《Cultivating Disciples to Breakthrough》


 Chapter 1: Xuan Hao

    <h4>Chapter 1: Xuan Hao</h4>


    "Elder Xuan the entrance examination for the new outer disciples is about to begin, would you like toe join the other elders this time around?"


    Within a quiet and majestic pavilion, Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes as he looked in the direction the voice came.


    "Sure, I''ll be there in a moment."


    After replying, Xuan Hao watched as the person standing in front of his pavilion quickly made his way down the peak it was situated on and soon disappeared into the distance.


    "Earth, Ewaria¡­"


    Xuan Hao let out a soft sigh when he thought about earth.


    He was not from this world. He was originally from another world, to be more precise, Earth.


    Transmigration. Something that he had only ever read about in fantasy novels and webnovels, happened to him.


    He even had his own system. The system which resided in his sea of consciousness at the moment was the ''cheat'' he got upon transmigrating here.


    "Elder Xuan¡­"


    Xuan Hao''s sect was called the Flying Sword Sect. The Flying Sword Sect was located in the northern region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Although it was not the strongest sect in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, it still had quiet some reputation and influence in the surrounding region.


    Overlord of the Northern Region. That was what people normally referred to the Flying Sword Sect.


    Even though it was considered the weakest of the four regions, it was still the fourth strongest sect in the Heavenly sky Kingdom.


    Xuan Hao was one of the core elders of the Flying Sword Sect.


    He was known as the youngest core elder in the recent history of the Flying Sword Sect. Having reached the Nascent Soul Realm at the young age of 21.


    He was currently the fifth nascent soul elder of the Flying Sword Sect.


    What was the Nascent Soul Realm?


    At the moment, the Flying Sword Sect only had five people at the Nascent Soul Realm. The sect master, vice sect master and two other elders excluding him.


    Xuan Hao felt a little bewildered when he found out his current status and it took him a few days to gather himself and recover from the shock of suddenly bing strong enough to level an entire city with a wave of his hand.


    Although most cultivation novels had people who reincarnated or transmigrated, most of them had to start from scratch and slowly climb their way up the pinnacle. Though there was still a few who started out way too strong...


    He was at the Nascent Soul Realm, an elder of arge sect, and an expert ranked among the top five in the entire sect¡­


    This was no ordinary starting point.


    Of course, Xuan Hao did not expect that to happen.


    The Nascent Soul Realm was an extremely powerful realm. In the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom, he could be considered as one the strongest people. Even the supreme expert from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, the ancestor of the imperial family, had only reached the peak of the ninth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Xuan Hao himself was a Stage one Nascent Soul Realm expert.


    This strength, however, was only considered strong within the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Outside of it, on the Ewaria continent, a kingdom like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom wasmon, you could not even count the exact number of these kingdoms, there were simply way too many of them out there!


    The Ewaria continent was split into four different regions. The North, South, West and East Regions. Each Region had hundreds of empires and each empire had hundreds of kingdoms like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom under it. The Heavenly Sky Kingdom was located in the southern region of the Ewaria continent.


    It was easy to imagine howrge the Ewaria continent was. Let alone whaty beyond it.


    On the Ewaria Continent, there was cultivation, and it was divided into Qi Condensation, Foundation Establishment, Core Formation and Nascent Soul.


    There were of course realms above Nascent Soul called the King Realm and the Emperor Realm. Each Realm was divided into nine stages also called the nine small realms.


    Of course, those realms were not something Xuan Hao could touch at the moment.


    Not to mention the Emperor Realm experts who were said to only appear in the stronger empires, Xuan Hao had never seen a King Realm expert before.


    The strongest person in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was after all still at the ninth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. The neighbouring kingdoms surrounding the Heavenly Sky Kingdom also did not have anyone who surpassed the Nascent Soul Realm


    A King Realm expert was considered strong, even on the whole of the Ewaria continent. A true expert who could start a kingdom by themselves and reign as a king.


    A person at the King Realm could easily destroy the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    To many people, a King Realm expert was a mythical existence. Even with the thousands of years behind the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, it still never had anyone reach the King Realm yet. At most one at half-step King Realm. Maybe someone had a breakthrough, but never revealed it and just ended up leaving the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Breaking through from the Nascent Soul realm and into the King Realm was terribly difficult.


    Of course, that was for other people. To Xuan Hao, who wanted to reach the pinnacle, the King Realm was just considered the beginning. Even the Emperor Realm was within reach.


    Smiling widely to himself, Xuan Hao entered his sea of consciousness and nced at a panel of characters that had appeared there.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Talent: ???


    Realm: Nascent Soul Stage 1


    Sect: Flying Sword Sect


    Disciples: N/A


    Main Quest: Any disciple reaches the Foundation Establishment realm.


    Main Quest Reward: ???


    Side Quest: Have a disciple with talent value of 10 or above.


    Quest Reward: [Cultivation Increase of 1 small realm], [Comprehending Sword Intent]


    The Rewards for the first main mission was mysterious and the second one was a side quest with generous rewards.


    The cultivation increase was nice, but the great thing was the sword intent.


    Sword intent was not some special move or anything like that but was rather a concept of sort.


    Those who couldprehend sword intent were all geniuses who had taken the first step towardsprehending the Dao of the Sword.


    Sword cultivators were extremely terrifying and could fight those several realms above themselves, that was how the Flying Sword Sect earned its ce as the overlord of the northern region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the first ce.


    Sword cultivators whoprehended sword intent were even more terrifying.


    However, even though the rewards were tempting, he first had toplete the quests.


    The first main quest required him to have a disciple reach the Foundation Establishment Realm, while the side quest required him to take in a disciple with talent a talent value of 10 or more.


    Both quests wanted him to be a teacher and take in disciples.


    "Haaah¡­"


    Letting out a slightly exhausted sigh, Xuan Hao got up from his meditative position.


    These two quests were the reason for him to join this years entrance examination for new outer disciples of the sect.


    "I hope that the uing entrance examination has someone suitable, hopefully someone who is quiet and well mannered."


    Xuan Hao honestly did not have much motivation when it came to teaching a bunch of young people. Even if he had the memory, fighting experience and feelings of the past Xuan Hao after merging together with him. Both of them, were quitezy. One wanted to just quietly spent his days meditating and increase his cultivation, while the other spent most of his time sitting down with a good cup of tea, reading a good book.


    He still wondered if he could be considered as the past Xuan Hao or a new Xuan Hao, as both of them had merged together during his transmigration.


    Throwing those thoughts to the back of his mind for now, Xuan Hao made his way towards the entrance of the sect, where the examination for new outer disciple would be held.

 Chapter 2: Qing Yi

    <h4>Chapter 2: Qing Yi</h4>


    Coming to the entrance of the sect, Xuan Hao was met with the sight of a bustling city spreading far into the horizon. This was the Flying Sword city. One of the many cities under the Flying Sword Sects direct management.


    "Hah¡­"


    Sighing a bit, Xuan Hao looked away from the bustling city and instead focused on the examination ground located a little away from the entrance to the sect.


    The examination ground was bustling with activity as children hade from all over the northern region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to try their luck at bing an outer disciple of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Xuan Hao mostly ignored the people present and instead directly made his way towards a pavilion located to overlook the entire examination ground. This was where the true experts of the sect were located.


    The two core elders, vice sect master and sect master were present there. The outer and inner elders were located a little more to the side, as most of them walked around the examination grounds to prepare the first round of tests.


    "Who is that?!"


    "I don''t know, but for him to enter the pavilion where the core elders are¡­ Maybe he''s a core disciple!?"


    "A core disciple?! No way!"


    All the children between the ages of twelve to eighteen were looking towards the pavilion, hoping that one of the powerful elders would notice them and take them as a personal disciple. Therefore, the sight of someone only a few years older than them entering the pavilion caused quite a stir in the young ones, as they quickly drew their own conclusion on who the mysterious youth was.


    "Everyone the first round of tests will begin shortly, report to the ce you were assigned upon entry into the examination grounds!"


    A loud voice echoed across the entire examination ground as the people talking quickly shut up and moved towards their designated area, both with anticipation and nervousness.


    Would they fail or jump over the dragon''s gate and ascend to a new high? All of it depended on how the next few tests went.


    ¡­


    "Elder Xuan, I didn''t expect you would be joining the examination this time. Looking to take in a disciple maybe?"


    The moment Xuan Hao entered the pavilion, he was blocked by a giant of man towering high above him.


    "Elder Wang, it''s been quite some time and yes, I''vee to see if I can find someone suitable to take in."


    Xuan Hao sighed internally as he answered.


    This person in front of him was called Wang Hu and was one of the two core elders of the Flying Sword Sect. A Nascent Soul expert.


    "Really!? You? Take in a disciple!?"


    "Yes, and I will go take seat as the first round of test are already starting."


    Not expecting the answer, Wang Hu blinked his eyes as he stared at Xuan Hao in surprise.


    "Haha, I see, I see... Guess it really is time for you to take in some disciples¡­"


    Listing to a few encouraging words, Xuan Hao quickly made his way towards the seating space of the pavilion and quickly greeted the rest of the upper echelons of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Namely, The Sect Master Feng Chen, a seventh stage Nascent Soul expert.


    The Vice Sect Master Zu Fei, a fifth stage Nascent Soul expert.


    The other core elder, Wang Lan, who was the brother of the second core elder Wang Hu. Both were at the third stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    To be honest Xuan Hao still found it surprising how big both of the Wang brothers were and could not help but think about whether or not they had the blood of giants flowing in them.


    Soon, the first round of tests began, and Xuan Hao spread out his divine sense to monitor the entire examination ground. Hoping to find a suitable disciple.


    Wang Hu and the others also stopped chatting and put all their focus on the examination ground. The children and young adults outside would after all be the new generation of outer disciples of the Flying Sword Sect.


    ¡­


    "Did you see that young man who entered the pavilion? I could not sense his cultivation, so he is most likely above the third stage of Core Formation! Our Fire bird city does not even have someone at the seventh stage of Core Formation, yet even the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect is at that level!"


    "Hehe, if I can be a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect, then in the future, I will also have the support of a Nascent Soul expert. When I return, even the family''s ancestors will have to be polite to me!"


    "It''s said that the Flying Sword Sects Master is not only at the peak of the seventh stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. He''s only a step away from the eighth stage."


    There were exmations of awe and admiration from the listing crowds upon hearing about how strong the Flying Sword Sects Sect Master was. In this world where martial arts were respected above all, experts were naturally sought after.


    "Not to mention the Sect master, there is still the Vice Sect Master and two Core Elders still at the Nascent Soul Realm."


    "I even heard rumours about the Flying Sword Sect recently adding a new Core Elder!"


    "How strong! If I could be a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect, then the n''s crisis would be easily resolved! Even though the ck Rose Sect is strong, the Flying Sword Sect is even stronger!"


    In the crowded examination grounds, a young girl who was about fifteen or sixteen years old starred intently towards the pavilion located in the centre of the examination grounds.


    The girl''s name was Qing Yi. She was the daughter of the head of the Qing n in Bright Sun City. The Qing n she was in was not a small n in Bright Sun City, it was one of the two great ns in Bright Sun City.


    Bright Sun City was a city located in southern part of the northern region. Although it was located in the northern region together with the Flying Sword Sect, the distance between the two was still quite far. It took Qing Yi and the other disciples of the Qing family nearly two months to reach the Flying Sword Sect from Bright Sun City.


    As the daughter of the current head of the Qing family, her status was naturally very noble and exalted.


    However, this honour and status was limited to Bright Sun City and the few cities and towns nearby.


    Qing Yi knew very well that her identity was still important in Bright Sun City. However, once she had left the sphere of influence that the Qing family had, she would be worth nothing much. No one would give her any face. Especially in the territory of the Flying Sword Sect, who had Nascent Soul experts holding down the fort.


    Thus, she had kept a low profile since the start of her journey, trying not to provoke any disasters.

 Chapter 3: Qing Family

    <h4>Chapter 3: Qing Family</h4>


    "Qing Chenyi, it''s all up to you to ensure that our Qing Family can survive the crisis we find ourselves stuck in. If you can enter the Flying Sword Sect, then Bai Li and the ck Rose Sect behind him won''t dare to do anything to our Qing Family!"


    Just a little behind Qing Yi stood an elderly man. Despite his looks, he was not weak. He was at the peak of the second stage Core Formation Realm, and the first elder of the Qing n. His position in the Qing n was only behind the current head of the Qing n, Qing Yi''s father.


    This time, he was in charge of leading the group of promising children from the Qing n to the Flying Sword Sect.


    The First Elder spoke, but he did not say those words to Qing Yi, the daughter of the n''s head. Instead, he said those words to a white-robed young man standing in the forefront of the group of Qing n children.


    Although Qing Yi''s status was the most noble and honourable among the disciples of the Qing Family, in terms of talent, she was far from the best of them. Even counting her among the top 10 of the children present would be a stretch.


    "First Elder, don''t worry. I will enter the Flying Sword Sect and get their support! With me entering the Flying Sword Sect, dealing with the ck Rose Sect will not be a problem for us at all! Instead of us worrying, it should be the Bai family worrying about themselves!"


    Qing Chenyi smiled. Not only was he the number one genius of the Qing Family, but he was also considered the number one genius of Bright Sun City. In his opinion, joining the Flying Sword Sect was a matter of course. Not difficult at all.


    Qing Yi pursed her lips when she heard this. The look in her eyes felt somewhat sad to onlookers.


    That''s right¡­ Qing Chenyi was the one who had the most hope of entering the Flying Sword Sect. Even the two others behind Qing Chenyi had quite a good chance of entering.


    ''I¡­''


    It had to be said that even though she was the sole daughter of the current n head, Qing Chenyi''s talent was way higher than hers.


    As the only child of the current family head, she did not manage to inherit her father''s outstanding talent and still enjoyed the family''s best resources. However, among the younger generation of the Qing family, she could not even rank amongst the top ten¡­ Talk about pathetic¡­


    It was not that she did not work hard. She had already worked extremely hard, maybe even harder than any of the others from the younger generation of the Qing n. From the beginning of her cultivation, she had never dared to rx in the slightest. However, the so-called talent wasn''t something that could be made up for by hard work¡­


    At her age, her father had already broken through to stage one of the foundation Establishment Realm.


    "Haha, You? Entering the Flying Sword Sect? Hahaha¡­ Qing Chenyi, are you and the Qing family even worthy of such a thing?"


    Right as the members of the Qing family were about to move towards the testing area of the examination grounds, a mocking voice sounded out just behind them. The Qing family''s people did not even need to turn around to know who it was.


    "What!? Bai Cheng, I''m not worthy? Are you? Get lost", Qing Chenyi turned around and coldly looked at the ck-robbed youth behind him.


    The young man''s name was Bai Cheng, from one of the two great ns of Bright Sun City. He was a member of the Bai family, and he was also one of their younger generations most brilliant talents. Definitely within the top three of the Bai family.


    In the past, Bai Cheng was stronger than Qing Chenyi and had even bullied him and other members of the Qing family from time to time, butter on, Qing Chenyi rose and suppressed him in both talent and strength.


    Whether it was his talent or his strength, Qing Chenyi was above him.


    "Heh, Qing Chenyi, what are you so proud of? When I enter the Flying Sword Sect, I willpletely surpass you easily. At the next year''s Bright Sun City Grand Competition, I will let you know that being in the lead for a moment means absolutely nothing. Haha, enjoy your ce as the number one in Bright Sun City while you can." Bai Cheng did not be angry upon hearing Qing Chenyi but continued tough.


    "Oh? I don''t know from which hole in the ground you popped up from. However, since you can enter, naturally I can as well." Qing Chenyi snored coldly. His talent was above Bai Cheng. If Bai Cheng could enter, so could he.


    "Then We''ll Wait and see. I''m looking forward to your expression when the examination ends. Hahaha¡­" Bai Chengughed and was about to walk off when he caught a ce of Qing Yi and suddenly stopped in his steps.


    "Yi, how is it? As long as you agree to marry me, then both the Bai and Qing family will be one big family. When I be a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect, I''ll ensure that your Qing family is safe and sound!"


    The matter of Bai Cheng''s love for Qing Yi was no secret in Bright Sun City. He had gone to the Qing family several times to propose already but had been rejected every time by Qing Yi''s father in a domineering manner. He had even been beaten up by him a few times.


    Qing Yi''s mother had passed away just after she was born. Her father only had one daughter, her. He would never force her to do anything she didn''t like. Let alone force her to marry someone from their rival family, the Bai family.


    Qing Yi shot a cold nce at Bai Cheng. She did not say anything. Instead, she looked at the pavilion in the middle of the examination grounds where the higher-ups of the Flying Sword Sect were located.


    It was because the appearance of a single person had attracted her attention.


    "Who is that?"


    "I saw him enter the pavilion earlier, maybe he was there to deliver a message to the higher-ups."


    "Eh? Who is he then? Not anyone can enter the pavilion, maybe a core disciple?!"


    This ''young man'' who had appeared only a little after he entered was naturally Xuan Hao.


    His appearance once again caused quite a stir in the examination grounds.


    However, what truly made people care about him was not that.


    Instead¡­ Xuan Hao stood beside Feng Chen!


    Who was Feng Chen?


    The Master of the Flying Sword Sect!


    Not just anyone had the right to stand beside him.


    Before Xuan Hao appeared, there were only three other people who did so and all of them were Nascent Soul Realm experts!


    Some people started questioning who Xuan Hao was.


    This young man¡­ Who was he?


    The son of the Flying Sword Sect''s Master?


    No, everyone knew that the Flying Sword Sect''s Master didn''t have a wife. Furthermore, thest person who mentioned anything about him marrying were called in for a meeting with the Vice Sect Master Zu Fei and mysteriously appeared beaten up somewhere in the outskirts of the city.


    Quite a few people shivered upon the thought of the Vice Sect Master Zu Fei.


    "Heh, You people are quite ignorant, right? This person is called Xuan Hao. Although he is young, he is a Core Elder of the Flying Sword Sect! A Nascent Soul Realm expert!"


    "Nascent Soul Realm? The same level as the Sect Master? He doesn''t seem that much older than me, how is it even possible to reach the Nascent Soul Realm at such a young age!?"


    "There''s nothing impossible. This Core Elder Xuan is indeed a Nascent Soul Realm expert. Not only is he one of the youngest core elders in the Flying Sword Sect''s history, but he''s also the youngest Nascent Soul Realm expert in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom." Another person reaffirmed.


    "How do you even know that in the first ce?" Some people still didn''t believe the im.


    "I naturally know that because my sister is an inner disciple of the Flying Sword Sect!" That person said proudly.


    Within the Flying Sword Sect, there were thousands upon thousands of disciples with distinct levels. The disciples were all divided into three levels, Outer disciples, Inner disciple and core disciple. For example, even if they entered the Flying Sword Sect after a series of selections, they were still only outer disciples. Apart from those lucky enough to be chosen by an elder to be personal disciples.


    The position of an inner disciple in the Flying Sword Sect was already rtively high.


    As expected, when this person revealed that his sister was already an inner disciple, a few gazes of envy and jealousy were immediately shot over.

 Chapter 4: Examination Starts!

    <h4>Chapter 4: Examination Starts!</h4>


    " He''s one of the core elders of the Flying Sword Sect, an expert at the Nascent Soul Realm."


    Qing Yi''s mouth opened slightly as she focused her eyes on Xuan Hao, she was shocked beyond belief upon listing to the chatter surrounding the young man walking besides the Sect Master.


    Around twenty years old? Already reached the Nascent Soul Realm?!


    "Everyone, since you''vee all the way here to join the examination of my Flying Sword Sect, I won''t waste anymore of your time. Now, I''ll announce that the Flying Sword Sect''s first round of examination will officially begin!" After briefly weing the younger generation, Feng Chen directly announced the start of the examinations first round.


    The first test was divided into two steps. Firstly, to test the bone age and making sure nobody over the age limit entered and secondly, cultivation.


    Those with a bone age less than eighteen and a cultivation level at the third stage of Qi Condensation directly entered the second stage of the examination.


    The first part was not difficult. Most of the people who could appear here agreed with the request and was tested.


    Children under the age of fourteen had a whole other set of tests they had to go through, so as to make it fair for them to be able to enter as well. After all, having a child the age of ten reach Qi Condensation stage three was a little too much to ask.


    The first part was not difficult and mostly served so as to separate the children from the young adults. The second part of the examination was the difficult one.


    The second part was the actual battle, where the ordinary would be removed and the extraordinary would shine brightly.


    At that time, those who managed to pass the first round of test would be led an outer elder of the Flying Sword Sect to a demon beast forest not too far away from the Flying Sword Sect for the true trail.


    The forest of demon beasts under the Flying Sword Sect was exceptionallyrge, but the demon beasts inside were not strong. Under the management of the Flying Sword Sect, the strongest was only at the 9th stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    After the participants entered the forest of demon beasts, every demon beast that they killed would be recorded by an elder. In the end, the elders of the Flying Sword Sect would rank all of them ording to how many demon beasts they managed to kill.


    In the end, the top 1000 people would be Outer Court Disciples of the Flying Sword Sect, the top 10 would be promoted directly to Inner Court Disciples if their performance was satisfactory.


    This, however, was not what caused most of the youths present to give their all. The most attractive part was to appeal to the higher-ups of the Flying Sword Sect and be epted as a personal disciple.


    Bing a personal disciple of any of the three core elders would be the same as ascending the heavens in a single step.


    It was also worth mentioning that it wasn''t just because one''s cultivation realm was higher than others, the higher one''s ranking would be. The second part of the examination was not about their cultivation realm, rather, it focused on evaluating the youths''bat strength and their ability to react to different and most certainly deadly encounters.


    Even if they were at the 3rd stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, if you could still not kill at least a few demon beasts that were above you in cultivation realm, you would most likely not be able to enter the top 1000.


    Simrly, if your cultivation base was high, but thebat strength you exerted did not match your cultivation base, then even if you were at the 6th stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, you might not end up in the top 1000.


    While the thousand spots did sound like quite a lot, people from all over the northern region of the Heavenly Sky kingdom had gathered for the examination.


    More than ten thousand people had gathered and were left for the second part of the examination. Meaning nine out of ten people would be eliminated.


    What the Flying Sword Sect used to test the bone age of the people present was a special kind of spirit tool called a talent tester, as it could measure a person''s cultivation base as well.


    This kind of tool wasn''t considered to be valuable, even Qing Yi''s n had a fewying around.


    After Feng Chen announced the beginning of the first test, the people in the examination ground began to test in an orderly manner.


    "Ying Lu, bone age 16, Qi Condensation Third Stage, Pass!"


    "Tao Tao? Bone age 17, Qi Condensation Fifth Stage, Pass!"


    "Yuan Meow, Bone age 19! Disqualified!"


    "Fang Fan, bone age 15, Qi Condensation Second Stage, Disqualified!"


    "Meng ¡­..."


    Most of the people who were able to appear here had a prior understanding of the Flying Sword Sect''s standards for epting disciples. Most of them had passed the test. Apart from a few who tried to cheat the system and squeeze in, most of them were qualified.


    Xuan Hao, who was located on a tform standing above the examination ground looked down at the group of little fellows in the examination ground.


    "hah¡­"


    Xuan Hao only wanted to sit quietly inside the pavilion and scout around with his divine sense to pick up a talent and bring him or her in as a disciple. Sadly, the two Wang brothers had other ideas for him and the moment they saw him spreading out his divine sense, they came up with a devious n.


    "Ah, this child Xuan Hao is still young and is going to pick his first disciple! Feng Chen, why don''t you take him with you for the start of the examination?"


    "Yes, yes! This way he will be able to see the new blood of the sect personally, it will definitely be easier to pick a disciple this way!"


    "Hmm¡­ Indeed, I also chose my first disciple this way. Xuan Hao, why don''t youe? If you just stay here you won''t be able to see the young ones personally."


    "¡­ Fine, I wille."


    Not even getting a chance to refuse, Xuan Hao was chased out of the pavilion and now stood quietly besides the Sect Master Feng Chen on the tform.


    "Sigh¡­"


    The first test had just begun, so Xuan Hao decided to throw the thoughts of the two scheming muscle heads aside and focus on trying to find a disciple.


    "Natural talent 4, no¡­."


    "Talent at 6, no."


    "Ah, someone with a talent of 9, why couldn''t you just have one more! Still not good enough and the fellow also looks like a troublesome type¡­"


    "Sigh¡­"


    Almost half of the first round of tests had passed, and Xuan Hao had still not found a person with 10 or more talent.


    Not to mention more than 10, the highest was still only at 9.


    "I''ve taken it for granted. Even within the Flying Sword Sect, Ling Song, who is know as the number one person in the younger generation only has a talent of 15" Xuan Hao shook his, and was slightly disappointed with the younger people trying to get into the Flying Sword Sect. It seemed like the side quest would probably be impossible if nobody with decent talent showed up.

 Chapter 5: Finding a Future Disciple

    <h4>Chapter 5: Finding a Future Disciple</h4>


    " Eh? That is!"


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to give up on the youths testing down below, he suddenly sensed something.


    It was a young girl with beautiful ck hair and brown eyes.


    What made Xuan Hao unable to move his gaze away from the young girl was the innate talent value disyed above her head!


    "Natural talent¡­ 37!"


    At first nce, Xuan Hao thought he was mistaken. Maybe he had just mixed two different people together allowing the talent values to ovep.


    But no, even after he continued to stare at the number above the young girl''s head, it still stayed there. Floating directly above her.


    A natural talent of 37!


    This aptitude for cultivating, was enormous!


    Even Ling Song, who was the number one genius of the Flying Sword Sect only had a natural talent of 15.


    "How strange, with a natural talent of 37, she''s still only at the fourth level of Qi Condensation? Ling Song had already advanced to the Foundation Establishment Realm when he was around her age, howe?"


    Xuan Hao frowned slightly. He didn''t understand how this could happen. A genius with a natural talent of 37 at the age of fifteen or sixteen, how could she still be stuck at the 4th stage of the Qi Condensation?


    It had to be said that even the fellow with a talent value of 9 was already at the 8th stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    "Wait a moment¡­"


    Suddenly, Xuan Hao noticed something that he didn''t see before. There was a line of words behind the young girl''s natural talent value.


    [Physique: (dormant) Bright Sun Divine Physique, Awakening method: Infernal Heart Grass (Spirit Grade)]


    There existed all sorts of physiques in this world. Those who possessed these blessed and divine physiques were all existences favoured by the heavens themselves. Cultivating the earlier stages would be as easy as eating and sleeping.


    Honestly, Xuan Hao felt a little envious when he thought about a peculiar physique, he had read about in the sect''s library.


    The physique was called the Immortal Dream Physique and the person who had it only needed to sleep to reach the peak¡­


    The one who had it was called the Immortal Dreamer and he reached the peak of Emperor Realm at the age of 150 by sleeping¡­ After that he disappeared from the Ewaria continent, most likely to surpass the Emperor Realm¡­


    Back to the unique thing called physiques or divine bodies.


    Some physiques were naturally activated from the moment a person was born, while others were in a dormant state. They needed some special items or method to awaken them. For example, the owner of the Bright Sun Divine Physique needed to consume the Infernal Heart Grass to activate the Bright Sun Divine Physique.


    However, the Infernal Heart Grass was not easy to find. Even a Nascent Soul expert like Xuan Hao would have a hard time getting his hands-on Infernal Heart Grass.


    Infernal Heart Grass was not too high-grade herb and was only considered a Spirit Grade herb. The ones to use spirit herbs were people at the Core Formation Realm. Not something a Nascent Soul expert should have a problem acquiring.


    Sadly, for Xuan Hao, it was extremely rare and hard to find due to the unique environment required for it to grow.


    "No mater what, I want this person!"


    It was not easy to finally find someone with a natural talent above 10, so how could Xuan Hao let her go over something like finding a rare herb?


    Originally, Xuan Hao wanted to directly rush down and take her in as his disciple, but after thinking about the arrogant and troublesome character with a talent of 9, Xuan Hao decided not to. He could do it after all the tests were over. He could use this period of time to properly observe her conduct and other aspects.


    Thest thing Xuan Hao wanted was a troublesome and arrogant disciple.


    On the other hand, this young girl who had been targeted by Xuan Hao a great Core Elder of the Flying Sword Sect, waspletely unaware at this moment.


    At this moment, she was nervously holding her small hands together while looking at the strange, yet familiar object in front of her.


    It was her turn to take the first test atst.


    Although she had already been tested in the n several times beforeing and already knew that she was qualified to pass the first tests, she was still nervous when faced with the real thing.


    "Yi''er, don''t be so nervous. You will pass the first tests. You''ve already been tested beforeing here." The one who spoke in calming voice as he gently patted Qing Yi''s shoulder was the First Elder of the Qing Family.


    It was Qing Yi''s turn. Before her, the Qing family''s number one genius, Qing Chenyi, had already gone up and tested. Bone age 17, 6th stage Qi Condensation.


    At this moment, Qing Chenyi was no longer as confident as he was before.


    With the test proceeding, he discovered that there were more than a few people who were at or above the fifth and sixth stage of Qi Condensation! He even spotted quite a few people at the seventh stage of Qi condensation!


    This immediately cause him to feel quite a big of pressure for the uing second test.


    Originally, he had been extremely confident that he would be able to enter the Flying Sword Sect and maybe even get into the top 10 and enter as an Inner Court Disciple. However, at this moment, his confidence from early hadpletely vanished.


    He discovered that many of the people present were not inferior to him in terms of talent and strength. Quite the opposite, some were far more superior than him.


    He truly felt like a frog at the bottom of a well, finally experiencing the real world.


    Even though he was the number one genius in bright Sun City, so what? Only a small unknown ce in the big Heavenly Sky Kingdom!


    Qing Yi waspletely unaware that the number one genius from her family n had a drastic change in emotions.


    At this moment, she arrived in front of the talent tester and nervously raised her hand before cing it on top of it.


    While Qing Yi was testing, Xuan Hao was also observing her with his divine sense. Looking at her appearance, Xuan Hao smiled a bit.


    ''This girl seems to be a little nervous''


    "Qing Yi, bone age 15, the fourth stage of Qi Condensation, qualified!"


    Hearing this, not even the slightest bit of joy made its way unto Qing Yi''s face.


    Even though she had passed the first test, she discovered how strong the people around her were.


    Those with a bone age of not more than eighteen and cultivation of at least forth stage of Qi Condensation were somon. No, it would be easier to say that only the ones considered among the children were below the fourth stage of Qi Condensation.


    How hard would the uing second round of examination be?

 Chapter 6: Dwindling Hope of the Qing Family

    <h4>Chapter 6: Dwindling Hope of the Qing Family</h4>


    Previously Qing Yi had thought that a genius like Qing Chenyi was already extremely rare and talented. Reaching the 6th stage of Qi Condensation at the age of 17, in the entire Bright Sun City. Only Bai Fei was able to pose a slight threat to his position as number one.


    But even with that, he was still undoubtedly the number one genius in Bright Sun City.


    However, when the first tests finally began, Qing Yi slowly discovered that there were quite arge number of ''geniuses'' like Qing Chenyi! There was even quite a number of people far above him in terms of talent!


    It was only at this moment Qing Yi realized how tiny her previous horizons had been, truly a frog at the bottom of the well¡­


    Qing Yi started to understand why, some elders in the n had always said that Qing Chenyi''s talent was not bad in Bright Sun City, but after leaving Bright Sun City, it wasn''t much. Back then, quite a few of the members of the younger generation in the Qing family thought that their elders were afraid that Qing Chenyi would grow arrogant and deliberately said this.


    But now, Qing Yi, Qing Chenyi and the other younger generation members brought along for the entrance examination, realized that those words of their elders were truly not exaggerated at all. They were simply the truth!


    "Wen Lu, bone age 16, Qi Condensation eighth stage!"


    Amotion broke out from a nearby testing tform upon hearing what one of the elders doing the testing said.


    It turned out that another strong youth with a cultivation of 8th stage Qi Condensation had appeared there, and his bone age was only sixteen!


    Qing Chenyi''s body shook a bit upon hearing the announcement and clenched his fists as he red over at the person one year younger than him, worst of all, that younger person had a cultivation far above his!


    Today, he was the one who had suffered the greatest blow, his confidence reached an all-time low.


    Genius?


    Compared to some of the people present here, was he, still considered a genius?


    Back in Bright Sun City, he was the undisputed number one genius. Praised by both the younger and older generation.


    However, at this moment, his talent was only a bit above average and even that would be a bit of a stretch. The huge gap made it a little difficult for him to ept the sudden change in status.


    From the undisputed number one to an ordinary person.


    The other disciples of the Qing family were not faring any better.


    If even the Qing family''s number one genius was worth nothing here, what were they¡­?


    Seeing the depressed state of the Qing family disciples, the first elder sighed a little, but decided not to say anything.


    Only after walking out of Bright Sun City would they realize how insignificant they were. Even Qing Chenyi, was nothing much¡­


    These words were not only for Qing Chenyi, Qing Yi, and the other disciples of the Qing family. Even the first elder himself suddenly felt really small in an excessively big world full of unknowns.


    Ayer of haze slowly started to engulf the hearts of the Qing Family.


    Previously, they had a blind belief in Qing Chenyi and that he would enter the Flying Sword Sect without any problems at all. Now, however, things would not be as easy.


    The appearance of geniuses that were way more monstrous than Qing Chenyi didn''t help the situation at all as the possibility of Qing Chenyi entering the Flying Sword Sect looked bleaker than ever.


    The Qing family crisis weighing on their mind didn''t help either as all the members of the Qing family worriedly looked in the direction of Qing Chenyi.


    Qing Chenyi, could he enter the final top 1000? If not¡­ Then what would happen to the Qing family?


    If no one from the Qing family managed to be a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect, then the moment that the Bai family got anyone from the ck Rose Sect over to the Bright Sun City would be the end of the Qing family. Their day of destruction!


    Bright Sun City had many different powers, and among them, the two great ns, Qing and Bai, were both well respected.


    Among the two great ns, the Qing n was the strongest, followed by the Bai n.


    The Qing and Bai n were in opposition. They had umted grudges for a long time now, and both of them were constantly fighting each other for control over the city.


    It had reached a point where they couldn''t resolve it simply by negotiating any longer and a war between the two were inevitable.


    The Qing family''s overall strength was above that of the Bai Family, so in recent years, the Bait family resulted to a lot of underhand tactics to try and gain an advantage.


    Originally, the Qing family had thought that under such circumstances, it would be difficult for the two sides to gain an advantage over the other in a short period of time. However, they didn''t expect that something unexpected would happen.


    Not long ago, a piece of new arrived and it blew up in the Bright Sun City. Bai Fei, the number one genius of the Bai family, had entered the ck Rose Sect. Not only that, but he was also epted as a personal disciple of the current Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect!


    An expert at the Nascent Soul Realm!


    In that instant, the Qing family was put at an absolute disadvantage.


    The ck Rose Sect was arge sect in the northern region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Although it wasn''t as powerful as the Flying Sword Sect, the overlord of the northern region, it still had a few Nascent Soul experts overseeing it.


    Not to mention the other Nascent Soul experts, even Bai Fei''s master alone, a Nascet Soul Realm expert was not something that the Qing family could contend against.


    Qing Yang the current head of the Qing family was the strongest expert of Bright Sun City and he was only at the fifth stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    To put it more bluntly, a Nascent Soul Realm expert could easily uproot the entire Qing Family.


    Even worse, the Bai n spread news that Bai Fei would return to Bright sun City to participate in the annual Bright Sun City Grand Competition. When he came back, his master would follow him as well.


    This was a true disaster for the Qing n. All they could do, was hope that they could gain the support of the Flying Sword Sect. Only then would they be safe from the Bai family.


    However, as more time passed, more and more geniuses appeared and their hope of entering the Flying Sword Sect slowly grew dimmer and dimmer.

 Chapter 7: Start of the Second Test

    <h4>Chapter 7: Start of the Second Test</h4>


    Time passed minute by minute, and after another 30 minutes the first test finally came to an end.


    Other than Qing Yi, Xuan Hao did not mange to spot anyone else with 10 or more talent. On the other hand, there were a few others who had a talent value of 9. Xuan Hao thought to himself that maybe the talent value of 10 was a different dimension from the 9. Maybe an overall change in quality of the talent?


    Xuan Hao honestly had no clue.


    Originally, other than Qing Yi, Xuan Hao had wanted to take in a few other disciples as well. After all, being the only disciple of him would probably be quite boring and having a few junior or senior sisters and brothers would most likely make it more interesting.


    However, after a period of observation, Xuan Hao had dispelled this thought. The people who had a decent talent value at nine were all arrogant and were somewhat displeasing.


    Such people would just end up being a bad influence!


    The first round of tests had ended.


    Of the more than ten thousand people who showed up, only a little over seven hundred people ended up being disqualified. The remaining people were all qualified!


    The most dazzling among them was none other than a young man called Wen Lu.


    Bone age 16, Qi Condensation Eighth stage! Even some of the Inner Elders of the Flying Sword Sect started getting excited.


    Although the second stage had not started yet, with Wen Lu''s talent, entering the Flying Sword Sect was not really troublesome.


    Some of the inner elders would most likely take him in as a disciple, allowing him to be a personal disciple of an inner elder. It had to be remembered, even the weakest inner court elder of the Flying Sword Sect was an eight stage Core Formation expert. Not weak in any way!


    Many envious gazes also focused on Wen Lu for this reason.


    The little fellow Xuan Hao set his eyes on was no exception either.


    "Ah¡­ This is the difference between normal people and geniuses. All of us will have to fight for the one thousand spots. That Wen Lu fellow on the other hand, even if he doesn''t participate in the second test, he would still have a few elders willing to take him in as a personal disciple and enter the Flying Sword Sect!" A disciple of the Qing family couldn''t help butment about the unfairness of the world.


    The First Elder heard this and frowned, "Talent is something you are born with, things like that can''t be envied. One''s path of cultivation does not mean everything. I hope you can understand. I''m sure all of you heard the tale of how the Heavenly Sky Kingdom came to be. The founder of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had a talent inferior to yours, but what was the result? He ended up bing an expert at half-step King Realm!"


    The First Elder''s words cause the originally dejected disciple of the Qing family to be motivated again. Even a few nearby youths heard the First Elders words and started to be more motivated for the second test.


    That''s right!


    It was said that the founder of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was the bottom of the pile, but in the end, he became a half-step King Realm expert. It also had to be known that a half-step King Realm expert was widely different from a Nascent Soul Realm expert.


    A single half-step King Realm expert was only a single step away from reaching the legendary king realm! Even a single attack of theirs could easily kill most ninth stage Nascent Soul Realm experts. It was even rumoured that a half-step King Realm expert could defend against a few attacks from a true King Realm expert!


    A King Realm expert! Someone who could easily wipe out the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and its neighbouring kingdoms with ease.


    From that one could see how strong the founder of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was! From that, one could see that talent didn''t mean anything! Hard work would always pay off in the end!


    If Xuan Hao heard what this first elder said, he would probably erupt out inughter. No talent? Bottom of the pile? The founder of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was none of that, he was even someone who awakened a divine physique! How could someone like that be called talentless?


    Luckily for the now hopeful disciples of the Qing family and nearby youths, Xuan Hao was not listening to what the first elder was talking about.


    After all, the first tests had just finished, and the second part of the examination was about to begin.


    Under the leadership of the elders from the Flying Sword Sect, over ten thousand qualified people set off to the Demon Beast Forest, located close by the Flying Sword Sect.


    When the people had left with the elders from the sect, Xuan Hao and the other could see the situation of all the participants in the Demon Beast Forest through a giant floating projection that had manifested in the centre of the examination ground.


    The projection was manifested by the Sect Master Feng Chen and a formation set up beforehand.


    Within the giant projection screen, there were more than ten thousand small screens. Each of the participants upied a small screen. Through this projection, the higher-ups of the Flying Sword Sect could see the entire journey of the participants as they walked through the Demon Beast Forest.


    Other than a few elders who remained at the Demon Beast Forest to ensure the participants safety, most of them had returned and were recording down what each of the participants did and graded them ordingly.


    Xuan Hao''s gaze drifted between a few participants, but mostly focused on Qing Yi, as she was the only one, he was concerned about.


    Xuan Hao even spread his divine sense all the way to the Demon Beast Forest so he could observe her more easily and also make sure that no danger happened to her.


    Xuan Hao hoped that nobody else would take any interest in Qing Yi, as she was the disciple that he had chosen to take in.


    But such concerns were close to negligible as most of them ignored her. After all she just had normal talent and was only at the Qi Condensation stage four. Not anything special in the Flying Sword Sect.

 Chapter 8: The Demon Beast Forest

    <h4>Chapter 8: The Demon Beast Forest</h4>


    " That Wen Lu isn''t too bad, He''s already at the peak of the eighth stage of Qi Condensation. Even when fighting an early ninth stage Qi Condensation demon beast alone, he can still beat them without too much difficulty. He can be considered among the best talents this year!"


    The one who spoke was an Inner Court Elder, even though there were a few other people who had reached the eighth stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, Wen Lu was by far the one who did the best so far.


    "Indeed. Inparison, that Feng Li fellow is a bit inferior. Originally, I thought that even if his talent weren''t at the same level as Wen Lu, it wouldn''t be so far off. Now however, it seems like I had overestimated him. He''s already at the peak of the eighth stage of Qi Condensation, yet he''s struggling so hard against an early eighth stage Qi Condensation demon beast!"


    Besides Xuan Hao, Feng Chen shook his head and looked at a green-clothed young man on one of the small floating screens with a sense of disappointment.


    At this moment, the young man in question was being chased down by two early eighth stage Qi Condensation demon beasts, and to call his appearance miserable would be an understatement¡­


    "Heh, this Feng Li most likely relied on medicinal pills to reach his current realm. At the same stage, anyone could beat him with ease¡­" Xuan Hao said as he also cast a disappointed look towards the green-clothed young man on the small screen.


    No matter what, someone who had just relied on medicinal pills to boost his cultivation would not be able to easily enter the Flying Sword Sect. Feng Li, even though he had reached the peak of the eighth stage would most likely not be ranked within the top 1000 to enter the sect!


    The first test only measured the participants cultivation bases and bone age. There was no real test to their abilities.


    But the second test was different from the first.


    The ''geniuses'' that had used a ton of medicinal pills to boost their cultivation were revealed immediately.


    Xuan Hao did not bother with these people and instead focused his attention back onto Qing Yi.


    Other than Xuan Hao, no other higher-ups from the Flying Sword Sect would focus their attention on her. They merely nced by her and did not stop to stare.


    To be certain, she would most likely not be among the 1000 spotster on.


    However, Xuan Hao didn''t expect her to pass the second test either. Before her Bright Sun Divine Physique awakened, her talents were as average as can be among the ten thousand people present in the second test.


    Back to before the start of the second test, Qing Yi was nervously looking at the giant forest looming directly in front of her.


    This was the Demon Beast Forest of the Flying Sword Sect! There were demon beasts ranging between the first and ninth stage of the Qi Condensation Realm!


    Just the possibility of running into a ninth stage Qi Condensation demon beast made Qing Yi feel afraid.


    "All of you will enter now, you are not allowed to group and should try to hunt as many demon beasts you can before the time runs out! Demon beasts are, as all of you know, only at the Qi Condensation Realm here. Therefore, there is not much danger to any of you!"


    The elder of the Flying Sword Sect who had led the Qing family disciples and some other participants told them before starting to walk back towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Ah, remember! The further in you go, the stronger the demon beasts be! Now off you go, hurry and hunt as many demon beasts you can. The stronger, the more points you get."


    Just before the elder disappeared into the distance, the group of youths heard his voice reminding them that the second test had already started.


    "Ah! Got to hurry, if not, my chances of entering the Flying Sword Sect will be gone!"


    "Demon Beast Forest? Here Ie, hopefully there is enough demon beasts for me!


    "Look, the other groups have already entered the Demon Beast Forest!? We got to hurry up as well!"


    Soon, both the youths from the Qing family and the extras, disappeared into the Demon Beast Forest. Only Qing Yi was left behind starring at the Demon Beast Forest.


    Unsheathing her sword, Qing Yi looked at it to make sure it was in the best possible condition before she clenched her hand around the handle.


    Taking a deep breath, she finally headed into the Demon Beast Forest.


    Qing Yi slowly made her way through the thick foliage of the forest and was cautiously looking to her side from time to time. Making sure no demon beast sneaked close to her without noticing.


    "ROAR"


    After what seemed like a few minutes, a roar resounded close by and Qing Yi quickly tensed up and the grip on her sword strengthened as she prepared for the inevitable battle.


    Soon, the origin of the roar appeared in front of her.


    A giant cat shaped demon beast, it gave off a savage aura filled with bloodlust and a will to fight. The sharp teeth of the demon beast were more than enough to intimidate Qing Yi. A peak second stage Qi Condensation demon beast!


    The cat like demon beast also spotted Qing Yi and started cautiously approaching her.


    Qing Yi gripped her sword even harder in her hands as she decided to make the first move towards the demon beast.


    Swoosh


    She raised her hand, and the silver-coloured sword flew out!


    The silver sword wasn''t fast! However, the demon beast didn''t dare to underestimate it as it quickly made a move to dodge the sudden attack.


    The demon beast however did not manage topletely dodge the attack, as the sword suddenly elerated and stabbed into one of the demon beasts'' four legs.


    "Roar!"


    Letting out an angry roar, the demon beast tried to retreat, but Qing Yi struck once again.


    Directly piercing through the head of the demon beast, killing it.


    "Hah¡­ Hah¡­."


    Laying down exhaustedly, Qing Yi did not look happy at all.


    She had used a lot of her qi for those two earlier attacks and only barely managed to kill the demon beast by catching it off guard.


    This was only a stage two Qi Condensation Realm demon beast!


    How was she supposed to kill anything stronger than this and enter the top 1000 and be a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect?


    "Sigh¡­"


    Letting out a slightly depressed sigh, Qing Yi quickly stood up again.


    She would not let this stop her! She would definitely enter the top 1000 and be a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect! That way, her father and family would be safe from the Bai n and ck Rose Sect as well.

 Chapter 9: Rankings for the Second Test

    <h4>Chapter 9: Rankings for the Second Test</h4>


    Time was fleeting and Qing did her best to kill as many demon beasts as possible. She even went deeper into the Demon Beast Forest and managed to kill a demon beast at the peak third stage Qi Condensation Realm. This result could overall be considered average among the participants and did not even put her close to the top 1000.


    One must know that Qing Yi''s cultivation was at the fourth stage of Qi Condensation! At the fourth stage of Qi Condensation, she had only managed to kill a single peak third stage Qi Condensation demonic beast. This result was indeed poor as she didn''t even manage to kill a demon beast at the same stage as herself.


    The moment she walked out of the Demon Beast Forest; Qing Yi shakenly sat down on the ground as her little face slowly turned pale.


    She did not expect that the demon beasts in the Demon Beast Forest would be so terrifying. Fighting back at the brink of death, savage and murderous. Compared to the battles she went through today, what she had done in the past seemed like aplete joke.


    Although the results from the final test had not yete out, Qing Yi was almost certain that she would not be able to enter the list of one thousand people qualified to enter the Flying Sword Sect.


    Afterall, she failed at killing something at the same cultivation realm as herself, it was only barely that she managed to even kill a demon beast at the peak of the third stage.


    Behind her, Qing Chenyi was also pale as he walked out of the Demon Beast Forest.


    His performance in the Demon Beast Forest had been no better than Qing Yi''s.


    Although the number of demon beasts that he killed far surpassed Qing Yi. The level of the demon beasts was only around the fourth and fifth stage of the Qi Condensation Realm. All of them were below the sixth stage of Qi Condensation!


    It was not that he did not manage to find any sixth stage demon beasts, on the other hand, he encountered quite a few of them.


    At first, he had tried to fight them, but he was instantly suppressed as soon as the fight began, and he was forced to run away.


    It wasn''t that Qing Chenyi and Qing Yi hadn''t fought against demon beasts before. Within the Bright Sun City, there were several captive demon beasts whom the elders of the family had caught for training the younger generation.


    Their strengths were all different, ranging from the third to the ninth stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Normally, the younger generations of the Qing family were frequently tasked with fighting the demon beasts captured by their elders, with the purpose of them training their actualbat experience.


    Originally, most of the Qing family disciple had thought that the demon beast in the Demon Beast Forest were around the same level of strength as the demon beast back in the n. However, most of them found out after the first exchange how different the demon beasts of the Demon Beast Forest were.


    The demon beasts in the Demon Beast Forest were wild, savage and bloodthirsty, while the ones in the Qing family were tame house pets.


    Not much of a difference in strength?


    It was like the difference between day and night!


    The demon beasts that the Qing family raised were also at the sixth stage of Qi Condensation. Qing Chenyi could easily defeat five or more alone!


    However, any of the sixth stage Qi Condensation demon beasts that he encountered in the Demon Beast Forest could easily beat him.


    At this moment, Qing Chenyi finally understood that there was a stark difference in demon beasts that were also at the sixth stage of Qi Condensation, just the demon beasts inside the forest were more than enough for him to realize how weak the demon beasts that his Qing family raised was.


    "Done with your thoughtsd? The rankings will be out in a moment, follow me back to the examination grounds." Qing Chenyi turned around and looked at the elder from the Flying Sword Sect who had appeared behind him at some moment.


    Nodding his head weakly, Chenyi looked at the other disciples from the Qing family and let out a sigh.


    Hopefully, he would be able to get in¡­ If not¡­ Qing Chenyi did not dare let his thoughts wander as he quickly followed behind the elder from the Flying Sword Sect.


    After the Second round of the test waspleted, the huge screen that previously had the contestants on it was reced by a giant ranking screen. On the screen, the results of all the participants in the second test were counted.


    Among them was Wen Lu!


    At the first stage, Wen Lu was ranked first with his bone age at 16 and a cultivation already at the 8th stage of Qi Condensation. During this second test, Wen Lu did not disappoint and was still first ce!


    Looking at the battle aplishments disyed on the big screen, Qing Yi and the other Qing disciples were shocked. Qing Chenyi was even shocked to the point that he couldn''t speak.


    Wen Lu: 1st ce, Achievements: 2 ninth stage Qi Condensation and 7 eighth stage Qi Condensation demon beasts!


    Wen Lu''s cultivation base was only at the eighth stage of Qi Condensation. However, two demon beasts who surpassed the eighth stage and had already reached the peak of the Qi Condensation Realm, the ninth stage, had died in his hands!


    They were above his cultivation realm!


    Qing Yi and the other Qing family disciple knew very well how terrifying those demon beasts from the Demon Beast Forest were. Not to mention crossing smaller realms to kill one, it was difficult to defeat one at the same stage, let alone kill them.


    As for Wen Lu, not only had he killed seven demon beasts at the same cultivation realm as himself, but he had also managed to kill two demon beasts one minor realm above himself.


    Below Wen Lu was a man named Long Li.


    Although Long Li was not as impressive as Wen Lu, he had still managed to kill a demon beast with a cultivation higher than himself!


    Qing Yi''s gaze continuously shifted downwards. Soon she found Qing Chenyi.


    Qing Chenyi: 2854 ce, Achievements: 2 fifth stage and 6 fourth stage demon beasts.


    On the other side, Qing Chenyi also saw his ranking.


    Although Qing Chenyi had expected it, he hadn''t expected that he would be ranked as low as the bottom of two thousand¡­


    Qing Chenyi also looked at the ranking of Bai Cheng. It was over 7000, even lower than him. For some reason, after seeing Bai Cheng''s ranking Qing Chenyi heaved a sigh of relief.


    Fortunately, that fellow from the Bai family did not enter and was ranked below him.


    Qing Yi let out a sad sigh as she finally found her own ranking at the bottom of the screen.


    Qing Yi: 9796 ce, Achievements: 1 third stage demon beast.


    Was her Qing family destined to not enter the Flying Sword Sect¡­?

 Chapter 10: New Disciples of the Flying Sword Sect

    <h4>Chapter 10: New Disciples of the Flying Sword Sect</h4>


    " The second test of the examination has beenpleted. Those ranked in the top one thousand will be official outer court disciples of our Flying Sword Sect." An elder of the Flying Sword Sect who was at the peak of the Core Formation Realm took a step forward and loudly proimed the end of this years examination.


    "I¡­ I am a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect! I-I will have to tell my family!"


    "Sigh¡­ It is over. To enter the Flying Sword Sect, I spent countless resources of the family in the past few years. In the end¡­ I failed to enter¡­"


    "To think I wouldn''t even be among the top ten thousand¡­ Maybe I should just drop cultivation and start up a small farm somewhere¡­"


    The Examination ground was suddenly extremely noisy after the rankings came out. The people on the list of the top 1000 were naturally extremely excited. With simple words like Flying Sword Sect Disciple, when they returned back home, they would receive the attention of countless people''s admiration and envy.


    Even some powers stronger than them would not dare to do anything to them because of the Flying Sword Sect standing behind them! Even the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms royal family treated the Flying Sword Sect respectfully, let alone the rest of the powers in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Those who had no been selected were filled with all kinds of mixed feelings as they stared at the giant ranking screen floating up in the air. Highlighting their failure for all to see.


    Among the one who failed the second test, there was nock of geniuses that had been nurtured by their ns and families with the assistance of countless resources. When they returned back to their n or families, one could easily imagine how disappointed the n or family would be towards them after their return.


    The resources they had used up were useless and most of the geniuses who failed, had made quite a few enemies back home to get their hands on those precious resources¡­


    However, no matter what they did, the second round of the test had officially ended and there was nothing they could do about that other than me themselves for their own ipetence.


    "Other than those ranked among the top on thousand, there are also some other people! Although they are not in the top one thousand, each of your performances has been seen by the elders of the Flying Sword Sect. Next, I''ll be calling out the names of those chosen by the elders. But before that, I want to congratte the ones within the top one thousand on bing disciple of our sect!"


    The elder of the Flying Sword Sect, who had stepped out to announce the end of the second test spoke up again.


    His words were like a thunderp, as countless people who failed to rank among the top one thousand once again lit up with hope.


    Even though the trace of hope was extremely slim, it still existed!


    As all eyes focused on the elder of the Flying Sword Sect, he slowly began reciting the names of those chosen as personal disciples by an elder of the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Yi Feng, Sikong Jia, Leng Yidan, Hou Tza..."


    Following this, the elder from the Flying Sword Sect named more than ten people, and those who were named all had an overjoyed smile stered on their face. They originally thought that they didn''t have any hope to enter the Flying Sword Sect, but now¡­


    Life was truly full of ups and downs, going from an all-time low to an all-time high in moments.


    Qing Chenyi, who was located somewhere in the examination ground clenched his fists tightly as he looked up at the elder reciting the names of those who an elder chose to enter the sect. Maybe they could even be personal disciples of the elder!


    Qing Chenyi sincerely wished that his name would appear in the elder''s mouth next.


    "Bai Cheng"


    Just as Qing Chenyi focused his attention on the elder, filled with endless anticipation, the name that he had uttered caused Qing Chenyi to be shocked still and he quickly turned around and looked straight at Bai Cheng, who was not far away from him.


    "Bai Cheng!? How is that possible! I''m far better than him!"


    When Qing Chen Yi looked over at Bai Cheng, Bai Cheng''s gaze also shot over a provoking look.


    Bai Cheng did not seem surprised at all when his name was called, it was as if he had already expected for it to happen.


    "How is it? I''ve already said that I would enter the Flying Sword Sect."


    Bai Cheng chuckled as he looked at the still shocked Qing Chenyi.


    Back in Bright Sun City, Qing Chenyi had suppressed him. When others spoke of him it was mostly to denounce him as a bully or yboy, while Qing Chenyi was the number one genius.


    But at this moment, what was Qing Chenyi, the so-called genius?


    In the future, he would surpass Qing Chenyi and the gap would only growrger after he entered the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Yi, what do you think? If you agree to marry me, I can help your Qing family. Even though the ck Rose Sect is strong it is nothingpared to the Flying Sword Sect. Do you know why even though I was ranked so low, yet I was still able to enter the Flying Sword Sect? This is because our Bai family and an elder of the Flying Sword Sect are old acquaintances!"


    "As long as you agree, I can invite this elder to help your Qing family resolve its crisis and help meditate the matters between the Qing family and the Bai family."


    "So, you entered the Flying Sword Sect through a back door?" Qing Chenyi secretly heaved a sigh of relief inside and snored coldly.


    At least he entered the Flying Sword Sect through a backdoor and not because he was better than him!


    "So what? Why don''t you give it a try and see if you can enter the Flying Sword Sect?" Bai Cheng ignored Qing Chenyi. His attention was focused on Qing Yi, waiting for her answer.


    "I¡­" Qing Yi didn''t know what to do, she know that her decision would most likely affect the Qing family''s survival.


    Even though she knew that even if she refused, no one would say anything, she still hesitated.


    To be honest, she did not like Bai Cheng at all. In the past, Qing Yi would not even have bothered with a random like him.


    But now¡­


    Perhaps he, no, the elder of the Flying Sword Sect and the Flying Sword Sect behind him would be the only lifesaving grace left for the Qing family.


    "I..."


    "Qing Yi!"


    Just as Qing Yi was about to speak up, the Flying Sword Sect elder who was announcing the names on the stage called out her name.


    "Eh?!"


    As soon as his voice had rung out, Bai Cheng, Qing Chenyi and the other members of the Qing family''s younger generation and even the First Elder were stunned.


    Bai Cheng''s ranking was low. He had even admitted that the reason why he could be selected was that his Bai family knew an elder of the Flying Sword Sect.


    But the Qing family didn''t have any acquaintances in the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Qing Yi opened her mouth as her little head started buzzing.


    Her name¡­ Was it called?


    How could this be¡­


    Her performance was ranked amongst the bottom, even lower than Bai Cheng¡­


    "Sorry, I refuse."


    After quickly calming herself down, Qing Yi smiled slightly as she immediately rejected Bai Cheng''s proposal.

 Chapter 11: First Disciple

    <h4>Chapter 11: First Disciple</h4>


    " Impossible! Why did she get chosen? How could she even enter in the first ce?!"


    Bai Cheng was rendered speechless when he heard the elder from the Flying Sword Sect call out Qing Yi''s name, he knew how difficult it would be to enter the Flying Sword Sect. In reality, even though the Bai n and an elder of the Flying Sword Sect were old acquaintances, the only reason why he was able to enter the Flying Sword Sect was because that elder owed the n a favor.


    The Bai family had been reluctant to use this favor for so many years because they knew that once it was used, it would disappear forever.


    To be honest, Bai Cheng was going overboard when he bragged about asking the elder from the Flying Sword Sect to stand up for the Qing family. Bai Cheng had managed to enter the Flying Sword Sect and the elders favor had already been returned. From then on, the elder of the Flying Sword Sect no longer had any rtionship left with the Bai family.


    The reason why he even dared to say he would take over the matter of the Qing family was because he felt that with the status as a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect, he alone would be more than enough to settle it.


    "Is there a problem with whom I choose as a disciple?" A soft voice resounded in Bai Cheng''s ears.


    "Who?!" Bai Cheng was shocked and immediately turned around to see who it was.


    Upon turning around, Bai Cheng was shocked as he noticed who it was, it was Xuan Hao, the person who stood besides the Sect Master earlier on during the start of the examination.


    The pressure that Bai Cheng felt was unimaginable as he finally knew who had chosen Qing Yi as a disciple.


    A Nascent Soul expert!


    Moreover, it was the one who had just barely reached the age of 21. Xuan Hao, 21 years old, Nascent Soul expert. Just this alone was enough to make all the geniuses present feel inferior.


    Qing Yi, herself also felt a sudden rush of happiness when she realized who had taken her in as a disciple. A Nascent Soul expert! With such a strong backing, her Qing family would definitely be safe. After all, even the ck Rose sect behind the Bai family only had a single Nascent Soul expert at the first stage.


    The surrounding youths also turned to look at Qing Yi with envy, if they could get a Nascent Soul expert as backing, they would reach the heaven in a single step. After all, even if they entered the Flying Sword Sect, there was still a difference between an outer court disciple and a personal disciple of a Nascent Soul expert.


    One was at the top of the Flying Sword Sect while the other was at the bottom!


    "Qing Yi, would you like to follow me back to the Flying Sword Sect to officially sign you in? Your family can just stay and wait here in the examination ground if they want to, it won''t take more than an hour or two."


    Xuan Haopletely ignored Bai Cheng an instead focused on Qing Yi as he patiently waited for her to answer.


    Xuan Hao had told the Sect Master about him choosing Qing Yi as a disciple earlier, and although he had been quite surprised as to why Xuan Hao had chosen such an average person as his first disciple, he still chose to just agree with him.


    After all, choosing someone average as his first disciple was also considered fine. He could learn how to teach disciples first before taking in some more talented disciples.


    Thinking like this the sect master had informed the elder announcing the disciple chosen by the elders of the sect and the rest is history.


    "O-of course!" Stuttering a bit due to nervousness, Qing Yi beamed in joy as she quickly made her way over and stood besides Xuan Hao. Not forgetting to cast a cheeky smile in the direction of Bai Cheng, who was still frozen in shock at the moment.


    Qing Chenyi and the Qing family disciples were no better than Bai Cheng and were shocked speechless by how Qing Yi managed to enter the Flying Sword Sect, she even got a master at the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "A-amazing! To think Qing Yi managed to get a core elder from the Flying Sword Sect as her master!"


    "I wonder why she got taken in as a disciple in the first ce. She is not more talented than us, let alone Chenyi!"


    "Maybe the elder could see something we could not, he is after all a Nascent Soul expert¡­"


    "Indeed¡­"


    As the disciple from the Qing family slowly woke up from their shocked state, they started to discuss among themselves how Qing Yi managed to enter the Flying Sword Sect.


    "How¡­?"


    Qing Chenyi felt a mix of emotions as he looked in the direction Qing Yi had disappeared to.


    He clearly felt he was superior to Qing Yi, who, even though she was the n head''s daughter, was still so weak. Be it cultivation or talent, he was superior to Qing Yi!


    But now what? An elder from the Flying Sword Sect had chosen her over him! And it was even a Nascent Soul Realm core elder!


    "Our Qing n is finally safe!"


    Compared to the Qing family disciples who were filled with mixed emotions. The First Elder was genuinely happy with the oue, as the Qing family no longer had to worry about the Bai family and the ck Rose Sect behind them.


    With a Nascent Soul expert backing Qing Yi, would the ck Rose Sect or Bai family dare to do anything to their Qing family?


    "Everyone, let''s wait here until Qing Yies back!"


    Smiling widely, the First Elder of the Qing family told the young ones as he quickly found a nearby bench to sit down and rx on.


    The disciples of the Qing family quickly found a ce to sit down as they soon resumed chatting as well.


    Qing Chenyi on the other hand just stared blindly into the air before turning towards Bai Cheng as a sneer appeared on his lips.


    "Looks like your help is not needed any longer!"


    Bai Cheng finally managed to recover from the shock that the appearance of Xuan Hao caused him. Turning, he saw the taunting look on Qing Chenyi''s face.


    "Well at least I managed to enter the Flying Sword Sect." With those words, Bai Cheng quickly ran towards the entrance of the Flying Sword Sect to sign up.


    Qing Chenyi just stared at him coldly for a few seconds before sighing quietly. All he could do now was to wait for Qing Yi to finish registering with her new master and officially enter the Flying Sword Sect¡­

 Chapter 12: True Sword Intent

    <h4>Chapter 12: True Sword Intent</h4>


    After Xuan Hao left together with Qing Yi, the examination of epting disciples gradually came to an end.


    Some of the higher-ups of the sect began to select disciples from the list of thousand people. Wen Lu was epted as a personal disciple of an Inner Elder at the peak ninth stage Core Formation Realm.


    As for the Sect Master and other Nascent Soul Realm experts of the Flying Sword Sect, none of them epted any disciples in the examination. After all, it was quite rare for a Nascent Soul Realm expert to take in a disciple.


    Returning back to Xuan Hao, he had just finished registering Qing Yi as his disciple at the management pavilion and now arrived at the entrance to his own pavilion together with her.


    "Qing Yi. I''m sure your curious as to why I chose you as my disciple." Turning around to look at the nervous girl following closely behind him, Xuan Hao saw her flinch the moment she heard his question.


    "Y-yes, I don''t think I''m particrly talented or anything like that¡­"


    Hearing her reply, Xuan Hao chuckled a bit to himself as he came to a stop.


    "hmm¡­ To not call you talented would be a quite unfair. After all, you are way more talented than any of the other people who underwent the examination today!"


    "H-how?" Rendered speechless by what Xuan Hao said, Qing Yi looked questioningly at him, waiting for an answer. After all, let alone being the most talented person at the examination today, just in her Qing family, there were more than 10 people more talented than her.


    Now her new master said she was the most talented person. Even that Wen Lu, who had reached the eighth stage of Qi Condensation was inferior to her?


    "Indeed, though still dormant, you have a divine physique!"


    Hearing that, Qing Yi'' small head short circuited as she just stared nkly into the air, while trying to process what her new master just told her.


    A Divine Physique! This was considered being chosen by the heavens themselves! In the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom, there were only 5 or so people who had a divine physique and all of them were either a genius of the younger generation or a Nascent Soul powerhouse from the older generation!


    Didn''t that mean that she would most likely reach the Nascent Soul Realm in the future?


    "The Divine Physique that you have is called the Bright Sun Divine Physique. The way to awaken your divine physique is to consume a special spirit herb called Infernal Heart Grass. The Infernal Heart Grass is a unique and rare spirit herb that only grows in special environment, so it will take your master a bit of time to acquire it."


    Not minding that shocked Qing Yi, Xuan Hao continued to talk about her divine physique as both of them started walking again. Onlying to a stop when they had reached the living area of the pavilion


    The living area of the pavilion was split into several levels, a room for the master of the pavilion, where Xuan Hao himself stayed. Rooms for the personal disciples of the master and rooms for servants who clean up the pavilion from time to time.


    "This will be where you will stay from now on."


    Stopping in front of one of the rooms, Xuan Hao pointed at the room in front of him.


    "You can return to your family for now and start moving in. Tomorrow we will officially start your training! Ah, onest thing, I rmend that you do not talk about your divine physique to anyone, even your family. The benefits a divine physique brings is indeed many, but there are always people who will be jealous!"


    "Y-yes master!"


    Warning his new disciple, Xuan Hao smiled to himself as he looked at her small silhouette slowing making her way out the pavilion and back to her family waiting for her in the examination grounds.


    "But this ce really is quiet¡­ Maybe I should get some servants before getting any new disciples¡­"


    Scanning his pavilion, Xuan Hao discovered that the only person in it was him. No servants, no disciples, just him.


    This environment was fine for him as he just spent his time cultivating silently in his room, but his new disciple would definitely need a few friends to talk to from time to time.


    "Ah, but before that!"


    Returning to his room, Xuan Hao quickly sat down in a meditative position as he entered his sea of consciousness to interact with the system.


    [Side Quest (Complete)]


    Rewards: [Cultivation increase of 1 small realm], [Comprehending Sword Intent]


    [Redeem]: [Y/N]


    Selecting to redeem the rewards, Xuan Hao felt a sudden heat in his dantian as arge amount of qi suddenly appeared and started to course through his meridians. Flowing from the centre of his body and out to his fingertips.


    Thissted for a few minutes before the qi slowly calmed down signifying his sessful breakthrough to the next realm.


    Nascent Soul stage 2!


    Xuan Hao felt ecstatic about how easily he had broken through, but before he could celebrate arge amount of information suddenly appeared in his head.


    Xuan Hao knew that it was the second part of the reward,prehension of Sword Intent!


    The enlightenmentsted for over 30 minutes this time, as Xuan Hao went from only havingprehended Nascent Sword Intent, toprehending True Sword Intent!


    True Sword Intent was widely different from the Nascent Sword Intent, as True Sword Intent allowed a sword cultivator to cut down enemies much stronger than themselves.


    Only when a sword cultivatorprehended True Sword Intent, was he considered to have taken the first true step towardsprehending the Sword Dao.


    "Hah¡­"


    Xuan Hao let out a breath of air as he willed his sword intent to manifest before him.


    Whoosh


    A silver light shed through the air as an almost transparent energy appeared in front of him floating quietly in the air.


    Smiling at the silver light that floated in front of him, Xuan Hao willed it disappear as he felt the excitement of his increase in strength.


    He had reached the True Sword Intent Realm! Next step would be to manifest a Sword Soul andbine man and sword into one, this was way more difficult and even in the empire ruling over the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, someone who reached the Sword Soul Realm was rare.


    But Xuan Hao did not let this dissuade him. As long as he trained disciples, he would surely reach the Sword Soul Realm in the future and even beyond!

 Chapter 13: End of the Day

    <h4>Chapter 13: End of the Day</h4>


    Xuan Hao spent the next 2 hours slowly adapting to his new strength. The time passed quietly, and Qing Yi had already returned and upied the room Xuan Hao allocated to her earlier.


    By now, the sun was slowly setting.


    Xuan Hao ignored this and instead entered his sea of consciousness to check out if he had gotten a new side quest from the system afterpleting the first one.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Talent: ???


    Realm: Nascent Soul Stage 2


    Sect: Flying Sword Sect


    Disciples: Qing Yi


    Main Quest: Any disciple reaches the foundation establishment realm.


    Main Quest Reward: ???


    Side Quest: Have a disciple with talent value of 50 or above.


    Quest Reward: [Cultivation Increase of 3 small realms]


    Indeed, a new side quest had appeared and this one was even harder than the one before. Talent value of 50!


    Even Qing Yi, who had a dormant divine physique only had a talent value of 37! Finding someone with a talent value at 50 or above? Wouldn''t that mean that they had better talent than someone with a divine physique?


    Xuan Hao already felt his head hurt slightly upon thinking about how troublesome finding such a talented disciple would be.


    For now, having a single disciple should be more than enough. When she reaches the Foundation Establishment Realm, he would be able toplete the main quest. The rewards from the main quest were still hidden, but Xuan Hao had a feeling that the rewards from it would be better than that of a side quest.


    Someone in the Nascent Soul Realm could live up to 1000 years of age. Xuan Hao was still only 21 years old, so for now, he decided to just take things slowly and cultivate quietly in the Flying Sword Sect.


    The first thing he needed to do was find the Infernal Heart Grass for his new disciple so she could awaken her divine physique.


    Qing Yi was sitting quietly in her new room as she thought about what had happened earlier when she returned to where her family was waiting for her.


    The first thing that happened was the First Elder of the Qing family excitedly asking her about her new master and if she knew why he had chosen her as his disciple.


    Qing Yi simply told him that she had no idea why Xuan Hao had chosen her as his disciple and quickly managed to avert the topic. She knew that her having a divine physique was an amazing feat and she was extremely excited and happy the moment that her master had told her about her divine physique.


    If not for her masters warning, the first thing she would have done was tell the First Elder about it, but as her master had said. Having a divine physique was dangerous if you were not strong enough, people easily grew envious of what they could not have.


    Qing Yi had taken the words of her new master to heart and decided to hide her divine physique from her family until she was strong enough to protect herself.


    She still remembered a story about someone from the Seven Fates Sect having a divine physique. He was discovered to have a Celestial Fate Divine Body when he was still at the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Later, the member of the Seven Fates Sect had died just after reaching the Core Formation Realm at the age of 19. Nobody knew why and the Seven Fates Sect had tried to hunt down the perpetrator, but never seeded.


    Seven Fates Sect! The overlord of the west of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom! The sect was even more powerful than the Flying Sword Sect but had still failed to protect the one with the divine physique.


    Qing Yi shuddered slightly when she thought about the sad end of the one who had the Celestial Fate Divine Body.


    Her master did indeed have good foresight!


    "But¡­ What should I do about the ck Rose Sect and the Bai family¡­?"


    A troubled look appeared on her face when she thought about what the first elder had mentioned before she went back to her master''s pavilion.


    Half a year from now, the Bright Sun City younger generation tournament would happen once again.


    Bai Fei, who had been epted by an elder of the ck Rose Sect would return by then and his master would follow him back, at that point the Qing family would be doomed.


    But with Qing Yi''s new master, this should not be a problem at all, after all, Qing Yi''s master was a Nascent Soul expert!


    "In the end¡­ How can I ask my master to help out¡­?"


    If her master did not show up at the younger generation tournament, the members of the Bai family would most likely not believe that Qing Yi got taken in as a disciple of a Nascent Soul expert.


    Someone who is only at the fourth stage of Qi Condensation at the age of 15 would be taken as a disciple of a Nascent Soul expert. Are you sure you are not bluffing?


    Qing Yi could already imagine how the Bai family would react¡­ Why not just let Bai Cheng inform them about it?


    Qing Yi really doubted whether he would mention it or not. The most likely thing to happen was him ignoring it and not saying anything to the Bai family about Qing yi bing the disciple of a Nascent Soul expert.


    "All of that can wait for now, I still have half a year to convince master toe with me to the tournament. I should just focus on getting stronger under master! If he sees how hard I work, he will definitely not mind following me back to my family for a trip!"


    With those encouraging words, Qing Yiid down on the bed that she had prepared earlier and slowly drifted off to sleep.


    Even though it was not thatte yet, the entire day had been extremely exhausting for her.


    From the second test where she had to fight against demon beasts for several hours with little rest to being epted as a disciple of Xuan Hao and moving into the pavilion. The entire day had been exhausting for Qing Yi as she could finallyfortably sleep the built-up exhaustion away.

 Chapter 14: Qing Yi Finds a Friend

    <h4>Chapter 14: Qing Yi Finds a Friend</h4>


    Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes as he looks out the window in his room, it was already morning.


    An entire night passed away just quietly meditating and improving his cultivation. After all, although the system helped him breakthrough, it did not mean he could not breakthrough by himself anymore.


    Cultivating was mostly about absorbing and refining the energy between the heaven and earth, this energy was called qi. As you absorbed and continued to refine more and more qi, you would get stronger and stronger until you finally reached the peak of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    To breakthrough and reach the Foundation Establishment Realm, you would have to use the qi you gathered inside your dantian to form a pir made of condensed qi inside your dantian. From here you continued to condense pirs, until having condensed a total of 9 pirs inside your dantian, reaching the peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Next was the Core Formation Realm where you form a core inside your body. To reach this realm, you had to first have a stable foundation before you could begin to form the golden core inside your body.


    Nascent Soul was almost unimaginable for most people and to reach this realm, one had to develop his own Divine Sense, before breaking the golden core and giving birth to the Nascent Soul.


    Xuan Hao''s divine sense had just expanded yesterday, and his Nascent Soul strengthened, causing his entire body to strengthen even further as well.


    Divine Sense itself was not just the ability to see and hear everything within arge radius, but instead allowed a cultivator to have an initial control over the energy between the heaven and earth.


    It was rumoured that someone who reached the King Realm could fully control the power between the heaven and earth to create a domain, thereby allowing them to easily destroy a kingdom like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    That was also why some called the King Realm the Domain Lord Realm instead of the King Realm.


    As for the Emperor Realm? Xuan Hao had no clue what was required in order to breakthrough into that realm for now.


    "Master, when will we begin the training today?"


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to begin cultivating again like he was used to doing, a voice came from outside his room.


    "We will begin after breakfast, just go to the dining hall and meet me in front of the pavilion when you are finished."


    As Qing Yi had just gotten up from bed before hurrying to the front of her master''s room under the excitement of getting to start training, shepletely forgot how hungry she was at the moment.


    "Yes master!"


    Acknowledging what her master said, Qing Yi quickly made her way out of her master''s pavilion and headed down the peak it was situated on and entered the main path going through the sect.


    The path was fairly simple, just being made of simple stones that could be found everywhere.


    Qing Yi had honestly expected the Flying Sword Sect to look way more majestic than it did. Simple stone paths, simple houses for the disciples. The only majestic thing in the sect was the pavilions for the elders and gathering halls.


    A good example would be the giant dining hall that appeared in front of Qing Yi as she opened her mouth in awe over the huge building in front of her.


    "First time visiting the dining hall?"


    "Eek!?"


    A voice suddenly came from behind Qing Yi, catching her by surprise as she let out a small yelp of surprise.


    "Ah, didn''t mean to surprise you. The name is Shihan, Zeng Shihan, a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect, just like you! I saw that you were spacing out in front of the dining hall, so I thought you were one of the new disciples. After all, most of them ends up spacing out when they see the dining hall for the first time. Just look over there."


    Saying so, the girl pointed to the side of Qing Yi, where a group of disciples all had their mouths open. Looking in awe and respect at the giant dining hall.


    "By the way, do you have anyone to eat with or would you like to eat together with me?"


    The girl, Zeng Shihan, asked kindly as put on a smile and waited for Qing Yi to answer.


    "If its fine with you¡­ I don''t really know anyone else here yet¡­"


    Contemting about whether to agree or not, Qing Yi decided it would be a good idea for her to make some friends.


    Back home, she had always kept to herself and spent almost all of her time on cultivating. The idea of making a friend or at least an acquaintance sounded quite tempting to her, who had no friends whatsoever at the age of 15.


    Zeng Shihan was also happy that she managed to find a friend so easily, she was honestly quite nervous inside as she had already tried to chat with a few other girls from the sect but had failed every single time.


    Sess truly came at an unexpected time, Zeng Shihan started to talk to Qing Yi about all the things happening in the sect at the moment. Not forgetting to show Qing Yi how to get food from the cranky elders manning the dining hall.


    The elders who manned the dining hall was less than pleased, they could not leave the disciples outside supervision as some of them were only 12 or so years old.


    The job of helping in the dining hall had slowly evolved over time, from the elders just watching over the disciples, to them being forced to help out the kitchen staff.


    Zeng Shihan told about a few elders who in the past had tried to escape the duty of helping out in the kitchen, in the end, those elders kept getting the "wrong" food delivered to their pavilion. From swapping out a good steak with a few carrots on a stick to "forgetting" the order or the order being "lost" on the way to the kitchen.


    Qing Yi got a goodugh about it and also learned that only the core elders, like her master, could get their own personal kitchen staff. The pavilion of Inner and Outer elders was too small to house kitchen staff, cleaning staff, disciples and so on. The elders could expand their pavilion, but that was way too expensive for most of them.


    Time slowly passed and with a promise to meet up again sometime in the future, Zeng Shihan and Qing Yi passed ways in front of the dinning hall.

 Chapter 15: Autumn Wind Sword

    <h4>Chapter 15: Autumn Wind Sword</h4>


    " Master, I have finished eating now! We can begin the training when you are ready!"


    Just as Xuan Hao finished a single qi cirction through his meridians, Qing Yi''s voice could once again be heard just outside the door to his room.


    "Great, then we will begin the training now." With those short words, Xuan Hao got up from his meditative position and walked to his door.


    Qing Yi, who was waiting on the other side of the door was shocked at suddenly seeing her mastere out, but quickly smiled happily before following her master out of the pavilion and into a small training court located on the same mountain peak as the pavilion.


    The training court itself was around a few hundred square meters in size, way bigger than Qing Yi had imagined it would be. Her family home was even a little smaller than this training court.


    And this training court was only used for her master and his disciples! Back at home, she had to share a few square meters of space at the training court with other family disciples¡­


    "Okay, we have arrived at the training court, you will be able to train here whenever you want to. For now, shall we begin with training your techniques?"


    The difference was way too much from what she was used to, and Qing Yi simply stood there. Only when her master talked to her, did she manage to recover her bearing to some degree.


    "Y-yes!"


    "Okay then, for starters we will look at what techniques you use, and I will help you point out areas youck in."


    Saying so, Xuan Hao stood still as he waited for his disciple to disy her techniques.


    Qing Yi didn''t say anything and instead started to move the qi in her body as she unsheathed her sword and let the qi flow through it ording to the sword technique her family had taught her.


    "Hah!"


    Letting out a small growl, Qing Yi swung her sword in the air as light extended from the de of the sword by a few centimetres and hit nothing but the empty air.


    "Hmm, a sword technique of the Low Tier Earth Rank¡­ What is it called?"


    Xuan Hao looked at the Sword Technique Qing Yi preformed and intuitively knew what rank and tier it was as he asked Qing Yi for the name of the Sword Technique.


    "It''s called Autumn Wind Sword; my dad came up with it after reaching the Core Formation Realm."


    "Your dad is indeed impressive toe up with something like that."


    Xuan Hao told Qing Yi, he really meant it as well.


    An Earth Rank Technique was used by people in the Core Formation Realm and the Nascent Soul Realm. For someone who had just reached the Core Formation Realm and create an Earth Rank Technique? It was talented and extremely rare in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, even if it was only a low-tier Earth Rank Technique.


    Compared to a Mortal Rank Technique used by Qi Condensation and Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators, an Earth Rank Technique was mostly only used by Nascent Soul cultivators in small kingdoms like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    For a Core Formation Realm cultivator to use an Earth-Rank technique when the rest were still stuck using Mortal Rank Techniques¡­


    It looked like Qing Yi had quite an impressive father.


    "But there is still quite a lot of ws when you use the Autumn Wind Sword. From what I can see, you are supposed to use the qi to manipte the wind around the sword and increase its speed, while also strengthening the de of the sword to deal a maximum amount of damage to the opponent!"


    "Yes, my father said so as well! But I always felt like it wascking something whenever I used it¡­"


    "Haha, indeed, even if your father tried his best to help guide you, it is still an Earth Rank Technique. You will not be able to use its full strength before you reach the Core Formation Realm." Xuan Hao chuckled quietly as he told Qing Yi.


    "For now, instead of focusing on both strengthening the de of the sword and the speed, try to focus only on one of the two aspects. Let''s start with strengthening the de of the sword, as that should be easier to do than manipting the wind around the sword."


    Xuan Hao smiled brightly as he taught his disciple how to go about learning how to use the Autumn Wind Sword her father had given her.


    The Technique itself was rtively simple for Xuan Hao, use wind to increase the speed of the sword, while simultaneously using the qi to strengthen the power of the sword.


    Compared to some higher tier Earth Rank Techniques that allowed a cultivator to use his or her divine sense to control the energy between the heaven and earth to perform a devastating attack.


    A good example would be amon technique used by Nascent Soul cultivators to deal with rtively weaker cultivators called Gods Palm. It was in essence just a giant gathering of energy from the heaven and earth, formed into a giant palm that could be used to simply squash cultivators below the Nascent Soul Realm.


    It was also convenient as the user of Gods Palm could control what would and would not be affected by the technique. Meaning the giant palm could press down on an entire city, yet not damage it at all and only killing the intended target.


    Qing Yi listened to what Xuan Hao told her and quickly started practicing the technique ording to what her master told her and only focused on using her qi to strengthen the de of the sword.


    "Hah!"


    Half an hour quickly passed with Qing Yi swinging at the empty air as she slowly felt her control over the qi inside the sword increase as time passed.


    "Great, now try to attack this!"


    Just as Qing Yi started to feel confident in her sword skills, Xuan Hao interrupted her.


    Looking to where her master was pointing a training dummy had appeared.


    The training dummy looked ordinary, but Qing Yi did not dare to underestimate it and attacked it with all her strength, executing the Autumn Wind Sword while only focusing on the strength aspect as her master had told her.


    Swoosh


    The sword flew through the air as it soon hit the training dummy.


    "¡­"


    Nothing happened, only a small scratch was left behind on the training dummy, making Qing Yi speechless.


    "Good progress so far, from now on, I want you to continue training in strengthening aspect of the Autumn Wind Sword. When you can cut at least 2 centimetres into the training dummy, we will move on to training the speed aspect of the Autumn Wind Sword. Cultivation will wait for now, as it would be best to first awaken your dormant divine physique before beginning with that."


    Xuan Hao said as he turned around and left the training court.


    "Remember to take breaks from time to time ande to my room when you seed or have any questions regarding how to strengthen the de of your sword further."


    Looking at her master disappearing from the training court, Qing Yi focused back onto the training dummy as she put her full attention into doing what her master said.


    "Hah!"


    Swinging her sword down towards the training dummy, Qing Yi began practicing the Autumn Wind Sword. Hoping that she could be as good as her father was when he used it.

 Chapter 16: Pagoda of Enlightenment

    <h4>Chapter 16: Pagoda of Enlightenment</h4>


    After leaving Qing Yi to train by herself at the training court, Xuan Hao made his way down the mountain peak where his pavilion was located and followed the stone paved road until he came to stand in front of a 30-meter-high pagoda.


    This was one of the Flying Sword Sects technique pagodas also known as the library pagodas, they were located at several ces around the Flying Sword Sect so disciples would not have to spent too much time finding one or run into a situation where the library pagoda was too crowded.


    The one in front of Xuan Hao mostly had the different cultivation mantras that was used to gather the qi between heaven and earth to breakthrough and increase your cultivation base.


    When Xuan Hao first crossed over into this world, he was surprised by how many cultivation mantras there was and how unique some of them were. Back then, he thought that a few dozen per sect would have been normal¡­


    One cultivation mantra would require the cultivator to only cultivate fire qi and practice only fire qi techniques, while another allowed the cultivator to only cultivate while sleeping. Though most of these cultivation methods were not used as they mostly had too harsh requirements or were simply inefficient.


    The Flying Sword Sect alone had over ten thousand different cultivation mantras stored in it, some even reaching the Heaven Rank!


    The cultivation method that the Flying Sword Sect used as its core cultivation method was a peak-tier Earth Rank Cultivation Mantra called The Flying Sword Mantra.


    The cultivation method allowed someone to practice all the way up to half-step King Realm and was rtively easy to get started with, which in the end caused it to be the most used cultivation mantra in the entire Flying Sword Sect.


    The Heaven Rank cultivation mantras they had were simply way too difficult to cultivate and only the core elders had ess to them in the first ce.


    The reason why Xuan Hao came to the library pagoda was that one of the cultivation mantras was fire based. The Heaven Rank cultivation mantra focused on fire qi and would definitely fit well with his disciple who had a Bright Sun Divine Physique.


    "Elder Xuan! What might be the reason for youing the Pagoda of Enlightenment?"


    An elder standing in front of the Pagoda noticed Xuan Haoing over and immediately called out to him.


    "Ah, I''m just here to try and find a cultivation mantra for my new disciple. Why are you here today elder Meng? Did you perhaps take in a disciple as well?"


    Xuan Hao was a little confused upon seeing the elder in front of the pagoda as he would mostly just spend his time in his pavilion cultivating. The only other reason for him to be here was if he had taken in a disciple after the recent examination finished and was here to find a cultivation mantra for him or her.


    Much like what Xuan Hao himself was here for.


    "Ah! No, I''m the elder in charge of helping the new outer court disciple choose a cultivation mantra, so the pagoda of enlightenment might be quite crowded on the first and second floor."


    "I see¡­ I will be going to the fifth floor, so it isn''t really that bothersome. Well, I will take my leave Elder Meng. Farewell for now."


    "Farewell, Elder Xuan."


    Exchanging a few more pleasantries Xuan Hao parted ways with Elder Meng who was standing in front of the pagoda of enlightenment.


    The Pagoda of Enlightenment had a total of five floors. The first two floors were for the outer and inner court disciples, while the third was for the core disciples and outer sect elders.


    The fourth floor was only essible to inner court elders and in some rare cases, talented core disciples. One example of such a talented core disciple would be the current leader of the Flying Sword Sects younger generation, Ling Song.


    The fifth floor was only ever essible by the Nascent Soul experts of the Flying Sword Sect. The fifth floor was after all where they stored all their Heaven Rank Cultivation Mantras.


    Upon entering the pagoda of enlightenment, Xuan Hao was immediately met with the scene of new disciples energetically running around the first floor of the pagoda.


    Xuan Hao mostly ignored it and made his way onto the second floor of the pagoda. Here, the amount of disciple''s present was way less, as the cultivation mantras were harder to understand and most chose to just use the Flying Sword Mantra on the first floor.


    The Flying Sword Mantra could help them all the way up to half-step King Realm and was way easier to get started withpared to some random Earth Rank Cultivation Mantra on the second floor of the pagoda.


    Even though this was the reason why so few continued on to the second floor, a few still came in the hopes of finding a cultivation mantra that fit them perfectly. Allowing them to easily progress in cultivation.


    After all, even though the Flying Sword Mantra was easy to get started with, it got increasingly harder the further on went and breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm using the Flying Sword Mantra was way harder than using a normal lower quality Earth Rank Cultivation Mantra.


    "Did you see who that was? Someone went to the third floor!"


    "Maybe it was just an outer sect elder. Nothing to get excited about¡­"


    "But He looked just a little older than us!"


    "Really! Then it must be a rumoured core disciple!"


    "Amazing, I have heard that there is quite a few peak-tier Earth Rank Cultivation Mantras at the third floor¡­ If I could just practice one of them rted to wind qi, I would have such an easy time reaching the Core Formation Realm¡­"


    "You Dream! We are Outer Court Disciples, not even Inner Court Disciples can enter third floor, let alone us!"


    Xuan Hao ignored the chatting disciple as he quietly made his way to the third floor of the Pagoda of Enlightenment.


    This time around, the floor was mostly empty, only a few outer court elders were sparsely walking around the floor. Each of them remembering to respectfully bow towards Xuan Hao as he passed by them.


    The Fourth floor waspletely empty, not even one person was present, which was also understandable as most of the inner court elders would spend their time cultivating instead of browsing the Pagoda of Enlightenment.


    Coming to a stop in front of a formationid down in front of the stairs to the fifth floor, Xuan Hao took out his core elder medallion given to him when he became a core elder.


    The medallion lit up as Xuan Hao moved it towards a spot in the formation and soon the formation formed a door big enough for Xuan Hao to pass through.


    Soon after he passed through the opening in the formation, it closed behind him as he made his way onto the fifth floor of the pagoda.

 Chapter 17: Finding a Cultivation Mantra for Qing Yi

    <h4>Chapter 17: Finding a Cultivation Mantra for Qing Yi</h4>


    The fifth floor of the Pagoda of Enlightenment was exclusively for the Nascent Soul Realm members of the Flying Sword Sect. The formation that Xuan Hao had passed through a little earlier was set up by the sect''s founder and could easily kill a mid-stage Nascent soul cultivator, even a peak mid-stage Nascent Soul cultivator at the sixth stage would have little chance of surviving the formation!


    Xuan Hao looked around the rtively small room as he located the few books present in the room.


    The books were the Heaven Rank Mantras that the Flying Sword Sect had collected throughout its years, it was even said that over 90 percent of the Heaven Rank Mantras here were all brought in by the founder when he established the sect back in the day.


    In the current day and age, getting one''s hand on a Heaven Rank Mantra was more difficult than ascending heaven. After all, a Heaven Rank Mantra symbolized a path to the King Realm!


    Xuan Hao hade here for specific mantra he remembered seeing up here when he first visited after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Heaven Burning Mantra!"


    The cultivation mantra was at high-tier Heaven Rank! Just a normal low-tier Heaven Rank cultivation mantra would cause an outrage the moment it appeared in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, let alone a high-tier Heaven Rank cultivation mantra, that would most likely attract the attention the empire above the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!


    The cultivation mantra was something that the founder had brought with him when he first established the sect and also one of the many reasons why Xuan Hao and the other Nascent Soul experts of the Flying Sword Sect thought that their founder was most likely someone important from a strong empire.


    But why had he escaped all the way to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to establish the Flying Sword Sect?


    Xuan Hao shook his head slightly as he thought about it, no use thinking about it. More than 5000 years had passed since the founder passed away already.


    Picking up the Heaven Burning Mantra, Xuan Hao looked over it just to see if it was truly a good fit for Qing Yi.


    The Heaven Burning Mantra had harsh requirements to who could cultivate it, one of those requirements was that the one cultivating it must have a divine physique aligned with the fire element.


    Just the first requirement was more than enough to disqualify almost all the people who wanted to cultivate it.


    Luckily, Qing Yi had the Bright Sun Divine Physique! The divine physique of Qing Yi was also a fire element divine physique and she should not have any problem cultivating the Heaven Burning Mantra.


    Smiling slightly to himself, Xuan Hao put the Heaven Burning Mantra away and made his way back down to the fourth floor before making his way out the Pagoda of Enlightenment.


    The disciples on the first and second floor was still running around the ce looking for cultivation mantras that fit them, though most of them had ended up sticking with the sect main cultivation mantra, the Flying Sword Mantra.


    "Did you find what you were looking for Elder Xuan?"


    Exiting the Pagoda of Enlightenment, Xuan Hao turned towards the sound of the voice.


    "Ah, Elder Meng! I did manage to find what I was looking for, luckily it was rather easy and didn''t take as long as I expected it would.


    "That is great to hear, well, I won''t hold you up any longer. Farewell once again Elder Xuan."


    "Haha, Indeed! Farewell once again Elder Meng."


    Exchanging a quick farewell with Elder Meng once again, Xuan Hao made his way towards the outskirt of the sect.


    The ce that he was headed to, was the location of the servant quarters of the sect.


    The servant quarters of the Flying Sword Sect were by no means a small ce, but due to it not really being a part of the sect itself, it was located at the outskirts of the sect.


    Servants from the servant quarters were mostly trained from a young age and wouldter be employed by the Flying Sword Sect when there was a need for it. Only when a servant was hired by a disciple or elder would he or she officially be considered to be part of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Standing in front of the main building of the servant quarters, Xuan Hao headed to the front desk located at the centre inside the building.


    "Hello, how can I help you?"


    Smiling brightly, a young woman asked Xuan Hao as he was the only one currently present inside the servant quarters.


    Stopping in front of the desk the young woman was sitting at, Xuan Hao took out his core elder medallion and showed it to the youngdy, who immediately straightened up and looked towards Xuan Hao with respect.


    "E-elder Xuan¡­ H-how can I help you¡­?" Stuttering slightly over her words due to nervousness, the young woman patiently waited for his answer.


    "I need a servant for my new disciple, a girl around the age of 15 would be preferable." Saying so, Xuan Hao watched as the young woman nodded her head frantically before darting out of the building and into the living quarters where the servants stayed and trained.


    Smiling upon seeing the young woman run away with such speed, Xuan Hao found a bench at the side of the room to sit down and wait for the woman to return.


    Meanwhile, the young woman ran directly to the head of the servant quarters and told him that Elder Xuan hade to ask for a servant for his new disciple.


    Following this, a storm swept the servant quarter as everyone wanted to be the servant of Xuan Hao''s new disciple.


    After close to half an hour passed, the young woman returned and told Xuan Hao that the servant would be send over to his pavilion in a day or two.


    Xuan Hao didn''t mind, as it would normally take a few days for the servant quarters to choose who would be the best fit and go.


    With that in mind Xuan Hao left the servant quarters and returned to his pavilion, unaware of the storm he had caused in the servant quarters.

 Chapter 18: Zhi Ruo

    <h4>Chapter 18: Zhi Ruo</h4>


    Just after Xuan Hao left the servant quarters a huge storm swept through the ce as the managers of different parts of the servant quarters quickly came together to decided on how they would choose the servant Xuan Hao had asked for.


    A few minutes passed before all the higher-ups from the servant quarters had gathered in the managing building.


    "I have already gone through the files of the younger servants around the age of 15 who preformed well enough to be chosen as the servant for Elder Xuan''s first disciple."


    A middle-aged man said as he looks at the other people sitting around the table.


    "For now, let''s decided on how we chose one of them." Saying that the middle-aged man passed a few papers around to everyone as they quickly read through each and every one of them.


    "Hmm¡­ I think we should let the young''unspete among themselves to see who is best. This way nobody wouldin about us being unfair or favourable towards someone!"


    "I think that the idea Manager Hou came with is reasonable, I vote for it."


    "Count me in as well."


    "Me too."


    "With that out of the way, let''s begin right away. The faster we get it done the better!"


    Having agreed on having the young girlspete with each other to find the best one, the managers quickly left and organised the tournament for the young girls, to find out who would be the servant of Elder Xuan''s first disciple.


    The News about the tournament and the reason for it soon spread around the servant quarters.


    The servant girls who were around the age of 15 were all excited upon hearing the news about the tournament arranged by the managers, while the younger onesmented about why they couldn''t be born a few years earlier.


    No matter what, a storm had swept through the servant quarters as all the girls who couldpete prepared to do so.


    After all, this was the first disciple of Elder Xuan, a Nascent Soul expert! Even just being the servant of his disciple would be a prestigious endeavour and would be like ascending to heaven in a single step.


    Another reason was because the servant girls heard tales of some young elder who had once married his servant girl after years of service and they ended up living happily together.


    No matter what reason it was for, all the servants who fit the criteria for signing up for the tournament did.


    Zhi Ruo was the same as most of the other servants signing up for the tournament, only, she had a little different reason for signing uppared to the other servants.


    The reason was that Zhi Ruo had once met Xuan Hao before. He had saved her back when she was only around 10 or so years old.


    Back then she was an orphan, she had been attacked by a group of people when she was out begging on the street like usual and Xuan Hao hade to help her back then. Afterwards he even helped her enter the servant quarters of the Flying Sword Sect!


    Zhi Ruo had worked hard ever since then in the hope of being helpful to her saviour sometime in the future. Now she finally had the opportunity to do so!


    After she finished signing up for the tournament, Zhi Ruo quickly went back to her room and started practicing.


    The tournament that the servant quarters held was nothing like the tournaments held by the Flying Sword Sect. The Flying Sword Sect was after all a sect for cultivators, so their tournaments involved fighting and other simr things.


    The servant quarters on the other hand, focused on the tasks of a servant, so the tournament it held of course did so as well.


    From cleaning, to cooking and tea brewing. All the things would be tested.


    Time passed and upon waking up the next day, Zhi Ruo immediately made her way to the ce the tournament would be held.


    A few hundred people around the same age as Zhi Ruo had already gathered and were waiting for Manager Hou to officially begin the tournament.


    "I think all of you already know what the first test will be, so I won''t exin too much. You all move to the station you are assigned to and start making something to eat. The time limit will be 1 hour."


    It didn''t take long and soon, Manager Hou officially announced the start of the first part of the tournament.


    Zhi Ruo looked around and saw a table with her name on it. The station itself was a table with cooking utensils. The first thing she did was start up the fire and taking out a rtively big wok.


    The dish Zhi Ruo decided to make was a rather simple one as she did not have a lot of time. Sadly, one of the aspects shecked in was cooking and the most she could do was stir-fry something.


    The dish she decided on was stir fried chicken and rice with some vegetables. Rather simple and quick, but it was still enjoyable to eat.


    Picking out the vegetables she needed, Zhi Ruo cut them before starting to cook.


    ...


    "Time''s up, we will be evaluating what you all cooked and the top 50 will move on to the next round of the tournament."


    Hearing the voice of Manager Hou, Zhi Ruo smiled proudly at what she had made and waited for the judges toe and judge her dish.


    "passable, you can move on."


    She didn''t wait for long as she was soon evaluated to have passed the first stage of the tournament.


    The next part of the tournament was cleaning, one of the things Zhi Ruo excelled at, so without much trouble, she managed to easily pass through it and enter the top 10.


    "The final test will be tea brewing! Only one of you can win this and it will be the best! To ensure that only fairness, all of you will be personally judged by the managers of the servant quarters and the winner will be sent to be the servant of Elder Xuan''s first disciple!"


    Zhi Ruo gulped slightly as she nervously looked towards the entrance of the tournament ground and saw the five remaining managers from the servant quarters enter.


    The other contestants were no different as they nervously looked at the five managers. Together with Manager Hou, all the managers from the servant quarters had gathered here!

 Chapter 19: Tea Brewing Contest

    <h4>Chapter 19: Tea Brewing Contest</h4>


    Manager Hou waited for the other managers to sit down before turning his attention back onto the 10 girls, who nervously stood to the side.


    "What all of you will bepeting in is Tea Preparation. In this category, you willpete in the skill of preparing and serving tea. You must demonstrate the skill of tea preparation by brewing and presenting to each of the judges a total of two beverages. The first will be a normal green tea we have chosen while the other will be a beverage prepared from any tea chosen by you from the tea samples provided by us."


    Finishing his speech, all 10 of the girls nervously look at the tea samplesying out on the 10 different stations prepared for them.


    There were all kinds of tea samples present and it could be used to make a wide variety of different ones.


    "The use of tea additives such as sugar, milk and so on is prohibited and blending samples of the tea is prohibited. Brewing is considered to have begun the moment of contact of tea with water! That is all you may begin when you see fit." A middle-aged woman, who was one of the managers who just arrived, spoke up just before the girls began their tea brewing.


    Zhi Ruo listened attentively to what was told as she quickly made her way over to her station.


    The Camellia leaves were in good condition and had already been prepared, so Zhi Ruo decided to just get started, as she took a kettle and filled it with water before heating it up.


    When the water started boiling, she let it cool for about 2 minutes time. Before carefully lifting the kettle, she filled the teapot with hot water before setting it aside.


    Picking up the Camellia leaves, Zhi Ruo measured 1 teaspoon of loose leaves into the water. Allowing the tea leaves to steep for another 3 minutes before cing a strainer over the cup and pouring the tea into it, so that there would not be any leaves in the tea.


    With her green tea finished. Zhi Ruo looked around at the other girls and saw that most of them were not finished brewing yet, so Zhi Ruo rxed slightly as she decided to take a look at the other tea samples present and decided what she could brew for her second beverage as she waited for the judges toe.


    Looking at all the samples presented, Zhi Ruo decided that she would make a ck tea for her second beverage. ck tea was something Zhi Ruo had made many times before and was familiar with, so she was certain that she would be able to do well.


    "Ah, Zhi Ruo! Are you ready for us to try your tea?" A voice sounded besides her as she turned around and saw the managers of the servant quarters or in this case, the judges standing right in front of her station.


    "Y-yes, of course." Zhi Ruo answered as she gently served a cup over to each of the judges for tasting.


    "Hmm¡­ The aroma is great."


    "Good taste as well."


    "The aftertaste is on point as well. Overall, I think you did a great job with the green tea Zhi Ruo."


    Complimenting her tea, each of the judges smiled happily at her as they started evaluating her tea.


    "You are definitely great at tea brewing Zhi Ruo! We will be going to the other contestants now to try their tea, so you can begin on the second one now. I''m looking forward to it, Zhi Ruo." Manager Hou said as he smiled brightly at Zhi Ruo, apparently, he really liked the tea that she brewed.


    "Y-yes, Sir!" Fumbling slightly over her words, Zhi Ruo excitedly picked out the things she needed to brew the ck tea and began on that as well.


    By the time that the judges reached her station once again to try her ck tea, seven people had already been disqualified, leaving only Zhi Ruo and two other girls behind.


    Serving the ck tea for the judges, Zhi Ruo nervously looked on them as they each carefully tasted her tea and judged it.


    "You have done well again Zhi Ruo, we will try the others tea as well beforeing to a final verdict."


    An older man among the judges said as the group moved towards the next contestant''s station.


    Zhi Ruo was extremely nervous as she anxiously stared at the judges and other contestant''s, hoping that she had done better than they had.


    Time passed and the judges had left to discuss among themselves after tasting all three of the girl''s tea.


    It was only one long hour after they had left to discuss between themselves that all of them returned.


    "After we discussed among ourselves, we have concluded that the overall winner of the tea brewingpetition will be Zhi Ruo, as she by far surpassed our expectations in regard to the green tea that she managed to brew. The ck teacked to some extent whenpared to the green tea, but overall, it was by far the best among the ones you chose to brew yourselves!"


    Zhi Ruo felt a wave of happiness ovee her as she started smiling from ear to ear, while the other two contestants let out a depressed sound.


    "Zhi Ruo, if you could please follow me and get you assigned as the servant of Elder Xuan''s first disciple." Manager Hou looked proudly at Zhi Ruo as he said this.


    He had thought that it would be one of the other girls who managed to win at the start, but Zhi Ruo showed that she was just as brilliant if not more so.


    For the servant quarters, having someone who excels at their job is a thing to be proud of. The managers themselves knew that the Flying Sword Sect rewarded them every time a servant they sent did a good job.


    An example would be the recent ace servant of the servant quarters who ended up bing a servant of one of the core elders, he showed talent in cultivation and ended up bing the personal disciple of the core elder!


    The core elder in question sent arge amount of resources to the servant quarters which helped them expand even more.


    To this day, the servant quarters had long since expanded beyond the northern region that the Flying Sword Sect controlled!


    Zhi Ruo didn''t know what Manager Hou was thinking about and just followed him to the registration building full of happiness at finally being able to return the favor of being helped by Xuan Ha back then.

 Chapter 20: The Raging Flame Sect

    <h4>Chapter 20: The Raging me Sect</h4>


    Back to the day before the servant quarterspetition, Xuan Hao returned to his peak and checked up on Qing Yi, not forgetting to answer her questions regarding the Autumn Wind Sword.


    "Master, can I go out tonight? I n to meet up with a friend and get something to eat." Qing Yi lowered down her sword as she asked Xuan Hao, she had already nned to meet with Zeng Shihan again.


    "Sure, no need to ask me about what you do in your own free time." Xuan Hao himself did not really mind it as he soon exited the training court and made it back to his room.


    Inside his room, Xuan Hao quickly looked through a few books located on a shelf besides his bed.


    The book he was looking for was one rted to herbs, he had decided that he would set out and find the Infernal Heart Grass, so Qing Yi could awaken her divine physique.


    Without it, Qing Yi would never be able to unleash her true potential. The longer he dyed finding the Infernal Heart Grass, the longer it would take for Qing Yi to breakthrough into the Foundation Establishment Realm. This would in the end dy himpleting the main quest of the system even more!


    Xuan Hao already knew where the Infernal Heart Grass would grow, the only bad thing was that it was located in the south region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. The territory of The Raging me Sect!


    The Flying Sword Sect and the Raging me Sect went way back and had always been at odds with one another, but what truly caused them to be enemies was something that happened 500 years ago.


    Back then, the Flying Sword Sect was weaker than it was now and only had 3 experts at the Nascent Soul Realm, while the Raging me Sect had a total of 7 Nascent Soul experts!


    The Raging me Sect back then had found out that the Flying Sword Sect had unearthed a spirit stone mine at the border of their territory and brutally killed all the Flying Sword Sect disciples present before sizing the spirit stone mine.


    This had caused an outrage in the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom at the time, but in the end, the Raging me Sect was stronger than the Flying Sword Sect at the time and managed to hold onto the spirit stone mine to this day.


    Now, the Flying Sword Sect had 5 Nascent Soul experts while the Raging me Sect had 8.


    Even though the Raging me Sect was still stronger, the difference had narrowed down quite a bit and the Flying Sword Sect was starting to demand the spirit stone mine back, while the Raging me Sect kept refusing.


    This in turn caused tension on their bordering territories to build up with passing time, as more and more skirmishes between the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect and Raging me Sect took ce.


    For him, a Nascent Soul Core Elder of the Flying Sword Sect to enter the territory of the Raging me Sect at such a time¡­ The Raging me Sect would most likely see it as an outright deration of war!


    But Xuan Hao still decided to take the risk and sneak into the territory of the Raging me Sect!


    "Hah¡­ I hope nothing goes wrong¡­" Xuan Hao sighed slightly to himself as he walked to the entrance of the sect before jumping on top of his sword and flying into the distance.


    Flight was normally something that only people at the King Realm was capable of.


    The reason why Xuan Hao was able to use his sword for flight was due to himprehending True Sword Intent, it allowed him to more easily control his sword and also manifest sword intent itself to strengthen it.


    Another use was to use the sword intent to engulf the sword and control it to float. With this, Xuan Hao could just jump on top of his sword and make it float in the direction he wanted to go.


    This was also another reason why sword cultivators whoprehended True Sword Intent were so feared, if the other party were not a King Realm cultivator, the sword cultivator could simply jump on top of his sword and fly away if he were at a disadvantage.


    Xuan Hao continued flying for another 2 hours before he finally came to the border between the Raging me Sect and the Flying Sword Sect.


    The border itself was just besides the spirit stone mine that the Raging me Sect had stolen from the Flying Sword Sect 500 years ago and by now the Raging me Sect had set up defensive structure all around it.


    Xuan Hao couldn''t help but feel annoyed when he looked down and saw the spirit stones slowly being transported out of the mine and onto carriages to be shipped back to the Raging me Sect.


    "Nothing to do about it for now¡­ In the future I will be sure to help the Flying Sword Sect deal with the Raging me Sect and make them pay back the spirit stones they loaned¡­ With interest of course¡­"


    Chuckling slightly, Xuan Hao shed an evil smile before he disappeared deeper into the territory of the Raging me Sect.


    Dealing with the spirit stone mine would have to wait until he was strong enough, for now he only needed to find the Infernal heart Grass for Qing Yi.


    The ce where it could be found was the Burning Mountain Range.


    The Burning Mountain Range was famous in the Southern Region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Mainly because of the strong demon beasts and also because it stretched through several kingdoms, there was even rumours that in the deepest part of the Burning Mountain Range, demon beasts in the King Realm could be found!


    Luckily, the part of the Burning Mountain Range that passed through the Heavenly Sky Kingdom did not have anything at the level of a King Realm demon beast. The strongest demon beast found there was at the Nascent Soul realm, so although not as dangerous Xuan Hao still had to be careful when he entered.

 Chapter 21: Sneaking by the Raging Flame Sect Outpost

    <h4>Chapter 21: Sneaking by the Raging me Sect Outpost</h4>


    The Burning Mountain Range was not a mountain range that was burning in the literal sense of the word but was instead a long mountain range that had a lot of volcanos present in it. Due to this, it slowly became know as the burning mountain range. The burning hot environment that most of the mountain range was in didn''t help in slightest.


    Other than that, a lot of fire rted herbs grew in it, the Infernal heart Grass was one of them.


    From Mortal Rank Herbs all the way up to Mystic Rank Herbs that only King Realm cultivators used. All of them could be found inside the Burning Mountain Range, though finding something like a Mystic Rank herb was not something Xuan Hao expected to find.


    After all, most herb were defended by a demon beast at around the same stage. Meaning a Mystic Rank Herb would have a King Realm demon beast defending it¡­ Not something that Xuan Hao could deal with at the moment.


    Xuan Hao came to the entrance of the Burning Mountain Range where the Raging me Sect had set out an outpost. From what he knew, there would always be a Nascent Soul expert present, so as to ensure that nobody entered the Burning Mountain Range without them knowing.


    The problem for Xuan Hao was how to evade the divine sense of the Nascent Soul Realm expert of the Raging me Sect.


    But why not just enter the Burning Mountain Range from another neighbouring kingdom?


    That would be even more impossible, as the imperial families of a kingdom normally station Nascent Soul experts all around the borders of their kingdom, so as to make sure nobody sneaks in without them knowing.


    If he were only at the Core Formation Realm maybe it would work, as the Nascent Soul experts did not pay attention to someone who was below the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Afterall, to a Nascent Soul expert, how much trouble could a mere Core Formation expert bring to an entire kingdom with dozens of Nascent Soul experts?


    Xuan Hao really wished that he had learnt some form of concealment technique at the moment, but there was nothing to do.


    For now, he decided to just try his luck and sneak in.


    Flying through the air, Xuan Hao flew at the edge of the border as he quickly made his way towards the Burning Mountain Range. Hoping that the Nascent Soul Realm Elder from the Raging me Sect was not paying attention.


    Sadly, things never go the way you want them to, and a divine sense swept out from the outpost set up by the Raging me Sect. heading directly in the direction where Xuan Hao was flying along.


    Xuan Hao sensed the change and looked towards the outpost as he started to swear quietly at his fantastic luck, if the elder from the Raging me Sect discovered him, a fight would most certainly erupt. This in turn would attract the other Nascent Soul experts from the Raging me Sect.


    Going 8 vs 1? Not really something Xuan Hao wanted to experience at the moment¡­


    "ARGH!"


    Just as Xuan Hao prepared himself to forgo stealth and go full speed towards the Burning Mountain Range, a loud scream echoed through the surroundings as an injured man ran full speed in the direction of the border.


    The divine sense from the Raging me Sect outpost focused directly on the man and soon an elderly man appeared in front of him.


    "Hmph, think you can just run away after offending the Raging me Sect?" The arrogant elderly man sneered as his lips curled up in a contemptuous smile.


    "P-please, I-I didn''t know- "


    Before the man even managed to finish his sentence, a quick sh appeared as the man''s head rolled to the ground. His eyes still open, clearly not expecting to suddenly die.


    "Hmph, why would I waste time speaking to trash like you?"


    Picking up a purse around the now dead man''s belt, the arrogant elderly man soon disappeared back towards the outpost.


    It was almost like nothing had even happened. Xuan Hao bet that if it were not for the now dead body on the ground, nobody would know that somebody just died here.


    "Indeed, the Raging me Sect, they are as ruthless as rumoured¡­ Thankfully that elderly man did not find me¡­"


    Letting out a sigh of relief, Xuan Hao looked cautiously in the direction that the elderly man had disappeared into.


    That elderly man was dangerous and from what Xuan Hao sensed, he was at the fifth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm! Even with his True Sword Intent, Xuan Hao could at most fight equally with him.


    Maybe in a longer fight he would win, but by then the other Nascent Soul experts from the Raging me Sect would have arrived.


    "Hah, I better get going before I get found¡­" Casting a nce at the dead body onest time, Xuan Hao began moving towards the Burning Mountain Range with increased speed.


    Xuan Hao spent the next 1 hour cautiously moving towards the Burning Mountain Range, it was only after he saw the towering mountains in front of him that he finally let out a sigh of relief.


    At the foot of one mountain was a small city, the city itself was mostly used by explorers who came to enter the Burning Mountain Range and try their luck and businesses buying the materials and rare herbs brought back by the explorers. Most of which was owed directly by the Raging me Sect.


    Even though that was the case, the strongest person was only at the Core Formation Realm and was not something Xuan Hao needed to be careful about. After all, a Core Formation realm expert would never be able to sense a Nascent Soul expert if he did not wish to show off his cultivation.


    "For now, I will try and see if there is any information regarding the location of the Infernal Heart Grass."


    Landing a little away from the city, Xuan Hao took out a small bag with clothes and quickly changed into something less conspicuous. The robe he was wearing before was the main core elder robe of the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Thinking back, maybe he should not walk into enemy territory with the robe of a core elder from the Flying Sword Sect on¡­


    Facepalming himself at how stupid he was, Xuan Hao quickly put away the brilliant and extremely colourful core elder robe and walked towards the city.

 Chapter 22: Flame Mountain City

    <h4>Chapter 22: me Mountain City</h4>


    The Walls of the city soon appeared in front of Xuan Hao as he felt slightly awed at their size, reaching more than 20 meters into the air.


    While such walls were not able to deal with stronger Core Formation demon beasts. Dealing with a few lower ranked Core Formation demon beasts should be doable. Especially if the Core Formation experts stationed in the city helped out.


    But even without them, a group of Foundation Establishment cultivators should be able to deal with a weaker Core Formation demon beast if they used the wall to their advantage!


    Looking at the uselesslyrge gate, Xuan Hao quickly made his way over.


    The Giant gate of the city had a long line in front of it, with guards checking the peopleing in and out of the city. Making sure that the ones who entered paid the entrance fee.


    Standing in the back of the line, Xuan Hao patiently waited until it was his turn, so as to not draw any unwanted attention. This was after all still the territory of the Raging me Sect and if they found him, he would have a lot more difficulties in finding the Infernal Heart Grass for Qing Yi.


    "Reason for entering the me Mountain City?"


    It was finally Xuan Hao''s turn, as a guard came up to him and asked for his reason to enter the city.


    "I''m here to explore the Burning Mountain Range and I''m looking for a ce to rest before continuing into the mountain range." Xuan Hao lied as he smiled brightly at the guard.


    "Sure, sure¡­ Just pay the entrance fee over there. Its 5 low grade spirit stones." Waving him off with an uninterested look on his face, the guard pointed towards another guard and made his way to the person behind Xuan Hao. Most likely asking him the same question that he just asked Xuan Hao.


    Spirit stones were the currency used by cultivators to trade between each other and was also the reason for the current animosity between the Flying Sword Sect and Raging me Sect.


    The reason for this was the other use of spirit stones. Speeding up the cultivation of a cultivator, while the amount needed increased with the cultivation level of the cultivator, it was still magical to be able to increase one''s cultivation speed. Some higher-grade spirit stones could even allow a cultivator to have an easier timeprehending the energy between heaven and earth!


    Such spirit stones were above the normal low grade spirit stones and were instead called high grade spirit stones.


    The spirit stone mine that the Raging me Sect had stolen from the Flying Sword Sect produced over 10 high grade spirit stones every year!


    This was an unimaginable temptation to many Nascent Soul experts and was also the reason why the Raging me Sect still held onto the spirit stone mine even if they made enemies with the Flying Sword Sect. The worth of high-grade spirit stones were simply too much.


    It was even rumoured that the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect managed to reach the eighth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm with the help of the high-grade spirit stones!


    Being able to reach the eighth stage might not sound like much, but the difference between realms widened the further along in cultivation one went and while one might be able to fight someone at the Foundation Establishment Realm only being a Qi Condensation Realm was possible. Fighting a someone at the King Realm while only being in the Nascent Soul Realm was close to impossible and those who archived it had long since surpassed the King Realm by now¡­


    In essence, someone at the eighth stage would be able to easily deal with a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator at the seventh stage.


    The only reason that the Raging me Sect did not dare to attack the Flying Sword Sect was simply because they were a sword sect and sword cultivators were always famed for their strength inbat.


    The current Sect Master Feng Chen was no different and while only at the seventh stage, he had fought equally against a Nascent Soul expert at the eighth stage before!


    Thinking about all the rumours regarding the current Sect Master of the Raging me Sect, Xuan Hao chuckled a bit to himself as he paid the 5 low grade spirit stones and entered the me Mountain City.


    The rumours about the Raging me Sects Sect Master were many and Xuan Hao knew quite a few of them.


    Fore example, it was rumoured that the Raging me Sect''s Sect Master had once been seen entering a famed establishment for¡­ Ahm¡­ Gentlemen¡­ to deal with personal stuff and sort out their¡­ Feelings¡­?


    This rumour had been cracked down upon hard by the Raging me Sect, especially by the Sect Master himself. After all, his wife was less than pleased when she heard the rumour¡­


    Neither was her father, the current Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect¡­


    Looking around the bustling streets of the city, Xuan Hao saw a giant build with a sign of two pickaxes crossing each other, this was the explorer union''s sign.


    The Explorer Union was a giant organization that existed all over the Ewaria Continent and could be found almost everywhere.


    The Explorer Union had several people at the Emperor Realm behind it and was not something even the strongest empire on the Ewaria Continent would carelessly offend.


    The main goal of the Explorer Union was as the name suggested, to explore the world and all the fantastic ces that existed in it. By joining the Union, one could sell all the material that one found in ces like the Burning Mountain Range to them at a reasonable price and without fear.


    Even a Qi Condensation cultivator could sell a Mystic Grade Herb at the Explorer Union and get a good amount of high-grade spirit stones without someoneing to kill them off in the middle of the night.


    If anyone had any information about the location of the Infernal Heart Grass, it would be the Explorer Union.


    With that thought in mind, Xuan Hao made his way towards the Explorer Union''s building. Hoping that they either had the Infernal Heart Grass in stock or at least knew the location of some in the Burning Mountain Range.


    If they truly had nothing toe up with, Xuan Hao would have to waste at least a few weeks tirelessly looking through the Burning Mountain Range to try and find it, while also making sure as to not enter the territory of some Nascent Soul demon beasts.

 Chapter 23: Explorer Union

    <h4>Chapter 23: Explorer Union</h4>


    The building housing the Explorer Union was set up with a few rows for people to sell of the materials, spirit herbs and other things that they found in the Burning Mountain Range. The rest of the building was mostly just fitted like a normal tavern where people could eat, drink and rx after a day out exploring.


    Xuan Hao curiously took in the sight of the Explorer Union and all the unique individual present. The most fascinating thing about the people inside was the small badge most of them had at the side of their chest.


    The badge itself was the symbol of two pickaxes crossing each other and was the Explorer Union''s symbol. The badge itself represented that the people bearing it were members of the Explorer Union.


    The Explorer Union itself had several forms of members and the ones with the badge on them were the simplest form of member, the explorer.


    The explorer rank did not really have any strings attached to it and mostly just came with the benefit of being able to buy and sell materials from the Explorer Union.


    Higher ranks in the Explorer Union came with certain benefits, but also gave the member a certain number of responsibilities that they needed to fulfil, like joining certain exploration missions or help defend some areas for the Union.


    All in all, most people just got the explorer rank and didn''t bother anymore with it.


    Back to the badge itself, if Xuan Hao was not wrong, the badge was crafted by a cksmith and was an artifact reaching at least the Earth Grade!


    Artifacts, much like the herbs, used the same ranking system. Going from the Mortal, Earth, Spirit and Soul Rank. Each representing the Qi Condensation Realm, Foundation Establishment Realm, Core Formation Realm and finally the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The sword that Xuan Hao himself used was an artifact at the Soul Rank and was around the lower end of soul rank artifacts.


    Even then, an artifact at the Soul Rank was extremely rare in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and only the four big sects and the imperial family of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had any.


    The reason for the this was simple, a cksmith who could make such high-grade artifacts was extremely rare and for one to be able to craft a Soul Rank Artifact, the cksmith would need to at least be an Artisan cksmith.


    The best cksmith in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom at the moment was an Expert cksmith, who was able to craft Spirit Rank Artifacts.


    Other than this, most of the cksmiths were only around the apprentice and journeyman level.


    For the Explorer Union to be able to freely give out artifacts at the Earth Rank for free easily spoke of how strong they were¡­


    Xuan Hao walked towards the information desk right besides the tavern part of the Explorer Union and waited for his turn. Luckily the line was not that long and he wouldn''t have to wait for too long, so while he waited, Xuan Hao decided to listen in on the conversations in the building and see if something happenedtely.


    "Hey, have you heard about people disappearing around the Fire Rock Mountain recently?" A man sitting on a table suddenly asked a friend sitting beside him.


    "What? No, I haven''t. Did anything perhaps happen?" The friend looked back shocked as he quickly questioned.


    "Yes, yes! Lately a lot of people started disappearing around the Fire Rock Mountain, it has even caused the Explorer Union to take action and they are preparing to send over a few people to find out what is happening."


    "Really!? Doesn''t that mean we can earn a lot if we join the investigation team? The Explorer Union always pays handsomely¡­"


    "Pfft, dream on. The minimum cultivation needed is the peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm, I even heard a few Core Formation cultivators would end up joining as well!"


    "Hah¡­ What a bummer¡­"


    "Indeed¡­ most of those investigation missions turn up nk anyways¡­"


    Listing to a duo siting at a table drinking together as they talked together, Xuan Hao grew interested in the Fire Rock Mountain mentioned in their conversation.


    Not because of the disappearances, as that was quitemon in the Burning Mountain Range and from what Xuan Hao knew, it was most likely just a demon beast at the Core Formation Realm having moved its nest to the Fire Rock Mountain.


    The reason why he grew interested in the Fire Rock Mountain was that the Infernal Heart Grass had appeared there in the past and with a supposedly Core Formation Realm demon beast suddenly moving into the Fire Rock Mountain all of a sudden, Xuan Hao guessed that it was because it had sensed the Infernal Heart Grass or another spirit herb.


    "I should join the investigation team and see if I could get my hands on the Infernal Heart Grass."


    With that in mind, it was finally Xuan Hao''s turn at the information desk and he quickly asked about the Infernal heart Grass, to which he got the possible location of a few Infernal Heart Grass. The only bad point was that all of them were in the territory of Nascent Soul demon beasts.


    Rather than potentially putting his life on the line to fight the Nascent Soul demon beasts for the Infernal heart Grass, Xuan Hao decided that it was better to go with his n of joining the investigation team of the Explorer Union and see if there was any Infernal heart Grass at the Fire Rock Mountain first.


    The process of joining the investigation team was rtively simple and all he needed to do was sign up to be a member of the Explorer Union and after getting a badge, he showed a cultivation of around the beginning stages of the Core Formation Realm and quickly managed to join the investigation team.


    From what he was told by the staff, the investigation team would head out by tomorrow morning, so for now Xuan Hao decided to just find a ce to stay for the night and cultivate in peace until morning.


    The sun was slowly going down in the distance as Xuan Hao made his way out of the Explorer Union and soon disappeared into the crowd of people in the street of the city.


    All he could do now was wait for next day. Heading out to the Fire Rock Mountain by himself? He had no clue where the so-called disappearances happened and having a guide would safe quite a good amount of time.


    Compared to scanning the entire mountain with his divine sense and idently offending some random hidden expert, who just happened to be in closed cultivation there¡­

 Chapter 24: Gui Hu and Chen Yang

    <h4>Chapter 24: Gui Hu and Chen Yang</h4>


    Time flew by and the sky started to light up once again, as the sun slowly rose up in the distance.


    Xuan Hao was sitting in a meditative position inside one of the inns in the me Mountain City, quietly cultivating.


    "Hah¡­ I hope that girl Qing Yi is fine. After all I ran away just after epting her as a disciple¡­" Xuan Hao opened his eyes and stood up.


    Yesterday, before he had left the Flying Sword Sect, he informed Qing Yi that he would be leaving to find the Infernal Heart Grass to help awaken her Divine Physique. Other than that, he had also left a few instructions on how to train her Autumn Wind Sword.


    Thinking about it, the servant that he requested from the servant quarters should arrive today, so at least Qing Yi wouldn''t be left alone for that long. Maybe they would even be able to get along well enough to be friends by the time he came back.


    "Haha¡­" Chuckling to himself at the idea, Xuan Hao made his way downstairs and quickly checked out of the inn before making his way towards the south gate of the me Mountain City.


    The south gate was located just next to the Burning Mountain Range and was one of the busiest spots in the entire me Mountain City, it was also the ce that Xuan Hao would meet up with the rest of the investigation team from the Explorer Union.


    "Why do we even have to join this investigation¡­? All that ever happens is us wandering about a bit before returning back anyways¡­"


    "That is what happens, both of us became pathfinders for the Explorer Union. You should be happy that we only have to go investigate a few disappearances in the outskirts of the Burning Mountain Range every now and then. From what I heard, a few pathfinders like us perished in an exploration mission into the deeper parts of the Burning Mountain Range¡­ At least the investigations are safe¡­"


    "Hah, guess you are right¡­"


    Hearing someone talking about the investigation, Xuan Hao looked over and spotted two men talking among each other as they both stood in front of the south gate and waited. The badge that both of them had was different from the normal explorer''s badge, signifying their higher rank inside the Explorer Union.


    "Hello, is this perhaps where we are gathering for the investigation team?" Walking up to them, Xuan Hao asked politely as he smiled slightly, while trying to be polite.


    "Hm? Ah, yes. You are¡­ Bright Sword? Interesting alias¡­ With you here we can head out immediately." ncing at him, one of the two higher ranked people from the Explorer Union nodded slightly before giving themand to head out towards the Fire Rock Mountain.


    Bright Sword was the alias that Xuan Ha decided to register with at the Explorer Union and also served as a way to make sure that the Raging me Sect did not find out that one of the Core Elders from the Flying Sword Sect had entered their territory. After all, the Raging me Sect knew the name of all the Flying Sword Sects Nascent Soul experts and having someone with the same name appear suddenly would cause them to be suspicious.


    That was even more so if the one in question was a cultivator.


    The journey to the Fire Rock Mountain went smoothly and Xuan Hao managed to find out what the name of the two Core Formation experts were.


    Apparently, they had managed to raise their rank from a normal explorer in the Explorer Union to a pathfinder. The rank above explorer.


    Both of them had thought that they would get a lot of benefits after raising their rank, but all they ever saw was forced missions like the current investigation mission.


    At most they would get paid a few spirit stones every month, but nothing much. Apparently, both of them heard that if they managed to raise their rank one more time and be elites of the Explorer Union, they would be able to get high-grade spirit stones on a monthly basis!


    "But how long would it even take for us to be elites of the Explorer Union¡­ I heard that most of the elites from the Explorer Union are at the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ The number of elites at the Core Formation Realm is so scarce that they almost don''t exist!"


    "Easy, Chen Yang, we will be able to be elite members at some time in the future. Worrying about it will not help at all!"


    "You are right Gui Hu if I keep worrying about it nothing will happen. For now, let''s just focus on the mission and get back as quickly as possible¡­"


    "Ah, Bright Sword was it. Howe you wanted to join this investigation? Any special reason?" As both of the Core Formation experts talked with each other, one of them, suddenly turned around and asked Xuan Hao.


    "Hm? Me? I heard that an herb I''m looking for might be growing around the Fire Rock Mountain, so I thought it would be convenient to just take the investigation mission from the Explorer Union and have a free guide there."


    ""Hah¡­ Indeed convenient¡­ Free guides are nice¡­""


    Both Chen Yang and Gui Hu repeated each other as they turned and looked at each other exhaustedly.


    It was not the first time that they were used as a form of free guide and it wouldn''t be theirst.


    The only reason why Core Formation experts would ever join them on their investigation missions was so that they could get a free guide and get paid a few spirit stones on the way.


    Truly a great service that the Explorer Union provided free of charge¡­


    "Hm, well, you can just go off and search for the herb that you need and report back to us if youe across anything unusual. The search area is the north west side of the Fire Rock Mountain." Gui Hu said as they arrived at the foot of the Fire Rock Mountain.


    "Well, then I will be going." Xuan Hao smiled slightly when he heard what Gui Hu said, having someone who gave him free reign to search for himself was great.


    "We don''t need to look after you like these Foundation Establishment cultivators and it would be more effective if you searched for yourself¡­" Chen Yangmented.


    "¡­"


    "Damn babysitting job¡­!" Gui Hu grumbled something from side as he looked menacingly at the Foundation Establishment cultivators, who in turn started shivering a little.


    With a fewst words of goodbye and the location of the meeting spot noted down, Xuan Hao quickly made his way towards the north west side of the Fire Rock Mountain.

 Chapter 25: Easily Getting the Infernal Heart Grass

    <h4>Chapter 25: Easily Getting the Infernal Heart Grass</h4>


    Leaving the rest of the investigation team behind, Xuan Hao quickly made his way towards the north west side of the Fire Rock Mountain.


    The trees were sparse on the mountain side and the heat around the mountain was high as smoke could be seening out from small cracks in the ground. Using his divine sense to peek into the cracks along the way, Xuan Hao managed to see arge amount ofva flowing beneath. Ready to surface at any time.


    The Burning Mountain Range was well known for its many active volcanos and from the looks of it, the Fire Rock Mountain was one of them.


    One of the requirements for the Infernal Heart Grass to grow was an extremely hot environment. An active volcano more than fit the description of that requirement¡­ The only thing left was to find out where the Infernal Heart Grass could be found.


    Even if he knew that it might be at the north west side of the Fire Rock Mountain, there is always a possibility that it was not there and instead might be on the east side of the mountain or simply not there at all¡­


    The north west side of the Fire Rock Mountain was hot to an unbearable degree and magma was flowing out from openings in the ground. Normal people would most likely die in this kind of environment, but Xuan Hao was a cultivator, so he was fine. At most he felt a little ufortable.


    "Hm¡­ In this kind of environment even weaker Foundation Establishment cultivators would have a hard time. No wonder that the Explorer Union had a minimum requirement of peak Foundation Establishment Realm¡­ At least a rare spirit herb like the Infernal Heart Grass should be able to grow here."


    Looking around, Xuan Hao carefully started to carefully spread out his divine sense to search the area. Making sure to restrain his divine sense as much as possible, so as to not randomly offend random bigshot A in hiding, who happened to be secretly cultivating here.


    "Ah, found something!" It did not take long before Xuan Hao found some of the people who had mysteriously disappeared.


    Walking over to the ce, Xuan Hao crouched down and inspected the body.


    The body was burnt and had bite marks all over it, meaning that the culprit was most likely a demon beast or some demonic cultivator who had gone through a demonic transformation already.


    Hopefully, it would just be a demon beast, after all, even the weakest demonic cultivator that had undergone a demonic transformation was at the Nascent Soul Realm. Further transformations would be even more terrifying.


    Xuan Hao had heard about an extremely powerful demonic cultivator at the third transformation going up against a Domain Lord, also known as a King Realm cultivator, without losing!


    The thought of encountering such a terrifying being was enough to make Xuan Hao want to turn around immediately.


    Luckily, demonic cultivators were extremely rare in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, as the Empire it belonged to was against demonic cultivation and actively hunted them down.


    From what Xuan Hao heard, most people considered demonic cultivators to be a scourge and a source of evil to be exterminated.


    Them going around devouring people did not really help with their reputation¡­


    "ROAAAAR"


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to be lost in his thoughts and start side tracking, a roar came from afar interrupting. From the sound and power behind it, Xuan Hao guessed that it was most likely a demon beast around the Core Formation Realm.


    At least it looked like he could rule out the possibility of it being a demonic cultivator¡­


    "If there is a Core Formation demon beast over there, the Infernal Heart Grass might be over there as well!"


    Not caring about the body on the ground anymore, Xuan Hao stood up again and moved in the direction of the roar he had heard earlier.


    ¡­


    "I thought you said that there would be nothing dangerous about the Fire Rock Mountain!"


    A shrill voice echoed in the surroundings when Xuan Hao made it to the location of the roar that he had heard earlier.


    "As I said before, most of the demon beast had left, I never said that there wouldn''t be a possibility that some of them were still left!"


    Looking ahead, Xuan Hao saw two young people, a man and a woman arguing with each other. In front of them, a giant tiger like demon beast was slowly approaching them.


    "Ah~ Look at the situation that younded us in~" The young woman let out a clearly fake pitiful voice as she tried to look depressed.


    "Who are you fooling! Damn vixen!"


    "Who''s a vixen! Damnable yboy!"


    "¡­"


    Xuan Hao had no idea what to do in the current situation, were they not in trouble? Was this not the time where he came by and saved them or something? Why does he feel like not helping them at all¡­?


    "Roar?" The tiger like demon beast also let out a confused roar, as it did not see the fearful expressions that it had expected.


    "Shut it! Can''t you see we are having a conversation!?" The man shouted rudely at the poor tiger demon beast before turning back and arguing with the young woman once again.


    "¡­"


    Should I just show myself? Xuan Hao thought as he looked at the couple arguing more and more intensively.


    "Ah, the Infernal Heart Grass!" Looking around the area, Xuan Hao spotted the Infernal Heart Grass a few dozen meters behind the tiger demon beast.


    Sneaking over, Xuan Hao quietly harvested the Infernal Heart Grass and put it in a special bag he had prepared for it beforehand.


    "¡­ Well, that was easier than I thought." Talking quietly to himself, Xuan Hao turned around and looked at the young woman and man still arguing in front of the confused tiger demon beast.


    "I should just leave for now. No need to get entangled with those two troublesome kids and their cultivation should also be around the Core Formation Realm, so they should be fine without my help anyway." Taking onest look at the arguing couple before heading towards the location where the investigation team would meet upter today, Xuan Hao had a feeling he would be unfortunate enough to meet them sometime again in the future.

 Chapter 26: The Untold Swords Mantra

    <h4>Chapter 26: The Untold Swords Mantra</h4>


    The meetup point for the investigation team was at the south side of the Fire Rock Mountain and was a rtively calm ce without too much danger and a rtively more normal temperaturepared to the rest of the Fire Rock Mountain.


    When Xuan Hao arrived at the meetup location, nobody else had arrived yet and Xuan Hao decided to just sit down and wait for them to arrive, at most it would take another hour or two.


    After all, with two people at the Core Formation Realm and a dozen peak Foundation Establishment cultivators. Finding out what happened at the north west side of the Fire Rock Mountain would not take a long time.


    Gui Hu and Chen Yang should be able to solve the puzzle of the dead body filled with bite marks and a potential nearby Core Formation demon beast, if not, Xuan Hao would be surprised at how they even managed to reach their current cultivation realm without getting stabbed in the back by someone.


    Even more so when they were obviously rogue cultivators without a sect backing them up before bing pathfinders of the Explorer Union!


    So, with nothing better to do, Xuan Hao sat down and took out the Infernal Heart Grass from the small bag he stored it in earlier.


    The Infernal Heart Grass looked just like normal grass, albeit slightly longer and denser. The most obvious difference from normal grass was the bright red colour and the pure qi radiating off it.


    Just holding it, Xuan Hao felt the qi between heaven and earth around him slightly increase. The benefit of consuming it would be obvious and it might even be useful to some Nascent Soul Realm cultivators. The pure Qi inside the Infernal Heart Grass was more than enough for a Core Formation cultivator to breakthrough a small realm!


    This benefit, however, palled inparison to what a cultivator who cultivated purely in fire qi would gain.


    Even a Nascent Soul cultivator might be able to breakthrough a small realm if they were cultivating fire qi.


    "Looks like it will be hard to hide it from the Nascent Soul cultivator from the Raging me Sect guarding the entrance¡­"


    Xuan Hao was both happy and sad that he got the Infernal Heart Grass.


    Happy because he now had what Qing Yi needed to awaken her divine physique, sad because he was certain that sneaking by the outpost of the Raging me Sect was impossible.


    The Raging me Sect was after all, a sect that cultivated purely in the fire qi between heaven and earth. Their sensitivity in regard to fire qi was unmatched in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Sneaking a spirit grade herb of the fire attribute past one of their Nascent Soul experts? He would have a better chance sneaking into the bedroom of the Raging me Sects Sect Master¡­


    Not that he would ever try something like that¡­


    Taking ast look at the Infernal Heart Grass, Xuan Hao put it back into the small bag and put it away.


    Changing his sitting position into a meditative one, Xuan Hao started absorbing the qi between heaven and earth as he slowly circted the qi through his entire body.


    The cultivation method that he used was also found on the fifth floor of the Pagoda of Enlightenment and was a Heaven Rank Cultivation Mantra as well.


    The cultivation mantra was called Untold Swords Mantra. The cultivation Mantra allowed one to build up a foundation as a sword cultivator and only truly started to show its might at the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Here the Untold Swords Mantra started to allow the cultivator to start constructing his own domain. At the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, this would allow one to have a Pseudo Domain! Normally, a Pseudo Domain was only something people at the half-step Domain Lord Realm had, but the Untold Sword Mantra would allow him to acquire it before that!


    This feat, however, was not without difficulties. Constructing a pseudo domain was hard and took half-step Domain Lords hundreds of years to achieve.


    The reason for this, was that it required the cultivator to have an initial understanding of a Dao. Be it the Dao of Fire or the Dao of Clouds, an initial understanding of the Dao was needed to construct a Pseudo Domain. Taking it a step further and transforming the Pseudo domain into a real domain would allow a Nascent Soul cultivator to be a Domain Lord!


    The Untold Sword Mantra however, solely focused on the Dao of the Sword and all one needed was toprehend True Sword Intent before being able to cultivate it at the Nascent Soul Realm.


    From this, one would be able to construct a Pseudo Sword Domain!


    The next step was for the True Sword Intent to transform into a Sword Domain, allowing the sword cultivator to step into the realm of Domain Lords.


    The step after the Sword Domain was mostly blurred, but the Untold Sword Mantra did mention the name of the realm.


    Sword Soul!


    Any way to reach it was foggy and blurred, as Xuan Hao struggled to understand the things written in the Untold Sword Mantra.


    He understood that he was way too weak at the moment to understand anything about what came after the Sword Domain. At least for now, he quietly cultivated his sword intent, trying to strengthen it with the help of the qi between heaven and earth.


    The moment his Sword Intent was able to engulf the area a few meters around him, he would have reached the Pseudo Sword Domain Realm. Only one step away from the Domain Lord Realm!


    For now all his Sword Intent could do was engulf his sword, increasing its strength and allowing him to fly on it.


    "Ah, Bright Sword, you are here already! Did you perhaps find what you were looking for?" A voice sounded a little behind him and Xuan Hao turned around and saw Qui Hu and Chen Yang, along with a few dozen peak Foundation Establishment cultivators appear.


    "Yes, I was lucky enough to find it. Did you manage to find the reason for the disappearances?"


    "Ah, great for you and yes we managed to find it¡­ Was just a stray Core Formation demon beast, feller was already dead when we arrived. Probably a passing Core Formation cultivator who found it before us¡­ Well, at least we can head back now, are you ready to go as well?" Gui Hu looked slightly bored as he exined what they found, before waiting for Xuan Hao''s answer.


    "Sure, I found what I was looking for already."


    "Great, then let''s head back immediately! I heard that the inn got some great ale recently, Chen Yang, want to join meter?"


    "Sure¡­ Just don''t drink too much likest time!"


    "Sure, sure, I promise I won''t! hehe."


    Hearing Xuan Hao agreeing, the group headed back towards the city as Gui Hu, and Chen Yang chatted along the way. Xuan Hao decided to just ignore the two as he quietly spread his divine sense a few hundred meters around them, so as to not be ambushed along the way.

 Chapter 27: Elder from the Raging Flame Sect

    <h4>Chapter 27: Elder from the Raging me Sect</h4>


    The journey back to me Mountain City went smoothly and Xuan Hao decided to head back to the Flying Sword Sect immediately, while trying to avoid the detection range of the Nascent Soul elder from the Raging me Sect along the way.


    Exiting the Explorer Unions building, Xuan Hao threw the few spirit stones that he earned from assisting in the investigation mission into a bag before making his way back out of the city.


    For dealing with the Nascent Soul expert at the outpost leading into the Burning Mountain Range, Xuan Hao thought about several things.


    From flying high in the air to try and enter a neighbouring kingdom and slip past the outpost without alerting the expert sent to monitor the border area.


    Sadly, both ideas had ws in them. Flying too high would not help as the pressure one would experience increased the higher one went. At the same time, the density of qi between heaven and earth also increased. Making it easier to cultivate, but at the same time harder to ascend.


    This was also one of the reasons why strong cultivators normally cultivated as high as possible, meaning most sects could be found on mountain tops or peaks.


    While entering a neighbouring kingdom was more doable, the risk of being found lower, Xuan Hao decided against it. After all, he''d rather end up being found by the Raging me Sect than the border guard¡­


    This was even more so after he removed his core elder clothes and put on some more normal clothes.


    Even if the Raging me Sects Nascent Soul expert found him, at most it would just be a foreign Nascent Soul expert passing by. This was not too unusual, considering that he came from the Burning Mountain Range that stretched through countless kingdoms.


    Things like foreign Nascent Soul experts entering the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was something for the imperial family to deal with, not the Raging me Sect!


    Now, the only problem that remained was the fact that he had the Infernal Heart Grass. The spirit herb was constantly amplifying the fire qi surrounding the small bag Xuan Hao had put it in.


    Hiding it from Core Formation experts was easy, as all Xuan Hao needed to do was cover it with his divine sense.


    But something like that would not work against another Nascent Soul expert¡­


    At this moment, Xuan Hao wished he had a storage bag or treasure to store it in, that way his problem would be solved.


    Sadly, such things required a Domain Lord to use his domain to carve out a part of space and bind it together with something like a bag or a ring.


    From what Xuan Hao knew, only the imperial family had something like that, and it was mostly because they had a founder who reached the half-step Domain Lord Realm in the past.


    A half-step Domain Lord had a pseudo domain and also had the ability to carve out space to some degree, while clearly inferior to something made by a Domain Lord, it still had the storage ability. Though way smaller and more fragile.


    Jumping atop his sword, Xuan Hao quickly flew towards the Flying Sword Sect. Hoping that the Nascent Soul expert would either miss him or ignore him.


    At that moment as Xuan Hao passed by the outpost of the Raging me Sect a long sword made from fire shed towards him from the outpost reaching far into the sky. It was a furious sh made from the Nascent Soul expert at the outpost.


    So much for not being noticed or ignored...


    "Arrogant fellow, you are asking for death!" A could shout spread out from inside the outpost. The sound was arrogant, filled with a strong aura which suppressed everyone in the surroundings and sent a chill down one''s spine.


    This was the aura of a Nascent Soul expert!


    The aura from the ming sword sh surged. It was like a giant sun rising into the sky. The burning sword soon smashed into Xuan Hao as it exploded, lighting up the surroundings.


    Engulfed by the now exploding me sword, Xuan Hao''s body let out a sharp sword intent. This sword intent went against the burning sword sh and caused the few people caught up in the surroundings to look on in shock with bated breath, as they felt the strength of a Nascent Soul expert.


    Xuan Hao, who was the target of the sword looked in the direction where the sword came from.


    This wasn''t an actual sword, but it was instead a sword sh formed by fire qi. It came from the Nascent Soul expert stationed at the outpost.


    Xuan Hao did not expect that the elder from the Raging me Sect would attack the moment that he appeared.


    The first sh of the elder from the Raging me Sect was not that strong and was mostly used to gauge his opponent, so before even a second passed, an even more powerful sword sh was sent in Xuan Hao''s direction.


    When the sword sh appeared directly in front of him, Xuan Hao unsheathed his sword and gathered his sword intent before shing down with all his might.


    The extraordinary Fire Sword quickly shattered under Xuan Hao''s sword. The fire qi was extinguished as the sword continued towards the outpost.


    As for Xuan Hao, he was perfectly fine as he stood on top of his sword and looked at a giant screen made of fire appear to block his sword sh from doing any damage to the outpost.


    At least he didn''t use his strong Soul Rank sword to fly on¡­ If he did, he would most likely have ended up falling to the ground as he tried to block the second ming sword earlier.


    In the next second, a person appeared in front of the outpost.


    The Nascent Soul elder from the Raging me Sect! His aura was really terrifying, and the aura surged into the sky towards Xuan Hao.


    Xuan Hao just shrugged it off and looked directly down at the elder from the Raging me Sect standing in front of the outpost.


    Xuan Hao was not nervous at all, as long as he manged to deal with the elder from the Raging me Sect, he would be able to run away before the reinforcements arrived.


    From the attack earlier, Xuan Hao had sensed that he was stronger than he had expected and even though the other party was at the fifth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, he had clearly taken some sort of short cut and his cultivation was far from stable at the moment.


    Xuan Hao did not say anything and instead unleashed another sword sh towards the elder from the Raging me Sect.


    The moment this sword sh was used, Xuan Hao looked like a sword god unleashing his wrath upon the mortal world as the sword descend from the sky.


    Hong!


    Xuan Hao''s sword went all out and was even stronger than before!


    The elder''s expression changed as well when he sensed the strength behind the sword.


    Hong long long!


    In the next second, he was hit by Xuan Hao''s attack. Fire qi spread out from him and formed a shield, but it was not enough to block the sword and soon his chest felt an intense pain and he screamed. He struggled and blood sshed out onto the ground beneath his feet.


    A wound appeared on his chest.


    "It seems I underestimated you. You are strong, but you are only one! When the rest of my Raging me Sect arrives, you are dead!" The elder covered his wound and turned into a bright me as he quickly disappeared into the distance.

 Chapter 28: Leaving the Raging Flame Sects Territory

    <h4>Chapter 28: Leaving the Raging me Sects Territory</h4>


    Looking at the elder from the Raging me Sect disappearing into the distance, Xuan Hao felt regretful that he didn''t manage to kill him off.


    To the Flying Sword Sect and Raging me Sect, a stage five Nascent Soul elder was really strong. If it were not for him being alone and isted at the outpost, Xuan Hao would most likely not have gotten a chance to fight him one on one.


    Moreover, a Nascent Soul experts'' body was really strong. Xuan Hao had used his sword intent to injure him earlier.


    But even with the heavy injuries he sustained from the sword attack, the Nascent Soul elder was still okay, and he should be able to fully recover with a few days of rest.


    Feeling the auras of several Nascent Soul Realm cultivatorsing over, Xuan Hao dared not stay any longer as he quickly jumped back on his sword and hurriedly flew away before the reinforcements managed to arrive and stop him.


    The attack from earlier had already drained him quite a bit and dealing with what felt like 4 to 5 fully rested Nascent Soul experts was not really something that he wanted to experience at the moment.


    As Xuan Hao left the ce, a group of people appeared in front of the outpost.


    "Hm¡­ True Sword Intent¡­ I don''t know anyone in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom who managed toprehend it, it should be someone from the outside!" An elderly man in front inspected the scars left from the battle and concluded.


    "Elder Gui, are you sure that you felt a strong fire qi on him?"


    "Y-yes Sect Master, it was most likely a herb that was of the fire attribute. From what I felt, it should at least be peak spirit grade¡­" The elder who was beaten up by Xuan Hao earlier appeared quite ragged as he answered the elderly man inspecting the scars left by the battle.


    "Hah¡­ If we had known earlier, we might have been able to set up a trap¡­ With a peak spirit grade fire attribute herb, I might have been able to breakthrough and enter the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­!" The Elderly man sighed regretfully as he looked into the distance where Xuan Hao disappeared.


    "But now, we lost any chance of that, I would have to put my life on the line and try to enter the deeper regions of the Burning Mountain Range. Catching up to a sword cultivator whoprehended True Sword Intent before reaching the Domain Lord Realm is nothing but a pipe dream¡­" The other men looked helplessly at one another. Not knowing what to say.


    The Sect Master had reached the eight stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and was just one step away from the ninth stage, but that tiny step had prevented most Nascent Soul Realm cultivator from ever reaching the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "I will enter the Burning Mountain Range today, I can''t keep dying and my lifespan is not infinite¡­" Concluding this, determination red up in the elderly man''s eyes.


    "B-but Sect Master, what if the Flying Sword Sect decides to attack when you are gone¡­?" A skinny elder asked worriedly as he looked at the determination shining from within the Sect Masters eyes.


    "No need to worry about that, even if that Feng Chen does act, we still have more Nascent Soul experts. You just need to hide inside the sect''s core formation, and he won''t be able to do anything. Secondly, how would they even know that I''m gone?" The elderly man said with a slight smile on his lips.


    "T-true, but if you are gone for too long, they will definitely start to suspect something¡­" The skinny elder was still not assured, he still remembered back when their Sect Master and the Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect fought each other. Back then, both of them had equal strength even though the Sect Master was one small realm above the Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect.


    "It''s fine, I will at most take a few years, just say that I went into secluded cultivation to try and breakthrough or something. People seem to easily believe that excuse¡­" With thosest words, the elderly Sect Master started making his way towards the Burning Mountain Range.


    "Sect Master! What do we say to your wife!?" The skinny elder yelled loudly towards the Sect Masters disappearing back.


    "¡­ Say I¡­ Went into secluded cultivation¡­"


    "But¡­"


    Before the elders managed to question their Sect Master, he disappeared into the distance, whether they saw him again in the next few years was uncertain.


    He would most likely not return immediately even if he managed to find the fire attribute herb, he needed to breakthrough¡­


    "W-what are we supposed to say to the Sect Master''s wife¡­?"


    "¡­"


    "Ah, Elder Gui, you seem to have gotten quite injured from your fight earlier, why don''t you head back first?" A rtively young elder said as he smiled at the injured elder Gui.


    "Yes, yes, I think the injured should head back first, we will stay here and keep an eye out for that sword cultivator!" another elder followed up as he pretended to keep an eye on the few trees in the distance.


    "¡­You guys¡­" Elder Gui was speechless, and it was only when he was already on his way back towards the Raging me Sect that he realized that he had been thrown for the lions, or in this case the Sect Masters wife.


    Normally he should not have been afraid of the Sect Masters wife, there was just one problem and that was the fact that she was the grand elder''s daughter.


    Thest time an elder had annoyed her he ended up being beaten up by the grand elder, who to most of the Raging me Sect Elders despair doted on his daughter.


    Meanwhile, Xuan Hao had no clue about the amount of despair the elder from the Raging me Sect that he had beaten up would end up going through and even if he knew, he most likely would not care much and would at mostugh at the elder''s situation.


    At the moment, Xuan Hao had made it out of the Raging me Sect''s territory and was back in the northern part of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, where the Flying Sword Sect ruled.

 Chapter 29: Returning to the Flying Sword Sect

    <h4>Chapter 29: Returning to the Flying Sword Sect</h4>


    The rest of the journey back to the Flying Sword Sect went without any problems and soon, Xuan Hao made it all the way back to his mountain peak.


    Back at the mountain peak, Qing Yi had spent most of the day before training and spent the rest of the time hanging out with Zeng Shihan, whom she had met earlier at the dining hall of the Flying Sword Sect.


    She already knew that her master had gone out to get the herb needed to awaken her divine physique and was really grateful towards what he did for her.


    Wanting to repay her master, Qing Yi decided to train extra hard and not disappoint the trust that her master put in her. Qing Yi trained with her full focus on the sword in her hands. Not even noticing Xuan Hao as he appeared at the entrance of the training count.


    Seeing the hard-working Qing Yi, Xuan Hao backed off and decided not to interrupt her for now. Reaching such a focused state was hard and would be beneficial for her.


    From what he remembered, such a state of mind was called sudden enlightenment or something. A cultivator does indeed have an increased brain capacitypared to normal humans and the stronger they got, the harder it would be to focus on one single thing at a time.


    Xuan Hao guessed the reason for the name sudden enlightenment was because the cultivators were not used to focus on solely one thing. The constant divine sense spreading out from a Nascent Soul cultivator, even when restrained, would still feed an enormous amount of information constantly to the mind of the cultivator.


    Reaching a state of constant focus, or constant enlightenment would surely bring a qualitative change for any cultivator.


    Xuan Hao himself had tried to focus his mind as well while cultivating, but all he could do was get a few minutes of enlightenment. Even just that was able to help him improve rapidlypared to his normal cultivation, cultivating 5 minutes under the enlightened state wasparable to over a week of normal cultivation time!


    At least for now, the dream of constant enlightenment was far off¡­


    "Oh yeah, the servant sent by the servant quarters have not arrived yet. Maybe she will arriveter today or tomorrow?"


    Having spread his divine sense around his pavilion, Xuan Hao noticed that there was still only him and Qing Yi at the pavilion for now.


    "Maybe I should go and take a look at the servant quarters and see how they are doing? Sitting around cultivating all day is quite boring and I just got back as well. Going for a small walk would be a nice change of pace after the fight earlier." Thinking to himself, Xuan Hao decided to go pay the servant quarters a visit and see if the servant was picked yet.


    From what he knew, apetition would always happen at the servant quarters whenever one of the core elders, the Vice Sect Master or the Sect Master asked for a servant.


    Apparently, it was a prestigious thing to serve as one of the Nascent Soul experts'' servants. Shocker¡­


    Xuan Hao did not wait for long and immediately took off, walking slowly towards the servant quarters. Making sure to enjoy the view of the many mountains along the way, even if most of the mountains were artificially created by Nascent Soul cultivators, it was still a beautiful sight to behold.


    The thing that Xuan Hao liked the most about the Ewaria continent was the cultivator''s dedication to make things breathtakingly beautiful. Even if they did not realize so themselves.


    From the beautiful plum trees to the humble willow trees, everything fit perfectly together with the majestic pavilions of the elders and humble dwellings of the disciples. Everything looked straight out of a painting.


    Meanwhile at the servant quarters.


    Zhi Ruo had just won thepetition and was being escorted by manager Hou to the registration building.


    Inside the registration building Manager Hou took out a rtively small book and wrote something down before cing it back at a small shelf.


    "Okay, with the registration done, all you need to do is pack the things you have left and move to the peak of Core Elder Xuan. He should know that a servant ising, so there is no need to be nervous." Seeing Zhi Ruo getting more and more nervous as he started talking, manager Hou slowed down and assured Zhi Ruo that there was nothing to be worried about.


    "Ah, by the way manager Hou, do you know anything about elder Xuan''s disciple?" Zhi Ruo was rather curious about the disciple of Xuan Hao that she was going to be serving and couldn''t help asking.


    "Hmm¡­ I honestly don''t know much about her but from what I could gather elder Xuan picked her at the recent entrance examination." Thinking about it for a while, manager Hou answered with a slight shake of his head. Not really knowing that much about elder Xuan''s new disciple.


    "I see¡­"


    "Well, no need to worry, I''m sure that elder Xuan''s disciple is a splendid person individual to be chosen by him personally!"


    Manager Hou chatted a bit with Zhi Ruo as both of them talked together about Xuan Hao and what she should remember to do and how to behave ordingly.


    All in all, Zhi Ruo left the registration building a littleter than she had expected, and the sun was already high up in the sky by the time she packed her things and exited the servant quarters. Heading towards the mountain peak that Xuan Hao''s pavilion was located on.


    Xuan Hao on the other hand had already arrived at the servant quarters and saw Zhi Ruo exiting the servant quarters.


    Ignoring her, Xuan Hao walked into the registration building to see if the servant quarters had chosen a servant for Qing Yi yet and quickly discovered that one had apparently already been sent.


    "Ah, it should be the girl from earlier¡­" Remembering Zhi Ruo who had exited the servant quarters a little while ago, Xuan Hao decided to make his way back to his pavilion and greet the servant sent over by the servant quarters.


    "Qing Yi should have finished her training and should be resting at the pavilion at the moment, should I let the two of them meet before introducing myself?" Thinking about it, Xuan Hao decided to take a longer path back to his pavilion and instead allow for the two girls to chat with each other without him being there.


    It would probably be easier for the new servant girl to talk with Qing Yi a girl around the same agepared to him, a Core Elder of the Flying Sword Sect at the Nascent Soul Realm¡­

 Chapter 30: Qing Yi and Zhi Ruo Meets

    <h4>Chapter 30: Qing Yi and Zhi Ruo Meets</h4>


    Qing Yi had just finished her training as she made her way out of the training court and back into the pavilion. At this moment, Xuan Hao had still note back yet and Qing Yi did not mind it so much as she already knew the reason why her master had left yesterday.


    "If I manage to awaken my divine physique like master said, will I really be able to cultivate quicker¡­?" No matter what Xuan Hao had told her earlier, Qing Yi still did not really dare to believe that she actually had a divine physique before actually feeling it for herself.


    After all, it was a divine physique! Even outside of the Heavenly Sky kingdom, something like a divine physique was highly valued.


    Qing Yi had heard that among the current younger generation of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, the only other person with a divine physique was the current crown prince of the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms imperial family!


    Someone whom she could only look up to. Now that someone was apparently at the same level as her¡­


    Knock Knock


    A knocking sound could be heard from the entrance to the pavilion, immediately rousing Qing Yi from her thoughts and bringing her back to reality.


    "Ah, I-I will be there in a moment!" Qing Yi quickly called out in a slightly flustered.


    She had no clue who woulde to her master''s peak at this point in time, especially considering that he wasn''t home at the moment.


    Hurrying over to therge front door of the pavilion, Qing Yi slowly opened it and looked out to see who it was.


    Outside the door, Zhi Ruo nervously waited as she tightly held her luggage.


    "Hello, who might you be¡­?" Hearing the voice, Zhi Ruo snapped back and immediately introduced herself.


    "I''m Zhi Ruo! The servant sent by the servant quarters to serve as the servant of elder Xuan''s disciple!"


    "My servant¡­?" Hearing the voice once again, Zhi Ruo looked at the person in question and saw a beautiful girl around the same age as her.


    This should be elder Xuan''s disciple! Thinking this, admiration shone out from her eyes as she looked at Qing Yi.


    Qing Yi was confused as she looked at the girl who proimed to be her new servant, stood there and stared expectantly at her. Full of both admiration and awe.


    This feeling of admirationing from Zhi Ruo was rtively new to Qing Yi, as she had mostly felt the disappointing gazes of the other Qing family members back in the Bright Sun City.''


    "Are you perhaps someone master requested for¡­?" Realizing that she had not gone to the servant quarters to request any servant, Qing Yi realized that it was most likely her masters doing.


    "Yes! Elder Xuan went to the servant quarters yesterday to request a servant for his new disciple!" Without missing a beat, Zhi Ruo answered honestly.


    "I see¡­ Then let''s find a ce for you to stay. Currently, most of the rooms are empty as only me and master stays in the pavilion at the moment." Looking back into therge, yet empty, pavilion. Qing Yi felt a little happiness upon realizing that she would not have to stay there alone anymore.


    Yesterday, when her master had left her alone, Qing Yi had felt quite lonely living in the big pavilion all alone.


    The arrival of Zhi Ruo would solve that issue, so even if her master ended up going out to get something again, at least she would not be left alone again.


    Zhi Ruo quietly dragged her luggage along as she followed Qing Yi deeper into the pavilion and soon the two made it to an empty room.


    "You can stay in this room for now, by the way what are you going to be doing here?" As Qing Yi stopped in front of the entrance to what would be Zhi Ruo''s new room, she asked curiously.


    "From what I know, I should be following you and help in any way I can, cleaning up the pavilion, serving tea or make snacks when needed¡­"


    "Ah, then you can follow me to the dining hall! I was about to go there to get something to eat and meet up with friend as well. Just leave you luggage here for now, you can just unpack it when we get backter!"


    "O-okay¡­" Zhi Ruo nervously put down her luggage in what would be her new sleeping quarters and quickly followed behind an excited Qing Yi, who had already made it down the hallway where the sleeping quarters were located.


    The rest of the day, Qing Yi and Zhi Ruo spent outside together with Zeng Shihan.


    In the end, the three girls ended up bing closer after spending the day together.


    Xuan Hao had watched the interaction between Qing Yi and Zhi Ruo when they first met and also watched as Qing Yi ran off towards the dining hall with Zhi Ruo following closely behind.


    While the opportunity was there, Xuan Hao also used his system to check out the talent of Zhi Ruo.


    "Natural talent¡­ 3?" Indeed, nothing amazing and quite average cultivation talent, far from enough to enter the Flying Sword Sect. What was to be expected by someone who chose to be a servant.


    Looking closer to see if he had missed anything, Xuan Hao saw that she had a normal physique as well. Nothing was out of the ordinary, just a normal servant.


    But even then, Xuan Hao couldn''t shake the feeling that something was not right.


    Well, it didn''t really matter at the moment, so Xuan Hao decided to throw his suspicions to the side for the moment.


    For now, Xuan Hao returned back into his room in the pavilion and took out the Infernal Heart Grass.


    Preparing the Infernal Heart Grass for consumption was easy as all he needed to do was mix it together with some water to dilute it.


    This way, someone at the Qi Condensation Realm could consume it without dying from therge amount of fire qi inside the Infernal heart Grass.


    If any alchemist saw how he ruined the medical efficiency of a peak grade spirit herb like this, they would surely want to take his life personally.


    The reaction of the Raging me Sect would probably be even more extreme, as the Infernal Heart Grass that could help them breakthrough was wasted in such a manner.

 Chapter 31: Bright Sun Divine Physique, Small Sun

    <h4>Chapter 31: Bright Sun Divine Physique, Small Sun</h4>


    Qing Yi and Zhi Ruo both returned to the pavilion only when the sun was about to go down and just after entering the pavilion, Qing Yi discovered that someone was standing in the hallway looking at both of them.


    "Master!"


    "E-elder Xuan!"


    Qing Yi happily called out to Xuan Hao, while Zhi Ruo was a little more nervous and shyly hid behind Qing Yi.


    "Qing Yi and you should be the servant sent over by the servant quarters, Zhi Ruo?" Seeing how excited Qing Yi was upon seeing him, Xuan Hao smiled slightly as he turned to look at the hidden Zhi Ruo behind Qing Yi.


    "Y-yes! Elder Xuan!" Zhi Ruo replied at the top of her voice. Maybe a little too loudly, as she soon hid away behind Qing Yi once again.


    "No need to be nervous, you can just get used to living here slowly. Did Qing Yi show you where you can stay?"


    "Ah, Yes! She already showed me a room earlier!"


    "That''s great, I will be borrowing Qing Yi for a moment then." Hearing an affirmative answer, Xuan Hao took his leave together with Qing Yi as Zhi Ruo returned to the room she was assigned to and started unpacking her luggage.


    "Did you manage to find the Infernal Heart Grass master?" After they had walked out of the pavilion, Qing Yi couldn''t hold herself back from asking anymore.


    "Yes, I did, we are going to carry out the awakening of your divine physique at the training court as it would be easier to control in case the fire qi between heaven and earth goes out of control or some other kind of heavenly phenomenon decides to show up.


    If that really happens, I should be able to control it. Better not have a heavenly phenomenon appear and broadcast that someone with a divine physique appeared¡­ The amount of trouble and danger that would bring is enormous!" Looking at Qing Yi, Xuan Hao assured her as they made their way to the training court.


    "So, what am I going to do? Just eat it?" As they made their way to the centre of the training court, Qing Yi curiously looked up at Xuan Hao and asked him.


    "I diluted the Infernal Heart Grass in some water to lower the effects, so all you need to do is drink it." Saying so, Xuan Hao took out the medical concoction he had made earlier.


    "Drink it and you will be able to awaken your divine physique!" Xuan Hao stated brightly as he handed the cup with the questionable medical concoction over to Qing Yi.


    "¡­" Qing Yi looked doubtfully at the ss of water with what looked like red grass sadly floating around in it.


    If any alchemist saw this medical concoction of her master, they would surely skin him alive¡­


    "Good! Now drink it!"


    Still doubtful about how much the water with red grass in it would help her, she decided to trust in her master.


    Gulp


    In one big gulp, Qing Yi drained the cup and almost immediately felt the change, as a fiery heat started spreading throughout her entire body.


    "Sit down and rx your body, what you are feeling now is the Infernal heart Grass''s effect flowing through your entire body. Soon arge heat should gather in your dantian, when that happen, try to spread the heat from the dantian into the rest of your body!"


    As she felt the heat spreading through her body, Qing Yi heard her master and quickly did what he told her to and soon the fiery heat that had been spreading through her entire body gathered inside of her dantian.


    The heat slowly rose, and Qing Yi started sweating as she tried her hardest to spread the heat gathering inside of her dantian out to the rest of her body.


    The process took a long time, and it was only after a little over one hour had passed that Qing Yi finally managed to spread the fiery heat in her dantian to the rest of her body.


    By now, she was extremely exhausted and sweating profusely. The heat alone was almost unbearable and if not for Xuan Hao assisting her from time to time, Qing Yi doubted whether she would have been able to do it.


    "Hah¡­"


    As thest wisp of heat left her dantian and spread into the rest of her body, a magical transformation took ce.


    The most obvious thing was her ck hair bing even darker as her brown eyes changed to red.


    Other than that, her cultivation directly went from the fourth stage of Qi Condensation to the seventh stage of Qi Condensation. Putting her close to the peak of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Xuan Hao saw this and let out a satisfied smile while looking at Qing Yi with the help of the system.


    Qing Yi


    Talent: 38


    [Physique: Bright Sun Divine Physique (Small Sun)]


    It seemed that her talent had increased by 1 after the awakening. Not much, but still something.


    Thinking about it, it was probably the effect of the Infernal Heart Grass and not the divine physique itself that had increased her talent.


    Ignoring it, Xuan Hao instead focused on her physique, it had changed from dormant to having small sun written behind it.


    Inspecting it further, Xuan Hao found out that small sun was the stage of the divine physique. Meaning that the physique could level up further in the future.


    What was needed for that to happen was not written and Xuan Hao himself had no idea how to level up a divine physique as he had never heard about anything like it before.


    "M-master, did it work¡­?" calling out to him, Qing Yiid down exhaustedly on the ground as she asked.


    "Hm? Ah, yes it worked splendidly! Congrattions Qing Yi, you have sessfully awakened your divine physique!" Seeing the exhausted look on Qing Yi''s face, Xuan Hao threw the idea of levelling up her divine physique to the back of his mind for now, as he focused on her instead.


    "Hah¡­ That''s great¡­" With thosest words, Qing Yi closed her eyes as she drifted off to sleep.


    "¡­"


    Looking down at his sweaty disciple living the life and sleeping under the stars, Xuan Hao bent down and picked her up before making his way back towards the pavilion.


    "Well, at least I got her a servant at the right time¡­" mumbling so to himself, Xuan Hao ended up handing the sweaty and still asleep Qing Yi over to the confused Zhi Ruo.


    Looking at Zhi Ruo hurrying back to Qing Yi''s room while carrying Qing Yi in her arms, Xuan Hao sighed at the scene.


    A cultivation world was indeed awesome, even a frail servant girl had the strength to carry an adult man. Let alone a small girl like Qing Yi¡­

 Chapter 32: Morning~

    <h4>Chapter 32: Morning~</h4>


    Having left Qing Yi with Zhi Ruo, Xuan Hao retreated back into his room.


    Xuan Hao wanted to teach Qing Yi the Burning Heaven Cultivation Mantra immediately, but she was currently sleeping. There was not much to do before Qing Yi woke up again, Xuan Hao decided to just spend the rest of the day cultivating in his room. At least the system did not prevent him from cultivating and he could still progress even without it''s help, though quite slowpared to the instant progress the system brought about.


    Siting quietly inside his room cultivating, time passed and before long the sun slowly rose in the distance.


    Looking at the side of his room, Xuan Hao went to a bookshelf where he had ced the Heaven Burning cultivation mantra before he went to get the Infernal Heart Grass for Qing Yi.


    Today, Xuan Hao had decided to finally help Qing Yi in cultivation. Now that she had awakened her divine physique, this was even more needed than her training her father''s sword technique.


    Walking out of his room, Xuan Hao immediately went to Qing Yi''s room and knocked gently at her door before waiting for an answer.


    "Ah, is it Zhi Ruo¡­? Ah! Master! Wait a moment!" Opening the door with a sleepy expression, Qing Yi woke up the moment she saw the person standing in front of her door and quickly disappeared back into her room. Most likely to make herself more presentable.


    "W-what are you here for master!?" Appearing once again, still confused at the sudden appearance of Xuan Hao in front of her door so early in the morning, Qing Yi asked nervously.


    "You have managed to awaken your divine physique, so it''s time for you to get a fitting cultivation mantra as well! I have already chosen one that will fit well with your divine body for you, if you are ready,e to the training court and meet me there."


    "Y-yes master, I will be there right away!"


    "No need to hurry, you can just go to the dining hall and get something to eat first. After that,e to the training court."


    "Yes, master!" Listing to what Xuan Hao said, Qing Yi did feel a slight pang of hunger hit her as she reluctantly agreed.


    The thought of being able to cultivate again excited her. Earlier, when she woke up. The first thing she tried to do was cultivate and the speed at which she felt her strength increased brought along an intoxicating feeling.


    Other than that, she also felt that her cultivation had increased after awakening her divine physique. Right now, it was even higher than Qing Chenyi!


    Suddenly going from an ordinary talent to having a heaven defying talent was an amazing feeling and Qing Yi felt extremely happy at the moment and she felt like she had ascended in one step.


    "Ah, but I heard that master reached the Nascent Soul Realm at only 21 years of age¡­ Now that I think about it. Not many people outside the Flying Sword Sect seems to know about master¡­ Why is that¡­? Even I only learned about master after entering the Flying Sword Sect¡­" As she walked towards the dining hall, Qing Yi suddenly thought about her master and how nobody seemed to know about him outside of the Flying Sword Sect.


    The only thing that was talked about outside of the Flying Sword Sect was that he was a core elder and a Nascent Soul Realm expert, but nothing more and nothing less.


    Thinking further about it, Qing Yi felt it was suspicious. Even if the Flying Sword Sect tried to hide it, there would still be spies from other powers and with how widespread her masters age was in the Flying Sword Sect, finding out would not be that hard¡­


    Maybe the other powers simply chose not to believe in it¡­? A 21-year-old Nascent Soul Realm cultivator was indeed unbelievable to most and if she had not entered the Flying Sword Sect, she would just have thought that her master was some 100+ year old man.


    Regaining one''s youth was easy at the Nascent Soul Realm and even if one looked like he was 20, he could easily be several hundreds of years old.


    Indeed, having someone reach the Nascent Soul Realm at 21 years of age was indeed a great advertisement of how strong the sect was and how great their training was¡­ It could also serve as something the younger generation could work towards¡­


    "Qing Yi?"


    "AH!" Putting her hands up in front of herself in a form of defensive pose, Qing Yi looked directly into the eyes of Zeng Shihan standing in front of her.


    "Ah what? I have been calling out to you for thest five minutes with no response¡­ By the way, where is Zhi Ruo?" Rolling her eyes, Zeng Shihan asked.


    "Zhi Ruo? She was still sleeping when I left¡­ And I was just thinking about something¡­"


    "Sure~ let''s get something to eat now, I''m starving!"


    Chatting together a little longer, Zeng Shihan and Qing Yi went to eat breakfast before leaving to do their own thing.


    Before leaving, Zeng Shihan told Qing Yi about a neer tournamenting up for the new disciple who just entered the sect. Apparently, the winner would be able to get an Earth Rank Artifact and a lot of spirit stones.


    Even the second and third ce got some decent artifacts, while the top ten would get spirit stones and some weaker artifacts.


    Before awakening her divine physique, Qing Yi would not dare to participate in the neer tournament.


    But now that she was at the seventh stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, she definitely stood a chance at the top ten! Qing Yi decided she would ask her master about participating in the neer tournament.


    For now, she headed back towards the training court where her master was waiting for her, she would finally be able to learn a cultivation mantra from her master!


    Compared to what the Qing family had, the one given to her by her master was bound to be better suited for her!

 Chapter 33: Unkown Threat and Training Qing Yi

    <h4>Chapter 33: Unkown Threat and Training Qing Yi</h4>


    At the training court, Xuan Hao was patiently waiting for Qing Yi to show up. Meditating while waiting for someone or something had slowly be a habit for Xuan Hao, as the rxation it brought about was unmatched. Maybe the influence from the former Xuan Hao''s soul that had merged into him affecting him more than he expected. Not that the rxing feeling was unwee, just unexpected.


    Xuan Hao still remembered just after he transmigrated over, he was overwhelmed with the unknown emotions and memories from the past Xuan Hao. Towards the end, he had forgotten his original name and decided to just go with Xuan Hao, as he had already merged together with the soul of the former Xuan Hao.


    From the memories of the former Xuan Hao, he could see many weird things. From birth and all the way up till he entered the Core Formation Realm, he only saw foggy figures and outlines. Nothing could really be seen from it.


    Only after he entered the Core Formation Realm did the memories start to be clearer as Xuan Hao could see the past Xuan Hao wandering alone through the world at a young age, passing through countless kingdoms and empires. Wandering without a goal or any location in mind, just trying to get away from something.


    It was only after encountering the current Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect Feng Chen, that the past Xuan Hao became friends with him and entered the Flying Sword Sect.


    From here on out, the past Xuan Hao just spent his time quietly cultivating in his pavilion until he reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Only a few weeks after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao passed over and merged together with the soul of the past Xuan Hao.


    Xuan Hao himself knew that he probably would not be able to rx and enjoy life like now forever and the missing memories warned him of something dangerousing, something that the past Xuan Hao had fled from since even before reaching the Core Formation Realm.


    From what Xuan Hao could gather after merging together with the past Xuan Hao, whatever he was fleeing from was not from the Ewaria continent.


    Instead, it was something beyond it, something way more dangerous than the so-called Emperor Realm cultivators here it was¡­


    "Master!"


    "Huh¡­?" Opening his eyes, Xuan Hao blinked slightly in confusion. The feeling of being close to reaching something still lingered in his mind as he turned around and looked at his disciple, Qing Yi.


    "Hm? Is something wrong master?" Blinking her eyes in confusion, Qing Yi tilted her head slightly to the side as she wondered why her master looked at her with such a confused expression on his face.


    "It''s nothing¡­ Let''s start the training now that you are here already!" Shaking his head slightly, Xuan Hao chose to just forget his earlier things and focused on training Qing Yi for now. The rest could wait forter when he was alone and had time to slowly meditate on it.


    "For starters, what cultivation mantra are you using? I don''t ask you to divulge the cultivation mantra as it is most likely a family heirloom or something along those lines. What I want to know is simply what it is aligned with, be it cloud qi, water qi, forest qi or so on." Exining patiently, Xuan Hao waited for a response.


    "Ah¡­ I-I''m using an earth qi cultivation mantra, it was the only one I could use back when I tried in the past¡­" Fidgeting in embarrassment, Qing Yi exin softly. Xuan Hao doubted whether he would be able to hear anything she said if he was not a Nascent Soul cultivator.


    "Hmm, I see. No need to feel nervous or embarrassed about it. The reason why you could not cultivate anything before, was probably because your divine physique had not awakened yet. This will no longer be a problem for you.


    Now, you cultivated earth qi before and will be switching to fire qi now. This is not really a problem and will at most take you a few hours. We will mostly spend the next few hours on this, as I will guide you in changing the remaining earth qi in your body out with fire qi. Sit down for now." Walking up to Qing Yi, Xuan Hao motioned for her to sit down, as he put his hand of her back.


    "I will now channel fire qi from the surroundings and let it enter your body, meanwhile, you will try to expel all of the earth qi remaining in your body."


    Qing Yi nodded to his instructions and Xuan Hao began slowly drawing in fire qi from the surroundings, as Qing Yi expelled the earth qi inside of her body out into the environment.


    Slowly one hour passed and thest bit of earth qi left Qing Yi''s body and now it was instead filled up with a rampant fire qi, it was only with Xuan Hao''s help that it did not go out of control.


    "Good, the first step ispleted. Now I will inject some of my qi into your body in the pattern of your new cultivation mantra. Try to follow it and familiarise yourself with it." Smiling at the progress they had made so far, Xuan Hao quickly instructed Qing Yi in the next step.


    Qing Yi did not say a word and only nodded slowly upon hearing Xuan Hao''s words.


    At the moment she was fully focused and did not dare to spare an ounce of attention on anything else.


    Feeling her master''s qi gently flowing into her dantian from her back, Qing Yi focused on the qi''s movement pattern and tried her best to imitate it.


    Ever so slowly, Qing Yi started to get a hang on it and the formerly rampant fire qi started to calm down and the environment of her dantian rxed as well.


    "Congrattions Qing Yi, you sessfully managed to swap out the earth qi in your body with fire qi. Now you can truly start cultivating. Here, this is the Heaven Burning Mantra, it focuses on fire qi and should be suited for your divine physique as well." Looking up at her master with an exhausted look, Qing Yi happily took the book that her master handed over to her.


    "Just go back and rx for now, you can try and read the Heaven Burning Mantra while recovering. The more you understand, the faster your cultivation and your strength should also increase along with it."


    Smiling happily, Qing Yi hugged the book as she ran off towards her room. Full of fighting spirit. Excited about the things she would learn from the cultivation mantra that her master handed her.

 Chapter 34: Azure Sky Kingdom

    <h4>Chapter 34: Azure Sky Kingdom</h4>


    Looking at the disappearing figure of Qing Yi, Xuan Hao wondered about the uing neer tournament in a weeks'' time.


    Considering the current strength of Qing Yi, she would definitely be able to participate in it and get a good ranking. Not to mention a good ranking, if she managed to learn the Heaven Burning mantra at least to an initial level, she would be able to easily take the first ce!


    But learning a Heaven Rank cultivation mantra was easier said than done and even gaining an initial understanding would take weeks if not months for Qing Yi. This was only because she had the Bright Sun Divine Physique, without it, learning the Heaven Burning Mantra would most likely be close to impossible.


    In the end, whether or not she wanted to participate was up to her. The neer tournament mostly existed so as to allow the newly recruited disciples to get to know each other and mix together.


    After all, most of the time they would meet each other would be when the elders help lectures for them regarding cultivation.


    Qing Yi did not participate in the lectures held by the inner or outer elders, as she had already taken a master and was just following what little instructions Xuan Hao had left for her. Spending most of her time training and cultivating.


    The uing neer tournament would definitely be a good opportunity for Qing Yi to mingle together with the other new disciples.


    At least that was what Xuan Hao thought to himself as he made his way back towards his room in the pavilion.


    As Qing Yi made her way back into her room, she immediately started reading the Heaven Burning Mantra and tried to learn as much as she could. Even though it was hard toprehend, Qing Yi felt herself finding it easier and easier to read. By the time she fully recovered from exchanging her earth qi with fire qi, she immediately tried cultivating ording to the way her master taught her.


    The result was nothing short of surprising as Qing Yi could feel her strength slowly increasing, she even felt that she was close to breaking through to the next small realm already!


    This was nothing short of amazing, soon, Qing Yi would be at the same cultivation realm as Wen Lu, who ended up bing the first-ce holder in the entrance examination of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Thinking about this, Qing Yi felt grateful towards her master helping her.


    As Qing Yi was training and trying her best toprehend the Heaven Burning Mantra, Xuan Hao quietly cultivated in his room.


    Like this, one week flew by and the neer tournament would soon begin.


    Qing Yi had already prepared for it and with the help of her friend Zeng Shihan, she managed to sign up for the tournament.


    Xuan Hao also learned that Qing Yi was going to participate in the neer tournament and decided to go there to watch as well.


    The neer tournament was not only great for getting to know others, but was also a great learning opportunity for the new disciples of the Flying Sword Sect.


    The fighting experience that they gained at the neer tournament would always be useful, even if they lost and there was not any danger of losing their life as it was just a friendlypetition. The elders from the Flying Sword Sect ensured that nobody would end up getting hurt too badly or get fatally injured.


    "Elder Xuan, are you going to watch the neer tournament as well?" As Xuan Hao made it to the tournament ground, a masculine voice called out to him from behind.


    "Wang Hu¡­ Yes, I''m going to watch the neer tournament. My disciple will be participating as well. What about you? I have not seen your brother Wang Lan aroundtely?"


    "I see, I''m here to see if any of the new blood can catch my interest. Maybe some of them toughened up after the first week! Haha, you never know! My brother on the other hand went out to check out something around the border of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Apparently, the Heavenly Sky Imperial family requested for us and the other three to send over a Nascent Soul expert to assist with something there." Smiling widely, Wang Hu exined his reason for watching the neer tournament, as his face slowly became a little more serious upon mentioning where his brother was.


    "I see¡­ Is it the border with the Azure Sky Kingdom?" Thinking about it for a while, Xuan Hao remembered that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was on not so friendly terms with the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "Yes, it is our borders with the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­"


    Skirmishes had erupted from time to time at their borders, but the participants in those had never exceeded the Core Formation Realm.


    For the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to request Nascent Soul experts from the four big sects could only mean that the skirmishes had evolved beyond the stage of only being fighting between Core Formation Realm experts.


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out an exhausted sigh, Xuan Hao thought about the implications of it.


    A full-blown war was not impossible, even if both the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and Azure Sky Kingdom belonged to the same Empire, The Great Sky Empire.


    The Great Sky Empire did not care what happened between its kingdoms and one kingdom destroying another was ignored. No matter what, the territory still belonged to the Great Sky Empire and it was only the person who controlled it that had changed.


    The only time where the Great Sky Empire would try to prevent a war between kingdoms was if the kingdom had a Domain Lord present in it.


    Nascent Soul experts did not mean a lot in a giant empire like the Great Sky Empire, but Domain Lords were worth a lot and even the weakest Domain Lord was precious to the Great Sky Empire.


    Thinking about it, Xuan Hao felt like his strength was still too low in the world. Maybe he was strong in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, but what about outside of it? At most he could be considered decent, as for being able to freely travel through the Ewaria continent, he would first have to reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    Sitting down together with Wang Hu, Xuan Hao looked at the stage where the neer tournament would take ce.

 Chapter 35: Newcomer Tournament

    <h4>Chapter 35: Neer Tournament</h4>


    The neer tournament was a big thing for many disciples in the Flying Sword Sect and attracted some of the older disciples as well. Many of them came because they wanted to see how the new disciples were doing.


    Most didn''t have time toe watch the entrance examination after all, so the neer tournament helped in that regard and allowed them to see how the new disciples were doing.


    Some came to watch the entire tournament, while some would just stop by and watch a few matches before moving on.


    Qing Yi stood in the participants waiting area and looked around nervously at the other participants. The other participants were the same people who hadpeted in the entrance examination together with her.


    Luckily, the number of participants were only around one hundred, nowhere near the amount at the entrance examination. Qing Yi even managed to spot Wen Lu, the one who managed to rank number one in the entrance examination.


    Currently he was surrounded by people on all sides as he smiled cheekily at the other contestants. Clearly not putting them in his eyes.


    Qing Yi decided that ignoring such an individual would be the best option and so she did just that. Making sure to take a distance between herself and the so-called number one among the new disciples.


    Time slowly passed and soon the ce was packed with people, a few elders were sent out in the venue to maintain order and make sure the disciples didn''t enter the ce where the contestants would bepeting.


    Xuan Hao himself was surprised at the amount of people that showed up just to watch the neer tournament and turned to look at Wang Hu questioningly.


    "Hm? Ah, this is normal¡­ Most of the disciples have nothing much going on at the moment, as most of their lectures are cancelled for the neer tournament, so they tend toe over here to take a look.


    Though it is mostly because most of the elders tend to wait until the neer tournament until they choose a new disciple, so as to allow the disciples to familiarise themselves with the sect and see how much they can learn and improve within one weeks'' time. The same reason why I''m here, Haha!" Smiling broadly, Wang Hu exined the reason why the number of people was so high at the neer tournament.


    "I bet most of those brats down there is on the lookout for who they will bepeting over resources of the sect with." Added Wang Hu as he narrowed his eyes and looked at the excited crowd surrounding the tournament venue.


    As the people slowly settled down, the contestants slowly made their way into the venue. Xuan Hao managed to spot Qing Yi towards the end, as she was one of thest people to enter the venue.


    The focus of most of the disciples from the sect were on Wen Lu, as he was the one with the highest talent among the new disciples and he even managed to get epted as a disciple of a quite famous inner elder before even entering the Flying Sword Sect.


    This had caused the other inner sect disciples of the Flying Sword Sect to feel cautious towards their new junior, as he would most likely take some of the resources of the sect that would have been used by them beforehand.


    "I will be announcing the rules of the tournament, so everybody quiet down!" A loud voice echoed through the entire venue as all the disciples quickly shut up and looked towards the centre of the venue where an elderly man was now standing.


    "Good! The rules will be simple! Each contestant wille up on the stage and draw a number from 1 to 100. Number 1 will fight number 100 and number 2 will fight number 99 and so on. Fighting will be conducted within the designated zones on the avenue and stepping out of bounds disqualifies you.


    The objective is to either knock your opponent out of bounds, have them surrender or knock them out. No lethal method is allowed and will result in instant disqualification! That is all, will the first contestant step up?" Rying the rules for all to hear, the old man motioned towards the contestants, as they quickly moved into a fine line and made their way up to the old man and drew out a number.


    "Ah, I got number 87, what about you?"


    "Mine is 46, looks like we are not going to fight each other!"


    "Yeah, looks like luck is on our side in that regard at least, haha!"


    Qing Yi made her way up to the elder and looked at the contestant, some were happy as they looked at their number, while others were dispirited.


    "Damn, I got number 99¡­ Looks like I''m going up against that Wen Lu¡­ Wish me luck friends!"


    "We feel for you! At least go down like a man and fight it out, No surrendering!"


    "Haha, you got it! At least I will get to see why that Wen Lu was ranked number one in the entrance examination!"


    The most curious one was the one that got to go up against Wen Lu, the boy looked a bit dispirited at first butter got his fighting spirit back upon hearing the encouragement from the other contestants.


    Qing Yi had no idea what to make of this and just decided to give a silent prayer for the boy like most of the other contestants had done.


    "Qing Yi? Draw a number and recite it."


    Coming to a stop in front of the elder, Qing Yi slowly lifted her hand and entered the pouch that the elder was holding in his hand.


    "Number 26!"


    Reciting the number written on it, Qing Yi looked up at the elder and waited for him.


    "Hmm¡­ Number 26, you will be going against number 75. Go back and wait until your number is called."


    Signalling for Qing Yi to return to where the rest of the contestants were waiting, the elder quickly announced her number before moving on to the next contestant.


    "Number 100 and 1, go towards stage 1. Number 99 and 2 go towards stage 2-¡­."


    Soon, all the contestants got a number and the elder started calling for the different contestants to move towards their stage.


    With this, the neer tournament officially started.

 Chapter 36: The Start of the Tournament! Wen Lu vs ???

    <h4>Chapter 36: The Start of the Tournament! Wen Lu vs ???</h4>


    Of all the stages, Qing Yi focused on the one with Wen Lu on it. Personally, she never really saw him fighting before and was quite curious about how strong he truly was.


    Many other disciples were of the same mind as Qing Yi and most of them focused on stage number 2 where Wen Lu and the boy from earlier would bepeting.


    As the two moved up on the stage, the boy who was number 99 was filled with fighting spirit as he clenched his hands together and looked straight at Wen Lu with no fear present in his eyes.


    "Just surrender, you have no chance of beating me¡­" ncing at the boy standing in front of him, Wen Lu didn''t even bother with him and just waved his hand dismissingly at him.


    "Like hell I''m going to surrender without a fight!" The boy stomped the ground as his eyes lit up with even more fighting spirit than before. The qi inside of him started to churn as the boy got ready to put his all into fighting Wen Lu.


    "If you say so¡­ Let''s end this quickly!" Saying that, Wen Lu turned back and looked slightly annoyed at the boy insisting on challenging him.


    "Stage 2, you may begin fighting when ready!" The elder in charge of the stage 2 said as he looked at the boy challenging Wen Lu with admiration. Having the courage to stand against someone clearly superior to himself and still fight back was an admirable feat and most of the elder''s present nodded approvingly at the scene.


    Wen Lu did not wait any further and suddenly he moved! His body was like a sh of light, sending a palm strike toward the boy''s chest!


    Whew!


    A clear sound was emitted from Wen Lu''s body as he moved. This was the sound produced from the movement technique he used and sounded extremely terrifying to the listeners.


    The boy''s pupils constricted suddenly. Wen Lu was too fast, and he had covered the distance of dozen meters between them in a blink of an eye to be in front of the boy.


    His palm''s five finger were like five sharp swords directly piercing towards the boy.


    The boy looked like he had no way of escaping, but the extremely calm look on hisuface told otherwise, as it was like the surrounding suddenly slowed down.


    In a split moment, the boy barely managed to dodge to the side and during the moment of confusion he gently pushed Wen Lu. Sending him out of the second stage.


    "Haha, looks like I won." The boy smiled brightly as he looked at the speechless Wen Lu.


    Wen Lu didn''t know what happened, he nned to just finish the boy quickly and get it over with. Never in his wildest dream did he imagine that he would get disqualified! And in such a humiliating way as well!


    "You! You cheated!" Not epting his defeat, Wen Lu screamed briefly as he looked at the elder. Hoping he would side with him.


    "Number 99 wins, number 2 disqualified." The elder did not care about Wen Lu''s feelings and instead looked at the boy left of the stage approvingly.


    Wen Lu had clearly been too confident and forgot about the size of the stage and ended up being disqualified because of it. Hopefully, he would learn to not underestimate his opponent again.


    The rest of the crowd was just as surprised at the oue as Wen Lu. The only exception would be Wang Hu and Xuan Hao, who had long since seen through the boy on the stage.


    "Hah, didn''t expect such a fellow to hide among the contestants¡­ He is at the eighth stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, yet still chose to hide his cultivation¡­" Xuan Hao looked at the young boy at stage smiling innocently at the surrounding disciples and elders.


    "Haha, indeed! I remember seeing him at the entrance examination, back then he was only at the sixth stage of the Qi Condensation Realm! For him to have reached the eighth stage so quickly and still have stable foundation¡­ Looks like he had a lucky encounter of some sort over the week!" Wang Hu smiled brightly as he looked at the boy who suddenly became the centre of attention.


    "Hm? Wang Hu, want to take him in as a disciple?"


    "It''s too early to tell, I will see how he preforms over the rest of the tournament before deciding on it." Shaking his head, Wang Hu disagreed and decided to take a wait and see approach.


    "Natural talent 23¡­"


    Looking at him with the help of the system, Xuan Hao discovered that the boy''s talent was way above the current number one genius of the Flying Sword Sect, Ling Song. Still, it was below Qing Yi''s and nowhere near the 50 needed toplete the next side quest of the system.


    "You! Just you wait, I will have my revenge!" Stomping off while grinding his teeth, Wen Lu threateningly called in the direction of the boy before disappearing from the tournament venue.


    "Number two, would you please go over to the rest of the contestants and wait for the first elimination round to finish?" The elder said smilingly as he looked at the boy who just won against the disciple determined to most likely win the neer tournament.


    "Of course!" Smiling in return to the elder, the boy slowly made his way over to the rest of the contestants, where he was soon surrounded by a group of curious contestants wondering how he managed to beat Wen Lu.


    Qing Yi looked at this from a distance and warned herself not to be overconfident. The Flying Sword Sect was filled with hidden dragons and crouching tigers. One misstep in the neer tournament could cost her dearly, as she did not know if anyone else decided to hide their true skills.


    "Number 26 and 75 go towards stage 5 and get ready to fight!"


    Listing to the elder announcing the next round of fights, Qing Yi heard her own number being called out and quickly made her way over to stage 5.


    The stage itself was located somewhat away from the centre of the venue and Qing Yi made her way onto the stage as she looked at the other side of the stage and saw her opponent.


    A boy around the same age as her, looking rtively confident in himself as he looked at Qing Yi with fighting spirit.


    Qing Yi did not say anything as well and instead just got into a fighting position, getting ready to fight at a moment''s notice.


    The fights at the tournament did not allow any form of weapon be used as even the weakest weapon would be able to easily kill off your opponent when strengthened with qi.


    The Flying Sword Sect only allowed disciples who reached the Foundation Establishment Realm to use swords and other weapons when fighting, as they had learned a certain amount of control at that stage and their bodies would be able to take more damage than when they were still at the Qi Condensation Realm.


    "Stage 5, you may begin fighting when ready!" With the elders announcement, Qing Yi''s first fight in the neer tournament officially started.

 Chapter 37: Hit Him Where it Hurts!

    <h4>Chapter 37: Hit Him Where it Hurts!</h4>


    Hearing the elder announcing the beginning of her duel, Qing Yi did not move immediately and instead started to observe her opponent.


    She learned from Wen Lu''s example earlier and did not charge at the opponent the moment that the elder announced the start of the duel.


    The boy in front of Qing Yi, also cautiously observed her without attacking immediately. From the looks of things, Wen Lu helped everyone learn not to be overconfident in oneself¡­ Even the confident looking boy in front of Qing Yi started acting more cautiously.


    Time slowly passed and after one minute passed, the boy finally grew impatient and attacked.


    The attack was a simple palm strike with his qi infused into it, as the boy ran full speed towards Qing Yi.


    Qing Yi almost felt that he lookedical, as he did not use any movement technique and all he did was infuse his palm with some qi as he ran straight at her. The amount of confidence he showed when he first entered the stage was baffling and Qing Yi had no idea where the boy got it from in the first ce.


    Stepping slightly to the side to dodge the attack of the boy, Qing Yi gathered the qi inside the centre of her palm as she hit the side of the boy.


    "ARGH!"


    Letting out a dramatic sound effect, the boy tumbled to the ground with a pale face.


    Not giving the boy a chance to recover, Qing Yi ruthlessly sent him flying of the stage with another attack as he tried to stand up again.


    "Number 26 wins, number 75 disqualified!" The elder announced the results as he told Qing Yi to return to the rest of the contestants and wait for the first elimination round to finish, while the boy who lost was sent out of the venue like Wen Lu.


    The first round was rtively easy for Qing Yi and she passed it without any problems.


    Thepetition continued and Qing Yi watched as several people revealed themselves to be stronger than others expected in a surprising manner.


    There was even a girl who was only at the fifth stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, but she still managed to beat someone at the seventh stage of the Qi Condensation Realm!"


    Outside of all this, Qing Yi still thought that the boy who managed to win against Wen Lu was the biggest threat. After all, the only reason why the girl managed to win against someone 2 stages above her were because she tricked him with¡­ less favourable tactics¡­


    At least the boy who won over Wen Lu looked like he hid his cultivation or something along the line, while the girl just used her assets to sway the mind of the innocent young boy¡­


    Not thinking about it anymore, Qing Yi instead focused on the other duels taking ce around the venue.


    Xuan Hao was also looking around the venue, just to make sure he hadn''t missed any talents or hidden geniuses.


    From what Xuan Hao read back on earth, he remembered that the main characters tended to show up in these kinds of situations. Sadly, the only one who had that kind of aura at the moment was the boy who beat Wen Lu.


    All he needed was a random grandpa inside of a magical ring teaching him everything he knew about cultivation and alchemy¡­


    "Number 26 and 73 go towards stage 3 and get ready to fight!"


    As Xuan Hao was thinking about the boy who beat Wen Lu, Qing Yi''s number was called out and caused him to focus back on the venue once again. Looking towards the direction of stage 3.


    Qing Yi walked up onto the stage and faced off against her second opponent with a cautious look on her face. The person in front of her was not like the one before, no, the one standing in front of her was at the same cultivation realm as her. The seventh stage of the Qi Condensation Realm!


    Compared to anything she faced before, this would be the hardest fight she ever had, outside of the demon beast and maybe a few fights back in the Qing family¡­ On another note, maybe the fight would not really be that hard after all¡­


    "Stage 3, you may begin fighting at will!" With the announcement of the elder, the boy in front of Qing Yi directlyunched an attack without waiting.


    "Whew!"


    A clear sound was emitted from the boy''s fist as it flew towards Qing Yi at a speed faster than a normal person could see.


    Focusing on the iing fist, Qing Yi''s pupil constricted as her palm''s five fingers suddenly engulfed the fist attack by the boy and stopped it right before it hit her.


    "Hm?"


    Letting out a surprised sound, the boy quickly tried to pull back his fist, but the five white and slender fingers of Qing Yi held it in ce with a steel like grip. Not letting go, no matter how much the boy tried to pull his hand back.


    The boy decided to just give up and was about to throw another attack towards Qing Yi, but up close, Qing Yi was able to use her one free hand to punch the boy where it hurt the most before he managed to attack.


    "AAARGH!"


    A pitiful scream full of despair echoed through the venue as all the contestant turned towards the stage where Qing Yi was standing. A perfect counterattack.


    Below her, the boy was rolling around holding the ce where Qing Yi had ruthlessly hit him. The one weakness that she knew that she could take advantage of.


    Looking at this scene, she remembered what her master had told her before she had made her way to the contest venue.


    "Master, is there any good way for me to win¡­? No matter how hard I think about it, I will definitely not stand a chance against those with more fighting experience than me¡­" Qing Yi looked downtrodden and looked at her master with upturned eyes at her master. Hoping he would grace her with a secret fighting method or something to help her in the uing neer tournament.


    "Hah¡­ Sure, listen here! When you fight the male contestants, all you have to do is hit the-"


    Remembering her master''s wise words, Qing Yi looked smilingly at the boy rolling around on the ground beneath her.


    Her master was indeed wise, after just casually throwing a punch there, the boy was already down on the ground unable to fight anymore.

 Chapter 38: The Shameless One, Future Troubles of Wang Hu

    <h4>Chapter 38: The Shameless One, Future Troubles of Wang Hu</h4>


    As Qing Yi was overlooking the boy rolling around screaming in agony on the ground, the surrounding contestants, elders and disciples who came to watch looked at her with a scared expression stered on their face.


    This was especially so for the male contestants, who prayed to the heavens above that they would not end up going against her in the next round.


    "N-number 26 wins¡­" Recovering, the elder in charge of Qing Yi''s stage quickly announced her victory as he watched Qing Yi walk towards the rest of the contestants. Waiting quietly for the next round of elimination to begin.


    "¡­ Your disciple sure is something, Elder Xuan¡­" Wang Hu shivered slightly as he looked at Qing Yi before turning towards Xuan Hao, looking at him with wry smile.


    "Indeed, she is quite talented!" Xuan Hao did not sense anything wrong with the way Wang Hu talked and answered him in a slightly proud tone.


    "Number 99 and number 34, go towards stage 1 and get ready to fight!" An elder announced as the boy who beat Wen Lu made his way towards stage number 1.


    In front of him was a girl around the age of 17, clearly older than the boy.


    The girl had managed to get the third ce back at the entrance examination and still did not have a master. This had in turn allowed her to enjoy quite a bit of attention from the older disciples of the sect, as well as some of the elders hoping to take her in as their disciple, she was after all the most talented female disciple among the younger generation.


    "Hmph, boy, I''m not like that Wen Lu and won''t underestimate you like he did. You won''t be able to sneak attack me like you did him! Surrender and I will spare you the humiliation!" The girl arrogantly swayed her hips as she looked disdainfully at the boy standing in front of her.


    "Good! I''mcking in talent and need to obtain advice from sister fairy, I hope sister fairy will go easy on me." The boy bowed slightly as he got ready to fight.


    The spectators looked on weirdly as they wondered how the boy came up with such a cheesy line.


    "¡­ You can take him as a disciple, I won''t fight you¡­" Xuan Hao looked at the boy and then back up at Wang Hu as he stated his willingness to give up on the boy. Xuan Hao had enough to deal with at the moment, having a cheesy main character won''t help in any way¡­


    "¡­" A few ck lines appeared on the side of Wang Hu''s head as he looked at Xuan Hao and then the boy down at the stage, then he sighed and shook his head a bit before deciding not to argue with Xuan Hao.


    "Since you want to fight, then alright¡­ Don''t say I didn''t warn you!" The girl stepped forward as her clothes fluttered in the wind. Her feetnded softly on the ground, like an otherworldly fairy had descended. The girl was beautiful beyond belief and not as much as a speck of dust managed toe in contact with her as she moved directly in front of the boy.


    "My name is Yi Xuan." Yi Xuan came to a stop in front of the boy as she introduced herself.


    "Lu Wen!" The boy said his name as he looked at Yi Xuan with a smile on his lips.


    "Stage 1, you may begin fighting when ready." The elder in charge of stage 1 said in a slightly annoyed tone as he looked at the two, who looked like they were about to flirt with one another at any moment.


    Yi Xuan''s eyes shone slightly upon hearing the elder and quickly took a bit more distance from Lu Wen as the sun shone down on her beautiful jade white skin. She almost looked like an immortal goddess in human form as she smiled slightly upon seeing the crowd of people staring at her with eyes full of adoration and awe.


    Lu Wen gulped slightly as he looked at her. His opponent was an otherworldly maiden. Although she looked weak and frail, Lu Wen knew that she was strong and not to be underestimated.


    But Lu Wen had no ns on showing mercy. He knew that he did not have the qualifications to show mercy, as the girl in front of him was most likely at the same cultivation realm as himself!


    Yi Xuan held her hands behind her back and stood still, as she waited for Lu Wen to make his move.


    She had clearly learned from Wen Lu and did not attack immediately.


    "Ahm¡­ Ladies first¡­ It''s better you be first!" Clearly not intending to go first, Lu Wen shamelessly told Yi Xuan as he smiled cheekily.


    "Quite a disciple you have chosen Wang Hu¡­" At this moment even Xuan Hao felt like hitting him.


    "¡­" Wang Hu had nothing to say, he had indeed decided to take in Lu Wen as his disciple. After all, who would say no to such a talented disciple?


    But the more he looked at it, the more he felt like this Lu Wen was more trouble than it was worth. Looking over at Xuan Hao, he could not help but admire his foresight in giving up on taking in Wen Lu.


    No matter what, someone would have to train such a talented disciple and from the looks of it, he had be the scapegoat¡­


    "Hah¡­ Why couldn''t we get a normal talent, like Ling Song¡­?" Wang Hu had no idea what kind of disciple he had decided to take in, but at least he knew that he was talented. All that needed to be fixed was his behaviour¡­


    "Ah,dy fairy, remember to be gentle, I''m not as strong as you are!" As Wang Hu made up his mind to correct this unfilial disciple, he heard that person''s shameless voice and almost felt like spitting out blood.


    I''m not even your master yet, at least leave some face for when I take you in!


    Wang Hu seemed to see all the difficulties in front of him in the future and seemed to grow 10 years older in an instant.


    "Then I''ll make my move, watch out!" Not affected by Lu Wen''s shamelessness, Yi Xuan seemed to have seen an opening and immediately took the chance tounch an attack.

 Chapter 39: Breaking Through in the Middle of Fighting!

    <h4>Chapter 39: Breaking Through in the Middle of Fighting!</h4>


    Yi Xuan did not bother waiting any longer and suddenly moved! Her body was like a sh of white light as qi started gathering around the centre of her palm as sheunched an attack directly towards Lu Wen''s chest.


    Whew!


    The palm of Yi Xuan flew through the air and barely managed to miss Lu Wen as he dodged to the side.


    Not stopping, Yi Xuan quickly turned around andunched another palm attack in the direction of Lu Wen.


    Swoosh!


    Not minding the attacks Yi Xuan sent at him in a constant barrage, Lu Wen dodged one attack after another. Not trying to attack at all as he only spent his energy on dodging the endless barrage of attacksunched by Yi Xuan.


    "¡­ Is he looking to exhaust all of her energy¡­?" Xuan Hao felt slightly speechless as he looks at this scene.


    Exhausting a cultivator was indeed a possibility, but it would take a long time, especially when Yi Xuan didn''t expend any qi and only gathered it at her palm ready for an attack.


    "¡­" Wang Hu decided to notment at the current state of the fight and just looked off into another direction.


    As the audience prepared themselves for a prolonged fight, Yi Xuan suddenly moved at a speed beyond what most of the new disciples could see and instantly appeared in front of Lu Wen.


    Having no way of escaping such speed, Lu Wen reacted quickly and switched from dodging to attacking in an instant.


    Lu Wenunched his own attack and met Yi Xuan''s attack head on.


    Ka-cha!


    The stone stage Lu Wen was standing on had been shattered as a spider web like crack appeared, spreading out with Lu Wen as the centre.


    The attack from Yi Xuan had been able to shatter the stone stage beneath Lu Wen!


    Both Yi Xuan and Lu Wen quickly jumped away from each other after the sh.


    Wow!


    Lu Wen''s pupils contracted as he looked up at his hands as he felt a throbbing sensation of pain spread through them. The attack from earlier had almost managed to break both his arms!


    Turning to look at her hand''s Lu Wen was surprised. Her hands were weak-looking and had the soft textures of a young girl who had never worked in her life, yet those weak-looking hands almost managed to break both his hands!


    Lu Wen felt a slight shiver go through him as he saw Yi Xuan getting ready to attack once again, he did not dare underestimate her again and decided to go all out. Showing her the respect that she deserved.


    "Hah!" Letting out a low voice, Lu Wen felt himself suddenly powerup, he had managed to breakthrough in his body cultivation method just after Yi Xuan hit him and managed to reach the next realm.


    Xuan Hao had a speechless look as he wondered whether he could powerup while fighting as well. Maybe he would also be able to do something like that in the future?


    Or was powering up a privilege for some destined main characters? Xuan Hao honestly had no clue, even with all the memories of the past Xuan Hao that he merged with, there was nothing about people powering up after being beaten up.


    Wang Hu was no better as he looked on speechless as Lu Wen broke through from the eighth stage of the Qi Condensation Realm to the ninth stage.


    "What the hell¡­" Yi Xuan was just as speechless as she looked at Lu Wen. Sitting down not knowing what to do, she decided to wait for him to finish his breakthrough.


    After being surprised by Lu Wen''s sudden breakthrough, everyone turned their attention onto the other stages. After all, a breakthrough took time¡­ In some cases, a breakthrough could even take hours, as the cultivator would need to stabilise his realm after the breakthrough.


    Soon the second round of thepetition finished as the third one soon began, Lu Wen had still not finished as he was automatically disqualified, causing Yi Xuan to move on to the third round of thepetition.


    Xuan Hao looked weirdly at the still cultivating Lu Wen, he probably thought people would wait for him to finish his breakthrough or something.


    Xuan Hao even started feeling a little pity for him as some of the elders carried him out of the stage and sat him down on the ground, so other contestants could use the space.


    Following Lu Wen''s sad ending in thepetition, both Qing Yi and Yi Xuan managed to win all theiring fights and ended up facing each other in the final.


    "Hm? Where am I? Didn''t I breakthrough on the stage earlier?"


    It was only when the elder announced for Qing Yi and Yi Xuan to make their way to the first stage and fight it out that Lu Wen woke up from his breakthrough.


    "Ah, what is Yi Xuan doing on stage 1? Weren''t we just fighting?" Clearly not knowing what was happening, Lu Wen looked confusedly at Yi Xuan and Qing Yi making their way onto stage 1.


    "Ah, as you were not able to fight back in the second round, you were disqualified from the tournament!" A kind elder walked up to Lu Wen and exined his situation to him.


    "Hah? Disqualified? Why was I disqualified? Couldn''t you just wait for me to finish breaking through?!" Feeling aggrieved upon hearing he was disqualified, Lu Wen looked annoyed and frustrated.


    "Why would we do that? We also have things to do other than watching a tournament¡­ You took over two hours to breakthrough, who would want to wait that long doing nothing¡­?" Raising an eyebrow, the elder looked annoyed as he exined to Lu Wen before making his way back towards the other elders watching the tournament.


    Xuan Hao and Wang Hu both caught wind of this conversation and looked at each other.


    "Hehe, good luck with your new disciple Wang Hu¡­ hehe!"


    "This damnable brat¡­ How can someone suddenly turn arrogant like that¡­? Oh no! Maybe he has a personality disorder as well!?" Lamenting at the various problems that his new disciple had, Wang Hu wondered whether it was really worth it for the Flying Sword Sect¡­ Even if he was talented.


    Xuan Hao decided not to frustrate Wang Hu anymore, as he looked like he was about to go down and beat up Lu Wen at any moment¡­


    What would happen to Lu Wen when Wang Hu took him in as a disciple, if he already wanted to beat him up before taking him in¡­?


    Xuan Hao wondered how Lu Wen would survive as he turned and look towards stage 1 where Qing Yi was preparing for the final fight.


    In this tournament she had done well and shown that she knew how to fight, even impressing her fellow disciples.

 Chapter 40: The Finals

    <h4>Chapter 40: The Finals</h4>


    Stepping up and entering stage 1, Qing Yi looked at the girl in front of her cautiously. The girl, was called Yi Xuan and she managed to ce third in the entrance examination,pared to her who entered only due to her master''s help.


    Yi Xuan was even one small cultivation realm above her and was most definitely stronger than she was, but Qing Yi did not let this dissuade her from fighting. No matter what, she had decided to give the fight her all.


    "Hello, I''m Qing Yi." Walking up to Yi Xuan, Qing Yi bowed slightly as she introduced herself.


    "Yi Xuan. Hope we can have a good fight!" Yi Xuan smiled slightly upon seeing Qing Yi''s introduction.


    The difference between the final fight in the neer tournamentpared to the rest of the fights was obvious as everyone had their eyes focused on stage 1, waiting for the battle to begin.


    "Yi Xuan, Qing Yi, both of you may begin fighting when you are ready!" The elder in charge of stage 1 announced the beginning of the final match and the crowd eagerly watched as the final match began.


    Qing Yi and Yi Xuan quickly took a few meters distance from each other before starting to measure one another up. Trying to grasp an opening in the other party''s defence.


    In an instant Yi Xuan suddenly shot forward as she suddenlyunched an attack towards Qing Yi.


    When the surrounding people saw this scene, they all felt that the oue of the match had already been determined. As for Qing Yi, her heart became nervous as she looked at the iing attack from Yi Xuan. How could she block off this attack?


    At the moment when Yi Xuan appeared directly in front of Qing Yi, she barely managed to raise both her hands in a defensive posture before she suddenly felt like both her arms were about to break at any moment under the pressure of Yi Xuan''s attack.


    The qi inside her dantian frantically flowed towards the point of impact trying to repair the damage and fend off the foreign qi that was slowly invading Qing Yi''s body through her arms.


    It was the moment that the foreign qi of Yi Xuan reached her dantian that Qing Yi suddenly felt her qi re up as it aggressively pushed the foreign qi out of her body and expelling it directly at Yi Xuan, causing her to retreat in pain at the sudden burst of qi hitting her.


    Feeling the power of her qi having recoveredpletely along with an illusion of endless power suddenly flowing through her, Qing Yi attacked Yi Xuan before she managed to recover from the earlier burst of qi hitting her.


    The attack came too fast for Yi Xuan to react and she was hit directly in the chest as she tried to make more distance between the two of them, she breathed in and out with a bit of difficulty before refocusing herself and countering Qing Yi''s follow up attack.


    The attack from Qing Yi was simple andcked any sort of technique, clearly, she had not trained in any sort of martial technique for close quartersbat and was only using her fists infused with qi to attack Yi Xuan.


    Yi Xuan on the other hand was a little different and at least trained in some martial art techniques for close quarterbat. The attack earlier which resulted in her qi infiltrating Qing Yi''s body was an example of such a technique.


    Yi Xuan would understandably not choose to use the same martial technique again, as she got hit by a bacshst time.


    Blocking Qing Yi''s attack, Yi Xuan thought about how she should deal with her.


    Swoosh!


    Dodging an iing attack by Qing Yi, Yi Xuan managed to draw a distance between the two of them.


    Qing Yi knew this was bad as she had lost the upper hand and the chances of Yi Xuan being caught off guard once again was close to none.


    Yi Xuan knew this as she took her time to contemte over how she would go about her next and possibly final attack.


    "Your new disciple is quite strong Xuan Hao, but she seems to not have trained any sort of martial technique for closebat¡­ This match is already over¡­" Looking at Qing Yi with a slight shake of his head Wang Hu determined the oue of the match.


    "Indeed¡­ Looks like I will have to find a martial technique for her, so she won''t be so hopeless without a weapon¡­" Looking down at Qing Yi, Xuan Hao sighed slightly as he saw Yi Xuan take advantage of herck of a good martial technique and knock Qing Yi out of the stage in one simple yetplicated move.


    Qing Yi, who was hit by the attack looked slightly bewildered and sad at the oue of the fight.


    While she already knew that she was not at the same cultivation realm as her opponent, she did not believe the reason that she would lose would be herck of any sort of martial technique.


    Let alone a good palm technique for fighting close quarters, she had never trained even the weakest martial technique. All she had ever trained before was sword techniques that her father had taught to her since she was small¡­


    "Hah¡­" Sighing at the oue, Qing Yi turned to look at the ce where her master was sitting.


    "Xuan Hao, your disciple is looking over here! Remember to give her a bright smile and don''t show any sort of disappointment, that will only make the little one more sad than she already is! Losing is not a fun thing, but we all need to go through it in the process of learning¡­" Wan Hu nudged Xuan Hao''s shoulder as he told him.


    Xuan Hao heard him clear as day and turned to look over in Qing Yi''s direction.


    At the moment, Qing Yi looked beaten up with a slightly swollen eye from a fist attack that had managed to hit her in the face. This made her look quite pitiful, and Xuan Hao could not help but feel bad for her.


    "It''s fine to lose Qing Yi, it''s a part of the learning process, just show her how much you can improve in the next tournament that the sect holds!" Sending over his divine sense, Xuan Hao transferred a message to her.


    Qing Yi heard her master''s words and instantly lit up with determination shining in her eyes as she turned to look towards Yi Xuan.


    "The winner of this year''s neer tournament is Yi Xuan!" As the elder announced the result of the final match, Qing Yi made her way out of the venue to meet up with her friend Zhi Ruo and Zeng Shihan.


    "You don''t have to worry so much about it, Qing Yi, you managed to get second ce! That in itself is already awesome!"


    "Yeah, I''m sure you will be able to win against that Yi Xuan in the future!"


    "Indeed, there is always a next time!" Hearing both her friends, Qing Yi smiled brightly as the three of them made their way out of the tournament ground.


    Meanwhile, Xuan Hao watched Qing Yi taking off with a wry smile on his lips.


    "What about the reward for second ce¡­? Why do you just leave¡­? Don''t you want the reward, or did you just forget?"


    "Second ce you maye up on the stage for the reward ceremony! Second ce? Qing Yi! Is she still there?" As Xuan Hao saw the elder looking around confused on the stage wondering where Qing Yi went, Xuan Hao sighed to himself.


    Hah¡­ Having a disciple was indeed troublesome¡­

 Chapter 41: Trouble Brewing

    <h4>Chapter 41: Trouble Brewing</h4>


    After the neer tournament had finished, Xuan Hao and Qing Yi both did not have much to do in theing days and most of the time was spent with Xuan Hao training Qing Yi in anything from her cultivation mantra and martial techniques that she clearlycked in.


    But one of the things that Qing Yi managed to make the most progress in was the Autumn Wind Sword that her father had taught her.


    "Hah!"


    Swish!


    A sword attack flew through the air and soon made contact to a training dummy.


    Ka-cha!


    The training dummy let out a metal nging as the sword managed to prate deep into its body, leaving behind another scar on its already scar filled body.


    The strength behind the sword strike was clear as day and Qing Yi could feel that her strength had increased a lot over the past few months and at the moment, she was only a single step away from breaking through and reaching the foundation establishment realm!


    "Good! Your strength with the sword has already reached the foundation establishment realm. Now all you need is an opportunity to breakthrough!"


    Xuan Hao looked happily at Qing Yi, soon he would be able toplete the main quest of the system.


    While he still had no clue what the reward forpleting the main quest was, at least he hoped that it would be something good. After all, a main quest normally had better rewards than a side quest¡­


    Other than training hard under Xuan Hao''s guidance over thest few months, Qing Yi also managed to get along with Zhi Ruo and the two of them ended up spending a lot of time together whenever she was not training.


    Zeng Shihan also joined the two of them whenever she had the time for it, but that in itself was not often as she recently managed to get a job within the sect. This had allowed her more resources, but also gave her less free time than before.


    Over the past few months, Qing Yi had spent her time well and managed to make friends with a number of disciples from the Flying Sword Sect.


    But she knew that this would notst forever. The Bright Sun City''s annual youthpetition was about to start in little under a months'' time and she had still not asked her master about it yet!


    "Well, let''s end it here for today!"


    "Ah, m-master I have something to ask you!" As Xuan Hao was making his way back to the pavilion and looked at the fidgeting Qing Yi. Clearly nervous about something.


    "Hm? What is it Qing Yi? You can just ask me, there is no need to be so nervous about it."


    "Ah! I-it''s just that¡­ My family will be participating in the youthpetition back in my city and I was wondering if I could participate in it together with master¡­?"


    "Sure, we can go if you want to, I see no problem with this." Understanding why she was nervous, Xuan Hao smiled slightly.


    As a core elder of the Flying Sword Sect, he really did not have much to do recently other than cultivating. The only thing that the Flying Sword Sect really wanted from him was to help out in case something happened to the sect itself.


    As for the rest of the time? He was free to do whatever he wanted, be it touring the Heavenly Sky Kingdom or quietly cultivating in his pavilion, the Flying Sword Sect did not care as long as he helped in case of an emergency.


    Upholding the territories and borders of the Flying Sword Sect was mostly done by Core Formation cultivators. Nascent Soul cultivators would only be located at important ces of interest for the sect.


    "Hah¡­ Thank you master! Thepetition will be held in 25 days'' time."


    Qing Yi was relieved upon hearing her master''s approval and let out a sigh of relief, as she gave him the date of the youthpetition of Bright Sun City.


    "No worries, I will tell the Sect Master that I will be leaving the sect for some time to go to Bright Sun City."


    As Qing Yi and Xuan Hao each made their way back to their quarters, Xuan Hao quickly took out a talisman used formunication from his bag and contacted the sect master Feng Chen to discuss his leave from the sect.


    "Hm? Xuan Hao, why are you contacting me?"


    The talisman slowly started lighting up and soon the voice from Feng Chen spread out from the talisman.


    "I want to join my disciple in a youthpetition back in her hometown of Bright Sun City and was wondering if there was anything I should be worried about when I go out. After all, even I can feel the tension at the moment¡­" Exining his situation to Feng Chen, Xuan Hao waited patiently for a response.


    "Hm¡­ I see, but I would be careful around that area. The ck Rose Sect is located close by and have begun acting increasingly suspiciouslytely, even if we are the rulers of the northern region, the ck Rose Sect does not seem to be happy about it and might want to take the position from us¡­


    The situation with the Azure Kingdom is not looking so great either and Wang Lan recently reported that they sent several Nascent Soul experts over, they might be up to something soon." Feng Chen said in a worried tone through the talisman as Xuan Hao looked a little lost in thought.


    It had soon been five months since Wang Lan left for the border of the Azure Kingdom and he had still not returned yet. The only reason for this was that the conflict with the Azure Kingdom had not been resolved yet and might even have escted even further.


    "I will keep that in mind and try to be as careful as possible, but should anything happen, I will try my best to get out of whatever situation Ind myself in¡­" Xuan Hao chuckled slightly towards the end.


    "Haha, indeed, I don''t doubt you will! Good luck on your journey to Bright Sun City." Feng Chen knew how much Xuan Hao hated dealing with anything troublesome andughed loudly at Xuan Hao''s promation of running away the moment trouble showed up.


    "¡­"


    Turning off the talisman, Xuan Hao saw the formerly brightly lit talisman slowly turn dark as he threw it back into his bag.


    Who knew how it would turn out, hopefully nothing would happen¡­

 Chapter 42: Qing Yi Reaches the Foundation Establishment Realm

    <h4>Chapter 42: Qing Yi Reaches the Foundation Establishment Realm</h4>


    After finishing his talk with Feng Chen, Xuan Hao quietly closed his eyes and resumed cultivating. Recently his cultivation had improved quite a bit and he felt that he was about to breakthrough into the third stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Already being at the peak of the second stage after quietly cultivating for thest 5 months'' time.


    After all, if Qing Yi were the only one who had improved over thest few months, Xuan Hao would have nowhere to put his face as her master¡­ There was nothing worse than being surpassed by your own disciple in the cultivation world, as it mostly meant you had stopped improving and might even be close to the end of your lifespan.


    Cultivation was about striving for constant improvement, being surpassed by your own disciple in most cases was not that great of a thing. Though there were still a few heavens blessed genius whom this did not apply to, where the disciple would help the master after growing up.


    Xuan Hao considered himself quite talented and had no ns of letting his disciple or future disciples surpass him.


    With newfound determination, Xuan Hao spent the night quietly cultivating and manged to break through the bottleneck between the second and third stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Reaching the third stage of the Nascent Soul Realm by the morning.


    Qing Yi did not find out that her master had managed to reach the third stage of the nascent soul realm and was only told by Xuan Hao to train by herself for the next few days. This was just so that Xuan Hao could stabilise his realm and familiarise himself with his newfound strength.


    The final month before the Bright Sun City''s annual youthpetition quietly passed with nothing out of the ordinary happening.


    The only thing worth mentioning was the Azure Sky Kingdom''s increasinglyrge number of troops gathering at the border.


    The Heavenly Sky Kingdom did not take nicely to this and also started gathering their own troops at the border. The Flying Sword Sect had also gotten increasingly tense as the tension between the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the Azure Sky Kingdom increased more and more.


    ¡­


    "To breakthrough and reach the Foundation Establishment Realm, you will have to use the qi you have gathered inside your dantian to form a pir made of condensed qi inside your dantian. This pir will act as a support for you dantian and will also be the first step into the Foundation Establishment Realm." Free of the tension that gued the rest of the sect, Xuan Hao was calmly guiding Qing Yi into reaching the foundation establishment realm.


    It was thest day before they were going to leave for Bright Sun City and Qing Yi hade to him early in the morning saying that she wanted to breakthrough into the foundation establishment realm before they left for Bright Sun City.


    Xuan Hao saw no reason to refuse this and decided to assist her in breaking through to the foundation establishment realm.


    "As you condense the pir inside of your dantian, try to imagine the pir as form of support for your dantian. Holding it together and allowing it to freely expand. The foundational pir is the foundation of your future progress. The stronger the pirs are, the stronger your core will be when reaching the core formation realm!" Looking down at Qing Yi as she was sweating bullets, trying her best to condense the first foundational pir inside of her dantian.


    After gather, a sufficient amount of qi in the shape of an illusory pir inside of her dantian, Qing Yi slowly condensed the qi in the shape of a pir as the illusory pir slowly became smaller and smaller, but at the same time grew more solid.


    As the pir inside of her dantian slowly went from illusory to real, Qing Yi''s aura started slowly changing along with it.


    The aura of a Qi Condensation Realm slowly became dimmer and dimmer as the aura of a Foundation Establishment cultivator started to spread out from her body.


    The stronger the pir one created, the better effect it would bring for the cultivator when they finally managed to construct it. This process of condensing her qi into the shape of a pir took another 4 hours before a wave of qi suddenly washed over her body.


    The qi came from the pir inside of her dantian and as it passed through her body, it cleaned it of impurities and refined it so that it bes more suited for cultivation. This is what is called forming a foundation, as the first foundational pir helped clean a cultivator''s body from impurities, refined it and granted the cultivator greater control over their qi.


    This would happen each time one constructed an additional pir in the Foundation Establishment Realm and would help the cultivator set up a strong foundation for the future cultivation realms.


    Xuan Hao looked happily down at Qing Yi as she sessfully broke through to the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Putting his hand on top her head, Xuan Hao instantly sent his divine sense inside her body to see if everything went well and was not disappointed as he saw Qing Yi''s first foundational pir inside of her dantian.


    The Pir was solely made from fire qi and therefor took on a red colour scheme as qi in the form of mes slowly danced around the pir located in the centre of her dantian.


    Where there formerly was just qi spread out everywhere in her dantian, it was now centred around the pir in the middle of it.


    This is the true first step on the path of cultivation, with the Qi Condensation realm being nothing more than the preliminary step towards it.


    Upon entering the Foundation Establishment Realm, a cultivator went through a qualitative change in strength.


    While a normal Qi Condensation Realm cultivator had a rtively normal mortal body like someone who did not cultivate, just with qi inside of it, a Foundation Establishment cultivator''s body was on a whole other level after being cleansed and strengthen by the qi of the first foundational pir.


    Qing Yi also opened her eyes and looked around the room happily as she felt her newfound strength flowing through her.


    "Master, master! Look!" Saying so, Qing Yi demonstrated her newfound control over fire qi by manifesting a small fire in the centre of her palm with a wide smile on her face.


    "Yes, yes¡­ It is all fine, but can you go take a bath before showing off¡­?" Holding his nose with a wry smile on his lips, Xuan Hao looked at the gooey ck impurities all over Qing Yi''s body. Staining her clothes and bringing an unbearable smell along with it.


    "Hm? AH! I will go take a bath immediately!" Seeing her own situation, Qing Yi ran off before Xuan Hao managed to remind her about stabilising her cultivation afterwards.


    "Well, she should be able to do it afterwards¡­" Shaking his head slightly Xuan Hao opened a nearby window and called for Zhi Ruo to clean up as arge amount of the impurities had fallen off when Qing Yi ran off.


    Zhi Ruo let out a sigh as she looked at the trail of impurities Qing Yi left behind when she ran through the pavilion. Looking in the direction of Xuan Hao, she discovered he had run away after calling for her.


    "¡­"


    Well, she was a servant, but next time something like a cleansing of impurities happened¡­ Could they not just do the breakthrough close to the bath instead of having it on the other side of the pavilion¡­


    "Sigh¡­" She felt like the chances of that happening was small, even if she manged to convince Qing Yi to do it¡­ How would she convince Xuan Hao''s other disciples when he took in more in the future?


    The image of a few dozen people covered in impurities running around the pavilion made its way inside Zhi Ruo''s head as she swore to make sure whatever disciples Xuan Hao took in would remain clean.


    She could not let them dirty up the pavilion!


    With a weird thought forming inside her head, Zhi Ruo began cleaning up the mess Qing Yi left behind.

 Chapter 43: Quest Rewards and Formations

    <h4>Chapter 43: Quest Rewards and Formations</h4>


    Finding an isted ce to sit down after seeing Qing Yi off, Xuan Hao excitedly entered his sea of consciousness to interact with the system.


    [Main Quest (Complete)]


    Rewards: [Moon silver (Mystic)], [Ash Sunstone (Mystic)]


    [Redeem]: [Y/N]


    Outside of Xuan Hao''s expectations, what he got frompleting the system''s main quest was not an increase in cultivation, nor was it a boost inprehension or a secret technique to boost his strength.


    epting the rewards, Xuan Hao saw the Main quest changing from thepleted to a brand-new quest.


    Main Quest: [Any disciple reaches the Core Formation realm.]


    Main Quest Reward: [???]


    Nothing out of the ordinary, the requirement just went from having a disciple in the foundation establishment realm, to having one in the core formation realm.


    ...


    Exiting his sea of consciousness, Xuan Hao instead focused on the two objects that had appeared in front of him after he epted the rewards from the system.


    One of them was a brightly shining silver ore, most likely the Moon silver. The other object he got from the system was an ash-coloured stone, this in turn should be the so-called Ash Sunstone.


    Xuan Hao had no clue what these two objects were, nor did he have any clue what they could be used for as the system did not give any description about them other than the small note besides them symbolizing that they were of the mystic grade.


    Mystic grade materials were for people in the Domain Lord Realm! While Xuan Hao did not know purpose of the materials he got, at least he knew they were precious if the system gave them that kind of valuation.


    "Well, nothing to worry about for now, I will just check up and see what they can be used for in the future. The Explorer Union should have some information on this if the sect doesn''t¡­" Not bothering too much with the unknown materials he got, Xuan Hao threw it to the back of his mind and quickly hid away both the Moon Silver and the Ash Sunstone.


    At this point, Xuan Hao really wished he had a storage ring of some kind to store them in. Sadly, he would have to wait until at least reaching the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm or be lucky enough to find one.


    At least for now, Xuan Hao decided not to worry about it and hoped that his pavilion would be safe after his leave from the sect soon.


    Nobody would go up and try to rob a core elders ce while he was gone? Right¡­?


    Xuan Hao did not know if it was because he was suddenly storing something precious at his pavilion or something else, but he decided to set up several formations to guard the room where he stored the Moon Silver and the Ash Sunstone.


    Looking at the more than three dozen formations surrounding the small room, Xuan Hao nodded slightly to himself.


    At least he had managed to learn some rudimentary formations in the past, even if they were not as strong as some of the moreplicated formations. Stacked on top of each other, they should still be able to provide some safety.


    However, if any formation master saw theplicated mess that Xuan Hao had manged to set up and called a formation, they would probably want to beat him up on the spot.


    What Xuan Hao had done was nothing short of a disgrace to all formations, as he had simply drawn in some qi from the surroundings and stacked it on top of each other and called it a formation.


    Noplicated formation runes orplicated rune lines, just a mess of qi naturally smashed together to create a barrier of some sort.


    This had repeated several times until a few dozen "formations" had formed.


    "Wha¡­ WHAT IS THIS!?" A short scream was heard from behind him, as Xuan Hao turned around and looked at the person in question.


    "Hm? Qing Yi, you finished cleaning up?" The person in question was Qing Yi. Small droplets of water were still dripping down from her hair as she looked towards Xuan Hao''s formations with a shocked look on her face.


    "M-master, what is that¡­ Thing¡­?"


    "Hm? Ah, that is a formation I set up! Awesome, no?" Upon hearing her talking about his recent masterpiece, Xuan Hao shed a bright smile and pointed at the abomination that he called a formation.


    "A formation¡­? I thought formations were supposed to exist in harmony with nature¡­ Not this¡­" Looking speechlessly at her master''s proud visage as he pointed at the different formations he made, Qing Yi decided to not talk about the "formations" that he had set up.


    Looks like her master wasn''t as perfect as she thought, at least when it came to formations, he was worse than a beginner. All that was needed to break her masters so-called formations, was to inject a bit of qi into them and let them copse on themselves.


    Qing Yi even started to wonder how the formations still hadn''t copsed yet¡­


    "Ah, by the way master, how are we going to get to Bright Sun City in a days'' time¡­?" Deciding that nothing woulde from starring at the formations any longer, Qing Yi instead asked about a question that had been guing her for the past few days.


    "Hm? Ah, we will fly there. By the way remember to pack your stuff as we will be leaving tomorrow morning!" Saying so, Xuan Hao took his leave and made his way back to his room in the pavilion.


    "Ah ok, we will just fly there¡­ Fly? W-wait a minute! MASTER! What do you mean by flying there!" Seeing Xuan Hao had already disappeared, Qing Yi quickly ran off to catch up to him and find out what he meant by flying.


    Crash!


    As Qing Yi left the room, all the formations set up by Xuan Hao copsed in on themselves as the qi that was holding them together dispersed into the surroundings.


    Xuan Hao would most likely not have any future as a formation master¡­

 Chapter 44: The Flying Sword Sects Stable

    <h4>Chapter 44: The Flying Sword Sects Stable</h4>


    As Qing Yi failed to catch up with her master and get any answers from him, she instead decided to pack up the things that she needed and prepare for the journey tomorrow morning. No matter what, she would find out what her master meant by them flying tomorrow.


    Most of her thought were on her master using a demon beast or something along that line, to travel. After all, the Flying Sword Sect did have quite a few flying demon beasts that they could use for something like that.


    Thinking more deeply about it, it was not really that surprising for someone at the Nascent Soul Realm to have a flying demon beast. From what she knew, some wealthy or strong Core Formation cultivators had flying demon beasts as well!


    Wondering about it would not result in anything and Qing Yi decided to meet up with Zhi Ruo and Zeng Shihan to say her goodbyes before leaving. Maybe she could even get augh out of them upon mentioning her master''s "expertise" in formations¡­


    ¡­


    The sun slowly rose from the east as a new day began for the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect. Many of them were nervous and tense as the situation regarding the Azure Sky Kingdom had spread across the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the past few months.


    This nervous and tense expression that hovered over most of the Flying Sword Sect, was not present on Qing Yi. Instead, her eyes shone with excitement as she stood outside of the pavilion and waited for her master to show up.


    The reason for her excitement was none other than the fact that she would finally be able to go home and visit her dad again! Qing Yi was ecstatic about her breakthrough into the Foundation Establishment Realm and could not wait to get home and show it off to her dad.


    Other than that, Xuan Hao had also helped her train in the Azure Wind Sword, allowing her to improve by leaps and bounds over the past half year.


    "Hm? You are already here Qing Yi? What about breakfast, did you remember to eat?" As Qing Yi was lost in her own thoughts, the voice of Xuan Hao was heard from the entrance of the pavilion. Soon, Xuan Hao could be seening out of the pavilion waring a casual white robe, contrary to his core elder robe.


    "Yes! I woke up early to make sure I was ready for today! I already ate and said farewell to both Zhi Ruo and Zeng Shihan, so we can go when you are ready master!" Not missing a beat, Qing Yi answered Xuan Hao''s questions as quickly as he asked them.


    Full of excitement and energy was not enough to describe Qing Yi''s current state of excitement, Xuan Hao even thought someone had reced his formerly calm disciple with someone else¡­


    "I see¡­ Then let''s just set off immediately." Looking at Qing Yi''s bobbing her head up and down, Xuan Hao ced his hand gently on her head to try and calm her down, in turn causing Qing Yi to turn red in embarrassment and immediately stop moving around excitedly.


    "Good, now that you are calm let''s go to the sect''s stable and get a flying demon beast." Saying this, Qing Yi nodded obediently and quietly followed behind Xuan Hao, no longer as excited as before.


    The earlier attack from her master was too much for her young heart to handle and Qing Yi quietly and cautiously observed her master as both of them made their way to the sect''s stable.


    The Flying Sword Sects stable was an enormous building with simple yet beautiful architecture.


    All of the demon beasts that the disciples caught and tamed were kept at the sects stable, as for the demon beasts caught and tamed by the elders. Most of them would keep their demon beasts at their own pavilion.


    Xuan Hao sadly had not caught and tamed any demon beast, so he had decided to just borrow one from the sect. Luckily such a thing was easy to aplish with his current status as a core elder of the sect.


    Entering the stable, Xuan Hao and Qing Yi, saw a wide variety of demon beasts. Ranging from small demon beasts the size of an apple, all the way up to the giant demon beastsrge enough to carry a few dozen people on their backs.


    "Greetings Elder Xuan and you must be his disciple, Qing Yi, how can I help you today?" As Xuan Hao entered the stable together with Qing Yi, a short old man made his way forward and bowed, before politely asking for their purpose ining to the stable.


    "I''m in need of a flying demon beast that can at least fit two people, I was told by Feng Chen that I should just ask for it." Not really knowing anything about how the stable worked or demon beast taming, Xuan Hao decided to just say that Feng Chen was the one who told him just to ask about it. Not willing to admit how little he knew about the subject of demon beast taming in front of his disciple.


    When he got any free time, Xuan Hao quietly swore to himself that he would train up some of the subjects that he had not trained before, like alchemy, cksmithing, beast taming and maybe even try and improve his expertise in formations.


    "I see¡­ Please follow me Elder Xuan, I''m sure we have a few flying demon beasts avable that will fit your need." Like a trained salesman, the short elderly man led them deeper into the stable as they passed by many fabulous demon beasts.


    One demon beast had the head of a lion with the body of a horse, making it look quiteical, while another had the body of an elephant with spikes sticking out all over its body.


    Both Xuan Hao and Qing Yi were amazed at all the different kinds of demon beasts as they slowly made their way deeper into the stable under the guidance of the short old man.

 Chapter 45: Beast Tamers

    <h4>Chapter 45: Beast Tamers</h4>


    As Qing Yi and Xuan Hao made their way deeper into the stable under the guidance of the short old man, Xuan Hao noticed that the strength of the demon beasts that they passed by had slowly increased.


    At first, most of them were only around the Qi Condensation Realm, but by now, most of the demon beasts were at the Foundation Establishment Realm, there was even a few who had reached the Core Formation Realm.


    But even then, there was still not a single flying demon beast!


    "Ah, here it is!" Coming to a sudden stop in front of arge gate, the short old man pulled out a small key and ced it into the keyhole and slowly turned.


    Creak~


    The giant gate slowly creaked opened as the short old man made his way into the open field behind it.


    Yes, behind the gate was a small open field, surrounded by the walls of the stable. The stable itself was apparently a giant circr building with a hole in the middle of it.


    Inside the small field at the centre of the stable, Xuan Hao and Qing Yi saw several demon beasts running around freely, both weak and strong demon beasts.


    But what caught both of their attention was the flying beasts that were sitting around the field rxing with a few disciples tending to them.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao smiled wryly.


    Who tamed who¡­? From the looks of the disciples happily tending to the flying demon beasts every need, Xuan Hao really wondered whether there was a simr profession like the beast tamer for humans for the demon beasts.


    At least the flying demon beasts were master human tamers¡­


    "Ah, this is the stables tenders, they are normally disciples who love demon beast and are trying their best to be future beast tamers. In the past I worked hard as a stable tender as well before reaching my current position." Seeing Xuan Hao look towards the disciples tending to the flying demon beasts, the short old man misunderstood something and exined happily with a smile on his lips.


    "I see¡­ what about flying demon beasts, which one would you rmend?" Not wanting to continue the conversation any longer, Xuan Hao tried to steer the conversation back to the flying demon beasts.


    "Hm¡­ I think I would rmend the Shadow Hawk over there! It''s rtively strong at the Core Formation Realm and also has more than enough space for both you and your disciple to sit." Thinking about it for a moment, the short old man turned around and pointed in the direction of a giant hawk with a wingspan of at least 10 meters.


    The giant shadow hawk was currently being fed a few pieces of raw meat by the nearby serva- stable tenders and rxinglyid on the ground while a few stable tenders were gently massaging its wings at the same time.


    The shade of a nearby tree created a perfect shade for the giant shadow hawk as it had the time of its life.


    "¡­" Xuan Hao and Qing Yi both turned to look at the rxing shadow hawk and then turned to look at the still smiling short old man.


    Looking around the field, Xuan Hao saw that all the flying demon beasts were like the shadow hawk,zily rxing under the shade of a tree while being catered to by the stable tenders.


    "Sure, we will just use the shadow hawk if its fine with you." Not seeing any better option around, Xuan Hao agreed with the short old man and the group made their way to the shadow hawk.


    "Ah, Lord Shadow, these two are the Core Elder Xuan and his disciple Qing Yi! Both of them will be requiring your services for the next few days if that is alright?" Doing a full ny-degree bow, the short old man started addressing the shadow hawk in an honorific way and looked like a small servant addressing his lord.


    "¡­" Both Qing Yi and Xuan Hao had their mouth open as they starred speechlessly at the short old man.


    Beast Tamer¡­ This short old man was supposed to be the best beast tamer that the Flying Sword Sect had¡­ Xuan Hao and Qing Yi would most likely never look at beast tamers the same way ever again, this short old man had ruined the reputation of all beast tamers out there¡­


    Screech!


    A low screeching voice came out from the shadow hawk as it stared disdainfully at the short old man.


    "Ah! Yes, yes, Lord Shadow! I got just what you want here!" Signalling for some of the stable tenders, soon they came over with a bunch of low-grade spirit stones, the short old man instructed them to ce the spirit stones in front of the shadow hawk before moving back.


    Screech?


    Letting out as somewhat questioning screech, the old man soon came up to the pile of spirit stones and added a few extra to it.


    Screech~


    Happily looking at the spirit stone, the shadow hawk quickly swooped down a gulped all of them down in one go.


    "Okay, Lord Shadow says he is satisfied with the offering and will apany you over the next few days!" Seeing the satisfied shadow hawk, the old man conveyed that the shadow hawk would apany them.


    "¡­" Xuan Hao and Qing Yi both felt a little speechless as they watched a huge amount of spirit stone get swallowed up by the shadow hawk.


    Such arge amount of spirit stones would be enough to speed up the cultivation of over 100 disciples below the Core Formation Realm over a month¡­


    "What are you wating for, Lord Shadow is ready for you now, just jump on his back and give him a direction to go in!" Seeing that Xuan Hao and Qing Yi still hadn''t moved, the short old man quickly hurried them to get onto the back of the shadow hawk.


    "¡­" Not saying anything, both Qing Yi and Xuan Hao quietly made their way onto the back of the shadow hawk and fastened themselves on its back as it slowly flew out of the field and into the sky.


    Looking down on the short old man below excitedly waving at them, Xuan Hao instructed for the shadow hawk to fly in the direction of the Bright Sun City.


    Screech!


    Qing Yi, who earlier was filled with excitement upon getting to fly, not long had any of that past excitement left.


    The short old man had ruined any and all respect she had for beast tamers.


    Now all she could think about was how many spirit stones they wasted each day on feeding demon beasts¡­


    "Master¡­ Are all Beast Tamers like that¡­?"


    "Some things are better left unknown¡­" Not knowing how to answer the question, Xuan Hao looked off to the side as the scenery quickly passed by.


    When he returned to the sect, he would have to have a chat with the Sect Master about how many spirit stones they dedicated to the Beast Tamers¡­

 Chapter 46: Shadow Hawks Barrel Roll Mid-Air

    <h4>Chapter 46: Shadow Hawks Barrel Roll Mid-Air</h4>


    Time passed by quickly as the scenery quickly passed by below, Qing Yi had somewhat recovered from earlier and was now excitedly looking at the scenery below as the shadow hawk flew over it.


    Looking down, the people looked like small ants and the viges and cities all looked like small ant colonies. Qing Yi was quite excited by this new view and observed everything she could.


    Xuan Hao also nced down below and looked at the small people passing by, but due to him having reached the nascent soul realm, his eyesight was rtively better than Qing Yi and he had no problem observing the people down below clearly.


    The shadow hawk did not bother looking down below at the humans and instead just looked straight ahead as it flew as quickly as possible, most likely wanting to get back home to his servants as soon as possible¡­


    Lazing around at the Flying Sword Sects expense was the best way to live, the shadow hawk had already lost his drive to improve further in cultivation and was justzing around all day.


    The only thing that the shadow hawk looked forward to at the moment was when it grew too old to fly around any longer. At that point, it would just get toze around without doing anything like flying around the elders or disciples of the Flying Sword Sect. Truly the pinnacle of life!


    The shadow hawk had always been envious when it watched the older flying demon beasts get toze around all day while being fed by their human servants. Luckily, it would soon be old enough to join them andugh at the young demon beasts who still had to fly around!


    It still remembered its time before entering the Flying Sword Sect, when it had to hunt food itself and fight with other demon beasts, it even had live in a bad environment without an array formation to regte to temperature! Terribly hard times, even though the Flying Sword Sect would allow the older demon beast to return to the wild as they grew weak, nobody ever did¡­


    Honestly, the shadow hawk had no idea why the Flying Sword Sect even asked them whether they would want to return to the wild when they grew old and weak.


    Wouldn''t they just get killed and eaten by another demon beast at that point!?


    Screech!


    Letting out a screech, the shadow hawk suddenly dived down on a passing bird a gulped it up in one mouthful.


    Qing Yi and Xuan Hao who barely managed to hold on, due to the sudden dive of the shadow hawk were both surprised.


    "M-master, this shadow hawk does not seem to care that we are on its back¡­" Qing Yi gripped tightly onto the feathers of the shadow hawk as she looked frightened at the shadow hawk below her.


    "Indeed¡­ It seems that the beast tamers are not that great at taming the demon beasts¡­ I almost feel like the demon beasts are the ones doing the taming¡­" Looking at the shadow hawk, Xuan Hao released a bit of his nascent soul aura in a bit to intimidate the shadow hawk.


    SCREECH!


    Sadly, the shadow hawk did not care about the aura of a nascent soul cultivator. Over the years, it had transported many nascent soul cultivators, why would it be afraid of one?


    So, before Xuan Hao or Qing Yi managed to react, the shadow hawk did a barrel roll mid air causing both of them to fall off its back.


    "¡­"


    "Aaaah!" Qing Yi let out a scream of fear as she was falling from what was at least a few thousand meters up in the sky, while Xuan Hao just looked annoyingly at the shadow hawk as it turned around and flew back towards the Flying Sword Sect. The speed of the shadow hawk was faster than even he could muster with his flying sword.


    "Hah¡­" Watching the shadow hawk disappear in the distance, Xuan Hao did not dy any longer and quickly grabbed onto the still screaming Qing Yi and brought his sword out of the scabbard.


    Focusing his sword qi into the sword, Xuan Hao slowly came to a stop a few hundred meters in the air.


    Qing Yi was still being carried by Xuan Hao and had already stopped screaming as she curiously looked down at the sword floating beneath her master''s feet.


    "Just stand in front of me, there should be enough space." Listing to her master''s instructions, Qing Yi quickly stood down on the sword wobbling slightly from side to side while trying to bnce herself on the sword.


    "Just hold onto me if you need to¡­" Grabbing hold of Qing Yi just as she was about to fall off the sword, Xuan Hao told her in a slightlymanding tone.


    "¡­" Nodding her head in response, Qing Yi shyly grasped the hem of Xuan Hao''s robe. Acting very much like a shy little girl.


    "When we get back to the sect, we will have to pay that damnable bird a visit¡­ I think grilled shadow hawk would taste great; we can even get Zhi Ruo to prepare it for us!" Not minding Qing Yi''s behaviour, Xuan Hao instead focused on the culprit of their situation, already having an idea about how to deal with the bird when they returned.


    ¡­


    Over the next hour, Qing Yi slowly got used to riding the flying sword with Xuan Hao and had already returned to observing the scenery passing by below.


    This time around, they only flew a few hundred meters above the ground. Allowing Qing Yi to easily see the people and animals below. Qing Yi wouldugh a bit whenever she saw people looking up in the sky and point towards them with a shocked look on their face.


    This was not without cause, as most people thought only people at the domain lord realm could fly without a demon beast.


    The journey had mostly recovered the former calm that the shadow hawk disturbed by throwing them off earlier and the two of them had finally made it to one of the biggestndmarks in the north of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    The Red Dust Desert. Not really fitting for it to be one ofndmarks for the north of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ Sadly the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was located in the southern part of the Ewaria Continent, where snow was extremely rare even in the winter.

 Chapter 47: Red Dust Desert and Bandits

    <h4>Chapter 47: Red Dust Desert and Bandits</h4>


    The Red Dust dessert, a dry barren area ofnd covered with sand. Looking as far as the eye could see, there was no water, and the little vegetation present was barely able to stay alive in the hot and waterless environment.


    Flying over the deste Red Dust Desert, Qing Yi remember how much trouble she and the rest of her family members had to go through when passing it.


    Back then, they had encountered desert bandits several times and if not for the first elder''s protection, they most likely would not have made it.


    Qing Yi even remembered one time when a desert scorpion at the Core Formation Realm had ambushed them while hiding beneath the sand! The first elder had barely managed to kill it with a surprise attack, but this had spooked out all of the Qing Family''s disciples, Qing Yi included.


    The danger lurking beneath the sand kept her up many nights in the desert, but now, she looked down and saw the endless ocean of sand passing by beneath her feet. The danger that she had felt from earlier was gone and she could just observe the quiet deste beauty of the Red Dust Desert.


    "Master, why is this desert called the Red Dust desert in the first ce?" Looking down on the desert below, Qing Yi curiously asked.


    She had wondered since she first travelled through the desert why it was called the Red Dust Desert, as she never saw any rest dust or anything like it.


    "The Red Dust Desert? Hm¡­ If I''m not wrong, the desert was created because two powerful domain lords once fought here in the past. This resulted in the creation of the Red Dust Desert, as for the name. The one who fell in the fight was called Daoist Red Dust¡­" Thinking about it for a while, Xuan Hao Answered Qing Yi''s question.


    "Wow¡­ Creating a desert from the aftermath of their fight, Domain lords really are strong¡­" Looking at the giant desert spreading endlessly into the horizon, Qing Yi recalled that her father had once said that the Red Dust Desert covered an area of several hundred kilometres! The domain lords who could devastate an area of a few hundred kilometres was definitely strong beyond belief.


    No wonder people often talked about how they could easily erase an entire kingdom by themselves!


    Xuan Hao did not correct her, even though he personally thought that the one who brought about the destruction of Daoist Red Dust was someone above the Domain Lord Realm. Daoist Red Dust was just lucky enough to be remembered as having fought someone here, thus resulting in the creation of the Red Dust Desert.


    The most likely thing to happen was that Daoist Red Dust offended someone above the Domain Lord Realm and was killed off, the desert was most likely created from a single attack by that expert.


    Other than that, the Red Dust Desert was suspiciously shaped like a giant palm print¡­ Xuan Hao honestly had no idea why people had not questioned the suspicious shape of the Red Dust Desert, even though it looked like someone extremely powerful using the Gods Palm Technique¡­


    "Hah¡­ Why can''t people around here see such an obvious thing¡­?"


    "Hm? Did you say something master?" As Xuan Hao wasmenting to himself, he earned a questioning look from Qing Yi.


    "Ah, its nothing."


    Brushing it off as nothing, Qing Yi only looked at him suspicious for a little while before returning to observing the desert passing by below them.


    ¡­


    "Hurry up! The Wild Serpent Bandits will catch up to us soon!"


    Somewhere close to the exit of the Red Dust Desert a caravan was anxiously speeding through the desert as fast as the weak demon beasts could drag the carriages.


    Qing Ming, who had just thought that he would catch a ride back home with the small trading caravan, was extremely anxious at the moment.


    Normally, desert bandits would be quite rare to encounter and even if they encountered any most of them were at the Qi Condensation Realm, Qing Ming was a Foundation Establishment cultivator! How many desert bandits could possibly deal with someone that strong?


    The Wild Serpent Bandits that were currently chasing after them, however, was another story all together.


    Recently, they gained quite arge amount of fame after the leader of the Serpent Bandits broke through and reached the Core Formation Realm!


    How could he possibly deal with someone at the Core Formation Realm!?


    "Th-there is someone up ahead!"


    Exiting the carriage fearfully, Qing Ming looked ahead and saw him.


    Serpent Lord! The leader of the serpent bandits!


    The carriages immediately came to a stop as people slowly grabbed their weapons shakingly and steeped out to face the enemy.


    "Haha, look at what we have here boys! It looks like these weaklings want to fight us!" The Serpent Lord let out a viciousugh as the other bandits slowly surrounded the trading caravan whileughing together with their boss.


    "If you fellows want to keep your life, leave all the goods and prettydies here, hehe, this lord needs some fun tonight!" The Serpent Lord Arrogantly steeped forward and demanded, as a lustful smile slowly spread across his face while looking at the few females present in the trading caravan.


    "Never! You will have to step over my dead body before I let you sully my wife and daughter!" A man heroically stepped forward as he looked threateningly at the Serpent Lord.


    Qing Ming felt the same way, but did not dare step forward, he knew that if he mentioned his family background, the Serpent Lord would most likely just kill everyone present to leave no evidence behind.


    "Haha, I see, boys! Kill the men and leave the women behind for us to have some fun withter! Hehe!" Not even waiting a split second, the Serpent Lord viciouslyughed as he ordered his men.


    Is there nobody that can safe us¡­? Qing Ming helplessly looked around as the bandits slowly moved closer and closer.


    It was at that moment of despair, that it suddenly happened!


    ¡­


    "Ah, what is that!?" As they made their way towards the end of the desert, Qing Yi spotted something beneath them, causing her to tug Xuan Hao''s robe slightly and point towards something in the distance.


    "Hm?" Turning to look where Qing Yi was pointing, Xuan Hao quickly spotted what she was talking about.


    A few hundred meters away a group of what looked like desert bandits were surrounding a small caravan. The caravan was severely outnumbered and was shakingly holding onto their weapons as the desert bandits slowly approached them.


    "Th-that is the Qing Ming, the first elder''s son!" As they approached the scene, Qing Yi immediately recognized one of the people in the trading caravan and called out in a surprised tone.


    Xuan Hao heard her and immediately started descending towards the caravan below, much to the surprise of the group of desert bandits and members of the caravan.

 Chapter 48: Bandits Regret

    <h4>Chapter 48: Bandits Regret</h4>


    As Xuan Hao was descending towards the trading caravan on his sword together with Qing Yi, he looked at the people surrounding the trading caravan with a slight surprise.


    Most of them did not look like normal bandits that had turned to robbing others due to things like food or bad living conditions. Instead, they looked more like a bunch of trained soldiers, at least the way they carried themselves were simr to how soldiers would.


    This however was not what surprised Xuan Hao, what ended up surprising him was the strength of the desert bandits. Most of them were at the peak of the Qi Condensation Realm, with a few reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm, there was even one person at the Core Formation Realm.


    The strength of the desert bandits was more than enough for them to settle down and im an area for themselves, why would they still remain as bandits? Xuan Hao honestly had no clue, but he could always ask them to try and find out.


    ¡­


    Yang Li was a normal soldier of the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms army, back then, he had reached the peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm and had been promoted to the position of a lieutenant general.


    The position was quite high in the military of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and he was the only one who had reached the rank while only being at the Foundation Establishment Realm. The reason being that he had performed well and excelled over the other people eligible for the role, while not as strong, a general needed to be able to lead his men and Yang Li excelled at that.


    He helped conquer territory for the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the east where no kingdom was established yet and he fought in skirmishes against the Azure Sky Kingdom at the borders.''


    He did well and kept his men safe during all this, but it all changed when he grew older¡­ Some of his higher ups were no longer so pleased with him still being stuck at the Foundation Establishment Realm at his age, they mostly thought he would breakthrough in the future, but at the age of 37, he was still at the peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Seeing no future hope for him, Yang Li was kicked out of his position and reced by a younger and more promising junior.


    Going from an honourable lieutenant general to what was a normal captain was too much for him and Yang Li turned to drink his troubles away.


    In the end, he started causing problems and was officially kicked out of the military.


    Yang Li resented the Heavenly Sky Kingdom for what they did to him and on one fateful night, someone came to him, promising him what the Heavenly Sky Kingdom took from him, what was rightfully his!


    All he had to do was create trouble inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, being a bandit robbing passing trading caravans was a starting point, when he grew his group strong enough, he would move on to sabotaging the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms army.


    "Boss! A trading caravan is passing by!" Those words passed by Yang Li''s ears and he thought to himself, just one more robbery and he could start getting his revenge on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom! Just one more time, he would go out and have some fun with his brothers!


    "Let''s go boys! We will surely be able to have some fun tonight!" Just one more time¡­ That was what Yang Li thought as he looked at the person descending from the sky on a flying sword, Yang Li started trembled all over.


    He knew they had mmed headfirst into a brick wall and there would most likely be no chance for regret.


    Flying¡­ Only a domain lord knew how to fly! What were the chances that they encountered one when they were out robbing a random trading caravan?


    Yang Li felt that his chances for getting revenge on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom slowly disappeared as the person on the sword slowlynded on the ground between him and the trading caravan.


    ¡­


    Looking at the scared look on the Core Formation experts face, Xuan Hao felt likeughing to himself. The poor guy probably thought he was a Domain Lord expert, after all, not many knew that a sword cultivator whoprehended True Sword Intent could use it to fly even below the Domain Lord Realm.


    Though, him being a Nascent Soul expert or a Domain Lord would most likely make no difference as the guy was only at the Core Formation Realm.


    "Qing Ming!" Upon reaching the ground, Qing Yi quickly jumped off the sword and ran over to Qing Ming, who stood in front of the trading caravan.


    This caused the faces of the desert bandits to turn even more pale, while the members of the trading caravan look relieved.


    The person with the expert knew someone from the caravan! This caused most of the people from the trading caravan to rx as they felt like they had just escaped a dangerous situation.


    The Desert bandits on the other hand were shaking all over as everyone silently stared at the in looked man standing in the middle of both groups. Even without him releasing any aura or anything, both groups silently waited for him to say anything.


    "Ahm! May I-"


    "Eeeeek!" Just as Xuan Hao was about to say something, one of the bandits screamed loudly and ran off into the distance. Making both Xuan Hao and the rest of the people wonder where he got the sudden burst of speed and courage from.


    Swoosh!


    Just as the man was about to make it over a sand dune and escape, Xuan Hao released his sword intent and killed the bandit at the spot.


    Xuan Hao felt slightly disturbed upon killing another living person, but the experience of Xuan Hao traveling through the world at a young age helped him quickly regain his former calm.


    In the past, Xuan Hao had killed quite a good amount of people while traveling from kingdom to kingdom before settling down in the Flying Sword Sect. The world was not really safe. There was danger everywhere and even a moment of hesitation could cost one''s life.

 Chapter 49: Hidden Danger (1)

    <h4>Chapter 49: Hidden Danger (1)</h4>


    Turning towards the dead body of the desert bandit and then back to Xuan Hao again. The desert bandits felt a chill go down their spine as they saw how easily the person who descended from the sky had dealt with one of them.


    "So¡­ Might I ask you a few questions?" Hearing the voice of the person in question, the bandit leader Yang Li shakingly turned around like the rest of his gang and looked fearfully at Xuan Hao. The attack from earlier was too fast and he didn''t even notice it, if such an attack wasunched towards himself¡­ He would most likely end up like Billy who tried to run away, dead on the ground!


    "Wh-what do you want to ask?" Building up all of his courage, Yang Li asked in a scared voice. Whatever the man in front of him asked, he would answer it no matter what! He really had no ns of dying yet.


    "Hm¡­ I''m just wondering why someone who already reached the Core Formation Realm is running around being a bandit. Even if you just worked as a guard, you would definitely earn far more than you do by robbing people¡­ Or maybe you have another reason?" Asking curiously, Xuan Hao looked directly at the leader of the Desert Bandits.


    "I-I¡­ I have my reasons¡­ "Thinking about his past with the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms military, Yang Li quietly clenched his fists together, if he ended up bing a mere guard, would he not be humiliated by others?


    The reason he became a bandit in the first ce was so that he could get revenge on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom for their treatment of him in the past!


    "So¡­ You don''t want to say it?" Raising an eyebrow, Xuan Hao curiously sized up the struggling look that appeared on the bandit leader and tried to push him a little.


    "I¡­ I want to get revenge! Revenge for the way they treated me!" Slowly breaking down, Yang Li started talking about his past and how he was approached by someone who told him that they could help him get revenge against the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    All he had to do was create chaos inside of their borders and apparently there were others like him as well, he still remembered a meeting at the start before he was given an area to cause chaos in.


    The meeting was the reason why he had hope that the mysterious power that helped him could get revenge against the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Nascent Soul Experts! There had been Nascent Soul Experts present at the meeting and more than just one, at least 5 Nascent Soul experts were present for the meeting and this talked to how strong the mysterious power was.


    "Did they have a name or something? Do you know where they are located?" Feeling a sudden looming danger appear, Xuan Hao hurriedly asked for more information.


    A mysterious power had suddenly appeared with at least 5 people in the Nascent Soul Realm and wanted to cause chaos in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, while at the same time, the Azure Sky Kingdom had started to gather their forces at the border.


    Xuan Hao felt that it was too much of a coincidence and wanted to get to the bottom of it immediately.


    "I-if I''m not wrong, they had a base at- "Just before he managed to answer, his head suddenly expanded like a balloon and exploded into a bloody mess.


    The sudden explosion of the bandit leaders head came as a surprise to everyone around, Xuan Hao included, as everyone quickly took a step back, trying to avoid whatever was left of the bandit leader''s head.


    "Eeeek!" Qing Yi, who was now standing beside Qing Ming, screamed upon seeing the bandit leader''s head suddenly explode into a gooey mess.


    Qing Yi had never seen anything like it before and even the death of the bandit who ran away before was something she could deal with, but the exploding head was a little too much for her as she quickly hid away behind Qing Ming.


    "¡­"


    Staring at the now headless body, Xuan Hao looked speechlessly down at his nowpletely drenched robe.


    Earlier, he had gotten closer to the bandit leader as he was talking to hear more clearly and make sure nothing happened to him while he was talking.


    This in turn resulted in Xuan Hao not reacting in time to avoid the blood from the head explosion, as he was not really expecting any danger toe from the bandit leader himself, thus changing his formerly white robe into a red one.


    "A soul contract?" This was the only thing that Xuan Hao could think of when he looked at the dead body of the bandit leader.


    A soul contract was something that only people at the Nascent Soul Realm and above could form, it was a contract that someone could sign, and it would bind to their soul, if the contract were vited, death would be the only oue of the contracted person.


    Though, it was wed, as people in the Nascent Soul Realm could easily bypass the contract if the party who wrote it was weaker than them.


    Thus, the soul contract was mostly used by the stronger cultivators to keep their subordinates in check.


    "But who would waste a soul contract on someone who had not even reached the Core Formation Realm¡­?" From what he knew, the bandit leader only recently broke through to the Core Formation Realm, meaning that someone was willing to use a soul contract on a Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator.


    Do not be fooled by the name soul contract, it is not just a paper one has to sign and bam, there you have a soul contract.


    No, a soul contract required a lot of expensive spirit herbs and high-grade spirit stones to forge and would mostly only be used on strong cultivators to make sure they did not end up betraying them.


    Wasting such an expensive thing as a soul contract on someone who was merely at the peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm?


    The only reason for this would be that the people behind him really desperately wanted to keep themselves hidden and Xuan Hao felt a slight chill go down his spine.


    It seemed like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was about to be in a whole lot of trouble!

 Chapter 50: Hidden Danger (2)

    <h4>Chapter 50: Hidden Danger (2)</h4>


    "Hah¡­" It looked like things were about to get really troublesome and he most likely would not be able to hide away from it¡­


    Swoosh!


    A wind slowly blew across Xuan Hao''s robe as the blood from the bandit leaders exploding head disappeared. Leaving behind a pristine white robe.


    At least his cultivation could help him clean his robe, ahh, the stronger the cultivation, the more useful it bes¡­ Core Formation cultivators would definitely not be able to clean their clothes as quickly as a Nascent Soul expert!


    "M-master! W-what do we do about the rest of the bandits?" Shakingly making her way from behind Qing Ming, Qing Yi walked up to Xuan Hao and asked him.


    "Hm? Ah, I will just seal their cultivation and allow the people from the caravan to hand them over the authorities, why?" Turning around, Xuan Hao answered Qing Yi in a confused tone. Not expecting her question.


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said, the bandits sighed in relief, at least they would not get killed off or anything and would just be handed over to the authorities.


    Spending a few years or decades in prison was way better than getting killed!


    "Hand them over to the authorities¡­? Not kill them off or something?" Blinking her eyes at the answer, Qing Yi''s words caused the bandits to start sweating once again.


    Girl! Nobody asked you to suddenly kill us off! Why did you not just keep quite and let the expert hand us over to authorities!


    "Why would I do that? Bandits will normally have a bounty on them and if I send these guys to the authorities, it will help the Flying Sword Sects reputation, while also earning some spirit stones along the way. A win-win situation if I say so¡­ No need to just randomly kill them off or anything¡­" Sighing to himself at his disciple''s bloodthirsty way of thinking, Xuan Hao reminded himself that he was her teacher and would have to teach her how the world worked.


    Just because he had killed one of the bandits who ran away as a warning, Qing Yi most likely thought he would kill all of the bandits!


    Turning to look at Qing Ming, whom Qing Yi had run to earlier, Xuan Hao pointed towards that bandits as he began talking. "Qing Ming, right? Can you take care of handing in the bandits for us? Just let them send the rewards for handing in the bandits to the Flying Sword Sect!"


    "Y-yes, sir!" Not really knowing how to respond, Qing Ming hesitatingly acknowledged Xuan Hao''s order.


    "Great! I will just seal their cultivation and let you handle it." Hearing the affirmative from Qing Ming, Xuan Hao spread his aura out and used it to seal the cultivation of the bandits all at once.


    The bandits who felt the aura from Xuan Hao slowly seep into their body and seal their cultivation base, did not resist in the slightest.


    They knew that if they fought back, death would be the only oue!


    The rest of the trading caravan was still just staring speechlessly at the bandits obediently had their cultivation sealed by Xuan Hao.


    What happened in thest few minutes was nothing short of an emotional roller coaster, going from being in a hopeless situation surrounded by desert bandits and then suddenly seeing the same ruthless and bloodthirsty bandits obediently having their cultivation sealed up.


    "Now that its done, we will take our leave. Need to be in time for the Bright Sun City annual youthpetition after all. Qing Yi,e here and let''s leave quickly, you can catch up with Qing Ming when he returns to the Qing family in the future." Looking at the bandits that were standing obediently in a group as the members of the caravan tied them up, Xuan Hao instructed Qing Yi toe.


    Qing Yi did not say anything and only hugged Qing Ming goodbye before making her way onto her master''s sword that was stillying on the ground.


    "Bye uncle Qing Ming! Hurry back to the Bright Sun City when you can, I will be there for the entire youthpetition, so you should be able to get back in time before I leave again!" Waving goodbye to Qing Ming, Qing Yi looked back at her master as he slowly caused the sword to ascend into the air again.


    "Ha¡­ Farewell Qing Yi, its great to see you found yourself a strong master!" waving goodbye to his niece, Qing Ming smiled awkwardly. This time, he felt like he would not be able to forget the scene of the man in the white robe descending to safe him for a long time toe.


    All he knew was that his niece had found a strong master and that he was apparently from the Flying Sword Sect, it looked like their Qing family would be fine, even with the Bai family having the ck Rose Sect to support them. The Flying Sword Sect was no weaker and was even stronger than them!


    It looked like a lot had happened in the time he was gone from the family! Back then, Qing Ming left his family to try and find a way for them out of their predicament, but in the end, it looked like his niece was the one who found the way out. Not him¡­


    Looking at Qing Yi and Xuan Hao disappearing in the distance, Qing Ming sighed to himself.


    The young will always surpass the old¡­ Looks like the younger generation of the Qing family is growing well¡­


    ¡­


    "Master, do you know what organization that bandit guy was talking about?" As they were flying out of the Red Dust desert, Qing Yi asked curiously. The bandit had talked about some organization with Nascent Soul experts causing chaos in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom before his head went pop.


    "¡­I have clue, but it looks like things are bound to get more troublesome soon. Hopefully, it won''t affect the Flying Sword Sect and us too much." Looking into the distance, Xuan Hao sighed to himself as he thought about the implications of having an organization with Nascent Soul experts trying to cause chaos inside of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    He had already sent the information about it back to the Sect Master with amunication talisman, who would hopefully know what to do about it.


    At least, he would not have to deal with it anymore, at the end of the day it was the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms problem¡­ Not his.

 Chapter 51: Father-Daughter Reunion

    <h4>Chapter 51: Father-Daughter Reunion</h4>


    " There it is master!" As they were flying through the sky, Qing Yi excitedly called out as she pointed towards a city slowly appearing in the distance.


    They had already left the Red Dust Desert for over 5 hours and had only stopped a few times so that Qing Yi could rest. Standing on top of a flying sword was not really thatfortable in the long run¡­


    "I see, we willnd a little away from the city and walk there, don''t want people to start panicking upon seeing somebody fly towards them¡­" Remembering the reaction of the bandits and caravan members when he descended towards them, Xuan Hao decided that it would be less troubling if they just walked into the city.


    Swoosh!


    Landing in a nearby forest, Xuan Hao and Qing Yi jumped off the sword as Xuan Hao quickly put it away.


    ¡­


    The journey towards the Bright Sun City was not too long and both of them soon arrived at the gates of the city.


    The gates of the city were filled with all sorts of people at the moment, most of them were people from the surrounding viges, who hade together with their families to watch the uing annual youthpetition.


    And, as there was no restriction on who could join thepetition. Many young people hade to join the annual youthpetition, it was an opportunity to stand out and maybe even get recruited by the Qing or Bai family!


    Other than that, the rewards for the rankings were not bad and caused many among the younger generation to join, after all, who would say no to some extra spirit stones?


    "Please show an identification token or pay 10 gold coins." As they made their way to the entrance of the Bright Sun City, a guard came over and stopped them.


    Xuan Hao smiled awkwardly when he heard the guard ask for gold coins. Gold coins was the normal currency of mortals and were way easier to get one''s hand onpared to spirit stones, a single spirit stone could easily be worth 500, if not 1000 gold coins!


    Xuan Hao was a respected Nascent Soul expert, why would he ever carry something like gold coins around with him¡­?


    "Do you perhaps not want to pay¡­?" Narrowing his eyes, the guard slowly put his hand on his sword as he threateningly asked.


    It''s a misunderstanding! I swear! Screaming silently to himself, Xuan Hao turned around and looked expectantly at his disciple.


    Qing Yi looked at her master''s expectant eyes and sighed to herself, her master was indeed a Nascent Soul expert¡­ Carrying something like gold coins was way too much to expect¡­


    "Here, this is my token." Taking out her own token, Qing Yi stepped forward and handed it over to the guard, who cautiously took the token from her hands and carefully inspected it.


    "Ah! M-miss Qing, excuse me from being so rude earlier! You and your uncle can enter whenever you want!"


    Doing a full 180-degree personality shift, the guard fawningly looked at Qing Yi with a smile on his lips.


    Xuan Hao tried his best not to hit the guard, he was 21! How could he be an uncle? Just call me her big brother or something!


    Looking at the guard''s fawning posture as he looked like a young girl meeting her inws for the first time, Xuan Hao decided to ignore it and pretend he didn''t hear anything.


    Qing Yi was also about to jump back as she did not expect the guard to suddenly act like that.


    "I-I see, just go back to what you were doing before." Taking back her token from the guard, Qing Yi hurriedly made her way into the city together with Xuan Hao as she cautiously stared at the guard behind them.


    "So where is your family located?"


    "Eeep!" Jumping up from the sudden question, Qing Yi turned back to look at Xuan Hao and realized that she had not told him where her family''s estate was located.


    "Follow me, the Qing Family''s territory is mostly in the centre part of the city. The outer parts are mostly run by the Bai family." As she was talking, Qing Yi led the way through the bustling city as both of them soon stood in front of a small gate leading into the centre of the city.


    Qing Yi went up to the small gate and talked to one of the guards present in front of it.


    Creak~


    A creaking voice was heard as the small gate slowly opened up and a tall handsome middle-aged man came out.


    "Yiyi! Your back!" The man happily called out as he ran towards Qing Yi.


    "Dad!" Qing Yi called back as she ran towards her father and embraced him.


    Staring at Qing Yi''s father as both of them were locked in a hug, Xuan Hao saw that he was at the sixth stage of the Core Formation Realm, instead of the fifth stage that he had heard he was at.


    It looked like he had broken through and reached the sixth stage of the Core Formation Realm in the within thest 6 or so months that Qing Yi was gone.


    "Ahm¡­!" Seeing as both of them looked like they would not stop hugging anytime soon, Xuan Hao decided to interrupt the happy father-daughter reunion.


    "Ah! Dad, this is my master, Xuan Hao! He is a Core Elder of the Flying Sword Sect and a Nascent Soul expert!" Realizing that her master was still there, Qing Yi felt her face turn slightly red as she pushed her dad away and began to quickly introduce Xuan Hao.


    "Ahm, I see. My name is Qing Yang, I heard about you taking in my daughter as a disciple, I hope that she has not caused too much trouble for you." Turning around to face Xuan Hao, Qing Yang bowed slightly as he respectfully spoke.


    "Dad! Let''s return first!" Feeling her face turn red upon hearing what her dad said, Qing Yi pulled on his arm, while trying to get him to move.


    "Haha, it''s fine, she has been doing great and is a good learner." Smiling widely, Xuan Hao decided to y along and tease Qing Yi a little more.


    "!" Feeling her face turn even more red than it already was, Qing Yi did not say anything and just ran into the house located behind the gate.


    "Haha, should we get going as well?" Smiling upon seeing his daughter turn shy all of a sudden, Qing Yangughed happily as he invited Xuan Hao inside.


    "Sure." Not wanting to be left too far behind by Qing Yi, Xuan Hao agreed and made his way towards the house of the Qing Family together with Qing Yi''s father, Qing Yang.

 Chapter 52: Bai Hua

    <h4>Chapter 52: Bai Hua</h4>


    The Qing family''s estate was enormous and even Xuan Hao''s pavilion was slightly smaller than it, though it was not as majestic looking as the pavilion.


    Xuan Hao was not surprised by this as several hundred people lived in the Qing Family''s estate, while only 3 people lived in his pavilion¡­


    As both him and Qing Yang made their way into the Qing family''s house, Xuan Hao was immediately greeted with the curious looks of several people. From young and old people, most likely wondering who he was.


    "This is Qing Yi''s master from the Flying Sword Sect, Elder Xuan!" Seeing the curious looks from the surrounding people, Qing Yang stepped forward and introduced Xuan Hao to them. Earning quite a few gasps of surprise and excitement.


    Even though they had heard about Qing Yi getting a master from the Flying Sword Sect, they expected him to be look older and some didn''t believe it fully until they could see it with their own eyes.


    "Ah, I see greetings elder Xuan!"


    "Greetings elder Xuan."


    "It''s our honour to be able to host you elder Xuan."


    All sorts of greetings came the moment they found out that the young man with their family head, was the rumoured master of Qing Yi, a Nascent Soul expert!


    Xuan Hao just smiled at the sudden energetic greetings from the Qing family members.


    "Do you perhaps know where Qing Yi is?" Turning to look at Qing Yang, Xuan Hao asked as he tried to move a bit away from the over enthusiastic Qing family members.


    "Hm¡­ She should have run to her room if I''m not wrong." Thinking about it for a moment, Qing Yang answered.


    "I see." Quickly taking his leave, Xuan Hao decided to just spread out his divine sense and lock onto the position of Qing Yi''s aura. This was so much easier than actually trying to ask around for where her room was located.


    "Master!" Seeing Xuan Hao suddenly appear outside of her room, Qing Yi was slightly shocked as she quickly recovered and remembered how she had just run away earlier.


    "I''m here to ask for when the Annual youthpetition will begin tomorrow and how long it willst." Stating his reason foring, Xuan Hao walked into Qing Yi''s room and picked a chair to sit down on.


    "Normally, the annual youthpetitionsts for around 1 week. The first 6 days are just to get people qualified, while thest day is considered the real finals of thepetition. Master can just rx here for the next 6 days as I join thepetition and reach the finals, with my current strength, it should not be a problem at all¡­" Thinking over it, Qing Yi answered with a smile on her lips.


    Finally, she would be able to show those people who had doubted her how strong she had be under her master''s teachings!


    "Sure, I will just ask your father for a room to stay in to cultivate then, I won''t disturb you any longer." Seeing the burning passion on Qing Yi''s face, Xuan Hao decided to just quietly observe.


    This was her time to shine, no need for him to get involved in it¡­


    ¡­


    Time passed by and Xuan Hao spent the next 6 days just quietly cultivating inside the Qing family estate, while Qing Yi joined thepetition and easily made her way through the qualifiers, shocking both her father and the rest of her family in the process.


    The fact that she had broken through to the Foundation Establishment Realm in a short half year spread through the city and shocked everyone, the Bai family included.


    "How did that girl from the Qing family manage to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm in such a short time! Did she perhaps manage to enter the Flying Sword Sect?" A elderly man said as he mmed the table in front of him.


    "Calm down, even if she managed to join the Flying Sword Sect, so what? Do you think the Flying Sword Sect would dare fight with the ck Rose Sect over simple outer disciple at the Foundation Establishment Realm?


    Remember who Bai Fei''s master is! A Nascent Soul expert and grand elder of the ck Rose Sect! No matter what, the ck Rose Sect is still only slightly behind the Flying Sword Sect in strength. The Flying Sword Sect would not want to offend them for a mere Foundation Establishment cultivator and her family!" A middle-aged man called out to the elderly man with a smile on his lips.


    "Bai Fei reached the Foundation Establishment Realm as well; we can just let him deal with the girl in the finals of the youthpetition. Bai Fei''s master is there as well, so nothing can go wrong!" Another man spoke up from the side as well, supporting the middle-aged man.


    "I still think that going against the Flying Sword Sect is a bad idea¡­ You all should know how protective they are of their disciples¡­!" The elderly man tried to warn them again.


    "Pft, so what, they won''t dare to act against the ck Rose Sect!" A younger member of the people present stood up and arrogantly proimed.


    "Indeed, if they dare do anything, they will have to deal with the ck Rose Sect!"


    "Yeah! They won''t offend the ck Rose Sect!"


    "Haha, the Flying Sword Sect will surely cower! They are already dealing with the Raging me Sect, adding the ck Rose Sect to the mix would spell disaster for them!"


    The elderly man slowly stood up and walked out of the room, he knew that he could not convince the younger ones anymore.


    The elderly man was the former head of the Bai family, Bai Hua, he had personally experienced the strength of the Flying Sword Sect in the past and did not like the idea of the Bai family offending the Flying Sword Sect.


    Even if Bai Fei had the protection of his master, who said the Flying Sword Sect would not juste after he left to erase the Bai family?


    Other than that, Bai Hua had felt that the reason the Bai Fei''s master decided to help him was not out of appreciation of Bai Fei''s talent, but something else.


    The recent chaos that had started to spread through the Heavenly Sky Kingdom did not help calm him either, with his experience he could see something brewing in the dark and the Bai family was far from safe!


    Bai Hua had already observed that the ck Rose Sect was being more and more suspicioustely and people had also started disappearing all around their territories.


    No matter what wasing, Bai Hua knew that he would not be able to keep his Bai family safe.


    "Ha¡­ If I knew this would happen, I would have just tried to mend our rtionship with the Qing family¡­" Staring out at the city, Bai Hua took a deep breath and sat down on a nearby bench to observe the bustling streets.

 Chapter 53: New System Feature

    <h4>Chapter 53: New System Feature</h4>


    The day of the finals of the annual youthpetition of Bright Sun City was finally here!


    Qing Yi had shocked the entire city with her Foundation Establishment cultivation, but she was not the only one who shocked the entire city.


    Bai Fei shocked the city just as much, as he had managed to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm as well!


    Most of the people already thought that the final winner would either be Qing Yi or Bai Fei and were looking forward to the battle.


    As for the former winner of the annual youthpetition Qing Chenyi? Most people had already forgotten about him at this point and only talked about Qing Yi or Bai Fei''s uing fight, though most of them expected for Bai Fei to win. The Bai family had after all spread out the news that his master was a Nascent Soul expert!


    Not only that, but the Bai family had also spread rumours that Bai Fei''s master wasing together with him to watch his disciple participate in the uingpetition!


    ¡­


    Back at the Qing family''s house, many of the Qing family members were excitedly looking at Qing Yi, all of them had started admiring Qing Yi ever since they learned that she had broken through and reached the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    This in turn also caused them to feel an even deeper sense of respect towards Xuan Hao, as he had managed to help Qing Yi reach the Foundation Establishment Realm in such a short time frame!


    Qing Yi''s father, Qing Yang was even more ted when he had found out about his daughter having reached the Foundation Establishment Realm. The guy had even thrown a party as he was happily running around bragging about his daughter to anyone that had children of their own.


    The first elder did not know whether tough or cry, as the Qing Yang kepting running to him talking about how much more talented Qing Yi waspared to his son Qing Ming¡­


    "Should we get going then?" looking at the respectful and awed looks from the Qing family members, Xuan Hao turned around and asked Qing Yi standing beside him.


    "Yeah, the finals will begin in little over an hour. Only, I did not expect for that Bai Fei to also breakthrough and reach the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­ The ck Rose Sect is indeed still quite powerful¡­" Thinking about Bai Fei, who also reached the Foundation Establishment Realm like her, Qing Yi could not help but smile awkwardly.


    She had expected that she would be able to easily win the annual youthpetition, as reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm was considered extremely difficult at her age.


    Only ces like the Flying Sword Sect and the other top powers would have geniuses who reached the Foundation Establishment Realm at her age.


    For Bai Fei, who did not have something like a divine physique that she did, to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm?


    Qing Yi felt some doubts about it, but who knows, he was after all taken in as a disciple of a Nascent Soul Realm expert¡­ There must be some reason for someone like that to want to take him in. Maybe his talent was just not something that the people of the Bright Sun City could see, like her Divine Physique!


    "Great! Then let''s get going immediately!" As Qing Yi was wondering why Bai Fei was able to be the disciple of a Nascent Soul expert and reach the Foundation Establishment Realm, Xuan Hao pulled her hand and quickly made his way out of the Qing family house.


    Staying there under the respectful and awed looks from the younger and older generation of the Qing family was a little too much for Xuan Hao, their gaze on him was too much. The worst was the hungry look which some of the girls and women looked at him with, that was a truly horrifying feeling. Like they wanted to eat him or something!


    Luckily, Qing Yi was not like them and was obedient and followed all of his instructions without missing a beat. Having an obedient and innocent disciple was definitely the way to go!


    Hopefully, nothing would change in the future and Qing Yi would always remain as obedient and innocent, as she was at the moment.


    Smiling to himself as he turned to look at Qing Yi following behind him with her father following closely behind, Xuan Hao, Qing Yi, Qing Yang and the rest of the Qing family made their way to the venue where the finals of the annual youthpetition would be held.


    "Well, well, well¡­. If it isn''t the Qing family!" As the Qing family had made their way into the venue a mocking voice could be heard from the side as a young man walked over.


    "Bai Fei!" Qing Yi frowned as she stepped away from Xuan Hao and went to confront the arrogant young master that had randomly appeared.


    [System detected low-tier young master. Host is rmended to allow his disciple to confront the young master, this will bring benefits from ancient magic treasures or a sudden increase in cultivation along to your disciple depending on the young master''s tier!]


    A sudden message from the system suddenly appeared in front of Xuan Hao as he stared speechlessly towards Bai Fei. What great luck Qing Yi has! She even manged to encounter someone like this! The system even showed a new feature all of a sudden, low-tier young master?


    Xuan Hao looked at Bai Fei and instantly noticed who he was, he would definitely be a great opportunity for Qing Yi!


    From what Xuan Hao remembered, people like Bai Fei were supposed to be steppingstones that people could use to either reach a new realm of cultivation or find some magical treasure. The so-called arrogant young master! A rumoured cultivation boost or magic treasure generator!


    The system seemed to ssify these young masters as great opportunities for his disciple as well, Xuan Hao was really curious about the benefit that the low-tier young master Bai Fei would bring Qing Yi!


    Qing Yi seemed to have know what a great opportunity it was beforehand and had even gone up to confront Bai Fei by herself.


    Ah, what a great disciple I have, not letting go of such a precious opportunity to improve!


    Xuan Hao smiled to himself as he decided to observe how Qing Yi dealt with the low-tier young master Bai Fei.

 Chapter 54: Bai Fei vs Qing Chenyi

    <h4>Chapter 54: Bai Fei vs Qing Chenyi</h4>


    " Hmph, I heard that you managed to breakthrough to the Foundation Establishment Realm as well¡­ Honestly thought it was a joke something at first, after all, who here does not know how low your cultivation is!


    Really makes one wonder what kind of godly herb that you swallowed to allow your cultivation to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm." Bai Fei said disdainfully as he looked down at Qing Yi, seemingly not caring much about her even though both of them had reached the same cultivation realm.


    "Bai Fei! We will see who is stronger than who in the finals!" Not saying anything more, Qing Yi left towards thepetition venue. Not waiting for Bai Fei to answer.


    Xuan Hao stood at the side and observed the short interaction with a smile on his face, he had just entered the system and checked out what the new feature was about.


    Apparently, the young masters were categorized into different tiers. The systems catagorazation and rewards was even listed as well.


    [Young Master tiers]:


    [Low-tier young master]: Strength at Foundation Establishment realm, backing of at least Nascent Soul Realm.


    [Possible Reward for disciple]: Sudden Breakthrough during fight with the young master, finding a random artifact/herb of Spirit Grade or below on the young master, mysterious opportunity.


    [Mid-tier young master]: ??? (meet a mid-tier young master)


    [Possible Reward for disciple]: ???


    Looking at the tier of young master, Xuan Hao immediately noticed that a low-tier young master was supposed to have the backing of a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator and have reached the Foundation Establishment Realm at the very least.


    Bai Fei seemed to fit in well with the description of the system, having a cultivation at the Foundation Establishment Realm and having a master at the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Nodding his head to himself, Xuan Hao instead focused on the rewards that Qing Yi could obtain from her encounter with Bai Fei. The sudden breakthrough and ability to find precious herbs or artifacts felt a little unfair in Xuan Hao''s eyes, personally, he wished that he could go and beat up Bai Fei and get the sudden breakthrough¡­


    Looking a little closer, Xuan Hao focused on thest possible reward, mysterious opportunity.


    The reward was, as the name said, mysterious and Xuan Hao had no clue what it entailed. Maybe it was a secret inheritance of some ancient cultivator, a secret path to a secret realm set up by a powerful Domain Lord?


    Xuan Hao could not help but wonder as he exited his sea of consciousness and looked straight at Bai Fei with a subtle light shining in his eyes.


    If Qing Yi could improve her cultivation, he would naturally be able to get stronger as well¡­ People like Bai Fei truly were treasures sent down by the heavens themselves!


    ¡­


    A little farther away, Bai Fei himself had already made his way towards the venue where thepetition was being held. Confidently walking, Bai Fei suddenly felt a chill go down his spine as he anxiously looked around himself.


    "Master Bai, is there anything wrong? Perhaps it''s that rude girl from earlier troubling you?" Seeing his sudden movement, a servant walking close by asked in an angry tone as he thought about how rude Qing Yi had been to his master.


    "Ah, it''s nothing, I was just hit by the wind and found it to be colder than expected." Not considering that it was a hot cloudless day with no such thing as a cold breeze even present and the fact that he was a Foundation Establishment cultivator, Bai Fei shrugged it off and made his way onto the first stage.


    The first one to face off against Bai Fei surrendered immediately and he easily moved on to the next stage.


    Qing Yi was the same as him, as nobody really felt like fighting someone one major cultivation realm above themselves. Losing was all but guaranteed. Only those heaven-defying geniuses would dare to challenge someone a major cultivation realm above themselves and ordinary people did not dare think of doing something like that.


    "Bai Fei! You lost to mest year and even if you managed to breakthrough and reach the Foundation Establishment Realm, I will be sure to beat you just likest year!" As time progressed, the semi-finals began and Qing Chenyi, the former genius of the Qing family stood in front of Bai Fei as he loudly proimed.


    The fact that Qing Yi of all people had broken through and reached the Foundation Establishment Realm before him had hurt him quite a bit, but in the end, they were still family, so he was still fine with it.


    Bai Fei on the other hand was his enemy and rival, back then he had barely managed to beat him and win thest annualpetition and now that he had managed to take a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator as master, he had managed to improve faster than him!


    It had to be known that over thest half year, Qing Chenyi had not dared to rx and had even managed to reach the eighth stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Sadly, this was far from enough to contend with someone at the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    "Qing Chenyi? Ha, you are still in the Qi Condensation Realm, even that little girl Qing Yi has already surpassed you! Come, I will be sure to end it quickly!" Bai Fei smiled smugly as he signalled for Qing Chenyi to attack him.


    "BAI FEI!" Qing Chenyi was angered by the way he was disregarded by his former rival and immediately attacked with all his might.


    "Pft, how pathetic, let me show you the difference in our strength!" Seeing Qing Chenyi charging at him, Bai Fei did not bother with it and onlyunched a casual palm strike towards him.


    "Bai Fei! You are underestimating me!" Seeing how little Bai Fei seemingly cared about his attack, Qing Chenyi felt his anger reach a new high as he finally shed with the casual palm attack of Bai Fei.


    Bang!


    Qing Chenyi did not even have a chance to resist as he was sent flying out of the stage, under the astonished gazes of the crowd.


    Bai Fei was so strong! Even Qing Chenyi could be dealt with so easily!


    Thinking about all of this, the crowd started to look forward to the fight between Qing Yi and Bai Fei.


    Qing Chenyi on the other hand was forgotten as he justid on the ground, it was only a littleter that some of the members of the Qing family finally remembered him and quickly went over to help him.

 Chapter 55: Flying Through the Sky~

    <h4>Chapter 55: Flying Through the Sky~</h4>


    Thepetition proceeded as most had expected and both Qing Yi and Bai Fei ended up facing each other in the finals. Not much of a surprise as they were the only ones who had reached the Foundation Establishment Realm. The rest of thepetitors were only at the Qi Condensation Realm¡­


    The finals would begin soon, and it was only at this moment that Xuan Hao managed to catch a glimpse of Bai Fei''s master.


    The man was wearing a pitch-ck robe and had an aloof look on his face as he looked uncaringly at the surrounding people.


    The man had onlye when the finals were about to start and was sitting at the seat of honour that the Bai family had made for him, even without feeling the other guys nascent soul aura, Xuan Hao could guess who he was.


    The only thing that surprised Xuan Hao, was how the guy seemingly didn''t try to hide or mask his aura and instead let it out freely.


    Xuan Hao himself had masked his Nascent Soul aura, as it would be quite ufortable for others and it would automatically give away his strength to any lurking enemies that might be out there.


    Like right now, Xuan Hao could easily feel that the nascent soul expert from the ck Rose Sect was only at stage 1 of the Nascent Soul Realm, while the man himself had no clue that there was another Nascent Soul expert observing him from the side.


    Other than Xuan Hao, the rest of the people present also looked at the man in the pitch-ck robe full of respect and fear.


    It was a Nascent Soul cultivator! A real living one!


    "Master, I will be going now!" Bai Fei looked at the ck robed man as he said respectfully, different from his former arrogant tone.


    "¡­" The man did not say anything and only nodded uncaringly as he closed his eyes, either to meditate or just rx.


    Bai Fei did not mind and went onto the stage, where Qing Yi was already waiting for him.


    "The finals of this year''s annual youthpetition will be between Qing Yi from the Qing family and Bai Fei from the Bai family! Are both of you ready?" A rtively young man stood between both Qing Yi and Bai Fei on the stage as he announced loudly.


    "Yes!" Both of them replied affirmatively, as they got into a fighting stance.


    "Then you can begin when you see fit!" Saying thosest words, the young man quickly made his way down from the stage, so both of them could start the duel.


    "Well then little girl, let''s see how strong you really are!" Bai Fei did not wait at all andunched an attack the moment the young man had made his way down from the stage.


    "ck Rose Palm!" Bai Feiunched his palm technique and a small rose made out of qi quickly formed at the centre of his palm as it engulfed it and expanded until it was double the size of Bai Fei''s hand.


    Manifesting qi through qi techniques was something that one could only do at the Foundation Establishment Realm and was also one of the reasons why a Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator was so much stronger than a Qi Condensation Realm cultivator.


    Swoosh!


    The ck Rose flew towards Qing Yi as she quickly drew her sword to defend.


    The Sword was an Earth Rank Artifact that she had gotten from cing second in the neer tournament of the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Autumn Wind Sword!"


    Swinging down with all of her might, Qing Yi shed towards the iing ck rose as the Autumn Wind Sword showed its might to the world.


    Bang!


    A small explosion urred as the ck rose and sword sh crashed into one another, sending a st of wind out towards the spectating crowd of people.


    Things did not stop here, as Qing Yi''s sword attack continued towards Bai Fei.


    "Argh!" Although the attack from Qing Yi was weakened by the ck rose that Bai Fei had attacked with earlier, it was still more than enough to wound him as a wound appeared on his left arm.


    In thest second before the sword attack reached him, Bai Fei had put his left arm up to defend while deploying a defensive qi technique to try and mitigate as much of the damage as possible.


    "You! How dare you!" Looking at the bleeding wound on his left arm, Bai Fei suddenly turned extremely aggressive as he stared at Qing Yi with a murderous look.


    "I will make you pay for daring to injure my body!" Having a temper tantrum, Bai Fei started screaming angrily like a 5-year-old child throwing a tantrum.


    "¡­"


    Qing Yi looked at the almost impossible to see small wound on Bai Fei''s left arm and 1 or 2 drops of blood that had leaked from the wound.


    Xuan Hao also looked speechlessly towards Bai Fei as he was openly throwing a tantrum for others to see.


    Howe a grown-up young man is throwing a tantrum that even a 3-year-old would find hard to beat? Is the Bai family not embarrassed?


    Thinking this Xuan Hao turned and looked at the Bai family in question and sure enough, all of them had already turned bright red in embarrassment at the childish behaviour of Bai Fei.


    Back on the stage, Qing Yi looked as speechless as the rest of the crowd as she watched how Bai Fei keptining and screaming.


    Is this really a cultivator¡­? My attack barely damaged him¡­ Maybe he is stalling for time to recover his qi!?


    Suddenly, Qing Yi felt like she had found the "answer" to her question and decisively charged towards Bai Fei as heined.


    "-And I will make sure that you will live to regret ever- "


    Swoosh!


    The attack came all of a sudden and Bai Fei had not expected for Qing Yi to suddenly attack as he was still talking about how he would deal with her.


    Smack!


    In thest second, Qing Yi realized that her opponent was not defending at all, so she turned her sword from the sharp side to the t side as the poor Bai Fei was smacked directly in the face and sent flying for a few dozen meters out of the stage.


    At least Bai Fei got to feel like a Domain Lord and fly freely in the air for a few seconds¡­

 Chapter 56: Troublesome Disciple

    <h4>Chapter 56: Troublesome Disciple</h4>


    "¡­" The entire crowd froze for a moment as they looked at where the passed-out Bai Fei was nowying on the ground, then they turned around and looked up at Qing Yi.


    This was supposed to be an epic match between two cultivators at the Foundation Establishment Realm! The fight even started out spectacrly¡­


    Qing Yi did not expect the match to end so easily and smiled awkwardly when she saw the confused look on the crowds faces.


    "Impudent!" As Bai Fei hit the ground, the ck robed man from the ck Rose sect opened his eyes and looked at Qing Yi with a frown on his face.


    The aura of a Nascent Soul expert quickly spread out and engulfed Qing Yi and the crowd, freezing them in ce.


    "Hmph, how dare your mere Qing family beat up someone from the ck Rose sect? Looks like you really don''t want to live anymore." The ck robed man stood up and looked disdainfully in the direction of the Qing family as he said this.


    Qing Yang and the rest of the Qing family started trembling in anger upon hearing the ck robed man''s words.


    Beat up? This is a goddamn martial arts tournament! How can someone not get hurt? If you want an excuse to attack us, just say it!


    Xuan Hao looked at the angry looks on the Qing family''s faces and then turned to look at the ck robed man now standing in front of the Bai family as he disdainfully smiled towards them.


    "¡­"


    Since when had Nascent Soul experts gotten so shameless? This was the thought on Xuan Hao''s and the crowds mind at the moment.


    But the crowd decided to stay quiet, it was after all a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator¡­


    "Hmph, I might as well deal with this little girl first." Saying so, the Nascent Soul expert from the ck Rose sect waved his hand slightly as a bloody tendril formed in the air and the slender threadlike tendril, stretched out towards Qing Yi at a speed only Xuan Hao could see.


    Before anyone could understand what was going on, the surrounding crowd saw a bloody tendril suddenly appear directly in front of Qing Yi.


    Buzz!


    However, just as everyone thought that Qing Yi was about to perish, another terrifying aura suddenly descended!


    The terrifying blood tendrilunched by the ck-robed man was suddenly cut in half as a sword strike appeared just in front of Qing Yi at thest possible moment.


    Qing Yi let out a sigh of relief upon seeing this, she knew that her master had defended her just now.


    "Hmph, it''s been a while since I have seen someone as shameless as you! Can''t bear that your disciple lost to mine, so you decide to attack her?" Xuan Hao''s voice came out from besides Qing Yi as he suddenly appeared directly besides her.


    "This aura¡­ What''s going on? Why is there another Nascent Soul expert!?"


    "Yeah, and this one seems to be slightly stronger as well, did you see how easily he dealt with that bloody tendril?!"


    "If it was me, I would have probably died if even 1% of that tendrils strength hit me¡­"


    Some of the weaker people in the crowd could not help but fearfully retreat and look towards Xuan Hao in awe.


    ¡­


    This damn Bai family! Why did they not mention that the Qing family had the support of a Nascent Soul expert!


    "¡­Might I ask where this Daoist is from?" The ck-robed man from the ck Rose sect regained his bearing as he cautiously asked with narrowed eyes.


    At the side, the Bai family knew that the situation was no longer under their control and most of the anxiously looked at the ck-robed man. Hoping that he could deal with the unknown Nascent Soul expert that had appeared at the Qing family''s side.


    Bai Hua, the former head of the Bai family looked towards Xuan Hao standing besides Qing Yi and sighed to himself.


    "Ha¡­ The Bai family is done for¡­ the only reason that the ck Rose Sect took in Bai Fei was because they had a use for him¡­ Between offending a Nascent Soul expert and helping the Bai family¡­" Bai Hua felt thest bit of hope that he had for the Bai family disappear as he walked out of the venue.


    Only Xuan Hao and the ck robed man from the ck Rose Sect saw him leave the venue, but both ignored him. After all, neither cared about him leaving or staying.


    "From today onwards, I will travel the world and finally explore it without being bound by the task of looking after the Bai family¡­" Giving a final sad smile in the direction of the panicking Bai family, Bai Hua told himself as he felt himself being freer and more rxed than ever.


    This was thest time that the Bai family would ever see Bai Hua.


    "¡­"


    Xuan Hao looked at the old man well into his eighties disappearing into the distance, he clearly knew that he was a member of the Bai family, but the sad feeling of the elderly man caused Xuan Hao not to do anything to him.


    He instinctively felt that the old man most likely did not have anything to do with the Bai family current aggressive behaviour in trying to kill the Qing family off.


    The current scuffle between the two family''s hadsted for hundreds of years, but it was only recently that the Bai family truly started to try and get rid of the Qing family!


    Xuan Hao did not find the scuffle and skirmishes for the past hundreds or so years weird, as it was rtively normal for something like that to happen if two families were around equal in strength in the same city¡­


    "Ha¡­" Sighing to himself, Xuan Hao looked away from the elderly man''s back and turned his focus back onto the ck robed Nascent Soul expert.


    The fight between two families for the rule of a region or city was not really fair and Xuan Hao knew this as well.


    Most likely, the Bai family and the ck Rose Sect were the big bad guys, but this was only from the Qing family''s perspective.


    The only thing Xuan Hao could see was two family''s fighting for control over a city, his disciple just happened to be from one of them, causing him to join in and help her family.


    This disciple of his¡­ Maybe she was more troublesome than he had first thought¡­?

 Chapter 57: Black Robed Man Runs Away!

    <h4>Chapter 57: ck Robed Man Runs Away!</h4>


    "¡­"


    Turning back to the ck robed Nascent Soul expert from the ck Rose Sect, Xuan Hao decided to not answer his question as he instead drew his sword.


    The Nascent Soul expert from the ck Rose Sect was only at the first stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and Xuan Hao himself could easily deal with someone like that!


    "!" The ck robed man narrowed his eyes even more when he saw Xuan Hao draw his sword, as he got prepared to fight.


    "I''m an elder from the ck Rose Sect! Are you sure that you want to fight me!?" Seeing that Xuan Hao clearly did not care about him, the ck robed man tried to use his background to intimidate him.


    The ck Rose Sect could easily be considered the fifth strongest sect in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, not just anyone would want to offend it for no reason.


    "Sure~ you attacked my disciple earlier and even tried to kill her¡­ How am I supposed to respond? Let you walk away for free after being unsessful?" Xuan Hao raised an eyebrow as he looked questioningly at the ck robed man.


    "¡­" The ck robed man was slightly speechless when he heard what Xuan Hao said.


    Indeed, if someone had tried to kill one of his disciples, he would make sure to get revenge on them and kill them off.


    Just earlier when Qing Yi had injured Bai Fei, he had already tried to just kill her off and use it as and excuse to help his disciple''s family take control of the Bright Sun City¡­


    "I see¡­ Guess I have no choice then!" Saying so, the ck robed man''s eyes shone in a vicious light as bloody tendrils suddenly drilled up from the ground and pierced the remaining Bai family members, Bai Fei included.


    "!" Xuan Hao opened his mouth in surprise as he watched the ck robed man proceed to kill off his own teammates.


    "Wha- "


    "The Bai family is¡­"


    "Hiii!"


    The Qing family members and surrounding crowd were no different as all of them stared at the ck robed man in horror.


    The bodies of the Bai family slowly dried up as the bloody tendrils quickly absorbed all of the blood and qi inside of their bodies.


    "Hah! This feels great!" A tendril connected back to the ck robed man as the blood and qi they had absorbed was transferred back into his body, causing a low moan to escape to ck robed man''s mouth.


    Swoosh!


    Xuan Hao decided that watching as the ck robed man''s aura slowly grew stronger as he absorbed the blood and qi of the Bai family members was most likely a bad idea, as he quickly shed down with his sword towards the ck robed man.


    "Haha! You think this silly little sword can do anything to me?" Smiling in contempt, the ck robed man waved his hand and dozens of tendrils shot up from the ground and formed a barrier between him and the sword attackunched by Xuan Hao.


    The sword shnded on the tendrils and instantly shed through them, like a hot knife through butter.


    "Rose Guard!"


    The ck robed man realized that Xuan Hao was stronger than he had expected, and a few thicker tendrils erupted from the ground as ck roses bloomed on top of them.


    Bang!


    The sword sh soon met the ck roses, and a small explosion came as the sword crashed directly into the defences of the ck robed elder.


    Seeing the tendrils with ck roses slowly getting cut through by the sword sh, the ck robed man immediately knew that he was not a match for Xuan Hao and quickly employed his own movement techniques as he tried to retreat.


    After all, why stay and fight a losing battle?


    With this in mind, the ck robed man used his strength as he quickly grabbed a few hundred people from the crowd and instantly drained their qi and blood to help himself recover the little qi he lost in the earlier sh with Xuan Hao.


    "Hmph, I will make sure that my ck Rose Sect repays you for the humiliation I faced today!" Saying that, the ck robed man slowly started disappearing as he mustered all of his strength to escape.


    "Think I will let you escape?" Xuan Hao did not dare to wait as he quickly used his own movement technique to chase after the ck robed man.


    Even if he could fly on his sword, it would still be quicker to use a movement technique for a short burst in speed and try to quickly catch up to the ck robed man.


    "¡­" Qing Yi and the rest of the Qing family did not even have time toprehend what had just happened as they observed the oue of the earlier sh between Xuan Hao and the ck robed man from the ck Rose Sect.


    Just a few seconds had passed, but most of the Bai family had been wiped out, even Bai Fei, the ck robed man''s disciple, was killed by his own master.


    Qing Yi honestly had no clue what had even happened, she had heard from her master in the past that the ck Rose Sect practiced some borderline demonic techniques and now she had seen it first-hand.


    Absorbing the blood and qi of other cultivators! Was this not one of the main giveaways for a demonic cultivator? How was this borderline demonic¡­? It was clearly a demonic technique!


    Thinking about this, Qing Yi felt a little nervous as she looked in the direction that her master and the ck robed man had disappeared in. Hopefully, nothing would happen.


    ¡­


    Meanwhile, Xuan Hao was just about to catch up with the ck robed man from the ck Rose Sect, when he suddenly felt a dangerous aura lock onto him.


    "!"


    Retreating immediately, Xuan Hao barely managed to dodge a pitch-ck sword that suddenly came from the sky and blocked his path.


    "What is that¡­?" Stopping in his tracks, Xuan Hao looked up as he saw another person in the same clothes as the ck robed man.


    "Howe you a running away from people the moment I find you? Did you manage to secure the Bright Sun City?" The new arrival appeared besides the ck robed man running away from Xuan Hao as he asked.


    "No¡­ This guy suddenly appeared and apparently has a disciple in the city¡­" The ck robed man who ran away from Xuan Hao earlier stopped as heined and pointed at Xuan Hao.


    "I see, let''s retreat for now. Not having the Bright Sun City will not affect the grand n!"


    "Fine, but we have to teach this guy a lesson in the future! Nobody offends the ck Rose Sect and gets away with it!"


    With that, Xuan Hao watched both of the ck robed men quickly disappear without doing anything. The new arrival clearly gave off a dangerous aura and Xuan Hao had no n to recklessly attack someone who was most likely stronger than him.


    "¡­"


    They do realize I can hear them talk¡­? I even know you guys are from the ck Rose Sect¡­


    Gazing speechlessly in the direction the two ck robed men from the ck Rose Sect left in, Xuan Hao wondered whether or not they realized that.


    Maybe they just thought he could do nothing to stop their so called "grand n"?


    Not thinking anymore about it, Xuan Hao shook his head slightly as he turned around and made his way back to Bright Sun City.


    Today was truly exhausting, he honestly did not want to deal with whatever n those people from the ck Rose Sect were talking about¡­

 Chapter 58: Leaving Bright Sun City

    <h4>Chapter 58: Leaving Bright Sun City</h4>


    "Master! Are you okay?!"


    Returning to the Bright Sun City, Xuan Hao saw Qing Yi running over with an anxious look on her face as she looked up and down Xuan Hao''s body. Making sure he was not injured.


    "Yes, I''m fine. The guy from the ck Rose Sect ended up getting away¡­ Apparently he had a friend close by." Sighing as he thought about the earlier chase, Xuan Hao felt quite embarrassed.


    If it were not for him fearing that him using his sword to fly, causing the Raging me Sect to find out he was the one who injured one of their elders, Xuan Hao would have used this method to catch up to the ck robed man after he failed to catch up to him at the start.


    Honestly, Xuan Hao still felt surprised at the speed of the ck robed man, even 2 small realms below him, he had still managed to slip away¡­


    When he got back to the sect, Xuan Hao swore to himself that he would find a movement technique to train in.


    "W-what will happen to my family now!" Realizing that the ck robed man had gotten away and knew her family''s location, Qing Yi shivered slightly as she looked hopingly up at her master. Hoping that he had a solution.


    "¡­From what I heard, they seem to be busy with something else at the moment and would most likely not have the time to send people over to deal with your Qing family. After all, even if the Qing family is weak to a power like the ck Rose Sect, it still has quite a few Core Formation cultivators and is inside the Flying Sword Sects territory." Thinking about it for a moment, Xuan Hao patiently answered his disciples worry.


    "I see¡­" Qing Yi slightly lowered her head as she looked sadly at the ground.


    If only I was stronger¡­


    This thought appeared inside of Qing Yi''s mind as she thought about the danger that the ck Rose Sect presented to her and her family.


    If only she was strong enough, the ck Rose Sect would not dare to attack her family, even when she was not there.


    "Master let''s go back to the sect! I want to grow stronger!"


    Clenching her fists and looking up at her master, Qing Yi''s eyes shone brightly as she innocently told her master about her desire.


    "But Yiyi, you only just came back¡­" From the side Qing Yang, Qing Yi''s father, put on a sad face as he looked at Qing Yi.


    "I will never grow stronger if I just stay here and there will always exist the danger from the ck Rose Sect if I don''t grow strong enough and the ck Rose Sect ends up sending someone to deal with the Qing family¡­ I don''t dare to just stay here and waste my time¡­" Looking at her fathers sad face, Qing Yi bit her lower lip as she told him.


    "Hah¡­ Fine¡­ Just make sure youe back to visit from time to time!" Qing Yang knew what Qing Yi said was true, no matter what, her master could not stay here and safeguard them all the time and even if they had the support of the Flying Sword Sect, who was to say that the ck Rose Sect would not secretly wipe out their Qing family?


    Even if the ck Rose Sect were dealt with in the future, who is to say some other power would note along and wipe out the Qing family?


    Only when they had someone strong to defend them would they truly be able to hold their head high and not fear being wiped out by a passing Nascent Soul expert¡­


    "¡­" Xuan Hao silently watched as the father and daughter duo talked with each other without interrupting them.


    Qing Yi''s desire to grow stronger had grown and she had truly felt how hopeless she was in front of the expert from the ck Rose Sect, even her master did not manage to kill the ck robed man in the end!


    What would have happened if her master were just a little slower to act and safe her? What if her master were not there, would the ck robed man have cared about her being a member of the Flying Sword Sect?


    Qing Yi doubted that the ck Rose Sects people would care whether or not she was a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect. After all, it was widely known that the Flying Sword Sect and the Raging me Sect was currently battling it out with each other and could only spare to send out so many people, lest the Raging me Sect takes advantage of it andunches an attack.


    "Great, then let''s leave immediately!" Seeing the determination that Qing Yi was currently showing, Xuan Hao decided to leave immediately, as she might change her mind to stay a little longer if they waited until the next day.


    Better strike while the iron was hard, Xuan Hao decided that he would impart Qing Yi some insights in her cultivation realm along the way. Hopefully, she would be able to absorb them better with her current state of mind.


    Qing Yi did not refuse as both of them soon left the Bright Sun City under the increasingly loud crying noises of a certain father.


    "Let''s get going then." Xuan Hao said as they came to a forest besides the Bright Sun City. The forest was only a few kilometres away from the city, but Xuan Hao knew that the chances of them being seen taking off was small and the faster they could get going the faster they would be able to get back to the Flying Sword Sect!


    Xuan Hao had still not forgotten how a certain shadow hawk had thrown them off mid-air and flown away without a care in the world.


    When he got back to the Sect, Xuan Hao would make sure he got his revenge!


    Swoosh!


    With that, Qing Yi and Xuan Hao both jumped on top of Xuan Hao''s sword as it quickly lifted into the air and flew away.


    Qing Yi held onto her master as she slowly turned around and looked at the Bright Sun City disappearing in the distance.


    I will definitely be stronger! Strong enough to deal with anything that threatens my family!


    Thinking about this, Qing Yi listened to her master.


    Not forgetting to memorise the teachings about the Foundation Establishment Realm that Xuan Hao started talking about the moment they reached a cruising altitude.

 Chapter 59: Spirit Valley

    <h4>Chapter 59: Spirit Valley</h4>


    As they were flying across the sky, Xuan Hao suddenly remembered that Qing Yi had managed to defeat Bai Fei, which the system called a low-tier young master.


    The system had not given him any notifications or anything after it had happened and the ck robed man from the ck Rose Sect attacked as well, causing Xuan Hao to forget about the new system feature.


    "Qing Yi, what happened to the Bai family''s corpses after I went to hunt down the man from the ck Rose Sect?" Remembering that the corpses of the Bai family were already gone when he returned, Xuan Hao asked curiously, he really wanted to know if Qing Yi managed to "loot" the low-tier young master Bai Fei.


    "After you left, we cleaned up the venue and took anything of value from the Bai family!" Directly admitting to looting the dead body of the Bai family''s people, Qing Yi proudly told Xuan Hao about her deeds.


    "¡­ Did you get anything¡­ Good?" Xuan Hao smiled awkwardly as he looked at the proud expression on his disciple''s face.


    Hopefully, she would not end up running around looting random corpses¡­ If that really happened, Xuan Hao had no idea how people would view him, the teacher, if that really happened.


    "Hm¡­ We did not really find anything interesting other than a few artifacts¡­ Ah! There was this ring that I found on Bai Fei, want to see it?!" Seemingly thinking about it for a moment, Qing Yi suddenly got excited as she took out a ring from a small pocket in her robe and gave it over to Xuan Hao.


    "This is¡­?" Inspecting the ring, Xuan Hao tried sending a bit of his divine sense into the ring and see what kind of reward his disciple had managed to pick up.


    "Hello young one, I''m a great Divine Moon Immortal, I can teach you about-"


    Woosh~


    "AH! Master! Why did you throw the ring away?!" Qing Yi cried out as she suddenly saw Xuan Hao use all of his strength to throw the ring that she handed him far away.


    "¡­"


    Xuan Hao did not answer and instead just stared quietly in the direction that he had thrown the ring.


    How dangerous! He had encountered the rumoured "random expert stuck in a ring", if he was not careful and acted immediately his disciple might be taken away from him!


    "Hah¡­ That ring was dangerous, there was some evil demon sealed inside of it! Better get rid of it before anything bad happens!" Looking at his confused disciple, Xuan Hao shook his head as he exined to her with a serious look.


    "I see¡­" Qing Yi had a slightly doubting expression on her face as she slightly narrowed her eyes while looking up at Xuan Hao.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao threw the ring far into the distance, Bai Hua, who had left the Bright Sun City to journey the world was walking slowly forward.


    "Hah¡­ Where will I even go from now on? I used all my time in the past looking after the Bai family¡­ Well, I might as well start going north! Auch!" As Bai Hua was talking to himself, he was suddenly hit by something as he raised his hand to hold the ce on his head where he was hit.


    "What in the world was that!?" caressing the area on his head, Bai Hua lowered his head and looked at the ring that wasying on the ground in front of him.


    "Hello young one¡­" As he touched the ring, Bai Hua heard a voice enter his head and his formerly depressed look slowly turned into one filled with joy.


    Looks like luck is finally with him!


    ¡­


    As they continued flying through the sky, Xuan Hao and Qing Yi saw many interesting things, though not that much different from what they had seen on the way to the Bright Sun City.


    "Master what is that!?" As they quietly flew through the air, Qing Yi suddenly called out to Xuan Hao as she pointed in a direction to the side of them with her hand.


    Xuan Hao was also curious as he turned around and looked at the ce where Qing Yi pointed.


    "Ah, a spirit valley." The ce where Qing Yi had pointed was a ce known as a spirit valley. Normally finding such a ce could be considered hard as they were quite rare.


    The spirit valley to the side of them that Qing Yi had pointed out was not that big and the spirit herbs that could be found there would most likely not be above Earth Grade and would mostly only be Mortal Grade.


    "A spirit valley?" Tilting her head slightly to the side upon hearing the name, Qing Yi questioningly looked up at Xuan Hao, wondering what a spirit valley was.


    "Ah, a spirit valley is normally a ce where the qi between heaven and earth is denser than normal. The ce is filled with all kinds of herbs, trees, rivers and can be considered quite a beautiful ce¡­ Want to go down and take a look?" Trying his best to describe what it was, Xuan Hao decided that it might be better to just go down there and show her, it would be easier to understand and they would be able to get a small break as well.


    "Yes!" Qing Yi answered immediately as she clearly felt her spirit of exploration beckoning for her to go down there and explore the spirit valley.


    "Haha." Laughing slightly to himself upon seeing the excited look on Qing Yi''s face, Xuan Hao slowly steered the sword towards the spirit valley as both of them soonnded besides a river flowing through the valley.


    The river was filled to the brim with all kinds of fish. Xuan Hao did not rx for a second as he used his cultivation to quickly catch a few of them to eat, as Qing Yi curiously inspected the area theynded.


    Whoosh


    A fire quickly appeared in Xuan Hao''s hands as some wood from a nearby tree slowly broke down and built up a small campfire in front of him.


    Soon an intoxicating aroma spread out from the campfire as Xuan Hao slowly grilled the fish he had caught over the fire.


    Qing Yi on the other hand did not act asid back as her master and instead left the small area under the agreement of Xuan Hao, to further explore the spirit valley.


    After all, it was just a rtively low quailty spirit valley. Nothing too precious would appear, meaning there would not be much danger present.

 Chapter 60: Herb Gathering~

    <h4>Chapter 60: Herb Gathering~</h4>


    Qing Yi left Xuan Hao behind at the small river stretching through the spirit valley as she ventured deeper into the forest just besides the small river.


    The forest was not dense, and light easily came through openings in the trees above, allowing Qing Yi to easily see in front of her without much trouble.


    Looking at the ground, Qing Yi instantly noticed a stark differencepared to a normal forest like the one that was just outside the Bright Sun City, herbs! And not normal herbs, no, they were Mortal Grade herbs!


    The entire forest floor waspletely covered in them, from deep root spirit shrooms, to sunlight flowers, Qing Yi could see all kinds of mortal grade herbs covering the forest floor.


    This was amazing, normally something like this would be considered a precious gathering ground for powers like her Qing family, yet here it was, countless low grade herbs just growing freely without any human interference!


    "Maybe I should inform dad when I return to the Qing family again in the future, it is after all not that far away from the Bright Sun City." Thinking about this, Qing Yi walked deeper into the spirit valley.


    At this point, even a few Earth Grade herbs had showed up along the way.


    Qing Yi had not held back in the slightest as she gathered all of them, stuffing whatever pockets she had full of herbs, making her look quite funny with herbs sticking out from several ces on her robe.


    Earth Grade herbs were normally useful for people in the Foundation Establishment Realm, so Qing Yi gathered all that she encountered. Not sparring even the most degraded and bad quality Earth Grade herb.


    "¡­"


    Back at the shore besides the river, Xuan Hao was quietly eating his newly grilled fish as he sent out his divine sense to check in on what Qing Yi was up to.


    What met him was a big round ball with herbs sticking out from every possible ce, if not for the small face sticking up from the top of the ball, Xuan Hao would never believe that the wandering ball of herbs was his disciple and even then, he still doubted whether the wandering ball of herbs was his cute little disciple¡­


    His disciple seemed to be a little greedy¡­ Maybe she was not as innocent as he had first thought?


    "No way¡­" Xuan Hao shook his head slightly as he retreated his divine sense, his disciple was definitely not someone greedy! She was just¡­ Helping the forest clean up by removing some of the older herbs, so the younger ones could get a little more sunlight and grow better¡­


    Yes¡­ That was the reason!


    Not thinking anymore about Qing Yi, Xuan Hao returned to rxing by the river as he peacefully ate the fishes he had caught.


    "Ah, if just life could always be so rxing!"


    ¡­


    As Qing Yi slowly made her way deeper and deeper into the spirit valley, she came upon a ravine in the middle of the forest.


    The ravine was not toorge but was still more than 1 kilometre long and a few dozen meters wide.


    This, however, was not the interesting thing about the ravine. Instead, it was the thing that Qing Yi saw at the bottom of the ravine.


    A Spirit Grade Herb!


    Qing Yi immediately narrowed her eyes to observe her surroundings, making sure that nobody was looking and only then did she slowly start to make her way down towards the spirit herb at the bottom of the ravine.


    Xuan Hao observed from a distance with the help of his divine sense as the ball of herbs known as Qing Yi slowly struggled her way down to the bottom of the ravine.


    Only after 10 minutes of struggle did she manage to pick up the spirit grade herb and return to the top of the ravine again.


    Normally, someone with her cultivation would have been able to do the same thing within a minute or less, but Qing Yi simply had too much extra weight on her. Making moving around normally quite difficult.


    "Hah¡­" Seeing that Qing Yi was finally making her way back towards him, Xuan Hao let out a sigh of relief.


    If she did not stop gathering more herbs, Xuan Hao honestly had no idea how they would even be able to carry them all back to the sect, he only had so much space in the small bag he had brought with him¡­


    Time passed by quickly and Qing Yi soon rolled her way back to Xuan Hao, as he watched with a wry smile as she unpacked all of her spoils and sorted them into various categories.


    From fire rted herbs she could use, to edible herbs, to seble herbs.


    "Let''s stay here for the night, it''s already gotten dark by now and we have still not crossed the Red Dust desert yet." Looking up at the sun disappearing in the horizon, Xuan Hao told Qing Yi as he waved his hand, causing a few nearby trees to breakdown and form into the shape of a small wooden house.


    "Okay¡­ Can I also make a house like that in the future?" Looking at the small wooden house that appeared in front of her all of a sudden, Qing Yi put down some of the herbs she was sorting into Xuan Hao''s bag, as she asked with an excited look stered on her face.


    "Sure, when you be strong enough, even reshaping an entire mountain into a pce will be child''s y." Smiling upon seeing her excited expression, Xuan Hao walked over and told her, causing Qing Yi to be even more excited.


    "For now go to bed or meditate, you need to have some rest, you can sort out the herbs you picked up tomorrow!" Putting on a slightly stern expression, Xuan Hao told her as he walked into the house and sat down in a meditative position to cultivate until the night passed.


    "Fine¡­" Carefully entering the small wooden house with her herbs, Qing Yi took out a small pillow she brought with her and sat on it as she began meditating just like her master.

 Chapter 61: Chu Yang

    <h4>Chapter 61: Chu Yang</h4>


    The night passed by peacefully and Qing Yi go up the moment the sun appeared and went outside the small wooden house to finish the sorting of herbs she had started yesterday.


    "Hm¡­ Seem some people areing this way¡­"ing out of the small wooden house, Xuan Hao looked across the river as he looked over at Qing Yi absorbed in sorting all the herbs she gathered.


    "Guess I will just go and take a look¡­ Qing Yi, I will go out and take a look at some people who just arrived, I will be back shortly!" Saying so, Xuan Hao unsheathed his sword and flew in the direction where the people wereing from.


    "¡­" Qing Yi only nodded slightly,pletely ignoring her master leaving. The herbs she had gathered were just too important¡­


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ Hah¡­ I-I think I finally managed to lose them!


    Somewhere not far away from the river where Xuan Hao and Qing Yi were currently located, a young man ran through the forest as he constantly kept looking over his shoulders. Making sure that nobody was following him.


    He had been running for thest two weeks and had finally managed to gain some distance between himself and his pursuers.


    "No matter what, I have to make it to the ravine! As long as I manage to get the spirit herb there, I should be able to breakthrough and recover!" Narrowing his eyes, the young man''s azure eyes suddenly swept over the bushes a few meters in front of him as he suddenly stopped and brought forward a spear strapped onto his back.


    The spear shone with a deadly light as the sun peeked through the leaves above, allowing the spear to look even more intimidating than it had before.


    Rustle~


    A rustling sound came from the bushes in front of the young man as several ck clothed individuals came out with their weapons already drawn.


    "Chu Yang, you can''t run anymore! Hand over the Devil-Immortal jade and we can make sure that you will die without any suffering!" A tall man with slightly darker clothes and a small red star on his shoulder came forward and told the young man known as Chu Yang.


    "Hmph, do you think I don''t know what that jade is for!? And do you honestly think I would just hand it over without a fight?" Not saying anymore, Chu Yang rushed at one of the ck clothed men that had moved in from his left and stabbed him through the chest. Killing him in an instant.


    "CHU YANG!"


    Swoosh!


    Not wanting to stay and listen to the ck clothed man''s tantrum, Chu Yang used the opening to hurriedly dart out of the encirclement that had been set out and dashed towards the ravine with the spirit herb.


    "Catch him!"


    Hearing the voice of the leader of the ck clothed men, Chu Yang jumped over a nearby river and darted towards the ravine with all the speed that he could possibly muster.


    Swish~


    Feeling an arrow encased in a thickyer of qi passing by close to his head, Chu Yang felt a slight shiver go down his spine as he barely managed to dodge to the side.


    Looks like the ck clothed men would not give him a chance to talk again and would just kill him on the spot¡­ Even if they were asked to bring him in alive, it looked like they didn''t care about that anymore¡­


    Well¡­ Rather bring back his dead body than letting him get away.


    "Almost there!"


    Rushing through the forest, Chu Yang felt inwardly happy that the ravine with the spirit herb in it was located in a spirit valley. The denser than usual qi between heaven and earth, made it harder for his pursuer to lock onto his position. Truly a blessing in disguise!


    "There it is! The ravine with the spirit herb, just like I remembered!" Chu Yang finally came to a stop in front of a ravine deep inside the spirit valley.


    Normally, a ce that deep inside of a spirit valley would be filled with all kinds of herbs, but strangely enough, there was not a single herb in sight. Not even a single Mortal Grade Herb could be seen in the area surrounding the ravine¡­


    Chu Yang did not notice this abnormality and instead just excitedly jumped into the ravine as he rushed towards a deeper part of it.


    Not even 10 seconds after Chu Yang jumped into the ravine, several ck clothed men appeared where he was standing before entering the ravine.


    "Hm¡­ Why did he enter the ravine? Is he trying to corner himself or did he just make a mistake?" The ck clothed man with a red star on his shoulder asked curiously as he nced at his subordinates curiously.


    "My lord, he might know about a ce to hide inside the ravine or some secret pathway!" One of the ck clothed men replied to the leaders curious question.


    "I see¡­ That Chu Yang is indeed quite slippery, so he would most likely have something nned! Be careful when you enter and look out for any sneak attacks or traps that he might have set up!" Nodding at what his subordinate said, the leader cautiously moved into the ravine together with the other ck clothed men.


    ¡­


    In the sky above, Xuan Hao curiously observed the entire chase scene as he wondered what to do and how to best impress the young man called Chu Yang.


    The reason for this was simple.


    "Talent of 57¡­"


    Other than that, Xuan Hao also thought about the trouble that his "new disciple" carried with him.


    But it was not really a problem and even if there was a bit of trouble, there was no way it could be any more than what Qing Yi had already brought¡­


    From what he had heard from the people chasing, Chu Yang had stolen something from them that would apparently help summon a great demon or something¡­ Chu Yang could be considered a good person by taking the demon summoning thing from the demon worshippers in ck clothes and all¡­


    "Ah, looks like the ck robbed men cornered the little guy" Looking down and seeing the ck robbed men surrounding Chu Yang, Xuan Hao smiled cheekily as he decided to take action and safe his future disciple.

 Chapter 62: Catching a New Disciple in The Wild

    <h4>Chapter 62: Catching a New Disciple in The Wild</h4>


    "The spirit herb should be just around here!" Excitedly entering a deeper region of the ravine, Chu Yang looked around trying to spot what he was searching for.


    A few seconds passed by and his formerly excited look turned into one filled with despair.


    "Why! Why is it not here!?" Looking at the spot where the spirt herb was supposed to be, all he saw was a small hole in the ground. Clear proof that someone had been here earlier to dig up the spirit herb.


    "Who? Who was it that took my spirit herb!?" Feeling the aura of his pursuers slowly closing in on him, Chu Yang desperately looked around and found out that he was stuck. The only way out was through the ck clothed people chasing after him and the chances of them giving him another chance to run away again was close to nothing.


    Swish~


    The ck clothed men appeared instantly and surrounded Chu Yang, this time, all of them had their weapons drawn as their cautiously monitored Chu Yang''s each and every move.


    "well, well, well¡­ Look what we got here. Are you perhaps stuck?" The leader of the ck clothed men smiled when he saw the despairing and hopeless look on Chu Yang''s face, it looked like he did not have any secret escape route or trap!


    Maybe he just mistakenly entered the ravine due to the stress of being chased for such a long time?


    Thinking this, the leader let out a breath of relief, at least he would not have to spend any longer chasing Chu Yang!


    "Get him!" Saying this, the leader along with the ck clothed men surrounding Chu Yang jumped into action as all of them attacked him at once.


    "!"


    Chu Yang barely managed to react as he quickly blocked the first few attacks from the ck clothed with his spear before being knocked unconscious by the leader.


    "¡­"


    Meanwhile, Xuan Hao was floating only a few meters above the fight happening below as he looked for a way to make an epic entrance and awe his to be disciple.


    As he did not sense any intent to kill, he had decided to wait and see how his future disciple would fare under pressure.


    Sadly, from the looks of it, the ck clothed men had decided to knock the little guy out as the leader quickly flung the now unconscious Chu Yang over his shoulders and began walking out of the ravine with a smug smile on his lips.


    "Haha, that was easier than expected! We didn''t even have to kill the little guy! Looks like he was really exhausted from all that running earlier, hehe~" Smiling triumphantly, the leader and his men started talking among each other. Not seeing the slowly darkening face of Xuan Hao floating on top his sword just a few meters above them.


    "Ahem..." Coughing into his hand to get the ck clothed men''s attention, Xuan Hao looked down and saw that he had beenpletely ignored as the bunch was happily talking about the rewards they would get when they brought Chu Yang back with them.


    "¡­"


    Watching as they were about to leave the ravine, Xuan Hao did not try to gain their attention by coughing again as a small rock floated over besides him.


    Swoosh!


    Throwing the rock with all his might at one of the nearby ck clothed men, the rock passed right through his head, killing him instantly.


    "Hey old Hu, what are you going to buy with your share of spirit stones? Going to visit the sect''s tavern for some fun, hehe. Last time you went there you were thrown out for harassing the inner elder''s daughter. Think they will let you in now that you got some spirit stones?" Not knowing that his friend had just died, one of the ck clothed men jokingly told the now dead old Hu as he nudged his shoulder.


    Thump!


    "O-old Hu¡­?" Seeing the body of his friend suddenly fall to the ground with a small hole going through his head, the ck clothed man shakingly called out to his now dead friend.


    "Everyone! We havepany!" The leader turned around the moment he heard the body hit the ground as all of them drew their weapons and cautiously inspected their surroundings.


    "Come out and face us coward! Hiding will not help you when we find you!" The leader put down Chu Yang''s unconscious body as he called out bravely.


    "Ahem!" Coughing even louder than before, Xuan Hao stared annoyedly down at the ck clothed men as they finally looked up at him with shocked and horrified expressions stered on their faces, at least Xuan Hao liked to believe that, sadly all of the ck clothed men were masked.


    "W-who are you!?" Realizing that the opponent was quietly floating above them as he satzily on his sword, clearly annoyed, the leader knew that the opponent was not someone that they could deal with.


    Swish~


    Floating down, Xuan Haonded in front of the group as the sword he formerly sat on flew into a sheath strapped on his side the moment his feet touched the ground.


    "¡­"


    The group of ck clothed men were sweating to the extreme as they all felt a chill go down their spine. The silence was killing them, as they tightly gripped their weapons, obediently waiting for Xuan Hao to talk.


    Raising an eyebrow at how obedient the formerly aggressive and bloodthirsty ck clothed men became, Xuan Hao thought about what to do with them.


    Kill them or let them go?


    Killing them would mean no trouble and he could easily make sure nobody even knew that they had died here.


    On the other hand, keeping them alive would bring trouble, as whatever power behind them clearly wanted the Devil-Immortal whatever jade that his future disciple had taken from them and would send others to get it. Most likely someone stronger than the Foundation Establishment cultivators in front of him.


    The only positive in leaving them alive would be that his future disciple could extract his revenge on them in the future when he grew strong enough¡­


    Swoosh!


    Before the ck clothed men could even react, Xuan Hao''s sword intent spread out with him as the centre, instantly killing all the ck clothed men, while leaving Chu Yangpletely unharmed.


    "Leaving them alive and let my future disciple take revenge? How long would that take and how much trouble would they be able to bring before that¡­?" Having thought it over, Xuan Hao shook his head slightly.


    Leaving them alive would bring way too much future trouble, it could notpare to whatever benefit his future disciple Chu Yang would get from dealing with them himself¡­


    Other than that, Xuan Hao had barely managed to sense that the leader of the ck robed men had used amunication device before his death. Most likely trying to contact the people behind him.


    Leaving the spirit valley as fast as possible was a top priority!


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao smiled to himself as he picked up Chu Yang and flew back towards the river where Qing Yi was sorting her spoils of war.

 Chapter 63: Return to the Flying Sword Sect

    <h4>Chapter 63: Return to the Flying Sword Sect</h4>


    "Master, who is that? Perhaps the person you sensed earlier?" Qing Yi curiously looked up from the herbs she was sorting, as she looked at the unconscious Chu Yang that Xuan Hao had brought back with him.


    "Yeah, found himying around like this so I brought him back¡­ He seems to be quite talented, so I thought about bringing him back with us to the sect, as it seems like he was injured somehow." Nodding his head, Xuan Hao told Qing Yi about his ns to bring a random person found in the forest back with them.


    "I''m already done sorting the herbs I found earlier, are we going back now?" Throwing thest few herbs into the pillowcase that she had emptied for more space to carry herbs; Qing Yi tilted her head slightly as she asked.


    "Yeah¡­ We should get back as fast as possible, don''t want to end up stuck in the Red Dust desert at night. Apparently, it gets quite cold, especially towards the centre of the desert, in the past a few Foundation Establishment cultivators apparently died because of the cold there¡­" Nodding his head, Xuan Hao answered as he waved his hand and erased the small wooden house along with anything else that might giveaway the fact that somebody had stayed besides the river.


    Whoosh~


    "Do we really have to take him with us¡­?" The moment they got into the air; Qing Yi''s voice could be heard.


    "¡­"


    Xuan Hao did not know what to say. The sword was not that big and even having two people at once was way over the limit of what could fit on his small sword.


    Now, with the addition of Chu Yang, the space became quite cramped. Even if Xuan Hao carried him over the shoulder.


    "Ah, I got it!" Suddenly having an idea, Xuan Hao quickly put it into action as he moved Chu Yang from his shoulder and attached him to the tip of the sword. Making sure that he would not fall with his qi and sword intent.


    "I-is this really okay master?" Looking at Chu Yang dangling in the air from the tip of the sword, Qing Yi smiled awkwardly as she asked Xuan Hao.


    "Sure~ He is unconscious anyway." Not seeing anything wrong with hanging Chu Yang from the tip of his sword while flying several hundred meters above the ground, Xuan Hao assured Qing Yi that it was fine, as she could only ept what Xuan Hao told her.


    I''m sorry about this¡­ At least you are not awake¡­


    Thinking this, Qing Yi shook her head as she looked apologetically at Chu Yang''s body dangling splendidly in the air. Looking like he was about to fall off at any moment.


    At the way back. Not long after Xuan Hao, Qing Yi and Chu Yang passed through an area, a new legend about a certain man flying through the air with a sword in the back of his head would appear¡­


    But that was something Chu Yang would not learn about for a long time¡­


    ¡­


    The journey back to the Flying Sword Sect went without any distractions, as Chu Yang was unconscious the entire way and no random bandits showed up.


    Landing a few hundred meters away from where the Flying Sword Sect was located, both Qing Yi and Xuan Hao jumped off the sword as Xuan Hao picked up Chu Yang and carried him.


    "Wee back elder Xuan! Who is it you are carrying?" The moment both of them made their way to the entrance of the city in front of the Flying Sword Sect, an inner elder in charge of guarding the entrance came out and asked as he nced questioningly at the unconscious body Xuan Hao was carrying with him.


    "Ah, found this guy injured on my way back to the sect and found out he was quite talented, so I just decided to bring him back with me¡­"


    "¡­ Okay¡­"


    Sending a slightly weird look in his direction, the inner elder did not hold them up any longer as he quickly returned to his post.


    Who was he to question if a core elder brought a random person back with him?


    "Master is it really okay to bring this guy back with us¡­?" Qing Yi looked in the direction of the inner elder as she asked. The weird look that he had given her master when he said he had picked up an injured person he had never met before and brought him back¡­ Qing Yi felt like there was something wrong with it¡­


    "No need to worry¡­ The guy is probably just worried about the little guy being a spy or something along those lines." Not minding Qing Yi''s doubt, Xuan Hao smiled slightly as he answered and started walking towards the sect.


    "¡­" Qing Yi did not say anything in response and thought what her master had said sounded like a good reason, but deep down she still felt that there was something wrong with the situation.


    Maybe she had just thought too much about it, after all, how much trouble could a guy barely in the Foundation Establishment Realm bring to one of the top four sects of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom?


    "Ah, master! Wait up!" Seeing that Xuan Hao had already walked ahead, Qing Yi threw her thoughts to the back of her mind, as she ran over to catch up with Xuan Hao.


    ¡­


    Meanwhile, in the stables of the Flying Sword Sect, a certain shadow hawk had just started his retirement life.


    Screech! Sceeeeech~


    Come here humans! I need more meat!


    "Ah, Lord Shadow! I will be there shortly with the recently grilled spiritmb meat!" A disciple tending to the demon beasts came over and told the shadow hawk before quickly dashing towards the area for meat preparation.


    Screech!


    Hurry up human!


    Looking at the disappearing figure of the young disciple, the shadow hawk rolled around andid on its back as it waited for the disciple to return with its meat.


    Retirement was life, it couldze around all day just like it saw the other old demon beast do. Finally, he could enjoy the good life! Nothing would ever get him to move as much as a single wing ever again!

 Chapter 64: Plotting the Downfall of the Beast Tamers

    <h4>Chapter 64: Plotting the Downfall of the Beast Tamers</h4>


    Returning to the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao did not immediately go visit the Sect Master to talk about how the "Beast Tamers" were wasting their spirit stones. Instead, he returned to his pavilion on top of his mountain peak together with Qing Yi.


    "Master, what do we do with this guy? Should I call someone from the medical department toe over?" As they entered the pavilion, Qing Yi asked as she looked at the still unconscious Chu Yang that her master had thrown at a nearby couch.


    "No need, he should be able to wake up soon. For now, I will have to go talk to the Sect Master about something serious. Please do take care of him until I return, I will be back shortly. Say hey to Zhi Ruo for me!" With that, Xuan Hao left before Qing Yi even managed to say anything as she could only stare in the direction her master had disappeared in.


    What am I supposed to tell this guy when he wakes up? That master "kidnapped" him when he was unconscious?


    Thinking about this, Qing Yi looked back down at Chu Yang as she shook her head and left the small room that she was currently in and went to find Zhi Ruo. Maybe she would know what to do when the person that her master had "kidnapped" woke up¡­


    "Ah!" On her way to meet Zhi Ruo, Qing Yi remembered the herbs that she had carried back with her to the sect and quickly went and got them from the small room.


    Zhi Ruo would definitely be able to use some of them in their food, it wouldn''t hurt to give her a few of the Mortal Grade herbs and better food would always be great!


    ¡­


    As Xuan Hao made his way down his mountain peak, he wondered how he should deal with the shadow hawk that had thrown them off its back on the way to the Bright Sun City.


    Should he grill it over an open fire or get the sects kitchen staff to prepare it for him so he could share it with the rest of the sect disciples and elders~?


    "Hehe¡­" An evilughter could be heard from Xuan Hao, scaring some of the nearby disciples along the to the sect master''s pavilion, as he nned the downfall of the "Beast Tamers" of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Like this, Xuan Hao soon stood in front of the entrance to the Sect Master''s pavilion.


    "Come in, elder Xuan¡­" A young man in his mid-twenties walked out from the pavilion and invited Xuan Hao inside.


    This was the current number one genius of the Flying Sword Sects younger generation, Ling Song!


    Looking at his cultivation, Xuan Hao discovered that he had already reached the peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm and could even be said to already have half a step into the Core Formation Realm, only needing a slight push to breakthrough.


    Reaching this cultivation realm when he was only in his mid-twenties was indeed impressive and he would most likely reach the Nascent Soul Realm in the future if nothing happened to him and be a pir of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Xuan Hao had not really interacted with this disciple, but from what he could tell, he was a decent guy.


    The only thing that puzzled Xuan Hao was the fact that Ling Song''s talent was only 15. Given his current aplishments, he should most definitely have a higher talent than 15, but no matter how hard Xuan Hao looked, the number stayed the same.


    Indeed, it looked like even without talent, you could still breakthrough your own limit and aplish something above what was normally possible for you.


    Looks like he had to not just evaluate the talent of his disciples in the future, but also focus on their willpower and other things that could help them progress on the road of cultivation¡­ Well¡­ Given that the system would stop making him take in disciples with higher and higher talent¡­


    What woulde after a talent of 50? A 100? Could he even find someone like that in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom?


    "Hah¡­" Letting out a sigh as he thought about his future situation, Xuan Hao turned to Ling Song and motioned for him to lead the way.


    Ling Song did not say anything and quietly led Xuan Hao into the pavilion.


    The pavilion of the Sect Master was way bigger than the one that Xuan Hao had, and it was decorated with all kinds of random things that the Sect Master had found over the years. From a golden buddha statue that he had found in an ancient ruin, to a small toy doll he had gotten from a normal mortal child in the past.


    The Sect Master did not really care much about the treasures or things he got from his many travels around the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and would mostly just hang it or disy it somewhere in the pavilion before forgetting about it a few minutester.


    Xuan Hao still remembered the first time he visited the Sect Master''s pavilion, back then he had thought he walked into a museum of some sort with all the extraordinary objects that were disyed everywhere.


    Back then, he had also visited a rather infamous room in the pavilion.


    The room was filled with all the things that was not disyed from the Sect Master''s travels and anything from a strong Spirit Artifact to a random glove could be found there.


    Xuan Hao had even heard a few rumours about the Sect Master allowing people to go in and try their luck at picking something from the storage room.


    Some found strong artifacts, while others walked away with a burnt-out candle.


    In the end, Xuan Hao heard that the disciples had started some kind tournament to choose a winner and allow them to enter the gambl- treasure room of the Sect Master and try their luck.


    "Come in." Arriving in front of a room at the centre of the pavilion, Xuan Hao was drawn out from his thoughts as he looked at the door where the voice came from.


    Ling Song stepped back a bit as the door opened and Xuan Hao entered, he would discuss how best to deal with the "Beast Tamers" and make sure the shadow hawk paid for what it did!


    A small smile appeared on his lips as he thought about the shadow hawk, just you wait! I will make sure you taste well~!

 Chapter 65: Redistributing the Resources of the Beast Tamers

    <h4>Chapter 65: Redistributing the Resources of the Beast Tamers</h4>


    Time passed by quickly and soon an hour had passed since Xuan Hao had entered the Sect Master''s room to discuss how to deal with the Beast Tamers of the sect.


    Coming out of the room, Xuan Hao had a smile on his lips as he quickly made his way out of the pavilion towards the stables where the Beast Tamers of the sect stayed.


    Ling Song, who had quietly and obediently waited outside the door, could not even react, before Xuan Hao had disappeared down the mountain peak.


    All he could see was a shadow suddenly darting past him before the door to his master''s room was closed again, followed by him being sent back to his training.


    Why did I even need to wait out here for an hour in the first ce?


    Thinking this, Ling Song sighed to himself as he went back to the training he had done before Xuan Hao arrived.


    ¡­


    Xuan Hao had managed to reach an agreement with the Sect Master Feng Chen after only a bit of discussion, as Feng Chen himself could easily see how many spirit stones and other resources the Beast Tamers wasted every single day.


    After that, both of them discussed how to deal with them and came up with a rather simple solution to the problem.


    The solution that both of them came up with was to slowly scale down the amount of resources sent to the Beast Tamers and see how they handled it at first.


    For now, Xuan Hao was in charge of giving out a few orders to the ones in charge of the stables for the demon beasts and help them cope with the changes toe.


    Hopefully, this would help the Beast Tamers in the long run and would allow them to stop treating the demon beasts like their master or something and give away all the sects resources.


    When Xuan Hao talked to Feng Chen about the Beast Tamers, he had also heard about how they treated what they called the "retired" demon beasts.


    Xuan Hao felt it was quiteughable as most demon beasts would not grow weaker with age, but instead grew stronger the older they got, there were even some demon beasts that required to be thousands of years old before they could breakthrough in their cultivation.


    This was honestly the first time he heard about someone treating demon beasts like the elderly poption of the mortal world¡­


    And for them to not only treat the demon beasts well, but also feed the sects precious resources from herbs to spirit stones to the so-called "retired" demon beasts that justzed around all day¡­


    "Elder Xuan? Why are you here again, didn''t you send Lord Shadow back already? Maybe you want to thank him for his service?" The short elder that had guided him to find a flying demon beast earlier came out and asked with a questioning look on his face the moment Xuan Hao reached the front door of the stables.


    "¡­"


    Hearing what the short elder said, Xuan Hao was a little speechless as he shook his head.


    So, when the shadow chicken came back on its own, its because I send it back¡­?


    It looked like the Beast Tamers really needed someone to guide them or all the Flying Sword Sects treasures would be consumed by their "masters" in the future!


    "No, I havee to pass down a new reform by the Sect Master in regard to the resources used by the Beast Tamers and their demon beasts!" Saying this, Xuan Hao turned and inspected the short elder''s expression. Hoping that he would at least have an idea what this would mean.


    "Ah, did he finally approve of sending those extra monthly spirit stones that we requested 2 months ago? Fantastic!"


    "¡­"


    Looking at enthusiastic and eager look on the short elder''s face, Xuan Hao sighed to himself as he really had no clue how to talk to this short elder in charge of the Flying Sword Sects stables.


    Maybe they should get someone new to take charge?


    "Here, this is the reform by the Sect Master, just read it." Not wanting for the short elder to get any more excited, Xuan Hao took out a small scroll and handed it over to the short elder.


    "HOW CAN THIS BE!" Reading the reform, the short elder''s expression slowly turned from one filled with joy, intoplete agony as he screamed out in disbelief.


    Xuan Hao honestly thought that he had given the short elder the wrong scroll and instead of the Sect Master''s new reform for the Beast Tamers, it was a scroll describing how the short elder''s entire family had somehow died in a terrible way¡­


    "Ahm, I will proceed inside to take back some of the resources immediately." Saying this, Xuan Hao walked past the spirit less short elder and entered the stables.


    The worst thing in Xuan Hao''s opinion, was that the resources being cut, was not for the Beast Tamers, instead it was the resources dedicated into the "older" demon beast''s retirement n.


    It had to be known that over 70% of the Beast Tamers resources went towards the retirement n and now the new reform had decided to cut off those resourcespletely. Lowering the amount of resources sent to the Beast Tamers by 70% in an instant.


    The resources would then be going to the disciples and elders to help improve their cultivation instead¡­


    Honestly, Xuan Hao found it quite funny that the Flying Sword Sect had wasted so many resources on demon beasts over the year, yet there was not even a single demon beast at the Nascent Soul Realm to this date¡­


    Entering the Beast Tamers Treasury, Xuan Hao was surprised by the sheer number of herbs and spirit stones present.


    Notzing around, Xuan Hao immediately got the Beast Tamers to start transporting them to other areas of the sect.


    "Ah, send those herbs to the Medical Hall and send those to the Alchemy Hall!" Giving out a few orders to the reluctant Beast Tamers, Xuan Hao watched as the huge storage filled with all kinds of worldly treasures slowly grew empty as they were transported to other ces in the sect where they would be more useful.


    Seeing that it would be fine to leave it as is, Xuan Hao excited the treasury under the piercing gazes of the Beast Tamers and made his way towards the centre of the stables where the older and stronger demon beasts resided.


    He had a certain oversized chicken to fry!

 Chapter 66: Death of the Shadow Hawk~

    <h4>Chapter 66: Death of the Shadow Hawk~</h4>


    Screech!


    Come here humans! Why are you taking so long to bring me my food?


    Rolling around, the shadow hawk raised itself up from itszy position as it looked around after the human who had gone out to get its food and still hadn''t returned yet.


    Screech?


    What? Where have all the humans gone?


    Looking all over the ce, the shadow hawk realized that not a single human could be seen anymore as the other demon beasts also roared and looked around confused at the weird phenomenon.


    Where had all the humans gone? Were they not supposed to serve them?


    Feeling something was wrong, the shadow hawk along with the other demon beasts suddenly heard a sounding from the door leading into the centre of the stables.


    No matter what came out from that door, the shadow hawk felt that it would not be anything good¡­


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ Why is this door so extravagant¡­?" Looking up at the door leading into the centre part of the stables, Xuan Hao sighed to himself as he looked at all the precious metals that were wasted to decorate the giant door.


    Thest time he was here, he had not really thought much about it, but now he finally saw how truly wasteful the Beast Tamers had been.


    Soul Grade Metals¡­ Wasted as decoration for a door¡­


    "Hah¡­" Sighing to himself once more, Xuan Hao no longer thought about it as he pushed the giant door open.


    Screech!


    Roar!


    All kinds of bestial roars could be heard the moment Xuan Hao opened the door.


    Looking around, Xuan Hao saw several demon beastsying down on the ground roaring among themselves as they could hardly move their fat bodies.


    Xuan Hao even managed to spot a demon beast trying to fly up into a tree, but it was too fat and directly fell down to the ground only after having flown a few meters into the air and started screeching for help as it rolled around in pain.


    "¡­"


    Why are these demon beasts so pathetic¡­?


    Xuan Hao had no clue how to describe them as they looked more likezy and overfed house pets that could barely move aroundpared to ferocious demon beasts.


    Last time he was here, Xuan Hao did not notice how truly degraded and weak the Flying Sword Sects demon beasts were, it was only now, without humans to help them, that he saw how utterly useless the demon beasts of the Flying Sword Sect had be.


    What would happen if another sect came and saw the demon beasts of the Flying Sword Sect¡­? How embarrassing¡­


    Roar~


    A fat tiger like demon beasts that was close to the entrance door had spotted Xuan Hao and quickly roared at him, it was like a starving person finally finding something to hold onto, as the fat tiger demon beast happily rolled over to Xuan Hao and roared a bit more at him to get going and find some food for him.


    Roar¡­?


    Seeing that the human had still not moved, the fat tiger demon beast lifted its head confusedly and looked up at Xuan Hao, only to be met by an ice-cold look filled with killing intent.


    R-roar¡­


    Letting out a weak roar, the fat tiger still did not understand its situation as it felt a chill go down its spine.


    "Looks like we will also have some tiger demon meat tonight¡­!"


    ROAR!


    Roll~ roll~ roll~


    Hearing what the human said, the tiger demon beast let out a panicked roar as it tried to roll away.


    The human that hade was nothing short of a demon in the eyes of the fat tiger demon beast! This was the first time it had ever heard about a human wanting to eat it, where had the humans that used to feed and pamper it gone?


    Maybe the cold faced human had done something to them and that was why the humans had disappeared!?


    This thought urred in the fat tiger demon beasts mind, as well as the surrounding demon beasts, who had by now turned their attention towards the tiger demon beast and the human.


    Screech!


    Howe that human is here!?


    In the back of the other demon beasts, a certain shadow hawk had seen Xuan Hao the moment he entered through the door and started panicking.


    From what it knew, the human was apparently important in the Flying Sword Sect and the reason for the human servants disappearing most likely had something to do with him as well!


    But, in the past when it threw off a few people, they would nevere back for it and look for trouble, they would normally just leave it alone.


    Why had this humane back to look for trouble?!


    What the shadow hawk did not know, was that the people it had thrown off before had not been able to fly like Xuan Hao and were mostly disciples at the Foundation Establishment Realm. The Flying Sword Sect had mostly recorded things like that down to the disciples perishing at whatever location they were going to¡­


    Sadly, for the shadow hawk, Xuan Hao was not a weak disciple and survived after being thrown off by the shadow hawk.


    "There you are¡­" Seeing the shadow hawk trying to hide behind the other demon beasts, Xuan Hao let out a soft smile as he walked through the crowd of scared demon beasts and arrived in front of the shadow hawk.


    Sc-screech¡­


    Letting out a weak screech, the shadow hawk brandished its ws weakly in front of itself and tried to threaten Xuan Hao.


    Swoosh~


    Xuan Hao did not wait and unsheathed his sword and stabbed the shadow hawk through the head, killing it instantly.


    ROAR!


    SCREECH!


    ROOOOAR!


    The surrounding demon beasts let out sounds of horror as they looked at the now dead shadow hawk and Xuan Hao, while trembling and letting out screams filled with despair as they saw themselves undergo the same fate as the shadow hawk.


    "¡­"


    Xuan Hao ignored the demon beasts and grabbed hold of the shadow hawk and started dragging it towards the door leading out of the centre area of the stables.


    Demon beast were especially nutritious and could help improve the strength of people who ate them, Xuan Hao nned to share the shadow hawk meat with the rest of the sect''s disciples and help them improve.


    Swoosh~


    Roa-


    Before the fat tiger demon beast could react, it too, fell dead on the ground.


    "Hm¡­ A single shadow hawk would definitely not be enough to feed all the disciples, but this fat tiger demon beast should be more than enough to make up for it!" Smiling to himself, Xuan Hao grabbed hold of the tiger demon beast and dragged its body out of the stables together with the shadow hawk.


    Leaving behind a group of mentally scared demon beasts, as they fearfully looked at Xuan Hao''s disappearing figure.

 Chapter 67: Chu Yang Wakes Up

    <h4>Chapter 67: Chu Yang Wakes Up</h4>


    Walking out of the stables with the two demon beasts, Xuan Hao awkwardly smiled as he saw the vengeful and distraught expressions on the Beast Tamers faces as he walked by them.


    "L-Lord Shadow!"


    "His Majesty, Big Tiger!"


    Honestly, Xuan Hao wondered whether the Beast Tamers were even needed in the first ce.


    But then again, without them, the Flying Sword Sect would not have any demon beast to help with transportation of either disciples or resources¡­


    ¡­


    Walking through the sect, Xuan Hao was looked at quite weirdly as he dragged the two demon beasts over towards the dining hall of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Though most of them looked more scared than anything, after all, the two demon beasts looked quite ferocious even when dead.


    "Elder Xuan, what have youe here for¡­?" A young servant said as he came out of the dining hall with a nervous look on his face. From time to time, he would nce at the two enormous demon beasts behind Xuan Hao with a scared look on his face.


    "Ah, I came to get the help of your dining hall, to prepare these two demon beasts. They are quite fresh and should still be quite good for cooking. Hopefully, some of their essences are still left and that could bring a few benefits to the one eating them, but these two are only at the Core Formation Realm, so it would mostly be useful for the disciples at the Foundation Establishment and Qi Condensation Realm." Saying this, Xuan Hao did not wait for the young servant to answer as he walked directly past him and entered the dining hall to talk with the elder in charge about it.


    "Ah, elder Xuan! Wait up!" realizing that Xuan Hao had already entered the dining hall, the young servant boy sent onest fearful look towards the two giant demon beastsying on the ground before running after Xuan Hao.


    The other servants, who were currently preparing food ingredients, washing dishes and other things, turned to look towards Xuan Hao as he entered the dining hall.


    Xuan Hao stood out quite a lotpared to the servants working in the kitchen and drew a lot of attention as most stopped doing their tasks and just stared at him questioningly.


    Xuan Hao did not really mind and chose to ignore it, as he soon made it to a small side room to the kitchen part of the dining hall.


    This was where the elder in charge of the dining hall would stay and supervise the servants and make sure nothing happened, while also keeping an eye on the disciples who entered the dining hall at the same time.


    "Hello Elder." Entering the room without knocking, Xuan Hao shocked the old man in charge of the dining hall as the old man almost jumped up from his meditative position due to suddenly being interrupted.


    "Elder X-Xuan?! What are you doing here?" Standing up right away, the elder asked with a surprised look on his face as he tried to think of any reason as to why a core elder woulde find him at the dining hall.


    "I have some demon beasts outside that I would like the dining hall to prepare for me, I think it would be great if you could use them in today''s dinner!" Smiling at the surprised look of the elder, Xuan Hao exined his reason for showing up.


    "Demon beast meat for dinner!? You mean you want to feed all the disciples demon beast meat¡­? Little Cheng, how big are the demon beasts outside?" Doubting what he heard, the elder turned and looked at the young servant boy, who had just managed to reach the small room.


    "T-the demon beasts outside are at least a few meters in lengths¡­ I-I don''t know, I didn''t manage to get a good enough look at them¡­" The young servant boy called little Cheng was the same person that had met Xuan Hao when he arrived at the dining hall earlier.


    "Hm¡­ Guess I will go and take a look myself, but if they are big enough, I will make sure to incorporate them in today''s dinner!" Saying that, the elder made his way out to inspect the demon beasts, dragging little Cheng along with him.


    "Guess I will just show myself out¡­" Looking at the elder and little Cheng''s disappearing figures, Xuan Hao decided to just let them deal with the preparation of the demon beasts. After all, there was more than enough meat on the tiger demon beast alone¡­


    With that, Xuan Hao made his way out of the dining hall and walked back towards his mountain peak.


    "I wonder if that Chu Yang has woken up yet¡­"


    ¡­


    "You! You were the one who stole my spirit herb!?"


    "Stole?! I just picked it up, it''s not your spirit herb just because you say it is!"


    Hm? What is this?


    Walking into the pavilion, Xuan Hao saw both Chu Yang and Qing Yi standing in front of each other with weapons drawn. Looking like they were about to attack one another at any moment.


    A little farther away, Zhi Ruo just silently observed them both with an annoyed look on her face.


    "What''s happening?" Asking the question that hade to mind from the moment that he saw his disciple and future disciple confronting one another, Xuan Hao made his presence known as both Qing Yi and Chu Yang turned around to face him.


    "Who are you!"


    "Master! You must help me deal with this brute! He wants to steal the spirit herb I collected!"


    Chu Yang had a cautious look on his face as he inspected Xuan Hao, while Qing Yi looked ecstatic as she quickly made her way over to Xuan Hao as she exined what had happened.


    "What do you mean your herb?! I found it first and just let it grow until it reached maturity! But you took it away!" Ignoring Xuan Hao, Chu Yang turned to Qing Yi as he started arguing with her again.


    "Found it first, let it reach maturity? Pah! Who would believe that?" Not losing in the slightest, Qing Yi turned around and faced Chu Yang with a disdainful smile on her lips.


    "¡­" Looking at the two arguing, Xuan Hao had no idea what to do.


    Just what happened?

 Chapter 68: Why did Chu Yang suddenly turn into a Bootlicker?

    <h4>Chapter 68: Why did Chu Yang suddenly turn into a Bootlicker?</h4>


    Looking over at Zhi Ruo, Xuan Hao ignored the arguing Qing Yi and Chu Yang as he made his way over to her.


    "Do you have any idea what happened?"


    "Ah, from what I know, the young man woke up and saw Qing Yi sorting the herbs she brought back. After that, he started saying that one of the herbs was his and that she had stolen it or something¡­ I don''t really know, as they have been like this for thest half hour with nothing happening¡­" Seeing Xuan Hao appear besides her and ask her about the current situation, Zhi Ruo straightened up and tried her best to answer.


    So, Chu Yang and Qing Yi was arguing because Qing Yi had a herb that Chu Yang imed was his?


    "Hah¡­" Letting a quiet sigh escape his lips, Xuan Hao turned and looked at Chu Yang and Qing Yi who was still arguing over the spirit herb.


    It was obvious that the spirit herb was Qing Yi''s as nobody would believe what Chu Yang had said about him "letting the spirit herb grow until it reaches maturity" and then harvesting it, especially when the spirit herb was located out in a spirit valley that had most likely not been explored yet.


    "Qing Yi, go back to your room, I will take care of this guy." Deciding to not let them continue arguing anymore, Xuan Hao interrupted the two as he told Qing Yi to head back to her room.


    "Yes, master!" Smiling slightly, Qing Yi quickly grabbed the herbs she had lying in the room along with the spirit herb as she quickly made her way out of the room with a triumphant look on her face. Not forgetting to smile cheekily in the direction of Chu Yang, as she disappeared.


    "You!" Not even getting a chance to argue with that fact that Qing Yi had taken the spirit herb and run away, Chu Yang had no clue what to do, as he could only watch his chances of a breakthrough to the next realm slip away.


    Chu Yang had no idea what to do at the moment, just recently, he had woken up in a strange ce that he did not know about and hisst memory was him being knocked out cold by the people in ck clothes chasing after him.


    But his condition did not seem to fit the scenario of being captured by the ck clothed men, after all, heid on a couch without being restrained.


    That was when he saw it, the spirit herb that should have helped him breakthrough to the next realm and help survive the ck clothed men''s attack!


    Mustering all his strength, Chu Yang had tried to grab the herb and eat it but was rudely awakened by a rude girl pushing him back and asking him why he was trying to take her herbs.


    Chu Yang did not know why, but for that girl to suddenly tell him that the spirit herb that he had secretly cared for and grown for years in his grand escape n really angered him to no end¡­


    Even when Xuan Hao had entered, he did not notice him and had just continued arguing with the rude girl until she suddenly said something about her master and left before he could react in time.


    "Ahm¡­ Can we talk?" Hearing a sudden voiceing from behind him Chu Yang almost jumped out of his skin in surprise as he quickly turned around and inspected the person who was talking.


    "Who are you uncle?"


    "¡­"


    Chu Yang did not know why, but he suddenly felt a chill go down his spine as his face slowly turned pale, the auraing off Xuan Hao''s body at the moment was suffocating for him, as Chu Yang felt like he could barely breath.


    That uncle is definitely someone strong!


    Even before he escaped, Chu Yang had only felt such a strong aura from the leaders of the organisation! Worst of all, this random uncle''s aura seemed to be slightly stronger than some of them!


    In his mind, Chu Yang noted down that he should definitely not offend the scary uncle that had suddenly appeared!


    ¡­


    Uncle? Why did people start calling him that all of a sudden? He was only 21 years old¡­ Maybe he just looked older than he actually was¡­?


    Shaking his head slightly at the thought, Xuan Hao decided to just ignore it and instead focused back on Chu Yang who now had a somewhat lost look on his face as he nkly stared at him.


    "Are you okay?" Wondering whether something happened, Xuan Hao asked worriedly. Hopefully, nothing happened to his 50+ tale- future disciple¡­


    "I-I''m fine, w-what can I help you with, Sir¡­?" Showing a meek and submissive expression, Chu Yang turned from someone strong willed and sharp witted into a first-ss bootlicker¡­


    What the hell happened?!


    "What is your name?" showing a slightly awkward smile, Xuan Hao asked.


    "My name is Chu Yang, Sir! M-might I know why I''m here?" Still carrying a submissive expression, Chu Yang looked up at Xuan Hao as he patiently waited for him to answer.


    "Chu Yang¡­ I see. The reason why you are here is because I brought you here, I found you knocked out in a spirit valley on my way back to the Sect and decided and saw you were quite talented for your age, so I brought you along." Coming up with a good reason, Xuan Hao did not mention anything about him killing off the ck clothed men and just told Chu Yang that he had found him knocked out and brought him back to his Sect due to his talent.


    "Knocked out¡­ I see¡­" Returning back to his formerly sharp self, Chu Yang narrowed his eyes as he was deep in thought.


    "I honestly thought about taking you in as a disciple as well, seeing that you can be considered decent and as you may be able to tell, the pavilion is quite empty at the moment." Telling him outright about his intention to recruit him, Xuan Hao saw Chu Yang suddenly freeze up as he looked up at Xuan Hao.


    "Sir¡­ I¡­"


    "No need to worry, you are not a member of a Sect already, are you?"


    "N-no Sir¡­"


    "That is fine then! I will let you think about it for a few days, just ask Zhi Ruo here for help if you have any questions." With that short conversation, Xuan Hao left the small room.


    He had already stated his intention to recruit Chu Yang and the chances of him refusing was low, someone was hunting him down and what he needed right now more than anything, was a strong backing.


    And with Zhi Ruo there to exin about the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao was certain that he would ept!


    After all, who in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom did not know about the Flying Sword Sect?


    Other than the skirmishes with the Raging me Sect that hadsted for hundreds of years, the Flying Sword Sect did not really have any enemies and was considered a rtively neutral force in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Only having a single enemy inside the kingdom and no enemy outside.

 Chapter 69: Alchemy

    <h4>Chapter 69: Alchemy</h4>


    Having left Chu Yang behind to figure out his options and talk with Zhi Ruo if there was anything that he wondered about, Xuan Hao made his way over to Qing Yi''s room.


    After seeing the earlier argument, Xuan Hao had grown quite curious about what kind of spirit herb would allow Chu Yang to fight with Qing Yi for it, while he already knew it was a herb of the spirit grade, he had no clue what kind it was.


    Be it a high-grade or low-grade spirit herb, Xuan Hao had no clue at the moment.


    *knock knock*


    Walking up to Qing Yi''s room, Xuan Hao knocked gently on the door as he waited for a response.


    "Come in¡­"


    Hearing the affirmative, Xuan Hao opened the door and walked into Qing Yi''s room.


    The room had changed a lot from what most of the rooms for disciples in the pavilion looked like and different from the usual bed and only a bit of the basic furniture like a small desk and wardrobe, Qing Yi''s room was filled to the brim with all kinds of herbs.


    The herbs helped give the room the vibe of an alchemists living quarters more so than a disciple training in martial arts. The only thing missing at the moment was the cultivation pills.


    Alchemy was the practice of turning spiritual herbs or nts or even certain special objects into pills, potions, elixirs and many more mystical items that cultivators could consume for various effects such as increasing their cultivation, help increase the chances of a breakthrough, healing injuries and so on.


    An example would be a Foundation Establishment Pill, that is beneficial to cultivators of the ninth stage of Qi Condensation, and it helps them breakthrough to the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Usually more than one Foundation Establishment Pill would be required to breakthrough and can be considered a quite sought-aftermodity, but the Foundation Establishment Pill alsoes with several demerit.


    For example. The Foundational Pir created inside the dantian would usually be weaker and more fragilepared to someone breaking through to the Foundation Establishment Realm by themselves.


    This had resulted in most people only using the Foundation Establishment Pill as a form of support to breakthrough by only consuming a single one instead of using several to forcefully breakthrough to the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Even then, it was still an external form of support and had some demerits, this was also the reason why Xuan Hao had let Qing Yi breakthrough and reach the Foundation Establishment Realm by herself without any support from a Foundation Establishment Pill.


    That Bai Fei from the Bai family could be considered a brilliant example, as he had used a Foundation Establishment Pill to breakthrough, causing him to have a weaker foundation and strength than someone like Qing Yi, who had broken through to the Foundation Establishment Realm by herself!


    While this was demerit was indeed big, the Foundation Establishment Pill was still widely used, as it could speed of the cultivation of someone. Allowing one to reach a higher realm faster.


    Honestly, Xuan Hao felt such a thing was stupid. After all, if you had a weak foundation, it woulde back to haunt you in the future.


    This could also be one of the reasons why there were so many Core Formation cultivatorspared to Nascent Soul cultivators, as the Nascent Soul Realm was the first realm where your foundation would be tested and start to show its importance.


    "Master?" Qing Yi saw that her master was in a daze and asked him in a quiet voice. Not daring to be too loud, as she did not know if he had a sudden enlightenment or something.


    "Qing Yi¡­ Are you perhaps interested in alchemy?" Thinking about, Xuan Hao thought that with Qing Yi''s interest in herbs and nts, she would most likely make a good alchemist in the future.


    "Alchemy? I never really thought about it¡­ I don''t really know that much about alchemy as my famil- no, the entire Bright Sun City never had any alchemists before. All I know is that they are able to earn a lot of money and treasures from creating pills and potions¡­" Looking at Qing Yi as she talked, Xuan Hao saw her face slowly turn from a curious look into one filled with desire when she got to the part of the alchemist earning a lot from selling their pills and potions.


    It seemed like his disciple was indeed interested in alchemy¡­ Just not for the reason that he had thought she would.


    "Master, can you please exin what alchemy is¡­?" Looking up at him with upturned eyes and trying her best at making puppy eyes at him, Qing Yi asked in a low and cute voice.


    "Sure, I''m your teacher after all! Alchemy is the ancient practice of turning things such as spiritual herbs or nts or in some cases, even certain special objects into pills, potions, elix-"


    Ding~


    As Xuan Hao started lecturing Qing Yi about alchemy, a slight sound could be heard from Xuan Hao''s sea of consciousness as he immediately knew that it was from the system. Most likely rted to the fact that he was teaching Qing Yi about alchemy.


    Supressing the curiosity that appeared when he heard the systems sound, Xuan Hao decided to wait until he finished teaching Qing Yi and found a quiet ce before entering his sea of consciousness to see what happened.


    Like this, Xuan Hao spent the next hour in Qing Yi''s room. Exining some of the basics of how alchemy worked and also how much the different pills and potions made by alchemists were worth.


    Qing Yi was especially shocked when she found out that turning a spiritual herb or nt into a pill or potion would at least increase its worth by several fold.


    In some cases, the prices would increase more than a dozen times!


    This was truly an eyeopener for Qing Yi, as she felt her passion for alchemy grow the more she heard her master exin about it.

 Chapter 70: The Most Lucrative Proffesion on the Continent

    <h4>Chapter 70: The Most Lucrative Proffesion on the Continent</h4>


    Xuan Hao soon finished exining the basics of alchemy to Qing Yi, as she looked at him with shining eyes. Clearly wanting to know more about it.


    "If you want to know more, you could go and visit the alchemy hall of the sect. From what I know, there is a lot of information about it there and you should be able to learn a lot from the Alchemist staying there. The Flying Sword Sect have quite a few famous Alchemists." Hearing what he said, Qing Yi did not even bother waiting any longer as she quickly disappeared from her room. Most likely making her way over to the alchemy hall of the sect.


    "Hah¡­" Sighing a bit to himself upon seeing how enthusiastic Qing Yi was, Xuan Hao just shook his head and went back to his own room to check out what had happened with the system earlier when he taught Qing Yi the basics of alchemy.


    Entering his sea of consciousness, Xuan Hao stared directly at the new quest that appeared below his current side quest.


    [Side Quest: Disciple, Qing Yi, Bes a Journeyman Alchemist]


    [Reward: Artisan level Alchemist Knowledge and skill]


    The new side quest was rted to the fact that Qing Yi had be interested in alchemy and was about her bing a Journeyman Alchemist. The only problem was that Xuan Hao did not have much knowledge in regard to alchemy and if he were ranked ording to his skill level, he would only be considered an Apprentice Alchemist, below the level of a Journeyman Alchemist.


    The different level of an Alchemist was ranked in ordance with the level of pills or potions that they could make. For example, a Journeyman Alchemist could make pills useful for cultivators at the Foundation Establishment Realm, while an Apprentice Alchemist could make pills useful for cultivators at the Qi Condensation Realm.


    The different skill level of Alchemist was as follows, Apprentice Alchemist, Journeyman Alchemist, Expert Alchemist, Artisan Alchemist and Master Alchemist.


    From what Xuan Hao knew, Alchemist were quite sought after and there was only a single Artisan Alchemist in the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom, and he was part of the Imperial family, as for a Master Alchemist? The Great Sky Empire that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was under, was said to only have a handful of Alchemist at that level¡­ Anything above the Master Alchemist Realm was close to unheard of, as most Alchemists, even in big empires remained stuck at the Master Alchemist Realm.


    Thest person who broke through to the realm above Master Alchemist was said to have left the Ewaria Continent long ago, just like the Immortal Dreamer, he had not returned after leaving¡­


    "Well, no use thinking about it¡­" Shaking his head at the thought, Xuan Hao decided to help Qing Yi in her journey to learn alchemy. After all, if he could be a strong alchemist or have a strong alchemist as a disciple, he would not need to worry so much about trouble.


    In the entire Ewaria continent, it was widely known that alchemist was not to be messed with, as nobody knew how many friends, they had made pills or other kinds of potions for in the past.


    This was especially so for Alchemist at the Master Realm, as they could mostly ignore the empire they were under and do what they liked. A single word from a Master Alchemist could easily rally a few dozen Domain Lords to his side for help!


    Though the rallying power of Alchemist of the Master Realm was strong, it could still notpare to the most sought-after profession of healers. The Healer profession could be considered another path for alchemist as it dealt with healing injuries and making all sort of medical pills and potion, it was widely acknowledged that a healer needed the corresponding realm in alchemy to even be considered a healer in the first ce.


    Meaning a Master Healer was also a Master Alchemist!


    This had resulted in the Healer profession being among the rarest professions on the Ewaria Continent.


    The rallying power of a Master Healer did not only include the Domain Lord cultivators, but even those above the Domain Lord Realm, as nobody knew when they would get injured and required the help of a healer.


    That was truly a lucrative profession! Compared to healers, Alchemist were nothing more than paupers!


    "hm¡­" Thinking about this Xuan Hao suddenly remembered Qing Yi. Perhaps, Qing Yi would walk the path of a healer in the future? They were after all, way more profitablepared to only being an Alchemist¡­


    "If she really bes a healer in the future, that would be great¡­ I won''t have to worry about trouble with such a disciple!" Smiling at the thought of bing the teacher of a brilliant healer with Domain lords at her beg and call, Xuan Hao quietly started cultivating.


    ¡­


    "WHAT! Is what you said true?!" In arge hall of the Flying Sword Sect, the Vice Sect Master Zu Fei mmed a pitiful innocent table in front of her as a terrifying look had appeared on her face.


    *Crash


    The table copsed under the sudden attack of a Nascent Soul expert and the pitiful remainsid on the floor with a now broken tea set that had been on the table earlier.


    "Calm down Feifei, we can''t act recklessly in this case!" The Sect Master Feng Chen smiled awkwardly when he saw the now destroyed table and looked at the angry Zu Fei.


    "What do you mean can''t act reckless! Those bastards are clearly taking people from our territory, if not for Elder Xuan finding out about this when he went out with his disciple, how long would it take for us to realize a few cities disappearing at our bordering territory with the ck Rose Sect!?


    And from what Elder Xuan said, those bastards are clearly using some sort of demonic technique to absorb the life force and qi of others! How can I remain calm knowing something like that is happening!?" Angrily standing up, Zu Fei threw a fit as she destroyed what little furniture was left in therge hall.


    "Hah¡­ I will contact the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the other sects regarding this, demonic techniques such as the one described by Elder Xuan, are after all banned by the Great Sky Empire¡­ For them to use it so openly, I fear something dangerous is about to happen soon, so we have to act cautiously! Do you understand Feifei?" Putting on a strict face, Feng Chen scolded Zu Fei as the person in question pouted angrily before leaving the hall.


    "I hope I''m just worrying over nothing¡­" Muttering this to himself, Feng Chen stared at the empty hall before leaving as well.


    The meeting between the two of them was about Xuan Hao''s encounter with the people from the ck Rose Sect and their open use of clearly banned demonic techniques.


    "W-what is this!" A servant entered the empty hall a few hourster and felt tears well up in her eyes.


    The damage done by the angry Zu Fei would at least take a few days to clean up¡­

 Chapter 71: The Enthusiastic Senior Brother

    <h4>Chapter 71: The Enthusiastic Senior Brother</h4>


    After leaving the hall, Feng Chen returned back to his Mountain peak and entered his pavilion with a slightly anxious look on his face as he fiddled with amunication talisman wondering what to say when he contacted the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    To say it was a bad time for something like the ck Rose Sect turning to demonic techniques at the moment was an understatement.


    Feng Chen knew that the most likely oue was for the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to postpone the matter with the ck Rose Sect until the Azure Sky Kingdom was dealt with or had at least calmed down more than it was at the moment.


    Feng Chen also understood this, if the Heavenly Sky Kingdom turned their focus towards the now demonic ck Rose Sect, the Azure Sky Kingdom would most likely seize the opportunity to attack.


    The chances of the ck Rose Sect having hidden their true strength was also extremely likely, after all, it was widely known that demonic cultivators could improve way faster than normal cultivators by consuming others blood and qi.


    Demonic cultivators could also be said to have their own unique cultivation system, instead of the normal cultivation, demonic cultivators would start at the lesser demon realm that was equal to the Foundation Establishment Realm. After that would be the higher demon realm, beingparable to a Core Formation cultivator.


    At both the lesser and higher demon realm, a demonic cultivator would still look normal, and you could not really see a difference between them and other people who cultivated the normal way.


    The true difference between normal cultivators and demonic cultivators only showed up at the realm after the higher demon realm, also know as the first demonic transformation.


    At this realm, demonic cultivators would start transforming their body into that of a demon.


    The first transformation would give some traits like demonic ws, horns or tails, while the second transformation gave them demonic wings, allowing them to fly. The final transformation, also known as the third demonic transformation, would allow them to fully turn into a demon and have the strength of a Domain Lord!


    Shaking slightly at the thought of a demonic cultivator having reached the third transformation, Feng Chen could not help but smile wryly to himself, if the ck Rose Sect truly had someone at the third transformation, they would most likely have erased the Heavenly Sky Kingdom already.


    Instead, it was likely that the strongest demonic cultivator had only reached the first demonic transformation, with most only of them trying to change their normal cultivation over to a demonic one.


    Even though this process was fast, it was mostly for those below the Nascent Soul Realm trying to turn into lesser and higher demons, as for Nascent Soul cultivators¡­ To change their cultivation over, they had to go through the first demonic transformation and that in itself required arge amount of blood and qi.


    This was most likely the reason why so many people had disappeared in the ck Rose Sects territorytely, even to the point that they had gone over the border of the Flying Sword Sect to collect a few more¡­


    "Well¡­ Can''t dy it forever¡­" Encouraging himself, Feng Chen sent his qi into themunication talisman as it lit up.


    He had to at least warn the other sects and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom about the demonic sect growing close by, lest they get taken by surprise when it suddenly shows its fangs¡­


    ¡­


    As the Sect Master was worrying about the neighbour of the Flying Sword Sect suddenly turning into a demonic sect, Qing Yi happily made her way through the sect as she headed towards the Alchemy Hall of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Thinking about how much she could earn by selling potions or pills made from all the herbs and nts she had collected in the spirit valley; Qing Yi could not help but smile widely as the nearby disciples were affected by her happy atmosphere and greeted her as she walked by.


    "So, this is the Alchemy Hall¡­" Staring at the giant tower like building in front of her, Qing Yi opened her eyes up wide as she could not believe how big the Alchemy Hall was.


    From what she could see, the height alone reached a few hundred meters into the air, it was the first time Qing Yi had ever seen such a tall building since leaving the Bright Sun City!


    Xuan Hao had also seen the Alchemy Hall of the Flying Sword Sect before, but he was not really as impressed as Qing Yi, to him it just looked like a skyscraper with an ancient architecture to it.


    Back then, Xuan Hao had seriously wondered how it could even stand without copsing, but he guessed it had something to do with formations or some other cultivation stuff. Maybe the materials used in its construction were simply better than what could be found on earth¡­


    "Hello, are you here to sign up for the Alchemy Apprentice training?" As Qing Yi spaced off in front of the Alchemy Hall, a slightly older student had walked over to her and kindly asked with a smile on his face.


    "Alchemy Apprentice training? What is that?" Tilting her head to the side, Qing Yi blinked her eyes as she curiously looked at the senior disciple in front of her.


    "Alchemy Apprentice training is the training the Alchemy Hall offers all new disciples of the Flying Sword Sect. All of the Profession Halls of the Flying Sword Sect offers this to new disciples, but you must remember, you can only join the apprentice training of one profession hall, so if you choose the Alchemy Hall, you won''t be able to get apprentice training for the cksmithing hall or any of the other profession halls without at least paying a few spirit stones!" Starting an informal introduction about the apprentice training of the Flying Sword Sects various profession halls. The older disciple had a passionate look on his face whenever he mentioned the Alchemy Hall.


    "I see¡­ I want to join the Alchemy Hall''s Apprentice training; do you know how to do it?" Not really caring about the "Less profitable" professions, Qing Yi asked the older disciple without missing a beat.


    Honestly, Qing Yi was a bit curious about why the senior in front of her was so enthusiastic about her joining the Alchemy Hall, but only time could tell.


    "Great! Follow me!" Hearing what Qing Yi said, the older disciple enthusiastically led the way and entered the Alchemy Hall with Qing Yi following closely behind.

 Chapter 72: Senior Brother Yu~

    <h4>Chapter 72: Senior Brother Yu~</h4>


    Entering the Alchemy Hall, Qing Yi curiously looked around and saw quite a few people busily walking around.


    Looking ahead at the senior brother that had led her inside, Qing Yi saw himing to a stop in front of a desk at the corner of the Alchemy Hall.


    The small desk had a sign above it reads out [Alchemy Apprentice Training Sign Up], what surprised Qing Yi a bit was how hidden away the small desk was and how empty it felt. From what Qing Yi knew about alchemy, there should be a line of people wanting to sign up every day! Imagine how much you could earn by bing an alchemist!


    "Ah! Elder! This is a new disciple of the Flying Sword Sect! She wants to sign up for the Apprentice training! ELDER! Wake up!" Walking over to the desk, Qing Yi saw the senior brother who had led her inside the Alchemy Hall shaking the elder at the desk awake as the elder slowly started opening his eyes.


    "Damn brat, at least let me get a little sleep¡­ Wait! Did you say someone is here to sign up?!" The elder groggily pushed the older disciple away as he looked rather annoyed at him, it was only when he realized that there was someone here to sign up for the Apprentice training that his eyes shot open and immediately focused on Qing Yi standing only a few meters away from the two of them.


    "¡­" Qing Yi did not know what to say at the moment, as she felt the elders sparkling gaze lock on to her.


    "Elder! Please stop staring at her like that! You will end up scaring her away at this rate!" Seeing the ufortable look on Qing Yi''s face, the older disciple hurriedly jumped over and scolded the elder without showing any form of respect for his senior.


    "Ah!? My bad, guess I was just a little excited when I heard we would finally have someone new join the Alchemy Hall this year¡­" Stroking his beard with an awkward smile on his face, the elder did not mind the older disciple''s rude behaviour and instead just apologised to Qing Yi as he took a few documents out from under the desk.


    The documents in question were the required documents for signing up for the Alchemy Halls Apprentice training.


    "So, I''m going to just ask some basic questions and you will answer them, is that okay?" Taking on a more professional look, the elder held a pen as he waited for Qing Yi''s answer.


    "Yes¡­"


    "Okay Great! Let''s start then, firstly, what is your name?"


    "Qing Yi¡­"


    "Great, great! So, Qing Yi, are you an Outer Disciple, Inner Disciple, Core Disciple or a Personal Disciple?" Seeing Qing Yi had answered, the elder wrote down her answer as he continued to ask.


    "Personal Disciple."


    "I see¡­ Seeing as you are a Personal Disciple, this will be thest question, who is your master?" Not expecting for Qing Yi to be a Personal Disciple, the elder had a slightly surprised look on his face as he stopped for a moment before continuing to ask.


    "Elder Xuan!"


    "Elder Xuan, I see, so it is Core Elder Xuan¡­" Hearing what Qing Yi said, the elder just wrote it down as he suddenly stopped and looked back up at Qing Yi.


    "D-did you just say elder Xuan¡­?" Thinking he might have heard something wrong, the elder asked again with a slightly doubting look on his face. Not really believing that the disciple of a Core Elder would be an alchemist, let alone sign up through the normal way instead of just directly getting someone toe to their pavilion and teach their disciple for them!


    "Yes! Elder Xuan is my master!" Feeling slightly offended by the elders doubting expression, Qing Yi loudly stated her masters name with a proud look on her face.


    "I see¡­ Little Yu, lead your new junior sister over to the library and get her the "Alchemy for beginners" and "Potions, Pills and other questionable concoctions" books." Not saying anything more the elder quickly left with the newly filled out documents in hand.


    "Hah¡­ Junior sister Qing Yi, please follow me to get the two books." Looking at the disappearing figure of the elder, little Yu sighed to himself as he told Qing Yi to follow him deeper into the Alchemy Hall.


    "Senior brother¡­ Little Yu? Why does the elder seem so surprised that I was signing up for the Alchemy Apprentice training earlier?" Not knowing how to call the senior brother in front of her, Qing Yi decided to just call him like the elder had as she asked something that had been on her mind since she entered the Alchemy Hall.


    "¡­ You see, alchemy is not really that poprpared to some other profession like cksmithing, painting or calligraphy¡­ Alchemy is extremely hard at the start withpared to other professions, causing many of the new disciples to just pick something that they can get good at quickly, instead of something like alchemy that requires years of dedication to even reach the lowest level of an Apprentice Alchemist¡­" Smiling a little awkwardly, little Yu exined the current situation of the Alchemy profession and why so few people even signed up to begin with.


    "I see¡­" thinking about it, Qing Yi nodded her head and thought that it was reasonable. After all, if such a lucrative profession could be learnt easily, there would be alchemists everywhere!


    "By the way, junior sister Qing Yi can just call me senior brother Yu, it feels slightly awkward when you call me little Yu¡­" Remembering how Qing Yi had called him senior brother little Yu, he quickly tried to correct the way she called him.


    If some of his friends came along and a girl half his age called him little Yu¡­ He really did not want something like that to happen¡­


    "Okay, senior brother Yu!" Seeing Yu''s face be slightly red from embarrassment, Qing Yi decided to correct herself as both of them soon headed off towards the library of the Alchemy Hall.

 Chapter 73: Chu Yangs Decision

    <h4>Chapter 73: Chu Yang''s Decision</h4>


    As both of them were walking through the Alchemy Hall, Qing Yi saw several people curiously looking at her as they passed by.


    Most of the people passing by at the moment were just like the elder at the sign in desk earlier and were mostly of the older generation, so far, Qing Yi had only seen one other person around the age of senior brother Yu and that was still someone around thirty years old! As for anyone around Qing Yi''s age? She had not seen a single young person in the entire Alchemy Hall yet.


    The only young people she had seen was at the entrance where they traded a few spirit stones for pills or potions, but these people were most likely not members of the Alchemy Hall in the first ce, so Qing Yi did not count them in.


    "We are here!" Coming to a stop in front of a giant door, Yu took out a small card and pressed it against the door as it started glowing.


    *Creak


    Soon the light from the card dimmed down and the giant door slowly started opening up as rows upon rows of bookcases spread out from beyond the door.


    "Wee to the Alchemy Halls Library! When you get your own card like I have, you will be able to freely enter as well. For now, we are just here to get you the two books." Spreading his arms out as he proudly presented the library, Yu smiled as he motioned for Qing Yi to follow him inside.


    ¡­


    "You mean to say that I''m currently inside the Flying Sword Sect?!" As Qing Yi was at the Alchemy Hall, Chu Yang was asking Zhi Ruo about anything from where he was and what had happened to him.


    "Yes, you are currently inside of elder Xuan''s pavilion in the Flying Sword Sect." Having a slightly annoyed expression, Zhi Ruo wanted to get back to what she had been doing beforehand, as Chu Yang just kept asking about the same thing again and again.


    "¡­" Turning slightly frustrated at the fact that he had not found out about what had happened to the ck clothed men who knocked him out, Chu Yang look at Zhi Ruo as he soon sighed to himself.


    No matter how much he asked, she would only give him the same answer, as for what happened to his pursuers, she had no clue.


    "Thank you for answering my questions, yo-" As Chu Yang was about to say Zhi Ruo could take her leave, he suddenly realized that she had already run out of the room by the time he looked in her direction.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say, Chu Yang just shook his head at the quick escape of Zhi Ruo and started thinking about how he should go about his current situation.


    Given that he was rtively safe at the moment and the fact that a Core Elder of the Flying Sword Sect wanted to take him in as a disciple, Chu Yang felt like he could rx. The chances of the people who had chased after him, finding him at the moment, was abysmal.


    For now, he was safe.


    "The Devil Immortal Jade!" Realizing something, Chu Yang hurriedly searched through his clothes and soon took out a small inconspicuous jade with the words devil and immortal written on it.


    This jade was the reason why he had been chased down after running away from the sect that he had been a part of!


    Chu Yang clearly remembered that his sect had slowly changed after someone came and met the sect master. After that mysterious person had met his sect master, a lot of people suddenly started to go missing and even a few elders and disciples of the sect had gone missing as well.


    Chu Yang had clearly felt the atmosphere of the sect change as people around him slowly turned more and more ruthless. Deaths in what was normal sparringpetitions before moremon, as a lot of questionable things started happening.


    The point in which Chu Yang found out that something was terribly wrong, was when he had overheard a conversation between two sect elders talking about the Devil Immortal Jade.


    The Devil Immortal Jade was a jade that the Sect Master had been carrying constantly since the mysterious person had visited and after hearing what the jade truly was, Chu Yang felt a deep fear that sent a chill down his spine.


    The Devil Immortal Jade was an artifact used be an extremely powerful demonic sect known as the Devil Immortal Sect to summon forth otherworldly demons!


    Chu Yang had no idea what the Devil Immortal Sect was, but he knew at that moment that the sect that he had known was gone and he did not see any way out of it.


    After all, all the people who had left recently had mysteriously disappeared or encountered an ident along the way¡­


    So, Chu Yang decided to do what he did best and pretended to be more and more ruthless as he adapted to the other disciples around him.


    This had continued for one year as he slowly prepared his escape, but it was at the day that he was going to escape that he saw it! The Devil Immortal Jade!


    It was ced down by the Sect Master andid in a giant ritual formation, Chu Yang, along with some other disciples had been set to watch a ritual preformed by one of the Core Elders.


    As they had all waited for the Core Elder toe, Chu Yang had sneakily taken the Devil Immortal Jade as he began his escape n, telling his fellow disciples he might be a bit too sick to participate in the demonic ritual, at least nobody questioned it.


    With that Chu Yang made his way out of the sect through a hidden entrance he had created beforehand and ran away.


    Maybe because of luck or something else, the Core Elder did not return to the ritual site for the next few hours and Chu Yang was not the only one who had escaped the sect that day.


    When they realized it, more than one hundred people had escaped. Leaving the upper management quite helpless on how to catch them all.


    In the end, Core Formation and Foundation Establishment cultivators were sent after the escapees. The ones at the Core Formation Realm was a priority to catch first, so only a few other Foundation Establishment cultivators were sent after him, as the sect had deemed that the chances of someone at the Foundation Establishment Realm taking the Devil Immortal Jade was low.


    Even then, they should still be able to catch him, just that it would take slightly longer¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Thinking about this, Chu Yang sighed to himself as thought about Xuan Hao''s attempt to recruit him.


    Maybe bing a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect was not such a bad thing¡­ At least he would be safe here...

 Chapter 74: Difference Between Real Alchemists and Fake Alchemists!

    <h4>Chapter 74: Difference Between Real Alchemists and Fake Alchemists!</h4>


    Coming to a decision, Chu Yang Immediately stood up and walked out of the room.


    Even though he had no idea why a core elder of the Flying Sword Sect wanted to recruit someone with an unknown background like him as his disciple, Chu Yang thought that it could not be something worse than what would happen to him if he was caught by his former sect.


    "Ah¡­ I don''t know where that elder Xuan''s room is¡­" Looking at the different corridors outside of the room, Chu Yang quickly realized that he had no clue where Xuan Hao''s room was located or what was where inside of the pavilion.


    "Maybe if I can find that servant called Zhi Ruo or someone else, they might be able to help me out!" Thinking this, Chu Yang started searching around the pavilion.


    As for what Xuan Hao was doing at the moment. He was still cultivating quietly in his room, while not paying any attention to what was happening to Chu Yang.


    No matter what, he had already decided to ept him as his master, whether he found him in 5 minutes or 2 hours. The result would be the same.


    "Hehe¡­" Smiling a bit, Xuan Hao found the confused Chu Yang running around the pavilion searching for Zhi Ruo who was currently outside doing some chores, quite entertaining¡­


    At least he would have something entertaining to watch if he wanted a break from cultivating.


    ¡­


    "Here, this is the [Alchemy for Beginners] and [Potions, Pills and other questionable concoctions], when you go back, remember to read them! After that, we can allow you to start with the alchemy training." Inside the Alchemy Hall''s Library, senior brother Yu handed two books over to Qing Yi and reminded her.


    "I don''t get to start making pills and potions immediately!?" Feeling a little betrayed, Qing Yi took the two books and looked at senior brother Yu with a hurt look in her eyes.


    "¡­" Smiling awkwardly at the terrible attempt at making what may have been puppy eyes, Yu felt like his new junior sister was going to be a troublesome one in the future.


    "Then tell me, junior sister Yi, do you even know how to make a pill or potion? Do you even have a clue on how to use a pill furnace or brew a potion? If we just let everyone start making pills or potions without any prior knowledge, we would end up wasting most of the materials in the process¡­


    Imagine if someone just randomly started making a few cultivation pills and ended up failing a few dozen times before finally making a pill of the lowest quality¡­ How many recourses would be wasted?"


    "Ah¡­" Listing to what senior brother Yu said, Qing Yi realized what he said was true, so what if a pill were worth a few times that of the materials used, if one ended up wasting most of the materials in the process, the profit from things made and cost of materials would not look so good anymore¡­


    "Indeed, that is why alchemy requires a lot of effort, without a 100% sess rate in making a good pill or potion, how can you even call yourself an alchemist to begin with? Sadly, there are still those fake alchemists who waste thousands of resources just to refine a single low-quality pill or potion¡­ Worst of all, they most likely won''t be able to refine another low-quality pill or potion without wasting just as many resources again¡­" Seeing that Qing Yi had understood what he said, Yu exined a bit more about the dreaded fake alchemists.


    In his eyes, fake alchemists were nothing short of a disgrace to the alchemy profession!


    Where alchemists normally helped to get more out of the materials and resources ced before them, a fake alchemist would waste a thousand times the resources needed to create an inferior version of something¡­


    To fake alchemist there existed different levels to pills, going from low-quality, high-quality, perfect-quality and finally the origin-quality.


    For real alchemists, there was no such grading system and things were either at what fake alchemists called origin-quality or it was a failed product that should not be consumed due to the toxic residue still left in the pill or potion!


    Hearing about the so-called fake alchemist, Qing Yi felt a chill go down her spine.


    Wasting so many resources just to refine a useless product that could be sold for a fraction of the production price!


    Even worse, the product would still contain some toxins that were not handled properly and harm the one consuming them!


    What would happen if the ones who consumed the bad pill or potion came back for a refund or came to look for trouble after finding out about the bad pill or potion that had been sold to them? Would it not just be looking for trouble to be a fake alchemist?


    "Ah, by the way¡­ Fake Alchemist also go around parading as real alchemist from time to time, they think that for an alchemist to be considered to have reached the next realm, they just need to refine a single pill or brew a single potion for that realm. Meaning by brewing a single low-quality Mystic Rank pill, they would think that they are all of a sudden, a Master Alchemist! Pathetic!


    Ha¡­ Remember this junior sister Yi, only when you can refine a pill or brew a potion with 100% uracy each time with no impurities can you be considered to have reached the next realm in alchemy!" Shaking his head at the thought of fake alchemist going around parading as real alchemists, Yu shook his head as he quickly reminded his junior sister to be careful in that regard.


    "Junior has heard what senior said and will make sure to take it to heart and remember what you taught me!" Saying so, Qing Yi had a serious look as she took what senior brother Yu taught her to heart.


    She would never be like those fake alchemists, wasting so many good herbs and other resources!


    "Great! Now be on your way, remember toe back here when you finish reading those books!" Seeing the serious look on his new junior sister''s face, Yu smiled brightly as he felt that she might not be as troublesome as he had first thought.


    "Farewell, senior brother Yu!" Bowing her head, Qing Yi quickly left the Library of the Alchemy Hall and made her way back to her master''s mountain peak.


    She would make sure to learn everything she could from the two books she got and, in the future, refine her herbs into pills and potions to sell at a great price!


    Qing Yi could almost see all the spirit stones she would earn with her alchemy in the future!

 Chapter 75: Trying to Act Like a Mysterious Bigshot

    <h4>Chapter 75: Trying to Act Like a Mysterious Bigshot</h4>


    "Qing Yi~" As Qing Yi was making her way back towards her master''s mountain peak, a person suddenly came out of nowhere and hugged her.


    "Zeng Shihan!?" Turning around to see the person in question, Qing Yi easily managed to identify her friend as she smiled happily.


    "Are you not really busy at the moment; howe you are out here?" As she thought about it, Qing Yi remembered that Zeng Shihan was really busy at the moment with doing some stuff for the sect and did not have much time to hang out with her or Zhi Ruo anymore.


    "Ah, yeah I have to go, we are having a meeting soon about some recent gues that have started up in some viges. Hopefully, we will be able to find a way to deal with it before it gets out of control." Wearing a slightly worried look, Zeng Shihan told Qing Yi as she shook her head slightly at the thought of the gue spreading.


    "I see¡­ I won''t hold you up any longer then¡­" Knowing that Zeng Shihan had something serious to deal with, Qing Yi exchanged a quick goodbye before both of them made their way in opposite directions.


    Qing Yi felt a little worried about her family when she heard about the gue spreading, but from what she had heard it was only in a few viges far away from Bright Sun City, so there was no need for her to worry.


    Even then, Qing Yi still felt a little worried when she heard about the gue that had been spreading recently.


    No matter what, it would not help worrying over something that she had no control over in the first ce.


    "Maybe¡­"


    If I be a skilled alchemist, I could make medical potions or pills to help people, for a¡­ Manageable sum¡­


    As Qing Yi thought about the amount of spirit stones that making medical pills or potions could earn her, she felt like she was on cloud nine as she felt her enthusiasm for alchemy burn even stronger than before.


    ¡­


    As Qing Yi was both worried about the recent news of a gue spreading among the viges inside the Flying Sword Sects territory and excited about how much she would be able to earn by bing a skilled alchemist, Chu Yang finally managed to find Zhi Ruo after searching the pavilion for a little over one hour.


    "You¡­ Hah¡­ Do you¡­. Hah¡­ Know where Elder Xuan''s room is¡­?" breathing in and out slightly exhausted from running around the pavilion for thest hour, Chu Yang looked at Zhi Ruo calmy watering a few nts beside the pavilion. Completely ignoring him in the process.


    "Miss? Do you know where Elder Xuan''s room is located?" Calming down a bit, Chu Yang realized something as he tried to act more politely towards Zhi Ruo.


    No matter what, she was still a servant of a Core Elder of the Flying Sword Sect and at the moment he did not really have any background so to speak¡­ Being rude towards her would most likely not yield anything¡­


    And for some reason, he had a bad premonition that being rude towards this servant called Zhi Ruo would most likely end badly for him down the line¡­


    "Just go to the centre of the pavilion¡­ The master of the pavilion''s room is mostly located there anywhere you go¡­" Talking in a slightly teasing tone of voice, Zhi Ruo tried her best to say where the room of Elder Xuan was located withoutughing at how Chu Yang couldn''t even figure out something so simple.


    "¡­" Feeling his face going slightly red, Chu Yang thought what she said made sense and he honestly had no idea why he himself did not think about it beforehand.


    "I-I will be on my way then!" Not wanting to stay there for even a second longer, Chu Yang quickly darted back into the pavilion and made his way towards the centre area where Xuan Hao''s room was located.


    "Bahahaha~!" Breaking into a loudughter, Zhi Ruo looked smilingly towards the direction where Chu Yang had disappeared.


    Looks like the disciple that Elder Xuan had decided to take in was a little¡­ No¡­ He was not really on the bright side when it came to some things¡­


    As Chu Yang made his way towards the inner area of the pavilion, he soon came to a stop in front of a door leading to a room located in the centre of the pavilion.


    "Come in!" Just as he came to a stop, a majestic voice echoed out from within, as the door slowly opened on its own.


    *gulp


    Feeling a cold wind passing by, Chu Yang shivered slightly as he looked inside thepletely dark room beyond the door.


    "Are you going toe in or are you going to just stand there staring inside all day long?" As he contemted whether to enter or not, the voice from earlier sounded out again as Chu Yang felt a slight impatience from the voice this time around.


    "Y-yes¡­!" Not knowing who he answered, Chu Yang entered the dark room timidly.


    *creak


    The moment he entered the room, Chu Yang looked back and saw the door slowly close behind him. Sealing his only way out.


    No matter what, he had no way back anymore and he could only face whatever hid in the darkness bravely!


    Meanwhile, as Chu Yang looked like he was about to face a deadly enemy, Xuan Hao smiled wryly.


    Why do you look like I''m some big bad guy who is about to attack you? Why do you look so scared? I only wanted to give off the aura of a mysterious bigshot and awe you¡­ Not give off some horror movie vibes¡­


    "Hah¡­" As Xuan Hao looked at the increasingly cautious and prepared to fight to the death expression on Chu Yang''s face, Xuan Hao flickered his finger as the curtains that he had used to cover the windows fell down, causing the light from outside to spill in and light up the formerly dark room.


    "!" Chu Yang was surprised by the room suddenly bing bright and forgot to pay any attention to the person sitting in a meditative position in the middle of the room.


    "Ahm¡­" Trying to get him to pay attention, Xuan Hao made a fake coughing sound, causing Chu Yang to turn around and look at Xuan Hao with a surprised look before he knelt down on the floor.

 Chapter 76: Nascent Soul Realm Stage 6 and Death by Bosom!

    <h4>Chapter 76: Nascent Soul Realm Stage 6 and Death by Bosom!</h4>


    "Chu Yang¡­ Have you decided whether you want to be my disciple or not?" Looking at Chu Yang kneeling in front of him, Xuan Hao smiled slightly as he already knew the answer.


    "Yes, elder Xuan- Master, I have decided to be a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect and be your disciple!" Still kneeling on the floor, Chu Yang said in a determined voice. Clearly, he had alreadye to terms with the fact that Xuan Hao would be his master.


    "Great, first we will have to register you at the Flying Sword Sect, when Qing Yi returns, you can have her help you get registered! You can leave for now and go find a room to settle into as you wait for your senior sister to return, there should be quite a few free rooms in the pavilion at the moment¡­ If you are unsure about what rooms you can use, you can ask Zhi Ruo for help." Smiling widely as he heard the sound of the quest beingpleted from his sea of consciousness, Xuan Hao quickly waved for Chu Yang to leave so he could enter his sea of consciousness and get the quest reward.


    "¡­" I expected to be taught something or hear some wise life lesson upon bing your disciple, why are you just sending me away without teaching me anything?!


    As Chu Yang walked out of the room in a slight daze, he felt like he had gotten scammed by Xuan Hao. Not really knowing what he had lost¡­


    "How do I get out of here again¡­?" Looking at the corridors going in all directions looking the exact same, Chu Yang felt extremely unfortunate as he picked a corridor and walked down it, hoping for the best.


    At least he should be able to find his way out if he just continued walking in one direction¡­ Right?


    ¡­


    Back inside his room, Xuan Hao excitedly sat in a meditative position as he entered his sea of consciousness to interact with the system.


    [Side Quest: Have a disciple with talent value of 50 or above plete)]


    [Rewards: Cultivation Increase of 3 small realms]


    [Redeem]: [Y/N]


    Choosing to redeem the rewards likest time, Xuan Hao was not really prepared for the massive amount of qi suddenly entering his body as he felt the enormous amount of qi start to course through all of his meridians and strengthen his body, until it finally entered his dantian, slowly starting to strengthen his nascent soul.


    As his nascent soul strengthened, it started to grow in size as the power of his soul got stronger.


    As this was happening, Xuan Hao also felt his strength increase as his divine sense strengthened, covering arger areapared to before!


    Finally, and most importantly, Xuan Hao felt hisprehension towards the Sword Dao increase as he felt it would be easier to cultivate the Untold Swords Mantra in the future.


    Looking at his own situation, Xuan Hao guessed that the stronger his soul got, the easier it would be for him toprehend the Dao in the future.


    Feeling that he had broken through to the fourth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao knew that it was not over yet as he sat down and felt a new rush of qi enter him once again. Pushing his Realm from the fourth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to the Fifth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Hah¡­"


    This process repeated one more time as Xuan Hao let out a slightly exhausted breath.


    Breaking through three minor realms at once was extremely exhausting, even with the systems assistance, Xuan Hao felt that he needed a few days to stabilize and familiarize himself with his newly acquired strength, lest he idently ends up destroying something or killing someone due to using too much strength.


    Xuan Hao could not even imagine how it would look like if he met a fellow elder and idently bumped into him and caused him to go flying¡­


    There had once been a time when a genius disciple of a famous sect on the Ewaria Continent did not go into seclusion to familiarize himself with his new strength and had instead went to celebrate with his fianc¨¦ and his best friend¡­


    In the end, the fabled genius had hit his friend a little too hard on the back as they were having a drink or two, causing him to go flying into his fianc¨¦''s bosom¡­ Killing the poor guy in the process¡­


    The fianc¨¦ had ended up injured as well, but she at least managed to survive with only a few injuries¡­


    In the end, the fabled genius had gotten traumatized from what had happened and ended up secluding himself for a few years before recovering.


    This was also one of the reasons why cultivators went into a short period of seclusion after breaking through to a new realm¡­ They did not want to identlyunch someone into their wife''s bosom and idently end up killing them in the process.


    Xuan Hao himself had also heard about the tale of the fabled genius killing his best friend with his fianc¨¦''s bosom and felt it was quite interesting.


    From what he could learn of what had happenedter on, apparently, the fabled genius in question was still alive and was one of the sovereigns on the Ewaria continent that had surpassed the Domain Lord Realm, ruling his own empire for the past thousands of years.


    If there was a chance in the future, Xuan Hao really wanted to meet the guy in question and find out if he had gotten married to his fianc¨¦ or any other interesting story that he might have.


    There was way too little information from the story itself as it had only mentioned that someone could not control their strength and had ended up killing his best friend byunching them into his fianc¨¦''s bosom¡­


    Xuan Hao was really curious how the best friend had died¡­ After all, there was no way the best friend would have died from just beingunched into someone''s bosom¡­ Right¡­?

 Chapter 77: Chu Yang Going to Search for Qing Yi

    <h4>Chapter 77: Chu Yang Going to Search for Qing Yi</h4>


    As Xuan Hao broke through and reached an even higher realm, he noticed that there had been no new side quest rted to talent issued by the system after he got the reward of his cultivation increasing by three minor realms.


    "Maybe it''s because I already have another side quest active?" thinking about the recent side quest he had gotten from Qing Yi''s sudden interest in Alchemy, Xuan Hao quickly shook his head, beforepleting the side quest rted to taking a new disciple with a talent of 50 or above, he had had 2 side quests at once.


    Maybe there needed to be some sort of trigger for him to get a new side quest, like when Qing Yi had showed interest in alchemy¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt a little saddened by the fact that he had not managed to get a new side quest, but he decided that there was nothing he could really do about it and just returned to familiarize himself with his newfound strength and make sure his cultivation realm was stable.


    Reaching the sixth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm already put him at the level just below the Sect Master who was at the seventh stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, at the moment, Xuan Hao was already the second strongest person in the entire Flying Sword Sect!


    At least when it came to cultivation¡­ As for actual battle strength, Xuan Hao would most likely end up stronger than the Sect Master as he hadprehended True Sword Intent, allowing his strength to be way stronger than normally!


    For now, at least, there should not be many that could threaten him left in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom other than the old ancestor of the imperial family¡­


    From what he knew that old ancestor might even have progressed further and be a Half-Step Domain Lord expert¡­


    "Should I try and find ways to get a few side quests¡­ Maybe if I train Qing Yi or Chu Yang, something will happen¡­?" As Xuan Hao thought about the imperial family of the heavenly Sky Kingdom and how there were still people above the Nascent Soul Realm, he immediately felt inspired to train Qing Yi and his new disciple Chu Yang¡­


    No matter what, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was only a small kingdom on the Ewaria Continent, and he would have to leave at some point to grow beyond the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Or he could just strengthen his sect¡­


    ¡­


    As Xuan Hao was breaking through to the sixth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, Chu Yang had finally managed to find his way out of the pavilion and stood exhaustedly in front of Zhi Ruo.


    "Howe you took so long? It''s been two hours by now, did Elder Xuan perhaps arrange some tests that you had to endure before he epted you as his disciple?" Looking at the exhausted Chu Yang, Zhi Ruo asked with a puzzled look on her face as she watched Chu Yang''s expression turn slightly rigged upon mentioning the time that had passed.


    "¡­ Master epted me as a disciple and asked me to get your help with finding a room that I can settle into¡­" Chu Yang himself had no clue how to answer Zhi Ruo''s question as he tried to dodge the question.


    After leaving Xuan Hao''s room earlier, he had first thought that he could just walk in one direction and end up on the outside, but he had underestimated the pavilion and had ended up at dead end and was forced to walk back.


    Following that, Chu Yang had entered all sorts of areas of the pavilion, from a small open garden area to arge bath and empty storage rooms. Chu Yang could be said to have visited everywhere in the pavilion except the path leading to one of the many exits in the pavilion¡­ Truly unlucky¡­


    "I see¡­ Do you want a room with a view to the outside¡­?" Seemingly picking up what had happened, Zhi Ruo tried her best not to burst out inughter, as she skilfully asked and motioned towards a few empty rooms just besides the entrance of the pavilion.


    "That¡­ Would be great, I always liked the view from such a tall mountain peak¡­" Feeling his face turning a little red from embarrassment, Chu Yang epted the offer as Zhi Ruo showed him a few rooms close to the main entrance of the pavilion.


    In the end, Chu Yang managed to get the room located closest to the main entrance with a window to the outside as well.


    Coming out of the pavilion once again, Chu Yang thanked Zhi Ruo for her help and just as she was about to leave, he called out to her.


    "Ah, by the way, Zhi Ruo, do you know where my¡­ s-senior sister¡­ Q-Qing Yi¡­ Is¡­?" Feeling a little ufortable with calling the girl he had met earlier senior sister, Chu Yang managed to barely say it as he waited for Zhi Ruo''s response.


    "¡­Why do you need to know that¡­?" Looking a little doubtful, Zhi Ruo clearly remembered what had happened earlier in the day and thought that he might be looking for her to get revenge or something along those lines.


    "Ah, its masters request, he wanted me to find s-s-senior sister Q-Qing Yi for help to register me as master''s disciple at the sect." Seeing the doubtful eyes of Zhi Ruo, Chu Yang hurriedly exined.


    "She is currently at the Alchemy Hall from what I know, you can just wait for her until she returns, I don''t know how long it will take¡­ If you don''t want to wait for her to return, you can make your way over to the Alchemy Hall." Hearing that it was Xuan Hao who had gotten him to find Qing Yi, Zhi Ruo did not hide anything as she told him straightaway.


    "I see, thank you! I will go over to the Alchemy Hall immediately then!" Saying that, Chu Yang said a word of thank as he made his way down the mountain peak towards the Alchemy Hall of the Flying Sword Sect.


    "¡­"


    Meanwhile, Zhi Ruo was left speechless as she just shook her head and left the ce to resume her work.


    That Chu Yang didn''t even ask where the Alchemy Hall was located and was from what she could see. Not really good with directions¡­ But what did it matter to her¡­? If he wants to run around the Flying Sword Sect with no identity and end up in trouble, she will not stop him¡­

 Chapter 78: Chu Yangs Encounter~

    <h4>Chapter 78: Chu Yang''s Encounter~</h4>


    A few minutes after Chu Yang left Xuan Hao''s mountain peak, Qing Yi made her way back carrying the two books she had gotten from the Alchemy Hall earlier.


    "Hey Zhi Ruo!" Greeting Zhi Ruo who was sweeping the entrance to the pavilion with a wooden broom, Qing Yi happily made her way over as she hugged her before she could react.


    "Qing Yi? How was the alchemy stuff you went out to learn?" Smiling a bit upon seeing Qing Yi return, Zhi Ruo returned the hug as she asked about the thing that she had run off so excitedly to learn earlier in the day.


    "It was great! I even met a senior in alchemy. Look! he gave me these books to learn before I could start making pills and potions! When I manage to learn how to make pills and potion, I will surly be able to use all the herbs I gathered when I went out with master!" Excitedly showing Zhi Ruo the two books that she had gotten from the Alchemy Hall, Qing Yi started talking about what happened.


    From how much an alchemist could earn to how wasteful the so-called fake alchemists are, Qing Yi told Zhi Ruo everything.


    "I see¡­" Zhi Ruo smiled awkwardly as she saw how excited Qing Yi had be and sincerely wished to just return to quietly sweeping the floor like she had done beforehand.


    The excited Qing Yi was not something she had wished to deal with!


    Thus, a poor and innocent servant was forced to listen to her master''s experiences in the Alchemy Hall, from the smallest details to the main focus being the two books that her master had brought back, that the servant in question would most likely never read¡­


    ¡­


    As a certain poor servant was forced to listen to her master''s experiences, Chu Yang had already made his way down the mountain peak and was curiously looking around the Flying Sword Sect.


    Not that he had lost his way or anything! No, he was just¡­ looking around his future sect to familiarize himself with the new environment¡­ Looking for his senior sister Qing Yi could always wait for a bit¡­


    As Chu Yang made his way through the Flying Sword Sect, he had unknowingly wandered into a small garden besides a building. The building was beautifully decorated and there were all kinds of ornamental bonsai trees in the garden.


    A single look was enough to see that someone cared greatly about the bonsai trees in the garden as they had been tended to with care and were in good health.


    "Hey! This is my backyard kid! What are you doing here?!" As Chu Yang was admiring the beautiful garden,pletely forgetting that he was supposed to go to the Alchemy Hall, a surprised voice sounded out behind him.


    Turning around to meet the owner of the voice, Chu Yang saw that it was an elderly man dressed in a simple white robe without any decorations on standing there with a cup of tea in hand.


    Clearly the elderly man was rxing today and had just gone in to get something to drink.


    "Sorry elder, I think I walked into the wrong ce!" Saying this Chu Yang quickly turned around and ran away before the elderly man managed to react.


    "¡­" Watching as Chu Yang figure quickly disappeared into the distance, the elderly man''s face slowly turned dark as Chu Yang''s answer was far from enough to answer how he had entered his garden that clearly had a two-meter-tall wall surrounding it!


    How does one simply "walk into the wrong ce" over a two-meter-tall wall!?


    "You! Wait up!" Realizing that Chu Yang had already disappeared back over his wall, the elderly man quickly jumped after him.


    While the elderly man was not really that great at cultivation, only having reached the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm at his age, he was still one of the most revered cksmiths in the entire Flying Sword Sect. Allowing him to still have quite a bit of status, even with his rtively weak cultivation.


    For some young kid to just walk into his backyard while he went in to grab himself a cup of tea?!


    This was most likely the most surprising thing he had experienced ever since he had decided to settle and rx for hisst few years.


    Whoosh


    As Chu Yang made his way over the wall and back onto the main road going through a residential area of the Flying Sword Sect, a cup of tea came flying from behind as Chu Yang barely managed to dodge to the side as he looked at the wall behind him cautiously, only to see a certain elderly man jumping over it.


    "Damn brat! You think you can just waltz into other people''s home and run away when you get discovered!?" The elderly man yelled angrily as he charged towards Chu Yang, vowing to himself that he would spank some sense into Chu Yang when he caught him.


    "!"


    Chu Yang did not dare to look at the elderly man for even a single second longer as he quickly turned around and ran away, staying any longer and he would surely get caught by the elderly man¡­ Chu Yang felt that he would not be in for a good time if that were to happen¡­


    And what if his new master or even worse¡­ New senior sister, heard about him sneaking into an elderly man''s home¡­? Even if he didn''t mean to and only idently entered¡­ Chu Yang could already see theughing and mocking look his new senior sister would give him¡­


    "Who is that?!"


    "why is elder Wang chasing that young disciple around so ferociously? Just look at his face! How scary!"


    "I fear that the young disciple is in for a beating or something worse when he gets caught¡­"


    Hearing the surrounding disciples talk and pitying gazes, Chu Yang felt even more motivated to get away from the elderly man called elder Wang.


    Sadly, Chu Yang was inferior to elder Wang''s cultivation and the elderly man was starting to catch up to him.


    Is there nobody that can save me¡­?


    As Chu Yang thought about this and looked back to see elder Wang just about to catch him, hope slowly started to drain out as Chu Yang started to think about how he could exin this to his new master¡­


    There!


    Just as he had given up hope, Chu Yang turned a corner and spotted a small open door leading into a rtively big house besides the road.


    Without any hesitation, he quickly entered through the open door and closed it before elder Wang turned the corner and saw him enter.

 Chapter 79: Chu Yang is still Trying to Escape and Unrest at the Border

    <h4>Chapter 79: Chu Yang is still Trying to Escape and Unrest at the Border</h4>


    As he listened to the sound outside of the room Chu Yang only let out a breath of relief when he heard the sound of the angry elder Wang disappear in the distance. For now, he was safe!


    Ring~


    A zither sound suddenly reverberated through the air as Chu Yang sat down on the ground to catch his breath and it was only then that Chu Yang discovered that the house he had entered was filled with all sorts of musical instrument.


    Ring~


    As the sound of the zither spread through the empty house filled with all sorts of musical instruments, Chu Yang felt himself slightly drawn towards the source of the sound.


    The melody being yed at the moment was neither sad nor happy and seemed indifferent to the world, giving off an otherworldly feeling.


    "There¡­" Stopping abruptly in front of a ss door leading out to a small opening, Chu Yang saw a young girl sitting with a beautifully decorated zither ying by herself.


    And at the next moment¡­


    Ring~


    The sound of the zither was cold and indifferent as Chu Yang heard the zither sound ringing in his ears bingpletely immersed in the sound of the zither.


    It was only when the sound of the zither stopped that Chu Yang realized that he was standing only a few steps away from the young girl who had been ying the zither earlier and she was currently staring directly at him with a cautious look on her face.


    "This is¡­" Not knowing how to exin his reason for sneaking up on a young girl, Chu Yang could only smile awkwardly as the two of them stared at quietly at each other.


    "Ah, that damn brat sure could run fast¡­ As both Chu Yang and the young girl sitting with the zither stared at each other without saying anything, a certain elderly man suddenly walked into the small house and entered the small opening.


    "¡­" Stopping in his footsteps, elder Wang''s mouth opened slightly as he stared between Chu Yang and the young girl with the zither.


    "H-hello again¡­ Looks like I have to go¡­" Not knowing what to do, Chu Yang took the opportunity to exit the small opening through a door leading back onto the main road of the residential area.


    "YOU DAMN BASTARD! WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING TO MY GRANDDAUGHTER!" Just as Chu Yang exited through the door, a loud scream full of anger and a bit of killing intent was heard from behind him and Chu Yang did not to hear anything more as he quickly ran as fast as his legs could possibly carry him.


    He had clearly felt the killing intent behind elder Wang''s voice and knew that his chances of returning to his new master in one piece had would decrease quite a lot if he got caught by elder Wang.


    ¡­


    As Chu Yang was being chased around in the Flying Sword Sect by the elder Wang, further away at the border between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, another elder from the Flying Sword Sect also having the name of Wang was standing inside of a small meeting room that had just recently been set up.


    "Elder Wang Lan of the Flying Sword Sect, how do you think we should react to the recent deployment of another three Nascent Soul experts from the Azure Sky Kingdom? You can after all be considered the one with the most experience present in this regard¡­" As Wang Lan was looking at a mapying on the table deep in thought, a calm and collected feminine voice came from one of the people present inside the small meeting room.


    The person in question had skin as white as snow, as a beautifully decorated jade hairpin secured her long ck hair, removing it would surely cause her hair to gently cascades down her silk robe all the way to her waist. She almost seemed like an immortal fairy, both graceful and alluring at the same time.


    But Wang Lan did not let this fool him so easily, he knew very well who this alluringdy was! She was older than him by at least a few hundred years, an old hag hiding in the skin of a young girl¡­ Truly shameless¡­ A Nascent Soul expert could to some extent retain their youth, but most men chose to appear as elderly men or someone in their forties¡­


    Just so they coulde out as someone older and wiser¡­ As for the female part of Nascent Soul cultivators¡­ Well¡­ Most of them were like thedy who had just asked Wang Lan for a suggestion earlier¡­


    At least in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the neighbouring few kingdoms, it was like this¡­


    "For them to deploy another three Nascent Soul experts can only mean one thing¡­ They are getting ready to attack! We will have to be ready for the uing battle. Seventh Flower¡­ How many people will your Spring Flower Sect send?" Answering the question of the beautiful woman also known as the Seventh Flower of the Spring Flower Sect. Wang Lan turned away from the map on the table and looked up at her.


    "The Fifth Flower of my Spring Flower Sect will join as well, what about your Flying Sword Sect? Will you send anymore people?" Hearing Wang Lan''s question, the Seventh Flower answered truthfully as she asked Wang Lan in return.


    "Hah¡­ with our recent¡­ conflict... with the Raging me Sect, we don''t dare to send any more people out¡­" Shaking his head in guilt, Wang Lan looked a bit angrily towards a certain person in the room.


    "The Raging me Sect won''t be sending anymore people for the same reason as that rusty sword from the Flying Sword Sect." The person in question answered before the Seventh Flower could say anything.


    "WHO ARE YOU CALLING A RUSTY SWORD! Damn sparkle boy¡­" Yelling a bit angrily, Wang Lan retaliated as his aura red up.


    "Sparkle boy!? Damnable rust sword! I wi-"


    "Now, now, m down both of you will you¡­? The Seven Fates will send three people over to make up for our friends¡­ shoring¡­" As the elder sent by the Raging me Sect was about to explode, a calm voice echoed out in the room and an elderly man stepped forward and released his aura to restrain both Wang Lan and the elder from the Raging me Sect.


    "With that settled, let''s go over and tell the Imperial family about our decision¡­" Seeing both Wang Lan and the elder from the Raging me Sect being restrained, the Seventh Flower from the Spring Flower Sect stepped forward and spoke.


    "¡­" Both Wang Lan and the elder from the Raging me Sect did not say anything and just followed the two back out of the meeting room.


    The meeting today was about how many Nascent Soul experts each of the four great sects of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would send to help strengthen the border of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    The Strongest of the Four Great Sects was the Seven Fates Sect, followed by the Spring Flower Sect, Raging me Sect and finally the Flying Sword Sect.


    They had already been at the border for quite a long time and the fighting had been getting increasingly more intense.


    At this point in time, they would have to go out and face some of the Azure Sky Kingdoms Nascent Soul experts from time to time and prevent them from interfering in the battle between those below the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The amount of Nascent Soul experts that the Azure Sky Kingdom had gathered at their side, at this point in time, had already grown to a terrifying number and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the four great sects were prepared for an all-out war to break out at any moment.

 Chapter 80: The Heavenly Sky Kingdom and Four Great Sects

    <h4>Chapter 80: The Heavenly Sky Kingdom and Four Great Sects</h4>


    The Heavenly Sky Kingdom itself had quite a few Nascent Soul experts stationed at the border at the moment, but even with the new reinforcements being sent over to help by the Seven Fates and Spring Flower Sect, they still had way less experts presentpared to the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­


    In the end the size and strength of the Azure Sky Kingdom had increased by quite a bit recently and they had absorbed a few nearby territories, strengthening them even further, there had even been a rumour that the old ancestor of the Azure Sky Kingdom had reached the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Not really that the rumour was something unique, as all the nearby kingdoms ancestors had a simr rumour surrounding them all the time¡­


    The difference between the Azure Sky Kingdoms ancestor and the rest, was that he had personally appeared and apparently beaten up another kingdoms Peak Nascent Soul Realm Ancestor! At least, that was the rumour going around at the moment.


    As Wang Lan and the rest of the experts from the four great sects exited the small meeting ce, they all hastily made their way over towards a luxurious tent with two Peak Core Formation Realm experts guarding the entrance.


    "Ah, have your four sectse to an agreement in regard to how many people you will send over to assist the border?" As they entered the room, a middle-aged man in a military uniform asked as he only slightly raised his brows upon seeing the four of them enter the tent. Not moving his gaze away from a few papers on the table in front of him.


    "Yes, we will send another four people over in total to match with the Azure Sky Kingdoms new arrivals." Before Wang Lan could say anything to the clearly rude behaviour of the middle-aged man, the elderly expert from the Seven Fates Sect answered as he quietly motioned for Wang Lan and the rest not to respond to the middle-aged man''s rude behaviour.


    "Good, you may leave! Be ready if anything happens and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom needs you!" Waving all four of them out with amanding and slightly disdainful tone of voice, the middle-aged man returned to looking at a few maps and papers of the Azure Sky Kingdoms troop movements.


    ¡­


    "That damn bastard! Howe the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms attitude is getting worse and worse by the day!?" The one who erupted in anger the moment they had made some distance between themselves and the luxurious tent was not Wang Lan nor the elder from the Raging me Sect. Instead, it was the Seventh Flower from the Spring Flower Sect!


    ""¡­""


    Both Wang Lan and the elder of the Raging me Sect stared a bit speechlessly at each other as they were both about to erupt just like the Seventh Flower had done, just that neither of them had expected for her of all people to erupt in anger like that.


    "Haha, easy now little flower. The Heavenly Sky Kingdom has indeed been getting worse and worse with handling our sects, it is most likely because we have grown a little too strong for themtely and they are getting worried that we band together and overthrow them! For now, just endure, they won''t dare do anything, especially with the Azure Sky Kingdom knocking at the front door." The elderly man from the Seven Fates Sect justughed a bit as he exined the reason for the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms behaviour.


    "¡­ Hah¡­ Indeed, we have been getting a little too strongtely for the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, at the moment our sects each control a corner of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ Thend they control themselves is only the centre region of the kingdom and a few other strategically important ces¡­" Sighing a little when he thought about it, Wang Lan could see how it must feel for the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Compared to the Azure Sky Kingdom''s Imperial Family, who had full control of the entire country and the sects within. The Imperial Family of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom barely controlled 20% of their territory, with the rest being under one of the four great sects or other strong sects.


    The only reason why the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s Imperial Family could still im that they ruled was due to the intimidation of their old ancestor, if the four great sects Nascent Soul experts truly united together, the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms Imperial Family would have less Nascent Soul experts on their side¡­


    In the end, they could only allow the sects to grow within their territory!


    This was quite a unique situation as the Ewaria Continent was mostly ruled by royal ns or imperial families. Sects mostly just existed under an imperial family and was more like a vassal to the statepared to a sect purely focused on cultivation.


    The Sects beingparable to the Imperial Family of the kingdom they existed in was a unique situation¡­


    "Let''s just head back for now and cultivate¡­ Only by improving do we have a chance to improve our situations¡­" The elderly man from the Seven Fates Sect said as he made his way into a nearby tent to resume cultivating.


    The Seventh Flower, Wang Lan and the elder from the Raging me Sect all remained silent for a while before they returned back to their own tents to cultivate and wait for something to inevitably happen.


    All of them felt the same way in regard to the current situation of most sects around the Ewaria continent, but they simply had no way to do anything about it.


    So, what if they managed to overthrow the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ They would still have to deal with the even stronger Sky Empire behind it¡­


    Most of the experts on the Ewaria Continent were from the different Royal ns or Imperial Families, as they hoarded the most resources. The sects did not have anywhere near as much strength as them and there was no sign of this changing any time soon¡­

 Chapter 81: The Path Towards Improving Ones Sense of Direction

    <h4>Chapter 81: The Path Towards Improving One''s Sense of Direction</h4>


    "So¡­ Chu Yang entered your house without permission and then proceeded to sneak up on your granddaughter in her house¡­ Am I correct¡­?" Not knowing how to respond, Xuan Hao felt his eyebrow twitch slightly as he looked at the elder in front of him holding a beaten-up Chu Yang by the neck.


    At this point, Xuan Hao doubted whether he was still conscious as he inspected a few swollen parts at his bottom, it looked like elder Wang had been quite heavy handed with him, at least it was not something that couldn''t heal over a few days.


    At the very least, it was nothing serious for a Foundation Establishment cultivator, so Xuan Hao did not really care much about the injuries that his new disciple had received, at this moment he was more worried about why his new disciple had sneaked into two different people''s houses, though he did have some idea about how it could have happened¡­


    "Yes! And when I called out to this scoundrel, sorry for thenguage elder Xuan, he just ran away without exining anything!" Looking extremely aggrieved, elder Wang angrily threw the unconscious Chu Yang on the ground.


    "Argh, w-where am I¡­?" Maybe due to the sudden impact of being thrown to the ground, Chu Yang blinked his eyes in confusion as he slowly looked around and saw the scary elder Wang who had been chasing him for thest few hours standing in front of his new master with a heartbroken and aggrieved expression.


    "Elder Xuan, you must help obtain justice for me and my poor granddaughter! If someone like this is to run around the Flying Sword Sect, what will happen to all the other youngdies like my granddaughter?! What would happen if I had not arrived on time?!" Not minding that Chu Yang had awoken, elder Wang stated his purpose foring.


    The so-called justice was just him asking for some crafting materials or spirit stones.


    "¡­" Xuan Hao knew this very well, but the only precious materials he had were the Moon Silver and Ash Sunstone that he had gotten from the system¡­


    Other than that, he had a few spirit stones that the sect gave out to the elders every month, but that was not really that many¡­


    Thinking deeper about it, was he not really poor for someone at his cultivation realm?


    Whoosh


    Disappearing from the hall of the pavilion that they were talking in, Xuan Hao soon returned back with a small bag of spirit stones and threw them to elder Wang.


    "Here, you can leave now." Not wanting to deal with the fact that he was too poor to give any good crafting material that elder Wang was most likely after, Xuan Hao threw him a bag with 10 low-quality spirit stones and shooed him away.


    "¡­" Looking at the pitiful amount of low-quality spirit stones inside the bag, elder Wang did not know whether tough or cry.


    At least just be a little arrogant and use your Core Elder status to send me away with nothing! Why the need to humiliate me with a measly 10 low-quality spirit stones? I heard that the Demon Beasts eat more for breakfast over at the Stables!


    You''re a Nascent Soul expert a few Spirit Grade craft materials should not be worth much for you¡­!


    After finding out that Chu Yang was a disciple of a Core Elder, he wanted to make use of the fact that he had caused him trouble to get himself a few good crafting materials for free and not beat him up too much, but things did not go as nned and he could only swallow his disappointment as he turned to leave.


    "So¡­ Do you mind telling me why you entered someone else''s living quarters¡­?" As elder Wang left the pavilion in disappointment, Xuan Hao turned around and asked Chu Yang, who was staring around the room with a dazed expression since he had woken up.


    "I-I, ah¡­" At this moment, he had still not fullyprehended what happened in thest moment before he got knocked out and was captured by elder Wang.


    All he could recall from hisst few moments was him entering yet another house, without permission of course and then a beautiful jade like hand had appeared in front of him and knocked him out.


    Trying his best to remember, he seems to have entered a¡­ Bathing house¡­?


    "So¡­?" Seeing all kinds of emotions sh across Chu Yang''s face, Xuan Hao decided to ask again, lest he ends up spending the rest of the day staring out into empty air.


    "M-master, I-I just went to try and look for s-senior sister Qing Yi at the Alchemy Hall, so she could help guide me to the ce where I would get registered¡­" Realizing his own situation, Chu Yang quickly returned from whatever dream he was having and answered truthfully.


    "Then¡­ How did you happen to enter elder Wang and his granddaughters living quarters¡­?" Raising an eyebrow in doubt, Xuan Hao asked as he wanted to confirm whether his new disciple really had such a bad sense of direction! It might have been way worse than he had thought at first¡­


    "I-I got lost¡­" Feeling a little embarrassed, Chu Yang looked a bit to the side as he told the reason for him idently entering other people''s houses.


    "I see¡­ Go and find Qing Yi, she has already returned from the Alchemy Hall by now. Have her guide you to get registered." Not wanting to think about the issue of his new disciple Xuan Hao send him away and returned to his room to quietly think.


    The reason why he needed to return to his room and think was¡­


    [Side Quest: Help disciple Chu Yang improve his sense of direction, at least enough for him to not get lost in his master''s pavilion¡­]


    [Hint: Herbs or cultivation techniques that can improve soul purity will help]


    [Reward: ???]


    He had gotten a new side quest and this one seemed way more troublesome than all the quests he had ever gotten before, even the main quests difficulty was nowhere near this one¡­


    The system even felt a need to give him a hint¡­


    But improving the purity of one''s soul¡­ Even the worst herb that could do that would be considered a rare herb at the soul grade¡­


    Even Domain Lord experts found something that could improve soul purity extremely useful as it could improve theirprehension speed and allow them to have an easier timeprehending their domain¡­

 Chapter 82: Qing Yis Scheme for Chu Yangs Future

    <h4>Chapter 82: Qing Yi''s Scheme for Chu Yang''s Future</h4>


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was contemting about how toplete the new side quest he had been given by the system. Chu Yang made his way smoothly out of the Pavilion and found Qing Yi in only a few minutes! Mostly because the room where he had been before was located just besides one of the entrances of the pavilion¡­


    "S-senior sister Qing Yi, can you help me get registered as master''s disciple¡­?" Still struggling a bit with calling her senior sister, Chu Yang smiled awkwardly as he asked, still struggling a bit standing up after the beating elder Wang had given him just a few minutes ago.


    "Sure, it was master who asked for you to get me to help show you the way there, No?" Already knowing that he woulde and ask her to help him with registering as a disciple at the Flying Sword Sect, Qing Yi was not really surprised upon seeing hime over.


    No matter how much she wanted to question the reason behind why her master had decided to take in someone like Chu Yang as a disciple, Qing Yi thought that her master had his reasons for doing things.


    Maybe her new junior brother was skilled at alchemy or something and could help bring in some spirit stones¡­ He had after all shown quite a bit interest in the herb, she had taken back with her¡­


    Now that she thought about it¡­ Had he not said he nted the spirit herb!?


    M-maybe, she could get him to grow herbs for her as she used the herbs to brew potions and refine pills!


    "Come dear junior brother! Let''s get you registered as a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect and a personal disciple of master!" Smiling from ear to ear at this thought, Qing Yi happily dragged Chu Yang down the mountain peak, much to the person in questions confusion about what happened to her all of a sudden.


    "¡­"


    Zhi Ruo just quietly swept the entrance of the pavilion with a broom as she smiled encouragingly towards him, causing him to feel even more confused than before.


    What happened to my senior sister Qing Yi, to treat me like this all of a sudden¡­? I thought she would be in a bad mood or something when she heard I had be a personal disciple of master just like her¡­


    The confusion of Chu Yang did not change at all and a weird feeling started to emerge in him, from the moment they registered him as a personal disciple at the registration hall, to their way back to the mountain peak. Qing Yi was nice to him and treated him well the entire way and answered all the questions that he had about certain ces or people in the Flying Sword Sect along the way.


    Only when he returned to his new room did he manage to let go of the weird feeling he had felt when Qing Yi had helped him register.


    "Now that I think about it¡­ Her behaviour was a bit simr to those vendors trying to please a customer into buying something¡­ But why¡­?" Muttering a bit to himself, Chu Yangid down on the bed in his room and decided not to think about it anymore. No matter what Qing Yi nned, it should not be anything dangerous¡­ They were after all both disciples under the same master!


    ¡­


    The day slowly passed and soon the first rays of light appeared as a new day began, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang were excited as their master Xuan Hao would be personally teaching them today!


    Normally, an elder at Xuan Hao''s cultivation realm would not teach their disciples too often, as they had to meditate and improve by themselves and their disciples also needed time to digest the things that their master had taught them.


    So, whenever Xuan Hao or any other elders set aside time to teach their disciples, they would be both happy and excited at the prospect of learning something new or improve even further in the techniques they already practiced.


    After getting something to eat at the dining hall of the sect, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang made their way over to the training ground located on the mountain peak.


    Qing Yi had already gone there quite a lot to train, but for Chu Yang it was his first time entering the training ground and he followed closely behind Qing Yi the entire way so he would not end up getting lost.


    Even if he had already been a disciple of a big sect like the ck Rose Sect in the past, it could notpare to the Flying Sword Sect and the sheer amount of diverse and high-level techniques and meditation mantras that they had.


    The Flying Sword Sect was after all both older and stronger than what the ck Rose Sect had been before the whole demonic thing happened, at the moment, Chu Yang had no idea how strong the ck Rose Sect had be.


    At least from what he knew, the ck Rose Sect''s current Sect Master was also the one who established the sect after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, so the age of the ck Rose Sect was not considered to be that old in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    The lifespan of a Nascent Soul cultivator was still a thousand years, so the ck Rose Sect still had a few hundred years of history after it was established in the past, though it was nothingpared to sects like the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    The thing that Chu Yang hoped for the most when he epted Xuan Hao as his master was to get a more suitable cultivation mantra. After all,pared to the Flying Sword Sect, there had only been a handful of Nascent Soul experts in the entire history of the ck Rose Sect. The number of cultivation mantras present were less than ideal, and Chu Yang had not really found any that suited him.


    With the number of cultivation mantras and a strong Nascent Soul Realm master to help him, he should be able to find a more suitable cultivation mantra!


    "Great, I see that both of you havee! Let''s begin then!" The moment Qing Yi and Chu Yang entered the training ground, Xuan Hao called out to them from the centre of the training ground with the sun shining behind him, his hands behind his back as he smiled gently at them.


    Looking at this scene, Chu Yang felt that the profile of his new master looked extremely majestic and awe inspiring and deep down he felt like he had made the correct decision to be his disciple!

 Chapter 83: Imparting a Cultivation Mantra and a Movement Technique

    <h4>Chapter 83: Imparting a Cultivation Mantra and a Movement Technique</h4>


    Indeed, appearing in the centre of the training ground with the sun in the back gives off such a grand feeling! Just look at how Chu Yang''s eyes are filled with awe and admiration! Looks like I made the right decision to show up earlier and prepare!


    "Great, I see that both of you havee! Let''s begin then!" Looking at both his disciples, Xuan Hao smiled as he called out to them and motioned for them toe over to him.


    "Qing Yi, I will be teaching you a movement technique this time around, as for you Chu Yang, I will get you a more suitable cultivation mantra for now." Looking at both of them, Xuan Hao first imparted the cultivation mantra to Chu Yang, as there was not much for him to do other than teaching him the cultivation mantra and how cycle the qi in his meridians and dantian.


    "This is the Soul Spear Divine Mantra; it does not have a rank like a normal cultivation mantra due to the few people being able to cultivate it¡­ Most who cultivate it either end up breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm or end up stuck with no progress¡­ I personally think you are well suited for this cultivation mantra and you might even be able to take it beyond what the past users have been able to¡­


    The Flying Sword Sect is after all a sword sect and we have not really had that many great spear cultivators over the years¡­" Exining this to Chu Yang, Xuan Hao started fully imparting the cultivation mantra as Qing Yi quietly waited at the side for him to finish.


    Only 15 minutester was the impartation of the cultivation mantra finished and Chu Yang looked bewildered at all the new information and felt like he could take his spear techniques to the next level with only a bit of meditation and reach a brand-new realm.


    The reason for this was that the Soul Spear Divine Mantra did not only contain a way to cultivate, but also contained arge amount of different high level spear techniques.


    "You can go over there and digest what you learned!" As Chu Yang was still lost in thought, Xuan Hao called out to him and pointed towards a corner of the training ground filled with training equipment and a few steel puppets for testing one''s offensive techniques.


    "¡­" Chu Yang did not say anything, he just bowed silently in appreciation and made his way over to the corner of the training ground as he sat down and startedprehending the new knowledge that he had been given.


    "Now, you have waited for quite a while now Qing Yi, so let''s get started as well now that your new junior brother has been settled." Turning to look away from the meditating Chu Yang, Xuan Hao looked a Qing Yi who was quietly standing a few meters away from him patiently waiting for her turn.


    Maybe I should just train them one at a time instead of having one of them wait as I teach the other¡­


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao quickly made his way over to Qing Yi.


    "I will demonstrate a simple low-tier Earth Rank movement technique called sh Step now, it is one of the easiest movement techniques that the Flying Sword Sect has and everyone who reaches the Foundation Establishment Realm will be qualified to learn it!" Saying that, Xuan Hao took a single step forward and instantly appeared a few dozen meters away.


    "This technique, while simple, can allow you to burst forward with a speed above what someone at your cultivation realm would normally be able to use and is a great way to catch your opponent off guard and deal a deadly blow!" Saying this, Xuan Hao disappeared once again from his location and reappeared besides Qing Yi.


    Yesterday, he had nned to teach both Qing Yi and Chu Yang something and had left earlier this morning to pick out a cultivation mantra that he could teach Chu Yang and a movement technique that he could teach to Qing Yi at the Pagoda of Enlightenment.


    The Soul Spear Divine Mantra was something that he had found at the top floor of the Pagoda of Enlightenment and could be considered to be a great cultivation mantra for those who practiced the spear, while the sh Step was a simple movement technique that all disciples at the Foundation Establishment Realm could get their hands on.


    The reason why he had chosen the sh Step instead of some higher rank movement technique was due to how easy it was to learn and the fact that he himself did not really learn anyplicated and strong movement techniques yet¡­ So, he had picked an easy movement technique to learn and spent a few hours to learn it himself beforeing to teach it to Qing Yi¡­


    With this Qing Yi started learning the sh Step movement technique under Xuan Hao''s guidance and started practicing in the training ground.


    Qing Yi''s movements were somewhat awkward at first but under Xuan Hao''s pointer she slowly grew more and more proficient in the sh Step.


    "Pay attention to your left leg when you utilize your qi to execute the sh Step. Don''t overuse your strength at those parts and waste your qi!" Xuan Hao''s reminder came from the side as Qing Yi quickly paid attention to her left leg and made sure to use less qi in that area when executing the sh Step movement technique.


    Whoosh!


    Qing Yi shed forward at a speed way faster than she had before and suddenly came to a stop a few dozen meters away from where she had started.


    Qing Yi involuntarily startedughing as she fell to the ground in exhaustion, the method of practicing bitterly for thest few hours had caused all parts of her body to ache in pain. But other than enduring this, how could she ever wish to improve?


    Thest execution of the sh Step had drained thest bit of energy left in her as she had manged to go even faster than thest time.


    Having someone guide you as you trained was way more beneficial than doing it by yourself!


    Qing Yi thought to herself as she remembered how far she had gone with the sh Step movement technique already.


    "Hah!"


    Hearing the familiar voice, Qing Yi turned her head a bit to the side on the ground and watched her new junior brother Chu Yang swinging his spear in the distance.


    After he had managed to sessfully meditate with the new cultivation mantra he had been given, he had started practicing his spear like he had be obsessed.


    "You can go back for now and get some rest, you should try and meditate on the sh Step Movement Technique when you get up again. Maybe you will be able to learn something new!" As Qing Yi was about to force herself up again, she heard her master call out to her and quickly agreed with what he said with a quick nod of her head, as she started dragging her exhausted body back to her room and threw herself at her bed.


    So, what if it was still in the middle of the day?! She was way too tired to continue doing anything at the moment!


    With those thoughts in mind, Qing Yi quietly closed her eyes and fell asleep.

 Chapter 84: Heavenly Sky Kingdom Refuses to Help

    <h4>Chapter 84: Heavenly Sky Kingdom Refuses to Help</h4>


    Seeing the tired Qing Yi leave the training ground, Xuan Hao turned around and focused on the still practicing Chu Yang swinging a practice spear around and hitting the steel training dummies from time to time.


    After he had finished meditating a bit with his new cultivation mantra, the Soul Spear Divine Mantra, he had immediately began practicing some of the spear techniques included in the mantra and fell into a sort of zen state as he was enlightened to a whole new way of using the spearpared to what he had been doing beforehand.


    As he stabbed, pierced and swung the spear in a rhythm of sorts, each move flowing seamlessly together resulting in a deadly attack on the poor steel dummy currently in front of him.


    "Looks like he is doing quite well!" Xuan Hao could not help but let out a sigh of amazement as he stared at Chu Yang''s beautiful spear moves and felt a little regretful that he had not trained the spear to such a degree¡­ At least for now he was only proficient in the sword, in the future, he would have to master other weapons as well, so he could better teach any future disciple in whatever best suited them, be it a spear, a bow or even halberd¡­


    The path to bing a great teacher would be difficult and his n of just beingzy and mooching off his disciples would not be able toe to fruition any time soon¡­


    For now, he had to make sure his current disciples grew stronger and learned to take care of themselves and for that, he had to grow strong enough to protect them from any who would try and snatch them away from him or endanger them¡­ It would not look so great if a random Domain Lord passed by and stole one of them away when he was not looking¡­


    At least he had to grow strong enough to prevent something like that happening before his disciples truly started to showcase their talents to the world!


    "Chu Yang, you can just continue to train, I will be taking my leave for now." Looking over at the still training Chu Yang, Xuan Hao called out as he made his way out of the training ground after receiving a small affirmative nod from Chu Yang.


    There was not much for him to teach Chu Yang at the moment other than giving him a new cultivation mantra and a few spear techniques to practice.


    ¡­


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was teaching Qing Yi and Chu Yang, Feng Chen, the Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect was worriedly looking towards amunication talisman that had just recently been used by him to talk with some of the higher ups of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    After he had reported to them about the recent demonic sect that had sprung up in their own backyard, they had decided to ignore the matter for now as the aggression of the Azure Sky Kingdom needed more attention at the moment.


    They could not spare anything to deal with a recently discovered demonic sect and would much rather only focus on the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    After contacting them once again today to stress the importance of the matter, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom pretty much just told Feng Chen to have his Flying Sword Sect deal with it for now until the Heavenly Sky Kingdom finished defending against the Azure Sky Kingdom that had not even truly attacked yet¡­ At most there was a small skirmish between those below the Nascent Soul Realm at the moment¡­


    "Truly infuriating! They clearly want to use this as a chance to weaken the Flying Sword Sect!" Not believing anything that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had said about wanting to deal with the Azure Sky Kingdom first beforeing to deal with the demonic sect, Feng Chen clearly knew just how many Nascent Soul experts that they had left without much to do other than stay in the imperial capital of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    And for the Flying Sword Sect to deal with the newly established demonic sect, they would have to sacrifice quite a bit and might even end up losing some of their Nascent Soul experts, lowering the overall strength of the sect.


    But at least for now, Feng Chen would not do anything to deal with the ck Rose Sect that was now a demonic sect as it had quite a few Nascent Soul experts before bing a demonic sect, let alone now¡­


    "Let''s just y it defensively for now and hope for the matter between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom be resolved as quickly as possible before the ck Rose Sect starts moving¡­" Muttering what he himself wished for, Feng Chen let out a slightly exhausted sigh as he picked up themunication talisman and contacted the Vice-Sect Master Zu Fei¡­


    She would most likely not be happy when she realized the stance of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom on the matter of the ck Rose Sect bing a demonic sect.


    As for the strategy of ying it defensively until the sh between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was over, Feng Chen did really not want to do something so cowardly.


    Let alone himself, Feng Chen knew that Zu Fei and most of the sect elders would not want to do something like that and would rather just sh with the demonic sect.


    But with both the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the Raging me Sect watching from the side, even a single slip up orpse in judgement could spell the end of the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Even if the Flying Sword Sect could destroy the newly established demonic sect by Feng Chen and the other Nascent Soul experts going over there as well, they had nowhere enough Nascent Soul experts to protect their base at the same time¡­


    "Hah¡­ It''s truly hard to be the Sect Master¡­" Not seeing any positive oue no matter what decision, he took, Feng Chen let out onest exhausted sigh as heid themunication talisman down and went out of his pavilion and moved in the direction of the Vice-Sect Master''s pavilion.


    Informing Zu Fei about the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s decision would go better if he informed her by mouth, lest she ends up doing something stupid after getting the news¡­

 Chapter 85: The Plague Spreads in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom

    <h4>Chapter 85: The gue Spreads in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom</h4>


    After the news about the Azure Sky gathered more and more people at the borders of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. The entire Flying Sword Sect was worried as they readied themselves for war to break out, but in the end¡­ Nothing happened and both forces were stuck in a stalemate, both unwilling to make the first move.


    As the stalemate continued, time in the Flying Sword Sect passed by quietly with Xuan Hao training both Qing Yi and Chu Yang in all kinds of techniques, while simultaneously learning as much as he possibly could from all sorts ofbat and movement techniques in case, he would ever need it at some point in the future.


    Like this, one month quietly passed without anything of interest happening other than the continued spread of the gue.


    The gue had continued to spread and even with both the Flying Sword Sect, the other sects and the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms help, it could only be slowed down.


    There had even been cases of someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm dying to the gue, causing all the sects and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to start panicking. The gue no longer affected only normal mortals, but cultivators as well!


    The Flying Sword Sect had a few people with the healer profession and all of them were currently working overtime together with the alchemist of the Alchemy Hall to try and find a solution to the gue that kept getting worse and worse with each passing day, it was only a moment till it would truly start to affect the stronger cultivators!


    At least that was what some doomsday callers said, after all, no matter how strong the gue was, a Nascent Soul cultivator could just give up his body if things came to it and exist purely in a soul form.


    If the gue could truly infect the soul and kill Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, the Sky Empire would most likely send people over to investigate as something like that would be quite troubling even for a big empire like the Sky Empire!


    "So, you want me to help investigate the source of the gue¡­?" At the same time that most of the Flying Sword Sect was in a state of unrest due to the recent gue news, Xuan Hao stood directly in front of the Sect Master and asked with a slightly raised eyebrow and a suspicious look on his face.


    Over the past month, Xuan Hao had long since disclosed his cultivation realm to the Sect Master Feng Chen and to say he was surprised was an understatement. The look he gave him when he told him what his cultivation realm was honestly quite scary¡­


    In the end, Xuan Hao med him suddenly reaching the sixth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm on him gaining enlightenment while he was cultivating, and Feng Chen easily epted this answer and started being happy and talking about how the heavens had blessed his Flying Sword Sect.


    Truly¡­ Just me everything on sudden enlightenment and people won''t ask anymore questions. The joys of being part of a cultivation world¡­


    Another thing that helped was also the fact that he had always been way fasterpared to anyone else in cultivation ever since entering the Flying Sword Sect and Feng Chen most likely believed he was some kind of talented heir from some kind of empires or powerful sect...


    The reason for him being asked by Feng Chen to go out and help find the source of the gue was that he could pretty much be considered the second strongest in the Flying Sword Sect by now, with the Vice Sect Master Zu Fei just below him at the fifth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "The gue has been spreading a lottely and we still have no clue where it came from¡­ A few Core Formation Realm experts sent by our sect, the rest of the four great sects and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom went to investigate the source but went missing soon after¡­ Now we can only send someone stronger and hopefully find the source¡­


    The Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the rest of the four sects all agreed that we would each send someone to investigate, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom will send over the most, with each of the four sects sending at least one person over. Each of you will search through one of the areas where the gue outbreak started to look for any clues." Shaking his head upon mentioning the missing Core Formation experts, Feng Chen went on to exin the n of the four sects and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "So¡­ Why me¡­?" Hearing what the Feng Chen said, Xuan Hao still did not understand why he wanted to send him of all people and not Wang Hu, who was still in the sect.


    "Hah¡­ From what the Alchemists and Healers managed to gather, the gue should be artificial¡­ Meaning someone is behind the sudden gue outbreak¡­" Letting out a heavy sigh, Feng Chen told Xuan Hao with a weary look on his face.


    "So, you want to send me as people still only think that I''m at the first stage of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­?" Understanding what Feng Chen meant by sending him instead of someone like Wang Hu, Xuan Hao felt a sense of danger.


    The gue outbreak¡­ Could it be rted to the ck Rose Sect¡­? Maybe a way for the Azure Sky Kingdom to weaken the Heavenly Sky Kingdom before an attack¡­ Or something entirely different.


    "Yes! If there really is some sort of trapid up, with your current strength, you should be able to get out without much trouble¡­ No matter who is behind it, they are clearly not strong enough to face us head on and needs to use the gue¡­ At most they would have the ability to kill someone at the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm." Stating the conclusion that he hade to, Feng Chen looked hopefully at Xuan Hao. Hoping that he would agree to go.


    "¡­I will go, make sure you look after my disciples for me while I''m gone!" Understanding that saying no would most likely cause the Sect Master to send someone else in his stead, Xuan Hao chose to ept the request.


    The Flying Sword Sect had taken care of him for quite a few years before he transmigrated and even after, they still took great care of him and never forced him to do anything and just let him cultivate quietly in peace at his mountain peak.


    He knew that it would most likely be dangerous, but at least with his current strength, he should not lose his life.


    Hopefully, they would be able to find the source of the gue.

 Chapter 86: The New System... "Feature"...

    <h4>Chapter 86: The New System... "Feature"...</h4>


    As Xuan Hao finished going over the information gathered so far about the gue, he soon left the room and returned back to his mountain peak to inform both his disciples about him leaving for a while.


    "Master!" As he returned to the pavilion, Qing Yi came running over with all sorts of herbs, potions and pills in her hands with an excited look on her face.


    Over thest month, she had progressed quite far in alchemy, way faster than what someone normally would, and she had already started practicing with some of herbs in hopes of sessfully bing an official Apprentice Alchemist.


    Even the waste pills and potions that she made as she improved her alchemy still had some use, as Qing Yi sessfully managed to find someone who wanted to buy it when she walked around the Flying Sword City just besides the sect.


    Xuan Hao honestly had no clue how she got someone to buy her low-quality test materials, but he decided not to ask about it¡­


    Looking at her, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a little pride at Qing Yi''s current progress, yesterday she had even broken through and reached the second stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm. Xuan Hao was sure that if she did not focus so much on alchemy at the moment, she might have even reached the third stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm by now!


    Chu Yang on the other hand, focused all his attention at cultivation after getting the new cultivation mantra and just two days after he had gotten the Soul Spear Divine Mantra, he broke through and reached the fourth stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    By now he had already reached the fifth stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    Both of them had worked hard over thest month and had shown great progress, Xuan Hao did not even have to spend too much of his time on teaching them and they pretty much only came to him to ask for advice a few times a week.


    "Do you know where your junior brother Chu Yang is?" As Qing Yi ran over and appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao immediately asked before Qing Yi even managed to ask whatever question she had wanted to ask.


    "Ma- Ah¡­ I think he is at the training ground like always, why?" Hearing her masters question Qing Yi stopped herself from asking the question she had prepared regarding the sh Step Movement Technique that she had been taught a month ago.


    She had grown quite skilled in the Movement Technique but would stille and ask Xuan Hao for help every now and then when she ran in to trouble and didn''t know how to move forward or improve further on the Movement Technique.


    "I see¡­ Follow me over there, I have something to tell both of you¡­" Saying this, Xuan Hao made his way over towards the training ground with a confused Qing Yi following him closely from behind.


    Like this, Xuan Hao exined the current situation about how he was going to leave for a period of time to both Qing Yi and Chu Yang.


    Both of them did not really mind it that much and thought that their master was just going out to do something for the sect. After all, from what they heard the other disciples of the Flying Sword Sect talk about, it was quite normal for an elder or core elder to leave for weeks, if not months, toplete a task on behave of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Xuan Hao leaving for a period of time was not really anything unusual in the first ce.


    "A-are you sure you will be fine¡­?!" Staring at hispletely unaffected disciples, Xuan Hao had expected both of them to at least show some reaction!


    Why did both his disciples not seem to care that he was leaving for some time!?


    "Well¡­ You normally just spend most of your time cultivating in your room and most of the things in the pavilion is taken care of by Zhi Ruo anyway¡­ At most we would not be able to get answers to some of the questions that we might have about our cultivation while you are gone¡­" Not seeing the distraught and saddened look on Xuan Hao''s face, Chu Yang ruthlessly answered as Xuan Hao truly felt like a useless cker.


    "W-what about you Qing Yi¡­?" Swallowing a bit of the blood he was about to throw up due to shock, Xuan Hao turned towards his cute and innoce-


    "I''m fine as well master, you can just set out immediately! Don''t let us stop you!"


    Psh*


    "Master are you okay!?" Suddenly throwing up a bit of blood, Xuan Hao barely managed to supress it back down again and cover the little bit that leaked out with his hand as his face turned a bit pale all of sudden, causing both Qing Yi and Chu Yang to look towards him with a worried look on their faces. Worried about why their master suddenly turned pale and held his hand up to block his mouth.


    "I-I''m fine, I will just go now and aplish the task that the Sect Master handed down to me and return as fast as possible¡­" Shaking his head a bit with a slightly awkward smile, Xuan Hao appeased his two disciples as he turned around to take his leave.


    "No need to hurry master! Take your time to make sure youplete the task of the Sect Master without making any mistakes!" Calling out as Xuan Hao was just about to leave, Qing Yi smiled happily as she waved him off.


    Psh*


    Looking down at his hand that was slightly covered in a bit of his own blood, Xuan Hao felt a little helpless.


    Better get out of here fast, or I might end up killing myself!


    Not daring to stay even for a second longer, Xuan Hao utilized his cultivation base and quickly used the sh Step Movement Technique to run away before his disciples could say anymore heartfelt words of goodbye.


    ¡­


    Words truly could kill in a cultivation world¡­ How did he even throw up blood in the first ce¡­? He was supposed to be someone at the Nascent Soul Realm having perfect control over his own body!


    Inspecting every part of his body to find the problem, Xuan Hao came upon a shocking truth when he entered his sea of consciousness.


    A single line of words exined how he ended up in his current situation¡­


    [You have been emotionally affected by your disciples and feel betrayed! Proceeding with dramatically-throwing-up-blood-in-shock-function]


    "¡­"


    Could he remove any of the system features¡­?

 Chapter 87: Church of The Plague God

    <h4>Chapter 87: Church of The gue God</h4>


    The gue that had spread through the territory of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had first started at the edges of the Flying Sword Sects territory and had slowly spread to the other regions of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, including the centre where the imperial family ruled.


    Later on, everyone learned that the gue had actually started in different viges each located in the north, south, east and west of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    At the moment, the gue had not really threatened much of the infrastructure of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom yet, but that was about to change soon as the first few cases had started to appear in some of the bigger cities in the centre region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Over thest months'' time, the gue spread fast and had slowly made its way to the centre region where the Imperial family ruled.


    Whoever made the gue clearly targeted the Imperial family of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom as the four great sects like the Flying Sword Sect had not taken any real damage from the gue other than losing a few viges on the path towards the centre region¡­


    The Centre region on the other hand saw the gue spread rampantly with no sign of slowing down at all after it reached a vige or city there¡­


    This did not really help a lot, as the Imperial family had grown a bit suspicious about whether the four great sects could be behind the outbreak of the gue, but there was not much they could do at the moment other than hope that the gue had an outside force behind it¡­ After all, if the four great sects truly turned on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom with the Azure Sky Kingdom at their borders¡­


    Like this, unrest spread through the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom together with the gue.


    ¡­


    "Hmm¡­ Everything is going ordingly, and the gue has already spread to the centre regions of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ As long as we can convert the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to the faith of the gue God, we should be able to start getting a foothold in the Sky Empire! Hmph, that church of the God of Nature won''t be able to keep the Sky Empires faith for themselves for long!" Inside a dark room, a shrivelled-up figure wearing a ck robe with a weird symbol on it was talking to himself as he smiled widely while looking at the papers in front of him on his desk.


    "Bishop! There is news from High Priest Bai, he is asking for permission to enter!" A voice came from beyond a door located in another end of the room, as the shrivelled-up figure slowly turned around and looked at the situation outside the door with his divine sense.


    "Come in¡­" After thinking about something for a few minutes, the shrivelled-up figure who was a Bishop of some sort called out as an equally eerie person entered the room with the same ck robe covering his body, the only difference being the symbol of the robe itself.


    "Bishop, ording to the n, the gue has already started spreading in the centre of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the four sects and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom is currently sending out some of their Nascent Soul experts out to find the source of the gue. Other than that, we also noticed a small demonic sect that recently established itself in the north of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, though they are not strong enough to affect any of our ns¡­!" Coming to a stop in front of the Bishop, the High Priest Bai silently stood there as he ryed all the information he had managed to gather.


    "Good! Send a few people to erase the people sent by the four sects and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom! They should at most be around the first to second stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, so sending a group of two or three High Priests to deal with each of them should be enough.


    Ignore the demonic sect for now, as long as they don''t interfere! After that, we will allow the gue to develop for a few more months before sending out missionaries to spread the faith of the gue god and cure the gue." Smiling happily, the Bishop thought of the church of the gue god''s missionaries entering the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the future going around and curing everyone, while establishing the faith of the gue god.


    "W-won''t they be a little suspicious if missionaries from a gue godes just after a gue spread and says they will cure them¡­?" Not knowing how to say it, High Priest Bai hesitantly asked as he dared not talk anymore in case the Bishop got angry with him.


    "¡­"


    Hearing the question of the High Priest, the Bishop could indeed see what he meant¡­ The Church of the gue God did not really have that good of a reputation among the other religious orders on the Ewaria continent and faced quite a bit of suppression due to some of their more¡­ "unique methods" of converting people into believerspared to other religious orders who were rtively peaceful when they spread the faith of their god...


    "T-the ordinary people won''t mind something like that, if they are sick enough and we bring them the cure, they would be more than willing to believe and be followers of the great gue God! And only the higher-ups of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would know it''s an artificial gue in the first ce¡­ At most we can just say that the great gue God got his name due to the fact that he cured countless gues of all shapes and forms over the years¡­" Coming up with a decent excuse, both the Bishop and the High Priest were satisfied as the High Priest Bai soon left the dark room to carry out the orders of the Bishop.


    "The Archbishop will being in a few years'' time to inspect both my work and the other Bishops work¡­ I hope I can manage to convert the Heavenly Sky Kingdom before that happens! Maybe I could even make use of the current situation and convert the Azure Sky Kingdom as well! At that point I might have a chance to get a reward from the main church and be promoted to an Archbishop!" Thinking about his own glorious future, the shrivelled-up Bishop smiled widely to himself as he soon resumed his earlier work.

 Chapter 88: The Abandoned Village

    <h4>Chapter 88: The Abandoned Vige</h4>


    After leaving the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao quickly regained his bearings as he decided to ignore whatever the new system feature was for now and instead focus on finding the source of the gue that had been spreading or at least find out who was behind it¡­ Though he did wonder how strong the people they would send out would be.


    Jumping on top of his sword and Xuan Hao started flying towards the borders of the Flying Sword Sects territory where the gue had first started, at the moment he could only be happy at the fact that the border that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom shared with the Azure Sky Kingdom was not near the ce that he was going¡­


    At the very least he would only have to deal with the people send by the ones spreading the gue instead of dealing with people from the Azure Sky Kingdom as well at the same time¡­


    Flying through the sky on top of his sword, Xuan Hao moved way faster than he had done in the past and soon passed over the first vige that had been infected with the gue on his way to the border region.


    The vige itself had long since been left as bodies of people in all sorts of stages of decay wereying on the ground rotting away under the sun. The only sign of life left in the vige was the crows poking to the still rotting flesh of the long dead bodies with their sharp beaks.


    Xuan Hao saw this and almost felt like throwing up when he saw the still rotting bodies being slowly eaten by the crows, but he just barely managed to hold it in as he quickly made his way down andnded in the abandoned vige below.


    "W-what is this¡­?!" The state of the long dead bodies was already quite a shocking scene for Xuan Hao to see, but the moment hended on the ground and spread his divine sense out to inspect the bodies of the now dead viges, he saw a truly horrifying thing.


    Inside the bodies of the long dead vigers, the gue had spread out to every part of their body, like a tree taking root in the ground, the roots of the gue had spread through the entire body of its victim.


    At the moment, the body of the dead vigers were nothing more than a simpleyer of skin, inside them aplicatedwork of roots spread throughout their bodies, with a giant ball of sorts in the middle of the body.


    Xuan Hao inspected the centre of all the dead bodies in the vige and found out that all of them had the same ball shaped thing in the middle of them, other than the fact that it was some sort of energy like qi, simr yet not. Xuan Hao could not tell what it was or what purpose it had.


    Swoosh~


    Waving his hand at one of the dead bodies, Xuan Hao''s sword qi swept over and split the body open. Following this, Xuan Hao used his qi to extract the ball shaped energy out from the body.


    The ball shaped energy had a dark green colour as it gave off an eerie kind of holy feeling, almost like a part of an evil god''s power had seeped into the ball of energy and merged together with it.


    Not daring to try and absorb the energy into his body and inspect it in detail, Xuan Hao threw it away as it slowly dispersed into the surrounding environment without the protection of the human body to keep it from dispersing.


    "Hah¡­" Sighing to himself, Xuan Hao looked over the empty vige and felt a slight pang of sadness wash over him as he saw the dead bodies of both old and young lying dead everywhere.


    The dark green energy ball that had formed inside the bodies of the deceased worried Xuan Hao quite a bit as he jumped back on his sword and made his way back into the air towards the vige located at the border of the Flying Sword Sect territory where the gue had first begun in the north region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    No matter what, he could not stay in the abandoned vige for too long as he wanted toplete the task that the Sect Master had given him and find out who was behind the gue and more importantly, return to the sect to quietly cultivate and train his disciples¡­


    Maybe he could even start interacting more with them as he clearly did not do so enough! Being a master who only ever came out to teach them a few times a week would not cut it!


    At the very least he was not like most of those other elders in the sect that almost demanded a constant form of respect from their disciple and would only teach them a few things every year.


    Maybe it woulde with time and he would end up like them when he grew older in the future¡­ Now that he thought about it, Xuan Hao quite liked the idea of being respected more by his disciple while putting in minimal effort to teach them only once or twice every year¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time that Xuan Hao thought about how to go about teaching his disciples when he returned to the sect, a group of ck robed individuals with a strange symbol on the front of the robe arrived at the vige that Xuan Hao was currently making his way towards.


    "Are we sure that the Flying Sword Sect will send someone to check the vige¡­? The chance of finding anything here is close to abysmal and there are only corpses left!" One of the ck robed men said in a slightly angry voice as he pointed at the surroundings of the vige.


    Most of the dead bodies had long since been eaten clean by the surrounding wildlife or was in a state of decay with all sorts of insects crawling all over the ce.


    "We have gotten information that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s Imperial Family requested for each of the four sects to send at least one person at the Nascent Soul Realm to inspect the ces where the gue started after the priests, we sent took care of the Core Formation experts they mobilized to do so earlier." Another of the ck robed figures spoke up as he ignored theint.


    "Now we just have to be ready and make sure the person from the Flying Sword Sect does not return¡­" Saying this, the ck robed figure looks at everyone present as each of them understood that there was no way out of it¡­


    Now they had to wait for who knows how long before the Nascent Soul expert of the Flying Sword Sect arrives¡­

 Chapter 89: The Group of Refugees

    <h4>Chapter 89: The Group of Refugees</h4>


    The traveling time from the location of the Flying Sword Sect to the border area where the vige was located would normally take a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator between one or two weeks if not longer to travel¡­ And that was if they travelled without resting more than a few hours a day and went full speed.


    Xuan Hao on the other hand was flying and could ignore most things like forests and other terrain that would normally slow one down, but even it would still take at least three or four days to reach the border vige where the gue had first started.


    As he was traveling through the territory of the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao saw the impact that the gue had had on the rtively weaker viges of the Flying Sword Sects territory.


    It had to be said that most of these viges had no cultivator in them and mostly had ordinary people. The strongest person in these viges would at most be a vige elder who barely managed to reach the Qi Condensation Realm¡­


    Now with the gue suddenly appearing, these viges had no way to resist as most of the ones in the path towards the centre region had already perishedpletely.


    Xuan Hao felt slightly sad when he flew over them on his way, but there was nothing much he could do as they had already died to the gue.


    "Hm? That is!" Taking in the sceneries as he was flying, Xuan Hao saw arge group of people suddenly appear on the horizon, moving slowly towards him from the distance.


    The group of people were most likely not really moving towards him specifically but were most likely just moving in the direction that he hade from.


    The thing that surprised Xuan Hao was the fact that the people moving inside therge group of people were all extremely weak, with the strongest person only barely reaching the first stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    This was a truly weird thing, as even in the case of a gue spreading, unless it was in their own vige, most people would still choose to stay where they lived and wait for it to settle down again. Even if the victim of the gue was their neighbouring vige!


    After all, this world was extremely dangerous and even with the Flying Sword Sect around, demon beast would still roam around outside the viges and cities, if even a single demon beast with the strength at the Core Formation Realm passed by, everyone in the giant group of at least one thousand people would perish!


    For them to willingly wander around, Xuan Hao doubted that there would not be a good reason for this and the most likely reason in his opinion would either be a demon beast had showed up in their vige or city and they had to run away, or the gue had appeared, and they decided to run away before they became infected as well.


    "Guess I will just have to ask them¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao steered his sword down towards the ground andnded a few miles away from the group of people who had still not managed to spot him yet and made his way over towards them.


    ¡­


    "Stop right there! Who are you and what are you doing out here!?" As Xuan Hao made his way over to the group of people, a strong looking middle-aged man stepped forward and called out to him in a threatening tone, clearly cautious about who the person in front of him was.


    Xuan Hao nced at the middle-aged man and instantly recognized him as the Foundation Establishment cultivator that was present in the giant group of what he by now assumed was refugees.


    "I''m a member of the Flying Sword Sect, I was sent to investigate the recent gue outbreak, might I ask why your group is out here¡­?" Deciding that it would most likely be easier if he just stated his background as someone from the Flying Sword Sect here to investigate the gue outbreak, the middle-aged man would most likely have a higher chance of actually wanting to talk to him about his and his groups reason for bing refugees.


    There was no real drawback to this, so as he finished talking, Xuan Hao took out a small token with the symbol of a sword carved beautifully on it.


    The token was the symbol of the Flying Sword Sect and only members of the Flying Sword Sect would have one to represent their identity.


    "This servant greets the Flying Sword Sect" There was different levels to the tokens and the one that Xuan Hao showed was his Core Elder Token, but the middle-aged man did not know about this and still bowed respectfully, even if he only knew that it was an identity token of the Flying Sword Sect. No matter what, this was the Flying Sword Sect territory!


    "No need, I''m only here to investigate about the gue, so if you know anything please do tell me why your group of people turned into refugees." Making a hand gesture for the middle-aged man to get up and stop bowing, Xuan Hao asked in a slightly aloof tone. Making sure that he took on the personage as someone from a prestigious sect.


    At least he would not look like too much of a disappoint when it came to outsiders¡­


    "Yes sir! A few weeks ago, the nearby city of Kubera encountered the gue and soon fell¡­ We normally would not leave because of this, but due to how rich the city of Kubera had been before it fell, a lot of greedy people went there after they heard about its fall and as a result, they got infected by the gue¡­ Some of the people who went were also from our city, so we evacuated before they could return and infect us with the gue as well¡­" Standing up straight again upon hearing Xuan Hao, he immediately started talking about what happened.


    "So, we want to go towards a bigger city located further away from the border as it would be safer and there would be no gue to worry about there¡­" Finishing, the middle-aged man retreated slightly as he waited for Xuan Hao to respond.


    "¡­ I see, your group can continue, there are no strong demon beasts if you continue on the path ahead." Saying this Xuan Hao pointed in the direction he came from as he quickly made his way into the distance before the leader of the group of refugees could respond.


    ¡­


    "The city of Kubera¡­ Huh¡­" Xuan Hao had read about the wealth of the city of Kubera before, it was one of the rtively stronger cities in the territory of the Flying Sword Sect and they even had a peak Core Formation expert backing them up.


    For a city with a Peak Core Formation expert to fall, Xuan Hao really doubted it purely due to the gue and decided to investigate it, after all, it was still on his path and he would at most waste a few hours¡­

 Chapter 90: Lord Kuberas Notebook

    <h4>Chapter 90: Lord Kubera''s Notebook</h4>


    The city of Kubera was quite a legendary city in the territory of the Flying Sword Sect, with merchants from all over the Heavenly Sky Kingdom flocking to it to do trade and with a Peak Core Formation Realm expert know as Lord Kubera as backing, the city was a rtively safe ce.


    The reason for the city of Kubera to enjoy the level of wealth that they did was mostly due to the excellent management of the lord Kubera himself. Taking the city from a normal one and raise it to its legendary status among the merchants of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Many people thought that Lord Kubera was the incarnation of the god of wealth himself and it was said his wealth was above that of many peak forces of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, but these were just rumours¡­ In the end, nobody knew how much wealth Lord Kubera had amassed over the years.


    Xuan Hao himself was also quite curious about this and decided to find out what had happened in the city of Kubera, that inevitably caused it to fall.


    ¡­


    "Wow¡­" Looking down at the city below him, Xuan Hao could not help but let out a slight exmation of surprise.


    The city of Kubera indeed lived up to its name as a wealthy city with countless pagodas and other luxuries buildings spread all over the ce with a giant tower like structure in the middle of it.


    Even in the partially destroyed state that it was currently in, Xuan Hao could clearly see how prosperous the city had been before its fall.


    "But where are all the dead bodies from the gue?" As he inspected the streets of the city, Xuan Hao could not even see a single dead body or living person, the city was eerily empty with nobody present. Dead or alive¡­


    There was no sign of a gue having passed by and ravaged the area, it looked more like someone had fought and destroyed the city in the process, most likely the City Lord of Kubera fighting someone¡­


    But for what had happened to all the people living in the city, Xuan Hao had no clue whatsoever.


    Flying down to the centre of the city, Xuan Hao entered the main tower where the city lord would be living and entered the somewhat destroyed tower with a slightly cautious look on his face.


    After he hadnded on the ground, Xuan Hao had clearly felt the aura of several people in the Nascent Soul Realm still lingering around the area of the tower. No matter what had happened, the city lord had most likely fought with a group of people at the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Guess he is most likely not someone just at the peak of the Core Formation Realm¡­ Maybe someone who went into hiding from a strong empire or something?" Sensing these auras, Xuan Hao felt a slight amount of fear as even the weakest person who had fought here was at the eighth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    If he was not wrong, the City Lord of Kubera should have been an extremely strong peak Nascent Soul Realm expert, if not a Half-Step Domain Lord!


    As he walked further into the tower in the middle of the city, Xuan Hao grew more and more confused about what had happened.


    The reason for this was quite simple, the gue!


    The gue that had supposedly ravaged through the Kubera city was present in the tower, but not inside someone''s body¡­ Instead, a few dozen vials were located in the tower with the dark green ball of energy floating around in some sort of liquid.


    Picking up the vial, Xuan Hao inspected it with a slight frown on his face, it seemed like whatever the city lord of Kubera was doing had most likely offended some of the people behind the gue, but the question was just what he had been researching before those people hade for him and how he was involved with the gue.


    More importantly, whoever was behind the gue clearly had a strong backing and the chances of it being the Azure Sky Kingdom or the newly established ck Rose Demonic Sect was close to none.


    After all, if they had someone that strong, they would most likely not need to use the gue to weaken the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the first ce¡­


    "Hm? This is!?" Putting down the vial again, Xuan Hao looked through the entire tower and soon discovered a small notebook buried beneath the rubble of a nearby copsed wall.


    Removing some of the loose stones and other things on top of it, Xuan Hao saw the title of the notebook.


    [Experimental Log #37: gues Created Using gue Type Divine Energy]


    "¡­"


    Xuan Hao felt himself stopping slightly as he looked at the title of the notebook, this felt more like the logs a scientist back on earth kept when running certain experiments.


    "So, the Lord of Kubera City was an Alchemist¡­" This was the only thing he could think of when he saw the title and the first few pages of the notebook.


    Alchemists mostly worked like a form of scientist and their way of noting down things and certain other aspects were¡­


    [gue #127 of the gue God Church has recently been spreading through the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, most likely the attempt of a newbie Bishop to convert the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to the faith of the gue God and get a promotion.]


    Towards thest few entries of the notebook, the former experimental data that Xuan Hao had no idea what meant, slowly turned into a diary of sorts as the Lord Kubera noted down what was happening outside in more detail.


    [An Archbishop of the Church of the gue God recently found the location of experimental site #5 and destroyed it.]


    The entries into the notebook stopped here as Xuan Hao put the notebook away and prepared to hand it over to the Sect Master when he returned. Maybe the Alchemists of the sect could find out what Lord Kubera had written down in his experimental notes¡­


    Looking around the tower, Xuan Hao let out quiet sigh as he turned to leave and return to his original task¡­


    Whatever the gue was, it seemed like it would be way more troublesome than he had first expected¡­

 Chapter 91: Ambushed!

    <h4>Chapter 91: Ambushed!</h4>


    As Xuan Hao was making his way over to the border vige where the gue outbreak had first started in the Flying Sword Sects territory, others from both the Raging me Sect, Spring Flower Sect and Seven Fates sect were making their way to the border vige where the outbreak had started in their territory.


    The first to reach his destination was an elder from the Raging me Sect, the reason for this was that the Raging me Sect itself was located quite a bit closer to the border areapared to the Flying Sword Sect or any of the other sects, so with that in mind, the elder reached the border vige that had first been infected by the gue in the territory of the Raging me Sect.


    "Hah¡­ Why do I even need toe out and check this god forsaken vige¡­? The gue has already mostly left the Raging me Sects territory by now¡­ Why do we need to care about what happens in the central region¡­? Can''t they deal with it themselves¡­" As he grumbled to himself, the elder of the Raging me Sect entered the vige and saw the still decaying corpses of the people who had perished from the gue.


    Compared to Xuan Hao''s first reaction to the people who had died to the gue, the elder from the Raging me Sect did not really seem to care as he just waltzed directly into the vige itself without caring about the dead bodies.


    The elder from the Raging me Sect did not really care that much about the gue or finding anything that could help cure it, after all, if he had nted the gue, would he leave something that could help cure it behind?


    Them going out to inspect the first infected viges was merely an attempt by the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to try and find anything that might end up helping them out of their current situation.


    All of a sudden, a violent energy suddenly erupted a few meters away from the elder of the Raging me Sect as he was walking through the quiet vige without paying too much attention to his surroundings.


    "Wha-" The elder from the Raging me Sect was caught off guard and even with his quick reaction speed he only barely managed to dodge the surprise attack.


    But this was not without any repercussions, as his left arm had been hit causing him to lose all feeling in it for a moment.


    Following this, four ck robbed individuals showed up and surrounded him, directlyunching another attack before the elder from the Raging me Sect could evenprehend what had just happened.


    Whoosh!


    Just as the four attacks were about to hit him, the elder from the Raging me Sect woke up from his earlier bewilderment and quickly jumped into the air in the direction of one of the ck robed men.


    Boom~


    Arge explosion soon followed as the elder of the Raging me Sectunched a giant ball of fire at the ck robed man, exploding it just before it reached him, causing smoke and dust to fill the entire area.


    Therge explosion caused the divine sense of the ck robed men to have a harder time locking onto the elder of the Raging me Sect as the elder in question quickly used the situation to speed into the distance, trying to run away before the ck robed men locked onto him again.


    Fumbling with amunication talisman in one hand while speeding away from the vige, the elder nervously infused his qi into it as he waited for themunication talisman to light up and connect to the current Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect.


    All of this happened over only a few seconds, as the ck robed men soon realized what had happened and quickly chased off in the direction that the elder from the Raging me Sect had run.


    "Elder me Beard, what is going on? Why are you contacting me? Did you perhaps find somet-"


    "Vice Sect Master!" As a voice echoed out from themunication talisman, the elder from the Raging me Sect quickly interrupted him.


    "W-what is it!? Why are you so anxious?" Sensing the desperation in Elder me Beard''s voice, the Vice Sect Master quickly refocused himself and asked for an exnation.


    "I have been ambushed by four ck robed people at the Nascent Soul Realm and don''t know for how long I can outrun them! All of them have a weird symbol one their chest, it looks lik-"


    Just as the Elder me Beard was about to finish his exnation a powerful dark green energy shaped like a sword suddenly appeared directly in front of him, cutting him down on the spot.


    "Elder me Beard what happened!?" The voice of the Vice Sect Master sounded out from themunication talisman as he already knew deep down that the ck robed men that Elder me Beard had talked about most likely caught up to him.


    Swish~


    A small orb of light escaped from Elder me Beards body as it flew into the distance at a speed way faster than he had moved before.


    This was his Nascent Soul that had barely managed to survive the earlier attack, now that he had lost his physical body, he had no way whatsoever to fight and his future path of cultivation had mostly been caught off unless he could somehow recreate his body or be a pure soul cultivator¡­


    But that was easier said than done as there was not a single cultivation technique for the path of a soul cultivator in the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­


    At least he could fly and move at a way faster speed now that he was no longer burdened by his physical body any longer.


    The ck robed man who hadid in ambush a little further away from the rest look at the escaping Nascent Soul and let out disgruntled noise.


    "I did not expect his nascent soul to survive¡­ Looks like we failed¡­ At the very least he should not be considered a threat in the future." Not minding it too much, the ck robbed man who had ambushed Elder me Beard regrouped with the rest of the ck robed men and soon left the vige.


    The act of them showing up and killing the Nascent Soul experts sent up by the four great sects of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would mostly be a form of intimidation, even if they did not seed like the Bishop wanted, they should have at least showed what would happen if someone dared to try and look into the gue.


    "I should not be punished too badly¡­ Right¡­?" Thinking this, the ck robed man who failed to kill Elder me Beard felt a slight shiver down his spine as he remembered how ruthless the Bishop was¡­

 Chapter 92: The Elders of the Black Rose Sect

    <h4>Chapter 92: The Elders of the ck Rose Sect</h4>


    As the ambush against Elder me Beard had finished, the other Nascent Soul Realm experts on their way to their own vige to investigate each got informed about what had happened.


    This of course included Xuan Hao himself as the Sect Master contacted him about it and called for him to return back to the sect. After all, even if the Heavenly Sky Kingdom could order them to send someone out at the border area to investigate, they could not force them to send someone directly into an enemy ambush¡­


    "I see¡­ Guess I will just return then or is there something else you would want for me to check up on now that I''m already outside?" Talking to themunication talisman in his hand, Xuan Hao stood on top of his sword floating a few hundred meters above the ground as he patiently waited for a response.


    "Hm¡­ There is not really much for us to do at the moment other than wait for things to settle down between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ The only thing that could help would be something that could deal with the gue, so juste back to the sect for now, the notebook you mentioned earlier on might have some clues to this in it!" Thinking about it for quite a while, Sect Master Feng Chen remembered the earlier conversation they had had about what Xuan Hao had found in the city of Kubera.


    "Fine, I will just start heading back then¡­" Feeling both happy and a bit disappointed at the prospect of returning to the sect already, Xuan Hao wished to at least have a chance to fight someone after his breakthrough to the sixth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ At the moment, he had no clue about how strong or weak he was as he never had an opportunity to fight with someone yet.


    ¡­


    The situation of Elder me Beard getting ambushed while investigating the gue and losing his physical body in the process soon started spreading across the Heavenly Sky Kingdom as the panic and fear of normal citizen reached an all-time high.


    The only part of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom that was calm at the moment was the now demonic ck rose sect, as the panic spread through the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, the ck Rose Sect''s territory had calmed downpletely and seemed to have shut off to the outside world as they ignored what was happening outside.


    "Sect Master, we have still not managed to find the Devil Immortal Jade yet¡­ From what we manged to find out, it should most likely havended in the hands of one of the disciples who ran away that day called Chu Yang¡­ But from what we heard, the people tasked with catching him were all killed¡­" Coming in front of arge and majestic throne in the centre of the ck Rose Sect, a slightly skinny elder timidly reported as he waited for the man sitting on top of the throne to respond.


    "Hmph! Then do you perhaps have any idea where he escaped to¡­?" Snorting coldly upon hearing what the skinny elder said, the man sitting on top of the throne asked in a threatening tone.


    "N-no, b-but we did manage to locate the area where he should have escaped and should be able to locate him soon!" Shaking more with every word he said, the skinny elder informed the Sect Master.


    "I see¡­ Go out and find him then and bring the Devil Immortal Jade back to me! Now leave! If you return empty handed¡­" Narrowing his eyes at thest bit, a terrifying pressure suddenly enveloped the skinny elder, causing him to turn even more pale than he already was as he desperately nodded his head.


    "O-of course, I-I will be sure to return with the Devil Immortal Jade and the traitor!" Saying this, the skinny elder did not dare to stay any longer as he quickly made his way out of the giant hall that the meeting had taken ce in.


    "H-how did it go¡­?" As the skinny elder finally made his way outside, a small group of elders anxiously waited for him as they quickly ran over and asked him.


    The Devil Immortal Jade was way too important for the ck Rose Sect at the moment and the fact that it was left unattended by someone was already a failure and the person in question had already been killed personally by the Sect Master himself!


    It had to be known that the person in question was a Core Elder who had already reached the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Even losing a single one would be a tremendous blow to the ck Rose Sect, yet the Sect Master had killed him out of pure rage, scaring the rest of the upper echelons in the process.


    "The Sect Master ordered me to go and find the Devil Immortal jade and the traitor¡­ And if I can''t find them¡­" The skinny elder did not need to say anymore as the others understood clearly what would happen if he failed.


    "So¡­ Did you find out anything about where he might have escaped to¡­?" One of the surrounding elders curiously stepped forward and asked.


    "I have no idea, I just came up with it to buy myself some more time¡­" Saying this, the skinny elder let out a heavy sigh as he felt that his future was quite bleak.


    "¡­" The other elders did not say anything either as they all just stood quietly staring at each other for a moment, if they had known things would turn out like this, they would have never agreed with the Sect Master to be a demonic sect¡­


    They might be stronger than their past selves, but the freedom they had in the past had long since disappeared as they could only cling onto the hope that the Devil Immortal Jade brought to them¡­


    As long as that thing seeded, they would be able to live more peacefully without fearing a sect, kingdom or empire suddenly sending someone to exterminate them¡­


    All the elders knew very well how hated the demonic sects and cultivators were¡­ But in the end, their greed for power had led them down a path they couldn''t return from any longer¡­

 Chapter 93: Sitting on the Hilltop

    <h4>Chapter 93: Sitting on the Hilltop</h4>


    Having the task of investigating the border vige where the gue first started stopped, Xuan Hao flew back towards the Flying Sword Sect with a somewhat disappointed expression on his face.


    In the future he should make time for himself to go and explore deeper into the Burning Mountain Range, at the very least he should be able to find some demon beasts to fight with and assess his current strength.


    Maybe he would even be lucky enough to find something that could help improve Chu Yang''s soul purity¡­ But for a spiritual herb that could increase soul purity, there would most definitely be a strong demon beast to protect it.


    As he was flying through the sky on his sword, Xuan Hao sensed someone on a small hilltop a little further away from him and grew quite curious as he sensed that the person was infected with the gue.


    This was the first time Xuan Hao had seen someone infected with gue still being alive! So, it was a given for him to make his way over to the person in question.


    "A-are you an Immortal!?" On the top of the hilltop, a middle-aged woman was sitting down with a depressed look on her face, suddenly sensing something above her, she had looked up and spotted Xuan Hao slowly descending down from the sky on top of sword.


    To the middle-aged woman who was nothing more than a normal person, Xuan Hao looked like an Immortal descending from the heavens themselves as he slowly made his way down from his sword and stood in front of the shocked woman.


    "¡­" Xuan Hao did not say anything, instead he gently took the hand of the still shocked middle-aged woman and allowed his divine sense to enter her body and inspect the gue inside of her.


    The gue itself was just like what Xuan Hao had seen before as several roots spread out from the dantian area of her body, the life of the middle-aged woman was slowly draining away as the roots absorbed it and transferred it back to where the dantian should have been located.


    The dark green orb of energy was there, slowly growing as it absorbed more and more of the middle-aged woman''s lifeforce.


    "A-are you perhaps here to send me off¡­?" Not hearing Xuan Hao answer her question as he had gently ced his hand on her, the middle-aged woman already knew what her situation was and momentarily thought that Xuan Hao was an immortal sent down to guide the souls of those who passed on into the circle of reincarnation.


    The middle-aged woman had heard tales of immortals descending down from the skies and guiding those about to pass away into the cycle of reincarnation from her vige when she was young.


    The constant pain with every breath she took convinced her that this must be the case as she felt herself growing weaker and weaker with each passing second.


    Xuan Hao did still not say anything as he felt the dark green energy inside of the woman''s body suddenly start absorbing the lifeforce of the woman at an increasingly fast pace.


    "!"


    Trying to forcibly inject his own qi to slow down the absorption of the woman''s lifeforce, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a strange kind of power preventing him from doing anything, it was almost like an omnipotent kind of force radiated from the small dark green orb the moment he tried to interact with it and prevent it from absorbing the woman''s lifeforce.


    Are these the so called "Laws" mentioned in the notebook of Lord Kubera?


    The Laws that Xuan Hao thought about was something briefly mentioned in the notebook of Lord Kubera when he talked about the different gues of the Church of the gue God.


    The Law was the same thing as the Dao that immortal cultivators like himself tried toprehend, just that the God of gue called it a Law instead of a Dao.


    The problem for Xuan Hao was, that only people at the Domain Lord Realm or at the very least the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm, could starting into contact with the Dao.


    Feeling extremely powerless at the moment, Xuan Hao retracted his qi from the middle-aged woman as he let out a slightly helpless sigh while looking at the lifeforce slowly draining out of the woman''s body without being able to do anything about it.


    "Maybe I will be able to meet my husband once again in my next reincarnation¡­? Hah¡­ Mr. Immortal, will you please help me meet my husband once again after I pass away¡­?" Feeling the surrounding slowly growing dimmer and dimmer, the woman slowlyid down on the ground to rx as she felt it was growing exhausting even to sit up any longer, but even then, she still looked at Xuan Hao with a certain light still shinning in her eyes.


    "¡­" Xuan Hao felt the desperation hidden in the woman''s voice and decided to just nod his head in an attempt to let her peacefully pass on without too much worry on her mind.


    "I see¡­ Then I must thank you¡­" Saying that the middle-aged woman slowly closed her eyes as her bodypletely rxed on top of the small hill, she had managed to peacefully pass on¡­


    Xuan Hao felt quite sad when he felt that the middle-aged woman he had just met passed away, but he still focused on observing the inner workings of her body, as he saw how the dark green orb of energy matured and the energy flowing through the roots of it slowly stopped working. Leaving only the dark green orb inside the woman''s body active.


    Thinking of something, Xuan Hao still had no idea how the gue was spreading in the first ce, but upon seeing the dark green orb once again, he thought that it might have something to do with it.


    After all, the dark green orb in the woman''s body was many times bigger than the one he had seen in the abandoned vige earlier!

 Chapter 94: Chu Yangs Future Professionis is...

    <h4>Chapter 94: Chu Yang''s Future Professionis is...</h4>


    As Xuan Hao was thinking about why the dark green orb of energy was bigger inside the now deceased woman, it slowly started expanding as the roots system it had created inside of the woman that had just stopped working became active again.


    The roots spreading out from the dark green orb of energy slowly transferred some of the energy from the dark green orb into the ends of the roots.


    Following this, small green orbs slowly exited from the pores of the deceased woman''s skin, invisible to the naked eye, Xuan Hao watched as the small green orbs slowly floated into the distance, carried away by the gentle breeze passing by.


    "Well¡­ That is one way¡­" Looking at the small green orbs numbering in the thousands floating into the distance, Xuan Hao looked back at the now dead woman for onest time before he waved his hand causing the earth beneath her to slowly open up and bury her body underneath.


    Next a small gravestone appeared at the peak of the small hilltop.


    Xuan Hao had no idea who the woman was, but he decided to give her a burial now that he had met her in herst moments¡­


    Whoosh~


    Xuan Hao looked back at the small hilltop onest time before he slowly disappeared into the distance.


    ¡­


    "Why do I need to do this¡­?"


    Back at the Flying Sword Sect a little after Xuan Hao had left, Chu Yang speechlessly looked at the different herbs that were ced in small pots in front of him by his "kind-hearted" senior sister.


    "What are you talking about dear junior brother~ it''s important to learn a side profession as cultivators so we have a way to buy the cultivation resources that we need in the future!" Smiling widely at Chu Yang, Qing Yi handed a book about botany over to him.


    "B-but why do I have to learn botany? Can''t I just learn something like cksmithing or tailoring¡­?" Still not understanding why his senior sister was so insistent on him learning botany, Chu Yang questioned with a confused look on his face.


    "Because I''m learning alchemy! If both of us support each other, you will grow nts and herbs, while I will brew potions and concoct pills to sell!" Saying thest part, a strange light started shining in Qing Yi''s eyes.


    Looking down on the book that Qing Yi had handed to him about the cultivation of different spiritual nts and exotic herbs, Chu Yang could not help but want to refuse, but the look in his senior sisters eyes looked exceptionally scary for some reason¡­ Chu Yang felt that if he refused his senior sisters "kind" intentions, he would have something bad happen to him¡­


    "Fine¡­ I will make sure to learn botany¡­" Sighing a bit inside of his head, Chu Yang decided to do what Qing Yi had told him.


    No matter what, he would most likely end up learning a profession down the line, it did not really matter much to him which one he would end up learning in the first ce and the fact that Qing Yi was learning alchemy was indeed true¡­


    At least this way, both should be able to support each other in the future¡­ Chu Yang did not really see any disadvantages to this, but deep down, he still felt that something was wrong¡­


    "Great! Master''s pavilion also has a greenhouse in it, luckily for us it is not in use, so you can use it to nt herbs and different kind of nts in the future!" Hearing Chu Yang''s response, Qing Yi started smiling ear from ear as she quickly grabbed onto Chu Yang and dragged him in the direction of the empty greenhouse inside the pavilion.


    "Wha-" Chu Yang wanted to stop her, but he did not find an opportunity to do so and soon both of them arrived at a greenhouse deep inside the pavilion, there was a small garden area next to it with a cute artificial river running through it.


    "I have already left quite a few different herbs of the Mortal Grade inside the greenhouse for you! You can just start practicing with them now and use the book I gave you to take care of them properly!


    I wille back in a few hours and see how well you are doing." Saying this, Qing Yi quickly turned around and before Chu Yang could understand what had happened, she was gone.


    "D-did she make use of the fact that I''m not good with directions¡­?" Looking at the entrance to the small garden area where the greenhouse was located, Chu Yang felt like Qing Yi had made use of the fact that he was not good with directions to force him into learning botany, or she wouldn''t help show him the way out¡­


    No¡­ Qing Yi would not do something like that to him¡­ Right¡­?


    Looking down at the book about nt and herb cultivation that was left in front of him, Chu Yang started doubting his senior sister''s good intentions for him ever so slightly.


    ¡­


    "The n was a sess! Hehe, now I just have to convince him to help mass producing those orchids that I need for the new potion recipe I got¡­" Laughing a bit to herself when she thought about her new personal herb supplier working free of charge for her, Qing Yi happily smiled as she made her way out of the pavilion and entered training ground to train for a bit.


    "¡­"


    A little further away, Zhi Ruo had watched the entire scene unfold and could not help but feel a little sorry for Chu Yang.


    It looks like that Chu Yang should hope that Elder Xuan does not have to go out of the sect for anything too often¡­


    Thinking this to herself, Zhi Ruo soon returned to her duties of cleaning the pavilion.


    Recently she had gotten lucky and was sent a few artifacts specifically made for the purpose of cleaning, thereby making her job easier and less physically stressing overall.

 Chapter 95: A Shady Stall Owner and a Shady Buyer

    <h4>Chapter 95: A Shady Stall Owner and a Shady Buyer</h4>


    As she had just left Chu Yang impriso- to study in the greenhouse deep in the pavilion, Qing Yi felt quite happy as she made her way down the mountain peak and entered the sect.


    Today she had nned to visit the Artifact Hall of the Flying Sword Sect.


    The Artifact Hall held most of the artifacts that was owned by the Flying Sword Sect and disciples went there from time to time whenever they needed a new weapon or other kinds of artifacts.


    But this was not the reason why Qing Yi was currently making her way over there, no, instead she was going to the marketce that had sprung up around the Artifact Hall!


    The marketce was the main ce where the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect gathered together to sell or buy the things, they got from going outside on missions or different tasks issued by the Flying Sword Sect.


    Luckily for the disciples, the sect did not close down the marketce that the disciples had created by themselves, but instead supported it and encouraged the disciples to do business with each other.


    In the eyes of the elders from the sect, the marketce was a great opportunity for the disciples to interact with each other and learn how to trade with others.


    "Ah! Qing Yi~ Hello~" At the entrance to the marketce a girl ran over and hugged Qing Yi happily the moment she saw her.


    "Shihan! Release me!" Trying her best to get out of the sudden hug from her friend, Qing Yi barely managed to get free after much struggle and quickly made some distance between them as she warily stared a Zeng Shihan smiling at her.


    "What''s wrong Yiyi~ I''m simply happy to finally see you again! I have been forced to take up so much extra work by the secttely and haven''t had any free time at all!" Ignoring the slightly angry look on Qing Yi, Zeng Shihan happily approached her and grabbed hold of her hand as she began dragging her towards the marketce.


    "You changed quite a bit over only a month¡­" Saying this, Qing Yi felt a little helpless as she stared up a Zeng Shihan with a clearly sad look on her face.


    "Hah¡­ Why did you suddenly degrade from a respectable senior sister, into¡­ This¡­"


    "I''m just more confident to be myself." Not minding anything that Qing Yi said, Zeng Shihan still kept a smile on her face as she dragged Qing Yi over to the front of a small stall close by the entrance of the marketce.


    "What do you need?" Casting a shady look in the direction of Zeng Shihan, the stall owner who was a slightly older disciple looked like an extremely suspicious individual at the moment.


    The fact that he was carefully grinding some questionable spiritual herbs and mixing them into an even more suspicious looking potion bottle did not help with his image¡­


    "I heard that you got some rtively high-quality herbs recently¡­" Acting in an equally shady manner, Zeng Shihan responded to the shady disciple sitting at the stall.


    "Hm¡­ I see word spreads quite fast, but what can you give me in return¡­?" Taking the potion bottle filled with the grinded up herbs, the shady disciple responds to Zeng Shihan as he took out a bottle filled with a bright blue liquid and filled the potion bottle with the grinded herbs up with it.


    Soon the liquid in the potion bottle turned bright red as the grinded up herbs inside the liquid dissolved.


    "¡­" Not saying anything more, Zeng Shihan took out a small bag and threw it in front of the shady disciple.


    "Here, d to do business with you." Inspecting the things inside the small bag, the shady disciple soon smiled a bit as he took out a small bag of his own and threw it over to Zeng Shihan before he put away the small bag that Zeng Shihan had thrown him and resumed mixing other ingredients into the now bright red liquid inside of the potion bottle.


    "No, the pleasure was mine." Saying so, Zeng Shihan gave an equally shady smile as she picked up the bag that the shady disciple had thrown to her.


    "¡­"


    Meanwhile, Qing Yi looked speechlessly at the interaction between both of them not knowing what to say¡­


    The shady disciple with a questionable bright red potion in hand was her senior brother Yu from the Alchemy Hall¡­


    Why did they need to do things like this¡­? Just look at how many other disciples stopped just to see what both of you were doing!


    Qing Yi did not know how these two had gotten to know each other and honestly, she did not feel like she wanted to know in the first ce¡­ It seemed like both of them were quite troublesome when they were together¡­


    "Hey! What are both of you doing over there!?" Just as Qing Yi was about to forcefully drag Zeng Shihan away, as the person in question was about to try and do another "shady" deal with Yu once again, a shout came from behind.


    Turning around both Qing Yi and Zeng Shihan looked towards the person in question, Yu was no exception either as he put down his suspicious potion bottle as well and looked over to see who shouted at them all of a sudden.


    "Ah! It''s junior brother Lu Wen! Is he here to stop those shady people?"


    "I think so, I heard Lu Wen is quite a righteous character, he was even epted as the disciple of Core Elder Wang Hu after the neer tournament!"


    "Is that so? I heard that he recently helped the security personal of the Flying Sword City deal with some people causing trouble!"


    "I saw that stall owner and girl exchange something suspicious with each other earlier! They are clearly up to no good!"


    "Looks like Lu Wen saw it as well and decided to step in and make sure that they don''t cause any trouble for the sect!"


    "That girl besides the suspicious one is probably also up to no good, I saw both of theme together earlier!"


    "¡­" As the surrounding disciples talked enthusiastically about the situation, the three people in question looked speechlessly at each other not knowing what to do as they saw Lu Wen walk over in heroic manner, seemingly about to uphold the peace of the sect and make sure nobody makes any trouble.


    The one who was the most speechless was Qing Yi, as she felt that she had unjustifiably been dragged into the situation as an innocent bystander.

 Chapter 96: Lu Wen Runs Away

    <h4>Chapter 96: Lu Wen Runs Away</h4>


    Lu Wen had been quite ashamed back when he had lost in the neer tournament after he had stopped to breakthrough and felt that he needed to improve himself further so something like that would not end up happening again! Next time he participated in a tournament; he would make sure he didn''t end up breaking through before it ended.


    With that in mind, Lu Wen tried his best to improve over thest half years'' time and soon gathered the admiration of the rest of the sect''s younger generation.


    With that, Lu Wen acted as a model disciple and lived up to the rest of the younger generation''s admiration, bing someone who helped the other members whenever he could.


    Hearing from a fellow disciple about two suspicious individuals doing a shady deal of some sort, Lu Wen hurried over to deal with the two troublemakers before they did anything to disturb the peace of the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Hey! What are both of you doing over there!?" Seeing the two individuals in question doing yet another shady trade with so many disciples watching them the moment he showed up, seemingly not caring at all, Lu Wen felt quite angry as he immediately made his way over to deal with the two troublemakers in question.


    One of them even had a suspicious potion in his hand¡­ Maybe it was some illegal potion, or something even worse banned by the sect?


    Thinking this, Lu Wen sped up even more as he soon arrived in front of both the troublemakers in question.


    "¡­"


    Zeng Shihan and Yu both looked at each other with an awkward smile as they saw the righteous Lu Wening over and standing directly in front of both of them.


    "With Lu Wen here, both of them are sure to get punished!"


    "Yes! I wonder how Lu Wen will deal with these two¡­"


    "Surly it will not be a great oue for both of the troublemakers! I just want to know what shady items they are trading with each other."


    Listing to the surrounding disciples getting even more heated as Lu Wen had made his way over, Qing Yi felt like she wanted to dig a hole and disappear into it¡­ Why did both of them have to act like those shady people handling illegal items in some random alleyway¡­?


    "Yoyo, what do we owe the pleasure of youing here junior? Hehe¡­" Putting on an even more shady appearance than before, Yu seemed to have thought of something funny as he started to y even more into the role than he did before.


    "Indeed¡­ Maybe this junior is interested in some of the more special items here as well¡­?" Deciding to y along as well, Zeng Shihan put on an equally shady look as gave Lu Wen a smile of encouragement, seemingly not hearing the surrounding people talk at all.


    "¡­"


    Not expecting Zeng Shihan and Yu''s reaction, both Lu Wen and the surrounding disciples stopped for a moment. Not really knowing what to do in this situation.


    Lu Wen was the worst case as he just froze with his mouth open, just about to chastise the two of them as he had expected both of his shady seniors toe up with an excuse of some kind to try and get out of the current situation.


    He had never expected both of them to take him as someone who wanted to buy something as well!


    "Hm? Maybe you are worried about the price? No worries, I definitely have the best prices around here! You can just ask this fine customer of mine if you have any doubt!" Seeing Lu Wen freeze up, Yu hurriedly "encouraged" him as he even referred to his earlier customer Zeng Shihan with a smiling face.


    "Indeed, indeed! He is definitely the best one around this marketce! Has the best prices as well!" Seeing what Yu was doing, Zeng Shihan smiled widely as she followed his lead and made sure to rmend him to the potential new "customer".


    You! What do both of you think you are doing!?" Recovering from his earlier frozen state, Lu Wen yelled angrily at both of them as stared directly at the potion in Yu''s hand at the moment.


    "What do both of you think that you are selling here in the first ce!? Do you not know things like that are illegal here!?" Saying this in an even more pissed off tone, Lu Wen violently took the potion bottle out of Yu''s hand as he began to chastise the shady senior brother and sister in front of him without holding back at all.


    "Hm? What do you mean illegal? How is something like this illegal?" Waiting for Lu Wen to calm down for a bit, Yu took the potion that he had stolen back and put on a neutral look as he questioned Lu Wen.


    "What do you mean?! This is clearly one of those illegal potions used to¡­ you know¡­ make that thing work better¡­ The sect has long since banned it from my knowledge due to the side effects that it brings!" Lu Wen''s face turned slightly red as he tried to exin what kind of potion Yu had in his hands.


    "Hm? What do you mean? This is just a normal juice with some herbs added to it for an enhanced vour¡­" Having a clearly fake bewildered look on his face, Yu shook the potion bottle a bit before he drank some of the content inside of it.


    "NO!" Trying to stop him from drinking the potion, Lu Wen tried to grab it away from him again but failed as Zeng Shihan stepped in and stopped him.


    Lu Wen and the rest of the spectating disciples could only watch with horror as they watched Yu drink the liquid inside the potion bottle.


    Some of the female disciples even blushed a bit as they tried their best to look away.


    "Ah, this truly is the best!" Not reacting at all to the horror-stricken faces of the disciples around him, Yu let out a rxed voice as he smiled happily.


    "Hm? What is wrong with you guys? Why are you all looking at me like that?" Seemingly just noticing the surrounding disciples, Yu asked all of them teasingly before he looked back over at Lu Wen.


    "By the way, what was that potion you were talking about earlier? I''m quite interested in how you would know what it looked like¡­"


    Hearing the question that Yu asked him, Lu Wen blushed heavily as he quickly turned around and ran away before anyone could react.


    So, what if they did a shady deal, those two were clearlyid out a trap for him!


    Thinking this, Lu Wen did not want to deal with that troublesome senior brother and sister any longer, if he continued any longer, he would no longer have any face left in the sect¡­ In the worst case his master would punish him again!

 Chapter 97: Returning to the Pavilion...

    <h4>Chapter 97: Returning to the Pavilion...</h4>


    Looking at Lu Wen''s figure quickly disappearing from their vision, both Yu and Zeng Shihanughed a bit to themselves as the crowd that had gathered around them seemed to have realized that there was not really anything wrong with what Yu and Zeng Shihan was doing, as they quickly dispersed and returned to doing their own thing again.


    "You guys set him up?" Looking at theughing Zeng Shihan and Yu, Qing Yi realized as she looked at both of them with a questioning look stered on her face.


    "Why?" This question was on her mind, no matter what, she could not see any reason as to why these two would work together to set up Lu Wen in the first ce.


    From what Qing Yi knew about him outside what she had learned about him from the neer tournament, Lu Wen seemed like a decent person, although he was a bit more stupid and arrogantpared to the normal disciple.


    But she did not really see this as too much of a problem as he mostly spend his time dealing with various troublemakers and often helped other disciples whenever they found themselves in trouble.


    Qing Yi still remembered a time when Lu Wen saved a young merchants daughter in a town close to the Flying Sword Sect from a rich second-generation kid''s lecherous intentions and wanted to take her in as his seventh concubine or something.


    Apparently, he ended up fighting the lecherous kid''s great great grandfather who was at the Core Formation Realm after beating up the great grandfather who was close to the peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm and his master Core Elder Wang Hu who had just arrived at the location had to step in and help him out¡­


    After that incident, Lu Wen''s reputation inside the sect had skyrocketed and many saw him as the new leader of the younger generation. After all the current leader of the younger generation, Ling Song was already close to his thirties and had recently reached the Core Formation Realm¡­


    "That kid caused me quite a lot of trouble, a few days ago when I was trying to sell some potions here and imed they were some defunct products of some kind, and he wanted his money back¡­" Yu answered with a slightly annoyed look on his face.


    "Yeah! Last time I tried to sell some of my artifacts as well, but that Lu Wen imed that I was charging way too much for them and wanted me to lower the price range and reach the same level as the other disciples sold for! He was clearly trying to make me lose money! If others had the same quality as mine, why not just buy theirs instead?" Zeng Shihan looked in the direction that Lu Wen had disappeared into with a murderous look.


    So, it was about him trying to "scam" them out of money¡­


    Upon hearing their reasons Qing Yi did not mind them fooling Lu Wen, but instead felt that it was too merciful¡­ If it were her, Qing Yi would have made sure he regretted trying to fool her about of her profits!


    "So, what was it that you bought from senior brother Yu?" Not thinking about Lu Wen any longer, Qing Yi instead turned her attention towards the thing that Zeng Shihan had gotten earlier from Senior Yu.


    "Ah that, it''s just some ingredients for today''s dinner¡­ I wanted to try making it myself for once, so I asked Yu to get me some specific herbs and vegetables for it. Yu is known for growing all kinds of unique herbs and vegetables in the sect, so if you need any in the future, I rmend going to him for them." Taking out the small bag she got handed by Yu earlier, Zeng Shihan showed the different kinds of herbs and vegetables inside it to Qing Yi before she quickly closed it and put it away.


    "I see¡­ Should we get going then, I still want to buy some herbs before going back again."


    "Sure!" Smiling brightly, Zeng Shihan answered as both of them walked away from Yu''s small stall and entered deeper into the marketce.


    The marketce was one of the liveliest ces in the Flying Sword Sect, as disciples were always present there trying to either buy or sell something. For this reason, a lot of small stalls selling all sorts of street food managed mostly by some members from the servant quarters had popped up around the ce.


    The servant quarters mostly viewed this as a good experience for the younger members to get a chance to interact with the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect and maybe it was even a chance for them to meet a friend that could be a future elder and get to work for themter.


    Though for most of the servantsing to sell street food at the marketce, it was a way for them to rx and earn a bit more besides the sry paid out by the servant quarters every month.


    The time spent in the marketce in front of the Artifact Hall passed by quickly and soon a few hours had gone by.


    "Bye, Yiyi~ I will miss you~"


    "I will see you next time Shihan! Bye, bye!" Waving goodbye outside the entrance to the marketce, Qing Yi smiled happily as both her and Zeng Shihan made their way back their own home after a quick goodbye.


    ¡­


    "Ah¡­ I forgot about junior brother Chu Yang¡­" Standing in front of the pavilion, Qing Yi quickly remembered that she had left Chu Yang to learn about herb and nt cultivation deep inside of a greenhouse in the pavilion.


    Making her way over to the greenhouse where she had left him earlier, Qing Yi did not feel too worried about him. After all, she had only left him for a few hours!


    "S-senior sister? I-is that you¡­?" Upon entering the greenhouse, Qing Yi immediately found Chu Yangying half dead in a corner with some of the herbs that she had left for him to nt close by, seemingly with a few bite marks in them.


    "¡­" She forgot that he had not eaten anything yet and even if he were a Foundation Establishment cultivator, Chu Yang''s appetite was extremely huge, and he could not go for long without getting something to eat.


    This was mostly due to his recent intense training that he had grown used to eating quite often.


    In the end, the current sad sight of him surrounded by half eaten nts was due to him not having eaten anything since yesterday.

 Chapter 98: Danger Approaching

    <h4>Chapter 98: Danger Approaching</h4>


    After getting her junior brother Chu Yang outside and sending him over to the dining hall, Qing Yi went back into the greenhouse that he had been using to check out what herbs or spiritual nts he had ended up eating¡­


    Hopefully, he did not eat anything that would end up bringing him some form of negative effect, at the very least, Qing Yi knew that the herbs she handed for him to practice with were only at the mortal grade¡­ So, it should not have too much of a negative effect on someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­


    Entering the greenhouse once again, Qing Yi walked over to the corner where she had found Chu Yang earlier and picked up a few of the half-eaten spiritual herbs and inspected them closely.


    "Looks like my junior brother will not be having a good time in the next few days¡­" Holding up one of the herbs that she had picked up from the ground, Qing Yi smiled awkwardly to herself as she thought about the sad fate of her junior brother over the next few days.


    Most of the herbs that he had eaten would be harmless, but there was one of them that was not¡­ The earth ca lily, this herb was rtively ordinary and could be found almost everywhere in Ewaria, but it had some interesting properties due to it having some earth qi inside of it, this in turn had resulted in some quite¡­ unique side effects after consumption¡­


    One of which resulted in the person who consumed it needed to use the toilet quite often¡­


    "I hope nothing bad happens to him at the dining hall¡­" Thinking this, Qing Yi sent her thoughts towards her junior brother. Hoping that he did not end up doing something that would end up embarrassing himself in front of the other disciples there¡­


    At the dining hall of the Flying Sword Sect, Chu Yang ended up running away all of a sudden at speed faster than what a Foundation Establishment cultivator should be able to muster. Surprising all the surrounding disciple that were sitting at the tables eating by themselves.


    A littleter, Chu Yang found a restroom and felt the pain of eating some random herbs that he had no idea about¡­


    Like this, the next few days passed by quickly with Chu Yang stuck in an endless loop of suffering while Qing Yi could not help butugh at him every time, she got a chance to do so. Not feeling sorry for him at all, no matter what, it would not kill him to go through a little suffering¡­ At the very least he would learn a little more about the suffering some herbs could bring.


    ¡­


    Arriving a bit outside of the Flying Sword City that was just besides the Flying Sword Sect, a skinny elderly man wrapped in apletely ck robe advanced to the entrance and quickly entered after showing a small token with a weird symbol on it to one of the guards who nodded and allowed him to enter.


    Walking through the city, the elderly man soon came to a stop in front of a rtively secluded area, with a somewhat rundown inn ced close to the nearby road, but still a bit far away from it.


    Seeing this, the skinny elderly man smiled slightly to himself as he walked over to the inn and entered through a backdoor.


    "Who are you?! What do you want here?!" The moment that he entered through the back entrance, a group of men came over and one of them threateningly asked him as the rest of them pulled out all sorts of weapons. Ready to act the moment that the elderly man showed any sign of doing something threating towards them.


    "I''m sent by the elders to check up on how things are going here in the Flying Sword City and see if you have found out anything about the person that we are searching for!" Ignoring the threatening men with their weapons drawn, the skinny elderly man took out the token he had shown to the guard earlier and showed it the man who had asked him.


    "Ah! So, it''s an envoy! Sorry for the earlier reaction, but recently a lot of people havee to look around, I think that the Flying Sword Sect might be on to us already." Saying, the man at the front who had spoken earlier signalled for the rest of the men to lower their weapons as he exined to the skinny elderly man.


    "I understand, we already knew that it would only be a matter of time before the Flying Sword Sect picked up on us in the first ce¡­ But did you find the person we were searching for?!" Answering in a slightly angrier tone of voice, the skinny elderly man stressed the importance of thest part as he stared at the man at the front of the group.


    "Y-yes envoy, w-we did manage to find out something about the person that the sect asked us to find!" Flinching a bit upon seeing the envoy get angry all of a sudden, the man in the front quickly answered the question instead of forgetting to answer it again and pissing off the envoy even more.


    "So? Where is he?" Raising an eyebrow at the mention of this, instead of getting happy. The envoy clearly saw the hesitation in the man''s eyes and knew that something was wrong.


    "H-he became a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect¡­ F-from what we know he does not leave the sect and he should also have be a disciple of one of the Core Elders¡­" Trying to avoid eye contact with the envoy, the man looked all over the ce as he nervously exined.


    "¡­I will have to inform the elders about this, you lot stay here and do what you were doing beforehand." Feeling his expression darken upon hearing what the now shivering man told him, the envoy took out amunication talisman and walked upstairs to find a room where he could quietly inform his superiors and find out what the next n of action would be¡­


    A Core Elder in the Flying Sword Sect was at least at the Nascent Soul Realm, this was not something that he, a mere envoy, could deal with¡­

 Chapter 99: Future Alchemy Competition

    <h4>Chapter 99: Future Alchemy Competition</h4>


    Entering the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao immediately made his way over to the Sect Master''s pavilion and handed the notebook of Lord Kubera over to him, before making his way back to his own pavilion.


    It had not taken as much time as Xuan Hao had expected for it to take, so his disciples should be quite surprised upon seeing him again so quickly¡­


    "Maybe I should just go to the Burning Mountain Range and practice a bit¡­ They won''t know that I had returned anyways and will most likely just think that I''m still out handling the task given to me by the sect master¡­" Coming to a stop on his way back to his pavilion, Xuan Hao looked in the direction of where it was located.


    Whoosh~


    "Indeed, I have to at least know how strong I am¡­" After thinking over it for a bit, Xuan Hao decided to enter the Burning Mountain Range once again, this time just to find a demon beast to practice with and find out how strong he currently waspared to the past him.


    ¡­


    "You have to make sure the Spirit Jade Flowers are nurtured with water qi on a daily basis, or they will simply die out!"


    As Xuan Hao left the sect once again, Qing Yi was currently doing her best to train up her recently recovered junior brother up to be the best botanist out there.


    "Qing Yi, there is someone out there asking for you." A voice drifted over from the entrance to the greenhouse that Qing Yi and Chu Yang were currently in, as Qing Yi turned around and looked towards the source of the voice.


    "Zhi Ruo? Do you perhaps know who it is and what they want? I''m quite busy at the moment as you can see¡­" Qing Yi signalled towards Chu Yang, as the person in question resumed what he was doing beforehand.


    "The person said that he was from the Alchemy Hall¡­ He also said that if you would still note, I should tell you about apetition with a really lucrative prize happening soon."


    "A lucrative prize!?" Hearing what Zhi Ruo said, Qing Yi threw the book she had in her hand away and immediately appeared besides Zhi Ruo with a smile on her lips.


    "Come, let''s go immediately!"


    "Ouch!"


    As the book hit Chu Yang directly in the back of his head, causing him to almost pass out due to the force behind the throw, Qing Yi soon left the greenhouse together with Zhi Ruo.


    "¡­" Chu Yang soon turned to look around the greenhouse after he recovered, only to discover that he had been left alone once again¡­


    "Ah, so it''s senior brother Yu! What was thepetition that Zhi Ruo mentioned?" Outside of the pavilion, Yu was standing there quietly as he saw Qing Yi rush out of the pavilion, it looked like the method that Zeng Shihan had taught him worked quite well!


    "Recently the Alchemy Hall of our sect has gotten invited to a youth alchemypetition. Thepetition is supposedly supported by the Sky Empire and the prizes for even getting into the top 100 is extremely lucrative. From what I Know, at the moment, you are the only one who reaches the right age for participating in thepetition in our Alchemy Hall, so I came over to ask if you were interested to join¡­ Even just joining would allow one to get a participation award of quite a few spirit stones~" Exining with a smile on his face, senior Yu looked expectingly at Qing Yi.


    "I-I really want to join, but I will have to ask my master first¡­ H-how long do I have until it starts?" Struggling a lot with not just epting right away, Qing Yi asked senior Yu.


    "Haha, you don''t need to worry about it, I know that your master is out at the moment. Thepetition will only begin in little over half a years'' time, so you can just ask your master when he returns." Knowing the reason for her struggle, senior Yuughed a bit upon seeing this before he reassured her.


    "Great! By the way, what is the reason for thepetition? Why is the Sky Empire hosting apetition all of a sudden?" Smiling happily upon realizing that there was more than enough time before thepetition, Qing Yi suddenly asked about the reason behind it.


    No matter what, the Sky Empire would not host apetition for no reason all of a sudden and even give away some valuable stuff to attract people toe and participate¡­


    "Indeed¡­ From what I know, apparently an old Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire is looking to take in a disciple and decided to set up thepetition to find a disciple. The reason for the age requirement is also because of this, the Artisan Alchemist would not want to take in someone from the older generation and instead wanted someone young and talented..." A slight sadness could be seen in senior Yu''s eyes when he mentioned this.


    "¡­" Qing Yi decided to not interrupt him as she just quietly watches senior Yu slowlye to terms with that fact that he was no longer so young anymore.


    "The Alchemy Hall decided that if you were going to ept and join thepetition, we would make sure to help you improve over the next half year! Of course, that is after we have dealt with the recent gue outbreak first¡­" Thinking about the gue that was still getting worse and worse in the central region, senior Yu really wanted for a solution to appear soon so things could return to normal again.


    Having to constantly dedicate his time to helping with research was extremely exhausting! Especially when it was not something he originally wanted to research in the first ce, he even had to cut out the time he normally used to improve himself to study the gue and trying to find a way to cure it¡­


    "For now, follow me back to the Alchemy Hall, we need to get you some new books and a few new pill and potion forms as well." With this, senior Yu lead the way as both of them made their way towards the Alchemy Hall.


    "Ah, Zhi Ruo, please get Chu Yang some food, he is currently in the greenhouse training in how to properly take care of nts and herbs!" Just before she disappeared down the mountain peak, Qing Yi remembered Chu Yang this time around as she instructed Zhi Ruo to take care of him and make sure he got something to eat this time around.


    "¡­" Zhi Ruo just quietly nodded as she looked at where Qing Yi had disappeared before looking back at the pavilion in the direction of the greenhouse that Chu Yang was staying at.

 Chapter 100: Fur Ball Demon Beast Appears!

    <h4>Chapter 100: Fur Ball Demon Beast Appears!</h4>


    Whoosh~


    At the edges of the Burning Mountain Range, Xuan Haonded quietly as he put away his sword and looked up at the giant mountain range stretching on for thousands upon thousands of miles into the distance.


    "Hm¡­ From the information given by the Explorers Union, there should be a demon beast at the Nascent Soul Realm a few miles away from here¡­" Taking out a map, Xuan Hao inspected one of the few marked areas on it and soon closed it and proceeded to take out his sword once again before flying in the direction where the demon beast was supposed to be.


    ¡­


    At the same time, a little further inside the Burning Mountain Range, a certain demon beast was having the time of its life as it savoured on some meat from a giant mountain lion demon beast that it had hunted down earlier.


    "Roar~!"


    Ah~ This is life~


    Letting out a satisfied roar, the demon beast in question rolled back into the small cave that it lived in.


    Looking closer, one would be able to see that the shape of the demon beast was quite unique, it looked like a giant ball, except, this ball had fur on it and a giant mouth filled with sharp teeth. The eyes of the demon beast could not be seen, as the fur covered it uppletely. Legs or arms could not be seen either, meaning the demon fur ball most likely moved by rolling around.


    "ROAR!"


    Y-you! You are the one who killed my father! I know you are hiding in there,e out and face me!


    Just as the demon fur ball had rolled back into his cave to enjoy the rest of the mountain lion''s meat, an angry roar came from outside disturbing the former peaceful scene.


    "¡­" Stopping just as it was about to bite down on the meat, the fur ball demon beast turned around and looked angrily in the direction of the little lion cub that had dared to disturb it while it was eating.


    "ROAR!" Letting out an earth-shattering roar, the fur ball demon beast rolled out from its cave in a majestic manner and came to a stop a few meters away from the lion cub that had dared to disturb it, towering majestically high above it, the sheer size of the fur ball demon beast was at least a few dozen meters!


    Even the few trees nearby seemed small inparison to the giant ball of fur!


    "R-roar¡­" Seeing how big it''s opponent truly was, the lion cub was frightened! It had never imagined that there would be such a big demon beast here! It was only a Core Formation Demon Beast! How was it supposed to deal with such a big demon beast in the first ce?


    Turning around, the small mountain lion ran away before the majestic ball of fur even manged to do anything.


    "ROAR!"


    You think you can juste here and disturb me when you want and run away whenever you find out who you messed with!?


    Seeing that the mountain lion demon beast just run away upon seeing it, the majestic fur ball demon beast let out an even more angry roar as it quickly rolled after it, destroying all the trees that dared to block its path.


    "Roar!"


    How dare you!


    ¡­


    "Where is the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast¡­? Maybe it fought someone recently or chased after someone?" Arriving at the fur ball demon beastsir, Xuan Hao looked around the area and saw all the broken trees in the surroundings.


    Looking a little further away from their of the Nascent Soul demon beast, Xuan Hao saw the destroyed trees had formed a path or something leading further into the Burning Mountain Range.


    The path was extremely big and the trees that was in the way had all beenpletely destroyed or ttened, showing just how big the demon beast who had fought here truly was!


    "Guess I will just have to go and see if I can catch up with it¡­ If I''m lucky, I might even be able see the opponent that caused it to chase it down¡­ Hopefully it was another demon beast and not a human¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao elerated his speed and flew in the direction that the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast had run in.


    ¡­


    "Roar!"


    You can''t run anymore little lion cub!


    Standing at the edge of a giant cliff with a fall of at least a few hundred meters, the mountain lion demon beast was standing with one paw over the edge as it shakingly looked at the giant fur ball in front of it slowly rolling closer and closer with each passing second.


    "Ro-roar¡­" Letting out a weak roar in response to the giant fur ball demon beast, the young mountain lion prepared for its end as it tried to put on a strong front.


    It had just wanted to avenge its father who had perished to the fur ball¡­ When he had gone missing after going out to hunt food for the rest of his newly born lion cubs, the young mountain lion was not that worried, it was only after its father did not return that it grew worried and went out to search for him.


    Communicating with some of the nearby demon beast that the mountain lion family was on friendly terms with, it had learned that its father had died at the hands of a demon beast living deep in the mountain forest.


    Hearing this, the young mountain lion did not think clearly and let rage take control of it as it went to challenge the demon beast who had killed its father, even though its father was stronger than it in the first ce¡­


    Now it came to regret its earlier decision¡­ What would happen to its newly born siblings and mother without anyone to help defend them¡­?


    "Well¡­ This is truly a¡­ Unique demon beast¡­" Arriving at the scene of the giant fur ball advancing towards the young mountain lion demon beast, Xuan Hao smiled wryly as he saw the giant ball of fur having the aura of a Nascent Soul Realm demon beast slowly rolling forward.

 Chapter 101: Little White Rabbit and Deadly Spiritual Flames

    <h4>Chapter 101: Little White Rabbit and Deadly Spiritual mes</h4>


    Inspecting the Big furry ball slowly rolling closer and closer to the mountain lion demon beast at the edge of the cliff, Xuan Hao realized that the ground beneath them looked way more parchedpared to the ground elsewhere on the Burning Mountain Range.


    The thing that made Xuan Hao curious was the fact that it was only the edges of the cliff that was parched, while the ground a little further away looked normal.


    Thinking a little further about it, Xuan Hao realized that it most likely had something to do with the area below the cliff, with that in mind, Xuan Hao decided to wait and see what would happen to the mountain lion and oversized fur ball¡­ Both of them did not really seem to have noticed the ground below them was differentpared to before as they were both standing extremely close to the edge of the cliff at the moment.


    "Roar!" Letting out a roar upon getting close enough, the giant fur ball opened its giant mouth and bounced towards the young mountain lion, looking to swallow it whole.


    Xuan Hao could almost not hold himself back fromughing as he saw the unique attack technique used by the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast.


    Rumble!


    Just as the Fur Ball demon beast was about to reach the shivering young mountain lion demon beast, a loud rumbling sound came from below the cliff as a wave of heat suddenly washed over both of them, stopping the fur ball demon beast in its track.


    "Roar?" Letting out a slightly confused roar, both the young mountain lion and fur ball demon beast looked in the direction where the sound came from and soon felt yet another wave of heat erupt from below the cliff once again.


    This time around arge me rose from the bottom of the cliff as well, scaring both the fur ball demon beast and the young mountain lion, who was both standing extremely close to the edge of the cliff.


    The both of them reacted immediately and tried to move out of the way of the me as the sheer heat from it made even the fur ball demon beast cautious.


    Sadly, only the fur ball managed to react in time as the young mountain lion was soon swallowed up by the me that by now covered the edges of the cliff to the ravine below.


    "Roar!" A pitiful roar came from the young mountain lion as it was soon swallowed by the mes and burned alive.


    Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes slightly as he saw the young mountain lion get swallowed by the mes and die within only a few seconds, it had to be known that the young mountain lion was a demon beast at the Core Formation Realm!


    Demon beasts normally had better defencepared to their human counterpart, so they could better take damage and survive stronger attacks.


    The mountain lion was an especially strong demon beast, but in this case, the young mountain lion at the Core Formation Realm had suddenly been burned to death by the giant me that had suddenly erupted from the ravine below the cliff!


    As the me continued to spread outwards from the edge of the cliff, it soon reached the location that the fur ball demon beast had retreated to and swallowed it up as well before it could react or do anything to prevent itself from burning up like the young mountain lion demon beast.


    Butpared to the young mountain lion demon beast that had died after letting out a single pitiful roar, the fur ball demon beast was way stronger than it and did not die due to the mes as it struggled for a bit before managing to get itself away from the mes that had stopped spreading a few dozen meters away from the edge of the cliff leading into the ravine below.


    Upon closer inspection, Xuan Hao discovered that the seemingly big mouth and body of the fur ball was merely an illusion of sorts used by it.


    Observing the current state of the fur ball demon beast, Xuan Hao saw that most of its fur had disappeared, leaving behind a small white ball only the size of his fist behind.


    Seeing therge pair of ears and small paws, Xuan Hao realized something. The small white demon beast was clearly a rabbit.


    How did a small, seemingly cute and innocent little rabbit reach the Nascent Soul Realm in the first ce¡­?


    Contemting about how he himself was on the same level as a rabbit the size of his fist, Xuan Hao did not notice that the small white rabbit had run away after its disguise as a big bad ball of fur had been dispelled by the mes.


    And when he did, he did not really care as much with the mystery of the me in the ravine directly in front of him.


    Sending out his divine sense, Xuan Hao carefully inspected the mes, but was immediately taken aback upon realizing that his divine sense had started burning the moment that it came into contact with the mes!


    "How curious¡­ The me has spiritual properties and is able to directly burn my divine sense!" Retreating his divine sense to prevent himself from damaging his own divine sense, Xuan Hao had a slightly shocked look on his face.


    For the mes to be able to burn someone''s divine sense meant that they would also have the ability to damage the soul of the person that they burned!


    Remembering what happened to the young mountain lion demon beast, Xuan Hao felt a little bad for it all of a sudden¡­ From the looks of things, the young mountain lion demon beast most likely had its soul burned up and would not be able to reincarnate and had simply ceased to exist.


    Deciding to wait for some time to see if the mes would disappear, Xuan Hao sat down in a mediative position and quietly cultivated as he waited.


    Whoosh


    Time passed and exactly 30 minutes after the mes had appeared there was a big whooshing sound of wind from the ravine below, followed by the mes that were currently burning the edge of the cliff disappearing back into the ravine below.


    Xuan Hao watched this unfold and waited for another 30 minutes.


    Rumble!


    The mes appeared again!


    Observing this, Xuan Hao deducted that the mes would appear for 30 minutes and then disappear for another 30 minutes before repeating the same pattern.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao waited for the mes to disappear again prior to entering the ravine himself and seeing if he could find out the reason for the me''s appearance.


    Fighting could wait, there were more than enough demon beasts in the Burning Mountain Range. For now, he just wanted to find the reason for the mes in the ravine!


    Maybe it was even caused by the appearance of a rare herb of some magical artifact!

 Chapter 102: Dark Red Whirlpool

    <h4>Chapter 102: Dark Red Whirlpool</h4>


    Not waiting for a second longer, Xuan Hao directly entered the ravine below where the terrifying spiritual me from earlier hade from. The time that he had to explore the ce beneath was only 30 minutes, so he dared not waste too much time and wait for the mes to disappear again.


    The farther down he travelled, the more space appeared to have been twisted as it began to look more and more distorted the deeper into the ravine he went.


    At the bottom of the ravine, a giant dark red whirlpool was slowly spinning as it seemed to bend the space around itself causing several cracks in space itself to appear nearby.


    The dark red whirlpool was surrounded in a terrifying me that was way strongerpared to the spiritual me from earlier that had appeared at the edge of the cliff leading down into the ravine.


    Rumble~


    A faint rumbling sound could be heard from the dark red whirlpool as it slowly grew stronger and stronger.


    Observing closer, Xuan Hao also saw that the mes around the dark red whirlpool were slowly shrinking a bit with every passing moment. After the 30-minute mark was up, they would most likely erupt to some extend and cause the spiritual me from earlier to appear once again.


    In the end, the spiritual me was most likely just a byproduct of whatever was happening inside of the whirlpool¡­


    But for now, Xuan Hao knew that he was nowhere near strong enough to get any closer to the dark red whirlpool, let alone enter and see what was hiding inside of it¡­ Maybe even someone at the Domain Lord Realm would be too weak, as space itself was shattered inside of the whirlpool¡­


    The power behind the dark red whirlpool was simply unimaginable and as the rumbling sounding from the dark red whirlpool slowly grew louder and louder, Xuan Hao gazed onest time at the mysterious yet dangerous dark red whirlpool before turning around and making his way back out of the ravine.


    ¡­


    "Finally found one!" having reached another marked spot on the map he had gotten from the Explorer Union, Xuan Hao let out a sigh of relief as he saw the Nascent Soul Realm demon beastzilyying in the sun rxing.


    After he had made it back out of the ravine, Xuan Hao went back to check if the little white rabbit demon beast returned to itsir, but it had long left when he arrived there, so Xuan Hao decided to check some of the other ces on the map with Nascent Soul Realm demon beast that had been marked out by the Explorer Union.


    Sadly, his luck seemed to havepletely disappeared as he went from one location to the next without finding a single Nascent Soul Realm demon beast!


    It was only at the ninth location that he managed to finally find a demon beast at the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    The demon beast in question was a ming mountain ape, it was well known for having the ability to manipte fire and used several me-based attacks when inbat.


    There was even a rumor that the Raging me Sect had taken a lot of inspiration from the ming mountain ape in their own qi techniques and fist-basedbat arts.


    "Well¡­ Time to see how strong I have gotten!" Muttering a bit to himself, Xuan Hao stood straight on top of his flying sword as he withdrew a sword from a scabbard on his left side and preformed a simple sh down towards the ming mountain ape.


    Swish~


    The sword sh was filled with his sword intent and even though it was just a simple sh, it carried with it enough strength to shatter the earth and split clouds.


    The ming mountain ape discovered the attack immediately, as Xuan Hao did not make any attempt to hide his attack and the fact that preforming a sneak attack on someone in the Nascent Soul Realm was close to impossible due to the constant presence of the other party''s divine sense.


    "ROAR!"


    Letting out a roar in response to the sudden attack, the ming mountain ape lifted both its hands in a defensive posture as arge me suddenly engulfed itpletely.


    Cling~


    A metallic sound soon sounded as the sword sh from Xuan Hao reached the ming mountain ape andnded directly at it without doing any damage at all, only a white mark could be seen at the ce where the sword sh hadnded after the ming mountain ape dispelled the raging me that had earlier engulfed it.


    "Hm¡­ It should have reached the sixth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm like me, but its body isparable to someone at the seventh stage or maybe even above it¡­ Truly, what a great practice target I found myself!" Smiling widely upon seeing how easily the ming mountain ape had dealt with his attack, Xuan Hao quickly descended andnded a few hundred meters away from it.


    "I have never tired using any of the sword moves that were recorded in the Untold Swords Mantra yet due to my cultivation being too weak before, but I can finally try the first move!" Saying this Xuan Hao raised his sword and preformed the first move recorded in the Untold Swords Mantra.


    "Sword Shadow!"


    Before the ming mountain ape could evenprehend why the human that had attacked it suddenly decided tond a few hundred meters away from it and start talking, a faint shadow of a sword suddenly appeared directly in front of it.


    "Roar?"


    The confused roar of the ming mountain ape could be heard for a split moment before it managed to react and quickly set up a quick defense to try and block the attack that had arrived directly in front of it!


    The attack from the human was way too fast! It had only barely seen the attack when it was already about tond!


    Swish~


    The sound of something cutting through the air could barely be heard as the attack from Xuan Hao finallynded on the ming mountain ape.

 Chapter 103: Sword Shadow!

    <h4>Chapter 103: Sword Shadow!</h4>


    Sword Shadow!


    When the strike wasunched, the ming mountain ape had barely managed to react and set up a defense!


    The wind blew gently as the ming mountain ape tried its best to defend against the sword attack, now, it was already surrounded by sword energy and had no path of retreat and could only try its best to block the attack.


    In the very next moment, the sword shadow Xuan Hao hadunched hit the ming mountain apes defense.


    Boom!


    The massive sword energy covered the skies as furious winds swept across the nearby forest, causing a few nearby trees to be pulled up from the ground and scattered in all nearby direction.


    Soon a small vortex made of sword energy had formed with the ming mountain ape stuck in the middle of the chaotic yet deadly sword energy vortex.


    ROAR!


    The ming mountain ape did not want to just let itself die so easily, as it let out a heaven shaking roar and caused the mes that engulfed it to expand rapidly outwards. Following which the sword energy vortex by forcefully got pushed back by the rapidly expanding me of the ming mountain ape.


    Swish~


    The sword energy vortex rapidly started expanding alongside the me of the ming mountain ape before finally bursting, as furious winds swept across the surroundings, destroying an evenrger part of the mountain forest that they were currently fighting in and sending off a shockwave that could be felt from several dozen kilometers away.


    Everyone in the surrounding area of several dozen kilometers witnessed the sudden shockwave washing over them and, in some cases, even sent them flying into a nearby tree or off the edge of a cliff if they were unlucky.


    The people were mostly adventures seeking treasures in the Burning Mountain Range or members of the Explorer Union¡­ Exploring the ce. All of them had felt the shockwave and became flustered,pletely unaware of what had just happened.


    Who were fighting?


    They were confused and only knew that both parties were immensely powerfulpared to themselves.


    "Hm¡­ Seems like the strength of the Sword Shadow is enough for me to injure someone at the seventh stage of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­" Looking over at the exhausted ming mountain ape, Xuan Hao went over the earlier attack he had used.


    The Sword Shadow could be considered the first move recorded in the Untold Swords Mantra and ording to the Untold Swords Mantra, only someone who had established a sword domain would be able to unleash its true power.


    Even just barely using it once, Xuan Hao had felt the clear exhaustion that it had brought to him.


    The reason for this was because the Sword Shadow attack, upon reaching the ming mountain ape had formed a giant sword energy vortex and suppressed it. The amount of energy wasted just on making the sword energy vortex and stopping it from dispersing was unimaginable.


    It could be said to have formed a pseudo sword domain of sorts to suppress the ming mountain ape inside!


    But because Xuan Hao had still not reached a realm strong enough for him to truly use the Sword Shadow attack, he had ended up using a lot more of his qi than required to execute the sword move.


    In the end, although the attack was strong and had a great visual impact, it could not bepared to the originally intended use of the sword shadow¡­ After all, it was named sword shadow because the attack would be silent, stealthy and deadly, like a shadow suddenly appearing quietly in front of the enemy and killing them instantly without a sound¡­


    Xuan Hao had seeded in the first part of it silently appearing in front of the ming mountain ape before it managed to react, but the killing without a sound would take some work to archive¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao smiled awkwardly at the giant crater that had formed with the ming mountain ape at the center, uprooted trees and other foliage scattered all over the ce as it looked like a bomb had just recently gone off at the ce where the ming mountain ape was standing.


    The ming mountain ape had even helped with making that impression as the ground had been scorchedpletely in the area a few dozen meters around the ming mountain ape due to its protective me''s sudden expansion earlier.


    "R-roar¡­!" Letting out a weak roar, the ming mountain ape looked fearfully at Xuan Hao for a moment before turning around and running away in the opposite direction with all its might.


    No way it was going to stay and fight with him after feeling how strong the sword wielding human was!


    Fighting to the death? Who would be dumb enough to do something like that! At most it would lose its territory, it could still rebuild in another location! That was a small price to pay for keeping itself alive!


    Xuan Hao watched this and was just about to give chase to the ming mountain ape, but he suddenly felt several different auras at the Nascent Soul Realm approaching from all directions.


    "Hah¡­" Letting out a sigh, Xuan Hao jumped on his sword and quickly left the area. Not chasing after the ming mountain ape.


    Roar!


    Soon after Xuan Hao had left the area, several roars could be heard as several demon beasts in all shapes and sizes appeared at the location of the battle and started a chaotic brawl, before dispersing again after a few minutes.


    This was one of the main reasons why nobody really wanted to try and hunt down the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast in the Burning Mountain Range¡­ When one first started fighting a demon beast at the Nascent Soul Realm, all the surrounding demon beasts at the Nascent Soul Realm would notice after a while ande flocking to the area, either to kill and devour the injured Nascent Soul realm demon beast or the human cultivator¡­


    No matter how strong you were, faced with the dozens of demon beasts at the Nascent Soul Realm, even someone at the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm would have a hard time keeping his life!


    If one wanted to hunt the demon beasts in the Burning Mountain Range, one should be able to kill them fast enough and run away before the reinforcements arrived!

 Chapter 104: The Notebook of Lord Kubera

    <h4>Chapter 104: The Notebook of Lord Kubera</h4>


    "Phew¡­ That was close!" Looking back at the area that he had fought the ming mountain ape earlier, Xuan Hao felt himself shivering a bit at the thought of being surrounded and attacked by those demon beasts.


    Even if they individually were weaker than the ming mountain ape, all of them put together would be more than enough to injure him or at the very least force him to run away.


    The only demon beast one could hunt down without worrying too much, was those in the Core Formation Realm¡­ Hunting the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast in a ce with other Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts nearby, was close to suicide¡­


    "Maybe I should choose somewhere at the edges of the Burning Mountain Range to test out my strength the next time around¡­ Whatever, at least I have an idea how strong I am now¡­" Sighing a bit to himself, Xuan Hao left the Burning Mountain Range and made his way back towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    Him testing his strength had only taken a little over day with travel time considered as well.


    Now he could return back to the Flying Sword Sect and teach his disciples something new! But what he wanted to teach both of them would not be something like a qi orbat technique, but instead something more practical that might help them in the future.


    ¡­


    Back at the Flying Sword Sect just after Xuan Hao had handed over the notebook, he had found at the city of Kubera to the Sect Master Feng Chen, who was currently reading through it trying to find out if there was anything useful in it.


    "Interesting¡­ Looks like I will have to hand it over to the Alchemy Hall and see if they can find out anything about the forms and experiments noted down here¡­ This!?" Stopping towards the end of the notebook, Feng Chen quickly put the notebook away and had a slightly worried look on his face.


    "A religion with a gue God¡­ Looks like it is not simply a gue by the newly established demonic sect or the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­ This would also exin how they could suddenly have people appear at all corners of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and intercept the Nascent Soul Realm experts sent out to inspect the first infected viges¡­" Muttering this to himself, Feng Chen worriedly made his way out of his pavilion and entered the Alchemy Hall to hand of the notebook and hopefully get something useful out from it.


    No matter what, dealing with a religion was not something that the current Flying Sword Sect could do, as it was simply way too strong¡­ At most they could passively wait for the already established religions of the Sky Empire to deal with them¡­ After all, splitting up the territory they used and allow others to take from the resources that they had would not go well with them.


    The only thing that mattered at the moment was how fast the religions already established in the Sky Empire would take to react to the threat of a new religion trying to snake its way in¡­


    The chances of the Church of the gue God doing the same thing in other kingdoms under the Sky Empire would most likely also be the case and the chances of the already established religions being able to stop the faith of the gue God in all of them was next to impossible¡­


    "Hah¡­ Looks like we are in for a difficult time in theing years¡­" Sighing a bit to himself, Feng Chen finally made it to the entrance of the Alchemy Hall.


    "Move those test vials over there! And you! Get the sect to send more Violet Sparkgrass over here immediately!" A loud voice could be hearding from a strong looking middle-aged woman at the centre of the Alchemy Hall, as she kept calling out orders to the various alchemists and servants running back and forth in a chaotic, yet orderly manner.


    "Wan Qiu, what is happening around here?" Walking his way over to the strong looking middle-aged woman, Feng Chen asked in a somewhat confused tone as he watched the people running all over the ce moving things from one ce to another.


    "Ah, Sect Master! We recently got a new idea on a way to solve the gue and we are going to try and make it!" Bowing her head slightly upon seeing the Sect Master, Elder Wan Qiu reported the reason for the current chaotic situation at the Alchemy Hall.


    "I understand¡­ This is also the reason why I''m here today! Elder Xuan just came back with something that will most likely be useful in dealing with the gue!" Putting on a slightly more serious face, Feng Chen took out the notebook of Lord Kubera and handed it over to the strong looking middle-aged woman Wang Qiu.


    "Hm? T-this is¡­" Opening up the notebook that Feng Chen handed over to her, Wan Qiu immediately got extremely interested the moment she saw the first few notes written down.


    "W-where did you say Elder Xuan got this¡­? The city of Kubera? D-do you perhaps know if the city lord is still there?!" Putting down the notebook with a slightly unwilling expression, Wan Qiu turned towards Feng Chen as she forcefully started to question him with a slightly threatening tone of voice.


    "¡­ He is already gone from what Elder Xuan had told me, why are you so interested all of a sudden?" Trying his best to supress the annoyance he felt from Wan Qiu''s forceful interrogation.


    Feng Chen knew that no matter what he did, this woman was quite¡­ Crazy when it came to anything Alchemy¡­ Getting on her bad side was not a good thing, he still remembered the poor fate of Core Elder Wang Hu¡­


    In the past he had interrupted one of her experiments and as a result, mysterious things started happening to him¡­ From sudden embarrassing "idents" at major events in the sect, to a shortage of certain pills of potions that he happened to need¡­


    "I-if I''m not wrong, this Lord Kubera is at least an Artisan level Alchemist! Maybe even a Master level Alchemist!" Saying this, Wan Qiu''s voice shivered slightly upon mentioning a Master Alchemist.


    It had to be known that Master level Alchemist were the highest level of Alchemists present on the Ewaria Continent!


    Even a single note casually written by a Master Alchemist was worth a fortune! Let alone a notebook filled with detailed experiments and forms for different potions and pills!


    To alchemists, this was a priceless treasure that could help them progress further and learn about the Realm of a Master Alchemist!

 Chapter 105: Future Plans!

    <h4>Chapter 105: Future ns!</h4>


    "Master level Alchemist!?" No matter how little Feng Chen knew about alchemy, he still knew what a Master level Alchemist meant!


    Someone at that level had reached the peak of Alchemy on the Ewaria continent. No matter where they went, every empire, royal n or sect would wee them with open arms and even try their best to attract them with all sorts of lucrative resources and spirit stones.


    The fact that they had gotten their hands on the notebook of a possible master level alchemist was something that would most definitely help the Alchemy Hall of the Flying Sword Sect increase in strength. Maybe they would even get an Artisan level Alchemist in the future!


    "Are you sure about this¡­?" Calming down after thinking about what such a thing could mean for the future development of the sect, Feng Chen asked Wan Qiu in a both excited and at the same time serious voice.


    "Yes! I have already the peak of the expert alchemist realm and I can say for sure that whoever wrote down this is way above me when ites to alchemy!" Not flinching for even a second Wang Qiu exined in an incredibly excited tone, focusing her attention on the notebook in her hands the entire time.


    "That''s great! Do you think you will be able to find something that can help deal with the gue in here?" Smiling happily upon hearing the confirmation, Feng Chen asked in a still excited voice filled with anticipation.


    Wan Qiu called down a bit the moment that she heard Feng Chen''s question, as she started to inspect the Notebook of Kubera once again to try and see if she could find something that could be used.


    "Hm¡­ I think we should be able to do it with some time, but I will have to ask some of the other elders from the Alchemy Hall for help first¡­ At the very least, it should be better than the cure we were just about to try and make."


    "That''s great! Go on then, don''t mind me and just go find some of the other elders of the Alchemy Hall for help!" Hearing that there was a better chance at finding a cure for the gue, Feng Chen happily encouraged Wan Qiu as she soon disappeared deeper into the Alchemy Hall to find the other elders of the Alchemy Hall.


    Seeing her leave, Feng Chen turned around and left the Alchemy Hall, for now he had to contact the other Core Elders and find out about how they should deal with the fact that a giant power like the Church of the gue God was eyeing the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time that the Sect Master Feng Chen was showing the Notebook of Kubera to the elder of the alchemy hall Wan Qiu, Qing Yi had made her way over to the alchemy hall together with senior Yu.


    "W-what is happening here!?" Looking at the current chaos happening inside of the alchemy hall, Qing Yi felt slightly baffled, as she had not seen the ce like this before,st time she came here to pick up books, the entire ce had looked almostpletely deserted! Nothing like the current state, filled with all kinds of people.


    "Ah, you have not been here recently due to the apprentice training being suspended and not having a reason toe here¡­ Well, it is due to the gue. The Alchemy Hall has poured most of its resources towards trying to develop a cure and as a result, things have gotten quite busy around here¡­" Letting out a slightly exhausted smile as he exined this, senior Yu and Qing Yu soon made their way to the library located farther into the alchemy hall.


    Compared to the rest of the alchemy hall, the library was quiet, and nobody was running around. The only difference here was that there were others reading through the books fully concentrated at a few spots for reading located throughout the library.


    "There should be some books over here that will be useful for you if you are going to participate in an alchemypetition¡­ Most of the time, the alchemypetition tests things like knowledge about herbs and how good the contestant is at making a certain pill or potion." Walking deeper into the library than before, senior Yu exined to Qing Yi as she quietly followed along with him.


    "So, for the books that we will be getting this time will mostly be some books that focuses on different basic pill and potion forms and The Basic herb encyclopedia. Ah, here it is!" Coming to a stop in front of a bookshelf, senior Yu went forward and pulled out a few different books and handed them over to Qing Yi.


    "So¡­ I should just read these and practice some of the potion and pill forms¡­?" Looking at the books that senior Yu handed over to her, she looked up questioningly at him.


    "Ah, of course not! You should try to make some time once a week ande to the alchemy hall so that one of the elders at the expert alchemy realm can help and teach you. This way you should be able to improve more!" Talking excitedly about the elders of the alchemy hall, senior Yu exined the n that the alchemy hall had for her training up to thepetition.


    "Great! I will exin it to master when he gets back again, I do not think he will say anything to it¡­ After all, it is only once a week and I do have quite a bit of freedom in the first ce." Smiling happily upon hearing that she would be able to train her alchemy skills for free once a week at the alchemy hall, Qing Yi decided to find a way to convince her master to let her do it.


    No matter what, Qing Yi was extremely excited at the fact that she would get to train her alchemy skills for free!


    No more she would have to waste her own herbs!


    Thinking this, Qing Yi soon excited the alchemy hall happily with the stack of books handed over to her by senior Yu in hand.

 Chapter 106: War Begins

    <h4>Chapter 106: War Begins</h4>


    "Hm¡­ With things getting more and more unstable inside of the imperial capital, the supplies that are sent to the border have significantly reduced¡­"


    Inside a tent located at the centre of the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms army stationed at the border, a robust looking middle-aged man let out arge sigh as he inspected the documents in front of him detailing the amount of supply sent over this month.


    As things in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was getting more and more unstable with the gue outbreak, the border between the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the Azure Sky Kingdom was seeing its fair share of unrest as well, as resources were needed back home to help deal with the gue as well.


    On the morale front, most of the soldiers stationed had started growing worried for their families back home with the increasing severity of the gue. Other than that, the skirmishes with the Azure Sky Kingdom had started increasing and the scale of the skirmishes had be bigger as well.


    At this point in time, there would always be a Nascent Soul Realm expert present whenever the two forces shed with each other.


    "General! The Azure Sky Kingdoms has started moving forward most of their troops and it looks like they are preparing for an all-out assault on our defensive positions at the front!" Just as the middle-aged man was about to go over the rest of the documents, a young man dressed like amon soldier stormed in through the opening in the tent and yelled anxiously.


    "Are you sure!?" Standing up immediately upon hearing what the young soldier told him, the middle-aged man who was the current general in charge of the army stationed at the border of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, walked over and grabbed the young soldier''s cor with a serious look on his face.


    "Y-yes." Shivering upon suddenly being grabbed by the general himself, the young soldier almost felt thest bit of life left in him leave his body due to fear as he answered.


    "¡­ Leave and make sure that our men are ready, get someone to inform those people from the four sects as well, we will need them to keep some of the Azure Sky Kingdoms Nascent Soul experts¡­" After a short pause, the general let go of the young soldier and he ran out of the room without a wasting even a single second, to carry out the order of the general as quickly as possible.


    The general looked at the young soldier quickly disappearing out of the tent before he made his way back to the documents on the table and with a worried expression on his face, he picked up amunication talisman buried beneath a few of the documents.


    "Hah¡­ Looks like we can''t escape with only fighting a few skirmishes with the Azure Sky Kingdom this time around, we can only hope the other nearby kingdoms won''t try to take advantage of this obvious weakens¡­ What is the Azure Sky Kingdom even nning in the first ce? If they attack us, won''t they be worried another nearby kingdom will swoop in and attack them when they are weak after fighting with us?" Muttering this to himself, the middle-aged general looked deeply at themunication talisman for a few seconds before finally using it.


    No matter what, he had to inform the higher-ups of the current situation and hope that they could spare a few more Nascent Soul experts for the border-


    BOOM!


    A few minutes after he had informed the higher-ups arge explosion suddenly happened, causing the general to rush outside and look towards the south-eastern part of the border army camp with a shocked expression on his face.


    ¡­


    "The Azure Sky Kingdom is preparing for an attack?!" Wang Lan looked at the soldier that had entered his tent and informed him with a slightly shocked expression on his face.


    He had mostly expected for the Azure Sky Kingdom to try and slowly whittle down the forces of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom over time, they were after all stronger over allpared to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and a full-on frontal attack would end up harming both kingdoms in the process. Leaving them open to attacks from other kingdoms.


    "Yes, the general is requesting for the experts of the four sects to be present at the frontline and help deal with the Nascent Soul Realm experts from the Azure Sky Kingdom''s sects." Saying what he was told to beforehand, the soldier quickly left before Wang Lan stopped him to question him for the next half hour¡­ Last time such a thing happened he got punished by his superior for beingte¡­


    "¡­" Staring a bit at the ce that the soldier was standing before, Wang Lan sighed a bit to himself as he went to pick up amunication talisman so that he could inform the sect master about what was happening at the border.


    This only took a few minutes as the sect master Feng Chen could not really do much other than encourage him to try and keep himself alive as a top priority and try to be as passive as possible while trying to avoid fighting at all cost.


    Truly the best way to stay alive was not fighting at all, but would the Heavenly Sky Kingdom really just let him ck around¡­?


    Wang Lan really doubted that and decided to at least talk with the members of the other four sects first, as all of them were in the same situation as him.


    BOOM!


    Coming to this decision, Wang Lan was just about to walk out of the tent when arge explosion suddenly sounded from the south-eastern part of the border army camp.


    "What the-" Wang Lan quickly rushed out from his tent and jumped up on a nearby rock a few meters in height and looked in the direction that the explosion came from.


    ck smoke billowed high into the sky where the explosion earlier had happened, a few soldiers ran over to where the explosion happened in confusion trying to figure out what caused it in the first ce, only to be met with a sharp sword that and get cut down on the spot.


    Soon arge amount of people dressed in the uniform of Heavenly Sky Kingdom soldiers came out through the ck smoke followed by an evenrger army dressed in the uniforms of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    What happened? Sudden betrayal by a part of the army¡­?


    Wang Lan felt like the situation was getting even more precarious, after all, for them to be able to get so close meant that at least a few of the Nascent Soul Realm experts from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had betrayed them¡­


    It seemed like there was something more to the Azure Sky Kingdoms full on attack and he had no clue what was happening¡­

 Chapter 107: Framing the Demonic Sect...

    <h4>Chapter 107: Framing the Demonic Sect...</h4>


    Feng Chen had gotten word of what happened at the border only a few hours after it had actually happened, this was mostly due to the fact that Wang Lan had ended up fighting with another Nascent Soul Realm expert soon after the incident and only after getting away from where most of the fighting was happening, did he managed to contact Feng Chen once again and inform him.


    It was not long before Feng Chen managed to gather Core Elder Wang Hu, Vice Sect Master Zu Fei and Xuan Hao together in a somewhat secluded pavilion to discuss what their next n of action would be.


    "So, what are we going to do? My brother will surely end up doing something stupid at this rate¡­ Not to mention that the Azure Sky Kingdom has more Nascent Soul Realm expertspared to us!" Wearing an extremely distraught expression, Wang Hu asked after hearing what was happening at the border and how precarious his brother''s situation was.


    Xuan Hao remained silent as he had no idea what to do in such a situation, even if he made his way over to the border, he would most likely not be able to do much other than get Wang Lan out. Maybe his presence as a rtively high-level Nascent Soul Realm expert would even cause the Azure Sky Kingdom to send forth some of their strongest experts¡­


    "Calm down, there is not much we can do, as we will still have to be careful with the threat of the Raging me Sect close by, at least the Heavenly sky Kingdom won''t take this lying down! They are most likely already preparing to send some more Nascent Soul experts over to help defend the border as we speak." Looking at everyone present, the sect master Feng Chen answered Wang Hu''s question.


    "But I can''t just leave my brother to fight alone like this! Feng Chen, at the very least, allow me to go to the border to help my brother!" Understanding very well that the current situation was not that favourable for them, Wang Hu still chose to ask.


    "Hah¡­ Fine you can go, the Raging me Sect should not attack us anyway with the threat of the Azure Sky Kingdom." Seeing the hopeful look in Wang Hu''s eyes, Feng Chen could not bring himself to refuse him.


    No matter what, it was his brother who was in a precarious position. Not being able to retreat back to the sect due to the pressure from Heavenly Sky Kingdom, even if he ran away from the battle at the border, he would most likely end up getting hunted down by the Heavenly Sky Kingdom if they survived the attack from the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Worse, it would implicate the Flying Sword Sect and give the Heavenly sky Kingdom a reason to get rid of it, in its ce, it could appoint a more obedient sect that they already had control of to look after the territory of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Xuan Hao and Zu Fei both knew that the current situation would not allow for them to leave as they needed to stay and defend the sect together with Feng Chen, Wang Hu leaving would still be fine, after all, he was the weakest person currently left in the Flying Sword Sect.


    The only reason why Feng Chen had let him go in the first ce was because he had learnt about Xuan Hao reaching the sixth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, without knowing that there was someone almost as strong as himself to defend the sect, Feng Chen would never have allowed for Wang Hu to leave for the border to help his brother.


    "Thank you, Sect Master!" Bowing deeply with a happy smile on his face, Wang Hu quickly turned around and made his way out of the pavilion after getting Feng Chen''s approval.


    Making his way to the border where his brother was, was the most important to him at the moment!


    "So, what should we do now? There is still that demonic sect¡­ They have gone awfully quiet after the gue appeared¡­" Seeing that Wang Hu had left, Zu Fei posed another problem that they would have to deal with at some point.


    Hearing this, Xuan Hao fell into deep thought as he remembered the small jade that his new disciple had with him when he had found him.


    From the conversation that he had managed to pick up, it was apparently something important to the demonic sect that he had taken away.


    Xuan Hao had not really paid that much attention to this, as he did not really want to investigate everything about his new disciple, he could have his own secrets without him as his master trying to find out everything about him and the opportunities he got.


    The current state of the demonic sect might be due to the fact that his second disciple had taken away that¡­ Devil-Immortal Jade thing from them.


    If it was really that important, they might even be trying their best to get it bac-


    "Zu Fei, you are in charge of most of our internal security, right?"


    "Yes, why?" Hearing the somewhat random question from Xuan Hao, Zu Fei answered truthfully as she curiously turned towards Xuan Hao and waited for him to exin.


    "Have there been any spies or people from underground organisations found recently in Flying Sword City?"


    "Now that you say it, we recently found a quiterge information gathering organisation that was gathering information on the newer disciples of the sect, but when we arrived there, everyone had already been killed or had mysteriously disappear- Ah!


    Perhaps you mean that the Demonic sect might be behind this!? But why gather information on our new disciples? Maybe it was just a distraction, and they were really gathering information on something else entirely!" Seemingly having realized the "truth" Zu Fei looked admiringly at Xuan Hao.


    "So, the reason they are so quiet is because they are nning to attack us? Well, we are the closest to them and pose the biggest threat at the moment¡­ They might try and use the chaos to get rid of us and grow stronger before the Heavenly Sky Kingdom or the other sects can respond! Damn those sly demonic cultivators, trying to attack us while two of our people have left for the border!" ring coldly towards the outside, Feng Chen felt his killing intent towards the demonic sect grow.


    "¡­"


    I just wanted to find out if someone were nning to go after my disciple! I swear I''m not trying to frame the demonic sect!


    Smiling awkwardly as he saw the killing intent of both Feng Chen and Zu Fei, Xuan Hao did not know what to do and decided to just ignore it.


    At the end of the day, the demonic sect was still their enemy, so what if they ended up hating them a little more?

 Chapter 108: The Plot Against Chu Yang

    <h4>Chapter 108: The Plot Against Chu Yang</h4>


    "It''s in the possession of a Core Elder!? How are we supposed to get the Devil-Immortal Jade back in time before the Sect Master''s deadline runs out!? How did that Chu Yang even manage to take a Core Elder as his master in the first ce!?"


    As the Sect Master and Vice Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect felt their killing intent towards the demonic sect grow after learning about their "plot" against them, a certain skinny elder from the demonic sect in question was currently panicking at the fact that he might not get to see their Devil-Immortal Jade ever again.


    Recently he had just found out about where Chu Yang was and had even prepared to go personally to try and catch him, but that was only under the circumstance that he had be an ordinary disciple of the Flying Sword Sect!


    At most he would be able to wait outside the sect in the Flying Sword City for him to exit and grab him at that point before running away.


    Having a Core Elder as a master was apletely different situation! Most of the time, the sect would likely always have an inner elder shadow them when they went outside to ensure their safety!


    No matter what, an inner elder of the Flying Sword Sect was still considered someone strong at thete stages or even the peak of the Core Formation Realm! That was the same as himself! How was he going to snatch Chu Yang and get away with such a person guarding him from the shadows!?


    That was also not considering that the Core Elder in question would most likely know about it almost immediately and rushing from the Flying Sword Sect to the Flying Sword City would not take more than a few seconds for someone like that, so even if he seeded, he would still have to deal with a Nascent Soul expert hunting him down¡­


    "Elder Skinling¡­ how are we going to get the Devil-Immortal Jade back from that traitor''s hands¡­? We have already made sure that the Flying Sword Sect would not be able to track us anymore, but we have also lost quite a bit of the intelligencework that we set up inside of the Flying Sword City in the process¡­


    But I think it will not take long for them to catch on, at that point we definitely won''t be able to make a move any longer!" Another elder walked over and told the skinny elder with an extremely anxious look on his face.


    He was in the same boat as Elder Skinling and would most likely end up getting punished by the Sect Master if they did not manage to get the Devil-Immortal Jade back as well!


    "I know! Let me just think for a moment! There has to be a way¡­ Maybe we could have one hold up the person that shadows Chu Yang and the other person can take him and run away, while one of us holds off the guard. After that both of should be able to retreat before the Nascent Soul Realm expert notices!" A bright light shone in Elder Skinling''s eyes as he thought about this, even if the n was wed, at the very least they had a chance!


    "But who would stay behind and hold back the person in the shadows¡­? That person will most definitely be at greater riskpared to the one that will be going for Chu Yang¡­" The other elder asked with a slightly raised eyebrow, clearly not wanting to be the one who had to stay behind and risk having to deal with an angry Nascent Soul Realm expert.


    "I will do it! If this does not work, I will end up getting killed off by the Sect Master anyway! All I need for you to do is grab that kid and run, while I hold back the person who should be shadowing him." Understanding the elder''s concerns, Elder Skinling answered his worries with malicious look on his face.


    No matter what, he did not really want to do it, but he had to¡­ If he did not, the other elder would most likely not want to help him and just take the punishment of the Sect Master.


    The other elder was after all, not the one who was tasked with getting it back, the Sect Master should at most injure him or demote him in his anger¡­ Not kill him!


    Elder Skinling on the other hand did not have such a bright oue waiting for him if he ended up failing to get back the Devil-Immortal Jade.


    "Great! Then we should leave for the Flying Sword City immediately and prepare!" Smiling a bit to himself upon hearing elder Skinling agree to take on the most dangerous part of the job, the other elder agreed immediately.


    Both of them were at the peak of the Core Formation Realm and ever since bing demonic cultivators, they had both increased to a point that they could be considered to be half-step Nascent Soul Realm in strength.


    Even someone in the Nascent Soul Realm would find it quite difficult to catch up to them if they managed to get a head start.


    Demonic cultivators were also physically strongerpared to normal cultivators and this in turn allowed them to be faster and have a better endurance than most on a simr level.


    Elder Skinling and the other elder from the demonic sect, the ck Rose Sect, could be considered to have the same speed as a stage one Nascent Soul Realm expert, so they did not really think that their lives would be in too much danger after getting out of the Flying Sword City.


    No matter what, they still had to consider that the Sect Master and Vice Sect Master was both stronger and faster than them, if one of them acted they would not even know how they died!


    The only thing that ensured them at the moment was that the Sect Master and Vice Sect Master would not dare to go too far away from the Flying Sword Sect in case someone from the Raging me Sect or others lurked nearby to ambush them while one of the two were gone.


    This was especially true with the recent information they got that showed two of the Core Elders had already left to help out in the war with the Azure Sky Kingdom at the border.

 Chapter 109: Now, what direction was it...?

    <h4>Chapter 109: Now, what direction was it...?</h4>


    " Finally! I managed to get away from senior sister Qing Yi!" Looking back at the pavilion with a slightly scared look in his eyes, Chu Yang quickly made his way down the mountain.


    Earlier, he had once again been forced to train in botany, how to take care of certain herbs and how to grow them, but as his luck would have it, Qing Yi was called over by someone to the Alchemy Hall, thus leaving Chu Yang alone in the greenhouse to train by himself.


    Normally he would just end up stuck in the greenhouse due to his sense of direction¡­ not being the best¡­ But this time around, Chu Yang had devised a n and left some small rocks along as he walked over there as a path.


    Following the rocks after Qing Yi had left, Chu Yang managed to make his way out of the pavilion and down the mountain peak towards the sect.


    He honestly did not really had anything against the herb growing thing , but Qing Yi was a little too brutal in her training as his senior sister and even if he had earned quite a bit of spirit stones from the herbs that he gave to her after he had finished nurturing them, he did not really enjoy the fact that he used so much of his time on it.


    The reason why he had run away this time was mostly because he had heard about a new weapon shop opening up in the Flying Sword City today and he wanted to spend some of the spirit stones that he had earned from botany on a new spear.


    As long as he manged to make it back before Qing Yi returned, he should not get found out by her¡­


    "Is she my parent or something¡­" Shaking his head a bit at the thought, Chu Yang felt like he had to stand up more to Qing Yi instead of just bing so meek and docile, doing whatever she told him.


    The reason for his meek and docile behaviour towards Qing Yi was mostly due to the fact that he still feared getting thrown out of the Flying Sword Sect and get found by his former sect.


    "No! From now on I will not let her do whatever she wants, she is not Master anyway, so she has no power over me other than her status as my senior sister! I''m even stronger than her when ites to cultivation!" Feeling encouraged by his own speech, Chu Yang felt reinvigorated as he finally made it to the bottom of the mountain peak.


    "Now¡­ Where is the entrance to the sect located¡­?"


    ¡­


    "Are you sure we will be able to get in without being found?" A few days had already passed since their conversation together, by now, both Elder Skinling and the other elder had arrived at the entrance to the Flying Sword City.


    Currently they were about to enter the city dressed just like any normal merchant or traveller.


    "No need to worry so much, their security measures are not really that impressive in the Flying Sword City. Only when ites to the sect itself is there any substantial defensive measures in ce, I already contacted some of our people inside the city to make it easier for us to enter!" Elder Skinling answered the other elder, who had turned extremely worried upon seeing the gate leading into the city with people dressed in standard guard uniforms with a logo of the Flying Sword Sect on their chest stationed on both sides.


    Listing to Elder Skinling, the other elder calmed down and both of them soon managed to make their way inside of the Flying Sword City without anything out of the ordinary happening.


    The person who came forward to escort both of them the moment they entered also gave them some new information, stating that their target had just been seen leaving the Flying Sword Sect a few minutes ago.


    "Is my luck finally turning for the better!?" Upon hearing the news, Elder Skinling felt himself being ovee with happiness. Originally, he had thought that he would have to wait for at least a few months before getting a chance.


    After all, as a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect, Chu Yang would spend most of his time inside of the sect training and leaving the sect would only happen if he had taken up a mission by the sect or went into the Flying Sword City for some personal reasons.


    "Where is he currently and how many people are together with him? How strong are they?" Grabbing the person who was leading both of them towards a hideout, elder Skinling''s eyes shone brightly as he shook the person back and forth.


    No matter what the reason was, Elder Skinling would not let such a great opportunity go!


    "H-he is alone and is currently walking around in a circle around the central square of the city with no set destination." Answering the question with a scared look on his face, the person who was in charge of leading both of them was soon let go by Elder Skinling after he heard his answer.


    "Hm¡­ Walking in a circle around the central square with no direction¡­"


    "Elder Skinling, I think that this might be a trap! No matter how you look at it, Chu Yang would not suddenly leave the sect the moment wee and then proceed to randomly walk in circles around the central square of the city! There is clearly something wrong with the situation!" As Elder Skinling started thinking, the other elder chimed in from the side and gave his analysis of the situation.


    "Indeed, this might be a trap, but this might also be the only chance we will ever have at getting the Devil-Immortal Jade back! For now, let''s observe him closely and look for an opportunity." Elder Skinling stood still thinking about what to do for a short moment before finallying to a decision.


    With that, both elders of the demonic sect parted ways with the person send to lead them to a hideout and instead sneaked towards the central square of the Flying Sword City.

 Chapter 110: Heavy Spear

    <h4>Chapter 110: Heavy Spear</h4>


    " Finally found it! Thank you for showing me the way." Standing in front of the weapon shop that he set out to find, Chu Yang smiled happily as he thanked the person beside him who had shown him the way.


    "No problem, it is quite hard to find a new shop like this. Helping you young''uns is the duty of us old ones." The man standing beside Chu Yang was a kind looking elderly man, who looked more than happy to help, as he slowly made his way back to whatever he was doing beforehand upon seeing that Chu Yang had indeed found the ce he was looking for.


    Chu Yang waved goodbye to the kind elderly man before finally turning around and facing the weapon shop.


    The weapon shop looked like any random weapon shop you would find, with the only difference being the fact that it looked way cleaner and more orderly, most likely due to the fact that it was the first day that it was open.


    "I hope that I can at least find a good spear at the earth rank¡­" Muttering so to himself, Chu Yang entered the weapon shop.


    ¡­


    "That traitor just entered a weapon shop, it looks like he finally deviated from the original route he was taking¡­ Maybe the ambush was called off? Should we wait for a while longer, or should we go for it?" The elder following Elder Ling asked him as he watched Chu Yang enter a weapon shop from the roof of a nearby building.


    "Hm¡­ For now, let''s watch for a few more minutes, if nothing out of the ordinary happens by then we will take action." Thinking about it for a while, Elder Ling answered as he narrowed his eyes at Chu Yang who was currently looking at the various spears inside of the weapon shop.


    No matter what, they were still inside what could be considered enemy territory. Acting would most definitely cause a lot ofmotion and alert the experts inside of the Flying Sword Sect.


    They had to be perfect when they acted, or they could both end up in a bad situation. Waiting for a few more minutes was nothing to them, as they had just mindlessly watched Chu Yang walk around in a circle around the central square for two hours straight.


    Remembering it, Elder Ling almost felt like exploding in anger! No matter how dumb they are, there was no way that they were going to fall for such an obvious trap!


    ¡­


    When Chu Yang had entered the shop, he had immediately spotted the ordinary looking spear among the other earth rank spears in a corner of the shop.


    At first, he had thought that it was a mistake that it was there among the powerful looking earth rank spears, but after grabbing hold of it, Chu Yang felt how heavy it waspared to the rest of the spears, while he also discovered how dull the spear tip was.


    The spear was almost like a giant heavy hammer used by some of the more unique cultivators to smash their opponents to death, just in the form of a spear.


    Maybe he would be able to smash people to death with his spear in the future? There were even some spear techniques in the soul spear divine mantra that required a heavy spear to smash one''s opponent to death.


    Thinking a bit about it, Chu Yang decided that he would get the heavy spear. Not thinking twice about why the so-called soul spear divine mantra had spear techniques that required the user to use his spear like a giant sledgehammer to smash his enemies to death with.


    "Are you sure you want this spear? Even though it is indeed at the earth rank, it''s only because it is sturdierpared to other spears¡­ When ites to the sharpness of the tip, it''s even worse than most mortal rank weapons¡­ But I guess you would already know that¡­" The shop owner nced down at the spear in Chu Yang''s hand as he said this.


    "Yes!" Having a confident smile on his face, Chu Yang took out the spirit stones required and paid the shop owner.


    "Haha¡­ I have nothing to say, it is after all still an earth rank weapon so the price should of course match¡­ Anything else?" Smiling widely upon getting the right amount of spirit stones from Chu Yang, the store owner quickly put them away before asking.


    "No thank you." Shaking his head, a bit, Chu Yang picked up the heavy spear with some difficulty and carried it with him as he walked out of the weapon shop.


    At the very least, he was allowed to carry weapons openly inside of the Flying Sword City as a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the two elders from the demonic sect were quietly getting ready to make their move on Chu Yang, Xuan Hao had just gotten back to his pavilion. Only to find out that it waspletely empty at the moment, outside of Zhi Ruo who was quietly taking some time to rx inside the small garden besides the greenhouse that Chu Yang spent most of his time practicing botany.


    Xuan Hao decided to not disturb her, as it was quite rare to see her taking time to rx and instead spread out his divine sense to try and find out where both of his disciples were currently at.


    Spreading out his divine sense was widely different from the passive version where the divine sense just covered a few hundred meters around him, this did not require any effort on his partpared to actively spreading out his divine sense.


    This was also one of the reasons why most Nascent Soul Realm cultivators could easily be bypassed as long as you did not enter the area covered by their passive divine sense.


    "Hm¡­? This is?" As he spread out his divine sense to cover the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao quickly found Qing Yi on her way back from the Alchemy Hall with a few books in hand, but Chu Yang was still nowhere in sight.


    Guess he should be somewhere in the Flying Sword City¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao quickly had his divine sense that covered the Flying Sword Sect retreat back, before he refocused it on the Flying Sword City.

 Chapter 111: Demonic Cultivator Skinlings Great Escape!

    <h4>Chapter 111: Demonic Cultivator Skinling''s Great Escape!</h4>


    " Let''s go now! It looks like he is about to return to the sect again!" The elder standing beside Elder Skinling said with an anxious look on his face. Nobody knew how long they would have to wait for another chance to capture him, they might even get found out by the Flying Sword Sect before that happens!


    "Fine, I will take care of the person protecting him from the shadows when he appears, and you will take that traitor and get as far away as possible! After this is over, we will meet up at the agreed location and return to the sect." Nodding his head in agreement, Elder Skinling knew that they would most likely not get a chance like this again any time soon and the Sect Master would not wait forever¡­


    Without waiting any longer Elder Skinling signalled for the other elder to act the moment Chu Yang made his way back towards the main street leading to the Flying Sword Sect.


    ¡­


    "¡­" Just as Xuan Hao had his divine sense cover the Flying Sword City, he sensed a rather familiar aura from two individuals.


    The individuals in question had the same aura as the ck robed man from the now demonic ck Rose Sect, although weaker.


    Focusing on both of them, Xuan Hao saw that they were currently in the process of stalking his disciple, Chu Yang, as he was browsing through a weapon shop looking for something to buy.


    To make sure nothing would happen to his disciple, Xuan Hao immediately moved over to the location and decided to watch from the side and see what the members of the Demonic Sect were nning to do, although he felt like he had an idea¡­


    Most likely something to do with the Devil-Immortal Jade that his disciple had stolen from them before running away in the past¡­


    "Oh¡­ Looks like they are going to take action¡­" watching the show unfolding below, Xuan Hao smile slightly when he saw one of the demonic cultivators grab his disciple and run away, while the other intercepted an inner elder tasked with keeping his disciple safe when he left the sect.


    Honestly, Xuan Hao was a bit surprised when he saw the strength of the inner elder, he was at the peak of the Core Formation Realm. Only one step away from reaching the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Someone like that would normally not guard the disciples of a Core Elder like Xuan Hao but would instead dedicate all their time to cultivating and trying to reach the Nascent Soul Realm. Maybe he had grown bored and wanted to go out for a bit?


    Not thinking too much about it, Xuan Hao instead focused on the strength of the demonic cultivator who was currently fighting with the inner elder.


    He did not look like much and was so skinny that he almost looked malnourished, but his strength spoke for itself as the skinny demonic cultivator exploded with strength and easily supressed the inner elder from the Flying Sword Sect without much difficulty.


    BOOM!


    Knocking the inner elder tasked with protecting Chu Yang away, the skinny demonic cultivator was about to escape when someone appeared in front of him to block his escape path.


    "Stop! Do you think you cane and go as you please inside of the Flying Sword Sects territory!?" The person blocking him was another inner elder at the peak of the Core Formation Realm that had arrived shortly after the first exchange between the inner elder protecting Chu Yang and the demonic cultivator.


    "Hm¡­ He should be done for¡­" Feeling the divine sense of both the Sect Master and the Vice Sect Master rush over and seeing over a dozen inner elderse out from a nearby teashop, Xuan Hao decided to leave the skinny demonic cultivator to them as he quickly followed the demonic cultivator who had taken off with his disciple.


    No matter what, the Flying Sword City was extremely close to the Flying Sword Sect and there would almost always be a few dozen inner elders staying there rxing in a nearby teashop or inn.


    The demonic cultivators had really chosen the worst possible time to act, as only a few meters away from the newly opened weapon shop, there was a rather popr teashop, and the inner elders of the Flying Swords Sects elderly generation were currently hosting a casual meeting to reminisce about the old days.


    ¡­


    "Where did all of these people suddenly pop up from!? Why are there so many Peak Core Formation experts so close by!?" Elder Skinling felt a sudden fear building up inside of him when he saw the Peak Core Formation Experts from the Flying Sword Sect surrounding him from all side, preventing him from running away.


    Even worse, he clearly knew that the Nascent Soul Realm experts of the Flying Sword Sect would be making their way over and could appear at any moment.


    "Looks like I don''t have a choice¡­"


    BOOM!


    A loud explosion erupted from the skinny demonic as a bright red mist enveloped his entire body, instantly causing his aura to skyrocket from the peak of the Core Formation Realm into the Nascent Soul Realm.


    With his newfound strength, Elder Skinling easily made his way through the encirclement of Flying Sword Sect elders and soon made it outside the Flying Sword Sect.


    Swoosh!


    But just as he was about to rx, a terrifying sword light came from the distance and soon appeared directly behind Elder Skinling within a few seconds.


    "BLOOD SACRIFICE!" Screaming on the top of his lungs, Elder Skinling''s arms both exploded into a bloody mist that flew forward and blocked the sword light.


    ng~


    An almost mesmerising sound of a sword hitting a metal surface sounded as the sword light was stopped for a moment before finally cutting through the bloody mist and shing down at the ce that Elder Skinling had been just a moment ago.


    Elder Skinling felt himself shiver a bit when he saw how easily the sword light had cut through his trump card. He had lost both his arms! Yet the bloody mist had barelysted a second against the sword light!


    Whoosh!


    Not thinking any longer about it, Elder Skinling used all his energy at trying to run away, his speed easily surpassed a stage one Nascent Soul expert in the moment of life and death, his speed had broken through to a new realm!


    But even that was not enough, as the person chasing him was someone in the seventh stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, thete stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    At this time, a new aura suddenly appeared in the opposite direction that the Elder Skinling had run to and was heading straight for the Flying Sword Sect.


    This did notst for long as another aura erupted from the Flying Sword Sect, causing the approaching aura to stop for a moment before resuming its path towards the Flying Sword Sect, this was followed by another three different auras appearing and making their way towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    ¡­


    "Hmph!" Feng Chen frowned slightly when he saw the situation and nced at the escaping demonic cultivator before finally turning back and abandoning the chase. Instead, he quickly made his way back to the Sect, causing the four auras to quickly retreat and disappear once again.


    "I hope Elder Xuan knows what he is doing¡­" Staring in the direction that the demonic cultivator disappeared in, Feng Chen muttered to himself.


    If it were not for Xuan Hao stopping him earlier and telling him to let the demonic cultivator escape in a believable manner, he would not have missed his attack on the demonic cultivator and would have already killed him.


    Now all he could do was wait for Xuan Hao to return and exin why he would allow a demonic cultivator to kidnap his disciple¡­ At the very least, Xuan Hao should have nned something¡­

 Chapter 112: Xuan Haos Scheme?

    <h4>Chapter 112: Xuan Hao''s Scheme?</h4>


    " Hah¡­ I didn''t expect for there to be so many Core Formation experts present in the Flying Sword City! Looks like it really was a trap!" ncing fearfully behind him as he continued moving at a fast speed, Elder Skinling felt like he had just barely escaped from the grasp of death.


    "I might have lost quite a bit, but in the end, we managed to catch that traitor! Now all I have to do is return to the sect and slowly recover and then I should be fine again in a few years'' time¡­" Looking down at the ce that his arms were supposed to be, Elder Skinling could still feel the pain from utilizing the blood sacrifice technique earlier.


    For him to be able to erupt with such strength and block the attack of Feng Chen for a moment while only being at the Core Formation Realm, a certain price had to be paid.


    Elder Skinling had ended up shattering part of his core located at the centre of his dantian and lost both his arms to get away, but in the end, Elder Skinling had managed to get away with his life!


    "Now I will just have to relocate and meet up with that cowardly guy¡­" Thinking about the other elder who had run away just as nned without incurring any injuries in the process, Elder Skinling felt a bit of resentment whenever he looked at the injuries that he had sustained.


    With that, Elder Skinling made his way towards a mountain located on the edges of the Flying Sword Sects territory, this was the ce that both of them had agreed to meet up after getting away from the Flying Sword Sect and heading back to the sect again together.


    ¡­


    Further away from where Elder Skinling was, Chu Yang was currently feeling extremely scared as he felt himself being carried away by an elderly man, that he could only guess was a member of his former sect.


    Things had happened way too fast for him to even react and before he knew it, he could see the Flying Sword City slowly disappearing into the distance as he got farther and farther away.


    At first, he had tried to struggle free, but after having no sess, he decided to just give up and wait for an opportunity.


    This went on for another few hours before his kidnapper finally came to a stop and threw him down on the ground.


    "Hah, this should be far enough!" Looking around cautiously, the kidnapper in question let out a sigh of relief before turning to look at Chu Yang with a malicious smile slowly appearing.


    "Now that we are alone little traitor, where did you keep that Devil-Immortal Jade? Hand it over now and I might be able to help you have a less painful death when we return to the sect¡­ But I can''t promise that the Sect Master will keep it, hehe!" Laughing at Chu Yang''s fate, the elder stretched out his hand, expecting Chu Yang to hand over the Devil-Immortal Jade.


    "¡­" Chu Yang suddenly felt himself starting to sweat a lot as he grew even more nervouspared to before.


    He did not have the Devil-Immortal Jade on him! Why would he bring something like that with him in the first ce? It was way safer to just let it stay in his room inside of the Flying Sword Sect!


    "Hm? Something wrong? Ah, perhaps you want to hand it over to the Sect Master personally in hopes that he would spare you? Hehe, I will allow you to hold this little hope, who knows? Maybe he will let you the sect again!" Not noticing how nervous Chu Yang was at the moment, the elder thought that he had hit the mark with his conclusion and justughed it off before taking out amunication talisman and contacting Elder Skinling.


    ¡­


    A few hundred meters in the air above Chu Yang and the elder from the demonic sect, Xuan Hao was closely keeping an eye on the situation happening down below.


    Earlier when he had discovered the two demonic sect elders, he had first thought about getting rid of them, but upon further contemtion, Xuan Hao realized that they would most likely juste again in the future and if he were not present, his disciple might be kidnapped for real¡­


    So, with that in mind, Xuan Hao decided on a n to deal with the now Demonic ck Rose Sect once and for all or at the very least prevent them froming to kidnap his disciple again.


    This n required Chu Yang to hand over the Devil-Immortal Jade to the Demonic ck Rose Sect, it was also for this reason that Xuan Hao had secretly taken away the Devil-Immortal Jade from his room.


    With a wave of his hand, Xuan Hao carefully threw out the Devil-Immortal Jade as it gentlynded in front of the surprised Chu Yang, who quickly picked it up and looked around himself in confusion.


    "Now for the next part¡­ I will have to look like a demonic cultivator, but how would I disguise myself as one and enter the ck Rose Sect¡­?" Thinking for a bit, Xuan Hao suddenly smiled slyly as he sensed a certain demonic cultivator approaching from the distance, the demonic cultivator guarding Chu Yang had yet to discover him as he was still quite far away, but Xuan Hao easily locked onto him.


    Xuan Hao had told Feng Chen to let him get away because he had originally wanted for him to keep the other demonic cultivator in check and prevent him from killing the person, they were supposed to capture and bring back along the way¡­ They were after all demonic cultivators and their reputation was not really that great¡­


    Xuan Hao had felt that the two of them would be able to keep each other in check and ensure that nothing bad would happen to Chu Yang along the way, but it had seemed that his worries were for nothing, as the elder in question did not seem to care about killing the traitor of the sect, Chu Yang.


    With that in mind Xuan Hao quickly came up with a new idea and soon appeared directly in front of Elder Skinling, shocking the living daylight out of him in the process.


    "Hello, I might have great opportunity for you and the future of your sect¡­" Smiling brightly, Xuan Hao started talking to Elder Skinling, who at first was still fearful of Xuan Hao, but slowly started growing more and more excited upon listing to what Xuan Hao said.


    "So, do we have a deal¡­?" Finished presenting his n, Xuan Hao looked over and saw Elder Skinling eagerly nodding his head in agreement.


    "Great! Just do as I told you and the ck Rose Sect will surely have a bright future¡­" Saying this, Xuan Hao quickly ascended into the sky and disappeared before Elder Skinling managed to react.

 Chapter 113: The Entrance to The Black Rose Sect

    <h4>Chapter 113: The Entrance to The ck Rose Sect</h4>


    " Elder Skinling!? What happened to you?!" The elder who had taken on the job of kidnapping Chu Yang and running away with him look at Elder Skinling with a shocked expression on his face when he saw him.


    This was not totally without reason, as the current Elder Skinling had lost both his arms earlier and his current self was nowhere close to being the same state as before, the other elder even started feeling a bit bad about the fact that he had just run away with Chu Yang while Elder Skinling blocked the path of the Flying Sword Sects people for him!


    "I got injured trying to escape, I barely manged to get away after using the blood sacrifice technique imparted by the Sect Master onto us¡­ For now, it looks like I will have to rely on you to get back safely to the Sect¡­" Putting on a pitiful expression, Elder Skinling let out a deep sigh of despair while mncholically ncing at where his arms were supposed to be from time to time.


    "N-no worries Elder Skinling, we are mostly safe already and we even manged to get the traitor and the Devil-Immortal Jade! The Sect Master might even be happy with our task when we return and help you recover your arms!" Smiling awkwardly, the other elder reassured Elder Skinling as he quickly made his way over and helped him up.


    No matter what, they were still members of the same sect and Elder Skinling and he had been quite close for some time and worked together on several asions in the past.


    "Indeed¡­ For now, let''s hurry back to the sect! I''m sure that the Sect Master is anxious to get the Devil-Immortal Jade back, so we can resume the ritual¡­" Shaking his head a bit, Elder Skinling and the other elder soon made their way back towards the ck Rose Sect.


    It was only for a moment, but Elder Skinling narrowed his eyes slightly with killing intent when the other elder turned around to pick up Chu Yang.


    The killing intent onlysted for a short moment and Elder Skinling quickly controlled himself again upon remembering what he had talked about with the mysterious person earlier.


    No matter what, he had toplete the task that he was given! For the future of the ck Rose Sect and for his own future!


    ¡­


    "Looks like there won''t be any problem with that guy¡­" Observing the situation from above, Xuan Hao smiled a bit to himself as he saw that Elder Skinling did not talk about his meeting or anything, it looked like his n so far had worked and Elder Skinling would most likely do the thing that he had tasked him with!


    "Now back to square one¡­ How do I enter the ck Rose Sect?" Thinking a bit about, Xuan Hao decided to fly ahead of the Elder Skinling and the other elder from the ck Rose Sect.


    Elder Skinling would most likely not dare to do anything to Chu Yang, as he was "critical" to the n Xuan Hao had told him about earlier and most importantly, there was a high chance that Elder Skinling had mistaken him for a Domain Lord because of his ability to fly¡­


    Xuan Hao would not be so kind as to correct his mistake if something like that had really happened. Flying with the help of a sword due to having True Sword Intent, was after all somethingpletely unheard of in the Heavenly Sky kingdom and few people knew about such a thing in the first ce.


    Time passed by and after travelling back over the Red Dust Desert, Xuan Hao soon made it to the Bright Sun City where Qing Yi and he had their first formal encounter with members of the ck Rose Sect.


    Xuan Hao only observed the city below for a few seconds before moving on upon discovering that everything was normal without a sudden demonic cultivator having suddenly appeared and destroyed the city in the name of the ck Rose Sect or something.


    The journey to the ck Rose Sect was peaceful and Xuan Hao did not encounter any demonic cultivator or anything along the way and by the time he arrived in front of the path leading up to the ck Rose Mountain that the ck Rose Sect was located at, Xuan Hao was a bit sceptical as to whether he was truly inside the territory of a demonic sect¡­


    Maybe he had taken a wrong turn along the way?


    From what he had learnt, most demonic sects would not be ced high into the sky where the qi between heaven and earth was the densest, instead, they would be located in an underground valley or cave system of some sort, so as to be closer to theherworld or something.


    All Xuan Hao knew about them being underground was that they did it because, like cultivators, they would have an easier time cultivating and improving.


    As for why they could improve the further underground they were, Xuan Hao had no clue, but he guessed that it had something to do with the energy that they cultivated being denser the further underground one went, simr to how qi grew denser the higher up one went.


    Throwing his doubts to the back of his mind, Xuan Hao tried his best to supress his own aura as he cautiously made his way up the ck Rose Mountain.


    Along the way, Xuan Hao discovered a lot of empty pavilions and other sort of living quarters and slowly started growing more and more confused.


    Where had they gone? Did they perhaps relocate after bing a demonic sect?


    All these thoughts swirled around Xuan Hao''s mind as he soon made it to the peak of the ck Rose Mountain, it was only at this point that he finally realized where the ck Rose Sect was truly located!


    At the ce that the Sect Masters pavilion was supposed to be located at the very peak of the ck Rose Mountain, there was instead a giant gaping hole leading straight down into what looked like a bottomless abyss.


    Xuan Hao could faintly hear faint roaring soundsing from the bottom of the abyss as he peered down into it.


    ncing towards a few tforms located a few meters below the normal ground level, Xuan Hao spotted a few ck robed individuals holding weapons, if he were not in the Nascent Soul Realm, they would have surely spotted him by now!


    Every single one of them had reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and were cautiously looking towards the top of the hole located a few kilometers above them at the top of the ck Rose Mountain, seemingly ready to act the moment they spotted something out of ce.

 Chapter 114: Only one Nascent Soul Realm Expert...?

    <h4>Chapter 114: Only one Nascent Soul Realm Expert...?</h4>


    Closely observing the path down into the abyss below where the ck Rose Sect was most likely located, Xuan Hao managed to spot a few blind spots that he could approach from and maybe sneak past the guard stationed directly below him.


    The only positive was that there was no Nascent Soul Realm expert present to guard the entrance at this point, though there was most likely one located further down¡­


    "I will just deal with it when I get to that point¡­" Muttering so to himself, Xuan Hao sneakily made his way down into the abyss below.


    The path down was an almost invisible staircase etched into the sides of the hole and Xuan Hao didn''t even notice it when he first looked down into the gaping hole that was the entrance of the ck Rose Sect.


    Thinking about it, Xuan Hao realized that there was most likely another entrance into the ck Rose Sect other than the giant hole that he was entering through.


    After all, they had to transport spirit stones and other essential item such as spirit herbs inside and the giant hole on top of the ck Rose Mountain did not really seem like a great ce to transport a massive amount of resources through¡­


    As Xuan Hao thought about this, he soon managed to make his way past the guards standing on the tforms.


    The guards did not seem to have noticed anything, as Xuan Hao quickly made it deeper into the abyss below.


    ¡­


    "We are here! Follow me to meet the Sect Master, he will decide your fate!" Arriving in front of an enormous cave entrance located only a few miles away from the ck Rose Mountain, with members of the ck Rose Sect stationed on both sides to guard the enormous cave entrance, Chu Yang was pushed forward as the elder known as Skinling lead him towards the cave entrance.


    "Elder Skinling, you manged to catch the traitor!? Colour me surprised! I thought the Sect Master would end up killing you in a few days, but it looks like you already started with your arms, haha!" As Elder Skinling and Chu Yang made their way over to the cave entrance, one of the Core Formation Experts guarding the entrance walked over with a taunting smile on his lips.


    "Elder Shadow Moon¡­" Elder Skinling narrowed his eyes when he saw the approaching person and if he still had his arms, he would surely clench his fists in anger.


    "Elder Shadow Moon, we are in a hurry to meet the Sect Master, if you could please allow us to pass¡­" As Elder Skinling and Elder Shadow Moon stared at each other, the other elder that had helped Elder Skinling capture Chu Yang stepped forward and meditated.


    "Fine¡­ We are after all both from the same sect, hehe, hope you can recover your arms quickly Skinling¡­ After all, as a demonic sect, we should not keep any useless people around!" Smiling tauntingly, Elder Shadow Moon soon made his way back to his position among the Core Formation Experts guarding the entrance.


    With that out of the way, Chu Yang was soon escorted in through the cave entrance towards the location of the ck Rose Sect, or at the very least the new location of the ck Rose Sect.


    Chu Yang himself had not seen the part of the sect that was located underground, at most he had heard a few rumours about the ce before he managed to make his escape.


    But from looking around at the younger members of the sect passing by along the way, Chu Yang could see that the entire ck Rose Sect had most likely already moved the entire sect underground.


    "T-this is¡­!" Coming to a stop in front of a giant pce, Chu Yang felt a primordial fear inside of him as he felt the strong menacing aura radiating from the giant pce.


    If he entered the pce in front of him, he would never be able to return again!


    That was the feeling Chu Yang had when he looked at the pce.


    Elder Skinling did not seem to mind the menacing aura that much and walked up to one of the people guarding the entrance.


    Soon, the giant gate leading into the pavilion swung open as the stench of human blood wafted out into the air, causing Chu Yang to feel even more afraid as Elder Skinling almost had to push him forward into the pce.


    Ah¡­ is this the end¡­?


    As he was pushed into the pavilion, Chu Yang nced backwards, only to see the giant doors of the pce closing.


    All he could do was walk forward with the assistance of Elder Skinling, who had taken on an extremely serious look from the moment he stepped foot inside the pce.


    ¡­


    "Hm¡­? They are here?" Hiding behind a rock formation close to the pce, Xuan Hao watched with a slight smile as he saw his disciple enter the pce with a scared look on his face. At this point, his disciple most likely thought he was about to meet his end¡­


    Xuan Hao also felt quite lucky as he had managed to enter the ck Rose Sect without encountering any Nascent Soul Realm Expert, but at the same time he had started to be worried¡­ After all, the only Nascent Soul Realm Expert he could feel in the entire ck Rose Sect was the Sect Master located in the pce that his disciple had just entered¡­


    Where were the other Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the ck Rose Sect¡­?


    "Time to move I guess¡­" narrowing his eyes, Xuan Hao shook his head slightly and cast the thought to the back of his mind as he made his way over towards the pce.


    The moment, Elder Skinling did what he had told him to do, he would act! If he was lucky, he might even be able to kill the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect now that there were no other Nascent Soul Realm Experts present in the ck Rose Sect, instead of just injuring him like he had originally nned!

 Chapter 115: Sect Master of the Black Rose Sect

    <h4>Chapter 115: Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect</h4>


    Inside the underground pce, Elder Skinling was carefully escorting Chu Yang forward towards the throne room located at the centre of the underground pce, this was the ce that the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect resided!


    As he got closer and closer to the throne room that the Sect Master was located in, Elder Skinling started growing more and more nervous with each passing second.


    No matter how confident he was in the person that he had met earlier, he still could not stop himself from feeling extremely nervous.


    "Come!" As Chu Yang and Elder Skinling arrived in front of arge double door, a demonic voice echoed out from the other side as the double door slowly started opening on its own. Not giving Chu Yang or Elder Skinling any time to respond to the voice.


    Looking into the pitch-ck darkness beyond the double door, Elder Skinling gulped in fear as he slowly walked inside, making sure that Chu Yang was walking in front of him.


    Thest time he visited the Sect Master, it was nowhere near as scary as it was currently! Before there were several light sources in the room making it bright and majestic, but now it waspletely dark and gave off a creepy and scary vibe.


    Elder Skinling felt like his life was no longer in his own hands, as the aura in front of him grew stronger and stronger the closer he got.


    "S-sect Master, I have brought back the traitor who stole away the Devil-Immortal Jade!" Coming to a stop a few meters away from the ce that the aura came from, Elder Skinling did not dare to move any closer as he quickly pushed Chu Yang towards the Sect Master.


    "Hm¡­" Not saying anything more, the Sect Master who waspletely hidden by the darkness thoroughly inspected Chu Yang before his gaze finallynded on a token firmly held in Chu Yang''s left hand.


    The Sect Master could clearly feel the demonic will inside the token and knew that it was the right one and not just some imitation that Elder Skinling had made in an attempt to safe himself from punishment, should he fail to get the Devil-Immortal Jade back again.


    "Great!" Not being able to fully control himself upon finding out that it was the real Devil-Immortal Jade, the Sect Master smiled happily as he waved his hand, causing the Devil-Immortal Jade to fly out of Chu Yang''s hand and into his own.


    "Hm?" Upon grabbing hold of the Devil-Immortal Jade, the Sect Master immediately felt that something was wrong, it felt lighter than it had in the past¡­ quickly bringing the jade closer to have a closer look.


    The Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect immediately discovered that arge part of the Devil-Immortal Jade had been chipped off, even worse, it was the main part of the jade containing the Devil-Immortal engraving.


    Without it, the Devil-Immortal Jade was useless¡­


    "Who!?" The aura of the ck Rose Sect Master went out of control as an overwhelming killing intent suddenly washed over both Chu Yang and Elder Skinling, causing both of them to weakly copse down on the ground, unable to move a single muscle.


    Chu Yangid t on the ground, while Elder Skinling barely managed to keep himself up as he looked in the direction of the Sect Master filled with fear of what was about to happen.


    "Y-you¡­!" Barely manging to get any words out, Elder Skinling looked extremely shocked the moment he actually saw the Sect master, this was not due to him suddenly bing extraordinarily handsome or anything like that.


    No, instead it was because of the two bat like wings behind him, making him look extremely demonic.


    "Youpleted the second demonic transformation!?" Barely managing to get a sentence out after calming himself down for a few seconds, Elder Skinling knew very well what the pair of bat-like wings on the Sect Master''s back meant.


    The Second Demonic Transformation was a cultivation realm under demonic cultivation that was said to be as strong as peak Nascent Soul Realm cultivators! But this was not the only thing that made demonic cultivators on the second transformation scary, what truly set them apart was the pair of demonic wings that they would grow, allowing them to fly through the air without reaching the Domain Lord Realm!


    While Elder Skinling did not know if the Sect Master truly attained the strength of someone at the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm had, he still knew that the current Sect Master was not one that would be easily caught.


    Maybe I made the wrong choice¡­?


    Thinking back to this, Elder Skinling remembered when he had secretly cut off the engraved part of the Devil-Immortal Jade with a special qi technique when Chu Yang had been sleeping and the other elder was not paying attention on the way back to the ck.


    The expert that could fly had instructed him to do this and then allow Chu Yang to hand over the damaged Devil-Immortal Jade to the Sect Master¡­ But why?


    Elder Skinling saw the Sect Masters aura growing more and more unstable as he felt an enormous killing intent locking on to him and Chu Yang, ensuring that neither of them could escape their impending doom.


    ¡­


    Outside of the pce where Chu Yang and Elder Skinling were currently, Xuan Hao felt the demonic aura inside of the pce suddenlye alive as it violently spread out causing an enormous pressure to descend upon the disciples and elders of the ck Rose Sect.


    The ones standing too close to the pce, like the guards, directly copsed to the ground as they could not stand up straight under the pressure and was forced to either kneel down or just copse directly in the form of a human pancake, trying their best to not suddenly die under the pressure.


    "Looks like that Elder Skinling is indeed useful!" smiling to himself, Xuan Hao could clearly see that the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect was currently undergoing an emotional upheaval, this had caused his aura to grow extremely unstable as he had a hard time controlling his anger.


    Normally, such a thing would only take a few seconds, if not less to calm down for a Nascent Soul Realm Expert and would normally not be a problem¡­ But during the period of emotional instability the Nascent Soul Realm Expert would be vulnerable, and his divine sense would momentarily be unstable enough that someone could sneak close without being noticed¡­


    Meaning there was an opportunity for a surprise attack!

 Chapter 116: Xuan Hao Attacks!

    <h4>Chapter 116: Xuan Hao Attacks!</h4>


    Xuan Hao did not hesitate for even a moment as he quickly made his way into the underground pce where the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect was located together with his disciple Chu Yang and Elder Skinling.


    At the current moment, the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect was currently ovee with rage as he angrily stared at Elder Skinling, waiting for him toe up with some sort of exnation before he killed him.


    "I, I- "Elder Skinling did not know what to do at the current moment, as he could only muster all of his remaining strength to look fearfully up at the Sect Master.


    He had done everything that he was told to do¡­ Where was that person¡­? Did he perhaps find out about the Sect Master having reached the Second Demonic Transformation and decided not to act¡­?


    This thought alone caused Elder Skinling to shake all over as he could only wait for his end toe at the hands of the Sect Master¡­


    "Hmph, I see that you don''t want to cooperate." Seeing that Elder Skinling did not exin or try to beg for his life, the Sect Masterpletely ignored Chu Yang standing beside him, as he mercilesslyunched an attack towards Elder Skinling.


    Is this the end¡­?


    Having such a clich¨¦ thought as his life was about to end, Elder Skinling closed his eyes and waited for the attack to hit him without putting in any effort to resist at all.


    Xuan Hao arrived just at this moment and saw the damsel in distress¡­? All though the damsel in question was not the kind of damsel that he was hoping for, even his disciple would have been better as he could at the very least leave a deeper impression on him¡­


    Swoosh!


    Before the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect could even react to Xuan Hao''s sudden appearance, heunched a deadly sword strike towards him and soon it arrived directly in front of him. Not giving him any time to react before he was hit head on with no defences in ce.


    Boom!


    "Wha-!" The sword strikeunched by Xuan Haonded directly on the chest of the ck Rose Sect''s Sect Master and exploded into a massive sea of sword qi that directly refocused and under Xuan Hao''s control continued to attack the Sect Master, throwing him backwards while destroying arge part of the underground pce they were currently inside in the process.


    The surrounding disciples and elders of the ck Rose Sect only felt that the pressure that was previously bearing down on them had disappeared as they all turned to look in the direction of the pce.


    The sight that met them was half the side of the pce beingpletely destroyed as their Sect Master flew out of it and mmed directly into the cave wall, causing part of the cave to copse, as rocks and other debris showered down, burying himpletely.


    "How dare you!" A loud and enraged scream erupted from beneath the rocks and other debris as the Sect Master soon jumped out and a blood red aurapletely engulfed him, sending a chill down the spine of every disciple or elder that was watching.


    Swoosh~


    The only answer that the Sect Master got was another sword attack, but this time he was ready for it, as a blood red shield formed in front of him and blocked the attack.


    Following this, Xuan Hao appeared from the now ruined part of the underground pce as he quickly rushed at the Sect master, preparing tounch another attack before he managed to recover.


    The n Xuan Hao had was rtively simple, first rush in when he is distracted, secondly hit the Sect Master with his sword until he either dies or is seriously injured.


    Xuan Hao could not let him regain his footing and make sense of what was happening, so he keptunching attack after attack at the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect, as the person in question continued to be pushed further and further back under the unrelenting wave of attacks by Xuan Hao.


    The only thing Xuan Hao was worried about currently was the other Nascent Soul Realm Elders of the ck Rose Sect showing up and joining the fight to support the Sect master.


    As for the Sect Master having reached the Second Demonic Transformation and beingparable with Peak Nascent Soul Realm cultivators and having the ability to fly with his bat-like wings? Xuan Hao did not worry at all.


    From what he could feel after fighting a bit with him, Xuan Hao had discovered that the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect had only just managed toplete the Second Demonic Transformation and was at mostparable to someone at the seventh stage of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ Far from reaching the true potential of the Second Demonic Transformation¡­


    Swish!


    "Argh!" Once again, a sword attack of Xuan Hao managed to make its way past the defence of the Sect Master and make direct contact, but even being wounded like this, the Sect Master did not seem to be seriously injured as he merely shrugged off the attack and continued to defend against the unrelenting barrage of attacks Xuan Hao threw at him.


    "Hah¡­" Seeing this, Xuan Hao stopped attacking as he clearly felt that the physical defence of the Sect Master was way stronger than he had first expected.


    An attack that could seriously injure a seventh stage Nascent Soul Realm cultivator only left a small flesh wound on the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect¡­


    "Hm?"


    ncing in the direction where Chu Yang and Skinling had entered the ck Rose Sect from, Xuan Hao clearly felt a few auras in the Nascent Soul Realming over.


    The Nascent Soul Realm experts from the ck Rose Sect that were missing earlier had returned!


    "Looks like I will have to go all out if I want to injure him¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao ignored the fact that the Sect Master had already gotten up and was looking at him filled with killing intent!

 Chapter 117: Rain Sword Art

    <h4>Chapter 117: Rain Sword Art</h4>


    Drawing back his sword, Xuan Hao decided to use a sword attack that he was more familiar withpared to the one in the Untold Sword Mantra that he could only barely execute.


    The Sword art in question was part of one of the few Heaven Rank sword arts of the Flying Sword Sect, called the Rain Sword.


    In the past, the sword art had been found by one of the ancestors of the Flying Sword Sect and hadter been given over to the Pagoda of Enlightenment.


    The sword art was split into three different attacks, Misty Rain, Spring Rain and finally Cloudburst.


    Xuan Hao did not dare to wait for any longer as he immediately appeared only a few meters away from where the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect was standing as he shed down.


    "Cloudburst!"


    Xuan Hao mustered all his qi as he used the final move of the Rain Sword, Cloudburst. Even though the sword attack was normally not something that he would be able to use with his current strength, Xuan Hao knew that if he did not injure the Sect master of the ck Rose Sect now, there would not be a chance to do so in future.


    Especially now that he had already been ambushed once, it was unlikely for him to give another chance for something like that to happen within a short amount of time.


    Sword qi formed around the sword together with Xuan Hao''s sword intent as a streak of sword light exploded forwards towards the Sect Master.


    Together with the sword light the sound of rain could be faintly heard, as the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect briefly felt like he was engulfed in the middle of a terrifying rainstorm that could wipe him out at any moment.


    This illusion onlysted for a brief moment, but it was more than enough time as Xuan Hao''s sword attack reached the Sect Master.


    BOOM!


    A violent explosion ensued, as the sword qi gathered inside of the sword light exploded outwards just as it was about to hit the Sect Master, raining down on the area surrounding the Sect Master and the Sect Master himself.


    "Argh!" Letting out a pitiful scream, the Sect Master quickly retreated from the area of the sword rain, but it was already toote as the sword qi had managed to prate deep into his body, if he were too slow, the sword qi would have prated his soul and directly killed him on the spot!


    "Sect Master!" A loud yell could be heard as the first of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the ck Rose Sect had made his way back to the sect. The first thing that he saw uponing to the underground pce was the Sect Master getting hit by countless small sword lights raining down on him from above, followed by his scream and him retreating.


    The Nascent Soul Expertpletely ignored Xuan Hao, as he quickly made his way over to the Sect Master to make sure that he was fine.


    Xuan Hao did not wait along for the rest of the ck Rose Sects Nascent Soul Realm Experts to appear as he quickly turned around and made his way into the underground pce where Chu Yang and Elder Skinling were currently located.


    "Hm? He fainted¡­?" Looking at the unconscious Chu Yang, Xuan Hao grabbed him and turned over to see Elder Skinling looking at him with eyes full of fear.


    Back then, Xuan Hao had promised to help him get out of the Demonic ck Rose Sect without them sending people to hunt him down in the future.


    After he had experienced how ruthless the current Sect Master was and how little his life mattered to the higher-ups, Elder Skinling wanted to quit and just return to being a normal cultivator, even being a wandering cultivator without any backing would be better than staying in the Demonic ck Rose Sect in his eyes!


    "A-are you still g-going to help me¡­?" Feeling extremely nervous when he was standing in front of Xuan Hao, Elder Skinling barely manged to ask what he wanted to. Thest few minutes of his life had been the most chaotic and terrifying it had ever been, even the chase a few days ago where he lost both his arms wasn''t as scary!


    "Of course, they will most likely not try and search for you over the next few weeks, so you should have more than enough time to escape to another kingdom¡­" Seeing Elder Skinling''s hopeful eyes, Xuan Hao decided to do as he promised and quickly grabbed onto Elder Skinling before jumping on his sword, quickly making his escape out of the ck Rose Sect through the hole that he entered through.


    The guards stationed on the few tforms at the side had already grown terrified as they carefully tried to see what was happening in the ck Rose Sect below them.


    Xuan Hao''s sudden appearance from below flying caused them to quickly scatter, as they tried their best to hide away in the small cracks of the wall, it was only half an hour after they were sure Xuan Hao was gone that they made their way back out.


    What happened in the Sect?


    All of the guards were confused and scared as they quickly abandoned their posts and made their way down into the sect to find out what happened.


    ¡­


    "Who was it!?" A few minutes after Xuan Hao had escaped, the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect''s voice echoed through the enormous underground cave, the few Nascent Soul Elders took a bit distance from the Sect Master, scared he might take out his anger at them.


    "We don''t know, but it looks like Elder Skinling helped him set up a trap of some sort¡­" A wise looking elder bravely stepped forward as he exined.


    "Skinling¡­! How did the preparations for the grand ritual go¡­?" Narrowing his eyes filled with killing intent, the Sect Master still managed to calm down as he asked about the thing that the other Nascent Soul Elders of the ck Rose Sect had been working on.


    "We managed to finish the preparations¡­ But without the Devil-Immortal Jade-"


    "Enough! I already reached the Second Demonic Transformation! When I recover, I should be able toplete the ritual without the Devil-Immortal Jade! Before then, we will close off the Sect and not bother with the outside world¡­" Interrupting the answer by one of the elders, the Sect Master turned around and made his way back to the half-destroyed pce.


    "Just you wait damnable sword cultivator! I will get my revenge after I recover! And find out where you are! And¡­ who you are¡­" Realizing that he had no idea who had attacked him in the first ce, the Sect Master fell into a sudden state of confusion as he could only sigh to himself before returning to his now destroyed throne room.

 Chapter 118: Return to the Flying Sword Sect

    <h4>Chapter 118: Return to the Flying Sword Sect</h4>


    Flying away from the ck Rose Sect, Xuan Hao came to a stop andnded on the ground after traveling in the direction of the Flying Sword Sect for 30 minutes straight. During the travel, Elder Skinling did not say a single word as he just quietly let Xuan Hao carry him away from the ck Rose Sect.


    "You are free to go now, I would rmend leaving the Heavenly Sky Kingdom as quickly as possible if you don''t want the ck Rose Sect toe after you in the future! With this my promise can be considered to have been fulfilled!"


    Upon reaching the ground, Xuan Hao let go of Elder Skinling as he warned him before quickly ascending into the sky with Chu Yang still unconscious, making his way back towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Thank you!" Bowing deeply in the direction of Xuan Hao''s disappearing figure among the clouds above, Elder Skinling felt a genuine sense of gratitude as he would not have to worry about his past secting after him and hunting him down.


    He had managed to leave! Even if he had ended up both of his arms, he could still recover them either with the help of a healer or through cultivating. Reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, one would go through aplete rebirth of sorts and recovering his two arms at that point should be more than doable.


    "Now where should I go first? The Azure Sky Kingdom is still at war with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, so going there would not be such a great idea¡­ I might even end up getting dragged into the conflict if I go there!" Going over his current situation, Elder Skinling smiled a bit to himself before shaking his head.


    "I will just try and head to the Cloud Sky Kingdom for now, they have always remained neutral and peaceful whenever something happened, and they will most likely not join the current conflict between the Heavenly Sky and Azure Sky Kingdom." Coming to a decision, Elder Skinling did not stand around and wait for any longer as he made his way in the direction of the Cloud Sky Kingdom.


    "Hopefully, I will be able to recover my strength and reach the Nascent Soul Realm there¡­"


    ¡­


    As the former elder of the ck Rose Sect Skinling was making his way towards the Cloud Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao had made his way back to the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Xuan Hao! How did things go, and did you manage to get your disciple back safely!? Did you kill off those damnable demonic cultivators!" Just as Xuan Hao made his way in through the gates of the sect, the Vice Sect Master Zu Fei came over with a slightly worried, but even so more angry expression on her face when she mentioned the demonic cultivators.


    "I''m fine and the ck Rose Sect should not be able to bother us in the short term¡­ At the very least their Sect Master is currently seriously injured." Xuan sighed slightly upon saying this, but quickly recovered.


    Earlier he had used up most of his qi in the attack against the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect, but even then, he had still managed to survive the attack.


    "Injured?! How strong was he?!" Upon hearing that the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect had only ended up seriously injured, Zu Fei wore a shocked expression on her face.


    Xuan Hao was a Nascent Soul Expert in the sixth stage and a sword cultivator famous for havingbat strength above their own cultivation realm! No matter how strong the ck Rose Sect had be due to bing a demonic sect, Zu Fei had never expected for their Sect Master to be that strong.


    "A-are you okay¡­?" ncing over at Xuan Hao more carefully, Zu Fei tried to see if he had managed to get injured as well.


    "I''m fine, I managed to get away before the other Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the ck Rose Sect made their way over to help the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect. For now, I will go back and make sure nothing happened to my disciple, I will personally go to the Sect Master and report what happened in detailter." Saying this, Xuan Hao made his way back towards his pavilion, while Zu Fei quickly went back to what she was doing beforehand.


    It was only a coincidence that she had managed to meet Xuan Hao just as he entered the Sect, and she made her way out to deal with a task given by the Sect Master Feng Chen.


    The journey back to the pavilion went without any incidents as Xuan Hao made his way up the mountain that the pavilion was located at.


    "Master and Chu Yang¡­? W-what happened to Chu Yang, do you know where he disappeared to in thest few days?" A person suddenly appeared a few meters behind Xuan Hao as she quickly ran over and asked with a slightly confused voice.


    "Qing Yi? Ah, Chu Yang is just unconscious. Nothing to worry about." Seeing that it was just his disciple, Xuan Hao quickly assured her that nothing was wrong with him and began to exin what had happened over thest few days of him going missing.


    "I see¡­ So Junior Chu Yang was kidnapped by people from the ck Rose Sect and master went to save him!" Upon hearing Xuan Hao''s nonbiased exnation about how he had saved Chu Yang from a den of demonic cultivators and heroically injured their leader in the process, Qing Yi''s eyes started shinning as she looked at her master with respect.


    To think he went into air of demonic cultivators to savejunior Chu Yang!


    Qing Yi felt that her master was really awesome at that moment and even started imagining the scene for herself.


    "Let''s return to the pavilion for now so I can put down your junior brother." Carrying around his disciple was not really something he wanted to continue doing, so with Xuan Hao leading the way, both he and Qing Yi made their way up the mountain.

 Chapter 119: Messenger of the Azure Sky Kingdom

    <h4>Chapter 119: Messenger of the Azure Sky Kingdom</h4>


    " Y-your Majesty! The gue that spread through the Heavenly Sky Kingdom over thest few months, have appeared in the border regions of the country!" Kneeling down, the messenger fearful conveyed what he was ordered to by his superiors. No matter what happened, he did not dare to look up at the person sitting on the throne in front of him.


    "And? This is most likely just someone trying to fish in the muddy waters. No need to pay any attention to it for now, just continue to focus on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom...


    Convey this to my generals; I would like for you to stop ying around at the borders and just get it over with. The Heavenly Sky Kingdom won''t send any of their strong experts and will at most send a few people in the early stages of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ If you still struggle, just use those Nascent Soul Experts from the sects as the frontline tounch an attack¡­ Now go." The man on the throne said with an emotionless voicepletely ignoring the person kneeling down in front of him after quickly waving him away.


    "Y-yes your majesty¡­" Not daring to say anything to the person on the throne, even if it meant that the message, he carried would cause friction between the Imperial family of the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Sect''s of the Azure Sky Kingdom!


    "Ah, wait¡­" Just as the messenger was about to leave the throne room, the emotionless voice from earlier sounded out once again.


    The messenger to froze in ce the moment he heard the emotionless voice and felt like his poor life might end at any moment, constantly thinking back to his earlier short conversation, wondering where he had messed up.


    "Deliver this to the current person inmand at the border when you arrive." Throwing out a small jade with a few engravings on it, the emotionless person on the throne finally seemed to have run out of things to say as the messenger almost ran out of the throne room like a Domain Lord demon best was chasing after him.


    Upon leaving the throne room, the messenger came to a stop in a small room inside the pce that he was currently located at, there, his subordinates were patiently waiting for him with an anxious look stered all over their faces.


    "Leader, how did it go? Any solution to the gue problem from his majesty?" One of the subordinates stepped forward and asked nervously in a slightly hopeful tone.


    The messenger who was the leader of the group could not help but sigh a bit to himself as he looked at the subordinate that asked this, his entire family was located at the border region where the gue outbreak happened!


    Even though he could move them to the capital now, it would most likely be toote as the vige where his family lived most likely already got infected.


    Let alone getting to the capital, they would be barred entry from the central region of the Azure Sky Kingdom, so as to ensure that the gue would not start to suddenly spread there.


    "His majesty is still undecided on how to deal with the current gue outbreak and is contemting about how to deal with it properly, for now our job will be to deliver a message to themander and generals at the border¡­" Not wanting to destroy his subordinates hopes, the messenger bit down on his lips as he lied in an attempt to make sure his subordinate did not do anything stupid upon learning the fact that his majesty simply didn''t care about the people located at the border region and chose to ignore them as the war with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was clearly more important in his eyes.


    "I see¡­ Dealing with the recent gue outbreak is definitely not something that can be decided on so lightly, I''m sure his majesty has some idea on how to deal with it¡­" Letting out the breath that he had unknowingly been holding, the subordinate looked a little more relived upon hearing what his leader said.


    The other subordinates were the same, as their family were mostly still located outside the central region of the Azure Sky Kingdom, with only a few having moved their families to the central region.


    Following what their leader said, all of them started chatting with each other about their family situation, causing the leaders face to turn a bit ugly, as guilt started to slowly seep its way into his eyes.


    "Enough chatting, let''s get going immediately, we have to deliver the message given by his majesty to themander at the border as quickly as possible!" The messenger felt a little bad when he saw his subordinates relived expressions, but quickly remembered his mission.


    "" Yes, Leader!"" The subordinates quickly answered as each of them saluted the messenger before making their way out of the pce together and heading in the direction of the border.


    ¡­


    As the messenger and his group of subordinates made their way towards the Azure Sky Kingdom''s border with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. The Heavenly Sky Kingdoms defences at the border were finally seeing a turn for the better, as Wang Hu had arrived to assist his brother and the Seven Fates Sect had sent over an additional 5 Nascent Soul Realm Experts to help defend the border region.


    Other than that, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s Imperial family also sent over a 5 Nascent Soul Realm Experts to match the Seven Fates Sect.


    Even with that said, the Nascent Soul Realm Experts sent over by both the Seven Fates Sect and the Imperial family were only first stage Nascent Soul Realm Experts, some of them even had extremely unstable auras as it could clearly be seen that they had somehow forced their way into the Nascent Soul Realm by second-hand means¡­


    Wang Hu and the rest of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts at the border were a little speechless when they saw this line-up of "experts" from both Seven Fates and the Imperial family.


    They were clearly a group of elderly people who had just broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm for the increase in lifespan and would forever be stuck at the first stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Just a single normal second or maybe even first stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert alone would be more than enough to deal with this group of elderly "experts"!


    Was this the Seven Fates Sect and the Imperial familypeting in who could waste the most resources to help take care of the elderly generation when they retired¡­?

 Chapter 120: Growing Threat of the Unkown Alchemist!

    <h4>Chapter 120: Growing Threat of the Unkown Alchemist!</h4>


    The already present Nascent Soul Experts started growing a bit uneasy when they saw the "Experts" that had been sent over to help them keep up the defence, but this uneasiness quickly disappeared as the Azure Sky Kingdom did not mobilize more people to the border.


    The border slowly fell into a state of peace as the usual small skirmishes resumed, with Nascent Soul Realm Experts only showing up from time to time when the other side was about to push too much into the others territory.


    The focus of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was mostly on the part of the army that had ended up betraying them all of a sudden. The anger of the soldiers and generals were understandable, as they hoped for the Heavenly Sky Kingdom could do something about the families of the traitors back home.


    After all, who knew if they were in on it as well and were waiting to deal a deadly blow to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom?


    Many of the traitors with ordinary backgrounds soon had their family arrested and interrogated, while the higher-ups among the traitors had already managed to sneak their family out of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and into the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    This in turn caused many of the ordinary soldier who had turned traitor in a moment of pressure or due to other circumstances, to once again turn traitor and defect back to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, most were hopeful that their families would be ensured safety if they did this.


    Overall, this did not affect the big picture as the Core Formation and Nascent Soul Realm Traitors still remained on the side of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    But it did manage to recover some of the faith that the soldiers had lost when they saw arge part of the army defect to the other side.


    ¡­


    "So, you are going to participate in this Alchemy Competition where an old Artisan Alchemist of the Sky Empire is looking for a disciple!?" Upon getting back to the pavilion and leaving Chu Yang to slowly wake up in his own room, Xuan Hao and Qing Yi walked outside as Qing Yi told him about the Alchemy Competition that she had decided to participate in a half a year.


    As the master of Qing Yi, Xuan Hao had the final say in whether she could participate in thepetition.


    Hearing the description of the Alchemy Competition, Xuan Hao immediately felt threatened! That old Artisan Alchemist wouldn''t try and steal his disciple away¡­ Right¡­?


    Xuan Hao knew very well that he had no way to resist the Sky Empire at the moment with his current strength, if that old Artisan Alchemist of the Sky Empire truly took an interest in his disciple and wanted to steal her¡­


    The thought alone caused Xuan Hao to be a bit vignt towards the unknown Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire.


    "Can I join¡­? I heard there were quite a few good rewards for the people participating and it would be great learning experience, I might even be able to advance my Alchemy Realm¡­ The Alchemy Hall will also let some of the seniors train me in the time leading up to thepetition." Seeing the struggling expression on her master''s face, Qing Yi called out in as she noted down how much she could improve by joining thepetition.


    "You can go¡­" Seeing the hopeful expression on Qing Yi''s face, Xuan Hao decided to agree. No matter what, his disciple should not be the best out of all the geniuses sent over by the other nearby kingdoms put together¡­ Right¡­?


    Feeling a bit nervous at the thought of his disciple acing thepetition and trashing the otherpetitors, Xuan Hao decided to sneak- discreetly follow the Alchemy Hall when they made their way to the Alchemy Competition hosted by the Sky Empires Artisan Alchemist.


    Only this way would he be able to set aside his worries towards the unknown Artisan Alchemist of the Sky Empire.


    "Thank you master! I will go over and inform the Alchemy Hall immediately!" Not knowing about the inner struggles of her master, Qing Yi happily jumped around the ce in an excited manner before quickly running off in the direction of the Alchemy Hall.


    "Hah¡­" Letting out a sigh filled with worry, Xuan Hao looked at the disappearing figure of Qing Yi.


    Maybe he made the wrong choice by letting her join the Alchemy Competition?


    "Still not up yet¡­?" Not thinking about it for any longer, Xuan Hao made his way down the mountain after checking in on Chu Yang and seeing if he had woken up yet.


    The ce he was going was of course the Sect Master''s pavilion, as he was going to report what he had found out about the strength of the ck Rose Sect and their current situation.


    Sadly, the current Flying Sword Sect was not even able to deal with a sect that was formerly below them¡­ Bing a demonic sect truly had its benefits in terms of short-term power increase¡­


    How was that former elder of the ck Rose Sect going to fare in the world¡­? He was after all a demonic cultivator and no matter where he went, demonic cultivators were hunted down even more aggressively than demon beast in many ces.


    The ck Rose Sect in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom could be considered a unique situation where the Imperial family wanted to borrow their strength to deal with the Flying Sword Sect.


    Skinling, the former elder of the ck Rose Sect did not have such a great thing to ensure his safety in the short term and he would be forced to run and hide whenever he was found out.


    In the end, Xuan Hao could almost see the struggle that Skinling would have to go through to seed on the path of cultivation in the future.


    Staying in the Flying Sword Sect and training up a few disciples and quietly cultivating was far better than that! At the very least, his chance of survival was way higher staying in the Flying Sword Sectpared to journeying around the world looking for opportunities to advance his cultivation.


    In the future, he could let his disciples do that!

 Chapter 121: Feng Chen Enters Secluded Cultivation

    <h4>Chapter 121: Feng Chen Enters Secluded Cultivation</h4>


    Travelling to the Sect Master''s pavilion did not take long and Xuan Hao soon made his way inside under the guidance of one of the few servants in charge of cleaning the pavilion. The servant in question was of course a man¡­ Thest time that the Sect Master had hired a female servant in his pavilion, the Vice Sect Master apparently held a meeting with the two other Core Elder''s that ended with the Sect Master transferring the female servant over to another elder a few dayster.


    What they had talked about in that specific meeting, Xuan Hao had no clue, as it had happened before he had joined the Flying Sword Sect.


    Even Wang Hu and Wang Lan did not dare to talk about what had happened during that meeting and Xuan Hao knew that it would most likely be best if he did not continue asking about it.


    "We are here." Coming to a spot in front of the Sect Masters room once again, the servant quickly backed off and returned to his duties. Leaving Xuan Hao to stare nkly at the door for a few moments before finally knocking gently on it.


    "Come in." The voice of the Sect Master echoed out from the inside, as the door slowly opened.


    Xuan Hao did not stand around as he walked directly into the Sect Master''s room.


    "Xuan Hao, how did it go? I was quite confused when you asked me to let that demonic cultivator run away with your disciple, but it seems like you managed to deal some damage to the demonic sect? How strong were they? How many Nascent Soul Realm Experts do they have? Did you find out what they were up to?" The moment Xuan Hao made his way inside the room, Feng Chen came over as a barrage of questions flew forward, catching Xuan Hao off guard as he did not expect for him to be so enthusiastic.


    "Feng Chen calm down a bit¡­ Your enthusiasm is quite overwhelming!" Taking a few steps backwards trying to make a bit distance between him and Feng Chen, Xuan Hao tried to get him to calm down a bit.


    "Ahem¡­ Sorry for that, I was just a bit worried when I heard that you failed to kill off the ck Rose Sect''s Sect Master even with your strength! They were way stronger than I had expected for them to be and the trouble they will bring in the future will be endless¡­" Looking a bit embarrassed at his earlier enthusiastic behaviour, Feng Chen quickly calmed down and once again had the appearance befitting of a Sect Master.


    "Well¡­ I did manage to injure their Sect Master quite heavily and the rest of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts were mostly just at the first stage of the Realm, so they should not be nning to do anything before their Sect Master recovers." Saying this, Xuan Hao inspected Feng Chen''s face to see if his expression had improved, but this did not happen, as the serious look on his face only deepened even more after hearing what he said.


    "But he will still recover at some point and then we will have to find a way to deal with him and the rest of the ck Rose Sect when that timees¡­ It''s a disaster waiting to happen, at the very least we have some idea about how strong they are, so we can prepare for it." Hearing what Feng Chen said, Xuan Hao also felt the seriousness of the matter.


    The ck Rose Sect might be dealt with for the time being, but what about in the future when their Sect Master recovers?


    "I will go into closed door seclusion and try to reach the eighth stage, inform the Zu Fei and the Wang Brothers for me when they return from the border. Only if the Flying Sword Sect grows stronger will we have a better chance at surviving the iing danger and any future problems¡­ So, what if we manage to deal with the ck Rose Sect, who knows what danger tomorrow will bring?


    The Sect needs to be stronger¡­ Xuan Hao, I''m nning to contact an old friend of mine from the Spring Flower Sect toe over before I go into seclusion. Remember, DON''T let Zu Fei discover that I was the one who called her over¡­" Having a serious face throughout the entire exnation for him going into seclusion, Feng Chen could not help but wear a slightly more cautious and scared look when he talked about his "old friend" from the Spring Flower Sect.


    Xuan Hao knew that there might be something between this old friend and the Vice Sect Master Zu Fei, but he decided not to ask, as it had nothing to do with him.


    "If that is all, I will be taking my leave." Seeing that there was most likely not anything more to do, Xuan Hao turned around to leave, he still had to check in on his disciple and return the Devil-Immortal Jade to him, even if it had been partly destroyed.


    Xuan Hao did not really care that much about the Devil-Immortal Jade and did not want to waste time investigating it. Having his disciple do that for him was a much better choice, as the chances of investigating it and its origin would most likely lead to him going on a journey outside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect.


    As for whatever benefits that his disciple would get from the Devil-Immortal Jade in the future, Xuan Hao would not care. After all, as long as his disciple grew stronger, so would he! All he had to do was remain quietly in the sect and wait for his disciples to grow stronger.


    Exiting the pavilion of the Sect Master, Xuan Hao looked back and saw that the array formation surrounding the room where Feng Chen was located had activated,pletely isting his room from the rest of the world.


    The Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect had officially entered secluded cultivation and would most likely note out unless something major happened.


    The war between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was nowhere near being threatening enough to be considered something major, after all, the truly strong experts on both sides still remained quiet for now.

 Chapter 122: Chu Yang Wakes Up

    <h4>Chapter 122: Chu Yang Wakes Up</h4>


    " Argh!?" Waking up with a massive headache, Chu Yang cautiously looking around himself. Thest time he was awake he was still inside of the pce of the ck Rose Sect''s Sect Master, it seemed like he had ended up passing out under the pressure of the ck Rose Sect''s Sect Master earlier.


    But the question was, why did the room he was currently in look so familiar¡­?


    Looking even closer at his surroundings, Chu Yang quickly discovered that he was back in his own room inside the Flying Sword Sect, but how did he end up here in the first ce? Did his master perhaps safe him?


    Thinking about it, Chu Yang felt both amazed and shocked, after all, Xuan Hao did not really have much public information out about him in the sect and Chu Yang spected that he was most likely in the first or second stage of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ But if he had managed to safe him from the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect, he was most likely stronger than a newly promoted Nascent Soul Realm cultivator!


    "I see that you are finally awake." Chu Yang heard the voice of his master and quickly moved his head in the direction of the voice as he came face to face with Xuan Hao standing at the entrance to his room with a slightly worried expression on his face.


    Xuan Hao was a bit worried when Chu Yang had not woken up even after they returned to the sect, but this worry was mostly directed at the fact that his disciple might have had some hidden injuries that he had not found.


    Other than that, Xuan Hao had felt a great amount of pity towards the fact that his disciple did not manage to see how strong he was when he fought with the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect¡­ On the other hand, he did not manage to defeat him and ended up having to run away in the end, so maybe it was better that his disciple had fainted¡­


    "Thank you for saving me from the ck Rose Sect master! I''m sure it must''ve been difficult¡­" Chu Yang did not think about these things at all and just felt guilty that he had caused his master to walk into a dangerous situation and even risk his life to safe him.


    Thinking about it, Chu Yang realized that he had not really done much for his master other than cause him and the rest of the Flying Sword Sect trouble with the ck Rose Sect.


    In the future, I will repay the safety and opportunity that master, and the sect have given to me!


    Remembering these words, Chu Yang steeled himself to work even harder at training in the future, his senior sister''s botanist training would also be a good ce to improve. After all, if he could be a great botanist in the future, he could provide a wide variety of rare spiritual nts and herbs to the sect.


    At this moment, Chu Yang remember how his senior sister had stressed how important it was for him to be a botanist and learn how to properly take care of and grow spiritual nts and herbs.


    Looks like senior sister was really looking after me all this time!


    "No need to be so emotional, it was not that difficult for me. Take a few days to recover, after that I will teach both you and your senior sister." Seeing his disciple''s face changing between a myriad of differentplicated emotions before finally starting to shed a few tears, Xuan Hao immediately tried to calm him down.


    "I-its nothing master, I-I was just a bit emotional all of a sudden¡­ By the way, where did senior sister Qing Yi go?" Stopping his tears, Chu Yang blushed embarrassedly as he quickly tried to divert the topic.


    How embarrassing! He had actually started crying in front of his master!


    "Your senior sister went to the Alchemy Hall for the uing Alchemy Competition in half a year that she is going to participate in. Hm¡­ I have something to do, try and use this meditation technique when recovering, it is quite useful for recovering your spirit and calming your mind." Upon talking about the uing Alchemy Competition that Qing Yi was going to join, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes ever so slightly.


    Taking out a small scroll with the words [Calming Breeze] written on it, Xuan Hao handed it over to Chu Yang before turning around and leaving his room.


    The Calming Breeze meditation scroll was something he had gotten from one of the elders in charge of the pagoda of enlightenment. Earlier, Xuan Hao had met him on the way back to his pavilion and asked if he knew about something that could help his disciple deal with any mental trauma, that his earlier encounter with the ck Rose Sect''s Sect Master might have caused him.


    Chu Yang did not know why his master suddenly became so weird upon mentioning the uing Alchemy Competition that his senior sister Qing Yi was going to participate in.


    Picking up the [Calming Breeze] Meditation technique that Xuan Hao had thrown onto his bed before leaving, Chu Yang decided not to think so deeply about his master''s earlier behaviour, he was most likely just worried now that his first disciple was going to leave the sect for the first time without him present.


    Unfolding the scroll, Chu Yang quickly read through the meditation technique.


    The Calming Breeze was a normal mortal meditation technique that could not be used for cultivation and only had the single purpose of calming the mind and spirit of the user.


    The effect was not heaven shaking or unprecedented and could be considered rtively average, but even then, it was quite a rare technique. Not because of its usefulness, but due to the fact that meditation techniques purely used for calming the mind and spirit were seen as useless in the cultivation world.


    A normal cultivation mantra would normally be able to improve the cultivation of the user while also calming both the mind and spirit at the same time, though less effective than a meditation technique purely focused on calming the spirit and mind.


    Chu Yang also wanted to just use the cultivation mantra given by his master to recover his state of mind back to what it was previously but seeing that his master had given him a specific cultivation technique and asked him to use it, Chu Yang as the disciple would follow what his master said.


    Sitting down in a mediative position on his bed, Chu Yang closed his eyes as he began to adjust his breathing with the Calming Breeze Meditation technique.


    Slowly, Chu Yang felt himself calming down and his previous worry slowly faded away.


    Like this, Chu Yang stayed quietly in his room as he meditated ording to what was written on the Calming Breeze scroll.

 Chapter 123: Elderly Artisan Alchemist of the Sky Empire

    <h4>Chapter 123: Elderly Artisan Alchemist of the Sky Empire</h4>


    After visiting Chu Yang and handing over the Calming Breeze meditation scroll over to him, Xuan Hao made his way back to his own room to make some preparations for the uing Alchemy Competition that was happening in half a year.


    No matter how early he prepared, it would at least be better than suddenly finding out that he was toote, and his disciple ended up getting stolen by some questionable old man from the Sky Empire!


    Truly, if the "questionable old man" heard the way he was being described at the moment, he would race over to beat up Xuan Hao.


    A respectable Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire beingpared to a questionable old man!? No matter who heard it, they would surely think that the person saying it had a death wish!


    ¡­


    "Achoo! Is someone perhaps thinking about me?" Inside arge room filled with all sorts of spiritual herbs and nts, an elderly man full of energy unbefitting of his age scratched the edge of his nose as he looked around himself with curiosity.


    "Now that I think about it, I was going to hold that Alchemy Competition in half years'' time or so¡­ Maybe it''s those young ones looking forward to meeting me! How exciting, I will surely be able to find a good youngd if they are already looking forward to meeting me now! Haha." Laughing wildly to himself, the elderly man smiled happily as he began mixing together all sorts of herbs in a small bowl before grinding them down and mixing them together with some sort of liquid.


    "But it seems like my current pupil is getting a little anxioustely¡­ Whenever I mention getting a new pupil to train, she gets quite moody¡­ Maybe she fears that I won''t pay as much attention to her after getting a new pupil, hehe, those young ones are indeed a little difficult to handle from time to time." Muttering the troubles with his current disciple to himself, the elderly man transferred the bowl with the liquid mixed together with all sorts of grinded up spiritual herbs in it over to another bowl made of some sort of stone.


    "Well, things should be able to sort themselves out with time¡­" With a smile on his lips, the elderly man put the stone bowl over an open fire as he waited for the concoction to just barely reach a boiling point for a few seconds before quickly removing it and adding some already prepared spiritual herbs into the still boiling liquid.


    Setting the stone bowl on the nearby table, the elderly man quickly turned around and left the room to get something as he waited for the concoction to cool down a bit.


    "Teacher, is the potion requested by the second grand ancestor ready yet?" Just as the elderly man returned to his room, a slightly feminine voice sounded out from the entrance of the room.


    "It will be done shortly, tell that old crook to wait for it if he doesn''t want for an ident to happen with the potion..." Yelling back in the direction of the feminine voice in a slightly annoyed tone, the elderly man picked up the stone bowl and sat down while taking out the thing that he just went out to get.


    "But the second grand ancestor said that he will need it before the grand banquet tonight¡­ He ns to look for a new wife and apparently he had his eyes on one of the participants, who is an elderly woman only around 300 years old and at the middle stages of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­" The feminine voice from the entrance of the room sounded again as the elderly man sitting down with the stone bowl in his hands slowly lowered the spoon into the soup and started eating whilepletely ignoring the person calling out to him.


    "Maybe I should have added a little more Ghostly Yin Chili kes to it¡­" Staring down at the soup filled with all sorts of precious spiritual herbs, the elderly man started going over the taste as the spoon never stopped moving. The soup inside the bowl decreased more and more.


    "Teacher¡­" The feminine voice called out again this time, but instead of being far away, it was directly behind the elderly man, and it was clear to the listener that the feminine voice belonged to a young woman.


    "Here, take it and go to that bald headed fossil with it! Tell him not to disturb me any longer with such menial things!" Standing up, the elderly man walked over to a nearby shell before he started looking at the different potion bottles neatly lined up.


    "Standard Hair Growth, hm¡­ too slow acting, fast hair growth for middle-aged men¡­ That baldie is too old for that one¡­ Ah! Here it is!" Taking a potion bottle with the words [Fast Hair Growth for Elderly Baldies] on it from the shelf, the elderly man quickly returned and handed it over to the young woman who was suspiciously eyeing the area surrounding his stone bowl.


    "Leave quickly or that or that old crook wille and cause trouble again¡­" Having handed over the potion bottle, the elderly man quickly waved for the young woman to leave.


    "Then, I will take my leave now¡­" Seeing that her teacher did not seem to want to talk about the second grand ancestors request, the young woman did not stay any longer as she held onto the bottle with [Fast Hair Growth for Elderly Baldies]bel on it before leaving the room.


    "Hmph, she is getting bolder and boldertely. Not even asking before entering her teachers'' room¡­ Now where was I?" Shaking his head slightly with a smile on his lips, the elderly man sat down on his chair once again as he picked up the stone bowl and was about to start eating.


    "¡­YOU DAMNABLE BRAT!? HOW DARE YOU STEAL YOUR TEACHER''S FOOD!? HOW DID I TEACH SUCH AN UNGRATEFUL PUPIL!?" Yelling loudly, the elderly man jumped up from his chair as he turned towards the entrance of his room and ran in the direction that his pupil had left at full speed.


    Passing through therge corridors outside his room, quite a few passing servants saw this and were not shocked or surprised when they saw the fabled Artisan Alchemist fuming in anger as he ran in the direction that a certain young woman had just passed through.


    This was quite amon urrence and most of the servants had be used to seeing the elderly man running through the corridors and hallways of therge pceplex at speeds unbefitting his age.

 Chapter 124: Wan Qius Improvement and Chu Yangs Recovery

    <h4>Chapter 124: Wan Qiu''s Improvement and Chu Yang''s Recovery</h4>


    The next few days after Xuan Hao returned to the sect with Chu Yang passed by peacefully without anything important happening. The only thing worth mentioning over the past few days was the progress that the Alchemy Hall had made towards creating a cure for the gue ravaging through the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    The notebook of lord Kubera was especially helpful in this regard, as Elder Wan Qiu especially managed to learn a lot from the notebook.


    Since getting her hands on the notebook of lord Kubera, she had managed to take a step further and reach was in a realm above the Expert Alchemist Realm in knowledge, but she still remained below the Artisan Alchemist Realm overall.


    There was no such thing as half-step realm in Alchemy, as you could either make a pill or potion at the required realm or you could not. To exin Elder Wan Qiu''s current Realm would be that she had the knowledge of a newly promoted Artisan Alchemist, but she had not yet managed to breakthrough yet, still just barely unable to refine pills or potions at the Soul Rank.


    Xuan Hao felt quite happy when he heard about this, as the strength of the sect would increase by a lot if Wan Qiu managed to be an Artisan Alchemist.


    The main importance of Artisan Alchemist for a big sect was the potions and pills that they made for helping Nascent Soul Realm cultivators of the sect more easily recover from battle. Most importantly they could help increase the cultivation speed of Nascent Soul Realm cultivators by amplifying the effect of certain useful spiritual herbs by refining them into either pills or potions.


    For example, if the Infernal Heart Grass got refined into a pill by an Alchemist at the Artisan Realm, its effectiveness for fire type cultivators would increase more than 5 times over!


    This easily showed how useful Artisan Alchemist were in sects and how valued they were.


    Qing Yi had also started learning under some of the elders of the Alchemy Hall once a week so as to not take away too much time from her normal cultivation, Xuan Hao did not really care much about this, as the elders from the Alchemy Hall did not n to steal away his disciple and even if they wanted to, they would not be able to.


    Today, Chu Yang had finally finishedpletely recovering back to his former state of mind and had already begun training in training ground besides the pavilion together with his senior sister Qing Yi.


    Xuan Hao had just arrived at the training ground and saw the scene of both his disciple locked in a practice fight with each other at the centre.


    Chu Yang had a heavy spear in hand that he had purchased just before getting kidnapped by the ck Rose Sect a few days ago, the spear had originally been dropped by him when he got kidnapped and the elder in charge of protecting him had handed over the heavy spear to Xuan Hao a day after he had returned to the sect again with Chu Yang.


    Qing Yi on the other hand wielded a short sword as she nimbly dodged the attacks of Chu Yang.


    Seeing how both of them werepletely concentrated and focused on their practice fight, Xuan Hao decided not to interrupt them and instead found a quiet ce from where he could observe their fight and see what parts he could help them improve in.


    "Hah!" Swinging down with his spear, Chu Yang looked more like he was using a hammer of some sort instead of a spear as the heavy spear hit the ce Qing Yi was standing just a moment ago.


    Chu Yang did not dare to stay in ce for long as he quickly used the heavy spear to defend from a swift sword stab by Qing Yiing in his direction.


    Following this, Chu Yang knocked her sword to the side before closing the distance in an instant, knocking the air out of her lungs with a quick elbow strike as Qing Yi copsed onto the ground breathing heavily trying to regain her breathing again.


    "I win again!" Smiling triumphantly as he looked at Qing Yi slowly standing up again with a slightly annoyed look, Chu Yang felt that it was a great feeling whenever he won.


    Even though he had a higher cultivation and more experience when it came tobatpared to his senior sister, Chu Yang still felt great whenever he ended up winning against her.


    Qing Yi on the other hand felt quite annoyed and frustrated whenever she lost to Chu Yang, she was supposed to be the senior sister! Howe she can''t win against him whenever they fight!? Maybe she was using too much time on alchemytely and needed to focus more on her cultivation in the future.


    Thinking about this, Qing Yi decided that she would spend less time on alchemy after the Alchemy Competition was over and focus on improving her cultivation! She could not continue losing to her junior brother!


    "Hm¡­ It seems both of them improved quite a bit while I was gone¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao thoroughly inspected both of his disciples. Neither of them had made any improvements when it came to their cultivation realm, but both of them had on the other hand grown when it came tobat experience.


    Chu Yang had not grown so much, the one with the biggest growth among the two of them would be Qing Yi, as she did not have anyone who would truly practice with her back in the Bright Sun City.


    Now on the other hand, Chu Yang was more than willing to fight her with all his strength without holding back! The elbow attack from earlier was more than enough for Xuan Hao to see that his second disciple did not seem to have the idea of going easier on the fairer sex.


    Now he would not have to worry about his second disciple ending up falling for a certain type of trap when he went outside to explore the world in the future.


    Smiling a bit upon thinking this, Xuan Hao made his way out of his hiding spot towards the ce his disciples were standing.

 Chapter 125: Black Rose

    <h4>Chapter 125: ck Rose</h4>


    " Master!" Seeing Xuan Hao making his way over, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang walked over to greet him.


    "I see that both of you are quite lively today, and it looks like Chu Yang here is back to training again." Smiling a bit at the thought of spending a bit more time with his disciples in the future, Xuan Hao went over the schedule of things he had prepared to do with both of them today onest time before he arrived in front of Chu Yang and Qing Yi.


    "Master, what are we going to do today?" Qing Yi asked in a shaky voice, still a bit out of breath from the earlier practice fight with Chu Yang.


    "First of all, we will be going over your earlier practice fight! Firstly, Qing Yi, earlier you were way too aggressive when fighting against Chu Yang, you left a lot of openings that Chu Yang could and did take advantage of. Just look at how he managed to get a hit in on you in the end and win!


    To improve this, you should try to be a bit more patient when fighting and try to wait for an opportunity instead of going in whenever you can. Constant pressure can be good in some situations, but you have to consider that such an aggressive attack method reveals a lot of mistakes for your opponent to take advantage of!" Saying this, Xuan Hao watched Qing Yi as she went over what he said with a thoughtful look in her eyes before moving his gaze over to Chu Yang.


    At this moment, Chu Yang stood with a smile appearing on his face. Ready to tease his senior sister for the mistakes that their master had pointed out when they were finished practicing today. Chu Yang felt that he did not make any mistakes in the earlier practice fight and even if he did, at most it was a few minor mistakes that could easily be avoided.


    "Now secondly, Chu Yang¡­" Upon hearing his master call out his name, Chu Yang put away the teasing expression that had appeared on his face, as he waited for what his master was going to say.


    "From the earlier fight, you were inactive when it came to attacking and several times you missed out on some of the obvious mistakes made by your senior sister due to your indecisiveness to attack. Instead of being proactive in attacking, you let your senior sister control the flow of battle. Even with a lower cultivation realm than you! She would have been able to win with a little morebat experience." Shaking his head at the thought of Chu Yang being proud of winning over his senior sister 3 minor cultivation realms below him, Xuan Hao felt a bit helpless.


    Chu Yang did not know what to say when he heard how his master described his earlier performance and felt like digging a hole to hide in upon seeing the smiling look that his senior sister was giving him.


    How embarrassing! How could he forget that he was 3 minor realms above his senior sister, yet he still wanted to brag about winning to herter! What if he ended up losing to his senior sister? Would that not just be a testament to the fact that he could not even win against someone below his own cultivation realm¡­?


    "Okay, both of you can think about what I saidter and try to implement it in the next practice fight you have with each other. Today I will be going over your cultivation progress since entering the sect." Seeing the teasing look Qing Yi was sending Chu Yang and Chu Yang''s increasingly awkward appearance, Xuan Hao took it upon himself and changed the topic in another direction.


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang both refocused their attention on Xuan Hao as they patiently waited for him to continue.


    Seeing that both of them started paying attention to him again, Xuan Hao went over to Qing Yi who was standing closest to him and put his hand on top of her head as he sent in a wisp of his divine sense to check out the condition of her dantian.


    Compared to when she first reached the Foundation Establishment Realm a month ago, another bright red pir had appeared besides the first one at the centre of her dantian, a bright red me made out of fire qi was engulfing both the pirs as the nearby fire qi had already started taking on the shape of a pir. Seeing this, Xuan Hao knew that Qing Yi would be able to reach the third stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm soon.


    The cultivation of the Burning Heaven Mantra went well for Qing Yi and there were not any mistakes present in her dantian that needed him to fix.


    "It looks like you have not cked off when ites to the Burning Heaven Mantra!" Nodding approvingly at Qing Yi as he removed the hand from the top of her head, Xuan Hao did not see the shy expression on her face as he moved over to where Chu Yang was standing with a nervous expression on his face.


    Putting his hand on top of Chu Yang''s head, Xuan Hao sent his divine sense inside of his dantian like he had done with Qing Yi and observed the situation inside of his dantian.


    Like Qing Yi, Xuan Hao instantly managed to locate the pirs floating in the middle of Chu Yang''s dantian. Four pirs were silently floating around the biggest pir in the middle of the dantian, each of them was engulfed in arge amount of spear qi that had taken the shape of a spear, but therge pir in the middle of the dantian did not have the qi in the shape of a spear but was instead engulfed by arge amount of ck qi in the shape of a rose.


    "This is¡­" Xuan Hao was quite surprised when he saw therge amount of ck qi shaped like a rose dancing around the central pir inside of Chu Yang''s dantian.

 Chapter 126: Master and Disciple Trip Outside

    <h4>Chapter 126: Master and Disciple Trip Outside</h4>


    Moving his divine sense, a bit close to the ck rose made out of dark qi, Xuan Hao felt that it gave off a simr aura as the ck robed person he first met back in Bright Sun City.


    So, it was the ck Rose Sect''s cultivation mantra¡­?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt that it made sense. After all, it was not like Chu Yang had broken through and created his first pir with the Soul Spear Divine Mantra¡­


    But then again, he had been at the second stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm when he first took him as his second disciple, should one of the small pirs flying around the central pir not also have the ck qi in a rose shape engulfing it¡­?


    Turning his attention back to the pirs floating around in Chu Yang''s dantian, Xuan Hao saw the dark qi in the form of a rose surrounding the central pir slowly being eroded and changed into a sharp spear qi by the other four pirs.


    The four pirs were slowly changing the ck qi of central pir into spear qi, while at the same time blocking any iing qi from reaching it and in turn strengthen the ck qi inside of the dantian.


    Normally, such a thing would have caused the ck qi to go berserk and try its best to break free from the other pir''s slow erosion, but instead it had given up on resisting the four smaller pir and let them slowly grind away the ck qi.


    Was this due to the fact that the Soul Spear Divine Mantra was a higher ranked cultivation mantra? Or maybe it was something else¡­


    Xuan Hao had no idea what the reason for the ck qi''s obedience was, but as it did not harm his disciple in any way and instead it would bring massive benefits to him when the ck qi in the form of a rose was gone and reced with the superior spear qi, Xuan Hao decided not to interfere in the process.


    "Hm¡­ I can see that both of you have not been cking in your training over thest month, so instead of me correcting mistakes that I thought you would have made, we will instead do something else¡­" Feeling a bit helpless upon saying this, Xuan Hao had expected to be spending the day helping correct his disciple''s cultivation and any mistakes they made along the way.


    Howe neither of them had any mistakes in their cultivation¡­ Maybe it''s because it is still in the earlier cultivation realms¡­ Yes, that must be it!


    Xuan Hao nodded to himself at this thought as both Chu Yang and Qing Yi looked at him questioningly.


    Was their master perhaps looking forward to them having made mistakes in their cultivation and now became disappointed that they had cultivated without making any mistakes¡­?


    "So instead, we will be going on a little trip outside of the sect. Both of you have yet to explore the surrounding area around the Flying Sword Sect yet, so this should be a great opportunity to explore the area and get to know it!" Not really paying attention to the questioning look that his disciples gave him, Xuan Hao announced their trip outside the sect with a smile appearing on his face.


    Chu Yang and Qing Yi did not say anything to stop their master as both of them were quite curious about the different ces surrounding the Flying Sword Sect¡­ To this day, both of them only knew about Demon Beast Forest, Flying Sword City and the spirit stone mine stolen away by the Raging me Sect.


    They both wanted to know more about the different territories under the Flying Sword Sect.


    With that, Xuan Hao and both of his disciples made their way down the mountain and out of the Flying Sword Sect.


    The first stop on the trip was the Star Peak Mountain, the highest mountain in not only the Flying Sword Sect''s territory, but the whole Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Originally the founder of the Flying Sword Sect wanted to establish the sect on the Star Peak Mountain due to its high altitude resulting in the qi between heaven and earth being denser than normal, but he soon found out why no other sect ced their sect on Star Peak Mountain.


    The qi between heaven and earth on Star Peak Mountain was too violent! Calming down the qi between heaven and earth enough for it to be usable in cultivation required a grand formationid out by a Domain Lord that focused in calming down the violent qi!


    But why would someone like that ever bothering to a ce like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­?


    Xuan Hao personally felt that it was a great pity that the qi on the Star Peak Mountain was so violent. The Flying Sword Sect would be able to improve their strength by a lot, if they managed to calm the violent qi and move their sect to the Star Peak Mountain!


    This would also cause a lot of greedy people to appear¡­ The only reason why the Flying Sword Sect was even allowed to ce themselves so close to the Star Peak Mountain in the first ce was because most people viewed it as being useless due to the violent qi, but if the Flying Sword Sect somehow managed to calm down the qi at Star Peak Mountain¡­


    "Maybe I should get a disciple that specializes in formations in the future¡­" As they made their way towards the Star Peak Mountain, Xuan Hao thought about what his third disciple should be¡­


    He already had one that specialized in alchemy and botany¡­ Maybe getting a few more disciples that focused on different professions would not be a bad idea¡­


    ¡­


    As Xuan Hao and his two disciples were making their way towards the Star Peak Mountain, a beautiful young woman wearing a pure white robe in herte twenties appeared at the entrance of the Flying Sword Sect holding onto what looked to be a small green jade with her left hand.


    "It''s been over 200 years, I wonder how Fengfeng has been doing with that witch Zu Fei around him¡­ But for him to ask me toe over¡­" Talking to herself, the woman walked straight past the Core Formation Realm elder at the entrance to the sect and entered the Flying Sword Sect without him noticing.


    "I wonder where that Elder Xuan is¡­? Fengfeng asked me to find him first upon arriving, but it seems like he might not be here at the moment¡­ Guess I will just go find that witch Zu Fei¡­" Narrowing her eyes a bit upon mentioning Zu Fei, the young woman made her way in the direction of the Vice Sect Master''s pavilion without losing her way, extremely familiar with the interior of the Flying Sword Sect.

 Chapter 127: Star Peak Town

    <h4>Chapter 127: Star Peak Town</h4>


    The journey towards the Shattered Star Peaks was rtively easy as Xuan Hao had opted for them to use a demon beast simr to horses to travel there instead of flying. Flying might be faster, but it would not allow him and his disciples to take in the surrounding environment and experience the world fully.


    The demon beasts that they used for traveling were known as horned lion horses, but Xuan Hao felt that they looked more like the mythological unicorns that he had read and seen before he was transmigrated. The only real difference between them and the unicorns were their giant frame, in size alone they were more than two times that of an ordinary horse.


    Like this, Xuan Hao and his disciples made it to arge town located at the bottom of the Shattered Star Peaks. The Explorer Union had a branch here and explorers came here frequently to enter the Shattered Star Peaks in search of some special herbs that only grew there.


    The herbs in question were worth quite a bit to cultivators below the Core Formation Realm but was mostly useless to cultivators in the Core Formation Realm and above.? Even then, it was useful for the weaker disciples, so the Flying Sword Sect also had a branch set up in the town.


    Originally the Flying Sword Sect wanted to monopolize the special herbs growing on Shattered Star Peaks, but since the Explorer Union showed interest in the herbs growing there, they had no choice but to let them set up a branch and allow other people to enter the Shattered Star Peaks and pick herbs.


    The Raging me Sect was in the same situation in regard to the entrance of the Burning Mountain Range located in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. The only difference was that they decided to build an outpost a little further away and try to stop any passer-bying from the Burning Mountain Range and demand them to pay a tax of sorts to them for entering their territory¡­


    The Flying Sword Sect on the other hand decided to just ignore the Explorer Union and set up a branch in the town to send in their own disciples and elders to gather the special herbs growing on Shattered Star Peaks.


    The herbs were aplenty and more than enough for the Flying Sect and the Explorer Union to harvest.


    The entrance to the town was busy as always even with a gue ravaging through the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, people here did not seem to care about it as they just went on with their normal day life.


    Xuan Hao, Chu Yang and Qing Yi came to a stop a few dozen meters away from the entrance to the town as they walked the rest of the way there.


    "Master, what are we going to do here? Perhaps we are going up those giant mountains?!" Talking faster than usual, Qing Yi excitedly asked while sneakily ncing in the direction of the giant mountains towering over the town in front of them. Making it look way smaller than it actually was.


    "Indeed, we will first go to the sect''s branch here and then we will be making our way up the Shattered Star Peaks to gather some of the local herbs growing there." This was the idea Xuan Hao had for going to the SShattered Star Peaks? today, since both his disciples were dabbling in things rted to nts, they should be quite interested in the special herbs growing on Shattered Star Peaks.


    "Really!? I can''t wait! I read that the Star Flower growing on the Shattered Star Peaks can be used in all sorts of special potions. The most famous one being the Star Shine Potion invented by our Alchemy Hall''s Elder Wan Qiu!" Almost jumping up and down happily at the prospect of getting her hands on the special herbs of the Shattered Star Peaks, Qing YI was filled to the brim with excitement.


    "We have a lot of these special herbs back in the sect, you can just buy some of them for cheap in the market outside the Artifact Hall¡­" Chu Yang who had been quiet until now spoke up while rolling his eyes a bit upon seeing his senior sister''s excitement, she was clearly happy that she could get the herbs for free without paying anything!


    Qing Yi turned around and gave Chu Yang a death stare upon hearing hisment, causing him to chuckle a bit in return.


    "Star Shine Potion¡­? I have not heard about it before, what does it do?" Xuan Hao ignored the small sh between his disciple as he asked Qing Yi with a curious look shing through his eyes.


    "Ah, the Star Shine Potion made by Elder Wan Qiu is quite famous in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, but I guess that it is not really used by someone like master¡­ So, it''s understandable not to know about it." Hearing her master, Qing Yi ignored Chu Yang as she turned towards Xuan Hao to answer his question.


    "I see¡­ So, what does it do?"


    "It attracts lightning!"


    "¡­ What? Why? Why is it called a Star Shine potion when it attracts lightning!?" Xuan Hao felt extremely confused as he questioningly looked at Qing Yi waiting for her to exin.


    "You see, Elder Wan Qiu called it Star Shine because you will shine like a star when the lightning hits you! It''s mostly used by people in the Foundation Establishment Realm to help refine their body as the lightning that is attracted is rtively weakpared to normal natural lightning." Exining the effect of the Star Shine potion, Qing Yi''s eyes shone brightly as Xuan Hao felt that the world of alchemy was a weird one.


    How did Elder Wan Qiu evene up with the idea of making a potion that attracts lightning to strike you in the first ce¡­?


    Maybe he should keep a bit distance from the elders of the Alchemy Hall in the future¡­


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao led his disciples inside of the town. Entering was easy as he just showed off his Core Elder Identification and soon the group of three made their way in the direction of the Flying Sword Sect''s Shattered Star Peak Branch.

 Chapter 128: Map of the Shattered Star Peaks

    <h4>Chapter 128: Map of the Shattered Star Peaks</h4>


    The town was extremely busy at this point of the day, asrge group of explorers had made their way back from the Shattered Star Peaks to sell the herbs or other things, they managed to get their hands on.


    The merchants having travelled all the way to the town were trying to outbid each other on the different materials brought back by the explorers willing to sell, trying to get the best possible price.


    Xuan Hao ignored the noiseing from the explorers and merchants chatting with one another, while Qing Yi kept her eyes locked on what the different merchants were doing in an attempt to get the explorers to lower the cost of their material. Taking out a small notebook from her robe and writing down some of the methods that worked.


    Chu Yang mostly just observed the people passing by as the group of three soon made it to the centre of the town. Directly in front of them, was a giant pavilion with the words Flying Sword written on the entrance. This was the branch of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Beside it was an evenrger building with the Explorer Union''s symbol hanging above the entrance, an endless stream of people going in and out of the building was a stark contrast to the empty and quiet space in front of the Flying Sword Sect''s Branch, with only two people standing at the entrance acting as guards.


    Xuan Hao made his way over to the Flying Sword Sect''s branch together with his disciples, as the two guards standing at the entrance manged to spot theming over immediately.


    "Hello, what can I help with? Do you have any specific business with the Flying Sword Sect?" Stepping forward the moment they were a few meters away from the entrance of the branch, one of the guards asked in a polite tone.


    "We are members of the sect as well; we are here to see if you have a detailed map of the Shattered Star Peaks." Saying this, Xuan Hao once again took out his identification token and showed it to the guard.


    "Ah! Core Elder Xuan! I-I''m sorry for the earlier rude- "


    "No need to worry about it, if you have a map of the Shattered Star Peaks that would be great." Seeing that the guard had started panicking upon realizing that it was the identification token of a Core Elder, Xuan Hao stopped him before he ended up causing an embarrassing scene in front of his disciples.


    "No worries Elder Xuan! We have the most detailed map of Shattered Star Peaks here in Star Peak Town! Even those people from the Explorer Union does not have a map as detailed as ours!" Seeing that Xuan Hao did not care about his earlierck of respect, the guard heaved a sigh of relief as he started bragging about the map that the branch had of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Compared to the elder in charge of the branch, this Core Elder was more easy going.


    Thinking this, the guard walked back to the other guard and informed him about the situation before one of them opened the entrance to the branch and led Xuan Hao and his two disciples inside.


    The inside of the branch was decorated in all sorts of exotic materials and looked luxurious, almost like the house of a newly rich merchant.


    Xuan Hao and Chu Yang both felt a bit ufortable in this environment, while Qing Yi looked at all the exotic materials and precious decorations with a certain shine in her eyes.


    "We are here, the map is right here." Coming to a stop in front of arge door, the guard opened it for them and led the group inside as Xuan Hao and the rest saw a giant map hanging at the end of the room.


    Making their way to the map at the end of the room, Xuan Hao started thoroughly inspecting the map of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Qing Yi did the same and started noting down specific areas of interest in her notebook, while Chu Yang just casually looked over the map before curiously looking over at what Qing Yi was writing down in her notebook.


    "Hm? Why are you writing down all these locations? Are we not just going up the mountains to have a quick look¡­? Are you perhaps nning toe back again after reaching the Core Formation Realm?" Seeing all the different locations noted down by his senior sister, Chu Yang grew a bit curious as he asked.


    "Of course! It will be easy to gather a lot of herbs here and because I''m a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect, I will be able to enter the Shattered Star Peaks for free!" Proudly stating her intentions, Qing Yi refocused back on the map.


    "Hm? Free? Did the Flying Sword Sect does not open up the Shattered Star Peaks for anyone to enter?" Feeling a bit confused about this, Chu Yang thought that he might have heard something wrong.


    "Ah, the Flying Sword Sect did indeed open up for everyone to be able to enter the Shattered Star Peaks, but anyone not a member of the Flying Sword Sect will have to pay an entrance fee to enter. Compared to the Raging me Sect''s control of the entrance to the Burning Mountain Range, the Shattered Star Peaks only has a single ce that you can enter through. The other ces are too steep for someone below the Core Formation Realm to climb up.


    This is also why most elders would want to end up as the elder managing the Shattered Star Peaks Branch¡­ The amount of spirit stones you would be able to earn is enormous!" The guard that guided them over to the map of the Shattered Star Peaks stepped forward as he exined this to Chu Yang.


    "I see¡­ The amount of spirit stones that the Shattered Star Peak Branch earns is astronomical!" Remembering the number of Explorers from the Explorer Union, Chu Yang swallowed a bit when he thought about the amount of spirt stones that the branch here earned.

 Chapter 129: Unlucky Inner Elder...

    <h4>Chapter 129: Unlucky Inner Elder...</h4>


    " We will go to the Third Star Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks, from what is written on the map, the Third Star Peak is the highest Peak that we can climb before the qi starts to be too violent." Looking over the map of the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao decided that they would go up the Third Star Peak.


    The map of the Shattered Star Peaks was not as detailed as the rest of the star peaks outside the main peak and second peak of the Shattered Star Peaks where it was impossible for someone below the Domain Lord Realm to venture.


    The Reason Xuan Hao decided to go up the Third Star Peak with his disciples was not only because it was the highest peak that he could travel up together with his disciples, but also because the Third Star Peak was said to have many unique herbs and other nts growing on it.


    Xuan Hao did manage to learn a bit about the Shattered Star Peaks back in the sect, but he did not really have a map avable to him back then and did not know where many of the things that he had read about were located on the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Now it seemed that they were located on the Third Star Peak!


    Officially, Xuan Hao had wanted to take his disciples out on a trip to the Shattered Star Peaks at some point after he found a map of the area, but since the opportunity presented itself in front of him, Xuan Hao decided to just visit the Flying Sword Sect''s Branch along the way together with his disciples.


    "Are both of you ready to go?" Seeing Qing Yi still focused on the map of the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao called out as Qing Yi came back to her senses again.


    "Yes master!" Chu Yang responded, closely followed by Qing Yi, who put away her notebook as all three of them made their way back out of the Flying Sword Sect''s Branch under the guidance of the guard.


    "Farewell Elder Xuan, may you have a great journey up the Shattered Star Peaks!" Bowing ever so slightly in the direction of Xuan Hao, the guard returned back to his post where the other guard was still standing.


    Xuan Hao and his two disciples were already too far away by this point, so only Xuan Hao manged to hear the goodbye of the guard before a group of explorers stopped a little in front of the Flying Sword Sect''s Branch to discuss something, blocking the view of the guard.


    Can''t you just say goodbye like any normal person? Why wait until we are out of sight?


    Shaking his head, Xuan Hao did not think about the guard any longer as they made their way towards the entrance of the Shattered Star Peaks located at the ce where the Star Peak Town met with the Ninth Star Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    This was the smallest of the nine Star Peaks, but even then, it still stretched far into the sky as the clouds above prevented one from truly seeing how tall the Ninth Star Peak was.


    ¡­


    Back in the Flying Sword Sect, the disciples located in the core area of the sect were running around nervously as they looked up at the mountain peak where the Vice Sect Master''s pavilion was located from time to time. Fear evident in their eyes as they did their best to avoid the mountain altogether, even some of the Vice Sect Master''s disciples had fearfully run away as they observed the pavilion from a distance.


    "What''s happening here!? Did the Vice Sect Master Zu Fei do something to scare her disciples and the rest of the disciples of the sect away?" One of the Inner Elders of the Flying Sword Sect asked one of the female disciples passing by in a curious voice.


    "Ah, Elder! From what I heard one of the Sect Master''s old friends came by and the Vice Sect Master is currently entertaining the guest!" Answering the question at a speed that the elder could barely follow, the female disciple ran away before the Inner Elder in question could evenprehend what was going on.


    "¡­" What in the world, why are they so scared if the Vice Sect Master is just entertaining one of the Sect Master''s old friends¡­ Hm, I have something to report to the Vice Sect Master anyway, so I will check and see what is so terrifying about this old friend of the Sect Master.


    Not knowing what he was about to walk into, the newly promoted Inner Elder of the Flying Sword Sect made his way up to the Vice Sect Master''s pavilion.


    "W-what happened here!?" Looking at the half-destroyed pavilion in front of him, the Inner Elder shivered to himself. Maybe the Guest and the Vice Sect Master had gotten into a fight, so the disciples had decided to run away until things calmed down again?


    Thinking about this, the Inner Elder put on a serious face as he cautiously proceeded inside the now destroyed entrance of the Vice Sect Master''s pavilion.


    The inside of the pavilion was not much better, as the Inner Elder felt like he had walked inside one of the ancient sect ruins scattered all over the Ewaria Continent from past sects or hidden ns that had fallen into ruin over the years.


    Back when he was young, the Inner Elder had once managed to explore the ruins of an ancient long forgotten sect. The hallway in front of him, reminded him of the ruined hallway in front of him, although without the overgrowth and all kinds of decay caused by time.


    Maybe the ruins he had explored looked like what he saw in front of him before it was forgotten and left to decay¡­


    "An Inner Elder? Come here and state why you are here!" Unknowingly, the Inner Elder already made his way to the inner section of the pavilion when a voice suddenly came out from the area in front of him.


    Looking ahead, the Inner Elder froze in ce as his face became pale with fear.


    In front of him, he saw two incredibly beautiful women, who seemed like two Immortal Fairy''s that had descended from heaven.


    But this was not what caused the Inner Elder to turn pale, no, it was the fact that there was two women in front of him! Did this not mean the Sect Master''s old friend was a woman¡­?


    Recognizing one of the two as the Vice Sect Master, the Inner Elder finally understood why the disciples tried avoiding the area like the gue.


    "What are you waiting for,e and state what reason you came for! I have a guest to entertain!" Calling out to the Inner Elder again in an annoyed tone, the Inner Elder felt death approaching as he made his way over to the small table where the Vice Sect Master and the guest were sitting.


    The guest in question did not say anything and just observed as the Inner Elder made his way over, shivering the whole way.


    I-I''m dead, aren''t I¡­?


    This was all the Inner Elder could think as he came to a stop in front of the Vice Sect Master. Hopefully, the Vice Sect Master would just let him go and not punish him for entering her personal quarters without permission¡­


    Yeah¡­ No hope for survival¡­

 Chapter 130: Summit of the Ninth Star Peak

    <h4>Chapter 130: Summit of the Ninth Star Peak</h4>


    Walking up the wide stone steps leading up the Ninth Star Peak, a myriad of different people could be seen going both up and down the stone steps.


    "Master, do you know why Nine Star Peaks are called the Shattered Star Peaks?" Chu Yang gazed up at the Ninth Star Peak full of curiosity as he asked.


    Qing Yi perked her ears up upon hearing Chu Yang''s question and moved a bit closer to Xuan Hao, she was also interested in the collective name of the Nine Star Peaks.


    "Hm¡­ From what I know they only got the name Shattered Star Peaks a few thousand years back, back then the founder of the Flying Sword Sect had just established the Flying Sword Sect and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s founder was still alive. The Flying Sword Sect back then had way less territorypared to now and the Nine Star Peaks were still under the Royal Family.


    But one day a giant star fell from the sky and shattered part of the Star Peak Mountains, causing each of them to be smaller than they originally were. The only Peak that survived the falling stars destruction was the main peak of the Star Peak Mountains, where the star was rumoured to havended." Gazing up at the Ninth Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao could clearly feel the violent and chaotic qi above.


    "What happened to the star thatnded on the main peak? Did the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s founder take it?" Coming over from the side, Qing Yi asked curiously as she could not wait for Xuan Hao to continue.


    "The founder of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom did not manage to get the star, only people at the Domain Lord Realm are able to reach the main peak of the Shattered Star Peaks¡­ Back then, the founder had even asked the Sky Empire if they would send someone over to check it out, but ultimately nothing ever came of it and the star supposedly still remains at the main peak to this day!


    At least that is what rumours say, there was also rumours that a Domain Lord from the Sky Empire already visited and took the fallen star away. In the end, we will only truly know if we go up the main peak and check for ourselves¡­" Xuan Hao knew that reaching the main peak would require a cultivation at the Domain Lord Realm and with his current progress, he will reach that at some point in the future. The only thing he needed was time, or his disciples having a breakthrough into the Core Formation Realm¡­


    Maybe when he visited the main peak there would be nothing or maybe the fallen star would still be there. No matter what, he was too weak to worry about any of it for now.


    The past of the Shattered Star Peak was mysterious, and Xuan Hao did not know much about it other than the falling star that had shattered eight out of the nine peaks there.


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang became quiet after listing to Xuan Hao''s exnation as both of them were lost in thought.


    Like this, the group of three managed to make their way up the Ninth Star Peak.


    At the summit of the Ninth Star Peak there was arge t surface spanning for several miles in all direction covered in a lush forest with different herbs and nts growing. From this alone, one could imagine how tall the Ninth Star Peak had been in the past.


    Xuan Hao, Qing Yi and Chu Yang all felt amazed by the amazing scene in front of them.


    Xuan Hao was especially shocked as reading about the lush forest with spiritual herbs and nts on top of a mountain summit was one thing, seeing it for himself was even more mindboggling.


    The temperature around the summit itself was not cold like he had imagined it would be at the current height and the air was the same as what it was down on the ground, if he did not know that he was currently on top of a mountain, Xuan Hao would have no idea at all.


    This was something weird with the Shattered Star Peaks as the temperature and everything else remained the same as when you were down on the ground.


    Xuan Hao decided not to think too much about it and in the end just decided to just throw it to the back of his mind for now, as he and his disciples made their way through the lush forest on top of the Ninth Star Peak.


    The qi in the air was violent, but at the same time denserpared to back at the ground. Staying at the Ninth Peak for an extended period of time was definitely beneficial to ones cultivation, but not really possible as the violent qi would end up destroying a cultivators dantian over time.


    This was the reason why explorersing here to gather the unique herbs growing on the Ninth Star Peak had to go down to rest and recover from time to time before going back up again.


    "M-master, c-can we stay here for a bit¡­?" Just as Xuan Hao was about to make his way out of the lush forest and walk down the path leading towards the Third Star Peak, a small hand grabbed on to the corner of his robes as Qing Yi''s soft voice could be heard.


    Turning around, Xuan Hao saw the puppy eyes that Qing Yi was giving him, while ncing over at the spiritual herbs scattered everywhere in the forest behind them.


    "¡­ We cane here again before going back to the sect again, we will go to the Third Peak first. After all, if we stay here for too long, you won''t be able to climb the Third Peak as the violent qi will be too much for you!" Saying this, Xuan Hao saw the disappointed look on Qing Yi''s as she reluctantly epted his reason.


    With this Xuan Hao and Chu Yang made their way down the Ninth Star Peakk, while Qing Yi had a dead look in her eyes looking back towards the summit of the Ninth Star Peak from time to time. Back when they walked through the lush forest, she saw all the spiritual herbs being picked up by random explorers along the way, while she got nothing!


    The most she managed to take was a few random Mortal Rank Spiritual herbs that grew close to the path they were walking on, while the explorers running by had all kinds of unique and expensive spiritual herbs from the Ninth Star Peak on them.


    Truly, what a painful experience!

 Chapter 131: Towards the Third Star Peak

    <h4>Chapter 131: Towards the Third Star Peak</h4>


    The path leading down from the Ninth Star Peak and deeper into the Shattered Star Peaks, was way more desertedpared to the path leading to the lush forest at the summit of the Ninth Star Peak.


    The reason for this was that the other Star Peaks did not have any special or unique herbs growing at them in abundance like the Ninth Star Peak, other than that, the violent qi at the other Star Peaks were more violent and chaoticpared to the Ninth Star Peak.


    The few who did make their way over the Ninth Star Peak and towards one of the other Star Peaks, were most of the time peopleing to sightsee the area, but most of them were people who came to try and breakthrough here as ast resort.


    After all, while the qi on top of the Shattered Star Peaks were more violent and chaoticpared to the normal qi on the ground, it was also denser and closer to heaven. Allowing a cultivator to have a greater chance at having a breakthrough, even if the violent qi would end up harming them a bit in the process¡­


    Xuan Hao nced a bit around at the people passing by and noticed that most of the people going to the other Star Peaks were of the elderly generation¡­ Even if you could breakthrough with help of the denser qi at the Peaks in the Shattered Star Peaks, you would still end up having your dantian damaged in the process.


    For this reason, most of the people willing to go to the Shattered Star Peaks looking for an opportunity to reach the next realm were those from the elder generation at the end of their lifespan, with no other alternative avable to them.


    The Third Star Peak had even gotten the reputation of being a sacred resting ground for many, as the elderly cultivators at the end of their life would go up there in an attempt to either reach the Nascent Soul Realm or Core Formation Realm and in turn increase their lifespan or pass away trying.


    Out of all the cultivators who went up the Third Star Peak to try their luck in breaking through to the next realm, only few people had seeded over the years.


    Among them were Foundation Establishment cultivators who managed to reach the Core Formation Realm, while there was only one who managed to surpass the others before him.


    That person had managed to reach the Nascent Soul Realm! Later on the person had joined the Seven Fates Sect and ended up bing one of the seven fate elders! The weakest person among the seven fate elders of the Seven Fates Sect was said to have reached the fourth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    This meant that the person who reached the Nascent Soul Realm at the Third Star Peak had managed to progress further than just the three lowest stages of the Nascent Soul Realm and had managed to reach the fourth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    When this news was a hot topic a few hundred years ago, it had apparently caused a flock of old people at the brink of death to swarm the Third Star Peak looking for a breakthrough.


    In the end, most of the elderly people going up the Third Star Peak back then never returned and those who did were the ones that gave up after reaching the summit of the Third Star Peak and felt how violent and chaotic the qi up there truly was.


    Xuan Hao looked into the distance and saw the Third Star peak towering above the clouds as he started wondering a bit to himself.


    Where had the corpses of all the elderly people who ended up passing away over the years go?


    "Master are we going to visit any of the other Star Peaks as well?" Shaking him out of his train of thought, Chu Yang walked a little closer to Xuan Hao as he asked.


    "No, we won''t be going to any of the other Star Peaks for today and both of you are still only at the Foundation Establishment Realm, so staying at the Shattered star Peaks for too long will be harmful to you." Saying this, Xuan Hao saw both of his disciple''s nod in understanding as they had already started to feel the effect that the violent qi had on them.


    At the moment this feeling of pain inside of their dantian was trivial, but over time it would grow stronger and stronger until it became unbearable for them.


    Xuan Hao knew that this would happen over time to them, but he had nned to leave the Shattered Star Peaks way before it started to be painful for them.


    After all, he did note to the Shattered Star Peaks to torture his disciples...!


    Like this time passed by quickly and soon Xuan Hao and his two disciples finally made it to the bottom of the Ninth Star Peak. Only Reaching this far could they be considered to have truly entered the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Many considered it a requirement to first climb the Ninth Star peak and make their way to the other side of the lush forest on the summit and down the path leading to the bottom of the Ninth star Peak inside the Shattered Star Peak.


    The reason for this was that one could not climb any of the other Nine Star Peaks unless you first passed over the Ninth Star Peak and followed the already carved path.


    Of course, someone at the Nascent Soul Realm could ignore this restriction and just directly enter the Shattered Star Peaks and climb up whatever Star Peak they wanted.


    Below the Ninth Star Peak was a rocky mountain terrain with a few bits of vegetation here and there.


    The path leading through the Shattered Star Peaks continued forward for a bit andter split up into eight directions, each leading to one of the remaining eight Star Peaks.


    ncing down at the ancient path starting to look more and more worn out the deeper they went into the Shattered Star Peaks; Xuan Hao made his way towards the Third Star Peak together with Qing Yi and Chu Yang.

 Chapter 132: Third Star Peak Summit

    <h4>Chapter 132: Third Star Peak Summit</h4>


    " Are you guys going to the Third Star Peak as well?" Walking up the steep mountain path towards the Third Star Peak, an elderly man came over from the side and asked curiously as he observed Xuan Hao and his two disciples.


    While it was normal for people toe and visit the Third Peak, it was normally only people from the elderly generation that came to check out the ce in case they needed toe there in the future to try and look for an opportunity to breakthrough.


    Young people like Xuan Hao and his two disciples were a quite unusual sight for the elderly man as he wondered why these young ones would bother going all the way up the Third Star Peak.


    "We are just here to enjoy the view and see the tallest reachable peak of the Shattered Star Peaks." Smiling kindly at the elderly man, Xuan Hao answered truthfully.


    "Hm, I see. The view up there is indeed amazing, back when I visited for the first time, I even managed to gain a momentary enlightenment and have a breakthrough. Haha, I hope I will be as lucky as I was back then once again¡­" Wearing a slightly sad expression on his face, the elderly man shook his head a bit before he turned around and inspected Qing Yi and Chu Yang walking behind Xuan Hao.


    "Are these two also going up the Third Star Peak? It might be dangerous for both of them, the qi up there is way more chaoticpared to the Ninth star Peak." The voice of the elderly man had turned a bit worried as he inspected Qing Yi and Chu Yang. It had to be known that the violent qi on top of the Third Star Peak was way more deadly than the Ninth Star Peak.


    The elderly man thought that Xuan Hao and his two disciples might not be aware of this, so he kindly reminded them just in case.


    "Haha, no need to worry about this! Both of them have already reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, so they should be fine if we just go up there for a quick look." Chuckling a bit upon seeing the worried look on the elderly man''s face, Xuan Hao reassured him as he signalled for both of his disciples to release a bit of their aura to show the elderly man.


    "How remarkable! The young ones will surely surpass the older ones with time, back then I had barely reached the middle stages of the Qi Condensation Realm!" Looking at both Qing Yi and Chu Yang filled with admiration, the elderly man shook his head a bit upon mentioning his own achievements back when he was around their age.


    "They are indeed impressive! In the future they will be even more remarkable!" Feeling like he, himself was the one getting the praise from the old man, Xuan Hao happily joined in and began to praise his two disciples.


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang both felt embarrassed upon hearing their master''s praise for them and with a few nearby elderly cultivators joining in to praise the talented young people as well, Qing Yi and Chu Yang soon found themselves at the centre of attention for a group of elderly cultivators making their way to the Third Star Peak.


    "Ah, I wish I could be so young and lively again! This boy reminds me of my younger days when I was still full of energy and fighting spirit!"


    "Who are you fooling old Hu, you were sozy back then! That is why you are still at the Core Formation Realm even to this day!"


    "Haha, I remember back when the old master tried his best to get old Hu to cultivate but he just ended up running away and hiding at the nearby farm!"


    "That''s true, I still remember howzy the rest of you were as well! Young ones, remember never to ck of or you will end up like this group of disappointments!" Motioning towards the group of elderly people that had gathered, the elderly man that had just praised them warned in a serious tone as he walked over join the other elderly people cursing at him from the side due to the warning, he gave Qing Yi and Chu Yang.


    Xuan Hao did not say much as he watched the group of elderly people chat along with each other, cursing andughing from time to time. Reminiscing about the old times.


    "We should get going before it starts getting toote." Casting onest look at the elderly cultivators talking with each other, Xuan Hao motioned for his disciples to follow him as the group made their way up the Third Star Peak.


    ¡­


    The path up the Third Star Peak was wide and had more than enough space for several people to walk beside one another.


    Xuan Hao looked up at the ce just in front of them where the end of the path was located where the summit of the Third Star Peak began.


    Looking closely at the path, it almost seemed like it had just suddenly been cut in half as it just stopped. Not continuing onto the summit of the Third Star Peak.


    In the past before the Star fell from the heavens and destroyed eight out of the nine Star Peaks. The path would have most likely stretched up to the top of the Third Star Peak.


    What was located at the Peak of the Third Star Peak and the other Star Peaks in the past?


    Whatever it was, it was clearly manmade.


    Maybe there would be an answer at the top of the Main star Peak that still remained intact to this day.


    "Master, a-are we at the summit now¡­?" An exhausted voice came from behind him as Xuan Hao looked over to see both of his disciples exhausted to the point of not being able to walk any further.


    The Third Peak was truly tall to the extreme and even with their cultivation at the Foundation Establishment Realm, they found it difficult to climb.


    "Yes, we are here, we can rest a bit at the summit before looking around." Saying that, Xuan Hao decided to carry both of his disciples the rest of the way as he waved his hand upon reaching the summit, causing a small stone bench to appear from the ground before settling his two disciples there to rest for a bit as he began to look around the Third Star Peak''s summit himself.

 Chapter 133: Wasteful Elder from the Seven Fates Sect

    <h4>Chapter 133: Wasteful Elder from the Seven Fates Sect</h4>


    Leaving both Qing Yi and Chu Yang to recover some of their strength at the small stone bench that he created, Xuan Hao left the two of them as he started walking around the summit of the Third Star peak.


    The summit of the Third Star Peak was evenrger than the Ninth Star Peak butpared to the lush forest atop the Ninth Star peak, the Third Star Peak was way more barren as the only thing present were a few tforms in the shape of giant lotus flowers spread out with a few hundred meters between them.


    On each of the lotus flower tforms a few elderly cultivators could be seen in deep meditation as they tried to reach an even higher realm with the assistance from the violent, yet dense qi present at Third Star Peaks summit.


    The lotus flower tforms themselves were not something that had been there for a long time but was instead something that had recently been created by the elder from the Seven Fates Sect that broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm at the Third Star Peak.


    It was said that he hade to the Third Star Peak a little over a hundred years ago to build the tforms shaped like lotus flowers with a formation inside them to make the violent qi less violent for the people meditating on top of them.


    How the formation worked under the violent qi, Xuan Hao had no idea, but he still admired the elder from the Seven Fate Sects kid gesture towards all the elderly cultivatorsing to look for an opportunity to breakthrough like he had in the past.


    It was rare to find someone kind enough among cultivators to go out of their way to help others to this degree, especially when it was something like constructing several hundred formations that were quite expensive.


    Xuan Hao had read a bit about it and remembered that the elder from the Seven Fates Sect had gotten into quite a bit of trouble constructing the lotus flower tforms and formations hidden inside.


    Firstly, the Third Star Peak was inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory and secondly, the Seven Fates Sect was not that keen on wasting so many resources for nothing other than a slight improvement to their image among the masses.


    In the end, the elder managed to construct the several hundred lotus flower tforms currently present on top of the Third Star Peak. Back then, it was rumoured that he had nned to build way more than just that on top of the Third Star Peak and it seemed like even to this day, the elder fought for an opportunity to build more on top of the Third Star Peak.


    "Honestly, what an interesting person¡­" Smiling awkwardly upon thinking about having an elder that fought over investing resources into the territory owned by another sect, Xuan Hao made his way over to an empty lotus flower tform close to the edge of the summit.


    Putting his hand atop the tform, Xuan Hao moved his divine sense into the tform so as to inspect it.


    He really wondered what kind of resources that the elder from the Seven Fates Sect used that had caused the Seven Fates Sect to try their best to stop him.


    After all, even if he wasted a few resources here and there, he was still a Nascent Soul Realm Expert above the third stage.


    "This is!" Seeing the formation hidden beneath the lotus flower tform, Xuan Hao felt shocked to the extreme as he smiled awkwardly. Luckily that elder had ended up joining the Seven Fates Sect instead of the Flying Sword Sect back then! If not, they might have had to deal with something even worse than the beast tamers¡­


    The thing that shocked Xuan Hao so badly was a small crystal located in the centre of the formation hidden inside of the lotus flower tform.


    "Cloud Crystal¡­" That was the name of the small crystal located inside of the formation, it was extremely rare and hard toe by for people below the Domain Lord Realm.


    Xuan Hao knew why the elder from the Seven Fates Sect had decided to use the Cloud Crystal as it had a purifying effect on the violent qi up on the Third Star Peak. Making it easier for people to absorb and cultivate.


    But why waste something so rare¡­ No wonder the Seven Fates Sect did their best from stopping this new elder of theirs from building any more lotus flower tforms on top of the Third Star Peak¡­


    It had to be known that the only way to get Cloud Crystals was to harvest them directly from a rare kind of cloud known as crystal clouds. The only problem was that it was a cloud and clouds tended to float high in the air and the height that the crystal clouds floated was impossible for anyone below the Domain Lord Realm to reach, even with a flying demon beast.


    The only way that anyone below the Domain Lord Realm could get their hands on Cloud Crystals was trading with someone at an extremely high price or be lucky enough to encounter a falling crystal cloud that had reached the end of its lifecycle, causing it to crash into the ground below.


    Sadly, for many such a thing was extremely rare as even the worst quality crystal clouds were said to be able to stay in the air happily floating around for over ten thousand years. Let alone the higher quality ones¡­


    "But howe nobody took away the Cloud Crystals here¡­?" Thinking this, Xuan Hao tried to reach into the formation with his divine sense and pull out the Cloud Crystal.


    Bzzzz~


    A small electric spark came from the formation as Xuan Hao quickly drew back his divine sense and took a few steps back, cautiously looking at the lotus flower tform for a few seconds before rxing.


    "No wonder nobody took away the Cloud Crystals here, the thing is literally set to self-destruct if anyone tries to make changes to the formation or take the Cloud Crystal out!" Smiling wryly, Xuan Hao decided not to mess with the Lotus Flower tform anymore as he went back to walking around the summit of the Third Star Peak.

 Chapter 134: Enlightenment

    <h4>Chapter 134: Enlightenment</h4>


    The rest of the summit was uninteresting and just the same barren look with a few lotus flower tforms scattered around the ce from time to time. Most of the lotus flower tforms were empty, while some had a group of people on them cultivating silently or just a single person quietly sitting by themselves.


    Looking back at where his disciples were sitting, Xuan Hao saw that they still needed another few minutes of rest before getting up again.


    "Hah¡­ This ce is great for cultivation, if just the qi around here wasn''t so chaotic¡­" Sighing to himself, Xuan Hao absorbed some of the qi in the air as he allowed it to enter his dantian and run rampant before the nascent soul at the centre of his dantian acted and forcefully refined the chaotic qi.


    Compared to the normal process of cultivating that only needed one to absorb the qi between heaven and earth, here one also needed to first refine the violent qi before it was safe to absorb into one''s own dantian.


    The process could be ignored, but it would leave behindsting damage as the qi inside one''s own dantian would start to be more violent and damage the body and meridians of the cultivator over time.


    Turning his attention away from the summit of the Third Star Peak, Xuan Hao instead looked out over the rest of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    From the summit of the Third Star Peak, Xuan Hao could see the other Star Peaks below the Third Star Peak. Each of them stretched far into the heavens above, with rolling clouds engulfing them upon reaching a few miles into the sky.


    Back on the ground, Xuan Hao could not see through the clouds covering their summits of the Star Peaks, but from the top of the Third Star Peak, Xuan Hao could clearly see the Fourth Star Peak to the Ninth Star Peaks summit.


    Looking at the rest of the Star Peaks from the Third Star Peak, Xuan Hao felt that something was a bit odd as he inspected the summit of the other Star Peaks from a distance.


    Why were all the summits of the Star Peakspletely t if a star had fallen and smashed through the Star Peaks before finallynding at the Main Star Peak¡­?


    Upon closer inspection, it almost looked like something had cleanly cut off apart from each of the Star Peaks, going lower and lower until it reached the lowest of the Star Peaks. The Ninth Star Peak.


    And why would itnd on top of the Main star Peak if it were a sky falling from the heavens above, would it not have to fly from somewhere below the Ninth Star Peak before finally reaching the Main Star Peak¡­?


    Xuan Hao found it more and more odd the more he thought about it. Maybe there was something more to the story of the falling star on top of the Main Star Peak?


    Shaking his head, a bit at this thought, Xuan Hao decided not to think about the matter for now. After all, he would have to first reach the Domain Lord realm before he could climb up the Main Star Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks!


    Looking out in the direction of the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao could not see anything other than a few towns under the Flying Sword Sect scarted all over the ce with severalrge areas of farmingnd attached to them.


    That was expected as while the Flying Sword Sect was located close to the Shattered Star Peaks, it was still too far for him to be able to see it from the top of the Third Star Peak. Maybe if he reached the Main Star Peak and had the cultivation of a Domain Lord, he would be able to see the Flying Sword Sect.


    After all, one of the things Xuan Hao had learned after reaching this world, was the fact that the world itself was considered a ne instead of a that he had lived on before his transmigration.


    Xuan Hao wondered if there was something simr tos in this cultivation world. Maybe there even existed worlds like other nes much like the one he was currently on out there.


    As Xuan Hao drifted away in his own thoughts thinking about the worlds beyond his own, he slowly slipped into a state of enlightenment as the violent qi surrounding his body frantically fought against an unknown power before forcefully being refined and ultimately absorbed into Xuan Hao''s body.


    "Master!" Both Qing Yi and Chu Yang saw the current state of their master and quickly rushed over as they had no clue about what was happening.


    The other people on top of the Third Star Peak that had yet to enter a final round of cultivation in an attempt to reach the next realm, also turned around as they all looked in the direction of Xuan Hao full of shock.


    "No need to worry, it seems like your master managed to gain a form of enlightenment." Walking up besides Qing Yi and Chu Yang, the elderly man they had met earlier came over and exined to them in a kind tone while starring admiringly towards Xuan Hao.


    "For now, it is best if you don''t disturb him." Saying this, the elderly man started taking a bit of distance from Xuan Hao as he found a lotus flower tform and started cultivating together with his friends.


    The Rest of the people who paid attention also returned to what they were doing before as they started cultivating with renewed hope.


    See! Someone managed to gain enlightenment at the Third Star Peak! We will also be able to do that and reach an even higher realm!


    Silence once again covered the Third Star Peak as the elderly cultivators felt a wave of hope wash over them as they all started concentrating on breakthrough.


    Unintentionally, Xuan Hao''s enlightenment had caused the violent qi on top of the Third Star Peak to calm down momentarily. Allowing for the elderly cultivators to more easily cultivate, this in turn allowed a few of them to breakthrough to the next realm and increase their lifespan.


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang also felt the qi turn calm and gentle as both of them sat down to cultivate a few meters away from their master. Making sure that nobody interrupted his enlightenment.


    Like this, everyone on top of the Third Star Peak quietly sat down together and grasped the sudden opportunity before them to cultivate in hopes of breakthrough.

 Chapter 135: Breakthrough! To the Nascent Soul Realm?

    <h4>Chapter 135: Breakthrough! To the Nascent Soul Realm?</h4>


    As the rest of the people were absorbed in their own cultivation, Xuan Hao felt himself gaining a deeper understanding of the world as he felt himself getting immersed in a brand-new world.


    Comprehending the Dao was something that one could only hope for.


    In that moment, when his thoughts, the environment and everything else around him all fused together, he was able to touch a hint of the Dao for the first time. But in order for that to happen in the first ce¡­ The prerequisite was that one would have to reach the state of bing one with the world.


    Only after one''s mind managed topletely be one with the world, was one capable of touching upon the Dao and startprehending it.


    Night descended upon the Third Star Peak, and the many elderly cultivators along with Xuan Hao''s two disciples were both in deep meditation as the formerly violent qi seemed to havepletely turned docile. Not harming anyone and instead assisting them in their cultivation.


    Soon the first rays of light came from the east as the people on top of the Third Star Peak slowly woke up and discovered that they had managed to improve by leaps and bounds with only a single day and night of cultivating.


    As the rest of the cultivators on the Third Star Peak slowly woke up from their meditation, Rays of sword qi began to surround Xuan Hao, still seated on the ground.


    First, some rays of ck light appeared, slowly forming one sword after another around him. One sword after another surrounded Xuan Hao as the spectators looked on with shock as the entire Third Star Peak slowly filled up with the swords formed by the ck light.


    But this was only the begging as immediately afterwards, dots of pure white light began to gather as well, forming into pure white swords as well.


    Two colours of swords, one white and one ck, floated around the Third Star Peak as a terrifying sword qi erupted from them before quickly disappearing again. Making the people present feel like they never appeared in the first ce.


    Currently, Xuan Hao felt like the world in front of him hadpletely changed as he felt the changes brought about by the sudden enlightenment had allowed him to start grasping his domain even before reaching the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm! Even then, it was still the halfplete domain of a half-step Domain Lord and not aplete domain.


    Thinking about it, his current strength should have surpassed the Nascent Soul Realm and only those at the half-step Domain Lord Realm should be able to pose a threat to the current him.


    Other than that, his cultivation had also increased from the sixth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and reached the seventh stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Opening his eyes and seeing both his disciples still deep in meditation, Xuan Hao decided not to disturb them as he turned around and looked at the other people present at the Third Star Peak.


    At the moment, most of the people cultivating had still not woken up yet as they were still trying to breakthrough to the next realm, but the few that had managed to wake up by now all looked at Xuan Hao filled with awe.


    From the strength of the sword qi that the ck and white swords excluded earlier, they were certain that the person in front of them was someone at the Nascent Soul Realm!


    It had to be said that many of the elderly cultivators present dreamed of reaching the Nascent Soul Realm as the increase in lifespan was enormouspared to the small increase one got in the Foundation Establishment or Core Formation Realm!


    But even if they wanted to, reaching the Nascent Soul Realm was too difficult for most and remained a mere dream till the day they passed away.


    BOOM!


    Just as everyone was focusing on Xuan Hao, a violent explosion urred as all the qi on top of the Third Star Peak mobilized and flew in the direction of a certain elderly man sitting with his eyes closed in a lotus position on top of a lotus flower tform together with his friends.


    This was the elderly man that Xuan Hao and his two disciples had met earlier on their way up the Third Star Peak andter talked with his disciples when Xuan Hao was going through enlightenment.


    At this moment inside of the elderly man''s dantian, his core was slowly showing cracks as an endless stream of qi from the outside world streamed into the core, causing it to grow more and more unstable.


    The elderly man focused all his attention on his core as the it started to break apart, revealing a small soul shining in all kinds of different colours inside. This was the Nascent Soul of the elderly man!


    It had just been born and was extremely weak, at the moment that the Nascent Soul was born a silver cloud filled with an unfathomable aura appeared inside the dantian of the elderly man.


    The silver cloud slowly flew over and merged together with the Nascent Soul as it grew stronger and started growing extremely unstable to the point that it was close to copsing at any moment.


    This could be considered the tribtion that a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator would go through upon reaching the Nascent Soul Realm for the first time. The tribtion was known as the silver cloud tribtion.


    If the Nascent Soul Realm cultivator endured and sessfully merged his newly born Nascent Soul with the silver cloud, he could be considered to have reached the Nascent Soul realm.


    On the other hand, If the Nascent Soul Realm cultivator did not endure the strengthening, his soul would perish, and he would die¡­


    The elderly man started sweating profusely as he focused all his attention on merging his newly born Nascent Soul together with the silver cloud.


    Like this, a few hours passed with the elderly man trying his best to merge the silver cloud and newly born Nascent Soul together into one.


    "Haha¡­ I seeded!" Followed by the happy exmation of the elderly man, the aura of a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator slowly spread out with him at the centre.

 Chapter 136: Cloud Tribulation

    <h4>Chapter 136: Cloud Tribtion</h4>


    The aura of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert was way weakerpared to the sword qi that had appeared earlier, but even then, it shocked all of the cultivators present.


    Xuan Hao was already in the Nascent Soul Realm before his enlightenment, so him being stronger than someone who had just reached the Nascent Soul Realm was expected.


    What shocked them was the fact that someone actually managed to breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm! This had only happened one time before and that person had already reached the middle stages of the Nascent Soul Realm by now!


    For another Nascent Soul Realm Expert to appear on the Third Star Peak, there would surely be a swarm of new peopleing to try their luck on top of the Third Star Peak, like what had happened in the past when the now elder of the Seven Fates Sect reached the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Xuan Hao saw the small silver cloud merging together with the newly born Nascent Soul inside of the elderly man as a new and strong vitality spread through his body, making him look full of energy once again, even with his elderly appearance.


    The silver cloud tribtion was a rtively ordinary one as most people breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm either experienced the silver cloud tribtion or the slightly inferior bronze cloud tribtion.


    The cloud tribtions were each divided up into the bronze, silver and finally gold cloud tribtion. The gold cloud tribtion being the hardest to ovee with the most benefits, while the bronze cloud tribtion was the worst with little chance for improvement after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The quality of tribtion that one would experience upon reaching the Nascent Soul Realm was dependent on how strong the foundation was. Most people experienced the silver cloud tribtion, while those going through the bronze cloud tribtion was mostly people who reached the Nascent Soul Realm through the help of pills or other external methods.


    Back when Xuan Hao had gone through the cloud tribtion in the past his tribtion was of course the golden cloud tribtion. In the Flying Sword Sect, only the Sect Master had also gone through the golden cloud tribtion like him and even then, the golden cloud tribtion could also be divided even further into strong and weak ones.


    Watching as the elderly man slowly calmed down and looked around himself with both wonder and happiness in his eyes, Xuan Hao decided not to disturb him as the elderly man enjoyed the feeling of his newfound strength after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Focusing on both his disciples still focused on their cultivationpletely oblivious to the outside world, Xuan Hao saw that both of them had managed to grasp the opportunity and improve. All they needed was a small push before reaching the next minor realm.


    But doing so here would not be a good idea¡­ After all, the purifying effect brought about whenever you constructed another pir inside your dantian was not really something you wanted to experience in public, especially not if you were a girl like Qing Yi¡­


    Just as Xuan Hao was debating on whether or not he should wake up his disciples to prevent them from going through the body cleansing in public, the qi on top of the Third Star Peak suddenly became chaotic and violent once again, causing a few people to wake up from their cultivation immediately upon sensing the change in the qi they were absorbing.


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang were the same as both opened their eyes and look around themselves with a confused expression on their face. Not really understanding what had just happened to the formerly abundant calm qi that could be absorbed and refined with almost no effort from their side.


    "It seems like both of you benefited quite a bit from the trip and are both close to breaking through, we should get back to the sect again so you can focus on breaking through in peace." Seeing both of them had finally woken up from their earlier meditation, Xuan Hao informed both of them.


    "Master! What happened earlier?! All the qi suddenly became calm, and we could easily cultivate without any of the demerits from the from the formerly violent and chaotic qi! Was it perhaps because master gained enlightenment that the qi calmed down!?" Qing Yi almost jumped up as she excitedly asked Xuan Hao with curious look in her eyes.


    "Calm down a bit first." Chuckling a bit at the excited appearance of Qing Yi, Xuan Hao reminded her as her excitement was a little too much for him at the moment.


    Maybe I should be stricter with her in the future, or else I will never have a quiet and docile disciple in the future¡­ What happened to her,pared to how calm and shy she was in the beginning, she has way too much energy now!


    "Yes master¡­" Stopping in ce, Qing Yi looked a bit guilty as she spotted Chu Yang from the corner of her eye smiling from where he was sitting on the ground in her direction.


    "¡­" Narrowing her eyes and starring back at him, Chu Yang realized that he was spotted and did not shrink back like he would in the past and instead met Qing Yi''s gaze.


    "I will go over and talk to the elder who just reached the Nascent Soul Realm, you two can talk to each other about what you gained from earlier with each other while I''m gone." Seeing both of his disciples sending different kind of looks to each other while ignoring the fact that he could see what both of them were doing, Xuan Hao decided to just go over and talk with the elderly man who had just broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Who was he to get in the way of the young ones?


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao made his way over towards the elderly man who had just reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Not realizing his train of thought was a bit wrong considering his own age.


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang realized that their master had seen what they had done and quickly agreed in a slightly embarrassed manner as they slowly thought about how their master might have seen their earlier behaviour.


    "Ah!"


    Both Qing Yi and Chu Yang felt a slight panic at that moment. No matter what, they would not be able to endure if their master started thinking that both of them were interested in each other in that way!


    What if their master started trying to ''help'' them!?

 Chapter 137: Distress Message from the Inner Elders!

    <h4>Chapter 137: Distress Message from the Inner Elders!</h4>


    Making his way over to the elderly man who had just reached the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao wondered if he had seen him anywhere other than the Third Star Peak, but that was unlikely as the Flying Sword Sect mostly only kept records on the people already in the Nascent Soul Realm. Not those who were in the Core Formation Realm as there were simply too many of them¡­


    Even then, Xuan Hao guessed that the elderly man most likely belonged to either a weaker sect or just a random family n ruling over a city or two.


    The chances of him being part of arger sect anding to the Third Star Peak to look for an opportunity to breakthrough was rtively low as the other sects had their own ways to increase the chances of their Core Formation Experts reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Hello, I did not manage to introduce myself properly yesterday, but I''m Xuan Hao, a Core Elder of the Flying Sword Sect." Seeing that the elderly man had somewhat managed to recover from his earlier Silver Cloud Tribtion, Xuan Hao took the opportunity and walked forward to introduce himself.


    The best-case scenario for Xuan Hao at the current moment was that the elderly man was a cultivator without any sect or family. In that case, Xuan Hao would have an opportunity to recruit him for the Flying Sword Sect, just like the Seven Fates Sect had done in the past.


    "Core Elder?! Apologies for any earlier disrespect Elder Xuan, I did not expect that you were a member of the Flying Sword Sect¡­ I expected for the third Core Elder of the Flying Sword Sect to look a little¡­ older than you. My name is Chi Hu, just an ordinary wandering cultivator." Showing a shocked expression upon finding out that Xuan Hao was a Core Elder of the Flying Sword Sect before apologizing for how he had acted yesterday, Chi Hu calmed down before long as he introduced himself.


    "No worries, I''m not one for too many formalities. By the way¡­ I could not help but notice that you said you were a wandering cultivator? Are you by any chance interested ining to the Flying Sword Sect¡­? Compared to the Seven Fates and Raging me Sect, we allow way more freedom to our members." Waving his hand to signal that he did not care much about earlier, Xuan Hao decided to invite Chi Hu without going over a long pointless discussion or anything along that line.


    From what he had seen earlier at the very least, this Chi Hu had a good character and seemed to be interested in looking after the younger generation. Maybe he would be able to take a few disciples in the Flying Sword Sect after settling down as a Core Elder.


    On the other side, Chu Hu was a bit shocked upon hearing the invitation by Xuan Hao.


    When he came to the Third Star Peak together with a few of his friends in an attempt to breakthrough, he did not expect to seed and even get invited to join one of the four big sects of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!


    Chi Hu had lived most of his life as a wandering cultivator. Back when he was younger, he had joined a sect in a faraway kingdom thatter ended up disbanding. From that point onwards, Chi Hu lived off thend as he went from ce to ce and experienced a myriad of different things. Betrayal, love, war between kingdoms and entire empires at times, Chi Hu had witnessed many things over the years.


    The reason why he hade to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and stayed there for thest year, was that he had heard rumours one of his friends had told him about the Shattered Star Peaks and with only a few years left in him, Chi Hu had decided to join his friends as they made their way up the Third Star Peak to make a final attempt at reaching the next realm.


    Looking back at his small group of friends starring at him with genuine happiness at his earlier breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm, Chi Hu felt a slight pang of pain in his chest as he knew that his friends would most likely never make it down from the Third Star Peak again.


    Even with the earlier opportunity before them, they had not managed to take a step forward and reach the next realm.


    But this was also understandable as all his friends were at the peak of the Core Formation Realm, if it were that easy to reach the Nascent Soul Realm, they would have done so long ago.


    "Can I get some time to think about it first?" Not knowing whether he should join the Flying Sword Sect without first finding out a bit more about than what he had just heard from random people, Chu Hu decided to first talk with his friends if they knew anything about the Flying Sword Sect before deciding.


    He had already grown tired of traveling by now and wanted to find a ce to settle down and quietly cultivate, Chi Hu hoped that the Flying Sword Sect could allow that to happen as Xuan Hao and his two disciples were way more friendlypared to other sect disciples or kingdom elites he had met in the past.


    "Sure, it has already been a while since I left the sect by now. Ah, the Sect Master asked me to wee a friend of his! You can juste to the Flying Sword Sect when you havee to a decision, take as long as you want there is no hurry. Farewell for now, I have to hurry back!" Getting a certain distress message through hismunication talisman from one of the Inner Elders, Xuan Hao remembered that the Sect Master had called one of his friends over before he went into secluded cultivation to ensure the sects safety while he was not there. Exchanging a quick farewell, he appeared besides both of his disciples and grabbed hold of them before using his fastest speed to make his way back to the Flying Sword Sect.


    By the time Xuan Hao disappeared from the Third Star Peak Chi Hu could only look around himself in a confusion .


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang had no idea what happened as they soon saw the Third Star Peak disappearing in the distance.


    Soon they were outside the Shattered Star Peaks as the scenery below passed by in an instant.


    The demon beasts that they rode there were left behind as Xuan Hao carried both his disciples towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    The message that he had gotten from one of the Inner Elders was quite worrying as Xuan Hao could almost feel the fear and terror from the Inner Elder in question.


    It should also be known that only a few Inner Elders had a way to contact him and each of them were those who were at the peak of the Core Formation Realm with a high chance of reaching the Nascent Soul Realm in the future!


    For them to even contact him when the Vice Sect master was still there, Xuan Hao could not even begin to imagine what might have happened! Did the Raging me Sect perhaps attack them!?

 Chapter 138: Zu Fei Destroys her own Pavilion...

    <h4>Chapter 138: Zu Fei Destroys her own Pavilion...</h4>


    Back to a few hours before one of the Inner Elders from the Flying Sword Sect decided to send a message to Xuan Hao asking for help.


    Everything was rtively calm in the Flying Sword Sect and not much had happened outside of a certain Inner Elder returning from the Vice Sect Masters Pavilion beaten up andpletely unrecognizable to most of his fellow elders.


    The Vice Sect Master''s pavilion was still off limits as the disciples went back to what they had been doing beforehand, sometimes looking in the direction of the Vice Sect Master''s pavilion wondering what was happing up there.


    "So, when are you going to leave!?" Inside the pavilion that the disciples and elders of the Flying Sword Sect evaded like the gue, Zu Fei''s aggressive voice could be heard echoing out as one could imagine how angry she was at the moment from her aura ring up and destroying a part of the pavilion even further than it already was.


    "Haha, little Zu Fei sure has a lot of energy even at her age~ I was asked toe here and help out now that Fengfeng is in secluded cultivation, perhaps you don''t want me to stay~?" A chuckle could be heard from another part of the pavilion as the teasing nature of the voice was especially provocative.


    "YOU!" The aura of Zu Fei red up once again, this time more violent than thest as part the part that Zu Fei and the other woman were located in directly copsed.


    The copse of such arge part of one of the pavilions in turn finally caused the Flying Sword Sect''s defensive formation to act as it automatically took action to supress the cause of the disturbance.


    "Wha-" Without realizing what happened, Zu Fei was directly suppressed by the giant sword array that had manifested above the Flying Sword Sect.


    This onlysted for a moment as Zu Fei had ess to the controls of the formation and quickly undid the suppression brought by the giant sword array, but by this point it was toote as a clearughter could be heard from the young woman standing in front of her.


    "Haha, to be suppressed by your own sect''s defensive formation for causing trouble! Haha, maybe I should ask Fengfeng if he designed this feature himself! Haha-"


    "Y-you!" Trembling from either embarrassment or anger, Zu Fei felt like the world was against her as sheunched an attack towards the young woman in front of her.


    Swish~


    Arge sword manifested from qi directly flew over andnded at the ce that the young woman was standing andughing at her predicament.


    Boom!


    With arge explosion the giant swordnded and exploded into a torrent of sword qi as the pavilion copsedpletely. The defensive formation of the Flying Sword Sect did not activate this time around as Zu Fei stopped it from acting, lest she ends up getting suppressed by it once again¡­


    "Ara~ Are you perhaps angry?" The teasing voice of the young woman could be heard as she walked out from the torrent of sword qi. Not injured in the slightest as her pure white dress gave off a soft green glow.


    "Shu Yao!" Not answering the question of the young woman known as Shu Yao, Zu Fei gathered the qi inside her dantian once again as sheunched another deadly sword attack in the direction of the fragile looking Shu Yao.


    "You really never do learn, as aggressive as ever¡­" Letting out a sigh as she looked at the iing sword attack, Shu Yao waved her right hand, causing a giant lotus flower to appear in front of her


    Boom!


    The sword attackunched by Zu Feinded on the giant lotus flower causing it to shake for a bit, but it soon stabilized as the sword attack of Zu Fei was blocked without much difficulty.


    Zu Fei saw this and did not mind at all, seemingly already having expected the current oue , as she continued her attack only to be blocked by the lotus flower again and again.


    Boom, Boom, Boom!


    First the defensive formation activated and now a continuous sound of explosions could be heard as countless giant swords manifested and descended down upon a giant seemingly unmoveable lotus flower floating in the air above the Vice Sect Master''s pavilion. No matter how hard the giant swords tried to breakthrough, they never managed to seed as the lotus flower remained in ce.


    "W-what is happening!? Did the Sect Master''s guest and the Vice Sect Master perhaps start fighting!?" A panicked Inner Elder looked up at the Vice Sect Master''s pavilion as he felt extremely worried.


    From what they had learned recently, their Sect Master was in secluded cultivation at the moment and both of the Wang brothers had left for the border. Due to this, the Sect Master had apparently called over one of his friends to make sure that the Raging me Sect did not take advantage of the situation tounch an attack at them.


    But the problem was that the Sect Master''s friend was apparently a woman¡­ And one that he went quite far back with, Zu Fei also seemed to be familiar with her and was¡­ A bit hostile towards her¡­


    "Should we call for Elder Xuan!? Only he can stop this!" Another Inner Elder walked over from the side and asked in a nervous tone.


    "But do we even have the ability to contact him¡­? I heard from one of the Inner Elders at the entrance that he went outside with his disciples yesterday to visit the Shattered Star Peaks¡­" A third elder came over and joined the conversation as all three of them felt helpless on how to deal with the current situation.


    "The disciples are all panicking and the lessons for today have all been disrupted! What on earth is happening?!" A heroic voice could be heard as an elderly man with a long white beard walked over to the three hopeless elders.


    "Elder Song!" All three of the Inner Elders called out in happiness as they called out excitedly.


    ¡­


    "I see, I will contact Elder Xuan immediately and see if he can calm down Vice Sect Master Zu Fei!" After listing to the exnations of the three Inner Elders, Elder Song took out hismunication talisman and send a message to Xuan Hao.


    "Hopefully, he will return before Vice Sect Master Zu Fei ends up destroying more than just her own pavilion¡­" ncing at the direction of the current ''battle'', Elder Song felt a bit helpless.


    If just the Wang brothers or Elder Xuan wanted to take on the role of Vice Sect Master¡­ Sadly none of them wanted it and Zu Fei ended up getting the position, though it was only so she could spend more time together with the Sect Master¡­


    To this day, the Vice Sect Master role could be considered empty as nobody wanted to do the work that the role required¡­


    Why were all the Nascent Soul Realm Experts in the Flying Sword Sect except for the Sect Master so unwilling to do anything work rted¡­?


    Thinking about it. Maybe the Sect Master was the unusual one...

 Chapter 139: Elder Song

    <h4>Chapter 139: Elder Song</h4>


    Flying back to the Flying Sword Sect at the fastest speed possible, Xuan Hao carried both his disciples as he went over the message that the Inner Elder Song had send him earlier.


    In the message, he had described that the Sect Master''s friend and the Vice Sect Master had started fighting on top of the Vice Sect Master Mountain Peak. The fight had apparently caused most of the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect to run around in a panic as they had no idea what was happening and could not concentrate on cultivating or anything else that required their focus with a giant fight happening close by.


    From the message, Xuan Hao also managed to understand that it was the Vice Sect Master that had started it and the Sect Master''s friend only defend all this while. Not attacking the Vice Sect Master Zu Fei at any point.


    "Hah¡­ I wonder how much damage Zu Fei has caused¡­ Hopefully she only destroyed her own pavilion like Elder Song said¡­" Thinking about the damage that a Nascent Soul Realm Expert could cause, Xuan Hao felt worried that the Zu Fei would end up damaging the few dwellings and other infrastructure of the sect located besides the Vice Sect Master''s pavilion.


    The cost of repairing in the future would definitely not be cheap for the sect¡­


    ¡­


    By the time Xuan Hao arrived in the vicinity of the Flying Sword Sect, he could see giant swords constantly shing against an enormous lotus flower at the centre area of the Flying Sword Sect.


    At this point, most of the people in the Flying Sword Sect had already evacuated the area where Zu Fei was fighting and were watching the show from the side. The Flying Sword City had also gotten a bit more popr than usual as many wandering cultivators from nearby hade to watch the fight between the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    The reason that they had gathered in the Flying Sword City located at the entrance of the sect instead of watching the fight from the other sides of the sect, was due to the fact that the other areas leading into the Flying Sword Sect were obscured by a dense mist year-round.


    For them, it was quite rare to be able to watch a Nascent Soul Realm fight without having to worry about dying in the process was a huge opportunity. Maybe they would even be able toprehend something and have a breakthrough from watching the fight!


    So, the amount of people gathering in front of the Flying Sword Sect''s entrance to watch the fight as closely as possible kept increasing, with some even sneaking onto the roofs of nearby buildings to get a better view of the fight happening in the centre area of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Landing in an area a little away from the Flying Sword Sect''s entrance without being seen by the crowd that had formed all around the area of the Flying Sword Sect''s entrance to try and watch the fight happening in the distance.


    "You two can wait over there together with the rest of the disciples as I go deal with the Vice Sect Master¡­" Xuan Hao motioned towards a group of Flying Sword Sect Disciples that had gathered at a mountain peak close to the entrance to watch the fight before quickly making his way inside the Flying Sword Sect and towards the Vice Sect Master''s Mountain Peak.


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang felt a bit confused upon suddenly finding themselves at the entrance of the Flying Sword Sect, but quickly managed to recover and make their way over to the mountain peak where arge group of disciples had gathered.


    After asking around from the other disciples of the Flying Sword Sect about what happened, Qing Yi and Chu Yang quickly found out what happened and that the people fighting at the centre region of the Flying Sword Sect was none other than the Vice Sect master Zu Fei and the Sect Master''s guest.


    ¡­


    At the bottom of the Vice Sect Master''s Mountain Peak, Xuan Hao arrived in front of the elder standing there anxiously waiting.


    Looking at the elder well into histe eighties with a splendid beard standing there waiting for him to arrive, Xuan Hao smiled a bit.


    This elderly man was the role model of many elders inside the Flying Sword Sect and there were even many of the disciples admiring to be someone like him in the future, more so than any of the other Core Elders or even the Sect Master!


    The reason for this was simple as the Elder known as Elder Song was in charge of the Outer and Inner disciples without a master being taught the different cultivation mantras and sword techniques in the sect, he helped both Inner and Outer disciples of the sect improve.


    Other than just helping the Outer and Inner disciples improve their cultivation, he also helped organize several public events where both the Inner and Outer disciple could get to know each other and improve.


    One of the most popr events that he helped organize was the neer tournament that Qing Yi had gone through in the past. Tournaments like the neer tournament where the new disciples of the sect would get a chance to show off and gain some fighting experience.


    At the same time, they could get more familiar with the other new disciples of the sect from fighting against each other.


    The older disciples of the sect often came to watch the neer tournament to see the new faces that would be entering the sect and also managed to get more familiar with each other and even make a few friends along the way.


    All in all, the neer tournament was just one of the many sessful events that Elder Song had managed to organize over the years.


    Many in the sect also believed that if Elder Song reached the Nascent Soul Realm in the future, he would take over the role of Vice Sect Master instead of Zu Fei.

 Chapter 140: Sealing Zu Fei

    <h4>Chapter 140: Sealing Zu Fei</h4>


    "Elder Xuan!" Seeing Xuan Hao appearing in front of him, Elder Song let out a sigh of relief as he called out to him.


    "Elder Song, it''s been a while since west saw each other, a pity that the circumstance is not optimal for a meeting¡­" Looking at the relieved expression on Elder Song''s aged face, Xuan Hao felt that it was a pity that he could not talk more with Elder Song.


    From past interactions with Elder Song, Xuan Hao knew that both of them had quite a bit in when it came to how they spent their time¡­ Both training disciples or cultivating to improve¡­ Maybe he should find some free time to do something new, like hanging out with the other elders of the sect or maybe even try to learn a profession.


    If things came to it, he could also find the library where the Flying Sword Sects records were stored and take a look to learn more about this world and what was outside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s territory.


    "Elder Xuan, Vice Sect Master Zu Fei is out of control currently! At this rate she will end up destroying arge part of the sect before she calms down again. The only positive thing about all this is the fact that the Sect Master''s friend does not seem to hold it against us¡­ If that were not the case, Zu Fei would have already been beaten by this point considering their difference in strength." Talking up to this point, Elder Song had a helpless look on his face whenever he mentioned Zu Fei.


    "I understand Elder Song, I will go up there and see if I can help settle the situation between the two of them before it esctes further¡­"


    "Thank you, Elder Xuan, I will leave dealing with Vice Sect Master Zu Fei to you! In the meantime, I will go over and get the servant quarters ready for cleaning up this mess¡­" With that, Elder Song soon disappeared into the distance as Xuan Hao was left alone at the bottom of the Vice Sect Master''s Mountain Peak.


    The constant explosion sounds echoing out from above was the only thing left to apany him as Xuan Hao made his way up the mountain.


    ¡­


    "Don''t you think that this is enough Zu Fei? You have already destroyed your own pavilion and if you continue like this, you will end up causing the damage to reach the few dwellings nearby¡­" Shu Yao still looked as rxed as she had been beforehand as she calmly blocked all the attacks Zu Fei threw at her.


    "Hmph!" Zu Fei did not answer as she insteadunched another attack towards Shu Yao, but this time around she no longer stood in the same ce tounch sword attacks formed by her sword qi. Instead, she finally drew the sword in the scabbard hanging off a small string attached to her robe and rushed over to Shu Yao and shed down with all her might as the entire mountain peak trembled under the sword sh.


    The sword sh seemed to cover the entire mountain peak, leaving Shu Yao with no ce to dodge the iing attack.


    "Hah¡­ You really never learn, do you? Still as aggressive as ever¡­ This has already dragged on for long enough, it''s time to end it!" Not moved by the iing sword sh, Shu Yao moved her hand into the sleeve of her robe and pulled out a small talisman that she threw in the direction of Zu Fei was charging at her from.


    The giant lotus flower disappeared the moment Shu Yao threw out the small talisman, allowing Zu Fei to get closer, but it was at this moment that the sword in Zu Fei''s hand collided with the small talisman thrown out by Shu Yao.


    Bzzzzt~


    "Wha-" Before Zu Fei managed to react in time, the small talisman erupted into a sea of lightning.


    By the time Zu Fei wanted to defend herself it was already toote as the sea of lightning easily broke apart her sword sh and directly invaded her body without allowing her to resist in the slightest.


    As the lightning coursed through her body, Zu Fei felt her cultivation being sealed up without her being able to stop it from happening. All she could do was stare hatefully in the direction of Shu Yao as her cultivation was sealed up.


    "Now you won''t be able to cause any more trouble. Maybe you will be able to calm down like this¡­?" Walking over to Zu Fei, Shu Yao retrieved the lightning sea that had invaded Zu Fei''s body as the lightning left Zu Fei''s body and returned to Shu Yao''s hand in the form of the small talisman from earlier that she quickly put back into the sleeve of her robe.


    "I see that I arrived at the right time, though it seems like you already managed to stop Zu Fei from causing any further destruction¡­" As Zu Fei was about to say something in response to Shu Yao, Xuan Hao had finally made his way up the mountain peak as he was greeted by the sight of a pouting Zu Fei sitting on the ground with a tall mature looking woman in herte twenties looking like a elder sister in the process of scolding her younger sister.


    "Elder Xuan! You have to help me! This ''person'' sealed my cultivation and w-"


    "Are you sure you want to continue this? Zu Fei?" Just as Zu Fei was about to ask for help, Shu Yao interrupted her and walked over to greet Xuan Hao.


    "You must be Elder Xuan, Fengfeng told me a lot about you."


    "The pleasure is mine; how should I address you miss¡­?"


    "Haha, no need to call me miss¡­ My name is Shu Yao, but you can feel free to call me sister Yao if you want~" Smiling brightly, Shu Yao decided to tease Xuan Hao a bit, but it was to no avail as Xuan Hao was more focused on something entirely different at the moment.


    This Shu Yao¡­ She is at the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!? Where did the Sect Master get such a strong friend¡­?


    From what he knew, Shu Yao was from the Spring Flower Sect. Outside of that, Xuan Hao knew nothing about her.


    But from what he knew about the Spring Flower Sect, they did not have any Ninth Stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert at the moment!

 Chapter 141: Reaching the Border

    <h4>Chapter 141: Reaching the Border</h4>


    While the Spring Flower Sect could be considered the second strongest sect in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, they were still weaker than the Seven Fates Sect that were rumoured to have an expert at the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm,parable to the ancestor from the Royal family of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Still if they had someone at the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao felt a bit worried on the behave of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s royal family. After all, in the past, they were used to supress the sects within their territory¡­


    But by now, they only had control over the central region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and even had to deal with both a gue outbreak and the attack of the Azure Sky Kingdom at the same time.


    The Sky Empire did not care about the kingdoms beneath them fighting with each other, as long as the territory ended up falling to one of the kingdoms under their control.


    This could be considered one of the ways that the Sky Empire tried to grow stronger experts within their territory by allowing the weaker kingdoms without a Domain Lord to fight each other. For them only Domain Lords mattered, as not even a few hundred Nascent Soul Realm Experts couldpare to the value of a single Domain Lord.


    "Hm¡­ So now that you are here Elder Xuan, can I borrow you for a moment?" Seeing that Xuan Hao did not respond to her, Shu Yao did not mind in the slightest as her face became a little more serious upon asking this.


    "Sure¡­ But what about Zu Fei? I can''t just leave her like this¡­" Looking over towards Zu Fei who by now was even more angrypared to before as she observed both of them get along without the slightest problem, Xuan Hao felt a bit awkward when he saw her pouting in anger.


    Perhaps she had expected for him to start fighting with Shu Yao upon arriving and seeing her cultivation sealed by an outsider¡­?


    "The seal I ced on her will automatically disperse in a few minutes, there is no need to worry about her¡­ I would not have sealed her in the first ce if she didn''t attack me all of a sudden."


    "Hmph! Elder Xuan, if you go with this vixen remember to be careful that she doesn''t attack you!" Pouting angrily in response to Shu Yao''s statement, Zu Fei turned her head away as she warned Xuan Hao.


    "Sure¡­" Not knowing how to respond to the warning that Zu Fei gave him, Xuan Hao made his way down the Mountain Peak together with Shu Yao as Zu Fei remained in ce.


    ¡­


    As Xuan Hao and Shu Yao made their way over to a secluded ce to discuss the reason that the Sect Master had called her over for outside of giving the Flying Sword Sect an extrayer of protection, a group of people finally arrived at the border between the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the Azure Sky Kingdom after travelling without much rest for the past few days.


    "Leader we have finally arrived at the border!" Calling out to the leader at the front of the group, one of the people from the group walked up and informed him.


    "I can see that¡­ We will take a rest at the camp for now, we will be returning to the capital again after I deliver the order of his majesty." Rolling his eyes at his subordinate, the leader decided to ignore him as he made his way down towards the army camp located a few hundred meters away from them together with the rest of his subordinates.


    The army camp was full of activity as soldiers armed from head to toe patrolled around the camp.


    Upon seeing the group of peopleing over, one of the soldiers standing guard at the camp entrance quickly motioned towards a few other soldiers patrolling nearby as a small group of soldiers soon formed and made their way over to meet the messenger and his group.


    The messenger did not slow down in the slightest upon seeing the soldiersing over, but instead took out a small token with a wing symbol carved onto it and showed it the leading figure among the soldiers as he was about to ask them to either leave or show something to prove their identity.


    "Royal Messenger¡­? The messengers are still around after the invention of themunication talisman, I thought you guys had been abolished long ago¡­" Showing a bewildered appearance upon seeing the token shown by the messenger, the soldier quickly recovered before he allowed them to enter the camp under the confused looks of the other soldiers.


    "Captain, what is a messenger? I don''t think I have heard about them before¡­ Are they a secret part of the military or something?" A young soldier could not help but ask as he curiously looked in the direction that the messenger and the rest of his group had disappeared in.


    "Hah¡­ The Messengers are a thing of the past now, I thought that his majesty had already abolished them after the invention of themunication talisman a few hundred years ago, but it looks like they are still around¡­" Shaking his head, the captain exined to the young soldier.


    "Communication talismans were such a recent invention?!" Seemingly shocked by this piece of information, the young soldier felt a bit bewildered.


    Themunication talismans were widely used pretty much everywhere on the continent, how could it have been something that had been invited only a few hundred years ago?


    "Well, calling it a recent invention would not be a correct statement as it has been around for far longer, it is just that it has only recently begun to see use on our continent after the Explorer Union started expanding further into our continent. Many people believe that the origin of the first few blueprints onmunication talismans stems from the Explorer Union.


    But this is only a rumour, and nobody knows for certain¡­ Well enough of this, get back to your patrol before we both end up getting in trouble." Seeing that the rest of the soldier already started to return to their original patrol routes, the captain stopped talking and hurried for the young soldier to return to his patrol.


    "Yes Sir!" Recovering the bearing of a soldier upon hearing the captainsst sentence, the young soldier quickly returned to his patrol route. Not forgetting to look in the direction that the outdated messenger group went.


    Sooner orter, the messengers would bepletely reced bymunication talismans as they were both safer and faster.


    It was a wonder that the current ruler of the Azure Sky Kingdom still used messengers in this day and age, instead of just conveying his orders throughmunication talismans.

 Chapter 142: Brewing Storm

    <h4>Chapter 142: Brewing Storm</h4>


    The messenger walked up to arge tent that was set up in the centre area of the army camp for the soldiers to eat and left his subordinates stay there for now as he made his way towards the ce where themander of the Azure Sky Kingdoms army was located.


    "Halt! What business do you have with themander!?" Standing in front of majestic looking tent decorated with the symbol of the Azure Sky Kingdoms crest, the messenger was stopped by a strong soldier guarding the entrance, d from head to toe in apletely ck armour that radiated a savage aura.


    Clearly, he had seen his fair share of bloodshed on the battlefield and was nowhere near the same level as the guards that the messenger had met at the entrance to the army camp.


    Comparing the two almost felt likeparing a new-born chicken just learning to walk, to a battle-hardened chicken that had fought a few other chickens to the death on the battlefield¡­


    "I''m a messenger that is here to deliver an order on behave of his majesty." Not showing any sign of weakness in front of the intimidating soldier, the messenger once again pulled out his token as he introduced himself.


    The guard only looked at the token for a split second before moving to the side, allowing for the messenger to enter. No longer paying any attention to him.


    "¡­" The messenger felt it was a bit odd, but still decided to enter the tent as he soon saw the luxurious environment beyond the entrance of the tent.


    The thing that stood out the most to the messenger as he made his way deeper into the tent were the many different kinds of weapons scattered around the tent. From swords, axes, bows and spears to more unique weapons like hammers, poles, whips and even a flute giving off a demonic aura that made the messenger shiver when he first saw it.


    "So, messenger, his majesty is still not willing to use themunication talismans¡­? That old idiot will have to use them at some point! I swear this inefficient use of time has to stop at some point¡­ Hah¡­" Comining in an obviously annoyed tone, themander appeared a few centimeters behind the messenger, causing the messenger to jump away in shock.


    "Haha, no need to be so scared. You can ry the order for me and take your leave." Feeling a bit amused upon seeing the messenger''s reaction, themander could not help butugh a bit at the as he informed for him to recite the order given to him.


    "This is the order from his majesty" A few seconds soon passed as the messenger finished reciting the order given to him. Following this, the messenger quickly handed over the jade given to him by his majesty before turning around to leave the tent as fast as possible.


    "I will take my leave immediately and return to his majesty and inform him that his order and the jade has been received by themander in charge!" With this, the messenger almost ran out of the tent as themander began to inspect the jade given to him.


    The jade had a few engravings on it, but this was not what caught themander''s attention, instead it was clear and powerful energy lurking beneath the surface of the jade.


    When used, this jade could erupt with a terrifying power.


    "A safety measure¡­?" putting away the jade, themander soon left the tent and made his way in the direction of the tent where they nned their every move in the war against the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    It was also here that the representatives of the different sects inside of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s borders had gathered as they were currently talking about the situation of the war.


    "Send someone to inform the others that we will be holding a meeting about a future attack shortly, tell them to gather at the fastest speed possible!" Informing one of the soldiers outside the tent, themander entered and made his way in the direction of the different sect representatives currently talking among themselves.


    He knew that they would not be happy with the idea of them being used as cannon fodder and decided to talk with them before the other important personal arrived. Hopefully, he could convince them before the discussion regarding how to proceed started¡­


    ¡­


    As the Azure Sky kingdom were getting ready tounch an attack to breakthrough the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s line of defense, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom reinforcements were all rxing in a few personal luxurious tents.


    The people send over by the Seven Fates Sect to aid in the defense were a little better, but not by much as they still spend most of their time rxing, causing the atmosphere of the entire army camp to be more rxed.


    Wang Hu and Wang Lan who were the only people present from the Flying Sword Sect saw this situation and had no idea what to do as they watched how the people in charge hadpletely rxed after the Azure Sky Kingdom showed no more signs of aggression towards them, there was even a few that were prepared to return to the capital.


    This feeling of not wanting to stay guarding the border any longer was further reinforced after some of their spies inside the army of the Azure Sky Kingdom had informed them that the Azure Sky Kingdom''s army had already started retreating and getting ready to return back to their capital again.


    "What do you think about the current situation brother?" Wang Hu asked his brother Wang Lan as he had been at the border longer than him who had just arrived recently.


    "I don''t know¡­ After part of the army defected to the other side, I don''t think that we can trust the words of the spies inside the Azure Sky Kingdom''s army camp¡­ they may be nning arge attack and the current border army is far from ready to deal with it¡­ We should prepare to retreat if things take a turn for the worseter on¡­" Wearing a heavy expression, Wang Lan looked into the distance where the Azure Sky Kingdom''s army camp was located as he felt a looming threat approaching.


    "Maybe the Heavenly Sky Kingdom won''t make it past the next few years¡­" Thinking about the gue spreading through the central region and the Azure Sky Kingdom who had managed to infiltrate arge handful of higher-ups in the army, Wang Hu felt a bit helpless in regard to the future of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    At least they were part of a sect within the kingdom and should be fine even if the Heavenly Sky Kingdom copsed.

 Chapter 143: Alliance?

    <h4>Chapter 143: Alliance?</h4>


    After reaching the base of the mountain, Xuan Hao informed Elder Song about what had happened as he guided Shu Yao towards? a secluded pavilion located a short distance away from the Zu Fei''s pavilion.


    Arriving in front of the pavilion, Xuan Hao and Shu Yao both entered as neither said anything along the way.


    The pavilion was spacious with a lot of room and was normally used by some of the Inner Elder''s to hold a public lecture for the disciples that had no master or just wanted toe and join in, but due to the position of the pavilion and the fact that Zu Fei had started fighting with Shu Yao a few minutes ago. The pavilion was leftpletely empty, with not a single soul present.


    All that was left in the pavilion, were a few notebooks that the disciples had forgotten in their hurry to leave the area around the Vice Sect Master Zu Fei''s pavilion.


    Xuan Hao thought that this was a great spot to discuss whatever the Sect Master had informed Shu Yao about outside of the obvious intent of using her as a deterrent to any of the other sects nearby that would want to take advantage of the Sect Master being in secluded cultivation.


    "Let''s finish it before the disciples returns to resume their lecture, we should have around two or so hours before that, but it should be more than enough time¡­ Unless you have something a little more difficult to exin? If that is the case, we can go over to my pavilion and discuss it¡­" Sitting down on a pillow used by one of the disciples to sit on as they listened to the lecture, Xuan Hao waited for Shu Yao to begin talking.


    "It''s fine, it won''t take too long to exin." Not minding the current environment or the fact that Xuan Hao had just taken her to a nearby pavilion used by the disciples and elders for public lectures, Shu Yao sat down on one of the pillows used by the disciples before focusing her attention back on to Xuan Hao.


    "The main reason as to why Fengfeng called me over you should already know about, so I won''t bother with it and instead talk about the other reason~" Smiling in a little less serious tone when she mentioned Feng Chen, Shu Yao went on to exin the second reason why Feng Chen had called her over.


    The reason for it was something Xuan Hao had not expected in the slightest and did have something to do with the fact that the so-called church of the gue God was trying to insert themselves into one of the Sky Empires Kingdoms.


    Compared to the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom fighting with each other, the Sky Empire was way more focused on the fact that a foreign religion was trying to make its way into the Sky Empire. The already established religions had neatly split up the faith of the different kingdoms under the Sky Empire and had no n to give up any of it.


    The main church that spread through the Sky Empire''s central territory itself, the church of the Sky God, was less than pleased with this new development and had already sent some of their main forces out to several different kingdoms affected to deal with it.


    Among them, the kingdoms receiving the most attention from the churches were the strong kingdoms with one or more Domain Lord present in them and those having a significantlyrge poption.


    "But what does this have to do with youing here¡­?" Still not really understanding what this had to do with Shu Yaoing to the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao could not help himself from asking.


    "Ah, I was getting to that! Due to the churches from the Sky Empire sending people out to deal with the invasion of the church of the gue God, the Sky Empire has started to look for a way to gain back more control of their territory. So, while part of the churches main forces is not present to prevent them from doing anything, they havee up with a n to create an alliance made out of the sects that exist inside their borders.


    They have already contacted severalrge and prominent sects across their territory and invited them to join this new alliancepromised of all the different sects under the Sky Empire! Feng Chen and I have both gotten this invitation¡­ Their main purpose is most likely to use this new alliance sh with the churches and weaken both sides, allowing the Sky Empire''s Imperial Family to gain backplete control¡­ After all, cultivators do not generate any faith after walking down the path of immortality and goes against their belief by going against the heavens that their gods created and exist in. Feng Chen asked for me toe here mostly so we could discuss this when hees out of secluded cultivation." Exining all this, Shu Yao leaned back a bit as she waited for Xuan Hao to digest the information.


    "Why would you need to discuss this with the Sect Master¡­? And why inform me in the first ce?" Xuan Hao still felt a bit confused as to why he was even informed by her about this instead of Feng Chen himself.


    "Ah¡­ Feng Chen just received the invitation after he went into secluded cultivation, so he asked me to inform you as I would being over anyways¡­ The reason why I need to discuss it with your Sect Master is because both the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect is weakpared to the other sects that will join the sect alliance, so we wanted to discuss the possibility of possibly merging the sects together.


    The Seven Fates Sect and the Raging me Sect was also invited, I did try to ask the Seven Fates Sect about merging, but they did not want to give away control of their cultivation techniques or resources to outsides¡­


    So, as both me and Fengfeng have known each other for quite some time and the Flying Sword Sect being¡­ calm and less aggressivepared to the Raging me Sect, I thought it would be fitting to merge both sects together!" Listening to her exnation, Xuan Hao finally managed to understand the reason why Shu Yao hade to the Flying Sword Sect, outside of just helping protect the Flying Sword Sect from possible enemy attacks.


    But¡­


    The Spring Flower Sect had quite a few enemies outside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, but also had arge number of sects that wanted to merge with them, some stronger than the Flying Sword Sect.


    The reason for this was quite simple as the Spring Flower Sect was famous for their many experts in the field of formations and talismans. The talisman that Shu Yao had used earlier to supress Zu Fei was a great example of how strong their talismans were.


    Finally, and to some most importantly, it was also a sect with only a few male disciples and were almost entirelypromised of female disciples¡­

 Chapter 144: Zu Feis Past

    <h4>Chapter 144: Zu Fei''s Past</h4>


    Talking about a few other things together with Shu Yao, Xuan Hao manged to find out that she is actually the current Sect Master of the Spring Flower Sect! Other than that, she also told Xuan Hao the reason why Zu Fei had been so hostile towards her, and it was not something Xuan Hao had expected.


    Apparently, both of them had been members of the Spring Flower Sect in the past, butter on, Zu Fei had decided to quit and ended up joining the Flying Sword Sect due to some of the rules inside the sect at the time being way too strict for her.


    Back then, the Spring Flower Sect did not ept any male disciples and was a rare sect with only female disciples and elders in it! They also had several rules that didn''t allow for any of the female disciples to get a daopanion and it just so happened that Zu Fei had met Feng Chen, the current Sect Master on a trip outside.


    She had fallen for him almost instantly but knew that she would never be able to be together with him if she stayed in the Spring Flower Sect, so she ended up leaving the sect and joined the Flying Sword Sect as an honorary elder, slowly working her way up to her current position.


    The reason why she was so hostile to Shu Yao, was partly due to the fact that most of the rules that had forced her to leave the sect in the past had been lifted under her rule as Sect Master of the Spring Flower Sect.


    But this in itself, was not what brought about the earlier hostility of Zu Fei¡­ What truly brought the hostility of Zu Fei, was the fact that she flirted with Feng Chen at every possible moment that they met in the past!


    ording to what Shu Yao said, Zu Fei was jealous because she flirted so openly with Feng Chen while she did not have the ability to do that as openly.


    "Hah¡­" Xuan Hao let out a sigh when he observed Shu Yao''s expression when she exined this with a clearly jealous look on her face whenever she talked about Zu Fei spending her time together with Feng Chen as the Vice Sect Master.


    These two are both equally dangerous, I think it is a good idea that I warn the Sect Master when he gets out of secluded cultivation...


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt that he was quite lucky.


    At the very least, he did not have someone that troublesome to deal with and only had to worry about both of his disciples growing up well.


    "Looks like the disciples are returning now that things have calmed down, I will return to my pavilion to check up on my disciples. You can look for someone called Elder Song, he will help you find a ce to stay." Sensing a few people walking over in the direction of the pavilion that they were currently staying in, Xuan Hao informed Shu Yao before taking his leave.


    The fact that he threw aside the trouble of dealing with Shu Yao to Elder Song, did not bother Xuan Hao in the slightest.


    Elder Song should be able to deal with Shu Yao without any problem until the Sect Master returns from his secluded cultivation¡­


    Like this, Xuan Hao made his way back towards his pavilion, putting his full trust into Elder Song''s ability.


    Shu Yao did not mind this arrangement either as she remembered the elderly man that she had seen Xuan Hao talking with on the way to the pavilion was called Elder Song.


    Locking onto his location with her divine sense, Shu Yao made her way in the direction of Elder Song just as the first disciples took the first step inside the now empty pavilion to resume their earlier lectures.


    ¡­


    Xuan Hao made his way back to his pavilion, but Chu Yang and Qing Yi had still not arrived yet, so he decided to finally go to one of the libraries and check if any of the two mystical rank materials he had gotten were useful for anything that could help either himself or his disciples.


    He had already ignored looking into it for quite some time by now and decided that it was finally time to look into what use they had, if the Flying Sword Sect even had any records on them in the first ce¡­


    ¡­


    Around the same time that Xuan Hao made his way over to one of the nearby libraries of the Flying Sword Sect, Qing Yi and Chu Yang were both walking back towards the Mountain Peak where Xuan Hao''s pavilion was located.


    "Do you think master managed to calm down Vice Sect Master Zu Fei? From what I heard she is quite unreasonable whenever she gets angry, I even heard that only the Sect Master can calm her down! Both Core Elder Wang Hu and Wang Lan failed when they tried in the past!" Looking in the direction of the Vice Sect Master''s Mountain Peak as she made her way through the sect together with Chu Yang, Qing Yi could not help but ask as she saw the earlier fighting had stopped.


    "Hm¡­ I think that it might have been the Sect Master''s guest that finally decided to act after being attacked by Vice Sect Master Zu Fei for the past hour or so¡­ From that alone, she should also be stronger than the Vice Sect master Zu Fei!" Coming to his own conclusion, Chu Yang thought that it was the Sect Master''s guest that had finally taken action to deal with the Vice Sect Master.


    No matter how tolerant the Sect Master''s Guest was, she would definitely get tired if someone kept attacking her unreasonably for one hour straight¡­


    "True¡­ I would most likely have attacked back the moment I got attacked by someone¡­" Thinking about it, Qing Yi could not help but agree with what Chu Yang said.


    If it were her, there was no way she would just allow someone to attack her while only defending herself if she had the means to fight back!


    "Ah, Qing Yi, do you know what that is?!" As Qing Yi thought about how she would respond in the same situation as the Sect Master''s guest, Chu Yang called out to her and even pulled on her robe, causing Qing Yi to turn around and look in the direction that Chu Yang was looking.


    "This is¡­"

 Chapter 145: Oversized Cat Statue

    <h4>Chapter 145: Oversized Cat Statue</h4>


    Looking at the thing that Chu Yang was asking about, Qing Yi felt a bit speechless when she noticed what he was referring to.


    Meow~


    "Have you never seen a cat before¡­?" Not knowing how to answer his question, Qing Yi asked in a bit confused tone. Cats were amon pet that many of the female disciples from the Flying Sword Sect kept by their side when cultivating and Chu Yang not having seen one before felt unrealistic to her.


    "Not the cat! I''m talking about the statue that the cat is sitting on!" Correcting the misunderstanding that had urred, Chu Yang''s words caused Qing Yi to focus her gaze away from the cat sitting on top of the statue and instead focus on the statue itself.


    The statue looked ordinary to most of the other statues that could be seen lined up in front of the different buildings along the road, some had statues of mythical beasts, while others had statues of different kinds of powerful demon beasts they had beaten.


    In most cases, the statues existed to show off the first or strongest demon beast that the owner of the house had in off during their time and could be considered a symbol of status inside the Flying Sword Sect.


    This did not mean that everyone had a statue like that in front of their dwellings, Xuan Hao and the Sect Master was a great example of this, as both of them did not have any in front of their pavilion.


    Zu Fei on the other hand did have a small demon wolf statue in front of her pavilion to symbolize the first demon beast she had managed to y in the past. Sadly, the statue had been destroyed after the recent fight at her pavilion¡­


    The statue in front of them, however, was not of a strong demon beast or mythical beast like a dragon or a phoenix¡­ No, instead it was a statue of a cat around four times the size of an ordinary household cat.


    The cat statue did not look threatening at all and even looked cute to some extent, as the statue just looked like a normal cat scaled up in size to make it look more majestic.


    But failed quite phenomenally at this and instead made the cat statue look more adorable and loveable than majestic.


    "I don''t know¡­ It might be an oversized cat? Maybe we should try to ask the owner if he or she should know something about it." Not being able to remember anything about what kind of demon beast that the oversized cat statue was from, Qing Yi began to walk towards the entrance of the house that the oversized cat was sitting guard in front of.


    Chu Yang did not object to Qing Yi''s suggestion and quickly caught up with her as Qing Yi leaned forward and knocked on the door with the cat statues in front of it.


    Knock Knock


    The sound echoed out and soon someone moving around could be heard from beyond the door as the door slowly began to open. Qing Yi and Chu Yang waited patiently as a young girl around the age of thirteen poked her head out of the door the moment there was enough space for her small head to fit through.


    "W-what do you want¡­?" Looking closer at the young girl in front of them, Chu Yang and Qing Yi discovered that the young girl standing in the door had a running nose as her eyes had started to turn slightly bloodshot.


    From the looks of things, the young girl was sick, but both Qing Yi and Chu Yang had no idea what it was. After all, to cultivators like them, getting sick would normally never happen. The only reason a cultivator would be like that was due to poisons or other simr things like eating the wrong herb when trying to gain a boost in cultivation¡­


    And the little girl in front of them was definitely a cultivator! Even though she was only in the Qi Condensation Realm, she was still a cultivator and getting sick like a normal person was close to impossible!


    "Ah, we just wanted to ask about the cat statue in the front and wanted to learn if you knew what kind of demon beast that it was¡­" Discovering the little girl had slowly begun to retreat back into the house while cautiously inspecting both of them, Qing Yi waved both her hands as she exined in an attempt to look as harmless as she possibly could to the little girl.


    "I-I see, then¡­ C-can I get you to help me get my medicine in return for telling you what kind of demon beast that the shadow cat statue is¡­?" Not realizing the fact that she had already given away the name of the demon beast, the little girl looked expectantly at Qing Yi as she waited for her to answer.


    "Sure¡­ W-where can we find your medicine¡­?" Not daring to refuse the request of the cute little girl in front of her even after already finding out the name of the demon beast, Qing Yi readily epted the request.


    "Great! You can go find grandpa Song; he is normally the one who brings me my medicine but today he has not managed toe over a deliver it¡­ I think it has something to do with the biiiig swords that flew around on top of big sister Zu Fei''s Mountain earlier!" The little girl had already made her way out of the door as she began to talk about where to find her medicine, but when she reached the point about her grandpa Song, the little girl began to talk about the earlier fight that had happened on top of the Vice Sect Master''s Mountain. Not forgetting to emphasize how big the swords conjured forth by Zu Fei were with her small hands.


    "So where can we find grandpa Song?" Trying to get the little girl back on track again, Qing Yi asked her with a kind smile as the little girl was about to start talking about the giant lotus flower that had blocked the big swords flying around on top of the mountain.


    "Hm¡­ You can try going to the Elder Hall over there, grandpa Song normally spends his time ying chess with some of his friends when he is not working." Pointing the direction of a tall building located towards the centre of the sect, the little girl thought about something for a moment before she began talking again.


    "If he is not there, you can try to ask grandpa demon devourer. He normally ys chess together with grandpa Song and should know where he is. When you bring me my medicine, I will tell you about the statue!" With this, the little girl disappeared into the house, leaving behind both Qing Yi and Chu Yang to wonder¡­


    How did someone get that little girl to call himself grandpa demon devourer!?

 Chapter 146: The use of Moon Silver

    <h4>Chapter 146: The use of Moon Silver</h4>


    "Who do you think this grandpa Song is?" Turning over to look at Qing Yi, Chu Yang who had remained silent during the earlier conversation asked with a curious look in his eyes.


    "Hm¡­ From what the young girl said, he should be an elder of the sect." Thinking about it for a moment, Qing Yi looked in the direction of the elder pavilion that the young girl had told them to go and look for her grandpa Song.


    The Elder Pavilion of the Flying Sword Sect was located at the centre of the sect itself and was the ce that most of the elders of the Flying Sword Sect spent their time whenever they were not cultivating or teaching the disciples of the sect.


    Over time, the Elder Pavilion had expanded to make space for the many elders of the Flying Sword Sect that came to socialize with the other elders.


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang both knew about the Elder Pavilion from their master, who had introduced the different ces and important locations of the Flying Sword Sect in the past.


    The fact that the Elder Pavilion was called the Elder Pavilion, did not mean that only the elders of the Flying Sword Sect could enter.


    In fact, many disciples made their way to the Elder Pavilion to pick up their master when he had been missing from his public lectures a little too long¡­


    "The Elder Pavilion, I have not been there before¡­ Should both of us go?" Feeling a bit excited upon thinking about going to the Elder Pavilion and seeing the main force behind the Flying Sword Sect, Chu Yang remembered that their master might be waiting for them back at his pavilion.


    "Both of us will go! I don''t think master will have anything against us returning a bitter due to helping a young girl get her medicine!" Qing Yi thought for a few seconds before she responded.


    Chu Yang could not help but nod in agreement as both of them made their way over in the direction of the Elder Pavilion.


    ¡­


    "Ash Sunstone¡­ Hah¡­ I really can''t find any information on it..." Throwing the book in his hand back towards a nearby shelf,? Xuan Hao did not bother to look at it as the book slowly down a gently slit into the small space that it had been taken from earlier.


    Xuan Hao had already stayed in the library for one hour straight and had scanned through countless books with his divine sense, trying to look for anything rted to the Ash Sunstone and Moon Silver in his possession.


    The Moon Silver was a rtively easy thing to find records on, as it was one of the most popr materials used by cksmiths to forge weapons of the Mystic Rank, suitable for Domain Lords and highly sought after.


    The Explorer Union even had a set price for it and would buy it up at that price no matter how much Moon Silver you offered.


    The Ash Sunstone however¡­ Xuan Hao had not managed to find as much as a single mention of its use or even its existence in the first ce.


    From what Xuan Hao knew, this could only mean two things. First, the Ash Sunstone was extremely rare. Rare to the point that it might not have been seen once since the creation of the Flying Sword Sect!


    The Second reason sounded more logical to Xuan Hao and that was the fact that people on the Ewaria Continent might call the Ash Sunstone something different.


    "But even then, there is nothing simr to it in appearance inside the rare material encyclopaedia¡­" Xuan Hao was not fully set on how to deal with the Ash Sunstone and decided to just throw the trouble of finding out how to use it to the future him who was stronger and hopefully more knowledgeable regarding the different rare materials in this world¡­


    At the very least, he managed to find out what the Moon Silver was used for. Now the question became, what to do with it?


    The Flying Sword Sect did not have any Master cksmith capable of using the Moon Silver to forge a weapon or another kind of artifact.


    Xuan Hao could keep it and wait for the time when the Flying Sword Sect managed to nurture a Master cksmith in the future, but how long would that take?


    Selling the Moon Silver to the Explorer Union would also be an option, but the value a weapon or artifact created by the Moon Silver would be worth far more than the spirit stones offered by the Explorer Union.


    "Do I have to find a Master cksmith that can make a sword or artifact for me?" Thinking about it, Xuan Hao felt like this would be a great option, especially after remembering his earlier conversation together with Shu Yao.


    If he in the future managed to be part of the sect alliance established under the Sky Empire, he should be able to find out the location of one of the Sky Empires Master cksmiths!


    It looked like he would have to help the Sect Master make a descension in regard to joining the Sect Alliance¡­ As long as it was no detrimental for the Flying Sword Sect, joining the Sect Alliance should be a good thing for the Flying Sword Sect future growth.


    Even if they ended up shing with the churches of the Sky Empire, it would most likely not involve the smaller and rtively weak sects that did not even have a Domain Lord in them, like the Flying Sword Sect.


    "But how would I convince a Master cksmith from the Sky Empire to make a weapon or an artifact for me¡­?" Having already grown confident that he would have the ability to meet a Master cksmith in the future, Xuan Hao instead turned his focus towards a nearby shelf of books with thebel [The Art of cksmithing] on it.


    Maybe he should find out what kind of payment a Master cksmith would be interested in¡­

 Chapter 147: The Double D

    <h4>Chapter 147: The Double D</h4>


    "Wow, so this is the Elder Pavilion!" Standing in front of therge open pavilion, Qing Yi and Chu Yang both felt amazed as they saw the elders inside sitting together in small groups chatting with each other while enjoying the view of a small artificialke located just besides the Elder Pavilion.


    The people inside the Elder Pavilion were not only elders, but a few disciples could also be seen talking with a few elders as a group of servants from the servant quarters made their way around therge pavilion with different kinds of refreshments for the elders.


    "Let''s go and find the grandpa Song that the young girl mentioned normally came with her medicine, we should ask over at the elders over there." Pointing in the direction of a few elders sitting at the edge of the pavilion stretching out over the water of the artificialke, Chu Yang entered the Elder Pavilion.


    Qing Yi did not wait around for too long as she made her way inside as well.


    "Hello, can I help you with anything? Are you perhaps looking for an elder¡­?" Just as Qing Yi and Chu Yang made their way inside of the pavilion, a servant carrying a tea set came over and asked them with a kind smile.


    "Ah yes, we are looking for someone called gra- Elder Song¡­ Do you perhaps know if he is here?" About to call Elder Song grandpa Song just like the young girl had called him, Qing Yi quickly corrected herself.


    "Elder Song¡­ I don''t know, but you can try and ask around over there. When hees, he mostly spends his time together with a few other elders ying chess or writing different kinds of techniques for the disciples under him while enjoying a good cup of tea." Smiling a bit upon talking about thest part, the servant was clearly quite familiar with this Elder Song, it seemed like he really did visit the Elder Pavilion quite a lot¡­


    Walking in the direction that the servant had pointed them in, Qing Yi and Chu Yang soon made their way over to the ce that they had seen a little before entering the Elder Pavilion.


    Even without the servants help, they would most likely have made their way over to the chess ying elders.


    "Hm? Are you two looking for someone?" One of the elders sitting on the side observing two of his friends fully absorb in a game of chess discovered Qing Yi and Chu Yanging over.


    "Yes, we are looking for someone called Elder Song, do you perhaps know if he is here?" Taking the lead, Chu Yang stepped out and asked before Qing Yi managed to say anything.


    "Old Song? Hm, he has not shown up today due to the earlier turmoil that the Vice Sect Master caused, I think Old Double D knowns where he is. You can try and ask him, he just over there." Saying this, the elder pointed over at another elder who sitting a few meters away from them.


    "Who are you calling Old Double D!" The elder in question rose up from his position and his splendid body swayed in the wind, causing both Qing Yi and Chu Yang to look away.


    No wonder he did not like that name, his body size was quite massivepared to normal people¡­


    But howe he was so big when he was a cultivator¡­? Normally cultivators were able to control the direction that their body grew in and seeing such a ''big'' cultivator could be considered a quite rare thing.


    Almost like finding a rare animal, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang could not help but look at the elder as he made his way over.


    It was only at this moment that both of them realized how truly massive this elder was!


    "Who are these two brats!?" Just as he was about to verbally attack the elder that had greeted Qing Yi and Chu Yang, the massive elder saw both of them staring at him like a rare animal of sorts.


    "These two are look for Old Song, don''t you know where he is Old Double D~" Informing the massive elder, the elder smiled a bit as he teased his friend.


    "I swear, if you call me that one more time-"


    "Haha, no need to be like that, you wanted people to call you the great demon devourer in the first ce! All we are doing is shortening the name a bit, so it is easier for us old ones to remember!" Another elderughed as he called out from the side, causing the few nearby elders tough alongside him.


    "Elder Demon Devourer do you perhaps know where Elder Song is?" Seeing the mood of the Elder Demon Devourer bing worse, Qing Yi quickly jumped out and asked before his mood became any worse.


    "Hmph? Why are you brats looking for Old Song?" Clearly not in a good mood after being annoyed by his friends, Elder Demon Devourer snorted angrily at both of them before asking.


    "W-we are looking for him because he did not deliver the medicine-"


    "What!? He did not deliver the little missy''s medicine?! That old bastard! Come with me, we are going to beat that old idiot up!" Not even getting the chance to exin who it was that sent them over, Elder Demon Devourer already seemed to know what they were talking about as he angrily started cursing Elder Song before marching out of the Elder Pavilion.


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang both looked at each other a bit confused at the sudden development, but still decided to follow after Elder Demon Devourer.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Why do I feel like something bad is going to happen to me?" Elder Song who was currently in the process of finding a ce for Shu Yao to stay suddenly felt a chill go down his spine as he began to look around himself to find the source.


    "Is something wrong?" Raising an eyebrow upon seeing Elder Song suddenly look around himself with a slightly anxious look on his face, Shu Yao felt that something might have happened.


    "Ah, its nothing. Maybe I''m just overthinking a few things, we will reach the location soon." Brushing his earlier feeling aside, Elder Song signalled for Shu Yao to move ahead as both of them entered a beautiful dwelling with everything a cultivator would need for cultivating in peace.

 Chapter 148: Smash and Grab

    <h4>Chapter 148: Smash and Grab</h4>


    Elder Demon Devourer made his way out of the Elder Pavilion with Qing Yi and Chu Yang following closely behind him, still not sure about what had just happened other than the fact that this Elder Demon Devourer was angry at Elder Song due to him not delivering the young girls medicine on time.


    The path they were walking on was leading deeper into the sect where the Core Elder''s Mountain Peaks and personal housing was located, this was also not that far away from where Xuan Hao''s Mountain Peak was located.


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang both noticed this as they followed behind Elder Demon Devourer.


    "Is Elder Song perhaps one of the higher ranked elders?" Chu Yang could not help but ask as he looked at the different mansions scarted around them, each had a powerful aura leak out from inside, either stemming from the defensive formation in ce or the person cultivating inside.


    "I don''t know, he might also just be running an errand for another elder that ended up dying him." Qing Yi did not really know much about the Elder Song that they were looking for and had not really stopped to think about the fact that he might actually be a strong elder from the Flying Sword Sect.


    But then again¡­ Looking at the angry Elder Demon Devourer charging ahead while cursing at Elder Song every few seconds, Qing Yi felt that this Elder Song might not be a strong elder from the Flying Sword Sect.


    If he really were, how could Elder Demon Devourer have the courage to curse him so openly without fear of getting beaten up? At least from what Qing Yi could tell when the other elders in the Elder Pavilion teased him, Elder Demon Devourer should just be a normal Inner Eder in the sect.


    With that in mind, Elder Song should also be an Inner Elder just like him or maybe even an Outer Elder!


    "Hmph, that bastard is up there! You brats wait here for a moment I will be back soon!" Stopping in front of a small hill with a beautiful mansion situated on top of it, Elder Demon Devourer told both Qing Yi and Chu Yang to stay as he made his way up the small hill.


    Crash!


    "Old bastard Song! I know you are in there!" Reaching the top of the hill, Elder Demon Devourer was not nning to wait for even a second as he smashed the door to the mansion and made his way inside under the bbergasted gaze of both Qing Yi and Chu Yang.


    "How does he even know that Elder Song is there in the first ce¡­?" Looking up at the destroyed entrance to the mansion, Chu Yang could not reallyprehend how Elder Demon Devourer managed to find out where Elder Song was located.


    Perhaps he already knew where he was beforehand?


    Seeing that Qing Yi did not have an answer to his question, Chu Yang could only think that Elder Demon Devourer had known the location of Elder Song beforehand.


    But even then, what about the elder who owned the mansion? Would he not be enraged upon seeing someone suddenly smashing the front door and entering without permission?


    ¡­


    Elder Song was currently in the process of finishing thest few things before Shu Yao could settle into the dwelling or mansion that she had chosen to stay in when he suddenly got a message on hismunication talisman from his best friend, Elder Demon Devourer, asking him where he was currently.


    Not thinking much about it, Elder Song told him where he was and that he should be able toe to the Elder Pavilion in a bit to have the chess match that they had agreed on before the whole thing with the Vice Sect Master happened.


    Like this a few minutes went by as Elder Song was about to leave the mansion, he suddenly heard the angry voice of his old friend Elder Demon Devourer.


    "Old bastard Song! I know you are in there!" Following this, the main entrance to the mansion in front of him flew open and crashed into a nearby wall.


    "Old Demon, what on earth are you doing!?" Not understanding why his good friend would suddenlye running and even smash the main door, Elder Song had a confused look on his face as Elder Demon Devourer made his way over to him and grabbed him by the neck before starting to berate him about the fact that he had forgotten to deliver the young missy''s medicine on time.


    Elder Song also seemed to have realized the reason for his friends'' anger and felt a bit embarrassed, how could he forget to deliver his granddaughter''s medicine!


    Shu Yao standing by the side observed the two of them with a slight smile on her lips, not intending to interfere in the slightest as she watched Elder Demon Devourer grab hold of Elder Song and carry him out of the mansion before he could exin the situation to Shu Yao.


    "No need to worry about it Elder Song, I''m already fine with this ce. You can just go and do what you dyed so far¡­" Sending over a message through her divine sense, Shu Yao did not take up anymore of Elder Song''s clearly busy schedule and decided to be a good guest.


    Elder Song let out a sigh of relief upon hearing Shu Yao''s message and would have bowed gratefully in her direction if he were not getting carried away by Elder Demon Devourer at the moment.


    "Looks like it would be quite interesting if the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect really merged with each other¡­" Thinking about how uptight and strict most of the disciples and elders from her sect were, Shu Yao felt that it might be a good change of pace if they could interact with the more¡­ Lively elders of the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    "All I can do is hope that Fengfeng agrees¡­" Thinking about Feng Chen who would ultimately have the final say in whether the two sects would merge together, Shu Yao could not help but feel a bit nervous.


    The amount of time and effort she had used on convincing the upper echelons of the Spring Flower Sect to this merger was not small and now all she could do was hope that Feng Chen would agree.


    At the very least, it seemed like the elders from the Flying Sword Sect would not be difficult to get along with in the future¡­

 Chapter 149: Medicine Delivered!

    <h4>Chapter 149: Medicine Delivered!</h4>


    Waiting at the base of the hill that the mansion Elder Demon Devourer had entered, Qing Yi and Chu Yang expected a fight to break out between Elder Demon Devourer and the original owner of the mansion.


    Expectations were often different from reality as Elder Demon Devourer soon came out of the house while carrying someone along with him that was most likely the Elder Song who forgot to deliver the medicine.


    "Can you at least let me down now!?" Elder Song saw Qing Yi and Chu Yang looking at him with a curious look in their eyes the moment he was at the bottom of the small hill. Elder Song immediately felt a wave of embarrassment wash over him when he saw the two and struggled a before getting free from Elder Demon Devourer and standing up by himself.


    Shu Yao was a Nascent Soul Realm Expert who did not really seem to care much about him being kidnapped, while Elder Demon Devourer was a friend of his that he had known for years. Both of them would most likely not talk to others about his current situation¡­ Qing Yi and Chu Yang on the other hand¡­


    Elder Song was almost certain they would share the unique sight of an elder being carried around with their friends! And when that happened, the other elders would likely find out as well!


    Elder Song was indeed right on one thing, it was the first time Qing Yi and Chu Yang had seen one of the elders being carried around like a sack of rice by another elder. The sight was, indeed, rather unique¡­


    "Ehm, so who are these two friends¡­? Are they perhaps the ones who informed you about the medicine?" Trying to get them to focus on something other than what they had just seen, Elder Song tried to ask Elder Demon Devourer with an almost begging look on his face. Hoping that his friend would help him out.


    "Yes, they were sent by the little missy because someone forgot to deliver her medicine on time! We should get going, you have the medicine on you right?" Rolling his eyes upon seeing the pleading look on Elder Song''s face, Elder Demon Devourer decided not to embarrass him too much in front of the younger generation.


    "Of course, I have it right here! Why don''t we let these two deliver the medicine? I still have a few things to attend to."


    "Fine, they were the ones asked by the little missy to get the medicine a certain irresponsible grandpa forgot~" Not seeing any reason to refuse what Elder Song said, Elder Demon Devourer agreed. Not forgetting to berate him along the way.


    "Here, this is the medicine. Now on your way young ones!" Handing over a small square wooden box iid with a small phoenix on the top, Elder Song adopted the image of a proper elder for once as he instructed both of them.


    "Yes!" Qing Yi and Chu Yang did not really get to say anything before they were on their way back to the house where the sick young girl was.


    "So, who do you think this Elder Song is? I heard about someone named Elder Song from Zeng Shihan, but that Elder Song was supposed to be the role model of most if not all disciples in the Flying Sword Sect¡­ This Elder Song seem a bitckingpared to what I heard¡­" Walking along the road out of the centre area of the Flying Sword Sect, Qing Yi could not help but ask as she remembered how much Zeng Shihan had praised Elder Song thest time they met and talked about what was happening inside the sect.


    "Perhaps it was another Elder Song? It''s not like there can only be one Elder Song, this one might just be an Outer Elder with the same name¡­" Not really finding it odd, Chu Yang shrugged his shoulders as he answered.


    "Hm¡­ Maybe that is so, I guess there are more than one Elder Song in the Flying Sword Sect. One impressive and one¡­ A bit more unique." Not knowing how to describe the Elder Song that they had met, Qing Yi just decided tobel him as one of the more unique elders in the Flying Sword Sect.


    At the very least, she would have to tell Zeng Shihan about this unique Elder Song she had managed to meet. Maybe both of them were even rted to each other?


    ¡­


    As both Qing Yi and Chu Yang began to get along rather well with each other while talking about Elder Song and Elder Demon Devourer that they had met earlier, both of them soon came to a stop in front of the sick young girl''s house.


    Even if it felt like they had been gone for a long time, by now it had only taken a little over one hour to get the medicine.


    Knock Knock


    Walking up to the front of the door, Qing Yi knocked gently on it two times before stepping back to wait.


    "Ah, h-hello again! Did you manage to get my medicine!?" The sound of movement was soon heard from beyond the door as the young girl soon came out and greeted them, this time she seemed to have gotten even worse than before and Qing Yi quickly handed the small wooden box given to her by the unique Elder Song over to the young girl.


    "This is the medicine that your grandpa Song asked us to deliver."


    "Ah! It really is, it even has the little fire birdy on it! Here this is for you!" Smiling happily upon getting the box, the young girl took out a small piece of paper with the drawing of what looked like a drawing of a big cat and a few words next to it.


    "This is?" Not knowing what the paper with a drawing and a few words on it was for, Qing Yi looked back at the young girl with a confused expression.


    "It''s about the shadow cat demon beast! The statue is a biiiig shadow cat that grandpa Song fought with in the past!" Saying this, the young girl tried her best to emphasise how big the shadow cat was with her arms waving all over the ce.


    "But I need to get my medicine fast or else I will start to feel reeeeeaaaally bad soon! Bye-bye for now big sis" After finishing, the young girl waved goodbye to Qing Yi before going back into the house to take her medicine.


    "What about me¡­" Standing a few meters away from the entrance to the house, Chu Yang could not help but feel a little left out as the young girl did not even seem to notice him at all.

 Chapter 150: Cure for the Plague?

    <h4>Chapter 150: Cure for the gue?</h4>


    Standing in front of one of the many bookshelves with books rted to cksmithing with a thick book in hand, Xuan Hao felt a bit helpless in regard to what he could use in his future attempt in convincing a Master cksmith to forge something for him.


    "Looks like I will have to look for a time to go back to the Burning Mountain Range and find some rare materials¡­" Thinking about it, Xuan Hao did not really know about any ces outside of the Burning Mountain Range that had anything that would interest a Master cksmith.


    As for using his cultivation and strength to owe the Master cksmith a favor? There was no chance¡­ The amount of Domain Lords requesting the assistance of a Master cksmith was endless, why would the Master cksmith care about a Nascent Soul Realm Expert promising to help him out in the future¡­


    "Hm?" ncing over the words in the book in his hands, Xuan Hao was about to put it away when something written on thest few pages caught his attention.


    The pages described a few of the most sought-after materials by cksmith and among them, Xuan Hao noticed quite a few that were rumoured to be found in the Burning Mountain Range.


    The problem with this, was the fact that most of the materials in question could only be found in the deeper regions of the Burning Mountain Range where demon beast above the Nascent Soul Realm resided!


    "I guess I will really have to visit the Burning Mountain Range again, at the very least I''m stronger than thest time, so I should be able to go a bit deeper¡­ Ah, I still have to go and check up on Qing Yi and Chu Yang." Shaking his head at the thought of already going back to the Burning Mountain Range again, Xuan Hao remembered both his disciples that were most likely waiting for him back at his pavilion.


    "Maybe I could even get them to go find the materials for me in the future¡­" Imagining how both his disciples could go out and gather whatever materials he required in the future, Xuan Hao felt a bit depressed.


    Why could his disciples not just find a random opportunity that allowed them to reach the Nascent Soul Realm or something?! That way he could just spend his timezing around in the sect without doing much of anything¡­ Not that he was doing much in first ce¡­


    "Now that I think about it¡­ Have I not been a little too busy recently?" Realizing this, Xuan Hao remembered how chaotic the current situation was.


    Sky Empire''s sect alliance, demonic sect, gue and gue God church, Azure Sky Kingdom and Heavenly Sky Kingdom fighting each other¡­


    Maybe he should ask the Sect Master if they could move out of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the future and be a neutral sect¡­ Staying seemed to be quite a troublesome thing¡­ And it was not like neutral sects not rted to any kingdom or empire did not exist on the Ewaria Continent.


    It was just the fact that most of them were either strong enough topete with a weaker empire or being a demonic sect that did not have a ce inside any empire or kingdom.


    The ck Rose Sect would most likely end up like that in the future as well, as they would be forced to move their sect''s location in the future when the Sky Empire found out a foreign force was trying to take over what was essentially its territory.


    At this point, Xuan Hao felt that only by either merging with the Spring Flower Sect to be a new stronger sect or moving out of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to live a more peaceful life as a neutral sect was an option.


    The reason Xuan Hao joined the Flying Sword Sect in the first ce was because it was one of the moreidback sects with close to no enemies, but this peaceful life in the Flying Sword Sect was getting destroyed due to all the things currently happening inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the Sky Empire as a whole.


    "Elder Xuan!" Just as Xuan Hao wasmenting about his peaceful life cultivating and doing nothing all day being interrupted by all the different things happening around him, an elderly voice called out from the entrance to the library as an elder with the robe normally used by members of the Alchemy Hall ran over.


    "What is it, did something happen?"


    "Yes! Elder Wan Qiu manged to sessfully create a potion that canbat the gue! She asked me to look for the Sect Master and ask for what to do now that we have a cure for the gue, but as he is in secluded cultivation, I instead came to find Elder Xuan!" Not missing a beat, the elder excitedly began exining.


    "That''s great! But why did you find me instead of the Vice Sect Master? Is she not the second in charge when the Sect Master is not here¡­?" Not understanding the elder''s reason for approaching him before Zu Fei, Xuan Hao asked with a curious look on his face.


    "Ah¡­ Well¡­ She just finished a fight with the sect master''s guest and need to rest after fighting? for such a long period of time¡­" Fidgeting awkwardly around the ce upon hearing Xuan Hao''s question, the elder tried his best to answer without being disrespectful towards Zu Fei.


    "Haha, indeed! Let''s get going then!" Not pursing the matter anymore, Xuan Hao decided to just follow the elder to the Alchemy Hall and find out what kind of cure Elder Wan Qiu hade up with after getting the notebook of Lord Kubera to assist in the research of a cure.


    With this, Xuan Hao and the elder made their way over to the Alchemy Hall, it looked like Qing Yi and Chu Yang would have to wait a little longer until he got back to his pavilion.

 Chapter 151: Sparkling Blue Water! The Perfect Cure!

    <h4>Chapter 151: Sparkling Blue Water! The Perfect Cure!</h4>


    After the news about Elder Wan Qiu seeding in making the cure for the gue spread among the members of the Alchemy Hall, many of the disciples and elders from the Alchemy Hall had gathered in front of Elder Wang Qiu''s room. Hoping to maybe get a look at the cure that they had been working overtime trying to develop over thest few months.


    Even though many of them had helped in brainstorming and testing different methods for making the cure, the main people in charge of trying to create the final product was the most senior members of the Alchemy Hal.


    Elder Wan Qiu was one of these senior members and had been the one to show the most promise in making a cure over thest few weeks. In the end she did not disappoint and managed to sessfully make the cure for the gue.


    The only problem left was finding out whether it could be mass produced and how they should go about it when it came to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom as a whole.


    At the current point in time, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would be quite desperate for a cure to the gue that was ravaging through the central regions of their kingdom.


    The fact that there was still no news about the Heavenly Sky Kingdom sessfully making a cure for the gue weighted heavily on themon poption as people had started moving away from the central region where the gue was the worst and instead started to settle down in the cities and towns under the four major sects located away from the central region.


    If they managed to get their hands on a cure, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would be able to stabilize the current chaotic situation inside the central region and at the same time focus more on dealing with other threats such as the Azure Sky Kingdom and the ck Rose Sect.


    But the Flying Sword Sect still had to decide on how to use the cure, be it holding it back and try to profit from the current situation or share it as quickly as possible to help as many people as possible. This could only be decided by either the Sect Master, Vice Sect Master or one of the Core Elders.


    Arriving at the Alchemy Hall, Xuan Hao followed the elder and soon arrived in front of Elder Wan Qiu''s room. Looking around at the group of people that had gathered in front of Elder Wan Qiu''s door, Xuan Hao could not help but sigh when he looked at their happy expressions.


    Even if he decided to share the cure, he would also have to consider what kind of response the Church of the gue God would have upon finding out that their gue had been rendered useless.


    Worst case scenario, they would try to get revenge on the ones responsible and Xuan Hao doubted that the Flying Sword Sect could resist if the Church of the gue God truly tried to destroy it¡­


    Thinking this far, Xuan Hao smiled a bit awkwardly as he followed the elder through the crowd of people and into the alchemyboratory located inside.


    "Ah, Elder Xuan! I heard that the Sect Master is in secluded cultivation and Zu Fei is¡­ Zu Fei¡­ Anyway! I finally managed to make a cure for the gue! See!" Greeting him the moment he entered the room full of excitement, Elder Wan Qiu began trailing a bit off upon mentioning Zu Fei, but her enthusiasm soon returned as she lifted a small potion bottle filled with a sparkling liquid with a deep blue colour.


    "This is the cure¡­?" Staring curiously at the sparkling liquid in front of him, Xuan Hao had no clue how it would work whenbating the gue.


    "Yes! You see the green divine energy core that the gue forms inside the body of a host will need a constant supply of energy from the inside, so the cure will go in and block the paths for energy into the green divine energy core inside the host and slowly destroy it! While this process is not instantaneous, it will remove the green divine energy core inside the host over a few days or weeks in more extreme cases!" Flushing a bit in excitement as she was talking, Elder Wan Qiu put the small potion bottle down and walked over to a nearby table and soon came back again with the notebook of Lord Kubera that Xuan Hao still remembered looking through. Not that he managed to understand anything other than thest few pages¡­


    "This Lord Kubera is amazing! He even wrote a detailed step by step guide on how to make a potion for directing the divine energy inside the host of the gue to locate the source of the gue!" Saying this, Elder Wan Qiu excitedly pointed at one of the pages in the notebook of Lord Kubera.


    "So, this potion can locate the source of the gue? What is the source of the gue in the first ce¡­?" Picking up the small potion bottle, Xuan Hao inspected the blue sparkling liquid a bit more closely.


    "Hm, it should be able to locate the source of the gue in theory if used correctly¡­ But even if that was the case, the source of the gue should be an artifact that the Church of the gue God mentioned by Lord Kubera uses and it will most likely be guarded tightly!" Moving over to Xuan Hao and taking back the small potion bottle before shaking her head a bit helplessly, Elder Wan Qiu felt a bit hopeless in that regard.


    "Indeed¡­ We will not release the news of finding the cure yet, if the Church of the gue God finds out that we managed to cure their gue so quickly, they will most likely not take kindly to us¡­ Elder Wan Qiu, I will have to trouble you with announcing that the cure is not working as expected and that it might just have been a fluke earlier¡­ At the very least, try to keep information about the cure inside the Alchemy Hall!" Putting on a serious expression as he exined their next course of action, Xuan Hao walked over to the ce that Elder Wan Qiu had ced the cure and took it away.


    Before he turned to leave, Xuan Hao had managed to ask about how he would use the potion to locate the artifact that was the source of the gue.


    "For now, you can go back to how things were before." With that, Xuan Hao left the Alchemy Hall and made his way back towards his pavilion with the cure to the gue in hand.


    Dealing with the gue was yet another thing that was added onto his already growing to-do list¡­


    Maybe the sect master woulde out of his secluded cultivation having gained some sort of enlightenment that helped him reach the Domain Lord Realm in just a few days¡­ If that happened, Xuan Hao would be able to hand over the responsibility of finding the source of the gue and dealing with it to him.


    Wait¡­ Maybe he should go and visit Shu Yao and see if she would be interested in dealing with it¡­?

 Chapter 152: Azure Sky Kingdom, Attack!

    <h4>Chapter 152: Azure Sky Kingdom, Attack!</h4>


    As Xuan Hao was making his way back to his pavilion where his disciples were waiting, the border between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom saw a lot of movement at the side of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    At the current moment, themander in charge of the Azure Sky Kingdoms army was making the final preparation beforeunching an attack.


    "Is everything ready?" Walking among the people hiding just outside the range of the Nascent Soul Experts from the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms divine sense, themander looked at the person in charge of dealing with the Nascent Soul Realm Expert at this ce as he asked.


    "Yes! After we deal with the Nascent Soul Realm Expert, we will retreat and let the Azure Sky Kingdom handle the rest!" The person in charge was not dressed up in the normal uniforms of the Azure Sky Kingdom but instead had a unique symbol of a bear head embroidered onto his robe, showing that he was a member of one of the Azure Sky Kingdoms sects.


    "Of course, as long as you kill or heavily injure the Nascent Soul Expert from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, your big bear sect can retreat." Themander nodded his head in agreement as he soon made his way over to a few other locations where a simr scene happened.


    This was the only way that themander could get the different sects to agree to act as the frontline in theing battle! Without having a clear target and a chance to retreat after dealing with it, the sects would simply not agree to join in and even threatened him with leaving the border all together. After all, who would willingly jump into a fire without a way out¡­


    Even if the Azure Sky Kingdom were strong, it would definitely be weakened for a period of time if all the sects decided to leave all of a sudden.


    "Commander, are you sure this will work?" A young soldier came over the moment themander made his way back into his tent to go over the final orders before the uing battle.


    "Yes! As long as those sects hold off the Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, we will be able to focus all our attention on one front and go straight for theirmander and other higher-ups!" Picking up a letter that he had written, themander handed it over to the young soldier as he answered his question.


    "Get someone to hand this over to the messenger that came here and tell him to deliver the letter to his majesty."


    "Yes Uncle- I meanmander!" Slipping up a bit when he addressed themander, the young soldier quickly corrected himself before darting out of the room in the direction where the field kitchen was located.


    "Hah, that brat¡­" Shaking his head as he thought about the past, themander quickly regained his former serious expression as he called for a few soldiers standing guard outside toe and deliver thest few orders before the assault on the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms defences.


    ¡­


    "Themander wants us to deliver this to his majesty? Is there anything else?" The messenger asked the young soldier in front of him as he felt a bit annoyed at the current situation.


    They were supposed to leave the army camp a long time ago and make their way back to the Capital, but they had gotten dyed again and again due to themander telling them to wait until he finished formting a response for his majesty.


    Other than that, themander also wanted them to go back towards the capital together with arge group of soldiers that had been injured to the point of not being able to participate in the conflict and a small group of medical staff.


    For some reason he wanted them to leave a few hours after the sun rose and walk on the most dangerous but also fastest path back towards the capital where the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had several people observing constantly.


    The messenger had no clue what themander was nning, but he clearly knew that he and his subordinates were being used as bait or a distraction by themander.


    "Leader¡­ Do you think we will be fine¡­? Themander won''t just sacrifice the injured soldiers. Right?" One of his subordinates walked up to the messenger and asked in a tense voice, clearly having seen through the n of themander.


    Looking over the rest of his subordinates, the messenger saw all of them were tensed up as they had started moving to group up with the injured soldiers and the medical staff making their way back towards the capital together with them.


    "No need to worry, I''m sure themander knowns what he is doing!" Putting on a brave front, the messenger''s words managed to somewhat calm down his subordinates as they reached the location where the injured soldiers and medical staff were preparing for departure.


    Time passed by quickly and soon the group of injured soldiers and medical staff departed from the army camp? together with the messenger and his small group of subordinates.


    At the same time that they left the army camp, several spies from the Azure Sky Kingdom''s side started spreading the news about the departure of the Azure Sky Kingdoms main army, saying that only the normal border guard would be left at the Azure Sky Kingdoms side.


    This caused most of the soldiers on the side of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to rx as they could see arge group of people openly leaving the army camp of the Azure Sky Kingdom before moving in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s capital.


    A few of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts still keeping a constant eye on the Azure Sky Kingdoms side also lowered their vignce when they saw therge group of people leaving from the army camp.


    This was the opportunity that themander was looking for as he waited for a few hours before making sure that the Nascent Soul Realm Experts on the side of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had rxed and stopped paying as much attention as before.


    At this point, they were most likely waiting for the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms order to retreat from the border.


    Picking up hismunication talisman, themander ordered for the sects that had hidden their experts close to the order to make the first move on the few Nascent Soul Realm Experts still standing guard on the frontline.

 Chapter 153: Mysterious person from the Azure Sky Kingdom~

    <h4>Chapter 153: Mysterious person from the Azure Sky Kingdom~</h4>


    Wang Hu and Wang Lan were both going about doing their own things when the Azure Sky Kingdomunched a swift attack breaking through one of the main fronts and directly attacked themander of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s border defence.


    The budget Nascent Soul Realm Experts sent over by both the Seven Fates Sects and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom happened to be present at the scene when themander was attack and tried their best to help out but were swiftly dealt with as they escaped. Leaving behind themander and two other Nascent Soul Realm Experts there to defend against more than five Nascent Soul Realm Experts alone from the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    The other parts of the border were not doing so well either as the Azure Sky Kingdom hadunched an attack on all the Nascent Soul Realm Experts ced around the frontline.


    "Should we help out on the frontline or go help themander?" Wang Lan looked over to his brother, clearly not knowing what to do in the current situation. He had never expected for the Azure Sky Kingdom tounch such arge-scale attack, especially not when rumours about the gue spreading through their territory had started to appear recently.


    "Hm¡­ Both situations would be dangerous, but I highly doubt going to help themander would be as dangerous as going to the frontline and risk being attack from behind by the people from the Azure Sky Kingdoms side that made it through the border defence¡­


    Helping themander is the best idea, we would also have an easier time retreating if things really called for it. Going to the frontline would just end up making retreating harder and themander would most likely appreciate it more if we went to help him! At least the Heavenly Sky Kingdom won''t say we ran away without fighting¡­ Not that it would matter if the Azure Sky Kingdom ended up winning." Shaking his head at thest bit, Wang Hu felt that the current situation was slowly growing more and more chaotic.


    Coming to an agreement, both Wang Hu and Wang Lan decided to help themander, they already had the Sect Master''s order to retreat in case things grew too dangerous.


    The Flying Sword Sect would not gain anything from the fight no matter who won. The only reason why they sent over people in the first case, was because the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was too strong for the current Flying Sword Sect to resist, they had to at least put up a front and sent some of their people over to help them.


    But there was no way Feng Chen, as the Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect, would allow 2 Nascent Soul Realm Experts to die for that¡­ The Flying Sword Sect was already short on experts, why risk having both of them perish at the hands of The Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s enemy?


    ¡­


    At the same time Wang Hu and Wang Lan had decided to make their way over to help themander, the people sent over by both the Raging me Sect and Spring Flower Sect came to the same decision as all three groups of Nascent Soul Realm Experts made their way over towards the ce that themander of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was located at.


    This had left only the few Nascent Soul Realm Experts on the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms side and the experts from the Seven Fates Sect, to defend against the offensiveunched by the different sect on the Azure Sky Kingdoms side.


    The battle did not look any better when it came to the ordinary part of the army that was below the Nascent Soul Realm, many of them were not even prepared to fight back and this had resulted in arge part of the army getting caught off guard and dying in the process before they even manged to mount a defence against the attackers.


    "Get to the rest of the army and ask them to retreat to the mountain pass south of here!" As the battle was reaching an all-time high across the border, the middle-agedmander from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom did not even have time to use hismunication talisman as he ordered one of his two subordinates to call the order for retreat in his ce.


    "But we will lose arge part of th-"


    "Just do it!" Hearing the hesitating voice of his subordinate, themander frowned as he yelled back at him before returning his attention back to the people from the Azure Sky Kingdoms side.


    Swish~


    The sound of a de cutting through the air could be heard as themander mobilized his cultivation base to the maximum and executed a movement technique, momentarily increasing his speed enough to barely dodge the attack.


    "This guy is really troublesome¡­ Why did, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would allow someone at the sixth stage toe to the border¡­" The person whounched the earlier sneak attack let out a fearful exmation as he looked at the middle-aged man staring coldly in his direction.


    "Hah¡­ I don''t think they expected for us to attack¡­ This guy is most likely some member of the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms royal family looking for an easy opportunity to earn a bit of merit for staying at the border and defend against the Azure Sky Kingdom or something along that line¡­ Let me deal with him, you four can deal with those two randoms besides him." Rolling his eyes upon hearing the fearful tone of the person in front of him, one of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts on the Azure Sky Kingdoms side walked forward.


    The man looked to be no more than his early thirties orte twenties dressed in a light blue robe with a snowke symbol on the side of it. The moment he appeared, themander on the side of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom felt a huge pressure descend upon him as he narrowed his eyes and prepared for whatever the young man from the Azure Sky Kingdoms side would do.


    "No need to bother with the serious look, you are not my opponent..." Confidently walking forward, the young man waved his hands as they lit up with a blue light, causing several small runic symbols to manifest in the air in front of him.


    Woosh~


    The runic symbols formed together into aplicated array within only a few seconds as they soon let off a gentle blue light, causing arge amount ice to gather together in the form of a giant spear in front of the young man.


    "Well, time to end this!" Saying this, the young man drew one final symbol in the form of a small snowke that quickly flew out and merged together with the giant ice spear in front of him, causing it to shine brightly before moving in the direction of themander from the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms side.

 Chapter 154: Wang Hu and Wang Lan Arrives!

    <h4>Chapter 154: Wang Hu and Wang Lan Arrives!</h4>


    Themander from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had not expected for things to actually escte to the point that it had and even prepared to leave the border and return back to the capital.


    But seeing the giant spear made of ice moving towards him, he could not help but feel a little hopeless.


    Why did the Azure Sky Kingdom want to continue their attack on them? Were they not afraid that some of their neighbours might take advantage of the situation and attack them when they found out that the Azure Sky Kingdom had moved arge part of their experts to attack the Heavenly Sky Kingdom?


    Themander did not understand this, but he knew that if he did not defend against the giant ice spear in front of him, he would end up being heavily injured or maybe even lose his physical body all together¡­ Severing his future path in cultivation!


    So, as the giant spear made of ice moved towards him, themander executed his movement technique once again in an attempt to dodge the iing attackunched towards him by the man dressed in a light blue robe.


    The man saw the move by themander but paid it no mind as the giant ice spear that was moving in the direction of the ce that themander had been a moment ago, changed direction mid-air, following after themander when he moved to the side in an attempt to dodge the giant ice spear.


    "Wha-!" Themander could not help but let out a slight exmation of surprise as he saw the giant ice spear following after him and appearing directly in front of him.


    Whoosh~


    Circting his cultivation base to the maximum, his qi gathered together at the centre of his dantian before erupting outwards like a raging current that soon took the shape of a giant wall adorned with the crest of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s royal family in front of themander.


    What followed was the sight of a giant spear made of ice directly crashing into the giant wall hastily constructed by themander in an attempt to block the giant ice spear.


    The sh did not end here as the giant ice spear continued to drill its way into the giant wall made by themander, giving him no choice but to supply his qi in an attempt to prevent the wall holding back the ice spear from breaking.


    "Hmph!" Seeing that the situation did not go as nned, the man dressed in a light blue robe frowned and drew a few more runic symbols in the air that flew forward andnded on the ice spear, causing the ice spear to strengthen even further.


    Psh!


    Spitting out a mouthful of blood upon feeling the sudden increased qi consumption from the wall between him and the ice spear, themander felt that his chances of getting out alive from his current situation was getting slimer and slimer with each passing moment.


    At the same time, he also felt the amount of qi avable to him decreased faster and faster with each passing moment that the ice spear attacked the wall in front of him.


    The only thing he could do was hope that his opponent would run out of qi or give up the attack, but this seemed like nothing more than a dream when he turned and looked at the light blue robbed man looking more annoyed than exhausted at the current situation.


    ¡­


    "That''s themander over there! But he is currently fighting against someone, looks like the ones sent over by the Azure Sky Kingdom are already decided to attack¡­" Wang Lan fearfully looked over as he observed themander spit out blood while trying his best to defend against a giant spear made of ice.


    Even observing from the battle from afar, the terrifying might of the giant ice spear and wall shing against each other caused the earth to tremble and crack as anything standing within a few hundred meters had already copsed from the shockwave the giant ice spear and wall generated when they first shed with each other.


    A little farther away from the main battle where themander and the light blue robed man shed with each other, the two men dressed like soldiers that normally followed themander were desperately trying their best to hold on as four Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Azure Sky Kingdom tried their best to kill them as quickly as possible.


    "I think we should go and help those two, themander''s enemy is at least at the sixth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and getting involved in their fight will not be a good idea before we deal with the other experts from the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­" Observing the two battles happening in front of him, Wang Hu clearly knew that the enemy of themander was not someone they could deal with.


    Helping out the other Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom before grouping up together with them to help themander, was by far a better n n he coulde up with.


    Having said that, themander still had to hold on for long enough for them to finish dealing with the four Nascent Soul Realm Experts on the side of the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­


    "Hah¡­ There is nothing more we can do, if themander can''t hold on, we will escape immediately!" Shaking his head, a bit when he looked over at themander defending against the giant ice spear slowly weakening the defensive set up by him, Wang Hu informed his brother before both of them moved over in the direction of the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms side and the four from the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Swish~


    Upon arriving at the scene, Wang Hu and Wang Lan worked quickly andunched two swift attacks towards one of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Azure Sky Kingdoms side that was standing on the side observing the situation, preparing for a chance to move in andunch a deadly attack on one of the two Experts from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "Wha-" Letting out a panicked voice as he saw Wang Hu and Wang Lan suddenly appearing before both sent an attack in his direction


    ng~


    The Expert from the Azure Sky Kingdom barely managed to block the first attack before the second arrived in front of him.


    The second attack came from apletely different directionpared to the first and he didn''t have enough time to defend against it!


    "Argh!" Letting out a shriek of pain as the attack hit him, the Expert from the Azure Sky Kingdoms side frantically retreated in the direction of his allies, who by now abandoned their earlier fight with the two soldiers toe help their friend.


    Wang Lan and Wang Hu did not take this opportunity to keep attacking the now injured Expert from the Azure Sky Kingdoms side.


    Instead, they quickly retreated as arge fist made of ice formed in the air and smashed down at the location, they were standing a moment ago.


    Boom!


    The giant ice fist hit the ground causing it to shatter into pieces before showering the surroundings, piercing through anything within a hundred-meter distance.


    Wang Lan and Wang Hu barely manged to react in time and make it out of the area that the shattered ice pieces could reach, but the Expert that they injured was not so lucky as a few of ice pieces from the ice fist directly pierced into him, causing his condition to grow even worse¡­

 Chapter 155: Fifth and Seventh Flower Appear!

    <h4>Chapter 155: Fifth and Seventh Flower Appear!</h4>


    "He can still attack us while dealing with themander¡­?" Feeling a bit fearful while looking at the ce where the giant ice hand had smashed into the ground, Wang Lan looked in the direction of the light blue robbed man stuck in a stalemate with themander looking over in their direction while drawing several different runic symbols in the air to further strengthen the ice spear.


    "Looks like themander won''t be able to hold on for much longer¡­" Wang Hu looked in the direction of the light blue robed man like his brother and saw themander spit out a mouthful of blood as the wall protecting him from the ice spear started cracking apart under the increased pressure of the ice spear.


    It seemed like the man from the Azure Sky Kingdoms side did not want the battle between him and themander to drag out any longer upon seeing Wang Lan and Wang Hu appearing.


    Wang Lan and Wang Hu knew that they had to do their best, at helping themander, but the four-remaining people from the Azure Sky Kingdom had seen the situation as well and had already moved to block them from helping themander.


    The two soldiers from themanders side also saw the current situation and both of them moved over to where Wang Hu and Wang Lan were standing.


    "Can both of you try to create and opening for us to go and help themander¡­?" One of the two asked desperately as he kept looking in the direction of themander anxiously. Clearly wanting to help themander out of his current situation.


    "Sure, but we might not be able to hold all four of them back for long¡­" Wang Hu answered before his brother Wang Lan managed to say anything.


    "Great! We will move whenever you are ready!" Thanking Wang Hu with a smile of gratitude on his face, the soldier began discussing something with the other soldier as both of them prepared for what would most likely end up bing a suicide mission for them.


    After all, the light blue robed man was not defenceless as he dealt with themander, as could be seen from earlier¡­


    What the two were hoping for was most likely just an opportunity for themander to break free of the current stalemate and escape.


    As for what would happen to them¡­ They clearly knew their chances of retreating was close to nothing.


    Wang Hu wondered a bit how themander managed to get such devoted people under him, it had to be known that both of them were Nascent Soul Realm Experts! No matter where they went, they would still have some status to their name. No kingdom would say no to a few extra Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    Even in Empires like the Sky Empire where there was plenty of Nascent Soul Realm Experts, they would still have a certain amount of status due to their cultivation realm.


    "How are we going to hold those four back and allow them to go and help theirmander¡­?" Wang Lan did not really understand how they would hold the four experts from the Azure Sky Kingdom back and allow the two soldiers to go help theirmander.


    Defending against them was one thing, holding them back and preventing them from moving over to stop the two soldiers from helping themander was an entirely different thing.


    "The two people send over by the Spring Flower Sect has just arrived. With their help, we should be able to hold those four back and allow the two soldiers to go help theirmander¡­" Just as he finished saying this, the aura of two new Nascent Soul Realm Experts appeared in the distances as two beautiful women dressed in the standard robe of the Spring Flower Sect made their way over to where Wang Hu and Wang Lan was standing together with the two soldiers.


    They were the Seventh Flower and Fifth Flower from the Spring Flower Sect, both of them part of the Nine Flowers of the Spring Flower Sect. The Nine Flowers were just the name that the Spring Flower Sect used for what the Flying Sword Sect called Core Elders, meaning each of the Nine Flowers were at the Nascent Soul Realm, with the First Flower being the strongest, while the Ninth Flower was the weakest.


    The First Flower among the Nine Flowers, could also be considered to be the Vice Sect Master of the Spring Flower Sect.


    "It seems like themander is in quite a desperate situation¡­ Is there any n how to help him?" The Seventh Flower stepped forward and asked as the Fifth Flower remained quiet behind her, observing the two Wang brothers deeply.


    "Yes, the two soldiers here want me and my brother to hold back the four from the Azure Sky Kingdoms side as they go help themander, I hope that both of you would be willing to lend us a hand in this¡­ It would be way easier for us, and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom will notin that we did not assist enoughter on¡­" Hinting a bit at the fact that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom might me them for the loss of themander in the future, Wang Hu waited patiently to see if they would agree to help them.


    "Sounds like a great n, we will hold off two of them and you two can deal with the other two¡­ One for each of us!" Thinking about it for a while, the Seventh Flower of the Spring Flower Sect agreed as the two soldiers listening in from the side happily praised her upon hearing her agree to help.


    "Great! Let''s move immediately then!" Saying this Wang Hu and Wang Lan each attacked one of the four Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Azure Sky Kingdom, closely followed behind by the Seventh and Fifth Flower of the Spring Flower Sect.


    Soon the four fell into a disadvantages position under the pressure of the four of them, mostly due to the fact that one of them had already been heavily injured.


    "Now!" The two soldiers saw that Wang Hu and Wang Lan along with the Fifth and Seventh Flower winning as they pushed the four Experts from the Azure Sky Kingdom away from blocking the way to the main battle of themander and light blue robed man.


    Seeing this, they did not hesitate in the slightest and took the opportunity to move past them in the direction of themander.

 Chapter 156: Nascent Soul! Attack!

    <h4>Chapter 156: Nascent Soul! Attack!</h4>


    Themander saw both of theming towards him and wanted to shout for them to leave, but the light blue robed man acted faster and a few dozen sharp icicle manifested besides him before flying over in the direction of the two soldiers that were moving in the direction of themander.


    The two soldiers were not surprised in the slightest, as they had already expected for the light blue robed man to attack them the moment they got close enough.


    So, one of them stepped forward and conjured a barrier to block the iing icicles, while the other continued moving over in the direction of themander.


    Crash~


    The icicles crashed into the barrier and within only a few seconds manged to pierce through and hit the soldier who by now was barely breathing as his physical body died causing his Nascent Soul to fly out.


    In such a situation, a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator would normally choose to escape, as even a small injury on the Nascent Soul would be almost impossible to recover.


    It did not help that the Nascent Soul itself had no form of defence that the physical body had, even a mortal would be able to destroy the Nascent Soul of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert without much difficulty.


    Of course, something like that would only be possible if the Nascent Soul Expert allowed for the person in question to freely attack without doing anything, but it still demonstrated how fragile the Nascent Soul was.


    The soldier however did not escape when he his Nascent Soul exited his now dead physical body, instead he floated gently in the air for a moment before flying over in the direction of the light blue robed man, while gathering all his remaining qi together, ready tounch a final attack upon getting close enough.


    Sadly, something like self-destructing in a glorious explosion was not a something one could do without ample preparation. Though there were rumours that Experts in the Domain Lord Realm could self-destruct without any prior preparations!


    Because of this, even though the soldier wanted to self-destruct and die together with the light blue robed man from the Azure Sky Kingdom, all he could do was try to get close enough andunch a deadly attack using all the qi stored in his Nascent Soul before perishing.


    "What the-" The light blue robed man also saw the Nascent Soul crazily flying over in his direction and immediately turned his attention away from the ice spear bearing down on themander. Allowing for the second soldier, who just arrived besides themander, to help stabilize the wall blocking the ice spear for a moment.


    Cough*


    Themander used this opportunity to stand up, but quickly fell down to the ground as he started coughing violently.


    "Commander!" The soldier standing beside him reacted quickly and went to support themander.


    "We need to get out of here immediately or his sacrifice will be for nothing¡­" Looking over in the direction of the Nascent Soul that was just about to reach the light blue robed man, themander shook his head as he steeled himself and reminded the soldier that they only had a limited amount of time before the light blue robed man recovered and focused his attention back on them.


    At that point, all three of them would not make it out alive, making the soldiers sacrificepletely irrelevant.


    "Y-yesmander!" Feeling a bit shaken upon hearing what themander said, the soldier looked over in the direction of his friend onest time before carrying themander in the direction of the mountain pass in the south that the army should have begun retreating towards.


    The mountain pass was one of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s fortified locations and was way better defendedpared to the border region where no arrays or any other form of permanent defensive structure was present.


    A little distance away where the two Wang brothers were holding off one person from the Azure Sky Kingdom each, they both saw the Nascent Soul from one of the soldiers flying over in the direction of the light blue robed man.


    "Looks like it is time for us to retreat¡­" Muttering this to himself, Wang Hu looked over and saw the other soldier carrying themander away in the direction of the South Mountain Pass that the army was ordered to retreat to.


    "Indeed, we should leave immediately, themander has already made it quite far and these four should not be able to catch him even if we leave." Hearing what his brother muttered to himself; Wang Lan agreed as he quickly contacted the two flowers from the Spring Flower Sect.


    Swish~


    The Seventh and Fifth Flower both agreed with the idea of retreating as the Fifth Flower threw out a few talismans that turned into arge ocean of flowers that momentarily limited the divine sense of the four Nascent Soul Realm Experts on the side of the Azure Sky Kingdom to a few dozen meters.


    Wang Hu and Wang Lan both took this opportunity and quickly retreated together with the Seventh and Fifth Flower.


    ¡­


    At the same time that Wang Hu, Wang Lan, Seventh and Fifth Flower retreated, the soldier that was only a Nascent Soul arrived a few dozen meters away from the light blue robed man filled with killing intent.


    "Hmph, you think you will be able to kill me?" Sneering disdainfully at the Nascent Soul flying towards him, the light blue robed man had already started deploying his defensive measures as heunch a few attacks towards the Nascent Soul of the soldier, who easily dodged them.


    The strong point of a Nascent Soul was that it fast and could fly, even with how fragile it was, hitting it was not something easy for cultivators who did not have an instantaneousrge area attack to kill it.


    The light blue robed man was in this category and while he did have manyrge scale awesome looking ice attacks, he did not have anything to deal with the nimble Nascent Soul flying towards him.


    The Nascent Soul of the soldier easily made it within 5 meters of the light blue robed man but was then blocked by a freezing wall of ice that did not allow for him to continue any closer.


    "Die!" Screaming as loudly as he could, the Nascent Soul of the soldier gathered all the qi left in his Nascent Soul before using the strongest technique avable to attack the light blue robed man.


    BOOM!


    Arge explosion instantly swept through the surroundings as the attackunched by the Nascent Soul of the soldier hit the light blue robed mans ice barrier and other defensive measures.

 Chapter 157: Heavenly Sky Kingdom Retreats!

    <h4>Chapter 157: Heavenly Sky Kingdom Retreats!</h4>


    BOOM!


    As the explosive attack hit the defences put up by the light blue robed man from the Azure Sky Kingdoms side, the Nascent Soul of the soldier quickly dissipated into the air as all the qi left to keep his Nascent Soul functioning outside a physical body was used up in the attack.


    This however did not stop the attack that was alreadyunched as the attack kept ravaging through the defences of the light blue robed man.


    Even if he were far above the realm of the soldier, an all-out attack from someone who even used the qi that kept their Nascent Soul alive after the loss of the physical body, was something that could be deadly for him if he showed even the slightest carelessness in how he dealt with the attack.


    Swoosh~


    Arge gust of cold wind appeared out of nowhere as the light blue robed man waved his hand to manifest a new barrier around himself, by now he had focused all his attention on the attack used by the soldier who had died to deliver this attack.


    "Hmph!" Feeling the attack weaken, the light blue robed man found a weak point in the attack and moved one of his hands over as a runic symbol formed in the air before flying over to the weak spot in the attack. Following this, the runic symbol suddenly began to rapidly expand.


    The sudden expansion of the runic symbol thrown out by the light blue robed man caused the violent suicide attack of the soldier to weaken at a speed visible to the naked eye and before long the light blue robed man forcefully broke apart the attack.


    "Where did they go¡­ You lot failed to hold them in ce for even a few seconds?" Trying had to contain his anger upon thinking about how themander from the enemy side and all the Nascent Soul Realm Experts had gotten away, the light blue robed man ignored the devastated surroundings and focused his attention on the four shivering figures looking over at him from the side.


    This was the four Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Azure Sky Kingdom, but their current appearance was nothing like what it had been before when they were fighting with the Wang brothers and two flowers from the Spring Flower Sect.


    Instead, they all looked extremely fearful when looking at the light blue robed man ncing over at them.


    "Did you lot not here me?!" repeating himself upon seeing no reaction from the four, the light blue robed man frowned as he walked over.


    "W-we did not expect for them to have so many Nascent Soul Realm Experts at themander''s side¡­ They left in the direction of the South Mountain pass¡­" Stepping forward, one of the four Nascent Soul Experts informed the light blue robed man before quickly retreating.


    "Hmph, indeed¡­ It is quite weird for there to be so many Nascent Soul Experts here, did they perhaps give up on their frontline?" Thinking this, the light blue robed man felt a little better.


    At the very least he had an excuse as to why he couldn''t kill themander outside of the fact that themander was at the sixth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, way stronger than being at the third or fourth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm that they had expected for him to be.


    "We will go back and see if themander wants us to help the frontline or anything now that we are free." Referring to themander of the Azure Sky Kingdom, the light blue robed man looked a bit reluctantly in the direction that the army camp of the Azure Sky Kingdom was located before he made his way back in that same direction.


    The four Nascent Soul Realm Experts felt like they had just escaped from a life-threatening situation as they obediently followed after the light blue robed man back to the army camp.


    ¡­


    As the Azure Sky Kingdomunched an attack on the unprepared Heavenly Sky Kingdom, arge part of the army stationed at the border ended up injured or dying during the first few minutes before they finally managed to stabilize the situation.


    But this did notst for long as arge part of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts on the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms side on the frontline was ambushed and outnumbered by the Azure Sky Kingdom and before long, the first Nascent Soul Realm Expert on the side of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom fell inbat.


    This caused a wave of panic to spread through the soldiers of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom as many of them knew that the Nascent Soul Realm Expert would have free reign to attack them without someone to stop them.


    "Themander has ordered a full retreat to the South Mountain Pass!" Just as the soldiers were about to start running away, the order to retreat came like a heaven-sent message, causing the soldiers from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to almost shed tears of joy at the fact that they would not be forced to face a Nascent Soul Realm Expert without one of their own.


    The Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms side and the people from the Seven Fates Sect also got the order to retreat and immediately followed the rest of the army as they began retreating in the direction of the South Mountain Pass.


    The Seven Fates Sects Experts did not even bother staying with the rest of the army that was retreating and instead just directly made their way towards the South Mountain Pass. Ignoring the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms army.


    The Azure Sky Kingdom''s army did not le go of this opportunity as they followed the retreating army of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Not forgetting to attack whenever they saw the opportunity to do so.


    This however did not continue for long as the Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the sects of the Azure Sky Kingdom had already retreated along with their people the moment their opponent decided to run away


    The army of the Azure Sky Kingdom also stopped their pursuit of the fleeing Heavenly Sky Kingdom army after chasing them for a few hours. When they returned back to the army camp, most of them were full of happiness at their easy victory. Not forgetting to praise themander for his brilliant idea tounch such a decisive attack on the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms border.

 Chapter 158: Ascendant Frost Hall

    <h4>Chapter 158: Ascendant Frost Hall</h4>


    "Themander escaped?!" As the soldiers from the Azure Sky Kingdom were happily talking to each other about their recent victory over the Heavenly Sky Kingdom under theirmander''s brilliant attack idea, themander in question was starring furiously at the light blue robed man in front of him.


    "What can I say? I didn''t expect for there to be 6 Nascent Soul Realm to support him, let''s not forget the fact that he is also someone at the sixth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm! You merely told me he was at the third maybe fourth stage!" Not backing down in the slightest under the angry gaze of themander, the light blue robed man answered back as he shrugged his shoulders provocatively in response to themander.


    "Hmph, let''s not talk about this anymore! We still need to find a way deal with the South Mountain Pass to truly enter the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ At least most of their Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the frontline were injured and would at least need a few years to recover from the injuries they received in the initial attack¡­" Changing the subject, themander focused back on their current objective, defeating the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    For that to happen, he would need to deal with the South Mountain Pass standing between the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the Azure Sky Kingdom!


    "Why don''t we just go around¡­?" Not really knowing why themander was so into attacking a fortified location like the South Mountain Pass, the light blue robed man could not help himself from asking out of curiosity.


    "Hah¡­ I would if it were possible for us, but there is the Burning Mountain Range on one side and another kingdom on the other side. Either would be a bad idea to go through, with the other kingdom possibly thinking we are trying to drag them into the war or attack them, while walking through the Burning Mountain Range with an army would be the same as offering our army as free food for those demon beasts¡­" Shaking his head as he answered the light blue robed man''s question, themander felt the difficulty of breaking through the South Mountain Pass would bring him.


    At the very least they had taken a control over arge part of the south area of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. After all, more than half the of the south was located outside the South Mountain Pass.


    "For now, we will stabilize the new territory and prepare for an assault on the South Mountain Pass. You can just go back for now; I will make sure to contact you before we begin the assault on the South Mountain Pass." Waving for the light blue robed man to leave, themander sat down and began looking through the different reportsing in from the scouts as they explored the newnd that they had manged to gain.


    "I will take my leave then¡­" Not wanting to stay at the army camp any longer in the first ce, the light blue robed man rolled his eyes a bit when he heard themanding tone that themander used before leaving the room.


    ¡­


    "Elder, what did themander say? Can we go back to the sect?" The moment the light blue robed man left the hastily builtmand centre for the Azure Sky Kingdom''smander, a middle-aged man dressed in a simr light blue robe came over and asked in a hopeful voice.


    "We will return to the sect for now, it looks like the Azure Sky Kingdom does not need our help anymore in the short term¡­" Turning around, the light blue robed man made his way over in the direction of a small, isted area of the army camp where the different sects were located.


    The middle-aged man who heard the confirmation that they would leave and return to the sect happily followed behind him as both of them soon approached a small group of people dressed in simr robes as them.


    "Elder White! How did it go? Did you manage to kill themander from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom?" Walking up to the newly arriving Elder White, a young woman in her mid-twenties walked up and asked.


    "No¡­ I did not, the guy had the support of more Nascent Soul Realm Experts than expected and he had also reached the sixth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ But themander said that we could return to the sect and would only have to send support when they decide to attack the South Mountain Pass." Shaking his head, Elder White quickly reassured the rest of the members that they would still be able to return to the sect.


    Their sect had honestly had quite a hard timetely with their Sect Master suddenly disappearing a few months ago, leaving only Elder White and a few other at the Nascent Soul Realm to guard the sect.


    Normally, their sect would have been fine refusing the Azure Sky Kingdoms request for help, but it just so happened that the Sect Master who made that possible had disappeared and with no choice left other than helping the Azure Sky Kingdom or possibly having their sect destroyed, Elder White decided to lend the Azure Sky Kingdom a hand in their war.


    Their sect, the Ascendant Frost Hall, was famous for both being strong in everything rted to ice, be it obscure materials or certain artifacts.


    The Ascendant Frost Hall enjoyed a rtively neutral status in the Azure Sky Kingdom due to the fact that their Sect Master was at the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm and had managed to keep the Azure Sky Kingdom at bay as only the current ruler would have the ability to deal with him.


    Other than that, the Ascendant Frost Hall was located at the far north of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s territory that was difficult to reach and bordered an area controlled by a powerful demonic sect.


    The Azure Sky Kingdom viewed the Ascendant Frost Hall as a barrier of sorts against the demonic sect, with them around, they would not have to deal with it.


    But this was only true if the Ascendant Frost Hall still had a powerful Expert like their Sect Master among them to serve as intimidation for the demonic sect¡­ Without him, the Ascendant Frost Hall would fall with time and the Azure Sky Kingdom would have to deal with the demonic sect.


    Even if they did not want to see this happen, they still had to find a way to deal with it when the time came and taking control of the north area''s resources and the Ascendant Frost Hall along with it, could be considered a given as they would already have an idea on how to deal with the demonic sect and with the Azure Sky Kingdom backing them up, they would be able to serve as a shield for the Azure Sky Kingdom to defend against the demonic sect in the north!


    The Ascendant Frost Hall on the other hand, did not really like the idea of ending up as a shield of the Azure Sky Kingdom while at the same time having all the resources in their territory taken away from them.

 Chapter 159: Raging Flame Sects Scheme to Avoid Conflict~

    <h4>Chapter 159: Raging me Sect''s Scheme to Avoid Conflict~</h4>


    As the Azure Sky Kingdom were busy absorbing what was equivalent to 10% of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s territory, the retreating army of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom arrived at the South Mountain Pass filled with both humiliation at their swift defeat and fear towards what the future would bring now that the Azure Sky Kingdom did not seem to have any ns at stopping their conquest of the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms territory.


    By this point in time, Wang Hu and Wang Lan had already arrived at the south mountain pass and were both sitting inside a room overlooking therge number of people walking by below them as they made their way through a huge gate in the centre of the giant wall that attached itself to a mountain on each side of the South Mountain Pass.


    The height of the wall alone made it impossible for anyone below the Core Formation Realm to scale it and that was without considering the many offensives and defensive formations ced onto the surface of the wall over the many years that it had existed.


    There were even some rumours that the South Mountain Pass Wall was constructed in the past even before the Heavenly Sky Kingdom came to be.


    In the past it had seen its fair share of war as it never fell, even when the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms territory was smaller, it had been used as a springboard for the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s army to take more territory and expand the borders.


    The territory that they had gained through years of war was the territory that was currently bordering the Azure Sky Kingdom. The territory that they had just recently lost within only a single battle¡­


    At the very least, it was an area considered barren and without any too precious resources... But in the end, it was still 10% of the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms territory? and while barren, at least 5% of their poption was located there.


    "Hehe, I wonder how those people from the Raging me Sect are doing recently¡­" Looking over in the direction of the Mountain Range that stretched far into the distance and over in the direction of the Burning Mountain Range, Wang Lan could not help but chuckle a bit as he thought about the trouble the Raging me Sect were currently going through.


    "Haha, indeed! They are probably the ones hurt most by this turn of events!" Laughing a bit upon hearing what his brother said, Wang Hu felt like finding the elder from the Raging me Sect and asking him how his sect were going to find new disciples now that half the area they used before had disappeared all of a sudden.


    Other than that, Wang Hu also knew that the Raging me Sects had a spirit stone mine in that territory and while not of that good quality or size, it still represented a significant loss to the Raging me Sect.


    ¡­


    The Raging me Sect was located deep inside the same mountain range that the South Mountain Pass was located.


    At this point, inside arge pce located on top of the highest mountain inside the Raging me Sect''s core area, a group of people had gathered together to discuss their next n of action after? the recent move by the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "How are we going to deal with the shortage of new disciples in the future? And that is not even talking about the loss of lower quality materials that we will face. We even lost one of our spirit stones mines!" Angrily mming his hand down on the table that the people had gathered to sit around, one of the people could not contain his anger as he said this.


    "The Heavenly Sky Kingdom is really going too far; they are clearly trying to use the Azure Sky Kingdom to weaken us by not sending any of their strong Nascent Soul Realm Experts over to hold the front!" Another person angrily eximed in support of the first one as the others followed behind and beganining about the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "Hm¡­ Maybe the situation isn''t that bad for us¡­" As the rest of the higher-ups from the Raging me Sect wereining about the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, one of them did not share the mindless hate as he muttered a bit to himself while thinking about the current situation.


    "What do you mean Vice Sect Master!? How can this not be bad? Without the Sect Master to help back us up, we might end up as a shield for the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Don''t forget that other than the South Mountain Pass, there is another way into the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms territory and that is through our sect! Even if it is not widely known, I''m sure the Heavenly Sky Kingdom ''leaked'' this information to the Azure Sky Kingdom!" Saying this, the elder felt his hatred towards the Heavenly Sky Kingdom reach its peak as he foresaw the army of the Azure Sky Kingdoming to knock on their doorstep anytime now.


    "What if we let them through without fighting¡­?" An eerie silence fell upon the group of people inside therge pce as they all looked at the Vice Sect Master full of doubt.


    "But¡­ If we do that, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would definitely retaliate and try to deal with us as quickly as possible¡­ The Sect Master is the only one who might be able to resist for a moment, but without him, we won''t be able to resist against the true experts from the royal family. At that point, the Azure Sky Kingdom would be the only one to benefit¡­" Shaking his head as he thought about it, one of the elders felt it was unrealistic, especially now that their Sect Master was not present.


    "I don''t mean that we just let them walk through normally, but what if a majority of us ends up injured and incapable of fighting during an ident in the Burning Mountain Range, the sect master disappearing during the terrible incident.


    With no people left to fight against the Azure Sky Kingdom, we can only reluctantly let them pass through our sect¡­ Even if the Heavenly Sky Kingdom checks up on it, the Sect Master missing is true and faking a few injuries should not be too difficult¡­" Finishing his exnation, the Vice Sect Master slyly pulled out a few pills with a weird skull marking on them.


    "This is¡­!" The other elders looked at each other in surprise as they understood what the Vice Sect Master wanted to do.


    It was risky and the Azure Sky Kingdom might want to try and take advantage of the situation to attack them.


    Themander seemed to be quite smart and if he could just ignore them and focus on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, all would be fine and both parties would not have to end up losing people in a meaningless fight.


    For the Azure Sky Kingdom, defeating the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was their main goal, destroying the sects did not really matter that much as they could be absorbed into the Azure Sky Kingdom after they took over the territory of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    At that point, the Azure Sky Kingdom would harm their future benefit if they attacked a sect that seemed more than willing to assist them in this.

 Chapter 160: Stalemate...

    <h4>Chapter 160: Stalemate...</h4>


    As the Azure Sky Kingdom was absorbing their newly conquered territory and sorting all the former citizen of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, The Flying Sword Sect along with the rest of the big sects in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom finally got the news of the Azure Sky Kingdoms attack at the border.


    The Heavenly Sky Kingdom was silent for a moment before they finally decided to actually send over some of their stronger experts at the seventh stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, while the Raging me Sect called back the elder, they sent over to support after news about their Sect Master disappearing and many of their higher-ups ending up injured during a trip to the deeper regions of the Burning Mountain Range.


    Stating that the Azure Sky Kingdom might take this chance to attack them and try to weaken the overall power of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    The Heavenly Sky Kingdom did not believe this at first, but after one of their core experts went to check on the situation, they discovered that it was indeed true, and their Sect Master was indeed missing.


    With this newsing out, the Seven Fates Sect also started calling back some of their people as they proimed to have observed unrest brewing at the western border of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    The Heavenly Sky Kingdom could only watch on in anger as all four sects slowly began to pull out of the border defence, with the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect retreating from the borderst, stating there was no need for them to stay now that the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms core experts had showed up.


    If a fight really did happen between these people in theter stages of the Nascent Soul Realm, someone at the third or fourth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm being present would make little to no difference.


    The Heavenly Sky Kingdom knew this and thus did not fight so hard against it when the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect decided to pull their people out of the conflict, instead they requested for them to support them with resources and other kinds of materials for the uing conflict between the Azure Sky Kingdom and Heavenly Sky Kingdom in return for them being able to retreat safely. Something both sects were more than happy to do.


    ¡­


    Like this time passed with the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom being locked staring at each other.


    After a few weeks had passed like this, news about a cure for the gue started circting within the Heavenly Sky Kingdom as the royal family soon came out and confirmed this along with a n for distributing the cure.


    The person who invented this cure was apparently a royal alchemist that hade up with the recipe for the cure after visiting his hometown and observing how the gue affected his family. The royal family imed he had gained enlightenment into how the gue would be cured after seeing his family suffering.


    Though, all of this was a lie. The cure was instead deliberately nted in an obscure and worn-down notebook at the royal alchemist''s vige in a small library, that the royal alchemist just so happened toe and visit to read in peace whenever he was stressed about something, like his parents falling sick with the gue¡­


    The cure itself was different from the first one made by Wan Qiu and would not be able to be used to track down the source of the gue. The Flying Sword Sect''s Alchemy Hall had used thest few months developing a specific cure that could be used for this and wouldn''t be able to be tracked back to them in the future.


    Now all they had to do was wait and see how the people behind the gue would end up reacting when a cure to the gue suddenly appeared when they were preparing to move in and act as a saviour for the people and establish themselves inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    The person who came up with this n to use the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s royal family as bait to see how strong the people behind the gue in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom were, was Elder Song.


    Xuan Hao mostly just watched by the side as Elder Song was the one who ended up taking control of the matter, making sure that the Flying Sword Sect would not end up in any sort of dangerous situation due to the cure being released to the normal citizen of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Watching how the entire thing yed out, Xuan Hao really wished for Elder Song to take over the role as Vice Sect Master in the future, with him at the helm to deal with troublesome matters, the peaceful life of cultivating and teaching his disciples a few techniques here and there could continue.


    Maybe he could even stop wasting most of his time on just cultivating and actually start learning some other useful skills or professions, like cksmithing or how to construct different kinds of formations?


    ¡­


    Crash!


    "How did they manage to find a cure so quickly and without the support of the Sky Empire?! High Priest Wu! Come here now!" Angrily throwing an innocent teacup he was holding ruthlessly at the floor, the bishop read through the rest of the reportying on the table in front of him as he soon called for one of the high priests guarding the entrance to his room.


    "What can I do for you, Bishop?" Walking in with a respectful look on his face, the High Priest quickly bowed down as he managed to identify the sad remains of the innocent teacup spread all over the floor and understood that the bishop was not in a good mood at the moment.


    "Investigate this person for me and find out how they managed to find a cure so quickly!" ncing over at the high priest, the bishop threw over a paper filled with the details of the royal alchemist before sitting down, grumbling something to himself about having to dy the conversion of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    High Priest Wu did not say anything and instead did another formal bow before turning around to exit the room with the paper containing the personal details of the royal alchemist.

 Chapter 161: The Splendor of The Great Plague God

    <h4>Chapter 161: The Splendor of The Great gue God</h4>


    While the Heavenly Sky Kingdom beginning to fight back against the gue outbreak, the Azure Sky Kingdom on the other hand were finally beginning to see the effects of the gue as it finally managed to reach a small town at the border of the central region.


    The worry of themon people began to increase as unrest inside the Azure Sky Kingdom grew day by day, with each day bringing about more and more bad news of the gue. Completely overshadowing the recent victory at the border against the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, resulting in the borders of the Azure Sky Kingdom growing bigger than ever before.


    But something like this did not mean much to themon people as they would be worried about the gue spreading throughout the kingdom,pared to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, the Azure Sky Kingdom did not respond to the gue at all and instead chose to ignore it.


    It was at this point, when the people were suffering under the gue not knowing what to do, that people calling themselves priests of the great gue god arrived with a way to cure them.


    At first people hesitated but seeing as the Azure Sky Kingdom''s higher-ups did nothing, they decided to try and were happily surprised upon finding out that the believers of the great gue god had indeed helped cure the gue they were suffering under.


    Like this, the splendor of the great gue god spread through the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Legend told about how the great gue god earned his name after curing countless gues in both the mortal realm and the heavens above, something themon people of the Azure Sky Kingdom were more than happy to believe in after seeing the gue they were just suffering under disappear after a few blessings from the priests of the great gue god.


    Other than that, the priests did not want anything from them after helping! They only asked that they thanked not them but the great gue god who allowed for them to help those who were in need.


    "The great gue god ask not for any payment, all he asks for is a simple thank you¡­" Somewhere at the borders of the Azure Sky Kingdom inside the house of a small vige that had been one of the first ces hit by the gue, a tall middle-aged man dressed in a ck robe with the crest of the gue god embroidered into it smiled kindly at the young woman kneeling down besides him with a small coin purse in her hands.


    "B-but how can I ever repay you for this¡­? Without your help, my daughter would have¡­!" Trying her best not to cry when she thought about how her daughter had been suffering over the past week, the young woman did not know what to do and had ended up asking one of the priests that came from the recently popr church of the gue god.


    Thinking back, the young woman realized that it had been the best decision she had ever made as the ''Great'' Azure Sky Kingdom did not send any help to themon people¡­ She had even heard rumours about people being blocked from entering the central region if they came from any of the areas the gue had spread through, even if they never visited the area for years!


    Looking back up at the middle-aged man kindly smiling at her refusing to take her money, the young woman did not know what to do.


    "You don''t need to be so worried, put your faith in the gue god and thank him, not me. I''m merely a conduit for his great power." As he finished, the ck robed man did not wait for any response before turning to leave the small room before the young woman managed to react.


    The young woman stared blindly in the direction the priest had left in for a short moment before going over to the bed to check up on her daughter that was looking like a normal young girl sleeping. Nothingpared to her deadly white face, high fever and constant coughing from earlier.


    "Put your faith in the gue god¡­" Muttering this to herself, the young woman felt extremely thankful to this unknown gue god that had saved her daughter, so with all her heart, she silently thanked this unknown god.


    Among the cities at the border areas, she was not alone as simr events happened in many ces, with the priests of the gue god gaining an increasingly good reputation among themon people of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    The Azure Sky Kingdom did not pay too much attention to a few rumours among themon people about magical priests appearing at their border to cure the gue.


    For most of the higher-ups, it sounded more like themon people trying to cope with the fact that the gue was starting to go out of hand.


    The thing they focused on at the moment was their war with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and they already knew that a cure for the gue had appeared there, it was only a matter of time before they got their hands on it.


    At that point themon people would be able to calm down again.


    This was the thought of most people among the Azure Sky Kingdom''s higher-ups, all oblivious to the fact that a certain bishop from church of the gue god had already considered the Azure Sky Kingdom to be its main target for conversion now that the cure had appeared andplicated things in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    It was at this moment that the Azure Sky Kingdom suddenly appeared, not caring about themon people, allowing the gue to spread freely without doing much to stop it.


    Was this not a perfect opportunity for bishop to convert themon people to the church of the gue god?


    With this, most of the bishop''s resources and people began to focus on the Azure Sky Kingdom, with only a few of them remaining inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to find out where the cure came from.

 Chapter 162: Secret Realm?

    <h4>Chapter 162: Secret Realm?</h4>


    With things returning back to a rtively calm state after the cure for the gue started circting among themon people of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao and the rest of the Flying Sword Sect happily weed the two Wang brothers back from the border.


    More than happy to send a few resources and artifacts to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in return for not needing to have anyone from their side stationed at the new border indefinitely. Waiting until either the Azure Sky Kingdom decided to attack or chose to retreat.


    "Maybe I should start participating in more things outside of just cultivating and teaching Qing Yi and Chu Yang every now and then¡­" Staring down at the two Wang brothers returning under the happy cheers of the surrounding disciples, Xuan Hao could not help but mutter a bit to himself as he thought about his current position within the sect.


    For everyone except a few people, Xuan Hao was just a somewhat unknown Core Elder inside the Flying Sword Sect. Most thinking he was someone from the older generation who still upheld his youthful appearance, not believing the rumours that he was only 21 years old.


    "I should begin participating more in some of the events Elder Song sets up all the time, I should at least show my face a bit more around the sect¡­" Smiling to himself as he decided to participate in some of the events set up by Elder Song. Maybe he could even give a few pointers to them and act like a proper elder¡­


    "Hmph?" As Xuan Hao was thinking about spending a bit more time interacting with the other elders and disciples of the Flying Sword Sect, a message appeared on hismunication talisman.


    "Who? Ah, Chi Hu!" Not knowing who would contact him when he was already at the sect, Xuan Hao was pleasantly surprised when he found out the person in question was Chi Hu. The person who just recently managed to breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm at the Third Star Peak.


    Back then, other than inviting him to join the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao had also given him a way to contact him through hismunication talisman as he was leaving. This way, he could ask if there was something he wanted to discuss further in regard to bing a Core Elder of the Flying Sword Sect.


    This way, he would also not have to personallye to the Flying Sword Sect and ask. After all, how would Chi Hu know whether the Flying Sword Sect would take kindly to him rejecting the offer to join them or just outright killing him to prevent any of the other sects from gaining another Nascent Soul Realm Expert?


    "A secret realm!?" Reading through the message that Chi Hu had sent over, Xuan Hao could not help but let out a surprised voice as he read through the message.


    Chi Hu noted that he had discovered the entrance to a secret realm when travelling around the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Other than him, there was another dozen or so Nascent Soul Realm cultivators present, most of them being lone wandering cultivators like himself or from smaller sects inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom with only one or maybe two Nascent Soul Realm Experts in the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm in them.


    The discovery of a secret realm would be something that would alert all the surroundings kingdoms and if not handled correctly, could spell disaster for the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. If the secret realm was powerful enough, it might even alert the Sky Empire into action! But something like that was highly unlikely.


    What was a secret realm even in the first ce? This question had once been on Xuan Hao''s mind when he overheard the Sect Master talking about the appearance of a new secret realm in a kingdom outside the borders of the Sky Empire resulting in the destruction of said kingdom almost overnight.


    Back then, Xuan Hao had been curious about why the appearance of a secret realm could cause the destruction of an entire kingdom.


    What he found out was quite astonishing, a secret realm was an independent space of sorts created by an extremely powerful Domain Lord close to reaching an even higher realm or in rare cases like the kingdom, someone above the Domain Lord Realm!


    The independent space was normally not referred to as a secret realm and was only referred to as a secret realm after the past owner either passed away of left the independent space.


    Manipting space was something all Domain Lords learned about upon reaching the Domain Lord Realm and was a requirement to fly, but opening an independent space was not something any Domain Lord was cable of doing! Only those at the peak of the realm was cable of this and that was without considering therge quantity of rare and precious resources required to set up an independent space in the first ce beingrge enough to even causerge empires like the Sky Empire to feel pain.


    What miraculous use did an independent space have that made these Pinnacle Experts want to spend the time, effort and resource to set up one in the first ce? This was something Xuan Hao did not know, as the few books he read never mentioned anything about the use an independent space would bring to a cultivator.


    All the things written about secret realms was mostly about the countless treasures and opportunities hidden within, along with the many dangers. Ranging from traps and deadly formations to demon beasts that had lived in there for countless years.


    Thinking about both the danger and opportunity that the secret realm could bring; Xuan Hao felt a bit troubled on how to deal with it.


    On one hand, part of him wanted to go and explore the secret realm that Chi Hu had found, and the other part felt that it would be too dangerous and staying back at the sect to quietly cultivate would be a way better option for him.


    "Hah¡­ I can''t keep just sitting around quietly all the time, I have to at least take some risk from time to time or I won''t ever be able to truly reach the peak in the future without any form of struggle¡­" Coming to a decision, Xuan Hao informed his two disciples about him leaving for a few days before using his sword to fly in direction of the secret realm mentioned by Chi Hu.

 Chapter 163: The Secret Realm Opens

    <h4>Chapter 163: The Secret Realm Opens</h4>


    The location of the secret realm was at the border of the Flying Sword Sects northern territory, close to the area controlled by the ck Rose Sect.


    The entrance to the secret realm was located in a small isted valley, with the shape of the entrance being a giant gate with nothing special to it other than its enormous size reaching close to 20 meters in height.


    "Ah! When will this damn secret realm open? If it does not open soon, we will never have a chance to enter when those strong ones find out¡­!" At this moment, the group of people gathered in the small valley had exceed more than a hundred people. All of them being experts at the peak of the Core Formation Realm or earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The nervousness and fear at the fact that the secret realm had yet to open yet even though it had already surfaced for several days caused most to feel like time was running out with the chances of the information about a secret realm appearing leaking growing more and more.


    Chi Hu was among the people waiting for the secret realm to open as he stared nervously down at themunication talisman in his hands. At first, he did not want to ask for Elder Xuan''s help as they barely knew each other, but with the number of Nascent Soul Realm Experts stronger than him growing every hour, Chi Hu decided to contact Xuan Hao and ask for help.


    Even if he knew there was a chance that he would not get anything from doing this, Chi Hu still decided to do it. At the very least from what he could gather over the past few weeks, the Flying Sword Sect had a positive reputation outside their Vice Sect Master who seemed to have quite a temper.


    Other than that, Elder Xuan had been kind and friendly to him even before he broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "I will just consider it me being bad at judging people if I''m wrong¡­" Shaking his head when he thought about it, Chi Hu decided to trust his instincts and trust that Elder Xuan would not be someone with evil intentions.


    Rumble~


    Just as Chi Hu was lost in thought, arge earthquake shook the surroundings as the ground began to shake more and more violently.


    Swoosh~


    With the sound of a violent winding from above as the earthquake intensified. The qi between heaven and earth descended into the giant gate before several mythical phenomena of true dragons and phoenixes manifested in the air above the gate.


    "The secret realm is finally opening!"


    "Ah, I will finally have a chance to reach the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    "Hurry inside when the gate opens! Thisrge disturbance will surely have alerted people within a few thousand miles radius!" As the giant gate located at the bottom of the valley began shining in all kinds of colours, as true dragons and phoenixes made out of qi manifested and floated around the gate. The surrounding cultivators all got excited as they prepared to rush into the secret realm the moment it opened up.


    Boom!


    With arge explosion, the qi within the surrounding hundred-mile radius was instantly drawn towards the giant as it slowly began to open, revealing arge ancient forest hidden inside.


    "It''s open, everyone, let''s go before those bigshots show up and force us all away!" Upon hearing the voice of one excited wandering cultivator, the rest of the people present were all excited as they all began to rush towards the entrance into the secret realm.


    "How dumb¡­ Don''t they know that entering a new secret realm first is one of the most dangerous things¡­?" Shaking his head, a bit when he saw the bunch of over eager people rushing into the world hidden behind the gate, Chi Hu found a ce to sit down and wait for Xuan Hao to show up.


    ROAR!


    "Argh, help me!" Chi Hu''s prediction was right as only a few moments after the first people entered the secret realm, the roar of a demon beast could be heard followed by the terrified scream of a male cultivator.


    This scream stopped the few people just about to enter as they saw the person excitedly calling for them to enter earlier torn to shreds by a giant lion demon beast at the peak of the Core Formation Realm, but this hesitation to enter onlysted for a moment before they charged inside. The benefit and chance a secret realm could bring them was not something they could give up on just from seeing someone dying in front of them! This represented a chance to reach the Domain Lord Realm!


    "Roar!" The lion demon beast had just finished the cultivator off and was about to enjoy a well-deserved meal, when a few dozen people at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and a few at the Nascent Soul Realm suddenly appeared andunched a barrage of attacks towards it.


    "Roaaaar?" Letting out a pitiful roar, the lion demon beast at the peak of the Core Formation Realm died under the attack of therge group of cultivators. Not knowing why so many humans had suddenly appeared out of the blue to attack him.


    The group of cultivators did not stay together for long as they quickly split up into their own small groups or went alone to explore the secret realm after the death of the lion demon beast.


    "Hah¡­ Seems like I was a bit too slow to inform Elder Xuan¡­" Smiling a bit wryly as he saw that only he himself and a few others remained outside the gate, waiting for their friends to explore the secret realm, Chi Hu regrated that he did not inform Elder Xuan at an earlier point in time.


    "Oh, I think I arrived just on time!" As Chi Hu wasmenting to himself about not informing Xuan Hao earlier, a familiar voice echoed out behind him.


    "Elder Xuan!" Turning around, Chi Hu excitedly called out as he saw Xuan Hao standing a few meters behind him dressed in a in white robe. Looking like a normal wandering cultivator that just happened to pass by.


    Chi Hu did not think this was weird as the treasures inside a secret realm was not something that the current Flying Sword Sect could bear to obtain without incurring a sect destroying catastrophe. Staying lowkey and anonymous was the best idea, soing dressed as an elder of the Flying Sword Sect would just draw unwanted attention and future trouble to the sect.

 Chapter 164: Entering the Secret Realm

    <h4>Chapter 164: Entering the Secret Realm</h4>


    A few minutes before Xuan Hao arrived at the valley where the secret realm was located, he was flying as fast as he could when arge earthquake suddenly appeared and shook the surroundings. The earthquake in itself was not anything to scuff at as the few viges nearby saw a few houses copsing under the sudden earthquake.


    "Is the entrance to the secret realm opening already?" Looking in the direction that the earthquake stemmed from, Xuan Hao quickly found out that it was the same location as the entrance to the secret realm that Chi Hu had told him about.


    Whoosh~


    The sound of a violent wind could be heard as the qi between heaven and earth suddenly began in a hundred-mile radius around the secret realms entrance.


    This was one of the mostmon ways to identify a secret realm opening as the amount of qi they devoured in the process of opening wasrge enough to be sensed from far away. Xuan Hao even believed that he would have been able sense such arge change in the qi between heaven and earth even if he was far outside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ Let alone when he was already inside it.


    "Looks like the entrance is indeed opening¡­ The ck Rose Sect is located nearby, I should hurry so I can enter before they arrive." Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao nced over in the direction where the ck Rose Sect was located before flying in the direction of the secret realms entrance as fast as possible.


    ¡­


    Flying for another few minutes, Xuan Hao soon spotted the giant gate entrance to the secret realm along with Chi Hu standing nervously a few meters away, seemingly waiting for someone.


    Xuan Hao smiled a bit when he saw this as he chose a location a bit away before descending down from the sky without any of the still remaining cultivators seeing him in the process.


    "Hah¡­ Seems like I was a bit too slow to inform Elder Xuan¡­" Upon closing the distance, Xuan Hao managed to hear Chi Hu mutter to himself, clearly regretting the fact that he had not informed him about the secret realm earlier.


    "Oh, I think I arrived just on time!" Walking up behind Chi Hu, Xuan Hao called out to him as Chi Hu promptly reacted by turning around turned around.


    "Elder Xuan! It''s great to see you managed to arrive, I was just about to enter the secret realm myself before some bigshot came and blocked the entrance!" Chi Hu greeted happily before heined a bit about the fact that someone would most likelye to block people from entering soon.


    "Indeed, we should hurry inside, or we might really end up being blocked from entering the secret realm." Shaking his head upon thinking about this, Xuan Hao and Chi Hu quickly made their way inside the secret realm and was greeted by a majestic ancient forest spreading out as far as the eye could see in all directions.


    "Hm¡­ It''s most likely a forest used to nurture demon beasts." Looking up at the different ancient trees reaching for the sky above and rich foliage below, Chi Hu muttered to himself as he began inspecting the surroundings that they found themselves in.


    "A forest used to nurture demon beasts?" Hearing what Chi Hu said, Xuan Hao began to observe the surrounding environment as well and there were indeed a few marks left behind indicating the true use of the forest.


    Looking around, Xuan Hao deducted that therge ancient forest was most likely not only used to nurture demon beasts but was also used like a test of sorts. Simr to how the Flying Sword Sect sent their new disciples into the demon beast forest that they kept under their control.


    "Only, how strong would the power behind this secret realm be for their tests to be so hard¡­?" Looking down on the corpse of the unlucky lion demon beast from earlier, Xuan Hao very clearly noticed that it had the strength at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm when it was still alive!


    For someone to keep demon beasts like this and rear them to be used in a test¡­? Xuan Hao clearly felt that the power behind this secret realm was not something ordinary. Maybe it was from a past long fallen empire or maybe the testing ground of one of a past sect that could rival a kingdom?


    "Elder Xuan, look over here!" Interrupting his train of thought, Chi Hu excitedly called out to him as Xuan Hao moved his sight over in the direction that Chi Hu was pointing.


    "A road?"


    "Yes! It must lead to somewhere important in the secret realm! Let''s hurry, the ones who entered before us should have already found this road. If we are not fast enough, there might not be anything left for us when we arrive!" Still full of excitement, Chi Hu hurried Xuan Hao as both of them soon made their way down the road leading deeper into the ancient forest.


    Keeping vignt for any demon beasts that might attack them along the road.


    ¡­


    "Hm? This is¡­ In the territory of the Sky Empire? A new secret realm appeared and from the looks of it, it should be from someone at the early stage of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ But when did someone at that stage appear on the borders of the Sky Empire?" Inside a dark and gloomy room big enough to put the throne room of Heavenly Sky Kingdom to shame, an elderly man covered in a pitch-ck robe had a thoughtful look on his face as his divine sense spread out and moved in the direction of arge pair of doors leading outside the dark and gloomy room.


    At the same time, a person standing outside guarding therge pair of doors immediately felt a shiver go down his spine as he felt the tremendous divine sense bearing down on him.


    Stopping himself from shaking, the guard knew what to do and made his way inside the dark and gloomy room, as he kneeled down in front of the elderly man sitting in a meditative position at the centre. Waiting for him to speak.


    "A new secret realm appeared at the borders of the Sky Empire. Go and check out where this secret realm stems from, if it is anything worthwhile, inform me about it. If not, just ignore it and let the Sky Empire have it for themselves¡­" Hearing the elderly man''s order, the guard quickly bowed before taking his leave through the giant pair of doors as a new person soon appeared in front of them to rece him.


    Simr scenes like this could be seen happening in the different empires and powerful sects surrounding the Sky Empire as all of them sent someone over to check the appearance of the new secret realm.

 Chapter 165: The Giant Pagoda

    <h4>Chapter 165: The Giant Pagoda</h4>


    "I see something up ahead! I think it might be ruins of whatever power controlled this secret realm in the past." Continuing the journey through the secret realm without encountering too many demon beasts along the way other than a few in the Core Formation Realm, Xuan Hao and Chi Hu soon came upon the first manmade structure in the secret realm.


    Chi Hu did not wait in the slightest as he rushed over to see this ruin as Xuan Hao followed closely behind.


    The ruin in question was a giant pagoda with nine floors, but by now it had decayed to the point that some of the walls had copsed, causing it to look like it would copse at any moment with even a tiny amount of force generated by the calm wind blowing through the ancient forest.


    Other than them, Xuan Hao also observed a few other cultivators having arrived at the scene before them excitedly searching through all the different floors of the pagoda, with most of them concentrated at the top of pagoda where the precious scrolls and techniques were normally stored as the Nascent Soul Realm Experts tried tob over therge amount of information with the help of their divine sense.


    Walking up to the pagoda, Xuan Hao and Chi Hu both stopped for a moment as they took in the sheer size of the pagoda as it towered up in front of them.


    Xuan Hao and Chi Hu both let their divine sense spread out as they began to inspect the pagoda. The few Nascent Soul Realm Experts on the inside stopped their reading session as they felt the brand-new divine sense wash over them, but quickly went back to reading upon discovering that it was just another two cultivators and not some powerful demon beast showing up.


    The interior of the pagoda was filled with rows upon rows of bookshelves filled with both books and scrolls. This continued on from the first all the way up to the ninth floor of the pagoda, just reading through this amount of information, even with the help of one''s divine sense, would easily take several years.


    This was also the reason why the Nascent Soul Realm Experts had made their way up to the Ninth floor of the pagoda where the most valuable things were usually stored, so they wouldn''t waste any time on the lower quality techniques stored inside the pagoda.


    Chi Hu also saw this and quickly rushed inside the pagoda and made his way to the top before joining the other Nascent Soul Realm cultivators as all of them quietly stayed together, recording all different techniques present on the ninth floor.


    Xuan Hao saw this and decided not to join him as he instead decided to walk around the first floor to see if he could find any history rted books that could give an idea as to where the secret realm came from and possible locations to other ruins inside the secret realm.


    Given that Chi Hu had contacted him for help with the secret realm, Xuan Hao had already expected for him to join the Flying Sword Sect afterwards, so he was not really too worried about the techniques on the top floor as Chi Hu remembered them and could write them down when they made their way back to the Flying Sword Sect.


    Why is he not worried about the different Nascent Soul Realm cultivators fighting each other over the cultivation techniques on the ninth floor?


    Well, the reason was quite simple as the different Nascent Soul Realm cultivators would rather spend their time recording and remembering as many of the techniques as possible instead of wasting their time fighting for sole ownership of a technique¡­


    Who knew how long they had before the different bigshots appeared and chased them out? More importantly, techniques were easy to just remember and copy downter as long as they were not from the higher end of the Heaven Rank and above.


    Techniques at that rank normally contained a special sort of insight in them and copying them was not an option any longer, unless you managed to master said technique or cultivation method at the same level as the creator¡­


    So, with nothing like that appearing, the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators along with Chi Hu on the Ninth floor could quietly read together as they minded their own business.


    Entering the Pagoda, Xuan Hao began walking around the first floor and saw many interesting books scattered all over the ce. From history books describing long forgotten wars of empires and huge sects fighting it out against each other, along with story books about all sorts of mythical creatures.


    Seeing all these interesting books, Xuan Hao could not help himself from picking a few to take back to the sect to read at ater time.


    "Hm? Journey of the Snow Phoenix?" Coming upon yet another book describing a mythical creature like a phoenix, Xuan Hao immediately felt something was different as he picked up the book and began closely inspecting it.


    The book [Journey of the Snow Phoenix] was an interesting novel so to speak, describing the tale of a small phoenix being cast out from her n at a young age due to being born different with an affinity for the ice element instead of the fire element that the phoenix n was revered for and proudly disyed wherever they flew.


    The young phoenix who was thrown out by her n waster cast down into the mortal realm where she tried to survive but found it difficult as she had never learned any kind of cultivation techniques from the phoenix n due her being viewed as an anomaly of the phoenix race due to her affinity for the ice element.


    Like this, the young phoenix struggled for the first few years of her life until a kind elder from a mortal sect picked her up and taught her cultivation.


    The story ended here as the book seemed to be the first part of a series, but all of this was not what caught Xuan Hao''s attention about the book. No, it was the fact that the writing and words with which the story was written contained a chilling aura far superior to his own!


    Xuan Hao could only barely feel this because he had established his own pseudo domain, without it, he would never have been able to feel the chilling aura hidden beneath the words of the story. The words in the story book were clearly written by someone using the power of their Domain!

 Chapter 166: Supreme Flower Breaking Mantra

    <h4>Chapter 166: Supreme Flower Breaking Mantra</h4>


    Why would someone use the power of their domain to write out a story about a phoenix? Maybe there was more to the story than what he could see at a first nce, Xuan Hao did not understand it too clearly, but decided to take the book with him and investigate it close when he returned back to the sect.


    No matter what, the power of a domain left in the book could help him gain a deeper understanding towards how a domain worked and increase his ownprehension towards it. The power of a domain left in the book was like a guiding light showing him how a fully-fledged domain would look like.


    Even if he did not manage to figure out what the meaning behind the book was, he would still be able to gain a lot from studying the power of a domain left behind in it.


    Looking around himself, Xuan Hao began to spread out his divine sense as he skimmed through the titles of all the books on the first floor followed by the second, third and finally ninth floor. Looking for the next part of the [Journey of the Snow Phoenix], but this was to no avail as the next part was nowhere to be found in the giant pagoda.


    The other people sensed his divine sense passing by but paid it no mind as they just continued reading through the different scroll and books.


    "Hah, looks like I was wishing for too much¡­" Shaking his head a bit in disappointment upon retracting his divine sense after scanning through the entire pagoda, Xuan Hao went back to looking through the books on the first floor. Finding a few interesting books here and there to bring back and read at ater time.


    But when it came to any sort of history books, there was none outside a few that described the war between different kingdoms or sects. None mentioned anything about where the secret realm could have originated from or any of the different ces inside the secret realm itself.


    "Elder Xuan! Are we going to move on to the next ce?" A few hours had passed and the Nascent Soul Realm Experts along with Chi Hu had finished reading through the important techniques on the ninth floor as they slowly began to take their leave from the pagoda and travel deeper into the secret realm.


    The Core Formation Experts present saw this opportunity and immediately rushed to the ninth floor to take a look at the different techniques when thest Nascent Soul Realm Expert left.


    "Yeah, there is nothing more for us to gain here¡­ Did you manage to find any Heaven Rank Techniques?" Moving in the direction of the exit to the pagoda, Xuan Hao could not help asking as he only skimmed through the titles of the techniques on the ninth floor without reading any of them.


    "Yes! There were two Heaven Rank, sadly both of them were notpatible with me¡­" Mentioning the two Heaven Rank Techniques, Chi Hu quickly became a bit depressed.


    "Hm? What were they about?" Seeing the sad expression on Chi Hu''s face, Xuan Hao began feeling a bit curious about the two Heaven Rank Techniques left on the ninth floor of the pagoda.


    "Well¡­ You see¡­ The first one is called Supreme Flower Breaking Mantra and it requires the user to cultivate together with a partner¡­" Blushing in embarrassment, Chi Hu stopped exining. Dual cultivation could be considered something ordinary and was something dao couples normally did to increase both their cultivation realms as they were together.


    Xuan Hao felt a bit bewildered when he saw the elderly face of Chi Hu going bright red upon talking about a dual cultivation technique, could there be something special about the Supreme Flower Breaking Mantra¡­?


    "And?" Trying to encourage for him to continue, Xuan Hao patiently observed the elderly man flushed unnaturally before continuing.


    "Well¡­ T-the Supreme Flower Breaking Mantra can only be cultivated with two male partners¡­ Earlier, I saw two of the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators on the ninth floor taking off together to try it out¡­" Ending his exnation, Chi Hu blushed as he turned away from Xuan Hao.


    "¡­" Spreading out his divine sense, Xuan Hao focused back on the ninth floor and discovered a group of middle-aged men at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm looking at each other as they muttered something about reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "What is the other Heaven Rank Technique?" Retracting his divine sense immediately before he saw something that would corrupt his poor soul, Xuan Hao asked about the other Heaven Rank Technique on the ninth floor as he increased the speed at which he was leaving the pagoda.


    "The other Heaven Rank Technique was called Enchanted Water Spring, but it is a female only offensive technique that requires the cultivator to cultivate a water qi mantra before being useful¡­ Not something that I would find any use in¡­" Sighing to himself as he thought about how useless the techniques and mantras on the ninth floor was to him, Chi Hu sincerely hoped that the next ce they found would have something useful like an ancient pill that could strengthen his body or a mystical elixir that could increase hisprehension towards the dao and allow him to reach and even higher realm.


    "The Enchanted Water Spring should be useful for someone in the sect, as for the Supreme Flower Breaking Mantra¡­ Just ignore it and keep it yourself¡­" Xuan Hao really did not feel like it was a good idea to spread the Supreme Flower Breaking Mantra in the Flying Sword Sect, so he simply told Chi Hu to keep it for himself, while the Enchanted Water Spring would be fine to share.


    "Yes¡­" Understanding what Xuan Hao meant, Chi Hu swore in his heart that he would never let the Supreme Flower Breaking Mantra corrupt anyone else like it had those two Nascent Soul Realm Experts earlier!


    "Good, let''s get going then!" Seeing that Chi Hu understood him and would not spread the Supreme Flower Breaking Mantra upon arriving at the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao nodded approvingly as both of them made it outside the giant pagoda standing alone in the ancient forest.

 Chapter 167: Sky Empire Arrives!

    <h4>Chapter 167: Sky Empire Arrives!</h4>


    The outside of the pagoda had changed a bit from before as a group of people at the Foundation Establishment Realm along with a few in the Core Formation Realm had arrived and were preparing to enter the pagoda.


    This was not something odd as the gate leading into the secret realm had already been open for a few hours and those close by would have rushed over the moment they felt the change in the qi between heaven and earth.


    "I wonder when the people from the ck Rose Sect will arrive¡­" Narrowing his eyes slightly upon remembering the ck Rose Sect, Xuan Hao felt that it would be best if he and Chi Hu left the areas close to the entrance and made their way into the deeper regions before anyone who might recognise him arrived.


    "Where should we go to next? Follow the road or try to see if we can find something by going deeper into the ancient forest?" Stopping as they made it outside the pagoda, Chi Hu asked as he observed the surrounding crowd of people beginning to make their way over towards the pagoda.


    "I think we should head deeper into the ancient forest; this road seems to just lead in a circle around the entrance to the secret realm and the chances of the other ces already having been visited by others is extremely high!"


    "That is true and with all the people at the Foundation Establishment Realm and Core Formation Realm nearby entering and flooding the area close to the entrance, the chances of us finding anything useful in the areas connected to the road is close to zero¡­" Nodding his head in agreement with what Xuan Hao said, Chi Hu looked over at the excited expression on the group of peopleing over as they seemed to not pay any attention to anything outside the giant ancient pagoda in front of them.


    With this, Xuan Hao and Chi Hu both turned around and made their way deeper into the ancient forest of the secret realm, unaware that this action might have ended up saving their life.


    ¡­


    "So, a secret realm really did appear here... Guess I am the first person to arrive."


    Outside the entrance to the secret realm, a person dressed like a wanderer appeared in the air above the secret realm. Holding a simple wooden staff in one hand, he observed the entrance of the secret realm for a moment before looking away with a smile at the corner of his lips.


    "This is a definitely a high-level secret realm! How lucky I am to be passing through this ce just when it appears! I might have a chance of strengthen my domain and reach a higher realm!" Feeling a rush of excitement rush through him, the wanderer put away his wooden staff as he suddenly stopped and thought about something.


    "This is the Sky Empires territory, and they would definitely be among the first to reach this area¡­ If I enter, I might end up falling out with the Sky Empire in the future¡­" This was something that even caused the wanderer to stop for a moment.


    Offending the Sky Empire was not something an ordinary Domain Lord like himself could just afford to do, even if there was a chance for him to increase his strength.


    "Ah, who cares if I offend the Sky Empire! My lifespan is already reaching its end and if I don''t breakthrough soon, I will die in another hundred or so years anyway¡­" Aftering to this conclusion, the wanderer did not hesitate for a moment longer before he entered the secret realm.


    By this point, the ck Rose Sect had already made their way over to the secret realm and allowed for a few of their Nascent Soul Realm Experts to enter.


    After this, nothing out of the ordinary happened as days slowly began to pass and? the different sects inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom began to learn about the appearance of a secret realm.


    The Flying Sword Sect, Spring Flower Sect and Raging me Sect all decided not to join in, while only the Seven Fates Sect allowed for some of their Nascent Soul Realm Experts to go over and explore the secret Realm.


    It had to be known that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was still at war with the Azure Sky Kingdom and none of the sects wanted to weaken themselves by sending out some of their Nascent Soul Realm Experts to a ce where they might very well lose their life.


    Like this, the area outside of the entrance had be more populous as several thousand cultivators from weaker sects or just wandering cultivators happening to pass by had gathered together to form groups to enter the secret realm and explore it.


    By now, a small market had appeared in front of the entrance where cultivators bought and sold things they managed to find inside the secret realm. From demon beast remains to different cultivation techniques and mantras.


    This peaceful environment continued on, but nothing was meant tost forever as, a terrifying aura suddenly descended from above.


    "Leave this area immediately or face the consequences!" A cold and oppressive voice shook the surroundings and caused the cultivators on the ground to look up with a shocked expression as they saw something they would never be able to forget.


    Above them, arge ship floated with the banner of the Sky Empire proudly swaying in the wind.


    The person who called out before was standing in the air a few meters away from the floating ship as he coldly looked down on the crowd below.


    The world shook under the pressure excluded by the figure floating above was too much as the people below felt their bodies be heavy as their knees folded beneath them, forcing them to kneel on the ground.


    "General¡­ If you supress all of them like that, they won''t be able to leave¡­" An old voice could be heard from inside the floating ship as the person floating above smiled awkwardly before retracting his aura. Allowing for the people below to finally move again, as they quickly left the area surrounding the entrance of the secret realm.

 Chapter 168: Formation Pillar

    <h4>Chapter 168: Formation Pir</h4>


    "When can we found something new outside just trees and caves?" It had been a day since Xuan Hao and Chi Hu set off from the pagoda located close to the entrance of the secret realm and over that time, they had not seen any other cultivators or ruins.


    The only thing they met along their path was the wildlife of the ancient forest and the demon beasts that attacked them from time to time. Not that the demon beast proved to be any challenge, as the strongest was only half a step into the Nascent Soul Realm, there had yet to be any demon beasts in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    By this point Xuan Hao suspected that there was some sort of formation in ce around the ancient forest, that made sure no demon beast above the Core Formation Realm appeared at the area close to the entrance.


    The reason for this was simple, as they had already encountered more and more demon beasts at half a step into the Nascent Soul Realm the further away from the entrance to the secret realm that they got and if he was not wrong, Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts would start to appear soon.


    Like the demon beast forest of the Flying Sword Sect where the demon beasts grew stronger and stronger the further the new disciples went in¡­


    "I have no- hm?" Just as Xuan Hao was about to answer back to Chi Hu, a clearing in the forest appeared as both of them stopped and surveyed their surroundings in case other cultivators were present or had already been there before them.


    "Looks like there is nobody nearby!" Sensing around with his divine sense like Xuan Hao, Chi Hu followed the direction Xuan Hao was looking in and saw the clearing ahead of them.


    Walking up to the clearing in the ancient forest, Xuan Hao and Chi Hu were both shocked by the sight that appeared in front of them.


    At the centre of the clearing was a giant pir nted firmly in the ground stretching up into the sky for several miles. The size of the pir alone was more than enough to shock both of them, but the countless formations and runic symbols flowing around on the surface of the pir was what truly shook both of them to the core.


    "W-what is this¡­" Not able to help himself, Chi Hu could not help but ask even though he already knew the answer.


    "Hm¡­ It looks like a part of a giant formation, but if this is just a single part¡­" Realizing something as he began talking, Xuan Hao immediately made his way above the nearby ancient trees and looked around himself and sure enough, another two pirs just like the one in front of them could barely be seen in the distance as the endless sea of trees stretched on for as longs as the eye could see.


    Only the giant pirs broke through this endless sea of trees as they pierced through the sky above, forming what could only be considered to be thergest formation Xuan Hao had ever seen.


    The formation might even have something to do with the secret realm itself. Maybe the formation kept the secret realm functioning and constructing such a formation could be one of the reasons why creating a secret realm was so expensive in the first ce?


    Xuan Hao truly had no clue and could only guess as he jumped down from the tree top he was standing on and walked over to the giant pir to inspect it up close.


    "A formation thisrge, how much time and effort would it take to construct!? And how do they even move these giant pirs in the first ce?" As Xuan Hao was beginning to inspect the pir in front of them, Chi Hu could not help but sigh in amazement as he looked up at the giant pir looking like it was holding up the sky itself.


    "Haha, definitely not something we would be able to do any time soon." Laughing a bit upon hearing Chi Hu, Xuan Hao touched the pir as he allowed his divine sense to roam around the surface of the pir and observe the different formations flowing beneath the surface.


    The countless formations seemed to have merged together into a single perfect entity with the body of the pir itself acting as an anchor to connect the different formations together. The connection between the other pirs spread throughout the secret realm could barely be observed as Xuan Hao was far too weak to observe the entire formation and could only settle to observe a single corner of it.


    But even that single corner was more than enough to deepen his understanding towards both formations and the sheer power that a formation could hold when reaching a certain level.


    If it was brought outside, the formation that the pir was a part of could probably cover the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom!


    "Should we stay here for a bit and try toprehend the pr before moving on?" Staring up at the pir, Chi Hu had made his way over to Xuan Hao as he also began to inspect the pir.


    "Yeah, let''s stay here for a day,prehending the formations that make up this pir is quite beneficial to both of us as they contain a power far beyond the Nascent Soul Realm¡­" Nodding his head in agreement with Chi Hu, Xuan Hao also wanted to spend a bit more time inspecting the giant pir as he found out that it was not only helpful to his understanding of formations, but also helped him deepen his understanding of a domain as the creator of the formation infused the power of his domain into the pir itself upon creating the formation in the past.


    But for some reason, the power of the domain left behind in the pir seemed to be weaker than the bone chilling power left behind in the book that he managed to find the giant pagoda close to the entrance of the secret realm.


    The creator of the [Journey of the Snow Phoenix] seemed to be stronger than the creator of the giant formation inside the secret realm, or maybe the power inside the pir had just weakened more over the years as the pirs were constantly keeping the giant formation running.


    Xuan Hao did not know the answer to this and only felt more interested in the creator of the [Journey of the Snow Phoenix].

 Chapter 169: Chi Hus Breakthrough!

    <h4>Chapter 169: Chi Hu''s Breakthrough!</h4>


    Observing the giant formation pir, both Xuan Hao and Chi Hu spent the next day uneventfully as both of them sat down quietly cultivating without any demon beasts or cultivators showing up to disturb them.


    Boom!


    A violent torrent of qi began to funnel in towards Chi Hu as his strength increased from the first stage to the second stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. After only a few weeks in the Nascent Soul Realm, he had already manged to breakthrough and reach the second stage and he still felt like his foundation was strengthened.


    Xuan Hao looked over from the side and did not feel jealous, the formation pir benefited him as well, butpared to a breakthrough in the realm, Xuan Hao''s pseudo domain grew stronger as the foundation of his domain was strengthened.


    "Sadly, the remnants of the creator''s domain inside the pir disappeared, it looks like the ability toprehend the domain of the creator for a day was a reward of sorts for those who reached the pirs in the past¡­ Maybe a part of the test that the ancient forest was a part of?" Coming to his own conclusion towards the reason for the remnants of the creator''s domain left inside the pir suddenly disappearing, Xuan Hao closed his eyes as he paid attention to the system staying inside his sea of consciousness.


    Over thest few months, it had been staying quiet without doing much, but after the remanent power of the domain inside the pir disappeared, it finally showed some sign of life again.


    [Side Quest: Find the core of the Secret Realm Formation]


    [Reward: ???]


    The quest was bewildering to Xuan Hao, as it was the first quest, he had gotten from his system that did not involve his disciples. By this point he had almost gotten convinced that the system only had quest rted for his disciples, but it seemed like that was not the case.


    Back to what the quest was about, it wanted him to find the core of the secret realm formation.


    Looking at the giant pir in front of him, Xuan Hao already knew what formation the system was referring to as he began thinking about the possibility of finding the core of the secret realm formation before people above the Nascent Soul Realm began showing up and the chances of that was close to nothing, as the size of the secret realm was enormous and finding the core of the secret realm formation could take years if not decades!


    For all he knew, the core of the secret realm formation could be located at the entrance to the secret realm!


    "Hah, this feels great, I didn''t expect to reach the second stage of the Nascent Soul Realm so quickly!! We should go and see if we can get a chance toprehend at the other pirs!" Chi Hu interrupted Xuan Hao''s train of thought as the aura of a second stage Nascent Soul Realm cultivator spread out with him as the centre.


    "I don''t think we will gain anything from it as the formation pir is part of the same formation as the other pirs¡­ But we can try the closet one. After all, if I''m wrong and we just leave, we would miss out on a huge opportunity!" Nodding in agreement with Chi Hu, Xuan Hao threw the quest about finding the secret realms formation core to the back of his mind.


    "Great let''s get going then!" Excited to the extreme as he flexed his recently increased cultivation base, Chi Hu acted like a child that had gotten a new toy to y with, as Xuan Hao smirked upon seeing the elderly Chi Hu hoping up and down excitedly.


    Adding him to the line-up of core elders in the Flying Sword Sect would at least be exciting for some of the disciples if he was as excited about teaching them as he was exploring the secret realm.


    ¡­


    "Ahhh! There is nothing toprehend here!" Falling to his knees in a dramatic way as he raised his hands towards the giant formation pir with an almost begging look on his face, Xuan Hao had to look the other way as he began wondering how this old man had been when he wandered around from kingdom to kingdom beforehand.


    "Don''t worry so much about it, I''m sure we will be able to find something if we continue to go further into the secret realm. Who knows, there might even be more pirs like these with more opportunities waiting for us! But it will definitely get more dangerous from here¡­" Narrowing his eyes as he finished his sentence, Xuan Hao looked into the ancient forest beyond the formation pirs.


    Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts would almost certainly begin appearing after they passed by the formation pirs and ventured deeper inside the ancient forest.


    "True, but I fear that we won''t be able to continue for much longer when Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts begin appearing¡­ And if they grow stronger the deeper into the secret realm we go, like they have done so far, the ones at the area around the next pirs would be half a step into the Domain Lord Realm¡­" Chi Hu shook his head as he felt the difficulty of reaching the next circle of pirs was beyond something a second stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert like himself could archive.


    "We can try and see how far we can make it, if it ever gets too dangerous for us, we can always retreat and leave." Seeing the hesitation on Chi Hu''s face, Xuan Hao encouraged him a bit.


    "Maybe there will be other ruins like the giant pagoda close by like the one at the entrance to the secret realm, we can try to see if we can find any and explore them." Hearing this, Chi Hu nodded his head in agreement.


    "That might be the case and the demon beast around here should only be in the early stages of the Nascent Soul Realm, so with you here, we should be fine exploring the area close to the pirs without too much danger..." Thinking it over, Chi Hu agreed with exploring the area close to the pirs as they could always retreat back towards the pirs again if things grew too dangerous for them.


    Hearing Chi Hu''s agreement, Xuan Hao smiled to himself. Personally he wanted to explore the deeper regions of the secret realm together with Chi Hu and find the core of the resecret alm formation mentioned in the system quest, as he was the one who had invited him toe and explore the secret realm together with him.


    But from the looks of things, he would have to part ways with Chi Huter if he wanted to enter the more dangerous areas of the secret realm to explore.

 Chapter 170: The Temple Hidden in the Ancient Forest

    <h4>Chapter 170: The Temple Hidden in the Ancient Forest</h4>


    The other ancient forest beyond the giant formation pirs was almost the same with the exception of a change in the foliage going from a normal forest floor into one filled with more colours and spiritual herbs above the Earth Rank appearing more and more often.


    Not that they were useful for Xuan Hao or Chi Hu, as both of them ignored the different herbs on the ground outside a few rare ones that could be useful to take back and cultivate.


    Like this, both of them continued further into the ancient forest without encountering a single demon beast along the way, causing both of them to feel a bit bewildered as this was not something either of them had been expecting.


    Far outside the idea of Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts attacking them the moment they passed by the giant formation pirs. Not a single demon beast appeared even after walking for over an hour!


    "I see something up ahead!" Pointing ahead, Xuan Hao called out to Chi Hu as he kept surveying the area around them for any potential demon beastsing to attack them when their guard was down.


    "A demon beast?!" Hearing the voice of Xuan call out, Chi Hu immediately focused his attention on the direction that Xuan Hao pointed in.


    "No, I think this is another ruin like the giant pagoda we encountered close to the entrance of the secret realm." Shaking his head, Xuan Hao began walking over towards the ruins hidden beneath the tall trees of the ancient forest, closely followed by Chi Hu.


    "We are most likely the first people to reach this ce, so there should be some treasures, artifacts, pills or maybe even high-rank qi techniques or cultivation mantras!" Following behind Xuan Hao as they walked, Chi Hu''s eyes began to shine brightly as he looked at the giant ruin in front of them. Forgetting everything about being cautious and looking out for any Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts that might be hiding nearby.


    The ruin in front of the two of them was a giant temple stretching on for miles as several parts of the? temple had broken off from the temple and broken down, resulting inrge parts of the temple being hidden beneath the rich foliage of the ancient forest.


    One of the only parts that still retained some resemnce of once had been, was the main part of the temple that towered up in front of Xuan Hao and Chi Hu. If it was not for the fact that the ground beneath it had caved in swallowing arge part of the temple, it would surely have pierced far into the sky and stand tall above the towering trees of the ancient forest.


    Sadly, this could not happen as arge area of the main part of the temple had been swallowed by the ground.


    "How could such arge area suddenly copse!? Perhaps there was a giant underground space beneath the temple that copsed in the past and thus caused the main part of the temple to sink into the ground?" Observing the ruins of the temple, Xuan Hao walked up to the main part of the temple and inspected the ground around the ce where the temple had sunk into the ground.


    "That is the most likely scenario, many temples like this normally have arge underground area used for religious ceremonies, I once saw one simr to this when I visited a kingdom in the past, but why would it be here? It seemspletely out of ce for a secret realm likely used by an ancient sect to train and test disciples, to have a religious temple inside of it." Wearing a confused expression on his face, Chi Hu put on a thoughtful expression as he seemed to have forgotten about the possible treasures inside after reaching the temple ruins.


    "Maybe the secret realm switched ownership at some point? It could also be part of the test; they might have made a temple to train their disciples in familiarising themselves with fighting in the environment of one? The past owner of the secret realm could have been locked in a war with a religious order and prepared their disciples for it¡­" Thinking over it, Xuan Hao could not reallye up with any other ideas as to why a temple had suddenly appeared inside of the secret realm.


    All they could do to find out about it was to enter and explore it¡­


    ¡­


    "Hm¡­ Seems like I am indeed the first one to arrive at this secret realm outside a few Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, but those can be ignored as entering the core area of a secret realm would not be possible with their cultivation!" Standing at the entrance to the secret realm, the wanderer who had just entered the secret realm looked around as his divine sense spread out and easily covered the first few ruins of the secret realm.


    "Guess I will start looking into the ruins around here and see if they can point towards the location of the core area." Muttering this to himself, the wanderer soon disappeared from the entrance to the secret realm as he soon appeared above one of the ruins located close by.


    The ruin in question was not the same pagoda that Xuan Hao and Chi Hu encountered earlier, instead it was a decaying pavilion located besides a smallke.


    When the wanderer in question arrived, a few other cultivators were already browsing through all the different scrolls and books as they searched for anything useful in them.


    "Looks like this ce used to be a test area of sorts before it was abandoned¡­ Hm¡­ A few of the neutral sects use the same kind of training ground, so finding the core area should not be too difficult as long as I find the core of the formation keeping the test area running." Smiling upon seeing the decaying pavilion, a formation suddenly appeared where the pavilion was in the eyes of the wanderer as countless lines connected to it and spread far into all directions.


    Through the lines connecting the formation around the pavilion to the formation keeping the test ground running, the wanderer sensed first-hand the massive scale of the formation.


    "Ahhh¡­ What bastard set up such a giant formation! Did they not have to worry about resources when building it? And how long will it take to find the core area if the formation is sorge? Don''t tell me the entire secret realm was used for this formation?!" Scratching his head in frustration upon sensing the sheer size of the formation, the wanderer knew that he would have no chance of breaking it and could only hope that he would be able to find the core area before others like himself began appearing.


    "I will try checking with the firstyer of the formation and see if I can find out something that might help me¡­" ncing over in the direction that the formation pirs were located, the wanderer soon disappeared from the decaying pavilion. Unbeknownst to any of the cultivators quietly reading through the scrolls and books inside.

 Chapter 171: Underground Hall

    <h4>Chapter 171: Underground Hall</h4>


    "The inside is in a better condition than what I expected¡­" Looking around at the inside of the temple, Xuan Hao could not help but observe the surroundings more closely as the tall pirs holding up the temple decorated with different religious figures was still standing tall even after the rest of the temple had fallen into ruin.


    Even when the temple had sunk into the ground in the past, the main pirs still stood strong and withstood the sudden copse of the underground area, keeping the main part of the temple intact up to this day.


    "What are these pirs made of¡­" Chi Hu seemed to be interested in somethingpletely different as he walked over a touched one of the pirs while muttering something inaudible to himself.


    As Chi Hu was lost in thought observing the pirs of the temples entrance hall, Xuan Hao went deeper inside.


    The environment of the temple changedpletely as he made his way inside the core area of the temple where the normal religious ceremonies would take ce, it was also here that the normal followers coulde to pray on a daily basis.


    The size of the core area alone was more thanrge enough to fit over ten thousand people praying together, while the other areas of the temple were most likely used as living quarters for the priests and other believers working at the temple.


    Walking up to a majestically decorated stand where a member of the church that was in charge of the temple would have stood when preaching to the followers below, Xuan Hao saw a small book filled with all sorts of religious chants and songs.


    "Cardinal¡­?" But this was not what caught Xuan Hao''s attention, instead it was a small bookying on the stand with a small note inside of it talking about a cardinaling to inspect the temple in a few days'' time, followed by a list of things that needed to be prepared before the cardinal arrived.


    It seemed a bit out of ce in the ruined temple and felt like it had just been abandoned. Looking around, Xuan Hao felt that the temple was too out of cepared to the rest of the ancient forest in the secret realm and could not help himself from thinking about it.


    "Could it be that someone moved the temple from the outside into the secret realm¡­?" Just the thought of someone being able to move an entire temple at this size was something unimaginable to Xuan Hao at his current realm, but it might have been possible for someone who had the ability to create a secret realm¡­


    Perhaps the reason that the temple had been swallowed up by the ground was not because an underground area had copsed, but was instead because someone had thrown the temple down on the ground¡­?


    This thought caused Xuan Hao to shiver a bit as he began inspecting the different cracks running along the side walls of the temple that seemed to have been created from the temple enduring a massive impact.


    "I will find out the truth by looking at the underground area and see if something really did copse under the temple, causing it to sink into the ground or if it was just thrown into the secret realm by someone in the past¡­" Shaking his head, Xuan Hao looked over at Chi Hu in preparation for entering the underground area together with him.


    "Ah! This is truly Holy Steel! How lucky! I will be able to earn a lot if I sell it outside in the future." Chi Hu eximed loudly as he used his weapon to cut off pieces of one of the pirs in the entrance hall of the temple, while happily storing the pieces of Holy Steel used to construct the pirs in a small bag around his waist.


    "¡­" Maybe I should just go and check out the underground area alone¡­


    Upon seeing how busy Chi Hu was, Xuan Hao decided to go down and enter the underground area of the temple on his own.


    Luckily, the temple had begun falling apart long ago. Allowing Xuan Hao to easily find a crack big enough for him in the floor leading down into the underground regions of the temple.


    Crack


    Landing on the floor on the underground area below the core area of the temple, Xuan Hao barely managed to react in time as he jumped to the side before the ce, he was standing moments ago disappeared into a giant gorge beneath it.


    Ssh!


    The part of the floor that broke off from the underground hall that he had jumped down onto could be heard contacting a body of water, as Xuan Hao used his divine sense to probe the bottom of the gorge located directly beneath the temple.


    "A river¡­?" Indeed, an underground river was peacefully flowing through the gorge below as the pieces of the underground halls floor were carried away before disappearing into a small hole where the gorge ended.


    "Where does the river lead to¡­?" This was the first time Xuan Hao had seen a subterranean river and he was quite intrigued and felt like trying to explore the cave systems connected to it.


    If it was not for the fact that he was inside a secret realm and Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts or even stronger demon beasts might be hiding in the cave systems connected to it and he would not be able to see if he crossed another line of pirs where Domain Lord Demon Beasts might begin appearing¡­


    Imagine finding a rare herb of ore and getting up from underground, only to find out that you are in the middle of a Domain Lord demon beasts'' nest¡­


    Shaking his head, as he shivered at this thought, Xuan Hao turned away from the river peacefully passing by in the underground gorge beneath him.


    Focusing back onto the underground hall of the temple as he began making his way through the hall, Xuan Hao closely observed the many weird paintings of mythical creatures like dragons and phoenixes fighting together with humans against a giant blue phoenix. The paintings depicted a war of mythical creatures and humans teaming up together to fight the giant blue phoenix.


    Thest painting on the wall depicted the giant blue phoenix losing and being sealed away.


    "But what church is this¡­ It doesn''t seem like the gue god''s church or any of the churches from the Sky Empire that Shu Yao described¡­ All those churches have a human like figure as their god, this is the first church I have seen that does not worship a human figure as their god¡­" The more he knew about the church that the temple belonged to, the more confused Xuan Hao grew.


    The temple seemed to be a ce where people came to worship the giant blue phoenix, this was further enforced by the fact that an altar with a statue of the blue phoenix spreading its wings was located at the end of the hall.


    Beneath the blue phoenix statue situated a little above the altar, Xuan Hao managed to see a small blue feather that glowed gently in the dark underground hall ced on the centre location of the altar itself.

 Chapter 172: Interspatial Ring and Surprise from the System

    <h4>Chapter 172: Interspatial Ring and Surprise from the System</h4>


    "What is creature is the feather from? A blue bird or something?" Walking up to the altar, Xuan Hao cautiously inspected the blue featherying on top of the altar before picking it up.


    The blue feather had no special aura or hidden domain of some sort inside of it, the only thing special was its colour and the slightly chilly feeling it left when Xuan Hao picked it up and inspected it. Outside of this, Xuan Hao could simply not tell what was so special about the feather, for it to be on top of a clearly important altar of the temple.


    "Perhaps it has something to do with the blue phoenix? An offering of sorts maybe? I do remember some religious orders sacrificed different kinds of things to their gods. From cattle and precious artifacts to humans¡­" Lifting the blue feather up into the air, Xuan Hao swung it around a bit to see if something would happen, but to his disappointment, him swinging it around did not cause the blue feather to do anything.


    "Guess I will just keep it for now and try to figure out what it is when I return to the sect¡­" Putting the blue feather away, Xuan Hao was prepared to spend some time on the blue feather when returning to the sect.


    After all, even if it looked like there was nothing special about the feather, it had still stayed in the temple for a long time and a normal feather would have long decayed by this point¡­


    Preparing to leave the underground hall, as there was nothing other than the blue feather, altar and phoenix statue inside of it, Xuan Hao manged to spot a small ringying on the floor towards the corner of the wall.


    The inconspicuous ring immediately caught his attention as Xuan Hao picked it up and inspected it to find out if there was anything unusual about the ring.


    "This is!" The moment Xuan Hao sent his divine sense out to probe the small ring, he immediately felt his divine sense being drawn inside it as the ring shone with a deep blue colour for an instant before returning to its former inconspicuous state.


    "An interspatial ring?!" Indeed, the small inconspicuous ring was an interspatial ring!


    Xuan Hao looked at the ring with a surprised and excited expression as he felt the connection that had been established between himself and the ring, with just a thought, he could easily ess the space inside the ring. Withdrawing or storing items with just a thought.


    Is there still something left inside the ring?


    Calming down, the first thing Xuan Hao did was ess the space inside the interspatial ring with his divine sense.


    "Nothing¡­" Feeling himself bing a bit depressed upon sensing the empty space inside the interspatial ring, Xuan Hao could not help but sigh at the sight of it.


    What had he expected¡­? The person who took care of this temple most likely emptied everything precious inside already¡­


    The interspatial ring was most likely useless to someone strong enough to take away an entire temple after looting the treasures inside.


    Did this not mean he was picking up something that had already been thrown away by others¡­


    "I swear¡­ When I reach the Domain Lord Realm, I will also be able to make interspatial rings! When that timees, I will make a few thousand interspatial rings and throw them at some random ces with a note about not needing them anymore! Haha!" Laughing a bit to himself as he eximed this, Xuan Hao only thought about it for a moment before he left the underground room.


    The construction of a single interspatial ring was not something cheap, this was also one of the reasons why people reaching the Domain Lord Realm would normally only construct one for personal use.


    Half a step Domain Lords also had the ability to make interspatial rings, but the cost was way too high for someone still in the Nascent Soul Realm to bear. This in turn resulted in most interspatial rings being constructed by Domain Lords or those above.


    Xuan Hao also knew¡­ And that was why¡­


    Ding~


    The sound of a new quest did not excite Xuan Hao for the first time, but instead made him think back to a certain day where the system had forced him to throw up blood¡­


    Stopping in ce, Xuan Hao did not move for a moment as he calmed down before entering his sea of consciousness to see the new system quest given to him.


    [Limited Time Quest: You have found a brilliant way to recruit new potential disciples! Scatter 1000 interspatial rings around the world. The system will add a specific test to the ring that will test the potential future disciples. Interspatial Rings will only be counted towards the quest if they are scattered a certain distance away from each other. Timer will begin upon reaching the Domain Lord Realm!]


    [Time: 10 years]


    [0/1000]


    [Reward: vary depending on the amount of sessfully scattered interspatial rings]


    "¡­" This quest was so troublesome... Worst of all, it was his first limited time quest as well.


    At least it seemed like the timer would only begin when he reached the Domain Lord Realm, so he could in essence dy his breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm and stay stuck at the half-step Domain Lord Realm producing interspatial rings.


    But who knew how long that would take? And what would he do if his disciples ended up surpassing him while he was busy making interspatial rings¡­?


    Xuan Hao felt quite a dilemma when looking at the limited time quest.


    Sure, he could ignore it, but the benefits for such a quest would definitely be good and might even be able to assist his cultivation on the long term!


    "I should not dy my cultivation for the quest¡­" Coming to this decision, Xuan Hao decided that he would work hard to secure and create as many interspatial rings as possible upon reaching the Domain Lord Realm.


    Work hard for the 10 years and scatter as many interspatial rings as possible, then return to rx at his pavilion teaching Qing Yi and Chu Yang from time to time for the next 100- No, next 1000 years!


    Nodding his head approvingly at his own ns, Xuan Hao made his way out of the underground hall and back into the core area of the temple where he left Chi Hu earlier.

 Chapter 173: First Encounter with Treasure Hunter

    <h4>Chapter 173: First Encounter with Treasure Hunter</h4>


    Putting most of the things he was carrying on him into the interspatial ring, Xuan Hao made his way back into the core area of the temple.


    "Elder Xuan! A group of treasure hunters are approaching the temple!" Just as Xuan Hao returned from the underground hall of the temple, Chi Hu came running over with an anxious look on his face, as a group of people arrived a few hundred meters away from the temples entrance. All of them were d in the same style of clothing as they made their way over towards the entrance of the temple.


    More importantly, all of them were in the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Anyone you are familiar with?" Seeing the panicked expression on Chi Hu''s face as he informed him, Xuan Hao realized that Chi Hu seemed to be familiar with the people outside.


    But how did he even get to know any Nascent Soul Realm Experts in the past when he was just in the Core Formation Realm?


    Xuan Hao doubted that Chi Hu would have been able to escape if he had offended them in the past as a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator was way faster than someone in the Core Formation Realm¡­ That is, unless there is a special circumstance allowing the Core Formation Expert to escape¡­


    "Yes! They are a famous group of wandering cultivators, I once managed to see them in the past when I was exploring a ruin together with a few friends. Back then, they were fighting another Nascent Soul Realm expert over a treasure. Me and my friend ran away the moment we saw this as they don''t really have the best reputation among wandering cultivators. Often ruthlessly killing anyone taking what they deem to be theirs¡­ I didn''t expect for them to show up here¡­" Shaking uneasily as he looked at the approaching group of three people, Chi Hu put away the Holy steel that he had managed to gather before preparing to run away from the approaching group of people the moment they showed any sign of aggression.


    "So¡­ A group of treasure hunters that will attack anyone that they deem to have the treasures that ''belong'' to them¡­?"? Feeling his head hurt a bit as he watched the approaching trio, Xuan Hao made his way out of the temple with Chi Hu following closely behind him.


    "Huh, it looks like there is already people that arrived before us! Brothers, they look like they are about to leave! They might have already cleaned the ce for any artifacts or precious materials and are looking to make a getaway!" Spotting Xuan Hao and Chi Hu making their way outside the temple, a tough and burly looking man among the group of treasure hunters stepping forward.


    "Huh, these two will make excellent test subjects." Another member of the trio followed as he was swaying a bit from side to side before taking out two alchemical potion bottles filled with a mysterious liquid from somewhere in his robe.


    "Hah, there''s no end to this¡­ How many more will attempt to steal out treasures?" Sighing a bit to himself upon seeing Xuan Hao and Chi Hu, thest among the trio stepped forward as he took out a giant hammer preparing to attack Xuan Hao and Chi Hu at moment''s notice.


    The Trio released their killing intent as they began slowly approaching Xuan Hao and Chi Hu.


    "Looks like they don''t want to talk about it¡­ Do you know anything about their way of attacking?" ncing down at the trio approaching filled with killing intent, Xuan Hao looked back at Chi Hu.


    "Ah, yes! The one with the potions will throw the different bottles that can cause different reactions that will result in an explosion most of the time, while I''m not sure the other two will do anything special¡­" Thinking over it for a moment, Chi Hu tried his best to exin what he had seen in the past.


    "I see¡­ I will try to take care of the tough looking one and the one with the hammer, you should be able to deal with the one throwing potions. From what I can tell, he should only be at the first stage of the Nascent Soul Realm." Sensing the opponent''s cultivation realms through his divine sense, Xuan Hao grew confident in his ability to deal with the group of treasure hunters.


    "Sure, but are you sure you can deal with two at once?" Chi Hu did not really know how strong Xuan Hao was and he only knew he was stronger than him¡­ As for how much stronger he was, Chi Hu had no idea.


    "Yes, you don''t have to worry about me." Nodding in response, Xuan Hao drew his sword out from his newly acquired interspatial ring.


    Xuan Hao''s cultivation being at the seventh stage of the Nascent Soul Realm was something that not many people knew about in the first ce. At the moment, the only people who knew about Xuan Hao having reached the seventh stage of the Nascent Soul Realm was the Sect Master Feng Chen and Shu Yao from the Spring Flower Sect.


    So, Xuan Hao did not really worry much about the group of treasure hunter, as even the strongest among them was only barely at the third stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Even then, Xuan Hao did not dare to underestimate his opponent. From past experience, they seemed to have been able to retreat safely every single time, he fought with anyone at the Nascent Soul Realm so far¡­


    This time around, Xuan Hao wanted to make sure that his opponents would not be able to just opt and run away when they wanted. Resulting in possible future problems for both him, his disciples and the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    "Huh, looks like these two want to fight it out! Haha, and I was looking for a little bit of entertainment!" Laughing loudly, the tough looking man who seemed to be the leader of the group cracked his knuckles before madly dashing towards Xuan Hao and Chi Hu, closely followed by his twopanions.

 Chapter 174: Hammer Treasure Hunter

    <h4>Chapter 174: Hammer Treasure Hunter</h4>


    "Remember, I will get the tough looking one and the one with the giant hammer, you take care of the one with the potions!" Seeing the trio rushing over towards them, Xuan Hao remained calm as he reminded Chi Hu before preparing to meet the opponent head on.


    Chi Hu looked at the approaching group and quickly calmed himself down before focusing on the treasure hunter with the different potion bottles on him.


    This would be Chi Hu''s first battle after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Even if he was a minor realm above his opponent, his opponent would have more experience than him when it came to fighting at the Nascent Soul Realm.


    With this in mind, Chi Hu prepared for a difficult fight as he took out his weapon, a simple looking wooden staff.


    This staff was Chi Hu''s personal weapon and was made from a rare type of wood that he had found when exploring ancient ruins in the past, it had helped him through the years of travel and was even tougher than Spirit Rank Artifacts, but how well it would fare in a battle between Nascent Soul Realm Experts, Chi Hu could only find out by trying.


    "Fist of fury!" As Chi Hu was making his way over towards the treasure hunter with the dangerous potions on him, the tough looking leader of the treasure hunters arrived in front of Xuan Hao and threw out a simple punch as his fist was engulfed in mes.


    Whoosh~


    Dodging to the side, Xuan Hao easily managed to dodge the ming fists of the tough looking treasure hunter as he responded with executing the second move of the Rain Sword Technique, Spring Rain.


    The sword glowed gently with a light blue colour for a moment before Xuan Hao shed down at his opponent.


    The treasure hunter who saw his attack missing did not wait in the slightest as he turned around to follow after Xuan Hao, only to be met with the sword flying down towards him.


    Trying his best to block the sword, by crossing his arms as they shone bright red followed by a wall of mes appearing in front of him to block it. The treasure hunter was surprised to see the sword glowing in a gentle blue hue easily shing through the me wall that was supposed to defend him.


    "Argh! I-I got careless¡­!" Letting out a howl of pain as the sword easily cut into both his arms, the treasure hunter hastily began retreating with all his might as Xuan Hao followed after him, trying to keep him in ce.


    "Big Brother! I got you!" Just as Xuan Hao was about to sh through the arms of the treasure hunter''s leader, the man with the giant hammer arrived just in the nick of time as he swung his giant hammer down towards Xuan Hao. Forcing him to momentarily stop to block the attack.


    BOOM!


    Xuan Hao firmly held onto his sword as he blocked the giant hammer, causing a spider web of cracks to spread through the ground beneath his feet with him as the centre.


    Stumbling backwards from the impact generated when colliding with Xuan Hao''s sword, the treasure hunter wielding the giant hammer barely manged to react as Xuan Hao performed three rapid sword attacks.


    ng~


    The sound of the sword colliding with the giant hammer sounded out three times in a row as the treasure hunter wielding the giant hammer felt his hands grow numb under the huge weight each of the three sword attacks put on him. The ground beneath his feet shattering with each attack he blocked.


    Not being able to bear the weight and strength of the attacks performed by Xuan Hao any longer, the treasure hunter wielding the giant hammer tried to retreat as he regretted helping out his leader.


    But it was far toote for regret as Xuan Hao used the opportunity that he showed when retreating, tounch a fatal attack.


    "Argh!" The sword attack hit the moment the treasure hunter was about to retreat as it pierced directly into the heart of the treasure hunter, causing him to let out a howl of pain before his blood sttered onto the ground beneath his feet.


    This however did not seem to have killed the treasure hunter, even when the blue sword qi from Xuan Hao''s sword began to ravage the insides of his body. The treasure hunter was still someone at the Nascent Soul Realm and his vitality was way strongerpared to someone who would die after losing a vital part of their physical body.


    So, with hisst remaining energy, the treasure hunter decisively chose to discard his physical body and try to escape with his Nascent Soul.


    Unfortunately for him, Xuan Hao had already prepared for something like this as he waved one of his hands, causing a new sword to appear out of thin air before channelling his sword qi into it.


    This was a backup sword Xuan Hao had brought with him and when he found the interspatial ring, he had stored it in there together with the rest of the things he had picked up along the way.


    "Wha-" The sword suddenly appearing out of thin air next to Xuan Hao caught the treasure hunter off guard as the sword suddenly flew over and directly pierced through his Nascent Soul.


    Killing him in an instant!


    "One left for me¡­" The fight between Xuan Hao and the treasure hunter only took a few seconds from start to finish as Xuan Hao had easily dealt with him.


    The treasure hunter was only at the second stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and could not present too much of a challenge to Xuan Hao, as he did not even have to use his pseudo domain to kill him.


    ncing over at where Chi Hu was, Xuan Hao saw that he was doing fine against the alchemist treasure hunter throwing his weird potions all over the ce in an attempt to injure Chi Hu.


    "I will go after the one who ran away, you should be fine here!" Calling out to Chi Hu, Xuan Hao did not waste any time as he chased after the leader of the treasure hunters, who had run away the moment he realized Xuan Hao was too strong for them to deal with.


    Leaving his two teammates behind in the process¡­

 Chapter 175: Potion + Potion = Boom!

    <h4>Chapter 175: Potion + Potion = Boom!</h4>


    Hearing Xuan Hao call out to him, Chi Hu did not have any time to look over as he remained focused on the opponent in front of him.


    The alchemist treasure hunter and Chi Hu had already fought each other for a bit, as Chi Hu tried to close the distance and get an attack in, while the alchemist treasure hunter kept him at a constant distance with all his weird potions.


    It had to be known that the explosions and other effects brought along by the potions was nothing to scoff at, as Chi Hu had felt it personally when he had been hit by one of them, forcing him to retreat before a few more came flying his way.


    Even at the Nascent Soul Realm, he would not be able to survive being hit by too many of the treasure hunter''s weird potions¡­


    The effect of the different potions far exceed what Chi Hu had witnessed in the past as they came with all sorts of weird effects outside of the normal explosions that he had seen before.


    From creating arge cloud of freezing air that froze him in ce, to a giant electric explosion that far exceeded the strength someone in the first stage of the Nascent Soul Realm should be able to produce.


    "Fry!" Throwing yet another potion bottle in his direction, Chi Hu dodged to the side as the potion bottle exploded upon hitting the ground in a fiery explosion. Leaving behind a pool of red liquid on that bubbled menacingly. Warning Chi Hu that stepping on it was not a good idea.


    "How do I even move close to him? Do I just wait for him to run out of potions to throw?" Thinking about what to do, Chi Hu felt that the chance of him being able to sessfully dodge all the time until the treasure hunter ran out of potions was unlikely.


    After all, the small potion bottles were plenty and Chi Hu could easily spot a few dozen on the outside of the treasure hunter''s robe.


    "Explode!" Not waiting for Chi Hu toe up with any ns, the alchemist treasure hunter threw out two different potions, one bright red giving off a terrifying heat, while the other was a dark purple with small electric sparks circling around the potion bottle itself.


    Chi Hu only managed to set up a quick defensive barrier to block the attack, as the two potion bottles hit the ground right in front of him.


    Boom Boom!


    Followed by this, they both exploded and as the content from the two potions met each other and caused a reaction, Chi Hu could only stare on helplessly as an evenrger and more deadly explosion spread out from the ce that the two potions content met each other and soon Chi Hu and the surrounding trees were engulfed in an evenrger explosion.


    BOOM!


    The explosion created by the content of the two potions reacting to each other was far more deadly and soon even the alchemist treasure hunter who threw out the two potions ended up affected by it, as he began throwing out different kinds of potions that caused the explosion to weaken as he soon put up his own barriers to defend himself from the explosion.


    Chi Hu on the other hand was not so lucky, as all he could do was try to retreat as he kept putting up new barriers to block the explosion.


    "Hah hah¡­" Finally making his way out of the explosion as things slowly began to calm down again, Chi Hu exhaustedly tried to breathe again as he felt pain throughout his entire body.


    The alchemist treasure hunter was far stronger than he had expected!


    Even as both of them had ended up injured due to the earlier explosion, Chi Hu knew very well that he had exhausted arge amount of qi to defend against the explosion, while his opponent only used a small amount of his qi reserves.


    If things continued like this, he would end uppletely exhausting all the qi in his body! And by that point, even if he could draw in qi from the surrounding environment to recover, he would still end up at the mercy of his opponent!


    Whoosh!


    Not wanting to end up in such a state, Chi Hu decided to go on the offensive, even if he would end up getting hit by a few of the alchemist treasure hunter''s potion bottles along the way.


    "You dare!" Seeing Chi Hu charging over towards him, the alchemist treasure hunter put on a disdainful look as he took out a few more potion bottles and threw them towards Chi Hu.


    Dodge!


    Chi Hu''s mind wanted him to dodge all the iing potion bottles, but he knew that if he did that, he would just end up at his previous situation and could only helplessly look on as his opponent could slowly exhaust his qi reserves without spending much of his own in the process.


    Boom!


    Psch~


    So, with his mind set, Chi Hu decided to run into the few potions he knew had a less damaging effect on him. Dodging the deadly explosions created by one potion and instead charging into the freezing cloud created by another, trying to minimize the damage he took with each wave of potion bottles thrown at him.


    "Agh! I got careless¡­!" Seeing Chi Hu arriving in front of him full of bloody wounds and other injuries, the alchemist treasure hunter immediately wanted to retreat, but Chi Hu was faster than him as he swung down his wooden staff!


    "No, you don''t!" As he swung the wooden staff, it shone brightly as Chi Hu executed one of his qi techniques to empower the staff as the alchemist treasure hunter hastily tried to set up a few barriers to block the wooden staff of Chi Hu to no avail.


    Bonk!


    The staff easily tore through the few flimsy barriers of the alchemist treasure hunter and directly contacted with the head of the alchemist treasure hunter.


    "I¡­" Before he managed to say anything more, the alchemist treasure hunter felt his world go dark as he fell unconscious.


    The attack earlier by Chi Hu had directly injured both his physical and Nascent Soul, forcing him to fall unconscious.


    "Hah¡­ Finally done¡­ Hah¡­ I will have to ask Elder Xuan¡­ Hah¡­ How to deal with this guy when he returns! At least we should be able to gain some useful information on some treasures¡­" Breathing irregrly as he tried to absorb as much of the surrounding qi between heaven and earth as possible to recover, Chi Hu exhaustedlyid down on the ground as he looked over at the unconscious alchemist treasure hunter.


    He did not just kill off his opponent like Xuan Hao had and instead kept him for questioning, it had to be remembered that their opponents were treasure hunters!


    Who knew how much information a treasure hunter had on them? From information regarding locations of ancient ruins, to information of the secret realm. Treasure hunters would always have an ocean of information when it came to things like this!


    Even the Explorer Union who focused on exploring these kinds of ces could be considered slightly inferior to treasure hunters when it came to gathering information about ancient treasures and their locations!

 Chapter 176: Escape of the Treasure Hunter, Cave Edition

    <h4>Chapter 176: Escape of the Treasure Hunter, Cave Edition</h4>


    As Chi Hu knocked the alchemist treasure hunter unconscious, Xuan Hao moved deeper into the ancient forest. Following closely behind the leader of the treasure hunters, who frantically used all the speed he could muster as he attempted to escape from Xuan Hao.


    But this was of no use, as the leader of the treasure hunters felt Xuan Hao getting closer and closer with each passing second.


    In just a few moments, he would catch up to him and the leader of the treasure hunters did not dare to let this happen.


    Looking around anxiously, the leader of the treasure hunters spotted a cave surround by a terrifying aura of a high-level demon beast and with a determined look he dived straight into the cave, using a special technique to elerate him forward. Momentarily giving him more speed than Xuan Hao at the cost of his qi running out quicker.


    Xuan Hao did not fall behind in the slightest either and without caring much about the aura of a powerful demon beasting from the inside, he soon entered the same cave as the leader of the treasure hunters.


    Making sure to slow down a bit so the demon beasts inside would attack the leader of the treasure hunters first and giving himself some space to escape in case the demon beasts inside were too strong.


    The cave itself wasrge enough to easily allow a group of demon beasts to nest inside of it and Xuan Hao also thought that he would finally get a chance to see a Nascent Soul Realm demon beast after crossing over the barrier that the giant pirs created for the demon beast.


    But upon traveling through the cave for a few minutes, he was disappointed upon discovering that no demon beast came out to attack the leader of the treasure hunter in front of him.


    Allowing the leader of the treasure hunters enter what was supposedly a nest of Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts without any trouble¡­


    "Guess I will have to catch him myself¡­" Extinguishing the thoughts about having the demon beasts inside the cave deal with the leader of the treasure hunters for him, Xuan Hao increased his speed as he moved deeper into the cave.


    Unaware of the entrance itself slowly closing off behind him, with the rocks from the surroundings gathering together to seal off the entrance.


    ¡­


    Having gained some distance from Xuan Hao as he entered the cave, the leader of the treasure hunters began to slow down as his cultivation couldn''t support using his movement technique for any longer.


    "Hah¡­ Hah¡­" Other than that, the leader of the treasure hunters had already used up most of his qi as he had a difficult time even moving at his normal speed under his current conditions, but upon remembering Xuan Hao behind him, he pushed his body to the limit as he continued deeper into the cave.


    The leader of the treasure hunters already knew a fair bit about the secret realm and was not scared of any Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts suddenly jumping him all of a sudden.


    All he had to do was make it through an exit located a little further into the cave and then Xuan Hao would end up stuck!


    The cave itself was a natural formation of sorts that the leader of the treasure hunters came upon when they split up to explore the area surrounding the ancient temple before grouping up to enter it together.


    What the group did not expect was that Xuan Hao and Chi Hu would arrive just as they were about to enter and clean the ce up!


    The leader of the treasure hunters angrily gritted his teeth upon thinking about this!


    Even if he managed to escape from Xuan Hao, he would still not be able to get any of the treasures from the temple! As for hispanions? He honestly did not care about them a lot and knew those two would have done the same in his situation¡­


    At most he would visit one of the gathering spots for treasure hunters after leaving the secret realm and pick up another two brothers to hunt with¡­ After all, being able to gang up on people three to one was important for winning with little to no risk and something all treasure hunters aspired to be able to do¡­


    Though¡­ Things did not always works as nned and even though the leader had judged Chi Hu as someone who just broken through to the second stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Weak enough for them to take on, he wasrgely mistaken when it came toparing Xuan Hao to be around the same level of strength¡­


    "Ah¡­ I wish I could go back in time-" Muttering this to himself full of regret as he moved through the cave, the leader of the treasure hunters was caught off guard when a giant paw filled with razor sharp ws suddenly came from the side and knocked him into the nearby cave wall.


    Crash!


    "Wha-" Still confused at his current situation, the leader of the treasure hunters stumbled a bit as he got up to look up at the person responsible.


    In front of him was a giant wolf at least 5 meters in length and over 2 meters in height. The aura of a Nascent Soul Realm demon beast could clearly be felt as a wave of terror washed over the leader of the treasure hunters. The shadow of death slowly beginning to engulf him as the giant wolf made its way over towards him.


    "How¡­ Are the demon beasts at the Nascent Soul Realm not supposed to remain sealed for the next week?!" The leader of the treasure hunters face grew pale as he questioned the giant wolf slowly making its way over towards him. Not understanding why, it had suddenly appeared.


    "ROAR!" The wolf only stopped for a moment to roar at him as it showed off its sharp fangs in the process before hungrily looking at the leader of the treasure hunters. Eating a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator was something rare for demon beasts toe upon and would help boost the cultivation of a demon beast.


    There were even some cases where Core Formation demon beast found the corpse of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert and manged to be a Nascent Soul demon beast after consuming it!


    The leader of the treasure hunters already knew about this and prepared to use all his strength to hold on for Xuan Hao.


    At this point he could not run away anymore as the qi inside his body had beenpletely exhausted from the earlier escape along with blocking the paw attack from the giant wolf in front of him.


    Escaping with his Nascent Soul was not an option either as the giant wolf was blocking the way in front of him, while the path behind him had already been sealed off by himself¡­


    All he could do now was hope Xuan Hao showed up a little earlier and distracted the giant wolf demon beast enough to allow him to slip away¡­ But the giant wolf did not seem to share the same idea as it pounced on him the moment it noticed his attention slipping.

 Chapter 177: Cave Wolves

    <h4>Chapter 177: Cave Wolves</h4>


    "Agh!" Just as Xuan Hao was about to catch up to the leader of the treasure hunters, a scream suddenly pierced through the formerly quiet cave as the roar of a demon beast could be heard up ahead.


    Xuan Hao did not slow down in the slightest upon hearing what was most likely the leader of the treasure hunter screaming out in pain as his divine rapidly began spreading out as it headed towards the location in front of him where the sound of the scream echoed out from.


    The thing that met him was the sight of a giant wolf gobbling up thest few remains of what he perceived to be the leader of the treasure hunters.


    Inspecting a little further into the cave with his divine sense, while trying his best not to be spotted by the giant wolf, Xuan Hao managed to sense at least another dozen wolfs hiding away in the darkness of the caves.


    All of them were in the Nascent Soul Realm! With most of them having reached the middle stages of the Nascent Soul Realm. The one currently in the process of devouring the remains of the leader of the treasure hunters had even reached theter stages of the Nascent Soul Realm and was at the seventh stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Guess there is no reason for me to stay here any longer¡­" Looking at his targets already dead body disappear into the mouth of the giant wolf, Xuan Hao decisively turned around to leave the cave before they managed to spot him.


    Fighting the group of Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts in front of him would be dangerous, even if he was stronger than the leader of the giant wolves, he still had to worry about the dozen or so wolves in the middle and early stages of the Nascent Soul Realm attacking him at the same time.


    This was not something Xuan Hao really wanted to do just for the fun of it¡­ After all, who knew if there were even more wolves hiding further into the cave and what would he do if they were stronger than the wolf currently in the process of devouring the treasure hunter''s body¡­?


    "Well¡­ This is troublesome¡­" Coming back to the ce where the entrance to the cave was located, Xuan Hao was met by a dead end as the former entrance was reced by a cave wall.


    Xuan Hao felt that the leader of the treasure hunters had done something when entering the cave back then¡­ Perhaps he knew about the giant wolves and wanted to die together with him?


    Even though Xuan Hao felt that this was unlikely given how the leader of the treasure hunters had abandoned his teammates so easily.


    Would someone like that want to give his own life in an attempt to take his opponent down with him?


    "No use thinking about it, I have to first find a way to get out of here before those wolves find me¡­" With this, Xuan Hao took out his sword and sent out a sword light towards the area that the entrance of the cave was located beforehand.


    Shuaa~


    A dazzling sword light took shape in an instant and moved towards the cave wall where the entrance had been located.


    Roar!


    "Not good!"


    As soon as the sword light formed, the giant wolves behind him felt the aura of the sword as they turned and saw the bright light from the sword intent lighting up the entire cave in front of them.


    Xuan Hao also sensed the giant wolves moving over towards him and felt like he had forgotten how bright his sword became when using a sword attack or something simr.


    Well¡­ It was not really his fault as he normally fought outside and in daylight where you did not really tend to focus on whether your attack was bright and shy,pared to the darkness of the cave where the only source of light was the sword attack used by Xuan Hao to smash the cave wall in front of him.


    Crash!


    As the sword light of Xuan Hao hit the cave wall and immediately began copsing as the outside world spread out before him, Xuan Hao used his sword to quickly fly out of the cave and over in the direction of the temple where Chi Hu should be waiting for him.


    Howl!


    Behind him, the howl of a wolf sounded out from deep within the cave, causing Xuan Hao to use all his strength to fly in the direction of Chi Hu as quickly as possible.


    The reason for this was simple¡­ The power behind the wolf howl earlier was from a half-step Domain Lord demon beast!


    Not something Xuan Hao wanted to fight with, especially not so when there were a few dozen Nascent Soul Realm wolves around it as well¡­


    ¡­


    Back at the temple, Chi Hu had just finished sealing off the cultivation of the alchemist treasure hunter as he had managed to recover some of his strength.


    Now he was just waiting for Xuan Hao to return or for the alchemist treasure hunter to wake up.


    "Hm? What is that? Isn''t that Elder Xuan!?" Looking up, Chi Hu got the shock of his life as he saw Xuan Hao descending down in front of him on top of his sword.


    "We don''t have time for this, we need to leave this ce-"


    Howl!


    Xuan Hao did not bother exining to him why he could fly despite not being in the Domain Lord Realm and was about to hurry him toe over when a loud howl sounded out in the distance.


    "Wh-what was that!?" Hearing the howl, Chi Hu felt the horrifying aura from that howl and began shivering at the thought of where it came from.


    "A demon beast half a step into the Domain Lord Realm and its group of friends, we have to leave before they arrive here! Do you want the treasure hunter to join us as well?" Discovering the unconscious body of the treasure hunter for the first time, Xuan Hao finished his quick exnation before asking.


    "Ah, if possible, he might know more about the secret realm that can help us in exploring it further¡­" Not really focusing much at the moment, Chi Hu starred frightenedly in the direction the howl came from as he exined.


    "I see, then we will take him with us as well!" Not waiting around for any longer, Xuan Hao picked up both Chi Hu and the unconscious treasure hunter before soaring into the sky in the direction of the giant pirs.

 Chapter 178: Wolves vs Barrier

    <h4>Chapter 178: Wolves vs Barrier</h4>


    As Xuan Hao picked up both Chi Hu and the unconscious alchemist treasure hunter, arge wolf easily towering over the giant wolf Xuan Hao had seen earlier. Made its way out of the cave as it looked around at the surrounding ancient trees towering far into the sky above.


    Howl!


    Raising its head high into the sky before howling loudly, arge number of wolves started pouring out from the interior of the cave as they began rushing out in all directions from the cave entrance.


    The amount of wolves present was also farrger than what Xuan Hao had expected with there being at least a few hundred wolves at the Core Formation Realm along with a few dozen at the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Spreading out from the entrance, the leader among the wolves looked on as the wolves began reiming their territory.


    Thissted only for a moment before the leader turned in the direction of the temple where Xuan Hao and Chi Hu had left only a few minutes prior.


    The next moment, the leader of the wolves appeared in front of the temple as it narrowed its eyes upon seeing the signs of battle present on the ground in front of it. Along with the dead body of the treasure hunter with the hammer.


    Howl!


    Howling loudly, a pack of wolves at the Nascent Soul Realm soon appeared in front of the temple as they waited patiently for their leader tomand them.


    Growl!


    After a fewmanding growling noises from the leader of the wolves, the group of wolves set off in the direction that Xuan Hao and Chi Hu had escaped in, while the leader of the wolves turned around after seeing the group leave and entered the now empty temple.


    ¡­


    "Hm¡­ We have already made it back past the pirs, we should be safe from the wolves for now¡­" Descending down from the air, Xuan Haonded in front of the pir that they had been staying at earlier, as he cautiously observed the dense ancient forest beyond the giant pir.


    "I think we should be fine¡­ I just hope we are right when ites to the fact that Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts not being able to cross over to this side of the giant pir." Standing down on the ground again, Chi Hu looked up at the giant pir with a nervous look on his face.


    Howl!


    A few minutes passed before a howl was heard in the distance as both Xuan Hao and Chi Hu observed a group of Nascent Soul Realm wolves make their way into the clearing where the giant pir was located.


    Grrr!


    The leader among the group of wolves growled threateningly upon seeing Xuan Hao and Chi Hu standing besides the pir as it began moving closer.


    "Looks like we will find out if the pir really blocks Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts¡­" Looking at the leader of the wolf group slowly making its way over, Chi Hu tightly held onto his staff. Ready to act in case anything happened.


    "?" The wolf was just about to cross the threshold of the giant pir when it suddenly stopped with a confused expression stered onto its face.


    Raising one of its paws, the wolf swung down at the area that blocked it and a light blue, almost transparent screen of light appeared to stop it at the area that the wolf paw hit.


    "Roar?" Letting out a confused sound, the wolf leader called for itspanions and soon all of them came up to try hitting the barrier.


    Like this, the wolves continued hitting the barrier for the next half hour before giving up and returning back into the ancient forest. The reason for them staying so long, was mostly because they seemed to find it fun whenever the barrier gave off a small bit of light wherever they hit it.


    "They finally left¡­" Looking at the disappearing figures of the wolves, Chi Hu let out a relived sigh.


    "It looks like your friend is also about to wake up." Pointing over in the direction of the unconscious treasure hunter, Chi Hu turned his attention over towards the treasure hunter upon hearing Xuan Hao''s words, as he observed the treasure hunter slowly began opening his eyes.


    "Ah! W-where am I!?" Looking around himself in a panicked state, the alchemist treasure hunter tried to mobilize his cultivation. Only to find that it had already been sealed away by Chi Hu earlier.


    Not only that his potions and other weapons hidden away on his body also seemed to be missing!


    "No need to continue searching, I already removed all your weird potions along with a few other weird objects!" Seeing the alchemist treasure hunter anxiously searching around his clothes, Chi Hu interrupted him.


    "W-what do you want¡­?" Realizing his situation, the alchemist treasure hunter stopped looking for potions and other weapons hidden away in his clothes as he nervously looked over at Chi Hu and Xuan Hao.


    By now he had already realized that he was kept alive by Chi Hu for something and if he could not provide it, he would have a high chance of ending up like brother hammer, who he had seen dying earlier at the hands of the person standing a small distance away from Chi Hu.


    Thinking about this, the alchemist treasure hunter decided that he would do his best to answer any question asked. Hoping they would allow him to leave alive if he fully cooperated with them.


    After all, for them to keep him alive without anything precious on him. The only thing desirable about him would be the information he had about the secret realm and other ancient ruins or possible locations of a future secret realm¡­


    Like this, the alchemist treasure hunter began to feel a little more determined as he remembered a few stories from other treasure hunters telling him about how they had been captured in the past and gotten away alive.


    The best way ording to other treasure hunters when it came to staying alive after being captured alive, was to disclose any and all information you were asked about truthfully!


    This way, the chances of survival would increase exponentially!

 Chapter 179: Interrogating the Alchemist Treasure Hunter

    <h4>Chapter 179: Interrogating the Alchemist Treasure Hunter</h4>


    "We only want the information that you have on the secret realm. After all, you treasure hunters would never enter a secret realm without ample preparation and knowing where the treasure inside is located¡­" Walking up the alchemist treasure hunter, Chi Hu narrowed his eyes as he asked the treasure hunter with a certain look on his face.


    Xuan Hao on the other hand stood a bit farther away and observed as Chi Hu began interrogating the treasure hunter. Not wanting to interfere in what he was doing. After all, Xuan Hao had never tried to interrogate anyone before, and Chi Hu seemed to know what he was doing at the very least¡­


    "So, do you know anything about the treasures inside the secret realm or perhaps where some of the important ces inside are located?!" Standing a bit back after finishing his question, Chi Hu waited for the treasure hunter to respond. Preparing to use some more questions in case he was unwilling to answer truthfully to those few simple ones.


    "Ah yes of course I do! Take the temple as an example, there was supposed to be a few pirs made out of rare metals inside ording to one of our sources. Apparently, it is the temple of an ancient god that ceased to exist long ago. The temple should be one of thest few from that ancient god left on the continent." Not hesitating in the slightest, the treasure answered truthfully as he even described the precious metal pirs inside of the temple.


    "I-I see, what about other important locations inside the secret realm or some of history behind it...?" Not expecting for the treasure hunter to answer without even trying to plead for his own life or ensure his own safety, Chi Hu was momentarily shocked as he soon began to question the treasure hunter further.


    "I don''t really know much outside the temple, as it was supposed to be the only ce we raided before leaving the secret realm. After all, we would not want to stay too long and wait for the entrance to get blocked off by those bigshots from the surrounding empires and strong entities¡­


    But outside of the temple, we also found out about a small pce located at the border the testing area holding an ancient artifact from the temple. However, going there would be suicide with our strength. So, we ended up deciding to just raid the temple." Shaking his head as he exined this, the treasure hunter had a regretful look on his face as talked about the small pce.


    "Why would it be suicide for you?" Thinking about it, Chi Hu realized that there were a bunch of dangerous demon beast along the way. Some even close to the Domain Lord Realm!


    "Hah¡­ The seal of the demon beast would expire before we even managed to reach the area and the entrance to the secret realm would have been sealed off by the bigshots of the different empires and other powerful entities by then¡­" Sighing regretfully at the thought of those bigshots taking away his treasures upon reaching the entrance of the secret realm, the treasure hunter became a bit depressed.


    The number of times he had ended up looting an ancient ruin. Only to have someonee over and take away all the artifacts because it was the "territory" of one of those bigshots¡­


    The treasure hunter knew very well that he could not afford to offend someone like that, so he was forced to give up his artifacts in order to keep his life safe. Truly a painful experience!


    "Seal on the demon beast¡­? What do you mean, we have seen several demon beast since entering the secret realm¡­" The confused voice of Xuan Hao echoed out from behind Chi Hu before he could ask.


    "Ah, it is only the demon beast at the Nascent Soul Realm and above that are sealed, though¡­ From what I know, the seal should naturally release one week after the opening of the secret realm. The core area should also be essible at that point. Most secret realms work like this, and this is also the reason why most bigshots only start appearing around one week after a secret realm opens.


    Treasure Hunters like me use this time period to get as many treasures as possible. Leaving before the bigshots arrive to seal off the area!" Answering confidently to Xuan Hao''s question, the treasure hunter proudly waited to see Xuan Hao and Chi Hu''s response.


    "But¡­ We have just seen a group of Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts¡­" Smiling wryly, Chi Hu could not help but question the treasure hunter as he still vividly remembered the terrifying wolf howl from earlier along with the group of Nascent Soul Realm wolves ying with the barrier between the Core Formation and Nascent Soul Realm area of the secret realm.


    "Hm!? W-wait¡­ A-are you sure¡­?" Freezing in ce, the treasure hunter began to look nervous all of a sudden as he asked in a shivering voice.


    "Yes? Perhaps the secret realm had already been open, and we just couldn''t enter it earlier¡­" Not understanding why, the treasure hunter looked so scared and nervous all of a sudden, Chi Hu could not help but ask him while thinking about the probability of the entrance already being open even though the gate leading inside was closed.


    After all, nobody went up and tried to open the gate manually during the time that they waited around for it to open by itself¡­


    "¡­"


    How do you think a secret realm works¡­? Is it something that can just be opened so easily without gathering an enormous amount of qi¡­?


    "The secret realm was not opened before the entrance opened up by itself¡­ This can only mean that this secret realm''s seal on the demon beast somehow weakened significantly..." Shaking his head a bit as he brushed aside Chi Hu''s idea. The treasure hunter narrowed his eyes upon reaching thest part.


    "Meaning¡­?" Feeling the serious and nervous tone in the treasure hunter''s speech, Chi Hu could not help himself from Urging for him to continue.


    "Meaning¡­"

 Chapter 180: Seal of The Secret Realms Demon Beasts

    <h4>Chapter 180: Seal of The Secret Realm''s Demon Beasts</h4>


    "Meaning¡­ Something inside the secret realm managed to weaken the seal¡­ From what I know, it should have been a demon beast reaching a certain stage in its cultivation where the seal of the secret realm was no longer able to supress it any longer¡­" Finishing his exnation, the treasure hunter shivered at the thought of the demon beast in question.


    "How strong would the demon beast be¡­ For it to be able to weaken the seal¡­?" Feeling the seriousness of the treasure hunter, Chi Hu felt a bit curious.


    "I-I don''t know, but the seal is able to seal early-stage Domain Lord demon beasts without too much trouble, so it should at least be above that¡­" Shaking his head, the treasure hunter had no idea how strong a demon beast capable of weakening the sealid out by the past master of the secret realm would be.


    Late stage of the Domain Lord Realm? Peak stage of the Domain Lord Realm? Maybe above that¡­?


    The treasure hunter did not dare to think any further about it, as the demon beast in question was far above his own realm and killing him would be as easy as swatting a random fly to death.


    "So, a demon beast that strong might be running around freely inside the secret realm¡­?" Shivering at the thought of possibly running into such a terrifying demon beast, Chi Hu eximed loudly.


    The thought of them being able to run into such a terrifying demon beast was not something either Xuan Hao or Chi Hu enjoyed. Leaving the secret realm at the fastest speed possible suddenly became their top priority.


    "Ah! Don''t get me wrong. The demon beast should still be sealed, it just weakened the seal enough for the demon beast below the Domain Lord Realm to be free faster. The final part of the seal should still be able tost for a few more days!" Trying his best to ensure both Chi Hu and Xuan Hao, the treasure hunter hurriedly exined.


    "I see, but it is still bing dangerous for us to stay¡­ Xuan Hao, what do you say we head back and leave before things get any more dangerous? We already got a few techniques and some good metal for cksmithing; I think leaving before things be too dangerous would be a good idea and we would still gain something from it¡­" Listing to what the treasure hunter said, Chi Hu still thought it would be too dangerous to stay inside the secret realm. After all, who knew how the bigshots would respond when they found out about the situation inside the secret realm!?


    The treasure hunter was standing beside Chi Hu as he nodded his head in agreement with what he said.


    Staying in the secret realm was way too dangerous and the only ce he knew about with anything worthwhile in it, was inside the Nascent Soul Realm area where demon beasts close to the Domain Lord Realm were nesting!


    Going there before they were unsealed was already dangerous due to how far he would have to travel. Let alone now that the demon beasts were beginning to get out of their sealed state earlier than expected!


    "You can leave, I will stay around a little longer and see if I can enter the Nascent Soul Realm area at another ce where the wolves are not at¡­ I am more than capable of getting out if it truly does get dangerous¡­" Thinking over it for a moment, Xuan Hao decided to stay inside of the secret realm for a few days more. After all, in the worst case scenario, he could still just use his sword and fly away from any dangerous situation and with the Domain Lord Realm demon beasts still sealed, Xuan Hao did not think he would end up in a situation too dangerous for him to get out of.


    "Fine, but you have to remember that staying for too long will increase the chances of the entrance being sealed off¡­ I will go to the sect and wait for you there!" Saying this, Chi Hu prepared to leave the secret realm alone.


    "What about the treasure hunter¡­?" Seeing Chi Hu about to leave, Xuan Hao quickly reminded him as both of them turned their attention over to the treasure hunter quietly observing them from the side.


    "Hm¡­ I think we should just let him go! It''s not like he knows us or anything and I don''t believe he would take revenge or anything in the future for the other two treasure hunters. From what I can tell they just grouped up to hunt for treasures together without any real connection between them other than the same desire to find treasures¡­


    This is normal for treasure hunters as most of the groups of them out there are set up like this. Other than that, he also answered our questions and didn''t really cause any trouble for us¡­" Chi Hu and Xuan Hao both looked over at the treasure hunter that was currently sweating bullets as he knew whatever came next would decide his fate.


    "Let''s just allow him to leave then but remember to only do it when you have left the secret realm. After that, you can unseal his cultivation and allow for him to go back to what he was doing beforehand¡­


    Wait¡­ wouldn''t he just return to being a treasure hunter¡­" Realizing that the idea of releasing the treasure hunter might actually not be such a good idea upon further contemtion, Xuan Hao stopped in his tracks as he thoughtfully began to inspect the treasure hunter, causing him to shiver in fear.


    "Indeed, what you say is true¡­" Nodding in agreement with what Xuan Hao said, Chi Hu also began to look over the treasure hunter. Trying to think of a solution.


    Won''t I end up dead if things continue like this!?


    Seeing the situation developing in a direction that the treasure hunter knew very well was not good for him or his future, he decided to find a way out for himself!

 Chapter 181: Treasure Hunters Life Story...?

    <h4>Chapter 181: Treasure Hunter''s Life Story...?</h4>


    "A-actually I-I never really wanted to be a treasure hunter in the first ce¡­ I only became a treasure hunter in the past due to the different herbs I needed for alchemy being way too expensive for me to get without bing a treasure hunter." Finishing what he wanted to say, both Xuan Hao and Chi Hu did not know how to respond.


    You''re an alchemist, couldn''t you just sell the potions or pills you made and earn more that way?


    Both Xuan Hao and Chi Hu''s face seemed to say this as the treasure hunter sighed a bit before continuing.


    "The reason I didn''t settle down and just be and normal alchemist at some sect or kingdom, was that the direction of my research is quite¡­ Unique. Compared to what ordinary alchemists will focus on doing¡­ So, nobody was ever willing to buy any of the things I made¡­


    The only people that showed a bit interest in the things I made were a group of demonic cultivators I met when out adventuring in the past¡­" Upon reaching the end, the treasure hunter wore a distressed look. Bing more and more depressed after remembering his past struggles as a young alchemist.


    "What is it that you were so focused on researching? Does it have anything to do with the potions you threw at me earlier¡­?" Listening to the treasure hunter, Chi Hu felt what he said made some sense, but why would people not want to buy his potions?


    From what he had experienced first-hand, they seemed to be able to injure someone in the Nascent Soul Realm! Selling them would surely be a big hit and good way to earn a lot of spirit stones to buy whatever he needed¡­


    "Yes, it is the potions I threw at you earlier¡­" Talking about this, the treasure hunter looked embarrassed as he calmed down before continuing.


    "But the potions themselves can be considered a part of what I am studying and just producing those few potions I threw at you earlier would easily be worth a few high-grade spirit stones¡­ The price that I would sell the potions at was way too high for anyone to want them in the first ce.


    Only those few demonic cultivators were interested in a few of them as it would help their cultivation after consumption or something along that line." Shaking his head as he thought of the weird looks people gave him every time he went to try and sell his potions at a market for cultivators, the treasure hunter became even more sad. Making both Xuan Hao and Chi Hu feel bad for him.


    "Maybe we should think about it for a bit longer¡­ Chi Hu, just take him back to the sect for now and we will get things sorted out after I return! Also, ask the Alchemy Hall to look into the potions that this guy made. Maybe they will find something useful from it!" Thinking about it over for a few minutes as the treasure hunter nervously observed him together with Chi Hu, Xuan Hao decided to bring him back to the sect for now and find out what to do with him after returning from the secret realm.


    For now, Xuan Hao did not want to waste any more time on the alchemist treasure hunter and try to figure out what to do with him.


    "Yes! Then, I will take my leave for now Elder Xuan! I hope to see you at the sect safely again soon!" Agreeing with what Xuan Hao said, Chi Hu grabbed onto the treasure hunter before taking off in the direction of the entrance to the secret realm.


    "Now that I think about it¡­ Did I remember to inform the Flying Sword Sect about recruiting someone new for the sect¡­? I probably did¡­!" Throwing the sudden thought to the back of his mind as he observed Chi Hu''s leaving figure, Xuan Hao soon jumped on top of his sword and once again flew into the Nascent Soul Realm area of the secret realm.


    The difference this time, was that he first decided to fly along the edge for some time before going deeper into the Nascent Soul Realm area. Not wanting to run into the recently unsealed wolf close to the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    ¡­


    "Hm? It seems someone already arrived at the edge before me¡­" As Xuan Hao was making his way deeper into the Nascent Soul Realm area outside the territory of a certain wolf pack, a person dressed like a simple wanderer appeared in the air above Chi Hu and the treasure hunter making their way back towards the entrance of the secret realm.


    "Just someone in the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ Looks like I''m worried over nothing!" The somewhat cautious look that started to form on the wanderer as he observed the two below him disappeared the moment, he felt the two''s cultivation realm. No longer deeming them to be a potential threat.


    "The firstyer of the formation should be just up ahead, perhaps those two encountered the formation and decided to go back?" Thinking about this, the wanderer soon disappeared from the spot above Chi Hu and the treasure hunter.


    Appearing directly in front of the pir Xuan Hao and Chi Hu had spent a day cultivating after half an hour of flying.


    "T-this is?! WHAT INSANE PERSON MADE SOMETHING LIKE THIS!?" Screaming in shock as he saw the giant pir piercing through the sky above, the wanderer felt a wave of terror wash over him.


    "Whoever made this formation is far above the Master Realm when ites to formations¡­ Looks like this is not an ordinary secret realm!" Feeling both excited and scared upon realizing this, the wanderer stared at the giant pir for a few minutes before deciding to spend the next day quietly studying the giant formation pir before making his way deeper into the secret realm.


    At this point, the wanderer knew very well that he could not waste too much time as the big empire would soon find out about the secret realm and seal it off to wandering cultivators like himself and force him to hand over everything upon leaving.


    Even then, just studying the formation pir for a single day had brought him immense benefits when it came to his own study as a formation expert. This was simply not something he could give up on and even if the entrance was sealed, he would still be able to keep the knowledge that he learned after studying the formation pir!

 Chapter 182: Flying up into the Sky Above~

    <h4>Chapter 182: Flying up into the Sky Above~</h4>


    The path through the ancient forest was quiet and Xuan Hao did not manage to spot any other Nascent Soul Realm beast like the group of wolves from earlier, so they were most likely one of the first groups of demon beasts inside the secret realm that had ended up being unsealed earlier than expected.


    This was good news for Xuan Hao, as he would not have to deal with all sorts of flying demon beastsing up to attack him while flying over the ancient forest as he made his way towards the small pce located at the border between the Nascent Soul realm area and the ce where the few Domain Lord Realm demon beasts inside the secret realm were located.


    Hopefully what the treasure hunter had said about the small pce was true and he would be able to gain quite a lot from his visit to the secret realm!


    Xuan Hao really was curious about what sort of ancient artifact was stored in the pce at the border between the two areas, perhaps it had something to do with the formation covering the secret realm, seeing as it was located at the border where the formation pirs were also present.


    "Well, I will find out when I get there¡­"


    Flying high above the ancient tress below, Xuan Hao suddenly thought about something.


    Normally, when he flew too high up on the outside, he would feel the pressure increase as the qi between heaven and earth grew denser and denser until it reached a point where it became unbearable for him to move any higher up.


    Xuan Hao felt a bit curious if things were the same in a secret realm and decided to try it out.


    Whoosh~


    With a quick change in direction, Xuan Hao flew straight up into the air.


    Bang!


    Without knowing what even happened, Xuan Hao flew full speed into an invisible wall in front of him. Falling off his sword in the process as he began falling down towards the ancient forest below.


    "What the hell! Howe there is an invisible wall!?" Cursing a bit at the creator of the secret realm, Xuan Hao felt a bit shaken that he had not even managed to discover that there was an invisible wall of sorts directly in front of him until it was toote.


    "Perhaps that was the edge of the secret realm?" Thinking about it, Xuan Hao nodded a bit at his own conclusion. After all, a secret realm was nowhere as big as the outside world and there had to be a limit to it of some sort. The qi between heaven and earth did not change either as he ascended. Always staying on the same level as it was on the ground.


    "Hm? What is that?" As he was falling down towards the ancient forest, Xuan Hao discovered something below him and failed to see it beforehand as he was too focused on making his way to the border before the demon beast there began to break free of their seal.


    But the thing in front of him was not something he could ignore as it literally screamed to be something from the test that had once been a thing in the ancient forest.


    After getting closer, Xuan Hao made out that the thing to be a giant stone monument standing tall beneath the ancient trees.


    Without looking down from the angle he was currently falling from, Xuan Hao would have never spotted the stone monument hidden beneath the ancient tress.


    Whoosh~


    Waving his hand, Xuan Hao''s sword intent spread out and covered his sword falling a few meters away from him and soon stabilized a few hundred meters above the ancient trees.


    "Guess I will have to check it out now that I found it¡­" Not really thinking much about it, Xuan Hao descended down to the ground and made his way over to the stone monument hiding beneath the ancient trees.


    The stone monument had several cracks running through it as the decay brought about by the passage of time was clear to see.


    Walking up to the monument, Xuan Hao discovered a small path close to it spreading out towards the surroundings. Sadly, whatever the path led to had long since decayed with the passage of time as only the stone monument itself was left barely standing.


    "There are some words on it¡­ Names?" Narrowing his eyes, Xuan Hao tried to use his divine sense to make out the names on the stone monument and soon came upon the name of the stone monument itself.


    But things were not that great as a giant crack had formed at the top where the title was located. Only allowing the few words reading out Nascent Soul Ranking to remain.


    [Nascent Soul Ranking]


    That was what Xuan Hao managed to make out from the few words at the top of the monument, this made Xuan Hao curious. Maybe some of the names on the rankings would be from people that had existed in the past?


    After spending some time reading through the few history books in the giant pagoda close to the entrance of the secret realm, Xuan Hao became a bit familiar with the history of the outside world during the era that the secret realm was still up and running normally under the sect behind it and hoped he would be able to recognize some of the famous names mentioned in the history books.


    "Hm¡­ Firestarter, Fluffy Fist, Death Incarnate, Daoist Fluffy Cloud¡­ What are these weird nicknames?" With the few topmost name being impossible to view due to the numerous cracks running through the stone monument, Xuan Hao could only view the ones at the middle and bottom of the stone monument.


    But this did not help in the slightest as it was filled with all sorts of weird nicknames. Making Xuan Hao think that one of the sect rules was to pick a silly nickname¡­


    Shaking his head in disappointment after realizing that he did not read about any of the names before, Xuan Hao decided to just throw it to the back of his mind for now and look over the history books back in the sect and see if any of the silly names showed up.

 Chapter 183: Stone Monument, Enlightenment!

    <h4>Chapter 183: Stone Monument, Enlightenment!</h4>


    Other than memorizing the few names still visible on the stone monument, Xuan Hao also focused on the stone monument itself as the aura of a cultivator could be felt behind each nickname on the stone monument. Suggesting that the people themselves had etched their name into the stone monument in past.


    From this, Xuan Hao could also sense a part of the strength they had when they etched their name into the stone monument in the past.


    The strength of those at the bottom of the stone monument were around the middle stages of the Nascent Soul Realm, while those in the middle areas like Daoist Fluffy Cloud were around theter stages of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The ones on the top on the other hand were not at the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. Instead, they were not at a specific realm, some being in theter stage, while others were in the middle or early stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    But they all had one thing inmon and that was the fact that the wisp of aura they left behind on the stone monument contained a pseudo domain! Or at the very least a trace of a pseudo domain¡­


    This should be the geniuses of the past sect¡­


    Xuan Hao felt a bit bad when he thought about his own pseudo domain¡­ Maybe he should work harder in the future? After all, someone seemed to have been able to get a pseudo domain just after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm here!


    How strong would someone like that be after a few hundred years? And a sect with such powerful people behind it had fallen!


    All of a sudden, Xuan Hao remembered that there would always be someone stronger than him. This was after all a cultivation world, and he didn''t know how many savage or ruthless main characters were out there!?


    "Hah¡­ No use thinking about this, I just have to get strong enough and I won''t have to worry so much about it¡­" Sighing to himself, Xuan Hao did not think any deeper about it and decided to focus on trying to see if he couldprehend anything useful from the different pseudo domain still barely surviving in the remaining aura left from the past cultivators who etched their name into the stone monument.


    The different pseudo domain was not as useful to Xuan Haopared to the domain left in the giant formation pir, but it would still be useful as a reference to improving his own pseudo domain further.


    And with so many different pseudo domains present, Xuan Hao would be able to learn more about how a pseudo domain was supposed to be set up.


    After all, he did not really have anyone to guide him on the path to constructing his pseudo domain, outside of [The Untold Swords Mantra] cultivation mantra. The past geniuses on the other hand, would have their elders help them and would definitely have a far more stable and stronger pseudo domainpared to him!


    Sitting down in front of the stone monument, Xuan Hao closed his eyes as he let his divine sense spread out and engulf one of the past genius''s pseudo domain, trying his best to fullyprehend the pseudo domain and find out what concept that the pseudo domain was created with.


    When Xuan Hao tried toprehend the domain inside the formation pir in the past, he could not fully enter it with his divine sense like he was doing now. Only capable of observing the domain from outside without being able to truly try andprehend the domain up close.


    The pseudo domains still remaining on the stone monument on the other hand, were not isted by anything at all.


    Allowing Xuan Hao to freely observe and touch the different pseudo domain with his divine sense attempting to learn what he could before they used up thest remaining energy in them and dispersed.


    "Earth Domain?" The first pseudo domain Xuan Hao'' divine sense engulfed was a pseudo earth domain.


    From The pseudo earth domain, Xuan Hao felt an indestructible will. Standing tall even against the worst disasters. Compared to it, Xuan Hao felt his own pseudo domain was fragile and could break at even the slightest impact from the pseudo earth domain.


    Of course, this was not true and was just Xuan Hao''s imagination. After all, what remained of the pseudo earth domain was far from enough to do something like that.


    The past owner of the pseudo earth domain should only have been at the middle stages of the Nascent Soul Realm, but Xuan Hao still felt a wave of helplessness wash over him when it came to the past genius''s pseudo domain.


    The domain was far superior to his own!


    Summoning his own pseudo domain, Xuan Haopared the two as several ws began appearing in his own pseudo domain.


    These ws were not something Xuan Hao could see before, but whenparing to another pseudo domain, they became as clear as day to him.


    "I was way too hasty with my domain¡­" Feeling the countless wless suddenly appearing in front of him, Xuan Hao knew very well that if he broke through to the Domain Lord Realm like this, he would be among the weakest Domain Lords as his Domain would end up filled with countless ws for his opponent to make use of.


    "I see¡­ So, the pseudo domain is there for me to mend the mistakes before creating my own domain and breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm!" Feeling like he understood something important, Xuan Hao entered state of enlightenment as he unconsciously began engulfing the rest of the pseudo domains on the stone monument.


    Like this, Xuan Hao unconsciously began to fix the different mistakes in his pseudo domain as his pseudo domain grew stronger and stronger under the constant refinement and improvement.


    A m breeze swept through the area as Xuan Hao was quietly sitting beneath the stone monument. The terrifying growth of his pseudo sword domain could not be sensed at all as he just looked like an ordinary young man quietly meditating to any outsider passing by.


    Unknowingly, his pseudo sword domain reached a brand-new realm.


    Even if his cultivation realm remained the same, his strength had undergone a huge change!

 Chapter 184: Towards the border of the Nascent Soul Realm Area!

    <h4>Chapter 184: Towards the border of the Nascent Soul Realm Area!</h4>


    As his pseudo sword domain grew stronger, Xuan Hao was fully absorbed in his cultivation and did not discover that the remains of the pseudo domains on the stone monument slowly disappeared as his own pseudo sword domain grew.


    This continued over the next few days as Xuan Hao was fully immersed.


    During this period of time, the wanderer at the? Domain Lord Realm reached the same area and was only a few hundred meter above Xuan Hao before quickly flying by. Not discovering Xuan Hao in the ancient forest below as his aura hadpletely merged together with the surrounding environment.


    A day after the wanderer had passed by Xuan Hao, he finally opened his eyes and calmy observed the surroundings as he felt his pseudo domain engulfing the area a few meters away from him.


    The pseudo sword domain was not activated by Xuan Hao but was instead passively merged into the surrounding environment as a sharp sword intent could be felt from Xuan Hao with every move he made.


    At the current moment, Xuan Hao felt that all he needed was a single thought to manifest his sword qi into a deadly attack.


    "So, this is what a domain is like¡­" Waving his hand, Xuan Hao caused a sword made out of sword qi to manifest directly in front of him without any effort.


    Whoosh~


    Pointing in the direction of a nearby ancient tree, Xuan Hao watched as the sword flew forward and easily cut through the giant ancient tree, causing the giant tree to crash into the ground below.


    The newfound power of his pseudo domain allowed him an even greater control over his sword qi and strengthened his sword intent at the same time. Making all his attacks even stronger than they were before.


    "It has already been two days¡­ I should hurry¡­" Looking over at the now empty stone monument, Xuan Hao quickly deduced the time he had spent improving his pseudo sword domain and felt a sense of urgency upon recalling the fact that the demon beasts were being unsealed earlier than expected.


    The fact that he had used two days already, could potentially force him to give up on the small pce and the ancient treasure inside mentioned by the treasure hunter¡­


    But Xuan Hao did not really regret it, as his strength had improved, and he felt even more clear at how he should reach the Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    Even if he had to give up on the ancient treasure mentioned by the treasure hunter, Xuan Hao still felt that it was worth it for him!


    Not wasting anymore time staying around the stone monument, Xuan Hao cast onest look towards the stone monument and the names etched onto it before a sword floated out in front of him.


    Jumping onto his sword, Xuan Hao quickly ascended into the sky and flew in the direction of the small pce mentioned by the treasure hunter.


    Flying through the air, Xuan Hao also discovered that his speed had improved by arge margin. At this rate, he should be able to reach the small pce located at the border between the Nascent Soul Realm area and the Domain Lord Realm area within a few hours!


    ¡­


    As Xuan Hao was making his way over in the direction of the border area, the wanderer from earlier had already managed to make it and had just finished inspecting one of the formation pirs located there.


    "These are so much more impressivepared to the first pair¡­ I really wonder what kind of crazy bastard wasted so many resources to construct them and why¡­ These things should not be required to seal some demon beasts in the Domain Lord Realm, heck, even someone above the domain lord realm could be sealed by this formation if that was its purpose¡­" The pirs at the border between the Nascent Soul Realm area and the Domain Lord area were widely different as the ones present here were smaller and looked more minimalistic, with only a few symbols visible on them.


    The wanderer did not let this simple exterior fool him, as he clearly knew about the terrifying might hidden beneath the surface of these pirs.


    Even if a single one of those pirs were used as a formation core to execute a killing formation, the wanderer knew very well his only option would be death!


    This just made the wanderer even more interested in the core of this giant formation. After all, for the formation to be stable meant that the formation core was able to supress all the auxiliary parts and keep them operating.


    The strength of the formation core could easily be seen just from this, and the wanderer wanted nothing more than to find it and study how it was able to operate such a giant formation!


    "Sadly, it looks like things are going to get difficult from here on out¡­" Staring at the area beyond the formation pir, the wanderer locked eyes with a giant worm like creature slithering around on the ground in front of him.


    The worm like creature was at the Domain Lord Realm! The same realm as the wanderer himself!


    But the wanderer did not back down as he took out his wooden staff and made his way over towards the giant worm like creature beyond the formation pir.


    The wanderer did not wait for the worm like creature to react as he swung his staff down towards it. At the same time a calm ocean manifested behind the wanderer as a torrent of water qi merged together with the wooden staff, causing the wooden staff to shine with a bright blue light as the calm ocean behind the wanderer began to descend down towards the worm like creature together with the simple wooden staff.


    Boom!


    This took a lot of time to exin, but it happened in an instant as the worm like creature barely managed to react before the wooden staff hit it.


    Screech!


    A terrifying screech erupted from the worm like creature as it struggled under the wooden staff, but soon it was suppressed as the calm ocean descended and directly killed it.


    "At least the demon beasts around the border do not seem to have a domain yet¡­ Only their physical body reached the Domain Lord Realm¡­" Looking at the remains of the worm like creature, the wanderer only paid attention to it for a short moment before moving deeper into the Domain Lord area of the secret realm.

 Chapter 185: Pseudo Sword Domain Showing its Might!

    <h4>Chapter 185: Pseudo Sword Domain Showing it''s Might!</h4>


    Screech!


    "Another one..." Flying high above the ancient forest below him, Xuan Hao helplessly looked down as a giant crow demon beast flew towards him from the ancient forest below.


    The demon beasts flying up to attack him from time to time had bemon as Xuan Hao already knew that most of the demon beasts in the ancient forest below had already been unsealed at this point in time.


    At this point, the crow demon beast with a wingspan of at least a dozen or so meters arrived a few hundred meters away from Xuan Hao as it prepared tounch an attack, its ws giving off a dangerous feeling as it quickly closed the short distance between itself and Xuan Hao.


    "Screech!" Getting closer and closer to Xuan Hao who ignored it this entire time, the crow demon beast let out an angry screech as it ws shone in an eerie ck light before it was soon only a little over 10 meters away from him.


    "Screech?" It was at this point the giant crow demon beast suddenly noticed something weird as it felt the world around itself disappear and instead it was reced by an endless ocean of swords.


    The crow demon beast was fully engulfed in Xuan Hao''s pseudo sword domain and before it could react, the sword ocean swallowed it uppletely. Killing it instantly before it could let out onest screeching sound.


    On the outside, Xuan Hao looked over and saw the crow demon beast suddenly freeze for a moment before it was filled with countless sword wounds all over its body.


    Bang!


    The crow demon beast did not remain flying after the wounds appeared on its body and soon crashed into the ancient forest below.


    A group of demon beast nearby heard themotion and soon swarmed over to devour dead body of the crow demon beast.


    Xuan Hao did not pay any more attention to the dead crow demon beast and resumed his journey towards the border area of the Nascent Soul Realm area.


    What happened earlier was simply Xuan Hao using the power of his pseudo domain to kill the crow demon beast. The image that the crow demon beast had of a sword ocean engulfing and attacking it from all sides was simply the image that Xuan Hao''s pseudo domain had.


    While not aplete domain yet, Xuan Hao still manged to bring out some of the true essence of his future sword domain.


    Following the Untold Swords Mantra, Xuan Hao''s future sword domain would be able to manifest an untold number of swords into an endless sword ocean that could be used to attack his opponents. At its current stage, Xuan Hao could only use it tounch an attack if the opponent was kind enough to walk directly into his domain like the crow demon beast did.


    Outside of that, Xuan Hao would be able to use his pseudo sword domain to strengthen his attacks even further. The strengthening brought about by his pseudo sword domain made Xuan Hao confident that he would be able to move however he wanted in the Nascent Soul Realm area of the secret realm without fearing the Half-Step Domain Lord demon beasts!


    This was not to say Xuan Hao wanted to fight with them, as that would most likely end up attracting other Half-Step Domain Lord demon beast the longer the fight went on.


    But Xuan Hao did not really worry too much about this. After all, he could always run away if things became too dangerous for him¡­ A tactical retreat!


    Xuan Hao did not really care much about "fighting to the end" or upholding his "honour" or something ridiculous like that. Life was way more important, and he doubted any sane cultivator would die for the sole purpose of saving a bit of face¡­


    ¡­


    The journey to the border area went rtively peacefully, with only a few demon beasts at the earlier and sometime middle stages of the Nascent Soul Realmunching an attack at Xuan Hao from time to time as the demon beasts on the ground below happily devoured what remained of them after their unfortunate encounter with Xuan Hao did not end as nned for them¡­


    "So, this is the formation pirs at the edge of the Nascent Soul Realm area, they look way smallerpared to the others..." Arriving at the border area, Xuan Hao instantly spotted one of the formation pirs stretching far into the sky above, butpared to the other formation pir, they were way smaller and looked simpler.


    Xuan Hao went up to the formation pir in front of him and tried to inspect it with his divine sense like he had done in the past together with Chi Hu but was disappointed when all he saw was a myriad of different formations.


    Nothing like the domain power left in the other pir was left behind for him toprehend or maybe there was something located beneath the countless formations, but Xuan Hao would never know¡­


    Moving his vision away from the formation pir, Xuan Hao looked at the surrounding ancient forest and did not spot the small pce mentioned by the treasure hunter anywhere nearby.


    ording to the treasure hunter, the small pce was located at the border area in the rough direction he was currently at, but even then, Xuan Hao could not spot the small pce even when he surveyed the surrounding area from above.


    Maybe the small pce was not visible when looking from above and was instead hidden beneath the ancient trees. After all, the treasure hunter did say it was a small pce instead of just calling it a normal pce¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao descended and began to search the area around the border from the ground.


    ording to what the treasure hunter said, the border area should be swarming with Half-Step Domain Lord demon beast, simr to how the border of the Core Formation area had a lot of Half-Step Nascent Soul Realm demon beast!


    Compared to when he was far above the ground where a random flying demon beast spotted him every now and then, danger could be lurking around every corner as Xuan Hao cautiously made his way through the ancient forest.


    Not daring to let his guard down as he searched for the small temple. Staying cautious in case any demon beast decided tounch a sneak attack on him.

 Chapter 186: Chi Hu and the Treasure Hunter leaves the Secret Realm

    <h4>Chapter 186: Chi Hu and the Treasure Hunter leaves the Secret Realm</h4>


    The ancient forest had not changed muchpared to how it was in the Core Formation area, outside of more spirit herbs growing there and the demon beasts being stronger.


    Xuan Hao cautiously made his way through the ancient forest as he searched for the small pce. Hoping that the treasure hunter had not lied to him about its existence¡­


    ROAR!


    A bestial roar echoed out from the area in front of him followed by the loud howls from what Xuan Hao presumed was a group of wolf demon beasts. Most likely in the process of hunting a bigger demon beast together or maybe they just identally entered the wrong territory¡­


    Xuan Hao did not really pay any mind to this as there were several fights happening all over the ce in the ancient forest at the moment.


    The demon beast who had just gotten unsealed were currently in the process of establishing their own territories inside the ancient forest and this had in turn caused them to fight with each other as they attempted to either expand or defend their newly established territories.


    With all the fighting happening all over the ce, Xuan Hao would have a higher chance at not attracting the surrounding demon beasts over if he ended up fighting a demon beast. After all, they would be too preupied with defending or attacking each other toe over.


    Not like the Burning Mountain Range where the different demon beast''s territories had already been established and they had more than enough spare time toe over whenever someone began fighting!


    This was also one of the main reasons that the Burning Mountain Range was so dangerous, even Domain Lords didn''t dare to enter the deeper areas in fear of being ganged up on by the Domain Lord demon beasts hidden inside!


    "This should be it¡­" Searching through the area surrounding the border area, Xuan Hao finally managed to find something after half an hour of searching.


    The thing in question was a small stonemp post.


    Whoosh~


    Waving his hand, Xuan Hao caused a gentle wind to sweep through the area around the small stonemp post removing the overgrown foliage around it and a path gradually began appearing leading in a direction further away from the border and the other closer to the border.


    Xuan Hao did not stand around waiting for long before he began moving towards the location of the path that led further away from the border. Reasoning that the past owners of the secret realm should not have built anything just beside the formation pirs¡­


    All he could hope now was that he was walking in the right direction so he wouldn''t have to make the shameful walk back to the stonemp post and follow the other direction of the path leading to an area closer to the border¡­


    ¡­


    As Xuan Hao had finished his cultivation at the stone monument earlier, Chi Hu and the treasure hunter had made it to the entrance of the secret realm as the two were about to leave.


    "So, where are we going? I heard you talking about returning with me to the sect for now, but I don''t really know what sect you were talking about, is it perhaps a local sect from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom or perhaps one of the nearby kingdoms?" The treasure hunter had a curious look on his face as he asked Chi Hu. No matter what, the treasure hunter already believed that he should be safe at this point.


    After all, if they wanted to kill him off, they would have already done it by now¡­


    "We are going to the Flying Sword Sect; it should only be a few days travel away from the entrance of the secret realm." Not nning to hide it as the treasure hunter would find out about it at some point in the future anyway, Chi Hu directly answered him without hiding anything.


    "The Flying Sword Set¡­ I see, that sounds great!" The treasure hunter thought about it for a moment before he remembered some information regarding the Flying Sword Sect of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    All in all, the Flying Sword Sect had a good reputation as a rtively neutral sect keeping to itself most of the time. Only really skirmishing with the Raging me Sect from time to time over a past feud, but nothing too serious like arge-scale fight had happened.


    The treasure hunter felt even more safe when he heard that it was the Flying Sword Sect and even began to chat more enthusiastically with Chi Hu as the two made their way out of the secret realm.


    "Hm?" The moment both of them made their way outside of the secret realm, a market of sorts had sprung up with cultivators trading all sorts of spirit herbs and other materials found inside the secret realm as they joined up in different groups to enter the secret realm together.


    "Leave this area immediately or face the consequences!" As Chi Hu and the treasure hunter were about to leave the secret realms entrance, a cold and oppressive voice shook the surroundings and caused them to look up into the sky where a giant flying ship floated with the banner of the Sky Empire proudly swaying above it.


    The person who called out before was standing in the air a few meters away from the floating ship as he coldly looked down on the crowd below.


    Both Chi Hu and the treasure hunter felt the pressure excluded by this person far surpassing the Nascent Soul Realm as both of them clearly understood the person in question was someone in the Domain Lord Realm!


    "General¡­ If you supress all of them like that, they won''t be able to leave¡­" An old voice could faintly be heard from inside the floating ship as the person floating above smiled awkwardly before retracting his aura. Allowing Chi Hu and the treasure hunter to breath freely again.


    "The Sky Empire arrived already!?" Both Chi Hu felt worried upon realizing what this meant for Xuan Hao still inside the secret realm, while the treasure hunter also began to worry about how things would work out for him if Xuan Hao did note back from the secret realm alive¡­

 Chapter 187: Underground Palace

    <h4>Chapter 187: Underground Pce</h4>


    Roar!


    Xuan Hao dodged to the side as a giant paw filled with razor sharp ws barely missed him as he swung his sword down on the attacker, cutting off the attacking demon beasts head cleanly without any form of struggle.


    "It seems like I''m getting closer¡­" Ignoring the dead demon beast lying beside him, Xuan Hao instead focused on the path before him bing more visible as he travelled deeper into the ancient forest. Ensuring him that he had picked the right direction to follow.


    Other than that, a few demon beasts around the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm also came out from time to time and blocked him, but they were swiftly dealt with as Xuan Hao continued following the path.


    The ancient trees quickly passed by as Xuan Hao moved through the ancient forest, listening to the surrounding roars and howls of demon beasts as they engaged in deadly fights with each other.


    "This should be the end of the path¡­" After traveling for another half hour, Xuan Hao was already far away from the border and felt a little doubtful as he looked at the ce where the path had stopped.


    A gorge stretching far into the distance had appeared in front of him, a small river ran through it as it spit the ancient forest in half as the ancient trees barely managed to hide it from any prying eyes with their wide tree crowns.


    Looking down, Xuan Hao managed to spot a small tform close to the bottom of the gorge with an entrance leading into the side of gorge. The path also seemed to lead down towards the tform as Xuan Hao also discovered a pair of stone steps etched into the side of the gorge leading all the way down towards the tform.


    Following it, Xuan Hao soon found himself at the bottom of the gorge as he looked towards the entrance leading into what he could only assume to be a cave.


    Checking out the tform with his divine sense, Xuan Hao did not sense anything weird about it or anything and decided to make his way inside the cave entrance. Maybe the small pce that the treasure hunter talked about had alreadypletely disappeared from history. Only leaving behind the tform in the side of the gorge.


    Xuan Hao felt that this was a possibility as quite a few demon beasts roamed around this area, and it could have been destroyed when the demon beasts had shed in the past and end up slowly getting washed away in the river below over a long period of time.


    In the end, the tform that the small pce once stood would be the only thing remaining¡­


    Entering the entrance in the side of the gorge, Xuan Hao was shocked to see several crystals in the side of the cave walls lighting up the interior as Xuan Hao observed the inside of the cave and was once again shocked after he managed to fully observe the sheer size of the underground cave.


    In front of him, Xuan Hao saw a small pce standing quietly surrounded by a giant chasm with only a simple hanging bridge connecting the small pce with the entrance to the cave.


    Walking up to the chasm surrounding the small pce, Xuan Hao leaned forward as he tried to find out how deep the chasm was with his divine sense. Only to end up disappointed as his divine sense did not manage to reach the bottom of the chasm, even when stretching it as much as possible.


    The reason for this was not so much that the chasm was too deep, but more because Xuan Hao felt his divine sense being suppressed the further down into the chasm his divine sense travelled.


    The feeling of suppression on his divine sense was not something Xuan Hao was used to, and he felt a bit weird after discovering it, while also feeling curious as to what restricted his divine sense from peering further into the chasm below¡­


    "No use thinking about it¡­" Shaking his head as he turned his attention away from the chasm, Xuan Hao walked over to the hanging bridge barely hanging in there and made his way over towards the small pce.


    Remaining cautious in case any demon beast had made the small underground pce their home or any formation were in ce to deal with any intruders.


    But his worry was for nothing as Xuan Hao made it to the other side of the chasm without anything happening to him in the process. No demon beast or formation to block his path¡­


    Xuan Hao felt that it was all a little too easy, but just shrugged his shoulders and entered the small pce in search of the ancient artifact mentioned by the treasure hunter.


    The small pce was almostpletely empty with no borate decorations or other precious objects.


    Instead, the pce only had a single hallway leading to the main hall along with a few other rooms on the side with nothing inside them.


    It almost seemed like everything inside the small pce had already been taken away with nothing remaining.


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I might be toote¡­" This caused Xuan Hao to sigh in defeat as he thought someone else might have found the small pce before him.


    Feeling depressed thinking about the fact that someone else might have beaten him to it, Xuan Hao made his way into the main hall of the pce without expecting there to be anything left inside.


    "This is¡­!"


    ¡­


    Rumble~


    The sound of arge creature moving could be heard from the chasm surrounding the underground pce, as a pair of eyes slowly sprung open and stared directly up at the underground pce filled with an undeniable killing intent.


    And before long, the creature slowly began moving up from the chasm and towards the underground pce where Xuan Hao was currently at. Completely unaware of the fact that a certain demon beast had already targeted him just after being unsealed!

 Chapter 188: Wooden Box and Demon Ape~

    <h4>Chapter 188: Wooden Box and Demon Ape~</h4>


    "This is¡­!" Entering the main hall of the small underground pce, Xuan Hao was taken aback as he saw the surrounding environment suddenly shift to a livelier one filled with all sorts of extravagant decorations. Making the past few rooms and halls look like they did not belong to the same pce in the first ce.


    Xuan felt it was weird as he observed the staircase at the end of the main hall leading into what he could only assume was the throne room of the underground pce.


    Walking forward, Xuan Hao did not spend too much time in the main hall as he walked up the staircase and entered the throne room of the underground pce. Only to be met with an almost empty room outside of a small stone pedestal located towards the end of the throne room where the throne would normally be located.


    The room itself did not seem like anything special and was not even close to being as beautifully decorated as the main hall was. Making Xuan Hao doubt whether he had truly entered the throne room of the underground pce or maybe taken a wrong turn¡­


    Slowly moving forward, Xuan Hao soon arrived in front of the stone pedestal as he discovered a small wooden box with a beautiful phoenix engraved into it.


    "Hm?" Picking up the wooden box, Xuan Hao tried to open it, but soon found out that the small wooden box did not react in the slightest and remained closed. Even when he tried to put all his strength into it, the small wooden box did not budge in the slightest and remained closed.


    "What is this?! Is it perhaps the ancient artifact mentioned by the treasure hunter?" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao decided to ask the treasure hunter about it after returning to the Flying Sword Sect.


    For now, he but the small wooden box away in his interspatial ring as he began exploring the rest of the underground pce.


    This however only ended in disappointment, with nothing of value appearing outside of the wooden box found in the throne room of the underground pce.


    "Hah¡­ Looks like there isn''t anything other than the wooden box in this pce¡­" Sighing with a disappointed look on his face, Xuan Hao left the underground pce and made his way over towards the hanging bridge connecting the underground pce with the entrance of the cave.


    Crash!


    "Hm?" Just as Xuan Hao was about to step onto the hanging bridge, the other part of the hanging bridge connected to where the entrance was snapped as the hanging bridge crashed down into the chasm surrounding the underground pce.


    This was not much of a problem as Xuan Hao could just jump on his sword and fly over to the other side of the chasm, what truly caught him off guard was the giant furry hand that suddenly appeared from the chasm as another hand soon appeared along with the rest of the demon beast''s body appeared.


    ROAR!


    Towering several dozen meters tall, a giant demon ape crawled out of the chasm as it let out a heaven shaking roar before turning to look in the direction of Xuan Hao filled with a clear killing intent.


    "Well¡­ This was unexpected¡­" Observing the demon ape on the other side of the chasm as it stared back at him filled with killing intent, Xuan Hao tilted his head to the side as he examined the cultivation of the demon ape.


    "Of course, its half a step into the Domain Lord Realm¡­" Taking out his sword from his interspatial ring, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes as he prepared for anything that the demon ape might do.


    ROAR!


    Seeing Xuan Hao drawing his sword, the demon ape reacted cautiously as instead of jumping over the chasm to fight him, it instead retreated out through the entrance to the cave as Xuan Hao was left alone in the cave.


    "Looks like it is nning to ambush me the moment I exit the cave¡­ Not that I have any other way out¡­ Maybe I could wait for it to get impatient?" Jumping up on his sword, Xuan Hao gently floated over to the other side as hended and went over his options.


    Rumble~


    Roar!


    Just as Xuan Hao was nning to stay inside the cave and wait for the demon ape to grow impatient outside. Another somewhat muffled roar could be heard from the chasm behind him as the entire cave began shaking violently.


    "There are more demon beasts sealed down in the chasm?!" Feeling the increasingly growing demonic aura of several demon beasts in the chasm as they were in the process of breaking their seal and regaining freedom just like the demon ape had, Xuan Hao felt his option of waiting around in the cave was no longer viable unless he wanted to fight multiple demon beasts like the demon ape at once¡­


    Whoosh~


    Not hesitating anymore, Xuan Hao decisively charged out of the cave entrance. Ready to deal with any ambush set up by the demon ape as he prepared to unleash his pseudo sword domain the moment the demon ape attacked him.


    Roar!


    The demon ape did not disappoint him in the slightest, as it had indeed waited outside the entrance of the cave.


    Swinging down its huge fist filled with a destructive qi as Xuan Hao used his pseudo sword domain to block the torrent of destructive qi that the giant fist of the demon ape unleashed.


    BOOM!


    Arge explosion urred the moment the destructive qi of the demon apes fist made contact with Xuan Hao''s pseudo sword domain.


    Instantly causing the entrance of the cave behind Xuan Hao to copse together with the stone tform both of them were standing on.


    Crash!


    The stone tform crashed into the river below running through the gorge, as Xuan Hao and the demon ape both moved up from the gorge and into the ancient forest above.


    ng~


    The sound of a sword hitting a metal surface echoed out in the surroundings as Xuan Hao''s used the moment that both of them made their way out of the gorge tounch a sneak attack at the demon ape.


    Sadly, it was easily blocked by the thick fur of the demon ape as it let out an angry roar and closed the distance on Xuan Hao before once again swinging down its huge fists in an attempt to kill Xuan Hao.


    "Looks like it won''t be easy to pierce through the thick fur of this one, I should try out the Sword Shadow technique from the Untold Swords Mantra now that my pseudo sword domain have gotten stronger, I should be able to more easily control it without using up too much of my qi reserves¡­" Muttering this to himself as he wanted to see how strong the Sword Shadow technique had gotten after the strength of his pseudo sword domain grew, Xuan Hao decided that the giant demon ape would be the best possible candidate to try it out on.


    And given how he needed to end things quickly before the other demon beasts in the chasm managed to break free from the seal ande to join in on the fight, Xuan Hao watched as the giant fists from the demon ape closed in on him as he used the Rain Sword''s first move, Misty Rain, to block the two giant fists from the demon ape.


    "Misty Rain!"


    The first move from the Rain Sword was a defensive sword move andpared to the Cloudburst from the Rain Sword technique that was the strongest move in the Rain Sword technique, the Misty Rain Sword was way more suited for dealing with the attack from the demon ape!


    The giant fists of the demon ape were about tond at the ce Xuan Hao was standing as a bright blue light erupted around Xuan Hao''s sword forming a thin transparent blue barrier around Xuan Hao as he remained in ce facing the two giant fists of the demon ape without trying to dodge to the side.


    BOOM!


    The attack of the demon apended on the thin blue barrier surrounding Xuan Hao as a shockwave spread out with him as the centre.


    Instantly levelling the surrounding ancient trees within 500 meters. Leaving behind only a barren wastnd where the ancient forest had once stood.


    "Roar?" The demon ape began feeling something was wrong as it slowly lifted both its fist to see the situation of its opponent. Only to be left with a shocked expression as Xuan Hao waspletely fine, with the blue barrier only showing a few cracks in the ce where the two fists of the demon ape made impact.


    "Hah¡­ It seems that Misty Rain is way stronger when it is strengthened by my pseudo sword domain!" Xuan Hao let out a satisfied smile as he did not expect for his pseudo sword domain to strengthen his sword techniques by such arge margin.


    "Hehe, seems like it is my turn now!" Chuckling a bit to himself as he felt the power of his pseudo sword domain, Xuan Hao stopped using the Misty Rain sword move and prepared to attack the demon ape.


    "R-roar¡­?" The demon ape saw the human who had survived its earlier attack suddenly preparing to attack and suddenly felt a shiver run down its back¡­

 Chapter 189: Demon Ape vs Xuan Hao!

    <h4>Chapter 189: Demon Ape vs Xuan Hao!</h4>


    Ching~


    Grabbing hold of his sword, Xuan Hao executed the Sword Shadow Move from the Untold Swords Mantra for the second time since learning it.


    Whoosh~


    A calm wind blew through the barrenndscape created by the demon ape''s earlier attack and an almost invisible shadow suddenly appeared in front of the demon ape.


    "Roar?" Letting out a confused roar upon seeing the small sword shadow suddenly appear in front of it, the demon ape instinctively knew that the sword shadow was far more dangerous than anything that it had ever encountered before!


    Boom!


    Surging with energy, the demon ape put up both its hands to block the iing attack. It''s qi erupting from its body as it formed ck barrier in front of its two arms, small electric currents running over the surface of the barrier making it look even more intimidating.


    Only a split second passed from when the demon ape set up its defensive barrier and the Sword Shadow by Xuan Hao finally hit the defensive barrier of the demon ape.


    Compared to thest time where the sword energy erupted out into a giant vortex made of sword qi covering the skies and sweeping through the surroundings, this time was different.


    Psh!


    The sword shadow easily pierced a tiny hole through the barrier and pierced into the demon ape as the sword vortex hidden inside of the sword shadow erupted out.


    The gentle wind blowing through the ancient forest soon turned into a furious storm that swept through the surroundings as a small vortex made of sword qi formed around the demon ape.


    "Looks like I still failed¡­" Trying his best to keep the sword vortex under control, Xuan Hao had a disappointed look on his face as he observed the demon ape being covered in a dark aura that protected it against the sword vortex''s constant barrage of attacks.


    The demon ape had a way easier time defending against the sword vortex as the attack was not as concentrated as the earlier sword shadow where the vortex had concentrated into the tiny sword shadow and easily prated through its defences.


    Roar!


    Letting out a heaven shaking roar, the demon ape forcefully dispelled the sword vortex surrounding it as the dark aura defending it dispersed.


    Xuan Hao did not really stop this and had already given up on wasting his energy to keep the sword vortex up and running. Allowing for the demon ape to dispel it uncontested.


    At this point, Xuan Hao had not really wasted too much of his qi reserves as he decided to not keep the sword vortex up, while the demon ape had already used arge majority of its energy.


    "Guess I should end this quickly¡­" ncing over in the direction of the gorge where the demonic aura from the other demon beast awakening could be felt growing stronger and stronger with each passing second, Xuan Hao did not waste any time as he attack the demon ape without any special sword moves or techniques.


    Just simple sword attacks strengthened by both his qi and his pseudo sword domain. Making even a simple attack from Xuan Hao deadly to the demon ape without wasting too much of his own energy in the process.


    ROAR!


    The demon ape roared loudly as it saw Xuan Hao suddenlye over to attack himself and prepared tounch an attack itself, but upon reaching the distance of a dozen or so meters from Xuan Hao, it suddenly felt its movement being restricted as it felt something all around it constantly trying to cut into it.


    Psh~


    Blood sttered out from the demon apes back as it felt the unseen force sessfully cutting through its skin.


    It did not take long before the demon ape realized that it had to keep up a constant barrier around its body to defend against the unseen force constantly trying to cut into it from all directions, while also having to block Xuan Hao''s constant barrage of attacks.


    This was one of the most useful abilities of Xuan Hao''s pseudo sword domain when dealing with opponents that could not just be outright killed by it and best of all, Xuan Hao did not even have to use any of his qi to constantly keep up his domain!


    The only demerit was that he would begin growing exhausted after an extensive use of his pseudo sword domain, but this did not matter much as he did not n for the current fight to continue for much longer.


    Like this, Xuan Hao kept on a constant offensive against the demon ape as it tried its best to defend, but this was not meant tost as the demon ape''s defence grew weaker and weaker with each passing second.


    Swish~


    A sword sh by Xuan Hao soon managed to break through the defences of the demon ape as the sword directly cut into the left arm of the demon ape, cleaning cutting it off.


    ROAR!


    The demon ape let out a roar filled with pain as it tried its best to retreat, but it was toote as Xuan Hao used the opening created by the demon ape.


    "Cloudburst!"


    Xuan Hao channelled his qi as he used the final move of the Rain Sword, Cloudburst.


    Sword qi rapidly formed around the edge of the sword and merged together with Xuan Hao''s Sword Intent as a streak of sword light exploded out from the sword and headed straight for the retreating demon ape.


    Together with the sword light, the demon ape faintly heard the sound of rain as it turned around only to see the sword light already appear directly in front of it.


    A terrifying rainstorm engulfed it briefly as the illusion ended the sword qi gathered inside of the sword light exploded outwards a few meters away from the demon ape, raining down on the demon ape in the shape of countless tiny raindrops.


    Roa-


    The demon ape did not even manage to let out onest roar as the raindrops formed from the sword qi hit it and created countless small holes in its giant furry body. Killing it in an instant.

 Chapter 190: Heading back towards the Secret Realm Entrance~

    <h4>Chapter 190: Heading back towards the Secret Realm Entrance~</h4>


    Crash!


    The giant body of the demon ape fell to the ground as it shattered the area that itnded with its weight alone, causing a dust cloud to rise up after the impact.


    The demon ape was dead! Riddled with countless small holes all over itsrge frame from Xuan Hao''s finishing move, Cloudburst.


    Roar Roar Roar!


    Countless roars could be heard from the gorge just besides the battlefield of Xuan Hao and the demon ape, causing Xuan Hao to quickly use his interspatial ring and store the corpse of the demon ape before making his way up into the sky away from the gorge. Not that keen on the idea of getting ganged up by a group of demon beasts that had just managed to get free from their seal.


    "Now what should I do¡­ Stay in the secret realm and try to search for the core of the secret realm formation or leave before things get too dangerous¡­" Looking over at the formation pirs separating the Nascent Soul Realm area with the Domain Lord Realm area, Xuan Hao felt himself hesitating even though he knew very well that going there would not end up well for him¡­


    Thinking about, Xuan Hao soon shook his head and turned away from the formation pirs and began heading back towards the entrance of the secret realm.


    "Hah¡­ No matter what, going to an area filled with Domain Lord Realm demon beasts at my current state would be nothing short of suicide¡­" Smiling wryly as he extinguished his early ambitious thoughts, Xuan Hao no longer hesitated as he made his way back towards the entrance to the secret realm.


    At most he would considering back to the secret realm after reaching the Domain Lord Realm if it had not been emptied out at that point in time¡­


    Going to search for the core of the secret realm formation at this point was nothing more than a suicide mission!


    He would at least need to reach the Domain Lord Realm before wanting to enter the secret realm again. For now, he should just focus on some of the more doable things for the current him, like helping his disciples reach a higher realm and solving the quest he got rted to them¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao no longer thought about the quest from the system as he observed the never changing? ancient forest passing by below him along his way back to the entrance of the secret realm.


    Trying to see if he happened to be lucky enough to spot an ancient ruin or some precious herbs along the way.


    Though that was easy said than done, as therge crowns of the ancient trees covered up most of the ground below. Not allowing for Xuan Hao to easily stop anything hidden beneath.


    ¡­


    "Are you sure there is an ancient ruin located over here? Sure the map you bought from that fellow at the entrance can be trusted in the first ce?" Just over the border between the Nascent Soul Realm area and the Core Formation Realm area, a duo of one female and one male were walking through the dense forest as they were arguing with each other.


    "I''m sure of it! And would that fellow even dare to lie to me in the first ce? Remember, I''m someone in the Nascent Soul Realm! How could that silly little fellow at the Foundation Establishment Realm dare to lie to me?" Saying that, the male of the two proudly puffed up his chest in an attempt to look a bit more reliable.


    "Sureee~ Just like the other map that you bought for 100 spirit stone from that child in the Qi Condensation Realm would not dare sell you a fake one~" Hearing the exmation from her male partner, the female of the two rolled her eyes as she pointed out the map that they had followed earlier.


    Back then, both of them had walked into a pack of Nascent Soul Realm wolves and just barely managed to escape back over the border to safety as the map in question had just pointed them into a cave that the pack of Nascent Soul Realm wolves were living in.


    "T-that¡­ I''m sure that was just a mistake! This map will surely lead us to a ruin with great treasures in it!" Not knowing what to say, the male tried to deflect as he insisted that the second map was real.


    Partly due to the fact that he didn''t want to admit the fact that he had wasted close to 1000 spirit stones on it¡­


    "Well, we will find out soon enough¡­" Not wanting to waste time arguing, the woman just decided to y along and chide him after they walked into yet another den of demon beasts¡­ Not at all worried that they would end up being in danger.


    "By the way, I heard that those fellows from the Sky Empire arrived already and blocked off the surrounding area around the secret realm¡­ Do you think that they were nearby or something? They reacted way too fast and one of their skyships even showed up¡­" Continuing through the ancient forest, the male among the two of them asked as he curiously looked over at his femalepanion to see her reaction.


    "Hmph, who cares what those idiots are doing! But leaving will indeed be more difficult with those people guarding the entrance¡­" Cursing out the moment she heard the mention of someone from the Sky Empire showing up, the female soon calmed down as she began to analysing the situation before them.


    Leaving would indeed be difficult if the Sky Empire blocked the entrance¡­


    Waiting until the other powers showed up and leaving during the turmoil would be their best option, but how long would that take¡­?


    "Ah, the ruin should be just over here!" Seeing hispanion''s mood growing a bit unstable, the male quickly informed her as he pointed ahead at a cave located a few meters away from them.


    "Is that not the same cave from before-" Looking over, the femalepanion immediately woke up from her train of thought as she recognized the cave from earlier in the day.


    Howl!


    "RUN!" A loud wolf howl was heard as she grabbed onto her stupidpanion and dashed over in the direction of the border, arge pack of wolves soon came out of the cave as they chased after the duo.


    "I swear it was not on purpose!" Being dragged along, the malepanion screamed out as he watched the pack of wolves following them all the way back to the border before giving up and returning to the cave once again.

 Chapter 191: Sky Empire Blocks the Entrance of the Secret Realm

    <h4>Chapter 191: Sky Empire Blocks the Entrance of the Secret Realm</h4>


    "So¡­ What did I say? Still want to try another of those maps you bought earlier?!" Looking over at herpanion with a mocking smile on her lips, the female of the duo snickered as she asked.


    "I-I''m sure its just a mistake¡­ This time for sure! As people say, third time''s the charm!" Not willing to give up, the male took out yet another map as he prepared to enter the Nascent Soul Realm area once again.


    "Enough! We can''t continue visiting those wolves and that map is the exact same as the first one!" Stopping him before he made his way back over the border, the female signalled for him to look at the map more closely.


    The malepanion stopped in ce as he took out the first map andpared it with the third map.


    "I-it''s the same!? W-what about the rest of the maps¡­?" Screaming out in surprise like he had gotten the shock of his life, he hurriedly took out the rest of the maps he bought andpared them with each other. Only to end up disappointed.


    All of the maps led towards the same cave with a pack of Nascent Soul Realm wolves living in it¡­


    "H-how could they scam me like this!? I-I swear I will get my revenge when I find them again!" Angrily proiming this, he proceeded to throw all of the maps away and begin sulking as he thought about therge amount of spirit stones that he wasted on those maps¡­


    Rolling her eyes at herpanion''s childish disy, she walked over beside him and asked, "So can we go explore the ce I want to. Seeing as we are finished with your treasure maps¡­?"


    "Hah¡­ Fine, but we have to find those people when we leave the secret realm!" Agreeing to follow her lead, the malepanion quickly calmed down and thought about how to deal with those people who scammed them after they made their way back out of the secret realm.


    "Sure~" Not wanting to continue this anymore, the female agreed. Not wanting to talk about how the Sky Empires people had most likely already chased away those people and their chances of finding them once again being reduced to close to nothing¡­


    Satisfied with his femalepanion''s response, the male of the two happily followed as the two of them once again entered the Nascent Soul Realm area.


    This time moving in a direction far away from a certain cave filled with wolves¡­


    ¡­


    A day passed as Xuan Hao had decided to slow down a bit while making his way back towards the entrance of the secret realm.


    The reason for this was not that he did not want to leave faster or anything along that line.


    Instead, it was because he had managed to spot a group of Nascent Soul Realm Experts earlier and had overheard them talking about the Sky Empire already arriving and blocking the entrance to the secret realm off.


    Searching anyone leaving the secret realm and Xuan Hao knew that he would most likely end up being stuck in the secret realm for a while longer before other people showed up and allowed people like himself a chance to escape without getting all the thing on him robbed clean by the Sky Empire¡­


    Because of this, Xuan Hao had decided to spend some more time in the Nascent Soul Realm area and decided to explore it more in depth as he slowed down and looked out for new ruins or precious spiritual herbs while flying above the ancient forest.


    Other than the group Xuan Hao had overheard earlier in the day, there was also other groups of cultivators present in the Nascent Soul Realm area trying to find ruins or treasures just like himself!


    "But howe they did not get killed off by that Half-Step Domain Lord Realm wolf at the border?" Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt a bit confused. The demon wolf should still be fine and these people at the earlier and middle stages of the Nascent Soul Realm running around should not have the strength to deal with the wolf and its pack¡­


    Maybe something changed and the wolf decided to move its pack away from the border deeper into the ancient forest?


    Xuan Hao had no clue what happened to the strong wolf demon beast and its pack, so he decided to ignore it for now.


    After all, with his current strength, he would be fine even if he encountered the wolf and its pack¡­


    "Hm? Maybe the people from the Sky Empire started entering the secret realm already and dealt with it?" Thinking a bit deeper about it, Xuan Hao realized that the Sky Empire would most likely have people at the Domain Lord Realm present.


    Dealing with a small demon beast half a step into the Domain Lord Realm, should be rtively easy for someone like that.


    Xuan Hao immediately began to feel the danger, as encountering a Domain Lord at his current state was not really something that he wanted to happen.


    "I shouldnd on the ground and walk the rest of the way¡­ If a Domain Lord spots me flying around, I will definitely get stopped by them¡­" Thinking about this, Xuan Hao quickly began descending towards the ancient forest below him as he put his sword away and began walking in the direction of the border.


    "Well¡­ At least I should be able to more easily find any ruins hidden beneath the ancient trees this way¡­" Xuan Hao did not feel that this was a problem and even felt like travelling on the ground was a good change of pace from all that flying earlier.


    "Hm¡­ I wonder what other powers will show up at the secret realm¡­ I don''t really know that many empires or powerful organizations outside of the Sky Empire and the Explorer Union¡­" Thinking about this, Xuan Hao began looking forward to the inevitable sh between these great powers outside of the secret realm.

 Chapter 192: Fire Blood Gang and Flowing Cloud Sect

    <h4>Chapter 192: Fire Blood Gang and Flowing Cloud Sect</h4>


    "There really are way more ruins around here than I expected¡­" As he was travelling along the ground this time around instead of flying high above the ancient forest, Xuan Hao managed to encounter several ancient ruins.


    But this also made Xuan Hao start doubting whether this ancient forest was truly a testing ground in the first ce or something different.


    After all, why would they ce so many random buildings inside of the ancient forest if it was just for testing disciples in the first ce? Perhaps it was for something other than just testing?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao realized that the different ruins he had found so far included a temple, a pagoda with cultivation techniques and mantras and several living quarters so to speak.


    At this point, Xuan Hao felt that the secret realm seemed more like a part of the ancient sect that controlled the secret realmpared to a testing ground for disciples toe¡­


    "Hah¡­ I really don''t understand¡­" Shaking his head a bit as he thought about this, Xuan Hao suddenly turned his head around as he sensed arge group of people a little farther away locked inbat.


    "Hm¡­? Seems like there is another ruin over there as well¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao did his best to conceal himself with the help of his pseudo sword domain helping him blend into the surroundings before moving over in the direction where he had sensed therge group of people fighting.


    The concealment from his pseudo sword domain was something he only found out about recently when ying around with it as he made his way back towards the secret realms entrance and was something anyone with a pseudo domain could do.


    It was useful for concealing oneself from those without a pseudo domain yet but waspletely useless if someone else had a pseudo domain or a real domain already.


    So, with his new concealment technique, Xuan Hao slowly made his way towards therge group of people. Praying that there was not anybody there that could spot him in case he was viewed as an enemy of sorts¡­


    ¡­


    Boom!


    A little farther away from Xuan Hao, arge explosion suddenly echoed out through the surroundings as a few figures could be seen flying through the air before crashing into arge ancient tree besides a small ruin of what looked like a house.


    "H-how? W-why are the people from the Fire Blood Gang here¡­?" One of the figures who crashed into the ancient tree struggled to stand up again as he fearfully looked over at the person responsible for his and his teammates current state.


    The person in question was a beautiful youngdy in her early twenties dressed in a pure white robe, or at least she looked like that¡­ Her true age was most likely far from being some youngd¡­


    After all, female cultivators tended to enjoy their young looks and went through all sorts of different techniques to make sure they appeared young and beautiful for as long as possible.


    This had led to quite an interesting development when it came to dao couples where most of the females forced their partners to take on a youthful look like themselves, as it would look a bit out of ce for someone looking like she was twenty or so walking together with a kind looking grandpa¡­


    "Hmph! I didn''t think a beautifuldy from the Flowing Cloud Sect would show up here, hehe!" Licking his lips with a lewd smile on his lips, the leader of the group made his way forward towards the weak looking youngdy just as Xuan Hao arrived at the scene to see this.


    What the hell did I just walk into¡­? Where is the hero saving the damsel in distress?


    Watching the leader of the Fire Blood Gang making his way towards the clearly weakeneddy from the Flowing Cloud Sect, Xuan Hao decided to observe the situation for now as he had clearly sensed a familiar presence among the group that were thrown back earlier together with the youngdy.


    Sitting back and preparing to watch a show, Xuan Hao recalled what little he could about the Flowing Cloud Sect and the Fire Blood Gang.


    Both of them belonged to the Cloud Sky Kingdom located quite a distance away from here, but the Fire Blood Gang was a well-known bandit group with several Nascent Soul Realm Experts in it that terrorized a lot of kingdoms close by as they often went outside the Cloud Sky Kingdom to either rob someone or recruit new people.


    All in all, Xuan Hao was not that surprised about their appearance in the Secret Realm, but thedy from the Flowing Cloud Sect.


    No matter what, she should not have appeared so far away from the Cloud Sky Kingdom but here she was¡­


    "You will have to pass through me if you want toy your hands on the youngdy!" Just as Xuan Hao was lost in thought, a familiar voice echoed out as Xuan Hao immediately turned to look at the person that appeared in front of the youngdy.


    "Old Ji!" The youngdy eximed the moment the person appeared to block the bandit leader from moving any further.


    "Heh, so you want to block me? Let''s see what you got then, don''t go flying likest time! Haha!" Bursting in loudughter along with the rest of the bandits. The leader had an amused look on his face as he walked forward with a huge double headed axe in hand.


    "Old Ji, hurry and run away! You can still escape if I buy some time!" Thedy pleaded with the elderly man standing in front of her as she desperately pleaded for him to leave her behind and leave.


    "No, I will stay mydy. Get ready to run away when we start fighting!" Saying this, Old Ji prepared to face the bandit leader as he ignored the pleading voice of the youngdy behind him.

 Chapter 193: All Out Attack! Kill the Bandit Leader!

    <h4>Chapter 193: All Out Attack! Kill the Bandit Leader!</h4>


    "This is¡­" Looking over at the so-called Old Ji, Xuan Hao wore a surprised expression on his face as he clearly recognized Old Ji¡­


    Old Ji was someone Xuan Hao had met a few months ago in the past, but at that time he was called Elder Skinling from the ck Rose Sect¡­ Howe was suddenly connected to someone from the Flowing Cloud Sect after only a few months'' time? And how did he already manage to heal his arm and even reach the Nascent Soul Realm?!


    Xuan Hao felt even more confused when he saw how concerned thedy from the Flowing Cloud Sect was about him as he selflessly stood up to protect her. Instead of running away, she instead remained in ce.


    Clearly intent on helping him out in theing fight against the bandit leader!


    "Hehe, both of you can juste together and I will deal with you at the same time!" Showing obvious disdain towards the two of them, the bandit leader motioned for both of them to attack whenever they were ready.


    "Youngdy¡­ You should just escape while there is still time!" Feeling a bit helpless upon seeing the young woman''s steadfast intent to stay and fight.


    "No! I will stay, we have a better chance at getting out alive if we stay together!"


    "Fine but remember to be carefulter on¡­" Looking at her with a helpless look on his face, Old Ji sighed to himself as he gave up on convincing her anymore.


    At the same time, Xuan Hao had made his way a little closer to the battlefield as he was hiding on top of a nearby tree branch of an especiallyrge ancient tree giving him full view of the soon to be battlefield.


    Currently, the bandit leader was around the fifth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and his three underlings were all in the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm as they all prepared to attack Old Ji and the youngdy from the Flowing Cloud Sect.


    The odds were not really in favor of the two as they were both only in the first stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, along with someone who Xuan Hao presumed was supposed to be the guard of the youngdy being at the third stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The person in question was an elderlydy who had not said anything since the start as she had clearly been heavily injured in a past sh with the bandit leader, a thin line of blood could barely be seen running down from the corner of her lips by Xuan Hao as he observed how she moved over towards the youngdy and prepared to move the moment that the bandit leader began his attack.


    "Hehe, you still have energy left in you after earlier?" Seeing the elderly womane up and prepare to attack him as well, the bandit leader did not seem to care at all as he justughed it off before narrowing his eyes and signalling to his underlings to move into position in case they tried to run away, or he needed help dealing with them.


    Seeing this, Old Ji along with the young and elderlydy prepared as they knew very well how dirty that the Fire Blood Gang normally fought, it would not surprise any of them if they suddenly ganged up on one of them as the leader held the others back¡­


    "Seems like these three will end up in trouble without any help¡­" Xuan Hao muttered this quietly to himself as he observed the bandit leader preparing to make a move along with the three underlings looking like they couldn''t wait for much longer.


    "Let''s go!" Before the bandit leader made his move and his underlings had moved into position yet, Old Ji moved along with the youngdy and elderlydy as the three of themunched a quick all-out attack towards the bandit leader together.


    Stacking everything on this single attack, they hoped that they would be able to catch the bandit leader off guard as he might not have expected for all of them to suddenly use their strongest moves before first shing with him or anything like that.


    This was especially so as the elderlydy clearly overtaxed herself by going all out and was severely injured in the process of using her strongest attack towards the leader of the bandits.


    Whoosh!


    Three terrifying attacks flew towards the leader of the bandit as they seemingly worked in tandem with one another to create a single powerful attack that hurled towards the bandit leader a breakneck speed.


    "How beautiful¡­!" Xuan Hao could not help but let out a voice of admiration as he watched the three attacks work together and create a singlebined attack with a strength way above the early stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    From observation alone, Xuan Hao easily deduced that the attack had already reached the level of beingparable to the all-out attack of someone at the peak of the fifth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    The bandit leader also sensed the iing danger as a panicked expression spread all over his face as he began setting up a few barriers to block the iing attack, but soon found out that it was useless to resist without proper preparations and instead abandoned his defence to take out a small ball that shone with an eerie ck light.


    Boom!


    The attack hit the bandit leader as a shockwave spread through the surroundings and uprooted a few nearby ancient trees along with the surrounding vegetation and nt life.


    "This should be enough¡­" Old Ji and the twodies all looked at the centre of the explosion as the elderlydy fell to the ground from exhaustion.


    "Grandma!" The youngdy quickly rushed over to support the olddy as she began checking up on her together with Old Ji.


    "W-what should we do now¡­?" One of the three underlings looked at the centre of the explosion with a scared look on his face as he asked the others in slightly confused voice, still not fully processing what had happened yet.


    "¡­" The other two underlings did not know what to do either as all of them just stared nkly at the ce their leader had been standing as the explosion from the earlier attack slowly began to subside.


    "Hm? This is!" On top of the tree branch, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes at the ce where the explosion happened as a dangerous killing intent slowly began to umte in his eyes.


    This feeling, Xuan Hao was all too familiar with it after he had visited the ck Rose Sect to fight with the Sect Master and get his disciple back.


    "What is that!" One of the underlings also discovered that something was wrong as he called out in shock and pointed over in the area where the explosion had urred earlier.


    Where the bandit leader had been standing earlier, there was instead a pitch-ck dome quietly flowing around the ce as it seemed to protect something inside of it.


    "Demonic qi!?" The olddy who had been helped up by both the youngdy and Old Ji eximed loudly with a shocked expression on her face as her eyes widened with fear.


    Old Ji and the youngdy were the same as they both prepared themselves for what was toe next.


    "Boss¡­? A-are you there?" One of the underlings cautiously moved over towards the ck dome as he called out in a fearful tone.


    "AHHH! How annoying!? Why did you have to force me to do this?!" The underling was not answered as an enraged voice could be heard from beyond the ck dome as it slowly began to disappear.


    Revealing the bandit leader hidden inside.


    Only this time, the bandit leader did not look like the bandit leader anymore and instead had arge pair of pitch-ck bat wings and arge pair of ws where his hands had been before.


    All in all, the bandit leader hadpletely turned into a demonic creature that looked like it had crawled up from hell as everyone stared over full of shock and fear. Not knowing what to do when faced with the new appearance of the bandit leader.


    "D-demonic cultivator¡­!" Shaking full of fear, the underling that had walked up to call out for the bandit leader began shaking in fear as he was about to turn around and escape.


    Ssh!


    Sadly, that was toote as a giant w came down from above and directly killed the underling where he was standing.


    Instantly killing someone in the Nascent Soul Realm!


    The others began shaking in fear as they watched the former bandit leader lift the w he just used to kill his own underling and lick some of the blood left on the w away while moaning in pleasure upon swallowing some of the blood.


    "Ah! Why did you have to force me to do this!? Now I will have to kill you all~" The former bandit leader let out a regretful voice as he lifted his head and smiled eerily at Old Ji along with the young and olddy from the Flowing Cloud Sect.

 Chapter 194: Xuan Hao Appears!

    <h4>Chapter 194: Xuan Hao Appears!</h4>


    "I never expected for the leader of the Fire Blood Gang to be a demonic cultivator¡­ This would surely prompt the Cloud Sky Kingdom to take action against them, but that is only if they find out¡­" Whispering this quietly to herself, the youngdy from the Flowing Cloud Sect quickly realized that the leader of the Fire Blood Gang did not n to let anyone of them leave alive¡­


    "What should we do?!" One of the two remaining underling panicked after seeing their leader turn into a demonic cultivator all of a sudden and ruthlessly kill one of them.


    At this point, both of the underlings had already realized that their former leader was not going to let them go in case they spread the news of him being a demonic cultivator, causing the surrounding powers to gang up on him and kill him.


    This was very likely, aspared to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom where the sects and the ruling royal family were at odds with each other. The Cloud Sky Kingdom existed in harmony with the sects inside their territory and for them to team up and deal with a demonic cultivator was an easy matter.


    The former bandit leader knew about this and nned to kill off everyone here to ensure his secret was safe!


    "Ahm! W-what do you say we work together¡­?" The underling that had no idea what to do made his way over to Old Ji and the other two as he asked in an awkward voice.


    The other underling also saw the opportunity and quickly made his way over as both of them waited for their response. Anxiously looking over in the direction of their former leader from time to time as they felt the terrifying pressure excluded by a demonic cultivator first-hand.


    "Sure¡­ We will need a miracle to get away from this guy alive and more people should at least increase our chances by a bit!" The olddy answered before Old Ji, or the youngdy could say anything as she looked over at Old Ji with an extremely exhausted look on her face.


    "Ji Yichuan, we might not have known each other for long but I hope you can take care of the youngdy¡­ Hah¡­ When we start fighting, try to look for an opportunity to escape with the youngdy!" Breathing roughly with each passing second. The elderly woman secretly informed Old Ji with her divine sense before turning around and focusing on the slowly approaching demonic cultivator.


    Clenching his fists upon hearing what the olddy said, Old Ji prepared to take the youngdy and escape the moment that the opportunity presented itself.


    No matter what, he would not let the olddy''s sacrifice be in vain! Oh, and the two unknowing former underlings of the bandit leader¡­


    Xuan Hao did not hear what the olddy had secretly informed Old Ji, formerly known as Elder Skinling from the ck Rose Sect, about¡­ But he could still guess it from his determined look and focused attention on the youngdy from the Flowing Cloud Sect.


    The fact that he was looking behind himself for a possible escape route just made it easier for Xuan Hao to deduce as the demonic cultivator had most likelye to the same conclusion.


    Looking over, Xuan Hao barely managed to spot a growing smirk on the demonic cultivator''s lips as he felt his divine sense focusing on Old Ji. Preparing for his attempt to escape.


    "Looks like I won''t be able to sit on the side-lines for any longer!" Seeing the situation in front of him, Xuan Hao decided to lend a hand to Old Ji.


    After all, it seemed like the former elder of a demonic sect had indeed turned his life around and Xuan Hao did not really want to deal with the demonic cultivator from the Fire Blood Gang in the future as the Fire Blood Gang had indeed begun focusing their attention on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom after the war between the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and Azure Sky Kingdom broke out¡­


    Though¡­ From how things were going now, Xuan Hao believed that both kingdoms would calm down with the appearance of the secret realm as neither party would want to idently offend any of the bigshots passing by on their way to the secret realm¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao decided that he would deal with the demonic cultivator before he ended up causing any unforeseen damage on his trip to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, like teaming up with the local demonic sect to attack a certain sect located just beside them¡­


    Whoosh~


    Jumping down from the tree branch he was standing on, Xuan Hao walked over towards the battlefield with a carefree look on his face.


    After all, even if the demonic cultivator was at the second demonic transformation, beingparable to someone at the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, it was far from enough to be a real threat to him with his pseudo sword domain.


    Only someone half a step into the Domain Lord Realm could cause the current Xuan Hao to be careful!


    ¡­


    "Hm? Who is it!?" Sensing someone approaching all of a sudden. The demonic cultivator narrowed his eyes as he carefully observed his surroundings before finally spotting Xuan Hao walking over with a carefree look on his face.


    Who is this guy!?


    The demonic cultivator felt an unprecedented danger approaching him as he could not sense the cultivation realm of the approaching Xuan Hao due to his domain''s concealment ability still being active.


    This in turn caused the demonic cultivator to be even more cautious as he clearly knew that Xuan Hao did not have any kind intentions nned for him¡­ Well, he was a demonic cultivator¡­


    "Who is that?" The youngdy from the Flowing Cloud Sect eximed loudly as she also spotted Xuan Hao and soon everyone had turned around to focus their attention on the approaching Xuan Hao.


    "Elder Xuan!?" Old Ji''s reaction was differentpared to the others as he clearly knew the person approaching, this in turn also caused him to grow a bit more confident as he had clearly seen him fly before.


    Elder Xuan was most likely someone in the Domain Lord Realm!


    Believing this, Old Ji felt way more confident in their survival as he doubted that Xuan Hao would let the former bandit leader get away alive.


    "You know him?" Hearing Old Ji''s exmation, the young and olddy both turned around and looked at him with a questioning look asking for him to exin.


    "Yes, he once helped me out in the past, with him here we should be fine!" Exining things shortly without mentioning how he was part of demonic sect, or anything rted to that, Old Ji confidently looked over in the direction of Xuan Hao as he hade to a stop a short distance away from the demonic cultivator.


    Both parties observed each other as neither made the first move.


    The demonic cultivator was fully concentrated as he prepared for the attack, while Xuan Hao was just carelessly standing in front of him without moving.


    "Hmph! Might I ask who you are?" Cautiously observing Xuan Hao who had suddenly appeared. The demonic cultivator could not stop his curiosity as he asked.


    "I''m Bright Sword!" Smiling cheekily at the demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao decided to use the nickname that he had used in the past to register at the Explorer Union.


    After all, he did not want his real name to be known by the people from the Flowing Cloud Sect.


    If people found out where he was from and the fact that he had been to the secret realm, Xuan Hao could end up drawing all sorts of unwanted trouble to the Flying Sword Sect as people showed up to either steal or try to persuade him to hand over the things that he might have found inside of the secret realm.


    "Bright Sword¡­ I don''t think I have heard your name before¡­" Muttering the name of the person in front of him for a bit as he tried to remember if he had heard about anyone like that before. The demonic cultivator helplessly shook his head after failing to recall anyone like that.


    "Haha, that is not unusual! I have just recentlye around here as I normally explore different ces through the Explorer Union!" Saying this, Xuan Hao mostly wanted the others to believe that he was just a random explorer from the Explorer Union that had passed by and happened to stumble upon the secret realm along the way.


    Old Ji also heard what he said and understood the underlying meaning of him wanting to keep his identity a secret.


    "An explorer from the Explorer Union I see¡­ I guess I don''t have to worry, but you were unlucky to show up here! You will die just like these people!" Not thinking much more about it after hearing that Xuan Hao was an explorer from the Explorer Union and not some big sect or empire. The demonic cultivator did not hold back as a terrifying killing intent erupted. Instantly covering Xuan Hao along with the two underlings and three people from the Flowing Cloud Sect.

 Chapter 195: Demonic Cultivator Attack~

    <h4>Chapter 195: Demonic Cultivator Attack~</h4>


    The killing intent excluded by the demonic cultivator was far denser and more terrifyingpared to what he had released before, causing everyone outside of Xuan Hao to shiver in fear as they looked over at the demonic cultivator.


    Xuan Hao only raised his eyebrows slightly upon feeling the killing intent of the demonic cultivator. Not really giving off the reaction that the demonic cultivator desired to have.


    "Hmph, seems like I will have to deal with you first then!" Not dragging it off for any longer, the demonic cultivator rushed over towards Xuan Hao as he prepared to swing down one of his demonic ws, a blood red light engulfing it as a bloodthirsty aura could be felt by the 5 spectators.


    "Misty Rain!"


    Xuan Hao used the Misty Rain sword as a bright blue light erupted out from his sword and formed a thin transparent blue barrier in front of him to block the giant demonic w heading directly towards him.


    The demonic cultivator arrived in front of Xuan Hao just as he finished using the Misty Rain Sword Move and his w came crashing down towards Xuan Hao. Drawing an eerie red line as it moved down towards Xuan Hao.


    BOOM!


    The red w of the demonic cultivator made contact with the blue barrier of Xuan Hao as a loud explosion erupted.


    "You are stronger than expected¡­" Retreating rapidly after the first exchange as he looked even more cautiously at Xuan Hao who waspletely unscratched from the earlier exchange.


    Xuan Hao did not say anything and struck out with his sword.


    The demonic cultivator suddenly felt something and looked over to see the sword attack of Xuan Hao heading over towards him.


    The strength contained in this simple attack by Xuan Hao was nothing to scoff at as it hadbined together with his domain and sword intent to create an indescribably terrifying attack.


    This was not something that someone not even at the half step Domain Lord Realm like the demonic cultivator should be able to survive!


    "Wha- What is that!?" Sensing the terrifying might behind the iing sword attack, the demonic cultivator immediately tried to dodge but found out that he could not escape as the attack seemed to follow after him no matter where he went.


    Whoosh~


    pping his bat like wings, the demonic cultivator tried to escape into the air, but this was to no avail as the sword attack soon appeared directly behind him.


    Without being able to escape from the simple sword attack, the demonic cultivator could only try to defend against it as he was floating mid-air.


    Boom!


    "That should be it¡­" ncing over at where the small explosion urred. Not believing that the demonic cultivator would be able to survive it.


    Whoosh!


    "Hm?" Just as Xuan Hao was about to go over and check the corpse of the demonic cultivator, a small ck me in the shape of a ball flew out of the explosion and headed straight for him as Xuan Hao immediately sensed the terrifying might hidden inside of it as he immediately set up a defensive barrier.


    Fwoosh!


    The small ck me hit Xuan Hao''s barrier and immediately engulfed his barrier for a short moment before disappearing.


    "What was that¡­" Not really understanding what the small ck me was, Xuan Hao clearly felt that the might of the small ck me was way above something that the demonic cultivator should be able to use at his current level, so with that in mind, Xuan Hao cautiously looked over towards the ce in the air above where the explosion slowly began receding.


    Revealing the demonic cultivator still fine without any visible injuries on his body, as he gently pped his wings while remaining floating in the air above the ancient trees.


    Xuan Hao did not really care much about this as he had instead focused on a small ck ball like object firmly held in the right w of the demonic cultivator as he was floating in the air above.


    Earlier, Xuan Hao had seen him use that ball once, but just thought it was a demonic defensive artifact of some sort used to block the attack of the trio from the Flowing Cloud Sect before he could transform¡­


    But from the looks of things, it seemed like there was more to the demonic artifact than he had first thought as the strength behind the earlier ck me clearly reached the levelparable to the demon ape from earlier.


    Half a Step into the Domain Lord Realm!


    With the demonic artifact in hand, the demonic cultivator had surpassed the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm and reached the transitional realm known as Half a Step into the Domain Lord Realm!


    ¡­


    "W-what is happening?! Is this still a fight at the Nascent Soul Realm!?" As Xuan Hao and the demonic cultivator began fighting each other, the youngdy from the Flowing Cloud Sect could not help but exim in shock as she observed Xuan Hao and the demonic cultivator exchanging moves. One more devasting than the other as the surrounding environment slowly began to change ording to the direction of the fight.


    "Youngdy, I think we should escape before we get caught up in it as well or be a distraction for Lord Bright Sword!" Addressing Xuan Hao with the honorary title of lord, the olddy from the Flowing Cloud Sect reminded her that they should not be staying here for any longer and risk getting dragged into the fight between the two of them.


    "Indeed, mydy, I think we should leave now that an opportunity has presented itself!" Backing up the suggestion of the olddy, Old Ji wanted nothing more than to leave the area as he watched the surroundings slowly be burned down under the weird ck me that the demonic cultivator had suddenly taken out.


    "Fine¡­ But we must remember to convey our thanks to Lord Bright Sword in the future¡­ Maybe we can do it through the Explorer Union? After all, he did say he was an explorer¡­" Agreeing to leave with a bit of reluctance in her voice, the youngdy of the Flowing Cloud Sect seemed to remember that Xuan Hao had mentioned that he was from the Explorer Union and found a way to convey her thanks in the future.


    The group of three did not stay around for much longer and soon left the battlefield. Leaving behind only the two underlings of the former bandit leader. Now demonic cultivator.


    "Brother¡­ What should we do now¡­?" One of the two helplessly asked as he knew very well that the Fire Blood Gangs days were numbered with their leader gone.


    "That person said he was from the Explorer Union¡­ Why don''t we try joining them and make a living there? I heard that they also explore different ruins filled with all kinds of treasures and ancient artifacts from time to time¡­" Answering his brother, the other former underling''s eyes shone briefly as he envisioned himself bing as strong as that Bright Sword person currently fighting their former leader.


    "True! I also heard that we could join the core of the Explorer Union and get to train at their headquarters at the Ewaria Continent if we worked hard enough! By that point we might even be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm!" Feeling that joining the Explorer Union would be a good idea, both of the former underlings agreed to join the Explorer Union after leaving the secret realm.


    Like this, only Xuan Hao and the demonic cultivator was left facing each other as countless ck me surrounded the demonic cultivator floating in the air together with Xuan Hao, who had by now jumped up on one of his own swords to match the demonic cultivator in the air above the ancient forest.


    "Hah¡­ H-howe you can fly as well!? Is that sort a flying artifact of some sort? Why?! Why can you fly as well while not being at the Domain Lord Realm!?" Letting out an exhausted breath, the demonic cultivator screamed loudly as he looked over at Xuan Hao quietly floating in front of him with a cold look in his eyes.


    After finding out how strong Xuan Hao was earlier, he had nned to just fly above him and rain down the ck mes until he was exhausted and died or retreat by flying away in case he held on against the ck mes.


    But this did not happen as Xuan Hao flew up to meet him the moment that he began throwing down the ming ck balls constructed by his demonic artifact.


    Resulting in them shing with each other several times mid-air, as the demonic cultivator was left on the defensive and forced to block the constant flow of attacks by Xuan Hao. Only able tounch an attack when he sacrificed some of his defences.


    The small ck ball in his right hand had not been perfectly fine from the past few shes with Xuan Hao, as several cracks had already begun spreading across the surface of it.


    Blocking the terrifying sword attacks of Xuan Hao had clearly taken a toll on the demonic artifact and the demonic cultivator knew very well that he would not be able to keep up for long if things continued like this.


    This had in turn resulted in his earlier loud screaming at Xuan Hao¡­


    To be honest, it was more like him letting some of his pent-up frustration with the current direction of the fight, as he tried to calm down in the face of Xuan Hao''s continued attacks.

 Chapter 196: Demonic Artifact

    <h4>Chapter 196: Demonic Artifact</h4>


    "Hah¡­ Hah, this should be far enough¡­" Breathing out loudly, Old Ji informed his twopanions as the group of three all came to a stop.


    By this point, they had already been running for close to one hour and all of them were exhausted to the point of almost copsing.


    After all, they had just used their ultimate moves earlier and exhausted most of their qi in the process¡­


    The olddy was the worst off, as she immediately sat down the moment Old Ji called for a break and began trying to stabilize the injuries that she had received from shing with the former bandit leader before he transformed into a demonic cultivator.


    "Old Ji¡­ Do you think Lord Bright Sword will be able to win¡­?" Seeing that the olddy had sat down to stabilize her injuries and recover, the youngdy from the Flowing Cloud Sect anxiously walked up to him and asked with a worried look in her eyes.


    "Haha, you don''t need to worry! I have seen Lord¡­ Bright Sword¡­ Fight before and dealing with that demonic cultivator should not be a problem at all!" Laughing confidently, Old Ji tried his best to ensure the youngdy as she seemed to calm down after hearing him speak.


    "That''s good¡­ Hopefully, we will be able to thank him personally in the future!"


    "Yes¡­ Hopefully we will¡­" Muttering this quietly to himself, Old Ji looked behind them in the direction of the fight and sent his sincere hope that Xuan Hao would win.


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ H-howe you can fly as well!? Is that sort a flying artifact of some sort? Why?! Why can you fly as well while not being at the Domain Lord Realm!?" Floating in the air on top of his sword, Xuan Hao looked over at the demonic cultivator as he angrily screamed at him while trying his best to quickly stabilize his breathing.


    Xuan Hao had already exhausted him way beyond what he could take, and his demonic artifact had even started breaking down under the constant barrage of sword attacks by Xuan Hao.


    This just spoke of how strong Xuan Hao currently was as it should have originally been a pseudo mystic rank demonic artifact. Breaking something like that would be hard for anyone below the Domain Lord Realm and Xuan Hao did not end up too exhausted after bringing it to the point that it was already about to break at the slightest touch.


    "What did you expect? That only you could fly?" Answering the demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao rolled his eyes at the childish question of the demonic cultivator.


    Did he expect that he would be the only one able to fly below the Domain Lord Realm just because he became a demonic cultivator?


    "Y-you!" Pointing angrily towards Xuan Hao with one of his ws, the demonic cultivator did not know what to say, as it was indeed true¡­


    The demonic cultivator had also heard about several different flying artifacts from his travels through different kingdoms and had already convinced himself that the flying sword beneath Xuan Hao was one such artifact.


    This misunderstanding did not really bother Xuan Hao much, as he had already viewed the demonic cultivator as a dead person¡­ Whether he knew about it being his sword intent or a flying artifact did not really matter to him.


    Boom!


    "Wha-!"


    As Xuan Hao was observing the demonic cultivator begin to throw a tantrum, arge explosion suddenly erupted from the demonic artifact in the demonic cultivator''s right hand as the ck me suddenly engulfed himpletely before he even managed to react.


    Following this, Xuan Hao watched as the ck me transformed into the shape of a small crow that quickly flew into the distance at a speed way faster than what Xuan Hao could currently muster.


    "What in the world¡­" Xuan Hao did not manage to react much to the situation as he looked over to see that the body on the demonic cultivator and all the things on his person had already beenpletely burned up by the ck me before it took the form of a small crow and flew away.


    "The demonic artifact managed to gain sentience¡­?" Thinking about it, Xuan Hao could not think of any other reason for the demonic artifact to suddenly erupt and kill the demonic cultivator before turning into a crow and fly away.


    Maybe it had gained sentience for some time and just waited for the demonic cultivator to be weak enough before breaking free and escaping¡­?


    "You wouldn''t run away¡­? Right?"


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao looked down at the sword in his hand and asked in a teasing tone.


    There was a difference between a demonic artifact and a normal artifact that had gained sentience. Most of the time, demonic artifacts would try to kill their master and escape to cultivate by themselves.


    This way, the artifact would be able to walk on the path of cultivation by itself after it managed to create a humanoid body.


    Normal artifacts on the other hand, would grow along with their master as they might be able to take on a physical body by themselves without needing to spend any time cultivating one after they be strong enough.


    Xuan Hao was not really clear about what would happen after this or how urate it was, as most of the things recorded in the Flying Sword Sect did not mention much about sentient artifacts outside of that¡­


    "Well¡­ What to do now? Should I go and find that Skinling guy or was it Old Ji now?" With the demonic cultivator dead, Xuan Hao did not really have to stay around for any longer as he thought about catching up with the former elder Skinling now going by Old Ji from the Flowing Cloud Sect.


    But he quickly threw this idea away.


    Meeting up with the people he had saved earlier did not really seem like a good idea and he should just leave that Old Ji alone and let him do his own thing without interfering.


    After all, it seemed like he was doing well after leaving the ck Rose Sect for only a few months¡­ Maybe he would give him a few more surprises the next time both of them met?


    "Hehe, seems like I will have to keep an eye out for the Flowing Cloud Sect in the future!" Chuckling to himself as he thought about this, Xuan Hao soon disappeared from the battlefield where the demonic cultivator had perished.

 Chapter 197: Azure Sky Kingdom Finds out about the Secret Realm~

    <h4>Chapter 197: Azure Sky Kingdom Finds out about the Secret Realm~</h4>


    "What!? A secret realm appeared in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!?" A loud voice echoed out from the Azure Sky Kingdom''s throne room as the nearby guards began shaking in fear. Afraid that even breathing too loudly would get them killed.


    At this moment, a certain messenger was shaking in fear as he was kneeling down in front of a giant throne .


    He had just finished delivering the news of a secret realm appearing inside of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom before the person on top of the throne began erupting in anger as he cursed at the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Originally, the messenger had thought that he and his group could rx after returning to the capital... But he had been wrong.


    Over the past week, the messenger had worked overtime together with his small group of subordinates. Travelling all over the vast Azure Sky Kingdom and trying their best to deliver the news of the secret realm''s appearance inside of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s territory.


    From the newly conquered territories to the capital at the centre of the Azure Sky Kingdom. The messenger had travelled all over the ce as only he was left toe and inform the ruler by himself.


    The reason why the messenger and his group had ended up being used for once outside of themunication talismans to deliver news, outside of what the current ruler in front of him ordered him to do from time to time, was the fact that the opening of the secret realm had rendered the normalmunication talismans from the Explorer Union useless.


    This was of course not to say that allmunication talismans in the nearby kingdoms were rendered useless after the secret realm opened, as the Explorer Union had higher quality for sale as well, that could be used over a longer distance as well.


    Though this was not cheap like the normalmunication talismans bought from the explorer union, resulting in the only buyer of these being the more powerful kingdoms or sects.


    "What should we do now? If we continue the offensive on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, we might risk offending someone powerful¡­ But if we don''tunch an attack on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom soon, they will have fortified their defensive position enough to resist our attack! ARGH! Why did a secret realm have to appear now!?" Screaming loudly as he thought about the secret realm that had just appeared, the current rule of the Azure Sky Kingdom felt that he was stuck between a rock and a hard ce. No real way for him to get out without losing anything¡­


    "Your majesty! Someone hase seeking an audience with you!" Just as the person sitting on the throne was about to throw yet another fit out of rage, a voice echoed out from the entrance as one of the guards walked into the throne room, a person wearing a pitch-ck robe with his face covered by a hood attached to the robe entering behind the guard.


    "Hm? You are?" Narrowing his eyes upon seeing the new person entering, the person on the throne seemed to have calmed down as a few seconds passed.


    "I see, so that is how it is¡­ Everyone is dismissed! Leave " Nodding his head with a serious look stered onto his face, the ruler of the Azure Sky Kingdom told everyone to leave as the messenger nced back at the hooded person on his way out of the throne room.


    The person waspletely covered outside of his hands that were clearly male from what the messenger could see.


    Other than that, there was nothing recognizable on the figure hidden beneath the pitch-ck robe.


    What is his majesty up to this time¡­?


    Feeling a profound sense of uneasiness welling up inside of him, the messenger felt that something regarding the fate of the Azure Sky Kingdom was about to take ce¡­ And it would not be resulting in something good for him or the rest of the people under him¡­


    This was just a gut feeling that the messenger had, but he was sure something that would shake the entire Azure Sky Kingdom was about to take ce inside the throne room¡­


    "Maybe I should try and gather those kids and try to go somewhere around the border to escape the iing storm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he made his way over to a small resting room located inside of the main pce of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s Royal Family, the messenger sat down and thought about what to do before finally standing up and making his way out of the pce towards the small office that the messengers still had left in the Royal Capital.


    No matter what, he would ensure that his people would be able to survive the iing storm and staying in the capital would most likely end up involving them in the uing storm that was about to sweep through the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    The messenger did not just decide on this because he had seen a personpletely hidden about to have secret conversation with the current ruler and king of the Azure Sky Kingdom, but because the situation with the gue had gotten even more out of control over the past few months.


    If not for a mysterious group of priests showing up to help the poption, the messenger doubted that the people would have wanted to stay any longer.


    There was even a chance that they might have started a mass exodus in the Azure Sky Kingdom as they would try to enter the nearby kingdoms in hope of finding aid¡­


    ...


    The Azure Sky Kingdom was not the only kingdom close to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom that reacted as all of the nearby kingdoms lost their ability tomunicate with each other and soon found out about the secret realm that had appeared inside of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s territory.


    By this point, all of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts in the nearby kingdoms began to grow restless as they all knew what the appearance of a secret realm represented! A chance to reach the Domain Lord Realm!


    All they had to do, was find a chance to gain ess to the secret realm...

 Chapter 198: Side Quest Complete, Artisan Alchemist?

    <h4>Chapter 198: Side Quest Complete, Artisan Alchemist?</h4>


    The aftermath of the fight with the demonic cultivator did not really lead to anything as the nearby ruin had been destroyed during their fight and everything on the demonic cultivator had ended up getting destroyed by the demonic artifact when it escaped.


    Xuan Hao did not really see a reason to stay around for any longer as he left the area andnded a few miles away to resume his walk through the ancient forest while trying to look for more ruins on his way back towards the entrance.


    Not wanting to be too fast and end up arriving before the other bigshots arrived to fight for control over the secret realm with the Sky Empire¡­


    Like this, Xuan Hao once again resumed his journey through the Nascent Soul Realm Area of the secret realm on foot. Observing his surroundings as he hoped that he would have a chance to encounter an ancient ruin without it getting destroyed in the process this time¡­


    "Hm?" Just as Xuan Hao was walking without anything happening, a small sound could be heard from the system as Xuan Hao quickly checked up on it in his sea of consciousness.


    [Side Quest: Disciple, Qing Yi, Bes a Journeyman Alchemistplete)]


    [Reward: Artisan level Alchemist Knowledge and skill]


    [Redeem Reward: Y/N]


    "This is¡­ Unexpected¡­ Seems like Qing Yi did not ck of when it came to alchemy!" Smiling to himself as he saw one of his side quests beingpleted, Xuan Hao redeemed the reward from the system and instantly felt arge amount of information about all sorts of different pills and potions fill up his mind.


    The information that he gained from the side quest was of course not just limited to different potion and pill recipes, but also included knowledge about all sorts of spiritual herbs that he never knew about before from the Mortal Rank all the way up to the Soul Rank.


    There was even information about some rather unique spiritual herbs as well and one of these unique herbs was the Purple Sky Flower¡­


    Contrary to its name sounding quite majestic, the herb itself was a rare but pretty useless Earth Rank spiritual herb. The only use of the herb was to cause the person who consumed it to giggle uncontrobly for up to an hour depending on how much of the herb was consumed¡­


    The information that he gained of course contained arge number of useless potions and pills as well and to be honest, Xuan Hao felt that the majority of the potion recipes that he had gotten waspletely useless¡­


    A potion that changes one''s hair colour needing over a dozen different Soul Rank spiritual herbs to brew¡­


    But this was not the worst of it, as another potion required hundreds of different rare and exotic herbs and its only use was to cause someone to develop a fear of rabbits¡­ This was a pinnacle Artisan level potion and was the most difficult potion to make that Xuan Hao got the recipe to¡­


    "Now that I look closer¡­ aren''t all these recipes useless!?" Looking over the different recipes that he was given by the system, Xuan Hao did not discover a single normal one among them and began to doubt whether or not he had truly be an Artisan Alchemist¡­


    He could indeed effortlessly brew these Artisan level potions¡­ But all of them werepletely useless!


    If he wanted to brew a normal Artisan level potion or pill that did not belong to the ones that the system had graciously bestowed upon him earlier, Xuan Hao would still have to spend the time learning the potion or pill recipes from scratch¡­


    While he would undoubtedly be faster as he was already an Artisan Alchemist, it would still take some time to learn the different recipes and he would still have to find some¡­


    The only ce Xuan Hao knew about with that level of alchemist recipes was the notebook of Lord Kubera¡­ Outside of that, he had no clue about where to find any pill or potion recipes for the Artisan level¡­


    After all, the Flying Sword Sect never had an Artisan Alchemist and therefore never really saw the need to try and gather any alchemist recipes outside of those for alchemists below the Artisan level¡­


    "W-what should I do with this¡­?" Xuan Hao felt confused and disappointed at the sudden turn of event.


    He had be an Artisan Alchemist and had a myriad of different potion and pill recipes, but all of them were useless!


    Even if he was an Artisan Alchemist, it was only in regard to his understanding of alchemy and spiritual herbs¡­ When it came to truly making any useful potions or pills, he could be considered to bepletely useless!


    "At least I should be able to teach Qing Yi with the knowledge I gained¡­ I don''t need to make any pills or potions myself; I will just let my disciple make them for me!" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao no longer felt that the quest reward was so useless anymore as it would allow for him to teach Qing Yi personally when it came to alchemy now!


    Maybe this was the goal of the system. For him to teach his disciple instead of letting others do the job for him¡­


    Yes... This was definitely what the system nned...


    ¡­


    A few hours earlier at the Flying Sword Sect, the information about the secret realm opening had already spread to the upper echelons of the sect over the past few days as they nned to just quietly observe the situation from the side and not get involved in it.


    After all, the sect master was currently in closed door seclusion attempting to breakthrough and they did not really have enough Nascent Soul Realm Experts to send out to explore the secret realm and could definitely not afford to lose even a single one of them.


    Other than that, there was also Shu Yao currently staying at the sect under the request of the sect master himself.


    Leaving the protection of the sect to her as they went out to explore the secret realm did not seem like such a good idea¡­


    As the Flying Sword Sect had decided to ignore the secret realm and just remain on the side-lines, Xuan Hao''s two disciples did not know anything about it as both of them just kept up their normal schedule.


    "Where do you think master went?" Walking back to the pavilion of Xuan Hao, Qing Yi asked with a curious expression on her face as she looked over at Chu Yang walking beside her.


    They had just recently finished a practice match against each other and were making their way back to the pavilion to rest up and understand the things they had learned from their earlier spar.


    "I have no idea about that¡­ Master just said he would be leaving for a few days, but I think I heard him mention something about Chi Hu that we met earlier at the Third Star Peak. Maybe he went out to try and recruit him?" Thinking about it for a moment, Chu yang could not think about any other reason why their master would suddenly leave for a few days.


    "I see¡­ I guess that is reasonable, it would never hurt to have more Nascent Soul Realm Experts like master in the sect¡­" Nodding her head to Chu Yang''s answer, Qing Yi felt what he had said was reasonable, but for some reason she still felt like there was something wrong.


    If master wanted to recruit him, it would surely not have taken so long¡­ Maybe he had moved to an area far away or something?


    "Ah, looks like Zhi Ruo is not here at the moment¡­" Qing Yi felt this was a little unreasonable, but her train of thought was interrupted as Chu Yang called out as both of them arrived in front of the pavilion.


    Zhi Ruo, who was normally always present in front of the pavilion was indeed gone and the pavilion looked a bit lonely to Qing Yi as she entered it and soon parted ways with Chu Yang and made her way back to her own room.


    "Hah¡­ What should I do?" Throwing herself down on her bed after making it back to her room, Qing Yi rolled around as she thought about what to do next.


    Originally, she wanted to hang out with Zhi Ruo and maybe grab something to eat in one of the many shops located just outside the entrance of the Flying Sword Sect.


    But now that her original n of action for the rest of the day did not seem usible anymore, Qing Yi suddenly felt at a loss about what to do.


    Rolling around her bed wondering what to do, Qing Yi felt that she hit something and turned over to see that it was a small notebook written by one of the seniors of the Alchemy Hall.


    The notebook had been given to her after she asked one of her seniors about higher level recipes and she had been told that the different potion and pill recipes inside of the notebook would be good for her to train with as they were rtively easy to understand and did not require a lot of expensive spiritual herbs to make in the first ce.


    "Hm? Maybe I should try and practice the new alchemy recipes I recently picked up at the Alchemy Hall¡­"? Muttering this to herself in a quiet voice, Qing Yi picked up the small notebook and began looking through it for a few minutes before deciding on one of the many recipes inside.


    "Hop!" Jumping off her bed, Qing Yi made her way out of her room towards a room where she could practice the new alchemy recipe.

 Chapter 199: Sweet Cloud Pill

    <h4>Chapter 199: Sweet Cloud Pill</h4>


    The room that Qing Yi normally used for practicing her alchemy was no longer her own room and was instead another room inside of the pavilion that she had switched over to using after the space in her room was no longer sufficient to store all of the different spiritual herbs and other tools that she used.


    Instead, she had moved her things over to arger room inside of the pavilion located just beside the area where she had put Chu Yang to work growing spiritual herbs for her.


    This way, it would also be easier for her to keep an eye on him and make sure he didn''t end up wandering up and getting lost somewhere inside of the pavilion¡­


    Walking along the hallways of the pavilion, Qing Yi soon came to a stop in front of a door with a small sign above it with the words [Alchemy Room] on it. The sign itself had been made by Qing Yi herself as she thought about the possibility of any future disciples showing up and wanted to make it clear what the room was for¡­


    Creak~


    Opening the door, a scent of fresh spiritual herbs hit her in the face as Qing Yi happily made her way over to her alchemy cauldron that she had managed to get for free at the Alchemy Hall.


    The alchemy cauldron was useful for practicing alchemy as it made making things like pills easier, but it was not needed to practice alchemy and was just the preferred tool for most alchemists.


    Alchemy could be practiced as long as someone had a pot or another form of container that could be used to store the different spiritual herbs as the alchemist was working.


    The reason why a cauldron was a preferred tool for alchemist was due to it being easy to manage the heat going to and from their ingredients and the fact that it could withstand way more heatpared to the normal pot found in the local marketce.


    A cauldron became even more useful when the alchemy reached theter stages as the amount of heat required for some of the spiritual herbs would simply end up melting any run of the mil pot.


    A cauldron on the other hand could hold on for longer as most of them were made with more precious metals and when even that was not enough, the alchemist would request a cksmith to make an artifact cauldron for them to be able to continue practicing alchemy.


    This was one of the weirder things to Qing Yi, as she had read about it when she visited the pagoda of enlightenment, that most cksmiths would only help an alchemist create an artifact in the shape of a cauldron. Never in the shape of something like a pot¡­


    When she had read this, Qing Yi had felt her business senses tingling as she felt something was wrong with the fact that alchemist only used artifact cauldrons when they went further in their practice¡­


    And indeed, looking deeper into it, Qing Yi found out that most of the cauldrons that circted around the entire Ewaria Continent were created by the same group of cksmiths¡­


    Maybe¡­ In the future¡­ She could¡­


    The small inconspicuous mark on the side of it representing a certain group of cksmiths fell into her sight as Qing Yi threw her thoughts about dipping her hands into the market for alchemists'' pill and potion refinement tools to the back of her mind.


    "No, no, no! Let''s not think about this for now¡­ I don''t even have a junior brother or sister practicing cksmithing, yet¡­" Shaking her head as she muttered this to herself, Qing Yi made her way over to the cauldron in the room and took out the small notebook and began looking through it.


    Shifting from her earlier state to an incredibly focused one.


    "50 grams of crushed cloud tree berries, 2 drops of sugar flower honey¡­" Muttering the different ingredients as she heated up the cauldron, Qing Yi began the process of refining the pill that she had chosen to try out first.


    The steps were simple for her to follow, and the ingredients were somemon herbs that cost close to nothing. The only really expensive thing in the pill recipe was the cloud tree berries, but luckily for her, she had recently gotten some from the elderly seniors of the Alchemy Hall when she went to visit from time to time.


    The cloud tree berries were a rare kind of berry that grew on a rare kind of trees called cloud trees, that only grew at ces where the ground touched the clouds or in more simple terms, tall enough mountains¡­


    The cloud berries were not only useful for alchemy but were also a popr fruit to eat among the younger generation, due to its sweet taste. This had in turn resulted in the elderly generation beginning to giveaway cloud berries to the younger generation whenever they came to visit them.


    In the sects, this also happened¡­ There were even some elders who would spend the entire day rxing and going around giving the younger disciples a few cloud berries to enjoy.


    Qing Yi did not really n to eat the cloud berries she was given, but instead saved them up inside her alchemy room as she knew they were used in alchemy as well.


    "And now all that is left is to wait¡­" finishing the first part of the pill refinement process, Qing Yi sat down on a nearby chair and began going over her earlier fight with Chu Yang as she waited for the cauldron to reach a high enough temperature before beginning to form the pills themselves.


    This process only took a few minutes as Qing Yi soon began to move her qi inside the cauldron before slowly guiding the liquid inside to form the shape of a pill before it began taking on a solid state after cooling down.


    "Done!" Finished with the refinement process, Qing Yi retracted the tiny amount of qi that she used to guide the liquid inside into the right shape before cutting the source of heat beneath the cauldron and watch as it slowly began to cool down.


    This cooling process was the longest part of pill refinement and normally took a few hours, so Qing Yi went over to a matt located a little further into the room before she sat down and quietly began meditating while she waited for the cauldron to cool down enough for her to take out the pills inside without having them crumble the moment, she touched them.


    Like this, a few hours quickly passed as the cauldron finally cooled down and allowed for Qing Yi to reach inside and take out the pills inside.


    "Hm¡­ Looks like I seeded in the first attempt¡­" Feeling a bit bewildered when she took out the four pills that had formed inside of the cauldron and ced them on a small tray on the nearby table.


    Qing Yi slowly began to inspect the four pills, preparing to note down any mistakes she had made but soon ended up speechless as she inspected the four pills


    None of the pills were failures! Instead, all of them came out perfect!


    Originally, Qing Yi had expected to fail her first attempt. After all, she had not spent more than a few minutes looking into the pill recipe in question¡­ But the pills in front of her proved that she had indeed seeded.


    "I''m a Journeyman Alchemist now?" Smiling wryly to herself as she stared down at the four pillsying on the table in front of her, Qing Yi felt a bit of disbelief when she thought about it, but she was indeed a Journeyman Alchemist now that she had sessfully refined a pill of that level¡­ Even if she did not feel like she was one with only having made one of the easiest Journeyman level pills.


    "No use thinking too much about it, I will just have to make some more in the future and be a true Journeyman Alchemist¡­" Throwing the thought of her being a Journeyman Alchemist without much trouble and even seeding in her first attempt, Qing Yi looked back down on the pills on the table.


    The pills in question glowed in a gentle pink colour as the sunlight from a nearby window shone down on them.


    A sweet aroma slowly began to permeate the room as Qing Yi remained focused on the four pills.


    Sweet Cloud, that was the name of the pill, and it could be considered one of the easiest Journeyman level pills to make as it did not really require any new knowledge outside of what a normal high-level apprentice like herself already knew about.


    Sweet Cloud was even easy to the point that some of the more difficult Apprentice level pills were harder to makepared to it, a Journeyman level pill¡­


    The use of the Sweet Cloud pill was even more useless to most cultivators as it would be used when one took a bath.


    Throw the Sweet Cloud pill into the bath water you are using, and you will have a pleasant, sweet smell after the bath.


    Qing Yi did not really understand why pills like this was so popr with the other female disciples of the sect, but she still felt that it would be nice to use after she broke through a minor realm in the Foundation Establishment Realm and ended up covered in impurities¡­


    Putting away the Sweet Cloud Pills, Qing Yi went back to the cauldron and began refining another batch of Sweet Cloud Pills.


    Even if she ended refining more than she would need for herself, she could always sell them to the other female disciples for a profit¡­

 Chapter 200: Suspicious Tree, Attack!

    <h4>Chapter 200: Suspicious Tree, Attack!</h4>


    Continuing his journey through the ancient forest, Xuan Hao was not ted over the fact that he had be an Artisan Alchemist and was instead a bit depressed as his only use would be teaching his disciple with the knowledge that he acquired about alchemy from the system.


    "How depressing¡­ If I have some time in the future, I should learn some more useful alchemy recipes¡­" Lamenting over his misfortune, Xuan Hao shook his head and decided not to think about it anymore.


    After all, he had learned all those different recipes and even acquired the knowledge and skill of what could be considered a peak Artisan Alchemist.


    All he needed to do was set aside the time to learn a few recipes¡­ It should not take too much time; he was after all an Artisan Alchemist now¡­


    "Hm?" Thinking it over for a few minutes as he made his way through the forest at a leisure pace, Xuan Hao soon felt something different as he suddenly came to a stop below a rtively smaller ancient tree with bright green leaves fluttering above as the wind passed by and shook the thin branches.


    "My Nascent Soul¡­ Feels stronger¡­?" Xuan Hao had a confused expression on his face as he slowly sat down below the smaller tree and began to inspect his Nascent Soul in depth.


    Inspecting his Nascent Soul, Xuan Hao discovered that it had indeed increased in strength. The strength increase to his Nascent Soul was close to negligible, but it was still there.


    This left Xuan Hao wondering as he thought about what had ended up causing his Nascent Soul to suddenly grow stronger all of a sudden.


    "Was it because I became an Artisan Alchemist?" Thinking about it, Xuan Hao thought that this was a usible reason.


    But why had he never heard about an Alchemist having their Soul strengthened upon reaching the Artisan Realm?


    Xuan Hao felt that it was unlikely that something like that would not be widespread, as even a tiny increase in strength to the Nascent Soul would allow for a cultivator in the Nascent Soul Realm to increase his chances at breaking through to the next realm.


    Nascent Soul Realm Experts stuck at a bottleneck would most likely be lining up to be alchemists if they knew that their Nascent Soul would be strengthened upon reaching the Artisan Realm!


    What Xuan Hao didn''t consider when thinking about this, was the fact that bing an Artisan Alchemist was not just something anyone could do and it took dozens, if not hundreds of years for an Alchemist to reach the Artisan Realm¡­ Reaching the Artisan realm before the age of one hundred would earn one the title of genius across the Ewaria Continent!


    This was also the reason why some alchemist even bothered cultivating in the first ce, as their lifespan would simply be too short if they did not¡­


    If news about Xuan Hao reaching the Artisan Realm at his age got out, it would surely cause an uproar in the alchemymunity!


    A normal Nascent Soul Realm cultivator would normally be able to live up to 2000 years if nothing unexpected happened to them and dedicating what would normally be 500 up to 1000 years on alchemy for a tiny increase of strength to the Nascent Soul, was simply not worth it¡­


    But Xuan Hao did not think about this as he had no idea about the countless struggles that his peers had to go through to increase the strength of their Nascent Soul¡­


    Rustle~


    A gentle wind blew through the area and caused a few of the leaves to fall off andnd in front of Xuan Hao as he blinked both his eyes before turning to look at the small tree with curious expression on his face.


    Those leaves from earlier had clearlynded right in front of him on purpose¡­ The only question that remained, was why and how¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao began to focus his attention on the smaller ancient tree and soon found several odd things about the tree.


    From its oddly green and vibrant leaves that was almost glowing, to the weird patterns that seemed to have naturally formed on its trunk.


    But this was not the oddest thing about the small tree¡­


    "A hole¡­"


    Indeed, there was a small hole hidden away at the base of the tree as its roots covered itpletely. Making it hard for Xuan Hao to spot if he was not looking for it.


    Even more odd, when his divine sense swept over it, he never felt anything odd about it.


    Like the hole was not even there in the first ce¡­


    "Well, this is not suspicious at all, let''s just enter the hole beneath the not so suspicious tree without knowing what could be waiting beneath it¡­" Xuan Hao rolled his eyes as he said this before quickly moving away from the small tree.


    "Hm?" Having moved a few dozen meters away from the small tree, Xuan Hao suddenly felt that something was holding onto his left leg.


    Whoosh!


    Ching~


    Cutting down at the thing holding onto his left leg with all his might, the only thing that could be heard was the sound of metal meeting metal as the thing holding onto his leg did not seem to flinch even the slightest under the sword attack along with his pseudo sword domain constantly attacking from the moment that Xuan Hao discovered it.


    "C-can we talk about this¡­?" Seeing that he would not be able to escape, Xuan Hao looked down at the thing holding unto his left leg and smiled wryly.


    The thing in question was a long tree root, that looked oddly simr to the roots that were covering the hole beneath the small ancient tree.


    Rustle~


    The leaves on the small tree a few dozen meters shook slightly in response and Xuan Hao suddenly felt himself being dragged into the hole by the tree root before it let go, causing Xuan Hao to fall into a giant space located beneath the small tree as the hole was quickly covered up by even more roots as Xuan Hao passed through it.


    "I guess I can''t get out that way¡­ Hah¡­ What is this? Forcing people to go and explore against their will? Was it because I didn''t willingly enter the suspicious hole?" Stabilizing himself on top of his sword as he floated inside of therge open space, Xuan Hao felt like crying as he looked at the hole slowly closing up as the roots of the small tree covered it up.


    Throwing a few sword attacks towards the tree roots, Xuan Hao soon gave up as he was clearly not able to breakthrough the roots of the small tree and even worse, the other parts of therge open space he now found himself in, was covered in roots as well¡­


    Meaning he would not be able to dig himself out¡­


    "Now¡­ Where in the world am I¡­?" Inspecting his new surroundings outside of just the root covered ceiling, Xuan Hao discovered that there were a few light sources simr to the ones that he had found in the cave with the small pce.


    Other than that, Xuan Hao could only tell that he was in a giant underground cave that seemed to go on endlessly in all direction, as Xuan Hao even felt like it might even cover most of the secret realm!


    "Hah¡­ Guess I will just have to look for a way out¡­" Sighing to himself as he looked at therge underground world spreading out before him, Xuan Hao did not feel the slightest bit happy as he began making his way in the direction where the entrance of the secret realm should be located.


    At least this way he should not suddenly run into strong demon beasts at the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    ¡­


    While Xuan Hao was making his way through the underground world of the secret realm, the Sky Empire had finally established a base outside the secret realm as they had begun to send their people inside to explore the area surrounding the entrance before determining where the secret realm was from.


    After all,pared to the Nascent Soul Realm Experts like Xuan Hao, who entered the secret realm without any prior knowledge at all. The Sky Empire had arge amount of knowledge when it came to the different secret realms that existed out there and what power it might have belonged to in the past.


    "So, you are saying that it might be a secret realm set up by a disciple from that sect in the past!?" A loud yell could be heard echoing out as the general that had appeared earlier on to chase away the cultivators setting up camp outside the secret realm looked towards and elderly man with a shocked expression on his face.


    "Calm down general, I will contact his majesty first before we do anything. Don''t enter the secret realm for now and prepare for when those people show up¡­" Smiling kindly in an attempt to calm down the general, the elderly man soon stood up and left the room as amunication talisman appeared in his hands, as terrifying killing intent leaked out from the elderly man upon reaching thest part of his sentence¡­


    Forcing the poor general behind him to shiver in fear even though the killing intent was not directed towards him, as he looked at the back of the elderly man with reverence in his eyes as he disappeared out of the room they were currently inside.


    "Hah, I will have to prepare before the fight begins¡­" Standing up after the elderly man was gone, the general once again looked like a general as he made his out of the room to order the soldiers under him to prepare for the inevitable fight that would happen.

 Chapter 201: Underground Formation Pillars~

    <h4>Chapter 201: Underground Formation Pirs~</h4>


    Travelling through the underground world, Xuan Hao saw many different unique nts growing along the ground as he flew above it. There were even a few rare spiritual herbs that he recognized after recently gaining a lot of knowledge about alchemy and spiritual herbs earlier on.


    The spiritual nts themselves did not really have much use in his hands, but Xuan Hao decided to gather them as he had more than enough space in his interspatial ring. After all, he could still give them to his disciple or the alchemy hall when he returned to the Flying Sword Sect.


    Spiritual herbs and nts were not the only thing that Xuan Hao met through his journey through the underground world as several demon beast had also shown up on the ground below him.


    Luckily, most of the demon beasts were only at the Nascent Soul Realm and none of them had the ability to fly as there was no flying demon beast in the underground world¡­ At least from what Xuan Hao had seen so far.


    So, his journey through the underground world went smoothly as Xuan Hao was not disturbed in the slightest as he flew through the air a few hundred meters above the ground below. The ceiling covered in thick roots only a few dozen meters above him.


    "Is that a¡­ Formation pir?" Flying undisturbed through the underground world, Xuan Hao soon came to a stop as he looked at the pir piercing through the underground world from above.


    The formation pir in question was piercing deep into the underground world from above as the thick roots from the cave ceiling were circling around it as they seemed to stop the formation pir from descending any further into the underground world. Leaving the formation pir just a few dozen meters above the ground of the underground cave.


    Xuan Hao felt that this looked quite weird as it almost seemed like the roots were trying their best to stop the formation pir from descending any further.


    Looking over in the distance, Xuan Hao soon discovered that other formation pirs were the same as they had each descended either more or less than the formation pir in front of Xuan Hao, but never closer than 10 meters from the ground.


    "This should be the formation pirs between the Nascent Soul Realm Area and the Core Formation Realm Area¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao nced ahead and saw several demon beasts at the Nascent Soul Realm wandering around freely in what was supposed to be the Core Formation Area!


    "Looks like I will have to be even more careful going forward¡­" Moving ahead, Xuan Hao no longer dared to fly openly like he did before and instead began moving on the ground as he used his pseudo sword domain to conceal himself from the different demon beasts wandering along the ground of the underground world.


    As he was moving closer and closer to the ce where the secret realm was located, Xuan Hao also discovered that the ceiling above was slowly getting further and further away from him.


    This was not obvious at first, but Xuan Hao soon discovered that the space between him and the cave ceiling had increased from a few hundred meters to several thousand meters!


    But this did not make any sense, as Xuan Hao was clearly close to the surface when the root had pulled him into this underground cave world¡­


    "Unless¡­" Thinking about it, Xuan Hao suddenly thought about the possibility of the entrance to the secret realm being located at the top of a tall mountain peak, Xuan Hao inevitably shook his head and felt like he understood less and less about the secret realm with each passing minute. It had never felt like he was on top of a mountain in the first ce and descending down towards the base of a mountain¡­


    Maybe it had something to do with the formation he was inside? Or maybe it was just something with how a secret realm was created in the first ce¡­


    Xuan Hao had no idea and suddenly felt his curiosity about the secret realm grow the longer he travelled around the underground world of the secret realm.


    "Well¡­ There is only one way to find out¡­" Looking over the formation pirs covered in the roots, Xuan Hao inspected them for a short time before turning to look in the direction of the secret realm''s entrance and continuing his journey deeper into the underground world of the secret realm.


    ¡­


    The underground world was in itself not so different from the ancient forest above. The ancient trees were just reced byrge stone formations and pirs sticking up from the ground as they covered the entire underground world.


    Walking through the underground world, Xuan Hao also managed to discover the first ruin since being forced down there.


    The ruin itself was nothing too extravagant like an underground pce or an ancient hiding ce for past treasure or that sort of thing but was instead a small crude looking stone hut cut into one of therge stones that covered the entire surface of the underground world. The front entrance blocked by arge stone acting as a door of sorts for the stone hut.


    If it was not for the fact that there were no traces of any other people ever being in the underground world before, Xuan Hao would most likely not have bothered with the crude looking stone hut and instead just continued on his way after quickly sweeping through it with his divine sense.


    But the fact that his divine sense had failed to discover the hole beneath the small ancient tree earlier on had left a mark on him and Xuan Hao no longer felt so certain about the current strength of his divine sense¡­


    Who knew if something inside the crude looking stone hut would be able to escape his divine sense as well¡­?


    Bang!


    Pushing aside therge stone in front of the crude looking stone hut, Xuan Hao cautiously made his way inside of the stone hut.

 Chapter 202: Hidden Scroll

    <h4>Chapter 202: Hidden Scroll</h4>


    The inside of the stone hut was almostpletely empty outside of a small stone mat located in the corner of the room and a few simple pieces of furniture like a chair and table made out of stone.


    The small stone mat was most likely used for cultivation, while the other furniture was used to make things inside of the small stone hut feel more homely. At least that was what Xuan Hao thought¡­


    Looking around the small stone hut, there was nothing that really caught his eyes as he made his way into a small room located beside the area where the stone mat wasying.


    Entering the room, Xuan Hao''s vision was instantly caught by a scroll in the corner of the stone huts backroom¡­ Though it would be more precise to say that it was the only thing that caught Xuan Hao''s attention inside of the small backroom.


    After all, there was nothing inside of it outside of the scrollying in the corner of the backroom.


    This alone was more than enough to make Xuan Hao curious as there was not really anything present inside of the small stone hut that could give him any idea as to who it had belonged to in the past or what purpose it might have served outside of a secluded area for someone to quietly cultivate.


    Rustle~


    Picking up the scroll and unfolding it, Xuan Hao''s eyes instantly focused on therge words written on the top of the scroll.


    "W-what is this!?" Starring at therge words written on top of the scroll, Xuan Hao encountered a problem that he had never encountered before¡­


    "I can''t read it¡­"


    Simply put, the words were anothernguage outside of themonnguage used throughout the Ewaria Continent¡­


    This was not really something that Xuan Hao had expected to encounter, and he felt helpless as he could only stare blindly at the weird words on the scroll before putting it away in his interspatial ring. Maybe he would be able to understand it at some point in the future and find out what was written in it¡­


    Roar!


    As Xuan Hao just put away the scroll written in an unknownnguage, a loud roar suddenly echoed through the entire underground world as Xuan Hao suddenly felt himself tremble unconsciously upon encounter the vast and overwhelming aura followed by the roar.


    "Domain Lord demon beast¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao quickly made his way outside of the small stone hut and moved in the opposite direction that the roar hade from.


    The direction that the roar hade from was not the same ce that Xuan Hao hade from, but was around the same general area, so by going in the opposite direction, Xuan Hao just had to continue his journey towards where the entrance of the secret realm would be located above.


    The only difference would be the fact that he moved faster and tried his best avoid any possible encounter with the demon beasts that roamed the underground world of the secret realm.


    ROAR!


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, it seemed like the source of the roar was only getting closer and closer with each passing moment, even when Xuan Hao had already utilized his cultivation to the max to move towards the location that the entrance of the secret realm was located as quickly as possible at this point.


    Even worse, the roars from the distance seemed to grow more and more enraged as Xuan Hao was able to pick up the sound of fighting in the distance.


    Ah! Please don''t involve me! Can''t you guys go fighting somewhere else¡­?


    Feeling the fluctuations of what he could only assume was several Domain Lords fighting the demon beast roaring loudly begin to close in on him, Xuan Hao felt like he might be an unfortunate bystander caught in the aftermath of the fight between Domain Lords if he was not fast enough.


    ¡­


    A few hours earlier at the entrance to the secret realm where the people from the Sky Empire had just finished setting up their first line of defence surrounding it, arge shadow suddenly appeared in the air above as the people from the Sky Empire below all looking up in shock.


    "The Onyx Empire¡­" Inside of the flying ship that hadnded just beside the entrance to the secret realm, the general turned around and looked up at the banners swaying on the side of therge flying ship that had suddenly appeared above them with a dense killing intent brewing inside his eyes¡­


    The Great Sky Empire and The Onyx Empire had long since been enemies with each other as they were located just next to each other and the only reason why they hadn''t ended up fighting an all-out war to destroy the other, was the fact that the other empires and powerful factions close by would be more than happy to take advantage of their fighting to swallow up some of their territories when they were weakened.


    But this was not the main reason, as there was a well-known mountain range that covered the bordering area between both of the empires. The mountain range was not just any ordinary mountain range, but it had several demon beasts at the Soul ension Realm hidden within!


    This alone was more than enough to cause both empires to only stare at each other from afar as they patiently waited for an opportunity tounch a devastating attack on the other.


    Of course, this was not to say that both empires did not fight with each other as both of them constantly secretly send people into each other''s territories to cause chaos.


    The general of course knew about this and had long since known that the Onyx Empire would be one of the first groups of people to show up at the secret realm as it was located close to their border with the Onyx Empire¡­

 Chapter 203: Sky Empire and Onyx Empire

    <h4>Chapter 203: Sky Empire and Onyx Empire</h4>


    "General Liu! Should we wait for them tond or justunch an attack now¡­?" As the general was standing still and thinking about what to do about the arrival of the people from the Onyx Empire, one of his soldiers anxiously made his way over as he asked in a nervous voice.


    "Hm?" Looking away from the flying ship above slowly descending down towards them, General Liu turned around and looked over at the nervous soldier that had rushed over to ask him.


    "Just wait for now, there is no use in meaninglessly attacking when the other have not even attacked us yet¡­ And the Onyx Empire will not be the only party to show upter, we still have to worry about the others as well¡­" Finished speaking, General Liu watched as the soldier hurried back to the rest of the soldiers and informed for them to not attack the people from the Onyx Empire for now.


    The elderly man that General Liu had spoken with earlier had yet to appear as General Liu clearly knew that he did not want to be the one to deal with the people from the Onyx Empire himself, so General Liu could only sigh in his mind as he floated up into the air to meet the people from the Onyx Empire before they decided that it would be a good idea for them tounch an attack on them.


    Whoosh~


    Ascending into the sky, General Liu soon caught the attention of the people on top of the flying ship from the Onyx Empire as someone stepped out from one of thepartments on the ship and flew over to meet General Liu mid-air.


    "I didn''t expect for the high and mighty General Liu to show up at the border after that thing 12 years ago~" Smiling in contempt as he taunted him, the person from the Onyx Empire looked over at General Liu as he clearly knew the other party.


    "Haha¡­ I did not expect for you of all people to show up here General Zhang¡­ Were you not dealing with something at your Onyx Empire''s northern border? I heard about a certain demonic sect having taken over a few of your kingdoms over there recently!" Not backing down in the slightest to the general from the Onyx Empire, General Liu did not wait for even a second before he answered back with a shortugh.


    "Hmph, we of course already settled that troublesome demonic sect! Let''s not talk about this anymore, we both know why we are here in the first ce¡­ So, are you going to allow us to enter the secret realm, or will we have to force our way in like what happened 12 years ago¡­?" Smirking upon mentioning the thing that had happened 12 years ago, General Zhang could not help himself from smiling as he watched the angry look of General Liu whenever he mentioned that incident.


    General Liu of course could not forget about thest time both of them had shed at the border when a secret realm had appeared during a skirmish between both of them.


    Back then, General Liu and his army had arrived at the secret realm first and managed to set up a defensive perimeter just like today and General Zhang from the Onyx Empire had arrivedter but still managed to crush their defences and enter the secret realm.


    General Liu had ended up seriously injured during their fight back then and was forced to return to the capital of the Sky Empire and recover for the next 10 years!


    The anger General Liu felt when he saw the person who had forced him to quietly recover without being able to cultivate for the past 10 years appear in front of him was understandable.


    But he managed to keep the anger he felt under control as he just resorted to taunt back. Not daring to fall for the obvious trap in front of him, causing him to attack General Zhang.


    "No need to bother about that this time around, an ancestor of the Sky Empire is already present!" Smirking happily as he said that General Liu looked over to see the surprised look on General Zhang''s face¡­ But there was no surprise written on it, instead the same taunting look appeared on his face as a smile slowly began to creep up his lips.


    "Oh¡­ What a coincidence~ It just so happens that I was acting as a guard for an ancestor of my Onyx Empire as well! Why don''t we just let those two decided on matters instead. After all, with both of the exalted ancestors present, we juniors should not make any important decisions." Smirking happily as he watched the face of General Liu deteriorate more and more with each word he said, General Zhang finished talking before retreating back into the flying ship of the Onyx Empire.


    "You-"


    "General Liu, return for now! I will take over from here on out!" just as General Liu was about to say something in return, a loud voice echoed out inside of his head as General Liu quickly shut up before turning to look back at the flying ship of the Sky Empire.


    "Hah¡­" Letting out an unwilling sigh, General Liu cast onst nce in the direction General Zhang had left in before returning back to the ground again.


    "Seems like the Onyx Empire already knows something¡­" Muttering this to himself inside of the flying ship, the elderly man slowly stood up and put away themunication talisman that he had been holding before making his way out of the interior of the Sky Empire''s flying ship.


    The elderly man did not wait before flying up as hended at the deck of the Onyx Empire''s flying ship before making his way into the interior of the ship where the person in charge would be located.


    "I really didn''t expect for the Onyx Empire to take the appearance of a secret realm not even inside their own territory so seriously!" Looking at the person shrouded in darkness sitting quietly in the middle of the room, the elderly man from the Sky Empire stopped and waited for a response. Not intending to stay any longer than necessary.


    "Hehe, I could say the same. After all, why would the teacher of the current Emperor of the Sky Empire, the Imperial Teacher, show up here for no reason¡­?" Chuckling to himself, the person sitting in the middle of the room slowly stood up and faced the elderly man from the Sky Empire. Only the smile on his face visible as the darkness of the room moved to cover the rest of his body.


    "So, what did you want to talk about? You should already know how things are between the Sky Empire and the Onyx Empire¡­ The only reason I even came here in the first ce is due to our past friendship¡­" As he was saying this, the imperial teacher of the Sky Empire wore a sad expression as he recalled some things that happened in the past.


    The person from the Onyx Empire did not say anything as he watched the Imperial Teacher of the Sky Empire slowly calm down again.


    "Hah¡­ You should already know what the appearance of this secret realm means, when the other empires, hidden ns and sects finds out¡­ The entire Sky Empire will be thrown into chaos¡­" Stopping his sentence here, the person hidden beneath the shadows slowly walked up close to the Imperial Teacher.


    "What are you proposing¡­?" Understanding the look in his old friend''s eyes, the Imperial Teacher immediately narrowed his eyes as he waited for the person to finish.


    "What I want to propose is¡­"


    ¡­


    "How long is it going to take?! Perhaps the Onyx Empire did something!?" Nervously pacing around on the ground below the Onyx Empire''s flying ship that had stopped descending after the Imperial Teacher had entered it, General Liu could not help himself from thinking about the worst possible oue.


    The taunting smile from General Zhang kept ying in his mind as he could not help worrying that something would happen to the Imperial Teacher, even though he knew very well how strong the Imperial Teacher was.


    By now it had already been 15 minutes and there was finally some movement from the Onyx Empire''s flying ship as General Liu watched the Imperial Teacher slowly descend down to the ground together with General Zhang and a person shroudedpletely in darkness giving off an aura simr to the Imperial Teacher.


    "W-what are they-"


    "We are entering the secret realm together, inform the soldiers to allow anyone that shows up to enter and not to stop them! Remember to not attack the people from the Onyx Empire!" Before General Liu even managed to let out a single word, the Imperial Teacher informed him before moving towards the entrance of the secret realm together with the two people from the Onyx Empire.


    "HUH!? Wha- what?! W-wait for me!" Seeing the group slowly disappear as they entered the secret realm, General Liu hurriedly informed one of the nearby soldiers about the order from the Imperial Teacher before quickly entering the secret realm. Hoping to understand why they suddenly began working together with the Onyx Empire¡­

 Chapter 204: To the Edge of the Secret Realm!

    <h4>Chapter 204: To the Edge of the Secret Realm!</h4>


    Entering the secret realm, General Liu soon caught up with the Imperial Teacher and the two people from the Onyx Empire as he began asking about why they suddenly began to work together with the Onyx Empire.


    But his question fell on deaf ears as the Imperial Teacher did not answer even a single question and instead just continued further into the secret realm as the two people from the Onyx Empire followed closely behind them. Not getting too close and not falling too far behind.


    Like this, the group of four made their way through the secret realm at a fast pace as all of them could fly at their current cultivation realm. Making traversing the secret realm easy and fast.


    During the entire time, General Liu kept sending hateful looks in the direction of General Zhang as thetter just smiled at him in return.


    "This should be the first part of the formation¡­" Coming to a stop after flying above the ancient forest of the secret realm for a few hours, the Imperial Teacher of the Sky Empire looked up at a giant pir piercing through the sky above as he muttered this to himself.


    The most shocking thing to General Liu was the fact that there were many more simr pirs in the distance as they seemed to form a circle around the secret realms entrance.


    Even the Sky Empire would find it difficult to create such arge formation! And the Imperial Teacher only said this was the first part of the formation!?


    Filled with disbelief and surprise at the giant pirs, General Liu was not the only one as General Zhang from the Onyx Empire opened his mouth with an equally shocking expression on his face after seeing the giant pir towering far into the sky of the secret realm.


    "Imperial Teacher, what is this formation for¡­ I have never seen anything like it, and you said this was only the first part?!" Looking over at the Imperial Teacher, General Liu had manged to hear him muttering this to himself and could not stop himself from asking.


    "Indeed¡­ This is only the first part of the formation and from what I know, this should be the first out of three parts of this formation! As for what it is used for¡­ Even I don''t know!" Shaking his head as he flew over and put his hand on the formation pir before quickly closing his eyes, the Imperial Teacher answered with a somewhat confused expression on his face.


    "Don''t bother trying to figure it out, the formation was set up by a formation master in the Soul Ascension Realm. Not something we will be able to understand at our current realm¡­ Let''s hurry or others will begin to show up" The person covered in darkness from the Onyx Empires side came in from the side and said this before hurrying the group to continue. Clearly not wanting to waste too much time admiring the giant formation pirs.


    "True¡­ If we don''t make it to the core area before the others begin showing up, we won''t have a chance when ites to getting the things hidden inside¡­ After all, when those people discover who this ce belonged to in the past, Soul Ascension Realm Expert would begin showing up¡­


    Our best chance is to clean up the core area and copse this secret realm before those people show up in the first ce. That way we would at least be able to avoid having them find out¡­" Nodding his head in agreement with the person from the Onyx Empire, the Imperial Teacher had a serious expression on his face as the group resumed their journey deeper into the secret realm.


    It was also at this point in time that both General Liu and General Zhang realized the seriousness of the matter.


    Anything that could attract the attention of someone in the Soul Ascension Realm to move out personally could bring enormous benefits to an empire or in worst cases an empire ending cmity!


    Even the Sky Empire only had a handful of Soul Ascension Realm Experts and most of them were in closed door seclusion all year long. Never moving no matter what secret realm showed up in the world.


    Normally only Domain Lords would move whenever a secret realm appeared on the Ewaria Continent¡­ For this secret realm to cause Soul Ascension Realm Experts to flock to it¡­ Both General Liu and General Zhang understood the seriousness of the matter!


    At this point, General Liu no longer kept sending angry looks over in the direction of General Zhang and instead decided to faithfully follow behind the Imperial Teacher as the group of four quickly made their way through the Nascent Soul Realm Area and into the Domain Lord Realm Area.


    Not even stopping when they passed by the secondyer of formation pirs as the group only cast a few nces at them before continuing forward.


    ¡­


    Most of the Domain Lord Realm demon beast were smart? enough to avoid the group of four as they travelled through the Domain Lord Realm area.


    The reason for this, was that the Imperial Teacher and the person from the Onyx Empire released their aura of high-level Domain Lords to scare away the nearby Domain Lord demon beast, but even then, a few weaker demon beasts still decided to attack them from time to time. Luckily they were nothing to worry about.


    Like this, the group of four soon made it to the third and final circle of formation pirs without encountering too much resistance.


    "Hm? Who is there!" The moment the group came to a stop before the pirs, the person from the Onyx Empire suddenly shouted out as his dark aura began boiling violently. Prepared to attack at any moment necessary.


    The other three also got ready as they looked towards one of the formation pirs where a lonely figure could be seen sitting quietly meditating all by himself with a wooden staff nted into the ground beside him.


    But this did not make the group of four calm down as the aura of a Domain Lord could clearly be felt from the seated figure, though not as strong as the Imperial Teacher and the person from the Onyx Empire, he should still be in the middle stages of the Domain Lord Realm!


    The person before them was indeed the wanderer that had entered the secret realm before them, and he had even been lucky enough to breakthrough from the early stages of the Domain Lord Realm and reach the middle stage of the realm!


    This would allow for him be considered strong even when it came to the entire Ewaria Continent as most of the people exploring and moving around like himself were mostly at the early stages of the Domain Lord Realm if not weaker!


    W-what is this!? Are these the people from the Sky Empire!?


    However, currently he was panicking as he felt the aura of two high-level Domain Lords along with two early-stage Domain Lords bearing down on him.


    Earlier he had thought that even if people from the Sky Empire showed up, he should be able to escape with his current cultivation, but the two terrifying auras above him proved that he was wrong and made him regret staying toprehend the formations hidden inside of the formation pir in front of him.


    "H-hello, I did not expect to meet people from the Sky Empire here¡­" Awkwardly getting up and flying into the air to meet the group of four.


    "You are?" Staring at the unfamiliar person, all four people did not bother correcting him as the Imperial Teacher walked forward and asked.


    "Ah, haha, I-I''m just a humble wanderer who happened toe upon this secret realm and decided to explore it. I-I had no idea that the Sky Empire would be in charge of it! I will just take my leave now!" Nervously stating this, the wanderer was just about to leave when the Imperial Teacher of the Sky Empire flew over to block his path.


    "Hold on¡­ Do you know anything about the area ahead or the formation pirs¡­?" Asking this, the Imperial Teacher narrowed his eyes as he decided to interrogate this person.


    If he knew about who the secret realm belonged to and spread it outside¡­


    "Ah, it seems like the secret realm ends after this row of formation pirs, but there is an underground part to the secret realm that can be entered from the edge of the secret realm¡­ As for the formation pirs¡­ Hm¡­ From what I can tell, they act to supress and split up the different demon beasts, but that should only be an idental feature as the formation pirs are stronger the closer to the secret realms entrance they are, therefore the suppression is the strongest around the secret realms entrance¡­


    The true use of the formation pirs still elude me, but it should have something to do with the underground part of this secret realm¡­" Exining everything he had found out so far without holding anything back, the wanderer sincerely hoped that the people from the Sky Empire would let him go.


    "I see, you can go now. Leave the secret realm and we won''t pursue this matter!" Listing to what the wanderer said, the Imperial Teacher quickly deduced that he had no idea who the secret realm belonged to and just told him to leave.


    Having someone other than their Sky Empire and Onyx Empire explore the secret realm as well would allow for the other powers to be less suspicious if the secret realm suddenly copsed¡­


    With that in mind, letting the wanderer go could be benifeical to them¡­


    The person from the Onyx Empire also understood this and did not interfere as the wanderer quickly felt like he had gotten a new lease on life, thanking the Imperial Teacher happily before using his top speed to fly back towards the entrance of the secret realm.


    "The core area should be somewhere in the underground part of the secret realm¡­ Let''s go!" Seeing that the wanderer had disappeared, the Imperial Teacher hurried the group of four as they made it to the edge of the secret realm and? saw the sky disappear. Instead, being reced by the ck void that stretched on infinitely where the ground of the secret realm ended.


    Going over the edge would mean they entered the void between worlds¡­


    None of the four focused on the endless void that had suddenly appeared and instead focused on the giant underground world that became visible the moment they reached the edge of the secret realm.


    The secret world was like a giant ind floating in the endless void as it was split into two differentyers. One was the ground above, while the other was the underground part of the secret realm.


    Looking at each other, the four soon entered the underground area and made their way towards the entrance of the secret realm where the core area would be located.


    ROAR!


    However, things would not always goes as nned as a loud roar echoed out from the distance. Forcing the group of four to stop as they took out their weapons and looked deeper into the underground world where a giant figure slowly began approaching them¡­

 Chapter 205: Giant Underground Lizard

    <h4>Chapter 205: Giant Underground Lizard</h4>


    ROAR!


    As the giant figure crawled over towards them as it roared angrily, General Liu and the rest of the group managed to the full body of the giant demon beast.


    Arge tail coiled around a nearby rock as it had stopped only a few hundred meters away from the group. The demon beast in question was a giant lizard with a set of rough brownish scales covering itsrge body.


    Other than that, arge pair of horns were also visible on the giant lizard as it threateningly stared at them from the inside of the underground part of the secret realm.


    Ready to attack them the moment that they moved even a single step closer!


    "Imperial Teacher, w-what should we do¡­?" Nervously starring over at the giant lizard starring at them full of killing intent, General Liu nervously turned around and asked the Imperial Teacher. Hoping deeply that he would just tell him to leave the underground area. Not having to deal with the terrifying giant lizard in front of him.


    That lizard was not just giant but looked like a small moving hill from a distance easily being a dozen meters tall and over a hundred meters in length!


    Looking at the tough scales covering its body, General Liu doubted that he would be able to do anything to the giant lizard, even if he used his strongest attack!


    "We will have to deal with the lizard if we want to move forward¡­ It looks like its body is already considered to be half a step into the Soul Ascension Realm, so injuring it will be difficult even for us¡­" Upon reaching this point, the Imperial Teacher looked over at the person shrouded in darkness before continuing.


    "But we should be able to take it down over a prolonged battle and make our way towards the centre of the secret realm¡­ Hah¡­ We will definitely have to waste some time to deal with it first¡­ Let''s hope it gets tired or afraid and runs away without too much trouble, that would save us some time at least..." Finishing his exnation, the Imperial Teacher looked over at the person shrouded in darkness and saw him nod in agreement with his idea as the two of them prepared to attack the giant lizard together.


    Roar!


    Sensing the people in front of it getting ready to fight, the giant lizard let out a threatening roar as it waved itsrge ws towards the group in an attempt to scare them away.


    "General Zhang, you go together with that guy from the Sky Empire. Try to stay aliveter on and keep up with us!" The person covered in darkness finally spoke as he instructed General Zhang before moving over beside the Imperial Teacher.


    "Yes! Ancestor Bi Sheng!" General Zhang did not say anything as he orderly moved over beside General Liu while both the Imperial Teacher and Ancestor Bi Sheng began making their move towards the lizard threateningly waving its ws towards them.


    Whoosh~


    Both Ancestor Bi Sheng and the Imperial Teacher acted without waiting for even a single moment longer as both of them attacked the giant lizard.


    Roar!


    The giant lizard of course saw thising, so it retaliated towards the iing humans as it brought down its giant ws, easily cowering both of them as it brought forth an unbearable pressure to the two generals looking over from a distance as they also began moving to support the two elders.


    Ching~


    The giant w of the lizard came down and Ancestor Bi Sheng from the Onyx Empire did not stand still as he waved his hand causing arge domain of darkness to spread out with him as the centre as it engulfed the iing w of the lizard and took the form of severalrge chains that restrained the giant w of the giant lizard.


    The lizard backed quickly as it tried to free its w from the chains of darkness created by Bi Sheng, but it was surprised when it saw the Imperial Teacher who used this opportunity to draw out arge symbol in the air a few meters away from it that flew towards it at an rming pace.


    An earth-shaking aura could be felt as the lizard could clearly tell that it would not be good for it if the symbol managed tond, but by this point it was toote!


    Boom!


    The symbol soon ignited into arge explosion that shook the entire underground cave as the lizard stumbled back awkwardly for a moment before stabilizing.


    Roar!


    The lizard managed to free itself from the chains of darkness cast out by Bi Sheng as it roared angrily towards the two humans in front of it before angrily charging towards both of them.


    Only a small wound was left in the location that the symbol from the Imperial Teacher hadnded and exploded¡­


    "Looks like we won''t be able to do much to this lizard¡­" Shaking his head as he watched the lizard approaching, the Imperial Teacher looked over at Bi Sheng who nodded his head understandingly.


    Both of them knew that killing the giant lizard was nothing more than a pipe dream with its strong defence.


    Like this, the two of them decided to enter a war of attrition with the giant lizard as they tried their best to move towards the centre of the underground world at the same time.


    Hoping that the giant lizard would be unwilling to move too far away from where it lived or just give up when it couldn''t kill them quickly enough.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Severalrge explosions kept happing as the two elders from the Onyx Empire and Sky Empire worked together to fend of the giant lizard, while the two generals tried their best to keep up without getting caught up in the aftermath of the fight between the giant lizard and two elders.


    Launching their own attacks towards the lizard whenever an opportunity presented itself.


    ¡­


    Roar!


    As the battle between the group of four and the giant underground lizard continued, Xuan Hao was using his greatest speed possible to get as far away from the battle as possible, but for some reason, it seemed like the fighting only grew closer and closer with each passing moment.


    "This should be the centre of the underground world¡­ The entrance of the secret realm should be just above here¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao looked at the giant ancient pceplex in front of him easily covering everything in the surroundings as arge barrier covered the entire pceplex.


    The ancient pce itself was nothing short of amazing, but Xuan Hao did not dare linger around for much longer as the group fighting was getting closer and closer with each passing moment.


    At this point, Xuan Hao could even make out the people fighting in the distance as on person covered in shrouded in a ck miasma like substance manifested countless chains of darkness in an attempt to restrain a giant lizard demon beast as another figure manifested an infinite number of ancient symbols to attack the giant lizard demon beast as they moved in the direction of the ancient pceplex.


    There were also two others following closely behind the trio locked inbat, but both of them seemed negligible inparison to the three locked inbat with each other.


    "Is this how Domain Lords fight¡­?" Observing the countless attacks that manifested out of thin air to attack the giant lizard demon beast. Xuan Hao felt like he understood a little more about how people in the Domain Lord Realm fought as he felt that the attacks should be the manifestation of the two peoples Domains.


    One domain of darkness manifesting a countless number of chains to restrain the giant lizard, while the other domain summoned forth an infinite number of ancient symbols bringing all sorts of changes to the world as they transformed into different attacks.


    Would he be the same when he reached the Domain Lord Realm¡­?


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao could not help but feel excited upon thinking about being able to summon forth a sea of swords to attack his opponent¡­ No matter how many enemies there was, it wouldn''t matter if they were below the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Casting onest look towards the fight moving closer and closer to him, Xuan Hao walked up to the barrier of the ancient pceplex and touched the barrier.


    "Hm? Seems like the barrier is not blocking me¡­ Maybe it''s like the one above that only blocks out demon beasts¡­?" Not thinking too much about it, Xuan Hao entered the ancient pceplex.


    At the same time inside of Xuan Hao''s interspatial ring, the blue feather that he had picked up from the underground hall of the temple earlier on shinned brightly for a short moment when Xuan Hao touched the barrier into the pceplex before returning to its former calm state.

 Chapter 206: Pure Qi Fish

    <h4>Chapter 206: Pure Qi Fish</h4>


    Boom!


    Arge explosion once again hit the giant lizard as the Imperial Teacher immediately fell back and dodged the iing w that was thrown out in retaliation before resuming his attacks together with Bi Sheng.


    Roar!


    This continued as the group made their way deeper into the underground world of the secret realm before the giant lizard suddenly froze where it stood and hurriedly turned around to run away.


    The Imperial Teacher and Bi Sheng both stopped attacking when they saw this and allowed for the giant lizard to retreat as it came to a stop a few hundred meters away where it began roaring intimidatingly towards them like it had done back at the entrance to the underground world.


    "Why did it suddenly retreat¡­?" The Imperial Teacher wondered as he still cautiously kept an eye on the giant lizard in case itunched another attack towards them when their guard was down.


    "I-Imperial Teacher¡­ I think that is the reason!" The voice of General Liu sounded out as both the Imperial Teacher and Bi Sheng turned around to look at the ce where General Liu was pointing and soon froze in shock as they stared at the giant underground pceplex spreading out in front of them.


    How did we even miss seeing this earlier¡­? Were we too absorbed fighting that damn lizard?


    Thinking about this, the Imperial Teacher quickly shook his head before he ordered General Liu to follow him towards the underground pceplex, while Bi Sheng from the Onyx Empire''s side did the same and had General Zhang follow him down towards the giant underground pceplex.


    "Now¡­ How do we get in¡­?" Standing before the giant barrier covering the entire pceplex, the Imperial Teacher helplessly put his hand on the barrier and felt himself being repelled.


    "¡­"


    The rest of the four did not have answer and for now they decided to inspect the area around the giant pceplex. Hoping to find a way inside¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time, Xuan Hao had just managed to make it inside the pceplex and sneakily looked down at the group of four from inside without being spotted.


    The reason for him doing this was because he felt his divine sense being restrained the moment he made his way inside, so he did not really feel like it would be too dangerous to stay and see who the people following behind him were.


    "They can''t enter¡­?" Xuan Hao was both happy and scared when he saw the group not being able to enter through the barrier like him.


    Happy because he would not have to worry about dealing with a group of Domain Lords. Scared because he felt like he was about to be in a dangerous situation. The fact that he was forced down into the underground part of the secret realm did not really help much either¡­


    At this point, Xuan Hao was certain that there was a reason why he was forced down into the underground part of the secret realm and was able to enter through the barrier of the giant ancient pceplex¡­


    But he was still not clear about why¡­ Was it perhaps because he was talented for his age and was selected to inherit an awesome legacy of a long forgotten overpowered sect that once ruled the world¡­?


    "Hah¡­ No way that is true!" Shaking his head as he banished his wishful thoughts, Xuan Hao cast onest look at the group of four searching the area outside the barrier before he made his way deeper into the ancient pceplex.


    Walking through the pceplex, Xuan Hao did not dare to lower his guard in the slightest as he had no idea what kinds of dangerous awaited inside.


    Like this, Xuan Hao soon came upon a pavilion located inside of the ancient pceplex.


    [Calm Pond Pavilion]


    The small letters on top of the entrance clearly hinted that the pavilion was once used as a leisure spot of some sort in the past and Xuan Hao could not help but look over at the small pond located beside the pavilion as a few fish were happily swimming around without minding the outside world.


    "Fish¡­?" Xuan Hao suddenly grew a bit curious as he inspected the few fishes swimming around in the pond beside the pavilion and soon discovered the fishes were not alive, they were not even fish in the first ce!


    Xuan Hao tried to think but could note up with anything to describe what the fishes in the pond were in the first ce, they were made up of pure qi and were not living in the first ce¡­


    Calling them a construct of the formation covering the small pond would most likely be enough to describe the small fishes made up of qi.


    Walking over to the side of the pond, Xuan Hao quickly crouched down and tried picking up one of the small fished made of pure qi and immediately felt his body grow excited as it attempted to absorb the pure qi fish on its own.


    "How curious¡­ Looks like the fishes here are useful for my cultivation¡­" Smiling happily to himself, Xuan Hao absorbed the small fish in his hand as a wave of pure qi entered his body and directly made it to his dantian before he felt his cultivation growing stronger and improving by a tiny amount.


    "If I absorb all these pure qi fish, I should be able to reach the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!" Looking over at the few hundred pure qi fish swimming around in the pond in front of him, Xuan Hao felt a wave of excitement wash over him as he waved his hand and caused all the small pure qi fish to float towards him before quickly storing them away in his interspatial ring for now.


    Breaking through to the eighth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm would definitely take at least a few hours, so Xuan Hao decided to wait until he made it back to the Flying Sword Sect again. At least he would not be interrupted there and if he broke through inside the ancient pceplex, he would also have to worry about the group of four Domain Lords outside finding a way inside and finding trouble with him.


    No matter what, leaving the secret realm was his top priority for now!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao quickly turned away from the now empty pond and made his way inside of the Calm Pond Pavilion.


    Seeing as there were such precious pure qi fish in the pond, Xuan Hao expected for there to be something good? inside of the pavilion as well, but this initial excitement after getting his hands on the pure qi fish did notst for long as he soon left the pavilion with a disappointed look on his face.


    Like the rest of the luxurious pces and other buildings inside of the ancient pceplex, it waspletely empty!


    All that was left were a few chairs and tables¡­


    Of course, these chairs and tables were all made of precious spiritual trees, so Xuan Hao decided to take a few with him on his way out¡­ Just to fill up his pavilion back at the Flying Sword Sect so it wouldn''t look so empty anymore.


    He also had two disciples so he would have to bring back some good furniture for them to fill up their rooms when he got back¡­ All they had currently were just the standard furniture that was already filled in before Xuan Hao was given the pavilion in the first ce and many of the rooms in the pavilion were empty as well.


    He would have to at least fill them up for when he got more disciples in the future¡­


    Convincing himself with this, Xuan Hao would not dare to admit the reason for him stealing away the chairs from the pavilion was due to howfortable they were to sit in¡­


    The tables on the other hand looked sturdy enough to endure the passage of time without a single sign of decay! Even if he cultivated for a few hundred years, he would not have to think about recing his furniture in the future! How great was that!


    Xuan Hao already knew that most of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts in the Flying Sword Sect were a few hundred years old by now and they had to rece everything in their pavilions at least a few times over as they did not want to waste things like precious metals and wood formon things like furniture when they could be used to craft powerful artifacts!


    Only if they had an abundance of resources would one be able to do something like this!


    Xuan Hao also felt like whoever owned the ancient pceplex in the past clearly did not care about things that the Flying Sword Sect would consider precious materials and even used it to makemon furniture like tables and chairs¡­


    Over the next few hours, Xuan Hao quickly explored the entire ancient pceplex except for the giant pce located at the centre without finding anything too precious outside of a few more pure qi fish.


    "Looks like I can only go to one ce if I want to find a way out¡­" Xuan Hao muttered this to himself as he looked towards the centre of the ancient pceplex with a hesitant look on his face.


    Compared to the rest of the ancient pceplex that was empty and without any real danger, Xuan Hao clearly felt a sense of deep fear whenever he looked over at the giant pce at the centre of the pceplex.


    But at this point, he did not have any other ce left to explore inside the ancient pceplex!


    Shing~


    Drawing his sword, Xuan Hao cautiously began approaching the giant pce as the feeling of danger grew more and more intense with each step.

 Chapter 207: Entering The Main Palace

    <h4>Chapter 207: Entering The Main Pce</h4>


    The path towards the main pce located at the centre of the ancient pceplex was arge path that cut straight through theplex.


    Earlier on, Xuan Hao had not entered through what was the entrance to the pceplex, but instead just entered the pceplex from the side as he entered through a pce located on the edge close to the barrier.


    Looking over in the direction of what could be considered the official entrance to the pceplex, Xuan Hao could not help but sigh in amazement as he felt the fear towards what was waiting for him inside of the main pce lessen ever so slightly.


    The entrance was of the pceplex was a majestic and beautiful arch at least a dozen meters tall and around a hundred meters wide easily showing how huge the path leading to the main pce was.


    "Hm? What is that¡­?" As he was observing therge arch that was the entrance of the pceplex, Xuan Hao caught sight of a certain group from earlier standing in front of the barrier only a few meters away from the arch.


    "Could they have found a way inside?!" Suddenly feeling a wave of worry wash over him, Xuan Hao inspected the group of four as he quickly hid away behind a nearby building. Letting out a sigh of relief when he saw they had not spotted him earlier, too busy with something else.


    Looking closer Xuan Hao discovered that one of the four was holding a weird object of sorts in one of his hands as he held it up against the barrier of the ancient pceplex.


    "What are they doing¡­?" Watching the small object as it was ced against the barrier, Xuan Hao soon saw the barrier begin to shake violently as it began weaking in a small area around the ce that the object was held up to.


    Soon a small circle big enough for a person to fit through began to form as the barrier began to grow weaker and weaker around the area in question.


    Xuan Hao felt shocked when he saw this and quickly turned around before making his way towards the main pce of the ancient pceplex without any of his former hesitation.


    If he was not fast enough, the group of four would get inside and at that point, Xuan Hao doubted he would be able to get away easily¡­


    ¡­


    "How long will it take before we can get inside!?" Standing outside the barrier, the Imperial Teacher was impatiently asking as he looked down at General Zhang holding up a weird object shaped like pillow made of a rare kind of spiritual metal up to the barrier of the ancient pceplex.


    "It should not be much longer¡­ From what the writing said, we should be able to get inside in another few minutes!" Focusing on holding the pillow shaped object up to the barrier, General Zhang hurriedly answered before focusing back on the barrier.


    The pillow shaped object was something they had found earlier in an underground ruin close to the entrance of the ancient pceplex.


    The pillow shaped object was in fact not shaped by someone to look like a pillow in the first ce but was a rare spiritual metal that could weaken barriers that it came into contact with and allow someone to pass through.


    At least that was what was mentioned in the little writing they found beside the pillow shaped spiritual metal¡­


    Only when the group saw the effects of the pillow did they begin to believe in its effect. Now all they could do was wait as the pillow created a path through the barrier and into the ancient pceplex.


    This of course did not stop the Imperial Teacher from wanting to enter the ancient pceplex as quickly as possible.


    After all, the more time they wasted, the higher the chances of someone other than the Sky Empire and the Onyx Empire showing up was¡­


    Luckily for both of them, the secret realm was located close to the border between the two empires and there was not really any other powerful force close by and the different religions never interfered in things like secret realms as it was useless for them given the fact, they followed a different systempared to cultivators.


    Demonic cultivators and normal cultivators were the only people interested in secret realms. At least given the fact that they did not know much about the secret realm¡­


    The Imperial Teacher and Ancestor Bi Sheng were both sure that the different religions in both their empires would very likely be interested if they knew who the secret realm belonged to¡­


    ¡­


    Entering the main pce of the ancient pceplex, Xuan Hao was amazed at the sheer size of everything in front of him.


    Even the main gate leading into the pce itself was several dozen meters tall!


    From here, Xuan Hao could also see how big the underground part of the secret realm had gotten.


    Compared to where he first entered where the gate of the main pce alone could easily reach the ceiling filled with roots. Here Xuan Hao had to look closely to see the ceiling several thousand meters above him.


    "Hm?" Looking up, Xuan Hao discovered something interesting as a giant pir simr to the formation pirs from earlier had pierced directly down through the barrier of the pceplex and into what Xuan Hao assumed was the core area of the main pce!


    "But howe I didn''t see it earlier¡­" Wondering this, Xuan Hao closely observed the pir many times bigger than its counterparts and discovered that it was located around the same area that the entrance of the secret realm was above the ground.


    "Is it connected to the entrance of the secret realm¡­? But why would the entrance of the secret realm pierce into the pceplex underground? Surely, they didn''t want to destroy their own pces¡­" Looking at the roots covering only a small part of the giant pir as they seemed unable to hold it back like the past pirs, Xuan Hao felt that the formation pirs might not have been set up by the owner of the secret realm but was instead from someone who might have attacked the secret realm in the past!


    Thinking about it in this way, Xuan Hao felt a little confused when he thought about all the different ruins he had seen above ground.


    Maybe it was indeed a training ground in the past, but it most likely lookedpletely different from the ancient forest that he had seen above¡­


    Xuan Hao could not make sense of the different ruins he had seen above like the small underground pce and the temple; both did not really seem to fit in if it was indeed a training ground for younger disciples in the past¡­


    All in all, Xuan Hao decided not to think about it anymore as he began making his way inside of the main pce through the giant gate. The fear he had earlier waspletely reced by curiosity as he was interested in finding out what had happened in the secret realm in the past.


    A foreign power invading one of the training grounds of the sect that the secret realm belonged to in an attempt to kill of their younger generation and weaken their future power?


    Maybe the owner of the secret realm had betrayed the sect he belonged to in the past and was therefore destroyed as a result?


    Or it could be a simple result of offending the religions on the continent¡­ They seemed to have a history of banding together whenever someone tried to take away their faith and begin to gather followers of their own¡­


    The temple in the ancient forest above ground could be rted to this¡­


    "Hah¡­ I will never know if I just let my imagination run wild!" Shaking his head as he thought about all the different reason as to what had happened in the secret realm in the past, Xuan Hao made his way into the main pce of the pceplex.


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ I will definitely not return without finding out what is hiding in here!" At the same time that Xuan Hao entered the main pce of the ancient pceplex and the group of four was close to breaking through the barrier and entering the pceplex as well, a certain wanderer appeared in the area close to the ancient pceplex as he looked over towards it with a passionate expression on his face.


    "With this artifact I will be able to enter even with those four around!" Thinking this to himself, the wanderer made his way over towards the group of four as a small artifact in the shape of a belt was firmly sitting around his waist as it produced a weird mist around him that kept himpletely hidden from the outside world.


    The giant lizard demon beast was only a few hundred meters away as it kept its gaze focused on the group of four that it had fought earlier.


    Completely oblivious to the wanderer that had just appeared beside it a moment ago.


    All it saw was just a small mist that passed by and drifted over towards the direction of the four people it kept its eyes locked on. Nothing unusual¡­

 Chapter 208: Meeting a certain Ancient Tree again...

    <h4>Chapter 208: Meeting a certain Ancient Tree again...</h4>


    Walking through the main gate of the pce, Xuan Hao soon found himself in an overgrown garden with the nearby trees and foliage having overgrown the path forwardpletely.


    In the past it would most likely have been a beautiful path filled with lush trees and nts on the side, but by this point they had all overgrown the entrance of the pce. Making it stand out from the rest of the ancient pceplex as Xuan Hao felt like he had returned to the ancient forest above once again.


    The sheer contrast caught Xuan Hao a little of guard as he quickly began to take in his surroundings before following along the original path into the main pce of the ancient pceplex. Finding the beautiful architecture of the ce eye opening and amazing at the same time. After all, it showed no sign of the passage of time outside of the overgrown nts and trees over the years.


    "This should be the main part of the pce¡­" Walking through the path covered in foliage and trees, Xuan Hao soon arrived in front of hall leading into the main area of the pce.


    The entrance was even more majesticpared to the entrance of the pceplex, with different phoenixes and dragons being carved into the door as they seemingly roared each other while engaged in some sort of battle for power.


    Xuan Hao almost felt like they were alive as he ced his hand on the big door leading into the main hallway of the pce and pushed it open with no resistance. Not being able to stop himself from looking at the beautiful carvings of phoenixes and dragons on the door one more time before continuing deeper into the pce.


    "Howrge¡­" Entering the hallway, Xuan Hao could not help but let out a sound of disbelief as he stared at the ceiling several hundred meters above him.


    A giant mural covering both the sides and the ceiling of the hallway spread out before him as Xuan Hao could not help but feel the sheer dedication of whoever painted such arge mural in the past.


    Observing the mural, Xuan Hao soon discovered that it was describing an epic battle between all sorts of heroic figures and mythical creature fighting with each other over long forgotten feuds.


    Trying his best to grasp the story told by the mural on the walls of the hallway. Xuan Hao could only shake his head and give up as the story told was not something he was familiar with, nor was it something he knew anything about in the first ce. All he could grasp was the fact that an epic fight had happened in the past and the owner of the secret realm might have even been a part of it¡­


    Maybe that was the reason why the secret realm had been attacked in the past¡­? Something to do with the war depicted by the mural in the hallway¡­


    Thinking about it, Xuan Hao felt like it made sense and continued slowly walking through the hallway as he tried his best to remember the different figures on the mural. Hoping he might be able to find out something in the future if he happened to find a historical record of one of the people on the mural¡­


    "This is!?" Coming to the end of the hallway, Xuan Hao saw arge door leading into what could only be the throne room of the pce, but this was not what caused Xuan Hao''s surprise.


    "The blue phoenix from the temple¡­?" Indeed, at the end of the hallway, the mural showed the giant blue phoenix that he had seen earlier on the painting inside the temple pping its wings as a wave of ice froze the surrounding dragons, phoenixes and humans on the spot.


    Compared to the painting where the blue phoenix being sealed away, the mural showed the blue phoenix defeating its opponents as it majestically looked down on the battlefield from above, causing the surrounding dragons, phoenixes and humans to be filled with fear as they looked up towards it.


    This was a stark contrastpared to the painting he had seen in the temple where the blue phoenix was sealed away by thebined alliance of humans, phoenixes and dragons¡­


    Perhaps the war on the mural in the hallway happened at an earlier date before the blue phoenix was sealed or perhaps one of the two were wrong¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao knew that it was no use for him to ponder about these things for now. First, he would have to be stronger, or he might have an unfortunate end looking into things he shouldn''t¡­


    After all, there had to be a reason why such an epic war was unknown by most and Xuan Hao felt that it did not have to do with the passing of time¡­


    Creak~


    Pushing open the door to the throne room, Xuan Hao opened his eyes wide as he saw a rather familiar tree rooted firmly in the middle of the throne room.


    The thing that shocked Xuan Hao however was not this and was instead the giant pir that descended from above and into the main pce through the ceiling of the throne room and stabbed directly into the ancient tree, breaking the tree in half.


    Xuan Hao could easily see the fact that the ancient tree was in the process of dying and had been in that state for a long time.


    It was also at this point that Xuan Hao became certain that the formation pirs were indeed part of an attack on the owner of the secret realm in the past¡­


    In that case, the entrance to the secret realm that he had used to enter, was most likely not the real entrance but instead one created by the attacking party when trying to invade the secret realm in the past!


    "If that is the case, then¡­" Looking around the throne room, Xuan Hao soon discovered arge gate of sorts that remained shut located at the ce where the throne would normally be.


    The main pce was the ce where the real entrance of the secret realm was located!


    Seeing the real entrance to the secret realm, Xuan Hao began to understand things a bit more as the pceplex was most likely a city of sorts where the different people under the past owner of the secret realm had lived¡­


    Rustle~


    As he was beginning to put things together about what he had seen in the secret realm so far, Xuan Hao was suddenly brought back to the real world again upon hearing the familiar rustling sound of the ancient tree that had thrown him down into the underground part of the secret realm in the first ce.


    "You¡­ Why did you want me toe here¡­?" Staring over at the ancient tree as he said this, Xuan Hao had already understood that there was a reason for the ancient tree to get him toe here in the first ce.


    After all, given its strength, Xuan Hao did not doubt that even injured and close to death, it would still be able to kill him without too much effort. The fact that it could easily beat him and throw him into the underground world with no trouble at all only strengthened this belief.


    Rustle~


    The tree waved its branches in answer as Xuan Hao suddenly felt himself freeze.


    How would he understand what the tree was saying to him...? He did not speak tree¡­


    As Xuan Hao was thinking about how to understand what the ancient tree was trying to tell him, it suddenly waved its branches more aggressively as they began to shine with a gentle green colour as a wisp of qi drifted off it and floated in front of Xuan Hao.


    Swoosh~


    At the same time, the blue feather inside of his interspatial ring flew out by itself and absorbed the wisp of qi from the ancient tree before shining in a gentle light blue colour before returning to its former state andnding in Xuan Hao''s hands.


    "W-what just happened!?" Looking at the blue feather still gently glowing in his hands, Xuan Hao inspected it without finding anything and could only reluctantly put it back in his interspatial ring before focusing back on the ancient tree again.


    From the looks of things, there was indeed more to the blue feather from the temple¡­


    Crack~


    "You got to be kidding me¡­" Looking back at the ancient tree, Xuan Hao felt that whatever it had just done exhausted itpletely and it could no longer hold back against the giant pir as it slowly began to descend down through the ancient tree.


    Bang!


    A loud sound echoed through the entire underground world as the pir split the ancient tree in half and pierced into the ground below.


    [Side Quest: Find the core of the Secret Realm Formationplete)]


    [Reward: Continue side quest]


    [Would you like to continue the side quest?]: [Y/N]


    Feeling the entire underground world shaking violently after the death of the ancient tree, Xuan Hao heard the familiar sound of the system.


    Even an idiot would realize that the giant pir at the centre of the secret realm supressing the ancient tree would be the core of the giant formation!

 Chapter 209: The Secret Realm is Collapsing!

    <h4>Chapter 209: The Secret Realm is Copsing!</h4>


    Looking at the current situation as the pce began copsing around him, Xuan Hao decided to quickly ept the continuation of the side quest given by the system as a new quest appeared in front of him.


    [Survival Quest: Escape before the copse of the secret realm!]


    [Reward: Purification Pill x5]


    [Failure: Death]


    This was the first quest that would kill him if he failed! A survival quest!


    Xuan Hao felt that the quest was indeed fitting for his current circumstances as he could feel the other formation pirs in the distance breaking through the roots that bound them in ce for countless years, as they pierced deep into the ground and began fully activating whatever formation they were supposed to execute in the past.


    Rumble!


    The formation in question began to show its might as the entire secret realm, both above and below ground began to shake violently as a terrifying energy began to brew around the pir located at the centre in front of Xuan Hao.


    "I will indeed die if I don''t get out of here soon!" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao looked over at the original entrance to the secret realm before quickly moving over to try and open it and escape.


    But it did not take long for him to realize that his attempts were in wain as the giant door leading out of the secret realm remained shut.


    The only hint on how to open it that Xuan Hao got was a small lock filled with all sorts of runes ced on the entrance.


    Bzz~


    "Hm?" As Xuan Hao was lost on how to open up the gateway out of the secret realm, the blue feather inside of his interspatial ring vibrated gently and flew out in front of him and began to move towards a hidden passageway located to the side of the throne room.


    All Xuan Hao could do for now was follow the blue feather and hope that it would show him a way to open the original entrance of the secret realm¡­ Or at the very least show him another way out of the secret realm¡­


    ¡­


    Rumble~


    "W-what is happening? Why did the ground suddenly start shaking all of a sudden!?"


    "Look! The earth is breaking apart!"


    "Is the secret realm beginning to copse!?"


    "Let''s get out of here before we end up getting caught in the disaster!"


    At the same time that Xuan Hao began to follow the blue feather in search for a way to activate the original entrance to the secret realm, chaos was beginning to spread above ground as severalrge cracks appeared in the ground leading directly down to the underground part of the secret realm.


    The people above however did not care about this as they used their fastest speed to rush towards the entrance of the secret realm. No longer caring about the fact that the Sky Empire would have set up people to block the entrance.


    Getting out was their top priority as everyone knew remaining in a secret realm as it copsedpletely would leave on stranded in the void between worlds with no way to get back to their original world again. Left to float in the void until they died to a random void storm or other terrifying dangers hidden in the void between worlds.


    Even if one was lucky enough to not encounter this, without any qi present, the cultivator would simply starve to death when they ran out.


    This was the main reason that they no longer cared about the fact that the Sky Empire might end up taking away the different treasures that they had found. No matter what, losing a few treasures was better than dying!


    "Young Lady, we should get out of here immediately! Even if those from the Sky Empire are outside, if we stay here, we will just end up dead!" Ji Yichuan pleaded with the youngdy of the Flowing Cloud Sect as she seemed to not want to leave the secret realm and possibly end up getting caught by the people of the Sky Empire in the process.


    "Mydy, I think that Old Ji is right! Even if we lose that artifact, it is still better than losing our lives here!" The olddy seemed to understand what was going through her mind and quickly spoke up to support Ji Yichuan.


    "Argh! Fine! We will leave like the rest of the people here! Let''s just hope that the Sky Empire is not the only power stationed outside the secret realm¡­" Letting out a frustrated voice when she thought about the fact that she would might lose that artifact, the youngdy reluctantly agreed to the suggestion of Old Ji and the olddy.


    The artifact in question was a precious artifact of the Flowing Cloud Sect that had been passed down for generations. Even then, its true use still remained unkown.


    The reason why the youngdy and olddy had ended up in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom with such a precious artifact from the Flowing Cloud Sect and managed to meet with Old Ji also had something to do with this.


    All in all, things back in the Cloud Sky Empire was not as peaceful as they used to be, and the Flowing Cloud Sect had ended up being targeted by another group of sects that had teamed up to steal the precious artifact of the sect.


    To stop this from happening, the sect master had sent the olddy and youngdy over towards the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in an attempt to hide until the unrest and chaos blew over.


    "We should be able to head the Spring Flower Sect after getting out¡­ Hah¡­ We should have never entered the secret realm in the first ce just because nobody had showed up to im it yet among those empires and stronger sects¡­" Sighing in regret, the olddy med herself as she said this. Thinking that she should have stopped the youngdy from acting so rashly and enter the secret realm to explore it.


    Crack~


    "No use thinking about it for now. Let''s just get out safely first of all" Watching the ground cracking as the earth below them began copsing, Ji Yichuan motioned for the two of them to look at the ground beneath them showing signs of copsing at any moment.


    "Let''s move!" The youngdy looked around and saw a nearby ancient tree towering over a hundred meters tall suddenly tumble down in the underground part of the secret realm below them and crash into the ground a few thousand meters below.


    Whoosh~


    The trio did not wait along for any longer as they quickly moved towards the entrance to the secret realm.


    Luckily, they had waited close to the entrance for an opportunity to leave when the Sky Empire would start fighting with the other powers on their level for control over the secret realm, so it did not take long before they safely made their way out of the secret realm.


    ¡­


    "Haha! Finally! We can enter the ancient pceplex!" Letting out a happyugh, the Imperial Teacher of the Sky Empire happily watched as the pillow like object had made a small hole in the barrier big enough for them to pass through.


    Rumble~


    But just as he was about to enter together with General Liu and the two from the Onyx Empire, the entire underground part of the secret realm began shaking violently as the barrier in front of the ancient pceplexpletely disappeared along with it.


    From the centre of the main pce, the group of four also saw a giant pir piercing through the main pce as it slowly began to release a terrifying energy. Slowly growing stronger and stronger with each passing second as the shaking from the surroundings grew more and more violent.


    Roar!


    The giant lizard demon beast also sensed the changes and let out a roar in the direction of the giant pir, but still remained locked in ce. Not daring to move even a step closer, clearly afraid of the giant pir.


    A certain weird mist also stopped a few meters away from the ancient pceplex before it quickly began floating in the direction of the main pce while the group of four were locked in ce due to the shock that the giant pir had brought to them.


    Boom Boom Boom!


    In the distance, a violent shaking could be felt as the Imperial Teacher and Bi Sheng could barely see the other smaller formation pirs in the distance pierced down in the ground and began linking up with the main pir as the terrifying energy began to gather together at an even faster pacepared to before.


    "T-this is a realm destruction formation!" Muttering this to himself with a shocked look on his face, the Imperial Teacher seemed to realize what kind of formation that the pirs were!


    A realm destruction formation!


    The only purpose of such a formation was to destroy a secret realm, but even the Sky Empire would not use such a method due to how wasteful it waspared to just causing the secret realm to copse by itself after finding the core.


    A realm destruction formation would only be used if this was not possible and even then, it would still be a waste of resources as the sheer amount of reassures used would cause even the biggest empires to feel the pain.


    Worst of all, those resources used to construct the formation would forever be lost in the void between worlds after the formation sessfully activated and destroyed the secret realm!


    In the end, capturing a secret realm was a way better solutionpared to destroying it most of the time!

 Chapter 210: Ancient Realm City

    <h4>Chapter 210: Ancient Realm City</h4>


    As the people in the secret were all panicking and trying to rush out before the secret realm fully copsed, Xuan Hao was making his way through the secret passage. Following closely behind the blue feather as it floated in front of him leading him deeper into the underground part of the pce.


    The passage that he was walking through shook violently as Xuan Hao wished that the blue feather could fly a little faster, as he worried that the ceiling woulde crashing down at him if it took too long!


    Crack~


    The worry was not unfounded as several cracks was beginning to spread along the underground passage as Xuan Hao tried his best to remain calm.


    "This is!" Coming to the end of the passage, the blue feather suddenly stopped, and Xuan Hao quickly grabbed it and put it back into his interspatial ring before inspecting the room that was at the end of the underground passage. Trying his best to look for anything that might be able to help him activate the original entrance of the secret realm and get out.


    The room itself was bigger than he had first expected, but it was still as empty as most of the other ces inside of the ancient pceplex.


    The only differencepared to the rest of the ces inside the pceplex, was the fact that the ce looked like it had been recently used.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao looked over on the bedsheets that were all crumbled up and thrown to the corner of the room and at the small table located in the other corner of the room with a few papers on it.


    A small light was emitted from amp beside the papers on the table as Xuan Hao wondered about whether there was still someone left inside of the pceplex other than the ancient tree.


    "Hm¡­ Weapons¡­?" Looking over the papers on the table, Xuan Hao immediately recognised the drawings on the paper to be blueprints for different kinds of weapons and other weird artifacts.


    Rustle~


    As Xuan Hao was looking over the different papers on the table, he suddenly heard a sound of something moving from beneath the bed and prepared himself for the worst as he cautiously approached.


    Earlier, he had not felt anything when he entered the room in the first ce and the ce was more than small enough for it to be covered by his entire pseudo sword domain¡­


    Xuan Hao could not help but be reminded of the time he got thrown into the underground part of the secret realm by a certain ancient tree¡­


    Whoosh~


    Moving towards the bed in the room and moving it to the side, Xuan Hao momentarily stopped.


    "Another secret entrance¡­" Staring at the trapdoor under the bed, Xuan Hao cautiously opened it and stared down into the darkness.


    "Someone else was indeed living here!" While he was not certain before, Xuan Hao managed to feel the presence of something living after opening the secret entrance and became certain that there had indeed been someone living in the room before he showed up and they most likely fled through the secret path after feeling him approaching!


    Rumble~


    The surroundings shook violently as Xuan Hao saw the passage, he came from getting closer and closer to copsing as several cracks began to spread at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    ncing around the room, Xuan Hao did not see anything that would be able to help him open the original entrance of the secret realm and escape¡­


    "Hah¡­ I hope there is a way out of the secret realm down there¡­" Sighing to himself as he looked at the passage behind him began copsing, Xuan Hao decided to follow whoever lived in the room before he showed up.


    After all, he doubted that they would enter the secret path under the bed if there was no way out with the secret realm beginning to copse¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao thought that it might have been possible that the person did not flee when he showed up, but instead ran away after feeling the imminent copse of the secret realm¡­


    Whoosh~


    Entering the secret path, Xuan Hao did not forget to store away the different blueprints that were scattered on the table before closing the trapdoor.


    Crash!


    Moving deeper into the secret path, Xuan Hao heard the room behind him copse as he let out a sigh.


    No matter what, there was no way back now¡­


    All he could do was hope that he had made the right decision.


    ¡­


    At the same time outside of the ancient pceplex, the Imperial Teacher and Ancestor Bi Sheng along with General Liu and Zhang all decided to enter the ancient pceplex.


    The time it would take for them to reach the entrance of the secret realm would take too long, unless they waited for the earth to crack apart enough for them to fly out of the underground world.


    But before that happened, they would still have some time to explore the ancient pceplex and uncover what was hidden inside.


    After all, the secret realm belonged to ''that'' sect in the past and there would surely be something precious inside!


    The sect in question could be considered the strongest sect to have ever existed and even the empires of today was nowhere near the same strength as the now forgotten sect!


    The Sky Empire''s Imperial Teacher and the Onyx Empire''s Ancestor Bi Sheng decided to work together precisely because they knew that the things inside a secret realm left behind by the sect would be more than enough to cause Soul Ascension Realm Experts to fight over it!


    This was an opportunity for both of them to finally breakthrough thest stage of the Domain Lord Realm and enter the Soul Ascension Realm!


    At that time, they could truly be considered to have reached the peak of the Ewaria Continent!


    No matter what kind of feud both empires had with each other, the Imperial Teacher and Ancestor Bi Sheng would be more than willing to let this go as they worked together to obtain a chance to reach an even greater hight!


    Of course, their past friendship also contributed to how easily they managed to work together¡­


    General Liu and General Zhang on the other hand did not have any sort of past friendship¡­ On the contrary, they had shed on the borders with each other quite a few times and only worked together because their elders told them to do so¡­


    "This should be one of the legendary realm cities from the past¡­" Looking at the countless pces spread around the ancient realm city, the Imperial Teacher emotionally muttered this to himself as he was lost in thought.


    "Realm cities¡­?" Hearing the mutterings of the Imperial Teacher beside him, General Liu tilted his head to the side and asked with a questioning look on his face as he looked at the surrounding pces. Clearly, he did not know as much about the ancient sect from the past as the Imperial Teacher did.


    "The realm cities are ces where the cultivators from that sect would go when they needed a ce to quietly rx or enter seclusion for an extended period of time, they were called realm cities because most of them were located inside different secret realms¡­" Walking over from the side as he also looked at the surrounding pces, Ancestor Bi Sheng exined this.


    "Indeed, they would construct an entire secret realm just to have a ce away from the world to quietly cultivate in peace¡­ Even then, entering a realm city and getting a pce was not easy. The minimum requirement would be for one to reach the Domain Lord Realm¡­" Continuing the exnation where Ancestor Bi Sheng Stopped, the Imperial Teacher could not help but let out a sigh of amazement.


    The pces in the ancient realm city alone were more than one thousand! And this was just for one realm city!


    The Imperial Teacher could not even begin to fathom how strong the ancient sect truly was back then¡­


    And to think such a terrifyingly strong sect ended up getting destroyed!


    Just from the giant realm destruction formation, the Imperial could easily see how brutal the war back then had been¡­


    The Imperial Teacher did not know much about what had truly happened in the past, but he could easily imagine how world shaking the war had been!


    Boom!


    Arge piece of rock fell from the ceiling and crashed into a nearby pce, quickly bringing the Imperial Teacher back.


    "ording to what I know, the entrance to the secret realm should be located in the main pce of the realm city. The one we entered was most likely an artificial entrance used by the invading force in the past! The main storeroom should also be located there!" Calling out to the others, the Imperial Teacher flew in the direction of the main pce.


    The others did not wait behind after hearing what the Imperial Teacher said as they quickly followed behind him. Not noticing an almost invisible mist floating a few meters above them as it followed closely behind the group of four.


    ¡­


    As more and more of the underground part of the secret realm copsed, the giant lizard demon beast could no longer stand still as it narrowly dodged the rocks falling towards it from above.


    Roar!


    Boom!


    Letting out a loud roar as it dodged another rock, the giant lizard demon beast looked up and spotted a giant ancient tree falling down towards it.


    When did trees start falling from above?


    Jumping to the side, the giant lizard demon beast discovered that a crack had formed in the ceiling and the sky above could be seen!


    ROAR!


    Letting out an excited roar upon seeing a way out of the copsing underground world, the giant lizard demon beast used all its strength to climb onto a nearby pir connected to the ceiling and make its way through the crack in the ceiling.

 Chapter 211: General Liu and Zhang, Towards the Storage Room!

    <h4>Chapter 211: General Liu and Zhang, Towards the Storage Room!</h4>


    Slowly making his way along the path, Xuan Hao felt that the shaking from the secret realm beginning to copse begin to grow more and more intense with each passing second, but he did not dare to move any faster.


    After all, he had no idea if the person who lived in the underground room was hostile towards him and prepared to attack him the moment he let his guard down.


    Even then, it did not take Xuan Hao long before he reached the end of the path and found himself in what could only be considered an underground garden.


    Looking around at the weirdly glowing trees and foliage neatly arranged in some sort of weird order all, Xuan Hao tried to think about what kind of nts they were and his newly acquired knowledge about spiritual nts and trees soon began to show its worth as Xuan Hao almost immediately recognised the different nts and trees inside the underground garden.


    "Violent Crystal Trees, Crystal Flowers, Earth Spirit Vines¡­" Looking over all the different rare spiritual nts, Xuan Hao could not help but open his eyes in shock as he slowly understood that he hade upon an extremely rare garden filled with rare spiritual nts!


    Rustle~


    Walking through the underground garden with an increasingly shocked look on his face, Xuan Hao heard a rustling sound from a nearby spirit berry bush and froze in ce as he cautious look over at the spirit berry bush.


    The spirit berries on the bush shook gently as Xuan Hao clearly felt and saw something moving inside of the spirit berry bush!


    "Hello¡­?" Calling out cautiously, Xuan Hao slowly began to approach the berry bush with his sword drawn. Ready to attack in case whatever was hiding inside the spirit berry bush decided tounch an attack towards him!


    The spirit berry bush also stopped shaking the moment Xuan Hao called out and it seemed like whatever was hiding inside the spirit berry bush had decided not to answer as it had ceased any form of movement.


    This in turn only causing Xuan Hao to grow more cautious as he slowly began to use his qi to move the leaves of the spirit berry bush to see what was hiding inside of it¡­


    ¡­


    "This should have been the original entrance to the secret realm¡­" Arriving in the throne room of the main hall, the Imperial Teacher of the Sky Empire said with confidence as he walked in front of a gate located to the side. Completely ignoring the terrifying pir piercing through the ceiling of the pce and directly into the ground.


    The terrifying energy gathered around the pir shattered the surrounding pce walls as it slowly grew stronger. Growing close and closer to reaching a point where it would erupt outwards and destroy the entire secret realm along with the remaining paths back to their home world!


    "Imperial Teacher. S-should we not hurry up and get out before that thing activates¡­?" General Liu nervously looked towards the giant pir with the terrifying energy swirling around it as it let out a world destroying aura.


    The sheer amount of fear he felt when looking at the giant pir with the energy swirling around it was iparable to anything he had ever felt before!


    Even when he met with the ancestors of the Sky Empire at the Soul Ascension Realm, he did not feel such a terrifying suppression!


    Whatever that energy was, it was above what someone in the Soul Ascension Realm was capable of doing on their own.


    At least that was what General Liu felt when he looked up at the giant pir gathering more and more of that terrifying energy.


    "Haha, you don''t need to worry so much about it! From what I see, it will at least take another 30 or so minutes before the formation gathers enough void energy to activate!" Calming down the worry of General Liu, the Imperial Teacherughed a bit before he focused back on the original entrance to the secret realm.


    "Void energy?" General Liu who heard an unfamiliar term could not help but ask out.


    "No need to think about that for now, go with General Zhang to find to storage room, I will stay here together with Bi Sheng and find a way to open up the entrance here." Dismissing the question of General Liu, the Imperial Teacher ordered for him to move with General Zhang of the Onyx Empire to find the storage room hidden inside of the pce.


    "But¡­" Looking over at General Zhang and Ancestor Bi Sheng, General Liu could not help but feel ufortable upon hearing the orders of the Imperial Teacher.


    Working together with them when the Imperial Teacher was around was one thing. Working together with them alone was another¡­


    He did not feel safe at all¡­


    "Don''t worry about it, he won''t do anything to you. The storage room should be located at the north wing of the pce. Now hurry!" Seemingly reading his mind, the Imperial Teacher answered before he managed to protest and directed him towards the north wing of the pce


    "Yes¡­ Imperial Teacher¡­" Reluctantly agreeing, General Liu cast an unwilling gaze in the direction of General Zhang as the other party just smiled in return before both of them moved towards the north wing of the pce.


    "Are you really sure it is fine to leave it to them¡­? One of us should have gone to make sure nothing happens¡­" Watching the two generals disappear, Bi Sheng turned around and asked the Imperial Teacher with a questioning look on his face.


    "Its fine¡­ I trust General Liu won''t do anything inappropriate and I''m sure you think the same about that General Zhang¡­ And I will need you here as well when breaking the seal on the entrance¡­" Smiling as he said the first part, the Imperial Teachers mood soon turned sour as he reached thest part.


    "My help¡­? What do you mean, you know that I''m not skilled in dealing with seals and that kind of stuff¡­" Showing a confused expression on his face for the first time since entering the secret realm, Bi Sheng looked at the Imperial Teacher waiting for him to exin what he meant.


    "That!"


    Swoosh~


    Pointing towards the giant pir gathering what the Imperial Teacher had called void energy, a small string of energy broke off as it mmed into a nearby wall and easily pierced through it beforending a little farther away.


    Boom!


    The small string of void energy caused a violent explosion as it hit the ground and easily reduced several nearby pces to rubble.


    "Another reason why realm destruction formations are not used often. Void energy is highly unstable! I hope you a prepared to block it when ites this way~" Smiling cheekily at Bi Sheng as he said this, the Imperial Teacher focused back onto the original entrance to the secret realm as several differing symbols manifested in the air around him while trying to break the seal on the gate.


    "You got to be kidding me¡­" Watching as the void energy around the pir grew stronger and stronger, Bi Sheng also discovered that it grew more and more unstable¡­


    Whoosh~


    A dark qi slowly began to drift out of Bi Sheng as he began to prepare his defensive techniques for the inevitable sh with the unstable void energy.


    ¡­


    Boom!


    "What was that?!" Looking over in the direction of the explosion, both General Liu and General Zhang had a shocked expression on their face as they watched from afar as several pces were reduced to rubble.


    "We have to hurry before this entire secret realm ends up copsing!" Feeling a sense of urgency, General Liu began moving quicker than before as they soon found themselves in the north wing of the pce.


    Not discovering a weird mist that slowly drifted a little behind them as they moved. Never getting too close and never falling too far behind¡­


    "General Zhang, should we split up or move together?" Entering the north wing of the pce, General Liu asked General Zhang in a cautious tone as he waited for an answer.


    "Just call me Zhang and we should move together, it would be dangerous to move alone if we encountered anything¡­ Remember, the barrier to this realm city is down and anyone can enter now, that includes demon beasts!" Saying this, General Zhang looked out of a nearby window in the direction that the giant lizard demon beast was staying.


    "I understand, you can just call me Liu as well then!" Nodding his head in agreement as he remembered the giant lizard demon beast from earlier, General Liu felt a shiver run down his spine.


    If it was not for the two elders, he was sure that he would never have been able to survive the encounter with such a terrifying demon beast close to the Soul Ascension Realm¡­


    "I think the storage room is located in that direction¡­" Just as they walked into the main hallway of the north wing of the pce, General Zhang stopped General Liu as he said this.


    "Hm? How do you know?" With a confused expression on his face, General Liu looked in the same direction as General Zhang and soon understood.


    [Storage Room ->]


    A sign was hanging on the wall of the hallway as it pointed in the direction of the storage room¡­

 Chapter 212: Soul Enhancing Flower

    <h4>Chapter 212: Soul Enhancing Flower</h4>


    "Nothing¡­?" Observing the spirit berry bush, Xuan Hao had a confused look on his face as he tried his best to see if he missed something, but in the end, he found nothing hiding beneath the spirit berry bush.


    "I swear I saw something moving there¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao shook his head and moved deeper into the underground garden as he picked up the different spiritual nts and herbs along the way.


    The only things he did not take with him was the crystal trees as they were simply too difficult to move and were not too rare. Taking the different spiritual herbs and nts growing in the underground garden was more than enough¡­


    Unknown to Xuan Hao at this point in time, a pair of eyes opened behind him and observed as he left the spirit berry bush before going deeper into the underground garden before quickly disappearing again.


    Xuan Hao did not notice this and instead focused on the different nts and spiritual herbs that appeared along the path that he was following.


    By this point, Xuan Hao could already feel that his interspatial ring was close to being full at this point in time, so he could only reluctantly stop himself and only focus on picking up the more precious spiritual herbs and nts.


    Walking along the path of the underground garden, Xuan Hao soon came to a stop as he saw a gate simr to the one, he had seen in the main pce of the ancient pceplex earlier on.


    The gate was covered in all sorts of foliage from the underground garden, that had grown all over it. Completely covering the gate in the process.


    This did not stop Xuan Hao from recognising it immediately.


    "Another entrance to the secret realm¡­" Looking at the gate located in the middle of the underground garden, Xuan Hao muttered this to himself as he cautiously approached the gate covered in different vines and other sorts of nts that had grown on it over the years.


    Compared to the gate he had seen earlier on in the throne room of the main pce; this gate was way smaller in size and did not have any sort of seal on it.


    At least Xuan Hao could not see any visible seal on the gate preventing him from opening it up like the one in the throne room.


    Creak~


    Pushing open the gate, Xuan Hao watched with a shocked expression on his face as the gate effortlessly began to open up without any resistance.


    "This feels way too easy¡­" Staring into the pitch-ck darkness beyond the gate, Xuan Hao clearly knew that the gate led to apletely different cepared to the entrance he had used to get into the secret realm in the first ce.


    Behind him, a pair of eyes shining in a bright green colour also appeared in a nearby crystal tree as it looked into the pitch-ck darkness of the gate with fear.


    Rumble! Bang!


    The rocky ceiling of the underground garden suddenly began shaking, as Xuan Hao saw a few glowing crystals fall down from above and crush a few nearby crystal trees in the process.


    "Hah¡­ I hope that nothing goes wrong¡­" Sword prepared, Xuan Hao cautiously entered the gate and officially left the secret realm.


    The owner of the pair of green eyes did not do the same and instead waited around for a good five minutes before also entering the gate after Xuan Hao.


    ¡­


    "This should be the storage room, but it looks like it has already been emptied out¡­" Standing in front of the entrance to the storage room and looking in, General Liu sighed as he said in a sad voice.


    If they didn''t get anything out of entering the secret realm, General Liu could not imagine how he would be able to justify working together with his enemies¡­ Even if the Imperial Teacher was the one who ordered him to do it, General Liu still did not feel like it was right for them to work together with their archenemies.


    Let alone now that it seemed like they would not even get anything out of it other than risking their lives together¡­


    "Calm down Liu, look over there!" Seeing the increasingly distorted look on General Liu''s face, General Zhang walked over from the side as he pointed at somewhere far off in the corner of the storage room where a small unremarkable wooden box was located.


    It was the only thing inside of the storage room and General Liu had even managed to miss it when he looked inside of the storage room the first time.


    Now hearing what General Zhang said, he once again looked inside the storage room and saw the small unremarkable wooden box located in the corner that General Zhang had pointed out.


    "Hm¡­ What do you think it is, Z-Zhang¡­?" Having a difficult time calling General Zhang without his title in front, General Liu walked over to the small unremarkable wooden box and picked it up.


    "No idea¡­ Let''s open it." Standing beside him, General Zhang took the small unremarkable wooden box out of General Liu''s hand and located a small lock that he easily destroyed with his strength before opening up the box and seeing what was inside.


    "This!"


    "Hm? What is it?" Hearing the shocked voice from General Zhang as he opened the wooden box, General Liu grew curious as he moved over to see what was inside of the wooden box.


    "Soul Enhancing Flowers!? And more than a dozen of them!?" Not able to keep himself from eximing loudly upon seeing the dozen or so delicate flowers inside of the box, General Liu felt a wave of excitement wash over him.


    Working together with the Onyx Empire for Soul Enhancing Flowers was more than worth it, as the trip to the secret realm could already be considered to be worth the risk.


    Soul Enhancing Flowers were incredibly rare spiritual flowers that could help purify and strengthen the soul, it was one of the most sought after spiritual herbs by Soul Ascension Realm cultivators as it would be extremely beneficial for them.


    The effects of the Soul Enhancing Flower were of course not just limited to the Soul Ascension Realm but was even more miraculous for Domain Lord and Nascent Soul Realm cultivators.


    Domain Lord Realm cultivators would have an easier time cultivating and even increase their chances of breaking through into the Soul Ascension Realm in the future!


    For Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, it could guarantee that they would be able to easily reach the Domain Lord Realm and ensure that they would be able to go further on the path of cultivation.


    All in all, the earlier that the Soul Enhancing Flower was consumed, therger benefit it would bring to the cultivator. The Nascent Soul Realm being the earliest possible realm, as the Soul Enhancing Flower''s strengthening effects to someone that had yet to ovee the cloud tribtion and reach the Nascent Soul Realm would be too powerful and instead end up killing the person who consumed it instead of strengthening their soul.


    Seeing the over dozen Soul Enhancing Flowers inside of the box, General Liu knew very well that there would at least be 6 for their side after splitting them together with the Onyx Empire.


    Other than that, he knew very well that he would get at least one of them from being one of the two to discover the Soul Enhancing Flowers, General Zhang was the same as both of them were excited over the prospect of being able to use a Soul Enhancing Flower.


    Whoosh~


    It was at this point where both of them were excitedly thinking about how they were going to use the Soul Enhancing Flowers in the future, that a small mist slowly drifted over before turning into a person that quickly grabbed the box of Soul Enhancing Flowers before turning to leave.


    "Stop him!" Seeing the Soul Enhancing Flowers in front of him suddenly disappear, General Liu angrily screamed as he watched the wanderer that they had chased away earlier suddenly appear and steal away the Soul Enhancing Flowers.


    General Zhang was a little more preparedpared to General Liu as he reacted the moment that the wanderer appeared and snatched away the box of Soul Enhancing Flowers.


    Using a movement technique to block the thief''s escape path out of the storage room as General Zhang did not wait for even a second as he quickly drew his weapon andunched an attack towards the wanderer.


    Swish~


    A terrifying de energy suddenly appeared in front of the wanderer as he took out his wooden staff to defend against the de attackunched by General Zhang.


    Not expecting that the other party was cable of using such a terrifying movement technique to block his escape path.


    Boom!


    Both the attacks collided as both parties were flung backwards by the sheer force.


    The wanderer looking rtively betterpared to General Zhang.


    This however did notst for long, as the wanderer found himself between a rock and a hard ce. General Zhang blocking him in front and General Liu behind him.


    Even if he had reached the middle stages of the Domain Lord Realm, he had only recently reached it and did not feel too confident in dealing with the continuous attacks from two other Domain Lords at the same time¡­


    Worst of all, both of them were generals from the Onyx and Sky Empire¡­ Theirbat experience in dealing with Domain Lord level opponents would be far superior to his own as a wandering cultivator¡­


    But he could simply not let go of such an opportunity¡­ The Soul Enhancing Flowers might be the only shot he would ever get at surpassing the Domain Lord Realm and reach the Soul Ascension Realm in the future¡­

 Chapter 213: Battle for the Soul Enhancing Flowers!

    <h4>Chapter 213: Battle for the Soul Enhancing Flowers!</h4>


    "Just leave the Soul Enhancing Flowers and we can forget about this¡­ The only way out is guarded by the two elders from earlier, you should at least know that you won''t be able to get away without running into them first!" Slowly approaching the wandering cultivator, General Zhang attempted to persuade him first before attack again.


    After all, the other party had already been blocked and would not be able to run away without going through him first!


    Even though the other part was above the early stages of the Domain Lord Realm and had already reached the middle stages of the realm, General Zhang had clearly felt that the other party had just barely reached the fourth stage of the Domain Lord Realm and was not yet familiar with his own strength yet.


    Other than that, the earlier sh also helped General Zhang affirm that the other party was not as skilled as himself when it came to fighting someone at the Domain Lord Realm.


    At this point, General Zhang already felt like he could win against the wandering cultivator alone if he was given enough time. Not considering that General Liu, who had around the same strength as himself, was there as well¡­


    "Hmph!" Narrowing his eyes after hearing what General Zhang said, the wandering cultivator knew very well what he said was true.


    Even though he was a wandering cultivator, he mostly specialised in formations and seals. Not really too focused on the aspect of fighting, outside of a few staff techniques that he had managed to pick up over the years.


    Swish~


    A calm ocean slowly began to manifest around him as the domain of the wandering cultivator appeared.


    "A water domain¡­" Seeing the water domain of the wandering cultivator appear, General Zhang and General Liu both knew that they would not be able to talk it out with him and fighting would be the only option left for them.


    Giving up the Soul Enhancing Flowers was not an option as both of them could easily imagine their elder''s reaction upon hearing how they lost something so precious due to a moment of tion where their guard was lowered. Allowing for the wandering cultivator to snatch away the box of Soul Enhancing Flowers.


    Whoosh~


    Both General Zhang and Liu reacted to the wandering cultivator and manifested their own domains.


    General Zhang was covered in darkness as a domain looking simr to what Ancestor Bi Sheng had used to fight the giant lizard demon beast earlier on appeared around him.


    General Liu on the other hand was covered in mes, as a sea of mes erupted with him as the centre.


    The fire domain and darkness domain soon collided with the calm water domain of the wandering cultivator as it began to shake visibly under the pressure of both domains.


    "Hah!"


    Whoosh!


    Knowing that he could not stand still and allow both of them to supress his domain together, the wandering cultivator did not stand still to contend against both domains at the same time and instead decided tounch an attack towards General Zhang. Attempting to break out of the storage room before using his artifact to hide away once again and look for an opportunity to leave the secret realm.


    The formerly calm water domain of the wandering cultivator suddenly became ferocious as arge amount of water qi gathered together and manifested into a giant tidal wave that came crashing down towards General Zhang.


    "Hmph!" Already prepared for the attack, General Zhang lifted his de and swung down to meet the iing wave. Following which dark qi merged together with his de to strengthen it as he met the attack of the wandering cultivator head on without hesitating in the slightest.


    Boom!


    The two shed once again as the attack this time around was way more devasting, causing the surrounding storage room to end up getting destroyed. Luckily, the wandering cultivator had already put away the box of Soul Enhancing Flowers in his interspatial ring.


    If not, the sh would surely have ended up destroying the flowers¡­ Not an oue either party would want to happen.


    As both General Zhang and the wandering cultivator shed with each other, General Liu did not wait behind as he was gathered arge amount of fire qi in his fists before throwing a punch in the direction that the wandering cultivator retreated towards after shing with General Zhang.


    The attack of General Liu began to burn the surroundings as the fire fist appeared behind the wandering cultivator who just barely managed to use his domain to block the iing fire fist of General Liu with arge wall of water.


    Fwoosh!


    As the fiery fist attack of General Liu hit the water wall that protected the wandering cultivator, arge amount of vapor appeared as the water manifested from the water domain began boiling under the intense heat of General Liu''s attack.


    Soon all of the water disappeared as the wandering cultivator could only meet the attack head on and try his best to ensure he did not take too much damage from the attack.


    Bang!


    The attack of General Liu had weakened quite a bit after evaporating the wall of water set up by the wandering cultivator, but still managed to carry forth a terrifying heat as it smashed directly into the body of the wandering cultivator.


    Sending him flying into a nearby wall of the storage room.


    Crash!


    The wall almost immediately copsed as it fell down and covered the wandering cultivator under the rubble.


    Rumble~


    The copse of the wall soon caused the rest of the storage room to copse, as both General Liu and Zhang quickly made their way outside.


    The materials used to construct the pce was not just any ordinary materials and even if they were Domain Lord Realm cultivators, they would still be injured if they were hit by the copsing storage room.


    "Give up and hand over the Soul Enhancing Flowers!" Moving over to the area where the wandering cultivator was buried, General Zhang called out in a stern tone as his domain covered everything around the area. Making sure that the wandering cultivator would not be able to escape without him noticing!


    General Liu moved over as well, as both of them slowly began to move the copsed wall. Preparing to resume their fight with the wandering cultivator at any point.


    Whoosh!


    "The Soul Enhancing Flowers!" Suddenly the wandering cultivator broke out from the copsed wall of the storage room as he threw the box containing the Soul Enhancing flowers into the distance while throwing an attack towards it at the same time.


    All of this was done while the wandering cultivator desperately escaped in the opposite direction, it was clear that he did not want to continue fighting any longer and was just trying to escape at this point.


    General Zhang also sensed this and through his domain felt that the Soul Enhancing Flowers were indeed in the box thrown out by the wandering cultivator.


    Boom!


    Flying out to block the attack that was flying towards the box of Soul Enhancing Flowers, General Zhang could not care too much about the wandering cultivator.


    Securing the Soul Enhancing Flowers was way more important in his eyespared to chasing after the wandering cultivator.


    "I got it!" Yelling out excitedly, General Liu had not blocked the wandering cultivator either and had instead caught the box of Soul Enhancing Flowers before they managed tond on the ground.


    Swish~


    Just as General Zhang was about to give chase to the wandering cultivator, he suddenly turned into a thin mist like form and disappeared.


    "There is one Soul Enhancing Flower missing!" Counting up the Soul Enhancing Flowers inside of the box, General Liu could not help but exim loudly.


    General Zhang only frowned as he looked in the direction that the wandering cultivator had disappeared for a few seconds before turning back towards General Liu.


    "Hah, looks like we won''t be able to chase after him¡­ At least we got the Soul Enhancing Flowers back¡­ Losing one should not be too bad considering that he might have destroyed them if we really entered a life and death fight¡­" Letting out a depressed sigh, General Zhang walked up to General Liu before he put away the box of Soul Enhancing Flower in his interspatial ring. Making sure the wandering cultivator would not return again to try his luck¡­


    Rumble~


    Crash!


    "Looks like we will have to hurry back to the elders and get out of here before the entire ce copses¡­" Not caring about the fact that General Zhang took away the box of Soul Enhancing Flower, General Liu was instead focused on the continuously worsening state of the secret realm.


    In the first ce, he did not worry about General Zhang running away with them as he was sure that the Imperial Teacher would make sure they got their share of the Soul Enhancing Flowers after leaving the secret realm.


    Like this, both of them left the north wing of the pce and returned to the throne room where both of the elders were waiting.

 Chapter 214: Collapse of the Secret Realm!

    <h4>Chapter 214: Copse of the Secret Realm!</h4>


    Making their way back to the throne room of the main pce, both General Liu and Zhang felt relieved when they saw the Imperial Teacher and Ancestor Bi Sheng standing in front of the open gate leading out of the secret realm.


    "Hm? Did you manage to find anything in the storage room?" Asking in a both curious and excited voice, the Imperial Teacher had an exhausted look on his face as he made his way over to the two approaching generals.


    Whoosh~


    General Zhang did not hesitate in the slightest as he took the box of Soul Enhancing Flowers out of his interspatial ring and showed it to the approaching Imperial Teacher.


    "Soul Enhancing Flowers!" not able to contain his excitement upon seeing the flowers inside of the box, the Imperial Teacher eximed excitedly as he went forward and took the box out of General Zhang''s hand before inspecting the Soul Enhancing Flowers himself.


    Making sure that he was extra careful, so that he did not idently end up damaging the flowers.


    "Did you say Soul Enhancing Flowers!?" Hurriedly walking over to the Imperial Teacher to see the flowers inside of the box, both General Liu and Zhang noticed the thin line of blood running down his lips as they did not understand how he had gotten injured.


    Perhaps both of them had send the two of them away as they dealt with a dangerous demon beast or something along that line!


    BOOM!


    Just as both generals were feeling grateful towards their two elders, arge explosion urred as some of the void energy gathered at the main pir of the realm destruction formation broke free and crashed into a nearby wall of the pce. Instantly causing it to copse.


    "Let''s get out of here first! We can go over the Soul Enhancing Flowers after leaving the secret realm first!" Putting away the box of Soul Enhancing Flowers before Ancestor Bi Sheng could catch a glimpse of them, the Imperial Teacher hurried all of them before making his way towards the gate out of the secret realm.


    Swish~


    The group did not really have anything to say when they heard what the Imperial Teacher said and followed him into the gate leading out of the secret realm.


    The void energy that had gathered around the main pir of the realm destruction formation at this point was way too terrifying and General Liu could not help but nce back onest time at it before leaving the secret realm behind.


    Boom!


    The moment everyone had made it through the gate, the void energy swirling around the giant pir in the centre of the throne room seemed to have reached a critical point as the void energy grew even more unstable.


    "We should leave this ce before the void energy from inside spills out and ends up harming us in the process!" ncing around at the cave with several kinds of ruins that they had found themselves in, Ancestor Bi Sheng hurried the group as they soon left behind the gate and looked for a path out of the cave.


    Bang!


    Just as a part of the void energy split off from the pir and made its way towards the gate leading out of the secret realm, a small mist flew towards the gate at its highest possible speed as it barely made it through as the void energy hit him along with the gate and destroyed it.


    "Hah¡­ Hah¡­ I-I made it¡­!" The mist slowly turned into a human shape, as the wandering cultivator looked back at the now destroyed gate behind him with an exhausted smile on his lips before suddenly spitting out a mouthful of blood.


    Looking down on the blood that stained the ground beneath him, the wandering cultivator soon turned back into a mist and found a ce to secretly recover.


    Earlier on, he had forcefully endured the void energy as he passed through the gate leading out of the secret realm and damaged both his soul and body in the process!


    Normally such an injury would be extremely hard to recover from, but with the Soul Enhancing Flower he would be able to recover in half a year and even be able to increase his strength even further!


    ¡­


    "What is this ce¡­?" Walking through the gate inside of the underground garden, Xuan Hao found himself in the middle of a wide underground cave in what he could only assume was outside of the secret realm. All the shaking sounds from earlier were alsopletely gone.


    Ignoring thepletion notification of the system, Xuan Hao looked around himself and saw a lot of ruins in his surroundings with the gate at the centre of what Xuan Hao assumed was also a part of the underground garden from the secret realm.


    The difference between the two underground gardens was size and the ruins of buildings spread all over ce. Most likely a ce for those who took care of the underground garden in the past to stay.


    Illuminated under the glowing crystal hanging high above in the cave ceiling, Xuan Hao had not seen anything like it back in the underground garden of the secret realm and hurriedly made his way through the thick foliage covering the cave floor towards one of the nearby ruins.


    Hoping that he would be able to find out about where he currently was and find a way out.


    After all, he still had to return back to the sect again!


    At least he had informed them about Chi Hu¡­


    He did inform them about him recruiting Chi Hu¡­ Right¡­?


    "Looks like I will have to hurry back quickly before Chi Hu ends up in a bad situation¡­" Smiling wryly as he thought about Chi Hu being blocked at the entrance of the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao walked a little faster as he soon arrived in front of the ruin closest to the entrance of the secret realm that was connected to the underground garden.


    Standing in front of the small cottage that seemed to have decayed to the point where only the stones foundation remained, Xuan Hao walked inside to see if he could find anything.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao entered the underground garden, under a crystal tree located deeper inside the underground garden, a pair of red eyes suddenly sprung open as arge creature looked in the direction of the gate leading into the secret realm for a short moment before disappearing.

 Chapter 215: Second Blue Feather

    <h4>Chapter 215: Second Blue Feather</h4>


    Looking around inside the ruins of the cottage, Xuan Hao could not see anything of interest. Even after looking through the entire ce with his divine sense and pseudo sword domain!


    "Guess I should just find own my way out of here¡­!" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao took out his sword and began floating up into the air to get a better view of his surroundings and hopefully spot a path out of the underground garden.


    In front of him, there were all sorts of nts everywhere covering the ground beneath him. In the area close to the gate leading into the secret realm, there was ake as clear as a mirror reflecting the surrounding greenery under the illuminating light of the crystals above.


    On the shore of theke, arge area surrounded in a stone fence that had long since broken down with the passage of time was barely standing as the surrounding vines and other foliage had begun to take over.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes as he focused on a ce inside of the area surrounded by the broken-down stone fence where the nts and foliage had not yet spread to.


    Leaving itpletely empty outside of a small shrine that did not show any sign of decay like the rest of the buildings in the underground garden.


    Looking closer, Xuan Hao discovered that it was not that the surrounding nts and other foliage did not spread to the area around the small shrine but was instead because they couldn''t. Almost like an invisible force of sorts had prevented them from growing any closer to it.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling curious, Xuan Hao flew over to theke and reached the ce with the small shrine.


    "Small is most likely not the right word to use¡­" Standing in front of the shrine, Xuan Hao discovered that the shrine was not small at all and was at least a few dozen meters tall!


    "But what is so special about it¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao observed the shrine that was in a blue colour oddly simr to the phoenix that he had already seen on the painting in the underground part of the temple along with the mural of the main pce.


    Walking up to the entrance of the shrine, Xuan Hao felt like he already knew what he would find inside before proceeding to enter.


    The inside of the shrine was almostpletely empty outside of the blue pirs following the theme of the outside holding up the structure of the temple itself.


    On the sides of the shrine wall, Xuan Hao saw yet another gathering of paintings of the blue phoenix.


    The difference was that this time around, it did not show off any kind of epic war like thest two ces had done.


    Instead, it showed the blue phoenix among different humans and demon beasts peacefully coexisting as they went on with their life.


    The changepared to the other depictions he had seen of the blue phoenix being sealed away and fighting against the coalition of both humans, demon beasts and other mythical creatures like dragons and phoenixes was enough to cause Xuan Hao to stop for a moment to observe the paintings a second time before moving deeper into the shrine.


    "So, three different depictions of the blue phoenix¡­ One peacefully coexisting with everyone, one locked in a war against different forces and finally the blue phoenix being sealed away¡­


    But why do I feel like I''m missing something¡­?" Speaking to himself in a low, barely audible voice, Xuan Hao had a confused look on his face.


    Honestly, Xuan Hao did not fully understand anything about the different stories being told of the blue phoenix, but he felt like part of the story was missing.


    Like, how did it go from peaceful to being at war with all those different powers and races all of a sudden? The shift was a bit too drastic¡­


    "Another blue phoenix statue¡­ Hah¡­" Staring at the familiar phoenix statue in front of him, Xuan Hao saw another blue feather simr to the first one that he had found in the underground part of the temple.


    "Maybe someone already took away the blue feather that was located inside of the main pce¡­" Thinking about this as he picked the blue feather up and put it into his interspatial ring where the other feather was, Xuan Hao remembered the fact that the secret realm was most likely attacked by someone in the past¡­


    Perhaps the people who attacked the secret realm in the past was after the blue feather¡­ But why¡­?


    Xuan Hao did not know why, but he suddenly felt a shiver go down his spine as he thought about something.


    Those people would attack a secret realm for one blue feather¡­ Would that not mean that they would alsoe after him in the future¡­?


    "Ah! No use thinking about this! It''s not even certain that the people who attacked the secret realm are still alive in this world. Let alone know that I have the two blue feathers!" Calming himself down, Xuan Hao decided to not think about it anymore, he would wait until he grew stronger before looking into where the blue feathers came from.


    For now, he just needed to get back to the Flying Sword Sect and help both his disciples grow stronger while also increasing his strength along the way!


    Roar!


    "Ah!"


    "Help!"


    About to check the system quest that he hadpleted after leaving the secret realm, Xuan Hao was suddenly alerted by a loud roar in the distance as a scream of fear soon followed closely behind the roar.


    "There are demon beasts down here? And a human as well!?" Showing a surprised expression on his face, Xuan Hao soon located the rough direction that the scream came from before jumping on top of his sword before quickly flying towards it.


    Not daring to be too slow in case the demon beast managed to catch up and make a meal out of the person screaming for help.


    Also preparing himself in case it was a trap to lure in people and ambush them¡­


    After all, screaming so loudly in the middle of the underground garden was sure to attract more demon beasts¡­


    The only reason Xuan Hao could see for someone to scream like that was to lure in someone and ambush them, or if they had entered the underground garden together with other people and were calling out for their help¡­

 Chapter 216: The Young Blacksmith

    <h4>Chapter 216: The Young cksmith</h4>


    A little earlier after Xuan Hao had already left behind the underground garden inside of the secret realm, a small shadow suddenly appeared in front of the gate leading out of the secret realm.


    Whoosh~ Crash!


    Only barely making it through as the gate on the other side waspletely crushed beneath the underground gardens ceiling caving in above it.


    "I made it! Now I just have to be careful that those wolves do not find me!" Cautiously ncing around the surrounding environment, the figure of the person who emerged from the gate was soon revealed.


    Under the light of the crystals from above a child around the age of thirteen with a pair of green eyes and pitch-ck hair could be seen standing in front of the gate as he cautious surveyed his surroundings.


    Earlier on, he had watched as Xuan Hao had entered the gate and hoped that he would be able to deal with the wolves waiting on the other side and from the looks of things, there were no wolves in view around the gate!


    Normally, arge pack of wolves would be sleeping in front of the gate, preventing him from leaving the secret realm. Luckily, it seemed like the person who went in before him had indeed driven them away! This time around they were nowhere to be seen!


    Feeling a bit more confident, the boy looked around the area onest time before making his way towards the exit of the underground garden.


    As he was walking through the underground garden, the young boy sighed to himself as he thought about how he had ended up in his current situation in the first ce.


    Originally, he was an orphan that was taken in when he was young and had been left in front of an orphanage thatter ended up shutting down due to the city lord not seeing the use in spending money to keep it running in the first ce.


    At that time, he had just reached the age of eight and managed to be a student for a local elderly cksmith that took pity on him and began to train him in the art of cksmithing and even treated him like his own son.


    The elderly cksmith did not have any family left in the world, so being able to take in the young orphan helped cheer him up as he tried his best to train the young boy to be a great cksmith in the future.


    Like this, three years passed where the young boy trained under the old cksmith. In the end he became an apprentice cksmith at the tender age of 11.


    But before he could share this great news with his teacher that he now viewed as a father figure, he was murdered¡­


    Listing to the people loitering around the smithy, he had found out that a group of people had broken into the smithy that he was running and killed him in broad daylight before disappearing.


    At that time, the young boy had been devastated and it was only after calming down that he remembered something that the elderly cksmith had said to him the day before.


    "Remember child, if anything were to happen to me. Look for the ce under the tree where I first picked you up. Don''t worry about anything and just try to get as far away from here as possible!"


    Before he reached the apprentice cksmith realm, his teacher had also weirdly told him to train in the forest instead of the normal spot just outside the smithy that he usually used¡­


    At that time, he had not understood what he had meant but at the moment he suddenly understood that his teacher and father might have offended someone powerful in the past and did not want him to get involved in it.


    After thinking about this, he wanted revenge for his teacher but had no idea who to take revenge against in the first ce.


    All he knew was that a group of people appeared in broad daylight and killed his teacher before leaving before anyone could even do anything¡­


    "I was so hopeless back then¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about his past, the young boy clenched his small fists as a determined look appeared on his face.


    The ce beneath the tree had contained a box with all sorts of different blueprints made by his teacher and would be able to help him improve as a cksmith in the future.


    "Just you wait teacher! I will surely get revenge for you in the future! With those blueprints I will definitely be able-" Suddenly stopping where he was standing, the young boy suddenly looked around himself with a panicked expression on his face as he searched everywhere on himself.


    "They are not there! Not there! Argh! I must have forgotten them when that guy suddenly appeared, and everything started shaking violently!" Remembering how shocked he had been when someone appeared while he was quietly studying his teacher''s cksmith blueprints inside the underground room. Drinking spring water and eating the different fruits in the underground garden whenever he grew hungry or grew thirsty over past few months he had been stuck in there.


    "Maybe that guy took them with him when he passe through¡­?" Knowing that it might not be likely, the young boy still held onto hope as he thought about it.


    After all, his teacher''s blueprints were extremely beautiful to behold and even someone not proficient in cksmithing would be able to see the value in them¡­


    Nervously looking all back at the gate, the young boy bit his lower lip as he thought about a myriad of different oues before deciding to wait at the gate and see if the person who had suddenly appeared would show up once again.


    The young boy knew that there was only one way out and it was extremely difficult to find under normal circumstance, so he was sure that the person would return to the gate and maybe look for clues to find the exit at some point.


    With this, he should be able to meet the person who he had observed earlier inside the underground garden of the secret realm¡­


    At the very least he seemed to be young and looked like a kind and reliable elder brother¡­ But the young boy knew very well that looks could be deceiving and did not dare to let his guard down as he patiently waited in front of the now destroyed gate into the secret realm.


    Rustle~


    "Ah!"


    Hearing the sound of a few nearby bushes suddenly moving, the young boy unintentionally let out a panicked scream as he turned over in the direction of the bush. Hoping to spot the person he had seen earlier inside the secret realm.


    Growl~!


    Things however did not always go as nned and an all too familiar growl could be heard from the bush as a slightlyrger than normal wolf stepped out.


    Growl!


    Growl~


    Bark!


    Closely followed by another dozen or so wolves appeared as they all began growling threateningly in the direction of the young boy.


    Ignoring one smaller ''wolf'' among the pack letting out a not so wolf like sound, the young boy did not dare to wait around for the wolves to attack him and instead turned to run in the direction of the nearbyke.


    Hoping that he would be able to make it into the water as the wolves had been afraid of it thest time, he had been chased by them.


    At that time, he had just entered the underground garden before he was found by the pack of wolves and was forced to jump into theke. After that, he swam to the other side before entering the gate and hiding away inside.


    Following this, he had tried to leave on several asions, but would always end up being found by the wolves and would soon be forced to run back into the gate that the wolves also seemed afraid to enter.


    Climb a tree to escape the wolves?


    He had already tried, but these wolves had just ended up jumping up after him and could easily just bring the tree down if needed¡­


    Growl!


    Coming to a sudden stop, the young boy looked helplessly as another wolf suddenly appeared in front of him to block his path forward.


    It seemed like the wolves had already learned about his escape path from thest time and were prepared!


    Roar!


    Arge wolf aggressively roared at him as it began moving closer, the young boy felt an enormous amount of fear as he saw the bloody mouth of the wolf slowly open as it approached him.


    "Ah!" Letting out a scream of fear as he watched the wolf, the young boy did not know what to do as he suddenly thought about the person who he had seen earlier on inside the underground garden of the secret realm!


    "Help!" Not knowing if the other party could hear him, the young boy desperately screamed for help as therge maw of the wolf slowly began approaching.


    At this point in time, he did not know what else to do other than scream for help.


    In all his life, the young boy had never been so close to death before, even when he was an orphan, or the time after the elderly cksmith was murdered!

 Chapter 217: Helping the Young Boy and Escaping?

    <h4>Chapter 217: Helping the Young Boy and Escaping?</h4>


    Arriving at the ce that the scream hade from, Xuan Hao looked down as he saw a young boy around the age of thirteen being? surrounded by a pack of wolves around the early stages of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Currently, a bigger than average wolf around the middle stages of the Qi Condensation Realm had begun approaching the young boy as it looked like it was about to attack him at any moment.


    "Doesn''t look like an ambush is set up or anyone nearbying to help him¡­ Perhaps he just screamed due to fear¡­?" Scanning the surroundings with his divine sense, Xuan Hao did not manage to find anyone else hiding nearby.


    Looking at the young boy, Xuan Hao quickly discovered that he did not have any cultivation at all.


    Not having any cultivation at all could be considered quitemon as one would at the very least need ess to a cultivation mantra before one could even begin to cultivate in the first ce, so Xuan Hao did not really find it weird that the young boy had no cultivation at all.


    However, the thing that he found weird, was the fact that the young boy was present in the underground garden in the first.


    "Maybe there is a vige or city located nearby and the child idently found his way down here by ident¡­?" Thinking about it, Xuan Hao felt that it sounded reasonable and decided to help the young boy for now.


    Hopefully he would know of a way out of the underground garden¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao used his pseudo sword domain to instantly kill off all of the wolves before descending down towards the young boy.


    ¡­


    As the young boy was fearfully looking at the wolf in front of him about to bite down, a sound something moving with the wind could be heard as the surrounding wolves suddenly froze in ce and stopped growling at him.


    Even therger wolf in front of the young boy had frozen in ce with its mouth wide open about to devour him.


    Bang~


    "W-what is happening¡­?" Letting out a somewhat confused voice as he looked at the now unmoving wolves slowly copse and fall onto the ground like they had just fallen asleep, the young boy cautiously began touching the big wolf in front of him as he felt even more confused with each passing second.


    Why had the wolves suddenly begun sleeping all of a sudden?


    That was all the young boy could think about as he observed the pack of wolves peacefullyying on the ground all around him.


    Not discovering Xuan Hao who had already descend from the sky and appeared behind him at this point in time.


    "Ahm!"


    "Ah!"


    Letting out a fake cough in an attempt to catch the young boy''s attention as he was busy looking at the surrounding pack of wolves on the ground, Xuan Hao smiled a bit awkwardly when he saw the young boy jump in fear before turning around to look at him cautiously.


    "Ah! You are that person!" Seemingly recognizing Xuan Hao, the young boy eximed loudly as his cautious face became eager and excited. Much to the confusion of Xuan Hao, who had never seen the young boy before.


    "Do I know you from somewhere¡­?" With a confused look on his face, Xuan Hao asked in a curious tone.


    Maybe the young boy had heard about him before or something along that line¡­ But he was not really well known inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the first ce, so that should not be the case.


    Xuan Hao felt more and more confused about the current situation the more he thought about it.


    "Ah! Sorry, I-I forgot! You have never seen me before, but I saw you back in the underground garden! Remember the room that you went through? That was my room! Did you perhaps take the blueprints on the table out with you¡­? Please say you did! I really need them!" Beginning to talk at a speed that would be hard for ordinary people to keep up with, the young boy began narrating where he knew him from as he ended asking about the blueprints Xuan Hao had found inside the underground room.


    "Wait a moment, so you are saying you were also inside of the secret realm? Howe you ended up there in the first ce¡­?" From what Xuan Hao had seen inside the underground room. The young boy had clearly lived there for a long time and had not ended up entering the secret realm a few days ago like Xuan Hao and the rest had.


    "I entered¡­ The secret realm? Through the gate that we both left the garden through¡­" Confused upon hearing the word secret realm, the young boy exined how he entered through the gate in the past.


    Also exining how he had ended up inside the secret realm in the first ce and how he had ended up being stuck in there for close to half a year by now due to the pack of wolves.


    "Did you not try to leave the room at all during thest half year or so¡­?" Finding it quite odd that the boy had not tried to leave the underground room and garden during half a year, Xuan Hao could not help himself from asking after seeing that the boy had stopped talking.


    "I did¡­ But every time I went too far along the passage; several roots would extend out from the sides and block my path forward¡­ No matter what I did, be it burning or cutting them, I couldn''t even leave a scratch on those weird roots¡­" Sighing to himself as he recalled all the things, he had tried to pass through the thick roots blocking his path, the young boy felt a bit helpless.


    "I see¡­ " Recalling the tree from the throne room, Xuan Hao knew that it had been the one to block the young boy and nodded understandingly when heard him mention the roots blocking his path forward.


    "By the way¡­ What is your name?" Realizing that he still had no clue what the boy in front of him was called, Xuan Hao asked kindly. Not as cautious after finding out that the one who screamed for help was just a child without any cultivation.


    "Name¡­? I-I don''t have one¡­" Fidgeting with an embarrassed look on his face, the young boy looked away for a moment.


    "Hm?" Showing a surprised expression on his face after hearing that the young boy did not have a name yet, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a shiver run down his spine as he looked into the distance.


    "You see¡­ I was an orphan and teacher who took me in never gave me a name and normally just called me boy¡­ But I don''t really mind it at all as that-" Not seeing the sudden change in Xuan Hao''s demeanour as he continued talking.


    The young boy told him about his time with histe teacher as he became absorbed in the past he had spent together with his teacher. No longer paying attention to Xuan Hao as he was talking about it.


    "Quiet down for a moment!" Putting his hand on top of the young boy''s mouth, Xuan Hao promptly silenced him as he moved on top of his sword before quickly ascending into the air with the young boy in hand.


    Bang!


    Just as Xuan Hao had ascended into the air, the ground where both of them had been standing moments ago suddenly copsed as a dark abyss leading downwards covering at least a few thousand meters appeared.


    "W-what is that?!" Looking down into the abyss that had suddenly appeared where he had been standing moments ago, the young boy saw something moving below as it felt like he was being watched.


    He did not really care about Xuan Hao interrupting him and dragging him into the air and was instead more focused at the dark abyss that had suddenly appeared beneath them.


    Even the blueprints of histe teacher were no longer on his mind as he remained staring down into the abyss below while Xuan Hao was holding onto him.


    "Let''s get out of here immediately! Do you know the path out of here!?" Compared to the young boy who could not see what was hidden below them, Xuan Hao on the other hand could clearly see what was lurking below them and wanted nothing more than to get out of the underground garden as fast as possible!


    If it was not for him sensing something suddenly moving below them through his divine sense, Xuan Hao was sure that the creature below would have been able tounch a sneak attack and injure, if not kill him, when he suddenly found himself falling.


    "Ah, y-yes! Go over there, the path I used should be over there!" Realizing that it was not the time to be shocked, the young boy quickly pointed in a direction where the path he had used to enter the underground garden was located.


    Xuan Hao did not stay floating mid-air for even a second longer as he used his fastest speed to move in the direction that the young boy had given him.

 Chapter 218: Escaping From the Serpent Demon Beast

    <h4>Chapter 218: Escaping From the Serpent Demon Beast</h4>


    Not looking back as he felt the creature that had suddenly appeared beneath them and caused the ce they were standing on and the surrounding area to copse following closely behind them, Xuan Hao felt an increasing sense of danger with each passing second that he remained inside of the underground garden!


    The creature in question was from what Xuan Hao managed to see, a giant serpent like demon beast that had lived in a cave that was just beneath the underground garden¡­ Worst of all, the serpent was a Domain Lord Realm demon beast!


    Not just some demon beast who had just managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm through its physical body alone, but a real Domain Lord Realm demon beast that had a domain of its own!


    This was also the reason why Xuan Hao could not wait to get out of the underground garden as fast as possible.


    Even though he had a pseudo sword domain and could be considered strong enough to deal with people at the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao doubted that he would be able to deal with someone at the Domain Lord Realm that already had a fully constructed domain instead of a pseudo domain¡­


    In the first ce, Xuan Hao did not have any experience when it came to fighting someone at the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Running away from the scary Domain Lord Realm demon beast that suddenly decided to show up seemed like the best n.


    After all, why would he risk his life to fight against a Domain Lord Realm demon beast for no reason? And who could say if there were not more demon beasts hiding below the underground garden where the serpent demon beast came from¡­?


    Xuan Hao clearly felt an indescribable danger when he tried to sense the bottom of the abyss that had appeared along with the serpent demon beast. Preventing him from truly finding out what was hiding below.


    But he was almost sure that the serpent demon beast would not be the most dangerous thing down there¡­


    "Over there!" Flying through the underground cave, Xuan Hao heard the young boy call out to him as he pointed in the direction of a small crack in the underground caves wall.


    Whoosh~


    Xuan Hao immediately dived down towards the crack in the wall and entered the crack together with the young boy.


    Soon finding himself inside of a dark cave tunnel with only one path going upwards towards the surface.


    Bang!


    ROAR!


    The giant serpent following behind them crashed headfirst into the wall of the cave as it tried to brute force its way through as the crack and into the cave tunnel.


    Luckily, both the crack and the cave tunnel were way too small to fit its huge body and it had to force its way through the hard rocks with its huge body.


    Bang Bang Bang!


    Rumble~


    Therge serpent slowly forced its way through the hard rocks, but Xuan Hao was not one to wait around as he did not stop moving and followed the cave tunnel upwards. Leaving the angry serpent demon beast in the dust as it could barely move forward with itsrge body. Only able to watch as both of them disappeared in front of it.


    Roar!


    Letting out onest unwilling roar, therge serpent demon beast soon gave up and returned back to the ce which it came from.


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ Hah¡­ That was close, who would know such a terrifying demon beast hid beneath the underground garden¡­?" Breathing in the surrounding qi between heaven and earth to speed up his recovery from flying as quickly as he did, Xuan Hao put the young boy down as he sat down recovering his strength.


    Earlier on, he had wasted way too much of his qi when escaping from the serpent demon beast, but it could not be helped as the other party was a Domain Lord demon beast¡­ Not really something Xuan Hao wanted to fight with his Nascent Soul Realm cultivation¡­


    "I will have to reach the Domain Lord Realm before anything simr happens again¡­" Originally, Xuan Hao had thought that Domain Lord Realm cultivators were a bit rarer, but after entering the secret realm, he had seen a group of at least four Domain Lords in front of the ancient pceplex and after leaving, he had encountered a Domain Lord Realm serpent demon beast¡­


    Domain Lord Realm cultivators felt a bit toomon all of a sudden, causing Xuan Hao to feel a sense of urgency before reaching the Domain Lord Realm, he could not feel safe¡­


    "Looks like I will have to have either Chu Yang or Qing Yi reach the Core Formation Realm after returning to the sect again¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao hoped thatpleting the main quest given by the system would give him something that would increase his strength¡­


    After all, in the past when he hadpleted a main quest, it had allowed him to breakthrough several minor realms at once!


    Thinking about the system, Xuan Hao went into his sea of consciousness andpleted the survival quest.


    [Survival Quest: Escape before the copse of the secret realm!plete)]


    [Reward: Purification Pill x5]


    [Redeem]: [Y/N]


    Yes!


    Redeeming the quest reward, Xuan Hao felt a wave of information appear in his mind as he learned about the use of the purification pills that he had gotten. Sadly, he did not get the recipe to making them¡­


    "I should use one of these for myself when I get back as well¡­" Taking out one of the Purification Pills that he had gotten from the system, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit excited when the thought about its use.


    The Purification Pill was pure white as it shone under the sun, causing it to appear mystical and extremely enticing to the young boy who was observing Xuan Hao suddenly taking out the pill from the side.


    The use of the Purification Pill, was as its name implied, purifying the body and soul a cultivator!


    Yes! The Purification Pill could purify the soul!


    Sadly, it could only be used once¡­ If not, Xuan Hao felt that he might be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm a few weeks after he returned to the sect!


    The effects of the Purification Pill were simply too powerful¡­


    From what Xuan Hao could gather, it was made with the use of a rare nt called a Soul Enhancing Flower as the main ingredient.


    Xuan Hao did not know anything about the Soul Enhancing Flower, but from the name alone, he could guess what its use was.


    "Why are you waiting around like that?" Standing up again, Xuan Hao discovered that the young boy was patiently sitting a few meters away from him as he was recovering from the earlier chase and going over the reward given by the system.


    "S-sorry-"


    Nervously answering Xuan Hao''s question with an apology, the young boy looked afraid when he looked up at him as he seemed to still be scared from the earlier encounter with the giant serpent demon beast and suddenly flying through the air at a speed that would have been less thanfortable for someone without any cultivation.


    "No need to apologise to me. Now that we are finally outside the underground cave, can you tell me where we are?" Stopping the boy before he could continue any further, Xuan Hao asked once again as he waited for the boy to calm down and answer.


    "W-we are close to the Seven Lily City; it should be somewhere at the eastern border of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!" Thinking about Xuan Hao''s answer as he calmed down, the young boy soon answered the question without his earlier nervousness.


    "I see¡­ At least it is still somewhere inside of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ And here I thought I would have to go through a few random kingdoms and use a few weeks if not months to get back again¡­" Hearing what the young boy said, Xuan Hao let out a breath of relief.


    The Eastern part of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was controlled by the Spring Flower Sect and could be considered the most peaceful part of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom as there were not any other powers with Nascent Soul Realm Experts present there, allowing the Spring Flower Sect to have an easy time keeping the entire ce under their control.


    "Here, they were yours in the first ce!" Taking out the different cksmith blueprints that he had taken from the boy back in the secret realm, Xuan Hao did not really see much value in keeping them.


    He did not understand them in the first ce and even though they looked extremely beautiful, they might just be that and he did not really like the feeling of stealing from a child in the first ce.


    "Thank you!" Happily receiving the blueprints from Xuan Hao, the young boy excitedly checked all of them as he made sure nothing had happened to them.


    "Hm?!" Watching as the boy was happily going over the different blueprints, Xuan Hao finally looked at the young boy''s talent value disyed by the system.

 Chapter 219: Recruiting The Boy for the Sect

    <h4>Chapter 219: Recruiting The Boy for the Sect</h4>


    Talent value of¡­ 34?" The talent value of the young boy could be considered to be extremely high, only a little below his first disciple Qing Yi, but still far above anyone else in the Flying Sword Sect.


    The reason why he did not have any form of cultivation in the first ce should be because he had nevere into contact with any cultivation mantra and thereby never had a chance to cultivate¡­ How many talents were missed among the ordinary people every single year¡­?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt that it was a pity that cultivation was not more easily essible to ordinary people like the young boy¡­ Maybe he could take advantage of this in the future and find a group of extraordinary children among themon people and get them to join the Flying Sword Sect¡­?


    "Boy, you don''t have anywhere to go back to¡­ Right¡­?" Turning around to look at the young boy still absorbed in histe teachers cksmithing blueprints, Xuan Hao asked in a probing way. Trying to see if he might be able to bring the boy back with him to the Flying Sword Sect.


    Even if he did not take him as his own disciple, Xuan Hao knew that he would surely be weed in the Flying Sword Sect with his talent and in the future, he might even reach the Domain Lord Realm and help protect the Flying Sword Sect, if not go even further!


    No matter what, Xuan Hao could not see any demerit to recruiting a talented orphan that had nowhere to go back to and no ce to call home¡­.


    "I-I don''t have anywhere to go¡­ I would most likely just go back to hunting in the forest and selling the things I caught¡­ M-maybe in the future I would be able to be a cksmith like master, but for now I can''t¡­ People don''t take me seriously and think I''m too young, even if I was taught by master for 3 years!" Looking to the side as he watched a rabbit jumping into a burrow located under a tree nearby, the young boy had a helpless and confused look on his face when thinking about what he would be doing in the future.


    "I see¡­ If you don''t have anywhere to go, how about following me back to my sect and bing a disciple there¡­? From what I can tell, you should be quite talented, just that you never had the chance to practice cultivation before!" Throwing out his invitation to the young boy, Xuan Hao patiently observed him as he waited for a reply.


    After all, he could not force him to join if he didn''t want to in the first ce.


    Doing something like that would only end up creating trouble for himself and the Flying Sword Sect in the future¡­ Not really something that was desirable for either Xuan Hao or the Flying Sword Sect!


    The only sects that would force someone to join them would be the demonic sects¡­


    Normal sects, kingdoms or empires would not force someone to join them no matter how talented they were, as they could end up nurturing someone who wanted nothing more to do with the sect in the first ce and might even feel resentful towards the sect and end up cooperating with their enemies to get rid of it...


    Secretly killing the other party if they deemed them to be a threat or that they might join their opponents was the mostmon oue¡­


    Not that Xuan Hao nned to do something like that if the young boy refused him¡­


    "Join a sect!? Are you sure I can do that?! B-but what about cksmithing? Can I still continue that if I join the sect¡­?" Contrary to the reaction that Xuan Hao had expected of the boy being a bit more excited, the boy instead seemed to be struggling as he asked about whether he would be able to continue practice his cksmithing.


    "Of course, we even have a part of the sect dedicated to just cksmithing, so you should be able to freely focus on improving your abilities there and you would even be able to get different spiritual metal to practice with if you managed to convince the elders over there of your talent!" Reassuring the boy that he would not have to give up cksmithing after joining the sect, Xuan Hao watched as the struggling expression on his face disappeared.


    "If that is the case, then I want to join!" Not thinking much about it after hearing that he could still practice cksmithing after joining the Flying Sword Sect, the boy immediately agreed to join the sect¡­ Even though Xuan Hao had not yet mentioned the name of the sect itself¡­


    Maybe it was because Xuan Hao had given him back histe teachers cksmithing blueprints and saved him earlier inside the underground garden from both the wolves and the giant serpent¡­?


    "Great! By the way, do you have anything you want to do before we leave¡­?" Hearing that the boy epted to join the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao was happy as he knew that the Flying Sword Sect would gain another powerful person in the future as long as the boy was trained properly.


    "N-no, I should be fine¡­" Shaking his head, the boy looked a bit nervous as he looked up at Xuan Hao.


    "Hm? Is there something you want to ask?" Saying this after seeing the clearly questioning look that had appeared in the boy''s eyes, Xuan Hao felt that he might have forgotten to say something earlier on when he asked if the boy wanted to join his sect¡­ Just that he could not remember what he had forgotten to say.


    "Ah¡­ I-I just wanted to ask what the sect is called¡­ And maybe how to refer to E-elder¡­" Asking this, the young boy looked at Xuan Hao waiting expectantly for an answer.


    "The Flying Sword Sect and you can just call me¡­ Elder Xuan in the future¡­" Feeling himself aging by at least a few years after being referred to as elder by the young boy, Xuan Hao promptly answered his questions before letting out a sigh inside his mind.


    Howe it is elder and not senior brother¡­? Do I perhaps look old¡­?


    Touching his face as he checked for any signs of aging, Xuan Hao could only give up as he really did not know how people kept calling him elder without even thinking twice¡­


    Maybe it was just that being an elder meant someone had a high position and was powerful in this world¡­ The young boy had after all witnessed how strong he was back in the underground garden and surely thought someone as strong as him would be a high ranking elder or something!


    Thinking that this made sense, Xuan Hao focused back on the boy.


    "Let''s get going now then, we should get back to the sect as soon as possible and get you registered before you can begin your journey on the path of cultivation."


    Not saying anything more as the boy seemed to understand and put away the blueprints from histe teacher, Xuan Hao once again picked him up before flying in the direction of the Flying Sword Sect.


    ¡­


    At the same time that Xuan Hao had managed to recruit the young boy to join the Flying Sword Sect, Chi Hu and the alchemist treasure hunter had both made their way to the Flying Sword Sect and was about to enter when a terrifying pressure suddenly descended upon the duo the moment, they were close to entering the Flying Sword City outside the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Halt, where do you two think you are going!? Why have youe to the Flying Sword Sects territory?" A calm voice could be heard as a beautiful mature looking woman dressed in a pure white dress with a lovely flower pattern on it, appeared in front of them.


    Both Chi Hu and the alchemist treasure hunter were shocked as they looked at the beautiful woman that suddenly appeared in front of them and immediately recognised that the terrifying pressure that had suddenly appeared was emanating from her.


    This person is dangerous!


    Both Chi Hu and the alchemist treasure hunter could only think about this as they clearly felt how terrifying that stunning woman in front of them was!


    "Elder Xuan asked me toe join the Flying Sword Sect and I decided to join a few days ago when I met up with Elder Xuan, this person is a treasure hunter that had his cultivation sealed. Elder Xuan asked me to bring him back to the Flying Sword Sect and wait until he returns to decide what to do with him!" Nervously saying this as he observed the beautiful woman in front of him, Chi Hu suddenly felt that the people from the Flying Sword Sect was way scarier than he had first thought.


    This could be considered a good thing as it would be a good thing for him the stronger the sect was!


    "I see, follow me then! I will allow you to enter, but I will keep an eye on both of you until Elder Xuan returns!" Sensing some of Xuan Hao''s aura on both of them with her divine sense, the mature looking woman, Shu Yao, agreed to let both of them enter as she decided to keep an eye on them until Xuan Hao returned¡­ Just in case they decided to do something...


    As Chi Hu and Shu Yao was talking, the alchemist treasure hunter was frozen in shock as he clearly felt that the mature looking woman in front of him was at the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    When did the Flying Sword Sect get someone that strong? Was it not enough with that Elder Xuan being present in the Flying Sword Sect¡­?


    Along with the Sect Master, there should at least be three Nascent Soul Realm cultivators in the Flying Sword Sect at theter stages!


    Such a sect would be more than strong enough to easily be the top sect in any kingdom that did not have a Domain Lord!

 Chapter 220: Naming the Young Boy

    <h4>Chapter 220: Naming the Young Boy</h4>


    "Hm, I think you need to get a name before we reach the Flying Sword Sect. After all, it would not do if everyone just referred to you as boy¡­" Flying through the air along with the boy as they were making their way back towards the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao could not help but say this as it felt a bit weird to continue calling him boy instead of using a name.


    "A name!?" Jumping up in surprise, Xuan Hao had to grab hold of the boy before he ended up falling off the flying sword that he was standing on together with Xuan Hao.


    "Yes, a name¡­ Do you have any idea as to what it could be?" Not really the best at things like giving out names, Xuan Hao tried to ask the boy if he had some idea as to what his name could be.


    "Hm¡­ I never really thought about it before, what about Bai¡­ Bai¡­ I don''t know, but I want the same family name as my teacher had!" Not able to find a name that he wanted; the boy just repeated the family name of histe teacher a few times before giving up.


    "What about Bai Ning¡­?" Coming up with a name after thinking over it for a little bit, Xuan Hao looked down at the boy to see what he thought about it.


    "Bai Ning¡­ I like it!" Muttering the name to himself a few times with a thoughtful look on his face, the young boy¡­ Or now Bai Ning, happily agreed to his new name.


    A few hours after he had gotten a name and Bai Ning had gotten used to flying together with Xuan Hao by now as he looked down at the trees and small viges passing by below them.


    "By the way, Elder Xuan¡­ How long would it take for us to get to the Flying Sword Sect?" Turning back to look up at Xuan Hao with a slightly sleepy look on his face, Bai Ning asked clearly exhausted from flying for so long without any rest.


    It did not help that the sky was slowly begging to turn dark as the night slowly approached.


    "I think we should be able to make it back to the sect in another day or two if we continue at our current speed¡­ But I think we should find a ce to rest for the night before you end up falling off." Smiling when he said this, Xuan Hao looked for a ce tond and a ce where they could stay for the night.


    "Mhm" Bai Ning did not say anything and just nodded his head in acknowledgement of what Xuan Hao said as a small sound escaped his lips.


    "Let''s go down to the city over there, they should have an inn or some ce for us to stay." As he was scanning the surroundings for a ce that they could stay over the night, Xuan Hao spotted a small city a few thousand meters away from their current position and quickly descended before approaching the city together with the half-asleep Bai Ning.


    ¡­


    "What do you mean the Spring Flower Sect knows about this!?" As Xuan Hao and Bai Ning were making their way inside of the city to find a ce to stay for the night, a group of people had gathered together inside the city lord''s manor and was discussing something as one of them eximed loudly.


    "What I mean to say is that the people from the Spring Flower Sect will soon find this ce and destroy it¡­ We won''t be able to continue operating inside of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom for much longer now¡­


    From what I know, the Seven Fates Sect already destroyed all the bases we had inside of their territory¡­" Shaking his head regretfully, one of the people said this with a pained expression on his face.


    "Looks like we really have to retreat from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom for the time being¡­ If only we had a little more support, we would surely be able to deal with the Spring Flower Sect and the Seven Fates Sect!" A burly man let out an unwilling sigh as he agreed with what the two others had said.


    "Indeed, we should not waste more time and resources here, we should just leave before we end up losing any more! In the future when we have more people to spare, we can always return andplete the mission! I will go and recover what I can from the Seven Fate Sect''s territory¡­" Thest among the group of people said as he stood up and took his leave from the dark room.


    "With this, the meeting ends!" Standing up, the person who was surprised over the fact that the Spring Flower Sect already knew about their location said this before everyone except for him began dispersing.


    Moving back to their own ces to begin preparations to leave the Heavenly Sky Kingdom behind.


    "Hah¡­ I never imagined things would go like this¡­" After everyone else had left, the man slowly sat down again and let out a sigh of disbelief.


    Originally, everything had gone as nned and they managed to do what the higher ups required of them¡­


    But everything changed when they tried to infiltrate the Seven Fates Sect!


    "I never expected that the Sect Master of the Seven Fates Sect would have reached the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm¡­" Their intel had been wrong and the person guarding the Seven Fates Sect was not just someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, but was instead a Half-Step Domain Lord that already had a pseudo domain¡­


    The original n had been for a group of their Nascent Soul Realm Experts to hold back the Sect Master while the restpleted their task before they would all leave faster than the Seven Fates Sect would be able to gather their people to surround and attack them.


    Sadly, when they met the Sect Master of the Seven Fates Sect, the group tasked with holding him back had ended up dying within a few seconds as the other group could do nothing but run away before they ended up in a simr situation¡­


    The situation with the Spring Flower Sect was even worse as they already found their bases even before they acted against them¡­


    The trip to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom could be considered to have ended in a disaster¡­ And they had originally thought they could borrow the chaos shown by the Church of the gue God and the war with the Azure Sky Kingdom to act¡­


    "All we can do now is wait for the rest to finish their missions in the Sky Empire before asking for help¡­ Hah¡­ Hopefully we can get a Domain Lord toe and help with the Sect Master from the Seven Fates Sect¡­" Shaking his head as he thought about this, the man no longer worried aboutpleting the mission given to him and the three others as he knew it was already considered to have failed.


    Retreating and waiting for others toe and help them was the best n of action¡­ After all, their intel had been wrong in the first ce, so they could avoid some of the me for the two failed missions in the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms¡­


    "Looks like the Seven Fates and Spring Flower Sect will be safe for another few years¡­" Narrowing his eyes as he said this, the man picked up a ss of wine before quickly drowning it in one go as he looked out a nearby window.


    "Master, all the preparation to leave are ready!" A voice echoed out beside the man as a dark shadow suddenly appeared to his left side and handed over a document before quietly waiting for instructions.


    "I see¡­ Begin leaving the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, make sure that no traces are left behind!" A thick killing intent spread through the room as he said this, the shadow beside him only nodded before disappearing from the room.


    The man did not stay for long either as he soon turned to leave the room, making his way out into the hallway of the city lord''s manor.


    "Hmph, looks like the shadows are quite good at cleaning up!" Looking around the hallway, the man saw at least a dozen corpse scattered all over the hallway as a creepy smile crept up his lips.


    Turning to look out of a nearby window, he watched a few people guarding the manor outside suddenly fall to the ground without even knowing how they died.


    ¡­


    "Hm?"


    "Elder Xuan, is something wrong?" Bai Ning asked in a confused voice as he suddenly saw Xuan Hao narrow his eyes and look towards the centre of the city.


    Xuan Hao had already felt a group of four Nascent Soul Realm Experts when he scanned the city earlier on but did not really care much about it as they might just be someone looking for a ce to meet up and chat together as they seemed to be gathered in the same ce.


    This idea was only reinforced when he felt three of them leave the city and move in threepletely different directions. Most likely returning to their sect or something along that line.


    But things suddenly changed when the aura of several Core Formation Experts suddenly began to be filled with killing intent as they began killing everyone around the ce where the group of four Nascent Soul Realm Experts had been gathered together earlier.


    "It''s nothing, let''s get a room for you to sleep in for now." Entering the inn and getting a room for Bai Ning to sleep in, Xuan Hao did not say anything about the massacre that had happened at what he supposed was the city lord''s manor.


    "I will be going out for a few minutes to check up on something¡­" Making sure Bai Ning was preparing to sleep for the night, Xuan Hao left the room before he could say anything and made his way over in the direction of the city lord''s manor.


    Ready to find out what had suddenly caused a massacre to take ce¡­

 Chapter 221: Spring Flower Sect Arrives!

    <h4>Chapter 221: Spring Flower Sect Arrives!</h4>


    "Seems like they already finished up¡­" Arriving in the air above the city lord''s manor, Xuan Hao looked down at the bodies of the guards and servants being dragged away by a group of figures dressed inpletely dark clothes. Hiding all their feature, making it difficult for Xuan Hao to discern anything outside their gender and cultivation realm.


    Xuan Hao decided to wait to see if he could find out something about the Nascent Soul Realm Expert that most likely ordered for the massacre to take ce, as he stayed still in the air above. Not forgetting to use his pseudo sword domain to hide himself.


    "Ah, looks like that person is finally showing himself!" Staring down at the entrance of the manor as a handsome man looking to be in his early thirties walked out and called for one of the people cleaning up the front of the manor, Xuan Hao sat down on his sword with a smile as he prepared to listen in on the conversation going on below him.


    "Though I do hope he at least gives some useful information¡­" With his feet hanging down from the side of his sword, Xuan Hao tilted his head to the side as he supported it with his hand while putting on a thoughtful look.


    Like this, Xuan Hao silently began listening to what the Nascent Soul Realm Expert down below was saying without the other party even noticing a person floating a few dozen meters above him.


    From this alone, it could be seen how strong the concealment ability of a pseudo domain was!


    Without the other party having a pseudo domain himself, it would simply be impossible to spot him!


    ¡­


    "Great job cleaning the ce up so quickly, we are pretty much clean when ites to this city after we finish moving our people and resources out of here! At that point, the Spring Flower Sect will just find an empty base with nothing in it! Hehe, I really wish I could see their expressions when they arrive!"


    Completely oblivious to the fact that there was another person directly above him listening in on what he was saying. The Nascent Soul Realm Expert did not bother thinking about what he was talking about, as the only? people around were his own.


    "Master, we have finished the clean-up, should we also take care of the rest of the city¡­?" Standing before the handsome man that hade out of the city lord''s manor, one of the figures dressedpletely in ck came up to him and asked in a voice devoid of any emotions.


    "No need to do that, it will take way too long in the first ce, and we would just end up wasting time and give the people from the Spring Flower Sect a chance to arrive before we finish moving everything out of here¡­!" Shaking his head in denial, the man talked a bit more on their direction of retreat and how long it would take with the person before he made his way outside the city lord''s manor in the direction of the city gates.


    The people of the city did not know that their city lord had already died and still went on with their lives without knowing anything about the massacre that just took ce.


    Xuan Hao quietly floated above the Nascent Soul Realm Expert as he made his way outside the city and came to a stop in front of a forest located to the north of the city.


    Fwoosh~


    A sound could be heard as Xuan Hao saw an entrance open up in front of the Nascent Soul Expert leading down into what he could assume was the base that the Nascent Soul Expert had talked about earlier with his subordinates.


    "This concealment formation is quite well made¡­ Even I missed it when I searched the ce with my divine sense!" Muttering a few words in surprise as he saw the entrance, Xuan Hao discovered once again that there were some things that his divine sense could not pick up on


    Maybe his domain could find it if he used it to sense his surroundings¡­ But that was not really possible on such arge scale as his current pseudo sword domain was way too small to even cover a few fractions of what his divine sense could!


    "To enter or not to enter¡­"


    Staring down at the entrance below as the Nascent Soul Expert entered, Xuan Hao hesitated for a moment as he did not know if his pseudo sword domain would be able to conceal him from the formation in front of him.


    "Hah¡­ Worst case scenario I will just have to fight that guy¡­" Watching as the formation slowly began to close up the entrance into the base, Xuan Hao steeled himself as he quickly descended and made his way inside the underground base.


    Luckily it seemed like the formation did not detect him when he entered, so he would not have to fight the Nascent Soul Realm Expert yet and might even be able to find out where the person is from or what he was nning¡­


    After all, they clearly targeted the Spring Flower Sect and given that they would most likely merge together with them in the future, Xuan Hao would much rather find out about these future enemies of his early on¡­


    ¡­


    "The base should be located close to the city over there!" At the same time that Xuan Hao entered the underground base, a group of female cultivators dressed in different kinds of clothes each with the same floral designs on them appeared a few hundred meters away from the city that he had just been in moments ago.


    The design in question was a rather beautiful yet simple flower wild flower that could be found almost everywhere in all kinds of different colours.


    "Let''s go, we can''t let them get away!" The group did not stand in front of the city and waited for long as a mature looking woman moved in front as the group entered the city.


    If Xuan Hao was present, he would have easily seen that the aura of the female leading the way was in the Nascent Soul Realm! And not only that, but in the fourth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Whoosh~


    It did not take more than a few seconds for the group to reach the city lord''s manor where they found a group of people in the process of removing the corpses of the people who formerly lived in the manor.


    "Prepare to attack-"


    "Elder Meng, I think we should wait for the leader to show up before attacking! ording to what the people from the Seven Fates Sect said, he should be in the Nascent Soul Realm, if we take care of these Core Formation Experts now, we might alert the leader and cause him to run away!" A more petite lookingdy among the group walked up and suggested as she could see that the elder in front of her was just about to attack the Core Formation Experts in front of them.


    "Xuefeng¡­ We can''t just wait around here for them! Don''t forget what the people from Seven Fates Sect told us! They will most likely be in the process of retreating from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom already. Catching a few of these people might be the only way for us to quickly find the base that is located around here before they are gone!" Looking back at the petitedy called Xuefeng, Elder Meng did not budge in the slightest as she signalled the others to get ready tounch an attack.


    "Xuefeng, take care of the backside and make sure that no one escapes!" Saying this, the group slowly spread out as they encircled the manor.


    Xuefeng could only pout in anger after seeing how she got refused before she did as Elder Meng told her and took position behind the manor to block anyone trying to escape.


    Boom!


    It did not take long for the group ofdies from the Spring Flower Sect tounch their attack as they soon overwhelmed the u group of Core Formation Experts without having as much as a single injury on their side!


    Not really that it was a fair fight in the first ce, as they had Elder Meng who was in the fourth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm on their side.


    Other than that, the petite looking youngdy called Xuefeng was also someone in the Nascent Soul Realm! Though not as strong as Elder Meng, she was still way stronger than the few escaping Core Formation Experts trying to leave from the back of the manor¡­


    In the end, the people inside the manor were swiftly dealt with as they had no chance to win against two Nascent Soul Realm Experts and a group of well-trained peak Core Formation Experts from the Spring Flower Sect.


    The people inside the city were also awoken as they heard the brief sound of fightinging from the city lord''s manor.


    The guards patrolling did not dare to ck for even a moment when they found out where the sound of fighting came from as they hurriedly made their way towards the city lord''s manor.

 Chapter 222: Blue Crystals

    <h4>Chapter 222: Blue Crystals</h4>


    "So, the base is located at the entrance of the forest just outside the city! Let''s get going and catch that guy before he finds out what happened here!" Throwing down one of the surviving ck clothed men that she had interrogated, Xuefeng excitedly told Elder Meng as she prepared to leave the manor.


    "Xuefeng, stay behind and exin what happened here to the guards with, I will go and check out the base located outside the city alone." Elder Meng watched as a group of people dressed like guards approached the city lord''s manor with her divine sense as she told Xuefeng.


    "But why go alone!? Can''t I join as well? You clearly just don''t want me to join in! If you really wanted someone to stay behind and inform the guards about what happened, you could just ask Grandma Zhang, Liu or Weng to do it!" Seeing Elder Meng about to leave without her, Xuefeng hurriedly caught up as she stubbornly followed after her.


    "This person should have reached the third stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and might even have reached the fourth stage like me¡­ I won''t be able to protect you after we start fighting¡­ And the mostbat experience you have versus other Nascent Soul Realm Experts are a few spars with me and the other elders!" With a worried expression on her face, Elder Meng stated her reason for wanting Xuefeng to stay back at the manor while she went out to deal with the Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    "But I won''t gain any experience if I never fight anyone other than you guys! And this is a perfect opportunity for me to gain some realbat experience. Even if I can''t help much, I should at least be able to keep myself safe!" Not wanting to back down, Xuefeng followed closely behind Elder Meng as the duo made their way through the now lively city.


    "Hah¡­ Fine¡­ But you have to run away the moment you can''t hold on any longer or feel that it would be dangerous for you to stay around!" Letting out a sigh as she decided to let Xuefeng follow her to subdue the Nascent Soul Realm Expert, Elder Meng felt that the once young girl she had watched grow up in the past had suddenly grown enough to be able to help her out¡­


    Looks like I have been a bit too protective in the past¡­


    Watching the girl beside her jumping around excitedly as she was allowed to follow, Elder Meng smiled happily as she decided to allow Xuefeng to join in and help the Spring Flower Sect like the rest of the elders, something Xuefeng had always wanted to do after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Thank you so much Big Sister Meng!" Suddenly giving Elder Meng a hug as she excitedly jumped around, Xuefeng smiled from ear to ear.


    "At least keep yourself in check and remember formalities! We are still out on a mission!" Stopping Xuefeng with one hand, Elder Meng quickly calmed her down.


    "Sorry, Elder Meng¡­ But there is no one else around¡­"


    "Hah¡­ Fine, but just until we reach the outskirt of the forest¡­"


    Seeing the sad look that Xuefeng gave her while apologising, Elder Meng could not help but give in to the sad look as Xuefeng suddenly sprang back to life again.


    "Thank you so much Big Sister Meng! I love you!" Hugging Elder Meng once again as they made their way to the gate, Elder Meng could not help but feel that she had been fooled by Xuefeng''s sad look just a moment ago¡­


    ¡­


    "What is this ce!?"


    Entering the underground base, Xuan Hao could not help but exim loudly inside his mind as he watched the entrance slowly expand out until arge cave more than big enough to fit the city that he had juste from, appeared in front of him.


    Looking around, Xuan Hao manged to spot a few different tools for mining along with several tunnels going in all kinds of different direction.


    From the looks of things, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert had been mining for something just outside the city and had even constructed a giant underground base for it¡­


    Xuan Hao felt really curious as to what had caused this Nascent Soul Realm Expert to go against the Spring Flower Sect and even construct such arge underground base inside their territory¡­


    Observing the rest of the base that was in the form of a small city, Xuan Hao easily passed by the few patrols walking around the ce as he followed after the Nascent Soul Realm Expert as he entered the small underground city.


    The city itself could not really be considered a city, as it only looked like one from outside.


    The moment Xuan Hao entered the underground city, he immediately felt the atmosphere around him change as all the people present inside wore a solemn look on their face while transporting different boxes of materials around.


    Getting a closer look, Xuan Hao discovered that the people were carrying all sorts of different things, from armour and weapons to food supplies and spirit stones.


    Among all of the things that were transported out of the city, Xuan Hao was most interested in a blue crystal that seemed to be handled with extreme care while being transported.


    Even the people transporting the blue crystals were at least in the Core Formation Realm as everyone seemed to make way whenever someone came running through with a box of blue crystals in hand.


    "What are these crystals?" Picking out one of the crystals from a box carried by a Core Formation Expert that ran by him without being spotted, Xuan Hao focused his divine sense on it as he tried his best to examine the blue crystal in his hand.


    "Spirit stones!? No, it''s something different¡­" Feeling the abundant amount of qi inside the blue crystal, Xuan Hao first thought that it was some kind of high-grade spirit stone, but this idea was quickly thrown away when he felt that he was unable to absorb the abundant qi inside the blue crystal.


    The reason for this was because the qi inside the blue crystal was ipatible with humans and absorbing it was not something he could do.


    No matter what he tried, Xuan Hao could not make any sense of what the blue crystal was or what other use it had.


    Even with therge amount of qi inside of it, it could not be used for anything¡­ At least Xuan Hao had no idea what use the blue crystal had.


    "I will just ask the Sect Master or the other elders when I get back to the sect and see if they know anything¡­" Throwing the blue crystal into his interspatial ring, Xuan Hao no longer paid attention to therge number of boxes filled with the blue crystals being transported out of the underground city and instead caught up with the Nascent Soul Realm Expert. Resuming his observation as he entered the core area of the underground city.


    ¡­


    "How is the transport of the crystals going!?" Entering his meeting room where a group of people were waiting for him around an oval table, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert loudly asked as he watched the surrounding people shrink away upon hearing what he asked about.


    "You! How long will it take to move all the crystals out of here through the emergency tunnel?!" Seeing nobodying forward to answer him, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert had an angry look on his face as he turned to focus on a shivering man sitting at the end of the oval table, as a dense killing intent filled up the entire meeting room.


    "S-seventy percent of the crystals have already been moved out and it will take around t-two days before we can move thest thirty percent of them out through the emergency tunnel!" Shivering under the gaze of his superior, the man barely managed to speak as he prayed that the person in front of him would not kill him off like the one who sat in his current position before him¡­


    "Seventy percent¡­? Hm¡­ That''s fine¡­ Everyone, we will leave the remaining thirty percent of the crystals mined so far. Begin cleaning up the ce and seal the mines before the people from the Spring Flower Sect arrives! We should have a day or two at most!" Thinking about what he was told, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert seemed lost in thought for a moment before he informed all the people inside the meeting room.


    Whoosh~


    After informing them about this, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert did not stay behind for any longer as he quickly disappeared from the meeting room.


    "Clean up!? Within 1 or 2 days!? How is this possible!?"


    "We are giving up so many crystals¡­"


    "Quick, we need to inform the miners and transporters about this!"


    "Yes, we need as much help as possible if we need to clean this ce up and seal the entrance to the mines¡­"


    As the Nascent Soul Realm Expert disappeared, everyone inside the meeting room began panicking as they quickly ran out to inform their subordinates to get started cleaning the ce up and making sure no traces of them could be found.


    Xuan Hao did not really pay much attention to this as he instead followed behind the Nascent Soul Realm Expert back into his personal quarters.

 Chapter 223: Xuefeng and Elder Meng vs Saber Lord!

    <h4>Chapter 223: Xuefeng and Elder Meng vs Saber Lord!</h4>


    The personal quarters of the Nascent Soul Realm Expert were not located at the centre of the underground city but was instead located in a small mansion just outside of it.


    Xuan Hao followed behind the Nascent Soul Realm Expert while remembering to keep his distance as he floated a few dozen meters above the mansion. Observing any movements made by the Nascent Soul Realm Expert inside.


    "Looks like he is just cultivating¡­" Watching as the Nascent Soul Realm Expert sat down an meditated through one of the windows in the mansion Xuan Hao knew that he would not find out much more from just following behind him and instead decided to enter the mansion himself and see if he could find anything about the organisation behind him or the use of the blue crystals that they had mined.


    Whoosh~


    Like a gentle breeze passing by, the guard standing outside the entrance of the mansion didn''t notice Xuan Hao as he entered without any difficulty at all.


    "A formation¡­?" Arriving at the entrance to the room where the Nascent Soul Realm Expert was cultivating, Xuan Hao saw a formation covering the entire room as he gave up on sneaking into the room.


    No matter how concealed he was with the help of his pseudo sword domain, he would still be discovered if he tried passing through the formation forcefully.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to explore the rest of the mansion and see if he could find any important documents or something along that line.


    Like this, Xuan Hao began reading through anything he could find. Aided by his divine sense, making it easier for him to go through the different documents and books inside of the mansion in no time at all.


    BOOM!


    "Hm?" Just as Xuan Hao had found a book about the blue crystals and was absorbed in reading it, arge explosion urred in the direction of the entrance as two auras at the Nascent Soul Realm appeared.


    "Someone broke the formation hiding the entrance and forcefully entered this ce¡­ Perhaps the people from the Spring Flower Sect arrived earlier than expected?" Smiling to himself as looked in the direction of the entrance, Xuan Hao decided not to kill the Nascent Soul Realm Expert and instead decided to use him to see how strong the people from the Spring Flower Sect were.


    "WHO DARES!?" At the same time that Xuan Hao put the book about blue crystals away and prepared to watch a good show, a loud roar shook the entire underground base as Xuan Hao turned in the direction of the room where the Nascent Soul Realm Expert was meditating earlier on.


    By this point, a dense killing intent could be felt leaking out from the room as the person had already stopped meditating as he was the one who roared angrily earlier.


    The Nascent Soul Realm Expert did not stay like this for long as he soon rushed out of the room in the direction of the entrance. Ready to confront the two people who just destroyed the concealment formation at the entrance and rudely let themselves in.


    ¡­


    "This should be the location of the base¡­ Are you ready Xuefeng?" ncing over in the direction of a ce located close to the entrance of the forest on the outskirts of the city with dangerous glint in her eyes, Elder Meng turned to look at Xuefeng standing next to her before she asked in a gentle voice.


    "Yes, Big Sister Meng!" Filled with excitement as she looked forward to fighting the Nascent Soul Realm cultivator that had caused trouble and was nning to create even more trouble inside the Spring Flower Sect''s territory, Xuefeng could not help but be excited when she thought of her first real fight against another Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    "Great! Remember what I said earlier on. Retreat if it gets too dangerous for you."


    "Yes~"


    Hearing her response, Elder Meng no longer dyed as she gathered her qi together in the form of a giant green ball that she proceeds to throw directly onto the entrance of the hidden base. Directly destroying the concealment formation in the process.


    BOOM!


    Not waiting for even a moment after seeing the entrance as both of them rushed down into the underground base, both of them showed a shocked expression when they saw the small underground city in front of them.


    They did not expect for there to be such arge city underground! Let alone so many people seemingly working to transport different things out through another tunnel in the distance.


    "WHO DARES!" It was at this moment both of them heard a loud roaring from a mansion located just outside the city as a figure soon rushed out from the mansion and headed towards them full of killing intent.


    "Xuefeng, be careful! This guy is at the fourth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!" Sensing the cultivation of the person who was rushing over to meet them surrounded by an almost suffocating killing intent, Elder Meng narrowed her eyes dangerously as she warned Xuefeng before taking out a small handheld folding fan with a beautiful flower pattern engraved on it.


    Whoosh~


    Waving the small handheld folding fan, arge amount of ice qi began to gather before quickly forming a small vortex of ice qi that quickly flew towards the iing Nascent Soul Realm cultivator.


    Freezing a few unfortunate miners and transports on the way as they were directly frozen to death as the ice qi vortex approached before having their bodies ripped apart by the violent ice qi vortex as it passed by their frozen bodies.


    "Hmph!"


    Seeing the ice vortex approaching him, the Nascent Soul Realm cultivator did not shrink in the slightest andrge saber appeared in his hand before he swung down towards the iing ice vortex.


    Whoosh! Boom!


    The attack sent out by the saber quickly collided with the ice vortex as both attacks cancelled each other out. Leaving behind only a frozen path of shattered bodies behind where the ice vortex passed through.


    "You should be the so-called Saber Lord who helped attack the Seven Fates Sect a few weeks ago! Are your three friends noting to help you? Sword Lord, Spear Lord and Bow Lord¡­? Quite the unique names you guys have¡­" Watching as the Saber Lord had stopped after blocking her attack, Elder Meng called out in an attempt to see if she could get more information on the other three that were also hiding inside the Spring Flower Sect''s territory.


    After all, if anyone of those three were here as well, it would be quite dangerous given that the Saber Lord in front of her was at the same cultivation realm as herself¡­


    "Hmph! Think I am more than enough to deal with you and that brat over there!" Sneering full of disdain as he said this, the Saber Lord charged forward as heunched another attack towards Elder Meng. Completely ignoring Xuefeng.


    "Who''s a brat!?" Clearly offended by how she waspletely disregarded by the Saber Lord as he attacked her big sister in front of her, Xuefeng took out her own weapon in the form of a giant hammer that was easily bigger than her and mmed down towards the Saber Lord with all her might.


    The Saber Lord saw a giant hammer suddenly appear out of the blue as he had a confused look on his face before quickly stopping his attack on Elder Meng and defend against the giant hammer.


    Bang!


    The giant hammer collided with the saber of the Saber Lord as he barely managed to push the aggressive little girl back before suddenly discovering a giant cluster of ice spikes flying towards him from the side.


    Puchi~


    The sound of flesh being pierced could be heard as the Saber Lord retreated with one of the ice spikes directly lodged into his right leg.


    "Hah¡­ I didn''t expect you to take advantage and attack me while dealing with the little girl! Hmph, looks like I will have to be a little more serious when fighting both of you!" Arrogantly pulling out the ice spike lodged in his right leg, the Saber Lord once again took a stance as he prepared to attack both of them.


    "¡­"


    Is this guy''s brain malfunctioning or something¡­?


    Staring at therge amount of blood flowing out of the wound of his leg along with his haggard expression, Elder Meng began doubting whether the person in front of them was truly someone in the fourth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    "Hah¡­ Xuefeng, you can fight him alone! I wille and help if something happens!" Looking over to Xuefeng and informing her of this, Elder Meng suddenly felt like it was a good idea to have Xuefenge along with her.


    If not, how could she find such a good training partner willing to fight for her without putting her in too much danger?


    ¡­


    "Somethings wrong with that guy¡­" At the same time, Xuan Hao was observing the fight as he felt something was wrong with the qi that the Saber Lord had used earlier on to block the ice vortex attack of Elder Meng.


    No matter how weak a fourth stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert was, he should never end up like this after just shing with Elder Meng and Xuefeng a few times¡­


    "How sad¡­" Listening in on what Elder Meng was saying to Xuefeng, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit bad for the Saber Lord as he was designated to be a training dummy for Xuefeng to help familiarize herself with fighting someone in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "But¡­ Maybe I can use this method in the future as well¡­"

 Chapter 224: Source Crystal and Snake~

    <h4>Chapter 224: Source Crystal and Snake~</h4>


    "Yes!" Hearing what Elder Meng said, Xuefeng excitedly stepped forward as she once again brought forth her giant hammer. Swinging it down towards the Saber Lord who was preparing tounch and attack towards the two of them.


    Boom!


    The giant hammer of Xuefeng collided with the saber of the Saber Lord as both of them were forced to take a few steps back as they seemed to be evenly matched.


    ¡­


    "Looks like I don''t really need to stay here any longer¡­" Looking at the twodies from the Spring Flower Sect treating the poor Saber Lord as a top-quality training dummy, Xuan Hao decided not to interfere in their battle as he instead turned his attention towards one of the tunnels that the miners had been transporting the blue crystals out from before the sh between the Saber Lord and two people from the Spring Flower Sect.


    Most of the people had already begun retreating towards what Xuan Hao had overheard to be their emergency tunnel, Xuan Hao had no idea where it led to and was not really too interested in finding out¡­


    So, he left the people retreating alone and instead made his way over towards one of the tunnels as he looked inside.


    Ignoring the constant sound of fighting happening behind him.


    From the book about blue crystals or Ghost Crystals as they were called in the book, Xuan Hao knew with certainty that they were not something a cultivator should absorb under any circumstances due to its poisonous effects on a cultivator''s soul and dantian.


    Other than that, he also found out that it was one of the most sought-after type of resources by demonic cultivators¡­


    The only problem was¡­


    The Saber Lord was not a demonic cultivator but stilled seemed to have absorbed the qi inside the Ghost Crystals¡­ Maybe that was why he was so weak even though he was a fourth stage Nascent Soul Realm cultivator?


    The book itself did not mention anything about this and only noted down how useful the Ghost Crystals was to demonic cultivators.


    "But there is supposed to be a Source Crystal at the centre of the Ghost Crystal mine." Reading through the book, Xuan Hao could not help but feel tempted to enter the Ghost Crystal mine and see if he could find the Source Crystal written about in the book.


    The effects of a Source Crystal were simply too amazing as it would allow the cultivator to easilyprehend the dao.


    For Xuan Hao, getting the Source Crystal would allow him to reach the Domain Lord Realm with ease after using the purification pill along with the pure qi fish from the secret realm!


    The reason why Xuan Hao believed that the Source Crystal was still inside the Ghost Crystal mine, was because of the fact that ording to the book, a special sort of life form was born alongside the source crystal and would protect it from anyone who dared to move too close¡­


    Even the weakest of these life forms had reached the Domain Lord Realm¡­ And it was not something that the living training dummy Saber Lord could deal with¡­


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    As Xuan Hao was hesitating on whether he should go in and enter the Ghost Crystal mine, a small explosion urred in the tunnel leading into the Ghost Crystal mine in front of him.


    This was not the only ce this happened as all the other tunnels except the entrance and the emergency tunnel began copsing after several explosion talismans hidden at the entrance of them activate, causing the different tunnels inside the underground base to begin copsing.


    Rumble~


    The tunnels were not the only affected, asrge stones began falling down from above. Signalling the fact that the cave that the underground base was located in was beginning to copse.


    Whoosh!


    Xuan Hao did not hesitate any longer as he entered the Ghost Crystal mine.


    He was not really worried about the two from the Spring Flower Sect. After all, with their strength, the copse of the cave would not be able to injure them. At most they would have to dig their way out after being buried by the falling rocks and dirt.


    It was not something like the secret realm where the entire ce was about to get destroyed.


    Even the best-case scenario of staying in the copsing secret realm would be ending up drifting aimlessly in the void between world before dying a slow death or a quick death if one happened upon some of the dangerous that lurked within the void.


    As for getting out by himself after the entrance Ghost Crystal mine and the underground base copsed? Like the two from the Spring Flower Sect, he could also dig his way out!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao had decided to enter the Ghost Crystal mine and search for the Source Crystal.


    Steal the Source Crystal from the guardian life form and run away as fast as possible! That was his n!


    Why fight a Domain Lord Realm life form if he did not have to?


    Even with this n in mind, Xuan Hao still felt that things might not go as nned¡­


    ¡­


    "Wow¡­ So, this is a Ghost Crystal mine!" Walking through a mostly empty tunnel for close to 10 minutes, Xuan soon came upon arge opening as he saw arge undergroundke at the centre.


    Around theke, countless small Ghost Crystals were covering the cave walls and ceiling as they weakly shone down towards a small natural tform made out of several different sized rocks that seemed to have fallen into the undergroundke from above.


    "That is the Source Crystal¡­?" Staring a small pure white crystal, the size of a grain of rice located on the natural tform of rocks in the middle of the undergroundke, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit suspicious.


    Would such a small crystal really be able to help him¡­?


    "Hisssss~"


    Lost in thought upon seeing the small size of the Source Crystal, Xuan Hao suddenly became cautious as he heard a small hissing sounde out from theke.


    "The guardian life form¡­?" Looking over in the direction of the hissing sound, Xuan Hao soon spotted the origin of the sound as arge snake at least a few dozen meters in length could be seen as the Ghost Crystal shone down and illuminated its body beneath undergroundke water.


    "Not a demon beast¡­" Even thought Xuan Hao had already read about it being a special life form that guarded the Source Crystal, he could still not really believe it as he had only ever really seen demon beasts before.


    But the snake quietly observing him from the undergroundke was clearly not made of flesh and blood.


    Instead, its entire body seemed to be made from different kinds of precious metals as its two eyes resembled the surrounding Ghost Crystals. Glowing weakly as they remained locked onto Xuan Hao. Capturing each and every move he made.


    ording to the book, each special life form born together with a Source Crystal was unique and not one was the same.


    This also made it difficult to know what kind of abilities the special life form would have, but at least it was written down that the special life forms strength depended on the size and strength of the Source Crystal itself.


    Meaning, the bigger and stronger that the Source Crystal was, the stronger the special life form guarding it would be!


    "How close can I get before it attacks me¡­" Looking around the underground cave, Xuan Hao quickly spotted a few boxes filled with Ghost Crystals as it seemed like the people under the Saber Lord had not managed to take away all of them in time before escaping.


    Observing the ces where the Ghost Crystals were missing after being mined and stored in the different boxes, Xuan Hao managed to calcte how far he would be able to go before he would be attacked by the unique snake observing him from the undergroundke in front of him.


    "Hm¡­"


    Ssh!"


    Picking up a Ghost Crystal from one of the nearby boxes and throwing it into theke directly in front of the snake, Xuan Hao hoped to get some sort of response from the snake.


    "Hiss!"


    But all he was met with was an angry hissing sound as the snake moved itsrge body inside the water, seemingly unhappy that Xuan Hao threw a Ghost Crystal towards it.


    "So, I have to fight it¡­" Feeling a bit unwilling as he clearly sensed the strength of the snake in front of him had reached the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao knew that he would not be able to sneak by it and steal the Source Crystal before running away like he had originally nned to do¡­


    Looking over towards the Source Crystal, Xuan Hao decided to try his luck.


    At most he would have to retreat if things were too much for him to handle¡­


    "Hissssss~!" Feeling the change in Xuan Hao, the snake quickly responded as it angrily hissed in his direction once again. This time in a more threatening tone as it clearly saw the direction Xuan Hao was looking!

 Chapter 225: Stealing the Source Crystal

    <h4>Chapter 225: Stealing the Source Crystal</h4>


    Standing in front of the snake as he watched it threateningly hiss at him from the undergroundke, Xuan Hao knew that he would not have a chance to sneak past it as he took out his sword from his interspatial ring and prepared to fight it.


    "Hiss!"


    Hearing the snake let out yet another threatening hiss, Xuan Hao used the opportunity to make a move, as his pseudo sword domain quickly spread out around him and soon covered the snake in an attempt to supress it while Xuan Hao went directly for the Source Crystal at the centre of the undergroundke.


    "HISS!"


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    The snake was not easy to supress as Xuan Hao pseudo sword domain was easily swept away by the snake as a bright yellow qi began swirling around it followed by Xuan Hao suddenly feeling an enormous pressure weighing down on him.


    "An earth domain!" Xuan Hao instantly knew what the yellow qi and sudden heavy feeling he felt was the domain of the snake bearing down on him.


    Even with his pseudo sword domain, Xuan Hao could not attack in the slightest with his own pseudo domain and was instead forced to use his pseudo sword domain to defend against the earth domain of the snake bearing down on him!


    The snake was way stronger than he had expected and for the first time, Xuan Hao felt the difference between someone in the Nascent Soul Realm and the Domain Lord Realm!


    Facing a fully fledged domain head on was not something anyone in the Nascent Soul Realm could do without a pseudo domain of their own to set aside some of the pressure brought by a domain.


    Xuan Hao knew that without his pseudo domain taking the pressure from the snake''s domain off him, he would not even be able to move at the moment and instead just stand still waiting for the snake to attack him.


    "Hiss! Hiss~?" Not expecting for Xuan Hao to still move after it had used its domain to supress him, the snake gave off a few confused hissing noises.


    Xuan Hao used the short time of confusion to quickly close the distance between himself and the Source Crystal before quickly grabbing it and storing it away in his interspatial ring.


    Bang!


    Xuan Hao did not wait for the snake''s reaction as he used his sword to attack the cave ceiling above to forceful dig his way up towards the surface and escape the snake below him.


    The snake recovered from its confusion as it watched the Source Crystal in the middle of the undergroundke being taken away before the thief in question suddenly crashed straight into the ceiling above as he soon disappeared, leaving only a small hole behind.


    "HISS!"


    The snake hissed once again, but this time, it was filled with madness as the snakes formerly blue eyes became blood red as it was filled with killing intent as it jumped out of the water and dug into the ceiling as it followed after Xuan Hao.


    There was no way it was just going to let him escape!


    Rumble!


    The cave with the undergroundke inside it soon copsed as the snake''s earth domain had momentarily gone out of control and destroyed the surroundings when it watched a certain thief taking the Source Crystal before running away.


    ¡­


    Bang!


    Xuan Hao erupted from the ground and found himself in the middle of a barley field located a few thousand meters outside the city where Bai Ning should currently be located in on the opposite side of where the forest with the underground base was located.


    "Hiss!"


    Xuan Hao did not manage to take in the beautiful barely field ready for harvest before an angry hissing sound came from beneath him as a giant snake head popped out from the ground and bit towards him filled with killing intent!


    Whoosh!


    Not daring to meet the sharp teeth of the snake that was made from some kind of precious metal head on, Xuan Hao barely manged to dodge to the side as he swung down his sword down towards the snake while executing a sword technique as he had moved to the side dodging it.


    Ching~


    A crisp sound of metal colliding with metal could be heard as the sword in Xuan Hao''s hand bounced back after hitting the rock like body of the snake.


    The snake did not seem to be affected by his attack at all as it simple shrugged it off as it crashed into the ground a few dozen meters away. Ruining the formerly good looking barely field in the process.


    At least one farmer and his family would not have a good day tomorrow¡­


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao shook his head and tried to think of a way to damage the rock like snake in front of him, as his attack earlier did not seem to do the slightest bit of damage to the snake.


    Whoosh! Bang!


    Xuan Hao suddenly moved and dodged the snake once again before being caught off guard as he was hit by the tail of the snake. Sending him flying for a few hundred meters before hended in a small stream just beside the barley field.


    "Maybe I could try to find a weak point in its body and-"


    "Hiss!"


    Before Xuan Hao managed to go over his next n of action, the snake showed up as it quickly slithered towards him as the surrounding barley field waspletely ttened under its enormous weight. Leaving behind a trail of destruction.


    Not panicking upon seeing the snakeing over to attack him again, Xuan Hao attacked it head on as he used his Rain Sword Technique to attack.


    Boom!


    A shockwave spread out with Xuan Hao and the snake at the centre as Xuan Hao began to sh with the snake.


    Using his Rain Sword Technique for both attacking and defending while trying to look for any weak spot on the snake that he could take advantage of to injure the snake.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    As both parties shed with each other, the surroundings were devastated as the nearby barely field ended uppletely destroyed under the aftershock of Xuan Hao and the snake''s battle.


    "W-what is happening?!"


    "Is the worlding to an end¡­?"


    "M-my barley field! How am I supposed to make a living like this!?"


    The battle was easily discovered by the city and few farmers living close by as everyone wore and expression of shock on their face as they looked towards the source of therge disturbance with both fear and awe on their faces.


    Bai Ning was the same as he looked out of the window from his room in the inn where he was patiently waiting for Xuan Hao to return.


    "I-is that Elder Xuan!?" Feeling the familiar auraing from the distance every time the sound of an attack could be heard and felt, Bai Ning had no idea how he could even sense the aura so far away as he did not pay attention to this and was instead focused on therge fight happening in the distance.


    For a short moment, a weird aura appeared around Bai Ning as he looked towards the battle happening in the distance before quickly disappearing before Bai Ning managed to discover anything.


    ¡­


    "Pah! I didn''t expect for them to suddenly cause the entire cave to copse on us!" Spitting out some dirt that had gotten into her mouth, Xuefeng angrily looked down towards the ce where the entrance of the secret underground was supposed to be.


    "Hah, I really did not expect for that to happen as well¡­ If I knew, I would have just killed off that Saber Lord when I had the chance!" Standing up from the ground as she cleaned her clothes, Elder Meng sighed regretfully as she remembered how the Saber Lord had used the opportunity where the cave was copsing to quickly dash towards a tunnel before causing it to copse behind him. Blocking both of them from chasing after him.


    Originally, Elder Meng and Xuefeng wanted to escape through the entrance but after the Saber Lord escaped, he had also triggered something that caused the entrance to copse.


    With no choice left, Xuefeng and Elder Meng could only prepare themselves as they were buried alive. Only able to dig their way back out to the surface afterwards.


    "But what were they doing down there in the first ce and what was the weird blue crystal that those people were transporting¡­?" Hearing what Elder Meng said, Xuefeng could not help but ask as she looked towards Elder Meng.


    "I have no idea, but it surely isn''t something good, when we get back to the sect, I will inform the other about this and send a group over here to try and dig this ce out and see if they find something-"


    Boom!


    Just as Elder Meng finished talking, arge shockwave suddenly swept over both of them from the distance.


    "W-w-what was that!?" Xuefeng hurried over beside Elder Meng as she asked in a fearful voice while looking in the direction of the shockwave.


    "I-I don''t know, but it looks like someone is fighting¡­ Let''s go and check it out first!" Shivering a bit herself when she felt the remnant power left behind in the shockwave, Elder Meng answered Xuefeng before both of them rushed back towards the city where the rest of the people who came with them from the Spring Flower Sect were currently waiting for them.

 Chapter 226: Xuan Hao vs Guardian of the Source Crystal!

    <h4>Chapter 226: Xuan Hao vs Guardian of the Source Crystal!</h4>


    Whoosh!


    Barely dodging to the side as several earth spikes suddenly erupted from the ground beside him, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine as he began to feel the deadly threat of the snake in front of him brought as he could do nothing outside of defending and dodging its attacks!


    This was the first time Xuan Hao had ended up in such a situation!


    Boom!


    The snake charged over once again, but this time Xuan Hao did not manage to dodge as he was thrown back.


    By this point, he had already shed with the snake several times and had yet to find any weakness that he would be able to take advantage of to injure the snake.


    This in turn had resulted in Xuan Hao ending up more and more injured as he did not have any way of truly injuring the snake with his sword attacks.


    Xuan Hao also felt the pressure brought upon him by the snake''s earth domain slowly increase with time as he felt his own pseudo sword domain constantly weakening under the pressure of a true domain.


    At this point, Xuan Hao was certain that his pseudo sword domain would not be able to hold up for much longer under the constant attack of the snake''s earth domain.


    "Hm?" It was at this crucial moment that Xuan Hao noticed a small change at a few different ces on the snake''s body when it had attacked him earlier with the earth spikes.


    The snake''s body had momentarily glowed a gentle yellow hue as it had attacked with the earth spikes.


    This was not out of the ordinary as it had merely used the yellow earth qi to summon forth the earth spikes to attack him, what Xuan Hao paid attention to was not this, but instead a few spots on the snake''s body that remained glowing in a gentle yellow hue for a longer period of time. Even after the attack had finished and the snake already returned to normal.


    "Nothing to lose at this point¡­" Not really able to find any other indication of a potential weak point that the snake had, Xuan Hao decided to try and attack the different spots on the snake''s body that had been surrounded by earth qi for a little longerpared to the rest of its body.


    Whoosh!


    Xuan Hao did not wait for the snake to attack and instead took the offensive. Charging over towards the snake as he focused on the different spots on the snake''s body as his sword qi erupted from the tip of his sword before splitting up into several different small streams of sword qi that quickly arrived and pierced into the several different ces on the snake''s body at once.


    "HISS!"


    A loud hissing sound filled with pain could be heard as the snake began squirming weirdly on the ground as Xuan Hao clearly felt that his sword attack had easily pierced into the snake.


    Maybe it was because it did not take Xuan Hao''s attack seriously after shing with him several times and being hit without any injury. The snake did not defend against Xuan Hao''s attack and insteadpletely ignored it.


    Hoping to use the opportunity to end the thief in front of it once and for all with a fatal attack!


    But things did not go ording to what it nned and instead it suddenly felt an enormous pain spread throughout its entire body as a weird glowing blue liquid beganing out of the ces Xuan Hao had pierced.


    Xuan Hao watched this and saw the glowing blue liquid corrode the ground where itnded.


    Along with the snake squirming around on the ground, this glowing blue liquid flew into the distance and even hit a few farmer houses in the distance as the family inside ran out in fear as they watched the house disappear in a matter of seconds under the corrosion of the glowing blue liquid.


    "Hisssss!"


    The snake did not take long to recover as it turned around and red at Xuan Hao full of hatred and killing intent.


    Not only had he stolen away the Source Crystal, but he had also wounded it!


    Whoosh~


    Xuan Hao did not wait for the snake to ovee its pain and had alreadyunched another attack towards the snake when it hissed angrily towards him full of killing intent.


    The attack this time around was a little different from the earlier attack where he had focused on all the different spots located on the snake''s body and was instead a direct attack that focused on only one of the different weak points on the body of the snake.


    The attack earlier, while it had indeed injured the snake, Xuan Hao clearly saw that the snake did not take too much damage from the attack.


    The attack was after all on several different ces at once and was therefore weakpared to a single attack with all his power focused on one ce at once.


    Therefore, even when the snake hissed out in pain and what he presumed was the blood of the snake flowed out from the wounds he inflicted, Xuan Hao did not let this fool him into believing that he had fatally injured the snake or something along that line.


    Bang!


    A terrifying sword qi gathered on the tip of his sword as he charged over towards the snake!


    The attack he had used this time was the First Move from the Untold Swords Mantra, Sword Shadow!


    Xuan Hao did not care about keeping the attack hidden and instead focused on keeping the vortex of sword qi under control until he managed to reach the snake.


    "Hiss!" Sensing the terrifying sword qi gathered in the sword as it watched Xuan Hao approaching, the snake let out a threatening hiss, clearly feeling the threat brought about by the hidden vortex of sword qi growing stronger and stronger within the sword of Xuan Hao as he closed in on it.


    Bang!


    The snake did not dare to ignore the attack like it had done in the past and for the first time began going on the defensive as the ground around it suddenly moved and formed into several giant earth spears that flew in the direction of Xuan Hao while a yellowish barrier began forming around its body.


    Earth qi was considered to be one of, if not the strongest when it came to defensive techniques!


    Coupled with the snake''s earth domain, a terrifying defensive barrier covered the snake as it prepared to block Xuan Hao.


    Not believing that the earth spear thrown after him would do much other than buy a bit of time for it to set up more defensive measures and strengthen the yellowish barrier made of abination between its qi and domain.


    Whoosh~


    Like the snake had already expected, Xuan Hao spent an extra few seconds dodging the earth spears throw out by the snake.


    However, Xuan Hao still arrived in front of the snake as he brought down his sword towards the yellowish barrier formed by the snake.


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    The vortex of sword qi formed by Xuan Hao erupted as itbined together with his pseudo sword domain to fight against the yellowish barrier and earth domain of the snake.


    "Hiss!"


    Slowly, the barrier of the snake began to show signs of cracking as it began panicking.


    BOOM!


    But this did notst for long as the barrier of the snake soon shattered under the sword qi vortex of Xuan Hao.


    At this point Xuan Hao was barely able to keep the sword qi vortex under control as he used thest remaining control he had and directed it towards a weak point located on top of the snake''s head.


    Xuan Hao quickly retreated as the vortex of sword qi entered the body of the snake through the weak point on top of the head and with Xuan Hao no longer keeping the vortex of sword qi under control, it fully erupted as it tried to expand while still inside the head of the snake.


    HISSSSSSSSSSSSS!


    Letting out a loud hiss filled with pain, the snake began to toss and turn in agony for a few seconds before it soon stopped all movement.


    Fwoosh~


    Xuan Hao did not dare to be careless and waited for the vortex of sword qi to disperse by itself as it continued causing chaos inside the body of the snake for a few more seconds after it stopped moving.


    "Looks like it''s really dead¡­" Walking over to the body of the snake, Xuan Hao felt that there were no signs of life left in it and quickly put the body into his interspatial ring.


    The body was made of all sorts of precious metals and was incredibly valuable! No way he was just going to leave it!


    Like this, Xuan Hao noticed the few people observing the battle in the distance and smiled a bit to himself when he noticed that it was the people from the Spring Flower Sect.


    They did not dare toe too close, but still moved way closer than the other people from the city who mostly just remained on top of the city wall as they tried their best to make out what was happening in the distance.


    "I will have to get back to Bai Ning before he gets too worried about where I am¡­" Thinking about the talented young boy that he intended to bring back to the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao soon disappeared from the scene and soon reappeared back inside the city.

 Chapter 227: Feng Chens Breakthrough!

    <h4>Chapter 227: Feng Chen''s Breakthrough!</h4>


    "Who¡­ Who in the world was that!? And what was that snake like creature made of rocks!?" Standing only a short distance away from where the fight had just taken ce, Xuefeng was filled with shock as she clearly felt the terrifying sword qi of the person who killed the rock snake.


    This was not to say that the snake was weak in any way, as both she and Elder Meng were not able to get any closer to the ce that the fight was happening as both of them would suddenly feel a terrifying pressure bearing down on both of them. Making them unable to move even a single step forward.


    "We have to get back to inform the rest of the sect about this as soon as possible!" Compared to Xuefeng who was still looking towards the abandoned battlefield, Elder Meng had a serious look on her face as she said this out loud for Xuefeng to hear.


    "Why¡­?" Not understanding why Elder Meng was suddenly in such a hurry to return to the sect again, Xuefeng asked in a confused tone while she tilted her head slightly to the side.


    They had still not finished investigating the group of people that had set up an underground base inside the territory and mined for some sort of weird crystals¡­ Should they not at least dig up a few of those blue crystals themselves to bring back before they returned to the sect?


    "The snake from earlier was not in the Nascent Soul Realm but was in the Domain Lord Realm! The person who fought it earlier is definitely someone in the Domain Lord Realm as well! We have to inform the others about the fact that someone in the Domain Lord Realm showed up in our territory!


    From what I know, he should most likely be someoneing to check out the secret realm that recently appeared at the edge of the Northern region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ At the edge of the Flying Sword Sect territory!" Saying this, Elder Meng did not wait for Xuefeng before she moved back towards the city to inform the rest of the people that came with them about the fact that they would be leaving.


    "Ah! Wait for me!" Seeing that she had been left behind by Elder Meng, Xuefeng eximed in a panic before she ran after Elder Meng.


    Not forgetting to cast onst look in the direction of the ce where the mysterious person and the snake had fought each other earlier.


    The remnants of power left behind as both parties fought each other still remained and would most likely be a hotspot for wandering cultivators toe and try toprehend some of the attacks left behind by the snake and sword cultivator.


    ¡­


    "Elder Xuan! Are you okay!? Was it you fighting earlier? I heard the fighting all the way back here and couldn''t sleep at all!" The moment Xuan Hao made his way back into the inn room where Bai Ning was staying, a barrage of questions suddenly came out from Bai Ning''s mouth as he worriedly looked up and down Xuan Hao. Trying to spot any injuries.


    "I''m fine and yes it was me fighting earlier." Already having fixed himself up before returning, Xuan Hao did not really feel that him fighting earlier was something that he needed to hide as he answered Bai Ning''s questions truthfully.


    Xuan Hao also did this because he noticed the worried look on the Bai Ning''s face, he had clearly begun growing attached to him¡­


    But was this not too fast? He had only met him a little over a day ago¡­ Maybe it was because he was giving him a new ce to live and a chance to continue practicing his cksmithing that histe teacher had taught him before passing away?


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao did not to think too much about it and decided to just take this as a good thing.


    After returning to the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao thought about having Bai Ning stay at his pavilion and have his two disciples help him adapt to life inside the Flying Sword Sect¡­ This way he would not have to do much himself!


    Other than that, it might be a good opportunity for Bai Ning to get someone other than an Elder of the sect like himself to talk with and he was not too far apart Qing Yi and Chu Yang when it came to age.


    "It''s alreadyte by now, you should get some sleep before we continue towards the Flying Sword Sect tomorrow morning." Noticing the fact that Bai Ning was already beginning to doze off as he was standing there, Xuan Hao smiled a bit to himself as directed him towards one of the two beds in the room.


    "Yes!" Hearing Xuan Hao, Bai Ning did not say much as he moved towards the bed Xuan Hao directed him to before he moved under the nket and closed his eyes and before long, Xuan Hao felt the calm breathing of Bai Ning as he had fallen asleep only a few seconds afterying down on the bed and covering himself with the nket.


    From this, it could easily be seen how tired Bai Ning was.


    Xuan Hao did not say much and just sat in a meditative position on the bed next, he was not going to sleep like Bai Ning and would instead be spending the rest of the night to recover from his earlier battle with the snake.


    Even though Xuan Hao had won, he had clearly sustained quite a few injuries after being thrown around by the snake so many times and had to use some time to recover before he could return to his peak state again.


    At the very least, it would not take him too long to recover and the rest of the night was more than enough time for him to recover to his peak again.


    "The people from the Spring Flower Sect are leaving¡­? Maybe it was because of my earlier battle just outside the city?" Sensing the people from the Spring Flower Sect gathering together before quickly moving out of the city, Xuan Hao had a curious look on his face as he thought about it for a short moment before ignoring it and focusing back on recovering.


    Xuan Hao wanted to meet the people from the Spring Flower Sect, but he would not bother doing it while he was in the process of recovering.


    Originally, he wanted to pay them a visit before leaving the city, but that no longer seemed to be possible¡­


    No matter what, he would still have to meet the people from the Spring Flower Sect at some point in the future when both sects were going to merge together.


    Xuan Hao did not really believe that Sect Master Feng Chen would be against both sects merging as it would strengthen them and allow them to join the sect alliance the Sky Empire was putting together in an attempt to lessen the influence of the different churches inside their territory.


    Shu Yao, who was the current Sect Master of the Spring Flower Sect was the one who came to ask about the merger would of course not say anything against it in the first ce!


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was recovering inside the inn room, Feng Chen had reached a critical step in his cultivation as his aura constantly fluctuated and seemed to be reaching a breaking point as the floor beneath him began cracking apart.


    "Hah!"


    Letting out a loud roar as the aura around him finally managed to breakthrough and climb to the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, but this was not the end of it!


    Feng Chen did not stop there as his aura continued to climb. Going from someone who just reached the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, all the way up to the pinnacle of the eighth stage!


    At this moment, Feng Chen had a determined look in his eyes as he felt the barrier to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm standing in front of him as he attacked it with all his might.


    BOOM!


    With a final push towards the barrier to the ninth stage, Feng Chen felt exhausted as sat in the middle of his room. Looking at the surrounding room that had already be apletely destroyed by the aura that leaked out from him during his breakthrough.


    "I-I seeded!" Feeling his newfound strength as he broke through to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, Feng Chen happily smiled to himself before closing his eyes to stabilize his cultivation base.


    He had managed to reach the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul realm in one go. Completely jumping over the eighth stage in the process.


    Even if he had to spend longer than normal to stabilize his cultivation base, Feng Chen felt that it was worth it!


    After all, he had just reached the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm! Outside of the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm, this could be considered the pinnacle of the Nascent Soul Realm!

 Chapter 228: Alchemy Halls Plan to Increase their Numbers!

    <h4>Chapter 228: Alchemy Hall''s n to Increase their Numbers!</h4>


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I was not injured too much by the snake earlier." Letting out a sigh as he nced around the inn room, Xuan Hao spotted the still sleeping Bai Ning on one of the two beds in the room.


    Looking towards the window, a few rays of light crept in through the cover and lit up the small inn room in the process.


    "Mhm~"


    A few rays of light shone directly into the face of Bai Ning as he soon opened his tired eyes and looked around with a confused look on his face before fully waking up and getting out of bed.


    "We should go down and get something to eat before heading out." Watching Bai Ning getting up from the bed and getting ready to move, Xuan Hao kindly informed him from the side as both of them soon moved down into a small area just beside the entrance of the inn dedicated for the guest to get something to eat.


    The time soon passed, and Bai Ning soon finished breakfast while Xuan Hao just ordered some tea as he waited for Bai Ning to finish eating.


    Like this, both Xuan Hao and Bai Ning soon left the small city and resumed their journey towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    ¡­


    "Haha! I finally seed!" Back in the Flying Sword Sect, Qing Yi who had recently managed to be a Journeyman Alchemist had been trying her best to improve as she had managed to convince a few of the elders from the Alchemy Hall to help provide different materials and herbs for her practice.


    The elders were more than happy that Qing Yi had managed to be a Journeyman Alchemist in such a short time and even convinced her to stay in the Alchemy Hall to practice and that was where she currently was as she held a small bottle of yellowish liquid in her hands as she happily held it up high with a smile on her lips.


    "Indeed, that is great! You will surely be able to do well in the uing alchemypetition half a year from now!" An elderly man beside her with a splendid white bear happily praised her while stroking his beard in the process.


    "But we still have to prepare more, after all, most of the people who will be participating are the same age as you and have already reached the Journeyman Alchemist Realm for a few years if not longer¡­ Compared to the bigger kingdoms, we can simply notpare¡­" Shaking his head, the elderly man could not help but shake his head as he thought about some of the top notch kingdoms with Domain Lord Realm cultivators in them joining the Alchemy Competition.


    To be honest, he and the rest of the elders did not think winning would be possible and just hoped that Qing Yi would be able to get a good ranking in thepetition and help bring some glory to their Alchemy Hall and maybe bring back a few rare pill or potion recipes in the process!


    Pill and potion recipes!


    This was the main goal for many joining thepetition, as the person holding thepetition was a famed alchemist, he had already announced that the people joining would get topete with some of his own recipes!


    The old Artisan Alchemist hosting thepetition this time around was rumoured to have already reached the peak of the Artisan Realm and the preciousness of his personal recipes was more than enough to attract all the surrounding kingdoms to send over their most talented young alchemists to join in.


    Other than that, the different prizes for the top 100 and above were more than lucrative enough to get people to try their luck ande join. The chance to learn the personal recipes of the old Artisan Alchemist could be considered to be the cherry on top.


    After all, even if you did not make it to the top 100, you would still have the chance to learn the recipes of the old Artisan Alchemist!


    So even without winning anything, you would still be able to gain something for joining!


    The old alchemist looked over at Qing Yi happily inspecting the potion in her hand as she wrote down the process that she had gone through to seed in a small notebook beside her on the table.


    Seeing this, the old alchemist felt that Qing Yi would be able to reach the top 100 in the uing alchemypetition. Maybe she would even be able to reach the top 50!


    "I will go back to my masters pavilion for now and go over the things I learned during the brewing processes and try to see if I can improve on something¡­ Thanks for your help today elder!" Finished with noting down the process she had gone through and what she thought about improving, Qing Yi turned around to thank the elderly alchemist before quickly making her way back out of the room.


    "Haha, no worries young one, I''m more than happy to be able to help the next generation of alchemist for our sect!" Laughing happily to himself as he saw Qing Yi out of the room, the elderly alchemist felt happy that he could help someone from the younger generation.


    Normally, something like this was rare due to the small size of the Alchemy Hall and the fact that it was unpopr¡­


    If not for the fact that cultivators lived longer than ordinary people, the old alchemist felt that there would no longer be any Alchemy Hall left in the Flying Sword Sect with how few people joined them!


    "But how could we attract the young''uns to join us¡­ Compared to those cksmiths or formation masters, alchemy takes way longer to learn in the earlier stages and those young''uns simply have no patience to spend a few years to only be a Journeyman Alchemist¡­" After Qing Yi had left, the old alchemist talked to himself in a depressed voice as he sat down at the table where Qing Yi had brewed the potion earlier.


    "Elder Gong, why are you sitting there all depressed by yourself¡­?"


    "Elder Wan!? Howe you are here?" As the elderly man heard the voice behind him when he was talking to himself, he immediately jumped up and turned around to face the person who suddenly appeared behind him.


    "How could I note? I could hear your depressed voice all the way from my own room! Quite a few of the other elders heard you as well but were too scared to enter and ask what was wrong¡­" Reaching thest part, Wan Qiu nced over towards the entrance of the room where a small handful of elders peeked over from behind the door cautiously.


    "Haha¡­ I see, I''m sorry to have disturbed all of you¡­ I just happened to feel a bit saddened after thinking about how few young''uns? join our Alchemy Hall nowadays¡­" Seeing the familiar faces peeking over from the entrance of the room, Elder Gong felt his cheeks redden from embarrassment as he scratched his left cheek whileughing awkwardly.


    "No problem at all Elder Gong!"


    "Yeah, we understand how you feel. My few apprentices are already over 50 by now and it looks like I won''t be getting a new one any time soon¡­"


    "Elder Gong is right; we indeed need to find a way to attract the young''uns to join our Alchemy Hall."


    The elders peeking over from the entrance slowly stepped forward as they agreed with what Elder Gong had said earlier.


    "Hm¡­ It seems like everyone is here¡­ Why don''t we find a way to try and attract more people to join the Alchemy Hall? For example, we could use the uing alchemypetition¡­" Calling out as the group of elders stepped into the room, Wan Qiu quickly caught the attention of the now small group of five inside the room.


    "What do you mean Elder Wan? Do you have any idea how we could attract more of the young''uns to the Alchemy Hall!?" Hearing what Wan Qiu said, Elder Gong could not help but exim in an excited tone as the other three elders also turned to look at Wan Qiu full of excitement.


    "Yes, I n to ask the Sect Master if we could bring a group of the disciples with us to watch the alchemypetition hosted by that old Artisan Alchemist! Seeing such a magnificentpetition would surely broaden their world view and at the same time get them more interested in alchemy! Especially when they find out what the different prizes are for getting into the top 100 and above!"


    Listing to Wan Qiu talking, Elder Gong along with the other three elders could not help but grow excited as they thought about the disciples shocked expressions after witnessing such a grand and dazzlingpetition.


    There would definitely be some disciples willing to join the Alchemy Hall after watching thepetition and those who went to see thepetition would talk about it to their friends and other disciples!


    "This is a brilliant idea! I will go and ask the Sect Master if we can take some of the disciples with us!"


    "The Sect Master is still in closed door seclusion for-" Watching Elder Gong suddenly filled with energy as he ran out of the room in a manner unbefitting of an elderly man, Wan Qiu didn''t manage to finish her sentence before he had already disappeared out of the room.


    By now, he was already heading in the direction of the Sect Master''s Pavilion.

 Chapter 229: Hidden Danger Approaching the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and Seven Fates Sect

    <h4>Chapter 229: Hidden Danger Approaching the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and Seven Fates Sect</h4>


    "The Sect Master is currently in closed door meditation and can not be disturbed, Elder Gong, why don''t you return when master is out again?"


    Standing in front of the Sect Master''s pavilion, Elder Gong was stopped by one of the Sect Master''s disciples as he was prevented from entering.


    "I¡­ I see¡­" Letting out a depressed mutter as he prepared to turn around, Elder Gong suddenly felt a terrifying aura gathering inside the Sect Master''s Pavilion before it suddenly erupted and reached a brand new high.


    Rumble!


    The aura alone was terrifying enough to cause both Elder Gong and the disciple standing at the entrance to fall down on the ground as they found it difficult to stand up again.


    "D-did the Sect Master finally breakthrough!?" The excited voice of the disciple could be heard as both of them looked towards the pavilion of the Sect Master.


    No matter what, both of them knew that the strength increase of the Sect Master could be considered a good thing for the Flying Sword Sect.


    Elder Gong also knew that he should be able to get the approval of the Sect Master in a few days after he had stabilized his cultivation base...


    At least it was not one of the longer closed door meditation! After all, it could at times take several years at times.


    The chance of him being able to meet the Sect Master during this period of time was close to nothing, so Elder Gong reluctantly decided to return to the Alchemy Hall and build up enough courage to go over and ask the Vice Sect Master¡­ But it looked like this was not needed anymore!


    With this in mind, Elder Gong decisively retreated from the Sect Master''s mountain peak and made his way back to the Alchemy Hall.


    He would inform the rest of them about the good news and at the same time try and find out if he had anything that could possibly help convince the Sect Master into allowing them to take some of the disciples with them for the uing alchemypetition after he stabilized his cultivation base¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time Feng Chen broke through to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, Shu Yao, Zu Fei and the two Wang brother immediately sensed it and hurried over.


    Chi Hu sensed it as well and was interested in who had broken through, but he did not dare to go against what Shu Yao had said and obediently stayed in the small courtyard that she had allowed both him and the treasure hunter to stay in until Xuan Hao returned.


    "Did Sect Master really just breakthrough to the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm? Why does it feel like he is stronger than that?" Being among one of thest to arrive at the entrance to the pavilion, Wang Hu asked in a confused voice as he kept looking towards the entrance of the pavilion.


    "From what I can sense, it seems like he did not only reach the eighth stage, but instead managed topletely skip over it in one go and reach the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!" Shu Yao who had arrived first was clearly able to more easily deduce the current realm of the Sect Master as she narrowed her eyes happily.


    "The Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!?" Both the Wang brothers along with Zu Fei had a shocked expression on their face when they heard what Shu Yao said.


    They knew very well what it meant now that their Flying Sword Sect had someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Even the old ancestor from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was only considered to have reached the Peak of the Ninth Stage!


    From this point onwards, the Flying Sword Sect would not have to bother too much with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and could even refuse them orpete with them for more territory like the Seven Fates Sect often did.


    By this point, the Seven Fates Sect had even begun topete more and more openly with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "Let''s leave him to stabilize his cultivation base for now." Seeing the group of three lost in thought, Shu Yao quickly reminded them as all four of them soon left the Sect Master''s mountain and returned back to what they were doing before.


    ¡­


    As Feng Chen broke through and reached the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, somewhere in the territory of the Seven Fates Sect, a burly looking man in his early forties dressed in a full te of armour was standing in front of a group of figures dressed in robes symbolizing them as being disciples of the Seven Fates Sect as he smiled full of disdain.


    "Hmph, do you really think your Seven Fates Sect will be able to continue expanding your territory just because the Azure Sky Kingdom attacked?" Saying this as he nced over at the group of people, a small insignia symbolizing the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was visible on his chest.


    "Hehe, I don''t have any clue what you are talking about Grand Commander, we merely came here to help out themon people who had been struggling due to the gue recently!" Stepping forward to face the man in front of them, an elderly man said with a sly smile on his lips as he did not show any sign of backing off.


    Grand Commander of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!


    This was a title that only the second strongest person in the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom had!


    It was even rumoured that the Grand Commander had already reached the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Elder Yan, if you merely came here to support themon people, howe you have begun building so many different branches all of a sudden? Perhaps themon people will grow better once they see all the splendid buildings constructed by the Seven Fates Sect in every city, they go to¡­?" Sneering to himself as he said this, the eyes of the Grand Commander had turned extremely cold as he looked at the group of people in front of him.


    He knew very well that the Seven Fates Sect had always wanted to overthrow the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and take over their territory and be an independent force under the Sky Empire.


    Normally such a thing would have been impossible, but with the Sect Alliance suddenly being set up and the Sky Empire wanting as many strong sects inside their territory as possible to join, the Grand Commander knew very well that the Sky Empire would not care if the Heavenly Sky Kingdom suddenly became the Seven Fates Sect.


    The Seven Fates Sect also knew about this god sent opportunity and finally began trying their utmost to take advantage of the Azure Sky Kingdom attacking the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to try and expand their territory and increase their disciples.


    "Grand Commander, how can you speak like that about our sect! We are merely creating a few ces for our alchemist to create the cure for the gue and help themon people. Nothing of the sort you are thinking!" Shaking his head as he denied what the Grand Commander said, Elder Yan from the Seven Fates Sect was intent on denying anything that had to do with them expanding their territory or going against the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "Hmph! We will see!" Knowing that he would get nowhere if he continued talking to the people from the Seven Fates Sect, the Grand Commander soon turned around and left as he nned to return back to the capital and see if the ancestor had any idea on how to deal with these traitorous people!


    If they could deal with the Seven Fates Sect, it would serve as a warning for the Raging me Sect, Spring Flower Sect and Flying Sword Sect to not act out of line!


    The opening of the secret realm, while it brought danger to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and all those close to it, it had also given the Heavenly Sky Kingdom time to deal with the internal problem known as the Seven Fates Sect.


    With the appearance of the secret realm, the Azure Sky Kingdom did not dare to continue attacking the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Fearing that they might identally offend a Domain Lord who came to check out the new secret realm that had appeared.


    Instead, they had focused on stabilizing the territory that they had just recently taken from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "Elder Yan, should we still continue¡­ It looks like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom are already on to us! Maybe they were even the ones who got those people to attack the sect and the Spring Flower Sect!" Stepping forward and saying this, one of the younger disciples among the group angrily eximed as he looked in the direction of the Grand Commander full of hatred.


    It had to be known that even though the people who infiltrated the Seven Fates Sect were unsessful in getting the thing they wanted, they still killed arge number of elders and disciples when they escaped!


    "If it was them, then¡­"


    "We should be more aggressive when dealing with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the future! Since the Heavenly Sky Kingdom no longer cares about keeping up a facade anymore, neither should we! How much can our sect grow if the Heavenly Sky Kingdom continues to supress us like this!?" Talking loudly as he had a wronged and angry look on his face, the young disciple could not hold himself back as he eximed loudly.


    "Hm?"


    "S-sorry for my outburst Elder Yan! I-I was just frustrated at how the Heavenly Sky Kingdom is constantly supressing us and trying to weaken our sect at any opportunity they get¡­" Realizing how rude he had been earlier; the young disciple''s face went pale as he immediately apologized to Elder Yan while kneeling down on the ground.


    "No need to worry child, what you said is indeed true! We can''t continue like this forever! Pass my order to the rest and increase the construction of new branches along with the expansion of the main sect, also¡­ Begin preparing to take control of the spirit stone mines, herb fields and cities along the border of the central region, I will go back and inform the Sect Master!" A determined look shing past his eyes, Elder Yan decided as he quickly ordered the few disciples around him before disappearing from the spot.


    The disciples did not dare to wait as they soon left the spot to carry out the orders of Elder Yan. Leaving only the younger person who had spoken up earlier behind.


    "Hah, what a boorish bunch of fools~ I never expected for it to be this easy to convince one of the seven core elders to take action against the Heavenly Sky Kingdom~" Completely different from his earlier angry and wronged look from earlier, the young male disciples voice suddenly changed as a seductive and mature female voice reced the formerly it.


    "Oh, I still have to inform the lord about this great news! He would surely be pleased if he knew that the Seven Fates Sect and Heavenly Sky Kingdom were about to fight each other!" Suddenly showing a happy expression upon saying this to herself, the person still looking like a male disciple from the Seven Fates Sect took out a high-grademunication talisman as she soon left to regroup with the rest of the people from the Seven Fates Sect.


    No matter what, how could she not join in the fun as both the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the Seven Fates Sect began to fight with each other¡­?


    It would be even better if the Azure Sky Kingdom decided to join in on the fun as well! This way, they might be able to gain more than they had first expected from this war between the Azure Sky Kingdom and Heavenly Sky Kingdom!

 Chapter 230: Returning to the Flying Sword Sect

    <h4>Chapter 230: Returning to the Flying Sword Sect</h4>


    "We are here!" Smiling to himself as hended in a small forest just outside the Flying Sword City, Xuan Hao carefully put Bai Ning down on the ground as he put his sword back into his interspatial ring.


    During thest few days of travel, Xuan Hao had gotten to know Bai Ning better as there was nothing much to do other than talk and admire the surrounding environment passing by while traveling.


    One of the things that Xuan Hao especially liked about the boy, was the fact that he was a curious child that asked a lot of questions, albeit being quite cautious in the beginning.


    Luckily after spending a few days with him, Bai Ning seemed to have befortable with Xuan Hao and began asking him about all sorts of things, though it was mostly rted to the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Elder Xuan¡­ I-is that the Flying Sword Sect!?" Walking in through the entrance of the city, Bai Ning eximed in a surprised tone as he looked around at all the people walking around the ce, this was his first time seeing such a big city!


    The city he had lived in all his life was after all not too big and was nowhere near the size of the Flying Sword City that the Flying Sword Sect was personally managing as a means to have a ce for the disciple''s family to stay while they were training in the Flying Sword Sect or just have a ce for the sect to have a ce that they could rx in their free time.


    The different shops and restaurants that sold food and snacks were among the most popr and prospers ones.


    In the end, the Flying Sword City was made up of different shops mainly for the disciples and other members of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Most of them were run by the different disciple''s families as well, so there could not be considered to anyone inside the Flying Sword City not rted to the Flying Sword Sect.


    Even the weapon shops and alchemy shops in the city, were mostly run by members of the Flying Sword Sect that had decided to retire from the Alchemy Hall or cksmithing Hall and wanted to live out a quiet life in the city while still helping the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Haha, it''s not the Flying Sword Sect, this is the Flying Sword City that is located at the entrance of the sect. See the mountains over there in the distance? That is where the Flying Sword Sect is located!" Laughing a bit to himself after he saw the shocked expression on Bai Ning''s face, Xuan Hao quickly exined it to him while pointing towards a few mountain peaks visible in the distance towering far above any building inside the city.


    A few majestic pavilions could also be faintly seen on the mountain peaks as a fog seemed to form and obscured the vision of anyone trying to see anything outside the thin outline of the majestic pavilions that was visible.


    "Wow!" Bai Ning let out a surprised sound as he looked up and saw the mountains towering far into the sky in the distance.


    This was his first time ever seeing mountains that tall!


    The ones he had seen in the past could only be considered a small hilltoppared to the tall peaks of the Flying Sword Sect!


    Thinking about this, Bai Ning suddenly began to feel excited upon thinking about the fact that he would be entering the Flying Sword Sect in the future.


    "Let''s get going, it is best if we can get you registered before tomorrow!" Seeing Bai Ning lost in thought while looking at the mountain peaks visible in the distance towering over the different buildings inside the city, Xuan Hao smiled a bit to himself before moving in the direction of the Flying Sword Sects entrance.


    Bai Ning heard what Xuan Hao said and immediately returned from his dazed state and looked away from the mountain peaks in the distance and quickly followed behind Xuan Hao as both of them soon arrived at the entrance to the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Ah, Elder Xuan is back again! Might I ask who this child is?" Seeing Xuan Hao walking over from the distance, the elder in charge of guarding the entrance to the Flying Sword Sect immediately bowed his head before noticing Bai Ning closely following behind Xuan Hao.


    The fact that Xuan Hao was not currently present in the Flying Sword Sect had be quite well known over thest few days, it was after all quite unusual for Xuan Hao to leave the sect, as he had spent most of his time just cultivating beforehand.


    Xuan Hao did not really mind this and just nodded towards the elder as he introduced Bai Ning to him.


    "This is Bai Ning, he is a talented child and I think he would be well suited for the Flying Sword Sect, so I decided to bring him back with me."


    "I see, so it''s someone Elder Xuan found!" Curiously looking over towards Bai Ning, the Elder smiled kindly towards him while Bai Ning nervously moved a bit closer to Xuan Hao. Clearly nervous upon facing the elder standing at the entrance.


    "Well, we will have to get going and get him registered as a disciple before the day is over, so we will be taking our leave for now." Seeing the nervous look on Bai Ning''s face, Xuan Hao quickly ended his conversation before entering the Flying Sword Sect together with Bai Ning.


    The elder at the entrance also seemed to have noticed how nervous Bai Ning was and did not say anything as he quickly returned to guarding the entrance again. No longer paying any attention to Xuan Hao and Bai Ning as both of them walked past him.


    This in turn eased Bai Ning up a bit as he soon opened his eyes wide while looking at therge and tall? buildings appearing in the distance as he was fully immersed in the pure and noble atmosphere that engulfed the Flying Sword Sect.


    The feeling of entering the Flying Sword Sect could be said to be amazing for someone who had yet to cultivate as the qi was denser than the outside world and given the fact that the Flying Sword Sect was mostly filled with sword cultivators, the qi also carried a hint of sharpness simr to a sword.


    Xuan Hao did not disturb Bai Ning as he stood there and felt the qi from the surrounding environment wash over him.


    This could be considered the first time that Bai Ning had ever felt qi in his life and Xuan Hao did not doubt that if had a cultivation mantra to follow, he would surely be able to easily reach the Qi Condensation Realm at this moment.


    "Ready now? Let''s go and get registered for now." Watching as Bai Ning slowly opened his eyes with a light blush on his face, Xuan Hao smiled at him as he pointed over in the direction of a rtively small building located a few dozen meters away from the entrance of the Flying Sword Sect.


    *Nod Nod


    Bai Ning just nodded his head, an amazed expression stuck on his face as he kept looking around himself to observe the surroundings while ncing over in the direction where the main part of the sect was located.


    At this point of the day, countless disciples and elders could be seen walking around as they made their way back to their own quarters to either rx for the rest of the day or cultivate. Among them, there were also arge part that headed towards the different profession halls in the Flying Sword Sect, like the Alchemy Hall or cksmithing Hall.


    Xuan Hao did not really pay any attention to this as he made his way over towards the small building beside the entrance, while Bai Ning closely followed behind him as he nced back towards the main area of the Flying Sword Sect from time to time.


    The appearance of the Flying Sword Sect was hidden away from outside view with the help of a giant array formation that spanned the entire sect, the formation itself was also the reason why a fog seemed to cover up the entire sect when viewed from the outside.


    Looking at the Flying Sword Sect from the inside, Bai Ning discovered that the entire sect was surround by mountains on all sides blocking the sect from the outside as the main part of the sect was located in a valley inside the circle of mountains.


    The only way inside the sect outside of climbing the mountains, was the small entrance that Xuan Hao and Bai Ning had entered through.


    Towards the centre of the sect, Bai Ning also managed to spot several tall mountains seemingly piercing into the heavens above as they easily towered far above the mountains surrounding the Flying Sword Sect.


    The tall mountains at the centre could be considered the core of the Flying Sword Sect and was also the ce that Xuan Hao along the other Core Elders were staying!


    As Bai Ning was still lost in thought, he was soon woken up upon finding out that a door suddenly closed directly in front of him. Preventing him from looking any further.

 Chapter 231: Entering Closed Door Meditation

    <h4>Chapter 231: Entering Closed Door Meditation</h4>


    After entering the registration building that had only recently been established, Xuan Hao quickly went through the procedures for making Bai Ning a disciple of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Normally, something like just getting someone random registered without going through any test first would not be allowed, but given the fact that Xuan Hao was a Core Elder, he could at least use his authority to get someone epted as a disciple.


    It was not like the Flying Sword Sectcked resources in the first ce and after the Beast Tamers lost arge part of their resources recently, there was even more spirit stones and other rare resources for the disciples to use.


    Xuan Hao had even heard a few elders talking about Elder Song using a lot of the recently acquired resources from the Beast Tamers to hold a lot of different tournaments andpetition for all the disciples to join in on a participate in.


    The disciples also seemed to really enjoy the tournaments andpetition Elder Song came up with as the overall atmosphere of the Flying Sword Sect had improved a lot from how it had been just after news of the gue had spread.


    Xuan Hao did not really have much to say in regard to this, as the gue had mostly been dealt with inside of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom at this point and it did not seem like he would have to go out and fight with the people from the church of the gue God to destroy the source of the gue if things continued like they did now.


    The only ces where it was still a big problem, was around the central region where the Imperial Capital was located and the western region where the Seven Fates Sect were. The Flying Sword Sect, along with the Spring Flower Sect and Raging me Sect no longer had any problems with the gue as it almostpletely disappeared from their regions by this point.


    Xuan Hao would not be so foolish as to go out and offend the church of the gue God, if the Flying Sword Sect was not affected by the gue¡­ It was simply way too dangerous.


    The church of the gue God was after all an entity that operated across the entire Ewaria Continent and could not be easily offended even by the big empires, let alone Xuan Hao himself¡­


    Shaking his head upon thinking about this, Xuan Hao decided to throw it to the back of his mind as he soon arrived in front of his pavilion together with Bai Ning.


    Even though Xuan Hao had not taken him in as his own disciple, he did indeed have ns of taking him in as a personal disciple in the soon to be future. After all, his talent was notcking, and he seemed like an easy-going type that would not cause too much trouble for him.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao had decided to let him stay at his pavilion and get along with Qing Yi and Chu Yang while getting used to the Flying Sword Sect.


    There was only one thing Xuan Hao had forgotten¡­


    "Hah¡­ W-Why is this ce so¡­ Hah¡­ High up¡­ Hah¡­" An exhausted voice could be heard behind him as Xuan Hao turned around with an awkward look on his face upon spotting Bai Ning who had copsed on the ground behind him in exhaustion.


    He had truly forgotten¡­ Bai Ning had not practiced any cultivation mantra yet and was still a normal mortal without any extraordinary powers that cultivators had.


    Even with Xuan Hao carrying him most of the way up the mountain, Bai Ning was still way too exhausted to even take a single step forward as he had copsed on the ground in front of the pavilion.


    Standing at the entrance to the pavilion as she was using a broom to sweep away a few leaves that had blown down from a few trees nted just beside the pavilion, Zhi Ruo spotted Xuan Hao along with Bai Ning the moment they appeared as she put away her broom before quickly making her way over.


    "Wee back Elder Xuan! Is this perhaps a new disciple? My name is Zhi Ruo, I''m the servant under Elder Xuan''s first disciple, Qing Yi and mainly spend the time making sure the splendid pavilion before you stay clean!" Bowing her head with a smile on her lips as she greeted Xuan Hao, Zhi Ruo formally introduced herself to Bai Ning before she gave a small bow to him as well.


    "I-I''m Bai Ning, h-hello big sister Zhi Ruo!" Nervously introducing himself as he was a bit shy upon seeing Zhi Ruoing up to greet them.


    "Zhi Ruo, can you get a room for him to stay in?"


    "Yes, Elder Xuan!"


    Not sensing any of his two other disciples present inside the pavilion or on the training ground, Xuan Hao decided to just let Zhi Ruo settle Bai Ning after making sure he would be fine without him around.


    Whoosh~


    With nothing more to do as Zhi Ruo began talking together with Bai Ning and introduce different ces in the pavilion to him, Xuan Hao entered the pavilion and headed in the direction of his own room.


    Before meeting with his two disciples, Xuan Hao decided to use the treasures that he had managed to bring back with him and see how far he could go.


    Even if the two of them returned, they would most likely want to know something about what he had been doing over thest few weeks and the only person who knew something about it was Bai Ning.


    This way, his two disciples would be able to get along with their future junior brother as both of them would seek him out to learn about what their master had been up to over the past few weeks.


    "Haha, that is indeed a great n, though I do feel like I forgot something¡­ Well, I will probably remember it if it''s something important."


    Laughing to himself as he thought about his brilliant n for getting his two disciples to interact with their future junior brother, Xuan Hao directly entered closed door meditation.


    ¡­


    At the same time, inside a small courtyard of the Flying Sword Sect, Chi Hu was quietly meditating as he suddenly looked up and looked in the direction of the entrance of the courtyard.


    "Elder, what can I help with¡­?" Looking over at the female figure approaching, Chi Hu suddenly felt a shiver run down his spine as he clearly remembered that she was the same person that he encountered when first entering the Flying Sword Sect''s territory.


    After being confined to the small courtyard, this person had repeatedlye over to poke fun at him! Even to this day, Chi Hu still had no idea who the mature looking beauty was.


    The only thing that he could guess himself to, was the fact that the person in front of him was a core elder of the Flying Sword Sect. At least that was the only exnation that he coulde up with.


    "Hello again, it seems like Elder Xuan just returned to the Flying Sword Sect." Smiling as she said this, Shu Yao approached Chi Hu.


    Chi Hu suddenly felt a wave of happiness wash over him as he clearly remembered that the only reason why he was barred from moving anywhere inside the Flying Sword Sect was because Elder Xuan Hao had not returned yet to rify things for him.


    "He returned!? Then I will finally be able to leave thi-"


    "But¡­"


    "B-but¡­?"


    Suddenly being interrupted by Shu Yao, Chi Hu felt that something was wrong as he watched the teasing expression suddenly appear on her face while she looked over at him.


    Chi Hu felt a strange sense of foreboding, as he knew nothing good woulde out of her mouth at this point, but he still felt curious as he focused on listening to what Shu Yao was going to say.


    "But it seems like he immediately entered closed door meditation the moment he reached his pavilion¡­ Looks like you will have to stay here for a little longer until hees back out again! No worries, I will be sure toe and keep youpany every now and then~" Saying this, Shu Yao turned around and smiled to herself as she began leaving the small courtyard while chuckling upon remembering the priceless look that Chi Hu had given her earlier.


    To be honest, Shu Yao had already determined that Chi Hu was most likely speaking the truth, but she had found it increasingly fun toe over and tease him from time to time and so it was decided by her that she would keep Chi Hu and whoever the other person was, until Xuan Hao returned and took him away.


    "Wh-what!? Closed door meditation!?" Eximing this loudly as a shocked expression appeared on his face, Chi Hu could only watch as Shu Yao smiled at him before slowly turning to leave.


    The treasure hunter alchemist did not pay any attention to the interaction between Chi Hu and Shu Yao and was just quietly drinking a cup of tea as he enjoyed a few cute pastries that Shu Yao hade with earlier in the day.


    He had already grown used to it after the first three days and by now it had already been close to two weeks since they were confined to the courtyard¡­


    The treasure hunter did not really care much about it, as he was free to rx while also being allowed to read some of the theory books on alchemy that the Flying Sword Sect had.

 Chapter 232: Breakthrough! Reaching the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!

    <h4>Chapter 232: Breakthrough! Reaching the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!</h4>


    Thud


    Closing the door behind him as he entered his room, Xuan Hao looked around himself before taking out some of the furniture that he gathered from the secret realm and reced it with his own furniture before taking out one of the purification pills along with the pure qi fish that he had gotten from the secret realm.


    He had already put the Ash Sunstone and the Moon Silver that he got from the system away in his interspatial ring on his way to his room and finally felt that it was in a safe ce. After all, what if someone with a high cultivation realm happened to pass over the Flying Sword Sect and noticed the two rare materials?


    Best case scenario, the expert would just take the two materials and leave without doing anything, worst case, the expert would end up destroying the Flying Sword Sect!


    Xuan Hao felt that he had been stupid to just leave the two rare mystic grade materials in his pavilion earlier. At least nothing had happened!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao observed as the pure qi fish he had taken out gently swam around in the air inside of his room, while taking out the Source Crystalst and cing it in front of him.


    For now, he nned to first absorb the pure qi fish along with the purification pill and try to reach the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm before using the Source Crystal to attempt reaching the Domain Lord Realm.


    Sitting down in a mediative position, Xuan Hao closed his eyes as he began using his pseudo domain to draw the surrounding pure qi fish swimming around in the air peacefully towards himself.


    Fwoosh~


    The small pure qi fish suddenly turned into streams of pure qi as they were absorbed into Xuan Hao''s body where they gathered together in his dantian where his nascent soul was located before, they were absorbed by it.


    The Nascent Soul inside Xuan Hao''s dantian had a silver colour and was in the form of a small ball that waspletely pure, untainted by anything as it silently floated inside Xuan Hao''s dantian.


    The pure qi from the pure qi fish slowly began to flow into Xuan Hao''s nascent soul as it suddenly experienced an influx of energy as it began to grow stronger while Xuan Hao''s aura also began climbing at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    Boom!


    Reaching a critical point, Xuan Hao''s nascent soul began transforming as the small ball that was his nascent soul began to take on a small human shape.


    This, however, did notst for long, as it suddenly stopped growing and began stabilizing as the pure qi from the qi fishes disappeared. The earlier human shape disappeared as the ball returned to its original shape.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao waved his hand and caused the purification pill on the table nearby to float over as he immediately swallowed it.


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    As Xuan Hao''s nascent soul was about to return to its original shape and begin stabilizing, a new influx of mysterious energy from the purification pill suddenly appeared and instantly entered his nascent soul, causing it to start transforming again.


    The nascent soul in the shape of a small ball, once again took on the shape of a small human figure.


    Soon the features of the small human figure began appearing and Xuan Hao felt like he was looking at a small miniature version of himself as he observed the process of his nascent soul in the shape of a ball slowly transform into a small miniature version of himself.


    "This feels so weird¡­" As the miniature Xuan Hao finished transformed and opened its eyes to look around inside his dantian, Xuan Hao suddenly felt like he got a new pair of eyes.


    One pair was observing the inside of his dantian, while the other was observing the small miniature version of himself looking around his dantian.


    Xuan Hao intuitively knew that his nascent soul in the shape of a small Xuan Hao was a part of himself and he could easily control it without any difficulties.


    Whoosh~


    The miniature Xuan Hao suddenly disappeared from his dantian and appeared directly in front of him as it gazed directly into his eyes.


    "Ahh! I will have to get used to this¡­" Xuan Hao suddenly felt like he was looking directly into his owns eyes and had no idea how to describe the feeling as he could move the small limbs of the miniature Xuan Hao and his own limbs separately without any sort of difort.


    Looking the pure silver coloured version of himself, Xuan Hao soon recalled his nascent soul as he felt it return back to his dantian where it stopped at the centre and floated with its eyes closed in a meditative position.


    Xuan Hao no longer paid any attention to his nascent soul after it settled down and instead looked over towards the Source Crystal as he suddenly became lost in thought.


    The realm he had reached right now could not be considered to be the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm but was instead a realm beyond it.


    From what Xuan Hao knew, the Nascent Soul Realm was about strengthening his nascent soul until it would finally transform into a miniature version of the cultivator and be a true nascent soul.


    Xuan Hao could be considered to have reached the transitional level between the Domain Lord Realm and the Nascent Soul Realm. The Half-Step Domain Lord Realm.


    "But I already formed my pseudo sword domain and only need it to be a true domain to reach the Domain Lord Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao suddenly felt that it would be a waste to use the Source Crystal to reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    Normally, someone in the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm would only just have begun forming their pseudo domain, unlike Xuan Hao who had already developed it and could be considered to have already reached the stage of transforming his pseudo domain into a real domain.


    Putting away the Source Crystal, Xuan Hao did not n to dy his breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Instead, he had clearly felt a change in his pseudo sword domain the moment his nascent soul changed and became a miniature Xuan Hao.


    His pseudo sword domain had begun strengthening and transforming under the influence of his nascent soul!


    This change was almost negligible, but Xuan Hao clearly felt it.


    Given that he would only have to wait for a few days as his pseudo sword domain slowly evolved from a pseudo domain into a real domain, Xuan Hao did not want to waste the Source Crystal to breakthrough a few days faster¡­


    It would be better if he could use it after reaching the Domain Lord Realm to stabilize his cultivation base and possibly go above the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    "I wonder what my status is by now¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao entered his sea of consciousness as his status appeared in front of him.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Domain: Pseudo Sword Domain


    Talent: ???


    Realm: Nascent Soul(Complete)


    Professions: Alchemy (Artisan level)


    Sect: Flying Sword Sect


    Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang


    "Looks like two new tabs appeared, domain and professions¡­ However, it looks like the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm is not recognized by the system, instead it just has theplete next to nascent soul¡­" Not feeling too surprised about this, Xuan Hao soon reached the quest part and suddenly saw a quest that he had almost forgotten about.


    [Limited Time Quest: You have found a brilliant way to recruit new potential disciples! Scatter 1000 interspatial rings around the world. The system will add a specific test to the ring that will test the potential future disciples. Interspatial Rings will only be counted towards the quest if they are scattered a certain distance away from each other. Timer will begin upon reaching the Domain Lord Realm!]


    [Time: 10 years]


    [0/1000]


    [Reward: vary depending on the amount of sessfully scattered interspatial rings]


    "I will have to look through the library of the cksmithing Hall and see if I can find anything rted to how interspatial rings are made after this is over¡­" Quietly muttering this to himself after leaving his sea of consciousness, Xuan Hao began stabilizing his cultivation realm.


    Even though it did not feel like a lot of time had passed since he entered his room to cultivate, Xuan Hao still felt that a little over two days had passed by this point.


    The aura of both Qing Yi and Chu Yang were present as Xuan Hao could feel that both of them were in the same room as Bai Ning.


    "I should be able to stabilize my cultivation realm in a few hours at most¡­" His cultivation base was already stabilizing by itself under the help of his nascent soul.


    "After that I will have to train Qing Yi and Chu Yang properly over the next few months before the uing alchemistpetition¡­" Realizing that he had not been spending enough time on teaching his two disciples ever since he took them in, Xuan Hao determined himself to spend the next five or so months before the alchemypetition to teach both of them as much as he could.


    Like this, Xuan Hao returned to stabilizing his cultivation base and getting more familiar with his nascent soul. Not realizing the fact that nobody outside of himself had realized that he had just broken through.

 Chapter 233: Bai Ning Meeting Qing Yi and Chu Yang

    <h4>Chapter 233: Bai Ning Meeting Qing Yi and Chu Yang</h4>


    At the same time that Xuan Hao had just returned and entered closed door meditation, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang got the news that their master had returned and quickly made their way back to the pavilion. Only to find out that he had already entered closed door meditation.


    But things were not all bad, as both of them soon discovered that their master had brought a child back with him to the sect! And he had even ordered for Zhi Ruo to inform them that they should show him around the sect and help him familiarizes himself with the daily happenings of the Flying Sword Sect.


    The child in question was Bai Ning, who was nervously inspecting the two disciples of Elder Xuan in front of him as he had just recently managed to move in his few belongings that he had with him into the room Zhi Ruo had told him that he would stay in for now on.


    "What is your name? How did you and master meet? And do you perhaps know about what master have been doing over the past few weeks?" Launching a barrage of question at him the moment she had spotted him; Qing Yi curiously observed the young boy in front of her while waiting for him to answer with an excited look stered all over her face.


    Chu Yang followed closely behind, butpared to Qing Yi, he was calmer as he patiently waited before asking anything. Not wanting to stress the boy out more than he already was after Qing Yi''s barrage of questions¡­


    "M-my name is Bai Ning! I-I first met Elder Xuan in an underground cave¡­ I-I-I don''t know what Elder X-Xuan have been doing over the past few w-weeks¡­" It was just a moment ago that both of them had barged into his room and Bai Ning did not know what to do as he nervously answered the big sister in front of him while stuttering a bit along the way.


    "Hah¡­ No need to be so nervous, Qing Yi here isn''t as scary as she looks-"


    "Who is scary looking!?"


    Trying to calm down Bai Ning, Chu Yang jokingly poked fun at Qing Yi as he was quickly interrupted by Qing Yi, who angrily puffed her cheeks and stared menacingly at him.


    Clearly not happy about the fact that she was referred to as scary looking.


    "Haha, See? No need to be so nervous." Ignoring the now pouting Qing Yi as he said this, Chu Yangughed loudly.


    This in turn caused Bai Ning to calm down as he also began to chuckle a bit upon seeing the stark contrast between the earlier aggressive questioning and the current aggrieved look on Qing Yi''s face as she pouted angrily while staring at Chu Yang.


    "Hmph, I have something to do at the Alchemy Hall anyway, so I will let this ''junior brother'' be the showing you around." Not wanting to stay and ask about her master anymore, Qing Yi quickly escaped out of Bai Ning''s room.


    For some reason, she had a feeling that Bai Ning''s appearance would not be a good thing for her.


    Given that he was already staying at the pavilion, Qing Yi already guessed that he would end up as a future disciple of her master.


    I will have to find a new disciple for master as well!


    Considering that Bai Ning seemed to have been drawn over to the side of the cool big brother Chu Yang already, Qing Yi felt that she needed to recruit a little sister of her own.


    With this n in mind, Qing Yi decided to scourge through the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect and see if she could find someone fitting to recruit.


    "Big sister is an alchemist?" Not understanding why Qing Yi had run away, Bai Ning had an innocent look on his face as he asked curiously. Being a cksmith himself, Bai Ning had always been curious about alchemy as both professions were often discussed when it came to what the number one profession out there was.


    "Yes, she is, you can try and ask herter on if you have any questions about alchemy."


    Rolling his eyes upon thinking about his senior sister, Chu Yang could not help but remember how embarrassed she had been before escaping earlier.


    He had a foreboding feeling that his senior sister would try and look for him in the soon to be future to try out a new potion she had recently made. Not that he really cared much about it, as it would most likely just end up with drinking some weird potion of hers¡­


    Chu Yang still remembered that Qing Yi had gotten him to eat a weird pill that made grass taste like strawberry cake when their master had just left and after that drink a potion that made his hair turn purple for a little over a day¡­


    This had made Chu Yang discover how truly weird alchemy was.


    "Great! I always wanted to know more about alchemy ever since I first found out about it!" Not acting nervous anymore, Bai Ning excitedly eximed as he happily moved around.


    "Seeing that Qing Yi already left, we should get going before it gets too dark if we want to look around the sect today." Looking out at the sky slowly growing dark as night approached, Chu Yang said this before both he and Bai Ning moved out of the pavilion as they made their way down the mountain that it was situated on.


    After some time, Chu Yang discovered like his master had, that Bai Ning was still a normal person and decided to carry him down the rest of the way.


    ¡­


    ng~ ng~ ng~


    A loud sound of metal hitting metal continuously rang out as Chu Yang and Bai Ning both arrived in front of a small wall located towards the edge of the core area of the Flying Sword Sect whererge plumes of smoke rose to the sky from the other side. Coincidentally, it was located not too far away from the base of Xuan Hao''s Mountain, so Chu Yang ended up arriving here first.


    "This over here is the cksmithing Hall where the different cksmiths from the Flying Sword Sect normally spend their time either learning in the library or crafting different weapons and artifacts for themselves and the disciples or elders to use." Exining what the ce in front of them was, Chu Yang curiously looked over at Bai Ning who waspletely absorbed as he looked at the plumes of smoke rising up from beyond wall in front of him full of excitement.


    "Are you perhaps interested? Want to go in and take a look?"


    "Yes!" Eximing loudly in response to the question, Bai Ning could almost not hold himself back as both of them soon entered the cksmithing Hall together.


    The moment they entered through arge gate leading inside, Chu Yang and Bai Ning were met with a scene of several different people working on their own artifacts in both open and closed workstations as both of them could see a bunch of both men and women sweating heavily while working with their artifacts or weapons.


    A little further inside, arge building was standing tall as it stood out among the many different workstations inside the cksmithing Hall.


    "What is that building¡­?" immediately spotting the building standing tall in the middle of therge open field filled with all sorts of working stations for the cksmiths, Bai Ning curiously asked as he pointed over towards the pagoda.


    "That is the main part of the cksmithing Hall and also the ce where the different elders of the cksmithing Hall stay most of the time, if you want to join the cksmithing Hall, you will also have to go there if you want to join the cksmithing Hall and be a cksmith." As they were making their way over towards therge building, Chu Yang exined this to Bai Ning as both of them soon entered therge building under the eyes of a few nearby disciples who hade to join the cksmithing Hall.


    The inside of the building was a stark contrast from the outside environment as there seemed to be a soundproofing formation in ce that prevented the loud nging noise from outside enter inside.


    "Are you perhaps here to be cksmiths as well?" Seeing that Chu Yang and Bai Ning both came inside the building as well, one of the disciples who had watched them as they approached from afar stepped forward and asked curiously.


    "Haha, no, I''m just here to show this junior brother around." Waving his hand in denial, Chu Yang answered while motioning towards Bai Ning that was walking beside him.


    "I see¡­ Recently Elder Teng is the one in charge of admitting the new disciples for the cksmithing Hall and I heard that he is quite ruthless¡­ I already failed the test to join twice!" Letting out aint, the disciple along with the rest of the disciples all had a dispirited look on their faces.


    Compared to the Alchemy Hall that would ept anyone that wanted toe and join them, the cksmithing Hall did not have ack of disciples that wanted to join them¡­ On the contrary, too many disciples wanted to join them, and they only ept a limited amount of people each year.


    Thepetition inside the cksmithing Hall was also way fiercer as the disciplespeted for resource and opportunities to be personally taught by some of the cksmith elders during some of the many events andpetitions held yearly by the cksmithing Hall.


    Overall, the cksmithing Hall could be considered one of, if not the mostpetitive ce in the Flying Sword Sect!

 Chapter 234: Blacksmithing Hall

    <h4>Chapter 234: cksmithing Hall</h4>


    "Elder Teng?" Not having heard about this elder before, Chu Yang could not help but ask as he looked over towards the disciple that had justined about the Elder Teng in charge of the tests for joining the cksmithing Hall.


    "Elder Teng is a new elder that just recently got promoted to the rank of elders after breaking through into the Expert Realm, bing a full-fledged Expert cksmith¡­ Other than that, he has already broken through to the Core Formation Realm as well and can be considered the most talented person to enter the cksmithing Hall over the past few decades!" Hearing this, both Chu Yang and Bai Ning could not help but wonder what was so bad about this Elder Teng.


    "Hah¡­ If just someone else could be in charge of testing disciples wanting to join the cksmithing Hall¡­" Sighing to himself, the disciples waiting around clearly did not borate any further and just shook his head as a sense of hopelessness engulfed him.


    "He can''t be that bad¡­ Can he¡­?" Not understanding why, the disciples in front of them were so depressed, Bai Ning could not help but step forward and ask the disciple that had just introduced Elder Teng to them.


    From the description alone, Elder Teng seemed like an elder that was both talented in cksmithing and cultivation.


    Bai Ning could not really understand why the group of disciples were so depressed over the fact that someone like that was the one to be in charge of the tests¡­


    On the other hand, should they not be happy that someone so talented is the one testing them¡­?


    "You wouldn''t understand¡­ If you try to join the cksmithing Hall in the future, you will understand our suffering¡­" Shaking his head with a helpless expression on his face, the disciple did not answer Bai Ning.


    "¡­"


    Not understanding what the group of disciples were looking so helpless for, Chu Yang and Bai Ning came to amon understanding as both of them quietly decided to leave them alone as they made their way through the cksmithing Hall.


    The cksmithing Hall was split up into several different areas, the one just outside that they had seen earlier with all the different workstations for the cksmiths of the Flying Sword Sect to work in was one of them.


    Other than that, there was still arge storage area located more to the back of the cksmithing Hall that Chu Yang and Bai Ning had entered, where all sorts of rare metals and magical ores of all kinds were stored before use.


    Leaving the main building of the cksmithing Hall, Chu Yang and Bai Ning found themselves in the storage area where they could see a few disciples along with some elders guarding the ce as a stream of people entered therge storage area and picked out different metals and ores to use.


    Entering the storage area itself was not something Chu Yang and Bai Ning could do without bing members of the cksmithing Hall themselves, so Chu Yang could only introduce the area to Bai Ning as they stood just outside of it and looked at therge piles of rare ores stacked in front of them.


    Chu Yang did not really care to much about these different ores and metals that were piled up like small mountains in front of him, as it would be useless even if he got his hands on them.


    "ckstone Metal, Fire Blood Ores¡­ And is that Earth Spirit Metal!?"


    Bai Ning on the other hand was different as he clearly recognized the worth of the different ores and other rare metals spread out before him.


    The ores and metals stacked up like small mountain were all some of the mostmon materials used by cksmiths at the Apprentice and Journeyman Realm of cksmithing. The rarer ores and metals used by Expert cksmiths and above was not visible as it was kept in a more secure location.


    This however did not matter to Bai Ning as the mountains of materials in front of him was especially what he needed to improve himself even further on the path of cksmithing at the moment.


    "Haha, are you interested in the different ores and metals we have stored here?" As Bai Ning was muttering the names of the different things he spotted in front of him, a middle-aged man wearing the robe symbolizing that he was an elder of the cksmithing Hall approached Bai Ning and Chu Yang as he asked Bai Ning with a happy smile on his lips.


    "Greetings Elder."


    "Huh? Ah! G-greetings Elder!"


    Turning around to greet the middle-aged elder, Chu Yang smiled wryly when he witnessed Bai Ning almost falling face first onto the ground as he turned around and greeted the elder from the cksmithing Hall.


    "Haha, no need to greet me like that, are you perhaps showing this little one around the sect?" Laughing a bit as he stepped in to catch Bai Ning before he fell onto the ground, the elder turned to look at Chu Yang as he asked.


    "Yes Elder, as master''s mountain is nearby, I decided to first show him around the cksmithing Hall. From the looks of it, he is also interested in cksmithing." Still not knowing anything about the fact that Bai Ning was already an Apprentice cksmith, Chu Yang answered the elder''s question without any hesitation.


    "Hm¡­ Master''s Mountain is nearby¡­ Are you perhaps a disciple of Elder Xuan?" Muttering something to himself before asking, the elder''s expression suddenly changed as he a hint of admiration was visible in the depth of his eyes after mentioning Xuan Hao.


    "Yes¡­ Do you perhaps know master¡­?" Realizing that the elder in front of them might be one of his master''s friends, Chu Yang became even more careful as he asked respectfully.


    "I see, so you are one of Elder Xuan''s disciples and I wouldn''t say I know Elder Xuan personally, but every elder in the sect knows about him¡­ It''s just a pity that the disciples don''t seem to know too much about him outside the fact that he is a Core Elder¡­" Shaking his head in denial as he said this, the tone of the elder became kinder as he smiled at both Chu Yang and Bai Ning kindly.


    "By the way, seeing as you are Elder Xuan''s disciple and this child here seems interested in cksmithing, how about entering the storage area together with me to take a look around?"


    "Are you sure elder? Were you not going somewhere before meeting us?" Not outright refusing the elder, Chu Yang had just looked over at the shinning eyes of Bai Ning and could not bring himself to refuse the elder in front of them.


    "Haha, I was just about to go and pick up a group of stupid brats for something, but I''m sure that they are more than willing to wait for a few more minutes while we are looking around." Laughing to himself as he said this, the elder motioned towards the storage area.


    Bai Ning and Chu Yang did not say anything after seeing that the elder was more than willing to show them around the storage area.


    Like this, both Chu Yang and Bai Ning saw all kinds of rare ores and metals stored by the cksmithing Hall and even found out that the elder showing them around was named Teng Huo.


    A few stupid brats¡­ Teng Huo¡­ Surely not¡­


    Thinking about a few disciplesining about having a certain Elder Teng in charge of their tests for entering the cksmithing Hall, Chu Yang suddenly smiled wryly as he watched the back of Elder Teng exin the different uses of a pitch-ck ore in his hand to Bai Ning as both of them seemed to get along while talking about cksmithing together.


    Hah¡­ But there should be some other eldering to test those disciples if Elder Teng does not show up¡­ Right¡­?


    Muttering this to himself in a low voice, Chu Yang decided to no longer think about that group of disciples as he followed closely behind Bai Ning while making their way through the cksmithing Hall.


    For some reason, Elder Teng seemed to have been quite happy with Bai Ning decided to act like their guide as he showed them around the entire cksmithing Hall.


    "Looks like it''s getting dark, we should head back now Bai Ning!" Looking up at the sky as the sun slowly disappeared in the horizon, Chu Yang called out to Bai Ning who was in the process of discussing something together with Elder Teng.


    "It is indeed getting a littlete by now¡­ I won''t hold up your junior brother any further then, I hope that I can see you in the cksmithing Hall again in the future!" Looking up at the sky upon hearing Chu Yang, Elder Teng soon took his leave. Not forgetting to express his desire for Bai Ning toe back to the cksmithing Hall again.


    In the end, Chu Yang and Bai Ning did not manage to visit anywhere other than the cksmithing Hall, but at the very least Bai Ning seemed more than happy with that as both of them made their way back to the pavilion.


    ¡­


    "Hey¡­ Do you guys perhaps know when Elder Teng will show up¡­?" At the same time, inside the almost deserted main building of the cksmithing Hall, one of the disciples that had been waiting to take the test for the first time asked the others as he looked out at the sun slowly disappearing behind a mountain.


    "¡­" The rest of the disciples did not know what to say as they just looked towards the entrance of the building. Not knowing what to do in their current situation other than wait.


    Perhaps Elder Teng finally got enough of them and no longer wanted to even bother testing them anymore¡­


    A few of the disciples who had gone through the test before thought this to themselves as they helplessly sat down on the ground and waited together with the rest of the disciples.


    The sight of the helpless group of disciples was not left unseen as many elders and disciples were still passing by and ncing over from time to time.


    Not understanding why, a group of disciples had suddenly decided to sit down close to the entrance of the main building.


    It was not long before one of the elders in charge of the main building had finally decided to go over and ask the group.


    It was only at that point, that they found out that the group of disciples hade to take the test to enter the cksmithing Hall¡­ It was just that the elder in charge of testing them had never showed up¡­

 Chapter 235: Lizard Demon Beasts Sudden Increase in Strength!

    <h4>Chapter 235: Lizard Demon Beast''s Sudden Increase in Strength!</h4>


    "Hah¡­ That took longer than I had expected¡­" Returning back to his own room, Chu Yang sat down on his bed as he began meditating.


    To be honest, he had not expected that his master would suddenly bring a child back with him¡­ But at least Bai Ning seemed like a good kid, so Chu Yang did not really have anything against it if he really ended up bing his junior brother in the future.


    At the very least he would no longer be considered to be the newest disciple under his master¡­


    Thinking about all of the things that had happened today as he slowly slipped into a deep meditation for the night, Chu Yang felt his cultivation improving even faster than it had before as he felt like he was just about to breakthrough to reach the sixth stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    The night quietly passed, and Chu Yang woke up from his deep state of meditation, only to discover that he waspletely covered in the ck gooey substance that was a mix between the impurities expelled during a breakthrough a breakthrough in the Foundation Establishment Realm, along with his own sweat.


    Unknowingly, he had broken through and reached the Sixth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm overnight!


    "Agh! It smells so bad! I will have to take a bath before showing Bai Ning around the rest of the sect today!" Almost throwing up as he caught wind of the smell that the impurities and sweat on his body was making, Chu Yang almost threw up on the spot as he quickly ran to the bath located just beside his room to clean himself.


    Luckily, no one was up yet, and Chu Yang soon came out of the bath and barely managed to clean up the mess he had left behind after breaking through before spotting Zhi Ruo suspiciously looking over towards him. Maybe having caught the disgusting smell from earlier.


    No matter what, he would not allow Zhi Ruo to see the mess he had left behind after his breakthrough¡­ It was simply too embarrassing for him to ask for her to clean it up. Even if it was her job to keep the pavilion clean¡­


    "Hm¡­ I thought I could smell something disgusting over here¡­ Ah, Chu Yang! Did you perhaps notice the bad smelling from here as well? Do you have any idea where it ising from?" Walking over while muttering something in a muffled voice to herself, Zhi Ruo asked in a respectful tone while looking around at the surrounding enviroment.


    "Haha, I''m sure it''s nothing, I just happened to wake up and was on my way to show the child master brought back with him where the dining hall is located¡­" Laughing awkwardly as he felt the suspicious look of Zhi Ruo bearing down on him, Chu Yang came up with an excuse as he quickly ran away before Zhi Ruo could say anything.


    "¡­"


    Staring at the back of Chu Yang as he left, Zhi Ruo did not say anything and instead just narrowed her eyes even further before turning to look in the direction of his room where the bad smell from earlier had beening from.


    "Broke through a minor realm in the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­" Spotting a small spot stained by the ckish impurities that Chu Yang had failed to clean up after himself inside the room, Zhi Ruo immediately understood what had happened as she quickly made sure the room was spot clean for when Chu Yang returned again.


    Nod Nod Nod~


    Seeing everything was clean once again, Zhi Ruo did not say anything as she nodded her head in satisfaction with a smile on her lips as she observed the now spot clean room in front of her before turning around to leave.


    No matter how hard Qing Yi and Chu Yang tried to clean up after themselves when they broke through, they would nevere close to being as good at it as Zhi Ruo was!


    ¡­


    Leaving behind Zhi Ruo as he made his way out of the pavilion as he waited for Bai Ning to show up, Chu Yang did not think about going to his room to wake him up and get him¡­ After all, there was a high chance that he would end up getting lost on his way there and not be able to find his way out again¡­


    Thinking about this, Chu Yang really wanted to reach the Nascent Soul Realm and gain a divine sense of his own¡­ At least that way, he wouldn''t be able to get lost anymore!


    "Senior brother! Where are we going today?" As Chu Yang was thinking about how much easier life would get after getting his own divine sense, Bai Ning appeared in the entrance to the pavilion as he called out to Chu Yang before happily making his way over.


    Yesterday, he had managed to make a new friend that was also really interested in cksmithing like himself.


    Other than that, he had also found out how great of an idea it was for him to join the Flying Sword Sect.


    With all the different ores and other materials for cksmithing in the cksmithing Hall, Bai Ning was sure that he would be able to easily be able to improve his skills and fully disy the power of some of the blueprints that histe teacher had left behind for him!


    "Ah, Bai Ning, you are here."


    Waking up from his thoughts, Chu Yang turned around and looked at Chu Yang before exining where they would be going today.


    "First, we will be visiting the dining hall to get something to eat for breakfast. After that I nned for us to visit the pagoda of enlightenment where the different cultivation mantras and other martial techniques of the sect are stored. Does that sound fine for you¡­?"


    "No, that sounds great! I didn''t manage to get much to eat yesterday, so I am quite hungry at the moment¡­" Nodding happily upon hearing about the dining hall, Bai Ning felt his stomach turn as he felt a sudden pang of hunger hit him.


    "Great! Let''s go then!"


    Whoosh~


    Before Bai Ning could even react, Chu Yang did not wait any longer and grabbed hold of him as he carried Bai Ning down the mountain towards the dining hall.


    After experiencing the walk down, the mountain yesterday, he did not really want to waste too much time on it now that he already knew about it.


    ¡­


    "Roar!"


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was in closed door meditation breaking through and Chu Yang had made his way down towards the dining hall of the Flying Sword Sect together with Bai Ning, arge lizard demon beast that had suddenly appeared at the ce where the entrance to the secret realm was located a few days ago roared loudly as it swept forth its giant w like hand towards two floating human figures in front of it.


    Bang!


    The two human figures floating in the air barely managed to set up a few defensive barriers before they were hit by the giant w of the lizard demon beast.


    Fwoosh~ Boom!


    The impact of the giant w was simply too much for the human figures to handle as they were directly sent flying into a nearby hill, directly shattering it as the surroundings were devasted from the resulting shockwave.


    ROAR!


    Seeing the human figures fly far into the distance, the lizard demon beast roared happily as it returned to the location where the entrance to the secret realm was. Not following after the human figures and instead just leaving them alone after having knocked them away.


    "Imperial Teacher!"


    "Ancestor!"


    General Liu and General Zhang quickly flew over and helped the two people up as the two figures revealed themselves to be the ancestor from the Onyx Empire and the Imperial Teacher from the Sky Empire.


    "Hah¡­ I really don''t understand how that lizard managed to suddenly breakthrough during such a short time¡­ Now only someone at the Soul Ascension Realm would be able to deal with it¡­" Shaking his head in disbelief as he stared towards the ce that the entrance was located, the Imperial Teacher could still not truly believe that the lizard that they had fought inside the secret realm managed to escape and at the same time managed to breakthrough!


    "At least our people managed to escape in time¡­ But that damn lizard destroyed both our flying ships! Worst of all, we can''t even kill that damnable creature!" Thinking about the extremely expensive flying ship that he had lost, Ancestor Bi Sheng could not help but curse as he stared in the direction of the lizard full of hatred.


    "Haha, at least we are still alive! Me and General Liu will be taking our leave first, we still need to inform his majesty about the appearance of this lizard, and it also seems like the others already found out about the destruction of the secret realm¡­"? Laughing with a smile on his face when he saw Ancestor Bi Sheng suddenly throw a tantrum about the flying ship he lost, the Imperial Teacher and General Liu directly left the scene.


    "Hmph! We will be leaving as well!" Thinking about what the Imperial Teacher had said before leaving, Ancestor Bi Sheng no longer wanted to stay around and directly left together with General Zhang.


    For now, leaving was a top priority!


    After all, both of them had Soul Enhancing Flowers on them that even Soul Ascension Realm cultivators wanted to get their hands on!


    As for the people that came together with them? They could just get back on their own¡­

 Chapter 236: Talking about Elder Xuan and Angry Senior Sister

    <h4>Chapter 236: Talking about Elder Xuan and Angry Senior Sister</h4>


    "So, I never really got to ask you about how you really met master in the first ce¡­ Outside of it just being in an underground cave or something along that line¡­?" Sitting down at a small table located in the corner of the dining hall, Chu Yang leaned over the food he had picked out and asked Bai Ning curiously.


    Extremely interested in finding out how Bai Ning and his master had managed to somehow meet each other in an underground cave in the first ce.


    "Ah! Eh¡­ That is¡­" Seeing Chu Yang''s face suddenly appear directly in front of him, Bai Ning nervously shrank back as he did not know how to respond.


    To be honest, he had no idea that the ce he had been staying in for the past few months was a secret realm, nor did he have any idea how he should exin the fact that he had ended up stuck inside a small room with an underground garden next to it for so long due to him stupidly entering an underground cave for no real reason outside of being curious¡­


    "No need to think so much about it, I''m just asking you about how you met master. Not your entire life story¡­" At least somewhat understanding what was going through the mind of Bai Ning as he struggled to think of a way to exin how he had ended up in the same underground cave as his master, Chu Yang gave him an easy way out as he just wanted to know what his master had been up to.


    He did not feel like spending the next few hours listing to Bai Ning''s exnation of how he ended up in the underground cave that his master was in¡­


    "O-okay then¡­ I met your master back when I was studying some of myte teacher''s cksmithing blueprints and¡­" Retelling the story of how he had ended up meeting Xuan Hao and was in the end saved by him as they had both escaped out from the underground cave with the weird roaring snake in it, Bai Ning did not notice a few nearby disciples curiously listening in on the story from the side together with Chu Yang.


    "¡­And that was how he ended up defeating the big rocky not roaring snake!" Finishing as he described thest part about the rock snake that he had seen Xuan Hao fight outside the city¡­ Or at least heard about, Bai Ning suddenly noticed at least a dozen or so disciples had gathered around him as they were all attentively listening.


    "Wow, Elder Xuan is really strong¡­"


    "Well, he is a Core Elder after all, so that is a given!"


    "Howe I never knew Elder Xuan was so awesome?!"


    As he stopped talking, the surrounding disciples began talking among themselves as Bai Ning looked at them with a flustered expression, clearly not aware that he had gathered an audience while retelling the events he had gone through together with Elder Xuan to Chu Yang.


    "So master was that strong¡­" Listening to the vivid description of battle given by Bai Ning, Chu Yang suddenly felt that his master was way stronger than he had first imagined him to be as he could not wait for him to leave his closed-door meditation and teach him again!


    "Hm? I think we should get going before it bes too crowded here¡­" Looking around himself, Chu Yang also discovered the growing crowd of disciples surrounding them as they talked about his master excitedly.


    Bai Ning understood what he meant and grabbed a few easy to carry fruits along with a loaf of bread as both of them left the dining hall before any of the disciples surrounding them noticed anything while they were concentrated on discussing the exploits of Elder Xuan that they had juste to know about.


    ¡­


    Leaving the dining hall behind, Chu Yang and Bai Ning both made their way towards the pagoda of enlightenment where the different cultivation mantras of the Flying Sword Sect was stored.


    Along the way, Bai Ning finished up the few fruits and piece of bread that he had taken with him upon leaving the dining hall.


    "Can I also pick out a cultivation mantra and begin cultivating¡­?" This was one of the first things that Bai Ning had thought about the moment he heard that they were going to visit the pagoda of enlightenment where the cultivation mantras of the Flying Sword Sect were stored.


    No matter how little he knew about cultivation, he still knew a little about the fact that a cultivation mantra was something important that would allow the cultivator to improve and increase his strength further.


    Other than that, a cultivation mantra was required if someone wanted to begin cultivating in the first ce¡­ So, Bai Ning was looking forward to getting his hands on his first cultivation mantra as well.


    After all, who would not be interested in cultivation when they knew that it would allow one to extend his life and live for longer¡­?


    "I don''t think so¡­ After all, master will definitely be able to pick the one most suited for you aftering out of closed door meditation! Other than that, he also has ess to the higher-level cultivation mantras locked away inside the pagoda of enlightenment¡­" Shaking his head, Chu Yang shot down Bai Ning''s dream of finding a cultivation mantra and attempt to start his journey on the path of cultivation today.


    "I see, that does indeed make sense¡­" Nodding his head in understanding upon hearing what Chu Yang said, Bai Ning fully understood how important the cultivation mantra would be for his start as a cultivator.


    At the very least he would still be able to see the pagoda of enlightenment and read through a few different cultivation mantras without practicing them.


    That way he would at least be able to gain some form of understanding regarding how to even cultivate in the first ce.


    Bang!


    A loud sound of an object hitting the ground in front of them suddenly echoed through the surrounds as both Chu Yang and Bai Ning jumped in shock as they looked towards the location of the impact from earlier with a trace of shock present on their faces.


    Was the Flying Sword Sect under attack!?


    This thought went through the mind of both of them at the same time.


    The surrounding disciples walking along the same path also wore a shocked expression on their faces as most of them recalled how their Vice Sect Master had caused no small amount of damage only a few weeks earlier¡­


    Back when the Vice Sect Master Zu Fei had fought with the guest of the Sect Master,rge stones and other rubble had rained down on the area surrounding the Vice Sect Master''s Mountain Peak.


    "Argh! W-where am I¡­?"


    However, this shock did notst for long as the group of disciples, along with Chu Yang and Bai Ning soon heard a voiceing out from the source of the impact as a human figure soon revealed itself as the surrounding disciples soon recognized the robes of the person were the same as the ones they were wearing.


    Where did this guye flying from?


    Everyone looked a bit confused as they had no idea where the male disciple in question had suddenlye flying from as all of them just stared at him speechlessly.


    "Lu Wen you bastard! Where do you think you are going?! I only barely hit you with a tiny amount of strength and you already went flying!" As everyone did not know what was happening, an angry female voice suddenly echoed and the male disciple who had juste flying and hit the ground suddenly stood up with a panicked look on his face before running away.


    "How dare you run away!? Stay here and let me hit you!" Just as the male disciple known as Lu Wen got up and ran away, a beautiful girl around her early twenties appeared with an intimidating aura along with no small amount of killing intent appeared and soon disappeared in the direction that the Lu Wen disciple had run in.


    "That was senior sister Wang Shufen¡­ I wonder how that disciple offended her¡­"


    "From what I can see, that Lu Wen guy won''t have a good ending¡­"


    "I almost feel bad for that guy¡­ Those offending Shufen never had a good ending¡­"


    Listening to what the different disciples were saying along with seeing the person behind the chaos appearing before chasing after the person who she had sent flying in the first ce, both Chu Yang and Bai Ning calmed down knowing that it was not something dangerous like an attack on the Flying Sword Sect.


    "D-does things like this happen often¡­?" Turning to look at Chu Yang, Bai Ning could not help but ask as he clearly saw the pitiful figure of that Lu Wen guy as he ran away from his Senior Sister.


    "No¡­ To be honest, this is my first time seeing something like this¡­" Not really knowing what to make of the situation he had just witnessed, Chu Yang could only answer him truthfully as both of them soon made their way towards the pagoda of enlightenment withoutmenting anymore on the situation that they had just witnessed.

 Chapter 237: Leaving Closed Door Meditation

    <h4>Chapter 237: Leaving Closed Door Meditation</h4>


    After arriving at the pagoda of enlightenment, both Chu Yang and Bai Ning did not focus a lot as they kept seeing a certain male and female disciple running back and forth just outside while one party was yelling curse words towards the other. Launching a few different techniques towards the person in question every now and then.


    It was only when the elder in charge of the pagoda of enlightenment had enough and decided to step in that the two calmed down and left the area, but by this point, Bai Ning was no longer that excited for the visit to the pagoda of enlightenment¡­


    So, with this in mind, Chu Yang and Bai Ning both left behind the pagoda of enlightenment as they instead went out to explore the rest of the Flying Sword Sect.


    With Chu Yang showing Bai Ning around the Flying Sword Sect, Bai Ning also began to open up more as both of them started getting along more with each other.


    Like this, another day passed and soon 2 days had passed since Xuan Hao returned to the Flying Sword Sect together with Bai Ning.


    ¡­


    At the start of the next day, Chu Yang had prepared to go out and continue showing Bai Ning around the Flying Sword Sect, as a single day was far from enough time to show him around the entire Flying Sword Sect, and he had already nned to show him around the Flying Sword City when his master came out and gave them permission to leave the sect.


    "What are you two doing¡­?" Leaving the pavilion to meet up with Bai Ning like he did yesterday, Chu Yang did indeed spot him, but he was currently talking with Qing Yi as both of them seemed to not even have noticed that he had shown up in the first ce.


    "Ah, big sister Qing Yi taught me about alchemy and how useful it is! I never imagined alchemy could be so profound!" Forgetting to even greet Chu Yang, Bai Ning excitedly said this as he soon returned his focus back to a small book that Qing Yi had handed over to him.


    "Thanks a lot for the gift! I will be sure to treasure it!"


    Not understanding what had happened between the two of them, Chu Yang could only look on in confusion as Bai Ning put away the small book given to him by Qing Yi.


    Qing Yi did not say anything either but just smiled triumphantly towards Chu Yang, who in turn just became even more confused.


    What had happened with his senior sister today? Did she perhaps eat some sort of weird herb beforeing here¡­?


    "Bai Ning¡­ What did Senior Sister give you¡­?" Watching Bai Ning as he walked over, Chu Yang could not help but ask as he really wanted to find out what Qing Yi had given to him.


    "This!"


    Taking out the small book that he had just hidden away, Bai Ning happily showed it off to Chu Yang as he smiled happily.


    "Encyclopaedia ofmon cksmithing materials and where to find them? Why did Senior Sister Qing Yi give this to you?" Not able to understand why Qing Yi had suddenly appeared to answer the questions Bai Ning had about alchemy and even given such a useful book to him, Chu Yang could not help himself as he asked.


    "Big Sister Qing said that she heard from Zhi Ruo that I wanted to know about alchemy, so she came to teach me about it, and she even brought a book about cksmithing after she found out that I was interested in cksmithing!


    Ah, she also said that she wanted to join us today for going around the Flying Sword Sect. I-is that okay?"


    "I see¡­ There is no problem if she wants to join us on our trip around the sect." Not knowing why, Chu Yang felt that something was wrong.


    Was he not the one in charge of showing Bai Ning around? She was clearly not interested in it beforehand, why did she suddenly want to join them?


    Not really finding any reason to refuse her joining them, Chu Yang ended up agreeing.


    Maybe he would also have a chance to get to know his senior sister better if they interacted more outside of their practice fights and the times, they met each other inside the pavilion.


    Thinking about this, Chu Yang and Bai Ning both walked over to Qing Yi before all three of them descended down the mountain.


    Xuan Hao had just arrived a bit earlier as he saw his disciples making ns to head down together and show Bai Ning around.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao did not want to interrupt them as it would also be important for his disciples to spend some time together and get to know each other better.


    "Hm, it seems like my two disciples are getting along quite well with Bai Ning¡­ Looks like I will just allow those two to show Bai Ning around while I go and see how the sect master is doing. After that I should also find that Chi Hu, he should have reached the sect by now¡­" Muttering this to himself as he quietly observed his disciples leaving the small space outside the pavilion as they headed down towards the sect, Xuan Hao soon disappeared as he headed in the direction of the Sect Master Feng Chen''s Pavilion.


    Whoosh~


    Almost instantly appearing in front of the Sect Master''s pavilion, Xuan Hao could clearly feel the strong aura leaking out from inside as a surprised expression momentarily appeared on his face.


    The Sect Master had broken through! And from the aura alone, Xuan Hao could tell that he had not simply broken through and reached the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm but had instead reached the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    This was a big surprise to Xuan Hao, but a wee one.


    With Feng Chen''s increase in strength, Xuan Hao knew that the status of the Flying Sword Sect inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would drastically change after it was revealed!


    If his strength was announced as well, Xuan Hao could easily imagine the Flying Sword Sect bing an untouchable existence inside of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    At that point, even the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would not dare to do anything to the Flying Sword Sect.


    Other than that, there was also the fact that the Flying Sword Sect would most likely merge together with the Spring Flower Sect.


    This alone would be more than enough for the Flying Sword Sect to split from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and be a neutral sect under the Sky Empire.


    The only thing required at that point would likely be for them to join the sect alliance that the Sky Empire was trying to build up in an attempt to weaken the influence of the different churches that had taken root inside the Sky Empire.


    No use thinking about that now! I still need to visit the Feng Chen and inform him about the organisation I encountered in the Spring Flower Sect''s territory¡­ But it looks like he is currently in the process of stabilizing his cultivation base, so it would not be a good time now, I guess¡­


    Observing the aura surrounding the Sect Master''s pavilion more closely, Xuan Hao could feel a few faint waves of instability in the aura as it would momentarily weaken every now and then.


    "Ah, Shu Yao is the Sect Master of the Spring Flower Sect! Maybe she would know more about the people who snuck inside their territory¡­" Mumbling this to himself, Xuan Hao soon disappeared from the Sect Master''s pavilion as he made it over in the direction of the most powerful aura outside of his own in the entire Flying Sword Sect.


    ¡­


    "Who is it!?" Making her way over towards the courtyard where Chi Hu and the treasure hunter were confined, Shu Yao suddenly felt the presence of another person appear behind her as she turned around prepared for a fight as several different flowers bloomed around her as the qi between heaven and earth began to grow restless.


    "It''s just me! Don''t attack!" Suddenly seeing several hundred different flowers filled with a terrifying might appear around Shu Yao, Xuan Hao panicked slightly as he felt a certain threat from the flowers around Shu Yao.


    There was clearly a hint of a pseudo domain present in them and even he would end up injured if those flowers were allunched at him!


    Shu Yao was clearly way stronger than he had expected!


    "Elder Xuan!? You have grown stronger than thest time I saw you¡­ Did you perhaps already reach the Domain Lord Realm!?" Making the different flowers around her disappear with a wave of her hand, Shu Yao looked at Xuan Hao with an expression of shock as she asked this.


    She had clearly remembered that Xuan Hao had not reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realmst time they met, but now she had not even sensed him before he had already appeared behind her.


    The only person that could do something like this in Shu Yao''s mind, was someone who had surpassed her own realm! And given the fact that she could already be considered to be at the Pinnacle of the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao had to be someone in the Domain Lord Realm!

 Chapter 238: Reuniting with Chi Hu

    <h4>Chapter 238: Reuniting with Chi Hu</h4>


    "No, I have not reached the Domain Lord Realm yet, but I am already in the process of breaking through." Shaking his head while saying this, Xuan Hao did not deny the fact that he would inevitably be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm in the soon to be future as he constantly felt his pseudo domain growing stronger with each passing minute. Growing closer and closer to bing a full-fledged domain.


    "I see¡­" Not knowing what to say when she heard this, Shu Yao just answered simply as she became even more determined in convincing Feng Chen to merge the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect together after he finished stabilizing his cultivation base!


    Having a Domain Lord in the sect would inevitably put the sect among the stronger factions on the Ewaria Continent.


    While not enough to contend against powers like the Sky Empire that had people above the Domain Lord Realm, it would still be more than enough to dominate the few dozen kingdoms surrounding the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and freely expand their territory without much of a challenge.


    After all, in the eyes of the Sky Empire, a sect with a Domain Lord was worth way more than a dozen kingdoms that only had people in the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ Especially so now that the Sky Empire was trying to build up a force made of the different sects inside their territory to weaken the churches.


    As he was about to ask Shu Yao about the organisation, he had found lurking around inside the Spring Flower Sects territory, Xuan Hao suddenly sensed a very familiar presenceing from a courtyard up ahead.


    "This is¡­ Chi Hu?"


    The person in question was indeed Chi Hu that Xuan Hao had almostpletely forgotten about!


    Looking over towards Shu Yao with a confused expression on his face, Xuan Hao clearly realized that Shu Yao was currently on her way towards the courtyard where Chi Hu was staying.


    The only question he had, was why?


    Perhaps they managed to get along with each other after Chi Hu reached the Flying Sword Sect?


    "You know him? After he suddenly showed up, I ced him in confinement inside the courtyard over here¡­ After all, I had no idea if he truly was your friend and not just someone sent over by an enemy of your sect¡­" Knowing what Xuan Hao wanted to ask about, Shu Yao quickly exined this in a serious tone.


    "I see, so you were going over to inform him about me returning¡­?" Nodding his head understandingly, Xuan Hao did not think too much about it as he heard what Shu Yao said.


    What she had said was indeed reasonable. After all, he had not been able to inform the other core elders about it due to the secret realm appearing. Distributing the use of low-qualitymunication talismans like the one he had for at least a month or so after opening in the surrounding kingdoms¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt that he would have to visit the Explorers Union at some point in the future and purchase a higher qualitymunication talisman for himself and the other core members of the Flying Sect.


    "Yes! I was just on my way to inform him about that, but from the looks of it, he was indeed speaking the truth." Nodding her head in agreement, Shu Yao soon came to a stop together with Xuan Hao as both of them arrived in front of a gate leading into a small courtyard.


    Beyond the small gate, Xuan Hao could clearly feel the presence of both Chi Hu and the treasure hunter alchemist that Chi Hu had caught back in the secret realm.


    Creak~


    Opening the gate, a small sound came out as the inside of the courtyard was revealed as both Xuan Hao and Shu Yao entered.


    The courtyard was by no means shabby as a small artificial pond was located at the corner with a few cherry trees spread around the courtyard along with other decorations such as a small lion statue at the entrance where Xuan Hao and Shu Yao entered.


    "Elder Xuan!?" A shocked voice could be heard as a figure ran over from the distance.


    Soon, Chi Hu appeared in front of Xuan Hao with a happy look on his face as he looked like he was almost about to start crying tears of joy.


    "Chi Hu, it is good to see that you are well. So, how was your stay during thest few weeks? I hope it was not too hard on you¡­" Smiling happily as he saw Chi Hu all well appear in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help himself from asking this as Chi Hu seemed too emotional after meeting again.


    "Ah, I-I have been fine, Elder Shu took good care of me while I was waiting for you toe!" ncing at Shu Yao beside him nervously as he said this, Xuan Hao felt a bit suspicious.


    Did something happen between them? Maybe he was beaten up by Shu Yao after just showing up and entering the Flying Sword City or something along that line¡­


    Shu Yao did after all say she had ced him in confinement¡­


    Not thinking too much about this, Xuan Hao decided not to dig into what happened between both of them. No matter what, Chi Hu was fine and that was the most important.


    After all, he was going to be a Core Elder of the Flying Sword Sect in the future!


    "That is great!"


    Talking with Chi Hu, Xuan Hao quickly learned about what had happened outside the entrance of the secret realm and found out that the people he had seen at the Domain Lord Realm was most likely people from the Sky Empire!


    "We should go out and introduce you to the other Core Elders and the Sect Master in the future. For now, I still have something to discuss with Shu Yao¡­ Go and ask after Elder Song, he will get you sorted out and help you with getting a pavilion of your own!" Finishing his conversation about what had happened after they split up, Xuan Hao instructed Chi Hu to go and find Elder Song to help him with getting a ce to stay.


    "What about Peng Yun?"


    "Who¡­?"


    "Ah, Peng Yun is the name of the treasure hunter we caught, he is just over there." Chi Hu turned around and pointed in the direction of the treasure hunter who was currently in the process of leisurely enjoying a few snacks as hepletely ignored the presence of the group that had just shown up.


    "I see¡­ Shu Yao, do you have any idea how to sort this out¡­?" Still having no idea how to deal with the treasure hunter alchemist Peng Yun, Xuan Hao asked Shu Yao for her opinion as it seemed like she already knew about both Chi Hu and the treasure hunter''s circumstances.


    "Can''t you just kill him¡­? He did after all try to kill you guys." Shrugging her shoulders with a clearly disinterested look on her face, Shu Yao ruthlessly dered the end of the treasure hunter Peng Yun.


    "W-w-w-wait a moment! I can be useful! I know alchemy and can even help make pills and potions for you!" Peng Yun suddenly sprang up from the spot he was sitting and hurriedly kneeled down on the ground as he began begging in front of all three of them.


    "¡­"


    Both Chi Hu and Xuan Hao had no idea how to react when they were suddenly faced with the begging Peng Yun.


    Already expecting the reaction of the treasure hunter Peng Yun, Shu Yao drew a small flower mid-air as it flew forward andnded on top of Peng Yun''s head before slowly entering his body.


    Following this, Xuan Hao felt the restriction already in ce inside Peng Yun disappear as an even more powerful restriction appeared to rece it.


    At the same time, a small flower mark appeared on Peng Yun''s chest as it shone for a short moment before disappearing again.


    This procedure soundedplicated, but everything happened in an instance, as Peng Yun had no chance to react before the new restriction was already in ce.


    "I have ensured that the seal on his cultivation is even stronger, and it cannot be broken by anyone other than myself or someone stronger than me. For now, I would rmend having him enter the Alchemy Hall and share his knowledge about alchemy. After that, you can allow him to go in return for giving away his knowledge on alchemy. From what I heard, his focus in alchemy is quite unique and should be useful as a referral point for other alchemists¡­" Hearing what Shu Yao said, Xuan Hao could not help but agree as he looked over at the Peng Yun.


    "What do you think? If you don''t want to give away your knowledge on alchemy, we can always find another way to deal with you¡­" As he was saying this, Xuan Hao did not notice how threatening his words sounded in the ears of Peng Yun.


    The other option mentioned by Shu Yao was death!


    How are you even calling this giving me a choice!?


    "I agree¡­" With a reluctant look on his face, Peng Yun agreed to share his alchemy knowledge with the alchemist from the Alchemy Hall in return for staying alive and regain his freedom.


    As for Xuan Hao and Shu Yao lying about letting him go in the future?


    Peng Yun simply did not have a choice in believing them as it was his only way out of his current situation alive. All he could do was hope the reputation that the Flying Sword Sect had outside was true¡­


    Thest few days of not thinking too much about anything and just quietly enjoying three meals a day along with snacks was something truly blissful to Peng Yun and at the same time something he had never experienced before.


    In the future, I will never be a treasure hunter again and will just find a quiet ce to settle down and spend the rest of my time peacefully enjoying life¡­


    Unknowingly, Peng Yun thought this to himself as he left the courtyard together with Chi Hu. Leaving behind only Xuan Hao and Shu Yao.

 Chapter 239: Talk with Shu Yao

    <h4>Chapter 239: Talk with Shu Yao</h4>


    "So, what is it that you wanted to ask me about?" Sitting down at a nearby chair in the small courtyard as she tilted her head to the side with a curious look on her face, Shu Yao stared up at Xuan Hao.


    Seeing the rxed appearance of Shu Yao as she sat down, Xuan Hao also walked over before sitting on a chair next to her as he began exining about what had happened in the Spring Flower Sect''s territory.


    "¡­ Do you perhaps know anything about the people who appeared to mine these, Ghost Crystals?" Taking out the Ghost Crystal he had brought with him and putting it at a small table next to them, Xuan Hao waited for Shu Yao to go over the information he just gave her.


    Thinking about it for some time before she answered, Shu Yao had a doubtful look on her face as she began talking.


    "Hm¡­ I haven''t been back to the Spring Flower Sect for quite a while now and sadly don''t have any clue about what sort of organisation that is¡­ Though I did receive a message before the secret realm appeared from my Vice Sect Master saying the Seven Fates Sect warned us about an imminent attack from some sort of organisation that had recently attempted to break into their grand treasury for some unknown reason and that they were targeting us as well¡­


    Maybe it was the same organisation? I have not really been in contact as these low-qualitymunication talismans still don''t work yet¡­"


    Listing to her, Xuan Hao did not gain anything useful from it and still had no clue what the organisation was up to.


    They had targeted both the Spring Flower Sect and the Seven Fates Sect''s treasuries and at the same time mined for the ghost crystals.


    Xuan Hao did not learn anything and only grew more confused upon knowing about the fact that the Seven Fates Sect was involved as well.


    Did both sects perhaps have something in their treasuries that this organisation needed? What was it and how did the organisation even know if the Spring Flower Sect and Seven Fates Sect had the thing, they were searching for in the first ce?


    Xuan Hao did not believe that they would just randomly attack the Seven Fates Sect and even n to attack the Spring Flower Sect just for their treasuries¡­


    After all, if they were after the treasures, just going after arge number of weaker sects would be way more useful and safer for them instead of risking their lives and failing like they had.


    "I will try and ask around about this after themunication talismans begin working again, I also know a fair share of people outside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom that might know something. After discussing things with Feng Chen, I will hurry back to the Spring Flower Sect and personally check up on things as well." Seeing the thoughtful look on Xuan Hao''s face as he seemed lost in thought, Shu Yao also began to feel worried about the Spring Flower Sect herself as she said this.


    Hearing about the Ghost Crystals and things Xuan Hao had encountered, Shu Yao was especially worried when he had mentioned the stone like snake.


    It was also through the vivid description of the fight that Shu Yao realized how strong Xuan Hao was.


    Even if he had not reached the Domain Lord Realm like he said himself, Shu Yao did not doubt the fact that his strength should have already reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    This realization caused Shu Yao to let out a sigh of amazement when she thought about the bright future of the Spring Flower Sect after merging together with the Flying Sword Sect.


    "That is great! I should be taking my leave as well for now. You can just contact me whenever after you find out something!" Smiling happily upon hearing what Shu Yao said, Xuan Hao stood up and took out hismunication talisman before linking it up with Shu Yao''smunication talisman so she could contact him in the future after she found out about something.


    "Ah, Elder Xuan!"


    "?"


    Stopping Xuan Hao as he was about to leave the small courtyard and return to his pavilion, Shu Yao suddenly pulled out a small token with a small symbol of a flower engraved on it as she gave it to him.


    "Use this if you ever find yourself in trouble inside the Sky Empire, it will give off a signal to some of my friends outside and they wille over and help you out." Not saying anything more, Shu Yao used the opportunity while Xuan Hao was looking at the small token with a confused expression to disappear from the small courtyard. Leaving behind Xuan Hao as he began carefully inspecting the token given to him by Shu Yao.


    "I wonder how strong the friends of Shu Yao are¡­ Maybe in the Domain Lord Realm? After all, she did not seem too surprised after learning about me reaching the Domain Lord Realm over the next few days¡­" Muttering this to himself as he stared at the small flower engraving, Xuan Hao shook his head not thinking too deeply about it before putting the small token away in his interspatial ring.


    Whoosh~


    With a small breeze passing through the courtyard, Xuan Hao''s figure disappeared from the courtyard as he made his way back to his pavilion.


    ¡­


    "What is with so many people suddenly showing up recently?! And howe we suddenly got a new Core Elder?" Elder Song eximed painfully as he stared down at arge stack of paper stacked up in front of him as hemented to himself.


    Over the past few days, arge number of elders had suddenlye to him and asked for different things that would normally be solved by the Vice Sect Master.


    Elder Song was already used to this and had not thought much about it at first, but the number of elders showing up to ask for his help did not decrease in the slightest! Instead, the number had increased and just now, a person called Chi Hu showed up and said he was a new Core Elder recruited by Xuan Hao!


    The old man called Chi Hu was to Elder Song''s liking and he instantly thought he had met someone who could help him and had quickly found an empty mountain peak in the core area with a pavilion on it before asking for the new Core Elder Chi Hu for help dealing with the elder''s requests.


    The new Core Elder Chi Hu had luckily not found his request rude or anything as he agreed to help out.


    Chi Hu''s reason was quite simple as the current appearance of Elder Song was simply too pitiful to look at.


    By this point he had already stayed up working through the different elder''s requests for over a week straight without resting, if he did not have a strong cultivation, Chi Hu was certain that the poor Elder Song would have already passed away due to overwork!


    Peng Yun had already had his cultivation sealed as he was sent over to the Alchemy Hall, so Chi Hu did not worry about him and began focusing on helping Elder Song out.


    "How did you even end up doing all of this by yourself in the first ce? Could you not just get some of the disciples or other Elders to help you out¡­?" Asking this as he looked through the different request and began sorting them out to help alleviate the workload on Elder Song, Chi Hu asked in a curious voice as he really wanted to know how an old man like Elder Song ended up in his current situation.


    "Hah¡­ I have no idea to be honest¡­ And only a small number of people are allowed to go over the elder''s requests¡­" Shaking his head helplessly as he stared at the mountain of requests in front of him, Elder Song felt a little helpless.


    Going over the different requests of the elders was not something that the disciples or even other elders could do and the number of people who had the authority to do so was extremely limited!


    At the current moment, outside the Sect Master, Vice Sect Master and the Core Elders, only Elder Song had the authority to do so!


    "How should I help out¡­?" Listing to what Elder Song said, Chi Hu quickly stepped forward and asked.


    He could help out the poor Elder Song and at the same time he would be able to learn more about the elders of the Flying Sword Sect through their requests!


    This was what Chi Hu thought to himself while sitting down beside Elder Song and grabbing a nearby request full of anticipation.


    What would the elders of the Flying Sword Sect be requesting so eagerly over the past week?


    [Elder Song my good friend, it''s been some time since west spent some time together me and that old baldie Xiao are hoping we could go and visit the Cloud Breeze Shop that recently opened up and get a cup of tea to rx¡­]


    "W-what is this¡­?" Muttering this to himself, Chi Hu no longer read anymore and instead looked over at another request and quickly realized that it was request asking Elder Song toe and hang out as well¡­? Looking around at the request, Chi Hu even found a few request that were just tantly demanding for Elder Song toe and hang out with them¡­


    How are these requests sent by the elders to the sect! These people are clearly just asking for Elder Song toe and hang out with them!


    "Hah¡­ Just¡­ Reject all of them!" Sighing to himself as he said this, Elder Song already seemed used to the requests of the elders at this point as he began rejecting the requests himself.


    "¡­"


    Chi Hu did not really know what to say as Elder Song seemed to be extremely popr with the other elders of the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Maybe they waited for a time when they knew only Elder Song would take in the requests beforeing to deliver them¡­?

 Chapter 240: Peng Yun Entering the Alchemy Hall

    <h4>Chapter 240: Peng Yun Entering the Alchemy Hall</h4>


    "So, this Peng Yun ising to teach us about his unique path in alchemy over the next few months?" Sitting in a chair together with four of the core elders of the Alchemy Hall, Wan Qiu tilted her head to the side as she had a curious look in her eyes.


    "Yes. Apparently Elder Xuan met this person when outside and found out he was an alchemist and did things a bit different from normal alchemist. Thinking that it might be able to help us improve further on the path of alchemy, Elder Xuan invited him back to the sect to teach us over the next few months!" Standing in front of the five elders, a disciple wearing the robes of an outer sect disciple said this respectfully as he bowed his head in the direction of the five elders.


    This was his first time facing any elders from the Alchemy Hall and he almost stuttered over his words as he said this, but in the end managed to stop himself as he happily thanked whatever higher being that had looked after him and allowed him to hide his nervous expression while bowing his head.


    "I see, he should be arriving only a little after you¡­ You can take your leave for now!" Muttering something to herself as she sent the outer sect disciple in front of her away, Wan Qiu turned to look at the other four elders with an even stronger look of curiosity than when she had first heard about someoneing to teach them about a new way to do alchemy.


    The outer sect disciple bowed even deeper than he already had before quickly turning around and leaving the room. Resulting in only the five elders remaining inside the room.


    "I never knew Elder Xuan was knowledgeable about alchemy¡­ To even be able to discern that the person was following a different path in alchemypared to the more orthodox one¡­ Seems like Elder Xuan is not only talented when ites to cultivation, but should also be quite experienced in alchemy as well¡­" Among the five elders present, an elderly man only about the height of a child around the age of thirteen or fourteen stood up from his seat as he said this with a wide smile spreading across his elderly face.


    "Indeed¡­ I never knew that Elder Xuan was proficient in alchemy¡­ I''m really curious about how far he has gone¡­" Nodding his head a bit upon hearing what the short elder said, Elder Gong could not help but grow curious about Xuan Hao''s alchemy.


    "Haha, we can always ask Elder Xuan about thister, for now we still need to wee the unorthodox alchemist that Elder Xuan sent over." Laughing as she saw the short elder and Elder Gong Bo talk about Elder Xuan, Wan Qiu stepped in and stopped them from continuing even though she was curious about the alchemy realm Xuan Hao had reached as well.


    She already knew very well that if both of them began talking, she would never get to leave this gathering room before the morning of the next day¡­


    "How about I go out and greet him?"


    "Are you sure Elder Xia?"


    Turning to look over at the short elder that voulentered himself, Wan Qiu did not really have anything against it. Only feeling a bit worried that he might end up chatting with the person sent over by Elder Xuan and forget that he was supposed to bring him to the gathering room¡­


    "Yes! I''m sure! I will be back shortly with the new friend of ours on the path of alchemy!" Proudly stating this as he soon disappeared from the room with a happy smile on his lips, Wan Qiu and the other elders could not help but feel a bit worried.


    Surely nothing would happen along the way¡­


    ¡­


    As Chi Hu got settled in and began helping out Elder Song with the absurd amount of requests from the different elders of the Flying Sword Sect, Peng Yun made his way over to the Alchemy Hall as he was already given a room there to write down and share his knowledge on the subject to the rest of the alchemist before being allowed to leave.


    "Are you perhaps Peng Yun?" Entering the Alchemy Hall, a short elder dressed in the robe symbolizing that he was part of the Alchemy Hall walked over and asked with a bright smile on his lips.


    "Yes, I am¡­" Felling a bit weird upon seeing the bright smile on the elder''s face, Peng Yun''s hand was suddenly grabbed by the short elder as he was dragged deeper into the Alchemy Hall.


    Given the seal ced on his cultivation base and given the fact that his physical strength had also been supressed alongside it, Peng Yun could do nothing as the short elder dragged him along with an excited expression stered all over his face. Making Peng Yun feel even more confused.


    Why was the elder so excited about seeing him? Did that Elder Xuan and Elder Shu not inform him about the fact that he was just here to record his alchemy knowledge down as punishment for attack Elder Xuan along with Chi Hu?


    "We are here!"


    Suddenlying to a stop at the end of the hall in front of a big wooden door, the short elder let go of Peng Yun as he pushed open the door and signalled for Peng Yun to follow after him.


    No matter what, he felt that the short elder''s reaction was too weird considering his current position.


    From the looks of it, he would be able to get an answer after entering the room¡­


    "¡­"


    Looking at the short elder for a moment as he was smiling at him from the other side of the door, Peng Yun felt himself suddenly growing nervous as he entered through the door in front of him.


    Creak~


    With a silent creaking noise, the door slowly closed behind him as Peng Yun stepped through the doorway into the room.

 Chapter 241: Peng Yun Meeting the Core Elders of the Alchemy Hall

    <h4>Chapter 241: Peng Yun Meeting the Core Elders of the Alchemy Hall</h4>


    Observing the person who entered through the door together with the short Elder Xia with a curious expression stered all over her face, Wan Qiu barely manged to hold herself back from asking about what sort of alchemy he had been doing for Elder Xuan to invite him and have them help them improve their understanding of alchemy.


    Looking closer, Wan Qiu saw that the person in question was a middle-aged man with short brown hair and a more handsome than average face. The nervous look on his face as he entered the room seemed somewhat out of ce as Wan Qiu secretly smirked to herself. The nervous look on the middle-aged man''s face looked a bit funny given how out of ce it was on the man''s face.


    "Hello, I am Elder Gong of the Flying Sword Sect''s Alchemy Hall! You should be the alchemist Elder Xuan invited toe over to teach us about your unorthodox path of alchemy, right?" Interrupting her thoughts as she was thinking about the nervous looking man in front of her, Elder Gong stood up and walked over the person in question before greeting him with a friendly smile on his face.


    "Ah, yes I am! My name is Peng Yun!" Looking a bit surprised upon seeing Elder Gonge over and greet him, the middle-aged man named Peng Yun quickly introduced himself as a somewhat understanding look shed through his eyes for a short moment.


    Wan Qiu saw this and looked around to see if anyone else saw it as well, but soon found out that she was the only one who seemed to have seen the weird look of understanding shing past the eyes of Peng Yun shortly after Elder Gong had finished speaking.


    Why do I have a feeling that something is wrong here¡­?


    Mumbling this to herself as she narrowed her eyes and inspected the middle-aged man named Peng Yun in front of her now confidently talking with the other four core elders of the Alchemy Hall as they came over to greet him one by one, Wan Qiu increasingly felt that Peng Yun was hiding something...


    Maybe Elder Xuan did not fully exin how he found this alchemist or what his true background-


    "This over here is Elder Wan; she is currently the leading alchemist in the Alchemy Hall and is also close to bing an Artisan Alchemist! Already having reached the peak of the Expert Alchemist Realm!" Interrupting her train of thoughts for a second time over the past few minutes, Elder Gong happily introduced her to Peng Yun as he soon began asking Peng Yun about different things regarding alchemy once again.


    Not paying any more attention to her after everyone was introduced as he began working together with Elder Xia to formte all sorts of questions for Peng Yun to answer.


    Firstly, because they were curious about how far Peng Yun had really made it on the path of alchemy and secondly to test him and see if he was truly as good at alchemy as Elder Xuan said when he was sent over.


    No matter how much trust they had in a Core Elder like Xuan Hao, they would never truly know how skilled Peng Yun was without testing him by themselves first-hand!


    Watching how Elder Gong and Xia no longer paid any attention to her after introducing her shortly before both of them began excitedly talking with Peng Yun who was caught a bit off guard, as Wan Qiu saw him seriously trying to answer each and every question asked by the two elders.


    "Both of you, give him some space and show him where he will be staying for now¡­ You can ask him questions tomorrow after he gets settled down.


    Another elder standing at the side watching as Elder Gong and Xia passionately began asking Peng Yun all sorts of questions regarding alchemy stepped forward.


    "Indeed, we can''t have both of you scaring him away before the first day even passed¡­" Wan Qiu saw this and did indeed see a somewhat troubled look appearing on Peng Yun''s face as the two elders became more and more passionate in their questions upon hearing the perfect answers given by Peng Yun.


    "Tsch¡­"


    Wan Qiu felt she heard both Elder Gong and Xia clicking their tongue when she stepped forward and backed up the other elder, but quickly shook her head. She had most likely just misheard¡­


    "I will be the one showing him where to stay as both of you will most likely not be able to reach it before Peng Yun here ends up running away¡­" Walking down beside Peng Yun, Wan Qiu rolled her eyes as she said this.


    "¡­"


    Elder Gong and Xia did not say anything but instead just kept quite as they watched Wan Qiu leave the room together with Peng Yun.


    They really could not say anything! What she said was the truth and both of them knew that they would not be able to stop themselves from asking a few questions about alchemy! Especially now that they found out that Peng Yun was indeed skilled when it came to alchemy!


    "How high do you think his realm is in alchemy?" Turning around to look at Elder Gong after watching Wan Qiu and Peng Yun leave the room, Elder Xia could not help but ask.


    When it came to discerning the alchemy realm of Peng Yun, Elder Gong was clear that Elder Xia who was more experienced than himself would be clearer as to what realm Peng Yun''s alchemy had reached.


    "I''m not too clear, but it should at least be at the Peak of the Expert Realm like Wan Qiu¡­ Maybe even higher than that! I really have no clue how Elder Xuan found someone like that, and he even practiced an unorthodox path when it came to alchemy! I suddenly feel really excited when thinking about learning another way of alchemy!" Smiling from ear to ear as he confidently said this with an excited look on his face, Elder Xia''s words made not only Elder Gong grow excited but the two other core elders of the Alchemy Hall as well.


    No matter what, every single alchemist of the Alchemy Hall wanted to improve, and these elders was no different.


    No,pletely opposite from that, they might even be more driven towards improvement the older and more experienced they grew.

 Chapter 242: Reuniting with Qing Yi and Chu Yang

    <h4>Chapter 242: Reuniting with Qing Yi and Chu Yang</h4>


    "Thanks for the help earlier¡­" Walking down a hallway in the Alchemy Hall, Peng Yun turned around and thanked the woman walking beside him.


    Earlier, he had felt troubled when the two elders continued to ask him all sorts of different questions regarding alchemy and felt himself starting to grow more exhausted with each question he answered.


    The woman beside him was the one who had stepped in a saved him from further questioning as she volunteered to show him where he was going to stay over the next period of time.


    "No problem, I hope we will be able to work together in the future and learn from each other!" Nodding her head as she continued walking without saying anything, both Peng Yun and Wan Qiu silently arrived at the end of the hallway.


    "This is the room you will be staying in for now, there is a space dedicated to alchemy and if you need any herbs, you can request them from the Alchemy Hall, and we will provide them as long as it is not something too precious! If there is anything else, you can contact me or the other elders! I will take my leave for now; we will see each other again tomorrow!" Stopping at a door located at the end of the hallway, Wan Qiu looked over at Peng Yun as she told him this before turning around and taking her leave.


    Peng Yun stood still for a moment and observed Wan Qiu disappear down another hallway as he suddenly discovered a small token with alchemy hall engraved into it in his left hand.


    Did she give it to me before leaving¡­?


    Thinking about this, Peng Yun put away the token before entering the room he had been allocated.


    Bzzt~


    A weird sound was heard from the door as Peng Yun touched it, with his experience, he easily concluded that defensive formation was in ce on the door and had prevented him from entering.


    "Maybe this is what the token is for¡­?" Muttering this, Peng Yun took out the token Wan Qiu had given to him and ced it against the door as it lit up followed by the defensive formation around the door disappearing.


    Creak~


    Entering the room, Peng Yun was left a bit bewildered as he watched therge room in front of him, there was everything he could wish for. From a cauldron used in pill making to different exotic tools rarely used for alchemy.


    Peng Yun truly felt he had everything he needed for making his special potions outside of the expensive herbs required, but he did not really expect for the Flying Sword Sect to just have such rare and precious herbsying around randomly. Let alone giving them to him for free¡­


    Looking around the room as he soon found a bedroom besides the alchemy workspace, Peng Yun soon discovered that he had a small private garden essible through another entrance to his bedroom as well.


    The small private garden waspletely encased in the Alchemy Hall and the only way in was from an opening at the top where light came in or through the door in his bedroom and a few windows leading into the workspace.


    Peng Yun had an amazed expression on his face as he walked through the small private garden admiring the small artificial stream along with the pond connected to it with a few fish happily swimming around without a care in the world.


    This is not bad¡­ Not bad at all¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he sat down at a chair located near the small pond in the garden, Peng Yun felt himself rxing while watching the fish swim around the pond.


    He had truly not expected to be able to live in such a great environment and Elder Xuan had even arranged for him to be an alchemist he met on the waying to teach for a few months before leaving¡­


    The Flying Sword Sect truly was a good ce¡­


    Like this, Peng Yun quietly fell asleep on the chair as he began to look forward to his next few months at the Flying Sword Sect.


    No matter what, he would use this time to learn as much about the alchemy at the Flying Sword Sect as he could! After all, the Flying Sword Sect might not excel at alchemy, but they were still a sect that hadsted for a long time!


    Their knowledge and records on alchemy was far superior and morepletepared to what someone like Peng Yun, a former treasure hunter, would ever be able to get his hands on.


    This could also be considered one of the reasons why his alchemy ended up taking such a unique path as he did not really know how to improve further and could only find a way by himself. Resulting in his weird, yet dangerous potions.


    ¡­


    "Elder Xuan!"


    At the same time that Peng Yun got settled into the Alchemy Hall, Xuan Hao had returned back to his pavilion again and soon spotted his two disciples walking together with Bai Ning as he called out to him the moment he appeared in front of the pavilion.


    ""Master!""


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang on the other hand, were too absorbed talking to each other to notice him when he appeared and instead only reacted when they heard Bai Ning as both of them happily greeted Xuan Hao at the same time.


    "It''s great to see both of you again and Bai Ning, it looks like you are along pretty well with both Qing Yi and Chu Yang." Seeing the excited expressions appear on both his disciples faces after seeing him, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a weird feeling appear inside of him as his two disciples rushed over to him together with Bai Ning.


    "Master! Is Bai Ning going to be our new junior brother!?" Chu Yang was the first to speak up as he seemed to have already guessed that Xuan Hao nned to take in Bai Ning as his third disciple.


    "Haha, I do have ns for that, but let''s wait a bit and allow him to adapt to life here for a little longer before that." Saying this in a low voice, Xuan Hao watched Bai Ning nervously making his way over in the distance.


    Both Qing Yi and Chu Yang had suddenly left him behind, causing him to freeze on the spot for a few seconds before he realized they had already made their way over the Elder Xuan!


    "Master is it really true that you killed therge stone snake in the Spring Flower Sect''s territory! I heard from Bai Ning that the giant snake was extremely terrifying and violent as it destroyed several nearby barley fields!" Asking this, Qing Yi looked up at Xuan Hao with a look of reverence present in her eyes.


    "Indeed, it was quite a difficult fight¡­" Retelling the story of himself fighting against the stone snake personally, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang had a look of amazement on their face as they both felt how terrifying the stone snake that their master had defeated was!


    Even though they had no idea what realm the stone snake was at, they were sure that it should at least be incredibly strong inside the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Bai Ning who had experienced the battle first-hand from a distance inside the city also added on a few details that Xuan Hao missed.


    For example, Xuan Hao learned that arge part of the barely field they were fighting on or close to most of the time had been ripped out of the ground and was flung directly into the city where it had crushed a small vegetable stand.


    With the passing of time as Xuan Hao told his disciples about his adventures in the secret realm together with Chi Hu and his encounter with the treasure hunters, Qing Yi, Chu Yang and even Bai Ning listening from the side felt more and more amazed the more they learned.


    Secret Realm. Underground Pces and dangerous Domain Lord Realm Experts and demon beasts!


    All the different dangers described by their master truly gave them all a freight as all three of them learned how terrifying the world was!


    But this was not the most amazing thing about their master''s adventure. No. It was the fact that the stone snake that their master fought against was at the Domain Lord Realm!


    Didn''t this mean that their master was a Domain Lord Realm Expert!?


    The look of reverence in his disciple''s eyes after he exined that the stone snake was at the Domain Lord Realm was a little too unbearable for Xuan Hao and he decided not to correct their misunderstanding about him being in the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    After all, given his domain growing stronger and stronger at a constant rate. Nearingpletion ever so slightly with each passing moment, Xuan Hao estimated that he would at most need one more week before breaking through!


    "It has already gotten sote by now; I will teach both of you along with Bai Ning tomorrow morning. For now, go back and rest well." Seeing that it had already grownte, Xuan Hao instructed his disciples and Bai Ning to rest for the night.


    He had already nned to take teaching his disciples more seriously and he was not one to ck off after deciding on something!


    ""Yes, Master!"" Both Qing Yi and Chu Yang happily agreed to what Xuan Hao said and made their way into the pavilion together with Bai Ning.


    Both Qing Yi and Chu Yang had looked forward to their mastering back specifically for an opportunity to be taught by him!

 Chapter 243: Unrest in The Azure Sky Kingdom

    <h4>Chapter 243: Unrest in The Azure Sky Kingdom</h4>


    "If things continue to drag on for too long, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom will surely be able to strengthen their border and pull more people there to defend!" Inside a majestic pce, an elderly man dressed in an exquisite robe anxiously bowed his head as he spoke his concerns to the person sitting on the throne in front of him.


    "So how are things going at the secret realm that suddenly appeared on the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms side? Any movement from the Sky Empire or any of the nearby powers¡­?" Not caring much about what the elderly man said, the middle-aged man sitting on the throne instead switched the topic as he asked about the secret realm.


    "The secret realm¡­ I don''t know much about it, but our spies reported that the Sky Empire has withdrawn and a demon beast at the Domain Lord Realm settled down at the ce where the entrance of the secret realm is¡­" Thinking about it for a short moment, the elderly man quickly answered the question.


    "Anything else¡­?"


    "T-there was a rumour that one of our people heard about the secret realm having copsed already¡­ This should have caused the surrounding powers to back away as there won''t be anything to gain from going ther-"


    "Good! Give orders for the troops to begin moving¡­ Go through the Raging me Sect and only attack if they attack first!" Interrupting the elderly man, the middle-aged man on the throne smiled to himself and ordered the elderly man with a wave of his hand.


    "B-but we can''t be certain that there won''t still be anyone at the Domain Lord Realm still present in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ If we offend them, then-"


    "Silence! Just do as you are told! And what are the chances of someone in the Domain Lord Realm still being around after the secret realm copsed and a Domain Lord Realm demon beast appeared outside the entrance of the secret realm? Even if there still are Domain Lords in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, they would most likely be at the location of the secret realms entrance! Not near the Raging me Sect or our border!"


    "Y-yes, your m-majesty!" Feeling the anger of the person on top of the throne as he quickly bowed his head in fear, the elderly man felt like the god of death had suddenly appeared and could bring him to theherworld at any moment.


    The elderly man was the most trusted minister of the current ruler of the Azure Sky Kingdom, and he could clearly feel that his king had changed over the past few years as he grew more and more unfamiliar and at the same time more and more terrifying with each passing day.


    "Now leave and deliver the message personally to the general at the frontline! Given your strength, you helping out should also be able to help out quite a bit at the frontline¡­" Waving his hand dismissively upon seeing the elderly man bowing his head, the middle-aged man returned to his former regal self as he said thest part, a small malicious smile formed on his lips as he felt the minister bowing down in front of him begin to shiver.


    "¡­"


    The elderly minister bowed once more and quickly left the throne room without looking back. Not daring to argue against the fact that he would go to the frontline and join the fight himself.


    "How did it go¡­?"


    The moment he left the throne room, a young knight walked up to him and asked in a worried voice.


    Only a few people had noticed the fact that his majesty had changed over the years as he would normally act like he had in the past, m, regal and disying just the needed emotions befitting of someone in his position.


    The only other people that knew about that change in his majesty over the past few years was a few close friends of the old minister and the young knight in front of him.


    "Go back home for now¡­ I still have to carry out his majesty''s order¡­ Prepare your parents and siblings to move to the Ascendant Frost Hall! Leave as quickly as possible!" Turning to the young knight as he said this, the elderly man only whispered thest part loud enough for the young knight to barely hear.


    "Grandpa¡­" Muttering these words, the young knight stood rooted on his spot as he slowly watched the elderly man leave the royal pce without looking back.


    The young knight was the grandson of the elderly minister, and he knew very well what his grandfather meant when he told him to return to his family and prepare for them to leave for the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    His majesty had most likely already begun to grow suspicious of his grandfather and¡­ His grandfather would most likely not make it back home after carrying out the order of his majesty¡­


    Knowing this, the young knight barely stopped himself from tearing up on the spot as he quickly made his way back home to inform the rest of his family.


    No matter what, he had to ensure his parents and siblings would make it to the Ascendant Frost Hall safely! Only this way would he be able to honour his grandfather''s sacrifice!


    Whoosh~


    A light wind passed by as the young knight hurried out of the royal pce. The sun shone brightly as a few clouds calmy passed by above.


    If not for the current deadly situation his family found itself in, the young knight would surely think today was a great day to rx out in the sun together with his friends and family.


    But the young knight knew very well that such a thing would not be possible in the near future¡­ All he could do was hope he would be able to get his family out of the capital safely before his majesty the king noticed they were missing¡­


    ¡­


    "Hah, I said I was going to teach them today, but what am I even going to teach them in the first ce¡­?" Opening his eyes as he felt the light from the sun peek in through his window announcing the beginning of a new day, Xuan Hao had a worried look on his face when he thought about teaching his disciples today.


    He had already prepared himself to teach his disciples and spent some more time with them, but he had not really figured out what he should even teach them about in the first ce.


    Combat techniques¡­? He did not really know about too manybat techniques and those he knew about were far from something that his two disciples at the Foundation Establishment Realm would be able to learn at their current realm.


    "I guess I will just go with teaching them about the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­" Thinking about all his different choices, Xuan Hao finally settled on teach his disciples about the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    No matter what, Xuan Hao was still someone close to the Domain Lord Realm. Preaching to his disciples about the Foundation Establishment was something easy for him to do and he would even be able to impart some of his own insights he had gained on the realm after reaching his current cultivation¡­


    The only thing that remained now was finding a cultivation mantra suitable for his future third disciple, Bai Ning¡­


    Whoosh~


    Having already decided on how he was going to proceed with teaching his two disciples, Xuan Hao stood up and quickly disappeared from his room and appeared directly on the top floor of the pagoda of enlightenment after a few seconds.


    "Heaven Burning Mantra, Great Sword Mantra, Six Ways Mantra¡­ Hah, is there really nothing fitting for Bai Ning here¡­?" Scanning through all the mantras on the top floor within a few seconds, Xuan Hao let out? sigh of disappoint as he felt the collection of the Flying Sword Sect was way too small¡­


    If this thought was heard by others, they would surely curse at him.


    Heaven Rank Mantras were something extremely rare outside of the imperial family of the different empires and the powers equal to them as they showed a clear path for someone to the Domain Lord Realm! The Peak Heaven Rank Mantras even allowed a clear path for someone to reach the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Yet someoneined over having too few Heaven Rank Cultivation Mantras with at least a few dozen in front of him to choose from!?


    What was worse, this priceless collection of Heaven Rank Mantras was located in a sect that did not even have a single Domain Lord Realm Expert in it¡­


    It was unknown how the surrounding powers would react if something like this became known¡­


    "Hm? What is this¡­ Unformed Mantra¡­?" Spotting a mantra out of the corner of his eye in the corner of the room just as he was about to leave, Xuan Hao froze in ce as he read the title on the top of it.


    For some reason, he felt a shiver go down his spine he read the title of the mantra.


    Calming down for a bit, Xuan Hao walked over and picked up the Unformed Mantra that he had not spotted with his divine sense when scanning through the room earlier on.


    He really wondered what kind of mystery this cultivation mantra held¡­

 Chapter 244: Third Disciple, Bai Ning!

    <h4>Chapter 244: Third Disciple, Bai Ning!</h4>


    Picking up the Unformed Cultivation Mantra, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes ever so slightly as he began reading through the cultivation mantra with his full attention. Not wanting to idently miss any important part that might cause a hidden danger to his future third disciple if he began cultivating the Unformed Cultivation Mantra in the future.


    "Unformed Cultivation Mantra¡­ Created by a cksmith that also wanted to walk on the path of cultivation in the past after finding out his lifespan was running out¡­ Really suitable for Bai Ning given the fact he will most likely also focus on cksmithing mainly and cultivation secondarily¡­" Xuan Hao weighted the benefits and demerits of the Unformed cultivation mantra and felt it would be really suitable for Bai Ning.


    While it was not strong when it came tobat or survival, the Unformed Cultivation Mantra almost seemed to be specifically made for cksmiths as the purpose of the creator was simply to increase his own lifespan so he could continue practicing cksmithing and reach an even higher realm in cksmithing.


    Putting away the Unformed Mantra, Xuan Hao decided to impart it to Bai Ning.


    Even if Bai Ning did not end up being exceptional among his peers when it came to cultivation in the future, Xuan Hao would be more than happy if he ended up bing an unparalleled cksmith that could easily gather a swarm of experts under his banner with a single word.


    At least if that happened, he would not have to worry about the Flying Sword Sect ending up in a dangerous situation, as a group of experts would willingly step forward and crush their enemies for them¡­


    "Ah, so much time already passed, I will have to get back to the pavilion¡­" ncing outside a small window on the top floor of the pagoda of enlightenment, Xuan Hao was roused from his imagination as he saw the disciples of the Flying Sword beginning to get up and move about.


    Unknowingly, he had spent over one hour in the pagoda of enlightenment reading through the Unformed Mantra!


    Whoosh!


    Not daring to wait around for any longer, Xuan Hao disappeared from the top floor of the pagoda of enlightenment.


    From start to finish, the elder guarding the pagoda of enlightenment did not even notice that someone had passed by him twice and even entered the highest floor of the pagoda!


    ¡­


    ""Master!"" The moment Xuan Hao returned back to his pavilion, his two disciples were already waiting outside as they called out to him the moment he appeared and quickly ran over to greet him.


    "¡­"


    Bai Ning on the other hand did not say anything and instead shyly looked on from the side before approaching with a nervous look on his face.


    "Ah, its great to see that all three of you are here already! Qing Yi and Chu Yang, both of you can make your way to the training ground first, I have something to say to Bai Ning first!" Smiling happily upon seeing his two disciples, Xuan Hao did not waste any time and quickly send both of them over to the training ground as he decided to first-hand over the cultivation mantra, Unformed Mantra, to Bai Ning before moving on with teaching his two disciples.


    ""Yes! Master!"" Already having some idea what their master was going to talk with Bai Ning about, both Chu Yang and Qing Yi did not stay around as both of them quickly made their way over to the training ground located on the mountain peak.


    Even if they could not listen to their master''s teachings yet, they could still spend the time warming up with a few practice matches¡­


    Having alreadye to the consensus that they would be fighting until their master showed up, both Chu Yang and Qing Yi were filled with battle intent as they soon disappeared from the mountain peak down towards the training ground located a little further down the mountain peak.


    "E-elder Xuan¡­?" Not knowing what Xuan Hao wanted to say to him as he had unknowingly already walked over in front of him, Bai Ning was filled with a sense of nervousness that he had never felt before.


    "Haha, no need to be so nervous all of a sudden Bai Ning, I''m not going to do anything!" Laughing a bit to himself as he saw the nervous expression stered onto Bai Ning''s face. Making him look like a small innocent animal about to encounter a ferocious predator, Xuan Hao really had no idea what to say.


    He was not so scary, okay? He might not be as handsome as some of those fabled young prodigies and devastatingly beautiful men¡­ But he was not that scary to look at¡­ He could at least be considered ordinary, if not a little above average¡­


    "Hah¡­ Maybe things will change when I reach a higher realm and go through a rebirth of flesh or something along that line¡­"


    "D-did you say anything Elder Xuan¡­?"


    "Ah, no, it was nothing!"


    Muttering something to himself, Bai Ning seemed to have calmed down as he was no longer acting as nervous anymore.


    Shaking his head as he threw his useless thoughts to the back of his mind, Xuan Hao took out the Unformed Mantra from his interspatial ring.


    "Bai Ning, how do you think things have been during your past few days in the Flying Sword Sect¡­?"


    "Hm? Ah, they have been great! Both brother Chu and big siter Qing showed me a lot of different ces! Today we even went to the Flying Sword City just outside and visited a lot of different ces to get delicious food! And¡­"


    Watching as Bai Ning slowly began to exin what he had been doing during the few days that he had left him in the care of his two disciples, Xuan Hao could not help but smile to himself happily.


    It was indeed a great idea to have his two disciples take care of their future junior brother and it seemed like they got along well!


    Chu Yang was especially good as it seems like he was the one who took care of Bai Ning the most and also managed to get the closest to him¡­ A little unexpected, I thought for sure Bai Ning would be more interested in a beautiful senior sister over a senior brother¡­


    Maybe I should get a female disciple next, so Qing Yi also has someone to cultivate and practice with in the future¡­


    After all, no matter what, Zhi Ruo is just an ordinary person and won''t be able to join in for practice and go out adventuring with her in the future¡­


    "¡­ After all of that, we ended up returning back to the pavilion again and then Elder Xuan appeared!" Thinking about all this, Xuan Hao was brought back from his train of thought as Bai Ning''s exnation finished.


    "So, you had a great time in the Flying Sword Sect so far¡­?" Asking this with a smile on his face, Xuan Hao could already predict that Bai Ning had begun to grow attached to the Flying Sword Sect over the past few days.


    "Y-yes Elder Xuan, everything has been great so far! I-I''m really thankful that you helped me and even brought me to join the Flying Sword Sect! In the future, I will do my best to repay this act of kindness!" Thanking Xuan Hao with all his heart, Bai Ning swore to return the favour that Xuan Hao had shown him by giving him a ce to stay and even a chance for him to continue studying cksmithing!


    Bai Ning truly felt happy for this and had no idea why someone like Xuan Hao had even helped him in the first ce.


    There were many people like him out in the world and he clearly knew that he wasn''t special in any way inside the Flying Sword Sect.


    In the first ce, how could someone like him ever hope to repay the favour shown by Elder Xuan in the future¡­?


    "No need to look so down all of a sudden, I brought you back to the Flying Sword Sect for a reason after all!" Seeing Bai Ning suddenly begin to look a bit depressed, Xuan Hao hurriedly called out to him as he watched Bai Ning look up at him with a confused look on his face.


    His face was clearly asking something along the line of ''what do you mean?'' and ''what reason?''


    Putting on a confident look, Xuan Hao smiled gently at Bai Ning.


    "When I first saw you, I clearly felt that you suited for walking on the path of cultivation in the future and wanted to take you in as a disciple. Be it on the path of cultivation or the path of cksmithing, I want to support you in the future as your teacher. Hoping that you can one day take in a few disciples of your own to help the younger generation of the Flying Sword Sect when the timees. Bai Ning, are you willing to take me as your master¡­?"


    "Yes!" Not waiting for even a second, Bai Ning happily agreed as he closed the short distance between them and hugged Xuan Hao before he could react.

 Chapter 245: Sudden Crisis

    <h4>Chapter 245: Sudden Crisis</h4>


    "Great! For now, I will give you this cultivation mantra and have you go back and study it. After I finish training Qing Yi and Chu Yang, I will see how much you learned and also help you take your first step into the Qi Condensation Realm!" Smiling happily as he looked at his third disciple, Xuan Hao handed the Unformed Mantra over to him before making his way towards the training ground where both Qing Yi and Chu Yang were waiting for him.


    "Yes! M-master¡­!" Nodding his head as he excitedly looks at the cultivation mantra Xuan Hao had given to him; Bai Ning did not dare to ck off as he hurried back inside the pavilion to study the Unformed Cultivation Mantra that his new master had given him.


    Before Xuan Hao came back, Bai Ning prepared himself to learn as much as he could from the Unformed Mantra!


    No matter what, he had to do his best to try and impress his new master and make sure that he would not regret taking him in as a disciple.


    ¡­


    Making his way over to the training ground, Xuan Hao soon spotted both of his disciples locked in a practice match with each other as both of them went back and forth attacking each other.


    The strongest among the two of them was clearly Chu Yang, as he focused more onbat techniques along with having a higher cultivation than Qing Yi.


    If not for the fact that he had limited his strength to around the same as what Qing Yi had, Xuan Hao was sure that Chu Yang would easily be able to win against Qing Yi.


    Even then, Qing Yi was constantly on the defensive as she had a difficult time keeping up with Chu Yang as she was slowly driven into a corner.


    Ching~


    The sound of metal hitting metal resounded throughout the training ground as Chu Yang''s spear was blocked by Qing Yi''s sword only a few centimeters from her face.


    But this was not the end as Chu Yang quickly retreated back, causing Qing Yi to lose her bnce for a short moment.


    During this short timeframe, Chu Yang once again attacked as the tip of his spear rested just beside Qing Yi''s neck.


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I lost¡­" Letting out reluctant sigh, Qing Yi looked at Chu Yang full of unwillingness as she put up both of her hands signalling her defeat.


    "No need to worry senior sister! The only reason I am stronger at the moment is because you are focusing so much on alchemy. I''m sure you will be able to defeat me in the future!" Smiling happily at his victory, Chu Yang tried his best to encourage Qing Yi after seeing the unwilling look in her eyes.


    "It''s fine- Master!" About to tell Chu Yang not to worry about it, Qing Yi managed to spot Xuan Hao walking over from the entrance of the training ground as she quickly forgot the fact that she had just lost a practice match to Chu Yang.


    "It''s great to see that both of you are improving even without my help." Feeling happy inside as he watched how both of his disciples had improved after entering the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao could not help but praise both of them.


    By this point in time, Qing Yi had reached the Third Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, while Chu Yang had improved even further and had already reached the sixth stage!


    Qing Yi could be considered to be worse than Chu Yang when it came to cultivation, but Xuan Hao knew that she was not spending most of her time cultivating like Chu Yang had and was instead focused on improving her alchemy for the uing alchemypetition.


    In that regard, she had already be a Journeyman Alchemist and could definitely be considered to have improved by leaps and bounds.


    This was in part also thanks to the fact that there were not any other disciples at the Alchemy Hall from the younger generation. Meaning most of the resources and elders of the Alchemy Hall gave it their all to help her improve for the uing alchemypetition.


    She was after all, the only person in the Flying Sword Sect that was qualified to participate¡­


    Chu Yang on the other hand, had focusedpletely on improving his strength and cultivation. Not using much, if any time at all on a profession¡­ By this point, Chu Yang did not really study botany anymore.


    Qing Yi did not really care much about it either after getting the full support of the Alchemy Hall and having as many herbs she ever wanted for free or extremely cheaply.


    All in all, both of his disciples had been doing well as both of them had improved by a lot during the time he was not there to teach them or help them train.


    "For today, I will be teaching both of you about the Foundation Establishment Realm and what I have learned about the realm so far and some of my own insights in how to go about the construction of the foundational pirs inside the dantian!


    First when gathering the qi to construct a foundational pir, the type of qi, mantra and image is important¡­" Looking over both his disciples as both of them attentively stood in front of him, Xuan Hao began sharing his understanding of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Both Qing Yi and Chu Yang stood directly in front of him as Xuan Hao signalled for both of them to sit down.


    Thumb~


    Sitting down in a meditative position, Qing Yi and Chu Yang tried their best to remember every word Xuan Hao said.


    A calm and serene aura spread out and filled up the entire training ground as a few clouds passed by above.


    The sun slowly moved above head and two hours peacefully passed as the two disciples werepletely engrossed in everything Xuan Hao taught them about the Foundation Establishment. Not noticing the passing of time as they remainedpletely focused on absorbing as much knowledge they could as possible.


    ¡­


    "¡­ And that will be it for my current understanding of the foundation establishment realm¡­" Coming to an end, Xuan Hao looked up at the sky as he suddenly discovered a little over two hours had passed from start to finish.


    "I didn''t even notice that so much time passed¡­ And my domain also seems to have improved even faster over thest two hours¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao looked over at both of his disciples having entered a state of enlightenment as he could feel both of their auras growing by leaps and bounds.


    When they woke up again, they would both have a stronger foundation and might even breakthrough a minor realm!


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao no longer paid any more attention to his two disciples and instead focused on his pseudo domain.


    His domain that was close to bing a true domain, had suddenly improved over thest two hours of him teaching Qing Yi and Chu Yang about the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    By now, Xuan Hao could feel that his domain would be a true domain in at most a few hours¡­ Compared to the week he had needed before, Xuan Hao felt quite surprised by this sudden but wee improvement¡­


    Other than that, his sword intent that had not shown any sign of improving over thest few months had begun to merge together with his sword domain.


    This change alone brought about a qualitive change as Xuan Hao clearly felt his strength had improved by a lotpared to before.


    But this in turn also brought up a problem for Xuan Hao that he did not foresee beforehand.


    The Pseudo Sword Domain that he was creating before was in ordance with his cultivation mantra, The Untold Swords Mantra¡­ But with his sword intent suddenly merging together with his pseudo sword domain, Xuan Hao was no longer able to follow the steps in the Untold Swords Mantra to evolve his Pseudo Sword Domain into a Sword Domain and step into the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Worst of all, he did not have a lot of time to figure out how to evolve his pseudo sword domain into a fully-fledged domain as it was continuously growing without showing any sign of stopping.


    If he did not manage to evolve his pseudo sword domain in time and it continued to grow and expand¡­


    Xuan Hao had no idea what would happen.


    Would his pseudo sword domain just continue growing or would something different happen after it grew too big?


    Whoosh~


    Leaving the training ground where Qing Yi and Chu Yang were cultivating, Xuan Hao hurried back to the pavilion where he quickly taught Bai Ning how to begin cultivating before entering his room and sitting down in a meditative position.


    First of all, he had to better asses his current situation. After that, he would have to find a way to allow his pseudo sword domain to evolve into a sword domain!

 Chapter 246: Breakthrough! Reaching the Domain Lord Realm!

    <h4>Chapter 246: Breakthrough! Reaching the Domain Lord Realm!</h4>


    Sitting down inside his room as the door closed behind him, Xuan Hao closed his eyes and focused on the current situation inside of his dantian as his nascent soul in the shape of a miniature version of himself opened its eyes.


    The current situation inside of his dantian was peaceful and nothing major was happening as the qi inside flowed around the nascent soul without showing any sign of something being wrong.


    "Seems like nothing is wrong here¡­ I just have to find a way to sessfully evolve my pseudo sword domain and breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm safely¡­" Observing his dantian and seeing that nothing had happened, Xuan Hao let out a sigh of relief as he turned his attention back to his constantly growing pseudo sword domain.


    Quickly, a terrifying sword domain spread out with him as the centre as the entire room was suddenly engulfed in a sea of swords that seemed to grow more and more chaotic.


    "My soul is not strong enough to support my domain if this keeps going¡­" Sensing the increasingly chaotic nature of his domain, Xuan Hao immediately found out what would happen if his domain continued to grow stronger.


    Crash!


    "Not good! I can''t stay here for much longer!" Seeing his sword domain suddenly shatter a nearby table, Xuan Hao tried his best to reign it in again as he stood up and left his pavilion.


    But this alone could notst for long as Xuan Hao clearly felt like his pseudo sword domain was about to break free and run loose at any moment. This was also the reason why he had decided to leave his pavilion as he headed to a small mountain range located a few hundred miles away from the Flying Sword Sect to find a solution to his current predicament.


    BOOM!


    The moment he sat down meditating on one of the mountains, Xuan Hao no longer tried to restrain his pseudo sword domain as it freely spread out and destroyed his surroundings.


    "Hm¡­ What should I do¡­? To reach the Domain Lord Realm, I will first have to evolve my pseudo sword domain to a sword domain¡­ But that is not even the most dangerous part¡­ Hah¡­" Sighing to himself as he thought about the way that the Untold Swords Mantra recorded to breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a deep sense of fear as he watched his pseudo sword domain destroy everything around him.


    For someone in the Nascent Soul Realm to advance into the Domain Lord Realm, they would first have to evolve their pseudo domain into a domain.


    Xuan Hao did not really worry too much about this fact as he was certain that he would be able to do it, even if his pseudo sword domain did not follow the path that the Untold Swords Mantra had noted down.


    The reason for this was that to evolve a pseudo domain into a domain, all he would need to do was wait until it stopped growing and then he would naturally be able to guide his pseudo sword domain to evolve into a sword domain.


    The problem with this however¡­ Was the fact that his pseudo sword domain was still growing, and its strength had already surpassed what his soul could currently endure, even causing him to lose control of it¡­


    Why did this matter¡­? Because the next step after evolving your pseudo domain into a domain was to fuse it together with his nascent soul. After that, he would be a Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    "Hah¡­ If just I had a way to increase the strength of my soul. Sadly, the purification pill can only be used once¡­" Letting out a depressed sigh as he watched his pseudo sword domain grow stronger and stronger as it fully integrated together with his sword intent, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a bit helpless.


    Whoosh~


    The pseudo sword domain suddenly stopped growing as it fully integrated with his sword intent.


    For a moment, everything went quiet as the pseudo sword domain suddenly calmed down and peacefully covered everything within a few miles as the devastation brought to the surroundings were revealed for all to see.


    Looking down at it, Xuan Hao felt his heart tighten as he could only be thankful for the fact that there was not anyone around to be caught up in his pseudo sword domain.


    Fwoosh!


    The pseudo sword domain suddenly seemed to have imploded as it began retracting back towards Xuan Hao with a speed many times greater than it had grown with before.


    Psh!


    As the pseudo domain suddenly retracted back to only having a circumference of one hundred meters, Xuan Hao suddenly felt an enormous pressure descend down on him as he couldn''t stop himself from throwing up a mouthful of blood.


    "Looks like the pseudo sword domain officially evolved into a sword domain¡­ But this is just too much¡­ How do I even fuse this together with my nascent soul¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he felt his own domain bearing down on him, Xuan Hao had no idea what to do as he clearly knew his nascent soul would not be able to survive if he attempted to merge it together with his sword domain¡­


    But¡­ I can''t give up like this¡­


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao took out the small grain sized source crystal that he had gotten from the stone snake back in the Spring Flower Sect''s territory.


    He still did not really know much about the source crystal and how useful it would be given how small it was, but he still decided to use it to hopefully help him when breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Things had not really gone as he had expected, and he could not afford to wait until he reached the Domain Lord Realm before using the source crystal¡­ After all, if things continued like they did now, he would likely end up dead when trying to fuse his nascent soul and sword domain together¡­


    Chomp~


    Eating the source crystal around the size of a grain of rice, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a weird feeling of freedom as he felt himself merge together with the heaven and earth. The world suddenly became silent, and the pressure brought upon him by his sword domain disappeared.


    "What is this¡­ This feels amazing!"


    Everything that troubled him before suddenly became clear as he reached out and felt his sword domain covered in countless ws and other imperfections.


    Merging together with his sword intent had caused arge number of ws to pop up as Xuan Hao waved his hand and began to fix the different ws in his sword domain.


    During this process, Xuan Haopletely forgot about his worries as he meticulously sorted out the ws in his sword domain, that in turn caused it to grow even stronger.


    "Hm! This should be good enough!" Finished removing the different ws and other imperfections in his sword domain, Xuan Hao slowly guided his nascent soul as it left his body and floated above him.


    Coming to a standstill, Xuan Hao''s nascent soul was shining in a brilliant silver colour as it looked like the soul of an immortal that had descended down into the mortal world.


    Whoosh~


    Waving his hand, Xuan Hao effortlessly guided his sword domain as it once again began retreating.


    This time however was different, as the sword domain began fusing together with his nascent soul and under some strange power did not harm it in the slightest as both of them seamlessly became one.


    The sword domainpletely disappeared from the world as only the silver-coloured nascent soul in the form of Xuan Hao remained quietly floating above him.


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out a breath of relief upon seeing this, Xuan Hao did not slow down in the slightest as his nascent soul returned back into his dantian.


    The most dangerous part of the breakthrough could be said to have finished.


    Whoosh~


    After his nascent soul returned to his dantian, Xuan Hao suddenly felt an enormous rush of qiing in from above him.


    Crack~


    The qi descending down from above was extremely beneficial and was of a way higher qualitypared to what he absorbed before.


    Soon he felt himself being filled to the brim and before long his dantian underwent a drastic change and expanded by several times its former size. Announcing that he had directly reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    But this was not the end as the qi continued to descend from above.


    First Stage Domain Lord!


    Peak First Stage Domain Lord!


    Second Stage Domain Lord!


    His cultivation continued to improve until it came to a stop at the second stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    He had directly skipped through the first stage of the Domain Lord Realm and directly reached the second stage!


    The qi descending from above stopped shortly after he reached the second stage, causing Xuan Hao to open his eyes and look around himself.


    Xuan Hao suddenly felt the world lookedpletely different from before as he felt the space around him clearly.


    Just taking a single step forward, he could¡­


    "Fly¡­"


    Looking down beneath himself as he stood in the air above the mountain without his sword beneath him, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a rush of excitement.


    The feeling of freedom after breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm and being able to fly, it was almost like a restriction of sorts had been removed. Freely moving through the air without any obstructions and the pure excitement of standing in the air by himself, waspletely differentpared to when he used his sword to hover or fly through the air.


    At this moment, Xuan Hao truly felt like he had taken his first step towards bing an immortal¡­

 Chapter 247: Feng Chens Shock!

    <h4>Chapter 247: Feng Chen''s Shock!</h4>


    At the same time that Xuan Hao broke through and reached the Domain Lord Realm, every single person inside the Flying Sword Sect along with the people a few hundred miles around the mountain range that felt the terrifying aura that erupted from Xuan Hao the moment he reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    "W-what is that!? Did one of the Sky Empires Domain Lords pass by!?"


    The Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect Feng Chen clearly felt the aura erupting a few hundred miles away and instantly knew that it was originating from someone above the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Given the fact that he had just learned about a secret realm appearing, he was not wrong in guessing that it was a Domain Lord from the Sky Empire.


    The Heavenly Sky Kingdom was after all, part of the Sky Empire and a secret realm had appeared at its border. Only a few days travel from the Flying Sword Sect for a normal Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    "No, I don''t think it is anyone from the Sky Empire¡­"


    Feng Chen had just finished stabilizing his cultivation and had only learned about the appearance of the secret realm and had not yet heard about the fact that it had copsed, and a Domain Lord Realm demon beast came out and made a nest in the area where the entrance had been located.


    "Hm? Shu Yao, why do you say so? Is it perhaps someone from another empire or power that want to get a part of the secret realm for themselves¡­?"


    Curiously turning to look at Shu Yao standing a few meters away from him, Feng Chen could not think of anyone other than the Sky Empire that had experts at the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even though the secret realm was bound to attract the attention of other powers on the same level as the Sky Empire, most of them would try to keep a love profile when inside the territory of the Sky Empire.


    The aura that erupted from earlier, was one of the farthest things from ''keeping a low profile'' that Feng Chen could think of¡­? And with that, he concluded that the other party was most likely someone from the Sky Empire.


    "I think that it might have been Elder Xuan breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    Saying this, Shu Yao also felt a bit surprised as she did not expect breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm would cause such argemotion.


    It was not wrong to say that the happenings today would soon spread out across the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the surrounding kingdoms!


    "Elder Xuan!? When did he reach the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!? And he even broke through and became a Domain Lord!"


    Staggering a bit backwards due to the sheer surprise from the news of Xuan Hao having reached the Domain Lord Realm, Feng Chen found it a little hard to believe.


    After all, even if Xuan Hao was considered a genius, there should still be a limit to it!


    By this point, it had taken Xuan Hao only a little over a year to go from the first stage of the Nascent Soul Realm all the way up to the Domain Lord Realm!


    Feng Chen suddenly felt a bit depressed when he felt his own cultivation at the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ And he had just been so happy that he managed to go directly from the seventh stage to the ninth stage¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out a depressed sigh upon thinking about this, Feng Chen soon shook his head.


    No use thinking aboutparing myself to someone like that, I will only end up disappointed in my own progress¡­ At least the Flying Sword Sect is stronger! With Elder Xuan now at the Domain Lord Realm, we will also be able to easily deal with those damned people from the Raging me Sect!


    Thinking about this, Feng Chen felt a rush of excitement as he thought about finally being able to get revenge on the Raging me Sect and taking back their spirit stone mine.


    Feeling jealous over Xuan Hao breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm was of no use and Feng Chen did not want to go down that route either.


    Shu Yao watched him lost in thought from the side and a small smile appeared on the corners of her lips as she understood the thought process Feng Chen was going through even without him saying anything.


    Feng Chen was indeed a great sect master, even if he was not the strongest in the Flying Sword Sect any longer, Shu Yao clearly knew that Feng Chen would put his all into making sure that the Flying Sword Sect was safe and continued to grow even stronger in the future.


    Compared to some other sect masters out there, that did their best to make sure that nobody in the sect grew stronger than themselves and could potentially pose a threat to their position.


    Other than that, such sect masters would also channel all of the sect''s precious resources into themselves to further increase their own cultivation.


    When she had been out travelling around the Sky Empire in the past, Shu Yao had heard many of such cases from her group of friends.


    In some cases, the elders or even sect masters, would even kill off the good seedlings to ensure they could keep their own position intact!


    Shu Yao failed to understand how such sects could ever grow stronger or bigger than they already were in the first ce, and it was also one of the reasons why she had ended up wanting to merge with the Flying Sword Sect over other and stronger sects¡­ Well, stronger than them in the past¡­


    With someone like Xuan Hao supporting the sect and Feng Chen leading the sect, Shu Yao felt her desire to convince Feng Chen about merging the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect grow even more!

 Chapter 248: Future Merger Between the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect

    <h4>Chapter 248: Future Merger Between the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect</h4>


    "So how was the idea I presented earlier¡­? Don''t you think merging the Spring Flower Sect and the Flying Sword Sect together is a great idea!?"


    Unknowingly, Shu Yao was already standing right besides Feng Chen as she pulled him back from whatever he was currently thinking about while looking over in the direction where Xuan Hao had broken through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Hm? Ah! Are you even sure that the rest of the Spring Flower Sect will agree to go along with what you said¡­? Don''t forget how you left the Spring Flower Sect back then to run away and adventure through the Sky Empire¡­"


    Turning around and looking towards Shu Yao with a doubtful look on his face, Feng Chen stated his doubts regarding the merger between the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect.


    He knew very well that Shu Yao had only returned to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom a few years ago and had not participated much at all when it came to the responsibilities of a sect master. Letting her elders do most of the work for her as she just did whatever she wanted¡­ In some way, she was quite simr to Zu Fei¡­


    "Haha, you don''t need to worry about that at all! Don''t forget that the Flying Sword Sect has a Domain Lord Realm Expert now! Even if they wanted to resist it in the past, now I''m one hundred percent sure that they will agree with it! And it''s not like the Flying Sword Sect has a bad reputation or anything along that line, we have worked together quite a lot in the past after all¡­"


    Laughing fearlessly at Feng Chen''s doubts, Shu Yao hit herself on the chest as she proudly proimed this.


    At first, she had indeed felt that some of the elders would resist the merger between the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect, but this all changed after Xuan Hao broke through and reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    No matter what, the elders of the Spring Flower Sect would not resist bing a part of a sect with such a strong person behind it! Especially given the fact that it was the Flying Sword Sect, that they had been on friendly terms with for several hundred years.


    Even if the friendly rtionship started out between Shu Yao, Feng Chen and Zu Fei, it had slowly developed to the point that the elders of both sects knew each other well and even met up from time to time.


    The fact that the Flying Sword Sect had a lot of powerful female disciples and elders also helped with this.


    Female cultivators, especially strong ones, were considered quite rare in the cultivation world. Most of the time, the sects and kingdoms were filled with elderly men, middle aged men and so on¡­


    This was also one of the reasons why so many sects from the surrounding kingdoms, even sects stronger than the Spring Flower Sect, wanted to merge together with them¡­


    It was hard for male cultivators, especially strong ones, to find a daopanion who was at the same realm as them¡­


    "I see¡­ If you can truly convince your elders to the merger, I am more than happy enough to agree with it! With both our sects merging together, we would also be able to expand our influence and begin setting up branches in the surrounding kingdoms after stabilizing. Ah! We would also need to find a ce to construct the new sect¡­ This ce is way too small and won''t be able to house the sudden influx of disciples and elders, I think the Spring Flower Sect should be the same. Other than that, we also¡­"


    The moment he got a confirmation that Shu Yao could get the merger agreed on her side, Feng Chen began to describe his ns with a certain shine in his eyes as he seemed to havepletely forgotten the world around him.


    Even the fact that Xuan Hao had reached the Domain Lord Realm seemed to fade from his mind as Shu Yao smiled helplessly while watching hime up with all sorts of ns to further expand the power of the sect after merging together with the Spring Flower Sect.


    She even manged to hear a few ns on how to pay back the Raging me Sect¡­ And they were quite¡­ Colourful¡­


    "Hah¡­ I''m starting to feel a bit bad for the Raging me Sect¡­"


    Mumbling this to herself as she looked out in the distance, Shu Yao could already imagine the fate of the Raging me Sect¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time that Shu Yao and Feng Chen were going over the merger between the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect, the rest of the Flying Sword Sect momentarily entered a sect wide panic as the disciples all turned to look in the direction of the mountain range where Xuan Hao had broken through.


    The elders could somewhat gauge the fact that the aura stemmed from someone above the Nascent Soul Realm and ended uping to somewhat the same conclusion that the sect master had arrived at first. The only difference being the fact that they thought it was someone from the Sky Empire returning from the secret realm instead of going to the secret realm.


    This in turn helped them rx a bit as they quickly went to calm down the disciples and had them return back to their lessons,bat practice and other activities.


    Like this, the Flying Sword Sect slowly returned to its former peaceful state and the disciples eagerly discussed what had happened at the mountain range a few hundred miles away from the sect.


    Some thought it was a great expert that had encountered a demonic cultivator and had ended up killing him. Resulting in the expert''s aura leaking out into the surroundings.


    Others thought that it might have been an entric expert that released his aura for fun while passing by to scare them on purpose and have a goodugh.


    All in all, the disciple were not too worried about it as life in the Flying Sword Sect soon returned to normal.

 Chapter 249: Hidden Observation Post

    <h4>Chapter 249: Hidden Observation Post</h4>


    Standing mid-air above the mountain range, Xuan Hao looked out at the area surrounding the mountain range as he reigned in his aurapletely. Making him look like an ordinary person who had not even taken their first step on the path of cultivation yet.


    This looked extremely out of ce given the fact that he was floating by himself mid-air without any form of artifact to hold him up.


    Even a random Qi Condensation cultivator would easily be able to tell that he was deliberately hiding his cultivation realm and aura.


    "Hah¡­ I never expected for my breakthrough to cause such argemotion. Looks like hiding the fact that I broke through to the Domain Lord Realm for long will be impossible¡­"


    Looking down at the nearby mountains that had beenpletely ravaged by his pseudo sword domain going out of control earlier, Xuan Hao could not help by smile wryly to himself.


    Other than that, Xuan Hao had spread out his divine sense to scan his surroundings and quickly found a small town located a dozen miles away from him on the other side of the mountain range leading away from the Flying Sword Sect.


    From such a close distance, Xuan Hao was almost certain that the people in the town had seen the scene of his pseudo sword domain destroying arge part of the mountain range located close by¡­


    Soon, tales of what they had seen would begin to spread across the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­


    "No use hiding it anyway¡­ For now, I should go back and inform the others about it, though I doubt that they didn''t sense themotion happening so close to the sect¡­"


    Shaking his head when he thought about this, Xuan Hao quickly flew back towards the Flying Sword Sect by himself without the use of his sword.


    The feeling of flying by himself was truly one of a kind.


    In the future, he hoped that his three disciples and the rest of the Flying Sword Sect would be able to try something so wonderful and fun as well.


    ¡­


    "Hm?"


    On his way back towards the sect, Xuan Hao suddenly froze in ce as he turned to look towards a small forest located around 50 miles away from the Flying Sword Sect.


    The reason why he came to a stop, was due to the fact that his divine sense barely managed to pick up? a small group of people sneaking around inside of the forest as they tried their best to conceal their auras, but this was far from enough to hide from him.


    On the other hand, Xuan Hao felt a bit surprised that he only barely managed to find them after having reached the Domain Lord Realm! Back when he was still in the Nascent Soul Realm, he had passed through this same area on the way over towards the mountain range where he made his breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    But back then, he did not manage to spot the small group of people hiding inside of the forest. This truly stood to testament for how strong their concealment method was!


    Maybe it also had something to do with the fact that his pseudo sword domain was going out of control, and he did not really pay any attention to his surroundings back when he rushed over to the mountain range¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao hid his presencepletely as he slowly began descending down towards the group of people hidden inside the small forest.


    For them to be hiding so close to the Flying Sword Sect¡­ They were most likely monitoring the situation of the sect.


    But why? And who did they belong to? Daring to move so close to the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    It had to be known that even if the other sects and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had people monitoring the Flying Sword Sect, they would never dare to move as close as the group in the small forest had¡­


    Whoosh~


    Sneakily making his way through the forest, Xuan Hao soon spotted the small group of people chatting with each other inside a tent that was located inside a concealment formation of some sort¡­


    ¡­


    "What the heck was that earlier!? We have to report it as soon as those damnedmunication talismans begin working again!"


    A scared voice sounded out inside of the tent as a woman in her early thirties looked at the other people sitting together with her around a round table as they were in the process of discussing what had happened just moments ago.


    "Indeed, if I''m not wrong, it should be the aura of someone in the Domain Lord realm¡­ But why would someone like that show up here!? If they are from the Sky Empire and manage to find us¡­"


    Saying thest part, a robust looking man around the same age as the woman spoke up as his face drained of colour as he thought about their current rtionship with the people from the Sky Empire.


    "Calm down both of you! This formation was set up by one of the elders and even someone in the Domain Lord Realm would have a hard time finding it without specifically looking for it! For now, we should just continue our job and keep an eye on the Flying Sword Sect, if that person returns, we will report it back to the elders. No need to trouble them over something like a Domain Lord from the Sky Empire showing up¡­"


    An older looking man who seemed like the leader of the group narrowed his eyes as he said this. Calming down both the woman and robust looking man in the process.


    "But that person has not shown up for at least 800 years and is most likely dead already¡­ Why do we still need to stay around and keep an eye on the Flying Sword Sect¡­?"


    Among the group, the youngest andst person in the group spoke up as she looked towards the leader with a questioning look in her eyes. Clearly not too happy about the fact that she was currently stationed to monitor the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Hah¡­ No matter what, that person was deemed to be extremely dangerous, and the elders still fear that person making aeback in the future¡­ But with so much time passing, I guess we will soon be recalled¡­"


    Letting out a sigh as he looked over the young woman, the leader could not help but agree with her, but in the end, he was unable to go against the elder''s decision and could only remain observing the movements of the Flying Sword Sect and look out for that person¡­


    "Really!?"


    "Yeah, I don''t think they want to waste any more resources keeping this concealment formation running all year round and I heard rumours that the recent fight for power back home is getting more and more intense with each passing day¡­ Apparently, they want to recall everyone inside the Sky Empire looking out for that person¡­"


    Nodding his head, the leader exined with a serious look on his face as the three others listened attentively with a happy expression on their faces.


    No matter what, they did not want to remain inside the territory of the Sky Empire any longer!


    They had already stayed inside the small concealment formation and the small tent for 10 years!


    If they were not cultivators, they would have long since gone insane from staying in such a small space for such a long time! Not to mention that they hadn''t eaten anything during these 10 years, surviving only with the help of their cultivation!

 Chapter 250: Back at the Flying Sword Sect

    <h4>Chapter 250: Back at the Flying Sword Sect</h4>


    Listing to the group of four as he hovered above the concealment formation covering the tent that they were currently inside of, Xuan Hao did not do anything as he felt himself suddenly bing confused.


    They were here to monitor the Flying Sword Sect to see if a certain person appeared. Even more confusing, that person disappeared 800 years ago and had apparently not showed up since then!


    Not only that, but they were looking for this person across the entire Sky Empire at once and seemed to be at odds with them!


    Xuan Hao suddenly felt reluctant to move against the group of four people.


    Not matter what, for someone to be at odds with the Sky Empire¡­ That would mean they were at least had a simr amount of strength!


    Xuan Hao did not really feel like going against a power at the same level as the Sky Empire with his current strength¡­


    The group of four also talked about them being recalled soon due to some infighting. So, with this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to just keep an eye on the group of four before they left.


    In the future when he was stronger, he would personally look into who this group of people belonged to and why they were monitoring the Flying Sword Sect.


    Maybe the person they were looking for had something to do with the Flying Sword Sect?


    The person they were looking for just so happened to disappear around the same time that the founder of the Flying Sword Sect disappeared¡­


    "No use thinking about this for now¡­ Even Feng Chen has no clue about the Founders background or where he came from¡­"


    Shaking his head as he slowly ascended into the sky, Xuan Hao cast onest look towards the small observation post that was hidden inside of the small forest before making his way back towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    After returning, he woulde back and keep an eye on them until they left! From what he had heard, they would most likely leave after the lower qualitymunication talismans could be used again.


    Given that the secret realm had already been around for quite a bit by now, Xuan Hao felt that it would at most take a week before that happened.


    ¡­


    Leaving behind the small group of four, Xuan Hao soon arrived back in the Flying Sword Sect as he quickly spread out his divine sense and found out that Feng Chen had already left seclusion.


    Through his divine sense, Xuan Hao could clearly feel his aura had grown far more stablepared to when he first came over to find him after returning to the Flying Sword Sect with Bai Ning a few days ago.


    Other than that, Xuan Hao also picked up all sorts of dubious stories from the disciples of the sect as they talked about the cause for the earliermotion¡­


    Whoosh~


    Disappearing from the spot he was standing in, Xuan Hao tried to erase some of the stories he heard as he soon appeared at the ce where both Shu Yao and Feng Chen were talking with each other without any of them noticing anything.


    "¡­ So, after that, I think we should make a move against the Raging me Sect together! What do you think?"


    "Hm¡­ It is indeed a good idea, and we would be able to deal with those troublesome people all at once¡­"


    "Ahm!"


    Still lost in their own conversation, Xuan Hao made a fake cough as both of them instantly turned around ready for a fight.


    ""Elder Xuan!""


    It was only when both of them recognized Xuan Hao that they calmed down and smiled happily as they quickly made their way over to him.


    "Was themotion earlier you doing? Did you really break through to the Domain Lord Realm!?"


    Feng Chen was the first among the two of them that stepped forward as he asked this with a certain level of excitement and expectation in his voice. No matter what, Feng Chen could not believe what Shu Yao had told him before hearing it personally from the person himself.


    "Yes, it was me that caused themotion earlier on. To be honest, I did not expect that it would be so spectacr when breaking through into the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    Nodding his heard in confirmation, Xuan Hao felt a bit embarrassed when he remembered all the stories that the disciples were making up about the earliermotion.


    Why would someone in the Domain Lord Realm release his aura just to scare a random sect that he passed by for fun¡­?


    "Congrattions on your breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, Core Elder Xuan¡­! Even though, I do feel a bit awkward now that your cultivation is above mine, yet your status is still below me¡­"


    Congratting him with a happy face, Feng Chen''s face soon became a bit troubled as he mentioned thest part.


    "Haha, no need to worry about it, I did not join the Flying Sword Sect to acquire a high standing or something along that line¡­ Just being able to train those few disciples of mine and cultivating in peace is more than enough for me."


    "Hah¡­ I guess that is fine¡­"


    Shaking his head after hearing what Xuan Hao said, Feng Chen no longer pursued the issue of increasing Xuan Hao''s position in the sect.


    Xuan Hao was also happy about this. After all, the only positions above a core elder were the sect master and vice sect master! Which would require him to put forth effort to manage the sect!


    Compared to how carefree he was as a core elder; Xuan Hao had no n to ept a ''promotion'' from the sect master and have to manage the Flying Sword Sect.


    Staying as a carefree Core Elder was the most ideal path for him!


    Seeing that Feng Chen was finished speaking, Shu Yao finally stepped forward with an evil look on her face


    "Now that Elder Xuan is here as well¡­ How about we discuss what to do next together with him? The rest of the sects in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom should not know about Elder Xuan bing a Domain Lord yet and we could use this to our advantage to deal with the Raging me Sect once and for all¡­. After all, if they know that the Flying Sword Sect, has someone in the Domain Lord Realm, they are sure to scatter in all directions trying to escape¡­"


    "¡­"


    Both Xuan Hao and Feng Chen looked at each other and did not know what to say after hearing Shu Yao. For some reason, the current look on Shu Yao''s face felt really scary¡­


    Was the Raging me Sect not their enemy¡­ Howe Shu Yao looked like she suddenly had a life and death grudge with them¡­?

 Chapter 251: Teaching Bai Ning

    <h4>Chapter 251: Teaching Bai Ning</h4>


    Standing together in front of the Sect Master''s pavilion, Xuan Hao and Feng Chen listened attentively as Shu Yao talked about how they could deal with the Raging me Sect once and for all.


    In the end, it was decided that Xuan Hao would hide his cultivation from the rest of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom for now.


    During the time it would take for Shu Yao and Feng Chen to prepare for their attack against the Raging me Sect and thoroughly deal with them.


    It had to be remembered that the Raging me Sect did not only have their main sect, but also had several branches spread out across the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Dealing with the Raging me Sect, meant dealing with the main sect and all their branches at once to prevent them from escaping and possibly taking revenge in the future.


    The moment it got out that Xuan Hao had reached the Domain Lord Realm, the Raging me Sect was sure to scatter in all directions as they would try their best to run away before he showed up to destroy their sect and different branches!


    "I will hurry back to the Spring Flower Sect and get some of our elders toe and help out, I should be back in around one week or so. We will move out at that time! Me and Feng Chen will handle the branches and Elder Xuan will deal with the main sect by himself!"


    Stating this as a matter of fact, Shu Yao quickly turned around and disappeared into the distance.


    Most likely making her way back towards the Spring Flower Sect as fast as she could.


    "Well, I will return to my pavilion for now and check up with my disciples¡­ By the way, can I trouble you to register a child named Bai Ning as my third disciple for me?"


    "Haha, no problem at all! Something like that is simple, you can leave it to me!"


    Looking at the departing figure of Shu Yao, Xuan Hao remembered that Bai Ning had not been registered as his personal disciple yet and turned to the sect master Feng Chen for assistance, which he was more than happy to provide.


    "That''s great! Thank you for the help, I will be returning to my pavilion for now¡­ I will see you in a week or so when we take action against the Raging me Sect!"


    Bowing his head slightly as a gesture of thanks, Xuan Hao turned around a flew back in the direction of his pavilion under the stunned gaze of the sect master Feng Chen.


    He had clearly not expected to suddenly see Xuan Hao float up into the air as he soon flew away! Due to his shock, he didn''t even get to say anything to him before he had already left¡­


    ¡­


    Making his way back to his pavilion, Xuan Hao used his divine sense to scan over the training ground and discovered that both of his disciples were still sitting in a meditative position. Completely oblivious to the outside world as they remained focused on their cultivation.


    Even the earliermotion caused by him breaking through into the Domain Lord Realm, had not caused them to slip out of their current deep meditation.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt like he would need to personally shake them awake to get them out of their current state. This was of course not something that he would do.


    After all, their cultivation realm was improving by leaps and bounds as their aura continued to grow stronger and more stable with each passing minute.


    "Hm¡­ I should go and check up on Bai Ning and see how he is doing¡­ After helping him reach the Qi Condensation Realm, I wonder how far he has gotten over the past few hours¡­"


    Looking towards his pavilion, Xuan Haonded a few meters away from the entrance as he made his way inside. Moving in the direction of Bai Ning''s room, where he was currently in the process of going through his first ever cultivation session by himself.


    "Hm?"


    Coming to a stop in front of Bai Ning''s room, Xuan Hao could clearly see the scene happening beyond the door through his divine sense as he watched how Bai Ning was trying to absorb the surrounding qi between heaven and earth through the method shown in the cultivation mantra that he had been given.


    "This is¡­ Interesting¡­"


    Deciding not to knock on the door and disturb him, Xuan Hao insteadpletely hid his presence as he entered the room and observed what Bai Ning was doing.


    "Argh! W-what if I try to absorb the qi like this¡­ And¡­ Argh! Not again! Why is it so hard to get the qi to stay in my dantian!?"


    Compared to both Qing Yi and Chu Yang, who had both experienced cultivating before bing his disciples, Bai Ning was different and had never tried doing something like absorbing the qi from heaven and earth before gathering it in his dantian.


    Xuan Hao had left in a hurry earlier due to his pseudo sword domain going out of control and had not managed to exin how he should go about absorbing and storing the qi in his dantian properly.


    All he had really done was help him reach the first stage of the Qi Condensation Realm and show him how to absorb the qi between heaven and earth ording to the Unformed Mantra¡­ He had not gotten to teaching him how to actually store the qi in his dantian and from the looks of it, the Unformed Mantra did not really do so either¡­


    The reason for this was quite simple, as the process of gathering and storing qi in the dantian during the Qi Condensation Realm was mostly the same everywhere and thus was normally not recorded as it was something everyone would normally know about¡­


    Xuan Hao also forgot about this and the fact that Bai Ning had never been introduced to cultivation before in his haste to fix his pseudo sword domain earlier, thus resulting in the current predicament of Bai Ning absorbing the qi between heaven and earth into his dantian. Followed by said qi staying around in his dantian for a few seconds before leaving and returning to nature again.


    "¡­"


    On one hand, the process of him absorbing the qi helped strengthen it and make it purer¡­ Truly a sad sight¡­


    Whoosh~


    Seeing the sight of his disciple helping his surroundings by strengthening the qi and releasing it out into the world again, Xuan Hao quickly left the room as he soon appeared in front of the door leading inside the room.


    Knock Knock


    "W-who is it¡­?"


    Gently knocking on the door two times, Xuan Hao heard the voice of his third disciple Bai Ning echoing out from inside.


    "It''s me!"


    "Master!"


    Listening to Bai Ning stand up before rushing over to open the door as he heard his voice, Xuan Hao could not help but smile a bit to himself upon seeing the young boy appear in front of him full of excitement.


    "H-howe you are here¡­?"


    "Ah, I remembered that I forgot to teach you how to properly keep the qi that you absorb stored inside of your dantian earlier due to something urgenting up all of a sudden, so I came back to finish our lesson from earlier and get you sorted out so you can begin cultivating by yourself!"


    Saying this, Xuan Hao watched the confused look on Bai Ning''s face transform into an understanding one as both of them made their way inside of the room without saying anything.


    "S-so¡­ Master¡­ H-how is it that I keep absorbing the qi between heaven and earth, but whenever I try to store it inside my dantian, it always ends up escaping a few secondster¡­ I really can''t figure out how to do anything about it¡­"


    "Haha, no need to worry so much. Cultivating was never easy in the first ce, and you just started cultivating a few hours ago! Now sit down and I will slowly guide you through it."


    Nodding his head, Bai Ning once again sat back down in a meditative position as he looked up at Xuan Hao waiting for instructions.


    "For now, begin gathering qi like you did before¡­ Yes¡­ Just like this! Now that your qi is inside the dantian, you will first have to create an anchor for it to gather around. The anchor point will act as the centre of qi for your dantian before you reach the Foundation Establishment Realm, I already helped you reach the first stage, so an initial anchor should be present at the centre of the qi you already have inside your dantian! Try to use that as foundation for¡­"


    Guiding Bai Ning along the way as a small spiral of qi slowly appeared in his dantian, Xuan Hao happily observed how Bai Ning''s cultivation began progressing.


    The qi that he absorbed from the surroundings no longer leaked out after a few seconds into the environment, but instead added to the small spiral of qi inside his dantian as it slowly grew bigger.


    All he had to do now was continuously refine and grow the qi spiral inside of his dantian to reach the peak of the Qi Condensation Realm!

 Chapter 252: Devil Immortal Jade Entering the Dantian!

    <h4>Chapter 252: Devil Immortal Jade Entering the Dantian!</h4>


    Leaving behind Bai Ning as he began to cultivate on his own, Xuan Hao once again left the pavilion. Making his way back towards the training ground where both Chu Yang and Qing Yi were currently in the midst of cultivating.


    The aura around both of them had alreadypletely changed, as Xuan Hao watched Qing Yi suddenly open her eyes before looking straight at him with a smile on her face.


    "Congrattions on breaking through!"


    Xuan Hao fully understood why Qing Yi was smiling at the moment, she had just broken through all the way from the third stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm to the Fifth stage!


    Whoosh~


    Waving his hand, Xuan Hao removed the impurities that covered Qing Yi''s entire body from her breakthrough.


    "Thank you master!"


    Standing up and going over to hug Xuan Hao in a show of happiness, Xuan Hao barely managed to dodge to the side as he chuckled upon seeing the confused expression on her face after finding out that her master had dodged her hug.


    "Go back and take a bath, I can only remove the impurities themselves¡­ Not the smell they leave behind!"


    Saying this, Xuan Hao watched Qing Yi show an understanding look before saying something even he could not hear before making her way back towards the pavilion.


    "Congrattions to you as well Chu Yang, it looks like you managed to reach the seventh stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm. You can be considered to be ate-stage Foundation Establishment cultivator by now!"


    Turning to look at Chu Yang still sitting on the ground with a thoughtful look on his face, Xuan Hao waved his hand and removed the impurities that covered his body.


    Seeing that Chu Yang was still not moving after he had removed the impurities that covered his entire body after his breakthrough, Xuan Hao felt that something was wrong as he watched the confused expression on his second disciple''s face.


    "Master¡­"


    "Hm? What is it?"


    Calling out to him, Chu Yang nervously looked over before continuing.


    "It''s just¡­ Earlier, when I broke through to the seventh stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, I suddenly felt something weird happening to the Devil Immortal Jade¡­ I-I don''t know why, but it seems like the jade suddenly got absorbed into my dantian after I broke through¡­!"


    Watching as Chu Yang nervously exined what had happened, Xuan Hao did not really know what to say¡­ He really did not expect that the Devil Immortal Jade that his disciple had stolen from the ck Rose Sect in the past, would end up getting absorbed into his dantian¡­


    "Let me take a look first¡­"


    Not really knowing what he could say, Xuan Hao walked up to Chu Yang and ced his hand on top of him as his divine sense quickly gathered together and entered his body without any resistance.


    Through his divine sense, Xuan Hao soon saw the situation of Chu Yang''s dantian and could not help but smile wryly to himself.


    The Immortal Devil Jade had indeed entered his dantian and not only that, but it had ced itself at the centre of it!


    Chu Yang''s seven foundational pirs circled peacefully around it as a continues stream of qi entered his dantian before reaching the Devil Immortal Jade.


    The Devil Immortal Jade did not keep the qi for itself as it refined the qi into an even purer state before transferring it towards Chu Yang''s seven foundational pirs, further strengthening them in the process¡­


    Scanning the Devil Immortal Jade along with the qi that it had refined and transferred into Chu Yang''s foundational pirs, Xuan Hao could not find anything wrong with it and instead could only acknowledge the fact that the Devil Immortal Jade seemed to be helping his disciple''s cultivation instead of causing any sort of harm to him.


    Xuan Hao felt a bit bewildered when he realized this, as he had thought the Devil Immortal Jade''s only use was to summon some demon like the ck Rose Sect had intended to use it for¡­


    But now it looked like the Devil Immortal Jade had another use as well¡­ And that was to increase someone''s speed of cultivation!


    "It looks like it is only helping you with your cultivation, you don''t need to worry about it."


    Retracting his divine sense from his dantian, Xuan Hao informed the nervous looking Chu Yang with a confident look on his face.


    No matter what, he did not see the Devil Immortal Jade causing any harm to Chu Yang¡­ On the contrary, Xuan Hao felt a slight tinge of jealousy after seeing how useful the Devil Immortal Jade was in purifying the qi that it absorbed¡­


    "Really!? That''s great!"


    Smiling happily after hearing his master inform him about this, Chu Yang felt a wave of tion roll over him.


    He had already realized how useful the Devil Immortal Jade was for his cultivation after absorbing it into his dantian, but it was after all somethinging from a demonic sect, so he was still cautious about it and decided to ask his master if there was something wrong with it before he truly began to use it.


    Hearing that there was nothing wrong with the jade, Chu Yang clearly knew that his cultivation would improve by leaps and bounds in the future with its assistance!


    Whoosh~


    "Argh!"


    Not expecting for Chu Yang tounch at him and hug him out of happiness like Qing Yi had done, Xuan Hao was caught off guard as a terrible smell suddenly invaded his nostrils, causing him to almost throw up on the stop.


    "Go back and take a bath like Qing Yi!"


    Pushing the happy Chu Yang away, Xuan Hao quickly informed him before disappearing from the training ground.


    His two disciples were quite eager to hug him today and he did not dare to return to the pavilion before both of them had taken a bath!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to check up on the two Wang brothers¡­ It had been quite some time since he hadst seen the two of them and from what he had learned, one of them had even taken in that Lu Wen as a disciple.


    Xuan Hao was curious how far that guy had grown, he was after all quite talented as well¡­

 Chapter 253: Lu Wen, Talent Increase!

    <h4>Chapter 253: Lu Wen, Talent Increase!</h4>


    Making his way over towards the ce where he had sensed the aura of Elder Wang Hu, Xuan Hao thought about what he should do in the future to strengthen the Flying Sword Sect even more. After all, if he wanted to live a peaceful life, strengthening the Flying Sword Sect would be a good idea.


    The stronger the Flying Sword Sect became, the less he would have to step in and help out from time to time.


    Remembering that he still had four purification pills left in his possession, Xuan Hao went over who he should give them to. Given that he had already used one and it was useless for him to use one again.


    The first choice that came into mind was his three disciples, but upon thinking more about it, Xuan Hao realized that they would not be able to truly make use of the purification pill before at least reaching the peak of the Core Formation Realm¡­ So, Xuan Hao quickly excluded them.


    It was not that he did not want Chu Yang, Qing Yi and Bai Ning''s strength to increase, it was just that it would take way too long before they reached the peak of the Core Formation Realm, and he might even have gotten something better for them at that point in time.


    In the end, Xuan Hao decided to use the purification pills to help increase the strength of the Flying Sword Sect¡­ The question that just remained was¡­


    Who should he give the purification pills to¡­?


    The sect master was a given as he was the second strongest in the Flying Sword Sect outside of himself.


    Shu Yao from the Spring Flower Sect was also a good option as the two sects would soon merge together and with the help of the purification pill, Xuan Hao thought that she might even have a chance at reaching the Domain Lord Realm!


    Having another Domain Lord to support the sect would surely allow the strength of the Flying Sword Sect to reach another level all together.


    One could stay back and defend while the other would be able to leave without fearing another power with a Domain Lord Realm Expert taking advantage of their absence to attack the sect.


    Xuan Hao felt that it would be perfect if he could end up as the Domain Lord Realm Expert that remained inside the sect to hold down the fort for them¡­


    But even if he decided to give two purification pills away like that, there were still another two left¡­


    "Hm¡­ What about the Wang brothers? Maybe even Chi Hu and Zhi Ruo¡­?"


    Thinking about the other Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the Flying Sword Sect as he slowly floated down andnded in front of Elder Wang Hu''s pavilion.


    "This is? Elder Song¡­?"


    Sensing the familiar presence, Xuan Hao opened his eyes as he instantly decided who the third purification pill was going towards.


    From the aura of Elder Song, Xuan Hao could clearly feel that he was just a single step away from the Nascent Soul Realm!


    If he used the purification pill, Xuan Hao was sure that the Flying Sword Sect would be able to gain another Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    This way, Elder Song would also be able to stay along for a longer period of time¡­ After all, Core Formation Experts could at most live up to 300 years and Elder Song was getting quite close to the limit.


    Losing him would be a great loss to the Flying Sword Sect. Having him be a Nascent Soul Realm Expert and take over the Vice Sect Master position would be a great boost to the Flying Sword Sects strength.


    At the same time, the elders and disciples that looked up to him would also be filled with admiration and might even increase the spirit and productivity of the entire sect as a result!


    If Shu Yao did not manage to reach the Domain Lord Realm with the use of the purification pill, Xuan Hao was certain that Elder Song would be the best use of a purification pill.


    "Then, who to give thest purification pill to¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he stood lost in thought in front of the entrance to Elder Wang Hu''s pavilion, Xuan Hao did not notice a disciple walking over from the distance as he approached him from behind.


    "Greetings elder! Are you here to see master¡­?"


    Hearing the voice of a young boy echoing out from behind him, Xuan Hao stopped thinking about who to give thest purification pill to.


    "Yes¡­ Hm¡­ Are you perhaps Lu Wen? I remember seeing you in a past tournament, if I''m not wrong you decided to breakthrough during the battle back then¡­?"


    Nodding his head in response to the young boy''s question, Xuan Hao quickly recognized him as Lu Wen from the neer tournament that Qing Yi had been a part of in the past.


    From the looks of it, he had be a disciple of Wang Hu.


    Xuan Hao did not really have much to say about him bing the disciple of a Core Elder. Lu Wen was talented and would surely grow into a pir of the Flying Sword Sect in the future!


    The only thing that surprised him was the boy''s cultivation realm.


    Eighth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    How in the world did this guy cultivate, even his strongest disciple was way more talented but was still only at the seventh stage!


    "Natural talent¡­ 35!?"


    If he did not remember wrongly, his talent was only at 23 back then¡­ It had grown by 12!


    Xuan Hao suddenly began regretting not taking him in as his disciple back then¡­


    Looks like I should not give the purification pill to Wang Hu¡­


    "Y-yes, that is me. Let me show you inside and find master for you!"


    Embarrassedly looking up at Xuan Hao upon hearing him mention his breakthrough during the neer tournament, Lu Wen awkwardly opened the door as he led Xuan Hao inside before quickly disappearing.


    Not knowing that he had cost his master a valuable chance to increase his cultivation¡­

 Chapter 254: Elder Song Seeking Help!

    <h4>Chapter 254 - Elder Song Seeking Help!</h4>


    Entering the pavilion, Xuan Hao soon came to a stop in front of the entrance to the inner section of the pavilion together with Lu Wen.


    "I-I will go and inform master, please wait here for a moment!"


    Saying this, Lu Wen entered through the door and walked deeper inside the pavilion beforeing to a stop in front of the room where Xuan Hao could sense the aura of both Elder Song and Elder Wang Hu.


    "Hm¡­ I do wonder what Elder Song is doing here¡­"


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao found a nearby bench located in the hallway and sat down waiting for Lu Wen to return.


    ¡­


    A little before Xuan Hao had shown up at the pavilion, Elder Song had just made his way over there as he was looking for Elder Wang Hu.


    With the help of Chi Hu, he had managed to get the different requests sorted out way quicker than he had originally expected, and the Sect Master had also just returned to take charge of things again, thus resulting in the requests looking to invite him to all sorts of events stopping.


    Having gained some free time for once, Elder Song made his way over towards the pavilion of his old friend, Core Elder Wang Hu.


    "Hm? Old Song, why are you here¡­?"


    The moment he had arrived at the pavilion, Wang Hu was leisurely enjoying a bite to eat under a blooming apple tree just besides the pavilion.


    "Haha, how can you call me old when you are older than me? And I''m just here to ask for your help¡­ It is about the increase in staff for the management of the sect, I hope that you would help me convince the Sect Master to send a few more elders my way to help out with things now that Zu Fei is¡­ Well¡­ Zu Fei¡­"


    Not trying to dodge the question in the slightest, Elder Song answered without concealing his reason for showing up.


    "Indeed¡­ I did hear you were overworked once again thisst week during the Sect Master''s closed door cultivation session¡­"


    Putting on a thoughtful look while saying this, Wang Hu stood up and walked over to Elder Song.


    At the same time, a servant also appeared and quickly cleaned up the remaining food and other things still left on the table that Wang Hu had been sitting at a few seconds ago.


    "Why don''t we head inside and discuss this first¡­? I should be able to help you out to some extent¡­"


    Standing beside Elder Song, Wang Hu remained respectful towards the elderly man as he invited him inside his pavilion.


    "Haha, then I hope you don''t mind."


    Smiling happily after hearing this, Elder Song already knew that Wang Hu would help him out. Now all that he needed to do, was try and get him to agree to help get as many elders to help him out as possible!


    Like this, Elder Song and Wang Hu both entered the pavilion to further discuss about the matter of sending more elders over to help out Elder Song with the overall management of the sect.


    It had to be known, that Elder Song was in charge of manging most aspects of the Flying Sword Sect, be it events for the younger generation and new disciples to the transport of goods and other essential resources.


    His importance in the Flying Sword Sect was no less than a Core Elder and to some extent, even more important to the overall function of the sect on a day-to-day basis.


    Knock Knock


    It was just when they had begun discussing how many elders they would try and convince the Sect Master to send over, that a quiet knocking sound from the door interrupted them.


    "Hm¡­? Who is it?"<i> The source of this content is [ f r e e w e b n o v e l. c o m ]</i>


    "Ah, it is just one of my disciples, I will be right back!"


    Hearing what Wang Hu said, Elder Song watched as he made his way over towards the door and began talking with a young boy around 15 or so years of age.


    Elder Song did not mind this at all and just sat down in a nearby chair and patiently waited for Wang Hu to sort out things with his disciple.


    "What did you say!? Go back and send him in immediately!"


    Hearing Wang Hu suddenly raise his voice, Elder Song felt a bit surprised as he curiously looked over towards the entrance of the room where the young boy quickly turned around and made his way over towards the entrance of the pavilion.


    Perhaps another core elder showed up¡­? Could it be his brother?


    Thinking this, Elder Song smiled a bit to himself, if he could convince another core elder to help him¡­ The sect master would surely give in to his demands and send a few more elders over to help him out!


    Maybe he could even get the new core elder Chi Hu to help him out some more in the future¡­ He learned quite quickly and was also goodpany¡­


    ¡­


    "Elder Xuan, master said that you can enter! Follow me and I will lead you to where master is at!"


    Sitting down at the bench covered in a soft fabric, Xuan Hao watched Lu Wen run over from the inside of the pavilion with a serious look on his face as he told him this.


    "Okay, you can just lead the way."


    Not wanting to make things more difficult for Lu Wen, Xuan Hao stood up from thefortable bench and followed behind Lu Wen as both of them made their way deeper into the pavilion of Elder Wang Hu together.


    Walking through the pavilion, Xuan Hao noticed something quite interesting about the pavilion as he observed how there were several different people along the way towards the ce where Wang Hu and Elder Song were waiting.


    Compared to his own pavilion that was empty most of the time, Wang Hu''s pavilion was filled with both disciples and servants walking all over the ce as he even spotted a few elders walking around the ce.


    Of course, these elders were not normal elders but were instead some of Wang Hu''s older disciples that had be elders of the sect at this point in time.


    The difference between his own pavilion and Wang Hu''s was truly easy to see. Not that Xuan Hao was envious of it or anything¡­


    After all, with so many people around, Xuan Hao doubted he would be able live his ideal peaceful life¡­


    "We are here!"


    Lost in thought as he watched the different people passing by, Lu Wen''s voice brought him back to reality as they came to a stop in front of a well decorated door located towards the centre of the pavilion.


    Reaching forward with his divine sense, Xuan Hao could sense the aura of both Elder Song and Wang Hu just beyond the door.. One of them standing close to the door, while the other was sitting down somewhere further inside the room.

 Chapter 255: Excited Wang Hu and Elder Song

    <h4>Chapter 255: Excited Wang Hu and Elder Song</h4>


    "Come in."


    Before Lu Wen could even reach out his hand to knock on the door, a deep voice sounded out from behind the door.


    "You can just leave; I will be fine on my own from here on."


    Seeing Lu Wen who had frozen for a short moment after hearing the voice, Xuan Hao smiled kindly at him as he opened the door and entered the room. Leaving behind Lu Wen, who still had no idea how his master knew they had already arrived.


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out a sigh as he watched the door slowly close in front of him after Xuan Hao entered, Lu Wen no longer thought about it before he turned around and made his way back towards his own room.


    As Elder Xuan had said, he should just leave and let the elders do whatever they were going to do, there was no need for a disciple like himself to hang around for any longer.


    ¡­


    "Elder Xuan, what is the reason for this surprise visit? Not that it''s unwee in any way, I just did not expect for you of all people to suddenly show up without any prior notice."


    "No worries, I just came here because I heard that Elder Song had been spotted going over here and I had something to talk to him about¡­"


    Walking over to greet him the moment he entered the room, Xuan Hao greeted Wang Hu before turning to nce over in the direction of Elder Song sitting a little further inside the room.


    Given that he had already decided to not give one of the purification pills to Wang Hu, Xuan Hao did not mention the fact that he had wanted to give something to him as well.


    The fact that Elder Song was here as well, was quite convenient for him, as it at least gave him a reason to show up now that he no longer nned to give him a purification pill¡­


    "Hm? Why are you looking for me, Elder Xuan? Do you perhaps need my help with something? Perhaps there was a dy in delivering the monthly batch of spirit stones to your pavilion?"


    Clearly not having any idea why Xuan Hao would be looking for him, Elder Song tilted his head to the side as he asked in a curious voice. The only real reason he could think of being him needing his help or there being a dy in regard to delivery of different essential materials for cultivation, like spirit stones.


    "Haha, not anything like that! Actually, I found something that might be helpful for increasing your cultivation realm during myst trip outside and wanted to talk to you about it, there might even be a chance that you could breakthrough and reach the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    "What!? Really?! What is it?!"


    Elder Song was not the one to suddenly scream loudly upon hearing what he said. Instead, it was Wang Hu, who had rushed over and began shaking him with an excited look on his face.


    For some reason, Wang Hu seemed way more excited than Elder Song when it came to Elder Song breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    "Y-yes, calm down for a moment first Elder Wang!"


    Shaking off the excited Wang Hu, Xuan Hao quickly reminded him to calm down as the robust looking man let go and blushed a bit in embarrassment at his behaviour unbefitting of someone his age or status.


    Stop! I don''t want to see a robust looking middle-aged man blush like that!


    "So, Elder Xuan, are you really sure that the thing you found would be able to help me breakthrough¡­?"


    Already standing up from his chair, Elder Song''s eyes shone with both hope and excitement while looking towards Xuan Hao.


    Breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm would not only increase his strength but would also increase his lifespan from 300 years to 2000 years!


    Given that he was already at the end of his 300-year lifespan as a Core Formation Expert, there was nothing Elder Song wanted more than to breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm!


    It had to be known that the reason why most people began cultivating in the first ce, was with the dream of one day bing immortal and never aging or bing stronger.


    Elder Song was no different and also wanted to live a longer life.


    300 years was a long time, but when the time truly came, Elder Song felt unwilling to let it just end like that. Now Xuan Hao had a way to help him breakthrough, it was easy to imagine how grateful Elder Song felt at the moment.


    Not everyone had such an opportunity like Elder Song and when someone reached the end of their lifespan, they would grow more and more desperate for a way to breakthrough and be able to live longer.


    This was also the biggest reason why someone might end up joining a church or falling to the demonic path and be a demonic cultivator.


    Both the churches and the demonic path offered a way to quickly increase one''s strength¡­ In turn, this had resulted in most members of both paths being more towards the older generation¡­


    "Yes, I''m certain that it will be able to help you!"


    Answering Elder Song with a confident look on his face, Xuan Hao watched as Elder Song looked like he was about to jump up and down like an excited child.


    Breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm!


    There was nothing Elder Song hoped for more than that and after breaking through, he would most likely rece Zu Fei as the Vice Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect.


    This way, the Flying Sword Sect would also be more stable in the future¡­


    "Well¡­ Elder Xuan, I guess I won''t hold you two here for any longer. Seeing as Old Song here is would most likely want to get started as soon as possible¡­ And Elder Song, I think you should be able to get some more assistance without my help if you seed in reaching the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    Watching Elder Song, Wang Hu grinned happily at the scene of the elderly man acting like a child before saying this.


    He hoped that Elder Song would be sessful with Xuan Hao''s help and reach the Nascent Soul Realm.

 Chapter 256: Doubt of an Old Elder

    <h4>Chapter 256: Doubt of an Old Elder</h4>


    "Indeed, I think Elder Song is looking forward to it and won''t be able to stay still in here for much longer¡­"


    ncing over at the excited Elder Song, Xuan Hao had to agree with what Wang Hu said.


    "Well, it was only a short encounter, but it looks like me and Elder Song will be taking out leave first."


    "Haha, no need to worry about it! Just go on your way, if Elder Song can really reach the Nascent Soul Realm, I will be more than happy!"


    Before Elder Song managed to recover from the shock of finding out that he might be able to reach the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao had already dragged him out of Wang Hu''s pavilion and was making his way down the mountain it was located on.


    "So¡­ Elder Song, where would you like to go to attempt your breakthrough¡­?"


    It was only when he heard Xuan Hao say this to him, that he slowly woke up and realized that he wasn''t dreaming!


    He truly had a chance to reach the Nascent Soul Realm! And he was about to attempt a breakthrough!?


    "M-my courtyard-"


    Things were moving a bit too fast for Elder Song, and he barely managed to answer Xuan Hao''s question as the scenery in front of him suddenly blurred before he found himself directly in front of the ce, he called home.


    The courtyard was far from beingparable to the magnificent pavilions that Xuan Hao or Wang Hu lived in, but it was stillrge and had everything that one could wish for when living a peaceful life.


    To be honest, Xuan Hao felt a bit jealous when he saw the peaceful and serene courtyard of Elder Song in front of him. This was what Xuan Hao would consider an ideal home!


    "Where do you normally cultivate¡­?"


    Remembering to get a peaceful courtyard like the one Elder Song had in the future, Xuan Hao returned back to the thing that he hade for in the first ce. Helping Elder Song breakthrough and reach the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Hm¡­ I normally just cultivate in my personal quarters¡­ Would that be fine¡­?"


    "Yeah, that should be fine."


    Thinking about it for a moment before answering, Xuan Hao Nodded his head in agreement as both of them made their way inside of the courtyard.


    Hopefully, Elder Song would be able to breakthrough and reach the Nascent Soul Realm with the help of the purification pill¡­


    ¡­


    "The person sent over by the Azure Sky Kingdom will be showing up soon!"


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was going about helping Elder Song ensure a safe breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm, the elders of the Raging me Sect were getting prepared to meet someone from the Azure Sky Kingdom before letting their people walk through their sect into the territory of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "Are we really going to do this¡­? The Sect Master is not even here to authorize something like this! I think we should wait for the Sect Master to return before agreeing to anything!"


    One of the elders looking like he already had one step into the grave stepped forward and said this as the surrounding elders of the Raging me Sect began talking with each other.


    No matter what, the Raging me Sect was about to betray the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and allow a foreign enemy to walk through their territory to attack them.


    The Heavenly Sky Kingdom would definitely retaliate in the future when they got the chance to do so¡­ At that time, the Raging me Sect would not be having a good time¡­


    "Heh¡­ That is only if there is any Heavenly Sky Kingdom left in the future! And even if they manage to survive the attack, the Azure Sky Kingdom agreed to allow us to join under them! At that time, we would be able to get the territory we lost back!"


    "Not only that! Don''t forget that the Azure Sky Kingdom promised us that they would help us with destroying the Flying Sword Sect after they finished off their war with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!"


    Not able to say anything as the two people who stood up to fight against his im to think things through before joining the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    The two people in question were the Vice Sect Master who was only second to the Sect Master in terms of strength and another elder who had been his rival since his younger days in the Raging me Sect¡­


    "Fine¡­ But I still think we should take some more time before agreeing to let the Azure Sky Kingdom walk through our sect and make an enemy of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!"


    Not wanting to stay together with the other elders as he felt himself being ostracized after giving his opinion on the subject.


    "About-"


    "The person send over by the Azure Sky Kingdom has arrived!"


    Just as the elder that had been at odds with the disagreeable was about to say something to cause him trouble, a young elder ran over from the entrance of the room that the elder had just left through and informed everyone present inside the room.


    "Then what are you waiting for!? Show the representative over here immediately!"


    Yelling at the young elder that hade in to inform them, the elder who was just interrupted let out his anger at the young elder as the person in question shivered under the terrifying pressure suddenly bearing down on him.


    "Y-yes!"


    Not able to say much more under the terrifying pressure of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, the young elder quickly turned around and ran out of the room to get the representative of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "Looks like someone lost their temper¡­ Don''t take that guy''s earlier words to mind, he won''t be able to affect the decision by himself!"


    Poking a bit fun at the elder, the Vice Sect Master reassured him of this before turning to look at the surrounding elders chatting among themselves.


    Following this, the Vice Sect Master quickly took charge of the entire room as everyone calmed down and patiently waited for the young elder to return with the representative sent over by the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    All the Nascent Soul Realm elders except the Sect Master and the one who left earlier were present in the room as they all waited for the person sent over by the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "I really wonder if this is the right decision¡­"


    Quickly extinguishing this thought the moment it appeared, the elder thought about his hateful rival.


    To think he almost began to think the same way that guy did! The Raging me Sect would be able to gain a lot from this and would even destroy the Flying Sword Sect and increase their territory in the future!


    There was no way something like that could go wrong!


    ¡­


    Leaving the room filled with the higher ups of the Raging me Set, the elder that had gone against the rest of the elders in regard to joining the Azure Sky Kingdom in their war against the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, walked through the Raging me Sect with nor clear purpose.


    "What should I do¡­ Should I just leave the Raging me Sect¡­?"


    The elder had no idea what to do at the moment and soon ended up at a small public garden located in the outer part of the Raging me Sect where the outer disciples would normally go to rx from time to time.


    "Hah¡­"


    Sitting down on a bench as he thought about what to do, a sighing sound could be heard just beside him on the bench as he discovered another person was already sitting on the bench beside him.


    Simr to him, the person looked to be an elderly man that was equally lost like himself.


    "Why are you here for friend?"


    Feeling an unknown sense of connection to the stranger beside him, the elder could not hold himself back as he asked the equally depressed looking old man.


    "Hm? Ah, I''m just here to deliver a message¡­ But I don''t think I will be able to meet my family again afterwards¡­"


    "I see¡­ I don''t think I willst much longer either¡­ Everyone around me seems to have a different view than me and I think they just about had enough by now¡­"


    Saying this, both old men soon found themselves talking with each other as both of them found out that they were in an equally bad situation.


    "¡­ Do you perhaps want to leave the Raging me Sect?"


    "¡­"


    Continuing their conversation, the old man sitting beside the elder suddenly came upon this question as the elderly man looked up at him curiously waiting for an answer. No ill intent hidden in his expression as he said something that could have easily gotten him killed if any other elder of the Raging me Sect heard it.


    "¡­ I can''t say the thought didn''t cross my mind recently¡­ Why do you ask?"


    Not outright refusing the words of the old man, the elder put on a serious look as he narrowed his eyes and looked at the old man cautiously.


    "Haha, no need to be so nervous, I''m not someone from the Raging me Sect, so you don''t have to act like that! Here, take this!"


    Laughing the moment he saw the cautious expression on the elder''s face, the old man directly threw over a small token engraved with a small snowke on it.


    "What is this for¡­?"


    Catching the token that the old man threw over to him, the elder had a confused expression on his face. Not knowing what he should do with the token he had just been given.


    "If you leave the Raging me Sect in the future, you can go to the Ascendant Frost Hall located at the far north of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s territory toy low for some time. I just hope that you would be willing to deliver a letter of mine at the same time to the Sect Master of the Ascendant Frost Hall¡­"


    Listening to what the old man said, the elder of the Raging me Sect suddenly realized that he did not do anything to stop the old man and was instead listening attentively to what he said.


    Had he already decided to leave the Raging me Sect deep down¡­?


    "Fine¡­ I will help you deliver the letter¡­ But are you sure they will be able to keep me safe from the Raging me Sect? You should know that most sects don''t take well to people suddenly leaving them¡­ Especially if they are higher ups and know a lot of the sect''s techniques and mantras¡­"


    Sharing his doubts with the old man, the elder only saw him smile at him before taking out a letter and handing it over to him.


    "You don''t need to worry about that, you will be safe as long as you reach the Ascendant Frost Hall!"


    Saying this, the old man stood up and walked away from the bench. Leaving behind the elder as he tightened his grasp on the letter that had been handed over to him.


    Even though he had no idea who the old man was, the elder felt like he could trust him.


    Like this, one of the Raging me Sect''s Nascent Soul Realm Elders quietly left the sect. Never to return again!

 Chapter 257: Cloud Tribulation Descends!

    <h4>Chapter 257: Cloud Tribtion Descends!</h4>


    Back at the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao took out one of his purification pills and handed it over to Elder Song.


    "Here, take this before you try to breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm, it should be able to increase the strength of your soul and allow you to reach the Nascent Soul Realm smoothly!"


    Listening to Xuan Hao as he exined the use of the pill to him, Elder Song nodded his head filled with determination.


    If he could not even reach the Nascent Soul Realm after that, he would be disappointing Elder Xuan and wasting his efforts on him!


    Even Elder Song knew that a pill that could increase the strength of his soul would be extremely rare and hard toe by.


    Elder Xuan must have encountered all sorts of dangers to get his hands on it! I can''t let his efforts go to waste.


    Thinking this as he gratefully? looked up a Xuan Hao, Elder Song swallowed the purification pill and closed his eyes.


    The moment the pill entered his body, Elder Song felt a sudden influx of energy course through his body as it rushed towards his dantian.


    Not stopping there, the energy directly rushed into his core floating at the centre of his dantian.


    "Argh!"


    "Hm? What happened!?"


    Seeing Elder Song suddenly scream out in pain after swallowing the purification pill, Xuan Hao rushed over and ced his palm on top of his head as his divine sense directly entered his body and soon arrived at his dantian.


    Earlier, when he had used the purification pill, he had never felt even the slightest amount of pain as it had directly been absorbed by his nascent soul. Strengthening it in an instant-


    "¡­"


    Realizing something, Xuan Hao did not know what to say¡­


    The purification pill strengthened the soul of a cultivator¡­ The only problem was¡­ At the Core Formation Realm, a cultivator''s soul had yet to evolve to a stage where it was visible and would remain hidden inside the core of the cultivator.


    During the Core Formation Realm, a cultivator would slowly strengthen their core a nurture it until it gave birth to a nascent soul. Almost like an egg for the soul to strengthen and grow inside of.


    Elder Song was at the Core Formation Realm and his soul had not broken out of its core and be a nascent soul yet¡­


    So¡­ The only way that the energy of the purification pill could strengthen his soul¡­


    "Argh!"


    Was by piercing directly through his golden core and reach his soul hidden inside¡­


    Xuan Hao felt bad after seeing Elder Song screaming in pain in front of him, but he did not worry too much after seeing the energy only strengthened his soul and did not cause any harm to Elder Song¡­ Outside of the pain he felt from having something directly pierce through his golden core¡­


    The screaming of Elder Song slowly began to go away as the purification pill finished strengthening the soul hidden inside of his golden core.


    Crack~


    This, however, was quickly reced by several small cracks appearing on his golden core as it was about to break and given birth to his nascent soul.


    Given that Elder Song was already half a step into the Nascent Soul Realm, the purification pill strengthening his soul even further, managed to just push him over the edge as his golden core began the process of cracking apart and give birth to his Nascent Soul on its own!


    Boom!


    Elder Song''s aura changedpletely as his golden core broke apart and gave birth to his nascent soul in the shape of a small ball of light that floated gently at the centre of his dantian.


    Only after reaching the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm would the small ball that was his nascent soul be a miniature version of himself like Xuan Hao''s nascent soul. Until then, it would just be in the shape of a ball and could not truly be considered a true nascent soul.


    Only upon strengthening it and reaching the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm would one have a true nascent soul.


    Elder Song''s nascent soul had just been born and even though it was stronger than normal, it was still weak.


    It was at this moment that? a silver cloud with a few tints of gold at the edges filled with an unfathomable aura appeared inside of Elder Song''s dantian.


    The cloud tribtion had arrived! And it was not a silver cloud tribtion like Chi Hu had experienced but was a silver cloud tribtion about to reach the level of a gold cloud tribtion!


    It would not be wrong to considered it a cloud tribtion above the silver level but just below the gold level!


    Swoosh~


    The silver cloud with hints of gold at the edges directly flew over and merged together with the newly born nascent soul of Elder Song.


    Boom!


    The aura around Elder Song instantly changed as the cloud merged together with his nascent soul, causing it to grow stronger, but at the same time unstable to the point that it was close to copsing at any moment.


    Xuan Hao removed his hand from the top of Elder Song''s head and instead sat down a short distance away from him.


    He could not interfere with the cloud tribtion as it would only end up harming Elder Song if he did so.


    All he could do now was hope that he could endure the process of merging together with the weird cloud and survive.


    The process of merging together the cloud and new-born nascent soul was a critical part in helping the nascent soul grow stronger and allow the cultivator to truly step into the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Other than all that, failure would ultimately result in the new-born nascent soul perishing as it could not endure the process of merging together with the cloud.


    Preventing the cloud from merging together with the nascent soul was also not doable.


    Apparently, some people had tried it in the past, but the unfathomable power that surrounded the cloud prevented anyone from interfering in the process of the cloud tribtion and in the end, they had given up.

 Chapter 258: Elder Song Reaches the Nascent Soul Realm!

    <h4>Chapter 258: Elder Song Reaches the Nascent Soul Realm!</h4>


    Sitting down a few meters away from Elder Song, Xuan Hao no longer paid too much attention to him as he began merging the cloud and his nascent soul together.


    From what Xuan Hao had experienced in the past, this process would at least take a few hours. Maybe it would even end up taking a few days if he was struggling with the merging process!


    The longer it took, the more dangerous it would be for the one currently undergoing the cloud tribtion. After all, the soul did not have an infinite amount of strength and could only endure the merging process for so long¡­


    Xuan Hao could clearly feel that Elder Song would take longer than normal toplete the cloud tribtion and sessfully reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    This was most likely due to the fact that his cloud tribtion had a few tints of gold around the edges. Making it stronger than the silver cloud tribtion that Chi Hu had encountered when he reached the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Maybe it was due to the purification pill strengthening his soul¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he looked over at Elder Song who was fully concentrated at making it through the cloud tribtion, Xuan Hao could clearly see his aura slowly growing stronger and stronger as he managed to sessfully merge more and more of the cloud together with his newly born nascent soul.


    Time slowly passed inside of Elder Song''s personal quarters, as Xuan Hao kept an eye on him during his breakthrough.


    Boom!


    After a long 10 hours of enduring the cloud tribtion, Elder Song''s aura began to grow at a terrifying rate before slowly calming down and beginning to stabilize.


    "Congrattions on breaking through and reaching the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    Slowly opening his eyes with a tired look on his face, the first thing Elder Song heard was the voice of Xuan Hao echoing out just beside him as he quickly realized that he had been sitting a few meters away from him this entire time.


    "Thank you so much for giving me this opportunity Elder Xuan! I will forever remember your help! If you ever need my help, you can just inform me, and I will do my best to try and help you!"


    Doing a full ny-degree bow, Elder Song expressed his utmost sincerity as he said this to Xuan Hao.


    "Haha, you don''t need to mention it Elder Song, we are both from the same sect and I''m not sure how well the Flying Sword Sect would function without your constant help¡­"


    Laughing it off as he said this, Xuan Hao felt that there was nothing wrong with what he did.


    Elder Song could be considered extremely important for keeping the Flying Sword Sect running on a daily basis¡­ If he suddenly disappeared all of a sudden, Xuan Hao was certain he would not be able to keep up his peaceful life of not having to help out the Flying Sword Sect in the more mundane things like resource management, deployment of different inner and outer elders to protect the interest of the Flying Sword Sect and so on¡­


    Having to help protect the Flying Sword Sect and his disciples from danger every now and then, was more than enough for him¡­


    "I understand¡­ But if there is anything, remember to find me!"


    "Okay! I will be sure to find you if there is anything in the future!"


    Seeing the determined expression on Elder Song''s face, Xuan Hao epted his kind intentions.


    "I will just be going back for now, seeing as you managed to sessfully breakthrough and reach the Nascent Soul Realm. You will most likely also need a few days to familiarize yourself with your current realm and stabilize it, I will inform the Feng Chen about this and have him take care of your work over the next few days!"


    "Ah, wait a moment-"


    Whoosh~


    Before Elder Song could say anything to refute Xuan Hao, he had already disappeared from his courtyard and was making his way over towards the pavilion of the sect master.


    He knew very well that Elder Song would not agree to someone taking over his work, even if it was just for a few days while he rested and sorted out his cultivation base.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao did not even give him an opportunity to refuse as he left directly after saying it.


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I will be spending the next few days at home¡­" Muttering this to himself in a quiet voice as he looked towards the door that Xuan Hao had left through, Elder Song once again sat down and slowly began to inspect the changes in his dantian along with his newfound strength.


    Most importantly, the condition of his body after breaking through¡­


    Before, he was close to the end of his lifespan and that could be seen from his aging body growing worse and worse with each passing month.


    After breaking through, Elder Song still looked the same, but there was a stark difference from before as his skin seemed to have regained their former lustre and energy.


    All it would take was a single thought and he could recover his former younger looks¡­


    "I will just stay the same¡­ Or those children will surely be scared upon seeing me change so much all of a sudden! Haha."


    Laughing to himself at the thought of the disciple''s reaction if he suddenly looked the same age as them, Elder Song shook his head a bit.


    No matter how bad some people viewed looking old as, Elder Song understood that one of the main reasons why he was so respected by the younger generation of the Flying Sword Sect, was due to the fact that he looked like a wise elder that had experienced life¡­


    Smiling widely while thinking about some of the disciples he had taught in the past, Elder Song closed both of his eyes and began focusing on stabilizing his cultivation base.

 Chapter 259: Delivering the News to Feng Chen...

    <h4>Chapter 259: Delivering the News to Feng Chen...</h4>


    "I hope Elder Song stays back home and just quietly stabilizes his cultivation base¡­"


    Observing Elder Song from the sky above his courtyard, Xuan Hao made sure to hide himself and only when he saw Elder Song sit down and begin stabilizing his cultivation base did he let out a sigh of relief before turning around and flying in the direction of the sect master''s pavilion.


    Elder Song was quite well known for how hard working he was in the sect and Xuan Hao did not dare to leave him alone just after he broke through¡­ If he ended up over working himself when he had yet to stabilize his cultivation base, it could cause his cultivation base to regress!


    Not that he would go down from the Nascent Soul Realm to the Core Formation Realm, but his strength would decrease by a lot, and he would have to spend a long time recovering before he could resume making progress in his cultivation again.


    The worst-case scenario would be for him to directly reduce his own lifespan during this process¡­


    "At least such a thing won''t happen if he stabilizes his cultivation base!"


    Shaking his head as he thought about the worst-case scenarios for Elder Song, Xuan Hao slowlynded in front of the sect master''s pavilion.


    "Elder Xuan!? H-how can I help you¡­?"


    The moment hended down in front of the pavilion and made himself visible, a nearby disciple standing close to the entrance stopped him and screamed out in surprise before making his way over with a scared look on his face.


    Well¡­ I did suddenly appear in front of him out of nowhere¡­


    "I''m just here to talk to the Sect Master¡­ Is he perhaps still here?"


    "Y-yes! H-he should be inside the conservatory at the south side of the pavilion!"


    "Thank you, I will be on my way then."


    Smiling kindly at the still scared disciple, Xuan Hao directly left as the disciple let out a relieved breath upon seeing him disappear.


    A Core Elder suddenly appeared in front of him while delivering something to one of the sect master''s disciples! How scary!


    What would he have done if I wasn''t lucky enough to spot the sect master earlier and knew where he was¡­?


    Shivering at the thought of this as he came up with all sorts of wild fantasies about his possible fate on his way down the mountain, a few weird rumours about Xuan Hao would soon begin to spread among the disciples in the near future. Not that the person in question cared in the first ce¡­


    ¡­


    Reaching the south side of the pavilion, Xuan Hao soon spotted the conservatory attached to the side of the pavilion.


    The conservatory itself was a room with a ss roof and ss walls, it was a nice ce to sit outside and rx, while still being inside.


    And given that a few dark clouds had begun gathering above, Xuan Hao could see the reason why Feng Chen had decided to use the conservatory instead of just finding a ce to sit outside.


    "Elder Xuan? What brings you here? D-did something perhaps happen!?"


    Not understanding why Xuan Hao suddenly showed up again after such a short time, Feng Chen felt a bit confused at first before thinking that something bad might have happened.


    This was the only reason he coulde up with for Xuan Hao toe and visit him again in such a short period of time.


    "¡­ Nothing bad happened if that is what you want to ask about."


    Rolling his eyes at the meaning behind Feng Chen''sst words, Xuan Hao entered the conservatory and sat down on afy chair.


    "So¡­ What did youe here to tell me about?"


    Watching Xuan Hao as he entered, Feng Chen already manged to grasp that Xuan Hao wanted to inform him about something¡­ And it was not bad news!


    Xuan Hao hade with good news!


    Upon reaching this conclusion, Feng Chen suddenly became excited as he knew that something Xuan Hao would personallye and talk to him about would be big news! Something big for the Flying Sword Sect!


    "¡­"


    Watching the excited expression on Feng Chen''s face, filled with anticipation, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a bit annoyed.


    "Elder Song informed me to tell you that he would not be able to help out with the management of the sect over the next few days. During this period of time, he expressed to me that he would be thankful if you could take over for him during this period of time. You are after all the sect master! The most experienced in the Flying Sword Sect when ites to management!"


    "¡­"


    Finishing his exnation while keeping out the part about Elder Song breaking through and reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao smiled secretly upon seeing the colour slowly drain away from the face of Feng Chen as he realized the amount of work, he would have to do over the next few days.


    "D-didn''t youe here with good news¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he slumped down on a nearby couch, Feng Chen looked over at Xuan Hao with hopeful eyes. Hoping that there was more to it other than him getting a ton of work.


    "Elder Song never rests properly, so it''s great news that he finally gets a few days of rest. Personally, I think this is really good news!"


    Smiling widely as he said this, Xuan Hao directly left the sad looking Feng Chen in the conservatory before he got the idea to keep him as a helper. Elder Song should be able toe back before they acted against the Raging me Sect¡­


    "B-but what about me¡­?"


    Saying this as he thought about the mountains of future workying before him over the next few days, Feng Chen suddenly felt that the world was a cruel and merciless ce.


    Even if Elder Song got to rest over the next few days, someone would still have to pick up his work and do it while he was away¡­ And the only person who could do that was him, the sect master¡­

 Chapter 260: Creating an Interspatial Ring!

    <h4>Chapter 260: Creating an Interspatial Ring!</h4>


    Leaving the Feng Chen''s pavilion after having delivered the news that Elder Song would not be able to help out with the management of the sect during the next few days, Xuan Hao made his way out of the Flying Sword Sect beforeing to a stop close to the hidden observation post he had found on his way back after reaching the Domain Lord Realm.


    The people hidden inside were still there, but they already seemed to have begun packing up their things. Preparing to leave the moment they got the order to do so.


    This was of course something Xuan Hao was more than happy to see.


    After all, having someone from a power at least the same level as the Sky Empire constantly keeping an eye on the Flying Sword Sect made Xuan Hao really ufortable.


    Even if he had reached the Domain Lord Realm now, he still felt some reservation towards randomly offending a power that had people above the Domain Lord present in it¡­


    "Hm¡­ Maybe I should get started on trying to make a few interspatial rings for that quest¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he thought about the limited time quest he had gotten back in the secret realm; Xuan Hao felt a bit dispirited.


    After the limited time quest activated, the system had been so kind to him and had bestowed the method on how to make an interspatial ring¡­


    It was just¡­ The time it took to even make a single interspatial ring was at least half a day!


    That was not the worst thing about it¡­ The material needed to create an interspatial ring was the biggest problem!


    "The worst material ording to the method I got from the system is Moon Silver¡­ But I highly doubt that one would need Mystic Grade metal to make an interspatial ring¡­"


    Sighing to himself as he said this, Xuan Hao found a spot located a few hundred meters away from the observation post where he could keep an eye on them before he began the process of making interspatial rings from the Moon Silver, he had gotten from the system¡­


    A part of him felt that it was all a set up¡­ After all, the amount of Moon Silver would barely be enough to make 1000 interspatial rings if he didn''t waste any of it¡­


    Why not just trade in the Moon silver for the interspatial rings?


    Xuan Hao had thought about doing that at first, but interspatial rings was not really cheap in the first ce and while the Moon Silver was valuable, it could notpare to 1000 interspatial rings.


    The reason that interspatial rings were so highly valued was because of the time they took to make and the fact that only someone around the Domain Lord Realm would be able to make them.


    Other than that, who would have 1000 interspatial rings justying around outside powers like the Sky Empire¡­? Maybe the Explorer''s Union?


    To be honest, Xuan Hao only using half a day to make an interspatial ring could easily shock other Domain Lords.


    After all, the process of crafting an interspatial ring involved the maniption of space and took a long time to make. Skilled Domain Lords could make an interspatial ring over a few days, while normal Domain Lords would have to use at least a few weeks of dedicated effort to make one!


    That was not to say that one would also need to know a formation that could bind the space together with the ring to even make a proper interspatial ring in the first ce.


    "Well, I better get started!"


    Not thinking too much about the fact that he was using the Moon Silver, Xuan Hao used his sword domain to cut off a small piece of the chunk of Moon Silver before making it into a small ring.


    The reason why a ring was the mostmonly used form of interspatial storage, was due to the fact that it was small and did not require a lot of material to make.


    Following the method that the system had given him to make an interspatial ring, Xuan Hao used his domain to carve out a small part of the space in front of him before using his domain to move it towards the Moon Silver in the shape of a ring.


    "Now I have to bind the space together with the ring¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he waved his hand and used his domain to carve out a small formation on the surface of the ring.


    Following this, Xuan Hao moved the space he had carved out with the help of his sword domain down towards the ring and began to slowly merge the space together with the ring.


    Whoosh~


    The part of space that had been carved out and removed by Xuan Hao. Healed almost instantly after he began the process of merging the formation on the ring and the space, he had carved out together with each other.


    This process was long and tedious, it was only after eighth hours that Xuan Hao finished making his first interspatial ring.


    "But it''s bigger than I expected¡­"


    The space inside the spatial ring, while smaller than the interspatial ring he found inside the secret realm, could still be considered to be quite big.


    [Do you wish to submit the interspatial ring for the limited time quest?]


    [Y/N]


    The moment Xuan Hao finished inspecting the ring, the system reacted.


    "Yes¡­?"


    Submitting the newly made interspatial ring, Xuan Hao watched the interspatial ring being covered in light for a short moment before reappearing in front of him again.


    The difference being the fact that the formation covering the ring hadpletely changed, just from looking at it briefly, Xuan Hao felt his head hurt!


    "So, I just¡­ Throw it away now¡­?"


    Whoosh~


    Throwing the interspatial ring towards a bush located a few meters away from him, Xuan Hao watched as it suddenly shone for a brief moment beforepletely disappearing from sight. Almost like it had never existed in the first ce¡­


    "Did that count¡­?"


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao quickly checked the progress on the quest.


    [1/1000]


    Looks like there is still a long way to go, but at least he knew what he was going to be spending his time on during the next period of time¡­

 Chapter 261: Secret Observers Leaving

    <h4>Chapter 261: Secret Observers Leaving</h4>


    "We finally got the message to leave this outpost and return back home!"


    Inside the secret observation outpost, the leader in charge looked at his now activemunication talisman with a smile on his face as he informed the other three about the good new with a smile on his face.


    "Finally! We are going to leave this ce!"


    "I will begin taking down the tent and the concealment formation."


    The other three smiled happily after hearing what the leader said, the youngest among them was even more happy about this news as she began to take down the tent before getting the order to do so from the leader.


    "Hah¡­ Let''s try and leave within the next 30 minutes, we don''t want to be discovered even if we are leaving! You two,e over and help me out with the concealment formation!"


    Sighing as he saw the young woman begin to take down therge tent they had been staying in for the past few years, the leader quickly instructed the other two to help him with taking down the concealment formation in ce. Making sure nobody would ever know they had even been there in the first ce!


    The group of four in the observation post worked quickly and after only 20 minutes, they had cleaned up the area.


    Even Xuan Hao observing from the side would not know that they had an observation post there before if he had not seen it with his own eyes!


    "Looks like they are leaving¡­ It has already been five days; I should get back to the sect and see if Shu Yao returned with the elders from her sect¡­"


    Looking at the group of four as they disappeared into the distance, Xuan Hao slowly stood up and stretched his body.


    During the past five days as he was keeping an eye on the four people in the observation post, Xuan Hao had managed to make a total of 11 interspatial rings!


    At first, he had thought about using them for the quest, but after thinking things through, he had decided to first give one to his disciples and the other Core Elders of the Flying Sword Sect before doing that.


    Following the four figures that disappeared in the distance with his eyes, Xuan Hao waited around for another 10 minutes before he flew up into the air and made his way back towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    Next, he would be dealing with the Raging me Sect and get rid of them once and for all!


    ¡­


    "Great! With this, we will be able to attack the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s core territory directly!"


    As the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect were getting ready tounch an attack towards the Raging me Sect, the Raging me Sect had managed toe to an agreement with the Azure Sky Kingdom. Allowing for their people to move through their sect''s territory and directly enter the territory of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "Yes, I hope you all the best in the future battle¡­ And, as promised, the Raging me Sect won''t participate in any of the uing battles! However, if the Flying Sword Sect appears, we will join in and help the Azure Sky Kingdom deal with them!"


    The Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect looked at the person from the Azure Sky Kingdom with an excited smile on his face as he said this. No small amount of killing intent leaking out upon mentioning the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Haha, we will be sure to inform you if we spot anyone from the Flying Sword Sect on the side of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!"


    Laughing happily after hearing what the Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect said, the person from the Azure Sky Kingdom felt confident in their uing battle with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    No matter what, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would not have the support of their fourth and third strongest sects and from what he had learned talking with the Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect, the other two sects would most likely not bother to send over any reinforcements to help out the Heavenly Sky Kingdom if they could avoid it!


    "Well, I will return back to the army and inform them about the good news! Farewell for now, Vice Sect Master!"


    "Farewell general! I hope we will be able to work together more in the future!"


    Leaving the Raging me Sect, the person talking with the Vice Sect Master was revealed to be one of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s generals!


    "I really did not expect that the Raging me Sect would help us out so easily¡­"


    At first, he had not expected for them to be able to convince the Raging me Sect to let their army walk through their sect and use it as a springboard tounch an attack on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, they were after all a kingdom that had remained strong for over 1000 years and offending them was not something anyone would want to do!


    Their four sects, the Flying Sword Sect, Raging me Sect, Spring Flower Sect and Seven Fates Sect, were also powerful. Even weaker kingdoms were weakerpared to those four sects!


    "But it looks like the sects in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom have grown too powerful and no longer wants to remain under the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­"


    Understanding the current situation of the sects inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, the general could easily see that the sects were way too big to stay under the control of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. They wanted to expand and grow stronger!


    Just look at the Raging me Sect, they were more than happy to betray the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and side with the Azure Sky Kingdom if it meant they would be able to deal with their rival, the Flying Sword Sect, and at the same time get more territory.


    "Looks like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom will fall into a state of chaos soon¡­ And with our attack, they might evenpletely disappear!"


    Muttering this to himself as he went over how unstable the Heavenly Sky Kingdom truly was, the general felt graceful that the sects under the Azure Sky Kingdom was strictly controlled and would never be able to grow so strong that the royal family would lose control over them like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had¡­

 Chapter 262: Showing up late...

    <h4>Chapter 262: Showing upte...</h4>


    Taking onst look down at the ce that the secret observation post had been, Xuan Hao flew back towards the Flying Sword Sect after making sure that the people at the secret observation post had left.


    After five days, Shu Yao should have returned to the Flying Sword Sect with some of the elders from her sect and be ready to move out against the Raging me Sect.


    "I wonder what we should do with their territory after defeating the Raging me Sect¡­"


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided that he would not interfere with those sorts of things and just leave them to the Sect Master and Elder Song.


    "Ah! I wonder if Elder Song finished stabilizing his cultivation base and met with Feng Chen already¡­ I really should have gone there to see his expression when he found out that Elder Song had broken through and reached the Nascent Soul Realm¡­"


    Spreading out his divine sense before locking onto the location of Feng Chen, Xuan Hao could not help but think about how Feng Chen would react after finding out about Elder Song bing a Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    The Flying Sword Sect was functioning normally and during his flight over towards Feng Chen, Xuan Hao managed to spot his first disciple, Qing Yi, making her way towards the Alchemy Hall while holding arge book in both of her hands.


    "Guess I will go and see how she is doing."


    Whoosh~


    Disappearing from the spot he was in; Xuan Hao appeared a few meters away from Qing Yi before making his way over towards her.


    "Master?"


    Suddenly seeing her master appear in front of her caused Qing Yi to blink both her eyes in confusion before calling out hesitantly.


    "Yes! How are you doing Qing Yi? Are you perhaps going to the Alchemy Hall¡­?"


    "Yes, I heard that a unique alchemist that you rmend teaching there for the next few months appeared. I never knew that you also knew about alchemy, master¡­"


    Listening to what Qing Yi said, Xuan Hao felt a bit confused upon hearing what she said.


    Since when did he rmend anyone to teach alchemy at the Alchemy Hall? Howe he never knew anything about that?


    "Hm? A unique alchemist I rmend for the Alchemy Hall¡­ Did you happen to get his name?"


    "Yeah, if I''m not wrong, his name was Peng Yun¡­ I wanted to learn from him as well before the alchemypetition and see if I can pick up any new ways to make pills and potions from him! By the way, master, could you also teach me alchemy in the future¡­?"


    "Ah, sure, I can teach you a few things after you finish learning from Peng Yun."


    Realizing that the alchemist in question was Peng Yun, Xuan Hao no longer thought about it. From what he knew, it was most likely Elder Song who arranged that sort of position for him. Not that it mattered as long as he helped increase the strength of the Flying Sword Sect''s alchemists¡­


    On another note, it seemed like Qing Yi thought he knew alchemy because of this. Not that he didn''t after getting the systems help.


    This was also the reason why he had readily epted Qing Yi''s request to teach her in the future.


    The reason why he would do so after she finished learning from Peng Yun, was because he would have to leave again soon to deal with the Raging me Sect, he could not really teach her about alchemy when he was not present in the sect¡­


    "Thank you master! I will make sure to learn everything I can from Alchemist Peng Yun!"


    Smiling from ear to ear after hearing her master agree to teach her, Qing Yi could not wait to meet Peng Yun and begin learning from him, so she could quickly begin to spend some more time with her master!


    "You can just go ahead and enter the Alchemy Hall; I just came to say hello because I spotted you on my way to Feng Chen."


    "Okay, bye master!"


    Nodding her head after hearing what Xuan Hao said, Qing Yi did not want to hold up her master for any longer after hearing he was on his way to meet the Sect Master.


    "See you soon, Qing Yi."


    Waving his hand, Xuan Hao watched as Qing Yi disappeared inside the Alchemy Hall before turning to look over in the direction of the Sect Master''s pavilion.


    Currently, he could feel the presence of several different Nascent Soul Realm Expert and most of them were unfamiliar to him.


    Among them, Xuan Hao could feel Feng Chen and Shu Yao, along with the two Wang brothers, Zu Fei and finally Elder Song¡­ It seemed like Chi Hu was the only Nascent Soul Realm Expert in the Flying Sword Sect that was not present.


    "Looks like Chi Hu was put in charge of guarding the area surrounding the Flying Sword Sect¡­ Feng Chen should already know about him by now."


    Picking up the presence of Chi Hu at the edge of his divine sense a few miles away from the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao easily deduced the reason for him not having gathered together with the rest of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts on the Sect Master''s Mountain.


    In total, Xuan Hao felt the presence of 10 Nascent Soul Experts! Five from the Flying Sword Sect and another five from the Spring Flower Sect, Xuan Hao knew that the Spring Flower Sect had more people in the Nascent Soul Realm, but in the end, someone would still have to stay behind and defend their sect.


    Five Nascent Soul Realm Experts showing up from the Spring Flower Sect was already more than enough to show how strong the Spring Flower Sect was.


    "But why are they all doing nothing and¡­ Are they perhaps waiting for me¡­?"


    Realizing that the entire upper echelons of both the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect had gathered together to wait for him, caused Xuan Hao to feel no small amount of embarrassment.


    "Themunication talismans are already working again¡­ Why did Feng Chen not just contact me and inform me that the people from the Spring Flower Sect arrived¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he put the me of arrivingte over at Feng Chen, Xuan Hao made his way towards the top of the Sect Master''s Mountain.

 Chapter 263: Waiting for Elder Xuan~

    <h4>Chapter 263: Waiting for Elder Xuan~</h4>


    "So¡­ How long will it take before this Elder Xuan shows up¡­?"


    Standing beside Shu Yao, one of the elders that she had brought over from the Spring Flower Sect to help out against the Raging me Sect asked in a somewhat questioning manner.


    It had already been close to three hours since they showed up! They had to act fast before the Raging me Sect found out that they were getting ready to attack them!


    The other elders from the Flying Sword Sect had already gathered, even the sect master of the Flying Sword Sect was present¡­ But somehow, one of their core elders was still missing at this point!


    "Can''t we just move out without him¡­?"


    Looking around at the surrounding people from the Flying Sword Sect and seeing that nobody answered her, the elder from the Spring Flower Sect instead suggested they just leave without him and attack the Raging me Sect.


    How much difference could a single Core Elder make in the grand scheme of things¡­?


    "You didn''t brief them about how we are going to attack the Raging me Sect¡­?"


    "No, I didn''t really think it was needed and just pulled a few elders with me¡­ But I guess I did tell them that we were nning an attack on the Raging me Sect, but that is about it¡­ I did not exin how we were going to attack them¡­"


    Listening to the conversation between her Sect Master and the Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect. Not only was she confused, but the rest of the elders from the Spring Flower Sect were confused as well.


    "H-how are we going to attack them? Are we not just going to go to their sect and attack them¡­?"


    A younger member among the group of elders from the Spring Flower Sect couldn''t hold back her curiosity as she stepped forward and asked Shu Yao.


    "Hm? Of course, we are not going to do something that stupid! If we did that, the people in the different branches of the Raging me Sect would just run away before we could even reach them! We are nning to split up andunch a simultaneous attack on all their branches at once to make sure that they won''t be able to threaten us in the future!"


    The younger elder seemed to understand what Shu Yao was saying and nodded her head in approval of her sect master''s logic.


    "I understand what you are saying sect master¡­ But how are we even going to do that in the first ce? The Raging me Sect is not weak and if we split up to attack their branches, we will not have the strength to attack their main sect!"


    The elder from earlier questioned Shu Yao once again, as she could not see any way that the n would work out at all.


    No matter what, the Raging me Sect had close to 10 Nascent Soul Realm Experts and their Sect Master was almost at the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    If they split up, the elder from the Spring Flower Sect could not see how they would be able to deal with the Raging me Sect¡­ Unless¡­


    "D-did the sect master perhaps¡­ Breakthrough!?"


    Coming to a sudden realization, the elder from the Spring Flower Sect seemed to havee up with a reason behind the n as she looked up at Shu Yao filled with both respect and awe.


    Whispering a few words only she herself and Shu Yao managed to hear.


    "¡­"


    Shu Yao had no idea what to say to this elder, she had indeed broken through since thest time she had been back to the Spring Flower Sect¡­ But it was not the sort of breakthrough that the elder in front of her was expecting.


    What should I do¡­?


    Feeling like she had suddenly lost her opportunity to just say that Elder Xuan from the Flying Sword Sect would be the one to deal with the main sect of the Raging me Sect, Shu Yao turned around and looked over at Feng Chen for help.


    "Ahm! The one who will be in charge of dealing with the Raging me Sect''s main sect will be Elder Xuan that we are all waiting for¡­"


    Seeing the look Shu Yao was giving him, Feng Chen gave a fake cough as he answered the question of the Spring Flower Sect Elder.


    "This Elder Xuan again?! Howe I never really heard about this Core Elder before today¡­?"


    Letting out a surprised voice as she heard about the elder, they were all waiting for, the younger elder reacted the fastest as she asked Feng Chen in a surprised voice.


    "Elder Xuan is currently the strongest member of the Flying Sword Sect and is also a Domain Lord! So you don''t have to worry about the main sect of the Raging me Sect. The reason you never heard about him is most likely because he doesn''t go out much and prefers to just cultivate in peace by himself¡­"


    Patiently answering the question of the younger elder, Feng Chen did not forget to mention the fact that Xuan Hao was a Domain Lord as he looked over at the elder standing beside Shu Yao.


    The elders of both the Spring Flower Sect and Flying Sword Sect were shocked after hearing that the Flying Sword Sect had a Domain Lord!


    A Domain Lord was something that they had only heard about before in stories and from passing cultivators!


    Yet, they would now be able to meet one personally!


    This caused all the elders from the Spring Flower Sect to grow both nervous and excited about the mysterious Elder Xuan.


    "Elder Xuan became a Domain Lord?!"


    On the other hand, the Flying Sword Sect''s elders who had not yet been informed about the fact that Xuan Hao had be a Domain Lord, were equally shocked.


    ¡­


    Arriving at the peak of the mountain, the first thing Xuan Hao saw the elders from the Flying Sword Sect surrounding Feng Chen together with another group that he assumed was the elders from the Spring Flower Sect.


    The only people not part of it was Shu Yao standing a few meters away and another young woman that was most likely also an elder of the Spring Flower Sect.


    What happened here...?

 Chapter 264: Towards the Raging Flame Sect!

    <h4>Chapter 264: Towards the Raging me Sect!</h4>


    "What happened? Why is everyone surrounding Feng Chen¡­?"


    Landing a short distance away from Shu Yao, Xuan Hao walked over and asked her. Hoping that she would be able to enlighten him as to the reason why so many people had suddenly decided to surround Feng Chen so eagerly.


    "Ah! Elder Xuan!? You gave me a shock there! And Feng Chen is just exining the fact that you reached the Domain Lord Realm to the elders from your sect and mine as well. Domain Lords are quite rare, so it''s a given that they are so¡­ Interested."


    Almost jumping up from shock when Xuan Hao suddenly appeared behind her, Shu Yao quickly exined the reason why everyone was currently surrounding Feng Chen.


    Xuan Hao barely managed to stop himself fromughing when he heard the surprised scream from Shu Yao as she quickly answered his question. Trying her best to pretend her earlier surprise scream did not happen.


    "Hm? Sect master¡­"


    However, other than Xuan Hao, there was one more person who heard the somewhat cute screaming from Shu Yao as the person in question turned to look over in the direction of Shu Yao where the sound came from. Spotting Xuan Hao in the process standing together with her.


    "Elder Xuan¡­?"


    Putting things together in a record speed, the younger elder quickly realized that the person standing together with Shu Yao was the Domain Lord from the Flying Sword Sect that Feng Chen was talking about. At the same time, he was also the elder that they were waiting for to show up before moving out to deal with the Raging me Sect once and for all.


    "The one and only. Are you perhaps an elder from the Spring Flower Sect?"


    Affirming the question that the young elder said without realizing it, Xuan Hao watched as she looked at him with an almost dazed expression before hearing what Xuan Hao said.


    "I-I''m sorry, I didn''t mean to sound rude or anything! I-I was just surprised that you suddenly appeared beside the sect master and¡­ and¡­ M-my name is Xuefeng! Shen Xuefeng¡­ B-but just calling me Xuefeng is fine! Yes! Normally people call me Xuefeng¡­ Or Elder Xuefeng."


    Having what could only be described as a nervous breakdown of sorts, Xuefeng apologized to him for some reason as she also introduced herself at the same time.


    "You can also just call me Elder Xuan. No need to be so nervous¡­"


    Perhaps its because I''m a Domain Lord¡­?


    Thinking about this as he tried to calm the young elder Xuefeng down, Xuan Hao made sure that he would not mention the fact that he was a Domain Lord when meeting someone at the Nascent Soul Realm outside¡­ Of course, only when they were friendly¡­


    Just pretending to be at the Nascent Soul Realm should be enough to not cause them to end up like Xuefeng¡­


    Maybe doing the same for when meeting people below his own cultivation realm would be a good idea¡­ After all, he could not have everyone he met outside the Flying Sword Sect react like Xuefeng did¡­


    He really had too little experience with being outside the Flying Sword Sect¡­ The only experience he really had, was interacting with cultivators around the same realm as himself.


    The ones with lower cultivation than him were mostly all disciples or elders from the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    "O-okay, Elder X-Xuan¡­"


    Building up some courage, Elder Xuefeng nervously called out to him as Shu Yao watched her from the side. Looking like she wanted to say something to her.


    "Feng Chen, stop your story time and the rest of you,e over here! Elder Xuan has already arrived! We should really get going¡­ We never know if the Raging me Sect has any spies in the Flying Sword Sect or the Spring Flower Sect, it is only a matter of time before they find out that we have gathered together like this!"


    Shu Yao cast onest look towards Xuefeng before turning towards Feng Chen and the rest of the Nascent Soul Realm Elders present and called out to them. Interrupting them in the process of questioning Feng Chen about Xuan Hao¡­


    "Great! We should head out immediately! Me, Shu Yao and Elder Xuan will go towards the main sect of the Raging me Sect, while the rest will split up and head towards the different branches under the Raging me Sect. Now, head out! We will need to move quickly before they begin to notice anything!"


    Knowing that the elders from both the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect would most likely end up asking Xuan Hao about his breakthrough for at least another hour if left alone, Feng Chen hurried the group of elders to leave for the different branches of the Raging me Sect before that happened.


    "¡­"


    Of course, none of the elders were able to refuse what Feng Chen said¡­ Especially not? so when Shu Yao supported him as well¡­


    Whoosh~


    Full of reluctance, the group of elders did not stay around the mountain peak and directly left for the different branches of the Raging me Sect. Elder Xuefeng that stood together with Xuan Hao and Shu Yao also moved as she soon disappeared from the mountain peak together with the rest of the elders.


    Leaving only Xuan Hao, Shu Yao and Feng Chen behind.


    "Time for us to move out as well-"


    "Let me."


    As both Shu Yao and Feng Chen were preparing to leave the mountain like the rest of the elders, Xuan Hao spotted them before he covered both of them with his sword domain.


    "Wah!"


    "Ah! I''m flying!"


    Under the shocked expressions of both Shu Yao and Feng Chen, both of them suddenly found themselves floating mid-air.


    "Looks like it can work like this as well¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao smiled secretly as he saw the two sect masters floating in the air in front of him with the help of his sword domain.


    His domain not only helped him fly freely in the sky, but he could also carry people with him¡­ The only downside was the fact that the energy and concentration required to carry even two people was way more than he expected.


    Xuan Hao calcted that three or maybe four people would be his limit and if he tried to carry any more people, he would lower hisbat strength and limit the area covered by his divine sense. Making himself more open to ambushes and weaker at the same time. Not really something he wanted to do if he could avoid it¡­


    "Now, let''s get going!"


    Saying this, Xuan Hao manipted his domain as the two sect masters together with himself flew in the direction of the Raging me Sect''s main sect.

 Chapter 265: Arriving at the Raging Flame Sect...

    <h4>Chapter 265: Arriving at the Raging me Sect...</h4>


    The distance between the Flying Sword Sect and the Raging me Sect was not small by any means and even with Xuan Hao carrying Shu Yao and Feng Chen with his domain, it would still take a few days before they arrived.


    During this time, Shu Yao and Feng Chen were both amazed that they were flying through the air and kept looking around at the sceneries passing by below them.


    This was the first time they had seen the world passing by below them from high above as they kept talking with each other about what they saw down below. Leaving Xuan Hao to just look at them as they acted like two children that had found something new and interesting to y with.


    "You two¡­ After you reach the Domain Lord Realm, you will also be able to fly like me by yourself instead of being carried like this!"


    Saying this, Xuan Hao watched as both of them finally calmed down a bit as they seemed to have gotten a bit more determination to increase their cultivation in the future¡­


    Like this, Xuan Hao, Shu Yao and Feng Chen spend the next two days flying through the air without rest before reaching the area where the Raging me Sect''s main sect was located.


    Shu Yao and Feng Chen had already gotten used to flying by this point and were not as excited as they had been at the start.


    "So, this is the Raging me Sect¡­ To be honest, it is my first time seeing it. Have any of you been here before¡­?


    Landing a few miles away from the Raging me Sect, Xuan Hao was the first one to speak as he asked both Feng Chen and Shu Yao.


    "Hm¡­ I have never been here before personally, but Feng Chen should have gone once in the best during a conflict¡­ If I''m not wrong, you ended up fighting their current Sect Master at that time to a draw¡­"


    Shu Yao shook her head and revealed the fact that Feng Chen had actually gone to the Raging me Sect to fight with their Sect Master in the past.


    "Haha¡­ I did indeed visit in the past after they took over our spirit stone mine¡­ But I couldn''t really do much to get it back, they simply had more Nascent Soul Experts and if I stayed for any longer, they might have killed me on the spot and gone ahead and destroyed the Flying Sword Sect¡­"


    Laughing awkwardly as he recalled what happened in the past, Feng Chen did not really have much to say as he told Xuan Hao why he hade to fight with the Raging me Sect in the past.


    "I see¡­ Well, we should be more than cable of dealing with them now¡­ By the way¡­ How many Nascent Soul Realm Experts did you say the Raging me Sect had?"


    "They have eight¡­ Why¡­?"


    Feeling that there was something wrong from Xuan Hao''s voice, Feng Chen suddenly felt that something was wrong as he answered the question.


    "From what I can sense through my divine sense, there should at least be 16 people in the Nascent Soul Realm currently present inside the Raging me Sect¡­"


    "Wha-"


    "Howe they have so many Nascent Soul Realm Experts all of a sudden!?"


    Interrupting Feng Chen, Shu Yao asked in a slightly confused voice. Clearly not expecting that the Raging me Sect suddenly got so many Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    She also began to worry about the elders from her sect and the Flying Sword Sect that had gone out to deal with the branches of the Raging me Sect¡­ They might encounter a way heavier resistance than expected¡­


    "You two can try and contact the elders, I will go and see the current situation before we attack¡­ There is no way that the Raging me Sect suddenly gained so many Nascent Soul Realm Experts all of a sudden!"


    Instructing the two sect masters, Xuan Hao hid himself with the help of his domain before making his way towards the Raging me Sect.


    Determined to find out the reason why so many Nascent Soul Realm Experts had suddenly shown up¡­ And most importantly, where they came from!


    "I will contact my elders; you should contact yours and make sure everything is fine on their side!"


    Seeing Xuan Hao disappear in the direction of the Raging me Sect, Shu Yao quickly calmed down before taking out hermunication talisman and contacting the elders from the Spring Flower Sect.


    Not forgetting to remind Feng Chen to do the same thing.


    ¡­


    At the Raging me Sect, the Vice Sect Master had finished thest few agreements with the Azure Sky Kingdom''s envoy and watched on from atop his mountain peak as the army of the Azure Sky Kingdom slowly began to make its way through his sect and into the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in an orderly fashion without causing any trouble for the disciples or elders of the Raging me Sect in the process.


    "I really have to admit, this went way smoother than I had first expected¡­ By the way general¡­ How long do you think it would take for your army to fully enter the Heavenly Sky Kingdom?"


    Gazing down at the endless line of soldiers entering the Heavenly Sky Kingdom through his sect with no end in sight, the Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect could not help himself from asking as he turned towards the general of the Azure Sky Kingdom standing only a few meters away from him together with another two experts at the Nascent Soul Realm standing shoulder to shoulder with him.


    After watching the Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Azure Sky Kingdom show up, the Vice Sect Master could not help but feel a sense of awe and fear towards the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Nine Nascent Soul Realm Experts!


    The Azure Sky Kingdom had sent over Nine Nascent Soul Realm Experts!


    The thing that caused the Vice Sect Master to be amazed, however, was not this! Instead, it was the fact that even the weakest person among those nine Nascent Soul Realm Experts were at the fourth stage!


    It really was a good idea that we chose to work together with them¡­ If not¡­


    Thinking about the power that the Azure Sky Kingdom had shown on the surface already made the Vice Sect Master feel fear¡­ Even the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would have a hard time getting so many Nascent Soul Realm Experts at that level together in a short time. Let alone having them go to war against an enemy kingdom where they could lose their life!


    "Hm¡­ It should take about 2 or 3 days before we have fully transported our troops and different resources through your sect, but I do hope we would still be able to use this route to transfer new supplies through when the battle begins¡­ Is that fine with you?"


    "Y-yes¡­ Yes!"


    Not noticing how nervous the Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect had suddenly be, the general answered his question after thinking about it for a few seconds. Even his request for continuous use of the route going through the Raging me Sect was easily agreed upon by the nervous Vice Sect Master as the general smiled happily while secretly saying something to one of the people standing beside him.


    Nodding his head, the person quickly disappeared back in the direction that the troops of the Azure Sky Kingdom wereing from.


    "I think I will get going as well. After all, I need to make sure that the troops get settled down properly before we begin moving out¡­ If you will excuse me, Vice Sect Master."


    "No need! It was great meeting you general!"


    Waving his hand as a goodbye towards the general, the Vice Sect Master watched as the remaining Nascent Soul Realm Expert along with the general left the mountain peak. Leaving behind only him.


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out a breath that he had unknowingly been holding, the Vice Sect Master looked up at the sky with a slightly helpless expression crossing his face for a moment before being reced by one filled with determination.


    "We have to endure for just a bit more and we will be able to deal with the Flying Sword Sect! At that time, when the Sect Master returns, the Raging me Sect will be way stronger than before¡­ But if he doesn''t return¡­"


    Muttering something to himself quietly, a small amount of killing intent appeared in the Vice Sect Master''s eyes as a n slowly began to take shape inside of his head.


    "Vice Sect Master! There is news from our spies in the north and the east of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom! It looks like the Spring Flower Sect and the Flying Sword Sect is up to something¡­"


    Just as the Vice Sect Master was deep in thought, one of the Nascent Soul Realm Elders rushed up the mountain together with a person dressed like a normal mortal. Looking like a normal middle-aged man. The only difference between him and a normal mortal being the fact that he was someone in the Core Formation Realm¡­


    "Really!? What is it¡­?"


    Hearing what the Nascent Soul Realm Elder said, the Vice Sect Master suddenly grew nervous all of a sudden.


    The Spring Flower Sect and Flying Sword Sect had always been on good terms with each other and was also one of the reasons why the Raging me Sect did not dare to carelessly attack the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Their spywork had picked up something happening in both sects at the same time!


    The Vice Sect Master felt that it would not be something good for his Raging me Sect¡­

 Chapter 266: Vice Sect Master of the Raging Flame Sect and his Disciple~

    <h4>Chapter 266: Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect and his Disciple~</h4>


    Flying through the air as he left Shu Yao and Feng Chen behind, Xuan Hao soon arrived at the entrance of the Raging me Sect.


    However, what he saw was not what he expected¡­


    "Go, keep moving forward!"


    Thumb Thumb!


    Arge number of well-equipped troops were moving through the Raging me Sect in an orderly line before moving towards a recently established camp located a few miles away from the Raging me Sect.


    "The Azure Sky Kingdom¡­?"


    The symbol on the troops armour was easily recognizable, as Xuan Hao instantly knew where this army came from¡­ The extra Nascent Soul Realm Experts inside the Raging me Sect should also be from the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    The only question that remained was¡­ Why did the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Raging me Sect suddenly be allies with each other?


    The Raging me Sect should know full well that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would not be happy about them being betrayed like this¡­ The ancestor of the royal family might even move out to destroy them personally in his anger after finding out¡­


    Xuan Hao truly did not understand the reason behind their actions¡­


    "Unless they truly believe that the Azure Sky Kingdom will be able to destroy the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­"


    Reaching this conclusion, Xuan Hao suddenly felt that the Azure Sky Kingdom might be way stronger than he and the rest of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had first expected¡­ For them to be able to destroy the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, they would need to be able to kill the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom! Someone at the pinnacle of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Meaning they should at least have someone half a step into the Domain Lord Realm¡­ But as long as it is only at this level, it should be fine and even if they have someone in the Domain Lord Realm, I should be more than capable of dealing with them now that I broke through!"


    Muttering this to himself as he watched therge number of troops from the Azure Sky Kingdom pass by him, Xuan Hao did not think about the reason why the Azure Sky Kingdom was confident in dealing with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom any longer as he directly entered the Raging me Sect.


    Even the Nascent Soul Realm Expert standing guard with his divine sense fully alert, did not notice Xuan Hao in the slightest as he slipped inside of the Raging me Sect right under his nose.


    Looks like even someone fully alert with his divine sense is not able to spot me¡­


    Looking down towards the ce that the Nascent Soul Realm Expert was standing guard, Xuan Hao could not help but feel amazed at how strong his concealment ability had be after bing a Domain Lord.


    However, he was not sure whether all Domain Lords would have the same ability as he had¡­ Maybe it had something to do with the cultivation mantra he had practiced so far being focused on concealed attacks and catching the opponent off guard¡­?


    "Hah¡­"


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao knew that he would properly not find out anytime soon, so there was no use thinking about it now.


    Whoosh~


    Flying into the Raging me Sect, Xuan Hao quickly managed to locate the location of the different Nascent Soul Realm Experts¡­


    "Hm?!"


    However, there was not anyone at the eighth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm like what the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect should be at¡­


    Where is the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect!?


    Not finding the Sect Master, Xuan Hao suddenly narrowed his eyes as he quickly located the Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect on top of a nearby mountain peak. Moving towards the pce located on top of the mountain¡­ All alone¡­


    "Looks like I will have to ask and see if this guy knows where the Sect Master of his sect is¡­"


    Narrowing his eyes as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao directly disappeared from the spot he was standing mid-air as he soon appeared directly in front of the pce that the Vice Sect Master had just entered without anyone noticing him.


    "Hm? Seems like there is a woman as well¡­ His wife?"


    Not thinking too much about it as the other person was clearly not too strong. Only being at the earlier stages of the Core Formation Realm, Xuan Hao covered the pce with his sword domain applying the same concealment he used to hide himself to hide anything happening inside from the outside.


    "Hah¡­ This quite exhausting¡­"


    Feeling arge wave of exhaustion wash over him the moment his domain began to apply the concealment to the entire pce, Xuan Hao had to take a deep breath as he stabilized himself before entering the pce.


    Having his domain cover the entire pce was not exhausting at all, but having it conceal anything happening inside the entire pce¡­ That was truly not something Xuan Hao wanted to do if he could avoid it¡­


    "Time to ask the Vice Sect Master where the Sect Master has gone¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao began moving down a hallway leading in the direction of the Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect, who was still oblivious to the fact that a Domain Lord was moving towards him with not so kind intentions¡­


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ To think that both the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect is suddenly moving all of a sudden, it looks like it might have been a blessing in disguise that we managed to join the Azure Sky Kingdom before those two ends up attacking us together. With the Azure Sky Kingdoms people currently here, there is no way those two would dare to attack!"


    Talking to himself as he entered his pce and made his way towards his room while thinking about how to deal with the Flying Sword Sect that now seemed to have teamed up with the Spring Flower Sect, the Vice Sect Master did not notice a person suddenly appearing behind him as he entered his room and closed the door behind him¡­


    "I really have to calm down¡­ Xinyue~ Are you there?"


    Already knowing the answer to his question as he called out towards a certain spot in the empty room, the Vice Sect Master''s gloomy expression turned into one of joy as he watched a beautiful mature looking woman with a pair of slender legs walk out from behind a cover that he was calling towards.


    "Master~ I didn''t expect for you to be back so quickly~ Xinyue didn''t even have time to dress up properly~"


    Smiling coyly, the mature looking woman called Xinyue walked over a leaned against the Vice Sect Master.


    Seductively showing off the parts of her body that was notpletely covered up as she began to remove the clothes of the Vice Sect Master in a quick an efficient manner.


    "Xinyue! You have gotten quite naughty while I was gone!"


    Not resitting in the slightest, the Vice Sect Master instead kissed her as he looked like he could devour her at any moment.


    "¡­"


    At the same time, a certain elder from the Flying Sword Sect was watching the interaction between the¡­ Master and disciple pair? Not knowing what to do in his current situation¡­


    "Hah¡­ I really can''t continue watching this anymore¡­"


    Sighing dispiritedly as he entered the room where the Vice Sect Master was, Xuan Hao did not bother hiding in the slightest as he entered the room and nced over at the surprised vice Sect Master and his disciple.


    "You! How dare you enter master''s personal quarters without his permission! Even death is not enough to-"


    "Shut up! Xinyue!"


    Calling out angrily towards Xuan Hao as she and her master were interrupted, Xinyue did not expect that her master would suddenly interrupt her in the middle of scolding the rude person.


    "M-master¡­ Is something wrong? Did Xinyue do anything? Please tell Xinyue and she wi-"


    "I said SHUT UP!"


    Not ncing at Xinyue in the slightest since Xuan Hao entered the room, the Vice Sect Master remained focused on Xuan Hao as he felt a sense of existential fear towards the unknown person that had suddenly appeared inside of his room.


    For some reason, the Vice Sect Master felt that the person in front of him could kill him in an instant without even the slightest bit of effort! This sort of feeling¡­ was something the Vice Sect Master had never felt before! Even the Sect Master did not give off that kind of feeling even though he was close to the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "W-who are you¡­?"


    Not knowing how terrified he looked in Xuan Hao''s eyes at the moment, the Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect barely managed to ask this before a tremendous pressure suddenly descended down on him.


    "I''m Xuan Hao¡­ And I''m here to ask you a few questions¡­"


    Bang!


    Crashing down onto the ground, the Vice Sect Master barely managed to hear a few words before fainting on the stop together with his disciple who had long since passed out under the terrifying pressure emanated from the person in question.

 Chapter 267: Attack the Raging Flame Sect!

    <h4>Chapter 267: Attack the Raging me Sect!</h4>


    "What is this¡­ I didn''t even manage to ask him anything before he passed out¡­"


    Smiling wryly to himself as he saw the master and disciple bothying on the ground in front of him, Xuan Hao grabbed the fainted Vice Sect Master before making his way out the pce. Leaving behind the disciple who had fainted on the ground shortly after he had begun using his domain to put a little pressure on them.


    Whoosh~


    Leaving the pce, Xuan Hao quickly flew in the direction of where Feng Chen and Shu Yao were waiting for him¡­ At least they should be more capable than him when it came to getting information on the missing Sect Master¡­


    Flying with the Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect in one hand, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit weird as he exited the Raging me Sect without anyone noticing the unconscious Vice Sect Master¡­.


    ¡­


    "W-why do you have the Vice Sect Master?! And did you find out why the Raging me Sect suddenly had so many Nascent Soul Realm Experts?"


    Looking at the unconscious Vice Sect Master with a shocked expression, Shu Yao could not stop herself from asking.


    "The Sect Master of the Raging me Sect is not there, and I thought we could get some information about his whereabouts¡­ The Nascent Soul Realm Experts present at the Raging me Sect are from the Azure Sky Kingdom, it looks like they are teaming up with each other¡­"


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said, both Shu Yao and Feng Chen became worried. After all, the Azure Sky Kingdom was not as weak as the Raging me Sect and¡­


    "So¡­ Should I just attack them or wait for this guy to wake up first and find out where their sect master is¡­?"


    ""¡­""


    Both Feng Chen and Shu Yao suddenly seemed to remember the fact that they had a Domain Lord on their side¡­ Even if the Azure Sky Kingdom had more Nascent Soul Realm Experts, what would it matter in front of a Domain Lord¡­?


    There was a reason why a Domain Lord was rumoured to be capable of either creating or destroying an entire kingdom by themselves¡­


    "By the way, the Vice Sect Master also had a¡­ femalepanion¡­ Want me to bring her over as well¡­?"


    Not hearing any answer from Feng Chen and Shu Yao, Xuan Hao thought they were nning to wait for the Vice Sect Master to wake up as he asked them whether to also bring over the young woman that the Vice Sect Master had been intimate with.


    "Its fine¡­ We should attack now! The other elders have already begun attacking the Raging me Sect''s branches across the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and it won''t be long before the main sect here finds out about. Maybe they already know about it at this point¡­"


    Shaking his head as he heard what Xuan Hao said, Feng Chen took out his sword with a dangerous gleam in his eyes as he looked towards Shu Yao.


    "Well¡­ Now is better than never¡­"


    Smiling a bit as she saw Feng Chen rearing to go, Shu Yao waved her hand as a few flowers materialized mid-air beforending on the Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect. Sealing up the cultivation base of the Vice Sect Master, just in case he happened to wake up while they were gone and tried escaping.


    Without his cultivation base, even if he tried running away, he would not be able to make it outside the range of their divine sense without at least a few hours of running at the speed of a normal person.


    "By the way, who is the strongest person there¡­?"


    "Hm¡­ It should be someone currently in the newly established camp of the Azure Sky Kingdom just outside the Raging me Sect, he is at the eighth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm! Two people at the four stages are also stationed nearby¡­ Why do you ask?"


    Tilting his head a bit confused after hearing Shu Yao''s question, Xuan Hao answered truthfully.


    "Great! I will take care of those three~ I hope they won''t die too quickly¡­! Feng Chen, you always wanted revenge against those people from the Raging me Sect, so why don''t you deal with them personally now that you have improved your strength!"


    Cheerfully announcing this, both Feng Chen and Shu Yao were about to charge over towards the Raging me Sect, but they were suddenly stopped by Xuan Hao appearing in front of them.


    "So¡­ What am I supposed to be doing¡­?"


    "Well¡­ Pick up the ones running away¡­ Maybe help us out when things get difficult?"


    Saying this with no shame whatsoever as Xuan Hao was tasked with being on watch duty for the ones running away and a lifeline when things got too dangerous.


    "Hah¡­ Fine¡­ Go do whatever¡­"


    Not refusing his task of just keeping an eye on the situation, Xuan Hao did not really feel sad that he wouldn''t get to fight in the uing battle.


    From what he had seen earlier when he entered the Raging me Sect and easily took away the Vice Sect Master, Xuan Hao already knew that there wasn''t really anything posing a threat to him inside the Raging me Sect.


    Better just have Feng Chen get his revenge for the past and Shu Yao¡­ Well¡­ Let Shu Yao do what she wanted¡­


    "Thanks for your help, Elder Xuan-"


    "Great! Let''s go Feng Chen. No time to waste!"


    Shu Yao excitedly pulled Feng Chen in the direction of the Raging me Sect as he thanked Xuan Hao for giving him an opportunity to get revenger, both for himself and the Flying Sword Sect personally.


    Whoosh~


    "Hm?"


    As the two sect masters disappeared in the direction of the Raging me Sect, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a small and almost invisible tremoring from the direction of the Raging me.


    If not for the fact that he was a Domain Lord and had a domain capable of sensing even the slightest changes in his surroundings, Xuan Hao would never have been able to pick up the small tremor traveling through the grounding from the direction of the Raging me Sect.


    "Time for me to get going as well¡­"


    Narrowing his eyes as he tried to pinpoint where the tremor hade from, Xuan Hao left the unconscious Vice Sect Master alone as he disappeared in the direction of the Raging me Sect.

 Chapter 268: Feng Chen vs Grand Elder!

    <h4>Chapter 268: Feng Chen vs Grand Elder!</h4>


    Fwoosh!


    A terrifying wall of fire erupted from the ground and surrounded the Raging me Sect, blocking Feng Chen the moment he showed arrived at the entrance to the Raging me Sect. Compared to Xuan Hao who could effortlessly sneak inside, Feng Chen would have to face the giant sect protection formation covering the entire Raging me Sect.


    "I see that you are doing fine here~ I will head over and deal with the ones from the Azure Sky Kingdom! Good luck Fengfeng~"


    Arriving besides him as she stared up at the giant wall of fire that surrounded the entire Raging me Sect, Shu Yao patted his shoulder lightly as she encouraged him before disappearing in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdoms newly established army camp.


    At this point in time, Feng Chen could already feel several auras at the Nascent Soul Realm ring up from the Azure Sky Kingdoms army camp and the Raging me Sect.


    "Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect, Feng Chen! Looks like your Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect are indeed working together to destroy MY Raging me Sect!"


    As he was looking over in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s newly established army camp that Shu Yao had gone towards, an angry voice echoed out from behind the wall of fire surrounding the Burning me Sect. Followed by this, an elderly man slowly became visible at the ce where the entrance to the Raging me Sect was located.


    A thick killing intent slowly enveloped Feng Chen, as he clearly saw the features of the old man before him.


    "Grand Elder¡­"


    The person who had made his way out to meet him face to face was the Grand Elder of the Raging me Sect!


    When it came to strength, the Grand Elder had been the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect in the past and could be considered the second strongest person in the Raging me Sect!


    "You reached the eighth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm?"


    Feeling the aura of the elder in front of him, Feng Chen slightly narrowed his eyes, he had not expected that the Grand Elder who already had one step into the grave would actually breakthrough from the seventh stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and reach the eighth stage!


    "Haha, indeed¡­ But it looks like I can''tpare to the younger generation anymore and will have to rely on our sect''s formation from the looks of it."


    Narrowing his eye as he said this, the wall of fire behind him began to move as it spread out and headed directly towards Feng Chen.


    The surrounding trees andkes around the entrance of the Raging me Sect was caught up in the inferno that the Grand Elder had unleashed.


    Trees turned to ash, while the water vaporized in an instant aftering into contact with the terrifying inferno unleashed by the Grand Elder with the help of the formation guarding the Raging me Sect.


    Swish~


    Feng Chen did not dare to be careless in front of the terrifying inferno unleashed by the Grand Elder of the Raging me Sect as he readied his sword.


    Even if he was a minor realm above him and a sword cultivator. The sheer power behind the inferno was more than enough to reduce him to ashes if he was careless!


    The guardian formation of the Raging me Sect could not be underestimated! Especially when the Grand Elder who had helped build it in the past was in charge of the formation, together with five other Nascent Soul Realm Experts supporting the formation from the inside!


    Boom!


    Not holding back in the slightest against the iing inferno, Feng Chen directly gathered his strength in his sword as he swung down with all his might. Directly carving a path through the inferno before hitting the guardian formation of the Raging me Sect that barely manged to protect the Grand Elder from the attack!


    "Wha- Howe you improved so much!?"


    The Grand Elder of the Raging me Sect could not help but scream out as he looked towards Feng Chen filled with disbelief.


    Howe the Flying Sword Sect''s Sect Master suddenly became so strong all of a sudden? Was he not only at the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm a few months ago¡­?


    Boom!


    The Grand Elder had originally thought that Feng Chen had used some kind of demonic technique to improve his cultivation by two minor realms forcefully, but as he continued his attacks without stop, he soon realized that he could not damage Feng Chen in the slightest.


    "I-I don''t believe this!"


    Screaming loudly as his expression contorted heavily, the inferno once again appeared as it headed towards Feng Chen.


    Butpared to before, the Grand Elder Suddenly materialized several different symbols with his qi before they flew over and merged together with the inferno heading over in the direction of Feng Chen.


    Fwsh~


    The symbols then proceed to merge together with the inferno as both the disciples from the Raging me Sect and the few wandering cultivators passing by, watched in horror as the inferno intensified to an unbearable degree.


    Even to the point that a few unlucky wandering cultivators standing too close were directly vaporized by it.


    The rest of the wandering cultivators outside the Raging me Sect watching the battle, were smart enough to back the hell away from the terrifying inferno heading in the direction of the Flying Sword Sect''s Sect Master, Feng Chen.


    They were terrified after seeing the scene of the wandering cultivators just here to watch the fight be vaporized in an instant and die without even knowing how they died.


    Just the sheer heat from the inferno was more than enough to turn them into nothingness in the blink of an eye¡­ What would happen if one were to be directly hit by it¡­?


    Thinking about this, the surviving spectators could not help but feel a sense of pity as they looked over towards Feng Chen where the inferno was heading.

 Chapter 269: Terrifying Inferno of the Grand Elder!

    <h4>Chapter 269: Terrifying Inferno of the Grand Elder!</h4>


    Boom!


    By this point, the grounding into contact with the inferno melted away as it was reduced down to a molten liquid that turned the area affected by the inferno into a sea ofva that burned anything it came into contact with.


    However, the inferno still didn''t seem to have reached its peak yet as the temperature continued to increase even further the closer to Feng Chen it got!


    Going anywhere near the inferno or the area that it had affected at this point in time was nothing short of suicidal.


    Everyone felt a deep sense of fear at that moment as they looked towards the Grand Elder of the Raging m Sect.


    Even the disciples and elders of the Raging me sect felt how terrifying the Grand Elder was at this moment.


    The difference between them was simply too big, and they could not feel anything other than awe mixed with a profound sense of fear towards his disy of power when looking towards the figure of the Grand Elder.


    At the same time, they also felt how strong their sect''s guardian formation truly was for the first time!


    "Hmph!"


    Feng Chen did not waste his time just observing the attack heading towards him, as he once again prepared his sword as his sword intent covered his sword.


    However,pared to Xuan Hao who hadprehended True Sword Intent, Feng Chen was still stuck with Nascent Sword Intent.


    The Nascent Sword Intent of Feng Chen was not weak in the slightest and was what had allowed him to fight with the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect evenly in the past. Even though he had been a minor cultivation realm below him!


    At this time, Feng Chen''s Nascent Sword Intent showed signs of evolving into to True Sword Intent at any moment, as he had already reached the peak when it came to refining his Nascent Sword Intent¡­


    Fwoosh~


    The terrifying inferno released by the Grand Elder of the Raging me Sect finally arrived in front of Feng Chen.


    Crashing directly into him as he used his sword to once again try and cut through the inferno.


    Bang!


    The terrifying inferno crashed with the sword attack of Feng Chen as it slowly began to melt away the Nascent Sword Intent along with the sword attack itself.


    The inferno was simply too strong as the sword attackunched by Feng Chen had no way to deal with it. Only capable of holding it back for a short moment before it resumed its path towards Feng Chen, who was now only a few meters away from the inferno.


    Seeing this, Feng Chen switched from an offensive into a defensive position as he put his sword in front of him as he used his Nascent Sword Intent along with his qi to form a protective barrier around himself. Preparing to meet the iing inferno head on now that he had failed to destroy it.


    Fwoosh!


    The inferno did not take long before it directly swallowed up Feng Chen as the protective barrier around him slowly began to melt under intense heat of the inferno.


    Even his Nascent Sword Intent did not seem to be cable ofsting for much longer as it also showed signs of disappearing at any moment under the intense pressure of the inferno!


    Ssh!


    As this process continued, the ground beneath Feng Chen turned into molten liquid as he suddenly found himself unable to find a stable footing as the ground beneath him wastterly melting away under the terrifying temperature of the inferno. Only by using his barrier to negate some of the sea ofva that was forming beneath him, was he able to remain standing.


    If things continued like this, he would soon be swallowed up by the ground beneath him!


    The spectators from both sides were horrified. They knew that if they were caught up in the inferno or the boiling liquid sea that had been formed, they would bepletely vaporized. The wandering cultivators caught up in the attack earlier was more than enough for them to understand this¡­


    "Haha! Feng Chen, it looks like you are going to die here! Without you, your Flying Sword Sect is nothing! Looks like we won''t even need the Azure Sky Kingdom''s help to deal with you in the future!"


    Laughing madly as he saw the barrier protecting Feng Chen from the inferno slowly melt away, the Grand Elder waved his hand and sent another symbol flying over towards the inferno.


    Ptch!


    The symbol flew out, but the Grand Elder seemed to have exceed his limits as he threw up a mouthful of blood after sending the symbol out.


    "Haha! This will be your end!"


    Not affected at all by this, the Grand Elder continuedughing as he kept his focus on Feng Chen as the symbolnded on the inferno before merging together with it like the other symbols.


    Fwoosh!


    The inferno seemed to suddenly have be injected with arge amount of energy as it suddenly red up and expanded by over one hundred meters in all directions. Directly swallowing up everything in its path as the temperature inside its core where Feng Chen was located grew even more extreme!


    "That was close¡­"


    "Luckily we retreated before the inferno expanded¡­ If not¡­"


    The spectating wandering cultivators sucked in a cold of cold air, as they looked over at the devastation caused by the sudden expansion of the inferno.


    Luckily, they had already retreated into the distance. If not¡­ They would have most likely perished from the sudden expansion of the inferno!


    Thinking about this, they could not help but turn their attention back towards the centre of the inferno where Feng Chen was located¡­ But they were disappointed, as the inferno obstructed their vision. Not allowing for them to see what was happening inside of the inferno.


    "Looks like the Flying Sword Sect lost their Sect Master¡­"


    "Well¡­ What do you expect? The Raging me Sect is simply too powerful! And he even attacked them when they could rely on their sect guardian formation¡­ This is simply too reckless¡­"


    "W-what is that!?"


    As the wandering cultivators were discussing among themselves, a bright silver light suddenly appeared at the edge of the inferno as it continued to expand before covering the entire inferno and¡­


    BOOM!


    Arge explosion suddenly urred as the silver light engulfed the entire inferno.


    Whoosh!


    Following this, arge shockwave swept through the surroundings, causing the wandering cultivators observing from the side to be thrown into the distance beforending on the ground a few dozen meters away from the spot they were standing at before.


    "Wha-"


    The Grand Elder did not expect for this to happen as he could only stare in disbelief as the figure of Feng Chen was slowly revealed at the centre of the explosion.


    ¡­


    "Hm¡­ Looks like you need a bit of help?"


    "No! I-I can continue! I will deal with the Raging me Sect myself!"


    A short time before the explosion, Feng Chen had heard Xuan Hao''s voice echo out inside of his head as he waspletely engulfed by the inferno. The barrier around him melting together with his Nascent Sword Intent, but even then, he did not want to admit defeat!


    He wanted to extract revenge by himself!


    "I see¡­ Your Nascent Sword Intent is already about to breakthrough and evolve into True Sword Intent¡­ How about I lend a hand and help your breakthrough by letting you experience True Sword Intent first-hand?"


    Having arrived in the air above the raging inferno, Xuan Hao looked down at Feng Chen as he asked him through his divine sense.


    "That¡­ Fine¡­"


    "Great! I hope you can sessfully breakthrough and obtain True Sword Intent!"


    Not seeing any reason to refuse given his current situation, Feng Chen agreed with Xuan Hao as he suddenly heard him talk again before a bright silver light suddenly appeared at the edge of his vision.


    The small silver light at first seemed weak and fragile when it made contact with the inferno, but this onlysted for an instant as the inferno was soon engulfed by the silver light.


    For a short moment, Feng Chen felt like he saw a massive sea of swords filling his vision as the silver light appeared directly in front of him.


    BOOM!


    This, however, did not continue, as the silver light destroyed the inferno in the next instant, causing the sea of swords to disappear along with it.


    "This is¡­!"


    Ignoring everything around him as he focused on remembering the sea of swords he had seen earlier; Feng Chen did not notice that his formerly weakening Nascent Sword Intent suddenly underwent a transformation as it seemed to have been injected with new life.


    The now revitalized Nascent Sword Intent did not just stop at recovering its strength, but instead began to grow even more powerful as it continued to improve under the subconscious guidance of Feng Chen until it reached a brand-new realm.


    Boom!


    After only a few seconds, Feng Chen returned back from the immersed state he had been in earlier as a small silvery light flicked at the tips of his fingers.


    "T-this is¡­ True Sword Intent!"

 Chapter 270: End of the Raging Flame Sect!

    <h4>Chapter 270: End of the Raging me Sect!</h4>


    "H-How did you survive!?" Screaming out unwillingly, the Grand Elder of the Raging me Sect stood? in front of the entrance to his sect as he looked over in the direction of Feng Chen filled with disbelief.


    Fwoosh~


    The wall of fire that surrounded the entire Raging me Sect had already begun to recede as the exhausted figures of the other Nascent Soul Realm Elders from the Raging me Sect could be seen exhaustedly copsing on the ground.


    By this point, only the Grand Elder was left standing among the Nascent Soul Realm experts of the Raging me Sect¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Feng Chen did not respond to the question of the Grand Elder and instead just let out a deep breath before lifting up his sword and swinging it down in the direction of the Grand Elder.


    Whoosh!


    The Sword lit up brightly as a silver-coloured light covered it before flying out in the direction of the exhausted Grand Elder.


    Standing exhausted in front of the entrance to the Raging me Sect, the Grand Elder barely managed to draw upon the power of the sect''s protective array formation an conjure up a barrier to block the iing attack¡­ But this was still not enough as part of the attack still broke through the barrier and pierced through him.


    "Argh!"


    Copsing down on the ground in front of the Raging me Sect, the Grand Elder directly died from the sword attackunched by Feng Chen! Not even his Nascent Soul managed to escape!


    "W-where is the Sect Master? Why has he not showed up yet?"


    "Maybe he already ran away!"


    "Yes, if the Sect Master already ran away, why should we still stay around?"


    The remaining disciples and elders of the Raging me Sect saw this scene of the Grand Elder dying to Feng Chen''s attack and began to panic before realizing the fact that their Sect Master had still not showed up at this point in time.


    Among the elders of the Raging me Sect, the only ones who knew about the fact that their sect master had left in an attempt to breakthrough, was those at the Nascent Soul Realm. The disciples and other elders at the Core Formation Realm had no clue that their sect master had gone out to seek an opportunity to breakthrough¡­


    So, with the fact that all the remaining Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Raging me Sect had copsed on the ground from exhaustion after using the sect guardian formation and the Grand Elder was killed by Feng Chen. Most of them began to panic as some even began to openly escape from the Raging me Sect. Hoping to safe their own skin by running away before Feng Chen came to kill them as well!


    Even if he decided to chase after them to kill off the Raging me Sect, he would not be able to catch all of them!


    "To think that the Sect Master is truly not there¡­"


    Feeling a bit disappointed as he watched a part of the remaining disciples and elders begin to escape in all directions, Feng Chen did not worry about them as he knew Xuan Hao would take care of them.


    Deep down, he had hoped the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect was still there¡­ So, he could make up for his defeat in the past¡­


    "No need thinking about this anymore¡­ For now, let''s take care of the Raging me Sect for good! After today, there will no longer be any Raging me Sect in the world!"


    A ruthless look appeared on Feng Chen''s face as he made his way over in the direction of the Raging me Sect.


    The only way to truly destroy a sect was to kill of their elders and the core and inner disciples.


    As for the outer disciples?


    Most of the time, they would be left alone as they had yet to fully be a core part of the sect and would not have too much attachment to the sect yet¡­ And killing the outer disciples of a sect would often be considered a bit too ruthless as the outer disciples were normally not members of the sect for more than a few years, often being of the younger generation.


    Killing all the outer disciples was something only the demonic sects did¡­ Or at least that was what most people thought.


    Things likeplete annihtion of a sect still happened from time to time in the surrounding kingdoms. The Azure sky Kingdom was even famous for doing it in the past before growing to its current height¡­


    Whoosh~


    Thinking about this as he arrived in front of the Raging me Sect, Feng Chen waved his sword and used the still unfamiliar sword intent as he began to kill off the different elders and disciples that could be considered the core of the Raging me Sect.


    Luckily, they were easily identifiable by their different coloured robes. Making it easy to not just randomly begin ughtering the outer sect disciples¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time that Feng Chen had gone to seek out the Raging me Sect for a fight, Shu Yao had directly made her way over to the Azure Sky Kingdoms newly established army camp¡­ But what she saw when she arrived there was nothing like what she had expected.


    "Hello Miss! It''s a pleasure meeting you, I hope we can solve things without any fighting as I think it can be mutually beneficial to both parties."


    The person who hade out to meet her upon reaching the entrance to the army camp was the Eighth Stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert mentioned by Xuan Hao along with two fourth stage Nascent Soul Realm Experts each standing on the man''s left and right side without saying anything.


    "¡­ You do know that you are from the Azure Sky Kingdom and is currently in the process of invading the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ Right?"


    Tilting her head to the side as she looked at the man in front of her like he was stupid, Shu Yao secretly prepared to attack in case the man in front of her was just trying to distract her beforeunching a surprise attack.


    "Hehe, we know very well how the current situation inside of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom is between the four¡­ Oh, I mean three strongest sects is¡­ All we want to do is destroy the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, we are not interested in attacking your three sects at all!"


    Laughing quietly when he saw the expression on Shu Yao''s face, the man did not back down in the slightest as he continued. Clearly, he was not willing to fight with the sects inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "So¡­?"


    "So, we want your sects to look the other way and not help out the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ In return, we won''t interfere with your sect''s territory and will even allow you three to split up the central region after we have finished dealing with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­"


    Feeling doubtful after hearing what he said, Shu Yao could not understand the reason behind what the man from the Azure Sky Kingdom said.


    If they were not invading the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to take over their territory and expand, then what reason did they attack the Heavenly Sky Kingdom for¡­? Did they not just take over arge part of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­?


    Remembering the fact that the Azure Sky Kingdom had just taken overnd equal to 10% of the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom recently, Shu Yao could not help but doubt the man as she narrowed her eyes and looked at him.


    "Did you not take over part of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom recently? How do you expect me to believe that you won''t do the same again?"


    "Hehe, we did indeed do so¡­ But that was only because thatnd was originally a part of the Azure Sky Kingdom that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had take over in the past! We do not n on taking any more territory and are only interested in destroying the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!"


    Listening to the man in front of her still being so confident, Shu Yao felt a bit uncertain¡­


    The Azure Sky Kingdom was at war with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. The Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect had not truly begun to fight against them yet and only send a few people over because of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­


    Maybe there is some hidden reason why the Azure Sky Kingdom are attacking the Heavenly Sky Kingdom...?


    "Sure, I agree-"


    BOOM!


    Just as Shu Yao agreed, arge explosion could be heard in the direction of the Raging me Sect as Shu Yao and the three Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Azure Sky Kingdom turned to look in the direction of the Raging me Sect.


    "W-well¡­ It looks like your friend already managed to deal with the Raging me Sect¡­ I-I will inform my superior that the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect will not interfere in our battle!"


    Nervously saying this as he felt the terrifying might behind the earlier explosion, the man from the Azure Sky Kingdom quickly made his way inside the army camp after seeing Shu Yao nod her head in agreement and leave in the direction of the Raging me Sect.


    Shu Yao was still suspicious about the Azure Sky Kingdoms purpose as she left the army camp and made her way over towards the Raging me Sect.


    For now, she would find an opportunity in the future to find out what reason the Azure Sky Kingdom had to attack the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­


    "Hm¡­ He didn''t seem too worried about the Azure Sky Kingdom soldiers still making their way through the Raging me Sect¡­"


    Muttering this to herself, Shu Yao could not help but shiver a bit upon realizing how ruthless the man from the Azure Sky Kingdom truly was!


    He gave up all the soldiers inside the Raging me Sect so he would not have to deal with the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect in the future¡­ Looks like I will have to be more cautious when investigating the Azure Sky Kingdom''s reason in the future¡­!


    ¡­


    At the same time, inside the newly established army camp of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "AH! I forgot about the soldiers we still had moving through the Raging me Sect!"


    The man who had spoken to Shu Yao earlier anxiously yelled to himself as the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts following him looked over worriedly


    "General¡­"


    "Ha¡­ Ipletely forgot about it after feeling that terrifying aura approaching¡­ I never imagined that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would have someone that terrifying among them, a half-step Domain Lord! At least they are not from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s own forces but are from one of the sects¡­ Looks like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would soon copse even without us¡­ Losing those troops still in the Raging me Sect can be considered a sacrifice for not offending someone like that¡­"


    Saying this aloud with a helpless expression, the general soon calmed down as he entered arge tent with amunication talisman in hand.


    He had to at least inform his superior about what happened today! Things had gotten uncertain with the appearance of someone in the half-step Domain Lord Realm!


    All he could hope, was that the woman from earlier would not interfere with anything and would just ignore them¡­ Everything had to work as nned!

 Chapter 271: Decaying Palace

    <h4>Chapter 271: Decaying Pce</h4>


    After helping out Feng Chen and seeing the fact that he managed to breakthrough from the peak of the Nascent Sword Intent and archive True Sword Intent, Xuan Hao quickly dealt with the few elders and disciples of the Raging me Sect that had begun escaping with his domain before turning his attention over towards Shu Yao.


    "Looks like things got sorted out on her side without fighting¡­ Maybe the Raging me Sect did not really team up with the Azure Sky Kingdom but only allow them passage through their sect into the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ Or they found out about Shu Yao''s cultivation realm and did not want to offend her over the Raging me Sect¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as things with the Raging me Sect had mostly been sorted out by Shu Yao and Feng Chen at this point, Xuan Hao instead turned his attention towards a certain mountain peak inside of the Raging me Sect.


    Earlier, he had felt a fait vibration traveling through the ground from that location¡­ The reason why he even paid attention to it in the first ce, was due to the fact that he had clearly felt a terrifying aura hidden beneath the surface¡­ Almost like it was trying to break free from something¡­


    This had caught his attention and at the same time confused him.


    Something that could make even him feel a sense of death just from a small amount of aura leaking outside¡­ Xuan Hao felt that even when he faced the Domain Lords or the Domain Lord demon beast in the secret realm, he had never felt such a terrifying feeling before!


    "I really wonder what it is¡­ And more importantly, why it''sing from the Raging me Sect¡­"


    Narrowing his eyes as he flew over the Raging me Sect, Xuan Hao directlynded on top of the mountain peak that he had felt the aura leaking out from earlier.


    The mountain peak itself was not anything special inside of the Raging me Sect but could instead be considered to be abandoned as nobody had lived on it for a long time. Even the small pce that had once stood there, had long since began decaying with the passage of time.


    From looks alone, Xuan Hao knew that the pce itself should be way older than the Raging me Sect that had only been around for a little over one thousand years. Around the same time as Flying Sword Sect.


    The decay shown on the small pce was even to the point that Xuan Hao found it hard to recognize it as such. Given that it had long since began the process of bing a ruin, with half of the pce already beingpletely reduced to rubble spread all over the peak of the mountain. nts and other vegetation would have long since grown over the rubble if it was not for the fact that the pce was located on a mountain peak where normal vegetation and nts found it hard to grow.


    "Why did the Raging me Sect not just demolish this and use the mountain peak¡­?"


    Xuan Hao could simply not understand why the Raging me Sect would let such a pce stay around on one of their mountain peaks without any reason.


    After all, the higher up you went, the denser and purer the qi between heaven and earth would get!


    Letting a mountain peak stay empty, was simply a waste!


    Back in the Flying Sword Sect, the mountain peaks that had yet to be imed by an elder and stood empty, would not just be abandoned until an elder showed up to im it.


    Instead, the disciples would be able to win a chance to cultivate on the various empty mountain peaks across the Flying Sword Sect for a certain amount of time during the various events held by the sect.


    The idea for this, was of course, Elder Song¡­


    This way, the disciples would have a way to experience the increased speed of cultivation when cultivating on top one of the sect''s tall mountains and at the same time, give them something to strive towards and look forward to.


    Xuan Hao did not fully understand how those things worked, as mountains also seemed to be dived into different categories and ranks given how tall they were and how pure and dense the qi between heaven and earth was on them.


    All he knew, was that the Sect Master and Core Elder''s mountains were the best in the sect¡­ No surprise there¡­


    Crack!


    Walking towards the decaying pce, Xuan Hao heard a loud crunching sound the moment he stepped down on the floor of the decay pce and looked down in surprise. Only to discover that the floor beneath him was breaking apart with each step he took.


    "Hm?"


    Discovering this, Xuan Hao looked around the entrance hall of the pce and quickly discovered a path of footsteps in the floor of the pce. The floor had clearly broken apart leaving behind the traces of someone else having been here before him.


    Xuan Hao did not find this unexpected, but the fact that there were only three sets of footsteps. Two going deeper into the pce and only one heading out again¡­


    Is there still someone inside!?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao immediately became more cautious as he cautiously began making his way deeper inside of the pce while spreading his sword domain out to search for anyone that might be hiding inside.


    Bang Bang Bang~


    A loud bang sounded all of a sudden as he spread his sword domain out to cover the pce before he suddenly felt himself losing his strength and copse on the ground for a short moment before standing up again with a pale look on his face.


    "Hah¡­ W-what is that¡­?"


    Retreating both his sword domain and his divine sense, Xuan Hao cautiously looked towards a certain spot at the centre of the pce.


    Earlier, he had suddenly heard a loud banging noise when his domain and divine sense reached the centre area of the pce. Followed by that, he suddenly felt extremely sluggish as he heard a loud banging noise, after which he felt both his domain and divine sense suddenly beginning to break apart. Truly a horrible feeling¡­ Let alone when both the domain and the divine sense is connected to his soul¡­


    To be honest, it was Xuan Hao''s first time feeling such an overwhelming feeling of pain directly through his soul as he had momentarily lost his bnce and copsed on the ground before quickly drawing his domain and divine sense back and in turn stopping the pain, he felt coursing through his soul.


    "¡­"


    For some time, Xuan Hao stood still and looked in the direction where he had felt both his domain and divine sense getting broken apart. Fear was evident in his eyes as he hesitated whether to continue forward or not¡­ Something that could so easily break apart his domain and divine sense¡­ He would have no chance whatsoever when it came to surviving if it actually attacked him.


    "Hah¡­"


    Calming down and taking a deep breath, Xuan Hao steeled himself before making his way deeper into the pce. Towards the centre where the thing that caused his domain and divine sense to break apart was located.


    The reason for this was simple, he had remembered the three sets of footprints.


    Two went in and one went out again!


    Given that it was most likely someone from the Raging me Sect that had gone in both times, Xuan Hao calcted that he would not just die instantly after entering the core area of the pce and should have a good chance at staying alive.


    The Raging me Sect, was after all a sect where the strongest person was at the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ If someone at the Nascent Soul Realm could survive after entering the core area of the pce, how could he, a Domain Lord, not?


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao slowly made his way towards the core area of the decaying pce. Not knowing what he would find when he got there¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was making his way towards the core area of the decaying pce, Shu Yao had made her way over to the Raging me Sect as she helped Feng Chen deal with the different disciples and elders of the Raging me Sect.


    Within a few minutes of Feng Chen and Shu Yao working together. Only the outer disciples of the Raging me Sect were left shivering in fear as they had gathered together in front of the Raging me Sect.


    "The other elders already finished up the different branches of the Raging me Sect. Today, there is no longer any Raging me Sect left in this world!"


    Putting down amunication talisman that he had just used tomunicate with the different elders that went to deal with the Raging me Sect''s branches, Feng Chen announced this news happily in front of the despairing outer sect disciples of the now gone Raging me Sect.


    "Now¡­ All that is left to do, is how to deal with the outer disciples¡­"


    Muttering this, Feng Chen went over the different ways to ensure the former outer sect disciples would not rise up again and seek revenge for the Raging me Sect.


    The mostmon method used, was ruining their cultivation base and making sure they would never be able to walk the path of cultivation again!


    Such a method would not work against people at the Nascent Soul Realm and above, as destroying their cultivation base would just end up killing them. No such thing as crippling a cultivator at that realm and above existed. At most one could seal their cultivation base.


    People not yet at the Nascent Soul Realm, however, would just return to being normal mortals after losing their cultivation base.


    "Let''s do that¡­"


    Coming to a decision on how to deal with them, the fate of the former Raging me Sect''s outer disciples was decided.

 Chapter 272: Black Miasma and Divine Runes

    <h4>Chapter 272: ck Miasma and Divine Runes</h4>


    "Reminds me of the entrance to the ck Rose Sect¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he had entered the core area of the decaying pce, Xuan Hao looked directly at the small opening in the middle of what had been the main hall of the decaying pce in the past.


    The opening leading straight down was oddly simr to the entrance of the ck Rose Sect that was also located on top of their main mountain peak. The main difference being that the hole leading downwards in the decaying pce was way smaller in size, being at most a few meters wide.


    "Don''t tell me the Raging me Sect is also a demonic sect that has a hidden base underground as well¡­?"


    Thinking this to himself loudly, Xuan Hao quickly discarded the thought of the Raging me Sect being a demonic sect like the ck Rose Sect.


    From the aura he had felt earlier, whatever hid beneath the decaying pce should most likely be rted to the terrifying aura he had felt earlier along with the terrifying force that was about to break apart both his divine sense and his domain.


    "¡­"


    Leaning over the edge of the hole leading straight down into what seemed like an endless abyss of darkness, Xuan Hao had to restrain himself, so he didn''t recklessly use his divine sense or domain to explore what was hidden beneath¡­ He did not really feel like going through the painful experience of having his soul torn apart again¡­


    "Should I go down or not¡­?"


    He had to find out what the Raging me Sect was hiding and what made him feel so terrified earlier!


    The three sets of footsteps also came to a stop in front of the hole in the main hall. Clearly indicating that someone else had entered before him¡­


    Hesitating for what seemed like years, Xuan Hao finally took a deep breath before jumping into the hole and began his descend down into the abyss of darkness below.


    Whoosh~


    As the wind blew past him on his way, Xuan Hao kept falling for at least a minute or two before the hole he entered through began expanding into arge underground cave.


    "Hah¡­ That was closer than I expected¡­"


    Forcefullying to a stop and hovering mid-air, Xuan Hao looked below himself as he observed a weird ck miasma that floated menacingly in the air only a few inches below the ce he came to a stop.


    The ck miasma covered everything below him. Obscuring his vision and making it difficult to see anything happening inside.


    "I wonder what this is¡­?"


    Moving his hand down to try and touch the ck miasma, Xuan Hao suddenly froze in ce as he stopped himself just as he was about to touch the ck miasma below him.


    For some reason, he suddenly felt a sense of death wash over him as he quickly pulled his hand back and looked at the ck miasma with a newfound sense of fear.


    He had no idea what the ck miasma was, but it had clearly made him feel a sense of death the moment he was about to touch it¡­ Meaning the ck miasma gently flowing through the air just below him, might have just killed him after touching it!?


    This thought caused Xuan Hao to fly a bit higher as he distanced himself from the ck miasma below, though he felt his curiosity towards the ck miasma grow.


    The ck miasma below, that seemed to be harmless, could kill him? A Domain Lord!


    "What in the world is this ce¡­"


    Narrowing his eyes as he began to inspect his dark surroundings, Xuan Hao quickly spotted a tform hanging from the ceiling of therge cave. Severalrge metal chains firmly embedded into the ceiling of the cave as they held above the tform, causing it to hover only a few meters above the ck miasma below.


    Looking around the tform hanging from the cave ceiling, Xuan Hao managed to spot a small rope connected from the hole he had entered through to the tform hanging from the cave ceiling.


    "Looks like there was indeed someone before me here¡­ At least it looks like they were indeed someone at the Nascent Soul Realm¡­"


    Seeing the rope hanging freely as the gently swayed from time to time, Xuan Hao heaved a sigh of relief as he was sure that the person who had entered before him was indeed someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, or else, why would they both connecting a rope to the hanging tform instead of just flying over there?


    The only thing that worried Xuan Hao slightly, was the fact that the rope looked to be rather new. Meaning the other person might still be inside of the underground cave¡­


    Whoosh~


    Slowly flying through the air as he followed the rope towards the tform hanging from the ceiling of the cave, Xuan Hao soon manged to make out the true appearance of the tform.


    The tform was wayrger than he had first expected and could easily fit a few hundred people on top of it!


    "But where did the person go after reaching the tform¡­?"


    Landing on top of the tform, Xuan Hao looked around himself filled with confusion.


    There were no other ropes like the one leading towards the tform going anywhere else. Meaning the person who came before him should have only made it to the tform, but for what reason? There was absolutely nothing on the tform itself¡­


    Rumble!


    Just as he was about to leave the tform and begin to try and inspect the other areas of the underground cave, arge rumbling sound suddenly echoed through the surroundings as the ck miasma below suddenly began to move.


    "Not good!"


    Having felt the terrifying sense of danger earlier when he was about to touch the ck miasma, Xuan Hao did not dare to ignore the ck miasma, as he watched it begin to quickly ascend upwards.


    "I have to get out of here¡­"


    Understanding that he might die if the ck miasma touched him, Xuan Hao quickly left the tform behind and rushed towards the hole he had entered the underground cave through.


    Whoosh~


    The ck miasma, however, seemed to have other ns as it suddenly began ascending at an even faster speed around the area that the hole to the outside was located. Blocking Xuan Hao''s only path out¡­


    Bang!


    Not feeling to discourage when he saw this, Xuan Hao tried to hit the cave ceiling in an attempt to dig his way out, but the cave ceiling seemed to have been covered in a weird ck light as his attempt to leave by digging his way out was out of the question.


    "What now¡­"


    Watching as the ck miasma below grew closer and closer, Xuan Hao felt the sense of death he had felt earlier on as he quickly scanned his surroundings before spotting a small area in the distance where the ck miasma seemed to be unmoving as the surrounding ck miasma rose up.


    Whoosh!


    Not waiting for even a moment, Xuan Hao used his fastest speed possible as he flew towards the ce where the ck miasma was not moving upwards like the rest of the cave.


    Rumble!


    Not even a secondter, Xuan Hao watched the ck miasma reach the ceiling of the underground cave as it crashed against it, causing the entire cave to begin shaking violently under the impact of the ck miasma before the ck miasma slowly began retreating back again.


    He remained safe!


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out a sigh of relief as he watched the ck miasma below him, Xuan Hao suddenly saw something moving as the ck miasma gathered together into two giant eyes that shone with a terrifying killing intent.


    BOOM!


    Arge explosion happened after the pair of giant eyes appeared, as the ck light covering the cave ceiling was suddenly covered in all sorts of divine runes that began shinning with a brilliant and divine holy light.


    ROOAAARR!


    The countless divine runes covering the cave ceiling seemed to have incited the anger of the creature below that the giant pair of eyes belonged to, as a loud roar filled with anger erupted from somewhere located deep beneath him.


    The runes did not care about this angry roar as severalrge chains made out of divine light manifested before diving down into the now violent sea of ck miasma below.


    ROAR!


    The angry roaring continued as more and more chains of light manifested from the divine runes covering the ceiling above before diving down into the sea of ck miasma below.


    The scene of somethingrge below being ensnared by the countless chains of divine light was barely visible to him.


    With time, Xuan Hao felt the creature below slowly begin to weaken as the roars grew fainter with each passing second, while the chains brimming with a divine and holy energy did not seem to weaken in the slightest.


    The ck miasma that seemed ready tounch another attack towards the divine runes covering the cave ceiling, was momentarily restrained as it returned back to the same height it was at before.


    Using this opportunity while the divine chains were busy restraining the creature below, Xuan Hao flew out from the safety spot he had found and made his way towards the hole he had entered the underground cave through.


    Whoosh!


    Leaving the underground cave, Xuan Hao watched the entrance below him slowly being covered up by the divine runes as the path inside the underground cave waspletely blocked off after another five minutes passed.


    The sound of roaring and the sh between the divine chains of light and the creature below had alsopletely disappeared along with it¡­

 Chapter 273: The Raging Flame Sects Treasury

    <h4>Chapter 273: The Raging me Sect''s Treasury</h4>


    Looking down at the entrance to the underground cave filled with ck miasma that had been sealed up, Xuan Hao noticed the divine runes covering the entrance to the underground cave slowly change as they soon transformed to look like ordinary rocks.


    If not for the fact that he had seen it himself, Xuan Hao doubted that he would be able to spot anything wrong with the new rock floor added to the hole in the decaying pce.


    "Hm¡­"


    Thinking about something for a moment as he observed the rocks that had now appeared, Xuan Hao cautiously released both his divine sense and domain to scan the interior of the hole along with the divine runes that had transformed into what looked like an ordinary rocky floor. Ready to retreat the moment he felt anything wrong. Not really willing to go through the same pain he went through earlier¡­


    "Nothing¡­?"


    Scanning everything inside the hole of the decaying pce, Xuan Hao found out that no sudden pain came through his domain of divine sense.


    It was like there was nothing of notice inside the old decaying pce outside of the random hole in the middle along with the three different paths of footsteps showing someone had been there before¡­


    Bang!


    "Sure enough¡­ The divine runes are still there¡­"


    Bringing forth some of his sword intent andunching it towards the ordinary rocks below, Xuan Hao barely caught a glimpse of the divine runes hiding beneath the surface before they quickly returned back to being ordinary rocks again the next second.


    His attack was not weak in the slightest and would have been able to easily kill someone at the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, but he had barely managed to reveal the divine runes hiding beneath the ordinary rocks for a split second¡­


    "Looks like I will have toe back here in the future when I''m stronger¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao cast onest nce in the direction of the ordinary rocks at the bottom of the hole at the centre of the decaying pce before turning around. Leaving the decaying pce behind as he made his way outside.


    He had already been away for a good twenty or so minutes, so Feng Chen and Shu Yao should have already sorted out the Raging me Sect at this point and made arrangement for their outer sect disciples¡­


    Whoosh~


    With this Xuan Hao left behind the decaying pce. Not worried in the slightest that anyone else would end up finding the hole inside the decaying pce and rocks at the bottom of it.


    After all, even he could barely reveal the divine runes hiding beneath for a split second with his strength at the Domain Lord Realm¡­ How many people stronger than him would be present in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the surrounding kingdoms? From what he knew so far. Nobody¡­


    ¡­


    "Did you find anything interesting¡­?"


    Leaving behind the decaying pce amidst the many different mountain peaks scattered inside the Raging me Sect, Xuan Hao directly appeared beside Shu Yao as she was in the process of looking through the Raging me Sect''s treasury.


    Given that the Raging me Sect did not have an interspatial ring or any other simr artifact to store their treasures, most of their precious materials and spirit stones were stored in arge vault located inside the middle of the mountain where the sect master of the Raging me Sect lived. All sorts of different defensive and offensive formation covering all the different paths into the vault.


    "Hm¡­ I did not find anything too precious here¡­ I doubt the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect would put the good stuff in here¡­"


    Seeing Xuan Hao appear beside her; Shu Yao did not panic in the slightest as she instead answered him honestly while picked up a few different treasures and putting them away inside an interspatial ring on her left hand.


    From the looks of it, the Spring Flower Sect had already gotten their hands on some interspatial rings.


    Well¡­ Given the fact that Shu Yao was Half a Step into the Domain Lord Realm, it was understandable¡­


    "Shu Yao- Elder Xuan?"


    Entering the treasury of the Raging me Sect a few seconds after Xuan Hao, Feng Chen walked inside as he eximed loudly in surprise upon seeing Xuan Hao.


    "Did you deal with the Raging me Sect¡­?"


    Not waiting for Feng Chen to recover, Xuan Hao asked him as he curiously turned to look over at Feng Chen.


    The main reason why the Flying Sword Sect had begun fighting with the Raging me Sect was rted to a dispute over a spirit stone mine between the current sect master of the Flying Sword Sect, Feng Chen and the sect master of the Raging me Sect that had still not shown up yet.


    "I have already dealt with the elders along with the inner and core disciples of the Raging me Sect¡­ But the Sect Master is still nowhere to be seen and it also seems like his wife is missing¡­ The outer sect disciples have been dealt with in the normal way, so there should not be any future problems.


    The only worry now is the missing Sect Master of the Raging me Sect¡­ In the future, he will most likely look to take revenge on the Flying Sword Sect after finding out about his sect¡­ Vanishing while he was gone¡­"


    Saying this, Feng Chen looked worried after mentioning the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect.


    "Don''t worry too much about it, I''m still around after all and after we merge together with the Spring Flower Sect in the future, how would the sect master of the now gone Raging me Sect be able to cause trouble?"


    Shaking his head as heforted Feng Chen, Xuan Hao watched as Feng Chen tightly clenching his fists for a short moment before letting go with an unwilling look on his face. Clearly not happy about the fact that the sect master of the Raging me Sect was still alive out there and posing a future threat to the Flying Sword Sect.


    But there was nothing he could do about it. After all, they had no idea where the sect master of the Raging me Sect had gone.


    The only lead they would have was¡­


    "I will get going, I hope both of you can take care of the treasury!"


    Remembering a certain Vice Sect Master that had his cultivation base sealed by Shu Yao earlier, Feng Chen was about to rush out of the treasury vault and back to where the Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect was so he could properly interrogate him about his sect master''s whereabouts when Xuan Hao suddenly stopped him and handed a small ring over to him.


    "This is?"


    "An interspatial ring, I think it will prove quite useful for you¡­ There is also a pill inside that will help you when you attempt to breakthrough in the future, I also included a small note on what it does for you."


    "I- Thank you Elder Xuan!"


    Not knowing much about the pill inside the interspatial ring, Feng Chen knew how useful an interspatial ring and could not say anything other than a simple thank you as he soon left the treasure vault and made his way in the direction where they had left the Vice Sect Master before attacking the Raging me Sect.


    Whoosh~


    Watching the disappearing figure of Feng Chen, Xuan Hao took out another Purification Pill and handed over to the confused looking Shu Yao.


    "What is this? I feel such a pure and cleansing power excluding from it¡­ Is it perhaps a soul strengthening pill of some sort?!"


    Compared to Elder Song who had no idea what the use of the pill was when he first saw it, Shu Yao instantly managed to grasp the use of the purification pill after Xuan Hao gave it to her as she looked at Xuan Hao with a shocked expression.


    Even she knew how precious pills and things that could increase the strength of someone''s soul was! Even those above the Domain Lord Realm would fight to the death if they found something that could increase the strength of their soul


    Shu Yao suddenly felt the weight of the small pill in her hand increase as she understood how truly valuable it was.


    "Indeed, with this, you should be able to strengthen your nascent soul even further and increase your chances of reaching the Domain Lord Realm! If you manage to breakthrough, we would be able to have two people at the Domain Lord Realm!"


    Smiling as he said this, Xuan Hao ignored the shocked expression on Shu Yao''s face as she was lost for words.


    Only looking at the pill in her hand with disbelief before turning back to look up at Xuan Hao.


    "I¡­ Are you sure that it''s fine to give me something like that¡­?"


    Hesitating as she said this, Shu Yao looked like she wanted to return the pill back to Xuan Hao.


    "It''s fine, the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect are going to merge together in the future after all!"


    "I see¡­ I will do my best and make sure this pill does not go to waste!"


    "Great! Now let''s take care of this treasury¡­ We can sort all of it out after returning to the Flying Sword Sect."


    Seeing Shu Yao ept the purification pill, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the massive amount of spirit stones and other treasures filling up the giant treasure vault in front of him.


    Whoosh~


    Xuan Hao did not wait as he took out one of the interspatial rings he had crafted earlier on and began filling it up with the treasures and spirit stones stored inside of the vault.


    Shu Yao did not say anything and quietly put away the purification pill before she joined him in taking away the resources that the Raging me Sect had umted over the past hundred years.

 Chapter 274: Heading back to the Flying Sword Sect

    <h4>Chapter 274: Heading back to the Flying Sword Sect</h4>


    "That should be all of it!"


    Putting away thest few spirit stones inside the Raging me Sect''s treasure vault, Xuan Hao smiled happily as he looked down on the ten or sopletely full interspatial rings present on both his hands.


    "I never expected for you to have so many interspatial rings¡­"


    Looking speechlessly at the interspatial rings on both his hands, Shu Yao had no idea what to say as she had never seen anyone take out so many interspatial rings before in her life¡­ It all felt a little too much as she doubted the fact that interspatial rings were as rare as she had first thought. Even she had spent at least a hundred or so years at her current realm before getting her hands on three interspatial rings!


    Not to mention the fact that she had already given two of them away. Keeping the one with thergest storage for herself.


    "Haha, this way we won''t need to leave someone behind to defend this ce while waiting for someone toe over and help us transport all of it!"


    Laughing happily after seeing the speechless expression on Shu Yao''s face, Xuan Hao made his way out of the nowpletely empty treasure vault of the Raging me Sect. Following closely behind him as she seemed to think about something, Shu Yao also made her way out of the empty treasure vault.


    "Let''s go and meet up with Feng Chen before-"


    "No need, he already informed me that he had gone to look for the Raging me Sect''s sect master when you were busy with storing away the different artifacts and spirit stones earlier¡­"


    Interrupting Xuan Hao who was about to make his way over in the direction where they had left the Vice Sect Master of the Raging me Sect, Shu Yao quickly informed him before trailing off towards the end. Looking at the ten or so interspatial rings on him.


    "I see¡­ We should just make our way back to the sect for now then, we can just meet up with him at another time. Elder Song should be more than fine when ites to dealing with the resources, we sized from the Raging me Sect."


    Nodding his head after hearing that Feng Chen had already left to chase after the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect that went missing, Xuan Hao could not help but feel thankful for the fact that Elder Song was now a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator.


    Handling the resources that they had gotten from the Raging me Sect''s treasury should be well within his authority to sort out now!


    ¡­


    "Hm!? Where did that cold wind suddenlye from?"


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine all of a sudden, Elder Song turned to look around himself in confusion.


    "Maybe I need another few days to stabilize my cultivation base even further¡­"


    Not knowing the fact that he would have to deal with handling a¡­rge¡­ number of different resources over the next few weeks after returning to the Flying Sword Sect, Elder Song shook his head as he ignored the weird shiver that ran down his spine a few seconds ago and focused on the situation in front of him.


    "Argh! Why are there only a few old people at the Core Formation Realm?! Hah¡­ I''m sure big sister Meng is having a way better time¡­ She properly managed to encounter one of the Raging me Sect''s Nascent Soul Realm Experts!"


    A youngdy was pacing back and forth angrily in the main hall of a pce located at the centre of the Raging me Sect branch that they had been dispatched to deal with as a group of around five elderly men and women were kneeling down in front of her.


    All of them were shivering in fear as they did not dare to look up at the young girl pacing back and forth.


    Maybe it was due to the fact that the young girl was someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, or maybe it was due to the fact that she was walking around with a giant hammer that still had blood dripping down from it.


    It did not help that the corpse of two other Core Formation Elders of the Raging me Sect branch were lying nearby close to the entrance of the pce.


    "Elder Xuefeng¡­ I think we should finish things up here and head back to the sect, I just got word from my Sect Master that they had already finished up the main sect of the Raging me Sect¡­"


    Smiling wryly as he nced over at the youngdy pacing back and forth angrily in front of the Core Formation Realm Elders, Elder Song informed Xuefeng about the information he had just gotten a moment ago when she had been busy with two of the Core Formation Realm Elders at the entrance of the pce¡­


    "So quickly?! Looks like someone in the Domain Lord Realm is way faster than the flying demon beasts we used to travel here¡­ I thought it would at least take a few more days before they even arrived at the main sect of the Raging me Sect¡­"


    Eximing loudly out of surprise upon hearing what Elder Song said, Xuefeng could not help but feel amazed at how quickly someone in the Domain Lord Realm was able to travel.


    Even flying demon beast would have needed another two or three days to even reach the main sect of the Raging me Sect, but Elder Xuan and the two sect masters had already arrived and even destroyed the main sect!


    "Well¡­ Looks like you guys won''t be useful anymore¡­"


    "W-wait! W-we still know about the location of the-"


    Shocked silly after secretly listening in on the conversation between Xuefeng and Elder Song, one of the elders called out anxiously as he clearly knew what Xuefeng meant when she said they weren''t useful anymore¡­


    Whoosh!


    Bang!


    But Xuefeng did not seem to care as she swung her hammer down. Directly killing the five remaining elders in one attack.


    "Hah¡­ Those idiots honestly thought I would believe they knew the location of some amazing artifact that could allow me to directly reach the Domain Lord Realm¡­ How stupid do they think I am?"


    Muttering thest few words, Xuefeng cleaned up the blood that covered her hammer with a simple technique before putting it away in a small interspatial ring located of her right ring finger.


    "Now that everyone in this branch is gone¡­ We can be considered to have sessfully wiped out the branch! Let''s head back!"


    "¡­"


    Not saying anything as he followed Xuefeng out of the now empty Raging me Sect branch towards the location that they their flying demon beasts were waiting; Elder Song could not help but feel a sense of anticipation well up inside of him.


    Now that the Raging me Sect was gone and the Spring Flower Sect was getting ready to merge together with the Flying Sword Sect, there was no way to stop the inevitable rise of the Flying Sword Sect!


    Even the Seven Fates Sect that had been the strongest sect in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the past, could only be second to the Flying Sword Sect in the future!

 Chapter 275: Ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom

    <h4>Chapter 275: Ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom</h4>


    After the destruction of the Raging me Sect, the army from the Azure Sky Kingdom did not stand around and wait for too long as they knew that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would soon find out about the fact that they had already entered their territory.


    So, with this in mind, the Azure Sky Kingdom directly moved forward andunched an attack towards the central region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom before they could prepare a proper defence. Taking control of the now former Raging me Sect in a bid to secure an easy path into the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    All of this happened after Xuan Hao and Shu Yao had already returned back to the Flying Sword Sect to meet up with the other elders who went out to deal with the different branches of the Raging me Sect spread out across their territory inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    They had already taken away all the precious resources and spirit stones under the Raging me Sect, so the Azure Sky Kingdom taking control of the now destroyed Raging me Sect''s main sect to get an easy and safe path inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom did not matter too much as the other party was not attacking them in the first ce¡­


    The spirit stone mine that had been a part of the Flying Sword Sect in the past had also returned to them shortly after the fall of the Raging me Sect.


    At the current moment, both the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had be locked in war as both parties battled it out at the border between the southern and central region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    With the initial surprise attack, the Azure Sky Kingdom had already managed to kill off some of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts on the side of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom as they looked to be winning the war so far.


    The reason for this was also because the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect decided to not help the Heavenly Sky Kingdom with defending the central region.


    In a twist of events, the Seven Fates Sect had directly dered to be an independent sect as they broke free from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Directly decreasing their territory by over 30% in one go.


    At this point, the ancestor from the royal family had to step in and stabilize the situation before things went even worse than what had already happened¡­


    ¡­


    A little over a week had already passed since the war between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom began at the border of the central region and the situation had only grown worse with each passing day¡­


    If not for the ancestor of the royal family personally arriving at the border to fight back the Azure Sky kingdom, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s army might have already fallen!


    Over the past week, Shu Yao had already returned to the Spring Flower Sect to discuss the merger between the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect together with her elders.


    Elder Song was busy dealing with the resources that they had taken from the now gone Raging me Sect, while Zu Fei had gone missing after finding out that Feng Chen went searching for the missing sect master of the Raging me Sect.


    All of this left Xuan Hao in charge of dealing with the elderly man standing proudly in front of him.


    The person in question was the old ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s royal family, a peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert!


    "So¡­ You want the Flying Sword Sect to send over some of our elders to help out with your current war with the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­?"


    "Yes! I hope you won''t refuse since I even bothereding here personally!"


    Arrogantly answering Xuan Hao''s question as he looked down on him, Xuan Hao really doubted whether there was something wrong with the person in front of him.


    He had not hidden his cultivation as someone in the Domain Lord Realm and the person in front of him already knew he was a Domain Lord, but still dared to act so arrogantly in front of him¡­ What was the reason for this¡­?


    Xuan Hao felt increasingly curious as he looked over at the arrogant ancestor from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom as thetter seemed to have taken his silence as a form of agreement. Smiling proudly before continuing to look over at Xuan Hao with amanding look in his eyes.


    "Given that those bastards from the Azure Sky Kingdom have already reached the central region, I think it would be fine if the Flying Sword Sect sends over all of their experts¡­ You can leave one to defend the sect I guess."


    Saying this without batting an eyelid, the old ancestor only retreated slightly and allowed one expert to stay behind upon noticing the increasingly terrifying pressure that came down from above. Making him almost unable to move.


    "And for what reason should we even send anyone over to help out the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the first ce¡­? You should at least know that with my cultivation realm, there is no way that the Flying Sword Sect would stay a part of the Heavenly Sky kingdom in the future¡­ Let alone send our Nascent Soul Realm over to act as cannon fodder for you on the frontlines¡­"


    Not holding back in the slightest as he said this, Xuan Hao saw the shocked expression on the face of the ancestor and could not help but wonder what was so shocking about what he had said.


    Did he seriously believe a sect with someone in the Domain Lord Realm would continue to be under him and his royal family¡­?


    Xuan Hao did not know what to say as the ancestor froze in ce. Not knowing what to say as he just looked over at Xuan Hao with a silly look on his face.

 Chapter 276: Stalemate between the two Kingdoms

    <h4>Chapter 276: Stalemate between the two Kingdoms</h4>


    "B-but¡­ W-where is Feng Chen?"


    Not having expected his answer, the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom began looking around the room anxiously. Stuttering nervously as he asked Xuan Hao.


    "He is not here currently¡­ Even if he was, it won''t change the fact that the Flying Sword Sect will not be helping the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in their war with the Azure Sky Kingdom!"


    ring coldly at the elderly ancestor, Xuan Hao did not hold back in the slightest as he had no n to help out the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "I¡­ Hmph! I will remember this!"


    Freezing for a short moment before saying this, the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom angrily stomped his feet before leaving the meeting room and quickly making his way out of the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Do you know anything about this¡­?"


    Looking over towards the entrance that the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had left through, Xuan Hao asked in a confused tone as Wang Hu appeared at the entrance to the meeting room and walked over.


    "I really have no idea¡­ He clearly already found out that you were in the Domain Lord Realm, but still dared to act like that! I think we will have to wait until the Sect Master returns before asking him what it''s about¡­"


    Shaking his head with an equally confused look on his face, Wang Hu did not know anything about why the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom acted like that either as he came to a few meters in front of Xuan Hao.


    "Hah¡­ How troublesome¡­ At least we should finally be able to rx now that the Raging me Sect is dealt with. The Azure Sky Kingdom and Heavenly Sky Kingdom fighting with each other is not something for us to worry about as their fight ultimately won''t matter too much for us¡­"


    After saying this, Xuan Hao felt that the future looked extremely bright.


    With the Raging me Sect gone and the church of the gue god no longer active in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, there was really nothing to worry about and he could focus on his disciples.


    The Flying Sword Sect would also begin officially merging together with the Spring Flower Sect when Feng Chen finally decided to show up again¡­ At that point, the Flying Sword Sect would reach a new height as they would need to expand their territory to further strengthen the sect.


    The Sect Alliance by the Sky Empire would also be able to give them a way to act as an independent power inside the Sky Empire.


    The Seven Fates Sect seemed to have already gone this way as they already dered themselves independent from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Now, the only two strong sects left in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom were preparing to merge together before leaving the kingdom¡­ This could truly be considered the worst time since the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms establishment in the past.


    They would lose almost all their territory outside of the core region of their kingdom in one fell swoop¡­ At the same time, the Azure Sky Kingdom was threating theplete destruction of their kingdom as they were attacking the core region itself¡­


    "Well¡­ It has nothing to do with me anymore¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he thought about the current situation of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao exchanged a few words with Wang Hu before leaving the meeting hall and making his way back towards his pavilion.


    From now on, he would not need to worry about anything with the Flying Sword Sect''s current position as a sect with a Domain Lord in it, he could begin fully focusing on training up his disciples and help them increase their strength.


    In the future, all he had to worry about was learning how to properly cultivate his disciples into powerful experts in the future!


    ¡­


    With the Heavenly Sky Kingdom trying its best to gather more people to defend against the invasion of the Azure Sky Kingdom, many of the weaker sects were forced to sent some of their people over to help.


    This resulted in a stalemate as the Azure Sky Kingdom were forced to a halt after one week of battle, both sides unwilling to let go of even a single inch as the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was personally holding down the front on the side of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Making sure that the Azure Sky Kingdom had no way to forcefully breakthrough.


    All of this, however, did not matter to the Flying Sword Sect as news about one of their elders having reached the Domain Lord Realm began to spread out. Deterring anyone from looking for trouble with them.


    The destruction of the Raging me Sect also served as a warning to those who had nned to act against them after someone had leaked the news that they would be merging together with the Spring Flower Sect sought after by many of the sects in the neighbouring kingdoms.


    The now demonic sect known as the ck Rose Sect on the other hand, seemed to havepletely disappeared from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom as they were nowhere to be found when Xuan Hao went to the location of their sect to destroy them once and for all.


    Like this, time passed by peacefully in the Flying Sword Sect.


    One month after the destruction of the Raging me Sect, Feng Chen and Zu Fei had not returned yet. The only news they had received from them was a brief exnation from Feng Chen about both of them having met up and being close to finding out where the missing sect master of the now destroyed Raging me Sect was located.


    Xuan Hao had mostly spent thest month training Qing Yi and Chu Yang differentbat techniques along with a much-needed movement technique for each of them.


    Bai Ning on the other hand was still only in the Qi Condensation Realm, so Xuan Hao just focused on teaching him the basics as he increased his cultivation realm. Already having reached the third stage of the Qi Condensation Realm in only one month!

 Chapter 277: First Time in the Mission Hall

    <h4>Chapter 277: First Time in the Mission Hall</h4>


    "Master!"


    Walking into the training ground where both Qing Yi and Chu Yang were sparring with each other, Xuan Hao did not know what to say as he suddenly saw both of them stop before Qing Yi came running over towards him together with Chu Yang.


    "Master, when can we take on missions as well? We have never gotten the chance to help the sect since we came and both of us are already close to theter stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm! All the other disciples get to take on missions after reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm, but we have to reach the Core Formation Realm first!? This is so unfair!" Pouting angrily as she said this.


    Xuan Hao had no idea how to respond to Qing Yi.


    The reason why the sect had a requirement for personal disciples of the Core Elders to first reach the Core Formation Realm before taking on missions and going out to adventure by themselves, was because they were afraid someone would scheme against the future pirs of the Flying Sword Sect and kill them!


    "Master¡­ The Raging me Sect is already gone and the¡­ ck Rose Sect¡­ Have already disappeared from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, I think it should be fine for us to take on missions from the mission hall as long as they are inside of the Sect''s territory."


    Chu Yang standing beside her also seemed to think the same way as talked out in support of his senior sister.


    "Hah¡­ Fine, but only if its inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory!"


    Seeing the determined look on both his disciples faces, Xuan Hao decided to give up as he let them take on missions from the mission hall inside of the Flying Sword Sect''s territory.


    No matter what, they would have to go out in the world at some point and he would also be able to use the time while they were gone to learn more about what he could teach his disciples and increase his knowledge about the different subjects that they were interested in.


    For example, even though he had promised to help out Qing Yi with alchemy after she finished learning from Peng Yun, he had no idea how to go about it when it came to truly teaching her and would have to spend some time organizing the information he had been given by the system.


    ""Thank you master!""


    Both Qing Yi and Chu Yang happily smiled after gaining their masters approval to take on sect missions as both of them soon disappeared from the training ground. Leaving behind only Xuan Hao.


    "Guess I will also spend some more time training Bai Ning with them taking on missions¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao soon disappeared from the training ground as he decided to also spend some more time with his newest and youngest disciple while the two others were out in the world adventuring.


    ¡­


    "We finally managed to convince master!"


    "Yes, we can finally take on missions! Staying in the sect just cultivating and training all day long¡­ It''s no wonder that most disciples decide to take on missions after reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­ I really wonder how master can do it¡­"


    Talking with each other, Chu Yang and Qing Yi arrived at the Mission Hall of the Flying Sword Sect amidst a stream of disciples simr to themselves. Alling to look for a mission because of the rewards offered, for a way to gain real-lifebat experience or maybe just to take some time off the usual cultivation.


    "So, this is the Mission Hall!"


    Entering the Mission Hall, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang were amazed at the sheer size of the building, it was by far one of the, if not thergest building in the Flying Sword Sect. Easily able to amodate the thousands of disciples streaming in and out of the building as they came to pick up a suitable mission to take on before leaving.


    The Flying Sword Sect had recently recalled most of their disciples during the time that the gue had been rampant in the north and only recently allowed for them to leave on missions again, this in turn caused the Mission Hall to be full of people at all times during thest few weeks.


    "Is it perhaps your first time here?"


    As Chu Yang and Qing Yi were looking around at all the disciples walking around therge building, an older disciple spotted the two of them as he walked over and asked kindly.


    "Y-yes, is it that obvious¡­?"


    Smiling awkwardly as she answered, Qing Yi looked over at the older disciple that hade over.


    The person in question was easily identified as an inner disciple due to the robe he wore.


    "Haha, it''s quite easy to see with how you two are looking around the ce instead of going over to pick up a mission! I would rmend going over there and get a briefing about how the Mission Hall works if you don''t know yet, it will be quite useful for you two!"


    Laughing loudly as he said this with a smile on his face, the older inner disciple pointed them in the direction of a small counter located to the side where there were only a few younger disciples around.


    A small sign saying [Mission Hall Basic Information] was hanging above the counter that the older disciple pointed them towards. Clearly it was a ce for new disciples unfamiliar with the Mission Hall were supposed to go.


    ""Thank you""


    "Haha, no worries! Helping out new disciples is the duty of us older disciples!"


    Thanking the older inner disciple for his help as the person in question justughed it off with a smile before turning to leave after having helped them, Qing Yi and Chu Yang both made their way over to the counter located in the corner of the Mission Hall.


    Today they would both take on their first mission and begin their first adventure outside of the Flying Sword Sect!

 Chapter 278: Mission Hall

    <h4>Chapter 278: Mission Hall</h4>


    "Hello! How can I help you two? Do you want a basic introduction on the Mission Hall or perhaps information about something else?" The moment it was their turn, Qing Yi and Chu Yang faced a mature looking older woman in her mid-thirties standing behind the counter as she asked both of them in a gentle tone with a kind smile on her lips.


    "We want to learn how we can take on missions!"


    Their main reason foring to the Mission Hall was to take on missions, what other reason could they havee for¡­? Chu Yang wondered this as he stepped forward and asked the woman behind the counter.


    "Sure, the Mission Hall exist as a way for the sect to regte and make sure the territory is safe. Missions you take from here will mostly be the subjugation of different demon beasts, bandits or in some cases gathering different rare materials like herbs and metals used in alchemy and cksmithing. Wait just a moment!"


    Nodding her head in understanding as she gave them a basic introduction to the Mission Hall, the woman behind the counter ducked down beneath the counter and pulled out two small books before handing them over one to each of them.


    "This is a book that records some of the different demon beasts and rare materials that can be found in the territory of the Flying Sword Sect. It also includes a few weaknesses of some of the demon beasts along with different well-known locations where certain rare materials can be found!"


    Looking at the small thin book in their hands, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang felt the importance that the book would have for them during their adventures outside of the sect. Unknowingly, both of them felt a wave of appreciation towards the older woman behind the counter. Even if it was just a normal procedure to give one to every new discipleing to the Mission Hall for the first time, they still felt grateful towards the older woman.


    "Over there, you can find different missions to take on. From demon beast subjugation missions to escort missions and material gathering mission. All mission will have a different requirement on the disciple''s realm. The weakest being the first stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, while the most difficult missions would require one to be at theter stages of the Core Formation Realm!"


    Saying this as both Qing Yi and Chu Yang were focused on the small book that she had given to both of them, the older woman continued her exnation as she pointed in the direction of arge group of disciples that were surrounding arge board that had at least a few hundred different papers hanging from it.


    The papers were the different missions given out by the Mission Hall and the disciples surrounding therge mission board were taking down one of the papers with a mission on it as someone from the Mission Hall would soone over to fill in the newly empty spot on the mission board with a brand-new mission that would soon get taken away by another disciple.


    "I-is it normally that busy¡­?"


    Looking at the scene of the disciples surrounding the mission board as they took down a piece of paper with a mission on it before moving towards one of the nearby counters, Qing Yi felt a little intimidated by therge swarm of disciples chaotically moving around the Mission Hall.


    "Hah¡­ Normally its not so busy, but due to the recent recall of all the disciples and elders outside of the sect. Many of the missions were left upleted and the sheer amount of missions just increased during that period of time as nobody went toplete them¡­ Currently the territory of our sect can be considered to be quite chaotic due to our sect recalling everyone when the gue had first appeared¡­"


    Sighing to herself as she said this, the older woman could not help but shake her head when she mentioned the current state of the Flying Sword Sect''s territory.


    Even with rumours about them having a Domain Lord behind them, demon beasts and ordinary bandits would not care about something like that as chaos would inevitably begin spreading through the territory without anyone there to keep the order¡­


    The supply of materials requested by disciples through the mission hall to practice their professions had also dried up during this period of time as the disciples all issued their own missions at the same time, causing the Mission Hall topletely overflow with missions for the different disciples looking for an adventure outside the sect to take on.


    "Well¡­ At least things should calm down again after a few months of the disciples and elders taking on missions to stabilize the current chaos¡­"


    Saying this, the older woman behind the counter soon turned back to Qing Yi and Chu Yang, smiling at both of them.


    "With more disciples like youing here to take on missions, things will stabilize even faster! I hope you all the best on your future missions!"


    With this, Qing Yi and Chu Yang exchanged a few more words with the older woman behind the counter about the current situation of the Flying Sword Sect''s territory before taking their leave and moving over in the direction of the mission board.


    During the conversation, both of them learned that the territory under the Flying Sword Sect was currently in a state of chaos as nobody had been there to take care of the demon beasts and bandit groups who had taken advantage of sects like the Flying Sword Sect, who isted themselves during the time that the gue spread through the northern region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to increase their power and influence.


    Now, the Flying Sword Sect was in the process of sending their disciples and elders out into the northern region again to stabilize the situation and take care of the different demon beasts and bandit groups that had begun to rise up.


    This, however, would at least take a few months for the Flying Sword Sect¡­ The Northern Region was by no means a small area and there were at least a hundred different sects and a thousand family ns on the same level as Qing Yi''s Qing n!


    The amount ofnd that the Flying Sword Sect covered was more than enough topare to a weaker kingdom by itself! This alone was more than enough to see howrge the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had been before the Flying Sword Sect and the other sects decided to break free from it.

 Chapter 279: Finding a Suitable Mission

    <h4>Chapter 279: Finding a Suitable Mission</h4>


    The mission board of the Mission Hall was split up into two different sections at the entrance of the Mission Hall, one section was farrger than the other and was also the one that the older woman at the counter had pointed both Qing Yi and Chu Yang towards.


    [Foundation Establishment Missions]


    Both Qing Yi and Chu Yang understood the reason why she had pointed them towards therger mission board the moment they saw therge words above the mission board with disciples all around it.


    The other mission board was for Core Formation Realm disciples; therefore, it was considerably emptierpared to the Foundation Establishment mission board, with only a few older disciples appearing in front of it asionally.


    "So¡­ Should we see if we can find a mission to do together?"


    Chu Yang said as he nced over at Qing Yi and waited for her to answer.


    Earlier, they had already decided that they would take on a mission together for the first time.


    "¡­"


    Qing Yi did not say anything upon hearing Chu Yang''s question, but instead just nodded her head approvingly as both of them made their way through the sea of disciples moving around in front of the mission board.


    "Well¡­ Let''s see what kind of missions there are¡­"


    Standing directly in front of the mission board, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang began scanning the different missions before them as they tried to search for one that both of them could do together without being too dangerous for them, it was after all their first mission, and they didn''t want to take on something too dangerous like dealing with a peak Foundation Establishment demon beast that had gone wild¡­


    [Subjugate the Blinding Flower Bandit Group at the Red Flower Ridge]


    [Description: The Blinding Flower Bandits have risen to strength over the past month, terrorizing the surrounding viges and kidnapping some of the locals. Their leader having an estimated strength at the fifth stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, with at least three other people at the Foundation Establishment Realm.]


    [Rmended strength: Peak Foundation Establishment Realm or a group of at least three at the fifth stage of the Foundation Establishment or above]


    [Reward: Sprit Stones]


    [Time Limit: 6 months]


    Looking over the different mission hanging on the mission board, Chu Yang found one mission that caught his attention about subjugating a group of bandits as he took it and prepared to rmend it to Qing Yi, but Qing Yi had not wasted any time either as she had also found a mission herself before she showed to Chu Yang at the same time he showed the mission he found to her.


    [Gather one kilogram of Pure Heart Spirit Grass]


    [Description: Pure Heart Spirit Grass is a rare herb that can be found around the Pure Heart Lake located in the territory of the River Sect. The Pure Heart Spirit Grass is often guarded by a demon beast at the Foundation Establishment Realm; therefore, you are likely to encounter several demon beasts at the Foundation Establishment Realm while gathering the Pure Heart Spirit Grass as it often only grows in small patches with around one hundred grams worth of Pure Heart Spirit Grass in them.]


    [Rmended strength: Above fourth stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, rmend doing it in a group, as it will be easier toplete the mission instead of having to search alone.]


    [Reward: Pure Heart Potion, Spirit Stones]


    [Time limit: 8 months]


    "So, which one should we go with¡­?"


    Chu Yang saw that the mission that Qing Yi had rmended was really suitable for them, but still felt that the one he had found was better¡­


    "Hm¡­ How about we just take on both of them¡­? If I''m not wrong, the River Sect should be located close to the Red Flower Ridge that the group of bandits are hiding, and it should not be a problem for us to take on more than one mission at once¡­"


    Thinking about something for a short moment, Qing Yi recalled that the River Sect should be located rtively close to where the Red Flower Ridge where the bandits were hiding.


    The River Sect was not a well-known sect in the Flying Sword Sect''s territory, but it was still a strong sect with someone at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm behind it!


    In the past, Qing Yi had learned about the River Sect due to someone in the Bright Sun City being epted as a disciple of the River Sect.


    Back then, she had felt shocked after learning that the River Sect had someone at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm! Way stronger than her father was, it was also at that point in time that Qing Yi had begun learning about the different sect''s that were located around the Bright Sun City.


    At that time, she had truly felt like a frog at the bottom of a well. Never knowing how big the world outside truly was, it was also at this point that she had learned about the Flying Sword Sect for the first time!


    "Yeah¡­ We can do that¡­"


    Listening to what Qing Yi said, Chu Yang thought about it for a moment before agreeing with her suggestion of taking on both of the missions. After all, there was no rule about not being able to take on more than one mission at a time.


    The only requirement the Mission Hall had in that regard was a time limit, but that time limit was normally more than long enough for the disciples toplete the mission given to them!


    Just the two missions that they had agreed on had a time limit of 6 months or more!


    Whoosh~


    Coming to a decision, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang held onto a the mission paper each of them had chosen as they made their way over in the direction of one of the many counters that the other disciples made their way towards after finding a suitable mission.


    All they had to do now was register the mission officially...

 Chapter 280: Searching the Burning Mountain Range

    <h4>Chapter 280: Searching the Burning Mountain Range</h4>


    Registering the two missions was not difficult at all, as they would only need to show their identification token to the staff member, who would then note it down.


    Quick and simple, without any long and drawn-out procedures to finish before being able to take on the missions¡­


    Qing Yi and Chu Yang were both a bit surprised after this as they had not expected for it to be so easy and quick. After all, the number of disciples inside the Mission Hall at the moment, had made them think that it would take longer than just a few seconds¡­


    "Should we go with the bandit mission first¡­?"


    Standing in front of the entrance to the mission hall, just having made their way outside, Qing Yi turned to Chu Yang standing beside her as she asked.


    "Yeah¡­ Dealing with the bandits should be a given. After all, the longer they are left alone, the more chaos they will cause to the viges close to the Red Flower Ridge where they are currently located¡­ If we wait too long, they might even change the location of their base. Making it harder for us to find them again¡­"


    Nodding his head in agreement, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both came to a decision as they began making their way out of the Flying Sword Sect. Picking up a suitable demon beast to ride there from the reluctant beast tamers on the way¡­


    Like this, Chu Yang and Qing Yi made their way out of the Flying Sword Sect for the first time since joining the sect without their master, Xuan Hao, apanying them!


    ¡­


    Boom!


    "Argh!"


    At the same time that Qing Yi and Chu Yang were setting off towards their first ever adventure, Feng Chen was having a bad time as he was hit by the tail of arge serpent demon beast and sent flying into a nearby mountain.


    "Feng Chen! Are you okay?!"


    Coming over to help Feng Chen up, Zu Fei anxiously inspected every inch of his body as she hatefully red in the direction of the serpent demon beast a few hundred meters away.


    Sssss?


    The serpent demon beast who was about tounch another attack towards Feng Chen when he was down, hesitated for a moment upon feeling the angry gaze of Zu Fei. For some reason, it felt a shiver run down its body as the human female red at it¡­


    Roar!


    Just as the serpent demon beast shook the weird feeling off, a loud roar echoed from the distance.


    Ssss!


    Acting extremely panicked upon hearing this roar, the serpent demon beast no longer cared about Feng Chen any longer, as it quickly turned around and slithered away.


    "Hah¡­ I''m fine, I just need to rest for a moment¡­ For now, let''s get out of here before the origin of that roar earlier shows up!"


    Breathing in deeply as he watched the serpent demon beast slither away in fear, Feng Chen hurried Zu Fei to move.


    No matter what, the serpent demon beast was at the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. For it to be scared of just a single roar¡­ Feng Chen did not dare to stay around and wait to find out the origin of the roar¡­


    "¡­"


    Zu Fei stayed silent for a short moment before she picked him up into a princess carry and ran towards a nearby cave on the back side of the mountain that Feng Chen had just crashed into.


    Rustle~


    Entering the cave, Zu Fei took out a thick nket from a bag she had been carrying.


    Whoosh~


    Using a qi technique to construct a decently sized rock bed, Zu Fei put the nket down on it before gentlyying the exhausted Feng Chen down on the newly constructed bed.


    "Thanks¡­"


    Not saying anything else, Feng Chen closed his eyes and began recovering.


    Thest month had been way more exhausting than Feng Chen had expected. Fighting demon beasts at the Nascent Soul Realm had already be a daily struggle and he didn''t even know if he could keep chasing after the Raging me Sect''s Sect Master if Zu Fei had not shown up two weeks ago to help him.


    It had already been close to a month since he entered the Burning Mountain Range to chase after the Raging me Sect''s sect master and he had finally managed to find some traces of him and even managed to pinpoint a possible location where he could be secretly cultivating.


    But the location was not easy to enter, and he had ended up encountering the demon serpent at the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm just before reaching the ce that he suspected the Raging me Sect''s sect master to be secretly cultivating¡­


    "But how did that guy manage to reach such a deep part of the Burning Mountain Range¡­?"


    Zu Fei watching Feng Chen recovering in front of her could not help but mutter this to herself.


    How the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect managed to reach such a deep area and even found a ce to safely cultivate was truly something curious.


    After all, Feng Chen at the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and with the help of Zu Fei only managed to reach this part of the Burning Mountain Range after one month of continues struggle!


    How did the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect who was only at the Eighth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm reach this ce¡­? And without anyone to help him as well¡­?


    "No use thinking about it, we will eventually find out after finding him!"


    Hearing Zu Fei''s muttering, Feng Chen opened his eyes and reassured her with a kind smile before closing his eyes once again. Focusing on recovering once again.


    "!"


    Cupping her head in her hands with a light blush appearing on her face, Zu Fei could not help but look away shyly.


    She had indeed made the right decision to follow after Feng Chen! She was able to spend so much time alone together with him!


    Now that Shu Yao had begun appearing, Zu Fei felt strangely anxious every time she watched her and Feng Chen together.


    Back when she heard Feng Chen had gone out to search for the missing sect master of the Raging me Sect, the first thing she did was rush over and make her way into the area of the Burning Mountain Range bordering the territory of the Raging me Sect.


    It took two weeks to find Feng Chen! But she had arrived just in time to help him fight off a group of Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts¡­ Even at this moment, she could still remember the thankful look on his face after she appeared and helped him chase off the group of Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts!


    ROAR!


    Rumble~


    Just as Feng Chen was fully focused on recovering and Zu Fei was lost in her own fantasies. The same roar that they had heard earlier scaring the peak Nascent Soul Realm serpent away, once again echoed through the surroundings as the mountain cave they were hiding inside of began shaking violently.


    ROAR!


    BOOM!


    This was not the end of it, as an equally terrifying roar sounded a little further away before arge explosion could be heard outside as the sound of tworge objects violently crashing into each other could be heard.


    Crash!


    "We have to get out of here¡­ But that would just get us killed¡­ Let''s move deeper into the cave for now and wait for things to settle down on the outside!"


    Watching as cave around them began copsing, Feng Chen sprang up from the bed constructed by Zu Fei, grabbing her hand before dragging her deeper into the mountain cave.


    Crash!


    Bang!


    The mountain cave behind them copsedpletely as both of them made their way deeper inside the mountain cave. Leading them deep into the ground.


    ¡­


    Rumble~


    As the battle from above grew fainter and fainter, Feng Chen came to a stop and cautiously looked around himself before letting out a breath of relief. Releasing Zu Fei''s hand at the same time.


    "We will rest here until I recover. After that we should try and look for a way out¡­ Digging does not seem like an option as the entire thing will just end up copsing down on us before we reach the surface¡­"


    "¡­"


    "Zu Fei? Are you sick?! Did you perhaps get hit by one of the serpents poison attacks earlier on!?"


    Not hearing anything from Zu Fei, Feng Chen turned around and saw herpletely red face as she trembled weakly.


    "N-no, it''s nothing, I''m fine!"


    Turning her face away as she tried to calm down, Zu Fei could not help but remember the feeling from earlier when Feng Chen had grabbed her hand and dragged her away¡­


    "I see¡­ But remember to tell me if there is something wrong!"


    Doubtfully looking over at Zu Fei, Feng Chen soon sat down and began recovering once again.


    He had to recover quickly so he could get out of this cave and resume his search for the sect master of the Raging me Sect!


    Given the battle outside, he might even decide to leave and find a quieter spot!


    Feng Chen would not let him disappear again when he was so close! If he found out about what happened in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, he would most likely decide to run away and at that point, the Flying Sword Sect would have a hidden enemy representing an unknown danger in the future.


    At the same time, he would also have wasted thest month¡­

 Chapter 281: Ancient Maze

    <h4>Chapter 281: Ancient Maze</h4>


    Spending the next few hours inside of the now sealed off cave under the mountain, Feng Chen slowly recovered his strength as the fighting above showed no signs of ending. Only growing more and more chaotic with each passing minute as more and more demon beasts seemed to join in.


    The scene above would surely be one ofplete devastation at this point in time¡­ Feng Chen and Zu Fei could be considered quite lucky to be underground at the moment. The snake from earlier that had tried to slither away, had most likely not gotten away from therge scale fight happening above¡­


    "Hah¡­ Let''s get going!" Taking a deep breath, Feng Chen opened his eyes before motioning towards Zu Fei cautiously standing guard beside him.


    Slowly, a small smile formed on the corner of his lips, when he saw the focused look on Zu Fei''s face as she was on guarding him in case some demon beast jumped out from the deeper part of the cave while he was busy recovering.


    "Yes!"


    Turning towards Feng Chen the moment she noticed him moving, Zu Fei excitedly nodded her head as both of them began making their way deeper down into the mountain cave together.


    The fighting above showed no sign of stopping any time soon, so it would be better for the two of them to look for another way out, instead of waiting for the fighting above to reach them¡­


    ¡­


    The mountain cave was way deeper than both of them could have predicted as they continued downwards for at least another hundred meters before reaching what could only be described as an underground maze, with the cave splitting up into a dozen small paths and those paths splitting off into even more paths further in.


    Zu Fei was the first to notice something wrong with the maze-like construct in front of them as she walked up beside one of the paths that the mountain cave had split into and closely observed it for a few minutes.


    "This looks artificial¡­"


    Saying this, Zu Fei picked up what looked like a long since decayed stone brick barely visible beside the entrance of the path.


    "Indeed¡­ Looks like we have stumbled upon an ancient ruin of sorts¡­ But I never heard about any Sect, kingdom or Empire having settled and build in the Burning Mountain Range before¡­ How old is this maze¡­?"


    Agreeing with what Zu Fei said as he looked over at the stone brick in her hand begging to slowly crumble, Feng Chen began to think about the age of the maze in front of them.


    When was it made? Who made it and why¡­?


    These questions swirled around Feng Chen''s mind as looked at the maze in front of him with both a confused and fearful expression on his face.


    There was a reason why no Empire, Kingdom or Sect had ever tried controlling the Burning Mountain Range in the past and now they were faced with the ruins of some ancient power that had most likely done what no other power on the Ewaria Continent had done before¡­ To say he felt fearful towards what dangers lurked in the ancient ruins before him would be an understatement¡­


    Rumble!


    Roar!


    The cave suddenly began shaking violently, interrupting both Feng Chen and Zu Fei''s thoughts as a loud roar sounded from above them, filled with an almost insane madness and killing intent.


    Did the demon beasts above finally sense them!?


    Roar!


    Bang!


    This thought crossed both of their minds at the same time as another roar followed by a loud banging noise from above sounded out from above so as to confirm their thoughts.


    The demon beasts above did indeed sense their presence! And even seemed to be digging down to get them!


    "So¡­ Which path should we take¡­?"


    Looking over at Zu Fei with a nervous smile on his lips, Feng Chen had already decided to enter the maze before them to get away from the demon beasts above.


    Even the Peak Nascent Soul Realm serpent had been scared of them! Clearly the demon beasts above were Half-Step Domain Lord demon beasts, if not stronger! Not really something they could fight with their current strength¡­


    "Let''s take this one¡­"


    Understanding what Feng Chen meant, Zu Fei quickly picked the path that she had found the nowpletely decayed stone brick in front of.


    Not wasting anymore time, Feng Chen and Zu Fei both entered the ancient maze in front of them without any hesitation.


    Finding out why so many powerful demon beasts had suddenly decided to gather and fight above them was not a great concern of theirs at the moment, as getting away safely was way more important¡­


    ¡­


    The moment Zu Fei and Feng Chen entered the ancient maze in an attempt to find a way out, the terrifying demon beasts momentarily stopped digging as arge bright red fruit appeared in a deep crater where the mountain Zu Fei and Feng Chen entered stood before.


    The entire mountain had been reduced to dust by the more than dozen terrifying demon beasts as they all stared at the bright red fruit that had appeared in front of them with an insatiable greed and insanity shinning in their eyes.


    ROAR!


    Ssss!


    Mooo!


    The more than dozen demon beasts all let out their own unique roars as they watched the bright red fruit in the crater slowly float into the air before shining brightly as a sea of blood red light covered the surroundings, causing the dozen or so demon beasts to grow even more insane and crazy.


    Boom!


    The bright red fruit final seemed to reach a climax as the sea of blood red light shrank before merging together with the fruit before a tempting aroma filled the surroundings.


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    The agitated roars of several weaker demon beasts could be heard from the surroundings as a horde of weaker demon beasts at the Core Formation Realm formed before charging towards the bright red fruit. Ignoring the dozen or so demon beasts at the Domain Lord Realm.


    Boom!


    The charging demon beasts were directly killed off by the Domain Lord demon beasts as a sea of blood formed beneath the bright red fruit.


    Swish~


    The sea of blood that had formed from the charging demon beasts inside the crater slowly began to float into the air as it was absorbed by the bright red fruit.


    Swoosh!


    This continued until the sea of bloodpletely disappeared and along with it, the dozen Domain Lord demon beast no longer remained in ce as they once again began fighting again.


    ROAR!


    Moo!


    BOOM!


    Their blood sttered all over the crater as it soon began to flow through the air before being absorbed by the bright red fruit floating gently mid-air¡­


    Feng Chen and Zu Fei werepletely unaware of the massacre that was taking ce above them or the real reason why the demon beasts had begun digging at the location where they were hiding.


    Instead, they were more worried about what sort of dangersy before them inside of the ancient maze that they now found themselves inside of¡­

 Chapter 282: Bullying an Oversized Rat and Stealing its Spring Water

    <h4>Chapter 282: Bullying an Oversized Rat and Stealing its Spring Water</h4>


    Feng Chen and Zu Fei cautiously moved forward through the many paths before them. Not daring to underestimate what dangers could hide inside the ancient maze.


    Rustle~


    Walking without any signs of life or ancient traps, a small rat suddenly appeared as it skittered across the floor. Followed by the sound of something moving around from the path directly in front of them.


    "Should we see where the sound ising from¡­?"


    Zu Fei turned to look over at Feng Chen as she asked, it had already been a few hours since they entered the ancient maze and they had still not encountered any traps or demon beasts. Let alone found a way out of the ancient maze.


    By this point in time, she had already begun to grow a bit tired of following the different paths leading to more paths, that led towards even more paths in the underground maze¡­ Something different finally appeared, causing her to grow more curious than cautious towards the origin of the sound.


    "Yeah¡­ But we still have to be careful, we never know what might be hiding inside of this ce¡­"


    Nodding his head in agreement with the curious Zu Fei, Feng Chen walked ahead as he cautiously began approaching the path where the sound of movement could be heard just a moment ago together with Zu Fei following closely behind him.


    Following along the path from where the sound could be heard, Zu Fei and Feng Chen soon found themselves in the middle of arge opening different from the narrow paths they had been walking through for thest few hours.


    All sorts of different nts covered the walls of therge opening as an artificial source of light could be seen shining above the opening in the shape of some sort of crystal, providing just enough light for the nts below to grow.


    Rustle~


    The sound that they had barely heard from earlier, could once again be heard as Zu Fei and Feng Chen both found the source of the sound in the middle of the room, in the shape of what could only be considered an oversized rat.


    Hissss!


    Hissing angrily the moment Feng Chen and Zu Fei entered, the oversized rat easily the size of a normal dog, showed off its sharp ws as it prepared to attack the two of them.


    Feng Chen and Zu Fei did not feel scared when they saw the oversized rat, but instead rxed as they clearly felt the strength of the oversized rat. Only barely reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm. Not something that they would worry about as someone in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "What is this¡­ Why is it so big¡­?"


    "Maybe because of something in here?"


    Answering Zu Fei''s question, Feng Chen began to inspect the small opening before finally focusing on a small spring with a small amount of water flowing from it before forming a small puddle beside the hissing oversized rat.


    Hisss!


    The oversized rat could not sense the strength of the two humans in front of it, as it angrily charged forward after seeing them ignoring itpletely before beginning to move towards its water!


    Whoosh!


    Appearing a few centimeters away from Zu Fei, the oversized rat jumped into the air as it swiped down with its ws aggressively, creating a small arc through the air as the oversized rat''s ws closed in on Zu Fei.


    Ching~


    Not paying any attention to the oversized rat as she crouched down together with Feng Chen and inspected the small spring, a transparent barrier made of qi surrounded her to block the w attack of the oversized rat.


    Bang!


    Resulting in it being sent flying into a nearby wall, weakly sliding down as it fearfully looked over in the direction of Zu Fei. Not knowing how it had suddenly been sent flying earlier.


    "It looks like the water from this spring is the reason why the rat grew so big¡­ Looks like there might be something below this ce¡­"


    Inspecting the small spring closely along with the water slowly flowing out from it, Feng Chen quickly concluded as he tried to use his divine sense to follow the path that the water took to reach the opening where he and Zu Fei were currently located. Only to end up being blocked by something after a few dozen meters.


    "Something is blocking me from continuing further¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Feng Chen gave up on exploring the origin of the spring water and retracted his divine sense.


    "We should gather this spring water for now and find out what use it has when we get back to the sect! Zu Fei, can I leave that to you?"


    "Yes!"


    Observing the spring water closely while Feng Chen was trying to find the source of it, Zu Fei nodded her head hastily after hearing his order before taking out a small container made of leather that she had been carrying with her around her waist.


    Whoosh~


    Waving her hand, all the spring water began floating into the air before entering the small leather container in Zu Fei''s hand under the helpless look of the oversized rat from the side.


    "Done!"


    Having taken all the spring water away in the small leather container, Zu Fei smiled happily as she reported this to Feng Chen.


    "Didn''t expect you would be carrying such an artifact around with you¡­ Well, it did end up being quite useful¡­ Let''s get moving, there is only one path out of this ce, and I have a feeling we will finally get out of this ancient maze¡­"


    Showing a hint of surprise on his face after seeing the leather container that Zu Fei pulled out, Feng Chen soon turned to look towards the only path out of the lush opening that formed arger underground cave¡­ Outside of the path they had entered through.


    "Let''s get going! We still need to catch the Raging me Sect''s Sect Master before he ends up disappearing!"


    With those words from Feng Chen, both of them soon left the oversized rat''s home and made their way through therger path leading towards what both of them assumed was the other side of the ancient underground maze.


    Leaving the injured oversized rat alone to stare fearfully at them as they left.

 Chapter 283: Leaving the Ancient Maze

    <h4>Chapter 283: Leaving the Ancient Maze</h4>


    Following the only path leading out of the oversized rat''s home, Zu Fei and Feng Chen soon reached the end of the path as they reached the outside in the form of a small tform about to copse at any moment hanging out from the side of arge canyon with a raging river passing by below.


    Lighting down from above as both of them began inspecting their surroundings.


    Crack!


    Ssh!


    The tform they found themselves on after leaving the ancient maze, was way less safe than they had first imagined as part of the tform cracked off and fell into the raging river below. Forcing both of them to step back.


    Even if they would not die from falling into the raging river passing through the canyon below, they did not want to find out what kind of demon beasts might beying in wait for them down there if they did happen to fall¡­


    They were after all still in the Burning Mountain Range where demon beasts could be found everywhere! For there to be some hiding in the turbulent river below would not be surprising at all.


    On the other hand, it would be more surprising if there were no demon beasts hiding in the river below them¡­


    "There are a few stone steps carved into the cliffside leading out from here! We should try and make our way out before this tform copses under our weight; it also looks like we have made it far enough away from the ce where those demon beasts were fighting¡­ If we reach the surface again, we should be safe."


    Inspecting the canyon that they now found themselves in, Feng Chen quickly spotted the rough stone steps located besides the copsing stone tform both he and Zu Fei were standing on.


    The stone steps were old but were carved directly into the cliffside of the canyon. Allowing for them to survive for a long time. Even if most of the original stone steps were now missing. The structure of the path leading from the stone tform to the top of the canyon still remained in ce.


    Even though it would be hard for normal mortals to traverse the broken-down path, it would be simple for cultivators like Feng Chen and Zu Fei.


    Whoosh~


    Bang!


    Like this, both Feng Chen and Zu Fei jumped over towards the stone path carved into the side of the cliff located just beside the stone tform, as the stone tform itself copsed under the force and crashed into the turbulent river below.


    The small space where a bridge should have been located in the past connecting the stone tform and the stone steps engraved into the cliffside of the canyon, was easily covered by Feng Chen and Zu Fei as theynded on the first few steps of the path leading out of the canyon without any problems.


    Roar!


    Several weird roars could be heard from below as the stone tform crashed into the turbulent river passing through the canyon.


    Feng Chen and Zu Fei turned and watched the ce where the stone tform had fallen. Only to feel a shiver go down their spine as several small fish the same colour as the river below surfaced and devoured the stone tform before disappearing from sight again.


    The weird roars from earlier should havee from the small fishes numbering in the thousands as the stone tform had disturbed them.


    "W-what are those¡­ Fish¡­?"


    Zu Fei could not help by feel fearful as she had watched therge school of fish devour the stone tform, they had been standing on moments ago. The aura given off by those fish were in the Core Formation Realm! There were even a few bigger ones giving off an auraparable to someone in the Nascent Soul Realm!


    The truly scary part, however, was not this but simply the sheer number of them¡­ Even if it was only those in the Core Formation Realm down there, if a Nascent Soul Realm Expert fell into the turbulent river, there would be no way for him to make it back up after being swarmed by the fishes hiding below the surface¡­


    "I have no idea¡­"


    Feng Chen truly had no idea what kind of demon beast the fish below them were, as he was equally scared and speechless.


    Before he had gone out to search for the sect master of the Raging me Sect, he had heard a few rumours about there being Domain Lord Realm demon beasts in the deeper regions of the Burning Mountain Range¡­ But the dangersying inside the Burning Mountain Range was far more deadly than he had ever imagined! And they hadn''t even reached what could be considered the deeper regions yet!


    At the same time, it also helped Feng Chen understand why even Empires with people above the Domain Lord Realm did not dare to try and conquer the Burning Mountain Range¡­ It looked like what was truly hiding inside the deeper regions was something far above just a few Domain Lord Realm demon beasts¡­


    "We should get out of here as fast as possible and find out where we are. After that we will find the ce where the sect master of the Raging me Sect is hiding and head back before we encounter yet another ident along the way¡­"


    Thinking over their current situation, Feng Chen did not want to give up on dealing with the sect master of the Raging me Sect, as he said this to Zu Fei before both of them made their way out of the canyon. Looking back down on the turbulent waters below from time to time.


    ¡­


    "We should be at the Death Eater Canyon¡­ What an interesting name¡­ The sect master of the Raging me Sect should be hiding in a ce not far from here. Looks like we got quite lucky and even ended up close to that ce!"


    Standing beside the edge of the canyon, Feng Chen smiled happily as he found out that they were not far from the ce that he had tracked the sect master of the Raging me Sect down to.


    The ce in question was a small volcano inside the Burning Mountain Range where the fire qi between heaven and earth was especially high and pure at the same time, a perfect ce for cultivators focusing on fire rted cultivation mantras and techniques to enter a seclusion.


    The ce would most likely have been more popr, if not for the fact that it was rtively far inside of the Burning Mountain Range.


    Other than that, human cultivators specialising in fire rted mantras and techniques were not the only ones who benefited from the rich fire qi around the volcano¡­


    Giant fire lizards also known as lesser dragons, were among some of the most dangerous demon beasts as they could fight cultivators far above their own realm, especially loved to live around volcanos such as the one where the sect master of the Raging me Sect should be at¡­


    Even if they were notparable with divine beasts such as real dragons, they were still known as lesser dragons in recognition of their strength and the faint amount of dragon blood running through them!


    "But how would that person even be able to cultivate in such a location without being found by the fire lizards¡­?"


    Thinking about the dangerous location they were about to move towards, Zu Fei could not help but ask in a doubtful tone.


    It had to be known, just like the prideful dragons, fire lizards were just as prideful. Never letting anyone else enter their territory. Let alone allowing some random human cultivator to freely cultivate in their home and absorb their precious fire qi¡­


    "Well¡­ We will find out when we get there, it should not be too difficult to lock onto him after reaching the volcano. At that time, we should also be able to find out why the fire lizards are not attacking him."


    Not too sure about why the fire lizards had not chased the sect master of the Raging me Sect away, Feng Chen could only shake his head and wait until they reached the volcano themselves to find out the situation by themselves.


    "But¡­ We should probably try and avoid getting close to that ce¡­"


    Referring to the mountain where therge fight between demon beasts had happened, Zu Fei pointed in the direction they came from, as even from far away, a terrifying aura could still be felt as the fighting was still ongoing. Showing no signs of ending anytime soon.


    With the stamina of demon beasts above the Nascent Soul Realm, the fighting might even continue over the next few days. Not ending even after they had dealt with the sect master of the Raging me Sect and were preparing to leave the Burning Mountain Range¡­


    "Yeah¡­"


    Nodding his head as he also agreed, Feng Chen and Zu Fei soon made their way towards the volcano.


    Doing their best to keep a distance from the fight happening in the ce they came from.

 Chapter 284: Finding the Sect Master of the Raging Flame Sect

    <h4>Chapter 284: Finding the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect</h4>


    Arriving at the edges of the volcano where Feng Chen had tracked the sect master of the Raging me Sect to, the first thing that caught the duos eyes was the sheer scale of the volcano. Easily reaching a dozen miles into the sky above as it dwarfed the nearby mountainspletely.


    The famed fire lizards that lived near such volcanos were also easy to spot due to their enormous frames bathing in some of the nearby pools ofva that had formed around the base of the volcano, with newva constantly pouring out from the side of the volcano.


    Bathing in theva that could be considered to contain one of the purest forms of fire qi, was more than enough to show how durable and strong the fire lizards were, as they werepletely unaffected by the high heat of theva and other toxic gasesing from the environment.


    Feng Chen and Zu Fei had to stop moving any closer to the volcano in front of them. Getting any closer would cause them to enter the territory of the fire lizards and at that point they would be forced to run away¡­ After all, even the weakest of the fire lizards, was a Core Formation Realm demon beast! Let alone the stronger ones at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    "How did the sect master of the Raging me Sect manage to enter this ce and even find a spot to quietly enter seclusion with so many fire lizards around¡­"


    Zu Fei muttered to herself as she looked at the hundreds of fire lizards peacefully bathing in theva and rxing under the sun at the base of the volcano.


    Even with their peaceful appearance, fire lizards were among the most territorial demon beasts out there, but they were also famous due to how peaceful they were when nobody entered said territory.


    "Let''s try looking around without getting too close to the volcano and angering the fire lizards¡­"


    Looking at the fire lizards in the distance, Feng Chen thought over it for a moment before both of them began searching the area around the base of the mountain. Looking for a safe path up the volcano with no fire lizards around.


    Sadly, even after spending a few hours looking around the base of the volcano, Feng Chen and Zu Fei did not manage to find a way up the volcano where the sect master of the Raging me Sect might be hidden.


    "What is that?"


    Just as Feng Chen was about to give up hope, Zu Fei''s voice could be heard calling out from the side, causing Feng Chen to look over in the direction she was standing.


    A small, almost invisible opening could be seen just outside the territory of the fire lizards hidden by a few nearby rocks that had fallen there. Most likely from a past eruption.


    "Ava tube?"


    Feng Chen almost instantly recognized what the small opening was.


    Ava tube, a natural conduit formed by flowingva from a volcanic vent that moves beneath the hardened surface of ava flow.


    Now that theva in the tube had emptied out, a cave leading back to the eruption point of the past was all that was left behind.


    "Do we enter¡­?"


    Zu Fei asked in a nervous tone. No matter what, the volcano in front of them was still active and entering what had in essence been ava tube in the past and making their way back towards the eruption point was quite dangerous.


    If the volcano suddenly erupted, both of them would have no way to survive if they were too close to the eruption point.


    Even with their cultivation base at the Nascent Soul Realm, there was no way to survive after being caught in the middle of an eruption. At most they might be lucky enough to escape with their Nascent Soul while losing their physical body¡­


    Not knowing what to do as he inspected the cave that had been formed by theva of the volcano in front of them in the past, Feng Chen suddenly picked up a familiar auraing from the deeper regions of the cave.


    "The sect master of the Raging me Sect!"


    The aura was clearly from the person that he had entered the Burning Mountain Range to chase after! The sect master of the Raging me Sect! He should have been able to sneak past the fire lizards at the base of the volcano and make his way further up the volcano through the use of the cave in front of them!


    "We will enter!"


    Coming to a decision the moment he felt the aura of the Raging me Sect''s sect master, Feng Chen did not hesitate in the slightest as he entered the cave, Zu Fei following closely behind as both of them made their way into the cave going directly past the fire lizards above.


    ¡­


    At the same time that Zu Fei and Feng Chen were making their way past the fire lizards hanging out around the bottom of the volcano, a certain person who had entered secluded cultivation inside arge cave many times the size of the one Feng Chen and Zu Fei had entered through slowly began to open his eyes as he looked around himself.


    Therge cave was not really a normal cave but was instead what had in the past been the mainva tube directly connected to an eruption point in the past as it had long since emptied out.


    But this was not the end, as the volcano had shown sign of erupting again and the mainva tube had begun heat up as fire qi had begun to gather towards the former eruption point. Making it a perfect location to cultivate for fire cultivators focused on cultivating with fire qi.


    The dangers, however, would cause many to not dare cultivate in such a ce as the eruption point located nearby could erupt at any moment. Spewing forth an endless amount ofva, that would easily kill anyone foolish enough to stay around such a dangerous ce.


    "Haha! I finally broke through!"


    The person that had just opened his eyes beganughing hysterically as he paid no heed to his surroundings.


    "Soon, the Flying Sword Sect will no longer be around! With me reaching the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm in one go, there is no way for that old bastard Feng Chen to stop me!"


    Revealing his identity as the sect master of the Raging me Sect, the personughed even louder filled with happiness as he began preparing to leave the cave.


    "Hm? Who is thi- FENG CHEN!"


    ¡­


    "FENG CHEN!"


    Just as Feng Chen and Zu Fei made their way out of theva tube that they had entered through and into an evenrger underground cave, that the pastva tube had been connected to, a loud scream filled with anger echoed through the cave walls as a figure soon appeared in front of them filled with killing intent.


    "Dong He¡­"


    The sect master of the Raging me Sect, Dong He, had finally shown up!


    But this was not what caught Feng Chen''s attention, instead it was the aura that Dong He in front of him gave off.


    Clearly, it was not something that even he, at the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, wasparable to! Dong He, the sect master of the Raging me Sect had reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Even Feng Chen had not expected for Dong He to improve so much since he hadst seen him and could not help but look over at the sect master of the Raging me Sect in shock.


    Dong He was no different, as he had only begun paying attention to the aura given off by Feng Chen after appearing.


    The shock he felt from finding out that his arc nemesis had reached the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, was no less than what Feng Chen felt after finding out he had reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, if not more!


    After all, Feng Chen had jumped two entire minor realms, while Dong He had just reached the Ninth stage and reached the peak of the realm.


    "¡­"


    Zu Fei did not say anything as she just stood at the side and watched the two sect masters confront each other for the first time in at least a hundred years since theirst battle over the spirit stone mine that Dong He had ended up winning.


    "Feng Chen! Even if you reach the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, you will never be able to beat me! After entering this ce, I managed toprehend a new technique! Why don''t you be the first to face it!?"


    Fwoosh!


    A terrifying me erupted around him, Dong He was the first to move, charging over towards Feng Chen filled with killing intent as the me around him began melting the nearby rocks.

 Chapter 285: Dong He vs Feng Chen

    <h4>Chapter 285: Dong He vs Feng Chen</h4>


    Fwoosh!


    Watching as the sect master of the Raging me Sect charged directly over towards him filled with killing intent, Feng Chen did not dare to be careless. Reading his sword as he met Dong He head on.


    Bang!


    The sh between the terrifying mes along with the sword, caused the surroundings to begin shaking violently as the rocky ground beneath them began to split apart from the aftershocks of the sh.


    Zu Fei standing at the side had no choice but to retreat further back in the direction that she hade from earlier together with Feng Chen. Only capable of watching from the side, while looking for an opportunity to get close and help Feng Chen.


    The mes of the Raging me Sect''s sect master, Dong He, was simply way too powerful! Forcing Zu Fei to retreat.


    "Hah¡­ You are stronger than I expected¡­"


    Breathing in heavily as he looked over in the direction of Feng Chen, Dong He could not help but say this with no small amount of disbelief present in his voice.


    Even if Feng Chen had reached the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, he had? not expected for him to block his attack so easily and at the same time injure him as well!


    "And you are weaker than I expected¡­"


    Smiling a bit as he said this, Feng Chen did not wait for Dong He to attack him again and instead used his newly developed sword intent tounch an attack towards him.


    Whoosh!


    A violent wind swept through the underground cave as the cave walls shook violently under the pressure of the sword intent that had gathered together on Feng Chen''s sword, as it slowly began to form into a giant phantom sword that soon flew over in the direction of Dong He.


    "Wha-"


    Not knowing what to say for a short moment as he watched the giant phantom sword approach him, Dong He soon recovered from his earlier state of disbelief as he began gathering the rich fire qi in his surroundings into a giant wall of fire that swept forward to meet the phantom sword formed by Feng Chen. Melting the volcanic tocks that made up the cave, as the surroundings began to look more and more like how it would have in the past whenva was still flowing through these caves.


    BOOM!


    The collision between the giant phantom sword of Feng Chen and the wall of fire made by Dong He. Forced Zu Fei away as she quickly hid inside the cave that she and Feng Chen had entered through.


    The power leaking out into the surroundings from the sh began to affect the surroundings of the cave as an opening leading up to the surface was created in the ce that the two had shed with each other. Directly carved out by the power of the phantom sword and the fire wall, as both of the attacks had most of their power redirected upwards and downwards.


    Most likely alerting the fire lizards above about something happening just beneath them in the process.


    "Hah!"


    Not slowing down in the slightest after seeing his attack being blocked, Feng Chen moved forwards at a speed that even Zu Fei found hard to follow as he swung down towards Dong He decisively. Not giving the other party a chance to recover.


    Whoosh!


    Dong He tried his best to block the quick sword attacks by Feng Chen by drawing in more of the surrounding fire qi to help him recover and form a natural barrier between the two of them.


    Ptch!


    Unfortunately, his abilities were limited, and he could not keep up with the seemingly endless wave of attacks that Feng Chen threw at him, causing some of the attacks to go through as they pierced into his body.


    Within only a few seconds, his entire body had already been be a bloody mess as Dong He began to grow more and more desperate for a way out of his current situation.


    The inactive eruption point!


    Suddenly remembering their current location, Dong He began to form desperate and dangerous escape n as he used most of his remaining power to force Feng Chen back for a short moment. No longer caring about killing the other party.


    Getting away alive was his top priority at the moment!


    Fwoosh!


    Seeing Dong He suddenly conjure a giant wolf made out of mes that charged over towards him, Feng Chen retreated for a split second as he soonunched his own attack to match the giant fire wolf that Dong He had conjured forth.


    Boom!


    "Feng Chen! He is moving towards the inactive eruption point!"


    Just as he had dealt with the giant fire wolf, Zu Fei''s anxious voice could be heard calling out to him from behind as he looked over in the direction of Dong He. Only to see the other party gather his fire qi andunch a technique towards the inactive eruption point.


    Rumble~


    A loud rumbling could be heard as everything began shaking violently.


    The fire qi of Dong He entered the inactive eruption point as all three people could sense something terrifying moving around just below the inactive eruption point.


    "We have to get out of here! Now!"


    Seeing the situation in front of her, Zu Fei had already made her way over to Feng Chen as she began dragging him towards the cave they hade from.


    "¡­"


    Feng Chen did not resist and just looked over in the direction of Dong He. Sending onest sword attack over towards him just as he was about to leave the eruption point.


    Whoosh!


    "Argh!"


    Not able to put up any form of defence, Dong He let out a painful scream as he fell powerlessly to the ground. Unable to move.


    By this point, things had gotten way too dangerous and there was no way they would stay behind and wait for the volcano to erupt and kill them!


    Like this, Feng Chen and Zu Fei quickly left the ce and hastily tried to get as far away from the now active volcano about to erupt. Leaving the dying Dong He behind at the eruption point!


    ¡­


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Just as Feng Chen and Zu Fei made it out of the cave they had entered through, the loud roars of fire lizards could be heard in the distance as they surrounded arge hole located in the side of the volcano.


    "Looks like the cave led us quite far up the volcano¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he watched the fire lizards continuing to roar towards the hole on the side of the volcano, Feng Chen suddenly felt like argescale earthquake hit the area he and Zu Fei were standing, causing both of them to momentarily lose their bnce before looking up towards the hole that he and Dong He had created.


    ROAR!


    BOOM!


    A terrifying roar echoed from beneath the hole in question as by far thergest explosion that Feng Chen and Zu Fei had ever witnessed happened.


    The volcano was erupting and along with it, something hidden in the magma chamber below the volcano came up as well!

 Chapter 286: Eruption! Escape of Feng Chen and Zu Fei

    <h4>Chapter 286: Eruption! Escape of Feng Chen and Zu Fei</h4>


    BOOM!


    As the volcano erupted, Feng Chen and Zu Fei watched the side of the volcano that they had been in earlier explode violently as arge creature came out. Followed by an even more violent explosion that directly destroyed the entire side of the volcano as ming rocks wereunched flying into the air together with toxic gases.


    Lava began to flow freely from several ces as well, causing the fire lizards to roar in happiness as they bathed in theva that flowed out from the magma chamber below the volcano.


    ROAR!


    This, however, was not the scariest thing¡­ Instead, it was the giant creature that had been sleeping in the magma chamber below. Nowing out from beneath as Feng Chen and Zu Fei could barely see its true appearance beneath therge amount ofva and other things covering up the creature''s true appearance.


    Roar!


    Roar!


    At the same time that the giant creature let out a terrifying roar, a few roars could be heard in the distance as Feng Chen and Zu Fei immediately knew who the roar belonged to.


    The demon beasts fighting with each other back at the mountain they had escaped from earlier noticed the appearance of the creature that had juste out from its sleep inside the magma chamber of the volcano!


    ROAR!


    Seemingly offended by the roars in the distance, therge creature still covered inva and other volcanic rocks unfolded arge pair of wings as it pped them, causing everything around it to be swallowed in a cloud of dust and smoke.


    Whoosh!


    With one final powerful p from its pair of wings, Feng Chen and Zu Fei could barely see the creature fly over in the direction of the mountain where the group of demon beasts had been fighting each other.


    Boom!


    In response to the giant creature leaving, the volcano once again erupted with even more force than before as arge amount of rock wereunched flying in all directions.


    "We should get out of h-"


    Interrupting what Zu Fei was about to say, Feng Chen did not wait around for any longer as he directly grabbed onto Zu Fei and left at the fastest speed possible. Dodging any of the ming rocksunched up into the air by the erupting volcano.


    The sect master of the Raging me Sect, Dong He, could be considered dead. After all, there was no way for him to survive given his half-dead state! Now they just had to get back to the Flying Sword Sect in one piece.


    "We will leave the Burning Mountain Range through one of the neighbouring kingdoms and try our best to remain hidden¡­ Going back the same way we came, is most likely not going to be doable during the next few days¡­"


    Saying this as he carried Zu Fei away from the volcano, Feng Chen could not help but look in the direction that the creature that hade out from beneath the volcano had flown in.


    Whatever that creature was, Feng Chen sincerely hoped that he would never have to encounter it ever again¡­!


    ¡­


    "Yes! Just like this, you are doing great Bai Ning! Just keep it up like this and you will be able to progress smoothly in the future!"


    At the same time, back in the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao was having a great time teaching Bai Ning the basics of cultivation.


    Compared to his two other disciples, Qing Yi and Chu Yang, who had already started cultivating before they met him, Bai Ning had never touched anything regarding cultivation before!


    "Thank you master!"


    "No worries, you cane to me anytime you are struggling with something or need any help with your cultivation!"


    "Yes, master!"


    Watching as Bai Ning left, Xuan Hao felt what it was like to be a role model and teacher for someone.


    Teaching someone who knew nothing about cultivation was way easier and Xuan Hao felt like he would be able to aplish? it even if he had never taught anything before!


    "But I still need to teach Qing Yi and Chu Yang in the future¡­ Maybe I should look for one of the other elders and ask for some advice¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he thought about his two disciples now out adventuring together, Xuan Hao did not want to admit to the fact that one of the reasons why he allowed for them to leave in the first ce, was that he did not have a lot to teach them.


    Xuan Hao had never really known how or what to teach Chu Yang and Qing Yi¡­ And having them go out and explore the territory of the Flying Sword Sect, while picking up a few missions toplete for the Flying Sword Sect, was a n for Xuan Hao to find out what to teach the two of them in the future.


    Finding out how to grow his two disciples was not something easy and Xuan Hao had spent the first few days after his disciples had left looking for various ways to improve his teaching ability.


    In the end, he had not found out much about what to do and in the end, concluded that he would have to ask one of the elders about help.


    Among the elders who were skilled in teaching, one name quickly appeared in Xuan Hao''s mind¡­


    Elder Song!


    Beloved by both the elder and younger generation, Elder Song could be considered the most skilled person when it came to teaching the younger generation of the Flying Sword Sect, being the driving force behind most, if not all events andrge-scale lectures conducted by the elders for the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect.


    ''Looks like I will have to meet Elder Song and ask him for some advice¡­ I hope he is not too busy, given that Feng Chen and Zu Fei are both missing at the moment¡­''


    Chuckling a bit to himself as he thought this, Xuan Hao used his divine sense to for a short moment before setting off in the direction of Elder Song.


    Finding him was not hard at all, his divine sense having grown even more powerful after reaching the Domain Lord Realm also helped shorten the time taken to find Elder Song even more¡­

 Chapter 287: Arriving at the Territory of the River Sect

    <h4>Chapter 287: Arriving at the Territory of the River Sect</h4>


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was looking for Elder Song to ask about how to improve his teaching methods, his two disciples, Qing Yi and Chu Yang arrived inside the territory governed by the River Sect.


    The territory of the River Sect was notrge and could just be considered a small part of the Northern region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom that the Flying Sword Sect was the leader of.


    Thisrge region was not totally under the control of the Flying Sword Sect, as they would mostly just manage important ces, such as spirit mines or forests where rare herbs grew on a regr basis.


    Outside of that, the rest of the region ended up being governed and controlled by the smaller factions that resided inside of it. The River Sect was one such faction and so was the ck Rose Sect in the past before bing a demonic sect¡­


    "The Red Flower Ridge should be located somewhere at the edges of the River Sect''s territory and the Blinding Flower Bandit Group should be hiding there¡­ We should first go and deal with them before searching for the Pure Heart Spirit Grass."


    Saying this, Chu Yang looked over in the direction of a few barely visible mountains in the distance.


    The Red Flower Ridge was on the edge of the River Sect''s territory, but he could still see it after just entering their territory from the opposite side¡­ The River Sect was truly smallpared to the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Sects who did not have a Nascent Soul Realm to back them up. No matter how many Core Formation Realm Experts they had, would never be able to grow past a certain point¡­


    The River Sect was a prime example of this, as they had a lot of Experts at the Core Formation Realm. Even some having reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm like their current sect master¡­ But even to this day, they have never had anyone breakthrough and reach the Nascent Soul Realm!


    This in turn had forced them to remain confined to their current territory size-


    "But howe the River Sect did not just deal with the Blinding Flower Bandit Group inside of their territory and instead waited for the Flying Sword Sect to send someone over¡­?"


    As Chu Yang was lost in thought looking over in the direction of the Red Flower Ridge, Qing Yi asked from the side with a curious expression on her face, causing Chu Yang to look over.


    "Given the strength of the River Sect, there is no way they would just allow some random bandit group with a few people in the Foundation Establishment Realm to harsh a few of the viges under them for no reason¡­"


    Answering her own question, Qing Yi looked over at Chu Yang.


    "For what reason would they- Maybe there is someone behind the bandit group¡­? Someone that the River Sect does not want to offend¡­"


    Understanding what Qing Yi was trying to say, Chu Yan could not help but admire his senior sister''s insight.


    "Finally using your head, I was a bit worried for you¡­ Given that you were always training all the time without pause back in the sect, I truly do not want my junior brother to turn into a muscle head only thinking about training all day long-"


    "What do you mean worried and me turning into a muscle head?! I was just training to be stronger¡­ And you should not be one to talk, always locked up in your own room doing alchemy all the time! Do you evene out of your room without me calling you for a practice match or when you need to eat and visit the Alchemy Hall for more herbs?"


    "I-"


    Whoosh!


    About to say something, Qing Yi was directly interrupted by Chu Yang as he silenced her with his hand.


    "There is a group of people hiding just in front of us¡­ And from the looks of things, they are most likely not so friendly¡­"


    "¡­"


    Just about to angrily protest against being silenced off by Chu Yang, Qing Yi found herself unable to argue with him as she ended up just nodding her head silently in agreement.


    "Hm?"


    Focusing on the location that Chu Yang had been hinting that the group of people were hiding in front of them with his eyes, Qing Yi soon managed to pick up the presence of the people that he had mentioned.


    "Come out, we already found you!"


    Jumping down from the tiger demon beast that he and Qing Yi had ridden on together on their way towards the territory of the River Sect, Chu Yang called out in the direction of a suspicious boulder ced just beside the road.


    Looking at it from the top of the tiger demon beast, Qing Yi could not help but wonder how she had not noticed such an out of ce boulder before.


    It had to be known that they were currently on a small road with only a peaceful grass in on either side of them.


    Yet at such a ce, a giant boulder at least a few meters tall and a dozen meters wide had appeared just beside the road¡­


    "Hmph! Boys, it looks like we were found out!" A rough voice sounded out from behind the boulder as a man in histe forties with several scars on his body came out from behind the suspicious.


    This was not the end, as a stream of rough looking men soon came out after him.


    "So¡­ What is this supposed to be, a robbery?"


    Chu Yang did not change his expression in the slightest as he watched the group that had appeared in front of him.


    During the time he escaped from the people that the ck Rose Sect had sent after him, he had encountered many simr situations, be it bandits or wandering cultivators seeing him as an easy target back then.


    "Hehe, brat, I like that you catch on pretty quickly¡­ So how about it, hand over your spirit stone and don''t forget to leave that prettydy you have with you behind as well! We brothers will make sure to take good care of her, Right boys!?"


    "Yeah, we will make sure to be gentle!"


    "Haha!"


    Watching the reaction of the bandits in front of them, Qing Yi and Chu Yang quickly understood that they had never encountered anyone from the Flying Sword Sect before. After all, they were both dressed in the robe of the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    "Hm¡­ All of them are in the Qi Condensation Realm, the leader is at the Peak of the Qi Condensation Realm¡­ Did they perhaps attack us because the tiger demon beast is only in the middle stages of the Qi Condensation Realm, and they can''t sense our cultivation realm?"


    Muttering this to himself as he looked over at the group of bandits, Chu Yang suddenly remembered something he had learnt back in the ck Rose Sect when he took his first steps on the path of cultivation.


    Back then, he had learnt that low-tier Mortal Rank Mantras would normally never be practiced because of the huge drawback they often resulted in. One of the draw backs that was the mostmon among these kinds of mantras, was that it would not allow for a cultivator to sense the qi of someone above their own cultivation realm.


    This was something truly terrible, as it was not something reversable and would be permanent, even if the cultivator found another higher tier mantra in the future.


    Though not being able to sense the qi of someone above your own cultivation realm was not the worst of the drawbacks that the low-tier mortal mantras brought.


    The more dangerous kind could permanently blind the user or cause them to forever lose the feeling in one or more of their body parts¡­


    "They practiced a low-tier Mortal Mantra¡­"


    Coming to this conclusion, Chu Yang shook his head as he looked over at the group of bandits.


    "Hey! We don''t have all day! And what is with that look brat! Hand over your spirit stones and that prettydy or we will kill you and just take thedy! Hehe!"


    Seeing the look Chu Yang gave him, the leader of the bandits felt a bit weird as he hurried the boy in front of him, while secretly signalling to the other bandits behind him to make sure they don''t try to run away.


    Seeing the bandits moving to surround them, Chu Yang calmly grabbed his spear strapped onto the side of the tiger demon beast.


    "Hah¡­ Guess you wa- Hm?!"


    Sighing dramatically as he stood with his spear in hand, prepared to face the bandits, a small hand suddenlynded on his shoulder and stopped him.


    "Q-Qing Yi¡­?"


    Chu Yang turned around and could not help but stutter when he saw the scarily cold look on his senior sister''s face.


    "Let me deal with them¡­!"


    Hearing her, Chu Yang could not help but feel a shiver go down his spine as he quickly nodded his head in agreement before watching Qing Yi gracefully jump down from the tiger demon beast andnd in front of him with her sword ready.

 Chapter 288: Qing Yis First...

    <h4>Chapter 288: Qing Yi''s First...</h4>


    "Thedy is finallying down, haha! Now put your weapon down brat or we might end up hurting you¡­ You as well littledy, I don''t want to hurt you even more, Hehe!"


    Seeing Chu Yang taking out his spear along with Qing Yiing down from the tiger demon beast, the leader of the bandit group did not seem careful at all as he called out to the two of them. Focused mostly on Qing Yi as the other bandits began to slowly move closer to the two of them with their weapons in hand.


    "Qing Yi-"


    About to say something as he watched Qing Yi prepare to attack the group of bandits, Chu Yang quickly stopped himself and decided not to interfere.


    No matter what, the fate of the bandits did not matter, and he was not eager to take away the fight that Qing Yi had clearly wanted for herself.


    But will she be okay¡­?


    Chu Yang could not help but feel a bit worried, as he had never seen Qing Yi fight with anyone other than him back in the sect and it was not easy to kill another human, Chu Yang could still remember the first time he had taken another humans life when he was escaping from the ck Rose Sect¡­ It was not something he wanted to go through again¡­


    And from what he had learnt about Qing Yi and her life before entering the Flying Sword Sect, Chu Yang knew that the most she had dealt with before the entrance examination, was some demon beasts raised by her family.


    Nothing on the same level as another human being¡­


    With this in mind, Chu Yang tightened his grip around his spear as he kept his eye on Qing Yi as she began walking over in the direction of the bandit groups leader. Ready to jump over and help her in case something happened.


    "Hehe, want to fight me?"


    Smiling creepily at Qing Yi as she walked over towards him, the leader of the bandits loosened the sword he had been carrying and made a threatening motion with his sword towards the approaching Qing Yi while the surrounding banditsughed at the disy.


    Qing Yi did not pay any attention to what the bandit leader said, as she arrived in front of him.


    Swish~


    Before anyone around managed to react, Qing Yi swung her sword and directly killed the bandit leader.


    "¡­"


    The surrounding bandits froze on the spot and an eerie silence slowly began to fill the surroundings as they could not understand what had just happened.


    Did their leader just die? And to a single attack by the petitedy they had been making fun of just a moment ago¡­


    Thumb!


    "She killed leader!"


    "What should we do?!"


    "Let''s run away! She is probably one of those powerful cultivators or something!"


    "If that is the case, is it not just better for us to beg and hope she will let us live?!"


    The silence was only interrupted by the sound of the bandit leaders body falling onto the ground, as the bandits that had just surrounded Qing Yi and Chu Yan began falling into chaos as they had no idea what to do.


    It was only after seeing that Qing Yi did not move from her previous spot after killing the bandit leader that some of them took the opportunity to run away. Thinking that she might have decided to let them go.


    Whoosh!


    The rest of the bandits soon followed suit as they began escaping in all directions. Not willing to stay around Qing Yi for even a second longer, their previous thoughts about what they had nned to do, hadpletely disappeared as the only thought left in their mind was getting away safely.


    "Hm?"


    Chu Yang observing from the side was surprised at how easily Qing Yi had killed the bandit leader but felt something was wrong as she didn''t move even after the other bandits had begun trying to escape.


    Swoosh~


    Worried that something might have happened, Chu Yang moved his spear as he went after the escaping bandits. nning to deal with them first, so as to not leave any trouble for future travellers using the same road as them in the future.


    "Argh!"


    Soon the tragic cries of the escaping bandits sounded out all across the in as they slowly feel one by one to Chu Yang''s spear.


    ¡­


    "D-demon!"


    "Says the bandit¡­"


    Ptch!


    Piercing through the heart of thest bandit, killing him instantly, Chu Yang turned back in the direction of Qing Yi still standing in front of the bandit leader''s dead body.


    "Are you fine¡­?"


    Not knowing what to say as he made it over towards Qing Yi, Chu Yang reached his hand forward to touch her shoulder, but the moment he touched her, Qing Yi''s body suddenly seemed to lose all its strength as she fell towards the ground.


    Whoosh!


    Stepping forward to support her body, Chu Yang was surprised to find out that Qing Yi''s entire body was shivering in his arms.


    "You don''t have to feel bad about it¡­ Just think about what would happen if you were weaker than this bandit!"


    "¡­"


    Not saying anything after listening to Chu Yang, Qing Yi''s face was still hidden as she shivered but she notably began to rx her body more.


    If they were indeed weaker than the bandits, the oue would have been terrible!


    Even worse, bandits like this would normally not care about anything, like sect''s, kingdoms or even empires. In the worst-case scenario, they would just tend to escape to another ce if they ended up offending someone before they could find out about it¡­


    "Sleep¡­ Get some rest for now!"


    Saying this as he watched apletely unfamiliar side of Qing Yi, Chu Yang gently patted her head as he felt her shivering slowly stop and after a few minutes a calm sound of breathing could soon be heard.


    The mental stress of killing another human for the first time was simply too much for her to easily take in. Completely different from killing a demon beast who could not talk and was not really from the same race as her.


    "Looks like she is asleep¡­"


    Standing still with Qing Yi in his arms, Chu Yang for the first time ever, gently smiled at Qing Yi as he carried her over towards the tiger demon beast. Ready to leave the dozen or so bandit corpse behind.


    "What in the world are you doing!?"


    Roar?


    The tiger demon beast that had been doing nothing this entire time, roared in a confused tone upon hearing the surprised voice before turning to look over at Chu Yang caring Qing Yi in his arms. Not understanding why Chu Yang had called out in such a surprised tone.


    Thumb


    A well chewed through human leg from one of the now dead bandits fell out of the tiger demon beast''s mouth in the process of turning around. Landing only a few centimeters away from Chu Yang.


    "Spit that out! And did those beast tamers not teach their demon beasts not to eat humans!? Perhaps this tiger demon beast was just recently captured or something¡­?"


    Listening to what Chu Yang said, the tiger demon beast understood absolutely nothing.


    The only thing it picked up on, was the fact that the human did not like it eating the other humans on the ground.


    Gulp!


    So, with no time to spare, the tiger demon beast swallowed what it had left in its mouth. Not forgetting to quickly swoop up the leg that fell out of its mouth earlier and swallow it together with the rest before innocently looking over at Chu Yang.


    "Hah¡­ I will have to tell those beast tamers about this after getting back to the sect so they can correct this behaviour¡­"


    Shaking his head as he realized the demon beast in front of him did not understand a single word he had just said, Chu Yang decided not to pay any mind to it and just remembered to inform the beast tamers about this when he and Qing Yi returned to the Flying Sword Sect.


    After all, tamed demon beasts eating humans was a no go and would need to be fixed immediately!


    What would the beast tamers do if the demon beasts back in the Flying Sword Sect suddenly felt a bit hungry and decided that the disciples taking care of them looked like quite a delicious snack¡­?


    To be honest, Chu Yang did not even know why the beast tamers would even allow such a demon beast to go out¡­


    Back when they had visited the Stable for a demon beast, they had clearly told them that they were disciples of Elder Xuan¡­ Could it be that the Beast Tamers had just made a mistake¡­?


    "No use thinking about it for now¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he looked down on Qing Yi''s beautiful sleeping face, Chu Yang soon got back onto the tiger demon beast while making sure that Qing Yi wasyingfortably.


    "Go!"


    Roar!


    Ordering the tiger demon beast, Chu Yang and the sleeping Qing Yi officially entered the territory of the River Sect!

 Chapter 289: Qing Yi Wakes up

    <h4>Chapter 289: Qing Yi Wakes up</h4>


    "Huh? Where am I¡­?"


    Looking around herself in confusion, Qing Yi found herselfying in a bed inside of what she could only assume was an inn.


    But how had she ended up here in the first ce¡­? Had Chu Yang perhaps carried her here!?


    Upon reaching this thought, a small blush appeared on her face as Qing Yi soon buried her head in the soft quilt that covered her.


    It was only after rxing and trying to remember what exactly had led to her current situation that she managed to calm down.


    She had killed someone¡­ Not a demon beast, but another human!


    "Hah¡­"


    Shivering a bit when she thought about it, Qing Yi took a deep breath of fresh air and soon rxed her body as she remembered what Chu Yang had told her before she fell asleep¡­ She should not feel bad about it. After all, who knew how many bad things the bandit had done before!


    Other than that, she was a cultivator! Fighting and killing others would inevitably happen, whether she liked it or not, she had to have the ability to protect herself properly and not leave any future trouble for herself¡­


    Compared to the bandit staying alive and most likely forgetting about the event a few months down the line, a normal cultivator would most likely remember being beaten up and plot his or her revenge sometime in the future¡­


    At least she remembered how her master had told her and Chu Yang about that and instilled his belief in them of not leaving any future trouble behind when dealing with one''s enemies.


    Being merciful to one''s enemies is most of the time just leaving around problems for one to deal with in the future¡­


    So, there was nothing wrong with killing the bandit leader!


    Creak~


    As Qing Yi was slowlying to terms with the fact that she had killed another human and would most likely end up killing more in the future, the door to the room opened before quickly being shut close again.


    "Ah! You are awake!"


    The voice of Chu Yang soon echoed out from the entrance of the room, as Qing Yi turned around and looked over at her junior brother. Not knowing how to react as she kept remembering how he had carried her earlier and even put her to sleep!


    How truly humiliating!


    "Hm? Are you perhaps still feeling bad about what happened earlier? Don''t worry so much about it, just think about the bandit leader like a demon beast that tried to attack you!"


    Misunderstanding Qing Yi''s silence, Chu Yang walked over beside her and quickly reassured her by patting the top of her head like he wasforting a child. Not knowing how embarrassing his actions were to Qing Yi.


    Wha- What in the world is this?! Does he think I''m a child or something!?


    Hurriedly pping his hand away from the top of her head as she jumped out of the bed before staring maliciously at Chu Yang, Qing Yi held back her urge to send him flying.


    "Never do that again! And where are we currently!?"


    "We are currently inside a small town located close to the border where we fought with the bandits, I have already contacted someone from the River Sect and informed them about our arrival¡­ They should send someone over to act as our guide soon."


    Answering Qing Yi''s question without saying anything regarding what he had done earlier, Chu Yang walked over to the door under the cautious eyes of Qing Yi before opening it.


    "Do you want something to eat before we move out?"


    Saying this after opening the door leading out into a small hallway of the in, Chu Yang observed Qing Yi closely as she nodded her head eagerly at the mention of food.


    "Great, we will eat first and then meet up with the person sent by the River Sect before making our way towards the Red Flower Ridge and dealing with those bandits¡­"


    Like this, Qing Yi and Chu Yang both made their way down in the dining area of the inn to get something to eat. During the course of the meal, Qing Yi returned to her former self as she hade to terms with what had happened earlier on, though she still remained vary of Chu Yang when he got too close to her for some unknown reason¡­


    ¡­


    As Xuan Hao began focusing on learning how to teach his disciple properly and his two disciples were getting closer to reaching their destination inside the territory of the River Sect, a lone man sitting on top of a throne inside the Azure Sky Kingdom slowly opened his eyes.


    "Looks like I will have to move myself¡­"


    The emotionless voice of the man on top of the throne slowly echoed out inside the empty throne room as he looked over in the direction of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    He had just been informed that the fellow he sent over to inform the army that they should attack the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, had run away¡­


    Even more importantly, the Spring Flower Sect apparently had someone in the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm and was even beginning the process of merging together with another sect from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom called the Flying Sword Sect!


    "How truly interesting! I never expected for the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to have someone like that! Well¡­ As long as that person does not get in my way, its fine¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he thought about the other part of the report stating that the Spring Flower Sect and the Flying Sword Sect would not interfere in the war and help the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, the man on the throne could not help but secretlyugh to himself.


    If the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had a Half-Step Domain Lord supporting them, he would have needed to rethink and few of his ns¡­ But this was no longer needed if the Half-Step Domain Lord from the Spring Flower Sect was in the process of breaking free from the control of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!


    To be honest, the man even began thinking about how he could use the Spring Flower Sect to help him deal with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, but quickly shook his head and threw the thought away.


    Risking a potential fallout with the Half-Step Domain Lord would not be a good idea¡­ And she might even be able to sense ''that''!


    Thinking about this, the man on top of the throne narrowed his eyes as they slowly turned crimson as an unbearable killing intent slowly began to fill the entire throne room.


    Whoosh!


    "My lord! The minister is heading for the Ascendant Frost Hall, just as we expected!"


    Just as the killing intent filling the room was about to reach a new height, a shadow in the shape of a man appeared beside the man on top of the throne as he informed him.


    "Hm? That was earlier than I expected, thought he would first return to that ce and¡­ No matter, you may leave! Continue keeping an eye on him, he might be on to something!"


    Raising on of his eyebrows in a slightly surprised expression upon hearing what the person that had appeared beside him said, the man on top of the throne quickly calmed down as the killing intent filling the throne room disappeared and his eyes returned to normal.


    "Yes, my lord!"


    Bowing his head upon hearing the order from the man on top of the throne, the shadow in the shape of a man slowly merged into the surroundings before disappearing from the throne room. Leaving behind only the man on top of the throne as he pondered about something for a short moment before standing up.


    "Looks like it''s time to end the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and get that thing before those people from the Ascendant Frost Hall realizes that something is wrong¡­"


    Saying this as he walked towards the entrance to his throne room, the man soon opened therge door leading outside with a thought.


    "Your majesty!"


    "Y-your highness!"


    "Lord!"


    "Hah¡­ I hope that old ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom won''t disappoint me too much¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he ignored the all the titles that the surrounding soldiers and other staff currently in front of his throne room uttered with shock written all over their faces, the man directly disappeared in front of them as he made his way in the direction of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!


    "Where is his majesty going!?"


    "Perhaps he is going to help the army dealing with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom? I heard that their old ancestor has been quite troublesome for the general to deal with¡­"


    "That is true¡­"


    "I think he wants to quickly deal with it before those people gains too much power inside the kingdom¡­" As the soldiers and staff were chatting with each other about what their king was up to, a young maid could not help but join in with her own ideas.


    "What do you mean?"


    Many of the people were confused after hearing what the young maid said as one of the soldiers stepped forward and asked for all of them.


    "Hm? You don''t know? After the gue appeared, a group of priests iming to be from the church of the gue god appeared and¡­"

 Chapter 290: Guide From the River Sect

    <h4>Chapter 290: Guide From the River Sect</h4>


    Leaving the inn after having gotten something to eat, Qing Yi realized that it was early in the morning. From the looks of it, it seemed like she had ended sleeping through the rest of the day and night after the incident with the bandit group.


    "Where are we meeting the person from the River Sect?"


    Turning to Chu Yanging out of the inn just behind her, Qing Yi asked curiously. Feeling a bit excited at the prospect of meeting a disciple from a sect that was not the Flying Sword Sect for the first time¡­ Well, outside her encounter with a few she had seen passing through the Bright Sun City.


    But back then, she had been focused on cultivation and never really had the chance to interact with any of the disciples from different sects passing through the city¡­


    "We agreed to meet at the entrance in around an hour, so we still have some time to look around the town here if you want to."


    "No need, I really want to meet the person from the River Sect!"


    Shaking her head when she heard Chu Yang''s suggestion to looking around the small town they were currently inside of, Qing Yi felt way more curious towards the person from the River Sect.


    She really wanted to find out more about the River Sect and maybe even sell-


    "Ahm!"


    "Ah¡­ C-Chu Yang, we should get going! You should know the way to the meeting ce."


    Blushing slightly when she realized that she may have said thest part out loud, Qing Yi quickly brushed the embarrassment aside and told? Chu Yang to lead them towards the meeting ce outside the city.


    "As you say¡­"


    Rolling his eyes at her tant attempt to conceal what she had said earlier, Chu Yang decided to just ignore it and did as she told him. Leading the way out of the small town, towards the location that he had nned to meet up with the person sent over by the River Sect to act as a guide for them.


    Not that he really felt like they needed one to reach the Red Flower Ridge, but having a guide would still be better than not having one and they might even be able to find out the reason why the River Sect was so reluctant when it came to dealing with a few bandits at the Foundation Establishment Realm by themselves¡­


    ¡­


    "Are you sure they were people sent over by the Flying Sword Sect?"


    "Yeah, I confirmed it from the token of the male disciple."


    Located just outside the town that Qing Yi and Chu Yang were currently inside, a group of five people had gathered together as they talked among each other.


    "We can finally get rid of those annoying bandits! With the disciples from the Flying Sword Sect being the ones to take care of them, there is no way that it will affect us! And with the recent rumours spreading around about them having a Domain Lord, there is no way they would be affected by this either.


    Not that the person supporting that damnable scum among those bandits would be able to do anything to the Flying Sword Sect even if the rumour is false, they still have quite a few Nascent Soul Realm Experts and with the recent destruction of the Burning me Sect under the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect. Nobody would dare to offend them in the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom!"


    Saying this, an older person in the group of five said confidently as his bright blue robe billowed in the wind. The symbol of a wave could be seen at the centre of the older person''s robe, as the other four people present were dressed in the same kind of robe, though with a few variations making them unique from each other.


    As three of the people were discussing among each other, the remaining two people stood a bit to the side as one of them, a woman in her early thirties grabbed thest person''s hand and pulled him to the side


    "Huang¡­ Are you sure that you want to guide the disciple from the Flying Sword Sect? It might be risky when you reach the Red Flower Ridge¡­ Other than that, we have no clue about their personalities! Even if the Flying Sword Sect has a great reputation, one would never know how much of it is true!"


    The woman in her early thirties finished talking in a somewhat quiet tone as her concern for the person she had pulled to the side was on disy for all to see.


    "Mother, you don''t have to worry so much about me¡­ This will also be a good opportunity for our River Sect to establish a connection with the Flying Sword Sect! Even if you don''t want to admit it, this will be a good opportunity for us!"


    Sighing quietly to himself as he said this, the person from the River Sect called Huang shook off his mother''s hand.


    "But-"


    "No but, we will never be able to get a Nascent Soul Realm Expert if we keep isting ourselves like this! We have to look outwards if we want to grow in the future and finally give birth to a Nascent Soul Realm Expert inside the sect!"


    Knowing his mother well, Huang stopped her before she coulde up with an excuse for him to stay back in the sect together with her.


    The River Sect had been isted from the rest of the Northern Region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom for as long as Huang could remember and for someone who wanted to go out and explore the world, this was nothing short of torture!


    He admired the Flying Sword Sect, as he had always heard about it from his parents and how they were the sole overlords of the entire Northern Region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    But this was not the main reason why he admired the Flying Sword Sect¡­ No, it was the fact that they allowed for their disciples to go out and adventure after reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    He managed to hear this from a travelling cultivator that visited the River Sect in the past and since then, he who had always dreamt about going out and exploring the world decided to wait until reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm before brining it up with his parents¡­ Who ruthlessly rejected him.


    It was a few days after being rejected that he heard his parents talking about finding a guide for two disciples of the Flying Sword Sect that hade to their territory in order toplete a rather special mission.


    So, without further ado, Huang had volunteered himself for the task. Only manging to get his parents approval after a few hours of convincing¡­


    "Hah¡­ Fine! But you have to promise me that you will run away in case something dangerous happens!"


    Thinking about what her son said with a struggling look on her face, the woman looking to be in her early thirties finally let outrge sigh as she agreed with her son. Even now, she was regretting ever letting hime here in the first ce¡­


    "Thank you, mom-"


    "The two disciples have already appeared and are heading over here! We should head back to the sect for now. Huang Yongyu, the rest will be up to you!"


    Smiling happily as he hugged his mother, Huang and his mother were soon interrupted as the older person who had spoken up earlier called out as Huang watched his mother reluctantly leave together with the rest of the group. Leaving only Huang behind as he anxiously waited for the two disciples of the Flying Sword Sect to appear. Not knowing what to expect.


    ¡­


    At the same time, Qing Yi and Chu Yang had made their way over towards the meeting spot just outside of the small town, with Chu Yang leading the way.


    "By the way, where did the tiger demon beast go? I haven''t seen it since I woke up earlier¡­"


    Walking along the road leading out of the town, Qing Yi asked curiously as she had not manged to see the tiger demon beast that had taken them all the way to the River Sect''s territory ever since she had fainted.


    "It is waiting outside of the town in the nearby forest¡­ Apparently the town does not want anyone entering together with demon beasts, tamed or not!"


    Saying this, Chu Yang could not help but shake his head. Not daring to say that the real reason he did not take the tiger demon beast inside of the town, was because he feared that it might end up attacking some of the people inside.


    After having seen it eat the corpses of the bandits yesterday, Chu Yang could simply not bring himself to trusting that it had been properly tamed!


    "I see, what about-"


    "Ah, we are here!"


    Just as Qing Yi was about to ask about something different, Chu Yang spotted a lone figure dressed in a blue robe with a wave symbol at the centre of the chest a few dozen meters in front of them just beside the forest where a certain tiger demon beast was located.

 Chapter 291: Hidden Danger behind the Bandit Group

    <h4>Chapter 291: Hidden Danger behind the Bandit Group</h4>


    Reacting first upon seeing the young man that stood waiting a few dozen meters away, Qing Yi dashed over towards the young man dressed in the blue robe belonging to the River Sect.


    "Are you perhaps the disciple from the River Sect that was sent over to guide us? You are in the Foundation Establishment Realm!?"


    Asking this as she sized up the young man, Qing Yi could not help but exim a bit surprised after discovering that he was actually in the Foundation Establishment like them.


    It was normal for a sect like the River Sect to send over one their disciples to guide them, they were after all from the Flying Sword Sect who had control over the entire northern region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­


    But this did not mean that the person sent over as a guide would be strong by any means. Most of the time, it would? just be a disciple in the Qi Condensation Realm that was familiar with the territory.


    That was why Qing Yi was surprised that it was someone in the Foundation Establishment showing up and he was only a little older than them! Even in the Flying Sword Sect, someone like that could be considered a genius¡­ Let alone in the River Sect.


    Why would the River Sect send over someone like that to guide them¡­?


    "Yes, I''m the one sent over by the River Sect. My name is Huang Yongyu and I''m a Core Disciple of the River Sect."


    Both Qing Yi and Chu Yan were curious about this, as the person in question did not seem to mind Qing Yi''s reaction much as he introduced himself calmly.


    "A Core Disciple? Why would the River Sect send over someone like that to act as a guide for us¡­?"


    Thinking that the River Sect might have somehow found out that they were both personal disciples of Xuan Hao and were trying to establish some sort of connection with their master through them, Chu Yang put on a cautious expression on his face as he asked Huang Yongyu.


    "Haha, you don''t have to mind it too much. The reason for this is mostly because I wanted to get out of the sect myself, I also wanted to see the disciples from the Flying Sword Sect myself and maybe find out how the world outside our River Sect looks like¡­ You should at least both have some idea about how isted my sect is¡­"


    Laughing with a smile on his face upon seeing the cautious expression on Chu Yang''s face, Huang Yongyu quickly exined his reason for acting as a guide to the two of them.


    "I see¡­ That is understandable, I hope we will live up to your expectations¡­ Even though the two of us haven''t been much outside the sect either¡­" Still remaining a bit cautious towards Huang Yongyu, Chu Yang said this before turning towards Qing Yi who was still staring at Huang Yongyu with an excited look on her face.


    "Do you have something to say, Qing Yi¡­?"


    "Ah! I was just wondering if the River Sect has any alchemists or if they mostly get their pills and potions through trade with other sects¡­"


    Letting out a surprised yelp after being found out, Qing Yi quickly asked the question she had wanted to ask ever since she first heard that they would be meeting up with someone from the River Sect.


    "Hm, If it''s about alchemist of our sect¡­ We don''t really have any, I think we mostly just buy them from some of the nearby sects when needed¡­"


    Thinking about it for a short moment, Huang Yongyu answered Qing Yi''s question without hesitation.


    The fact that they got most of their pills and potions from the outside was not really a secret in the first ce, Huang Yongyu was just a bit surprised that a disciple from the Flying Sword Sect would ask him about something like this.


    "Great!"


    Not saying anything else, Qing Yi quickly retreated from Huang Yongyu. Smiling happily as she seemed to be in deep thought about something.


    "Just ignore her, we should get going and deal with those bandits at the Red Flower Ridge as quickly as possible. Wait here for a moment, I will just be getting our mount."


    Rolling his eyes upon seeing Qing Yi, Chu Yang informed the confused Huang Yongyu as he soon entered the forest in search of the tiger demon beast. Leaving Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu alone together at the entrance to the forest.


    "¡­"


    Huang Yongyu did not know what to say in response, as he watched Chu Yang slowly disappear into the forest and Qing Yi sitting down with a small notebook in hand before staring to write something down. Completely ignoring him in the process.


    The disciples from the Flying Sword Sect¡­ Were different from how he had first imagined them¡­


    Time slowly passed and Chu Yang soon came back with the tiger demon beast.


    Like this, Qing Yi, Chu Yang and the new member of the group, Huang Yongyu. All mounted up on the tiger demon beast before setting off in the direction of the Red Flower Ridge.


    The tiger demon beast barely holding on under the weight of three people who could barely fit on his back.


    ¡­


    The journey towards the Red Flower Ridge was peaceful without much happening. Most of the time was spent with Chu Yang and Qing Yi asking Huang Yong Yu about the River Sect and Huang Yongyu asking about how things were outside of the River Sect, to which Chu Yang took the lead in talking about some of the things he had seen when on the run from the ck Rose Sect.


    During their conversations, Chu Yang and Qing Yi also learned about the Pure Heart Lake for their second mission.


    Apparently, the Pure Heart Lake was located close to the centre of the River Sect''s territory where their sect was built.


    "¡­Though I do have to remind you that even if the Pure Heart Lake is inside my River Sect''s territory, we do not control it alone and there are many other sects that have their disciples enter and gather Pure Heart Spirit Grass! In return, we get a lot of potions, pills and other essential materials for our disciples and elders!"


    The talk was currently on the Pure Heart Lake and the powers present in it and Huang Yongyu''s exnation had helped both Qing Yi and Chu Yang understand the current situation better.


    "¡­"


    Chu Yang and Qing Yi both looked at each other quietly after hearing Huang Yongyu finish his exnation, he very clearly looked upset when mentioning the fact that the Pure Heart Lake was notpletely under his own sect''s control.


    Well, that was understandable¡­ After all, who would want some other sect having their disciples loiter around just outside the entrance of their sect? How would their elders ever be able to leave without worrying that one of the sects who had sent people over just outside the sectunching an attack?


    From the looks of things, the River Sect might not be so willing to be in istion as Chu Yang and Qing Yi had first though, but were most likely forced into their current situation due to arge group of people from other sects having their own people hanging out just outside their sect¡­


    The other sects very clearly wanted to somehow deal with the River Sect but feared their overwhelming number of Core Formation Experts.


    Instead, they resorted to other means.


    Forcing their experts to stay at home while they cut them off from the outside world. Slowly killing them off by limiting the resources going into the River Sect¡­


    "Thank you for your exnation, I will keep it in mind."


    "No need, I''m acting as a guide, so it''s the least I can do!"


    Thanking Huang Yongyu for his exnation, Chu Yang seemed to form an understanding of the general situation inside the River Sect''s territory¡­


    It looked like the bandit group that had appeared at the Red Flower Ridge was connected to the sects that were currently setting up shop beside the Pure Heart Lake¡­ Things were way more troublesome than expected¡­


    The River Sect had even requested for the Flying Sword Sect to take care of the bandits so the sects hanging out outside their sect wouldn''t be able to do anything to them, like iming that the bandit group had kidnapped some of their disciples and the River Sect had ended up killing them and therefore wanting some sort ofpensation in return¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Chu Yang could not help but let out an exhausted sigh when he thought about this. At the very least, he had the Flying Sword Sect behind him, so there was no way those sects would dare do anything unreasonable to him and Qing Yi¡­


    Even then, Chu Yang could not help but feel a bit uncertain the closer they got to the Red Flower Ridge.


    The sects should at least have predicted that the River Sect would end up asking the Flying Sword Sect for help dealing with the bandits¡­ So howe they still nted those bandits there anyway¡­?

 Chapter 292: Veposs Flowers and Red Flower Ridge

    <h4>Chapter 292: Veposs Flowers and Red Flower Ridge</h4>


    "We are here¡­ So, this is the Red Flower Ridge¡­"


    After traveling through the peaceful territory of the River Sect under the guidance of Huang Yongyu, Qing Yi and Chu Yang managed to reach the base of the Red Flower Ridge at the dawn of the third day after they entered the River Sect''s territory.


    "Indeed, and I can now see why it''s called the Red Flower Ridge¡­"


    Nodding her head with a smile on her face, Qing Yi looked up at the Red Flower Ridge. Mainly focused on the sea of red flowers that spread as far as the eye could see, covering almost the entire base of the few dozen mountains that were called the Red Flower Ridge.


    "What are these flowers? I don''t think I have seen then anywhere before¡­"


    Compared to Qing Yi who had absorbed a huge amount of knowledge regarding alchemy and spiritual herbs over the past few days, Chu Yang was still not knowledgeable in that regard. Even with the guidance book handed over to him back in the Mission Hall, Chu Yang had not spent much time reading through it. Only having gone through the parts about the Pure Heart Spirit Grass that they would have to gather after dealing with the bandit group hidden somewhere at the Red Flower Ridge.


    "Veposs, they are rtivelymon flower growing around mountains where blood of some ancient species of demon beasts had hit in the past. Not much is known about them other than that¡­ The reason why they aremon, is that the ancient species of demon beasts had once been involved in some kind of long forgotten war that engulfed the entire Ewaria Continent. In turn, their blood has been spilt in a lot of different ces. Mostmonly around the Burning Mountain Range¡­"


    "Then aren''t they really precious!? After all, they grew due to some ancient demon beast''s blood!"


    Answering before their guide Huang Yongyu, Qing Yi exined the full history of the small red flower called Veposs. Much to the Huang Yongyu''s surprise, as he had not expected for Qing Yi to know so much about them.


    "While the Veposs flower did indeed grow due to the blood of the ancient demon beast, it is not worth much and is not evenparable to a Mortal Rank Spirit Herb¡­ Other than that, there is no use for it in alchemy¡­


    So, while it is indeed a pretty flower, it''s not worth much more than a random wildflower picked up beside the road¡­" Shaking her head a bit when she said this, Qing Yi instantly put a stop to Chu Yang''s excitement.


    "Ah¡­ I guess they wouldn''t just be growing freely around here if they really were worth something¡­ What a pity¡­"


    Letting go of a few of the Veposs flowers that he had just picked up, Chu Yang could not help but feel a bit disappointed when looking over the pretty sea of red flowers that stretched as far as the eye could see.


    "The Veposs flower grow where the blood of the ancient demon beast spilled¡­ Now that is a lot of blood¡­" Chu Yang could not help but sigh in amazement when he truly realized just howrge the ancient demon beast must have been to create such arge sea of flowers.


    "Indeed¡­"


    Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu also looked over the sea of red flowers. Imagining just how powerful such arge ancient demon beast might have been.


    Whoosh~


    With a calm wind passing by them, Chu Yang turned to the two others.


    "Enough rxing, we should get going. Don''t forget that we still have to find the bandits and deal with them! By the way, Huang Yongyu, will you be going with us or are you going to return to your sect?" If it was before he knew that the guide sent by the River Sect was in the Foundation Establishment Realm, Chu Yang would not have asked this and just left them behind as they would make their way up the Red Flower Ridge in search of the bandits.


    "I will go! The reason why I came here as a guide in the first ce was to explore more of the world! Even as a Core Disciple, I have never gotten the time to explore the Red Flower Ridge before, as it is located at the edge of our territory¡­ Other than that, the bandits should also be our River Sect''s responsibility in the first ce!"


    Saying this with a determined look on his face, Chu Yang nodded his head in agreement. Even if he did worry a bit about it, as he didn''t really know if Huang Yongyu had any experience when it came to killing.


    Anyway, having one more person in the Foundation Establishment Realm would be a great help when it came to dealing with the bandits below the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Worst case scenario, Huang Yongyu could just knock out the Qi Condensation Realm cultivators and allow him to deal with them when everything was over¡­


    "Then let''s get going!"


    With those words from Chu Yang, the group of three headed up the Red Flower Ridge. The tiger demon beast following closely behind them as they made their way up on foot. Prepared to fight in case they were ambushed along the way.


    ¡­


    "Hm¡­ Looks like the River Sect really did request for the Flying Sword Sect to deal with the bandits¡­"


    "Good that we prepared beforehand! Haha, I would really love to see their faces when they find out!"


    Located in a small secret room, a small group of people were happily talking together as they went over the newest information brought over by their spywork.


    The group of people were all from the sects that had worked tirelessly over the past years to iste the River Sect from the outside world and slowly weaken them without having to do any fighting.


    After all, even if the River Sect did not have any Nascent Soul Realm Expert, they still had a terrifying amount of Core Formation Expertspared to any normal sect at their level.


    Even with all the surrounding sects gathering together in an attempt to deal with them once and for all, they had only barely managed to gather together more Core Formation Experts than the River Sect!


    This was also one of the reasons why they chose to slowly weaken the River Sect instead of attacking them head on¡­


    Another reason was that the Flying Sword Sect might step in when they began fighting and that was not something any of the sects wanted to happen!


    Given the current chaos in the Northern Region of the Heavenly Sky Empire, the Flying Sword Sect stepping in would mean that they would use their power to forcefully calm the situation down as quickly as possible to prevent any further chaos spreading¡­


    And that in turn would most likely help the River Sect out of their forced istion that the surrounding sects had worked so hard to cause in the first ce¡­ And they did not want to see their years of hard work suddenly go down the drain like that¡­

 Chapter 293: Attack the Bandits!

    <h4>Chapter 293: Attack the Bandits!</h4>


    The Red Flower Ridge was hard to scale, in the end, Chu Yang had to let the tiger demon beast return back to the Veposs flowers to wait for them after only climbing up a short distance.


    The way up the Red Flower Ridge, was only made more difficult with the fact that there was no set path or any other sort of walkway in the first ce.


    "Do you perhaps have any idea where the bandit group might be hiding...?"


    Understanding that they would use a lot of time searching around the Red Flower Ridge without any clues to work off, Chu Yan turned to look back at Huang Yongyu climbing up behind him. Hoping that he would at least have some sort of idea about the general location of the bandit group.


    "Ah¡­ I thought you guys would know where they were located, I only know they should be somewhere at the Red Flower Ridge¡­"


    "¡­"


    Both Chu Yang and Qing Yi could not help but feel a bit awkward upon hearing what Huang Yongyu said.


    Maybe they should have asked around the viges that had been raided by the bandits over the past few months before rushing over to the Red Flower Ridge without any clue about where they might be hiding¡­


    "Looks like we will just have to search for them¡­"


    Feeling that their first mission suddenly became much more difficult, Qing Yi could not help but sigh to herself in her mind as she said this.


    Chu Yang and Huang Yongyu was of the same opinion as all three of them slowly began the process of searching for any clues about the whereabouts of the bandits on the Red Flower Ridge.


    Not that it would be easy. After all, the Red Flower Ridge waspromised of severalrge mountains and searching just one of them would take at least a day or two for the group of three¡­


    ¡­


    Crash!


    "Howe those disciples from the Flying Sword Sect have not found us yet?! They already arrived over a week ago and we even left so many clues about where our base is located when we raided those viges located just beside the Red Flower Ridge! Did they perhaps find out about our n¡­?"


    Inside arge mountain cave, a young man in histe twenties angrily threw a cup towards the cave wall as he eximed loudly, causing the surrounding bandits to shiver in fear.


    "It looks like we will have to contact the elders about this and have them change the n¡­ From the looks of it, we won''t be able to go with the original n and we will have to find a way to quickly get those two disciples to leave¡­ Hah¡­"


    Calming down as he muttered this to himself, the young man soon turned towards the shivering group of bandits that had gathered around him and let out an exhausted sigh.


    Things had suddenly gotten moreplicated¡­ Why did the two disciples from the Flying Sword Sect not act like they had nned!?


    The young man had no idea what to do about it and could only act in response to the weird behaviour of the Flying Sword Sect''s disciple and try to adapt to the situation.


    "Prepare to move out, we are going to leave for now and find out how to get things back on track again!"


    Thinking over his options, the young man decided to leave the mountain cave for now and return to the elders ande up with a new n.


    Staying around could potentially be dangerous if the disciples from the Flying Sword Sect had already sensed that something was wrong about their mission.


    "Looks like we won''t be able to capture those two¡­"


    ncing towards the exit of the mountain cave as he watched the bandits pack up and prepare to leave, the young man soon headed deeper into the cave to get his own things before leaving to meet up with his elders and set up a new n.


    ¡­


    At the same time, on top of the Red Flower Ridge. Not far away from the ce of the bandits and the young man, Qing Yi, Chu Yang and Huang Yongyu were sitting around eating thest of the food that they had brought with them up the Red Flower Ridge.


    "Look! I think the bandits are over there!"


    Chu Yang was the first to spot a group of people in rugged clothes with slightly tanned bodies andrge muscles visible from a few holes in their clothes walking out from arge rocky area with several dozen mountain caves dotted around.


    "Indeed¡­ It looks like it''s the bandits¡­"


    "Why have they suddenlye out? Are they perhaps preparing to raid another vige?"


    Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu, who both had their backs to the location that the bandit group appeared, reacted immediately upon hearing what Chu Yang said and turned around to look at the ce behind them.


    Closely inspecting the group of bandits moving out from thergest of the mountain caves, Chu Yang soon spotted therge number of crates and other precious materials that they were carrying out with them before descending down the Red Flower Ridge.


    "From the looks of it, they are not going out to raid, but are moving!"


    This conclusion left all three of them slightly panicked as they knew that they would have to act fast before the bandit group disappeared and relocated somewhere different.


    At that point, they would have to waste even more time looking after them!


    They had already spent close to a week searching through the Red Flower Ridge looking for them! They did not want to spend another week looking for their new hideout!


    "Should we just attack them now¡­? They are unprepared and won''t expect to be attacked at this moment. Most of them are not even carrying weapons and are instead carrying crates down the Red Flower Ridge¡­"


    As both Qing Yi and Chu Yang were thinking about what to do about the bandits, Huang Yongyu came forth and suggested.


    "Indeed¡­ We should just attack them, like this we won''t have to worry about finding themter! What do you say Qing Yi?"


    Nodding his head in approval, Chu Yang turned over towards Qing Yi and waited for her opinion.


    "Yeah¡­ Better just deal with them faster rather thanter, this way they won''t be able to cause any more harm to the viges below!"


    "Great, then let''s finish up eating before attacking them!"


    With all three of them approving to attack the bandits, Chu Yang took the lead and ate thest remaining part of his meal before taking out his spear. Ready for battle!

 Chapter 294: Bandit Leader vs Chu Yang!

    <h4>Chapter 294: Bandit Leader vs Chu Yang!</h4>


    Standing behind a rock only a few dozen meters away from the bandits, the group of three all readied their weapons.


    "Me and Qing Yi will take care of the three Foundation Establishment Realm bandits, Huang Yongyu will be the one to take care of the Qi Condensation Realm bandits¡­ Is that fine with you two?"


    ""Yes!""


    Seeing both Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu agree to the n, Chu Yang nodded approvingly before signalling for them to move out.


    Whoosh~


    Like that, they rushed over towards the bandits.


    "Wha-"


    Ptch!


    Huang Yongyu instantly killing the one closest to them without any hesitation before moving on to the next, while Chu Yang and Qing Yi moved towards the mountain cave where the three Foundation Establishment bandits were located.


    Huang Yongyu being left behind as he easily took care of the Qi Condensation Realm bandits without any problem. Even Chu Yang felt a bit impressed when he saw how easily he killed off the bandits with his sword dancing through the air as he easily cut down bandit after bandit.


    Fwoosh!


    "That should be the Foundation Establishment Realm bandits¡­"


    The moment Qing Yi and Chu Yang entered the mountain cave, three distinct auras red up.


    Two of them were simr to Huang Yongyu, being at the first stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, while thest one was way more powerful. Having reached close to the peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    "The bandit leader is way stronger than expected! Qing Yi, deal with the two bandits at the first stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, I will deal with the leader!"


    "Okay!"


    Understanding that the situation had gotten more dangerous with the bandit leader being at the peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm, she quickly agreed to what Chu Yang said as she dashed over in the direction of the two Foundation Establishment Realm bandits. Luckily, they were located in the same ce of the cave.


    Chu Yang did not hesitate for too long as he quickly made his way over in the direction of the Peak Foundation Establishment bandit.


    The information being wrong was no small surprise to Qing Yi and Chu Yang, as most of the information about the strength of the opponents in the missions were gathered by the Servant Quarters.


    The guide that they had been given back in the mission hall even imed that if there was a mistake in the opponent''s strength during a mission, the disciple could directly im no small amount ofpensation from the Mission Hall. Truly showing how much they trusted in the Servant Quarters ability to gather information!


    Not that either of them had any idea how the Servant Quarters gathered information in the first ce¡­ At least the Mission Hall seemed to have put theirplete faith in them¡­


    "So, this is the bandit leader¡­"


    Arriving at the end of the mountain cave, Chu Yang could not help but feel a bit shocked when he saw a handsome young man in histe twentiesyingzily down on a couch looking over in his direction.


    Completely different from the burly and rough looking middle-aged man he had expected to be the bandit leader¡­


    "I really didn''t expect for you to appear when we were just about to leave¡­ How lucky!"


    Muttering something to himself as a smile slowly formed on his lips after seeing Chu Yang appear, the young man slowly stood up.


    From the way he acted, his strong aura and cultivation, Chu Yang knew that the person in front of him would not be so easy to beat¡­


    Looks like I can finally fight without holding back!


    Even if he fought with Qing Yi a lot back in the sect, he was still stronger than her and would have to hold back whenever they fought each other. After all, they were merely practice fights. Not fights to the death!


    Thinking this as he strengthened the grip on his spear, Chu Yang could not help but feel a wave of excitement when seeing the young man in front of him take out a slim sword fastened around his waist and prepare to attack.


    Whoosh!


    ng!


    "Hm? You are stronger than expected¡­ This might take longer than I thought it would¡­"


    Retreating back in surprise after a quick exchange, the young man could not help but look at Chu Yan in surprise.


    Ching!


    Ptch~


    Barely reacting in time to block Chu Yang''s attack, as heunched an attack the moment, he saw the young man not paying attention.


    Catching him slightly off-guard as a line of blood appeared on his left chin, a minor wound caused by Chu Yang''s spear.


    "You-"


    ng!


    About to say something, the young man once again blocked Chu Yang''s spear as he quickly stopped talking.


    The opponent in front of him very clearly would not give up any chance he had at attack and from the looks of it, he did not have the luxury of ignoring him¡­ Even though he was 2 entire minor cultivation realms above him!


    Like this, both Chu Yang and the young man with the identity of a bandit leader put their full attention in fighting as they fought back and forth through the mountain cave.


    Rumble~


    Causing no small amount of damage to their surroundings in the process, as the mountain cave began showing signs of copsing down on them with each passing second. Not that the two cared. Completely focused on their opponent as the fighting grew more and more intense.


    "Mountain Breaker!"


    Whoosh!


    "Wha-?!"


    BANG!


    Chu Yang disyed the first move of the Soul Spear Divine Mantra, Mountain Breaker. Catching his opponent by surprise with his unique attack move and thus ending up directly smashing through the defensive qi barrier set up by the bandit leader before sending him flying into a nearby cave wall with his spear.


    Thumb


    "I should at least have broken a few bones-"


    RUMBLE!


    Muttering to himself as he looked over at the sorry figure of the young bandit leader fall down onto the cave floor, Chu Yang who was about to make his way over and finish off the bandit leader, was caught off-guard as the surrounding cave suddenly began copsing down on him.


    Whoosh!


    Not thinking twice about staying behind, Chu Yang left behind the half-dead bandit leader.


    Looking back just before he got out of sight, as a giant rock fell down from the cave ceiling and directly crushed his skull. Killing him on the spot.


    Bang!


    "¡­"


    Freezing for a moment upon seeing the sight of the bandit leader dying, Chu Yang was soon awakened by a rock falling just beside him, as he quickly made his way out of the mountain cave. Not willing to end up like the bandit leader¡­

 Chapter 295: Qing Yis Change

    <h4>Chapter 295: Qing Yi''s Change</h4>


    A little earlier, when Chu Yang went to confront the bandit leader, Qing Yi quickly made her way over towards the location of the two first stage Foundation Establishment bandits.


    Whoosh~


    Making her way through a side tunnel in the mountain cave, Qing Yi soon found herself out in the open again.


    Several small wooden buildings soon appeared in front of her, as Qing Yi quickly realized that she had made it through the mountain and reached the other side.


    This should be the real base of the bandit group!


    Coming to this conclusion as she quickly scanned over the surprised bandits about to carry a few crates through the tunnel she had juste out of, Qing Yi soon focused on two middle-aged men standing in the back. Looking over at her cautiously with their weapons drawn.


    "You are one of the disciples from the Flying Sword Sect!? What are you-"


    Eximing in surprise upon recognising who Qing Yi was, the bandit was soon interrupted by the fact that Qing Yi did not wait for him to finish as she attacked.


    Fwoosh!


    The attack of Qing Yi was different from how it had been in the past, as arge me coated her sword before shooting out in the form of arge fire sword made of fire qi, that rushed over towards one of the two Foundation Establishment bandits.


    After she trained with her new cultivation mantra and the fact that she had gotten more control over her Bright Sun Divine Physique. Completely transformed herbat style over the past few months.


    However, Qing Yi had note close to fully mastering her new fire rted abilities, Qing Yi had still experienced a leap in strength.


    "Argh!"


    The Foundation Establishment bandit did his best to block the fire sword of Qing Yi, but had no way to stand up to it, as he was directly reduced to dust¡­


    Whoosh!


    The other Foundation Establishment Realm bandit, who just watched his fellow bandit friend being reduced to dust in an instant by a young girl, did not dare to stay around any longer. Turning around before escaping into the distance.


    However, Qing Yi did not n to let him run away, as she gathered her qi together andunched another sword made of fire in the direction of the escaping bandit.


    Fwoosh!


    "Wha-!?"


    Only able to let out half a word, the escaping bandit did not even manage to react and put up a defensive barrier before joining his friend.


    The difference in strength between them was simply toorge, as the two first stage Foundation Establishment Realm bandits could not even block a single attack from Qing Yi, who was at the fifth stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­


    That was not counting the fact that she was stronger than normal fifth stage Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators, due to her Bright Sun Divine Physique and Heaven Rank cultivation mantra.


    The Foundation Establishment Realm bandit could be considered quite unlucky to have met someone like Qing Yi as their opponent¡­


    ""¡­""


    The remaining bandits standing around the base with crates and other things in hand, preparing to move out. Did not know what to do as they just saw their two leaders being reduced to dust within the span of no more than a few seconds.


    Qing Yi also stood still like the bandits and looked over at what remained of the two bandit leaders. Not knowing what to say as a part of her felt bad for killing the bandits, but another part of her remember what Chu Yang had told her and quickly supressed her regret for killing the two bandits.


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out a sigh as she turned to look at the shivering bandits, Qing Yi closed her eyes.


    Someone had to deal with these bandits¡­ If not, they will just bring even more suffering to the surrounding viges in the future!


    Thinking about how these bandits were using their cultivation to take advantage of the normal mortals, Qing Yi could not help but feel something fundamental change inside of her as she no longer felt hesitant when thinking about killing the bandits around her.


    "L-let''s get away!"


    "Y-yeah¡­ She seems to be deep in thought or something¡­"


    "True, this is our only chance!"


    As Qing Yi was slowly changing her way of thinking. The surrounding bandits did not let go of such an opportunity, as they quietly conversed among each other, while slowly beginning to move away from Qing Yi.


    Of course, all of this was heard by Qing Yi as she opened her eyes once again. No longer hesitant about how to deal with the remaining bandit!


    Earlier when she had killed the two Foundation Establishment Realm bandits, she had not truly wanted to kill them, it was just that they were way weaker than she had expected.


    Even when she had lowered the strength of her second attack, Qing Yi did not expect for the escaping bandit leader to not even put up any defensive barriers, as he joined the other bandit leader¡­


    Fwoosh!


    "Wha- mes! Where did these mese from!? Argh!"


    "W-what is thi-"


    "H-help m-"


    Not hesitating about killing the bandits any longer, Qing Yi fully showed off her brilliant mastery of fire qi for the first time ever, as the slowly retreating bandits. Along with the wooden buildings, were directly swallowed up by a sea of fire.


    The sea of fire continued to spread out with Qing Yi at the centre before reaching a little over a hundred meters away from her in all directions.


    Rumble!


    In a dazed state as she kept the sea of fire going, Qing Yi did not notice that the cave she came through copsed behind her.


    Fwoosh!


    "Hah¡­"


    After another few seconds passed, Qing Yi could finally not bear the qi consumption of keeping the sea of fire running, as she directly fell onto the ground and began breathing in heavily.


    Looking around at the surrounding terrain, Qing Yi could not help but suck in a breath of cold air. The bandits, the small wooden houses and even a few trees, were allpletely gone!


    All that remained was the ground that had turnedpletely ck under Qing Yi''s fire¡­


    Maybe¡­ She had overdone it¡­


    Smiling wryly at this thought, Qing Yi quickly sat up in a meditative position before trying to recover the qi that she had just spent.


    Walking around in her current state was way too dangerous and she would have to recover before going back to where Chu Yang and Huang Yongyu were at. After all, she did not want to run into a bandit on her way back in her current state¡­

 Chapter 296: System back in action!

    <h4>Chapter 296: System back in action!</h4>


    Dealing with thest few escaping bandits, Huang Yongyu soon made his way back to the mountain cave that Chu Yang and Qing Yi had entered. Only to be met with the sight of a copsed cave and an exhausted Chu Yang standing next to it.


    "Where is Qing Yi?!"


    Looking around and seeing that the other disciple from the Flying Sword Sect missing, Huang Yongyu started panicking as he very well knew that it would spell bad news for his River Sect if they came over to investigate¡­


    After all, with everything said and done. Even if the surrounding sects were trying to kill of his River Sect, they had still used the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect to help themselves out from their schemes¡­!


    "No need to worry so much, she is at the other side of the Red Flower Ridge¡­ She was just exhausted after her fight, so she will be recovering before meeting up with uster!"


    Seeing the anxious expression on Huang Yongyu''s face, Chu Yang knew a bit about what must be going through his mind, as he reassured him.


    Even if the River Sect had to some degree ended up using them in an attempt to circumvent the sects setting up just outside their gate, Chu Yang knew that they most likely had no choice¡­


    After all, given their current circumstances, Chu Yang highly doubted that they would be able to send any of their own experts out to deal with the bandits without meeting an unfortunate ident along the way¡­


    In a sense, the only reason why Huang Yongyu was safe at the current moment, was that he was together with him and Qing Yi¡­


    "That''s great¡­"


    Letting out a sigh of relief after hearing that Qing Yi was safe, Huang Yongyu sat down a few meters away from Chu Yang and began recovering his qi. Even if he could easily deal with the Qi Condensation Realm bandits, it still drained his qi reserves to deal with so many of them without rest¡­


    Time slowly passed and after recovering their qi and meeting up with Qing Yi, the group of three soon began heading towards the Pure Heart Lake where the Pure Heart Spirit Grass was located¡­ And at the same time, the ce where the sects against the River Sect were gathered together.


    Not that it mattered to Qing Yi and Chu Yang, as there was no chance that they would dare to do anything to them. Fearful of what the Flying Sword Sect might do, they were after all well known for being overprotective of their disciples, be it Core Disciples or Outer Disciples¡­


    ¡­


    A few days earlier when Chu Yang and Qing Yi had just made their way inside the territory of the River Sect, Xuan Hao spent almost an entire day together with Elder Song, as he learned about how to best go about teaching his disciples.


    Elder Song himself, was more than happy to set aside some time to help out Xuan Hao and teach him how to train up his disciples, he was after all the one who had helped him finally breakthrough and reach the Nascent Soul Realm! Even if Xuan Hao asked him for more time, Elder Song would be willing to throw the work he had been doing onto some poor soul so as to make sure he would have enough time¡­


    The poor soul in question being the Flying Sword Sect''s newest Nascent Soul Realm Expert outside of Elder Song who had just broken through, Chi Hu¡­


    After he had joined the Flying Sword Sect, Chi Hu had be good friends with Elder Song and in turn started working together with him to help manage the Flying Sword Sect.


    Something Elder Song was more than happy about, as he started training him in how to properly manage the sect''s resources.


    In a sense, Chi Hu could almost be considered the sessor of Elder Song, as he easily absorbed all the new information and happily took on the management work of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Given that he had already spent a good part of his life adventuring about, Chi Hu very much liked the position that he had ended up in¡­


    Xuan Hao also knew about this and felt happy for the old guy who was finally begging to fit in after joining the Flying Sword Sect.


    To be honest, he had been a bit worried about him when he first joined, but his worry was for nothing, as Chi Hu got along well with Elder Song and the rest of the elders.


    Though he had not yet interacted much with the disciples, but that could always wait.


    The yearly entrance examination where a bunch of new disciples came to join the sect was a good opportunity for Chi Hu. At that point, he could even take in a disciple or two and be more well known by the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    "Hm¡­ I will still have to train more to be a good teacher¡­"


    Sitting down outside his pavilion with a cup of tea in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help but mutter this to himself as he watched the steam slowly drift up from his cup.


    [Side Quest: Learn about new subjects to better teach your disciples.]


    [New Knowledge about Professions: 0/100]


    [New Knowledge about Movement and Combat Techniques: 0/100]


    [New Knowledge about World History: 0/100]


    [Time limit: Complete before your disciples return from their sect missions!]


    [Reward: Cultivation Increase of one Minor Realm]


    And just like that, a new quest had appeared.


    "What is this¡­?"


    Looking over the new quest, Xuan Hao was a bit confused as it was the first of its kind. Asking him to learn more about different subjects that would be useful to teach his disciples about in the future.


    However, the thing that caught his attention the most, was the fact that the reward would be an increase to his cultivation realm!


    Back at the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao had still felt that it was rtively easy to improve his cultivation realm even without the systems help. However, after reaching the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao felt like his progress had suddenlye to grinding halt, as his cultivation no longer improved as quickly as he wanted it to.


    He would have to slowlyprehend thews of nature and incorporate them into his domain and strengthen it¡­ A truly slow process, but there was nothing he could do about it.


    Yet at this point, the system finally showed up¡­


    Xuan Hao somewhat had a feeling that it had been waiting for him to reach a point where cultivation would be slow, thus increasing his drive toplete the missions and train up his disciple¡­

 Chapter 297: Learning about other Continents

    <h4>Chapter 297: Learning about other Continents</h4>


    Having been given a new mission, Xuan Hao decided to go and visit one of the sect''s libraries and find a few books about the history of the Ewaria Continent.


    Maybe he could even find some information about what existed beyond the Ewaria Continent if he got lucky¡­


    Overall, the history of the world that he was currently in, was one of the things that he had not really focused much on learning and should be the easiest among the three objectives toplete. Given the fact that he had at most learned about the Flying Sword Sect, Heavenly Sky Kingdom and a tiny bit about the Sky Empire.


    Even if most of the things he knew about the Sky Empire, was obtained from Shu Yao when she came and talked to him about the Sect Alliance that they were in the process of setting up¡­


    Now that I think about it, when would we be joining the Sect Alliance in the future? How would we even go about it in the first ce?


    Remembering the Sect Alliance that Shu Yao had talked about, Xuan Hao could not help but ponder to himself as he thought about it.


    But in the end decided not to worry too much over it, Shu Yao had after all mentioned that they would only join after their sects had merged together and there was still some time before that happened¡­


    "Elder Xuan, are you perhaps here to visit the library?"


    Lost in thought about the Sect Alliance, Xuan Hao soon found himself in front of the library of the Flying Sword Sect that stored different records about historical events and different books that talked about the past of the Ewaria Continent from the perspective of the different powers that existed back then.


    "Yes, I think I will being here more often to research a few things about the past."


    Looking over at the elder standing at the entrance to the library, Xuan Hao answered with a smile on his face as the elder nodded understandingly. After all, it was a given that someone would want to learn more about the past and what kind of epic battles had happened back then.


    Xuan Hao did not stay around at the entrance for too long before entering the library. Picking up a few books to read as he sat down beside a small table at the first floor of the library. Excited to progress his new mission and at the same time learn more about the world he was currently living in.


    Different from information gained from other ces, the historical records and books depicting the past, would always be over the top. Allowing for one''s imagination to run wild as near apocalyptic abilities was described in the books.


    From someone having the ability to cut an entire continent in half with a single swing of his sword, to someone materializing a giant floating ind with nothing more than a single wave of their hand.


    Even from Xuan Hao''s perspective, all of this sounded like pure fantasy. Especially given the fact that most of the stories like that dated back tens of thousands of years, if not more¡­


    The only stories stood out to Xuan Haopared to the others, was the history of how the Ewaria Continent came to be.


    The stories told about an ancient war that happened over one hundred thousand years ago, that caused what was known as the main continent back then, to split into four smaller continents.


    Amongst these four new and smaller continents, was the Ewaria Continent that he was currently on and three other continents.


    The three other continents were not named in the book, but from the descriptions of them, Xuan Hao managed to at least get some idea about the people that had inhabited the areas that would split up in the future into their own continents.


    One of? the continents, was the ce where the churches had their main headquarters in the past. Many of the churches of the Ewaria Continent, could even trace their origin back to the churches on that continent.


    The second continent was a ce that had mostly covered inrge forests and tall mountains stretching far into the sky.


    Ancient demon beasts had roamed freely through the forests and mountains, as humans were close to non-existent. The books he read, had even mentioned that some ancient powerful demon beasts would be able to take on a human form!


    Thest among them was by far thergest of the four continents, it was also the ce where the powerful Sects, Empires and Demonic Sects from back then was located.


    Xuan Hao felt that he gained a deeper understanding of the world after reading about the other three continents beyond the borders of the Ewaria Continent.


    But¡­


    "Why is there no mention about the Ewaria Continent outside of its name¡­?"


    Xuan Hao could not understand this, the other three continents very clearly had some powerful forces residing on them before they split off in the ancient war in the past.


    The churches and their priests on one continent, The demon beasts, theirrge forests and mountains on another and finally the powerful sects, empires and demonic sects on thest one¡­


    What power had resided over the Ewaria Continent in the past¡­? Before the main continent had split up into four continents.


    Even though he did not know much about the past, Xuan Hao could very clearly see that the Ewaria Continent had a mix of the other three, churches from one, sects and empires from another and finally the Burning Mountain Range with demon beasts in it from thest one¡­


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I won''t be able to find out anything more for now¡­ Maybe the Sky Empire or other empires would have more information on this¡­"


    Sighing to himself as he said this, Xuan Hao put down the book he had just finished about the ancient demon beasts from before the main continent had split up into four.


    Standing up from his chair at the library, Xuan Hao managed to see thest few rays of sunlight entering through a nearby window, as the sun slowly disappeared behind the mountains surrounding the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Looks like it''s alreadyte¡­ Time sure does fly by."


    Whoosh~


    Leaving behind these few words, Xuan Hao directly disappeared from the library. The books left behind slowly floating up and returning to their rightful ce in the different bookshelves of the library.

 Chapter 298: End of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom Approaching!

    <h4>Chapter 298: End of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom Approaching!</h4>


    By the time Xuan Hao made his way back to his pavilion, he quickly checked on his quest to see how much it had progressed from his earlier reading session. Learning about three other continents, along with some general knowledge about who might be living on them, should at the very least count towards gaining new knowledge in some way¡­


    Well, if the information was fake, I should not gain any progress towards the quest¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao went through the quest he had just gotten earlier today before focusing on the part about world history.


    [New Knowledge about World History: 97/100]


    "¡­"


    To say he was shocked would be an understatement, as Xuan Hao saw the current progress of the world history part of the quest almost done and it had only taken him a little under a day!


    If things continued like this, wouldn''t he be able to breakthrough and reach the third stage of the Domain Lord Realm in another two days!?


    Other than that, Xuan Hao also realized that the information about the three other continents that he had just read about, was true¡­


    The strength of the people on the three continents that he had read about was simply mind boggling to the current Xuan Hao and the excitement from being close to reaching the third stage of the Domain Lord Realm quickly vanished.


    That''s right! Even here on the Ewaria Continent, there was still people at the Soul Ascension Realm above me! Given that the powers of the old main continent had their bases at the other three continents, they should be stronger than the people at the Ewaria Continent!


    By how much, he had no idea, but Xuan Hao silently promised himself that he would not leave the Ewaria Continent any time in future before at least increasing his strength to the Soul Ascension Realm!


    From what he had read earlier, there was a few mentions of people in the Soul Ascension Realm when it came to the war that had ended up splitting the ancient main continent into four back then.


    So, at the very least, people in the Soul Ascension Realm would not be considered weak by any means outside the Ewaria Continent! On the other hand, they should at least beparable to how Domain Lords were viewed on the Ewaria Continent¡­ Just below the peak of strength that was the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt even more motivated toplete the system quest and increase his strength.


    Even if it was far off in the future, Xuan Hao wanted to be able to visit the other three continents without? the fear of dying to some of the experts over there. Maybe even expand the Flying Sword Sect and set up a branch on each of the three continents¡­


    After all, if the people over there were stronger, they would also provide a good training environment for his disciple when they grew stronger¡­


    At that point in time, he could just let his disciples adventure around the three continents without having to spend a lot of time training them. From what Elder Song had taught him, the best way to let one''s disciples grow, was to let them adventure outside and explore the world for themselves.


    This way, they would get ample battle experience from other cultivators and demon beasts alike. At the same time, they might also be able to chance upon different rare artifacts, precious herbs or even inheritances from old powerful cultivators from the past.


    And with his disciples out and about adventuring, he would be able to just stay back at the sect rxing and enjoying life¡­


    Sadly, his disciples were far from strong enough to go out and adventure through the world by themselves. Currently, the only ce that was somewhat safe for them to go out and adventure in, was the territory of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Anything beyond that would be way too dangerous for them with their current cultivation realm.


    "I will have to teach them about the other continents at some point in the future¡­ Maybe knowing about them will give them an increased drive to increase their cultivation?"


    Saying this out loud to himself as he sat down in a meditative position on a small mat, Xuan Hao slowly closed his eyes and focused on cultivating.


    Tomorrow, he would finish up the world history part of the quest before moving onto one of the two remaining parts of the quest.


    Like this, Xuan Hao quietly began cultivating.


    This had been a normal routine for him, as he no longer needed to sleep. Cultivating would be the same as sleeping, as his entire body wouldpletely rx during the process. Slowly clearing away the mental exhaustion umted during the day.


    In a sense, cultivating during the night was the same as sleeping for a cultivator. The only difference being that they were way more alert to their surroundings than if they were sleeping.


    ¡­


    As the night slowly went by, somewhere at the front lines between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, a shadowy figure slowly appeared at the centre of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s camp.


    "Y-your majesty! W-why are you here!?"


    A figure soon showed up as he called out to the shadowy figure that soon revealed itself to be the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "Seeing as things were going so slowly with the appearance of that old fossil from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, I decided toe myself and deal with that nuisance once and for all!"


    Answering the person who had long since kneeled down in front of him, the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom narrowed his eyes as his gaze locked onto the defensive barrier set up by the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the distance.


    The soldiers of the Azure Sky Kingdom were helplessly trying to breakthrough the barrier to no avail, as they couldn''t advance even a single step.


    A very strong aura could be felt from the centre of this defensive barrier, as the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom very clearly knew who it was originating from.


    "Hmph! I will take action to remove the old fossil tomorrow! Tell your men to rest for the night before attacking after I dealt with that old guy tomorrow!"


    "Y-yes!"


    Not daring to refuse the order, the general very quickly disappeared in the direction where the soldiers of the Azure Sky Kingdom were fighting in an attempt to break through the barrier.


    "You have one night left¡­ Tomorrow there will no longer be any Heavenly Sky Kingdom left on the Ewaria Continent!"


    Smiling arrogantly, the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom no longer stayed around as he entered the general''s tent at the centre of the army camp before sitting down to meditate until the morning arrived.


    Tomorrow, he would finish off the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and make sure there was no Nascent Soul Realm Experts let to resist them on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s side-


    "I just hope that the person from the Spring Flower Sect stays out of it¡­"


    Feeling a presence around the same level as his own, the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom could not help but nce in the direction of a small hilltop not far from where the battle between the two kingdoms was happening¡­

 Chapter 299: Shu Yaos Suspicion

    <h4>Chapter 299: Shu Yao''s Suspicion</h4>


    At the same time that the King of the Azure Sky Kingdom arrived inside of the army camp, on a small hilltop located a short distance away from the battlefield, Shu Yao curiously popped her head up and gazed over in the direction of the King.


    "Hm¡­ Never expected that the Azure Sky Kingdom would have some at the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm like me. Looks like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom is going to end soon! Maybe I should ask if Elder Xuan coulde over just to be safe in case that guy gets any funny ideas¡­"


    Muttering this to herself as she felt the divine sense of the Half-Step Domain Lord in question lock onto her, Shu Yao debated whether to contact Xuan Hao.


    The fall of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would have arge effect on both the Spring Flower Sect, the Flying Sword Sect and the Seven Fates Sect.


    Brining both an opportunity for further expanding their territory and at the same time bringing forth possible dangers in case the Azure Sky Kingdom decides to not keep up on their promise to leave after the destruction of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Overall, Shu Yao felt that Xuan Hao should be present, just in case¡­


    Other than that, Shu Yao had a nagging feeling that there was a reason why the Azure Sky Kingdom had gone ahead andunched a full-on war to destroy the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Outside of just destroying an old rival kingdom¡­


    After all, it made no sense for the Azure Sky Kingdom to put forth so much effort to destroy the Heavenly Sky Kingdom without any benefits.


    At the same time, she had heard from a few friends that the neighbouring kingdoms around the Azure Sky Kingdom had begun moving to invade them while they were busy taking down the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­


    No matter how she looked at it, Shu Yao could not see a reason why the Azure Sky Kingdom would want to destroy the Heavenly Sky Kingdom so badly unless there was something they wanted from them.


    But what¡­?


    Shu Yao had no idea and nned to find out what the king from the Azure Sky Kingdom wanted so badly that he left his kingdom wide open to attacks from the neighbouring kingdoms¡­


    Thinking about all of this, Shu Yao took out hermunication talisman and contacted Xuan Hao.


    At least with him around, Shu Yao was sure that the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom wouldn''t be able to sneakily hide away the thing he was invading the Heavenly Sky Kingdom for!


    At this point in time, Shu Yao had already convinced herself that there must be something important hidden inside of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom that the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom was after¡­


    ¡­


    Back at the Flying Sword Sect, the night slowly passed with Xuan Hao cultivating peacefully.


    "Hm? Who is it?"


    Picking up hismunication talisman, Xuan Hao was surprised to hear Shu Yao on the other side as she exined that she was currently observing what would be the final battlefield between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and that the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom had shown up.


    "So, why did you contact me¡­?"


    Still not understanding why she would contact him over the battle between the two kingdoms, Xuan Hao clearly remembered that they would remain neutral in the fight¡­


    In the first ce, howe Shu Yao was even there¡­?


    "I felt that something was wrong with the Azure Sky Kingdoms attack on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. No matter how much of a rival they are, they have already taken arge part of their territory away with close to no risk and continuing until theypletely destroy the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would result in the neighbouring kingdoms taking advantage of it to take over part of the Azure Sky Kingdom''snd!


    From a few of my friends outside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, I already know at least three other kingdoms working together tounch an attack and take over arge chunk ofnd away from the Azure Sky Kingdom this morning!"


    "Indeed¡­ It makes no sense for them to continue until theypletely destroy the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, especially so if they are not even nning to take over their territory in the first ce¡­ At this point they will only end up losing territory overall¡­"


    Listening to what Shu Yao said, Xuan Hao could not help but agree with her as it was indeed weird for the Azure Sky Kingdom to continue their attack on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom without any benefits.


    "So, what do you think their reason for this is¡­?"


    Not understanding why, the Azure Sky Kingdom would do something so stupid, Xuan Hao could not help but ask Shu Yao trough hismunication talisman.


    "I think that the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom found out about something precious in the possession of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and want to take it away for himself. An ancient artifact or maybe a precious herb of some kind, I really have no idea, but that is the only real reason I can think of¡­"


    Following a short silence from the other side, Shu Yao exined what she believed to be the reason for the Azure Sky Kingdoms continued aggression towards the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "I see¡­ That would indeed exin why they would continue their attack on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, especially if the thing in question is something that would help the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom breakthrough into the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    Nodding his head in agreement while saying this, Xuan Hao could not help but remember the source crystal that he had consumed back when breaking through into the Domain Lord Realm.


    A big enough source crystal would most definitely be more than enough to help someone at the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm take the final step into the Domain Lord Realm!


    Other than that, Xuan Hao did not know about any other way to help someone reach the Domain Lord Realm. Perhaps a pill simr to the purification pill he had gotten from the system, but Xuan Hao highly doubted that, as the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would definitely have consumed it by now.


    The purification pill fundamentally strengthens the soul and the earlier it could be consumed the better, there would be no reason for the ancestor to just keep it around and wait until he reached the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm¡­


    A source crystal on the other hand, would increase theprehension of a cultivator during a certain period of time. The effect growing longer and stronger the bigger the source crystal was.


    The ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would definitely not use such a precious resource before reaching the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm!


    All in all, Xuan Hao could be wrong and the thing in question could be somethingpletely different, like a powerful artifact or an ancient cultivation mantra of some sort¡­


    "So¡­ I wanted to ask if you were free and wanted toe over, just to keep an eye on the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom and find out the reason he wants to destroy the Heavenly Sky Kingdom so badly!"


    Hearing Xuan Hao agree with her that there was something suspicious about the Azure Sky Kingdom''s attack, Shu Yao decided to ask whether he wanted toe over and watch the situation unfold.


    "Sure, I will be there in a few hours!"


    Not seeing any reason to refuse Shu Yao outside of the fact that he might waste a day or two, Xuan Hao quickly made his way towards several libraries across the Flying Sword Sect before finding over a dozen different books suitable for him to learn for his quest during his short travel outside to watch the fall of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Finished packing away the dozens of books in his interspatial ring, Xuan Hao did not forget to help out his newest disciple Bai Ning with his cultivation.


    Guiding him on how to improve his cultivation in the Qi Condensation for half an hour before finally leaving the Flying Sword Sect after informing Elder Song about his outing.


    ¡­


    Flying through the air, Xuan Hao soon passed by the territory of the River Sect where his two disciples were adventuring about and with a quick sweep of his divine sense, Xuan Hao soon found their location.


    Currently, both of them were heading over towards arge mountain ridge in the distance together with someone from the River Sect guiding them along the way.


    "Hm¡­ That should be the Red Flower Ridge, if I''m not wrong, they were going to deal with some bandits there?"


    Muttering this to himself as he floated in the air above his two disciples, Xuan Hao smiled a bit to himself when he thought about something.


    The quest only mentioned that the time limit was until my two disciples returned from their sect mission¡­ So, why don''t it a little more difficult to find those bandits¡­?


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help but smile cheekily as he disappeared from the location above his two disciples and reappeared directly above the cave leading towards the bandit base.


    Fwoosh!


    Covering the entire bandit base along with all the bandits in his domain, Xuan Hao directly knocked out all of them before changing the surrounding environment of the base to be more hidden before they woke up again.


    "This should do!" Looking at the entrance to the bandit base nowpletely hidden from view, Xuan Hao nodded to himself before disappearing from the Red Flower Ridge.


    He hoped that hiding the bandit base would at least buy him another few hours of time. Maybe even a day if he was lucky!

 Chapter 300: Reappearance of the Flower Breaking Mantra!

    <h4>Chapter 300: Reappearance of the Flower Breaking Mantra!</h4>


    Having finished up making sure that he would have some more time toplete his quest, Xuan Hao soon left the northern region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and directly entered the central region where the main Heavenly Sky Kingdom hadplete control, though from the few towns and cities he passed over, things seemed to already be on the brink of copse.


    Most of the people were either trying to sell off what property they had, while others formedrge groups before making their way towards the Northern, Western or Eastern region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    To be honest, Xuan Hao wondered whether or not he had arrived toote and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had already lost, but after a quick conversation with Shu Yao, Xuan Hao learned that the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom had yet to make his move yet.


    "Perhaps the situation of the central region was way worse than I expected¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he observed therge amount of people trying to leave the central region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao just sighed at the sight before continuing over in the direction Shu Yao had given him.


    ¡­


    "So that is the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom?"


    Arriving just in time to watch the fight between the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao could not help but ask Shu Yao standing beside him with a curious expression on his face, as he watched the person in question standing arrogantly in front of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s barrier.


    "Yes, though he is indeed quite good looking¡­"


    A wry smile appearing on her face when saying that, Shu Yao had remained focused on the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Xuan Hao could not help but agree with Shu Yao, as he observed the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom. A middle-aged man with a bearing belonging to a king and a handsome face to go along with it.


    FWOOSH!


    Just as Xuan Hao and Shu Yao were talking about the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom, the person in question finally moved when he was only a few meters away from the barrier of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Arge amount of baleful qi flooded the surroundings, as the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s surprised voice could be heard from beyond the barrier.


    "This is?!"


    Shu Yao let out an exmation of surprise after seeing the baleful energy, as a trace of fear appeared on her beautiful face.


    "What is it? Do you perhaps know what kind of mantra that the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom is cultivating?"


    Seeing the fear appearing on Shu Yao''s face, Xuan Hao asked in a curious voice. Maybe the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom was cultivating some sort of demonic cultivation mantra? Given therge amount of baleful qi, Xuan Hao thought that it should be a demonic cultivation mantra of some sort.


    The only problem was the fact that the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom was still very much human. Not like the demonic cultivators he had encountered from the ck Rose Sect in the past¡­


    "Indeed, I know this cultivation mantra and it''s not a demonic one¡­ The results of cultivating it is truly terrifying, I don''t think I would be his match if we ended up fighting each other¡­"


    "Not a demonic cultivation mantra? Then do you perhaps know what this cultivation mantra is called, I have never seen a cultivation mantra involving baleful qi that is not demonic¡­"


    Listening to what Shu Yao said, Xuan Hao not only did not feel the slightest fear and only grew more curious after hearing Shu Yao openly admit that she was not the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s match in a fight.


    After all, no matter how strong the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom was, he was still only at the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Xuan Hao was only surprised over the fact that he had cultivated baleful qi, when it came to a fight, Xuan Hao would easily be able to deal with him.


    His domain alone would be more than enough to instantly deal with him.


    "Hah¡­ Sorry for losing myposure earlier, the cultivation mantra is called the Flower Breaking Mantra and it''s a Peak Earth Rank Mantra. Apparently, its only part of an even stronger Peak Heaven Rank Mantra called the Supreme Flower Breaking Mantra¡­"


    Remembering the fact that she had someone at the Domain Lord Realm standing just next to her, Shu Yao quickly calmed herself down before answering.


    "The¡­ Flower Breaking Mantra¡­?"


    "Yes, it belonged to an ancient sect in the past called Devil Flower Sect, their sect master was an expert at the Soul Ascension Realm and was given the name of Flower Breaking Emperor¡­ The sect itself has long since ceased to exist even before the Sky Empire came to be, but their legacy still exists to this day.


    The main reason for this, is due to the fact that they were freely distributing the Peak Earth Rank version of the Flower Breaking Mantra to everyone¡­ Perhaps you''ve heard about it before?"


    "No¡­ I never heard about it before¡­"


    Listening to Shu Yao''s exnation, Xuan Hao remembered his time back in the secret realm together with Chi Hu.


    Back then, Chi Hu had found the Supreme Flower Breaking Mantra, but the cultivation method for the mantra was simply too much and Xuan Hao had tried to erase the memory of what he had read back then¡­


    "I see, you can be considered lucky! The Flower Breaking Mantra is indeed powerful, but it has several drawbacks and the method cultivating it¡­ is rather ''unique''¡­ In the past, I happened to pass by a group of people cultivating this mantra together¡­"


    Shaking her head as she thought about something with a both fearful and disgusted look appearing on her face for a short moment, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a sense of sympathy for her¡­


    For her to encounter a group of cultivators practicing the Flower Breaking Mantra¡­ Xuan Hao could barely begin to imagine the horror a woman like Shu Yao must have experienced upon witnessing such a scene¡­

 Chapter 301: Su Wuhan, King of the Azure Sky Kingdom!

    <h4>Chapter 301: Su Wuhan, King of the Azure Sky Kingdom!</h4>


    Just as Shu Yao and Xuan Hao were talking with each other about the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s cultivation mantra, the person in question had finished flooding the surroundings with his baleful qi, as it soon gathered together again before covering up the entire barrier that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had set up.


    Crack~


    Several cracks suddenly formed all over the barrier under the pressure of the baleful qi and after a few more seconds under the terrifying pressure, the barrier of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom broke apart. Revealing the fearful faces of both the soldiers and Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom hiding on the other side of the barrier.


    Not understanding how the barrier had been destroyed so easily in the first ce.


    "Attack!"


    The shout from one of the generals on the side of the Azure Sky Kingdom quickly woke them up, as the soldiers and Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Azure Sky Kingdom''s side began charging over towards them.


    "Prepare to hold-"


    Ptsh!


    A small team captain for in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s army called out in an attempt to get his men ready to face the Azure Sky Kingdoms soldiers, but this was short lived, as an arrow imbued with qi flew over and pierced through his head. Killing the small team captain of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in one hit.


    "C-captain!"


    "No!"


    "H-how is this happening!?"


    The group of soldiers under the now dead captain began panicking after seeing their leader suddenly dying, as many of them broke ranks in an attempt to get away from the soldiers of the Azure Sky Kingdom charging over towards them full of killing intent.


    "Argh!"


    "Nooo!"


    "I-I can''t die like this-"


    The same thing was happening across the entire army of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, as several key members in charge of the army died off one by one.


    Soon, the entire army of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was in a state ofplete chaos, as most were just trying to get away from the battlefield instead of fighting back against the soldiers of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    ¡­


    "Damn you!"


    Watching the chaos unfolding below, the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom stared hatefully of in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s king. Not forgetting to curse him after seeing the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms Nascent Soul Realm Experts being blocked by the Azure Sky Kingdom''s own experts.


    Stopping them from calming down the current chaos spreading through the army at an rming rate.


    The ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom felt even more angry that he could not move out personally to kill the deserters running away fearfully.


    The king of the Azure Sky Kingdom had not once looked away from him and what was even worse, was the fact that the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had no idea what level his strength had reached. Only certain that he had not reached the Domain Lord Realm yet. After all, if he was at the Domain Lord Realm, destroying the entire Heavenly Sky Kingdom would be a walk in the park.


    No need to bring his army and Nascent Soul Realm Experts along¡­


    "Su Wuhan! What is the meaning of this? Why are you continuing this meaningless attack on my Heavenly Sky Kingdom!? You should at least know that the other kingdoms won''t sit still with your entire army here!"


    Calling out the name of the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom, the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom asked in a both angry and confused voice loud enough for even Xuan Hao and Shu Yao to hear him clearly.


    "Hmph! Don''t y so ignorant! You should know the reason why I''m here¡­ So, I have a suggestion for you. Hand what I want over peacefully, and I won''t kill you¡­ How about it? This way your Heavenly Sky Kingdom will be able to survive as well!"


    Snickering disdainfully after hearing what the ancestor said, Su Wuhan suggested this, even though he very well knew that there was no way the ancestor from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom would give away the thing he wanted.


    After all, it represented a chance to breakthrough and reach the Domain Lord Realm!


    There was no way the old ancestor from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, who was already of old age, would hand over what could be hisst chance to breakthrough and increase his lifespan!


    Both of them knew this very well¡­


    Whoosh!


    Without even answering Su Wuhan, the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom took the opportunity tounch the first attack, as he charged over towards Su Wuhan full of killing intent.


    A spikey maze giving of a terrifying aura appearing in his right hand along the way, showing off the fact that the ancestor was in possession of an interspatial ring.


    Whoosh~


    Using his full strength to swing down his maze towards Su Wuhan, the ancestor was only met with a look of contempt from Su Wuhan, as he slowly lifted his right hand to block the iing maze.


    Tch! How foolish, does he think he can easily block my maze?


    Seeing this, the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom did not hesitate as he used his qi to strengthen the maze even further.


    Hoping to kill the arrogant Su Wuhan in one fell swoop.


    BOOM!


    Only an instant had passed from the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom charging over, to his maze bearing down on the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom with a dreadful power hiding inside of it before arge explosion urred, causing a shockwave that swept through the entire battlefield.


    This in turn, caused both the fleeing soldiers of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the charging soldiers of the Azure Sky Kingdom toe to aplete stop as they all looked over towards the centre of the explosion where their respective leaders were currently located.


    A few soldiers from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s side even managed to take advantage of this, to quietly sneak away from the battlefield.

 Chapter 302: End of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!

    <h4>Chapter 302: End of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!</h4>


    "The ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom is indeed at the Peak of the Ninth Stage. Probably with just a bit mor time, he would break through to the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm¡­ What a pity¡­" Shaking her head as she looked over at the centre of the explosion, Shu Yao already knew the oue of the battle before she could see the two figures beneath theyer of dust that surrounded them at the moment.


    Even she would not be able to win against Su Wuhan inbat! Let alone the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, who hadn''t even reached the true peak of the Nascent Soul Realm yet¡­


    "H-how!?"


    As if to answer her prediction, the fearful voice of the ancestor could be heard as the dust slowly began to settle. Revealing the current state of the two respective rulers.


    One standing without a single injury, while the other was covered in blood with a broken mazeying next to him on the ground.


    Disbelief written on his old face, as he could still not understand how he had been defeated so easily by Su Wuhan.


    "You are simply weaker than me, that simple¡­ Now, want to tell me where you hid that thing? I''m certain that you wouldn''t bring it with you in your interspatial, it should be way too big for that!"


    Walking over to the half kneeling ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, Su Wuhan asked in a demanding tone. Not leaving any way out for the old man.


    "Hmph, think I will tell you? Over my dead body!"


    Regaining some of his former arrogance for a short moment, the old man decisively abandoned his physical body, as his Nascent Soul flew into the sky and began escaping at the fastest speed possible.


    "You!"


    Even if Su Wuhan had predicted that the old ancestor would do something like that when driven close to death, he could still not catch up with the old man''s Nascent Soul as it flew into the distance. Far exceeding the speed, he or his attacks would be able to catch up with.


    "Haha, I guess you didn''t expect for me to have a secret technique allowing me to increase the flying speed of my Nascent Soul! Hehe, in the future, I will be sure to return and pay you back for this humiliation today!"


    A happyughter echoed out from the Nascent Soul of the old ancestor as it flew away into the distance. Leaving Su Wuhan in the dust.


    Whoosh!


    Bang!


    Boom!


    Su Wuhan tried his best to prevent the escape of the Nascent Soul, but all his attempts were futile. Only resulting in him idently hitting some of his own soldiers along with some of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Killing them the moment the attack hit, as there was no way for them to resist the attacks of someone in the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm.


    "DAMN YOU!"


    "HAHA, I will see you soon! HAHAHA!"


    Screaming out angrily as the Nascent Soul slowly began disappearing into the distance, Su Wuhan could not help but lose control of his emotions for a split second.


    He knew very well how much trouble the Nascent Soul of the old ancestor escaping would mean for his Azure Sky Kingdom in the future. Not to say that he might have wasted his time attacking the Heavenly Sky Kingdom if he could not find the thing that the old ancestor had hidden away¡­!


    ¡­


    "Should we interfere and kill the ancestor? He will most likelye looking for revenge in the future, we did after all split off from his kingdom and take arge part of his territory along with it¡­"


    Standing on top of the small hilltop only a few hundred meters away from the edge of the battlefield, Shu Yao turned around and asked Xuan Hao.


    The scene of the Su Wuhan chasing the Nascent Soul was still ying out, as Shu Yao wanted to move out and deal with the ancestor before he managed to escape.


    This way, they would be able to deal with a potential future threat and might even get some clue as to what the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom wanted so badly that he set out to destroy the Heavenly Sky Kingdom for it¡­


    "No¡­ Let him get away!"


    Smiling to himself, Xuan Hao shook his head and stopped the eager Shu Yao from going over to help kill the Nascent Soul of the old ancestor.


    "Why?"


    Shu Yao could not understand why Xuan Hao did not want to deal with a potential future threat now that the chance presented itself.


    "Because him staying alive is of great use to us! With him around, there is no way the Azure Sky Kingdom can rest easy, and they won''t be able to pay much attention to us when we decide to expand our influence and territory in the future.


    Other than that, I highly doubt that we are first on the list of revenge targets for the old ancestor¡­ The first on his list in the future will definitely be the Azure Sky Kingdom!"


    Saying this, Xuan Hao watched the Nascent Soul of the old ancestor disappear in the distance as the angry Su Wuhan soon returned to the battlefield before letting out his anger on the remaining soldiers of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Boom!


    The poor soldiers only around the Qi Condensation Realm and Foundation Establishment Realm had no way to resist as they were quickly reduced to dust under the attacks of the angry Su Wuhan.


    The remaining Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom on the other hand, knew that there was no hope left for the kingdom after seeing the fall of their ancestor and had long since decided to run away. Taking with them a few of their trusted friends or family among the remaining soldiers before Su Wuhan returned to the battlefield.


    "I think we should leave as well¡­ Looks like Su Wuhan didn''t even know the location of the thing that the ancestor was hiding¡­ How disappointing¡­"


    Shaking her head as she remembered the conversation between the two rulers she had overheard earlier, Shu Yao felt like she had wasted her timeing to watch the final battle of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "I guess¡­ At least we were able to witness how strong the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom was!"


    Noting the small positive information, they had gained from showing up, Xuan Hao and Shu Yao soon left the small hilltop and made their way back towards the Flying Sword Sect together. Flying there with the help of Xuan Hao''s domain.

 Chapter 303: Spending the rest of the Day Reading Peacefully~

    <h4>Chapter 303: Spending the rest of the Day Reading Peacefully~</h4>


    After returning to the Flying Sword Sect together with Shu Yao, Xuan Hao quickly sat her down on the ground before she took off and disappeared in the direction of Feng Chen''s pavilion.


    The reason for this, was that Feng Chen would be returning to the Flying Sword Sect soon and she would like to finish thest few details of the merger with him before officially beginning the process of merging the two sects together, it looked like the Spring Flower Sect would soon be a part of the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help but worry about where they would have their main sect in the future¡­ After all, both the current Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect, were way too small to amodate everyone in one ce¡­


    It almost seemed inevitable that they would have to either expand one of the two main sects or find a new location to build an evenrger main sect at.


    "Well¡­ That is not for me to worry about¡­"


    Shaking his head when he thought about how they would fit everyone into one location, Xuan Hao felt a little pity for Elder Song, as he would most likely be worked to dead in theing months.


    At least he hoped Feng Chen and Shu Yao woulde to some idea on what direction they would be going. Expanding one of the two main sects or finding a new location to build an evenrger main sect on.


    No matter what, Elder Song was going to have a hard time allocating the sect''s resources and manpower towards the chosen n¡­ Maybe the Spring Flower Sect had their own Elder Song to help out as well¡­?


    "Hehe¡­"


    Chuckling a bit to himself upon imagining a female version of Elder Song, Xuan Hao soon decided to make his way back to his own pavilion.


    The fight between the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and Su Wuhan, king of the Azure Sky Kingdom, had taken a way shorter time than expected and Xuan Hao still had the books he had gathered earlier on him.


    So, in the end, there was no need for him to go and visit the sect''s libraries. Instead, he could just read through the books he had gathered back in his own pavilion first.


    Hopefully, the books he had gathered, would be enough for him toplete the world history part of the quest along with thebat and movement technique part.


    After that, he could go around and visit the different profession halls of the Flying Sword Sect andplete thest part of his quest.


    "Bai Ning also seems to be out at the moment¡­ Is he perhaps visiting the cksmithing Hall¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he arrived back at his pavilion after only a few hours outside, Xuan Hao could not help but smile to himself when he thought about Bai Ning.


    Even from the first day that he had taken him as a disciple, Bai Ning was already set on the path of bing a cksmith. Even if he focused on cksmithing way more than cultivation, Xuan Hao did not mind it. The reason why had chosen the Unformed Mantra for him in the first ce, was due to the fact that he knew this would happen!


    Whoosh~


    Making his way around his pavilion, Xuan Hao soon came to a stop in front of a small gazebo with a few chairs and a table located at the edge of the mountain peak overlooking the entire Flying Sword Sect from above.


    "This looks like a great spot¡­"


    Sitting down on one of the chairs, Xuan Hao looked down at the Flying Sword Sect below.


    The smokeing from the furnaces of the cksmithing Hall, the swarm of disciples constantly moving in and out of the Mission Hall, disciples selling and buying different pills or artifacts at the small market they created in front of the Artifact Hall¡­


    There were even a few elders sneakily moving away from one of the storage buildings with a barrel of what looked like wine¡­


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao smiled a bit to himself.


    The Flying Sword Sect is indeed quite lively¡­


    Thinking this before taking out one of the books he had brought with him, Xuan Hao began to read it as he slowly became immersed in the book. Trying his best to learn and remember every single thing written in it by heart.


    Rustle~


    "Thank you!"


    At some point, Zhi Ruo had shown up with a cup of tea that she gently ced in front of him along with a few snacks.


    "¡­"


    Not saying anything, Zhi Ruo just bowed her head respectful before turning to leave just as quietly as she had appeared.


    Like this, Xuan Hao spent the rest of the day peacefully reading through different books filled with all sorts of differentbat and movement techniques. Expanding his overall knowledge when it came to bothbat techniques and movement techniques!


    In the future when his two oldest disciples returned, Xuan Hao would have a plethora of new techniques to teach them!


    [Side Quest: Learn about new subjects to better teach your disciples.]


    [New Knowledge about Professions: 0/100]


    [New Knowledge about Movement and Combat Techniques: 100/100plete)]


    [New Knowledge about World History: 100/100 plete)]


    "Looks like the technique and history part is already done. Maybe I should teach Bai Ning one of the techniques I learned about today after finishing the rest of the quest? After all, he should at least know some way of defending himself in the future!"


    Saying this to himself, Xuan Hao looked up at the sun about to disappear behind the mountains surrounding the Flying Sword Sect.


    After spending the rest of the day reading, it looked like he would have to wait until the next day before visiting any of the profession halls¡­


    Bai Ning had also returned back to the pavilion at some point and was already asleep in his room, Zhi Ruo was the same. Leaving only Xuan Hao awake on the mountain peak.


    "Guess I will just cultivate here until morning arrives¡­"


    Putting his books away, Xuan Hao closed his eyes and sat down on a pillow he had taken off one of the chairs before beginning to cultivate.


    Like this, the stars soon appeared above as the night slowly passed.

 Chapter 304: Xuan Haos First Visit to the Alchemy Hall

    <h4>Chapter 304: Xuan Hao''s First Visit to the Alchemy Hall</h4>


    "Huh? I improved by so much all of a sudden!?" Looking up at the sun slowly rising up from behind the mountains, Xuan Hao could not help but mutter to himself in surprise as he felt how much his cultivation base had improved from just one night.


    If he was at the earlier stages of the second stage of the Domain Lord Realm before. By now he had already be a Peak Second Stage Domain Lord. Only a short distance away from reaching the Third Stage!


    Standing up from his mediative position, Xuan Hao scanned his body and found out that he was indeed only a single step away from reaching the third stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    "Maybe it was because I cultivated outside for once?"


    Xuan Hao truly had no idea why he had advanced so quickly and decided to check his status with the help of the system to see if anything had changed throughout the night.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Domain: Sword Intent Domain


    Talent: ???


    Realm: Peak Second Stage Domain Lord


    Professions: Alchemist (Artisan level)


    Sect: Flying Sword Sect


    Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning


    Looking over his status, Xuan Hao could not really see any changes. The only thing that caught him slightly off guard, was the fact that his domain was called a Sword Intent Domain instead of just a Sword Domain by the system.


    Still, this did not give him any clues as to what may have caused his sudden increase in cultivation speed duringst night. Maybe his hidden talent of some sort had awakened¡­?


    "Hah¡­ No way¡­" Shaking his head at the thought of this, Xuan Hao decided that he would just try and cultivate outside again tonight and see if the same thing would happen again.


    "I should not dy for too long; I still have toplete the mission before my two disciples return and I have a feeling that thest part will be the hardest¡­"


    Already having a n of action for what he would be doing for the rest of the day, Xuan Hao floated up into the air before heading over towards the Alchemy Hall.


    Learning somemon potions or pills from the profession that he was already at the Artisan Level in, seemed to be the easiest way for him toplete his quest¡­


    At the very least, he would be able to easily learn given the knowledge he already had on alchemy.


    For the first time, Xuan Hao felt thankful that the system had not transferred any knowledge about ordinary alchemy recipes back then. At the very least, he would be able to easily find something new to learn at the Alchemy Hall!


    ¡­


    Arriving in the Alchemy Hall, Xuan Hao decided to check in on Peng Yun and see how he was doing at the moment.


    After all, he had his cultivation sealed by Shu Yao and was forced to give away the alchemy knowledge he had umted throughout his life for a chance to live¡­ Not really something that would be easy by any means, but Xuan Hao had no idea what to say when he really saw him.


    "Senior Peng Yun! Can you help me out with this potion recipe? I messed up a bit yesterday and¡­"


    "Peng Yun! Can youe and help me outte today?"


    "Elder Peng Yun, thank you for you great lecture today! I Learned a lot from you!"


    What was this? Howe both elders and disciples of the Alchemy Hall were so happy around him asking for help? Even Wan Qiu, who locked herself up for practicing some new alchemy recipe most of the time, was asking Peng Yun toe and help her out!?


    "Looks like he is doing well¡­ Maybe we might even be able to add another Nascent Soul Realm Expert to our sect after he finishes teaching in the Alchemy Hall¡­"


    Narrowing his eyes as he quickly sent a message to Elder Song through hismunication talisman, Xuan Hao soon left the entrance of the Alchemy Hall before moving towards the library where the different potion and pill recipes were located.


    The library was mostly empty when Xuan Hao entered it, likely because of the Alchemy Hall''s low number of disciples.


    Even to this point in time, Qing Yi was still their most recent member¡­


    Hopefully the alchemypetition in another 3 or so months would be able to inspire a few more disciples to join the Alchemy Hall¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao walked over to a nearby bookshelf with arge sign hanging above it with [Apprentice Potion Recipes] written on it.


    The bookshelf waspletely filled to the brim with all sorts of recipes and books withrge collections of recipes in them.


    The bookshelf was also not the only one with apprentice potion recipes, as Xuan Hao could easily see another dozen or so with the same sign above them a little further inside the library.


    From this alone, Xuan Hao could easily see how many different recipes that the Alchemy Hall was in possession of! And this was only the Apprentice Potion Recipes! There were still pill recipes and the recipes for the higher-level pill and potions!


    "Hm¡­ Qi Absorption Potion, Minor Strength Potion, Healing Salve¡­"


    Going over the different apprentice level potion recipes, Xuan Hao quickly picked a few before leaving the library.


    To truly learn alchemy, reading would not be enough, he would have to brew the potion in question before he could say that he had truly learned it!


    For that, he would need to borrow one of the Alchemy Hall''s alchemy rooms or return back to his pavilion and use one the build in alchemy rooms! Andst but not least, some of their spiritual herbs¡­


    Using his identity as a Core Elder was truly a good feeling, as the elder in charge of the spiritual herbs happily gave away any spiritual herbs, he asked for and pointed him towards one of their empty alchemy rooms¡­


    But for some reason he had a feeling that he was being observed by someone during the entire process¡­?


    Shaking his suspicious feeling aside as he only saw a few elders from the Alchemy Hall nearby, Xuan Hao entered the brewing room that he had been pointed towards by the elder in charge of the spiritual herbs before quickly closing the door behind him.

 Chapter 305: First Potion and Alchemy Elders Outside

    <h4>Chapter 305: First Potion and Alchemy Elders Outside</h4>


    Entering the alchemy room, Xuan Hao did not think too much about what he had felt earlier and instead just ced the spiritual herbs that he had gotten on the side before taking out the first potion recipe that he had decided to try out.


    [Strength Potion]


    The potion in question, was one that would boost one''s physical strength for a set amount of time.


    The reason why he had chosen it as the first potion, was the fact that it was among one of the easiest apprentice potions to make. From what he knew, the potion itself would also be useful when it came to making other potions in the future, as it incorporated many elements that was used as a basis for brewing other apprentice level potions.


    Fwoosh!


    Starting the fire, Xuan Hao began to grind the different spiritual herbs used for the potion ording to the recipe before cing some water over to boil over the fire.


    Compared to some higher-level potion recipes that would use all sorts of different rare spiritual liquids or waters. Apprentice level potions would only use normal water for the potion.


    Bubble~


    "Hm¡­ Looks like I should add the different herbs in now¡­" Muttering this to himself as he watched the boiling water, Xuan Hao slowly began to add in the newly grinded up spiritual herbs in the order that the recipe had dictated. Making sure he added just the right amount. Not forgetting to stir to boiling mixture when needed.


    Fwoosh!


    With time slowly passing by, Xuan Hao did his best to keep an eye on the potion mixture as it slowly began changing colours.


    Going from a light purple at the start, to a bright red towards the end as he carefully put the mixture aside and let it cool down before cing it into three separate bottles for storage.


    "Looks like I seed in the first try! The knowledge of alchemy given to me by the system was really useful¡­"


    Smiling to himself as he looked at the finished product, Xuan Hao could not help but feel happy when he thought about how easy it had been for him to make the strength potion.


    Even if he had never tried making the apprentice level strength potion before today, his knowledge about all sorts of alchemy recipes and how to make them that he had learned from the system. Ended up helping him make it without any problems.


    On the other hand, it would be quite embarrassing if he could not even make an apprentice level potion as someone who was an Artisan level alchemist¡­


    "Next is the Qi Absorption potion!"


    Not waiting for even a moment after seeing that his strength potion was a sess, Xuan Hao began preparing the next batch of spiritual herbs before starting the process of brewing the next potion.


    ¡­


    At the same time, just outside the alchemy room that Xuan Hao had entered, the different elders from the Alchemy Hall had gathered together as they barely managed to supress their curiosity to open the door and enter.


    "Wan Qiu¡­ Are you sure we can''t just enter and greet Elder Xuan? I''m sure he won''t mind and if he is offended by it, we can always give him a few spiritual herbs as an apology¡­" One of the elders who could almost not hold himself back turned towards Wan Qiu and asked.


    "No! You should at least know how bad it is for someone toe and interrupt you in the process of making a potion or pill!"


    Understanding the reason for the elder''s curiosity, Wan Qiu had to spot him in case he ended up offending Elder Xuan.


    She herself, had also been curious about the true level that Elder Xuan had reached when it came to alchemy and wanted to break down the door and see for herself, but her reasoning managed to hold her back from doing something so dumb.


    No matter what, Xuan Hao was a Core Elder and they could not afford to offend someone like that¡­ And much less so just to satiate their curiosity for his current alchemy realm¡­


    "Hm¡­? What are all of you doing around here?"


    Having just left a moment earlier after talking with the group of elders to sort out a few things in his own alchemy room, Peng Yun could not help but ask in a confused tone as he saw almost all five of the Alchemy Hall''s elders gathered together in the hallway with alchemy rooms for disciples or elders not part of the Alchemy Hall to use.


    "Ah¡­ Nothing¡­ We¡­ We just finished checking the quality of these rooms and were discussing how to go about a few much-needed repairs in a few of them!"


    Reacting much faster than Wan Qiu and the rest of the elders, Elder Gong Bo stroked hisrge white beard with a wise look on his face as he exined to the confused Peng Yun, causing the rest of the elders to breath out a sigh of relief.


    Luckily Elder Gong Bo was fast thinking and came up with an excuse! There was no way they wanted to admit to the fact that they almost broke into the alchemy room of someone in the midst practicing alchemy!


    Something like disturbing someone in the process of brewing or making pills, was highly frowned upon and disgraceful for alchemist, as it might result in them making a mistake and ruining all the precious spirit herbs that they were using. Let alone, the person they were about to disturb was also a Core Elder!


    "Ah, I see, I won''t disturb you anymore then! I just came to inform Wan Qiu that she is more than wee toetter today after I finish up a lecture for some of the younger alchemists."


    Nodding his head in approval upon hearing what Elder Gong Bo said, Peng Yun soon turned around and left the group of elders.


    "W-we should just leave Elder Xuan alone for now¡­ We can always find out about his alchemy realm in the future¡­"


    The short elder Xia Wu felt a bit nervous all of a sudden as he said this, causing the surrounding elders to nod in agreement before turning to leave the doorway leading into the alchemy room Xuan Hao was currently staying in.


    Soon, only Wan Qiu was left behind in front of the alchemy room, as she felt reluctant to leave and give up the opportunity to learn about Elder Xuan''s alchemy realm.


    What should I do?!


    Hesitating for a moment, as she looked around herself to see no one else around her, Wan Qiu built up a bit courage for herself before finally stepping forward.


    Knock Knock~


    And lightly knocking at the door to the alchemy room.

 Chapter 306: Chaos Breaks Out

    <h4>Chapter 306: Chaos Breaks Out</h4>


    Knock Knock~


    "Hm?"


    About to start brewing the second potion, Xuan Hao turned and looked over towards the door with a confused look on his face before quickly scanning over the person outside with his divine sense.


    What does one of the Alchemy Hall''s elders want with me? Is it perhaps rted to Qing Yi?


    Thinking about what the Alchemy Hall''s elders might want with him, Xuan Hao could only think that it might be something rted to Qing Yi, she was after all the only real connection he had with the Alchemy Hall¡­ Other than being a part of the same sect.


    Creak~


    "Is there anything I can help with? Are you perhaps here regarding something about Qing Yi?"


    Opening the door without waiting around, Xuan Hao smiled kindly at the middle-aged elder outside the alchemy room.


    "I¡­ Y-yeah, that''s it!"


    Thinking about something for a short moment before she answered him, Wan Qiu suddenly remembered that Elder Xuan''s disciple was also a member of their Alchemy Hall!


    How stupid! Why could I not just ask Qing Yi about her master''s realm in alchemy! He would surely have taught her about alchemy at some point!


    "I see¡­ Is it perhaps about the alchemypetition that ising up in another three months?"


    Nodding his head as he confirmed his suspicions, Xuan Hao asked Elder Wan Qiu yet again, seemingly already having an idea as to why Elder Wan Qiu hade.


    "Indeed! I just heard from another elder that you were here and decided toe over and ask you about the uing alchemypetition! I was mainly curious about whether you would be joining us as well when we leave for thepetition in three months."


    Deciding to just go with what Xuan Hao had said, Wan Qiu did not hold back in the slightest as she asked him.


    On one side, their safety while traveling to the site of thepetition would increase even further with someone like Xuan Hao around and on the other side, she would be able to learn more about him along with how far he had gone when it came to alchemy! A win-win situation!


    "Hm¡­ I should be joining you if nothing urgent pops up all of a sudden."


    Thinking about it for a short moment, Xuan Hao nodded his head in agreement to Wan Qiu''s question.


    This way, he would also be able to prevent his disciple from being snatched away by someone at the uing alchemypetition!


    Even if he knew it was unlikely, Xuan Hao still felt a bit cautious towards the organizer of the alchemypetition. The old artisan alchemist did after all set up thepetition to find a disciple!


    What if he ended up taking an interest in his disciple and tried snatching her away?


    "That''s great! I really wanted to ask you about this, but as you know, it''s been quite hard to contact youtely and seeing as time was running out, I decided toe over and disturb you for a short moment¡­ I hope I didn''t cause you any trouble¡­"


    "No worries, all is fine!"


    "Great! Then I will take my leave for now. Thanks for your time Elder Xuan!"


    Bowing her head as she said this, Wan Qiu soon turned around and disappeared after turning around the corner at the end of the hallway.


    "Looks like the Alchemy Hall have been trying to contact me during the past few months¡­ Maybe I didn''t get informed because I spent so much time outside the secttely¡­?" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao soon shook his head and turned around to enter the alchemy room again.


    At least he would now be able to join the Alchemy Hall when going to the Alchemy Competition in another three months!


    Feeling that he would no longer have to worry too much about Qing Yi being stolen away with him around in the future alchemypetition, Xuan Hao picked up the few spiritual herbs and began brewing the Qi Absorption potion with even more energy than before. Motivated by both the quest and a desire to increase his alchemy skill so his disciple would not end up running away to a more skilled teacher!


    ¡­


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was practicing different alchemy recipes back at the Flying Sword Sect, what remained of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom after the Azure Sky Kingdom destroyed their main force, began escaping in all directions. Most of them leaving what had been the territory of the Heavenly Sky Kingdompletely, while only a few decided to flee into the territory of the three remaining sects. The Seven Fates Sect, Spring Flower Sect and Flying Sword Sect.


    The escapees mostly consisted of people who had worked as administrators over the different towns, cities and different states existing inside the central region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    All of them running due to the fear that the Azure Sky Kingdom mighte and finish off what remained of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom soon.


    The normal citizen of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom did not react calmly upon seeing their different leaders running away all of a sudden and many had already begun fleeing even before the defeat of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s main force.


    In the end,plete chaos engulfed the central region as what remained of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom rapidly began copsing, with everyone taking whatever precious resources or materials they could with them before running away.


    Even the guards in charge of the treasury back at the Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s Royal Capital abandoned their post upon hearing the news of the main forces defeat. Instead bing one day robbers, as the treasury''s precious spirit stones and resources were soon emptied outpletely.


    Wandering cultivators and bandits alike had joined in on the action as well, quickly throwing the capital intoplete chaos as cultivators could be seen fighting at the streets over spirit stones and artifacts that had been stored in the treasury for the past hundreds of years.

 Chapter 307: Quest Progress Limit!

    <h4>Chapter 307: Quest Progress Limit!</h4>


    The chaos caused by the fall of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, was not only limited to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, as the surrounding kingdoms began to see arge influx of people suddenly entering their kingdoms.


    This sudden influx of people caused arge crisis at the borders, as some managed to enter the other kingdoms, while others were left with no way out from the rapidly copsing Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Even the Flying Sword Sect, who now existedpletely independently from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Felt the pressure of the sudden influx of people streaming into their territory, as Elder Song was forced to work overtime to sort out the issue of where the new people should be ced with the different sects and other forces inside the Flying Sword Sects territory.


    Making sure that a sect with only a few hundred disciples and a sect master at the early stages of the Core Formation Realm, would not end up having to deal with over ten thousand people suddenly showing up out of nowhere, when they were used to dealing with only a fraction of that beforehand.


    Prioritizing therger and more stable sects andrge cities run by different family ns to take in the former Heavenly Sky Kingdom citizen fleeing from the chaos erupting in the central region over what little spirit stones or other resources remain.


    At the same time, back in the Azure Sky Kingdom, the church of the gue god had already managed to establish a foundation and had begun spreading more rampantly with the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom gone.


    Su Wuhan had just barely made it back in time to supress the church of the gue god before they managed topletely take control of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    In the end, the whole ordealnded the Azure Sky Kingdom in an extremely dangerous situation, as they were etching closer and closer to copse with each passing day.


    The church of the gue god constantly furthering their influence and power as they tried to take control on the inside, while several neighbouring kingdoms had teamed up to invade and take over arge part of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    By this point in time, the only reason why the Azure Sky Kingdom did not copse, was due to the fact that Su Wuhan, the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom, was someone at the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm.


    When this became known, the invading kingdoms did not dare tounch a full-scale invasion on the Azure Sky Kingdom, while the church of the gue god began to take things more slowly.


    No matter what, the Azure Sky Kingdom barely managed to remain stable after the return of their king, Su Wuhan.


    ¡­


    [New Knowledge about Professions: 25/100]


    [Alchemy 25/25]


    "So, there''s a limit to how much I can gain from just alchemy¡­"


    Looking at the new addition to his quest, Xuan Hao could not help but let out a sigh of frustration. Putting the purple potion currently in his hand to the side.


    "Looks like I will also have to learn about other profession than just alchemy¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao looked over the remaining spiritual herbs inside the room before turning around to leave. Remembering to inform the elder from earlier in charge of the spiritual herbs that he was done with the room and some of the spiritual herbs were still left.


    Taking the strength potions with him was not really important, as it was pretty useless to him and he doubted his other disciple would find any use for it¡­


    The only potion that he brought with him out of the alchemy hall was the Qi Absorption Potion. Given that it might be helpful to his youngest disciple, Bai Ning, who was still at the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Whoosh~


    With this, Xuan Hao quietly left the Alchemy Hall. Thinking about which three professions he should try and learn about next. Given they had the same progress limit as alchemy.


    ¡­


    "Elder Wan Qiu! Elder Xuan just left¡­ If you want to enter the alchemy room he used, I think now is the time before someonees along to clean up the ce!"


    Inside arge alchemy room with all sorts of different spiritual herbs stored all around it in a messy manner.


    "Argh!"


    All kinds of papers wereying all over the floor of the messy alchemy room, with the person who called out earlier barely managing to stabilize himself from tripping over a small pile of papers together with a few unfortunate spiritual herbs on the floor.


    "Hm?! Ah! The elder in charge of the spiritual herbs! Are you sure Elder Xuan left and is not just out for a short break or something?"


    Noticing the elder that had entered her alchemy room, Wan Qiu quickly brightened up as she ignored the fact that he fell over some of the mess she had created in her personal alchemy room¡­


    She had already heard enough from the other elders constantlyining about her mess and wanting her to clean up¡­ There was no way she was going to bring it up herself! Even if another elder ended up falling headfirst onto the floor and getting a little intimate with it!


    "¡­ Yes, he just left, saying he left behind a few spiritual herbs and some other things he didn''t need! Also, you really need to clean-"


    Whoosh~


    Before the elder in question even managed to finish what, he was about to say, Wan Qiu had already run past him and disappeared out into the hallway just behind him as she rushed towards the room Xuan Hao had just been using moments ago.


    "¡­ Hah..."


    Leaving behind one shocked elder, who could not help sighing to himself as he inspected the messy alchemy room of Wan Qiu.


    Did she perhaps know what he was going to say? Is she really so much against just sorting out her mess¡­? Perhaps she was just curious about the things Elder Xuan had been working on?


    Not knowing the answer to the questions, the elder looked at the messy room onest time before leaving the messy alchemy room behind.


    Even if her methods and alchemy room were messy most of the time, Wan Qiu was still the best alchemist in the Alchemy Hall¡­

 Chapter 308: Formation Hall

    <h4>Chapter 308: Formation Hall</h4>


    Bang!


    Violently making her wa inside the alchemy room Xuan Hao had been in just moments ago, Wan Qiu did not waste any time before making her way over towards the table filled with the different spiritual herbs and three strength potions made earlier by Xuan Hao.


    "This is¡­?"


    Seeing the low rank spiritual herbs, Wan Qiu was slightly surprised for a short moment before focusing on the three strength potions still left alone on the table.


    Perhaps he just came to brew a few potions for his disciples to use¡­?


    Thinking this as she observed the three strength potions in front of her, Wan Qiu picked up one of the three bottles before inspecting the liquid inside curiously.


    "T-this!?"


    At first just ncing over the liquid inside the potion bottle, Wan Qiu could not help but let a small, surprised voice escape from her lips as she focused her full attention on the liquid inside the potion bottle. Growing more and more excited with each passing second.


    "This is a new recipe for the strength potion! Even if the herbs and order are the same, the refinement method towards the end ispletely different!"


    Smiling from ear to ear as she said this out loud to herself, Wan Qiu soon looked around the room supesciously before taking away the other two remaining potion bottles.


    Whoosh!


    Making a straight line through the Alchemy Hall, as she returned to her alchemy room.


    Surprising a certain alchemy elder that had just left her room and was on his way over towards the alchemy room Xuan Hao had stayed in to take care of the spiritual herbs or other things he had left behind before a few servants from the servant quarters woulde and clean up the ce.


    "She sure is excited about something¡­ I just hope it doesn''t result in any idental explosions again¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he thought about a few other times Wan Qiu had been so excited about something in the past, the alchemy elder unconsciously sped up as he moved away from the location of Wan Qiu''s alchemy room¡­


    ¡­


    After leaving behind the Alchemy Hall, Xuan Hao decided to first go and visit the Formation Hall of the Flying Sword Sect.


    The Formation Hall,pletely different from the Alchemy Hall that was mostly empty. At least had a moderate number of disciplesing and going¡­


    While not close to a ce like the cksmithing Hall or Beast Tamers Stable that most of the disciples ended up choosing as their second profession. The Formation Hall could still be considered sessful in gaining at least a dozen or so new members every year,pared to the Alchemy Hall that were happy when they got even a single disciple to join them¡­


    This in turn, had also resulted in the Formation Hall itself being muchrger than the Alchemy Hall, so as to amodate therger number of people who stayed there.


    Still, the number of disciples who have a profession of sorts is still smallpared to the disciples who chose to just focus solely on cultivation¡­


    The main reason for this being the current sect master, Feng Chen, who was famous for being solely dedicated to his cultivation. Not spending even, a single second learning about professions and just focusing on improving his cultivation base.


    The younger generation of the Flying Sword Sect highly admired their sect master for this and a lot of them were following in his footsteps, hoping to one day be a powerful Nascent Soul Realm Expert like him¡­


    "Hah¡­ Why could there not just be more disciples wanting to be like Elder Song among the younger generation? They already admire him anyway¡­"


    Sighing to himself upon thinking about this, Xuan Haonded a few dozen meters away from the Formation Hall. Not being discovered by the nearby disciples, due to a well-ced tree blocking his descent from view.


    "Hm?"


    The moment he began walking over in the direction of the Formation Hall, Xuan Hao clearly felt himself passing through some transparent barrier of sorts, as the temperature around him suddenly changed to be morefortable.


    "So, this is a formation¡­?"


    Xuan Hao could not help but mutter to himself as he felt the qi between heaven and earth flowing in all sorts of different patterns around him. Ending up regting the temperature inside the formation to room temperature.


    The use waspletely different from what he had experienced from formations elsewhere. One being the protective formation surrounding the Flying Sword Sect, while the other was the Realm Destruction Formation that he had experienced back in the secret realm.


    Not reallyparable to a formation that changed the temperature of the surrounding environment by a tiny bit¡­


    "Greetings Elder, are you perhaps here for something¡­?"


    Walking towards the entrance of the Formation Hall, Xuan Hao felt a bit surprised when he suddenly saw a rtively young disciples dressed in the robes belonging to an inner disciple appear in front of him.


    "Yeah, I''m here to visit the Formation Hall''s library to look up on a few formations¡­"


    "The library¡­ Want me to show you there elder?"


    "Sure¡­"


    Not knowing what the sudden pause after the library was about, Xuan Hao decided to just go along with it and epted the inner disciple''s kind intentions to show him the way. Even if he could just scan the area with his divine sense and instantly locate the library in question¡­


    At the very least, the inner disciple in question did not seem to realize who he was and just presumed he was a normal elder.


    "Hey, isn''t that-"


    "Yeah, is she here to try and enter the Formation Hall again¡­? How many times does this make, five? Seven?"


    "Looks like there is an elder besides her as well¡­ Maybe she managed to pass the test?"


    Listening to what the surrounding disciples were saying, Xuan Hao quickly managed to find out that the inner disciple showing him over to the Formation Hall''s library, was in fact someone who had tried to enter the Formation Hall for the past few years! Even dying her own cultivation in order to spend more time on her attempts to pass the test for entering the Formation Hall¡­


    The only thing that confused Xuan Hao, was the fact that the young disciple beside him had managed to fail the test to enter the Formation Hall¡­


    After all,pared to the Alchemy Hall that had no test whatsoever and happily epted anyone with open arms, the Formation Hall had at least some requirement for the disciples who wanted to enter.


    It was just¡­ The test was mostly just a formality and was not really supposed to bar any disciples from entering. Given that the disciple beside him even managed to fail such a test in the first ce could be counted as an achievement of sorts¡­


    No matter what, the Formation Hall would be more than happy to ept more disciple than just a dozen a year or so, as it would also mean that Elder Song would allocate more resources to them¡­


    Just how bad did she do to continuously fail to enter the Formation Hall¡­?


    Wondering this as he looked down on the young girl in question walking a bit in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help but grow curious.


    The girl was ignoring the people talking around them, as she had moved slightly in front of him so as to lead the way, but Xuan Hao could clearly feel how nervous she was the moment she stepped through the entrance of the Formation Hall.


    A few of the Formation Hall''s elders also seemed to recognize the young girl, as they were about to walk over. Only to stop the moment they saw the person that was walking behind her.


    Even if most of the disciples were not familiar with him and could not recognize him, there was no way that the elders did not know who he was!


    "¡­"


    About to walk over and greet him, Xuan Hao quickly signalled for the Formation Hall''s elders to back away as he followed the young disciples deeper into the Formation Hall.


    Slowly making their way through all sorts of different hallways before finally ending up at the entrance to the library.


    It was only after standing at the entrance to the library that Xuan Hao realized the fact that the different hallways were a part of some sort of formation.


    The realization both shocked and intrigued him at the same time. Given the fact that he had not noticed anything off before leaving the formation as someone in the Domain Lord Realm¡­ There was also the case of the young disciple, who was not even a member of the Formation Hall knowing her way through such a formation in the first ce-


    "W-we are here!"


    Coming to a stop in front of the entrance to the library of the Formation Hall, the young disciple nervously turned around as she informed him about their arrival.


    "Is there something else¡­?" Seeing the young disciple staying around and even beginning to fidget with her hands. Evidently wanting to say something, Xuan Hao asked with a curious look on his face.

 Chapter 309: Sect Mission

    <h4>Chapter 309: Sect Mission</h4>


    "W-would it be okay if I stayed during your time in the library?" nervously looking over at him while saying this, the young disciple began fidgeting even more with her hands before looking away from him.


    "Sure¡­ I don''t have any reason to refuse, but why are you asking me whether you can stay around or not?" Looking over at the nervous young girl, Xuan Hao could not stop himself from asking as he found the current situation quite weird.


    "N-normally I would not have a chance to enter the library¡­ After all, I''m not a member of the Formation Hall¡­"


    "I see¡­ You are wee to read as much as you can before I leave¡­"


    Feeling a bit sympathetic towards the young girl, who wanted to learn about formations, Xuan Hao moved over towards a nearby bookshelfbelled with Beginner Formations.


    Rustle~


    Taking out a bookbelled [Beginner Formations for Fledgling Formation Masters], Xuan Hao handed it over to the young girl before finding a few books to read himself. Not leaving the library, but instead deciding to stay around and allow the young girl some more time to read up on formations¡­


    "Thank You!"


    Seeing the book that Xuan Hao handed over to her, they young disciple quickly thanked him before eagerly sitting down and reading the book with her full attention. Not daring to even look away for even a second, in case the book in her hands disappeared.


    Xuan Hao did not mind this in the slightest and instead just focused on the book in his hand exining the foundations of how a formation was made and constructed.


    "Hm?"


    Just as Xuan Hao was getting absorbed into the book in front of him, the system decided to once again show up, showing off the fact that it had indeed be more active¡­


    [Sect Mission: Help the young disciple trying to enter the Formation Hall]


    [Description: They young inner disciple of your sect, Fang Yu, has been trying to enter the Formation Hall for the past two years without any sess even with the close to non-existent test difficulty. Find out the reason and help her enter the Formation Hall.


    [Reward: Qi Gathering Formation Blueprint, Strength of the Formation Hall will increase]


    Sect mission¡­? The system not only wanted to increase the strength of his disciples, but also wanted to increase the strength of his sect?


    Xuan Hao did not know how to react when he saw the new quest given out by the system. Even the rewards forpleting the quest were something unfamiliar to him.


    The Qi Gathering Formation was not something he really knew anything about, and he had no clue how useful it would be. The only thing he could do at the moment, was specte that it was a formation that would help increase his cultivation speed.


    The second part of the reward on the other hand, was way vaguer and harder to understand. Only saying that the strength of the Formation Hall would increase¡­


    How would it increase?


    The only reason Xuan Hao could think of, was that the increase in the Formation Hall''s strength would have something to do with Fang Yu¡­ Just that¡­ She was currently only an inner disciple and was far from reaching a level where she would be able to increase the strength of the Formation Hall¡­


    That is not to talk about the fact that she was someone who failed the entrance test of the Formation Hall two years straight, ording to the system.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao nced over at Fang Yu for a short moment before returning his focus back to his book again. No matter what, he would first have toplete the knowledge rted quest. Given that it had a time limit on it¡­


    Like this, Xuan Hao, and the young inner disciple Fang Yu both sat down reading inside the library peaceful as the time outside passed by. The sun slowly reaching its peak in the sky.


    ¡­


    "Hah!"


    It''s already been four hours! I wonder how close topleting the quest I am¡­


    Stretching his arms as he thought about this, Xuan Hao observed his quest progress before a surprised expression appeared on his face.


    [New Knowledge about Professions: 53/100]


    [Alchemy 25/25]


    [Formations: 28/??]


    From the looks of things, him learning about formations was not limited to only 25% on the knowledge quest!


    Smiling happily when he realized this, Xuan Hao could not help thinking about the reason why his progress with alchemy had been restricted and the only reason he could think of, was the fact that the system had already given him the knowledge and skill of an Artisan Alchemist.


    The system wanted him to expand his knowledge on other professions than just alchemy¡­ Maybe it even wanted him to learn every single profession out there at some point¡­


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a shiver run down his spine as he imagined just how much work it would take for him to learn so many different profession¡­ Let alone the fact that the system would most likely want him to master said professions¡­


    "No need to think about that now!" Shaking his head as he said this to himself, Xuan Hao stood up and was about to leave the library and find a ce to practice some of the formations that he had read about, when he suddenly remembered Fang Yu, who was stillpletely absorbed by the book he had handed over to her earlier.


    Even when he stood up and caused quite a bit of noise, Fang Yu did not seem to notice in the slightest. Remainingpletely focused on the thick book in her hands.


    "Hah¡­ Guess I will just stay here and practice a few small-scale formations¡­"


    Remembering the fact that Fang Yu would most likely have to leave the library if he left, Xuan Hao sat back down again and circted his qi into a small beginner formation that increased the temperature by a few degrees in the area it covered.


    The formation itself was not big at all. Only being around the size of his hand. Easily disying one of the biggest charms of formations, their ability to easily scale up and down. From covering a house to covering his hand. Formations were easily able to scale up and down, as long as they had an ample supply of qi or were constructed with a medium taking the ce of the formation master, like the pirs he had seen back in the secret realm.

 Chapter 310: Feng Chen and Zu Feis Return

    <h4>Chapter 310: Feng Chen and Zu Fei''s Return</h4>


    Whoosh~


    Moving the small formation around on the table easily, Xuan Hao began implementing different changes to it. Changing its purpose from just acting as a heat source to having a more interesting use.


    The first change that he made to the formation was increasing the temperature inside of it by several hundred degrees by channelling fire qi into it. Making sure to iste the area around the formation with his domain, just to make sure he did not end up burning down the library by mistake¡­


    He did not really feel like exining how he had ended up burning down the Formation Halls library on his first visit to Elder Songing to ask for an exnation after the deed¡­ From what he knew about Elder Song, Xuan Hao did not want to end up being the person who destroyed a part of the sect¡­


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao quickly changed the formation back before he began to slowly experiment with it. Trying to change and shape it into all sorts of different forms, just to try and see how freely the formation could be changed around.


    "There is no restriction whatsoever¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as the small temperature regting formation in his hand changed into the shape of a horse before turning into a flower and then a small pagoda, Xuan Hao could not help but feel amazed at the sheer ease one could change the shape of a formation.


    Maybe it''s just because the formation is small¡­?


    Whoosh!


    Expanding the formation and once again trying to change its shape, Xuan Hao instantly discovered the difference.


    The formation that was the size of his hand was easy to manipte and shape as he pleased, while the formation covering the table and chair, he was sitting on, was impossible for him to change without feeling an enormous exhaustion straining from his soul!


    "T-this!"


    Feeling the strain on his soul with even a small change to the shape of the formation, Xuan Hao quickly stopped what he was doing, as the formation surrounding him quickly copsed before there was no sign of it left.


    The experience was simply too terrifying for him. The soul was after all the most important part of a cultivator and a mortal for that matter. Even the slightest injury might result in permanent damage to the soul.


    Something that would lower the lifespan of normal mortals and prevent a cultivator from advancing onwards to the next realm. Forever stuck at whatever realm they got the injury at¡­


    Xuan Hao did not really feel like he wanted to try and experiment with anything that could potentially cause an injury to his soul! That would at least have to wait until he found a way to safely do so and ensure that he would be able to recover just in case the worst thing ended up happening!


    "Hm?"


    [Side Quest: Learn about new subjects to better teach your disciples. plete)]


    [New Knowledge about Professions: ??/100 plete]


    [Alchemy 25/25]


    [Formations: ??/??]


    [New Knowledge about Movement and Combat Techniques: 100/100 plete)]


    [New Knowledge about World History: 100/100 plete)]


    [Reward: Cultivation Increase of one Minor Realm]


    [Redeem reward: Y/N]


    Looking over at his quest, Xuan Hao felt a wave of surprise wash over him upon seeing the quest being showing aspleted.


    The Formation part of it had even more question marks and even the main part of the profession knowledge part also had question marks rece the former number 53 that had been there just a few moments ago¡­


    Did he perhaps just find out something incredibly important about formations¡­?


    Xuan Hao could not help but feel excited when he thought about it, but quickly calmed down again.


    After all, even if he knew that shaping a formation would put a strain on the soul, he had no way to test it out in practice at the moment. Unless he decided to risk injuring his soul¡­


    "Hah¡­" Sighing to himself upon realizing this, Xuan Hao put the information to the back of his mind before choosing not to redeem the reward for the quest at the moment.


    The library of the Formation Hall was not really a great location for that. At least he would wait until he had gotten back to his pavilion and found a quiet ce to breakthrough without anyone disturbing him.


    There was also the young inner disciple Fang Yu that he would have to help entering the Formation Hall ording to the sect mission that the system had given him¡­


    First and foremost, he would have to find out the reason why she had managed to fail the test to enter the Formation Hall for two years straight!


    Rustle~


    Standing up from his chair, Xuan Hao looked over in the direction of Fang Yu before making his way over towards the fully concentrated disciple, who didn''t even notice when Xuan Hao was experimenting with formations earlier just a few dozen meters away from her.


    ¡­


    "Hah! Finally, back again!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was about to attemptpleting his first ever sect mission, Feng Chen and Zu Fei slowly appeared a few hundred meters away from the Flying Sword City. Exhaustion visible on both their faces as they dragged theirpletely drained bodies towards the entrance of the Flying Sword City.


    "Who is that?"


    "Maybe refugeesing from the central region? The copse of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom really caused quite arge number of refugees to head towards the Flying Sword Sect and other nearby powers¡­"


    "But why are they here? The Flying Sword Sect already designated several ces for refugees to stay before stabilizing and finding out where they want to go after things calm down¡­"


    "No idea¡­ Maybe they got lost on the way and ended up here?"


    Listening to the surrounding people looking over towards them filled with pity, both Feng Chen and Zu Fei suddenly realized their current state.


    Exhausted,pletely tattered robes. Making it hard to see that they were actually from the Flying Sword Sect¡­ And finally, dirt and dried up blood making it hard for even the guards to recognize them¡­


    "Hah¡­ Why did we have to be so unlucky on our way back¡­"


    Sighing full of sadness as she remembered what had transpired just after they managed to leave the Burning Mountain Range, Zu Fei could not help but feel a profound anger towards the people who caused them to end up like this¡­

 Chapter 311: Bright Red and Unlucky Border Guards...

    <h4>Chapter 311: Bright Red and Unlucky Border Guards...</h4>


    A few days before Feng Chen and Zu Fei arrived back at the Flying Sword Sect, both of them had just managed to make it out of the Burning Mountain Range. The only problem being the fact that they were not inside of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, but instead another kingdom that was adjacent to the Burning Mountain Range like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    This would have been fine and all if it was just a normal kingdom simr to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ But they were not that lucky and had instead stumbled upon one of the stronger kingdoms under the Sky Empire with someone in the Domain Lord Realm in it!


    "The Crystal Sky Kingdom¡­ The only kingdom with a Domain Lord in it close to our Flying Sword Sect¡­" Showing a shocked expression on his face when he noticed the uniforms of the nearby border soldiers, Feng Chen could not help eximing in surprise.


    Feng Chen didn''t know about all the kingdoms with Domain Lords in the Sky Empire, but at the very least he knew about a few that were nearby. The Crystal Sky Kingdom being the closest, was therefore also the kingdom with a Domain Lord that he knew the most about!


    "Who are you guys!? What are you doing here?"


    Hearing the booming voice calling out from a small outpost located at the border between the Crystal Sky Kingdom and the Burning Mountain Range, Feng Chen could not help but feel a wave of fear roll over him.


    The main reason for this was because he knew how intolerant the Crystal Sky Kingdom was to anyone at the Nascent Soul Realm daring to enter their kingdom without permission. Even if it was by ident, they would in most cases kill them if they did not have a sufficient backing¡­


    The Crystal Sky Kingdom was strong and was a kingdom with someone in the Domain Lord Realm, but more importantly than that, it was a really small kingdom, and they had a lot of Nascent Soul Realm Experts¡­ Just by numbers alone, they easily had a few hundred Nascent Soul Realm Experts, with most of the stationed around the border to prevent any unwee guest from entering.


    Watching as the Nascent Soul Realm Expert that had called out to them made his way over, Feng Chen prepared to make a run for it as he secretly informed Zu Fei.


    Whoosh!


    In the distance, at least another five or so auras at the Nascent Soul Realm, ranging between the middle andter stages, could be felt making their way over towards them.


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out a depressed sigh as he realized just how dangerous their situation would be, Feng Chen and Zu Fei both prepared to run back into the Burning Mountain Range to escape the Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Crystal Sky Kingdom!


    BOOM!


    ROAR!


    "Wha-what is that!?"


    The guarding over to meet them, along with the group of Nascent Soul Realm Experts making their way over to make sure their friend would be safe. All looked on with a shocked and terrified expression, as a bright red light suddenly appeared deep in the Burning Mountain Range. Followed by a terrifying roar that instantly caused all of them to fall weakly onto the ground. Feng Chen and Zu Fei were no different. Only capable of looking over in the direction of the bright light erupting from the depths of the Burning Mountain Range.


    Time seemed toe to a halt as nobody, be it the guards at the Nascent Soul Realm, or Feng Chen and Zu Fei, were able to move for what felt like hours before they slowly began to regain movement again.


    Still staring in the direction of the bright red light in the depths of the Burning Mountain Range, that only seemed to increase more with each passing second.


    "Let''s get out of here before they notice!" Hearing someone whispering into his ear, Feng Chen forced his vision away from the bright red light and looked over at Zu Fei urging him to leave.


    "Indeed¡­ We should not stay around for any longer. The event has most likely already attracted the Domain Lord of the Crystal Sky Kingdom¡­"


    Nodding his head in agreement to what Zu Fei had said, Feng Chen and Zu Fei took advantage of the Nascent Soul Real border guard still having their full attention on the bright red light in the distance. Quietly making their way past them before heading back in the direction of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Trying their best to avoid the guards along the border as they snuck through the Crystal Sky Kingdom.


    Only when reaching the border of the Crystal Sky Kingdom and another neighbouring kingdom, did they have to make a run for it, as both of them charged forward through the border. Instantly alerting the Nascent Soul Realm Experts hiding along the border.


    "Who are you!?"


    "State your identity or we will attack!"


    "They are spies! Kill them!"


    Several Nascent Soul Realm Experts soon appeared to block them, but Feng Chen and Zu Fei could care less about fighting them.


    Launching only a single attack to block the first wave of attacks before running straight past them. Escaping into the nearby kingdom.


    ¡­


    "Hm? What is this¡­?"


    The border guard on the other side, was only a group of soldiers at the Foundation Establishment Realm and a single person at the early stages of the Core Formation Realm.


    Boom Boom Boom!


    All he manged to see was several bright shes of light heading straight past him, as explosions suddenly appeared left and right. Killing a few of his unlucky Foundation Establishment soldiers.


    "W-we are under attack-"


    The Core Formation Realm border guard did not manage to say anything more, as the bright shes of light. Along with the explosions, had already disappeared. Only leaving behind a few dozen pits surrounding his army camp, so as to validate the fact that what he saw really happened¡­

 Chapter 312: Unexpected Danger

    <h4>Chapter 312: Unexpected Danger</h4>


    Running away from the Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Crystal Sky Kingdom, Feng Chen and Zu Fei soon managed to shake them off, as they were only around the first three stages to just having reached the fourth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Just a bit weaker than Zu Fei who was at the fifth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Hah¡­ Looks like we finally managed to shake them off!"


    Copsing down on the ground with an exhausted expression on her face, Zu Fei began recovering the qi she had used to increase her speed with her movement technique for thest few minutes of hectic running away from the border guards of the Crystal Sky Kingdom.


    Even if it was only for a short period of time, she had to use up most of her qi reserves to make arge enough distance between them and their pursuers before she and Feng Chen could escape the range of their divine sense.


    Divine sense was truly one of the most annoying things about sneaking past or escaping from someone in the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    "Haha! Just recover for now, I will keep an eye out for any possible enemies out there!" Laughing with a cheeky smile on his face upon seeing the exhausted Zu Fei, Feng Chen moved out of the small cave they had hidden in. Ignoring the trembling bear in the corner of the cave looking over towards both of them fearfully.


    The outside of the cave was a rtively calm and peaceful forest that they had decided to hide in for a few hours until the border guards of the Crystal Sky Kingdom gave up chasing after them and returned back to their post.


    After all, no matter how much they wanted to catch them, they would not be able to leave their post empty for too long¡­


    Feng Chen and Zu Fei just had to remain hidden for a few hours before they would inevitably have to give up their chase and return to the Crystal Sky Kingdom once again¡­


    Thinking about this, Feng Chen sat down in front of cave entrance and spread his divine sense out to cover as much of the surrounding environment that he could.


    Finding a small vige beside the normal forest they were hiding in, together with several animals without any cultivation.


    Much like the bear currently shivering fearful in a corner of the cave that they borrowed from it¡­


    The overall surroundings were nothing out of the ordinary, with the strongest person inside of the vige only barely having reached the fourth stage of the Qi Condensation Realm. Not really something that would pose a threat to him or Zu Fei¡­


    Time slowly passed and it was only after a day and night had passed that Zu Fei came out fully recovered and ready to go from the cave.


    Seeing Zu Feie out of the cave, Feng Chen stood up from his meditative position in front of the cave entrance.


    "Let''s get going! Those people from the Crystal Sky Kingdom should have already given up by now."


    Nodding her head in agreement with what Feng Chen said, both of them soon left behind the peaceful and calm forest¡­ Something that both of them woulde to regret in the soon to be future¡­


    ¡­


    Only a few momentster, at the border between the Burning Mountain Range and a kingdom, Feng Chen and Zu Fei could be seen running at full speed as several bright shes of light could be seen to be moving closer towards them.


    Boom!


    Arge explosion could suddenly be heard as both Feng Chen and Zu Fei desperately ran away from the origin of the explosion in question. Not daring to look back, they already had some idea about where it came from, as even the remnants of energy left in the shockwave was more than enough tounch both of them into a nearby mountain from the Burning Mountain Range.


    Bang!


    Crashing into the mountain side, Feng Chen managed to recover rtively quickly from the impact, while Zu Fei could barely get up after the impact. Forcing Feng Chen to carry her, as he ran away at his fastest speed possible while carrying Zu Fei in his arms.


    BOOM!


    Yet another explosion could be heard, as Feng Chen managed to see a giant ball of fire engulf an entire city out of the corner of his eye. Reducing the city and everything within to rubble.


    The sheer heat of the explosion spread outwards and began burning everything 10 kilometers away from the city that the giant ball of fire hadnded and exploded.


    ROAR!


    A loud roar echoed out from behind him, as several explosions soon followed.


    "How did we even encounter that thing again!?"


    Feng Chen could not help but mutter this to himself in a depressed tone, as he clearly realized the identity of the demon beast behind the roar.


    It was the demon beast that the now dead Sect Master of the Raging me Sect, had woken up back at the volcano in the Burning Mountain Range and also the demon beast that had paralyzed both him and Zu Fei at the border of the Crystal Sky Kingdom!


    Currently the demon beast in question was fighting someone, most likely the Domain Lord from the Crystal Sky Kingdom.


    However, this was not the main reason for Feng Chen and Zu Fei''s bad situation. No, it was instead the fact that? both of them were making their way over towards both of them while fighting each other along the way.


    Now, what could be the reason for them coincidently moving towards the two of them¡­?


    "This bloody fruit!"


    Feng Chen could not help but exim in a depressed voice, as he looked at the bright red fruit flying over towards him and Zu Fei.


    No matter what direction he ran in, the bright red fruit would follow him for some reason and no matter what direction the fruit went. The fight between the two powerhouses would soon follow¡­


    How do we even get away¡­?


    Thinking this as he looked at the fruit approaching him, Feng Chen could not help but feel yet another wave of depression wash over him before executing his movement technique once again, in a vain attempt at outrunning the flying bright red fruit following him from behind¡­

 Chapter 313: A Way Out!

    <h4>Chapter 313: A Way Out!</h4>


    Boom Bom Boom!


    Hearing the explosions behind him growing closer and closer with each passing second, Feng Chen decided that running along the border of the Burning Mountain Range was not a good option for him and would also end up implicating a lot of innocent mortals that were unlucky enough to live in a town or city near the border of their kingdom¡­


    Whoosh!


    With this in mind, Feng Chen immediately made his way into the Burning Mountain Range. Hoping that he would be able to shake off the red fruit flying after him and the two powerhouses fighting each other just behind the red fruit.


    Bang!


    Just as Feng Chen was about to rush into a cave entrance leading down underground and try and hide there, arge boulder flew over from behind him andnded directly in the centre of the cave entrance, causing it toe crashing down along with the cave behind it. Sealing off the entrance to whatever underground tunnelwork might have been present below there in the past.


    "Damnit!"


    Not able to do anything other than curse loudly, Feng Chen did not dare stay around for too long before turning to run in another direction with no set location in mind, just trying to escape from the red fruit and terrifying experts following behind.


    Even worse. Now that he was carrying the already unconscious Zu Fei, he had an even harder time moving through the dense foliage that covered the surroundings he currently found himself in. Not that he was going to question why a jungle had suddenly appeared below and in between the mountains of the Burning Mountain¡­


    All he could do, was hope that the trees would at the very least help making it hard for that damnable red floating fruit to find him¡­ If he was lucky, one of the powerhouses following behind him might even be able to grab hold of the red fruit and take their fight somewhere that did not involve him or Zu Fei¡­


    However, this was far too much to hope for as a bright red light could soon be seen following him from above the treetops. Completely unaffected by theck of visibility.


    How would a fruit even see him in the first ce¡­?


    "Hah¡­" Sighing loudly upon realizing that he had forgotten the fact that the thing chasing him was a fruit and not a person caused Feng Chen to rethink his ns.


    The fruit was obviously following him because of something, he just had to find out what and get rid of it if possible!


    ¡­


    "Commander! Someone is approaching us from the south, they will show up in less than a minute! Estimated strength should at least be at the Domain Lord Realm!"


    A short distance from where Feng Chen and Zu Fei were, arge ship was floating mid-air above the tall mountains of the Burning Mountain Range.


    "Hm¡­ Prepare forbat, I will go out and see who it is¡­" Inside themander room of the floating ship, a middle-aged woman with a stern look etched onto her face and a scar running straight across it informed the captain who had just walked over and informed her about someone approaching them.


    ncing over in the direction of arge round table in the middle of themand room to get a grasp of the situation. Themander could not help but marvel at the wonder of the artifact that was the table in question.


    The entire table was lit up as the light formed a three-dimensional map of the surrounding environment covering an extremely wide area around them, way more than what her divine sense would ever be able to cover!


    And on that table, tworge red dots were approaching towards their location.


    Narrowing her eyes even further upon seeing the howrge the red dots on the table were, the middle-aged woman frowned slightly as she knew very well that the bigger the dots were, the stronger the person would be¡­


    At least that was all she knew about the weird artifact that was the result of countless formations being merged together into one.


    "Looks like this will be more difficult than first expected¡­ Captain, change of ns! Prepare to retreat! This is not something you will be able to deal with!"


    "Cmander? Are you sure¡­?"


    The captain could not help but ask in a confused voice. No matter what, he was also someone in the Domain Lord Realm¡­ Just how strong were the two approaching them!? Thinking about this, themander could not help but shiver as a sense of fear began to take root, but this fear soon dispersed when he looked over at hismander again.


    "Yes, make sure that you are ready to retreat at any point in time and keep a distance! Remember that it''s not only us here at the moment!" Saying this, themander motioned over towards therge group of people moving around themand room.


    "I understand¡­" Nodding his head, the captain did not say anything more as he began informing the rest of the crew about what was going on.


    Themander on the other hand, did not say anything more upon seeing what the captain did and instead left themand room before leaving the floating ship that slowly began to move away. Leaving her floating mid-air as she looked towards the south. Waiting for the two approaching experts!


    ¡­


    Back on the ground, Feng Chen had already noticed the flying ship in the distance through a few gaps in the treetops and even though he did not recognize the emblem on the side of the flying ship, Feng Chen knew very well that this might be the chance he was looking for!


    If the expert that owned the flying ship saw the red fruit flying after him, Feng Chen was certain that the expert would go after it and prevent it from following him!


    After all, the two powerhouses behind him very clearly wanted the red fruit, so it should be a precious spiritual herb of some sort!


    Thinking this, Feng Chen used thest bit of his qi reserves to speed up even further as he dashed through the thick foliage while carrying the unconscious Zu Fei at a speed surpassing his past top speed. Maybe evenparable to a Domain Lord flying through the sky!

 Chapter 314: Escape from the Red Fruit!

    <h4>Chapter 314: Escape from the Red Fruit!</h4>


    "Hm? What is that¡­?"


    Having made her way out from the floating ship, themander stood mid-air and looked over towards the south, when a bright red fruit shining brightly suddenly came flying over towards her. The two experts she had been on the lookout for soon followed as they appeared to be chasing after the red fruit. Fighting each other along the way.


    "A Transcendent Grade spiritual herb!?" Realizing what the red fruit floating through the air was the moment she saw it, a brief hint of greed shed through themander''s eyes as she soon focused her attention back onto the two experts moving over towards the herb while still locked in a fight with each other.


    "If I could just grab it and run away¡­ As long as I make it back, I should be safe¡­" Thinking about how she should proceed, themander came up with an idea as she turned back towards the flying ship slowly moving into position a short distance away from her, as the captain was prepared to leave at any moment.


    "Captain! Leave at the fastest speed possible and make your way back! I will catch up with youter!"


    "Yes, Commander!"


    Having already seen the red fruit floating towards them, the captain also had an idea as to what grade the herb was and understood how beneficial it would be if they managed to grab a hold of it.


    Whoosh!


    So, without wasting any time, the flying ship turned around a sped into the distance at its fastest speed possible. Easily surpassing the speed of an ordinary Domain Lord!


    Seeing that the flying ship was retreating, themander no longer waited and immediately moved over towards the red fruit.


    Bang!


    Grabbing hold of it as she felt a tremendous impact from the red fruit trying desperately to escape her grasp, but it was all to no avail, as themander soon pulled the red fruit directly into her interspatial ring before turning around and flying away as fast as possible in the opposite direction of the two other Domain Lords approaching from the distance.


    ROAR!


    "How dare you steal my treasure!"


    One loud beastly roar and an angry human roar could be heard as the demon beast and human expert stopped fighting each other upon seeing the red fruit being taken away in front of them.


    Fwoosh!


    Crackle~


    Tworge scale attacks were immediatelyunched towards the fleeingmander, as she was forced toe to a halt as arge barrier made of yellow qi surrounded her in the form of a giant lotus.


    The attack from the demon beast and human seemed to have momentarily fused together, as both of them flew over andnded on the giant yellow lotus barrier of themander.


    One attack a fire-based attack, while the other was a lightning-based attack.


    BOOM!


    The fire and lighting from the two attacks perfectlyplemented each other as a terrifying explosion urred the moment the two partially merged attacks came in contact with the giant yellow lotus that surrounded and protected themander.


    Fwoosh~


    Part of the attack was directly negated by the giant yellow lotus, as it instead ended up raining down on the treetops of the trees below. Instantly causing a forest fire to begin spreading rapidly and uncontrobly.


    Crack!


    The yellow lotus surrounding themander just barely held up against the attack, as the person in question did not dare stay around any longer and wait for her two opponents to catch up with her, as she quickly turned around to escape again before anotherbined attack wasunched towards her.


    Whoosh~


    ROAR!


    "Come back here!"


    Watching themander having survived their attack now escaping, both the demon beast and human Domain Lord did not seem to care about anything else as they quickly chased after her. One angrily screaming all sorts of different profanities towards her, while the other was roaring loudly in what could only presumed to be not so kind words in whatevernguage that the demon beast was using¡­


    ¡­


    Back on the ground, Feng Chen did not dare to stay around after he saw the woman who had appeared from the flying ship grabbing hold of the red fruit.


    BOOM!


    Barely making it out of the way as a terrifying explosion soon echoed out behind him as mes began to consume the jungle environment around him.


    Boom boom boom


    Several explosions soon followed after that, but each one grew fainter than thest. Signalling the fact that the source of the explosions was moving away from him and Zu Fei!


    "Finally¡­"


    Making his way out of the area affected by the forest fire, Feng Chen exhaustedly copsed besides a fewrge rocks on a random mountainside. Gentlyying Zu Fei down on the ground beside him, as he began to recover from the wounds, he had umted from the chase earlier.


    Even if the two following behind him had no idea he was there in the first ce, they still injured him and even knocked Zu Fei unconscious!


    Rustle~


    A few minutes passed by before Zu Fei began to shift around on the cold ground. Slowly opening her eyes as she cautiously began scanning her surroundings. Only calming down upon seeing Feng Chen sitting just next to her with her eyes closed.


    "What happened- Ah! Why are we both covered in ash?! Even our robes arepletely ruined!"


    About to ask Feng Chen what had happened while she had been unconscious, Zu Fei quickly realized their current condition! Both of them looked no better than two beggars! No, even beggars would be in a better situation than they currently were when it came to appearance!


    "Calm down, I managed to get away, we will just recover for a short time before moving back towards the sect¡­ We will clean up after we return to the sect. After all, we might risk running into some random expert again if we take too long¡­ At least we should not be too far away from the sect." After saying this, Feng Chen closed his eyes and began recovering his qi reserves again.


    Zu Fei could not say anything in return and sat up before she began recovering her qi reserves as well. No matter what, she would have to take a long warm bath after she got back!

 Chapter 315: Fang Yus Difficulty...

    <h4>Chapter 315: Fang Yu''s Difficulty...</h4>


    After travelling through the Burning Mountain Range for another few days in their beggar like appearances, Feng Chen and Zu Fei finally arrived at the entrance of the Flying Sword City¡­ Only to hear the people about to enter the city talk about them like a random group of refugees from some recent war in that caused the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to fall apart-


    "Wait¡­ Refugees from the copsing Heavenly Sky Kingdom!?"


    Zu Fei stopped as she looked over at the group of people looking over towards her filled with pity, as she realized what their words meant. The Heavenly Sky Kingdom had copsed! And she had only been gone for a few weeks at most!


    "So, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom actually ended up copsing¡­ I wonder if that old ancestor died as well¡­" Muttering this with a rtively calm expression on his face, Feng Chen was not that surprised over the fact that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had ended up copsing.


    After all, he still vividly remembered the fact that Shu Yao had entered some sort of deal with them to not help the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. In return, the Azure Sky Kingdom would leave after they finished off the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Feng Chen really wanted to rush back to the sect and find out if the Azure Sky Kingdom had really left the central region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­


    "Who are you and why have youe to the Flying Sword City? Refugees should-"


    Hearing the voice from one of the guards at the entrance to the Flying Sword City, Feng Chen did not even bother answering him.


    Whoosh!


    Instead, he just showed off his sect master token before walking past thepletely stunned guard together with Zu Fei. Disappearing from sight before the other guards had even managed to react.


    There was no way he would stay around after having revealed his identity, or at the very least showed some proof that he was connected to the Sect Master in some way¡­


    At the very least, the guards at the gate would note running after him and Zu Fei as they dragged their still exhausted bodies back towards their pavilions to freshen up and recover from some of the deeper injuries they had received along the way and were unable to heal in a short period of time.


    ¡­


    Thumb thumb~


    Back at the library of the Formation Hall, Xuan Hao was slowly making his way over towards Fang Yu, when the sound of footsteps suddenly echoed out from the direction of the entrance to the library.


    "Hm?"


    Fang Yu, who had beenpletely focused on the book in her hand just a second ago. Instantly looked over towards the entrance of the library just behind her. Not noticing Xuan Hao who was only a few meters away from her at this point.


    "Elder-"


    "No need to speak so formally my child, I heard you managed to make to sneak your way back into the library by borrowing the help from another eldering here to read!"


    Calling out to the tall elderly woman who appeared from the entrance of the library, Fang Yu happily got up and greeted her before the person in question interrupted her greeting.


    Squeeze~


    Walking over to Fang Yu, the tall elderly woman hugged her tightly with a happy smile on her face. Almost lifting Fang Yu off the floor of the library in the process.


    "G-grandma... C-can''t¡­ Breath!"


    Trying her best to get out of the elderlydy''s tight hug, Fang Yu could only helplessly beg for her to stop, as her cultivation at the Foundation Establishment Realm was renderedpletely useless before the elderly woman.


    "Hmph, fine! Is this perhaps the elder who you followed inside-!"


    Reluctantly letting go of Fang Yu, who quickly escaped a few meters away from her, the elderly woman soon turned over in the direction of Xuan Hao standing a short distance away from her and Fang Yu.


    "Elder Xuan!? It''s a pleasure to meet you Elder Xuan, I have long since heard about you from the other elders!" Showing a shocked expression for a short moment after recognizing Xuan Hao, the elderly woman quickly greeted him respectfully under the shocked gaze of Fang Yu.


    From what she knew, she had never seen her grandmother act so respectfully towards anyone other than the Sect Master and the Core Elders! Even those older elders at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm did not receive such respect from her!


    Given that she had already seen what the Sect Master looked like, it could only mean that the elder she had followed inside the Formation Hall was one of the Core Elders!


    "No need for the formalities, I am just here to read up on a few things¡­"


    Waving his hand as he said this, Xuan Hao soon turned over towards Fang Yu standing to the side before continuing.


    "Now that I have you here, I heard quite a bit about the child over there and was wondering why she have not been able to enter the Formation Hall. After all, given how dedicated to formations she is, I highly doubt she would be able to fail the simple test that the Formation Hall set up¡­"


    "¡­"


    "Is there perhaps some other reason as to why she could not enter the Formation Hall¡­?"


    Seeing the hesitation and silence from the elderly woman, Xuan Hao could not help but grow curious.


    From the sect mission, Xuan Hao clearly knew that there was some sort of problem with the entrance test of the Formation Hall and Fang Yu, but he still had no clue as to what it was exactly.


    "Ehm¡­ Elder Xuan¡­ Do you perhaps know what the test for entering the Formation Hall is¡­?"


    Looking over towards Fang Yu who had nervously steeped forward, Xuan Hao could only shake his head in denial.


    The test that one was required toplete before entering the Formation Hall was aplete mystery to him. At this point in time, the only thing he knew about the test was the fact that it was an extremely easy test that disciples would normally be able to easily get through as long as they put in some effort in learning about formations.


    "I see¡­ The test for entering the Formation Hall is a simple one that requires the disciple to master three different beginner formations. One for lowering the temperature of the area it covers, while the second increases the temperature. These two formations can normally be learned within only a few days of practice.


    Thest one is the most difficult and is a formation that can continuously keep a small fire burning. This formation is also the one that takes the longest to learn and it takes a week to learn it and in some rare cases, it might even take an entire two weeks to learn¡­


    I¡­ Have still not been able to use thest formation after two years¡­" Stopping for a moment when her exnation reached the end, Fang Yu could not help but blush from embarrassment upon mentioning the fact that she had been unable to learn thest among the three formations even after two years of hard work.


    Watching Fang Yu as she blushed from embarrassment, Xuan Hao could not help but feel shocked after learning the reason why she had not yet managed to enter the Formation Hall yet and at the same time a sense of helplessness washed over him.


    How was he supposed to help her sessfully pass the test and enter the Formation Hall if she had already been stuck learning the same formation over the past two years without any progress¡­


    And for some reason, Xuan Hao felt like the system would most likely not consider the quest to bepleted if he just used his status to forcefully have her enter the Formation Hall.


    "Hm¡­"


    Thinking about a way to help out Fang Yu and allow her to enter the Formation Hall, Xuan Hao inevitably looked over towards the tall elderly woman who had been called grandma by Fang Yu just a few seconds earlier.


    Though, both of them do not look like they are rted¡­


    Not to be rude to Fang Yu or anything along that line, but she was really short for her age¡­


    "Elder Xuan¡­? "


    Seeing Xuan Hao looking over at her, the elderly woman could not help but ask in a curious tone.


    "Ah¡­ It''s nothing, I was just wondering if¡­ your grandchild? Would be willing to learn a bit from me given that we were fated to meet-"


    "No problem, no problem! She is more than willing-"


    "S-sorry for my grandmother''s rude behaviour, I hope you can forgive her as she was just excited¡­" Before Xuan Hao even managed to finish his first ever attempt at sounding like some experienced scam- fortune teller, the elderly woman interrupted him with an excited expression on her face before her granddaughter jumped in and stopped her. Quickly apologising on her behave.


    "No worries at all, I don''t mind it! Seeing as it has already gotten quitete outside, I will be taking my leave for today. Show up in front of my pavilion at dawn tomorrow and we will look over your problem."


    Waving his hand in an attempt to calm down both the grandmother and granddaughter, Xuan Hao decided that it would be a good time to take his leave.


    "Y-yes!"


    Calming down a bit after hearing Xuan Hao, Fang Yu quickly agreed with him.


    "Great, then I will see you tomorrow at dawn!"


    Whoosh~


    Smiling kindly at Fang Yu after hearing her agree, Xuan Hao turned around and left the library of the Formation Hall before either of the two could say anything.

 Chapter 316: Fluffy Cloud Café

    <h4>Chapter 316: Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦</h4>


    Leaving the Formation Hall, Xuan Hao made his way back towards his pavilion.


    Walking instead of flying back, as he wanted to take things a bit slower now that he had managed toplete the knowledge rted quest from the system.


    Other than that, Xuan Hao also wanted to see what the disciples from the Flying Sword Sect were doing on a day-to-day basis and maybe get some ideas as to what his own disciples might be doing when he was not teaching them¡­


    All in all, Xuan Hao had never really spent much time outside of his pavilion ever since entering the Flying Sword Sect, so most he was unfamiliar with most of the Flying Sword Sect!


    "Hey, I heard that a new restaurant just opened up in the Flying Sword City!"


    "Really? Is it special or something?"


    "Yeah, I heard that it was called Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦. It''s a quite famous chain that exist even outside the Sky Empire. ording to some rumours, a caf¨¦ can easily be found anywhere on the Ewaria Continent!"


    "Hm?" Walking along the path leading away from the Formation Hall, Xuan Hao suddenly heard two nearby elders talking excitedly with each other about a new caf¨¦ opening up in the Flying Sword City.


    "Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦¡­ That is quite a cute name for a caf¨¦ and one that have quite some background¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help but grow curious about the new caf¨¦ opening up in the Flying Sword City.


    After all, if it was a caf¨¦ that had the ability to spread across the Sky Empire and maybe even beyond that, it should at the very least have some sort of backing.


    "Looks like I will have to pay a visit to the Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦¡­"


    Smiling a bit to himself, Xuan Hao changed direction and moved towards the entrance of the Flying Sword Sect leading directly into the Flying Sword City.


    He was in no hurry to return to his pavilion and redeem the reward from the quest. After all, he did not want to just spend all his time focusing on cultivation and improving his strength¡­


    In the first ce, he wanted to spend his time without stressing over improving his cultivation base and reaching a higher realm. Rxing at a caf¨¦ with a good snack and a cup of tea would be a good change of pace.


    No matter what, he should not forget that the reason he wanted to be strong in the first ce was being able to live a rxing and peaceful life without any disturbances.


    Maybe when he got strong enough, he could settle down and set up a family. At least for now, that was far in the future¡­ After all, it would require him to find a wife first and¡­


    Shaking his head at the thought of actually setting up a family, Xuan Hao could not help but smile wryly to himself.


    "Hah¡­ Maybe I should just return to the pavilion and cultivate¡­" Stopping his thoughts before they began to wander into a not so safe direction, Xuan Hao''s divine sense spread out in all directions around him. Instantly covering both the Flying Sword Sect and the Flying Sword City.


    "That should be it¡­"


    Finding the location of the Fluffy Cloud caf¨¦, Xuan Hao directly disappeared from the road he had been standing on just a moment ago before directly reappearing in front of the Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦ within seconds.


    Whoosh!


    For such a short distance, Xuan Hao could almost appear instantaneously! Even if it was not teleportation, it was close to the same thing¡­


    ¡­


    Appearing discreetly in front of the Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦, Xuan Hao was shocked by therge group of people that had gathered inside of the caf¨¦. Quickly using his domain to obscure his appearance, so as to not be recognized.


    Mainly consisting of disciples and a few elders from the Flying Sword Sect, the people gathered inside the Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦ all had an excited expression on their face as they ate all sorts of different kinds of food.


    From light snacks, to some even eating severalrge cakes all by themselves in a corner of the caf¨¦¡­


    Overall, the Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦ served mostly cakes and other light snacks like a small fruit tter with a few apples in the shape of cute rabbits and other animals. Some even mixing several different fruits together into the shape of small and cute demon beasts showing off a furious expression that just made them look even cuter¡­


    "Hello! What can I get you?"


    "Ah¡­ Is there something you would rmend?"


    Unknowingly having made his way inside the caf¨¦, Xuan Hao was faced with a waitress that hade over to ask him.


    "Hm¡­ I would personally rmend the Fluffy Cloud, it''s by far the best thing we have! Though it does cost three spirit stones¡­"


    "I will take it! Get me a cup of any tea you would rmend as well; just keep the rest."


    Taking out four spirit stones before handing them over to the waitress who happily took them, Xuan Hao was soon guided over to a small table with a view of the streets of the Flying Cloud City just outside.


    Sitting down as the waitress disappeared into what he could only assume was the location of the kitchen.


    "Here is your tea, sir!"


    A few minutes passed before the waitress returned with a cup of tea and a small te with what he could only assume was the Fluffy Cloud that she had rmend him to try out.


    "Thank You."


    Nodding his head as the waitress put down the small te along with the tea in front of him before disappearing in the direction of another customer, Xuan Hao looked outside at the people passing by while slowly sipping on the tea.


    "Jasmine tea? This is my first time trying it aftering here¡­" Feeling a bit nostalgic as he drank the tea, Xuan Hao closed his eyes to appreciate the taste for a short moment.


    Jasmine tea had always been one of his favourites and now he had the opportunity to taste it again after so long¡­


    "I wonder what the Fluffy Cloud will taste like." Curiously looking down at the small fluffy cloud like object that seemingly floated just above the small te, Xuan Hao put down his cup of tea as he picked up a small forkying at the edge of the te before poking into the fluffy cloud.


    Pfff~


    The moment Xuan Hao poked into the fluffy cloud, a small stream of hot air escaped as the fluffy cloud deted and copsed down onto the small te.


    Feeling even more curious about the food of sorts in front of him, Xuan Hao slowly picked up a small amount of the now gooey hot substance on his small te before eating it.


    "This is¡­ Interesting¡­"


    Not knowing how to describe the taste of the fluffy cloud with words, Xuan Hao waspletely unfamiliar with what he was tasting. The only way he could describe it, would be some kind of vani rted dessert¡­


    Like this, time slowly passed by with Xuan Hao enjoying the weird yet tasty fluffy cloud with a cup of jasmine tea.


    By the time Xuan Hao stood up and prepared to leave the Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦, the sun had already begun to go down as the moon was beginning to rise.


    Looking around himself, Xuan Hao saw that the Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦ was still bustling with activity. The only difference being the customers themselves. From most of the people being disciples of the Flying Sword Sect, to it mostly consisting of people from the elderly generation. Elders of the Flying Sword Sect being among the most dominant¡­


    It was a good idea to hide my identity beforeing here. Though I do wonder why the elders are always hanging out in somewhere in the Flying Sword City¡­ Perhaps they don''t have enough to do? Maybe I should inform Elder Song about this, he always seems to need more people to help him out¡­


    Thinking about this as he looked over at therge gathering of Flying Sword Sect Elders inside of the Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦, Xuan Hao quietly left the Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦.


    ¡­


    At the same time in a corner of the Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦, three elders from the Flying Sword Sect suddenly shivered.


    "Huh¡­? Why do I suddenly feel something bad is going to happen?"


    "You as well? I suddenly felt a shiver go down my spine for some reason, perhaps something bad is really going to happen soon¡­"


    "Both of you calm down, there is no way something bad will happen just because of that! Aren''t we going to merge with the Spring Flower Sect soon? And don''t forget the fact that Elder Xuan Is rumoured to have reached the Domain Lord Realm! How can something bad happen to us so suddenly without any reason!?"


    Discussing about the sudden feeling of danger among themselves, two of the elders were interrupted by a third one as he reasoned with them.


    "Hah¡­ Guess there is no arguing with that Old Double D¡­"


    "True, Old Double D is indeed more reasonable than us two¡­"


    Shaking their heads as they teased the elder who calmed them down, the elder in question did not seem to take to it so kindly as he angrily looked at the two other elders.


    "IT''S DEMON DEVOURER!"


    "Haha, Yeah, yeah~ If you say so~"


    "Haha!"


    Ignoring the loud? and angry voice that caught the attention of everyone inside the Fluffy Cloud Caf¨¦, the other two elders justughed teasingly before the group soon resumed chatting together like they had earlier, as the night slowly grew darker outside.

 Chapter 317: Anxious Fang Yu

    <h4>Chapter 317: Anxious Fang Yu</h4>


    Returning back to his pavilion, Xuan Hao checked in on Bai Ning and Zhi Ruo. Only to find out that Bai Ning had already gone to sleep for the night, while Zhi Ruo was still awake in her room.


    Sensing the presence of the two of them, Xuan Hao did not go and wake up Bai Ning or disturbed Zhi Ruo and instead just walked back to the spot outside his pavilion that he had cultivated the day before.


    "I really wonder if I will advance as quickly asst night¡­"


    Feeling both curious and excited upon thinking about how far he had managed to progress in only a single night, Xuan Hao decided to with redeeming his quest reward and see if he could breakthrough to the third stage of the Domain Lord Realm on his own.


    After all, he would really feel like he wasted the opportunity given by the system to breakthrough if he could do it by himself¡­ Rather wait one day and see if he could reach the third stage of the Domain Lord Realm by himself, than use the chance given by the system!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao slowly sat down outside and began cultivating with the moon above shinning down on him from above as the night slowly passed quietly. The Flying Sword Sect having already begun to quiet down, as most of the disciples and elders returned to their own quarters to cultivate or sleep¡­


    Though most of the elders were most likely still out and about in the Flying Sword City¡­


    ¡­


    "Hm? Nothing¡­?" Standing up as he watched the sun slowly rise over the mountains surrounding the Flying Sword Sect in the distance, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit disappointed as he felt no real improvement to his cultivation like he had yesterday.


    "Maybe it had to do with something else¡­ Like the moon or stars¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he began thinking about what might have been the cause for his sudden increase in cultivation speed, Xuan Hao could not wait to go and find out if that night was special in some way¡­


    Standing up from his spot overlooking the main part of the Flying Sword Sect below him, Xuan Hao suddenly sensed someone moving up his mountain and towards his pavilion.


    "Fang Yu?"


    Immediately recognizing the person moving up his mountain so early in the morning, Xuan Hao quickly remembered that he had indeed told her toe up and meet him in front of his pavilion at dawn the next day.


    Whoosh~


    Deciding to not stand around, Xuan Hao directly made his way over towards the entrance of his pavilion. Arriving a little earlier than Fang Yu as he watched her run up thest part of the way up the mountain without even showing the slightest sign of exhaustion.


    "I see that you made it on time!" The sun had barely risen, and Xuan Hao had honestly not expected for her to show up the moment that the sun appeared.


    Looking over at the fully awake Fang Yu standing in front of him full of energy, Xuan Hao could not help but nod approvingly towards her. No matter what, she was definitely showing off her determination to enter the Formation Hall for all to see¡­


    Even Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit more determined to help her get through the entrance test for the Formation Hall and officially enter¡­


    ¡­


    A few hours earlier when the sun had still yet to rise, Fang Yu was anxiously pacing back and forth inside of a small courtyard as she kept looking over towards the east where the sun would rise.


    Waiting for the first rays of light to appear over the tall mountains surrounding the Flying Sword Sect before she would make her way over towards Xuan Hao''s pavilion.


    "Fang Yu¡­ Are you still awake at this time? Didn''t I tell you to get some sleep and be fully rested for when you meet Elder Xuanter today...? Even if you have reached the Foundation Establishment Realm and can go a few days without sleep, you still have to rest your head!"


    "Grandma¡­"


    Calling out pitifully as she dashed over towards the person who had just entered her courtyard, Fang Yu did not hold back in the slightest as she hugged her tightly. Fully disying how nervous and anxious she was to the olddy.


    "Eh? Not so against hugging me now?" Smiling upon seeing Fang Yu act all spoilt with her as she tried her best to hold back herughter, Fang Yu''s Grandma hugged her in return as she waited for a few minutes until she calmed down.


    "Grandma¡­ D-do you really think that Elder Xuan can help me¡­?" Turning to look up at the olddy after calming down, Fang Yu could not hold herself back. Asking the question that had been stuck in her mind ever since Xuan Hao had told her that he would help solve her problem and help her clear the entrance test for the Formation Hall.


    No matter what, she had been stuck at the same formation for over two years at this point in time. Even if Xuan Hao was a Core Elder, she still felt doubtful as to whether he could really help her master the formation she had struggled with¡­


    "Haha, you are worrying about this child? You have to remember that a Core Elder is someone in the Nascent Soul Realm! And there are even some rumours floating around among the elders that Elder Xuan reached the Domain Lord Realm above the Nascent Soul Realm! So, I don''t think you have to worry so much about it¡­"


    Chuckling a bit upon hearing what Fang Yu worried about, the olddy quickly reassured her.


    "Domain Lord Realm¡­?"


    Not knowing much about what realm came after the Nascent Soul Realm, Fang Yu felt a bit reassured after knowing how strong his cultivation was¡­ At least he should be quite skilled when it came to formations, he had after alle to visit the Formation Hall and had even rmend a really good book to her¡­


    Thinking about all of this, Fang Yu slowly grew more confident in Xuan Hao and felt that he might really be able to help herplete the Formation Hall''s entrance test once and for all!


    "Thank you, grandma! I will get some sleep before the sun rises!"


    "Sure~ I will wake you up in time, so you don''t have to worry about it!"


    Seeing Fang Yu rush back into her room to get some much-needed sleep, the olddy smiled happily as she sat down in the Fang Yu''s courtyard and began cultivating.


    There were still a few hours until the sun rose, and she would have to spend that time on something¡­

 Chapter 318: Arriving at Dawn

    <h4>Chapter 318: Arriving at Dawn</h4>


    After getting a few hours of sleep, Fang Yu was awoken by her grandmother as she quickly gave her thanks to the olddy before rushing out of her courtyard in the direction of the different mountains where the elders of the Flying Sword Sect resided.


    Running through the Flying Sword Sect on her way over towards the location of Xuan Hao''s pavilion, Fang Yu suddenly remembered the fact that she had no idea what mountain his pavilion was located on¡­ If she made a mistake, she might end up walking up the wrong Core Elders Mountain.


    Not really something she wanted to happen, as trespassing in a core area of the Flying Sword Sect would end with her being punished to some degree. At that point she would not be able to reach Xuan Hao''s pavilion at dawn¡­ Worst case scenario, she could even end up getting expelled from the Flying Sword Sect!


    "Greetings Elder! Do you perhaps know where Elder Xuan''s pavilion is located?" Seeing an eldering back from a night out in the Flying Sword City, Fang Yu did not shy away from walking over and asking him.


    "Hm? Elder Xuan? Might I ask why you are looking for Elder Xuan so early in the morning?"


    Seeing an inner disciple suddenly appear in front of him and ask about one of the Core Elders, the elder did not answer immediately and instead asking about her intentions. Clearly not willing to just share the information with her if she was just some disciple looking for one of the Core Elders in a hope to be epted as a personal disciple¡­


    Over the past few days, a few of the disciples should have already learned about the fact that Xuan Hao had reached the Domain Lord Realm and it was not his first time that he had been approached by a disciple who asked about which mountain among the ones belonging to the Core Elders that Xuan Hao was living on¡­ Even if they knew that going there could result in punishment and in the worst case being expelled from the Flying Sword Sect!


    However even with all of this, some disciples would still try and approach the Core Elders from time to time¡­ Though in most cases, the elders who had reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm like himself suffered the most from disciplesing to try and be personal disciples¡­


    After all, it was more likely for them to be the personal disciple of someone in the Core Formation Realmpared to a Core Elder in the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    "I was asked to visit his pavilion at dawn, but I have no idea where his pavilion is even located in the first ce¡­" Not knowing about the thoughts that was going through the elder''s mind, Fang Yu did not hide anything as she answered his question truthfully.


    Narrowing his eyes as he scanned over Fang Yu for a short moment, the elder soon let out a small sigh as he answered her. At the very least, he could tell that Fang Yu had been speaking the truth when he asked her why she was asking about the location for Elder Xuan''s pavilion.


    "It''s the one to the right of the Sect Master''s Mountain, you should at least know where that is located¡­"


    "Yes, I know! Thank you for the help, Elder!"


    Hearing the location of Xuan Hao''s pavilion, Fang Yu smiled happily as she quickly thanked the elder before turning around to run in the direction of Xuan Hao''s pavilion.


    "Why would Elder Xuan ask for this little girl toe visit him? Is he perhaps taking in another disciple or just helping a troubled disciple with something?"


    Muttering this to himself as he watched Fang Yu disappear towards the core area of the Flying Sword Sect, the elder soon shook his head before making his way back towards his own ce to get some much-needed rest.


    He would have to ask around with a few of his friends tomorrow and see if Elder Xuan was nning to take in yet another disciple¡­ At least from what he could remember, it had at most been a few days since Elder Xuan had taken in a new disciple and now, yet another potential disciple had suddenly appeared!


    ¡­


    Following her encounter with the elder and getting the correct location of Xuan Hao''s pavilion, Fang Yu no longer felt nervous about idently walking up the wrong Core Elder''s Mountain and all of her worry instead ended up being focused on the fact that she was going to meet with Xuan Hao in a short moment!


    No matter how much her grandmother had tried to calm her down beforehand, Fang Yu was still incredibly nervous about the prospect of meeting a Core Elder. Even if she had spent quite some time together with him back at the Formation Hall, she had only believed him to be a normal elder like her grandmother back then and did not have any difficultymunicating with him at all!


    "The sun is rising!"


    Slowing down the closer she got to Xuan Hao''s Mountain peak, Fang Yu suddenly noticed the first few rays of light appearing at the mountains surrounding the Flying Sword Sect in the distance.


    Seeing this caused her to throw away all of her nervousness as she used her cultivation base to run over to and quickly scale the mountain that Xuan Hao''s pavilion was located on.


    Not worrying about anything other than what might happen if she ended up arrivingte.


    What if he decided not to help her out because she showed upte?!


    Fang Yu did not want something like that to happen, so she had put aside all of her worry and nervousness. Instead, just focusing on getting up the mountain as quickly as possible!


    "I see that you made it on time!" The sun had barely risen, when Fang Yu reached the peak of the mountain. Only to be met with the calm smile of Xuan Hao who stood at the entrance to his pavilion. Almost like he had been standing there waiting from the beginning.

 Chapter 319: Fire Burning Formation

    <h4>Chapter 319: Fire Burning Formation</h4>


    "H-hello, Elder Xuan! Thank you for taking some time to help me today!"


    "No problem at all, it''s my pleasure to help, but what should I be calling you?"


    Smiling assumingly at the nervous Fang Yu, Xuan Hao quickly asked for her name. Even if he had found out about it through the Sect Mission.


    "It''s Fang Yu!" Answering without a moment to waste, Fang Yu had calmed down a bit after hearing his question.


    "Fang Yu¡­ we will move over to the training ground located just beside my pavilion before going over the formation you have been struggling with for the past two years."


    Muttering her name to himself as he nodded his head in an attempt to look like it was the first time, he heard it, Xuan Hao did not intend to waste too much time on the Sect Mission. Wanting to get started on it as soon as possible.


    "Yes!"


    Nodding her head obediently, both Xuan Hao and Fang Yu left the entrance of the pavilion and moved over towards the training ground.


    ¡­


    The small journey towards the training ground was mostly spent with Fang Yu nervously walking behind Xuan Hao, as she kept looking around herself. Trying her best to observe the different things located on Xuan Hao''s Mountain Peak¡­ Not that there was much to begin with.


    At most she managed to get a good view of the Flying Sword Sect that could be seen below them from time to time when the vision was not obscured by the clouds that decided to show up only a few hundred meters from the peak. Making the Flying Sword Sect belowpletely invisible to the naked eye.


    "Hm?"


    Arriving at the training ground, Xuan Hao could not help but let out a slightly surprised voice as the entire training ground was covered in a thick fog.


    Observing closer, Xuan Hao discovered that the fog in essence was a cloud that was in the process of passing through the area of the training ground¡­ This in turn should not be unusual, as the training ground itself was located a few hundred meters lower than the peak of the mountain where the pavilion was located.


    This in turn was also the ce where clouds normally formed. In reality, the training ground had been covered by a thick fog most of the time, it was just that Xuan Hao had yet to experience it for himself. In a sense, he felt a little unfortunate that the training ground had not been as foggy when he had visited it in the past.


    The moisture in the air, along with the increase in water qi would surely make it easier to both cultivate and train water rted techniques like his Rain Sword¡­ Maybe he should take some time to visit the training ground after he finished up things with Fang Yu and practice his Rain Sword for a bit?


    "Wow¡­"


    Fang Yu waspletely different from Xuan Hao who had just been a little surprised by the foggy training ground, as she let out an exmation of surprise after witnessing the beautiful foggy environment¡­ Or due to the increased density in water qi making it easier to cultivate. Especially for someone cultivating a water-based mantra...


    Whoosh~


    Scanning her body with his divine sense, Xuan Hao easily determined the fact that Fang Yu was indeed practicing a water-based cultivation mantra.


    "I can allow you to cultivate here for a bit, but we first have to help you learn the formation that you have been struggling with!"


    "Yes! I will do my best to learn from Elder Xuan!"


    Upon hearing Xuan Hao mention that she would be allowed to stay in the training ground and cultivate afterwards, Fang Yu became even more motivated and excited to learn the formation she had been struggling with for the past two years.


    "Did you perhaps bring the formation blueprint with you?"


    "Yes!"


    Eager to get started, Fang Yu took out a small piece of paper out from her robe and handed it over to Xuan Hao before retreating back a few meters, while eagerly looked over at Xuan Hao who began looking over the formation blueprint.


    The formation blueprint was simple and easy to understand. Only requiring one to change the normal temperature formation by a tiny amount to create a small burning me that would be sustained by the Formation Master''s own qi.


    Other than that, there was also a higher-level version of the formation that detailed how to make a permanent version of the formation that did not required the Formation Master''s own qi, but instead passively took in qi from the surroundings to keep the fire burning.


    "Now that I think about it, this should be how most of the lights in the city and sect are operated¡­" Muttering this quietly to himself as he put away the small blueprint, Xuan Hao began to construct the easiest among the two small fire burning formation on the blueprint.


    Fwoosh!


    With the sound of a me igniting, the fire burning formation appeared in between Xuan Hao and Fang Yu, as Xuan Hao felt a small continuous drain on his qi from the fire burning formation.


    The drain of qi was negligible to him, as he recovered his qi far faster than the small fire burning formation could drain it. Other than that, he would be able to easily cut off the small connection at any point in time.


    "A-amazing!"


    Fang Yu looking on from the side could not help but exim in surprise, as she watched how quickly Xuan Hao had learnt and set up the fire burning formation.


    Even her grandmother would need at least an hour or two, to learn a brand-new formation at the beginner level!


    Thinking about this, Fang Yu gazed over at Xuan Hao filled with respect. He might really be able to help herplete the entrance test and enter the Formation Hall!


    "I think I understand how it works, Fang Yu, why don''t you try and set up a fire burning formation?"


    Nodding to himself as he watched the fire burning formation in front of him for a short moment, Xuan Hao waved his hand and cut of his connection to the formation before turning around to ask Fang Yu as the fire burning formation slowly began to copse without the input of any new qi to keep it up and running.


    "Y-yes!" Stuttering a bit due to suddenly being asked as she was absorbed watching the fire burning formation Xuan Hao had set up, Fang Yu hurriedly began to set up her own fire burning formation.


    Woosh~


    Slowly, the formation began to take shape in front of her without any problem.


    Fwoosh!


    A small fire began to burn brightly at the centre of the formations as Fang Yu finished setting up the fire burning formation. The entire process was smooth, elegant, and beautiful to watch. Even if it was far slowly than what Xuan Hao had done.


    "Hm?"


    Fwish~


    Keeping an eye on the fire burning formation that Fang Yu had just set up, Xuan Hao suddenly felt the small fire burning in the middle of the formation behave weirdly as he felt a change in the flow of qi transferred to the fire burning formation by Fang Yu.


    Fwoosh! Boom!


    Forcefully cutting off Fang Yu''s connection with the fire burning formation before retreating a few meters backwards, Xuan Hao watched the small fire inside the formation explode.


    "Well, this is interesting¡­" Smiling a bit to himself as he looked at the ce where the fire burning formation had been moments ago, Xuan Hao looked back at Fang Yu, who was just standing still and looking at the location of her fire burning formation with a depressed look on her face.


    "Does this normally happen?" Raising one of his eyebrows as he noticed that Fang Yu was not really surprised over the fact that her formation had suddenly turned into a bomb of sort and exploded in front of her.


    "Yes¡­ Whenever I finish setting up the fire burning formation and begin adding my qi to it, it will either cause the small fire to fizzle out and die or explode violently like this¡­" Pausing for a short moment before answering his question, Fang Yu did not dare look directly at him while saying this.


    "And you have no idea why this happens? Perhaps something with the mantra, you practice or your qi?"


    "No¡­ Grandmother already tried to see if it had something to do with my qi or the mantra I am practicing and found nothing wrong with it"


    Listening to Fang Yu''s answers, Xuan Hao put on a thoughtful look as he began remembering the process from earlier.


    The fire burning formation had only explode after she had added in her own qi for a short amount of time, but she said it had nothing to do with her qi or her cultivation mantra¡­


    What could it be that was affecting her if it was not her qi or her cultivation mantra¡­?

 Chapter 320 - Source Of Fang Yus Problem

    <h4>Chapter 320 - Source Of Fang Yu''s Problem</h4>


    Lost in thought, Xuan Hao motioned for Fang Yu to move closer as he began examining her body with his divine sense. Trying his best to see if he could find anything wrong with her cultivation that might have caused the formation to copse and explode.


    Sadly, this examination came up with nothing, she was normal in all possible senses of the word when it came to her cultivation. Even the foundational pir inside of her dantian was a normal foundation pir filled made out of water qi. Nothing out of the ordinary that might have disrupted her fire burning formation earlier¡­


    "E-elder Xuan¡­ Did you find anything wrong?" Sounding a bit nervous and hopeful, Fang Yu looked up at the thoughtful Xuan Hao.


    "No¡­ But I think I might find something by observing your dantian during the process, so I will have to ask you to set up the fire burning formation once again."


    Answering her and moving on to what they would be doing next before she could get disappointed, Xuan Hao''s divine sense fully focused on every small thing happening inside Fang Yu''s dantian as she slowly nodded her head before setting up the fire burning formation once again.


    Fwoosh~


    Slower thanst time, the small fire slowly appeared at the centre of the fire burning formation made by Fang Yu.


    Fwish~


    Just as the formation was about to explode once again and Fang Yu was beginning to retreat back a few steps in order to avoid the explosion, Xuan Hao managed to pick up a small abnormality appearing inside of her dantian!


    Whoosh~


    Acting at a speed way faster than Fang Yu could perceive with her current cultivation realm, Xuan Hao''s qi forcefully entered her body before she even had any time to react to what was happening.


    At this point in time, the small abnormality was about to disappear again, but Xuan Hao''s qi suddenly appeared and forcefully restrained it before it managed to hide away inside of Fang Yu''s body again.


    "What is this¡­?"


    Seeing what the small abnormality was, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a wave of confusion wash over him.


    The abnormality in question was some kind of lifeform made up of some kind of energy closely resembling qi in the shape of a small worm wriggling fearfully under the restraint of Xuan Hao''s qi.


    "E-elder X-Xuan¡­ W-what is happening?!"


    Being called back to reality as he was absorbed inspecting the small worm like creature inside of Fang Yu''s dantian, Xuan Hao was suddenly reminded about the fact that he had forcefully used his qi was currently inside of Fang Yu''s dantian¡­


    This was not something that someone only at the earlier stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm would be able to handle, as the sheer pressure of even a tiny fraction of a Domain Lord''s qi could easily destroy the dantian of a Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator¡­


    The only reason Fang Yu was still alive and well, was due to the fact that most of his qi inside her dantian was upied with restraining the weird worm like creature, thus allowing her dantian to survive for a longer than normal period of time.


    After all, forcefully entering the dantian with his qi was not the same as when he used his qi to guide Bai Ning onto the path of cultivation by helping him reach the Qi Condensation Realm. Thetter being far gentler and more controlledpared to forcefully entering without any prior preparations or warnings to the other party.


    Ssssh~


    A weird sound could be hearding from inside Fang Yu''s body, as Xuan Hao pulled out the small snake like creature in one go. No matter what, Xuan Hao could not see any good thing behind leaving a weird hostile energy lifeform inside of Fang Yu''s dantian¡­


    "Hah¡­ Hah¡­ W-what is that¡­?" Breathing in and out due to exhaustion, Fang Yu looked fearfully at the small snake like creature held in Xuan Hao''s hand around a few centimeters long.


    "No idea, I found it inside you dantian, so I thought you might have an idea as to what it is¡­"


    Saying this, Xuan Hao looked away from the small worm like creature. Only to be met with thepletely bewildered and fearful face of Fang Yu, who had still not managed toprehend the fact that the small snake like creature in Xuan Hao''s hand had been inside of her dantian just a moment ago.


    "Okay, you clearly have no idea what it is either¡­ You should rest here for a bit; I will go out and ask around and see if anyone knows anything about this little one!"


    Shaking his head upon realizing the obvious fact that Fang Yu had no idea what the snake creature inside her dantian was all about, Xuan Hao could only seal the small creature up with his qi before leaving the training ground and head towards someone who might know about the little snake.


    Leaving behind Fang Yu to recover on his mountain. Not that he thought she would be that much against it given the fact that the environment of the training ground was currently highly beneficial to her cultivation¡­


    "Now¡­ Where is Elder Song¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he floated up into the air and covered the Flying Sword Sect with his divine sense, Xuan Hao soon smiled to himself before flying over towards a certain location inside the Flying Sword Sect. The small snake like creature he had forcefully ripped out from Fang Yu''s dantian in hand.


    ¡­


    "Elder Xuan¡­ To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?"


    Standing inside of the Flying Sword Sect''s administrative buildings, Elder Song had just been going over a new batch of spiritual herbs that hade in recently. Having the help of an elder from the Alchemy Hall, who helped check if the spiritual herbs quality was fine, when Xuan Hao had suddenly appeared and asked him if he had time to talk about something.


    "I wanted to ask if you know anything about this!"


    Having already entered a small private room in the building, Xuan Hao did not bother hiding anything as he showed the small snake like creature in his hand to Elder Song.


    "This is! W-where did you find a Qi Sapping Worm!?"


    "I found it inside the dantian of an inner disciple¡­ What is a Qi Sapping Worm¡­?"


    Seeing the shocked expression on Elder Song''s face, Xuan Hao did not have any idea what the so-called Qi sapping worm was, but he could at least tell that it was something important or dangerous given Elder Song''s current expression.


    "Hm¡­ Inside the dantian of an inner disciple you say? That does not make sense¡­ A Qi Sapping Worm is extremely rare even in the Sky Empire! Who would waste something so precious to harm an inner disciple of our sect!? Unless she was unlucky enough to stumble upon a wild one that had yet to grow up and idently ended up getting infected by it¡­


    By the way, how did you find it? A Qi Sapping Worm should be close to impossible to discover. Even someone above the Domain Lord Realm would have a hard time finding it ording to some rumours I heard¡­ This is also one of the reasons that it''s considered to be so precious¡­" Completely ignoring his question, Elder Song went on talking to himself as his expression constantly shifted all over the ce as he came up with different reasons to exin the appearance of the Qi Sapping Worm.


    "I found it when I was looking for a reason as to why the disciple in question failed in keeping a fire burning formation running. Now will you exin what a Qi Sapping Worm is?"


    Not wanting to be ignored again, Xuan Hao answered quickly as he asked a bit more forcefully, he really wanted to find out what the Qi Sapping Worm was.


    After all, Elder Song had just mentioned it being rare for a power like the Sky Empire and someone above the Domain Lord Realm possibly not being able to find it after it infected someone!


    "A formation? I see, it might affect something as delicate,plicated and precise like a formation. Revealing itself for a short moment¡­" Nodding his head, satisfied with the exnation, Elder Song was just about to ask a new question when he was met with a pair of clearly impatient eyes at him not having even exined what a Qi Sapping worm is yet¡­


    "Hehe, excuse me¡­ I was just a bit curious; A Qi Sapping Worm is a rare and exotic worm that is widely known for being capable of discreetly sapping away the qi of a cultivator to enhance itself before reaching an adult stage where it will fully consume the host. The worm will then evolve into its next stage of life where it bes a demonic beast. Taking on the same cultivation realm as the host it grew up inside of.


    It is mostly considered to be so precious due to its ability of being used to secretly assassinate high level experts. There are even a few rumours that someone ones managed to infect a Soul Ascension Realm Expert with a Qi Sapping Worm without the other party knowing about it. In the end, a Soul Ascension Realm Expert died, and a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast was born¡­"


    Finishing his exnation, Elder Song looked fearfully at the Qi Sapping Worm in Xuan Hao''s hand.


    "¡­"


    Xuan Hao did not say anything and just looked down at the seemingly harmless worm in his hand. Not knowing what to say after learning how deadly the small worm was.

 Chapter 321 - Qi Sapping Worm

    <h4>Chapter 321 - Qi Sapping Worm</h4>


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    "So, what should we do with it¡­? Just kill it before it ends up infecting someone else?" Curiously looking at the small Qi Sapping Worm he was currently holding firmly in his hand, Xuan Hao asked Elder Song.


    Killing it was what he had first wanted to do, but from how Elder Song had behaved earlier, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the old man might have some other ns for the worm¡­


    "NO! Don''t kill it! We can use it to trade with the Sky Empire and get ourselves an even better position in the Sect Alliance that they are currently in the process of building up!" Almost screaming out loud upon hearing the mention of killing the worm, Elder Song reached his hands forward in a protective manner towards the small worm. Looking like he wanted to rip it out of Xuan Hao''s hands at any moment.


    "¡­ Here, you can just take care of it¡­ I still have a confused disciple to get back to¡­"


    Not wanting to have Fang Yu wait back at the training ground for too long as he talked with Elder Song, Xuan Hao decided to just throw the sealed Qi Sapping Worm over to Elder Song before taking his leave from the small private room they talked in.


    Ignoring the curious stare, he got from the Alchemy Hall Elder just outside waiting for Elder Song to continue go through the remaining spiritual herbs that had just arrived.


    Whoosh~


    Stepping out of the administrative building, Xuan Hao flew into the sky and headed back towards his mountain. Hoping that the Qi Sapping Worm was the only reason why Fang Yu had been struggling with the fire burning formation¡­


    ¡­


    Back inside of the training ground just after Xuan Hao had left to look for Elder Song to figure out what the Qi Sapping worm, he had found inside of Fang Yu''s dantian was, Fang Yu herself recovered the few small injuries Xuan Hao had unintentionally caused her during the process of extracting the Qi Sapping Worm.


    "What was that thing Elder Xuan pulled out from my dantian¡­"


    Feeling that her dantian had already recovered after only a few minutes in the current in environment filled with a dense amount of water qi, that increased the efficiency of both her recovery rate and cultivation speed, Fang Yu could not help but think of the weird worm like creature Elder Xuan had just pulled out from her dantian a few minutes ago¡­


    The entire ordeal was simply not something Fang Yu had ever imagined she would experience after stepping onto the path of cultivation¡­ Knowing that she might die in a fight with another cultivator in the future, was one thing. Having a worm like creature living inside your dantian, doing who knows what, was another thing entirely¡­


    If Elder Xuan had not discovered that worm¡­ What would have happened in the future¡­?


    Thinking about all sorts of horrifying possibilities, Fang Yu could not help but feel thankful towards Xuan Hao.


    Calming down upon thinking about the fact that Xuan Hao had already removed the worm from her dantian, Fang Yu began cultivating inside of the training ground. Feeling the enormous amount of water qi eagerly rushing towards her as she felt her cultivation speed increase!


    Fang Yu felt like something fundamental had changed inside of her, as her cultivation speed began to increase faster and faster until she managed to directly breakthrough her current realm at the Third Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm. Reaching the Fourth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    Officially going from someone at the early stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm to someone at the middle stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    Not stopping to celebrate her breakthrough, Fang Yu continued to quietly cultivate inside of the training ground as she knew an opportunity to cultivate in such a blessed environment filled with pure and dense water qi suitable for her cultivation mantra, was hard toe by in the future.


    At least she wanted to take advantage of the small opportunity she had gotten to increase her cultivation realm!


    Whoosh~


    A short distance from the training ground Fang Yu was waiting inside of, Xuan Hao quietly appeared just in time to witness Fang Yu breaking through to the Fourth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    "Guess I will wait until the cloud passes through¡­"


    Watching how greedily Fang Yu was absorbing the surrounding water qi, Xuan Hao decided to give her a little more time to cultivate. After all, the current environment inside the training ground with the cloud passing through was simply a blessing for someone like Fang Yu.


    Other than that, the cloud currently making the training ground all fogey would not stay around for much longer, as it was already about to be gone.


    Giving Fang Yu a few more minutes to cultivate as the cloud passed through would not hurt anyone¡­ Other than the cloud whose water qi was currently in the process of being absorbed¡­


    Clouds could truly be considered a blessing for cultivators who were practicing water-based cultivation mantras.


    ¡­


    "You should have recovered by now, are you ready to continue from where we left off earlier?"


    Waiting around for a few minutes outside of the training ground until the cloud had passed by and drifted off the mountain. Continuing onwards towards some unknowing location. Xuan Hao entered the training ground and walked over.


    "Elder Xuan!? I-I already recovered¡­ Do you know what that worm from earlier was? And will I be¡­ f-fine¡­?" Seeing Xuan Hao suddenly appear, Fang Yu quickly stopped cultivating. Asking the two questions, that had not left her mind ever since she had seen the worm Xuan Hao had pulled out from her dantian.


    "No need to worry about it, you will be fine. The worm has already been dealt with by me and there is nothing for you to worry about."


    Seeing the worried expression on Fang Yu''s face, Xuan Hao quickly began reassuring her without mentioning what kind of worm the Qi Sapping Worm was.


    Something that the Sky Empire wanted; he did not want news about something like that appearing inside of the Flying Sword Sect spreading outside... That would just end up attracting unwanted trouble¡­


    "What I''m more interested in, is if the worm might have had something to do with the fact that you failed with the fire burning formation for the past two years!"


    Not letting Fang Yu discover the fact that he avoided he question, Xuan Hao instead redirected her attention towards the fact that she might be able to set up the formation she had been struggling with for two years.


    "Really!?"


    Fang Yu did not notice how Xuan Hao had avoided answering what kind of worm had been inside of her dantian just a moment ago. Instead focusing her full attention towards the fact that she might finally be able toplete the fire burning formation. Officially being capable of entering the Formation Hall!


    This was understandable.. After all, she had been trying hard to enter the Formation Hall for two years straight and now she finally saw a chance for her dream toe true. The identity of the worm did not matterpared to the news that she might finally be able to set up aplete fire burning formation without it exploding after a few seconds¡­


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 Chapter 322 - Will It Explode?

    <h4>Chapter 322 - Will It Explode?</h4>


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    "Try and set up the fire burning formation again and we will find out whether it''s true or not!"


    Watching over Fang Yu, who had suddenly be extremely excited after learning that she might be able to sessfully set up a fire burning formation, Xuan Hao encouraged her to try and set up the formation.


    After all, he still had to make sure that his Sect Mission would bepleted¡­ He was also curious about how the Formation Halls strength would increase like the quest rewards said, would it be over time as Fang Yu grew up and became stronger or would it be something entirely different that caused the Formation Hall to experience a sudden increase in strength. Like one of their Formation Masters breaking through into a higher realm, them discovering a brand-new formation that would help increase their strength or maybe some strong Formation Master appearing and joining the Formation Hall.


    Xuan Hao had no idea what would happen and really wanted to find out how the system would increase the strength of the Formation Hall¡­ Although he already had a feeling that it had something to do with Fang Yu. The main subject of the sect mission!


    Fwoosh!


    Focusing on setting up the fire burning formation, Fang Yu carefully proceed to sessfully ignite the small fire in middle of the formation. Watching it burn like she had done in the past.


    Now all she needed to do was to keep it burning without the formation suddenly copsing or exploding like the past...


    Fwoosh~


    "I, I seeded!"


    Keeping an eye on the me in the middle of the fire burning formation, Fang Yu could not help but exim loudly in an excited manner.


    The small fire did not explode like it had in the past! Instead, it remainedpletely calm inside of the fire burning formation without showing any signs of exploding.


    "Looks like it did indeed have something to do with the Qi Sapping Worm¡­"


    Nodding his head with a smile on his lips, Xuan Hao could not help feeling happy for Fang Yu, as she finally managed to seed in what she had dedicated the past two years of her life towards doing.


    Honestly, Xuan Hao had no idea what he would do if the Qi Sapping Worm did not have something to do with her failing for two years straight. At that point, he might even end up failing his first ever quest from the system¡­


    "No use thinking about that¡­ Now I just need to help her take the test and officially enter the Formation Hall!"


    Muttering this to himself as he shook his head upon thinking about how he might have ended up failing the sect mission if the Qi Sapping Worm had not been rted to Fang Yu''s continues failures for the past two years, Xuan Hao felt that he had been quite lucky with the sect mission this time around.


    He almost didn''t have to do anything other than remove a worm that took minimal effort and be done with it. No need for him to try and use what little knowledge on formations he had to try and teach Fang Yu.


    Overall, Xuan Hao felt quite satisfied with how everything had gone. The only thing left for him to find out about, was where and how Fang Yu managed to get infected by the Qi Sapping Worm in the first ce¡­


    "Thanks for your help Elder Xuan! Without you, I don''t think I would ever be able to enter the Formation Hall!"


    Dispersing her fire burning formation by herself for the first time since she had learned the formation, Fang Yu happily bowed down and thanked Xuan Hao for hist help.


    Without him, she would still have that weird worm hiding inside of her dantian. Disrupting her progress when it came to setting up the fire burning formation.


    As an added bonus, she had even managed to breakthrough to the fourth stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    "No need for that, it''s only a given that I helped you out. For now, we should move over to the Formation Hall so you can officially be a member of the Formation Hall!" Feeling happy upon seeing how thankful Fang Yu was to him, Xuan Hao quickly stopped her from bowing any further before moving the conversation towards the Formation Hall.


    Helping her enter the Formation Hall was thest thing left to do before his sect mission could be considered to have beenpleted and it was still early in the morning, so there was more than enough time left for both of them to visit the Formation Hall and have her take the entrance test!


    "Yes!"


    Fang Yu happily agreed with what Xuan Hao said, as both of them soon began making their way down the mountain towards the Formation Hall.


    ¡­


    At the same time, Feng Chen and Zu Fei had finally finished cleaning up and were preparing to meet with Elder Song. Firstly, to learn about what had happened when they were gone. Secondly, they would also tell him about what happened on their end during the past few weeks that they had spent mostly inside of the Burning Mountain Range searching for the Raging me Sect''s Sect Master.


    "Hm? W-what is this?"


    Arriving inside the room that they had been informed Elder Song was currently staying inside of, both Feng Chen and Zu Fei were taken aback, as the person in question seemed extremely focused on feeding some kind of small worm on his table. Instead of working like he normally did.


    "Sect Master? Zu Fei? It''s great to see both of you have returned safely! Did you manage to deal with the Sect Master of the Raging me Sect¡­?"


    Not turning his gaze away from the small, weird worm in front of him, Elder Song asked the two of them, while remaining focused on feeding some kind of small spiritual herb to the small worm on his table.


    "Yes¡­ The Sect Master of the Raging me Sect was dealt with¡­ But I have to ask¡­ What is this worm all about? Did you perhaps find a new hobby of some sort¡­?"


    Answering truthfully, Feng Chen could not help but ask about the worm being slowly fed by Elder Song with a precious spiritual herb.


    "Ah¡­ This is-"


    Seeing both Feng Chen and Zu Fei''s doubtful and weird expressions, Elder Song quickly exined what the Qi Sapping Worm was, like he had done for Xuan Hao only a short time ago.


    Quickly causing both Feng Chen and Zu Fei to look at the small worm with both a surprised and fearful look on their faces.


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 Chapter 323 - The Formation Halls Entrance Test!

    <h4>Chapter 323 - The Formation Hall''s Entrance Test!</h4>


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    Walking in the direction of the Formation Hall, Xuan Hao did his best to not get noticed by the different elders passing by them, as it would take forever if he were to stop and be greeted by all the elders passing them on the way there. The sun was still high in the sky, so both disciples and elders were filling up the roads and streets of the Flying Sword Sect.


    The only thing making sure that he was not seen by the surrounding elders passing them, was his domain. Hiding him from the view of the elders passing by. Allowing him to walk beside Fang Yu without being greeted by every single elder passing them¡­


    He didn''t mind his current position in the slightest. The only demerit was the fact that every single elder woulde over to greet him whenever he showed up¡­ Something he could live without, as it did make it quite hard for him to move outside of his mountain.


    Luckily, this problem had been solved after reaching the Domain Lord Realm, as he could now hide himself from the elders with the help of his domain. Allowing him to freely move through the Flying Sword Sect without being stopped by someone along the way!


    Walking together with Fang Yu, Xuan Hao suddenly remembered the fact that the entrance test to the Formation Hall might only be done during a specific time of the day. Maybe they didn''t even do it every day!


    "Ah, I forgot to ask, but is there a specified time where you can take the entrance test for the Formation Hall?"


    "Hm¡­ From what I know, there is no specific time where they hold the entrance test, I would normally just go up and ask one of the elders and the elder would then conduct the test for me."


    Hearing Xuan Hao''s question, Fang Yu only thought about it for a short moment before answering confidently, she had after all been trying to ovee the entrance test of the Formation Hall for the past two years¡­


    "That''s good, I hope you are ready. After today, you will officially be a member of the Formation Hall!"


    "T-thank you¡­"


    Blushing a bit shyly upon hearing Xuan Hao suddenly tell her that she would pass the test so confidently, she also had to make her grandmother proud!


    Thinking about all of this, Fang Yu felt even more motivated to seed inpleting the entrance test of the Formation Hall!


    ¡­


    "You''re here to take the entrance test again¡­?"


    Arriving at the Formation Hall, Xuan Hao decided to just watch over Fang Yu from behind as she went over towards one of the elders standing just outside the Formation Hall.


    He did not want to idently influence the elders of the Formation Hall by being there¡­ Having Fang Yu do it by herself would be more suitable, as the elders of the Formation Hall would not give her any kind of favourable treatment or decided to just let her enter because he was there to support her.


    In the end, Xuan Hao feared that doing something like that would end up resulting in the sect mission from the system failing¡­


    "Yes!"


    "Hah¡­ Follow me, we will do it in the usual location¡­" Sighing a bit upon hearing her answer, the elder seemed to have already tested Fang Yu in the past.


    Whoosh~


    Soon, both of them left towards a small area located behind the Formation Hall with Xuan Hao secretly following behind. Devoid of any disciples and elders walking around like the entrance of the Formation Hall.


    At most, there were a few elders situated in a corner drinking some kind of brownish liquid together with a smile on their lips as they chatted among each other.


    Stopping for a short moment to look over towards the elder and Fang Yu who had just arrived.


    "Oh, it''s the little girl again! What was her name¡­ Fang Yu? It''s been quite some time since she came to try and beat the entrance testst time¡­ Perhaps she finally managed to beat thest part and learned the fire burning formation?"


    "Haha, I hope so! It''s rare to see any disciples as dedicated as that little girl!"


    "Pft, who are you fooling? You are just after her dear grandmother!"


    "You!"


    "What? Was I wrong?"


    "Haha, you indeed got him this time around!"


    Listening in on the three elders chatting together, Xuan Hao heard something quite interesting. Apparently, they already knew about Fang Yu and thought well of her. At least two of the elders did. Thest one was questionable¡­ Maybe he should warn Fang Yu''s grandmother when he handed her back¡­?


    ¡­


    "Are you ready?"


    "Yes!"


    Having arrived in the small peaceful area located behind the Formation Hall, Fang Yu gazed over at the three elders observing her from the distance out of the corner of her eye before focusing back at the elder that was going to administer her entrance test. Nodding her head as she signalled that she was ready for the test.


    "Great! I don''t think I have to exin what the test is all about, so let''s start with the formation for increasing the temperature in a small area!"


    Nodding his head approvingly after seeing how confident and obedient Fang Yu was, the elder took a few steps back. Giving some space for Fang Yu to set up her first formation.


    Whoosh~


    Not holding back in the slightest after seeing that the elder had moved out of the way, Fang Yu immediately began setting up the formation and within only a few seconds, she had finished and could easily increase the temperature inside of her formation by a few degrees.


    "Good! Looks like you improved since thest time I saw you! You can move onto the formation for decreasing the temperature!" Nodding his head approvingly as he inspected the formation, the elder soon gave her the go for setting up the next formation.


    "Yes!"


    Whoosh~


    Following what the elder had told her, Fang Yu undid her first formation and began setting up the second formation for decreasing the temperature inside the small area covered by the formation.


    Soon, a second formation appeared in front of Fang Yu, who quickly disyed the use of the formation by decreasing the temperature inside of it by a few degrees.


    "It really looks like you have had a breakthrough sincest time I saw you, I still remember that you struggled quite a bit to keep up this formation back then. Only just barely passing! But now it looks like you are easily able to do it¡­"


    Smiling at Fang Yu as he nodded his head approvingly at her once again, the elder began to feel like Fang Yu might have a chance to finally break free from her cycle of constant failures and officially pass the entrance test and enter the Formation Hall!


    "Now for thest formation¡­ The fire burning formation¡­ Are you ready, Fang Yu?" Having a serious look on his face for once, the elder asked Fang Yu, even using her name.


    "Yes!"


    Not wavering in the slightest, Fang Yu nodded her head confidently as she answered the elder.


    "That is good, then I hope you will show me how much you improved sincest time!"


    Encouraging Fang Yu onest time, the elder took a few more steps back to give a proper amount of space to Fang Yu.


    "Hah¡­"


    Whoosh~


    Taking a deep breath, Fang Yu calmed down before she began to set up the fire burning formation. Doing her best to replicate how she had done it when she had seed for the first time back in Xuan Hao''s training ground.


    Fwoosh!


    A small fire suddenly ignited. Signalling the fact that the formation had officially been set up!


    Fwoosh~


    A few seconds slowly passed with the elder nervously keeping an eye on the small fire. Making sure that it did not explode like it had in the past.


    "You really did it!"


    It was only after a little over ten seconds had passed, that the elder finally calmed down before walking over to inspect Fang Yu''s formation with a happy smile on his face.


    "Congrattions, Fang Yu, you can now be considered a member of the Formation Hall!"


    The elder felt extremely happy saying this to Fang Yu, he knew very well how much it meant for her. After all, he was among one of the elders that had watched how hard she had tried improving over the past years to pass the entrance test and enter the Formation Hall. Other disciples would simply give up and move on to another profession or just focus purely on improving their cultivation.


    Not Fang Yu! She had kept trying, until she finally seeded in entering the Formation Hall today!


    The joy and tion Fang Yu felt upon hearing the elder saying that she was now a member of the Formation Hall, was immeasurable!


    ¡­


    "Wow, I never expected that little girl to finally seed¡­"


    "Indeed, I for sure thought that fire burning formation would end up exploding like it did in the past¡­ She really did improve a lot sincest time¡­"


    "Now she will be a member of the Formation Hall! Do you guys think her grandmother wille over from time to time to check in on her? Maybe she might finallye back to the Formation Hall again!"


    ""¡­""


    "W-what¡­? Why are both of you looking at me like that!?"


    "Hah¡­ This idiot¡­"


    "This guy¡­ Was it not your fault she decided to leave in the first ce?"


    "¡­"


    Back at the corner of the small area, Xuan Hao listened to the conversation among the three elders.


    "It looks like Fang Yu will have a hard time in the future¡­" Muttering this to himself while looking at one specific elder among the three, Xuan Hao left the small area and returned to his former spot in front of the Formation Hall where he had been standing before Fang Yu left with the elder to take the entrance test.


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 Chapter 324 - Qi Gathering Formation

    <h4>Chapter 324 - Qi Gathering Formation</h4>


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    "Thank you so much for your help, Elder Xuan! I couldn''t have done it without your help!"


    After Fang Yu had officially managed to pass the entrance test for the Formation Hall, the first thing she did, was rush back out of the formation hall to thank Xuan Hao.


    "No problem, it''s natural for an elder like me to help disciples like you whenever there is a problem." Trying his best to act like a wise elder by copying how he had seen Elder Song interact with disciples from time to time, Xuan Hao reassured Fang Yu before turning to look at the elder that had followed behind her out of the Formation Hall.


    "Well, it looks like you still have to officially register at the Formation Hall, so I won''t be standing around here any longer and just let you finish your registration procedures." Before the elder from the Formation Hall could react, Xuan Hao waved goodbye to Fang Yu before silently taking his leave. Not giving the elder any chance to talk with him.


    If that happened, he might end up stuck at the entrance of the Formation Hall talking with the different elders of the Formation Hall¡­


    "Farewell, Elder Xuan!"


    Not finding it weird that Xuan Hao left after seeing she had managed to pass the entrance test, Fang Yu just smiled happily as she waved goodbye to Xuan Hao, who soonpletely disappeared from view even before she finished saying her goodbyes.


    After registering, she would also have to go and visit her grandmother to deliver the good news of her finally passing the entrance test and entering the Formation Hall!


    "E-elder Xuan¡­?"


    The eldering out together with Fang Yu could not help but stare over in the direction Xuan Hao left. Slowly beginning to realize what just happened and who the person helping Fang Yu had been.


    However, this only caused the elder to grow confused¡­


    Elder Xuan was skilled in formations¡­? Had he not just found out that Elder Xuan was also skilled when it came to alchemy from one of his good friends at the Alchemy Hall¡­?


    Howe he was skilled enough in formations to even help Fang Yu ovee the test she had struggled with for two years straight!?


    All the elders from the Formation Hall had already tried their best to help her our in the past! But no one had seeded, yet Elder Xuan had done it!


    "Hah¡­ I really can''t underestimate the Core Elders¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked back down at Fang Yu still happily waving in the direction Xuan Hao had left in. The Elder soon made his way back into the Formation Hall together with Fang Yu to get her officially registered as a member of the Formation Hall.


    ¡­


    [Sect Mission: Help the young disciple trying to enter the Formation Hall plete)]


    [Description: The young inner disciple of your sect, Fang Yu, has been trying to enter the Formation Hall for the past two years without any sess even with the close to non-existent test difficulty. Find out the reason and help her enter the Formation Hall.


    [Reward: Qi Gathering Formation Blueprint, Strength of the Formation Hall will increase]


    [Redeem]: [Y/N]


    Having made his way back to his pavilion, Xuan Hao brought the sect mission given by the system up before quickly redeeming the reward.


    Whoosh~


    Arge influx of information suddenly filled up his mind, as the information on how to set up a Qi Gathering Formation was imprinted into his sea of consciousness like the alchemy knowledge and different potion recipes had done in the past after he redeem them.


    The overall process onlysted for a split second before the information had been imprinted into his consciousness.


    The only thing hecked for actually setting up the Qi Gathering Formation himself, was the rare materials required for it and bing a stronger Formation Master. Meaning, the current him had no way to set up a Qi Gathering Formation at the moment¡­


    But even then, he still learned just how useful and important a Qi Gathering Formation was, the formation itself being capable of absorbing the surrounding qi between heaven and earth over arge area before concentrating the qi inside of the Qi Gathering Formation was good...


    But this was not the main use of the Qi Gathering Formation¡­


    The main use of the Qi Gathering Formation was its ability to gather and absorb the purer qi from high up in the sky! The higher up the Qi Gathering Formation was built, the higher quality qi it would be able to gather from above!


    For example, if a Qi Gathering Formation was built of the ground where most of the Flying Sword Sect''s disciples were living, they would be able to enjoy living in an environment with more qi and purer qi than the tallest mountain peak of the Flying Sword Sect where the Sect Master lived!


    Sadly, the resource requirements for setting up the Qi Gathering Formation was way too steep for the current Flying Sword Sect. The main reason for this being the fact that it would require several different Mystic Grade materials! Outside of that, the core material of the Qi Gathering Formation was Transcendent Grade above the Mystic Grade!


    It had to be said that Mystic Grade was something Domain Lords would fight to the death over, while Transcendent Grade materials, metals, or spiritual herbs, was something Ascension Realm Experts would fight to the death over!


    Not really something that was easy toe by, yet the Qi Gathering Formation required something from that grade¡­


    Xuan Hao could only put his ideas of setting up a Qi Gathering Formation aside for the future. For now, it would be far too difficult for the current him to set up a Qi Gathering Formation and he would also have to worry about what would happen if a Soul Ascension Realm Expert passed by and saw it¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao instead focused on the second part of the reward that would increase the strength of the Formation Hall but found out that nothing had really happened even after he had redeemed the reward from the system.


    Whoosh~


    Checking up on the Formation Hall to see if anything had happened, Xuan Hao could only return empty handed.


    Perhaps the increase in strength mentioned by the system, really did have something to do with Fang Yu. Now he would just have to wait for her to grow up before the Formation Hall would see an increase in strength¡­


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 Chapter 325 - Third Stage Of The Domain Lord Realm!

    <h4>Chapter 325 - Third Stage Of The Domain Lord Realm!</h4>


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    "Qing Yi and Chu Yang should be returning soon; I should use thest few days with only Bai Ning around to use the reward from the system¡­"


    Back at his pavilion, Xuan Hao had decided to use the cultivation reward given by the system immediately instead of waiting until he broke through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm by himself. The main reason for this being the fact that he discovered the fact that the system had a 48-hour time limit for him to redeem the cultivation increase reward in ce¡­


    Given that he had already spent over a day since hepleted the knowledge quest from the system, Xuan Hao did not want to idently end up losing the opportunity to increase his cultivation realm due to something urgenting up.


    Whoosh~


    Having made up his mind, Xuan Hao returned to his room and closed off the door before sealing the surrounding environment off with his domain. Making sure no one woulde in and interrupt him during the breakthrough.


    [Reward: Cultivation Increase of one Minor Realm]


    [Redeem]: [Y/N]


    Yes!


    Bringing up the system, Xuan Hao proceeded to redeem the reward before he suddenly felt an enormous influx of qi coursing through his entire body.


    Whoosh!


    Not only was it an influx of qi, but a vast amount of information also began to fill up his mind. Expanding his knowledge about his sword domain, while at the same time increasing the strength of his soul.


    Boom!


    The entire processsted only for a little over five minutes before the influx of both qi and information came to a stop. Leaving Xuan Hao alone to absorb the vast sea of pure qi flowing through his body together with the information.


    At the very least, the strength increase to his soul was not something he had to do himself, as the system did it for him. Allowing his soul to grow even stronger without much effort.


    ¡­


    Boom!


    Spending the rest of the day along with the night, Xuan Hao managed to absorb all of the pure qi inside of his body. Breaking through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    The only thingcking behind at the moment was his domain, that had still not increased in strength even after he reached the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Xuan Hao, However, was not worried about this. The main reason for this being that the increase in strength to his domain came from the information that the system had inserted into him earlier! After spending some time fullyprehending the information that the system had imparted onto him, his domain would be able to catch up with his current cultivation realm.


    This was also the first time Xuan Hao found out that he would not have to increase the strength of his Domain to breakthrough to the next stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­ But he had a feeling that if he wanted to breakthrough to the next major realm, the Soul Ascension Realm, he should not neglect increasing the strength of his domain¡­


    Thinking about all of this, Xuan Hao spread out his divine sense and began checking up on the current situation of his third disciple along with the rest of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Not surprised at all upon finding out that his disciple was still asleep in his room, it was after all early in the morning and the rest of the Flying Sword Sect was no different, with only a few elders and disciple walking around the sect.


    Xuan Hao honestly felt a bit disappointed when he noticed the fact that most of the people who were up early today were instead just peopleing back to the sect after a night out¡­ Even worse, most of those people were the elders¡­


    Maybe the elders of the Flying Sword Sect are a little too carefree¡­?


    Wondering this to himself as he shook his head in disappointment, Xuan Hao began to look forward to the time when the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect merged together. At that time, the elders of the Spring Flower Sect should be able to whip the elders of the Flying Sword Sect into shape, or at the very least serve as a rival.


    After all, when all was said and done, there was no way those old people would be able to tolerate the fact that the younger generation would begin to respect the elders of the Spring Flower Sect more than them¡­


    Xuan Hao looked forward to that point in time and even contemted whether he should go and visit the sect master to speed the merger between the two sects up.


    He already knew that there was a lot of boring stuff involved in the merger that Elder Song was taking care of, like how resources would be managed in the future, how to monitor and keep the sects along with other powers inside their territory in check¡­


    The list continued of things to do continued on for an ungodly length and Xuan Hao had to praise Elder Song for his expertise in putting forth solutions for all these problems so quickly¡­


    "Let''s go and see if there is something I can help out with¡­"


    Not knowing if there really was anything he could do to speed up the merger between the two sects, Xuan Hao still decided to go and see if he could help with anything.


    After all, if the Flying Sword Sect increased in strength and the amount ofnd that they covered increased, he would be able to have ess to arge pool of potential disciples¡­ The more people showed up, the higher the chances of someone with good talent showing up would be!


    The stronger the Flying Sword Sect, the easier it would be for him to recruit talented disciples!


    Going out and searching all over the world for talented disciples was not something he wanted to spend his time doing. The danger and time involved in doing something like that was way higher than just staying in one ce letting the talented disciplese to him by themselves¡­


    Coming to this conclusion, Xuan Hao decided that he would help increase the strength of the Flying Sword Sect!


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 Chapter 326 - Future Sect Location!

    <h4>Chapter 326 - Future Sect Location!</h4>


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    Whoosh~


    Leaving his pavilion behind, Xuan Hao headed over in the direction that he had sensed Feng Chen''s aura. Hoping that he had something for him to help out with to maybe help speed up the process of the merger between the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect.


    Not really realizing the fact that it was still early in the morning and the first few rays from the sun had just barely appeared, as the shone down on the Flying Sword Sect.


    ¡­


    At the same time, Feng Chen was sleeping peaceful inside of his pavilion. Having decided to get some proper rest instead of meditating through the night after spending thest few days being chased by a weird fruit and encountering countless dangerous situations.


    The mental strain he had experienced during that time was not something that would easily go away without a proper rest¡­


    "Feng Chen! Are you there?"


    It was during that peaceful time of recovery, that a familiar voice suddenly echoed through his head. Forcefully interrupting his sleep!


    Whoosh!


    "W-what is it¡­?"


    Feeling a bit annoyed at the fact that he had just been woken up, Feng Chen still put up with it and rushed out of his pavilion to meet Xuan Hao. After all, something serious might have happened to the sect! If that was the case, it would require his attention! Even if he wanted to sleep for a few more hours¡­


    "Ah, I just wanted if there was something I could help out with to speed up the merger between our sect and the Spring Flower Sect. Now that everyone is still asleep, I don''t really have much to do outside of cultivating and felt like I wanted to help out a bit for once¡­"


    "¡­"


    Not realizing the fact that Feng Chen''s face slowly grew darker upon listening to what he said, Xuan Hao exined his reason for showing up so early.


    "Hm¡­" Still feeling a little annoyed at the fact that he had just been woken up by Xuan Hao, Feng Chen thought about Xuan Hao''s question for a short moment.


    "If you are looking for some way to help up with the merger, you could help see if there is any suitable location to move the sect to. After all, we will soon have a huge influx of new people¡­ You can try visiting the Shattered Star Peaks, with your current strength you should be able to visit the Main Peak! Try and see if you can find a way to deal with the chaotic qi up there as well!"


    The Shattered Star Peaks was by far the best location to relocate the Flying Sword Sect in the future. The ce was wayrger than the current Flying Sword Sect and at the same time also had a way better cultivation environment, if the chaotic qi could be dealt with properly¡­


    Sending Xuan Hao to check it out and see if he could find anything at the Main Peak was a good way to have him help out. At the same time, he would also be able to return back to his pavilion and get a few more hours of sleep before the rest of the sect began waking up¡­


    "The Shattered Star Peaks¡­? Got it! I will go and check out the main peak and see if I can find a way to deal with the chaotic qi!"


    Whoosh!


    Leaving Feng Chen behind. Not noticing anything wrong with what Feng Chen had said, Xuan Hao flew in the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks. Remembering the time that he had visited the ce with Qing Yi and Chu Yang in the past.


    Back then, he could clearly feel how damaging the chaotic qi would be someone if they were not protected from it. The only thing that he could think of that protected someone from the chaotic qi to some degree, was the lotus flower tforms located on the summit of the Third Star Peak.


    Xuan Hao already knew that he had no way to replicate the lotus flower tforms at his current level, but he had another way to deal with the chaotic qi that he had just learned recently and that was the Qi Gathering Formation!


    The Qi Gathering Formation did not only gather qi from the surrounding environment and the sky above but would also purify the qi to some degree and make it easier to absorb for the cultivator.


    In essence, the Qi Gathering Formation could be used to neutralize the chaotic qi on the Shattered Star Peaks!


    Now the only thing he needed was resources enough to support the creation of nine giant Qi Gathering Formations to cover each of the Nine Mountains¡­ Not really something that was doable given his current situation¡­


    "At least the Flying Sword Sect should be able to move to the Shattered Star Peaks in the future after I find the resources needed for the Qi Gathering Formations¡­" Muttering this to himself while flying towards the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao soon found himself at the small city located at the base of the Ninth Star Peak.


    The city had not changed since he had visited with Qing Yi and Chu Yang in the past, but it was only at this moment that Xuan Hao realized just how small the town waspared to the Ninth Star Peak.


    Even the smallest of the Nine Star Peaks was enormous! Far beyond any mountain in the Flying Sword Sect!


    Whoosh~


    Flying over the entrance that he had gone throughst time he was there, Xuan Hao soon arrived at the summit of the Ninth Peak. Overlooking therge forest spreading on for miles on end.


    Inspecting therge forest from the air, Xuan Hao could truly feel howrge the Ninth Star Peak waspared to the Flying Sword Sect.


    Just the sheer size of the summit with the lush forest growing on it was more thanrge enough to house the entire Flying Sword Sect!


    Even getting one Qi Gathering Formation put in ce on top of one of the Shattered Star Peaks, would be more than enough for the current Flying Sword Sect and they would also be able to grow in the future by expanding onto the other Star Peaks¡­


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 Chapter 327 - Finding An Old Friend Of Chi Hu

    <h4>Chapter 327 - Finding An Old Friend Of Chi Hu</h4>


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    Looking down on the lush forest below him, Xuan Hao felt a bit surprised upon noticing therge number of people searching for spiritual herbs inside of the forest.


    Compared to thest time he had gone through the forest with Qing Yi and Chu Yang, there were far fewer people and Xuan Hao had not expected for there to be such arge influx of new people showing up to search for spiritual herbs¡­ Maybe it was rted to the copse of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao decided to see if he could find anything inmon between the people inside the lush forest below him and soon enough, he did find a simrity between arge part of the people searching for spiritual herbs.


    The simrity in question, was the fact that most of the people hade from the copsing Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Most of them hade to search for a new ce to settle down, while others just hoped to earn a few spirit stones from gathering spiritual herbs at the Ninth Star Peak before leaving the territory of what was considered the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Even if that territory was not in the control of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. The people still feared that sects like the Flying Sword Sect, Spring Flower Sect and Seven Fates Sect, would soon copse just like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­


    After all, most ordinary cultivators and citizen of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had no idea how the kingdom worked and just believed that the Royal Family was in control of everything inside of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom! After the copse of the Royal Family of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, it would only be natural for the rest of the territories under the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to copse like they had¡­


    There was some truth behind that belief, as most kingdoms were far stronger than the sects and other powers that existed inside their border and so, when those kingdoms fell, so would all the powers beneath them¡­


    The Heavenly Sky Kingdom was an abnormality in that sense, where the sects were stronger than the Royal Family.


    "Hm?"


    Flying towards the Main Star Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao came to a stop above the Third Star Peak where he had met Chi Hu in the past before he broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Back then, Chi Hu hade to the Third Star Peak to enter a final meditation. Attempting to breakthrough to the next major realm or die to the chaotic qi!


    Xuan Hao remembered that Chi Hu hade together with a group of old friends and grew a bit curious, as he could not help himself from scanning the Third Star Peak with his divine sense.


    A long time had already passed since he had been to the Third Star Peak and he doubted any of Chi Hu''s old friends would still be around, as most people who came to the Third Star Peak would at mostst a single month before breaking through or dying to the chaotic qi.


    Even if the lotus flower tform could protect the people cultivating on top of it to some degree from the chaotic qi, it was not able topletely protect them.


    As a result, the people cultivating on top of the Third Star Peak would perish from the corrosion and other damaging effects brought on by absorbing the chaotic qi¡­


    "One of them is actually still alive¡­?" Staring down towards a lotus flower tform located towards the edge of the summit, Xuan Hao could not help but exim in a surprised tone.


    Among the elders that had gone up together with Chi Hu, Xuan Hao could clearly remember that each of them had been one step into the grave, while at the same time being at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm!


    Even then, for one of them to have survived on top of the Third Star Peak¡­ Xuan Hao felt a bit curious towards this individual¡­


    Whoosh~


    Secretly descending from above, Xuan Haonded only a few meters away from the flower lotus tform that one of Chi Hu''s old friends were meditating on, it was also at this moment that Xuan Hao realized that the elder in question had managed to breakthrough into what could be considered the half a step into the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Hah¡­ She is too weak to take the final step into the Nascent Soul Realm¡­"


    The person in question was an elderly woman and after inspecting her current situation with his divine sense, Xuan Hao quickly found out why she had not broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm yet.


    Her body had weakened far too much due to the corrosion of the chaotic qi and it was a wonder how she had managed to stay alive for so long.


    If she broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm in her current state, Xuan Hao could easily predict her oue. The Cloud Tribtion would descend and attempt to merge with her newly born Nascent Soul, this in turn would put an enormous stress on both her newly born Nascent Soul along with her half dead physical body¡­ In the end, she would just end up dying after breaking through¡­


    "Hm¡­ Should I help her¡­?"


    Taking out thest purification pill in his possession, Xuan Hao felt a bit conflicted.


    On one side, he could give the purification pill to Chi Hu''s old friend. The purification pill would purge all the chaotic qi from her body and at the same time strengthen her soul. Allowing her to recover and have a chance at living through the Cloud Tribtion.


    On the other side, he didn''t really know much about the olddy other than the fact that she was an old friend of Chi Hu, who hade to the Third Star Peak to take onest shot at trying to breakthrough and reach the next major realm.


    Giving her hisst purification pill seemed to be quite wastefulpared to giving it to someone from the Flying Sword Sect¡­ But if he saved her, Chi Hu would surely be grateful towards him and the Flying Sword Sect. Maybe he could even convince her to join the Flying Sword Sect like her old friend Chi Hu¡­


    "Hah¡­ What to do?"


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 Chapter 328 - Helping Chi Hus Old Friend

    <h4>Chapter 328 - Helping Chi Hu''s Old Friend</h4>


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    Wondering what to do as he looked over at the olddy on the lotus flower tform in front of him, Xuan Hao began to feel her body slowly begin deteriorating at an increased speedpared to just a few seconds ago.


    "How convenient¡­"


    Not having a lot of time left before the old friend of Chi Hu decided to kick the bucket, Xuan Hao stepped up on the lotus flower tform before walking over beside the dying woman, who didn''t even notice him when he was standing right next to her. Fully focused on trying to look for a way out of her current situation, while still staying alive in the process.


    Sadly, her body did not work with her and just kept getting worse and worse with each passing second. The chaotic qi now having already begun to fill up every corner of her body as it ravaged through her meridians and dantian.


    Xuan Hao could clearly see this happening through his divine sense, and he knew that she was about to enter the final state of herst meditation on the Third Star Peak.


    At that point, the chaotic qi would end uppletely recing any of the cultivator''s normal qi and slowly devour them from the inside in a process that took less than a minute. Leaving behind nothing of the former cultivator outside of the clothes and precious items they might have been carrying before their death.


    These items would normally be taken away by some cultivators that came to the Third Star Peak to look for an opportunity to strike it rich looting what some of the old experts might have left behind.


    The only thing stopping these people from not just outright robbing them of their precious items when they were still alive, was due to the fact that the other experts in or about to enter theirst meditation, would likely kill them¡­


    For this reason, these people would have to be sneaky when doing thing. Only striking when their target had already passed away.


    Xuan Hao could already feel a few other people behind him, that had noticed the fact that the old woman in front of him was nearing her end and had begun moving closer towards the lotus flower tform where she was located.


    "Hey! What do you think you are doi-"


    Seeing one of the people in question walk up to scold him or something along that line because he thought he was there to go after the thing left behind after the old woman passed away, Xuan Hao did not even bother waiting for him to finish.


    Bang!


    Whoosh~


    Directlyunching the poor fe flying off the side of the Third Star Peak¡­


    ""¡­""


    The other people who were about toe forward and back up their friend in calling out Xuan Hao in an attempt to get some of the old experts to deal with him, stopped as they looked over at Xuan Hao fearfully before wisely backing off. Not daring to say anything.


    The few Core Formation Experts paying attention to what was happening also stopped as they decided not to interfere in what Xuan Hao was doing.


    Given his strength was at least around their level, they were almost certain that he would not bother about the things that they were carrying with them for theirst attempt at breaking through to the next major realm.


    After all, beforeing to the Third Star Peak, they would have left most of what precious artifacts and spirit stones they had left somewhere safe or given it to their friends or family just in case they didn''t make it back again¡­


    What little they had left, was of no use to someone like themselves¡­ Therefore, most of the Core Formation Experts keeping an eye on what was happening thought that Xuan Hao might have been a friend of the old woman or maybe even a rtive that hade to say goodbye before she passed on¡­


    What are these old people thinking about¡­?


    Seeing the weirdly sympathetic looks that the surrounding Core Formation Experts gave him, Xuan Hao had no idea whether tough or cry.


    Hah¡­ No use thinking about what these old people are thinking about, I have to act fast if I want to save this old friend of Chi Hu¡­


    Shaking his head as he ignored the looks of the surrounding people, Xuan Hao spread out his domain and isted the lotus flower tform that he and the old woman was on.


    Having isted the lotus flower tform from the outside world, Xuan Hao quickly made it impossible for the people outside to see what was happening inside.


    "Y-you¡­ You are¡­ T-that elder¡­ C-Chi Hu-¡­"


    The old woman did not seem to bepletely unaware of what was going on in the outside world. Opening her eyes as she looked over at Xuan Hao while trying to ask him something.


    "Yes, I''m the elder from the Flying Sword Sect that recruited Chi Hu."


    Understanding what she wanted to ask without hearing her full sentence, Xuan Hao answered truthfully. Not wanting to hide his origins in the first ce.


    "W-why¡­ A-are you¡­ H-here¡­?"


    Barely getting four words out before she could no longer continue, the old woman asked Xuan Hao in a clearly confused voice. Not understanding why, he hade to visit her.


    "I was passing by and found out that one of the people who were with Chi Hu back then was still alive. After that I decided toe over and see if there was anything I could help with, Chi Hu is after all a member of the Flying Sword Sect now and its only normal for me to help him look out for his friends!"


    Saying this, Xuan Hao could see the old woman growing a bit emotional as a relieved expression clearly appeared on her face after hearing Chi Hu was fine.


    "T-that''s¡­ Great¡­"


    Not saying anything more, the old woman slowly closed her eyes again. At the same time, Xuan Hao clearly felt the body of the old woman grow even weaker.


    "Eat this!"


    Knowing that he didn''t have any time left before the old woman left this world, Xuan Hao only said these two words before forcing her mouth open with his domain before the Purification pill floated off his hand and into the now open mouth of the old woman.


    "¡­!"


    Not able to say anything as she felt her mouth being pried open before a pill of some sort entered it, the old woman could do nothing. Only able to watch as the pill dissolved into arge amount of energy that coursed through her body. Purging any and all the chaotic qi inside of her in an instant before rushing towards her dantian.


    "Wha-?"


    Having recovered some of her strength after the chaotic qi had left her body, the old woman could only look over at Xuan Hao with a confused expression on her face before the energy from the purification pill finally reached her dantian.


    "Argh!"


    Like what Elder Song had gone through in the past, Xuan Hao watched from the side as the energy from the purification pill rushed into her core floating at the centre of her dantian.


    "AH!"


    However,pared to the past when Elder Song had experienced this, Xuan Hao remainedpletely calm as he listened to the pained screams of the old friend of Chi Hu.


    Crack~


    Like what had happened with Elder Song, Xuan Hao watched on as he observed several small cracks appearing on the golden core of the old woman.


    Boom!


    The old woman''s aura began changing rapidly as her golden core broke apart and gave birth to her nascent soul in the shape of a small ball of light that remained floating quietly at the centre of her dantian.


    Feeling the aura of the old woman, Xuan Hao could not help but feel happy that he had sealed off the lotus flower tform. Preventing the aura from spreading out and alerting every single person on the Third Star Peak.


    "It''s here¡­"


    Just as the Nascent Soul had been born, a small cloud appeared inside of the old woman''s dantian.


    The cloud was different from the cloud tribtions Xuan Hao had seen in the past, beingpletely silver without a single hint of gold in it.


    Swoosh~


    Flying over, the silver cloud did not wait around for the old woman to recover after her breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm, as it began merging together with the newly born Nascent Soul.


    Boom!


    Like he had done in the past, Xuan Hao stood on the side and carefully observed the process of the silver cloud merging together with the newly born Nascent Soul.


    At least the energy brought into her body by the purification pill had helped remove the chaotic qi inside of her and rejuvenated her strength to some degree, but even then, Xuan Hao had no idea whether she would be able to survive.


    There was nothing more he could do to help. At this point, he could only hope that she would be able survive her cloud tribtion and sessfully reach the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


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 Chapter 329 - Zhu Lian

    <h4>Chapter 329 - Zhu Lian</h4>


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    At the same time that Xuan Hao was helping Chi Hu''s old friend with making a breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm, his two disciples had managed to finish their first sect mission. Dealing with the bandit group before making their way towards the River Sect to gather the Pure Heart Spirit Grass at the Pure Heart Lake.


    Even if both Chu Yang and Qing Yi had somewhate to know about the current situation of the River Sect, it was not something they could get involved in at their cultivation realm. The most they could do, wasplete the sect mission before making their way back to the Flying Sword Sect and informing them.


    Letting the Flying Sword Sect decide how they would deal with those sects¡­


    "Are you going to return to the River Sect, or will you be following us to the Pure Heart Lake?"


    Walking along the road leading away from the Red Flower Ridge where they had dealt with the bandits just a few hours ago, Chu Yang could not help but turn around and ask Huang Yongyu with a curious look on his face.


    After all, Huang Yongyu going to the Pure Heart Lake where all of his sect''s enemies had gathered together, was nothing short of asking for trouble.


    Chu Yang also doubted that he and Qing Yi would be able to keep him safe when going there¡­


    Both of them were protected by their identity as disciples of the Flying Sword Sect, they would not dare to kill them or harm in fear of the Flying Sword Sects retaliation!


    Huang Yongyu was different, as the experts from the enemy sects might decide to secretly kill off Huang Yongyu.


    Their current cultivation was simply way too low to find out if someone at the Core Formation Realm sneaked up on them before killing Huang Yongyu and escaping.


    If something like that happened, there was nothing Chu Yang or Qing Yi would be able to do.


    "I¡­ I will be following you to the Pure Heart Lake¡­ The sects would just think that our sect send out someone below the Foundation Establishment Realm and would not care about sending someone to kill me.


    The area covered by the Pure Heart Lake is alsorge and the sects are mostly concentrated in the area closer to my sect, so we should be fine as long as we don''t move around the area that those sects have under their control¡­"


    Thinking about it for a short moment, Huang Yongyu answered Chu Yang with a determined look on his face.


    He had finally gotten the opportunity to wander out from his sect, there was no way he would willingly return if he had a chance to continue adventuring together with Chu Yang and Qing Yi!


    "Fine¡­ We should be get going before they find out about what happened to the bandit group here. Given that they were about to move when we attack them, we might have a few days. Maybe even a week or more left before the sects find out about what happened here!"


    Nodding his head after seeing how determined Huang Yongyu was to follow them, Chu Yang agreed to letting Huang Yongyu follow them to the Pure Heart Lake before reminding both him and Qing Yi that they needed to get moving.


    Roar~


    Moving down the Red Flower Ridge to the ce where they had left the demon beast behind. The group of three soon stopped the demon beast in questionzily rxing beneath a tree with a half-eaten rabbit in its mouth.


    "Let''s get going!"


    Following Chu Yang, the three soon climbed up the demon beasts back before ordering it to get up.


    Roar!


    The demon beast could only swallow what remained of the rabbit as it reluctantly rose up from itsfy spot in the shade provided by the tree. Moving in the direction of the Pure Heart Lake.


    ¡­


    Back at the Third Star Peak, Xuan Hao watched over the old woman as she the silver cloud slowlypletely merged together with her soul.


    Boom!


    The aura of the old woman suddenly reached a brand-new level, as Xuan Hao felt thest bit of the silver cloud being absorbed by the new-born nascent soul.


    "Congrattions on reaching the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    "I-"


    Congratting the old woman with a slight smile on his lips, Xuan Hao watched as she slowly opened her eyes and looked up at him with a confused expression on her face. Clearly still not knowing why he had decided to help her reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The pill that he had given to her was surely something incredibly precious, it had after all helped her expel the chaotic qi inside of her body and even helped her breakthrough and reach the Nascent Soul Realm!


    But this was not the most important thing! The old woman could clearly feel that her soul had undergone aplete transformation.


    Compared to the past, she felt like it would be easier to improve her cultivation in the future!


    All of these thingsbined left the old woman even more confused. Failing to understand what she had done to deserve something like that¡­


    "Don''t worry so much about it, you''re a friend of Chi Hu. Given that he is also a member of the Flying Sword Sect now, it''s only natural to help out! By the way, I never managed to get your name¡­"


    Interrupting the old woman''s train of thought, Xuan Hao quickly rified the fact that he had helped her because of Chi Hu and the fact that he was a member of the Flying Sword Sect. Trying not so subtly to influence the old woman''s perception of the Flying Sword Sect to be a positive one.


    Nodding her head, a bit nervously as she listened to what Xuan Hao said, Zhu Lian quickly moved her exhausted body in front of him before bowing deeply towards Xuan Hao full of gratitude. Expressing her sincere thanks for his help.


    "My name is Zhu Lian¡­ Please ept my bow, I can''t even begin to repay you for saving me earlier!"


    Zhu Lian knew very well how she would have ended up without Xuan Hao''s help, so her thanks came from the depth of her heart.


    "No need to worry about it¡­"


    Xuan Hao felt a bit awkward upon witnessing Zhu Lian bowing down in front of him and quickly tried to help her up.


    "No, this is the least I can do!" Insisting on thanking him, Xuan Hao could only allow her to continue as a few minutes passed before she raised her head up from the ground.


    "Now that you have reached the Nascent Soul Realm, I will give you the same option I gave Chi Hu back then and invite you to be an elder or you-"


    "Yes! I will join the Flying Sword Sect!"


    Not even allowing for him to continue what he was going to say, Zhu Lian interrupted him as she answered with an unwavering determination on her face. Clearly wanting to join the Flying Sword Sect.


    Well¡­ It''s quite normal I guess; she was after all just saved by me and she might feel that joining the Flying Sword Sect would be a good way to repay me for saving her¡­


    Other than that, the Flying Sword Sect is not weak by any means and at the same time does not really have any enemies after the destruction of the Raging me Sect.


    "Great! I still have something to do here, but you can just head towards the Flying Sword Sect and look for Chi Hu to help you out with getting settled down. He has after all gone through the process once already¡­"


    Nodding his head as he happily instructed Zhu Lian, Xuan Hao removed the barrier formed by his domain around the lotus flower tform to stop people from looking in while he helped Zhu Lian breakthrough.


    "T-they appeared again!"


    "Wow¡­ Out of thin air¡­ The lotus flower tform is also back!"


    "What happened¡­? Why is the old woman suddenly fully recovered and even giving off such a powerful aura!?"


    "S-she reached the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    Unknowingly, Xuan Hao concealing what was happening on the inside, had caused the entire lotus flower tform along with him and Zhu Lian, to disappear directly in front of the people on top of the Third Star Peak.


    Now, the moment that they appeared again, Xuan Hao could not help but feel baffled as he watched the old people that had gathered together to enter a life and death seclusion rush over to see what was happening.


    Most importantly, someone had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "I will see you back at the sect¡­" Not wanting to end up being swarmed be a group of old people, Xuan quickly took his leave. Directly disappearing before either the old peopleing over or Zhu Lian could react in time.


    "See you¡­"


    Looking in the spot that Xuan Hao had been standing only a moment ago, Zhu Lian could not help but feel a bit bewildered at how he had just disappeared in front of her.


    She had not even seen him move before he was gone!


    Now that she was in the Nascent Soul Realm, she thought that she had gotten strong, but after seeing Xuan Hao just disappear without her even being able to sense him, Zhu Lian could not help but feel like she still had a long way to go¡­


    Joining the Flying Sword Sect might have ended up being the best decision i ever made...


    Thinking this as she thought about how she would be joining a sect with someone that strong and kind in it, Zhu Lian could not help but feel herself growing excited.


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 Chapter 330 - Second Star Peak...

    <h4>Chapter 330 - Second Star Peak...</h4>


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    "This should be the Second Star Peak¡­"


    Having left Zhu Lian to fend for herself against the swarm of elderly cultivators curious about the person who broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm back at the Third Star Peak, Xuan Hao flew up towards the peak of the Second Star Peak.


    He felt like he would at least have to check it out...


    After all, from what he knew, there should not be anyone that had made their way up the Second Star Peak since the star fell from the sky and shattered eight out of the nine mountain peaks¡­


    "This¡­ Is getting quite difficult¡­"


    Whoosh!


    Flying up towards the peak of the Second Star Peak, Xuan Hao soon found himselfnding on the small worn-down path leading up the mountain.


    "I never expected for the chaotic qi to be so dense¡­"


    Having felt an increased pressure from the chaotic qi as he flew up the Second Star Peak, Xuan Hao was forced tond and walk. Using his domain to fly up the mountain was simply way too exhausting, and it was close to impossible for him to recover any of the qi that he expended given the fact that there was only chaotic qi around him¡­


    He could still sit down and slowly absorb and purify the chaotic qi, but that process would take a long time and Xuan Hao did not really want to spend a few days scaling up the Second Star Peak¡­


    Walking up with only his physical strength while protecting himself from the chaotic qi with his domain was a way easier solution and would at most add a few extra minutes to his journey up the Second Star Peak¡­


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ Finally, here¡­"


    Taking hisst step up the Second Star Peak, Xuan Hao could not help but let out an emotional sigh as he looked at the summit of the Second Star Peak stretching on for miles in every direction.


    The only thing standing out about the environment of the Second Star Peak''s Summit, was therge chunks of blue coloured rocks that were spread around all over the entire summit.


    "What is this¡­?" Walking up to one of the nearby chunks of blue coloured rocks, Xuan Hao soon felt himself lose all feeling in the arm he was holding onto the blue coloured rock with.


    Thumb!


    Letting go of the rock immediately, Xuan Hao retreated a few feet away from the strange and now dangerous blue coloured rock.


    Looking back down at the arm he had been holding the blue coloured rock with earlier, Xuan Hao saw that it waspletely encased in a thinyer of ice as he could barely move it¡­


    Note to self. Don''t touch strangely coloured rocks on the ground without thoroughly inspecting them first¡­


    Having dedicated the small lesson to memory, Xuan Hao used the next half hour slowly removing the ice from his arm and recovering it back to normal.


    "Now¡­ Let''s see what''s hidden inside of this¡­ rock¡­" Proceeding cautiously, Xuan Hao spread out both his divine sense and his domain before he began to slowly and methodically inspecting the small chunk of blue coloured rock in front of him.


    Inside the rock, Xuan Hao found an energy that was eerily simr to the green energy that he had found in the form of the gue of the church of the gue god¡­ From what he remembered; it should be-


    "Divine energy¡­" Muttering the name of the thing inside of the rock to himself in disbelief, Xuan Hao became even more cautious of the small chunk of blue rock in front of him.


    Divine energy was rted to some kind of church, and he did not really have any good impression of the churches in this world¡­


    Even if he had only encountered one, Xuan Hao still remembered the fact that the Sky Empire was currently in the process of creating the Sect Alliance to weaken the churches influence ording to what Shu Yao had said.


    However, inspecting the divine energy inside of the rock, Xuan Hao found out that there was a stark difference between the green and eerie divine energy of the church of the gue god and the blue divine energy inside of the rock.


    The green divine energy gave of an eerie and evil feeling, while the blue divine energy just gave off the feeling of endless coldness. Almost like it could freeze one''s soul to death with ease¡­


    The coldness from the blue divine energy was not malicious or evil like the green divine energy and it didn''t attack. The earlier point in time where his arm was covered in ayer of ice and slowly began to lose feeling, was most likely just the result of himing into contact with the divine energy. Not the divine energy attacking him¡­


    "Just how powerful is this divine energy¡­" Xuan Hao could not help but feel baffled when he realized just how strong the blue divine energy inside the rock was. The green divine energy of the church of the gue god that he had encountered seemed weak and harmless inparison to the blue divine energy!


    The two divine energies were onpletely different levels¡­


    "But¡­ where did these rockse from¡­?"


    Looking away from the small rock in front of him, Xuan Hao looked out over the summit of the Second Star Peak and looked at the countless small and big blue rocks that covered the entire ce.


    All likely to be filled with the blue divine energy¡­


    Just how much divine energy was left in this ce and for what reason¡­?


    Is this perhaps rted to the star that fell from above and destroyed this peak along with the other seven peaks?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao turned his gaze away from the blue rocks on top of the Second Star Peak''s Summit before looking up in the direction of the Main Peak.


    Even from the peak of the Second Star Peak, Xuan Hao could still not see the top of the mountain. Only barely able to see a few weird blue clouds that concealed what he assumed to be the peak of the mountain.


    Looking up at the blue clouds from below, Xuan Hao felt a wave of fear wash over him.


    The blue coloured clouds were dangerous... Just looking at them gave him a feeling of certain death, but at the same time, he felt his curiosity towards what was hidden on the Main Peak increase even further.


    I will stay here for some time and see if I can learn something from studying the blue divine energy. After that, I will head up the Main Peak!


    Supressing his feeling of curiosity, Xuan Hao decided to first study the blue divine energy now that he had gotten the chance to study divine energy for the first time without it dispersing or trying to escape like the green divine energy had.


    Maybe he would even be able to absorb some of the powerful divine energy and increase his cultivation realm¡­


    Whoosh~


    Feeling motivated to improve, Xuan Hao sat down beside one of therger blue rocks filled with divine energy and began to study the divine energy.


    Soon finding himself open to a brand-new world, as the energy was far moreplicated than he had ever imagined.


    The energy itself consisting of an endless sea of small divine symbols that seemed to contain the information of both thews that made up the world and something far surpassing it.


    Sadly, the information was simply way too profound for the current him to understand and he could only grasp at a few small pieces of information concealed inside the sea of divine symbols¡­


    But even then, Xuan Hao still managed to gain a lot from what little piece of information that he managed toprehend.


    The small bits of information were far beyond anything he had evere into contact with before and Xuan Hao slowly began to enter a state of enlightenment as he began to merge together the information, he hadprehended from the sea of divine symbols hidden inside of the blue divine energy with his sword domain.


    At this point in time, Xuan Hao''s sword domain fully spread out. Slowly, a change began to take ce inside of the sword domain, as it began to emit a freezing aura. Simr to the freezing aura emitted from the blue divine energy.


    Whoosh!


    The environment on top of the Second Star Peak seemed to havepletely changed, as the ground was covered in ayer of frost with Xuan Hao in the middle.


    The temperature had already dropped below freezing and seemed to show no signs of stopping!


    Slowly, the temperature grew colder and colder, but Xuan Hao waspletely unaffected by this. Instead, he waspletely focused on the information inside the sea of divine symbols that was hidden inside the blue divine energy!


    Disregarding everything that was happening on the outside¡­


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 Chapter 331 - Fourth Stage Of The Domain Lord Realm!

    <h4>Chapter 331 - Fourth Stage Of The Domain Lord Realm!</h4>


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    Time slowly passed as the temperature at the summit of the Second Star Peak dropped even further, Xuan Hao in the middle of the snowstorm that had formed at the summit was still sitting motionless on the ground without opening his eyes.


    Fwoosh!


    It was at this moment that his domain suddenly stopped expanding and instead just remained in ce as the temperature began to drop at an even faster speed than before, as several ice swords materialized inside of the domain.


    Whoosh~


    The ice swords did not remain stationary for long, as they soon flew over towards Xuan Hao where they surrounded him in the shape of a giant icy blue lotus flower.


    Boom!


    Arge explosion urred as the surrounding chaotic qi on top of the Second Star Peak was drawn over towards the motionless Xuan Hao inside the icy lotus flower made of the ice swords that had been formed from his domain earlier.


    The moment that the chaotic qi entered the icy lotus flower, the icy swords that made up the lotus flower began to radiate an icy white glow. Slowly refining the chaotic qi that entered into a more stable and pure qi. Following which, the now pure qi gently began flowing into Xuan who quickly absorbed the pure qi in the middle of the icy lotus flower.


    The entire thing happened unconsciously, as Xuan Hao still remainedpletely focused on the small divine symbols that the blue divine energy was made up of.


    Boom!


    Like this, Xuan Hao directly managed to break through and reach the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm with the help of the surrounding chaotic qi being purified and channelled into him, but this was still far from over as the surrounding temperature dropped even further.


    By this point, everything on the Second Star Peak waspletely frozen.


    If someone else saw the current condition of the Second Star Peak''s Summit, they would surely think they had entered some kind of icy hell as the temperature was low enough to even freeze someone at the Core Formation Realm to death! Even someone at the Nascent Soul Realm would have to be cautious or they might end up freezing to death as well¡­


    A Nascent Soul Realm Expert freezing to death was simply terrifying. Not so much because the power it disyed, but the fact that the temperature was extreme enough to the degree that it could even affect the soul!


    That is not considering the fact that the chaotic qi would end up killing them way before they even reached the summit¡­


    Yet, Xuan Hao remainedpletely unaffected by all of this as the temperature continued to drop lower and lower with no end in sight¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was undergoing enlightenment at the Summit of the Second Star Peak, Zhu Lian had just finished up talking with a few of the people who hade over to ask her for guidance after realizing she had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    It was after all, their dream to be like her and break through to the Nascent Soul Realm. Increasing their lifespan and at the same time entering the realm of what was considered the strong.


    Zhu Lian did not mind this at all, as she had helped all of them by exining the process she had gone through when reaching the Nascent Soul Realm. Not mentioning the fact that she had been fed a pill by Xuan Hao beforehand that helped her take the final step and officially reach the Nascent Soul Realm. Only mentioning that Xuan Hao had helped drive out the chaotic qi inside her body and helped her recover some strength before she attempted to reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    At least, the group of old people felt motivated after they heard how Zhu Lian had exined the Cloud Tribtion.


    The fact that they would experience a leap in power before the Cloud Tribtion arrived, gave many of the old people on the Third Star Peak the courage they needed to try and take the next step and attempt reaching the Nascent Soul Realm before it was toote¡­


    "By the way, if I may be so rude to ask Miss Lian¡­ Who was the person that came to help you out earlier¡­?"


    An older person who had met Zhu Lian beforeing to the Third Star Peak stepped forward and asked just as she was about to leave.


    "Ah, that was Elder Xuan from the Flying Sword Sect, he came to help me out because a friend of mine entered the Flying Sword Sect as an Elder a month or so ago¡­" Not finding bothering to hide Xuan Hao''s identity as it would only help paint the Flying Sword Sect in a better picture, Zhu Lian answered her old acquaintance without hiding anything.


    "He helped you reach the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ Just because of that¡­?"


    "Yes!"


    ""¡­""


    The surrounding elders who were about to leave and go back to cultivating stopped as they heard what Zhu Lian and her acquaintance were talking about.


    Someone would actually help another person reach the Nascent Soul Realm because of something like that¡­ Why didn''t any of my friends join the Flying Sword Sect.


    Every single person at the Third Star Peak had this thought go through their head as themented over the fact that nobody in their friend group had entered the Flying Sword Sect, if they did so, they might also have gotten the help from Elder Xuan and reached the Nascent Soul Realm just like Zhu Lian.


    There were even a few of them that had been elders in some weaker sects inside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect that regretted not just joining the Flying Sword Sect.


    Even if their position would be lower than the weaker sect they had chosen. At least they would have a better chance at reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    A few among them even took out theirmunication talisman and directly contacted a few of their friends outside the Third Star Peak and encouraged them to go and join the Flying Sword Sect.


    "¡­"


    Zhu Lian saw all of this and did not know that she had unknowingly increased the image of the Flying Sword Sect in many of these old people''s mind. Even to the degree that they would go out of their way to encourage some of their friends outside the Third Star Peak to go over and join the Flying Sword Sect.


    There was even one among the old people on the Third Star Peak that contacted his nephew and told him to quit his current sect where he was a Core Disciple and instead try to be an Outer Disciple of the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    "Hah¡­" Sighing to herself at the sight of this, Zhu Lian was about to leave when she suddenly felt a terrifying aura erupt from the distance.


    Looking over towards the direction that she had felt the aura erupt from, Zhu Lian soon realized that the terrifying aura hade from the Second Star Peak!


    Something like this had never happened before on the Shattered Star Peaks and immediately caused her to focus on the direction that the aura came from. Only to realize that it came from the Summit of the Second Star Peak.


    "W-what is that!?"


    "Something is happening at the Second Star Peak!"


    "Maybe a peerless natural treasure is about to be born!?"


    Zhu Lian was not the only person who noticed the terrifying aura and the changes happening at the summit of the Second Star Peak.


    At this point in time, the entire summit was already surround in an icy storm that caused the surroundings to freeze overpletely¡­


    "Maybe the reason Elder Xuan came to the Shattered Star Peak has something to do with what is happening at the Second Star Peak¡­?" Muttering this to herself as she thought about Xuan Hao, Zhu Lian soon rxed and felt that it made sense.


    After all, someone like Xuan Hao would most likely note to the Shattered Star Peaks just to help her out.


    The reason that he showed up should be because he knew something was going to happen at the Second Star Peak!


    "No need for me to worry about any of this¡­ After all, even if I wanted to go and see what it is, I have no way to reach the summit of the Second Star Peak without dying to the dense chaotic qi¡­"


    Shaking her head as she looked up at the ice storm that was increasing in strength on the summit of the Second Star Peak, Zhu Lian began wondering what might be happening up there.


    The only thing she could think of was a precious ice rted spiritual herb maturing or maybe some powerful ice rted natural treasure being born.


    Either of the two would be more than enough to cause the people looking on from the Third Star Peak to look up towards the icy storm happening at the summit of the Second Star Peak filled with greed.


    Sadly, they had no way to scale the Second Star Peak with their current strength. Even someone in the Nascent Soul Realm would die due to the density of the chaotic qi¡­ Let alone someone only at the Core Formation Realm like themselves!


    In the end, they could only look up at the icy storm that was happening at the summit of the Second Star Peak.


    Unable to go back to cultivating due to the terrifying aura spreading out from the summit of the Second Star Peak making it hard to calm down and cultivate.


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 Chapter 332 - New Domain...?

    <h4>Chapter 332 - New Domain...?</h4>


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    Back at the summit of the Second Star Peak, the temperature slowly stopped decreasing further as things began to calm down.


    The icy lotus flower surrounding Xuan Hao also began breaking apart, as the swords making up the icy lotus flower slowly disolved into the surroundings. Disappearingpletely from the world. Leaving behind only Xuan Hao on top of the Second Star Peak.


    "Hm?"


    Opening his eyes as he looked around at the now frozen wastnd that the summit had turned into, Xuan Hao had a confused look on his face before feeling the changes that happened to him.


    Quickly realizing that the main reason why the summit had transformed into a frozen wastnd, was him¡­


    Whoosh~


    Waving his hand, Xuan Hao watched as a sword martialized in front of him.


    However,pared to the past silver coloured sword. The sword currently in front of him, looked like it had been carved out of ice. Even causing the surrounding air to freeze.


    Looking at this, Xuan Hao remained unaffected by the sword and was instead more focused on a more crucial and fundenmental change he had noticed upon materializing the ice sword.


    "My qi changed¡­" Whispering this to himself in disbelief, Xuan Hao noticed how his qi had transformed from its former pure silver colour to having a light blue colour mixed into it. Ending half silver coloured and half light blue.


    Not knowing what had caused this change to happen in the first ce, Xuan Hao decided to enter his sea of consciousness and bring up his system status. Hopefully allowing him to find out if the system could help shed some light on the changes he had just gone through.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Domain: Sword Intent Domain, Ice Domain


    Talent: ???


    Physique: ???


    Realm: Peak Fourth Stage Domain Lord


    Bringing up his status, Xuan Hao quickly noticed the changes to his domain section, having changed from having one domain to now having two domains¡­


    "You can have more than one domain¡­?"


    Suprised at what he just found out, Xuan Hao quickly inspected it for himself. Soon finding out that he indeed did have two domains instead of one.


    The reason that he did not realize this at first, was due to the fact that the two domains were entwined together. Almost to the point of merging into one, both coexisting as a part of him.


    The feeling of controlling two domains at once was not really bringing forth any stress or harm to his body or soul for that matter. Instead, it feltpletely natural as he used the two domains together as one.


    The ice sword he had just martialized a second ago, was a perfect example of the two domains working together as one. Materializing the ice sword currently hovering in the air in front of him.


    He didn''t even notice the fact that he had been using two entirely different domains before checking his status!


    Whoosh~


    ying around with his newfound domain for a bit as several ice sculptures materialized in front of him in shape of his disciples along with Feng Chen, Zu Fei, Elder Song, and some of the other elders he had met in the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao soon stopped.


    His Ice Domain was easy to use and didn''t requried him to go through a training montage to master, he already knew how to use it instinctively!


    "Now for my qi¡­"


    Having found out about his new domain, Xuan Hao focused on his qi, as the status did not give him any idea as to what had changed in his qi.


    The only thing he had to go on, was the fact that he now had an Ice Domain and his qi was half light blue...


    "So¡­ Cold¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, as he pushed some of his qi out of his body and inspected it, Xuan Hao could not help but feel baffled when he reached forward and felt the freezing temperature of his qi.


    Before this, his qi did not have any temperature so to speak, the sudden change would force him to be even more careful if he decided to have his qi enter one of his disciples to help them out like he had done in the past. After all, thest thing he would want, was to idently turn one of his disciple into an ice sculpture¡­


    Not finding out anything useful, other than the fact that he might idently end up freezing one of his disciples to death with his qi in the future, Xuan Hao stood up and looked towards the blue rock that he had been using earlier to study the blue divine energy inside of it.


    Only to find out that the blue rock had turned into dust. Leaving nothing behind. The blue divine energy inside of it had also disappeared without leaving a trace behind!


    "What in the world happened when I entered enlightenment earlier¡­?" Xuan Hao could not help but mutter this to himself. Once again looking around at the frozen wastnd he had unconsciously created earlier.


    Calming himself down, Xuan Hao walked over to another blue rock filled with blue divine energy inside of it and attempted to put it inside of his interspatial ring.


    If he could bring them back with him to the sect, he could study the blue divine ener-


    Crack~


    Bang!


    Throwing away his interspatial ring as he watched it begin cracking apart before exploding and spilling out everything he had stored inside of it along with the blue rock filled with divine energy, Xuan Hao could only walk over to the small pile of his things and take out a new interspatial ring to store the things not ruined by the cold temperature inside.


    "¡­"


    Okay¡­ Can''t store weird blue stones with divine energy inside interspatial rings... Got it!


    Making a new mental note on the fact that blue rocks with divine energy in them could not be stored inside interspatial rings, Xuan Hao could only give up his idea of bringing some of the blue rocks away with him.


    After all, he could not touch them and now he couldn''t even store them away in his interspatial ring. All he could do was leave them at the Second Star Peak until he found some way to move them in the future.


    For now, he would have toe back if he wanted to further study the blue divine energy hidden inside of them.


    Even if it might not be as useful as it had been just now when he studied the blue divine energy for the first time, Xuan Hao still knew that studying the blue divine energy would allow him to improve faster!


    Whoosh!


    Having nothing more to do at the Second Star Peak at the moment, Xuan Hao decided to head towards the Main Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    ¡­


    "So, this is the Pure Heart Lake¡­"


    As Xuan Hao was making his way towards the Main Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks, his two disciples and Huang Yongyu arrived at the Pure Heart Lake inside the River Sect''s territory.


    "Indeed, quite beautiful¡­ Isn''t it?"


    Smiling widely upon seeing the awed expression on both Chu Yang and Qing Yi''s faces, Huang Yongyu could not help feeling a bit proud as he asked.


    "It is truly a beautifulke¡­"


    "Yeah, I really want such ake like this back in the sect¡­"


    Both Qing Yi and Chu Yang nodded their head in agreement to what Huang Yongyu said. Focusing all their attention on the beautifulke that spread out before them.


    Crystal clear blue water stretching for as long as the eye could see with no end in sight. Lively and healthy fish swimming peacefully through the water. The only thing missing was a good ce to sit down and get something to eat and drink while enjoying the view...


    If not for the fact that they already knew about the fact that the Pure Heart Lake took up a good ten to fifteen percent of the River Sects territory, Qing Yi and Chu Yang would have thought that the giantke in front of them had truly been even more suprised at the sheer size of theke¡­


    "By the way¡­ Where is the Pure Heart Spirit Grass? And the demon beast for that matter¡­"


    Looking out over the Pure Heart Lake, Chu Yang soon realized the fact that he could not see any Pure Heart Spirit Grass or demon beasts mentioned in the mission given by the sect and grew a bit confused. Turning to ask Huang Yongyu for an answer.


    "Pure Heart Spirit Grass? Demon Beasts? They can only be found at the Pure Heart Ind located at the centre of the Pure Heart Lake¡­"


    Showing a confused expression on his face for a short moment before answering them, Huang Yongyu soon pointed over in the direction of a barely visible ind in the distance.


    "And how do we get there¡­? Swim?"


    Seeing the ind barely visible out on the Pure Heart Lake, Chu Yang turned towards Huang Yongyu and asked him. Hoping that he would not agree with swimming to the ind¡­


    Even if he was at the Foundation Establishment Realm, he did not want to swim such a long distance...


    "Hm¡­ Most of the demon beasts are hidden inside theke water, so swimming would not be a good idea at all. Personally, I think we should head to the Pure Heart City and try to get a boat to the Pure Heart Ind, but¡­"


    "But what?"


    Hesitating a bit when he reached the end of his sentence, Chu Yang hurried for him to continue upon seeing his troubled expression.


    "¡­But the sects against my River Sect are currently controlling most of the city, we have a high chance of being seen by members of the sects if we go there!"


    Saying this, Chu Yang could not help but put on a thoughtful expression when he heard what Huang Yongyu said.


    Indeed, if they were found out, the sects would most likely try to cause trouble for him and Qing Yi, while Huang Yongyu might end up dead...


    How should they proceed....? Try and sneak inside the city and find a way to the Pure Heart Lake, or try to find another way?


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 Chapter 333 - Main Peak Of The Shattered Star Peaks

    <h4>Chapter 333 - Main Peak Of The Shattered Star Peaks</h4>


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    As his two disciples were trying to find a way for them to reach the Pure Heart Ind, Xuan Hao was making his way up the Main Peak of the Nine Star Peaks.


    The journey up the mountain was calm and rxed for the most part. Only begging to grow more difficult after he reached the height where the summit of the Second Star Peak was located.


    At that height, the chaotic qi seemed to have undergone a change of some sort, as it became difficult for even Xuan Hao to advance forward. The chaotic qi forcing him to use his two domains together to protect him from it infiltrating his body and injuring him.


    Slowing down, Xuan Hao could not help but feel how terrifying the chaotic qi truly was!


    Looking up towards the clouds obscuring the peak of the Main Peak, Xuan Hao began to doubt whether he would even be able to make his way up there in the first ce. The increasing pressure from the chaotic qi in the air made it harder and harder for him to move forward and Xuan Hao doubted that he would even have been able to reach his current height in the past before obtaining his new Ice Domain.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao realized that the only reason why he could continue forward was due to the fact that he had two different domains to help support him and keep the increasingly scary chaotic qi out of his body and dantian. Preventing it from wreaking havoc inside of him.


    Whoosh~


    A cold wind blew past him, causing Xuan Hao to shiver for a short moment as he felt the chaotic qi increase in strength once again.


    This continued on as Xuan Hao slowly managed to make his way up the Main Peak, soon standing directly in front of the weird clouds that were hiding the summit from being seen by anyone looking on from below.


    "Hah¡­"


    Taking a deep breath, Xuan Hao used both his domains to their limit before walking headfirst into the weird clouds obscuring the Main Peak¡­


    ¡­


    Walking into the weird cloud, Xuan Hao suddenly felt himself being pushed forward. Soon finding himself in front of what could only be described as a giant version of the blue rocks that he had found on the Second Star Peak''s summit.


    "W-what is this!?"


    Not knowing what to say as he felt an enormous pressure suddenly engulf him, Xuan Hao quickly retreated a few hundred feet away from the giant blue rock before catching his breath.


    The pressure given off by the giant blue rock seemed to only cover the few dozen meters around the rock itself, but the pressure alone was more than enough for Xuan Hao to feel the threat of death the longer he remained, as both his domains were slowly cracking apart under the pressure of the giant blue rock.


    "Is this perhaps the star that fell in the past¡­?"


    Looking over at the giant blue rock easilyrge enough to be considered a small hill with its size, Xuan Hao felt like calling it a rock was not suitable.


    Rustle~


    Hearing some movement behind him when he was wondering over what to call the giant rock in front of him, Xuan Hao spotted a small blue deer without any cultivation appear from some foliage that had grown around the mountain peak.


    "Hm? The chaotic qi is gone¡­?"


    It was only at this moment that Xuan Hao realized the fact that the terrifying chaotic qi was no longer around. Instead, being reced by a weird energy that reminded Xuan Hao of the blue divine energy he had studied earlier. The only thing missing was the part where it could freeze even him to death if he came into contact with it¡­


    Heck, even a random deer could survive with the weird energy around. Showing no side effect up other than the fact that it had turned blue¡­


    Lowering his guard as he no longer exerted his two domains to their limits, Xuan Hao felt at ease. Finally capable of moving around normally, without having to use both his domains to keep the chaotic qi from invading his body.


    The energy that had take up the ce of the chaotic qi also did not seem to be harmful in the slightest as Xuan Hao absorbed a tiny amount of it into his body to check its effects.


    Instead, the blue energy seemed to rece qi. Easily being refined and turned into pure qi inside of his dantian before Xuan Hao fully absorbed it!


    While not as useful as the chaotic qi that he had ended up refining and absorbing at the summit of the Second Star Peak, Xuan Hao still felt that the weird blue energy was far more useful to cultivate withpared to the qi back in the Flying Sword Sect.


    More importantly than that, it was easy to absorb and even someone only at the Qi Condensation Realm would be capable of absorbing the weird blue energy to increase their cultivation speed!


    The chaotic qi might be more useful to Xuan Hao due to the fact that he was able to refine it, but for someone weaker than him, it would just be seeking death to absorb chaotic qi on the Second Star Peak''s summit¡­


    Someone below his strength would definitely benefit way more from absorbing the weird blue energy on the Main Peak¡­ The only problem for them would be reaching the Main Peak.


    Even Xuan Hao doubted that he would be able to take someone up to the Main Peak with him given his current strength and how hard it had been to reach for him alone in the first ce¡­


    "The weird blue energy seems to being from the blue rock¡­"


    Focusing on the weird blue energy, Xuan Hao soon followed the direction it came from and soon found out that the giant blue rock the size of a small hill was the culprit behind the energy on the Main Peak.


    The weird blue energy seemed to be slowly leaking out from the giant blue rock. Slowly having filling up the area of the Main Peak¡­


    Xuan Hao also felt that the clouds surrounding the Main Peak had something weird going on about them.


    Looking at it from the inside, Xuan Hao felt that the weird clouds were in ce to keep the chaotic qi out and keep the weird blue energy inside.


    In a sense the clouds could be considered a natural formation of sorts that kept the weird blue energy inside and protected it along with the blue deer from the chaotic qi.


    After all, if the chaotic qi could enter, Xuan Hao was certain that the blue deer and the other living creatures that might be present at the Main Peak would soon die off.


    The chaotic qi was strong to the point that even Xuan Hao struggled to keep it out with his Sword Intent Domain and Ice Domain working together¡­ There was no way a blue deer without any cultivation would be able to survive under such terrifying circumstances!


    "I wonder if there is anything other than the blue rock up here¡­ From what happened at the other eight peaks, it looks like there has been someone else living at the Shattered Star Peaks in the past."


    Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the lush forest that seemed to cover the Main Peak, Xuan Hao felt himself grow curious.


    Someone who was able to live on the Shattered Star Peaks before it was destroyed by the blue rock in the past, was way stronger than any power Xuan Hao had seen before!


    There might even have been someone above the Domain Lord Realm present!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help but grow excited at the thought of finding the inheritance of an expert above the Domain Lord Realm.


    Given the fact that nobody had reached the Second Star Peak in the past few thousand years since the rock had destroyed it along with the other seven Star Peaks, Xuan Hao was almost certain that nobody should have reached the Main Peak before him!


    This meant that he would be the only person to have reached the Main Peak over thest thousand or so years!


    All he could do now, was hope that nobody had reached the Main Peak before the blue rock had fallen from above¡­


    If that was really the case, then¡­


    Roar!


    Not waiting around for any longer, Xuan Hao only took a single step forward before a terrifying roar sounded out in the distance.


    Instantly causing him to freeze on the spot. The roar was clearlying from a demon beast, and it was by no means a weak demon beast!


    Rustle~


    Following the roar, Xuan Hao heard the sound of somethingrge approaching him at a terrifying speed.


    ROAR!


    Before Xuan Hao even managed toprehend what had happened, arge demon beast slowly appeared in front of him.


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 Chapter 334 - Blue Deer

    <h4>Chapter 334 - Blue Deer</h4>


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    Roar!


    Therge demon beast that had just jumped out from the lush forest beside him roared once again as it slowly turned to look down at Xuan Hao, who had already fully prepared himself as the temperature surrounding him began to reduce rapidly. Instantly freezing the everything within a dozen meters of him.


    The only reason why it didn''t go beyond a few dozen meters was due to the fact that Xuan Hao had only prepared his Ice Domain defensively and hadn''t directly gone on the offensive towards the demon beast that just appeared.


    R-roar¡­


    The demon beast seemed to have felt the aura given off by Xuan Hao and instantly began shivering. No longer looking as aggressive as it had just a moment ago.


    "Nascent Soul Realm¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself upon noticing the cultivation realm of the demon beast in the shape of a giant version of the blue deer he had seen just a moment ago, Xuan Hao observed as the blue deer from earlier appear besides therger blue deer demon beast.


    "A child?" Realizing that the blue deer was likely to be the child of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast, Xuan Hao began lowering his guard as the demon beast had note to attack him, but merely to protect its offspring.


    Other than that, the blue deer demon beast was only at the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ It was not really something that could threaten him at his current cultivation realm!


    Recovering from its earlier fright after Xuan Hao restrained his aura again, the blue deer demon beast along with the smaller blue deer calmed down. Looking over at Xuan Hao for a short moment before turning around to leave after seeing that he didn''t attack. Entering the lush forest just behind them.


    Rustle~


    Watching as the two left, Xuan Hao suddenly saw the smaller blue deer poke its head out from a small bush at the edge of the lush forest as it motioned for him to follow.


    "Hm? You want me to follow you?"


    Thinking that the demon beast deer along with its child would just leave, Xuan Hao was a bit surprised when he saw the small blue deer suddenly motion for him to follow.


    Maybe because there aren''t any real threats to it on the Main Peak, it has grown fearless to the point that even Xuan Hao''s scary aura from before had no effect on it¡­


    Boing Boing~


    "Haha, I guess I will be following you then."


    Seeing the small blue deerically try to keep his attention by jumping up and down the moment he slightly lowered his head to think about whether to follow the blue deer or not, Xuan Hao could not help himself from agreeing with the cute creature.


    Not like he would be able to get anything from just standing around in front of the hill sized blue rock that would kill him if he got too close to it¡­


    He had also nned to go and take a look at the rest of the Main Peak and following the blue deer might even help him find something rted to the past owners of the Main Peak.


    The reason why he didn''t just spread out his divine sense to search through the main peak was firstly due to the fact that he might idently wake up some random ancient expert or demon beast that had been secretly recovering from some kind of injury over the past thousand years or something stupid along that line¡­


    After all, his divine sense was far more powerful than the Nascent Soul Realm blue deer demon beast!


    That second and main reason why he didn''t spread out his divine sense, was due to the fact that the weird blue energy in the airing from the giant hill sized blue rock, suppressed his divine sense to the degree that it would be difficult to even cover an area a few hundred meters around him.


    Rustle~


    Having grown impatient after seeing Xuan Hao still not following, the small blue deer began aggressively rustling the leaves of the bush it had poked its small head out from earlier in an attempt to catch his attention.


    "I''ming!" Not knowing what to say to the impatient and fearless blue deer, Xuan Hao could only smile wryly as he followed it inside the lush forest. Not knowing where it was going to lead him andpletely ignoring therge blue deer demon beast, who fearfully looked between the small blue deer and Xuan Hao from time to time. Clearly having no idea why its child had decided to bring Xuan Hao along with them.


    Like this, Xuan Hao entered the lush forest on the Main Peak together with the onerge and one small blue deer.


    ¡­


    "Are you sure this is going to work?"


    At the same time at the Pure Heart Lake, Qing Yi could not help asking Huang Yongyu in a worried tone as the group made their way towards the Pure Heart City.


    "Yes! I''m one hundred percent sure! I tried it in the past when sneaking around the sect! Nobody will recognize us like this!"


    "Fine¡­ You are the one in most trouble if they find out our identities¡­"


    Hearing the reassuring words from Huang Yongyu, Qing Yi did not rx in the slightest. The only thing bringing her some reassurance that the n would work, was the fact that Huang Yongyu would most likely end up dead in case it didn''t work¡­ So, his insistence on moving forward with his n knowing that¡­ At the very least gave her some confidence that the n would work.


    "I hope junior brother Chu Yang can sessfullyplete his task¡­" Whispering these words to herself when she thought about the n Huang Yongyu hade up with, Qing Yi could not help but send her wishes towards her junior brother.


    The part he had to y in Huang Yongyu''s n, was by far the most important one¡­


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 Chapter 335 - Unkown Struggles Of A Young Master

    <h4>Chapter 335 - Unkown Struggles Of A Young Master</h4>


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    "I hope everything ends up going well¡­"


    Walking towards the gate leading into the Pure Heart City together with Huang Yongyu, Qing Yi nced towards a small river by the side of the road leading inside the Pure Heart City.


    The small river in question went through the Pure Heart City and ended up in the Pure Heart Lake ording to Huang Yongyu.


    Looking at it while moving towards the gate, Qing Yi could not help but feel a worried after spotting the small metal bars that came down and blocked off the small entrance for the river in the wall of the city. Stopping anyone trying to sneak into the city through the river.


    After all, breaking the metal bars to sneak inside would instantly catch the attention of the nearby guards standing just beside the river¡­


    Qing Yi could only hope that Huang Yongyu was correct when it came to there being a small hole enough for a single person to squeeze through¡­ If not, their n would automatically end in failure!


    Hopefully, we did not have to dress up like this for nothing¡­


    Looking down on her current torn and dirty clothes, Qing Yi arrived at a small line of people waiting to enter the Pure Heart Lake together with Huang Yongyu. Lining up orderly, both of them waited for their turn.


    ¡­


    A few minutes earlier, Chu Yang looked at both Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu before jumping into the river before swimming ahead of Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu. His cultivation base making it easy to hold his breath under water for a long time.


    "I will be going¡­ See you at the entrance of the city!"


    Ssh!


    Entering the cold river water, Chu Yang swam to the bottom before sneakily moving towards the city wall of the Pure Heart City.


    Soon reaching the metal bars that blocked anyone from sneaking inside the Pure Heart Lake through the river, Chu Yang could not help but breathe a sigh of relief to himself upon stopping a small area where one of the metal bars had broken off at the bottom. Leaving behind just enough space for someone to squeeze through.


    One of the metal bars really did break off at the bottom!


    Swish~


    Not waiting around any longer, Chu Yang hurriedly swam through the small gap at the bottom of the river before having officially made his way inside the Pure Heart City.


    Now he just needed to find a way out of the river without being spotted by any guards, members of the sect and residents of Pure Heart City¡­


    Here it is!


    Swimming along the river for a few seconds longer, Chu Yang soon came upon a small underwater wooden structure connected to an abandoned building by the riverside.


    Swish!


    Entering the small underwater wooden structure that was slowly rotting away, Chu Yang soon found himself inside the abandoned building.


    Looking around himself, Chu Yang could not help but sigh in amazement upon noticing all the different clothes, hats and anything needed for a perfect disguise neatly stored in the abandoned building.


    "I really wonder how Huang Yongyu knows about this building in the first ce¡­ Perhaps it''s not his first time sneaking into the Pure Heart City?"


    Muttering this to himself as he quickly changed his clothes into something suitable for their uing act.


    "Hehe, I really do look like a good for nothing young master now!" Chuckling to himself upon seeing his current appearance in a nearby mirror, Chu Yang could not help donning a small evil smile as he left the abandoned building in an arrogant manner.


    Trying his best to look the part as he made his way over in the direction of the city gate south city gate that Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu were currently making their way towards.


    "Who is that young master? So handsome!"


    "Perhaps its someone from one of the sects that have stationed people here! Don''t you remember how a lot of people began appearing over the past few months? Perhaps he is a young master from one of those sects!"


    "Really?! I hope I can catch the fancy of one of those young masters¡­"


    "Ha? Quit dreaming! There is no way someone like that would take an interest in an ordinary girl like you!"


    "What did you say!?"


    Bang!


    "You dare hit me? Think I won''t hit back?!"


    Bam!


    "¡­"


    Watching the reaction that two female friends had upon seeing him after reaching the main street of the Pure Heart City, Chu Yang could not help but smile wryly as his presence alone had caused the two friends to fight each other.


    "Look! The young master looked my way! Do you think he is interested in me?!"


    "Ha? No way! He looked at me!"


    "No, me!"


    Bang!


    "I said he was looking at me!"


    "You dare?"


    Turning to look in another direction, Chu Yang had unknowingly caused three other young girls to begin fighting with each other.


    What in the world is happening? Why is everyone acting so weirdly all of a sudden?


    Feeling both confused and scared at the fact that he could cause young girls to start fighting each other for no real reason with a mere look, Chu Yang instead opted to look up in an arrogant way to avoid eye contact with any of the young girls walking along the main street.


    "Ah¡­ He looks so cool!"


    "So arrogant~"


    "So charming!"


    Unknowingly speeding up his pace as he made his way towards the south gate, Chu Yang could not wait to change out of his current young master disguise and return to how he had been dressed before.


    Even when he walked around with the robe of the Flying Sword Sect, he had not experienced such a strong and passionate reaction.


    Was there perhaps something special about the fact that he was dressed like a young master¡­?


    Like this, Chu Yang made his way in the direction of the South gate. Ignoring the group of girls that had decided to sneakily follow him¡­


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 Chapter 336 - Young Master Chu Yang!

    <h4>Chapter 336 - Young Master Chu Yang!</h4>


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    "Next!"


    Waiting for their turn in the line into the Pure Heart City, Qing Yi could not help but nce nervously towards the inside of the city. Hoping to spot Chu Yang''s figure at any moment as they slowly moved closer and closer to the guard granting ess to the city.


    If he was not there, they would definitely not be allowed in without giving away their identities first! Especially given how they messed up and dirty both she and Huang Yongyu currently looked, there was no way the guards would allow them to enter without knowing their identities.


    However, with the n Huang Yongyu hade up with they had a shot of entering the Pure Heart City without giving away their identity. Only, Chu Yang, the most important person for their n to work, was nowhere to be seen!


    "Next!"


    Watching as the people in front of them slowly went through the gate, Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu were finally called over by the guard as it was their turn.


    "Hm? What happened to you two?" ncing down at both of them and their shabby appearance, the guard could not help but raise his one of his eyebrows in surprise.


    This was the first time the guard had ever seen someone looking as pitiful as the two people in front of him! Even the homeless people he had seen in the past were better off than the two young people in front of him.


    "W-we encountered a bandit group on our way to the Pure Heart City¡­"


    Remembering the story Huang Yongyu hade up with for their act, Qing Yi did her best to act pitiful as she said this. Hoping that Chu Yang would show up at any moment to help them gain ess to the Pure Heart City¡­


    Their n was a simple, but useful one. Having Chu Yang sneak inside the Pure Heart City and have him act like a young master from one of the sects that had recently began moving more people into the Pure Heart City.


    On the other hand, Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu would act like fellow disciples that had been unfortunate enough to encounter bandits on their way to the Pure Heart City and had all their stuff stolen.


    After this, Chu Yang would show up and hopefully help in fooling the guards to let them in and handing over a token without having shown any proof of identity¡­ However, this would only work if they sessfully managed to give off the impression that they were indeed someone from one of the sects inside the Pure Heart City¡­


    The reason why they didn''t all just sneak in through the river, was that they needed a token to get a boat to the Pure Heart Ind.


    Coincidently, the token in question would be given out at the entrance to the city by the guards after passing their identification process.


    "I see¡­ Do you perhaps any proof of identity still left on you? I sadly won''t be able to let you in without it¡­" Showing a sad look upon hearing what Qing Yi said, the guard still asked if they had anything that could help identify who they were.


    "W-we don''t have any¡­ We lost our sect identification token when fighting the bandits and our robes are not really in good enough condition to be used as identification in its current state¡­"


    Stepping forward, Huang Yongyu showed off his tattered robes filled with several holes from all sorts of different weapons in it.


    "Someone from a sect¡­?! Do you think it''s one of those sects¡­?"


    "Who knows? Could just be someone pretending in an attempt to enter Pure Heart City¡­"


    "I don''t think so¡­ Just look at the quality of those robes! Definitely not something a normal person could get their hands on! I''m sure they are the robes normally worn by disciples of those sects!"


    "True, but can they still let them enter without-"


    Listening to the people still waiting in line behind them begin specting over whether they were truly disciples of one of the sects, Qing Yi supressed her cultivation and deliberately released a pressureparable to someone around the middle stages of the Qi Condensation Realm. Soon Huang Yongyu did the same thing.


    ording to what Huang Yongyu had said, this was the normal cultivation realm of the disciples among the sects that were ganging up on the River Sect.


    "They really are cultivators!"


    "But it still doesn''t mean they are from any of the sects!"


    "What if-"


    Observing both Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu as they ''revealed'' their cultivation realm in an attempt to show proof of their identity as sect disciples, the guard felt conflicted on what to do.


    On one side, letting them enter without really showing any proof of their identity would be against normal regtions and might end him up in a troublesome situationter on and lose his job, if they ended up not being sect disciples.


    On the other side, if they really were sect disciples and he ended up blocking their entry into the Pure Heart City¡­ He might end up suffering a terrible fateter on. After all, the sects were not really known to be kind and he already heard several stories from his friends about how some people who offended the disciples or elders ended up disappearingter on¡­ He did not want to disappear, and he didn''t want to lose his job either!


    Feeling troubled at his current situation, the guard looked over to the other guards. Only to end up disappoint when seeing all of them look away pretending not to see his current situation.


    You guys!


    Screaming internally, the guard could not help but curse at the people he thought of as friends in the past.


    "I-"


    "Ah! There you guys are! What took you two so long? And how did you end up like that?"


    Just as the guard was about toe to a decision about? Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu''s entry into the city, a loud voice echoed out from behind him as everyone turned to look towards the origin of the voice.


    ""Senior Brother!""


    Seeing Chu Yang appear from inside the Pure Heart City, Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu both seized the opportunity. Putting on a distraught expression as they called out to him.


    "Who is this person? He is dressed so well and looks so handsome as well¡­"


    "Is this perhaps one of those rumoured young masters? So those two really were from one of those sects¡­"


    Watching all of this happen from the side, the guard felt a shiver run down his spine.


    He had just been about to refuse the Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu''s entry into the city, yet a young master from one of the sects had suddenly appeared! Luckily, he did not manage to turn them away yet!


    If that really happened, he might have to deal with the anger of the young master currently in front of him¡­ A poor gate guard like him would definitely not survive such an encounter¡­


    "Might I ask if these two are with the young master¡­" Nervously walking up to Chu Yang while Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu were exining about their earlier encounter with a group of bandits, the guard asked in a respectful tone. Even bowing his head in an attempt to not anger the young master.


    "Are they with me?! Of course, they are! How dare you question this young master!? Do you perhaps want my Ghost Howl Sect to identify ourselves every time we enter and exit this city?!"


    Putting on his best young master act, Chu Yang arrogantly said this while throwing out the name of one of the sects currently inside the Pure Heart City, that ording to Huang Yongyu, was still in the process of moving arge number of disciples over to visit the Pure Heart Ind for a training exercise.


    "Yeah! How dare you question the friends of the young master!"


    "Wai-"


    "Dumb guard! Didn''t you hear the young master said his fellow disciples are with him! Why are you not letting them in!?"


    "I-"


    "Boo! A guard like you should just go away, your ugly appearance stains the young master''s pure eyes!"


    Watching as arge group of females both young and old appeared from the south gate, the guard was suddenly caught between a rock and a hard ce as he was ruthlessly attack by the ravenous group.


    "H-here! This is the token for using the facilities of the Pure Heart city, I¡­ Have something urgent to do!"


    Not daring to stay around for any longer, the guard hurriedly handed over a token to Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu before running away.


    ""¡­""


    Looking at how easily things went after Chu Yang showed up, Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu could not help but nce towards the aggressive group of women following behind Chu Yang with a passionate expression on their face.


    Maybe Chu Yang was born to be a young master¡­?


    Feeling this thought enter their mind at the same time, Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu soon entered the Pure Heart City together with Chu Yang.


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 Chapter 337 - Following The Blue Deer

    <h4>Chapter 337 - Following The Blue Deer</h4>


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    Back at the main peak of the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao was walking through the lush forest that covered the entire main peak together with the two blue deers. The small blue deer leading the way, with the bigger one cautiously following behind him. Not daring to take its eyes off him for even a second in case he decided to do something.


    "Hah¡­"


    Sighing audibly upon seeing how cautious therger blue deer was of him, Xuan Hao could not help but regret letting out his aura earlier. Even after everything had calmed down and he didn''t attack, therge blue deer still remained extremely scared and cautious of him.


    Well¡­ Not that I can me it¡­


    Thinking this as he thought about it from therge blue deer''s point of view, Xuan Hao could indeed see why it remained so cautious and scared of him¡­ He was after all someone who was far stronger than it and would easily be able to kill it along with its child, the small blue deer¡­


    Thump thump!


    Seeing the small blue deer leading the way suddenlye to a stop as it lightly stomped both its small hooves on the ground before looking back towards Xuan Hao. Clearly wanting him toe.


    "What is it little one?"


    Walking up beside it and soon spotted a few decaying objects in the shape of smallmp posts. Covered by shrooms and other foliage from the forest that had overgrown the smallmp posts over the years.


    "A path?"


    A narrow stone path could barely be discerned beneath the thick foliage around themp posts, as Xuan Hao felt the excitement of discovering something rted to the power that had upied the Shattered Star Peaks in the past.


    Following the narrow stone path would surely be able to lead him to some kind of ruin and from what he had experienced so far. Ruins would often have some kind of precious artifact, cultivation manual of precious spiritual herb inside of them!


    At least when nobody had visited them beforehand¡­


    "You want me to go?"


    ncing over towards the small blue deer that refused to take another step forward along with therger blue deer not even daring to step anywhere close to the narrow stone path.


    Thump!


    The small blue deer seemed to have understood what Xuan Hao said as it stomped both its front hooves in confirmation before looking up at Xuan Hao with an almost pleading look on its small, cute face.


    "I see, so something dangerous is that way and you want me to deal with it¡­?"


    Understanding the reason why the small blue deer had brought him here in the first ce, Xuan Hao didn''t know whether tough or cry as the small blue deer had intended to use him as a means to deal with the problem at the end of the narrow stone path¡­


    Nod Nod~


    Innocently nodding its small head with an almost human expression on its face, Xuan Hao confirmed the fact that the small deer clearly understood what he was saying and at the same time didn''t see anything wrong with sending a total stranger like him off to deal with the whatever was waiting at the end of the stone path¡­


    [Side Quest: You encountered a small blue deer asking for help to deal with a threat that once took the life of the small blue deer''s mother.]


    [Reward: Full Moon Ganoderma(Mystic)]


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to scold the small blue deer, the system sprang into action as a new side quest appeared. Confirming his initial suspicion about the fact that there was something dangerous waiting for him at the end of the stone path.


    "A Mystic Grade Full Moon Ganoderma¡­"


    Seeing the reward from the side quest, Xuan Hao could not help but whisper quietly to himself .


    The Qi Gathering Formation required five different mystic grade materials outside of the Transcendent Grade required for the core of the formation.


    The five different mystic grade materials each belonged to one of the five elements. Fire, Wind, Water, Wood and Metal. The material rted to the fire element already in his possession in the form of the Ash Sunstone that he was given by the system long ago¡­


    The Full Moon Ganoderma just so happened to be the mystic grade item from the wood element that the Qi Gathering Formation required, with it, he would be in possession of two out of the five required mystic grade materials needed to set up the Qi Gathering Formation!


    "Guess there is no reason not to explore where the stone path leads to¡­"


    Knowing that he would have gone to explore whatid at the end of the narrow stone path even without the side quest and the small blue deer urging him to go, Xuan Hao nced back at the excited small deer happily moving around therger blue deer as it watched him move forward.


    "What a weird deer¡­" Muttering this to himself as he rolled his eyes at the small blue deer''s clearly excited expression, Xuan Hao left the two blue deers as he moved along the narrow stone path until the two blue deerspletely disappeared from sight.


    Leaving Xuan Hao alone on the narrow stone path.


    Whoosh!


    Not intending to continue moving as slowly as he had when he followed the small blue deer earlier, Xuan Hao increased his speed, while at the same time preparing his defences in case he was ambushed along the way.


    After all, given the simple fact that the system had given him a quest, Xuan Hao knew that whatever the small deer wanted him to deal with, was something that would be able to pose a threat to him!


    Feeling himself grow more and more cautious the longer he travelled along the narrow stone path, Xuan Hao didn''t even notice how the stone path began to expand the closer he got the end of the path.


    It was only when it had already expanded to over double its size that Xuan Hao noticed it, but he didn''t pay too much attention to this and instead just continued to travel along the ancient stone path.


    ¡­


    "What in the world is happening!?"


    It was only after travelling for at least an hour that Xuan Hao came to a stop as he looked around at the ancient stone path that had now transformed into arge ancient stone road.


    "I should have reached the end of the stone path- stone road, long ago¡­ Why does it seem like I''m not moving at all?!"


    Voicing his thoughts, Xuan Hao looked at the stone road filled with confusion, he had clearly travelled far faster than a normal person could walk and given his current speed, he would already have been back at the Flying Sword Sect¡­ Let alone reach the edge of the Main Peak!


    Having already seen the Main Peak from the ground, Xuan Hao very clearly knew how big it was!


    "I don''t believe I can''t reach the end of this stone road!"


    Whoosh!


    Not holding back in the slightest this time around, Xuan Hao exerted all his strength. Instantly crossing dozens of miles within a few seconds.


    ¡­


    Slowly, another hour passed¡­


    "Hah¡­ Howe¡­ Hah¡­ There is no end to this bloody road¡­? Why can''t I leave?"


    Sitting down on the ground in a spot that looked exactly the same as the ce he had been an hour ago, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a wave of helplessness wash over him.


    At this point he had already realized he was trapped in some sort of confusion formation simr to the mist formation around the Flying Sword Sect that would cause people below a certain cultivation realm to always end up in the same location that they entered through.


    No, the formation he found himself in was different. Instead of calling it a confusion formation like the Flying Sword Sect''s mist formation, it was more fitting to call it an entrapment formation, as it trapped him inside with no way out¡­


    Xuan Hao had already tried moving off the road, but the road would soon appear in front of him after moving through an empty forest for a few minutes.


    Flying up into the air would not help either, as the sky would turn into a solid surface after moving up a few hundred meters.


    Breaking through the sky would then end up with him digging his way out of the ground next to the road. Digging down beneath the road on the other hand, would cause him to appear a few hundred meters up in the sky with the road beneath him¡­


    Xuan Hao very clearly understood that the entrapment formation that he was inside of, was way above anything he understood.


    It very clearly incorporated the maniption of space to a level that Xuan Hao had never seen before, he even spected that the formation itself was set up by someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. Maybe even someone in the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "Now¡­ How do I get out¡­?"


    Knowing that following the stone road would not help him, Xuan Hao sat down and began thinking about ways to escape the entrapment formation.


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 Chapter 338 - Finding A Way Out!

    <h4>Chapter 338 - Finding A Way Out!</h4>


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    Having managed to shake off the group of people following after them, Chu Yang, Qing Yi, and Huang Yongyu had changed their clothes once again before making their way towards the small harbour of Pure Heart City.


    Walking onto the pier of the small harbour of Pure Heart City after showing one of the tokens to a nearby guard, they made their way over towards one of the many small sized boats in the process of preparing to head towards the Pure Heart Ind.


    "So, this is the boat that will be taking us to the Pure Heart Ind?"


    Looking over at the small boat, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit uncertain. After all, from what Huang Yongyu had said, the Pure Heart Lake had quite a few demon beasts hidden inside of it¡­


    "No need to worry, the bottom of the boat is covered in a special material that makes it invisible to the demon beasts of the Pure Heart Lake. The only thing we need to keep in mind is to not make too much noise or the demon beasts will notice."


    Hearing what Chu Yang said, Huang Yongyu quickly reassured him. Not forgetting to point towards the weird blue material that covered the bottom of the small boat in front of them, a small part barely visible above the surface of the water.


    "What about any disturbance that the boat causes in the water¡­?" Not convinced after hearing what Huang Yongyu said, Qing Yi came forward and asked Huang Yongyu with a sceptical expression on her face.


    Even if the demon beasts couldn''t see them, they would at least be able to feel the movement in the water from the boat''s movement¡­


    "¡­ Hah¡­ You two don''t need to worry about it that much, if it didn''t work and the boats got attacked by demon beasts constantly, do you really think they would still be used¡­?" Giving up on exining anymore, Huang Yongyu knew very well that him answering Qing Yi''s question would end up causing another question to appear. Followed by another question and then another¡­


    Huang Yongyu did not really feel like exining every little thing about how the boat worked, as that would at the very least take a few hours¡­


    "You have a point¡­"


    Unable to find anything wrong with what Huang Yongyu said, Qing Yi and Chu Yang no longer questioned the safety of the boat as the group soon made their way over and boarded the small boat about to take off towards the Pure Heart Lake.


    With Huang Yongyu paying for the trip as Qing Yi and Chu Yang only brought a few spirit stones with them. Forgetting the fact that they would need normal coins for most transactions¡­


    Swish~


    Like this, the boat soon left the small harbour of the Pure Heart City and made its way towards the Pure Heart Ind located in the middle of the Pure Heart Lake.


    ¡­


    Bang!


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out an exhausted sigh, Xuan Hao watched as the giant hole in the ground in front of him slowly began to mend itself before returning to its former state.


    "Guess force will not be able to break the entrapment formation¡­ Or at the very least, the attack is still far too weak to do something like that¡­"


    Muttering this to himself with a curious look on his face, Xuan Hao had tried toe up with some kind of solution that would be able to get him out of his current predicament. However, all he coulde up with was hitting the ground as hard as possible and hope for the best¡­


    Not really the smartest idea, but at the very least he hoped that the formation would have grown weaker since it had been so long since it had been set up.


    After all, his skill when it came to formations was not anywhere strong enough to be able to figure out a way to break through the formation¡­


    "What about attacking arge area at once¡­?


    Whoosh!


    Trying out his new n of action, Xuan Hao began using both of his domains together, as the temperature around him began to reduce rapidly.


    At the same time, several ice swords began to form mid-air before they began wildly destroying the surroundings environment. Almost instantly destroying the lush forest that covered every piece ofnd surrounding the ancient road.


    "No use¡­?"


    Seeing that the trees and the ground still able to keep up with this speed of destruction inflicted by both his domains, Xuan Hao decided to try something different¡­


    Whoosh~


    With a wave of his hand, the ice sword currently in process of destroying everything around them in an attempt to beat the recovery rate of the formation, suddenly came to a stop before all of them flew back towards Xuan Hao.


    "Hmph!"


    BOOM!


    Using both his domains to control the numerous ice swords in front of him, Xuan Hao directed them to attack a single point in ground just in front of him as they quickly broke through.


    "Hm?"


    Looking up at the ce that the ice sword should have appeared, Xuan Hao was confused for a moment as he saw nothing appear.


    "It''s not there? Maybe¡­"


    Opening his eyes wide as a thought suddenly dawned on him, Xuan Hao jumped into the hole that his ice swords had created before appearing a few hundred meters in the sky with the rapidly closing hole behind him.


    Whoosh!


    However, all of this was not something Xuan Hao was interested in watching. Instead, he continued downwards with his ice swords in front of him.


    Bang!


    Piercing yet another hole in the ground, Xuan Hao soon found himself a few hundred meters in the air above the lush forest and the ancient road.


    However, this did not stop him, as he soon reached the ground before making yet another hole. Like this, Xuan Hao continued straight down without showing any sign of stopping.


    ¡­


    Ching~


    Having continued through an unknown number of ancient roads, Xuan Hao for the first time felt his ice swords bounce off as they hit the ground. Unable to pierce through.


    "This should be at the edge of the formation, if I break through here, I should be able to escape¡­"


    Staring at the ground that his ice swords had failed to break through, Xuan Hao smiled happily to himself as his idea had been correct.


    The formation did indeed move him around through spatial maniption, but the spatial maniption was way more limited than he had first thought.


    Instead of it covering everything, the spatial maniption only covered the four different direction he moved in and didn''t cover the sky and the ground. Like this, Xuan Hao could break through the ground or the sky and would appear in a new ce that looked just the same as thest.


    Havinge to this conclusion, Xuan Hao easily deducted the fact that these simr environments had been stacked together. However, the number of these environments were limited. Most likely by the strength of the formation core itself...


    After all, given the fact that the formation master could cover the four directions, he would likely also have been able to cover the ground and sky if the formation core was strong enough to handle it.


    "Guess I''m quite lucky¡­" Shivering at the thought of what would happen to him if the formation core had been strong enough to handle what he deemed theplete version of the entrapment formation, Xuan Hao could not help feeling happy at the creator of the entrapment formation''s bad luck at finding a strong enough formation core.


    "Now I just have to break it!"


    Not wanting to stay for even a second longer inside the entrapment formation, Xuan Hao focused solely on his Sword Intent Domain as pure silver sword martialized in his right hand.


    Whoosh!


    Standing still with the sword in his hand, a powerful air current surged up as the swords terrifying aura began overflowing, forming an invisible pressure as the ground beneath his feet began showing sign of cracking apart at any moment.


    Raising his hand. The silver-coloured sword swung down towards the ground without making any noise. The violent air current and terrifying pressure seemed to havepletely disappeared for a short moment before the de of the sword began to gently cut into the ground beneath him


    A short moment after the sword had cut into the ground, an endless sword aura instantly enveloped the entire space Xuan Hao was inside of.


    BOOM!


    Followed by that, Xuan Hao''s silver sword began tearing into the wall making up the edge of the entrapment formation.


    Rip~


    No matter how strong the formation was, the attack of Xuan Hao was simply too strong, as a small line first appeared before spreading at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    Soon, Xuan Hao could look directly outside through as the entrapment formation slowly began disintegrating around him!


    Wait¡­ What happens to the formation core¡­?


    Suddenly feeling like he had made a huge mistake by forcing his way out of the entrapment formation, Xuan Hao barely managed to turn around before the entire formation managed to disintegratepletely.


    Crack~


    But this was more than enough time to see what had most likely been a Transcendent Grade material acting as the formation core disintegrate along with the rest of the entrapment formation.


    "¡­"


    I really wish I didn''t see that¡­


    Feeling a profound sadness watching the formation core disintegrate, Xuan Hao soon recovered the strength used in the attack before beginning to look around himself and inspect the ce he had just appeared.


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 Chapter 339 - Sleeping Demon Beast

    <h4>Chapter 339 - Sleeping Demon Beast</h4>


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    Observing his surroundings, Xuan Hao quickly realized that he had reached the end of the ancient stone road. The lush forest that covered the main peak had alsoe to an end as he stood at the entrance to arge opening with nothing inside of it outside a half broken down pagoda at the centre.


    This however was not what caught Xuan Hao''s attention¡­ Instead, it was arge sleeping demon beast in the shape of a lionying just beside the broken-down pagoda.


    Looking closer, Xuan Hao discovered that the lion demon beast even had a pair of wings on its back neatly hugging its sleeping body as it breathed in and out rhythmically.


    A few meters away from the sleeping winged lion demon beast, arge pile of animal bones could be seen. Among which, a pair of giant deer bones could be seen on top of the pile. belonging to the most recent victim of the winged lion demon beast.


    "This is most likely the remains of the small blue deer''s mother¡­" Whispering this to himself as he cautiously looking around the open space, Xuan Hao soon calmed down after realizing that the winged lion demon beast didn''t wake up.


    "The quest wants me to deal with the threat that once took the small blue deer''s mother''s life¡­ So, I have to deal with the giant winged lion¡­?" ncing over towards the giant winged lion, Xuan Hao didn''t know how to proceed next.


    From just inspecting the aura alone, Xuan Hao had easily determined that the winged lion demon beast was still in the Domain Lord Realm. The only problem was the fact that he could not find out if it was at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm or only the first stage of the Domain Lord without waking it up in the process.


    Though¡­ Just looking at it, Xuan Hao doubted that the winged lion would merely be at the first stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Maybe I should check out the pagoda first?"


    Looking away from the winged lion demon beast, Xuan Hao focused his gaze on the half broken down pagoda just beside the winged lion demon beast.


    The broken down and decaying pagoda was by no means small, as it easily towered a few dozen meters into the sky. Given its current decaying circumstances, Xuan Hao even began to wonder how it could stand tall without copsing.


    Just looking up at it from where he was standing, Xuan Hao could clearly see into the first floor of the pagoda where arge part of it seemed to have broken off and fallen onto the ground below. Leaving behind arge hole that anyone walking by could look inside the pagoda through.


    I should explore the pagoda first¡­ After all, if I start fighting with that winged lion, the pagoda will most likely end up being destroyed¡­


    Having made up his mind to search through the pagoda before fighting the winged lion demon beast, Xuan Hao sneakily moved towards the pagoda. Levitating just a few centimeters off the ground so as to not make any sound and idently wake up the winged lion demon beast.


    Whoosh~


    Arriving in front of the entrance to the decaying pagoda, Xuan Hao cautiously looked towards the giant winged lion demon beast sleeping just a few meters away from him before letting out a sigh of relief upon discovering that the winged lion was still asleep.


    I wonder who this pagoda belonged to in the past¡­


    No longer paying any attention to the sleeping winged lion, Xuan Hao marvelled at the beautiful architecture of the pagoda that was still intact while slowly floating inside. Not knowing what he might find inside.


    ¡­


    "W-what in the world is this ce!?"


    Arriving inside the ground floor of the pagoda, Xuan Hao could not stop himself from eximing loudly as he stared out at the massive amount of withered up herbs covering the floor of the pagoda. However, the main reason for Xuan Hao''s not being able to hold himself back was¡­


    "Why¡­ Why wasn''t I born a few hundred years earlier¡­? So many¡­ Mystic Grade Herbs¡­"


    Feeling a profound sadness as he looked over at least a few hundred, if not thousands withered up Mystic Grade spiritual herb. Even Xuan Hao felt pain in his heart at the sheer number of spiritual herbs that had been renderedpletely useless with the passage of time.


    While it was often known that a spiritual herb would grow stronger the longer, they were alive. Spiritual herbs were not immortal and even if they had a lifespan way above humans and demon beast, they would still have to advance to the next level to increase their lifespan...


    Like the spiritual herbs in front of him, if they wanted to live longer, they would have to evolve into Transcendent Grade spiritual herbs¡­ Sadly, none of the spiritual herbs on the ground floor of the pagoda had managed to take this crucial step in their evolution and reached the Transcendent Grade¡­


    Meaning, all that was left on the ground floor of the pagoda, was the sad withered husks of what had once been extremely rare and useful spiritual herbs¡­ Truly a sight anyone would feel sadness over. Alchemist might even break into tears at the sad sight¡­


    "Hopefully there is something different on the first floor of the pagoda¡­"


    Not wanting to stay around the ground floor where the sad remains of spiritual herbs covered the floor, Xuan Hao could not help turning towards the spiral staircase located at the centre of the pagoda before making his way over.


    From what he had seen through the hole in the pagoda from the outside, the first floor of the pagoda was filled with several books that had been scattered all over the ce. Simr to how the withered spiritual herbs wereying all over the ground floor of the pagoda.


    At least the books would not be able to wither away like the spiritual herbs had¡­ Hopefully, he would be able to find something useful on the first floor¡­


    ¡­


    "¡­"


    Looking down on a book he had just picked off the floor of the first floor of the pagoda, Xuan Hao felt like crying as the book was written in apletely differentnguage than the one that was currently used on the Ewaria Continent!


    Even if there was something useful like a peerless cultivation technique or a mythical potion form, Xuan Hao would have no idea even if he looked directly at it¡­


    "Hm?"


    Just as he was about to give up on finding anything useful on the first floor of the pagoda, Xuan Hao barely managed to spot a few familiar letters on a book partially buried beneath a few other books at the edge of the hole he had seen making his way over to the pagoda earlier.


    Whoosh~


    Not daring to be too loud with the winged lion demon beast sleeping just outside, Xuan Hao slowly levitated towards the book before gently pulling it out of them small pile of books on top of it before moving away from the hole.


    Keeping his eye on the winged lion demon beast the entire time. Making sure that it didn''t wake up from its deep sleep.


    "Hah¡­"


    Arriving back at the spiral staircase, Xuan Hao let out a sigh of relief upon discovering that the winged lion was still deep asleep. Showing no signs of waking up any time soon.


    He really didn''t want to fight with it before he had finished searching the pagoda for anything precious¡­


    "Movements of the¡­ Hm?"


    Looking down at the title of the book, Xuan Hao realized that part of the title had been scratched off.


    Opening the book, Xuan Hao quickly realized that the book was not really a book in a sense, it was more like a record that noted down the movements of several different people. All of whose names Xuan Hao had never heard of before.


    The only thing that gave Xuan Hao some idea about how strong the people noted down in the book were, was the fact that original writer of the book had included several footnotes beside each of the people''s names. Stressing the importance of them and showing off the pure terror the writer had felt towards the people he or she had been keeping an eye on.


    Looking through the book, Xuan Hao found the names of several familiar locations and at the same time, even more unfamiliar locations he had never heard of before¡­


    However, one thing clearly stood out to him as he was reading through the book and that was the fact that all the people mentioned inside the book, was part of some kind of ancient power that had been at war with the power behind the person who had originally written down the book.


    "I wonder what happened in the past¡­"


    Not having heard much about the war that was mentioned in the book, Xuan Hao felt like it might be rted to the ancient war that happened in the past¡­ Maybe it was even rted to the power that had once ruled the area that had now be the Ewaria Continent¡­


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 Chapter 340 - Third Blue Feather

    <h4>Chapter 340 - Third Blue Feather</h4>


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    Putting the book away in his interspatial ring, Xuan Hao nced over towards the hole in the wall of the pagoda leading to the outside before continuing up to the next floor of the pagoda. Not wanting to stay around too long in case he ended up waking the winged lion up by ident.


    The faster he finished searching through the pagoda, the faster he would be able to ensure that he didn''t idently wake up the winged lion sleeping just outside¡­


    After all, thest thing Xuan Hao wanted to happen, was for the winged lion to wake up and destroy the ancient pagoda along with everything inside of it.


    "Empty¡­"


    Reaching the next floor of the pagoda, Xuan Hao quickly? scanned through the entire floor before showing disappointed expression and continuing onwards towards the next floor after realizing that the second floor of the pagoda waspletely empty. Not even simple furniture was present on the second floor as if someone hade along and reduced everything inside to dust before scattering those remains. Leaving behind thepletely empty second floor¡­


    ¡­


    Continuing onwards through the next few floors of the pagoda, Xuan Hao was only met with simr empty floors. Each no different from thest.


    "Now only thest floor remains¡­"


    Having made his way through all the empty floors, Xuan Hao no longer had much hope of finding anything useful inside of the pagoda. From his point of view, it almost seemed like the floors above the first floor had beenpletely emptied out before the pagoda had been left behind.


    Thinking about it, it was most likely rted to the ancient war in the past. Perhaps the people living in the pagoda in the past had been found and had decided to evacuate the pagoda before their enemies came for them...


    But somewhere along the line, their enemies had shown up before they had managed to pack away all their stuff and thus, the things on the two lowest floors had been left behind as they ran away¡­


    Coming to this conclusion, Xuan Hao felt that it made sense. There was just one thing missing¡­


    "Just how is the giant blue rock filled with divine energy rted to all of this¡­ The ancient war should have long since ended by the time that the blue rock fell from above and shattered eight mountain peaks beforeing to a stop at the Main Peak¡­ "


    Maybe there was something more to the main peak that he just didn''t see yet¡­?


    Shaking his head upon thinking about all of this, Xuan Hao decided to just focus on exploring thest floor of the pagoda as he slowly made his way up the spiral staircase before arriving at the top floor of the pagoda.


    Entering the top floor of the pagoda, Xuan Hao was surprised upon realizing that it was not empty like the other floors. Instead, it lookedpletely untouched. Almost like the past owners of the pagoda had forgotten about it when cleaning up the other floors of the pagoda¡­


    "This is¡­"


    Scanning over the top floor of the pagoda, Xuan Hao soon focused on a small pedestal located in the middle of the top floor before a look of a shock appeared on his face.


    "Another blue feather¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he walked over to the pedestal and looked down on the all too familiar looking blue feather on top of it, Xuan Hao could not help growing curious about the origin of the blue feathers.


    The two other blue feathers he had found so far had been in locations that were rted to the ancient war to some extent and the pagoda was also seemed to be rted to the war in question¡­


    Whoosh!


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to pick up the blue feather and put it away in his interspatial ring, the blue feather on top of the pedestal suddenly flew towards him before entering the interspatial ring by itself. Ignoring thews of space as it soon appeared inside Xuan Hao''s spatial rings floating quietly beside the two other blue feathers.


    "Well, that was-"


    Rumble!


    A few seconds after the blue feather had settled down inside Xuan Hao''s interspatial ring, the surroundings began to shake violently as the pagoda slowly began to copse around him, causing him to panic for a short moment. Not because the pagoda was copsing around him, but because he was certain that the copse would end up waking up the winged lion demon beast sleeping just outside¡­


    ROAR!


    As if knowing what Xuan Hao was thinking, arge roar could be hearding from the outside as a terrifying aura began spreading out across the Main Peak rapidly.


    "At least theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    Not worried about idently waking up the winged lion demon beast, Xuan Hao began analysing its strength. Not surprised in the slightest at the fact that it was in theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm.


    ROOOOAAARR!


    Having felt Xuan Hao''s presence, the moment it woke up, the winged lion did not care even the slightest about keeping the copsing pagoda intact.


    Angrily swinging its giant paw towards the top floor of the pagoda where Xuan Hao was located without holding back.


    BANG!


    As the enormous paw of the winged lion hit the top floor of the pagoda, a few symbols shone for a brief moment. Stopping the giant paw of the winged lion for an instant before beginning to copse under the pressure of the winged lion''s paw along with the rest of the pagoda.


    The few formations still intact on the pagoda itself were clearly in a bad statepared to how strong they had been in the past and could not defend against the attack of the winged lion for more than a few seconds¡­ But this was more than enough time for Xuan Hao to react!


    Whoosh~


    Flying down the staircase before leaving the pagoda, Xuan Hao easily managed to dodge the paw attack of the winged lion without any effort.


    "This is way bigger than before¡­"


    Looking over at the winged lion as it directly destroyed the pagoda, Xuan Hao could not help sucking in a cold breath of air as he finally realized just how massive the winged lion was. Easily being as tall as the pagoda itself! The pagoda was a seven-floor pagoda!


    The winged lion demon beast was by far thergest and at the same time the strongest demon beast Xuan Hao had encountered to date and even the demon beast that he had encountered back in the secret realm was nowhere near as strong as the winged lion in front of him¡­


    "Maybe it has reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm¡­?" Whispering this to himself as he felt the winged lion''s terrifying aura wash over him, Xuan Hao struggled to truly discern the real cultivation realm of the winged lion demon beast.


    The difference between someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and someone in theter stages was huge, it would be like having someone at the eighth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm fighting against someone at the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm.


    Only¡­ The difference between each minor realm in the Domain Lord Realm, was wayrger than in the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Roar!


    Spotting Xuan Hao who had just flown out of the pagoda that it crushed to pieces; the winged lion roared angrily before nimbly moving its massive body in the direction of Xuan Hao.


    "Hmph!"


    Not nning to just wait around for the winged lion to attack him, Xuan Hao directly used his ice domain to envelop the massive, winged lion charging towards him. Attempting to slow it down, while at the same time using his sword domain tounch a single sword attack towards the winged lion to test out its strength.


    Roar?


    Letting out a confused roar as it felt the ice domain descend upon it, the winged lion merely shrugged it off as it continued charging forward. Completely unaffected by the ice domain, as it resisted it with its physical body alone!


    "Wha-"


    Boom!


    Letting out a surprised voice upon seeing how easily his ice domain was dealt with, Xuan Hao was once again shocked speechless upon witnessing the winged lion take his sword attack with its physical body. Not even flinching after being hit.


    Even if it was merely an attack to test the strength of the winged lion, it was still an attackunched by his sword domain!


    For the winged lion to so easily shrug his attack aside without even using its own domain¡­ Xuan Hao suddenly had a feeling that the winged lion would not be so easy to kill¡­


    Roar!


    Roaring loudly upon arriving in front of Xuan Hao, the winged lion swung itsrge paw filled with sharp ws down towards him.


    "Hah¡­ This is going to take some time¡­"


    Not affected by the giant paw swinging down towards him, Xuan Hao didn''t bother dodging the attack and instead faced it head on as a giant sword materialized next to him before shing up towards the descending paw of the winged lion.


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 Chapter 341 - Xuan Hao Vs Winged Lion Demon Beast!

    <h4>Chapter 341 - Xuan Hao Vs Winged Lion Demon Beast!</h4>


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    BOOM!


    As the paw of the winged lion demon beast shed with the giant sword of Xuan Hao, arge explosion urred as both Xuan Hao and the winged lion demon beast were forced back a few steps beforeing to a stop.


    Roar?


    Looking down at its paw with a confused expression on itsrge face, the winged lion demon beast had a hard timeprehending the fact that Xuan Hao had managed to block its attack. All that it could see was a thin line going from one end of its paw to the other as a thin line of blood was barely visible for a short instant before quickly closing up and returning to its former unharmed state.


    However, this was the first time that the winged lion demon beast had ever experienced actually being wounded by someone in a long time!


    ROAR!


    Roaring angrily, the winged lion demon beast didn''t attack immediately this time around and instead began more closely observing Xuan Hao, as it clearly understood the fact that he was more dangerous than any of the other demon beasts that it had encountered so far on the Main Peak¡­


    "Hm?"


    Having expected for the winged lion tounch another attack, Xuan Hao was caught slightly off guard when it suddenly stopped to examine him for a short moment.


    But this did notst for long as the winged lion demon soon came to a decision andunched yet another attack in the direction of Xuan Hao.


    The only difference was the fact that instead of just casual swinging its paw down towards him, the winged lion had begun viewing Xuan Hao as a threat. Going all out from the start¡­


    Holding back against Xuan Hao was clearly not something that the winged lion demon beast could afford to do, and it had quickly realized this fact after their first sh!


    Whoosh!


    The winged lion demon beast was not weak, and as it approached Xuan Hao floating a few hundred meters away from it, a terrifying storm followed. The wind danced around it as its speed increased to a new height. The winged lion demon beast had summoned forth the power of its domain, a wind domain!


    Boom!


    The devastating power of the wind directly erupted, as it split up into an endless number of small wind des the moment that the winged lion demon beast reached Xuan Hao. Instantly surrounding him from all directions with no path out.


    Roar!


    This was not all, as the winged lion demon beast gathered the power of its wind domain into one of its paws before ruthlessly smashing down towards the location currently about to be hit by the terrifying wind des that it had martialized through its domain.


    The two attacks of the winged lion demon beast both came down upon Xuan Hao in quick session of one another without nning to give him any time to react.


    "Hah¡­ A wind domain¡­?"


    Faced with the two attacks of the winged lion demon beast, Xuan Hao did not panic in the slightest as he calmly used his sword domain and newly acquired ice domain together as countless ice swords materialized all around him to block the iing wind des.


    Zing~


    The ice sword of Xuan Hao soon flew out as they shed with the wind des of the winged lion demon beast. Blocking them before they managed to get too close.


    "Sword Shadow!"


    Knowing that the terrifying paw of the winged lion demon beast enhanced by its wind domain was still heading towards him, Xuan Hao did not hesitate in the slightest as he used the first move from the Untold Swords Mantra.


    Even if he had not obtained his domain ording to the cultivation mantra, the Sword Shadow was still one of the strongest techniques he could use at the moment!


    BOOM!


    As the paw of the winged lion demon beast shed with the sword attack, various images shed behind each of them, a terrifying storm that seemed capable of ripping apart anyone who entered behind the winged lion demon beast and an endless sea of swords as cold as ice behind Xuan Hao.


    ¡­


    The sheer strength behind the sh between both of them caused the entire Main Peak to shake violently as even the people outside the Shattered Star Peak could feel a terrifying shakinging from the Main Peak as the entire Shattered Star Peak seemed to shake for a moment.


    "W-what in the world is happening on the Main Peak?!"


    "I-is the Main Peak perhaps about to copse¡­?"


    "H-how can the Main Peak just copse?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was locked in a fight with the winged lion demon beast, the cultivators who hade to the Shattered Star Peak were all looking up towards the Main Peak filled with fear as they all felt everything around them suddenly begin shaking violently. Almost like and earthquake had suddenly hit the Shattered Star Peaks


    Whoosh~


    Those watching from the Third Star Peak, could barely see the weird clouds engulfing the Main Peak begin moving around erratically as they did their best to seal of the space inside the Main Peak. If not, everything around the Main Peak would have been affected by the aftershocks, and the people currently watching from the side on the Third Star Peak might have fallen victim to the terrifying shockwaves of the battle between Xuan Hao and the winged lion demon beast!


    That was a battle between Domain Lord! Not to mention that both Xuan Hao and the winged lion demon beast both had strength close to the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. Their powers were incredibly strong and a shockwave from a sh between both of them could easily kill off the Core Formation cultivators currently on the Third Star Peak. Even Zhu Lian who had just reached the Nascent Soul Realm might end up seriously injured!


    The only truly unfortunate ones in this circumstance were the inhabitants of the Main Peak that didn''t have anything to protect them against the shockwaves from Xuan Hao and the winged lion demon beast''s sh. All of them trying their best to hide away underground to escape the terrifying shockwaves of Xuan Hao and the winged lion demon beast.


    In this sense, the small blue deer was far ahead of the other demon beast. Already having predicted something like this to happen, it had hidden away in arge cave deep inside the mountain together with therge blue deer demon beast at the Nascent Soul Realm. Both of them perfectly unaffected by Xuan Hao''s fight outside of the tremors that the battle sent through the entire mountain.


    However, after the feeling the effects of the first sh, the weird clouds directly descended as they sealed off the small opening that Xuan Hao and the winged lion demon beast were fighting in from the rest of the Main Peak.


    Allowing the surviving demon beasts to at least stay alive¡­


    ¡­


    Back at the opening in the forest, Xuan Hao, and the winged lion demon beast both separated before observing their opponent.


    After the earlier sh, Xuan Hao had clearly felt that the winged lion demon beast was way stronger than he had first expected. From what he had observed during the earlier sh, the winged lion demon beast''s physical body should be close to surpassing the Domain Lord Realm!


    This alone made things way more difficult, as it was difficult to truly inflict anysting damage on the winged lion demon beast¡­


    The main reason for this was the fact that its physical body was strong enough to recover almost instantly. Even the Sword Shadow attack from earlier had barely managed to cut off a part of the winged lion demon beast''s paw¡­


    "I have to find some other way to deal with-"


    ROAR!


    Before Xuan Hao coulde up with n to deal with the insane defence of the winged lion demon beast, it charged over towards him full of anger.


    Clearly not happy at the fact that Xuan Hao had just cut off part of its paw¡­


    Boom!


    Like this, Xuan Hao began fighting with the winged lion demon beast. Neither of them showing any signs of winning as both of them shed again and again, causing the Main Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks to shake more and more violently as the weird clouds surrounding the Main Peak worked overtime to not let the effects of the battle harm the Main Peak itself.


    However, this would not be able tost forever as the weird clouds surrounding the Main Peak slowly began to show signs of weakening.


    This was a catastrophic thing for all the different creatures and demon beasts living on the Main Peak. After all, if the weird clouds even weakened by a little bit, the chaotic qi outside would be able to break through the weird clouds and reach the Main Peak!


    At that point in time, only Xuan Hao and the winged lion demon beast would be able to survive!


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 Chapter 342 - Fate Of The Winged Lion Demon Beast!

    <h4>Chapter 342 - Fate Of The Winged Lion Demon Beast!</h4>


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    "Hah¡­" As Xuan Hao and the winged lion demon beast continued to sh with each other, Xuan Hao slowly felt the exhaustion of fighting a prolonged fight. For him to win, he would need to deal with it quickly and not end up stuck in his current situation.


    After all, as things were now, he would never be able to kill the winged lion demon beast even if he continued to fight it for another three days and three nights!


    Its physical body was simply too strong, and its qi reserves seemingly had no end to them, Xuan Hao even felt that he would be the one loosing if he tried to fight a prolonged fight with the winged lion demon beast¡­


    With all this in mind, Xuan Hao began to formte a n to deal with the winged lion demon beast!


    Whoosh!


    Boom!


    Blocking another attack from the winged lion demon beast that came for him the moment his attention drifted from the battle, Xuan Hao was flung backwards by the force of the attack as he crashed into the ground a few hundred meters away.


    Just before hitting the ground, Xuan Hao noticed the weird clouds that had encircled both him and the winged lion demon beast move backwards to avoid him.


    "Hm? Maybe I can use the weird clouds to my advantage¡­"


    Looking at the movement of the weird clouds and back at the winged lion demon beast gathering the power of its wind domain in both itsrge wings!


    "It''s going to try a quick attack again¡­ I can use this!"


    Recognizing the attack that the winged lion demon beast was about to use, Xuan Hao''s eyes shone for a brief moment as his mind worked overtime toe up with a n to deal with the winged lion demon beast.


    Whoosh!


    Setting his n into action, Xuan Hao used his greatest speed possible to ascended upwards towards the weird clouds covering the sky above.


    ROAR!


    p~


    The winged lion demon beast not far behind as it pped both of its huge wings before chasing after with a speed far exceeding that of Xuan Hao, it was after all a demon beast with wings! Even Xuan Hao could notpare to it when it came to flying speed¡­.


    Swish~


    Reaching the weird clouds sealing off the Main Peak from the outside world, Xuan Hao went through it like he had done in the past. Directly appearing in the air above the Main Peak itself.


    "Ah!" Letting out a low scream of pain as the chaotic qi began rapidly invading his body like it had done in the past on his way up the Main Peak, Xuan Hao quickly expelled the chaotic qi that managed to enter his body with thebined strength of his sword domain and ice domain.


    However, just remaining floating in the air above the Main Peak was an enormous drain on his strength.


    Even with his current strength, Xuan Hao did not think he couldst more than an hour or two fighting in his current condition. Having to keep the chaotic qi at bay was simply too draining on both his domains...


    Whoosh!


    Watching as the winged lion demon beast followed closely after him through the weird clouds beforeing to a stop as it tried to keep the chaotic qi out of its body.


    Roar!


    The winged lion demon beast roared angrily towards Xuan Hao before pping its wings and diving down towards the weird clouds-


    Bang~


    Only to collide with them and bounce back a few meters¡­


    The weird clouds had clearly realized that the winged lion demon beast and Xuan Hao were a threat and didn''t n to let them inside again in case they caused even more damage than they already had¡­


    "How interesting¡­ It does indeed have some kind of awareness¡­"


    Smiling happily? upon seeing the winged lion demon beast being shut out from what was most likely its home, Xuan Hao didn''t wait around as his ice domain fully erupted around him before descending down on the winged lion demon beast!


    ROAR!


    Feeling its movements slow down as it had to deal with both the ice domain of Xuan Hao and the chaotic qi trying to enter its body and ravage its meridians and dantian, the winged lion demon beast became enraged as its wind domain erupted violently. Forming a small-scale hurricane with itself at the centre.


    "Looks like it is indeed harder for the winged lion to deal with the chaotic qi¡­" Looking at how much the winged lion demon beast was struggling with keeping the chaotic qi out of its body, Xuan Hao could not help feeling thankful that his idea had been correct.


    Earlier, his n had been to lure the winged lion demon beast out of the Main Peak and use the chaotic qi to weaken the winged lion. Thinking that it would have to deal with way more chaotic qi trying to invade its bodypared to him. Reason being that its body was many timesrger than his own.


    Seeing this work and how the winged lion demon beast was now trying to leave the space above the Main peak, Xuan Hao had no n to let it escape so easily! This might be his only chance to kill the winged lion demon beast now that it had weakened due to the chaotic qi constantly trying to invade its body!


    Whoosh~


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao stopped using his ice domain to slow down the movement of the winged lion demon beast after seeing its futile efforts to go through the weird clouds.


    Instead switching to using his ice domain to keep the chaotic qi at bay for the moment, while using his sword domain to fight the winged demon beast!


    This was by far thergest advantage Xuan Hao had in his fight against the winged demon beast in the air above the Main Peak.


    He could dedicate one of his domains to keeping the chaotic qi at bay and the other to fighting, while the winged lion demon beast was forced to use its wind domain both to fight and keep the chaotic qi from invading its body!


    Whoosh~


    "Haha, think I will let you leave so easily?"


    Seeing the winged lion demon beast give up on reaching the Main Peak through the weird clouds and instead try to escape down towards the ground where the chaotic qi was not present, Xuan Haoughed disdainfully.


    The winged lion demon beast clearly did not think he could stop it!


    Swish!


    Before the winged lion demon beast managed to even move a few meters away from its current location, a sea of pure silver swords manifested all around it as Xuan Hao''s sword domain engulfed the winged lion demon beast and the hurricane formed by its wind domain.


    BOOM!


    The two domains violently shed against each other with neither letting the other gain any advantage on the other¡­ But this was more than enough for Xuan Hao as he managed to keep the winged lion demon beast from escaping.


    Roar!


    The winged lion demon beast also realized what was happening as it began panicking. Violently trying its best to break free from Xuan Hao''s sword domain to no avail.


    The moment it tried to leave, it would leave an opening for Xuan Hao to attack through and even with its strong physical body, a small wound would allow the chaotic qi to easily enter its body and destroy it from the inside!


    The winged lion demon beast already realized its own helpless situation as it grew more and more desperate with each passing moment. Feeling its strength slowly weakening due to Xuan Hao''s sword domain and the chaotic qi both trying to break through its wind domain at the same time.


    ¡­


    Time slowly passed and after half an hour of fighting with the wind domain of the winged lion demon beast, Xuan Hao felt a change ur.


    Suddenly feeling a change in the winged lion demon beast, Xuan Hao prepared himself for a possiblest-ditch effort in the form of an all our attack from the winged lion demon beast.


    "Hm?"


    The winged lion demon beast suddenly came to aplete stop as it spat out a drop of pure red blood towards Xuan Hao.


    "You want to establish a blood pact¡­?"


    Looking at the drop of pure red blood that came to a stop floating a few centimeters in front of him, Xuan Hao immediately understood the intentions of the winged lion demon beast.


    It didn''t want to die, so it hoped that Xuan Hao would establish a blood pact with it and allow it to live¡­


    A blood pact was something Xuan Hao learned about when looking into the Beast Tamers of the Flying Sword Sect.


    From what he knew, the blood pact was a contract established between a demon beast and a human.


    The contract itself was a master-servant kind of contract where the demon beast gave up a part of its essence blood infused with a part of its soul.


    Doing something like this was out of the ordinary and Xuan Hao had never heard about anyone in the Flying Sword Sect establishing this sort of contract before, though he felt like there was some other reason for that¡­


    With the essence blood, Xuan Hao could easily kill the winged lion demon beast by destroying the soul infused essence blood!


    The winged lion demon beast had clearly not seen a way out of its current situation and hoped that it would at least gain a chance to live if it gave up its essence blood and followed Xuan Hao¡­


    Given that Xuan Hao had already disyed his strength and was not someone weak, the winged lion demon beast was not too sad about this fate. After all, it would rather follow some strong who beat it over someone weak!


    "I ept!"


    Storing away the soul infused essence blood of the winged lion demon beast, Xuan Hao saw no reason to refuse gaining such a strong demon beast.


    With it, Xuan Hao could more easily leave the Flying Sword Sect for the alchemypetition in the future.


    Leaving behind the winged lion demon beast to defend the sect would be more than enough to cause even Domain Lords in theter stages to think twice before doing anything to the Flying Sword Sect!


    Whoosh!


    Having finished the fight, Xuan Hao was not too hurried in checking out his quest and instead made his way back through the weird clouds back down to the Main Peak.


    After he epted the soul infused blood essence of the winged lion, they suddenly allowed both of them to enter again. Almost like the gathering of weird clouds were aware of what was happening between both of them¡­ The clouds circling the Main Peak were most definitely weird¡­


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao and the winged lion demon beast both began recovering from their fight in the now devastated opening in the lush forest of the Main Peak.


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 Chapter 343 - Pure Heart Island

    <h4>Chapter 343 - Pure Heart Ind</h4>


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    Looking out over the side of the small boat at the water of the Pure Heart Lake, Qing Yi could not help but feel how small she was. The sheer size of the Pure Heart Lake was simply unfathomable to her in its entirety and that was only looking on the surface of theke itself.


    Below the surface, there would surely be a myriad of hidden treasures and ancient relics of the past that had been lost over the countless years since the Pure Heart Lake hade into existence. Not to mention the demon beasts that lived in the waters of the Pure Heart Lake¡­


    "The Pure Heart Lake truly is massive¡­ I wonder how big the ocean ispared to this¡­"


    Muttering this to herself, Qing Yi could simply not begin to imagine the ocean that supposedly surrounded the entire Ewaria Continent.


    Just thinking about the ocean and what kind of terrifying demon beat and ancient artifacts that might be hidden beneath the surface made Qing Yi both excited and terrified thinking about it at the same time.


    But then again, not many people on the Ewaria Continent had seen the ocean before. Simply due to the fact that the Ewaria Continent was way too big and even someone in the Nascent Soul Realm would not dare venture out of the region they were born in. Normally ranging from a few adjacent kingdoms to a few dozen kingdoms.


    Take the Flying Sword Sect''s current location as an example, if you wanted to go from the Flying Sword Sect to the ocean, you would have to cross through at least a few hundred different kingdoms and at the same time through different empires!


    The task itself was dangerous beyond belief and one could easily lose their life, that is of course also not considering the years it would take to make the trip in the first ce¡­


    In the end. Only someone at the Domain Lord Realm would even think about going on such a long journey in the first ce to see the ocean and most of those Domain Lords would be those whoprehended a water domain looking for enlightenment through observing the huge body of water that is the ocean!


    "Qing Yi, we are almost there!"


    Lost in her own thoughts as she looked out over the railing of the ship, Chu Yang suddenly walked up and nudged her shoulder gently before informing her.


    "Hm?! That is the Pure Heart Ind¡­?"


    Blinking her pair of bright eyes for a short moment, Qing Yi looked around herself in a slightly bewildered manner before turning around to look at therge ind that had suddenly appeared in front of the ship at some point in time.


    "Yes! We will be getting off soon, so I thought we should group up before making our way onto the Pure Heart Ind." Nodding his head to her question, Chu Yang decided not toment on Qing Yi''s bewildered expression, as she seemed like someone who had just woken up without knowing where they were.


    "I see¡­ Then let''s get Huang Yongyu!"


    Like this, Qing Yi and Chu Yang quickly made their way to the inner part of the ship where Huang Yongyu was happily chatting with some of the other people on their way to the Pure Heart Ind.


    "We''re about to reach the Pure Heart Ind!"


    Just as Chu Yang was about to go and inform Huang Yongyu, an old man came into the inner part of the ship and informed the people inside about the fact that they would soon reach the Pure Heart Ind.


    Making it easy for Qing Yi and Chu Yang to go over and pick up Huang Yongyu. Now that the people he had been chatting with leaving him behind to prepare themselves to leave the ship.


    ¡­


    Arriving on the Pure Heart Ind, Qing Yi and Chu Yang were both amazed by the unique flora of the ind. Weird yet beautiful flowering trees covered in beautiful blue flowers and other mostly blue nts covering most of the ind that they could see.


    After taking in the beautiful environment of the Pure Heart Ind, Qing Yi and Chu Yang soon made their way over towards a small building located close to the shore of the ind under the lead of Huang Yongyu, who seemed way more knowledgeable about how things worked on Pure Heart Ind.


    Not that surprising given that the Pure Heart Lake and ind were under his sect''s control, though their enemies seemed to have mostly taken control of it at this point in time¡­


    "Are you here to participate in the Ghost Howl Sect''s expedition towards the centre of the Pure Heart Ind?"


    The moment the three of them entered, a young man came up and asked in a curious voice.


    "Ghost Howl Sect''s expedition? I didn''t hear anything about this, we are merely here to try our luck on getting some Pure Heart Spirit Grass¡­ Could you perhaps exin a bit more about this expedition?"


    Reacting to the young man mentioning the Ghost Howl Sect when he just impersonated as a young master from the sect a short moment ago, Chu Yang could not help asking about more information.


    After all, thest thing he wanted was for the Ghost Howl Sect to figure out that he had impersonated as a young master from their sect¡­


    "Sure¡­ The Ghost Howl Sect has put together a small force and n to enter the centre region of the Pure Heart Lake to explore and gather some of the natural resources growing on the Pure Heart Ind. However, this is not the truth.


    In truth, the Ghost Howl Sect is actually using the expedition as realbat training for their disciples and at the same time allowing younger wandering cultivators an opportunity to join! From what I know, they are even nning to recruit the best preforming wandering cultivators into their sect as disciples!"


    Saying this, the young man looked extremely excited.


    More often than not, young wandering cultivator didn''t want to be wandering cultivators and actually only ended up like that due to them either failing to enter a sect or some other circumstances that prevented them from joining a sect, kingdom or other power that taught cultivation.


    Rarely did young people want to be wandering cultivators by themselves. Not having any guidance from elders as they took their first and, in most circumstances, wed steps on the path of cultivation.


    "Do you want to join the expedition with me? It will be way easier for you to get your hands on Pure Heart Spirit Grass as well! Don''t forget that most of the demon beasts found around Pure Heart Spirit Grass are at the Foundation Establishment Realm!"


    Listening to what the young man said, Chu Yang, Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu smiled wryly. The young man in front of them was clearly only at the Qi Condensation Realm and was likely thinking that they were like him.


    Wandering cultivators who came to look for an opportunity on the Pure Heart Ind.


    "We will think about it beforeing to a decision¡­ Anyways, thanks for the information!"


    Not outright refusing the young wandering cultivator, Chu Yang kindly replied to him.


    "Sure, just remember that the Ghost Howl Sect''s expedition will set off tomorrow at dawn!"


    Not seeing anything wrong with what Chu Yang said, the young man happily nodded his head in approval before heading over towards a small group of people gathered together at a nearby table chatting together. Most likely other wandering cultivators also looking to join the expedition of the Ghost Howl Sect tomorrow.


    "Hah¡­ Didn''t expect the Ghost Howl Sect to be the one currently at the Pure Heart Ind¡­"


    Watching as the young man left, Huang Yongyu suddenly muttered to himself with a troubled expression on his face.


    Not understanding why Huang Yongyu suddenly appeared so troubled over the mention of the Ghost Howl Sect, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both grew curious about what was so troubling about the Ghost Howl Sect.


    "Is there a problem with the Ghost Howl Sect? I don''t think they will know about what happened earlier and it should also be easier for us to find Pure Heart Spirit Grass if we follow them¡­"


    "No! You might not know this, but the Ghost Howl Sect is one of the main sects in the coalition against my River Sect and they are by no means good and could be described as a demonic sect! The only thing missing is them practicing demonic techniques¡­


    And now, this sect is nning an expedition to the centre of the Pure Heart Ind. Even allowing young wandering cultivators to join them with the promise of a chance to maybe join the sect¡­? No matter how I look at this, there is something wrong with this so-called expedition!"


    Listening to what Chu Yang said, Huang Yongyu proceeded to voice his doubts about the expedition. Making sure not to talk too loudly in case anyone other than Chu Yang and Qing Yi heard him.


    "Can''t we just avoid joining the expedition? Do remember that we are not here to uncover what the Ghost Howl Sect are up to, we are just here to get some Pure Heart Spirit Grass for a sect mission¡­" Qing Yi who remained silent when both Chu Yang and Huang Yongyu were speaking suddenly asked the two of them.


    "Indeed, we can just ignore the Ghost Howl Sect¡­ Even if it''s slower, at least it will be safe."


    "I agree as well, but I still have a feeling something dangerous is going to happen, we should strive to finish gathering the Pure Heart Spirit Grass you two need before leaving."


    Chu Yang and Huang Yongyu both agreed with what Qing Yi said, they had indeed onlye for the Pure heart Spirit Grass, there was no need for them to involve themselves with what the Ghost Howl Sect was up to and pointlesslynd themselves in a dangerous situation¡­


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 Chapter 344 - Never Pretend To Be A Young Master!

    <h4>Chapter 344 - Never Pretend To Be A Young Master!</h4>


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    "This should be all we need for finding the Pure Heart Spirit Grass!" Coming out of the building, Huang Yongyu smiled happily as he held a map he had just bought.


    "So, the reason we went into the building was to get this map?" Tilting her head to the side as she asked this, Qing Yi did not understand why Huang Yongyu was so excited about buying a map.


    "Yes! It gets updated once a month and the locations of the stronger demon beasts on Pure Heart Ind are noted down on it. The location where you are likely to find Pure Heart Spirit Grass and other unique spirit herbs from Pure Heart Ind are also noted down, so it should be easy for us to find the Pure Heart Spirit Grass before leaving!"


    Nodding his head excitedly as he began exining the use of the map to Qing Yi and Chu Yang, both of them grew more interested as they listened to his exnation, both of them leaning closer to Huang Yongyu to get a glimpse of the map itself.


    The map was extremely colourful and covered the entire ind. Having different regions of the ind coloured differently depending on the danger. Going from the most harmless areas marked for someone in the Qi Condensation Realm, to the most dangerous marked for the Core Formation Realm at the centre of the ind.


    Looking over the map, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang quickly spotted a small symbol that represented the Pure Heart Spirit Grass.


    Scanning over the map in Huang Yongyu''s hands, both of them quickly realized that Pure Heart Spirit Grass could be found in all the different regions. Growing moremon the closer to the centre of the ind one went¡­


    "Should we start over there? It seems like there are quite a lot of Pure Heart Spirit Grass in that area and it''s not too dangerous ording to the map."


    Spotting a small region not far from where they were filled with Pure Heart Spirit Grass, Qing Yi quickly pointed it out to Chu Yang and Huang Yongyu.


    "Hm¡­ It looks like it''s danger level is Foundation Establishment but given how far from the centre of the ind it is, it should be no problem for us to deal with the demon beasts there! To be honest, I don''t even think we will encounter any demon beast above the Third Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­"


    Reluctantly agreeing with Qing Yi, Chu Yang felt a little disappoint upon thinking about the fact that he would not be able to have a proper fight with any of the demon beasts there.


    After his fight with the bandit leader a few days ago, Chu Yang had grown to enjoy the thrill of battle and wanted to experience a fight where he didn''t just end up casually swinging his spear to kill mindless demon beasts¡­


    "¡­"


    Huang Yongyu did not say anything and just silently agreed.


    In the first ce, it was not really his ce to refuse Qing Yi even if he wanted to go to an even less dangerous area closer to the Qi Condensation danger level regions of the Pure Heart Ind.


    However, the positive about going to the location Qing Yi had pointed out, was the fact that they would be able to gather Pure Heart Spirit Grass faster than if they went to one of the safer regions¡­ Huang Yongyu had also seen how strong both Qing Yi and Chu Yang were back when they dealt with the bandits, so he didn''t worry too much about them ending up in a situation that they couldn''t get out of.


    "If everyone agrees, then let''s get going!"


    Seeing both Huang Yongyu and Chu Yang agree with her, Qing Yi happily informed both of them before taking the map away from Huang Yongyu as she began moving in the direction of the region that they had agreed to go to gather Pure Heart Spirit Grass.


    Whoosh~


    Huang Yongyu and Chu Yang quickly followed after Qing Yi as the group of three made their way away from the shore of the Pure Heart Ind.


    ¡­


    At the same time that Chu Yang, Qing Yi, and Huang Yongyu were making their way to gather Pure Heart Spirit Grass, a ship many timesrger than the one they had used slowly made its way towards the Pure Heart Ind.


    "Someone pretended to be disciples of our sect?! Tell me, have you caught them yet!?"


    Crash!


    Arge crashing sound echoed out through arge room located at the centre of the ship as a handsome young man angrily threw a cup in his hand towards a person kneeling down in front of him full of fear.


    "Y-young master, t-they were not caught ye-"


    Bang!


    Before the person kneeling down could finish speaking, the handsome young man sitting in the centre of the room flipped the table in front of him as it flew through the air before hitting the man kneeling down only a few meters away from him.


    "And¡­?"


    Calming down after flipping the table on the unfortunate person who hade to report this to him, the handsome young man asked in a less agitated tonepared to before.


    "¡­"


    "Young master¡­ I think he fainted¡­"


    Not hearing any answer from the personying beneath the table, the handsome young man was just about to find something different to throw when an elderly man appeared from the shadows and informed him.


    "I see¡­ Elder, do you perhaps know about this situation?" Nodding his head as he suddenly became more obedient upon seeing the old man, the young master asked the elderly man about the situation that had happened in Pure heart City in a respectful voice. Not daring to act as arrogantly as before.


    "Haha, I indeed heard about it. Apparently, they didn''t only pretend to be disciples of our sect to enter the Pure Heart City, but one of them even pretended to be the young master of our sect! Haha, I truly admire their courage!"


    Hearing the elderly manughing menacingly beside him, the handsome young man shivered as he felt the clear killing intent behind theughter.


    "Wait! Someone pretend to be ME!?"


    Just now realizing what the elderly man had said, the handsome young man screamed loudly as an uncontroble anger began to overtake him.


    Not only did someone pretend to be disciples of HIS sect, but one of them was even bold enough to pretend to be HIM!


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 Chapter 345 - Searching For Pure Heart Spirit Grass

    <h4>Chapter 345 - Searching For Pure Heart Spirit Grass</h4>


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    Having left the shore of the Pure Heart Ind, the group of three soon arrived at the region Qing Yi had found on the map.


    The ce itself was located in a small forest made out of tall trees with glistering blue bark covering them, with close to no branches present before reaching the crown of the trees a few dozen meters in the air.


    The crown of the blue trees was weirdly enough not following the colour of the rest of the tree. Instead, being covered in bright flowers of all sorts of colours.


    "What a weird tree¡­" Muttering this to himself, Chu Yang could not help looking at the weird trees that had formed a small forest by themselves in front of him.


    "Indeed, weird trees¡­ They are known as rainbow crown trees due to¡­ Well, their crown being covered in flowers in all the colours of the rainbow. Other than that, they also grew a rare spiritual fruit called the Rainbow Crown Fruit! It''s a well-known spiritual fruit from the Pure Heart Ind. Sadly, its lifespan after being plucked is no more than a few days, so it''s not often found in ces too far from the Pure Heart Lake¡­"


    Exining this as he looked up at the blue tree with their rainbow-coloured crowns, Huang Yongyu''s exnation caused Chu Yang to look up towards the beautifully coloured crowns of the rainbow crown trees. Hoping to spot one of the so-called Rainbow Crown Fruits Huang Yongyu mentioned.


    Such a spiritual fruit was bound to be delicious¡­


    "We should try and see if we can find any Rainbow Crown Fruits! I really wonder what they will taste like¡­ What do you thi-"


    "Remember the reason why we are here in the first ce and don''t forget that there are also demon beasts in here! Let''s start searching for them by splitting up, so we can cover arger area!"


    Watching Huang Yongyu and Chu Yang as they talked about the weirdly coloured trees, Qing Yi interrupted Chu Yang as he looked like he was about to give up their sect mission to search for spiritual fruits. Reminding both him and Huang Yongyu about their reason foring to the small forest in the first ce before she began searching for the Pure Heart Spirit Grass by herself.


    "¡­"


    Chu Yang, who was about to ask Qing Yi about searching for the Rainbow Crown Fruits was both rendered speechless by what Qing Yi said. Unable to argue with what she said.


    Indeed, they had onlye to the Pure Heart Ind for the Pure Heart Spirit Grass¡­


    Not finding any way to disagree with what Qing Yi said, Chu Yang was forced to put aside his thoughts of tasting the Rainbow Crown Fruit to some other time¡­


    "I will search over here!"


    Huang Yongyu was not against Qing Yi''s suggestion in the slightest and happily began searching for the Pure Heart Spirit Grass.


    No matter what, to avoid the Ghost Howl Sect, the best way would be for them to leave before they arrived and started up their expedition!


    With this in mind, Huang Yongyu put forth all his effort and knowledge about the Pure Heart Ind gained through growing up in the River Sect to use in searching for the Pure Heart Spirit Grass.


    "The Pure Heart Spirit Grass is most often found being guarded by demon beasts, so the easiest way to find Pure Heart Spirit Grass, would be to find the demon beasts guarding them!" Muttering this to himself as a smile appeared on his face, Huang Yongyu switched from searching for Pure Heart Spirit Grass. Instead searching for any demon beasts that might live inside the rainbow crown tree forest.


    ¡­


    "A demon beast¡­ Now where is the Pure Heart Spirit Grass?" Looking down from a small hill he found himself on top of after tracking down a giant blue spider demon beast, Huang Yongyu quickly began to scan the surroundings around the blue spider demon beast


    "Pure Heart Spirit Grass!"


    Searching for the Pure Heart Spirit Grass, Huang Yongyu was the first among the three to finally find the first Pure Heart Spirit Grass neatly hidden underneath the giant body of the blue spider demon beast.


    "Third Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­ I will have to get Chu Yang or Qing Yi to help me¡­" Determining the cultivation realm of the blue spider demon beast, Huang Yongyu quickly concluded that he would have to get Chu Yang or Qing Yi''s help before dealing with the blue spider demon beast.


    No matter what, he had no way to deal with the demon beast by himself as it was at the Third Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm. Not really something he would be able to deal with given his current cultivation realm at the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­ That is not to mention the fact that he had nowhere near enough experience to deal with a demon beast two minor realms above himself!


    Now I just have to leave without getting spotted-


    Crack~


    As Huang Yongyu came to a decision and took a step backwards, a brightly coloured blue branch had somehow found its way to the top of the small hill just behind him. Laying in the perfect spot for him to step on by ident. Even with no rainbow crown trees on the hill itself¡­


    "¡­"


    Looking down on the branch he had stepped on, Huang Yongyu felt like crying at the spot. Especially so when he realized that there was only that one branch on top of the small hill!


    Even worse, the demon beast in question had clearly heard the sound of the branch snapping, causing it to slowly make its way over towards his current location.


    Whoosh!


    Not daring to stay around waiting for the demon beast in the shape of a giant blue spider to reach him, Huang Yongyu didn''t bother hiding from it any longer.


    Rushing out from his current position, Huang Yongyu used all his speed to run away as he could. Making his way over in the direction that he, Qing Yi and Chu Yang had nned to meet up in after an hour of searching.


    Pulling out hismunication talisman along the way and contacting both Qing Yi and Chu Yang about his current situation. Hoping both of them coulde and help him before he ended up at a certain blue spider''s dinner te¡­


    Swish~


    Along with Huang Yongyu fully revealing himself, the blue spider demon beast''s eyes began shinning at the sight of what it believed to be a new meal. Instantly increasing its speed as it skittered across the forest floor effortlessly towards the now fleeing Huang Yongyu!


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 Chapter 346 - Huang Yongyus Escape...

    <h4>Chapter 346 - Huang Yongyu''s Escape...</h4>


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    Running through the rainbow crown tree forest with a giant blue spider following closely behind him, Huang Yongyu didn''t think anything could get worse as he unknowingly stumbled upon what could only be described as a den of blue spider demon beasts. Having gathered together to have a feast of some sort.


    "¡­"


    Freezing for a short moment as he looked at the dozen or so blue spider demon beasts at the Foundation Establishment all around him, Huang Yongyu did not want to wait for them to wake up again. Running even faster than before as he dashed past one of the blue spiders having frozen up just like him.


    The den of blue spider demon beasts all looked around themselves with a confused expression stered all over their faces.


    It was only when the blue spider demon beast already chasing after Huang Yongyu arrived that the other blue spiders woke up and looked towards it for answers.


    The blue spider produced a vibration, which hit the surrounding dried leaves cover the ground, causing them to vibrate.


    Purr purr~


    The vibrating leaves on the ground produced a low ''purring'' sound audible for anyone walking past to hear, and that sound travelled through the dried leaves on the ground to the other blue spider demon beasts standing around


    The leaves themselves served as a sort of medium through which the blue spidersmunicated with each other. Instead of using an organ to produce a sound, the blue spider demon beasts would instead vibrate inanimate objects around them tomunicate with each other.


    Purr purr~


    The other blue spider seemed to have gotten the message as one of them answered back the blue spider demon beast that had been chasing after Huang Yongyu.


    Whoosh~


    And just like that, Huang Yongyu now had over a dozen blue spiders at the Foundation Establishment Realm chasing after him instead of just a single one¡­


    ¡­


    "Haha, to think Huang Yongyu ended up in such a situation, I wonder if he will be able to get here before the spider catches up with him, hehe¡­" Laughing a bit to himself when he heard about Huang Yongyu being chased by a spider at the Third Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, Chu Yang did not feel too worried.


    After all, Huang Yongyu was someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm as well and he should at the very least be able to stay alive. Even if the blue spider caught up with him!


    "I really hate spiders¡­" Standing just beside Chu Yang, Qing Yi shivered a bit at the thought of the giant blue spider chasing after Huang Yongyu.


    "Junior brother Chu Yang, can you deal with the spider, I''m not really too good with those sorts of things¡­"


    Saying this, Qing Yi looked pleadingly at Chu Yang. Clearly not too happy about the idea of having to deal with any creepy crawlers¡­


    "No problem, it''s only a single spider at the Third Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm. Nothing too difficult!"


    Rolling his eyes upon seeing the slightly scared look on Qing Yi''s face, Chu Yang epted her request without any problem.


    In the first ce, he at the very least managed to find out that his senior sister was not good with spiders¡­ Maybe he could use that in the future¡­


    Rustle~


    "RUN!"


    Just as Chu Yang had agreed to deal with the spider, Huang Yongyu burst out through a nearby bush as he screamed at them before running past them without slowing down in the slightest.


    ""Hm?""


    Both Chu Yang and Qing Yi blinked their eyes in confusion upon seeing this. Not understanding why they needed to run.


    Rustle~


    It was only a short momentter Chu Yang and Qing Yi understood the reason why Huang Yongyu had told them to run as a massive number of blue spiders suddenly appeared from the same direction as Huang Yongyu.


    "Eeeek!"


    To say both of them were shocked would be an understatement, as Qing Yi screamed fearfully at the giant blue spider demon beasts making their way over in her and Chu Yang''s direction before running after Huang Yongyu who was about to disappear in the distance.


    "Wha-?!"


    Chu Yang was equally speechless upon seeing the massive number of spider as he soon caught up with the escaping Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu.


    "What in the world happened? Howe there are so many spiders?! Didn''t you say it was just one at the Third Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm?!"


    Calling out to Huang Yongyu, Chu Yang didn''t understand how a single blue spider at the Foundation Establishment Realm had suddenly transformed into at least a hundred blue spider demon beasts at the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    And even worse, Chu Yang could clearly feel the aura of at least three Core Formation Realm demon beasts appear in the back of the horde of blue spider demon beasts!


    How in the world did Huang Yongyu manage to attract the attention of so many blue spider demon beasts? Did he perhaps steal the treasure of some underground blue spider kingdom?


    "It''s not what you think! I merely stumbled upon a den of a dozen or so blue spiders while running and then¡­"


    Listening to Huang Yongyu retell his story about how he had ended up offending over a hundred blue spiders at the Foundation Establishment Realm along with at least three at the Core Formation Realm, both Chu Yang and Qing Yi suddenly felt like just throwing him to blue spiders and escape by themselves.


    In essence, Huang Yongyu''s story boiled down to a simple point of him stumbling into one nest of blue spiders after the other.


    How had he ended up offending three Core Formation Realm blue spiders? Well¡­ Along the way, Huang Yongyu had suddenly found himself running through an underground tunnel into arge nest of blue spiders¡­ Inside that nest¡­


    "¡­ I idently stepped on this little one and all the blue spiders suddenly became even more determined to chase after me!"


    Finishing his story, Huang Yongyu pulled out the corpse of a small blue spider the size of a small puppy with a small pink crown birthmark on its forehead.


    Worst of all, in the middle part of its body, a clear boot mark could be seen where Huang Yongyu had stepped on the puppy sized blue spider and caused its early demise¡­


    ""¡­""


    Why do you even carry that with you¡­?


    Not even bother to ask this question, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang looked helplessly at each other at the same time, both understanding the reason why so many blue spiders were chasing after Huang Yongyu.


    "Should we just throw him to the spiders?" Qing Yi suggested with an expressionless look on her face.


    "Please don''t joke like that! I swear it was an ident!"


    "Who said I was joking¡­?"


    "¡­"


    Feeling himself shiver when he was met with the unfamiliar expressionless look of Qing Yi, Huang Yongyu had no idea what to say, he clearly knew that the reason for their current situation was all his fault and while Chu Yang and Qing Yi were strong, there was no way for them to deal with the blue spiders growing closer to them with each passing second.


    "Stop it, Qing Yi, we shouldn''t just go about throwing someone to the spiders¡­ Even if they deserve it¡­ There is arge group up there, let''s see if they can help us!" Stopping Qing Yi before she did something to Huang Yongyu, Chu Yang calmed down the situation as he pointed towards arge group of people barely visible in the distance.


    "That is¡­ The Ghost Howl Sect!? Weren''t they supposed to start their expedition tomorrow at dawn?! Why are they suddenly out here now!?" Seeing the emblem on the people moving at the front were wearing, Huang Yongyu could not help eximing in a surprised voice.


    "The Ghost Howl Sect¡­ Maybe we can use this, Huang Yongyu, hand over that corpse to me for a moment!"


    "Sure?"


    Not understanding what Chu Yang wanted to do, Huang Yongyu obediently handed the corpse of the small blue spider over to Chu Yang with a confused look on his face.


    "Use you fastest speed possible! We are running straight past the Ghost Howl Sect''s people!" Informing Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu, Chu Yang soon ran ahead of both of them as he appeared only a few hundred meters away from therge group of people.


    Whoosh~


    Under the surprised looks from the people of the Ghost Howl Sect, Chu Yang threw the corpse of the small puppy sized blue spider to a handsome young man sitting at a majestic chair being carried by a group of people located in the front of the expedition force of the Ghost Howl Sect before disappearing into the forest.


    ""¡­""


    Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu didn''t say anything as they both followed closely behind Chu Yang before any of the people from the Ghost Howl Sect managed to react.


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 Chapter 347 - Young Master Of The Ghost Howl Sect!

    <h4>Chapter 347 - Young Master Of The Ghost Howl Sect!</h4>


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    A little earlier, arge ship arrived at the shore of the Pure Heart Ind as a handsome young man slowly appeared from the interior of the ship with an old man following closely behind him.


    "So, this is the Pure Heart Ind? It does indeed live up to its name¡­ Even if it''s my first time here, I can still easily see why it''s known for its unique beauty! What a pity such a ce falls under the control of the River Sect¡­"


    Saying this as he narrowed his eyes dangerously upon reaching thest part, the handsome young man turned around and motioned for a few nearby people toe over.


    "Is there anything we can help with, young master¡­?" Nervously arriving before the handsome young man, one of the group of people kneeled down submissively before one of them stepped forward and asked for instructions.


    "Go and inform our people that we will be leaving for the centre of the Pure Heart Ind immediately! No need to wait for tomorrow now that I''m already here!"


    Waving his hands around as he ordered the group of people, the handsome young man soon began talking chatting with the elderly man standing beside him about their uing journey to the centre of the Pure Heart Ind.


    "¡­"


    The people who had just been ordered to go out and inform the young wandering cultivators about their early departure. nced around at each other for a short moment before disappearing in the direction of the small building Chu Yang, Qing Yi and Huang Yongyu had visited to get a map of the ind just a few minutes ago.


    Quickly, a few minutes passed since the Ghost Howl Sect had arrived at the Pure Heart Ind, and by this point in time arge expedition force had already formed with the handsome young master from the Ghost Howl Sect at the front.


    The wandering cultivators who hade to join were confused about why the time had changed all of a sudden but didn''t darein about it as they all wanted to be chosen to enter the Ghost Howl Sect as disciples.


    The only ones who wouldin about the expedition being moved forward among themselves, were those who had gone out to hunt for demon beasts or search for spiritual herbs just before the Ghost Howl Sect''s young master arrived¡­


    "Move out!"


    Seeing that everyone from his sect along with a group of young wandering cultivators gathered, the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect gave themand to move out towards the centre of the Pure Heart Ind.


    "Hmph!"


    Frowning to himself as he looked down at therge group of people, the handsome young master of the Ghost Howl Sect felt himself grow a bit nervous.


    The true purpose of the expedition towards the centre of the Pure Heart Ind was something only he and the elder beside him knew about and both of them knew very well how dangerous it would be for them¡­


    But if they managed to seed, they might be able to finally get rid of the River Sect for good!


    No more need for them to station most of their Experts in front of the River Sect, they would be able to get rid of the River Sect and if everything went ording to his father''s n. The Flying Sword Sect would not be able to do anything about it!


    Noticing his young master growing anxious as he was lost in thought, the elder quickly reassured him that nothing would happen. "Young master, trust in your father''s n! Nothing will happen and we even brought along so many experts at the Core Formation Realm! Don''t forget I''m also around to keep you safe in case anything happens!"


    "Hah¡­ You are right elder¡­ I''m simply worrying for nothing! There is no way my father would send me here if he didn''t already think it would be safe for me!" Nodding his head as he rxed a bit upon listening to the old elder, the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect sat up straight in the chair he was sitting on as he was carried by a group of wandering cultivators at the front of the expedition.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Someone is approaching?"


    As the expedition force were making their way through a rainbow crown tree forest located on their path towards the centre of the Pure Heart Ind, a young man suddenly came sprang out from the thick foliage of the forest from the side of the path they were using.


    Two others followed closely behind him, one male and another female as the group of three directly ran past the front of the expedition force.


    Whoosh~


    Just as the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect was about to order someone to stop the three people, the male in the front suddenly threw something over in his direction before disappearing back into the forest on the other side of the path they were using.


    "Protect the young master!"


    "My life for the young master!"


    "Young master!"


    The moment the people in the expedition force realized something had been thrown towards the young master, at least a dozen people nearby rushed over as if they wanted to give their lives to keep the young master safe.


    "All of you, get back! It''s just a small blue spider corpse!"


    Having reacted way faster than any of the other people present, the old man beside the young master had already realized that the thing being thrown towards them was not anything dangerous and had already caught the corpse of the small blue spider before it could reach the young master.


    "Elder! How dare they throw a corpse; can I ask you to catch them for me to deal with personally!?"


    Caught off-guard by someone suddenly throwing a corpse at him, the young master barely held back his anger as he looked over at the elder who had caught the corpse of the small blue spider full of anger with nowhere to vent it.


    "Sure, I will be back in a short moment-"


    Just as the old elder nodded his head to take off in the direction that the three troublemakers at the Foundation Establishment Realm ran, he suddenly felt several terrifying auras simr to his own approaching from the direction that the three troublemakers had just appeared from.


    "Prepare for battle!"


    Without exining anything to his young master, the elder screamed loudly so every could hear him as a blue spider suddenly appeared from the thick foliage of the rainbow crown tree forest to their left.


    Swish~


    This was not the only one, as dozens of giant blue spiders suddenly began appearing from the forest before angrily charging towards the expedition force of the Ghost Howl Sect.


    Bang!


    To make things even worse, three enormous blue spiders each over three meters tall in height along with their massive bodies suddenly came rushing out of the forest. The biggest one easily reaching a height of five meters!


    Each of them heading in the direction of the small blue spider corpse currently in the hand of the elder beside the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect!


    "The corpse! How dare they plot against the Ghost Howl Sect!"


    Having already realized what had happened, the old elder red up in anger. At the moment, he wanted nothing more than to tear apart the three troublemakers from earlier.


    Bang!


    Sadly, he couldn''t chase after the three troublemakers before dealing with the blue spiders first!


    Whoosh!


    Several auras at the Core Formation Realm also appeared on the side of the Ghost Howl Sect, as several figures charged out from the expedition force to meet the blue spiders head on.


    "I will deal with the big one! You four deal with the two others! Another two, stay behind to keep the young master safe! The rest deal with the normal blue spiders!


    Charging out together with the other Core Formation Realm cultivators that hade to participate in the expedition. The old elder quickly gave down a set of orders before he began facing off against the biggest and strongest among the Core Formation Realm blue spiders.


    Boom!


    As the battle began, the surrounding forest quickly turned into a battleground as the blue spiders and humans fought each other to the death.


    Even when they were clearly weaker than the humans, the blue spiders didn''t give up as they fought like crazy until they died.


    ¡­


    "Looks like we got away safely¡­ We really need to leave the Pure Heart Ind as quickly as possible now! We can''t risk the Ghost Howl Sect blocking the path back!"


    Looking back towards the direction they had juste from, as sounds of battle reached them, Huang Yongyu nervously informed Qing Yi and Chu Yang. Hoping both of them would choose to leave before they ended up in an even more troublesome situation than before.


    "You should leave for now, we still have to gather some Pure Heart Spirit Herb for the sect mission and now that we know where it is, there is no way we can just give up on it!"


    "But-"


    "Don''t worry too much about us. Even if we get found by the Ghost Howl Sect, we can always reveal our identity¡­" Reassuring Huang Yongyu, Chu Yang didn''t feel like they had much to worry about.


    The Ghost Howl Sect were in the process of dealing with the blue spiders and they just needed to take a long way around them, get the Pure Heart Spirit Grass and then leave.


    Even if they were found by them, what could the Ghost Howl Sect do? They were still disciples of the Flying Sword Sect and thest thing the Ghost Howl Sect wanted was to be seen as an enemy by the Flying Sword Sect¡­ Especially after what happened to the Raging me Sect¡­


    "Fine¡­ But you have to be quick! I will wait for you back at the pier of Pure Heart City!"


    Reluctantly agreeing with the decision, Huang Yongyu made his way back towards the shore of the ind, while Chu Yang and Qing Yi stayed behind.


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 Chapter 348 - Winged Lion Demon Beasts Special Ability

    <h4>Chapter 348 - Winged Lion Demon Beast''s Special Ability</h4>


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    [Side Quest: You encountered a small blue deer asking for help to deal with a threat that once took the life of the small blue deer''s mother. plete)]


    [Reward: Full Moon Ganoderma(Mystic)]


    [Redeem: Y/N]


    Back at the Main Peak, Xuan Hao had just finished up recovering from his earlier battle with the winged lion demon beast before getting the reward from the small blue deer''s quest and putting it into his interspatial ring.


    "That should be about it, should I go check up on the blue deer from-"


    [System detected that hosts disciples encountered a low-tier young master. The disciples Chu Yang and Qing Yi confronted the low-tier young master!]


    Just as Xuan Hao was contemting over what to do next, a message from the system, that he had not seen in a long time suddenly reappeared.


    "A young master¡­? How did Chu Yang and Qing Yi manage to encounter someone like that?" Muttering this to himself as he narrowed his eyes, the first thing Xuan Hao thought about was that it might be rted to the area both of them had gone to.


    After all, it was a well-known fact that the River Sect had a lot of Core Formation Realm cultivators, but no one at the Nascent Soul Realm, so the first thing Xuan Hao could think of was that someone from the River Sect had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm and a member of their family had ended up in a fight with his two disciples¡­


    No need to worry about it, the River Sect wouldn''t dare to do anything to those-


    [Disciple Chu Yang and Qing Yi enraged the low-tier young master, the low-tier young master will stop at nothing to get revenge!]


    "¡­"


    Upon seeing the second message from the system, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he felt like the system waited to throw out the second message¡­


    Maybe I should go to the River Sect and make sure everything is okay¡­


    About to leave the Main Peak for now, Xuan Hao turned around and looked at the winged lion. "Now, what should I do about you? Want to join me?"


    Roar!


    The winged lion roared approvingly towards Xuan Hao before excitedly moving around.


    "Is this perhaps your first time outside the Main Peak¡­?"


    Looking at how excited the winged lion was, Xuan Hao could not help thinking that it acted like a child leaving home for the first time.


    Something not really fitting in with the winged lion demon beast''s giant size and savage appearance.


    Roar!


    Roaring once again in response to what Xuan Hao said, Xuan Hao suddenly began realizing that the winged lion most likely never left its small spot besides the pagoda before he hade along.


    Had this winged lion really just remained sleeping beside the pagoda and eating what little that came towards it on its own ord throughout its entire life¡­? Such a unique style of cultivating, even he was far inferiorpared to the winged lion.


    After all, he would still leave his pavilion from time to time and interact with other people. The winged lion on the other hand, just remained asleep beside a pavilion on the Main Peak as it slowly cultivated until it reached its current cultivation realm¡­


    If not for the fact that demon beasts had a longer lifespan than human cultivators, Xuan Hao highly doubted that the winged lion would have been able to reach its current cultivation realm before its lifespan ran out¡­


    Roar!


    Having realized that its master was thinking something rude about it from the expression he was looking at it with, the winged lion roared angrily.


    "Hehe, I was just thinking about my disciples. No need to be so angry~" Chuckling yfully after seeing the winged lions disy, Xuan Hao joked around with it for another few minutes before stopping.


    "Ahm! We still need to get going or we will never reach the River Sect''s territory any time soon!"


    Seeing the winged lion look over at him with a wronged look simr to a child that had just been bullied by an evil adult, Xuan Hao stopped joking and returned to the issue at hand.


    Any longer and the winged lion might disregard the blood pact and directly attack him! But at the very least he learnt that the winged lion was simr to a child in how it acted.


    This did not have much to do with its age, but more with the fact that it hadn''t really interacted with anyone before Xuan Hao had appeared.


    Looking up at the giant winged lion standing in front of him, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that it might not be a good idea to fly over the Flying Sword Sect''s territory with such a giant demon beast.


    The sheer panic and fear such a giant demon beast flying by would cause, was likely going to end up being reported to the Flying Sword Sect for months toe¡­


    "Can you look less threatening¡­?"


    Not knowing if the winged lion had any way to make this happen, Xuan Hao could only ask and see if it had any way to do this.


    Roar!


    Fwoosh


    Having understood what Xuan Hao said, the winged lion nodded itsrge head before it was suddenly enveloped by arge amount of smoke, causing Xuan Hao to take a few steps. Trying to move away from the smoke beginning to spread out with the winged lion at the centre. Soon covering a few dozen meters around the winged lion demon beast. Making it impossible to see the winged lion demon beasts hidden inside the smoke.


    Whoosh~


    After a few seconds passed, Xuan Hao watched the smoke disperse. Revealing the winged lion demon beast hidden inside.


    "What in the world!? How is this even possible?!"


    Not knowing what to say, Xuan Hao could only stare at the now tiny, winged lion demon beast that was standing in the ce that the giant winged lion demon beast had stood seconds ago.


    "You can shrink yourself?"


    Roar~


    A small, cute roar nowhere as majestic as before echoed out from the tiny, winged lion cub.


    "Guess that is a yes¡­ With this, we should be able to reach the River Sect without causing a massive panic along the way!"


    Not thinking too much about how the winged lion had managed to shrink itself in the first ce, Xuan Hao just decided to note it down as a special ability of whatever race the winged lion demon beast belonged to.


    In the first ce, it did not grow any stronger from shrinking. Instead, Xuan Hao clearly felt its strength weakening by arge margin through shrinking to its current small size.


    If the winged lion could be said to be close to the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm before. Now it would only be around the middle stages of the Domain Lord Realm in strength!


    Whoosh~


    Picking up the tiny, winged lion before it could react, Xuan Hao made his way down the Main Peak before heading towards the territory of the River Sect.


    Exploring the rest of the Main Peak would have to wait. In the first ce, he was far from being strong enough to fully examine the hill sized blue rock filled with divine energy!


    For now, the most important thing was to reach the River Sect before the low-tier young master mentioned by the system called his father, grandfather, ancestor, or great ancestor for help¡­


    ¡­


    "Hm?!"


    Why do I suddenly feel like something bad is about to happen to me¡­?


    At the same time Xuan Hao was making his way over towards the River Sect''s territory, a middle-aged man sitting down cultivating suddenly opened both his eyes as he looked around himself anxiously.


    "Master? Is something wrong?"


    A dozen figures donningpletely ck armour instantly appeared beside the middle-aged man before one of them stepped forward and asked in a worried tone.


    "No need! My injuries just red up for a short moment¡­ More importantly, how is the current situation at the Pure Heart Ind? Is my son making any progress in acquiring the Pure Heart Spiritual Water?"


    Not wanting to admit that he just acted all anxious due to a superstitious feeling of danger, the man instead med his injuries before asking about his son''s progress with a smile on his face.


    His son was the most important thing left for him and he loved him dearly. Even to the point that he handed over the matter of getting the Pure Heart Spiritual Water needed for his recovery to him!


    "The young master arrived at the Pure Heart Ind a few hours ago, but¡­"


    "Hm? But what?! Did anything happen to my son!?" Hearing something might have happened to his son, the middle-aged man sprang up and grabbed hold of the ck clothed man.


    "N-nothing happened to the young master, b-but the great elder said that there might be someone scheming against them on Pure Heart Ind¡­ T-the great elder said that it might be one of the other sects that know you need the Pure Heart Spiritual water to recover!" Exining the situation as fast as he could, the ck clothed man felt his shoulders begin letting out a few cracking sounds under the great force of the middle-aged man''s grip.


    "The other sects?! They dare? Looks like I will have to go help my son before those half dead fossils kills him!"


    "Master! You can''t! You are still not-"


    Whoosh!


    ""¡­""


    Before any of the people present could react, the middle-aged man disappeared in front of them.


    "Let''s get going as well¡­ We have to make sure the master is safe¡­" Looking at everyone standing around, the ck clothed man who had his shoulders broken by the middle-aged man stood up again before the group of ck clothed people began chasing after their master.


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 Chapter 349 - Sect Mission Complete! Pure Heart Spiritual Grass Found!

    <h4>Chapter 349 - Sect Mission Complete! Pure Heart Spiritual Grass Found!</h4>


    You can read the novel fast updates at  or NovelTeam.Net


    Watching as Huang Yongyu made his way back towards the shore of the Pure Heart Ind, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both turned around and made their way back in the direction they had juste from.


    Following the sound of battle, both of them soon reached the battlefield that they had created between the people on the Ghost Howl Sect''s side and the blue spiders.


    "Looks like the Ghost Howl Sect is winning¡­"


    Looking over the battlefield heavily in favour of the Ghost Howl Sect given the fact that they had way more experts at the Core Formation Realmpared to the three on the side of the blue spiders, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both knew that they had to hurry and sneak past them before the battle ended.


    After all, thest thing they wanted at the moment, was for them to get discovered by the Core Formation Experts on the Ghost Howl Sect''s side just after they caused them to fight so many blue spiders for no reason and that was not to mention the losses on the side of the Ghost Howl Sect!


    Even if they had a clear advantage against the blue spider demon beasts. The sheer ferocity and strength of the blue spiders overwhelmed some of the weaker and less experienced disciples of the Ghost How Sect. Inevitably causing quite a few casualties on the side of the Ghost Howl Sect¡­


    "Let''s go¡­"


    Looking over the bloody battlefield onest time from behind the thick foliage of the rainbow crown forest, Chu Yang grabbed a hold of Qing Yi and dragged her along with him before long, both of them had managed to make their way past the chaotic battlefield by moving a few dozen meters away from the edges of the battlefield to avoid both the Ghost Howl Sect and the blue spiders at the same time.


    This was mainly possible because both sides of the fight were upied with each other instead of focusing on anyone that might be sneaking past them. All but one person who enjoyed thefort of being guarded by two Core Formation Realm Experts¡­


    "Who- The person who threw the damned corpse?!"


    Keeping an eye on the battlefield and feeling his anger rise every time he watched a blue spider sessfully break through the defences linepromised by disciples of the Ghost Howl Sect and kill a few of them, he manged to barely spot two familiar figures moving along the edges of the battlefield, as they tried to make their presence invisible to the two sides fighting.


    "You! Go after those two and get them for me! They are the ones who caused this mess in the first ce!"


    "But¡­ Young master, your safety-"


    "No need to worry, I don''t need both of you to keep me safe! One is more than enough and I can still fight myself if ites down to it!"


    Refusing to listen to the request of one of the Core Formation Experts guarding him from the ferocious blue spiders, the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect directly ordered him to go after Qing Yi and Chu Yang sneaking along the edges of the battlefield.


    "¡­Yes, young master¡­"


    Knowing he had no way to refuse his young mater, the Core Formation Expert reluctantly nodded his head before charging towards Chu Yang and Qing Yi.


    Having to deal with blue spiders constantly attacking him and slowing him down along the way.


    By the time he reached the edges of the battlefield, Qing Yi and Chu Yang were already gone¡­


    "¡­"


    Looking back towards the direction of his young master, the Core Formation Expert let out an exhausted sigh inside his mind.


    There was no way he could return empty handed without having caught those two, his young master would definitely get the great elder to punish him¡­ All he could do now, was to chase after them into the rainbow crown forest!


    ncing back towards the battlefield onest time before chasing after Chu Yang and Qing Yi, he just barely managed to catch the sight of the great elder in questionunching a terrifying fist attack forward and pierce through the body of the giant blue spider¡­


    Yep¡­ No way I''m returning emptyhanded!


    Whoosh~


    With this thought passing through his head, the man quickly disappeared in the direction Chu Yang and Qing Yi had run in.


    Still barely able to pick up the faint traces they left behind while moving through the rainbow crown forest.


    ¡­


    Having hurried through the rainbow crown forest, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both found themselves in front of a small hill without any rainbow crown trees on it setting itself apart from the forest that surrounded it on all sides.


    "This should be close to the ce that Huang Yongyu found the Pure Heart Spiritual Grass¡­ Let''s split up and search for it"


    Looking down on the map where Huang Yongyu had crossed out the location, he had found the Pure Heart Spiritual Grass, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both came to a stop before splitting up to search for the Pure Heart Spiritual Grass.


    Chu Yang moving to search in the area around the hill, while Qing Yi made her way up the small hill to get a better view of the surroundings.


    After all, no matter how urate the location on the map was, there was no way Huang Yongyu could note down the precise location on the map, when the hill in front of them was barely visible on it.


    "I found it! It''s just over there by therge rainbow crown tree!"


    The search did notst for long, as Qing Yi spotted the Pure Heart Spiritual Grass the moment, she reached the top of the hill.


    "¡­ How is that supposed to help me?" Listening to Qing Yi''s yelling at him from the top of the small hill, Chu Yang could not help muttering to quietly under his breath as he looked around at the rainbow crown trees all around him.


    Just how did Qing Yi expect for him to know what rge rainbow crown tree'' she was talking about¡­?


    Thinking this to himself, Chu Yang looked up at Qing Yi standing on top of the small hill before seeing that she was pointing towards a location just beneath the hill.


    "Guess the Pure Heart Spiritual Grass is over there¡­"


    Following the directions Qing Yi pointed in, Chu Yang soon arrived in front of therger than average rainbow crown tree, with the Pure Heart Spiritual Grass growing just beneath it.


    The home of the blue spider?


    Observing therge rainbow crown tree, Chu Yang quickly noticed a rtivelyrge hole leading into the interior of the tree covered in weird blue spider webs.


    Feeling a bit cautious upon seeing the blue spider home, Chu Yang soon remembered that the blue spider had already left before he began lowering his guard.


    Swish~


    Approaching the Pure Heart Spiritual Grass, Chu Yang didn''t intend to waste any time. Quickly uprooting the spiritual herb before taking out a small wooden box for storage.


    "This should do, the sect mission never mentioned the amount of Pure Heart Spiritual Grass needed¡­ I hope this will be enough¡­"


    Having put away the small wooden box where he had stored the Pure Heart Spiritual Herb, Chu Yang looked back up towards the top of the small hill where Qing Yi had been standing a moment ago. Only to be shocked when the person in question suddenly appeared directly in front of him with a panicked look on her face.


    "Chu Yang! We have to run!"


    Before Chu Yang could ask about anything, he was suddenly dragged off by Qing Yi as both of them soon began running at top speed in a random direction.


    "What in the world happened!? Why are we suddenly running like this?" Not understanding why Qing Yi had suddenly dragged him to run away, Chu Yang desperately tried to understand the current situation as he asked her in a bewildered voice.


    "Someone from the Ghost Howl Sect is after us! Someone in the Core Formation Realm!" Seeing Chu Yang''s bewildered expression, Qing Yi quickly exined what she had seen just a moment ago from the top of the hill.


    "Ghost Howl Sect!? Core Formation Realm!? Someone managed to spot us¡­"


    Realizing the reason for someone to be chasing after them, Chu Yang regretted not taking a longer way around the battlefield¡­ The only problem was that they might get spotted by other demon beasts by doing that and end up drawing unwanted attention towards themselves this way and if they took a path around that was too long, the battle would finish up before they could take a boat towards the Pure Heart City!


    At that point in time, the Ghost Howl Sect would likely set up people to search anyone trying to make their way off Pure Heart Ind¡­


    "Yes! And they somehow tracked us all the way here and are getting closer! The only advantage we have at the moment is the fact that the person chasing us don''t seem to have found us yet and is still only tracking our movements¡­ If not, he would likely already have caught up to us by now¡­"


    Nodding her head in agreement to what Chu Yang said, Qing Yi herself also began to realize the danger of their current situation.


    No matter what, they had to escape the Core Formation Expert from the Ghost Howl Sect! Who knows, he might even ignore their identity and just kill them if they were unlucky to have encountered someone who either didn''t believe them or believed that the Flying Sword Sect would never find out about what happened¡­


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 Chapter 350 - Demon Beasts Of The Pure Heart Lake

    <h4>Chapter 350 - Demon Beasts Of The Pure Heart Lake</h4>


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    Running through the rainbow crown tree forest, Qing Yi and Chu Yang soon found themselves reaching the end of the forest as arge river appeared in front of both of them, arge open terrain spreading out in front of them.


    The river itself ran straight through the Pure Heart Ind and ran from a small body of water at the centre of the ind out into the Pure Heart Lake.


    "Let''s go-"


    "We should follow the river back towards the shore along the edge of the rainbow crown tree forest! Going onto the other side without any cover would easily reveal our position¡­" Just before Qing Yi could make his way over the river and keep going straight, Chu Yang stopped her.


    When it came to experience with escaping from someone with a stronger cultivation realm than himself, Chu Yang was far more experienced than Qing Yi and he knew through personal experience that crossing the river and going straight through such an open terrain with no ces to hide, was a terrible idea¡­


    "True¡­" Looking over the mostly opennd with no ces to hide for them on the other side of the river, Qing Yi quickly agreed with what Chu Yang said and stopped herself from jumping over the river and instead decided to listen to Chu Yang.


    Whoosh~


    With Chu Yang now leading the way instead of Qing Yi, both of them began proceeding forward more smoothly as they made their way towards the shore of the Pure Heart Ind.


    The more important thing was that now with Chu Yang having recovered from the shock of suddenly being dragged to run away with Qing Yi, he could help make sure they didn''t leave any too obvious traces behind while escaping.


    After all, Qing Yi had no experience when it came to escaping from someone¡­ Compared to Chu Yang who had once spent weeks escaping from the ck Rose Sect''s people!


    In the end, Chu Yang even began throwing out several fake clues to the person following them.


    Some clues suggesting they escaped towards the other side of the river and some to suggest they had made their way back into the rainbow crown tree forest towards the battlefield of the blue spiders and the Ghost Howl Sect.


    With all of this in mind, Chu Yang hoped that the person following them would be slowed down and if possible,pletely shake him off their tail as he went in the direction one of his fake clues pointed out¡­


    "¡­"


    Qing Yi didn''t understand much of what Chu Yang was doing as they were escaping. Only silently observing from the side as he stopped for a few seconds to break a few branches on the ground leading deeper inside the rainbow crown tree forest or rip off a small part of his clothes before cing it on the ground on the other side of the river.


    All of this was new to her, so Qing Yi just decided to just obediently do whatever Chu Yang said while escaping!


    ¡­


    "What in the world is this!?"


    At the same time, the Core Formation Realm Expert following closely behind them had just arrived by the river before following after Chu Yang and Qing Yi. Only to curse loudly the next moment when he discovered he had followed a wrong lead.


    "When did they grow experienced in hiding their escape path¡­?"


    Gritting his teeth as he returned to where he had been a moment ago. Only to discover several more leads than he had before, the Core Formation Expert from the Ghost Howl Sect was not happy in the slightest as he realized most of the leads were likely to be fake.


    "Hah¡­ At least I know that those two will be trying to find a way off the Pure Heart Ind now that they offended the Ghost Howl Sect..." With this in mind, the Core Formation Expert of the Ghost Howl Sect chose to ignore the different clues left behind by Chu Yang and instead trusted in his prediction.


    Whoosh!


    Utilizing his movement technique to its peak, the Core Formation Expert of the Ghost Howl Sect let out a scary smile as he disappeared back into the rainbow crown tree forest.


    No matter what, he could not return to his young mater without bringing the two troublemakers back with him¡­


    ¡­


    "Looks like we escaped¡­"


    Having made their way to the shore of the Pure Heart Ind without encountering the Core Formation Realm Expert along the way, Chu Yang came to a stop as he told Qing Yi with a smile on his face while looking back towards the direction they had juste from.


    "Are you sure¡­?" Not sure that they had escaped yet, Qing Yi nced in the same direction as Chu Yang, just that instead of having a confident smile on her face like Chu Yang, Qing Yi was still on edge as she asked him.


    "Yeah, if he had still been after us at this point in time, he would have already caught up with us!"


    Hearing Chu Yang say this in a confident tone, Qing Yi began rxing a bit before turning to look out on the calm Pure Heart Lake.


    "Now we just need to get back and get a ship back to the Pure Heart City before making our way back to the sect¡­ I wonder if anything happened while we were gone¡­"


    "I don''t think much will have changed, but I''m curious how far our new junior brother has managed to progress over the past week or so¡­"


    Ssh~


    As Qing Yi and Chu Yang were taking a short moment to rx before continuing their journey towards the area on Pure Heart Ind where the boats were located, arge sshing sound could be hearding from behind them.


    Followed by therge ssh, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang witnessed for the first time what the demon beasts lurking in the depths of the Pure Heart Lake looked like, as a giant fish like creature the size of a small building burst out from the surface of the water before flying towards both of them.


    Bang!


    Before Chu Yang and Qing Yi even had time to get out of the way of the giant fish demon beast that had suddenly been sent flyingnded just a few meters beside them.


    "Wha-"


    Whoosh


    Qing Yi barely manged to get a sound out from her mouth as the giant fish demon beast was grabbed by an enormous tentacle that appeared out of nowhere, as it coiled around the fish demon beast before dragging it back into the Pure Heart Lake.


    Roar!


    Ssh!


    "¡­"


    The entire process only took a little over five seconds and both Qing Yi and Chu Yang had no idea what they just witnessed¡­ But one thing was for certain, both of them had started to understand why nobody dared to swim across the Pure Heart Lake to reach the Pure Heart Ind.


    Other than that, the giant roaring fish demon beast the size of a small house that they had just seen being ruthlessly thrown on shore before being dragged back down underwater, was at the Core Formation Realm¡­


    It was not like the giant fish demon beast didn''t fight back during the process, it was simply because the tentacle that coiled around it was way too powerful for it to resist, as it could only roar pitifully while being dragged back into the Pure Heart Lake¡­


    "Let''s move a bit further away from the shore¡­"


    "Yes¡­ Let''s do that¡­"


    Coming to a tactic understanding, Qing Yi and Chu Yang both decided to move further away from the shore of the Pure Heart Lake, they did not want to find out what kind of underwater demon beast that tentacle from earlier belonged to¡­


    It would be far easier to deal with the Core Formation Realm Expert of the Ghost Howl Sectpared to whatever horror that tentacle was a part of¡­


    At the same time, it also made both of them think, just how strong were the demon beasts hidden beneath the surface of the Pure Heart Lake?


    The giant fish demon beast was at the Core Formation Realm, the demon beast that the tentacle belonged to would surely be stronger be a lot. Maybe it had reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm? Or maybe, it had even reached the Nascent Soul Realm¡­?


    Thinking about this, both Chu Yang and Qing Yi could not help but shiver as they unconsciously began moving further and further away from the shore of the Pure Heart Ind.


    At this point in time, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang wanted nothing more than to leave the Pure Heart Ind as quickly as possible and make their way back to the Flying Sword Sect.


    At least the Flying Sword Sect did not have such a terrifyingke that contained all sorts of scary demon beasts! The demon beasts inside the Pure heart Lake are probably stronger than the River Sect that are supposedly in control of it!


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 Chapter 351 - Leaving Pure Heart Island!

    <h4>Chapter 351 - Leaving Pure Heart Ind!</h4>


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    Having been shocked by the strength of the demon beasts that lurked inside the Pure Heart Lake, both Chu Yang and Qing Yi cautiously nced over towards theke as both of them slowly made their way over towards the area that they had first arrived at the Pure Heart Ind, where the boats used to go to and from the ind were located.


    The building that Huang Yongyu had first gone to and bought the map of the Pure Heart Ind along with the familiar small boats soon appeared in front of the two.


    "What is that huge ship!?" Eximing loudly as she pointed towards arge ship several timesrge than the small boat, they had used to cross the Pure Heart Lake, Qing Yi felt a sense of amazement well up inside her.


    The ship was by far thergest one she had ever seen in her life! Though that was because she didn''t really live next to arge body of water in the first ce¡­ Even then, Qing Yi still felt amazed seeing such arge ship.


    "It''s likely the one used by the Ghost Howl Sect! We have to be careful¡­" Unlike Qing Yi''s amazed expression, Chu Yang instead grew more cautious after seeing therge ship.


    From personal experience, he knew very well that there would likely be someone from the Ghost Howl Sect around to guard the ship and he soon managed to spot a few figures dressed in the robes belonging to the Ghost Howl Sect talking to arge bulky middle-aged man with a respectful look on their faces.


    The one in charge of defending therge ship?


    Coming to this conclusion, Chu Yang turned around to inform Qing Yi about it.


    "That is the person who chased after us! Even if I couldn''t see him clearly from the top of the hill, there is no way I would mistake him for someone else!"


    "Really?"


    "Yes¡­"


    Listening to what Qing Yi said, Chu Yang suddenly felt like they had found themselves in an extremely troublesome situation.


    The person that had chased after them had suddenly appeared in front of them¡­ Did he perhaps understand that they would attempt to reach the small pier at the Pure Heart Lake to escape and wanted to block their path of escape?


    Thinking about this, Chu Yang could not help frowning to himself as the person chasing after both of them turned out to be smarter than he had expected!


    Now they would have to find a way to sneak past the people from the Ghost Howl Sect, who very likely had some clue about their appearance and at the same time avoid the eyes of the Core Formation Realm Expert¡­


    At least Huang Yongyu had already left earlier on, and they didn''t have to worry about him getting caught by one of his sect''s enemies.


    "Should we just try and sneak onto one of the small ships about to leave and reveal our identities if we get discovered by the Ghost Howl Sect?"


    As Chu Yang was deep in thought trying toe up with a way for them to get out of their current situation, Qing Yi asked him with a sad look on her face. Clearly not too fond of the idea that they would have to use the influence of their sect to get out safely.


    "¡­"


    Chu Yang, who had been losting up with a way for them to escape their current predicament, was rendered speechless upon hearing Qing Yi''s suggestion.


    Why did I not think of that?!


    Realizing the fact that he had been too caught up withparing their current situation to back when he had been chased by the ck Rose Sect, Chu Yang could not help smiling wryly.


    Compared to back then where he would die if he got caught, the current situation was far less dangerous, as they could always use their background as disciples of the Flying Sword Sect to intimidate the people of the Ghost Howl Sect¡­


    Like this, Chu Yang and Qing Yi soon began sneaking their way towards a departing boat. Doing their best to avoid any members of the Ghost Howl Sect along the way.


    Moving towards the boat was not really that hard, as they just tried their best to blend in with the surrounding people. Hoping that the few people from the Ghost Howl Sect that saw them would believe that they were just a few wandering cultivators.


    At least only the Core Formation Realm Expert would be able to recognise them at first nce!


    "Hah¡­ That was way too nerve wrecking!"


    "Indeed¡­"


    Having sessfully managed to make their way onto the small boat about to depart from the Pure Heart Ind, both Chu Yang and Qing Yi copsed down on a seat in the interior of the boat.


    Thumb~


    Just as both Qing Yi and Chu Yang were about to rx as they would make their way back towards the Pure Heart City before beginning their journey back towards the Flying Sword Sect, a loud thumb was heard before the door leading into the interior of the small boat was flung open. Followed by two people belonging to the Ghost Howl Sect making their way inside.


    "No need to worry, we are just here to check if the people who attacked our sect is present!" One of the two stepped forward and exined. Calming the down the passengers who looked to be a little more on edge after seeing two people from the Ghost Howl Sect suddenly appear.


    "So, they are just here to look for the three people who endangered their young master..."


    "Three people dared to attack the Ghost Howl Sect''s young master? Who was brave enough to do something like that? Don''t they know how protective the Ghost Howl Sect is of their young master?!


    "Listen here, just a moment ago, someone led an entire horde of blue spiders into the Ghost Howl Sect''s expeditionary group heading for the centre of the Pure Heart Lake! It was even said that the one in front even threw the corpse of a royal blue spider towards the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect before running away!"


    "Really!? Isn''t this simr to wanting the horde of blue spiders to attack the young master?!"


    "Yeah, and it was apparently done by three young wandering cultivators!"


    "Wow¡­ To think they dared to do something like that¡­"


    "No need to be surprised, they were likely hired by the River Sect or one of the Ghost Howl Sect''s other enemies! People like that will do anything for a few spirit stones¡­"


    ""¡­""


    As the conversation continued among the passengers, Chu Yang and Qing Yi could not help smiling awkwardly at each other as the conversation turned them into someone that was a part of arger scheme against the Ghost Howl Sect''s young master that happened to be present at the scene.


    "Chu Yang¡­ Did you really throw the corpse at the young master they are talking about?"


    "I think so¡­ I just threw it in a hope that the blue spiders would target them instead of us, I never expected for things to turn out like this!"


    Not expecting that he had ended up throwing the blue spider corpse directly at the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect, Chu Yang could not helpment at how unlucky he was.


    After all, given what he had done, the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect mightpletely disregard his background and just outright kill them when he got their hands on them¡­


    ording to a short reminder of the dangers of the world from their master before they left toplete the two sect missions, the typical young masters were often unreasonable beings that never considered the consequences of their actions.


    Therefore, they should not try and use their background as disciples of the Flying Sword Sect to get away from people like that, as they would most likely just ignore it and just outright kill them¡­


    "Hm?"


    As Chu Yang and Qing Yi were both trying their best to make themselves blend in with the surrounding passengers onboard the small ship, one of the two people from the Ghost Howl Sect seemed to have discovered something as he slowly began making his way over towards the ce where Chu Yang and Qing Yi were sitting.


    The member of the Ghost Howl Sect suddenly making his way over towards them. Not only caused Chu Yang and Qing Yi to grow nervous, as the other passengers sitting close to them also began to grow nervous.


    Even if they knew that they were not involved with the incident that took ce, they still held a certain amount of fear towards arge sect like the Ghost Howl Sect.


    After all, for a normal wandering cultivator. Even a small sect would be considered something they couldn''t offend.. Let alone a sect like the Ghost Howl Sect that was widely regarded as one of the strongest in the area around the River Sect''s territory.


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 Chapter 352 - Elder Songs Plan For The Other Elders...

    <h4>Chapter 352 - Elder Song''s n For The Other Elders...</h4>


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    Thumb thumb!


    The interior of the small boat suddenly became quiet as the man from the Ghost Howl Sect scanned over Chu Yang and Qing Yi, along with the rest of the passengers sitting close to them with a frown slowly making its wat onto his face.


    "I-is there anything wrong¡­?" One of the passengers could not calm down, as he suddenly stood up and asked the man from the Ghost Howl Sect the moment, he was about to pass by him.


    Raising his eyebrows at the question of the nervous man, the man from the Ghost Howl Sect narrowed his eyes even further as he closely inspected the small group of passengers along with Chu Yang and Qing Yi.


    "Hm? I just thought I saw someone familiar among the passengers and¡­ It looks like there is indeed someone my Ghost Howl Sect has been searching for!" Finishing what he said, both Chu Yang and Qing Yi grew extremely nervous as they prepared to knock out the two people from the Ghost Howl Sect before taking control of the small boat and escaping.


    At the very least, there was no way the Core Formation Expert would dare to follow them if they managed to get out on theke!


    If he really did continue to chase after them by jumping into the Pure Heart Lake by himself¡­ Well, he would have to deal with whatever demon beasts that might be lurking beneath the surface. Waiting for their next meal to show up¡­


    As Chu Yang and Qing Yi were both tightly gripping the handle of their weapons. Prepared to fight with the two members of the Ghost Howl Sect before trying to make an escape by taking over the small boat, the man from the Ghost Howl Sect suddenly grabbed onto a man sitting just in front of the two!


    "Argh! H-how did you recognize me?"


    "How could I forget you?! I still remember how you scammed me out of all my spirit stones back in the Pure Heart City! Do you know how much pain you caused me when my junior sisters asked me to go out and have fun. Only for me to be too broke to even go out and buy a simple meat bun!?"


    Bang!


    The man sitting in front of both Chu Yang and Qing Yi was suddenly pulled away from his seat before being thrown onto the floor violently.


    "Hehe, I searched for you through the entire Pure Heart City¡­ Only for you to hide away over at the Pure Heart Ind! Looks like it was indeed a bit of good luck on my side that the sect decided to search everyone leaving the Pure Heart Ind¡­" Smiling happily as he began dragging the man towards the entrance leading out of the small boat.


    "I hope you won''t me the Ghost Howl Sect too much for this short inspection¡­" The other man from the Ghost Howl Sect chuckled quietly to himself upon seeing his friend''s behaviour before also turning around to leave.


    Clearly, he was already aware of the incident and had even ended up benefiting quite a bit due to it, as the junior sisters in question had insteade to look for him after his friend''s refusal to join them¡­


    ""Hah¡­""


    Watching as the two disciples from the Ghost Howl Sect left with the man that had just sat in front of them, Chu Yang and Qing Yi could not help letting out a simultaneous sigh of relief.


    At least for now, it looked like they had escaped the Pure Heart Ind safely without needing to expose their identity or call for their masters help through theirmunication talismans!


    It would simply be way too embarrassing if they had to call their master for help during their first ever sect mission and they were almost certain that doing something like that, would most likely result in them not getting another opportunity to go out and explore the world outside the Flying Sword Sect before reaching the Core Formation Realm¡­


    Yes¡­ That was it, they totally didn''t forget the fact that they could just call their master for help through theirmunication talismans through the entire encounter with the blue spiders and the Ghost Howl Sect¡­ In the first ce, it would also take their master some time to reach them.


    After all, the River Sect was not located right next to the Flying Sword Sect and given that it had taken them several days to reach while riding on a demon beast, their master would definitely not have the ability to instantly appear in front of them the moment they called for help¡­


    Swish~


    Having been searched by the two men from the Ghost Howl Sect, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both smiled happily at each other as they felt the boat slowly beginning to move away from the Pure Heart Ind and towards the Pure Heart City.


    No matter what, there was no way the Ghost Howl Sect would darepletely stopping the traffic between the Pure Heart Ind and the Pure Heart City.


    Not to mention the fact that the River Sect was the rightful owner of the ind and city, the other sects that banded up with the Ghost Howl Sect to supress the River Sect, would salivate at every opportunity to cause trouble for the Ghost Howl Sect and try to get a few more opportunities for their own sects¡­


    ¡­


    "Are you sure this will work¡­?"


    At the same time back in the Flying Sword Sect, Feng Chen had just recently gotten back together with Zu Fei when Elder Song had rushed into his pavilion and presented arge scroll filled with row upon row of densely packed words.


    "Yes! If we do this, we will be able to increase the loyalty of the different sects inside our territory and at the same time increase our control over our territory as a whole! You should already know, outside the few important locations like spirit stone mines and ces where spiritual herbs grow, we don''t really have any idea about the overall situation of our territory¡­"


    "But¡­ Are you sure the elders will be fine with this¡­?"


    Looking down on the scroll that Elder Song had presented to him, Feng Chen could not help but ask with a worried expression on his face.


    If they really went ahead with Elder Song''s ns, the elders of the sect would need to be spread out to take up different governing positions neatly set up by Elder Song in different ces around their territory.


    Feng Chen worried that elders might riot if he suddenly split them up like that¡­ After all, those old people seemed to enjoy spending their time together¡­ Lazing around while spending the sect''s resources¡­ Swarming both him and Elder Song with their requests for help whenever they ended up arguing with each other¡­


    "Never mind, we will go ahead with your idea¡­ This way, the sect will also be able to utilize the fact that we have so many elders at the Core Formation Realm. Instead of just letting them stay in here to fade away with time¡­"


    Thinking about a few rather unique requests that had appeared after waking up, Feng Chen decided to agree with Elder Song.


    "Good! At the moment, I only n for the younger elders at Core Formation Realm Experts to take up this task for now. From what I have seen, there is more than enough of them to cover our current territory ording to the way I divided it up and we can at the same time allow for the older elders justying around all day, to instead spend some time teaching the outer and inner disciples of the sect! No need to worry about them refusing, I will personally make sure that they will agree!"


    "You already thought way ahead of me, so I will just allow you to handle the situation as you see fit! This is a great opportunity for our Flying Sword Sect to expand our scope of influence over the surrounding territory!" Nodding his head while listening to what Elder Song said, Feng Chen did not hesitate in the slightest as he allowed Elder Song to implement his desired changes to the territory of the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Yes, Sect Master!" Bowing his head respectfully upon hearing what Feng Chen said, an evil smile slowly made its way onto Elder Song''s face as he made his way out the Sect Master''s pavilion.


    Whoosh!


    "I Hope he won''t be too harsh on them¡­"


    Looking at the departing figure of Elder Song, Feng Chen suddenly began feeling bad for the elders of the Flying Sword Sect¡­ But there was no use in him feeling bad for them.


    After all, the elders of the sect had indeed grown quite a bitzy over the past few years and a quick whipping by Elder Song and a reorganisation of the sect before they began merging with the Spring Flower Sect was sure to bring them back into action in no time at all.


    At least Feng Chen hoped that the elders of the Flying Sword Sect would not end up embarrassing him whenpared to the elders of the Spring Flower Sect¡­


    From what Shu Yao had said during their talk of merging the two sects, Feng Chen was very well aware of how proud she was of her elders¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Thinking about the state of his own elders, Feng Chen could not help but sigh to himself.


    Maybe he should also join Elder Song¡­?


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 Chapter 353 - Sect Master Of The Ghost Howl Sect!

    <h4>Chapter 353 - Sect Master Of The Ghost Howl Sect!</h4>


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    "Did you get the Pure Heart Spirit Grass¡­?"


    The moment Chu Yang and Qing Yi stepped off the small boat, Huang Yongyu suddenly rushed over from a small bench located just beside the area where the small boats going to and from the Pure Heart Ind were docked.


    "Yes, we managed to get the Pure Heart Spirit Grass, so we will be returning to our sect soon¡­" Nodding his head as she said this, Chu Yang felt somewhat reluctant to leave knowing the current situation of their new friend''s sect.


    "What will you be doing from now on¡­?"


    "I don''t know¡­ I guess I will return to my sect and see how my parents are doing. Nothing really changed, so we will still be keeping an eye on the Ghost Howl Sect and the other sects working together with them-"


    "Just waiting for them to inevitably attack when your sect grows weak enough for them to handle?"


    "Yeah¡­"


    As the conversation between Chu Yang and Huang Yongyu ended in silence, Qing Yi tilted her head slightly to the side with a confused expression on her face.


    "Can''t we just ask master to help them out when we get back? It''s not like it will be too much trouble and I think master would be more than happy to prevent the potential chaos caused by these sects after the disappearance of the River Sect¡­"


    ""¡­""


    Listening to what Qing Yi said, both Chu Yang and Huang Yongyu starred at each other nkly for a short moment a look of realization appeared on both their faces.


    That''s right! If the Flying Sword Sect lend a hand to the River Sect, it would be easy to solve the problem of the Ghost Howl Sect and other sects slowly moving into the River Sect''s territory!


    "Good idea! Let''s do that!"


    As Chu Yang happily agreed to Qing Yi''s suggestion and Huang Yongyu bowed his head. Not clearly believing that two disciple would be able to do something like convincing their sect to help out his sect.


    "I-if you really manage to do that, my River Sect would be in your debt!"


    With both Chu Yang and Qing Yi having decided that they wanted to help out Huang Yongyu''s River Sect, they quickly said a few words of goodbye before hurrying towards the entrance of the Pure Heart City. Wanting to return to the sect as quickly as possible to now help out their new friend and officiallyplete their first two sect missions.


    ¡­


    Bang!


    A loud explosion could be heard as a man covered in apletely ck robe angrily stomped the ground with all his strength only a short distance away from the entrance to the Pure Heart City with amunication talisman in hand.


    "What!? The people who schemed against me and my son escaped!?"


    A low yet furious voice filled with killing intent could be hearding from beneath the ck robe covering the man''s body as the few people unfortunate enough to be entering the Pure Heart City at the moment all began trembling in fear under the terrifying aura slowly beginning to spread out with the man covered the ck robes at the centre.


    The person in question was the Sect Master of the Ghost Howl Sect, who had hurried towards the Pure Heart Ind where his son had been schemed against by someone. Only for the said people to have somehow escaped right under their noses.


    Apparently, they had just been spotted by one of the Ghost Howl Sects disciples inside the Pure Heart City making their way off one of the small boats.


    The main reason why the disciple had even recognised them in the first ce, was because he was out searching for the group of three who had pretended to be part of the Ghost Howl Sect to sneak into the Pure Heart City¡­


    When the disciple had confronted the group after one of them had just left for somewhere else, the disciple asked them about them pretending to be disciples of his sect, when they had suddenly attacked him for no reason.


    Followed by this, he had ording to his own exnation ''fought valiantly before being knocked out by them in long drawn out fight''.


    "So, they are still inside the Pure Heart City!?"


    "I think so, Sect Master! But they might have already made their way out of the city and trying to run away."


    "Good! Like this I can just use my divine sense to find those two easily, hehe, I never expected for it to be this easy!"


    Putting away hismunication talisman as an evil smile appeared on his lips, the man chuckled menacingly to himself before entering the Pure Heart City where he began using his divine sense to search for the three people who dared to plot against his Ghost Howl Sect.


    "Kekeke, there you are!"


    Whoosh~


    Without a single guard daring to step forward to stop him, the sect master of the Ghost Howl Sect suddenly let out a wickedughter before rushing back out of the gate before moving over towards a certain ce located just outside the Pure Heart City.


    Being someone at the Nascent Soul Realm, along with him having been given a decent description of how the group of three schemers looked, the sect master of the Ghost Howl Sect used close to no time before he locked onto their current position inside the Pure Heart City.


    His first target being the group of two who had apparently just knocked out one of his sect disciples and were in the process of escaping from the Pure Heart City!


    "Hehe, just you three wait! I will make sure my dear son can get his revenge on you himself!"


    ¡­


    "Do you think the Ghost Howl Sect knows we left the Pure Heart Ind¡­?" Looking down at a disciple from the Ghost Howl Sect that had just showed up to confront them about pretending to be member of the Ghost Howl Sect, Qing Yi could not help growing a bit anxious as she clearly knew that the Pure Heart City was mostly under the control of the Ghost Howl Sect and the other sects working against the River Sect.


    "No need to worry so much! For now, we just need to leave the Pure Heart City before the Ghost Howl Sect returns from the Pure Heart Ind¡­ After all, given the fact that they are most likely there for something important, I doubt they would suddenly return just because of someone who pretended to be part of their sect knocking out their disciple! It''s not like we killed any of their disciples¡­"


    Trying his best to calm down Qing Yi, Chu Yang exined to her logically. No matter what, they clearly didn''t harm the disciple too much and the Ghost Howl Sect should not take the matter too seriously.


    At most they would send one of their Core Formation Realm Experts over to investigate what happened, but at that point Chu Yang and Qing Yi would both have long left the Pure Heart City!


    "Hah¡­ Sure, but I can''t help worrying about it for some reason¡­"


    Looking over at the unconscious disciple from the Ghost Howl Sect, Qing Yi shook her head before both of them hurriedly made their way towards the river Chu Yang had used to enter the Pure Heart City before.


    Neither of them having any idea that the sect master of the Ghost Howl Sect was just about to reach the gate into the Pure Heart City at this point in time.


    Ssh!


    Jumping into the river upon seeing that nobody was around to spot them jumping in, Chu Yang looked back up at Qing Yi who hesitantly stared down at the very clearly contaminated river water. "With this we should be able to avoid the guards at the gate that might recognize us from our little stunt earlier!"


    "But¡­ Hah¡­" About toin about their method out of the city, Qing Yi could only give up after seeing the Chu Yang already making his way towards the hole in the city wall for the river to flow through.


    Ssh!


    Jumping into the river water before following after Chu Yang, Qing Yi did her best to not think about how disgusting the river water inside the city walls were.


    However, the sight of someone standing on a small pier along with the sound of water hitting water did not help in the slightest, as Qing Yi directly dived under the surface of the river before swimming after Chu Yang at speeds more simr to a fish than a human.


    Ssh!


    "Hah! Finally, out!"


    Reaching the other side of the city wall, Qing Yi almost jumped out of the water before rushing to clean herself under the bewildered eyes of Chu Yang who soon appeared behind her.


    "With this, we should at least be safe for now¡­ Let''s find the demon beast from the-"


    "Found you!"


    Just as Qing Yi had finished cleaning up and Chu Yang was getting ready to search for the demon beast they had used to travel, a loud voice could suddenly be heard in the distance as both Qing Yi and Chu Yang watched in horror as a middle-aged man appeared in the distance.


    Bang!


    Before they could even move to attempt escaping, the middle-aged man had already appeared directly in front of Chu Yang and Qing Yi.


    H-how fast!


    Both Qing Yi and Chu Yang knew very well from the speed alone that the person in front of them was not someone they could escape from with their current strength!


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 Chapter 354 - Fate Of The Ghost Howl Sects Sect Master!

    <h4>Chapter 354 - Fate Of The Ghost Howl Sect''s Sect Master!</h4>


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    "Hm¡­ I wonder how my two disciples are doing¡­" Flying through the air with the small pup sized winged lion, Xuan Hao could not help thinking about how his two disciples were doing.


    Given that even the worst young master ording to the system had someone at the Nascent Soul Realm behind him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit happy that it was only a low-tier young master that his two disciples had encountered.


    After all, if it was a mid-tier or even high-tier young master, Xuan Hao feared that his two disciples wouldn''t have been alive¡­


    At least from what he had understood about the grading part of young masters, the mid-tier would mean someone at the Domain Lord Realm supported the young master, while at the high-tier, it would be someone at the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Given the fact that not many people outside what had made up the past Heavenly Sky Kingdom knew about the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao didn''t believe someone with a Domain Lord Realm Expert backing them up would even bother take a sect from such a ce into ount¡­


    High-tier young masters could probably only be found inside the core territory of the different empires on the Ewaria Continent, so Xuan Hao didn''t really worry about his disciples encountering someone like that all of a sudden¡­ The chances of that happening were simply way too unlikely.


    "Hah¡­ Even if that is the case, there is still a chance that my disciples will encounter someone like that when they begin adventuring outside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect in the future¡­ I will have to make sure they are prepared for how to deal with it when the timees!" Muttering this to himself as he saw the Pure Heart Lake in the distance, Xuan Hao began to slow down before spreading his divine sense out to search for his two disciples.


    The entire process took no more than a few seconds as his divine sense easily spread out and covered the Pure Heart City located only a few miles away from his current position.


    "Hm? That is¡­"


    Picking up the location of his disciples just outside the Pure Heart City, Xuan Hao frowned slightly upon sensing an aura around the Nascent Soul Realm making his way over towards both of them filled with killing intent.


    Does that guy have a death wish¡­?


    Clearly seeing through the strength of the Nascent Soul Realm Expert, Xuan Hao could simply not believe that someone barely in the first stage of the Nascent Soul Realm would dare attack someone from the Flying Sword Sect so tantly and out in the open!


    The guards standing at the gate could easily see the whole thing take ce from where they were standing!


    More importantly, even before the rapid increase in strength that the Flying Sword Sect had experienced over the past half year, it would have no problem dealing with someone only at the first stage of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    Whoosh!


    Seeing the person in the Nascent Soul Realm suddenly speed up before charging over towards his two disciple, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes dangerously before flying over. Soon reappearing a few meters above his two disciples.


    "Found you!"


    Listening to the clearly furious Nascent Soul Realm Expert as he smiled menacingly at both his disciples full of killing intent, Xuan Hao suddenly grew a bit curious and stopped himself from just killing him.


    I really wonder what these two disciples of mine did to anger a Nascent Soul Realm Expert to this degree¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to watch for now and see what the Nascent Soul Realm Expert was going to do with his two disciples. Even if he suddenly turned around to kill both of them, with his current strength, Xuan Hao was more than confident in being able to stop someone who was only at the first stage of the Nascent Soul Realm from doing anything.


    Especially so given the fact that he could just use his new ice domain to freeze him to death instantly¡­


    Roar~?


    Not understanding why Xuan Hao had suddenly stopped just above the three random humans, it tilted its small head cutely to the side. Hoping that it would get an exnation on what they were even doing here in the first ce¡­


    "Don''t worry, these two are my disciples and this is-"


    Roar!


    Swish~


    Already understanding what Xuan Hao meant after pointing out that the two small humans beneath them were his disciples, the winged lion''s paw suddenly grew back to its original size before moving down towards the unsuspecting Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    "Hehe, you two are not going to die so easily! I will allow my son to have the honour of extracting his revenge with his own hands! For now, I will just seal you two up before catching your little friend still inside the-"


    St!


    The giant paw of the winged lion suddenly appeared out of seemingly thin air in the eyes of Chu Yang and Qing Yi before hitting the Sect Master of the Ghost Howl Sect. Killing him instantly!


    The fact that the winged lion was hidden by Xuan Hao along with their close proximity to the Sect Master of the Ghost Howl Sect and its use of the wind domain to increase the speed of its paw. Resulted in Xuan Hao having no chance to stop the winged lion from killing the Sect Master of the Ghost Howl Sect.


    ""¡­""


    The entire thing happened way too quickly and both Chu Yang and Qing Yi, who were about to try and use their identity to intimidate him, were shocked speechless at the sight of a giant paw suddenly appearing out of thin air before smashing the Sect Master of the Ghost Howl Sect to death.


    "¡­"


    Xuan Hao was no better than his two disciples, as he saw the winged lion looking up at him with a proud look on its face.


    Roar~!


    "You did well¡­"


    With an expression that screamed to be praised for having done something good, Xuan Hao could only praise it reluctantly¡­


    ""Master!?""


    Descending down from the sky in front of his two shocked disciples, Xuan Hao felt a bit saddened over the fact that he wouldn''t get a chance to find out what the Sect Master of the Ghost Howl Sect had wanted to do to his two disciples.


    The only thing he found out about was that he wanted to bring them back for his son to deal with, who was most likely the young master his system had mentioned and the fact that Chu Yang and Qing Yi had been adventuring with someone else¡­


    "Can one of you two exin to me how you ended up having someone in the Nascent Soul Realm chase after you¡­?"


    ncing over both his disciple who slowly recovered from seeing the Sect Master of the Ghost Howl Sect suddenly being killed in front of them, Xuan Hao asked in a slightly stern tone.


    No matter what, if he had not arrived in time, his two disciples might have lost their lives!


    "Yes master! So it started like this¡­"


    Listening to Chu Yang as he slowly began to recount their adventure through the River Sect''s territory along with their new friend from the River Sect called Huang Yongyu, Xuan Hao began understanding what had happened.


    At the same time, he also realized that the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Ghost Howl Sect still had no clue that his two disciples were a part of the Flying Sword Sect up to the moment of his death¡­


    From his point of view, his son had just randomly been schemed against by his disciples along with the person from the River Sect¡­


    Why does it feel like my disciples are in the wrong here¡­?


    Going over everything Chu Yang had told him, Xuan Hao suddenly felt like his two disciples were in the wrong by randomly leading a horde of hundreds of blue spider demon beasts into the group of people from the Ghost Howl Sect...


    Even worse, the reason why they had to do that in the first ce was to escape the horde of blue spiders that the disciple from the River Sect had angered after idently stepping on a royal blue spider child¡­


    At least ording to what he had told his two disciples¡­


    No matter how I look at it, it feels like the disciple from the River Sect is trying to instigate a conflict between the Flying Sword Sect and the Ghost Howl Sect, or he is just the unluckiest person I ever encountered!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes dangerously for short moment.


    "Should we meet up with that friend of yours and see if he is fine?"


    Nodding their heads upon remembering how they had promised Huang Yongyu that they would ask their sect for help, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both gave a description of his cultivation realm along with his appearance and soon, Xuan Hao used his divine sense to search through the entire Pure Heart City for him.


    "¡­"


    However, the scene he saw through his divine sense after finding the person in question, caught him slightly off guard, as a gagged and beaten-up Huang Yongyu was thrown onboard arge ship before the ship began moving towards the Pure Heart Ind


    Maybe he was just an unlucky person¡­?


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 Chapter 355 - Back To The Pure Heart Island!

    <h4>Chapter 355 - Back To The Pure Heart Ind!</h4>


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    After having parted ways with Chu Yang and Qing Yi back at the Pure Heart Ind, Huang Yongyu had rushed to leave before anxiously waiting for both of them to show up at the small dock of the Pure Heart City.


    Only after having met up with the two of them and making sure that they were safe did he part ways with them as Chu Yang and Qing Yi made their way back to their sect, while he made his way back to his River Sect.


    Hopeful about the future after hearing how Chu Yang and Qing Yi were willing to inform their sect about his River Sect''s situation.


    Given how the Flying Sword Sect had normally acted regarding such situations in the past, Huang Yongyu was almost certain that the Flying Sword Sect would lend his River Sect a hand with at least driving those sects out of his Rive Sect''s territory¡­


    "I really hope they will be able to help out¡­" Huang Yongyu muttered to himself as he went through several different alleys and somewhat hidden paths inside the Pure Heart City.


    Since young, Huang Yongyu had spent a lot of time inside the Pure Heart City. Back then, while those sects like the Ghost Howl Sect was indeed still encroaching on their territory, they had not yet managed to take control of the Pure Heart City away from the River Sect and it was only after several random idents happening to the disciples of the River Sect whenever they travelled between the River Sect and the Pure Heart City, that caused the River Sect to begin withdrawing their people from the Pure Heart City.


    Even a bystander could see who was behind the idents happening to the disciples of the River Sect, but the River Sect had no way to deal with them!


    The main reason for this, was due to the fact that the people causing these idents were often bandits from outside the territory of the River Sect, that the sects had paid handsomely toe and harass the disciples of the River Sect.


    That is not to say that the River Sect didn''t retaliate against the bandits¡­


    The problem was that new bandits unaware of what had happened to the past bandits kept appearing, so with no way to deal with the constant loss of disciples to these bandits, the River Sect decided to give up the Pure Heart City a few years ago and the sects have jointly taken control of it since then¡­


    Clenching his hands angrily upon remembering how those sects had shamelessly wandered into the Pure Heart City as the River Sect was leaving, Huang Yongyu felt his anger towards those sects rise.


    "Hehe, they really got what they deserved earlier~" Suddenly remembering how he had managed to cause an entire horde of blue spider to attack the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect along with therge expedition force of the Ghost Howl Sect, Huang Yongyu could not help chuckling happily.


    Even if it had just been an ident on his part, he still felt good knowing how much trouble he had ended up causing the Ghost Howl Sect.


    They deserved it!


    "Is that so¡­?"


    "Ah¡­" Hearing an angry voice suddenly echo out behind him, Huang Yongyu froze on the spot before slowly turning around only to be met with the smile of an older Ghost Howl Sect disciple along with another two Ghost Howl Sect disciples standing a little behind him.


    "So, the attack on our Ghost Howl Sect was your doing? It''s well deserved? Huh?"


    "Haha, I think you misheard me, I-"


    "Get him boys! Remember to keep him alive for our young master to deal with personally!"


    Whoosh!


    Before Huang Yongyu could even react, the three disciples of the Ghost Howl Sect had already sealed off his path of escape as they began attacking him. Even worse, all of them were way older than him and had simrly reached the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    The oldest among them had even reached the middle stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    Bang!


    Crack~


    As Huang Yongyu was one-sidedly beaten up by the three Ghost Howl Sect disciples, he soon lost consciousness and faint after being punched into the stone paved road beneath him.


    "Hm, he is weaker than expected¡­"


    "Doesn''t matter, let''s take him with us to the young master! I''m sure he will be pleased with us catching one of the people who schemed against him!"


    "True, let''s head out immediately! I heard that another of our ships will be leaving soon! If we run fast enough, we should be able to catch it!"


    Whoosh!


    Ignoring the surrounding people that had gathered to see what the ruckus was all about, one of the Ghost Howl Sect''s disciples flung the unconscious Huang Yongyu over his shoulder before the group of three made their way in the direction of the Pure Heart City''s dock.


    ¡­


    The following scene yed out just like Xuan Hao had seen through his divine sense, as Huang Yongyu had been gagged before being transported across the Pure Heart Lake towards the Pure Heart Ind.


    "Looks like that friend of yours was caught by the Ghost Howl Sect¡­"


    "We have to help him! If the Ghost Howl Sect finds out he is part of the River Sect¡­ There is no way he gets out alive!"


    "And you think he will get out alive if he was not a part of the River Sect?!"


    Watching as both his disciples looked up at him pleadingly wanting to save their new friend, Xuan Hao only let out a sigh as he waved his hand before his disciples began floating up into the air alongside him.


    "No need to worry, he is still on his way towards the Pure Heart Ind and is only unconscious at the moment¡­"


    Seeing both his disciples let out a sigh of relief upon hearing that Huang Yongyu was still fine, Xuan Hao decided not to disclose the fact that he had been beaten up as it might cause both his disciples to grow more anxious.


    It was better for them to save him first instead of having his disciples be worried along the way¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time Huang Yongyu was being transported towards the Pure Heart Ind and Xuan Hao was about to take his two disciples to follow, an old man Qing Yi would be all too familiar with appeared at the centre of the Pure Heart Ind.


    "Are you sure the thing you talked about is really in here¡­?" Bai Hua, the former head of the Bai family nced questioningly down towards arge opening leading deep underground with a cautious look on his face.


    Ever since he had left the Bai family back then and stumbled upon the ring with the soul remnant of an ancient cultivation powerhouse that had fallen down from the sky, he had adventured across the territory of the Flying Sword Sect on foot.


    Under the guidance of the soul remnant of the ancient expert inside the ring, he had managed to break through to the Half-Step into the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The main reason he hade to the Pure Heart Ind, was because the soul had told him there was some kind of rare natural treasure inside that could promote the strength of his soul, while at the same time help him break through to the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Bai Hua had been ecstatic upon hearing this and had made his way to the Pure Heart Ind without waiting, it was only after arriving that he had realized that a strong local sect called the Ghost Howl Sect was currently leading arge expedition force towards the centre of the Pure Heart Ind!


    Given this information, Bai Hua was almost certain that their reason for doing this was the same as him!


    They were also after the natural treasure found at the centre of the Pure Heart Ind!


    "Yes, this should be the ce, I feel the aura from the Pure Heart Spiritual Water inside! This is Mystic Grade spiritual water! Just drinking a tiny amount would allow your soul to evolve to a higher level! Now let''s go before those people from the Ghost Howl Sect shows up!"


    The ecstatic voice from the soul remnant inside of the ring could be heard. Hurrying Bai Hua to enter therge opening in the ground.


    "¡­"


    Bai Hua didn''t say anything in response and just looked around him before jumping into therge opening in the ground.


    Even if he wanted to trust the soul remnant inside the ring, Bai Hua had clearly felt a sharp change in the voice of the soul remnant the moment it had discovered the rare natural treasure at the Pure Heart Inds.


    No matter what, Bai Hua was not some unexperienced young person who would just listen to everything the so-called dead expert in the ring told him.


    After all, even someone in the Nascent Soul Realm would have the ability to possess someone''s body to quickly recover after losing their own physical body. Let alone someone above the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Bai Hua had increasingly felt that the soul remnant inside the ring became more and more untrustworthy the more he talked with it over the past few days¡­


    Maybe it was going to attempt possessing him after strengthening through the use of the Mystic Grade Spiritual Water¡­?


    Bai Hua could not help having such thoughts as he began trying to think up ways to prevent something like that happening.


    Even thinking about just throwing the ring away, but the benefits it brought him in the form of it teaching him about cultivation was hard to give up, as he had managed to increase his cultivation base after remaining stagnate for so many years!


    Whoosh~


    While Bai Hua was struggling with what to do, he slowly made his way deeper into therge opening into the ground at the centre of the Pure Heart Ind¡­


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 Chapter 356 - Huang Yongyus Suffering...

    <h4>Chapter 356 - Huang Yongyu''s Suffering...</h4>


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    "He was caught by the Ghost Howl Sect!?""


    Chu Yang eximed in shock closely followed by Qing Yi after hearing how the Ghost Howl Sect had caught Huang Yongyu and were in the process of transporting him back to the Pure Heart Ind where the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect was located.


    "We have to save him!"


    Seeing both his disciples suddenly turn around to look at him full of expectation, Xuan Hao could not refuse both of them. "Fine, but we have to hurry before he ends up meting the young master that you three offended¡­"


    ""Thank you, Master!""


    Both Chu Yang and Qing Yi happily smiled as they heard their master''s answer, with their master around, there was no way the Ghost Howl Sect would be able to do anything to them!


    Not to mention their sect master who had suddenly met his end due to the massive paw that had suddenly appeared out of thin air before ttening said sect master.


    "By the way master¡­ What was that massive paw from earlier? Is it perhaps one of master''s techniques!?" Having remembered the giant paw from earlier, Chu Yang could not help himself as he asked Xuan Hao.


    Roar!


    The winged lion, who had not been spotted by Chu Yang and Qing Yi yet. Roared angrily towards Chu Yang upon hearing how its majestic paw had been reduced to a mere technique!


    "A lion with wi-"


    "Wha-what is that cute little creature master!?"


    Interrupting Chu Yang before he could finish his sentence, Qing Yi jumped in front of him before focusing her gaze on the cute looking winged lion, that had by now taken up a resting spot on one of Xuan Hao''s shoulders.


    "A winged lion demon beast I picked up and tamed."


    "This little one is really a demon beast? Is it perhaps the one responsible for the paw attack earlier!?"


    "Yes, beforeing here, I was at the Main Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks and¡­"


    Not hiding anything about the strength of the winged lion or where he encountered it, Xuan Hao told both his disciples how he had managed to tame it on the Main Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    "Wow¡­ So, the winged lion is actually a demon beast in the Domain Lord Realm¡­ Does it have a name yet?"


    "No."


    "How about Fluffy Paws?" Hearing that the winged lion demon beast had no name yet, Qing Yi excitedly presented a fitting name she hade up with.


    Roar!


    Not wanting to end up with that kind of embarrassing name, the winged lion angrily roared at Qing Yi to show off its clear disapproval of such non majestic name.


    "I think the little one likes it!"


    ROAR!


    "Hah¡­ Let''s go out to save that friend of yours first for now¡­" Watching the interaction between Qing Yi and the winged lion demon beast, Xuan Hao decided to return focus back on their friend who had been caught by the Ghost Howl Sect and was currently on a ship moving towards the Pure Heart Ind.


    Whoosh~


    With a wave of his hand, Xuan Hao used his domain to lift up both his disciples into the air before flying in the direction of the Pure Heart Ind.


    "Wha-what just happened?!"


    "Who was that?!"


    "A King level Expert!"


    Watching the entire thing from the side, the guards standing in front of the gate along with the people trying to enter the Pure Heart City, were all left shocked at the scene they had just seen.


    Flying was something only people in the Domain Lord Realm could do! Or as most normal people in the Ewaria Continent called it, the King level!


    To see someone at that level suddenly appear had caused all of them to be filled with awe! Just seeing someone in the Nascent Soul Realm was rare enough, let alone someone above that!


    Only after a few minutes passed did everyone resume what they were doing and stopped looking towards the direction that Xuan Hao had left in. All of them still left wondering what could have caused some like that to suddenly appear at the Pure Heart Lake¡­


    ¡­


    W-where am I¡­?


    Huang Yongyu looked around himself with a confused expression on his face. Not really understanding what happened to him before observing his surroundings for a little longer.


    I''m on a ship, inside a small storage room¡­ Likely on its way towards the Pure Heart Ind¡­


    Remembering how he had been beaten up by the three disciples of the Ghost Howl Sect and was currently on his way back towards the Pure Heart Ind that he had just managed to escape, Huang Yongyu could not help feeling a sense of helplessness creep up inside him.


    The main reason for this, was because he knew just how ruthless the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect was.


    Rumours had it that the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect had a hobby of torturing anyone that looked at him the wrong way, those who went against him would have an even worse fate!


    Even without them knowing that he was a part of the River Sect, Huang Yongyu could still easily imagine how painful his death would be at the hands of someone like that! All he could do now, was hope that the rumours of the young master''s ruthlessness were exaggerated by others¡­


    No! I have to find a way out of here before I reach the Pure Heart Ind!


    Finding himself beginning to give up hope of escaping, Huang Yongyu quicklyposed himself and stopped thinking about the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect.


    For now, the most important thing was to look for a way to escape!


    At least he had not been bound with anything other than a normal rope. Nothing he couldn''t easily break out of with his strength. The problem was how to get back to the Pure Heart City or at least the shore of the Pure Heart Lake¡­ After all, theke was known to be filled with ferocious demon beasts!


    Creak~


    Just as Huang Yongyu was thinking of a way to escape the ship, he found himself on, a creaking noise could be hearding from a door located to his right side followed by the sound of a fewughing voices, as the group of three people who beat him up entered the small storage room.


    Should I try to fight them or pretend I haven''t woken up yet!?


    Finding himself in a troublesome situation the instant he woke up, Huang Yongyu decided to pretend that he hadn''t woken up yet.


    No matter what, he had already lost to them once. Fighting again would just end up with him being knocked out again and the next time he woke up, he might end up face to face with the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect!


    "Haha, just look at this guy, we only beat him up a bit and he still haven''t woken up yet, I told you there was nothing to worry about!" Laughing with a smile as he said this before kicking Huang Yongyu who hadid in the location that he had woken up in, the disciple from the Ghost Howl Sect smiled towards the oldest among the three disciples.


    "Yeah, it looks like you are right, I worried for nothing¡­ Let''s go back, we will just get him when we arrive at the Pure Heart Ind."


    "Haha, senior brother, you worry too much! Even if he woke up, where would he go? Jump into theke and get eaten by the demon beasts? Haha!"


    Bang!


    "Ah¡­"


    As the group of three directly left the small storage room after confirming that Huang Yongyu was still unconscious, the person in question let out a groan of pain muffled by the rope that they had used to gag him before sitting up again.


    The kick from earlier by the Ghost Howl Sect disciple, had been to hisher region and the sheer pain almost caused him to scream loudly before jumping up to violent beat up the person who did it.


    The only thing keeping him from doing this, was the fact that he knew that he was no match for the three of them. Not to mention if other disciples of the Ghost Howl Sect on the ship came rushing over to help out¡­


    "I need to find a way out of here!" removing the rope used to gag him, Huang Yongyu easily broke free from the rope that was used to bind him before beginning to once again inspect the small storage room.


    The storage room was not used for anything precious and was mostly filled with all sorts of bread, meat and vegetables¡­ Not really anything that would be able to help him escape his current situation¡­ Or maybe it would¡­


    Feeling a n slowly take shape inside his mind, Huang Yongyu nced around the small storage room with a smile on his face.


    At this point in time, just waiting to be delivered before the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect was not something Huang Yongyu wanted to do!


    If he seeded, he might even have chance to live!


    Even in the worst case scenario, he would at least be able to get revenge on those three disciples who beat him up¡­


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 Chapter 357 - Huang Yongyus Escape... Again!

    <h4>Chapter 357 - Huang Yongyu''s Escape... Again!</h4>


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    Flying through the air towards the direction of the ship that Huang Yongyu had been ced on before it left the small dock of the Pure Heart City towards the Pure Heart Ind, Xuan Hao suddenly blinked both his eyes in surprise upon sensing the ship suddenlying to a halt around the midway point between Pure Heart Ind and the Pure Heart City.


    Normally, something like that would not happen and after further inspection with his divine sense, Xuan Hao quickly realized that the reason that the ship had stopped, was not so much because the people onboard had wanted it to stop¡­ On the other hand, it hade to a stop due to arge demon beast taking on the shape of arge shark that had bitten into the ship.


    Forcing it toe to a halt as the disciples from the Ghost Howl Sect on board frantically tried their best to get the demon beast shark to let go of the boat before other demon beasts began noticing what was happening.


    At the same time, Xuan Hao noticed one person doing theplete opposite at the other end of the ship, as he dumpedrge amounts of different kinds of food into theke. From normal vegetables to raw meat.


    Going by Chu Yang and Qing Yi''s description, that person should be the person from the River Sect that they wanted to save¡­ Huang Yongyu!


    "¡­"


    ncing over towards his two disciples and seeing both of them just looking around at theke water passing by below them full of wonder, Xuan Hao decided to slow down his speed, so as to not arrive too quickly at the location of the ship.


    Xuan Hao was really interested in seeing what kind of n the disciple from the River Sect hade up with and how he nned to escape from the soon to be sinking ship¡­


    After all, no matter how hard the disciples from the Ghost Howl Sect tried to deal with the shark demon beast, they would soon have to deal with even more demon beast and also stronger demon beasts!


    The Pure Heart Lake was the territory of the demon beasts and when discovered, there was close to no way out.


    This was also one of the reasons Xuan Hao was curious about how Huang Yongyu would escape his current predicament.


    The River Sect had controlled the Pure Heart Lake for a long time, so he should at least have a few secret methods up his sleeve¡­


    Observing Huang Yongyu''s predicament from afar without his two disciples having any clue about their friend''s current dangerous situation, Xuan Hao speed slowed down even further.


    The only reason Chu Yang and Qing Yi didn''t discover anything was due to the fact that they were too absorbed in watching theke below. Looking out to see if they could spot any of the demon beasts hidden beneath the surface.


    ¡­


    Ssh!


    "That should be thest of it¡­ Now to find a way off this ship¡­"


    Watching as thest bit of raw meat stored inside the small storage room with him was pushed into theke water below him, Huang Yongyu smiled cheekily as he watched several shadows cautiously approaching the food floating just beside the ship before happily beginning to feast.


    Bang!


    Soon after, the still hungry demon beasts in theke below began attacking the ship. All ording to his n!


    With this, the ship would soon be overwhelmed by the endless amount of demon beasts in the Pure Heart Lake!


    Huang Yongyu knew very well that the Pure Heart Lake was extremely dangerous and once the demon beasts found a ship floating on the surface, there would be no way to save the ship!


    The River Sect understood this very well and hade up with several ways to prevent something like that from happening, as giving up the precious resources on the Pure Heart Ind was simply not an option for them¡­


    One of the methods they hade up with, was a special coating of sorts applied to the underside of the ship or boat. Making it harder for the demon beasts inside the Pure Heart Lake to spot it.


    But this was not the only method the River Sect hade up with to safely cross the Pure Heart Lake, just the one that most other people knew about as they had made it public. For this reason, it was also this method that the sects like the Ghost Howl Sect used to travel between the Pure Heart City and the Pure Heart Ind.


    The other methods were something only the core members of the River Sect knew about!


    "I really hope this works¡­"


    Remembering the method, he had been taught about by his father when he was still young and had the opportunity to freely go to and from the Pure Heart Ind, Huang Yongyu felt extremely nervous.


    It had already been over 10 years since he hadst used that method and he had no idea whether it would work or not, as he had never really gotten to train it in the first ce and now that the River Sect no longer controlled the Pure Heart Ind, there was no need for him to use it either. Focusing on his cultivation seemed to have been a way better option back then. Even if he nowmented over the fact that he had not spent any time on training like his parents had told him to do¡­


    BANG!


    Watching as arge shark demon beast suddenly appeared on the other side of the ship and violently bit down before violently trying to drag the ship below the surface, Huang Yongyu knew he wouldn''t have a long time left before the even more terrifying demon beasts began showing up.


    "Wai- How are you out here? Is this your doing?!"


    Just as Huang Yongyu was about to make his escape, a group of Ghost Howl Sect disciples suddenly came rushing out and spotted him along with the few dozen empty containers used to store food just next to him.


    "Farewell, good luck dealing with the demon beasts!"


    Whoosh!


    Not nning to wait for the Ghost Howl Sect disciples to recover from their shock before catching him again, Huang Yongyu ran away from the spot where he had dumped the food into theke before jumping off the ship and into theke water below a little further away.


    Hoping that there weren''t any demon beasts just below him.


    Ssh!


    Hitting the water, Huang Yongyu didn''t wait around for even a second as he hurriedly began executing his sect''s secret technique and before long, Huang Yongyu''s body began merging together withke water beforepletely disappearing from view.


    Neither the Ghost Howl Sect''s disciples looking at him from the ship or the demon beasts rushing towards him from below, had any clue what happened as he seemingly disappeared into thin air.


    Swish~


    At the same time, a small movement could be seen on the surface of the water where Huang Yongyu had been just a moment ago before disappearing into the distance.


    The technique in question was called Lake Shadow and it allowed Huang Yongyu to borrow the natural power flowing through the Pure Heart Lake to hide himself from others.


    The technique was truly powerful when used on the Pure Heart Lake, but waspletely useless outside of the Pure Heart Lake, this was the main reason Huang Yongyu hadn''t bothered to continue learning the technique after his sect lost control over the Pure Heart Lake¡­


    Now, he could barely execute the Lake Shadow technique and very clearly knew that it would not be able tost for a long time.


    Huang Yongyu''s n was to get as far away from the ship before he could no longer keep up the Lake Shadow technique.


    He hoped that the demon beasts below would ignore him and instead focus their attention on the ship from the Ghost Howl Sect instead.


    This way, he might have a chance to make his way back to the shore of the Pure Heart Lake¡­


    ¡­


    "How amazing¡­"


    Xuan Hao could not help but sigh to himself in amazement when he watched Huang Yongyu use the Lake Shadow technique.


    Compared to the demon beasts swimming past Huang Yongyupletely oblivious of his existence, Xuan Hao could still clearly see Huang Yongyu and quickly understood how he borrowed the natural power flowing through the Pure Heart Lake to hide himself from both the people on the side of the Ghost Howl Sect and the demon beasts.


    The reason why the technique amazed Xuan Hao, however, was not this.


    Instead, it was because he very clearly knew that borrowing power from the natural world was something one would only be able to start doing upon reaching the Nascent Soul Realm. Mainly due to the massive stress doing something like that would cause on the soul.


    After reaching the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao''s control over the natural world increased to a new level. In a sense, his domain was just a manifestation of a small part of the natural world that he had managed toprehend. Outside his sword and ice domain, there were still many more things left for him to understand¡­


    Not to mention, he was far from fully understanding either of his two domains full potential¡­ Only just recently having begunprehending the power of a domain.


    The Lake Shadow technique used by Huang Yongyu was simr to a Domain Lord using his domain to hide! The thing that amazed Xuan Hao was the fact someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm could do something only a Domain Lord would normally be capable of!


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 Chapter 358 - The Centre Of The Pure Heart Lake

    <h4>Chapter 358 - The Centre Of The Pure Heart Lake</h4>


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    "Wha-"


    Whoosh!


    Before Huang Yongyu could even manage to react to what was happening, he suddenly found himself being dragged into the air before finding himself face to face with the two disciples from the Flying Sword Sect that he had just parted ways with a short time ago.


    "Are you okay?"


    "Looks like you got beaten up quite badly¡­"


    Happily waving at their friend from the River Sect before discovering the different wounds that had appeared after his fight with the disciples from the Ghost Howl Sect, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both asked out of concern.


    "I-I''m fine, but-"


    How had he ended up floating mid-air with Chu Yang and Qing Yi all of a sudden?


    Just as Huang Yongyu was about to ask this, he noticed Xuan Hao standing a short distance away from him with his hands behind his back and a serene look on his face.


    "You are Huang Yongyu?"


    "Y-yes!"


    Hearing him talk, Huang Yongyu felt himself be extremely nervous all of a sudden when he felt an invisible pressure sweep over him, that almost prevented him from speaking.


    Even if he had no idea who Xuan Hao was, he still realized that he was an extremely terrifying cultivator and given that he was together with Chu Yang and Qing Yi, Huang Yongyu quickly deduced that he should be a member of the Flying Sword Sect''s older generation.


    Was the Flying Sword Sect always this scary¡­?


    Thinking this, Huang Yongyu quickly looked away from Xuan Hao with a fearful expression on his face. Some experts would find the act of someone looking straight at them offensive and he dared not continue doing that in case Xuan Hao was one such person.


    "I heard a bit about you and your sect from my disciples on my way here and will inform the Flying Sword Sect''s elder in charge of these kind of things, to look into it and find a fitting solution for your sect''s current predicament."


    Understanding how nervous Huang Yongyu was to face him, Xuan Hao didn''t say much and just informed him about how he had decided to bring up the matter of the River Sect and the sects ganging up on it to the elder in charge of these kind of things.


    In other words, Elder Song¡­


    "Hm?"


    Suddenly detecting a terrifying aura from the centre of the Pure Heart Ind, Xuan Hao narrowed his both his eyes.


    Something about the aura was familiar, he just couldn''t put his finger on what it was¡­


    "Chu Yang, Qing Yi, I will set you off at the shore of the Pure Heart Lake. After that, you should head back to the sect on your own¡­ It seems like there is something I will have to check out personally¡­"


    Not saying anything more, Xuan Hao quickly rushed back to the shore of the Pure Heart Ind where he put down both his disciples along with a still confused Huang Yongyu, who still had no idea what had just happened.


    One moment he was praying that no demon beast would notice him as his Lake Shadow technique was about to expire and the next moment, he found himself at the shore of the Pure Heart Lake several miles away from his previous location.


    Whoosh~


    Xuan Hao did not stay with his two disciples and Huang Yongyu after dropping them off before he rushed towards the Pure Heart Ind where he had felt the terrifying, yet familiar aura just a moment ago.


    Dropping off the winged lion and instructing it to make sure his two disciples were safe in case anyone else from the Ghost Howl Sect or the other sects decided to find trouble with them!


    Roar!


    The winged lion was clearly not happy about this, as it had also felt the strong aura from the Pure Heart Ind and also wanted to go, but what could it do about this¡­ Xuan Hao had told it to stay and protect the two weak humans, it had already established a blood pact with Xuan Hao and going against him was not a good idea¡­


    Roar~


    With a somewhat reluctant roar, the winged lion decided to just give up as it flew up from the ground before settling at the top of Chu Yang''s head. Ignoring everything around it before closing its two eyes and going to sleep.


    Not like those two weak humans would be able to find anything interesting for it to do in the first ce. Sleeping was the best option! With its domain, it would easily be able to detect if anything dangerous happened¡­ Even if it was asleep!


    "¡­"


    Chu Yang didn''t even manage to say goodbye to his master before he had left, and the winged lion settled on top of his head before going to sleep.


    "How unfair!"


    At the same time, he was also met with the jealous eyes of Qing Yi and the still questioning eyes of Huang Yongyu, who wanted to understand what had just happened¡­


    ¡­


    A few minutes earlier at the centre of the Pure Heart Ind, the expedition force of the Ghost Howl Sect had arrived in front of therge opening in the ground just in time to barely see Bai Hua jumping into therge opening in the ground.


    "Someone just entered the Heart of the Lake!"


    "No need to worry young master, there is no way he will be able to survive! There is a reason why the River Sect hasn''t dared to dwell too deeply into that ce. Even with them upying the area for the past five hundred years! Now let''s get going, we still need to get the thing that the Sect Master needs to recover!"


    Not showing even a single ounce of worry like his young master did, the elder patted him on the shoulder before quietly informing him about the reason for their visit to the Pure Heart Ind.


    "Yes! We have to get the Spiritual Water so my father can recover! At that time, there is no way the River Sect or even those allies of ours will be able to stop us from taking control of the surrounding territory! We might even end up bing one of the top 5 sects inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory!" Smiling full of eagerness as he said this, the young master could barely contain his anticipation of his bright future of being the young master of such a powerful sect.


    "Move out!"


    Not before long, the Ghost Howl Sect''s expeditionary force also entered the opening in the ground known as the Heart of the Lake.


    The main reason behind the name, was because the centre of the entire Pure Heart Lake also being the centre of the Pure Heart Ind!


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 Chapter 359 - Four Paths

    <h4>Chapter 359 - Four Paths</h4>


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    Having left his disciples and the winged lion behind at the shore of the Pure Heart Lake to make their way back to the Flying Sword Sect for themselves, Xuan Hao didn''t bother holding back in the slightest. Flying through the air and easily crossing the distance between the Pure Heart City and the Pure Heart Ind within a minute.


    "This should be the ce¡­"


    Arriving in front of arge opening in the ground where the terrifying aura that he had felt earlier came from, Xuan Hao grew a bit cautious. Using both his domains to careful scan the surroundings for any clues that might help him figure out what had happened earlier.


    "Arge group of people seem to have entered around half an hour ago¡­"


    Narrowing his eyes as he discovered a few lingering traces from the expeditionary force of the Ghost Howl Sect, Xuan Hao soon began observing the opening itself.


    Outside of just being arge hole in the ground. The opening had four different rivers that ran into it from four different directions. Ending up forming four different waterfalls that fell down into arge body of water located on the bottom of the opening in the ground.


    Whoosh~


    Moving down through the opening, Xuan Hao soon discovered that there were four different paths, each of them hidden behind a waterfall formed from the rivers above.


    "¡­"


    Please don''t be a maze¡­


    Feeling that he already knew where this whole thing was going, Xuan Hao gave a silent prayer as he entered the northern path.


    "Wha-"


    Letting out a breath of relief and at the same time amazement, as he found himself at the entrance of what could only be described as an underground ancient temple of some long-forgotten water rted god.


    What had once been walls filled with beautiful murals, had long since decayed under the long passage of time. Only leaving behind the pirs supporting the ancient underground temple decorated with different water serpents coiling around them in different stages of copse.


    The water serpents that decorated therge pirs several meters thick, was one of the reasons why Xuan Hao believed the ancient temple had belonged to some water rted god.


    However, there was an even more obvious thing pointing towards this and that was therge mural located at the back of the ancient temple.


    Even though it had been damaged like the rest of the murals that covered the side walls of the temple, Xuan Hao could still make out a few things from it.


    One being the fact that the bottom half of the mural seemed to depict an endless ocean, while the top half should have been the god of the temple itself.


    Sadly, it was not possible to see the appearance of the god in question, as the top half of the mural was far more damaged than the bottom half. Making it impossible for Xuan Hao to begin guessing what the water god looked like.


    Searching through the ancient underground temple that the northern path had led to, Xuan Hao soon left after finding. Leaving the ancient temple to explore the three other paths.


    Only to be met with the exact same thing, the difference being the element of the god that was worshipped.


    The southern path was a fire god. The eastern path an earth god and the western path a wind god.


    Exploring the four different ancient temples, Xuan Hao realized that all of them werepletely empty. Not even a single spirit stone could be found inside of any of the four and at the same time, he had no clue where the people who had entered before him had disappeared to¡­


    Even scanning the surroundings with his divine sense strengthened by his domain, did not lead to anything.


    All he could ever get to, was that the aura of the people that came before him disappeared into thin air after reaching the middle of the opening...


    "Maybe it''s a guardian formation of some sort¡­"


    Looking at the centre of therge hole Xuan Hao was lost in thought. The water below the centre began to move out of the way before a circr entrance shrouded in a thick mist leading to somewhere unknown a few meters wide began to form.


    Ssh!


    "Hah¡­ I esca-"


    Staring unblinkingly as a man dressed like a disciple from the Ghost Howl Sect crawled out of the circr entrance that had formed in the body of water before moving his exhausted body into the water with a happy smile on his face, Xuan Hao suddenly made eye contact with the person now floating in the water below him.


    "¡­"


    "¡­"


    The man who had juste out from the circr entrance simr to the entrance of a secret realm that formed in the water. Looked up at Xuan Hao floating only in the air only a few meters away from him before a terrified expression slowly began to appear on his face.


    "S-senior¡­!"


    Doing his best to sound respectful, the disciple from the Ghost Howl Sect shivered all over as he called out to Xuan Hao. Hoping that the senior floating a few meters away from him wouldn''t just outright kill him.


    Even if he had no idea what the Domain Lord Realm was, the disciple could still easily understand that the person floating just a few meters away from him, was an existence that far surpassed even his sect master!


    "What did-"


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to ask the Ghost Howl Sect about what had happened to him and what was beyond the circr entrance shrouded in a thick mist that prevented his divine sense and domain from piercing through, the circr entrance started shrinking at a speed visible to the naked eye. Given a few more seconds and the circr entrance to somewhere unknown at the centre of theke would be closed again.


    Whoosh!


    Not thinking about the disciple from the Ghost Howl Sect, Xuan Hao directly rushed through the entrance shrouded in a thick mist.. Not knowing what awaited him on the other side.


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 Chapter 360 - Mysterious Place Beyond The Mist~

    <h4>Chapter 360 - Mysterious ce Beyond The Mist~</h4>


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    Fwoosh~


    Making his way through the thick mist that covered the circr entrance that had formed at the centre of the water, Xuan Hao soon found himself in the middle of arge corridor.


    The corridor itself was not too different from the four ancient temples he had seen above. Onlyrger and more detailed. Allowing it to give off a more majestic fellingpared to the other four temples he had seen above.


    Another thing of note was the fact that the corridor showed way fewer signs of decaypared to the found temples located above. Likely due to the fact that the ones above were way easier to esspared to the temple he currently found himself inside of.


    After all, even with his current cultivation realm and the help of his domain, Xuan Hao still had no idea how to reach make the entrance to the temple appear¡­


    If not for the help of the Ghost Howl Sect disciples so graciously opening the entrance for him and allowing him to enter, he would have likely ended up just giving up on finding out where the expeditionary force of the Ghost Howl Sect had disappeared to.


    Now that he was thinking about it, where is the expeditionary force from the Ghost Howl Sect¡­?


    Realizing that he hadn''t met anyone from the Ghost Howl Sect since entering the corridor where the Ghost Howl Sect had escaped from, Xuan Hao could not help but grow cautious as he began more thoroughly inspecting the corridor that he was inside of.


    The only thing standing out was a small trail of blood on the floor of the corridor. Likely having stemmed from the Ghost Howl Sect disciple that had opened up the entrance in the first ce¡­


    Looking down at the trail of blood, Xuan Hao looked back up at where the entrance to the corridor had been before it had disappeared behind him.


    It looked like he would have to look for another way out¡­


    "Hm¡­?"


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to follow the direction that the trail of blood that the Ghost howl Sect disciple had left behind, he suddenly felt the terrifying aura that he had first picked up on in the air above the Pure Heart Lake.


    The only problem being that it came from the opposite direction that the trail of blood was in¡­


    To follow the trail of blood leading to somewhere unknown, or to find out who or what the terrifying aura belonged to?


    Whoosh~


    Without much thinking, Xuan Hao turned around and headed towards the location that the powerful aura hade from.


    Even if it was terrifying, Xuan Hao had clearly felt that the aura seemed far weaker than when it had the first time it erupted.


    If at first the aura was something way beyond anything he had ever felt in the Domain Lord Realm. Now the aura seemed moreparable, if not a little weaker than the winged lion at its peak. Giving Xuan Hao more than enough confidence to deal with the origin of the aura if it came down to it.


    ¡­


    Xuan Hao, who was making his way through the corridor towards the origin of the aura. Discovered that the corridor was far longer than he had expected, even after increasing his speed, he still took over five minutes to reach the end of the corridor.


    The area that he arrived at after reaching the end, was arge open space with a dense forest in front of him. Looking up, Xuan Hao could even see what looked like an artificial sky. All run by some kind of enormous ancient formation.


    "Wha-"


    Turning to look back towards the corridor he had juste from, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a surprised sound, as the corridor faded out of existence. Leaving him with no way back the way he came. Unless he could break through the formation that kept the entire thing running¡­


    But just from the fact that he couldn''t even sense the formation with his divine sense or domain in the first ce. Gave Xuan Hao the impression that he would likely not have enough strength to do something like that¡­


    Rustle~


    "They must''ve been frightened from seeing someone just suddenly appear in front of them and are now running away¡­" Watching as several small animals that had been hiding or were eating in the surrounding forest run away fearfully after discovering that someone had suddenly appeared in the ce, they were either hiding or getting something to eat.


    "How weird¡­ The qi is clearly so dense in here, but none of the surrounding animals have even reached the first stage of the Qi Condensation Realm¡­" Scanning his surroundings through his divine sense, Xuan Hao quickly discovered that none of the animals inside the dense forest had any form of cultivation.


    All of them remaining regr animals even with the qi being dense enough to allow even someone with no talent in cultivation to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm within a few years.


    Not thinking too much about the weird phenomenon, Xuan Hao paid it no mind as he continued forward towards the location of the powerful aura, he could clearly feel that he was getting closer.


    ¡­


    Meanwhile, in a deeper part of the dense forest Xuan Hao had just arrived in, the expedition force of the Ghost Howl Sect was fighting off a tide of monsters with the elders using severalrge-scale attacks all over the battlefield. Killing hordes of demon beasts in an instant.


    But the demon beasts kept appearing like there was no end to them, causing heavy casualties on the side of the Ghost Howl Sect as blood sprayed into the air and the corpses of the weaker disciples slowly began covering the ground until only those at the Foundation Establishment Realm were left fighting.


    "Kill! Kill all these demon beasts!"


    "We have to escape, there is no way for us to hold them back!"


    "It''s that man! He has something to do with all these demon beasts suddenly appearing and attacking us like this! If we don''t kill him, there will be no end to these monsters!"


    At the same time, Bai Hua was sitting fully concentrated in a meditative position inside a small pond located on top of arge altar.


    "How dare you resist!? Just give up your body to me and stop fighting against it!" An arrogant voice suddenly echoed out from inside the body of Bai Hua sitting in a meditative position, as a barely visible silhouette of an elderly man manifested next to his body with a pissed off look on his face.


    "Are you perhaps thinking about having those pitiful idiotse to your rescue? Or maybe you just want them to weaken me? Hehe, stop daydreaming, those insects are at most at the Core Formation Realm! The small horde of demon beasts I made from the local wildlife is more than enough for me to deal with them!" The silhouette floating next to Bai Hua mocked. Hoping that he would just give up and allow him to take over his body without struggling.


    After all, even if he could take over the body, the soul remnant did not want to expend all its energy on the task and end up weakened for a period of time afterwards if it could be avoided.


    Not only would that be extremely dangerous as someone much weaker than itself could kill it, but it also very clearly knew that its currently location was not really anywhere safe in the first ce. Having a drawn-out fight for Bai Hua''s body was not anything desirable¡­


    "¡­"


    "Tsk¡­ If you really don''t want to give up your body without resistance, don''t expect me to be gentle!"


    Fwoosh!


    Seeing Bai Hua remain silent as he desperately tried absorbing the spiritual water below him to increase his soul strength and better ward off the invasion of the remnant soul, the silhouette disappeared back into his body and before long a stream of blood began trickling down from the corner of his mouth.


    "Look! The man is about to seed!"


    "We have to stop him! If he sessfully breaks through, we will all be dead!"


    The people from the Ghost Howl Sect had no idea about the struggle happening on top of the altar and only thought Bai Hua was behind the horde of demon beasts that came over to attack them all of a sudden.


    Feeling the powerful aura and seeing the precious spiritual water on top of the altar slowly being absorbed by him only resulted in further strengthening this belief.


    "Looks like we won''t be able to make it out of here alive¡­ At least the young master managed to escape¡­"


    Surrounded by over five berserk demon beasts at the Core Formation Realm, the elder who had been tasked with guarding the young master of the Ghost Howl Sect could not help smiling sadly to himself.


    He had discovered the demon beasts only a few seconds before the rest of the expeditionary force and had used arge part of his strength to directly throw the young master out of the encirclement that had been forming around them at that time, while telling him to escape and not look back.


    "At least I managed to repay the debt I owed for you saving my life back then¡­" Muttering this to himself as he watched even more Core Formation Realm demon beasts swarm over towards him, the elder slowly felt himself be weaker and weaker with each passing second before one of the demon beasts attacks managed to pass through his defences-


    Swish!


    And pierce through his heart. Instantly killing him.


    The rest of the Ghost Howl Sect members didn''t fare any better than their strongest elder, as they slowly began dying one by one.


    Even if the demon beasts were not as strong as what their cultivation realm suggested, the sheer amount of demon beasts numbering in the thousands was simply way too much for them to handle with only a small expeditionary force of around a hundred people.


    Not to mention they also had to deal with the blue spider horde earlier¡­


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 Chapter 361 - Sneak Attack!

    <h4>Chapter 361 - Sneak Attack!</h4>


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    "Hehe, that is thest of those annoying pests. Now there is no one left to disturb us!" The sinister voice from the soul remnant echoed out in triumph from inside Bai Hua''s body, as thest person from the Ghost Howl Sect''s expeditionary force fell to the ground before being consumed by therge horde of demon beasts that had formed a living wall around the altar.


    Roar!


    Screech!


    ROAR!


    Followed by the sinisterugh from the remnant soul, the demon beasts surrounding the altar suddenly fell onto the ground before turning into a pure red qi that slowly began flowing into Bai Hua''s body.


    Forcefully raising so many normal animals without any strength to the Foundation Establishment Realm and Core Formation Realm had drained most of the remnant soul''s power.


    After having dealt with the Ghost Howl Sect''s people, there was no longer a need to keep the demon beasts around. Absorbing the qi that it had used back to speed up the process of taking over Bai Hua''s body was by far the best option!


    This way, the remnant soul would also be able to decrease the time that it was exposed to danger by staying inside the ce called the Heart of the Lake by the locals¡­


    "Soon¡­ soon this body will be mine and I will once again be able to walk among the living!"


    With Bai Hua feeling his soul grow weaker and weaker with each passing second, the crazedughter of the remnant soul was the only thing keeping him awake enough to fight back.


    ¡­


    Only a short distance away from the ce where the battle between the Ghost Howl Sect''s expeditionary force and the demon beasts enhanced and controlled by the remnant soul that was trying to take over Bai Hua''s body, Xuan Hao slowly appeared seemingly out of thin air.


    "Looks like I found out what happened to the Ghost Howl Sect, I guess that disciple from earlier should be the only one still left alive then¡­" Muttering this to himself as he gazed over towards the altar located in an opening inside the dense forest, Xuan Hao clearly felt the aura he had sensed back when he had been helping his disciples save Huang Yongyu.


    The only difference was that he could also sense another person''s aura seemingly merging together with the owner of the powerful aura!


    No¡­ Merging together would not be the correct word. Devoured, consumed, absorbed, these words would be way more fitting for that person''s current situation¡­


    Whoosh~


    Deciding to observe the situation for now instead of just recklessly charging forward and revealing himself, Xuan Hao floated up in the air before looking over towards an elderly man located on top of the altar.


    Sitting down in a meditative position with closed eyes and a small stream of blood continuously flowing out from both his eyes and mouth at the same time, even a normal person would realize that the old man was at the edge of death as his body looked like it would give in at any moment.


    So, a remnant soul is trying to possess his body¡­ But why go for such an old one when there were so many younger and more suitable bodies among the people from the Ghost Howl Sect¡­ Unless there is something special about the old man''s body?


    Realizing that he was witnessing a long dead powerhouse in the process of attempting to take over a body to revive and live again, Xuan Hao decided not to act recklessly.


    Given the strength of the aura he had felt back at the Pure Heart Lake, Xuan Hao had already realized that the remnant soul had once been someone above the Domain Lord Realm when he had still been alive.


    Someone like that would have all kind of tricks and hidden cards up their sleeve after living for a long time, with all of this in mind, Xuan Hao carefully began preparing tounch a sure kill technique that would hopefully kill the remnant soul before it even realized what was happening.


    Ignoring the remnant soul and allow it to take over the body and go on its way?


    Doing something like that would spell disaster for the Flying Sword Sect and all the sects and kingdoms located nearby.


    Why?


    Well¡­


    "Hahaha, after taking over your body and devouring your pathetic soul, I will make sure to devour a few people outside to recover my cultivation realm and return to my peak!"


    The crazy rambles from the remnant soul constantly echoing out from inside the elderly man''s body seemed to answer for itself¡­


    Could someone at the realm of the remnant soul go insane?


    Xuan Hao shivered at the thought of this, if someone above the Domain Lord Realm truly ended up going insane. The damage they could bring would be unimaginable if there weren''t anybody present to stop them in time.


    Even with his current cultivation realm, Xuan Hao would still easily be able to devastate an entire kingdom within a few days. Not to mention someone above the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Waiting around for another five minutes as the remnant soul neared the final step of the possession, Xuan Hao chose this moment when the remnant soul would be the most focused to strike.


    Cling~


    A serene metallic sound could barely be heard as a sword made out of sword qi manifested through his sword domain appeared in Xuan Hao''s hand as he shed down towards the man sitting cross legged on the altar.


    As for whether or not the person currently in the process of being possessed would survive? This was simply not something Xuan Hao thought about. Given the strength of the remnant soul, Xuan Hao could simply not afford to hold back.


    Swish!


    The sound of the attack was close to non-existent. The Sword Shadow was by far Xuan Hao''s best attack when it came to being stealthy and lethal at the same time and after having reached the Domain Lord Realm, his Sword Shadow seemed to have undergone some kind of evolution as it had almost perfectly merged into the surroundings while quickly approaching the elderly man on top of the altar.


    "WHO!?"


    Only a few meters away from the elderly man on top of the altar, the remnant soul discovered the iing attack and screamed loudly before interrupting the possession process and rushing out of Bai Hua''s body to meet the attack as a sea of blood manifested behind it.


    The sea of blood was terrifying beyondpare and seemed to contain an endless amount of blood and all sorts of weird and terrifying demon beast corpse could be seen floating around the sea of blood.


    "Hmph, do you really think killing me will be that easy¡­?"


    With amand from the remnant soul. The massive sea of blood directly flew forward and met Xuan Hao''s sword attack, causing his attack to unravel before reaching its intended target.


    BOOM!


    Xuan Hao''s sword attack directly exploded forth, causing the sword energy stored inside the attack fiercely swirl around at the edge of the blood sea before forming into an enormous vortex of sword energy that slowly began ripping apart the massive blood sea.


    Whoosh!


    Not intending to wait around for the sword vortex to fade away as he didn''t want to waste his energy supplying it, Xuan Hao charged over towards the remnant soul with both his domains springing forth at the same time.


    His sword domain forming into an endless ocean of sword before shing with the blood ocean together with the sword vortex, while ayer of ice covered everything within a few miles of the altar as the ice domain took effect and began freezing up the blood sea at the same time.


    At this point in time, the remnant soul suddenly endured three different attacks at the same time!


    Crack~


    Within only a short moment, the blood sea began cracking apart as it weakened significantly, to the point that the remnant soul didn''t bother wasting any time with talking any longer.


    Instead looking seriously at Xuan Hao for the first time since the attack as it waved its hand. Followed by several ancient blood red runes to manifest around the sea of blood before it began stabilizing under Xuan Hao''s attack.


    I really wish I had a good weapon¡­


    Looking at the situation slowly begin turning in the favour of the remnant soul, Xuan Hao could not help butment over the fact that he still didn''t even have a weapon.


    If he had a weapon that was fitting for his cultivation realm, Xuan Hao felt that he would have been able to directly end the fight with the three different attacks.


    When going to the Alchemy Competition in the future, I have to find a skilled cksmith that can make a weapon for me¡­ Or at the very least find a good sword¡­


    Having resolved himself to find a sword or an artifact useful forbat that had at least reached the Mystic Grade in the future, Xuan Hao focused back on the blood sea of the remnant soul that suddenly increased in strength after the blood red ancient runes had appeared.


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 Chapter 362 - Pure Heart Spiritual Water

    <h4>Chapter 362 - Pure Heart Spiritual Water</h4>


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    Bang!


    The blood sea didn''t just grow stronger after the appearance of the ancient blood runes, but also began increasing in size as it soon began to engulf Xuan Hao''s first attack, the sword vortex.


    Whoosh~


    Directly swallowing it up before forcefully erasing it from existence. Leaving only his two domains around to push back against the massive blood sea.


    "Looks like he is about to reach his limit¡­" Looking at the quickly expanding blood sea growing stronger and stronger, Xuan Hao didn''t get nervous and instead smiled to himself.


    The remnant soul was after all just that, a remnant soul¡­ The power that it disyed could onlyst for a certain amount of time before ending up exhausting what little qi had been saved up over the years.


    The blood sea should have been the remnant soul''s domain, but in its current state, there was no way for it to effortlessly disy its full strength with only part of its soul. Even just using part of its blood domain''s strength was more than enough to begin supressing Xuan Hao''s ice and sword domain.


    The sheer terror and strength of the remnant soul when it had been alive could easily be imagined from this alone¡­


    "Argh! H-howe there is such a freak in this god forsaken ce!?" Seeing that it wouldn''t be able to easily break through Xuan Hao''s defences in a short period of time, the remnant soul knew very well that it wouldn''t be able to keep up fighting for an extended period of time and began to realize the fact that it might end up perishing.


    Crack~


    As time slowly passed, the sea of blood began to weaken before suddenly cracking apart like a giant mirror in the sky under the pressure of both his domains.


    "Damn yo-"


    About to curse at Xuan Hao onest time as the blood sea broke apart, the remnant soul was directly obliterated under an endless wave of sword qi that materialized through Xuan Hao''s sword domain.


    The remnant soul had been destroyed!


    "That was exhausting¡­"


    With the destruction of the remnant soul, Xuan Hao could breathe out safely as he had avoided dealing with it any time in the future. Even if the fight onlysted for a short moment, it was still extremely dangerous for him. The remnant soul had after all once been a powerhouse way above his current realm when it had been alive.


    However, all thing considered, it was still way better fighting the remnant soul at its weakestpared to fighting with it after it had gotten a body and recovered part of its strength from when it had been alive¡­


    Just imagining how strong the remnant soul would have been at its peak caused Xuan Hao to revaluate his current strength. Even if he had reached the Domain Lord Realm, there was still a long way to go until he could be considered strong enough to live without a care in the world on the Ewaria Continent.


    No to mention there were three other and possible stronger continents outside the borders of the Ewaria Continent!


    "Hah¡­ Still have a long way to go¡­" Shaking his head as he threw these thoughts to the back of his mind, Xuan Hao decided not to think about things that were far off in the future. For now, his current strength should be more than enough to keep himself and the Flying Sword Sect safe!


    Not to mention Domain Lords, there weren''t more than a few Peak Nascent Soul Realm Experts in the kingdoms surrounding the Flying Sword Sect...


    Merging together with the Spring Flower Sect and joining the Sect Alliance under the Sky Empire would also allow the Flying Sword Sect to gain a more legitimate and permanent position inside the Sky Empire.


    All thing considered, he didn''t have to worry too much about increasing his strength like he had the past half year and could spent more of his time increasing the number of techniques avable to him and his understanding of formations along with alchemy and any other profession that he would need to learn in order to better teach his disciples.


    Rustle~


    "Hm? How is he still alive¡­?" ncing over towards the altar where the elderly man that had just been about to be possessed by the remnant soul, Xuan Hao could not help but exim in a surprise upon witnessing him roll around like someone just about to wake up from a good night''s sleep.


    This waspletely out of Xuan Hao''s expectations as he had clearly been located at the middle of his and the remnant soul''s fight. Even if the massive blood sea didn''t crush him to death, Xuan Hao''s sword or ice domain surely should have!


    However, the elderly man was currentlyying down on top of the altar inside a small pool of water without any signs of injuries visible on his body. Even the injuries that he had sustained during the possession earlier seemed to have disappeared. Allowing him to look healthier than the first time Xuan Hao saw him.


    "What is this water?" Noticing the fact that there should be something special about the small pond of water on top of the altar, Xuan Hao moved the sleeping elderly man out of the way and began inspecting the water.


    "Pure Heart Spiritual Water!?"


    Pure Heart Spiritual Water was a special kind of natural treasure and was a mystic grade natural treasure that could be used in the water part of the Qi Gathering Formation! With it, Xuan Hao now got his hands on three out of the five mystic grade treasures needed for the construction of the Qi Gathering Formation! Only needing two of the mystic grade treasures.


    Inspecting the water inside the small pond located at the top of the altar, a look of understanding slowly appeared on Xuan Hao''s face as he understood how the elderly man had survived and even managed to recover.


    From some of the knowledge that he gained from the system at the same time he had gotten his alchemy knowledge, Pure Heart Spiritual Water had been presented as one of the best ingredients to use when brewing different potions due to its beneficial properties. Among which, its healing property was among one of the strongest when it came to the different spiritual water he had learned about.


    The only difference being that the Pure Heart Spiritual Water in the alchemy knowledge he had was below the Mystic Grade and only reached the Soul Grade.


    As for what kind of changes there was in the Pure Heart Spiritual Water after it reached the Mystic Grade, Xuan Hao could only look towards the elderly man that had been submerged in it during his fight with the remnant soul.


    Just from a quick scan with his divine sense, Xuan Hao could easily tell that the Pure Heart Spiritual Water still had its former healing property. The main difference that he could sense was the fact that the soul of the elderly man was far stronger than normal people at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm.


    Normally, Xuan Hao would not have cared too much about this, but the elderly man''s soul had just been about to be devoured before he began fighting with the remnant soul!


    Logically speaking, the elderly man''s soul should only just barely be hanging in there about to head for theher world¡­ Yet it was now stronger than normal Peak Core Formation Realm cultivators¡­


    This alone was more than enough for Xuan Hao to realize that the Pure Heart Spiritual water not only helped in recovery of the physical body but would also help the recovery of the soul after reaching the mystic grade!


    If he had the Pure Heart Spiritual Water, he would also be able to practice changing the shape ofrger formation without too much fear that he would end up having to spend a few years on mending his soul and in the worst case end up sustaining permanent damage to his soul!


    The Pure Heart Spiritual Water was truly a blessing in disguise. Not only helping him with his trouble regarding practicing shaping formations, but also serving a use as one of the treasures used in the creation of the Qi Gathering Formation.


    The sheer amount of Pure Heart Spiritual Water would be more than enough for him to use over a long period of time. Even if he ended up sustaining an injury or two to his soul every year!


    If any other cultivator heard about his ns for using a Mystic Grade Natural Treasure so wastefully, they would surely haveunched a deadly attack to seize it from him!


    Spiritual Water was rare enough in the first ce. Even Spiritual Water at the Earth Grade could sometimes be sold at a price simr to other treasures at the Soul Grade!


    The main reason for this being its use in alchemy. Allowing different pills and potions to have a stronger and better effect.


    The scarcity of spiritual water was also one of the main reasons why many alchemists were forced to use normal water instead of spiritual water for their concoctions.


    Whoosh!


    Taking out a brand-new interspatial ring before directly emptying the small pond on top of the altar into it, Xuan Hao didn''t leave even a single drop behind.


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 Chapter 363 - Leaving The Pure Heart Lake

    <h4>Chapter 363 - Leaving The Pure Heart Lake</h4>


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    Having taken away all the Pure Heart Spiritual water inside the small pond located at the top of the altar, Xuan Hao turned around to look back at the elderly man on the ground who had still not woken up yet.


    He should not be someone from the Ghost Howl Sect, I will just let him get out on his own. After all, it''s not my responsibility to look after every troubled stranger I meet¡­


    Not wanting to end up taking care of the elderly man, Xuan Hao soon left the altar where the elderly man was located.


    Now that he had found the origin of the powerful aura that he had first felt at the Pure Heart Lake, Xuan Hao had no ns to stay around to explore the maze-like formation that subtly guided him around into different locations before shutting off the way back.


    Well¡­ A corridor only going in two directions is not really that subtle¡­


    At the very least, Xuan Hao did not n on staying any longer and began searching the dense forest that he found himself inside for a way out.


    Soon enough, a familiar circr portal covered in a thickyer of mist appeared in front of him.


    "Looks like the formation is sentient to some extent¡­" Whispering this to himself while looking at the circr portal in front of him, Xuan Hao only hesitated for a short moment before stepping through the thick mist.


    The fact that the formation was sentient to some extent and had manifested a way out for him a few minutes after beginning to look for a way out caused no small amount of fear in Xuan Hao.


    After all, if the formation wanted him dead, Xuan Hao doubted he would have ever been able to walk out from it with his life still intact. Even the small things he had managed to see from the formation was more than enough to convince him of this.


    "Maybe an inheritance of some ancient cultivator looking for an inheritor¡­ Wait, if that''s the case, it found me unqualified!?" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a little hurt and at the same time curious about what kind of qualifications would be needed if the formation at the Heart of the Lake was really an inheritance of an ancient cultivator.


    After all, Xuan Hao was only a little over twenty and had reached the Peak of the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and had evenprehended two different domains!


    Shaking his head at the thought of this, Xuan Hao could not help butment over the fact that there were people out there even stronger and younger than him out there. Not knowing that these thoughts would cause an endless amount of pain to his poor disciples in the future, as their master would increase his expectations and at the same time increase the difficulty of their training¡­


    ¡­


    Leaving behind the Pure Heart Lake without much thought about the inheritance that might be hidden there, Xuan Hao made his way back towards the Flying Sword Sect without picking up his disciples along the way.


    The main reason for this being the fact that Feng Chen had suddenly contacted him. Telling him to hurry back because he had something important to inform him about. The other reason being the fact that they were still out on their own adventure, and he didn''t want to interfere any more than needed with their journey back to the sect.


    Even if something dangerous happened, they still had the winged lion to guard them.


    Like this, Xuan Hao soon appeared back in the Flying Sword Sect. Given his speed as someone in the Domain Lord Realm, the short distance between the River Sect''s territory and the Flying Sword Sect could be crossed within only a few minutes if he didn''t have to carry someone along with him.


    "Elder Xuan! The Sect Master is waiting for you inside the eastern meditation room!"


    Seeing Xuan Hao appear before slowly descending down in front of the sect master''s pavilion, the disciple standing guard quickly lowered his head before respectfully standing to the side. Allowing Xuan Hao to enter.


    Nodding his head in response to the disciple standing guard in front of the pavilion, Xuan Hao directly stepped inside before making his way over towards the eastern part of the pavilion where Feng Chen was waiting for him.


    Passing by quite arge number of elders that seemed to have also just met up with Feng Chen along the way.


    Did something happen¡­?


    Seeing so many elders inside the Feng Chen''s pavilion, Xuan Hao quickly realized that something important was going to happen.


    Perhaps Elder Song and Feng Chen are beginning to change things up a bit in preparations for merging with the Spring Flower Sect in the soon to be future¡­


    Feeling a bit more curious as he made his way towards the meditation room located at the eastern most part of the Sect Master Pavilion, Xuan Hao soon found himself standing in front of the room together with the two Wang brothers and Zu Fei.


    At this point, it looked like almost all the people at the Nascent Soul Realm had been called over except for Chi Hu and Elder Song!


    I wonder if Zhu Lian arrived at the sect¡­


    Thinking about the old female friend of Chi Hu, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself at the thought that the Flying Sword Sect would get yet another Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    "Did something good happen recently Elder Xuan? You seem to be quite happy about something¡­" Standing beside him, Wang Hu curiously looked over before asking.


    "Yeah, I managed to recruit one of Chi Hu''s friends to join the sect when I visited the Shattered Star Peaks¡­ I was just wondering if she had arrived yet. Her name is Zhu Lian."


    "Really?! You just managed to recruit that Chi Hu and now youe back with yet another Nascent Soul Realm Expert¡­ Hah¡­ Really makes me feel a bit useless when thinking about my failed recruitments in the past¡­"Showing a surprised expression after hearing that Xuan Hao managed to bring back yet another Nascent Soul Realm Expert, Wang Hu could not helpmenting over how useless he had been.


    "Why are you acting so sad all of a sudden? Didn''t you manage to get a brilliant new disciple called Lu Wen recently? I heard that he already broke through to the middle stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm a few days ago!"


    Rolling his eye upon seeing the depressed expression on his brother''s face, Wang Lan could not help but mention the disciple that his brother had taken in after thest round of recruitment for the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Lu Wen¡­ The person who suddenly broke through during a fight at the neer tournament?" Hearing what Wang Lan said, Zu Fei soon joined the conversation as she asked with a curious expression on her face.


    "Yes¡­ He is the one¡­" Feeling somewhat embarrassed over the fact that his newest disciple had done something like that during the neer tournament that ended up getting him disqualified, Wang Hu''s face grew slightly red.


    The mostmon thing to do during such circumstances would be to supress his breakthrough until the tournament was over, but Lu Wen had decided to just breakthrough on the spot without taking the rest of the tournament into ount.


    "Haha, it was indeed him! What an interesting disciple, I picked up the young girl called Yi Xuan who ended up winning the tournament. If I''m not wrong, the finals were between Yi Xuan and your disciple Elder Xuan?" Laughing a bit after seeing the embarrassed look on Wang Hu''s face, Zu Fei turned around and asked Xuan Hao.


    "Yes, that was indeed the case."


    Nodding his head as he remembered the neer tournament, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit upon remembering how much Qing Yi had improved since then. Already having reached the Fifth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    "Now that I think about it, how have teaching disciples been for you so far? If there is anything you need help with, you can always ask your seniors here for help! Even if we do not look like, all of us are already way above one hundred years old-"


    ""¡­""


    Before Wang Lan managed to finish his sentence, Zu Fei suddenly smiled in his direction with an enormous killing intent washing over both Wang Hu and Xuan Hao standing at the side.


    "Ahm¡­ So how are things going with your disciples?"


    Awkwardly coughing, Wang Lan pretended nothing had happened as he looked over at Xuan Hao with a slighting strained smile on his face.


    "Things have been going fine and both of them have been improving well over the past half year, while the one I just picked up still needs to go over the fundamentals of cultivation."


    Noting down the fact that he should not mention the matter of age in front of Zu Fei in the future, Xuan Hao answered Wang Lan with a simr smile on his face.


    For a short moment, Xuan Hao had clearly felt the killing intent of Zu Fei almost reaching the same level as the winged lion!


    Creak~


    "All of you cane in now, I have something important to discuss with all of you regarding the future of our sect!"


    It was at this moment that the door to the meditation room opened up and Feng Chen''s serious voice echoed out from the inside.


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 Chapter 364 - Feng Chens Request

    <h4>Chapter 364 - Feng Chen''s Request</h4>


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    Entering the meditation room, Xuan hao and the rest of the elders were all surprised when they spotted Feng Chen buried in what could only be described asyer uponyers of different documents.


    There was even a table located in the middle of the room as the cushion normally used for one to sit on while meditating was moved to the side. Transforming the meditation room into a makeshift office room normally used by official in kingdoms.


    ""¡­""


    Something like this was not a normal sight in a sect, outside of Elder Song''s pavilion, so Xuan Hao and the others were all surprised after seeing their sect master suddenly looking like a hard-working official going through important documents.


    "All of you have arrived! I have something important to discuss with you all regarding the future of the Flying Sword Sect!"


    "W-what is it¡­?"


    Feeling somewhat nervous after seeing how serious Feng Chen was, Wang Hu could not help but ask. The sight of the meditation room being turned into some kind of office had already given him? the feeling that the sect was about to go through some sort of major change.


    "No need to look so worried Wang Hu, me and Elder Song have already gone through our ns together beforehand and I''m just filling out the documents to authorises a few things for him."


    How is this a few things! You are clearly buried in a few hundred documents!


    The elders and Xuan Hao could not help but curse out inside themselves after hearing Feng Chen casually shrugging off Wang Hu''s worry.


    Even an idiot could see that Feng Chen was helping Elder Song do something major that would likely end up affecting the entire Flying Sword Sect and in turn them!


    "Haha, all of you don''t have to look at me like that, you really won''t have to worry about anything. The ones being affected by the changes will mostly be the other elders at the Core Formation Realm. The main reason I have so many documents here is because I have to go over the documents of the elders that Elder Song intends to use!" Laughing a bit upon seeing the four of them staring at him doubtfully, Feng Chen quickly exined the reason for the many documents in front of him.


    "¡­ So, what is it that you called us here to discuss if it''s not going to affect us?" Still doubtful about what Feng Chen said, Wang Hu asked. Not understanding what Feng Chen had called them over for if it wasn''t going to affect them¡­


    "Well¡­ With the number of elders that Elder Song want to use, there will be a shortage of people to teach the disciples over the next few months until the next batch of elders are trained up and ready to take over¡­"


    "So, you wanted us to take some time to teach the disciples during the next few months when there is a shortage of elders to teach the disciples?"


    Getting to the crux of the thing that Feng Chen was going to ask them, Xuan Hao could not help but roll his eyes at the reason he had been called back to the sect so urgently for.


    Clearly, Feng Chen had not expected for there to be so few elders left after Elder Song began to take away elders and was caught off-guard by the small number left and had to call them in to help out.


    "Hehe¡­ I hope you won''t mind; it will not be more than once or twice a week for an hour or two¡­" Smiling awkwardly after having been found out, Feng Chen nced over at them with a hopeful look in his eyes.


    Xuan Hao''s guess had not been far off from the truth. The only difference being that Elder Song had informed Feng Chen that he would take some of the young elders, Feng Chen had just not expected for Elder Song''s understanding of a young elder was widely different from what Elder Song considered a young elder¡­


    "It''s no problem at all! It''s only a given that we as elders help out the younger generation of the sect!"


    True to her name as someone who would blindly follow Feng Chen no matter what he said, Zu Fei was the first to jump forward and agree to help out with training the disciples while the sect went through a shortage of elders.


    "Well¡­ I guess I don''t have so much going on anyway at the moment, I will help out as well."


    "If my brother is going to teach, then so am I!"


    The two Wang brothers only thought about it for a short moment before agreeing with the sect master to teach the disciples for a few hours every week over the next few months. Leaving behind only Xuan Hao who had yet to state his decision on the matter.


    "Elder Xuan, if you are too busy with your own personal disciples, you don''t have to join in¡­ I know that you just recently epted a new third disciple, and you are still new to teaching disciples. Teaching arge crowd of them at once might be a little too much at the moment." Not wanting to seem like he was forcing Xuan Hao into it, Feng Chen quickly gave him a way out.


    "No need to worry about that it, it''s only natural that I will join as well!"


    About to refuse, Xuan Hao was suddenly surprised upon seeing the systeme alive and give out a new quest, as he quickly epted the sect master''s request.


    "Hah¡­ I understand, it''s only natural for you to ref- Wait! You epted?!"


    "Yes?"


    "Haha, that''s great! With you four, I won''t have to worry about the disciples growing sad over less lectures over the next few months! With three Nascent Soul Realm Experts and a Domain Lord personally teaching them, there is no way they wouldin. Even if they are getting way fewer lectures than normal!"


    Watching as Feng Chenughed happily after hearing all of them agree to teach the disciples over the next few months, Xuan Hao and the other three took their leave from the meditation room that had been transformed into an office room, while Feng Chen returned his focus to the documents in front of him with a smile on his face. No longer feeling as distraught as he had earlier.


    "You really agreed to teach the outer and inner disciples over the next few months¡­ I was almost sure that you would refuse like always¡­" Having left the room, Zu Fei curiously drifted over towards Xuan Hao as she asked with a curious look in her eyes.


    "¡­"


    Not answering her question immediately, Xuan Hao looked over to see both the Wang brothers also looking over at him curiously from the side.


    He really had been way too inactive when it came to sect matters before. Always refusing any and all requests that had required him to leave his pavilion and focus on something outside of his cultivation realm.


    Well, things were not really different now¡­ Just that his system allowed for him to begin interacting more with the other elders and disciples of the sect.


    Deep down, Xuan Hao knew that if he didn''t get a quest from the system when Feng Chen had asked him, he would have refused his request. After all, teaching disciples that were not his own personal disciples seemed like a waste of time to him¡­


    Maybe I should set aside some time to interact with the other elders¡­


    "I guess I was curious about the other disciples of the sect. After all, I haven''t really gotten a chance to interact with them before..." Answering Zu Fei''s question with this, Xuan Hao soon left the Sect Master''s pavilion after a quick session from the two Wang brothers and Zu Fei on how to go about teaching arge crowd of disciples at once.


    After all, teaching arge crowd of disciples was differentpared to how you would teach one or two. The sheer amount of time you had with each disciple in a crowd of a hundred over the course of an hour was differentpared to only having to focus on one or two.


    The overall method of teaching like he had done with his three disciples so far, was simply not possible with arge crowd of disciples. Unless he wanted to spend the entire day going through each and every one of them¡­


    Maybe this is the reason why I suddenly got a new system quest¡­


    The system would only give him quest that would benefit his disciples to some degree. In this case, it was by increasing his proficiency when it came to teaching and at the same time helping increase the strength of the sect''s younger generation.


    Whoosh~


    Flying back towards his pavilion where he had left Bai Ning in the care of Zhi Ruo over the past few days.


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 Chapter 365 - New Sect Quest And Bai Ning

    <h4>Chapter 365 - New Sect Quest And Bai Ning</h4>


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    Arriving at his pavilion, the first thing Xuan Hao did was to return to his own room at the centre of the pavilion before going over the quest that he had been given by the system back when Feng Chen had requested for him to help out with teaching the inner and outer disciples a few hours every week over the next few months.


    [Sect Quest: From today and until the date set up by the Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect is reached, you must teach the inner and outer sect disciples for at least one hour every week.]


    [The reward will vary depending on how much the inner and outer disciple manages to learn.]


    The quest itself was rather simple and wouldn''t be that difficult for him toplete.


    The main thing that interested him about it was the fact that it had a reward that would change depending on how well he did. Simr to the limited time quest that wanted him to make a thousand interspatial rings and scatter them all over the ce¡­


    "Now that I think about it, I have made quite a bit of progress sincest time, though I''m still far away when ites to reaching the one thousand¡­"


    [Limited Time Quest: You have found a brilliant way to recruit new potential disciples! Scatter 1000 interspatial rings around the world. The system will add a specific test to the ring that will test the potential future disciples. Interspatial Rings will only be counted towards the quest if they are scattered a certain distance away from each other. Timer will begin upon reaching the Domain Lord Realm!]


    [Time: 9.9 years]


    [43/1000]


    [Reward: vary depending on the amount of sessfully scattered interspatial rings]


    Looking over at the limited time quest that he hadn''t checked up on in a while, Xuan Hao could not help but sigh to himself. Even if he had made quite a lot of progress on it, it was still far from reaching the goal of one thousand¡­


    At the very least, he still had a little under 10 years toplete it and with his current speed, he should not have any troublepleting it in time.


    The only thing worrying him was the fact that he had underestimated the amount of Moon Silver used in the production of an interspatial ring¡­ With his current usage, it might only be able to get him to the halfway point of 500 interspatial rings before running out!


    Putting the need for finding more Moon Silver for the creation of more interspatial rings aside for the moment, Xuan Hao left his room and made his way over to meet his youngest disciple Bai Ning and see how he had been doing over the past few days while he had been gone.


    Curious whether he had managed to improve his cultivation realm. Not that he expected for him to increase his cultivation realm over such a short period of time.


    ¡­


    "Master! Wee back!" Hearing someone call out to him the moment he stepped out of his room; Xuan Hao watched Bai Ning run over before he respectfully greeted him with a happy smile on his face.


    "Thanks, what have you been doing over the past few days?" Not able to stop himself from smiling upon seeing the happy Bai Ninge over to greet him, Xuan Hao decided to first of all ask him what he had been up to during the time he had been gone.


    After all, he was a bit worried that Bai Ning would end up growing bored spending most of his time alone in therge pavilion with only Zhi Ruo around every now and then.


    No matter what, Bai Ning was still only a child and might not fare too well alone. Even if cultivation was mostly something done in solitude and by oneself in a quiet ce, Xuan Hao still knew that sitting down and just cultivating every day would be boring for the younger generation who had not yet grown used to it yet.


    For example, the Flying Sword Sect had a special area dedicated to the disciples below the age of 15 where they would stay together and slowly grow used to the solitary lifestyle of a cultivator.


    The special area was not really something like confining the younger disciples to a certain location but was more like giving them a ce where they could gather together and interact and be looked after by some of the older and more experienced elders who would help guide them.


    The existence of the special area and training thate with it, was invented by Elder Song during his younger days just after he became an elder, when he saw how many of the younger disciples were having a hard time adapting to the solitary lifestyle that was synonymous with cultivation.


    Back when Xuan Hao had entered the sect, the special area for the younger disciples had already been around for a few dozen years and was working as intended.


    From what little Xuan Hao knew about it, the special area for the younger disciples was among one of the first things Elder Song did in the Flying Sword Sect that made him famous among both disciples and elders.


    "I have been visiting the cksmithing Hall and big sister Zhi Ruo took me to visit the food stalls located just outside the entrance of the sect! Master, did you know there were so many different kinds of food?! Before going out with big sister Zhi Ruo, I didn''t even know you could get something like deep fried scorpion-"


    Listening to Bai Ning as he began exining how he had been spending his time over the few days he had been gone, Xuan Hao felt the worry from earlierpletely disappear.


    Bai Ning didn''t feel lonely or bored but had instead spent the time having fun together with Zhi Ruo! Even getting to the point that he had begun respectfully addressing Zhi Ruo as big sister.


    The only bad part Xuan Hao managed to pick up on, was theck of any mention about cultivating¡­ From a close look, Xuan Hao could also clearly feel that Bai Ning''s strength had barely increased since he left.


    Well, he was way more interested in cksmithing in the first ce and mostly just spent the time getting more familiar with the sect and Zhi Ruo, so this is to be expected¡­


    Shaking his head as he decided not to care too much about the fact that Bai Ning hadn''t spent any time on cultivating while he had been gone.


    "-And then, I saw master return and rushed over!"


    "You seem to have been doing quite well over the past few days."


    "Yes¡­ I know I haven''t been focusing much on my cultivation realm, so I hope master will be able to guide me!"


    "Haha, of course! Let''s get going!" Hearing the words from Bai Ning, Xuan Hao happily agreed to his disciple before they made their way over to Bai Ning''s room where Xuan Hao watched Bai Ning begin cultivating. Instructing him on how to improve in different areas from time to time, as Bai Ning''s cultivation of the Formless Mantra grew smoother.


    ¡­


    "Finally, we managed to leave the Pure Heart Lake for good! Now we just have to make our way back to the sect again and we will officially havepleted our first two sect missions!"


    Letting out a sigh of relief as he remembered thest time they had left the Pure Heart City and was just about to be caught by a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, Chu Yang looked back towards the Pure Heart Lake that was slowly disappearing in the distance.


    "Yeah¡­ I really don''t want toe back here for the time being. No offense towards Huang Yongyu and his River Sect, but this ce is really unstable¡­ At least we got Fluffy Paws to protect us this time around! Right?"


    Roar!


    Hearing the disrespectful name that Qing Yi used for it, the still small winged lion roared angrily from the top of Chu Yang''s head.


    "¡­"


    At the same time, the lion demon beast that was carrying all three as it shakingly walked back towards the direction of the Flying Sword Sect shivered in fear upon hearing the winged lion''s roar.


    Compared to before, the lion demon beast looked like a small, frightened animal at the moment. Completely different from before where it had even dared to eat a few human body parts in front of Chu Yang and Qing Yi without permission.


    "Hm? There is someone approaching in front! Get ready in case they attack!" Suddenly discovering arge group of around twenty people dressed inpletely ck rushing over from the distance, Chu Yang immediately called out to get Qing Yi''s attention to make sure she was ready for the soon to be confrontation.


    Whoosh~


    Before long, one of the people dressed in ck broke off from the rest of the group as he made his way over to meet up with them.


    "Hello travellers! We are from the Ghost Howl Sect and wondered if you happened to see someone pass through here before us, he should have been leaking quite arge amount of killing intent along the way as well."


    "¡­"


    Are they perhaps talking about the Nascent Soul Realm Expert that was crushed to death by the giant paw?


    Not knowing what to say to the person in front of them that imed to be a member of the Ghost Howl Sect, Chu Yang and Qing Yi were both momentarily stunned as they just stared at the man that had stopped them.


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 Chapter 366 - Causing Chaos With A Few Words

    <h4>Chapter 366 - Causing Chaos With A Few Words</h4>


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    "Hm? Did something perhaps happen to that person?" Narrowing his eyes as he noticed the sudden change in Chu Yang and Qing Yi upon hearing his question, the man from the Ghost Howl Sect slowly began realizing that something might have happened to their sect master after he left them behind to catch the people who schemed against his son.


    Was this perhaps all a n to lure the sect master over andunch a sneak attack on him!? Given his current injured state, it would be possible if those sects teamed up on him and used the young master as bait!


    Thinking about what might have happened to their sect master, the man from the Ghost Howl Sect quietly motioned towards the rest of the group standing a little farther away before they began to slowly move closer to Chu Yang and Qing Yi.


    "You don''t need to worry so much; we are just here to search for that person and are worried that something might have happened to him¡­ If you could tell us anything useful, that would really be a great help and the Ghost Howl Sect will be in your debt in the future!" Saying this, the man tried his best to look as harmless as possible in front of Chu Yang and Qing Yi.


    After all, he clearly knew the strength of his sect master and Chu Yang and Qing Yi was far too weak to ever do anything to him.


    But from the way they had acted upon seeing him and what he said, he could at least tell that they had at least seen the sect master. Maybe they had even witnessed the sect master being attacked!


    "I see, sorry for the earlier response, we were just a little afraid after what we just witnessed¡­ If I''m not wrong, the person you are talking about was ambushed around the entrance of the Pure Heart City before he barely managed to escape into the city as his other paths had been cut off by the ambushers."


    Trying his best to convince the man in front of him without giving away the fact that the sect master they were looking for was already dead, Chu Yang decided to see if he could help out their friend from the River Sect a little.


    Hoping that the group of people would begin attacking the other sects inside the Pure Heart City without asking them about the situation first¡­


    "I understand¡­ Thank you for answering my questions, we should be on our way now¡­" Narrowing his eyes even further as a hint of killing intent leaked out, the man returned to his group before briefly talking about something.


    Whoosh!


    And before Chu Yang and Qing Yi could say another word, the group of twenty or so people had already rushed off in the direction of the Pure Heart City.


    "I didn''t expect for that to work¡­" Smiling wryly as he witnessed the group leave them alone, Chu Yang ordered for the lion demon beast to continue moving like nothing had happened.


    For now, they needed to get out of the River Sect''s territory before that group of people realized that they he had lied to them. Hopefully, none of the people who had witnessed the sect master''s death had time to pay any attention to them¡­


    ¡­


    Only a few minutester, the entire Pure Heart City was suddenly thrown into chaos as the core elders of the Ghost Howl Sect suddenly showed up and beganunching an attack towards the other sects inside the city.


    The matter only grew more and more chaotic with each passing minute as the elders from the Ghost Howl Sect screamed about getting their sect master back, while the other sects kept iming they had nothing to do with it.


    Things continued like this before the sects finally managed to calm down the angry core elders of the Ghost Howl Sect.


    However, things were not going tost for long, as a small group of elders were spotted dragging away their sect master''s dead body by one of the Ghost Howl Sect''s core elders, thus reigniting the slowly dwindling fighting spirit of the core elders.


    You im that you had nothing to do with our sect master''s disappearance? Then why is one of you elders dragging away his dead body?!


    The core elders of the Ghost Howl Sect instantly became convinced about the fact that the other sects had teamed up to kill their sect master before resuming their attack on them.


    Not discriminating between normal disciples or elders this time around, as dead bodies slowly filled up every part of the Pure Heart City, while the citizen rapidly escaped the chaotic city.


    Most of them running towards the River Sect to seek protection from the destruction brought by the Ghost Howl Sect and other sects.


    The River Sect was of course not one to refuse when people came running to them for protection and opened their sect gates to allow people inside during the crazy battle at the Pure Heart City that had slowly begun spreading out from the River Sect''s territory and had started affecting the home territory of the sects involved.


    In the end, the Ghost Howl Sect''s core elders were forced to retreat due to sheer number of people the other sects had at their disposal¡­


    But this spelled the beginning of the end for the different sect''s cooperation to deal with the River Sect, as they would now have to return back home to defend against the core elders of the Ghost Howl Sect when they inevitably decided tounch an attack on their sect!


    All in all, the River Sect did nothing and the sects that had been supressing them for so long had disappeared on their own. The help from the Flying Sword Sect that Huang Yongyu had told them about, had not even been needed either¡­


    Other than that, the reputation of the River Sect that had been on the decline recently due to the small sect alliance against them. Showed signs of improving after news of them helping provide refuge for the citizen of the Pure Heart City during the whole ordeal spread around.


    At the same time, Chu Yang who had been behind the chaos that had ended up spreading through the River Sect''s territory and all the territories surrounding them, was on his way back towards the Flying Sword Sect together with Qing Yi.


    Completely unaware of the chaos a few words of his had ended up causing¡­


    ¡­


    Over the next few days, Chu Yang and Qing Yi made their way back to the Flying Sword Sect, while Xuan Hao was getting ready for his first ever teaching session for a small crowd of outer sect disciples.


    The teaching session for the outer sect disciples, was up for himself to decide the topic, whether he wanted to teach about something rted to a specific cultivation realm, the importance of a certain profession or somethingpletely different.


    Feng Chen left the decision up to Xuan Hao, allowing him as much freedom as he wanted when it came to the teaching session.


    "Master, are you really going to hold a session for the outer disciples today!?"


    At the side of Xuan Hao who was about to leave his pavilion, Bai Ning asked nervously with a somewhat excited look on his face.


    "Yes? Do you want to join in? I''m nning to go over some of the fundamentals when ites to entering the Foundation Establishment Realm and the establishment of the first foundational pir inside of the dantian."


    Taking only a short look to see through what his third disciple wanted, Xuan Hao asked him while exining what he had nned to teach the outer sect disciples during his first ever public teaching session in the sect.


    The subject was in Xuan Hao''s eyes fitting. After all, most of the outer sect disciples were still in the Qi Condensation Realm and were all hoping to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm so they would have a chance at bing an inner disciple.


    "Yes! Can big sister Zhi Ruo join as well?"


    "Hm? Sure, I don''t see anything wrong with that¡­"


    Not expecting Bai Ning to bring up Zhi Ruo, Xuan Hao was caught slightly off-guard before quickly agreeing.


    To Xuan Hao, it didn''t matter whether one more person would tag along, and Zhi Ruo had been doing well ever since she came to his pavilion and had never caused any sort of problem. Instead, she had improved the overall condition of the pavilion and at the same time been getting along well with his third disciple Bai Ning.


    Not really what he had expected as he mainly brought her in because of Qing Yi¡­


    All things considered; Zhi Ruo had been doing an excellent job. Now that she would be join them and also listen in to his lecture, Xuan Hao decided to not only teach about the Foundation Establishment Realm, but also the Qi Condensation Realm.


    This would still benefit the outer sect disciples and at the same time also help his own disciple along with Zhi Ruo¡­ Hopefully, she would be able also be a strong cultivator in the future¡­


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 Chapter 367 - Outer Sect

    <h4>Chapter 367 - Outer Sect</h4>


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    Having made up his mind that he would be bringing both Bai Ning and Zhi Ruo along with him to his first ever public lecture, Xuan Hao quickly spread out his divine sense and located Zhi Ruo in a small room. Busy dusting off a small empty bookshelf likely left behind by the past owner of the pavilion.


    Whoosh~


    Disappearing in front of Bai Ning before reappearing in the small room where Zhi Ruo was busy dusting off the bookshelf, Xuan Hao''s sudden appearance caused Zhi Ruo to jump a bit as she soon bowed her head down and greeted him.


    "G-greetings Elder Xuan, is there anything I can help with?" Stuttering a bit due to the shock of suddenly seeing Xuan Hao appear all of a sudden.


    "Yes, I''m going to do a teaching session for a crowd of outer sect disciple in a a few hours and Bai Ning wanted to join in, I need someone to look after him while taking care of the outer sect disciples."


    "Really!? I will get ready immediately!"? Listening to what Xuan Hao said, Zhi Ruo extremely excited, as she knew that it would be a good opportunity for her to improve her knowledge when it came to cultivation.


    After all, as a servant from the servant quarters, she never got a real opportunity to be a cultivator outside the basic cultivation mantra that was given to all the servants upon entering the servant quarters.


    The cultivation mantra was a different one depending on what qi one was found to be more proficient in and it was by no means a bad cultivation mantra, as it could allow someone to reach the Core Formation Realm¡­ But it was ultimately not suited for her and even after having spent a few years in the servant quarters, she had still not reached the Qi Condensation Realm¡­


    Now that she managed to work under someone like Elder Xuan, Zhi Ruo felt that her chances of finally stepping into the Qi Condensation Realm woulde at some point and now that chance had arrived! There was no way she would refuse!


    Hopefully, she would be able toprehend enough from Elder Xuan''s lecture to officially break through to the Qi Condensation Realm and officially be a cultivator!


    Zhi Ruo already knew that most of the servants working under the other Core Elders were way stronger than she was, with most of them being in the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    For her to be a brilliant servant, she not only had to be good at the standard things like cleaning up, brewing tea and so on, but she would also need a decent cultivation realm to not shame Elder Xuan!


    Even if she was not Elder Xuan''s servant. Her master, Qing Yi, was still a disciple of Elder Xuan! So, she could be considered a servant of Elder Xuan to some degree! At least she believed so herself¡­


    "Good, meet us at the entrance when you are finished here, we will be leaving in 15 minutes!" Unaware of the different things going through Zhi Ruo''s head, Xuan Hao only nodded his head before leaving only Zhi Ruo behind in the empty room with only a few dusty bookshelves left in it.


    "Ah! I have to finish cleaning this ce before leaving!" Waking up from her somewhat dazed state after Xuan Hao disappeared, Zhi Ruo quickly picked up a small fan used for getting rid of the dust that she had unknowingly dropped at some point during the short instant Xuan Hao had appeared. Wanting to finish cleaning the room as quickly as possible.


    ¡­


    Gathering in front of the pavilion, Xuan Hao, Bai Ning and Zhi Ruo soon made their way down the mountain towards the part of the sect where the outer disciples were located.


    Along the way down the mountain, Xuan Hao also noticed that someone had made a path up the mountain, so as to make it easier to reach for those without any cultivation realm to speak of.


    Thinking about it, it was likely one of his two disciples that had done it to help make things easier for Zhi Ruo, as just making her way up and down the mountain would have taken at least half a day''s time without it¡­


    In a sense, it was an amazing feat in itself that Zhi Ruo had even made her way up and down the mountain before the path had been made and was a testament to how strong she was. Even if she had yet to step onto the path of cultivation.


    After all, scaling such a tall mountain, would be hard feat. Even for someone at the Qi Condensation Realm¡­


    Like this, the group of three soon made their way down the mountain and headed towards the outer part of the sect where the outer sect disciples were located.


    The outer part of the Flying Sword Sect was by far the most expansive area of the sect, as it was also the ce where most of the disciples along with elders resided.


    The reason for this being that most of the disciples lived there and the outer part of the Flying Sword Sect was also the ce where most of the disciples, be it inner or outer disciples, decided to spend their time either training or rxing together with a group of friends.


    On the other hand, the elders in the outer part of the sect were not weak by any means, as even the weakest elder from the Flying Sword Sect would have reached the Core Formation Realm, there was still a difference and that was the fact that most of the elders who resided in the outer sect were still young.


    The reason for this, was that the older elders tended to be stronger and therefore lived in the inner part of the sect in their own pavilion, while the younger and newer elders were weaker and therefore lived in the outer part of the sect until they grew strong enough to take over a pavilion themselves and move into the inner part of the sect.


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 Chapter 368 - Curious Disciples And Elders~

    <h4>Chapter 368 - Curious Disciples And Elders~</h4>


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    "So, this is the outer sect¡­" Staring out at therge crowd of disciples both older and younger than himself walking around in front of him, Bai Ning could not help but sigh in amazement as he watched.


    "Didn''t you visit it with Zhi Ruo while I was gone?"


    "No¡­ We only visited the ces close to the mountain, it would take too long to get back in we began exploring the outer parts of the sect¡­"


    "I see¡­" Realizing the fact that his third disciple was still only in the early stages of the Qi Condensation Realm along with Zhi Ruo who hadn''t even reached the Qi Condensation Realm, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly.


    Even just making their way down to the outer sect had taken them a few hours!


    If Zhi Ruo and Bai Ning had really tried to explore the outer part of the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao doubted the time he had been gone would be sufficient. Even a few weeks would not be enough to explore the entire outer sect¡­


    To be honest, Xuan Hao had never really explored the outer sect himself and at most he had scanned over it with his divine sense a few times.


    After all, since the first moment he had entered the Flying Sword Sect, he had been at the inner part of the sect. Never having associated with the outer sect.


    The teaching session for the crowd of outer sect disciples would not only be helpful forpleting the sect quest but would also allow him to explore a part of the Flying Sword Sect that he had never really had a chance to see before today.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao began looking more around him as he watched the disciples and elders that passed by look over at him curiously whenever he passed by before politely bowing down upon noticing him looking over in their direction.


    From the response alone, Xuan Hao quickly realized that both the disciples and elders passing by realized that he was a core elder. Likely because he was wearing the clothes of a core elder and the fact that the core elders would be teaching over the next few months had begun spreading among both disciples and elders alike.


    The rumour in question was likely the doing of Feng Chen, who had tried using the fact that the core elders came to personally teach to calm down the disciples who had likely begun noticing fewer and fewer elders around and their number of lessons being reduced.


    Having the core elders personallye teach them had ended up far overshadowing the news of the elders slowly disappearing and had instead turned into excitement as they would be able to enjoy being personally taught by the core elders of the sect!


    It had to be known that each of the core elders were at the Nascent Soul Realm! A realm that many of the young disciples dreamed of reaching!


    What better way to excite the young disciples and distract them, than having a few Nascent Soul Realm Experts personallye and teach them?


    Not only that, but the rumours of Xuan Hao having reached the Domain Lord Realm had slowly spread out to the young disciples and had caused them even more excitement than when they had learned that the core elders at the Nascent Soul Realm would being to teach them.


    The Domain Lord Realm! A realm above the Nascent Soul Realm that many of the young disciples didn''t even know about a few weeks ago!


    At most they had heard about it in stories being called as the king realm, people who singlehandedly had the power to dictate the rise and fall of an entire kingdom by themselves!


    Learning a person like that would teach them, was more than enough to cause both the outer and inner disciples to boil over in excitement as they patiently waited for this legendary figure to appear. Even the different elders were secretly excited, as they nned to listen in.


    Even if the subject matter would not be something rted to their current cultivation realm, they could still benefit greatly from increasing their own understanding of cultivation as a whole and might even be able to help them ovee some problems that had gotten them stuck in the past.


    Slowly and under the gazes from the surrounding elders and disciples that were not so sneakily following after him, Xuan Hao soon arrived in front of the building that he would be teaching in. Bai Ning and Zhi Ruo following closely behind him.


    "Is this the ce you will be teaching master?" Looking up at the somewhat small building that could at most hold little over one hundred people before looking back towards therge crowd that had formed behind them, Bai Ning could not help but feel that the building was way too small¡­


    "Yes, today I will be teaching one hundred outer sect disciples who were chosen through a few different tournaments over the past few days. Even though this ce is a little small, you two should be able to find a ce to sit during my lecture¡­"


    Not realizing how his disciples was nervous looking at the crowd that had formed behind them, Xuan Hao reassured his disciple that there should be more than enough space for two extra people before making his way into the small building.


    "¡­"


    Master¡­ I''m not worried about the fact that there is not enough space for us, but the people behind us!


    Not knowing whether tough or cry as he felt the burning gazes of both the disciples and elders behind him, Bai Ning could only bite is lips nervously before entering the building just behind his master.


    Not daring to stay behind with the crowd for even a second.


    Zhi Ruo on the other hand, didn''t say anything and just followed behind Bai Ning and Xuan Hao like everything happening was normal.


    Soon, the crowd of both disciples and elders slowly began dispersing, with only a few young disciples staying behind as they sneakily tried to listen in on the lecture happening inside.


    Along with a few older elders from the outer sect who saw this as their possiblest chance of having a breakthrough.


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 Chapter 369 - Qing Chenyi

    <h4>Chapter 369 - Qing Chenyi</h4>


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    Entering the building, Xuan Hao soon realized that the entire building was just one giant room with seating space for around a hundred people forming into a half circle with a small open space in the middle.


    "Who are those three?"


    "Maybe someone who arrivedte?"


    "Wait¡­ Is that-!


    "Shh! Don''t talk so loudly or you might disturb the elder!"


    Chattering could instantly be heard as Xuan hao soon nced over the already upied seating spaces filled with what he assumed to be the outer sect disciples who had been ced well or won in whatever tournament they had participated in to get the chance toe and learn from him¡­


    "Hah¡­ To think there would be a group of peoplepeting to listen to me talking." Muttering this to himself as a small wry smile made its way onto his face, Xuan Hao quickly took out two chairs from his interspatial ring before handing one to Bai Ning and Zhi Ruo before telling them to find a ce to sit down.


    The chairs in question were among some of the furniture that he had¡­ Taken from the underground pce back in the secret realm, so they were quite high quality and looked extremely luxuries. Just a single nce would allow someone to instantly understand the value of the two chairs!


    The disciples sitting inside the room were all shaken by the sight of the two chairs, but quickly calmed down again after seeing Xuan Hao begin making his way towards the open space located at the centre of the half circle.


    Even the fact that Bai Ning and Zhi Ruo had appeared together with Xuan Hao waspletely overshadowed as all the disciples focused their full attention on Xuan Hao. Scared that they might miss anything and lose an opportunity that they had been fighting hard for just a few days prior.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was about to begin his lecture, somewhere in the back of the seating space for the outer sect disciples inside the small building, young disciple clenched both his fists filled with mixed emotions as he looked at Xuan Hao.


    This person was Qing Chenyi, who had tried to enter the Flying Sword Sect in the past at the same time as Qing Yi but had ultimately ended up failing. Not only that, after he returned back to the Qing Family and joined in the annualpetition, he had ended up getting beaten up by a rival he had long since considered himself superior to before said rival was beaten up by Qing Yi!


    The fact that all of these things had happened within only around a month had caused Qing Chenyi topletely lose faith in his own strength and his future as a cultivator.


    In turn, this caused him to leave the Qing family and go on an adventure without even having reached the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    During his adventure, he had many ups and downs before he finally managed to encounter an elder from the Flying Sword Sect who took an interest in him and decided to bring him back to the sect as an outer sect disciple.


    If it had been in the past, Qing Chenyi knew he would never be able to have such an opportunity. The main reason why he had been able to catch the eye of an elder from the Flying Sword Sect in the first ce, was because he had managed to improve a lot during his adventure.


    Reaching the Eighth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, while having the ability to battle against someone at the Ninth Stage!


    His overall improvement over only a few months without anyone to guide him had been phenomenal!


    Even allowing him to join the tournament for a spot at the lecture held by Elder Xuan. At least he was lucky that a spot was not only rewarded to the first ce, but the top three¡­ Barely managing to get into top three himself!


    The only thing that caused him to not feelpletely ecstatic over the prospect of someone in the Domain Lord Realm teaching him, was the fact that he was the master of Qing Yi¡­ His cousin¡­


    He had to fight for an opportunity to listen to a lecture given by Qing Yi''s master¡­ The thought of it alone caused a lot of his enthusiasm to die down, but this was of course not enough to discourage him froming!


    After all, Qing Yi only managed to grow stronger than him because she found an excellent master! In the future, he would surpass her once again and be the strongest among the younger generation of the Qing family!


    Just you wait Qing Yi! In the future, I Qing Chenyi will be the one to bring the Qing family to an even higher level and allow it to grow even stronger and bigger!


    Unknowingly having formed a pure and honest desire to increase the strength of his family n through hispetitive drive to be the best in his family, Qing Chenyi began focusing his full attention onto Xuan Hao as he came to a stop in the middle of the space located at the centre of the half circle.


    """¡­"""


    Qing Chenyi was not the only one who remainedpletely quite as all the outer sect disciples focused their full attention onto Xuan Hao. Ready to absorb every single word that came out of his mouth.


    All of a sudden, everything becamepletely quite inside the small building as Xuan Hao slowly opened his mouth.


    "Well¡­ Seeing as everyone is ready, how about we begin? Let''s start with the basics, the Qi Condensation Realm. The Qi Condensation is about absorbing the qi between heaven and earth and making it your own before beginning the process of refining it to be both purer and stronger, but this can only be considered the most basic interpretation of the Qi Condensation Realm-"


    As Xuan Hao began talking, the outer sect disciples, together with Bai Ning and Zhi Ruo listened attentively.. Not a single sound could be heard from the hundred people inside the building as all of them wereser focused on each word Xuan Hao was saying.


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 Chapter 370 - End Of The First Lecture

    <h4>Chapter 370 - End Of The First Lecture</h4>


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    "-With that, today''s lecture can be considered finished." With Xuan Hao''s lecture smoothly proceeding for the next one hour before Xuan hao finished.


    The outer disciples didn''t even notice the fact that Xuan Hao began leaving before he had already disappeared from the building together with Bai Ning and Zhi Ruo.


    ""¡­""


    For a short moment, all the outer sect disciples just sat quietly as they tried their best to remember everything they had heard during the past hour.


    Not daring to say a single word in case they would ruin this moment.


    Even Qing Chenyi sitting towards the back of the group remainedpletely silent as he felt his cultivation realm slowly proceeding forward. Only a slight push and he would be able to enter the Ninth Stage of the QI Condensation Realm!


    Even if he had personally listened, Qing Chenyi knew that he was far from understanding most of what Elder Xuan had talked about when it came to the Qi Condensation Realm¡­ When he began talking about the Foundation Establishment Realm, he had already given up on understanding what was being said and had instead focused on trying to remember the things that had been exined about the Qi Condensation Realm!


    Looking around himself, Qing Chenyi understood that the other outer sect disciples like himself was in a simr situation. Only a few of those who were already at the Foundation Establishment Realm and were going to attempt bing an inner disciple in the soon to be future sitting at the front, had tried remembering what Elder Xuan Had said when he began talking about the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­


    And just looking at their concentrated expressions, Qing Chenyi easily realized that they were attempting to use what they had managed to learn by using it to strengthen their foundation here and now.


    Not wanting to risk forgetting anything on the way back.


    The other outer sect disciple at the Qi Condensation Realm slowly decided to do the same as all of them remained seated without moving and Qing Chenyi soon decided to do the same as well.


    Soon enough, the one hundred outer sect disciples all decided to remain still in the same ce before each of them attempted to implement some of the things they had learned from the earlier lecture.


    In the end, the fact that nobody had shown up even after a few hours had passed since Elder Xuan left, caused quite a few elders from the outer sect to worry, as they ended up entering to see what had happened.


    The elders suddenly entering caused the disciples inside to wake up fully as they had all looked over towards the elders entering, some with anger and others with confusion. Not fully certain about what had just happened or how much time had passed.


    Soon, the stories of what happened began spreading across the Flying Sword Sect. Many of the disciples who had joined the lecture even managed to break through over the next few days and weeks. Helping increase the interest and curiosity that both the disciples and elders had towards Elder Xuan even more.


    ¡­


    Xuan Hao, having left the building where he held his first ever lecture for someone outside his own personal disciples, was slowly making his way out of the outer part of the sect. Heading back in the direction of the inner part of the sect where his mountain and pavilion was located.


    "So how was my first lecture?" Curious about what his disciple or Zhi Ruo might have thought about his lecture, Xuan Hao could not help himself from asking as he looked over towards both of them walking a short distance behind him.


    "It was great master! Although I didn''t understand much when it came to the Foundation Establishment part, I still understood it when you talked about the Qi Condensation Realm! Most of it was also things you exined to me when I first began cultivating¡­"


    "It was enlightening, I might even be able to enter the Qi Condensation Realm after returning to the pavilion¡­"


    Listening to both Bai Ning and Zhi Ruo''s answers, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself.


    From the looks of things, it looked like his first ever lecture went well.


    Moreover, if Zhi Ruo could really reach the Qi Condensation Realm, she would be able to more easily move around in the future and maybe also learn a few easier techniques that would make things like keeping the pavilion clean easier.


    "Looks like it will not be too hard having to do one lecture every week in the future¡­ Now that things have mostly calmed down, I will also have a lot of free time again!" Muttering this to himself as he thought about how calm things were going to be in the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao could not help smiling happily to himself.


    There was no more Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the ck Rose Sect had pretty much disappeared after the destruction of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. The Azure Sky Kingdom also seemed to have ended up in some sort of internal struggle after they left.


    The only thing that Xuan Hao could see happening in the future, was the alchemypetition hosted by the Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire¡­


    How could I forget that! I still have to prepare in case that old alchemist from the Sky Empire tries snatching my disciple!


    Suddenly remembering the uing alchemypetition that his disciple would be joining in a few months; Xuan Hao suddenly felt an unknown pressure bearing down on him as he clearly knew that the Sky Empire was not a power that he could afford to offend given his current strength.


    If that old alchemist from the Sky Empire really took an interest in his disciple and wanted to take Qing Yi in as an alchemy disciple, Xuan Hao would at the very least need to have the ability to show off the fact that she already had an alchemist master and one that was no weaker than the Artisan Realm at that!


    For something like that, Xuan Hao knew he would at least have to learn some of the more ordinary pills and potions for the Artisan Realm.... He doubted the old artisan alchemist from the Sky Empire would care much about a hair growth potion at the Soul Rank¡­


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 Chapter 371 - Neighbouring Kingdoms

    <h4>Chapter 371 - Neighbouring Kingdoms</h4>


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    With his first lecture having concluded, Xuan Hao began to focus on increasing his knowledge and familiarity with alchemy for the uing alchemypetition that Qing Yi would be participating in only a few months'' time. Putting aside the matter of using the Pure Heart Spiritual Water for training with formations until after the alchemypetition.


    For now, the most important thing, was to fully assimte the knowledge of alchemy that he hadn''t truly put to use yet.


    Like this, Xuan Hao''s time was filled with teaching the outer and inner disciples once a week, teaching his own disciples for a few hours every day and finally spend the rest of his time getting better at alchemy and at the same time helping Qing Yi whenever she came with any alchemy rted questions.


    ¡­


    As time slowly began passing with Qing Yi and Chu Yang returning to the sect again after sessfullypleting their two missions in the River Sect''s territory. The kingdoms surrounding the Flying Sword Sect began learning more about what had happened to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    The destruction of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was not too much of a surprise to these kingdoms, but the fact that it was not done by one of the sects and instead the Azure Sky Kingdom, was the most surprising fact about it.


    However, this did not change that the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms territory had suddenly lost the kingdom that formerly ruled over it. Now, any kingdom coulde a im a bit of territory for free without too much of a loss. Even if the sects wanted to break free, they would not be able to take over the entire territory by themselves.


    At least, that was what the different kingdoms had thought before news of someone from the Flying Sword Sect having reached the Domain Lord Realm! With the appearance of a Domain Lord within the Flying Sword Sect. The surrounding kingdoms not only decided not to involve themselves with the sects of the former Heavenly Sky Kingdom, but instead became worried about the uing expansion of the Flying Sword Sect.


    After all, a sect that could produce a Domain Lord, would be far more valued than a kingdom with someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    While kingdoms were way more valued than a sect in the current day of the Ewaria Continent, a sect that could produce someone at the Domain Lord Realm was still far more valued than a kingdom where the strongest person was in the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    People in the Domain Lord Realm were rare enough in the first ce and given how long their lifespan was, some even being able to live up to ten thousand years, Domain Lords were the main yers and strength inside of an Empire!


    In turn, this had also resulted in most wars between empires being fought between the Domain Lords of the empires involved. Rarely would the Soul Ascension Realm Experts act themselves.


    After all, they were the true core of an empire! Even a single Soul Ascension Realm Expert dying, would be a disaster no matter which empire it was!


    If the empire in question only had a single person at the Soul Ascension Realm, his or her death would directly spell the end of said empire!


    Take the Sky Empire as an example.


    The Sky Empire was known for being one of the stronger empires on the Ewaria Continent. Having at least two people at the Soul Ascension Realm. Namely the Great Sky Emperor, current ruler of the Sky Empire and the ancestor of the Sky Empire''s royal family.


    If even a single one of the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts perished, the Sky Empire would directly lose half of theirbat potential in one go.


    Other than weakening the Sky Empire, it would also cause the Domain Lords under them to leave and join another stronger empire. After all, the main reason some of them had joined the Sky Empire in the first ce, was because it was one of the strongest empires on the continent!


    In the worst-case scenario. Not only would the Domain Lords begin leaving, but the vassal kingdoms under them would try to break free and join another empire¡­


    In essence, fighting between Soul Ascension Realm Experts was extremely rare and both parties tended to avoid it unless absolutely necessary.


    The other part of it, was that the battle between people at the Soul Ascension Realm being way more destructive and all-epassingpared to people at the Domain Lord Realm.


    If a fight between to Domain Lords could easily result in the destruction of an entire kingdom if drawn out, a fight between Soul Ascension Realm Experts could result in the destruction of an entire empire!


    With all of this considered, empires would normally try to confine the battles between themselves to fights between their Domain Lords.


    In a sense, the highest level of fighting force in a war between empires would be Domain Lords, therefore, the more Domain Lords you had, the higher your chances of winning.


    Finally, the more Domain Lords you had, the higher the chance that one of them would one day end up reaching the Soul Ascension Realm!


    With all these things in mind, the surrounding kingdoms knew that they could not mess with the Flying Sword Sect.


    Even if the Flying Sword Sect was not a direct vassal to the Sky Empire like they were, it would be stupid for them to try and use the name of the Sky Empire to take over the territory of the now gone Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    All things being considered, the Flying Sword Sect was now a force that they couldn''t mess with. Now or in the future.


    The main thing on these kingdoms mind at the moment being whether or not the Flying Sword Sect was going to expand outwards and begin taking over their territory now that they had someone in the Domain Lord Realm backing them up¡­


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 Chapter 372 - Elder Song Begins Stabilizing The Territory Of The Flying Sword Sect

    <h4>Chapter 372 - Elder Song Begins Stabilizing The Territory Of The Flying Sword Sect</h4>


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    With the neighbouring kingdoms not daring to invade in an attempt to take control of the former Heavenly Sky Kingdom''s territory, the Flying Sword Sect was leftpletely alone.


    Allowing Elder Song to put forth his ns of stabilizing the territory of the Flying Sword Sect without anyoneing to interfere¡­


    Like this, over the next few months, Elder Song freely mobilized the elders of the Flying Sword Sect with the help of the Sect Master, Feng Chen.


    Strengthening the Flying Sword Sects control over the sects and other powers inside their territory, by first of all establishing several new small sized branches each with an elder in control all around the territory to keep an eye on the different powers that existed under them.


    After the branches had begun taking shape, Elder Song then proceeded to use the influence of the Flying Sword Sect to calm down the chaotic situation through the newly established branches.


    Slowly but surely, the control of what had formerly been the northern part of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and was part of the Flying Sword Sect in name only, began truly bing a part of the Flying Sword Sect.


    At the same time, the Spring Flower Sect was also beginning to exert their influence across eastern part of the now gone Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    The Seven Fates Sect, not one to fall behind, had also begun increasing their influence over their territory and due to the fact that they had already begun this before the fall of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Even began spreading inwards towards what had once been the central region of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the past.


    Like this, the former territory of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was quickly being absorbed by the three sects.


    ¡­


    "The Flying Sword Sect¡­? Are you sure that someone in the Domain Lord Realm appeared in such a ce?"


    At the same time, in arge city located far away from the Flying Sword Sect, a man looked over towards an old man standing in front of him, a hint of curiosity briefly passing through his indifferent eyes.


    "Yes, my lord, I recently received the news that one of our vassal kingdoms had been destroyed by another vassal kingdom and sent someone over to investigate if it had anything to do with the recent resurgence of the church of the gue god but found no leads to believers of the gue god at the battlefield.


    ording to the one I sent, news about one of the sects formerly under the vassal kingdom that ended up being destroyed had someone who broke through and reached the Domain Lord Realm. After fully investigating the sect in question, he confirmed that someone had indeed reached the Domain Lord Realm in that sect¡­ But¡­"


    Reaching the end of his exnation, the voice of the old man suddenly came to a stop as he hesitated on whether to continue or not.


    "But¡­?" Raising an eyebrow upon suddenly seeing the hesitation on the old man''s face, the man grew a bit more curious as he signalled for him to continue his exnation.


    "But he never responded again after sending that message¡­ I think that something might have happened to the investigator, what if the Domain Lord from the Flying Sword Sect-"


    "Stop! You should know what it would mean for us to offend a Domain Lord just based on something like this! Moreover, what would we do if that Domain Lord leaves and decides to join the Onyx Empire!? Wouldn''t we just be handing them a brand-new Domain Lord that is more than eager to fight us!? Don''t forget how General Bi Sheng ended up joining the Onyx Empire!" Forcefully stopping the old man before he could say anything more, the man narrowed his eyes as he looked over the old man.


    "The matter of General Bi Sheng''s disciple is already in the past! What happened back then was a mistake and we won''t repeat such a thing-"


    "Quiet! You can leave for now and report the news about the appearance of a new Domain Lord ordingly, I will take care of the matter regarding the disappearance of the investigator and find out how it''s rted to the Domain Lord from the Flying Sword Sect!" Not wanting to continue listening to the old man any further, the indifferent looking man directly threw the old man out of the room before descending to handle the matter by himself.


    Bang!


    Watching as the door the room snapped shut just as he was out of the room, the old man could not help looking towards the room with a resentful expression on his face before taking his leave.


    "Just you wait! Damned brat¡­" Muttering these words while leaving the old man looked back onest time before disappearing around a nearby corner.


    ¡­


    "Hah, they are getting more and more impatient¡­ Even if they want me screw up, can they at least not make it less obvious?"


    Back inside the room, the indifferent looking man let out a sigh as he motioned towards the corner of the room as a nearby shadow soon began moving before slowly martializing into the shape of a shadowy person.


    "Your highness, do you want me to deal with that old man?"


    "No need, he is merely a pawn of my dear brother¡­ I know he has been wanting to take over my position as the crown prince now that father is looking for someone to take over before entering the ancestral grounds to cultivate with the ancestor.


    However, he has been getting more and more impatient for me to make a mistake over the past few years¡­"


    Waving his hand dismissively as he said this, the man revealed the identity of the old man without even bothering to hide it.


    A pawn of his brother, the second prince of the Sky Empire!


    Yes, the man inside the room was none other than the Crown Prince of the Sky Empire! The person next in line to be the emperor of the Sky Empire!


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 Chapter 373 - Reward For Completing The Sect Quest...

    <h4>Chapter 373 - Reward For Completing The Sect Quest...</h4>


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    "Your highness, how should we deal with the Domain Lord from the Flying Sword Sect and the disappearance of the investigator¡­?"


    Inside the room, the shadowy person with a voice sounding neither like a man or a woman asked the crown prince after seeing that he didn''t want to deal with the old man.


    "Hm¡­ For now, just send over two shadows to find out what really happened to the investigator, as for the Domain Lord from the Flying Sword Sect¡­ If I''m not wrong, father will be setting up a sect alliance to weaken the influence of those damnable churches.


    Given that he is from a sect, he will likely have his Flying Sword Sect join the sect alliance! At that time, I should be able to get chance to see him personally¡­" Smiling slightly as he said this, the crown prince motioned towards the shadowy person in front of him, who nodded in response before slowly merging together with the surrounding shadows and disappearing from the room to carry out the orders of the crown prince.


    Whoosh~


    "Hah¡­"


    Watching as the shadowy person disappeared from the room. Leaving himpletely alone, the crown prince could not help but let out a sigh of exhaustion as he sat down.


    Slowly taking out amunication talisman before beginning to contact someone.


    ¡­


    Different from the undercurrent of the Imperial Capital of the Sky Empire, the Flying Sword Sect had been going through several different changes over the past few months.


    The most important being the fact that Elder Song hadrge sess in spreading the elders out across the territory of the Flying Sword Sect in an attempt to increase the sects influence and control over the region.


    On the other hand, the lectures by Xuan Hao and the other Core Elders, had also been a major sess with both the inner and outer disciples. Many of them had even managed to breakthrough during the past few months and reach a brand-new realm.


    Overall, the reputation of Xuan Hao, had seen the greatest change, as he went from a rtively unknown core elder that not many of the disciples had seen before, to an elder that had personally taught them and helped them improve.


    Though, he was still nowhere near the level of adoration that the disciples held for Elder Song¡­


    No, after personally experiencing how the disciples viewed Elder Song, Xuan Hao felt that he would probably never be able to reach that level of adoration unless he began dedicating all his time to helping the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Well, being regarded as a kind and helpful elder is more than enough¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he knew that he would never be able to do what Elder Song did on daily basis, Xuan Hao slowly made his way back from hisst lecture before the new elders would take over and teach the disciples.


    [Sect Quest: From today and until the date set up by the Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect is reached, you must teach the inner and outer sect disciples for at least one hour every week. plete)]


    Just as he was about to take another step forward, the message of the sect quest''spletion arrived.


    I wonder what the reward will be¡­ ording to what it said, the reward will vary depending on how much the disciples I taught managed to learn¡­


    Given that I heard about quite a few breaking through and improving their cultivation realm after listening to my lecture, it should at the very least not be too bad¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao curiously looked down towards the reward part below the sect quest''s description.


    [During the Sect Quest, a total of 142 disciples broke through a minor realm in the Qi Condensation Realm, 24 broke through a minor realm in the Foundation Establishment Realm and a total of 7 broke through from the Qi Condensation Realm to the Foundation Establishment Realm after listening to your lecture]


    [Reward, choose one: Seven Petal Sky Flower or Heaven Splitting Sword Art]


    "¡­"


    Looking at the reward, Xuan Hao didn''t know whether to be happy or start crying.


    The reward was extremely good and just what he needs, the Heaven Splitting Sword Art, clearly being a sword art that would help improve his strength and add a much-needed newbat technique, while the Seven Petal Sky Flower was one of the Mystic Grade natural treasures needed for the Qi Gathering Formation¡­


    All in all, things would have been great¡­ But he could only choose one of the two¡­


    Why had the system given him such a choice all of a sudden instead of just giving him one of the two without letting him see the other?


    Xuan Hao had no clue and almost felt like the system wanted to torture him by having to give up one of the two things he needed.


    No matter what he ended up choosing at this point, he would still end up being left with a feeling of emptiness at having let go of the chance to get one of the two.


    The Heaven Splitting Sword Art being abat technique involving swords, though its rank was not directly written down, Xuan Hao had a feeling that it should be a powerful sword art from its name alone.


    The Seven Petal Sky Flower on the other hand, was a spiritual flower that was at least at the Mystic Grade and was a wind rted natural treasure and would have him require only one more mystic grade natural treasure before needing to look for a Transcendent grade one to use as the formation core.


    Other than that, the Seven Petal Sky Flower, could also be above the mystic grade¡­


    All in all, he had no clue what rank the Heaven Splitting Sword Art was and at the same time had no idea what rank the Seven Petal Sky Flower was at either. All he knew was that the Seven Petal Sky Flower Would at least have reached the Mystic Grade¡­


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 Chapter 374 - Winged Lions New Life~!

    <h4>Chapter 374 - Winged Lion''s New Life~!</h4>


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    [Reward, choose one: Seven Petal Sky Flower or Heaven Splitting Sword Art]


    Looking over the two different rewards and going over the benefit that each of them would give him, Xuan Hao ended up choosing the Heaven Splitting Sword Art.


    No matter how useful the Seven Petal Sky Flower would be for him in the creation of the Qi Gathering Formation, there was no way it could outweigh the benefits that a new sword art could possibly bring him.


    Especially a high rank sword art!


    "Hah¡­"


    Feeling some regret at losing the opportunity to get one of the natural treasures he needs for the Qi Gathering Formation, Xuan Hao slowly chose the Heaven Splitting Sword Art.


    [Reward chosen: Heaven Splitting Sword Art]


    Watching the words representing the Seven Petal Sky Flower Slowly disappear before a new line of words appeared and reced thest one, Xuan Hao was about to sigh once again before a book suddenly martialized in the air in front of him without any prior warning.


    Whoosh!


    Not expecting the reward to just materialize by itself all of a sudden, Xuan Hao quickly grabbed hold of it before putting it away in his interspatial ring.


    No matter what, he was still on his way back to his pavilion and there were both disciples and elders walking by around him at the moment!


    Looking around after having put the book that materialized in front of him, Xuan Hao let out a sigh of relief upon discovering the fact that none of the people around him seemed to have discovered the book that had suddenly martialized directly in front of him without any prior warning.


    For some reason, the system seemed to have begun doing its best to be troublesome this time around¡­


    Whoosh~


    Lest anything more troublesome happened, Xuan Hao directly flew into the air before rushing back to his pavilion. Not wanting the system to suddenly begin doing something troublesome again.


    ¡­


    Thumb


    Landing back on the ground in front of his pavilion, Xuan Hao could not help smiling awkwardly with a new book in his hand.


    During his short flight back towards his pavilion, two more books suddenly began materializing one after the other like the first book before the total number of books reached three.


    At least he had the foresight to leave before the other two books appeared¡­


    "Elder Xuan? Did anything happen during yourst lecture? Do you need me to brew some tea?" In the process of removing a few leaves that had fallen down in front of the entrance to the pavilion from therge tree situated just beside it, Zhi Ruo was caught off-guard as she suddenly saw Xuan Hao appear with a somewhat angry look on his face.


    "No, it''s nothing, you can just continue what you were doing before." Seeing the worried expression on Zhi Ruo''s face, Xuan Hao quickly realized that he might have looked a bit angry when he thought about the books that had suddenly appeared out the blue on after the other and decided to calm down before kindly refusing her offer.


    "I see, then I will return to what I was doing." Nodding her head with a relieved expression on her face, Zhi Ruo returned to cleaning up the entrance of the pavilion.


    Fwoosh~


    A small wind quickly swept through the area as it carried the remaining few leaves in front of the pavilion over towards a small pile of leaves at the side.


    Watching this, Xuan Hao smiled approvingly and entered the pavilion.


    Over the past few months, Zhi Ruo had managed to finally reach the Qi Condensation Realm and at this point, she had already managed to breakthrough to reach the Fifth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm!


    Her fast improvement after entering the Qi Condensation Realm was not only because she had attended a lot of his lectures together with Bai Ning over the past few months but was also because she had helped Qing Yi in testing out some of her finished pills and potions for increasing the speed of cultivation.


    Chu Yang had of course also joined this testing session, though he had ended up testing the more¡­ Unique pills and potions made by Qing Yi¡­


    Thinking about how Qing Yi and Chu Yang had begun training together even more than before after Bai Ning''s arrival in an attempt to show off to their new junior brother, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself while he made his way towards his room at the centre of the pavilion.


    The past few months had been really peaceful, and he didn''t have anything to do outside the sect.


    The only notable thing that happened inside the sect was when he showed off the winged lion to the Sect Master and the rest of the Core Elders¡­


    Their Expressions back then was a sight to behold and after discussing about where to put the winged lion, they all ended up agreeing to letting the Beast Tamers help take care of it, while it would mainly stay at Xuan Hao''s pavilion until they made a more permanent ce for it to stay.


    The winged lion agreed to this suggestion without any struggle, even the beast tamers who were allowed toe and take care of it were epted by the winged lion as it mostly just spent its timezing around at the back side of the pavilion.


    Having the beast tamers bring it food whenever it was hungry and sleep when it was not¡­


    In a sense, the winged lion had returned to the same state that it had been back at the Main Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks¡­


    The only difference being that it didn''t sleep for a long time and would instead wake up at least once a day to get the beast tamers to bring it something to eat.


    The time this happened varied a lot, sometimes being in the middle of the night, while at others early in the morning or around dinner¡­


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 Chapter 375 - Blood Punisher, Creator Of The Heaven Splitting Sword Art!

    <h4>Chapter 375 - Blood Punisher, Creator Of The Heaven Splitting Sword Art!</h4>


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    Arriving at his room, Xuan Hao entered and soon found a ce to sit down before he took out the three books that he had gotten from the sect quest.


    Heaven Splitting Sword Art, Volume One¡­ Two¡­ Three¡­


    Examining the three books, Xuan Hao quickly found out that all of them were a part of the Heaven Splitting Sword Art, just that sword art in question was split up into three different volumes.


    This alone was a sign that the Heaven Splitting Sword Art was a high-level sword art¡­ At Xuan Hao thought so until he opened the first volume and began reading it.


    In essence, the first volume contained no sword art, instead it contained the legendary exploits of the sword art''s creator who called himself Blood Punisher, though it sounded like nothing more than someone bragging about all the things they had allegedly done¡­ Just reading through the entire first volume was a challenge in itself¡­


    "Did I¡­ Perhaps make a mistake¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he began realizing the fact that he might have lost the opportunity to get his hands on a Mystic Grade Natural Treasure for three books filled with the heroic exploits of some random crazy person, Xuan Hao felt like he wanted cry as he picked up the second volume and began reading.


    Even if he didn''t want to continue reading thest two volumes, he at the very least had to see if there was a sword art hidden inside the three books.


    In the end, the second volume was not better than the first volume. Mainly going over how the legendary Blood Punisher himself had fought of a legion of immortals while at the same time using his legendary blood arts to revive an entire race that had just been wiped out by the legion of immortals he was fighting.


    "¡­"


    Without saying anything about the second volume, Xuan Hao slowly picked up the third the third volume.


    "A sword art!?"


    Having expected for the third volume to just be the same as the other two, Xuan Hao could not help eximing in surprise upon turning the first page and seeing a sword art instead of yet another story about the awesomeness of the Blood Punisher¡­ Not really that he knew what that name even meant in the first ce.


    Maybe it was because he was skilled when it came to the Dao of Blood and Blood Techniques? But why the name Blood Punisher?


    Not wanting to continue thinking too much about the creator of the Heaven Splitting Sword Art, Xuan Hao began reading through the sword art and soon found himself immersed in a brand-new world.


    Very quickly, Xuan Hao realized that the Heaven Splitting Sword Art was far above any sword art he had evere in contact with. Even the Untold Swords Mantra could not bepared to it.


    Meaning that the Heaven Splitting Sword Art was likely above the Heaven Rank!


    The appearance of a sword art above the Heaven Rank would easily be enough to cause even those at the Soul Ascension Realm toe out!


    The sword art was divided into three moves.


    Earth Splitting, Sky Splitting and Heaven Splitting.


    The main requirements of each move being in one''s current sword realm.


    To perform Earth Splitting, it required him toprehend a sword domain.


    Sky Splitting required him to reach the realm of a sword soul, that was likely the realm after a sword domain.


    "Hm? The Heaven Splitting is missing¡­"


    Not knowing what to say, Xuan Hao could not help cursing out silently when he realized that thest move, Heaven Splitting, was not present in the third volume of the Heaven Splitting Sword Art.


    He managed to get his hand on the Heaven Splitting Sword Art, but the Heaven Splitting sword move was missing¡­


    At least he did not end up with another one of the Blood Punisher''s stories and even learned about the name of the realm that woulde after a sword domain¡­ But for some reason, he did not feel happy about this and just felt like he had been scammed¡­


    "Hah¡­ No use thinking about it, I still got my hands on two new sword moves from a sword art that is likely above the Heaven Rank!" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao slowly began reading through the third volume of the Heaven Splitting Sword Art once again.


    The First move, Earth Splitting, was the move that he decided to focus on first. Mainly because he fulfilled the requirement of havingprehended a sword domain and at the same time because it was the first move mentioned in the Heaven Splitting Sword Art.


    Slowly, Xuan Hao began immersing himself inprehending the first move, Earth Splitting. Only to be taken out from his concentrated state of mind by the random sentences thrown in by the Blood Punisher every now and then, bragging about how awesome his Heaven Splitting Sword Art was¡­


    Through this experience, Xuan Hao sincerely hoped that he would never have to experience the pain of trying to understand anything written by Blood Punisher ever again.


    The sheer difficulty was far above anything he had ever read before, this was not only because the level of the sword art was above normal, but also because of how bad the creator was at writing down even a small part of the sword art before mentioning how awesome he was and how strong his sword art was¡­


    Just reading and memorizing the first move ended up taking him more than a few hours, where it would normally only have taken him a few minutes! Simply because he had to exclude the sentences where Blood Punisher bragged about himself from the sword move itself¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Closing the third volume of the Heaven Splitting Art, Xuan Hao let out a sigh of exhaustion. Not looking forward to opening the book again to go over the second move, Sky Splitting in the future.


    For now at least, learning the first move should be more than enough to keep him busy for a while¡­


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 Chapter 376 - Fire Explosion Potion!

    <h4>Chapter 376 - Fire Explosion Potion!</h4>


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    Leaving aside the matter of training in the first move of the Heaven Splitting Sword Art, Earth Splitting, Xuan Hao instead turned to leave his room before heading towards the location of the alchemy room where Qing Yi had been spending most of her time over the past few months.


    Using most of her time on improving her skill in alchemy so she would be ready for the uing alchemypetition. If she was not there, she would either be at the Alchemy Hall or training together with Chu Yang.


    Thest few weeks had been especially intense for Qing Yi, as the date of the alchemypetition slowly grew closer.


    At this point in time, she would rarely leave the alchemy room in the pavilion, asking Zhi Ruo to get her any of the herbs she needed while she would remain focused on trying her best to improve her skill.


    Not without any sess, as even though her cultivation realm had not improved by a lotpared to Chu Yang who solely focused on increasing his cultivation realm, Qing Yi had managed to reach the peak of the Journeyman Alchemist Realm. Only a single step away from reaching the realm of an Expert Alchemist!


    Her rapid rate of improvement had not only stunned Xuan Hao, but also the elders of the alchemy hall.


    This had in turn caused the elders of the alchemy hall to fully support Qing Yi with any spiritual herbs she needed, as they looked forward to her performance in the uing alchemypetition.


    Xuan Hao on the other hand¡­ Began growing worried that the Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire would really attempt to steal his disciple away!


    Even if he himself had improved a lot by learning several new recipes fitting for the level of an Artisan Alchemist, he still felt it wascking.


    After all, the other party was an Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire! There was no way he would ever be able to have ess to as many different and high-level recipes that someone belonging to the Sky Empire would!


    The only thing he could do at this point was try the unique recipes that the system had so graciously bestowed upon him¡­


    Even if they were not as useful as the other recipes that the Flying Sword Sect had stored up over the years, they were still of a way higher level and would help him familiarize himself with the alchemy knowledge that he had been given by the system¡­


    Not wanting to think too much about the system recipes, Xuan Hao came to a stop in a more secluded part of the pavilion. This was his destination and also the small corner of the pavilion that had been solely dedicated to either storing spiritual herbs or practicing alchemy after Qing Yi spent a week transforming the ce together with Zhi Ruo.


    Whoosh~


    "Master!?"


    Before Xuan Hao even had a chance to knock on the door, Qing Yi who had been standing at the other side suddenly swung the door open. Looking like she was about to rush over towards the storage room just behind him filled to the brim with all kinds of different spiritual herbs that the elders from the alchemy hall had brought over.


    "Hello there, Qing Yi, just continue what you were doing before and ignore me." Smiling a bit as he noticed how she had begun anxiously ncing over in the direction of the spiritual herbs located in the storage room behind him.


    "Thank you!"


    Whoosh!


    Not saying much more than that, Qing Yi rushed into the storage room before grabbing onto a small bundle of dried star flower leaves before rushing back into the alchemy room she came from with a worried expression on her face.


    "¡­"


    Xuan Hao just observed Qing Yi as she began preparing the leaves before beginning to add them into a small cauldron filled with a pink coloured boiling liquid that looked like it was just about to boil over a spill onto the ground beside the cauldron.


    Psh~


    Watching as the leaves of the star flower were added to the mixture, Xuan Hao could not help but smile approvingly at Qing Yi as the boiling pink liquid began calming down before slowly changing into a yellowish red colour.


    For now, it looked like Qing Yi had managed to calm down the mixture in time.


    "So, what are you making?" Feeling a bit curious about the mixture in the cauldron, Xuan Hao could not stop himself from asking the moment things had calmed down and Qing Yi got the situation under control.


    "I''m making a Fire Explosion Potion¡­ I just changed a few of the ingredients to make it more¡­ Potent and things almost ended up backfiring on me¡­"


    "Fire Explosion Potion¡­" Muttering the name of the potion to himself as he slowly made his way over towards the cauldron before inspecting the mixture inside, Xuan Hao quickly remembered what he knew about the potion.


    The Fire Explosion Potion was on the lower end of what a normal Journeyman Alchemist could make, but it was not to be underestimated because of this! While not too hard to make for a new Journeyman Alchemist, the Fire Explosion Potion, as its name suggested, would cause arge fiery explosion.


    When thrown out, the potion would rapidly absorb arge amount of fire qi from the surroundings upon contact before using the quickly gathered fire qi to cause arge fiery explosion. Damaging anyone within a few meters of where itnded.


    The strength of the Fire Explosion Potion was not too weak and not too strong either, having enough power to easily hurt someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm, but having a hard time truly doing any permanent damage unless the target was below the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    However, this did not affect the value of the potion in the eyes of the disciples. Not only was the Fire Explosion Potion easy to produce, but it was by far one of the best tools for disciples adventuring outside.


    Its main use being scaring off demon beasts, as therge explosion would in some case even be able to scare off demon beasts at the Core Formation Realm. Allowing the disciples more than enough time to escape orunch an attack towards the confused and scared demon beast.


    "Wait¡­ You said you made it more potent¡­ How much more potent are we talking?" Remembering thest few words Qing Yi had said, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that his disciple might have ended up in a really bad situation if the mixture boiled over and fell onto the ground below.


    Given the fact that it was a Fire Explosion Potion¡­ The mixture would likely have caused arge explosion upon hitting the ground and in turn ignited the rest of the mixture into an evenrge explosion!


    Given how much she had made, part of his pavilion might have ended up disappearing before he could even react and use his ice domain to stop the explosion from spreading¡­


    "It should be enough to hurt someone at the Core Formation!" Not realizing how dangerous the situation had been only a short moment ago, Qing Yi proudly told her master how much stronger her Fire Explosion Potion was.


    "I see¡­ Mind if I try it out?"


    "No¡­ But it will need to cool down first before it can be transported- Ah!"


    Before Qing Yi could finish what, she was saying, Xuan Hao directly used his ice domain to cool down the boiling liquid inside the cauldron before picking up a small potion bottle and filling it up with the liquid mixture that was Qing Yi''s more potent version of a normal Fire Explosion Potion.


    Inspecting the small potion bottle now filled to the brim with Qing Yi''s more potent Fire Explosion mixture, Xuan Hao left the alchemy room with Qing Yi following closely behind him.


    Soon, both of them made their way out of the pavilion and reached the training ground where Chu Yang curiously observed both of them. Not expecting Qing Yi or his master to suddenly show up.


    "Master? Qing Yi? Are you here to train!?" Asking this with an excited look in his eyes along with a rising fighting intent clearly visible to Qing Yi and Xuan Hao, Chu Yang walked over towards the two of them.


    "No, master wanted to test one of my new potions¡­" Rolling her eyes as she said this, Qing Yi''s words instantly caused Chu Yang''s excited expression to dim down a bit.


    Over the past few months, his time had mostly been spent at training and as Qing Yi was the only person who could currently spar with him on the mountain peak, Chu Yang constantly went to get her whenever he needed to test out a new spear move, he hade up with or another attack he had improved on since theirst spar.


    All things considered, Qing Yi had been interrupted by him a lot until she stopped Zhi Ruo from helping him find his way to her alchemy room¡­


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 Chapter 377 - Bai Nings Growth

    <h4>Chapter 377 - Bai Ning''s Growth</h4>


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    As Qing Yi and Chu Yang were talking with each other, Xuan Hao threw out the Fire Explosion Potion made by Qing Yi towards therge open space at the centre of the training ground.


    Whoosh~


    The potion bottle flew through the air beforending on the ground. Drawing in the nearby fire qi that lingered peacefully in the air before exploding into a violent explosion.


    Boom!


    The explosionsted for a short while beforeing to a stop. Having caused both Chu Yang and Qing Yi to stop talking, as both of them looked towards the source of the explosion.


    Chu Yang having a somewhat fearful look on his face while Qing Yi''s eyes shone excitedly upon seeing how effective her more potent version of the Fire Explosion Potion had been.


    "Looks like it will definitely be able to injure someone in the Core Formation Realm if they are caught off-guard¡­ Good job Qing Yi! Just remember to be more careful in the future when making such dangerous potions. One wrong move and it could blow up in your face during the brewing process!" Nodding his head in admiration of the strength behind the Fire Explosion Potion, Xuan Hao didn''t forget to warn Qing Yi to be more careful when handling something as dangerous as a Fire Explosion Potion.


    It was not like there weren''t any stories of alchemist dying due to their own concoction blowing up on them¡­


    The danger of something like that happening was very real, especially when it came to the making of potions such as the Fire Explosion Potion. Caution was needed when handling such potions! Even if they were easy to make.


    "Yes master¡­" Knowing that he was referring to how close she had been to just that happening, Qing Yi lowered her head a bit as she took his words to mind.


    Even if she had wanted to improve the Fire Explosion Potion and had ultimately seed, she was still way hurried in the process and almost ended blowing herself up as a result¡­ No matter how much she had wanted to improve the potion in question, it was not worth risking her life over like she had done!


    "It''s good as long as you remember to be careful¡­ You can spend some time training with Chu Yang, you have not moved outside for thest few days and really need to rx a bit before we begin leaving for the alchemypetition. "


    Seeing that Qing Yi understood what he meant, Xuan Hao nodded his head before making his way back towards the pavilion while leaving Qing Yi to train together with Chu Yang.


    Even if it did not seem as like a rxing thing to do, training together with Chu Yang was sure to help Qing Yi take her mind off alchemy and focus on something different.


    "Yes¡­"


    Not knowing what else to say when her master personally told her to train together with Chu Yang, she could only reluctantly ept as Chu Yang excitedly came over. Not having expected his master to personally deliver a training partner for him.


    "Should we get start Qing Yi?" Smiling ear from ear as he said this with a wooden training spear in his hand, Chu Yang threw over a wooden training sword to Qing Yi.


    "Hah¡­ Let''s do it!" Sighing a bit as she grabbed onto the wooden sword, Qing Yi epted as both of them soon began a mock fight with neither side losing. Mainly due to the fact both of them limited their strength so as to focus more on the skill of their techniques instead of pure strength.


    After all, Chu Yang was still stronger than Qing Yi and during the past few months, the gap had only widened due to the fact Qing Yi was single-mindedly focusing on improving her alchemy.


    Even then, Qing Yi had still managed to reach the seventh stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­ But in the end, it was not even close to Chu Yang, who had already reached the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm. The Ninth Stage!


    Not only that, but he had even begun preparing to breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm!


    So, when it came to strength alone, Chu Yang was the strongest!


    ¡­


    Leaving the training ground after having tested out the potion Qing Yi had made and at the same time handed her over to Chu Yang in an attempt to help her think of something other than alchemy and end up doing something dangerous again, Xuan Hao made his way over towards the direction of his third disciple, Bai Ning.


    Over the past few months, Bai Ning had fully adapted to life in the Flying Sword Sect. At the same time, he had grown morefortable with cultivating. Having reached the seventh stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    While not improving as fast as Xuan Hao had expected, the growth of his cultivation realm was not the thing that Bai Ning had spent the most of his time focusing on.


    Instead, that time had been used to increase his cksmithing. Allowing him to go from an apprentice cksmith to bing a journeyman cksmith!


    The fact that he had be a journeyman cksmith at such a young age had not only caused Xuan Hao to feel surprised, but even the elder he normally spent his time together with from the cksmithing hall, Elder Teng Huo, was surprised upon personally witnessing the rapid growth of Bai Ning.


    Even getting so courageous that he personally went to Xuan Hao and asked if he could give up Bai Ning and allow the cksmithing hall to nurture him¡­


    This was of course refused by Xuan Hao, as there was no way he would just give away any of his disciples.


    Though this did allow him to understand something crucial, he not only had to worry about outside forcesing to take his disciples away, but also had to worry about the elders inside the secting to take them!


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 Chapter 378 - Weird Young Girl

    <h4>Chapter 378 - Weird Young Girl</h4>


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    Shaking his head as he threw those thoughts aside, Xuan Hao soon reached the ce Bai Ning was currently staying and was not surprised in the slightest after noticing a certain elder from the cksmithing hall.


    Elder Teng Huo was that certain elder and after having been refused by Xuan Hao in his attempt to take Bai Ning to the cksmithing hall, he had ended up convincing Xuan Hao to allow him to visit Bai Ning every now and then to both help him improve his cksmithing skills and at the same time have someone to talk about cksmithing with.


    Overall, Xuan Hao wanted to refuse, but Bai Ning had already expressed his desire to spend more of his time at the cksmithing hall just so he could have someone to talk with¡­ So, thinking that he might spend some more time in the pavilion, Xuan Hao had allowed Teng Huo toe over once a week.


    At the very least, Teng Huo seemed to have given up trying to take away Bai Ning after being allowed toe visit once a week¡­


    Knowing that Bai Ning was likely busy talking about something cksmithing rted at the moment, Xuan Hao decided to not disturb him and instead decided to leave his pavilion before making his way down his mountain.


    ¡­


    The scene below the mountain was apletely differentpared to his mountain, as disciples and elders could constantly be seen going from one ce to another.


    Even if it was the inner part of the Flying Sword Sect, the ce was still extremely busy due to most of the most frequented buildings were located there.


    From the Mission Hall where the disciples took on different missions from the sect to gain experience and earn a few spirit stone, to the Artifact Hall where the marketce set up by the disciples was located.


    Not to mention the fact that things had gotten busytely, with Elder Song stabilizing the territory of the Flying Sword Sect. Many new missions had appeared in the mission hall with extremely good rewards earlier in the day.


    Xuan Hao knew that the new missions were put up by Elder Song, he had waited until after the new elders had been appointed and Xuan Hao along with the other three Core Elders finished theirst lectures before putting them up.


    The disciples who had refused to go out to adventure during the time Xuan Hao and the other three were teaching personally over the past few months, would suddenly find a sea of new missions with good rewards waiting there for them.


    "I wonder what the missions were about¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a bit curious as he decided to hide his presence before following the stream of disciples towards the Mission Hall.


    The way there took longer than normal due to therge amount of people rushing over towards the Mission Hall, but this did not stop Xuan Hao. Soon finding himself in front of the Mission Hall that had a constant stream of people going in and out.


    If not for the fact that he had stood a bit to the side, Xuan Hao was certain that he would end up being dragged along with the crowd into the Mission Hall. At least if he was just a normal disciple¡­


    "Ah! I was going to the Artifact Hall! I''m not going to the Mission Hall! Please stop for a mome-"


    As if to affirm his thoughts, Xuan Hao watched a disciple at the Qi Condensation Realm try to pass through the stream of disciples only to end up getting swept away by it. Soon being pushed directly into the Mission Hall against his will¡­


    "¡­"


    The sight was quite funny as the disciple soon came out through another entrance along with a crowd of disciples leaving the Mission Hall, looking quite dishevelled as he soon turned to leave in a hurry.


    "Are you here to take on one of the new missions as well? Grandpa Song said he put up mission for everyone! Even the elders should be able to find a mission for them!" Just as Xuan Hao was about to enter the Mission Hall, the voice of a young girl sounded out behind him.


    "Are you talking to me¡­?"


    "Yes? Who else would I be asking?"


    Hearing the young girl, Xuan Hao turned around and looked over towards the young girl standing just behind him with a somewhat bewildered look on his face.


    Given the fact that he had used his domain to hide himself, there should be no way for anyone to see him unless they had also reached the Domain Lord Realm or were stronger than him¡­


    Looking over the young girl, Xuan Hao quickly examined every inch of her body within a split before an even more confused expression appeared on his face.


    There was nothing extraordinary about the young girl other than the fact that she was around the Early stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm. Instead, what caught his attention was the fact that her body was way weaker than what someone at the Qi Condensation should have, to the point that even a normal person with no cultivation would have a stronger body than her!


    "Ah, is it perhaps because there are so many people here¡­? It would indeed be hard for someone to know that you are speaking to them when you have never talked to them before¡­" Nodding her head as she said this, the young girl soon looked back up at Xuan Hao who had already managed to calm down as he was looking at her curiously.


    "So, are you here to take on a mission as well?" Asking the question, she had asked at the start, the young girl looked up at Xuan Hao as she waited for him to answer.


    "As well? Are you perhaps here to take on a mission?" Not answering her question, Xuan Hao instead picked up thest part of what the young girl said as he asked her with a curious expression on his face.


    "Ah! Yes, I am! How did you know!? Grandpa Song said I shouldn''t because it''s dangerous¡­ But I really want to try and do a mission! If you are going to do a mission, we can go together! Being two people is safer and I''m sure Grandpa Song won''t punish me too badly when I get back if I''m doing it with someone else!"


    "Sure, we can take on one of the easier missions and be back within an hour or two."


    "Great! Let''s go!"


    Listening to the young girl, Xuan Hao felt his curiosity towards her increase even further. Agreeing to her request without much thought.


    Other than finding out if the Grandpa Song mentioned by the young girl was Elder Song and her high cultivation realm for her age, Xuan Hao was interested in finding out about her weird ability to see him even when he hid with his domain¡­


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 Chapter 379 - Spiritual Herb Magnet?

    <h4>Chapter 379 - Spiritual Herb Ma?</h4>


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    Following the young girl into the busy Mission Hall, Xuan Hao was a little blown back upon witnessing how truly chaotic the situation inside the Mission Hall was¡­ In the future, they needed to get an even bigger Mission Hall or maybe add on a few more Mission Halls. Separating the missions over these new halls through the strength needed for the missions.


    Having a hall for the Foundation Establishment Realm missions, one for the Core Formation Realm and so on¡­


    "So, do you have any kind of mission that you had been looking forward to do doing¡­?" Having looked around enough, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the young girl.


    Even if he wanted to take on a mission that was easy and quick toplete, he still had to listen to what the young girl wanted to do.


    After all, for now at least, it looked like she still had no clue who he was and might even have mistaken him for a disciple like herself¡­


    Hearing Xuan Hao, the young girl thought about it for a moment before walking up to the ce where missions for the Foundation Establishment were located.


    "We can do this one!" Squeezing her way into the crowd of disciples beforeing back out with a mission in hand, the young girl happily showed it off to Xuan Hao.


    [Gather Herbs for the Alchemy Hall]


    [Description: Gather Herbs for the Alchemy Hall, any herbs are eptable, be it Mortal Grade Spiritual Herbs or normal herbs. Normal herbs or Mortal Grade spiritual herbs can be found in the forest surrounding the sect.]


    [Rmended Strength: Vary depending on the grade of the spiritual herb, normal herbs require no strength to gather.]


    [Reward: Depends on the quality of the herb brought back. Possible rewards are spirit stones, potions, pills or artifacts]


    [Time Limit: No Time Limit]


    [Special Notice: This mission is repeatable. Please don''t remove it from the mission board!]


    "Are you sure you want to do this mission¡­?" Trying his best not to say anything rude to the young girl after noticing thest part written down on the mission, Xuan Hao discreetly got her to hand it over to him as he asked before using his strength to put the mission back onto the mission board without the young girl noticing anything.


    "Yes! I always get a lot of different herbs from Grandpa Song, and I really wanted to see how they are gathered!" Nodding her head, oblivious to what Xuan Hao was doing, the young girl was full of excitement as she answered truthfully with a pure smile on her face.


    "I see¡­ Then we will take on this mission!" Agreeing with her, Xuan Hao and the young girl soon left the mission hall.


    Registering the mission was not needed, as it was not a personal mission given by an elder or a disciple, but the sect. All they would need to do was to hand in the herbs after they had gathered them, and the sect would pay them ordingly.


    From Xuan Hao''s perspective, this mission was perfect. At most taking a few hours toplete and at the same time far one of the closest missions. Only having them visit the forest close to the sect to gather a few herbs.


    A few hours should be more than enough time for him to figure out what was so special about the young girl¡­


    At least that was what Xuan Hao had thought, but after walking together with her to the forest and even using his system to try and find out if she had a high talent or special physique, Xuan Hao still had no way to find out why the young girl was so special.


    For the first time, Xuan Hao''s system showed nothing when he had tried inspecting the young girl to find out if she had any special physique or high natural talent.


    Scanning her with his divine sense and domain several times yielded no results as well, causing Xuan Hao to grow even more curious about the young girl and the reason as to why the system for the first time ever didn''t work on someone.


    Not only that, but during their small journey to the forest closest to the Flying Sword Sect located just a few hundred meters away from the Flying Sword City, Xuan Hao managed to learn that the young girl was blind¡­


    Though she had exined that she was notpletely fine and could still barely see the blurry outlines of people and objects a few meters in front of her, but this was still more than enough to shock Xuan Hao.


    After all, she had walked like apletely normal person, and he hadn''t noticed different about her in that regard.


    Looking a bit closer after hearing this, Xuan Hao had indeed noticed how different her eyes were. Realizing that her eyes were a little white or cloudy in colour.


    Not only that, but Xuan Hao felt something inexinable as he looked into her pair of cloudy eyes. Almost like something was hidden beneath the surface.


    "I-is something wrong¡­?" Noticing how Xuan Hao hade to a stop as he stared directly into her eyes, the young girl nervously asked. Different from her earlier energetic self.


    "No, it''s nothing, I''ve just never met someone like you before, so I was a bit curious¡­ We should get started so we can finish the mission before it starts getting dark!" Answering honestly, Xuan Hao and the young girl reached the forest just outside the Flying Sword City.


    The forest was different from the demon beast forest used during the entrance test for the sect and didn''t contain any dangerous demon beast. Most of the demon beasts that were there would at most have reached the first of second stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    The reason for this was that the Flying Sword Sect would often clean up the area around the sect, so as to make sure there weren''t any dangerous demon beasts around.


    Overall, the area surrounding the Flying Sword Sect was safe. Most of the ce being cleared out by the elders and disciples on a daily basis.


    The only somewhat dangerous ce around the Flying Sword Sect was the demon beast forest and that was kept tightly under watch by a few elders around the clock, so as to ensure none of the demon beasts inside left and ended up causing chaos outside¡­


    Well as much chaos as a few demon beasts in the Qi Condensation Realm could cause¡­


    ¡­


    During the entire mission to gather a few herbs, Xuan Hao mostly stood to the side as he watched while the young girl easily found several Mortal Grade spiritual herbs along with a single Earth Grade spiritual herb that should not even have been present inside the forest just next to arge city¡­


    The fact that the young girl so easily found several rare herbs with close to no effort, once again caused Xuan Hao to grow more curious.


    Perhaps there was something special about her eyes?


    "H-help!"


    His thoughts were quickly interrupted as he saw the young girl in question run over towards him with a fearful expression on her face, a small squirrel demon beast barely at the first stage of the Qi Condensation Realm chasing after her from behind.


    "¡­"


    Is she really that weak¡­?


    Not knowing what to think as he watched someone at the Foundation Establishment Realm fearful escape from a small squirrel demon beast at the first stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, Xuan Hao waved his hand as the small squirrel demon beast directly froze on the spot. Having turned into an ice sculpture.


    "Hah¡­ Hah¡­ That was scary¡­ Grandpa Song was right, the outside world truly is dangerous!" Not aware of what Xuan Hao was thinking, the young girl sat down on the ground with an exhausted look on her face before turning her head over in the direction of Xuan Hao.


    "Thanks for saving me! I Really don''t know how I would have ended up without you help!"


    "No problem¡­"


    Feeling a bit weird being thanked for helping her, Xuan Hao''s attention soon focused on the herb in her hand.


    "Is that¡­"


    "Yes, the demon beast was guarding this herb! With how strong it was, I''m sure this is a precious spiritual herb! ording to what Grandpa Song told me, precious spiritual herbs are always guarded by strong demon beasts!"


    "¡­"


    Feeling speechless yet again, Xuan Hao looked over towards the squirrel that had turned into an ice sculpture after having been frozen by his ice domain.


    While the strength of the demon beast is not that strong, the spiritual herb is indeed precious¡­ How did she even manage to find something like this here in the first ce?


    The spiritual herb in question was a Spirit Grade spiritual herb! Normally something like that would be guarded by a demon beast in the Core Formation Realm! Not a small squirrel in the first stage of the Qi Condensation Realm!


    Not to mention the fact that they were currently inside a small forest located only a few hundred meters away from the Flying Sword City¡­


    Was the young girl perhaps a spiritual herb ma?


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 Chapter 380 - Meeting Elder Gong Bo And Preparing To Leave

    <h4>Chapter 380 - Meeting Elder Gong Bo And Preparing To Leave</h4>


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    "Do you perhaps know what kind of spiritual herb this is?!" Not knowing why Xuan Hao didn''t respond, the young girl curiously asked with a questioning look stered all over her face. Moving the Spirit Grade spiritual herb in her hand forward for Xuan Hao to get a better view of it.


    "Yes, it''s an Earth Flower Root¡­" Not wanting to tell her about how surprised he had been at her finding such a rare herb, Xuan Hao decided to just tell her the name of the herb that she had found.


    "Really!? Earth Flower Root¡­ I hope we can get a lot for this when we return to the sect! With such a powerful demon beast guarding it, I''m sure it will be worth a lot!"


    Looking even more fascinated than before after having heard the name of the spiritual herb in her hands, the young girl quickly put the herb into a small bag together with the other herbs she had managed to gather so far.


    "Let''s return to the sect for now, it''s already starting to get dark."


    "It''s already getting dark? I thought we could at least gather a few more herbs before we needed to head back¡­" Feeling disappointed at the fact that she would have to return to the sect again after having so much fun gathering herbs outside, the young girl clenched the small bag filled with herbs. Deep in though about something.


    "Don''t you have to return back home before your Grandpa Song realizes you are gone?"


    "Ah! I forgot about that!"


    Jumping up in surprise upon hearing what Xuan Hao said, the young girl soon began moving at lightning pace back towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao could only smile wryly as he followed after the young girl back towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    ¡­


    "I hope we can meet again and gather herbs together like today! It was really fun! I have to hurry back before Grandpa Song returns¡­ Bye!"


    Waving both her hands as the young girl''s figure disappeared into the constant stream of disciples in front of the Mission Hall, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit.


    Even though the day had not gone the way he had expected.


    Meeting a rather extraordinary disciple and going on a mission to gather herbs together with them, Xuan Hao still felt that his day was well spent.


    During the mission, while he had not managed to figure out anything regarding what made the young girl special, he had at the very least managed to conclude that the Grandpa Song she was talking about, was indeed Elder Song.


    So, in the future, he would be able to easily find the girl again through Elder Song if he got some clues about her special condition.


    "Now that I think about it, I never asked her what her name was¡­ Neither did she ever ask me about mine¡­" Muttering this to himself as he began walking back towards his pavilion, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head.


    Next time he met the young girl, he should make sure that he managed to get her name.


    "Elder Xuan! What are you doing here!?"


    Walking along the path back towards his pavilion, Xuan Hao suddenly heard a voice call out behind him as he quickly realized that he had not used his domain to hide himself this time around.


    "Hello¡­?"


    "Gong Bo! I''m an elder from the Alchemy Hall!"


    "Ah, Elder Gong Bo¡­ What can I help you with?"


    Looking over towards the elder who had called out to him, Xuan Hao was met with the sight of a short elderly man whose face donned one of the most splendid beards he had ever seen.


    Alchemy Hall? Does he perhaps want to talk about something rted to the Alchemy Competition?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that while the Alchemy Competition was still a few weeks off from starting, they would still have to reach the location of thepetition itself!


    "We have been discussing the best time to leave for the alchemypetition and though it would be best to leave in two days'' time¡­ This way, we will be able to reach the location for thepetition a few days before it starts. At the same time, we will also have more time in case some dys appear along the journey!"


    Listening to Elder Gong Bo as he affirmed his thoughts, Xuan Hao nodded his head in understanding. The location of the Alchemy Competition was not really located anywhere close to the Flying Sword Sect in the first ce and the only reason they had even dyed the departure until this point was due to the fact that Xuan Hao woulde along with them. Allowing them to more safely travel without having to worry too much about possible attacks along the way.


    "I understand Elder Gong Bo, you don''t have to worry, I''m more than ready to leave now that my lectures for the outer and inner disciples finished."


    "That''s great! I will go back and inform the others that we are leaving in two days! Ah, can I trouble you to inform Qing Yi about this as well?"


    Watching as the elderly man was about to rush off before asking him this, Xuan Hao could not help but chuckle a bit at the sight of the elderly man almost tripping over his long beard in the process.


    "No problem, she is after all my disciple. Informing her about this is not troubling at all."


    "Thanks! I will be taking my leave then!"


    Hearing Xuan Hao''s answer, the elderly man didn''t wait around for even a second longer before rushing in the direction of the Alchemy Hall.


    "Haha, looks like the elders from the Alchemy Hall are quite an interesting bunch!" Laughing to himself as he watched Elder Gong Bo run off, Xuan Hao decided that he would have to visit the Alchemy Hall at some point in the future before making his way back towards his pavilion.


    ...


    Knowing that he would be leaving the sect together with Qing Yi to head towards to location where the alchemistpetition was going to be held, Xuan Hao began preparing a few different things for both Chu Yang and Bai Ning to do while he was gone.


    Making sure that they would at least have a few things to do while he was gone and at the same time also asking Elder Song to look after them and help in case, they ran into trouble during the time he was gone.


    Something Elder Song was more than happy to do for him. Even with his busy schedule.


    Having settled the matter of his second and third disciple within only a few minutes of returning to the pavilion, Xuan Hao didn''t forget to inform Qing Yi about the fact that they would be leaving in only two days.


    "Two days!? I still haven''t finished perfecting my-"


    The sight of Qing Yi, who had suddenly be extremely panicked after hearing that she only had two days left before they left for thepetition, caused Xuan Hao to sigh.


    "You don''t have to worry so much about it, I''m sure you will end up doing great in thepetition." Trying his best to calm down his now panicking disciple, Xuan Hao smiled wryly as he wondered what she would act like when they reached the location of thepetition.


    Well, it''s understandable she is acting like this¡­ After all, thepetition is hosted by an Artisan Alchemist who is from the Sky Empire-


    "There is no way for me to get the first ce without perfecting those recipes!"


    "¡­"


    Listening to what Qing Yi was saying, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that there might be another reason for her panicked state¡­


    Shaking his head at this thought, Xuan Hao quickly calmed down Qing Yi before making his way towards the ce where the winged lion was peacefully sleeping.


    During his journey out of the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao knew that he would not be able to rush back to the sect in case something happened that Feng Chen could not handle while he was gone.


    At first, Xuan Hao had been worried about this and had almost decided not to go with Qing Yi, but the presence of the winged lion changed his mind.


    Now, with the winged lion present, Xuan Hao would not have to worry about anything happening to the Flying Sword Sect! Even if someone at the Domain Lord Realm showed up, they would now have to deal with the winged lion!


    Roar?


    Seeing Xuan Haoing over, the winged lion let out a confused roar as it chewed down on arge grilled deer demon beast that the beast tamers had made for it.


    The winged lion had already returned back to its original size at this point in time, as itsrge body took up most of the space behind the pavilion.


    "I will have to ask you to protect the Flying Sword Sect over the next period of time¡­ Soon, I will-"


    Informing the winged lion about how he would be leaving for at least a month if not longer, Xuan Hao only left to return back to his quarters after seeing the winged lion understood that it would be protecting the Flying Sword Sect during the time he was not there.


    With this, all his preparations were done and he was ready to leave for the alchemypetition together with Qing Yi!


    Now all that was left to do, was wait until the day of departure arrived....


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 Chapter 381 - State Of Mind

    <h4>Chapter 381 - State Of Mind</h4>


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    The day for departure slowly approached as the news about the uing alchemypetition became more well known among the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect.


    This in turn helped spread Qing Yi''s name, as she had formerly been a mostly unknown individual due to the fact that she spent most of her time locked away in her own alchemy room in Xuan Hao''s pavilion or was staying in the deeper parts of the Alchemy Hall where normal disciples not part of the Alchemy Hall wasn''t allowed.


    That she was a disciple of Xuan Hao only helped spread her reputation even further, as Qing Yi had essential ended up bing an overnight celebrity inside the Flying Sword Sect. Even though the person herself still had no clue that she had suddenly be the main talking point among the majority of the disciples inside the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    "Hm¡­ We should be leaving tomorrow morning, but I still have not managed to fully learn those few potion and pill recipes¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he looked down at a few booksid out in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help butment over the fact that he had not managed to learn even a fraction of the pill and potion recipes for the Artisan Realm that the Flying Sword Sect had.


    The sheer number of potion and pill recipes easily numbered in the hundreds, but Xuan Hao had only managed to learn at most a few dozen over the past few months.


    Nowhere near his original target of learning all of them before the alchemypetition¡­


    The Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire would surely have ess to more than recipes than him and at the same time would likely have learned far more than him¡­


    The Sky Empire even had someone above the Artisan Realm, so the old Artisan Alchemist might even have learned a few recipes bordering the realm between an Artisan Alchemist and a Master Alchemist¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Xuan Hao sighed a bit to himself as he picked up one of the books in front of him, his rate of learning recipes had been way slower than what he had expected, but it was still understandable.


    After all, the knowledge and skill he had gained was for the Artisan Realm. If he wanted to speed up his learning speed of Artisan Realm recipes, he would have to breakthrough and be a Master Alchemist, but that was easier said than done.


    Without the systems help or any other kinds of external help, Xuan Hao knew that it would take him at least a few years'' time at minimum to be a Master Alchemist by himself.


    Even if this speed was more than enough to shock every other alchemist at the Ewaria Continent, Xuan Hao knew that it was still too slow. After all, the alchemypetition would have finished at that point in time¡­


    "I need to stop worrying so much about someone I haven''t even met yet¡­" Shaking his head as he realized how worried he had be about someone he had never even met yet attempting to steal away his disciple, Xuan Hao could not help putting down the book he had just picked up.


    I need to calm down¡­


    Sitting down in a meditative position, Xuan Hao decided not to worry so much about the uing alchemypetition and instead focused on cultivating instead.


    At the very least, cultivating was way more calming than studying any more alchemy recipes and continuing with it while being in such a worried state might end up causing more harm to him in the end.


    Cultivating was a way easier to do and at the same time also helped him calm down.


    Quietly spending the rest of his time like this, quietly cultivating inside his room, Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes as the first rays of light passed through a small window in his room.


    "Cultivating is really useful¡­"


    Even if he didn''t manage to improve his cultivation realm, his state of mind had improved a lot from the day before.


    One of the most important things for cultivating was to keep a calm state of mind. In turn, cultivating had allowed Xuan Hao to fix his state of mind and calm down.


    Realizing the fact that even if the Artisan Alchemist ended up trying to take away his disciple, he would not have to fear him.


    After all, he was a Domain Lord and at the same time also an Artisan Alchemist!


    Given normal circumstances, there was no way the Artisan Alchemist in question would want to offend him for no reason by trying to steal away his disciple and there was even less of a chance that the Sky Empire would support him in case he did something like that¡­


    The importance of a Domain Lord to an Empire could not be taken lightly and at the same time, someone who was also an Artisan Alchemist!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao no longer felt as worried as he had before.


    Even if he ended up being worse than the old Artisan Alchemist that was hosting thepetition, he would not have to worry about him trying to take away his disciple!


    At the very least, that was what Xuan Hao hade to believe after a night of meditation¡­


    ¡­


    "Haha! Finally, the alchemypetition is about to begin! I have been so excited thinking about getting a new disciple!"


    At the same time, in a messy room inside arge pce located far away from the Flying Sword Sect, an elderly man with a potion bottle in one handughed happily to himself as he looked over arge list of names in front of him that mentioned the names of every single person who was going to participate in his alchemypetition.


    Yes, this was the old Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire that Xuan Hao was worried about possibly taking away his disciple!


    "Hm? Flying Sword Sect? Isn''t that the sect that his highness got interested intely due to them suddenly having someone in the Domain Lord Realm?" Muttering this to himself while looking through the list in front of him, a hint of interest shed through the elderly man''s eyes.


    "Qing Yi?" Looking over the name attached to the Flying Sword Sect, the elderly man smiled even more as he grew curious about the person that hade from the sect that just had someone reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Master¡­ Stop smiling like that, it looks creepy¡­" At the same time, a young woman who just entered the room, witnessed her old master''s splendid smile¡­


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 Chapter 382 - Departure

    <h4>Chapter 382 - Departure</h4>


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    Preparing for the alchemypetition, Xuan Hao was not the only person who was worried. Instead, the elders from the Alchemy Hall were the most worried about the alchemypetition.


    The reason for this, was that the oue of the alchemypetition would end up affecting the disciples outlook on the Alchemy Hall and could either help them gain a lot of interested new disciples to join the Alchemy Hall or in turn cause the few who were already interested in joining to stay away¡­


    Qing Yi''s improvement over thest few months. Even if she had improved a lot, still did not manage to calm down the elders of the Alchemy Hallpletely.


    After all, it was highly likely that she would end uppeting against an alchemist from the Sky Empire! Someone like that would likely have practiced alchemy for a way longer time than Qing Yi and at the same time might also have ess to way better alchemist that could help them out.


    In the worst-case scenario, someone who had been guided by one of the few Master Alchemist in the Sky Empire might even end up showing up!


    This could result in the unfortunate thing of Qing Yi being knocked out of thepetition in the early stages. Not something the elders from the Alchemy Hall wanted to see¡­ But all they could do was to be worried by themselves, as the day of departure finally arrived.


    "Is everyone here?" Standing at the stable of the beast tamers, Gong Bo asked with an anxious look on his face.


    "No! Elder Xuan and his disciple are still missing, we should get ready to leave so we can leave the moment they show up."


    Answering the short elder from the Alchemy Hall, another elder from the Alchemy Hall told him before getting up on a nearby flying demon beast.


    For the journey, the Alchemy Hall had decided to use flying demon beasts. Usingnd-based demon beasts was simply way too slow and they would also have to deal with way more ambushes along the way.


    "Elder Xuan and Qing Yi is not here yet¡­?" Hearing the answer from the elder, Gong Bo began growing worried as he nervously looked over in the direction of Xuan Hao''s pavilion.


    Even though he knew that he had arrived way earlier than the time that they had nned, Gong Bo was still nervous when he saw everyone already here expect Xuan Hao and Qing Yi.


    I really should not have asked everyone toe before the nned time¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he smiled wryly while looking up towards the still dark sky with the sun not going to appear any time soon¡­


    ¡­


    A few hourster, Xuan Hao had just gotten up from his night of cultivating before looking for Qing Yi to leave for the alchemypetition.


    "Master! Are we leaving now!"


    Opening the door to her room with an excited expression on her face and a few dark circles under her eyes from a clearck of sleep, Qing Yi asked in an excited tone.


    "Yes¡­ But we will first have to say goodbye to your two junior brothers before leaving¡­" Not wanting to ask her about the dark circles under her eyes, Xuan Hao and Qing Yi both went to find a tired Bai Ning to say goodbye before going out to find Chu Yang already up training at the training ground to say goodbye.


    Followed by another quick visit to the winged lion that would protect the Flying Sword Sect while he was gone, Xuan Hao and Qing Yi both made their way towards the stable of the beast tamers where they had agreed to meet the elders from the Alchemy Hall.


    "Gong Bo¡­ Is something wrong¡­?" Looking at one of the core elders of the Alchemy Hall that would be going with them nervously walking back and forth with an anxious look on his face, Xuan Hao could not help but think that something bad had happened.


    Maybe the flying demon beasts they were going to use had suddenly gotten sick or something?


    "Elder Xuan! Qing Yi! Both of you are finally here! Nothing is wrong, nothing is wrong! I was just a bit nervous when thinking about the alchemypetition, that''s all!" Hearing Xuan Hao''s voice, Gong Bo excitedly ran over and almost tripped over his long beard as he hurriedly exined.


    Seeing that Xuan Hao didn''t say anything after hearing his exnation, Gong Bo heaved a sigh of relief before quickly running into the stable of the beast tamers beforeing out with arge ck bird demon beast that could barely make its way out of the stable without idently hitting the top of the entrance to the stable.


    "This is the Great Raven demon beast, I personally got the beast tamers to prepare it for you and your disciple to use during the journey, Elder Xuan! It''s by far one of the best flying demon beasts that we currently have in the sect, being at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm! I even heard that the sect master personally caught it in the past!"


    Introducing the Great Raven demon beast to the best of his abilities, Gong Bo quickly came over with the Great Raven demon beast.


    "I see¡­ Thanks¡­" Not knowing what to say to Gong Bo as he watched how disdainfully the Great Raven demon beast was looking at him while he introduced it to him, Xuan Hao discreetly let out a small bit of his aura to intimidate the Great Raven demon beast a bit.


    After all, he did not want a repeat of what happened thest time he flew with a demon beast from the sect¡­


    "!"


    Not saying? a word as it felt his terrifying auraing from Xuan Hao, the Great Raven demon beastpletely froze up as it looked over at Xuan Hao with a fearful expression on its face.


    W-who is that human?! He is even more terrifying than the person who caught me!


    With these few thoughts passing through its mind, the Great Raven demon beast was way smarter than the shadow hawk and decided to not offend Xuan Hao.


    Did that human perhaps have anything to do with what happened to that youngling Shadow Hawk¡­? And now I''m going to fly with that terrifying human on my back¡­!


    Thinking about this, the Great Raven suddenly felt Xuan Hao had be even more scary than before, as it started shivering violently. Not even daring to take a single step back in fear that it would end up like the Shadow Hawk¡­


    "Haha, looks like the Great Raven is all excited knowing that it will get to fly Elder Xuan!" From the side, Gong Bo could not help but smile happily as he eximed upon seeing the Great Ravens behaviour.


    Stupid human! Who is exited to fly that terrifying monster! I want to go back!


    "Should we get going now that everyone has arrived?" Ignoring the angry res he got from the Great Raven demon beast, Gong Bo asked Xuan Hao as he had already gotten on top of his own flying demon beast along with the rest of the elders that were going to join them for the alchemypetition.


    Looking at the few elders that were present, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit surprised when he discovered Chi Hu among the elders that were joining them.


    "Yeah, let''s get going."


    But this did not really surprise him too much as he had already expected that someone other than him among the core elders would be joining, he had just not expected for the recently added core elder Chi Hu to be the one.


    Whoosh!


    After Xuan Hao''s words, the small group made up of a few members from the Alchemy Hall, Chi Hu, Xuan Hao and Qing Yi set off towards the alchemypetition.


    In a sense, this was after all his first encounter with someone from the Sky Empire¡­ Outside of the ones he had unknowingly seen in the secret realm from a distance¡­


    The first real encounter with the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao, both feared it and looked forward to it at the same time. This was after all an empire that had someone who surpassed the Domain Lord Realm in it¡­


    ¡­


    BOOM!


    "Haha! I finally managed to breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm! I have to thank Elder Xuan in the future when I have a chance!"


    At the same time, over in the Spring Flower Sect, Shu Yao wasughing happily as she had finally managed to consolidate a domain of her own. Reaching the Domain Lord Realm!


    Along with her joyful voice, a field of flowers appeared all around her as her domain manifested itself, Shu Yao was ecstatic at her breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm.


    The flower field seemed to go on forever with Shu Yao at the centre of this field of flowers.. Happilyughing to herself, as the countless flower around her began blooming in all kinds of colours in response to her happy emotions.


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 Chapter 383 - Iron Sky Kingdom

    <h4>Chapter 383 - Iron Sky Kingdom</h4>


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    Having set off towards the alchemypetition, Xuan Hao and the rest flew through the air peacefully without anyone appearing to disturb them.


    After all, as they had chosen to fly, the only ones who would be able to even attack them in the first ce, was someone in the Domain Lord Realm or someone who also had a flying demon beast like them.


    This in turn, had made their overall journey smoother and saferpared to how it would be if they had decided to travel bynd where any random bandit group would be able to attack them.


    However, this was only the first part of their journey through a few kingdoms with simr strength to the past Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    After all, the farther away from the Flying Sword Sect they got and the closer they got to the core of the Sky Empire, the stronger the average strength of the people would get. The kingdoms they passed through would in turn also be stronger.


    Not to mention that in the Sky Empires core areas, the few bandit groups that had been able to continue existing there were rumoured to have more than a few dozen people in the Nascent Soul Realm! A force that would easily be able to overwhelm the Flying Sword Sect of the past!


    A group that powerful would of course have several flying demon beasts!


    Luckily, the alchemypetition was not located anywhere close to the ces where such groups operated.


    Instead, it was located in a rtively small kingdom barely inside the core area of the Sky Empire.


    The kingdom in question was one of the more important kingdoms under the Sky Empire, the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    The main reason for the Iron Sky Kingdoms importance was not due to the fact that the ruler of the kingdom was someone in the Domain Lord Realm, but due to the fact that the Iron Sky Kingdom was by far the biggest producer of spiritual metals inside the Sky Empire.


    This in turn had also allowed the kingdom to be one of the wealthiest kingdoms under the Sky Empire and had in the end solidified the kingdoms position as one of the most important under the Sky Empire.


    From what little Xuan Hao had learned about the Iron Sky Kingdom, he knew that it was often seen as a gathering ce for people belonging to all sorts of professions.


    cksmithsing for therge quantity of spiritual metals, alchemistsing to buy cauldrons and other equipment used in the making of their pills and potions and normal cultivatorsing to buy artifacts or weapons from the abundant number of cksmiths that resided in the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Even Domain Lords often made a trip to the Iron Sky Kingdom due to the fact that the ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom was not only a Domain Lord, but also a Master cksmith at the same time!


    As for what kind of powers that existed inside of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao had no clue.


    After all, the Flying Sword Sect was still located quite far away from the Iron Sky Kingdom and had never really interacted with it before. The only reason why Xuan Hao had even managed to learn about the Iron Sky Kingdom in the first ce, was because the Flying Sword Sect had a few records about it that had been passed down over the years.


    To be honest, the current situation of the Iron Sky Kingdom might be a lot different from what Xuan Hao had learned from the records in the Flying Sword Sect. The records in question were after all a few hundred years old at this point and even though not much should have changed as the Iron Sky Kingdom had the Sky Empire and a Domain Lord backing it¡­ But one never knew if something had happened¡­


    Maybe Gong Bo knew something? After all, he was among the older generation of the Flying Sword Sect and should have quite a few friends that travelled around the ce.


    Whoosh~


    "Elder Gong Bo, do you perhaps know anything about the current situation of the Iron Sky Kingdom?"


    Moving the Great Raven demon beast, he and Qing Yi were flying on a little closer to Gong Bo''s flying demon beast, Xuan Hao asked with a curious expression on his face. At the same time, his question also caused Qing Yi to look over towards Gong Bo curiously.


    Compared to Xuan Hao who had read up a bit about the ce that they were going, Qing Yi had never even learned about the name of the kingdom that the alchemypetition was being held in. Instead, she had fully focused on improving her alchemy during thest few months.


    "The Iron Sky Kingdom¡­ Hm¡­ I do have a friend who visited the ce recently, but he didn''t talk much about the overall situation of the kingdom itself, he only reallyined about the increasing price of a few spiritual metals he had gone there for¡­


    Ah! If I''m not wrong, he did mention that the king of the Iron Sky Kingdom recently entered closed door seclusion at that time to breakthrough. If I''m not wrong, the king of the Iron Sky Kingdom should be close to the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm if he seeded in breaking through at that time¡­ Maybe he even broke through and became a Peak Domain Lord already!" Finishing, Gong Bo had an awe inspired look on his face upon mentioning the fact that the ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom might have reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Peak of the Domain Lord Realm! Even in the entire Sky Empire, someone like that would be among the top ten strongest people below the ones at the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Even Xuan Hao felt a little cautious upon hearing the strength of the current ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom, he still had no clue how he would fare against someone who had truly reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm.


    The winged lion, while strong, had not reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "A Peak Domain Lord¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help but think about how his current strengthpared to a Peak Domain Lord at the Ninth Stage of the Realm¡­


    "Elder¡­ Will that person perhaps also be present during the alchemypetition¡­?" Sitting a little behind Xuan Hao, Qing Yi had also begun growing nervous upon hearing the strength of the current ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom, as she asked Gong Bo.


    "Haha, you don''t need to worry about that Qing Yi, someone like that won''te to watch the alchemypetition! At most he would show up to greet the Artisan Alchemist due to him being part of the Sky Empire. From what my friend told me; The ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom rarely leaves his cksmith. Even if a Domain Lord shows up, he won''t leave unless they seek him out or causes trouble!" Laughing a bit as he said this in an attempt to calm down Qing Yi, Gong Bo also felt like what he was saying was the truth.


    From what he had learned about the ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom, he would never leave his cksmith and would at times even directly refuse some of the Domain Lords that came to seek him to make a weapon or an artifact at the door without meeting them.


    The only time he would leave was if someone from the Sky Empire came or if one of the more powerful Domain Lords under the Sky Empire showed up to find him!


    Nodding her head upon listening to what Gong Bo was saying, Qing Yi suddenly looked up at her master before¡­


    "Do you think he wille out to greet master?"


    "Ah¡­ Maybe? I don''t know¡­"


    Feeling a bit shocked at Qing Yi''s question, Gong Bo suddenly realized the fact that they also had someone in the Domain Lord Realm apanying them to the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    If the ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom came out to greet the Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire, would he not also end up greeting Elder Xuan after having already made his way out of his cksmith?


    "What do you think, Elder Xuan?" Not knowing what to say as Qing Yi kept staring fixedly over at him with shinning eyes, Gong Bo turned to ask Xuan Hao about what he thought.


    "Hm¡­ No idea, he mighte over to say hello. After all, I''m a new Domain Lord in the Sky Empire that he never met before¡­" Thinking about Gong Bo''s question for a short moment, Xuan Hao quickly answered.


    "Really!? Then we might get to meet the king of the Iron Sky Kingdom!" Hearing what her master said, Qing Yi felt that it would be reasonable for the king of the Iron Sky Kingdom toe over and greet her master.


    At the same time, she suddenly began growing nervous thinking about the fact that she would likelye face to face with such a powerful figure in the soon to be future!


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 Chapter 384 - Talking With Chi Hu

    <h4>Chapter 384 - Talking With Chi Hu</h4>


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    "By the way, Chi Hu, have you met Zhu Lian yet¡­?" Having finished asking Gong Bo about what he knew about the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao moved the Great Raven over towards Chi Hu flying close by on his own flying demon beast. Not paying too much attention to Qing Yi as she seemed to be deep in thought of something after talking with Gong Bo.


    "Zhu Lian? No, I haven''t met her yet,st time I saw her was on top of the Third Star Peak¡­" Showing a bewildered expression upon hearing Xuan Hao''s question, Chi Hu answered his question. Not knowing why Xuan Hao had suddenly asked him about one of his pastpanions whom he ascended the Third Star Peak together with¡­


    "Hm¡­ I see¡­" Not intending to ask anymore after hearing Chi Hu''s answer, Xuan Hao quickly realized that Zhu Lian had not even made her way to the Flying Sword Sect yet.


    Maybe something hade up that had ended up dying her along the way?


    After all, she might not be like Chi Hu who was a wandering cultivator without any family or rtives before joining the Flying Sword Sect.


    Thinking about it, Xuan Hao was not too worried about anything happening to Zhu Lian. If something serious really did happen, she could always contact him through hismunication talisman. Other than that, she was also someone in the Nascent Soul Realm and was at the same time an experienced wandering cultivator¡­


    Xuan Hao doubted that she would be someone to easily end up in trouble in the first ce, or she would have long since ended up dying during her travels. The world was a dangerous ce and one needed to know when to stay low, especially so for wandering cultivators who often had no one to back them up.


    "Did you perhaps happen to meet Zhu Lian? Did she manage to breakthrough and on the Third Star Peak!?"


    Not one to back down after having heard about one of his old friends who had gone together with him to do ast-ditch attempt on breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm, Chi Hu moved the demon beast he was flying on a little closer to Xuan Hao''s Great Raven, as he asked expectantly.


    "Yes, I did meet her, and she did indeed breakthrough like you! I invited her toe and join the Flying Sword Sect like I did with you a few months back, but I just realized she has not showed up yet¡­ Do you perhaps have any idea what might have caused her dy?" Hearing what Chi Hu said, Xuan Hao decided to answer him truthfully and at the same time ask him if he had any idea what might have dyed Zhu Lian.


    "Really?! And she broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm like me?!"


    "Yes¡­"


    Seeing how excited Chi Hu had be upon hearing that one of his old friends had managed to break through just like him and even agreed to join the Flying Sword Sect like himself, Xuan Hao just answered inly as he waited for him to calm down before asking if he knew about anything about why she hadn''t showed up even after a few months had passed.


    "Hm¡­ From what I know, Zhu Lian still kept in touch with her family after bing a wandering cultivator. Even visiting them once every few years. If I''m not wrong, she should have headed back home to visit her family before officially joining the sect¡­ Her family is located quite far away from the Flying Sword Sect.


    After all, both me and her came here from far away due to a few rumours we had heard of the Third Peak through a few friends. Back then, we used a few years to reach the Third Star Peak, but given that she reached the Nascent Soul Realm, she should not take too long to get back home ande back, she might even have arrived when we return to the sect again!" Thinking over it for a short moment before answering Xuan Hao''s question, Chi Hu soon fell silent as he looked forward to meeting his old friend upon returning to the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Hm¡­ I understand, that would indeed make sense¡­" Nodding his head in understand upon hearing what Chi Hu said, Xuan Hao still felt that there was something wrong with the fact that Zhu Lian had not yet reached the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Maybe it was because of his talk with her back at the Third Star Peak that had convinced him that she would have rushed over to the Flying Sword Sect and reach the sect even before him, Xuan Hao unknowingly felt a little worried about Zhu Lian.


    No use thinking about it, if something dangerous really happened to her, she should have contacted me by now¡­


    Thinking this to himself as a quiet atmosphere had descended upon the group, Xuan Hao soon closed his eyes and began to meditate on top of the Great Raven. No longer concerning himself with the outside world.


    Their journey wouldst for at least a few weeks, and one would quickly grow bored of the ever-changing terrain below. At that point, one could at the very least meditate to make time go by.


    This was also one of the reason Xuan Hao had decided to use a flying demon beast instead of flying by himself.


    Sitting on top of the Great Raven, while it was slower than flying himself, he could at the very least spend his time cultivating.


    If he flew by himself, he would still have to wait for the others anyway¡­


    Carrying all of them with his domain¡­?


    There were more than a dozen people and he did not exhaust his strength by carrying everyone there a little faster.


    How awkward would it be for him to end up facing a possibly hostile Domain Lord just after he had exhausted his strength to carry everyone? Even if the chances were low, Xuan Hao did not want to risk it!


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 Chapter 385 - Rebellion In The Azure Sky Kingdom

    <h4>Chapter 385 - Rebellion In The Azure Sky Kingdom</h4>


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    Flying towards the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao didn''t pay any mind to his surroundings as he focused on his meditation. Only keeping up his divine sense in a short area around the group, so as to make sure he could react in time in case they were attacked.


    On the other hand, Qing Yi who was sitting just behind him began focusing on the terrain passing by below them intently.


    After having travelled for quite some time, they finally passed through the borders of a neighbouring kingdom.


    For Qing Yi, this was her first time ever outside the borders of the now gone Heavenly Sky Kingdom, so she was making sure that she kept an eye out for anything new.


    Xuan Hao did not really care too much about all of this. After all, the kingdoms around them, were not much stronger than the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had been back at its peak¡­


    The thing Xuan Hao was looking forward to seeing, was the Iron Sky Kingdom. Even if it was only located at the border of what was widely regarded as the core part of Sky Empires, Xuan Hao clearly knew the importance of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Other than all of that, the Iron Sky Kingdom could also be considered the first ce that was truly a core part of the Sky Empire that he would be visiting!


    ¡­


    At the same time that Xuan Hao, Qing Yi and the rest of the group passed the border and truly left the Flying Sword Sect''s territory, chaos was beginning to spread through the Azure Sky Kingdom located just next door.


    "Just what in the world is happening?! Howe those ants dared to cause so much trouble all of a sudden? And howe none of you have managed to stop it yet?!" An angry roar could be heard inside the pce located at the centre of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s capital as a group of people were kneeling down in front of arge throne where a majestic looking middle-aged man was sitting with a heavy look on his face as he looked down on the group of people kneeling below him.


    The person on the throne was none other than the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom, Su Wuhan, who had just a few months earlier ended the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!


    However, things didn''t work out like he had expected they would¡­


    After chasing the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to no avail and having no luck finding the thing, he had destroyed the Heavenly Sky Kingdom for in the first ce, Su Wuhan had gone back home.


    Angry at the fact that he couldn''t get anything other than a bit of thend he had lost to the ancestor of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the past due to the fact that the sects were too strong for him to deal with¡­ Heck, the Spring Flower Sect had someone at the same realm as him, while the Flying Sword Sect was rumoured to have someone at the Domain Lord Realm¡­ There was no way he would want to fight someone like that over a bit of territory with his current strength!


    However, this was not the end of his troubles and could only be considered the beginning of it¡­


    At first, he had thought he just had to deal with the three neighbouring kingdoms that had banded together to grab a bit of his territory while he was gone dealing with the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, but things had soon ended up spiralling out of control and he suddenly had to deal with a rebellion trying to overthrow him.


    Who was leading this rebellion? The normal people with close to no cultivation!


    Apparently, they had been fed up with their conditions under the gue and wanted to overthrow him¡­


    At first when he had heard about this, Su Wuhan had simplyughed it off. After all, what could a bunch of useless people with no cultivation do to him? Even if he allowed them to freely attack him, they would simply have no way of even injuring him!


    For that reason, Su Wuhan had not really cared about the rebellion when he first heard about it and sent a group of people over to deal with it! Now, that group of people were currently kneeling down in front of him with fearful expressions stered all over their faces¡­


    "Answer me! How have you not managed to deal with that little rebellion yet!?" Seeing that none of the people kneeling down in front of him dared to talk, Su Wuhan grew even more angry as his killing intent along with his pseudo domain pressed down on the group of people.


    "I-I apologies your majesty! But that group of people were simply way too strong, and we weren''t able to deal with them! All our attacks were immediately rendered ineffective when we attacked and the people not here with us today perished during the confrontation!" Nervously stepping forward after feeling that his king would indeed begin killing them unless they began talking, one of the people shivered all over before he began speaking of what he had experienced.


    "Too strong? Perished? Tell me what happened, I want to know everything!"


    Listening to the short answer of what happened, Su Wuhan suddenly felt that something was very wrong about the rebellion that had appeared in his kingdom.


    Rebellions were not rare, but they would normally be easily dealt with.


    The only party he could think of that had the ability to truly begin a rebellion inside his kingdom, was the Ascendant Frost Hall, which was also one of the reasons why he had been nning to get rid of them over the past few years¡­


    "W-when we first went to confront the rebels, everything was fine and weunched an attack to quickly deal with them¡­ But¡­"


    "But?"


    "B-but all of a sudden, one of the rebels stepped forward to confront us while muttering something to himself as a pale green light engulfed him and spread out towards us¡­ Seeing this weird light, we all felt a threat of death and decided to retreat as fast as we could.


    However¡­ All of us were not fast enough, those who managed to retreat in time are here before you, your majesty, while those who didn''t¡­ Are dead¡­ None of us manged to get a good look at what happened to their bodies as all of us were too busy escaping at that point¡­" Finishing his exnation, the person who had been brave enough to step forward fearfully went back to the rest of the group as he nervously waited for his king''s response.


    "¡­ Leave, I will have to think about this alone!"


    Hearing the exnation, Su Wuhan narrowed both his eyes before sending the group out of the throne room.


    Bang!


    "Hah¡­ I never expected the church of the gue god to target me and my kingdom¡­" Slumping down on his throne with a slightly helpless look on his face after seeing the door close behind the group that had just been shivering down in front of him, Su Wuhan almost looked more nervous and afraid than them as he quickly took out amunication talisman before contacting someone.


    No matter what, Su Wuhan clearly knew about the strength of the church of the gue god and along with that, he also very clearly knew that he could not face such a powerful church by himself.


    Even if he managed to deal with the ones currently trying to take control of his kingdom, he would still have to deal with the possible revenge of the church in the future¡­


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 Chapter 386 - Entering The Iron Sky Kingdom!

    <h4>Chapter 386 - Entering The Iron Sky Kingdom!</h4>


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    Time slowly passed with the group from the Flying Sword Sect flying towards the Iron Sky Kingdom. The journey, much to both Gong Bo and Chi Hu''s surprise, continued without even a single attack from a local bandit group or something simr¡­


    Like this, the group soon found themselves on the border to the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Different from the border of the kingdoms before them that had easily let them pass through without too much difficulty. The border of the Iron Sky Kingdom waspletely different as severalrge towers were scattered across the border of the kingdom.


    From a single nce, Xuan Hao could clearly feel a terrifying power lying dormant inside the towers and instantly realized they were some sort of artifact that had likely been made by the current king of the Iron Sky Kingdom to protect the borders of his kingdom.


    "We should descend from here on out and make the rest of our way towards the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom by walking!" Before Xuan Hao could even bring up the matter that the artifacts in the shape ofrge towers scattered across the border might attack them if they just flew into the Iron Sky Kingdom, Gong Bo spoke up and suggested for them tond before making their way across the border on foot.


    Whoosh~


    Following the words of Gong Bo, everyone in the group descended a few hundred meters away from the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom before making their way over towards a road just besides the ce where theynded, as they followed the road into the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "Stop!"


    The moment they were about to cross the border, someone called out to them before a person jumped down from a nearby tower and quickly approached the group.


    Inspecting the person who had called out to them before rapidly approaching them, Xuan Hao quickly realized that the person in question was someone at the Nascent Soul Realm! While only at the second stage of the realm, Xuan Hao still felt amazed at the strength of the border guard.


    How many Nascent Soul Realm Experts would the Iron Sky Kingdom have if each and every tower at the border had someone like that inside of it¡­?


    Just thinking about it made Xuan Hao realize just how strong the Iron Sky Kingdom was. Even if it''s size overall was smaller than even the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, its strength far outstripped it! And that was without mentioning the Domain Lord that controlled the kingdom itself!


    "What is your purpose for entering Iron Sky?" Arriving just a few meters in front of them, the border guard at the Nascent Soul Realm directly asked with a somewhat hostile look on her face as she closely observed everyone.


    Focusing mostly on Xuan Hao and Chi Hu, Chi Hu was at the Nascent Soul Realm, while she could not feel the realm Xuan Hao was at. Only knowing that it was stronger than herself.


    This in turn also caused her to tighten her grip around a spear she was carrying with her as she appeared a bit more cautious. looking ready to retreat or attack in case anything happened were to happen.


    "We are here to participate in the alchemypetition hosted by an alchemist from the Sky Empire¡­" Seeing how hostile the border guard looked, Gong Bo didn''t dare to dy as he quickly answered her question.


    "What sect or kingdom are you from? Can you prove your identities?""


    However, this did not seem to calm down the border guard in the slightest as she asked another question. The only difference being that she had taken a few more steps away from the group and towards the tower she had just jumped down from¡­


    "We are from the Flying Sword Sect, located in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, though¡­ The Heavenly Sky Kingdom came to an end a few months ago¡­ Currently we can be considered a sect living inside the Sky Empire and we are looking get a more legitimate status by joining the Sect Alliance that the Sky Empire is going to set up in the future!" Stepping forward, Xuan Hao quickly exined where they were from and took out his core elder token with the symbol of the Flying Sword Sect etched into it before signalling for Gong Bo to show the invitation to the alchemypetition to the border guard as well.


    "Flying Sword Sect? Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­?" Listening to what Xuan Hao said, the border guard narrowed both her eyes as she inspected the token in Xuan Hao''s hand along with the invitation letter for the alchemypetition.


    Swish!


    Waving her hand as the invitation letter flew out of Gong Bo''s hand before carefully reading through it, Xuan Hao and the rest did not interfere as all of them waited until the border guard was done and sent the invitation letter back to Gong Bo.


    "¡­ It looks like the invitation letter is authentic, you can enter¡­ Don''t cause any trouble while inside the Iron Sky Kingdom and don''t use your demon beasts to fly! Things are currently not so¡­ Never mind¡­" Nodding her head slowly before allowing them to enter, the border guard didn''t stay around, as she quickly disappeared back towards the direction of the tower she had originallye from.


    Only leaving them with a few words of caution and reminding them that they should not fly around inside the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "¡­"


    Looking at the disappearing figure of the border guard, Xuan Hao felt like a headache was on the way. From the looks of how cautious the border guard was, it looked like something troublesome was currently taking ce or going to happen inside the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    Not that he had expected for thing to gopletely smoothly, with Qing Yi joining the alchemypetition before they peacefully headed back to the sect again after thepetition had finished¡­ But he had still not expected to already see signs of trouble at the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "Hah¡­ That was so nerve wrecking! Looks like we will have to walk the rest of the way to the capital¡­" Sighing loudly as the border guard disappeared into the tower closest to them, Gong Bo patted the giant bird demon beast next to him before walking over towards Xuan Hao.


    "Elder Xuan, should we just send the demon beasts back to the sect? They should be able to find their way back on their own ording to the beast tamers. For getting back again, we can just loan a few flying demon beasts from the Iron Sky Kingdom. Kingdoms this big usually loan out flying demon beasts for a modest price¡­"


    "That sounds fine, it''s not like we can''t afford it¡­" Nodding his head in agreement with Gong Bo, Xuan Hao and the rest of the group got off their flying demon beasts before sending them back to the sect.


    Whoosh!


    Soon, with the Great Raven Xuan Hao and Qing Yi had flown on for thest few days flying up in the air, the rest of the flying demon beast soon flew into the air behind it, as the small group of flying demon beast soon headed back towards the Flying Sword Sect together. The Great Raven flying at the front leading the way for the weaker flying demon beasts.


    "Well¡­ We should get going as well¡­" Watching the flying demon beast making their way off into the distance towards the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao slowly began making his way across the border into the Iron Sky kingdom.


    The other elders and Qing Yi following closely behind him as the small group from the Flying Sword Sect officially entered the Iron Sky Kingdom!


    ¡­


    At the same time, at the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom, arge flying ship had appeared just outside the countless mining shafts that were scattered all around the area around the capital.


    Aside from their powerful king, this kingdom often appears in gossip all around the Sky Empire not just for the countless rare metals found there, but for the bottomless mining shafts their capital is built around. Many visitors have fallen in and disappeared forever.


    The main source of the Iron Sky Kingdoms fame was not only the rare spiritual metals that they were in possession of, but also the bottomless mining shafts they had dug out over the years to get their hands on the spiritual metals.


    Rumours even had it that the poption found on the surface of the Iron Sky Kingdom was far below that of the number that existed beneath the surface. Mining away for the precious spiritual metals that were abundant in the ground beneath the capital.


    In turn, the Iron Sky Kingdom formed by far one of the mostplex underground tunnelworks inside the entire Sky Empire! At the same time, the true size of the capital could not be measured just by seeing the capital itself¡­ One also had to ount for what was hidden beneath the surface!


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 Chapter 387 - First Town

    <h4>Chapter 387 - First Town</h4>


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    As the flying ship slowly began descending in front of the capital, a few figures could be seen rushing out towards the flying ship before a small group of people had formed in front of the flying ship.


    Whoosh!


    Just as the flying shipnded, two people could be seen walking out from inside the flying ship.


    One was a young woman who was curiously looking at the unique mining shafts that the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom was built on top of, while the other was an elderly man who signalled for the group from the Iron Sky Kingdom standing in front of them toe over.


    "Master, this ce looks really interesting! Totally different from any of the other kingdoms around this ce!" As she was curiously looking at the mining shafts that were just a few meters in front of her.


    The mining haft in question was not an abandoned one but was still active as a few people could be seening up from time to time before making their way over towards the capital with a few precious spiritual metals in hand.


    Though¡­ The flying ships sudden appearance had mostly caused these people to take a short break as they were looking towards it with curious expressions on their faces.


    Flying ships were not something just anyone could use, and it required a lot of resources to make one in the first ce. For that reason, other than Domain Lords. Normally only people with a strong background would ever use a flying ship.


    Not to mention that the symbol of the Sky Empire was stered all over the flying ship¡­ Making it rather easy for anyone passing by to identify who it belonged to and think twice about whether they would want to try and rob it¡­


    "Ah¡­ It''s your first time to the Iron Sky Kingdom if I''m not wrong?" Thinking about something for a short moment as he watched the people from the Iron Sky Kingdom making their way over, the elderly man turned to ask the young woman walking beside him.


    "Yes¡­ I never got a chance to visit because a certain someone didn''t want to let me leave the capital before I at the very least became an Expert Alchemist¡­!" Frowning a bit towards the end as she narrowed her eyes while looking at the elderly man walking beside her, it was clear to everyone around who she was referring to.


    "Hehe, I wonder who that was¡­ Now, now, the people from the Iron Sky Kingdom are already here! Let''s not think about the past any longer." Brushing the young woman''s words aside with a shameless smile on his face, the elderly man quickly switched the focus of the conversation towards the people of the Iron Sky Kingdom who finally came to a stop only a few meters away from them.


    "Greetings, Artisan Fang Shi! We are part of the royal guard and are here to escort both of you to the royal pce!" Stepping forward and introducing who they were, a tall looking and well-built female soldier d in a full te of armour bowed down in front of Fang Shi while saying this.


    The other soldiers standing behind her silently followed her lead as they bowed down as well in a show of respect towards the elderly man.


    "Hoho, I never expected to be greeted so sincerely. Just get up for now and let''s get moving, I still have quite a lot to prepare for before the start of thepetition¡­ After all, I don''t want to end up not even having the spiritual herbs needed for thepetition ready when it starts!" Laughing happily with a smile on his face as he saw how respectful the royal guards of the Iron Sky Kingdom was to him, the elderly man called Fang Shi soon dragged the young woman with them as both of them made their way towards the royal pce of the Iron Sky Kingdom under the protection of the small group of royal guards¡­


    It had to be noted that each and every single one of the royal guards had at least reached the fourth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm! The strong looking woman, who had taken the lead in talking with Fang Shi, was at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    From this alone, it could easily be seen how strong the Iron Sky Kingdom waspared to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!


    Someone who wasparable to the strongest person in another kingdom was only one of the people in charge of the royal guard of the Iron Sky Kingdom!


    Other than that, the strong looking woman was still young and might even have a chance to breakthrough into the Domain Lord Realm in the future with the guidance and help from the king of the Iron Sky Kingdom!


    ¡­


    At the same time, Xuan Hao and the rest of the group had just entered the territory of the Iron Sky Kingdom, when they came upon their first town.


    "What is this?"


    "How in the world¡­"


    "T-this is still a town¡­?"


    Outside of Xuan Hao who had long since managed to grasp the appearance of the town before they could even see it, everyone else gasped in wonder and amazement at the weird town in front of them.


    Instead of a normal town just consisting of a few buildings, houses and maybe a wall for protection against bandits or demon beasts, the town from the Iron Sky Kingdom was surrounded by severalrge mining shafts that went straight down into the ground below!


    Large groups of people could also be seen moving in and out of the mining shafts with severalrge containers filled with all sorts of different rocks.


    This, however, was not the most shocking part of the town from the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­ The most shocking part of it was the town itself.


    The town was located above an enormous mining shaft in the shape of a giant hole that had a diameter of at least a few hundred meters!


    Held up by several supporting beams located at the sides of the enormous circr mining shaft, the town was barely held up. Looking like it could fall and take everyone inside the town together with it into the enormous mining shaft below if even a single support beam ended up breaking.


    Even Xuan Hao felt a wave of nervousness wash over him while looking at the town from a distance. Not to say how the rest of the group had reacted to the shocking sight.


    Towards the centre of the town, Xuan Hao could feel the presence of a formation that helped keep the entire town stable. The formation itself was not tooplicated and just helped spreading the pressure at the centre of the town out towards the corners of the town where the support beams were present.


    The formation was most likely the only reason why the town could even exist in its current state, and it made Xuan Hao wonder why the inhabitants had not just simply built the town around the giant miningshaft and had instead decided to build on top of it¡­


    Looking a bit closer at the countless smaller mining shafts located around the town, Xuan Hao suddenly seemed to havee to some understand as to why the town was not located beside the giant mining shaft¡­ There was simply no ce to put the town in the first ce¡­


    "Master¡­ Are we going to enter that town¡­?" Nervously grabbing onto the side of his robe to get his attention, Qing Yi seemed almost afraid as she asked this while keeping her eyes locked on the weird town almost floating above the giant mining shaft.


    "Of course, we are going to visit the town! Aren''t you curious why the people here build a town directly above such a giant vertical mining shaft?" Smiling down towards the nervous Qing Yi as he said this, Xuan Hao didn''t even wait for her to respond as he began making his way towards the weird town. Making sure not to fall into some of the smaller mining shafts that were located along the way.


    "¡­"


    Qing Yi who was about to answer her master about how she really didn''t want to visit the town dangling dangerously above a giant bottomless hole was left speechless as she watched her master walk over towards the town without even waiting for her!


    "M-master! Wait for me!" Not daring to hesitate and stand around for too long in case she lost sight of her master, Qing Yi bit down on her lips as she threw her fear of the weird town aside as she ran after Xuan Hao who was only a few dozen meters away from the entrance to the town at this point in time.


    ""¡­""


    The group of elders who hade together with them for the alchemypetition all looked silently at each other with. Nervously ncing over in the direction of Qing Yi and Xuan Hao from time to time.


    Whoosh~


    It was only when Chi Hu took the first step to follow after the master and disciple that the rest of the elders build up enough courage to break free from their nervous and fearful state and follow.


    They were not Domain Lords! If they ended up falling into the giant mining shaft, they would die! Even if they were Core Formation Realm Experts!


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 Chapter 388 - Scaring Everyone~

    <h4>Chapter 388 - Scaring Everyone~</h4>


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    Entering the town located above the giant mining shaft with Qing Yi following closely behind him, Xuan Hao began walking around towards the centre of the town on what could only be described as loose wooden boards a few meters long that had been clumsily put together to make up the main road of the small town.


    Just looking down at the wooden boards, Xuan Hao could easily see down into the bottomless mining shaft located beneath the town. At the very least, it looked like the thing holding up the buildings of the town was saferpared to the loose wooden boards that made up the main road going through the city¡­


    "M-master¡­ Is this really safe¡­?" At the same time, Qing Yi kept looking down through the holes in the main road of the town with a scared look on her face. Trying her best to keep as close to her master as possible.


    "Yes, it should be safe. After all, there is an entire town living here! If it was really that unsafe then-"


    "Ah! Old Hong fell through one of the holes in the road recently!"


    "Yeah, I heard about it! What a tragedy¡­"


    "Even worse, I heard the only reason he could fall through the hole was because he had lost weigh recently¡­ Slimming down was the end of old man Hong¡­"


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to reassure his disciple that everything was fine, a group of young people happened to pass by and interrupt him.


    "Master¡­"


    Looking even more like she wanted to leave the town after hearing what the young people had just said, Qing Yi looked up her master with a pleading look in her eyes.


    She was not big at all; she was young and would likely also have the ability to slip through one of the holes in the main road! She did not want to end up like the old man Hong mentioned by the young people!


    "You don''t have to worry¡­ Even if you end up falling through, I can still catch you!" Not knowing what to say, Xuan Hao half gave up as he said this. The town really was not a safe ce to live¡­


    "¡­"


    Not feeling the slightest bit safer upon hearing her master say this, Qing Yi cautiously moved towards the centre of the town together with him. Observing each and every single ce she stepped on beforehand to make sure she would not end up falling through.


    Chi Hu and Gong Bo''s group was no better as they also entered the town hanging above the giant mining shaft. The only difference between them and Qing Yi, was the fact that none of them had Xuan Hao to rely on in case they fell down.


    At the very least, they did not even think about the fact that Xuan Hao would be able to easily catch them with his domain if they happened to fall...


    In turn, this had caused the group to look even more nervous than Qing Yi while walking through the small town. Even causing a few of the townspeople to stop and look over at them with a curious look on their faces.


    "Mom, what are they doing?"


    "I think they are just scared of falling down, son."


    "Hm¡­ scared?"


    "Yes!"


    "¡­"


    Listening to the conversation of a mother and child as they cautiously made their way forward, Chi Hu felt himself blush red in embarrassment. Feeling the disdainful look of a close to 5-year-old boy was not something Chi Hu was used to¡­


    But what could he do? He truly was afraid of stepping down on a wrong spot and end up falling into the bottomless mining shaft below¡­


    ¡­


    After what felt like hours for everyone not Xuan Hao, the group from the Flying Sword Sect had finally managed to reach the centre of the town. Having gathered quite a bit of attention from the locals along the way¡­


    "What a big lift!"


    Not able to stop herself from letting out an exmation of surprise upon finally lifting her head and looking towards the centre of the town, Qing Yi was met with the sight of a giant lift.


    The lift was suspended by four giant tough looking metal chains made out of spiritual metal and was easily a dozen meters long and wide. Fitting a house on top of the lift should be no problem at all!


    "Indeed, quite a big lift¡­" Xuan Hao had already seen it through his divine sense long before he had reached the centre of the town, but he still felt amazed upon witnessing it first-hand.


    The reason for this was that the core of the formation that kept the town suspended safely above the mining shaft was none other than the lift, or to be more urate, the chains that held the lift up.


    Looking more closely, even without any cultivation so to speak of one would still be able to glimpse a few runes etched into the surface of the fourrge chains.


    Currently, a few dozen people were busy unloading severalrge rocks from the lift as they carelessly rolled them down onto the weak looking wooden boards that covered the town centre. The scared looks of Qing Yi and the rest of the people from the Flying Sword Sect as they watched this happen, was quite entertaining in its own way.


    "Master¡­ What are we here for?" Having seen the giant lift along with the rocks that were being rolled onto the fragile looking wooden boards, Qing Yi could no longer hold herself back from asking this question.


    Since the start, she did not understand why her master had decided to visit the town. Especially when it was so dangerous!


    Were they not supposed to be moving towards the capital for the alchemypetition¡­?


    "Haha, of course, it''s to help you get a little used to this kind of environment before we reach the capital! Gong Bo, how did that friend of yours describe the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom to you?"


    "He didn''t mention much¡­ Only saying that it was by far one of the most unique ces he had ever visited¡­ D-don''t tell me-"


    "Indeed, from what I read, the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom should be suspend just like this town!"


    Saying this before Gong Bo could voice out his doubts, Xuan Hao watched the expression on everyone around him change for the worse as they realized that they would be spending over a week living inside a ce simr to the town they were currently inside of!


    How big was the mining shaft that the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom was located above¡­? More importantly¡­ How deep was it?


    "From what I read, there have even been a Nascent Soul Realm Expert that was unlucky enough to fall down into the mining shaft that the capital is suspended above¡­ He never returned alive!"


    At the same time that these thoughts were coursing through everyone''s mind, Xuan Hao decided to add this with a smiling expression on his face.


    In fact, the capital was not suspended above a single giant mining shaft, but Xuan Hao decided not to say this and instead just allowed his disciple and the rest of the elder''s thoughts to run wild.


    As for the story of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert falling down a mining shaft and dying? That was merely a story he had made up to scare Chi Hu a bit, as it looked like he was realizing the fact that there was close to no way he would die from falling from a high ce.


    After all, he could just abandon his physical body and fly away with his Nascent Soul if things really came down to it¡­


    At the very least, Xuan Hao had quite a bit of fun at the expense of his disciple and the few elders from the sect.


    "Now, should we get going? We still need to reach the capital before the alchemypetition starts!" Smiling happily as he had seeded in scaring everyone, Xuan Hao no longer saw any use in staying around and decided to give everyone a way out of the current situation.


    "Yes!"


    "Let''s get going!"


    "We can''t waste too much time!"


    Without wasting even, a single second, everyone happily agreed with what Xuan Hao said before the group soon left the small town.


    The locals who had been busy removing the precious spiritual metals from the lift didn''t pay too much attention to these weird outsiders.


    From their point of view, their reaction was quite normal and most of them had long since be used to how outsiders reacted upon first entering their city. Mainly due to the town being located so close to the border and the fact that they saw way more outsiders passing throughpared to some of the towns closer to the capital.


    Like this, Xuan Hao and the rest set off towards the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


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 Chapter 389 - Entering The Capital

    <h4>Chapter 389 - Entering The Capital</h4>


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    The capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom was by no means small and easily stretched on for several thousand meters in each direction! The sheer size of the capital alone, was easily enough to fit the entire Flying Sword Sect a few times over¡­ Not that this was unwarranted as most of the people inside the Iron Sky Kingdom lived inside the capital and worked in one of the countless mineshafts that surrounded the capital.


    Looking at it from far away, Xuan Hao could not help but sigh in amazement as he clearly felt an enormous formation was in ce and covered the entire capital. The sheer number of resources required for something like that was far from anything he would ever be able to afford given his current situation!


    Just from feeling the terrifying aura hidden inside the formation, Xuan Hao was certain that more than one treasure at the Transcendent rank had been involved in its construction! The formation was likely strong enough to directly kill someone at the Domain Lord Realm without needing anyone to personally control it!


    This alone easily showed off just how wealthy the Iron Sky Kingdom was and understandably also made Xuan Hao more nervous about possibly meeting the current ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    After all, from what he could tell, there was a high chance that he was stronger than him and that is not to mention the fact that he would have the support of the giant formation covering the capital in case they ended up fighting!


    "I wonder if the king of the Iron Sky Kingdom opened up an independent space¡­ Given his resources, he should have the ability to do something like that¡­" Muttering this to himself as he gazed over towards the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom in the distance, Xuan Hao could not help but think back to what he knew about independent spaces, also known as secret realms after the master of the independent space had either passed away or left.


    Normally, an independent was a space that could only be created by an extremely powerful Domain Lord close to reaching the Soul Ascension Realm. Given that they had enough resources.


    So, with that in mind, Xuan Hao could not help but think that the king of the Iron Sky Kingdom had his own independent space, simr to the secret realm that he had visited in the past!


    As for the reason why, someone would spend so many resources to create an independent space in first ce, Xuan Hao still had no clue.


    Maybe the process of creating an independent space would be helpful towards one''sprehension of the world?


    "Master¡­ This is the capital!?" At the same time that Xuan Hao was deep in thought thinking about how far the king of the Iron Sky kingdom had gone, Qing Yi walked up beside him and asked with an amazed look on her face.


    "Yes!"


    Outside of the bottomless mining shafts the capital was built around, it lookedpletely different from how Qing Yi and the rest of the elders had imagined it after listening to Xuan Hao back in the small town located close to the border of the kingdom.


    From what he had said, they had imagined that the capital would be built on top of a giant mining shaft several thousand meters wide, but this was not the case. Instead, the capital looked like it was ced on solid ground without any giant mining shaft visible beneath it!


    "Should we get going? It''s starting to get dark, and they might close the gates during the night¡­" Watching as Qing Yi and the others gazed over towards the capital with amazement on their faces, Xuan Hao interrupted their current state as all of them nodded their heads in agreement with what Xuan Hao said.


    They really did not want to end up walking all the way to the capital. Only to find out that they had closed the gate and they would need to wait until morning¡­


    Even if they had Xuan Hao who would likely be able to get them in anyway due to the fact that he was a Domain Lord. One could never be too safe. After all, with the Iron Sky Kingdom''s strength and status in the Sky Empire, they were more than capable of dealing with a Domain Lord.


    ¡­


    Walking over towards the capital, Xuan Hao and the rest quickly realized just how many mining shafts were in the area around the capital.


    Seeing it from a distance and seeing it up close was apletely different experience, as arge crowd of people could be seen constantly streaming out from the countless mining shafts and towards the capital.


    Looking at this, Xuan Hao felt that it was a little odd that none of the peopleing out of the mining shafts scattered around the capital were carrying any of the ores or other things that they had mined down below.


    Whoosh~


    Spreading out his divine sense, Xuan Hao quickly looked into one of the nearby mining shafts, as he quickly found out the reason why the peopleing up were not carrying anything along with.


    The reason in question, was arge undergroundwork of mine carts that carried the newly extracted ores towards the capital, where they would likely be processed before being sold or used directly by the cksmiths of the Iron Sky Kingdom!


    Wanting to follow the direction the ores were going and look further; Xuan Hao abruptly came to a stop as he felt the formation around the capital appear in front of his divine sense.


    If he continued any further, he would likely end up alerting the formation and in turn the king of the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    Whoosh~


    Retracting his divine sense, Xuan Hao decided to not go any further. In the first ce, he did not want to idently offend the Domain Lord of the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    Other than that, they had also arrived in front of the gate leading into the capital. The only thing standing between them and entering the capital being an identification process carried out by the guards. Simr to how the border guard had wanted to confirm their identifies and where they came from before they were allowed to enter the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "Here for the alchemypetition?" Having made it to the line of people that were waiting to enter through the gate, Xuan Hao was caught slightly off-guard upon seeing one of the guards walk up to him and ask this.


    "Yes¡­ How did you know?"


    "I was informed about a group from the Flying Sword Secting to enter the capital for the alchemypetition hosted by Artisan Alchemist Fang Shi. Hm¡­ From what the border guard informed us about, your identities have already been confirmed, so you can enter without waiting!"


    "I see¡­ I will have to thank the border guard for her help if I see her again." Nodding his head in understanding upon hearing what the guard said.


    "No problem, we have all just recently been informed about making sure thepetitorsing to join in the alchemypetition gets there safely. Recently, things have not been so safe inside the capital, so I rmend you head directly towards the south side of the capital where the royal pce is located. The alchemypetition will begin in five days'' time. Until then, you can stay at a small manor that is ready for you to stay in over the next few weeks."


    "We have a small manor!?"


    Hearing what the guard said, Qing Yi could not help but exim from behind Xuan Hao as she heard this. Having expected they would be staying inside an inn during the alchemypetition. Much like how she had done travelling towards the Flying Sword Sect and waiting for the entrance ceremony to officially begin.


    "Yes, all of it was arranged by the Sky Empire''s Fang Shi, who is also the host of the alchemypetition!"


    After having made sure that they would indeed be staying inside a small manor during their stay in the capital, Qing Yi hadpletely ignored the part where the guard mentioned the capital was dangerous at the current point in time. Instead, she was looking forward to seeing the small manor they would be staying at.


    "How do we find out where to go when we reach the south part of the capital?"


    "The ce is more heavily guarded, and you will need to show the invitation to the alchemypetition again. After which, someone will help you find your way to the ce where thepetition is held and the location of the small manor that is reserved for you during your participation in the alchemypetition!"


    "I see, thank you¡­"


    "No need, it''s my job!"


    With a final polite exchange, Xuan Hao and the rest soon made their way inside the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom.. Of course, skipping over the line at the gate on the way in.


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 Chapter 390 - Iron Sky Market

    <h4>Chapter 390 - Iron Sky Market</h4>


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    Entering the capital of the Iron Sky kingdom, Xuan Hao and the rest were instantly met with the sight of a several shops lined up around arge open space. Forming into arge market that was located just at the other side of the gate.


    Three paths going straight through the market. One going straight ahead towards the south part of the capital, while two other paths went towards the eastern and western part respectively.


    Outside of therge paths piercing straight through the giant marketce at the entrance to the capital, Xuan Hao was instantly caught off-guard by the fact that he felt so many people at the Nascent Soul Realm present inside the marketce.


    From outside the gate, he could not really sense anything inside of the capital due to the formation blocking him. Only when entering the capital did he truly realize just how many Nascent Soul Realm Experts that existed inside the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom. Just in the marketce in front of the capital alone, Xuan Hao could sense more than a dozen people at the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "The Iron Sky Market¡­" As everyone else were staring at the marketce with curiosity, Gong Bo was the only person to not show a surprised expression as he instead showed one of longing.


    "Hm? Elder Gong Bo, do you perhaps know about this marketce?"


    Picking up on this and hearing him call what he supposed to be the name of the marketce in front of them, Xuan Hao''s question instantly caused the group from the Flying Sword Sect to turn their curious gazes towards Gong Bo.


    "Yeah¡­ I heard a bit about it from the friend of mine who visited the Iron Sky Kingdom in the past. The Iron Sky Market is quite famous inside the Sky Empire due to the wide variety of different spiritual metals that is sold there on a daily basis. My friend came here to find the spiritual metal he went to the Iron Sky Kingdom for¡­


    Sadly, he got quite unlucky and didn''t find it there. Forcing him to search for it in the eastern part of the capital, I don''t know why, but he never mentioned what happened after that. Only that he found the spiritual metal he needed after visiting the eastern part of the capital¡­" Sighing a bit as he finished his exnation of the Iron Sky Market in front of them, Xuan Hao felt like he understood why he had felt the presence of so many Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    The Nascent Soul Realm Experts were most likely not from the Iron Sky Kingdom and were most likely just someone who hade in search of spiritual metal or perhaps a weapon¡­


    If the Iron Sky Kingdom truly had a few dozen Nascent Soul Realm Experts just hanging around the entrance of their capital, Xuan Hao felt like he would really have to revaluate his idea on how strong the Iron Sky Kingdom was¡­


    "Should we take a look around the market before heading over towards the southern part of the capital? We should still have a few hours left before it gets dark."


    Having walked forward with his eyes clearly stered onto a nearby stall filled with a few pipping hot skewers along with a few other simrly hot food options, Chi Hu almost salivated as he asked this.


    "Sure, we can look around the marketce for an hour or two before making our way towards the southern part of the capital¡­" Also feeling himself grow hungry after looking over towards the stall Chi Hu''s gaze was focused on, Xuan Hao could not help but agree with him as both of them soon made their way over towards the stall to try out some of the skewers before the rest of the group had even managed to realise both of them had disappeared only to appear in front of a stall a few dozen meters away.


    Unknowingly, both of them had used their increased speed due to their cultivation realm to rush over to the small stall, causing the stall owner to jump a bit due to the shock of suddenly seeing someone appear in front of him.


    "W-what can I help with¡­?"


    Under the nervous gaze of the stall owner, Xuan Hao and Chi Hu almost bought up everything inside the small stall before happily walking away.


    Even if they did not need to eat given their current cultivation realm and could just survive by absorbing the qi between heaven and earth, neither Chi Hu nor Xuan Hao would want to do get rid of something so wonderful!


    By the time Qing Yi and the rest of the elders from the Alchemy Hall that hade along reached them, both Xuan Hao and Chi Hu were already happily enjoying the food they had just bought.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say, Qing Yi decided to just shrug her shoulders and joined her master and Chi Hu as she picked up one of the skewers and began eating.


    At this point in time, it had already been a long time since she hadst eaten and even if she could survive a few days without food given her current cultivation realm, she would still need to reach the Nascent Soul Realm before she could directly live off the qi between heaven and earth.


    The elders who mostly remained quite were the same. Not having reached the Nascent Soul Realm, so they also decided to partake in the small feast of skewers and other ordinary stall food Xuan Hao and Chi Hu had bought for a few spirit stones¡­


    A little farther away back at the small stall, the stall owner had yet to fullyprehend what had just happened when he realized around a dozen spirit stonesying directly in front of him.


    "S-spirit stones!?"


    Seeing the spirit stones in front of him and realizing that it had been payment for the food that had just been taken from his stall, the stall owner quickly packed up before directly turning to leave.


    In the end, he was only an ordinary person without any cultivation. Getting his hand on something like spirit stones was a rare opportunity for him to buy a low-grade cultivation mantra and use the rest to increase his cultivation realm after reaching the Qi Condensation Realm! Maybe he would even have a chance to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm and increase his lifespan by another 100 years!


    The simple act by Xuan Hao and Chi Hu had unknowingly ended up bing a great opportunity for this otherwise normal stall owner inside the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom. Even if neither of them even realized it, the stall owner would be forever grateful towards both of them¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time, inside arge room in the royal pce of the Iron Sky Kingdom, a beautiful young woman momentarily raised one of her eyebrows as she turned to look towards the northern gate of the capital.


    "Hm? A Domain Lord entered the capital¡­ An unfamiliar one as well¡­" Muttering this to herself as a curious smile momentarily graced her lips, the young woman put on a thoughtful expression as she tried to think about who the Domain Lord that just appeared was.


    Perhaps¡­ Is the Domain Lord rted to those people¡­?


    A trace of killing intent briefly passed through her eyes upon thinking about this.


    Over thest few months, those people have gotten more and more impatient perhaps they finally decided to act¡­


    "Yi Min, is anything wrong?" Just as she was about to personally go and check out who the unfamiliar Domain Lord that had entered her capital was, a worried voice sounded out from the side as she turned to look towards the origin of the voice. An elderly man and a good friend of hers, Fang Shi.


    "It''s nothing much, I just sensed that an unfamiliar Domain Lord entered the capital and felt like I should go and see who it is¡­" Narrowing her eye while saying thest part, a clear killing intent began leaking out.


    "Don''t worry too much about it, I know what you are worrying about, and I don''t think it''s those people¡­ It''s likely the Domain Lord from the Flying Sword Sect, his highness informed me just beforeing here that there was a chance that he would show up." Shaking his head, Fang Shi quickly informed the young woman looking like she was just about to jump out of the nearby window and rush over to beat up an innocent person up¡­


    "Flying Sword Sect? Why have I never heard about this sect before? Are they perhaps a former neutral sect that came to the Sky Empire seeking refuge from an enemy or something?" Frowning a bit upon hearing the name of the sect and not being able to link it to any of the sects with a Domain Lord behind them inside the Sky Empire, Yi Min could not help but ask what she deemed to be the most logical answer.


    "No, they are a sect located close to our border with the Onyx Empire. ording to what I know, someone there broke through to the Domain Lord Realm¡­ Though, I do not know when this happened, nor do I have any idea how strong they are¡­"


    "A new Domain Lord? This will certainly make things more interesting¡­" Smiling dangerously as she said this, Yi Min no longer worried about the Domain Lord that just entered her capital. If he truly made any trouble or was up to something, she would easily be able to sense it through her formation!


    Following this short conversation, both of them began to talk together again. The main focus being on the uing alchemypetition.


    Fang Shi still had a few things to ask about regarding the set up for his alchemypetition and Yi Min was the only person who could help him get them done¡­


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 Chapter 391 - Manor

    <h4>Chapter 391 - Manor</h4>


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    Over the next hour as the sun slowly began disappearing beyond the horizon, Xuan Hao and Chi Hu spent most of their time trying out the food from the different stalls, while Qing Yi and the rest of the elders curiously looked around the Iron Sky Market to see just what had ended up making the Iron Sky Kingdom so famous inside the Sky Empire.


    Even if the most precious of the spiritual metals were not sold in the market, Qing Yi and the group of elders still managed to spot several different spiritual metals of the Soul Rank. At one point, Qing Yi was even lucky enough to spot a Mystic Grade spiritual metal being sold!


    The sheer amount of rare spiritual metals present in the Iron Sky Market was more than enough to cause any cksmith to be ovee with happiness!


    Thinking about this, Qing Yi could not help but recall her new junior brother Bai Ning, who was a cksmith¡­ Perhaps she should ask her master if he could help her buy at least a few pieces of spiritual metal when they made their way back after thepetition.


    "We should get going now before it gets toote¡­" Looking up towards the sun that was slowly beginning to disappear, Xuan Hao finished a mushroom skewer he had just bought a few seconds ago.


    Hearing her master and watching as the elders began making their way towards the southern part of the capital, Qing Yi soon ran up to her master and followed him.


    Getting a present for her junior brother would have to wait until after the alchemypetition. Maybe she would even be able to get some kind of spiritual metal by getting a good cing in thepetition!


    After all, it had to be remembered that one of the things the Iron Sky Kingdom was most famous for was spiritual metal and it would be a great reward for the young alchemist as they would be able to easily find a cksmith to make them a cauldron with said spiritual metal after thepetition had finished¡­


    Other than the spiritual metal that was likely going to be a part of the reward, there would surely be other more suitable things for an alchemist! Namely recipes and rare spiritual herbs!


    Having thought about the rewards that she would be able to get, Qing Yi looked even more forward to the alchemypetition.


    Even when they were being guided towards the manor that had been reserved for them during their stay over the duration of the alchemypetition, Qing Yi had still not finished fantasizing about what she would do with the things she won from the alchemypetition.


    After all, it had to be known that the person behind thepetition was someone from the Sky Empire! There was no way the rewards would be bad in any way!


    As for how far she could go in the alchemypetition¡­ Qing Yu honestly had no idea, the reason for this was the fact that other than people like her who came from the border area of the Sky Empire, there would also be people from the more central part of the Sky Empireing to join the alchemypetition!


    People like that would have had a way longer time than her to train and learn alchemy! Even if some of them had managed to reach the Expert Realm and be an Expert Alchemist, Qing Yi felt like it would not be surprising in the slightest!


    This was also the reason why she had worked so hard over the past few months. Trying her best to improve as much as possible before the alchemypetition! For that reason, even if she did not manage to reach the Expert Realm and be an Expert Alchemist, Qing Yi knew that she was not too far off from it!


    At the very least, she hoped that she would be able to be among to top twenty in the alchemypetition-


    "We are here, this is the manor assigned to you during the alchemypetition! After the alchemypetition is finished, you can at most stay here for another week before having to pay for renting it yourself!" Interrupting Qing Yi''s train of thought, the guard that had been guiding them towards the manor that was reserved for them due to taking part in the alchemypetition, said this before quickly taking his leave.


    "This is the manor we are going to stay at¡­?" Muttering this to herself as she looked over towards the giant manor that was directly in front of her, Qing Yi could not help but feel a bit intimidated by the sheer size of the manor in question.


    Just from its size alone, it was bigger than her master''s pavilion back in the Flying Sword Sect!


    Yet at this point in time, such a giant manor would be given to every single person that participated in the alchemypetition?


    This alone easily made Qing Yi realize just how strong both the Sky Empire and the Iron Sky Kingdom was. Even the entrance to the manor in question had a small artificial mountain along with an artificial river! Thinking about the cost of such a manor, Qing Yi could not help but take a deep breath as she watched her master, and the rest of the elders just make their way inside without showing the slightest sign of caring about the giant and luxurious manor!


    Master! Elders! How can you guys just treat this manor so casually! Do you know how much it would have cost to make and rent!


    Thinking this as she also entered the manor, Qing Yi could not help but feel a bit saddened over how her master and the rest had reacted to such a splendid manor!


    "The alchemypetition should begin in about a week, do you want to continue practicing alchemy over thest few days before the start of thepetition? If you want to, I can also help you in your practice-"


    "Yes! I want to practice with master!"


    Hearing her master suddenly say he would help her with alchemy practice, Qing Yipletely forgot everything about the manor, as she quickly nodded her head and agreed. No matter what, she would not give up an opportunity like training with her master!


    Smiling a bit upon seeing how eager his disciple had be upon hearing that he would be helping her with her alchemy practice, Xuan Hao was a little taken aback before quickly calming down.


    "I see¡­ Then how about we get some rest and begin tomorrow morning?"


    "Yes! That sounds great master! I will take my leave then."


    Whoosh!


    Watching as Qing Yi headed towards one of the bedrooms in the manor to quickly pass the night, Xuan Hao smiled once again before shaking his head, his disciple was truly eager to begin practicing with him¡­


    "Now, Chi Hu, Elder Gong Bo, can you two handle it from here?" Having seen Qing Yi run away to get some sleep, Xuan Hao turned towards the two senior elders as he asked this.


    "Yes? Are you perhaps going somewhere Elder Xuan?" Tilting his head, a bit in confusion upon hearing Xuan Hao''s question, Gong Bo did not understand why Xuan Hao was suddenly saying this.


    "Yes, I n to look a bit around the capital before the sun rises again, I really wanted to check out the eastern side of the capital that you mentioned earlier¡­"


    "The eastern side of the capital¡­? Ah! The ce that my friend went to find spiritual metal when the Iron Sky Market didn''t have what he was looking for!"


    "Yes, that''s the ce!"


    Seeing Gong Bo show an expression of realization, Xuan Hao nodded his head in agreement.


    "You have to be careful of that ce! My friend warned me a few times about never going to the eastern side of the capital if I ever visited the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­ But with your strength, I feel like there is nothing to worry about¡­" Smiling a bit awkwardly when he said this, Gong Bo could not really imagine what kind of danger Xuan Hao might run into in the eastern side of the capital with his strength.


    After all, his friend was at the Core Formation Realm like himself and had probably warned him due to encountering something or someone dangerous who was in the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ This was not really something that an Expert at the Domain Lord Realm would worry about!


    On the other hand, it was the people inside the eastern part of the capital that should worry about idently offending Xuan Hao¡­


    Thinking about this, Gong Bo felt like his momentary worry about Xuan Hao was better directed towards the unfortunate people who mistook Xuan Hao for someone weak and easy to rob¡­


    "Haha, I will make sure to be careful Elder Gong Bo!" Laughing a bit as he heard what Gong Bo said, Xuan Hao soon disappeared from the manor with a smile on his face.


    If there really was someone dangerous for him in the eastern part of the capital, Xuan Hao would likely have ended up encountering the ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom!


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 Chapter 392 - Eastern Part Of The Capital

    <h4>Chapter 392 - Eastern Part Of The Capital</h4>


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    Having left the manor that, they had been given to stay in during the alchemypetition, Xuan Hao quickly made his way through the capital and soon left the southern part and soon found himself inside the Iron Sky Market located at the gate he had entered the capital through during the day.


    "Hm?" Walking through the Iron Sky Market, Xuan Hao immediately noticed a stark difference in the people that were walking aroundpared to when the sun was still out.


    The main difference was the fact that the people he had sensed earlier in the Nascent Soul Realm had left. Leaving the current strongest person inside the Iron Sky Market to be someone around the Peak of the Core Formation Realm¡­ Not really what Xuan Hao had expected to happen to this busy market during night-time.


    But from another point of view, it might have something to do with the fact that the business being done inside the Iron Sky Market currently was not really something that would interest most people just here looking for a specific spiritual metal¡­


    ncing over the shady looking stall selling all kinds of different not safe to consume potions and other substances, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head.


    From his knowledge, he could clearly discern the effects of the potions and other things currently being sold in the Iron Sky Market and calling them not safe was an understatement¡­ None of the products were produced by legitimate alchemist and was instead clearly created by fake alchemist!


    In turn, the products in question were extremely unsafe for anyone to consume!


    Given the fact that the Iron Sky Kingdom was such a strong kingdom and enjoyed a great reputation, Xuan Hao did not expect to see any products or other things rted to fake alchemists and he had at first not seen any when entering¡­ However, from the looks of it, they came out during the night to sell their dangerous products.


    Looking around, Xuan Hao spotted a few guards deciding to just ignore the whole thing as they went on with their work.


    The Iron Sky Market turning into a ce for fake alchemists to gather and sell their products was likely a normal and epted urrence from the small group of guards reaction¡­


    "Hah¡­" Shaking his head as he watched this, Xuan Hao just decided to ignore it as he passed through the Iron Sky Market and headed towards the eastern part of the capital.


    No matter where one went, fake alchemists could always be found doing shady stuff and selling unsafe products!


    If it was in the Flying Sword Sect or Flying Sword City, Xuan Hao would have done something about it, but this was the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital. Not the Flying Sword Sect''s territory! How they handled things was none of his business¡­


    Whoosh~


    With onest look over in the direction of the Iron Sky Market, Xuan Hao slowly disappeared down the mostly empty road leading down towards the eastern part of the capital.


    ¡­


    The eastern part of the capital was different from the southern part and the Iron Sky Market he had seen so far and just after entering it, Xuan Hao was taken aback by the severalrge holes in the ground that were filled out with small houses build off the side of therge holes in the ground.


    The holes were likely past mineshafts that had been transformed into ces for people to live after they had outlived their use¡­


    Looking down one of the holes with extremely small and dangerous paths going from house to house, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit curious over what had caused people to build their houses in such dangerous locations, but he soon came to understand as the houses around him was slowly reced with enormous storage buildings taking up most of the space.


    Observing the different and well-guarded warehouses a little more closely, Xuan Hao soon realized that each of them were filled to the brim with all sorts of different spiritual metals and other more normal ores that had been brought out from one of the many mineshafts that were located around the capital.


    The eastern part of the capital is where most of the spiritual metals and ores mined are stored¡­ Are they perhaps also processed here? Maybe it happens below the surface¡­


    Remembering how the ores and other spiritual metals he had seen before entering the capital being moved through underground tunnels, Xuan Hao thought that it would be reasonable for the Iron Sky Kingdom to have some sort ofrge underground facility where all the ores and different spiritual metals they mined were processed before being stored in different warehouses across the capital, with the eastern part being the main location for storage!


    "They are empty¡­?"


    Walking along a somewhat rundown road that moved deeper into the eastern part of the capital, Xuan Hao quickly came to realize that while the number of warehouses around had not decreased in the slightest and instead only increased in number. The warehouses that had anything inside of them hade to a stop as all the warehouses beyond a certain point werepletely empty with nothing inside of them.


    "Hm?"


    Feeling curious about this, Xuan Hao soon caught the sight of a few people dressed like the guards he had seen at the gate loading up several different spiritual metals and ores insiderge boxes simr to an interspatial ring, just with a way higher capacity before moving the boxes onto a small carriage that soon headed out towards the south.


    Using the same road, he had been using to enter the eastern part of the capital in the first ce.


    The group of guards was not alone and soon, Xuan Hao discovered that the same thing was happening across many of the warehouses that covered the eastern part of the capital.


    The warehouses were slowly being emptied out before the things inside were moved towards somewhere south of the eastern part of the capital¡­


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 Chapter 393 - Storage Box!

    <h4>Chapter 393 - Storage Box!</h4>


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    Seeing the warehouses being emptied out, Xuan Hao just felt himself growing more curious about what was happening in the eastern side of the capital.


    What were the ns of the Iron Sky Kingdom after they had finished emptying out the eastern part of the capital? And more importantly, what were those boxes simr to interspatial rings that were used for transportation and where could he get some for his sect¡­?


    Just from seeing sheer amount of different spiritual metals and ores that the guards put inside of the boxes, Xuan Hao could easily see just howrge the space inside of them werepared to an ordinary interspatial ring.


    While notparable to the one he had found in the ruin inside of the secret realm, it was not far off from it!


    Using those boxes would surely help making the logistics of storing things inside the Flying Sword Sect easier and would at the same time also allow them to moverger quantities of materials over arger distance.


    Given the ns Elder Song had for increasing the Flying Sword Sect''s influence and strength over its current territory over the next few years, Xuan Hao knew that he would need to moverge amounts of different building materials over arge distance and the boxes being used by the guards of the Iron Sky Kingdom would be able to help out with that and make the entire thing go faster and smoother at the same time!


    Whoosh~


    Having decided to go over and ask the closest group of guards currently in the process of transporting the things inside one of the many warehouses to another location, Xuan Hao ended up catching the small group of guards by surprise.


    "Who are you?!" And causing one of them to immediately call out in a cautious tone while the rest looked ready to fight in case anything was to happen.


    "Ah, I''m just someone curious! Not anyone dangerous!" Saying this as he approached the cautious guards, Xuan Hao raised his hands to show he meant them no harm.


    Given the environment of the eastern part of the capital, Xuan Hao could understand why they were so on edge.


    Other than the many warehouses that were tightly guarded, it seemed like the fake alchemists he had seen back in in the Iron Sky Market lived here¡­ In turn, the eastern area was more unstablepared to the other parts of the capital.


    At least it was like that from what he had seen so far during his short walk¡­


    Even if he had not been robbed yet, it was mainly due to the fact that he had used his domain to hide himself just to avoid something like that happening to him!


    "Not a cultivator¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he closely observing Xuan Hao approaching them, the guard who called out to him in the first ce breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing Xuan Hao''s young appearance along with not being able to feel any qi present inside of him.


    "What is it that you are curious about and don''t you know how dangerous it is to visit the eastern area during the night?" Having ''seen through'' Xuan Hao, the guard asked. No longer worried about Xuan Hao being someone who potentially came to try and rob the precious spiritual metals they were currently moving.


    "I just noticed how many different things you were putting inside one of those boxes and wondered what they were¡­ Are they perhaps something simr to an interspatial ring?" Not trying to hide what he wanted to know and discreetly ask about the boxes, Xuan Hao decided to just straight up ask them about.


    From his point of view and given how little the guards did to hide the ability that the boxes had to store a lot of things inside of them like an interspatial ring, Xuan Hao did not expect that the identity of the boxes was some sort of secret only a special few had ess to.


    "These things? They are just normal storage boxes that had a few modifications done to them so as to allow them to store around four times more than usual¡­ From what I know, these boxes were just recently mass produced by someone from the Explorer Union.


    ording to the rumours I heard, the person behind these boxes discovered a blueprint for a small formation that would allow other things than rings to be used as interspatial storage containers! The boxes here were personally requested from the Explorer Union by our king to allow us to more easily move things around and do our job!"


    Finishing his long exnation, the guard patted a nearby box with a smile on his face, clearly showing how happy he was with their king''s decision to get the storage boxes for transporting things around.


    Xuan Hao could also easily imagine just how useful something like this was for someone in charge of moving stuff around¡­


    Explorer Union¡­ Looks like I will have to find a time to visit in the future and find out if I can get some of those boxes for the sect to help out Elder Song, it''s the least I can do given how hard he works all the time!


    "Hm?" Just as Xuan Hao had decided to get Elder Song some of the boxes to make his life easier in his mind, several different auras could suddenly be felt sneakily approaching him and the group of guards from a few hundred meters away.


    What is this? Are these people perhaps here to try and steal the spiritual metals these guards are transporting?


    "Thanks for the information! I was really curious about what the boxes were after having seen how you just endlessly filled them up with different metals without stopping."


    Thinking about the few different people that were sneakily approaching from all directions, Xuan Hao did not act any different on the outside as he thanked the guards.


    "Haha, no need to thank me, you can find out about these boxes just by asking around anywhere nowadays.. To be honest, I''m quite surprised that you didn''t know about them!" Completely oblivious to the people approaching him and the rest of the guards, the guard smiled happily as he answered Xuan Hao.


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 Chapter 394 - Thieves!

    <h4>Chapter 394 - Thieves!</h4>


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    Whoosh!


    "Who''s there?!" Just as the people sneaking up on the guards had managed to get within a few dozen meters of the guards, they suddenly came rushing forward as each of the munched an attack towards the unprepared guards.


    "Argh!"


    Catching them by surprise and injuring at least half of the guards that had just casually been observing Xuan Hao and the guard leader chatting while loading up the boxes in preparation to transport them.


    The mood of the situation had been rxed when the group of people suddenly appeared out of nowhere andunched an attack towards the guards!


    Not having managed to fully react to the current situation unfolding in front of them, Xuan Hao watched curiously on as the guards tried their best to stop the group of people who had appeared out of nowhere to steal away the boxes filled with precious spiritual metals.


    "Hurry! We need to get out!" Seemingly anxious about how long things were taking, the leader of the group that had appeared out of nowhere to steal away the boxes dashed forward. Grabbing onto one of the boxes before the rest of the group soon followed after him and disappeared into the distance with a few of the boxes already filled up with spiritual metals and other precious ores from the mines below the surface before the guards even had a chance to stop them.


    The whole thing happened within only a few seconds and the group of thieves had soonpletely disappeared once again. Only leaving behind a few injured and angry guards.


    "Those damn- hah¡­ We really need to catch those people before we end up losing anymore spiritual metals to them¡­" Stomping the ground in anger while looking the direction that the group of people had disappeared to after stealing a few boxes worth of spiritual metal, the guard leader muttered this to himself while signalling for one of the other guards to contact someone.


    "Who were those people? Are they not afraid that the formation will attack them?" Xuan Hao, who had just been observing the entire thing from the side without doing anything asked curiously, as he looked over towards the angry looking guard leader.


    Just a few seconds ago, he had been talking calmly with him, yet a group of people had actually dared to steal directly from the guards of the capital!


    This was nothing short of offending the entire Iron Sky Kingdom. Not only that, but they had even dared to do something like that inside the capital with the formation that covered the entire capital around!


    "Hm? Ah¡­ The formation is nothing to worry about, it will only activate when someone is directly using it or if someone with at least the strength of the Nascent Soul Realm begins fighting. Anything below that is not worth activating the formation for¡­" Turning over towards Xuan Hao upon hearing his question, the guard leader shook his head while letting out a sigh of sadness.


    Whether it was over the lost boxes of spiritual metal or the fact that the formation did not just pop up to deal with the people who just robbed them was unknown.


    "I see¡­ I should be taking my leave now, it''s quitete already and I don''t want my family to worry too much about me."


    Feeling someone in the Nascent Soul Realm approaching from the southside where he hade from and at the same time feeling the group of people who had just robbed a few of the boxes filled with spiritual metals disappear into the deeper part of eastern part of the capital, Xuan Hao quickly gave a short believable excuse before taking his leave.


    "Be careful on your way home! It looks like things are going to be quite chaotic tonight¡­"


    The guard leader did not really care much about this, as he was more focused on finding out just what they had ended up losing and likely also preparing for the inevitable scolding he would end up receiving from the Nascent Soul Realm Expert heading over towards them to find out what happened.


    Whoosh~


    Seeing that the guards were not paying any attention to him after the short warning from the guard leader, Xuan Hao left the group of guards and headed in the direction of the group of people that had just robbed the group of guards.


    The main reason for him not attacking any of them, was because he was curious about why they had dared to so tantly steal from the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Other than that, they didn''t attempt to kill any of the guards either. Only lightly injuring them to push them away from the boxes filled with spiritual metals.


    "I''m really curious what these people are up to¡­" Muttering this to himself as he had alreadypletely hidden himself with his domain, Xuan Hao appeared only a short distance away from the group of people who were desperately rushing towards the deeper part of the eastern area.


    However, unknowingly to both Xuan Hao and the group of people who had just sessfully managed steal away the spiritual metals from the Iron Sky Kingdom, a third person was currently observing everything happening in the eastern part of the capital through the formation that covered the entire capital.


    Even Xuan Hao, with his cultivation base at the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm didn''t notice that someone was secretly observing him through the use of the formation.


    The main reason for this being that he did not dare to fully use his domain nor divine sense inside the capital. Fearing that he might? just idently end up triggering the formation and cause it to attack him in the process¡­ Not really something he wanted to happen¡­


    ¡­


    "Hehe, I really wonder how things will y out¡­ Perhaps that Domain Lord from the Flying Sword Sect would be able to help me deal with those annoying bugs once and for all?"


    Smiling happily to herself as she kept an eye on Xuan Hao''s figure as he entered a mineshaft leading down into the endless mining tunnels below the surface, Yi Min slowly turned her attention away from Xuan Hao and instead focused on therge stack of papers in front of her that was filled with the names of all sorts of different spiritual herbs that Fang Shi had asked her to help him get for his alchemypetition.


    "What I do for friends¡­" Muttering this to herself as she looked over the long list of spiritual herbs in front of her, Yi Min slowly sighed to herself.


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 Chapter 395 - Creepy Cave

    <h4>Chapter 395 - Creepy Cave</h4>


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    "Everyone, we should have escaped the guards by now, there is no way they will follow us all the way down here!"


    Coming to a stop inside one of the many tunnels beneath the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom. The leader of the thieves who had stolen away a total of three boxes filled with spiritual metals smiled happily while informing the others, as the group of thieves slowly came to a stop.


    A little farther away from the group, Xuan Hao also came to a stop as he curiously observed how the thieves stopped before happily beginning to go over the different spiritual metals stored inside of the three boxes that they had stolen.


    This continued until they had made sure just what they had gotten away with. Among which, the most precious in the three boxes was a few dozen Soul Grade spiritual metals.


    "Looks like they are finally moving again¡­" Seeing the group of thieves pack up the different spiritual metals that they had just taken out before continuing deeper into the abandoned mining tunnel that they currently found themselves inside of, Xuan Hao continued following closely behind them.


    Given that they had not just left the abandoned mining tunnel after having already realized and even talked about how the guards would no longer be after them. Allowed Xuan Hao to at the very least confirm that they should not be working alone and indeed did have some kind of backing¡­


    Now the only question that had yet to be answered¡­ Who would dare backing a group of thieves stealing directly from the Iron Sky Kingdom?


    After all, doing something like that would almost be the same as directly stealing from the Iron Sky Kingdom themself!


    No matter how tolerant the Iron Sky Kingdom was, it would not just let people steal from them without any consequences!


    Following behind the thieves as he thought about this, Xuan Hao be a bit more cautious. Given that the Iron Sky Kingdom had yet to act against these thieves, their backing was clearly not ordinary!


    ¡­


    "Is it just me or is something wrong with the cave up ahead¡­?"


    Walking along the mining tunnel for close to half an hour, one of the thieves suddenly called out to the rest as the entire suddenly came to a stop as every one of them quickly looked over to where the thief? that first called out was looking.


    "What is that¡­"


    "It''s almost like the wall is alive¡­!"


    "Maybe we should go back and find a way around it?"


    Seeing the thing that had rmed their friend, the rest of the thieves soon began shivering in both disgust and fear towards the thing in question. Most of them immediately suggesting for them to find another way around the cave in front of them.


    "Some sort of living creature in the shape of a wall?" Looking over towards the thing that had caught the thieves off guard, Xuan Hao tilted his head slightly to the side as he triedprehending just what the thing in front of him and the thieves was.


    Wiggle~


    "Ah! Let''s get out of here and find a way around the cave!" Caught by surprise as part of what could only be describe as a wall of flesh and blood began wiggling weirdly, the leader of the thieves immediately agreed with the other thieves that going around the cave in front of them was most likely a good idea¡­


    Rumble~


    Crash!


    Just as the group had decided to turn around and find a way around the weird cave screaming that something nefarious was going on inside, the path behind them suddenly began shaking violently before the ceiling of the mining tunnel came crashing down. Blocking their path back.


    "W-what should we do now boss¡­? We are at least a few hundred meters underground, and we will likely not be able to dig ourselves out even if we tried¡­" As the rest of the thieves still had a hard timeprehending what had just happened in front of them, the thief? who had first spotted the weird living flesh wall that existed inside the cave in front of them asked the leader of the thieves in a clearly scared voice.


    Not that anyone could fault him¡­ The weird squirming and wriggling wall of flesh was simply way too creepy and unnatural. Even if they had lived for quite a long time, this was the first time the thieves had ever encountered such a weird situation.


    "I-I think we will have to make our way through the cave¡­" Unwilling to even say it, the leader of the thieves barely managed to utter these words as the faces of each and every one of the thieves darkened visibly.


    None of them wanted to enter the cave in front of them after seeing the small fleshly part of the wall that likely covered the entire inside of the cave¡­


    "Boss¡­ We can try to do dig our way out, with ourbined strength, we should be able to make our way-"


    Bang!


    "¡­"


    Just as one of the other thieves suggested that they tried digging their way out through the copsed tunnel behind them, a loud sound could be heard in the distance as what was likely another part of the tunnel copsing behind them.


    "Let''s make our way through the cave, I don''t think we have any other way out¡­"


    Hearing another part of the tunnel copsing behind them, the leader of the thieves sighed to himself. Knowing that they likely would not have any other way to go than through the creepy cave in front of them¡­


    ¡­


    "Looks like it worked!"


    A little behind the group of thieves close to the rubble that blocked the now copsed mining tunnel leading back to the mining shaft that they had entered through; Xuan Hao smiled a bit to himself upon seeing that he had been sessful in forcing the thief? group inside the weird cave in front of him.


    Compared to the scared thieves who were all around the Core Formation Realm, Xuan Hao was not afraid of what might be lurking inside the creepy cave.


    The main reason that he had decided to force them through it was so that he would be able to better investigate the creepy cave himself, without losing track of the thieves in the process!


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 Chapter 396 - A Lot Of Tentacles

    <h4>Chapter 396 - A Lot Of Tentacles</h4>


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    "Looks like the rest of the cave is also like that¡­" Muttering this to himself as he entered the cave first, the leader of the thieves could almost not stop himself from running back out upon seeing that the weird living flesh wall that could barely be seen by them at the entrance, did indeed cover everything inside the cave.


    From the ceiling to the floor. Everything inside the cave was covered by a weird wriggling fleshly mass.


    "Hm?"


    Stepping down on it, the leader of the thieves felt his foot almost sinking into the fleshly mass.


    Standing still on the weird fleshly mass that covered the cave was not an option, he did not really feel like finding out what it was like to sink into the fleshly mass that covered the floor of the cave¡­


    "Let''s get going! The faster we get through the cave, the faster we will be able to leave this ce!" ncing back at the other thieves fearfully looking over towards him, the leader of the thieves put on a brave face before entering the cave.


    ""¡­""


    Seeing their leader enter the cave without any fear on his face nor anything happening to him, the rest of the thieves soon build up their courage before entering the creepy cave. Following after their brave leader, as the group of thieves began making their way through the creepy cave.


    "Looks like we were panicking too much earlier¡­"


    "Indeed, we should be able to make our way through it within five or so minutes. At that point we should reach a mineshaft and make our ways back up to the surface again!"


    With everyone having made their way inside the cave, the thieves slowly began calming down after seeing that the cave, albeit being a bit weird, was not dangerous.


    Different from the group of thieves who had concluded that the weird and creepy cave was harmless, Xuan Hao following behind the thieves was not of the same opinion as he focused on a small line running through the centre of the cave.


    The more he looked at the line, the more he felt that something was wrong¡­


    Whoosh~


    To make sure that he didn''t end up allowing whatever creature the cave was to discover him, Xuan Hao no longer walked after entering the cave and instead decided to float just above the floor of the cave.


    ¡­


    The journey through the cave continued on, with the group of thieves remaining on guard in case anything happened, while Xuan Hao tried to analyse what the weird fleshly mass that covered everything in the cave was in the first ce.


    At first, he had thought it was the inside of a trap created by some weird underground creature, with the small line running through the centre acting as the mouth that would open up and swallow the people or demon beasts making their way through the ''cave''.


    But this idea was quickly dispelled after Xuan Hao tried to investigate the line along with the rest of the cave through his domain.


    No matter how hard he tried, he could not figure out just what it was, but at the very least, he was sure that it was not some sort of underground demon beast waiting for them to go deeper before opening up and swallowing all the thieves in one gulp.


    Other than that, Xuan Hao also found out that the formation that covered the capital did not reach far into the ground like he had first expected. Different from when he had first encountered the formation while trying to find out where the different ores and spiritual metals went to be processed just a few hours earlier.


    Maybe the formation only covered parts of the tunnels and cave under the capital? Not covering the already abandoned areas underground like the cave he and the thief? group currently found themselves inside of¡­ Or maybe it had something to do with the cave itself-


    "Hm? Something is moving up ahead¡­" Narrowing his eyes as he focused on the exit to the cave that was located just a few dozen meters in front of the group of thieves in front of him, Xuan Hao watched arge number of small tentacles sneakily slither over across the floor of the cave towards the leader of the thieves walking at the front.


    "Haha, the exit is just up ahead! Looks like we worried about this creepy cave for nothing!" Ignorant of the tentacle heading over in his direction from the cave exit, the leader of the thieves smiled happily as he informed the rest of the thieves.


    Even if nothing dangerous had happened to them after entering the cave. The walls and floor of the cave made out of some sort of flesh wiggling from time to time along with a few drops of blood dripping down on them every now and then from the ceiling.


    The thieves were not calm at all, so when they heard about finally being able to leave, a few of the thieves began rushing towards the exit. Overtaking their leader along the way.


    "Finally! I can get out of this damn ce! I never want to get anywhere near this cave again!"


    "This ce is simple too terrifying! Boss, I will wait for you at the top!"


    "Last to the top will have to buy spirit wine for the rest!"


    Whoosh!


    "Ha¡­? These cowards¡­"


    Looking at the other thieves rushing to leave the cave after finding out that the exit was just in front of them, the leader of the thieves could not sigh to himself while saying this.


    Whoosh!


    But his words did not dictate what he felt himself, as he also began rushing towards the exit after seeing the others already doing so.


    Among the group of thieves. Only the three carrying the three boxes filled with spiritual metal were not rushing towards the exit of the cave at full speed. Having to instead be careful that they did not end up dropping the boxes on the weird floor below their feet, while making their way over towards the exit like the rest of the thieves.


    "Hm?"


    Tilting his head with some confusion on his face, Xuan Hao watched as the thieves rushed past the small tentacles without them attacking.


    For some reason, the small tentacles that had begun moving towards the thieves had stopped moving after they began rushing towards the exit.


    Even when some of the thieves directly stepped on them, they remainedpletely unmoving almost looking like they were a part of the weird wiggling mass of flesh that made up the floor of the creepy and weird cave.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao felt curious about what the tentacles were up to and where they had evene from in the first ce, as he quietly flew after the thieves making their way out of the cave.


    ¡­


    "W-what is that thing!?" The first reaction of the thief? that who had rushed out of the cave before the others, was not one of tion, but one of terror as he screamed loudly. Catching the rest of the thieves by surprise before they also came out of the cave and saw just what had shocked their friend.


    The thing in front of them was nothing short of something out of a nightmare, as a weird mass of flesh in the shape of a giant cocoon could be seen wriggling at the bottom of the mineshaft that the cave led to. Located right in the middle of it.


    Not only that, but there were countless both big and small tentacles all around the cocoon, a few which had people wrapped up.


    From a distance, even someone without any cultivation would be able to feel how the life was slowly draining away from the people who had unfortunately been wrapped up by one of the countless tentacles, as the tentacles dropped a few of the people who had beenpletely drained.


    ""¡­""


    The thieves along with their leader frozepletely in front of the cocoon in the middle of the mineshaft. Not knowing what to do.


    "L-let''s get out of here¡­" Not knowing just how much he had begun shaking after seeing the cocoon located at the bottom of the mineshaft, the leader of the thieves suggested to the rest before the group slowly and quietly began making their way up from the mineshaft. Trying to make as little sound as possible along the way.


    For some reason, the tentacles below did not seem to register the fact that the thieves were there, as they just continued sucking out what little life remained inside the people that had been caught by them.


    This, however, changed when Xuan Hao came out of the cave and appeared inside the mineshaft¡­


    "They¡­ Can see me?"


    Noticing how all the tentacles suddenly seemed to freeze up before moving towards the cocoon and taking up a defensive stance after he appeared, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes before focusing on the cocoon at the bottom of the mineshaft. Not even questioning how the tentacles could even ''see'' in the first ce¡­


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 Chapter 397 - Tentacle Cocoons Special Ability!

    <h4>Chapter 397 - Tentacle Cocoon''s Special Ability!</h4>


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    "It looks like they can indeed see me¡­" Closely observing the tentacles around the cocoon, Xuan Hao could not help but wonder how the tentacles had managed to find him only when he had left the cave connected to the mineshaft.


    The tentacles are connected to the cocoon¡­ Perhaps the reason they spotted me has to do with the cocoon?


    Thinking this to himself, while observing the cocoon and seeing that each and every single one of the tentacles were connected to it, Xuan Hao guessed that the reason the tentacles had managed to spot him. Even when he had used his domain to conceal himself, had something to do with the cocoon located at the bottom of the mineshaft.


    Looking at it like this, the countless tentacles that filled out the bottom of the mineshaft were part of the giant cocoon located down there¡­


    Gazing directly at the giant cocoon, Xuan Hao used his divine sense to probe it and see if he could find out what kind of creature it was and what was hidden inside of the giant cocoon.


    "Hm?" As his divine sense descended down upon the giant cocoon, Xuan Hao easily pierced through the outer shell made of flesh and saw the inside of the cocoon.


    "Nothing?"


    Indeed, there was nothing inside of the cocoon. Just an empty space the size of a small house¡­


    Perhaps its deceiving my divine sense into thinking that there is nothing inside? No¡­ If that was the case, why would it show me that there is nothing inside the cocoon? That would only cause me to doubt what I''m seeing¡­


    Lost in thought as he tried figuring out what kind of creature the weird cocoon with countless tentacles was, Xuan Hao soon shook his head. Giving up trying to figure out just what kind of creature it was.


    "The thieves have already left the mineshaft¡­ I should be able to deal with this thing before they run too far¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao descended down towards the cocoon at the bottom of the mineshaft.


    In the first ce, he had never nned to just leave something like that alone. From the fact that it wastterly draining the life out of a few people before absorbing it for itself, Xuan Hao had already realized that whatever creature the cocoon was, it was not kind in the slightest.


    More importantly, it reminded him quite a bit about the life draining technique he had seen the person from the ck Rose Sect use back when he went to Bright Sun City together with Qing Yi for a youthpetition between the young people of Bright Sun City.


    Maybe the ck Rose Sect''s demonic skills were rted to this creature in some way?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao really wanted to find out just where the weird tentacle cocoon hade from¡­


    Wriggle~


    Feeling Xuan Hao slowlying descending down towards it, the tentacles at the bottom of the mineshaft slowly began growing restless as arge part of them began wrapping around the cocoon for protection.


    "Well¡­ Let''s see how strong you are!"


    Whoosh!


    Having his qi take on the shape of a sword, Xuan Hao directly brandished the newly created sword before shing down towards the tentacle cocoon just below. Making sure not to use too much strength in case he ended up alerting the Domain Lord of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    The main reason for this, was because he had no idea if the one behind the tentacle cocoon was the Domain Lord of the Iron Sky Kingdom, while he did not know why the formation that protected the entire capital did not seem to be present around the weird tentacle cocoon, Xuan Hao felt that it could be something that the ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom had arrange and preferred being on the careful side.


    After all, the tentacle cocoon could not move and was stuck at the bottom of an abandoned mineshaft¡­


    From the fact that it had clearly been devouring the life of at least a dozen or so people when he arrived together with the thief group, Xuan Hao realized that someone had likely been feeding the tentacle cocoon!


    At this point, Xuan Hao was just hoping that the effects of the battle between him and the tentacle cocoon would be limited within the mineshaft. Not leaking out into the capital where people and more importantly, the Domain Lord of the Iron Sky Kingdom, would notice-


    Swish!


    Watching as his attack shed through the tentacles blocking his its path towards the cocoon with ease before hitting the cocoon without losing any power, Xuan Hao was even more surprised after seeing how easily it went through the cocoon itself.


    "Something is wrong¡­" Seeing how easily things went, Xuan Hao closely observed the tentacle cocoon and just as he watched his attack sh through the bottom part of the tentacle cocoon, Xuan Hao felt a profound sense of danger as his sword attack went moved towards a thinyer of the cocoon that covered the entire bottom part of it.


    Only when he focused on it, did he manage to realize that theyer was even there! But he could still not see just what thatyer was, as itpletely blocked his divine sense from fully seeing it.


    BOOM!


    Knowing that something was wrong, Xuan Hao rapidly began retreating out of the abandoned mineshaft and just as he made his way out the moment his attack shed through the smallyer at the bottom of the tentacle cocoon.


    Instantly killing the weird tentacle cocoon and at the same time causing whatever was hidden inside smallyer to activate.


    BOOM!


    Rumble~


    Without even a single second to spare, a terrifying explosion urred inside of the abandoned mineshaft.


    Not only that, but the explosion did not stop there as it violently moved upwards and directly caused the formation around the capital to active.


    Whoosh!


    Along with the activation of the formation, Xuan Hao was left speechless as he watched the explosion that had more than enough strength to gravely wound him, be supressed within a few seconds before everything calmed down.


    The only thing left to remind anyone of what had just happened, was the now copsed abandoned mineshaft¡­


    "Just what in the world happened¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help but try andprehend just what had happened.


    The attack he had used against the tentacle cocoon, could only be considered a normal attack of someone in the early stages of the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    From the fact that the tentacle cocoon had managed to spot him, Xuan Hao had expected for it to have also reached the Domain Lord Realm and be able to block his attack. Allowing him to gauge its strength¡­


    But looking over towards the copsed mineshaft where the tentacle cocoon had violently exploded just seconds ago, Xuan Hao could not help but rethink his earlier thoughts about the tentacle cocoon''s strength.


    More so than the weak strength of the tentacle cocoon, Xuan Hao was more surprised by the explosion that it had caused after he killed it. If not for the fact that the tentacle cocoon was located inside the mineshaft and he had managed to retreat in time, Xuan Hao was sure that he would have ended up getting gravely injured by the explosion!


    Not only that, given the strength of the explosion arge part of the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital would likely have ended up being affected before the formation could activate by itself to supress it¡­


    "I should get out of here before the Domain Lord from the Iron Sky Kingdomes¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao quickly left and made his way over towards the thieves he had been following before fighting with the tentacle cocoon.


    ...


    "What in the world is happening? Are we under attack!?"


    "The guardian formationid down by the king activated!"


    "Did you guys hear that giant explosion earlier!? Do you think someone is attacking us?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was running away from the scene of the crime, the people inside the capital were all surprised at therge explosion followed by the guardian formation of the Iron Sky Kingdom activating.


    Some panicking over potentially being caught in the middle of a fight against Domain Lords, while others tried to find out what happened .


    Soon the formation began disappearing, as it became invisible to the naked eye once again.


    The capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom was by no means a safe haven without any dangers, but it was still among one of the more peaceful ces in the Sky Empire due to the fact that the formation deterred anyone at the Nascent Soul Realm from fighting.


    Along with the guards that patrolled most of the capital outside parts of the eastern area, it was a safe ce to live. Even for someone without any cultivation realm.


    The explosion earlier was far from normal and had immediately caused everyone inside the capital to ask about it.. In the end, the ones who suffered the most were the guards, as the people curious about the explosion all swarmed towards any guards they spotted. Asking them about the earlier explosion¡­


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 Chapter 398 - Scaring The Thieves~

    <h4>Chapter 398 - Scaring The Thieves~</h4>


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    Boom!


    "W-what was that?!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao had managed to kill off the tentacle cocoon in the mineshaft, the group of thieves had only managed to get a few hundred meters away from the mineshaft when the explosion suddenly urred behind them. Catching all of them by surprise, as the thieves carrying the boxes filled with spiritual metals directly dropped them as they hid behind a few nearby rocks.


    Following therge explosion, the thieves all nced back towards the mineshaft they had been inside of just a few seconds ago.


    Whoosh!


    Seeing the explosion heading up into the sky with a tremendous force, the thieves all felt a shiver run down their spine.


    If they were ever hit by such a terrifying explosion¡­


    All the thieves could not help but shiver upon reaching this thought. The explosion was simply too terrifying and watching how the formation around the capital had needed at least a few seconds to deal with it, they knew that the strength of the explosion should have reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    Realizing just how dangerous their current situation was, the leader of the thieves quickly woke up from the dazed state he and the rest of the thieves had found themselves in before anxiously yelling at the rest of the group to wake them up from their dazed state.


    "We need to leave this ce quickly!"


    Along with their leader''s loud voice, the rest of the thieves soon recovered from their dazed state as well before the entire group began running away from the now copsed mineshaft at full speed.


    Not daring to stay around and wait for the guards and possibly higher echelons of the Iron Sky Kingdom to show up to investigate just what had happened.


    Even if they were curious about what had happened inside the mineshaft, their life was way more important than finding out the origin of the explosion! There was also the fact that they all still very clearly remembered the tentacle cocoon that they had seen inside the mineshaft¡­ Who knew if that thing was still there?


    ¡­


    Having finished off the tentacle cocoon and managed to get out of the way before it had exploded, Xuan Hao wasted no time waiting around before he managed to catch up with the thief group once again.


    The formation that he could not feel back in the mineshaft had appeared around him once again, causing Xuan Hao to wonder if the tentacle cocoon really had an ability that could hide an area around itself from the formation that guarded the capital.


    Thinking back, the space around the tentacle cocoon waspletely cut off from the effect of the formation¡­ Even when he had used his divine sense without restricting it, the formation had not registered anything!


    "No use thinking about it, there is no way I can investigate it now that the tentacle cocoon is already dead¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao turned his attention back onto the thieves running at a speed close to someone at the Nascent Soul Realm in front of him.


    The group of thieves moved even fasterpared to when they had been escaping the guards. Truly, they had been too scared by the earlier explosion¡­


    Grinning a bit to himself upon realizing that he had ended up scaring the thieves that much with the earlier explosion, Xuan Hao decided to mess a bit more with them along the way.


    ¡­


    Whoosh~


    "Argh! W-who is it?!"


    "Quiet! There is no one other than us out here!"


    "But-"


    "No buts! How many times is this now? There is no one out there, its just because you are on edge after the earlier encounter with that weird tentacle creature and the explosion!"


    Watching the thieves quarrel once again, Xuan Hao chuckled quietly to himself as he prepared to throw a small pebble towards one of the thieves carrying one of the three boxes with spiritual metal.


    Following the thieves, Xuan Hao had decided to scare them a bit by throwing a few pebbles at them every now and then. Using his domain to cloak the pebble and make it invisible, Xuan Hao made sure the thieves didn''t notice anything.


    This limited use of his domain was not enough to trigger the formation around the capital, so Xuan Hao had happily continued scaring the thieves for thest one hour.


    Even if it took them a little longer to travel this way, at the very least it was entertaining for him¡­


    "We are here!"


    Just as the pebble in his hand was about to fly out towards the unlucky target he had chosen, Xuan Hao''s hand came to a stop upon hearing what the leader of the thieves said before he turned his attention away from his lucky target and looked at the ce that the leader of the thieves had stopped.


    In front of a small rundown house leaning up against therge wall surrounding the entire capital, Xuan Hao watched as the thief? leader began cautiously looking around therge empty space all around the small run-down building.


    Well¡­ Empty space would be an overstatement, it would be better to call the surrounding space the ruins of what had once been an active mineshaft that nowid abandoned after all the precious metals below had been mined out, or a bigger mineshaft opened up nearby¡­


    The houses that had once been upied by the minersidpletely empty, as the only house still standing, was the rundown house that the thief? leader hade to a stop in front of.


    Looking more closely, the rundown could only barely support itself due to the fact that it had been leaning up against therge city wall for support.


    "Everyone, let''s go!" Having surveyed his surroundings for a few minutes, the thief? leader turned towards the rest of the thieves as he informed them before entering the rundown house.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao waited until all the thieves had entered before slowly following behind them into the rundown house himself.


    "This is¡­" Entering the rundown house, Xuan Hao was surprised upon seeing the thieves orderly squeezing out through a small crack in the wall.


    The crack was just barely enough for the thieves to get through and push the boxes out with them, but this was not what had surprised Xuan Hao.


    Instead, it was the fact that there was a crack in the wall of the capital that the thieves could use to get in and out without going through any of the gates that were tightly guarded by the guards and soldiers of the Iron Sky Kingdom!


    Not only that, but the wall of the capital was clearly part of the formation that engulfed and protected the entire capital¡­


    For there to be a crack in the wall, meant that the foundation of the formation had been damaged! There was no way that the Domain Lord of the Iron Sky Kingdom would not notice something like this!


    Looking more closely at the crack that the thieves were squeezing through, Xuan Hao noticed a small row of runes flowing alongside the crack of the wall.


    "Hm¡­ Looks like things are not that simple¡­" Taking a closer look, Xuan Hao realized that the runes flowing along the crack in the wall seemed to have isted the crack and made it disappear in the eyes of the formation.


    It was like the runes were falsely rying information through the formation and ensuring that the person using the formation would not be able to discover that there was something wrong with it.


    Before the formation was utilized to its full potential, the damage to the foundation would not show up¡­


    Thinking this far, Xuan Hao could clearly see that something was very wrong inside the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Remembering how the border guard had warned him and the others, Xuan Hao could not help but realize that the warning likely had something to do with the damage to the formation around the capital.


    Someone is preparing to attack the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    This was the only thing that he coulde up with after putting the few clues he had gathered so far together. Now the only question that remained, was who?


    Not to mention that the ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom was someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, who would be brave enough and have the power to attack one of the most important kingdoms inside the Sky Empire?


    Other than having to deal with the powerful ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom, they would still need to do it before the Sky Empire had time to respond and send people over.


    Given the importance of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao did not doubt that an attack towards it might even cause one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts to show up!


    After all, losing a Peak Domain Lord along with one of the most important locations for the production of spiritual metal was not something any empire would want.


    Even if they could take the area back, it would take years to restart production again and the loss of a Peak Domain Lord would not recover within just a few years¡­


    "Hah¡­ No use thinking about all of this¡­" Sighing to himself as he thought about all of this, Xuan Hao watched thest of the thieves leave the capital through the crack in the wall and quickly followed after them.


    This time around, being more careful than he had been before¡­


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 Chapter 399 - Caught Red-handed

    <h4>Chapter 399 - Caught Red-handed</h4>


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    Coming out on the other side of the wall and the foliage it was hidden behind, Xuan Hao was met with the same scene of countless different sized mineshafts surrounding the capital that he had seen before entering the capital itself.


    Large numbers of people could even be seen going back and forth between different mineshafts along the wall of the capital. Making it difficult for him to spot the thieves he had been following after without using his divine sense.


    If not for the fact that he could lock onto the group of thieves with his divine sense, Xuan Hao doubted that he would have been able to keep track of the thieves given just how many people were walking around just outside the walls of the capital.


    Though he did wonder why there were so many people walking along the wall of the capital¡­


    "Hm, I think I understand why¡­" Looking up towards the wall of the capital, Xuan Hao saw a few soldiers patrolling back and forth while keeping a close eye on the people below.


    The reason why so many people chose to walk close to the wall of the capital was likely because it was safer with the soldiers on the wall keeping an eye on them from above.


    After all, who would want to try and start any trouble when directly being watched by the soldiers of the Iron Sky Kingdom? Other than that, it was also in the middle of the night where crime tended to be higher¡­


    Thinking about this for a short moment, Xuan Hao did not stay still for long before he followed after the group of thieves making their way towards an area away from the capital where they could rx without having to worry about being caught by the guards or soldiers of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ We are finally back¡­" Letting out a breath of relief upon seeing the entrance to their base in the distance, the thief? leader could not be any happier. The earlier encounter with the tentacle cocoon. Followed by therge explosion and constantining from the other thieves screaming about someone throwing something at them along the way.


    All of this was in the past. Now all he needed to do before he could rx again was to deliver the spiritual metals!


    After he had delivered the spiritual metals, he would take a few weeks off from stealing anymore and just try to rx! Given that things had grown so chaotic inside of the capital. Even to the point that the formation had activated, the thief? leader did not see any reason why his superior would refuse his request to take a few weeks off before things calmed down again.


    After all, no matter what, sending people in during a time where the capital was chaotic was simply stupid. Times like that, would also be times where the Iron Sky Kingdom was the most cautious and kept an eye on everything happening inside the capital.


    Stealing anything during such a time would be close to impossible, as the guards around the city would likely have someone at the Nascent Soul Realm keeping an eye on them to ensure their safety and at the same time make sure that they could act in case something happened again.


    "Boss! Should we go over the spiritual metals before entering?" Just as the thief? leader was thinking about his uing vacation, one of the other thieves carrying one of the three boxes filled with spiritual metal walked up and asked him.


    "Sure, we need to make sure that we report the correct number and what kind of spiritual metals we got¡­" Not paying too much attention to what his underling said, the thief? leader just waved him aside and allowed him to go over the spiritual metals inside the boxes again.


    It was not anything unusual and it was a rather normal thing to go over the things inside more than one time to ensure that no one had stolen anything along the way for themselves.


    Going over the things inside before entering the base was also crucial, as reporting an incorrect number would not result in anything good for them¡­


    Worst case scenario, they would be forced to enter the capital again to get another batch of spiritual metals before they would be allowed to get a break! Not something any of the thieves wanted to happen given what they had experienced over the past few hours.


    Especially given that the entire capital was on full alert after therge explosion that had happened only a little over one hour ago. Stealing anything during such a time would be close to impossible¡­


    "B-boss¡­"


    "Hm? What is it? Are you already done going through the spiritual metals?" Hearing the underling from earlier call out to him, the thief? leader looked over at him. Not understanding how he had been able to go over the spiritual metals so quickly¡­ It had only been a few seconds since he had asked him to go over them in the first ce!


    "N-no¡­ Something is missing¡­"


    "WHAT!? What''s missing!?" Hearing his underling nervously say that something was missing, the thief? leader no longer looked as calm as he had before. Going from his former rxed expression that was looking forward to taking a few weeks off, into one filled with anger.


    After all, the only way something could have gone missing, was if someone among them had taken some of the spiritual metals for themselves!


    "The Soul Rank spiritual metals¡­"


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say upon hearing what was missing, the leader of the thieves tried his best to not beat up the underling in front of him.


    The Soul Rank spiritual metals were the most precious thing that they had managed to steal! If they were missing, his chances of being able to take a few weeks off, would likely disappear and he would end up being forced to enter the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom during a time where the guard''s strength and numbers had increased!


    "Who is it!? Who was the one carrying the box with the Soul Rank spiritual metals!?" Thinking about how he might have to go back into the capital again, the thief? leader looked towards the three people carrying the boxes with killing intent present in his eyes.


    Having them take a few of the lower rank spiritual metals was not a problem, but he had to get his underlings to spit those Soul Rank spiritual metals back out!


    They were the only reason he had been so confident that he would be able to get a few weeks off to rx during the time that the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom had increased guards and patrols!


    "B-boss¡­ It was me¡­ But I didn''t take any of them! You can check my interspatial ring and the rest of my body-" Anxiously stepping forward, one of the underlings answered his boss and even before he could finish talking, he already felt his boss violently rip the interspatial ring on his finger ring off before proceeding to forcibly searching it.


    "Nothing¡­" Having found nothing inside it, the leader of the thieves soon began searching the entire body of the thief? that had been carrying the box with the Soul Rank spiritual metals. Only to find out that he had nothing on him.


    "All of you, give me your interspatial rings ande here to be searched!"


    ""¡­""


    Seeing their boss''s angry appearance, the other thieves all went up one by one as everyone except one of the thieves had been personally searched by the leader of the thieves.


    "Now there is only you left¡­ Anything to say for yourself?" Seeing that only one of the thieves were left to be searched, the leader''s killing intent once again red up as he asked thest thief? who had been avoidinging over to show his interspatial ring.


    "B-boss, it was not me! I swear!"


    "Then why won''t you show me your interspatial ring¡­?"


    "I-I¡­"


    Not knowing what to say the thief? looked like he was about to run away when the leader of the thieves suddenly appeared beside him and forcefully pried the interspatial ring off him before emptying everything inside on the ground in front of him.


    "Don''t!" Even with the scream from the thief, the leader of the thieves did not care in the slightest as he began looking through the things that had been inside his underling''s interspatial ring.


    "W-what is this?!" Finding none of the spiritual metals he had been looking for, the leader of the thieves was just about to give up searching through the belongings of his underling when he spotted something familiar out of the corner of his eyes.


    But it was not the spiritual metals he had been looking for. Instead¡­


    "Is this not my wife''s¡­?"


    Looking at the all too familiar pair of underwear inside the pile of things stored inside his underlings interspatial ring, the leader of the thieves suddenly froze on the spot before an unbearable killing intent began washing over all the thieves. Mainly focused towards the thief? who had been caught with something he should not have¡­


    "YOU! HOW DARE YOU!"


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 Chapter 400 - Sneaking In~

    <h4>Chapter 400 - Sneaking In~</h4>


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    "YOU! HOW DARE YOU!"


    Watching the scene of the raging leader of the thieves beat up one of his underlings, Xuan Hao smiled a bit embarrassedly.


    After all, the one who had stolen the Soul Rank spiritual metals was him, he had done it at the time that they had gone through the things they had managed to steal away. Not expecting them to look inside any of three boxes before reaching their base.


    Well¡­ He was not wrong, as they had indeed reached the base. Even if he was discovered now, he already found their base¡­


    Whoosh~


    Not bothering to stay behind and watch the drama that was currently unfolding between the leader of the thieves, and another thief, Xuan Hao directly moved past the group of thieves before reaching the entrance to the base located just a few meters away from the ce that the thieves had decided to stop and look through the boxes before entering the base.


    Even thiste at night, the mineshaft around the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom were still in full swing as the miners worked without rest. The base itself was nothing much on the outside, just a small building located next to a busy mineshaft brimming with activity.


    Looking at it from a distance, the small building looked out of ce in the area around the busy mineshaft.


    The only thing that made it stand out was the fact that a dozen or so people surrounded the entire building. Guarding it from anyone getting too curious about what was inside the seemingly ordinary building.


    Given the fact that the people surrounding the building to guard could all be seen wearing the guard uniforms of the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital. The miners going back and forth did not question why they were there and merely believed that the small building was a meeting ce, where some of their higher ups in charge of the different mineshafts woulde to discuss how things were going.


    Going over what kind of metals they had managed to mine out over a certain period of time and how they could improve their efficiency and the safety of the people working down in the mines.


    This idea was not too out of ce. After all, in the area around the capital, there were several such buildings that were used for precisely this!


    Most of them having been built as a ce for the higher ups of the Iron Sky Kingdom a ce to stay when inspecting the different mineshaft leading down into therge undergroundwork of tunnels below the surface of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Whoosh~


    Ignoring the people standing guard in front of the building, Xuan Hao directly entered without any problem.


    Other than the guards standing outside who were all around the middle tote stages of the Core Formation Realm, Xuan Hao was not the least surprised upon discovering someone in the early stages of the Nascent Soul Realm upon entering the building.


    Looking around the inside of the small building, Xuan Hao suddenly found himself stuck as he saw the Nascent Soul Realm Expert in question sitting quietly on top of a trap door leading downwards into what he presumed to be the core part of the base.


    The problem now, was how he could enter without letting the Nascent Soul Realm Expert find out?


    After all,pared to someone in the Core Formation Realm, someone in the Nascent Soul Realm had already developed their own divine sense and were way more observant of what was happening around themselves.


    While he could indeed hide from a Nascent Soul Realm Expert with his domain, Xuan Hao doubted he would be able to enter through the trapdoor that the Nascent Soul Realm Expert was sitting on top of without alerting said Nascent Soul Realm Expert¡­


    Maybe I should just wait for the thieves toe...?


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao quickly used his divine sense to check up on the thieves a few dozen meters away from the small building.


    "¡­"


    However, what he saw did not look promising in the slightest as the leader of the thieves was in the process of beating up his underling.


    At some point during the beating, a few of the thieves had also gone through the belongings of said thief and had managed to uncover a small diary with several ns on how he was going to runaway together with the leader of the thief''s wife after they had gotten back to the base¡­


    At this point, all of the thieves had alreadye to believe that it was indeed thest thief currently being beaten up that had stolen the Soul Rank spiritual metals. Wanting to runaway and needing something to sell for some spirit stones to make life easier¡­


    In the end, the rest of the thieves had to intervene so that their boss did not end up beating him to death before he showed them where he had hidden the Soul Rank spiritual metals.


    The thief being beaten up of course had no idea where the spiritual metals were, but the rest of the thieves didn''t bother listening to his words. Just making sure that their boss didn''t end up beating him to death.


    Rustle~


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to settle down and try to wait until the group of thieves showed up. The Nascent Soul Realm Expert sitting on top of the trapdoor leading down towards what he suspected to be the real base opened his eyes as he nced towards the direction of the group of thieves with an annoyed expression on his face.


    "Hah¡­ Those damn things are making quite a mess out there¡­ Don''t they know that they should keep things quite to not have too much attention on this location?" Listening to the Nascent Soul Realm Expert muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao happily watched him stand up before walking out of the small building with an increasingly more annoyed expression with each passing second.


    The Nascent Soul Realm Experting out from the small building instantly caught the eyes of some of the thieves, while Xuan Hao used this opportunity to sneak through the trapdoor leading down into the base below.


    Breaking a small seal on the trapdoor in the process.


    Whoosh!


    Using his domain to iste the small seal that had been destroyed as he opened up the trapdoor, Xuan Hao could not help but curse a bit to himself.


    The seal was likely part of an rm system set up and it was quite well made. Even he only barely managed to notice it after he had already triggered it.


    At the very least, he had managed to directly freeze the seal with his ice domain and prevent it from alerting those inside the base¡­ But this was only a matter of time, when the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from above returned back to the trapdoor and noticed that the seal was frozen over, the entire base would know someone had entered¡­


    Sneaking a peak at what was happening a few dozen meters from the building after the arrival of the Nascent Soul Realm Expert, Xuan Hao smiled happily to himself upon seeing how the thieves were allining about the stolen Soul Rank spiritual metal. Helping him keep the Nascent Soul Realm Expert distracted.


    I should at least have a few minutes before he returns back and finds out someone entered¡­


    Calcting how much time he would have before he was discovered, Xuan Hao didn''t bother going slowly, as he instantly made his way through the tunnel under the small building heading downwards at a close to ny-degree angle.


    As for just killing off or knocking out the Nascent Soul Realm Expert along with the rest of the people guarding the small building?


    Xuan Hao did not dare to do it in case some other seals like the one at the trapdoor was ced on them and he would be too slow to stop them from activating and alerting the people below that something was wrong at the entrance.


    For the matter of only having a few minutes, to Xuan Hao, this would be more than enough time to reach the base and find out who it belonged to before they ever had a chance to destroy anything that would help him find out.


    The main reason for his confidence in this regard, was simply because he was someone in the Domain Lord Realm. Even if there was someone in the Domain Lord Realm waiting in the base, he should be more than capable of keeping himself safe.


    Other than that, Domain Lords were not just amon day expert and if there really was a Domain Lord present, he should be able to easily find out which power he or she belonged to!


    Fighting was not what he hade for anyway. The main reason he had showed up was to find out who it was that was stealing from the Iron Sky Kingdom and given what he had seen so far, might even be the one nning to attack the Iron Sky Kingdom!


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 Chapter 401 - Breaking In Through The Front Door

    <h4>Chapter 401 - Breaking In Through The Front Door</h4>


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    Making his way through the tunnel at a speed that would easily allow him to disappear in the eyes of people, Xuan Hao arrived at the true entrance of the base that was located beneath the small house within only a few seconds.


    "Hm¡­ Looks like that''s the entrance to the base¡­" Coming to a stop just as the tunnel around him had expanded from only being a tunnel only a few meters tall, to being a cave least a few dozen meters tall expanding in all directions.


    Not only that, but there were several other tunnels simr to the one he had used, connecting to the underground cave he now found himself inside of. Likely leading towards other simr entrances like the one he had entered through.


    Just looking at the number of tunnels alone numbering above ten, Xuan Hao could easily imagine the strength of the power that existed here if? every single entrance had someone at the Nascent Soul Realm guarding it!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao cautiously inspected his surroundings before focusing all his attention on arge metal gate made out of spiritual metal located only a few hundred meters away from him.


    Just the size of the gate alone was more than enough to amaze anyone seeing it. Not only for its sheer size being able to directly block anyone from moving deeper into the cave where the base was likely located, but also because the spiritual metal used in its construction was at the very least Soul Rank Spiritual Metal!


    From a distance, Xuan Hao could even sense that traces of Mystic Grade Spiritual Metal had been used in its construction to strengthen the giant gate even further!


    The gate was not only built to hold off against people in the Nascent Soul Realm, but would also have the ability to dy someone in the Domain Lord Realm for a short moment¡­


    Looking over at the gate, two guards that could be seen closely observing the tunnel, both of them having reached the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Should I just try to break through?" Muttering this to himself as he looked over at the gate, Xuan Hao had already tried to find a way around the gate, like digging into the side of the cave and directly bypassing the gate altogether¡­


    But after closely inspecting with his divine sense, he realized that the gate was not only a gate, but also acting as a core for arge formation that enveloped the deeper part of the cave!


    The formation connected back to the gate in front of him and without breaking through it, he would have no way enter the deeper part of the cave.


    Ignoring the two guards at the gate, breaking through the gate would be his only way of entering the base in the short term and he did not really have time on his side¡­


    Whoosh!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t bother wasting any more time trying to think up a way to sneakily enter the base and directly dashed towards the base while condensing the strength of both his cultivation base and two domains inside arge transparent silver palm that-


    BOOM!


    Directly smashed into the gate, causing several cracks to form in the gate, while at the same time causing the two unfortunate Nascent Soul Realm Experts standing guard to be hit by the shockwave of the attack. Instantly sending both of them flying into the nearby cave wall. Their conditions unknown.


    "Indeed, a strong gate¡­" Looking at the gate that had managed to hold up even after he had used the Earth Rank Technique, God''s Palm, Xuan Hao could not help but feel amazed at the defensive powers of the gate.


    Even if he had only used an Earth Rank Technique, God''s Palm was not a technique that could be underestimated in the slightest!


    The reason why it had ended up bing popr across the entire Ewaria Continent was because its ability in allowing someone to merge all of one''s power into a simple palm attack!


    The stronger the user, the stronger the palm would be! While it was indeed a useful technique for fighting people below one''s own realm, its weakness became obvious when fighting someone at the same realm.


    The technique was indeed strong, but it cost a massive amount of energypared to other techniques and at the same time, the attack was extremely slow! Only improving in speed after every breakthrough into a new major realm, where the newly acquired speed was once again useless against someone in that realm¡­


    Swish~


    Not bothering to stand around waiting for the people behind the gate to react, Xuan Hao switched to using his sword domain, as a sword manifested in his right hand before he shed down towards the gate that was already in the process of falling apart.


    After being hit by the giant palm attack, the gate could no longer stand up any longer, as the sword attack managed to directly sh through it. Cutting the gate in half and destroying the formation connected to it at the same time.


    Bang!


    As the gate fell to the ground, therge cracks that had formed from the first attack grew evenrger before the two halves of the gate shattered into several smaller pieces on the ground.


    "Wha-"


    A person standing on the other side of the gate covered in a dark robe with his hand raised into the air like he was about to knock on the gate had a confused look on his face upon seeing the gate suddenly cracking before being shed in half in front of him.


    The entire thing took no time at all and in the eyes of the robbed man about to knock on the gate, all of it had happened during the time that he even manged to move his hand a few centimeters forward to knock on gate!


    Whoosh~


    Not bothering to pay any attention to the person who had appeared on the other side of the gate, Xuan Hao dared not waste any time, as he rushed through the now empty ce where the gate had been just a few seconds ago.


    "WHO!?"


    Just as he entered the underground base located, a loud roar could be heard from the deeper part of the cave before a terrifying aura even stronger than his own could be felt erupting with a fear inspiring domain following closely behind.


    Just from the presence alone, Xuan Hao knew that the other person would not be someone that he would be getting along with¡­


    Whoosh!


    Ignoring the question from the voice, Xuan Hao fully unleashed the strength of his ice domain to counter the terrifying aura erupting from the deeper part of the cave, as everyone and everything around him instantly froze in ce.


    The few unfortunate people caught up in his domain suffered simrly as they were all turned into ice statues on the spot. Not even getting a chance to react before they died a quick and cold death.


    Boom!


    The sh between the two domains instantly caused the cave to shake violently as it showed signs of copsing.


    Without the gate and the formation to help keep it intact, there was no way a normal cave would be able to endure the terrifying energy waves from two domains shing with each other for more than a few seconds!


    "HOW DARE YOU!"


    Sensing how bad the current situation was, the voice from the deeper part of the base immediately began dedicating part of his strength towards making sure that the cave didn''t suddenly copse and kill off all the people and ruin everything inside the base.


    From the domain alone, Xuan Hao could not find any simrities to the domains of the Domain Lords that he had read about in a book detailing the domains of the different Domain Lords inside the Sky Empire!


    The book itself was not that hard to get his hands on, as it was apparently avable for the Flying Sword Sect to easily buy for a few spirit stones through the Explorer Union even before he had reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    From the book, Xuan Hao guessed that the Domain Lord should either be a new Domain Lord or someone not from the Sky Empire and given the fact that he was above the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao highly doubted he was a new Domain Lord¡­


    At the same time, he could also not rule out the possibility that the Domain Lord was someone with more than one domain like himself!


    Whoosh~


    Ignoring the angry wordsing from the deeper part of the cave, Xuan Hao smiled to himself as he began searching through the cave for anything that would help him figure out what power the Domain Lord in the deeper part of the cave belonged to.


    Even if he could not pinpoint where the Domain Lord was from, he should still be able to find something inside the cave that would help him find out¡­


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 Chapter 402 - Stealing Documents

    <h4>Chapter 402 - Stealing Documents</h4>


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    Searching through the base with his divine sense, Xuan Hao soon smiled brightly as he discovered a small building with several different documents gathered stacked on top of each other located just a few dozen meters outside the area covered by his domain.


    The only problem, was that the documents were part of the area covered by the domain of the Domain Lord in the deeper part of the cave¡­ If he wanted to get his hands on the documents gathered inside the small building, he would have to break through the domain of the Domain Lord he was currently in the process of confronting.


    The fight itself had not yet truly evolved into a real fight between Domain Lords and given that the Domain Lord was still hiding away in the deeper part of the cave. Only using his domain to fight with him over a distance, Xuan Hao guessed that the Domain Lord had no n to reveal himself.


    Thinking a bit about this, Xuan Hao felt like the Domain Lord inside the deeper parts of the cave should be waiting for someone toe and help him out¡­ If this really was the case, the people aiming for the Iron Sky Kingdom was a lot stronger.


    Having to fight one person in the Domain Lord Realm was different from having to fight two people in the Domain Lord Realm! Even Xuan Hao had no idea if he could do something like that and he didn''t know how strong the personing to help out would be either.


    "Staying here for too long and getting my way out blocked, is not a good idea¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced over towards the deeper part of the cave, Xuan Hao didn''t hesitate about making a move towards the small building filled with documents likely able to help him figure out what power the base belonged to in the first ce.


    Given that the person hidden in the deeper part of the cave did not look like he would be moving out before his backup arrived, Xuan Hao didn''t bother with the sh between his and the hidden Domain Lord''s domain any longer.


    Whoosh~


    Rushing towards the small building, Xuan Hao used his ice domain to carve a path directly through the hidden Domain Lord''s domain towards the small building before the other party had even managed to react to the sudden change, Xuan Hao had already managed to store most of the documents inside the small building. Stuffing them into his interspatial ring without caring too much if he idently damaged them in the process.


    "Wha-"


    The voiceing out from the Domain Lord hidden in the deeper part of the cave sounded out in a confused tone, as the person in question did not understand what Xuan Hao was doing and just watched speechlessly as he rushed forward.


    "STOP!" Only after seeing all the documents inside the small building disappear into Xuan Hao''s interspatial ring did he realize what he wanted to do.


    However, by the point that the Domain Lord hidden inside the deeper part of the cave realized what Xuan Hao was doing, Xuan Hao had already begun retreating as he hastily made his way towards one of the many exits of the underground cave.


    Not wanting to stay around when the backup of the Domain Lord hidden away inside the base showed up¡­


    The Domain Lord in the deeper part of the cave seemed to want to rush out after him, but for some reason, still didn''te out to chase after him and instead stayed behind in the deeper part of the cave.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao could not help but feel curious about just what it was that the Domain Lord was guarding in the deeper part of the cave with so much determination.


    Even when he had taken away so many documents that probably had a lot of information regarding the goals of the underground base, the Domain Lord still didn''t chase after him and try to prevent him from leaving. Instead staying behind to defend something in the deeper part of the cave¡­


    "Hm?" Just as he was about to make his way back out of the same tunnel he had entered through, the system suddenly decided to issue him a new quest.


    [Side Quest 1/2: Explore the deeper part of the cave.]


    [Reward: Unlock next part of the quest]


    Checking out the quest as he hade to a stop at the entrance to the tunnel leading out of the underground cave, Xuan Hao felt a bit speechless.


    He had just finished up inside the underground base and was on his way out, but the system had suddenly decided to issue him a new side quest that asked him to go back in¡­?


    Other than that, the quest was a two-part side quest, and he wouldn''t get anything from justpleting the first part of the quest¡­ At the very least, it looked like he would only get a reward afterpleting both the second andst part of the quest¡­


    Boom!


    Just as Xuan Hao was thinking about whether or not he should try entering the deeper part of the cave where the Domain Lord was hidden for the side quest, a terrifying aura could be felt rapidly approaching towards his direction from one of the other tunnels.


    This aura alone was far stronger than the aura of the Domain Lord hidden inside the deeper part of the cave! The person approaching, should be the reinforcements that the Domain Lord inside the deeper parts of the cave had been waiting for, as Xuan Hao felt a drastic change happening inside the deeper part of the cave before a shadowy figure could be seen rushing over towards him filled with killing intent.


    The Domain Lord in the deeper part of the cave no longer stood still as he made his way over to hopefully team up and deal with Xuan Hao before he could escape.


    Whoosh!


    Not wanting to be caught in a battle with two strong Domain Lords at once, Xuan Hao no longer thought about his new side quest and turned around before using his full speed to rush out from the underground cave before the two Domain Lords could join up and prevent him from leaving.


    The entire thing happened within an instant and by the time Xuan Hao had made his way back up through the tunnel, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert guarding the trapdoor leading down into the tunnel beneath had not even returned and could be seen scolding the thief leader and the other thieves a few dozen meters away from the small building. Still unaware of just what had happened within the past few minutes.


    Bang!


    As he reached the trapdoor, Xuan Hao didn''t bother hiding himself in the slightest, as he directly broke through the trapdoor leading up to the surface before rushing back towards the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "W-what is happening!?"


    "Intruder!"


    "Get ready to fight!"


    By the time that the Nascent Soul Realm Expert and the guards reacted to the sound of the trapdoor being destroyed along with a new hole that had formed at the top from Xuan Hao directly rushing to the sky before flying in the direction of the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom, the person responsible was already long gone.


    "Everyone, return to the base! Something happened and we will have to move forward faster than expected!"


    A short momentter, a solemn voice filled with a dense killing intent echoed out from the tunnel entrance. Instantly causing both confused and curious people standing around the small building wondering just what had happened to freeze up.


    "We will follow themand of the Lord!" As everyone else froze up, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert barely managed to respond under the terrifying pressure that had suddenly appeared around all of them.


    Whoosh~


    After the Nascent Soul Realm Expert spoke up, the pressure around the guards of the building and the thieves disappeared as all of them suddenly felt like they had escaped from the grasp of death.


    "Looks like you guys got lucky today¡­ We will be returning to the base after cleaning up the surrounding area!" Narrowing his eyes as he said this to the group of thieves, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert no longer paid any attention to them before he began cleaning up the inside of the building along with fixing the trapdoor and hole in the wall.


    As this was happening, the group of thieves had yet to make a single sound. Scared that if they said anything out of line, they would be killed.


    Scolding from the Nascent Soul Realm Expert was one thing, the aura of death they had felt earlier was somethingpletely different! Even the Nascent Soul Realm Expert that had seemed so fierce earlier, was nothing more than a helpless chicken without any way to resist in front of the terrifying aura that followed the scary voice.


    All the thieves knew very well that something major had happened and the thief leader knew that his vacation would most likely note any time soon¡­


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 Chapter 403 - Back To The Manor

    <h4>Chapter 403 - Back To The Manor</h4>


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    "That was close¡­" Looking back towards the ce where the entrance to the underground tunnel was located, Xuan Hao could not help but mutter to himself, he only wanted to find out who had been nning to deal with the Iron Sky Kingdom as it might end up affecting him now that he, his disciple and a few of the elders from his sect were staying during thepetition.


    To be honest, Xuan Hao didn''t really expect to encounter someone in the Domain Lord Realm. Not to mention encounter two people in the Domain Lord Realm! One of them being around the same realm as himself, while the other should be above the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    By how much, Xuan Hao would not know without fighting the person first. At the very least, he did not want to end up fighting against both Domain Lords at the same time.


    Whoosh~


    Thinking about this as he made his way back through the crack in the capital wall without being seen, Xuan Hao soon decided to make his way back to the manor before the sun came back up again and his dear first disciple, Qing Yi, came to ask him for help with her alchemy.


    However, before all of that, he wanted to go through the documents he had gotten his hands on and see if he could find out who the underground base belonged to and maybe even find out who the two Domain Lords were¡­


    ¡­


    "Elder Xuan? Did you check out the eastern part of the capital?" Arriving back at the manor that had been allocated for them to stay at during the alchemypetition, Xuan Hao happened to bump into Chi Hu sitting down on a stone bench at the small garden located in front of the manor.


    "Yes¡­ Howe you are out here?" Not asking how Chi Hu had managed to guess where he went, Xuan Hao was instead more curious about why Chi Hu was sitting outside in the middle of the night just staring up at the dark sky above.


    "No reason, I was just thinking about a few things¡­ You know, this isn''t really my first time inside the core territory of the Sky Empire. The Iron Sky Kingdom is just so different from the kingdom I visited back then¡­" Sighing a bit to himself before standing up from the stone bench, Chi Hu looked over towards Xuan Hao who had just appeared at the entrance of the small garden in front of the manor.


    "Not your first time? I guess you were a wandering cultivator before I got you to join the sect¡­ Did you perhaps manage to visit the capital city of the Sky Empire in the past?" Hearing Chi Hu talk about having visited the core territory of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao could not help growing excited.


    After all, he really wanted to find out about the Sky Empire and more importantly than that, the capital of the Sky Empire where at the very least one of the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts of the Sky Empire would be staying.


    Even in the records kept by the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao had not managed to find anything written about the capital of the Sky Empire.


    He could find records of the different Domain Lords that lived in the Sky Empire and their domain, but he couldn''t find anything about the capital?


    This alone had been more than enough to cause Xuan Hao''s curiosity about the capital of the Sky Empire to grow the more he managed to see of the Sky Empire outside of just the kingdoms located around the Flying Sword Sect that were no stronger than the past Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "The capital of the Sky Empire?"


    "Yes, have you visited in the past or perhaps know anything about it?" Ignoring the clearly confused look that had appeared on Chi Hu''s face after hearing Xuan Hao''s random question, Xuan Hao continued to ask him.


    "Hm¡­ I have never really managed to visit the capital of the Sky Empire. After all, it''s simply located way too far away from here and given that my cultivation realm was only at the Core Formation Realm at the time, it might have ended up taking me my entire lifespan to reach the capital¡­ Not to mention how dangerous it would be to travel through strong kingdoms with Domain Lords ruling them and plenty of people in the Nascent Soul Realm!" Shaking his head as he said this, Chi Hu soon put on a thoughtful look.


    "I see¡­ I forgot just how far away the capital of the Sky Empire truly is. Even with my cultivation realm, it would take weeks if not months to reach¡­" A little disappointed after hearing that Chi Hu had not visited the capital of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao shook his head. Not intending to me Chi Hu for not being able to satiate his curiosity.


    "But¡­ I have heard a bit about it from a fellow wandering cultivator that I once travelled together with for a few months, I really do wonder how that guy is doing now¡­ From what hest told me; he should be somewhere in the core territory of the Sky Empire currently. Given how young he waspared to me, he should not be anywhere near passing away from old age like I was¡­"


    Turning a little reminiscent towards the end, Chi Hu soon let out a sigh before continuing.


    "From what he told me; the capital of the Sky Empire is not like any city he had seen before. Easily beingrge enough to cover the same space as an entire kingdom! Not only that, but several different independent spaces or secret realms have been set up over the years by both the Imperial Family and the different that exist inside the capital city.


    The only other thing he told me, was that the capital is split up into two sides. One being the ruling family and the other being the different religious orders¡­ Outside of that, I know nothing more about the capital of the Sky Empire."


    "No problem at all, I still have something to do, so I will get going first. Thanks for helping me understand a bit more about the capital of the Sky Empire!"


    Having listened attentively to what Chi Hu said, Xuan Hao talked with Chi Hu for a few more minutes before heading back into the manor, he still had to go through the documents he had stolen earlier before the sun rose and he would have to teach Qing Yi¡­


    ¡­


    "No name or any location of other bases¡­" Having made his way into the manor and found himself an isted room to look through the documents he had stolen from the underground base, Xuan Hao was a bit disappointed upon realizing that there was nothing about the name of the organisation that the underground base belonged to nor was there anything about any other bases.


    Even finding out who the two Domain Lords he had encountered down there, was not possible through the documents he had stolen¡­


    But at least there is some information about their ns regarding the Iron Sky Kingdom!


    Thinking this to himself as he looked through the documents, Xuan Hao soon sorted therge quantity of documents into the two piles, the one for documents with useful information and the one for documents without any useful information.


    The majority of which ended up being useless documents filled with information about small missions like the one the group of thieves he had followed were on to gather spiritual metal through stealing it from the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    The useful information he managed to gather on the other hand, was more than enough to help him understand that an attack on the Iron Sky Kingdom would not be happening any time soon!


    The documents themselves were mostly made up of different request for materials made between the underground base and what he assumed to be the headquarters of the power that the underground base belonged to.


    In those requests, Xuan Hao was clearly able to make out the fact that the people nning to attack the Iron Sky Kingdom were still not finished preparing and would not be attacking the Iron Sky Kingdom any time soon.


    By the point that the attack happened, Xuan Hao and the rest of the people who came together with him would have long since left the Iron Sky Kingdom!


    Thinking a bit more about it, Xuan Hao also felt that it would not be a good idea for the enemy of the Iron Sky Kingdom to attack when an Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire was present¡­


    After all, there was no way an Artisan Alchemist would just visit the Iron Sky Kingdom without any form of protection!


    The most obvious of which would be a set of powerful talismans imbued with the power of a powerful cultivator from the capital of the Sky Empire!


    There was even a chance that the Alchemist had managed to get his hands on a talisman created by one of the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts¡­ No matter what, attacking the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom now was not a good idea for the enemies of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao began rxing as he used his sword domain to get rid of the documents, he had stolen from the underground base.


    At the very least, if the Iron Sky Kingdom was attacked, it would be after the alchemypetition had finished. Not something he personally needed to worry about!


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 Chapter 404 - Start Of Alchemy Practice And Nervous Yi Min

    <h4>Chapter 404 - Start Of Alchemy Practice And Nervous Yi Min</h4>


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    As thest few hours of the night passed with Xuan Hao preparing to teach his first disciple Qing Yi alchemy, the first rays of light passed through the windows leading into the room, that he by this point had transformed into an alchemy room. Having everything that he or Qing Yi would need to practice alchemy!


    Other than that, Xuan Hao had also managed to get his hand on a few different spiritual herbs that they could use for practice by asking a few of the elders from the Alchemy Hall that hade together with them.


    One thing was for certain, if he ever found himself in need of any spiritual herbs in the future, just asking an elder from the Alchemy Hall would be more than enough to get him a few.


    How they even managed to carry around such arge number of spiritual herbs without an interspatial ring, Xuan Hao had no clue, but at the very least it had been a good thing for him, as he did not need to go out and buy any spiritual herbs for his practice sessions with Qing Yi¡­


    "Talking about alchemy practice, looks like Qing Yi just got up¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao left his room and headed over towards the room where Qing Yi was staying inside the manor.


    Knock kncok~


    "Who¡­?" Hearing someone knock on her door just when she had woken up, Qing Yi looked around her room in confused state before quickly putting on a new set of clothes before walking over to the door.


    "Master¡­? Master!" Opening the door to her room, Qing Yi tilted her head in confusion when she saw her master standing there like he was waiting for her, it was only after a few second of staring at him for a few seconds that she remembered how she would be training together with her master from today onwards. All the way until the start of the alchemypetition in a week.


    "Are you going to teach me alchemy now!?" Feeling herself grow excited upon thinking about her master teaching her, Qing Yi could not help but ask as she looked up at Xuan Hao with an increasingly excited expression on her face.


    After all, from what she knew, her master should be a really skilled alchemist. Far better than the elders of the alchemy hall that she had learned from so far!


    "Yes! Let''s go to the room I prepared for us to use in the next week up until the start of the alchemypetition." Nodding his head in agreement to his excited disciple''s question, Xuan Hao soon made his way towards the room he had transformed into a usable alchemy room during thest few hours.


    "Yes, master!" Hearing what her master said, Qing Yi excitedly travelled behind him towards the alchemy room where they would be spending a majority of their time over the next week.


    She knew very well that this might be her only chance to breakthrough and be an Expert Alchemist before the start of the alchemypetition!


    Although she did not really expect herself to be able to do so. After all, the current best alchemist in the entire Flying Sword Sect was an Expert Alchemist!


    If she could breakthrough and be an Expert Alchemist, she would automatically be among the best alchemists of the Flying Sword Sect after only having begun her study less than a year ago!


    Even if she knew how slim her chances were of bing an Expert Alchemist, Qing Yi still hoped deep down that she would be able to be one.


    The main reason for this being that she had heard from some of the elders in the Alchemy Hall, that some of the younger alchemists participating in the alchemypetition would already have reached the Expert Alchemist Realm!


    For Qing Yi who deep down wanted to win the entire Alchemypetition and take the lucrative prize offered up by the Artisan Alchemist, bing an Expert Alchemist would be a requirement!


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao and Qing Yi were making their way to the newly created alchemy room, somewhere at the eastern part of the capital where a crack had been formed in the wall that Xuan Hao had followed the thieves throughst night, a figure slowly appeared next to the crack in the wall.


    "Looks like there is indeed something hidden here, it looks like it was a good idea for me to secretly monitor that new Domain Lord from the Flying Sword Sect, he truly helped me out a lot this time¡­"


    The figure in question slowly revealed itself to be the current ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Yi Min, who had been keeping a close eye on Xuan Hao entered the capital. At some point even being close tounching an attack towards him if not for her old friend Fang Shi stopping her.


    "But how did they manage to make such arge crack in the wall without me noticing¡­? The crack itself is even slowly expanding with each passing second at an increasingly fast pace! If this continued for another month or so, the entire formation around the capital would likely have beenpletely destroyed without me even knowing it!" Saying this to herself, Yi Min could not help but shiver at just how dangerous her situation would have been if she did not discover this.


    Given her cultivation realm, she could easily imagine how things would y out in case she was attacked by someone and decided to rely on her formation to protect her and the capital from damage while fighting. Only to suddenly realize that the formation she relied on for protection was gone¡­


    The result of possibly taking a full-on attack of someone at her realm would be easy to imagine! Even if she survived, she would be way too injured to fight back at that point in time and her opponent would most likely be able to easily overwhelm her and kill her before she had the chance to escape!


    Thinking about this, Yi Min felt even more thankful towards Xuan Hao. Even if he had no idea that he had ended up helping her so much, Yi Min would still remember the fact that he had ended helping her out. Knowingly or not.


    "But how should I deal with this crack¡­? I don''t want it to continue destroying the foundation I spend so long onying down. At the same time. Dealing with this crack is likely to warn the other party that I''m aware of what is happening, likely causing them to retreat once again and bide their time like in the past¡­" Muttering this to herself as she realized just how hopeless she was when it came to dealing with the crack in front of her without alerting the people after her life, Yi Min ultimately decided not to deal with the crack.


    In some way, this might be her only opportunity to deal with the people after her life!


    Now that she had some idea on how they nned to kill her, she would be able to prepare for it!


    Other than that, she also had time to secretly call over a few of her trusted friends to help her out. Given the speed at which the crack in the wall was widening, Yi Min could easily calcte that her enemy did not n to attack anytime soon, as there would still be some time left before the formation had been damaged enough to render it useless.


    "There is also finding out the origin of that weird explosion from earlier¡­ From its strength alone, its likely another one of those peoples ns to deal with me! Just¡­ How did they manage to iste an area inside the capital from my formation and just how many more of those things are hidden inside the capital?" Havinge up with a n for dealing with the crack in the wall, Yi Min now focused on the other thing that Xuan Hao had managed to uncover for her.


    The origin of the explosion could not be found. Even when she had searched through the wrecked mineshaft that it had been located inside of.


    At this point, the origin of the explosion was the thing that worried her the most, as she had already some idea on how to deal with the crack in the wall slowly weakening her formation.


    The explosion on the other hand was different, it clearly had more than enough strength to injure someone in the Domain Lord Realm and at the same time had the ability to remain hidden inside of the capital. Even her formation had beenpletely useless when it came to finding out about the origin of the explosion!


    In the future during her fight, she might idently end up being drawn into one of the areas where this explosive device was located and without even realizing it, she would be caught in an explosion and end up being badly wounded¡­ Not something she ever wanted to experience!


    "I have to find out just where that explosion came from!" Muttering this to herself, Yi Min nced onest time at the crack in the wall before disappearing.


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 Chapter 405 - Cloud Cover Potion

    <h4>Chapter 405 - Cloud Cover Potion</h4>


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    After reaching the alchemy room, the first thing Xuan Hao did was make sure everything was in order and ready to be used.


    Following closely behind him inside the room, Qing Yi stood quietly by the side as she patiently watched her master go over the different tools and spiritual herbs neatly ced together in easy to ess locations.


    "Everything should be fine¡­" Having made sure that everything was in order, Xuan Hao turned his attention away from the different tools and spiritual herbs he had gathered together over the past few hours.


    "Master, what are we going to be doing? Alchemy practice or maybe the more theoretical side¡­?" Seeing her master having gone over the different tools and spiritual herbs, Qing Yi could not hold herself back from asking.


    The moment she found out her master would be personally teaching her during the week leading up to the alchemypetition, Qing Yi had been extremely excited! This could be considered the first time her master would truly be teaching her alchemy!


    Even during the few months leading up to the alchemypetition before they set off. The most he had helped her in regard to alchemy, was answer a few of her questions when she came to him for help.


    While this had indeed helped her a lot, it was still differentpared to having her master directly teach her over a longer period of time instead of just answering the questions she might have!


    "Hm¡­ I think we should start off with this."


    Whoosh~


    Thinking about it for a short moment, Xuan Hao soon waved his hand and caused a piece of paper to float over in front of him before several hundred words instantly appeared on the paper.


    "This is the recipe to a Pinnacle Journeyman Alchemist Potion, the ingredients required for it are all present here and the first thing we will do today, is help you brew this potion!"


    Whoosh!


    Along with Xuan Hao finishing hisst words, the piece of paper that had now been turned into a brand-new potion recipe flew over towards Qing Yi and hovered in front of her.


    "This is¡­ Cloud Cover? What does this potion do, master?" Reading the title of the potion on the top of the piece of paper along with the long list of steps involved in making the potion, Qing Yi could not help but grow curious about the effect of the Cloud Cover Potion.


    From the name alone, Qing Yi did not really have any idea what purpose the potion had and looking at the different ingredients used in making the potion only ended up making her even more confused as to what use the Cloud Cover Potion would have.


    It was the first time since she had started practicing alchemy, that she had evere across such a weird potion¡­ Just from the ingredients alone, it looked like someone had just grabbed a handful of spiritual herbs from a bag filled with random spiritual herbs!


    The potion recipe made no sense to her, and she had no clue if it would even work! How would she ever figure out what the Cloud Cover Potion that her master gave to her did when she didn''t even think that following the recipe would result in her getting a potion in the first ce!


    "What it does¡­? Hm¡­ The Cloud Cover Potion will cover the user in a thinyer of clouds, that will make one lighter and at the same time make it easier to hide among clouds¡­" Thinking about it for a short moment, Xuan Hao soon exined what the Cloud Cover Potion did.


    In the end, this only caused Qing Yi to grow even more confused as she heard about the use of the Cloud Cover Potion.


    Doubtfully turning to look back down at the recipe that her master had given her filled with spiritual herbs known for their violent effects.


    Take the Death Willow Root used in the Cloud Cover Potion as an example, well known for its poisonous nature to the point that it was widely known to have caused the death of countless unfortunate cultivators who idently consumed the spiritual root in the belief that eating a spiritual root would help increase their cultivation realm¡­


    Qing Yi had heard about the spiritual root from one of the elders of the Alchemy Hall, who had warned her about just how dangerous a Death Willow Root was! The elder in question even told her that she had seen someone in the Core Formation Realm die after consuming a Death Willow Root!


    How did such a scary spiritual root ever have anything to do with making one''s body lighter and allowing one to hide among the clouds covered by a thinyer of clouds!?


    "Now, should we get started? First, I will make a Cloud Cover Potion so you can see how its done. After that, I will go over any questions you have, and you will make one yourself! Of course, I will help you from the side and help correct you in case you make any mistakes." Not realizing how doubtful Qing Yi currently was about the Cloud Cover Potion even being a potion in the first ce, Xuan Hao gathered the spiritual herbs needed for the potion before he began the brewing process.


    Given that the potion was one he had already practiced over the past few months and the fact that it was one of the recipes he had gained through the system, Xuan Hao easily went through the process of mixing the different spiritual herbs without making any mistakes and soon enough an airy and bubbly liquid that was a pure white colour could be seen inside the cauldron Xuan Hao was using.


    "Wha-?!" Seeing the entire thing happening before her, Qing Yi could not help but let out a gasp of shock at just how skilled her master was.


    At first the liquid had been in a colour simr to charcoal when the first few herbs had entered the cauldron, but somehow after a few minutes under her master''s skilful maniption of the liquid inside the cauldron and the new spiritual herbs being added in at just the right time. The liquid had gone from looking like liquid charcoal, to bing a pure white, airy and bubbly liquid!


    Just looking at it, Qing Yi could not help opening her mouth in shock. Even without personally testing the pure white liquid, she could tell that the poisonous effect of the Death Willow Root and the other poisonous herbs that had been were gone.


    Whoosh!


    Upon seeing that the liquid inside the cauldron had turned into an airy and bubbly white liquid, Xuan Hao used his ice domain to quickly cool down the mixture before pouring it into a few empty potion bottles that he had already ced on the ground beneath the cauldron.


    "And¡­ Done!" Filling up thest potion bottle and cing it on top of the table located just beside the cauldron he had used during the brewing process, Xuan Hao turned around to see Qing Yi staring fixatedly at the potion bottles he had just filled up.


    Seeing her look so intently towards the potion bottles, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit proud inside.


    "You can just take one if you want to study the finished product before attempting to make on by yourself."


    "T-thank you, master¡­" Shyly thanking her master as she realized that her intentions had been seen through, Qing Yi quickly hopped over towards the table and picked up one of the bottles filled with the still airy and bubbly white liquid that made up the Cloud Cover Potion.


    Not wasting any time after getting her hands on one of the potion bottles, Qing Yi quickly began to observe the liquid inside of it more closely before cautiously bringing the potion bottle up to her lips.


    Pwhoosh!


    "Wha-what is this?!" Eximing in shock as she suddenly felt herself begin floating from lightly pushing against the ground beneath her as a thinyer of clouds covered her body, Qing Yi didn''t know what to do as she had never felt something so bizarre before.


    Even if her body was lighter, it was not to the degree that it would make it easier for her to fight. Instead, it was more like she had be too light, to the point that even exerting a slight amount of strength would cause her float away without being able to get down again in the short term.


    After all, it was only people in the Domain Lord Realm that had the ability to fly¡­ Floating might be a nice thing but given the fact that she could not control where she went, Qing Yi did not feel that the floating benefitted her in the slightest. Especially not when she was currently in the process of slowly floating towards the ceiling of the alchemy room without being able to stop herself¡­


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 Chapter 406 - Poisonous Herbs

    <h4>Chapter 406 - Poisonous Herbs</h4>


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    Floating down onto the ground again after having reached the ceiling and pushing herself gently downwards, Qing Yi cautiously tried moving around under the effect of the Cloud Cover Potion her master had made.


    For the next five minutes, Qing Yi curiously tried floating around inside the alchemy room, while also trying to understand just how such poisonous spiritual herbs had ended up having such a unique effect¡­


    "Ahh!"


    After five minutes had passed, the effect of the Cloud Cover Potion conveniently ended while she was floating close to the ceiling of the alchemy room, causing Qing Yi to suddenly fall from a few meters in the air and onto a table filled with several different things beneath her.


    Crash~


    Landing on top of the table, Qing Yi manged to destroy a few empty ss vials and potion bottles without injuring herself in the process ofnding on top of the table.


    "T-the effect ran out faster than I expected¡­"


    Hurriedly getting down from the table, Qing Yi quickly proceeded to clean up the mess of broken ss that she had ended up creating with her suddennding.


    "I will take care of it." Standing by the side, Xuan Hao did not n to wait for Qing Yi to clean up, as he quickly waved his hand, causing a small wind to pass through the room and take care of the mess Qing Yi had created.


    "Thank you, master¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as her master had cleaned up the mess she had made, Qing Yi decided to just thank him before Turning her attention towards gathering the different spiritual herbs needed for the Cloud Cover Potion located around the alchemy room.


    cing all of them on a table beside an unused cauldron that her master had found for her during the time she was floating around the room.


    Having gathered all the things required to make the Cloud Cover Potion, Qing Yi turned her attention back towards her master.


    "Do you have any questions before starting?" Seeing Qing Yi stare up at him, Xuan Hao immediately knew the reason why as Qing Yi soon nodded her head.


    "Yes! I''m not too sure how you prepared the poisonous spiritual nts used in the Cloud Cover Potion and I''m still not certain about the exact order that I will be adding in the different spiritual herbs to the cauldron¡­" Not holding back in the slightest after hearing what her master said, Qing Yi asked about the things that she had been worried about when it came to making the Cloud Cover Potion.


    Not to mention the fact that she had never really dealt with any poisonous spiritual nt when making potions or pills before, Qing Yi was not sure about exactly what order she would be adding in the different spiritual herbs!


    Even if she had seen her master do it already, she had not really focused too much on the order that the spiritual herbs had been added into the cauldron and the recipe given by her master had only mentioned what spiritual herbs were used! Not the order that they would be added into the cauldron!


    "Hm¡­ I will teach you how to handle the poisonous spiritual herbs used for the Cloud Cover Potion and how to prepare them. Luckily most poisonous spiritual herbs or roots in this case, are prepared in mostly the same way, so you should be able to apply what you learn from handling these few poisonous spiritual herbs to any you may encounter in the future!


    For the order that the different spiritual herbs will be added into the cauldron, I purposefully left out. You will have to figure it out by yourself! Though, I will give you a little help. The stronger and more powerful herbs will go in first, while the weaker will go inst!"


    Hearing? what her master said, Qing Yi first felt excited upon hearing that he would teach her how to handle and prepare poisonous spiritual herbs, but began feeling a bit afraid upon hearing that she would have to figure out the order of the different spiritual herbs by herself¡­


    "Let''s start with the weaker poisonous spiritual herbs and slowly move our way up towards the Death Willow Root¡­ What do you say Qing Yi?"


    "I''m ready master!"


    Ignoring Qing Yi who was still in the process of trying to figure out the order that she would be adding in the different spiritual herbs to the cauldron, Xuan Hao interrupted her state of mind and quickly brought her back to the matter of the poisonous spiritual herbs.


    Over the next few hours, Xuan Hao slowly taught Qing Yi how to prepare the four different poisonous spiritual herbs for use in alchemy. Making sure that she knew what do, so she wouldn''t idently end up poisoning herself in the future.


    After having gained a lot of knowledge on different poisonous spiritual herbs through the system when he had be an Artisan Alchemist, Xuan Hao found out how truly terrifying some poisonous spiritual herbs were.


    Among the Soul Grade Poisonous Spiritual Herbs that he had learned about through this knowledge, there were even a few that had the potential to infect the soul and possibly kill someone in the Domain Lord Realm!


    Therefore, it was important that Qing Yi learned how to properly prepare and handle poisonous spiritual herbs before she began using them in the future.


    Avoiding poisonous spiritual herbs was easy at the start, but from what Xuan Hao had learned after reading through the recipes stored inside the sect and the going over the recipes he had learned from the system. Poisonous spiritual herbs would end up bing one of the main ingredients used throughout almost all potions and pills!


    ¡­


    "Finished!"


    Smiling happily as she looked down on eight small piles of now prepared spiritual herbs, Qing Yi felt a bit proud when she looked over the four piles that belonged to the four poisonous spiritual herbs that the Cloud Cover Potion needed.


    "Now all you have to do is figure out when the different spiritual herbs are going in."


    Feeling her smile suddenly disappear when she heard those words from her master, Qing Yi could not help but look over at him with a slightly wronged expression on her face.


    Did he really have to mention that already!? At least let her pat herself on the back for a bit before moving on to the next step!


    "Haha, no need to look at me like that, you still have to make the Cloud Cover Potion!" Laughing a bit upon seeing the wronged expression on Qing Yi''s face, Xuan Hao showed no mercy as he said this.


    "I know¡­" Muttering this in a low voice, Qing Yi began looking over the eight different spiritual herbs she had prepared.


    Her master said that the more powerful spiritual herbs should go in first, while the weaker ones would go inst¡­


    Thinking along this line of thought, Qing Yi quickly managed to divide the herbs into four different piles. Each containing two different spiritual herbs of the same grade.


    Six Mortal Grade Herbs, with a pair of two belonging to the lower, middle and peak of the Mortal Grade.


    Thest pair contained two Earth Grade Spiritual Herbs. One of which was the poisonous Death Willow Root!


    "S-should I add them in like this?" Feeling a bit nervous as she looked down at the spiritual herbs divided into four different pairs, Qing Yi looked back over at Xuan Hao. Hoping that she would have correctly divided the spiritual herbs up.


    "Yes, that''s great! Do you know why each of the poisonous spiritual herbs are paired up with another spiritual herb?"


    "Because it neutrali-! It neutralizes the poisonous nature of the poisonous spiritual herbs!" Listening to what her master said, Qing Yi quickly realized why the spiritual herbs would go into the cauldron at the same time!


    Even if she still struggled to understand how these spiritual herbs would end up producing such a weird effect like the one the Cloud Cover Potion had. At least she had begun to understand that it had something to do with the poisonous spiritual herbs poison being neutralized, or at least that was what she believed was happening¡­


    "Correct, I think you should be more than ready to try making a Cloud Cover Potion by now!" Observing how Qing Yi excitedly looked at him and the different neatly prepared spiritual herbs on the table, Xuan Hao stepped to the side and allowed for his disciple to begin.


    Hearing the encouraging words from her master after, Qing Yi no longer felt as confused about the Cloud Cover Potion as she had at the beginning.


    Instead, she began feeling confident. Confident in the fact that she would be able to make a Cloud Cover Potion herself!


    Whoosh!


    Beginning the process of adding in the first pair of spiritual herbs to the cauldron, Qing Yi began the most important step in the process of making any potion. The mixing process where the different spiritual herbs were blended together into a single mixture that would then end up bing the Cloud Cover Potion!


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 Chapter 407 - Qing Yis Cloud Cover Potion And Winged Lion

    <h4>Chapter 407 - Qing Yi''s Cloud Cover Potion And Winged Lion</h4>


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    Whoosh~


    Along with Xuan Hao helping Qing Yi with cooling down the potion mixture after she had finished adding in thest few spiritual herbs, Qing Yi''s first attempt at making a Cloud Cover Potion had officially finished!


    Now all that was left for her to do was find out if the potion hade out well or she had made some sort of mistake along the way that ended up ruining the potion mixture¡­


    "¡­"


    Nervously inching forward as she looked over the still bubbly white and airy liquid that was a carbon copy of what her master had made, Qing Yi did not feel herself calming down in the slightest. After all, while the potion mixture looked the same, it could still have a widely different effect.


    For example, if she had ended up making any sort of mistake during the preparation of the poisonous spiritual herbs, it might instead have be a deadly poison for any who consumed it¡­


    Thinking about all of this, Qing Yi could not help but feel even more nervous as she watched how her master in her eyes, carelessly filled up an empty potion bottle with the potion mixture she had made before inspecting it for a few seconds and then swallowing the whole thing in front of her.


    Even if she knew that the poison inside of the Death Willow Root and other poisonous spiritual herbs were not enough to harm her master, she still felt a bit afraid when he drank the potion mixture.


    Pwoosh!


    Just like it had done when she had taken the Cloud Cover Potion made by her master, Qing Yi watched as her master was covered in a thinyer of almost transparent clouds.


    "Hm¡­"


    Whoosh!


    Pushing himself off the ground as he floated around the alchemy room for a bit, Xuan Hao soon stabilized himself on the ground before nodding his approvingly towards Qing Yi looking on from the side.


    "I¡­ I did it!"


    Knowing that she had seeded in making the Cloud Cover Potion, Qing Yi felt herself ovee with joy as she happily jumped into the air before quickly calming down again upon remembering the fact that her master was still present.


    Having her master see her do something like that was quite embarrassing¡­


    Wait... What about the time I floated around the room¡­?


    Realizing just how embarrassing she had been just a few hours earlier when she had tried out the Cloud Cover Potion made by her master, Qing Yi could not help wanting to dig a hole for herself to jump into and hide away at the moment.


    "Looks like it works perfectly without any weird side effects¡­ Well done Qing Yi, you can take a break for now and get something to eat. Thest few hours should have been quite hard on you, and you didn''t get anything to eat before we started." Not paying any attention to the embarrassed look on Qing Yi''s face, Xuan Hao instead praised her Cloud Cover Potion before allowing her to leave for a break before they would continue.


    "Thank you, master! I will be taking my leave!"


    Whoosh~


    Taking advantage of the fact that she had been given a chance to escape, Qing Yi quickly darted out of the alchemy room. Not daring to stay behind for even a second longer in case her master realized anything wrong with her.


    "How interesting¡­ It looks like this Cloud Cover Potion should be only slightly behind the one I made¡­" Too busy inspecting the Cloud Cover Potion made by Qing Yi to discover how weird she was just before she rushed to leave, Xuan Hao waspletely oblivious to what had just transpired.


    ¡­


    Yawn~!


    At the same time Xuan Hao had just finished teaching Qing Yi, back at the Flying Sword Sect, the winged lion demon beast waszilyying on arge rock basking in the sun on top of an almost empty mountain with only a few strong pine trees growing there.


    After Xuan Hao had left, the winged lion didn''t feel like staying around Xuan Hao''s pavilion and decided to look around the Flying Sword Sect and find a morefortable ce to sleep.


    In the end, it had found a lonely mountain located inside the mountain range surrounding the Flying Sword Sect and decided to stay there to pass time.


    For the winged lion, it just wanted a good ce to sleep and good food to eat whenever it was hungry.


    In a sense, the winged lion felt like it had benefited from following Xuan Hao back to the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Not only was there a lot of nice mountains with great sleeping spots on them, but there would also always be someone ready toe deliver a well-prepared meal whenever it was needed¡­


    "Roar?" Just when the winged lion was about to call for its daily meal to be delivered, a strong presence could be felt approaching the Flying Sword Sect.


    The presence in question should have at least reached the Domain Lord realm! But in the eyes of the winged lion the presence approaching was still far from being strong enough to pose any threat to it.


    Whoosh!


    Instead of getting ready for a fight, the winged lion just sent a warning by using its own terrifying aura to show off its strength to the approaching presence. Hoping that the person in question would leave after having felt the difference between both of them¡­


    Roar!?


    However, much to the winged lion''s surprise, the presence did not slow down and instead continued approaching without showing any sign of stopping!


    Feeling the presence still continue towards it, the winged lion narrowed both of itsrge eyes as it knew that it would not be able to get rid of the approaching person by just flexing its strength over a distance.


    Swoosh~


    pping both itsrge wings, the winged lion directly took off from the mountain top that it had been sleeping on top of. Heading directly towards the approaching presence.


    The faster the annoying presence was dealt with, the faster it could return to the Flying Sword Sect and get to eat¡­


    ¡­


    "Why does it rain so much today of all days?"


    At the entrance of the Flying Sword City, a travelling merchant could not help but grumble to himself as he looked up at the rain the was violently pouring down in front of him.


    "I should really get a carriage that can allow me to stay dry while steering in the future-"


    "Papa, there is a biiiiig kitty!"


    "Kitty? Where? I don''t see any¡­ And why would they be out here in such bad weather? Get inside the carriage again before you end up getting wet!" Hearing his youngest daughter call out to him from behind, the merchant quickly scolded her.


    "But! There really was a biiiig kitty! It even had wings and could fly! Look it just flew away!" Not one to back down upon hearing her father''s words, the young girl pointed over towards one of the mountains that were part of the mountain range surrounding the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Wings? A cat with wings!?" Hearing how insistent his daughter was, the merchant felt a bit nervous as he thought she might have seen a demon beast and turned to look at where she was pointing but saw nothing.


    "Look there is not cat out there. Now get back into the carriage before you get any more wet than you already are!" Feeling a bit relived at the fact that there was no cat with wings at the ce his daughter pointed, the merchant quickly got back to the fact that she was still pointing her small head out in the cold rain.


    At this point, her hair had already beenpletely drenched like his own. Making the merchant already imagine how she will end up getting a fever the next day.


    "But-"


    "No but-"


    Not nning to discuss with his daughter any longer, the merchant decided to call for his wife who had been taking a nap inside the carriage before the daughter was pulled back inside to get dried and warmed up.


    If not for the fact that the sky was clouded, and it was raining violently. Making it hard for anyone to notice that anything was happening just above them. The merchant traveling towards the Flying Sword City would surely have been able to spot a giant winged lion demon beast and a person floating mid-air just a few hundred meters above them.


    Havinge to a stop, the winged lion slowly began to observe the person floating in front of it.


    "What a curious demon beast, was this perhaps the one mentioned by Feng Chen?" As the winged lion demon beast was cautiously observing the person before it, the person in question was also observing the winged lion without a worry in the world.


    Roar!


    Roaring threateningly towards the person in front of it upon realizing that it was not being taken seriously. The winged lion fully concentrated its terrifying aura towards the person floating just in front of it.


    "Ah! No need to be like this! I''m a friend of Elder Xuan!" Feeling the terrifying aura, the person floating mid-air quickly called out, causing the winged lion to stop what it was doing.


    Roar?


    Hearing this, the winged lion felt a bit confused as it stopped and looked more closely at the person floating in front of it.


    Friend? My master had a friend who also reached the Domain Lord Realm?


    "I''m Shu Yao! The current Sect Master of the Spring Flower Sect! You can ask Feng Chen if you have any doubts!" Seeing that the winged lion was still doubtful of her identity, Shu Yao revealed her identity. Not daring to drag it any longer in case the winged lion really decided to attack her.


    Even if she was curious about the strength of the winged lion, she had no n to fight it in her current situation!


    After all, it had not been too long since she reached the Domain Lord Realm and she had not yet fully stabilized her cultivation base yet!


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 Chapter 408 - Domain Lord Shu Yao

    <h4>Chapter 408 - Domain Lord Shu Yao</h4>


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    Roar!


    Still not fully convinced by Shu Yao, the winged lion demon beast still remained in front of Shu Yao. Preventing her froming anywhere near the Flying Sword Sect.


    "I get it¡­ I will call for Feng Chen!"


    Knowing that she could not simply get past the winged lion by saying she was friends with its master and the Flying Sword Sect, Shu Yao quickly pulled out amunication talisman before she contacted Feng Chen toe over and help her out before the winged lion demon beast in front of her grew impatient and decided to attack her.


    Soon enough, the figure of Feng Chen rushed out of the Flying Sword Sect before he reached the ce just below where Shu Yao and the winged lion were.


    Roar¡­?


    Seeing Feng Chene out, the winged lion understood that Shu Yao did not lie earlier and was indeed a friend of the Flying Sword Sect and its master¡­


    Whoosh!


    Lifting the pressure that it had slowly begun applying to her again. The winged lion directly left. Flying back towards the mountain peak just above the rain clouds that it had beenzily sleeping on top of before Shu Yao showed up.


    Having realized that it had wasted the time it could have spent eating or sleeping, the winged lion didn''t bother waiting for Feng Chen to exin how Shu Yao was a friend of its master and the Flying Sword Sect.


    Not wasting any time in contacting the disciples and elders in charge of making its meal as soon as it had returned to its sleeping spot. Making sure they understood that it needed something bigger than normal now that it had been forced to move around so much just after waking up¡­


    ¡­


    Thumb!


    "Took you long enough to show up¡­" Landing on the ground as Feng Chen came running over, Shu Yao could not helpining to Feng Chen.


    The short time between her calling for him to show up and him actually showing up was simply unbearable for her, as the winged lion demon beast clearly began to grow impatient with each passing second. Slowly increasing the pressure on her with its aura.


    At first it was still bearable for her, but with time, it became harder and harder for her to remain standing in the air.


    The pressure that was applied to her was not simple in any way and she had clearly felt the domain of the winged lion having merged with this pressure. Even using her own domain, she just recentlyprehended, Shu Yao had no way to block the pressure of the winged lion demon beast. The difference between their strength was obvious from this alone!


    "Sorry, I was busy discussing something with Elder Song and was not anywhere close to the entrance of the sect¡­"? Apologizing for histe arrival, Feng Chen soon focused on the fact that he had just seen Shu Yao flying. Looking closer, Feng Chen realized that her presence hadpletely changedpared to the past.


    "You reached the Domain Lord Realm!?" Putting two and two together, Feng Chen could not help but exim loudly as he looked over at Shu Yao filled with disbelief.


    Not only had Xuan Hao reached the Domain Lord Realm, but now Shu Yao had also broken through to the Domain Lord Realm?


    "Yes, I managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm with the help of Elder Xuan from your sect!"


    Hearing the confirmation from Shu Yao that she had indeed reached the Domain Lord Realm and that it was Xuan Hao who had helped her breakthrough, Feng Chen could not help but feel a bit doubtful about his future.


    Why had he not reached the Domain Lord Realm yet? Could he still remain as the Sect Master in the future when they merged together with the Spring Flower Sect given that he was only at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm? Up to this point, he had still not even managed to condense a pseudo domain¡­


    With all of these things going through his head, Feng Chen suddenly remembered the purification pill Xuan Hao had given to him.


    Yes! He still had the purification pill that Xuan Hao had given him, with it, he should be able to at least condense a pseudo domain of his own! At that point, he would not be too far off reaching the Domain Lord Realm himself!


    Thinking about this, Feng Chen hadpletely forgotten about Shu Yao standing only a few meters away from him.


    "Should we go into the sect?" Calling out from the side to Feng Chen who was lost in thought about how to improve his cultivation base even further, Shu Yao didn''t really think too much about why Feng Chen had suddenly gone so quiet.


    Mainly because she thought he had just been shocked over the fact that she had reached the Domain Lord Realm, which was true to some extent.


    "Yes! Yes, let''s find a ce to talk! I''m sure you didn''te here just to show off the fact that you reached the Domain Lord Realm¡­" Throwing his thoughts of using the purification pill to the back of his mind for now, Feng Chen and Shu Yao both began making their way back towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    ...


    "M-mom!"


    The voice of a young girl could barely be heard through the rain as a certain little girl had managed to witness the entire conversation between Shu Yao and Feng Chen.


    Both Shu Yao and Feng Chen of course knew that someone had been observing both of them the entire time, it was just that neither of them really cared about a little girl with no cultivation hearing them talk about the fact that Shu Yao had reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    In the first ce, the fact that Shu Yao had reached the Domain Lord Realm, would be public knowledge inside the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect''s territory in the soon to be future anyways¡­


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 Chapter 409 - Core Region Of The Ewaria Continent

    <h4>Chapter 409 - Core Region Of The Ewaria Continent</h4>


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    "So, what is the reason you came here?" Having found a quiet ce to talk inside the Flying Sword Sect, Feng Chen turned around and to ask Shu Yao.


    In the first ce, it should be something important, or she would just have contacted him through amunication talisman instead of showing up in person¡­


    "The Sect Master of the Seven Fates Sect has also reached the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    "What¡­?"


    "The Sect Master of the Seven Fates Sect is also a Domain Lord!"


    Hearing what Shu Yao told him, Feng Chen at first thought he had heard wrong at first. After all, Shu Yao reaching the Domain Lord Realm was one thing, as she had been helped out by Xuan Hao. It was only after Shu Yao repeated herself that he finally managed to fullyprehend what she said.


    Now the Sect Master of the Seven Fates Sect had also became a Domain Lord before him?


    "Are you sure he reached the Domain Lord Realm?!"


    "Yes, I managed to see him around the border of our territory just after I broke through myself¡­ From talking with him, it seemed like he wanted to take over a part of the core region where the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was located before its destruction."


    Frowning a bit when she said this, Shu Yao could notprehend what the Seven Fates Sect was up to and how it would affect her sect and the Flying Sword Sect. Especially now that their Sect Master had reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    Were they simply trying to expand their territory now that they had freed themselves from being suppressed by the Heavenly Sky Kingdom for so long, or was there perhaps some other reason for their expansion?


    No matter what it was, it looked like they would have to keep an eye on the Seven Fates Sect in the future¡­


    "How troublesome¡­ It looks like I will have to inform Elder Xuan and the rest of the elders about this¡­"


    Compared to Shu Yao who was frowning a bit when talking about the Sect Master of the Seven Fates Sect, Feng Chen looked way more troubled.


    Deep down, Feng Chen hoped that the Seven Fates Sect would give up their current territory and move towards the Core Region of the Sky Empire after joining the sect alliance being set up by the Sky Empire.


    This way, the Flying Sword Sect would easily be able to grow its territory without having to worry about another sect with a Domain Lord just next door.


    Leaving their current territory for a new one in the Core Regions of the Sky Empire where the resources were more plentiful, was never really something Feng Chen had thought about doing. In his eyes, staying in one ce and slowly growing was the way to go and the way that The Flying Sword Sect had done things in the past.


    A sect would not be able to survive for thousands of years without being cautious and knowing their surroundings!


    Leaving for a more resource rich territory at the Core Region of the Sky Empire might be a great idea on the surface, but one should also remember that there would be far more powerful cultivators in ces like that. In turn, one would also have to face far more dangerous situations!


    The Core Region of the Sky Empire was a part of the Southern Core Region of the Ewaria Continent.


    The Core Region of the Ewaria Continent was split into several different regions. Each being controlled by a powerparable, if not stronger than the Sky Empire!


    It was also here that the fights between theserge powers would mainly take ce between the different Domain Lords under them.


    The Sky Empire might be able to stay safe, but the Domain Lords under them would be forced to fight to keep control of their territory from any Domain Lords from other powers that mighte to attack them at any time.


    This was not to say that the Sky Empire would just let the Domain Lords under them die to their enemies, they of course assisted them in making sure that their territory did not fall into the hands of their enemy.


    It was just that the fights were limited to the Domain Lord Realm, so as to not end up causing too much destruction.


    At least, this was what Feng Chen knew about regarding the Core Region of the Ewaria Continent and all of his knowledge was based on what little records their founder had left behind before disappearing¡­


    All in all, while the Core Region of the Continent was filled with treasures and countless opportunities, it was also a ce filled with danger. Even someone in the Domain Lord Realm could not guarantee their safety, it was after all the ce where the Soul Ascension Realm Experts of the Ewaria Continent all resided!


    Shivering a bit when he remembered the things that their founder had recorded about the Core Region of the Continent, Feng Chen promised himself that he would never move the Flying Sword Sect anywhere near that ce.


    Not only would it be dangerous for the sect as a whole, but it would also make it extremely dangerous for the disciples to travel outside the sect like they could after just reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm at the moment.


    The current territory of the Flying Sword Sect, while it was still dangerous to travel for the weaker disciples, it was still far safer than any territory in the Core Region of the Sky Empire!


    ¡­


    "Looks like he''s deep in thought about something¡­" Watching Feng Chen''s thoughtful expression as he was clearly deep in thought about something, Shu Yao knew that their conversation would not go anywhere for the time being, as shezilyid down on thefy couch she was sitting on.


    "I wonder what the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect are like¡­ I never really had a chance to meet any of them before¡­" Muttering this to herself as she remembered the fact that their sects would be merging together soon, Shu Yao spread out her divine sense to cover the Flying Sword Sect with a curious expression on her face as sheid down on the couch.


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 Chapter 410 - Future Sect Location Decided!

    <h4>Chapter 410 - Future Sect Location Decided!</h4>


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    "Hm?" Looking over the Flying Sword Sect with her divine sense, Shu Yao quickly discovered the low number of elders present inside of the sect.


    The number of elders currently present inside of the sect was less than halfpared to when she hadst visited the sect and even more baffling was the fact that most of them were busy with either teaching the disciples or working in one of the profession halls inside the sect.


    Remembering the rxed elders, that she had seen walking around without doing much thest time she visited, Shu Yao could not help growing curious thinking about what had happened over the past few months that had caused such a change to take ce.


    "Maybe it has something to do with what that Elder Song has been up to¡­" Muttering this to herself as she remembered how some of the elders from the Spring Flower Sect had informed her about Elder Song from the Flying Sword Sect beginning to stabilize and build up the territory of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Normally, doing something like that would be normal. Especially given how much the Flying Sword Sect had grown in strength over the past few months¡­


    But looking the current state of the Flying Sword Sect herself, Shu Yao realized that the one known as Elder Song was far more effective than she had imagined when she had first heard about him from her own elders!


    "Shu Yao, what do you think we should do regarding the Seven Fates Sect¡­?" Having thought through what Shu Yao had told him about the Sect Master of the Seven Fates Sect reaching the Domain Lord Realm, Feng Chen decided to ask Shu Yao.


    After all, as someone who had lived next to the Seven Fates Sect for a long time and interacted with them a lot more than himself and the Flying Sword Sect, Feng Chen trusted that she would have a better understanding of thempared to himself.


    "Hm? I think we should just ignore them and let them do their own thing. The Seven Fates Sect was never really that bad and given that we both have Domain Lords, I doubt the Sect Master of the Seven Fates Sect would try anything¡­


    On the other hand, I think there is a high likelihood that they will move their sect into the Core Region of the Sky Empire in the future. From what I heard over the years, it seems like the Seven Fates Sect was originally a big sect in the Core Regions of the Continent, but they encountered some kind of disaster along the way and were forced to take refuge in the borders of the Sky Empire¡­"


    "I see¡­" Letting out a sigh of relief upon hearing that the Seven Fates Sect would likely be leaving for the Core Regions of the Sky Empire in the future, Feng Chen nced over towards Shu Yao, who was stillzilyying down on the couch without showing any sign of moving.


    "Is there still something else?" Asking this with a curious expression on his face, Feng Chen watched Shu Yao slowly sit back up on the couch, as she looked back at him with a serious expression on her face.


    "W-what is it¡­?" Feeling himself begin growing nervous upon witnessing the serious expression on her face, Feng Chen could notprehend just what had caused such a serious expression. Even when she talked about the Sect Master of the Seven Fates Sect having reached the Domain Lord Realm, she was not that serious looking!


    "Have you managed to find a new sect location yet?"


    "Sorry?"


    "Have you found a location where we can build the new sect for when we merge? After all, both our sects are way too small to hold both of our disciples and elders currently!"


    Not too certain he heard correct the first time around, Feng Chen could not help but freeze up when he realized that Shu Yao really was asking about their future sect location! For them to merge together with the Spring Flower Sect into one sect, they would first of all have to at least have a sect that could house everyone!


    And currently, neither of the two sects were big enough for that¡­


    How did I forget about that!


    Panicking a bit when he saw the serious look on Shu Yao''s face clearly expecting an answer, Feng Chen began going over the different locations inside both their territories, but found no ce that would be fitting for them to build up a new sect.


    What about the Shattered Star Peaks? Xuan Hao went there to scout out the mountain as a potential ce for the new sect, I never got to ask him if he found a way for us to deal with the chaotic qi there and move our sect to the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Given howrge the Nine Star Peaks is, there should be more than enough space for both my sect and the Spring Flower Sect tofortably stay at a single Star Peak¡­


    "Wait a minute! I will have to ask Elder Xuan about something, he was the one I send out to inspect ces for us to build the new sect up, so he is more knowledgeable regarding possible future sect locations!" Throwing out this very clear excuse , Feng Chen hurriedly ran out of the room as he got his hand on a high-grademunication talisman located back in his pavilion before contacting Xuan Hao.


    High-grademunication talismans were expensive and in the current Flying Sword Sect, the only people who had ess to them were Feng Chen!


    Xuan Hao had also been given one by him before leaving for the Iron Sky Kingdom. Just so he could contact him in case anything happened¡­ Not that he would be able to get back in time given how far away the Iron Sky Kingdom was from the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    ¡­


    "Hm?"


    Back at the Alchemy Room, Xuan Hao was going over what he should teach Qing Yi next, when he suddenly felt themunication talisman given to him by Feng Chen a few days before he left light up. Showing that someone was trying to contact him and given the fact that he only really knew about Feng Chen having a high-grademunication talisman, Xuan Hao could easily guess who was trying to contact him¡­ Now the question became why?


    "Hello? Did some something happen¡­?" Not in the belief that the Flying Sword Sect was in any sort of dangerous situation due to the winged lion being present there, Xuan Hao was rtively calm when he picked up themunication talisman.


    "Ah¡­ Elder Xuan¡­ The thing is-"


    Listening to Feng Chen''s exnation about why he had called him, along with the fact that both Shu Yao and the Sect Master of the Seven Fates Sect had reached the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao understood why Feng Chen sounded a bit anxious when talking.


    But he wants to know if it''s possible for us to set one of the Star Peaks as our future sect location¡­


    Thinking about the chaotic qi that covered the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao knew very well that it was not currently possible for them to move to one of the Nine Star Peaks. After all, currently, the only way he had to deal with the chaotic qi and allow such a thing to happen, was the Qi Gathering Formation¡­


    But he was still not done collecting the required materials for it yet, he still needed to find a wind and metal natural treasure of at least Mystic Grade. Not to mention the Transcendent Grade Natural Treasure that would act as the core of the formation...


    "When will the construction for the new sect begin?" Not outright denying the possibility, Xuan Hao instead decided to ask Feng Chen how long there would be until they began construction at the new sect location.


    "Hm¡­ From what Elder Song has been saying, one and a half year¡­ Maybe two years." Not knowing why, he asked this, Feng Chen still answered the question truthfully.


    "One and a half year or two years'' time, I should be able to gather the things needed and set up the formation in that time¡­


    Feng Chen, you can just tell Shu Yao that the new sect location will be one of the Star Peaks. Don''t worry about the chaotic qi, I have a way to deal with it!" Muttering the first part to himself as he thought about it for a short moment, Xuan Hao soon nodded his head before informing Feng Chen that they would use on of the Star Peaks as their future sect location.


    "Really!? That''s great! I will inform Shu Yao about!" Feeling like he had been saved from having to deal with trying to ask Shu Yao for more time to find a future sect location, Feng Chen quickly ended the conversation before rushing back to inform Shu Yao about their future sect location.


    "Hm?"


    On the other side, Xuan Hao had just put away themunication talisman, when the system suddenly showed signs of life again!


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 Chapter 411 - Day Of The Alchemy Competition!

    <h4>Chapter 411 - Day Of The Alchemy Competition!</h4>


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    [Limited Time Sect Quest: Gather the rest of the natural treasures needed for the construction of the Qi Gathering Formation and set up the Qi Gathering Formation inside the Shattered Star Peaks within two years'' time!]


    [Time: 2 years]


    [Reward: Cultivation Increase of 1 Minor Realm, ???]


    Looking over the quest that he had just managed to trigger, Xuan Hao could not help smiling happily. The limited time sect quest not only hid a reward like it usually tended to do, but it would also allow him to increase his cultivation realm by one minor realm!


    Even without being given a quest by the system, he would still have tried to gather the things he needed for the Qi Gathering Formation and set it up before the two years'' time period was over and the construction for a new and bigger sect to house both the disciple of the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect started.


    "Hm? Looks like Qing Yi is back already¡­" Pushing the new quest from the system aside as he felt his discipleing over after having taken a quick break, Xuan Hao returned his focus back to what he would be teaching Qing Yi next.


    The time limit for the sect quest was two years¡­ He had more than enough time to look for thest three natural treasures that he needed for the Qi Gathering Formation at another time.


    For now, he had to help Qing Yi prepare for the uing alchemypetition that was only a single week away!


    Other than that, he also had to think up some different measures to deal with the alchemist from the Sky Empire in case he took an interest in his disciple and tried to take her away. No mater what, he could not let that happen!


    "Master! I''m back!"


    Following the voice of Qing Yi who had just returned to the alchemy room, Xuan Hao soon began teaching her again. Making sure that he covered the important areas of alchemy that she didn''t learn about yet, like the preparation of poisonous spiritual herbs that he went over at the start.


    Not forgetting to include some more standard alchemy to make sure she would be improving across the board during his teaching sessions.


    Like this, the week leading up to the alchemypetition peacefully passed with Xuan Hao diligently teaching Qing Yi for several hours every single day.


    During this time, the people scheming against the Iron Sky Kingdom seemed to have disappeared into thin air. Even the thievesing to steal spiritual metals never returned after Xuan Hao''s visit to their underground base.


    The capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom was truly peaceful during this week up to the alchemypetition.


    ¡­


    "We have to hurry! The alchemypetition hosted by one of the Sky Empire''s Artisan Alchemist in our capital is going to start in just a few hours! All the seating spots will be gone if we arrive toote!"


    "Yes, I heard that even the lord will show up personally! The Artisan Alchemist sure is powerful¡­ Even our lord has to show up!"


    "Calm down! Isn''t it just an Artisan Alchemist? The Sky Empire has a lot of them¡­ Don''t forget who our lord is! How can an Artisan Alchemistpare to our lord?"


    Walking along the incredibly busy streets of the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital, Xuan Hao had gone out to get some air before the start of the alchemypetition.


    Listening to the conversation of a group made up of three friends, Xuan Hao could not help but notice how excited they were about the alchemypetition.


    Not only them, everywhere he looked, people were excitedly talking about the uing alchemypetition hosted by the Artisan Alchemy from the Sky Empire!


    This made Xuan Hao a bit curious, as this was the first time, he had ever really seen anyone outside of alchemist so excited when it came to alchemy.


    Perhaps it was just because he had never really moved too far away from the territory of the Flying Sword Sect before? Alchemy was after all. Not really that developed back in the Flying Sword Sect. Let alone the surrounding sects and kingdoms¡­


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head in pity.


    Alchemy was incredibly valuable to cultivators, but the disciples back in the Flying Sword Sect had never really shown any profound interest in learning alchemy. This could be seen from the fact that the youngest member of the Alchemy Hall outside of Qing Yi was thirty years old!


    How the Alchemy Hall even remained operating with such low numbers was an odd urrence. The only real reason why it had remained likely had to do with the fact that cultivators could live longer than normal people¡­


    Hopefully they would be able to spark some interest in alchemy with Qing Yi''s performance during the alchemypetition.


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao had unknowingly ended up with the exact same idea as the elders back at the Alchemy Hall who wanted to use the alchemypetition as a way to possible recruit more disciples into the Alchemy Halls and ensure the future alchemist of the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Yeah, I heard about that as well! I never expected for the Artisan Alchemist of the Sky Empire to be-"


    "Hm?" Hearing something unexpected as he walked along the streets of the capital, Xuan Hao came to a stop as he carefully began listening. Unwilling to miss anything, as the thing he heard next caused him to frown.


    "The Artisan Alchemist of the Sky Empire is actually at the peak of the Artisan Realm and half a step into the Master Realm¡­?"


    This news was nothing short of terrible, as it looked like the Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire was way stronger than he had first expected.


    The difference between an Artisan Alchemist and a Master Alchemist was like the difference between heaven and earth!


    Bing a Master Alchemist would symbolize that one had reached the peak in alchemy on the Ewaria Continent! The alchemist from the Sky Empire was only half a step away from reaching this legendary realm!


    "Hah¡­ I should be fine¡­" Remembering the fact that he himself could also be considered to have reached the peak of the Artisan Realm, as well as the fact that he was a Domain Lord, Xuan Hao calmed down again.


    No matter what, he would never allow anyone to steal away his disciples!


    If things came down to it, he could always return the favour! if the person from the Sky Empire really tried to steal his disciple, he would steal away his disciple as well!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly to himself.


    The scene of him and that unknown Artisan Alchemist trying to steal each other''s disciples away, was really an interesting thing to imagine¡­


    "Looks like I should get going before thepetition starts¡­" Throwing the thought of him and the unknown Artisan Alchemist stealing each other''s disciples to the back of his mind, Xuan Hao left the street and returned to the manor that he, Qing Yi and the rest of the elders from the Alchemy Hall had stayed at during the past week.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Why did it get cold all of a sudden? Did someone perhaps leave an open window somewhere?"


    At the same time inside the pce located at the centre of the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital, Fang Shi, the Artisan Alchemist who would surely try to ''steal'' Xuan Hao''s disciple, shivered as he looked around himself with a confused look on his face.


    "There are no windows inside an underground storage room¡­ Master¡­" From the side, his disciple Cai Yu, almost facepalmed upon hearing her master''s stupid question.


    They were a few dozen meters underground getting thest batch of spiritual herbs for the alchemypetition¡­ Why in the world was her master talking about someone having left a window open?


    "Ah¡­ I see¡­ Hehe, my bad- By the way, did you find any of the Yellow Heart Spirit Leaves?" Laughing a bit awkwardly when he realized that they were indeed underground, the old man soon changed the topic towards the thing they hade down to search for.


    "No, I didn''t find any Yellow Heart Spirit Leaves¡­" Rolling her eyes at how obviously her master switched the topic away, Cai Yu did not bother dealing with him and just went along with it, she knew very well what kind of person her master was¡­


    "Not found¡­ Hm¡­ This is really bad; we haven''t found any of the Purple Jewel Flower Roots either! At the very least, these things are for the final. Hopefully I will be able toe up with something different before then. Now that it looks like a few of the spiritual herbs for the pill I nned to make the semi-finalists create is not going to show up¡­" Frowning sadly when he said this, Fang Shi didn''t notice how his disciple rolled her eyes upon hearing what he said.


    Those are all Peak Spirit Grade Herbs¡­ If you really make them create a pill using so many different Spirit Grade Herbs, I fear that not a single person in the semi-finals will make it through to the final¡­


    Not saying her thoughts out loud, Cai Yu just silently searched through the underground storage room together with her master.


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 Chapter 412 - People From The Core Region Of The Sky Empire!

    <h4>Chapter 412 - People From The Core Region Of The Sky Empire!</h4>


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    Entering the manor, Xuan Hao was met by the sight of all the elders franticly moving around the manor as they were all making sure Qing Yi was ready for the alchemypetition.


    Every single one of them wanted Qing Yi to do well, as it would mean an increased poprity for the Alchemy Hall and that in turn would mean more disciples woulde to join the Alchemy Hall in the future!


    Whoosh~


    Seeing her master appear at the entrance to the manor, Qing Yi quickly freed herself from the elders of the Alchemy Hall and ran over to meet him.


    "Qing Yi! Wait!"


    "Qing Yi, you still have to memorize the exotic spiritual herb codex before the alchemypetition!"


    "Master! Help!" Ignoring the elders calling out to her from behind, Qing Yi quickly hid behind her master, as the elders from the Alchemy Hall soon came rushing over.


    At the same time, Gong Bo and Chi Hu were standing at the side watching the entire thing y out with a wry smile on their faces.


    The elders from the Alchemy Hall had gotten a little too fired up over the past few days¡­


    The close it got to the alchemypetition, the more anxious they became thinking about how the alchemypetition would end up determining whether they would be able to get a new batch of disciples to join the Alchemy Hall.


    For these elders who most of the time had no disciples to teach due to how unpopr the Alchemy Hall was. The matter of the alchemypetition was by far one of the most important things in their life ever since they had be elders.


    After all, currently they were elders in name only, with no disciples to speak of under them in the Alchemy Hall. Outside of Qing Yi of course¡­


    "All of you, calm down! If you, do it like this, you will just end up stressing her before the start of thepetition."


    Standing in front of Qing Yi, Xuan Hao stopped the elders from the Alchemy Hall from jumping over and dragging Qing Yi away for a fewst-minute preparations.


    "Y-yes¡­"


    ""¡­""


    Looking a bit unwilling, one of the elders shyly responded while the rest of the looked away embarrassedly after they realized just how they had been acting a few moments ago.


    Ah! Just looking at how Qing Yi stared at them now from behind her master was painful!


    "Let''s get going, it won''t hurt to arrive a little earlier."


    Ignoring the elders from the Alchemy Hall, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards Qing Yi as he said this.


    "Y-yes, master!" Nodding her head eagerly upon hearing her master, Qing Yi and Xuan Hao soon turned to leave the manor towards thepetition ground.


    "Indeed, I think Elder Xuan is correct, we should also get going."


    "Good idea, Elder Gong Bo!"


    Following behind Xuan Hao and Qing Yi, Gong Bo and Chi Hu, who had watched the entire thing from the side hurried out of the manor together.


    ""¡­""


    Soon, only the elders from the Alchemy Hall who had been insisting on having Qing Yi stay to memorize a few more things before the start of thepetition were left behind inside the manor.


    "M-maybe we should get going as well¡­?"


    Whoosh~


    Without even responding to the elder who said this, the rest of the elders looked at each other before they also made their way out of the manor towards thepetition ground.


    "Guys¡­?"


    The elder who was left behind looked in the direction everyone had disappeared with a slightly confused look on his face. Not really understanding clearly what had just happened.


    "Wait for me!"


    Whoosh!


    Realizing that everyone had left him alone, the poor elder in question quickly used his cultivation base to rush after them. Not wanting to be left alone in the manor. In the first ce, he had to quickly catch up with the rest. After all, without them, how would he even be able to enter thepetition ground in the first ce?


    He was not like Elder Xuan who had a Core Elder Token for identification! All he had on him was a few random herbs that he brought along for practice and trade during his time in the Iron Sky Kingdom!


    ¡­


    "Let''s go before thepetition starts! I heard that several young lords anddies from the variousrge powers of the Sky Empire joined!"


    "Really!? Let''s get going!"


    The alchemypetition being hosted in the Iron Sky Kingdom was not only a ce for smaller sects to show off and gain recognition but was also a gathering for the young genius alchemist across the Sky Empire.


    While it was notparable to an alchemypetition hosted in the capital of the Sky Empire by one of their Master Alchemists, it was not too far off the mark. After all, the person hosting thepetition was incredibly close to reaching the Master Realm and would likely end up bing one of the few Master Realm Alchemist in the Sky Empire in the future!


    No matter what, this was an opportunity for the younger alchemist to be the disciple of such an amazing alchemist. Even if the Iron Sky Kingdom was at the borders of the Core Region of the Sky Empire, a few of the young people joining thepetition spared no expense to make the journey.


    Because of this, several different flying ships could be seennding around the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom on the day that thepetition started as the young peopleing from the Core Region of the Sky Empireing to join thepetition showed up.


    Compared to most of the other participants, like Qing Yi, who had to travel over a long distance for serval weeks if not months to reach the Iron Sky Kingdom, these people could get there within a few days of travel through the use of a flying ship!


    "I really wish I could have a flying ship myself in the future¡­ Travel would be so much easier if that was the case¡­"


    "Dream on! Do you know how expensive they are!? Not only that, but they also consume arge amount of spirit stones just to function in the first ce!"


    Looking over at the many flying ships that had arrived in the air around the capital, the peopleing from outside the Core Region could not help but look over filled with envy.


    If they just had a flying ship of their own, travelling to the Iron Sky Kingdom would have been much easier and less dangerous!


    After all,pared to Xuan Hao''s group, they did not have anyone in the Domain Lord Realm to protect them if they were attacked. Not to mention the people who couldn''t even get their hands on flying demon beasts and were forced to travel on foot¡­


    Soon enough, everyone participating in the alchemypetition had arrived at the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom as they made their way towards the ce that thepetition would be hosted.


    Of course, there were some unlucky people who didn''t make it in time for thepetition and the even more unfortunate ones who died on the journey to the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    ¡­


    "Looks quite a lot of young ones showed up today, I wonder if I can find a new disciple among them¡­" Looking down at therge crowd of both spectators and participants moving towards the area where thepetition was going to be hosted, the old alchemist Fang Shi felt himself grow excited as he began looking forward to the performance of the young alchemist.


    "Yeah, there are indeed quite a few interesting ones among the participants. Hm? Not that guy¡­ Master, it looks like the Crown Prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom showed up as well¡­ Do you think he is here to try and be your disciple again¡­?" Looking down on the crowd of people moving around on the streets below them, Cai Yu frowned deeply upon seeing a certain person making his way towards thepetition area with great fanfare.


    Smiling wryly as he looked over and spotted a familiar arrogant young man making his way through the crowd with arge group of guards following closely behind him, Fang Shi didn''t dare say anything.


    The history between his only disciple Cai Yu and the Crown Prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom, he knew all too well that talking about that person would only result in bad things¡­


    "Ahm! I-I think it''s time for us to make our way towards thepetition grounds. After all, we don''t want to bete as the host!" Doing his best to avoid talking about the Crown Prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom, Fang Shi began moving towards the exit of the room. Hoping that Cai Yu would just follow him and not mention anything regarding that Crown Prince¡­


    "Fine¡­" Not looking the least bit happy after having seen a certain arrogant looking Crown Prince, Cai Yu stopped staring menacingly towards him from the window and made her way out of the room together with her master.


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 Chapter 413 - Entering The Competition Ground

    <h4>Chapter 413 - Entering The Competition Ground</h4>


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    Making their way to thepetition ground through the busy streets of the capital, Xuan Hao and Qing Yi cam to a stop in front of an enormous mineshaft that had been repurposed for the alchemypetition, with seating spaces being carved out into the sides of the mineshaft itself for the spectators to watch thepetition.


    The mineshaft itself was not deeper than a few dozen meters and instead covered an extremelyrge area. Looking at it from another point of view, the mineshaft should not be a finished one, but instead a new mineshaft under construction.


    If not for the fact that a few things were still left on the sides of the huge, repurposed mineshaft in construction that indicated therge hole in the ground''s true purpose, Xuan Hao would have easily believed that thepetition ground had been made just for the purpose of the alchemypetition¡­


    "Sorge¡­!" Opening her mouth in surprise upon seeing the huge hole in the ground easily the size of a small town.


    In essence, the hole in the ground was not much different from the giant mineshaft that was located beneath the first town they had visited upon entering the Iron Sky Kingdom. The only difference was the fact that the hole in front of them was nowhere near as deep as the mineshaft they had witnessed beneath the town close to the borders of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    That mineshaft was at least a few thousand meters deep¡­ Not like the unfinished one in front of them.


    "So, this is where the alchemypetition will be held¡­"


    "It looks quite simr in size to the mineshaft in the town we saw back at the borders¡­"


    Arriving a littleter than Xuan Hao and Qing Yi, Chi Hu and Gong Bo both looked at the giant hole in the ground in front of them.


    "Let''s get going, we still need to get Qing Yi to the other participants before the start of thepetition!" Seeing the other elders show up as well behind Chi Hu and Gong Bo, Xuan Hao didn''t intend to just stand around at the entrance of thepetition ground and made his way inside together with Qing Yi.


    ""Yes!"" Hearing what Xuan Hao said, the others quickly followed him inside.


    The guards at the entrance didn''t stop them either after having seen the invitation given to all the participants by the Alchemist from the Sky Empire.


    Like this, the group soon split off from Qing Yi, as she made her way towards the area where the participants of thepetition would stay until its start, while Xuan Hao, Chi Hu, Gong Bo and the rest of the elders made their way towards a spectating area reserved for the people who came along with the participants.


    "Hah¡­ Wait-"


    Barely managing to catch a glimpse of one of his friends from the Alchemy Hall as he entered thepetition ground, the elder from the Alchemy Hall who left the manorst. Felt a wave of panic running through him as he watched his friend disappear out of view.


    "Hm? What are you screaming for?"


    Having heard the elder''s scream, one of the guards standing at the entrance came over and asked him with a suspicious look on his face.


    "I was a littlete to show up and my friends entered before me¡­"


    Saying this with a sad look on his face, the elder knew very well that he would likely not have a chance of entering now that the others were already inside¡­


    "Sure, sure¡­ If you want to enter, I rmend using the entrance over there, this one is only used for participants and the peopleing together with them!" Rolling his eyes upon hearing what the elder said, the guard pointed towards a giant entrance located a few hundred meters away from the one they were guarding.


    "¡­"


    The only problem was the fact that an enormous line of people was currently queued up in front of said giant entrance¡­


    Will I even be able to get a spectator seat by the time it''s my turn¡­?


    Knowing very well that he had missed his chances of getting in with the others, the elder sighed deeply to himself before making his way towards therge line of people in front of the giant gate.


    No matter what, he would not be able to get anything out of getting angry with the guards or trying to talk his way inside. After all, in their eyes, he was just someone who hade to skip the line and enter without waiting¡­


    Thinking about this, the elder reluctantly lined up at the back of the massive line in front of the giant entrance¡­


    Hopefully he would be able to meet up with the others upon entering¡­


    ¡­


    Having separated from her master and the rest of the elders who hade together with her to the Iron Sky Kingdom, Qing Yi felt a bit nervous as she all by herself for the first time since her arrival at the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Walking along a mostly empty corridor inside the rocky wall surrounding the enormous hole in the ground that had been repurposed for the alchemypetition, Qing Yi finally came to a halt in front of a small doorway with the words [Participant Registration] written on it.


    "This should be the ce¡­" Muttering this to herself, Qing Yi opened the door and entered the room behind it.


    Creak~


    "Hm?"


    Upon entering the room, the first thing that caught her eyes, was a few other young people like herself sitting down as they curiously looked over towards a young man that could be seen talking to an elderly man sitting with a small book in front of him writing something down.


    "So, you are Luo Jin from the Fire Sky Kingdom?"


    "Yes!"


    "I see, go through the second door over there and the person on the other side will instruct you on what to do next!"


    Nodding his head upon hearing what the elderly man said, the young man soon disappeared through one of the four doors located behind the elderly man.


    "Next one!" Seeing that the young man had left, the elderly man pointed towards a girl sitting down just a few meters away from Qing Yi.


    Soon enough, the young girl was asked a few questions about where she was from, he name, age and so on before she was also sent towards one of the four doors behind the elderly man.


    As this continued for the next few minutes, Qing Yi noticed that most of the people inside the room were all weaker than her when it came to cultivation.


    The strongest outside of herself was another girl who had reached the Fourth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­


    Thinking a bit about this, Qing Yi realized that the people around her had most likely spent all their time on alchemy. In turn, the girl who had reached the Fourth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm might actually be worse than the other young people inside the room when it came to alchemy¡­


    This thought caused Qing Yi to grow a bit nervous. After all, she herself had not spent more than a year or so learning alchemy!


    Would she really be able to go up against someone who had focused on learning alchemy far before? her¡­?


    "Next one!"


    Feeling the gaze of the elderly man focus on her, Qing Yi flinched slightly as she quickly got up from the chair, she had found for herself to sit on after entering the room.


    "What is your name and where are you from?"


    "Qing Yi, I''m from the Flying Sword Sect!"


    Feeling herself grow nervous being stared at by the elderly man in front of her, Qing Yi bit her tongue to calm herself down a bit before answering the question.


    "Qing Yi, Flying Sword Sect¡­" Muttering these things, the elderly man quickly scanned through the book in front of him before writing down a few things.


    "Qing Yi, what part of alchemy are you the most proficient in? The Art of Potions or the Art of Pills?"


    "The Art of Potions!" Hearing the question, Qing Yi did not hesitate in the slightest as she answered.


    Alchemy could be split up into two major sides, the alchemist making potions and the ones making pills.


    Although there was really no difference between the two overall, there still was a few unique aspects to both sides.


    When talking about this, Qing Yi had practiced making potions way more than pills. Even when she had been taught by her master over the past week, it had mostly been in regard to potions.


    From the start, she had not learnt too much when it came to pills and had mostly been focusing on the aspect of potions when it came to alchemy.


    "I see, go through the fourth door over there and the person on the other side will instruct you on what to do next!"


    Getting almost the exact same line she had heard when she had first entered the room, Qing Yi nervously made her way towards the fourth door behind the elderly man.


    Creak~


    Opening the door and seeing a long empty corridor appear in front of her, Qing Yi slowly made her way into the corridor¡­


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 Chapter 414 - Alchemy Competition, Begin!

    <h4>Chapter 414 - Alchemy Competition, Begin!</h4>


    Following the long corridor that seemed to go on forever, Qing Yi soon found herself in the middle of arge open space.


    Looking around herself, Qing Yi quickly realized that she had made her way into therge hole in the ground that had been refitted for the alchemypetition. Looking up and seeing several hundred, if not more people looking down on her from above, was quite a nerve-wracking experience¡­


    "Are you Qing Yi?"


    "Ah!?"


    Hearing someone suddenly call out to her, as she was just about to scan through the spectators above for her master and the other elders, Qing Yi almost jumped backwards in shock before turning towards the person that called out to her.


    "Y-yes, I''m Qing Yi¡­" Seeing that it was an older person like the one she had given her identity to just a short time ago, Qing Yi quickly calmed down before answering with a somewhat flustered look on her face.


    "Great! You should be thest person for this group¡­ For now, you can just go over there and wait until the first part of thepetition begins." Smiling happily upon hearing her name as he looked through a small notebook in his hand, the old man pointed her towards a ce a few meters away from her where a group of people much like herself were nervously waiting for the start of the alchemypetition.


    Whoosh~


    "¡­"


    Not even having a chance to say anything as the old man directly disappeared in front of her, Qing Yi made her way over towards the other participants and found a ce to sit down and wait until thepetition began.


    All she could do now was wait and think about what the first part of thepetition would be about.


    At least from what she had managed to see so far, she and the rest of the participants had been split up into four groups, most likely to bepeting differently based on whether they were more skilled in potion making or pill making.


    Gazing over towards what could be considered the four other corners of thepetition ground, Qing Yi could not help but feel a bit confused upon noticing the fact that the other groups were farrger than the one she had been ced in.


    The other three groups having roughly a little over a hundred people in them, while hers only had a little over 10 people¡­ And from what the older man from earlier had said, she was thest person in this group. Meaning there would not be any more peopleing to join her group¡­


    Maybe they expected more people to join thepetition and just ended up like this due to some people not showing up on time¡­?


    Not being able toe to any other conclusion about why her group was so smallpared to the other three groups, Qing Yi once again turned her attention towards trying to figure out what the first part of thepetition might be about.


    ¡­


    "This should be it¡­"


    Having found the spectating room that had been designated to them after asking a few of the guards, Xuan Hao could not help showing a slightly surprised expression on his face upon realizing just howrge and luxurious the spectating room waspared to the other spectating rooms for the other participants guardians and elders that he had seen on his way over.


    Perhaps the Iron Sky Kingdom already knew about the fact that he had reached the Domain Lord Realm and didn''t dare to treat him and the rest of the Flying Sword Sect badly¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt that it made sense. After all, given therge formation surrounding the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom, the ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom had most likely already noticed the fact that someone in the Domain Lord Realm had entered.


    After which his identity as a member of the Flying Sword Sect had likely been uncovered¡­


    "This is!? So many refreshments¡­"


    Showing up just a few seconds after him, Chi Hu eximed in surprise upon seeing the luxurious and spacious spectating room¡­ Focusing most of his attention towards therge variety of refreshments and snacks readilyid out inside the room for them.


    "Wow¡­"


    "This is so much bigger than the other rooms!"


    "So many snacks¡­"


    As the other elders showed up, each of them had a look of amazement on their face as they entered the room.


    The only person not acting too surprised was Gong Bo, as he just silently entered the room before finding a good ce to sit from where he had a full view of therge space for thepetition below.


    Sitting down on a seat besides Gong Bo, Xuan Hao quickly scanned through therge space below them before locking onto his disciple.


    "Qing Yi is over there."


    Seeing Gong Bo very clearly searching for Qing Yi among therge number of participants below, Xuan Hao kindly pointed out where she was, as Gong Bo gave a quick thanks before focusing his full attention onto Qing Yi and the small group of participants, she was ced in.


    From this alone, Xuan Hao realized just how much importance Gong Bo had ced on Qing Yi doing well in the alchemypetition. Not to mention that she would help allow their sect to be more well known, her doing well in argepetition hosted by someone from the Sky Empire was sure to help the elders of the Alchemy Hall take in a few more disciples.


    "Hm? Looks like thepetition is about to start¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao focused on arge tform located at the centre of the space below as an elderly man along with a young girl appeared at the centre of the tform.


    Focusing on the elderly man, Xuan Hao directly ignored the young girl beside him. From what he could see, the young girl was only in the Core Formation Realm.


    The elderly man on the other hand¡­


    Bang!


    Before Xuan Hao could finish his thoughts, the elderly man on therge tform waved his hand asrge cauldron appeared in the air a few meters above him before mming down into therge tform. Instantly causing everyone to quiet down as they focused their attention on therge tform in the middle of therge space below.


    "Hello everyone! I see that I got your attention! I''m Fang Shi, the host of the alchemypetition and also an Artisan Alchemist of the Sky Empire. Thepetition will begin shortly, as all the participants are already here!" Smiling widely as he said this, the elderly man waited for a short moment as several people appeared before they brought out arge number of spiritual herbs before proceeding to set up several alchemy stations within only a few minutes in therge space.


    "The alchemypetition will be split into four groups, three for those specializing in pills and one for those specializing in potions. Each group will be given a recipe for a potion or pill, both the potion and pill recipe require the exact same spiritual herbs! Shortly, when thepetition begins, a limited amount of time will be given to each of you to make the potion or pill!"


    Back in the small group of people only numbering a little over 10, Qing Yi felt herself grow nervous upon hearing that they would only have a limited time toplete what was likely to be a brand-new potion or pill for them, but what caused her to fell even more nervous was what the alchemist from the Sky Empire said next-


    "The different spiritual herbs you need to make the potion or pill can be found here!" Pointing towards severalrge tables filled up with spiritual herbs surrounding therge tform in the middle of therge space that had been set up during the time he started speaking, the elderly Fang Shi smiled brightly before continuing with an even brighter smile on his face.


    "You will have to search for them yourselves. Ah¡­ I forgot to mention, there are over 3000 different spiritual herbs here. All looking quite simr to the one you need and there is only enough of the correct spiritual herbs for around two hundred of you¡­ Only those sessfully making the pill or potion before the time ends, will pass through to the next round!"


    Listening to Fang Shi saying all of this with a bright smile on his face, Qing Yi and the other participants beside her could not help growing nervous as they knew that most of them would not survive through the first round of thepetition.


    Making a brand-new potion or pill without any practice before-hand was difficult enough. Now they would also have to identify the correct spiritual herb required among over 3000 spiritual herbs!


    ¡­


    There were more than 3000 spiritual herbs on thoserge tables, and they would have to find the correct ones?


    At present, a lot of the participants felt grief at their current situation.


    There were more than 300 people participating in thispetition.. No one could guarantee that there wouldn''t be any conflict between the spiritual herbs need by the participants. After all, there were only enough for around 200 people!

 Chapter 415 - Trouble Brewing~

    <h4>Chapter 415 - Trouble Brewing~</h4>


    Carefully observing the spiritual herbs that had been ced on the severalrge tables around the tform that the Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire was currently standing on top of, Qing Yi tried her best to identify the different spiritual herbs on therge tables.


    However, this was to no avail as she quickly realized that she at most had the ability to identify a few dozen of the spiritual herbs present of therge tables. The rest of the spiritual herbs seemingly blended together with the others, as she found it hard to tell them apart from each other.


    "H-how are we going to find the spiritual herbs we need?"


    "I can only identify a few dozen of the spiritual herbs in there¡­"


    "I really hope that I know the spiritual herbs we will have to find¡­"


    Listening in on the other participants nervous talking about the uing first part of thepetition, Qing Yi knew that she was not alone in her thoughts about how difficult it would be to identify the correct spiritual herbs among the thousands other spiritual herbs that looked simr to the one they would need.


    "Haha, I see that all of you are getting quite nervous now! The recipe will be given to all of you shortly, along with an in-depth description of the different spiritual herbs you will need. No need to worry about someone already knowing the recipe beforehand, as its one of my personal recipes that I finished just yesterday for today''spetition!"


    Hearing the Artisan Alchemistughing upon seeing how nervous everyone had gotten before he proceeded to motion for a group of people to hand over the recipe along with a description of the different spiritual herbs, Qing Yi and the other participants immediately began reading through both of them.


    The recipe in question was split into two, one for a pill and another for a potion. The name of the pill and potion in the recipe, was Dragon Force Pill, or Dragon Force Potion.


    ording to the short description of the pill/potions effect, it would momentarily raise a cultivator''s strength by three minor realms! The side-effect of such an increase in strength being that the user would enter a state of weaknesssting a few days.


    Other than that, the only real limit to the Dragon Force Pill/Potion, was the fact that it could only be used by people in the Core Formation Realm and below.


    Even then, Qing Yi still understood just how valuable the Dragon Force Pill/Potion was for a cultivator!


    Caught in a dangerous situation, a momentary increase in strengthparable to raising one''s strength by three minor realms, would in some cases be the determining factor between life and death.


    "Now that all of you have the recipe and description of the spiritual herbs needed, thepetition will officially begin! You have three hours to make either a Dragon Force Pill or a Dragon Force Potion! Those unsessful, will be disqualified!"


    Just as she was about to look over the spiritual herbs she needed for the Dragon Force Potion, along with the in-depth description of the spiritual herbs in question. The Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire interrupted her train of thought, as he officially announced the start of the alchemypetition.


    Whoosh!


    Along with the start of thepetition, arge portion of the participants rushed towards therge tables ced around the tform at the centre of thepetition ground.


    "¡­"


    Qing Yi did not do this, as she instead just looked over at the flock of people rushing towards therge tables filled with spiritual herbs for a short while before focusing her attention onto the recipe of the Dragon Force Potion.


    Looking over the recipe, Qing Yi quickly focused onto the spiritual herbs she needed before turning to look at the in-depth description of the spiritual herbs.


    Overall, she needed five different spiritual herbs for the Dragon Force Potion, each of them being Earth Grade Spiritual Herbs!


    The first spiritual herb she needed was a spiritual herb called Red Dragon Sage¡­


    Reading through the description on how to identify the spiritual herb, Qing Yi quickly continued on wards and before long, she had remembered the different characteristics of the five spiritual herbs that was needed for the Dragon Force Potion.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any time, Qing Yi quickly rushed towards therge tables filled with spiritual herbs as she joined the other participants in searching through therge pile of spiritual herbs, while she tried to find the correct spiritual herbs among therge quantity of simr looking spiritual herbs.


    Searching through therge pile of simr looking spiritual herbs, Qing Yi for the first time since she had started on the path of alchemy. Realized just how many different spiritual herbs were out there¡­


    Just the number of herbs looking extremely simr to the five that she and the rest of the participants needed to find. Numbered over 3000!


    Through this, Qing Yi resolved herself to read up on more spiritual herb encyclopaedias when she got back to the sect¡­


    ¡­


    Watching how Qing Yi had begun to search through therge pile of spiritual herbs on top of therge tables around the main tform below, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit worried for her.


    After all, he had no idea how knowledgeable Qing Yi was when it came to spiritual herbs. However, she was clearly at a disadvantagepared to the other participants, as she had only been learning alchemy for a year.


    Knowledge on spiritual herbs? was not something that could be done in a short time.


    Well, outside how he had gained knowledge of different spiritual herbs with the help of the system¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt even more nervous when he watched her pick up a wrong herb before she soon put it down and searched somewhere different to his relief.


    How did he know the spiritual herbs needed for the Dragon Force Potion that Qing Yi was going to make?


    Well¡­ Given his current cultivation realm, he could easily peek at the recipe from a distance. Even without using his divine sense¡­


    As for knowing about the spiritual herbs¡­ The knowledge about spiritual herbs he had gained from the system was noughing matter and out of the over 3000 spiritual herbs piled up onto the differentrge tables, Xuan Hao could easily identify most of them!


    All of which, were used in all sorts of different potions and pills.


    Take the Red Dragon Sage Spiritual Herb as an example, it was used in a potion that¡­ Allowed someone to burp like a dragon, as for what a dragon burp looked like, Xuan Hao had no clue and at the same time. Not n to find out¡­


    Not really the most useful thing an Earth Grade Spiritual Herb could be used for¡­


    ¡­


    Time slowly passed and after half an hour, Qing Yi had sessfully managed to get the spiritual herbs needed to make the Dragon Force Potion, as she began getting ready to make the potion.


    Thump!


    "Hm?" As he was keeping an eye on Qing Yi together with the rest of the elders, Xuan Hao was suddenly alerted by the quiet sound of something hitting the ground.


    Looking around at the other elders, Xuan Hao quickly realized that none of them seemed to have heard anything, as they werepletely focused on Qing Yi''s performance.


    Elder Gong Bo was the most focused, as Xuan Hao clearly saw the clear look of terror on his face whenever Qing Yi was about to make a small mistake before showing a blissful look on his face when she corrected herself just in time.


    To be honest, it was quite entertaining to watch how much his expression changed from watching Qing Yipete below¡­


    "¡­"


    Not saying anything about what he heard just a moment ago, Xuan Hao quietly stood up from his seat before making his way over towards the entrance to their room to check out where the sound hade from.


    "Come on! Qing Yi! You can do it!"


    "That''s right! Show them how it''s done! Make the Alchemy Hall proud!"


    "Ah-! Don''t do it! You should never cut Blood Spirit Leaves like that!"


    Casting onest nce over towards the Qing Yi fan grouppromised of a bunch of old men and women. The youngest being at least 60 or so years old, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly to himself.


    At least, Qing Yi did not have to watch her elders act in such a shameful manner. Looking like a group of fangirls cheering on their favourite idol¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao soon heard yet another sound simr to before. The only difference being that it was fainter and more distant than before.


    "How troublesome¡­" Upon leaving the room, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself as he saw a guardying in a small pool of blood only a few dozen meters away from him.


    At least he manged to find out where the sound of something quietly hitting the ground hade from¡­

 Chapter 416 - Brawl For The Last Few Spiritual Herbs!

    <h4>Chapter 416 - Brawl For The Last Few Spiritual Herbs!</h4>


    Walking up to inspect the dead body of the guardying only a few dozen meters away from him, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit cautious.


    The Guard had been at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and from the looks of the small wound across his neck, he had been killed within a single strike!


    Doing something like this and without causing any disturbance, was not possible if the opponent had been someone in the Core Formation Realm. Meaning, the person who had killed the guard should at the very least have reached the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "If just there wasn''t any formation covering up the capital, I would have easily been able to sense anyone nearby with my divine sense¡­" Muttering this to himself as he realized just how blind he felt without being capable of using his divine sense freely, Xuan Hao moved towards the direction that the perpetrator had gone.


    No matter what, he at least wanted to find out what was happening and make sure that it would not end up affecting his disciple or the alchemypetition.


    Hopefully, the Domain Lord from the Iron Sky Kingdom was not sleeping and at the very least had their divine sense activated. This way, he might not even need to deal with the perpetrator himself¡­


    But given the fact that nothing had happened, Xuan Hao realized that even if the Domain Lord had their divine sense activated, they clearly did not cover arge area. This was also normal, as constantly monitoring everything within several thousand meters of oneself, was quite an exhausting endeavour in the long run.


    Even he himself would normally not have his divine sense cover an area more than a hundred or so meters around himself normally. Unless he was searching for someone or something¡­


    Whoosh!


    Moving through the long corridors going around thergepetition space, Xuan Hao came across several simrly dead bodies before he manged to catch up with the perpetrator just as he shed through the neck of yet another poor Core Formation Realm guard who had just been cking off. Happily enjoying a few snacks, he had just taken from a nearby empty spectator room.


    "That should be thest guard on the northern section¡­ Moving any closer, I will risk being spotted¡­"


    Listening to the perpetrator as he muttered this quietly to himself after killing the Core Formation Realm guard before taking out amunication talisman to contact someone, Xuan Hao felt a bit surprised.


    He¡­ Looks like one of the two guards from the underground base¡­ Did my attack on their base perhaps cause them tounch an attack towards the Iron Sky Kingdom now? But this doesn''t make sense, I clearly looked through some of their internal documents and they should still be quite far away from being capable ofunching an attack¡­


    Thinking all of this to himself as he quietly kept an eye on the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the side, Xuan Hao could not help but feel that whatever was currently happening was his fault to some degree¡­


    "Yes¡­ I know¡­ I will head towards the agreed location!"


    The Nascent Soul Realm Expert did not discover the fact that he was currently being observed by someone standing just a few meters away from him, as he quickly put away hismunication talisman before rushing towards a nearby exit leading out towards the city.


    "Hm?"


    Stopping himself just as he was about to follow after the Nascent Soul Realm Expert, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine as he very clearly felt a terrifying divine sense lock on to him all of a sudden.


    "Meet me at the spectator room located at the centre of the southern section!"


    Hearing the powerful and authoritarian female voice echoing out inside his head, along with the powerful the divine sense, Xuan Hao instantly realized that the person who had stopped him from following the Nascent Soul Realm Expert, was none other than the Domain Lord of the Iron Sky Kingdom!


    It looked like the Domain Lord from the Iron Sky Kingdom had already discovered the Nascent Soul Realm Expert long ago, but if that was the case, why had she not acted when he began killing the guards located in the corridors and instead opted to let him go?


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao watched with a shocked expression on his face as the guards who had very clearly been lying dead on the ground just a moment ago turned into metal puppets that soon stood up before they merged into the ground below them. Completely disappearing¡­


    If not for the fact he had seen it himself, Xuan Hao doubted that he would have believed what he had just witnessed...


    Not to mention the fact that he had not even noticed the fact that the guards were normal humans just a few moments ago!


    "No need to act so shocked, you would have realized what they were if you used your divine sense to examine them!"


    Hearing the female voice echo out inside his head through voice transmission once again, Xuan Hao could not help but smile a bit awkwardly upon hearing the impatience in the voice before he quickly moved towards the southern section of thepetition ground. The opposite locationpared to where he and the elders from the Flying Sword Sect had been ced.


    Whoosh!


    Along the way towards the southern section, Xuan Hao could not help but feel shocked inwardly as he began using his divine sense to examine all the guards on his way and to his shock, he noticed that every single one of them was a metal puppet disguised as a real human!


    Not a single one of the guards in the corridors were normal humans!


    Is this perhaps the ability of a Master cksmith? All of these metal puppets have strength simr to someone at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm¡­ Are there perhaps even stronger metal puppets? Nascent Soul Realm Metal Puppets? Or¡­ Perhaps Domain Lord Realm Metal Puppets?


    Thinking this to himself as he arrived in front of arge and extravagant door with two guards at the Nascent Soul Realm standing solemnly in front of it.


    "Come in¡­"


    Just as Xuan Hao was just about to examine the two guards to check if they were also metal puppets, the voice he had heard reach out to him just a few moments ago echoed out from inside the room beyond therge doors.


    "¡­"


    Not saying anything as he slowly entered the room, Xuan Hao suddenly felt himself grow a bit nervous.


    After all, the ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom was someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm! Even he had no idea if he would be able to fight against someone like in a normal fight. Let alone when the other party had the home ground advantage in the shape of a giant formation constructed through the use of several Transcendent Grade Natural Treasures¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time, Qing Yi was currently trying her best to sessfully make the Dragon Force Potion that she and the rest of the participants had been tasked with. Unaware of what had just happened inside the corridors for the spectator rooms. Located below the normal spectator seats where the normal people without special invitations were located.


    "I was quite lucky getting the spiritual herbs so quickly¡­" Gazing over towards therge tables filled with spiritual herbs just as she finished preparing her herbs, Qing Yi could not help but let out a sigh of relief as she watched how the remaining participants had begun snatching the spiritual herbs from each other.


    If not for the fact that they were not allowed to fight, Qing Yi did not doubt that a few of the participants would have already begun fighting.


    After all, who could endure having thest spiritual herb they needed, get snatched just in front of their faces by one of the participants¡­?


    "Not again! How dare you steal from me twice in a row?!"


    Just as Qing Yi was about to begin the brewing process for the Dragon Force Potion, a loud roar filled with anger could be heard before one of the participants directlyunched an attack towards another participant, who had just snatched away a spiritual herb from him.


    Bang!


    Under the shocked eyes of both Qing Yi and the rest of the participants who had just been disturbed by the sudden outburst. None of the guards from the Iron Sky Kingdom, nor the Artisan Alchemist himself did anything to stop the attack, as the disciple who had just stolen away the spiritual herb was suddenly sent flying through the air before crashing into the ground a few meters away.


    ""¡­""


    Fighting for the spiritual herbs¡­ Was, okay?


    "Yes, I never said anything about not being able to fight for the spiritual herbs¡­ As long as someone steals a spiritual herb from you, you are free to try and steal it back before they finish collecting all the required spiritual herbs!"


    Hearing this, all the participants felt shocked. After all, they did not expect that they would have to fight during an alchemypetition¡­


    At the very least, it has nothing to do with me¡­


    Thinking this, Qing Yi and the rest of the participants who had already managed to gather the spiritual herbs they needed all breathed a sigh of relief upon realizing that the fighting would not affect them.


    "You! You stole my herb just a moment ago! It''s time for you to return it!"


    Following this one shout from one of the participants who also had their spiritual herbs stolen, the entire space around the tform at the centre suddenly turned chaotic.


    The disciples who had their spiritual herbs taken away in front of themunched an attack to regain their spiritual herbs, while the thieves in question fought back to keep their stolen spiritual herbs.


    All of a sudden, the rtively calm alchemypetition had ended up turning into a brawl between thest remaining participants still searching for the spiritual herbs they needed to refine the Dragon Force Pill or Potion¡­

 Chapter 417 - Yi Min

    <h4>Chapter 417 - Yi Min</h4>


    Creak~


    Entering through therge extravagant looking doors, Xuan Hao instantly focused his attention onto to the beautiful young woman sitting on top of afy looking chair with a small table in front of her lightly sipping on a cup of tea at the centre of the room.


    The young woman was by far one of the most beautiful women that Xuan Hao had ever seen before, her dark brown hair was hanging down loosely across her shoulders, as only a single golden flower ornament could be seen in her hair.


    Scanning over the rest of the young woman''s body, Xuan Hao could not help shivering upon realizing that the beautifully decorated dress mostly taking on the red and gold colour, was not just a beautiful dress¡­ Instead, the clothes that the young woman in front of him was wearing, was very clearly a set of powerful artifacts that would be able to protect the wearer duringbat!


    "You are finally here! Find a ce to sit down." Smiling lightly upon witnessing Xuan Hao enter, the young woman said this before motioning towards a few empty chairs located close to her.


    "Sure¡­" Moving his gaze away from the young woman before sitting down in front of her, Xuan Hao soon focused on a few different documents located at the small table. For some reason, Xuan Hao found the documents spread out on the table eerily familiar¡­


    Is this not the same documents as the ones I stole a week ago!?


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao soon realized that the person in front of him might have kept an eye on him during his visit to the underground base¡­ Or at the very least, she had secretly observed him while he had been looking through the documents by himself¡­


    This thought quickly made Xuan Hao realize just how strong the person in front of him was. Given the fact that she had been able to secretly observe him without him noticing anything!


    Even if she had the help of the formation, it was still not easy to secretly observe someone at the Domain Lord Realm without the other party finding out. The main reason for this being that their awareness was far above someone in the Nascent Soul Realm. Even if Xuan Hao had not been using his domain or divine sense to observe his surroundings inside the capital, he should still have noticed if someone had been observing him!


    "I have to thank you in advance¡­ Without your help, I would never have managed to realize the fact that those people were so close tounching an attack. From the looks of things, it even seems like they moved ahead with their ns to attack before having finished all their preparations after your little visit to one of their bases-


    Ah, how rude of me, I forgot to introduce myself. I''m Yi Min, the current ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­ Though you should have already figured that out at this point¡­"


    Listening to the ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Yi Min, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit wryly to himself upon realizing how rxed she was in front of him.


    Even when talking about the matter of him having caused her enemies to attack ahead of time, she didn''t seem the affected in the slightest. Instead, she even seemed a bit excited upon mentioning the fact that her enemies would soon beunching an attack towards her Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    "My name is Xuan Hao, an elder from the Flying Sword Sect! Might I ask what reason you called me here for¡­? Surly not just to chat with me, when your enemies are about tounch an attack? Do you perhaps want to make sure I''m not going to side with them during the uing battle and called me here to confirm this?"


    Not wanting to end up in a long meaningless conversation, Xuan Hao decided just to outright ask Yi Min about her reason for calling him. In his eyes, the most likely reason was that she wanted to confirm whether or not he was part of her enemy''s n.


    If she really determined him to be from her enemy''s side¡­


    Xuan Hao felt himself grow a bit nervous upon reaching this thought as he looked over at Yi Min with a solemn expression on his face. Prepared to fight if it came down to it!


    "Eh¡­?"


    However, instead of the expected oue, Yi Min tilted her head slightly to the side as she looked over at him with a confused expression on her face.


    "Is this perhaps not the reason why you called me over¡­?" Not knowing what other reason Yi Min had to call him over, Xuan Hao could only ask her. After all, if she just wanted to talk to the unknown Domain Lord who entered her capital, she could have called him over during the week that he had already stayed in the capital¡­ No need to wait for an entire week before calling him¡­


    ¡­


    "Eh¡­?"


    W-what do I do¡­? I can''t just tell him that I just wanted to ask about a few mundane things that Fang Shi had asked me to help ask the Domain Lord from the Flying Sword Sect during the alchemypetition now! After that- Ah! It''s all that Fang Shi''s fault!


    At the same time Xuan Hao was prepared for a fight to break out at any moment, Yi Min was stuck on how to proceed with the current conversation. ncing over towards the solemn expression on Xuan Hao''s face, Yi Min had no idea what to do, to move the conversation away from the direction it was currently headed towards¡­


    "Ahm! You are right! I called you here to confirm whether or not you were in cahoots with those people! But from what I can see, that is not the case.


    You see, those people have a very distinctive and unique feature present in their aura. This feature is very hard to spot and without knowing about it beforehand, it is close to impossible to notice. Even someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm like myself would not be able to notice this unique feature in their auras without learning about it beforehand."


    ncing over towards Xuan Hao from time to time as she said this with a serious expression on her face, Yi Min was happily surprised as Xuan Hao nodded his head in understanding upon hearing her exnation.


    He believed me!


    Letting out a sigh of relief at the fact that Xuan Hao had believed her, Yi Min felt like she had just avoided a dangerous topic. No matter what, she did not want to idently end up falling out with Xuan Hao for no reason.


    After all, the main reason she had not suspected him to start with, was the fact that Fang Shi had informed her about him the moment he entered the capital and had even told her about his background.


    If that was not the case, Yi Min would have already paid him a visit the moment he entered the capital. How friendly that ''visit'' would have been given her kingdoms current circumstances, did not matter anymore¡­


    Other than that, Fang Shi had also informed her that he was told to investigate this Domain Lord from the Flying Sword Sect¡­ With all of this in mind, Yi Min was certain that the Domain Lord from the Flying Sword Sect was not a part of her enemy''s n!


    ¡­


    "I understand, that makes sense¡­" Remembering the distinctive aura of death that the two Domain Lords he had seen, or at least managed toe into contact with during his visit to their base had, Xuan Hao could not help nodding his head in understanding.


    From what he had seen, the unique feature that Yi Min was talking about, should be the aura of death around them that he had felt during his short sh. Although¡­ He would not really call that feature hard to spot in any way, but perhaps that was just because the other party had not tried to hide it during their short sh¡­


    "Is there perhaps anything you want to ask?" Feeling way more rxed after understanding this, Xuan Hao smiled kindly towards Yi Min as he said this.


    "Yes! Actually, I wanted to know more about the Flying Sword Sect! First of all, how did you manage to reach the Domain Lord Realm? Did you have a fortunate encounter with an ancient powerhouse while travelling, gained enlightenment during meditation, a special natural treasure, or-"


    Having waited for this moment, Yi Min no longer kept herself back upon noticing how rxed Xuan Hao had be. Quickly unleashing a barrage of questions towards him, both the questions Fang Shi had wanted her to ask him and also the questions she herself wanted to ask.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this sudden shift in character from Yi Min, Xuan Hao felt a bit shocked for a moment before calming down and adapting to the situation.


    One asking a myriad of useless questions, while the other answered any question he could¡­

 Chapter 418 - End Of The First Stage...

    <h4>Chapter 418 - End Of The First Stage...</h4>


    The current excited and curious persona should be how she normally acts¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he answered yet another question about the size of the mountain he was living on and what his pavilion looked like, Xuan Hao and Yi Min both spent the next few hours talking together. Only stopping when Xuan Hao realized that the first part of the alchemypetition was about to end, as he quickly excused himself before heading back towards the spectator room where the rest of the elders from the Flying Sword Sect were located.


    Staying with Yi Min to spectate was not really an option in his eyes, as from what he had learned about her during thest few hours of talking. Knew that he would not get a chance to watch the alchemypetition given the sheer amount of endless number of useless questions she had to distract him¡­


    ¡­


    "This should be thest spiritual herb¡­"


    At the same time Xuan Hao left Yi Min and made his way back towards the spectator room with the rest of the elders to watch the rest of the alchemypetition, Qing Yi had just finished adding in thest spiritual herb to her boiling potion mixture.


    All she could do at this point was hope she hadn''t missed anything along the way, as she carefully controlled the me beneath the cauldron that the potion mixture was currently inside of¡­


    Fwoosh!


    Controlling the mes beneath the cauldron with ease, Qing Yi could not help but feel thankful towards her master. The Burning Heaven Mantra that she had been bestowed and had been practicing for close to a year at this point. Not only allowed her to increase her cultivation realm, but also granted her the ability to easily manipte fire.


    The ability to control fire was by far one of the most essential things for an alchemist. This was also one of the main reasons why it had be the norm for alchemists? to cultivate with a fire-based mantra, though there would always be a few unique people not following the norm¡­


    The difference between Qing Yi''s control over her fire and the rest of the alchemist participating in thepetition, was with the sheer ease she did this. Not having to expend any attention or energy to manipte the mes beneath the cauldron to keep the correct temperature, while the rest of the participants had to focus their full attention onto this task.


    "How interesting¡­"? This scene of course did not escape the eyes of Fang Shi, as he narrowed both his eyes before gazing over towards Qing Yi with an intrigued look on his face.


    "Master¡­ Don''t look at her like that or people will end up misunderstanding you¡­ After all-"


    "Dear disciple, please don''t nder your master like that!" Hearing what his disciple beside him said, Fang Shi could not help feeling his face twitch before quickly rebuking his disciple.


    Even worse, when he looked away from Qing Yi, Fang Shi managed to spot his old friend Yi Min looking over towards him with an amused look on her face from her private spectator room.


    "¡­"


    From the look alone, Fang Shi understood that she had heard his disciple''s earlier nder towards him and to make things even worse, it also looked like the few guards and elders standing around the tform had heard it as well.


    The main difference between them and Yi Min, was the fact that instead of looking over towards him with an amused look on their face, they were instead giving him a rather weird look before quickly looking the other way upon noticing that he was looking at them¡­


    They clearly misunderstood something! I really have to punish that rascalter!


    "Hah¡­"


    Taking a deep breath as he calmed himself down, Fang Shi put on a stoic expression as he looked over the rest of the participants currently in the process of finishing up their Dragon Force Potion or Pill. Not intend on giving his disciple another chance to nder him again!


    ¡­


    "Time will be up in another five minutes!"


    Hearing the Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire announce this, Qing Yi looked down at her potion mixture that had already begun the process of cooling down at this point. Not the slightest bit worried about the fact that she only had five minutes left and soon enough, she carefully began to pour the potion mixture into three potion bottles upon seeing that it had cooled down.


    "Finally done!" Looking down at the three Dragon Force Potions she had managed to produce, Qing Yi could not help smiling to herself as she put the three potion bottles on top of a table located just beside her cauldron.


    With all of this, she had sessfully managed to make a Dragon Force Potion! At the very least, she hoped this was the case. After all, given the sheer number of simr looking spiritual herbs that they had to go through to identify the correct ones, was noughing matter and even up to this point, Qing Yi was not a hundred percent certain that she had used the correct spiritual herbs¡­


    Thinking about this, Qing Yi slowly felt her earlier happiness from sessfully finishing her Dragon Force Potion disappear, as she nervously began looking at the other participants around herself, to see if any of the ones who had finished their Dragon Force Potion looked simr to hers.


    "No potions¡­"


    Sadly, she quickly came to realize that none of the people around her had made a Dragon Force Potion. Instead, all the other participants around her, had made a Dragon Force Pill. Not a Dragon Force Potion!


    Even if she wanted topare herself to the other participants, Qing Yi could not spot a single person who had made a potion like herself when looking around at the participants located a little further away from her.


    Instead, she came to the realization that she was the only one among all of the participants, who had sessfully managed to finish a Dragon Force Potion!


    "Everyone, stop what you are currently doing! The time is up!" Hearing the voice of the Artisan Alchemist echo out behind her just as she hade to the realization that she was the only person who had made a Dragon Force Potion, Qing Yi inevitably felt herself growing even more nervous as she looked down towards the three potion bottles on her table.


    At this point, the only way for her to find out if her Dragon Force Potion was a sess or not, was to wait until the Artisan Alchemist came to examine her Dragon Force Potion¡­


    No looking over at the other participants finish products andparing herself with them to find out if she had potentially failed or seeded. The rest of the participants who had produced pills, however, were not the same¡­


    "Damn! Why does mine have such a weird shape. This is the first ever square pill¡­! Ha¡­ I might fail just based on looks alone¡­ How would you even swallow a square pill¡­?"


    "You are one to talk! Look at my Dragon Force Pill, it''s the only pink one among all of the Dragon Force Pills here! There is no way I will make it through the first part of thepetition! I knew that Red Dragon Sage looked a bit wrong¡­"


    "Hmph, I came out with a perfect one! Haha, I will surely move on to the next stage!"


    Listening in on both the sad cries of those who realized how wrong their pills looked whenpared to the other participants beside them and the ones who realized that they had likely seeded fromparing with others, Qing Yi felt a bit left out as she could notpare her Dragon Force Potion with anyone¡­


    "Hah¡­ I was so close to seeding¡­ Just five more minutes and my pill would have been done¡­"


    "I feel you! I had my spiritual herb stolen early on and had to waste another twenty minutes searching for a new one. In the end, I was dyed for way too long and had no way to finish my Dragon Force Pill in time¡­"


    At the same time, the people who had not managed to finish their Dragon Force Pill or Potion in time or had idently ruined one of their spiritual herbs while preparing them, were conversing with together, with a depressed expression on their faces.


    There was no way they would feel happy about having failed the first stage of the alchemypetition without even having finished a single pill or potion. Merely failing due to a small mistake or not picking the correct herb¡­


    "Those who failed to make a Dragon Force Pill or Potion may leave thepetition space! The rest will bring up their finished pill¡­ Or potion¡­ over to one of the tables around the tform and stand behind it, as I will judge you finished Dragon Force Pill or Potion!"


    As the words of the Artisan Alchemist echoed across thepetition space, Qing Yi and the rest of the participants who had sessfully made a Dragon Force Pill or Potion made their way up to the now empty tables, while the rest of the participants who hadn''t made anything were guided out of thepetition space by a few elders.


    When and how the massive number spiritual herbs had disappeared from the tables without anyone noticing¡­ No one bothered to think about this, as their main focus was on whether they would move on to the next stage of thepetition¡­

 Chapter 419 - Judging Pills And Potions

    <h4>Chapter 419 - Judging Pills And Potions</h4>


    Having ced all three of the potion bottles that she had filled up on top of the table, Qing Yi could not help curiously looking over the pills that the participants standing almost shoulder to shoulder with her had made.


    On her left, there was a young girl around the same age as herself. Looking over the pillsid out in front of her, Qing Yi felt quite interested upon noticing how identical and perfect the pills in front of her looked.


    The person on her right on the other hand¡­ Let alone having his pills look identical, the dozen or so pills in front of the young man to her right were all sorts of different colours blended together. The most dominant colour being pink.


    From this alone, Qing Yi had a feeling that the young man would not be making it through the first stage of thepetition¡­


    ""¡­""


    At the same time Qing Yi was looking over the two people''s pills, they were also looking over the three potion bottles that she had brought up with her, both having a curious look on their face as they inspected her potion bottle with a curious look on their faces.


    Not alone in this endeavour, a few of the other nearby participants were also looking over towards Qing Yi''s potion bottles with a simrly curious expression on their faces.


    After all, among all of the remaining participants, Qing Yi was the only person who had managed to make a Dragon Force Potion! Among the little over 10 people who had chosen to make a potion during the alchemypetition, Qing Yi was the only one to seed!


    ¡­


    As Qing Yi and the few participants close to here were looking over what each of them had managed to make during the time they had been given, Fang Shi made his way down towards the participants together with his disciple, Cai Yu.


    "Hah¡­"


    Arriving in front of the first participant, Fang Shi could not help but sigh to himself as he looked down at the weirdly green pills looking like they were about to melt under the sun.


    "It''s a failure! You used an incorrect spiritual herb in ce of the Red Dragon Sage Spiritual Herb, causing the pill to grow unstable¡­ The herb you used instead, was a poisonous herb called Venom Blood Leaves. If I anyone ate this pill¡­ Let''s just say they would not live to tell the tale unless they had a strong enough cultivation¡­"


    Saying this to the participant with a solemn look on his face as he quickly understood what went wrong with the participants pill making, Fang Shi soon moved onto the next participant.


    "Well done, this is a Dragon Force Pill! Although it was a bit miss coloured due to the fact that you left it in the cauldron for too long. Other than that, the pill is fine, it only lost a bit of its efficiency!"


    Nodding his head upon seeing the next participants Dragon Force Pill, Fang Shi didn''t show any sign of happiness while saying this before moving onto the next participant.


    Even if the participant number two''s Dragon Force Pill was enough to move onto the next step of thepetition, Fang Shi knew very well that the participants ability was not what he was looking for.


    "I-I made it!"


    Not aware of the fact that Fang Shi had just ruled him out as a potential disciple, the participant who heard that he had made it into the next stage of thepetition happily smiled before waving towards one of the spectator rooms where the people who hade alongside him were located.


    Like this, Fang Shi slowly began making his way around the tables ced around the tform. Inspecting each of the participants Dragon Force Pills within only a few seconds before moving onto the next, as the participants were either sent out of thepetition space due to failing or moved onto the next stage by sessfully making a Dragon Force Pill!


    "W-why is the pills seeding not the same colour¡­?"


    After Fang Shi began inspecting the Dragon Force Pills, all the participants soon came to realize that the Dragon Force Pills that sessfully moved on to the next part of thepetition were not always the same colour.


    Instead, they were in all sorts of different colours. From red to purple and from blue to yellow.


    There was no definite colour to the Dragon Force Pill! Instead, it looked like it could be any sort of colour¡­


    This realization instantly caused arge portion of the participants to panic, as most of them had pills that were the same red colour, while those with weirdly coloured pills losing hope in making it to the next stage of thepetition. Regained hope, as they began looking forward to Fang Shi inspecting their Dragon Force Pills.


    Among all of the tension that had suddenly appeared among the participants, Qing Yi was the only person who remained unaffected.


    At the moment, Qing Yi had turned her attention away from the other participants pills. Instead beginning to search through the spectator rooms all around thepetition space. Hoping to spot her master and the rest of the elders that hade together with her to the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Searching through the spectator rooms, Qing Yi soon spotted her master calmly smiling towards her from one of the spectator rooms. The other elders also came into view, as Qing Yi found herself smiling a bit nervously upon noticing that everyone was looking over towards her.


    She could even see Elder Gong Bo, one of the Core Elders of the Alchemy Hall nervously looking over her Dragon Force Potions before looking over towards the location of the Artisan Alchemist slowly moving closer and closer to her.


    Seeing this, Qing Yi could not help smiling wryly to herself, as she reckoned that Elder Gong Bo was most likely the person who was the most nervous about the oue of thispetition¡­


    "-Sadly, you used the wrong spiritual herbs. Not even a single one of the spiritual herbs used in these pills are among the five needed to make the Dragon Force Potion!"


    Waving over towards her master and the other elders for a minute or so, Qing Yi was surprised to suddenly hear an old and solemn voice echo out just beside her.


    He''s here! How did he make it here so fast! There should at least have been 10 or so participants left before me¡­


    Staring over at the old Artisan Alchemist currently in the process of judging the young man to her right side, Qing Yi could not help realizing that none of the 10 people to her right had managed to make it onto the next stage of thepetition!


    From the looks of it, the young man currently in the process of being judged was not going to make it either¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Watching as the old Artisan Alchemist finished his judgement along with giving the young man a few suggestions of what he could improve in. Mainly suggesting for him to read a few more spiritual herb encyclopaedias when he got back home, Qing Yi suddenly felt herself grow nervous the moment she felt the old Artisan Alchemist fixate his gaze onto her and the three potion bottles she had ced on the table.


    "Hm¡­? A potion? I guess this is the only potion that managed to be finished on time¡­" Hearing the old Artisan Alchemist mutter this to himself, as she felt his eyes go from solemn to curious while looking over her three potions before picking up one of them, Qing Yi felt herself beginning to sweat.


    Something she had only ever experienced when she was extremely nervous before she started cultivating. Ever since she had reached the Qi Condensation Realm, she had never experienced something like that!


    After all, for a cultivator, havingplete control over one''s own body was by far one of the most important aspects of cultivating¡­


    "This is great! The Dragon Force Potion you made has no signs of any problem with the spiritual herbs used, and it looks like you got the timing of everything done perfectly! I can''t find any mistakes with it!"


    Hearing the excited voice of the old Artisan Alchemist as he put down her Dragon Force Potion before looking over towards her with a look of approval, Qing Yi could not help but let out a sigh of relief before smiling happily.


    She had made it onto the next stage of the alchemypetition!


    Filled with happiness, Qing Yi proudly looked up towards her master and the other elders who happily waved back at her.


    ¡­


    Smiling as he waved towards his disciple who had just made it onto the next stage of thepetition, Xuan Hao soon narrowed his eyes before looking down towards Fang Shi the moment Qing Yi turned to look somewhere different.


    "¡­"


    That old fossil is aiming for my disciple!

 Chapter 420 - The True Master...? And A Short Break

    <h4>Chapter 420 - The True Master...? And A Short Break</h4>


    Having finished judging Qing Yi''s Dragon Force Potion with a happy smile present on his face, Fang Shi nodded his head towards Qing Yi to show his approval towards her before moving onto the young girl standing to her left.


    "Hm¡­ Looks like you also made it through to the next stage-"


    Not listening in on the Artisan Alchemists judgement, Qing Yi had instead been caught off-guard by a young woman in her early twenties following closely behind the Artisan Alchemist.


    Whoosh~


    "Hm? Looks like you are quite decent for your age¡­ Especially given the fact that you specialize in potions instead of pills¡­" Picking up one of her Dragon Force Potion before saying this, the young woman soon put it down again before following after the Artisan Alchemist who had already managed to go through three participants during the duration of the young woman''s short inspection of her Dragon Force Potion.


    Who was that? A disciple of the Artisan Alchemist?


    Thinking this to herself, Qing Yi could not help but look towards the young woman slowly following the footsteps of the Artisan Alchemist as she inspected some of the participants after her master was done.


    The only difference being the fact that she only inspected one person for every 10 her master inspected¡­


    Somehow¡­ Qing Yi felt that the young woman looked way more like an exalted master only paying attention to a select few who stood out, while the Artisan Alchemist was the disciple going ahead and doing the hard work of inspecting everyone before his master to make sure only the best was left when she arrived...


    "Hehe~"


    Not able to stop a smallughter from escaping her mouth upon imagining the old Artisan Alchemist as the disciple and the young woman as the master, Qing Yi stopped herself as she felt the young girl to her left look over towards her with a curious expression on her face.


    Wondering why Qing Yi beside her had suddenly begunughing all of a sudden.


    "D-did something happen¡­?" Building up a bit of courage, the young girl asked Qing Yi. Wanting to find out why she had suddenly startedughing before quickly looking away with an embarrassed look on her face.


    "Hm? Not really, I just found it funny how the young woman looked more like the masterpared to the actual master¡­" Answering the young girl beside her who had also managed to move onto the next stage of thepetition like herself, Qing Yi did not try to hide the reason forughing earlier.


    Motioning over towards the young woman walking behind the old Artisan Alchemist with an aloof and distant expression etched onto her face most of them time. Only changing into a curious expression whenever she inspected one of the Dragon Force Pills from the participants after the Artisan Alchemist.


    "Haha, she does indeed look like the master¡­" Laughing a bit to herself upon looking over towards the direction that Qing Yi motioned her towards, the young girl barely managed to stop herself fromughing too loudly.


    However, the voice of the young girl still managed to reach the ears of Fang Shi as he was about to inspect one of thest few Dragon Force Pills. Worst of all was the fact that he had also managed to hear what Qing Yi had said about him that lead to the young girlughing at him!


    How does that damn brat Cai Yu look more like a master than me!?


    Thinking this to himself, Fang Shi nced back towards Cai Yu walking only a few meters behind him with an aloof expression while staring into the distance while casually ncing over a few of the participants pills from time to time before looking away again.


    From an outside view, it looked like she did not put any of the passing participants in her eyes. Only rarely inspecting a few of the most exceptional participants.


    "¡­"


    That brat¡­ She is clearly doing this on purpose!


    "Failure!"


    "Failure!"


    "Not even close, you used the wrong spiritual herbs!"


    Losing his temper upon realizing how his own disciple was seemingly trying her best to make him lose face in front of the participants, Fang Shi angrily looked over thest three pills before instantly disqualifying them and moving back onto the tform.


    "Wha-"


    "I''m disqualified!?"


    "What just happened¡­?"


    "Now let''s move on to the second stage of the alchemypetition!" Ignoring the three bewildered participants who had just been eliminated within a second of each other, Fang Shi caught the attention of the participants who had managed to make it through the first stage of the alchemypetition with his words.


    No one paid any attention to thest three participants to be eliminated from the alchemypetition, as they were escorted out of thepetition space like the rest of the disqualified participants.


    The only thing differentpared to them and the rest of the participants, was the fact that none of them got any guidance from Fang Shi in how to improve¡­ They had at least expected that they would get some guidance from the Artisan Alchemist even if they were eliminated!


    Even worse, the ''participation reward'' they would get from being eliminated in the first stage of the alchemypetition was not really worth traveling all the way to the Iron Sky Kingdom. This was even more so the case if they came from a sect or kingdom with the same power as the past Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­


    In the end, the three participants all felt incredibly sad and disappointed as they made their way out of thepetition space.


    "The second stage of thepetition will be different from the first stage. This time around, you will have to make the highest-level pill or potion you currently know! Among all of you. Only the top twenty will move on to the third stage!" Completely ignoring the three disappointed stares from the three participants who had been eliminatedst, Fang Shi went on to exin the details of the second stage of the alchemypetition.


    "You will have half an hour to rest before the second stage will begin. During this break, everyone should make sure what pill or potion you n on making!" Along with these few words, Fang Shi soon turned to leave the tform together with his disciple.


    Leaving behind the remaining 87 participants who had made it through the first stage of thepetition to think about what sort of pill or potion they wanted to make for the uing second stage.


    "Everyone! You can take a rest over here and get something to eat and drink!" Just as everyone had begun nning over what they wanted to make, a loud voice interrupted their thoughts as a small part of the space for the alchemypetition had turned into a buffet filled with all sorts of food, water and snacks.


    "I¡­ I do feel quite a bit hungry¡­" A participant who was only in the Qi Condensation Realm was the first to move, as he soon began to grab arge variety of food before beginning to eat.


    Rumble~


    " Let''s just get something quick¡­"


    Soon enough, over sixty of the participants had made their way over to the buffet to get something to eat.


    Among the remaining twenty or so participants, Qing Yi could not help but frown as she looked over towards the buffet with narrowed eyes.


    The Artisan Alchemist had clearly told them that they had half an hour break to rest and figure out what potion or pill they wanted to make¡­ He never said anything about the buffet that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere¡­


    Was the buffet perhaps a trap of sorts to waste the time they had been given to think up what potion or pill they wanted to make during the second stage of thepetition?


    Thinking this, Qing Yi could not help but nce over towards the participants absorbed in eating all sorts of delicacy with a pitying look on her face.


    Finding out what sort of pill or potion one wanted to use was not simple and would take time to figure out.


    After all, she and the rest of the participants had no idea what spiritual herbs would be avable to them during the second stage of thepetition!


    With that in mind, Qing Yi began thinking about several different potions she had made together with her master during the past week.


    The potions she had practiced with her master were all high level and at the same time each of the potion used different spiritual herbs. During her practice with her master, Qing Yi had found herself learning about new spiritual herbs she never knew existed before and learning how to use them every day!


    Thinking back to the week leading up to the alchemypetition, Qing Yi could not help but smile happily as she looked up towards her master before quickly focusing back on the task of figuring out a wide variety of potions, she could make no matter what spiritual herbs were avable to them during the second stage of the alchemypetition!

 Chapter 421 - Start Of The Second Stage

    <h4>Chapter 421 - Start Of The Second Stage</h4>


    "Hm¡­ Looks like the second stage of the alchemypetition will be quite difficultpared to the first stage¡­" Having heard what, the old Artisan Alchemist said about the second stage of the alchemypetition, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit worried for his disciple.


    After all, she was still only a Journeyman Alchemist. Even if she had reached the peak of the realm and was about to be an Expert Alchemist, she was still not there yet. Given the fact that only twenty people would pass through to the third stage and Xuan Hao had already observed more than twenty people at the Expert Alchemist Realm among the participants, it was understandable that he worried about whether or not Qing Yi could make it to the next stage of thepetition¡­


    No matter what, she would have a hard time making a potion above the Earth Grade without being an Expert Alchemist¡­


    If all the Expert Alchemist participants managed to make a Spirit Grade Pill during the second stage of the alchemypetition, Qing Yi would have no way to make it to the Third Stage of thepetition!


    The only thing bringing him some sort of sce, was the fact that a majority of the Expert Alchemist among the participants had decided to waste their time eating instead of thinking about what kind of pills they could make for the uing second stage of thepetition.


    Whether it was due to their confidence of being Expert Alchemist or something else, Xuan Hao had no idea. All he knew, was that Qing Yi would be able to have an advantage in the second stage. Especially so if the Expert Alchemist currently eating their fill at the buffet had no time toe up with a suitable pill or potion when the time-


    "Ah, Qing Yi is looking over here!"


    "Hurry up and-"


    ncing over towards the other elders that had suddenly interrupted his train of thought as they excitedly waved over towards his disciple like a group of dedicated fans, Xuan Hao could not help rolling his eyes at their behaviour.


    These Alchemy Hall elders are way too excited¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao soon joined the group as he also waved over in the direction of Qing Yi to encourage her and make sure she knew that he was there to cheer her on.


    Even if he didn''t approve of the Alchemy Hall elder''s behaviour¡­ At the very least it seemed to have made Qing Yi more determined to perform well, as Xuan Hao watched her put on a focused look. Clearly thinking about what potions she could make in the uing second stage of the alchemypetition.


    Soon the break ended, and the old Artisan Alchemist once again appeared on top of the tform with a smile on his face and his disciple following closely behind him.


    "Everyone! The half hour break is over! Now, we will begin the second stage of the alchemypetition! First of all-"


    As all the participants gathered, the Artisan Alchemist announced the start of the second stage. Along with a few new rules he hadn''t told them about the first time and of course, an extremely limited number of spiritual herbs.


    In total, the number of spiritual herbs that they could choose between for their pill or potion, were only a measly 12 spiritual herbs!


    Even worse. Not all of them were high grade herbs! In fact, there was only a single Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb along with two Earth Grade Spiritual Herbs!


    Making a Spirit Grade Pill or Potion was extremely difficult. Even making a normal Earth Grade Pill or Potion was difficult with such a limited number of spiritual herbs!


    Outside of that, the participants were only allowed to chose eight out of the twelve spiritual herbs!


    ¡­


    "Hurry up! We have to inform the rest of the sect before it''s toote!"


    At the same time that the second stage of the alchemypetition was beginning in the Iron Sky Kingdom, three figures could be seen moving rapidly across arge open grass field. Anxiously looking back from the direction, they hade with a face full of fear.


    The reason for this fear soon appeared as arge group of people gradually appeared in the distance behind them, as they rushed towards the three figures.


    A few intangible shouts could barely be heard from therge group of people chasing after them, as the three figures rapidly increased their speed to escape from therge group of people that had appeared behind them.


    However, this was to no avail, as the group grew closer and closer with each passing second.


    Before long the group would catch up to the three escaping figures!


    "There is no way we can reach the Dark Frost Mountain Range before they catch up to us¡­" ncing back towards the group of people growing closer and closer to them, one of the figures escaping informed the rest in a depressed tone before once again increasing his speed. Even disregarding any internal damage, he might suffer due to increasing his speed way over what his cultivation realm allowed.


    If not for the fact that his face had been covered in a thin ck cloth. Completely hiding his identity, one would surely be able to see just how depressed he was upon saying this¡­


    The two others escaping together with him also understood this as they increased their speed as well. No matter what, if they were really caught by their pursuer, they would experience a fate worse than death!


    If they could get away by only suffering a few internal injuries, these three people would be more than happy, but they already knew that this was unlikely to happen.


    Whoosh!


    The main reason for theirck of faith soon appeared, as two figures broke off from the group of people chasing them before rushing over towards them.


    The speed of these two people was way above that of the group behind them as they soon managed to close the distance between them and the three.


    "I will try and slow them down¡­" Seeing the two people almost having caught up with them, one of the three figures d inpletely ck clothes informed the rest before stopping to confront the two rapidly approaching figures before the other two even had a chance to respond.


    Boom!


    The violent aura of someone at the Peak of the Core Formation Exploded out into the surroundings before suddenly growing extremely unstable and increasingly violent.


    "No! Don''t-"


    BOOM!


    Just as the two still escaping figures d in ck managed to say anything, arge explosion could be heard behind them as the person had chosen to forcefully ignite all the qi inside his dantian for a powerful attack towards the closet of the two people rushing towards them.


    The attack was far more powerful than what someone at his realm should be able to muster, but the side effect of forcefully igniting the qi inside one''s own dantian, was-


    BOOM!


    Death¡­


    After the attack had beenunched, an even more terrifying explosion followed, as the body of the person who had chosen to stay and hold back the two figures violently swelled up like a giant balloon before violently exploding. Sending what little remained of his body flying out in all directions.


    Instantly killing the man d in ck!


    Through igniting his qi, he had been able to preform a precise attackparable to someone at the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm towards one of the two people rushing over and a second not so precise attackparable to someone at the Fourth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    The man who had justunched the two attacks was only at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, yet he had managed tounch two attacks at the Nascent Soul Realm through sacrificing his own life!


    The entire thing simply happened too fast for the other two escaping people to react, as their friend had already sealed his own fate the moment, they managed to call out to him¡­


    "Hmph!"


    The two figures that had broken off from the rest of their group to follow after them had to stop for a moment as they blocked the two attacks.


    Boom!


    At this moment, the strength of the two people was instantly revealed, as the terrifying aura of two Nascent Soul Realm Experts spread out with them at the centre!


    The two attacks that the one ck d man had executed at the cost of his life was soon easily dealt with by these two experts, as they only stopped for a short moment before resuming their chase again.


    ¡­


    "The Dark Frost Mountain Range!"


    After another minute passed and the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts were about to catch up with them once again, one of the two remaining ck d people called out happily as arge mountain range covered in snow appeared on the horizon.


    The Dark Frost Mountain Range, as long as they could make it to the mountain range, they would be safe!


    With this thought in mind, the two remaining people desperately rushed towards the mountain range in the distance. Trying their best to increase their speed no matter what kind of injuries they sustained.


    Whoosh!


    "We can''t allow them to reach the Dark Frost Mountain Range!"


    One of the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts called out, as they also seemed to have realized that their targets were about to escape, as a serious expression appeared on both their faces before they increased their speed to catch up with the two ck d men in front of them.

 Chapter 422 - Chase!

    <h4>Chapter 422 - Chase!</h4>


    "Hah¡­ It looks like both of us won''t be able to make it¡­" One of the two people escaping sighed to himself as he said this while looking back towards the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts that were just about to reach them.


    "¡­" The other person running just beside his friend understood very well what he meant, as he didn''t say anything. Instead, he just let out a sigh filled with sadness as he gazed over towards the Dark Frost Mountain Range that was slowly appearing in the distance.


    No matter how he looked at it, he could not see how any of them would be able to make it back before the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts caught up with them. Even if one of the two ended up sacrificing themselves to buy a bit more time, it was unlikely to have the same effect now that the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts had already experienced it once¡­


    "Well¡­ Looks like this will be it¡­ If you manage to make it, please take care of my family¡­"


    "Sure¡­"


    With both parties not saying much, one of the two people soon came to a stop as heunched a simr suicidal attack towards the two approaching Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    Boom!


    BOOM!


    "Ah-!"


    The tworge scale attacks could be heard for miles around, as thest remaining person running away didn''t dare look back to see what had happened to his friend. Instead focusing all his energy on running as fast as he could towards the Frost Mountain Range in the distance.


    "Hmph! Another suicidal one! Now there is only one left¡­"


    One of the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts quickly recovered from the attack before he chased after thest remaining person with a sneer on his face.


    The earlier attack had been just as powerful as thest time, it was just that he had been far more prepared this time and in turn quickly managed to resume his chase.


    In a sense, both the Nascent Soul Realm Experts had been prepared for the suicide attack, it was just that at thest moment before exploding into a gory mess. The ck clothed man had managed to use his first attack to approach one of the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts and directly blow up in his face.


    The explosion at the end wasparable to an all-out attack from someone at the Fourth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    The danger brought by such an attack was more than enough to force the Nascent Soul Realm Expert that had been targeted to be grievously wounded. Resulting in there now only being one Nascent Soul Realm Expert left to chase after thest remaining ck clothed figure.


    Whoosh~


    Like this, the chase resumed like before. The only difference being that there were now only two people left. One escaping, while the other was chasing.


    In the distance, the Dark Frost Mountain Range slowly grew closer and closer, but it could notpare to the speed of the Nascent Soul Realm Expert, who was rapidly closing the distance.


    If not for the fact that the person escaping had already used several secret techniques that permanently damaged him to forcefully increase his speed, there was no way he would have ever been able to even have a chance of escaping the Nascent Soul Realm Expert. After all, he was only at the Core Formation Realm. Far from beingparable to someone in the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I won''t make it back, my two senior brothers sacrifice might have been in vain¡­ No, I can''t give up! If I fall, the Ascendant Frost Hall will surly fall into the Azure Sky Kingdoms trap!" Muttering this to himself as he slowly felt his strength leaving his body. Thest person among the three people slowly felt his speed beginning to decrease, as the secret techniques he had used to increase his speed over thest few minutes slowly began losing their effectiveness!


    Gazing over towards the Dark Frost Mountain Range that symbolized the start of what little territory the Ascendant Frost Hall still had inside of the Azure Sky Kingdom, the ck clothed figure could not help but be filled with immense regret.


    He was so close, if just he couldst for another minute, he would be able to reach the perimeter of the Dark Frost Mountain Range! At that point, the Nascent Soul Realm Experts guarding the ce would be alerted ande over to rescue him!


    "Ah!"


    Thinking about this, the ck clothed man roared loudly before pushing himself forward. Momentarily stopping his speed from decreasing any further at the cost of the core inside his dantian slowly beginning to copse under the huge pressure.


    Crack~


    The ck clothed man knew very well that if he continued like this, the core in his dantian would shatter. Erasing his cultivation base in one go.


    In such a situation, the luckiest oue would be that he might be left with at most a year or two to live. In such a scenario, his only way to live on was to try and recultivate back up to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm before breaking through to the Nascent Soul!


    However, such a scenario was the best oue for him. The most likely oue was that the core in his dantian would begin a process of rapid copse and take him down with it in the process¡­


    Whoosh!


    These thought only momentarily passed through his mind before he focused on his task. Escaping to the Dark Frost Mountain Range!


    Even if his core copsed, he should at the very least have enough time to ry the information he and the other two had managed to gather before he perished¡­


    "Haha! Looks like you can''t hold on for much longer. Maybe I don''t even need to chase after you any longer?"


    Hearing the mocking voice that belonged to the Nascent Soul Realm Expert chasing after him from behind, the man escaping could not help but shiver as he suddenly realized that the Nascent Soul Realm Expert was only a few meters behind him at this point in time!


    Let alone have a chance to make it to the perimeter of the Dark Frost Mountain Range and get help from his elders, there was no way he could even enter therge forest covered in snow located in front of the Dark Frost Mountain Range¡­


    After all, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert being so close meant that he was more than capable ofunching an attack to finish him off!


    At this point, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert was just ying with him!


    "¡­"


    Knowing this, a look of despair appeared on the man''s face. Not matter what, he no longer had a chance to reach the Dark Frost Mountain Range. All he could do was wait for death when the Nascent Soul Realm Expert grew bored, or he got too close to the Dark Frost Mountain Range¡­


    Whoosh~


    It was also at this moment that the cloth that concealed the man''s face was swept away by a sudden violent wind current. Instantly revealing his face.


    "Wow, you are younger than I expected. Hehe, I guess you are one of the more talented youngsters from the Ascendant Frost Hall? What a pity, hehe~"


    The first to react to this sudden development was the Nascent Soul Realm Expert chasing from behind as his mocking voice soon entered the ears of the young disciple from the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    "¡­"


    The young man did not say anything to this, as he just continued rushing towards the Dark Frost Mountain Range in the distance.


    At this point in time, his entire face had changed to a dark red colour, as blood could be seen flowing out of all his orifices. Instantly dying the snow below him red.


    Wait, snow?


    Not able to see clearly anymore due to the blood in his eyes. The young man suddenly realized that he had already reached the forest at the outskirts of the Dark Frost Mountain Range.


    Maybe if I enter the forbidden zone, I will have a chance to escape, it''s not close to the Dark Frost Mountain Range either, so there is a chance the Nascent Soul Realm Expert won''t kill me yet¡­


    Rapidly analysing his current situation, the young man from the Ascendant Frost Hall quickly remembered the ancient forbidden zone that his elders had talked about before and warned him not to enter.


    If he did not remember wrong. The forbidden zone should be located close to the edge of the frozen forest he had just entered¡­


    Thinking this, the young man from the Ascendant Frost Hall quickly wiped the blood in his eyes away before rushing forward.


    No matter what, he had to take a chance and enter the ancient forbidden zone! Maybe he would be able to survive there for a day and two and return to warn his sect. At least it was better than having to deal with the Nascent Soul Realm Expert¡­

 Chapter 423 - Mystic Realm

    <h4>Chapter 423 - Mystic Realm</h4>


    "It''s here¡­" having almost exhausted everyst bit of his strength, the young man from the Ascendant Frost Hall felt a new wave of energy wash over him as he saw arge frozenke in front of him.


    Theke itself did not look anything like an ancient forbidden zone and just looked like any normalke that had been frozen over.


    The young man already knew this and hoped that the Nascent Soul Realm Expert following him would not find anything odd about the frozenke and just kill him to prevent him from having a chance to escape.


    Crack~


    Rushing out onto the frozenke, the young man immediately used thest bit of his strength to crush the frozenke water before directly jumping into the frozen water below.


    Ssh!


    Along with entering the frozen water of theke, the young man saw the Nascent Soul Realm Expertunch an attack over towards him before a weird energy engulfed his entire body and prevented the Nascent Soul Realm Experts attack from approaching.


    Thest thing the young man from the Ascendant Frost Hall managed to see before he lost consciousness, was the shocked expression on the Nascent Soul Realm Expert''s face before a fearful expression soon reced his shocked expression.


    This was also understandable. After all, the weird energy hadpletely erased his attack with no effort whatsoever¡­


    "What in the world was that¡­?"


    Having been left staring speechlessly as the person he had been ying with for thest few minutes was suddenly engulfed by a strange energy strong enough to easily erase his attack before disappearing into theke water below, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert soon began to investigate the frozenke he was currently standing on top of.


    Searching around for a few minutes for any traces of where the young man might have disappeared to together with the weird and powerful energy from earlier, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Azure Sky Kingdom suddenly realized something as he quickly left the frozenke.


    Crack~


    Bang!


    Not a secondter, the frozen surface of theke suddenly cracked a part before arge quantity of the weird energy that had engulfed the young man from the Ascendant Frost Hall began to radiate out from the bottom of theke.


    "A¡­ A mystic realm?!"


    Gulping audibly upon realizing just what he had stumbled upon as he fearfully look towards the origin of the weird energy where a dark blue whirlpool of energy could be seen swirling around, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert felt a terrifying pressure suddenly seal his movement.


    Whoosh~


    Slowly, he felt himself being drawn down towards the dark pool whirlpool lurking at the bottom of the frozenke¡­


    I have to get out of here!


    Realizing just how dangerous his current situation was, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Azure Sky Kingdom didn''t dare hold back, as he tried his best to struggle free from the invisible force that had begun dragging him down towards the dark blue whirlpool!


    "No!"


    Bang!


    Executing a secret technique, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert barely managed to break free from the force that had been slowly dragging him down towards the dark blue whirlpool!


    Whoosh!


    Not looking back, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert directly left the frozenke.


    As for finding out about the young man''s situation? In his eyes, the young man was as good as dead!


    A mystic realm was different from a secret realm that was created by a powerful cultivator in the past.


    On the other hand, a mystic realm was not created by a powerful cultivator and was instead a naturally urring. This in turn had resulted in there often being arge number of both natural treasures and spiritual herbs, but it also meant that a mystic realm had not been set up with any restrictions that a powerful cultivator might ce on a secret realm¡­


    For the mystic realm, this meant that there were no restrictions on the lifeforms developing inside of it that had fallen in over time.


    If one was lucky, the strongest demonic beast inside would only be at the Domain Lord Realm, but in most cases, the demonic beasts inside a mystic realm would have reached the Soul Ascension Realm. In some cases, even above that depending on the age of the mystic realm!


    Therefore, it had been widely acknowledged that a mystic realm was no different than a death trap in most cases!


    Even if the Nascent Soul Realm Expert had no idea about most of this, he very clearly knew how dangerous a mystic realm was for someone like himself. This was also the reason why he had treated the young man from the Ascendant Frost Hall like an already dead person!


    Given the injuries he suffered along with the dangers of a mystic realm, there was no way that young man would survive!


    Whoosh whoosh!


    Shortly after the Nascent Soul Realm Expert had escaped from the frozenke, several figures appeared around theke. All of them were covered in pure white robes with a beautiful snowke symbol on it. From their auras alone, one could tell that every single one of them had reached the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Someone entered the ancient forbidden zone¡­"


    Standing out among the crowd of people who had appeared, an old woman narrowed her eyes as she scanned over the dark blue whirlpool located at the bottom of the frozenke.


    Thump~


    Walking over the mostly shattered ice that covered the frozenke, the old woman soon arrived directly above the dark blue whirlpool. The binding force that had almost managed to drag down the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Azure Sky Kingdom seemed to have no effect on her.


    ncing down towards the dark blue whirlpool, the old woman''s eyes shone in light blue colour for a short moment before the whirlpool below seemed to have calmed down before it disappeared and merged into the surroundingke water.


    Completely disappearing from sight!


    "Hah¡­ It looks like one of our disciples were forced to enter the ancient forbidden zone¡­ Given the fact that the disciple knew about this ce in the first ce, it should be one of our core disciples¡­" A solemn expression appeared on the old woman''s face upon saying this.


    ""¡­""


    The other people who had arrived together with her were the same as a clear killing intent could be felt from some of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    "Grand Elder! Who is it!? Who dared to force our disciple into such a desperate situation!?" Gritting his teeth, one of the elders could not hold himself back as asked the old woman.


    "Hm¡­ I have no idea¡­ But that person should be in the Nascent Soul Realm and from what I can sense, he is still somewhere nearby, I will be back shortly¡­!" Narrowing her eyes as she said thest part, the old woman soon disappeared from the top of the frozenke.


    Whoosh!


    Seeing their grand elder suddenly rush off, the other people who had arrived beside the frozenke were all shocked for a short moment before they soon left the frozenke to chase after their grand elder.


    From their expressions alone, it was obvious they had not expected for their grand elder to act!


    ¡­


    At the same time that all of this was happening in the Azure Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao was watching the second stage of the alchemypetition together with the rest of the elders from his sect.


    All of them were currently extremely excited as they had just watched how Qing Yi easily picked out the spiritual herbs that she needed out of the few that were avable for them during the second stage of the alchemypetition!


    From this alone, they could all tell that Qing Yi already had a potion recipe prepared! She did not have to wait around and think about what she wanted to make like most of the other participants were currently doing!


    This was an especially good thing considering that other than limiting the spiritual herbs avable to them during the second stage of the alchemypetition, the Artisan Alchemist, Fang Shi, had also limited the time they had to pick out the spiritual herbs they needed for their pill or potion!


    At this moment, the participants who had chosen to partake in the buffet just a moment ago, were filled with regret, as they had less than five minutes to figure out what pill they wanted to make out of the spiritual herbs that were avable to them!


    Not only did they need to make a pill from the few avable? spiritual herbs, but they would also need to make a pill strong enough to qualify them to the third stage of the alchemypetition!


    This was not something that could be done by just making a random pill using the two Earth Grade Spiritual Herbs! For them to move onto the third stage of the alchemypetition, they would most likely have to use the Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb avable to them in some way!

 Chapter 424 - Qing Yis Gamble~

    <h4>Chapter 424 - Qing Yi''s Gamble~</h4>


    The only thing that still worried Xuan Hao and the other elders about Qing Yi''s performance during the second stage of the alchemypetition, was the fact that she had chosen to use the Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb!


    A Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb was not something used in Earth Grade Potions, but something used in Spirit Grade Potions!


    The reason why Xuan Hao and the rest of the elders from the Flying Sword Sect were worried was because of this, Qing was after all still a Journeyman Alchemist and had yet to be an Expert Alchemist!


    Xuan Hao was even more certain about Qing Yi''s current alchemy realmpared to the other elders. After all, he had been spending his time teaching her over the past week leading up to the alchemypetition!


    "Is she perhaps trying to make one of the more¡­ Unique potions I showed her¡­?" Trying to figure out just what his little disciple might be up to, Xuan Hao suddenly had a bad feeling as he recalled how he had showed her a few recipes for Spirit Grade Potions during the past week.


    The reason for this was that he wanted for her to see the difference between the Journeyman Realm of alchemy and the Expert Realm¡­


    He had never expected for her to remember those recipes and even be bold enough to disy one of them during the alchemypetition!


    "This is¡­ Troublesome¡­" Smiling wryly upon remembering the recipes he had shown her, Xuan Hao suddenly began growing worried for his little disciple. After all, the pill recipes he had showed her and had unknowingly allowed her to memorize¡­ Were all from the system!


    If there was one thing, he was certain of in the regard to the system, it was the fact that it did not have a single decent alchemy recipe! Every single one of the recipes he had gained was either useless or simply too embarrassing to make!


    ncing down towards the avable spiritual herbs along with the herbs Qing Yi had taken, Xuan Hao could not help growing nervous.


    "I¡­ Hope she does not decide to make ''that'' potion¡­" Remembering a certain potion among the potion recipes he had shown Qing Yi back then, Xuan Hao could not help wondering whether or not he should sabotage his own disciple¡­


    I can''t do that¡­ And even if she really makes that potion, the person who will end up suffering should be that Artisan Alchemist, Fang Shi! Hehe, now I''m actually looking forward to it¡­!


    "E-elder Xuan, is something wrong¡­?"


    "Ahm, no its nothing, I just thought of something funny!"


    Feeling a bit embarrassed that one of the elders caught his small evil chuckle, Xuan Hao quickly pretended that nothing had happened before looking back down towards his disciple.


    "If you say so¡­"


    The elder who had spotted had heard his evil chuckle didn''t say anything more after that and also began watching the alchemypetition below again.


    There was no way he would want to call out Elder Xuan on the evil expression he had just a few seconds ago, nor would he mention just how much he resembled a viin nning some sort of evil scheme¡­


    ¡­


    Back down in thepetition space, Qing Yi smiled happily to herself as she looked over the eight spiritual herbs, she had chosen among the twelve spiritual herbs.


    During thest week that she had practiced together with her master, Qing Yi had already reached the Peak of the Journeyman Realm in alchemy and only needed an opportunity to breakthrough and be an Expert Alchemist!


    During the second stage of the alchemypetition, Qing Yi decided that she would take the chance and try to make her first ever Spirit Grade Potion and officially be an Expert Alchemist!


    The reason she took this risk, was not only because she wanted to show off in front of her master, but also because she was worried that she might not have a chance to make it through the second stage of the alchemypetition without making a Spirit Grade Potion.


    After all, there were more than twenty people among the remaining participants that had already be Expert Alchemists! For her to enter the third stage of thepetition, she would either have to hope that not all the Expert Alchemist had a recipe for a Spirit Grade Pill or Potion that used the spiritual herbs avable to them¡­ Or she could take the chance at trying to make a Spirit Grade Potion herself!


    In the end, Qing Yi had decided to not put her hope in what recipes the other participants had learned!


    Luckily the spiritual herbs for one of the Spirit Grade Potions that master showed me were present! With this I should be able to make my first Spirit Grade Potion and be an Expert Alchemist!


    Thinking this to herself, Qing Yi felt her confidence soar as she began preparing the spiritual herbs she had picked out.


    Among the spiritual herbs she had chosen, there was two Earth Grade Spiritual Herbs, five Mortal Grade Spiritual Herbs and finally, the Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb! The most important spiritual herb among the eight spiritual herbs and the core ingredient for her Spirit Grade Potion, Verdant Jade Bamboo!


    Verdant Jade Bamboo of the Spirit Grade was not too rare among Spirit Grade Spiritual Herbs, and Qing Yi had seen the other elders from the Alchemy Hall use it a lot during her past visits to the Alchemy Hall.


    Not only that, but Qing Yi had also learned how to prepare the Verdant Jade Bamboo in the past while she had observed the elders of the Alchemy Hall. The method was extremely simple and even if she wasn''t an alchemist, she would still be able to easily do it on her first try! This was one of the main reasons why she had decided to take the risk and attempt to make a Spirit Grade Potion!


    Not thinking about it any longer, Qing Yi quickly finished preparing her five Mortal Grade Spiritual Herbs and two Earth Grade Herbs before cautiously beginning to prepare the Verdant Jade Bamboo ording to how she had seen the elders of the Alchemy Hall do it in the past.


    ¡­


    "Looks like quite a few of the participants are struggling with what they should make¡­ Hah, looks like the quality of these people are quite low~"


    "You even chose the Verdant Jade Bamboo, the Expert Alchemists among the participants should have no trouble finding a recipe given howmon it is¡­ But look at the Earth Grade Spiritual Herbs you chose!? How on earth would they be able to make anything with those two spiritual herbs in the mix!? To be honest I''m surprised that so many people even had a recipe for something using those spiritual herbs to begin with!"


    Trying his best to calm down as he heard his disciples yful voice while he observed the participants, Fang Shi began regretting the fact that he had handed over the second stage of the alchemypetition to her¡­


    No matter what, from the looks of it, they would be lucky if there was even twenty people who managed to sessfully make an Earth Grade Pill or Potion during the time that they had been given!


    The Earth Grade Spiritual Herbs that his disciple had chosen was simply way too difficult to handle, other than that, they were quite rare.


    Fang Shi had been surprised that there even was anyone among the participants who had a recipe involving those spiritual herbs!


    His disciple had really been trying her best to trouble him over the best few days¡­


    Thinking about this, Fang Shi could not help but sigh in his mind, he knew that the reason for his disciple''s behaviour was because he would be taking in a new disciple.


    The reason for the alchemypetition was for him to find a new disciple and from what he had experienced over the past few days, his only disciple so far, didn''t seem so happy about the prospects of getting a junior brother or sister in the future¡­


    "Hah, I spoiled her way too much in the past¡­" Sighing to himself once again as he reflected on how he had treated his disciple in the past, Fang Shi decided to not scold his disciple and just go along with it.


    Even if there were less than twenty people who made it into the third stage of the alchemypetition, it did not really matter to him. After all, the people who could make it to the third stage even with his disciples meddling would be the best and it would not really interfere in his original objective of finding a second disciple to teach.


    Not paying any more attention to his own disciple, Fang Shi once again looked around at the participants and soon spotted the Verdant Jade Bamboo on Qing Yi''s table.


    "Hm? That little girl from the Flying Sword Sect is trying to breakthrough to the Expert Realm during a time like this!?"


    Feeling a bit shocked upon realizing that someone was trying to reach the next realm during such a time, Fang Shi narrowed both of his eyes as he began observing how Qing Yi was handling the different spiritual herbs in front of her.


    I hope that little girl can breakthrough and be an Expert Alchemist, she has quite a lot of talent when ites to alchemy¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he watched how smoothly she handled the two troublesome Earth Grade Spiritual Herbs, Fang Shi slowly began looking forward to Qing Yi''s performance....

 Chapter 425 - Enemies Of Yi Min Arrive...

    <h4>Chapter 425 - Enemies Of Yi Min Arrive...</h4>


    The second stage of the alchemypetition was soon in full swing, as the participants had all begun preparing their spiritual herbs and a few had even begun making the pills with their pill cauldrons.


    At this point, Qing Yi was the only person left in thepetition that was making a potion, while the rest of the participants all made pills.


    This had not only helped her gain attention from the Artisan Alchemist, Fang Shi, but also helped her garner part of the crowd''s attention. After all, even if she was not the best alchemist present in thepetition, she was still the only person making a potion!


    A pill was solid, while a potion was liquid. The process of potion making was different from pill making! For the crowd of spectators, it would be a little boring to just watch everyone seemingly do the same thing with the same few spiritual herbs, so Qing Yi slowly began to garner more and more attention from the crowd with the passing of time.


    Half an hour after the second stage of thepetition had begun, even Xuan Hao was slightly alerted upon hearing a group of people that were not from the group of Alchemy Hall elders cheer on his disciple¡­


    "Hm?"


    Someone is sneaking around again?


    Xuan Hao suddenly frowned as he sensed someone sneak into thepetition space.


    Compared to thest time where he didn''t use his divine sense to observe his surroundings properly due to him being careful about not wanting to idently offend Yi Min, Xuan Hao had long since allowed his divine sense to spread out and cover the entirepetition ground. Making sure he paid attention to anything unusual happening.


    The main reason for this was because Yi Min had told him that it was likely that her enemies wouldunch an attack soon¡­ Due to him ''visiting'' their underground base a week ago¡­


    "I wonder what they are up to¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao curiously observed the person who had sneaked into the observation ground.


    Not only was he observing the person, but an even more powerful divine sense was also carefully keeping an eye on the person who had sneaked inside thepetition ground. The owner of this divine sense was of course Yi Min!


    At this point, both of them were just keeping an eye on the person who had snuck inside thepetition ground. The man in question was not too strong, having only reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm.


    Even if he wanted to create trouble, there was no way he could do too much given his cultivation realm only being at the Core Formation Realm!


    "This should be the ce!"


    Listening in from the side as he slowly made his way over towards one of the areas that the participants had registered earlier on, Xuan Hao suddenly saw the man take out a small metal ball before throwing it into the area where the participants of thepetition had first gone to register.


    "Who are you!? This is a restricted area-"


    Before the elder standing inside the registration area even managed to react, a weird gas was released from the small metal ball, as the elder soon fainted together with two young guards inside.


    Neither of the two guards or the elder had been strong in the first ce, with the strongest person being the elder who had just barely reached the Core Formation Realm.


    After all, there was no way they had actually expected for someone to suddenlye and cause trouble in the registration area for participants!


    What did they want to do in such a ce? There was nothing of value and the only thing that would be gained from doing something like that, was the anger of the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    Thump Thump Thump!


    As the three people still left inside the registration room fell to the ground unconscious, Xuan Hao and Yi Min were both watching as the man walked over to where the elder noting down the names of the participants was located before picking up the book used for registration of the participants with a smile on his face before cautiously looking around himself. Only when he was certain no one was watching, did he put the small registration book into a small bag before beginning to leave.


    Still sitting down inside his spectator room with the rest of the elders from his sect as he saw this, Xuan Hao decided to inform Yi Min through his divine sense.


    "I don''t think this guy is rted to the people nning tounch an attack¡­"


    "Indeed, I think this has nothing to do with those people. In my opinion, he is likely working for someone who ns to assassinate one of the participants after the alchemypetition and just came here to gather some information on his employers target¡­"


    Hearing Yi Min''s response, Xuan Hao felt that it was a likely scenario. After all, there was no way Yi Min''s enemies would suddenly send someone random back inside after they had just ''killed'' arge number of guards.


    Though it did make Xuan Hao a bit curious, who had enough courage to n an assassination inside the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom?


    After all, it had to be remembered that all the participants had guardians at the Nascent Soul Realm with them! After having spread out his divine sense, Xuan Hao even sensed a few people at the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm among the spectators!


    For the assassin to have a chance to seed, he or she would at least be in the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ But a Nascent Soul Realm Expert fighting inside the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom would instantly trigger the giant formation covering the capital!


    No matter what, Xuan Hao could not see how the assassin would proceed¡­ Perhaps poison? But then again, there was currently an Artisan Alchemist close to bing a Master Alchemist present!


    If anyone was poison, that Fang Shi would likely be able to solve it instantly¡­


    Thinking about Fang Shi, Xuan Hao suddenly felt his mood sour.


    "Xuan Hao, it looks like my old friends are finally themselves ¡­"


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to start cursing Fang Shi in his mind, Yi Min''s solemn voice suddenly echoed out inside his head. From her voice alone, Xuan Hao could easily feel a terrifying killing intent slowly stirring...


    From the looks of it, the people she was talking about was not just someone at the Core Formation Realm!


    It looks like they are beginning their attack!


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help frowning, he never imagined that he would end up getting involved with the Iron Sky Kingdom''s enemies! Even worse was the fact that he was the main reason why they had decided to attack before the alchemypetition had ended!


    From how Yi Min was interacting with him, Xuan Hao knew very well that she expected for him to help up during the uing battle¡­


    There was also the quest he had been given by the system when he entered the underground base¡­


    [Side Quest 1/2: Explore the deeper part of the cave.]


    [Reward: Unlock next part of the quest]


    If he worked together with Yi Min to get rid of her enemies, he would have chance to explore the deeper part of the cave where one of the two Domain Lords from the other side had been guarding with so much devotion that he had even ignored him while he trashed the entrance of the base¡­


    Only when he had another Domain Lord to support him, did the Domain Lord guarding the deeper part of the underground base dare slowly move out to chase after him¡­


    If the Domain Lord was still around, Xuan Hao felt that there was no way for him toplete the side quest before the end of the alchemypetition.


    Therefore, he had already steeled himself for the probability that he had to give up on the side quest¡­ But from the look of things, it looked like he might have a chance atpleting it if he and Yi Min managed to deal with her enemies!


    Even if he had no idea what the reward forpleting the side quest was, Xuan Hao still felt drawn towards it due to his curiosity! This was after all the first ever mission that was split into two parts!


    The reward forpleting such a mission¡­ Xuan Hao could already imagine how great they would be!


    Whoosh~


    Expanding the range of his divine sense, Xuan Hao soon managed to find the people Yi Min had referred to and the smile at his face slowly began to fade away.


    The scene that appeared in front of him was enough to make him reconsider whether or not he should just take the elders from his sect and his disciple and run away from the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    How in the world¡­ Why are there so many Domain Lords!? Yi Min¡­ Just how many enemies do you have!?

 Chapter 426 - General Guan

    <h4>Chapter 426 - General Guan</h4>


    The number of Domain Lords that had gathered outside the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital was not the two he had chanced upon during his short exploration of the underground base but was instead threepletely unfamiliar Domain Lords that he had never seen before!


    Not only that, but the two Domain Lords that he very well knew were part of the conspiracy against Yi Min was nowhere to be seen! If they also showed up, Yi Min and himself would have to deal with five Domain Lords all by themselves!


    Maybe I should just escape¡­?


    With such a thought crossing his mind upon seeing the three Domain Lords outside, Xuan Hao honestly had no n to stay around and fight if it ended up endangering his life¡­


    After all, at the end of the day, he did not really have any form of connection with Yi Min outside of the fact that he had talked with her for a short moment. At most they could be considered acquaintances.


    Even if he had to abandon the side quest, it would be better than getting ganged up on by a group of Domain Lords and lose his life!


    "Yi Min¡­ Do you have any way to deal with these people...?" Feeling a bit nervous as he was faced with the probability of facing five Domain Lords at once, Xuan Hao could not help contacting Yi Min through his divine sense. Hoping to find out if she had any way to deal with them¡­


    "Hmph! These three are far from enough to pose any threat to me! Even without any help from the formation, I would still be able to deal with these three people!" Hearing the disdainful voice from Yi Min, Xuan Hao could clearly tell that she did not put the three Domain Lords in her eyes at all!


    Indeed, worthy of being someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Feeling a bit more reassured upon hearing what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao quickly left the alchemypetition to follow after Yi Min who had already made her way over to face the three Domain Lords.


    During this time, Xuan Hao also managed to observe the strength of the three Domain Lords standing just a few hundred meters outside the capital city.


    Among them, two were around the middle stages of the Domain Lord Realm where he himself was currently at, while thest person should have reached theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao breathed a sigh of relief.


    With his current strength, he should be able to face off against someone in theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm without a problem. The only ones who truly posed a threat to him would be someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm or above!


    At the very least, the only person he knew for certain that should have reached this realm among Yi Min''s enemies, was the Domain Lord who hade to help the underground base that he visited a week ago.


    But at this moment, both the Domain Lords that he had met in the underground base were missing¡­


    Thinking about what those two might be up to, Xuan Hao could not help but start growing a bit nervous. No matter what it was, he was certain that it would not be anything good!


    ¡­


    "General Guan¡­ For what reason have the generale to my kingdom?"


    Arriving at the city wall, Xuan Hao curiously looked over as he heard this. From the looks of it, the person in the lead outside the city walls was a general and given the generals strength, he was likely a general from the Sky Empire!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt a massive headache was about to show up. Even if he was not the smartest person around, Xuan Hao could still easily see that something troublesome was going on in the Sky Empire and even worse, he was about to be dragged into whatever that mess was about!


    "Hehe, Yi Min, I just came here because a demonic cultivator escaped and hid inside your Iron Sky Kingdom! We managed to track the person down to this ce and from the looks of it, that person has hidden inside of your capita-"


    "So, you want toe in and search for this ''demonic cultivator''? Howe I never heard anything about this?"


    Interrupting the general from the Sky Empire as she heard what he said, Xuan Hao could clearly feel the pressure excluded from Yi Min increase as she said this.


    "Of course, you never heard about it, it happened just recently, and that guy is really good at hiding! We have been chasing him for close to a week now and you can ask around if you don''t trust what I''m saying¡­"


    Showing a viinous smile as he said this with a confident tone, the leader of the three Domain Lords remained standing mid-air outside the walls of the city.


    From the looks of it, he still knew that he should not enter the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom recklessly. After all, the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom was the core of Yi Min''s territory! No one could say for certain just how many traps and other things were present inside the capital to deal with intruders¡­


    "We will see¡­" Narrowing her eyes upon seeing how confidant the general was, Yi Min took out a transmission talisman before she began contacting someone. Likely to find out if what General Guan had said was true or just a lie he had made up to enter the capital.


    After all, at the end of the day, he was still a general from the Sky Empire!


    If he was really chasing after some demonic cultivator who had even managed to escape her sense and dodge her formation to hide away inside the capital, Yi Min would have to let him inside.


    "Try and see if you can find the demonic cultivator! I will owe you in the future if you can help me out this time around!"


    Just as Xuan Hao was prepared to watch Yi Min and General Guan begin another battle of words, Yi Min''s voice entered his head as he looked over towards her in surprise.


    There was really a demonic cultivator hidden inside the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom! If not, there was no way Yi Min would ask him this¡­


    Not leaving to search for the demonic cultivator immediately just because Yi Min had told him to, Xuan Hao began thinking about what he should do.


    On one hand, he could help out Yi Min and find the demonic cultivator hiding inside of the capital. However, this would inevitably anger whatever faction in the Sky Empire that General Guan belonged to!


    On the other hand, he could also just ignore what Yi Min had said and just escape the Iron Sky Kingdom while there was still time. Not involving himself in whatever power struggle he had suddenly found himself in the middle of. The only downside to this, was that he would end up angering Yi Min and whatever faction she was a part of in the Sky Empire¡­


    "Hah¡­" Sighing to himself as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help looking over towards the direction of the alchemypetition with some regret. If he had just prevented his disciple from joining the alchemypetition¡­


    No, I can''t think like that! Qing Yi should be able to do something like that and improve herself! Even now, she should be attempting to breakthrough and be an Expert Alchemist.


    Shaking his head, a bit as he thought about this, Xuan Hao felt that it was not anyone''s fault that he was in his current situation where he had to chose who he wanted to fight against in the future.


    The faction General Guan was a part of that he had no idea about, or the faction Yi Min was a part of. No matter what he chose, he would end up bing enemies with one of these two factions fighting for power inside the Sky Empire¡­


    "I will try my best¡­" havinge to a decision, Xuan Hao nodded his head towards Yi Min before leaving to search through the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom for the demonic cultivator.


    In the end, he chose to join Yi Min''s side!


    The reason was simple, Yi Min was by far the strongest person she had seen to date and other than that, Xuan Hao had already had a chance to talk with Yi Min before all of this and already had some idea about her personality.


    At the very least, from what he had learned about her so far, Yi Min was a likable person and in his eyes, a far better choice to ally up withpared to General Guan that he had never really even had chance to talk with yet!


    Other than that, he had no idea if General Guan would even be friendly in the first ce! After all, he had already fought with two Domain Lords who were likely from the same faction as General Guan!

 Chapter 427 - Qing Yi Becomes An Expert Alchemist!

    <h4>Chapter 427 - Qing Yi Bes An Expert Alchemist!</h4>


    Leaving the city wall where Yi Min had begun pretending to talk with someone through hermunication talisman, Xuan Hao began searching through the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom in search of the demonic cultivator that had somehow managed to sneak inside the capital without being discovered by the formation.


    Thinking about how that demonic cultivator had managed to avoid Yi Min''s formation, Xuan Hao could not help recalling the weird tentacle egg monster he had encountered as he followed behind the thieve group.


    The tentacle egg monster could avoid the formation!


    Maybe it had something to do with the demonic cultivator that General Guan had imed to be hiding inside of the capital?


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao made his way towards the eastern part of the capital.


    If he could find more of those weird tentacle egg shaped monsters in the eastern part of the capital, he might have a chance of track down the origin of the weird tentacle egg shaped monsters.


    Given the fact that they were demonic in nature and the fact that they could avoid the formation, there was a high chance that they were rted to the demonic cultivator that General Guan had mentioned!


    This time around, he just had to remember to hide himself and not be discovered by the tentacle monster. After all, he did not want the other party to find out that someone might be searching for them¡­


    When he had been standing at the city wall earlier, General Guan did not seem to have realized that he was also someone in the Domain Lord Realm. Having focused all his attention on Yi Min who hade over to confront him at that time.


    Thinking a bit about it, it was likely that Yi Min had used the formation to hide the fact that he was a Domain Lord from General Guan¡­


    How smart¡­ This way, he will think that only Yi Min is a threat inside the capital¡­


    Praising Yi Min in his mind, Xuan Hao soon arrived at the eastern part of the capital and before long, he dived down into the nearest abandoned mineshaft.


    To start off with, he would search through the underground tunnels of the eastern part of the capital to look for any traces of the weird tentacle egg shaped monster!


    The first time he had found one the tentacle monsters, it had after all been when he had been making his way through the underground tunnels below the surface of the capital. All he had to do now was find one of the tunnels that had been affected by the tentacle monster and transformed¡­


    At the same time that Xuan Hao began searching for the demonic cultivator in the eastern part of the capital and Yi Min was confronting General Guan at the city wall in an attempt to buy more time for him to find said demonic cultivator, the rest of the capital seemed to continue like it did before.


    In the first ce, General Guan didn''t cause any ruckus when he first arrived a few hundred meters from the city walls. Instead, he had just silently arrived and waited for Yi Min to rush over after she sensed him.


    The only few guards present at the city wall to witness the confrontation between Yi Min and General Guan were shivering in fear as they didn''t dare breath too loudly.


    At the very least, the ce that Yi Min and General Guan was located, was one of the more deste parts of the city wall away from the gates into the capital.


    As for whether or not General Guan had chosen to appear at this location so as to not spread the matter of his appearances too quickly. No one could tell for certain¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time, back in the alchemypetition, things proceed smoothly without anyone knowing about the fact that one of the Sky Empire''s generals had arrived to confront the ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "Finished!"


    Finishing her potion after a close to two-hour brewing process, Qing Yi felt strength leave her body as she plopped down on a nearby chair with an exhausted look on her face.


    "Hah¡­ I really seed!" Sitting down on the chair, a smile crossed her exhausted face as Qing Yi realized that she had seeded in making her first ever Spirit Grade Potion!


    Following her sitting down, Qing Yi felt a weak wave of energy enter her body before she suddenly felt a cold sensation in her dantian followed by a clear increase in her vision and thought process.


    Feeling the cold wave of energy along with her improvements, Qing Yi knew that she could officially be considered to have stepped into the realm of an Expert Alchemist!


    Not only that, but Qing Yi also felt her cultivation realm increase. Going from the Seventh Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm to the Eight Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    Her breakthrough was smooth and there seemed to be no obstacles whatsoever in the process.


    Wait¡­ What about the impurities that gets-


    Realizing something, Qing Yi slowly looked down towards her hand and saw a weird ck substance slowly on its way out of her body.


    Whoosh!


    Not daring to stay around as she barely managed to stop her impurities from leaving her body and destroying the clothes she was currently wearing, Qing Yi rushed up to the nearest elder.


    "E-elder, can I leave for a short moment?!"


    "Hm? Oh¡­ Sure, just remember to be back before the time is up in half an hour, or you will be disqualified! There is a bath just to the left over there."


    The elder who saw Qing Yi quickly realized what was happening? to her and didn''t mind at all as she smiled kindly before showing her towards the nearest exit and at the same time also giving her directions to the nearest bath so Qing Yi would be able to quickly clean herself up.


    "Thank you!"


    Whoosh!


    Giving a quick bow in thanks to the elder, Qing Yi soon rushed out of thepetition space. Half an hour would be more than enough time for her to clean up and return before the Artisan Alchemist began to go over the participants pills and her potion!


    ¡­


    "Looks like that little girl managed to breakthrough to the Expert Realm sessfully! Haha, to think even her cultivation managed to breakthrough as well, she can be considered quite lucky!"


    Having observed the entire process of Qing Yi finishing her Spirit Grade Potion along with her rushing out of thepetition space after an idental breakthrough in her cultivation realm, Fang Shi could not helpughing to himself with a smile on his face as he was reminded about how he had reacted in the past upon bing an Expert Alchemist.


    Different from other breakthroughs when it came to alchemy, upon reaching the Expert Realm, one''s soul would receive a boost in strength after each major breakthrough.


    While the boost in strength from reaching the Expert Realm was almost negligible to someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, the same could not be said for someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    The boost in strength of the soul would not only increase one''s future prospects, but at the same time would also help one have an easier time oveing bottlenecks.


    For example, Qing Yi had already reached the Peak of the Seventh Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm and only needed an opportunity to breakthrough and reach the eighth stage.


    The boost in strength to her soul provided her this small opportunity and she had directly crossed over into the Eighth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    Fang Shi already knew about this, so he was not really too surprised when he had seen Qing Yi breakthrough her cultivation realm and only smiled with understanding as he watched how she had rushed out of thepetition space.


    "Hah¡­ When will I reach the Master Realm¡­?"


    Having seen Qing Yi breakthrough to the Expert Realm, Fang Shi was suddenly reminded about the fact that he was also close to a breakthrough himself. The difference was just that the difficulty in breaking through from the Artisan Realm to the Master Realm was not something easy.


    At this point in time, Fang Shi had already been stuck at the peak of the Artisan Realm for close to two hundred years!


    But at the same time, Fang Shi also knew just how big of an opportunity it would be for him to breakthrough to the Master Realm!


    The boost in strength his soul would receive at that point in time would be more than enough to push his cultivation realm even further and might even allow him to directly reach the Domain Lord Realm!


    Thinking about this, Fang Shi could not help sighing to himself even more. After all, he had never been too focused on improving his cultivation realm over the years and had single mindedly been focused on improving his alchemy...


    If he ever wanted to improve his cultivation realm, he could only do so by breaking through to the Master Realm!

 Chapter 428 - End Of The Second Stage

    <h4>Chapter 428 - End Of The Second Stage</h4>


    Shaking his head as he thought about the Master Realm, Fang Shi knew very well just how hard it would be for him to breakthrough.


    In the first ce, the main reason why he had wanted to take on a disciple this time around, was because he hoped that he would be able to further increase his fundamental understanding of alchemy by teaching someone.


    At the very least, that was what he had been told by one of the Sky Empire''s Master Alchemists thest time he had gone to ask for help regarding oveing his bottleneck and breaking through to the Master Realm¡­


    "Hah, why do I still feel like I''m still so far away from the Master Realm? Just what is it that I''m missing?"


    Remembering his conversation back then with a certain Master Alchemist from the Sky Empire, Fang Shi could not help but let out a quiet sigh as he soon redirected his attention towards the participants busy finishing up their pills.


    Other than Qing Yi, Fang Shi also kept an eye on three other participants who all surpassed the other participants in both skill and alchemy realm...


    Looking over those three participants, Fang Shi could not help but smile wryly as he noticed a certain young man smiling confidently as he looked over towards his disciple Cai Yu standing a few feet away from him.


    The young man in question, was the crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom that had been chasing after his disciple for thest few years!


    To be honest, Fang Shi felt truly impressed by this crown prince and even wanted to take him in as a disciple. The main reason for this was the fact that the crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom had only started practicing alchemy three years ago after rumours about him epting in the near future began circting inside the Sky Empire¡­


    In under three years, the crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom had directly gone from someone who had nevere into contact with alchemy before, to bing an Expert Alchemist!


    This talent in alchemy alone was more than enough to make Fang Shi want to take him in as a disciple and he had even approached him a few months before the alchemypetition. Expressing his wishes to enter his tutge¡­ The only thing preventing him from doing so was Cai Yu''s clear dislike towards this crown prince.


    While he didn''t know the real reason why his disciple was so against this crown prince, Fang Shi decided to priories the wishes of his first disciple and didn''t ept the crown prince as a disciple at that time.


    In the end, the crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom had ended up following them all the way to the Iron Sky Kingdom and even joined the alchemypetition¡­


    ncing over towards the pills that were ced in front of the crown prince, Fang Shi could not help shaking his head with a wry smile on his face.


    This crown prince clearly came all the way here to show off how much better than the other participants he was and get epted as his disciple!


    If the crown prince won, Cai Yu would not be able to say anything if he picked the crown prince as his disciple!


    He was scheming so much just to get epted as his disciple and get closer to Cai Yu¡­


    Thinking about this, Fang Shi could not help but marvel over just how shrewd this crown prince! No wonder his disciple was so cautious of him¡­


    Turning around to look over towards Cai Yu, Fang Shi clearly saw how a small frown had appeared on her face as she looked over towards the pills in front of the crown prince.


    "Ah, looks like the time is up¡­"


    ¡­


    Arriving back in front of her small alchemy station where her potion along with other things were located, Qing Yi could not help but breath out a sigh of relief upon discovering that she had managed to make it back in time before the end of the second stage of thepetition.


    The time it had taken for her to clean up and not smell like something that had been dragged manure pit was longer than she had expected. The main reason for this was because the smell from the impurities had be way harder to remove, due to the fact that she had forcefully prevented them from leaving her body right after her breakthrough.


    "Time is up! Everyone that didn''t manage to finish a potion or pill in time, leave. The rest,e up with your pills¡­ Or potion, likest time and I will inspect them. The top twenty will move on to the third stage of thepetition."


    Hearing the voice of the Artisan Alchemist just as she finished looking over her potion, Qing Yi quickly grabbed her potion before making her way up towards the tform located in the middle of thepetition space.


    Likest time, she found herself standing shoulder to shoulder with the same young girl that she had stood with during the first stage of thepetition.


    Looking down towards the pills that the young girl had made, the young girl did the same as she looked down towards her potion.


    Seeing that the Artisan Alchemist was noting over to inspect their products yet as he was waiting for the participants who failed to make a pill or potion in time to leave thepetition space, the young girl inched a bit closer to Qing Yi.


    "What kind of potion did you make?"


    Asking this in a quiet tone so as to not catch too much attention from the other participants, the young girl curiously looked up towards Qing Yi who was a little taler than her.


    Trying her best to remember what the use of the potion was, all Qing Yi could remember was the fact that her master said that one should drink it to gain some sort of beneficial effect¡­ Or maybe it was something different?


    "I''m not too sure¡­ I just learned about it from my master a few days ago¡­ To be honest, I never got to ask him what it does. The only thing I know is that it''s supposed to have some sort of beneficial effect when you drink it¡­"


    Tilting her head, a bit as she thought seriously about the question that the young girl had asked her before answering her, Qing Yi quickly realized that she had no idea what the potion she had just made did.


    She actually had no idea what the first ever Spirit Grade Potion she made did!


    But it should at the very least be something beneficial. After all, all the Spiritual Herbs she had used were normally only used in potions or pills that brought about some sort of beneficial effect. From a short increase in strength, to increasing the recovery of one''s qi during battle¡­


    The Verdant Jade Bamboo was also well known for its positive effects in alchemy, being a core ingredient in several different healing pills and potions!


    The first time she had seen the Verdant Jade Bamboo being used by one of the elders of the Alchemy Hall, was also when the elder was in the process of making a Spirit Grade Qi Recovery Potion!


    With this in mind, Qing Yi felt certain that the Spirit Grade Potion that she had made, would have some sort of beneficial effect. After all, she had never heard about the Verdant Jade Bamboo being used in any sort of harmful potions or pills before!


    "I see¡­ I decided to make a Spirit Grade Qi Recovery Pill!" Nodding her head in understanding at what Qing Yi said, the young girl also decided to show off what she had made to Qing Yi.


    "Spirit Grade Qi Recovery Pills!?"


    "Yes!"


    It was only at this moment that Qing Yi realized that the young girl beside her was already an Expert Alchemist!


    Even more surprising, was the fact that the young girl was clearly way younger than her! At least two years her junior!


    Thinking about this, Qing Yi could not help but take a deep breath as she suddenly came to realize just how talented the young girl beside her truly was.


    Reaching the Expert Alchemist Realm at the age of 14 or 13 was no joking matter! Even Qing Yi felt slightly inferior when shepared herself to the young girl standing beside her.


    Forgetting the fact that she had gone from someone who knew nothing about alchemy about alchemy less than a year ago.


    In under a year, she had gone from someone who knew nothing about alchemy to someone at the Expert Alchemy Realm! Even if the young girl beside her was talented, she was way more talented than her!


    "Ah, the inspection is starting!"


    Being brought out of her thoughts by the voice of the young girl, Qing Yi quickly realized that the Artisan Alchemist had begun moving down towards one the participants.

 Chapter 429 - Skin Strengthening Potion...?

    <h4>Chapter 429 - Skin Strengthening Potion...?</h4>


    The inspection was not much different from the first stage of the alchemypetition, as Fang Shi was simrly making his way around inspecting the participants pills one by one. The only difference from thest time, was that he did not say whether anyone moved on to the next stage or failed, while inspecting the participants pills.


    Even then, Fang Shi did not forget to tell each of the participants how they could have improved their pills. Making sure that each of them knew that they could do better and how they could improve when they made the same pill again in the future.


    This way, all the participants felt that they had a chance to move on to the next stage of thepetition, as everyone had at least a few mistakes pointed out by Fang Shi when he went over the pills that they had made.


    ¡­


    "Hm?"


    Finishing his inspection of a Spirit Grade Qi Recovery Pill from a young girl, Fang Shi could not help but raise his eyebrows upon realizing that Qing Yi was the next person he would go over.


    To be honest, Fang Shi had felt a bit curious about just what kind of potion she had ended up making after witnessing her breaking through to the Expert Alchemist Realm earlier.


    "This is¡­" Looking over the potion ced in front of Qing Yi, Fang Shi showed a slightly confused expression before picking up the potion bottle to examine it more closely and find out just what kind of potion she had ended up making.


    Narrowing his eyes as he even opened the potion bottle to try and find out what kind of potion it was, Fang Shi soon shook his head as he put down the potion bottle.


    The potion clearly used the Verdant Bamboo as the core and the two Earth Grade Spiritual Herbs to further strengthen the effect of the potion¡­ But it''s not simr to any potion I have ever read about before, I¡­ I don''t know what potion this is¡­?


    Realizing this, Fang Shi could not help but feel shocked inside. After all, as an Artisan Alchemist, he had seen thousands upon thousands of different Spirit Grade Potions and Pills before!


    "I-is something wrong with my potion¡­?"


    "Ah¡­ No, nothing is wrong, I was just lost in thought for a moment. Might I ask what this potion is called?"


    Hearing Qing Yi suddenly call out to him as he had stood in front of her in deep thought for quite some time, Fang Shi quickly answered her with a kind smile before asking her about the name of her potion.


    "Hm¡­ If I''m not wrong, it should be called skin¡­ Ehm¡­ Sorry, I don''t remember the full name of the potion¡­"


    "Haha, no need to worry!"


    Seeing Qing Yi''s face begin to turn a bit red in embarrassment upon realizing that she couldn''t remember the name of the potion she had just made, Fang Shi stopped her as he already had some idea as to what the use of the potion should be from what Qing Yi had said.


    She had mentioned it was called something rted to skin. Given the fact that the Verdant Jade Bamboo was well known for being used in many skin strengthening potions, Fang Shi felt like the potion Qing Yi had made would most likely be a skin strengthening potion.


    Fang Shi knew just how many skin strengthening potions were out there, so he no longer felt that it was too weird that he had no idea about the potion Qing Yi had made.


    After all, just from the spiritual herbs avable together with the Verdant Jade Bamboo alone, Fang Shi knew over a dozen different skin strengthening potions¡­


    These skin strengthening potions all had pretty much the same effect. Not one stronger or weaker than the other. The only difference being the ingredients used in making them.


    "Would you mind if I test out your potion?"


    Thinking that Qing Yi had made a skin strengthening potion, Fang Shi decided to ask her whether he could try out her potion or not. After all, if her skin strengthening potion was stronger than a normal skin strengthening potion that used the same spiritual herbs, he would have to make sure he got his hands on the recipe after the alchemypetition!


    No matter the price, Fang Shi was sure he could pay the spirit stones that Qing Yi''s alchemy teacher wanted for such a recipe. After all, at the end of the day, he was an Artisan Alchemist! If there was one thing, he had a lot of, it was spirit stones¡­


    ¡­


    Not knowing why Fang Shi suddenly wanted to test out her potion, Qing Yi began feeling a bit nervous as she thought that there might be something wrong with her potion.


    Maybe the reason why he looked over my potion for such a long time was because there was something wrong with it?! Or else, why would he want to test out my potion all of a sudden¡­?


    "S-sure¡­"


    "Thanks, I will test it out after going over the rest of the participants."


    Feeling her body stiffen up as she barely managed to squeeze out a single word, Qing Yi nervously looked on as Fang Shi smiled at her before taking her potion and began walking over towards the person standing beside her.


    "Did you do something to your potion? Why did it get taken away?"


    "I-I don''t know¡­"


    Hearing the voice of the young girl standing beside her call out filled with curiosity the moment Fang Shi had moved away, Qing Yi could only shake her head as she also had no idea why Fang Shi wanted to take her potion away after inspecting it.


    "Hm¡­ Maybe your potion is the best among all of us and he wants to show it off or something? I remember the alchemy elders back in my sect used to do that during ourpetitions from time to time, to encourage the rest of us to improve!"


    "Maybe¡­"


    Not feeling the least bit confident in what the young girl said, Qing Yi could only nervously follow Fang Shi with her eyes as she waited for the inspection of the rest of the participants pills to finish¡­

 Chapter 430 - Skin Strengthening Potions... Side Effects...

    <h4>Chapter 430 - Skin Strengthening Potion''s... Side Effects...</h4>


    "That should be thest of them¡­"


    Putting down the pill he had been looking over with a slightly disappointed expression on his face, Fang Shi made his way back onto the tform beforeing to a stop in front of therge cauldron he had ced down at the start of the alchemypetition.


    "I should test out that girl''s potion and see how effective it is." Muttering this quietly to himself as he looked over Qing Yi''s potion that he had been carrying around, Fang Shi could not help feeling himself grow excited.


    After all, there was nothing more exciting to an alchemist than discovering a brand-new pill or potion!


    Smiling a bit to himself as he lifted the potion bottle up to his mouth as he drank it.


    Scared of any side effects or other things that might happen if the potion was not made correctly?


    Fang Shi didn''t fear any of those things! Qing Yi had broken through to the Expert Alchemist Realm, so Fang Shi was certain that she had sessfully made the Spirit Grade Potion.


    If the Spirit Grade Potion had really failed, Qing Yi would not have been able to breakthrough and be an Expert Alchemist!


    "Master!?" Letting out a surprised gasp upon witnessing her master drink the potion from one of the participants all of a sudden, Cai Yu looked over towards her master with a bewildered look on her face.


    Why had her master drunk one of the participants potions by himself? If he really wanted to test out its effects, he could have just gotten one of the elders from the Iron Sky Kingdom watching over thepetition to try it out! Why would he drink it himself!?


    Feeling confused upon witnessing her master''s reckless behaviour, Cai Yu soon found herself taking a few steps back.


    The potion began to take effect!


    "Pft-"


    Witnessing first-hand as the potion took effect, Cai Yu tried her best to hold back herughter as she watched how her master ''changed''.


    "Wha-"


    "Pft- What is that!?"


    "Hehe, what an evil potion¡­ I should ask if I can get the recipe after thepetition."


    The rest of the participants watching from the side did the same, as all of them tried their best to stop themselves fromughing out loud at Fang Shi.


    After all, it had to be remembered that he was the sole judge of the alchemypetition and at the same time an Artisan Alchemist! They could not justugh at him!


    "Haha! Look at that! The Artisan Alchemist, he-"


    "Hahahaha, I''m so happy I decided toe to the alchemypetition!"


    "Indeed, where else would we be able to see an Artisan Alchemist like that!"


    The spectators on the other hand were not limited like the participants still waiting to know if they moved on to the third stage of the alchemypetition, asughter erupted all across therge crowd of people gathered in the spectator stands.


    "Hm? Is something wrong?"


    Not having any clue as to why everyone suddenlyughed at him, Fang Shi first felt confused before realizing that there was something wrong with the potion, he had just drunk.


    Now the question just became, what in the world did the potion do that caused everyone to startughing at him?


    Thinking about this, Fang Shi quickly checked his current condition through his divine sense.


    Hm¡­ My defensive capability has increased by so much! This is far better than an ordinary skin strengthening potion made using the Verdant Jade Bamboo! Now why is it that everyone isughing at me? Perhaps therge increase in strengthes with some sort of temporary physical deformity or alteration?


    Not the least bit bothered by the peopleughing at him due to the likely alteration that had urred to his appearance, Fang Shi calmly went over the effects that the potion had on him. After all, he was an Artisan Alchemist. How could he be bothered by something like a small alteration to his appearance?


    "This is!?"


    At least that was what Fang Shi believed until he began inspecting his current appearance with his divine sense.


    The current Fang Shi no longer looked the same as he did before he drank Qing Yi''s ''Skin Strengthening'' Potion. Instead, the current Fang Shi was covered in a thinyer of white fur that had grown out all over his body.


    This, however, was not what had caused Fang Shi to suddenly freeze up.


    "W-why do I have rabbit ears?!"


    Not knowing what to say as he saw therge pair of rabbit ears on top of his head, Fang Shi carefully touched them and felt like they were a part of his body, it was almost like he had gained another pair of ears¡­


    The potion strengthens one''s defence, but it transformed one into some sort of humanoid rabbit?


    Having reached this conclusion as to the effect of the potion he had just drunk without thinking about the consequences, Fang Shi suddenly thought about something¡­


    How long would the potionst?


    Even if Fang Shi did not normally care much about his appearance, there was no way he wanted to proceed with thepetition in his current condition.


    Not to mention his own mental health, there was no way any of the participants would take anything he said seriously given how he looked, they would most likely just be trying their best to stop themselves fromughing¡­


    Thinking this as he looked over the participants who were all trying their best to not burst outughing upon seeing him look over, Fang Shi felt embarrassed for the first time in a long time.


    "You will get some time to rest while I go over everyone''s results during the second stage and pick out twenty people to move onto the next stage of thepetition!"


    Whoosh!


    With that quick announcement, Fang Shi quickly left the tform and disappeared from view. Likely to hide away until the potion lost effect¡­


    ¡­


    "Do you think this will affect my results¡­?"


    Asking this to the young girl standing beside her, Qing Yi could not help feeling that there was close to no chance that she would be moving onto the third stage of thepetition.


    "Who knows¡­ At least it was a Spirit Grade Potion."


    Not saying anything more, the young girl soon beganughing to herself as she recalled Fang Shi''s appearance after drinking Qing Yi''s Potion


    Other than the white fur covering his body, Fang Shi had also gained a pair of cute whiskers¡­

 Chapter 431 - Searching For The Demonic Cultivator

    <h4>Chapter 431 - Searching For The Demonic Cultivator</h4>


    At the same time that the second stage of the alchemypetition ended, Xuan Hao was searching through the close to endless tunnels beneath the surface of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Even though he had limited himself to only search through the eastern part of the capital, it was still a far harder task than he had first expected it to be! The main reason for this being the fact that the tunnels went way deeper into the ground than he had first expected.


    ¡­


    Sighing to himself as he reached yet another dead end without finding any clues as to the location of the demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao began to think that there might actually not be another tentacle monster around.


    If that was really the case, it would be way harder for him to find the demonic cultivator hidden inside the capital.


    "Nothing here as well-"


    Rumble~


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to turn around and leave to resume his search, a loud rumbling sound could be heard. Followed by the sound of arge quantity of rocks being moved around just a few meters beneath him.


    Someone is digging a new tunnel?


    This was the first thought that passed through his mind, but it was soon dismissed again.


    From the time he had searched through the underground tunnels in the eastern part of the capital, Xuan Hao hade to understand that most of the mining activities were stopped. The few mining operations still active, were located close to the surface!


    Not to mention the fact that yin qi grew denser and denser the further down one went. Making it? impossible for ordinary people to mine at such depths, Xuan Hao was currently he was a few thousand meters below the ground.


    At such a depth, the yin qi was dense enough to even kill Qi Condensation Realm cultivators! Only someone at the Foundation Establishment Realm would be able to prevent the yin qi from invading their body and killing them!


    A mining operation at such depth required a lot of cultivators and resources to carry out, there was no way he would have missed something like that with his divine sense. Even if it had been slightly restricted due to the dense yin qi in the air around him.


    Demonic cultivator who cultivated yin qi would love such an environment, as it would allow them to progress twice as fast as normal with half the effort.


    If someone was moving around at such a depth and it weren''t anyrge-scale mining operation conducted by the Iron Sky Kingdom, it was highly likely demonic cultivators and it just so happened that he was looking for one!


    Whoosh~


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao quickly made his way towards the source of the sound without alerting the other party. Even making sure to go back and make his way down through the tunnels instead of directly bursting through to the tunnel being dug out below him.


    After all, the demonic cultivator he was chasing after should be quite strong. Given the fact that he had managed to escape from someone at the Domain Lord Realm, or at the very least pretended to do so if he was working together with General Guan¡­


    At the very least, Xuan Hao expected that the demonic cultivator should have already reached the demonic cultivators equivalent of the Domain Lord Realm.


    ording to the demonic cultivation realms, that would mean he had reached the third and final transformation before fully transforming into a demon!


    The thought of encountering someone like that, was more than enough to cause Xuan Hao to be extra careful as the origin of the digging sound from earlier finally came into view.


    Rumble!


    Crack-


    Tentacle cocoons¡­?


    Seeing fiverge tentacle cocoons simr to the one he had seen a week ago in the middle of arge underground cave all using their countless tentacles to dig deeper into the ground, Xuan Hao immediately hid himself as he decided to observe what the gathering of tentacle cocoons were up to before doing anything.


    Thump~


    Not a momentter, a young man with pale skin and blood red eyes appeared from a tunnel at the other side of the underground cave.


    Roll~


    Arge tentacle cocoon simr to the other five in the process of digging with their tentacles rolled behind him before settling together with the other five tentacle cocoons where it soon joined in the digging process.


    "Hm¡­ That should be all of them, it''s just a pity that I lost one of them. At least I was smart enough to hide a self-destruction formation inside of them in case something like that happened. Even if that little girl Yi Min tries to, she will only realize it when it''s toote!"


    "¡­"


    Listening to the young man who had just appeared inside the cave together with a tentacle cocoon, Xuan Hao had a feeling that he was the demonic cultivator he was looking for.


    Not only that, but the yin qi around him seemed to condense even further as the ground beneath his feet froze over with every step he took. This was not due to a domain or anything like that but was merely an after effect of the yin qi swirling around his body.


    Just looking at it from a distance made Xuan Hao feel a shiver run down his spine. Of course, this was not because the ground froze over with every step that the pale looking young man took, but because of the power that was hidden within each step.


    At this point, Xuan Hao had already managed to conclude that the pale looking young man currently looking over the tentacle cocoons as they dug deeper into the ground, was at least at the peak of the Third Demonic Transformation. Making himparable to a Peak Domain Lord!


    Even if Xuan Hao had managed toprehend two domains and had fought against the winged tiger demon beast, Xuan Hao knew very well that there was no way he would be a match for the person in front of him.


    Almost instinctively, he knew that he would die if he fought the pale looking young man in front of him!


    Where this sudden fear came from, Xuan Hao had no idea, and he didn''t want to try and test out his luck by fighting the demonic cultivator. After all, Yi Min had merely asked him to find out where the demonic cultivator was. Not kill or fight him!


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao decided to make his way back towards Yi Min and inform her about the location of the demonic cultivator so she could deal with it.


    As for what the tentacle cocoons were up to under the demonic cultivator''s orders?


    He did not n to stay around and find out. Even without knowing what the demonic cultivator was up to, Xuan Hao was certain that it was nothing good¡­


    Crack~


    About to make his way out of the underground cave back towards Yi Min, Xuan Hao looked back towards the entrance of the tunnel he hade in through just behind him with a shocked look on his face.


    There, in the tunnel he had entered the underground cave through, a giant oversized rat at the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm casually made its way over. Stepping on a few pieces of wood that had fallen off therge support beams that kept the long-abandoned tunnel standing.


    The oversized rat in question was a rock eating rat, amon demon beast found deep underground in natural or manmade tunnels and caves.


    The rock eating rat lived off eating rocks and had developed a special resistance to the dense yin qi found deep underground. Normally, miners or explorers would ignore these demon beasts, as they never attacked others before being attacked.


    All in all, there was nothing special about the peaceful oversized rat that liked to eat rocks¡­


    "Hm?"


    Other than the fact that it had just managed to alert the demonic cultivator inside of cave¡­


    What have I done to deserve this?


    Smiling wryly to himself as he looked over towards the demonic cultivator cautiously looking over towards his direction, Xuan Hao turned around to look towards the still oblivious oversized rat making its way over from the entrance of the tunnel. Unaware at just how dangerous its current situation was.


    Given his current precarious situation, Xuan Hao knew that it would not be long before the demonic cultivator came over to take a look. At that point, Xuan Hao would have no way to hide.


    Whoosh!


    So, before he would be discovered by the other party, Xuan Hao decisively used a movement technique to run away.


    ¡­


    "Who!?"


    The scene of an unfamiliar person suddenly appearing before running away instantly entered the eyes of the pale looking young man, as he realized that his hiding spot had been discovered.


    Who is that? The Iron Sky Kingdom has more than one Domain Lord? No! I can''t let this person escape and inform that little girl Yi Min!


    Narrowing both of his eyes as an overwhelming killing intent leaked out from them, the pale looking young man didn''t think too much about Xuan Hao''s identity before chasing after Xuan Hao.

 Chapter 432 - Third Transformation Realm Demonic Cultivator

    <h4>Chapter 432 - Third Transformation Realm Demonic Cultivator</h4>


    And¡­ He is following me¡­


    Feeling the terrifying demonic aura that suddenly erupted behind him before rushing over towards him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling depressed upon realizing that the other party had no idea to just let him get away.


    Even worse, Xuan Hao realized that his speed was way slowerpared to the demonic cultivator chasing after him.


    The only advantage Xuan Hao had at the moment, was that he had managed to gain some distance between him and the demonic cultivator at the beginning. Other than that, with his current speed, he would not need more than a few seconds to reach the surface again.


    Even if the demonic cultivator was faster than him, there was no way for him to catch up with him before he reached the surface. At that point, Yi Min would likely be able to sense what was happening through her formation¡­


    Even if he was forced to fight with the demonic cultivator by himself, Xuan Hao was more than confident in being able to stay alive.


    Feeling himself calm down as he got closer and closer to the surface, Xuan Hao sensed the aura of the demonic cultivator get closer and closer with each passing second.


    I should really learn a proper movement technique in the future¡­


    Having realized just how bad his current movement technique waspared to the demonic cultivator chasing after him, Xuan Hao nned to search for a suitable movement technique when he returned to the sect after everything was done in the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "Wha-?!"


    Suddenly, several small runes etched into the ceiling of the tunnels in front of him appeared out of seemingly thin air. Even when he had gone through the tunnels earlier to reach the deeper parts of the tunnels, he had not sensed any of these small runes that now covered the ceiling of all the tunnels in front of him!


    Boom!


    Rumble~


    "Haha! There is no way you thought it would be that easy to run away?"


    Before Xuan Hao even managed to react, the voice of the demonic cultivator chasing him from behind echoed out as the small symbols all exploded at the same time. Instantly blocking his way up towards the surface.


    Not daring to stay around and wait for the demonic cultivator to catch up to him, Xuan Hao scanned the still intact tunnels around him and soon realized that only the tunnels leading back underground were still left intact!


    Whoosh!


    Knowing he would not have a good oue from just standing around and waiting for the demonic cultivator to catch up to him, Xuan Hao decisively entered a new tunnel leading back underground.


    As for digging his way up to the surface by using his domain?


    Xuan Hao had no n to try it. After all, digging his way up to the surface would severely limit his speed and the demonic cultivator would be able to easily catch up with him¡­ At that point, he would likely not even make it half the way up!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao did not waste any time using his divine sense to search the different tunnels that appeared along the tunnel going back down once again. Searching for any tunnel that might lead to an alternate part of the underground tunnelwork, where he might be able to find a way back up to the surface without having to slow down.


    "There!"


    Descending deeper and deeper, Xuan Hao felt that he was about to reach the deepest part of the underground tunnelwork below the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom, when his divine sense suddenly managed to lock onto a small and narrow tunnel only half a meter wide and two meters tall.


    However, this was not the important part of the narrow tunnel. The important part was that the small narrow tunnel continued onwards before ending up in arge underground cave!


    Swish~


    Not able to explore too much of the underground cave at the end of the narrow tunnel with his divine sense, Xuan Hao barely managed to dodge a thin red de sh from the demonic cultivator that had alreadye close enough to attack him.


    At this point, Xuan Hao did not bother exploring the underground cave up ahead any further with his divine sense as he directly entered the narrow tunnel and made his way towards the underground cave at the other side.


    Rumble~


    Not forgetting to destroy the tunnel as he passed through it to buy himself a few precious seconds of time as the demonic cultivator would have to dig his way through.


    This method was not too useful earlier, as there were simply way too many other tunnels connected to the one, he was using to escape.


    Things, however, was not the same this time around, as the demonic cultivator had no other tunnels that he could use to chase after him¡­


    "Ah! Damnable-"


    Bang!


    Hearing the angry scream of the demonic cultivator behind him followed by the sound of the tunnel copsing on top of him, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself as he travelled through the narrow tunnel.


    Soon enough reaching therge underground cave on the other side.


    "I hope this cave leads to the surface, or at the very least is connected to a tunnel leading that does so¡­" Muttering this to himself as he briefly stopped and surveyed the underground cave which only inhabitants were a few oversized rock eating rats happily eating the loose rocks scattered all across the cave floor, Xuan Hao soon began making his way through the underground cave.


    Whoosh~


    Flying through the underground cave, Xuan Hao didn''t discover anything out of the ordinary. Not that he had any time to spare looking around the underground cave, there was after all still a demonic cultivator chasing after him¡­


    Because of this, Xuan Hao didn''t notice that something inside the cave was currently keeping an eye on him from the side, a pair of dark green eyes barely visible in the dark underground cave as they silently followed him as he made his way through the underground cave.


    Boom!


    "Haha! Do you think you can just run away from me that easily!?"


    Just as the owner of the pair of dark green eyes was about to strike towards the unsuspecting Xuan Hao, arge explosion along with an evilughter echoed throughout the entire underground cave. Instantly causing the owner of the pair of dark green eyes to shrink back into the darkness due to the shock of someone new suddenly appearing.


    "He''s faster than I expected¡­"


    Frowning as he noticed the demonic cultivator had already managed to make his way to the cave, Xuan Hao felt a wave of worry wash over him.


    This worry only further increased when he turned around to momentarily look at the demonic cultivator. Only to discover that the pale looking young man was long gone.


    Instead, what could only be described as a demon remained, as the demonic cultivator had beenpletely covered in ayer of thick scales, razor sharp teeth, a pair ofrge bat-like wings on his back and pair of terrifying ws for hands.


    Looking back at the former pale looking young man and seeing what he had transformed into, Xuan Hao understood why demonic cultivators were so terrifying. Not to mention the demonic cultivator behind him had reached the third and final transformation. One more step and he would reach the True Demon Realm and be a real demon!


    The demonic cultivator in his current demonic state, was by far the strongest person that Xuan Hao had ever encountered!


    Even Yi Min at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm seemed to be weakerpared to the monster behind him!


    Whoosh!


    Increasing his speed by a tiny amount by expending more of his qi, Xuan Hao no longer paid any attention to the demonic cultivator behind him as he rushed through the underground cave that had to his advantage, slowly begun to move up towards the surface.


    In his eyes, as long as he made it back up to the surface again, he should be able to get help from Yi Min to deal with the demonic cultivator.


    Even in the worst-case scenario where General Guan was together with the demonic cultivator and helped him, Xuan Hao still felt that Yi Min would have some way to deal with it.


    After all, the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital was literally her home!


    The damage to the formation around the capital had not yet managed to truly damage its foundation and as a Renowned Master cksmith, Xuan Hao doubted that Yi Min didn''t have some other trump cardsying around¡­


    Not to mention the fact that she would undoubtedly have arge arsenal of powerful weapons and artifacts at her disposal when fighting!


    In a fight, a Master cksmith like Yi Min would simply be able to p someone to death with her wallet as her opponent would be overwhelmed with the sheer number of weapons and artifacts at her disposal!

 Chapter 433 - Beginning Of Chaos!

    <h4>Chapter 433 - Beginning Of Chaos!</h4>


    Flying through the underground cave, Xuan Hao soon noticed that the cave was getting smaller and smaller with every meter he travelled. Even worse, he was still far away from the surface and there had been no new tunnels appearing either. In the end, he might just have forced himself into a corner by escaping into the underground cave¡­


    At least he had would have more time and have a higher chance of finding a way back to the surface by entering the underground cave¡­ Far better than waiting for the demonic cultivator to catch up to him in the underground tunnelwork located beneath the eastern part of the capital.


    "So fast!?"


    Feeling the demonic cultivator growing closer and closer with an even greater speed than before, Xuan Hao could not help growing a bit nervous about his future oue. No matter what, he didn''t want to end up in a fight with the demonic cultivator.


    Even if he ended up winning, he would surely end up injured in the process and when he got back to the surface, he would still have to deal with whatever scheme that General Guan had nned to deal with Yi Min.


    The n to deal with someone like Yi Min in her own territory would surely be terrifying...


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao stopped himself from letting his thoughts wander towards what ns General Guan might have for dealing with Yi Min. Instead focusing on his current precarious situation.


    "A gate?"


    Looking up ahead, Xuan Hao felt a bit bewildered as he spotted a giant gate blocking his path forward appear up ahead and for some reason, the gate looked quite familiar. Not that he had any time to think about it as he still had a demonic cultivator chasing after him from behind¡­


    Whoosh!


    Directly gathering his power together with his sword domain into a small thin transparent sword, Xuan Hao did not even bother finding out how strong the giant gate blocking his way was before shing down towards therge gate in the distance.


    Along with the transparent sword descending, a terrifying arc of sword light was formed in the air along the travel path of the sword


    Swish~


    Within a short instant, the arc of sword light was fully formed as it flew towards therge gate, while the transparent sword in Xuan Hao''s hand dispersed into the surrounding. Leaving behind no trace of its existence.


    BOOM!


    The arc of sword light formed by the transparent sword directly crashed into therge gate ahead, as it exploded into before transforming into a terrifying vortex of sword energy that quickly grinded its way through therge gate before dissipating upon havingpletely destroyed therge gate.


    Whoosh~


    Just in time for Xuan Hao''s arrival as he easily passed through the now destroyed gate and made it to the other side.


    The sword attack he had used just a moment ago, was something he hade up with himself after having studied the Untold Swords Mantra''s sword moves. Especially the first one, Sword Shadow, regarding the vortex of sword energy¡­


    [Side Quest 1/2: Explore the deeper part of the cave. plete)]


    [Reward: Unlock next part of the quest]


    [Proceeding to issue second part of the quest¡­]


    Feeling the sudden activity of the system inside his sea of consciousness after he passed through the destroyed gate, Xuan Hao felt a wave of confusion wash over him before he finally realized why therge gate, he had just destroyed just now looked so familiar to him¡­


    "WHO!?"


    Along with an all too familiar voice, a fear inspiring dark domain expanded over towards his direction from the other side of the now gone gate.


    "You!? Why are you here again!?"


    Realizing that it was Xuan Hao who had shown up again, the killing intent of the Domain Lord with the dark domain clearly increased to another level as he thought Xuan Hao hade to make trouble once again ruining the base that had just recently been repaired¡­


    Whoosh!


    Without even bothering to respond to the other party, Xuan Hao directly used his ice domain to counter his domain before rushing forward with renewed energy.


    Compared to the unfamiliar cave behind him, Xuan Hao had already been to the underground base before, and he already knew the way back to the surface from there!


    All he had to do now was rush towards the exit he already knew about!


    "How dare you just run away again! This time-"


    Seeing Xuan Haopletely ignore him as he rushed towards the newly constructed main gate into the underground base, the Domain Lord in charge of defending the underground base did not even have time toin before he suddenly sensed the terrifying demonic cultivator chasing after Xuan Hao from behind.


    "¡­"


    What in the world is happening today? Where did that great demonic cultivator suddenlye from¡­?


    Realizing that the demon was chasing after Xuan Hao, the Domain Lord who was just about to rush after Xuan Hao decided to remain silent and not interfere. No matter what, he did not n to involve himself in any more troublesome matter.


    And¡­ The demonic cultivator chasing after Xuan Hao was far stronger than him. Maybe even his senior brother was inferior¡­


    Thinking along this line, the Domain Lord quickly retracted his domain so as to not offend the great demon passing through his little base by ident.


    Whoosh!


    Watching as both Xuan Hao and the demonic cultivator quickly disappeared from sight, the Domain Lord let out a sigh of relief before smiling wryly upon noticing the destruction that the two had brought upon the underground base.


    Not only were both the gates destroyed, but all the buildings inside were destroyed by the shockwaves created by Xuan Hao''s attack when he destroyed the second gate¡­


    Can things even get worse¡­? Wait¡­ Both gates are destroyed, then what about the seal-


    "ROAR!"


    Just as this thought crossed through his mind, a terrifying roar could be hearding from the underground cave that Xuan Hao and the demonic cultivator hade out from¡­


    ¡­


    [¡­Second part of the side quest has been issued!]


    [Side Quest 2/2: Kill the demonic creature that has just broken free from its seal in the underground cave]


    [Hint: The demonic creature is currently in a weakened state due to being sealed for a long period of time and is currently onlyparable to a Half-Step Soul Ascension Realm Expert, it''s rmended you deal with it before it recovers!]


    [Reward: Drifting Cloud Steps]


    "This is-!?"


    At the same time that he was escaping, Xuan Hao quickly looked over the second part of the of side quest with a shocked expression on his face.


    He had to kill a demonic creature that had the strength of a Half-Step Soul Ascension Realm Expert! Not only that, but that was the weakened strength of the demonic creature!


    At this point in time, Xuan Hao no longer felt that the demonic cultivator chasing after him from behind was that scary. After all, the demonic creature was very likely to reach the Soul Ascension Realm when it recovered!


    The only thing that confused him a bit was that he had not seen any terrifying demonic creature when he escaped through the underground cave just a moment ago¡­


    "ROAR!"


    Hearing the loud roar that suddenly came from behind, Xuan Hao and the demonic cultivator both turned to look back towards the direction of the underground base.


    Only to see an elderly man escaping like his life depended on it with a giant demonic rat almost the size of the entire underground cave chasing him from behind with a fierce look on its face.


    Rumble~


    Each step of the giant demonic rat caused the underground cave to begin copsing. The elderly man running away from the giant demonic rat was even more pitiful as he was constantly bombarded with wave after wave of giant rocks from the copsing underground cave.


    Even if he used his domain to stop the rocks from hitting him, it still ended up slowing down his speed as the giant demonic rat closed in on him.


    "¡­"


    Xuan Hao did not really have anything to say to this as the elderly man currently being chased by the giant demonic rat was the Domain Lord that had protected the underground base just a moment ago.


    Making it to the tunnel he had first used to reach the underground cave where the secret base was located, Xuan Hao didn''t wait for even a moment as he rushed into it and made his way up towards the surface. The demonic cultivator following closely behind him. Followed by the elderly Domain Lord escaping from the giant demonic rat.


    Bang!


    "Roar!"


    Seeing the elderly man escape into the small tunnel only designed for a few humans to walk side by side through.. The giant demonic rat roared angrily as it crashed headfirst into the cave walls before angrily digging into the ground where the tunnel was located to chase after the elderly Domain Lord.

 Chapter 434 - Reaching The Surface!

    <h4>Chapter 434 - Reaching The Surface!</h4>


    "Finally, I''m at the surface again!"


    Rushing out from the tunnel through the trapdoor leading up to the small house on the surface, Xuan Hao only let out a short exmation of happiness before he rushed over towards the capital located just a few seconds from his current location.


    "Hmph!"


    The demonic cultivator following after him from behind frowned angrily upon realizing that they had reached the surface before he turned to leave in the opposite direction of the capital. No longer chasing after Xuan Hao. At this point, he already knew that his chance of dealing with Xuan Hao had been lost the moment he reached the surface and was able to get the help of Yi Min.


    Other than that, there was also the giant demonic rat that was currently in the process of digging its way back up to the surface¡­.


    No matter what, the demonic cultivator had no n to end up sandwiched between the angry giant demonic rat and Yi Min before being beaten to death to death! He was not that stupid¡­


    "Maybe the demonic rat will be able to buy me enough time¡­"


    Narrowing his eyes as he muttered this to himself, the demonic cultivator shed an evil smile before he disappeared into one of the nearby mines. Leaving behind only the elderly Domain Lord that had been guarding the underground base at the small house.


    "Elder? What are you doing here? Who was thating out before you just now?"


    Standing beside the trapdoor leading down towards the underground base with a surprised expression on his face, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert who was just about to sit down on the trapdoor to guard the entrance after getting a snack to enjoy asked the elderly Domain Lord with a surprised expression on his face.


    The only thing that passed through his mind as he asked this, was the thought of that someone had infiltrated their base once again¡­


    "We don''t have time, get everyone to leave the area and relocate at-"


    Rumble~


    Just as the elderly Domain Lord was about to order the Nascent Soul Realm Expert to leave, a loud rumbling sound came from beneath as the elderly Domain Lord instantly grabbed the Nascent Soul Realm Expert before running away.


    As for the Core Formation Guards standing around the small house? He simply had no time to help them¡­


    Boom!


    "Roar!"


    Barely making it far enough to not be in the way of the giant demonic rat, the elderly Domain Lord did not dare stop as he continued escaping with the Nascent Soul Realm Expert in hand.


    "Elder! W-what is-"


    "Quiet! Or I will throw you to the giant rat!"


    Not wanting to be the slightest bit distracted during the escape, the elderly Domain Lord directly threatened the scared Nascent Soul Expert.


    "¡­"


    Understanding that it was best he didn''t say anything, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert directly shut his mouth as he could only stare back towards the giant demonic rat burst out from the ground behind them. Instantly killing all the Core Formation guards located around the small house before they even had a chance to react to what was happening.


    "W-what is that¡­?"


    "A giant rat?"


    "It killed all those guards!"


    At the same time that the giant demonic rat violently burst out from the ground beneath the small house and killed all the guards, the surrounding miners and guards patrolling around the area also noticed the giant demonic rat that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere and killed close to a dozen people in only a few seconds.


    "Everyone! Get out of here before-"


    A young man standing in the way of the giant demonic rat tried to wake up the other miners from their current dazed state and get them to escape before it was toote, but his warning did not manage to get across before he was directly stomped to death by the giant demonic rat.


    "Eek! Run!"


    The death of the young man instantly woke up the miners who had been staring at the giant demonic rat with a dazed expression, as everyone at the surface began running in all directions. Trying their best to get away from the giant demonic rat.


    Soon enough, panic spread throughout the enormous mining sector located around the capital and before long, what was happening outside began to spread into the capital itself as fear of the unknown giant demonic rat gripped the citizen of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the miners were running all over the ce and panicking due to the sudden appearance of the giant demonic rat, Xuan Hao soon arrived at the location where Yi Min and General Guan were still busy facing off with each other.


    "Yi Min!"


    "Hm? Did you find the demonic cultivator?"


    Seeing Xuan Hao suddenly appear outside the capital as he came rushing over, Yi Min asked with a slightly excited expression on her face. After all, if the demonic cultivator was found, she would be able to deal with him herself and General Guan would have no reason to enter the capital!


    "Who is-" General Guan had not expected for a new Domain Lord to suddenly show up on the side of Yi Min, as he called out in surprise.


    "Guan!"


    However, General Guan had barely managed to say one word before the elderly Domain Lord came flying with a Nascent Soul Realm Expert in hand and a fearful expression on his face.


    Looks like they are indeed in the same boat¡­


    Seeing how the elderly Domain Lord ran over to General Guan, Xuan Hao slightly narrowed his eyes.


    "Xuan Hao,e over here quickly!"


    "Hm?"


    Just as Xuan Hao was thinking about what General Guan and the elderly Domain Lord were nning, Yi Min suddenly called out to him through her divine sense in a hurried tone.


    Rumble~


    Along with the loud sound of somethingrge moving over in their direction, Xuan Hao instantly understood why Yi Min had called out to him, as he quickly flew over to her side.


    Whoosh!


    Not even a second after he had made it to her side, Xuan Hao watched as countless small runes lit up along the wall that surrounded the capital. Followed by which an enormous golden barrier manifested around the capital itself. Blocking it from the outside world.


    RUMBLE!


    Hearing the loud soundsing from the distance getting closer and closer, General Guan soon saw the appearance of the giant demonic rat approaching from afar as it charged over towards them filled with killing intent.


    "Wait¡­ Why is that thing here!? Wasn''t it sealed? And where on earth is your damnable senior brother?!" Looking towards the elderly Domain Lord as a panicked expression made its way onto his face, General Guan asked him with an increasingly fearful voice.


    "I-I don''t know, I already contacted my senior brother, but he seems to be in a dangerous situation at the moment and can''te¡­ As for the seal¡­"


    Shaking his head dispiritedly upon mentioning his senior brother, the elderly Domain Lord soon turned to angrily look towards Xuan Hao standing beside Yi Min on the other side of the barrier that had covered the entire capital city.


    Seeing this, General Guan instantly understood that the Domain Lord on Yi Min''s side seemed to have something to do with the fact that the giant demonic rat had broken free from its seal.


    At the same time, General Guan also realized that Yi Min had already used the full strength of her formation to guard the entire capital.


    "¡­"


    It was also at this point in time that General Guan realized his current position.


    On one side, a giant demonic rat was running over filled with killing intent, while at the other side had been blocked off by Yi Min''s barrier¡­


    He couldn''t escape¡­?


    Realizing that Yi Min was trying to force him and his two subordinates to fight against the giant demonic rat, General Guan felt depressed.


    From the cold look she was currently giving him, General Guan also knew that there was no way he would be able to convince her to help out. After all, the elderly Domain Lord was one of her enemies and her enemy had just called out to him for help¡­


    There was no way Yi Min would lend her assistance under such circumstances. Even if he was a general of the Sky Empire!


    On the other hand, he would have to watch his back in case Yi Min would attempt to create an ''ident'' for him during his fight¡­


    "Ahhh!"


    Feeling incredibly depressed over his current state of being forced to fight, General Guan angrily roared as he took the initiative to attack the giant demonic rat rushing over towards him.


    The aura around him instantly changed and became stronger, as a giant halberd appeared in General Guan''s hand before he swung it down towards the approaching giant demonic rat.


    Bang!


    Whoosh!


    Followed by the halberd hitting the giant demonic rat that had charged over, a terrifying shockwave instantly swept through the surroundings as the few people that had yet to flee into the underground tunnels below the surface were blown to piece.


    Even the barrier around the capital began gently shaking upon being hit by the terrifying shockwave!


    Looks like General Guan is stronger than I first thought¡­


    Looking at the scene of General Guan wielding his halberd to face the giant demonic rat from behind the barrier, Xuan Hao could not help but sigh to himself in wonder at the awesome disy of strength.


    Sadly for General Guan¡­


    Roar!!


    The giant demonic rat had the strength of a Half-Step Soul Ascension Realm cultivator¡­

 Chapter 435 - Start Of The Third Stage And General Guans Fight...

    <h4>Chapter 435 - Start Of The Third Stage And General Guan''s Fight...</h4>


    The moment that the formation around the capital of the Iron Sky kingdom activated, everyone inside the capital instantly realized something was wrong. Even the ones who had yet to hear about the giant demonic rat from the miners close to the capital that managed to run inside before the formation began closing off the capital from the rest of the world realized that something big was happening close to the capital.


    After all, there was no way the formation would have been activated and used to seal off the capital if there wasn''t something dangerous happening nearby that might affect the capital.


    "What is that? Did someone perhaps attack the capital?"


    At the same time that the giant barrier appeared to surround the capital, both the spectators and participants at the alchemypetition all looked up towards the barrier that had suddenly appeared all of a sudden with both nervous and curious expressions showing.


    "Hm? Did those people perhaps decide to attack now?"


    Having juste back after the effect of Qing Yi''s potion disappeared, Fang Shi looked up towards the barrier. Not the least bit of worry showing on his face as he saw therge barrier above. Clearly showing how confident he was in Yi Min and her ability to resolve the trouble that she found herself in.


    "For them to attack now¡­ It looks like Yi Min will have quite an easy time dealing with those people. Especially if she has the help of the Domain Lord from the Flying Sword Sect¡­" Smiling to himself as he muttered this, Fang Shi decided to proceed with the alchemypetition without worrying about what was happening outside.


    If Yi Min truly encountered some sort of dangerous situation that she couldn''t deal with, Fang Shi was sure that she would contact him. After all, he still had a few things he could help out with as an Artisan Alchemist. Even keeping himself safe in the face of a normal Domain Lord was not too hard for him¡­


    "Ahm! There is nothing to worry about. Don''t forget who is in charge of this ce! We will now proceed with the third stage of the alchemypetition. The people moving on to the third stage, is-"


    Turning to look over the fearful participants, Fang Shi quickly got their attention before calming them down and beginning to name the participants who had moved onto the third stage of the alchemypetition.


    Hearing Fang Shi''s reassuring words, the participants quickly calmed down and listened to him announce the names of the participants who managed to move on to the third stage of the alchemypetition.


    The main reason why they managed to calm down so quickly with just a few words from Fang Shi, was the fact that the Iron Sky Kingdom was quite well known for the strength of their ruler, Yi Min, who was widely known to be among the 10 strongest people below the Soul Ascension Realm in the entire Sky Empire!


    With someone like that around, who would be able to attack the Iron Sky Kingdom? Even if there was someone like that, they would at the very least have to be in the Soul Ascension Realm and if a person at that realm attack, they would likely not even have enough time to react before the entire kingdom disappeared¡­


    "-Andstly, Qing Yi, from the Flying Sword Sect!"


    Listening to the names of the people moving onto the third stage of the alchemypetition, Qing Yi had felt that her chances were close to none after she had¡­ ''transformed'' Fang Shi, but in the end, she had still somehow managed to move onto the third stage of the alchemypetition!


    Not only that, but the young girl next to her had also managed to move onto the next stage of the alchemypetition.


    Even though she still had not gotten to ask the young girl''s name yet, Qing Yi still managed to get along with her during the short period of time that they had interacted with each other.


    Through their short interaction, Qing Yi also finally learned about the rewards for the alchemypetition!


    Yes¡­ Even at this point in time, Qing Yi did still not have any clue what the rewards for the alchemypetition was! All she knew about the rewards was told through the Alchemy Hall elders, who only told her how good the rewards for the alchemypetition were.


    Finding out about the rewards of the alchemypetition was more than enough to make Qing Yi do her best as the sheer number of spiritual herbs that she could win from getting the first ce would be more than enough for her to use over the next few years.


    Even better, most of the spiritual herbs that she could win through thepetition were suitable for someone in the Expert Alchemist Realm!


    The rewards in the alchemypetition were tailored to help the participant have all the resources they needed avable for them to improve. Not to mention quite a few recipes were included in the rewards that all used the spiritual herbs that were rewarded to the participants!


    For example, just her making it to the top twenty would give her more than five unique recipes, twenty Spirit Grade Spiritual Herbs and fifty Earth Grade Spiritual Herbs!


    Thinking about it, everyone except the people eliminated in the first stage of the alchemypetition would be rewarded with a lot of good things.


    Because of this, the participants who failed to move on to the third stage of the alchemypetition were not as sad as the ones who failed during the first stage of the alchemypetition.


    "Now let''s get started! Among all of you, only one person will remain at the end of the third stage!"


    Standing on top of the tform at the centre of thepetition space, Fang Shi suddenly called out once again as everyone except the twenty who made it on to the third stage had left thepetition area.


    Not only that, but he also directly announced that the third stage would be thest part of the alchemypetition!


    ¡­


    "Should we just continue watching¡­?"


    At the same time that the third stage of the alchemypetition was beginning, Xuan Hao smiled wryly as he looked over towards Yi Min and asked this.


    "Haha, of course! General Guan is so kind as to take care of the demonic rat outside for us! How could we interfere with his work?"


    Chuckling a bit at Xuan Hao''s question, a barely visible evil smile could be seen on Yi Min''s face as she looked over towards the fight taking ce just on the other side of the barrier.


    Whoosh!


    Just at this time, General Guan was hit by the tail of the giant demonic rat and was sent flying over towards them with a terrifying momentum-


    Bang!


    "Ah~"


    Directly crashing into the barrier in front of them, General Guan let out a low groan filled with pain before ring over towards Yi Min filled with anger. Rushing away from the barrier as he once again shed with the giant demonic rat.


    Xuan Hao might not have noticed anything happening when he crashed into the barrier, but General Guan knew very well that Yi Min had just barely changed the area of the barrier he hit to be filled with countless small spikes barely visible to the naked eye.


    Earlier when he crashed into the barrier, General Guan had very clearly felt his body being pierced by these small spikes, as they rapidly drained away both his qi and vitality!


    In just a short instant, he felt like he had lost close to five percent of his strength!


    Yi Min''s formation was simply way too powerful!


    At this moment, General Guan first-hand experienced just how terrifying the formation surrounding the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom was! He also understood why no one had dared to attack Yi Min over the years¡­


    Attacking her when she had the formation backing her up, was simply impossible unless it was someone above the Domain Lord Realm!


    Just a little more and we will have a chance¡­!


    Thinking about something, General Guan narrowed his eyes as he looked over in the direction of Yi Min beforeunching yet another wave of attacks with his halberd down towards the giant demonic rat.


    Roar!


    Roaring angrily upon seeing yet another wave of attacks heading towards it, the demonic rat directly ignored the attacks as it charged over towards General Guan.


    Ching~


    Ching~


    Bang!


    Blocking all the attacks directly with its body as it soon appeared directly in front of General Guan before it opened itsrge mouth and bit down, wanting to swallow him whole!


    "Ha?"


    Not expecting for this to happen, General Guan looked shocked for a short moment before trying to dodge therge gaping maw of the demonic rat.


    Chomp~


    Sadly, he reacted way toote and, in the end, could not dodge in time¡­

 Chapter 436 - Help Arrives!

    <h4>Chapter 436 - Help Arrives!</h4>


    Chomp~


    ""¡­""


    "G-general!"


    Watching the giant demonic rat chomp down before directly swallowing General Guan whole, both Xuan Hao and Yi Min showed a surprised expression on their faces. Neither of them having expected for the giant demonic rat to do something like that!


    "Is he gone like that¡­?" Not knowing how to feel about the current situation, Xuan Hao turned over towards Yi Min and asked her.


    "No¡­ That should not be enough to kill someone like him¡­" Thinking about Xuan Hao''s question for a short moment, Yi Min soon answered him as she focused her attention onto the giant demonic rat that had just swallowed General Guan.


    At the same time, the elderly Domain Lord who had run to General Guan for help froze in ce.


    His help had just been eaten whole! What was going to happen to him now?


    Roar!


    As if to answer the elderly Domain Lord''s inner thoughts, the giant demonic rat directly dashed towards him. Intending to swallow up the elderly Domain Lord just like it had swallowed General Guan only a few seconds ago!


    Whoosh!


    "S-senior brother!"


    However, just in thest moment before the demonic rat managed to reach the elderly Domain Lord, a handsome looking middle-aged man appeared in front of him and blocked the demonic rat.


    Bang!


    "Hmph!"


    Frowning upon feeling the strength behind the demonic rat''s attack, the middle-aged man was covered in a pitch-ck miasma as his strength seemed to have reached a new level before he directly sent the demonic rat flying backwards.


    Flying through the air for a few hundred meters before stopping itself. The demonic rat looked over towards the handsome middle-aged man that had just appeared before it began appraising him with a serious look on its face.


    At least as serious, as a rat''s face could be¡­


    "What happened here? Where did General Guan go?" ncing around, the handsome middle-aged man narrowed his eyes upon recognizing the two Domain Lords that were just standing at the side without doing anything.


    Even when General Guan had been swallowed by the demonic rat, they had not done anything. Only looking on from the side, likely expecting for General Guan to deal with the demonic rat with a little time.


    "T-the General¡­ H-he¡­"


    "Hm? Did something happen to General Guan?" Hearing one of the two Domain Lords following General Guan say this with a nervous expression on his face, the senior brother of the elderly Domain Lord frowned as he felt something was wrong.


    "H-he was swallowed by the d-demonic rat¡­"


    "¡­"


    Hearing this, the middle-aged man turned to look at the demonic rat slowly preparing for another attack filled killing intent.


    It had to be known that General Guan was a general of the Sky Empire! His position was extremely important for him, and his sect future ns! Not only that, but without him around, they would have no way to deal with Yi Min. Even if they ended up killing her, they would still end up being pursued by the Sky Empire afterwards!


    After all, Yi Min''s position in the Sky Empire was not something that could be ignored by them without having someone help cover up for them.


    "Hm?"


    Just as the senior brother of the elderly Domain Lord was about to escape, the demonic rat suddenly froze in its step as something began moving around violently inside of it.


    ROAR!


    Roaring in both pain and anger, the demonic rat''s stomach suddenly burst open as General Guan made his way out of the demonic rat covered in blood and other internal organs of the demonic rat.


    Roar!


    Having its stomach suddenly split open as the person it had just eaten walked out, the demonic rat was beyond pissed as it swiped down towards General Guan who had just managed to make his way outside. Intending to directly kill him on the spot.


    "Hah¡­ Damnable rat!" Having exhausted arge portion of his strength to get out of the demonic rat''s stomach, General Guan had no way to resist the attack of the demonic rat. Only able to curse at the demonic rat as itsrge ws got closer and closer.


    "General Guan!"


    Ching~


    Barely arriving beside him in the neck of time, the senior brother of the elderly Domain Lord drew summoned forth a giant greatsword from his interspatial ring and blocked the w swipe of the demonic rat before it could reach General Guan.


    "Zi Hui¡­?


    "Get him to safety, I will deal with this oversized rodent!" Ignoring the words of General Guan, Zi Hui screamed at the twopletely useless Domain Lord''s that hade along with General Guan to get him to safety, as he soon engaged inbat with the demonic rat.


    ""Y-yes!""


    The two Domain Lords who had just stood at the side this entire time reacted quickly upon hearing what Zi Hui said, as both of them flew over and picked up General Guan before retreating to a safe distance.


    Even though they were also Domain Lords themselves, they had quite a cowardly disposition, as neither of them joined in to help dealing with the demonic rat. Only the elderly Domain Lord ended up joining the fight by supporting Zi Hui from the side to alleviate some of the pressure that the demonic rat brought upon him.


    Like this, a fight once again broke out. The only difference was that instead of General Guan fighting alone against the demonic rat, it was Zi Hui and his¡­ Junior brother¡­ Fighting against the demonic rat.


    ¡­


    "Did you manage to find the demonic cultivator hiding inside the city?"


    Observing how the people scheming against her were busy fighting outside, Yi Min turned her attention away from the bunch for a moment as she asked Xuan Hao.


    "Ha? Ah! Yes, I found the demonic cultivator hiding at the deepest part of the tunnels below the eastern part of the capital! Although¡­ I don''t know if he is still there anymore. After he found me, he chased me all the way to the surface just outside the walls¡­"


    Showing a slightly surprised expression the moment Yi Min asked him this, Xuan Hao quickly calmed down before he responded.


    "I see¡­ Was the demonic doing anything when you found him? Like a ritual or something along that line?"


    "Hm¡­ From what I remember, he seemed to have gather a bunch of weird cocoons with countless tentacles and was having them dig deeper into the ground for some reason-" Remembering what the demonic cultivator had been doing, Xuan directly exined it to Yi Min.


    "Really!? He was trying to dig deeper!?" Only for Yi Min suddenly interrupt him as she asked with an incredibly serious expression on her face before appearing directly in front of him.


    "Y-yes? Is there a problem?"


    Not knowing what was wrong with what the demonic cultivator was doing, Xuan Hao asked before unintentionally taking a few steps back due to Yi Min suddenly appearing so close to him.


    "Do you know why the tunnel below don''t go any deeper and all stop at a certain depth?"


    "No?"


    Shaking his head in response to what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao did indeed feel that it was a bit weird that all the tunnels seemed to havee to a stop without going any deeper. In his eyes, there should be better resources avable the deeper one went, so even if it required someone a bit stronger to mine them out due to the increasingly dense yin qi, there should be no reason not to dig any deeper¡­


    After all, the Iron Sky Kingdom did not reallyck Core Formation Realm Experts and would have more than enough strong people capable of mining of precious spiritual metals in the more dangerous depths.


    "The depth that the tunnels end at is at the limit before the yin qi underground undergoes a transformation and grows terrifyingly strong! Strong to the point that even I myself wouldn''t dare to venture that deep underground with my current strength. At that depth, only demonic cultivators at the True Demon Realm would be able to travel around freely without worrying about the yin qi killing them!


    For the demonic cultivator to be digging that deep¡­ I fear that he might be trying to use the dense yin qi underground to breakthrough! If he fails, the dense yin qi will kill him¡­ But¡­ If he seeds, he will reach the True Demon Realm!"


    Exining this to Xuan Hao, Yi Min''s frown deepened even further as she said thest part.


    The True Demon Realm! At that realm, a demonic cultivator would be able to fight equally with someone in the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Just thinking about having to possibly deal with such a terrifying existence, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a shiver run down his spine.


    No matter how much stronger he waspared to a normal Domain Lord also at the fourth stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao did not expect he would be able to fight someone at the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Heck! He didn''t even know if he could fight General Guan, who was still at the Domain Lord Realm!

 Chapter 437 - Third Stage Of The Alchemy Competition!

    <h4>Chapter 437 - Third Stage Of The Alchemy Competition!</h4>


    "We can''t dy this; we have to deal with the demonic cultivator before he manages to breakthrough!"


    Frowning even further after she had told Xuan Hao why she was worried about what the demonic cultivator was doing, Yi Min would definitely already have left in search of the demonic cultivator if there wasn''t currently a fight happening just outside the barrier¡­


    ncing over in the direction of the fight currently taking ce between the demonic rat, Zi Hui and the elderly Domain Lord, Yi Min knew very well that she couldn''t just leave to find the demonic cultivator, as the people outside would likely take advantage of the fact that she was gone if she didn''t manage to deal with the demonic cultivator before they had finished off the demonic rat.


    "That''s it! Can I ask for your help once again¡­? " Having thought about something, Yi Min turned around and looked over towards Xuan Hao who was still lost in thought thinking about what she had told him just a moment ago.


    "Hm? Sure¡­ What is it?" Seeing that Yi Min was once again asking for his help, Xuan Hao had a bad feeling. Not really sure what she wanted his help with¡­


    Could it be that she wants me to deal with the demonic cultivator alone!?


    "No need to look at me like that, I just wanted to ask you to keep an eye on these people while I go deal with the demonic cultivator and inform me whenever they finish up their little fight¡­ Did you think I would ask you to take care of the demonic cultivator by yourself after just barely running away?"


    Rolling her eyes upon seeing the expression on Xuan Hao''s face, Yi Min already knew what he was thinking before Xuan Hao could even say anything.


    "Ah¡­ I''m more than willing to keep an eye on these people¡­" Smiling wryly as he realized his thoughts had been seen through, Xuan Hao happily agreed to the simple job of looking after the people outside the barrier for her.


    No matter what, Xuan Hao had already joined sides with Yi Min by helping her out, so there wasn''t anything wrong with just keeping an eye on the fight happening outside while she dealt with the threat of the demonic cultivator.


    Even if she did not manage to deal with the demonic cultivator in time, Xuan Hao was confident that the giant formation covering the capital would be able to resist against the people outside for some time in case they decided to try and destroy the formation while Yi Min was absent.


    "Great, you can contact me through this in case anything happens!"


    Whoosh!


    Throwing a high-grademunication talisman over towards him, Yi Min quickly disappeared in the direction of the eastern part of the capital to deal with the demonic cultivator.


    "¡­"


    Left alone, Xuan Hao soon descended and found himself a good spot to stay, as he began watching the fight happening outside the formation.


    At the very least, it was quite insightful for him to see someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm give their all while fighting. After all, he had not really had too much experience when it came to fighting between Domain Lords.


    Now, Zi Hui and the other Domain Lords outside the formation, provided a great opportunity for Xuan Hao to learn more about how Domain Lord''s fought¡­


    ¡­


    Having calmed down after Fang Shi''s short speech to the participants, the alchemypetition proceeded without being interrupted by the fact that the formation protecting the capital had been activated.


    "Looks like we were a bit too hasty earlier¡­"


    "Yeah¡­. From the looks of it, the formation has not even been attacked once, it does indeed look like someone is just fighting nearby."


    "The formation was likely activated to protect us in case some of the aftershocks from the battle reached the capital!"


    The fact that the formation had not been attacked even once since it activated just caused the spectators and participants to grow more confident in what Fang Shi had said about someone powerful fighting nearby.


    After all, if someone was really attacking the Iron Sky Kingdom, would they not first try to destroy the formation protecting the capital city?


    Given that the formation had yet to be attacked after it had already been activated for such a long time. Many people in the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital concluded that it was just some powerful cultivators fighting nearby.


    For the formation to be activated meant that the people fighting would at least have reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    Even if their target was not the capital itself, the aftershocks from two experts at that level shing with each other was more than enough to directly destroy anything within a few thousand meters¡­ And that is not mentioning when both parties began using their domains to their full extend, as the area affected would increase exponentially!


    At that point, it would not be weird if the entire Iron Sky Kingdom would be affected!


    The fight between Domain Lords was simply terrifying for anyone not at that realm watching from the side.


    In a sense, it could be considered quite lucky for Yi Min that the battle happened just outside the capital instead of somewhere else in the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    The reason for this was that there were not many towns or smaller cities located close to the capital itself, as thend had mostly been covered in countless big and small mines over the years, that were easy to inside of in case someone started fighting on the surface¡­


    "Now that everyone has calmed down a bit¡­ Let''s move on to the third stage!"


    Narrowing his eyes as his gaze passed over the twenty people who had made it into the third stage of the alchemypetition, Fang Shi was way more serious than he had been before, as he already knew that one of the twenty people remaining would likely end up as his second disciple!


    With this in mind, Fang Shi did not intend to take it easy and nned to make sure he chose the best among them to be his second disciple.


    Even the crown prince that Cai Yu was not so happy about entered his eyes. However, the crown prince had not yet shown enough talent for Fang Shi to take him in and have to deal with the guaranteed anger of his first disciple¡­


    "As many of you already know, as the finale of the alchemypetition, the third stage will of course be the hardest! Other than that, all of you have already reached the Expert Realm! Because of this, I have decided to allow all of you to take on the Alchemy Trial of the Sky Empire!"


    Following what he said, all the participants except the crown prince from the Dark Sky Kingdom, had a confused expression on their faces.


    From this alone, one could tell that none of them except the crown prince had any idea what the Alchemy Trial that Fang Shi mentioned was¡­


    "The Alchemy Trial is a special trial that the Sky Empire requires one to go through to be an official alchemist of the Sky Empire. The minimum requirement for taking on the Alchemy Trial is for one to have be an Expert Alchemist!"


    Finishing his exnation, all the participants, including Qing Yi, felt their curiosity towards this mysterious alchemy trial increase. The only person not showing a single change in his expression was the crown prince from the Dark Sky Kingdom, who remainedpletely focused on Cai Yu standing beside Fang Shi the entire time.


    "Now all of you should be quite curious what the Alchemy Trial is..."


    Before any of the participants could react, Fang Shi suddenly appeared beside therge cauldron located in the middle of the tform as he waved around both his hands, causing dozens of different symbols to manifest before sinking into the cauldron.


    Whoosh~


    As the dozen or so different symbol appeared to line up around the cauldron before sinking into it, Qing Yi and the other participants suddenly felt themselves lose control over their body, as they were directly sucked into therge cauldron before any of them could react.


    Soon finding themselves inside a weird empty hall filled with a thin mist, the participants all looked around with both curiosity and fear at their new environment.


    "Haha, all of you don''t have to worry, you are currently inside the trial cauldron where the alchemy trial will take ce. The trial is mostly automated and controlled by the artifact you are currently inside of and will begin shortly.


    During the trial, you will be able to gain points depending on how well you do and of course, the person with the most points will be the winner of the alchemypetition!"


    As the participants were all looking around their new environment, the voice of Fang Shi suddenly echoed out from somewhere above them.


    However, before any of the participants could react to what Fang Shi had said, they suddenly felt themselves being pulled away from the empty hall before appearing somewhere new.

 Chapter 438 - Alchemy Trial

    <h4>Chapter 438 - Alchemy Trial</h4>


    "What is this ce!?"


    Having suddenly found herself in arge empty hall before being transported somewhere different the next second, Qing Yi began inspecting her surroundings once again. Hoping that she would not suddenly end up being dragged somewhere different over the next few seconds¡­


    Arge mountain stretching far into the sky had appeared in front of her, a narrow path was visible in front of her leading up the tall mountain.


    Looking away from therge mountain in front of her, Qing Yi realized that there was nothing else around her other than a thick mist that prevented her from seeing more than a few meters away from where she stood.


    "Ah!?"


    Touching the mist with her hand, Qing Yi let out a suppressed voice upon realizing that her hand had been forcefully stopped by the thick mist. Preventing her from moving her hand further inside the mist.


    "¡­"


    Looking away from the mist and back towards therge mountain, Qing Yi would be dumb if she didn''t realize that she was supposed to climb her way up the mountain.


    The only thing on her mind, was¡­ How was climbing a mountain rted to alchemy¡­?


    Shaking her head as she thought about this, Qing Yi made her way to the base of the mountain where the narrow path started. Not too worried about the fact that the other participants had disappeared, as she had already expected something along that to happen.


    They should also be faced with the same situation as me, I wonder if anyone has begun climbing up the mountain yet¡­


    Smiling a bit as she thought about the other participants being faced with the same bewildering situation as herself, Qing Yi soon arrived at the base of the mountain beforeing to a stop once again with a confused expression appearing on her face.


    "What is that?"


    In front of her, at the start of the narrow path of the mountain, was a small ancient looking stone tablet. Even weirder, it had her name engraved into it at the top along with some other information below it.


    "Qing Yi¡­ Flying Sword Sect¡­ Expert Alchemist Trial¡­ Specializes in potions¡­ 0 Points¡­"


    Muttering this to herself as she looked over the information on the small stone tablet, Qing Yi quickly understood that it was some basic information about herself, the trial, and the points she had obtained.


    There was no real useful information to her about what the trial was about or why she had to climb a mountain for an alchemy trial.


    Hah¡­"


    Sighing to herself as she gazed up towards the peak of the mountain that was hidden by ayer of clouds, Qing Yi remember her master''s mountain peak¡­


    The road leading up towards her master''s pavilion was just as narrow and hard to traverse as the one in front of her! Only when she had reached the Foundation Establishment Realm could she easily travel up and down before that, she had suffered quite a bit going up and down the mountain back then¡­


    Even worse, when she stepped onto the path leading up the mountain, Qing Yi realized that her body became heavier, and it was harder for her to walk.


    At this point, she had be even weaker than she was before entering the Flying Sword Sect! How on earth was she supposed to climb such a tall mountain like this?!


    Is this really an alchemy trial? Why does it feel more like one of those pressure trials for cultivators!?


    Cursing silently inside her head, Qing Yi began making her way up the mountain. No matter how weird the alchemy trial was, Qing Yi was determined to continue onwards and get a high ranking in the alchemypetition!


    "W-what is this? Why is the pressure while climbing the mountain so much!?"


    "M-my strength!? Is this not supposed to be an alchemy trial¡­?"


    "I thought this trial was about alchemy¡­ Perhaps the Artisan Alchemist made a mistake and sent us to a wrong trial¡­?


    No better than her, the other participants were also filled with disbelief the moment they stepped onto the narrow mountain path.


    However, one thing that stood out from this, was the fact that everyone seemed to experience a different degree of pressure. The stronger they were, the bigger the pressure and inversely the weaker they were, the less pressure they experienced while climbing up the mountain.


    In the end, all of them had their strength reduced to the same level.


    ¡­


    At the same time, outside the alchemy trial, the spectators were all watching what was happening inside the alchemy trial on a fewrge light projections that floated mid-air.


    ""¡­""


    To say they were speechless upon seeing all the alchemist geniuses struggling to climb up the narrow mountain path was an understatement.


    After all, they were all expecting for there to be some kind of alchemy rted test inside¡­. Not climbing a mountain!


    "Is this really an alchemy trial¡­?"


    The doubts that the participants had when they first stepped onto the narrow mountain path soon appeared among the spectators as they really had no idea how climbing a mountain under some sort of pressure was rted to alchemy¡­


    "Look! There is a cave appearing in front of that young man!"


    However, this doubt did notst for long as a loud yell soon woke up the crowd of spectators, as everyone focused their attention onto the handsome looking young man who had been the first to step onto the narrow mountain path.


    Not only that, but the spectators clearly saw the several spiritual herbs and cauldron inside the cave in front of the young man!


    "Looks like it''s still an alchemy trial¡­"


    Several elders among the spectators whose disciple was still in the alchemypetition breathed out a sigh of relief upon spotting the spiritual herbs and the cauldron inside the cave.


    After all, the disciples they had chosen to participate in the alchemypetition were mostly skilled young geniuses in alchemy. Not cultivation!


    ¡­


    "A cauldron? And spiritual herbs?"


    A few minutes after the first person had arrived at the cave, Qing Yi also reached the cave tugged away beside the narrow path leading up the mountain.


    Not only that, the small stone tablet she had seen at the bottom of the mountain was also there. Of The information on it was also the same with no changes and of course, her points were still a beautiful round zero¡­


    Looking away from her point score on the stone tablet, Qing Yi discovered that the path further up the mountain had been blocked off by the same mist that prevented her from going in any other direction than the narrow mountain path back at the base of the mountain.


    "I will have to do something to continue forward?"


    Muttering this to herself before looking over towards the cauldron inside the cave, Qing Yi entered the cave before going over the things inside.


    Around a dozen or so spiritual herbs with the strongest having reached the Earth Grade, a recipe for an Earth Grade Potion and a cauldron already filled with water infused with a tiny amount of spiritual qi. Barely allowing it to be qualified as the lowest level of spiritual water.


    At this point, if she still had no idea what the trial wanted her to do, Qing Yi should probably just quit the alchemy trial before she ended up embarrassing herself¡­


    "Five Windbloom Flowers, five Waterbloom Flowers and five Thunder Thistles¡­"


    Going over the spiritual herbs, Qing Yi soon picked up the recipe.


    "This¡­"


    Looking over the recipe, a frown slowly appeared on her face.


    The spiritual herbs avable to her and the spiritual herbs required for the potion werepletely different!


    "I have to find out which of these spiritual herbs can be used a substitute for the ones in the recipe¡­?"


    Picking up one of the Windbloom flowers, the frown on Qing Yi''s face only deepened further as she realized just how difficult the first test of the alchemy trial was.


    The difficulty in finding out what spiritual herb could be used as a recement for one of the spiritual herbs used in the recipe was extremely difficult. Not to mention that the recipe only used three spiritual herbs and Qing Yi had never heard about any of them before.


    Even worse, the names of the spiritual herbs did not give any hint towards what type of spiritual qi they belonged to¡­


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I will have to go figure it out through trial and error¡­" Sighing to herself with a depressed expression slowly making its way onto her face, as she realized that she would have to ruin some of the spiritual herbs in front of her, Qing Yi felt a small pang of pain in her chest while looking over the spiritual herbs in front of her.


    Is there really no other way¡­?


    Even if it was not her own spiritual herbs and they were only around the Mortal and Earth Grade, Qing Yi still felt that figuring out the correct order of the spiritual herbs this way, was way too wasteful¡­

 Chapter 439 - First Test Of The Alchemy Trial

    <h4>Chapter 439 - First Test Of The Alchemy Trial</h4>


    Having gone over the spiritual herbs, Qing Yi picked up the recipe and began thoroughly reading through it. Not willing to miss even a single word, as she tried to find out if there was any hint inside it that could help point her towards which of the spiritual herbs could be used as recements for the ones used in the recipe.


    Sadly, her attempt to find out which order to use the different spiritual herbs did not work out. Instead, she just ended up confirming the fact that she would have to try her hand at making the potion first before she could figure out the correct order in which to add the different spiritual herbs.


    In the end, it looked like she could not escape from having to waste some of the spiritual herbs inside the cave¡­


    "Hah¡­" Picking up one of the three different spiritual herbs before beginning to prepare them, Qing Yi could not help but sigh to herself as she realized the fact that she would not be able to take away as many of the spiritual herbs with her as she had first expected.


    Yes, Qing Yi wanted to take the spiritual herbs she didn''t use out with her! After all, there was no rules about her taking away the remaining spiritual herbs¡­


    For this reason, Qing Yi was way more focused than normal when she began preparing to brew the potion required for the first test of the alchemy trial.


    Soon enough, Qing Yi began her first attempt on the potion in the recipe and¡­


    Boom!


    "Failure¡­"


    The potion failed and the spiritual herbs used in the brewing process were all renderedpletely useless! Two Mortal Grade Spiritual Herbs and one Earth Grade Spiritual Herb was gone just like that!


    The sight alone caused Qing Yi to feel sad for the three spiritual herbs that had beenpletely wasted by her¡­


    At the very least, she managed to understand the potion she was making and grew confident brewing the potion, but¡­


    Boom!


    Boom!


    Boom!


    Three times in a row!


    She failed all three times of her next attempts without sessfully making the potion!


    If the pain of wasting one batch of potion materials was notrge enough, the pain of directly wasting four was enough to cause Qing Yi to feel like she was burning up spirit stones!


    Other than that, Qing Yi also realized how difficult the first test of the alchemy trial was. Even after four attempts, Qing Yi was still not confident that she would be able to sessfully make the potion required for her to move on to the next test!


    If things continued like this, would she not be eliminated from the alchemy trial having received a score of zero points¡­?


    Feeling herself grow slightly nervous upon thinking about this, Qing Yi picked up thest batch of spiritual herbs avable to her inside the cave before carefully preparing them. Not daring to be the slightest bit careless in case she messed.


    Zap~


    Even when the Thunder Thistle idently let out a small spark of electricity while being cut into, that hit her hand and left a small burn mark behind¡­


    At this point, Qing Yi had already understood why the pressure was present on the mountain, as the reduced strength had made it harder for her and likely also the other alchemist, to prepare the spiritual herbs. This in turn resulted in them possibly making a mistake that could get them injured along the way!


    Even if the small spark of electricity was not enough to truly hurt her, Qing Yi knew that the Thunder Thistle was only an Earth Grade Spiritual Herb¡­ How painful would it be if she ended up making a mistake while preparing a Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb in one of thetter tests¡­?


    Just thinking about this made Qing Yi shiver as she ced down the small knife, she had used to prepare the Thunder Thistle.


    At the very least the knife she had been provided was sharp enough to cut into an Earth Grade Spiritual Herb without any problems¡­ Something that a normal knife would struggle with¡­


    Blop~


    Having already finished preparation of the other spiritual herbs, Qing Yi once again began the brewing process as she added in the first spiritual herbs with a nervous look on her face.


    Blop~


    Blop~


    Soon enough, Qing Yi had added in all the required spiritual herbs, as she nervously stirred the mixture. Looking out for anything that might signify that she had made a mistake in the order of the spiritual herbs¡­


    "Sess!"


    However, much to her happiness, Qing Yi watched as the mixture suddenly turned into a bright red colour before settling down.


    From what she had read in the recipe, Qing Yi knew that she had seed in making the potion!


    But at what cost¡­?


    Looking over towards the empty ce where the spiritual herbs had been located just a moment ago, Qing Yi could not help but feel sad at the fact that she had missed the opportunity to get some free spiritual herbs.


    Fwoosh~


    All of a sudden, Qing Yi heard something and looked back towards the cauldron filled with the potion mixture. Only to see it disappear in front of her. Not leaving behind even a single drop as everything had disappeared¡­


    In the end, she got nothing out of the first test¡­ Other than a few points¡­ 10 points to be exact.


    How much was 10 points worth? Qing Yi had no idea, all she knew, was that the mist that had been blocking her way forward had cleared up and she could continue further up the mountain.


    "I wonder what the next test will be about¡­"


    Muttering this to herself as she looked up the narrow mountain path snaking its way up the mountain that pierced far into the sky, Qing Yi felt herself growing more curious about the other tests that awaited her on the mountain!


    Given how difficult the first test had been, Qing Yi could easily imagine how hard the other test on the mountain would be!


    Thump~


    Taking a step forward, Qing Yi once again began making her way up the mountain following the narrow mountain road¡­


    ¡­


    BOOM!


    "This damn rat is growing stronger!"


    At the same time that Qing Yi was undergoing the alchemy trial and was climbing up the mysterious mountain, her master was leisurely observing the battle taking ce outside the barrier of the capital city.


    "Looks like that Zi Hui guy and General Guan have both joined forces¡­"


    Gazing over towards General Guan who had just been sent flying once again, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit of pity for him. Even if he was an enemy, his current situation was quite a depressing sight...


    After all, so far, he had not really done much other than show up in front of the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom to talk with Yi Min. In the end, he was now being thrown around by the demonic rat.


    Even worse for General Guan¡­


    Bang!


    The demonic rat seemed to have discovered that General Guan''s strength would weaken every time he hit the barrier protecting the capital city¡­


    "But that demonic rat truly is strong¡­ Will it really reach the Soul Ascension Realm if things continue like this¡­?"


    A total of five Domain Lords were currently fighting the demonic rat, but it was still holding on and even started to grow stronger with the passing of time.


    The only good thing, was that Zi Hui managed to get a few good attacks in every time the demonic ratunched the poor General Guan flying into the barrier¡­


    "Ahhh-!"


    Bang!


    "¡­"


    Maybe he should help them out¡­? After all, if the demonic rat managed to recover its strength to the Soul Ascension Realm like the system had suggested, he would most likely not be able to leave the Iron Sky Kingdom alive!


    And more importantly, it did not look like the five people currently fighting with the demonic rat would be able to deal with it before it managed to recover what he assumed to be its strength before it had been sealed underground.


    "I will wait for a bit more¡­ Hopefully Yi Min will be able to finish the demonic cultivator and get back soon¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao decided to observe the one-sided beating for now without interfering.


    Anyway, he should still have some time left before the demonic rat''s strength recovered.


    Other than that, Xuan Hao didn''t n to kill the demonic rat, just for the five Domain Lords outside to attack him when he had left the barrier!


    Woosh!


    Just as Xuan Hao had decided to wait for a while longer, arge shockwave spread through the surroundings as one of the two Domain Lords that hade together with General Guan was caught off-guard by a w swipe from the demonic rat. Directly splitting his body into several smaller chunks that fell onto the ground below.


    "M-my body-"


    Before the soul of the Domain Lord even had the time to retreat, the giant maw of the demonic rat descended from above and swallowed the soul that had barely emerged from the now destroyed body!

 Chapter 440 - Zi Huis Plan...

    <h4>Chapter 440 - Zi Hui''s n...</h4>


    ""¡­""


    An eerie silence soon spread across the battlefield outside the barrier, as the four remaining Domain Lords all froze upon seeing the soul being devoured by the demonic rat without any chance of escape.


    It had to be known that the Domain Lord who had just died, was someone at the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    No matter where in the Sky Empire such a person went, he could be considered a Peak Expert that few people could even hope to contend against, yet such a person had died!


    Even worse, he had died in an extremely pitiful manner, being devoured by the demonic rat without even having the chance to put up the slightest resistance¡­


    Roar!


    Having devoured the Domain Lord, the demonic rat let out a triumphant roar as its aura grew even stronger.


    Roar!


    ncing over towards the four Domain Lords who had frozen upon witnessing the death of one of General Guan subordinates, the demonic rat let out another roar as it arrogantly looked down towards them.


    Clearly, the demonic rat no longer viewed the four remaining Domain Lords as a threat!


    Not only that, but the two strongest Domain Lords, General Guan and Zi Hui, both had a cautious expression on their faces as they faced off against the demonic rat.


    At this point neither of them dared to take a chance to escape from the demonic rat, as it would leave an opening for the demonic rat to attack them. Especially given that their main escape path had been blocked by the giant barrier covering the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    "¡­"


    Staring at the demonic rat roaring arrogantly towards them, General Guan could not help but look over towards the remains of what could be considered his second strongest subordinate with a depressed expression on his face.


    Thinking about how many resources he had spent and just how hard it had been for him to nurture that subordinate, General Guan felt another wave of depression hit him. Among the four Domain Lords left, General Guan was by far the most depressed of all of them, as he honestly had no idea how he had ended up in his current situation¡­


    Nothing had gone as nned! And he had even lost one of his only two Domain Lord subordinates! Even if they managed to deal with Yi Min, General Guan already felt that it was no longer worth it for him¡­ At this point, General Guan just wanted to leave the Iron Sky Kingdom!


    Roar!


    Sadly, he already knew that was not possible before dealing with the demonic rat in front of them.


    "Are we not just taking care of this demonic rat for Yi Min¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he watched the strengthened demonic rat charge over, General Guan felt even more depressed.


    Not only did he have to fight with some terrifying demonic rat, but given the fact that the demonic rat was located in the Iron Sky Kingdom, it would likely have attacked Yi Min if he and the other three were not there¡­


    Just why did this demonic rat show up now¡­?


    Having still not fully grasped why the demonic rat had even showed up in the first ce, General Guan utilized his domain and unwillingly began to fight with the demonic rat once again. Even bringing out some of the trump cards he had saved up for dealing with Yi Min, to deal with the demonic rat before it devoured someone else and grew even stronger¡­


    Boom!


    BOOM!


    Soon enough, both General Guan and Zi Hui began working together seamlessly, as both of themunched attack after attack towards the demonic rat. Immediately creating several enormous craters several dozen meters deep in the ground.


    "What is this-"


    "Argh-!"


    "No-"


    Even hitting several of the underground tunnels where the miners and workers had been hiding. Instantly killing them in the process, as those realizing what was happening quickly made their way deeper into the ground to hopefully find somewhere safe before the fight on the surface reached them.


    "¡­"


    Looking at the fight outside the barrier suddenly increase in ferocity, Xuan Hao felt a bit surprised as both General Guan and Zi Hui seemed to work perfectly together. Driving back the strengthened demonic rat without letting it gain the slightest advantage.


    All of a sudden, General Guan and Zi Hui were the ones controlling the battle as the demonic rat looked like the helpless one, that was constantly being driven back.


    Roar!


    Feeling more and more wounds umte, the demonic rat roared full of anger as it broke free from the darkness domain of Zi Hui that had momentarily restrained it before swinging its tail over towards General Guan who wasing in for an attack.


    "Why me again?"


    Whoosh~


    Barely able to finish what he wanted to say as the giant rat tail hit him with a terrifying force, General Guan was sent flying through the air once again.


    Bang!


    Crashing face first in the barrier around the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Looking in through the barrier, General Guan spotted Xuan Hao sitting on top of the wall silently watching as he slid down the side of the barrier.


    "¡­"


    "¡­"


    Thump~


    Landing on the ground, General Guan remained quietly on the ground without rushing back to join Zi Hui in fighting back against the demonic rat.


    To be honest¡­ After seeing Xuan Hao sitting on top of the wall on the other side of the barrier watching as he and Zi Hui were fighting, General Guan realized that he had not thought about what might happen after they finished of the demonic rat.


    Would Yi Min really let them go after they had exhausted most of their strength fighting against the demonic rat?


    As he thought about this, General Guan suddenly realized that he might not be able to leave the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    No! I have to find a way out!


    "Zi Hui!"


    "Hm?"


    Contacting Zi Hui who was currently fighting against the demonic through his divine sense, General Guan directly informed him about their current situation and brought up his worries regarding what would happen to them after they had finished off the demonic rat.


    "This is indeed troublesome¡­ Hm¡­ I have a n, but I don''t know if you would be fine with it¡­"


    "You have a n!? What is it?!"


    "It''s like this¡­"


    Showing an excited expression, the moment he heard that Zi Hui had a n, General Guan was not the least bit worried about anything. Instead, being more excited over the fact that he would be able to get out of his current precarious situation alive.


    However, his excited expression soon disappeared, and a frown reced it. The n Zi Hui hade up with would definitely be able to get them out safely, but¡­ The cost was way too great!


    "Are you really sure that this is the only way¡­?"


    "Yes, I''m certain we will be able to get out like this and we might even be able to deal with Yi Min at the same time as this!"


    "Alright¡­ I will inform my subordinate about the n¡­"


    Responding back to Zi Hui in a slightly reluctant tone, General Guan soon informed his subordinate, while Zi Huo informed the elderly Domain Lord about the n.


    The two of them both showed a surprised expression on their faces before solemnly nodding their heads and getting into position.


    During the short conversation that Zi Hui and General Guan had through their divine sense, less than a second passed, as they began implementing the n that Zi Hui hade up with.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Looks like they are up to something¡­"


    Observing the fight from behind the barrier on top of the city wall, Xuan Hao instantly realized that the people outside were up to something as he prepared himself just in case.


    No matter how strong the barrier around the capital was, Xuan Hao did not dare to let his guard down, as he began to closely observe the movements of the four Domain Lords.


    "They want to force the demonic rat to attack the barrier!?"


    Seeing the two weaker Domain Lords move just beside the barrier, Xuan Hao could not help but frown as he watched how Zi Hui, and General Guan slowly began to lure it closer and closer to the barrier.


    If he was not wrong, they would lure the demonic rat close to the barrier, where the two weaker Domain Lords would get its attention and¡­ Get attacked together with the barrier¡­?


    Tilting his head to the side, as a confused expression appeared on his face, Xuan hao suddenly felt that there was something wrong with what was happening outside the barrier.


    Watching as the two weaker Domain Lords suddenly began violently attacking the demonic rat, Xuan Hao felt even more confused as he watched how the two weaker Domain Lords just continued attacking without a care in the world.


    Almost like they did not seerge ws of the demonic rat currently swiping down towards them¡­


    Just how do they n to escape that attack!? If they could truly dodge the attack and get the demonic rat to destroy the barrier for them¡­


    Xuan Hao felt even more nervous as he thought about this. Focusing his full attention onto the two weaker Domain Lords. Wanting to see just how they nned to escape from the w swipe of the demonic rat and have it attack the barrier for them....

 Chapter 441 - Running Away...

    <h4>Chapter 441 - Running Away...</h4>


    "General!" "Senior Brother!"


    Watching closely as the w swipe of the demonic rat descended down towards the two weaker Domain Lords, Xuan Hao suddenly heard both of them screaming loudly followed by their expressions of confidence being reced with one of fear, as they scrambled to get out of the way before the attack of the demonic rat reached them.


    However, this was toote, as the attack of the demonic rat soon arrived!


    Swish~


    Bang!


    As the ws of the demonic rat descended down towards the two weaker Domain Lords, Xuan Hao watched as both of them barely managed to put up ast-minute defence before both of them were send flying into the barrier located just behind them.


    In the end, both of them had been grievously injured by the demonic rat and didn''t really cause any damage to the barrier like Xuan Hao had first expected.


    Watching all of this take ce from behind the barrier, Xuan Hao could not help but feel confused over the scene taking ce only a few hundred meters away from him.


    No matter what, it did not look like the two weaker Domain Lords had nned to get hit by the w attack of the demonic rat and looking at how they had begun throwing all kinds of desperate attacks towards the demonic rat while trying to escape, Xuan Hao became even more certain that things did not go like they had nned.


    But just what had they expected to happen from standing in front of the barrier without doing anything when the demonic rat came charging over to attack them?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao suddenly nced over towards the ce where General Guan and Zi Hui had made their way towards after the two weaker Domain Lords had be the target of the demonic rat.


    At first, he had thought that they hid away for a short moment to prepare for the next step of some borate n, but from the looks of it, that was not the case¡­


    Instead, what Xuan Hao saw was the figure of both Zi Hui and General Guan disappearing in the distance. Soon disappearingpletely after passing over a nearby mountain range¡­


    They had run away and abandoned the two weaker Domain Lords!


    One being an elderly man who had already exhausted most of his strength after having to defend against the w swipe of the demonic rat, while the other was a heroic looking middle-aged man covered in noble looking te armour that had been ruined by the demonic rat''s earlier w swipe.


    "Not good!"


    Seeing that the General Guan and Zi Hui had actually been ruthless enough to abandon theirpanions, Xuan Hao instantly realized how dangerous his current situation was.


    After all, without General Guan and Zi Hui to hold back the demonic rat, the two weaker Domain Lords would soon be devoured and be used by the demonic rat to recover its strength faster and at that point, he would be forced to deal with the demonic rat that might have recovered back to the Soul Ascension Realm by himself!


    Whoosh!


    Not daring to allow such a thing to happen, Xuan Hao knew he could no longer stand around watching as he jumped down from the wall and passed through the barrier before charging over towards the demonic rat about to devour the two.


    Boom!


    Using his ice domain together with his sword domain to manifest a giant ice sword, Xuan Hao barely managed to throw it out to block the demonic rat before it devoured them.


    Even if they were his enemies currently, Xuan hao did not intend to allow the demonic rat to devour them in an attempt to recover the strength it had lost over the period that it had been sealed underground.


    "Wha-!?"


    "Who¡­?!"


    The subordinate of General Guan and the elderly junior brother of Zi Hui both had a shocked expression as they suddenly realized that the demonic rat bearing down on them had been blocked by a giant ice sword that had suddenly smashed into the head of the demonic rat. Preventing it from devouring both of them for the moment.


    "You-!"


    Turning their heads to look in the direction that the giant ice sword hade from, the elderly Domain Lord was the first to react, as he had already fought against Xuan Hao once in the past and knew that he was on the side of Yi Min.


    Other than that, the elderly Domain Lord also remembered that Xuan Hao had been the one to destroy the gate leading into the ce where the demonic rat had been sealed! From this alone, the elderly Domain Lord had already med Xuan Hao for the demonic rat escaping its seal!


    However, at this point, he did not intend bringing this matter up. After all, the other party had just saved him and angering him did not seem like the wisest decision given his current circumstances.


    I just have to get out of here when I get a chance, with senior brother''s help we will-


    "I can''t believe the general and that Zi Hui ran away¡­"


    As the elderly Domain Lord was thinking about how to best get away from the demonic rat, he suddenly heard the words of the domain lord finding himself in a simr situation as him.


    Wait¡­ Senior brother ran away? Is that why he didn''t act like nned¡­?


    It was only at this point that the elderly man seemed to realize the fact that his senior brother had already escaped. Leaving him behind to fend off against the demonic rat by himself.


    If senior brother ran away, then¡­


    Feeling a wave of depression role over him, the elderly Domain Lord suddenly looked extremely dispirited as he realized what had happened.


    His senior brother had abandoned him!


    ¡­


    Roar!


    At the same time that the two of them lost control of their emotions and stared nkly into space while muttering some iprehensible words, Xuan Hao had already begun fighting against the demonic rat to make sure it didn''t devour the two of them while they had frozen in ce.


    Damnit! I thought that I would at least be able to get those two to help out, but from the looks of it, I can only rely on myself!


    Losing control over one''s emotions to the degree that the two of them had, was not something that normally happened and when it happened, it might cause a mental demon that could permanently affect their cultivation!


    Xuan Hao had only heard about mental demons before and had never seen anyone with a mental demon before.


    The reason for this was very simple, as only people at the Domain Lord Realm would be able to form a mental demon.


    The reason why only Domain Lords could form a mental demon, was because a mental demon was a unique lifeform that would directly be born through a cultivator''s domain.


    After its birth, the mental demon would begin to slowly devour the cultivator and his domain until the Domain Lord died! After the birth of a mental demon, the cultivator would have to deal with it immediately or end up having his entire cultivation base devoured before dying!


    Boom!


    Blocking another attack from the demonic rat as he was flung backwards, Xuan Hao frowned upon realizing that he was not able to fully block the terrifying energy contained inside the simple attack of the demonic rat. Resulting in a few injuries appearing on his body.


    "Damn oversized rat!"


    Not paying any more attention to the two Domain Lords currently looking like they were about to develop a mental demon, Xuan Hao focused his full attention on the demonic rat charging over towards him once again.


    It was only at this point that Xuan Hao had truly realized how scary someone at the Half- Step Soul Ascension Realm was, that was not mentioning the fact that the demonic rat had yet to use its domain¡­


    But given that it had not even used it fighting against Zi Hui and General Guan, Xuan Hao thought that it might not be that it did not want to use its domain, but because it couldn''t use it.


    Even with such arge disadvantage, Xuan Hao could only barely keep himself alive against the demonic rat only using its physical body!


    "I hope Yi Min finishes up that demonic cultivator and returns soon¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he prepared to sh with the demonic rat knowing very well that he would be send flying once again, Xuan Hao clenched his teeth as a determined expression appeared on his face.


    At the very least, through getting beaten up by the demonic rat, he managed to get a better understanding of his current strength.


    The demonic rat could be considered to be at the peak of the Domain Lord Realm currently and even without a domain, it could still beat him up¡­


    Thinking about how he would end up if the demonic rat could use its domain, Xuan Hao realized that his current strength was still far away from reaching the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm¡­

 Chapter 442 - The Terror Of A Master Blacksmith!

    <h4>Chapter 442 - The Terror Of A Master cksmith!</h4>


    Whoosh!


    Dodging to the side as the demonic rat''s giant maw came bearing down on him, Xuan Hao barely managed to get out of the way before suddenly being caught off-guard by the demonic rat''s giant tail that came flying towards him the next moment.


    Bang!


    Not able to react in time to the demonic rat''s tail, Xuan Hao finally understood how General Guan had felt while fighting against the demonic rat. The only difference being that he had Zi Hui to help out holding the demonic rat back after being hit, while Xuan Hao did not have this luxury¡­


    As the demonic rat quickly followed up its tail strike with another simple w strike imbued with more than enough power to directly destroy his physical body and soul alike!


    Understanding very well that he could not afford to get hit by the ws of the demonic rat, Xuan Hao did his best to conjure forth a defence, as he used the Rain Sword in tantum with his ice domain.


    This was just in the nick of time as the demonic rat''s w strike was beautifully blocked before Xuan Hao managed to make some distance between both of them. Soon finding himself directly beside the barrier of the capital city.


    Just a single step back and he would be able to get back into safety again, but¡­


    "¡­"


    Looking over towards the two people still not showing any sign of moving, as an increasingly demonic aura began to spread out from the elderly Domain Lord, Xuan Hao knew that he would have to hold on if he didn''t want the demonic rat to turn its attention towards the two of them.


    After all, if it managed to devour both of them, Xuan Hao didn''t think that Yi Min would be able to deal with the demonic rat. Even if she had the support of the formation behind him¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out an exhausted sigh as he examined the injuries he had sustained from the short sh with the demonic rat, Xuan Hao gazed over towards the demonic rat about to charge over towards him once again.


    Whoosh~


    Having made up his mind, Xuan Hao acted a step faster than the demonic rat, as heunched himself forward. Not retreating back behind the safety of the barrier!


    ¡­


    A little before General Guan and Zi Hui had escaped leaving behind their twopanions, Yi Min arrived at the underground cave that Xuan Hao had first found the demonic cultivator inside of.


    "This should be it¡­"


    Looking around and spotting therge tentacle cocoons in the process of building? something instead of digging, Yi Min''s face turned serious as she searched for the demonic cultivator. Soon spotting a pale looking young man drawing something on the ground while muttering several iprehensible words in the process.


    "A Demon Gate Formation!"


    Not as unaware of what the demonic cultivator was up to like Xuan Hao had been, Yi Min instantly recognized the formation that the pale looking young man was currently in the process of making.


    It was also at this point in time that Yi Min realized that he was not trying to breakthrough to the Ture Demon Realm like she had first expected upon hearing how Xuan Hao had described that he was digging arge pit in the ground¡­


    After all, a demonic cultivator digging arge pit in the ground could mean many things at the current depth.


    The most likely was that the demonic cultivator was trying to breakthrough to the True Demon Realm, which was why Yi Min had guessed that the demonic cultivator below her city was doing just that.


    "However, I never expected for it to be a Demon Gate Formation¡­" Narrowing her eyes as she did not act immediately, Yi Min began observing the pale looking young man in the process of drawing several different runes onto the ground while muttering to himself in some iprehensiblenguage.


    A Demon Gate Formation was a demonic formation that drew upon the rich yin qi underground to create a demon gate, a spatial passageway, to another location with a simr demon gate.


    The reason Yi Min did not act in the first ce, was because she tried to figure out just where the demonic cultivator in front of her came from. After all, a demonic formation like the one currently being constructed in front of her, was not something that was easily essible.


    For this reason, Yi Min was also certain that the demonic cultivator was not just some lone demonic cultivator, but was instead a demonic cultivator that had some sort of backing from a likely stronger demonic cultivator¡­ Someone in the True Demon Realm¡­


    Trying her best to go over every single demonic cultivator she knew about, Yi Min could not help but frown as the pale looking young man in front of her did not resemble any of the demonic cultivators from therge demonic sects located close to the Sky Empire.


    "Looks like I''m out of time¡­"


    Seeing that the Demon Gate Formation was about to bepleted and the yin qi from below slowly began being sucked into the runes drawn up by the demonic cultivator, Yi Min knew that she couldn''t dy any longer.


    If she really continued to dy, she would risk the demonic cultivatorpleting the formation and possibly escaping, or worse, have someone cross over from the other side¡­


    Whoosh~


    Having decided to attack, Yi Min was swift and decisive. Directly charging over towards the pale looking young man, whilepletely ignoring therge tentacle cocoons along the way.


    "Wha-"


    Fwoosh!


    Realizing someone? was attacking him the moment Yi Min was a hundred meters away from him, the pale looking barely managed to transform into his demonic form before a giant vortex of ck energy engulfed his entire body along with the demon gate formation that was close to finishing.


    "¡­"


    Not rxing in the slightest upon seeing the ck vortex swallow up the demonic cultivator, Yi Min clenched her hand as the ck vortex with the demonic cultivator inside of it quickly began shrinking in size before a terrifying force tearing force began ripping apart everything around the ck vortex.


    Before the tentacle cocoons even had the time to react to their master being swallowed up by the ck vortex, they were instantly ripped to shreds asrge chunks of flesh covered the cave floor.


    If not for the fact that the self-destructive measure had been removed by the demonic cultivator after he had them begin constructing the Demon Gate Formation, it could easily be imagined how this careless action on Yi Min''s side might have yed out for both her and the demonic cultivator¡­


    But in the end, this did not matter, as the demonic cultivator in question, was currently being ripped apart inside the rapidly shrinking ck vortex.


    "AH-! HOW DARE YOU! WHEN I GET OUT OF HERE-"


    Hearing the angry screams from inside the ck vortex, Yi Min did not show any sign of care as she just waved her other hand, causing a dozen small daggers in the Mystic Grade along with a single Transcendental Grade dagger to fly out towards the demonic cultivator still struggling inside the ck vortex.


    Sensing the appearance of so many high-level weapons, the demonic cultivator suddenly felt like crying. Even he only had a single Mystic Grade sword!


    "¡­"


    Howe he suddenly encountered someone with so many high-level weapons? Can I take back my earlier words¡­?


    Thinking about this with a regretful look on his face as he felt the daggers grow closer and closer to him. The demonic cultivator for the first time in his life understood why nobody wanted to offend a Master cksmith¡­ They simply had way too many weapons to go around!


    "Ah-!"


    Knowing that he was in bad situation, the demonic cultivator quickly unleashed all of his strength and used a secret technique to momentarily increase it even further.


    Breaking apart the ck vortex that restrained him and blocking the initial attack of the daggers before rushing towards the closest tunnel out of the cave.


    Even if he was a demonic cultivator, it did not mean he was stupid! There was no way he would continue the fight when his opponent had so many terrifying weapons!


    Whoosh~


    Seeing that the demonic cultivator was escaping, Yi Min did not give chase and instead just put away the daggers before pulling out a beautifully decorated longbow. Gently pulling back the bowstring as an arrow made out of pure lighting qi was formed out of thin air.


    W-what now¡­?


    Feeling that something was wrong while escaping from Yi Min, the demonic cultivator turned back to look at what Yi Min was up to. Only to see an arrow made up of the most destructive qi¡­ Lighting Qi!


    "What have I done to deserve this¡­?"


    Feeling a bit bewildered as he felt the lighting arrow lock onto him and at the same time cause the space around him to grow chaotic. Prevent him from dodging. The demonic cultivator felt helpless as he looked at the approaching lighting arrow instantly cross the short distance between him and Yi Min¡­


    BOOM!


    Followed by the lighting arrow hitting the demonic cultivator, a terrifying explosion soon engulfed the entire cave. Destroying everything it came into contact with.


    Even Yi Min was forced to take out a few defensive artifacts when the explosion reached her, to avoid getting hurt by it.

 Chapter 443 - Yi Mins Arrival, End Of The Demonic Rat!

    <h4>Chapter 443 - Yi Min''s Arrival, End Of The Demonic Rat!</h4>


    "That should be it for the demonic cultivator!"


    Following a short one-sided battle after the demonic cultivator was hit by the lightning arrow, Yi Min found herself standing in front of what remained of the demonic cultivator. The surrounding cave around her just barely being held up by her domain. Preventing it from copsing on top of her.


    "I Wonder how things are going back on the surface¡­"


    Muttering this to herself as she remembered how she had asked a rtively unfamiliar Domain Lord she had only met today behind to inform her in case anything happened, Yi Min could not bother staying around any longer, as she quickly rushed out of the underground cave towards the surface.


    Rumble~


    After Yi Min left, the underground cave that had increased in size following the battle between Yi Min and the demonic cultivator, could no longer remain as it quickly copsed. Burying whatever remained inside the underground cave beneathrge amounts of earth that came crashing down from above.


    As for Xuan Hao informing Yi Min about his current struggle with the demonic rat? He simply did not have the time to do so, as the demonic rat might have used the time, he contacted Yi Min to devour the two currently useless Domain Lords¡­


    ¡­


    Back on the surface just outside the barrier protecting the capital from any of the damage brought along by the fight taking ce just a few dozen meters away from the walls, Xuan Hao was barely holding up against the demonic rat''s relentless attacks.


    Even if the demonic rat had gotten injurie during the fight with General Guan and Zi Hui, it was constantly healing whatever wounds was inflicted on it in a short period of time. Given that not even General Guan and Zi Hui could inflict any serious injuries on the demonic rat, Xuan Hao had even less sess on truly injuring the demonic rat.


    All he could do was take the beating by the oversized rodent while making sure not to approach the two useless Domain Lords at the side¡­


    Bang!


    Blocking another simple yet powerful w attack from the demonic rat, Xuan Hao was once again sent flying backwards, as he quickly stabilized himself mid-air before a frown appeared on his face.


    From the sh just now, Xuan Hao clearly felt that the strength of the demonic rat had once again increased by a small margin! Even worse, he knew that he would not be able to sh with the demonic rat with his current injuries, or he might risk losing his life like the subordinate of General Guan!


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out a short sigh as he realized this, Xuan Hao knew that he would not be able to hold the demonic rat back for any longer.


    Whoosh~


    So, before the demonic rat charged at him again, Xuan Hao quickly retreated back behind the barrier surrounding the capital for safety, while ncing over in the direction of the two useless Domain Lords.


    Or¡­ One Domain Lord¡­


    Sometime during his fighting, it seemed like the subordinate of General Guan had managed to recover. Escaping from the scene while he still had the chance to do so.


    The only person currently remaining was the elderly Domain Lord, who was currentlypletely engulfed in a demonic aura as his darkness domain was on full disy for everyone to see.


    The main thing standing out was that the domain itself began changing while the demonic aura grew stronger and stronger with each passing second. Slowly overpowering the elderly Domain Lord''s original aura, as the demonic aura merged together with the elderly Domain Lord''s own¡­


    Not only that, but the domain of the elderly Domain Lord also began to showrge changes, as the area around the elderly Domain Lord was devastated by the darkness domain seemingly going out of control. Destroying the everything around the elderly Domain Lord.


    Roar?


    The demonic rat who was just about to jump towards Xuan Hao no hidden behind the barrier for another attack, was also rmed by the change in the elderly Domain Lord, as its attention shifted away from Xuan Hao and towards the elderly Domain Lord in the process of developing his very own mental demon¡­


    Roar!


    Though different from Xuan Hao who was just observing the entire thing from the side, the demonic rat did not think this way, as it directly attacked the elderly Domain Lord.


    "Hm¡­ It seems to have grown stronger sincest¡­ By the way, where did General Guan go?"


    Just as the demonic rat was about to charge over and attack the elderly Domain Lord, a curious voice drifted out from behind him, as Xuan Hao quickly turned around already knowing the identity of the other party.


    "Yi Min, you are back! Ah, General Guan already ran away earlier when-"


    Exining what had happened while she was gone. Not forgetting to exin how the demonic rat had grown stronger after devouring one of General Guan''s two subordinates, Xuan Hao watched on from the side as an expression of disgust slowly appeared on her face upon hearing how General Guan had abandoned his subordinate to the demonic rat while running away.


    "Hah¡­ There is no use thinking about General Guan now that he has already run away¡­ For now, the most important thing should be to deal with the giant rodent before it grows any stronger!"


    Letting out a sigh as she shook her head slightly, Yi Min focused her attention onto the demonic rat who had simrlye to a stop upon sensing her arrival.


    Even if the current demonic rat was not the smartest demonic beast out there, it could still sense how dangerous Yi Min was! Compared to General Guan and Zi Hui who it had fought earlier, the demonic rat could very clearly feel that Yi Min was stronger than the two of them¡­


    In the end, this had caused the demonic rat to freeze up, as it began to cautiously observe Yi Min. Not daring to be the slightest bit careless!


    At this point, it had alreadypletely forgotten about the elderly Domain Lord located only a few hundred meters away.


    "Haha, it seems like our big friend also noticed my arrival."


    Not the least bit taken aback by the fact that the demonic rat had discovered her this time around, Yi Min smiled brightly towards the demonic rat before stepping out of the barrier. Ready to face off against the demonic rat.


    "¡­"


    Seeing how things were ying out, Xuan Hao knew that he would not have to find his disciple and the elders who came along with him to escape before the demonic rat recovered its strength to the Soul Ascension Realm¡­


    For now, it looked like he could sit back and watch the fight between Yi Min and the demonic rat y out, while recovering from the injuries he had suffered from his short fight with the demonic rat.


    At least he managed to get a better grasp over his current strength and also ca me to understand where he could improve. From hisck of a good movement technique to the fact that he still fought without a weapon. Instead fighting with the sword manifested through the power of his two domains, Xuan Hao fully understood how to improve his strength after returning to the sect.


    Hopefully the quest given to him by the system would be considered to have beenpleted. Even if he didn''t kill the demonic rat himself...


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt even more anticipation towards the battle between Yi Min and the demonic rat. Not only would he be able to witness Yi Min''s strength, but he would also be able to solve his immediateck of a good movement technique!


    However, things did not y out like Xuan Hao had first expected them to, with both Yi Min and the demonic rat shing in an epic manner before Yi Min would finally emerge victories.


    Instead¡­


    Whoosh!


    The fight ended before it even got started, with Yi Min summoning a giant ck vortex that stopped the demonic rat from moving before a dozen or so terrifying daggers appeared out of thin air and easily pierced into the demonic rat. Directly rendering it close to death in one easy motion.


    Roar!


    Even the demonic rat had not expected for things to go like this, as it roared angrily before Yi Min ended the short battle by using a way toorge axe to cut the demonic rat along with its soul in half. Instantly killing the demonic rat before it could even muster up a counterattack!


    The demonic rat that both General Guan and Zi Hui had struggled with, was easily taken care of by Yi Min¡­


    Remembering that both General Guan and Zi Hui should at least have reached theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm, if not the peak of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao had a feeling that Yi Min might already have surpassed the Domain Lord Realm!

 Chapter 444 - Birth Of A Mental Demon

    <h4>Chapter 444 - Birth Of A Mental Demon</h4>


    "Thanks for the help, it must have been quite hard to hold back the demonic rat given your current cultivation realm¡­"


    Before Xuan Hao could think any further about Yi Min''s current cultivation realm, the person in question suddenly appeared in front of him with a thankful expression on her face. The giant body of the demonic rat already gone, as Yi Min had stored it away in her interspatial ring shortly after its death.


    "It was not a problem at all¡­" Seeing Yi Min thanking him, Xuan Hao could not help himself from smiling a bit wryly. After all, she had in some way forced him to offend whatever faction was behind General Guan¡­


    Refusing Yi Min and just letting her deal with the problem by herself?


    Xuan Hao didn''t even think about this from the start. After all, if he did something like that, it was highly likely that he would end up offended Yi Min in the process¡­ In the end, it didn''t matter if he chose to help or not, as he would make enemies with one of the two sides no matter what.


    All he could do now, was hope that he had chosen the correct side. Maybe, if he was lucky, General Guan would not even know that he had sided with Yi Min and in turn help him avoid having to join in on whatever power struggle General Guan and Yi Min were a part of¡­


    At the very least. From the fact that General Guan had run away, Xuan hao felt like he had chosen the correct side. Other than that, he never personally acted against General Guan and just spectated from the side. Only leaving the safety of the barrier to make sure the demonic rat didn''t devour the two weaker Domain Lords and powerup.


    Wait¡­ Weaker Domain Lords-


    Having suddenly remembered something, Xuan Hao quickly turned to look over towards the elder Domain Lord still standingpletely motionless a short distance away from the barrier.


    At this point, the demonic aura around him seemed to have reached its peak as it hadpletely fused together with the elderly Domain Lord.


    "Hm? A mental demon?"


    Seeing Xuan Hao suddenly turn around to look somewhere outside the barrier, Yi Min soon did the same. Instantly spotting the elderly Domain Lord currently in the process of developing a mental demon.


    "What happened to him that caused him to start developing a mental demon?"


    Feeling a bit confused upon witnessing someone developing a mental demon all of a sudden, Yi Min turned back towards Xuan Hao as she asked this with a curious expression on her face. Not showing the slightest care for the elderly Domain Lord outside.


    After all, she still remembered that he was together with General Guan and Zi Hui before she had left to deal with the demonic cultivator.


    No matter how merciful she was, there was no way she would willingly help out an enemy.


    Not to mention, there was no way to help someone deal with a mental demon. All one could do at that point was hope the other party sessfully managed to wake up from their dazed state and destroy the growing mental demon before it was toote¡­


    And¡­ Looking at how the elderly Domain Lord showed no signs of struggle, Yi Min did not expect for him to sessfully wake up¡­


    "From what I managed to pick up, it seems like one of the two people who escaped while leaving him behind was his senior brother¡­"


    Hearing her question, Xuan Hao remained focused on observing the changes taking ce with the elderly Domain Lord, while answering.


    Observing someone develop a mental demon could still be considered important to the current Xuan Hao. After all, if he ever encountered a mental demon himself in the future, he would need to understand how to deal with it and observing was a far better learning experiencepared to reading about!


    After the whole mental demon thing, Xuan Hao nned to return to the alchemypetition and check out the quest from the system!


    Yes, even if he was not the one who killed the demonic rat, it still seemed like the system considered it to be enough for the quest to bepleted!


    "I see."


    Yi Min seemed to have understood his intention of observing the process of someone devolving a mental demon and did not directly kill the elderly Domain Lord like she had first intended upon realizing the fact that one of her enemies were still around.


    In the end, it did not really matter much to her, as the other party was way weaker than her. Even if managed to recover and tried to run away, Yi Min was confident that she could catch him!


    "Ah-!"


    Following the fact that both Xuan Hao and Yi Min watched from the side without doing anything, the elderly Domain Lord suddenly let out a loud scream before a change took ce.


    The domain around him seemed topletely disappear as his cultivation began rapidly decreasing. Going from the lower end of the Domain Lord Realm to the Nascent Soul Realm and all the way down to the Qi Condensation Realm before his entire cultivation base hadpletely disappeared!


    In just a few seconds, a Domain Lord capable of destroying an entire kingdom single-handily had lost all of his strength and turned into an ordinary mortal within only a few second!


    Knowing that the mental demon would directly devour one''s cultivation base was one thing, seeing it happen first-hand was another!


    Even Xuan Hao who had already known what would happen was shocked upon witnessing the elderly man''s cultivationpletely disappear!


    Hundreds of years, if not thousands of years of cultivation. Gone, just like that!


    Whoosh!


    Before Xuan Hao managed to recover from the shock he had felt after witnessing what had happened to the now elderly man without any cultivation, the weak soul of the elderly man flew out before hovering mid-air, while the now elderly body copsed dead on the ground beneath it.


    At this point, the soul itself was already on the brink of copse, but Xuan Hao could clearly feel that something deep inside of it was forcefully keeping the soul from dispersing.


    Looking closer with his divine sense, Xuan Hao quickly discovered that a new life was taking shape inside the fragile soul. Not only that, but the life form taking shape inside the fragile soul was currently merging together with the elderly man''s former cultivation base and darkness domain!


    Because of this, the cultivation base of the new life form hidden away inside the fragile soul quickly increased at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    First Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm¡­


    Third Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­


    Core Formation Realm¡­


    This continued for a few minutes before finallying to a stop at the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, while not the same realm as what the elderly man had been in the past, it was still extremely terrifying to consider that the life form had just been born a few minutes ago and had already reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    After all, the Domain Lord Realm was a realm that many people pursed for their entire lives, yet failed to take a final step and ended up perishing in the endless river of time¡­


    But for such growth to happen, the mental demon also had to pay a certain price¡­


    The price in this case, was that a mental demon could only grow stronger by devouring others cultivation and domain¡­


    At least, that was what Xuan Hao had read about mental demons in the Domain Lord Realm.


    As for mental demons above the Domain Lord Realm? Xuan Hao had never heard about them before and had no idea if they were the same.


    The main reason for this, was also that most would band together to destroy a mental demon whenever one appeared. Even demonic cultivators who were considered demons by most, would put their differences aside and deal with a mental demon if one appeared inside their territories!


    In a sense, a mental demon could be considered the enemy of all living things, as it solely existed to devour others and turn them into its own strength¡­


    Knowing all of this, Xuan Hao turned towards the fragile soul slowly breaking apart mid-air, as the mental demon of the elderly man was born!


    Whoosh~


    However, before Xuan Hao managed to get a full grasp of its appearance, Yi Min decided to act. Instantly killing the newly born mental demon before it managed to take its first step in the outside world¡­


    "¡­"


    Could you at least let me see what it looked like before killing it!?


    Not daring to say these words out loud as he begrudgingly looked over towards Yi Min, who seemingly did not feel his gaze.


    "Now that we have finished dealing with the troublemakers, let''s get back to the alchemypetition again. You should be quite eager to find out how your disciple is doing, no?"


    "Sure¡­"


    Not knowing what to say, Xuan Hao just rolled his eyes at her before making his way back towards the alchemypetition. To be honest, he was quite curious how Qing Yi was doing¡­

 Chapter 445 - Second Test Of The Alchemy Trial

    <h4>Chapter 445 - Second Test Of The Alchemy Trial</h4>


    Around the same time that things were finishing up outside the city wall with Yi Min''s arrival, Qing Yi was making her way up the mountain towards the second test of the alchemypetition. Not knowing what awaited her this time around, while hoping that it would not be something simr to the first test.


    Even if she was indeed an Expert Alchemist, her knowledge regarding different spiritual herbs did severelyck behind the other participants who had studied alchemy for years before she even made her first potion!


    The first test would have been way easier for her, if she recognized at least one of the spiritual herbs that she needed to find a substitute for¡­


    It really looked like she would have to read through some more spiritual herb encyclopaedias when she returned back to the sect again. At least that way, she would not encounter a situation like she had during the first test. Not knowing anything about the spiritual herbs she needed to find a substitute for.


    Just thinking about the spiritual herbs, she had ended up wasting due to her own weakness, Qing Yi felt even more motivated to increase her knowledge over spiritual herbs after the alchemypetition came to an end.


    Maybe she could even get her master to help her out when it came to testing her spiritual herb knowledge in the future¡­


    Lost in thought thinking about the future as she made her way up the narrow path slowly leading her higher up into the mountain, Qing Yi soon arrived at the second test!


    Different from the first test, the second test was not inside a cave with everything needed for potion brewing. Instead, there were three stone pedestals in front of the path leading further up the narrow mountain path.


    Each of the herbs had a different spiritual herb ced on top of each pedestal, as a small sign could be seen in front of the three pedestals followed by the small stone b with her information on it.


    "Pick one of the three spiritual herbs and move on to the next test. You will have to use the chosen spiritual herb for the next test! How interesting, looks like this is not the second test¡­" Reading out loud what was written on the small sign, Qing Yi ignored the small stone b with her information on it and walked up to the three pedestals.


    "Smoldering Earth Flower¡­ Dew Touched Arteria Leaf and¡­ Cave Moss?"


    Inspecting the three spiritual herbs, Qing Yi could not help but feel a bit confused upon reaching thest spiritual herb. Cave Moss.


    How what looked like simple moss had ended up being ced on the same level as two spiritual herbs very clearly at the Spirit Grade, Qing Yi had no idea. Even the name of the moss, was just cave moss. No special name that gave away anything about the clump of moss on the third pedestal¡­


    Looking a bit closer at the Cave Moss, Qing Yi could feel a strong spiritual qi circting inside of it. Not the least bit inferior to the Smoldering Earth Flower and the Dew Touched Arteria Leaf!


    Having looked over all three of the spiritual herbs avable to her, Qing Yi had no idea which one to pick among them.


    No matter if it was the Smoldering Earth Flower, the Dew Touched Arteria Leaf or the ordinary looking Cave Moss, Qing Yi had no knowledge about any of them.


    The only thing she managed to learn through her short inspection of the three spiritual herbs, was that the Smoldering Earth Flower was a fire rted herb with arge amount of fire qi inside of it, while the Dew Touched Arteria Leaf seemed to contain both water qi and some sort of blood qi.


    Needless to say, that Qing Yi immediately decided not to pick the Dew Touched Arteria Lead¡­ After all, she had only ever witnessed blood qi during her encounter with the cultivator from the ck Rose Sect, who had directly devoured over a dozen people in front of her¡­


    Lastly was the ordinary looking Cave Moss, while it did not look like some kind of high-quality spiritual herb, Qing Yi knew that its appearance was misleading, and arge amount of qi was hidden away inside it. The main element of the qi inside the Cave Moss was Earth Qi and Water Qi, both of which Qing Yi would not have a problem working with.


    "So¡­ The Smoldering Earth Flower, or the ordinary looking Cave Moss¡­"


    With the Dew Touched Arteria Leaf already eliminated from her choices, Qing Yi was left with only two spiritual herbs to chose from, both of which would present their own unique challenges when it came to turning them into a potion during the second test¡­


    "Smoldering Earth Flower it is¡­"


    After thinking about it for a short moment, Qing Yi decided to pick the Smoldering Earth Flower. The main reason for this, was because she had a much easier time and was far morefortable when working with fire rted spiritual herbspared to water and earth.


    The cause of this, was of course her special physique along with the fact that she was someone who practiced a fire-based cultivation mantra.


    Even if she was interested in the ordinary Cave Moss, Qing Yi did not want to take a risk just because she was curious about the Cave Moss. After all, she was still in apetition! Making things more difficult for herself would just be stupid¡­


    Creak~


    As she picked up the Smoldering Earth Flower, Qing Yi once again watched how the two other spiritual herbs began descending below the ground like the potion mixture, she had made during the first test of the Alchemy Trial.


    Whoosh~


    Different from before, Qing Yi did not wait for the spiritual herbs to disappear, as she directly tried to grab one of them before they disappeared-


    Bang!


    Only to hit some sort of invisible barrier that stopped her from taking away any of the two remaining spiritual herbs.


    Other than that-


    "5 points¡­ I lost 5 points?!"


    She had five points deducted after trying to steal away the spiritual herbs¡­


    To say she was depressed over the sudden development would be an understatement, but what could she do about it?


    "¡­"


    Feeling a bit resentful after losing five points, Qing Yi slowly began making her way towards the second test that had be visible after the three pedestals disappeared and the mist behind them lifted.


    Given that she already knew that she would be making a potion for the second test, Qing Yi was not the slightest bit surprised that there was a small alchemy station already prepared for her along with a dozen or so different spiritual herbs that she could use together with the Smoldering Earth Flower.


    A few different potion recipes using the Smoldering Earth Flower as the main ingredient could also be seen on a small table located next to the cauldron.


    The only thing that caused Qing Yi to worry a bit, was the fact that there were no extra Smoldering Earth Flowers¡­ All she had was the one she had gotten from the pedestal!


    This meant that she would only have one chance to make a brand-new potion she had never tried making before! Not only that, but the potion in question was also a Spirit Grade potion...


    Feeling herself grow nervous upon thinking about this, Qing Yi made her way over towards the small table with the different potion recipes on it before beginning to thoroughly read through them. Not wanting to make a mistake when choosing what potion to make using the Smoldering Earth Flower and end up with a potion that was way too hard for her to make.


    She had only just be an Expert Alchemist less than an hour ago, the Spirit Grade Potions she was capable of making was limited to one¡­


    Just thinking about this caused Qing Yi to feel even more stressful.


    The Alchemy Trial truly was difficult for a newbie Expert Alchemist like her¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time Qing Yi was about to begin with the second test of the Alchemy Trial, her master had finally made his way back to the alchemypetition.


    "Looks like something quite interesting happened while I was away¡­"


    Having made his way back into the spectator room where the elders from his sect were located, Xuan Hao instantly caught sight of therge light projections disying what was happening inside the Alchemy Trial.


    Asking one of the elders watching Qing Yi as she read through a dozen or so different alchemy recipes, Xuan Hao quickly came to understand what was happening and at the same time also felt curious about therge cauldron located at the middle of the tform below.


    Just what kind of artifact was therge cauldron that contained what could be considered a small world inside of it?

 Chapter 446 - Drifting Cloud Steps

    <h4>Chapter 446 - Drifting Cloud Steps</h4>


    Focusing back onto therge screen of light that showed what Qing Yi was currently doing inside, Xuan Hao soon lost interest and turned his attention towards the quest he hadpleted just a little while ago. After all, watching his disciple read through a dozen or so pill recipes was not really that interesting to him¡­


    [Side Quest 2/2: Kill the demonic creature sealed in the underground cave(Complete)]


    [Reward: Drifting Cloud Steps]


    [Redeem]: [Y/N]


    Seeing that everything was in order and the quest had indeed beenpleted after Yi Min killed the demonic rat, Xuan Hao decided to redeem the reward without any hesitation.


    Whoosh!


    Following the fact that he redeemed the reward, Xuan Hao felt the simr feeling as he had when he first absorbed the knowledge from the system after Qing Yi was first promoted to a Journeyman Alchemist.


    The only difference this time around, was that the information he received was way lesspared to that time. After all, one was the alchemy knowledge worthy of someone at the peak of the Artisan Alchemist Realm with countless different recipes, while the other was just a single movement technique.


    Different from the alchemy knowledge, he would have to learn the Drifting Cloud Steps from the start without any help¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao began reading through the Drifting Cloud Steps Movement Technique that he had just been given.


    The Drifting Cloud Steps was different from any of the movement techniques he had seen before back in the Flying Sword Sect, as it required a certain degree of spatial maniption. Meaning that for one to start practicing the Drifting Cloud Steps, one would at least need to be in the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Maybe someone talented enough might be able to grasp the Drifting Cloud Steps in the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm, but Xuan Hao did not really think too much about this. Mainly because his three disciples were still far away from reaching that level.


    At the very least, he would have a strong movement technique to teach his disciples when they became strong enough in the future!


    Having thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help but sigh as he looked up towards the light projection showing Qing Yi still busy looking through the potion recipes.


    His two oldest disciples were both close to reaching the Core Formation Realm and could already be considered the strongest among their peers in the Flying Sword Sect, but¡­ Xuan Hao could not help feeling that they were a bit weak when he looked around at the other youths who had showed up from around the Sky Empire to join the Alchemy Competition.


    Even if they specialised in alchemy, the ones not from sects outside the core region of the Sky Empire, were all at theter stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm! There was even one who had already reached the Core Formation Realm!


    It was worth mentioning that these youths spent most of their time practicing alchemy instead of cultivating! The ones who focused on increasing their cultivation realm¡­ Xuan Hao felt that most of them would likely already have reached the Core Formation Realm at this point!


    How could his disciplesck behind others by so much!?


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I will have to help Qing Yi and Chu Yang breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm when I get back¡­ That way I will also be able toplete the main quest!"


    Having made up his mind, Xuan Hao decided to make sure to spend some more time with his two oldest disciples and help them breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm after returning to the sect.


    As for Bai Ning, he would not stress him too much given that he had only recently joined the Flying Sword Sect. Letting him enjoy his cksmithing was a good n for now¡­ In the future, he would make sure Bai Ning learned a few techniques to protect himself.


    After all, even if he wanted to be a great cksmith, he would still have to learn a few things to protect himself¡­ Just look at Yi Min, she was a splendid example of a great cksmith with powerful techniques to protect herself from danger!


    "Looks like she''s finally going to start making a potion."


    Seeing that Qing Yi stepped away from the small table filled with all sorts of potion recipes, Xuan Hao focused back onto therge light projection in the sky showing his disciple.


    Helping his disciples increase their strength and learning the Drifting Cloud Steps could wait. For now, the most important thing was Qing Yi''s performance during the Alchemy Trial and preventing the Artisan Alchemist Fang Shi from having any ns to steal away his disciple¡­


    "Hm?"


    Secretly ncing down towards Fang Shi standing on the tform as he was busy managing the situation inside the cauldron, Xuan Hao could not help but let out a slightly surprised voice upon spotting something.


    "A rabbit tail¡­?"


    Why does he have a rabbit tail!?


    Not knowing about what had happened in the alchemypetition during his absence, Xuan Hao thought that Fang Shi might have some kind of weird hobby and felt even more adamant in preventing him from snatching away his disciple!


    ¡­


    "Haha, looks like everything is going well inside the alchemy trial!"


    Unaware of the fact that part of Qing Yi''s Skin Strengthening Potion had notpletely worn off yet, Fang Shi smiled happily as he observed the condition of everyone inside the cauldron.


    "Though, I did not expect for them to do so well! The only one who did worse than expected on the first test, was that girl from the Flying Sword Sect¡­ I hope she can do better during the second test¡­"


    Feeling happy that almost everyone exceeded his expectations, Fang Shi could not help but feel that it was a little weird that Qing Yi was the only person who did worse than he had expected¡­ Perhaps he had overestimated her?


    "Master¡­ Please stop talking to yourself¡­ It''s weird¡­"


    "Cai Yu! Just wait for thepetition to end-"


    Hearing his disciple suddenly call out to him from the side and even daring to call him weird in front of the elders from the Iron Sky Kingdom standing nearby, Fang Shi felt a wave of embarrassment wash over him as he turned around to begin scolding her.


    Whoosh~


    Unfortunately for Fang Shi, the quick turn caused him to discover something weird close to his-


    "W-what is this!? I thought it had already disappeared¡­ Don''t tell me, is there perhaps a permanent side effect to that potion!?"


    Discovering the cute fluffy rabbit tail hidden behind therge outer robe he was wearing; Fang Shi began shivering as he remembered that some potions and pills caused permanent side effects that would not disappear over time and would be hard to recover from.


    Given that he still had a small cute and fluffy rabbit tail, Fang Shi feared that Qing Yi''s Skin Strengthening Potion might be one of those potions with permanent side effects¡­


    If that was really the case, would he not have to live with a rabbit tail until he got back to his alchemyb and figured out a way to remove it¡­?


    Thinking about all of this, Fang Shi hadpletely forgotten to continue scolding Cai Yu, as the person in question curiously looked over towards him. Wondering why her master had suddenly frozen up and looked all embarrassed.


    ¡­


    "Ah!"


    Having realized something, Cai Yu barely managed to stop herself fromughing out loud, as she watched the embarrassed expression on her master''s face.


    Did he not check if the side effects had disappeared beforeing back out and starting the Final Stage of the alchemypetition? There was no way he could just stop it now that it had already started¡­


    "Master~ Did something happen~?"


    With a cheeky grin on her face, Cai Yu looked over at her master, as he instantly understood that she knew what had happened.


    "Ahm-! Nothing to worry about!"


    "Hm? Are you sure~? I was almost certain that you were going to scold me just now¡­"


    Not nning to let her master go, Cai Yu decided to use the opportunity to escape from whatever punishment her master had nned for her when they got back home.


    Even if she enjoyed poking fun at her master from time to time, she still understood that her master''s punishments were nothing to scoff at!


    It had to be known, thest time she had stepped over the line, she was forced to take care of her master''s collection of poisonous herbs¡­


    With her strength back then, taking care of those poisonous spiritual herbs, while not deadly, was still a quite painful experience for her. Even when she tried to use her father to escape, he had directly refused her and allowed her master to punish her!


    "You were just imagining things¡­ How could I ever be angry with my dear disciple¡­?"


    Hearing her master say this, Cai Yu smiled happily, she knew that she had escaped punishment.


    "Indeed! It was just this disciple''s imagination!"


    Fang Shi did not take this to mind, as he was far more worried about how to get rid of his new permanent rabbit tail¡­

 Chapter 447 - A Dark Horse Appears!

    <h4>Chapter 447 - A Dark Horse Appears!</h4>


    Back inside the alchemy trial, Qing Yi had found a potion she wanted to make using the Smoldering Earth Flower and began picking out the rest of the spiritual herbs that she needed for the potion, among the spiritual herbs that were avable to her during the second test.


    The entire thing took no more than a few seconds, as Qing Yi soon began carefully preparing the different spiritual herbs she had just picked out. Leaving the Smoldering Earth Flower to the side for now.


    Quickly, a few minutes passed¡­


    "That should be it!"


    Qing Yi finished preparing the spiritual herbs needed, with only the Smoldering Earth Flower left.


    Taking a step back, Qing Yi soon began to inspect the spiritual herbs that she had just finished preparing. Wanting to make sure that she had not made any mistake along the way.


    "Now, all that is left, is the Smoldering Earth Flower¡­"


    ncing over towards the Smoldering Earth Flower, Qing Yi could not help growing a bit nervous.


    Not only was the Smoldering Earth Flower a Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb, but it was also an extremely dangerous spiritual herb to prepare from what she had managed to understand through the potion recipes.


    The main danger brought about by the Smoldering Earth Flower, was even more odd, as it could explode if not handled correctly. The explosion itself was more than enough to kill someone at the Qi Condensation Realm ording to what she had read through the different recipes¡­


    Learning about this, Qing Yi had slowly started to regret the fact that she did not chose the ordinary looking Cave Moss. After all, it should be far less dangerous that the Smoldering Earth Flower that she had ended up picking¡­


    "Hah¡­ No use regretting my choice now¡­"


    Muttering this to herself as she cautiously looked over the Smoldering Earth Flower currently ced on the table in front of her, Qing Yi slowly began to cut it ording to the pill recipe. Making sure not to make any mistake in case it blew up in her face like the different potion recipes had described¡­


    As Qing Yi was slowly starting to prepare the Smoldering Earth Flower, the rest of the participants were also currently at the second test of the alchemy trial. All having their own unique Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb for the test¡­


    Among the participants, Qing Yi was thest person to have reached the second test and because of this, some of the other participants had already begun finishing up by the time Qing Yi was still preparing the spiritual herbs.


    "Ah-! No-!"


    Like this, the first person among thest twenty participants was eliminated during the second test, as he was directly transferred out of the alchemy trial the moment he failed.


    ¡­


    "Yang Kai, 15 points. You can go over there and wait until the rest gets out!"


    Seeing the first person being eliminated, Fang Shi could not help but sigh silently to himself while he directed the confused looking young man towards a small resting ce that had just been set up for the participants to wait for the alchemy trial to finish up.


    To be honest, Fang Shi already knew that the second test would end up eliminating quite a few of the participants due to its difficulty being quite a challenge for someone in the Expert Realmpared to the first test that was mostly used to test the alchemist''s spiritual herb knowledge.


    The second test of the alchemy trial could be considered the test that weeded out most of the people, while the third test would signify the true start of the alchemy trial¡­ As for the fourth test and above? Fang Shi honestly did not expect any of the participants to pass more than the third test¡­


    The main reason for this, was that for one to pass the third test, one would be considered to have the qualifications to be called an Expert Alchemist of the Sky Empire, while passing the fourth test would signify that one was already at the Peak of the Expert Alchemist Realm, close to bing an Artisan Alchemist!


    Passing the fifth test was not something someone in the Expert Alchemist Realm could do¡­


    "Looks like that kid might have a chance to pass the fourth test¡­"


    ncing over towards the crown prince from the Dark Sky Kingdom, Fang Shi could not help but feel a bit surprised as he watched him easily pass the second test before moving onto the third test.


    If things progressed like this, it looked like he would be taking in the young crown prince as his second disciple¡­


    Given the talent he disyed, Fang Shi felt that even if he ended up offending his first disciple, Cai Yu, he would have to ept him!


    The crowd also noticed that someone had managed to pass the second test and had moved through to the third test, as all of them focused their attention onto the crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom while cheering.


    All of them were curious what the third test of the alchemy trial was all about¡­


    "Hm? Who is that¡­?"


    Having been focused on the crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom who just entered the third test area, Fang Shi suddenly blinked both his eyes as he realized someone else had just entered a few minutes after.


    From this alone, Fang Shi could already tell that the person should be extremely talented like the crown prince. The only problem was the person in question was a little girl that did stand out during thest twopetitions¡­


    But this did not matter to Fang Shi, the thing he cared the most about was talent and the little girl very clearly disyed her talent by passing through the second test just a few minutes after the Dark Sky Kingdom''s crown prince!


    If Qing Yi was there, she would have realized that the little girl that had just made it to the third test was none other than the little girl she had been talking with during the second and first stage of the alchemypetition!


    The little girl really did not stand out at all during the two past stages and only started to show off her talent during the alchemy trial!


    All of a sudden, the spectators also began to notice the little girl also passing through to the third test of the alchemy trial, as they all felt like the two were likely to be the onespeting for the first ce in the Alchemy Competition and the right to be the second person disciple of the Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire!


    Even if the ordinary spectators were just normal citizen of the Iron Sky Kingdom, they still knew about the Sky Empire and just how powerful it was! It had to be remembered that the Iron Sky Kingdom was only considered one of the many kingdoms under the Sky Empire!


    ¡­


    Blob~


    At the same time that both the crowd of spectators and Fang Shi were eagerly watching the little girl and the crown prince begin the third test of the alchemy trial, Qing Yi had sessfully finished preparing the Smoldering Earth Flower, as she had begun the brewing process.


    The brewing process itself was not simple at all, as she would have to add in each of the spiritual herbs she had prepared beforehand, while carefully controlling the temperature of the me. Making sure the unfinished potion mixture did not get too hot or cold.


    At the very least, this process was far easier for her than any other alchemist, as she both practiced a fire-based cultivation mantra and had a fire rted divine body¡­


    For Qing Yi, controlling the temperature of the fire was the least of her concerns and soon enough, she had finished adding in all the spiritual herbs except the Smoldering Earth Flower without any problems¡­


    "Hah!"


    Taking a deep breath as she knew that the most difficult part of the brewing process was about to start, Qing Yi gently ced the Smoldering Earth Flower into the potion mixture.


    If she was not careful during this process, Qing Yi knew that the fire qi inside the spiritual herb might end up going out of control. Ruining the potion mixture and directly eliminating her from the alchemy trial!


    Fwoosh!


    As the Smoldering Earth Flower entered the potion mixture, Qing Yi instantly felt the temperature of the mixture increase rapidly, as the colour changed into a crimson red.


    FWOOSH!


    This was already something she had expected, and Qing Yi did not only not try to lower the temperature of the unfinished potion mixture, but instead did her best to increase it even further.


    This was the final step of the brewing process for the potion she had chosen to make, and it was also the most dangerous part of the brewing process.


    During this process, Qing Yi would have to increase the temperature constantly until reaching a certain point, or the unfinished potion mixture would explode.


    The reason for this, was that after adding in the Smoldering Earth Flower, the potion mixture changed from a mostly harmless mixture, into what could in essence be called an active bomb that would explode if it got too cold¡­


    Why this happened? Qing Yi had no idea and the potion recipe did not exin why the Smoldering Earth Flower turned the rtively harmless potion mixture into some sort of weird bomb that would explode if it got too cold and the temperature didn''t increase fast enough¡­


    FWOOOSH!


    For now, all Qing Yi had to do, was make sure she kept steadily increasing the temperature of the potion mixture!

 Chapter 448 - End Of Second Test

    <h4>Chapter 448 - End Of Second Test</h4>


    Following the constant increase in temperature of the me, Qing Yi suddenly began to feel herself losing control over the me under the cauldron.


    The reason for this, was not that she couldn''t control the me herself. After all, she had controlled way hotter and more dangerous mes when she had fought people in the past. Instead, it was the pressure covering the mountain that had begun to interfere with her me after it reached had reached a certain level!


    At first, Qing Yi had only thought it would affect her physical strength. However, now the pressure had begun to influence her control of the fire!


    If not for the fact that she was naturally gifted when it came to fire maniption, Qing Yi was certain that she would have lost control of the me below the cauldron and in turn ended up causing the potion mixture to explode!


    Not to mention it exploding because it got too cold, the potion mixture could also explode if the temperature increased too quickly!


    Fwoosh!


    Having first-hand experienced how the pressure from the mountain had begun to influence her control over the me, Qing Yi grew even more cautious as she did her utmost to make sure that the me steadily continued to increase in temperature along with the potion mixture.


    This time around, Qing Yi also paid way more attention to the pressure that covered the mountain in case it caused even more problems than it already had. Thest thing she wanted, was for it to suddenly mess up her control once again and catch her off-guard at a crucial moment¡­


    With this in mind, Qing Yi carefully observed as the potion mixture got closer and closer topletion.


    "Only a little bit more¡­"


    Muttering this to herself as she watched the crimson red potion mixture begin to settle down, Qing Yi narrowed her eyes dangerously. Not daring to rx in the slightest.


    Failing on the second test was one thing and failing just before passing the second test was another. Thetter was way more painful than the first¡­


    Blob~


    Along with the mixture bubbling wildly for a few seconds, Qing Yi smiled happily as she watched the potion mixture suddenly calm down before turning from a crimson red colour into a more orange colour.


    Looking at the potion mixture, Qing Yi knew that she had seeded and quickly retracted the mes below the cauldron, while waiting for the alchemy trial to take away her potion mixture and give her the points forpleting the second test.


    This time around, Qing Yi did not dare to have any thoughts about the remaining spiritual herbs. After all, she had just lost five points recently due to her trying to take away some of the spiritual herbs from the alchemy trial¡­


    Whoosh~


    Just as Qing Yi had expected a few seconds after she hadpleted the potion using the Smoldering Earth Flower, she watched the cauldron filled with the potion mixture sink into the ground before disappearing from sight.


    Not paying too much attention to where the potion mixture had disappeared to, Qing Yi instead focused on the small stone b with her information written on it, as she focused on the area where her points were noted down slowly begin to change.


    "35 points¡­"


    Seeing the number change from five to thirty-five, Qing Yi soon looked away and focused on the path leading further up the mountain that had be visible after shepleted the second test.


    "I wonder how many managed to pass the second test¡­"


    Thinking out loud as she gazed back towards the ce where the cauldron had been just a second ago, Qing Yi had a feeling that the second test should have eliminated quite a few people among the twenty remaining participants¡­


    "Hah¡­ No use thinking about that¡­" Shaking her head as she thought about this, Qing Yi focused back onto the path leading towards the next test with a determined look.


    From the second test, Qing Yi had already realized that the tests increased by quite a lot in difficultypared to thest and the dangers involved were not small either.


    Just looking at the fact that every single one of the recipes avable to her that used the Smoldering Earth Flower could explode at some point during both the preparation and brewing process, Qing Yi felt that the danger during the third test might even directly threaten her life!


    Not that she thought the Artisan Alchemist would just allow them to die inside the alchemy trial, but it would never be wrong to be on the safe side in case something unexpected happened¡­


    Thinking about the uing third test and the dangers that might be involved in the test, Qing Yi began making her way up the narrow mountain path that had appeared just after she cleared the second test.


    No matter how hard the third test was, Qing Yi was determined to pass it! If she could pass it, she was certain that she would be among the top of the participants and at that time would be guaranteed an extremely good reward!


    Just thinking about the spiritual herbs, she would be rewarded with for getting into the top five caused Qing Yi''s determination to reach an entirely new level¡­


    ¡­


    Outside the alchemy trial, Xuan Hao was happily smiling to himself as he watched Qing Yi sessfully pass through the second test before moving on to the third test of the alchemy trial.


    From looking at how the other participants were preforming in the third test; Xuan Hao could tell that the third test was likely to be thest and at the same time most difficult¡­


    Other than that, Xuan Hao spent most of his time going over the Drifting Cloud Steps without paying too much attention to anything else happening around him.


    Given that the enemies of Yi Min had already been dealt with together with the demonic rat and the demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao did not feel like anything more could happen.


    After all, Yi Min had in a sense experienced three different enemy groups that could destroy her kingdom if she was not careful¡­ There was no way she would be unlucky enough to encounter a fourth enemy on the same day¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was rxing while eating some of the snacks inside the spectator room, Fang Shi was looking over towards the area where the participants who had been eliminated during the alchemy trial was located with a depressed expression on his face.


    Fifteen people! Fifteen out of the twenty who had moved on to the final stage and entered the alchemy trial had been eliminated during the second test!


    Even if he had expected for arge number of the participants to be eliminated during the second test, he had never expected for so many of them to be eliminated!


    Not to mention the reason why they had all been eliminated was that they had all chosen the same Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb!


    The Smoldering Earth Flower!


    Somehow, the spiritual herb had ended up among most of the participants choices and in the end most of the participants had ended up choosing this spiritual herb!


    It was not that he didn''t understand their reason, as the Smoldering Earth Flower looked like a simple fire based spiritual herb from the outside¡­ But Fang Shi knew very well that this was not the case!


    Not only was the Smoldering Earth Flower among one of the most difficult spiritual herbs to prepare and use for its grade, but it also tended to explode with the smallest mistake during the preparation and concocting /brewing process!


    During thest half hour, Fang Shi had already exhausted himself quite a bit in an attempt to safe the unfortunate participants who messed up and caused an explosion¡­


    To make a pill or potion using the Smoldering Earth Flower, was a task that took the utmost precision when it came to both control of fire and preparing the spiritual herb itself!


    "Someone actually seeded¡­"


    For this reason, Fang Shi was extremely surprised when he witnessed Qing Yi sessfully make a potion using the Smoldering Earth Flower!


    Among more than half the participants who had ended up trying to make a pill using the Smoldering Earth Flower, Qing Yi was the only person who had seeded and moved on to the third test!


    "Looks like I was not wrong about her!"


    Smiling to himself as he thought his earlier judgment of her was indeed correct, Fang Shi could not help but look over towards the crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom and the little girl who had already started the third test of the alchemy trial.


    Looking at these three young people, Fang Shi had a feeling that his future disciple would likely end up being among one of them. Deep down, he hoped that it would be one of the two girls, as his first disciple, Cai Yu, would notin to him if she ended up getting a cute junior sister instead of a smelly junior brother who chased after her¡­

 Chapter 449 - Coral Jellyfish And Endless Sea Of Mist...

    <h4>Chapter 449 - Coral Jellyfish And Endless Sea Of Mist...</h4>


    Proceeding up the narrow mountain path that had appeared after she had finished the second test, Qing Yi soon found herself walking up a set of worn-down stone steps leading up towards an ancient looking tform that had been built into the side of the mountain.


    The difference in testing groundpared to thest two test was obvious from the get-go, as Qing Yi had a feeling that the third test would be different from the first two test that had both required her to make a potion of some sort to move on to the next test.


    This feeling was soon turned into reality, as Qing Yi made her way up the stone steps and up on the ancient tform.


    In front of her, Qing Yi saw no cauldron or spiritual herbs like thest two test. Instead, there was almost nothing on top of the ancient tform.


    The only thing that remained the same as thest two test, was the stone b on the ground that had her information recorded on it. The points she had obtained remained the same asst she checked just before making her way up towards the third test.


    Not that she had expected to somehow gain any points from making her way up to the third test¡­


    Outside of this, the only out of the ordinary thing on top of the ancient tform was a small pedestal with a potion bottle on top of it.


    Looking over at the potion bottle from a distance with a curious look on her face, Qing Yi could see an almost gaseous liquid that was silver in colour swirling around inside of the potion bottle.


    However, this was not what caught Qing Yi''s attention. Instead, it was the potion bottle itself!


    The potion bottle was in the shape of some sort of coral-like sea creature. Making Qing Yi wonder just how she would even be able to ess the liquid inside of the potion given the weird shape of the potion bottle itself¡­


    Was the third test perhaps for her to try and find a way to ess the liquid inside the potion?


    Thinking about this, Qing Yi could not help but shake her head. No matter how strange the third test would end up being, Qing Yi didn''t expect for it to just be her opening a weirdly shaped potion bottle. After all, it was called an alchemy trial¡­ Not a potion opening trial!


    Walking up to the weirdly shaped potion bottle before picking it up and inspecting it, Qing Yi soon found an opening located towards the top of the potion bottle in one of the¡­ Tentacles? Of the weird sea creature that the potion bottle had taken the shape of.


    Plop!


    Without waiting around, Qing Yi directly opened the potion bottle. Not that there was much else she could do given the potion bottle was the only thing present so far on the ancient tform and her way further up the mountain was still blocked off by the mist.


    Whoosh~


    Following the opening of the potion bottle the gaseous silver coloured liquid inside the bottle suddenly turnedpletely gaseous and floated out of the potion bottle before Qing Yi had the time to react.


    "Wha-"


    Watching the now silver coloured gas rush out of the potion bottle before forming into arge sea creature eerily simr to the potion bottle in her hand, Qing Yi prepared herself to fight. After all, the appearance of the sea creature formed from the silver-coloured gas looked nothing short of some kind of nightmarish sea monster that would keep most people far away from the sea¡­


    The only reason why Qing Yi did not attack the sea creature that had formed from the silver-coloured gas, was because she had lost most, if not all of her power under the pressure of the mountain.


    Even if she fought with the sea creature, Qing Yi doubted she would be much stronger than someone at theter stages of the Qi Condensation Realm in her current state¡­


    Whoosh~


    Before Qing Yi even had the time to react, the nightmarish sea creature extended its long tentacles and directly grabbed onto the sides of the ancient looking tform before slowly floating upwards. Carrying the tform along with it¡­


    "¡­"


    Watching the entire thing unfold as the tform slowly moved further up the mountain, Qing Yi remained rooted on the same spot. Looking up towards the giant sea creature floating just above her as it carried the tform upwards.


    Looking a bit closer, Qing Yi realized that the now giant sea creature looked a bit like some kind of weird merger between a coral and a jellyfish.


    A coral jellyfish?


    Bang!


    As she was lost in thought thinking about just what kind of creature the weird coral jellyfish floating above her was, the loud sound of the ancient tform being put down on the ground again directly interrupted her train of thought.


    Along with the tform being put down again, Qing Yi suddenly felt the weirdly shaped potion bottle still firmly held in her hand fly out her hand beforending at the pedestal at the centre of the ancient tform.


    Whoosh~


    Before Qing Yi had any time to react, the coral jellyfish floating above her suddenly turned back into a gaseous liquid again before entering the potion bottle.


    Everything happened over only a few seconds and by the time Qing Yi recovered from the shock of what had just happened, the potion bottle had already mysteriously disappeared along with the pedestal at the centre of the ancient tform.


    "What in the world just happened¡­?"


    Muttering this quietly to herself as she looked over at the centre of the ancient tform with a bewildered look on her face, Qing Yi felt like she had just witnessed one of the oddest things since she was born¡­


    At the same time, Qing Yi had also realized that the ancient tform was not the ce where the third test was going to take ce. Instead, it was only a form of transport for her to reach the third test located higher up on the mountain.


    Looking out over the edge of the ancient tform, Qing Yi could not help but show an amazed look on her face.


    The reason for this was that beyond the mountain she was currently on top of, Qing Yi could see over the mist that surrounded the base of the mountain when she had first made her way up the mountain!


    From her point of view, Qing Yi saw an endless sea of mist covering everything as far as the horizon went. Along the way, Qing Yi could see several mountains simr to her own sticking out from the seemingly endless sea of mist that covered everything in sight.


    "The other participants should be on one of those mountains¡­"


    Saying this to herself, Qing Yi tried her best to see if she could spot any of the other participants on the other mountains in the endless sea of mist.


    However, this onlysted for a short moment, as Qing Yi soon gave up due to how far away the other mountains were and the fact that there were way more than just twenty mountains inside the alchemy trial from what she could see, and she did not feel like spending the next few hours looking over all the mountains just to try and spot one of the other participants¡­


    Turning her attention back towards inspecting the ce she had just arrived at; Qing Yi ignored the usual small stone b with her information on it and began seizing up the cave in front of her.


    Different from thest two tests, Qing Yi saw no cauldron or other alchemy rted tool inside the cave. Instead, she saw a few words etched into the side of the cave entrance.


    "Find your way through the mist and reach the other side¡­ A maze¡­?"


    Muttering this to herself, Qing Yi realized that the cave in front of her was not a cave, but instead an entrance to what she assumed to be some sort of maze.


    The only question in her mind at the moment was¡­ How in the world was her finding her way through a maze rted to alchemy!?


    Only letting out a short sigh as she thought about how weird the third test was, Qing Yi made her way into the maze. Not knowing what awaited her inside.


    ¡­


    At the same time outside the alchemy trial, Xuan Hao was looking down towards therge cauldron located on the tform with an increasingly curious expression on his face.


    Simr to Qing Yi, he had also seen the seemingly endless space inside the alchemy trial and could not help but grow curious about just what kind of artifact the cauldron was.


    Even if it was notparable to an independent space like the secret realm he had been to in the past, Xuan Hao was still amazed at the sheer size of the space inside the cauldron.


    He really wanted to figure out just how the cauldron could have such arge space inside of it¡­

 Chapter 450 - Maze Of Challenges

    <h4>Chapter 450 - Maze Of Challenges</h4>


    Back inside the alchemy trial, Qing Yi had taken her first step inside the maze that led inside the mountain. Only to discover that the all too familiar mist had once again appeared and silently covered up the entrance to the maze behind her.


    After entering the maze, she had no way back out! Not that she really had any n to leave, as it would mean she gave up on the alchemy trial!


    Having entered the maze, the first thing Qing Yi noticed, was that the cave walls around the entrance hadpletely disappeared. Reced by a sea of mist that had formed into high walls reaching far up into the sky.


    Even the rocky cave floor had changed to be the same as the sea of mist she had seen surrounding her own along with the other mountains inside the alchemy trial. The only thing catching her off-guard, was the fact that she could walk on top of the mist without sinking through it.


    Finished observing her new surroundings, Qing Yi began to make her way deeper into the maze of mist that she now found herself inside of. Hopefully, she would soon find out just what the maze of mist was about¡­


    ¡­


    Observing as Qing Yi entered the maze of mist from the outside, Fang Shi could not help smiling a bit to himself as he looked forward to her performance.


    The third test was quite specialpared to thest two test where the participants only had to make a pill or potion.


    For them to proceed, they would be forced through several different challenges. From something simple like identifying an unknown spiritual herb, to brewing a specific pill within a certain timeframe.


    In the end, the main difficulty from the third test came from the different challenges that the participants would encounter inside of the maze itself.


    Withoutpleting said challenges, the participants would have no way to move forward!


    The only saving grace for the participants was the fact that they would always have more than one challenge to chose from. Instead of just being locked to a single choice.


    The main reason why this had been imnted in the alchemy trial, was because the sess rate for passing the third test without more than one choice, had dropped to nearly zero percent for alchemists not yet at the peak of the Expert Alchemist Realm¡­


    The third test was only made to test Expert Alchemists! Not Peak Expert Alchemists!


    Focusing his attention back onto Qing Yi currently making her way towards the first challenge inside the maze, Fang Shi prepared to closely observe her this time around. At the very least, he did not have too many other people to keep an eye on now that most of them had been eliminated.


    Other than that, both the crown prince from the Dark Sky Kingdom and the young girl who had entered the third test before anyone else were stuck at one of the challenges for now and the other participants who had also reached the third test were not really doing too well at the moment¡­


    ¡­


    Back inside the maze made up of mist, Qing Yi encountered her first challenge and finally understood what the maze inside the alchemy trial was about, as she quickly decided to pick the easiest challenge presented to her. Identifying an Earth Grade Spiritual Herb.


    Even if she did not know about too many spiritual herbs yet, Qing Yi still managed to easily pass through the first challenge as it was not too difficult for her and even if she couldn''t figure out what spiritual herb it was, she could always turn back and try the other challenge.


    Feeling extremely rxed as she followed the path opening up in front of her afterpleting the first challenge, Qing Yi suddenly saw arge hourss that turned around the moment she passed the first challenge.


    "After passing through the first challenge, you will have three hours to pass through the maze of challenges before the time runs out. Good luck¡­ I have a time limit!?" Reading out the words that had formed next to the hourss, Qing Yi could not help but feel herself panicking a bit before quickly making her way over towards the next challenge.


    Now that she knew that she only had a limited amount of time to make it through the maze toplete the third test, Qing Yi felt that she couldn''t waste any time just standing around.


    The most important thing now was to make it through the maze before the time ran out!


    Like this, Qing Yi began making her way through the challenges inside the maze. Given that the participants would only have three hours to make it through the maze, the challenges inside were mostly designed to be short and quick to go through. So, within a short period of time, Qing Yi had soon found herself face to face with her with her first ever dead-end.


    "Hah¡­ It is after all a maze¡­"


    Qing Yi who had taken the easiest challenges along the way so far could only let out a sad sigh as she began making her way back towards the other challenge, she had decided to ignore earlier for the easier challenge that just needed her to find a fire based spiritual herb among a few dozen different spiritual herbs¡­


    The challenge really was way too easy for her to ignore and in the end, she had just ended up finding a dead-end on the other side afterpleting the challenge¡­


    Reaching the crossroad where she had chosen to take the easier path, Qing Yi regretfully made her way over towards the harder challenge that required her to concoct a pill¡­


    Yes! Instead of a potion, the challenge wanted her to concoct a pill!


    Even though it was only an Earth Grade Pill, it would still be difficult for Qing Yi. After all, she had spent most of her time making potions instead of pills like most mainstream alchemists did.


    Even if the two were pretty much the same when it came to preparation of ingredients, there was still a few unique aspects to pill making that Qing Yi was not so confident in. Mainly the fact that she had to use a pill furnace instead of a cauldron.


    "A cauldron is so much easier to usepared to this thing¡­"


    Having made her way to pill furnace, Qing Yi began reading through the instructions for the challenge before looking over the spiritual herbs avable to her. At the very least she did not have to learn a new recipe, but just had to use the ingredients already present to make a pill that had reached the Earth Grade.


    Remembering the easiest and quickest pill that she could make with the present spiritual herbs, Qing Yi quickly prepared all of them before preparing for the next step.


    "I really hate this part¡­"


    Picking up one of the spiritual herbs she needed, Qing Yi conjured forth a small me and began to slowly refine the already prepared spiritual herb with it.


    Compared to potion brewing where she could just directly add in the prepared spiritual herbs, pill making required an extra step, the refining of the prepared spiritual herb to remove any impurities inside of it!


    This entire process waspletely removed when brewing a potion, as the impurities would automatically be burned off during the brewing phase, but pill making was not the same, as it required the spiritual herbs to be liquified before being slowly formed into a pill shape.


    During this process, there was no time to slowly allow the impurities to be burned off. If the impurities were not removed earlier on, they would end up bing a part of the slowly forming pill inside the pill furnace with no way to escape as they would end up merging together with the pill itself.


    After a gruelling half hour of refining the spiritual herbs, Qing Yi finally threw the spiritual herbs inside the pill furnace as she carefully controlled the mes around it to make sure that the pill came out smoothly.


    At this point in time, Qing Yi suddenly understood why there were so many fake alchemists out there¡­ If she had to go through the boring and tedious refining process every time, she wanted to make something, she would probably also end up skipping it at some point to save a little time¡­


    The only thing that left her a bit confused, was the fact that those fake alchemists had not turned towards potions instead of pills.


    After all, in Qing Yi''s eyes, potions were way easier to makepared to pills that required one to go through a gruelling refining process every time one wanted to make something!


    "Finally finished!"


    After another twenty minutes, Qing Yi let out a sigh of relief as a small pill rolled out of the pill furnace and into her hand.


    Whoosh~


    cing the small pill on top of a nearby empty pedestal, Qing Yi watched a path reveal itself. This time around, it was not a dead-end!


    She really would not know what to do if she had used close to a third of her time on a dead-end path¡­

 Chapter 451 - Last Challenge

    <h4>Chapter 451 - Last Challenge</h4>


    Havingpleted the challenge that required her to make a pill, Qing Yi soon passed through a few more challenges, with nothing too hard. However, Qing Yi still began to worry, as she only had one hour left and had yet to find her way out of the maze.


    Not to mention finding her way out of the maze, Qing Yi did not even have any idea if there was anything special about the different paths that would indicate that they led towards the exit!


    So, all she could do, was try andplete as many challenges as possible and hope to find the way out¡­


    ¡­


    "Another time consuming one¡­"


    Looking towards the three different challenges that had appeared in front of her, Qing Yi could not help but smile wryly as she realized that every single one of the challenges were incredibly time consuming.


    One of the challenges was for her to concoct a Spirit Grade Pill. Another wanted her to brew a Spirit Grade Potion, while thest of the three challenges wanted her to make both an Earth Grade Pill and an Earth Grade Potion!


    No matter how she looked at it, Qing Yi felt that she would only have time to make a single pill or potion. So, without thinking too much about, Qing Yi decided to make the Spirit Grade Potion.


    It was after all what she would be mostfortable with and have the easiest time making¡­


    "I wonder what kind of potion it will be¡­" Muttering this to herself as she made her way over towards the challenge, Qing Yi soon spotted the all too familiar cauldron and other alchemy tools.


    Reading through the challenge that was neatly described by a few words on a nearby wall of mist, Qing Yi could not help but let out a sigh of relief.


    The challenge only wanted a Spirit Grade Potion made, there was no requirement for a specific potion or anything along that line. On the other hand, there was even a few recipes for different Spirit Grade Potionsid out on a small table that all used the spiritual herbs present for her!


    Given that she had just recently be an Expert Alchemist and she did not really know too many Spirit Grade Potion Recipes outside of the one she had used to breakthrough to the Expert Realm. So, the fact that there were recipes present for her was a god sent helping hand.


    As without it, she really had no idea what to do, if she ended up not knowing any Spirit Grade Potion Recipes using the spiritual herbs, she had been given for the challenge¡­


    Feeling that the challenge would not be too hard for her toplete, Qing Yi let out a sigh of relief as she began reading over the recipes before deciding on which potion she wanted to make.


    However, at this moment, Qing Yi slowly began to realize that things would not be as easy as she had expected and the Reason for this was simple¡­


    All the recipes on the small table were for higher level Spirit Grade Potions! Not a single one of them were for early-stage Expert Alchemists like herself, like she had secretly hoped for!


    Let alone making such a potion on the first try, Qing Yi even doubted that she would be able to make such a potion without a time limit!


    ¡­


    Able to see what was happening inside the alchemy trial, Xuan Hao had also read what Qing Yi''s challenge was about and could not help but grow a bit nervous for his disciple. After all, she only had around one hour left to make apletely unfamiliar Spirit Grade Potion!


    And from the look on her face, Xuan Hao could instantly tell that it would not be an easy one¡­ At the very least he already knew that his disciple had reached thest challenge, as long as she managed to pass through her current challenge, she would sessfully manage to pass through the third test and move on to the fourth test!


    Only two people had made it to the fourth test so far, the young girl and the crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom¡­


    Not only would she be able to move on to the fourth test of the alchemy trial if she made it through the current challenge, but she would also directly enter the top three in the alchemypetition!


    "Qing Yi! You have to make it!"


    "Go Qing Yi! If you can make it through the third test, I will give you a few spiritual herbs from my personal collection when we get back!"


    "You can do it!"


    At the same time, the elders beside him were all cheering as they remained fully focused on what Qing Yi was currently doing.


    The same could be said for the rest of the crowd of spectators, as currently, the other two had yet to reach the site of the fourth test.


    As for the rest of the participants? They had already been eliminated in the third test. Making Qing Yi the only person left inside the third test!


    If not her, who else could the spectators watch at this point?


    Seeing everyone having focused their attention on Qing Yi, as there was even a group of people cheering her on among the crowd of spectators, Xuan Hao could not help smiling happily to himself.


    The only thing that caused him to feel a bit conflicted over therge amount of attention that his disciple had gotten all of a sudden, was the fact that the Artisan Alchemist, Fang Shi, was also paying quite a bit attention to his disciple.


    Even beginning to smile approvingly while nodding his head as Qing Yi began the brewing process!


    This old man is having thoughts about my disciple!


    Clearly understand the look of the old Artisan Alchemist, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he nced down towards the old man at the centre of the tform with therge cauldron.


    No matter what, he would have to make sure the old man kept his hands off his disciple¡­


    "Hm? Why do I feel like someone is staring at me? Wait¡­ Could they have discovered the tail?!"


    At the same time down at the tform, Fang Shi suddenly felt someone looking at him as he began panicking. Thinking that someone other than his disciple might have discovered his new permanent limb on his back¡­


    "Yi Min¡­"


    Thinking that he had discovered the person looking at him, Fang Shi could not help smiling wryly as he looked up towards the ce where Yi Min was located. Only to be met with theughing eyes of his old friend who had indeed discovered the tail now permanently situated at his behind¡­.


    However, even when he knew that Yi Min was the one who had been looking at him, Fang Shi could not help but feel that something was wrong.


    The gaze he had felt earlier should have been different from the one Yi Min was giving him¡­ But he could not find out if it really was a different person or just Yi Min having a bit of fun teasing him after finding out about the tail¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Shaking his head, Fang Shi decided not to think about this any longer as he returned his focus back towards the participants inside the alchemy trial.


    Not only had Qing Yi''s performance exceeded his expectations, but the young girl that had suddenly appeared as a contender for first ce out of nowhere hadpletely caught him off-guard!


    Not only was she the youngest among all of the participants, but she might even be the strongest among them as well!


    Such a talent was not something he wanted to miss and for the first time since the start of the alchemypetition, Fang Shi began thinking about whether or not he should take in more than one personal disciple after the end of the alchemypetition¡­


    Even if he ignored the crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom, both Qing Yi and the young girl currently at the fourth test, were more than qualified to be his personal disciples!


    To top it all off, both of them were girls, so there was no chance of his first personal disciple, Cai Yu, being resistant to him taking both of them under his wing!


    Whoosh~


    Feeling that he had struck gold with the alchemypetition that he had decided to host, Fang Shi forgot about the fact that he had recently gained a permanent tail on his back, as it unintentionally became visible for the surrounding elders from the Iron Sky Kingdom stationed nearby to see.


    Realizing his mistake almost instantly, Fang Shi quickly hid it away, but it was far toote¡­ The elders had already seen the small rabbit tail, as they soon began looking over towards him with a weird look on their faces.


    "¡­"


    I need to get this bloody tail removed as quickly as possible!


    Not even wanting to think about how his friends back in the capital of the Sky Empire would react to his new tail, Fang Shi became even more determined to remove the tail as quickly as possible after the end of the alchemypetition!

 Chapter 452 - End Of The Third Test!

    <h4>Chapter 452 - End Of The Third Test!</h4>


    Faced with the reality that she had less than one hour left before her time ran out; Qing Yi was fully focused on the task of making the potion. Completely ignoring her surroundings, as all that was left in her eyes was the spiritual herbs along with the cauldron. Not that there was much for her to look at given the fact that she was still inside the maze of mist¡­


    With all of this and the attention of the people outside focused on her, Qing Yi slowly progressed as the potion mixture managed to reach the final stage without any issue!


    Reaching this point, Qing Yi was extremely nervous, but she did not let even the slightest bit of this show as she carefully controlled the potion mixture inside the cauldron. Beginning to slowly lower the temperature ording to the recipe before adding in the final and most important spiritual herb, the Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb!


    Blop~


    As the spiritual herb entered the almost finished potion mixture, Qing Yi nervously began to lower the temperature of the potion mixture even further until shepletely extinguished the mes beneath the cauldron.


    Normally, the potion mixture would be finished at this point and could be added to potion bottles for consumption, but the potion she was currently making was quite unique, as it still had one more step left until it was finished and that was¡­


    Whoosh!


    Freezing it!


    Given that it was her first time freezing up a potion mixture and the fact that she was a cultivator practising fire qi, Qing Yi was forced to borrow some of the spiritual herbs with ice qi inside of them to aid the process.


    Far from something she had wanted to do, as her control over the ice qi when it froze the potion mixture would be abysmal¡­


    At the very least, the cauldron with the potion mixture inside of it could not move and she just needed to freeze the potion mixture. Not really something that required any real control so to speak of.


    Whoosh~


    "Hah¡­ So exhausting¡­ Hah¡­ I hope it seeded¡­"


    As the potion mixture became solid, Qing Yi exhaustedly sat down on the ground to recover some of her strength before moving on to inspect the inside of the cauldron.


    Using the ice qi to freeze the potion mixture was an extremely exhausting endeavour under the pressure of the mountain and at the same time ice qi was an unfamiliar qi to her, as she was a fire cultivator.


    Remaining on the ground for a good minute to catch her breath, Qing Yi managed to restore some of her strength.


    "I should finish it up before the time runs out¡­"


    Muttering this to herself, Qing Yi stood back up before moving over towards the cauldron where the potion mixture had already turned into a solid block.


    Crack!


    Picking up a random metal tool from the small table next to the cauldron, Qing Yi broke some of the solid potion mixture into small chunks before finding a potion bottle that she quickly filled up to the brim with the chunks of frozen potion mixture before cing it on top of the pedestal.


    Whoosh!


    Seeing the potion bottle slowly disappear along with the pedestal, Qing Yi could not help but let out a sigh of relief inside her mind as she watched a new path appear in front of her.


    She had seeded!


    Not only had she seeded, but she had also managed to make such a unique ''potion''!


    If it could even be called a potion in the first ce. After all, it was just a potion bottle filled with small chunks of potion mixture that could be eaten like pills¡­


    To be honest, Qing Yi felt that the chunks of frozen potion mixture was quite a unique way to make weirdly shaped pills without the use of a pill furnace and she felt that it would be quite interesting to explore some time in the future¡­ But for now, she had to first finish the alchemy trial and with it the alchemypetition!


    Not thinking too much more about the weird frozen potion mixture chunks she had just made, Qing Yi rushed over towards the path that had just opened up. Hoping that she would soon be able to finish the maze of mist and challenges, as she had begun to grow quite exhausted over the past few hours that the alchemy trial hadsted so far.


    ¡­


    Reaching the end of the path, Qing Yi could not help but let a small smile appear on her lips as she discovered an entrance leading out of the maze inside the mountain at the end of the path.


    Whoosh~


    Not standing around too long after discovering that the path led back out of the maze inside the mountain, Qing Yi soon found herself back outside at a small ledge with the all too familiar and narrow mountain path leading further up the mountain.


    For now, Qing Yi ignored the path leading further up the mountain and instead scanned over the small ledge in search of the small stone b that recorded her points.


    Even if she had no idea how many points the other participants had gotten, Qing Yi was still curious about just how many points she had gained from making it through the maze of mist filled with all sorts of challenges inside the mountain¡­


    "Ah- there it is¡­ 137 points!"


    Spotting the small stone b with her information recorded down on it, Qing Yi could not help showing a slightly surprised look on her face. After all, she had gained 102 points just for the third test alone! That was more than a hundred points for only a single test!


    At the first test she had gained 10 points and then on the second test 30 points before finally gaining over a hundred points on the third test¡­


    From this, Qing Yi felt like the number of points she gained frompleting each test should be increasing around three times with each test she managed to pass through¡­ With this in mind, she would most likely gain 300 points or more by making it through the fourth test!


    Thinking about this, Qing Yi looked over towards the narrow mountain path leading further up the mountain with a bit of hesitation on her face.


    She had only barely managed to pass through the third test before the time ran out.


    From this alone, Qing Yi could tell that she had already reached her limit and she would likely not have any chance of passing through the fourth test of the alchemy trial.


    Even then, giving up at this point in time was really not something she wanted to do and even if she ended up failing in the fourth test, she would not end up losing all her points. At least she would be able to experience the fourth test and maybe even gain something from it.


    For example, during thest challenge in the third test, she had learned about the weird chunks of frozen potion mixture.


    If she could learn something unique like that during the fourth test, Qing Yi would really regret just giving up at this point without even trying.


    Not to mention all of this, she would likely also be given a bunch of free high-level potion recipes whenever she started a new test. This alone was more than enough reason for Qing Yi to try out the fourth test. Even if she knew that she was highly likely to fail¡­


    Her master was also watching her, so there was no way she could just give up without even trying!


    Having made up her mind after thinking about it for a short moment, Qing Yi decided to make her way up towards the fourth test.


    ¡­


    "She passed through the third test!"


    "Qing Yi really made it¡­"


    "She managed to enter the top three¡­? Old Jin, I think I''m dreaming! Quick, pinch me!"


    At the same time outside the alchemy trial, the elders of the Flying Sword Sect were all ovee with happiness as they watched Qing Yi just barely pass through the third test and solidify her spot in the top three of the alchemypetition!


    This was far beyond what any of them had ever imagined beforehand, as back then, most of them would have been more than happy with her making it to the top twenty¡­


    Sitting a short distance away from the elders, as they happily chatted among themselves like a group of excited sport fans cheering on their favourite yer, Xuan Hao could not help but smile a bit as he was infected by the happy atmosphere created by the elders.


    "Ouch! Old Jin!? Why did you pinch me!?"


    "You were the one who asked me to, you old fool!"


    "ying innocent now? Hmph! Watch how I return the favour!"


    "¡­"


    Just as quickly, the happy atmosphere disappeared because some of the elders suddenly began fighting among themselves for reasons Xuan Hao didn''t want to think about¡­

 Chapter 453 - Only One Person Left In The Alchemy Trial!

    <h4>Chapter 453 - Only One Person Left In The Alchemy Trial!</h4>


    Making her way up the narrow mountain path, Qing Yi soon climbed up a few steep stone steps etched into the rocky mountainside.


    "This should be the fourth test¡­"


    Reaching the top of the steep stone steps, Qing Yi could not help widening her eyes in amazement upon witnessing therge open garden that appeared in front of her filled with all sorts of different spiritual herbs.


    Feeling a bit confused over why there was suddenly such arge spiritual herb garden in front of her, Qing Yi soon began to inspect the spiritual herbs inside of it.


    "Earth Root Flower, Blooming Fire Lotus¡­ Scorching Earth Flower!?"


    Not only could she see several Spirit Grade Herbs growing inside the giant herb garden, but she even managed to catch a glimpse of the Scorching Earth Flower, a Soul Grade Spiritual Herb, and the upgraded version of the Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb, Smoldering Earth Flower, that she had used during the second test!


    From this alone, Qing Yi realized that the fourth test was already on a level of its ownpared to the past three tests she had gone through!


    For a Soul Grade Spiritual Herb to be present, it likely meant that the fourth test might require her to make a Soul Grade Potion!


    "There is no way¡­"


    Just thinking about making a Soul Grade Potion made Qing Yi lose any confidence she had at making it through the fourth test.


    Not to mention making a Soul Grade Potion, Qing Yi had never even seen a Soul Grade Potion before! The strongest alchemist she had seen was her master, who''s level she still had no idea about.


    Other than that, Qing Yi had only really interacted with the alchemists of the Alchemy Hall, who were all at the Expert Realm, with the best being half a step into the Artisan Realm!


    Now that she understood the difficulty of the uing fourth test, Qing Yi could not help but feel that her chances of making it to the fifth test was non-existent¡­


    "Hah¡­ No use thinking about it, I will just do my best and make sure master is proud of me!"


    Muttering this to herself as she quickly shook her head, Qing Yi made her way up thest stone step and made her way along the small path going through the garden filled with spiritual herbs. Trying her best to control herself from attempting to take away any of the spiritual herbs¡­


    ¡­


    "Ei, I got eliminated, I wonder what the fourth test was about. Only three people managed to reach it so far¡­"


    "Everyone! Two of them are out! Let''s go and ask about the fourth test!"


    At the same time outside the alchemy trial, both the crown prince and the young girl who Qing Yi had been chatting with during the earlier stages of the alchemypetition hade out and were currently being surrounded by the other participants as they asked them about the fourth test of the alchemy trial.


    The reason for this was because the light projections showing what was happening inside the alchemy trial were located high in the sky at a rtively awkward angle that prevented those not in the spectator seats from seeing clearly, so all of them were curious about what the fourth test was about.


    After all,pared to the elders from the Iron Sky Kingdom, these young alchemists had not yet developed their divine sense and simply had no way to watch what was happening inside the alchemy trial.


    All they could do was ask each other or the elders located around the tform with Fang Shi and the giant cauldron on top of it.


    In that regard¡­ The elders were less than useful¡­ All the information some of the young alchemists had gathered about the fourth test was that it was something about spiritual herbs¡­


    Truly¡­ The young alchemists had no idea what to say when they got this answer¡­


    It was alchemy! Which part of it doesn''t involve spiritual herbs!?


    "Haha, both of you did really well during the fourth test! From the looks of it, it will be quite close when ites to the top three!"


    Before any of the participants could make their way over towards the young girl and crown prince who just came out from the alchemy trial, Fang Shi beat them to it, as he came over with a look of praise on his face. Clearly the two young alchemists had managed to impress him during the alchemy trial.


    "Thanks a lot for your praise elder!"


    Bowing her head politely upon receiving the praise from Fang Shi, the crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom had apletely different reaction, as a surprised expression appeared on his face.


    "Top three!? How can that be!? I should clearly be the best¡­"


    Quietly muttering this to himself as he gazed down towards the rtively small young girl who hade out along with him, the crown prince did not know what to say as he suddenly realized that his n of bing the second personal disciple of Fang Shi no longer seemed as certain as before¡­


    Not to mention first ce, from what Fang Shi said, the crown prince quickly realized that he was not onlypeting with the young girl who came out alongside him, but also someone else!


    He really had no idea what to do if he ended up getting third ce¡­ That would simply be way too embarrassing!


    "Hm? Where is thest person¡­?"


    Realizing that only one person hade out alongside him, the crown prince could not help but turn towards Fang Shi, whom he had ignored until now, to ask him about the person in question while looking over towards the participants who hade out before him and the young girl.


    "¡­ She is still inside¡­"


    "Impossible! Is she perhaps a Peak Expert Alchemist!?"


    Already feeling quite annoyed at the behaviour of the crown prince, Fang Shi instead turned his attention towards the young girl who had also juste out of the alchemy trial. Ignoring himpletely!


    If not for the fact that he had some background in the Sky Empire¡­


    "Hello little one, my name is Fang Shi! Might I ask what your name is?"


    Having already turned his attention towards the young girl looking like she was between thirteen and fourteen years old, Fang Shi tried to put on his kindest smile as he asked this.


    Even if he already knew her name from when he had gone over the list of participants before the start of the alchemypetition, Fang Shi still decided to ask her after introducing himself. After all, there was a high chance that he would be taking the young girl in as his second disciple after the alchemypetition ended.


    "I-I''m Li, Li Yao!"


    Seeing how nervous the young girl, Li Yao, had be, Fang Shi could not help but smile to himself as he remembered how his first-person disciple was just like that in the past when she was still small¡­


    Ah¡­ How time flies, that young girl is already grown up and is more than happy to cause trouble for her old master¡­


    "Li Yao? That''s indeed a fitting name¡­ You can go over to the rest and the participants and wait until the alchemy trial ends, there is still one person left inside on the fourth test!"


    Nodding his head smilingly as he said this, Fang Shi soon turned his attention back towards the cauldron as he focused Qing Yi who was about to begin the fourth test.


    Compared to the others, she had fallen quite a bit behind due to her struggle during the first test, but Fang Shi did not really mind this, as he had already understood the reason for her slow progress during the first test was likely due to hercking knowledge on spiritual herbs. Something that he could easily fix with time!


    "There is indeed still someone at the fourth test!"


    The crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom who had been wondering whether the other person was just resting somewhere inside the alchemy trial looked towards Fang Shi who still ignored him with a shocked expression.


    The person he had been wondering about was indeed still undergoing the fourth test! Did this not mean that shested longer than he did¡­?


    Thinking this far, the crown prince showed an? even more shocked expression.


    "Hey, hurry up and get down from the tform!"


    Only when one of the elders standing around the tform called out to him, did the young crown prince wake up before listlessly making his way down the tform and sitting down in a corner of the small space prepared for the participants.


    The current expression on his face was nothing short of a depressing sight as he longingly looked over towards Cai Yu from time to time¡­


    "What the¡­"


    Cai Yu who was on the receiving end of the longing look quickly hid away behind her master before ncing over towards Li Yao from time to time.


    In her eyes, the innocent looking Li Yao was by far the best choice if she had to chose between who would be her future junior sister or brother¡­

 Chapter 454 - Nameless Alchemy Technique

    <h4>Chapter 454 - Nameless Alchemy Technique</h4>


    Walking through the spiritual herb garden inside the alchemy trial, Qing Yi soon came upon a small open space in the middle of the spiritual herb garden.


    "Looks like the fourth test is indeed going to take ce here¡­"


    Muttering this to herself, Qing Yi made her way up to the small open space, but quickly came to realize that there was no cauldron or anything she needed to make a potion present. Instead, all that was present in the small open space was what she expected to be a recipe¡­


    "Hm? It''s not a recipe?"


    Picking up the small piece of paper, Qing Yi could not help but let a slightly surprised voice escape. The piece of paper in the small opening of the spiritual herb garden was not a potion recipe like she had expected but was instead a technique!


    Yes! Not a potion or pill recipe, but a technique!


    To be more specific, it was a special technique that would allow her to make a potion without the use of a cauldron and just through the maniption of her qi!


    Just looking over the nameless technique gave her quite a headache, as Qing Yi understood just how difficult it was and at the same time, she also understood just how difficult the fourth test was.


    After all, from what she managed to guess so far after getting the nameless technique, Qing Yi clearly understood that she would likely have to learn this technique and use it to pass through the fourth test¡­


    Having picked up the technique, Qing Yi continued walking through the spiritual herb garden before finally reaching the end after close to five minutes of walking.


    It was also at this point in time that Qing Yi saw the familiar set up for her to make a potion, the only thing missing was the cauldron. Confirming Qing Yi''s thoughts about her having to use the nameless technique to make a potion without the use of a cauldron.


    At the very least, Qing Yi felt the pressure that had been bearing down on her from the time she stepped onto the narrow mountain path and headed up the mountain lift. Allowing her to regain her full strength in an instant.


    However, this did not cause Qing Yi to feel the slightest bit happy, as she knew that the only reason why the pressure on her lifted, was to allow her to use the nameless technique. The qi required for it to work was nothing to scoff at. Even Qing Yi who could be considered to have almost reached the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm felt that she would not be able to keep the technique up for even half the duration needed to refine a single potion¡­


    Throwing the thought of her inevitable failure to the back of her mind, Qing Yi made her way over towards the small table that was filled with all sorts of different potion recipes before going over every single one of them.


    Even if she ended up failing the fourth test, she would at the very leastmit the few high-level potion recipes to memory so she could use them in the future when she was strong enough¡­


    "Even the worst of them uses a Peak Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb as the core¡­"


    Finished reading over the potion recipes, Qing Yi could not help but sigh to herself. For the first time since the start of the alchemypetition, she feltpletely helpless. Not knowing what to do, as the recipes presented to her were all far too difficult for someone like her who just broke through to the Expert Alchemist Realm a few hours ago¡­


    Knowing her chances of sess was abysmal, Qing Yi randomly chose one of the potion recipes using a Peak Spirit Grade Fire Spiritual Herb and went with it.


    "Core Strengthening Liquid¡­ Huh¡­"


    Having decided on what she was going to make, Qing Yi headed into the spiritual herb garden behind her to gather the spiritual herbs she needed.


    One part of the fourth test was also about the gathering process of spiritual herbs. The reason why this was important, was because the quality and strength of a spiritual herb could lower if it was done in a wrong way.


    However, this was the least of Qing Yi''s concerns¡­ After all, one of the things she had studied the most in depth was how to precisely gather spiritual herbs without them losing any of their value!


    Qing Yi was really not someone who wanted to chance upon an extremely rare spiritual herb only for her to ruin it when she pulled it out of the ground¡­


    Whoosh~


    Dashing from spiritual herb to spiritual herb, Qing Yi quickly managed to gather the spiritual herbs she needed for the Core Strengthening Liquid. The fact that the suppression was lifted also helped, as she could now use her cultivation base to easily move around.


    Arriving back at the set up prepared for her, Qing Yi did not say much and quickly prepared the spiritual herbs.


    Lucky or not, Qing Yi did not have the slightest issue when it came to preparing the Peak Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb and could begin the process of adding them into the cauldron-


    "Ah!"


    Realizing that she had momentarily forgotten the fact that she had no caldron, Qing Yi smiled a bit awkwardly to herself before picking up the nameless technique to read through it onest time.


    "So, I should hover the water like this and heat it up like this¡­?"


    Doing her best ording to the technique, Qing Yi levitated arge clump of spiritual water before using her cultivation base to manifest a me beneath the mass of levitating water to heat it up.


    Having just finished the most basic part of the set up before she could begin the brewing process, Qing Yi suddenly felt an enormous strain on her dantian. The consumption of qi required for her to keep the water floating while heating it up at the same time was simply way too much for her natural recovery to keep up with and as a result, her qi reserves began to empty out at a speed visible to the naked eye¡­


    Knowing that she could not dy for even a second, Qing Yi began adding in the different spiritual herbs in order, but despite that, she didn''t even get to add in the Peak Spirit Grade Spiritual herb before she felt that her qi reserves had beenpletely emptied out and the clump of iplete potion mixture floating in front of her began to dissolve as parts of the clump of liquid began breaking off before parts of itnded on the ground in front of her.


    Ssh! Ssh! Ssh!


    Watching as parts of the iplete potion mixturended in front of her and almost sshed up on her legs, Qing Yi understood that in a short moment the rest of the potion mixture would follow, and her potion would end up as failure. Eliminating her and sending her out of the alchemy trial!


    Knowing all of this, Qing Yi decided to gamble that she would at least be able to get some points if she at the very least presented a potion before being eliminated-


    Whoosh~


    Throwing thest few spiritual herbs along with the Peak Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb into the iplete potion mixture, Qing Yi watched the spiritual herbs dissolve almost instantly before the floating ball of liquid turned from a bright green to a crimson red, pure ck and finally bright orange colour before she managed to fill up a single potion bottle before losing control over the potion mixture.


    SPLASH!


    Following thest bit of her qi inside her dantian being used up, Qing Yi barely managed to dodge the boiling hot potion mixture falling down on the ground in front of her before she ended up getting hit by any of it.


    Even if she was someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm, it would still be dangerous for her if she got hit by the boiling liquid filled with the qi of all sorts of different spiritual herbs.


    Not to mention someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm like herself, even if she had reached the Core Formation Realm, she would still have to dodge the boiling liquid unless she wanted to end up with some serious and perhaps life-threatening injuries¡­


    "At least I managed to fill up a potion bottle¡­"


    Spending a few minutes justying down on the ground to recover, Qing Yi who had thrown herself to the side to dodge the boiling hot potion mixture got back up and went over to inspect the potion bottle she had managed to fill up with the iplete potion mixture.


    Picking up the still hot potion bottle, Qing Yi directly ced it on top of the pedestal before watching it disappear like she had already seen quite a few times by now.


    "Hm?"


    Seeing that nothing happened after the potion bottle disappeared, Qing Yi suddenly felt herself growing a little excited.


    "Perhaps I managed to-"


    Whoosh!


    Before she could even entertain the thought of her passing the fourth test for more than a few seconds, Qing Yi directly disappeared from the mountain inside the alchemy trial before reappearing back outside.


    "¡­"


    Looks like I got excited too fast¡­

 Chapter 455 - Qing Yis Rank Is...

    <h4>Chapter 455 - Qing Yi''s Rank Is...</h4>


    "With that, thest person has left the alchemy trial!"


    Coming back out from the alchemy trial located inside therge cauldron, these were the first words Qing Yi heard before seeing all the other participants looking over towards her with both curious and envious looks on their faces.


    "Qing Yi, right? You did well during the alchemy trial! You can just go over to the rest of the participants for now, I will be announcing the results of the alchemy trial shortly."


    Suddenly seeing the elderly Artisan Alchemist appear in front of her before saying this, Qing Yi only managed to nod her head before already having made her way over to the location where the other participants were waiting. Still feeling a bit bewildered over what had just happened.


    "You did really great! I think you will definitely enter the top three together with me!"


    "You too, I hope both of us can at least enter the top three¡­"


    Hearing the familiar voice of the young girl she had talked with during the earlier stages of the alchemypetition, Qing Yi smiled cheerfully as she said this. Even if she had only known the young girl for a short time, Qing Yi felt like she was a nice person and got along quite well with her. For her to enter the top three would definitely not be something Qing Yi was against. At least she liked the young girlpared to the other participants that she knew nothing about¡­


    "Yeah! We will definitely do the best among everyone here!"


    Listening to the cheerful young girl, Qing Yi could not help but smile as both of them soon turned to look towards Fang Shi. Waiting for him to officially announce the who won the alchemypetition.


    "I guess there is no use dragging this out any longer, I will now announce the ranking for the alchemy trial. Starting with thest ce before moving towards the first ce. First off, in the twentieth ce with 34 points is¡­"


    As Fang Shi began announcing their ranking and how many points they got, Qing Yi could not help growing a bit nervous.


    I wonder how many points I managed to get in the end¡­ Hopefully the iplete potion at least gave me a few points for the effort¡­


    Thinking about this, Qing Yi focused all of her attention on Fang Shi.


    The rest of the participants were the same, as everyone looked up towards Fang Shi filled with expectations. After all, the higher their rank was, the better rewards they would get and at the same, they would also have more resources focused on their development by their elders when they returned back home!


    ¡­


    "I wonder what kind of technique she used during the fourth test of the alchemy trial¡­" At the same time Qing Yi was thrown out of the alchemy trial and Fang Shi began announcing the final ranking of the alchemypetition, Xuan Hao could not help but think about the technique that his disciple had used during the fourth test.


    Even if she had failed the fourth test, it was more than enough time for him to understand just how useful the technique that she had been using to brew without a cauldron was!


    Feeling a bit excited when he thought about the alchemy technique, Xuan Hao prepared himself to shamelessly ask his disciple for it after the alchemypetition came to an end.


    From the alchemy trial, the technique in question also seemed to be an important alchemy technique, as the other two who had made it to the fourth test were also given a simr technique for pill refining¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help but narrow his eyes as he thought about it. From the knowledge that had been granted to him through the system, Xuan Hao had never seen a technique like the one that his disciple and the other two had used during the fourth test.


    Because of this, Xuan Hao could not help thinking that the technique that his disciple had used might actually be something that would be important for a Master Realm Alchemist!


    After all, he knew very well that the technique was not rted to the Artisan Realm¡­ Especially knowing that he was currently at the Peak of the Artisan Realm and had never learned said alchemy technique¡­


    Not to mention learning it, he never even knew about its existence before witnessing his disciple use it during the fourth test!


    "¡­ Xiao Yang, 137 points, fourth ce!"


    Hearing Fang Shi calling out the fourth ce from the tform, Xuan Hao threw the thought of the alchemy technique to the back of his mind for now before focusing back onto what was happening in the alchemypetition.


    Qing Yi had yet to be called out, but that was to be expected¡­ After all, only three people had moved on to the fourth test!


    The only thing that was a bit surprising was the fact that someone who didn''t even make it through the third test had ended up getting more points than his disciple had after shepleted the third test.


    Perhaps that Xiao Yang was just unlucky and ended up running into dead end after dead end inside the maze of challenges¡­


    ¡­


    "¡­ Next up is the top three! Among all of you, these three performed the best and every single one of them even managed to pass through the third test of the alchemy trial and officially make it to the fourth test!"


    At the same time that her master had turned his attention back onto Fang Shi announcing the final ranking of the alchemypetition, Qing Yi was no longer nervous after hearing the person in the fourth ce being called out.


    At the very least she had managed to make it to the top three!


    Thinking about this, Qing Yi could not help looking up towards the spectator room that her master and the other elders were located in.


    "Master¡­"


    Murmuring this out quietly, as she nervously looked over towards her master sitting in the middle of the other elders, Qing Yi could not help but feel a bit proud of herself upon noticing her master nod his head in her direction with a look of approval on his face.


    "!"


    Knowing that she had managed to make her master proud with how far she had gone in the alchemypetition, Qing Yi could not help feeling a bit shy all of a sudden.


    "Now, let''s start with the third ce¡­"


    However, just as she was lost in her own world thinking about her master, Fang Shi''s voice suddenly echoed out across the entire venue for all to hear. Instantly forcing Qing Yi back to reality, as she quickly forced her attention away from her master and back on to Fang Shi.


    "In the third ce with 179 points is¡­ Chu Yang! Crown Prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom!"


    Hearing that she did not end up in the third ce, Qing Yi could not help herself from growing a bit excited before she turned to look over towards the handsome looking young man that the Fang Shi gestured towards while saying this, Qing Yi could not help widening both her eyes in disbelief.


    Peak of the Core Formation Realm!


    As the young man did not restrain his own aura in the slightest, Qing Yi could easily tell what realm he was currently at without any effort. Not only was the young man at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, but he looked no more than a few years older than her!


    "For the second ce is¡­ Qing Yi from the Flying Sword Sect with 181 points!? Andstly, for the first ce with a grand total of 238 points is Li Yao from the Sunfire Sect!"


    Before Qing Yi could recover from the shock of discovering how strong Chu Yang, the crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom was, Fang Shi directly moved on to the announce her as the second ce and someone called Li Yao as the first ce.


    "We did it! We both entered the top three!"


    Just as Qing Yi began wondering who this Li Yao was, she heard the young girl standing beside her excitedly exim as she happily began jumping around her.


    "Li Yao¡­?"


    "Yes!"


    Getting a near instant confirmation, Qing Yi suddenly realized that the young girl was actually the Li Yao who had just managed to ce first!


    Li Yao should at least be two years younger than her, yet she had still managed to ce first in the alchemypetition!


    Just thinking about this, was more than enough for Qing Yi to realize just how talented Li Yao was, but she did get jealous knowing that she had been beaten by someone younger than her.


    "I never thought you would be that skilled¡­ Perhaps we can meet in the future to discuss alchemy after the alchemypetition ends and we return to our respective sect. This way we can also help each other improve!"


    "Sure! It sounds fun!"


    Instead of feeling jealous over being beaten by someone younger than herself, Qing Yi was far more interested in establishing a friendship with someone who was likely to be a future Artisan Alchemist! Maybe even a Master Alchemist!

 Chapter 456 - Fang Shi Taking In Two Disciples?

    <h4>Chapter 456 - Fang Shi Taking In Two Disciples?</h4>


    Personally, giving out the rewards to the different participants, Fang Shi soon handed over an interspatial ring to the crown prince of the Dark Sky Kingdom, Chu Yang before signalling for him to leave like the rest of the participants.


    Now that he had two potential personal disciples, there was no need to keep someone like that around. Especially given how much his disciple, Cai Yu, disliked him¡­


    "Hmph!"


    Frowning angrily before casting a longing look towards Cai Yu, Chu Yang grabbed the interspatial ring before angrily making his way out of the testing ground. Clearly not happy about how things had turned out.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this, Fang Shi didn''t really care too much as he just decided to ignore him before moving over towards the ce where Li Yao and Qing Yi were standing with arge smile on his face.


    Compared to how he had treated the other participants, Fang Shi underwent aplete change in both temperament and expression by the point that he arrived in front of the two young girls.


    ¡­


    Having talked a bit together with Li Yao, Qing Yi soon watched the participants being handed an interspatial ring filled with the rewards that they had won by Fang Shi before leaving the testing ground and making their way back to their elders and seniors waiting for them.


    An interspatial ring!


    Realizing that she would get a free interspatial ring along with the rewards she had won for getting second ce, Qing Yi could not help herself from getting a little excited, as she watched Fang Shi get closer and closer to the ce where her and Li Yao were staying.


    "Hm? Looks like the elder will give us our rewards personally!"


    Noticing what Fang Shi was doing as he got closer to them, Li Yao also looked over towards Fang Shi who slowly made finished up handing out an interspatial ring to the other participants before making his way over towards both of themst.


    "Li Yao and Qing Yi, this is your reward for getting the first ce and second ce, but as you might know, the reason why I-"


    Before Fang Shi could even mention the reason why he had set up an alchemypetition to begin with and start the process of taking in the two talented young girls, Qing Yi had suddenly moved forward and grabbed away the interspatial ring that he was about to hand her.


    Even with his cultivation, Fang Shi did not get to react in time before the interspatial ring he was about to hand over to Qing Yi had already disappeared, as the person in question had directly proceeded to hide it away somewhere in her clothes.


    More so than Fang Shi not reacting in time, it was more like he simply did not expect for Qing Yi to suddenly snatch away the interspatial ring before he managed to hand it over to her...


    "-The reason why I set up this alchemypetition was to find a new personal disciple and both of you are more than talented enough! If both of you are willing, I will be more than happy to take both of you in as my second and third personal disciple! So, what do both of you think¡­?"


    Watching how smoothly Qing Yi had taken away the interspatial ring, Fang Shi decided to pretend nothing happened as he handed Li Yao her interspatial ring before continuing what he was about to say earlier.


    Not only did he want to take in Li Yao, the winner of the alchemypetition as his second personal disciple, but he also wanted to take in Qing Yi as his third personal disciple!


    Even if Fang Shi had only nned to take in one new disciple at the start, he wouldn''t mind getting one more. After all, given his current status inside the Sky Empire, it would be easy for him to raise a dozen or so personal disciples to the Artisan Realm!


    "Personal disciple¡­?"


    "I will have to ask my elders first¡­"


    "Haha, its fine, I will give you some time to talk it over with your elders and seniors first!"


    Hearing the response from both Qing Yi and Li Yao, Fang Shi smiled understandingly as he motioned for both of them to go back and talk with their elders about it first.


    "But¡­ I already have a master¡­"


    Not having fully understood that the elderly alchemist was currently in the process of snatching her away from her master, Qing Yi could not help but say this as she looked up towards Fang Shi standing in front of her with a confused expression on her face.


    "This¡­"


    Seeing Qing Yi''s expression, Fang Shi had no idea what to say.


    He could not just outright say that he was better suited to teach her alchemy than her master and wanted to take her away, could he?


    Thinking about this, Fang Shi suddenly had an idea as his lips tugged slightly upwards into a small smile.


    "How about this, we can ask your master what he thinks about it, what do you think? If he is not sure of my skills, he can always test out my skills personally if he wants!"


    Saying this, Fang Shi looked towards Qing Yi.


    No matter what happened, Fang Shi was confident in being able to sessfully take in Qing Yi as his personal disciple. After all, in Fang Shi''s eyes, there was no way the master of Qing Yi was better than him when it came to alchemy and at the same time, there was no way he would refuse him taking her in as a disciple.


    No matter what, Fang Shi was still someone who was only a single step away from the Master Alchemist Realm and at the same time he was also a renowned Artisan Alchemist from the Sky Empire!


    "I¡­"


    Hearing what Fang Shi said, Qing Yi was just about to look over towards the direction of her master and the other elders from the Flying Sword Sect. Not knowing what to do in her current situation.


    ¡­


    "That old man really is trying to steal away other people''s disciples!"


    At the same time Fang Shi had begun trying to steal away his disciple, Xuan Hao instantly knew what was happening as he narrowed both of his eyes and stared down towards the elderly Artisan Alchemist.


    There is no way I will let that old man steal away my disciple!


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to make his way down to confront the old man, the system inside his sea of consciousness suddenly began moving as a new quest appeared¡­


    [Side Quest: Someone is trying to snatch away one of your disciples! Make sure your disciple does not get taken away!]


    [Punishment in case of failure: Cultivation base will be reduced by three minor realms.]


    [Reward: Not losing a disciple.]


    Reading the quest that he had just gotten from the system the moment Fang Shi began trying to take away his disciple, Xuan Hao could not help frowning.


    Not only did he get anything frompleting the quest itself, but he would also be punished if he failed!


    This was the first time where he would be directly punished by the system if he ended up failing a quest! Not like the survival quest he had gotten back in the secret realm where his death would likelye along with the copse of the secret realm itself¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help but let out a sigh internally. No matter what, he should never let his disciples get taken away by someone else¡­


    At least the system was against something like that happened and was more than willing enough to punish him severely if he let it happen.


    Losing three minor realms would directly send him back to the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and who knows how the system would reduce his cultivation base in the first ce.


    What if it ended up directly erasing the things, he hadprehended over thest half year? Not to mention the fact that his Ice Domain might also end up getting erased if that were to happen¡­


    No! I can''t let that happen!


    Whoosh~


    Feeling even more motivated to ensure Qing Yi did not get snatched away with the ''kind encouragement'' from the system, Xuan Hao directly stood up before moving down toward? the ce that Qing Yi, Li Yao, and Fang Shi were standing.


    "How about this, we can call your master over and ask what he thinks about it! If he is not sure of my skills, he can always test out my skills personally if he wants!"


    "I-"


    "No need, I''m already here¡­"


    Arriving beside Qing Yi just as she was about to look up towards the spectator room where he and the other elders from the Flying Sword Sect were sitting, Xuan Hao calmly ced a hand on Qing Yi''s shoulder before turning around to confront the elderly Artisan Alchemist.

 Chapter 457 - Qing Yis Master Appears!

    <h4>Chapter 457 - Qing Yi''s Master Appears!</h4>


    "You are¡­"


    Seeing someone suddenly appear beside Qing Yi all of a sudden, Fang Shi was caught off guard, as he tilted his head with a confused expression slowly appearing in his eyes. Not expecting for someone to suddenly show up beside Qing Yi.


    Not to mention the fact that he had not even sensed the person approaching before the other party was already standing there!


    From this alone, Fang Shi understood that the other person was likely someone stronger than him! Maybe he was even someone who had alreadyprehended a pseudo domain!


    "Qing Yi''s master, I don''t think there''s a need for her to be your disciple!"


    "This¡­"


    Hearing the person who just appeared say this, Fang Shi suddenly smiled wryly as he realized that he had just talked about asking her master regarding him taking her in as his disciple. Even proiming that her master could test out his skills if he wanted to¡­ However, from the looks of it, her master was far stronger than he had first expected!


    For him to be angry was a given. After all, he had just been talking about taking away his disciple!


    "To be honest, I did not expect for Qing Yi''s master to be this strong, I wonder if you were the one who taught her alchemy as well?"


    Knowing that his cultivation was likely inferior, Fang Shi decided to probe the other party''s alchemy skills.


    After all, in his eyes, Qing Yi should be someone focused on alchemy and cultivation should be a secondary focus to alchemy. Much like what he himself had been doing over the years¡­


    With this in mind, Fang Shi was confident that he could convince the other party with his alchemy and convince him that he could do a better job in helping Qing Yi''s alchemy realm reach a new height!


    "Yes, I was the one who taught her! I''m an Artisan Alchemist as well!"


    Nodding his head to Fang Shi''s question, Xuan Hao directly told him that he was an Artisan Alchemist as well. Hoping the other party would just directly give up any ns he had regarding his disciple.


    "I see, I wonder if you would want to have apetition with me...? I''m sure I will be able to impress you-"


    "No."


    "¡­"


    Not the slightest bit intimidated upon hearing that the other party was also an Artisan Alchemist, Fang Shi tried challenging the other party. Only to be shot down instantly.


    Was he not supposed to agree with his challenge and try to use it as an opportunity to show off how in front of his disciple?


    "It''s alreadyte at this point and I don''t think anyone wants to see another drawn-outpetition¡­"


    Hearing Xuan Hao follow up with this, Fang Shi suddenly realized that the sun had already disappeared as the stars shone down from above.


    Not only that, but he also noticed that the spectators around thepetition space were slowly beginning to leave following the end of the alchemypetition.


    Having apetition at this point where everyone had already been exhausted and were making their way back home was a little¡­


    "Hah¡­ I understand what you mean... How about this, we can have a small and simplepetition using the cauldron here. It will only take a few minutes at most. If I win, I''m sure you will be convinced with me taking Qing Yi as my disciple!"


    Still not giving up onpeting with Xuan Hao and taking in Qing Yi as his third personal disciple, Fang Shi signalled towards therge cauldron that contained the alchemy trial.


    "Fine¡­ But are you willing to give up your disciple if I Win?"


    Knowing that the other party would not be convinced to give up with just words and the fact that he was quite interested in therge cauldron with the alchemy trial inside of it, Xuan Hao decided to agree to the old Artisan Alchemist''s challenge.


    Of course, not forgetting to put forward a small request himself.


    "This¡­"


    "Isn''t it only fair that you give me your disciple if I win?"


    "Fine¡­ But I hope you will uphold your side of the deal in case you lose¡­"


    Not knowing what to say upon hearing the suggestion Xuan Hao had put forward, Fang Shi ended up agreeing to it in the end. No matter what, he was confident in his alchemy and didn''t feel like Xuan Hao would have a chance to win against him!


    Whoosh!


    Following Fang Shi reluctantly agreeing, he waved his hand as Xuan Hao suddenly felt himself getting pulled towards therge cauldron in the middle of the tform.


    "How interesting¡­"


    Not resisting the pulling force of the cauldron, Xuan Hao muttered to himself with a smile on his face before he allowed himself to get pulled inside together with Fang Shi.


    ¡­


    Looking around himself and discovering that he was currently inside of arge ancient hall, Xuan Hao linked it together with the hall that Qing Yi and the other participants should have found themselves inside of before the start of the alchemy trial, though he was not sure, as he had not been there to see it for himself and could only go off what he had heard from the other elders upon returning¡­


    Other than that, he did not get sent somewhere else after appearing inside therge ancient hall like the elders had told him happened to Qing Yi and the other participants, as each of them was transported to a mountain where the alchemy trial itself was located.


    "Hm?"


    Finished looking around at the ancient hall that he now found himself inside of, Xuan Hao began to observe the shinning symbols that covered the walls and pirs of the ancient hall.


    From inspecting the severalrge symbols covering the walls and pirs, Xuan Hao quickly deduced that he should be inside some sort of formation core¡­ But with his current level, he could not understand how it worked. All he could make out was that it was an incredibly terrifying formation far surpassing his current level in formations.


    Even if he used all his strength, Xuan Hao doubted that he would even be able to put a single scratch on the formation! How Fang Shi even managed to get his hands on something like that was aplete mystery to Xuan Hao¡­


    "I will not be showing off what is happening in here to the people outside, so we can haveplete privacy in here."


    Seeing Xuan Hao lost in thought as he looked at the symbols that covered everything inside the ancient hall, Fang Shi smiled with a look of understanding.


    He understood what Xuan Hao was feeling. After all, they were currently inside the core of the small realm located inside therge cauldron and also at the centre of the formation that kept everything running smoothly inside of it. This included the alchemy trial and the many other functions!


    From growing the spiritual herbs used in the alchemy trial to keeping the space inside stable. Everything was done by a single massive formation. All of this without requiring someone to manually manage it!


    "Let''s get this over with¡­ I wonder what kind ofpetition you nned?"


    Hearing what Fang Shi said, Xuan Hao didn''t continue inspecting his surroundings any longer, as he returned his attention back towards Fang Shi.


    No matter what, he did not forget that he had to make sure this old alchemist stopped coveting other people''s disciples and wanted to quickly get done with thepetition, so he could quickly take his disciple far away from here before someone new showed up and targeted his disciple¡­


    "Haha, we are going to do a simple pill refinement-"


    "I thought you said this would not take a long time¡­?"


    Interrupting Fang Shi before he managed to finish speaking, Xuan Hao narrowed both his eyes as he asked the old man.


    The main reason for this was because concocting a pill would easily take a few hours. Especially given that both of them would most likely be making something at the Soul level¡­


    "No need to interrupt me before I finished exining¡­ We are indeed going be making a pill, but instead of normal pills, we will be making Qi Gathering Pills! We will bepeting in who can make the most Soul Grade Qi Gathering Pills within fifteen minutes!"


    Listening to what Fang Shi said, Xuan Hao''s frown disappeared, as he quickly recalled what little he knew about Qi Gathering Pills.


    Qi Gathering Pills, as the name suggested, were used to increase a cultivators cultivation speed. Not only that, but Qi Gathering Pills were one of the most simple and easiest pills to make.


    At the same time, it was also a unique pill that did not have a potion version like most other pills!


    The pill was in essence just a bunch of spirit stones that had been refined into a pill and became easier to absorb for cultivators.


    However, there was a fatal w in the creation of Qi Gathering Pills and that was the fact that only 50 percent of the qi inside the spirit stones used would be left after the Qi Gathering Pill had been made!


    While the pill did make it easier for someone to absorb the qi contained inside spirit stones, the qi wasted in the process was simply not something anyone was willing to endure. This was also the main reason why the Flying Sword Sect did not use Qi Gathering Pills, as it was simply a waste of spirit stones and didn''t really bring about enough benefits so as to be considered worth it.


    Only people with too many spirit stones to spent would ever make Qi Gathering Pills-


    "Ah¡­"


    Suddenly recalling how the beast tamers of the Flying Sword Sect had given away thousands upon thousands of spirit stones to the demon beasts of the sect on a daily basis, Xuan Hao''s expression turned for the worst as he decided not to think about how wasteful Qi Gathering Pills were any longer¡­


    "Hah¡­ Let''s get started¡­"


    Shaking his head as he tried erase the image of demon beast swallowing dozens upon dozens of spirit stones with each mouthful inside the stables of the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao agreed to thepetition proposed by Fang Shi.

 Chapter 458 - Alchemy Challenge! Fang Shi Vs Xuan Hao!

    <h4>Chapter 458 - Alchemy Challenge! Fang Shi Vs Xuan Hao!</h4>


    "Great! We will just be using a simple pill furnace, the one to make the most Soul Grade Qi Gathering Pills will be the winner!"


    Waving his hand as two normal pill furnaces directly appeared in front of them. Following which arge amount of spirit stones rushed out from the interspatial ring he was wearing before stacking up into a small mountain between the two pill furnaces.


    The sheer amount of spirit stones that Fang Shi had taken out was more than Xuan Hao had ever seen in one ce, that is not to mention the fact that the spirit stones pilled up into a small mountain was not only low-grade spirit stones, but there was also arge amount of high-grade spirit stones present!


    "Are you ready?"


    Having finished the little preparation required for the quick challenge, Fang Shi turned his attention back towards Xuan Hao.


    "Yes, we can start any time."


    Not willing to admit that he had momentarily been rendered speechless by the sheer quantity of spirit stones that Fang Shi had brought out with ease, Xuan Hao quickly calmed himself down before making his way towards one of the two pill furnaces.


    Even if he mainly made potions due to the fact that his disciple along with the rest of the alchemists in the Flying Sword Sect did so as well, Xuan Hao was no stranger when it came to creating pills. Mostly due to the information he had gained in the past through the system, that included an equal amount of both potion and pill rted knowledge at the Artisan Realm.


    "The time starts now!"


    After hearing Xuan Hao say he was ready, Fang Shi didn''t waste any more time, as he announced the official start of the short challenge.


    Whoosh~


    At the same time, a small artifact in the shape of an hourss was also thrown out by Fang Shi, as it soon came to a stop mid-air where it remained floating before quickly flipping around. Even Xuan Hao with little knowledge on artifacts understood that the small floating hourss was used to make sure they only used fifteen minutes.


    "At least we are not using something uncertain like an incense stick to measure time¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he turned his gaze away from the hourss floating in the air above both of them, Xuan Hao focused on the spirit stones and the pill furnace in front of him.


    The process of making a Qi Gathering Pill was incredibly simple and took close to no time to make. The only bad thing about it being the horrible conversion rate of losing around 50 percent of the qi inside the spirit stones in the process, but with Fang Shi providing all the spirit stones, Xuan Hao had no worries when it came to wasting the qi inside the spirit stones.


    Not wasting any time, Xuan Hao began making his first Soul Grade Qi Gathering Pill.


    "Ten to one¡­ If I remember correctly¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he recalled what the ratio of low-grade to high-grade spirit stones were in a Soul Grade Qi Gathering Pill, Xuan Hao quickly took out ten low-grade spirit stones and a single high-grade spirt stone from the small mountain of spirit stones.


    After which, he proceeded to stuff all of them inside the rtively small pill furnace before using his cultivation base to conjure forth a small me that instantly caused the temperature inside the pill furnace to soar to a terrifying level.


    Along with the increase in temperature inside the pill furnace, the spirit stones inside the pill furnace began melting one by one before all of them turned into a liquid state.


    Following this, all Xuan Hao need to do waspress the hot liquid spirit stones into a small pill that could be directly swallowed.


    Thepression of the liquified spirt stones was thest step of the process and also the most heart wrenching part of the process.


    Whoosh!


    As he beganpressing the spirit stones that had melted and merged together into a single liquid form, Xuan Hao could not help but frown upon watching the qi inside the liquid rapidly decrease, as thepression of it ended up forcing out some of the qi inside the liquid, that in turn instantly got burned up inside the pill furnace¡­


    The sight alone was more than enough to cause even a Domain Lord like himself to feel a bit regretful over how much pure qi inside the spirit stones that ended up just being wasted as it was destroyed the moment it was forced out of the quickly shrinking liquid.


    Soon enough, the liquid inside the pill furnace waspressed into the shape a normal round pill before Xuan Hao took it out and directly used his ice domain to cool it down before cing it at the side and beginning the process again, he couldn''t be bothered to waste any time inspecting the Qi Gathering Pill, as another dozen or so spirit stones were directly thrown into the pill furnace.


    The entire process of making a single Soul Grade Qi Gathering Pill, took no longer than thirty seconds, though during the creation of the second Qi Gathering Pill, Xuan Hao felt his speed increase, as he managed to finish it in only 27 seconds! Three seconds faster than the first time!


    ¡­


    The challenge proposed by Fang Shi onlysted for 15 minutes and it didn''t take long before the time ran out and both of them finished theirst Soul Grade Qi Gathering Pill.


    "That''s 15 minutes! Haha, I wonder how many you managed to finish? Let''s just put them on the table here and count them all."


    Removing both of the pill furnaces along with the small mountain of spirit stones the moment fifteen minutes had passed, Fang Shi directly brought out a small table before cing the Soul Grade Qi Gathering Pills, he managed to create during the fifteen-minute time span before signalling for Xuan Hao to do the same with a confident smile.


    "30¡­ 33¡­ 35!"


    Seeing how many Soul Grade Qi Gathering Pills Fang Shi had managed to make within a fifteen-minute timespan, Xuan Hao calmed down as he let out a sigh of relief before putting his own Qi Gathering Pills down onto the table Fang Shi had taken out.


    "Hm¡­ Let''s see how many you managed to make¡­ 20¡­ 27¡­ 33¡­ 37!? How is this possible?!"


    Counting the Qi Gathering Pills Xuan Hao had managed to make, Fang Shi could not help but exim loudly as he realized that there were two more than what he had ended up making. Meaning, he had lost the challenge!


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I have lost this time around, but I really hope we can have a proper duel at some point in the future¡­"


    Shaking his head before calming down, Fang Shi acknowledged his own defeat. No matter what, there was no use crying when he had already lost to the other person. The only thing he found regretful, was the fact that they didn''t have a proper match and instead ended up having a short match on who could make the most Soul Grade Qi Gathering Pills.


    This was especially so after he realized Xuan Hao was likely someone at his own level¡­ But in turn, it also made him understand that he most likely didn''t have any chance taking Qing Yi as his third personal disciple¡­


    "Well, let''s get back out. Don''t worry, I won''t try to take your disciple anymore¡­ Anyways, I still managed to get a quite splendid new disciple in the end, so everything still ended well-"


    "Are you not forgetting about something¡­?"


    Just as Fang Shi was about to send both of them out again while saying this, Xuan Hao suddenly interrupted him.


    "Ah¡­ I have no idea what you are talking about! Look, it has already gotten quitete, and your disciple should be worried sick now that her master disappeared for so long, we can''t keep her waiting!"


    "¡­"


    Not expecting the old alchemist to be shameless enough to ignore his earlier bet of giving away his own disciple in case he lost, Xuan Hao suddenly felt himself getting pulled out of the space inside the cauldron, as he quickly put away the Qi Gathering Pills he had made in his interspatial ring before finding himself back outside again.


    "Well¡­ I have some things to check up on, so I will be leaving first! Haha, I won''t wait around for you two to have a nice little chat about the alchemypetition!"


    "¡­"


    The moment he found himself back outside the cauldron, Xuan Hao didn''t even manage to say anything before he discovered that the old alchemist was already in the process of running away¡­


    "Master? What happened¡­?"


    "I will tell you when we get back¡­"


    Seeing Qing Yi look over towards him with a questioning look on her face after seeing her master appear after only fifteen minutes, Xuan Hao decided not to chase after the old alchemist for now and instead decided to go back and rest.


    A lot of things had happened during the day of the alchemypetition¡­

 Chapter 459 - Return Of The Missing Elder...

    <h4>Chapter 459 - Return Of The ''Missing'' Elder...</h4>


    Along with the end of the alchemypetition, Xuan Hao had met back up with the other elders together with Qing Yi.


    The moment that the elders from the Alchemy Hall had seen Qing Yi, all of them hade forward to congratte Qing Yi on getting second ce and at the same time ask her about some of the potions, she had made during the alchemy trial with excitement.


    Among all of the elders outside of Xuan Hao himself. Only Gong Bo and Chi Hu acted like an elder should, as the rest of them kept asking Qing Yi about the alchemypetition. Acting like a group of excited children¡­


    "Qing Yi, can you demonstrate the alchemy technique you used during the fourth test!?"


    "Qing Yi, what potion did you make during the-"


    "Qing Yi-"


    Looking at current state of his disciple being bombarded with question by the elders from the Alchemy Hall, Xuan Hao feared that if things continued, Qing Yi would end up copsing from exhaustion.


    Mainly because a few of them had even started to ask her for a demonstration on the alchemy technique she had learned during the fourth test and Qing Yi had ended up relenting to the curious elders, as she had begun to use it for the elders to see!


    Even if he also wanted to learn more about the alchemy , there was no way he could allow Qing Yi to continue like this in her current state.


    "Enough! You can ask her tomorrow! After she got a proper rest!"


    Seeing the exhausted look on his disciple''s face, Xuan Hao decided to step forward to stop the elders from asking any more questions.


    After all, Qing Yi had just finished apetition thatsted for an entire day and even if she wanted to answer the Alchemy Hall Elders questions for longer, both her body and mind werepletely exhausted at this point and wouldn''t allow her to do so.


    Not to mention she had just exhausted what little qi she had managed to recover over thest fifteen minutes demonstrating the nameless alchemy technique for the elders to see¡­


    ""¡­""


    Stopping the barrage of questions the moment they heard Xuan Hao''s voice, the elders quickly discovered just how exhausted the current Qing Yi was, as all of them smiled apologetically towards Qing Yi.


    "Now, with that out of the way. Let''s get back to the manor before it gets any darker outside."


    Seeing everyone quiet down, Xuan Hao informed them about this before taking Qing Yi out of the spectator room before making his way back towards the manor.


    Gong Bo and Chi Hu soon followed Xuan Hao and Qing Yi back towards the manor, as the rest of the elders were left behind.


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ Let''s get out here¡­"


    With one of the elders taking the lead, the rest of the elders soon left the spectator room and made their way back towards the manor like Xuan Hao and the others.


    "Elder Tian¡­? Is that you? What are you doing out here?! W-what on earth happened for you to end up like that?!"


    However, the moment they left the ce where the alchemypetition was hosted, they were shocked to find a familiar figureing out from a nearby dark alleyway with torn clothes and a half dead expression.


    "Ah¡­? Y-you guys! How could leave me like that!? Do you even know what I had to go through during the time all of you were just sitting in there!?"


    Seeing that it was indeed a fellow elder that hade out from the dark alleyway looking like some dead animal the cat had dragged home from god knows where, the other elders quickly rushed over to examine him and ask about what happened for him to end up like that.


    However, no matter how they asked, the half dead elder refused to answer any of their questions on how he had ended up like that, so in the end the elders could only push it aside for now as they all made their way back towards the manor together.


    ¡­


    At the same time that Xuan Hao, Qing Yi, and the rest of the elders from the Flying Sword Sect had made their way back towards the manor that had been reserved for them during the alchemypetition. Two figures had met up just outside the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom, one short and one tall, both covered by a dark robe that seemingly merged together with the darkness of the night, while their faces were covered by arge hood. Preventing anyone from seeing the faces hidden beneath them.


    just outside the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom, as they talked to each other in low voices to avoid anyone who happened to pass by from hearing them.


    "Are you really sure what you just said is true!?"


    "Yes, I''m one hundred percent certain!"


    As the two figures talked to each other in low voices to avoid any of the miners passing by from hearing them, the tall one of the two figures asked in a serious voice before shorter one responded in a confident tone to the question asked.


    "Hah¡­ Looks like we will only have one opportunity to act when the target leaves the capital and is about to leave. After that, we might not get another opportunity again before it''s toote."


    "Y-you mean we are going to do it here!? What if-"


    "Don''t worry about it, we will only proceed when the target is outside the city and its formation. By the point that the lord notices anything happening outside, we will already be gone¡­"


    Calming down the other party, the tall one of the two hidden figures proceed to exin this in a confident tone.


    But¡­ To escape from someone like that was easier said than done¡­


    For him to im that he would be able to get away from the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom before Yi Min managed to respond, was more than enough to tell how strong he was¡­ Or maybe he was just someone seeking death!


    After all, a Domain Lord at the level of Yi Min, could easily cover hundreds of miles around her with her divine sense whenever she noticed something happening. Not to mention she could also use the formation around the capital to further enhance her divine sense. Allowing her divine sense to momentarily reach an even higher level!


    "But¡­ How are we going to escape?"


    The shorter of the two hidden figures also knew about this and couldn''t help himself from asking. After all, it was a matter of life and death for him¡­


    "Still not convinced when I tell you not to worry about it? Do you think I would willingly send all of us to our death and perish with the target?"


    "¡­"


    Seeing the expression of hispanion under therge hood he was wearing, the tall one of the two of them could not help frowning.


    Hispanion very clearly believed that he would indeed sent them in to die with their target!


    "Hah¡­ We will talk about this tomorrow! For now, return to the others and make sure they are ready tomorrow morning, I will keep an eye on the target inside the city and will contact you when the target is about to leave!"


    Sighing a bit to himself as he realised that he would not be able to convince hispanion that he was not just sending him and others in to die, the taller one among the two quickly sent hispanion back to inform the others that they would act tomorrow when the target was most likely be leaving the city now that the alchemypetition had officiallye to an end¡­


    "Yes, Sir!"


    Giving a quick formal bow before leaving, the short one of the hidden figures very clearly knew that they would not be talking over how they would be escaping before they had alreadyunched an attack!


    Not to mention, his leader had actually told him they would talk it over tomorrow, while at the same time telling him that they were going to act tomorrow morning. Not to mention his leader was going to be keeping an eye on the target this entire time inside the capital itself¡­


    With one person beginning to resolve himself for death as he left towards somewhere hidden where the others were hiding, the tall figure remained in the same ce before narrowing his eyes while staring at the figure of hispanion slowly disappearing in the distance, as a small amount of killing intent began leaking out.


    "Looks like they have already begun noticing that there is no way out for them¡­ However, as long as they don''t get any ideas of leaving before tomorrow, everything will be fine¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he watched the figure of the short man who he had just talked with disappear in the distance, the tall figure turned around to face arge gate leading into the capital before slowly making his way over towards said gate.


    At the very least, he had to make sure everything went ording to n, or he would likely not be able to get out alive¡­

 Chapter 460 - Elder Tians Ill-fated Encounter...

    <h4>Chapter 460 - Elder Tian''s Ill-fated Encounter...</h4>


    After Xuan Hao and Qing Yi had made it back to the manor, they quickly went back to their own room to rest for the night, while Gong Bo and Chi Hu decided to wait for the rest of the elders before returning to their room to rest.


    "What happened? Did you happen to fight someone on your way back¡­?"


    The moment the other elders returned with the half dead looking elder being supported by one of them, Gong Bo could not help but exim in a surprised tone as he asked with a curious look on his face. Wondering just how the elders had managed to get into a fight during the short period of time that they had separated¡­


    "Elder Gong¡­ It''s not like that at all! Actually-"


    Hearing what Gong Bo said, one of the elders smiled wryly before stepping forward to exin what had happened. Not forgetting to mention the fact that the injured party had refused to talk about what happened to him during the time he had been trying to get into the alchemypetition and watch.


    "Hm¡­ I understand¡­ Elder Tian, would you like to exin what happened to you?"


    "This¡­ Can we talk privately¡­?"


    Knowing that he would not be able to refuse someone like Gong Bo, who was one of the leading elders of the Alchemy Hall, Elder Tian agreed to talk about what had happened to him. Only, he requested for it to be done privately, so the other elders could not listen in.


    "That''s fine with me. Follow me and we will talk in my room."


    Realizing that it might be something embarrassing, Gong Bo felt his curiosity grow, as he readily agreed to Elder Tian''s request before both of them left the other elders and made their way towards Gong Bo''s room in therge manor.


    "So, what on earth happened to you¡­?"


    Sitting down at a small table inside the room without any of the other elders around, Gong Bo once again asked Elder Tian.


    "This is¡­ After I separated from the rest of you and was refused entrance to the-"


    Looking around and making sure none of the other elders were listening in from the side, Elder Tian slowly began to retell the events that led up to his current situation.


    ¡­


    A few hours ago, Elder Tian had made his way to the long line of people waiting to pay a small fee to get in and watch the alchemypetition taking ce.


    Like this, Elder Tian had spent a good 30 minutes before finally reaching the entrance-


    "Sorry, there is no more avable seating spots inside¡­"


    Only to be refused at the entrance by one of the guards, who informed him and the other people behind him. About the fact that there were no more seating spots left inside.


    If they still wanted to enter, they could wait for someone to leave, but Elder Tian did not really see that happening any time soon and with this in mind, Elder Tian decided to give up on waiting for what would likely be few hours. Already having wasted half an hour in line and instead decided to make his way around the capital now that he had a lot of free time at hand. At the very least he would not feel too regretful if he manged to find some good spiritual herbs being sold cheaply and even if he didn''t, he would still be able to explore the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom and see all therge artifact shops that had made this city so popr in the first ce...


    This would soone to be a decision he woulde to regret, as Elder Tian made his way over towards what could be considered the centre of the capital where all of the shops were located.


    Only to suddenly end up catching the sight of an older madam also moving in the same direction as him.


    At first, Elder Tian had not paid much attention to this older woman tailing him from behind. However, in hindsight, he should have remembered to be more cautious. After all, he was in apletely unfamiliar ce all alone¡­


    "Ara? Who is this cutie?"


    As he had arrived at the centre of the capital, the older woman had suddenly approached him and called out to him in a seductive way as she slowly began moving closer.


    "Me?"


    Even at this point, Elder Tian had no sense of danger. Only feeling surprised over how the older madam had referred to him, an elder already close to a hundred years of age. Looking like he was close to reaching his sixties, while not having the same sagely old man appearance as Elder Song, he was not too far away. Onlycking the splendid beard¡­


    "Yes you! I wonder if it''s your first time to the capital¡­ If you want, this big sister can show you around, I know all the shops around here. Hehe~"


    "Really? Sure, if you want to."


    Ignoring the creepyughter at the end, Elder Tian had examined the older woman and falsely determined meant no harm before agreeing to her request.


    In the end, the older woman had ended up showing him around the ce for some time before they ended up visiting a small teashop owned by her.


    "Hm? I-I suddenly feel really tired¡­"


    After having only, a single cup of tea, Elder Tian had only felt both his eyelids grow heavy as he felt himself slowly falling into a deep sleep.


    Knowing that something was wrong, Elder Tian was still an experienced Expert Alchemist and quickly managed to deduce what had happened to him, so in one swift and secret motion, a small needle appeared in his hand before he secretly pierced it into his thigh.


    A sleep-inducing potion of the Spirt Grade¡­ I hope the antidote will take effect in time and allow me to wake up before she does anything¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he slowly felt himself losing consciousness, Elder Tian barely looked over towards the older woman.


    Thest thing he remembered seeing before everything went dark, was the older woman suddenly smiling at him sinisterly before he lost consciousness.

 Chapter 461 - Female Demonic Cultivator~

    <h4>Chapter 461 - Female Demonic Cultivator~</h4>


    Following Elder Tian telling Gong Bo how he had been knocked out at the teashop, the other party''s interest had increased, as he wondered just what had happened to Elder Tian after he had been knocked out.


    "Elder Gong¡­ Do I really need to-"


    "Yes! You just got to the interesting part! How can you think of stopping here? How will I even know if you got away safely if you stop now?"


    Hearing the words of his senior the moment he tried to stop the story, as it was getting to the more ufortable part, Elder Tian could only smile wryly before reluctantly beginning to talk about what had happened after he had been knock out could inside the small teahouse¡­


    ¡­


    Following the fact that he had been knocked out by the sleep-inducing potion that had been secretly added to his tea, Elder Tian soon woke up.


    However, he was no longer inside the small teashop. Instead, he was inside some kind of underground dungeon.


    "Wh-where is this¡­?" Looking around himself after fully waking up, Elder Tian saw several dried-up corpses next to him. All of them elderly men like himself.


    "J-just what on earth happened here!?"


    Seeing the corpses next to him, Elder Tian could not help but shiver,


    If he had not been able to wake up in time, Elder Tian could easily see how he would end up like the dried-up corpses all around him, as he realized the small anti poison needle that he always carried around had ended up saving his life!


    Creak-!


    Someone ising!


    Hearing the creaking sound of a door located at the other end of the dungeon, Elder Tian quickly decided to pretend he was still asleep. The reason for this being the fact that he had found out most of his strength was in a weakened state. Requiring at least a few minutes for him to recover his strength back to what it normally was.


    All in all, in his current state, Elder Tian was no stronger than some young kids who had just entered the Qi Condensation Realm a few days ago¡­


    "Ah~ I can finally savour this little cutie~"


    Hearing the familiar female voice, Elder Tian felt a shiver run down his spine listening to her footsteps slowly moving closer and closer to where he was pretending to still be knocked out cold by the sleep-inducing potion.


    Rustle~


    Suddenly, the footsteps came to an end, as Elder Tian heard the older woman searching around for something.


    After close to two minutes passed with the older woman searching for something, Elder Tian managed to recover his strength back to the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm, while still needing another minute to recover his strength back up to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm again¡­


    It was also at this moment that Elder Tian realized the older woman was only a single step away from the Nascent Soul Realm! She was stronger than him. After realizing this, Elder Tian knew very well that he would have to take the other party by surprise if he wanted to escape. Given the fact that the older woman was stronger than him!


    The difference between someone at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and someone only a single step away from the Nascent Soul Realm was extremelyrge. Even if both of them were still in the same realm.


    Especially so given that Elder Tian was an Alchemist with far lessbat strengthpared to someone who solely focused on cultivation¡­


    "Ah! Here it is~"


    Hearing the voice of the older woman once again, Elder Tian focused on recovering his strength. Even as he felt the older womane over towards him after she had found the thing she was searching for.


    "Hehe~ Little cutie~"


    Suddenly feeling the older woman beginning to rip apart the clothes he was wearing, while sensually running her hands through his hair and beard, Elder Tian tried his best to stop himself from jumping up and fighting the old woman to death.


    "Hah¡­ I will make sure¡­ Hah¡­ to squeeze all your life essence¡­ Hah¡­ out of you~ Hehe~"


    I can''t take this anymore!


    Feeling the older woman''s heavy breathing along with her beginning to move her hands further downwards, Elder Tian couldn''t hold himself back any longer, as he directlyunched an attack towards the older woman who had already begun ripping apart his pants.


    Before the older woman even had the time to react to Elder Tian suddenlyunching an all-out attack. Three small needles appeared in each of his hands before piercing into the older woman.


    "Little cutie!? What is this!?"


    Whoosh!


    Seeing the older woman with a long whip in one hand suddenly realize that she had been poisoned and was unable to move after being pierced by a total of six poisonous needles that had been hidden in Elder Tian''s sleeves, Elder Tianunched a second attack filled with killing intent towards the older woman.


    Bang!


    Easily killing the now unmoving target!


    Thump~


    "What was that!?"


    "Did something happen, senior sister?"


    "Let''s go and check what happened!"


    Hearing a myriad of voices from the entrance that the older woman had entered from, Elder Tian didn''t dare stay any around any longer. Only ncing once towards the old woman to make sure she was dead before scanning his surroundings for an escape path. Soon spotting a second door a little hidden away in the corner of the underground dungeon.


    "Of course, it''s an entrance to the sewers¡­"


    Met with the horrible smell the moment he opened the door. Along with the rapidly approaching auras of several Core Formation Realm Experts, Elder Tian didn''t have time to hesitate as he entered the sewers.


    ¡­


    "¡­ After that I managed to make my way back towards the alchemypetition, where I managed to meet the other elders."


    Finished telling Gong Bo what had happened, Elder Tian smiled awkwardly before looking away.


    "I-I see, I never imagined for you to encounter a demonic cultivator proficient in sucking out other people''s life force, we will have to inform the guards about this before we leave¡­ You can go back for now."


    Barely able to hold himself back fromughing after hearing how an old woman had nearly managed to take advantage of Elder Tian. Even referring to him as her little cutie, Gong Bo quickly sent him out of his room while trying to keep a serious and understanding look on his face the entire time.


    "Thank you, Elder Gong! I hope you won''t talk about this to the other elders, as it''s quite embarrassing for me to get take advantage of like that¡­"


    "No worries! Y-your secret is safe with me!"


    Nodding his head, Gong Bo reassured Elder Tian onest time before the other party soon showed a relieved expression before leaving the room.


    "Haha, I never imagined something like that to happen to Elder Tian!" Unable to stop himself fromughing the moment the other party had left, Gong Bo soon calmed down again before leaving the manor to inform some of the guards about what happened.


    Normally a female demonic cultivator focused on sucking the life essence out of male cultivators, would focus on the younger ones instead of the older ones¡­


    However, Elder Tian had been unlucky enough to encounter one with a quite¡­ Unique taste¡­

 Chapter 462 - Meeting With Yi Min... Again!

    <h4>Chapter 462 - Meeting With Yi Min... Again!</h4>


    After Gong Bo had informed one of the guards patrolling around the area just outside the manor, he had returned back to the manor again where all the others had already returned back to their own rooms and settled down for the night.


    "I should get some rest as well¡­"


    Muttering this to himself while looking around the empty manor, Gong Bo soon returned to his own room like the others and soon enough.


    Like this, the night slowly passed with a tranquil atmosphere settling over the quiet manor.


    ¡­


    "Hmh!"


    Stretching herself after waking up, Qing Yi looked over the edge of the bed she wasying in before remembering what had happened yesterday.


    "That''s right! The interspatial ring!"


    Remembering the interspatial ring that had been handed to her, Qing Yi quickly fumbled her way out of her bed before searching the small table next to the bed.


    Rustle~


    "Hah¡­ It''s still here¡­" Letting out a sigh of relief upon discovering the small interspatial ring still filled with all sorts of spiritual herbs and a small mountain of spirit stone, Qing Yi soon got dressed before making her way out of her room to meet up with her master and the other elders.


    From what they had nned, she already knew that they would be leaving the morning at the day after the alchemypetition.


    "Hello Qing Yi, how are you doing? Got enough rest?"


    Hearing an old voice echo out from behind her the moment she stepped out of her room, Qing Yi quickly turned towards the origin of the voice.


    "I''m fine Elder Gong, a good night''s sleep was enough to clear away all my exhaustion from thepetition! By the way are the other elders already preparing to leave?"


    "That''s great to hear and the other elders are indeed preparing to leave, it''s just that your master had something to do before leaving, so I think we might have to wait a bit until he returns again. Well, I still have to see if I can help the others, you can just rx in your room until we leave."


    Watching Elder Gong turn to leave after saying this, Qing Yi could not help but feel a little curious.


    Where was her master and what was it that he needed to do before leaving¡­?


    "Hah¡­ No use thinking about it, I will just check out my rewards before master returns¡­!"


    Shaking her head as she knew that it would be impossible for her to find out where her master had gone, Qing Yi instead returned to her room with an excited expression, while looking at the interspatial ring she had won.


    Before her master returned and they left the Iron Sky Kingdom, Qing Yi wanted to check out all the rewards she had gotten from getting second ce in the alchemypetition!


    Among which, the first thing to enter her eyes was the small mountain of spirit stones¡­


    ¡­


    A little earlier when the sun had juste up and Qing Yi was still asleep, Xuan Hao had suddenly felt Yi Min contacting him through her divine sense asking him to meet her at therge ce located at the centre of the capital city where she resided.


    This was not really out of his expectations, as he had already expected for her to contact him at some point before he left. The subject of said meeting was very likely going to be something about the people who had attacked the capital earlier!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao thought that the main reason why she did not ask him to follow her back to talk about this earlier, was likely because she already knew that his disciple was participating in the alchemypetition, and she didn''t want him to miss it for something that could wait.


    After all, she did not really expect for her enemies to return within a few hours of them having been beaten up by the demonic beast that they had likely nned to use against her at some point¡­


    Whoosh~


    Standing up from where he had been meditating through the night, Xuan Hao disappeared from the room. Only to reappear directly in front of the pce at the centre of the capital in the next moment.


    Given that the other party already knew about his cultivation realm and the fact that she was not an enemy, Xuan Hao didn''t bother hiding his aura when he appeared.


    "Who is-!?


    "This aura¡­!"


    The two guards at the Nascent Soul Realm standing guard at the entrance to the pce both wore a shocked expression the moment they felt this aura, as both of them instantly understood that the other party was someone simr to their lord! Someone above the Nascent Soul Realm, a Domain Lord!


    "Come to the top floor in the west wing of the pce!"


    Before any of the two guards could even say anything, the familiar voice of Yi Min flowed out from inside the pce.


    Whoosh!


    Disappearing in front of the two guards, Xuan Hao moved through therge pce before reaching a beautifully decorated room at the west wing of the pce with a great view of the capital city.


    Seeing the person that had called him over in the first ce sitting in a small corner of the room nibbling away on a few snacks with a cup of tea next to her, Xuan Hao walked over and found a chair already prepared for him as he quickly sat down.


    "I wonder what you called me to talk about?"


    Asking this even though he already had some idea what she wanted to talk about, Xuan Hao curiously looked over Yi Min, who was still busy nibbling away on a small cookie in her hand.


    "Yes, I called you over to talk about the people who attacked my capital yesterday and wanted to ask you about a few things regarding that, I wonder if you are curious about why they even decided to attack me in the first ce?"


    Reluctantly putting the half-eaten cookie down, Yi Min put on a serious face before asking this.


    "¡­"


    The very clear pieces from the cookie she had just eaten covering parts of the dress along with a few pieces still left around her mouth, did not really fit very well with her current serious expression¡­

 Chapter 463 - Factions Of The Sky Empire

    <h4>Chapter 463 - Factions Of The Sky Empire</h4>


    Whoosh~


    "Ahm! I called you over to talk about the people who attacked my capital yesterday and if you are curious about why they even decided to attack me in the first ce?"


    Realizing that her face was still covered with the remains of the snacks she had eaten before Xuan Hao''s arrival, Yi Min quickly used her power to erase said snack remains before asking Xuan Hao again. Pretending nothing had happened¡­


    "I am indeed quite interested in knowing who attacked yesterday¡­ Although I did manage to hear that one of them was a general from the Sky Empire¡­" Ignoring the little cleaning Yi Min did, Xuan Hao nodded his head and responded.


    Even if he already knew that one of the people who had been there yesterday was a General of the Sky Empire, he still had no clue who the others were. Not to mention the demonic cultivator that Yi Min dealt with, there was a high likelihood that the people who hade together with General Guan, were very likely from a demonic sect of some sort.


    Given that he would very likely have ended up offending them by standing on the same side as Yi Min, Xuan Hao really wanted to find out just who they were, so he knew who to look out for.


    Even if there was a chance that they had not noticed him behind the barrier and the two people staying behind had already perished, Xuan Hao didn''t want to take any chances and wanted to be prepared, just in case they came to attack him at some point in the future¡­


    "Haha, I thought so!"


    Smiling happily upon hearing him say that he was indeed interested, Yi Min stood up before dashing towards a small bookshelf a short distance away beforeing back with a beautifully decorated book with a drawing of arge open sky as its cover.


    "This is¡­?"


    Seeing the book that Yi Min had suddenly ced handed over to him, Xuan Hao could not help showing a slightly confused expression. Not understanding why, he had been given a book when asking about the people who had attacked the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom yesterday.


    "It''s a basic introduction to the Sky Empire given to everyone inside the Sky Empire who reaches the Domain Lord Realm! Of course, it also gives a simple exnation of the different factions inside the Sky Empire itself. The ones who attacked yesterday are noted down in there as being on ''bad terms'' with me¡­"


    Listening attentively to Yi Min''s exnation, Xuan Hao felt like he understood why she had given the book to him.


    Not only would he be able to find out about the people who had attacked Yi Min''s capital yesterday, he would also be able to get a clearer picture of the current situation of the Sky Empire as a whole.


    "Ah! I forgot to mention, you can just keep the book after reading through it, I have quite a lot of themying around. Also! The book is a special artifact linked to the original in the capital of the Sky Empire. From what I know, it''s updated every 10 or so years. However, if something major, like another empireunching a full-blown invasion on the Sky Empire, it will also be updated."


    "Really!? What kind of artifact is it?"


    "Don''t think too much about it, the book itself is not really a rare artifact and can at most be considered an Earth Grade Artifact. The original on the other hand¡­ I have no idea about its rank, but it should at the very least have reached the Transcendent grade!"


    Hearing this, Xuan Hao did not feel disappointed as he opened the book before slowly beginning to read through it.


    Yi Min did not mind this at all and just picked the half-eaten cookie back up before she began nibbling away at it once again while looking out the window next to her.


    ¡­


    Reading through the book, the first thing Xuan Hao focused on was the part that talked about the different factions located inside the Sky Empire. Outside of the imperial family members that were not listed anywhere in the book.


    At least it looked like the book did not mention anything about the different princes and princess''s factions¡­


    However, even with this, Xuan Hao could not help but feel shocked when he saw just how many factions there was inside the Sky Empire. At the same time, it also made him feel a bit sceptical regarding the book he had read through back at the Flying Sword Sect about the different Domain Lords inside the Sky Empire¡­


    From that book, Xuan Hao expected for there to be between around a hundred or so Domain Lords inside the Sky Empire, but looking over the many factions, Xuan Hao felt like there should be far more Domain Lords inside the Sky Empire!


    After all, it did not make sense that a family n without any Domain Lord could be enemies with a kingdom that had a Domain Lord King at the helm¡­


    Looking through the list of factions, Xuan Hao could not help but feel more surprised the more he read about the different faction of the Sky Empire.


    Not to mention the churches that he had already known about beforehand, there was also severalrge noble families that had taken root inside the capital of the Sky Empire. From the writing in the book, Xuan Hao had quickly realized that therge noble families seemed to have a lot of power in the Sky Empire. Albeit, still weakerpared to the churches¡­.


    Speaking of the churches, Xuan Hao learned that there were three main faiths inside the Sky Empire.


    The Order of the Sky God.


    Followers of the Fire God.


    Andstly, Cult of the Scarlet Moon.


    Among the three, Xuan Hao could not help but read thest one again.


    Cult of the Scarlet Moon¡­


    Seeing that there was no description under the threergest faiths of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao could only throw aside his growing curiosity for now, as he continued reading through the different factions of the Sky Empire before finally finding the Iron Sky Kingdom!

 Chapter 464 - General Guans Backer And The Frost Devil Sect

    <h4>Chapter 464 - General Guan''s Backer And The Frost Devil Sect</h4>


    Having found the Iron Sky Kingdom under the faction part of the book, Xuan Hao began slowly reading through the long and in-depth description that was attached to it.


    Not to mention the fact that Yi Min was far older than he had first expected. Noticing the fact that the Iron Sky Kingdom had built up by her some 2000 years ago¡­


    Outside of the fact that he now knew that Yi Min was someone over 2000 years old, there was no real list of factions that the Iron Sky Kingdom was hostile towards, but Xuan Hao quickly managed to pick up that it was mention that Yi Min had once destroyed over a dozen branches of a demonic sect.


    The sect in question, was called the Frost Devil Sect!


    Thinking about it, the members of the Frost Devil Sect should have been working together with General Guan to get revenge on Yi Min for destroying so many of their branches in the past!


    Now, the only question that remained was¡­


    Why did General Guan work together with members of a demonic sect to attack Yi Min?


    Even after reading through everything mentioned in the book about the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao still had no clue why a general from the Sky Empire would do something like that.


    "Curious about why General Guan teamed up with them?"


    Hearing the voice of Yi Min sitting just across him, Xuan Hao turned away from the book in his hand and looked over towards her, just in time to see her finish up the remaining half of the cookie she had been nibbling on when he had arrived.


    "Yes, I''m quite curious why a general of the Sky Empire is working together with someone from a demonic sect!"


    Nodding his head as he said this, Xuan Hao gazed over towards Yi Min sitting directly in front of him-


    Whoosh~


    Who in turn quickly cleaned up after having finished the rest of the cookie from earlier.


    "General Guan is loyal to one of the many princes of the Sky Empire currently fighting for a chance to be the next emperor. The specific one he serves under is quite hostile to me after I refused said prince''s attempt at recruiting me in the past¡­ Hah¡­ And being a prince, he has enough power to get away with cooperating with a demonic sect. Even if it became public knowledge, I doubt it would even affect him¡­"


    Hearing just how petty the prince General Guan served under was, Xuan Hao understood why Yi Min''s expression had slowly begun to look a bit hostile.


    After all, she had only refused to join him and had never attacked him or anything along that line, yet he had suddenly gotten one of his subordinates to team up with a group of demonic cultivators to kill her¡­


    "Then what about the Frost Devil Sect? There is no way such a strong demonic sect would be able to run inside the Sky Empire without being discovered¡­"


    Having realized that it was likely not a good idea to continue asking about the prince that General Guan served under, Xuan Hao decided to ask about the Frost Devil Sect.


    "The reason for this is actually quite simple, while demonic sects are normally destroyed the moment they appear inside the Sky Empire, the same can not be said for demonic sect located outside the Sky Empire!"


    "The Frost Devil Sect is not located in the Sky Empire?"


    "Indeed¡­ Even though I don''t know where the main sect is located, I''m sure that it''s not anywhere inside the Sky Empire! From what I managed to find out, they should be located somewhere in the enormous frozen wastnd at our borders. Now that I think about it, you''re Flying Sword Sect should not be too far away from where it is..."


    Listening to what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao could not help showing a slightly confused expression before he tried to remember anything he could about the frozen wastnd that Yi Min had mentioned.


    If he was not wrong, the Azure Sky Kingdom should be bordering a frozen wastnd of some sort and was struggling with demonic cultivatorsing from there and trying to take over theirnd from time to time¡­ But he had no idea if it was the frozen wastnd that Yi Min talked about¡­


    The reason for this, was that the frozen wastnd located beside the Azure Sky Kingdom had a far worse environment for cultivationpared to the border region of the Sky Empire where the Flying Sword Sect was located.


    Xuan Hao could simply not imagine a demonic sect with more than one Domain Lord setting up a sect in a ce like that¡­


    However, after thinking about it, Xuan Hao realized that the reason why they would set up a sect in a ce like that, was most likely to avoid being found by the Sky Empire. The moment they were found, the Sky Empire would not hesitate to send an army down to erase them¡­


    All of a sudden, Xuan Hao felt like he began to understand the struggles of a demonic cultivator¡­


    "Is there anything else you want to know?"


    Having finished her short exnation about the person behind General Guan and the Frost Devil Sect, Yi Min asked Xuan Hao before picking up a brand-new cookie to begin nibbling on from the table in front of her.


    "Yes, I actually wanted to hear if I could get a sword made. You are after all a quite renowned cksmith, and I don''t really have a weapon¡­"


    "I understand, here!"


    Swish~


    Before Xuan Hao managed to say anything more, Yi Min waved her hand as a beautiful silver sword appeared and floated directly in front of him.


    "Consider it a thank you for your help yesterday¡­ Now, is there anything else you want to ask? If its anything about the Sky Empire, you can just look it up in the book I gave you."


    "I also wanted to know where to find a Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb or Metal¡­ Really, just any kind of natural treasure should do fine¡­"


    Putting away the beautiful looking silver sword that Yi Min had given him, Xuan Hao did not inspect it for now, as he decided to ask Yi Min about the main thing, he had been concerned about regarding getting the Qi Gathering Formation made in time.


    "A Transcendent Grade Natural Treasure? Hm¡­ Let me guess, it''s for a formation core?"


    "Yes..."


    Smiling a bit wryly when he heard Yi Min ask this, Xuan Hao did not really see any reason to hide what he needed a Transcendent Grade Natural Treasure for.


    "I see! I do indeed know the location of a Transcendent Grade Natural Treasure, a quite special spiritual herb so to speak¡­ But I would need something in return for telling you it''s location!"


    "Really!? What do you need in return¡­?"


    Hearing that she did indeed know where to find a Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb, Xuan Hao excitedly nodded his head. Waiting for her to say what she wanted in return for the information about the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb''s location.


    "Great! Actually, the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb just so happens to be located in a quite dangerous ce inside the frozen wastnd and¡­ I was hoping you could try and look around for the Frost Devil Sect for me and help me find the location of their main sect!"


    "This¡­"


    Hearing Yi Min''s request, Xuan Hao could not help hesitating. No matter what, he had already understood just how strong the Frost Devil Sect was given the fact that they could send two Domain Lords to attack Yi Min inside the Sky Empire.


    Even if he found the location of the main sect, he was very likely going to be discovered and would inevitably end up being chased down by the Domain Lords from the Frost Devil Sect!


    "Hah¡­ Fine, but I will not be heading there immediately."


    Having thought about it and remembering the movement technique he had just received through the system, Xuan Hao decided to agree with Yi Min''s request.


    "That''s fine! As long as you can find the location of their main sect, I will be more than happy! If not for the fact that so many people wanted to destroy my little kingdom, I would have gone to search for them and get the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb myself¡­"


    Saying thest part with no small amount of regret, Xuan Hao watched Yi Min take out arge map before handing it over to him.


    "This is a map of the frozen wastnd; the location of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb is also noted down on there¡­ Though a little bit of advice, be careful when trying to get the spiritual herb, as there should be a guardian demon beast of some sort around it."


    "Thank you, for both the sword and the trust."


    Whoosh~


    "At least don''t let it go to waste¡­"


    Muttering this to herself as she stared towards the direction Xuan Hao had left in, Yi Min soon stared back outside the window next.


    Nom~ Nom~


    Slowly nibbling away on the small cookie in her hand.

 Chapter 465 - Encountering Li Yao

    <h4>Chapter 465 - Encountering Li Yao</h4>


    Having left the pce after getting so many different things from Yi Min, Xuan Hao decided to wait until he made it back to the Flying Sword Sect before reading through the rest of the book. The same with the map of the frozen wastnd he had been given. After all, he did not really have much use for any of those things at the moment¡­


    The only thing he wanted to inspect immediately, was the beautiful silver sword Yi Min had given him as a thanks for helping out yesterday.


    First and foremost, he did not want to end up encountering a powerful enemy on the way back. Only to be unable to fully use the sword that he had just obtained¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao took out the silver sword as he slowly made his way back towards the manor.


    The silver sword that Yi Min had given him was not a Transcendent Grade Sword, something like that was simply way too precious and Xuan Hao did not really expect for her give him such a high grade sword in the first ce.


    However, even if it was not a Transcendent Grade Sword, it was by no means a bad sword. On the other hand, the silver sword should be at the Peak of the Mystic Grade just below the Transcendent Grade! Even if he surpassed the Domain Lord Realm in the future, he should be more than fine using the silver sword¡­


    Not to mention, given the fact that Yi Min had made something like the silver sword, Xuan Hao believed that she might not be too far away from surpassing the Master cksmith Realm!


    If she really managed to surpass the Master cksmith Realm, Xuan Hao could alwayse back and ask for a Transcendent Grade Sword in the future!


    Thinking about all of this as he put away the silver sword, Xuan Hao felt like it was a good idea to get closer with Yi Min in the future¡­


    ¡­


    "Let''s get going, we should at least get out of the Iron Sky Kingdom before it starts getting dark!"


    ""Yes!""


    Returning to the manor where Qing Yi and the rest of the elders were already waiting for him to return before leaving the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao did not intend to let them wait for any longer, as the group soon left the manor under hismand.


    "Li Yao!? Are you also leaving today? Didn''t the Artisan Alchemist take you in as a disciple?"


    Having left the manor, the group abruptly came to a stop almost the moment they had taken their first step out of the manor, as Qing Yi eximed loudly while making her way over to greet a young girling out from a simr manor to theirs located directly across from them.


    "Q-Qing Yi?! Y-yeah, we are leaving today as well, I first need to talk with my parents before they can agree to let me study under Elder Fang¡­"


    Watching the young girl nervously answer Qing Yi as she had run over, Xuan Hao did not know what to say, as he soon realized that the girl was none other than the young girl who had managed to ce first in the alchemypetition!


    She was even younger than Qing Yi, yet she had managed to take the first ce in the alchemypetition!


    Even if Xuan Hao had not witnessed how well she did in thepetition, as most of his attention was on Qing Yi during the time he was there, Xuan Hao still felt impressed by the achievements of the young girl.


    Not only that, but from the looks of it, Qing Yi seemed to have be quite good friends with the young Li Yao during the short period of time they had interacted with each other over the duration of the alchemypetition.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao looked over towards the people walking together with Li Yao. From the looks of it, they should be Li Yao''s elders or maybe family members who hade along with her.


    "Hm?"


    However, inspecting the group of old people on Li Yao''s side, Xuan Hao could not help but frown. The group of old men and women looked extremely on edge, like someone was going to attack them at any given moment!


    Not to mention the fact that almost all of them had reached the Nascent Soul Realm, there was also the formation that covered the capital. Any attack at the Nascent Soul Realm or above would cause it to instantly activate and at the same time alert Yi Min¡­


    "Master! Can we go together with Li Yao? She said that her group are also leaving, and they will be moving in the same direction as us!"


    "That''s fine with me, but what did Li Yao''s elders say about this?"


    "Ehm¡­"


    Seeing his disciplee up to him and ask him this, Xuan Hao could not help but smile a bit as he watched her make her way back over towards Li Yao currently talking with one of the elders walking just behind her.


    "¡­"


    Seeing Qing Yi make her way over the old man stopped talking, as he suddenly raised his head to stare at Xuan Hao with an unfriendly expression.


    "Hah¡­"


    Not knowing what to do when faced with the death stare of the random old man he had never seen before, Xuan Hao could not help but sigh to himself as he watched Qing Yi make her way back towards him after a small conversation with Li Yao.


    "Master! Li Yao said it would be fine for us to go together with them!"


    "Really?"


    "Yes!"


    Hearing his disciple say this, Xuan Hao could not help looking over towards the unfriendly looking old man who had stopped giving him a death stare and was instead talking with Li Yao with the expression of a kind old man.


    He really had no idea what was up with the elders from Li Yao''s side, but he decided to not really care about it for the moment. After all, for his disciple to make a new friend was a good thing and he wouldn''t be the one to ruin it.


    Li Yao also seemed like a kind girlpared to the older people who hade along with her¡­


    "Well then, you can go over and chat with Li Yao, me and the other elders will go over and have a chat with the ones on Li Yao''s side."


    "Thank you master!"


    Like this, the two groups of people making their way out of the capital merged into one.


    After beginning to move together with the elders from Li Yao''s side, Xuan Hao took the opportunity to talk with the old man who had given him what could almost be considered a death stare just a few minutes earlier.


    Talking with him, Xuan Hao quickly learned the reason why they were so on edge. Even when still inside the formation that covered the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    ording to him, Li Yao, and the rest of them were a part of arge sect inside the Sky Empire called the Sunfire Sect. The reason that they were so on edge, was because several of the small kingdoms neighbouring the Sunfire Sect had turned hostile after discovering that Li Yao''s mother, the sect master, had been injured during a battle with a powerful demon beast.


    However, what had truly caused them to risk it all and offend a Domain Lord, was because it was rumoured that Li Yao''s mother had gotten her hand on a source crystal!


    In the end, they wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to destroy the Sunfire Sect and size the source crystal for an attempt to breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm!


    Things, however, did not go as nned¡­ As even if she had been injured, Li Yao''s mother was still a Domain Lord and had easily managed to repel the small kingdomsbined attack on her sect!


    "¡­ And, with things not going ording to n, these smaller kingdoms turned their attention towards her daughter that was currently on her way to the Iron Sky Kingdom. Wanting to kidnap her and use her to force the Sect Master to hand over the source crystal!"


    "I understand, but how can you say something like that to me without fear? Are you not scared that we take the opportunity to kidnap Li Yao after hearing this?"


    Hearing the joking tone in Xuan Hao''s voice, the old man could not help rolling his eyes.


    "Please¡­ If the sect master really did have a source crystal, she would have already used it to recover from her injuries¡­"


    "Haha, indeed, it''s a wonder those kingdoms did not realize something simple like that yet."


    "Maybe they did, maybe not¡­ From what I can see, someone should be controlling those small kingdoms from behind the scenes!"


    Talking with the old man, Xuan Hao could not help but feel a bit of pity towards Li Yao, it seemed like she would have quite a dangerous journey back home¡­

 Chapter 466 - Fang Shi!?

    <h4>Chapter 466 - Fang Shi!?</h4>


    Now that I think about it, it seems like someone has been following us for quite a while¡­


    Feeling a unique presence seemingly hesitantly approaching them from time to time before backing off again. Only to resume the hesitant approach a few secondster, Xuan Hao could not help but chuckle to himself.


    While the person might be able to escape the senses of someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, it was impossible for him to escape the senses of a Domain Lord like Xuan Hao!


    The only reason why he did not care about this presence, was that he could not feel any killing intent or other malicious intent from it. However, in the end, he was still quite curious about who it was¡­


    So, with this in mind, Xuan Hao used his divine sense to inspect the person following behind them.


    "This is¡­ Fang Shi?!"


    Realizing that the person following behind was none other than the old Artisan Alchemist who had wanted to snatch his disciple away less than a day ago, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly.


    Was the reason why he was following them because he knew about Li Yao''s situation and wanted to secretly ensure her safety on her journey back home, or maybe the old man wanted to fulfil his part of the bet they had yesterday¡­


    "Hehe~"


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help but chuckle a bit to himself without anyone noticing.


    From what he saw, it looked like the chances of the old alchemist secretly showing up was to make sure his new disciple made it back safely. Not toe and give away his first disciple!


    The reason why he was hesitating to get any closer, was likely because he had seen him and remembered their bet yesterday!


    The bet itself was nothing more than a joke in his eyes. After all, there was no way Fang Shi''s disciple would just agree to a stranger that she had no idea who was, taking her away from her current master.


    At that point, it would just be him kidnapping some random girl¡­


    However, from the looks of it, Fang Shi did not see things the same way he did, as he seemed to seriously think that he wanted to take away his first disciple now that he had lost the bet to him. For this reason, he did not dare to approach Li Yao''s group while he was still nearby.


    The current situation was quite funny to Xuan Hao. Especially given the fact that the old Artisan Alchemist had yet to discover the fact that the person he was hiding from had already discovered him.


    "Looks like we will be parting ways here, it was nice meeting you and I hope we can meet again sometime in the future, as it seems the young mistress is getting along quite well with your disciple¡­"


    Before Xuan Hao could hatch any n to get a little revenge on the old alchemist who had tried to steal away his disciple yesterday, the old man from Li Yao''s side whom he had been talking to during the duration of their journey to the gate leading out of the capital came to a stop as he said this.


    The other elders from Li Yao''s side were the same, as some of them even directly took out their weapons just in case they were attacked on their short journey to their flying ship floating a few dozen meters off the ground a short distance from the city gate.


    "Indeed, looks like we will be parting ways already¡­ I will make sure toe by and visit with Qing Yi in the future, if an opportunity presents itself."


    Saying this as he signalled for Qing Yi toe over to his side, Xuan Hao watched as Li Yao and her group gathered together before slowly and cautiously making their way towards the ce where the flying ship was located.


    Looking at them moving forward so cautiously was quite aical thing, as many of the miners and guards passing by them looked towards the group with a slightly weird expression on their faces. Not really understanding what they were up to.


    "Master¡­ Are they going to be fine¡­?"


    Having somewhat understood that Li Yao was potentially being targeted by someone over the course of their short journey to the gate, Qing Yi could not help asking her master in a slightly worried tone.


    After all, Qing Yi already considered Li Yao to be her friend and she did not want for her to get hurt. Especially so when she was there and could help out in case something really did happen!


    "No worries, they should be fine, we should also get going."


    Feeling the old alchemist having already sneaked past him and left the capital to follow behind the group, Xuan Hao knew that the group should be more than safe.


    The main reason for this was that, even though Fang Shi was an alchemist, he was by no means weak. Having already reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm with a pseudo domain, being just a single step away from forming a true domain to be a Domain Lord.


    Given the many different potions and pills at his disposable along with the fact that he would surely have gotten his hands on many different powerful artifacts over the years as an Artisan Alchemist, Xuan Hao didn''t doubt that the old man should be more than capable of fighting with a Domain Lord Realm Expert for some time!


    Even if he could not beat the other party, holding off long enough until Yi Min showed up should be more than enough¡­ Not that he really expected for the other party to send any Domain Lords given what he had learned about Li Yao''s enemies from the old man.


    In the end, if things really did end up getting dangerous for Li Yao, Xuan Hao could always step in himself to resolve the issue. However, it was after all Fang Shi''s new disciple so he should¡­ give¡­


    Wait¡­ Why do I need to give that old thief the chance to show off in front of his new disciple!?

 Chapter 467 - Not Allowing Fang Shi To Show Off~

    <h4>Chapter 467 - Not Allowing Fang Shi To Show Off~</h4>


    "It looks like he didn''t discover me¡­"


    Having just left the city as he secretly followed behind his future second disciple''s group, while remaining hidden by his pseudo domain, Fang Shi could not help but let out a sigh of relief as he looked towards Xuan Hao''s figure still standing at the gate to the capital city. Waiting for the other elders from his side to get their hands on a few demon beasts for them to use on their way back.


    As for how Fang Shi even knew about Li Yao''s current situation, he was still an Artisan Alchemist with quite arge number of connections spread throughout the Sky Empire. Investigating Li Yao was an incredibly simple thing. Not to mention he already knew where she was from¡­


    At this point, Fang Shi hoped that nothing would happen, and Li Yao and her group could safely make their way back onto the flying ship before flying back home.


    This way, Xuan Hao would not be able to try and get him to fulfil his promise from yesterday''s bet!


    However, things did not go ording to Fang Shi''s wishes, as he suddenly felt several hostile presences rushing over towards his future second disciple and her group. Even worse, he very clearly felt that the group of people rushing over, were stronger than his future second disciple''s group of elders¡­ From the looks of it, it looked like he would need to step in and reveal himself.


    Even if he got to show off in front of his future second disciple, Fang Shi did not feel the slightest bit happy about this. After all, when he revealed himself, Xuan Hao would instantly spot him!


    But¡­ Looking at the people? approaching Li Yao''s group from all sides just as they were about to reach the flying ship that had begun descending down towards them, Fang Shi knew that he would have toe out and protect Li Yao.


    Unless he wanted to end up losing a disciple just after finding one¡­


    "However,¡­ How do they n to get away? There is no way they don''t know that such amotion just outside the capital would alert Yi min. Unless, they don''t n to kidnap Li Yao!"


    Muttering this to himself as he realized that the people approaching might very well be a grouping to sacrifice their own lives to take down his future second disciple Li Yao, Fang Shi narrowed both his eyes as he secretly moved closer to Li Yao. Making sure he could protect her properly during the uing battle!


    Fwoosh!


    Just as he managed to position himself close enough so that he could protect Li Yao in case her elders couldn''t hold back the slowly approaching attackers, a powerful aura simr to his own suddenly red up from the direction of the gate to the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom just a few hundred meters away from him and Li Yao''s group before directly charging towards Li Yao currently located in the middle of the group of Nascent Soul Realm elders.


    Whoosh! Whoosh!


    Followed by the powerful aura of someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm along with a pseudo domain, several dozen auras at the Nascent Soul Realm erupted around Li Yao''s group from all directions before charging over filled with killing intent.


    From the looks of it, the fear of the old man and the rest of the elders came true, as they were indeed attack on their way back from the alchemypetition!


    The only thing causing them to feel slightly surprised, was the fact that their enemies did not wait until they had left the territory of the Iron Sky Kingdom, but instead decided to attack them before they had even managed to reach the flying ship.


    Thinking about it, it was understandable to some degree, as fighting in the air was way riskier. Especially given the fact that none of the people rushing over had reached the Domain Lord Realm. Meaning if their flying demon beasts died while trying to approach the flying ship, they would fall straight to the ground and likely end up losing their physical body¡­


    In the end, it seemed like they thought that it was a better option to attack Li Yao and her group when they were still on the ground. The only problem that remained, was the fact that they were currently just outside the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Escaping was pretty much impossible, as they were far too weak to run away from a Peak Domain Lord like Yi Min!


    Attacking them in front of the capital was pretty much a death sentence¡­


    "Who dares to behave so brazenly in front of the capital!?"


    Followed by the appearances of a group of Nascent Soul Realm cultivators full of killing intent charging over towards Li Yao''s group, the few Nascent Soul Realm guards secretly guarding the gate were instantly alerted.


    Already knowing that the group targeted was the winner of the alchemypetition and a future disciple of the Artisan Alchemist Fang Shi, the few Nascent Soul Realm Experts at the gate quickly alert their superiors before rushing over to reinforce the group even before the attacks had managed tounch a single attack yet.


    Whoosh!


    Everything happened extremely quickly, as the Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert with a pseudo domain who had charged over first ignored everyone and went directly for Li Yao.


    Given the fact that he had a pseudo domain, it was easy for him to pass through the Nascent Soul Realm Experts without them having a chance to block him.


    "No, you don''t-"


    Bang!


    Just as Fang Shi revealed himself and was about to protect Li Yao from the Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert who had passed through the tight formation of elders, an all too familiar figure appeared in front of Li Yao.


    "Oh? You were here as well Fang Shi? I wonder if you remember our bet from yesterday?"


    Casually blocking the Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert who was just about to grab onto Li Yao, while at the same time rendering his pseudo domain useless, Xuan Hao chuckled light-heartedly as he smiled over towards the speechless Fang Shi just a few meters away.

 Chapter 468 - Thousand-Mile Talisman~

    <h4>Chapter 468 - Thousand-Mile Talisman~</h4>


    "Wha-what!? Who!?"


    Seeing someone appear directly in front of him before casual stopping him from grabbing hold of Li Yao, the leader among the attackers could not help eximing in a both fearful and surprised voice.


    He had just been about to grab hold of Li Yao before someone had suddenly appeared in front of him without any prior warning, it had to be known that he had not even seen the other party move before he was already in front of him!


    Not to mention the fact that he had very clearly felt his pseudo domain being renderedpletely? useless by the other party before he even had a chance to truly use it¡­


    From this alone, the leader of the attacks quickly realized that the other part was someone far stronger than him and for someone to be stronger than him¡­ Meant that the other party should be someone who had reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    This thought alone was more than enough to terrify the leader of the attackers, to the point that he still hadn''t noticed Fang Shi standing just a few meters away from him also about to try and stop him¡­


    "Oh? You were here as well Fang Shi? I wonder if you remember our bet from yesterday?"


    It was only when he heard the person who had stopped him talk that he discovered Fang Shi was also there.


    Someone who was very likely to have reached the Domain Lord Realm and a famous Artisan Alchemist only a single step away from the Domain Lord Realm!


    No, I have to get out of here!


    Understanding that he would not be able toplete his mission of kidnapping Li Yao, the leader of the attack brought out a small talisman and before Xuan Hao could react in time, managed to activate it.


    Whoosh!


    Followed by the talisman being activated, both Xuan Hao and Fang Shi showed a surprised expression, as the leader of the group of attackers suddenly disappeared into thin air. Not leaving behind any traces of him having even been present in the first ce.


    Even Xuan Hao didn''t have any time to react, as it was a first for him to suddenly see someone just disappear in front of him all of a sudden¡­


    ¡­


    "What was that¡­?"


    Unknowingly muttering this to himself, as he just watched the leader of the group of attackers disappear in front of him, Xuan Hao looked over towards the other attackers who had already stopped their attack also looking over with a simrly shocked expression.


    Looks like they have no idea about what happened either¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao used his ice domain to freeze up the group of attackers before they even had any time to react and began observing his surroundings. Trying to find out just what had happened to the leader of the attackers.


    However, his search came to nothing, as he still had no clue what had happened to the leader of the attackers.


    Well¡­ Notpletely useless as he had still managed to discover some changes to the space around the ce the leader of the attackers had been standing just a few seconds ago, it was just that hisprehension regarding spatial maniption was way too shallow to understand just what had happened.


    All he could see with his current level, was that some changes had taken ce in the surrounding space.


    Maybe if he was stronger or had dedicated some more time to understand spatial maniption, outside of making interspatial rings to throw around wherever he went, he might have an idea as to what had caused the leader of the attackers suddenly disappear in front of him.


    "A thousand-mile talisman!? Impossible!"


    As the fight had stopped before it even managed to start, Fang Shi''s voice could? clearly be heard by everyone standing around, as the old man himself looked over towards the location where the leader of the attackers had been standing just a few seconds ago with a look of disbelief.


    "You know what the talisman that he used?"


    Hearing Fang Shi''s exmation of surprise after having remained silent for a short moment, Xuan Hao asked the old alchemist.


    "Yes, a thousand-mile talisman is a teleportation talisman that can be used once to randomly teleport the user somewhere a thousand miles away¡­ But a thousand-mile talisman is not something easy to acquire.


    Even a Domain Lord will have a hard time acquiring a thousand-mile talisman due to the expensive materials involved in making one. Not to mention the fact that it also requires a Peak Domain Lord skilled in the art of talismans!"


    Listening to Fang Shi exnation of a thousand-mile talisman, Xuan Hao understood why he was so surprised after he recognized the talisman used by the leader of the attackers.


    The fact that it required someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm to make, was more than enough for Xuan Hao to understand just how precious a thousand-mile talisman was.


    Not to mention the fact that the talisman could be considered lifesaving. Allowing one to escape in case one encountered a dangerous situation.


    Like the leader of the group of attackers who had escaped after realizing that he had no way to fight back against Xuan Hao¡­


    "Hah¡­ If only I knew about it beforehand¡­"


    Only able to shake his head with regret over the fact that he had not killed the enemy before he escaped, Xuan Hao resolved himself to not make such a mistake in the future. At the very least he now knew about the existence of things like the thousand-mile talisman!


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was thinking about the thousand-mile talisman, the first of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts from the Iron Sky Kingdom''s side arrived.


    "Senior, do you have any n on how to deal with those people? If not, we can take care of them!"


    "Sure, I don''t have any use for them, and it seems like you already have something nned¡­"


    Already having realized that the remaining Nascent Soul Realm Experts were likely just someone who had been hired by the person who had run away, Xuan Hao allowed for the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Iron Sky Kingdom to take away the frozen Nascent Soul Realm Experts¡­


    Even though they were still alive, they could not move a single muscle, as even their Nascent Soul had been frozen in ce inside their bodies.


    "What happened to them¡­?"


    "They turned into ice sculptures¡­ Is this perhaps a special defensive technique?"


    It was also at this moment that Li Yao and her group of elders realized that the people who had just been rushing over towards them filled with killing intent a moment ago, had been turned into human popsicles.


    "E-elder Grandpa, what happened¡­?"


    Li Yao, who was just about to get snatched away by the unknown man a few seconds ago, looked up towards the elderly man standing beside her.


    "We were attacked by some bad guys, and it looks like Elder Xuan, Qing Yi''s master, saved us¡­"


    "Wow! Qing Yi''s master is really strong!"


    Listening in from the side, Fang Shi could not help feeling a wave of sadness wash over him as he watched how his future second disciple was looking towards Xuan Hao filled with admiration.


    Not only did he end up revealing himself to Xuan Hao, but he also didn''t even manage to anything other than provide a bit of information regarding how the enemy leader had escaped¡­


    "Thank you¡­ For protecting the youngdy, the Sunfire Sect will make sure to repay the favour in the future!"


    "No problem, Li Yao is still a friend of Qing Yi, so it''s only a given that I help out."


    "¡­"


    Remaining silent on the side as this short conversation between Xuan Hao and the elder at Li Yao''s side, Fang Shi decided to escape while he still had time.


    There was no way he was going to stay around and wait for Xuan Hao toe and ask him to uphold his bet from yesterday!


    Whoosh!


    Just before Fang Shi managed to leave the area, he suddenly realized that he could not move his body any longer.


    "W-what is this!?"


    Feeling something bad was about to happen, Fang Shi was just about to use his pseudo domain to run away, when the familiar voice of Xuan Hao echoed out from behind him.


    "Oh¡­ Leaving already, Fang Shi¡­?"


    "Hehe, of course not! I just wanted to check up on the other elders over here. After all, I''m an alchemist and have quite a few healing potions and pills on hand."


    Not knowing what to say as he had been caught trying to run away this time around, Fang Shi decided to y ignorant as he said this before showing off a few different Qi Recovery Pills he was carrying with him.


    "They didn''t even fight yet, so I don''t think there is a need for that¡­ More importantly, how about we discuss the bet from yesterday? I wanted to talk about this yesterday, but you suddenly disappeared after we left the cauldron¡­"


    Smiling happily while saying this, Xuan Hao arrived beside Fang Shi.


    This time around, he was not going to let him run away¡­

 Chapter 469 - Extorting Fang Shi~

    <h4>Chapter 469 - Extorting Fang Shi~</h4>


    I almost let that old man get away again! I really can''t let my guard down around someone like that or I would never be able to stop him from running away!


    Thinking this to himself as he had just barely managed to stop Fang Shi with his domain before the other party escaped back into the city, Xuan Hao could not help but curse at the thought of the old man running away like he did yesterday.


    Even his future second disciple was not important enough for the old man to stay behind for too long, as he tried running away the moment, he saw that she was safe!


    "First of all, let''s get some privacy."


    Whoosh!


    Before Fang Shi even had time to react to his words, Xuan Hao directly used his domains to iste the area around them. Making sure no one would be able to hear them talking and at the same time making sure that the old alchemist couldn''t just run away.


    "So¡­ ording to our bet, if you won, you would be able to take in my disciple, Qing Yi, as your own¡­ On the other hand, if I won, I would be able to take in your disciple! Is the reason you ran awayst time perhaps because you wanted talk it over with your disciple? Don''t worry too much about it, I will make sure to treat her just like my other disciples in the future!"


    Smiling a bit sarcastically towards the end as he watched Fang Shi''s face go through several different, but equally interesting expressions.


    The old man had probably never expected to lose in the first ce and the fact that he had bet his own disciple would surely make said disciple quite angry when she found out about it¡­ Not to mention her master had ended up losing¡­


    "Ehm-! Can we perhaps discuss this¡­? I have quite a lot of treasurers-"


    "Great! We will just do it like that! Don''t worry, as long as you can take out treasures of equivalent value, I will be more than happy to do it like that! After all, taking away another person''s disciple is never something I would want to do¡­"


    Hearing Fang Shi mention the thing he originally wanted out of him, Xuan Hao quickly agreed as both his eyes shone for a brief moment.


    Saying that he would be fine as long as he could bring out something of equivalent value to their bet, Xuan Hao was essential asking him to show how much he valued his first and currently only disciple!


    Given the old man''s status, he was sure to have quite a few treasures on him. Not to mention the fact that he might even have some of the natural treasures that he required for the Qi Gathering Formation!


    No matter what, the old man would not be able to get away without paying a sufficient price for daring to try and steal away his disciple!


    Understanding what Xuan Hao meant, Fang Shi could not help letting out a sigh as he looked over towards the happily smiling Xuan Hao standing in front of him.


    "Hah¡­ Is there anything specific you are looking for?"


    Letting out a sigh as he began to regret his bet yesterday even more, Fang Shi could only agree to the other party as he asked this with a reluctant look on his face.


    "I''m d you asked! Actually¡­"


    Following what Fang Shi said, Xuan Hao''s eyes once again shone as he began to list out several things that would be needed for the Flying Sword Sect and his future residence when he and the Flying Sword Sect moved in the future. Not just limited to the two remaining Mystic Grade Natural Treasures for the Qi Gathering Formation¡­


    "¡­"


    Hearing the long list of rare and precious materials being listed by the other party, Fang Shi suddenly felt his vision go dark for a short moment.


    The sheer amount of precious resources Xuan Hao asked for was more than enough to bankrupt a normal Domain Lord! Even someone like Fang Shi, who was far richer than a normal Domain Lord due to his profession, would not easily be able to gather the thing Xuan Hao asked for!


    Why are you asking me for so much!? Can''t you just rob me instead at this point!?


    ¡­


    At the same time that Li Yao''s group talked with a few of the Nascent Soul Realm guards on the Iron Sky Kingdom''s side, Fang Shi was forced to take out several different treasures. Among which was a Seven Petal Sky Flower and arge chunk of Spiritual Dark Metal Ore!


    The Seven Petal Sky Flower filled with a dense amount of pure wind qi, while a heavy earthen qi enveloped the Spiritual Dark Metal Ore!


    Even though Xuan Hao had already expected Fang Shi to be rich given the fact that he was an old Peak Artisan Realm Alchemist who had been around for hundreds of years, he did not expect the old man to casually pull out two mystic grade natural treasures!


    Not to mention that the two mystic grade natural treasures were just what he needed, a wind and metal rted mystic grade natural treasure. Now he just needed to go and get the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb Yi Min had given him the coordinates to and he could officially begin to set up the qi gathering formation at one of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Whoosh~


    Watching the old man run away the moment he handed over thest treasure and the domain around them disappeared, Xuan Hao suddenly felt like he should have asked for more. Given how easily the old man handed out those treasurers just a moment ago, he should have a lot more-


    "Master-!"


    As Xuan Hao was just about to pull the escaping Fang Shi back with his domain and ask him for a few more things, his disciple suddenly arrived beside him with a relieved expression.


    "What happened to you and Elder Fang¡­?"


    Hearing Qing Yi''s question, Xuan Hao could not help but smile a bit awkwardly.


    When extorti- talking with Fang Shi earlier, he not only made sure nobody could listen in, but he also made sure nobody could see what they were doing, as he did not really n for others to see him what was happening¡­


    So¡­ In the eyes of his disciple and the others looking at him and Fang Shi, it had looked like both of them had disappeared into thin air like the leader of the attackers had just a few moments ago.


    This in turn, had caused Qing Yi to grow worried. Not knowing where her master had suddenly disappeared to. Only rxing upon seeing that her master had reappeared again.


    "I just had to talk about something private with Fang Shi. So, I isted the area around us. Don''t worry so much about it."


    "Yes¡­"


    Seeing that she understood that nothing had happened, Xuan Hao smiled as he ruffled her hair, causing a small blush from her as both of them soon made their way back towards the area beside the gate where the other elders from the Flying Sword Sect were waiting with a few newly acquired demon beast mounts for them to use on their way back.


    The only bad thing was the fact that the demon beasts were not flying demon beast. Meaning their way back to the Flying Sword Sect, would most likely take a few weeks longer than expected¡­


    Why was there no flying demon beast avable in such arge kingdom like the Iron Sky Kingdom?


    Well¡­ It just so happened that most of the demon beasts had been killed by someone over the past few days, their bodiespletely drained of blood¡­


    For this reason. Only some of the weakernd demon beasts were still alive, though if they had been any slower, there might not even be a singlend demon beast left as well!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help recalling the tentacle cocoons that had sucked out the blood of its victims to grow strong.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the recent disappearance of demon beasts inside the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom most likely had something to do with a demonic cultivator.


    "Let''s get going, we have already been away from the sect for way too long¡­"


    Shaking his head as he ordered the rest to move out after seeing that everyone had mounted up on a demon beast, Xuan Hao decided not to get involved in any more of the Iron Sky Kingdom''s problems!


    At least Yi Min should be more than capable of dealing with something like that by herself, or she would not have been able to rule the Iron Sky Kingdom for such a long period of time!


    Thump- Thump!


    Thump- Thump!


    Following Xuan Hao''s orders, the group from the Flying Sword Sect soon began their long journey back to the Flying Sword Sect.

 Chapter 470 - Hollow Mountain

    <h4>Chapter 470 - Hollow Mountain</h4>


    At the same time Xuan Hao, Qing Yi, and the rest of the elders from the Flying Sword Sect who hade along with them to the Iron Sky Kingdom were beginning their journey back towards the Flying Sword Sect, Chu Yang had just made his way out of the pavilion with the help of Zhi Ruo.


    "I''m so close¡­ I just need an opportunity and I should be able to breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm!"


    Muttering this to himself as he stared at the clouds gently floating by below him, Chu Yang felt that it was time for him to go out again.


    Without going out and experiencing the world, he didn''t know how long it would take for him to breakthrough the Core Formation Realm by just sitting around. Not to mention, Qing Yi had already managed to go out together with their master!


    "Hah¡­"


    Thinking about Qing Yi and the fact that she and her master had gone to some powerful kingdom for an alchemypetition, Chu Yang could not help feeling a little jealous of her¡­


    "If you want to go out, I think you should go visit the Mission Hall. Recently they put up a lot of new missions and most of them are for Foundation Establishment Realm Disciples."


    Hearing Zhi Ruo''s voice, Chu Yang looked towards the young girl with a curious expression.


    "I still haven''t reached the Core Formation Realm; can I really leave the sect without master''s approval¡­?


    "Yes! From what I heard, most of the missions are rted to Elder Song? and him slowly increasing our control over the territory under our sect. From what I heard; the missions are not too dangerous. At this point, most of the other personal disciple below the Core Formation Realm under the Core Elders have taken up one of the missions issued by Elder Song!"


    Listening to Zhi Ruo''s exnation, Chu Yang could not help growing a little excited. If what she said was really true, he would be able to take on a mission and gain some real-world experience without waiting for his master toe back!


    Maybe he could even breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm and surprise his master when he came back!


    "I see¡­ Looks like I will have to visit the Mission Hall! Thanks for the information, Zhi Ruo!"


    "No problem, you can alwayse and ask me if you are ever curious about what the current situation in the sect is!"


    Thinking about how wonderful it would be if he could reach the Core Formation Realm before his master returned, Chu Yang did not pay too much attention to his surroundings, as he began making his way down the mountain towards the Mission Hall.


    "Ah! That''s the wron-"


    Crack~


    "Huh¡­?"


    Before Zhi Ruo even had time to warn him, Chu Yang had already stepped down the wrong side of the mountain, as the ground beneath his feet suddenly cracked apart-


    Rumble!


    Before the rocky surface Chu Yang was standing on broke apart and he began falling downwards!


    All of a sudden Chu Yang had found himself falling freely! Even worse, a small forest of spiky rocks was located directly below him!


    Just how unlucky can I get¡­


    Realizing just how dangerous his current situation was, Chu Yang focused on finding a way to get out of his current situation without ending up getting pierced by the spiky rocks below.


    "A ledge!"


    Whoosh!


    Spotting a ledge just below him rapidly approaching, Chu Yang focused all his energy to propel him towards the small ledge.


    Bang!


    Just barely managing tond on it.


    "Are you okay down there!?"


    "Yes! I just need a bit of time¡­"


    Hearing the worried voice of Zhi Ruoing from above, Chu Yang quickly informed her that everything was fine beforeying down on what little space was avable to him on the small ledge.


    He really needed a few seconds to understand what had just happened¡­


    "In the future, I should watch where I walk more carefully¡­"


    Muttering these few words to himself, Chu Yang got back up before slowly climbing down towards the forest of spikey rocks below him.


    He had to at least he had to remove those dangerous things before making his way to the Mission Hall¡­


    Just in case someone happened to fall down here in the future¡­


    ¡­


    Bang!


    "That should be thest of them!" Having finished tearing down all the dangerous looking spiky rocks, Chu Yang smiled happily to himself as he looked at the empty ce that the spiky rock forest had been just a few moments ago.


    "But I wonder¡­ Where is this¡­?"


    Looking around himself, Chu Yang had long since realized that he was not anywhere at the side of the mountain after beginning to tear down the spikey rock forest. Currently, he was inside the mountain itself!


    To be honest, Chu Yang didn''t even know that his master''s mountain had been hollow in the first ce!


    "Maybe I should explore this ce first before going to the Mission Hall¡­"


    Feeling himself getting more and more excited over the prospect of exploring just what was hidden inside his master''s mountain peak.


    During his earlier destruction of the spikey rock forest, he had also managed to spot a few demon beasts running around the ce, though the strongest of them had only reached the Fifth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm. Nothing that would pose a threat to him with his current strength!


    The demon beast he encountered, also seemed to understand this, as they had run away immediately upon spotting him¡­


    Having made up his mind, Chu Yang slowly began moving away from the remains of the spiky rock forest and began exploring the space inside his master''s mountain. Not forgetting to look out for any demon beast that might try andunch a sneak attack on him.


    Even if he was currently inside the Flying Sword Sect and the demon beasts, he had seen so far were only in the Qi Condensation Realm, Chu Yang did not dare to be slightest bit careless. After all, he had no idea what he would end up finding inside the hollow mountain¡­


    ¡­


    "What happened to senior brother Chu Yang?"


    At the same time Chu Yang had begun exploring the hollowed-out part of the mountain, Bai Ning had just returned from the cksmithing Hall, as he asked about his senior brother''s whereabouts.


    "He fell into the hole at the side of the pavilion, just over there."


    "Thanks, big sister Zhi!"


    Seeing where Zhi Ruo pointed, Bai Ning quickly made his way over towards arge hole that was located just a few meters away from the outer walls on the side of the pavilion.


    The hole was by no means small and had a diameter of at least a few meters.


    "How did he even fall into such a big hole to begin with¡­?"


    Making Bai Ning wonder just how his senior brother had ended up falling into such arge hole to begin with¡­


    "Senior brother! Are you there!"


    Calling out for his senior brother for a few minutes, Bai Ning got no response.


    "Big sister Zhi, can you help me get down to the bottom of the hole? I want to go down and see if senior brother is alright¡­"


    Feeling a bit worried after not hearing from his senior brother that was supposed to be down in the hole, Bai Ning made his way back to Zhi Ruo before asking her for help.


    "Sure, we can just use a rope to lower you down, its far easier than trying to climb all the way down."


    Not refusing Bai Ning''s request, Zhi Ruo instead went to get a strong rope from the pavilion before both of them made their way to the hole that Zhu Yang had fallen into.


    "Are you ready?"


    "Yes!"


    Having the rope bound around his waist, Bai Ning showed no signs of fear, as Zhi Ruo slowly began lowering him down into therge hole in the ground.


    It was also at this point in time that Bai Ning realized that he was not going down arge hole in the ground, but instead found himself inside arge open space.


    "Big sister Zhi! This is not a hole! It¡­ It looks like the entire mountain is hollow!"


    "Really!?"


    "Yes!"


    Hearing the surprised voice of Zhi Ruo from above after he had informed her about his discovery, Bai Ning responded affirmatively before reaching the ground.


    "Maybe your senior brother went to explore the ce?"


    Having calmed down after discovering that the mountain she had been living on this entire time was hollow, Zhi Ruo suggested where his senior brother might have disappeared to.


    "Big Sister Zhi, I will go look for senior brother, you don''t need to stay around waiting, as I think it might take some time to find him¡­ This ce is quite big¡­"


    "Okay, I will fasten the rope somewhere so you can climb up by yourself after finding your senior brother. Remember to be careful!"


    Along with the warning from Zhi Ruo, Bai Ning began exploring the inside of his master''s hollow mountain. The only difference from Chu Yang''s experience¡­ Was the fact that the demon beasts were not afraid of attacking Bai Ning!

 Chapter 471 - Blood Pond

    <h4>Chapter 471 - Blood Pond</h4>


    After walking around the inside of the mountain for close to two hours, Chu Yang finally managed to find something different from the usual rocky terrain with a fewrge rocks appearing every now and then.


    Not only that, but Chu Yang had also realized that the inside of the mountain was farrger than the mountain itself. If he was walking around outside, he would have at least managed to reach the edge of the sect given his current speed, yet the inside of the mountain did not seem to have any end in sight¡­


    The thing in question was argeplex of ruins!


    The ruins themselves looked like the remains of what had once been an ancient city, of which only a few pirs and walls remained intact over the long passage of time.


    "I wonder what a city is doing inside a mountain¡­"


    Saying his thoughts out loud as he made his way inside what little remained of the ancient city, Chu Yang began looking through the ruins. Trying his best to find anything that could help him figure out just why the city was there in the first ce.


    Walking through the empty streets of the ruins of the ancient city, Chu Yang soon arrived in front of thergest of all the buildings and also the one which remained the most intact over the years. Given the fact that it was located at the centre of the city, Chu Yang easily deduced that the building should have once belonged to the lord of the ancient city.


    Looking around the premise of therge ruins resembling a small pce, Chu Yang could not help but feel a bit weird.


    After having walked through the ancient city, Chu Yang saw no signs ofbat having taken ce inside the ancient city in the past. Even the buildings had no signs of being attacked, they had simply stood there over a long period of time and had slowly begun decaying and breaking apart without any maintenance.


    As for the people who had once lived inside the ancient city, it seemed like they had just left. Leaving behind the city to slowly decay on its own¡­


    Why they had just decided to leave their city, Chu Yang really had no idea. Maybe looking through the estate in the form of a decaying pce that belonged to the past lord of the city would have some clues as to what had happened, though he did not have too many hopes. After all, just from looking at the state of the ancient city, Chu Yang could tell just how long ago it had been since someone had truly lived inside the ruined ancient city!


    Thump-! Crack~


    Having made up his mind before entering the decaying small pce located at the centre of the city, Chu Yang was caught slightly off guard by the oversized rock eating rats inside the pce itself.


    From the looks of it, it appeared that the oversized rock eating rats had made the abandoned and decaying pce into their home, as it should be quite hard for the stronger and more aggressive demon beasts to enter


    "¡­"


    Gazing over towards the oversized rock eating rats peacefully going about their own business without paying any attention to him, Chu Yang decided to also ignore them, as he slowly moved around them before making his way into the deeper parts of the decaying pce.


    Rock eating rats were not hostile demon beasts and were instead the kind of demon beast that did not really care about humans unless they were attacked. Instead preferring to spend all their time eating rocks.


    There was no reason for him to just start randomly attacking the peaceful oversized rock eating rats!


    ¡­


    "W-What in the world is this!?"


    Reaching the deeper parts of the decaying pce, Chu Yang could not help opening his mouth slightly as he eximed with a both confused and surprised expression on his face.


    Inside of what was supposed to be the centre room of the small decaying pce stood arge artificial pond of blood with human bones lining the sides of the pond itself. Even after an unknown number of years had passed since its construction, the blood pond at the centre of the decaying pce remainedpletely intact.


    Not only that, but the blood inside of the pool itself also seemed like it was new. As though it had been gathered just a few minutes ago!


    Of course, Chu? Yang knew this was not possible, as the ancient city had long since been abandoned! However, looking at the giant pool of blood that had been dug into the ground and lined with human bones in front of him, he had a feeling that he found out what happened to the people of the ancient city in the past¡­


    As he walked a bit closer to get a better look of the blood pond, Chu Yang suddenly felt the Devil Immortal Jade that he was always carrying around with him begin to move.


    "Wai-"


    Whoosh~


    Before Chu Yang even had time to react, the Devil Immortal Jade suddenly flew out before diving into the blood pond in front of him. Disappearing from sight.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say upon witnessing the jade that helped increase his cultivation speed suddenly fly away before disappearing into the blood pond, Chu Yang could only walk up to the blood pond and see if he could find out what had happened to the Devil Immortal Jade.


    Hoping that he would be able to get it back again, or his cultivation speed would end up decreasing without the help of the Devil Immortal Jade! Not really something he wanted to happen when he was so close to breaking through to the Core Formation Realm¡­


    "Lotus flowers?"


    Seeing a few small but beautiful red lotus flowers growing inside the blood pond after getting up beside the blood pond itself, Chu Yang could not help wondering just what kind of lotus flowers grew inside a pond made of blood.


    They truly are beautiful; I should be able to get them if I enter-


    Smack!


    pping himself, Chu Yang instantly retreated from the blood pond. Fearfully looking towards the blood red lotus flowers inside the blood pond.


    Looking at the blood red lotus flowers inside the blood pond, he had felt himself losing control of both his body and mind! If he was even a secondter to regain control over his body and mind again, he would have entered the blood pond!


    Dangerous!


    That was the only word that he could describe the blood pond in front of him!


    To think I lost the Devil Immortal Jade just like that-


    Whoosh!


    Just as Chu Yang was about to get as far away from the blood pond as possible whilementing over losing his Devil Immortal Jade, the jade in question suddenly flew back up from the blood pond beforending in front of him covered in blood.


    First you fly off and dive into the blood pond, then when I decide to leave, youe back again?


    Looking speechlessly at the Devil Immortal Jade that had justnded in front of him, Chu Yang didn''t know what to say.


    About to pick the Devil Immortal Jade back up after it hade back out of the blood pond, Chu Yang was about to grab hold of it when he suddenly felt a terrifying force repel him.


    Whoosh!


    Bang!


    Sending his body flying a few meters back before mming into one of the nearby walls.


    "Ah-! What in the world is that blood!?"


    Getting back up, Chu Yang could not help looking towards the blood pond with an even more fearful expression on his face.


    When he felt the terrifying force earlier that had suddenly sent him flying, Chu Yang had very clearly seen that the terrifying force in question, was nothing more than a bit of remnant power contained inside the blood!


    For the blood to contain such strong power, Chu Yang could only imagine how powerful the person in question was. Not to mention, there was an entire pool of blood inside the small decaying pce!


    "It looks like the Devil Immortal Jade has absorbed the blood¡­ I wonder if something changed after it absorbed the blood¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he arrived back at the ce where the Devil Immortal Jade hadnded after leaving the blood pond, Chu Yang cautiously picked up the now clean Devil Immortal Jade before testing it out to see if there had been any changes to it after it absorbed the blood from the blood pond.


    Fwoosh!


    "This!? I-I''m about to breakthrough!?"


    Suddenly feeling his bottleneck loosen, as blood red qi entered his dantian the moment he used the Devil Immortal Jade to cultivate like he had done in the past, Chu Yang quickly found a ce as far away from the blood pond as he could go before sitting down in a meditation position to breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm.


    Even if he wanted to move further away from the blood pond, he did not dare to dy his breakthrough for too long, as even a single mistake might end up with his breakthrough failing!

 Chapter 472: Dangerous Breakthrough!

    Chapter 472: Dangerous Breakthrough!


    Focusing on the red qi that had just entered his dantian after he cultivated using the Devil Immortal Jade, Chu Yang did not have any ability to stop the red qi from merging together with the nine foundational pirs made up of qi inside his dantian.


    The moment that the red qi merged together with the nine pirs of qi that he had condensed inside his dantian, Chu Yang felt an unbearable pain spread through his entire body.


    "Argh!"


    As the pain slowly increased in intensity, Chu Yang could not help letting out a scream as he slowly felt the strength of the nine pirs increase rapidly along with the increase in pain.


    Soon enough, Chu Yang turned all of his attention towards breaking through to the Core Formation Realm.


    Starting the most dangerous part of the breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm. Breaking down the nine pirs to form the golden core!


    Failure at this point could result in his qi going out of control while he was forming the golden core. In the best-case scenario, he would end up losing his entire cultivation base, being forced to start over again. The worst-case scenario was death!


    Crack~


    Feeling the pirs all begin breaking apart inside his dantian under both his own guidance and the help of the blood red qi from the Devil Immortal Jade, Chu Yang carefully controlled the enormous qi from the nine pirs into the centre of his dantian where it slowly began forming into the shape of a giant sphere of qi.


    At this point, he only needed topress the qi into a golden core, and he could be considered to have sessfully reached the Core Formation Realm!


    However, all of this was easy said than done, as controlling such arge amount of qi was extremely hard for the current Chu Yang, let alone given the fact that he would have topress the massive amount of qi into a golden core!


    The blood red qi from the Devil Immortal Jade did not help much with this either, as it instead only increase the difficulty of keeping the massive amount of qi inside his dantian under control.


    "Hah!"


    Knowing that he would not have enough energy to slowlypress the qi inside his dantian into a golden core normally, Chu Yang instead decided to increase the speed at which hepressed the qi inside his dantian.


    At this point, Chu Yang felt a mind-numbing pain spread through his body as he felt his control over the now massive vortex of qi that had formed inside his dantian going out of control.


    Focusing onpressing his qi into a golden core was close to impossible given the sheer amount of pain currently coursing through his body. Making him feel like being eaten up by a thousand ants, while at the same time being burned alive.


    Psh!


    In the end, this caused an increased strain on his body, as Chu Yang immediately spit out a mouthful of blood. Followed by two thin lines of blood running down his both his cheeks, as blood slowly began flowing out from his seven orifices.


    As he slowly felt himself lose more and more control over his own qi, Chu Yang finally realized just how dangerous his current situation was and the fact that he might actually end up as one of the unlucky people who ended up dying during their breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm!


    No!


    Unwilling to fail just like that, Chu Yang barely managed to ignore the pain as he regained control over the qi inside his dantian and beganpressing it rapidly. Soon the outline of his golden core could be seen as the qi inside his dantian slowly began solidifying into a solid core.


    Even through all the pain wrecking through his body at the moment, Chu Yang could not help smiling to himself when he saw that he was about to seed.


    Whoosh~


    It was at this moment that the blood red qi inside his dantian finally made its move and forcefully merged together with his golden core that had yet to solidify.


    "Ah-!"


    The pain brought along by the blood red qi forcefully merging together with his unfinished golden core was way too much for the current Chu Yang to endue, as he instantly let out a blood-curdling scream filled with anguish before fainting without having any time to react to what was happening.


    The pain was way too much, and he ended up fainting on the spot.


    Feeling that Chu Yang had fainted, several blood red tendrils emerged from the blood pond just a few dozen meters away from his current location before rapidly approaching the now unconscious Chu Yang.


    BOOM!


    Before the tendrils had any time to retreat, a terrifying aura suddenly erupted from the Devil Immortal Jadeying in Chu Yang''s hand. Instantly reducing the approaching tendrils from the blood pond to nothing more than dust.


    Screech!


    A terrified inhumane screech could be heard from the blood pond before everything went quiet around the blood pond.


    Like nothing had happened. Only the unconscious Chu Yang remainedying quietly on the ground, his breathing had slowly stabilized after the appearance of the terrifying aura from the Devil Immortal Jade, as his bleeding had alsoe to a stop.


    Currently, Chu Yang looked like he was sleeping peacefully¡­ If one could ignore that he was covered in his own blood from head to toe¡­


    ¡­


    "Wh-what happened- Ah! My cultivation!"


    Waking up after having remained unconscious for an unknown period of time, Chu Yang quickly remembered what had happened before checking his cultivation base.


    "My golden core¡­ Formed sessfully?"


    Feeling the core floating around at the centre of his dantian, Chu Yang could not help tilting his head as a confused expression slowly began forming on his face.


    He could clearly remember the terrifying pain running through his body as he slowly began losing control of the qi inside his dantian, then-


    "The blood red qi from the Devil Immortal Jade merged together with my golden core¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he very clearly remembered how the pain barely manageable pain had suddenly increased by several fold after the blood red qi forcefully merged together with his unfinished golden core.


    From this alone, Chu Yang realized that his current situation likely had something to do with the blood red qi from the Devil Immortal Jade. The only problem was the fact that he had no clue what kind of change the blood red qi had caused.


    At the moment, he could not inspect his golden core first hand to see if there was anything wrong with it, as that would require him to develop his own divine sense¡­ There was still quite some time left before he could reach the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and develop his own divine sense in preparation for breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    Throwing these thoughts aside for the moment, Chu Yang instead focused on the most important discovery.


    He had sessfully managed to form his golden core!


    Even when he thought he would end up dying during his breakthrough towards the end, he had somehow still managed to get through it and sessfully reach the Core Formation Realm!


    Thinking about this, Chu Yang could not help smiling happily to himself. The mystery of how he had reached the Core Formation Realm and what the blood red qi from the Devil Immortal Jade could wait for now.


    "Senior brother! Are you there!"


    "Bai Ning? What is he doing down here¡­?"


    Hearing the familiar voice of his junior brother suddenly echo out from somewhere outside, Chu Yang could not help frowning as he remembered the many Qi Condensation Realm demon beasts he had encountered along the way to the ancient ruined city.


    Not only that, but he had also spotted a few Foundation Establishment demon beasts!


    What in the world was his junior brother thinking? Coming to such a dangerous ce all alone!


    "Ah!"


    Hearing the scream of his junior brother, Chu Yang knew that he should have encountered one of the stronger Qi Condensation Realm demon beasts or in the worst case. One of the Foundation Establishment Realm demon beasts!


    Whoosh!


    Not thinking about too much upon hearing the scream of his junior brother, Chu Yang directly rushed out of the decaying pce. Leaving behind the blood pond and whatever mysterious were hidden away inside of it.


    Not that he could even wish to explore what was hidden inside with his current strength¡­


    ¡­


    Boom!


    Arriving just outside the ancient ruins after leaving the ancient decaying pce, Chu Yang easily obliterated arge worm like demon beast just about to swallow the small Bai Ning in front of it.


    "Junior brother¡­ Just what in the world are you doing down here!?"


    "I-I just wanted to find senior brother¡­ Zhi Ruo said you went down here and went missing for quite some time, so I felt worried something might have happened to you and- Ah! Senior brother! Just what happened to you!?"


    Beginning to exin his reasons for why he was there, Bai Ning suddenly turned around to face his senior brother. Only to see the other party covered in blood from head to toe.


    "This¡­ Let''s just go back for now¡­"


    Not knowing what to say when he saw his little junior brother''s worried expression along with the fact that he had juste here to search for him after he went missing, Chu Yang decided not to be too harsh to Bai Ning and instead just decided to go back for now.


    Even if he wanted to investigate and explore the hollow part of his master''s mountain further, he knew that he had just broken through and would need some time to stabilize his cultivation realm.


    Other than that, he would also need to clean up and bring his little junior brother back.


    Who knew how lucky the little one had been to make it all the way to the ancient ruins without encountering any dangers outside of the one he had just dealt with!


    "Okay¡­"


    Seeing the little guy nod his head approvingly upon hearing what he said, Chu Yang began making his way back towards the ce that he had entered the hollow part of the mountain through.


    Bai Ning following closely behind!

 Chapter 473: Finally... Main Quest Completed!

    Chapter 473: Finally... Main Quest Completed!


    [Main Quest: Any disciple reaches the Core Formation realm. (Complete)]


    [Reward: Cultivation increase of 2 minor realms (redeem within 48 hours), 5 low-grade Qi Springs, 1 mid-grade Qi Spring.]


    [Redeem: Y/N]


    "Hm?"


    Riding through one of the few forests inside the Iron Sky Kingdom on top of a demon beast a short distance from the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao who had been spending most of his time during their journey so far cultivating. Focused intently on the system prompt that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere.


    After such a long time, he had finallypleted a main quest!


    From the looks of it, it seemed like Chu Yang had managed to breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm during the time that he and Qing Yi had been to the Iron Sky Kingdom for the Alchemy Competition¡­


    "Hehe."


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help but chuckle a bit to himself as he looked over towards Qing Yi, he really looked forward to seeing the little girl''s reaction when she realized that Chu Yang had already reached the Core Formation Realm.


    Now¡­ The rewards for the main quest¡­


    Cultivation realms was something he had already expected, but the Qi Springs were not something he had seen before.


    Feeling increasingly curious about what the Qi Springs were, Xuan Hao could only stop himself from taking out one of them after a small warning from the system. Telling him that the Qi Spring would have to be fixed to a permanent location by him before being redeemed¡­


    Given that he was not even back at the Flying Sword Sect yet and the fact that the sect would soon move to another location, Xuan Hao realized that he would most likely not see the Qi Springs in action.


    At the very least they did not have a time limit in which he needed to redeem them like the cultivation increase part of the reward¡­


    "Did anything happen master?"


    "No, I was just thinking about something funny and identlyughed as a result."


    "I see¡­"


    Seeing Qing Yi move her demon beasts closer to him beforeing over to ask this, Xuan Hao quickly came up with an excuse. In the end, Qing Yi could only nce suspiciously at her master before focusing back on riding her demon beast.


    Compared to Xuan Hao''s demon beast that had been thoroughly intimidated to follow behind some the other elders from the Flying Sword Sect riding just in front of him, Qing Yi still needed to focus some of her attention towards controlling her demon beast.


    It was not that Xuan Hao had not tried to intimidate Qing Yi''s demon beast into listening, it was just that her demon beast was¡­ Special¡­ As only a few minutes after he had intimidated it, it seemed to forget all about it and became unruly again.


    After going through this for a dozen or so times already, he gave up trying to scare Qing Yi''s demon beast into just following the others without Qing Yi having to control it¡­


    "The border is up ahead!"


    Hearing the voice from one of the Flying Sword Sect Elders in front of the group call out, both Xuan Hao and Qing Yi turned their attention towards the path ahead, where therge towers surrounding the Iron Sky Kingdom slowly started to be visible as the forest came to an end.


    Even though it had only been a little over a week since he had seen therge towers located at the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao still felt impressed upon seeing them.


    The towers were not only to spot iing enemies but were also a part of some kind of defensive formation that Yi Min should have spent quite arge quantity of resources to set up.


    Thinking about the fact that therge formation should be covering the entire Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao could not help thinking back to the attack that had taken ce just a day ago.


    Maybe the formation was notpleted yet¡­


    After all, if it had beenpleted, it should have epassed the entire Iron Sky Kingdom and would be far more powerful than the formation covering the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom! At that point in time, there would not be any way for General Guan or his friends to cause any trouble in front of the capital!


    Coming to this conclusion, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just what level a formation that covered an entire kingdom had reached.


    Maybe it had reached the level of being able to contend against someone in the Soul Formation Realm¡­?


    This thought alone caused Xuan Hao to feel a shiver run down his spine, as he realized just how scary the Renowned Master cksmith Yi Min was and it also seemed like she was a formation master on top of that¡­


    At this point, Xuan Hao no longer felt bad joining Yi Min''s side and establishing a friendly rtion with her.


    ¡­


    During the next few hours, Xuan Hao, Qing Yi, and the rest of the group crossed the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom and officially left territory of the Iron Sky Kingdom. Signalling an end to their mostly peaceful journey so far.


    From this point onwards, they would have to deal with banditsing to rob them and demon beasts jumping at the opportunity to devour them.


    Not to mention that they would have a way harder time passing through the many kingdoms on their way back to the Flying Sword Sect.


    At least that would be the case if they did not have someone in the Domain Lord Realm around, who could sense said troublemakers approaching from miles away. Easily dealing with them before any others even had a clue that somebody had nned to attack them just moments ago¡­


    As for having a harder time passing through the kingdoms on the way back to the Flying Sword Sect?


    Well¡­ Xuan Hao just had to show his cultivation realm and they would be more than willing to let them pass through!

 Chapter 474: Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!

    Chapter 474: Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    A day after Xuan Hao hadpleted the main quest, they had managed to make it halfway through a weaker kingdom neighbouring the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    During this time, they had encountered a few bandits and demon beasts along the way, but Xuan Hao had dealt with most of them before they managed to reach the group. Only letting a few weaker bandits or demon beasts through for Qing Yi.


    Of course, even these weaker bandits and demon beasts had been quite difficult for the current Qing Yi to deal with, as she had ended up in a life and death struggle most of the time. The number of times she was close to dying during this short time period was above a dozen times!


    In the end, those bandits and demon beasts had been in by Qing Yi. Increasing her experience when it came to fighting with her life on the line.


    "Let''s stop here for the night, we will continue our journey in the morning. I will go out and look around the area to make sure it''s safe."


    Havinge to a small opening inside a small forest, Xuan Hao did not bother waiting for the others to respond, as he directly left them to find a ce where he could redeem the cultivation reward from the system.


    ""¡­""


    The elders did not really have anything to say regarding their sudden break, as they thought Xuan Hao''s reason for doing it, was because Qing Yi had been exhausted to the extreme after having fought with all sorts of demon beasts and bandits over the past day. Looking like she was only a single step away from copsing.


    To be honest, if it was not for the fact that Xuan Hao had prevented them from helping her out during those battles, they would have long since stepped in to help her fight off the bandits and demon beasts that Xuan Hao allowed to approach.


    However, they also understood that this experience would be extremely beneficial to Qing Yi in the future when she encountered a life and death situation and didn''t have her master or any of the elders around to help her out.


    With this in mind, the elders slowly began setting up for the night, while Chi Hu specially came over to help the exhausted Qing Yi down her demon beast before finding a nice ce for her to sit down and meditate in the opening.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the elders were taking care of Qing Yi and making sure she was fine and had a good spot to recover from her earlier battles, Xuan Hao found a small empty cave located just a few hundred meters away from the opening in the forest.


    "This should do¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao entered the small empty cave before hiding the entrance with his domain.


    [Redeem cultivation of two minor realms]: [Y/N]


    "Yes!"


    Sitting down inside the small cave, Xuan Hao cleared his head of any distracting thoughts before redeeming the cultivation increase part of the main quest reward.


    Fwoosh!


    Following the cultivation reward being redeemed, Xuan Hao felt a terrifying energy appear inside his dantian before it directly began merging together with his soul, refreshing his mind immediately.


    With that, he was incredibly focused as his brain began to process information at an even faster rate than before. At the same time, Xuan Hao also felt hisprehension had increased by a terrifying degree. Even more than the time he had consumed the Source Crystal to breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm!


    Whoosh~!


    It felt as though a brand-new world had appeared before his eyes, as the strength of both his sword and ice domain suddenly began increasing rapidly.


    In a short moment, Xuan Hao''s cultivation passed through the barrier separating the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm before continuing towards the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    During this short period of time, his dantian had begun expanding at a terrifying speed to amodate the sudden increase in qi that seemingly appeared out of nowhere through the help of the system.


    Boom!


    Not long after breaking through to the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao directly passed through the barrier separating the Fifth Stage and the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Officially reaching the Sixth stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    However, this was not the end as his cultivation continued increasing even further, until it finally came to a stop at the Peak of the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Not enough¡­"


    Feeling a bit reluctant upon realizing that he was only a single step away from the seventh stage of the Domain Lord Realm, yet the help from the system that had increased hisprehension had slowly begun to disappear after he reached Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Not only that, but he also felt that the endless stream of pure qi that had been supplying him during his breakthrough drying up.


    "No, I can''t just stop here!"


    Not wanting to give up when he was already so close to reaching the seventh stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao wanted to breakthrough to the seventh stage!


    Even if his cultivation base was extremely unstable after directly breaking through two minor realms within the span of only a few short minutes, Xuan Hao did not want to stop when he was so close to reaching the seventh stage¡­


    Not to mention, the seventh stage of the Domain Lord Realm was considered one of the three major thresholds of the Domain Lord Realm, with the barrier between the third and fourth stage being one and thest being the barrier between the eighth and ninth stage.


    Whoosh!


    Having made up his mind, Xuan Hao took out the Soul Grade Qi Gathering Pills that he had made during the small challenge with Fang Shi before directly swallowing all of them at once.

 Chapter 475: Unkown Change

    Chapter 475: Unkown Change


    Rumble~


    After swallowing the qi gathering pills that he had grabbed after the challenge with Fang Shi, Xuan Hao felt like he managed to breakthrough some kind of barrier inside his dantian as for the first time since he reached the Domain Lord Realm, he once again felt his soul begin to undergo a transformation.


    Following his soul beginning to change, the inside of his soul that resembled the void between worlds that he had seen during his visit to the secret realm, where chaos and nothingness reigned supreme. Began to change!


    BOOM!


    In just a moment, a sudden violent change urred inside this ce as something slowly began to take shape inside his soul.


    Not only was his soul going through such dramatic changes, but his body was experiencing simr dramatic changes, as the qi inside his dantian from the Qi Gathering Pills began draining up rapidly.


    "I need more qi¡­"


    Knowing that he would soon run out of qi inside his dantian to fuel the transformation he was going through, Xuan Hao''s mind went into overdrive thinking about what to do as he began searching through his interspatial ring for any spirit stones he had.


    Only to realize just how poor he was, as he had close to no spirit stones on him and the spirit stones, he had were way too few to match up with the amount required for the transformation. Even the thirty plus Soul Grade Qi Gathering would at mostst him for a few minutes before all the qi inside of them had been consumed!


    "Maybe¡­ No, she doesn''t have enough in the first ce¡­"


    Thinking about his disciples recently won spirit stones for a short moment, Xuan Hao soon shook his head, as the spirit stones Qing Yi had won would still be far from enough to help him sessfully make it through the transformation that his soul and body had decided to go through.


    "At least I can still move¡­ Guess I should check out the surroundings and see if there are any spirit stone mine around here¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao ignored the pain wrecking through his entire body with every single step he took, as he left the small cave.


    Whoosh!


    "There really is one, three or so hundred miles to the west of here¡­"


    Using his full strength to extend his divine sense hundred of miles in all directions in search of a spirit stone mine, Xuan Hao quickly found what he was looking for.


    There was only one problem¡­ And that was the fact that the spirit stone mine had already been discovered by the kingdom they were currently inside of and was in the process of being mined out!


    Normally, this would not be a problem given that the strongest person in the kingdom was someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, but his current situation was less than ideal. Even using his domains was difficult in his current state, let alone fighting¡­


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I will have to try and sneak inside¡­"


    Not left with any other choice as the qi inside his dantian was quickly being consumed by both his soul and body, Xuan Hao used what strength he could muster to fly towards the spirit stone mine he had located.


    ¡­


    "Of course, there is someone at the Nascent Soul Realm guarding the mine!"


    Arriving a few miles from the spirit stone mine, Xuan Hao could not help cursing upon discovering that someone in the Nascent Soul Realm was personally guarding the spirit stone mine.


    At first, he had thought that he would at most have to hide from someone in the Core Formation Realm while he absorbed the massive amount of qi present in the spirt stone mine, but now that would be close to impossible with a Nascent Soul Realm Expert present.


    The main reason for this, was the fact that the Nascent Soul Realm Expert had divine sense, while a Core Formation Realm cultivator did not. Unless he had reached the absolute pinnacle of the realm and was about to breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    Now that someone with divine sense was present in the spirit stone mine, Xuan Hao would not be able to easily absorb the qi contained in the spirit stones without being noticed and given his current situation. Even someone in the Core Formation Realm might be able to win against him in his current state if he didn''t run away¡­


    Boom!


    "Hm? Fighting?"


    Hearing arge explosion from the direction of the spirit stone mine, Xuan Hao''s eyes began shining brightly.


    Normally, he might not be able to seed in absorbing the qi from the spirit stones yet to be mined inside the spirit stone mine¡­ But thing would be different if the Nascent Soul Realm Expert guarding the mine was distracted!


    Whoosh!


    Knowing that he could not let such an opportunity pass, Xuan Hao used what little strength he could in his current situation and hid himself with his domain while flying over towards the spirit stone mine where the earlier explosion had just urred.


    At this point, he was already dangerously close to running out of qi inside his dantian and due to that, Xuan Hao had managed to discover that the transformation process that he was currently going through, was not something that could be stopped by him simply running out of qi¡­


    If there was no qi left, it would simply begin absorbing his life force!


    Life force was essentially what made up his lifespan. Meaning, if he lost all his life force, he would lose all his remaining lifespan and¡­ Die¡­


    Even if the transformation process had yet to truly begin absorbing his life force yet, Xuan Hao had already felt himself losing what would essentially be equivalent to 10 years of his lifespan!


    If it truly began absorbing his life force in full force¡­ Xuan Hao didn''t dare to think about this¡­


    BOOM!


    "Die demon!"


    Making his way over to the entrance of the spirit stone mine, Xuan Hao could not help showing a slightly surprised expression on his face upon discovering a demonic cultivator currently locked inbat with the person who he guessed to be the Nascent Soul Realm Expert in charge of defending the spirit stone mine.


    "Another demonic cultivator? Howe there are so many of them showing up now all of a sudden¡­?"


    Not thinking too deeply about it, Xuan Hao had more important things to do, as thest bit of qi inside his dantian dried up. Following which, a terrifying feeling spread throughout his body, as he felt his life force being absorbed by his body and soul!


    Why his body decided to also join in and absorb his life force when it just ended up weakening in the process was a mystery¡­


    Whoosh~


    Barely ncing at the two, Xuan Hao rushed into the spirit stone mine.


    ¡­


    Entering the spirit stone mine, Xuan Hao rushed towards the deeper parts of the mine where the higher grade spirt stones would be located before finding a good ce to sit down and absorb the qi from the spirt stones inside the mine.


    Whoosh!


    Like a dam had broken, as the qi from the spirit stones suddenly rushed out from the walls around Xuan Hao before directly entering his body under the guidance of his domain.


    At the very least, there was not any miners around to see what was happening, as all of them had long since fled far away with the battle taking ce outside the spirit stone mine.


    "Hah¡­ I hope this will be enough¡­"


    Feeling the massive amount of qi entering his body being devoured the moment it entered his dantian without even needing him to refine it, Xuan Hao could not help shivering as he realized that there might not even be enough qi for the transformation. Even after he had absorbed an entire spirit stone mine worth¡­


    It had to be known that even if the number of high-grade spirts stones only numbered in a few dozen or a few hundred depending on the size of the mine. The sheer number of low-grade spirit stones inside a spirit stone mine would easily number in the tens of millions!


    The amount of qi inside that many spirit stones was simply iprehensible for Xuan Hao. However, the absorption speed did not slow down in the slightest, as Xuan Hao could only extend the range of his domain to absorb more qi.


    ¡­


    "It stopped¡­?"


    After unknown period of time had passed, Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes before carefully observing both his dantian and body for any abnormalities. Making sure that everything had reallye to an end.


    In the end, he had ended up directly absorbing close to seventy percent of the spirit stone mine before the transformation finally ended.


    "What in the world?!"


    Finishing his inspection of the current situation of his body, dantian and soul, Xuan Hao could not help eximing loudly as he finally discovered just what had changed.

 Chapter 476: Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and Return of the Blue Feather~

    Chapter 476: Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and Return of the Blue Feather~


    First of all, two small objects had materialized inside his soul. The first was a small silver sword, while the other was a small ice flower. Even just looking at the two objects, Xuan Hao could clearly feel his connection with both of them.


    Through the small silver sword floating around inside his soul, he could feel his sword domain, while the same could be said for the ice flower and his ice domain. The silver sword and ice flower inside his soul seemed to be a physical shape taken on by his two domains!


    Before Xuan Hao could inspect the ice flower and silver sword inside his soul more closely, he suddenly felt the fighting taking ce outside the spirit stone minee to a stop as he felt the aura of both the Nascent Soul Realm Expert guarding the spirit stone mine and the demonic cultivator rush over towards his current direction.


    "Ah-! Looks like they finally managed to discover the fact that most of the spirit stone mine suddenly dried up, I should get away here before those two shows up¡­"


    Whoosh~


    Smiling a bit awkwardly as he looked around the empty tunnel, he was currently sitting down inside, Xuan Hao postponed going over the situation of his dantian and body for now, as he began leaving the dried-up spirit stone mine.


    BOOM!


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, his n of leaving without the other party finding out ended up in aplete failure, as he tired using his ice domain to hide himself from the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts rushing over. Only to end up causing a small snowstorm inside the spirit stone mine¡­


    It was also at this that Xuan Hao realized that his domains seemed to have also gone through an upgrade. Increasing their strength to another level, but at the same time also bing harder to control.


    Not only that, but Xuan Hao also very clearly felt that his cultivation base was extremely unstable at the moment. Fighting before he stabilized his foundation would not only be risky, but also have a potential to damage his foundation if he fought for too long!


    With all of this in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t really want to fight with the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    Mainly because he had no way to properly control his strength¡­


    Even using one of his domains to supress them was not doable, as it would most likely just end up with him killing both of them. Not that he would feel too much regret over the dead demonic cultivator, but there was still another Nascent Soul Realm Expert around¡­


    Other than that, Xuan Hao did just steal a crucial resource for his kingdom¡­ If he also killed one of their core experts without even knowing the other party, that seemed a little out of line. Especially given that the kingdom in question was just next to the Iron Sky Kingdom and was likely a vassal of sorts.


    "Who!?"


    "There really was someone in here¡­! How dare you sneak inside while we are fighting! Coward!"


    Guess I will just run away before they see me¡­


    Feeling two powerful divine senses, one belonging to each of the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts rushing over, Xuan Hao no longer bothered trying to hide himself.


    Bang!


    Whoosh!


    Repelling both the iing divine senses before they managed to reach him, Xuan Hao used his full strength to run away from the spirit stone mine.


    "Wha-"


    "¡­"


    Leaving behind a grievously wounded Nascent Soul Realm Expert and a half-dead demonic cultivator¡­


    ¡­


    "This should be far enough¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the direction of the spirit stone mine with an awkward expression, Xuan Hao did not know what to say.


    Earlier when running away, he had just intended to repel the two''s divine sense, but in the end, he had grievously wounded one, while leaving the other half-dead with one step into the grave!


    At least the one in a half-dead state was the demonic cultivator and not the Nascent Soul Realm Expert who had been protecting the spirit stone mine that he had mostly emptied out¡­


    Deciding not to think about this anymore, Xuan Hao returned to the small cave a few hundred meters from where Qing Yi and the other elders were located before checking out the situation of his dantian.


    Compared to his soul, the changes to his dantian were far more drastic, as the dantian had expanded by more than double as to what it was when he just reached the Peak of the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    However, this was not the most shocking change that had taken ce inside his dantian. Instead, it was the fact that two giant vortexes of qi had formed, one silver, another deep blue in colour.


    Both of them orbited around his soul located at the centre, as a massive amount of qi gushed out from both of the vortexes. Slowly beginning to fill up his dantian.


    Even if he did nothing, Xuan Hao felt like it would at most be a year or even less before his dantian was filled up and he would breakthrough without doing anything¡­


    "So that''s where the qi from the spirit stone mine went¡­"


    Understanding where the massive amount of qi wasing from, Xuan Hao still felt a bit confused about why the two vortexes had suddenly appeared inside his dantian. More importantly, he felt like something was hidden inside the two vortexes, but he could not see just what it was with his current strength.


    Turning his attention away from his dantian after realizing that he had no way to find out what was hidden inside the two vortexes, Xuan Hao finally focused on the most visible change that had taken ce during his earlier transformation¡­ His body¡­


    Not only had his soul and dantian changed, but his body had also undergone quite a few changes¡­


    "I wonder if this is a good or bad thing¡­"


    Using his divine sense to look over his body, Xuan Hao had no idea how to react to the changes that had taken ce.


    If before he looked like an average young man in his early twenties, he had now grown a bit more good looking, while also growing a bit older.


    Of course, this was not the main thing Xuan Hao was focused on. Instead, it was the small blue feather imprint currently located directly between his brows, that looked eerily simr to the blue feathers he had been finding over the past year or so¡­


    "Maybe the system will know something¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao quickly entered his sea of consciousness before checking out his status after a long time.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Domain: Sword Domain, Ice Domain


    Talent: ???


    Physique: ??? (Criteria for awakening not met, rmended to increase cultivation realm)


    Realm: Seventh Stage Domain Lord


    Outside of the fact that his cultivation realm had been updated from the Peak of the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao focused his attention on the small note next to his physique. Criteria for awakening not met, rmended to increase cultivation realm after noticing that there was nothing about the blue feather currently located between his brows.


    Compared to it just being question marks, Xuan Hao finally managed to confirm that he did indeed have a special physique of sorts like his first disciple, Qing Yi.


    What the physique was, he still had no idea, but from the looks of it he would be might be able to find out after increasing his cultivation realm¡­ As for how much he needed to increase it before he would find out anything about his physique, he had no idea¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Shaking his head upon thinking about this, Xuan Hao sat down and began stabilizing his cultivation base.


    No matter what, he at the very least needed to get his domains under control before returning to Qing Yi and the other elders¡­ After all, Xuan Hao did not want to idently end up injuring or even killing them¡­


    ¡­


    A few hours after he had returned to the small cave a short distance away from where the others were resting, Xuan Hao was prepared to make his way back, when he suddenly remembered the blue feather imprint located between his on his face smacked in directly between his brows.


    "Can I hide this¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he touched the blue feather located between his brows, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that the blue feather imprint had disappeared.


    "This¡­"


    Not knowing what to say upon feeling the imprint disappear the moment he wanted it to, Xuan Hao tried to summon it again and soon enough, it reappeared again.


    "At least I don''t have to worry about walking around with a weird feather imprint on my face¡­"


    Letting out a sigh of relief after discovering that he could make the blue feather imprint disappear, Xuan Hao made his way back towards the ce where Qing Yi and the other elders were waiting.

 Chapter 477: Escaping the Mystic Realm

    Chapter 477: Escaping the Mystic Realm


    "Master! Hm? Did something happen? You look somewhat different¡­"


    "Ah, I just happened to have a small breakthrough that changed my body a bit."


    Hearing Qing Yi call out the moment she spotted himing over, Xuan Hao just casually answered her without clearly giving a reason as to what had happened to him during the few hours, he had gone missing.


    "Really!? That''s great! Now master is even stronger!"


    Smiling happily when she heard that her master had broken through and be even stronger, Qing Yi no longer though about the changes that had taken ce in regard to her master''s body.


    After all, she knew very well what kind of changes a breakthrough could bring to the body. Especially given the fact that she was currently in the Foundation Establishment Realm and had to go through said change every time she broke through as her body was cleansed for impurities¡­


    Not to mention the fact that her master was way stronger than her, so the changes brought about by him breaking through should be way biggerpared to the changes she experienced!


    "Indeed, your master is even stronger now! Let''s get going, we still need to get back to the sect again at some point, I think both Chu Yang and Bai Ning are quite lonely now that both of us have been missing for so long!"


    Feeling happy upon seeing his Qing Yi''s reaction, Xuan Hao fluffed her hair much to her embarrassment before both of them joined up with the elders watching the scene from afar.


    Soon enough, they resumed their journey back towards the Flying Sword Sect. The only difference this time around, was the fact that Xuan Hao no longer dealt with any of the bandits or monsters on the way and instead let Chi Hu deal with them.


    At the moment, it was way more important for him to fully familiarize himself with his newfound strength and at the same time stabilize his foundation so he could fully utilize his strength without having to worry about idently using too much strength.


    In the end, the fact that Xuan Hao was no longer the one dealing with the iing bandits and demon beasts, was nothing short of a great thing to Qing Yi, as Chi Hu dealt with all the bandits and demon beasting at them along the way.


    No longer leaving any behind for her to enter a life and death struggle with! Truly, she hoped her master would take a little longer to stabilize his foundation¡­


    ¡­


    While Xuan Hao, Qing Yi and the rest of the elders were making their way back to the Flying Sword Sect, a young man hiding inside arge tree crown of a giant tree towering several hundred meters into the air let out a sigh filled with despair as he looked down towards arge demon beast moving around just below him.


    The young man was none other than the young man who had jumped into the mystic realm to escape from the Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the Azure Sky Kingdom!


    Not only was he not dead after having entered the mystic realm, but he had also managed to locate a way out of the mystic realm!


    The only problem was the fact that when he had just been about to reach the exit, a demon beast at the Nascent Soul Realm had suddenly shown up!


    At that time, he had barely managed to avoid getting detected by the demon beast, as he had hidden inside the tree crown of one of the enormous trees that covered the mystic realm.


    However,¡­ Even after a few days, the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast had not shown any signs of leaving and had instead stayed just below the giant tree he was hiding in.


    "Looks like I will really have to leave this ce, or I will simply starve to death¡­ Hah¡­ How I wish my cultivation was strong enough to sustain me off the qi floating in between heaven and earth¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he scanned his surroundings for a way out like he had done so many times before, the young man from the Ascendant Frost Hall could only let out another sigh of despair.


    No matter what he did, as long as he moved from his current hiding spot, the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast below him would find out!


    Even if he had a chance to escape from it in the past, the situation was not the same now, as he had pretty much destroyed his cultivation while escaping from the Azure Sky Kingdom Nascent Soul Realm Expert Earlier.


    The only reason why he had even survived for so long was because he had found a spiritual fruit just after entering the mystic realm, while it didn''t help him recover his cultivation realm or anything along that line, it at least stopped the bacsh of the forbidden technique from killing him.


    "Maybe I can eat the leaves-"


    Rumble~!


    Roar!


    Just when the young man from the Ascendant Frost Hall was about to try and eat the leaves of the tree to satiate his hunger, a powerful earthquake suddenly urred, causing the earth below him to split apart as the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast below him roared fearfully before running away.


    "This is my chance!"


    Knowing that he might not get such a great opportunity in the future, the young man rushed down the enormous tree the moment the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast had left. Making his way towards the exit of the mystic realm that he had found just when he entered the mystic realm.


    RUMBLE!


    Crack~!


    The shaking from the earthquake and the ground beneath his feet cracking apart. Revealing a seemingly bottomless abyss below, was not enough to deter the young man, as he barely managed to keep himself stable rushing towards the exit of the mystic realm.


    Crack!


    "There it is!"


    Along with the ground just behind him cracking apart, the young manpletely ignored what was happening around him as his gaze was focused on a small pond with a simrly small whirlpool in the middle of it.


    Through the small whirlpool, arge frozenke with several people standing around it saying something while several different runes were drawn mid-air could be seen.


    "Oh no, they are about to seal off the mystic realm!"


    Instantly realizing that the people on the other side were his elders and the fact that they were about to seal of the mystic realm with him still inside, the young man could not help himself from panicking slightly.


    Whoosh~


    The sound of the whirlpool inside the small pond suddenly starting to shrink instantly caused the young man to panic even further. Using all the strength left in his body to rush over towards the small pond.


    Roar!


    However, just as he was about to jump into the small whirlpool in the pond, a familiar roar sounded out just behind him¡­


    "No! Not like this!"


    Realizing that he couldn''t move his body in the slightest under the terrifying aura of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast, the young man could not help calling out in despair as he struggled to no avail.


    Having no cultivation at all at the moment, he could not even put up the slightest resistance!


    Swish~


    Roar-


    Seeing a sh of green before suddenly hearing the demon beast behind him roar out in despair before falling silent, the young man didn''t even bother finding out what happened as he dived headfirst into the small whirlpool the moment the pressure restricting his movement disappeared.


    Whoosh!


    Following the young man of the Ascendant Frost Hall entering the small whirlpool, it disappeared from the small pond. Leaving behind no trace of it ever being there in the first ce!


    ¡­


    "You go up first junior brother."


    Back at the Flying Sword Sect, Chu Yang and Bai Ning had managed to make their way back to the ce where the hole out of the hollow part of the mountain was located, as Chu Yang hurried for Bai Ning to climb up the rope first.


    "If you say so¡­"


    Not waiting around after listening to his senior brother''s encouragement, Bai Ning began climbing up the rope first before reached the top a few minutester.


    "Senior brother! I''m up now! You cane!"


    Yelling so Chu Yang below could hear him after having made his way to the top, Bai Ning sat around and waited for another few minutes until Chu Yang''s head popped out of the hole.


    Rustle~


    Climbing the rest of the way out of the hole, Chu Yang nced back towards the hole in the ground that he had created just a few hours earlier.


    "We should get this hole sealed up so nobody ends up falling down there in the future¡­"


    Muttering this just loud enough for Bai Ning to hear what he was saying, Chu Yang turned around and was just about to say something to Bai Ning, when-


    Crack~


    Hurriedly taking a step back from the ground beneath his feet that had suddenly breaking apart, Bai Ning just managed to make eye contact with Chu Yang as the ground beneath his feet cracked apart way faster for some reason. Compared to him, Chu Yang didn''t have enough time to escape like he did...


    "¡­"


    "¡­"


    Whoosh!


    Watching directly as his senior brother disappeared into the darkness below, Bai Ning could not help smiling a bit awkwardly.


    From the looks of it, his senior brother not only had a bad sense of directions, but he was also quite unlucky¡­


    At least he should be fine falling from such a height with his cultivation realm, he could also grab onto the rope while falling if-


    Snap!


    "¡­ Looks like I will have to find big sister Zhi and see if we have another rope¡­"

 Chapter 478: Cloud Sky Kingdom

    Chapter 478: Cloud Sky Kingdom


    Over the next few weeks, Xuan Hao, Qing Yi and the rest of the elders slowly made their way back towards the Flying Sword Sect on the demon beasts they had bought before leaving the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    During this period of time, Qing Yi had fought a lot of different opponents under the guidance of her master, as she had even managed to breakthrough again within a short period of time. Reaching the Ninth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm. Only a single step away from reaching the Core Formation Realm!


    This, however, did not mean that Xuan Hao spent all his time on Qing Yi''s training after he had managed to stabilize his cultivation.


    Instead, he once again put focus back onto making interspatial rings for the quest before randomly throwing them out along the way ording to the instructions of the system.


    At this point, it had be far easier and faster for him to make interspatial rings and by the time they reached the Cloud Sky Kingdom just next to the territory of the Flying Sword Sect, he had already managed to scatter 571 interspatial rings in total. Allowing him to already be more than halfway done with the quest!


    "Now that I think about it, I wonder how that old man is doing¡­"


    Remembering his meeting with the former elder of the ck Rose Sect back in the secret realm, Xuan Hao could not help recalling the fact that the old man should have settled down in the Cloud Sky Kingdom under one of the sects there.


    "Hm, if I''m not wrong, he should have joined the Flowing Cloud Sect¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as they officially entered the territory of the Cloud Sky Kingdom without being stopped, Xuan Hao thought about whether or not he should pay the old man a visit or not.


    After all, the old man was someone who had once been an elder of a demonic sect, so Xuan Hao was quite curious about how he was doing at the moment.


    Not to mention the fact that he had reached the Nascent Soul Realm thest time he had met him without using the demonic cultivation technique he had been practicing when he had first met him!


    How he had escaped the influence of the demonic technique and even managed to cultivate normally again was quite an interesting thing. After all, when one walked down the demonic path, one would normally not have a way out again¡­


    "Chi Hu, can you take charge for the rest of the journey back to the sect?"


    "Hm? S-sure, but why?"


    "I have an old friend here in the Cloud Sky Kingdom and was nning to visit him before making my way back to the sect, it might take a while, so I didn''t want to hold all of you up when we are almost back home."


    "I see¡­ Then don''t mind us and leave, we should be more than safe so close to the sect. At most we will just have to say we are from the Flying Sword Sect! I doubt anyone in the Cloud Sky Kingdom would dare attack us at that point! Hehe!"


    Feeling his curiosity towards the current situation of old Ji as he was calledst time, he saw him; Xuan Hao did not stay around for long after finishing his conversation with Chi Hu. Only talking a bit with Qing Yi to inform her about him leaving before flying towards the direction of the Cloud Sky Kingdom''s capital to find out where the Flowing Cloud Sect that old Ji was now a part of was located.


    "Though, it looks like I might have been a bit harsh to Qing Yi during the past few weeks¡­"


    Flying through the air, Xuan hao could not help frowning unhappily upon remembering the happy expression on Qing Yi''s face the moment he mentioned that he would be leaving to visit an old friend in the Cloud Sky Kingdom.


    Not thinking about this for too long as the capital of the Cloud Sky Kingdom appeared in the distance, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit amazed upon witnessing the capital of the Cloud Sky Kingdom.


    The capital city was located next to a small mountain range with arge river located directly next to it where dozens if not hundreds ofrge merchant ships could be seen sailing in towards arge harbour connected to the capital city of the Cloud Sky Kingdom through severalrge roads.


    Looking at the sheer size of the capital city of the Cloud Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao could not help but wonder just how strong the Cloud Sky Kingdom actually was.


    After all, while still smaller than Yi Min''s capital city, it was not by much.


    Maybe they actually have a Domain Lord¡­?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao decided to be a bit more cautious as hended a few thousand meters from the capital city and began making his way over on foot instead of flying. Not wanting to idently end up offending the Cloud Sky Kingdom in case they really did have a Domain Lord watching over them.


    ¡­


    Whoosh~


    Having made his way inside the capital of the Cloud Sky Kingdom, the first thing Xuan Hao did, was to use his divine sense to scan the entire capital city. Trying his best to find out whether or not there really was a Domain Lord inside the capital city of the Cloud Sky Kingdom.


    "No Domain Lord¡­"


    After having his divine sense sweep through the capital city a few times, Xuan Hao could only shake his head upon realizing that there was not any Domain Lord inside the Cloud Sky Kingdom


    However, even if he had not found any Domain Lords, the capital was still very clearly powerful. The sheer amount of Nascent Soul Realm Experts present was far above what the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had; this was even including the different sects inside their territory!


    At the same time, the strongest person inside the capital was not someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm but was instead someone who had reached the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm. Already havingprehended his own pseudo domain!


    "Hm¡­ It seems like there really isn''t any Domain Lord inside the capital of the Cloud Sky Kingdom, I wonder how the city got so big without a Domain Lord to back it up, a Half-Step Domain Lord should not be able to do it¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he walked down the busy streets of the capital city, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit curious about how the capital of the Cloud Sky Kingdom had managed to grow sorge and powerful without the backing of a Domain Lord.


    Currently, the only thing he knew about the Cloud Sky Kingdom, was the fact that it was neutral when it came to conflicts involving any of the other nearby kingdoms. Even when the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had fought, it had not tried taking advantage of the situation to expand its borders or gain any benefits by helping one of the two kingdoms.


    Other than the neutrality and no conflict attitude of the Cloud Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao also knew that there were a few strong sects inside of it. One of them being the Flowing Cloud Sect that the former Elder Skinling of the ck Rose Sect, now known as Old Ji or Ji Yichuan had joined.


    "Now all I need to do is find someone who knows where the Flowing Cloud Sect is located¡­"


    Walking along the street, Xuan Hao checked out the different shops along the way, as he thought about how to go about finding the location of the Flowing Cloud Sect before long reaching the end of the street.


    "This is¡­"


    Seeing the gigantic building that was located at the end of the street going from the main gate of the capital city, Xuan Hao could not help opening his eyes as a look of amazement appeared on his face.


    Not to mention just how big the building in front of him was, through his divine sense, he had also discovered that the building in front of him was farrger than the castle of the Cloud Sky Kingdom at the centre of the capital city!


    "The Explorer Unions?"


    Spotting the familiar two pickaxes crossing each other above the entrance to therge building, Xuan Hao instantly realized that the building belonged to the Explorer Union. Not only that, but after scanning through the building in front of him with his divine sense, Xuan Hao also realized that the Half-Step Domain Lord inside the capital city was not inside the capital at the centre of the city but was instead inside the branch of the Explorer Union currently in front of him!


    "Interesting¡­ Looks like the Explorer Union''s branch here is quite strong¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao didn''t stand around looking at therge building for too long before entering.

 Chapter 479: The Sect That Rules Over the Swamp...

    Chapter 479: The Sect That Rules Over the Swamp...


    Entering therge branch of the Explorer Union, Xuan Hao was amazed by the sheer size and amount of people walking around inside the building. The branch he had been to in the past during the time that the Heavenly Sky Kingdom was still around, was nowhere near the level of the one he currently found himself inside of.


    Even the strength of the people inside was far higher, with even the weakest person inside having reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, while the stronger ones had reached the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    From this alone, it was easy to see just how strong the Explorer Union was inside the Cloud Sky Kingdom¡­ Not to mention the fact that there was still a Half-Step Domain Lord present inside the branch!


    The Explorer Union sole purpose was exploring secret realms, mystic realms, ancient ruins and so on. Not involving themselves with any of the kingdoms or empires across the Ewaria Continent in an attempt to not get involved in any of their wars and conflicts. At least not anything he had heard about.


    For them to have such arge branch inside the Cloud Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao could only think of one reason¡­


    "Hah¡­ When will we go back and try to explore that ce again? So far, we have still not managed to enter the inner part of that ce. Even the branch leader only reached the border between the outer and inner area¡­"


    "Calm down, your sister still needs to recover before we can move anywhere near that ce any time soon!"


    Listening in on the conversation between two of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts inside the branch, Xuan Hao felt like the ce that the Nascent Soul Realm Experts were talking about, was likely the reason for the Explorer Union''s presence in the Cloud Sky Kingdom!


    Thinking about it, it was most likely an ancient ruin or something along that line. After all, a secret realm would have not only caught the attention of the Sky Empire, but also the nearby empires.


    At that point, it would not just be the Explorer Union that was present in the Cloud Sky Kingdom¡­


    Simr to what had ended up happening with the secret realm that appeared in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, where Domain Lords from both the Onyx Empire and the Sky Empire showed up within a short period of time.


    If not for the fact that the secret realm had been destroyed so quickly, other empires would have likely also begun showing up to explore the newly discovered secret realm. At that point, the Heavenly Sky Kingdom along with the Flying Sword Sect might get drawn into a conflict between these great powers!


    Shaking his head as this thought passed through his mind, Xuan Hao knew that it was truly a lucky thing that the secret realm had been destroyed back then¡­


    "Hello! Is there something I can help with?"


    "Yeah, I wanted to know where the Flowing Cloud Sect is located."


    Hearing a voice calling out to him, Xuan Hao realized he had already made his way over to the counter of the Explorer Union, as he quickly responded before the other party had time to realize that he was spacing out.


    "The Flowing Cloud Sect? It''s located¡­"


    Not even a second after hearing his question, the person behind the counter gave him a detailed exnation of where the Flowing Cloud Sect was located. Even mentioning a few different caravans going towards the Flowing Cloud Sect that he could travel together with for safety. Only requiring him to pay a small fee.


    Not that he would need to travel with some random caravan for safety in the first ce¡­


    The reason why the clerk behind the counter had mentioned it, was most likely because he had hidden his cultivation base. Looking no different than a normal person with no cultivation.


    Given his age, she might even think that he was someone who was trying to enter-


    "¡­ If you take of in the next 3 days, you should be able to make it for their entrance examination! I heard that they are also taking in people above the age of eighteen if they are talented enough! If you are not sessful, you can always join the Explorer Union! We ept everyone and even allow you to choose a free cultivation mantra when joining!"


    "¡­ Thanks¡­ I will get going then¡­"


    Listening to the clerk behind the counter confirm his thoughts about him, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly before taking his leave.


    "Good luck!"


    "¡­"


    Ignoring the clerks call, Xuan Hao quickly left the Explorer Union branch.


    Next time, he should notpletely hide his cultivation base. Maybe showing something around the level of the Core Formation Realm¡­ At least that way, he would not have to encounter a simr situation in the future¡­


    "Hah¡­"<i> The source of this content is [ f r e e w e b n o v e l. c o m ]</i>


    Letting out a sigh as he stepped outside, Xuan Hao directly left the capital city of the Cloud Sky Kingdom without finding out the reason why the Explorer Union had built such arge branch there.


    In the first ce, he just wanted to check up on Old Ji as he was now called before returning to the sect to see his two disciples, Chu Yang and Bai Ning again.


    Finding out the reason why the Explorer Union was in the Cloud Sky Kingdom would surely end up with him getting side tracked and only returning a few weeks after Qing Yi and the other elders had made their way back to the sect.


    This was not really something he wanted to do at the moment¡­ After all, he could alwayse back to the Cloud Sky Kingdom in the future and find out why the Explorer Union was so active there.


    Whoosh~


    Having made up his mind to not investigate the Explorer Union and just what they had found inside the Cloud Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao flew into the air hidden beneath his domain before flying towards the location of the Flowing Cloud Sect that the clerk had described to him.


    "Though¡­ I do wonder why the Flowing Cloud Sect would be located in such a hostile location¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he flew through the air, Xuan Hao could not help remembering the map that the clerk had pulled out while exining how to get to and where the Flowing Cloud Sect was located inside the Cloud Sky Kingdom.


    The area in question, was arge swamp located at the borders of the Cloud Sky Kingdom. Not only was this swamp dangerous ording to the clerk, but it was also massive enough to cover a good ten percent of the entire Cloud Sky Kingdom!


    Just seeing it on the map, Xuan Hao could easily understand just howrge the swamp was.


    If put into the past Heavenly Sky Kingdom, the swamp itself would cover around the same area as the territory of the Flying Sword Sect!


    For the Flowing Cloud Sect to be in control of such arge swamp¡­ It caused Xuan Hao to wonder why they had even ended up calling themselves the Flowing Cloud Sect instead of something like the Great Swamp Sect or Muddy Water Sect!


    On the other hand, perhaps it was for the better that they were called the Flowing Cloud Sect¡­


    Whoosh!


    No longer thinking too much about the name choice of the Flowing Cloud Sect, Xuan Hao increased his speed after getting far enough away from the capital city. No longer bothering to hide himself with his domain.


    The only reason he had hidden himself, as because he didn''t want to idently cause a panic inside the capital city¡­


    ¡­


    "Is that so¡­ Looks like they are really not giving up that easily!"


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was making his way over towards the Flowing Cloud Sect, somewhere inside therge swamp of the Cloud Sky Kingdom, a middle-aged man looked towards the ruins of arge temple, an overwhelming killing intent overflowing from both his eyes.


    Currently, arge dome shaped barrier covered the temple as several people in front of the middle-aged man could be seen attacking therge dome surrounding the temple ruins. All of them were at least in the Foundation Establishment Realm, while the stronger ones had already reached the Core Formation Realm!


    "We have to leave soon leader¡­ The help from the Flowing Cloud Sect is sure to arrive any minute now! If one of the Core Elders of the Flowing Cloud Sect shows up-"


    "Shut up! I know already! Just help bring this damnable formation down!"


    Half of the temple had already sunken into the soft swamp soil over the years, but even with all of this, the formation that conjured forth the dome shaped barrier had somehow still been fine after all of that¡­


    "¡­"


    Seeing his leader act like that, the man who had tried to warn his leader about the approaching danger could only keep quiet before joining the others in attacking the barrier around the temple ruins.

 Chapter 480: A Burning Sensation

    Chapter 480: A Burning Sensation


    "So, this is the swamp that the Flowing Cloud Sect is located inside of¡­"


    Arriving in front of the swamp that the clerk had told him about, Xuan Hao could not help feeling amazed upon seeing the dozen or so narrow paths connected across the swamp with small wooden bridge.


    Even more impressive was the enormous swamp cypress trees that had almost ended up bing the only species of trees inside the swamp in front of him.


    Other than that, Xuan Hao also inspected the different demon beasts hiding away in between the roots of the swamp cypress trees along with those hidden below the muddy waters.


    The strongest among them was by far the alligator demon beasts, where even at the entrance to the swamp, the weakest among the group he had spotted, had already reached theter stages of the Qi Condensation Realm!


    Whoosh~


    Only staying around the entrance to the swamp for a few moments to appreciate the beauty of the cypress trees and get a grasp over what kind of demon beasts would likely be present inside the deeper parts of the swamp where the Flowing Cloud Sect was located, Xuan Hao once again flew into the sky before heading towards the Flowing Cloud Sect''s location.


    At the same time, he also began realizing just how hard it would be for the Flowing Cloud Sect to recruit new disciples and somewhat began to understand why they also epted new disciples who were above the age of eighteen.


    After all, it was not really easy to reach the Flowing Cloud Sect, as even the outer parts of the swamp already brimmed with demon beasts in theter stages of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Given how dangerous the outer parts of the swamp were, there should be quite a few demon beasts in the Foundation Establishment Realm, if not the Core Formation Realm in the deeper parts of the swamp.


    Not really something a young child seeking to enter a sect had any way to deal with¡­


    Travelling through the swamp, Xuan Hao saw many different and unique demon beasts that he had never seen before. However, he hade to realize that the most terrifying thing about the swamp was not the demon beasts, but therge quantity of insects present.


    Not to mention the sheer number of insects flying all over the ce, they were also extremely poisonous!


    During the short period of time that he had spent flying through the swamp, he had already witnessed close to a dozen strong demon beasts copse dead on the ground after being stung by these poisonous insects. The strongest of which had already reached the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    Inside the swamp, the apex predator was not the strong alligator demon beasts he had seen, but was instead the small poisonous insects flying all over the ce¡­


    Thump!


    Coming to a stop mid-air beforending on one of the many small wooden bridges below him, Xuan Hao frowned as he touched his forehead.


    The reason for this, was that he had suddenly begun to feel a slight burning sensation from the ce between his brows where the feather imprint was located.


    Whoosh!


    Using his divine sense, Xuan Hao quickly realized the fact that the feather imprint between his brows suddenly showed itself and began shinning with a pale blue light.


    "The feather imprint is showing itself¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he touched the now feather imprint between his brows shinning with a pale blue light, Xuan Hao quickly realized that he could not hide it like he had done before¡­


    Other than that, Xuan Hao also began to feel something calling out to him from afar.


    How weird¡­ I wonder what it is¡­


    Whoosh!


    Looking towards the direction that the calling wasing from; Xuan Hao did not stay around waiting for long before moving towards the thing that was calling out to him.


    For better or worse, he had a feeling that the burning sensation and the imprint of a feather between his brows would not disappear before he found the thing calling out to him. At the very least, he could tell that it was not too far away and was still somewhere inside the swamp¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time, Xuan Hao began searching for the thing that was calling out to him and had caused the feather imprint between his brows to show itself, the formation around the temple ruins deeper inside the swamp was beginning to crack, as a few of the temple pirs covered in cracks began breaking apart.


    Bang!


    Along with each of the pirs breaking apart, the formation that formed the dome shaped barrier around the temple ruins weakened even further.


    "Finally, that damnable formation is breaking! Haha, they won''t be able to hide away for long!"


    The middle-aged man in the lead of the people currently attacking the dome shaped barrier smiled happily upon seeing this.


    Even if he had angrily dismissed one of his subordinates earlier upon hearing the mention of the Flowing Cloud Sect''s possible reinforcements showing up, he knew very well that his subordinate was right.


    In the first ce, the reason why he was so nervous, was because he understood that he would have no way to fight back when one of the Flowing Cloud Sect''s Nascent Soul Realm Experts arrived.


    The only reason why he had dared to stay for so long with the Flowing Cloud Sect not being located too far away from his current location, was because a giant swarm of death poison mosquitos had appeared between the temple ruins and the Flowing Cloud Sect.


    The death poison mosquitos were not something to be taken lightly, as their special soul poison was strong enough to even kill someone in the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Given that these terrifying insects were blocking the main path between the Flowing Cloud Sect and the temple ruins, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Flowing Cloud Sect would have no choice but to take a detour around them.


    Crack~


    "Haha! Looks like it won''t be able to hold for much longer! Everyone, begin spreading out, we can''t let any of them escape!"


    Seeing one of the main pirs of the temple shatter as severalrge cracks began appearing on the dome shaped barrier, the middle-aged manughed happily to himself before informing his subordinates to surround the temple.


    Whoosh!


    It did not take long for his subordinates to spread out andpletely surround the temple ruins before once again resuming their attack.


    "Hm¡­ This should be the ce¡­"


    "Ah-!"


    Hearing someone''s voice just behind him, the middle-aged man jumped up in a fearful manner before turning towards the direction of the voice.


    Having remainedpletely focused on the temple ruins and the people inside of the temple, he did not even notice that someone had suddenly appeared behind him.


    Who is that¡­? It should not be someone from the Flowing Cloud Sect, we should still have a few minutes before their Nascent Soul Realm Expert arrives¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he inspected the young man that had suddenly appeared behind him, the first thing that stood out was the weird feather imprint located between his brows shinning with a pale blue light.


    Staring at the feather imprint between the young man''s eyebrows, the middle-aged man felt a shiver run down his spine, as he suddenly realized that he could not move a single muscle in his body.


    The rest of his subordinates was no better, as everything suddenly seemed to have frozen in ce. The attacks traveling towards the dome shaped barrier covering the ancient temple had at some point dissipated mid-air before reaching their target.


    "Looks like there is also someone inside the temple ruins."


    Watching as the young man suddenly took a step forward before disappearing in front of him, the middle-aged man barely managed to force his body to turn around after the young man had disappeared.


    However, when he turned around, he just managed to see the young man lightly taping the dome shaped barrier.


    Crack~


    Bang!


    This¡­ What in the world!? Who is that person!?


    Seeing the barrier that would at least have taken them another minute or so to break apart, being destroyed by a light tap from the young man, made the middle-aged man realize just how terrifying the young man was.


    "Hah¡­ I can¡­ Hah¡­ Move again¡­"


    As the figure of the young man disappeared into the temple ruins, the middle-aged man copsed onto the ground sweating all over. The restrictions keeping him from moving had disappeared, but this was only followed by an overwhelming sense of terror.


    "L-leader, w-what should we do¡­?"


    "We leave! Immediately!"


    "But what about¡­"


    "You want to enter the temple ruins with that person around!? You should be happy you are still alive! Let''s leave before that person returns!"


    Angrily rebuking the subordinate who hade over to him, the middle-aged man did not dare stay around the temple ruins for even a second longer, as he directly left without waiting for his subordinates to follow.


    "L-leader!"


    "Wait for me!"


    Soon everyone surrounding the temple ruins ran away with their tails between their legs. Not daring to stay around after seeing their leader escape.


    "First you want to stay and now you want to leave?"


    Muttering this to himself before following the others. The subordinate who had asked what to do, could only sigh to himself as he began to wonder when his leader had be so cowardly.


    However, in the end, he did not have anything to say regarding his decision. After all, the young man who had suddenly appeared, was simply way too scary¡­

 Chapter 481: Feather Imprint! Absorb!

    Chapter 481: Feather Imprint! Absorb!


    Arriving at the location where he felt the calling, Xuan Hao spotted arge temple ruin with arge dome shaped barrier surrounding it.


    At this point, several cracks had already spread all over this barrier as a group of people were using all their strength to attack the dome shaped barrier.


    Thump~!


    Landing a short distance away from the ruined temple, Xuan Hao didn''t bother hiding himself. After all, the strongest person present was only at the Core Formation Realm. Not really anything that could pose a threat to him given his current cultivation realm.


    "Hm¡­ This should be the ce¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao used his domain to momentarily stop the people from moving before peering through the dome shaped barrier to see what was inside the temple ruins.


    "Looks like there is also someone inside the temple ruins."


    Spotting a few people fearfully looking on from inside the temple ruins, Xuan Hao could easily guess what was happening, as he took a step forward before arriving in front of the dome shaped barrier.


    Crack~


    Bang!


    Destroying the dome shaped barrier without paying too much attention to the people inside the temple ruins, Xuan Hao instead focused on the weird calling he had felting from inside the temple ruins.


    ""¡­""


    The people hiding away inside the temple ruins did not dare moving in the slightest after seeing Xuan Hao destroy the dome shaped barrier so easily before entering the temple ruins.


    Even if they wanted to say something to the unknown person who had suddenly appeared, like the people outside the temple ruins, they soon found out that they could not move a single muscle in their body. Only able to helplessly stare towards Xuan Hao as he entered the temple ruins.


    The only thing causing them not to panic, was the fact that Xuan Hao did not seem to care about them in the slightest as he made his way past them before proceeding towards arge broken-down altar located at what had once been the core of the temple ruins.


    Feeling the curious gazes locked onto him, Xuan Hao who had just reached the broken-down altar stopped.


    "Leave¡­"


    With a short sentence leaving no room for conversation, Xuan Hao removed the suppression on the people inside the temple.


    "Y-yes!"


    "T-thank you, sir!"


    "Thank you for your help!"


    The people in question quickly thanked Xuan Hao before leaving the temple ruins. The reason for this being that they had been in a pretty hopeless situation before his arrival and would most likely have ended up being killed by the people who had surrounded the temple ruins from outside.


    "¡­"


    Not saying anything in response, Xuan Hao stood in front of the broken-down altar, as he waited for the people inside the temple ruins to leave before continuing.


    The altar in question, was nothing more than a simple broken-down stone b at this point, with a small sun disc located on top of it.


    From the feather imprint between his brows glowing brightly and the feeling of something calling out to him from the altar, Xuan Hao understood that the thing calling out to him should be somewhere on top of, or inside of the altar in front of him.


    Rustle~


    "Good¡­ Looks like everyone is gone now¡­"


    Along with thest person leaving the area around the temple ruins, Xuan Hao set up a short-term barrier around the temple ruins using his two domains as the core. Preventing anyone from peeking inside with their divine sense and stopping anyone from being able enter without his knowledge.


    This was the best way to make sure that nobody disturbed him.


    "Now¡­ I wonder what''s inside here¡­"


    Tracing the thin outlines along the sun disc covered in dust on top of the altar, Xuan Hao could clearly feel a familiar energy from the small sun disc.


    "Divine energy!"


    Albeit weak, Xuan Hao could still recognize the weak blue divine energy from the sun disc, it was the same as the divine energy he had found in the two tallest mountains of the Shattered Star Peaks!


    Whoosh~


    Not only that, but Xuan Hao soon discovered that the divine energy inside the small sun disc suddenly flew out before entering the feather imprint between his brows!


    The entire thing happened way faster than he could react and by the time that he had discovered the blue divine energy entering the feather imprint, the small sun disc on top of the alter had already beenpletely drained, as the feather imprint disappeared without needing him to do anything.


    "Wha-"


    Realizing that the feather imprint had just devoured the blue divine energy, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a wave of shock, as he knew very well how terrifying the blue divine energy was.


    Even if it was weakened by a lot, he still did not dare absorbing it. Fearing that he might just end up freezing to death the moment he allowed the blue divine energy to enter his dantian!


    But now, the feather imprint had easily devoured the weakened blue divine energy without anything happening to him¡­


    Well, something did happen, as Xuan Hao felt his mind clear up and the world around him felt a bit differentpared to before.


    "It increased my ability toprehend to natural world?!"


    Standing frozen in front of the altar for a short moment before he realized just what had happened, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    The feather imprint had increased his ability toprehend the world around him!


    Even if this did not immediately increase his strength, in the long run, it would increase his speed ofprehending his two domains and in turn increase his cultivation speed!


    Maybe, there was even a chance for him toprehend more than two domains if hisprehension increased¡­


    "I should go back to the Shattered Star Peaks and see if it can absorb the blue divine energy there¡­"


    Whispering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling himself grow a bit excited thinking about how much hisprehension speed would increase if the feather imprint devoured all the blue divine energy present on the Shattered Star Peaks.


    At this point, Xuan Hao no longer thought about visiting the Flowing Cloud Sect and was instead way more interested in returning to the Flying Sword Sect before making a trip to the Shattered Star Peaks.


    I guess I will just have to visit that Old Ji at some other point¡­ I don''t even know him too well in the first ce¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao decided to give up on visiting the Flowing Cloud Sect for now.


    In the future, he would return and check out how the former elder of the ck Rose Sect was doing¡­ Yeah¡­ He was going to check up on him at some point in the future¡­


    Whoosh!


    Having already gotten the thing that he wanted inside the temple ruins; Xuan Hao did not stay around for any longer. Directly removing the barrier, he had put up to prevent any people or demon beasts from entering while he looked for the thing that had called out to him and caused the feather imprint between his eyebrows to start shinning.


    Visiting the Flowing Cloud Sect and finding the elder from the ck Rose Sect had alreadypletely disappeared from his mind at this point in time.


    The former elder of the ck Rose Sect was simply not someone Xuan Hao wanted to waste any time on after finding out about possibly being able to increase hisprehension speed and in turn increase his cultivation speed¡­


    ¡­


    "You said that it was here you hid away? Inside the temple ruins over there?"


    "Yes!"


    "I see¡­ I will go and check it out¡­"


    Only a few minutes after Xuan Hao had left the temple ruins, one of the people who had previously hidden inside the temple ruins arrived back at the temple ruins together with one of the elders of the Flowing Cloud Sect!


    "Be careful! If that person is still in there, Elder Ji¡­"


    "I understand, just leave it to me!"


    Not to mention, the elder from the Flowing Cloud Sect, was none other than the former elder of the ck Rose Sect that Xuan Hao hade to visit! Ji Yichuan!


    Shortly after the people from the Flowing Cloud Sect, who had hidden inside the temple ruins, had left, they encountered Ji Yichuan and a few other elders who hade together with him.


    Soon enough, they told him about what had happened at the temple ruins and of course their encounter with Xuan Hao.


    Following this, Ji Yichuan had instructed for everyone to head back to the sect while one of the people stayed behind to guide him to the temple ruins to find out who the mysterious person that had ended up saving the people of the Flowing Cloud Sect was.


    Whoosh~


    "Looks like he already left¡­"


    Arriving inside the now empty temple ruins, Ji Yichuan could not help sighing disappointedly at the fact that he had not been able to catch the unknown saviour.


    Even if it was unintentional, Ji Yichuan still wanted to thank him. Not only had that person ended up saving the people of the Flowing Cloud Sect, but he had also saved the only daughter of the current sect master, who had been hidden among the people inside the temple ruins!

 Chapter 482: Returning to the Sec

    Chapter 482: Returning to the Sec


    Returning back to the Flying Sword Sect only a few short minutes after Qing Yi and the other elders, Xuan Hao was greeted by his youngest disciple Bai Ning the moment he stepped into his pavilion again after being gone for the past few months.


    "Master!"


    "Haha, great to see you again as well."


    Seeing Bai Ning run over to greet him, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit to himself as he happily greeted the young boy.


    The seventh stage of the Qi Condensation Realm¡­ Looks like I will have to spend a little more time training him before I go to the Shattered Star Peaks¡­


    Noticing that Bai Ning''s cultivation base had not improved as much as he had expected for it to during the time he and Qing Yi were gone, Xuan Hao decided to stay for a few days at the Flying Sword Sect before leaving for the Shattered Star Peaks.


    In the first ce, I will also have to check up with Chu Yang and see how he is doing now that he broke through to the Core Formation Realm.


    Thinking this to himself as he looked over Bai Ning happily standing beside him.


    "Let''s go and see how your senior brother and sister are doing, I would also love to hear what you''ve been up to over the past few weeks!"


    "Really!?"


    "Yes, I''m also quite interested in learning how far your cksmithing skills have managed to progress and if you managed to make any new friends at the cksmithing Hall."


    "Hm, I made quite a lot of progress during thest few weeks and even managed to work together on an artifact with one of the-"


    Listening to Bai Ning talking about what he had gone through during the time he was not there, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly to himself upon learning how many elders in the cksmithing Hall, that he had ended up bing friends with.


    In the end, Bai Ning had not managed to make a single friend around his own age, but had instead ended up befriending most of the elders from the cksmithing Hall during his frequent visits¡­


    Of course, it also helped that he was a personal disciple of a core elder and could easily move around the sect and talk with the many elders without having to worry too much about his position as a disciple.


    After all, the personal disciples of core elders, were viewed as future elders and possible core elders of the sect!


    Thinking this to himself as he made his way further inside the pavilion together with Bai Ning, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head.


    Maybe he should help his disciple find a few simrly aged friends among the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect?


    "Maybe I should take him with me to the next entrance examination¡­"


    Muttering this to himself without Bai Ning hearing anything, Xuan Hao began making ns for how he could ensure that his youngest disciple got some friends around his age in the future.


    ¡­


    "You reached the Core Formation Realm!?"


    "Yeah, I guess you will have to reach the Core Formation Realm if you don''t want to get left too far behind dear senior sister~"


    A few minutes before Xuan Hao had returned to the Flying Sword Sect, Qing Yi had arrived back at the pavilion. Only to discover that Chu Yang had actually managed to break through to the Core Formation Realm during the time that she had been away with her master!


    "You-!"


    Grinding her teeth upon seeing the cheeky smile stered all over Chu Yang''s face, Qing Yi felt that her status as the senior sister had been challenged and resolved herself to enter seclusion to break through to the Core Formation Realm herself.


    No matter what, she did not intend to get left behind by Chu Yang.


    "Hmph! The only reason why you managed to reach the Core Formation Realm before me, was because I was participating in the alchemypetition together with master! In another month or two, I will also be able to reach the Core Formation Realm!"


    Rustle~


    Not waiting for Chu Yang to respond to her, Qing Yi directly left before returning to her room to begin cultivating.


    In the first ce, she hade to brag about the fact that she had gotten second ce during the alchemypetition, but in the end, Chu Yang''s break through to the Core Formation Realm hadpletely caught her off-guard.


    "With the resources I won during the alchemypetition, I should easily be able to catch up with that damnable Chu Yang!"


    Muttering this to herself as she turned around the corner of the hallway she was walking down, Qing Yi didn''t notice the fact that her master and Bai Ning had appeared directly in front of her the moment she turned around the corner.


    ¡­


    Watching the frowning expression on Qing Yi''s face as she turned around the corner just in front of them, Xuan Hao felt like she had already found out about the fact that Chu Yang had broken through to the Core Formation Realm.


    Hm? It seems like she didn''t discover us yet¡­


    Having stopped together with Bai Ning, Xuan Hao felt a bit amused upon seeing that Qing Yi still didn''t notice them and instead just continued forward while ncing back towards the direction she had juste from.


    Tap-tap, Thump!


    Walking head-first into his chest, Qing Yi showed a confused expression before looking up.


    "Ah- M-master!"


    "Haha, indeed, it is your master! However, it seems like someone is quite preupied thinking about something, I wonder if it''s about the fact that Chu Yang broke through to the Core Formation Realm?"


    Chuckling a bit to himself upon seeing the embarrassed expression on Qing Yi''s face, Xuan Hao could not help himself from teasing her a bit.


    "M-master¡­ It''s not like that¡­" Almost whispering these words, Qing Yi felt even more embarrassed.


    "Is something wrong senior sister!?"


    "No! It''s nothing, I will excuse myself, I have something important to do¡­"


    Whoosh!


    Realizing that her junior brother Bai Ning was also present, Qing Yi quickly recovered before making an excuse. Dashing away before any of them had a chance to say anything.


    "Master, is something wrong with senior sister? Her face looked all red earlier¡­ Do you perhaps think she is sick!?"


    "Haha, no need to worry about that! In the first ce, your senior sister has already reached theter stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm, there is no way she would easily get sick given how strong her body is!"


    Laughing a bit before reassuring Bai Ning everything was fine upon hearing how worried he was, Xuan Hao secretly used his divine sense to check up on Qing Yi, just in case.


    "Ah! Why did I have to run into master and junior brother Bai Ning! Ah! How embarrassing!"


    "¡­"


    Recalling his divine sense after seeing the embarrassed Qing Yi rush into her room before shutting the door to enter secluded cultivation, Xuan Hao was sure everything was fine.


    Though, they might not be seeing her before she broke through to the Core Formation Realm¡­


    Not that Xuan Hao was worried about it, as she should be more than capable of breaking through to the Core Formation Realm in a short period of time now that she had already reached the Ninth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    "Senior brother! Master is back!"


    "Hm? Master is back?!"


    "Indeed, I''m back."


    Hearing the excited voice of his second disciple, Xuan Hao smiled as he saw Chu Yang rush over upon seeing that his master had indeed returned.


    "Master, master, master! I broke through to the Core Formation Realm!"


    Fwoosh!


    Calling out to him several times like an excited child as soon as he made his way over, Chu Yang quickly unleashed his aura at the first stage of the Core Formation Realm. Wanting to show off what he had aplished during the time he had been left on his own.


    "It was indeed the right choice to take you in as my second personal disciple back then! I never expected for you to reach the Core Formation Realm so quickly. Not only that, but you manged to do it without my help during the time I was gone! You''ve exceeded my expectations!"


    Nodding approvingly with a happy smile, Xuan Hao was indeed quite surprised that Chu Yang had managed to break through to the Core Formation Realm in such a short period of time without his help.


    He did not have the highest talent value among his three disciples for nothing! Even Qing Yi, his first disciple, wascking slightly behind him when it came to cultivation¡­


    "Thank you, master! Actually, there is something I wanted to inform you about¡­"


    Smiling from ear to ear after being praised by his master, Chu Yang did not forget to inform his master about the hole in the mountain and the hollow part of the mountain that he had idently fallen into.

 Chapter 483: Chubby lion~

    Chapter 483: Chubby lion~


    "The mountain is hollow!? And you even said that you found the ruins of an ancient city in there¡­? Show me where the hole is located!"


    Hearing that the mountain he had been living on top of was hollow and the fact that there even was an ancient city ruin in there, Xuan Hao could not help eximing in surprise as he hurried for Chu Yang to show him where the hole was located.


    During the time he had spent on top of his mountain, he had used his divine sense and domain to scan the area several times but had not found out about the fact that his mountain was hollow!


    For him to not be able to sense this after such a long time¡­


    "Hm? Is something wrong- Ah¡­ Bai Ning, do you happen to know where the hole is located?"


    Realizing his mistake in asking Chu Yang for directions, Xuan Hao quickly switched to asking Bai Ning instead.


    "Yes! It''s just outside!"


    Not noticing anything weird about his master''s question, Bai Ning happily responded before leading the way towards the hole into the hollow part of the mountain that Chu Yang had ended up creating and soon enough, the group of three headed towards the entrance to the hollow part of the mountain.


    Chu Yang was not at all affected by the fact that his master had ended up asking Bai Ning for directions instead of him¡­ He very well understood how bad his sense of direction was¡­ Especially after falling into the hollow part of the mountain. Almost ending up skewered alive on the spear like rocks covering the ground beneath the hole!


    ¡­


    "There really is a hole here¡­" Muttering this to himself upon seeing the hole leading into what he assumed to be the hollow part of the mountain, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more surprised over the fact that he had not sensed such arge hole in the ground with his divine sense upon returning to his pavilion.


    Not only was the hollow part of the mountainpletely hidden from his divine sense, but even the hole that was directly in front of him, waspletely invisible to his divine sense.


    If not for the fact that he had now seen it personally, Xuan Hao would doubt that his mountain peak really was hollow on the inside¡­ Not to mention the fact that he would likely never have found out about it, if not for Chu Yang idently taking a wrong turn before falling into the hollow part of the mountain!


    Perhaps, his bad sense of direction, was not totally useless¡­


    "Master, this is the ce!"


    Coming to a stop only a short distance away from the hole in the ground leading into the hollow part of the mountain, Bai Ning smiled happily as he looked up towards his master.


    "Indeed¡­ You did well Bai Ning, you can go back for now, I want to check out this ce by myself."


    "Yes, master!"


    Smiling even more happily upon being praised by his master, Bai Ning quickly ran back into the pavilion behind them. Leaving only Xuan Hao and Chu Yang behind in front of the hole in the ground.


    "Master¡­ Do you want me to show you where the ancient city ruins are located? Even if I''m not too good with directions, I think I can recognize some of the terrain on the way there-"


    "No! No need for that, you can head back to the pavilion for now!"


    Quickly denying Chu Yang''s request to show him where the ancient city ruins were located before, he even managed to finish speaking, Xuan Hao send him back to the pavilion as well.


    "Okay¡­"


    Looking a bit sad after being turned down so quickly, Chu Yang could onlyment at his bad sense of direction¡­ At least he should be able to resolve his troubles after developing his divine sense.


    Maybe I can try to develop my divine sense a little earlier. At least I will be of more help to master in case something like this happens again in the future...


    With these thoughts in mind, Chu Yang soon left the area where the hole or entrance to the hollow part of the mountain was located. Heading back towards the pavilion.


    "Guess I should check out just what''s hidden beneath my pavilion¡­"


    Having resolved himself to enter the hollow part of his mountain to find out what was hidden inside, Xuan Hao jumped straight into therge hole-


    Bang!


    But only a momentter, he felt himself getting thrown back out by some sort of invisible force.


    "This¡­ A formation¡­?"


    Almost whispering these words to himself as he stared towards the hole in front of him, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that a new set of information had suddenly appeared inside his mind after having been thrown back by the formation that prevented him from entering the hollow part of the mountain.


    Taking a short moment to process the information that had suddenly appeared inside his mind, Xuan Hao first and foremost. Realized that the formation was far stronger than anything he could deal with at the moment.


    This could easily be seen from the fact that the formation had been able to easily transfer a set of information into his mind, without him even having the chance to resist!


    "A restriction that only allows for those below the Domain Lord Realm to enter¡­"


    Other than the feeling of fear he felt after realizing that the formation most likely had the ability to kill him in an instant, Xuan Hao also understood what the hollow part of his mountain really was.


    In reality, the hollow mountain that his two disciples, Chu Yang and Bai Ning, had entered, was in fact not a part of his mountain!


    Instead, the hole that Chu Yang had fallen through before expanding to its current size, was instead one of countless entrances to an enormous mystic realm!


    Not only that, but the mystic realm in question, had once been under the control of an ancient cultivator and said ancient cultivator''s inheritance was located inside of this mystic realm!


    Outside of this, there was not any more information regarding the mystic realm entrance located in front of him.


    However, from what Xuan Hao could guess, it looked like the ancient cultivator had set up the formation because he or she wanted to find someone to inherit the inheritance left inside the mystic realm!


    How dangerous the mystic realm was and how big it was, Xuan Hao had absolutely no clue. Even with the short descriptions of Chu Yang and Bai Ning''s experience during their short journey into the mystic realm, Xuan Hao could not truly say that he knew how dangerous it was inside.


    After all, a mystic realm was a ce that was dangerous and life threatening. Even to someone at the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Given that, Xuan Hao could at most think of Chu Yang and Bai Ning''s short journey, as them being exceptionally lucky¡­


    "But why is there an entrance to a mystic realm here of all ces¡­? Looks like I will have to ask Feng Chen and see if he knows anything about this¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he nced over towards the direction of Feng Chen''s mountain peak, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit wryly.


    The reason why he had not gone to visit Feng Chen after returning to the sect, was because the other party was currently in secluded cultivation.


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao did not want to disturb the other party.


    But now that an entrance to a mystic realm had suddenly appeared on his mountain peak, Xuan Hao did not really feel like caring too much about the fact that Feng Chen had entered closed door cultivation and hadpletely secluded himself.


    Roar~!


    "Hm? I almost forgot about¡­ How have you been doing over the past mon- Is it just me, or did you get a bit chubbier¡­?"


    Spotting the winged lion flying over as it greeted him happily with a small roar, Xuan Hao was shocked upon discovering that the winged lion seemed to have grown a size bigger since thest time he saw it¡­ Not only that, but it was clearly not the direction that he was hoping for it to grow in¡­


    ROAR!


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said, the winged lion immediately began roaring angrily at him.


    "Hehe, calm down, I was just a bit astonished upon realizing that you were preparing to evolve into a ball of fur~"


    ROAR!!!


    Whoosh!


    Roaring even louder before as it felt extremely humiliated after hearing this, the winged lion decided to leave before Xuan Hao could say anything.


    Roar! Roar! Roar!


    Listening to the roars of the winged lion, as it disappeared as quickly as it appeared, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling to himself.


    The winged lion seemed to have taken full advantage of the beast tamers during the time he was gone, though he did not know what to say about the fact that his heroic looking winged lion seemed to have suddenly be chubby.


    Normally, something like that wouldn''t happen no matter how much it ate¡­ The only reason why this would happen, was if it had absorbed too much qi-


    "¡­"


    Those damnable beast tamers!

 Chapter 484: Feng Chen’s Breakthrough!

    Chapter 484: Feng Chen''s Breakthrough!


    Shaking his head as he tried to forget about those wasteful beast tamers, Xuan Hao jumped into the air before heading towards Feng Chen''s pavilion to ask him about the entrance to the mystic realm located on his mountain peak.


    Even if Feng Chen had no idea about the entrance to the mystic realm, he should be able to dig up something about it from the sect''s records going back over a thousand years¡­ If that did not yield any information, Xuan Hao would have to search for information about the mystic realm by himself.


    Above all, there was no way he would just randomly send his disciples into such a dangerous ce without at least having any knowledge about the dangers lurking inside. Trusting the information that he had gained after shing with the formation was not really something he wanted to bet his disciples lives on...!


    Sending in someone other than his disciples was also something that he wanted to avoid¡­ Not only because he didn''t want to end up causing the death of the Flying Sword Sect''s few Nascent Soul Realm Experts, but also because if there really was a powerful inheritance waiting inside the mystic realm, he wanted one of his disciples to get it!


    Selfish or not, he would prefer for one of his three disciples to get the inheritance inside the mystic realm.


    Other than worrying about the mystic realm, Xuan Hao could not help looking at his system feeling a bit frustrated. At this point it had already been a few days since he hadpleted his main quest, but unlike the past, he did not get a new quest immediately after!


    Maybe I can trigger a new main quest afterpleting the side quests, or maybe I can activate it with the help of the mystic realm¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could only end up letting out a helpless sigh in the end. No matter what, he had no control over the system and could only wait for it to activate.


    Even if he didn''t get a new main quest, he still had quite a few side quests to keep him upied.


    Worrying about not having any new quests could wait until hepleted them¡­


    For now, he still had three side quests! Namely, the one requiring him to set up the qi gathering formation, the one requiring him to scatter at least on thousand interspatial rings andstly, the one requiring him to help Chu Yang improve his sense of direction¡­


    All in all, there was nothing for him to worry about in the short term.


    Boom!


    Feeling a strong aura suddenly burst out from Feng Chen''s pavilion in the distance before rushing into the sky. Instantly rming everyone inside the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself as he witnessed this scene.


    "Hm? Seems like Feng Chen is about to exit his seclusion. How lucky!"


    Whoosh!


    Not waiting around for any longer, Xuan Hao directly increased his speed. Arriving in front of Feng Chen''s pavilion only a few secondster.


    "Elder Xuan!? It''s great to see you back again!"


    "Oh? Zu Fei? Didn''t expect to see you waiting here."


    Feeling a bit surprised seeing Zu Fei standing in front of Feng Chen''s pavilion with a look of anticipation on her face. Wondering how she managed to arrive faster than him.


    "Ah, I decided to stand guard during sect master''s seclusion!"


    "I see¡­"


    Saying this with a weird light shining in her eyes, Zu Fei looked towards the entrance of the pavilion filled with excitement.


    Seeing this scene, Xuan Hao decided it was for the better not to ask about why she had decided to stand guard in front of Feng Chen''s pavilion when he was safely cultivating inside the Flying Sword Sect. Not to mention the fact that the secluded cultivation of Feng Chen should havested at least a few weeks!


    Maybe even longer if he was in secluded cultivation during the time that he had contacted him about the future location of the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Whoosh~


    "Elder Xuan! You are here as well!?"


    "Indeed, I just returned a short time ago."


    Hearing the voiceing from behind him followed by the figure of arge man appearing at the path leading up the mountain peak that Feng Chen''s pavilion was located on top of, Xuan Hao responded calmly as he looked over towards Core Elder Wang Hu, who quickly arrived beside him and Zu Fei.


    "Ah, looks like everyone are showing up after themotion caused by Feng Chen¡­"


    Along with an old voiceing from the path, Elder Song soon appeared as well.


    Still spotting his splendid long white beard. Looking like both a wise man and a strong expert. Among all the elders of the Flying Sword Sect, Elder Song was the one who resembled what people had in mind when they thought about a strong elder from a sect! this was also one of the reasons why he had gained so many admirers over the many years he had been teaching¡­


    His reputation had increased even more after he had reached the Nascent Soul Realm. During the time Xuan Hao had left the Flying Sword Sect together with Qing Yi, he had even taken over Zu Fei''s role as the Vice Sect master, causing his reputation to almost eclipse Feng Chen, the sect master!


    "Hoho, looks like Elder Xuan is here as well, I hope you can tell me a bit about the Iron Sky Kingdom when you get some time in the future¡­ I have always been quite curious about the kingdoms located in the core area of the Sky Empire."


    "Sure, I will pay a visit in the future when I have the time."


    Boom!


    Following the short conversation with Elder Song, Xuan Hao and the rest of the core elders having gathered on Feng Chen''s mountain peak suddenly turned towards the pavilion, as an even more powerful aura erupted from inside.


    Fwoosh!


    Before any of the other core elders had any time to react, a terrifying sea of swords suddenly appeared around the pavilion before expanding out towards them.


    Bang!


    However, before the sea of swords even had a chance to touch the core elders, Xuan Hao waved his hand and supressed it with his own sword domain.


    "Looks like Feng Chen managed to construct his own pseudo sword domain¡­ Now he is only a single step away from the Domain Lord Realm!"


    Muttering this to himself as he assessed the pseudo sword domain of Feng Chen that had just erupted violently around him, Xuan Hao could not help smiling approvingly, while at the same time feeling grateful that none of Feng Chen''s disciples or servants were inside the pavilion currently.


    After all, Feng Chen had no control over his pseudo sword domain after sessfully constructing it and needed some time to fully control it¡­


    During this period of time, his pseudo sword domain could go out of control and idently harm those around him and given the strength of his pseudo domain, he would have likely ended up grievously injuring all of the core elders currently present if Xuan Hao had not been around to stop it!


    "What in the world!?"


    "Did the sect master break through to the Domain Lord Realm!? I knew he was the reincarnation of a sword immortal the moment I saw him!"


    "How scary¡­"


    As the core elders eximed in surprise upon witnessing the sea of swords quickly tear apart the pavilion before slowly revealing Feng Chen hidden inside, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes after seeing their surprised faces.


    Why did he not even remember these people acting five percent as surprised and awe stricken when they had been informed about him breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm!? Is it perhaps different when Feng Chen has a breakthrough!?


    "Calm down, he didn''t breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, but instead sessfully constructed his pseudo domain!"


    Feeling a bit irritated thinking about this, Xuan Hao did not even notice that he had unknowingly released part of his aura. Instantly causing the awe-struck core elders to quiet down.


    Even Zu Fei in the process of praising Feng Chen to the high heavens looking like a lovestruck young maiden quieted down, as she bit her lips while looking towards the figure of Feng Chen with an unknown desire shinning in her eyes.


    ¡­


    "Looks like I was not able to breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm. However, I was at least able to condense a pseudo domain and sessfully reach the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm!"


    Sitting in the middle of what had once been his pavilion, Feng Chen slowly opened his eyes as he examined his newfound strength.


    "Hm? Xuan, Elder Song, Zu Fei, Elder Wang¡­ What are all of you doing here? Huh? Where did my pavilion go¡­?"


    Looking around himself Feng Chen first discovered Xuan Hao and the others before quickly realizing that he was no longer inside his cultivation room but was instead inside arge ruin.


    "This¡­ Ehm¡­ Actually, you are sitting inside you pavilion¡­"


    Stepping forward to say this, Elder Song smiled wryly before exining what had happened.


    "What!? I destroyed my pavilion!?"

 Chapter 485: Talk with Feng Chen

    Chapter 485: Talk with Feng Chen


    "Where am I going to stay now¡­ How do I exin this to my disciples?"


    Muttering this to himself as he nced around at the ruins of his pavilion, Feng Chen became even more depressed thinking about how he would exin what had happened to his disciples.


    "You can stay at my pavilion until its rebuilt! I have more than enough space avable for both you and your disciples!"


    Not wasting a single second after hearing what Feng Chen muttered to himself, Zu Fei jumped forward and suggested for him and his disciples to stay at her pavilion during the time that it would take to rebuild the destroyed pavilion.


    ""¡­""


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao and the two others very clearly understood what Zu Fei wanted to do, but in the end, they decided to not say anything. After all, if they butted in and caused Feng Chen to refuse, they would have to deal with Zu Fei''s revengeter on. Not something any of them wanted to deal with¡­


    "Really? Are you sure its fine?"


    "Yes! I have more than enough space for you and your disciples!"


    "Well, if you say so, then I guess I will have to intrude over the next few weeks¡­"


    Watching the conversation between Feng Chen and Zu Fei proceed smoothly, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head as he watched the almost predatory look in Zu Fei''s eyes upon hearing Feng Chen ept her offer to stay at her pavilion with his disciples.


    In the end, Feng Chen had unknowingly walked into a trap set up by Zu Fei, whether he would be able to leave in the future was something that would depend on Zu Fei¡­


    "Now, let''s go to my pavilion and I will sho-"


    "Sect master, I have something to talk to you about, it''s rather important¡­"


    Walking over towards Feng Chen side before Zu Fei had the chance to drag Feng Chen back to her pavilion and show him where he would be staying, Xuan Hao interrupted the over eager Zu Fei and moved over.


    Seeing the serious expression on Xuan Hao''s face as he said this, Feng Chen instantly showed a simrly serious expression.


    "Something important? I understand, we can go to your ce and talk about it now that my ce has turned into this¡­"


    Not minding the fact that Xuan Hao had interrupted Zu Fei, Feng Chen very well understood that it should be something quite serious for Xuan Hao to look for him.


    Not to mention that he had just returned from the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­ perhaps it was something regarding the Iron Sky Kingdom or some possible enemy!?


    Whoosh!


    Thinking along this line, Feng Chen quickly left together with Xuan Hao after a quick word with the other elders present on the mountain peak, as both of them headed towards Xuan hao''s pavilion.


    ¡­


    "Your mountain peak has an entrance to a mystic realm!?"


    "Yes, I wondered if you had any idea about this, but from your reaction I can guess that you also had no clue about it¡­"


    Shaking his head disappointedly realizing that Feng Chen had no clue about the entrance to the mystic realm located on his mountain peak. Not that he had expected for him to know about it in the first ce. After all, if that was the case, he should have not allocated the mountain peak to him back when he reached the Nascent Soul Realm and officially became a core elder of the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    "Hm, a mystic realm is an extremely dangerous ce. Even for someone like you who is in the Domain Lord Realm, so I think we should take things slowly and see if we can find out just what kind of mystic realm, we are dealing with first!"


    Not forgetting to mention just how dangerous a mystic realm was before warning Xuan Hao about entering the mystic realm, Feng Chen looked extremely serious.


    "Well, I was hoping that you would be able to look through the sect''s historical records and see if you could find out if there is any mention regarding the mystic realm entrance, or at least a mention of some sort of hollow mountain peak."


    Still not mentioning anything about the possible inheritance that might be present inside the mystic realm, along with the fact that nobody at the Domain Lord Realm or above could enter, Xuan Hao looked hopefully towards Feng Chen.


    In the first ce, his original goal had been to see if there was any information about the mystic realm entrance in the sect''s historical records.


    However, the problem here, was the fact that the number of historical records present inside the Flying Sword Sect was enormous! Even Xuan Hao would need at least a few weeks, if not months to go through them on his own and Xuan Hao really didn''t want to waste such a long time on going over old historical records¡­


    "I should be able to do that with the help of a few other elders¡­ But it will take a bit of time, as going over a thousand years of historical records is no small task. Especially given the fact that the past elders and sect masters were quite eager to write down what was going on during their time¡­"


    "That is more than enough! Not like the entrance to the mystic realm will go anywhere¡­"


    "Hah¡­ I will first stabilize my cultivation realm properly before finding a few avable elders for the task of looking through the historical records, I will make sure to contact you in case I find anything. If you want to join in and learn a bit more about the history of the sect at the same time, you can visit therge underground library where all the historical records of the sect are kept. The entrance is located at the base of my mountain peak."


    "Thanks, I will make sure to pay a visit at some point. After all, I still need to spend some time with my disciples after returning¡­"


    With the end of the conversation about the mystic realm entrance between Xuan Hao and Feng Chen, Xuan Hao and Feng Chen began talking about what Xuan Hao had experienced during his time in the Iron Sky Kingdom also talking about how strong the Iron Sky Kingdom waspared to a kingdom like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom located at the edges of the Sky Empire.


    "Well, I should take my leave for now, I can already feel my cultivation base growing more and more unstable."


    "No worries, you still need to stabilize your cultivation base!


    "Farewell, Elder Xuan, I will make sure to inform you in case something is found in the historical records!"


    "Haha, get going before you end up permanently damaging your cultivation base!"


    Sending off Feng Chen with a slight smile on his face, Xuan Hao could not help himself fromughing as he looked over Feng Chen''s current condition.


    Not only had he not stabilized his cultivation base yet, but he had clearly attempted to drag the matter out to chat with him about the Iron Sky Kingdom for longer.


    Feng Chen was simply way too curious about the stronger kingdoms of the Sky Empire and the Core region of the Sky Empire¡­


    Whoosh~


    Along with the calm midday wind blowing over the mountain peak, Xuan Hao watched Feng Chen slowly make his way down the mountain side.


    Even with him already havingprehended True Sword Intent and having the ability to fly using his sword, there was quite a risk in doing so given the current state of his cultivation base. In the end, the safest option of walking back was taken.


    "Now that I think about it, why is he making his way back to his pavilion? Did he perhaps forget that he destroyed it¡­?"


    Hah¡­


    Not knowing what to say as he watched Feng Chen make his way back towards what remained of his pavilion, Xuan Hao let out a sigh as he took out hismunication talisman to inform Zu Fei to pick Feng Chen up.


    "I should check up on Chu Yang and Bai Ning and get a proper look on how much both of them have improved over the past month¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he put away themunication talisman without listening to the response of Zu Fei on the other side, Xuan Hao nced over in the direction of his pavilion where his disciples were currently staying.


    Outside of Qing Yi that had gained quite a lot ofbat experience during their journey back to the Flying Sword Sect, Chu Yang and Bai Ning should not have been able to gain any real life and death practice during the time he was gone and would at most have settled with training with some of the other disciples.


    Bai Ning is still a bit too young to begin real life and death practice for now, but it should be fine for Chu Yang¡­.


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao slowly began making ns for how he would spend his next few days training his two disciples before making his way to the Shattered Star Peaks to absorb the blue divine energy on the second star peak.

 Chapter 486: Annoying Young Disciple

    Chapter 486: Annoying Young Disciple


    Having decided on what he was going to do over the next few days, Xuan Hao didn''t stand around outside his pavilion for long. Soon jumping into the air before heading towards the pagoda of enlightenment to see if he could find some new skill and techniques that he could teach his disciples.


    In the first ce, Xuan Hao had already realized just how bad it was for him to only have learned around a dozen or so different techniques given his current cultivation realm!


    Take Feng Chen as an example, the sheer number of sword techniques avable to him numbered in the hundreds, if not thousands!


    On the other hand, Xuan Hao only knew around five or so sword techniques¡­


    Even if they were way higher level than the ones Feng Chen had learned, it still didn''t change the fact that Feng Chen was far more experienced and would have a far easier timepared to him when it came to teaching anyone the way of the sword.


    Having a sword domain did not really provide any assistance when it came to teaching his disciples the fundamentals regarding the sword and that was not even mentioning the fact that one of his disciples were using a spear. Not a sword¡­


    With such a small number of techniques avable to him. How in the world was he possibly going to be able to properly teach his three disciples¡­?


    What in the world have I been doing up till now?


    Smiling wryly as he remembered just how little he had done for his three disciples during the time he had taken them in, Xuan Hao stelled himself to be a better teacher and at least be able to help them out more when it came to improving the skills, they excelled in.


    Learning spear techniques to help Chu Yang improve his spear techniques, learn cksmithing to help Bai Ning forge high level artifacts and weapons, and finally, increase his alchemy so he could help out Qing Yi when she inevitably reached the Artisan Realm in the future!


    Thump~


    Landing on the ground in front of the pagoda of enlightenment, where the different techniques of the Flying Sword Sect were stored, Xuan Hao directly entered after greeting the elder standing guard in front of the pagoda.


    "I should look around the first floor first and try to pick out a few of the lower-level techniques first¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he entered the first floor of the pagoda of enlightenment, Xuan Hao suddenly came to a stop upon noticing a few disciples passing by in front of him.


    It was only at this moment that Xuan Hao realized that the first floor of the pagoda was almostpletely filled up with the younger Qi Condensation Realm disciples! Not only that, but a quick scan with his divine sense also revealed the fact that disciples were present on the floors above him.


    "¡­"


    Not saying a single word, Xuan Hao quickly disguised himself as a young disciple before any of the disciples had the chance to recognize him. Thest thing he wanted, was for a swarm of young disciplesing over to disturb him while he was busy reading¡­


    "Hey, have you guys heard about the recent events at the tempest sect?"


    "Haha, you talking about the thing that happened to their supreme elder? That was indeed hrious, a senior brother of mine was present and recorded the entire thing with a special technique!"


    "Really!? You have to show me!"


    Listening to the small talk from the nearby disciples standing close to the entrance of the pagoda talking about recent events happening inside the Flying Sword Sect territory, Xuan Hao could not help breathing out a sigh of relief. He had not been spotted by any of the young disciples before disguising himself!


    I should look for some spear techniques first. After all, what I''mcking in the most when ites to teaching Chu Yang, is the fact that I haven''t really learned any spear techniques. At this point Chu Yang should have far exceed my level when ites to the spear¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided to first go and find the foundational low level spear techniques located on the first floor of the pagoda of enlightenment.


    First, he would learn a few spear techniques on the first floor of the pagoda before moving on to the higher floors, where the moreplex techniques would be located.


    "Hello! Are you new? I don''t think I have seen you before¡­"


    "Yes."


    Hearing the voice of a young girl from behind him just as he was about to pick up a spear technique from the bookshelf in front of him, Xuan Hao casually answered without bothering to turn around. Picking out the spear technique as he began reading through it.


    "I thought so! If you need any help, just say it! I know where all the techniques on the first floor are located! I even know where the higher-level techniques hidden away on the first floor are located! Not only that, but-"


    "¡­"


    Not bothering to answer the young girl talking behind him as she began talking about all sorts of different hidden techniques and their location on the first floor, Xuan Hao continued reading through the spear technique he had taken out.


    [Foundational Spear]


    A simple spear technique suited for cultivators between the Qi Condensation Realm and the Foundation Establishment Realm. The reason why Xuan Hao had chosen this spear technique, was because it helped oney a solid foundation to improve one''sprehension of the spear in the future.


    The Foundational Spear technique allowed one to transition to higher level spear techniques more easily in the future.


    From what he knew, Chu Yang should also have trained a simr spear technique before he had been handed over the Soul Spear Divine Mantra. Due to his mastery one thi foundational spear technique, he had easily managed to adapt to the Soul Spear Divine Mantra and learn in within a short period of time.


    Because of this, Xuan Hao also nned to learn a spear technique that would help him establish a solid foundation before beginning toprehend the Divine Soul Spear Mantra that Chu Yang was practicing.


    This way, he would be able to easily help out Chu Yang whenever he encountered any trouble regarding his cultivation mantra, or the spear moves inside of it.


    "-after the divine spirit mantra, there is also the- Ah! Your leaving!?"


    Having already picked out the spear technique that he was nning to learn, Xuan Hao was about to take his leave, when the young girl who had been talking for thest 10 or so minutes straight suddenly stopped him by cing herself in front of him with a sad expression. Tears threatening to fall at any moment.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say when confronted with something like this, Xuan Hao just looked speechlessly at the young girl in front of him looking like she was about to start crying at any moment.


    In the first ce, he had barely even talked to her, yet she appeared like she was about to cry the moment he turned to leave¡­


    What in the world is with this girl¡­?


    Thinking this to himself as he looked over the young girl, Xuan Hao could not help showing a slightly surprised expression upon noticing how unique her appearance was.


    Outside of her pure yellow cat like eyes, the young girl had long flowy dark hair that almost reached down to her feet. Looking quite funny given her short height.


    "Hm¡­? Fang Yu?"


    "Ah!? Do you know me!?"


    "Yes, I think I saw you when visiting the Formation Hall in the past. It''s just¡­ You looked taller back then¡­"


    Not revealing his identity, Xuan Hao just mentioned that he had visited the Formation Hall in the past and had seen her there. In the first ce, she had already be a member of the Formation Hall, so it would not be too weird if he had seen her there before.


    More importantly, Xuan Hao was curious about why Fang Yu suddenly seemed to have shrunk in size¡­ Well, most her had shrunk in size. For some reason, her hair seemed to have not been affected at all and was still the same length that he remembered¡­


    "This¡­ Ahm! I-I had a small ident during an experiment when trying to set up a new formation¡­ Ah! No, it''s not like I''m bad at setting up formations or anything like that!"


    "No need to worry, I''m saying your bad with formations or anything like that, I was just a bit curious about why you seemed to have shrunk in size."


    Shaking his head as he watched Fang Yu look like she was about to start crying at any point once again, Xuan Hao could not help thinking that whatever had reduced her size, also seemed to have decreased her mental age in the process¡­

 Chapter 487: Song Jia

    Chapter 487: Song Jia


    "Ahm¡­ The formation I was working with was a new one that was made together with the Alchemy Hall, using a liquid made by them as the core of the formation. In the end, some of the liquid meant for the formation ended up getting on me, causing me to shrink in size¡­"


    Listening to Fang Yu''s exnation of how she had ended up shrinking to the size of a young child, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just how Fang Yu had gotten involved with the Alchemy Hall and the Formation Hall''s attempt at making a new formation.


    At the same time, Xuan Hao also felt himself growing quite curious about the formation that the Formation Hall and Alchemy Hall were attempting to create¡­


    "Is there any way for you to return to normal again, or are you stuck like this¡­?"


    Asking one of the questions that had popped into his mind after finding out that Fang Yu had shrunk in size, Xuan Hao eagerly looked down towards the small Fang Yu as he waited for an answer.


    "Ahm¡­ If I''m not wrong, it should at mostst around week¡­"


    "How long have you been stuck like that?"


    "Two weeks¡­"


    "¡­"


    Seeing the depressed expression on her face upon mentioning this, Xuan Hao felt a bit bad for her and inspected her body with his divine sense to see if there was anything he could do to help her undo the effects of the liquid from the Alchemy Hall.


    Hm? Looks like this is the liquid that she was talking about, it seems like some of it ended up getting absorbed into her body before gathering inside her dantian.


    Thinking this to himself as his divine sense secretly entered Fang Yu''s dantian without the other party noticing anything, Xuan Hao used part of his power to draw the liquid inside her dantian out.


    Whoosh~!


    "Ah! W-what is happening!?"


    Along with the surprised voice of Fang Yu, she suddenly started growing rapidly before reaching her normal height.


    Rapidly putting away the liquid that he had drawn out from her dantian before she discovered anything, Xuan Hao quickly took out a in robe and threw it towards Fang Yu. After all, her clothes didn''t really start growing along with her and was about to rip apart at any moment after Fang Yu''s sudden growth.


    "T-thank you for the robe, I-I will be taking my leave now¡­" Nervously thanking him for the robe before putting it on, Fang Yu quickly ran out of the pagoda before any of the surrounding disciples had any time to realize what had just happened.


    Even if she had been given a robe to cover herself up when her clothes inevitably ripped apart due to her sudden growth, Fang Yu didn''t really n to stay inside the pagoda of enlightenment with only a robe on!


    "Well, at least I can focus on reading now¡­"


    Chuckling quietly to himself upon seeing Fang Yu run away, Xuan Hao soon focused back onto the spear technique now that there was no longer anyone around to distract him.


    For now, checking out the liquid made by the Alchemy Hall, that had ended up causing Fang Yu to shrink, would have to wait until he was finished at the pagoda of enlightenment.


    At the very least, he did not have to deal with anyone talking to him now that Fang Yu was gone and after only a few hours. Finished reading through all the foundational spear techniques on the first, second and third floor of the pagoda.


    While this had not increased his skill when it came to handling a spear too much, as he had not practiced yet, it had increased his knowledge regarding the spear to a whole new levelpared to what it was before. Even if Chu Yang came up to ask him for help in something rted to the spear, he would now be able to answer his questions and help him out regarding his fundamentals.


    However, he still needed to learn more and practice first hand, to be able to help Chu Yang polish his spear moves and improve his mastery over the Divine Soul Spear Mantra¡­ Something he had yet to even start learning at this point!


    "This should be enough for now; I still have to teach Bai Ning before it gets toote."


    Muttering this to himself as he began making his way out of the pagoda of enlightenment, Xuan Hao did not n on staying for too long. After all, he still nned to train Bai Ning for a few days before heading to the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Getting absorbed into the process of learning the spear was not really in his ns at the moment and he just nned to learn enough to not seempletely useless in the subject when Chu Yang would inevitablye and ask him for help in the future.


    "Hm?"


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao was just about to leave the third floor, when he suddenly noticed someone looking at him before slowly approaching him.


    "Elder Xuan!"


    Recognizing the young girling over the moment she called out his name, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just how in the world she could see through his disguise¡­


    "You are¡­ The granddaughter of Elder Song?"


    "Yes, you can just call me Song Jia!"


    Bowing her head respectfully as she officially introduced herself, Song Jia showed a pure smile as she slowly lifted her head before staring back up at Xuan Hao with her cloudy pair of eyes starring directly at him.


    If not for the fact that he already knew that she was blind, Xuan Hao would never have realized that she was blind on his own. After all, she was walking around like a normal person without any difficulty and could even see through his disguise with ease¡­


    It had to be known that even someone at the Domain Lord Realm would have a hard time seeing through his disguise, yet a young girl only at the Foundation Establishment Realm had managed to see through it!


    Not to mention her ability to easily find spiritual herbs, which she had disyed during the small adventure that they had gone on together, where she ended up finding a Spirit Grade Spiritual Herb, the Earth Flower Root.


    Even Xuan Hao felt amazed the more he learned about this young girl called Song Jia, and he felt even more curious about where Elder Song had picked her up from!


    Another thing that made him curious, was the fact that Song Jia who had already reached the Foundation Establishment Realm was unknown inside the Flying Sword Sect.


    Thinking about all of this, Xuan Hao could not help remembering how weak the young girl had been during the small adventure they had gone on. Even though she had reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, she had no ability to fight against a demon beast that was only in the Qi Condensation Realm¡­


    The disease that she was suffering from, likely had something to do with her incredibly lowbat strength.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao could easily guess why the young girl was not more known in the sect and was seemingly hidden away by Elder Song.


    "Hah¡­"


    "I-is there something wrong¡­?"


    Shaking his head as he thought about the sad circumstances of the young girl in front of him, Xuan Hao was taken aback as he heard the girl in question asking him if something was wrong.


    "It''s nothing, I just remembered something sad all of a sudden¡­ Anyway, why are you here? Won''t your grandpa Song get worried if he realizes that you are running around without his permission?"


    "Haha, I don''t need to worry about that at all! Just recently, grandpa got assigned to help out looking for setting up a group of elders to look for something in the sect''s historical records by the sect master! He won''t be back for a day or two!"


    Smirking triumphantly as she said this, Song Jia also decided to strike a small pose. Making her look exceptionally cute to the few disciples passing by.


    "¡­"


    Compared to the young disciples passing by taking a few extra nces towards the happy Song Jia, Xuan Hao face turned dark for a short moment upon hearing Song Jia exin what had happened to Elder Song.


    So¡­ It''s my fault she ran away from home¡­?


    Smiling a bit awkwardly as he realized this, Xuan Hao understood that he could not leave the young girl to wander the sect on her own. After all, it was in essence his fault that she had ended up getting an opportunity to run away from Elder Song to explore the sect. Not to mention the fact that she might end up doing something stupid if no one looked after her, like going to the demon beast forest to look for spiritual herbs on her own¡­


    "Do you have anything nned over the next few days that Elder Song is busy?"


    "Yes, I nned to visit the demon beast forest again and see if I could find some more spiritual herbs!"


    This idiot¡­


    "How about this. Instead of going to the demon beast forest to look for spiritual herbs, you cane to my pavilion, and I can show you around, I even have arge, winged cat that you can y with~"


    Not feeling the slightest bit of regret selling out the winged tiger, Xuan Hao smiled kindly towards Song Jia as he said this.


    "Really!?"


    "Yes, I have more than enough empty space there and one more person staying for a few days won''t hurt¡­"


    With this, Elder Song can''t me me for idently causing his workload to increase¡­

 Chapter 488: Forging a Defensive Artifac

    Chapter 488: Forging a Defensive Artifac


    After leaving the pagoda of enlightenment together with Song Jia, both of them soon returned to his pavilion, where Xuan Hao quickly arranged for Song Jia to y with the winged tiger. Even if it protested this. Unfortunately for the winged tiger, it had no way to refuse Xuan Hao and, in the end, could only obey him to y with Song Jia.


    Making sure that Song Jia was properly entertained with the winged tiger, Xuan Hao didn''t stay around for much longer and left her in the care of the winged tiger, while he made his way towards the ce Bai Ning was currently located at.


    Not surprising to him at all, Bai Ning was currently at the cksmithing Hall.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao had made his way back to his pavilion together with Song Jia, Bai Ning was excitedly staring at arge forge in front of him as he patiently pulled out a mixture of melted metals.


    "Bai Ning¡­ Are you sure this is going to work¡­? Thest time you did this, you almost ended blowing up an entire forging area!"


    Elder Teng, one of the elders from the cksmithing Hall that Bai Ning had gotten along with quite well during his visits to the cksmithing Hall nervously asked while staring at the molten metal slowly being shaped by Bai Ning.


    "It''s fine elder Teng! I''m sure it''s going to work this time around!"


    "I really hope so¡­ Hah, if only I arrived before you had begun¡­"


    Not fully believing in what Bai Ning had said, Elder Teng looked even more nervous than before, as he kept his attention focused on the artifact slowly forming under Bai Ning''s hands.


    Even if the artifact had yet to fully form yet, it still excluded a scary aura causing even Elder Teng, a Core Formation Realm Expert to feel a bit cautious.


    The only reason why he was staying around, was to safe Bai Ning in case he failed once again and ended up causing a deadly explosion in the process¡­


    Bang! Bang!


    Along with the artifact slowly being formed under Bai Ning''s control, Elder Teng could finally get an idea of what the artifact was supposed to look like when it was finished.


    "It''s a bracelet¡­? Not to mention a defensive artifact¡­ And it should be somewhere between the Earth and Spirit Grade!"


    Muttering this to himself, Elder Teng quickly began looking over the bracelet slowly forming in front of Bai Ning.


    At this point, Bai Ning had already gone way farther than he had thest time and Elder Teng had already begun to rx, as he realized that Bai Ning might actually seed this time around without blowing anything up in the process.


    Fwoosh~!


    However, just as Elder Teng had begun rxing and the artifact was about to fully form. An all too familiar thing happened, as the half-formed metal bracelet began violent absorbing the surrounding qi between heaven and earth.


    "The final step has started, but it''s absorbing way too much and too quickly for an Earth Grade Artifact!"


    Whoosh!


    "Ah?!"


    Frowning to himself as he narrowed his eyes at this scene, Elder Teng dashed over and grabbed Bai Ning before escaping from the forging room together with the young boy.


    Given that the artifact had entered the final step and had begun absorbing the qi between heaven and earth, there was no need for Bai Ning to stay around and potentially ending up staying next to it in case it blew up¡­


    FWOOSH!


    The moment both of them left the forging room, the absorption speed of the metal bracelet seemed to have increased another level, as it greedily devoured all the qi rushing towards it. Growing stronger and stronger with each passing moment.


    "What is happening over there!? Is one of the elder''s perhaps forging a Spirit Grade Artifact!?"


    "No, that is the location of junior Bai Ning''s forge¡­"


    "Again!? Is he perhaps trying to blow up the cksmithing Hall!?"


    "I hope the explosion this time around won''t affect any of the nearby forges¡­ Mine is located only a few meters away from junior Bai Ning''s forge¡­"


    As Bai Ning and Elder Teng had arrived outside the forge, they were instantly greeted by arge group of cksmithing disciples who had gathered to see what was happening.


    "Oh no! Elder Teng came out with junior Bai Ning! Everyone! Run!"


    Spotting Elder Teng and Bai Ning who hade out from the forge, one of the cksmithing disciples screamed fearfully before running away.


    "Oh no¡­ My forge!"


    "Run everyone!"


    Soon enough, all the cksmithing disciples gathered around Bai Ning''s forge realized that the ce would most likely blow up shortly and began scattering in all directions. Trying to get as far away from Bai Ning''s forge as possible.


    Only when they had gotten a few hundred meters away did theye to a stop before cautiously ncing in the direction of Bai Ning''s forge.


    "¡­"


    I just blew up my forge a few times, okay!? Nobody got injured in the end¡­


    Only able to smile wryly when he saw this scene, Bai Ning could only me a few incidents that had happened over the past month on the other cksmithing disciple''s fearful behaviour¡­


    Rumble~


    Seeing the forge behind him suddenly begin shaking violently as the absorption of qi by the bracelet he had made seemed to have reached the peak, Bai Ning quickly followed the footsteps of his seniors and hid behind arge crate a few hundred meters away from his forge, Elder Teng following closely behind him.


    Fwoosh~


    "D-did it seed-"


    BOOM!


    Just as Bai Ning was about to get out from his cover and go to check out the bracelet inside his forge following the absorption of qi stopping, a violent explosion suddenly erupted with his forge at the centre.


    Instantly reducing the closest forge to rubble in the process.


    "Nooooo! My forge!"


    Ignoring the painful cry from one of the senior cksmithing disciples, Bai Ning remained focused on his forge as the smoke from the explosion slowly lifted.


    "Hahaha! It seeded!" Seeing the bracelet inside the ruins of what had once been his forge, Bai Ning happily eximed to himself before rushing over towards the ruins of his forge.


    In the first ce, the forges of the cksmithing Hall used by the cksmithing disciples, were not worth much in the first ce and could easily be rebuilt in a day or two.


    What Bai Ning truly cared about at this point, was the fact that the defensive artifact had survived the explosion! Not only that, but upon getting closer, Bai Ning realized that the bracelet did not have a single scratch on it.


    Even after being at the centre of such arge explosion, it had not sustained the slightest bit of damage!


    "Elder Teng, Elder Teng, what grade do you think this artifact is!?"


    Filled with excitement, Bai Ning turned towards Elder Teng who had been following closely behind him with an amazed expression on his face. Clearly not expecting for the bracelet to survive the explosion.


    "From what I can see, it should at the very least have reached the Peak of the Earth Grade, there is even a chance that it managed to reach the Spirit Grade!"


    Saying this, Elder Teng felt surprised at what he had just said. After all, if the bracelet had reached the Spirit Grade, it would mean that Bai Ning had broken through and reached the Expert cksmithing Realm!


    Not to mention that it had taken Elder Teng a good decade or two to reach the Expert cksmithing Realm, Bai Ning was still only thirteen years old!


    A thirteen-year-old Expert cksmith? How terrifying would that be?


    Even with the thousand-year history of the Flying Sword Sect, there had never been a thirteen-year-old Expert cksmith¡­


    "What is all this ruckus?! Just what is happening out here and who blew up a forge!?"


    As Bai Ning walked forward to pick up the bracelet nowying in the middle of what had once been his forge, an old voice echoed out from behind. Followed by an old grumpy looking man appearing.


    "Grand Elder¡­"


    "Hm? Elder Teng? What happened here¡­?"


    Discovering who the old man was, Bai Ning no longer paid any attention as he entered the ruins of his forge to get the bracelet that he had made. Leaving Elder Teng to exin what had happened to the old man.


    The old man in question, was none other than the Grand Elder of the cksmithing Hall, Elder Lou Wei! A Peak Core Formation Realm Expert and an Artisan cksmith!


    His status inside the Flying Sword Sect could be said to beparable to the Core Elders who had reached the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Bai Ning,e over here and show me what you made, I will check it out and determine its grade for you."


    The moment Bai Ning came back out from the ruins of his forge, the Grand Elder Lou no longer seemed as grumpy as before and was instead looked towards him filled with excitement.


    "Yes, Grand Elder¡­"


    Obediently handing the defensive artifact in the shape of a bracelet that he had made over to the Grand Elder, Bai Ning pertinently stood on the side and waited for his judgement.


    No matter what, Bai Ning knew very well that other than his master''s identity helping him out, the only reason why he could continue blowing up forge after forge inside the cksmithing Hall, was because the Grand Elder had helped him after seeing his immense talent for cksmithing¡­

 Chapter 489: Sacrificial Defensive Artifac

    Chapter 489: Sacrificial Defensive Artifac


    Smiling happily as he began inspecting the bracelet made by Bai Ning, the Grand Elder of the cksmithing Hall used part of his strength to activate the bracelet, causing a thin barrier to cover his entire body.


    "This is quite an interesting artifact that you have made, young boy! From the looks of it, it should be somewhere between the Earth Grade and the Spirit Grade. All that is left now, is to test how strong it is¡­"


    Saying this, the Grand Elder of the cksmithing Hall proceeded to use part of his strength to test out the defensive capabilities of the thin barrier covering his body.


    Bang!


    Crack~


    Raising one of his eyebrows in astonishment upon seeing that the thin barrier covering his body, albeit filled with cracks, was not broken. The Grand Elder took a short time to recover, as he had not expected for the thin barrier to survive his attack.


    "Looks like this bracelet of yours is more impressive than expected, I had only thought it was somewhere between the Earth and Spirit Grade, but from the looks of it, it''s defensive capabilities should have already reached the Spirit Grade. More than capable of defending against someone in the Core Formation Realm!"


    Handing the bracelet over to Bai Ning after exining all of this, the grand elder suddenly seemed to have noticed something, as he narrowed both his eyes.


    "You have to be careful when using it, as it should only be able to work a limited number of times before breaking¡­"


    "Really!?"


    "Yes, just look here. More cracks should appear on the bracelet with every use. Until finally breaking¡­ Hah, if it managed to truly reach the Spirit Grade, this w would not exist"


    Shaking his head as he pointed down towards a small crack that had appeared on the bracelet after having withstood his earlier attack. The Grand Elder felt that it was a pity such an artifact would be destroyed only after a few uses.


    However, in the end, it would still act as a life-saving defensive artifact for the few times that it could be used¡­


    "Hah¡­ This w should be what allows this bracelet to archive the strengthparable to a Spirit Grade Defensive Artifact¡­"


    Sighing to himself as he said this, the grand elder soon took his leave after having found out the origin of the disturbance and at the same time looked over Bai Ning''s newest artifact. The destruction of the two forges never seemed to have bothered him, as he didn''t pay any attention to them during the short time he was there.


    "So, it was not a Spirit Grade Artifact, but instead a sacrificial defensive artifact¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he looked at the bracelet with disappointment, Bai Ning understood that the bracelet didn''t end up bing his first ever Spirit Grade Artifact¡­


    "What are you looking so disappointed for!? If you really managed to forge a Spirit Grade Artifact and managed to be an Expert cksmith, what in the world would someone like me do with themselves!? You still have a long time ahead of you kid, you will surely be able to be an Expert cksmith in the future. Even bing an Artisan cksmith shouldn''t be too hard with your talent!"


    Feeling a wave of annoyance upon seeing how disappointed Bai Ning was upon realizing that the bracelet had not reached the Spirit Grade, Elder Teng could not stop himself from saying this.


    "I understand Elder Teng, I was simply way too impatient earlier! Thank you for your guidance, I will not try to hurry up my breakthrough and will take some time to slowly familiarize myself with the Peak of the Journeyman Realm before attempting to make a Spirit Grade Artifact again!"


    "¡­"


    Hearing what Bai Ning said before the young boy ran off towards one of the empty forges, Elder Teng had a feeling that the Flying Sword Sect might soon see the birth of a new Expert cksmith!


    While an Expert cksmith was not even close to the importance of an Expert Alchemist, it would still be a significant thing on the level of getting a new elder at the Core Formation Realm! Something that would help increase the strength of the Flying Sword Sect''s foundation.


    "I should also try to increase my realm¡­ I can''t have him catch up to me so easily¡­"


    Smiling a bit to himself as he watched Bai Ning''s figure disappear, Elder Teng didn''t stay around for long, as he returned to his own forge to improve his own cksmithing realm.


    ¡­


    "Looks like someone blew up a forge recently, I wonder what happened¡­ From the scale of the explosion, it should be one of the elders at the Expert Realm. Those cksmithing elders really need to be more careful."


    Arriving at the cksmithing Hall only a short time after everything had concluded, Xuan Hao only nced over the ruins of the two ruined forges for a short moment before moving towards the location of his disciple.


    Whoosh!


    Stopping a few meters outside the forging room that Bai Ning was currently inside of, Xuan Hao used his divine sense to check out the situation inside. After all, thest thing he wanted to do, was idently interrupt his disciple while he was in the process of forging and end up ruining whatever he was making.


    "Good, looks like he isn''t forging anything and is just fiddling with a bracelet¡­"


    Not waiting around outside after finding out that Bai Ning was not busy forging something, Xuan Hao directly entered the forging room-


    "M-master?!"


    Instantly catching his little disciple by surprise, as he had not expected for his master to suddenly show up all of a sudden.


    "A-are you perhaps here because of¡­ That¡­?"


    "Hm? What are you talking about? I''m here to bring you back to the pavilion for some training. Did something perhaps happen for you to be worried about me showing up?"


    Not expecting Bai Ning to react all guilty the moment he saw him, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he asked this.


    Did his disciple perhaps cause trouble while he had been gone during the past month!?


    "Nonono, it''s nothing master, I was just thinking about something else!"


    "Let''s go back to the pavilion for now¡­"


    "Yes master!"


    Not believing that it was nothing, Xuan Hao decided to ignore it for now. If Bai Ning had really caused a serious problem, the elders of the cksmithing Hall would inform him about it¡­


    Bai Ning didn''t say anything about it either and obediently followed him out of the cksmithing Hall.


    Whoosh!


    Not wanting to waste too much time on getting back on foot, Xuan Hao used his domain to fly back together with Bai Ning after leaving the cksmithing Hall.


    "Wah!"


    Catching Bai Ning by surprise, as he fearful clung to his master upon suddenly discovering the ground disappearing beneath his feet.


    "Calm down, you are inside my domain and won''t fall¡­"


    "R-really¡­?"


    "Yes."


    Realizing that he had yet to fly with Bai Ning after having acquired his domain, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling a bit to himself as he watched Bai Ning begin moving around mid-air under the support of his domain.


    "Look, look master! I can fly!"


    Rolling his eyes as Bai Ning moved around mid-air like he was swimming in water, Xuan Hao decided to fly a little slower. Allowing Bai Ning to y around mid-air for a few minutes.


    ¡­


    "Is this really the ce where the entrance to the secret realm was located¡­?"


    "Yes, the Sky Empire proimed that the secret realm was destroyed during their initial exploration together with the Onyx Empire. The Onyx Empire also supports this im, so it''s almost certain that it''s the truth. After all, who doesn''t know about the rtionship between the Sky and Onyx Empire¡­"


    "But¡­ If they are lying and that secret realm did indeed belong to someone from that ce¡­"


    "¡­"


    At the ce where the secret realm Xuan Hao and Chi Hu had entered in the past was located, two people arrived mid-air above the now deep and seeminglyrge hole in the ground that had appeared in the ce where the isted valley and the entrance to the secret realm had once been located.


    "Hm? It looks like there is quite a strong demon beast digging down there¡­"


    About to head down into the chasm below, one of the two figures froze as he said this.


    "Looks like you are right. From the looks of it, it should have reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and will probably soon take on the first tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­"


    Frowning as he also looked down into therge hole that was below them, the other figure didn''t dare move any closer to the ce where the entrance to the secret realm had once been located.


    "Looks like we will have to inform master about this, it''s no longer something we can deal with ourselves. Only someone in the Soul Ascension Realm can deal with that giant lizard¡­"


    "Indeed¡­ Let''s head back¡­"


    Whoosh!


    Following the short exchange, the two figures above the isted valley disappeared into thin air, like they had never been there in the first ce. Even the giant lizard close to reaching the Soul Ascension Realm didn''t notice them from start to finish and just continued digging. Making the hole even bigger...

 Chapter 490: Training with Bai Ning!

    Chapter 490: Training with Bai Ning!


    "Show me how much you have improved during the month I have been gone!"


    "Yes master!"


    Standing at the training ground together with Bai Ning, Xuan Hao patiently watched as Bai Ning began demonstrating a simple palm technique with his strength at the Seventh Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Whoosh!


    So Weak¡­ Looks like he hasn''t really been spending any time learning anybat techniques over the past month. Only learning one of the simplest Mortal Rank Palm Techniques.


    Shaking his head as he watched the sad disy on Bai Ning''s part, Xuan Hao realized that he would need to spend some more time with his younger disciple and encourage him to improve his cultivation andbat techniques¡­ Because without it, he would focus all of his energy on cksmithing!


    Even if the Unformed Mantra that he was cultivating helped him improve his cultivation realm while forging, it did not help him improve hisbat techniques in the slightest.


    What Xuan Hao wanted was not for Bai Ning to focus all his energy on increasing hisbat strength, but instead just spending some time so he could protect himself in the future¡­


    "Master, how was it!?"


    Walking over to his master with a nervous expression on his face after having finished his demonstration, Bai Ning obviously knew that his performance was not up to par as he asked this.


    "¡­"


    Looking down on the nervous Bai Ning waiting for his judgment, Xuan Hao was just about to say a few kind words of encouragement to the young boy, but quickly stopped himself before doing so.


    If he really just said a few encouraging words and tried to be kind, Bai Ning would likely just return to focusing only on improving his cksmithing skills every time he left him alone! This was not something Xuan Hao wanted to see happen, as even if Bai Ning became a renowned cksmith like Yi Min, he still needed to have the ability to protect himself!


    "The execution of the palm technique was sloppy, and I could clearly tell that you at most practiced it four or five times before today! Did you really not practice anything else during thest month¡­?"


    "I-I d-didn''t¡­"


    Watching how nervous Bai Ning was as he answered while lowering his head shamefully, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a quite sigh inside his mind as he watched this.


    "For now, let''s forget about this and start practicing the palm technique you learned."


    Not wanting to stress out the young boy anymore after having confronted him about hisck of practice in regard tobat techniques, Xuan Hao didn''t ask any more questions regarding his cultivation realm, his progress on his Unformed Mantra and so on. After all, he already knew the answer to these questions.


    In the end, it looked like Bai Ning understood how disappointed he was after finding out how little he had improved in his cultivation realm and qi techniques¡­


    "Y-yes master¡­"


    Nodding his head even more nervously than before, Bai Ning began following the guidance of his master, as he slowly began improving his understanding of the palm technique that he had learned over the past month.


    On Xuan Hao''s side, helping his disciples learn a simple Mortal Rank Palm Technique was as easy as breathing.


    Even without seeing the technique itself, he could easily see through it after a simple demonstration by Bai Ning and help him understand the technique. Even improving the technique, itself during the process was an easy thing with his current cultivation realm.


    Towards the end, this had resulted in the palm technique transforming from a simple Mortal Rank Technique to an Earth Grade Technique!


    "M-master, is this enough for today¡­ I-I don''t think I can keep going for much longer¡­"


    Bai Ning, who had no idea that his Mortal Rank Palm Technique had actually been transformed into a brand-new Earth Grade Palm Technique under his master''s constant changes along the way, copsed exhaustedly on the ground after close to two hours of practice.


    "I guess that is fine, but we will continue where we left off tomorrow morning!"


    Seeing the exhausted expression on Bai Ning''s face, Xuan Hao reluctantly agreed to let him go. After all, he was still only in the Qi Condensation Realm and his endurance was not much different from a normal person. Not to mention he had been training a Qi Technique the entire time¡­


    "Thank you master!"


    Whoosh!


    Not even waiting for his master to say anything more, Bai Ning sprung up from the ground before escaping into the pavilion only a short distance away from the training ground. Clearly not nning to give his master a chance to regret his descension of letting him go.


    "Hah¡­ This kid¡­ Does he really think I would go back on my word and make him continue practicing the palm technique for another two hours?"


    Muttering this to himself, as he shook his head with a small smile on his face, Xuan Hao could not help finding the figure of Bai Ning running away quite funny. Especially when thinking about the fact that he had supposedly copsed exhaustedly on the ground just a short moment ago.


    Well, what should I do now¡­? I probably won''t be able to train Bai Ning any more today and it''s a littlete to start training now that it has already started growing dark¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he looked out over the edge of the training ground down towards the busy elders and disciples still moving around in the sect below, Xuan Hao suddenly felt that the sect seemed way livelier since a year ago.


    The main reason for this, was the fact that Elder Song had started putting both the elders and disciples to use over the past few months.


    Using both parties to stabilize the Flying Sword Sect''s territory and at the same time building up several new branches for the Flying Sword Sect all across the territory under them.


    At this point, it would not be wrong to say that the strength of the Flying Sword Sect was rapidly expanding, as the north of what had once been the Heavenly Sky Kingdompletely came under the Flying Sword Sect''s control.


    Even the few strong sects still remaining inside this territory with a Nascent Soul Realm Expert or two to back them up pledged their allegiance to the Flying Sword Sect.


    However,pared to the allegiance that they had pledged to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the past, they were way more genuine when it came to the Flying Sword Sect. The main reason for this, being the fact that the Flying Sword Sect now had someone in the Domain Lord backing them up!


    After all, in the eyes of the surrounding powers. The strongest expert had only reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, a Domain Lord was nothing short of a legendary existence in their eyes!


    Submitting to a Sect with a Domain Lord protecting it, was not something shameful at all! Instead, it provided these sect''s a lot offort in knowing that they were now under such a powerful sect.


    This was not even mentioning the fact that there were quite a lot of rumours spreading around about the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect merging together in the future. Coupled with the rumours that the sect master of the Spring Flower Sect had also reached the Domain Lord Realm, it was easy to see this sect was inevitable!


    Even Xuan Hao was quite surprised when he had heard the rumours about Shu Yao reaching the Domain Lord Realm, but had not yet gotten a chance to confirm the rumours yet¡­


    Having one Domain Lord was more than enough to establish oneself as a known force inside the Sky Empire. Having two Domain Lords on the other hand, was enough to make even the powerful forces of the Sky Empire unwilling to act against them!


    After all, thest thing one wanted, was to end up having a revengeful Domain Lord not caring about their reputation trying their best to inflict as much damage as possible to them¡­


    Only the three great forces of the Sky Empire, the imperial family, the churches, and therge noble families, would have the ability to attack a power like that without a worry in the world¡­ Of course, that was only a given if the Domain Lord''s of the Flying Sword Sect were around the earlier stages of the realm¡­


    Thinking about all of this just looking out over the sect and the busy elders and disciples below, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly to himself.


    The main reason why he knew about all of this, was because of the book that Yi Min had given to him.


    Inside the book, it very clearly warned him about not offending these three great powers of the Sky Empire, consisting of the imperial family, therge noble families, and the churches!


    In the end, Xuan Hao had only felt himself growing more curious about these three great forces after reading about them, as the book didn''t really mention anything about them outside of this¡­

 Chapter 491: Rebellion

    Chapter 491: Rebellion


    As the light from the stars covering the sky slowly began revealing themselves, Xuan Hao found a ce to sit down as he gazed up at the stars above with a sense of wonder.


    The stars were the same as the ones he had seen before transmigrating to this world, yet different at the same time. Faintly, he could feel some sort of power radiating from the stars above, but it was too faint for him to grasp it¡­


    "Hah¡­ No use thinking about it for now¡­"


    Shaking his head a few minutester, Xuan Hao found a ce to sit down in a lotus position to cultivate through the rest of the night.


    Focused on cultivating, the night passed by quickly, as the sun soon rose behind the mountains that surrounded the Flying Sword Sect.


    Weing a new day that consisted of Xuan Hao once again training with Bai Ning. Increasing his proficiency over the Palm Technique. Following which the rest of the day was spent entertaining Song Jia, while she yed around with the winged lion.


    Oddly enough, the winged lion seemed to not fight back against Song Jia and had instead started to y along¡­


    At one point, Xuan Hao had even watched the winged lion act cute in front of Song Jia¡­ Something that prompted him to immediately check up on the winged lion, just to make sure that it hadn''t idently hit its head during the time that he wasn''t watching¡­


    The oddity of the winged lion aside, the next few days passed in simrly peaceful manner, with most of his time being spent either helping Bai Ning practice his Palm Technique and cultivate or y together with Song Jia and the winged lion.


    "Thank you for looking after Song Jia during this time, Elder Xuan."


    It was only when Elder Song arrived to pick up Song Jia after learning that she had been staying at his pavilion during the past few days, that Xuan Hao knew that these few peaceful days hade to an end¡­


    "No worries¡­ It was after all my fault that you ended up so busy over the past few days¡­"


    "Wai- It was your fau-"


    "See you next time Elder Song, you as well Song Jia!"


    Escaping from the scene before Elder Song even had the time to startining, Xuan Hao informed Bai Ning that he would not have toe train his palm technique anymore.


    However! He didn''t have to look so happy running down the mountain towards the cksmithing Hall!


    Thinking about this to himself as he checked up on Chu Yang and Qing Yi''s situation onest time, Xuan Hao once again left the Flying Sword Sect, as he headed towards the Shattered Star Peaks to figure out if the feather imprint between his eyebrows could absorb the massive amount of blue divine energy present on the second peak.


    Even if it ended up not working, he could still visit the blue dear on the main peak and explore it further than he had in the past. Now that his cultivation was stronger. Hopefully, he would not end up walking into another trapping formation this time around¡­


    Whoosh~!


    "Looks like master left again, I should also get ready to leave!"


    Shortly after Xuan Hao had left the Flying Sword Sect, Chu Yang came out from the pavilion and looked in the direction that his master had left with a determined look on his face.


    Over the past few days, he had talked to his master about wanting to go out and explore the world and had ended up getting his approval in going out. The requirements his master set for him going out to explore, was that he couldn''t leave the Flying Sword Sect, or the Spring Flower Sect''s territory and he would have to always carry amunication talisman on him.


    Something Chu Yang had happily agreed with. After all, the sheer size of the Flying Sword and Spring Flower Sects territorybined, was more than enough for someone in the Core Formation Realm to explore for the next hundred years and still only scratch the surface.


    Not to mention the size of the two sect''s territories, the number of sects, family ns and other powers present inside of them were simply endless in the eyes of a normal mortal.


    Soon enough, Chu Yang followed in the footsteps of his master and left the Flying Sword Sect to explore the world by himself. This time around, he wasn''t nning to return without properly exploring some of the many famous ces spread out across the Flying Sword and Spring Flower Sect''s territories!


    He had even gone so far, as to take get his hand on a book roughly noting down the different famous ces and their rough locations with his master''s help!


    The famous ces he was thinking about, was not ces like the Shattered Star Peaks. After all, mysterious ces like that were incredibly rare and hard to find. To date, the Shattered Star Peaks could be considered to be one of a kind in terms of both danger and mysteriousness among the many nearby kingdoms¡­


    Instead, the famous ces that Chu Yang was thinking about, were the ces that those people with a cultivation realm below the Nascent Soul Realm would go to and seek opportunities to breakthrough¡­ Ancient Ruins, Sprit Valley, Large Demon Beast Forests filled with demon beasts at the Core Formation Realm and so on¡­ These were the ces that Chu Yang intended to visit during his time traveling around.


    Hopefully, when he returned to the Flying Sword Sect in the future, he would have improved even further. Maybe even managing to reach the middle stages of the Core Formation Realm!


    Whoosh!


    Not dying his leave for any longer, Chu Yang felt extremely excited about his uing adventures outside, as he quickly dashed down the mountain before leaving the Flying Sword Sect. Not forgetting to inform Zhi Ruo about him leaving.


    Bai Ning and Qing Yi, were not really avable¡­ One locked in closed door cultivation, while the other had already left for the cksmithing Hall¡­


    Along with Chu Yang leaving the Flying Sword Sect, both the master and the disciple left the Flying Sword Sect on the same day. Leaving behind only three people to watch over therge pavilion.


    As for how Chu Yang was even going to find his way back to the sect after leaving... Well, his master didn''t really think about that...


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao and Chu Yang left the Flying Sword Sect, one to explore the world outside the sect, while the other wanted to absorb the blue divine energy on the second star peak, things in the Azure Sky Kingdom next door were starting to change¡­


    "All praise be to the great lord of gues! He who freed us from the sea of suffering inflicted upon us by the heretics!"


    "Rot away the sinner''s flesh! Make them suffer for the pain they inflicted upon us!"


    "Let thend return to the bearer of gues, the god who can cure all gues, the supreme ruler of the great rot!"


    The weird wording aside, a change was mildly speaking, as the people all over the Azure Sky Kingdom had started rebelling. All with the simple goal of recing the current ruling ss of the Azure Sky Kingdom, with the great church of the gue God¡­


    Of course, all of this would beughable under normal circumstances. After all, what could a normal mortal ever hope to do in front of a cultivator?


    However, this was not a normal circumstance, as the church of the gue god had sent arge number of priests/priestesses and high priests/priestesses to support the people rising up against the ruling ss of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    With the support of these priests and priestesses, the ruling ss of the Azure Sky Kingdom was easily fought back, as church after church was established inside the Azure Sky Kingdom with each city that fell to the growing rebellion!


    Even weirder, was the fact that the current king of the Azure Sky Kingdom chose topletely ignore the matter of the church of the gue god beginning to take control of his kingdom.


    The entire thing happened so quickly, that the surrounding kingdoms had no time to react before their way into the Azure Sky Kingdom had already been blocked off by the church of the gue god. Preventing them from interfering in the matter.


    Not that they would really want toe in between the church of the gue god and the Azure Sky Kingdom in the first ce¡­ After all, no matter how weak the church of the gue god was in the eyes of the big churches of the Sky Empire, it was still a powerful force way beyond any of these small kingdoms.


    Staying out of the way and informing the three big churches of the Sky Empire about this, was the only thing they could do with their limited power. At the very least, those three had more than enough strength to deal with the church of the gue god newest attempt on snaking their way into the Sky Empire¡­

 Chapter 492: Changes to The Small Town at the Shattered Star Peaks

    Chapter 492: Changes to The Small Town at the Shattered Star Peaks


    The news of the rebellion taking ce inside of the Azure Sky Kingdom did not take long to reach the Flying Sword Sect and the surrounding sect''s and kingdoms located close by, while slower than the kingdoms that had ns of invading the Azure Sky Kingdom, it was not by much.


    However, this did not change the surprise felt by these kingdoms upon learning about the rebellion in the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    In response to the sudden rebellion. These kingdoms prepared themselves in anticipation of the uing battle between the Sky Empires religions and the church of the gue god, that would inevitably end up taking ce over the next few weeks.


    Feng Chen also soon learned about the rebellion taking ce inside the Azure Sky Kingdom located just next to them.


    "If we could remain neutral, that would be for the best¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he informed both Shu Yao and Xuan Hao about the rebellion controlled by the church of the gue god taking ce inside the Azure Sky Kingdom, Feng Chen finally managed to calm down after both Shu Yao and Xuan Hao told him that there was nothing to worry about and they could just follow the same direction as the nearby kingdoms of waiting on the side lines without doing anything.


    In the first ce, there was no reason for my Flying Sword Sect to involve itself in the struggle between the church of the gue god and the Azure Sky Kingdom. Let alone joining the uing battle between the Sky Empire''s religions and the church of the gue god!


    Thinking this to himself, Feng Chen felt himself rx as he resumed what he had been doing before getting the news about the Azure Sky Kingdom rebellion. Trying to rebuild his pavilion as quickly as possible¡­


    ¡­


    After having left the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao had not expected that he would end up getting contacted by Feng Chen about the church of the gue god making a move to take control over the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Outside of reassuring Feng Chen that everything would be fine, Xuan Hao also felt himself grow curious about just what was happening inside the Azure Sky kingdom after learning that the church of the gue god had seemingly sealed off the entire kingdom from the outside world.


    Trying to take control over the Azure Sky Kingdom was one thing¡­ Why did they go to the effort of sealing off the Azure Sky Kingdom from the outside world?


    Whoosh~


    As the Shattered Star Peaks appeared in the distance, Xuan Hao was still thinking about the situation inside of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Even if the oue of what was happing in the Azure Sky Kingdom would not really have any effect on the Flying Sword Sect in the first ce. Mainly because they had no trade agreements with the Azure Sky Kingdom, nor were they allied with them¡­.


    There was also a buffer territory in the form of what had once been the southern territory of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom between them.


    To this day, the Flying Sword Sect had only taken control over a few important spirit stone mines and spirit herb valleys in this territory, as they had yet to truly begin integrating this territory. Not nning to do so before the new main sect had officially been established on the Shattered Star Peaks¡­


    As a result, the southern territory had now fallen into a state of chaos without the presence of the Raging me Sect or the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    All the Nascent Soul Realm Experts that had once been living in the southern territory, had already fled upon learning about the destruction of the Raging me Sect. Fearing that they might be next.


    At the moment, the southern territory had be a haven for ouws and the like. Only a few sects and ns with Peak Core Formation Realm Experts holding down the fort could barely remain stable in this chaotic environment.


    Even in this state, it still served as a perfect buffer territory between the Flying Sword Sect and the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    As long as the southern territory was there, the Flying Sword Sect did not really have to worry about the Azure Sky Kingdom before they took control over the southern territory in the future. However, therge churches of the Sky Empire should have taken care of the church of the gue god at that point in time¡­


    Xuan Hao really didn''t expect them to just watch as the church of the gue god took control of a kingdom inside the Sky Empire and began establishing a foothold there!


    ¡­


    Still thinking about how thing would end up ying out, Xuan Hao arrived at the small town at the base of the Ninth Star Peak that he had visited in the past together with Chu Yang and Qing Yi. Back then, it was during that trip, that he had first met Chi Hu¡­


    Recalling what had happened in the past upon seeing the town slowly appear in the distance, Xuan Hao no longer thought about what was happening in the Azure Sky Kingdom, as his divine sense spread out before covering the small town at the base of the Ninth Star Peak.


    However,pared to the past, the town had experienced some very clear changes over the past year. Especially the Flying Sword Sect branch present inside the town.


    Not only had the branch been expanded by several times since hisst visit, but there were also more than five elders at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm present inside the branch itself!


    The reason for their presence soon revealed itself in the form of arge quantity of both high-quality building materials and spirit stones.


    "Looks like Elder Song already started getting ready to build up the new sect at one of the Shattered Star Peaks¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he felt amazed over the sheer quantity of spirit stones and high-quality building materials that Elder Song had brought over to be ready for when they were ready to build the new sect in the future, Xuan Hao quickly realized that other than the elders from his sect, there was also a group of five elders from the Spring Flower Sect present inside the town with a simr cultivation realm.


    Simr to the five Peak Core Formation elders from his sect, the five elders from the Spring Flower Sect were also guarding arge quantity of building materials and spirit stones.


    Not only that, but there was even a Nascent Soul Realm Expert hidden away on the Spring Flower Sect''s side!


    Seeing that the other side actually brought along a Nascent Soul Realm Expert to guard the ce, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly.


    Mainly because he was almost certain that the reason why the Spring Flower Sect had brought over a Nascent Soul Realm Expert most likely had something to do with Elder Song¡­


    "Hah¡­ Elder Song is indeed quite effective¡­"


    In the future, the small town would surely develop into arge city, that would act as the Flying Sword Sect''s connection to the outside world and a ce for young talents hoping to join the Flying Sword Sect would be able to gather before the entrance examination. Most important of all, the city would be able to act as a ce where both elders and disciples coulde to have fun and rx¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao hid his presence before making his way inside the small town that was slowly expanding in all directions.


    Instead of heading directly for the Second Star Peak, he decided to take a closer look at the town and more importantly. Pay a visit to the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Spring Flower Sect. After all, the other party hade all the way to the Shattered Star Peaks just to stand guard¡­


    ¡­.


    "How in the world did I end up here of all ces? Watching over building materials and spirit stones! Hah¡­ It''s all that sly old man from the Flying Sword Sect''s fault!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao made his way inside the city to check out the elder from the Spring Flower Sect. The elder in questionmented loudly to herself as she thought about how a certain old man had ended up getting her to protect the small town and the different building materials and spirit stones that both her and the Flying Sword Sect had moved there.


    "ARGH! Just thinking about it makes me angry! How could big sister Meng agree to the request of that old man in the first ce!?"


    As the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Spring Flower Sect continued toin over a certain elder from the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao managed to overhear her talking to herself.


    "¡­"


    Maybe I should just get going¡­ Staying here for any longer properly won''t be a good idea¡­


    Feeling that he already knew what elder the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Spring Flower Sect was talking about, Xuan Hao felt that it might not be a good idea to greet her right now and decided to just make his way up the Shattered Star Peaks for now¡­

 Chapter 493: Work! Feather Imprint!

    Chapter 493: Work! Feather Imprint!


    Having decided not to pay a visit to the Nascent Soul Realm Expert sent over by the Spring Flower Sect after seeing her rather¡­ Interestingments about how she had ended up in the small town, Xuan Hao quickly began making his way up the Ninth Star Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks without alerting any of the guards in front of the only path leading up the mountain.


    The reason why he didn''t just directly fly up to the Second Star Peak, was because he was quite curious about how thing had changed at the Shattered Star Peaks during thest year. Especially after he had informed Feng Chen about the Shattered Star Peaks being their future sect location¡­


    At least from what he could see while making his way up the Ninth Star Peak, it seemed like there were way fewer people making their way up the mountainpared to when he had gone together with Qing Yi and Chu Yang in the past.


    Not only that, but after arriving at the forest covered peak, there were even fewer cultivators present looking for the spiritual herbs that grew there, with the weakest of them having reached the Foundation Establishment Realm. Not a single person at the Qi Condensation Realm could be seen even after he scanned the entire Ninth Peak.


    From the looks of it, Feng Chen had likely put some restrictions on the people who could enter the Shattered Star Peaks, though still notpletely restricting it to others, that would most likely only happen after the construction of the Flying Sword Sect on top one of the Mountain Peaks began¡­


    The Shattered Star Peaks had quite a reputation even outside their territory, with the Third Star Peak being the most famous due to the many people going there to enter a life and death cultivation trying to reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Closing such a ce down, would surely incur a lot of anger from these Peak Core Formation Realm Experts with half a step into the grave that hade to seek an opportunity to reach the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ Something Feng Chen really didn''t want to experience¡­


    With that in mind, it might be for the best if the Third Star Peak remained open to the public after the Flying Sword Sect had been constructed!


    This way, the Flying Sword Sect could potentially recruit any new Nascent Soul Realm Expert that came out from there.


    Even using it as a way to recruit Core Formation Realm Experts was not out of the way. After all, some of the Core Formation Realm Experts going to the Third Star Peak were just there to visit the ce in case they would return there in the future when their lifespan was about to run out and they still hadn''t reached the Nascent Soul Realm...


    Overall, having the Third Star Peak open to the public was a good idea. However, in case they built the sect on the Ninth Star Peak, they would have to make another way into the Shattered Star Peaks going directly to the Third Star Peak.


    After all, no matter what, they couldn''t just have a bunch of unknown cultivators walk through their sect on a daily basis¡­


    ¡­


    "Looks like the Third Star Peak in still filled up with people likest time¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he arrived at the Third Star Peak, Xuan Hao could not help sighing internally as he watched the hundreds of elderly people desperately clinging onto what little hope they had left of extending their lifespan and continuing their journey towards immortality.


    From what Xuan Hao understood, it seemed like the people of the Ewaria Continent believed in one''s soul reincarnating after death, something that did make some sense given the fact one could begin interacting with one''s own soul from the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Now, why did these old people fear death even when they believed in reincarnation after death?


    Well¡­ The reason why these old people feared death was simple, they were cultivators. People who essentially went against the heaven in an attempt to escape the cycle of reincarnation and obtain immortality.


    Because they had essentially already gone against the cycle of reincarnation, they believed that heaven would no longer allow them to reincarnate after death¡­


    However, all of this was not really something that could be confirmed and was merely based on spections¡­


    "Hm¡­ I wonder how that friend of Chi Hu is doing, Zhu Lian was it? I don''t think I saw her at the sect, I wonder if she is guarding one of the new branches¡­"


    Remembering the old female friend of Chi Hu, who he had helped reach the Nascent Soul Realm on the Third Star Peak, Xuan Hao jumped into the air before heading towards the Second Peak lost in thought.


    From him seeing her at the Third Star Peak and helping her reach the Nascent Soul Realm, to him leaving for the Main Peak back then, he had not even caught a single glimpse of Zhu Lian since then.


    Not something too odd, as he had not really been much at the secttely¡­ Not to mention, Feng Chen could have assigned her to guard some ce away from the sect after she had stayed for only a few days¡­


    Whoosh~


    Not thinking about Zhu Lian for too long, Xuan Hao increased his speed and at the same time made sure to protect himself from the chaotic qi with one of his domains. Not something nearly as difficult after his strength had increased.


    Even flying that would consume all his strength in a short period of time before, had be easy! At least flying up to the Second Star Peak was not a challenge to him, things might be different if he tried flying up to the Main Peak¡­


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ Looks like the feather imprint might not be able to absorb the blue divine energy on the Second Star Peak¡­"


    Arriving at the Second Star Peak, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh as he said this. The feather imprint had still not revealed itself like it had in the swamp of the Cloud Sky Kingdom.


    However, Xuan Hao still felt reluctant about going back without at least trying, so after thinking about it for a short moment, he made his way towards the smallest rock of blue divine energy that he could find.


    "Still as scary as before¡­"


    Remembering what had happened when he had idently picked up one of these small divine rocks, Xuan Hao could not help shivering. After all, he had almost died just from touching a rock back then!


    If he really died touching a rock, it would be quite embarrassing¡­


    For this reason, he did not dare picking up the small fist sized rock filled with blue divine energy in front of him. Instead, he tried to get as close as possible in an attempt to get a reaction from the feather imprint between his eyebrows.


    Something less than enjoyable, as he felt his entire body freeze up the closer, he moved his head to the small rock on the ground. Even with his cultivation at the seventh stage of the Domain Lord Realm and his ice domain, he still had no way to resist this freezing cold invading his body the closer he got.


    "S-so, c-cold¡­"


    Not giving up as he moved close enough to almost touch the small rock on the ground with his head, Xuan Hao suddenly felt like he was thrown into a frozen hell, as he became unable to move any closer to the small rock without risking turning into an ice statue¡­


    Remaining still just like that for a few minutes as he felt his dantian slowly empty out, Xuan Hao was about to give up, when the feather imprint between his eyebrows finally began showing signs of life again.


    Fwoosh~


    Lighting up like it had done back in the swamp of the Cloud Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao felt a small stream of blue divine energy being sucked out of the small rock in front of him before entering the feather imprint between his eyebrows.


    Different from the time in the swamp. Absorbing the small stream of blue divine energy from the rock had apletely different effect on the feather imprint, as an excruciating pain spread throughout his body with the feather imprint at the core of it, causing Xuan Hao to rapidly retreat from the small rock.


    However, the stream of blue divine energy inside the rock had already been absorbed by the feather imprint and moving away did not stop the pain from spreading all over his body.


    Barely able to stop himself from screaming out due to the sudden pain, Xuan Hao managed to stabilize himself as the pain wrecked through his body. At the very least, only his physical body was affected by the pain, his soul remainedpletely unaffected. Allowing him to think clearly.


    Due to this, he could also clearly see the changes taking ce in his physical body alongside the pain spreading through it.

 Chapter 494: Meridians Change

    Chapter 494: Meridians Change


    The changes taking ce inside of his physical body was not anything life changing that suddenly increased the strength of his physical body another level. Instead, it was a more subtle change that slightly changed the meridians in his body.


    The change in his meridians not only allowed his qi to flow more smoothly, but also allowed him to absorb the qi between heaven and earth faster!


    Other than these two things, Xuan Hao also felt like something else had fundamentally changed, but he couldn''t really grasp what it was. Looking through the system to find out what had happened, didn''t really yield any results either.


    But simr to thest time the feather imprint had absorbed something, he had also felt like his understanding of the world around him had increased. In essence, hisprehension speed had once again increased after the feather imprint had absorbed the blue divine energy.


    Although,pared to thest time, it did not increase by a lot. The biggest change was still what had happened to the meridian inside his physical body.


    "I wonder if I can absorb more of the blue divine energy¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as the pain slowly began subsiding and the changes taking ce inside his meridians stopped, Xuan Hao could not help thinking about what would happen if he managed to absorb even more of the blue divine energy.


    Maybe an even more drastic change would take ce-


    Fwoosh!


    Just as he was thinking about absorbing even more of the blue divine energy after the changes in his body finished, a sudden burning sensation appeared between his eyebrows as he felt the feather imprint suddenly appear. Looking like it was about to burst as tiny amounts of blue divine energy leaked out from it into the surrounding air. Instantly causing the surrounding temperature to fall rapidly, as the ground beneath his feet froze over.


    The entire thing onlysted for a short moment, but it was more than enough time for Xuan Hao to understand that the feather imprint had most likely reached its limit for how much of the blue divine energy that it could absorb for now¡­


    Even if this made him quite disappointed, there was nothing much he could do about it. After all, he didn''t want to end up having the feather imprint absorb too much of the blue divine energy. Resulting in the feather imprint possibly exploding or beginning to leak the excess blue divine energy, both of which would possibly end up killing him!


    Taking things slowly and returning to absorb more whenever the feather imprint had finished refining the blue divine energy that it had absorbed, was the best option in his mind.


    Now¡­ All that was left for him to do now, was find out how long it would take for the feather imprint to fully digest the blue divine energy that it had absorbed.


    Thinking about this issue for a few seconds, Xuan Hao touched the ce where the feather imprint between his eyebrows was located before trying to send a part of his divine sense inside it to investigate it. Something he had already tried a few times before to no avail.


    "Hm?"


    However, this time around the oue was different!


    While he could still not enter the space where the blue divine energy had disappeared to, he could feel the state of the feather imprint with his divine sense. Allowing him to realize just how close to bursting apart and killing him it currently was¡­


    At the same time, he could also feel that the feather imprint was slowly refining the blue divine energy that it had absorbed.


    Smiling unnervingly as he realized this, Xuan Hao didn''t know if he should feel happy over having found a way to deduct when he could get the feather imprint to absorb more blue divine energy, or he should feel happy that he had not chosen a slightlyrger rock filled with blue divine energy¡­


    If he had really chosen arge rock¡­


    Shaking his head at this thought, Xuan Hao decided not to think about it and instead thought about what to do next.


    "Now that I''m already here, should I check out the other mountain peaks of the Shattered Star Peaks¡­?"


    Saying this to himself as he gazed down towards the seven smaller mountain peaks below him, Xuan Hao realized that he had yet to actually decided on which of the Nine Star Peaks the future Flying Sword Sect should be built on top of¡­


    The Second Star Peak was out of the question given the abundance of blue divine energy rocks on top of it and the Main Star Peak would also not be a good idea given the fact that there might be a lot of dangerous things hidden away up there like the trapping formation he had encountered on his first trip up there¡­


    The Third Star Peak was also not an option. Mainly because its use, but also because it was way too small in Xuan Hao''s opinion. Especiallypared to the size of the Ninth Star Peak¡­


    The Ninth Star Peak was a good ce to build a sect, but Xuan Hao felt like it would be a waste to destroy the forest on top of it growing an abundance of spiritual herbs for this.


    In the end, this left the Eighth to the Fourth Star Peak as a potential location of the future Flying Sword Sect!


    All of these mountains had yet to be explored by most people due to their treacherous environments and the ever-present chaotic qi, with the few who had explored them only recounting how they found nothing of value there.


    In the end, these mountains had never really gained as much interest as the Third- and Ninth-Star Peak over the years. Ending up being forgotten by most of the people who came to the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Whoosh~


    Not standing around to wait for long after the changes taking ce inside his body hade to a stop, Xuan Hao jumped into the air before heading down towards the closest mountain. The Fourth Star Peak.

 Chapter 495: Mountains of the Shattered Star Peaks

    Chapter 495: Mountains of the Shattered Star Peaks


    Easily making his way down the Second Star Peak, Xuan Hao soon found himself on top of the Fourth Star Peak. Different from the other mountains among the Shattered Star peaks that he had visited so far.


    The Fourth Star Peak was covered in a special kind of alpine vegetation that had survived even under the chaotic qi that swirled around in the air. Even more bewildering to Xuan Hao, was the fact that the vegetation consisting of several small flowers and different types of grass and bushes absorbed the chaotic qi in the air. Allowing the top of the Fourth Star Peak to have around the same level of chaotic qi in the air as the top of the Ninth Star Peak!


    Just this alone was more than enough for Xuan Hao to grow interested as the nt life on top of the Fourth Star Peak seemed to have the same properties as the ones found on the Ninth Star Peak. The only difference being that there weren''t any spiritual herbs present. Making it a far more ideal ce to make the Flying Sword Sect in the future. At least whenpared to the Ninth Star Peak¡­


    Staying for some time to investigate the Fourth Star Peak without finding anything interesting outside the special nt life, Xuan Hao soon left and made his way down towards the Fifth Star Peak. For now, the Fourth Star Peak was the best location he had found so far, but it was also the first among the remaining mountains of the Shattered Star Peaks he had yet to explore.


    Hopefully, the other mountains would be in a simr, if not better condition than the Fourth Star Peak. This would make it easy to expand in the future when the time came for them to fully settle the entire Shattered Star Peaks.


    ¡­


    "Well¡­ This was not what I expected¡­"


    Arriving at the Fifth Star Peak, Xuan Hao could not help eximing in surprise upon witness the scene of the mountain top in front of him.


    The reason for this, being that instead of a normal somewhat t mountain top like the other mountains in the Shattered Star Peaks had, the Fifth Star Peak instead had a massiveke covering almost the entire mountain top, with some of the water cascading down the side of the mountain in the form of small waterfalls, thatter formed into rivers going through the valley of the Shattered Star Peaks below.


    Not only that, but the chaotic qi on top of the Fifth Star Peak was far more violentpared to any of the other mountains. Only beingparable to the chaotic qi on top of the Main Peak!


    Even more baffling, was the fact that the chaotic qi seemed to calm down the farther away from theke on top of the mountain it got...


    "Theke on top of the Fifth Star Peak seems to agitate the chaotic qi around it¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he stated the obvious, Xuan Hao only casually investigated theke with his divine sense before moving towards the Sixth Star Peak. No matter what, it would be quite hard to build the future Flying Sword Sect on top of a massiveke¡­


    Investigating theke on the Fifth Star Peak could always be done at some other time. For now, he wanted to investigate the other mountains and find out which one would be the most suitable to house the future Flying Sword Sect!


    Whoosh~


    Leaving the Fifth Star Peak, Xuan Hao went over the remaining three mountains inside the Shattered Star Peaks that he had yet to visit.


    The Sixth Star Peak was filled with all sorts of small caves that covered both the top and sides of the mountain, it was also here that Xuan Hao saw the first demon beasts outside of the ones on the Main peak. The demon beasts were quite different from ordinary demon beasts, as they seemed to have adapted to the surrounding chaotic qi over time.


    However, this came at the cost of their strength. Even the strongest among the demon beast had only reached the Qi Condensation Realm!


    Building the future Flying Sword Sect on top of the Sixth Star Peak was doable, but it would require some effort, as the caves covering the mountain would have to be dealt with.


    The Seventh Star Peak was simr to the Third Star Peak,pletely barren without anything on top of it other than a few different rocks. The chaotic qi in the air was also nothing out of what Xuan Hao had expected. All in all, the Seventh Star Peak was a decent location to build up the new Flying Sword Sect in the future.


    Even if the new Flying Sword Sect did not get build on top of the Seventh Star Peak, it could still be used for expanding the sect in the future without any issues when there were enough resources for a second Qi Gathering Formation or the original one could be expanded to epass more than just a single mountain.


    Finally, the Eighth Star Peak, thest among the mountains of the Shattered Star Peaks that Xuan Hao had left to visit.


    The Eighth Star Peak was nothing like any of the other mountains before. Instead, a giant hole presented itself in ce where the even mountain top should have been.


    Looking closer, Xuan Hao discovered that the hole led all the way down to what should have been the middle part of the mountain. Here, a small valley had formed inside the hole. Even weirder, the valley had no chaotic qi inside of it. Instead, it was like a normal valley down on the ground!


    As if that was not odd enough, Xuan Hao discovered a small town inside the valley after scanning the ce with his divine sense.


    Even weirder, the town was not a ruin like he had expected but was instead a town filled with living beings walking around and going about their day¡­


    Not only that, but the living beings inside the town, were not humans¡­

 Chapter 496: Unkown Race

    Chapter 496: Unkown Race


    Looking closer at the small humanoid creatures walking around inside the town below, Xuan Hao thought hard as he tried remembering what he could about the different races other than the human race present on the Ewaria Continent.


    Sadly, none of them seemed to fit in with the race inside the small town below him.


    Fitting in would properly not be the correct word, as Xuan Hao didn''t really have much knowledge about any other races than the human race. The ''other'' races that he knew about, were demon beasts who had taken human form and nature spirit who had also take a human form.


    None of which the small race of humanoid creatures below him was a part of¡­


    Feeling even more curious about the small town below after realizing that he had no idea what race the humanoid creatures belonged to, Xuan Hao didn''t stand around for long, as he hid himself before flying down towards the small town.


    Hoping that he would be able to learn something from the small humanoid creatures¡­ At least, if they spoke the samenguage as him, that was¡­


    Entering the small valley located inside the mountain, Xuan Hao could not help breathing a sigh of relief upon discovering that the small humanoid creatures talked the samenguage as him.


    At the same time, he also managed to get a closer look of the small humanoid creatures.


    Sharing clear traits with humans, the small creatures looked almost simr to humans. However, their height was no more than half a meter to a meter in total. The tallest Xuan Hao had spotted, was only a little taller than a meter¡­


    Inspecting these tiny humans so to be speak, Xuan Hao could not help feeling surprised at their strength. Even the weakest among them had reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, while the strongest among them had already reached the Nascent Soul Realm! There was even one among them that was at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    From this alone, Xuan Hao quickly realized that the small race had an innately good talent when it came to cultivationpared to humans¡­


    The other interesting thing about this small race, was the fact that they had not left the small valley. After all, given their strength, they should have easily been able to do so!


    "Let''s go! We have to be ready! The grand ceremony will take ce in only a few hours'' time!"


    "I know, I know! No need to hurry me, we still have a few hours!"


    "Come on! You know that-"


    Listening to the conversations between the small people inside the town, Xuan Hao understood that some important ceremony was going to take ce when the sun went down.


    The people inside the town didn''t really talk about what the ceremony was about, outside of mentioning that a new leader would be chosen during this grand ceremony. So, even if he was curious, Xuan Hao could only wait for this ceremony to find out what it was about.


    After all, he had no n to reveal himself to this race of small people yet, he still needed to understand why they here and why they had remained hidden inside the valley even with their current strength beingparable to a small kingdom!


    Following behind a group of the small humanoid creatures as they made their way out of the town towards the ce where the ceremony would take ce, Xuan Hao could not help frowning beforeing to an erupt stop.


    Not moving a single step closer to the small temple of where the ritual of these small creatures would take ce.


    The temple was elegant and well decorated with all sorts of mystical creatures being carved into it''s walls and ceiling. Giving the small temple a majestic feeling for those whoid their eyes upon it.


    Well¡­ The temple itself was small by his standards, but in the eyes of these small creatures, it should be an enormous temple. Covering what would approximately beparable to half of their small town¡­


    The reason why he hade to a stop, was because he had not seen the temple at all when scanning the area with his divine sense. Only seeing it first hand with his own eyes did he realize it was there!


    For it to avoid his divine sense¡­ Xuan Hao didn''t dare be the slightest bit careless in front of this temple belonging to an unknown race¡­


    Whoosh~


    Landing on the ground a short distance away from the temple of the unknown race of small humanoid creatures, Xuan Hao slowly made his way towards the temple. Making sure both of his domains were ready in case he was attacked.


    "Today''s grand ceremony is going to be amazing!"


    "Yes! I''m really excited, this is my first ceremony!"


    "Haha, I also remember how excited I was back during the first time I participated in the grand ceremony."


    As the small humanoid figures walked past him without even realizing he was there, Xuan Hao could not help listening in on their conversations. Quicklying to understand that the grand ceremony was not only a way for them to choose a future leader for their small town, but also aing of age for their younger generation.


    The more Xuan Hao learned about this ceremony sneaking his way towards their temple, the more curious he grew about it.


    If not for the fact that the small temple had blocked his divine sense from entering, he would have long since scanned the entire temple to find out what the grand ceremony was all about¡­


    ¡­


    Arriving in front of the small temple after sneaking his way to one of therger entrances, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face.


    "Something is preventing me from entering the temple¡­?"


    Indeed, upon making his way to the temple of the small humanoid race, Xuan Hao found himself unable to enter the small temple.


    Not only that, but after using a good part of his strength tounch a small hidden attack in an attempt to forcibly break through this barrier, Xuan Hao came to realize that the barrier of sorts that surrounded the temple preventing him from entering was far stronger than he had expected.


    Even with his small attack containing more than enough strength to kill someone at the early stages of the Domain Lord Realm, it did not show the slightest sign of having been attacked, a testament to the strength of the barrier covering the small temple.


    "How in the world-"


    Not knowing what to say when faced with such a strong barrier all of a sudden, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just where it hade from. After all, the strongest person inside the small town had at most reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, there was no way someone in the Nascent Soul Realm could set up such a strong barrier!


    For someone to set up such a strong barrier that prevented him from entering¡­ The person who set it up, would at the very least have to be stronger than him by a few times¡­


    "Hm?"


    About to turn around and return to the small town to see if he could find out more about the temple and possibly about the barrier covering the temple, Xuan Hao suddenly felt the feather imprint between his eyebrows show signs of life again, as it shone with a gentle blue light on the barrier of the small temple.


    Fwoosh~


    Following the gentle blue lightnding on the barrier of the small temple, the barrier seemed to struggle for a short moment before quickly retreating and opening a path up for him.


    "This-"


    Feeling the barrier retreat and allow a way for him to enter, Xuan Hao could not help eximing in surprise as he realized what had just happened.


    The feather imprint¡­ How was it connected to the small temple of this unknown race inside the Shattered Star Peaks¡­?


    Not able to answer this question, Xuan Hao could only wonder just how the two were rted to one another before he entered the small temple.


    No matter what, there was no way that he would give up the opportunity to enter the small temple of the unknown race now that the feather imprint between his eyebrows had helped him get through the barrier.


    Not only did he want to find out about the grand ceremony of this unknown race, but now he also wanted to find out how the temple was rted to the feather imprint!


    Maybe, he would even have a chance at finding out what the unknown race was called¡­ Calling them small humanoid creatures all the time did not really seem that fitting. Especially given the fact that they just looked like smaller humans¡­


    Whoosh~


    With this in mind and wanting to know more about the unknown race, Xuan Hao quickly entered the small temple¡­

 Chapter 497: Discovered!

    Chapter 497: Discovered!


    The inside of the small temple belonging to the unknown race, was not much different from what he had expected.


    Exquisitely decorated like the outside of the temple, several mythical beasts, and other exotic creatures that he had never seen before were carefully engraved into the walls along the path he walked through the temple.


    To be honest, Xuan Hao felt quite graceful for the fact that the temple was tall enough that he could walk through it normally. Saving him from having to crouch down as he made his way through it¡­


    "This should be the ce where the grand ceremony is going to take ce!"


    Coming to arge open hall at the centre of the temple, Xuan Hao noticed that most of the people from the unknown race had gathered together inside the hall. The hall was well decorated with all sorts of different murals depicting epic battles of ages long past. Among which, the centre piece of which was an all too familiar phoenix.


    Seeing the phoenix taking up most of therge hall''s ceiling, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just why the phoenix had appeared here of all ces, but his thought process was cut short as an elderly person only a little over half a meter tall made his way into the hall followed by several other elderly people closely following behind him.


    "The Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert¡­"


    Noticing this small elderly man, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes as he focused his full attention on him and the people neatly walking behind him. All of which had reached the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "The grand elder and the elders are here!"


    "Do you think something happened? The grand ceremony is not supposed to start yet¡­"


    Listening to the surrounding people who had gathered early inside the hall, Xuan Hao realized that the group of elders showing up was not something normal.


    Thus, the question became, why had the group of elders showed up all of a sudden¡­?


    Wondering this, Xuan Hao made sure that he was properly hidden with his domain before finding a ce to observe the grand elder and elders following behind him.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Someone triggered the barrier?!"


    A little earlier when Xuan Hao had first made contact with the barrier around the temple, the grand elder of the small town abruptly opened his eye before jumping up and staring towards the direction of the temple in the distance with a surprised expression on his face.


    "No! I have to find out what caused the barrier to trigger all of a sudden! Hopefully, it''s just another demon beast that managed to stumble its way inside again¡­"


    Not standing around doing nothing, the grand elder quickly contacted the other elders of the town before quickly making his way towards the temple. Not bothering to waste any time exining things to the other elders, as it would waste time.


    The other elders also seemed to understand that something was wrong, as they silently followed after the grand elder. Slowly starting to show a look of understanding upon realizing that they were moving towards the temple just outside the town.


    Even if it turned out to just be another demon beast that had bumped into the barrier around the temple, they could never be too careful. After all, the temples importance was far too much and involved their town''s continued existence!


    The grand elder and the other elders understood this and therefore didn''t waste any time upon reaching the temple. Quickly searching the area around the temple to see if there was any demon beast nearby that had caused the barrier to activate by bumping into it.


    However, with the search ending up not finding any demon beasts. The faces of the grand elder and the other elders grew solemn.


    "Grand elder, there are no demon beasts in the area around the temple¡­ Do you think that-"


    "Yes¡­ It looks like an outsider might have entered the temple¡­!"


    Hearing the words spoken by the grand elder, the rest of the elders present around him all showed a simrly shocked expression on their faces as some even gasped audibly.


    "Wha-"


    "An outsider!?"


    "Impossible! How long has it been since thest outsider visited?!"


    "We have to fine the outsider!"


    Even with the group of elders shocked exmations, the grand elder remained quiet as he looked towards the temple deep in thought.


    "Grand elder-"


    As one of the younger eldersing up to ask for his help in calming down the elders, the grand elder suddenly moved towards the temple. Not caring the slightest bit about the restless and panicking elders behind him as he made his way inside the temple.


    "The barrier of the temple was not broken. From this, we can tell that the outsider is most likely not an enemy of ours!"


    Along with these words, the grand elders figure slowly disappeared inside the temple.


    "Not an enemy¡­?"


    "Wai- Grand elder!"


    Hearing what the grand elder said, the other elders quickly calmed down before realizing that the grand elder had already left them behind, as he made his way inside the temple in search of the outsider.


    Whoosh~!


    Not daring to wait around outside the temple, the other elders quickly rushed into the temple.


    ¡­


    Still hiding in a corner of the hall that the people from the unknown race had gathered, Xuan Hao could not help tilting his head slightly to the side as he observed the group of elders suddenly spread out before they could be seen running down the different hallways leading into the hall that they were currently located.


    Perhaps¡­ Are they looking for me¡­?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself. How on earth had they managed to find out that he had entered the temple?!


    "Maybe when I first touched the barrier."


    Muttering this to himself with a look of understanding as his domain stopped his voice from leaking out into the surroundings, Xuan Hao could not stop himself from feeling even more curious about the race of small people.


    After all, for someone to feel a change in the barrier, they would have to be in control of it to some extent!


    ¡­


    "Maybe I should just reveal myself¡­"


    Watching the elders send away the people who hade for the grand ceremony before searching the temple for at least half an hour without showing any sign of stopping, Xuan Hao could only shake his head after realizing that he would not be able to see the grand ceremony.


    Not to mention the grand ceremony, he would most likely not be able to gain any useful information observing them now that they realized that someone might be watching them from the shadows.


    Other than that, Xuan Hao didn''t really n to spend the next few weeks observing them¡­


    Whoosh~


    "Who- o-outsider!?"


    "Protect the grand elder!"


    "Argh- S-so strong¡­"


    Revealing himself as he appeared in front of the grand elder still standing at the centre of the hall deep in thought, Xuan Hao didn''t bother hiding his cultivation realm, as a few of the weaker elders copsed on the ground under the sheer pressure brought along by his two domains covering the entire hall the moment he revealed himself.


    After all, while he had decided to reveal himself, Xuan Hao did not n to hide his cultivation and appear weak in front of the other party. Not to mention, he would easily be able to kill any of them if they tried something when they were already inside of his domain.


    "O-outsider of the human race¡­ I wonder for what reason have youe to our little town¡­"


    Still standing tall under the pressure brought along by his two domains, the grand elder showed a dignified expression as he asked this. However, a tinge of fear could still be seen on his face when he looked over towards Xuan Hao. After all, the other party was someone in the Domain Lord Realm! Killing a Nascent Soul Realm Expert like him would be as easy as squashing a random bug by the side of the road!


    Even if the ancient texts said only an ally can safely enter the temple. How could I possibly believe it so easily?!


    Thinking this to himself as he looked over towards Xuan Hao waiting for an answer, the grand elder prepared to activate a small runic talisman that he grasped tightly in the palm of his hand. Something that didn''t escape the eyes of Xuan Hao, as his ice domain had already secretly covered the runic talisman. Ready to freeze it along with the grand elder''s hand in case he tried anything.


    "No real reason, I was just traveling around the area and happened upon your little town. Growing curious, I decided to investigate the area."


    Saying this, Xuan Hao smiled kindly towards the grand elder before releasing the pressure brought along by his two domains. Allowing the elders and grand elder to breath a sigh of relief, as they could finally move their bodies again.


    Feeling that the other party did not have any hostile intentions towards him and his people after hearing his words along with the pressure on him and the others lifting, the grand elder breathed out a sigh of relief.


    "I see¡­ Is there perhaps anything we can help with? I''m more than willing to answer any question you have¡­"

 Chapter 498: Half Spirit Race

    Chapter 498: Half Spirit Race


    "Is there perhaps anything we can help with? I''m more than willing to answer any question you have¡­"


    Hearing the grand elder''s question along with feeling his grip on the hidden runic talisman loosen, Xuan Hao breathed out a sigh of relief. For now, it looked like he had avoided fighting with this not so tall unknown race.


    "Actually, I was quite curious about what race you are from¡­" Not nning to hold back his questions, Xuan Hao decided to ask the question that he had been most curious about since discovering the small town and the unknown race of people inside of it.


    "Our race¡­? To be honest, we don''t really know much about it ourselves¡­ All we know is that we are the descendants from a nature spirit and a human, we don''t know much else. From most of our ancient records, it seems that most of them refer to our race as the half spirit race."


    "Half spirit?"


    "Yes¡­ As you can see, we are of a quite short staturepared to you humans. The reason for this is due to our connection with the nature spirits of old!"


    "Were the nature spirits perhaps really short¡­?"


    "No, they were actually quite tall. Even their human forms often reached two meters of height, some even standing over three meters tall!"


    Then how on earth are they rted to the fact that you have such a short stature!?


    Not saying out loud what he was thinking after listening to the grand elder''s exnation of their ancestors, Xuan Hao decided to leave the question of why the half spirit race was so short for another time and instead focus on some more important questions for now.


    "Actually, some among our people are doubting that we are even rted to the nature spirits of the world. After all, nature spirits are quite well known for their ability to control the elements of nature, yet we have no one who ca-"


    "Don''t worry too much about it, I think the reason why no one has awakened their abilities yet is just because their cultivation realm is too low. Don''t forget how strong nature spirit are! Not something anyone at the Nascent Soul Realm could everpare with!"


    Not knowing anything about nature spirit as he said this, Xuan Hao had hoped to end the conversation and get on to the next question, but-


    "That¡­ That is indeed true! Everyone in the town always remained stuck at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm without being able to take the next step forward¡­ perhaps this is rted to us needing to awaken our nature spirit bloodline and-"


    Listening to the old grand elder continue on talking with an excited expression on his face like they were old friends, Xuan Hao could not help frowning. The grand elder had really gottenfortable with him quickly...


    Even worse, the other elders had also ovee their earlier fear of him, as they joined in on the conversation.


    All of a sudden, the entire thing had developed into a conversation about how they should go about awakening the nature spirit part of their bloodline¡­ While interesting to a certain extent, Xuan Hao honestly didn''t really care about it that much. Finding out about the temple and the giant phoenix mural located above him was far more important!


    However, looking at the faces of the group of elders from the half spirit race, Xuan Hao could not bring himself to interrupt them.


    Ah¡­ Who cares! At most I will have to wait for a few minutes until they calm down again, there is also their grand ceremony that is supposed to take ce soon!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to wait. Believing that there was no way they would just ignore him and continue their conversation for too long¡­


    Something that he soon came to regret, as they didn''t n to stop any time soon. Even worse, they were more than happy to include him in their conversation. Asking if he had any idea on how to awaken their bloodline.


    ¡­


    In the end, they had talked for over an hour before this had happened¡­ Something Xuan Hao had thought impossible given the fact that they had pretty much repeated the same things over and over again. Making no progress towards finding an answer to how they could awaken their nature spirit bloodline, yet remaining as excited about it as they had been when they started¡­


    Having finally had enough listening to them talking about their "awakening", Xuan Hao had forcibly interrupted the group of half spirit elders filled with way too much energy.


    "Now that you are done talking about your ideas on how to awaken your nature spirit bloodline, we can continue our earlier conversation. Right?"


    "Yes!"


    "Great! Now, the next question I wanted to ask was rted to the temple we are inside of. Do you perhaps have any idea about its origin?"


    Releasing the pressure of his domain that he had used to interrupt these half spirit elders conversation after hearing the grand elder''s quick response, Xuan Hao let out a sigh of relief before asking the second andst question he had for the grand elder.


    Outside of their race and the temple, Xuan Hao wasn''t really too interested in anything else.


    The story of how the half spirit race ended up inside the valley and why they hadn''t left yet, was not really that interesting to him after remembering what had happened just seconds ago when he had just asked about their race¡­


    "The origin of the temple?!"


    "Yes, I was wondering if you had any clue about it. After all, it seems like your race have been in control of this temple for quite some time."


    Seeing the shocked expression that appeared on the grand elder''s face after hearing his question, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit excited thinking that he would finally find out just who the temple belonged to in the past.


    Maybe even getting a chance to find out something rted to the phoenix and the epic battles taking ce on the murals covering the walls of the temple hall that he was currently inside of.


    "Hm¡­ The temple has always been here, so I can''t say anything for sure, but¡­"


    "But?"


    "But we do have quite a few intact records from before we took control of the temple, you are more than wee to check them out if you are interested in finding out more about the temple. For us, we just use the temple as a gathering ce most of the time. Using it for things such as the-


    Ah! Wepletely forgot about the grand ceremony that was going to take ce today!"


    Ignoring the panicking voice from the grand elder after he remembered the fact that a grand ceremony was going to take ce today, Xuan Hao instead focused on the first part of what he said.


    They still had some surviving records from the time before they took control over the temple!


    From what he hade to understand, the town had been around for at least a few thousand years, so the time from before they took control over the temple was likely going to be when the original owners had still been in control!


    "Where can I find these ancient records?"


    "Ah? Just follow the hallway over there until you reach a spiral staircase leading down. Go down and you will find the record hall! Now, if you''ll excuse me, I have to prepare for the grand ceremony!"


    Pointing him towards a nearby hallway, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit bewildered at this grand elder''s behaviour. At first, he had been cautious and careful with him, yet now, he was treating him like an old friend. Not worrying about him doing anything bad...


    The entire thing was quite an interesting experience. Especially given the fact that the rest of the elders standing around still nced over towards him cautiously from time to time, as they made sure to keep their distance.


    Hah¡­ There is no use thinking about that now. The most important thing should be to check out the ancient records stored here!


    Shaking his head as he threw his thoughts about the grand elder''s weird behaviour to the side forter when he had finished going through the ancient records of the temple, Xuan Hao made his way down the hallway that the grand elder had pointed him towards.


    Not forgetting to use both his domains to protect himself, just in case the grand elder of the half spirit race decided to send him into some sort of trap. After all, no matter how well he treated him, Xuan Hao would never believe a hundred percent of what a stranger he had gotten to know for only a little over an hour¡­


    Even less so when the other party belonged to a race that had decided to remain hidden inside a small valley for what had essentially been thousands of years!

 Chapter 499: Ancient Record Hall

    Chapter 499: Ancient Record Hall


    Pushing open the door leading down into the underground section of the temple, Xuan Hao was taken aback by the cloud of dust that suddenly greeted him the moment the door opened up.


    From the amount of dust that greeted him, Xuan Hao could easily tell that it had been a long time since anyone had been down there. From the looks of it, the grand elder might not have visited the ancient records stored away beneath the temple.


    The reason for the grand elder not doing so, was likely because he and the rest of the elders from his race saw no use in them going down there to check out the ancient records. After all, there was a high chance that other elders before them had already gone over the records below the temple.


    At that point, they would have already taken everything of use out of the ancient record hall. Only leaving behind what they had inevitably deemed as something useless¡­


    Scanning the entire underground hall with his divine sense, Xuan Hao breathed out a sigh of relief discovering that there were no hidden traps and there were indeed some still intact records present in the ancient record hall!


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any time after discovering this, Xuan Hao directly moved towards the closet shelf that had an intact record scroll on top of it before carefully picking it up.


    "At least the writtennguage is still the same¡­ Although there are a few differences, but they shouldn''t be too hard to decipher with a bit of time!"


    Smiling happily to himself as he read through the ancient record, Xuan Hao could not help growing excited after realizing that the ancient record in his hands was not only fully intact, but also in themonnguage on the Ewaria Continent.


    For the first time since discovering something simr to the temple he was currently below, Xuan Hao would finally be able to get some insight into the era that the temple was constructed in!


    Filled with excitement at this thought, Xuan Hao began reading through the ancient scroll held firmly in his hands.


    The content of the ancient scroll was not something Xuan Hao had expected, as it didn''t mention anything regarding the temple itself, but was instead some kind of ancient record about the people who had visited the temple in the past.


    "Grandmaster of the Forsaken Well, Revered Thousand Doves, Master Shoeless, Dao Mistress Bloodless¡­"


    Reading through the many unique names written down in the ancient record, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just how they had managed toe up with so many interesting Daoist names for themselves¡­


    However, even if there was nothing more than their name and short description beneath each of these people''s names, Xuan Hao understood that each of them should have been an expert during their time.


    How strong they truly were, was still aplete mystery, but he did get some clues that they should at the very least be experts of the Soul Ascension Realm, if not stronger. From the short description written beneath each of their names.


    The most unique of which was Master Shoeless, a spiritual tree that had apparently gained sentience at some point before cultivating and bing strong enough to take on a human form.


    Even if he did not gain any of the information he wanted from the ancient scroll, there was still more scrolls left inside the ancient record hall and to be honest, Xuan Hao was more than fine just getting an insight into the experts that had been around during the era that the temple was from.


    However, Xuan Hao was far from done checking out the ancient records kept in the record hall below the temple, as he directly made his way over to the next intact ancient record scroll before quietly reading through it.


    ¡­


    At the same time that his master was reading through the ancient record scrolls of the temple under the control of the Half Spirit race, Chu Yang had just started his journey and was looking around himself with a confused expression on his face. Not willing to admit that he had already gotten lost before he could even reach his first destination¡­


    "I should not be too far away from the Shattered Star Peak if I''m not wrong¡­ But why can''t I see it?"


    Muttering this to himself as he walked up a nearby hill to get a better grasp over where he was, Chu Yang could only frown after not discovering the Shattered Star Peak in the distance.


    The reason why he had even chosen to go to the Shattered Star Peak, was because it was located just next to a rtively famous demon beast forest inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory.


    Inside the demon beast forest, there were a lot of opportunities for people in the Core Formation Realm like himself and at the same time, there were also a lot of demon beast at the Core Formation Realm!


    The demon beast forest had mostly been under the Flying Sword Sect''s control and was at the same time also the ce the beast tamers would go to choose new demon beasts for the Flying Sword Sect.


    For this reason, Chu Yang had decided to visit this demon beast forest first before making his way towards some of the other famous locations inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory.


    At least¡­ That had been his n¡­


    "I should go to the vige over there and see if I can find out where I am¡­"


    Whoosh!


    Spotting what he expected to be small vige in the distance from the hilltop hidden inside a small valley through a few distinct clouds of ck smoke rising into the air from the valley, Chu Yang quickly made his way towards the vige in the distance. Even if he had¡­ Taken a slightly different route than he had originally nned, he should not be too far off his original route.


    Asking the local vige for directions should be more than enough to help him find out where to go to reach the Shattered Star Peak before making his way to the demon beast forest!


    ¡­


    "Fight back! We can''t-"


    Ching~!


    "Ah! Brother! No!"


    However, things did not go as expected. The ck clouds of smoke did indeed belong to a vige. The only problem was the fact that the vige in question, was currently in the process of being burned down by a group of bandits.


    When he arrived, thest few among the vigers mostly consisting of the elderly and children were left behind.


    Standing in front of this group protecting them from therge group of bandits that had invaded their vige, was what remained of the small viges fighting force.


    The fighting force consisted of both the viges young men and woman, with only a few middle-aged men and woman remaining. All of them wounded to some degree.


    The strongest among the vigers was only at the Seventh Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, while the strongest bandit had already reached the Foundation Establishment Realm! Not only that, but there was also more than one person at the Foundation Establishment Realm among the bandits!


    Looking over the fighting force of the small vige and the bandits, Chu Yang could not help frowning as he sensed just how big the difference between the two groups were.


    The bandits could obviously deal with the group of vigers easily, yet they were smiling sinisterly as they yed with thest remaining vigers struggling to fight back!


    Things really are still quite chaotic. No wonder Elder Song is constantly asking for help to deal with bandits roaming around terrorizing merchants and vigers alike!


    Thinking this to himself, Chu Yang could not help remembering how Elder Song had worked hard over the past few months to get every avable disciple to help cleaning up the territory of the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Deciding to help the group of vigers now that he was here, Chu Yang unfastened the spear he had been carrying on his back before thrusting it forward towards the strongest person among the bandits.


    A rtively older man who was currently showing a lewd smile as he greedily gazed towards a few younger women among the vigers.


    Whoosh~!


    Ptch!


    Before the bandit even had any time to react, Chu Yang''s spear had already pierced through his head. Killing him on the spot!


    "Wha-!?"


    "B-BOSS!!!"


    Swish~


    Not waiting around after having killed the leader of the bandits, Chu Yang''s spear moved towards the next bandit. Another person at the Foundation Establishment Realm that had been standing just next to the bandit leader.


    "No-"


    Only after all the Foundation Establishment Bandits had died, did the rest of the bandits manage to register what had just happened, as they scattered in all directions. However, they were only in the Qi Condensation Realm. How could they possibly run away from Chu Yang, who had reached the Core Formation Realm?


    "R-run- Agh!"


    "D-demon! A demon has appeared!"


    Swish~!


    Soon enough, the escaping bandits were cut down in a short period of time under the bewildered eyes of the remaining vigers¡­

 Chapter 500: Ancient Scrolls

    Chapter 500: Ancient Scrolls


    "Hm?"


    Turning towards the still bewildered group of vigers that had yet toprehend what had just happened, Chu Yang smiled wryly as he realized that a few of the weaker vigers had ended up fainting during his early disy. A few of the quick mothers among the viges had also managed to cover the eyes of their children. Preventing them from seeing the massacre of the bandits.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this situation, Chu Yang had no idea what to do. This was the first time he had ever ended up in such a situation. The vigers just standing there staring at him without saying anything also didn''t help break the awkward silence that had suddenly descended after thest bandit''s death.


    Wanting to end the awkward silence by saying something, Chu Yang was a step too slow, as a young woman at the early stages of the Qi Condensation Realm from the vige''sst bit of fighting force stepped forward.


    "T-thank you for your h-help, n-noble lord! I-is there perhaps anything w-we can help with¡­?"


    Hearing how nervous she was when thanking and asking him, Chu Yang could not help letting out a small sigh internally.


    Was he really that scary? Well, he did just kill off the group of bandits that they had been hopelessly struggling against¡­


    "Actually, there is something I could use your help with-"


    About to answer the young woman''s question, Chu Yang could not help frowning upon suddenly noticing a change in the way that the vigers was looking at him.


    "I want to know if you have any idea about the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks, a small mountain range consisting of nine really tall mountains."


    Finishing his sentence before some of the vigers ended up saying something, Chu Yang watched as a few of them blushed a bit in embarrassment upon realizing that they had misunderstood what he wanted to ask for¡­


    These people¡­


    Not knowing what to say when he discovered this, Chu Yang decided to pretend he didn''t notice anything, as he kept his gaze focused on the young woman who had been the only person brave enough to step forward and talk to him so far.


    "The Shattered Star Peaks¡­? The one where the peaks of the mountains were cut-"


    "Yes! Do you perhaps have any idea what direction it''s located!?"


    Not paying too much attention to the fact that the young woman had calmed down enough to talk normally already, Chu Yang was excited after realizing that the young woman. Even to the point that he had interrupted her before she had finished speaking.


    "Y-yes, the Shattered Star Peaks should be located in that direction."


    Stuttering a bit out of surprise at Chu Yang''s sudden excitement, the woman from the vige answered quickly before pointing in the direction that Chu Yang had juste from.


    "¡­"


    Discovering the direction that the young woman was pointing in, Chu Yang suddenly felt his expression darken.


    He did not believe that the young woman would lie to him. Especially given the fact that he had just saved her and her vige, but¡­ He really didn''t want to admit that he had ended up walking in the opposite direction of the Shattered Star Peaks¡­


    "Are you sure that is the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks!?"


    "Yes¡­?"


    Not understanding why Chu Yang had suddenly asked her this with an extremely serious expression on his face, the young woman answered almost absentmindedly due to being caught off-guard by Chu Yang''s sudden question.


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I have to backtrack¡­"


    Letting out a reluctant sigh, as he muttered this to himself, Chu Yang shook his head before putting away his spear. Preparing to leave the vige now that he had found out that he was still far away from the Shattered Star Peaks.


    "Um! C-can I ask where t-the noble lord is from¡­?"


    Seeing the young woman suddenly move towards him before he left, Chu Yang decided to answer her honestly. In the first ce, it would be a good way to help increase the Flying Sword Sect''s reputation. Even if just a little¡­


    "I''m from the Flying Sword Sect!"


    Whoosh~!


    Along with these words, Chu Yang left the small vige without looking back. Hopefully heading in the correction direction this time around.


    ¡­


    Back at the ancient record hall below the temple of the Half Spirit race, Xuan Hao had already grown tired looking through the ancient scrolls that only turned out to be name lists of past visitors!


    To be honest, he had even started giving up hope of finding something that wasn''t a name list of past experts who had visited the temple during its peak. However, he did not n to leave the ancient record hall before he had read through every single intact scroll present there.


    "Hm?"


    Picking up another ancient scroll thinking that it would turn out to be a name list like the rest of the ancient scrolls he had read so far, Xuan Hao was taken aback upon realizing that it was somethingpletely different!


    "First flight¡­?"


    Reading the barely readable title on top of the worn-down scroll with interest, Xuan Hao slowly began reading through the scroll with much difficulty.


    The words written down on the worn-out scroll told a short story, a story about a small blue bird that had been struggling to fly. After struggling for some time trying to learn on its own, it soon met with a kind wind spirit.


    The wind spirit saw the small blue bird struggling so hard and decided to lend it a hand. Spending the next few days teaching the small bird how to fly by harnessing the power of the wind.


    After learning how to harness the power of the wind over only a few days, the small blue bird could fly into the sky. Parting ways with the kind wind spirit as it flew high above the ground.


    The rest of the story waspletely unreadable. In the end, only a little below half of the story was readable.


    The story written down on the barely intact scroll was not something Xuan Hao had expected. At first nce, it seemed like children''s story of some sort. However, looking closer, Xuan Hao could not help frowning, as he discovered that the first half of the story was essentially made in a way to allow the reader to more easilyprehend the dao of wind!


    Even he felt his close to negligibleprehension of the dao of wind increase slightly after only reading through the story once¡­


    Very clearly, the story was a priceless treasure that could help whenprehending the dao of wind.


    Thinking this far, Xuan Hao quickly put away the worn-down ancient scroll before resuming his search of the ancient record hall.


    Rustle~


    "Wind, Fire and Wood¡­"


    Having finished his search through the entire ancient record hall, Xuan Hao smiled to himself as he looked over three small worn-down scrolls in front of him.


    Other than the story of the bird that allowed one to more easilyprehend the dao of wind, he had found two more simr stories. One for the Dao of Fire and one for the Dao of Wood!


    Even if he had not gained any more information about the ancient era that the temple was from. At least he managed to obtain three priceless treasures that would be able to help not only him, but also his disciples and the Flying Sword Sect!


    With the help of the small scrolls, it would be much easier for someone to form a pseudo domain andter on enter the Domain Lord Realm! Even if the dao inside the scrolls was not suitable for them, it would still help them to some degree.


    "Chu Yang is practicing the spear and is likely to end up pursuing the dao of the spear, while Bai Ning will likely end up pursing the dao of metal¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head. From the looks of it, it looked like the one who would benefit the most from this would be Qing Yi. After all, she practiced a fire mantra and even had a fire rted physique!


    Having thought about just how much Qing Yi would end up benefiting from this, Xuan Hao felt like he had to get something good for his two other disciples.


    "Looks like I will take a bit longer before I return to the sect¡­ Maybe the Half Spirit race has something?"


    Remembering the Half Spirit race that had been inside the valley for over a thousand years by now and the fact that they had cleaned up the ancient record hall in the past, Xuan Hao realized that they might also have simr scrolls stored somewhere.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting anymore time in the ancient record hall, Xuan Hao directly left the ancient record hall. Prepared to ask the grand elder of the Half Spirit race if he could take a look at the things, they had taken out from the ancient record hall.

 Chapter 501: Blue- Phoenix Feather!?

    Chapter 501: Blue- Phoenix Feather!?


    "Oh¡­ Looks like the grand ceremony is still taking ce even with me around¡­"


    Realizing that the grand ceremony that he had ended up dying was still proceeding with an outsider like himself around, Xuan Hao could not help showing a bit interest, as he hid himself with his domain before making his way towards therge hall of the temple where the grand ceremony of the Half Spirit race was taking ce.


    Compared to therge hall of the temple from before, the entire hall waspletely filled to the brim with people from the Half Spirit race. Most of them cheering as a small group of young people could be seen standing on top of arge formation drawn at the centre of therge hall. Even the tallest among them had was just barely half a meter tall.


    What in the world is that formation for? It was not there before¡­


    Looking over towards the grand elder in charge of the grand ceremony talking passionately to the young people on top of the formation, Xuan Hao decided to wait until the ceremony had ended before asking the grand elder about the things, they had taken out from the ancient record hall and where those things were store


    Fwoosh!


    Feeling even more curious about the ceremony after seeing the formation that was on the ground beneath the group of young people light up, Xuan Hao found a good ce to settle down and watch the grand ceremony of the Half Spirit race.


    Even if it was a bit of a waste of time, Xuan Hao didn''t mind it at all. After all, he was quite curious about the grand ceremony of the Half Spirit race himself.


    "The ceremony is finally starting! I hope I can make it through the trail¡­"


    "You are one to talk, you are far stronger than me! I only just reached the Foundation Establishment Realm two days ago!"


    "It''s your own fault for cking off all the time!"


    Standing on top of therge formation at the centre of therge hall, the group of young people from the Half Spirit race nervously talked among each other as the formation beneath their feet grew brighter and brighter before they suddenly found themselves inside arge arena covered in ancient symbols.


    Swish~!


    Before the young people from the Half Spirit race had any time to react to suddenly finding themselves somewherepletely foreign to them, they were forcibly separated from each other.


    Roar!


    Roar Roar Roar!


    Following which arge demon beast at the Foundation Establishment Realm appeared in front of each of them.


    Bang!


    "Die! Beast!"


    Boom!


    Before long, the young people from the Half Spirit seemed to have recovered from their confusion, as each of them lunged towards the demon beast in front of them filled with killing intent.


    Very clearly, they had realized that all of it was a part of the trail set up for them by their elders!


    How interesting, it looks like the formation links together with the temple to transport the young people into some sort of arena that''s part of the temple. From the looks of it, the Half Spirit race turned this arena into some sort ofing of age for their children.


    Having seen the entire thing taking ce, Xuan Hao easily managed to see through it. Even the actual location of the arena that the group of young people from the Half Spirit race was currently fighting inside of, could not hide from him!


    However, there was nothing inside the arena other than a few demon beasts that had been sealed away inside of it. The Half spirit race also seemed to have gained full control over the arena, as a few elders were even hiding inside of it. Likely in case one of the younger people could not beat the demon beast that he or she faced off against.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao realized that the demon beast sealed away inside the arena was the doing of the elders from the Half Spirit race.


    Nothing too surprising, as the strongest demon beast in there was only at the Core Formation Realm¡­


    The only thing that made Xuan Hao curious about the demon beasts, was where they hade from. After all, when he scanned the small valley that the Half Spirit race lived inside of, he had not managed to find any demon beast at all. Not even a single demon beast at the Qi Condensation Realm was present!


    "One more thing to ask the grand elder about¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao looked away from the fight taking ce inside the arena and instead focused on therge phoenix mural inside therge hall. After all, a fight at the Foundation Establishment Realm was far from interesting to someone at the Domain Lord Realm... Of course, things would be different if it was his own disciple fighting!


    "Hm?"


    Inspecting therge phoenix ceiling mural above him, Xuan Hao suddenly saw something at the tail of the phoenix that was located just above the grand elder.


    Is this not another blue feather¡­?


    Realizing that he had finally managed to find another blue feather hidden in in sight. Blending together with the enormous phoenix in the ceiling of therge hall, Xuan Hao suddenly came to the realization, that the blue feathers that he had been collecting might very well be phoenix feathers¡­


    Real phoenix feathers that had belonged to an ancient phoenix from the ancient era that the temple came from!


    "I don''t think they would mind me taking it away. After all, they have no idea its even there in the first ce¡­"


    Not nning to simply leave it now that he had found another blue phoenix feather, Xuan Hao went up and grabbed the blue phoenix feather before putting it away with the other three feathers inside his interspatial ring.


    The grand elder just below him didn''t notice any of this, as he continued watching over the young people fighting with all their strength inside the arena. By this point, the first and strongest among them had already begun wounding the demon beast they were fighting against, causing the surrounding members of the Half Spirit race watching through the formation to cheer excitedly.


    Silently returning to the ce he had been watching the fights taking ce inside the arena, Xuan Hao did not have to wait for long before the fights taking ce inside the arena came to an end.


    In total, 23 people had participated in the trail and 23 had passed in the end. Nothing too surprising given the fact that the demon beasts were only in the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, and they had been weakened by their elder before the fight took ce¡­


    Following the end of the fight in the arena, the grand elder congratted the young people on sessfully passing the trail to be adults.


    The talking part was not really something Xuan Hao was that interested in, as he instead spent his time fiddling with one of the blue phoenix feathers. Trying to figure out what was so special about it to no avail.


    Not to mention, he could no figure out why the other three blue phoenix feathers had not reacted to the feather inside the temple.


    Was the feather inside the temple perhaps different from the three other feathers he had picked up so far¡­?


    ¡­


    Spending the next two hours like that, Xuan Hao only put away the blue phoenix feather in his hand after discovering that the grand elder and the other elders were leaving therge hall.


    At this point, it had already gotten dark outside, and the grand ceremony hade to an end. The only people who remained behind after the elders started leaving, were the young people who had just be adults.


    Rustle~


    "Ah! Why is it that we have to clean up after everyone?"


    "Hah¡­ Don''t think too much about it, it''s a tradition after all¡­"


    "Why do I feel like its just something made up by the elders because they are toozy to clean up the temple hall by themselves¡­?"


    "Even if it is like that, what can we do about it?"


    "That¡­ That is true¡­"


    Following the elders having left, these new adults of the Half Spirit race began cleaning up therge temple hall. Not looking so happy about their current situation¡­


    Whoosh~


    Seeing this scene, Xuan Hao did not intend to stay behind as he quickly followed after the grand elder of the Half Spirit race.


    He had already waited patiently for a few hours and Xuan Hao really wanted to ask him about the things his race had taken out from the ancient record hall below the temple and see if he could get something for his disciples.


    At the same time, he also wanted to ask him about the demon beasts sealed away inside the arena and find out where they had gotten the demon beasts from!

 Chapter 502: Information about the Soul Ascension Realm!

    Chapter 502: Information about the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Appearing behind the grand elder when he was alone, Xuan Hao barely managed to fit inside the room itself. The rooms of the Half Spirit race were simply not designed for someone as tall as himself¡­


    "Hello again grand eld-"


    "Ah! I-it''s you again!"


    Caught off-guard by Xuan Hao who had suddenly appeared behind him, the grand elder let out a small scream of surprise before turning around to face him with a nervous expression on his face.


    "I hoped that you would be able to answer a few questions of mine that have after I visited the ancient record hall¡­"


    "O-of course! Ask anything and I will do my best to answer!"


    "Great! First of all, I wanted to know-"


    Proceeding to ask the grand elder about the demon beasts and where they had gotten them from, Xuan Hao learned that there was arge underground cavework below their valley that had several different demon beasts living inside of it. ording to the grand elder, some of those demon beasts were even stronger than him!


    Given the grand elder''s cultivation realm, Xuan Hao guessed that those demon beasts should at the very least have reached the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm. Maybe there was even Domain Lord Realm demon beasts!


    As for the things that the past elders of the Half Spirit race had taken out from the ancient record hall in the past, they had been ced in the small town''s library, while the more important records found were always protected by the grand elder.


    "Would you mind me looking through the records?"


    "Not at all!"


    Shaking his head, the grand elder quickly took out arge stack of ancient worn-down scrolls before handing them over to Xuan Hao without the slightest bit of hesitation.


    Something Xuan Hao had not expected at all. After all, these were supposed to be the most important records of the Half Spirit race! Not something that could be handed over to an outsider like him so casual!


    But then again¡­ He was far stronger than the grand elder and the other party knew that as well. Handing over everything he asked for and not get on his bad side, was obviously the safest choice for him and his town.


    "Thank you, I will return them after I finish reading through them."


    "Wai-"


    Whoosh~


    Taking the ancient scrolls, Xuan Hao directly left the grand elder''s ce before the other party had any time to say anything.


    ¡­


    I should check out the scrolls that the elders from the Half Spirit race deemed valuable enough to take with them in the past before checking out the underground cavework mentioned by the grand elder!


    Thinking this to himself as he arrived at a secluded location away from the small town where the grand elder''s home was located, Xuan Hao began looking through the ancient records that the grand elder had given to him.


    "Looks like the things gathered by the past elders of the Half Spirit race are indeed quite useful!"


    Muttering this to himself in a happy tone as he read through the first ancient scroll, Xuan Hao felt incredibly excited the more he read through the ancient scroll.


    The reason for this was simple, as the scroll itself contained a description of the different cultivation realms. From the Qi Condensation Realm, all the way up to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Not only that, but ording to a few notes located at the top of the ancient scroll. There was a high chance that the scroll had been written by someone above the Soul Ascension Realm!


    At least that was what Xuan Hao guessed after seeing the writer referring to himself as someone who transcended the mortal realm. Referring to the Qi Condensation Realm to the Soul Ascension Realm, as being the mortal realm. The Qi Condensation being the first step, while the Soul Ascension Realm was thest step of the mortal realm.


    Skipping through the lower realms for now, Xuan Hao focused on to the part that was about the Domain Lord Realm. The realm that he himself was currently in.


    Reading through the description of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao came to understand that the most important part about the Domain Lord Realm was toprehend thews of the world through one''s domain. Inevitably, this would cause one''s soul to strengthen, as the soul had already merged together with the domain upon entering the Domain Lord Realm. Something Xuan Hao had already experienced every time one of his two domains grew stronger¡­


    "Hm? This¡­"


    Feeling that he already understood most of the things written about the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao was suddenly taken aback when he reached the end of the description of the Domain Lord Realm.


    "To reach the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, you will have merge body, soul, and domain into one¡­ In case you haveprehended more than one domain¡­ You will have to merge the domains together into a single domain before attempting to reach the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. Taking on the first Tribtion to reach the Soul Ascension Realm without doing so, will result in certain death¡­!"


    Reading it out loud to himself, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he felt his ice and sword domain.


    How in the world would he go about merging the two together?


    Xuan Hao honestly had no clue and for now, it was not something to worry about, as he was still far away from reaching the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm...


    Shaking his head as he decided not to think about how to merge his two domains for now, Xuan Hao instead focused on the part that mentioned the Soul Ascension Realm...


    Even at this point in time, he didn''t really know much about the Soul Ascension Realm other than the fact that people at the Soul Ascension Realm were considered the most powerful people on the Ewaria Continent.


    In front of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert, a Domain Lord was not worth mentioning at all!


    For this reason, Xuan Hao was extremely interested in finding out more about the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "I will finally be able to learn about the Soul Ascension Realm¡­"


    Filled with excitement, Xuan Hao began reading through the ancient scroll''s description of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    The Soul Ascension Realm was the final stage of the mortal realm and was also the realm at which one began the process of transcending the mortal realm.


    During the Soul Ascension Realm, one would have to endure six different soul tribtions. Sessfully oveing the soul tribtion would result in the cultivator undergoing the process of Soul Ascension. Soul Ascension would allow the cultivator to momentarily borrow the power of the world to strengthen their soul andprehend the dao. Allowing them to rapidly increase their strength. Failing to ovee the tribtion would result in death!


    In the end, the writer of the ancient scroll described the process of soul ascension after oveing a soul tribtion as an opportunity even immortals would die for!


    Reading this, Xuan Hao could not help looking forward to the time when he reached the Soul Ascension Realm and underwent his first soul ascension. However, at the same time, he also came to understand just howrge the difference between people in the Soul Ascension Realm were.


    Someone who had undergone one tribtion and someone who had gone through two were on apletely different level. Even if the difference was only a single minor realm¡­


    "I wonder how many tribtions the ancestor and emperor of the Sky Empire made it through¡­"


    Remembering that the ancestor of the Sky Empire and the emperor who had both reached the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just how far they had gone.


    Had they only made it through a single tribtion, or had they made it through more than that?


    Feeling curious about this, Xuan Hao soon began reading through the ancient scroll once again. Sadly, theter part that detailed what would happen after one passed through the sixth soul tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm had been worn-down and waspletely unreadable.


    The only thing Xuan Hao could make out, was a small paragraph with only the words [Seventh Tribtion] still readable¡­ Something that only ended up making him even more curious about what happened after someone passed the sixth tribtion¡­


    However, no matter how curious Xuan Hao was, there was no way for him to find out. Unless he suddenly mastered the dao of time and reversed time for the ancient scroll¡­


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I will have to hope for another scroll with more information on the Soul Ascension Realm in here¡­ At least the information about the realms below the Soul Ascension Realm is still fully intact"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao shook his head before reading through the ancient scroll''s description of the Qi Condensation. Deepening his understanding of the different cultivation realms was key when it came to teaching his disciples!

 Chapter 503: Fate of the ‘other’ races

    Chapter 503: Fate of the ''other'' races


    Reading through the rest of the ancient scroll that was about the remaining four mortal realms, Xuan Hao once again turned his attention towards the small pile of ancient scroll that he had borrowed from the grand elder of the Half Spirit race. Not waiting long before picking out another of the ancient scroll. Hoping that it would be just as useful as the first one¡­


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, the Half Spirt race did indeed not take anything useless from the ancient record hall of the temple!


    The rest of the ancient scrolls were all covering different subjects connected to cultivation below the Domain Lord Realm. From ancient qi techniques and movement techniques to how one could ensure a sessful breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The ancient scrolls were extremely useful to the current Xuan Hao. Not only would it help him when it came to teaching his disciples, but it would also help increase the overall strength of the Flying Sword Sect after he shared some of the things, he found with the sect master!


    The part about how to ensure a safe breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm was especially useful given how many elders they had stuck at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm. Fearful of taking the final step to reach the Nascent Soul Realm before their lifespan was about to run out¡­


    After returning to the Flying Sword Sect and sharing this, the Flying Sword Sect would surely see arge number of new Nascent Soul Realm Experts over the next few years! Increasing the overall strength of the sect. At the same time, the people teaching arge portion of the disciples would be Nascent Soul Realm Experts. Increasing the strength of the Flying Sword Sect''s younger generation!


    The only unfortunate thing was that there was no scroll that increasedprehension of the dao like he had expected. From the looks of it, he would have to look somewhere else if he wanted to find something good for Chu Yang and Bai Ning.


    Well¡­ There were quite a few ancient cksmithing blueprints among the ancient scrolls, so he just needed to find something for Chu Yang after convincing the grand elder to let go of these few ancient cksmithing blueprints.


    Taking them away was not really something Xuan Hao nned to do, as he did not want to be enemies with the Half Spirit race.


    Instead, he was way more interested in having them be a part of the Flying Sword Sect in the future when the Flying Sword Sect officially moved their main sect to the Shattered Star Peaks¡­


    However, for now, he just nned to leave them be and have Feng Chen deal with it when the time came.


    "And Feng Chen will likely push the job to Elder Song¡­"


    Storing the ancient scrolls, he had just finished reading, Xuan Hao made his way back to the grand elder of the Half Spirit race before handing the ancient scrolls back over to him. Not forgetting to ask for the few cksmithing blueprints among the ancient scrolls.


    "You can just take them; they are of no use to us in the first ce¡­"


    "Okay¡­"


    Not knowing why, the grand elder had epted his request so easily, Xuan Hao didn''t bother asking why, as he just stored the cksmithing blueprints for Bai Ning away.


    "Ah! I was wondering why your race have not left this small valley yet?"


    Having handed most of the ancient scrolls back to the grand elder of the Half spirit race, Xuan Hao was just about to leave when he suddenly realized he hadn''t asked why the Half Spirit race had remained inside the valley for so long.


    After all, the current strength of the Half Spirt race was more than enough to establish themselves outside!


    "The reason for this is quite simple, is there not a strong power with someone in the Soul Ascension Realm ruling over the area that this ce is located?"


    "Yes, there is the Sky Empire¡­"


    "Is that power not made up of humans? How would they like it if a foreign race suddenly begins establishes themselves inside what they consider their territory?"


    "This¡­"


    "It''s as you think, there is no way a human empire would tolerate a foreign race suddenly appearing out of nowhere. Not to mention a human empire, no race in today''s time would allow something like that¡­ Hah¡­ Sadly the Half Spirit race have no one to protect them, so we can only hide in here¡­"


    Listening to what the grand elder said, Xuan Hao suddenly felt like he began to understand why there weren''t any talk about other races than the demon beast and humans on the Ewaria Continent¡­ The other races had either been annihted or had hidden away like the Half Spirit race!


    Following the conversation about why the Half Spirit race were hidden away inside the small valley, Xuan Hao did not stay around for long. Exchanging a quick farewell with the grand elder before heading towards the underground cavework filled with demon beasts. Wanting to investigate just how strong the demon beasts below the valley truly were.


    Part of him was even hoping that there were at least some demon beasts at the Domain Lord Realm down there, as he really wanted to find out just how strong he was now that he reached the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    ¡­


    Leaving the small town, Xuan Hao headed to the ce where the grand elder of the Half Spirit race had told him that the entrance of the underground cavework was located.


    "Hm? This should be the ce¡­"


    Coming to a stop in front of a small cave, Xuan Hao felt a bit doubtful about him havinge to the correct ce. After all, the cave entrance in front of him was incredibly small. The only thing that gave him some reassurance, was the fact that his divine sense could not pass through this seemingly normal cave entrance.


    "Only one way to find out if this is the right ce¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao took a step forward and entered the small cave entrance. Soon feeling himself disappear from the small valley of the Half Spirit race before appearing inside an enormous cave.


    The cave entrance was actually a teleportation formation!?


    Realizing what had just happened, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked. After all, the ce that the Half Spirit race considered to be a cavework below their valley. Might actually be located somewherepletely different!


    This would also make more sense, as Xuan Hao felt quite doubtful when he had heard about arge cavework below the Shattered Star Peaks filled with an enormous number of powerful demon beasts.


    ROAR!


    Before he could think any further about where the teleportation formation might have taken him, a loud roar filled with a terrifying power could be heard echoing out across the enormous underground cave.


    "Looks like the grand elder was not wrong, there are indeed demon beasts stronger than him here¡­"


    Feeling a bit taken aback, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly to himself as he looked in the direction that the loud roar hade from.


    He had just been wondering whether or not he would be able to encounter any demon beasts in the Domain Lord Realm, and now one just happened to show up the moment he entered the underground cavework¡­


    Not only that, but the strength of the demon beasts should at the very least have surpassed the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    It was no wonder that even the grand elder of the Half Spirit race was scared of entering the underground cavework to hunt for demon beasts. After all, even with his strength, he would have to be extremely careful when entering.


    Catching the attention of a demon beasts that had reached the Domain Lord Realm, would spell certain death for someone like the grand elder of the Half Spirit race who had only reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Evaluating the Domain Lord Realm demon beast in the distance that had let out the powerful roar just a few seconds ago, Xuan Hao took out the sword given to him by Yi Min.


    "Hm¡­ Even though it would be great if it was stronger, this should be more than enough for me to test out my strength! I should also be able to test the strength of my new sword¡­"


    Looking over the beautiful silver sword that he had been given by Yi Min, Xuan Hao felt that it was a pity that he had not gotten an opportunity to use it yet. However, that would not be the case any longer¡­


    ROOOOAR!


    The Domain Lord demon beast had also noticed Xuan Hao, as he had revealed his presence the moment, he realized that the strongest demon beast around him was the one currently roaring at him angrily from a distance.

 Chapter 504: Underground Cave Network and...

    Chapter 504: Underground Cave Network and...


    Following the loud roar of the Domain Lord Realm demon beast, Xuan Hao watched with a shocked look on his face as arge worm made its way towards him filled with killing intent!


    Thest thing that he had expected, was for the Domain Lord Realm demon beast to be a giant worm with a length of at least a few hundred meters! Not only that, but the worm was clearly covered in a thickyer of skin that increased its defences way beyond its cultivation realm!


    However, Xuan Hao was not the slightest bit intimidated by the giant worm demon beast charging towards him. Gathering the power of his cultivation base and sword domain into the silver sword Yi Min had gifted him, Xuan Hao didn''t give the worm demon beast any time to react, as he shed down towards the worm demon beast charging towards him.


    Not having the time to question how a worm could roar in the first ce¡­


    Swish!


    Roar?


    Not having any time to react to the terrifying sword light that suddenly appeared on Xuan Hao''s sword before it was already toote, the worm demon beast was caught off-guard and ended up being sent flying into the distance-


    Bang!


    Onlying to a stop after smashing into the walls of the enormous underground cave that they were currently inside of, as arge web of cracks could be seen on the ce where Xuan Hao''s sword attack had hit it.


    Roar!


    Rumble~


    Getting up the second after it had smashed into the cave wall, the worm demon beast didn''t dare stay around after realizing how strong Xuan Hao was. Directly digging into the ground below it and escaping. Not giving Xuan Hao any chance to attack it again!


    "¡­"


    Watching the worm demon beast dig into the ground before escaping, Xuan Hao didn''t bother chasing after it, but instead looked down at the silver sword in his hand.


    From the single sh with the worm demon beast, Xuan Hao had already realized just how much stronger he waspared to before and at the same time, he also realized how important it was to have a good weapon!


    Without the silver sword that he had been given by Yi Min, there was no way for him to breakthrough the worm demon beast defence so easily!


    The reason for this was simple, as the worm demon beast was at the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and from what Xuan Hao''s experience, its defences were above that of a Late-Stage Domain Lord!


    Thinking about it¡­


    The reason why Xuan Hao was so certain about the level of defensive capabilities of a Late-Stage Domain Lord, was because of a certain general of the Sky Empire going by the name of Guan¡­


    "Hehe¡­"


    Chuckling a bit to himself when he remembered the sight of General Guan getting thrown into the barrier of the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital city again and again, Xuan hao shook his head with a small smile before returning his attention back to his surroundings.


    In the future, he would have to thank him for getting beaten up in front of him by the giant rat demon beast¡­


    For now, he would have to explore the underground cavework as the grand elder had called it and see if he could find any stronger demon beast than the worm.


    At the very least, he hoped that the other caves would be more interesting than the one he currently found himself inside of¡­


    Not only was there no other demon beasts present than the worm, but there was also nothing to see outside a barren rocky cave floor filled with several big and small craters. Most likely from past fights between demon beasts.


    Whoosh~


    Spreading out his divine sense, Xuan Hao quickly realized that there was some kind of force restricting force preventing him from fully utilizing his divine sense.


    At his current strength, he could only barely cover and area one mile around himself. Around one fourth of the cave he currently found himself inside of.


    "Hm? Looks like there is a tunnel just over there¡­ It should lead to one of the other caves in this underground cavework that the grand elder talked about¡­"


    Finding a tunnel after searching around for a few minutes, Xuan Hao didn''t bother staying in the now empty cave and directly flew towards the tunnel that he had found. Looking forward to hopefully finding a demon beast stronger than the worm he had encountered the moment he arrived.


    ¡­


    "Still barren like thest cave. The only difference is that there is no worm this time around¡­ Don''t tell me that the worm ate all the other demon beasts just before I arrived!?"


    Coming to this realization as he stared at the simrly dead and barren cave that opened up in front of him, Xuan hao could not help cursing at the worm demon beast. Beginning to regret that he didn''t chase after it to kill it off back then.


    ¡­


    "Hm!? Finally! A different cave!"


    Having wandered through god knows how many dead barren caves over the past one hour since he had first arrived in the underground cavework, Xuan Hao was just about to give up searching for the demon beasts that were present everywhere ording to the grand elder of the Half Spirit race.


    Whoosh!


    Increasing his speed, Xuan Hao froze the moment he stepped outside of the narrow tunnel he had been inside just a moment ago.


    "This¡­ I''m outside!?"


    Seeing the sun burning brightly in the sky above him, Xuan Hao was taken aback as he realized that he had indeed managed to make his way outside. Something that the grand elder had never mentioned anything about, as the demon beasts would grow stronger the further away from the entrance to the underground cavework, he went¡­


    Given the fact that the Grand Elder was only at the Nascent Soul Realm, there was no way for him to possibly deal with a demon beast like the giant worm Xuan Hao had encountered!


    "Only a single hour should have passed, why is the sun already up?"


    Realizing that something was wrong, the moment he looked up into the air, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just where he had ended up.


    Did he idently enter some Secret Realm or perhaps a Mystic Realm¡­?


    Feeling extremely confused over the situation that he found himself in, Xuan Hao didn''t notice the fact that someone was observing him with a simrly confused expression from afar.


    "Hah¡­ I should just look around for now and try to find out where I am. In the first ce, I can always leave through the teleportation formation left inside the cavework¡­"


    Sighing as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao didn''t n to stay around in front of the narrow tunnel leading into therge cavework, as he began looking around himself. Only to realize that he was in the middle of an overgrown jungle.


    Not only that, but the suppression on his divine sense had increased even further after having left the underground cavework. To make matters worse, Xuan Hao had also felt something restricting his ability to fly. Forcing him to move by the ground instead of the air once again¡­


    "I should head for somewhere to get a better look over where I am¡­"


    Whoosh~


    Climbing up a nearby tree towering more than a hundred meters into the sky, Xuan Hao looked around himself. Only to find out that an endless sea of trees spread out all around him. The only thing standing out in this sea of trees, was arge mountain piercing through the sea of tree and reaching for the clouds above.


    I should be able to get a better view from the mountain. Maybe I can also get an idea of where I am.


    Deciding to head towards therge mountain in the distance without a second thought, Xuan Hao left behind a small formation so he would be able to locate the narrow tunnel leading into the cavework in the future. After all, thest thing he wanted was to not know how to get back home again¡­


    Whoosh~


    Even when moving on the ground, Xuan Hao''s speed had not decreased by much, as he rapidly approached therge mountain in the distance. Jumping over severalrge ravines and rivers along the way.


    His divine sense restricted to the extreme, Xuan Hao didn''t even notice the fact that someone or something was following closely behind him as he moved through therge jungle¡­


    Roar!


    Along the way, Xuan Hao had also managed to discover that the jungle was filled with demon beasts. However, none of them interested him in the slightest, as most of them were only in the Nascent Soul Realm. The strongest had only barely reached the Domain Lord Realm. Far from enough to pose a challenge to the current Xuan Hao!

 Chapter 505: Primeval Jungle

    Chapter 505: Primeval Jungle


    Screech!


    Frowning as arge bird demon beast screeched at him from above, Xuan Hao was forced to hide inside a nearby ravine. Waiting patiently for a few minutes until the annoying bird demon beast left.


    By far, the most annoying part about the suppression he had found himself under, was the fact that bird demon beasts could screech threateningly at him from high up in the sky without him being able to do anything to stop this.


    Even worse, like the bird demon beast he had hidden from just a moment ago, the bird demon beasts never attacked him and instead just screeched angrily at him from the sky. Even hiding his cultivation realm didn''t help this, as the bird demon beasts still only screeched at him threateningly from the sky.


    The reason why they didn''t act against him, was likely because most of them were in the Core Formation Realm, with only a few of them having reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Entering the jungle below was an extremely dangerous thing. Given how weak they werepared to most of the demon beasts hiding inside the dense jungle foliage.


    The only thing he got out of hiding his cultivation, was being swarmed by these demon beasts hidden inside the jungle, as they were no longer fearful of him¡­


    All in all, he could not do much to stop the annoying birds from screeching at him from above and could only hide from the for a few minutes before continuing his journey towards the mountain towering above the sea of trees stretching out seemingly infinitely in all directions.


    "Hah¡­ I really hope I won''t encounter anymore of those annoying birds¡­" ncing up through the thick tree crowns covering the small ravine that he was hiding inside, Xuan Hao made sure that the bird demon beast had left before resuming his journey towards the mountain.


    Ending up quite lucky on thest part of his journey towards the mountain, Xuan Hao managed to make it all the way to the base of the mountain without any bird demon beasting to annoy him.


    Well¡­ One did show up, but it was close enough to the ground that Xuan Hao could jump up and deal with it before it even had the time to react and escape into the clouds above. Something that was extremely satisfying after being annoyed by those birds for half hour that it took him to reach the base of the mountain towering above the sea of jungle trees.


    ¡­


    Looks like I''m not the only person here¡­


    Arriving at the base of therge mountain, Xuan Hao was slightly taken aback upon discovering a group of a little over a dozen humans gathered together a short distance away from his current location. Not only that, but Xuan Hao also discovered that each of them had reached the Domain Lord Realm, there was even one of them excluding a terrifying aura of a peak Domain Lord!


    Over a dozen Domain Lords and a Peak Domain Lord! Even Xuan Hao did not have the confidence to fight such a strong group all on his own.


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, it looked like they also had their divine sense restricted and were in a simr situation as him-


    Rustle~


    Allowing him to quickly hide in the thick foliage of the jungle crawling up the side of the tall mountain before any of them discovered him.


    Hidden in the thick foliage, Xuan Hao began observing the group of Domain Lords more closely. Hoping that he could figure out where they were from and find out where he had ended up.


    "Are you really sure that this is the ce? You should know how dangerous this primeval jungle is!"


    Asking one of the weaker Domain Lord''s in the group, the leader at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm frowned slightly as he looked towards the nearby jungle trees with a cautious expression on his face.


    "Yes, I''m certain that it''s here! Don''t think that I don''t know how dangerous a primeval jungle like this is! All of us already know that a Soul Ascension Realm Expert from the central region went missing here just a few months ago!"


    """¡­"""


    Following the weaker Domain Lord''s insistence along with the mention of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert that had gone missing. The rest of the Domain Lords along with the leader quieted down for a moment a solemn look appeared on their faces.


    A Soul Ascension Realm Expert disappearing was no small matter and all of them remembered just how terrified they had been after hearing about it. At the same time, it also increased their fear towards the primeval jungle.


    "Hah¡­ If you are sure, then let''s get this over with as fast as possible¡­"


    Seeing that nobody said anything after the mention of the Soul Ascension Realm Expert that had gone missing, one of the other Domain Lords in the group sighed audibly before getting the attention of the others. Reminding them that the faster they finished what they set out for. The faster they would be able to leave the Primeval Jungle.


    "Indeed, we can''t let our past few weeks of struggle be in vain. Let''s get going and hope our brother''s information is correct¡­"


    "True, we also need to get going before it gets dark. Remember what happenedst night when-"


    After a few others in the group joined in wanting to get things over with as soon as possible so they could leave the jungle, the leader agreed, and the entire group began making their way up the mountain.


    Not noticing Xuan Hao hidden only a few hundred meters away from them. Listening to their conversation with great interest.


    ¡­


    So, this is somewhere close to the central part of the continent¡­


    Realizing just where he had ended up, Xuan hao could not help wondering why the ancient teleportation formation located inside the valley of the Half Spirit race had ended up taking him to an ancient primeval jungle close to the central part of the continent¡­


    Outside of that, Xuan Hao also became way more cautious about his surroundingspared to before. After all, the group of Domain Lords had just mentioned that a Soul Ascension Realm Expert had gone missing inside the primeval jungle a few months ago!


    No matter how strong Xuan Hao thought he was, there was still no way he thought that he would be able to escape from something that even a Soul Ascension Realm Expert could not escape from¡­


    However, even knowing all of this and how dangerous it was for someone at the Domain Lord Realm to enter the primeval jungle, the group of Domain Lords had still decided to enter the primeval jungle!


    Why did theye here and what are they looking for?


    Wanting an answer to these two burning questions, Xuan Hao decided against leaving the dangerous primeval jungle and instead decided to secretly follow the group of Domain Lords up the mountain.


    Large parts of the mountain had beenpletely covered in green foliage and small trees, as the jungle tried its best to swallow up therge mountain piercing through the clouds above. Making it easy for Xuan Hao to hide while following after the group of Domain Lords.


    Rustle~


    Shortly after Xuan Hao had left his hiding ce and followed after the group of Domain Lords, a pair of bright green eyes appeared in the foliage behind him. Following him closely as he sneakily followed behind the group of Domain Lords.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was busy inside the primeval jungle, the Order of the Sky God had just learned about the church of the gue god''s recent movement in the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "Are those people from the church of the gue god stupid? Do they really think we would just allow them to swallow up a kingdom without responding!? Archbishop Soft breeze, you will go and deal with those annoying leaches from the church of the gue god once and for all!"


    Following the angry voice of a man standing inside an enormous temple, an elderly man bowing down faithfully in front of him quickly nodded his head before answering reverently.


    "Yes, Lord Cardinal!"


    "Good! You may leave! Make sure to finish before those people from the fire cult and the moon worshippers find out, we can''t let them take in even more followers in the border region after finishing off those leaches of the gue god!"


    "Yes!"


    Nodding his head faithfully upon hearing what the Lord Cardinal said, Archbishop Soft Breeze soon disappeared out therge and exquisitely decorated entrance to the enormous temple.


    "Hmph, have an Archbishop deal with it should be more than enough, I refuse to believe that the church of the gue god sent a cardinal to deal with a mere border kingdom!"


    Shaking his head disdainfully upon mentioning thest part, the cardinal from the Order of the Sky God no longer paid any attention to his surroundings, as he closed his eyes and began praying faithfully.

 Chapter 506: Spiders?

    Chapter 506: Spiders?


    "Haha, so many spiritual herbs and all of them are above the Spirit Grade! Brother, it seems like it was a good decision for us to trust you and take the risk to enter the primeval jungle!"


    Having made their way to the top of the mountain, the leader walking in front was the first to react as he happilyughed upon seeing spiritual herbs present everywhere on the mountain peak.


    Growing everywhere on the mountain peak. Not showing the slightest sign of having been disturbed by any cultivators or demon beasts that might have passed through the area over the hundreds of years that it had taken for them to reach their current level!


    "So many spiritual herbs¡­ There are even a few at the Mystic Grade!"


    "Good brother¡­ Thanks for taking us with you when exploring this ce!"


    "Indeed, without him, we wouldn''t have been able to find this ce! Ha, if not for his insistence, none of us would have dared enter the Primeval Jungle just a few months after a Soul Ascension Realm Expert went missing!"


    "Haha, when we get back, I will make sure to help you out if you want a new weapon made."


    "Don''t forget me! I will make a few pills if yo-"


    As the group of Domain Lords were all busy praising the one who had shown them the way to the mountain peak filled with spiritual herbs, Xuan Hao hidden behind arge rock covered in ayer of green moss could not help frowning upon witnessing therge number of spiritual herbs.


    Not to mention the fact that there was no chaotic qi present in the air at the current height and the fact that the jungle nts had manged to climb all the way up to where he current was, Xuan Hao was even more disturbed by the fact that he could see more than three Mystic Grade Spiritual Herbs unprotected on the mountain peak.


    "Haha, brothers, let''s harvest these spiritual herbs before it gets dark, we can split them after we have safely left the primeval jungle!"


    With a happy smile on his face, the leader of the Domain Lords was not as worried about the unprotected spiritual herbs as Xuan Hao was. Directly taking the lead and starting to harvest the different spiritual herbs on top of the mountain peak.


    Unlike the danger Xuan Hao had expected the group of Domain Lords would encounter upon beginning to harvest the spiritual herbs. Nothing happened. Even when the leader slowly put away the Mystic Grade Spiritual Herbs on the mountain peak, there was no sign of any secretly hidden demon beast showing up to defend its precious spiritual herbs.


    A few minutes passed like this, as Xuan Hao just secretly watched how the group of Domain Lords harvested all the spiritual herbs on top of the mountain peak.


    During this short period of time, he had already taken the liberty of gazing out across therge jungle that surrounded the mountain. However, he was quite disappointed to realize that there were no signs of any human activity in sight. All he could see was the seemingly endless sea of green stretching far into the distant horizon.


    Hm?


    Staring out into the endless sea of green from behind the rock as the group of Domain Lords happily gathered the spiritual herbs on the mountain peak, Xuan Hao suddenly frowned.


    In the distance, he could barely make out something moving rapidly through the thick primeval jungle. Destroying any tree in its path!


    Along with knowing just how dangerous the primeval jungle was, Xuan Hao quickly decided to leave the mountain peak. After all, even a Soul Ascension Realm Expert could not keep themselves safe in the primeval jungle!


    Not only that, but the path of the thing moving rapidly through the primeval jungle, was very clearly the mountain he was currently on top of¡­


    "Truly a great harvest! Let''s get thest few spiritual herbs before heading back down and finding somewhere safe to stay for the night."


    Rustle~


    Ignoring the happy words from the leader of the small group of Domain Lords still unaware of something that was very likely dangerous moving in his direction, Xuan Hao quickly began descending down from the mountain peak. Making sure not to move too quickly and idently end up revealing his presence to the group of Domain Lords in the process.


    He did not n to stay around and find out what the thing heading towards the mountain peak was. After all, what would he do if what was most likely a powerful demon beast heading towards the mountain peak was also the one behind the missing Soul Ascension Realm Expert?


    Given the fact that he could not fly under the current suppression, Xuan Hao didn''t think he would be able to escape if the creature heading towards the mountain peak ended up targeting him!


    "¡­"


    Likely of the same opinion as him, the owner of the pair of bright green eyes also secretly followed after Xuan Hao down the mountain. Not showing the slightest interest towards the spiritual herbs from start to finish.


    ¡­


    Rumble~!


    "Hm? What is that?"


    Unaware of the fact that Xuan Hao and another person had already left after realizing something dangerous was approaching, the leader of the Domain Lords was taken aback upon suddenly feeling the ground beneath his feet start shaking violently.


    "T-that-"


    Looking out across the primeval jungle to try and find out where the shaking hade from, the leader was shocked upon discovering the cause of the shaking.


    "A-an emerald demon spider¡­"


    Saying this with a look of fear on his face, the leader at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm muttered out the name of the giant green spider that had crashed directly into the base of the mountain just a moment ago. If Xuan Hao was still there, he would have wondered why the leader was so terrified after seeing the emerald demon spider. After all, it was only at the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Not really something the group of Domain Lords would have to worry about with their strength.


    "Is it really an emerald demon spider¡­?"


    "Yes! We have to leave now! I think¡­ This mountain¡­ Might even be-


    Bang! Bang!


    Just before the leader managed to finish speaking, the emerald spider that still hadn''t gotten up after crashing headfirst into therge mountain suddenly began mindlessly smashing its head into the ce where it had smashed into the mountain.


    Rumble~


    Soon revealing arge passageway leading directly into the mountain hidden behind ayer of rock and dirt.


    "We have to leave! Immediately!"


    Realizing something upon seeing what the emerald demon spider did, the leader showed an even more fearful expression as the rest of the Domain Lords realized the seriousness of their situation.


    Whoosh~!


    Not saying much following this the group of Domain Lords rapidly rushed down the mountain. Abandoning the spiritual herbs that were still left on the mountain peak.


    Rumble~


    Before the group even had the time to reach the base of the mountain. Severalrge passageways suddenly appeared all across the mountain, as arge number of emerald demon spiders appeared from each of these passageways.


    Even the weakest one among them had reached the Core Formation Realm, while the stronger ones had already entered the Earlier stages of the Domain Lord Realm. Simr to the one who had smashed headfirst into the mountain in what had likely been an attempt to wake up the nest of emerald demon spiders.


    "The mountain was indeed an emerald demon spider nest! No wonder all those spiritual herbs were just sitting there without anyone guarding them! The reason why none of them were present is likely because they recently entered a deep sleep after going on an eating frenzy!"


    Realizing what had happened after seeing therge number of enormous spiders pour out in a seemingly endless stream from the mountain, the leader could not help cursing loudly.


    "Recently gone to sleep after an eating frenzy¡­ Leader¡­ Don''t tell that the Soul Ascension Realm Expert that went missing over the past few months-"


    "Don''t finish that sentence¡­ Let''s just get out of here for now. The strongest among them is still only in the early stages of the Domain Lord Realm and they have not noticed us yet. Hopefully we can get out of here before they manage to fully wake up from their sleep¡­"


    Interrupting what one of the Domain Lords beside him was about to say in an attempt to stop him from falling into despair at their current situation, the leader tried to remain optimistic, as the thick foliage of the primeval jungle grew closer and closer with each passing second.


    As long as they made it to the primeval jungle before being noticed, they should be fine, as the still barely awake emerald demon spiders would have a hard time realizing they had even been there in the first ce.


    Screech!


    However, things did not go as nned, as arge bird at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm spotted them. Screeching loudly to annoy them and of course¡­


    Rustle Rustle Rustle~!


    Alerting the emerald demon spiders in the process!


    """¡­"""


    DAMNABLE BIRD!!!

 Chapter 507: Desperate Escape

    Chapter 507: Desperate Escape


    Boom!


    Rumble~!


    Unaware of what was taking ce back at the mountain, Xuan Hao was not at all surprised upon hearing the loud explosions and rumbling sounding from behind him.


    Good thing I left before I got drawn into the fight!


    Not thinking too much about what had happened back at the mountain, Xuan Hao continued making his way back towards the underground cavework that the ancient teleportation formation he had used to arrive at the primeval jungle was located.


    Knowing that a Soul Ascension Realm Expert had very likely perished inside the primeval jungle, Xuan Hao had no ns to stay around the primeval jungle and try to look for opportunities to increase his strength.


    In the first ce, he had onlye to see the cavework that was below the valley of the Half Spirits ording to them.


    Something they would have figured out was not true if they had someone strong enough to make it out of the underground cavework and into the primeval jungle located just outside. Especially with the Domain Lord Realm worm that he had encountered just after entering the underground cavework¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while making his way through the thick foliage of the primeval jungle, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that shaking he had felt a moment ago had not stopped. Instead, it had increased in intensity!


    "Are they perhaps fighting while moving in my direction?"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao curiously looked back in the direction of the mountain before he began increasing his speed.


    No matter what, he did not want to get dragged into the battle between a powerful demon beast and a group of Domain Lords-


    Whoosh~!


    However, before he could take more than a few steps in the direction of the underground cavework, a bloodied body suddenly came flying towards him from above.


    Crack~ Bang!


    Barely dodging to the side and avoiding the bloodied body that had seeminglye out of nowhere as it crashed through a few nearby trees before finallying to a stop, Xuan Hao quickly recognized the owner of the body as one of the weaker Domain Lords from the group he had met at the mountain.


    "he''s dead¡­"


    Only needing a single nce to determine that his soul had already been extinguish before having been sent flying towards his location, Xuan Hao could not help shivering a bit at the thought of the demon beast that had caused this.


    No more than five minutes had passed since he had escaped into the jungle, yet one of the Domain Lord''s had already died! Even worse, he could clearly tell that the fight was heading in his direction from the increasingly loud sounds of battle.


    If that was not enough, he could just look up to see a fewrge broken jungle trees flying overhead. Having been sent flying by the aftershocks of the battle behind him¡­


    Bang!


    Seeing one of the broken treesnd directly in front of him, along with the sounds of battle growing closer with each passing second, Xuan Hao did not even thinking twice before escaping in the direction of the underground cavework.


    Whoosh!


    Not forgetting to pick up the now dead Domain Lord''s interspatial ring before escaping. After all, the wealth of a Domain Lord was nothing to scoff and would be immensely useful to not only him, but also his disciples. That would be especially true for a Domain Lord in question was from the central region of the Ewaria Continent!


    ¡­


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was running away from the fight taking ce behind him, the group of Domain Lords were in the same situation, as they desperately ran in the exact same direction as him.


    Rustle~ Rustle~ Rustle~


    The reason for this was simple, as the seemingly endless swarm of emerald demon spiders prevented them from moving in any other direction.


    Two people were not present in the group, one being the Domain Lord that Xuan Hao had found dead, while the other was the leader at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Swish~


    Just as the group were beginning to widen the distance between them and the emerald demon spiders chasing from behind, a painful scream suddenly echoed out from behind, as they suddenly saw their leader flying straight past them.


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    "Ah-!"


    Crashing through several ancient jungle trees stretching over a hundred meters into the air before slowing down enough to recover and join the group of bewildered Domain Lords in escaping.


    "B-big brother¡­ What on earth happened!? Didn''t you say that you would just injure the Domain Lord Realm emerald demon spiders following after us?!"


    Hearing what on of the Domain Lord''s said, the leader could not help showing a depressed smile as he shook his head helplessly.


    "An emerald demon spider at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm suddenly appeared out of nowhere andunched a sneak attack, I only barely managed to block the attack before being sent flying. By the way, where is-"


    "He is no longer with us¡­ An emerald demon spider at the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm appeared to block our escape path just when you left. In the end, he held it back. Allowing us to escape before the swarm descended upon us¡­ We didn''t see what happened, but¡­"


    "I¡­ I understand¡­"


    Realizing that they had already lost one person only a few minutes after the escape had started, the leader could not help feeling even more depressed over their current situation.


    Not to mention the fact that they had already lost one person, the Peak Domain Lord Realm emerald demon spider was even more worrisome. Especially given the fact that it had not followed him to continue its attack afterunching him flying.


    Looking around himself cautiously as he thought about this, the leader felt extremely stressed. Having to both worry about the swarm of emerald demon spiders chasing them from behind, while also having to worry about a Peak Domain Lord Realm emerald demon spiderunching a sneak attack when he least expected it.


    Stepping into a small opening that had been created by some of the trees that had been sent flying during his short sh with the Peak Domain Lord Realm emerald demon spider, the leader and the other Domain Lords discovered the dead body of the brother who had sacrificed his life to buy them a few precious seconds time to escape.


    "B-brother!"


    "W-what on earth happened to him?!"


    "His soul has already been extinguished¡­"


    Not able to waste even a single second to pick up the dead body, the group could only watch with agonized faces, as the body of their brother was consumed by the tide of giant green spiders moving towards them from behind.


    However, this was only the start of their escape, they were still far from making it out of the primeval jungle. Not to mention how difficult it would be for them to survive a single day; they would need at least a few weeks to leave the primeval jungle!


    Like this, the painful escape for the group of Domain Lords began. The second person and third person already passing away shortly after the leader had returned due to a massive surprise attack by over twenty Domain Lord Realm emerald demon spiders¡­


    The Peak Domain Lord emerald demon spider also showing up to restrain the leader before disappearing shortly after the death of the two Domain Lords.


    From the perspective of the leader and the other Domain Lords, it almost felt like the emerald demon spiders had begun ying with them.


    ¡­


    "There should be arge underground cavework somewhere over here! Remember? We camped inside one of the caves just the other day¡­ Maybe we can shake off the emerald demon spiders and escape by entering the underground cavework!"


    Already having run for close to half an hour by now, one of the only five remaining Domain Lords could not help suggesting upon realizing where they were.


    "What if it''s a dead end¡­?"


    "Do we really have an option at this point in time?! Will we be able to survive if we continue running like this!? The emerald demon spiders should be preparing tounch a final attack to finish the rest of us off! It doesn''t matter if you don''t want to take the risk, but I will!"


    Whoosh!


    Not backing down in the slightest upon hearing the Domain Lord running beside him said, the Domain Lord who suggested to enter the underground cavework didn''t wait for the others to agree to his idea and instead just directly rushed into the nearby small tunnel leading inside the cave that they had spent thest night inside of.


    "Hah¡­ What he said makes sense¡­ Why not just take the risk. At least it''s better than waiting for the emerald demon spiders tounch a final attack and kill all of us¡­"


    ""¡­""


    Hearing what their leader said, the Domain Lord who had hesitated to enter the underground cavework along with the other two silently agreed.


    Indeed¡­ Staying up on ground and running through the jungle would only get them killed in the end. Better to take a risk and possiblye out of it alive in the end!


    Whoosh!


    Not wasting too much time in front of the small tunnel entrance to the underground cavework, the remaining four Domain Lords entered. Quickly catching up to the Domain Lord who had already rushed inside.

 Chapter 508: Return of the Worm

    Chapter 508: Return of the Worm


    Roar!


    "You again?"


    Having just entered the underground cavework, Xuan Hao was taken aback upon suddenly encountering the giant roaring worm that he had met back when he had first arrived at the underground cavework located below the primeval jungle.


    Rumble~ Crack!


    Roar! Roar! Roar!


    About to rush over to kill the Domain Lord Realm worm before it had a chance to escape again, Xuan Hao was suddenly caught off-guard, as several new worms suddenly burst out from the ground around the first giant worm before joining in and starting to roar threateningly at him.


    In total, there was seven worms, all of which had reached the Domain Lord Realm. To be honest, it was really not something Xuan Hao wanted to deal with at the moment. Especially given the fact that he was trying to leave the primeval jungle before he would end up getting dragged into the trouble caused by the group of unknown Domain Lords that he had encountered back at the mountain¡­


    ROAR!


    Almost like the fear it had felt upon their first short sh had disappeared over the past few hours, the giant worm roared arrogantly before charging towards Xuan Hao together with the other six giant worms at the Domain Lord Realm. Not nning to give him a chance to escape.


    "Hah¡­ I really don''t have time for this¡­"


    Letting out a reluctant sigh as he watched oversized worms slither towards him at a speed that would put an ordinary Domain Lord to shame, Xuan Hao waved his hand, causing the silver sword he had been gifted by Yi Min to appear once again.


    Ching~


    "Hm?"


    Unsheathing the silver sword just in time to meet the angry giant worm he had wounded earlier in the day; Xuan Hao showed a slightly surprised upon noticing that he didn''t pierce through the thick skin of the worm like he had done only a few hours ago.


    Roar!


    Seeing that Xuan Hao could not cut into it''s skin like it had before, the giant worm became excited.


    Not feeling nervous after having realized that he for some reason could not pierce through the skin of the giant worm by just using his sword domain and sword together, Xuan Hao decided to try out one of the first sword attack from the Heaven Splitting Sword Art. Earth Splitting!


    "Think I can''t pierce through you skin- Why are they here!?"


    Retreating rapidly before the other worms managed to catch up andunch abined attack together with the giant worm, Xuan Hao was just about to test out the Heaven Splitting Sword Art, when a group of five familiar looking Domain Lords suddenly came running out of the same tunnel that he had used to enter the underground cavework.


    Roar?


    Rooooar roaar?


    Even the group of worms were confused over the sudden appearances of a small group of human Domain Lords. Stopping in their charge towards Xuan Hao, as they beganmunicating with each other about what to do now that even more humans had showed up.


    The group of human Domain Lords were no better, as they also came to a stop upon discovering that the cave was not empty like they had expected.


    """¡­"""


    Suddenly, everything inside the cave became silent, as the three parties began inspecting each other. Not knowing what to do in their current situation.


    Rumble~


    Before any of them even said a single word, a loud rumbling sound came from the tunnel behind the group of human Domain Lords, causing a terrified expression to appear on all their faces, as they began desperately escaping towards the tunnel leading to another cave. Not paying any attention to the worms and Xuan Hao along the way.


    The rumbling sound should be from the powerful demon beast chasing after them! For them to be that terrified even with someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm around¡­ It might be a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast chasing them!


    Realizing that it was best for him to leave, Xuan Hao was not one to pointlessly stay and fight the worms, as he quickly entered the tunnel leading to the next cave before the group of human Domain Lords.


    Whoosh~!


    "W-what in the world?!"


    "Who was that¡­?"


    "So fast, he should at least be someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. Maybe even someone who is half a step into the Soul Ascension Realm!"


    Unaware of the impression that he had left on the Human Domain Lords, Xuan Hao rapidly rushed towards the location of the ancient teleportation formation, there was no way he was confident in facing something like a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast!


    Especially given the fact that the group of more than a dozen human Domain Lords and a Peak Domain Lord had already failed. Leaving only five of them alive!


    For now, all he had to focus on, was getting to the ancient teleportation formation and getting out of the primeval jun-


    Skitter Skitter~


    Before he could even make it through to the other side of the tunnel, Xuan Hao found his path forward blocked off by arge red ant.


    "A red ant?"


    Not thinking too much about the sudden appearance of a red ant, Xuan Hao swung his sword towards arge red ant that had suddenly appeared in front of him. Intending to kill it quickly before moving on.


    After all, the ant was only in the Nascent Soul Realm, so a casual swing was more than enough for him to deal with it with his current strength!


    Swish~


    Effortlessly cutting it in half before it even had the time to react, Xuan Hao rushed past its dead body.


    "More ants¡­?"


    Only to realize, that there were even more of the red ants behind the one he just killed¡­


    "Looks like they are only in the Core Formation Realm."


    Muttering this to himself as he stopped for a short moment to observe the red ants, Xuan Hao thrust his sword forward after realizing that they were only in the Core Formation Realm.


    Fwoosh!


    Along the de of the sword, a silver-coloured sword light was formed before it shot out towards the red ants. Instantly sweeping through the red ants before they had any time to respond. Killing all of them!


    The sword light formed by his sword domain was indeed quite useful when it came to dealing with a bunch of weaker opponents. Especially so in a ce where the range of both his divine sense and domain had been limited¡­


    Arriving at the other side of the tunnel only a few seconds after having killed off the red ants blocking his path, Xuan Hao suddenly froze on the spot.


    "This¡­ Is quite troublesome¡­"


    Staring at the seemingly endless sea of red spiders covering the entire cave in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help shivering at the sheer number of red ants crawling around in front of him.


    Even if the strongest one among them had only reached the early stages of the Domain Lord Realm and was of no real threat to him, it did not lessen the fear brought along by the sight of the seemingly endless sea of ants that covered everything inside the cave.


    Not to mention, the red ants had the advantage of numbers. Fighting them did not really seem like a good idea¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Hiding before the red ants managed to spot him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling thankful for the fact that the area around the tunnel entrance was one of the only ces inside the cave that the red ants had yet to cover up.


    Is there going to be more ants in the other caves? What about the teleportation formation? Have any of the ants entered it and begun attacking the Half Spirit town?


    With these questions swirling through his mind, Xuan Hao suddenly felt the presence of the five human Domain Lordsing towards him from the other side of the tunnel.


    "Stop!"


    Stepping forward before the group could rush into the ant covered cave, Xuan Hao felt relieved upon seeing the person in fronting to a stop upon hearing what he said.


    "Everyone, stop"


    Along with the words of the person in the front, the group of Domain Lords quickly came to a stop.


    If they ignored him and charged forward, they would have ended up being spotted by the red ants on the other side.


    "Might I ask why you stopped us? As you should have realized by now, we are currently in the process of esca- That!? Primeval Fire Ants!? Don''t tell me¡­ Did we perhaps walk into a primeval fire ant nest¡­?"


    Before the leader of the group of Domain Lords even had the time to finish his sentence, he quickly discovered the red ants covering the entire cave in front of them.


    Hm¡­ So, they are called primeval fire ants¡­


    "Indeed, quite a troublesome situation all of us have found ourselves in. Might I ask what demon beast was chasing after you and your group? From the looks of it, it should be a quite powerful one¡­"


    Noting down the name of the red ants, Xuan Hao didn''t show the slightest bit of nervousness on his face. Calmly asking the leader currently looking like he was about to break down after seeing the seemingly endless sea of ants blocking their path forward.

 Chapter 509: Primeval Fire Ants vs Emerald Demon Spiders!

    Chapter 509: Primeval Fire Ants vs Emerald Demon Spiders!


    "What kind of demon beast is chasing after us¡­?"


    "Yes, I was wondering what got you all so scared. Especially given the fact that you are at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    Saying this, Xuan Hao could not help looking curiously at the man at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. Feeling even more curious about the demon beast that was chasing them.


    Back at the mountain, he had not managed to catch a glimpse of the demon beasts rushing towards the mountain. Leaving before it showed up to avoid the trouble, that he now found himself in the middle of anyway.


    All things considered; it had beenpletely useless to run a bit earlier. In the end, he was now sandwiched between the primeval fire ants and the demon beasts chasing after the group of Domain Lords standing just next to him¡­


    "It''s not just a demon beast chasing after us¡­ We¡­ Happened to antagonize an emerald demon spider nest. Quite simr to the primeval fire ant nest that we now find ourselves inside of¡­"


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after hearing what the man said, Xuan Hao could already imagine an endless tide of spidersing towards them from the other side of the tunnel at any moment.


    "In the end, we are stuck between a rock and a hard ce¡­ Hah¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he let out a sigh at the end, Xuan Hao could not help butment over his current situation. From the looks of it, he would have no way out of fighting his way to the ancient teleportation formation deeper inside the underground cavework¡­ Or, well¡­ Primeval fire ant nest¡­


    Who in the world builds a teleportation formation in such a dangerous location in the first ce!?


    Cursing the people who had chosen such a location for a teleportation formation, Xuan Hao forgot that thousands, if not tens of thousands of years had likely passed since the construction of the teleportation formation and the time when the primeval fire ant nest appeared.


    Bang!


    Interrupting his train of thought, Xuan Hao could not help frowning upon noticing a giant green spider at the Nascent Soul Realm suddenly appear on the other side of the tunnel before rushing towards them.


    Looks like the emerald demon spiders showed up already.


    Thinking this to himself Xuan Hao casually shed his sword down in the direction of the emerald demon spider before the other Domain Lords present had any time to react to the appearance of the spider.


    Swish~


    A silver-coloured light instantly formed and flew past the group of Domain Lords before directly shing the Nascent Soul Realm emerald demon spider in half.


    Screec-


    Letting out what sounded like a painful screeching sound upon suddenly being shed in half by the sword light. The spider''s soul barely managed to stay alive for a little over a second after the death of the body before being consumed by the silver-coloured sword light.


    "Let''s get out of here before more spiders show up, we can try to use the ants to distract them. Maybe we will be able to get a chance to escape during the chaos!"


    Before Xuan Hao even said a single word following the death of the spider, the Peak Domain Lord seemed to have calmed down as he suggested this.


    "Let''s try that¡­ We can try and hide behind some of therge rocks just outside the entrance and wait for the spiders and ants to sh with each other before trying to escape."


    Even if the Peak Domain Lord had somewhat lost hope when it came to getting out alive after discovering that he had entered a primeval fire ant nest, he is clearly not one to give up without at least trying¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he agreed with the idea, Xuan Hao and the five other Domain Lords soon snuck out of the tunnel entrance before hiding behind a few different smaller rocks located just next to the cave wall and only a few dozen meters away from the entrance to the tunnel.


    During the entire process of sneaking out of the tunnel entrance, Xuan Hao made sure to keep an eye on both the primeval fire ants and the human Domain Lords. After all, there was no way he could just trust a group ofplete strangers. Especially given their current circumstances and the fact that they might try to use him as a distraction to escape themselves¡­


    The reason why they were so friendly since meeting, was likely due to the fact that the primeval fire ants were located just next to them!


    Rumble~


    Keeping an eye on everyone, Xuan Hao could not help growing nervous as he watched the tunnel beginning to shake violently all of a sudden. Quietly deciding to move as far away as possible, while both the human Domain Lords and the primeval fire ants had their attention focused on the tunnel that began shaking more and more violently with each passing second.


    Screeeeeech!


    Along with a rather annoying screeching sound, the first emerald appeared. Instantly alerting primeval fire ants, who remained silent for a short moment to examine the spider that had suddenly appeared inside their nest.


    Screech!


    Seemingly undeterred by the cave filled with primeval fire ants, the emerald demon spider charged forward and attacked the closest primeval fire ants.


    Given the fact that the emerald demon spider that had appeared was at the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, the destruction brought upon by it attacking the outer edges of the sea of primeval fire ants was instantly visible, as most of the primeval fire ants located there was only at the Core Formation Realm.


    Boom!


    The attacks of the emerald demon spider instantly killed thousands of primeval fire ants. Followed by the fact that more and more emerald demon spiders appeared from the tunnel entrance, therge sea of primeval fire ants instantly began responding to the sudden attack by the emerald spiders that had begun pouring into their nest.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Soon enough, both the emerald demon spiders and the primeval fire ants were engaged in a bloody battle.


    Xuan Hao and the other human Domain Lords were watching this bloody scene happily, as none of them had been discovered yet.


    Looking for an opening to charge through the battlefield and reach a tunnel leading towards the cave of the ancient teleportation formation, Xuan Hao kept his attention mainly focused on the Domain Lords present inside the cave.


    Most of the primeval fire ant and emerald demon spider Domain Lords were already locked in battle, but for some reason. The stronger Domain Lords on both sides had not moved yet.


    Because of this, the human Domain Lords had yet to act and were still waiting around looking for an opportunity just like him.


    The battle continued like this for the next minute before one of the stronger primeval fire ants suddenly moved. Instantly killing two of the emerald demon spider''s weaker Domain Lords.


    BOOM!


    Along with the move from the primeval fire ant Domain Lord, the emerald demon spider''s stronger Domain Lords also joined the battle.


    Not even a few secondster, an opportunity appeared!


    This is it!


    Seeing a Peak Domain Lord emerald demon spider and a Peak Domain Lord primeval fire ant begin shing with each other, Xuan Hao decided to take his chance and rush towards the tunnel entrance leading to the next cave.


    Using the highest speed possible under the suppression in the primeval jungle, Xuan Hao jumped on the head of a giant emerald demon spider before using it as a steppingstone to jump across the battlefield in the direction of the tunnel leading to the next cave.


    Bang!


    Whoosh~


    Along with jumping off the head of the emerald demon spider, the sheer strength put into his legs instantly crushed the head of the unlucky emerald demon spider that had been chosen to be used by him.


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    The emerald demon spider was not alone in this unfortunate fate, as several other emerald demon spiders and primeval fire ants encountered the same fate only a few secondster. Having been used by Xuan Hao to traves through the chaotic battlefield without having to deal with anyone attacking him-


    Fwoosh~


    At least he would have liked for things to y out like that, but a few nearby primeval fire ants at the Domain Lord Realm had almost instantly spotted him, as theyunched several enormous balls of fire towards him while charging over. Not showing the slightest bit of care towards the primeval fire ants that they would inevitably end up killing with their attacks.


    Swish~


    BOOM!


    Narrowly dodging the attacks from the primeval fire ant Domain Lords, Xuan Hao nimbly ran past them without fighting before continuing his charge towards the tunnel leading out of the now war-torn cave.


    Much to the bewilderment of the primeval fire ant Domain Lords, who had expected for him to fight with them¡­

 Chapter 510: Back Again...

    Chapter 510: Back Again...


    Whoosh~


    Following closely in Xuan Hao''s footsteps, the other human Domain Lords also decided to use the opportunity to move out from their hiding spots. Charging towards a different tunnel closer to them and at the same time avoiding most of the Domain Lord Realm Experts on both the spiders and ants'' side.


    However, they were not able to reach the tunnel peacefully, as a group of emerald demon spider Domain Lords barely managed to block them before they could escape from the cave.


    Boom!


    A loud explosion suddenly echoed across therge battlefield inside the enormous underground cave as a Domain Lord from the emerald demon spiders side stepped forward and blocked the advance of the human Domain Lords.


    Soon, the human Domain Lords and the emerald demon spider began fighting, with more and more emerald demon spider Domain Lordsing over to help out. The difference this time around, was that the emerald demon spiders were no longer at an advantage, as they now also had to deal with the primeval fire ants at the same time. Only capable of having a small number of their Domain Lords rush over to fight with the human Domain Lords to prevent them from escaping again.


    Like this, the human Domain Lords slowly began to push back the emerald demon spiders. Getting closer and closer to the tunnel leading out of the war-torn cave.


    ncing over from the side to see their situation, Xuan Hao was surprised to see the Peak Domain Lord from the group of human Domain Lords singlehandedly fight five emerald demon spider Domain Lords!


    Even more astonishing was the fact that he had managed to grievously injure two of the weaker ones and looked like he was about to go in for a killing blow!


    A Peak Domain Lord was indeed not one to be underestimated!


    Shaking his head at this thought as he turned his attention back towards the path in front of him, Xuan Hao noticed that a few Domain Lords among the primeval fire ants had already rushed in front of him and was blocking his path forward.


    Fwoosh!


    This time around, they didn''t wait around like thest group he had rushed past, but instead took the initiative tounch an attack towards him. Clearly not nning to let him slip past them like he had just done when the first group attempted to stop him.


    FWOOSH!


    Feeling the terrifying fire surging towards him under the guidance of the primeval fire ants before taking the form of a giant sea of fire, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes.


    Not only was the attack far more powerful, but the weaker primeval fire ants along the path of the sea of fire was not affected by it at all. Instead, they seemingly merged together with it and strengthened the sea of fire even further!


    Different from the enormous fire balls that the other primeval fire ants had thrown at him. Therge sea of fire conjured up through thebined effort of these primeval fire ants was simply terrifying¡­


    This time around, there was no way for him to escape!


    Knowing that there was no way to dodge the sea of fire conjured forth by the primeval fire ants, Xuan Hao could not help thinking about the Heaven Splitting Sword Art¡­ As of now, he still had not gotten an opportunity to try out the Earth Splitting Sword form the Heaven Splitting Sword Art¡­


    Crack~


    Looking over towards the sea of fire growing closer, Xuan Hao was just about to use the Earth Splitting Sword, when arge number of familiar worms suddenly broke through the rocky ground in front of him.


    Bang!


    Getting hit by therge sea of fire before they even had the time to react¡­


    Fwoosh!


    As the fire sea of the primeval fire ants hit the giant worm that had now grown even stronger, Xuan Hao watched with amazement how the skin of the worm turned bright red before it began to rapidly absorb the sea of fire before it even had a chance to harm the other worms beside it.


    ROAR!


    "¡­"


    Listening to the angry roar of the all too familiar worm that had now shown up again with even more Domain Lord Realm worms following behind it, Xuan Hao didn''t even bother questioning why it had grown even stronger within the span of only a few minutes.


    The first time he had seen it, it was at the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, a few minutes ago, it was at the sixth stage and now it was at the seventh stage!


    Meaning, the worm had gone from the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Increasing in strength by one minor realm every time it had escaped. Now firmly cing it at the same realm as him¡­.


    Would the worm demon beast reach the Soul Ascension Realm if he caused it to run away a few more times¡­?


    Shaking his head as he threw this thought to the back of his mind for now, Xuan Hao focused on the battle currently taking ce in front of him.


    The primeval fire ants, caught off-guard by the sudden appearance of the worms, were currently in the process of beingpletely massacred by said worms. The main reason for this, was also because there was no more than four primeval fire ant Domain Lords present, while there were more than twenty worms at the same realm.


    Not to mention the now Late-Stage Domain Lord Realm leading the charge against the primeval fire ants¡­


    I should get out of here before they are finished with the primeval fire ants¡­


    Knowing very well that he was the target of the worms, Xuan Hao didn''t intend to stay around and wait for them to finish off the small group of primeval fire ant Domain Lords.


    Whoosh~


    Using the chaos currently taking ce, Xuan Hao minimized his presence before sneaking past both the worms and the primeval fire ants.


    Thud!


    Soon finding himself directly in front of arge empty tunnel leading further into the underground cavework without having to fight any of the worms or the primeval fire ants...

 Chapter 511: Eerie Underground Jungle

    Chapter 511: Eerie Underground Jungle


    "This is really too easy¡­"


    Muttering this to himself with a wry smile on his face as he looked towards the primeval fire ants and the worms fighting, Xuan Hao decided not to say anything more. After all, it could only be considered a good thing that he didn''t have to join in on the chaotic fighting like the other human Domain Lords had been forced into.


    Even if they were still getting closer and closer to the tunnel they had decided to escape through, Xuan Hao could easily see them taking too long. Ultimately resulting in them getting overwhelmed by either the primeval fire ants or the emerald demon spiders.


    Looking over the battlefield onest time before leaving the chaotic underground cave, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the ones winning in the end would be the emerald demon spiders. The reason for this, was the fact that a seemingly endless tide of emerald demon spiders had been flowing into the cave since the start of the fight. Not showing any signs of stopping.


    The primeval fire ants on the other hand were getting pushed back further and further by the emerald demon spiders. Not that they had fewer reinforcementsing in from a few dozen tunnels behind them, but because the over twenty worm Domain Lords had been enraged and started massacring them...


    Boom!


    Along with a loud explosion echoing through the cave, Xuan Hao watched a Peak Domain Lord Realm emerald demon spider sessfully pierce through the head of one of the five remaining human Domain Lords. Leaving only four behind to fight off the emerald demon spiders.


    All of a sudden, they came toplete halt. No longer able to progress forward anymore.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao understood that the emerald demon spiders would likely soon take control of the chaotic situation inside the cave.


    Whoosh~


    Not caring about what happened in the cave behind him, Xuan Hao quickly left before he also ended up getting caught like the human Domain Lords.


    In the first ce, the human Domain Lords life and death did not really matter to him. After all, they wereplete strangers! There was no way he was going to risk his life saving them!


    Especially when there was a Peak Domain Lord Realm emerald demon spider closely watching their every move. Looking for an opportunity to attack!


    "Hm?"


    Arriving at the cave on the other side of the tunnel only a few secondster, Xuan Hao came to a stop once again. Not daring to rush forward after seeing that the formerly barren cave in front of him had be a miniature replica of the primeval jungle above.


    How a barren cave only filled with rocks had suddenly turned into a lush jungle deep underground without any light or water source nearby was by far one of the most puzzling things he had seen so far, and a feeling kept telling him to turn around and run away from this weird eerie underground jungle.


    Whatever happened back in the cave filled with primeval fire ants, emerald demon spiders and worms, was better than what might be hiding inside the jungle that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere.


    However, if he wanted to reach the ancient teleportation formation, he would have to go through the weird underground jungle¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out a sigh, Xuan Hao cautiously looked around himself before taking a step forward. Entering the eerie and dark jungle. Deciding against what his instincts told him¡­


    Thump~


    Just as Xuan Hao entered the weird jungle, a small figure appeared in the spot he had been standing a few moments ago, a pair of bright green eyes barely visible inside the dark underground cave.


    Standing inplete silence, the small figure looked towards the eerie jungle Xuan Hao had just entered with a reluctant look clearly visible in the pair of bright green eyes.


    "¡­"


    As a few seconds passed, the sounds from the battle happening in the cave that Xuan Hao and the small figure had juste from began to grow closer.


    Standing around just long enough to witness arge worm charging over from the other side of the tunnel. The small figure seemed to havee to a decision.


    Whoosh~


    Leaving the tunnel opening and entering the eerie jungle following after Xuan Hao.


    Roar!


    Following closely behind, a familiarrge worm roared loudly before appearing at the entrance to the eerie jungle.


    BOOM!


    However, different from Xuan Hao and the small figure with the pair of bright green eyes. The worm violently forced itself to stop upon seeing the weird jungle. Directly destroying the tunnel entrance in the process.


    R-roar¡­


    Letting out a seemingly fearful roar, the worm didn''t chase after Xuan Hao and instead dug into the ground before escaping. Clearly fearful of the eerie jungle.


    ¡­


    There was no light, no animals, no demon beasts inside the jungle¡­ Not even a single sound could be heard as Xuan Hao cautiously made his way through the eerie jungle. Prepared to attack at a moments notice, as a silvery light covered the sword firmly held in his hand.


    Walking through the eerie jungle, Xuan Hao quickly realized that his divine sense seemed to have been renderedpletely useless. Even seeing a few dozen meters around him was difficult. Let alone covering a third of the cave like he had been able to do inside the other underground caves¡­


    BOOM!


    Hearing arge explosion like sound behind him in the direction he hade from, Xuan Hao quickly increased his speed. After all, there was a high chance that the worms had given up fighting with the primeval fire ants after realizing he had escaped before following after him.


    Along with him increasing his speed, Xuan Hao had unknowingly failed to notice the jungle trees a bit further away from him sway in an excited manner, as therge thick jungle vines curling around them and on the ground beneath them slowly beginning to move in his direction¡­

 Chapter 512: Flying~

    Chapter 512: Flying~


    Whoosh~


    Getting close enough to the unsuspecting Xuan Hao making his way through the eerie jungle, the thick jungle vines slithering along the ground and in the canopy above suddenly shot towards Xuan Hao. Rapidly closing in on him from all directions.


    "Hmph!"


    Noticing the jungle vines moving towards him from all directions the moment they entered the small area covered by his divine sense, Xuan Hao moved the sword in his hand and executed the Rain Sword Art defensively.


    Swish!


    Blocking any of the jungle vines before they managed to reach him-


    Whoosh!


    However, the jungle vines kepting in greater and greater numbers. No matter how many he cut down, there seemed to be no end to them!


    I have to destroy the source of these jungle vines¡­


    As this thought crossed his mind, Xuan Hao began putting way more power and qi into his sword attacks-


    BOOM!


    Inevitably, this instantly caused a devastating level of destruction to his surroundings, as the power of a Seventh Stage Domain Lord was on full disy!


    Even if he was just using a simple sword art like the Rain Sword Art defensively, the power was not something that the surrounding eerie jungle could withstand. Soon enough, everything within a thousand-meter radius was destroyed.


    The jungle vines also stopped their attack as Xuan Hao got some time to inspect his surroundings.


    After the eerie jungle around him had been destroyed, Xuan Hao clearly felt the restriction on his divine sense lessen visibly. To the point that he managed to see the true appearance of the ''eerie jungle'' that had suddenly covered the cave he was inside of¡­


    "What in the world is this¡­"


    Not able to describe what he was seeing after his divine sense prated a few meters into the ground beneath him, Xuan hao could only begin cursing to himself after feeling the terrifying aura excluded from arge creature just below him.


    The creature in question was definitely above the Domain Lord Realm! Not to mention, it was farrge than what his divine sense could cover. However, given what he could see, it would not be shocking if the creature was bigger than the cave of the eerie jungle!


    The only good thing about this discovery, was the fact that he realized that the creature below him was in some sort of dormant state. Not waking up even after the destruction he had caused above ground...


    "Hm? The jungle is recovering...?"


    Fully focused on therge dormant creature below him, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed that the jungle around him was rapidly growing back during the short moment he had been looking away.


    At this point in time, the thousand meters of space between him and the jungle had already been reduced to nothing more than a hundred meters space!


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao could not help frowning. No matter how he looked at it, the eerie jungle was almost certainly rted to therge dormant creature below him. If he continued to damage it, wouldn''t he end up risking waking up the creature below him¡­


    Not only that, but the jungle veins inside the regrown part of the jungle he had just destroyed, was way stronger than the ones he had encountered just a moment ago. At most, there had been two or threeparable to the Nascent Soul Realm, while the majority had been around the Core Formation Realm and the Foundation Establishment Realm in strength.


    The new, thicker, and stronger jungle veins on the other hand¡­ Were far stronger!


    From what he could tell, at least one in five of them had already reached a levelparable to the Nascent Soul Realm!


    The number of Nascent Soul Realm jungle veins might not sound like anything dangerous. Especially considering that Xuan Hao had reached the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, But¡­ There were more than ten thousand jungle veins in the eerie jungle all around him!


    Dealing with them while his domains were severely limited and having to worry about idently waking up whatever creature was dormant below him; Xuan Hao really just wanted to leave and not have to deal with such a troublesome situation.


    New jungle trees and foliage sprouting up from the ground seemingly out of thin air.


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out a sigh as the eerie jungle slowly grew closer and closer all around him, Xuan Hao fastened his grip around his sword before looking in the direction of the tunnel leading towards the ancient teleportation formation was located.


    His best option was to get out before he ended waking up the dormant creature below him or got overwhelmed by the increasingly strong jungle veins all around him.


    Remembering some of the things in the higher levels of the Drifting Cloud Steps, Xuan Hao realized that he could have easily gotten out of his current situation. Especially a part that allowed him to fly without the use of his domain¡­


    I really wish I spend more time learning the Drifting Cloud Steps¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about the only good movement technique he had learnt, Xuan Hao decided to properly master the technique if he managed to get out of his current situation.


    No matter what, one of the most important things for a cultivator, was their ability to run away if things got too dangerous. Something he had neglected for far too long!


    Wait¡­ My sword intent fused together with my domain, if I cover my sword with it like in the past, can''t I use it to fly¡­?


    Freezing for a short moment as this thought appeared, Xuan Hao took out the sword he had used to fly in the past from his interspatial ring and threw it on the ground before stepping on top of it.


    Whoosh~


    "¡­"


    Flying into the air without any difficulty, Xuan Hao did not know what to say. Ever since reaching the Domain Lord Realm, he had only ever used his domain to fly.


    In the process, he had forgotten the fact that he could use his sword intent, or now sword domain, to cover his sword and use it to fly!

 Chapter 513: Easy Escape

    Chapter 513: Easy Escape


    Whoosh!


    Whoosh!


    Whoosh!


    Standing on top of his sword a few dozen meters above the ground, Xuan Hao didn''t have any time to reflect on his past mistakes, as the jungle veins from the jungle below him shot into the air towards him.


    During the short period of time that he had been thinking about how he could have forgotten about the fact that he could fly with a sword, the eerie jungle had already managed topletely recover and cover the area he had just destroyed.


    Swish~


    Dodging the first few jungle veins, Xuan Hao didn''t stay around for much longer, as he quickly flew towards the tunnel leading out of the eerie jungle cave and towards the ancient teleportation formation.


    Given the fact that he could now fly, this was easily aplished, as the jungle veins on the ground below could not catch up to him. During this short time, Xuan Hao had also realized that the qi consumed to enable flight in the underground cave, was terrifying.


    Even the short flight taking him to the tunnel leading out of the eerie jungle cave, consumed close to half of the qi inside his dantian!


    Something he was more than willing to do. Given that he would have to face an endless swarm of increasing strong jungle veins and the possibility of waking up the creature below the eerie jungle up if he didn''t¡­


    However, it did look like it would be impossible for him to fly as freely as he had hoped-


    Rumble~


    Taken aback by a loud rumbling sounding from the direction he hade from, Xuan Hao quickly guessed that either the emerald demon spiders or the primeval fire ants had entered the cave and were-


    BOOOOOM!


    Not able to finish his train of thought, Xuan Hao shivered as he felt a terrifying shockwave heading towards his location.


    From the shockwave alone, Xuan Hao could tell that someone at theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm had justunched an all-out attack towards the eerie jungle.


    Are they trying to wake up that thing¡­?


    Not daring to stay any longer after seeing how crazy either the emerald demon spiders or primeval fire ants had gotten, Xuan Hao quickly escaped through the tunnel behind him on foot to not waste his remaining qi. Increasing his speed as much as he could.


    No matter what, he had to get out before the creature dormant below the eerie jungle woke up!


    Whoosh~


    Seemingly of the same mindset as him, the small figure with the bright green pair of eyes hidden behind a rock just next to the tunnel entrance Xuan Hao had entered, quickly got up and rushed after Xuan Hao.


    Just barely keeping enough distance between them so that Xuan Hao didn''t notice someone was following behind him.


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ I didn''t¡­ Hah¡­ Expect that we would be able¡­ Hah¡­ To get out alive!"


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was rushing towards the direction of the ancient teleportation formation. The human Domain Lords, who had looked like they were about to be overwhelmed by the emerald demon spiders when Xuan Hao hadst seen them, wereying exhaustedly on the ground inside a barren cave.


    From the four Xuan Hao had seen, there was now only three people left. The leader at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm being one of them.


    "True, we have to thank those worms¡­"


    Looking over thest two of his brothers still left alive, the leader of the human Domain Lords showed an extremely depressed expression while saying this, as he remembered how they had managed to escape from the chaotic cave.


    Back then, they had beenpletely surrounded by the emerald demon spiders and were about to be killed off, when suddenly, arge worm at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Followed by several other worms at the Domain Lords Realm. Pierced through the ground all around them. Blocking the attacks of the emerald demon spiders.


    Following this, the worms all began letting out all sorts of weird roars before crazily attacking the emerald demon spiders. Completely ignoring them in the process.


    Knowing that such an opportunity was not likely to appear again, he had grabbed his two barely alive brothers and rushed towards the tunnel before escaping with them. Not looking back to see how the fight between the emerald demon spiders and the worms was ying out.


    Only a few minutes had passed since then and they had only barely recovered a small amount of qi. Fighting at this point in time was pretty much impossible, as he had used almost all of his qi to increase his speed while carrying his two brothers to safety.


    "Big brother¡­ Do you think the emerald demon spiders will follow us¡­?"


    Hearing the voice of one of his brothers, the leader, or big brother, looked towards the tunnel only a short distance away from them.


    "I don''t think they will. After all, they should have alreadye for us if they did¡­"


    Saying this, he stood up before signalling for the two others to do the same.


    Even if they had not recovered enough yet, they couldn''t just stay still and hope that the emerald demon spiders had forgotten about them.


    The most likely reason why they had not followed after them, was the worms that had appeared and saved their lives.


    Back when he escaped with his two brothers, he still remembered the fact that there had been over twenty worms at the Domain Lord Realm present! Dealing with so many Domain Lords would take some time. Even for the emerald demon spiders¡­ And that was not even mentioning the giant worm at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    "Let''s hope we won''t encounter anything like an emerald demon spider nest on our way back¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he walked forward, the leader of the human Domain Lords began thinking about how he would exin the massive loss of Domain Lords when he got back home¡­

 Chapter 514: Ancient Teleportation Formation!

    Chapter 514: Ancient Teleportation Formation!


    Entering the cave with the ancient teleportation formation, Xuan Hao was relieved upon realizing that nothing had changed during the time he had left. No primeval fire ant nest had appeared covering the entire cave and no dormant creature above the Domain Lord Realm had suddenly shown up below the surface!


    Xuan Hao even made sure to check for thest one the moment he entered the cave just in case he really was unlucky enough to encounter such a situation again.


    "Finally¡­"


    Seeing the ancient teleportation formation appear in front of him without any signs of damage after travelling for only a few short seconds, Xuan Hao felt extremely relieved knowing that nothing had happened to the ancient teleportation formation during the short period of time he had left.


    To be honest, given what he had encountered on his way back through the now active underground cavework, Xuan Hao had expected to also encounter something in the cave of the ancient teleportation formation.


    However, he was not at all disappointed after realizing that nothing had changed and was overall just happy about the fact that he would be able to leave the cave without having to risk his life...


    The things he had seen in what had essentially only been a little over an hour, was more than enough to make him want to go back to the Shattered Star Peak and destroy the ancient teleportation formation on that side. Making sure that none of the things from the primeval jungles side could make it through to the other side.


    After all, be it primeval fire ants, emerald demon spiders or the dormant creature above the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao did not want any of them to pass through the ancient teleportation formation and appear on the Shattered Star Peak.


    Having any of those three appear inside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect, was nothing short of a sect destroying disaster to the current Flying Sword Sect! Even Xuan Hao had no confidence in dealing with any of them at his current realm¡­


    Thump~


    Arriving in front of the ancient teleportation formation almost perfectly blending in with its surroundings, Xuan Hao looked around himself for a short moment before stepping onto the ancient teleportation formation.


    Fwish~


    A split second after stepping onto the ancient teleportation formation, Xuan Hao found himself back in the valley of the Half Spirit Race. No issues had taken ce during the process and from looking around at the valley, it looked like nothing had gotten through the ancient teleportation formation and entered the Half Spirit Race''s valley.


    "Now-"


    Boom!


    "Hm?"


    Trying to destroy the ancient teleportation formation, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he felt like a normal mortal trying to destroy a mountain with his fists.


    The ancient teleportation formation was simply way too strong! Even if he had not put too much strength into his attack, it was still more than enough for him to understand that he wouldn''t be able to destroy the ancient teleportation formation with his current strength.


    Thinking about it, this also made sense. After all, the other part of the teleportation formation was located inside the primeval jungle where demon beast above the Domain Lord Realm were present. Without being strong enough, there was no way it would have been able to survive for so long!


    However, this was not something Xuan Hao was the slightest bit happy about. After all, how would he possibly feel safe knowing what was on the other side of the ancient teleportation formation?


    Now, he couldn''t even destroy the formation and prevent anything from crossing over from the other side. All he could do was hope that the ancient teleportation was not discovered. Something he doubted would not happen¡­ After all, the emerald demon spiders or primeval fire ants would likely step into it as long as they swarmed the cave that the ancient teleportation formation was inside of!


    No matter what, he had to prevent this from happening!


    Fwish~


    Stepping through the ancient teleportation formation once again, Xuan Hao wanted to try and hide the ancient teleportation formation with some of the rocks from the cave. At least that way, the ancient teleportation formation would not be discovered as easily. Especially given the fact that the ancient teleportation formation was invisible to divine sense and could only be discovered by seeing it with one''s own eyes.


    However, things did not go as nned, as Xuan Hao suddenly found himself staring directly into a pair of bright green eyes the moment, he arrived on the other side of the ancient teleportation formation.


    Whoosh~


    Before he even had any time to inspect the other party, the owner of the pair of bright green eyes jumped past him and entered the ancient teleportation formation.


    All he manged to see was what looked like a few different vines and other sorts of nts attached to the owner of the bright green pair of eyes before the other party disappeared through the ancient teleportation formation.


    Not intending to let anything from the primeval jungle run free inside what was essentially his sect''s territory, Xuan hao rushed back through the ancient teleportation formation. Intending to follow the creature that had just passed through it.


    Fwish~


    Not seeing anyone after returning to the valley of the Half Spirit Race, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes before spreading his divine sense out in all directions around him. Instantly covering the mountain that the valley of the Half Spirit Race was inside of before covering all of the Shattered Star Peaks and the growing town at the base of the Shattered Star peaks, until finally spreading out several kilometers in all directions around the Shattered Star Peak.


    Outside of the top of the Second and Main Star Peak. Everything within a 10-kilometre radius of the Shattered Star Peaks became visible to him!


    "Hm?"


    Not seeing the owner of the pair of bright green eyes even after this, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he narrowed his eyes and began a more thorough inspection of his surroundings.


    The time frame between him and the owner of the pair of bright green eyes entering the ancient teleportation formation was less than a second. There was no way for the other party to escape the range of his divine sense in this short amount of time!


    Meaning¡­ The other party was likely hiding somewhere nearby and had somehow been able to hide from his divine sense!


    Whoosh~


    As this thought passed through his mind, Xuan Hao began using his domain to investigate his surroundings.


    Compared to his divine sense, it was way harder to hide from his domain. After all, his domain would epass everything inside of it. Even the slightest abnormality would be discovered in an instant!


    The only problem with his domainpared to his divine sense, was the fact that his domain would only be able to cover a fraction of the area covered by his divine sense.


    To search the entire Shattered Star Peaks with his domain would at least take a few hours with the current size of his domain. Especially so given that he would have to search the area thoroughly. After all, given the other parties hiding abilities, he might miss the creature in question if he didn''t¡­


    To be honest, he had not expected that someone would show up during the short few seconds it had taken for him to go back.


    Thinking along this line, Xuan Hao realized that the other party might have been following him for some time¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Letting out a sigh upon realizing this, Xuan Hao could onlyment over the fact that he had been too slow to react back when he had returned through the ancient teleportation formation to hide it. Now, all he could do was search for the other party and hope he would be able to find the owner of the pair of bright green eyes.


    ¡­


    "Nothing¡­"


    Shaking his head with a disappointed expression on his face, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a hint of amazement over the other parties hiding abilities.


    Even afterbing through most of the Shattered Star Peaks without entering some clearly dangerous areas, he had found along the way, Xuan Hao could only give up searching for now.


    Whoosh~


    Returning back to the ancient teleportation formation, Xuan Hao nced around the area just outside the teleportation formation onest time before entering it again.


    Fwish~


    Even if he wanted to continue searching, he already understood that he wouldn''t be able to find the other party.


    All he could do now, was hope that the other party would not cause any destruction in the territory of the Flying Sword Sect in fear of the Sky Empire. Hopefully, the other party would just leave the Flying Sword Sect''s territory and head for somewhere different.


    However, this was only something Xuan Hao could hope for. After all, the other party was not a human and might not even know about the Sky Empire and the fact that the Flying Sword Sect was inside the territory of the Sky Empire¡­

 Chapter 515: Chu Yang’s Journey... On the Right Path...

    Chapter 515: Chu Yang''s Journey... On the Right Path...


    Hiding the ancient teleportation formation on the side of the primeval forest to the best of his abilities, Xuan Hao returned back to the valley once again before finding the grand elder of the Half Spirit Race.


    After informing him about some of the dangers he had encountered on the other side of the ancient teleportation formation, Xuan Hao easily managed to convince the grand elder to not enter the ancient teleportation formation and to do his best in preventing his people from entering it as well.


    In the end, it had been far easier to convince the grand elder than he had first expected. The main reason for this, was that ording to the grand elder, his people didn''t use the ancient teleportation formation for anything other than catching a few weaker demon beasts for theiring-of-age ceremony.


    Outside of that, the ancient teleportation formation was more of nuisance, as some demon beasts managed to get through it from time to time and attack their small town.


    The short conversation with the grand elder onlysted for a short moment and Xuan Hao soon left the small valley of the Half Spirits before making his way back towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao began making his way back towards the Flying Sword Sect, Chu Yang who had been wandering in the direction that the people of the vige had pointed him towards for thest few hours.


    "This¡­ Does not look like the Shattered Star Peaks¡­"


    Looking over at the other side of the ravine suddenly blocking his path forward, Chu Yang had a feeling that he was not going in the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks¡­


    On the contrary, the ravine in front of him looked eerily simr to a ravine that was described as one located at what was the border between the Flying Sword Sect and the Raging me Sect¡­ At least that was the case when the Raging me Sect had still been around¡­


    "ording to the description about the ravine that served as a border, there should be an outpost on the side of the Raging me Sect. Even if the Raging me Sect is gone, there should at least be a few ruins left behind¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Chu Yang began to inspect the other side of the ravine. Looking for the ruins of what had once been an outpost of the Raging me Sect.


    "Looks like there is nothing! If I don''t remember wrong, there should also be a ravine on the path to the Shattered Star Peaks¡­ I should still be on the right track!"


    Not seeing any ruins from an outpost of the Raging me Sect on the other side of the ravine, Chu Yang felt himself grow confident that he was on the right path towards the Shattered Star Peaks after remembering that he and his master had passed also passed over a ravine when they had gone there together.


    The time it took to reach the ravine in question was far less than what it had taken him, but Chu Yang just med this on the fact that he had taken a wrong turn at the start.


    Like this, Chu Yang easily jumped to the other side of the ravine and confidently continued his journey towards the Shattered Star Peaks. Completely missing the ruins of severalrge buildings that had seemingly fallen into ravine before being covered up by a few nts that had grown over the past year.


    Missing the buildings that had fallen into the ravine was not something easy to do, as even a quick nce over the ravine would be more than enough for even a normal mortal to stop them¡­


    However, Chu Yang hadpletely neglected the fact that the outpost of the Raging me Sect might have ended up in the ravine below. Not thinking that someone would have gone through the effort of throwing the entire outpost in to the ravine below¡­


    Unfortunately, Chu Yang had no idea about all of this and directly left the Flying Sword Sects territory. Entering the territory that had formerly been under the control of the Raging me Sect.


    Not knowing just how chaotic the ce had be following the Raging me Sect''s destruction¡­''


    ¡­


    Only a short time after having jumped over the ravine, Chu Yang was rendered speechless, as he was met with the sight of tworge groups of cultivators numbering in the hundreds shed with each on arge open pasture below the hill he was standing on top of. Instantly devasting everything in their surroundings.


    BOOM!


    Along with what he assumed to be the leaders of both sides shing, the battle taking ce in front of him became even more intense.


    After all, the people fighting on the green pasture below him were all rtively strong. Most of them having reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, while at least five on each side had reached the Core Formation Realm. The leaders shing with each other were both people above the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm. Having reached the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    "Hm? Who''s there!"


    Suddenly feeling a presence of someone, Chu Yang called out as a he took out his spear and got ready to fight.


    "Haha, no need for that, I''m just here to watch the fight between to Simen and Mapai Sect. Aren''t you also here for that?"


    Followed by a shortugh, a tall man appeared on the small hill. Making sure to keep some distance between himself and Chu Yang.


    "Simen Sect? Mapai Sect? Haven''t heard about them before¡­"


    Frowning slightly upon hearing the name of the two sects fighting on the pasture below, Chu Yang tried his best to remember the names of the smaller sects inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory, but ultimately failed. After all, he had never really spent much time learning about the names of those weaker sects living inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory¡­


    The reason for this was rather simple¡­ They were simply way too weak¡­ This could easily be seen from the battle taking ce on therge pasture below. Even the strongest among them had only reached the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm¡­


    A sect where the strongest person had only reached this realm, Chu Yang really didn''t want to waste his time remembering the hundreds, if not thousands of sects like that inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory¡­


    "You don''t know about the Simen and Mapai Sect!?"


    Showing a slightly shocked expression on his face after hearing that Xuan Hao hadn''t heard about the two sects before.


    "Yes? Is something wrong?"


    Not feeling that anything was wrong with him not knowing about the two obviously weak sects, Chu Yang could not help feeling curious about why the tall man had showed such a shocked expression on his face after hearing that he didn''t know about the two sects.


    "You must be a traveller from one of the other regions to not know about them. After all, they are extremely famous!"


    "Is that so¡­ What are they famous for?" Not refuting the tall man''s description of him, Chu Yang asked about the two sects currently in the process of fighting to the death.


    Even if he didn''t care about them, he still became rather curious after seeing just how shocked the tall man had be after realizing that he had no idea who the Simen and Mapai Sect were.


    "The Mapai Sect is well known for being beast tamers, they are most famous for their Great Fire Demon Horses! One of those demon beast horses even reached the Core Formation Realm! Look, its down there as well!"


    Introducing the Mapai Sect to him with a smile on his face, the tall man proceeded to point towards arge ck horse with fire all around it fighting against two Core Formation Realm Experts on the Simen Sect''s side at the same time.


    At the same time, he could also see several weaker horse demon beasts supporting the members of the Mapai Sect. Some of them even sacrificing their lives to keep them safe¡­


    The difference between the Mapai Sect beast tamers and the Flying Sword Sect''s beast tamers¡­ It was simply way toorge¡­ And not in a good way.


    "What about the Simen Sect?"


    Turning his gaze towards the Simen Sect''s side, Chu Yang could not help asking. Having grown even more curious about the two sects fighting to the death on the green pasture spreading out below him.


    "The Simen Sect¡­ They are quite well known for producing all kinds of special silk. Their strongest silk is even rumoured to be strong enough to block the attacks of someone at the Core Format-"


    "AH!"


    A loud painful scream suddenly interrupted the tall man, as he narrowed his eyes and looked down towards the battlefield below.


    At this moment, the Simen Sect had gotten the advantage, as they began pushing back the Mapai Sect. The painful scream from earlier hade from the leader of the Mapai Sect, who had his entire left arm cut off by the leader of the Simen Sect!

 Chapter 516: Finely Decorated Dinner Plate!

    Chapter 516: Finely Decorated Dinner te!


    Watching how the tall stranger that had suddenly appeared beside him slowly became more and more anxious watching the fight taking ce below, Chu Yang could not help growing a bit curious about how the tall stranger was rted to the loosing Mapai Sect.


    As seconds slowly grew into minutes and the Mapai Sect began losing more and more people, Chu Yang grew certain that the tall stranger was rted to the Mapai Sect. Now the question just became¡­ Why did he not help out the Mapai Sect?


    After all, the tall stranger was someone at the Core Formation Realm. His presence on the battlefield below would be more than enough to sway the battle in the direction of the Mapai Sect¡­


    Looks like he is just going to stand there¡­


    Realizing that the tall stranger was not going to continue his earlier exnation of the Simen Sect or join in on the battle, Chu Yang decided to leave.


    In the first ce, the battle taking ce between the two sects did not really matter to him in the first ce. Battles between sects often urred, Chu Yang still remembered just how many such battle he had chanced upon during his escape from the ck Rose Sect.


    Back then, he had be quite good at using such chaotic battles to distract the people who had been chasing him¡­


    Thinking about this as he made his way down the hill, Chu Yang nced onest time towards the tall stranger. Stillpletely focused on the battle taking ce just below him.


    Looking a bit closer, Chu Yang realized that the man''s expression was filled with agony as he watched the ughter below take ce. The Mapai Sect would most likely not survive this battle. The Simen Sect would end up as the ultimate winner.


    In the end, all of this had nothing to do with him¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Shaking his head as he thought about all of this, Chu Yang moved his gaze away from the battle and the tall stranger. Avoiding the battlefield before resuming his journey towards the Shattered Star Peaks once again.


    ¡­


    Walking for a little over an hour, Chu Yang could not help frowning as he suddenly sensed a battle up ahead. Even though the battle should only be between two groups of Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators, it was still enough to make Chu Yang feel ufortable.


    The reason why he felt ufortable, was not because of the battle up ahead, but because he had already encountered more than a dozen such small battle over the past hour!


    From what he remembered; the Flying Sword Sect''s territory should not have so many fights taking ce inside of it!


    A single battle between two sects was something rather normal but encountering so many battles and all of them between either a group of Foundation Establishment cultivators or battles between two Core Formation Realm Experts, was not something normal!


    Even Chu Yang, who had not managed to spend much time outside the Flying Sword Sect or the ck Rose Sect when he was still part of it. Understood that there should not be so many battles all over the ce. Especially considering the fact that he should be getting closer to the Shattered Star Peaks, a ce that had be one of the most important areas for the Flying Sword Sect over the past month!


    "Did I perhaps take a wrong turn again¡­?"


    Muttering this to himself as he realized he might have ended up in a ce outside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory, Chu Yang could not help frowning as he remembered that his master had only allowed him to venture inside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect or the Spring Flower Sect!


    If his master found out that he had left the territory of the Flying Sword Sect¡­ Well¡­ He did not really have any idea what would happen if his master found out¡­


    Perhaps he would bar him from leaving the sect before he had reached the Nascent Soul Realm¡­?


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Chu Yang decided that it would be for the best to quickly find out where he actually was.


    For now, asking the group of Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators fighting only a short distance away from his current location seemed like a rather good idea for now.


    As Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators, they were bound to know something¡­


    Whoosh~


    Not standing around, Chu Yang took a step forward and soon appeared on the location of the battle between the two groups of Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators.


    Currently, the battle seemed to havee to a stop, as two groups of Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators were facing off against each other.


    One group had more than a dozen people, while the other only had five people left. All injured to some degree.


    "Hah! There is no way we will surrender the ancient relic to scum like you!"


    "Hehe, do you really think you have a choice? Look how many people we havepared to you? We already killed off more than half of your elders¡­ Why don''t you just surrender the relic obediently, we will be more than happy to let you leave afterwards!"


    "Do you really think I would believe that!?"


    Listening in on the conversation taking ce, Chu Yang grew a bit curious about the ancient relic mentioned as he nced over towards the person who had just spoken up and saw a disc shaped object with exquisite decorations carved all over it in his hands.


    Even from a single nce, Chu Yang realized that the disc shaped object was likely the ancient relic that the two groups were talking about. Now the question just became, what was the ancient relic? A finely decorated dinner te?


    "Haha~"


    "Who is it!?"


    Chuckling a bit as he thought about this, Chu Yang was inevitably discovered by the two groups who both stared cautiously towards the neer. Not something Chu Yang cared too much about.


    After all, the strongest among them had only barely reached the Sixth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­ Far from enough to pose a threat to the current him!


    "Who are you!"


    Asking again in an even more aggressive tone after not getting an answer from Chu Yang, the random mob character who had called out to him earlier lifted hisrge saber up in the air before threateningly waving it towards Chu Yang.


    "Pft-"


    To be honest, the sight was quite entertaining. Especially given the fact that therge saber was far toorgepared to his small body size, Chu Yang had to do his best not tough at the other party¡­


    "Hehe-"


    Even some of the Foundation Establishment Realm Experts could not helpughing quietly to themselves at the funny sight. Wondering why they had not discovered the other parties funny scalepared to hisrge saber when they had been fighting earlier.


    "You! All of you!"


    Realizing that even his own teammates were doing their best to hold in theirughter, the man with the way toorge saber could not help feeling embarrassed.


    Whoosh~


    "Hm~ I wonder what this ancient relic is."


    "Wai- That''s!?"


    Before any of the people present had the time to react, Chu Yang used the time when everyone''s attention was focused on the man with the saber to rush forward and take away the ancient relic from the injured man who had been about to fight to the death for the ancient relic.


    Not something too difficult given the fact that the other party had only reached the Third Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­


    "How did you- No, give it back!"


    Showing an extremely confused expression for a short moment after realizing that the ancient relic that had just been in his hand a second ago had disappeared, the man slowly showed a crazed expression before rushing towards Chu Yang in an attempt to take it back.


    Bang!


    Whoosh~


    Chu Yang did not really care much about this, as he casually hit the other party flying into the distance before beginning to inspect the ancient relic in the shape of what could only be described as an overly decorated dinner te.


    ""¡­""


    Seeing how Chu Yang had casually sent the man flying, the other Foundation Establishment Realm Experts about to jump forward themselves suddenly stopped.


    From how easily Chu Yang had dealt with the young man. All of them realized that he was far stronger than them!


    Given how little he seemed to care about them, all of them quickly realized that Chu Yang should be someone at the Core Formation Realm!


    It was only at this moment that they began more closely inspecting Chu Yang, the person who had suddenly shown up out of nowhere and snatched away the ancient relic.


    So young!


    This single thought appeared in each of their heads at the same time, as they all realized just how young Chu Yang was.


    Given his appearance, he should still be someone below 20!


    A Core Formation Realm Expert below the age of 20! This thought alone was more than enough for the two groups of Foundation Establishment Realm Experts to shiver. After all, they were all more than thirty and were still stuck at the Foundation Establishment Realm!

 Chapter 517: Fancy Dinner Plates one use Ability~

    Chapter 517: Fancy Dinner te''s one use Ability~


    I really wonder what use this fancy dinner te has¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he looked over the disc shaped object in his hand, Chu Yang began injecting his qi into it. Hoping to see if that would do something.


    Fwoosh!


    Along with qi being injected into it, Chu Yang had no time to say anything, as he suddenly saw a bright light cover his body before feeling a sense of weightlessness as his vision was overwhelmed by the light. Preventing him from seeing anything.


    "W-what happened¡­?"


    Not knowing what had just happened, as he had been blinded by the bright light from the disc as it covered his entire body, Chu Yang could only open his mouth in amazement upon discovering that he was no longer in the ce where the two groups of Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators had been fighting!


    The ancient relic had actually transported him somewhere after he injected qi into it!


    Thinking about this, Chu Yang looked down on the ancient relic he had taken away. Only to discover that it had already begun disintegrating in his hands. Only a few secondster. Nothing more than dust was left of the ancient relic that the two groups of Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators had been fighting for.


    "¡­"


    Seeing that the ancient relic had self-destructed, Chu Yang could only me himself for inserting his qi into it without knowing just what the ancient relic was.


    At first, he had wanted to ask the Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators about where he was, but in the end, he got distracted by the ancient relic they were fighting over and had somehow ended up being transported somewhere by said ancient relic.


    I should find out where the fancy dinner te took me¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Chu Yang looked away from the remains of what had once been the ancient relic and focused on his surroundings.


    Arge mountain range was clearly visible in the distance, and he currently found himself in the middle of arge, ruined altar.


    "Hopefully there is someone nearby that I can ask for directions¡­"


    Muttering this to himself as he took in his surroundings, Chu Yang could not help feeling a little depressed over his current situation.


    "Hm?"


    Looking in the direction of the mountain range, Chu Yang suddenly had a bad feeling as he felt a shiver run down his spine.


    ROAR!


    Soon enough, arge wolf like demon beast easily the size of a small hill appeared on top one of the mountains of the mountain range in distance, as it roared loudly towards the heavens.


    RUMBLE! BOOM!


    ROOOAR!


    Following the appearance and roar of therge wolf demon beast, the sky suddenly darkened as a terrifying bolt of lightning descended towards the wolf demon beast. Instantly causing it to howl in pain as tried its best to resist the terrifying lighting.


    BOOM BOOM BOOM!


    Before long, Chu Yang watched the wolf demon beast resit the lighting from above, as parts of the lighting broke of and fell into its surroundings. Instantly reducing a few nearby mountains to dust.


    BOOM!


    Not only that, but part of the terrifying lighting alsonded right next to Chu Yang. Erasing small hill next to the ce he was standing and at the same time almost killing him.


    I have to get out of here!


    Waking up from his seemingly frozen state after a small part of the lightningnded right next to him, Chu Yang didn''t dare watch the wolf demon beast any longer.


    Directly escaping in the opposite direction as quickly as he could.


    Not caring about where he went, as long as he managed to get away from the terrifying lighting and wolf demon beast that seemed to have been the reason for the terrifying lighting showing up.


    Whoosh!


    Running as quickly as he could for the next few hours, Chu Yang did not even manage to catch a glimpse of another human being. The same could be said for demon beasts, as it seemed like every living being had hidden away after discovering therge wolf¡­ Not too surprising given how terrifying the wolf demon beast and the lightning was!


    "Hah¡­ I should¡­ Hah¡­ Have gotten away by now¡­ Hah¡­"


    Arriving at a small pine forest, Chu Yang exhaustedly copsed on the ground beneath arge pine tree. Not able to keep running any longer, as all the qi inside his dantian had pretty much been emptied out by him during his escape.


    "Hah¡­"


    Taking a deep breath as he calmed down, Chu Yang sat up in a lotus position before beginning to draw in qi from his surroundings to hasten his qi recovery.


    By the time he opened his eyes, the sky had already turnedpletely dark, and a few demon beasts had appeared in the pine forest. Luckily, they were just in the Qi Condensation Realm and had been too scared by his Core Formation Realm aura to attack him.


    Rustle~


    Standing up, Chu Yang''s movement instantly scared some of the more curious demon beasts away, as they had been slowly beginning to move closer to him after seeing him not moving for a long time.


    "Looks like I''m not anywhere close to human territory¡­"


    Looking around himself, Chu Yang could not help muttering this to himself as he realized that there was no sign of human activity anywhere around him.


    The only ce he knew about with human activity, was the stone tform he had ended up on after being transported by the fancy dinner te¡­ The same ce that the terrifying wolf demon beast was located¡­


    "I''m telling you, the demon beast over here were acting quite weird! I''m sure some sort of treasure appeared!"


    "Sure¡­ We won''t enter another den of Core Formation Realm wolves¡­ Will we?"


    "You! It was only one- two times!"


    Suddenly hearing loud voices from the distance approaching, Chu Yang instantly rushed towards the origin of the voices.


    Whoosh!


    "Greetings fellow cultivators!"


    Realizing that the origin of the two voices were two humans who were both in the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang decided to politely greet the two of them.


    After all, who knew how long it would take for him to get back to the Flying Sword Sect if the two decided to not help him out?


    "Ah- Who are you!"


    Screaming in an unbefitting manner, one of the two Core Formation Realm Experts fell to the ground as he cautiously lifted his sword before pointing it towards Chu Yang.


    ""¡­""


    Both Chu Yang and the remaining Core Formation Realm Expert froze for a short moment upon seeing the pathetic disy.


    "Ehm! Excuse mypanion''s behaviour¡­"


    "No worries¡­"


    "Hey! Why are both of you acting so familiar with each other! Chen Yang! You have to be more cautious when encountering strangers! Especially inside the Burning Mountain Range!"


    So, I''m inside the Burning Mountain Range, one of the most dangerous ces on the continent¡­ How lucky¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he watched the two Core Formation Realm Experts begin arguing with each other, Chu Yang managed to learn the names of both of them. The calmer one was called Chen Yang, while the¡­ ''Interesting'' one among the two, was called Gui Hu.


    "I swear¡­ When we get back, I will-"


    "¡­"


    Listening from the side as the person known as Gui Hu tried his best to start an argument with Chen Yang, Chu Yang could not help letting out a sigh as he realized he had encountered a quite unique person¡­


    Did he perhaps forget about me?


    Smiling wryly as this thought passed through his mind, Chu Yang decided to make him aware of the fact that they were not alone.


    "Ahm!"


    "Ah- You! You are still here?"


    ring towards the one going by the name of Gui Hu as he said this, Chu Yang could not stop a small frown from appearing on his face.


    "Yes, I am."


    So, you didn''t forget about me¡­ Did you expect me to leave or something?!


    "Oh¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after hearing Chu Yang''s response, Gui Hu suddenly seemed to realize something as he cautiously looked towards Chu Yang.


    "¡­"


    What in the world is wrong with this guy?


    "Hah¡­ Might I ask what fellow Daoist is here for? The Burning Mountain Range has been quite dangerous over the past few weeks, as many of the stronger demon beasts from the inner regions have appeared in the outer regions of the Burning Mountain Range. Both of us are from the Explorer Union."


    Letting out a sigh as he said this while casting a critical look towards hispanion, Chen Yang asked Chu Yang politely.


    "The Explorer Union!? Actually, I got lost while escaping from a powerful demon beast and haven''t been able find my way back out again¡­"


    Hearing that the two were from the Explorer Union, Chu Yang felt a wave of relief wash over him.


    The reason for this was rather simple, as the Explorer Union had a great reputation for helping cultivators get out of any of the ces they were in the process of exploring. The Burning Mountain Range just so happened to be one such location!

 Chapter 518: Chen Yang and Gui Hu

    Chapter 518: Chen Yang and Gui Hu


    "You got lost? Hm¡­ Indeed, quite understandable. Especially considering howrge the Burning Mountain Range is and just how many different ces it connects to. Want to follow us back out?"


    Having heard that Chu Yang was lost, Chen Yang directly asked if he wanted to follow them back out of the Burning Mountain Range.


    "Wha- You can''t just trust aplete stranger like that! What if he has any bad intentions!?"


    Unlike Chen Yang, hispanion Gui Hu was not at all happy when he heard the suggestion. Immediately having stepped forward to protest it.


    How big was the difference between someone close to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and someone who had just broken through and reached the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm?


    Rolling his eyes upon hearing what Gui Hu said, Chen Yang could not help feeling that hispanion was a little too cautious about someone who had only reached the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    "And what is he going to do? He is only at the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm, both of us are already close to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm! Do you perhaps think you would lose?"


    Even if Chu Yangunched a sneak attack on them, Cheng Yang was confident that he would easily be able to deal with the other party if that happened. After all, it was not like he was going to let his guard down¡­


    "This¡­ I''m not going to lose¡­"


    Not knowing what to sat upon hearing what Chen Yang said, Gui Hu also scanned over Chu Yang and realized that the other party was indeed someone who had just reached the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    Him thinking that the other party attacking them, two people close to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, was indeed a little too much¡­ After all, no matter how he looked at it, it would be a death sentence for Chu Yang to attack both of them. Even a sneak attack wouldn''t be able to make up for the difference in their cultivation realm.


    "¡­"


    Not saying anything as he watched how Chen Yang convinced Gui Hu to let him follow them, Chu Yang just rolled his eyes at the unique duo''s conversation. Not too bothered about the fact that they had called him weak.


    Trying to convince them otherwise was not a good idea anyway, as it might make the two more cautious. Maybe even to the point that they might end up leaving him to find his way out of the Burning Mountain Range on his own!


    No matter how good the reputation of the Explorer Union was when it came to things like this, Chu Yang highly doubted they would help him out if they felt it was dangerous for them¡­


    "Let''s get going, we should get out of here before any of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts discovers us!"


    Having finished their conversation, Chen Yang said this. Following which the small group of three people began leaving the small pine forest filled with Qi Condensation Realm wolf demon beasts. All of which were too afraid of them to attack. Allowing the group, a peaceful start to their journey out of the Burning Mountain Range.


    ¡­


    Having made his way back to the Flying Sword Sect without seeing a single sign of the creature that had made it through the ancient teleportation formation, Xuan Hao felt a bit surprised when he suddenly felt the aura of an unfamiliar Nascent Soul Realm Expert inside the sect


    "Looks like someone new appeared¡­ Perhaps someone form the Spring Flower Sect?"


    Feeling curious about the Nascent Soul Realm Expert that had suddenly appeared, Xuan Hao used his divine sense to investigate without anyone noticing.


    Whoosh~


    Soon enough, Xuan Hao saw the familiar figure of Elder Song standing in front of an elegant woman angrily staring at him with a beautifully decorated fan covering half her face as she looked like she was about to attack Elder Song at any moment.


    "Elder Meng¡­ I don''t think this is quite appropriate, the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect will be merging in the future-"


    "You want us to transfer almost all our red copper over for the construction of the new main sect?! You know very well how precious that spiritual metal is to the Spring Flower Sect. Not to mention, we only have a single red copper mine! If we send all of it-"


    "Now now, Elder Meng, I''m not asking for all of it, I''m just asking for 98 percent of it¡­ There should be more than enough left for you disciples to practice until you get some more mined out!"


    "You-! Damnable shameless old man-"


    Apparently Elder Song was in the process of getting some precious spiritual metals for the construction of the new main sect¡­


    Retracting his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he realized what was happening. This Elder Meng should be someone from the Spring Flower Sect, yet Elder Song looked like he was ripping her off for some reason-


    "Master! You''re back!"


    Looking in the direction of his pavilion where the voice of his youngest disciple, Bai Ning, hade from, Xuan Hao could not help smiling as he watched the young boy run towards him.


    Internally feeling quite happy that he had managed to get a few ancient cksmithing blueprints for him during his visit to the Half Spirit Race hidden away inside the Shattered Star Peaks. Not to mention the three scrolls that would increase one''s daoprehension that he had gotten his hands on¡­


    Thinking about, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit sad over the fact that he had not managed to get something suitable for Chu Yang during his short trip¡­ At the very least he would still have some time to find something good for him before he got back from exploring the world outside-


    Wait¡­ How will he find his way back?


    Suddenly remembering that his dear second disciple was bad with directions and often tended to get lost even inside the sect, Xuan Hao realized that it might not have been a good idea to allow Chu Yang to leave the sect alone.


    Well, it should be fine¡­


    Thinking this as Bai Ning made his way over towards him, Xuan Hao tried to reassure himself that Chu Yang would be fine. Even if he was bad with directions, he would always be able to ask someone for directions!


    If the worst happened and he really could not find his way back, he would always be able to contact him through themunication talisman he had on him. In the end, there was not too much to worry about¡­


    Watching his master lost in thought all of a sudden, Bai Ning showed a slightly worried expression on his face.


    "Master, will you be leaving again soon¡­?"


    Asking the question that had appeared in his head the moment he saw his master suddenly deep in thought, Bai Ning could not help remembering the fact that his master seemed to have been busy with a lot of different things outside the sect.


    In the end, this had resulted in him not having a lot of time to interact with his master. Especially so given the fact that he had left for an alchemypetition with his senior sister just a short time after they had returned to the sect¡­


    Seeing his masters face, Bai Ning suddenly thought that his master was about to leave for something outside the sect once again.


    "Hm? No, I don''t intend to go anywhere for the time being."


    "Really¡­?"


    "Yes!"


    Seeing the worried expression on Bai Ning''s face, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he realized that he had indeed not spent a lot of time together with his newest disciple.


    Let alone spending time with him, he had pretty much only taught him two times since he had taken him in!


    Even if Bai Ning spent most of his time on cksmithing, Xuan Hao clearly felt that this young disciple of his wanted to spend some more time together with him. Even if that meant he would not be able to practice his cksmithing for some time.


    "Ah! I remember, I have a gift for you! Something I think you would be quite interested in¡­"


    Wanting to cheer up Bai Ning a bit more, Xuan Hao took out the ancient cksmithing blueprints he had gotten from the Half Spirit Race and handed them over to him. In total, there was three different blueprints.


    Xuan Hao didn''t really understand too much of what was written in them and couldn''t fully determine what the three blueprints were for. Only managing to understand that one of the three blueprints was of an attack-based artifact of some sort.


    "What is it!?


    Feeling curious about what gift his master suddenly took out, Bai Ning curiously took the cksmithing blueprints before looking over them. Soon enough, he becamepletely engrossed in reading the three ancient cksmithing blueprints.


    His expression changing between one of amazement and one of fear as he read through the three ancient cksmithing blueprints.

 Chapter 519: Youngest Disciple talks too much...

    Chapter 519: Youngest Disciple talks too much...


    "M-master¡­ Are you sure giving me something this precious!?"


    "Don''t mind it, It''s a gift! Weren''t you quite interested in cksmithing? I just happened to pick up a few blueprints during my time away from the sect and thought it would be suitable to giv-"


    "Thank you so much!"


    Before he even managed to finish his sentence, Xuan Hao was slightly taken aback by just how happy his little disciple seemed to be with the three cksmithing blueprints.


    "Are they really that special¡­? What are the blueprints for?"


    Feeling a bit curious about the three cksmithing blueprints and what they would be used to create, Xuan Hao could not help asking Bai Ning, as he was just about to happily resume reading through one of them again.


    "Yes! All of them are blueprints way above my current level when ites to cksmithing, and they will be really helpful in helping me increase my understanding when ites to cksmithing. Not only that, but I believe that the blueprints might even be at the Master Realm. One of them might even be above the Master Realm! Sadly, I have no way to be sure with my current realm...


    As for what they are used to make¡­ One of them is a special artifact used tounch a deadly attack of some sort, while another is a defensive artifact. Thest one¡­ I have no clue about it, I suspect that it might be above the Master Realm. For it to be so difficult to discern even the blueprint of it. Maybe with more time I will be able to understand it!"


    Beginning to talk with an excited expression on his face the moment he heard his master ask about the cksmithing blueprints, Bai Ning fully disyed his love for cksmithing. More than enough for his master to understand that he should be prepared to stay and listen for some time whenever he asked his disciple about something rted to cksmithing-


    "Ah! I almost forgot! The special artifact that canunch a deadly attack also seem to be capable of gathering qi from the surroundings through the use of some sort of formation engraved on it. Allowing it to be used without supplying it with one''s own qi! Hm¡­ Though it looks like one would need a Formation Master''s assistance in the production for this¡­ Maybe I should start learning some more about formations as well in the future. Indeed, what do you think master?"


    "Y-yes¡­ Learning about formations should be fine, as it should be quite useful whenbined with cksmithing¡­"


    "Haha! I knew it! The defensive artifact also seems to be using some sort of formation to-"


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to do as Bai Ning continued talking about the two ancient blueprints that he had only barely looked over for a few short seconds, Xuan Hao could not help looking towards Zhi Ruo cleaning the entrance of the pavilion in the distance for help.


    ""¡­""


    Staring at each other for a short moment as Bai Ning continued talking, Xuan Hao suddenly saw Zhi Ruo nod her head in understanding before disappearing into the pavilion.


    You! I didn''t want for you to leave!


    With no one able to hear him, Xuan Hao could only resign himself to his fate, as he listened to Bai Ning''s extensive and seemingly never-ending exnation of the two ancient cksmithing blueprints.


    Only after close to half an hour had passed did Xuan Hao finally manage to put an end to his little disciple, as both of them soon entered the pavilion. Following which Xuan Hao spend the rest of the day training Bai Ning.


    ¡­


    Back in the Burning Mountain Range, Chu Yang was still making his way out together with the two members of the Explorer Union that he had chanced upon. The sky above them was covered in a thickyer of clouds, as it wa getting darker and darker. Only a few stars could be seen peeking through the thickyer of clouds covering the darkening sky.


    "So¡­ I was wondering what kingdom bordering the Burning Mountain Range we are heading to¡­"


    Breaking the silence that had slowly descended upon the group of three after they had started their journey out of the Burning Mountain Range together, Chu Yang walked a bit closer to Chen Yang as he asked this.


    Compared to Gui Hu, who was still giving him a suspicious look every now and then, Chu Yang felt way morefortable talking with Chen Yang. Whether this was because their rtively simr name or his calm bearingpared to hispanion, Chu Yang had no idea. At the very least, it had ended up causing him to ask Chen Yang instead of Gui Hu¡­


    "What kingdom we would end up in after leaving the Burning Mountain Range? Hm¡­ If I''m not wrong, the area should not be under the governance of any kingdom. On the contrary, it''s ended up bing a quite chaotic ce over thest year or so¡­


    Well, you will be fine inside the city under the control of the Explorer Union. One of the bigger branches specifically sent over a Nascent Soul Realm Expert to ensure nothing would happen to the branch now that the area turned chaotic all of a sudden!"


    Area turned chaotic, no kingdom, is it perhaps the former territory of the Raging me Sect¡­?


    Listening to what Chen Yang said, Chu Yang ignored the increasingly suspicious look he was getting from Gui Gu, as he felt the description given by Chen Yang lined up with the description, he had heard of the territory of the now destroyed Raging me Sect and what he had seen himself first hand before being transported somewhere inside the Burning Mountain Range by the fancy dinner te.


    "Is it by any chance the former territory of a sect known as the Raging me Sect!?"


    "Yes? Guess you are from our side of the Burning Mountain Range¡­"


    Feeling relieved by getting a confirmation that it was indeed the former territory of the Raging me Sect, Chu Yang soon picked up on the other part of what Chen Yang had said.


    "What do you mean the other side of the Burning Mountain Range? Did you perhaps think I was from the Onyx Empire?"


    Remembering that the Onyx Empire was supposed to be located on the other side of the Burning Mountain Range, Chu Yang curiously looked over towards Chen Yang. Wanting to find out what he had meant with his earlier words.


    "Hah¡­ Well... The ce you came from does not lead towards the Onyx Empire, but the sea¡­ Very few humans live there, be they demonic cultivators, normal cultivators, mortals. Even the different religions avoid the areas close to the sea.


    The few people who live in the area close to the sea are either weak mortals or those looking for a chance to breach through the eternal storm surrounding our continent. Don''t bother asking me about the eternal storm, as I have no knowledge about it other than its name and the fact that it supposedly surrounds our continent¡­"


    Feeling that he had been left with more questions than answers after hearing what Chen Yang had said, Chu Yang felt like he should ask his master about this after getting back to the Flying Sword Sect again!


    After all, his master was someone at the Domain Lord Realm! He was bound to know more than a Core Formation Realm Expert from the Explorer Union!


    "Hm?"


    Just about to ask Chen Yang something different to make the journey out of the Burning Mountain Range a little more enjoyable, Chu Yang suddenly came to a stop before quickly taking out his spear and getting ready for battle.


    Chen Yang and Gui Hu was the same, as both of them also took out their weapons and scanned the area around themselves.


    Currently, they were walking along a small narrow path on the side of a mountain, with only rocks and a few small trees to keep thempany.


    Thump!


    The reason for their sudden stop soon revealed itself, as arge cougar appeared directly in front of them!


    Grrrrr~


    Not roaring at them like most other demon beasts would do in a simr situation, the cougar demon beast instead began growling at them threateningly.


    "Everyone, lower your weapons for now, it doesn''t look like it will attack¡­"


    Clearly not wanting to fight the cougar that had suddenly appeared, Chen Yang quickly instructed both Chu Yang and Gui Hu to lower their weapons. Not something they disagreed with. After all, the cougar demon beast was Half a step into the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Even if they could deal with it, it would not be without any loss¡­


    Grr~


    As all three of them lowered their weapons, the cougar demon beast seemed to calm down before cautiously moving further up the mountain, a few cute cougar cubs could be seen closely following behind it.


    "Let''s get going!"


    Seeing the cougar disappear up the mountain with its cubs in tow, Chen Yang hurried Chu Yang and Gui Hu to follow him, as all three of them quickly made their way down the narrow mountain path into a small valley formed in between some of the Burning Mountain Range''s mountains.

 Chapter 520: Fog Stalker and Lava Eaters~

    Chapter 520: Fog Stalker and Lava Eaters~


    Where did this foge from¡­?


    Having entered the valley just after their encounter with the cougar, Chu Yang could not help frowning to himself as a dense fog had suddenly appeared out of nowhere around them after entering the valley crammed in between severalrge mountains.


    Before entering the valley, Chu Yang could clearly remember that there was no fog present. Only when they entered, did this fog appear¡­


    No matter what it was, Chu Yang had a feeling that the fog was not the sign of anything good.


    With this in mind, Chu Yang tightly gripped his spear. Prepared in case some sort of demon beast hidden inside the thick fog decided tounch a sneak attack.


    Chen Yang and Gui Hu also prepared themselves as they scanned their surroundings in a simr manner as Chu Yang.


    Chen Yang frowning more and more as he looked around himself.


    "We have to be careful; I think we walked into the domain of a fog stalker¡­"


    Disying the fact that he was far more knowledgeable about the demon beasts of the Burning Mountain Range than him, Chen Yang had already determined their current situation to some extent after a few seconds.


    What a fog stalker was, he had no idea, but Chu Yang was certain that it was not some weak demon beast given how serious Chen Yang and Gui Hu looked.


    Whoosh~


    Just as he was thinking about the fog stalker mentioned by Chen Yang, Chu Yang felt something moving towards him from his left, as he quickly moved his spear to block it.


    Ching~


    The sound reverberated through the surroundings, as Chu Yang barely managed to see a pair of sharp ws hit his spear before disappearing into the thick fog surrounding them.


    The strength behind the short attack was far more than he had expected, and Chu Yang felt both his hands tremble violently, as he almost lost the grip of his spear.


    Even if he had no time to determine the cultivation realm of the attacker, he was certain that it was far stronger than him!


    "Looks like it is indeed a fog stalker¡­ We have to get out of here as quickly as possible! Fighting a fog stalker in the fog is simply suicide!"


    Hearing the voice of Chen Yang standing just a few meters away from him, Chu Yang could not agree more to the idea of leaving the valley as quickly as possible.


    From the single exchange he managed to have with this fog stalker demon beast, Chu Yang already understood that he would not be a match for it. Even if it only attacked him every once every now and then, it would end up consuming all of his qi after only a few such attacks. The difference in their strength was simply way too big!


    ¡­


    Ching~


    "Hah¡­ Why is it only focusing on me¡­?"


    Blocking a pair of ws that hade out from the fog directly in front of him, Chu Yang could not helpmenting as he looked cautiously around himself filled with exhaustion. At this point, they had already been walking through the fog filled valley for close to thirty minutes!


    "Isn''t it because you are the weakest among us and therefore the easiest pray? Hehe, at least we won''t have to worry too much with you around~"


    Hearing the annoying voice of the one named Gui Hu echo out beside him, Chu Yang could not help cursing him inside his head. After all, what he said was indeed the truth.


    During this time, the fog stalker had attacked both Chen Yang and Gui Hu only once!


    He on the other hand, was not that lucky¡­ It had attacked him a grand total of 18 times!


    At this point in time, his qi reserves were already close to empty after dealing with the fog stalkers constant sneak attacks. Not only that, but neither Chen Yang nor Gui Hu had any ability to help him deal with the fog stalker.


    It''s sneak attacks inside the fog was simply way too perfect. Easily avoiding the two¡­


    "Looks like you are in luck, Chu Yang!"


    "Hm?"


    Hearing the voice of Chen Yang call out to him, Chu Yang looked over and soon felt a wave of excitement rush over him as he understood what he had meant.


    A way out!


    Whoosh~


    Rushing out of the valley before any of the other two, Chu Yang only came to a stop after having travelled a good half kilometre.


    Even though the time in the valley did notst for long, Chu Yang had no ns of staying anywhere close to it after getting out!


    ¡­


    Time passed, a few days after having left the valley, Chu Yang was still making his way through the Burning Mountain Range together with Chen Yang and Gui Hu from the Explorer Union. At this point in time, Chu Yang became more and more amazed at the sheer scale of the Burning Mountain Range.


    Other than their earlier encounter with the cougar while making their way over one of the countless mountains that made up the Burning Mountain Range and the fog stalker in the valley, the group of three didn''t encounter any other powerful demon beasts along the way.


    At most, they encountered a few Peak Foundation Establishment demon beast that Gui Hu quickly dealt with before they even had time to attack them.


    Rumble!


    Hearing a loud rumbling sounding from a mountain not too far away, Chu Yang could not help sighing in amazement upon witnessingrge amounts ofva suddenly gush out from severalrge cave-like entrances at the top of the mountain before flowing down towards the base of the mountain where several unique grey coloured rock demon beasts were happily waiting.


    As theva reached the base of the mountain, these weird demon beasts quickly worked together to dig arge hole for theva to flow into-


    Ssh~!


    Before happily jumping into theva pool, they had created.


    "¡­"


    Watching these unique demon beasts'' bath with great enthusiasm, Chu Yang finally understood why it was called the Burning Mountain Range, as these unique demon beasts flung theva all around them. Launching some of it several kilometers away where it set fire to anything it touched.


    Whoosh~


    Some of the molten rocks evennded on a tree in front of them-


    Fwoosh~!


    Setting fire to the tree and the surrounding foliage¡­


    Looking at this, Chu Yang even began wondering how there were still any trees left inside the Burning Mountain Range¡­


    "Never seen a group ofva eaters before?"


    "Lava eaters?"


    Taken aback by what Chen Yang suddenly said, Chu Yang gave him a questioning look. Clearly not putting together that he was talking about the demon beast currently swimming around in theva pool they had created.


    "The one''s over there."


    "Ah! Indeed, I have never seen these¡­ Lava eaters before¡­"


    Immediately realizing what Chen Yang was referring to after seeing him point towards the demon beasts swimming around in theva pool they had made for themselves, Chu Yang quickly nodded his head. Acknowledging the fact that he had not seen ava eater demon beast before.


    "How weird, they are reallymon here in the outer edges of the Burning Mountain Range. Hard to miss¡­"


    Along with the suspicious Gui Hu narrowing his eyes while ring at him, Chu Yang could not help smiling a bit wryly. Not knowing what to say.


    "He probably just got unlucky and didn''t meet any, we didn''t meet any either on our way inside. Remember?"


    Luckily, Chen Yang came to his assistance before Gui Hu got to asking again.


    "By the way, what are theva eater demon beasts?"


    Wanting to make sure that Gui Hu didn''t get a chance to ask him something after Chen Yang had finished speaking, Chu Yang quickly asked Cheng Yang.


    "What are theva eater demon beasts? Well¡­ Honestly, I don''t really have much of a clue about them myself. All the information about them in our branch only mentions that theva eaters have something to do with the Burning Mountain Range getting its name and the fact that they consumeva¡­ Not eating anything other thanva!"


    Thinking about Chu Yang''s question for a short moment before he answered, Chen Yang seemed to suddenly enter a state of deep thought as he tried to recall more information about theva eater demon beasts.


    "If I''m not wrong, there was also something about youngva eaters barely on the Qi Condensation Realm easily consumingva without any side effects. Other than that, parts of ava eater demon beast''s body can be used for some special potions that increases one''s resistance to fire. Maybe there is something other than that, but this is at least what I can remember about theva eater demon beasts..."


    Listening to Chen Yang finish his exnation about theva eater demon beasts, Chu Yang nced towards theva eater demon beasts ying around in theva pool they had created with great interest.


    From the looks of it, theva eater demon beasts were rather unique. Something he had already expected after seeing them literally bath inva¡­


    Whoosh~


    Moving away from the location where they had seen the group ofva eater demon beast, Chu Yang and the other two soon saw a path out of the seemingly endless mountain range in the distance.

 Chapter 521: Young Priest and Su Wuhan’s Worries

    Chapter 521: Young Priest and Su Wuhan''s Worries


    On top of arge flying ship rapidly moving through the air, a young priest was nervously making his way down arge exquisitely decorated corridor leading towards arge wooden door made from an ancient spiritual tree. Several holy symbols were carved into this door. Giving it an ancient and divine presence.


    Seeing this door, the young priest became even more nervous, as he understood just how important the person on the other side of the door was.


    Just one wrong move and he might lose his little life!


    Originally, it had not been him who should inform the exalted personage behind the door, but he had ended up loosing a bet with a friend and was promptly forced down the long and exquisitely decorated corridor stretching through the entire hull of the flying ship before he had any chance to say anything!


    Ah! If I just didn''t lose the bet from earliera?|


    Remembering how he had ended up in his current situation, the young priest could not help shaking his head filled with regret as he arrived in front of therge wooden door.


    Knock Knock~


    "Your Excellency, we are going to arrive at the border of the Azure Sky Kingdom within the next half hour. "


    Gently knocking on the door, the young priest used all his remaining courage to say this before anxiously finding a ce to wait in front of therge wooden door for a response.


    Creak~


    Along with the creaking sound of therge ancient wooden door, the young priest felt a few droplets of sweat run down his face as he quickly lowered his head. Not daring to look up at the person who opened the door.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling a terrifying pressure suddenly descend out of nowhere along with the sound of footstepsing from the room beyond the ancient wooden door, the young priest felt his breathing be erratic as he barely managed to keep hisposure.


    "This humble priest greets his excellency!"


    Just managing to get these words out, the young priest used all his strength to remain in a respectful position.


    The young priest was already certain that the exalted personage was controlling his aura just barely enough for him to not outright copse on the ground, so he gritted his teeth as he waited for the footsteps to grow distant before finally disappearing.


    How the young priest was so certain about the person controlling his aura, was due to the simple fact, that if he did not. The young priest would have been squashed to death alreadya?|


    Thump~!


    "Haha?| Haha?|"


    Copsing on the floor sweating all over the moment he was left alone, the young priest could not help staring towards the other end of the corridor filled with horror. The pressure was simple way too terrifying. Even the few other strong people he had encountered before came nowhere close!


    "An Archbishopa?| Truly terrifying!"


    Muttering this to himself as he managed to get back up from the floor, the young priest slowly made his way out of the corridor inside the flying ship before returning back to his own small room on the flying ship.


    Even if he knew that he would not be able to rest for more than half an hour, as they were about to reach the Azure Sky Kingdom, the young priest wanted to recover as much of his energy as possible. Not in case of an attack from the church of the gue god after they entered the Azure Sky Kingdom, but in case he managed to encounter the Archbishop again!


    In the young priest''s eyes, the Archbishop was far more terrifying than the church of the gue god in the Azure Sky Kingdom that they hade to deal with!


    a?|


    "The churches of the Sky Empire are really not slow to acta?| To think someone from the Order of the Sky God already arrived. Not to mention that they sent over an Archbishop!"


    Walking around with an obvious frown on his face, the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom Su Wuhan had already learned about the Order of the Sky God having sent over someone to erase the church of the gue god that had begun taking control over his kingdoma?| Something that he should normally be very happy about, as they would essentially be dealing with his problems almost free of charge. At most he would have to build a few temples or churches for the Order of the Sky God in his kingdom as repayment.


    "Hehe, you don''t have to worry about it, just do as we nned, and everything will be fine."


    An eerie voice suddenly interrupted Su Wuhan''s train of thought as a woman wearing a robe belonging to the church of the gue god appeared inside his throne room.


    Not showing any signs of shock at the appearance of the person from the church of the gue god, Su Wuhan narrowed his eyes as he moved towards his throne.


    Thump~


    As he slowly sat down at the throne inside the room, Su Wuhan''s gaze remained locked on the person from the church of the gue god.


    "Buta?| They sent an Archbishop! Even the weakest Bishops have reached the Domain Lord Realma?| How do you n to deal with an Archbishop!? Someone ranked above a Bishop!"


    "Hehe, this is not something you have to worry about little king~ All you have to do is follow our little n~"


    Not the slightest bit scared upon hearing what Su Wuhan said, the woman from the church of the gue godughed a bit as she said this.


    "Hmph, I hope your church knows what it''s doing! If nota?| It will end up dragging me down and revealing some of my master''s ns to the Sky Empire! If my master-"


    "Yeah, yeah, I know~ Your big scary master will be angry with my little church~ How scary~"


    Not at all intimidated by what Su Wuhan said, the woman from the church of the gue god instead began teasing him before disappearing from the throne room.


    "That damnable woman-!"


    Not knowing what to say, Su Wuhan barely managed to keep hisposure as he stared in the direction that the woman from the church of the gue god had left in.


    If not for them suddenly showing up and messing around with things in his kingdom, he would never have had to worry about an Archbishop from the Order of the Sky Goding to visit!


    Not only did it put his life at risk if he was seen through by the other party, but he would also end up risking revealing some of his master''s ns!


    If he really ended up revealing something to the Archbishop of the Order of the Sky Goda?| He dared not imagine what his master would do to hima?|


    At the very least, the protection master ced on me should be able to fool the sight of anyone below the Soul Ascension Realma?| As long as the Archbishop is not in the Soul Ascension Realm. Everything should be finea?|


    Thinking this to himself, Su Wuhan nced towards the entrance of his throne room once again before standing back up.


    Knowing that the people from the Order of the Sky God would soon arrive, he had to properly prepare himself and make sure that the Archbishop would not be able to find anything wrong with him!


    a?|


    me Mountain City, a city located just at the outskirts of the Burning Mountain Range and also the location of an Explorer Union Branch.


    "Finally! We are back!"


    At this moment, Gui Hu eximed loudly as he rushed through the small gate leading inside the city. Completely ignoring the few guards standing at the front and the line of people standing in line in front of him.


    "a?|"


    "Don''t worry about it, members of the Explorer Union and people above the Foundation Establishment Realm can enter without waiting in line. The guards herea?| Are also quite familiar with Gui Hua?|"


    Seeing Chu Yang staring weirdly towards the direction Gui Hu had run off to, Chen Yang felt like he had to exin this, as he smiled a bit wryly while pointing in the direction of the group of guards that hadpletely ignored Gui Hu as he rushed past them.


    From the looks of it, the guards had indeed already gotten quite used to thisa?|


    "For now, how about we enter the city and go visit the branch? If I''m not wrong, they should have a map of the surroundings avable for you to look at."


    "Sounds greata?|"


    Not feeling too confident about his ability to find his way back to the Flying Sword Sect, Chu Yang half-heartedly agreed to what Chen Yang said before following him inside the city.


    No matter what, he was more than happy that he had managed to get out of the Burning Mountain Range.


    Finding his way back to the Flying Sword Sect was not something he needed to worry about for now, as he had only been gone for about a weeka?|

 Chapter 522: Broke

    Chapter 522: Broke


    Entering the me Mountain City together with Chen Yang, Chu Yang followed him to the Explorer Union''s branch inside the city before both of them parted ways.


    Given that he had already helped him out of the Burning Mountain Range, there was really no reason for Chen Yang to apany him any longer, Chu Yang also understood this and didn''t say anything as Chen Yang disappeared inside the Explorer Union''s branch located at the core of the me Mountain City.


    Standing around the entrance to the Explorer Union''s branch, Chu Yang began thinking about what to do next. After all, his ns of going to the famous demon beast forest next to the Shattered Star Peaks was not going to happen and he now had to get back to the Flying Sword Sect''s territory againa?|


    "a?|"


    Looking towards the entrance of the Explorer Union''s branch directly in front of him, Chu Yang could not help narrowing his eyes upon noticing how many different people were entering and leaving the branch with every minute going by.


    Maybe I can join the Explorer Union and see if there is any caravan or something simr heading towards the Flying Sword Sect''s territorya?|


    As this thought appeared, Chu Yang could not help feeling that it was a good choice to find a caravan heading towards somewhere inside his sect''s territory. This way, he would not have to worry about getting lost on his way back!


    As for joining the Explorer Union, while being a part of the Flying Sword Sect? There was no problem with this, as he would just be a normal explorer. An external member of the Explorer Union and not truly part of the Explorer Union.


    Many of the Flying Sword Sect disciples he had talked with back in the sect had already done this, as it would allow them to not only sell the things they gathered when out adventuring without any risk, but also because it allowed them esses to a certain amount of knowledge about their surroundings kept by the Explorer Union.


    This was normally not that useful when the disciples were still inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory, as the branches set up by the Flying Sword Sect were by far better than the branches of the Explorer Union and the knowledge, they could get their hands on there would be far better.


    However, when they adventured outside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect, it was crucial to be a member of the Explorer Union. Not only have ess to the knowledge of the different powers that existed in the ce they chose to adventure, but also the dangerous ces that should be avoided.


    For now, I should be a member of the Explorer Union and see if there is any missions about protecting caravans heading to somewhere inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory!


    Having decided on what to do, Chu Yang took a step forward and entered the Explorer Union branch.


    Soon finding himself inside arge chaotic environment, with different people dashing all around the ce.


    Even having seen all the people constantly entering and leaving the branch, Chu Yang still felt taken aback by the sheer number of people that had managed to squeeze inside the branch building.


    "Hey! Don''t stand in the way!"


    "Sorry-"


    Still feeling taken aback by how cramped it was inside the branch building, Chu Yang didn''t register the voiceing from behind him as he unconsciously answered before feeling arge burly man along with three other simrly burly men move in front of him before making their way towards a counter with a long queue of simrly burly men in front of it.


    Recovering from the shock of the busy scene in front of him, Chu Yang quickly scanned the different counters before finally spotting the one for registering that he was looking for. Luckily, the line in front of it was nowhere near any of the other counters, as it only had two young people around his own age nervously waiting, while another was getting in the process of bing a member of the Explorer Union.


    The cultivation of the three youths was only around the middle stages of the Qi Condensation Realm. Quite good given their agea?|


    Not thinking too much about the three youths, Chu Yang looked around himself onest time before making his way towards the counter to register himself and officially be an external member of the Explorer Union.


    Quietly waiting in line before it was finally his turn, Chu Yang quickly went through the registration process beforeing to a stop.


    "You can''t paya?|?"


    "a?|"


    Not able to say anything when faced with the stern look of the middle-aged woman behind the counter, Chu Yang could only remain quiet.


    Indeed, as the woman behind the counter had said, Chu Yang could not pay the small fee required to be a member of the Explorer Union. Even if the fee required was only a few normal spirit stones, it didn''t matter, as Chu Yang had juste to realize that he had somehow ended up loosing the few spirit stones he had taken with him when leaving for an adventure outside the sect.


    He had no idea how he had lost them, but his most likely guess was when he had fled from therge wolf demon beast just after entering the Burning Mountain Range. Another possibility was that he had ended up losing them during the encounter with the fog stalker demon beast. Back then, he had focused all his attention on his surroundings to counter the attacks of the fog stalker, he might have ended up losing his spirit stones during that time, as they had just been hanging loosely in a small leather pouch attached close to the top of his speara?|


    I lost them when I fought with the fog stalkera?| Didn''t Ia?|?


    "Haha?|"


    Letting out a sigh as he realized this, Chu Yang could not stop a wry smile from appearing on his face. Awkwardly looking at the woman behind the counter.


    "To think even someone at the Core Formation Realm can''t pay up such a small suma?| You cane back when you gathered up the required spirit stones!"


    Giving him a not so friendly re after finding out that he couldn''t pay the small fee required. The woman behind the counter did not care about his cultivation realm as she directly told him to leave.


    A Core Formation Realm might be powerful whenpared to the people currently inside the branch, but when taking the entire Explorer Union into ount, a Core Formation Realm Expert was nothing. Even his age didn''t matter, as the woman behind the counter shooed him away.


    Faced with such a situation for probably the first time in his life, Chu Yang had no idea how to respond, as he could only awkwardly turn around to leave.


    Thump~


    Stepping outside again without having aplished anything, Chu Yang had no idea what to do next.


    Not only was he far away from the Flying Sword Sect and its territory, but he was also broke!


    At this point in time, Chu Yang felt nothing could make his current situation worse-


    Whoosh~!


    "Hm?"


    Hearing the sound of something above him, Chu Yang quickly looked up and saw an enormous flying ship passing by. Two people were flying close to the ship itself as they cautiously observed their surroundings.


    The aura excluded by the two people flying through the air was terrifying, as the other people inside the me Mountain City also looked up an noticed the two people in the air flying alongside the enormous ship.


    The only difference between them and Chu Yang, wa? the fact that most of them had a terrified expression on their face, while Chu Yang only felt curious about the enormous flying ship.


    The main reason for this, was that Chu Yang had already be familiar with the aura of his master. Compared with his master, Chu Yang could clearly feel that the two people flying alongside the ship were weaker whenpared to his master!


    For two people to fly through the air like guards around the shipa?|


    Chu Yang felt extremely curious about the person inside the flying ship.


    Would it be some important young genius or a terrifying expert?


    No matter what the answer was, Chu Yang felt extremely curious about the flying ship, as he watched it disappear after passing through a thickyer of clouds.


    "Isn''t that the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom?"


    "Azure Sky Kingdom? For what reason would someone like that visit a small kingdom like the Azure Sky Kingdom? From what I know, it should not be much stronger than the Heavenly Sky Kingdom before its destructiona?|"


    "Haha, you all might not know, but recently, a new religion appeared in the Azure Sky Kingdom and began taking control of the entire kingdom! I bet that the ship belonged to one of the big three religions of the Sky Empire!"


    "Really!?"


    "Tell us more old man! I will buy you a drink if you do!"


    "What is the Sky Empire?"


    Along with the conversations of the people on the streets who had stopped to look up at the flying ship as it passed by. Almost everyone focused their attention on an elderly man at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm after he shared some of his knowledge.


    Chu Yang also felt quite curious as he decided to listen in from the side.


    Even if he knew about the Sky Empire, he only really knew the name of the empire which he was currently inside of, he had never learned anything about the big three religions that the old man just mentioned.


    "Hehe, I happen to need a new weapona?| If everyone is willing to donate a few spirit stones, I''m more than willing to share some of my knowledgea?|"


    The elderly man suddenly said this while looking at the people who had surrounded him with a big grin on his old face.


    """a?|"""

 Chapter 523: Mysterious Young Master~

    Chapter 523: Mysterious Young Master~


    Witnessing the knowledgeable old man at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm suddenly turn around and ask for spirit stones, Chu Yang felt like he could do something simr as well to earn spirit stones.


    At the very least, he should be able to earn the few spirit stones that he needed to be and external member of the Explorer Uniona?|


    As Chu Yang was thinking about how to do something simr to the old man, a well-dressed servant suddenly appeared out of nowhere before walking up to the old man with a dignified expression on his face.


    "Here, this should be enough for you to buy yourself a new weapon! My young master is quite interested in knowing more about what you just mentioned."


    Throwing arge pouch filled with spirit stones over after saying this, the servant waited for the old man to look through the pouch fille with spirit stones. Only returning after receiving a positive nod from the old man. Signalling that he was satisfied with the number of spirit stones in the pouch.


    Even if he was someone at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, no one would ever say no to spirit stones. Other than that, the old man at the Peak Core Formation Realm Expert had managed to spot a few high-quality pills inside the pouch as well.


    "Hehe, now that a generous young master was kind enough to donate a bit to this poor old man, I have to continue where I left off earlier!"


    Along with theugher of the old man as he smiled happily at the spirit stones he had managed to get pretty much for free, he slowly began describing the three big religions of the Sky Empire.


    a?|


    "Order of the Sky God, Followers of the Fire God, and Cult of the Scarlet Moona?|"


    Muttering the names of the three biggest religions inside the Sky Empire, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit regretful watching the old man finishing his description of the three.


    In the end, the only useful thing he got from what the old man said was the names of the three big religions and the fact that they were powerful to the degree that the imperial family of the Sky Empire did not dare do anything to thema?|


    Shaking his head as he watched the old man prepare to leave, Chu Yang suddenly spotted the servant from earlier appear in front of the old man again.


    "Old man, do you want to join my young master for a chat, he is quite interested in knowing if you have anything more interesting tales on youa?|"


    Saying this, the servant took out a spirit stone and showed it to the old man.


    "High-grade spirit stone!"


    Seeing this stone, the old man could not help eximing in shock. After all, a high-grade spirit stone was something he had never managed to get his hands on! Not only would a high-grade spirit stone be useful to him, but it would also present a chance for him to better prepare himself for the Nascent Soul Realm and at least lower his chances of death when going through the cloud tribtion!


    The old man quickly lowered his voice after his exmation before looking around himself. Only to see the crowd that was about to disperse suddenlying to a stop, as all of them greedily eyed the high-grade spirit stone.


    This was especially true for a few other elderly Core Formation Realm Experts also present at the scene.


    "Hmph, don''t even think about it!"


    Along with the snort of the servant who had showed off the high-grade spirit stone, a terrifying aura quickly enveloped the surrounding people who had stopped dispersing after discovering the high-grade spirit stone.


    This person is also someone at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm!


    Instantly managing to see through the strength of the servant, Chu Yang could not help feeling amazed at the strength of the servant.


    At first, he had not really bothered trying to see the other parties cultivation, as he just introduced himself as a servant of some young master, but now it looked like this servant was someone quite powerful.


    Even the old man who was also at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm was taken aback upon realizing the harmless looking servant had suddenly turned into an expert that was no weaker than himself!


    "W-where is your young mastera?|? I would be more than willing to talk a bit about my past encounters and what little I have learned during my time adventuring throughout the Sky Empire!"


    Answering in a slightly nervous tone as he realized he might have encountered the son of a bigshot; the old man quickly showed a kind expression as he said this to the servant. Not taking his eyes off the high-grade spirit stone from beginning to end.


    "Follow mea?|"


    Rolling his eyes slightly upon seeing the focus of the old man''s eyes, the servant quickly handed the high-grade spirit stone over to him before both of them began leaving under the eyes of the small crowd of people that had gathered.


    I wonder who the young master is, for him to have such a strong servant by his sidea?|


    At this thought, Chu Yang curiously observed the servant, as he and the old man made their way towards arge and luxurious carriage located only a short distance away.


    Given how respectful the servant suddenly became after reaching this carriage, Chu Yang could easily guess that the young master should be inside the carriage.


    "You may enter!"


    As everyone observed the carriage of the mysterious young master, a childish voice suddenly echoed out from within the carriage, as the servant bowed his head before leading the old man inside. Not allowing any of the people waiting outside to see the mysterious young master.


    The only thing that Chu Yang and the others could determine, was the fact that the young master was a childa?|


    "Wha- there is actually a soundproofing formation on the carriage?!"


    "No waya?| Something like that, on a carriage!? How expensive is that!?"


    "The owner of the carriage, I think we encountered the son of some bigshot in the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    Along with the voices of a group of old men and women who were trying their best to not outright attack the carriage for the high-grade spirit stone. The luxurious carriage slowly began moving before turning around a corner and disappearing.


    Whoosh!


    Whoosh!


    Whoosh!


    After the carriage disappeared behind the corner, arge portion of elderly men and women at the Core Formation Realm also lefta?| Likely to try and rob the high-grade spirit stone and any other treasures the mysterious young master had on hima?|


    As for potentially offending a Nascent Soul Realm Expert? They did not really think much of it, as they would just have to escape to some other kingdom before the Nascent Soul Realm Expert found out.


    In the first ce, they were all adventures who travelled the world, so what if they would never be able to return to the me Mountain City in the future!


    If they could increase their chances to breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm, it was a small price to pay!


    Chu Yang also understood these old men and women''s thought process and didn''t intend to get involved.


    In the first ce, he had only just reached the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm, there was no way he wanted to face off against a group of Peak Core Formation Realm Experts desperate for anything that would increase their chances of reaching the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Haha?| hopefully that mysterious young master has something to keep himself safe from those ravenous old people..."


    Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while looking in the direction that the mysterious carriage had disappeared to, Chu Yang focused back onto the problem at hand, he was still broke!


    a?|


    [System detected disciple Chu Yang encountered a mid-tier young master. Host is rmended to allow his disciple to confront the young master, this will bring benefits from ancient magic treasures to your disciple experiencing a sudden increase in strength. The benefits depend on the young master''s tier!]


    At the same time Chu Yang was watching the luxurious carriage slowly disappear around a corner, Xuan Hao, who was in the process of teaching Bai Ning about the Qi Condensation Realm, suddenly froze as a system notification he had not seen for a long time appeared in front of him.


    "Master? Is something wrong?"


    Suddenly seeing his master freeze up all of a sudden, Bai Ning in a worried tone. Thinking that he had done something wrong.


    "Ah? Ah! It''s nothing. Let''s continue. After having gathered your qi together-"


    Seeing the worried look on Bai Ning''s face, Xuan Hao threw the notification from the system to the back of his mind and resumed guiding Bai Ning after reassuring him that everything was fine.


    If something really happened, Chu Yang would contact him through themunication talisman he had given hima?|

 Chapter 524: Becoming a Beggar~

    Chapter 524: Bing a Beggar~


    Beginning to wander around the me Mountain City, Chu Yang tried thinking if he had any interesting information like the old man at the Core Formation Realm that he could use to attract a group of people to pay him a few spirit stonesa?|


    ncing around at the street filled with people, Chu Yang spotted a few beggars asking for money from travellers passing by.


    "Thanks kind stranger!"


    Along with a small bow and a word of thanks from one of the beggars who just received a spirit stone, Chu Yang realized that the beggars around him not only managed to get a few mortal coins, but some of them had also been given a few spirit stones!


    Not only that, but the beggar was rtively cleanpared to the ones he had seen during his escape from the ck Rose Sect and his clothes only had a few tears in them.


    Was being a beggar always such a lucrative profession?


    Not knowing what to say when he watched just how much the beggars of me Mountain City were earning. The reason why they could earn this much, was most likely due to the fact that there were so many new people constantly streaming in and out of the me Mountain City. Not to mention, most of the people inside the me Mountain City were cultivators.


    For cultivators, a few mortal coins were worth close to nothing and to most Core Formation Realm Experts, a single low-quality spirit stone was not really worth to much either.


    Seeing more and more spirit stones enter the hands of the beggars on the street, Chu Yang felt a bit shocked realizing that it might be a good idea to act as a beggar for a few hours.


    He could always steal the spirit stones from the beggars, buta?| Stealing from a bunch of beggars did not really feel like the right way to go about things.


    In the first ce, Chu Yang already had some experience acting as a beggar, as he had tried to hide among a group of beggars during his escape from the ck Rose Sect. Even if he was unsessful in hiding away from his pursuers at that time, he still learned a few things about beggars.


    Among which was the fact that there should be someone in control of the beggars on such a busy street!


    However, Chu Yang did not really care too much about this unknown beggar leader. After all, he was still someone in the Core Formation Realm! How could he be scared of some random beggar leadera?|?


    Rip~


    Finding an empty back alley, Chu Yang destroyed parts of the robe he was currently wearing before dirtying himself and his now torn robe up a bit. Hiding his spear away under a trash container also located in the back alley.


    "Great. Now to find a good ce to beg for spirit stones."


    Not feeling the slightest bit ufortable at his current beggar appearance, Chu Yang made his way back onto the busy street before finding a good spot just beside the back alley with no other beggars close by before sitting down.


    "Hello kind sir, could you spare a small spirit stone?"


    Making sure his cultivation was hidden, Chu Yang joined the other beggars asking for a few coins from the passing crowd of people.


    However, different from the other beggars, Chu Yang directly asked for spirit stones!


    Even if this might cause most of the people passing by to avoid him, it drew quite a bit of interest from a few stronger cultivators passing by.


    "Youngd, why are you begging for spirit stones- Well, to be honest, it feels more like you are asking for spirit stonesa?|"


    After only five minutes of asking the people walking past him for spirit stones, an old man at the Foundation Establishment Realm finally came over as he asked this with a curious expression on his face.


    Clearly, the fact that Chu Yang had been asking for spirit stones instead of coins like the other beggars had caught his attention.


    Given that the old man''s cultivation realm was only at the Foundation Establishment Realm, the old man did not realize that Chu Yang was hiding his cultivation. In his eyes, Chu Yang was just a normal mortal without any cultivation!


    "Ah! I heard that I could enter the Explorer Union as long as I can pay the spirit stones required to be an external member. Even if I don''t have any cultivation to speak of, I should be able to take a few odd jobs from the Explorer Union to be able to earn a living!"


    Saying this with a pitiful expression on his face, Chu Yang waited for the old man''s reaction. Wondering whether the old man would buy his story and give him a few spirit stones...


    "Haha?| I understand, I was just like you when I was younga?| In the end I joined the Explorer Union after gathering enough spirit stones together and even managed to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm! Guess this can be considered a form of fate! Here you go youngd, hopefully you will be able to go farther than I did in the future."


    "a?|"


    Not saying anything as the old man suddenly got emotional before handing him a small pouch filled with just enough spirit stones for bing an external member of the Explorer Union, Chu Yang felt bad taking advantage of the old man''s kindness.


    However, he really needed the spirit stones!


    In the end, Chu Yang could only thank the old man as he watched him walk away with a kind smile on his face. Looking closer, Chu Yang even had a feeling that the old man''s cultivation experienced some sort of breakthrough after giving him the spirit stones.


    Don''t tell mea?| That old man is going to breakthrough to the Core Formation Realma?|?


    Shaking his head at this thought, Chu Yang felt it was a little unrealistic for the old man to breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm just after giving him a few spirit stones!


    "I should go and get registered at the Explorer Union for now."


    Muttering this to himself as the old man disappeared into the crowd of people on the street, Chu Yang stood back up before finding an empty back alley to clean himself up before trying to find his way back to the Explorer Union.


    "Hm?"


    ? About to use a simple qi technique to clean himself up and repair his torn robe, Chu Yang suddenly realized that a group of people had appeared at the entrance to the back alley. Blocking his path back out onto therge street filled with people.


    "Hehe, so you are the new one that just showed up. How about I teach you how things are run around here?"


    What thea?| I''ve only been acting as a beggar for five minutes. How did the beggar boss appear so quickly!?


    Understanding his current situation, the moment he turned around and saw three thugs smiling menacingly in his direction, Chu Yang could not help feeling amazed over just how fast they had showed up.


    Looking more closely, Chu Yang was a bit surprised upon realizing that all of them had actually managed to enter the Qi Condensation Realm. The leader among the three had even managed to reach the Fourth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm!


    It was no wonder that he could take control over a bunch of beggars with no cultivation with such strength, as he most likely learned a low-level qi technique and had used it to scare the beggars into submissiona?|


    "Hey! Listen when the boss is talking to you brat!"


    Angrily stomping towards Chu Yang after not getting any response, one of the three thugs soon raised arge wooden club that he had been carrying before swinging it down towards Chu Yang''s head. Infusing a tiny amount of qi into the club in the process.


    Whoosh~


    "Haha, try not to make too much of a mess!"


    Seeing the club heading towards Chu Yang''s head, the two other thugs already imagined how Chu Yang would end up after being hit by the club, as the boss evenughed while telling the thug with the club not to make too much of a mess.


    Thump!


    However, the scene that they had imagined did not happen, as Chu Yang casually raised his hand and stopped the wooden club heading towards his head. Directly dispersing the tiny amount of qi inside the wooden club in the process.


    "How annoying, I only wanted to get a few spirit stonesa?|"


    Crack~


    Finally turning to look towards the group of now shivering thugs as he said this, Chu Yang tightened his grip on the wooden club of the thug directly in front of him. Directly destroying it.


    ""a?|""


    Freezing up the moment they saw this, the three thugs all seemed to realize that something bad was about to happen to thema?|

 Chapter 525: Archbishop Soft Breeze and Su Wuhan

    Chapter 525: Archbishop Soft Breeze and Su Wuhan


    "Argh!"


    Bang!


    Following a scream of pain from the thug with the wooden club as he was sent flying into a nearby wall before directly passing out of the ground, Chu Yang looked towards the two remaining thugs inside the back alley.


    "E-Exalted lord, it''s all a misunderstanding, we-"


    Bang!


    Before the leader of the three thugs even managed to finish what, he was saying, Chu Yang had already arrived in front of him, as he was simrly sent flying into a nearby wall. Whether he was dead or alive was unknowna?|


    "I-"


    Thest remaining thug barely managed to get a single word out before he joined the other two.


    However, because he had been lucky enough to m into the ce on the nearby wall where his leader was, he did not take as much damage as the other two and could still move to some extent.


    "Hm?"


    Realizing that one of the three thugs were still moving, Chu Yang was about to finish the job, when he suddenly noticed that the still conscious thug had suddenly used hisst remaining strength to knock himself out.


    "Guess I will spare youa?|"


    Shaking his head, a bit when he saw this scene, Chu Yang decided to let the thug live, as he was not really the leader nor the person who had attacked him.


    Whoosh~


    Cleaning himself up with a simple qi technique before repairing what he could of the tears he had made in his robe, Chu Yang made his way out of the back alley towards the Explorer Union''s Branch.


    a?|


    At the same time that Chu Yang was making his way towards the Explorer Union, therge flying ship carrying Archbishop Soft Breeze from the Order of the Sky God had already been flying through the Azure Sky Kingdom for some time without encountering any resistance. Not to mention resistance, they had not even encountered a single person from the church of the gue god. Outside of the few recently? converted mortals on the ground.


    "How weirda?| No one from the Church of the gue God showed up to stop usa?|"


    Muttering this to himself as he cautiously scanned his surroundings, Archbishop Soft Breeze could not help feeling something was wrong. After all, even if the church of the gue god was weaker than the Order of the Sky God, they were still followers of a god. Not someone he could take lightly!


    "Your Excellency! We will arrive at the capital of the Azure Sky Kingdom shortly!"


    Hearing the voice of one of the two Domain Lords that hade with him to clean up the Azure Sky Kingdom, Archbishop Soft Breeze nodded his head before signalling him to remain cautious in case the people from the church of the gue god decided tounch a sneak attack on them.


    However, in the end. Nothing happened, as the flying ship soon hovered directly above the pce located at the centre of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s capital city.


    Maybe I''m worrying too mucha?| Perhaps the things taking ce in the Azure Sky Kingdom was set up by some ambitious bishop from the church of the gue goda?|


    Shaking his head at this thought, Archbishop Soft Breeze looked towards the two Domain Lords who hade with him.


    "Lin, you stay and keep an eye on things, Mei, follow me to meet the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom!"


    ""Yes, your excellency!""


    Having one of the two Domain Lords remain on the flying ship, Archbishop Soft Breeze and the Domain Lord called Mei both descended down towards therge pce located below them.


    For now, Archbishop Soft Breeze''s n was rtively simple, as he would greet the king of the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom and try to gain an understanding of the current situation taking ce inside the Azure Sky Kingdom. Hopefully finding out how strong the people sent over by the church of the gue god were in the process.


    a?|


    Having entered the pce before directly making his way to the throne room, Archbishop Soft Breeze could not help feeling a bit shocked when he noticed the cultivation realm that the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom had archived.


    Creak~


    "Wh-"


    Opening the doorrge door leading into the throne room, Archbishop Soft Breeze could not help softly chuckling to himself upon witnessing the confused, cautious, and fearful expression that had appeared on the king of the Azure Sky Kingdoms face after someone had suddenly barged into his throne room unannounced.


    From this alone, Archbishop Soft Breeze could tell that the king was quite worried about someone attacking him. Not too surprising, as the church of the gue god had suddenly begun trying to take over his kingdom.


    "Haha, no need to be so scared! I''m Archbishop Soft Breeze from the Order of the Sky God and havee to deal with church of the gue god!"


    "Y-your excellency!? I-I didn''t expect for an exalted Archbishop to show up, this-"


    "No need to worry, I''m not here for anything other than the church of the gue God. On the other hand, I didn''t expect for there to actually be someone Half a step into the Domain Lord Realm so far from the Core Region and from the looks of it, you should not be too far away from reaching the Domain Lord Realm! Quite impressivea?|"


    "T-thank you for the kind words your excellency!"


    Watching how nervous the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom was in front of him, Archbishop Soft Breeze could not stop a small smile from appearing on his lips as his gaze towards him carried a hint of disdain.


    No matter how scared he was of him, the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom''s current disy was a bit too much. Especially considering that he was someone close to reaching the Domain Lord Realm.


    With such a mindset, there is no way he will ever breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realma?|


    Thinking this to himself as he signalled for Mei standing beside him to leave and investigate the pce, Archbishop Soft Breeze walked up to the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom before standing directly in front of him.


    "Soa?| King of the Azure Sky Kingdom, as you already know, I''m here because of the church of the gue god recently invading your kingdoms in an attempt to take control of it! Tell me everything you know about their activities, and you can get your kingdom back again quicklya?|"


    a?|


    Standing directly in front of Archbishop Soft Breeze, Su Wuhan, king of the Azure Sky Kingdom barely managed to keep hisposure after hearing what Archbishop Soft Breeze said.


    Ah!


    This damnable priest! He was all fine just a moment agoa?| Guess that person was right in regard to the behaviour of those from the Order of the Sky Goda?| I just acted a bit cowardly, and he suddenly seems to no longer put me in his eyes!


    "Of course, your excellency! I will do my utmost to be of help to you!"


    Completely different from his inner thoughts, Su Wuhan showed a slightly fawning expression on his face before starting to exin the current situation of the Azure Sky Kingdom ording to what he and the people from the church of the gue god had agreed on.


    Of course, what he exined was not all lies. Instead, most of it was correct information about the different towns and cities that the church of the gue god had taken over in the short period of time that had passed since their first appearance inside the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "Hma?| I understanda?| Do you have any idea about their strength? Perhaps anything about a base inside your kingdom?"


    There it is!


    Hearing the question asked by the Archbishop, both of Su Wuhan''s eyes shone for a short moment before he quickly recovered and faked a fearful expression on his face.


    "Actuallya?| Your excellency, I managed to track down a base in a small mountain range where the people from the church of the gue god seemed to have gathered inrge numbers inside my kingdom, buta?|"


    "But?"


    "But when going there myself to investigate myself, I encountered someone far stronger than myself. From what I could tell, the person should have already reached the Domain Lord Realm! In the end, I only barely managed to get away by sacrificing the ancient heirloom of my Azure Sky Kingdoma?|"


    Reaching this part, Su Wuhan smirked inside his mind upon noticing the interested look on the Archbishop''s face after hearing him mention an ancient heirloom.


    "What was this heirloom you mentioned? Would you mind if I took a look? Perhaps I can determine the strength of the person who attacked you!"


    "Here, I hope this broken heirloom will be of some help, your excellency!"


    Seeing the smiling kind expression on the Archbishops face, Su Wuhan could not help rolling his eyes while taking out an artifact that had been prepared just for this asion by the church of the gue god.


    "Hma?| Indeed, it looks like the other party should be someone at the firsta?| Maybe Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, I can also sense a viscous energy on it belonging to the gue god! I will keep it with me for safetya?| Why don''t you show me where this base is located for now?"


    "a?| I understand, your excellencya?| I will show the way."


    Not knowing what to say when he watched the shameless disy of the Archbishop in front of him taking the artifact away without the slightest bit of shame, Su Wuhan could only smile awkwardly before following him out of the throne room.


    As long as he got the people from the Order of the Sky God to enter the mountain range specified by the people from the church of the gue god, his part of the deal would be donea?|

 Chapter 526: Hidden Beneath the Azure Sky Kingdom

    Chapter 526: Hidden Beneath the Azure Sky Kingdom


    Walking out from the throne room of the Azure Sky Kingdom together with Su Wuhan, Archbishop Soft Breeze was happily going over what had just transpired inside his head.


    Not only had he managed to get a good artifact for free, but he had also managed to find out the level of the people from the church of the gue god present inside the Azure Sky Kingdom. Even if they were slightly stronger than what the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom had said, he did not really worry too much about it.


    After all, in his opinion, the person who had attacked the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom should at most be at the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. An expert at that level was something he could easily deal with, with his strength as a Peak Domain Lord!


    In the end, Archbishop felt like the cardinal had been worrying way too much about the church of the gue god invading the Azure Sky Kingdom. Sending the two Domain Lords who hade along with him, Mei and Lin, would have been more than enough to deal with the experts from the church of the gue god present inside the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "This- A flying ship!?"


    Hearing the voice of the cowardly king of the Azure Sky Kingdom beside him, Archbishop Soft Breeze could not help rolling his eyes at the fearful expression that had appeared on Su Wuhan''s face.


    At least act with? the dignity befitting of someone in your position!


    Thinking this to himself, Archbishop Soft Breeze did not bother saying anything, as he directly grabbed onto Su Wuhan before he could react and directly carried him up to the flying ship.


    Thump!


    Putting Su Wuhan down after reaching the deck of the flying ship, Archbishop Soft Breeze instructed Domain Lord Lin to take care of him before leaving to see if Domain Lord Mei managed to find anything of interest inside the pce of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    a?|


    "Your excellency!"


    "No need for all that, did you manage to find anything inside the pce?"


    Meeting up with Domain Lord Mei who had already returned to the flying ship before him, Archbishop Soft Breeze could not help feeling a bit excited thinking about what kind of treasures might have been hidden away inside the pce of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    The reason why he had gotten so excited, was because of the artifact Su Wuhan had ''given'' him.


    The artifact in question was a Peak Mystic Grade Defensive Artifact! Even if it had been damaged, the value of the materials in the artifact alone, was worth more than enough for him to want it.


    The most important part was the fact that the core of the artifact had not been damaged at all!


    With his connections, Archbishop Soft Breeze was confident that he could find a Master cksmith that could help restore the defensive artifact when he finished dealing with the church of the gue god and returned to Order of the Sky God''s main temple in the Sky Empire.


    "Actually, I did manage to find something quite interesting-"


    "What is it!?"


    Not wanting Domain Lord Mei to drag it out, Archbishop Soft Breeze interrupted her with a slightly impatient tone.


    "Beneath the Azure Sky Kingdom''s pce, there should be severalrge deposits of rare spiritual metals! From the looks of it, the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom won''t be able to discover it unless he reaches the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even then, he would have to search for quite some time to discover it even if he reached the Domain Lord Realma?| If we manage to open a mine here. Even if slightly inferior to the Iron Sky Kingdom, it should not be by much!"


    Hearing what Domain Lord Mei said, Archbishop Soft Breeze could not help opening his mouth in surprise. If what she said was true, thena?|


    "Is what you said true!? You should know that this ce is far away from the Core Region! How can there be so manyrge deposits of rare spiritual metals beneath a small Azure Sky Kingdom!?"


    "Even if I''m not a hundred percent certain on the exact size of the deposits, as they are hard to fully observe with my divine sense given how far underground, they are located! However, I''m certain that put together, they should at least be two thirds the size of the deposits under the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital!"


    Not showing any hesitation as she said this, Domain Lord Mei remained firm in what she said.


    "Haha, we are going to get rich! Maybe I will even have a chance at bing a cardinal in the future!"


    Filled with excitement after hearing Domain Lord Mei solemnly reaffirm what she had told him, Archbishop Soft Breeze very well understood just how significant the discovery would be for the development of the Order of the Sky God!


    "For now, don''t tell anyone else about this, we can''t have this leak out and reach the ears of the fire lovers and moon worshipers, or even worse, the emperor!"


    "I understand!"


    Understanding just how bad it would be if any of those three managed to learn about therge deposits beneath the capital of the Azure Sky Kingdom, Domain Lord Mei did not feel what Archbishop Soft Breeze said was odd.


    Of course, she also understood that the main reason for him wanting her to keep quiet, was because he wanted to use it to improve his position inside the Order of the Sky God!


    "Hm? Come in!"


    Creak~


    Realizing that someone hade to the door Archbishop Soft Breeze called out, as the door slowly opened to reveal Domain Lord Lin on the other side.


    "What is it? Did that little king from the Azure Sky Kingdom perhaps cause any problems?"


    "No! he assisted me without any problems! I''m here to inform your excellency that we will arrive at the mountain range where the base is located in less than half an hour!"


    "I understanda?| I will prepare for the battle, you can leave for now, Mei, you can leave as well, we will continue our discussion after dealing with the leeches from the gue god!"


    ""Yes!""


    Whoosh~!


    Following his order, both of them left, as Archbishop Soft Breeze sat down to meditate before the battle. Even if the other party only had a single person at the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Archbishop Soft Breeze still wanted to be at his best possible state when facing off against them.


    After all, he had not reached his current position by carelessly charging into battlea?| Even if that was what he was currently doing to some degreea?|

 Chapter 527: Escort Mission

    Chapter 527: Escort Mission


    "Thank you for showing me the way!"


    "Haha, no problem young one! You can repay me if you be something in the future and we meet again!"


    Thanking a middle-aged man who had helped him find his way back to the Explorer Union, Chu Yang soon entered the Explorer Union branch once again before heading towards the counter for registering as a member.


    "You againa?| Did you manage to get the spirit stones required?"


    Thump!


    cing the pouch of spirit stones on top of the counter with a happy smile on his face, thedy behind the counter just rolled her eyes before proceeding to register him.


    In the first ce, she had already expected for him to return. After all, a Core Formation Realm Expert would not have a difficult time earning the small number of spirit stones required by the Explorer Union. Selling a few materials from in demon beasts on the streets of the me Mountain City would be more than enough to earn the required number of spirit stones.


    After all, the Burning Mountain Range filled with demon beasts, was located just next to the me Mountain Citya?|


    "Here''s your badge."


    "Thank you!"


    Happily taking the badge with the logo of the Explorer Union engraved into it, Chu Yang left the counter before moving towards another counter to take on an escort mission that would take him back to the Flying Sword Sect''s territory. Sadly,pared to the counter for registering as a member of the Explorer Union, there was an extremely long line of people in front of this counter!


    "Are you also here for the escort mission to the Small River Town?"


    Seeing the person in front of him? suddenly turn around before asking this with a curious expression on his face, Chu Yang shook his head in denial.


    "I''m just here for an escort mission to the Flying Sword Sect''s territorya?| I don''t know about any escort mission to the Small River Town."


    Saying this, Chu Yang suddenly felt that the person who had turned around to ask him looked towards him with a slightly weird expression on his face before turning back around to chat with the person in front of him.


    Not finding anything odd about this, Chu Yang just silently waited in line until it was finally his turn.


    "What kind of escort mission are you looking for? Anywhere specific you want to go and what is your cultivation realm?"


    "I just want an escort mission going to the territory of the Flying Sword Sect''s territory as soon as possible. My strength is at the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm!"


    Saying this, Chu Yang heard a few surprised gasps from the people behind him, as they had not expected him to be someone in the Core Formation Realm. Even the man standing behind the counter showed a slightly surprised expression on his face upon hearing his cultivation realm.


    After all, even with his current appearance looking a little older than his actual age, Chu Yang still looked like someone who would at most be 20 years old!


    "Sure- It will take just a moment and I will be back!"


    Calming down again rtively quickly after hearing that Chu Yang was actually someone in the Core Formation Realm, the man behind the counter quickly dashed towards a small drawer located a few meters away.


    "Found it!"


    Pulling out a piece of paper inside the drawer as he said this, the man quickly dashed back to the counter, all within the span of less than 10 seconds.


    "I think this escort mission would be suitable for you, as the escort mission will take you to Small River Town inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory and will be leaving in less than an hour! As long as you are fine with leaving that soon, I think this mission will be perfect. The pay-out is also quite gooda?|"


    "I will take it!"


    Not hesitating in the slightest saying this, Chu Yang happily epted the escort mission. The fact that he would be leaving within an hour was a positive thing in his eyes, as he could return to the territory of the Flying Sword Sect faster this way.


    "Great! From what I know, the person who set up the escort mission should have already started getting ready just outside the branch entrance, it should not be too hard to spot them, as there are quite arge number of people participating in the escort mission.


    Althougha?| I have to warn you, as the strongest members on this escort mission have already reached theter stages of the Core Formation realm, so there is a good chance that it will be a dangerous journey!"


    Frowning a bit when he heard this, Chu Yang thought about what the man behind the counter had said for a short moment before ultimately reaffirming that he epted the escort mission.


    In the first ce, if things really got too dangerous, he could always run away.


    a?|


    Leaving the branch building, Chu Yang scanned his surroundings before spotting arge gathering of people located a short distance away from the entrance to the branch of the Explorer Union. Even from a distance, Chu Yang could feel the aura of more than five Core Formation Realm Experts!


    "That should be the group heading towards the Small River Towna?|"


    Muttering this to himself before making his way over, Chu Yang didn''t waste any time, as he directly walked up to one of the Core Formation Realm Experts.


    "What do you want brat? Can''t you see-"


    Whoosh~


    "I epted this escort mission to the Small River Town, I hope you can help me inform the person in charge!"


    Not bothering to listen to what the rude Core Formation Realm Expert said, Chu Yang directly disyed his strength at the Core Formation Realm before saying this.


    "This- I didn''t expect for the Explorer''s Union to find another Core Formation Realm Expert and one so young at that! Follow mea?|"


    Not knowing what to say when he heard what Chu Yang said along with feeling his aura at the Core Formation Realm. The rude Core Formation Realm Expert could only smile wryly before signaling for Chu Yang to follow him.

 Chapter 528: Entering the Mountain Range~

    Chapter 528: Entering the Mountain Range~


    As Chu Yang followed the Core Formation Realm Expert and got briefed about the escort mission and what was expected of him to do during the journey, the flying ship from the Order of the Sky God? arrived in the periphery of the mountain range that the base mentioned by the Su Wuhan was located.


    Closely observing the first mountain that appeared in front of them, Domain Lord Lin from the Order of the Sky God could not help frowning after not seeing a single person from the church of the gue god''s side on the ground below.


    "I don''t see anyone at alla?| Are you really sure that the base of the church of the gue god is located herea?|?" Narrowing his eyes as the frown on his face deepened, as they got even closer to the mountain range without spotting anyone from the church of the gue god, Domain Lord Lin threateningly asked Su Wuhan standing just beside him.


    "I-I''m sure! I clearly remember facing the expert from the church of the gue god just over there!"


    Showing a fearful expression on his face while looking around the mountain range slowly getting closer and closer to them, Su Wuhan pointed towards a location at the base of one of the mountains located deeper inside the mountain range just barely visible from the deck of the flying ship.


    "Looks like someone did indeed fight over there just recentlya?|"


    Looking towards the location that Su Wuhan pointed, Domain Lord Lin seemed to calm down slightly before focusing his attention back onto the mountain range below. Putting even more effort into scanning his surroundings with his divine sense. Looking for anyone who might be a member of the church of the gue god.


    "Hm?! Finally found someone!"


    Not even a few seconds after having refocused back on looking for members of the church of the gue god in the mountain range below, Domain Lord Lin suddenly showed a surprised expression on his face as he had actually managed to discover someone.


    Creak~


    Just as Domain Lord Lin was about to say something, the door leading up to the deck of the flying ship from the inside of the ship opened as Archbishop made his way onto the deck of the flying ship.


    "Your excellency!"


    "Don''t mind me, you can go down and catch that little fellow you just found and see if he knows anything useful."


    "Yes, your excellency!"


    Whoosh~


    Jumping off the side of the flying ship, Domain Lord Lin rushed towards the person he had found just a moment ago while searching the mountain range with his divine sense.


    Seeing this, Archbishop Soft Breeze made his way to the front of the ship before gazing towards the mountain range in front of them. At this point, the flying ship had already managed to reach the first mountain and the site where the battle between Su Wuhan, the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom, and the expert from the church of the gue god, was clearly visible.


    Looks like it should indeed be someone at the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Scanning the ce where the battle had supposedly taken ce, Archbishop Soft Breeze grew confident in his belief that the person from the church of the gue god''s side should be a Fourth Stage Domain Lord.


    Just how strong is the broken Mystic Grade Defensive Artifacta?| For it to be able to help the little king, who is merely half a step into the Domain Lord Realm escape from a Fourth Stage Domain Lorda?|


    At the same time, Archbishop Soft Breeze understood just how powerful the broken artifact that he had gotten his hands on was, causing him to grow even more excited thinking about how useful it would be to him after getting it repaired.


    Maybe I can even get the order to pay for the repairs after Ie back with news of the rare spiritual metals below the capital of the Azure Sky Kingdoma?|


    As his thoughts drifted towards just how great things would be after returning from the Azure Sky Kingdom, Archbishop Soft Breeze failed to notice a small shimmer behind the flying ship as soon as they bypassed the first mountain of the mountain rangea?|


    As for Domain Lord Lin and Mei, one had just left the ship to chase down a member of the church of the gue god ahead of them, while thest had simrly failed to notice the shimmer behind them.


    However, this did not have to do with the fact that Domain Lord Mei was not paying attention, but more with the fact that she was simply too weak to notice with her current strength!


    Whoosh~


    Returning back to the flying ship after having caught the person from the church of the gue god, Domain Lord Lin smilinglynded in front of Archbishop Soft Breeze.


    Thump!


    "Your excellency! This fellow is rather cowardly, he divulged the location of the base as soon as I caught him! ording to what he said, the base of the church of the gue god should be located at the base of a mountain at the centre of the mountain range."


    Throwing the shivering man in his grasp onto the deck of the flying ship, Domain Lord Lin snickered disdainfully as he said this before waiting for Archbishop Soft Breeze''s response.


    "Hma?| Indeed, a cowardly one. At most a High Priest of the gue Goda?| Just kill him, we will check out the location, as it should be around the same ce the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom told us about."


    "Ah-!"


    Along with the painful scream from the person caught by Domain Lord Lin as he was killed off, Archbishop Soft Breeze did not pay too much attention to this, as he focused most of his attention towards the centre of the mountain range. The location that both the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom and the person that had just been killed off said was the location of the base!

 Chapter 529: Trap! Massive Formation!

    Chapter 529: Trap! Massive Formation!


    Watching as the base of the church of the gue god slowly appeared in the distance, Su Wuhan could not help letting out a sigh of relief as he realized that all three Domain Lords from the Order of the Sky God focused their full attention on the base that had appeared at the base of arge mountain located at the centre of the mountain range.


    Now I just have to wait for the attack before escaping.


    Thinking about just how dangerous his uing situation would be, Su Wuhan could not help feeling a bit nervous. After all, even if he understood that the church of the gue god would not be attacking him, he very well understood just how destructive the battle would be.


    If he was idently hit by some remnant power from the sh between the Archbishop from the Order of the Sky God and his opponent, he would instantly be reduced to dust without a chance to fight back!


    In front of the almighty Archbishop, Su Wuhan was nothing more than a small insect that could easily be squashed!


    This was the difference between someone at the absolute peak of the Nascent Soul Realm and someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Su Wuhan focused his attention tworge mountains just in front of the base belonging to the church of the gue god.


    After crossing the two mountains, the attack would officially begin and his chance to escape would appear!


    Knowing this, Su Wuhan grew more and more nervous with each passing second, as he understood just how dangerous things would be for him.


    "You don''t need to act that nervous, the Archbishop is more than strong enough to handle that person from the church of the gue god!"


    Seemingly having misunderstood the reason why Su Wuhan was growing more and more nervous, Domain Lord Lin said this filled with contempt. Clearly, he looked down on Su Wuhan''s behaviour.


    Just wait and see if you can maintain that attitude after the attack begins!


    Hearing what Domain Lord Lin said, Su Wuhan did not say anything and decided to just remain silent while thinking this to himself. In the first ce, he would get his revenge shortly and those people from the Order of the Sky God would soon die!


    It''s here!


    Whoosh!


    Noticing that they passed the second mountain, Su Wuhan could only watch in amazement, as an enormous formation suddenly materialized.


    Starting at the outer perimeter of the mountain range, the formation soon rose into the air before covering the entire mountain range.


    Even Archbishop Soft Breeze had no time to react before the sky above them was blocked by the massive formation.


    At this point, even an idiot would be able to realize that they had walked into a trap set up by the church of the gue god!


    "Hah, looks like this is not going to be as easy as I expected it to bea?| Lin, Mei, both of you be careful! The church of the gue god likely brought an Archbishop with them, if they didn''t, they wouldn''t dare do something like this knowing I''m here!"


    Along with the sigh from Archbishop Soft Breeze, Su Wuhan watched as everyone on top of the flying ship tensed up before getting ready for battle.


    Fwish~


    The flying ship also began shinning as several holy runes manifested all over it before a barrier covered the entire flying ship.


    Just in time, as the formation covering the mountain range shone in an eerily green colour before several massive green spears manifested and flew towards the flying ship-


    Boom!


    What followed was an earth-shaking explosion, as the barrier covering the flying ship shook violently under the attack of the massive formation.


    "Hmph, do they really think this formation is enough to deal with us!? Mei, stay back and keep the flying ship''s formations active, Lin, follow me to see how many people those leeches brought!"


    Not the slightest bit intimidated by the massive formation that he was now caught inside of, Archbishop Soft Breeze quickly instructed the two other Domain Lords before rushing out from the protective barrier formed by the flying ship together with Domain Lord Lin.


    BOOM!


    What followed could only be described as devastating, as the second mountain just behind them was suddenly blown apart as the sh between the church of the gue god and the Order of the Sky God officially began!


    a?|


    BOOM!


    Seeing the mountain behind them suddenly get blown apart, Su Wuhan could not help cursing as he realized just howrge the difference between himself and someone in the Domain Lord Realm was.


    Haha?| Now I just have to disable the flying ship and I can escapea?|


    Narrowing his eyes as he remembered the thing, he had been given by the church of the gue god, Su Wuhan looked towards the Domain Lord known as Mei who stayed at the Flying Ship to make sure it stayed intact during the battle.


    Whoosh~


    At the moment, a holy light had engulfed her as she seemed to have merged together with the formation of the flying ship. Controlling it to not only defend against the attacks from the massive formation outside, but also using it to attack the massive formation covering the mountain range.


    "a?|"


    Seeing this scene, Su Wuhan decided to try his luck, as he acted like he was scared of what was happening. Slowly moving closer and closer to the centre of the flying ship.


    This was easy than I expecteda?|


    Reaching the centre of the flying ship, Su Wuhan didn''t think about it for too long.


    Whether it had been because of his good acting skills or because Mei was simply focusing all her attention on what was happening outside the flying ship. In the end, he had managed to reach his destination.


    Whoosh!


    "What are y-"


    Before Mei even had the time to react, Su Wuhan took out arge green orb from an interspatial ring that had been hidden with the help of the expert from the church of the gue god before smashing it into the centre of the ship!

 Chapter 530: Su Wuhan’s Betrayal!

    Chapter 530: Su Wuhan''s Betrayal!


    Fwoosh!


    After the green orb made contact with the deck of the ship, it instantly broke apart before a violent green mist spread out and engulfed the entire flying ship.


    Not even a secondter, the shining holy symbols covering the flying ship seemed to lose their power, as the barrier disappeared, and the flying ship began falling down towards the ground below.


    "YOU! YOU DARE BETRAY THE ORDER OF-"


    Before Mei managed tounch an attack to kill Su Wuhan, the formation covering the mountain range attacked her. Preventing her from rushing down towards Su Wuhan, who had already jumped off the falling ship.


    Even if he could not fly, he understood that if he didn''t jump off the ship, the now extremely angry Domain Lord from the Order of the Sky God would definitely kill him!


    Bang!


    "Ah!"


    Not able to stop a small scream of pain from escaping his lips as he crashed into the rocky mountain terrain below, Su Wuhan quickly got up before using all his strength to escape in the direction that he had been told would be safest by the church of the gue god.


    "HMPH!"


    Only a few seconds had passed after he hadnded on the ground and begun escaping before a cold snort echoed out from above followed by a terrifying pressure descending from the sky. Instantly engulfing him. Preventing him from moving a single inch forward.


    "Think you can just run away!?"


    Recognizing the owner of the voice as the Archbishop from the Order of the Sky God, Su Wuhan could not help shivering as he barely managed to muster up enough strength to look up. Only to witness an enormous golden palm descending down towards him with an unstoppable momentum.


    Its over!


    As this thought appeared in his mind, Su Wuhan understood that he had no chance to resist the massive golden palm sent out by Archbishop Soft Breeze. Even moving was impossible under the terrifying pressure!


    Whoosh~


    However, just as he had resigned himself to death, a figure covered in a luxurious green robe with the familiar symbol belonging to the believers of the gue god on it, appeared in front of the massive golden palm pressing down towards him.


    As the figure raised his hand, a simrly massive green palm appeared and shed with the massive golden palm from Archbishop Soft Breeze.


    BOOOOOOOM!


    Whoosh!


    The moment the two palm attacks shed with each other; Su Wuhan was sent flying by the powerful wind created from the sh before crashing into a mountain located several miles away.


    Inspecting his body, Su Wuhan quickly realized that he had actually lost one of his arms after being hit by a fraction of the power from the sh!


    Not even bothering to look back to see the destruction that had taken ce after the sh, Su Wuhan used all the strength he could muster to escape. Losing only an arm could be said to be a rather lucky oue, as he could always regrow it again in the future if he managed to escape safelya?|


    BOOOOOM!


    As another terrifying attacknded on a mountain just a short distance away from him, Su Wuhan could not stop himself from shivering as he watched the mountain in question crumble under the terrifying attack.


    I-I have to get out of here!


    Not thinking about anything else, Su Wuhan directly utilized a forbidden technique that would reduce his lifespan to increase his speed just a tiny bit.


    In his eyes, the only thing that mattered was to get out of the mountain range and the formation as quickly as possible. Losing a few hundred or a thousand years of his lifespan was nothing to worry about as long as he could escape sessfully and breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm in the future!


    a?|


    The moment Su Wuhan had been sent flying into the distance; Archbishop Soft Breeze looked towards the person who had appeared below him to block the attack he had sent to kill Su Wuhan.


    "How dare you interrupt me, you damnable leech!?"


    "Hehe, what did you expect? Did you perhaps want me to wait on the side line while you killed my little friend? Now, let''s resume our battle!


    Along with a small chuckle, the person floating in the air only a little below him smiled sinisterly before a green mist appeared around him before rapidly spreading outwards. Soon engulfing Archbishop Soft Breeze!


    "Hmph!"


    Feeling the green mist around him trying to invade his body, Archbishop Soft Breeze only frowned slightly before the image of a terrifying cyclone appeared behind him.


    WHOOSH!


    Along with appearance of the cyclone, the green mist was instantly swept away.


    "As expected from Archbishop Soft Breeze, your domain is indeed impressive!"


    Not saying anything more than this, the man from the church of the gue god''s side also manifested his own domain in the shape of massive poisonous swamp to counteract Archbishop Soft Breeze''s domain before lunging forward for another attack.


    Whoosh!


    Seeing his opponent rushing towards him, Archbishop Soft Breeze narrowed his eyes before simrly rushing forward. Deciding to meet his opponent head on!


    BOOOOOM!


    The following sh was no less destructivepared to before, as the ground beneath them was instantly turned into a wastnd, while any living being unfortunate enough to be caught up in the attack died on spot!


    a?|


    At the same time that Archbishop Soft Breeze was locked in his own battle, Mei had suddenly found herself under attack by a Domain Lord around her own level without any way out.


    "That damnable king! After I get out of here, I will burn his Nascent Soul for a thousand years before reducing it to ashes!"


    Not able to stop herself from cursing when she felt another attack from the massive formation heading towards her, Mei could only curse Su Wuhan. The sole reason why she now had to deal with both a Domain Lord and the formation at the same time without being able to fight back.


    In the distance, thest remaining Domain Lord, Lin, was doing no better, as he was also facing a Domain Lord with simr strength to himself and the formation at the same time!


    For both of them, all they could do, was hope that Archbishop Soft Breeze won and came to help thema?|

 Chapter 531: Chaotic Battle!

    Chapter 531: Chaotic Battle!


    "Bang-bang-bang!"


    Back at the centre of the mountain range, both Archbishop Soft Breeze and the person from the church of the gue god were shing violently with? each mid-air, as the area around them had already beenpletely devasted. Turning into a wastnd of death.


    Looking at the fight taking ce from afar, it was clear that the person from the church of the gue god had the upper hand in the battle, as the formation covering the mountain range had focused most of its strength on restraining Archbishop Soft Breeze. Preventing him from being able to fight with all his powers against the person from the church of the gue god!


    "Take this!" Roaring loudly in a wrathful tone as he understood how bad his current situation was, Archbishop Soft Breeze pulled out a divine golden sceptre before swinging it down towards his opponent filled with killing intent.


    The moment the divine sceptre appeared the world around lost its colours as the only source of light present inside mountain range at the moment was the divine sceptre in Archbishop Soft Breeze''s hands.


    "Oma??" Sacred runes encircled this holy treasure sceptre, as it began to exude countless divine lights that managed to forcefully pierce through the formation covering the mountain range. The divine power spewing out was boundless, causing the person from the church of the gue god to shiver at the sight.


    "A Transcendent Grade Holy Artifacta?|" Muttering this to himself the moment he saw the divine sceptre in the hands of Archbishop Soft Breeze, the person from the church of the gue god began forming several seals with his hands before the formation covering the mountain range began moving.


    Soon enough, the divine light from the sceptre was suppressed by the formation, as the holes that had formed in the formation were beginning to repair themselves.


    Not a secondter, the divine sceptre arrived in front of the person from the church of the gue god!?


    Whoosh!


    A fraction of a second before the divine sceptre managed tond on its target, a massive shield made out of green divine power materialized in front of it-


    BANG!


    Stopping it from reaching the divine sceptre from proceeding forward towards its intended target.


    "Hm? The formation isa?|" Realizing something, Archbishop Soft Breeze tried pulling back together with the divine sceptre, but he was toote, as therge shield made out of green divine power suddenly turned into dozens of chains that quickly sealed up the divine sceptre.


    "nka??" Taking out a weapon of his own in the form of arge saber, the moment the divine sceptre was sealed up by the chains, the person from the church of the gue god did not stand around to wait for Archbishop Soft Breeze to free the divine sceptre, as he jumped forward and shed down towards Archbishop Soft Breeze.


    In the next moment, a sh cut across the sky. Heading directly towards Archbishop Soft Breeze, who was trying his best to free the divine sceptre from the green chains.


    "nk!" As the saber sh arrived in front of him, Archbishop Soft Breeze could only release the divine sceptre, as he defended against the saber sh.


    Even if the saber sh was far from beingparable to the divine sceptre, it was still terrifying beyond belief, as the sh was assisted by the powerful saber intent of the person from the church of the gue god.


    The saber strike not only hit him, but also spread out and headed towards the two other Domain Lords from the Order of the Sky God currently fighting at the edge of the mountain range. In an attempt to not get hit by the attacks of Archbishop Soft Breeze and his opponent.


    "No!" Realizing just what his opponent was nning to do, Archbishop Soft Breeze could only nce reluctantly at the divine sceptre getting sealed up by the chains connected to the formation covering the mountain range, as he rushed out to save the two Domain Lords who hade together with him.?


    However, the person from the church of the gue god did not intend to just sit around and wait for Archbishop Soft Breeze to save the two Domain Lords.


    "ng!" Another saber hymn filled the sky. Followed by one more sh flying towards Archbishop Soft Breeze with unparalleled speed. Far exceeding the speed of thest sh, though this had ended up lowering the strength of the saber sh.


    Seeing this through his divine sense, Archbishop Soft Breeze understood that the sh was not intended to kill him. Instead, it was merely to dy him from saving hispanions.


    Whoosh!


    Feeling the saber sh already arrive behind him, Archbishop Soft Breeze could onlye to a stop for a split second as he dealt with the saber sh.


    Bang-!


    The power was indeed not powerful and did not require too much effort to deal with, but Archbishop Soft Breeze very clearly understood that he would not have time to reach both hispanions before the first saber sh reached thema?|


    "DAMN YOU!" Screaming loudly as he realized this, a holy light covered Archbishop Soft Breeze''s body as his speed rapidly increased for a short moment, just barely managing to overtake the closest of the two saber lights that had split off from the attack that had hit him.


    BOOM!


    Blocking the saber sh, Archbishop Soft Breeze did not feel the slightest bit happy, as he watched the second saber sh cut through the defences of Domain Lord Mei like a hot knife cutting through butter before reaching her body, splitting it in half and directly annihting her soul before she had any time to react.


    Freezing on the spot as he saw this, Archbishop Soft Breeze did not know what to say, as both his eyes were filled with a terrifying killing intent.


    Not to mention how painful it was for the Order of the Sky God to lose one of their Domain Lords, it was especially devastating to Archbishop Soft Breeze, as Domain Lord Mei was one of the two Domain Lords, he had nurtured himself!


    Now, there was only Domain Lord Lin left!


    For them to have prepared so well against me, there is likely a mole inside the order! I have to get word back to the cardinal!


    Knowing very well that hismunication talisman would be useless in his current circumstance given the massive formation sealing them from the outside world, Archbishop Soft Breeze could not help cursing at just how well thought out the trap was.


    "Hm?"


    Thinking about how he could escape his current situation, Archbishop Soft Breeze suddenly noticed the small holes still present all around the formation slowly repairing themselves.?


    The damage created by the divine sceptre had yet to recovera?| Maybea?|


    "Lin, get to the edge of the formation and wait for an opportunity to escape! The moment you get out, rush back to the order and inform the cardinal about what happened here!"


    As a n slowly took shape inside his mind, Archbishop Soft Breeze quickly instructed Domain Lord Lin through his divine sense before rushing back to face the person from the church of the gue god. Not waiting for his response.


    "Your excellencya?|"


    Knowing that Archbishop Soft Breeze was going to give him an opportunity to escape, Domain Lord Lin gazed towards Archbishop Soft Breeze''s disappearing figure filled with respect.


    After all, for him to help him escape the formation, Domain Lord Lin was certain that he would not be able to escape himself!


    Whoosh!


    Not standing daring to waste any more time, Domain Lord Lin rushed towards the edge of the mountain range.


    The Domain Lord who had been fighting him, had already escaped a few seconds before Archbishop Soft Breeze showed up, so there was not anyone there to stop him!


    a?|


    Knowing that he would only get one chance, Archbishop Soft Breeze was filled with determination as he rushed towards the divine sceptre that had almost beenpletely sealed up at this point in time.?


    "Time to end this!" Muttering this to himself as he arrived back at the centre of the mountain range where his opponent stood ready to face him, Archbishop Soft Breeze decided to use a forbidden technique, as a golden me erupted from the top of his head before engulfing his entire body.


    The forbidden technique rapidly increased his strength, but at the same time rapidly reduced his lifespan. Every second that passed, would reduce his lifespan by a hundred years!


    As Archbishop Soft Breeze could already be close to the end of his lifespan, the forbidden technique was especially costly for him. After all, using it for too long would end up killing hima?| At this point, he did not see any other way out of his current situation without using the forbidden technique!


    FWOOSH!


    As the golden me burned brightly, the person from the church of the gue god rapidly retreated, as he sensed the danger.


    However, he was not Archbishop Soft Breeze''s target, as he very well understood? he would have no time to defeat his opponent before his lifespan was burned upa?| Instead, he lunged towards the divine sceptre-


    "Boom-boom-boom!" Destroying the chains that sealed it before using its divine light to make an opening in the massive formation for Domain Lord Lin to escape through.


    "I hope the cardinal will send someone to helpa?|" Watching as Domain Lord Lin escaped through the hole in the formation he had created, Archbishop Soft Breeze shook his head slightly as the golden me covering his body was slowly beginning to disperse.


    "Hehe, Archbishop Soft Breeze, looks like you lost!"?


    Hearing the voice of the person from the church of the gue god, Archbishop Soft Breeze''s eyes filled with killing intent as he suddenly thought of something.


    "Not yet!"


    Saying these words filled with an unbearable killing intent, Archbishop Soft Breeze used thest remaining bit of his power to leave his physical body before forcibly merging his soul together with the divine sceptre.


    After having merged together with the divine sceptre, Archbishop Soft Breeze borrowed the power of the divine sceptre to protect his soul inside of it.


    BOOM!


    Following this, the divine sceptre crashed into the ground below, as it seemed to have erected a defensive barrier around itself. Preventing anyone from touching it.


    "No!"


    The person from the church of the gue god also realized this, as he could only struggle helplessly after the divine sceptre had sealed itself.


    Even if he could restrain the divine sceptre, there was no way for him to move it, or evene into contact with it after it had sealed itself off. No matter what, the divine sceptre was a Transcendent Grade Holy Artifact! To remove it after it had sealed itself off, would require someone in Soul Ascension Realm!


    Therefore, the person from the church of the gue god could only helplessly stare at the sceptre that had nted itself in the middle of the now destroyed mountain range. Not able to do anything about ita?|

 Chapter 532: Chaotic Battlefield

    Chapter 532: Chaotic Battlefield


    At the same time that the chaotic battle inside the Azure Sky Kingdom wasing to an end, Chu Yang had already begun his journey towards the Small River Town inside located somewhere inside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect.


    During the journey, Chu Yang had found out that they were actually escorting the luxurious carriage that he had seen being followed by therge group of old Core Formation Realm cultivators. How the person inside the carriage had managed to deal with so many Core Formation Realm Experts, Chu Yang had no idea, and he didn''t n to try finding out either.


    In his eyes, just being able to get back to the territory of the Flying Sword Sect again was more than enough for him!


    Even if his job was to help protect the luxurious carriage currently located in the middle of a small caravan, it was mostly decided to be done in shifts. Having two people at the Core Formation constantly around the luxurious carriage, while the others would rx as they made their way towards the Small River Town.


    As luck would have it, Chu Yang was not among the two Core Formation watching over the luxurious carriage and he had decided to rx in one of the carriages following behind.


    "Haha?|" Letting out a sigh as he thought about this, Chu Yang could not help feeling that his trip outside the sect had been aplete failure so far. Not to mention visiting a famous ce for training and opportunities to increase his cultivation realm, he had spent all of his time so far travelling!


    At least he should be able to do something more exciting after returning to his sect''s territory. Maybe he would finally be able to visit one of the famous demon beast forest or ruins after returninga?|


    "Hm? Did something happen?"


    Suddenly realizing that the caravan consisting of around a dozen or so carriages hade to a stop, Chu Yang could not help frowning as he jumped off the carriage he had been sitting in since the start of the journey and began moving towards the front to check out what had happened.


    Even if he just wanted to stay inside the carriage and ck off during the journey to the Small River Town, he at the very least had to show his face whenever something happened.


    With this in mind, Chu Yang quickly made his way to the front of the caravan to see what was happening. Not too worried about the situation, as he didn''t hear any sound of fighting up ahead.


    If there really was a fight taking ce, he would first of all not rush forward and would instead try to find out just how strong the opponent was before determining whether to help out or escape in case the opponent was too stronga?|


    "We can just move around, there is no reason for us to get involved in whatever is happening over there!"


    "If we do that, we will at least add half a day extra to the journey! I think we should ask what the boss thinks firsta?|"


    Arriving at the front of the caravan, Chu Yang ignored the group of people that had gathered to discuss among themselves, as he instead focused his attention on the thing that had caused the caravan toe to a stop.


    "Just how chaotic is this cea?|"


    Muttering this to himself as he gazed towards the battlefield that had formed just in front of him, Chu Yang could not help recalling just how many such battles he had encountered after having left the territory of his sect.


    The territory that had once been under the Raging me Sect had truly ended up chaotic after the Raging me Sect had been destroyeda?| Just the battle taking ce in front of him involved several thousand different cultivators, with no small number of Core Formation Realm Experts present!


    Among one of the two forces on the battlefield, Chu Yang even managed to spot a few familiar figures, some belonging to the Simen Sect that he had seen after having entered the chaotd, while a few others belonged to the Mapai Sect that they had been fighting against.


    The Core Formation Realm Expert that he had chatted with back then was also present on the battlefield, as he worked together with the still injured leader of the Mapai Sect and several other forces to fight against the Simen Sect and the forces that had joined together with them.


    Did the battle reallyst for over a day before evolving into this messa?|?


    Frowning a bit to himself as he realized this, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit of pity when he looked at the exhausted figures belonging to the Mapai and Simen Sects. After all, they had been fighting for over a day by now! Even if they were cultivators and had far better staminapared to mortals. Fighting for over a day would inevitably exhaust thema?|.


    "Hey, isn''t that the Mapai Secta?| And the Simen Sect as well!"


    Hearing one of the people standing in front of him call out loudly as he seemed to have recognized the two sects fighting on the increasinglyrge battlefield, Chu Yang wondered just how famous these two rtively weak sects were.


    This feeling only deepened when he saw everyone standing around him seemingly knowing about the two sects after they recognized that they were in the middle of the chaotic battlefield in front of them. Among them, there were even some who wanted to rush forward and help out either the Mapai Sect or the Simen Sect!


    Please don''t force me to join that messa?|


    Sincerely thinking this as he stared back towards the luxurious carriage located at the centre of the caravan, Chu Yang wanted nothing more than to avoid the mess taking ce in front of him.


    Even if he was at the Core Formation Realm, the battle taking ce in front of him was not something he wanted to take part in. Especially considering the fact that he had counted over thirty Core Formation Realm Experts in the middle of said battle, with at least five of them at theter stages of the Core Formation Realma?|


    Creak~


    Just as he was nervously looking towards the luxurious carriage, the door leading inside the carriage opened, as the familiar servant he had seen before walked out. Soon arriving at the front of the caravan where he and most of the others were located.


    "Hma?| This is quite troublesome; we need to reach the Small River Town before-" Muttering something to himself as he looked over the chaotic battlefield in front of the caravan with a troubled expression on his face, the servant seemed to havee to a decision as he stopped mid-sentence.


    Listening from the side, Chu Yang could not help feeling that the servants train of thought was going in a bad directiona?|


    "We will continue forward, try to move along the edge of the battlefield and try your best not to get involved in the fight! Inform everyone to be ready to fight in case someone tries attacking us during this time!"


    Hearing what the servant said, Chu Yang could not help cursing him inside his mind.


    Moving so close to a chaotic battlefield like the one in front of them, they would inevitably end up getting hit by some of the attacks that were thrown all over the cea?|


    "Haha?|" Letting out a sigh as he realized this, Chu Yang made his way back towards the carriage he had been spending his time inside of during the journey. However, instead of entering the carriage to cultivate or rx, Chu Yang sat on top of the carriage so he could react in case an attack happened to fly towards the carriage!


    Looking around at the rest of the people inside the caravan, Chu Yang could not help frowning upon realizing that none of them acted with even the slightest bit of cation. Instead, they acted more excited at the possibility of finally getting some ''exercise''a?|


    Among them, there were even a few that openly talked about trying to antagonize the people on the chaotic battlefield, as they wanted to join the fight to help either the Mapai Sect or the Simen Sect.


    "Looks like I won''t be able to avoid joining the fight unless I run awaya?|" Shaking his head as he almost whispered this to himself, Chu Yang could only prepare for the inevitable battle he would be forced to join.


    After all, he still needed someone to help him get back to his sect''s territory and he highly doubted that the owner of the luxurious carriage at the centre of the caravan wanted to join the fight taking ce in front of them.


    The main reason why he thought this, was because of what he had heard the servant mutter to himself before deciding that they would be moving along the edges of the chaotic battlefielda?|

 Chapter 533: Massive Spirit Stone

    Chapter 533: Massive Spirit Stone


    Cautiously observing the battle taking ce a short distance away from him, Chu Yang made sure that he was ready in case an attack happened to fly his way. However, from the looks of it, the two groups fighting each other on the chaotic battlefield did not seem too keen on idently involving them in their fight.


    The main reason for this, was most likely the fact that there were around five Core Formation Realm Experts in total including himself defending the caravana?| If they ended up joining either of the two sides in the battle, it would inevitably tilt the scale of the battle in the favour of that side!


    Because of this, the people fighting close to the edge understood that it was best not to attack them, as they tried their best to avoid the caravan whenever they saw it.


    This was of course a wee surprise in Chu Yang''s eyes, as he didn''t want to join in on the fight between the two sects. Especially given the fact that he had already avoided joining the fight once before, when it was still rtively small scalepared to the chaotic brawl it had evolved into at this point in timea?|


    Now, his only real worry, was the people in the caravan who had talked about wanting to join in on the fight and help out either the Simen Sect or the Mapai Sect-


    "Look! What''s that!"


    Hearing a shout suddenlye from one of these people, Chu Yang felt that something bad was about to happen, as he looked in the direction that the person who had called out was pointing in.


    "a?|"


    In the middle of the chaotic battlefield, a weird oversized spirt stone could barely be seen half submerged in the ground from their current position. Not only that, but several of the Core Formation Realm Experts nearby were trying their best to dig out the massive spirt stone, while at the same time trying to prevent the other side from doing the same.


    In the end, the side that was winning at the moment tried freeing the massive spirit stone from the ground, while the losing side tried their best in preventing the massive spirit stone from getting out of the grounda?|


    "Such arge spirit stonea?|"


    "If I had something like that, wouldn''t I be able to breakthrough? Even reaching the Nascent Soul Realm is no longer a dream!"


    "Just cultivating with it for a few hours would be more than enough for me to reach the Core Formation Realm!"


    "Damn this escort mission, I can''t let such a huge opportunity go!"


    As more and more of the people escorting the caravan discovered the massive spirt stone, they soon decided to abandon the caravan, as they rushed into the chaotic battlefield and joined one of the two sides fighting for the massive spirit stone.


    Luckily or not for them, both of the sides were more than willing to wee them, as they soon joined in on the chaotic battle for the massive spirit stone located at the centre of the chaotic battlefield.


    Looking at all of this, Chu Yang not only realized just how unreliable the people from the Explorer Union was when it came topleting the escort missiona?| But also recognized that the reason why so many people had gathered was not to support the Simen Sect or Mapai Sect but was instead to fight for the massive spirit stone.


    Indeed, the two small sects influence would be a bit too much if they had managed to cause such a huge fight all by themselves. Especially given the fact that their sect leaders had only reached the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, while the strongest people currently present on the chaotic battlefield were close to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm!


    "Those useless idiots!"


    Watching the people who were supposed to protect them leave in droves as they rushed to join the fight around the massive spirit stone, the servant who hade out from the luxurious carriage to check what was happening, could not help cursing to himself as he stared in the direction of the massive spirit stone.


    From start to finish, he did not seem to care about the massive spirit stone and showed no sign of wanting to join the fight for it.


    In the end, after a few short minutes, the people left behind to protect the caravan were only a few weaker people at the Peak of the Qi Condensation Realm and earlier stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    The only Core Formation Realm Expert who had decided to stay, was Chu Yang. Even if the massive spirit stone was rather enticing. In the end it was just a slightlyrger high-grade spirit stone. Joining the chaotic fight for it and giving up his ticket back to his sect''s territory, was not really something Chu Yang was willing to do!


    If he really wanted a high-grade spirit stone, he could always beg his master for one when he returned to the Flying Sword Sect. After all, the Flying Sword Sect was still a major sect that had several spirit stone mines under it. Given how strong his master was, it should be easy for him to get his hands on a few high-grade spirit stonesa?|


    "Those damnable greedy-"


    As the servant was still busy cursing in the direction of the explorers who had run off, he suddenly noticed that Chu Yang was still around.


    "Someone actually stayed behinda?| You area?| Chu Yang? Right?"


    "Yes."


    Answering with a simple yes, Chu Yang did not know why the servant had called out to him, as he curiously looked back at him.


    "Hma?| Given that everyone else in the Core Formation Realm have run away, you and I should be the only Core Formation Realm Experts lefta?| For now, you will help guarding my young master''s carriage in ce of the one''s whoa?| Decided to abandon their escort missiona?|"


    Listening to the servant say this, Chu Yang quickly agreed before moving on top of the luxurious carriage.


    "I didn''t mean you had to sit on top ofa?| Haha?| Whatever, let''s continue before we end up getting dragged into the fighta?|"


    Not knowing what to say when Chu Yang suddenly moved on top of the luxurious carriage, the servant could only shake his head beforemanding the people still left in the caravan to continue moving along the edge of the chaotic battlefield.


    After half hour passed, the caravan with the luxurious carriage at the centre managed to safely bypass the chaotic battlefield.


    While they did not end up getting dragged into a fight during this period of time, the overall strength of the caravan had been lowered by arge degree, as they had ended up losing around five Core Formation Realm Experts and over a hundred cultivators in the Foundation Establishment Realm. Most of which had reached the middle toter stages of the realm.


    From an outsider''s perspective, therge caravan had only a single Core Formation Realm Expert and a few people at the Foundation Establishment and Qi Condensation Realm.


    Although this level of strength was enough to intimidate some of the weaker bandit groups looking for someone to rob, it was a prime target for any of the stronger bandit groups that had grown rapidly by robbing some weaker sects and family ns following the destruction of the Raging me Sect.


    "Hehe, looks like the boss will be happy hearing about this!"


    At this moment, a bandit belonging to one such bandit group had just happened to spot therge caravan, as he quickly rushed back to inform the rest.


    a?|


    Back at the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao walked out from his youngest disciple''s room with a satisfied smile.


    "Looks like Bai Ning should be fine on his own for nowa?|"


    After having returned to the Flying Sword Sect, he had spent all his time teaching Bai Ning and his youngest disciple did not disappoint him in the slightest, as he managed to directly breakthrough from the Seventh Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm to the Eighth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm under his guidance!


    Currently, Bai Ning was in the process of stabilizing his cultivation realm after having broken through and did not need his help.


    Even if he could help him quickly stabilize his cultivation base, Xuan Hao didn''t n on doing it, as it was a good opportunity for him to check up on Qing Yi and see how see was doing.


    "Still in closed door meditationa?|" Muttering this to himself as his divine sense locked on to Qing Yi, Xuan Hao soon disappeared from the hallway just outside Bai Ning''s room before appearing directly inside the room of his first disciple, Qing Yi.


    At the moment, Qing Yi waspletely motionless, as she was fully absorbed in her cultivation mantra. Absorbing the qi between heaven and earth, as she slowly got closer and closer to the Core Formation Realm.


    Seeing this scene, Xuan Hao thought about something for a moment before taking out the ancient scroll rted to the Dao of Fire, that he had gotten from the temple of the Half Spirit race.

 Chapter 534: Ancient Scroll and Excited Bandits~

    Chapter 534: Ancient Scroll and Excited Bandits~


    The reason why he wanted to take out the ancient scroll was because he was curious if it would do anything when put in front of his disciple, who was both cultivating a fire-based cultivation mantra and at the same time had a fire-based divine physique.


    Fwoosh!


    The moment the ancient scroll rted to the Dao of Fire appeared, it instantly reacted to the presence of Qing Yi deep in meditation in front of it, as a small me appeared on top of it. Rapidly increasing the fire qi and temperature inside Qing Yi''s small room


    "Looks like it does indeed act differently in front of someone cultivating in the direction of the Dao of Firea?|" Muttering this to himself as he watched how the ancient scroll began assisting Qing Yi in improving her cultivation, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that it was a pity that he could not find an ancient scroll rted to one of the two domains he had managed toprehenda?|


    However, there was nothing he could do about it. All he could do for now was hope his disciples would improve enough for the system to give him something to help out with merging his two domains. Even just pointing in the correct direction would be more than enough for him, as he had more than enough time to slowly merge both of his domains together.


    Outside of the fact that there was a looming threat in the form of the Sky Empire and the powerful existences above the Domain Lord Realm that existed in the Core region of the continent that could easily wipe out the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao did not really feel that there was anything that could threaten him or his sect in the short term.


    Not to mention, the Raging me Sect and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. The Flying Sword Sect''s biggest threats had already been dealt with.


    The current Flying Sword Sect not only had him, but also had Shu Yao and the winged lion at the Domain Lord Realm. Not to mention Feng Chen, who was only a single step away from reaching the Domain Lord Realm!


    Even if the Azure Sky Kingdom or the Seven Fates Sect decides to attack them, he wouldn''t need to worry, as Shu Yao alone would be more than enough to deal with them!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help smiling slightly.


    After the sect moves to the Shattered Star Peaks, I should enter closed door cultivation and try to figure out how to merge my Ice and Sword Domain together- The nts!


    Lost in thought thinking about the future, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed that the spiritual nts all around Qing Yi''s room were slowly starting to die out. The increase in temperature was simply way too much for them, as a few of them had already started to wither-


    Fwoosh!


    There was even one of them that managed to catch fire!


    Whoosh~


    Using his Ice Domain to lower the temperature before any more of the nts manged to die out or catch fire, Xuan Hao gently picked up Qing Yi and the ancient scroll before moving both of them to an empty room in the pavilion. Making sure that the room was made out of a material that would not end up catching fire like the unfortunate spiritual nt in Qing Yi''s rooma?|


    Having moved Qing Yi to a new room, Xuan Hao stayed around for another two hours. Taking away the ancient scroll after it could no longer help her improve her cultivation base any further.


    "Now it''s up to youa?|" Muttering this as he made his way out of the empty room where he had ced Qing Yi, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit nervous on behalf of his first disciple.


    A breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm could take between a few hours all the way up to a few weeks!


    The time it took to break through to the Core Formation Realm, was not rted to the strength of the golden core and nobody really understood why some would take weeks to breakthrough, while others would only take a few hours.


    Only one thing was certain and that was the fact that the longer it took to breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm, the more dangerous it would be!


    Because of this, Xuan Hao decided to not move anywhere outside the sect until she managed to breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm, just in case something really happened, and she needed his help.


    a?|


    "What!? Such arge caravan and there are only a few people at Foundation Establishment and Qi Condensation Realm guarding it!"


    Having returned back to his boss after having discovered the caravan that Chu Yang was a part of the bandit scout was currently smiling happily as he informed his boss about therge caravan possibly filled with all kinds of great things. Not forgetting to mention the luxurious carriage at the centre of the caravan.


    "Bossa?| There was also someone on top of a luxurious carriage keeping an eye on the surroundings, I think he should be a Core Formation Realm Expert!"


    Remembering Chu Yang whom he had seen on top of the luxurious carriage, the bandit scout did not forget to warn his boss. After all, someone in the Core Formation Realm was not anyone that would be easy to deal with.


    "Haha, Indeed! With me around, there is no need to worry about that little Core Formation Realm Expert! If I''m not wrong, he should merely be someone at the earlier stages of the Core Formation Realm. Maybe it''s not even someone in the Core Formation Realm given how weak the guards around the caravan are!"


    Showing a proud expression on his face while saying this, the bandit boss let his aura run wild. Instantly catching the attention of the surrounding bandits who all looked over towards him filled with both fear and awe.


    "What the Boss says is correct! With the boss around, we won''t be anything to worry about! Even if there is someone in the Core Formation Realm, Boss will easily deal with them!"


    "Yeah! There is also the Master Pu who just broke through to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm yesterday!"


    "Yeah! Boss is powerful! Master Pu is powerful! Our bandit group will soon be the most powerful in this region!"


    Along with the loud cheering from the surrounding bandits who heard about the caravan that had been discovered, the bandit scout could not help feeling proud as it saw this scene.


    Just look at how united we are! In the future, we will definitely grow even stronger! Maybe after we take care of the caravan, I will be able to get a few rewards and breakthrough!


    Thinking this to himself, the bandit scout could almost not sit still any longer, as he grew more and more excited thinking about the rewards, he would be able to get after the sessful raid on the caravan.


    If the caravan carried something precious, he was sure that the boss would be happy with him and reward him heavily!


    "Haha, brothers! It looks like we will be having a feast tonight! Let''s get going before the caravan discovered by this little brother disappears!"


    Grabbing the shoulder of the bandit scout with a smile on his face, the bandit leader loudly proimed this, as the other bandits began cheering loudly while waving their weapons in the air.


    Over the past few weeks, things had gotten quite boring, as most of the usual caravans had begun avoiding the ces where they were waiting in ambush. So, the bandits were extremely excited upon hearing that they would be able to raid arge caravan. Not only because of the good stuff they would most likely be able to get their hands on, but also because they loved the thrill of robbing people.


    In a sense, these bandits were among the few who had truly started embarking upon the Dao of Robbery. Truly an achievement that would result in a quite unique domain if any of them managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm in the futurea?|


    "What is happening in here? Did a group of beauties perhaps enter our territory unknowingly?"


    At this time, a rge'' man almost rolled inside as he asked this with a confused expression on his face. Clearly not knowing why everyone were cheering and looking so excited all of a sudden.


    "Ah! Master Pu! Listen to this-"


    "Hm? Large caravana?| Bad defencea?| Luxurious carriage!? Maybe there are a few beauties in there!"


    Listening to one of the bandits exin to him why all of them were so excited, Master Pu could not help bing equally excited after hearing about the luxurious carriagea?| Although, for a slightly different reason than the other bandits.


    "What are we waiting for, let''s get going before the beau- I mean caravan disappears!"


    Not waiting around for a second, Master Pu, who arrivedst, was the first one out the door. Not forgetting to drag the bandit scout along with him for directionsa?|

 Chapter 535: Bandit Betrayal!

    Chapter 535: Bandit Betrayal!


    "Hm?"


    Sitting on top of the luxurious carriage while looking at the scenery passing by Chu Yang suddenly noticed something moving in the distance, as arge group of not so friendly looking people soon came into view.


    Even more troubling, was the fact that he could very clearly feel two powerful people among the group that was rushing towards them, both having reached the Core Formation Realm!


    "Bandits!"


    Hearing one of the Foundation Establishment Realm guard situated at the front of the caravan call out, Chu Yang could not help cursing to himself. Normally, a group of bandits with two Core Formation Realm Experts should not have been a problema?| Buta?| Things were different after all Core Formation Experts guarding the caravan except for himself ran away to join the fight for the massive spirit stone.


    At this moment, there was only two Core Formation Realm Experts defending the caravan, him, and the servant inside the luxurious carriage below him.


    Even if they could deal with the two Core Formation Realm bandits charging over, Chu Yang was not so certain that they would also be able to stop the rest of the bandits from massacring the rest of the guards.


    The main reason for this, was that the bandits charging over were far stronger than the weak Foundation Establishment and Qi Condensation Realm Experts who had chosen to remain in the caravana?|


    Creak~


    Having sensed arge group of people approaching them, the servant appeared from inside the luxurious carriage with a confused expression on his face.


    "What is happening? Who is-" Freezing? up the moment he came out from the carriage and saw therge number of bandits rushing towards the caravan, the servant soon realized that the other side rushing towards them did not have any kind intentionsa?|.


    "Soa?| How should we deal with the bandits?" Seeing the servante out, Chu Yang quickly asked this. Feeling that he should at least have some idea what to do.


    "Hm? Just hold back the weaker among the two Core Formation Realm bandits and wait for me to kill the stronger one. The guards left will all surround the carriage of my young master and protect it from the other bandits. Even if they are weaker, they should at least be able to hold off until we finish off the two Core Formation Realm bandits!" Not feeling too worried about the current situation after having scanned over the approaching group of bandits, the servant informed him while also making sure the guards left in the caravan heard what he said.


    Whoosh~!


    Not even a secondter, the servant narrowed his eyes before dashing towards the aggrieves group of bandits heading in their direction. Not the slightest bit of fear visible on his face.


    "Looks like the strongest among the bandits have not reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realma?|" Muttering this to himself as he quickly realized why the servant was so confident in dealing with the bandits charging towards them, Chu Yang gazed towards the guards shivering at the sight of the ferocious bandits heading in their direction.


    From the looks of it, there was no way those guards would stay and hold the line against the banditsa?| There was a way bigger chance that they would run away before the bandits even reached thema?|


    Given that even he understood this from a single nce, Chu Yang doubted that the servant didn''t see this as well.


    Perhaps there is still someone else left inside the carriage to protect his young master or perhaps he wants me to protect it while also fending off against the weaker Core Formation Realm Experta?|?


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Not understanding what the servant was thinking leaving his young master behind, Chu Yang remained still on top of the luxurious carriage, as the servant shed with the leader of the bandits in the distance.


    Luckily, he could clearly tell that the servant was far stronger than his opponent after the first sh!


    Rumble~


    On the unfortunate side of things, the group of bandits only stopped for a short moment before continuing towards them. Leaving their leader to fight with the servant all by himself. Even the second Core Formation Realm Expert among the bandits did not lend his leader any assistance and also continued towards the caravana?|


    Did the servant perhaps already expect the second weaker Core Formation Realm Expert to disregard his leader and continue his charge towards the caravan? Indeed, this way, it would make it easier for me to also try and defend the luxurious carriage at the same timea?|


    Thinking this to himself, Chu Yang could not help feeling a slight admiration towards the servant at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm. Even from such a long distance, he had easily seen through the bandits and the fact that the two Core Formation Realm Experts were not on great terms with each other!


    a?|


    "YOU DAMNABLE BASTARD!"


    At the same time Chu Yang was admiring the servant for his insight into the discourse between the two Core Formation Realm Experts, the leader of the bandits screamed angrily, as the one known as Master Pu hadpletely disregarded his call for help and had instead continued charging towards the caravan with a lustful expression on his face. Focusing all his attention on the luxurious carriage at the centre of the caravan.


    "a?|"


    Locked in battle with the leader of the bandits who had reached the Eighth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, the insightful servant who had easily seen through the discourse existing between the two Core Formation Realm bandits, was speechlessly watching this scene y out, as he used the opportunity tond a hit on the bandit leader while he was distracted.


    "JUST YOU WAIT UNTIL THIS IS OVER! YOU AND THAT LITTLE SCOUT CLEARLY SET ME UP!"


    As the screams continued, the servant could not help feeling even more confused.


    Just what on earth were these bandits up to? Was what the leader of the bandits said perhaps true? Was the weaker bandit really trying to use him to get rid of his leader so he could im the position as leader?


    "BOSS! We will help you!"


    "Master Pu is a traitor and so is the scout!"


    "Everyone! Who cares about the caravan! Let''s help out the boss!"


    """YEAH!"""


    Along with the shouts of the surrounding bandits who had realized that Master Pu had betrayed their boss and tried to set him up, all the bandits expect Master Pu turned around and charged towards the servant in an attempt to protect their boss.


    What in the-


    Almost spitting out a mouthful of blood upon seeing several hundred bandits at least having reached the Foundation Establishment Realm suddenly turn around andunch all kind of different colourful attacks in his direction, the servant quickly went on the defensive as he protected himself against the onught of attacks.


    Even if they had only reached the Foundation Establishment Realm and were far weaker than someone in the Core Formation Realm. The number of attacks were more than enough to make up for the difference in realm, as the servant was forced to go on the defensive.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Along with the attacksnding, the leader of the bandits quickly managed to fall back to his brothers before joining them in attacking the servant.


    BOOM!


    Why is this happening to mea?|?


    The servant who had thought he would have a rtively easy time dealing with the bandit leader, suddenly found himself trying his best to defend against the countless attacksunched towards him from both the Foundation Establishment Realm bandits and the bandit leader himself!


    a?|


    "Hm? Why did all the bandits except for the Core Formation Realm one decide to turn around and fight the servant? Waita?| Did he perhaps expect this to happen!?"


    Realizing that all of the bandits expect the weaker one among the two Core Formation Realm bandits had turned around, Chu Yang could not help looking towards the servant fighting against hundreds of bandits along with the powerful bandit leader all by himself with respect.


    At this point, Chu Yang had already realized that the servant intended to deal with all the bandits except for the one still heading towards the caravan all by himself!


    Not only that, but he had even wanted to quickly deal with him so he could return back and finish off thest Core Formation Realm bandit that he had asked Chu Yang to hold back!


    "Haha?| I really can''t run away when I''m only asked to hold back a single bandit. Not to mention, I can finally gain some experience fighting against someone in the Core Formation Realm!"


    Shaking his head as he felt a bit ashamed for wanting to run away when the servant had been so kind as to give him the easy task of holding back a single Core Formation Realm bandit, Chu Yang took out his spear before jumping down from the carriage to face the Core Formation Realm bandit before he reached the caravan.

 Chapter 536: Master Pus Sacrifice...

    Chapter 536: Master Pu''s Sacrifice...


    Watching as the Core Formation Realm bandit was getting closer and closer, Chu Yang quickly realized that it seemed like the other party did not care about the fact that the other bandits were no longer following behind him.


    At least that, or he simply hadn''t noticed it and had all his attention focused on the caravan.


    However, considering the fact that the other party was someone in the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang doubted this. After all, with his strength, the bandit should have been able to notice if close to two hundred bandits suddenly stopped following behind him before beginning to fight a secondter.


    Looking at the rapidly approaching bandit, Chu Yan tightened his grip around the handle of his spear as he prepared for the inevitable battle as he began to closely observe his opponent.


    "Hm?"


    Observing the bandit as he got closer, Chu Yang could not help frowning upon feeling the strong presence of the other party. Even from a distance, Chu Yang realized that the other party was stronger than him. Reaching the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm!


    Not only that, but Chu Yang also discovered that the other party had a rtively unstable aura, like he had just recently broken through and had not had time to properly stabilize his cultivation base.


    The fact that his cultivation was unstable, was more than a wee surprise to Chu Yang, as he very clearly understood that the other party should not be able to use his full strength in such a state. Even if he had reached the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm given the fact that his cultivation base was still unstable, he would not be able to fully use his power!


    Even more confusing, was the fact that the bandit did not seem to even acknowledge his presence at all and was instead keeping his full attention on the luxurious carriage located behind him.


    "Here Ie beau-"


    Interrupting whatever the bandit was about to say as he finally got close enough, Chu Yang used the Mountain Breaker spear move from the Soul Spear Divine Mantra to attack him while he was still focusing his attention on the luxurious carriage. Havingpletely ignored him.


    Swish~


    As he sensed the attack heading his way, the bandit showed a bewildered expression on his face for a split second before quickly responding to the attack throw out by Chu Yang-


    Bang!


    Using his own weapon in the form of a saber to block the attack of Chu Yang from killing him!


    Ptsh!


    However, due to the fact that he did not manage to fully block the attack, he still ended up spitting out a mouthful of blood as he felt pain spread through his body from the arm which the saber, he had used to block the attack was in.


    "You-"


    Bang!


    About to say something to Chu Yang, the bandit was once again interrupted as Chu Yang continued his attack without allowing the bandit any time toprehend what was happening, as he was forced to defend himself against Chu Yang''s attacks.


    "Ah! How annoying!"


    Knowing that Chu Yang was intend on fighting him, the bandit could only reluctantly give up on rushing towards the luxurious carriage, as he turned to face Chu Yang with all his might.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    As the fight between Chu Yang and the bandit continued on for a few minutes, the bandit seemed to have finally realized that no one other than himself had showed up so far.


    "Where in the world is everyone!? Did those cowards run awaya?|?" Muttering this to himself as he was gaining the upper hand in his fight against Chu Yang, the bandit could not help turning around to see where everyone had gone-


    BOOM!


    As dozens of bandits were killed by one of the servant''s attacks the moment, he turned around to see what had happened to everyone.


    "NOOO! BROTHERS!"


    Along with the angry roar of the bandit leader who saw what happened to his brothers, the fight between the servant and the rest of the bandits increased in intensity, as the bandit leader madly attacked the servant with everything he had. Completely disregarding his own safety.


    "Ah-!"


    ? Catching the servant off-guard, the bandit leader finally managed tond a proper hit on the servant, as a visible wound dripping fresh blood appeared on the servant''s face.


    "a?|"


    Watching this scene from afar as the battle be more and more chaotic, the bandit suddenly froze for a split second as he tried toprehend what was happening behind him.


    Swish~


    Using this opportunity, Chu Yang used most of the qi left in his body to execute the Mountain Breaker spear move from the Soul Spear Divine Mantra-


    Ptsh!


    Managing tond a fatal blow on the bandit in front of him before he had time to react, still shocked after witnessing his leader and the other bandits locked in a brutal battle for survival against a powerful opponent.


    "You!" Feeling the strength leave his body as the spear pierced through him, the bandit looked at Chu Yang filled with killing intent as he understood what had just happened. However, he was not about to go down without a fight, as he prepared to sacrifice his life to take Chu Yang down with him.


    "Even if I die, I will-"


    "AH-!"


    Just as he was about to use a forbidden technique to sacrifice himself and take his opponent down with him, the bandit heard the scream of his boss in the distance. Watching with a painful expression on his face as the servant forcefully broke through a barrier formed by the bandit leader and cut off one of his arms.


    The sight of what happened to his boss caused the bandit to stop himself from using the forbidden technique.


    Swish~!


    "Hmph!" Seeing Chu Yanging towards him once again for another attack, the bandit only frowned before using his rapidly decreasing strength to dodge the attack before rushing towards the chaotic battle taking ce between the bandits and the servant.


    "a?|"


    Not understanding what the bandit wanted to do, Chu Yang decided not to chase after the other party, as he was already exhausted after their battle.


    Not only were the other party three minor realms above him, but he also had far more experience than himself when it came to fighting.


    The reason why he could fight him, was not only because the bandit''s cultivation mantra and fighting techniques were far worse than his own, but also because the other party constantly got distracted during their fight. Allowing him to narrowly stay on a rtively equal footing against the bandit. Even managing tond a fatal blow after the other party had been distracted by the chaotic fight between the other bandits and the servant behind them!


    a?|


    "Look! Master Pu ising back!"


    "Is he perhaps here to finish off boss!?"


    "This bastard! He can not even leave boss alone when he is about to die! Brothers! Let''s stop him before he reaches the boss!"


    Spotting Master Pu running back towards them, the other bandits did not seem to notice the fact that he had been injured, as the bandits who spotted him quickly tried their best to stop him when he got close enough.


    Whoosh!


    However, all of this was to no avail, as they had no way to stop Master Pu, who had already begun the process of using his forbidden technique. Wanting to sacrifice his own life in an attempt to help out his boss.


    "Master Pu! Please stop what you are doing!"


    "Don''t do it Master Pu!"


    "Why are you doing this!? What are we going to do in the future?!"


    Hearing the anxious and saddened screams of the other bandits as they looked at him filled with hopelessness, Master Pu could not help shedding a tear as he became even more determined to save the boss.


    You guys! If there is a next life, I hope to have such wonderful brothers againa?| If I had just not focused on the luxurious carriage and had instead been there to help out from the start. None of this would have happened in the first ce!


    Thinking this to himself as he arrived at the main battlefield where the bandit leader and the servant were located inbat with each other.


    "Boss! Get everyone out of here, I will hold him back!"


    Not waiting for his boss''s reaction, Master Pu executed the final part of his forbidden technique, as he felt his strength rapidly increase, while his body began deteriorating at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    Fwoosh!


    At the same time, arge seal formed around the servant, as he suddenly found himself trapped inside arge bubble-


    Boom!


    Even attacking the bubble-like seal only caused a small amount of damage and it would at least take a few minutes for him to get out.


    "a?| Everyonea?| RETREAT!"


    Not knowing what had just happened, the bandit leader ordered the others to retreat with a confused expression on his face. Not understanding why Master Pu had suddenlye back to safe them.

 Chapter 537: End of the Battle

    Chapter 537: End of the Battle


    "-RETREAT!"


    Upon hearing the shout of their boss and seeing the servant sealed up in therge bubble-like seal, the bandits did not think twice about what had just happened, as they all began darting in the opposite direction of the caravan.


    No matter what, they were unwilling to continue their attack on the caravan after having found out that the people defending it were stronger than them. Not to mention, the seal on the servant would most likely notst for long. Given the fact that the bubble around said servant had already begun to show signs of cracking after every single attack.


    Continuing to attack the caravan would at most result in the servant killing all of them after he freed himself from the bubble-like seal! More than enough reason for the bandits to abandon their original goal!


    "Haha?| It''s good. Everyone is getting awaya?|"


    Smiling happily upon seeing the sight of his brothers running away, Master Pu showed a happy smile before the forbidden technique fully consumed him. Turning his body to dust, as the seal began cracking apart even faster than before.


    Crack~


    A few minutes after the bandits had escaped, the bubble-like seal broke apart as the servant managed to free himself from the seal formed after Master Pu sacrificed his life.


    "a?|"


    Gazing over the scene of destruction left behind, the servant soon turned to look towards the bandits still barely visible in the distance running away with all their might, the servant remained unmoving for a short moment before shaking his head.


    "No use continuing the fighta?|" Muttering this to himself, the servant turned around before heading back towards the caravan where Chu Yang and the rest of the guards from the caravan were waiting. Most of which were quite happy after realizing they didn''t have to do anything during the battle that just took ce.


    "Let''s resume the journey, we got dyed by quite a bit and might arriveter than expected if we end up encountering another bandit group along the way!"


    As the servant returned back to the caravan, Chu Yang was just about to say something when the servant suddenly said this before entering the luxurious carriage.


    The guards were more than happy to get going before another group of bandits appeared to attack them, as the caravan soon began moving once again.


    Not saying anything as watched this y out, Chu Yang decided to jump back on top of the luxurious carriage as the he watched intently observed the ce where the servant and the bandit leader had fought each other when they passed by it.


    The scene of destruction left behind the two and the rest of the bandits were more than enough for Chu Yang to realize just how far he still had to go before reaching the Peak of the Core Formation Realm.


    "I still have a long way to goa?|"? Muttering these words to himself, Chu Yang suddenly felt like he was still far from being considered someone strong, as he felt a drive to improve his cultivation base and reach the Peak of the Core Formation Realm. After that, he would do his best to reach the Nascent Soul Realm and truly be an expert in the cultivation world!


    No. Reaching the Nascent Soul Realm was far from enough! His master was someone who had reached the Domain Lord Realm, so as his disciple, he should at the very least reach the Domain Lord Realm in the future and truly be a powerful cultivator. Not only in the smaller kingdoms, but across the entire Sky Empire!


    Lost in thought thinking about his future, Chu Yang didn''t notice that the flow of qi inside his body bing smoother as it easily coursed around his body.


    While this did not improve his cultivation realm, it did unknowingly to Chu Yang, make it easy for him to not only absorb qi from heaven and earth, but also allowed him to use his qi more easily while fighting!


    a?|


    Back at the Flying Sword Sect, things were still moving along smoothly towards the merger that was going to take ce in little over a year.


    One of the ways to make the merger easier, was hosting serval friendly events for the younger disciples from both the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect to meet with each other andpete together in groups and take on different challenges arranged by the elders of both sects.


    Of course, these events took ce inside both of the sects, as a few elders were in charge of moving these disciples back and forth between the two sects in batches to ensure their safety.


    On the other hand, the older disciples from both of the sects who had already reached the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm, or the Core Formation Realm, were send out on ''special mission'' to deal with strong demon beasts running wild or diplomatic matters pertaining the Flying Sword Sect''s expanding control over their territory.


    Specially arranged by Elder Song to help the older disciple understand some of the work they would have to undertake after bing elders in the futurea?|


    After having seen howzy most of the elders of the Flying Sword Sect were, Elder Song had taken it upon himself to make sure that the next generation of elders would not turn out like thest.


    Not to mentiona?| Now that he had reached the Nascent Soul Realm, Elder Song would live for a long time! Because of this, he understood very well that in the future, he would most likely be the one ending up with the work that the future elders ignored in case they ended up bingzy like the current group of elders!


    Even if he was currently in the process of reforming these elder, Elder Song already understood that doing so would take a long time, something he did not want to repeat when the next group of elders were chosena?|


    "a?|"


    Watching all of this take ce across the Flying Sword Sect though his divine sense from inside his pavilion, Xuan Hao could not help smiling slightly to himself. Especially when watching an alchemy tournament for the newer members arranged by the Alchemy Hall being set up by a few disciples and elders in front of the Alchemy Hall.


    Even if the Alchemy Hall had be famous inside the Flying Sword Sect after Qing Yi returned and many new disciples ended up joining, the same could not be said for the young disciples of the Spring Flower Sect, as most of them did not seem too interested in alchemy.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao had personally put up a few of the spiritual herbs which he had found in the interspatial ring of the dead Domain Lord that hadnded in front of him inside the jungle located close to the centre of the continent to help spark some more interest in the Alchemy Hall among the young disciples of the Spring Flower Sect.


    After all, one of the most important things for the future development of the Flying Sword Sect, was to ensure an ample supply of potions and pills for the disciples to not only help their cultivation improve, but to keep themselves safe while wandering the outside world.


    Elder Song also understood this, as he had even gone so far as to proim that he would personally guide the top five and help them with any questions they might have regarding cultivation.


    Unsurprisingly, this caused an influx of disciples entering the Alchemy Hall to reach a new height, as the Alchemy Hall ended up extremely crowded for days after the announcement had been made by Elder Song.


    Not too surprising, as Elder Song was a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, a personal lesson from him, was more than enough to sway most of the young disciples to rush towards the Alchemy Hall.


    All of this considered, the tournament would officially begin in about a week, as the newer disciples would try their best to no avail to make their first potiona?|


    "Hm?"


    Turning his attention away from the tournament ground slowly being prepared in front of the Alchemy Hall, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed arge number of people appearing at the entrance of the Sect.


    Looking closer, Xuan Hao quickly realized that therge group of people were yet another batch of Spring Flower Sect disciples who had arrived to join the different events currently taking ce inside the Flying Sword Sect for the younger disciples of both sects.


    However, just a momentter, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself as he watched arge group of male disciples having gathered to see the disciples of the Spring Flower Sect who had just arrived.


    "a?|"


    Not knowing what to say upon witnessing this scene, Xuan Hao suddenly felt like teasing thesea?| ''spirited'' young disciples.


    "Hehe~" Chuckling in a slightly eerie tone that made him look like a viin, Xuan Hao waved his hand in the direction of the entrance to sect.

 Chapter 538: Beast Tamers New Way to Waste Spirit Stones...

    Chapter 538: Beast Tamers New Way to Waste Spirit Stones...


    Whoosh~


    Along with the wave of his hand, Xuan Hao froze the ground beneath the group of Flying Sword Sect disciples eagerly looking towards the group of disciples from the Spring Flower Sect.


    "Wha-!"


    "Why did the ground suddenly freeze?!"


    "Ah!"


    Watching the disciples slip on the ice that was now beneath them before tumbling down the small hill that they had ced themselves on top of to watch the disciples from the Spring Flower Sect, Xuan Hao could not helpughing a bit after realizing that most of these disciples ended upnding directly in front of the group of disciples from the Spring Flower Sect.


    "Lu Wen? What are you doing here!?"


    Seeing that the person in front of the group of disciples from the Spring Flower Sect was actually a disciple from the Flying Sword Sect that had managed to recognize one of the disciples who had fallen down the hill, Xuan Hao felt things were about to get interesting. Especially considering the fact that the look on the female disciple''s face very clearly told that she had understood what was happening and the fact that it was not the first time she had seen this beforea?|


    "Yi Xuana?| Actually-"


    "Everyone, let''s get going, we still have a lot to do before it gets dark!"


    Interrupting the young boy on the ground in front of her, the female disciple from the Flying Sword Sect called Yi Xuan, guiding the Spring Flower Sect disciples inside the Flying Sword Sect, directly walked past him. Not forgetting to give him a judgemental look while walking past him together with the disciples from the Spring Flower Sect.


    "a?|"


    Watching this scene y out, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly, as he quickly looked away.


    For some reason, he had a feeling that the little girl called Yi Xuan, guiding the disciples from the Spring Flower Sect, would not look so kindly at the one called Lu Wen in the futurea?|


    "Haha?| This has nothing to do with me!" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao focused on other parts of the sect, as he slowly forgot about what had happened at the entrance of the sect. After all, to him, this was not anything important. At most a bit of fun teasing the younger disciples.


    a?|


    As time passed with Xuan Hao looking around the Flying Sword Sect and seeing all the changes that had taken ce since the time that the Flying Sword Sect officially began preparations for merging together with the Spring Flower Sect, his divine sense finally ended upnding on a rather familiar building located close to the centre of the sect.


    "The stables!" Narrowing his eyes as he muttered the name of the building, Xuan Hao could not help recalling his past encounters with the beast tamers of the sect and their rather uniquely arrogant demon beasts.


    "I wonder if things have changed sincest..." The beast tamers were by far the most wasteful among all the professions that were nurtured inside the Flying Sword Sect when he hadst seen it. For this reason, Xuan Hao felt quite curious about what had happened to them during the past year.


    After all, he had alreadyined about them to Elder Song back then. Not to mention, Elder Song had looked more than happy to take care of the beast tamers after finding out about just how many spirit stones they were wasting on a daily basisa?|


    Whoosh~


    As his divine sense swept over the stables and he began investigating the ce, Xuan Hao was happy to realize that the demon beasts inside were not acting arrogant like he had seen them do in the past and the beast tamers did not feed them hundreds of spirit stones each.


    Not only that, but Xuan Hao also noticed that the number of demon beasts inside the stables had increased by quite a lot sincest and there were even a few Peak Core Formation Realm demon beasts present inside the stables!


    "Hm?"


    However, just as Xuan Hao was about to turn his attention away from the stables, he noticed a group of three disciples gather up arge amount of spirit stones before making their way out of the stables.


    What in the world are they up to? Where are they going with so many spirit stones?


    Feeling curious, Xuan Hao decided to follow them with his divine sense to find out where they were going with so many spirit stones.


    Not to mention, the number of spirit stones they were carrying was well above a thousand! This number of spirit stones was no small amount and was definitely not something that the Flying Sword Sect could afford to just go missing.


    Now they are going up one of the border mountains surrounding the secta?|


    Feeling that something bad was about to happen as he watched the group of three beast tamers make their way up the border mountain on the outskirts of the sect, Xuan Hao continued watching the group as they finally arrived at the top of the mountain together with the spirit stones.


    "Great lord lion! Please receive this humble gift from us!"


    ""Praise the great lord lion!""


    Feeling himself shiver all over as he listened in on what the beast tamers were saying after reaching the top of the mountain, Xuan Hao had already realized what was happening, as he watched arge, winged lion lower its head in front of the group of three before directly swallowing all of the spirit stones with a happy expression on its face.


    ""Praise the great lord lion!""


    Along with onst chant from the group of three beast tamers after the winged lion had already finished eating half of the spirit stones, the group quickly made their way down the mountain before making their way back to the stables again.


    "a?|"


    Not knowing what to say to what he had just witnessed; Xuan Hao had a feeling that the beast tamers usage of spirit stones was not decreasing like Elder Song, and he had wanted it toa?| And the reason for this was none other than the demon beast he had tamed and brought back with him!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes before disappearing from his pavilion before reappearing in front of the winged lion who was still in the process of devouring the spirit stones a few secondster.


    Roar?


    Not understanding why its master had suddenly appeared in front of it, the winged lion tilted its head in confusion. Not understanding why, it suddenly felt like something bad was about to happen.


    "You have been enjoying yourself for quite some time nowa?|"


    Roar!


    Seeing the winged lion roar happily at him after hearing what he said, Xuan Hao frowned as he waved his hand and used the blood contract between him and the winged lion.


    ROAR!?


    Not understanding what was happening as Xuan Hao used the blood contract, the winged lion roared confusedly before it suddenly transformed into its small cub form.


    Roar~?


    Still not understanding what had just happened, the winged lion looked up at Xuan Hao with a confused expression on its now both small and adorable face.


    "You are consuming way too much in your normal form, this way, you will be way cheaper to have around. Not only that, but I have also restricted your transformation for now, so you can''t return to your normal form unless you encounter a dangerous situation!"


    Whoosh~


    Leaving directly after saying this, Xuan Hao did not bother staying around to witness the winged lion''s response. No matter how unwilling the winged lion was, what he had done would end up saving the Flying Sword Sect thousands of spirit stones every daya?|


    ROOOOAR~~~!


    Following Xuan Hao''s disappearance, a loud but cute roar echoed out from the mountain top as the winged lion realized that it had been forced to remain in its cub form by its master.


    "a?|"


    Seeing that its master had truly left it to stay in its cub form, the winged lion unwillingly made its way over to the pile of spirit stones still left uneaten. At least it still had something to make up for the fact that it was now stuck in its cub forma?|


    Chomp~


    Biting down on one of the spirit stones, the winged lion quickly realized that its mouth was too small for it to even swallow a single spirit stone hole. In the end, if it wanted to eat the spirit stone, it would have to slowly eat through ita?|


    Roar~!


    Realizing this, an unwilling roar escaped from the cub sized winged lion as it angrily bit down towards? a slightly smaller spirit stone. Only to have it end up smashing into its forehead.


    R-roar~


    Even if the spirit stone did not hurt the winged lion, it still felt like its pride had been injured by what had just taken ce.


    However, there was nothing it could do to recover its lost pridea?|


    Roara?|


    Knowing this, the cub sized winged lion reluctantly bit down on another spirit stone before beginning to slowly eat it.


    From now on, it could only slowly eat the spirit stones one by onea?|

 Chapter 539: News Reaches the Cardinal

    Chapter 539: News Reaches the Cardinal


    Returning back to his pavilion again, Xuan Hao didn''t bother thinking about the winged lion and its obvious influence over the beast tamers. No matter how many spirit stones it asked for, it would be of no use if it couldn''t eat them.


    As for the winged lion asking for high-grade spirit stonesa?| The beast tamers would have to personally ask Elder Song or Feng Chen for them and Xuan Hao highly doubted that either of the two would give any to the beast tamersa?|


    Instead of this, the first thing Xuan hao did was check up on Qing Yi who was still in the process of breaking through to the Core Formation Realm before beginning to look around the Flying Sword Sect once again to kill some time while Qing Yi was breaking through. Teasing a few disciples every now and then with the help of his Ice Domain.


    a?|


    "The Archbishop was not able to make it out of the formation set up by the church of the gue goda?|?"


    "Yes! He used most of his remaining strength to allow me to leave and inform your excellency! The Archbishop also wanted me to warn you about the fact that there might be someone leaking our movement to the church of the gue god from the insidea?| After all, there is no way they could set up such arge formation within such a short period of time and especially one designed to restrain the holy artifact of his excellency Soft Breeze!"


    "Hma?| I seea?| I will have to think about what to do before moving to deal with them. Taking a risk and moving another Archbishop to the Azure Sky Kingdom is not a good idea at this point in time. Especially considering that they might use a simr trap againa?| Try and make your way back safely for now!"


    "Yes, your excellency!"


    Watching as themunication talisman in his hand grew dull, signalling the fact that the conversation had ended, Domain Lord Lin exhaustedly sat down on the ground as he began recovering his strength.


    Over the past few days, he had not dared to stop and contact the cardinal, as he ran away from the ce where the church of the gue god had ambushed them.


    Only after having crossed through the borders of a kingdom under theplete control of the Order of the Sky God, did Domain Lord Lin rx slightly before finding a ce to hide before contacting the cardinal and informing him about what had happened.


    Even after he had sessfully informed the cardinal, Domain Lord Lin still felt like he was not safe yet. After all, the person from the church of the gue god lurking inside the Order of the Sky God, should at least be an Archbishop to know about Archbishop Soft Breeze''s movements!


    Domain Lord Lin did not know if this traitor woulde after him and for this reason, he had not informed anyone other than the cardinal about his current whereabouts.


    At least, this way, he should be able to recover his strength and treat his injuries inside a somewhat safe ce before making his way back to the capital of the Sky Empire.


    Even if the traitor was an Archbishop at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, there was no way the other party would dare making a move while inside the capital of the Sky Empire!


    However, the injuries he had sustained during the battle was not something that could be recovered in the short term, so Domain Lord Lin would at least have to spend a few weeks before continuing his journey towards the capital of the Sky Empire. After all, if the other party decided to wait close to the capital to ambush him, he would have no way out if he went in his current statea?|


    Thinking this to himself, Domain Lord Lin smiled a bit wryly as he looked down arge gaping wound left behind by one of the Domain Lord''s from the church of the gue god. Even if he had managed to sessfully escape the formation with the help of Archbishop Soft Breeze, he did not manage to do so without a few sacrificesa?|


    Whoosh~


    Focusing most of his attention towards recovering his strength and repairing his injured body, Domain Lord Lin made sure that the rest of his attention was focused on keeping an eye on the area surrounding his hiding spot, as he began the slow process of recovering his strength back to its peak.


    a?|


    "Haha?| To think the church of the gue god actually managed to infiltrate usa?|" On the other side of themunication talisman, the cardinal sighed to himself as a terrifying killing intent appeared in his eyes.


    For someone to be able to infiltrate the Order of the Sky God and get information about the movements of an Archbishop and the specific holy artifact he was carrying, the cardinal very well understood that the other party should at the very least be an Archbishop!


    Every single Archbishop was crucial to the Order of the Sky God''s strength inside the Sky Empire and even the loss of a single one was devastating, yet now it looked like the Order of the Sky God had just lost two within a short span of timea?|.


    After all, there was no way the cardinal would ever consider whoever the spy was to be a member of the Order of the Sky God after finding the other party!


    "I hope you managed to keep yourself alive Soft Breezea?|" Muttering this to himself as he thought about what Domain Lord Lin had said, the cardinal could not help hoping for Archbishop Soft Breeze to find a way out of his predicament alive.


    Even if he understood that the other party hade prepared, the cardinal still understood just how strong the holy artifact he had been carrying was. Even if he could not escape, Archbishop Soft Breeze should at the very least be able to keep his soul alive for the time being.


    "However, what in the world does the church of the gue god gain by doing this? Why are they suddenly shifting so much attention towards the Azure Sky Kingdom at the borders? Did they perhaps give up entering the inner regions of the Sky Empirea?|? But this makes no sense either, their cardinal is still stationed at the-"


    Bang!


    "Cardinal! Urgent news!"


    Just as the cardinal was trying to make sense of the church of the gue god''s movements, the door leading inside therge prayer room where he was currently located was violently opened, as a young priest anxiously called out to him without any proper etiquette.


    "Little priesta?| I hope you have a good reason for interrupting me!" Narrowing his eyes as the killing intent he had barely been holding back after learning about what had happened to Archbishop Soft Breeze washed over the young priest, the cardinal only barely managed to stop himself from killing the little priest that had dared barging in.


    "Y-your e-e-excellency, I-I have u-urgent-" Not able to continue speaking under the terrifying killing intent of the cardinal, the young priest who had just barely reached the Nascent Soul Realm almost fainted as he felt his soul slowly beginning to copse under the terrifying pressureing from the cardinal''s killing intent.


    Whoosh~


    "T-thank you, your excellency!"


    "Hmph!"


    Lifting the pressure so the other party could speak properly again, the cardinal just snorted coldly in response to the young priest.


    "Your excellency, news just came in that the church of the gue god has begun moving out of the inner region kingdoms. The cardinal from the church of the gue god is also said to have disappeared!" Understanding what the cardinal wanted, the young priest quickly ryed the urgent news that had juste in regarding the church of the gue god.


    "I see, they are leaving the inner regiona?| You can leave for nowa?| Remember not do such a thing again or I won''t spare you!" Narrowing his eyes as a grim expression appeared on his face after hearing what the young priest said, the cardinal quickly waved for him to leave the prayer room.


    "Yes! I will cherish your excellency''s words and never make such a mistake again!" Bowing thankfully as he understood that he had just escaped from the jaws of death, the young priest quickly turned around before escaping out of the prayer room.


    "a?|"


    Not caring about the young priest after having told him off, the cardinal was instead way more focused on the information he had just gained, as he began to worry about Archbishop Soft Breeze.


    Against a normal Archbishop from the church of the gue god, he would still be able to keep his soul alive with the help of the holy artifact that he had brought with hima?| However, things were different if the cardinal from the church of the gue god showed up. At that point in time, the holy artifact would not be able to protect him!


    "Looks like I will have to pay a visit to the Azure Sky Kingdoma?| Hopefully I can get there before that old fossil of the gue goda?|" Along with these few words, the space around the cardinal suddenly warped visibly before it directly swallowed him up. Leaving behind an empty prayer room.

 Chapter 540: Qing Yi Reaches the Core Formation Realm!

    Chapter 540: Qing Yi Reaches the Core Formation Realm!


    As time slowly passed, Xuan Hao spent his time teaching Bai Ning and looking after Qing Yi while she was breaking through to the Core Formation Realm. At this point in time, Qing Yi''s strength had reached a limit after having grown stronger and stronger over the past few days.


    Inside her dantian, Xuan Hao could also clearly see a bright red core just about to solidify as almost all of the qi inside her dantian that had been stored in her foundation establishment pir had been gathered inside of the bright red core.


    Boom!


    Knowing that she was just a single step away from sessfully reaching the Core Formation Realm, Qing Yi used all her strength to forcefully solidify her bright red core, as a small explosion sounded out inside her dantian followed by arge amount of qi from outside rushing into her dantian to nurture the new-born core. Helping her directly solidify her cultivation base on the spot.


    In the end, Qing Yi sessfully solidified her core without any issues. Even the time she would normally need to solidify her cultivation base had been taken care of for her!


    "Hm?" Opening her eyes as she felt her newfound strength, Qing Yi could not help feeling a bit surprised after realizing how stable her cultivation base was and how smoothly she had managed to break through.


    The reason she was surprised over this, was because she had heard some of her seniors and the elders talk about how difficult it had been for them to break through to the Core Formation Realm and the fact that failing to break through to the Core Formation Realm could result in death!


    However, during her breakthrough, she had experienced none of this and instead felt like she had just woken up from a long nap. Feeling refreshed and energetic.


    "Master?!" Looking around herself after investigating the current situation of her newly born core, Qing Yi finally discovered her master sitting on a chair just next to her.


    "Qing Yi, congrattion on breaking through to the Core Formation Realm!" Seeing that his disciple had discovered him, Xuan Hao who had just arrived a few minutes earlier after feeling her beginning the final stages of her breakthrough, smiled happily before congratting her.


    Even if the system did not give him any rewards after her breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm, Xuan Hao was still happy that she had managed to reach the Core Formation Realm.


    Sadly, the main quest still had not showed up yet. From the looks of it, he needed to do something before he could activate it and having two disciples in the Core Formation Realm was not ita?|


    Maybe, he needed toplete some of the quests he still had yet toplete, like the one requiring him to scatter interspatial rings across the world. At this point in time, he was still quite some time away frompleting it, as it was currently at [673/1000].


    Other than that, Xuan Hao thought that another reason for the main quest not activating, could be because he did not have enough disciples. Maybe getting more disciples would activate the next part in the main quest seriesa?|


    "Thank you master! Now I''m no longer behind junior brother Yang!" Interrupting her master''s train of thought as she said this with a happy expression on her face, Qing Yi stood up before doing a cute pose while thinking about how she would shock Chu Yang after he found out about her breaking through to the Core Formation Realm.


    "Indeed. Now both of you have reached the Core Formation Realm."? Rolling his eyes upon witnessing his disciples cute pose, Xuan Hao walked up to Qing Yi before using his divine sense to scan her dantian thoroughly. Making sure nothing was wrong with the newly born core inside her body.


    "What a pure fire qia?|" Muttering this to himself as he scanned the bright red core inside of Qing Yi''s dantian, Xuan Hao could not help sighing in amazement upon feeling just how pure the fire qi gathered together inside his little disciple''s core was.


    Not only that, but he could also very clearly tell that the bright red core faintly caried the aura belonging to the Dao of Fire that he had felt from the secret scroll he had brought out to help her during her meditation.


    Even if the aura was extremely faint, it still symbolized that Qing Yi had already startedprehending the Dao of Fire. Not only that, but he had also very clearly noticed that her Bright Sun Divine Physique had improved. Increasing her affinity with the Dao of Fire!


    Althougha?| The minisculeprehension she had gained of the Dao of Fire would likely not be of any use to her before she reached the Nascent Soul Realm, as her current body and soul were far too weak to amodate a pseudo domain. Let alone a fully-fledged domaina?| Xuan Hao at the very least understood that his disciple would most likely not have a hard time condensing her pseudo domain in the future!


    "Master, is everything okaya?|?" Seeing that her master had suddenly begun looking at her with a serious expression on his face, Qing Yi could not help feeling slightly worried as she thought that he might have discovered a problem with her dantian after her breakthrough.


    "Ah? Ah! It''s nothing to worry about, I was just surprised over how stable your cultivation base is. From the looks of it, you won''t have to spend a few days stabilizing you new cultivation realm like most other people."


    "I see! I did indeed feel that my cultivation base was extremely stablepared to how it was when I broke through in the past!" Nodding her head in understand, Qing Yi also felt that it was rather weird for her cultivation base to be so stable after she reached the Core Formation Realm.


    "Master, do you have any idea why this happened? Is it perhaps rted to my Bright Sun Divine Physique!?"


    "You are not wrong; your Bright Sun Divine Physique did indeed show signs of improving after your breakthrough to the Core Formation Realma?| Buta?| The reason why your cultivation is so stable, is likely because of this-"


    Whoosh~!


    Hearing Qing Yi''s question, Xuan Hao did not want to hide anything from her, as he directly took out the ancient scroll that had helped her reach the absolute Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    "M-master- W-what is this?!" Feeling the fire qi inside the small room rapidly increase as a small me appeared on top of the ancient scroll the moment it appeared, Qing Yi felt her entire body resonate with the small me.


    "This is an ancient scroll your great and almighty master risked his life to get for you during one of his adventures~" Seeing the bewildered expression that had appeared on Qing Yi''s face, Xuan Hao could not stop himself from saying this as he chuckled slightly towards the end.


    "Master!" Realizing that her master was making fun of her reaction, Qing Yi puffed up her cheeks. Looking like someone had wronged her.


    "Hehe, no need to pout, what I said was indeed true!"


    "You risked your life for this ancient scroll!?"


    "Wella?| Not reallya?| But it is an ancient scroll I found for you after countless- Well this doesn''t really matter." Seeing his little disciple begin pouting again, Xuan Hao quickly stopped himself from teasing the young girl.


    "It''s really for mea?|?" Having calmed down, Qing Yi slowly reached her hand forward before touching the ancient scroll with one of her hands, causing the small me on top of it to be even brighter than before.


    "Yes! It''s really useful for you and I''m sure you will put it to good use in the future. Although, you have to be careful where you use it, as it can attract quite a bit of unwanted attention when outside." Saying this, Xuan Hao took out one of the many interspatial rings he had on him and threw it to her.


    "Keep the ancient scroll inside this whenever you are not using it or when you are adventuring outside!"


    "T-thank you master!" Not knowing what to say after having suddenly receiving both a precious ancient scroll that could increase her cultivation speed and an interspatial ring, Qing Yi could only thank her master for the gifts.


    "No need to worry about it, you are after all my disciple, and I should take care of you and ensure that you will be able to grow to your full potential! Follow me, we will go to the training ground and test out your new strength"


    "Yes, master!"


    ...


    Not wasting any time after this, both Qing Yi and Xuan Hao made their way to the training ground.


    "Here Ie, Master!"


    Whoosh~


    Bang!


    Not holding back in the slightest, Qing Yi used her full strength to attack her master after reaching the training ground, as both of them ended up spending the next few hours together, with Xuan Hao helping Qing Yi familiarize herself with her new strength and how to use it properly.

 Chapter 541: New Sect Quests!

    Chapter 541: New Sect Quests!


    Watching as Qing Yi disappeared back into the pavilion after she had managed to get a good grasp over her newfound power, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the system notification that had appeared shortly after he had finished helping Qing Yi.


    [Detected that two of host''s disciples reached the Core Formation Realma?| Required number of disciples for next main quest not reached! Host is encouraged to take in the required number of disciples as quickly as possible! Proceeding with evaluation of host''s secta?|]


    This notification that had appeared was way too differentpared to what he had seen from the system in the pasta?| And from the looks of it, he would need to take in more disciples to active the next main quest from the system.


    "I wonder what the evaluation is about-" Just as he was about to finish his sentence, a brand-new notification appeared in front of him.


    [Evaluation of host''s sect, Flying Sword Sect,plete. Chance of finding a qualified disciple inside Flying Sword Sect: 0.00097%. Host is rmended to increase the strength and size of the Flying Sword Sect to attract more talented disciples! Proceeding to issue new quests rted to increasing the strength of the Flying Sword Sect.]


    Looking over the evaluation of the Flying Sword Sect by the system, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised, he already understood? that the Flying Sword Sect did not have too many talented disciples, but he did not expect for it to be that bad! Even the system seemed unsatisfied with the strength of the Flying Sword Sect and was going to release some quests to help strengthening ita?|


    "Wella?| I guess this is a good thing as well, it would be great if more of the elders could break through to the Nascent Soul Realm. Increasing the strength of the rest of the disciples of the sect is also a good idea. At least my disciples will have someone topete with this waya?|" Muttering this to himself as he thought about the changes to the system, Xuan Hao chose to wee it with open arms.


    After all, the Flying Sword Sect was indeed weak considering the fact that there was already more than one Domain Lord present in the secta?| The disciples and elders of the sect really were weak whenpared with the Iron Sky Kingdom of Yi Min where Nascent Soul Realm Experts were numerous and there was nock of young experts at the Core Formation Realm.


    "Haha?|" Letting out a sigh as he thought about this, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the new quests that had appeared following the change in the system.


    "This isa?|!?"


    Looking over the brand-new section that had appeared specifically for sect rted quest, Xuan Hao could not help sighing in amazement upon realizing that he had received more than one quest. Not only that, but the quest rted to setting up the Qi Gathering Formation had also moved in under the section specifically for sect quests.


    a?¡ì Sect Quests a?¡ì


    [Sect Quest: Hold a cultivation lecture for the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect.]


    [Chose one of the following rewards uponpletion: Spirit Stones, Specialized Cultivation Mantras, Qi Techniques, Spiritual Herbs, Spiritual Metals.]


    [Repeatable: Once every 3 months]


    [Sect Quest: Increase the strength of the Flying Sword Sect]


    [Domain Lord Realm Experts: 1/3]


    [Nascent Soul Realm Experts: 8/20]


    [Reward: Improved version of the Flying Sword Sect''s cultivation mantra, the Flying Sword Mantra]


    [Limited Time Sect Quest: Gather the rest of the natural treasures needed for the construction of the Qi Gathering Formation and set up the Qi Gathering Formation inside the Shattered Star Peaks within two years'' time!]


    [Time: 1.9 years]


    [Reward: Cultivation Increase of 1 Minor Realm, ???]


    Outside of the limited time sect quest for the Qi Gathering Formation, Xuan Hao was slightly taken aback by the two new quests that appeared.


    One of them was a repeatable quest that only required him to do a lecture for the disciples of the sect. The second one on the other handa?| Was far more difficult topletepared to the first one.


    Increase the strength of the Flying Sword Secta?| Just looking over it, Xuan Hao realized that it had not counted anyone of experts from the Spring Flower Sect in. The reason for this was likely because the Spring Flower Sect and Flying Sword Sect had not merged together into one sect yet.


    "One Domain Lord and eight Nascent Soul Realm Expertsa?| That little lion is not counted? And howe there are eight Nascent Soul Realm Experts?" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao felt something was wrong and quickly tried remembering all the Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    There was the Sect Master, Feng Chen and the now former Vice Sect Master, Zu Fei. The two Wang Brothers, Chi Hu, and Elder Songa?|


    I''m still missing two?


    Frowning a bit to himself as he realized this, Xuan Hao quickly used his divine sense to scan the entire Flying Sword Sect. Trying to find out who these two missing Nascent Soul Realm Experts were.


    As his divine sense swept over the Flying Sword Sect, it very quickly reached the Alchemy Hall where a certain treasure hunter was busy holding a lecture for some of the disciples who had just recently joined the Alchemy Hall in anticipation of the uingpetition that was going to be held.


    "Aha?| Perhaps that treasure hunter alchemist Peng Yun is counted as well? Never did find out what happened to him after dropping him off at the Alchemy Hall. From the looks of it, he ended up officially joining the Alchemy Halla?| I should lift the restriction in ce on his dantian."?


    Whoosh~?


    Not waiting along aftering to this decision, Xuan Hao directly lifted the restriction that had been ced on Peng Yun''s cultivation.?


    a?|


    WHOOSH!!!


    "Wha-what in the world!?"


    Feeling the seal on his cultivation baser suddenly being lifted, Peng Yun looked around himself filled with confusion.?


    "Everyone, I will be taking a short break, you can discuss the thing I brought up regarding of the Fire Root Potion while I''m gone!" Not understanding what had just happened, Peng Yun quickly excused himself from the lecture before leaving the study room to find a ce to investigate what had just happened to the seal on his cultivation base.


    "Peng Yuna?|"


    "Wha- E-elder Xuan!?" Suddenly hearing the voice of one of the two people he had fought with back in the secret realm, Peng Yun could not help feeling a bit fearful. Even if nothing had happened to him yet and the elders from the Alchemy Hall had made him a permanent member of the Alchemy Hall, he was still fearful of his future.


    "Don''t worry about the seal, I was the one who lifted it! Seeing as you have already joined the sect, there is no need for the seal to be there any longer."


    "T-thank you!" Listening as the voice slowly drifted away towards the end, Peng Yun quickly understood what had just happened as he felt a wave of tion from the bottom of his heart.


    Even if the other party had said he would be spared, Peng Yun was never certain about it and had always had the thought that maybe the other party would kill him off after he had finished giving away all of his alchemy recipes.


    From now on, he would no longer have to fear what would happen to him in the future and could confidently stay in the Alchemy Hall without worrying about Elder Xuan suddenly deciding to kick him out, or worse, kill him!


    a?|


    "That was one of the two missing Nascent Soul Realm Expertsa?| Now where is thest one?"?


    Whoosh~


    Not forgetting to inform the Peng Yun that it was his doing, Xuan Hao once again began thoroughly searching for thest Nascent Soul Realm Expert that was counted towards the sect quest.


    However, even after searching through the entire Flying Sword Sect with his divine sense, he could not find out who thest one was. The only reason for this, would be that the other party was currently not inside the Flying Sword Sect.


    Not something odd. Especially with Elder Song sending them out to help deal with some of the stronger sects who tried fighting back against the Flying Sword Sect''s increasing control over their territory.


    An example would be the two Wang brothers, who were currently not present in the sect, as they were dealing with one such sect that had a Nascent Soul Realm Sect Master.


    Hm? Maybe its Zhu Lian?


    Recalling the name of the olddy he had helped break through to the Nascent Soul Realm and recruited into the sect, Xuan Hao remembered that he had not even managed to see her shadow since then.


    Originally, he had thought that she might have decided to run away after he helped her breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm, but from the looks of it, that was not the case.


    "I wonder where she isa?| Maybe Feng Chen knows somethinga?|" feeling curious about what had happened to the Zhu Lian, who was likely the eighth Nascent Soul Realm Expert of the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao decided to pay a visit to Feng Chen and see if he knew anything about where she had disappeared to.

 Chapter 542: Zhu Lian in Danger?

    Chapter 542: Zhu Lian in Danger?


    Arriving in front of Zu Fei''s pavilion where Feng Chen was temporarily staying as his own had still not been rebuilt yet, Xuan Hao instantly spotted Zu Fei standing at the entrance to the pavilion. Busy talking with a young disciple.


    Spotting Xuan Hao almost the same moment he appeared in front of her pavilion; Zu Fei quickly signalled for the young disciple to leave before making her way over to meet him.


    "Elder Xuan, What brings you here? Are you perhaps here for the Sect Master?"


    "Indeed, I have something to ask him about."


    "I understand, he should be cultivating at the eastern flower garden inside my paviliona?| if he is not there, you can try the other flower gardens, he normally cultivates inside one of them!"


    "Thanks, I will be going then."


    Not really needing her directions to find Feng Chen as he had already locked on to him with his divine sense, Xuan Hao still thanked Zu Fei before entering her pavilion and making his way towards the location of Feng Chen.


    a?|


    Entering Zu Fei''s pavilion, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked at the inside of the pavilion. No calling it a pavilion would not be appropriate, as Zhu Fei''s pavilion was just arge garden with walls around it and several walkways made from the wood of spiritual trees going through thisrge garden. Every now and then, a few small residences could be seen where some of Zu Fei''s disciples resided.


    Walking along one of these walkways, Xuan Hao soon reached what Zhu Fei had referred to as the eastern flower garden, a beautiful part of the giant garden that was Zu Fei''s pavilion filled with all sorts of flowers, both spiritual and mortal in nature.


    "Elder Xuan? Did you perhapse here because of the Mystic Realm entrance you found? Sorry to disappoint you, but we have not been able to find anything about the entrance to a Mystic Realm in the historical records of the sect so fara?|" Spotting Xuan Hao the moment he entered the eastern flower garden, Feng Chen stood up before calling out to him in a slightly surprised tone. Having already drawn his own conclusion as to why Xuan Hao hade to visit him.


    "Noa?| I''m not here because of the Mystic Realm, but it is indeed rather disappointing to not have any information about ita?|" Shaking his head in response, Xuan Hao quickly denied this. After all, his reason foring was not to ask about the entrance to the Mystic Realm located just next to his pavilion, but about the person most likely to be the eighth Nascent Soul Realm Expert of the Flying Sword Sect, Zhu Lian.


    "I seea?| I wonder what reason you havee for then?" Not expecting for his guess to be wrong, Feng Chen could not help feeling a bit curious about why Xuan Hao hade to him this time around.


    Did another Mystic Realm perhaps appear? Was someone powerful about to attack the secta?| Or maybe he was finally going to set up the Qi Gathering Formation so they could begin moving the sect to the Shattered Star Peaks?


    No matter what it was, Feng Chen understood that Xuan Hao would normally note to him if it was not something important!


    "Actuallya?| It''s about the Nascent Soul Realm Expert I mentioned some time ago, Zhu Lian, I was wondering if you knew anything about where she is."


    "Zhu Liana?|? Now that you mention it, you did mention that you had helped one of Chi Hu''s old friends break through to the Nascent Soul Realm and managed to get them to join the sect, buta?|"


    "Is something wrong?"


    Sensing something was wrong the moment he saw a frown appear on Feng Chen''s face; Xuan Hao understood that something might have happened to Zhu Lian since he hadst seen her.


    "But I never saw her after you mentioned her, I only got a letter sent through the servant quarters from her a few weeks ago. Mentioning that she had apparently run into some sort of trouble when visiting her home and not being able to make it to the sect for the time being. The letter is right here..."


    "Haha?| Looks like that is really the casea?|" Hearing what Feng Chen said along with reading the content of the letter in his hand, Xuan Hao quickly understood that Zhu Lian had indeed run into some sort of trouble.


    [Sect Quest: Save Zhu Lian]


    [Description: Save the Eighth Nascent Soul Realm Expert of the Flying Sword Sect before she dies. Rough location of Zhu Lian''s location have been given to host.]


    [Time Limit: 3 days]


    [Reward: Zhu Lian lives, location of undiscovered spirit stone mine inside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect.]


    The system also did not even wait for him to think it over before it issued a brand-new sect quest rted to Zhu Lian. Not even giving him any time to react before the information about Zhu Lian''s location appeared in his head. From what the system said, it seemed like she had already been recognized as part of the Flying Sword Sect after she had been invited by him and had agreed to join.


    Not knowing what to say at the sudden enthusiasm from the system, Xuan Hao could only shake his head before checking out the information he had been given about Zhu Lian''s location.


    "The Frozen Wastnd!?"


    "Is something wrong?"


    "No, it''s nothing, I was just thinking about something after hearing what you mentioned regarding Zhu Lian."


    Feeling a bit embarrassed that he had eximed a bit loudly after finding out about Zhu Lian''s current location from the information he had been given by the system, Xuan Hao could only try his best to brush it off as nothinga?|


    "Surea?| If you say soa?|" This of course did not work at all, as Feng Chen clearly did not believe him. At least he still understood that it was not something Xuan Hao wanted to talk about, as he decided not to ask any further.


    "Wella?| I have to get going, I might be gone from the sect for a week." Feeling how awkward it had suddenly gotten, Xuan Hao quickly excused himself before dashing out of the eastern flower garden.


    "Hehe~" Chuckling a bit to himself when he saw this, Feng Chen just shook his head before sitting back down and resuming his cultivation like nothing had happened.


    In the first ce, he was only a bit interested in what had caused Xuan Hao to suddenly act so shocked over something when they had been talking about Zhu Lian.


    "Feng Chen~ What were you and Elder Xuan talking about? Something about a woman called Zhu Liana?| How do you know about this Zhu Liana?|?"


    However, this interest did notst for long, as he suddenly heard a familiar voice call out to him shortly after Xuan Hao had left.


    "Zu Feia?| Did she instal some kind of listening formationa?|?" Muttering this to himself as he watched Zu Fei suddenly appear beside him with an ominous smile on her face, Feng Chen suddenly felt a chill go down his spine.


    a?|


    During the short time he had visited Feng Chen and asked about Zhu Lian, the sky had already be dark, as the moon illuminated the ground below.


    "The Frozen Wastnda?| I didn''t expect that I would be going there so soona?|" Landing back at the entrance to his own pavilion after having left Zu Fei''s garden like pavilion, Xuan Hao could not help saying this to himself as he gazed up at the moon.


    From the looks of it, he would have to visit the Frozen Wastnd and save Zhu Lian before she ended up dying to the trouble she had mentioned encountering in her letter.


    Not only that, but he would also get a chance to look for the location of the Frost Devil Sect that he had promised Yi Min in exchange for the information about the Transcendent Spiritual Herb he needed for the Qi Gathering Formation.


    Maybe he would even go and look for the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb after having made sure that Zhu Lian was safe. This way, he would be able to begin setting up the Qi Gathering Formation way earlier than expected and at the same time would not have to return to the Frozen Wastnd again in the future to get the Transcendent Grade Spiritual herb.


    "Isn''t this like getting three birds with one stone? I can rescue Zhu Lian from the life-threatening situation she finds herself in, find the location of the Frost Devil Sect and find the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb needed for the Qi Gathering Formation. All at the same time!"


    As he said this out loud, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that it might not be such a bad idea to do this.


    "Zhi Ruo!"


    Seeing that Zhi Ruo was still up at this time leisurely reading a romance nove, Xuan Hao quickly called out to her before quickly informing her that he would be leaving for a short period of time.


    Whoosh~


    Not waiting around after having informed her, Xuan Hao directly left the Flying Sword Sect in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom where the closest border leading into the Frozen Wastnd was located.

 Chapter 543: Disappearance of Archbishop Soft Breeze and the Holy Artifact!

    Chapter 543: Disappearance of Archbishop Soft Breeze and the Holy Artifact!


    Around the same time that Xuan Hao set off from the Flying Sword Sect towards the Frozen Wastnd, space distorted visibly above the now destroyed mountain range where Archbishop Soft Breeze and the people from the church of the gue god had fought with each other .


    Stepping out from the space that had suddenly twisted and distorted above the mountain range, the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God frowned as his vast divine sense instantly engulfed what was left of the mountain range that had been turned into rubble during the fight that took ce a few days earlier.


    "Looks like I''m tootea?|" Shaking his head as he found no traces of the holy artifact or Archbishop Soft Breeze inside the destroyed mountain range, the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God did not stay around for long, as space soon began distorting around his body once again before he disappeared from the destroyed mountain range.


    Given that the Cardinal from the church of the gue god had already arrived before him and taken away the holy artifact that most likely contained the soul of Archbishop Soft Breeze, the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God understood that there was not much he could do about it.


    As for the Azure Sky Kingdom that was about to fall under the church of the gue god, he did not really care too much, as it was not for him to deal with. The people under him were much more suited to deal with a small kingdom like the Azure Sky Kingdom. Wasting his time to do it himself was not really something he wanted to do.


    Even if his Order of the Sky God could not do it, the Followers of the Fire God, or the Cult of the Scarlet Moon, would most likely send someone over to do ita?|


    Swish~


    Arriving shortly after the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God had left, an old man dressed like what could only be described as some sort of necromancer appeared in the sky above the destroyed mountain range.


    "Hm?! That brat actually arrived before me!? Looks like his spatial maniption has taken another step forwarda?| The Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God should not be too far off from his next tribtion!"


    Scanning through the mountain range simr to how the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God had done it, the person could not help cursing to himself as he discovered the remnant aura left behind by the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God.


    This person was none other than the Cardinal from the church of the gue god that the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God had believed to have already arrived before him!


    "Haha?| Even with all those preparations in cea?|" Whispering this to himself as he understood just how much his church had lost, the necromancer like Cardinal could not help letting a regretful sigh escape from his lips.


    Everything would have been fine if they had sessfully managed to kill off Archbishop Soft Breeze and gotten their hands on the Transcendent Grade Artifact, he was carrying on hima?| But now, they had only managed to deal with a single Archbishop and had not gotten his hands on the Transcendent Grade Artifact!


    Not to mention, the Archbishop had not truly died, and his soul should still be alive ording to what his subordinates had told hima?|''


    "If I''m fast enough, I might still have time to stabilize the situation in the Sky Empire before the Followers of the Fire God and the Cult of the Scarlet Moon movesa?|" Muttering this to himself as he thought about his church current position at the border to the core region of the Sky Empire without his presence, the Cardinal from the church of the gue god did not bother wasting any more time in the Azure Sky Kingdom, as he directly used his spatial maniption to leave in a simr way the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God had done.


    Like this, both the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God and the church of the gue god left the Azure Sky Kingdom after not finding any signs of Archbishop Soft Breeze or the Transcendent Grade Holy Artifact that his soul had sought refuge inside of.


    In the end, none of them cared too much about a small kingdom like the Azure Sky Kingdom and didn''t waste too much time there.


    In their eyes, even if the Azure Sky Kingdom fell to the church of the gue god, it would not influence the situation in the core region of the Sky Empire!


    a?|


    "So, this is the Azure Sky Kingdom?" Not taking more than a few hours to pass through the territory that had belonged to the Raging me Sect in the past, Xuan Hao arrived at the old border that had existed between the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the Azure Sky Kingdom before thetter copsed.


    The border was not much different from what Xuan Hao had expected, as soldiers belonging to the Azure Sky Kingdom could still be seen cleaning up the border area that had been gued by decades of war before the Azure Sky Kingdom had finally managed to push through this barrier and invade the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Even after the battle hade to an end, there was still countless different traps and killing formations hidden across the now abandoned battlefield that needed to be cleaned up before it would be safe for ordinary mortals and weaker cultivators to pass through without fear of getting caught up in a random killing formation set up by one of the two sides in the past.


    "Hm?" Noticing something odd about the soldiers that were walking around the border busy cleaning the area up, Xuan Hao directly used his domain to iste one of the soldiers before knocking him out.


    Searching through the body of the unconscious soldier with his divine sense, Xuan Hao quickly discovered the reason why he had felt something odd when observing the soldiers cleaning up the abandoned border.


    "Divine energy from the church of the gue goda?|" Indeed, inside the dantian of the soldier who had just barely reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, Xuan Hao could clearly feel the same divine energy he had seen back when the gue invented by the church of the gue god first appeared inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom!


    The difference between the divine energy he had seen back then and the divine energy currently inside the dantian of the soldier, was the fact that the green divine energy seemed to be aiding the solder''s cultivation. Helping him improve faster!


    Letting go of the soldier after having finished investigating the oddity he had felt, Xuan Hao soon came upon a small camp from the Azure Sky Kingdom where the soldiers cleaning up the abandoned border resided.


    Outside the soldiers from the Azure Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao also very clearly saw a priest belonging to the church of the gue god present inside the camp. Investigating for a few minutes longer, he quickly realized that the priest was the one who injected the green divine energy into the soldiers to help their cultivation improve!


    "I did hear that the church of the gue god made a move to take control over the Azure Sky Kingdom, buta?| I didn''t expect it to be like this. Did they perhaps already sessfully take control of it?" Muttering this to himself as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit worried about the church of the gue god deciding to expand in the direction of his Flying Sword Sect. Hoping sincerely that one of the three big religious organisations of the Sky Empire would show up to stop this from happening.


    Whoosh~


    Not staying around the border area for too long after having investigated this, Xuan Hao resumed his journey towards the Frozen Wastnd. Even if he was worried about the church of the gue god might be up to after taking control of the Azure Sky Kingdom, he did not really have the time to look into it, as he still had to save Zhu Lian within three days'' time.


    a?|


    Finding himself at the border between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Frozen Wastnd after flying through the Azure Sky Kingdom for half a day without stop, Xuan Hao could not help stopping to take in the scenery of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Completely different from any ce he had seen before, a magnificent frozen tundra spread out before him.


    If not for the fact that he only had a little over two days'' time left to find Zhu Lian inside the Frozen Wastnd, Xuan Hao felt like it would not be a bad idea to spend some time taking in the magnificent and beautiful scenery of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Especially given the fact that he had a feeling that his Ice Domain would improve way faster cultivating in an environment like the Frozen Wastnd!

 Chapter 544: Unlucky Zhu Lian

    Chapter 544: Unlucky Zhu Lian


    Whoosh~!


    Not standing around watching the beautiful frozen tundra for too long, Xuan Hao took a step forward and moved towards the rough location of Zhu Lian that he had been given by the system.


    Even if the location was nowhere near as urate as he would have liked it to be, he should have enough time to find Zhu Lian before the time was up!


    a?|


    At the same time that Xuan Hao arrived at the Frozen Wastnd in search of Zhu Lian, the person in question, was helplessly staring at the mossy stone walls surrounding. Engraved into the mossy stone walls were several different symbols that together formed a terrifying trapping formation. Even using all her strength in an attempt to forcefully break through the trapping formation, was of no use.


    The reason why she had stopped attacking the formation at this point in time, was because she had discovered that the formation was slowly draining any and all qi inside of it. This included the qi inside her!


    Given enough time, the formation would drain all the qi inside of her. Even if she could do fine without any qi, she was currently using said qi to maintain her body. Meaning that instead of eating or drinking, she would use the qi between heaven and earth to sustain her body!


    If the formation drained all the qi inside her body, Zhu Lian could easily imagine her ouea?|


    Just a few days earlier, she had finally been able to make her way to the Flying Sword Sect after solving some problems that hade up along the way. Preventing her from making her way to the Flying Sword Sect sooner.


    Back then, she had sent a letter back exining her situation and the fact that it might take some time before she could officially be a member of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Sending a letter was not something she really needed to do, but she felt that it was the best thing she could do given how much she had ended up getting dyed.


    Unfortunately for her, this was not the end of her troubles, as she had ended up encountering a group of demonic cultivators around the borders of the Azure Sky Kingdom. Looking for any unfortunate person who passed bya?| In the end, she had ended up as that unfortunate persona?|


    In the end, she had just barely escaped by entering the Frozen Wastnd. However, not a minute after the demonic cultivators had given up chasing her, she had stumbled upon the ancient ruins of a city buried beneath the snow.


    Her first reaction back then had been to get out of there before anything happened, but she had still not managed to react fast enough, as she soon found herself tripping over an ancient trapping formation that had remained dormant for who knows how long before she idently tripped over it. The rest was history and she now found herself in her current situation with no way out. Only waiting to slowly starve to death from qi deprivationa?|


    "How unfortunate can one get?" Noticing the fact that the qi inside her body was already running out only after having been stuck for a few days, Zhu Lian could not help cursing the group of demonic cultivators who had forced her to us up most of her qi while escaping from them.


    Rumble~!


    "What nowa?|?" Suddenly feeling the ground beneath her begin shaking violently, Zhu Lian had a feeling something bad was about to happen, as she prepared herself for the worst.


    RUMBLE-!


    As the shaking got more intense, the ancient trapping formation around her showed signs of cracking apart.


    Crack~


    Sadly, Zhu Lian did not get to see the formation fully crack apart from the sudden earthquake, as the ground below her feet suddenly split apparat before she had the chance to see this.


    "Aaaaaaah-!" Not able to fly with her current cultivation realm, Zhu Lian could only let out a surprised scream as she suddenly found herself falling down the crack that had opened up below her.


    Grabbing on to the sides of the crack to stop herself from falling down was not an option either, as the size of the crack itself had expanded from only a few meters in size to what looked could only be described as a giant ravine several hundred meters wide.


    Even worse, she was located directly at the centre of it!


    Whoosh~


    So, Zhu Lian could only brace for the inevitable impact and hope her physical body would not end up dying from the-


    BANG!


    Falla?|


    "That hurta?| At least my body is still fine!" Feeling that her physical body was still fine after her intimate contact with the ground beneath her, Zhu Lian quickly got up before finding a ce to hide and recover her strength.


    In her current condition, she did not dare release her divine sense to inspect where she had ended up. For now, the most important thing was to quickly recover her strength!


    However, this was made even more difficult, as Zhu Lian soon discovered that the qi around her was not the normal qi she was used to. Instead, it was yin qi. Incredibly dense and pure yin qi!


    To absorb this type of qi, she would have to use a long time to slowly refine it. Not to mention the fact that absorbing some of the stronger yin qi in the air around her, could end up directly killing her in her current situation!


    "Looks like I''m not out of danger yeta?| How unlucky can I geta?|?" Muttering this to herself as she absorbed a strand of yin qi into her dantian, Zhu Lian closed her eyes and began the arduous task of refining the yin qi.


    a?|


    Travelling through the Frozen Wastnd, Xuan Hao managed to reach the rough location where the system had indicated Zhu Lian was.


    The only problem being that the surrounding area was not any different from what he had seen so far during his travel through the frozen tundra called the Frozen Wastnd. The area waspletely barren with no signs of life for miles on end. Wella?| Notpletely without life, as a few snow rabbits could be seen scavenging for some sort of nt living beneath the thickyer of snow that covered the frozen tundra.


    Even at this point in time, Xuan Hao had yet to spot a single living creature outside the snow rabbits on his way through the frozen tundra.


    Thinking about it, the snow rabbits seemed like the apex predators of the frozen tundra so far. Preying on the helpless nts trying their best to hide beneath the snowa?|


    "Hm? Looks like there actually is someone else arounda?|" Still in the process of scanning through the frozen tundra while observing a group of lively snow rabbits below him searching for the nts hidden beneath the snow, Xuan Hao could not help smiling happily to himself after spotting a group of cultivators with his divine sense.


    Even if he could clearly sense that the group in question was demonic cultivators who had managed to reach the First Demonic Transformation and were equivalent to someone at the Nascent Soul Realma?|


    "Waita?| Demonic cultivatorsa?| Are these people perhaps from the Frost Devil Sect!?" Remembering that he also needed to find a demonic sect hidden inside the Frozen Wastnd for Yi Min, Xuan Hao could not help feeling excited over the fact that he had already managed to find a group of demonic cultivators.


    If he followed behind them secretly, would he not be able to easily find the location of their sect- No, I still need to find Zhu Lian first and make sure she is safe!


    Stopping himself before he decided to do something that might very well end up spelling the end of Zhu Lian who he hade to save, Xuan Hao was suddenly taken aback upon noticing that the group of demonic cultivators wereing straight towards him.


    Did they perhaps find me?! No waya?| With their cultivation realm, there is no way for them to notice me and even if they did, would they dare approach a Domain Lord like that?


    Not knowing why, the group of demonic cultivators was suddenly running towards him, Xuan Hao made sure he was hidden by his domain before closely observing them.


    a?|


    "Haha?| To think that old woman who had just reached the Nascent Soul Realm actually managed to escape from us! So embarrassing!"


    "Don''t mention it. At least I managed to ce one of my tracking bugs on her clothes before she escaped! From what I can sense, the bug is just up ahead."


    "Haha! You really are the best, without you, that old woman would surely have escaped from our grasp! At this point in time, she should have already used most of qi and should no longer be able to escape!"


    Floating a few dozen meters above the group as they ran through the frozen tundra leisurely chatting with each other, Xuan Hao suddenly narrowed his eyes upon hearing what they were talking about.


    From the looks of it, it would not be a bad idea to follow the group of demonic cultivators and find out if the old woman mentioned by them was Zhu Liana?|

 Chapter 545: The Mysterious Crack in the Ground~

    Chapter 545: The Mysterious Crack in the Ground~


    Following the group of demonic cultivators while listening to them talk among themselves, Xuan Hao quickly learned that two of the people in the group were indeed from the Frost Devil Sect like he had expected when he had first discovered them.


    However, this was not the most interesting thing he had managed to find out during his time following the group of demonic cultivators¡­ Instead, it was the identity of the third demonic cultivator in the group of three! A member of the ck Rose Sect!


    The fact that one of the demonic cultivators came from none other than the ck Rose Sect was more than enough to catch Xuan Hao''s interest. After all, since hisst encounter with the ck Rose Sect where he saved Chu Yang, he had not seen the shadow of the demonic cultivators from the ck Rose Sect, as they had seemingly disappeared over night.


    Now that there was actually someone from the ck Rose Sect together with two Frost Devil Sect members, it was more than enough to cause Xuan Hao to start specting over just what had happened to the ck Rose Sect.


    Perhaps they ended up moving to the Frozen Wastnd and became a subordinate sect under the Frost Devil Sect?


    This was Xuan Hao''s best guess at what might have happened to the ck Rose Sect, and it was not too unrealistic, as demonic sects were more than happy to take in weaker demonic sects as subordinate sects and have the weaker sects work for them and in return get protection. Not too different from how normal sects would take care of weaker sects under them.


    "Look! There is something in the distance! It looks like arge crack in the ground¡­"


    Hearing one the demonic cultivators suddenly call out; Xuan Hao and the other two demonic cultivators all turned their attention towards therge crack in the ground that had suddenly appeared in front of them.


    The size of the crack was nothing to scoff at, as it was dozens of miles long and several hundred meters wide.


    Whoosh~


    Using his divine sense in an attempt to find out if Zhu Lian might be inside the crack that had appeared out of nowhere, Xuan Hao was slightly taken aback when he suddenly felt his divine sense being blocked after only going a few hundred meters down into the crack.


    Whoosh!


    Trying a few more times to forcefully breakthrough the invisible barrier blocking him, Xuan Hao could only give up after realizing that there was no way for his divine sense to prate it and enter the deeper parts of the enormous crack breaking up the beautiful scenery of the frozen tundra.


    Unlike Xuan Hao''s frustration over not being able to search through the crack with his divine sense, the group of demonic cultivators reactedpletely differently, as all of them excitedly felt the increasingly dense yin qi in the air around the crack in the ground.


    "A natural formation formed by yin qi!? Haha! To think we would be lucky enough to stumble upon a natural formation formed by yin qi!" Saying this, the excitement and greed on the first demonic cultivators face became visible for all to see.


    "Are you sure¡­? Even if the yin qi is dense around here¡­ If there really is a natural formation formed by yin qi, it would mean that-"


    "That we might have an opportunity to reach the Second Demonic Transformation! Maybe we can even reach the Third Demonic Transformation if there is a rare natural yin treasure down there! The old woman should also be down there!" Interrupting the demonic cultivator from the ck Rose Sect who was still a little doubtful about the im, the first demonic cultivator did not bother waiting for the other two''s answer, as he jumped into the enormous crack that split apparat the frozen tundra without the slightest bit of fear.


    ""¡­""


    Staring nkly at each other for a short moment after seeing theirpanion jump into the crack, the second demonic cultivator from the Frost Devil Sect and the demonic cultivator from the ck Rose Sect quickly jumped into the crack as well.


    It had to be known that neither of them believed that theirpanion would wait for them before consuming whatever treasure he came upon. At the same time, they had already felt the dense yin qi in the air around the crack and believed that theirpanion''s prediction of there being a natural formation formed by the dense and pure yin qi in the crack to be correct.


    After all, outside of that, for what other reason would such pure and dense yin qi be present in the air above ground?


    ¡­


    A natural formation formed by yin qi¡­?


    Not knowing what the natural formation formed by yin qi was, Xuan Hao could only shake his head as he realized his knowledge regarding formations was still quitecking.


    However, one thing was certain from watching the behaviour of the demonic cultivators and that was the fact that the so-called natural formation formed by yin qi was not dangerous at all. Instead, it looked like it was a heaven-sent opportunity for demonic cultivators given how excitedly they had entered the crack.


    Even more importantly than that, the old woman, who was most likely Zhu Lian, was hiding inside the crack¡­


    [Time Limit: 1.9 days]


    Checking out the time left for the quest requiring him to save Zhu Lian, Xuan Hao could not help frowning.


    If Zhu Lian was truly hiding inside the crack filled with yin qi, the demonic cultivators would easily find her within an hour. At that point in time, with her strength and in an area beneficial to demonic cultivators, she would likely not be able to escape again!


    For her to be able to survive for a little under two days like this¡­ Xuan Hao had a feeling that the crack in the ground was not as simple as the demonic cultivators believed it to be!


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ I really can''t absorb any more of this damnable yin qi or my body will copse! Why is this irritating yin qi so pure?! Ah! How frustrating, I even need to use what little qi I recovered to protect myself!"


    Talking to herself in a frustrated tone, Zhu Lian could not help cursing the yin qi that surrounded her, freezing up her body as she slowly tried to escape from the yin qi that was bing stronger and stronger behind her.


    Just a few minutes ago, she had been trying her best to recover her strength by slowly refining the yin qi in the air around her. However, luck was not on her side, as the purity and strength of the yin qi in the air around her had suddenly begun increasing rapidly.


    In the end, she had been forced to stop refining the yin qi, as it got way too dangerous for her. Even forcing her to use what little qi she had managed to recover to block out the now increasingly strong yin qi around her.


    "Hm? A flower?" Noticing a small blue flower in front of her, Zhu Lian stopped for a short moment before she began cautiously inspecting the small blue flower that had blocked her path forward.


    After what she had gone through over the past few days, Zhu Lian did not dare be? the slightest bit careless. Even a flower might be some kind of hidden trap out to kill her!


    Thinking along this line, Zhu Lian decided to go around the blue flower that had suddenly appeared in front of her and not interact with it. Even if it might have been some sort of rare spiritual herb, Zhu Lian was not willing to take the risk¡­


    In the end, she sessfully managed to make her way past the blue flower without any trouble and soon managed to reach a new ce where the yin qi in the air was way more manageable than before. The only problem-


    "W-why¡­ Why are there so many of those weird blue flower!?"


    Was that arge flower field filled with flowers simr to the blue flower from earlier spread out before her.


    At this point in time, there was no way for her to continue moving forward without having toe into close contact with the weird blue flowers.


    "Looks like I will have to take the risk¡­" Feeling as the yin qi in the air around her was still growing stronger with each passing second, Zhu Lian reluctantly entered the flower field in front of her.


    "I''m safe! Hah¡­ It looks like I worried over nothi-"


    Thump! Thump! Thump!


    Feeling happy that nothing happened even when she entered the flower field filled with the weird blue flowers, it did not take long for things to go wrong, as arge, blue-coloured demon beast appeared behind her.


    Looking closer, Zhu Lian discovered that the blue-coloured demon beast was eating a few of the weird blue flowers and was making its way towards the flower field she was currently inside of¡­

 Chapter 546: Time Reduced!

    Chapter 546: Time Reduced!


    Roar!


    Not even a secondter, the demon beast spotted her, as it rushed towards her direction. Approaching at a speed way too fast for her to escape in her current condition!


    Where did you evene from?!


    Feeling like crying as she watched the rapidly approaching blue coloured demon beast, Zhu Lian did not n to wait around for it to reach her, as she still used what little strength she could muster to escape in the opposite direction. Even knowing that she had no chance of running away from the demon beast, Zhu Lian still understood that only by buying more time would she have a chance to discover a way out of her current rather precarious situation.


    "Hehe, I never expected for there to be so many yin flowers down here! Even a fraction of these would be more than enough for me to break through to reach the Second Demonic Transformation Realm!"


    Suddenly hearing a familiar voiceughing happily in the distance, Zhu Lian could not help narrowing her eyes as she rushed in the direction of the voice without the slightest bit of hesitation.


    "Hm? You are-"


    Whoosh!


    Before the demonic cultivator who had already started gathering the yin flowers in front of him with an excited expression on his face could react, Zhu Lian used most of the qi she had managed to recover since falling into the crack and ending up in her current situation to run straight past him before he had a chance to stop her.


    ROAR!


    Not giving the demonic cultivator any time to follow after Zhu Lian, the blue coloured demon beast directly attacked the demonic cultivator. After all, in its eyes, Zhu Lian and the demonic cultivator were working together to steal its food. In the demon beast''s eyes, the demonic cultivator was a far bigger target, as it could clearly see him currently in the process of stealing!


    Bang!


    Barely managing to defend against the demon beast that had suddenly appeared out of seemingly nowhere, the demonic cultivator was soon locked inbat with it. Soon discovering that the demon beast was far stronger than him.


    "Help!" Knowing that he was not the demon beast''s match, the demonic cultivator called out for help.


    Bang-bang-bang!


    However, even after a few minutes of him getting knocked around by the demon beast. No one showed up to help him¡­


    "There is a strong demon beast and its guarding a field of yin flowers-"


    "Junior brother! I''m here to help!"


    "Where is that vile demon beast! I will make sure that it won''t be able to get away!"


    "¡­"


    Frowning visibly with an annoyed expression on his face as he watched the two others show up even before he finished what he was saying, the demonic cultivator in the process of getting beat up by the blue coloured demon beast could not help rethinking his choice of travelpanions¡­


    In the future, he would find someone different to travel with!


    ¡­


    At the same time that the three demonic cultivators engaged in battle with the blue coloured demon beast, Zhu Lian copsed on to the ground on the edge of arge cliff leading even further down into the increasingly mysterious crack she now found herself inside of.


    "Hah¡­ I should be¡­ Hah¡­ safe for now¡­" Feeling thest bit of strength left in her body disappear, Zhu Lina could not help smiling happily when thinking about how she had managed to escape from the blue coloured demon beast.


    "More importantly than that¡­ How did those three manage to find me? I''m sure I left them behind after escaping into the Frozen Wastnd¡­" Muttering this to herself as she absorbed the surround yin qi to recover her strength, Zhu Lian soon stopped as she realized that the other party might be tracking her through some kind of special technique.


    Whoosh~


    Scanning herself thoroughly with her divine sense. Making sure to check every corner of her clothes, Zhu Lian soon managed to discover something hidden on her robe.


    The thing in question, was a small bug the size of a grain of sand. Even if she used her divine sense to search her surroundings, she would not be able to discover it. Only when thoroughly searching herself for anything that might be used to track her location, did she manage to find the small bug hidden on her robe.


    ? Ptsh!


    Using her divine sense to crush the little bug to death, Zhu Lian decided to move away from her current location and find another ce to recover her strength. Just in case the demonic cultivators came looking for her at the location where they hadst felt the little bug.


    "This should be fine, the yin qi around here is also easy to absorb!"


    Finding a new location, Zhu Lian sat down before closing her eyes to absorb the surrounding yin qi.


    Luckily for her, the yin qi in the air around her was not too different from the qi at the surface and it was rtively easy for her to absorb and refine. Given a few hours, she would be able to recover her full strength at her current speed. At that point. Finding a way out of her current situation would be way easier!


    ¡­


    Back up at the surface, Xuan Hao did not follow behind the group of demonic cultivators immediately when they entered the mysterious crack. Instead, he observed the natural formation formed by yin qi that engulfed the crack to see if anything changed after the group of demonic cultivators had rushed inside.


    "Looks like nothing happened¡­" Muttering this to himself as he watched for any changes to the formation, Xuan Hao could not help breathing out a sigh of relief.


    From the looks of it, the natural formation formed by yin qi was not some sort of offensive formation that would attack once someone entered it. Instead, after carefully observing it for some time, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the natural formation formed by yin qi was rather simr to the Qi Gathering Formation. The only difference was that one was for normal cultivators, while the other was for demonic cultivators¡­


    Swish~


    Knowing that he wouldn''t be in any danger after entering the massive natural formation formed by yin qi below, Xuan Hao slowly flew down before entering the mysterious crack in the ground.


    The inside of the crack was covered in a thick fog that made it hard to see more than a few meters ahead. Even with his current strength, Xuan Hao still felt his divine sense being restricted to the extreme after having entered the mysterious crack covered by the natural formation formed by yin qi.


    At this point in time, he could only cover an area a thousand meters around himself with his divine sense! It was easy to imagine that the demonic cultivators who entered before him would most likely not even be able to use their divine sense in an area more than a few meters around themselves¡­


    [Warning! Detected a change has taken ce in location of a time limited quest. Sect quest [Save Zhu Lian], time toplete quest reduced from 1.9 days to 2 hours!]


    "¡­"


    Suddenly seeing this message appear in front of him shortly after he passed through the invisible border of the natural formation covering the mysterious crack, Xuan Hao could not help feeling like he had something to do with this "change" that took ce in the area where Zhu Lian was located¡­


    At the very least, he was now certain that the old woman that the three demonic cultivators had been chasing after was indeed Zhu Lian!


    However, Xuan Hao now felt like he had to speed up, as he now only had two hours left to save Zhu Lian!


    Finding her in two hours inside the mysterious crack where his divine sense had been restricted¡­ Even Xuan Hao felt like he might not be able to do so. Not to mention, he had no idea what the change that had taken ce was and it could very well be something that would make it even harder for him to find Zhu Lian!


    "Ah¡­ Didn''t one of those demonic cultivators say he had a way to track Zhu Lian¡­?" Suddenly remembering that one of the three demonic cultivators had boasted about using some sort of bug to track Zhu Lian''s location, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes as he gazed in the direction of a flower field located at the edge of his divine sense where a battle was currently taking ce between three demonic cultivators and a blue coloured demon beast.


    "Hm¡­ I think it should be a good idea to ask these three if they would be kind enough to help me out in finding Zhu Lian¡­" Showing a splendid viinous smile as he said this to himself, Xuan Hao soon utilized his movement technique before appearing directly at the centre of the battle between the three demonic cultivators and the blue coloured demon beast.

 Chapter 547: Befriending Demonic Cultivators

    Chapter 547: Befriending Demonic Cultivators


    "Wha-"


    "Who are you!?"


    Roar?


    Seeing someone appearing directly in front of them, the demonic cultivators and the blue coloured demon beast stopped their fight as they sized up the person that had suddenly appeared in front of them.


    "Hm¡­ Now that I think about it, I would only need the one with the tracking ability¡­"


    Listening to the person who had seemingly appeared out of nowhere in front of them mutter something to himself as he ignored them, the demonic cultivators felt annoyed over the fact that they had been ignored, while the blue coloured demon beast had recovered from the shock of suddenly seeing someone appear in front of it.


    Roar!


    Before the demonic cultivators had a chance to say anything to the mysterious person that had appeared in front of them, the demon beast let out an angry roar filled with killing intent before charging towards Xuan Hao.


    In the demon beast''s eyes, Xuan Hao was just another human who had appeared together with the others to steal from its food supply. For this reason, demon beast did not bother thinking about how Xuan Hao had been able to appear in front of it before it attacked. Not bothering to think how it had not been able to detect him.


    Swish~


    Seeing the demon beast that was charging towards him filled with killing intent, Xuan Hao directly used his Sword Domain. Instantly killing the demon beast before it even had a chance to understand what had just happened to it.


    Thump!


    ""¡­""


    The demonic cultivators speechlessly watched as the demon beast they had been struggling to deal with fell dead on the ground all of a sudden. From start to finish, they had no idea how the demon beast had suddenly died, but all of them were certain that the person who had just appeared in front of them had something to do with it.


    For this reason, all three of them could not help feeling a shiver run down their spine as they realized that the person who had appeared in front of them was an existence far stronger than them!


    "Y-you are the person from back then!" As the two other demonic cultivators were thinking about how to get out of their current situation alive, the demonic cultivator from the ck Rose Sect could not help eximing in shock as he recognized Xuan Hao from his past visit to the ck Rose Sect when they had still been stationed inside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Even now, he could still remember how his sect master had been beaten up by the other party without any chance to properly fight back against the other party.


    Thinking about it, the demonic cultivator suddenly realized that he was way weaker than his sect master had been back then!


    "You know this person? Is he perhaps a demonic cultivator?"


    "If he is not a demonic cultivator, why would he bother entering a ce like this filled with yin qi? Even if there were any treasures in here, they are of no use to those normal cultivators¡­"


    About to kill off the two demonic cultivators from the Frost Devil Sect and getting the one from the ck Rose Sect to guide him to where Zhu Lian was located, Xuan Hao suddenly thought of something as he grabbed hold of the demonic cultivator from the ck Rose Sect before he had time to answer the other two demonic cultivators.


    "I''m a demonic cultivator who became friends with your sect master in the past¡­ Got it?"


    "Y-yes!"


    Not daring to say a word as he heard Xuan Hao''s voice inside his head having been transferred through his divine sense, the demonic cultivator from the ck Rose Sect could only fearfully nod his head. Knowing very well how he would end up if he disagreed with him¡­


    "Good!" Smiling happily after seeing that he understood, Xuan Hao let go of him. Killing the demonic cultivators for now was not a good idea, as he might be able to use them to find the location of the Frost Devil Sect after he found Zhu Lian and made sure she was safe¡­


    "Is something wrong?" Seeing Xuan Hao suddenly grab hold of theirpanion, the other two could not help feeling a bit confused.


    "N-no, it''s nothing, this person is a friend of my sect master and just so happened to chance upon this ce like us."


    "Indeed, I happened to meet the sect master of the ck Rose Sect in the past. Back then, both of us got along quite well and he even helped save my life in the past, so it''s only a given that I help look after his people!" Not allowing for the two other demonic cultivators to grow suspicious, Xuan Hao quickly cooperated what the demonic cultivator from the ck Rose Sect said.


    "I see¡­ So, it''s a friend of the ck Rose Sect!"


    "I didn''t expect for the Sect Master of the ck Rose Sect to have such a strong friend¡­ Might I be so bold as to ask which transformation you have reached¡­?"


    Hearing the question, Xuan Hao released his aura together with his Ice Domain, as it was rather simr to yin qi. Together, it formed an aura not too dissimr to a demonic cultivator!


    "The¡­ The Third Demonic Transformation!" Feeling the powerful and ice-cold aura being released, the demonic cultivator who asked the question feeling quite sceptical regarding the identity of Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine upon realizing that the person in front of him was indeed a demonic cultivator. Not only that, but it was a demonic cultivator only a single step away from the True Demon Realm!


    "I apologize for my rude behaviour! I hope senior will spare this junior!" Falling to his knees the instant he realized this, he quickly begged for forgiveness. After all, he very well understood just how ruthless those powerful demonic cultivators were!


    Even if it was someone from his sect, if he disrespected one of those powerful demonic cultivators, he might still end up dead!


    "¡­ No worries, I will let you go on behalf of the ck Rose Sect!" Narrowing his eyes as he said this, Xuan Hao wondered whether he should kill the demonic cultivator to sell his image of a demonic cultivator to thest remaining demonic cultivator from the Frost Devil Sect. After all, he only needed one of them to show him the way to the Frost Devil Sect¡­


    "Thank you senior! This junior will not forget your kindness!"


    "Don''t let it happen again!"


    Seeing the demonic cultivator nodding his head eagerly knowing that he had just escaped from death, Xuan Hao had a feeling that he would have a higher chance at getting them to show him the way to their sect this way.


    "Might I ask for what reason senior hase here? With you cultivation, these yin flowers should not be useful to you¡­" Having already understood that Xuan Hao had a reason to spare him and the other demonic cultivators, the one from the ck Rose Sect asked this. Trying his best to not show a fearful expression in front of the other two demonic cultivators.


    "Hm¡­ Actually, I came here looking for someone. An old woman, who should be somewhere in here ording to my information¡­ Do any of you perhaps have any idea about the location of this person?"


    "Ah! I think we know about this person! We have been chasing an old woman for thest few days and she happened to hide in here. Perhaps this is the person you are searching for?" Finishing what he was saying, the demonic cultivator slowly drew a portrait of Zhu Lian in the air in front of him with his qi for Xuan Hao to see.


    "Indeed! This is the person I have been searching for! Do you perhaps have any idea on where to find her?" Feeling happy upon confirming that it was indeed Zhu Lian, Xuan Hao asked this while keeping an eye on the demonic cultivator from the ck Rose Sect.


    "Yes, brother Beetle nted one of his bugs on her and can track her!"


    "Is that true¡­?"


    "Yes¡­ I do have a way to find her!"


    "Great! Help me find her and I will allow you three to keep all the yin flowers here!" Already knowing that the demonic cultivator from the ck Rose Sect called Beetle had a way to find Zhu Lian, Xuan Hao still decided to act surprised as he said this. Instantly causing the two demonic cultivators from the Frost Devil Sect to encourage their friend to help.


    Whoosh~


    Hoping that Xuan Hao would keep his promise after finding the person he was looking for, Beetle quickly used his technique to find the location of the bug he had ced on Zhu Lian.


    "Hm?" However, he quickly realized something was wrong, as he soon realized that the bug in question was no longer alive. All he could get was the location just before its death!


    "The location of the bug is not too far from here-" Not daring to share this news with Xuan Hao for fear that he might be killed off by the other party, Beetle decided to give Xuan Hao the location just before the death of the tracking bug.


    Whoosh~


    Not doubting the authenticity of what Beetle said, Xuan Hao quickly left in the direction that he had given him.


    The main reason why he did not doubt the authenticity of what Beetle had told him, was because the location he had given him was extremely close to his current location.


    As a demonic cultivator, Beetle should at the very least understand what would happen if he gave him wrong information¡­

 Chapter 548: Centipedes~

    Chapter 548: Centipedes~


    "Haha, I never expected brother Beetle to know someone like that!" As Xuan Hao left, one of the two demonic cultivators walked over to the demonic cultivator from the ck Rose Sect known as beetle while he said this with a smile on his face. Clearly happy that they would still be able to get their hands on the yin flowers.


    "Let''s just harvest the flowers and get out of here as quickly as possible¡­ It would be best for us to leave as soon as possible!" Not feeling as happy as hispanions, Beetle grabbed arge number of yin flowers as he said this with a solemn expression on his face. After all, he understood very well how he would end up in case Xuan Hao found out he had lied to him¡­


    For now, Beetle hoped sincerely that the old woman was still staying around the location that he had given to Xuan Hao. At the very least he would be able to buy enough time to gather the yin flowers and escape back to his sect this way!


    "I see¡­ Guess that guy is not that good friends with your sect master and might change his mindter on after finding that old woman¡­" Understanding what theirpanion meant to some degree, the other two demonic cultivators quickly picked up their speed and began harvesting the yin flowers as quickly as possible.


    As for leaving the yin flowers behind and escaping? There was no way they would give up a chance of possibly being able to reach the Third Demonic Transformation! Especially when they had just witnessed just how strong someone at that realm was!


    Like this, the three demonic cultivators worked together in harmony to harvest all of the yin flowers. Not fighting with each other over who got what, as they understood doing something like that might cost them precious time.


    When Xuan Hao returned in the future and possibly changed his mind about allowing them to take the yin flowers, they would regret having wasted even a single second arguing with each other over who would get what.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the three demonic cultivators were busy harvesting the yin flowers, Xuan Hao arrived at the location that Beetle had pointed him in.


    Whoosh~


    Searching for any sign of Zhu Lian with his divine sense in his surroundings, Xuan Hao soon reached the edge of what could only be described as a bottomless abyss leading even deeper.


    "Don''t tell me she fell down there¡­" Muttering this to himself as he felt just how pure and dense the yin qi was inside the abyss.


    Just from a nce, Xuan Hao understood that even if Zhu Lian was at full strength, she would not be able to survive for long inside the abyss in front of him. Even he himself might have to put in extra effort to make sure not to freeze to death inside the abyss if he went too deep¡­


    I should look around the edge first and make sure if she really did enter the abyss or not.


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao decided to not enter the abyss for now, as he began searching close to the edge of the abyss.


    No matter what, Zhu Lian should not enter the abyss unless she had no other escape path. Given that the three demonic cultivators were no longer chasing after her, she should be fine for now-


    Rumble~


    "Hm? Centipede demon beasts¡­?"


    Suddenly seeing a massive number of centipede demon beasts appear in the distance as they made their way towards the abyss filled with pure yin qi, Xuan Hao could not help feeling surprised upon realizing that the centipede demon beast all had strength ranging between the middle andter stages of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    In front of the group of massive centipedes, there was even one who was over a hundred meters long and had managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm!


    [Sect Quest: Save Zhu Lian]


    [Description: Save the Eighth Nascent Soul Realm Expert of the Flying Sword Sect before she dies.]


    [Time Limit: 1.8 hours]


    Feeling a bit afraid that the worst could have happened to Zhu Lian, Xuan Hao only managed to breath out a sigh of relief after seeing that nothing had changed to the quest. At least she should still be alive for now.


    Looking closer at the group of massive centipedes approaching the abyss, there seemed to be someone running in front of them-


    "Wait¡­ Isn''t that Zhu Lian!?"


    Realizing just who the person running away from the group of massive centipedes was, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just how she would be able to get out of her current situation alive. After all, ording to the quest, she would still be able to survive for around two more hours!


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao felt a bit curious about just how she would escape from the massive centipedes as he decided to hide with his domain and follow close by.


    Making sure to keep far enough away from the Domain Lord Realm centipede so as to not be found. After all, hiding close to a demon beast that had reached the Domain Lord Realm was impossible with his current strength!


    ¡­


    Only a short time before Xuan Hao had showed up at the edge of the abyss, Zhu Lian, who had just found a ce to recover her strength-


    Bang!


    Was interrupted as a giant centipede dozens of meters long suddenly broke through the ground a few meters away from the ce that she was sitting.


    Wha-


    Swish~


    Before she even had time to react, a massive eagle demon beast with a wingspan big enough to cover a small estate dived down from above as it grabbed hold of the massive centipede with its ws before carrying it off into the distance.


    Bang-bang-bang!


    What in the world is this ce!?


    Following the first massive centipede that got taken away by the massive eagle like demon beast, Zhu Lian could only freeze up in fear as she watched more than a dozen simr sized centipede break through the hard rocks beneath her before they began making their way in the direction of the abyss located not too far away from her current location


    Rumble~!


    Suddenly feeling the ground beneath her begin shaking violently, Zhu Lian quickly moved out of the way as another massive centipede emerged from the ground. This time around, directly beneath the ce she had been sitting just a second ago!


    Roar!


    Spotting her the moment it emerged from the ground the centipede roared loudly. Instantly alerting the other massive centipedes in the distance as they all turned their attention towards her.


    RUUMBLE!


    However, before any of them could charge towards her, the ground beneath began shaking even more violently than before.


    Whoosh!


    Using this opportunity while the centipedes were all distracted by the loud rumbling noiseing from the ground, Zhu Lian rushed past the centipede still not fully out of the ground in front of her before making her way in the opposite direction of the centipedes. Wanting to get as far away as possible from them before they decided to eat her.


    BANG!


    ROOOAR!


    However, she did not manage to get far before a loud sound of rocks breaking apart followed by a terrifying roar echoed out behind her.


    Turning around for a short moment, Zhu Lian could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine as she witnessed a massive centipede more than a hundred meters long crawl out from the ground. Not only that, but she also discovered that the centipede focused its attention on her as soon as it appeared.


    Just the stare from the massive centipede alone was more than enough to cause her to freeze up in fear as she felt a deep sense of hopelessness well up when confronted with the massive centipede demon beast that was staring directly at her with an all too clear killing intent.


    Roar!


    Rooooar!


    Roar! Roar!


    Seemingly in response to what the over a hundred-meter-long centipede did, the other massive centipedes all around it began roaring angrily towards her before all of them suddenly charged towards her filled with killing intent.


    "I¡­ I can''t move?"


    Feeling her body not responding properly to her as she felt the stare of the hundred-meter-long centipede, Zhu Lian could not help panicking as she saw the massive centipedes rapidly approaching her.


    No! I have to escape! I just managed to reach the Nascent Soul Realm not too long ago, there is no way I will die like this!


    Thinking about this as she desperately tried to move her body, Zhu Lian barely managed to turn her head around. Looking away from the hundred-meter-long centipede and in turn instantly causing her to regain control over her body again and also allowing her to use her movement technique with the qi she had managed to recover to run away just before the massive centipedes had time to catch up to her!

 Chapter 549: Rescue...?

    Chapter 549: Rescue...?


    Continuing to run with all her remaining strength, Zhu Lian could not help cursing to herself when she watched the abyss she had left after finding out about the bug that had been ced on her and used to track her location appear in front of her.


    Turning to the side a moving towards the location of the demonic cultivators to use them as a distraction like she had done just a few minutes earlier was not an option, as she doubted that she would be able to reach them before the centipedes caught up to her. Not to mention the massive hundred-meter-long centipede that was the leader of the group of centipedes!


    In front of such a powerful demon beast, even the three demonic cultivators she had struggled trying to escape from were nothing more than a bunch of sheep waiting to be ughtered!


    With that in mind, Zhu Lian understood that she had no way out of her current situation. Even if she jumped into the abyss, she very well understood that she would just be dying the inevitable, as even if the centipedes did not kill her, the pure yin qi would.


    After all, with her current strength, there was no way for her to resist the yin qi inside the abyss for more than half an hour. Maybe a little more than an hour if she was lucky and found a ce to hide where the yin qi was a bit less pure.


    However, there was no way she would just give up and allow the centipedes to catch up to her!


    Whoosh!


    For this reason, Zhu Lian did not hesitate in the slightest when she reached the abyss. Directly jumping into it just in time to dodge one of the massive centipedes that hadunched itself towards her with its mouth wide open.


    Swish~


    Bang!


    The centipede flew directly over her before crashing into the rocky walls of the abyss on the other side. However, this was not the end of the flying centipede-


    Ptsh!


    As it was unfortunate enough to fall down into dozens ofrge spiky rocks covered in some sort of liquid.


    Roar-


    Barely letting out a single roar, the centipede soon stopped moving.


    However, the centipede that had just died was not on Zhu Lian''s mind as she continued falling downwards towards the bottom of the abyss. Trying her absolute best to stop the increasingly strong yin qi from freezing up her body and soul.


    Thump!


    "Ah-!"


    Landing on the bottom of the abyss after falling for at least two minutes straight, Zhu Lian could not help letting out a scream of pain, as she felt like all the bones inside her body had been broken from the fall. The fact that her physical body had even manged to survive was a miracle!


    After all, if she had to fly around with her nascent soul in her current environment, it was easy to imagine how things would y up, as the surrounding yin qi would instantly invade her nascent soul before freezing it up and killing it. Not something she wanted to happen¡­


    Well¡­ Nobody would really want their soul to freeze up and die¡­


    Rumble~


    "They are still chasing me!?" Suddenly hearing a loud rumbling sound from above, Zhu Lian could not help narrowing her eyes in shock upon realising that the massive centipedes were still following after her.


    Looking around herself, Zhu Lian quickly realized that there was no path of escape. The abyss was in the end just a veryrge hole in ground, with no way out outside of climbing back out again, something she had no way to do with her current strength and that was not to mention the massive centipedes currently heading down towards her from above. Blocking any chance, she would have of escaping from the abyss!


    ¡­


    [Time Limit: 1.8 hours]


    Looking at the time left, Xuan Hao remained hidden just beside Zhu Lian with his domain before ncing up at the massive centipedes that would reach her in less than a minute.


    How on earth is she going to survive this¡­?


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao truly could not see how Zhu Lian would be able to escape alive from her current situation.


    The abyss itself was also quite disappointing, as it was literally just a hole in the ground. No secret yin rted treasure or anything was hidden at the bottom of it.


    Seeing Zhu Lian growing increasingly desperate as she looked for a way out of her current situation just a few meters away from him, Xuan Hao could not help frowning upon noticing that the yin qi was slowly starting to infiltrate her body and in turn her nascent soul.


    If things continued for any longer, her soul would most likely be permanently damaged by the yin qi!


    Even if he was curious about how she would be able to get out of her current situation, there was no way he would risk Zhu Lian permanently damaging her soul due to this.


    "Zhu Lian¡­." For this reason, he decided to call out to Zhu Lian before revealing himself.


    "E-elder Xuan?!"


    To say Zhu Lian was surprised upon seeing him would be an understatement, as she froze on the spot. Not knowing how Xuan Hao had suddenly appeared beside her when she was about to die.


    "Yes, it is me, I came looking for you since you didn''t show up and seemed to be in some sort of trouble¡­ From the looks of it, I arrived just in time!" Not sharing the fact that he had been secretly following her from the time she jumped into the abyss, Xuan Hao just said this as he walked over to Zhu Lian before using his domain to keep the surrounding yin qi at bay. Preventing it from further damaging her already half dead physical body.


    "¡­" Looking at just how badly damaged her physical body was, Xuan Hao could not help feeling bad about not saving her the moment he saw her.


    Although the physical body would be rtively easy to fix with a few rare spiritual herbs and potions, it was still something that would take time to do.


    At the very least I have to help her out when ites to reconstructing her body¡­


    Handing over a few spirit stones for her to at least recover enough to be able to move properly, Xuan Hao nced towards the massive centipedes that had already made their way down into the abyss.


    "Just recover your strength enough to move for now, I will deal with these centipedes."


    Seeing Zhu Lian mindlessly nod her head as she epted the spirit stones handed over to her, Xuan Hao focused his attention on to the massive centipedes. Keeping most of his attention on the hundred-meter-long centipede among them.


    Normally, dealing with the hundred-meter-long centipede would not be too difficult for him given his current strength¡­ But things were different in his current situation, as he was currently inside a rather confined space filled with yin qi and also had to make sure to keep Zhu Lian safe at the same time.


    In such a situation, it would be better to avoid fighting with the group of massive centipedes and from the fact that the massive centipedes had not attacked yet, it looked like their leader had also decided that it would be best for them to not fight.


    Rooooar!


    Rumble~


    Staring at each other for close to a minute like this without moving, the hundred-meter-long centipede finally let out a loud roar as it burrowed into the ground together with the other centipedes. Disappearing from sight.


    "Hah¡­" Letting out a breath that he didn''t know he had been holding, Xuan Hao could not help looking back at Zhu Lian absorbing the spirit stones he had handed over to her without paying any attention to what was happening around her.


    Whoosh~


    Using his domain, Xuan Hao caused Zhu Lian to levitate off the ground before he took her and moved both of them out of the abyss before anything happened. After all, even if he could use his domain to resist the surrounding yin qi, it was still rather draining for him to protect both himself and Zhu Lian at the bottom of the abyss.


    The yin qi at the bottom of the abyss was simply way too strong, to the point that a Nascent Soul Realm Expert like Zhu Lian would not be able to survive for more than a minute or two without the yin qi permanently damaging their nascent soul!


    Looking back down towards the bottom of the abyss after he reached the top, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just how Zhu Lian would survive for so long at the bottom of the abyss without his help¡­


    [Time Limit: 1.7 hours]


    Why has the time limit not changed yet!? Is it perhaps because we are still inside the crack¡­?


    Suddenly realizing that the quest had not beenpleted even after he had rescued Zhu Lian and helped her recover her strength, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that something bad was about to happen¡­


    Whoosh~


    As if to answer his worries, the massive natural formation that covered the crack suddenly began moving, as all the yin qi inside of it began rapidly gathering towards the abyss he and Zhu Lian had just left.

 Chapter 550: Seals Inside the Abyss

    Chapter 550: Seals Inside the Abyss


    Along with the yin qi inside the crack gathering together inside the abyss just behind them, Xuan Hao slowly felt the restrictions on his divine sense lessen with each passing second.


    If the yin qi in the air continued decreasing, he would soon be able to fully utilize his divine sense and strength inside the crack without any restrictions.


    Crack~


    Observing as the yin qi inside the abyss liquified at the bottom of the abyss, Xuan Hao could not stop a shiver from running down his spine as he witnessed bottom of the abyss crack apart under the pressure of the liquified yin qi slowly increasing on top of it.


    For it to start breaking the ground beneath it that had supported the massive hundred-meter-long centipede and several dozens of massive centipedes, it was easy to imagine just how heavy the liquified yin qi was!


    BANG!


    As the liquefied yin qi on the bottom of the abyss reached a height of a single centimetre, the ground beneath it cracked apart before revealing that the abyss was even deeper!


    During the split moment before the ground beneath the liquefied yin qi cracked apart, Xuan Hao barely managed to spot arge symbol briefly shinning as it tried to prevent the yin qi from breaking apart the ground to no avail.


    At the back of his mind, Xuan Hao had a feeling that he had seen a simr symbol somewhere before. However, he could not seem to remember where...


    "We should get out of here¡­" Muttering this to himself as he turned his attention towards Zhu Lian who had just opened her eyes after absorbing one of the spirit stones he had handed over to her, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the reason why the quest had not beenpleted yet had something to do with the yin qi inside the crack being gathered together inside the abyss by the massive formation they were currently inside of.


    For some reason, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the abyss was a seal of some sort after briefly witnessing the symbol that briefly tried stopping the liquified yin qi above it!


    If that was really the case, it was likely that whatever was sealed inside the abyss would be the cause of Zhu Lian''s death!


    With this in mind, it should at the very least still take over an hour for the seal to break apart.


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help looking at the timer slowly ticking down below the sect quest for saving Zhu Lian.


    "Hm?"


    [Time Limit: 1.2 hours]


    Frowning as he saw that the time limit had suddenly decreased by arge margin after what was most likely a seal had been broken through by the liquified yin qi, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the timer of the quest did not consider for the liquefied yin qi helping quicken the speed of the seals in the abyss breaking.


    Did this perhaps mean that the yin qi gathering together inside the abyss and increasing the speed at which the seal broke apart had something to do with him?


    Shaking his head at this thought, Xuan Hao only managed to understand that he should probably leave the mysterious crack with Zhu Lian as quickly as possible!


    After all, while he was curious about what had been sealed inside the abyss, he was not dumb enough to risk both his and Zhu Lian''s life!


    "Wha-!?"


    Hearing the surprised voice of Zhu Lian from behind him as she let out a small yelp in surprise after witnessing the terrifying amount of yin qi flowing towards the abyss from all directions the moment, she opened her eyes. Followed by her quickly moving away from the edge of the abyss, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit wryly upon realizing the fact that he had ced her right next to the edge of the abyss¡­


    "Elder Xuan¡­ W-what is happening?" Barely saying this as she kept her attention fully focused on the abyss, Zhu Lian could not look away from the seemingly endless streams of yin qi flowing into the abyss.


    "This¡­ I think that-"


    Rumble~


    BANG!


    Just about to answer Zhu Lian''s question, Xuan Hao was taken aback as an even louder sound could be heard from the abyss. Followed by the yin qi flowing towards the abyss gathering at an even faster speed than before.


    Did another seal get broken through by the liquified yin qi¡­?


    Not paying too much attention answering Zhu Lian''s question after realizing what had just happened, Xuan Hao quickly turned his attention towards the timer for Zhu Lian''s death.


    [Time Limit: 48 minutes]


    Indeed, it had decreased once again, this time around, there was less than one hour left before the seal would break under normal circumstances. However, given the current speed at which the seals inside the abyss were breaking apart, Xuan Hao doubted that they would be able tost for more than five minutes!


    "Let''s get out of here for now!" Not waiting for Zhu Lian to answer, Xuan Hao grabbed hold of the old woman before using his movement technique to rapidly move out of the crack.


    "Wah-!?"


    Not knowing what was happing as she suddenly found herself flying through the air, Zhu Lian had no idea what to do as she could only allow Xuan Hao to carry her while making sure to observe her surroundings.


    Along the way, they even managed to find the three demonic cultivators all panicking as they were trying their best to climb out of the crack with several blue flowers stuffed into every part of their clothes.


    From the looks of it, the three demonic cultivators did not have a single interspatial ring¡­ Not too surprising given the fact that demonic cultivators would not be as proficient at spatial maniption as normal cultivators.


    Normally, a demonic cultivator who had reached the realm equivalent to a Domain Lord was even worse than a normal Peak Nascent Soul Realm cultivator when it came to spatial maniption.


    Getting their hands on an interspatial ring was slightly harder for demonic cultivators, but they could always rob them from some normal cultivators. To be honest, Xuan Hao was a bit surprised that none of the three demonic cultivators had an interspatial ring. After all, two of them were from the Frost Devil Sect that was likely to have several demonic cultivators who reached a realm equivalent to the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Whoosh~


    Seeing that they were just about to leave the crack and would be able to make it out in time before the seal broke, Xuan Hao did not bother to help them as he continued out of the crack while carrying Zhu Lian.


    At this point in time, the yin qi in the air had almostpletely disappeared. Making flying way easier and less energy consumingpared to do doing so in an environment filled to the brim with yin qi that tried its best to invade and freeze up the body and soul.


    ¡­


    Thump!


    Not stopping before getting at least a few miles away from the mysterious crack, Xuan Haonded on top of a small icy hill together with Zhu Lian who had been fully immersed in the feeling of flying through the air.


    "Cultivate here for now and recover your strength as much as you can, I will help repairing your body after returning to the sect." Saying this before Zhu Lian even had the chance to say anything, Xuan Hao handed over a few more spirit stones before turning his attention towards the sect quest involving Zhu Lian.


    [Sect Quest: Save Zhu Lian plete)]


    [Description: Save the Eighth Nascent Soul Realm Expert of the Flying Sword Sect before she dies.]


    [Reward: Zhu Lian lives, location of undiscovered spirit stone mine inside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect.]


    After he left the mysterious crack in the ground, the sect quest had immediately been considered to have finished and she was no longer in any danger. For this reason, Xuan Hao did not worry about leaving Zhu Lian alone as he moved closer to the mysterious crack after making sure she was properly recovering her strength.


    For now, he wanted to check out what was going to happen when the seal was broken. After all, ording to the system, he should not be in any danger as long as he did not enter the crack itself.


    Rumble~


    Not long after he had arrived a short distance away from the crack, a loud rumbling sound could be heard across the entire frozen tundra as the massive crack in the ground suddenly began closing.


    "¡­"


    Before he even had any time toprehend how such a massive crack could close, it had already finished closing up. Leaving behind no traces of it ever existing in the first ce.


    Whoosh!


    Scanning the area where the crack had been just a few seconds ago, Xuan Hao could not help frowning upon realising that even after his divine sense spread far underground there was no traces of what he had seen inside the crack.


    "Hm¡­ At least those three managed to escape¡­" Shaking his head in disappointment after not finding anything, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the three exhausted demonic cultivators exhaustedly gasping for air in the middle of the empty frozen tundra.


    Now that he had managed to save Zhu Lian, the demonic cultivators only had one use left¡­ Showing him the way to the Frost Devil Sect!


    However, it would have to wait, as he first had to make sure Zhu Lian got back safely.


    Whoosh~


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao made his way back to icy hill where he had left Zhu Lian to recover her strength. In the first ce, it would take quite some time for those three to recover and begin moving again. Not to mention they would likely also think that he had disappeared along with the crack, thus giving him some more time to make sure he could at least send Zhu Lian back out of the Frozen Wastnd.

 Chapter 551: Rabbit Thief!

    Chapter 551: Rabbit Thief!


    Reaching the icy hill where he had left Zhu Lian to recover her strength just a few minutes earlier, Xuan Hao found a ce not too far away from her.


    "I should have Feng Chen send someone over to help her get back to the sect¡­" Realizing that he would not be able to follow the three demonic cultivators if he also had to guide Zhu Lian safely back to the sect, Xuan Hao took out hismunication talisman before contacting Feng Chen. Having him send over someone to help get Zhu Lian back to the sect safely.


    Even if she should be fine as long as she didn''t encounter anyone in the Nascent Soul Realm with bad intentions, Xuan Hao did not want to take the risk!


    "Hm¡­ It should still take a few days before anyone arrives at the borders to the Frozen Wastnd¡­" Muttering this to himself as he said this, Xuan Hao shook his head and threw these thoughts to the back of his mind before sitting down to cultivate while waiting for Zhu Lian to finish absorbing the spirit stones, he had handed over to her.


    Cultivating on the frozen tundra was something he had already wanted to try the moment he realized just how much easier it was to improve his ice domain inside the Frozen Wastnd. Doing it while waiting for Zhu Lian was something Xuan Hao was more than happy to do.


    As for the location of the spirit mine he had received afterpleting the quest, Xuan Hao doubted that he would be able to do anything by himself, as he did not really have any experience when it came to setting up any sort of mine. Be it a spirit mine or one for spiritual metals¡­


    For this reason, he nned to give the location to Elder Song after returning to the Flying Sword Sect. After all, he would be able to put the information to use and set up a proper mining operation and establish a new spirit stone mine.


    Thinking about it, it was a good idea to leave something like that to Elder Song¡­ Hopefully, he would not end up with too much work on his hand and in turn neglect his granddaughter. In the worst-case scenario, he could always look after Song Jia for Elder Song.


    Turning his attention back onto cultivating, Xuan Hao felt himself merge together with the surrounding environment as he felt the cold wind blow past him while a few young snow-white rabbits curiously peeked their heads out of the snow to inspect the two people that had suddenly appeared on the icy hill where their burrow was located.


    Following this, Xuan Hao felt his senses spread out in all directions as he fully immersed himself in the environment of the Frozen Wastnds. Along with this, Xuan Hao also felt hisprehension of the Dao of Ice increasing, which in turn caused the strength of his ice domain to increase.


    Even if the increase in strength was miniscule and almost impossible to detect over such a short period of time, Xuan Hao still managed to feel it, as he understood just how great it was for him to cultivate in such an environment filled with ice and snow.


    Maybe the reason why his sword domain grew stronger faster than his ice domain, was because he spent most of his time cultivating inside a sword sect where most of the people walked the path of the sword?


    Shaking his head as he felt these distracting thoughts enter his mind, Xuan Hao emptied his mind before fully immersing himself inprehending the Dao of Ice that was seemingly ever present across the Frozen Wastnd.


    ¡­


    Time slowly passed as Zhu Lian finished absorbing the spirit stones Xuan Hao had handed over to her.


    "Ouch!"


    Getting up from the frozen ground beneath her, Zhu Lian could not help letting out a small yelp of pain as she felt pain spread through her entire body. After having spent thest few hours absorbing the spirit stones that Xuan Hao had given to her, she hadpletely forgotten about the current state of her body!


    For this reason, the pain had caught her by surprise, causing the small yelp of pain earlier to escape from her lips as she stood up.


    Even though her physical body was still in a bad state at the moment, Zhu Lian soon concluded that she could still move around by herself without any trouble through the support of her cultivation base. Fighting someone at the Core Formation Realm should also be possible, as for someone at the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ In her current state, it would be best not to fight someone at the Nascent Soul Realm!


    If she really was unfortunate enough to encounter someone in the Nascent Soul Realm who had bad intentions-


    "Ah!" Suddenly remembering that she was not alone, Zhu Lian looked around herself before finally finding Xuan Hao silently meditating a few meters away from her.


    Seeing him, Zhu Lian did not know what to feel as she remembered what she had gone through over the past few days. From getting hunted down by demonic cultivators to getting trapped inside an ancient formation and the mysterious crack that suddenly appeared beneath her when she was trapped inside the ancient formation¡­ Too much had happened over the past few days and Zhu Lian felt happy knowing that it should be over.


    Even the pain constantly spreading through her body didn''t hurt so much after this realization!


    "You finished absorbing all the spirit stones?" Before she had time to think about anything else, Xuan Hao suddenly opened his eyes as he asked this.


    "Yes!" Nodding her head up and down rapidly like a young child in acknowledgement of his question, Zhu Lian could not help feeling a bit embarrassed upon realizing how immature she was acting.


    Feeling the embarrassment getting even worse upon noticing Xuan Hao''s weird look after seeing her childish act, Zhu Lian could not help but wanting to find a hole to jump into a burry herself out of sight.


    Swish~


    Luckily, this did notst for long, as a snow-white rabbit suddenly dashed towards them before it ate the spirit stone, she had just finished absorbing. After closer inspection, there was still a tiny amount of spirit energy left in the spirit stone before the snow-white rabbit had swallowed it.


    Zhu Lian and Xuan Hao were both baffled upon seeing this scene. Wondering where the snow-white rabbit had grown so courageous. Even daring to charge in and snatch away the almost empty spirit stone.


    Even if the amount of qi it had absorbed was miniscule, it should still be enough to allow the snow-white rabbit to transform from an ordinary mortal animal into a demon beast!


    Swish!


    After having consumed the almost empty spirit stone, the snow-white rabbit quickly disappeared back into its burrow only a few meters away from their current location.


    Neither Zhu Lian or Xuan Hao knew what to say at the disy of both courage and speed of the little rabbit. At least it helped Zhu Lian, as she no longer felt the embarrassment, she had felt just a moment ago.


    "Let''s get going, I will be taking you to a small city located close to the edge of the Frozen Wastnd. One of the other Core Elders wille and pick you up after a few days."


    Feeling a bit disappointed when she heard that Xuan Hao would not be the one to take her to the Flying Sword Sect, Zhu Lian recalled the three demonic cultivators who had also been inside the mysterious crack.


    Could it be that those three were still following her even after the bug used to track her had been killed by her?


    Then again, those three should not be any threat to someone like Elder Xuan¡­


    Thinking this to herself, Zhu Lian decided not to pry into why Xuan Hao was leaving her in the hands of one of the other core elders instead of just escorting her to the Flying Sword Sect by himself.


    Whoosh~


    Seeing that Zhu Lian understood that he had something to do and didn''tin over the fact that he was essentially going to leave her alone to fend for herself for a few days in the small city he and Feng Chen had decided to be the safest option for her to stay alone in her current condition, Xuan Hao didn''t bother wasting any more time, as he took to the sky before flying in the direction of the small city in question. Wanting to get it done as quickly as possible so he could return back to the location of the three demonic cultivators and find the location of the Frost Devil Sect!


    ¡­


    Thump!


    "The person who wille looking for you is called Zu Fei; she looks like this-"


    Whoosh~


    Conjuring forth a small image with his qi of Zu Fei, Xuan Hao didn''t exin any further as he jumped back into the air before rushing back towards the Frozen Wastnd after making sure Zhu Lian understood what he said and had memorized the image of Zu Fei he had conjured.


    Swish!


    "¡­"


    Seeing Xuan Hao quickly disappearing into the distance, Zhu Lian let out a soft sigh before finding a secluded location close to the entrance of the small city to quietly meditate. Waiting for Zu Fei to show up and at the same time making sure that her body''s situation didn''t end up worsening any further during the next few days she would have to wait.

 Chapter 552: The Higher Level of the Drifting Cloud Steps

    Chapter 552: The Higher Level of the Drifting Cloud Steps


    Making his way back towards the location inside the Frozen Wastnds where the three demonic cultivators were recovering after having left the mysterious crack, Xuan Hao could not help feeling worried that they might have already left the area and disappeared into the endless frozen tundra that spread out all around him.


    Even with his current cultivation realm, searching through the entire Frozen Wastnd would be an impossible task, as the Frozen Wastnd itself was enormous.


    Reading about the Frozen Wastnd in the book he had been given by Yi Min, Xuan Hao realized just how scary the Frozen Wastnd was. Not only did it cover an area farrger than the Sky Empire, but it was also an area that was famous for the sheer number of demonic cultivators hiding inside of it.


    As long as he went deep enough into the Frozen Wastnd, he was guaranteed to idently stumble upon a demonic cultivator who had reached the True Demon Realm, the demonic cultivators equivalent of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    If he really encountered a demonic cultivator at the True Demon Realm, it would be toote for regrets¡­


    Not to mention, the presence of demonic cultivators who had reached the True Demon Realm was more than enough to cause any Soul Ascension Realm cultivator to think twice about entering the deeper parts Frozen Wastnd!


    The only good thing about the Frost Devil Sect, was the fact that they should be hidden somewhere close to the border between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Frozen Wastnd. Not anywhere deeper inside the Frozen Wastnd.


    After all, Yi Min would not ask him to do something impossible like finding a demonic sect located at the core of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Even if he managed to find the demonic sect, Yi Min would likely not be too eager to attack a demonic sect in such an area, as she might end up attracting the attention of a demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm¡­


    "Hah¡­ How lucky, it looks like they are still here! From of the looks of it, it seems like they are still absorbing yin qi from the yin flowers that they managed to bring out from the mysterious crack before it disappeared¡­" Smiling happily to himself as he arrived back at the location of the three demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao felt that he was lucky that the demonic cultivators didn''t move immediately after recovering from the injuries they had received during their time inside the mysterious crack.


    However, this was also not really surprising. After all, they were still inside the Frozen Wastnd and could encounter another group of demonic cultivators at any point in time if they were unlucky enough¡­ At that point in time, a fight would surely erupt of the yin flowers they were carrying around with them!


    Not having an interspatial ring was truly an inconvenient thing¡­


    Having fully understood why they had not moved yet, Xuan Hao decided to wait until they finished absorbing the yin flowers.


    No matter what, they were only absorbing the yin qi inside the yin flowers and did not refine it and make it their own yet. Doing so would not only require a long time to digest all the yin they had absorbed, but also a safe environment where they could do this without getting attacked.


    The safe location for the two members of the Frost Devil Sect would surely be their sect!


    As long as he followed them, he would easily be able to find the location of their sect and give it to Yi Min and fulfil her request. Paying her back for the information she had given him regarding the location of a Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb¡­ Of course, he would only give her the location of the Frost Devil Sect after he had managed to confirm that the information, she had given him was urate!


    Havinge up with a n, Xuan Hao found a small mountain not too far away from the demonic cultivators, as he settled down and closed his eyes to cultivate while waiting for the demonic cultivators to finish absorbing all of the yin flowers.


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ When are you guys done? Even if we were lucky enough to escape from the crack before it closed and disappeared, we can''t spend too much time sitting around. Don''t forget those people from the Fire Ghost Sect have been seen roaming around this areately!" Having finished absorbing his part of the yin flowers, one of the three demonic cultivators was quick toin as he said this.


    "You can always hand a few of them over to-"


    "Don''t worry too much about the people from the Fire Ghost Sect, the ones that were found by our seniors did not even reach the First Demonic Transformation! Even if some of those Fire Ghost disciples show up, we three are more than enough to deal with them!" Knowing that hispanion just wanted to get his hands on his yin flowers, the other disciple from the Frost Devil Sect frowned visibly as he said this before absorbing thest few yin flowers he had on him.


    The one called Beetle from the ck Rose Sect also soon finished absorbing his yin flowers, as all of them had finished absorbing all the yin qi into their body.


    "Now that all of us are more or less ready, we can head back¡­" Seeing that the other two had finished absorbing their yin flowers, the one from the Frost Devil Sect who had finished absorbing his yin flowers first could only say this in a slightly regretful tone after realizing he would not be able to get any more yin flowers.


    "Indeed, we have to get back quickly or the yin qi we just absorbed will end up going to waste!" Not caring too much about the regretful expression on hispanion''s face. The other person from the Frost Devil Sect nodded his head in agreement before getting ready to leave.


    Beetle from the ck Rose Sect was the same, as he also got ready to leave.


    Absorbing the yin flowers at the spot was fine in the short term, but in the long term, it would cause the yin qi they had absorbed to slowly destroy their body if they did not manage to refine it in time.


    In the worst-case scenario, they could always expel the yin qi from their body¡­ But this was not something any of them wanted to do. Mainly due to the fact that the yin qi would be rendered useless after they expelled it from their body!


    Whoosh~


    Not spending too much time talking to each other after deciding to get moving, the group of three soon used their own movement techniques to move across the frozen tundra.


    "Hm?"


    At the same time the group of three demonic cultivators began moving, Xuan Hao sitting with eyes closed meditating on top of a small snow-covered mountain opened his eyes as he gazed in the direction of the three demonic cultivators.


    "Looks like they are finally moving¡­ For a moment, I thought they would try to breakthrough before moving on!" Muttering this to himself as he gazed up at the sky that had already gone dark during the past few hours of waiting for the demonic cultivators to start moving, Xuan Hao could not helpmenting over just how long it had taken for them to absorb the yin qi inside the yin flowers¡­


    Whoosh!


    Standing up from the ground he had been sitting motionless cultivating for the past few hours, Xuan Hao directly used the Drifting Cloud Steps as he soon arrived in the air a few hundred meters above the group of demonic cultivators.


    After having used the Drifting Cloud Steps for some time to move around, Xuan Hao had slowly gotten more used to it. Not only did it allow him to fly without the use of his domain, but it was also way more energy efficient to move with it. Not to mention faster.


    ncing down on the three demonic cultivators below him moving rapidly through the frozen tundra, Xuan Hao had a feeling that it would still be some time before they reached the Frost Devil Sect.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao decided to secretly practice the Drifting Cloud Steps while remaining hidden from the three demonic cultivators below him.


    Stepping on the air while using the Drifting Cloud Steps, Xuan Hao decided to try out a higher level of the movement technique that required spatial maniption-


    Swish!


    Not leaving any time for him toprehend what was happening, the world around him suddenly twisted before a new yet familiar scenery appeared in front of him.


    Looking around himself through his divine sense, Xuan Hao quickly realized that he was over a hundred meters away from his previous location. The three demonic cultivators were no longer directly below him, as they were instead a few hundred meters to his right.


    "So, this is the Drifting Cloud Steps¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he felt a wave of surprise wash over him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling amazed.


    Even if he had no understanding how he had done it, he still understood that he had just managed to essentially teleport himself a few hundred meters away from his original location with a single step!


    Swish!


    Trying it again, Xuan Hao soon realized that he had no way to control where he appeared. In the end, he just ended up randomly appearing a hundred meters away from his original position after using the higher level of the Drifting Cloud Steps together that required spatial maniption¡­


    Looks like I will have to practice the Drifting Cloud Steps more when I get back to the sect¡­


    From the looks of it, it was still too early for him to use the higher level of the Drifting Cloud Steps. Thinking about it, Xuan Hao could already imagine how he would idently end up teleporting directly into his opponents attack during a fight. Not something he wanted to experience first-hand¡­

 Chapter 553: Frost Devil Sect

    Chapter 553: Frost Devil Sect


    Time passed by slowly, as Xuan Hao continued to practice the Drifting Cloud Steps while following the three demonic cultivators through the frozen tundra of the Frozen Wastnds.


    The frozen tundra was seemingly never ending, as the only sign of life during the journey was the snow-white rabbits that seemed to be the only animals living inside the frozen tundra. No demon beast or demonic cultivators showed up along the way. Making Xuan Hao begin to doubt that they were really heading towards the location of a major demonic sect.


    Even if there were no living creatures around outside of the snow-white rabbits, there should at the very least be a few demonic cultivators present¡­ Right?


    Feeling more doubtful about where they were heading as the three demonic cultivators suddenly slowed down and began cautiously advancing forward, Xuan Hao stopped practicing the Drifting Cloud Steps and instead focused his full attention on keeping an eye on the three demonic cultivators and their surroundings.


    Whoosh~


    However, even after scanning his surroundings with his divine sense, he could not find anything and was left wondering why the demonic cultivators had suddenly be so cautious all of a sudden.


    Looking closely, the three were clearly fearful of something, as they already had their weapons ready while moving through the empty frozen tundra.


    "Hm?"


    Searching for any abnormalities, Xuan Hao soon found out that his divine sense had been blocked by some kind of barrier located only a few kilometres away from his current location. Not only that, but he could also sense several hundred demonic cultivators located around the barrier in question!


    Knowing that it might be the Frost Devil Sect that he had been searching for, Xuan Hao did not dare to forceful try and pry inside the barrier with his divine sense. Instead deciding to wait and see what the three demonic cultivators would do after reaching the barrier.


    After all, he had note to fight with the Frost Devil Sect. All he wanted was the location of the sect so that he could fulfil the request Yi Min had given him in exchange for the location of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb.


    Of course, he would only give her this information after getting his hand on the spiritual herb and confirming what Yi Min had told him was indeed true!


    ¡­


    "Haa¡­ We are almost there! I feel like my body is about to burst apart at any moment!" ncing around at the lifeless tundra spreading out in all directions around him, one of the two demonic cultivators from the Frost Devil Sect could not help eximing as his body had slowly begun freezing due to the massive amount of yin qi inside of him.


    "Don''t let your guard down! We can''t be careless this close to sect¡­ Don''t forget what happened thest time we returned to the sect!" Not the slightest bit rxed knowing that they would soon be reaching their sect, thest member from the Frost Devil Sect tightened his grip around the sword in his hand.


    "¡­" Beetle from the ck Rose Sect did not say anything when hearing the conversation between the two demonic cultivators, as he just cautiously observed his surroundings. Looking for any suspicious movements in the snow.


    As a demonic cultivator, he understood the reason why the demonic cultivator from the Frost Devil Sect was so nervous upon realizing that he was getting close to his sect¡­


    Swish!


    "Hehe, If it isn''t the-"


    Bang-bang-bang!


    Just as someone appeared in front of them to block their path forward, the three simultaneouslyunched an attack towards the person in question. Directly sending him flying before he even had a chance to finish talking.


    "Let''s increase our speed, if not, our dear junior and senior brothers might gather together and block us from entering the sect!" Looking into the distance where the person who had suddenly appeared in front of them flew, one of the two demonic cultivators said this before rapidly increasing his speed.


    ""¡­""


    Knowing what he meant, the other two demonic cultivators did not wait around, as both of them used all their strength to rush forward, as they soon saw more and more demonic cultivators appearing before rushing towards them. Wanting to know if they had managed to get anything good during their journey away from the sect.


    ¡­


    "Well¡­ This is rather entertaining¡­" Muttering this to himself as he observed the entire frozen tundra suddenly get filled with all sorts of demonic cultivators chasing after the group of three, Xuan Hao could not help wondering why there were so many demonic cultivators hiding around what he assumed to be the location of the Frost Devil Sect.


    Don''t tell me¡­ Are these demonic cultivators perhaps waiting for some of their juniors to show up after having gone out to adventure and are lying in wait to rob them¡­?


    Realizing this, Xuan Hao could not help wondering why anyone would want to join a sect that allowed for something like that to happen¡­ Then again, it was a demonic sect, so they were bound to have a different way to go about things¡­


    However, no matter how hard Xuan Hao thought, he could not think of a way in which what was currently happening to the three demonic cultivators was in any way a positive thing for the development of the demonic sect.


    Perhaps if Elder Song was around, he could think of a reason as to why the demonic sect was doing what it was doing and in what way it would help the development of the demonic sect!


    Shaking his head at this thought, Xuan Hao focused his attention on to the three demonic cultivators, as they were slowly getting closer and closer to the location of the barrier that had blocked his divine sense from advancing any further.


    Bang!


    "Ah¡­ How unlucky¡­"


    Watching one of the three demonic cultivators suddenly getting knocked to the ground by a group of demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao did not feel the slightest hint of pity as he watched the group of demonic cultivators proceed to ruthlessly kill the person who should be a member of the same sect before forcibly absorbing the yin qi still inside his body.


    A demonic sect truly gave off a different feelingpared to a sect like the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Turning his attention towards thest two remaining demonic cultivators who rushed towards the barrier that was likely the entrance to the Frost Devil Sect, Xuan Hao silently approached the barrier without being noticed by any of the demonic cultivators before remaining hidden in the area just a few meters above the area of the barrier that the two remaining demonic cultivators were rushing towards.


    The reason for this, was that he wanted to see if he would be able to catch a glimpse of the Frost Devil Sect while the two passed through the barrier and entered the sect. To confirm that it was indeed the Frost Devil Sect and not a branch of the Frost Devil Sect.


    Using his divine sense waspletely out of the question, as Xuan Hao fully understood that he would very likely get spotted if the Frost Devil Sect was really hidden behind the barrier in front of him.


    "We are almost there!"


    Hearing the voice of thest remaining demonic cultivator from the Frost Devil Sect among the former group of three echo out behind him, Xuan Hao could not help frowning upon noticing a group of demonic cultivators hiding only a few hundred meters away from them in front of the barrier.


    The group of demonic cultivators were preparing to attack the two. Greed written all over their faces. Having clearly sensed the dense yin qi that oozing out from the two demonic cultivators, who were barely able to stop themselves from blowing up from the massive amount of yin qi inside their bodies.


    Whoosh!


    Narrowing his eyes as he saw the group was about to jump into action and ruin his chance to confirm whether the barrier in front of him really led to the Frost Devil Sect, Xuan Hao directly used his ice domain to freeze the entire group of demonic cultivators to death before they had any time to react.


    This action was not noticed by anyone, as the two demonic cultivators directly rushed past the frozen demonic cultivators on the ground below. Oblivious that these demonic cultivators had been alive just a short moment ago.


    "Finally¡­"


    "ording to the sect rules, they can''t attack us inside the sect!"


    Hearing the happy exmations of the two demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao watched in anticipation as the barrier slowly began lifting in front of them. Revealing arge gate with the words [Frost Devil Sect], written boldly on top of it.


    Creak~


    Hearing the sound of therge gate slowly starting to open, the demonic cultivators rushing over quickly stopped rushing towards the two escaping demonic cultivators before retreating. Knowing that they would no longer be able to catch them.


    Standing in the air only a few meters above the two, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes upon seeing the bold words written on top of therge gate-


    Swish!


    Before rapidly retreating after feeling a terrifying aura appearing from the other side of the gate.

 Chapter 554: Location of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb

    Chapter 554: Location of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb


    Crack~


    As therge gate appeared in front of the two demonic cultivators before slowly opening. The rest of the demonic cultivators retreated back to their hiding spots, while Xuan Hao followed them in moving away from the gate as quickly as possible. Hoping that the person he had sensed beyond the gate did not have enough time to notice him.


    Bang!


    All of a sudden, the gate that had been slowly opening in front of the two demonic cultivators flew open as a skinny elderly man appeared from the other side before scanning through the surroundings with his divine sense. Completely ignoring the presence of the two demonic cultivators who had been scared silly by the elderly man''s sudden appearance.


    "¡­"


    Barely escaping the range of the elderly man''s divine sense as he remained hidden with his domain, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he looked at the skinny elderly man who hade out from the gate.


    Even at a nce, Xuan Hao could clearly tell that the man should have reached the Peak of the Third Demonic Transformation. Essentially cing him at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Well¡­ At least I can be certain that this is the Frost Devil Sect¡­


    Swish~


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao decided not to risk idently revealing himself, as he slipped away before the skinny elderly man standing at the gate scanning the surrounding area with his divine sense noticed him.


    In the first ce, he had onlye for the location of the Frost Devil Sect. Not to fight the Frost Devil Sect!


    ¡­


    Having escaped far enough away from the Frost Devil Sect, Xuan Hao stopped as he spent a few minutes before taking out the map of the Frozen Wastnd that Yi Min had given him back in the Iron Sky Kingdom. Soon managing to figure out where he had ended up after sneaking away from the Frost Devil Sect''s front door.


    "Hm¡­ I should not be too far away from the location of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked down at the location of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb noted down by Yi Min on the map in his hands, Xuan Hao quickly recalled the little information Yi Min had given to him regarding the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb during a short conversation while he had been making his way towards the Frozen Wastnd.


    ording to what Yi Min said, the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb was located at the border between the Frozen Wastnd''s inner and outer region. Not only that, but she had also mentioned that there should be a Domain Lord Realm demon beast guarding the spiritual herb.


    When he tried asking about the strength of the demon beast, Yi Min had just answered that she had no idea about it¡­


    Answering that when she found the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb, she had still not reached the Domain Lord Realm and had only chanced upon its location out of sheer luck. Thousands of years had already passed since then and she did not know what realm the demon beast had reached at this point in time.


    Other than this, Yi Min did not have much information about the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb.


    Recalling all of this, Xuan Hao could not help praying that the spiritual herb had not fully matured yet and was still around.


    This was not too unrealistic, as a Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb could take thousands- If not tens of thousands of years to fully mature!


    Swoosh~!


    Not standing around for too long, Xuan Hao put away the map before flying in the direction of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb that had been noted down on the map.


    Given his current speed, it would take around two to three days'' time to reach. During this time, Xuan Hao decided to use the Drifting Cloud Steps and increase his mastery over the movement technique.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was making his way deeper into the Frozen Wastnd, Chu Yang waszily gazing up at the clouds passing by above him as he felt bored to the extreme.


    During the past few days after the bandit attack, he had not done anything and could only cultivate silently, watch the scenery pass by around him or spent his time observing the clouds drifting by overhead.


    The job of guarding the caravan along with the luxurious caravan was fine for the first few days, but it slowly grew more and more boring with each passing day. Not to mention, the bandits that attacked them were all below the Core Formation Realm and were dealt with by the remaining guards without him needing to do anything.


    However, following the caravan was his only way of safely getting back to the Flying Sword Sect''s territory without getting lost along the way-


    "We will soon be reaching the Small River Town!"


    Suddenly hearing one of the guards located in the front call out, Chu Yang could not help jolting awake from his dazed state before jumping down from the roof of the luxurious caravan where he had been staying most of the time during the journey.


    Thump!


    Ignoring the confused looks of the surrounding guards who saw him jump down from the roof of the carriage; Chu Yang rapidly moved to the front of the caravan to confirm what he had heard.


    "That is¡­ The Small River Town¡­?" Reaching the front of the caravan, Xuan Hao could not help opening his eyes in amazement as he saw arge town appearing in the distance with several small rivers flowing through it.


    Following the small rivers flowing through the town, Chu Yang watched how all of them intertwined and merged together into arge river a short distance away from the town.


    On therge river, a small port with several trading ships could be seen ready to make a trip up the river. Likely heading to a town or city where they could trade the things, they were carrying with them.


    "Indeed, the Small River Town is quite well known for their trade of several different spiritual fruits." Standing beside him, one of the guards that was familiar with the Small River Town said this before pointing towards several orchards located around the small rivers both inside and outside of the Small River Town.


    Looking more closely at the town after hearing this, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit surprised upon realizing that more than half the town was actually just orchards¡­ And that is not counting the orchards located in the areas just outside the town itself!


    Indeed, with so many orchards around, it was no wonder that the Small River Town would be famous for the spiritual fruits they produced!


    However, an important question appeared the moment he realized this and that was how the Small River Town could keep control over so many spiritual fruit trees.


    Even if they were they only produced the lowest grade of the spiritual fruits, it would still not be something that would be easy to hold on to. Let alone if some of the spiritual trees of the Small River Town produced higher grade spiritual fruits!


    How could I not know about a town like this inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory!?


    Frowning to himself as he wondered how he had not learnt anything about the Small River Town while going over the different important ces located inside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect in preparation for his adventure, Chu Yang could not help feeling interested in the Small River Town.


    Given that he was already going there together with the caravan, Chu Yang decided to spend some time in the Small River Town and try to see if he could learn more about the town and the people who lived inside of it.


    Swish~


    Turning around after having thought about all of this, Chu Yang made his way back to the luxurious carriage before informing the people inside about the fact that they were about to reach the Small River Town. Something he had been told to do by the servant so he could wake up his master in time for their arrival.


    Following this, Chu Yang returned back to the roof of the luxurious carriage where he began to go over his options on where to go after staying at the Small River Town for a few days.


    Given that there was also a branch of the Explorer Union present inside the Small River Town, Chu Yang felt confident that they would be able to help him out with finding a path to the location he decided to go after having stayed at the Small River Town.


    Sitting on top of the luxurious carriage as he thought about this, Chu Yang gazed towards therge town slowly getting closer and closer in the distance.


    After reaching the Small River Town, he would once again be able to resume his adventure¡­ This time around. Hopefully staying inside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect!

 Chapter 555: The Young Master

    Chapter 555: The Young Master


    "Thanks for the help during the journey, I will have to report what happened during the escort mission to the Explorer Union and I hope you will be able to help continue to look after my master during this period of time. Don''t worry, I will of course pay you for this!"


    "No problem at all."


    "Great! I will be back shortly!"


    Having reached the Explorer Union, Chu Yang waved goodbye to the servant as he entered the Explorer Union branch in the Small River Town before jumping back on top of the luxurious carriage.


    Watching over the carriage for the servant while he reported the people who had run away during the escort mission to Explorer Union should not take too long and Chu Yang did not feel reluctant to do this in the first ce. Especially considering that the servant would pay him for it!


    After all, he still needed spirit stones for his travels considering that he had lost all the spirit stones he had on him only a little over a week earlier¡­


    "Hm¡­ I wonder who the young master of the servant is¡­" Sitting on top of the luxurious caravan, Chu Yang could not help looking down at the carriage beneath him as he started to feel a bit curious about the identity of the young master that he was protecting.


    Even after having travelled together for around a week, he had still not managed to see the shadow of the young master that the servant was protecting!


    Not to mention seeing the young master, he had never heard anything from the luxurious carriage while staying on top of it during most of the journey to the Small River Town. Making him believe that there was likely some sort of silencing formation in ce on the luxurious carriage. Preventing anyone from listening to what was said on the inside.


    Thump!


    Standing up before jumping down from the carriage, Chu Yang turned around to face one of the luxurious carriage''s doors-


    Knock knock~


    Before gently knocking on the door. Hoping that he would be able to get a chance to see the young master of the servant hiding away inside the carriage.


    "¡­"


    However, even after waiting for a good fifteen minutes. Nothing happened, as the young master inside the carriage did not show himself.


    Having already grown bored waiting after the first five minutes had passed, Chu Yang returned back to the roof of the carriage to wait for the servant to return. Not expect for the young master to show himself.


    Creak~


    For this reason, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit shocked when he suddenly heard the carriage door below him starting to open all of a sudden.


    Leaning over the roof of the carriage to look down towards the carriage door that had just been opened, Chu Yang could not help feeling surprised upon witnessing a young boy no more than 10 years of age peek his head out from the carriage before beginning to survey his surroundings. Clearly looking to see if the person who had knocked on the carriage door just a few minutes earlier was still around.


    "H-hello¡­?" Not spotting anyone in the area around the carriage, the young boy called out as he continued looking around for any response. Not looking up to see Chu Yang inspecting him from the roof of the carriage.


    "¡­" Not saying anything as he continued inspecting the young boy, Chu Yang could not help sighing in amazement upon noticing at least a dozen different artifacts strapped onto the young boy''s body.


    Not only that, but the artifacts were not low-level artifacts in any way and would be more than enough to even prevent him from harming the young boy¡­ To be honest, Chu Yang had a feeling that even someone at the Nascent Soul Realm would have a difficult time trying to break through the artifacts that protected the young boy!


    Just where is this young master from¡­?


    Feeling himself growing even more curious about the young boy''s identity after seeing all the artifacts he carried on him, Chu Yang quickly went through the different powers with Nascent Soul Realm Experts inside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory and what had once been the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    However, he couldn''te up with one that could hand over so many precious defensive artifacts to a young boy barely reaching the age of 10¡­


    As he thought about this, Chu Yang realized that the young boy was most likely the young master of some sort of power that existed outside what had once been the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Not only that, but he should also belong to a rtively strong power given the powerful defensive artifacts he could wear!


    Thump!


    Not waiting around any longer after having finished inspecting the young boy, Chu Yang jumped down from the roof of the carriage beforending directly in front of the young boy. Shocking him silly as he rapidly retreated back into the carriage.


    "Y-you are¡­?" Cautiously poking his head back out after a few seconds, the young boy could not stop himself from asking this, as he was curious about the person who had suddenly dropped from the sky beforending in front of him.


    "Chu Yang, your servant told me to watch over you during his absence." Saying this, Chu Yang made sure not to sound threatening as he waited for the young boy to introduce himself. Hoping that he would be able to get some clue about where he was from through his name.


    "I-I see¡­ I''m- Ah!" Nodding his head in understanding, the young boy was just about to introduce himself when he suddenly seemed to remember something as he quickly stopped himself before saying his name.


    Haa¡­ Looks like he was told not to disclose his name¡­


    "Don''t worry about telling me your name." Feeling a bit disappointed upon realizing this, Chu Yang gave up on finding out the young boy''s name, as he quickly reassured him it was fine.


    "O-okay¡­" Fiddling around with his hand nervously, the young boy clearly did not feelfortable after having realized that he could not properly introduce himself.


    Looking at this from the side, Chu Yang could not help feeling bad about having caused the young boy to be in such a situation, as he soon managed to get him back into the carriage. Knowing that he would likely not be able to get any useful information from the young boy.


    As for doing it forcefully¡­ Not to mention the artifacts he had protecting him and the servant inside the branch of the Explorer Union just a few meters away from their current location, Chu Yang had no ns to randomly be enemies with someone who most likely belonged to a rather powerful sect, n, or kingdom.


    "Hm? You are back?" Just as the young boy had returned to the carriage, Chu Yang spotted the servant exiting the branch building of the Explorer Union before making his way over with a frown on his face.


    "Yes¡­ Here is your payment for escorting us, you don''t need to go enter the branch, I also added some extra for helping me look after the carriage for thest 20 minutes." Clearly not in a good mood after having left the branch of the Explorer Union, the servant threw a small pouch towards Chu Yang before entering the carriage to check on his young master.


    Creak~


    Coming back out from the carriage only a few secondster, the servant ced himself in the seat of the coachman and soon enough, the luxurious carriage disappeared into therge crowd of people on the street in front of the Explorer Union branch.


    "¡­"


    Looking in the direction that the carriage disappeared in, Chu Yang could not help wondering what had caused the servant''s mood to turn so bad in only 20 minutes.


    Did something perhaps go wrong during his conversation with the people from the Explorer Union?


    Thinking this, Chu Yang turned his attention towards the branch building located just a few meters away.


    The building itself was way better decoratedpared to the one he had encountered in me Mountain City. Not to mention, upon closer inspection, the branch building was also way bigger than the one in me Mountain City!


    Given howrge the branch was, did this not mean that there was some sort of ancient ruin or dangerous demon beast infested area nearby!?


    As this thought urred to him, Chu Yang decided to make his way inside the branch building and ask around to see if there really was some sort of ancient ruin or demon beast infested area nearby.


    If there really was, it would be a good opportunity for him to train and look for opportunities to increase his strength!


    Not to mention, it would be easier for him to find the ces if they were nearby¡­


    Swoosh~


    With all of this in mind, Chu Yang entered therge branch building belonging to the Explorer Union.

 Chapter 556: Explorer Union... Gambling Den!?

    Chapter 556: Explorer Union... Gambling Den!?


    Entering therge branch building of the Explorer Union, Chu Yang could not help feeling shocked upon seeing the luxurious decorations all over the ce. Compared to the branch of the Explorer Union that he had seen back at the me Mountain City, the branch inside the Small River town was apletely different world!


    Not only that, but Chu Yang also discovered that the people inside the branch were very clearly not part of the Explorer Union, as most of them were younger people with close to no cultivation spending their time drinking and gambling around luxurious tables all over the branch building.


    After a closer inspection, Chu Yang realized that the actual part of the branch where he could ept requests and sell monster parts or treasures, he found was located in a small corner that didn''t even fill up a tenth of therge building''s interior.


    Is this some sort of hang out spot for wealthy young masters anddies¡­?


    Thinking this to himself as he watched a few young men gambling with a few hundred spirit stones, Chu Yang felt like he understood why the servant had been in a bad mood after having left the branch building.


    Among the people gambling, the weaker guards that had participated in the escort mission from the Explorer Union with him could also be seen among the crowds of gamblers inside therge building. Gambling away the spirit stones that they had just earned a short time ago.


    This could no longer be called a branch of the Explorer Union, it would be more appropriate to call it a gambling den with a small branch of the Explorer Union attached to it¡­


    "Hello cutie~ How can I help you~?


    Hearing the voice of a youngdy, Chu Yang turned around to see a young woman dressed in a rather provocative manner make her way over towards him while keeping her gaze focused on the pouch filled with spirit stones that could barely be seen hanging off the side of his robe.


    "Are you looking for some fun? This older sister-"


    Swish~


    Before the young woman even manged to finish her sentence, Chu Yang had already moved across the floor of therge building towards the corner that the Explorer Union branch was located in.


    "W-where did he go!?"


    The young woman had no idea where he had gone and could only look around herself for a short moment before giving up and moving towards a middle-aged man who entered the building a few secondter.


    Not even a minuteter, the young woman happily escorted the middle-aged man towards a gambling table located only a few meters away from the entrance.


    Perhaps the reason why the Explorer Union was ced in the corner was to catch the people who came toplete their request or sell monster material.


    Chu Yang could not help shaking his head when he thought of this. Wondering how the manager of the Explorer Union branch had even allowed for the Explorer Union to be ced inside a gambling den in the first ce¡­


    Not thinking too deeply about the odd location of the Explorer Union branch, Chu Yang made his way towards one of the two people from the Explorer Union that were avable. Given that there was a gambling den between the branch and the entrance to the building, there was not many people present at the branch and he only had to wait for less than five minutes before it was his turn.


    "What can I help with¡­?" Reaching the desk, the voice of the older man standing behind the counter came out as he asked in a tired voice deprived of energy. Just from looking at him, it could be seen that he was about to fall asleep at any moment.


    "I would like to know if there are any ancient ruins or area filled with demon beasts nearby." Ignoring the exhausted look on the older man''s face, Chu Yang decided to still ask the question he had entered the Explorer Union for.


    "Ancient ruins? Demon beasts? Haa¡­ No idea. Maybe there are some nearby. Try asking around town-"


    Thump!


    Before the old man managed to finish what, he was saying, he suddenly began waying slightly before copsing on to the floor. Having fallen asleep due to his exhaustion.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this scene take ce, Chu Yang had no words, as he had never expected for something like that to happen in front of him.


    Not only did the person from the Explorer Union copse in front of him due to exhaustion, but he also didn''t even manage to give him a proper answer and had just asked him to ask around town!


    The Explorer Union of Small River Town is truly in a bad state. Really makes me want to see who the manager of this branch is¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he observed the old man who had fallen asleep on the floor behind the counter, Chu Yang was just about to move towards the second person from the Explorer Union-


    Thump!


    When he noticed that he had also fallen asleep on the floor behind the counter together with the old man.


    All of a sudden, there was not a single person left managing the Explorer Union branch!


    "Haa¡­ Looks like we got here toote today brothers, we will have toe back in a few hours when one of them wakes up toplete our mission¡­"


    "This damnable manager! Refusing to hire more than two people and forcing them to work for days without rest!"


    "Don''t botherining, you should know how petty that person is! If he hears what you say¡­"


    "I know¡­ It''s just, why is our branch in such a terrible conditionpared to other branches!? This ce should not be called a branch of the Explorer Union anymore, it would be better to just call it a gambling den at this point!"


    "Let''s just get going before any of those troublemakers show up¡­"


    Listening to the three other people that were still left waiting in front of the man who had just copsed and fallen asleep from exhaustion, Chu Yang could not help frowning upon realizing that this scene seemed to be a regr thing.


    Not only that, but it seemed to be the intention of the manager of the Explorer Union branch¡­


    Why on earth would the manager do something like that, is he not afraid of angering his higher ups¡­?


    Remembering how the Explorer Union had sent someone at the Nascent Soul Realm to the branch in the me Mountain City to calm down things following the Raging me Sect''s fall, Chu Yang could not help wondering why the manager had dared to essentially cripple his own branch for seemingly no reason.


    "Hello¡­"


    "Hm? You are¡­ Someone new?"


    "Yes, I wanted to ask about this branch''s condition¡­ If it''s not too much trouble of course¡­"


    Seeing that the three had stopped talking and were about to leave, Chu Yang quickly jumped forward and asked them. After all, they had seemed like the only people he had seen so far that could answer any of his questions regarding the current situation of the Explorer Union branch. Hopefully, they would also know about a nearby ancient ruins or area filled with demon beasts¡­


    "Ah¡­ I understand, but it''s not good to talk about those things here¡­ Let''s go outside and we can find a quiet ce to talk!" Understanding what Chu Yang meant, one of the three said this before signalling for him to follow them out of the branch building.


    "Sure!" Nodding his head in understanding, Chu Yang quickly made his way out of the branch building belonging to the Explorer Union, that had somehow turned into a gambling den.


    As for being cautious in case the group of three were nning to ambush and rob him? Chu Yang really did not view the three of them as his opponent. Mainly because the strongest among the three had only barely managed to reach the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    With his current strength, Chu Yang could easily kill someone at the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm. Let alone someone who had just barely managed to reach the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    ¡­


    "Hm? Those two idiots copsed again, and it looks like someone new showed up¡­ He seems to be different from that group of Foundation Establishment and Qi Condensation Realm cultivators from earlier¡­ Maybe one of the experts from the caravan that just entered the town?"


    At the same time Chu Yang left the gambling den together with the three who had beenining about not be able to turn in theirpleted mission, arge man in the shape of a ball almost rolled across the upper floor of the building as he narrowed his eyes while watching Chu Yang and the three leave.


    "Looks like I will have to investigate who it is and make sure he doesn''t cause any trouble for my business¡­" Muttering this to himself as a faint killing intent appeared in his eyes, the man signalled to a few people nearby-


    Whoosh!


    Causing them to nod their head before disappearing from the upper floor of the building.

 Chapter 557: Origin of the Gambling Den~!

    Chapter 557: Origin of the Gambling Den~!


    "So, what is the reason for the branch of the Explorer Union bing a gambling den? As far as I know, something like that should not be normal¡­" Having followed the three cultivators out of the building that the branch of the Explorer Union was located inside, Chu Yang could not hold back his curiosity as he asked this. Wanting to find out how a branch of the Explorer Union had essentially transformed into a gambling den.


    "Wait with your questions, we have to get somewhere quiet and away from this ce before we can talk without worrying about that vicious meatball finding out about it!"


    Only able to tilt his head when he heard this as he wondered who the vicious meatball was, Chu Yang followed the group of three as they made their way towards the edge of the Small River Town. Soon arriving in front of arge restaurant.


    "We will get a private room, just bring the usual."


    "Sure, boss! I will be back soon after checking which rooms are avable!"


    Watching the man who he assumed to be the leader of the group of three talking with one of the servers at the entrance of the small restaurant, Chu Yang thought about how odd his current situation was.


    He had just met the group of three a few minutes ago and now it felt like they were about to divulge some big secret about the Explorer Union branch of Small River Town.


    Thinking about it again¡­ To say his current situation was odd, would be an understatement!


    "Please follow me, the third private room is avable." Returning only a few seconds after he had left to check the private rooms, the server smiled happily before leading them into a rather spacious room on the second floor of the restaurant.


    The room was not only spacious, but Chu Yang could clearly feel some sort of formation surrounding the private room.


    After closer inspection, Chu Yang realized that the formation was extremely weak and would break if he idently walked into it.


    What is the use of such a weak formation¡­?


    Barely whispering this to himself as he looked over the formation, Chu Yang did not take more than a few seconds to understand the use of the weak formation that surround the small room.


    The formation was not for attacking, defending, trapping or anything simr. Instead, it existed to dampen the voices of the people inside the formation.


    Not like an istion formation that made it impossible to hear what was happening inside the formation¡­ It merely silenced the sound of those inside the formation. Making it harder for people outside to hear what the people inside the formation were talking about!


    To be honest, Chu Yang was a bit shocked upon realizing this, as he did not expect that a voice dampening formation actually existed¡­


    "Okay, this ce should be good enough for us to talk¡­" Interrupting his train of thought before he ended up dwelling deeper into the mysterious that was the weak noise dampening formation, the man who had reached the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment said this before looking around himself cautiously.


    Even if he said that the ce was good enough for them to talk, he clearly did not feel safe given how he was looking around himself¡­


    Rolling his eyes as he thought about this, Chu Yang could not help wondering just what this manager of the Explorer Union branch had done to make these three people so terrified of him¡­ Was he perhaps a demon in human form or something?


    "So, the same question from earlier¡­ What is the reason that the branch of the Explorer Union is a gambling den?" Asking the question, he had asked just after they had left the Explorer Union branch again, Chu Yang patiently looked towards the strongest of three people sitting together with him. Waiting eagerly for an answer.


    "Haa¡­ This all happened a few years ago when the old manager of the Explorer Union branch retired and left to live the rest of his life in the vige he was born. The new manager arrived shortly after and built up his gambling den. Slowly turning the oncerge and lively Explorer Union branch into what it is now¡­


    At first, some wanted to resist andined to therger branches located deeper inside the Sky Empire¡­ However, this was to no avail as the father of the current branch manager seem to have quite a few connections inside the Explorer Union. At the very least enough to make sure his son does not get in trouble for what he turned the Small River Town Explorer Union branch into¡­"


    Shaking his head filled with sadness as he said this, the man almost looked like he was about to cry when exining the current situation of their town''s Explorer Union branch.


    The other two sitting beside him were the same, as they looked down at the table with depressed expressions on their faces.


    To the three of them, the Explorer Union was not only their source of ie, but was also the reason why they had managed to step onto the path of cultivation in the first ce!


    Witnessing how bad the situation of their branch had be, it was obvious that they would feel sad and disheartened. Especially when they saw many of their former friends get addicted to gambling. Wasting what little they earned for risking their life against demon beasts or other cultivators!


    Even thinking about the group''s situation was more than enough for Chu Yang to feel bad for them.


    Given that they were all in the Foundation Establishment Realm, it would not be hard for the three of them to take an escort mission to another town or city with an Explorer Union branch in it and never return to the Small River Town.


    As for why they had not left the Small River Town¡­ Chu Yang guessed that it was most likely because their friends and family were still living there¡­ If not, Chu Yang doubted that the three would not have left after witnessing what the branch of the Explorer Union turned into!


    "Then, what about the manager of the Explorer Union, why are you so¡­ Scared of him?" Asking thest question that was on his mind regarding the Explorer Union, Chu Yang eagerly waited for them to answer. After all, the manager of the Explorer Union was the reason why everything had ended up going astray.


    Back at the Explorer Union branch, he had indeed managed to spot a ball shaped man who was most likely the manager of the branch spying on them while they left the building, but he was only someone around the Fourth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Not to mention, he had clearly ended up with his ball shaped appearances due to an over consumption of pills used to forcefully increase his cultivation realm.


    Even the leader of the three in front of him who had only reached the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm should be more than capable of dealing with someone who had been fed so many pills-


    No! Even someone at the Peak of the Qi Condensation Realm might be able to deal with the ball shaped man he had spotted spying at them. After all, the ball shaped man''s movement should be extremely limited due to his shape. Making it rather easy to dodge him and at the same timend an attack¡­


    "Actually¡­ We are not really afraid of the manager himself. Even I can beat that human shaped ball with little effort. The problem is the guards that his father sent to guard him and help him out in anything he does. From what I know, even the weakest among them are at the Foundation Establishment Realm, while there is also another two at the Core Formation Realm!


    With me and my two brothers'' strength, there is no way we can beat someone like that! Not to mention that no one in Small River Town has the strength to fight with those two guards at the Core Formation Realm. The next strongest person is the town lord, who just recently broke through to the Core Formation Realm with the help of those two experts¡­"


    Hearing this exnation, Chu Yang understood why the three people in front of him were so nervous and did not dare to speak ill of the branch manager.


    They clearly feared that someone would tell him about it and that he would in turn sent over some of his subordinates to beat them up!


    "Now¡­ Another question, this time it''s not about the branch manager or anything like that. I''m curious if any of you know if there is any ancient ruins or area filled with demon beasts nearby? I tried asking at the counter of the Explorer Union earlier¡­ But it was not really of much help¡­" Asking this, Chu Yang looked up towards the group of three.


    Compared to knowing about the situation of the Explorer Union, he was much more interested in finding a location where he could go to improve his strength¡­

 Chapter 558: Ancient Ruins Upstream

    Chapter 558: Ancient Ruins Upstream


    Hearing Chu Yang''s question, the leader of three thought about it for a moment beforeing up with an answer.


    "Ancient ruins? A ce where there is a lot of demon beasts? Hm¡­ If I''m not wrong, there is some ancient ruins filled with demon beasts further upstream. The treasures inside the ancient ruins have already been taken away, but there is still a lot of demon beasts around. Although¡­ Most of the demon beast are at the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm or above!"


    Listening to the description of the ancient ruins, Chu Yang could not help smiling happily. The ancient ruins described by the leader was indeed what he had been looking for and from the looks of it, it was the perfect ce for him to train with his current strength.


    Not only that, but from the looks of it, it also seemed like there wouldn''t be too many other people hunting for demon beast given just how empty the Explorer Union of the Small River Town was¡­ That was not mentioning that the few strong people he had seen so far in the Small River Town did not exceed the earlier stages of the Core Formation.


    Even at this point in time, Chu Yang could not helpmenting over just how weak the Small Rive Town waspared to the me Mountain City.


    Although, it was not too surprising given that the me Mountain City was located at the borders of the Burning Mountain Range where demon beasts even above the Nascent Soul Realm could be found¡­ In such a location, strong people would gather with the intention of exploring the dangerous Burning Mountain Range for an opportunity to increase their strength.


    If not for the fact that the me Mountain City was located outside the Flying Sword Sect''s territory and the fact that he would most likely not be able to find his way out, Chu Yang would have been more than happy to spend his time exploring the Burning Mountain Range and fight the demon beast there while searching for ancient ruins spread across the Burning Mountain Range.


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he recalled the image of the massive wolf like demon beast roaring towards the sky. The demon beast he had encountered after having been teleported inside the Burning Mountain Range was far more terrifying than any demon beast he had ever encountered. Even the Nascent Soul Realm Expert he had encountered during his short adventure with Qing Yi was nowhere near the same level as the massive wolf like demon beast!


    "Thanks for the help, I should get going¡­" Shaking his head as he threw the thoughts of the massive wolf like demon beast to the back of his mind, Chu Yang stood up before making his way out of the private room.


    "Wai-"


    "Your food is here!"


    The leader of the group of three that was just about to say something to the leaving Chu Yang, was suddenly interrupted as the server from earlier entered the room with arge amount of food just as Chu Yang left.


    "Please enjoy!" Ignoring the fact that Chu Yang left the private room, the server quickly ced the food on the small table in the middle of the room which the three were sitting around before taking his leave.


    The server already knew the identity of the group of three cultivators and understood that it was best for someone like him without any cultivation to stay away from any cultivators chatting with each other¡­


    Who knew if they suddenly talked about some rare artifact or spiritual herb, and he happened to idently overhear them!?


    One of the server''s friends was unfortunate enough to run into this kind of situation and had been outright killed before the other party escaped from the Small River Town to avoid any repercussions.


    Whoosh!


    Even if cultivators were customers that paid several times what ordinary mortals did, he did not want to end up like that! It was best just to keep his distance and hope for them to leave a few spirit stones for him¡­


    ""¡­""


    Seeing how quickly the server left after havingid the food out on the table in front of them, the three cultivators could not help frowning as they all wondered if something was wrong for both Chu Yang and the server to escape so quickly.


    "Hah¡­ And here I thought we would be able to recruit someone new to our group¡­" Letting out a sigh, the leader of the group could not help muttering this to himself as his intentions for talking with Chu Yang became clear to the other two.


    "So, you wanted to recruit him!"


    "Never expected that¡­ I just thought you were nice enough to warn the neer¡­"


    "Haa¡­ You two¡­ That young man should at least be in the Foundation Establishment Realm. Recruiting him would definitely be able to increase our strength and allow us to take on more difficult missions from the Explorer Union, I just didn''t expect for him to run away so quickly after I answered a few questions¡­" Shaking his head as he said this with a regretful expression while looking at the two others, the leader began eating the dishes in front of him.


    "Foundation Establishment Realm!? I never expected for someone that young to have reached the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­ I fear that he should be someone with a background to have reached the Foundation Establishment Realm at such a young age!" Eximing in surprise upon hearing what his leader said, one of the other two could not helpmenting at the difference between him and the young man.


    The young man should be in histe teens or earlier twenties, but he had already reached the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    It had to be known that all three of them were over forty years old. The Leader being a little over fifty!


    The fact that Chu Yang was 20 to 30 years younger than them was more than enough to render the other the remaining two speechless and unable to eat the food in front of them for a short time.


    ¡­


    "Hm¡­ They didn''t follow me?" Having left the restaurant along with the three Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit surprised after realizing that they had not followed after him.


    He was almost certain that they wanted something from him¡­ Why else would they take him to the restaurant and answer all of his questions without getting anything in return?


    Maybe they really did just want to help me out and warn me about the branch manager of the Small River Town Explorer Union¡­?


    Thinking this to himself, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit touched.


    The group of three had clearly risked their own safety to warn him about the branch manager without asking for anything in return. Cultivators like them were way too rare and Chu Yang had never expected to encounter someone like that!


    "Well¡­ If you really just wanted to help me, I guess I will have to help you three out in the future if we encounter each other again¡­" Muttering this to himself, Chu Yang began making his way out of the Small River Town.


    Following the small rivers that went through the Small River Town before they merged together into arge river would not be hard. All he had to do was follow the dozen or so small rivers and he would be able to reach his destination!


    Even if the small rivers ended up going off in some other direction, he would always be able to backtrack and try again in case he ended up getting lost¡­


    With this in mind, Chu Yang made his way out of the Small River Town before following the small rivers upstream towards the ancient ruins and demon beasts that the leader of the three cultivators had mentioned to him.


    As for investigating the spiritual fruit trees scattered all over the Small River town, Chu Yang decided to do it after he had visited the ancient ruins upstream.


    In the first ce, it was not like he would not be able to return to the Small River Town after having explored the ruins. Especially given the fact that he would always be able to follow the small rivers back without fear of loosing his way in the process!


    Whoosh!


    Using his movement technique, the moment he was far enough away from the Small River Town to not be seen by anyone, Chu Yang began his journey upstream towards the ancient ruins and demon beasts.


    It was only a few dayster that Chu Yang realized he had never asked just how far away the ancient ruins were from the Small River Town.


    At that point in time, it was already way toote for him to regret not having asked this before leaving, as he could only continue his journey upstream. Hoping to soon encounter the ancient ruins¡­

 Chapter 559: Demonic Cultivators... Are Scary...

    Chapter 559: Demonic Cultivators... Are Scary...


    Travelling through the Frozen Wastnds in the direction of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb for three days straight, Xuan Hao could not help feeling excited upon seeing a mountain range of severalrge mountains covered in snow and ice appear in the distance.


    ording to the map of the Frozen Wastnd that Yi Min had given to him. The mountain range in front of him was the location where she had encountered the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb and its guardian demon beast.


    Bang-bang-bang!


    Suddenly hearing the sound of someone fighting in the distance, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he quickly hid himself before looking over in the direction of the sound of battle.


    "Demonic cultivators¡­" Narrowing his eyes after recognizing the demonic techniques used by the two groups fighting a short distance away from his current location, Xuan Hao soon continued moving towards the snow-covered mountain range in the distance after making sure that none of the demonic cultivators would spot him.


    During the past few days, he had encountered many simr situation where demonic cultivators were fighting with each other for the few resources avable in the Frozen Wastnd. In some cases, the demonic cultivators would not even fight over resources and would instead fight to devour their opponent''s cultivation¡­


    In the Frozen Wastnd with scarce resources, the most precious resource to demonic cultivators, was other demonic cultivators who wandered the seemingly endless wastnd in search of opportunities to improve their strength!


    Not only were these demonic cultivators extremely ruthless, but they were also extremely strong! Just during the short three days he had travelled through the Frozen Wastnd, he had encountered more than 10 demonic cultivators at the Third Demonic Transformation.


    This was more than 10 Peak Domain Lords! Even a strong empire like the Sky Empire should not have the ability to easily gather up so many Peak Domain Lords!


    What was worrying was that he had encountered most of them during thest day of travel as he got closer to the core part of the Frozen Wastnd.


    If the outer part of the Frozen Wastnd was so dangerous, just how terrifying would the core part be? Would he perhaps encounter a demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm the moment he stepped foot into the core of the Frozen Wastnd¡­?


    As this thought appeared in his head, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine at the thought of encountering a demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm. After all, with his current cultivation realm, he doubted that he would be able to fight back.


    "Hm?" Coming to a stop mid-air a short distance away from the snow-covered mountain range, Xuan Hao squinted his eyes as something headed towards him at a speed far surpassing his own speed. Even with the help of the Drifting Cloud Steps, Xuan Hao doubted that he would be able to archive such speed.


    "That is-"


    Whoosh~


    Having realized what, the thing flying towards him was, Xuan Hao barely managed to dodge before getting hit, as it continued forward before violently hitting one of the snow-covered mountains.


    BOOOOOM-!


    Directly passing through it beforeing to a stop after smashing into a second mountain behind the first.


    Whoosh


    Not even a secondter, the thing that had smashed into the second mountain suddenly stood up before rushing into the sky. Revealing itself to be a demonic cultivator with a pair ofrge demonic looking bat wings.


    "Hm? A demonic cultivator¡­" Feeling surprised that the other party was actually a demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao suddenly had a bad feeling as he turned to look in the direction that the demonic cultivator hade flying from.


    "YOU DARE ESCAPE!?" Along with the loud almost bestial roar, another demonic cultivator appeared in the distance with evenrger demonic wings. Heading towards the demonic cultivator in the air above the second mountain, who had just recovered from being sent flying through a mountain a few seconds earlier.


    "Hmph! You think I will just wait around for you to catch me!?" Barely able to pick up what the demonic cultivator floating above the second mountain said, Xuan Hao watched as he pped hisrge demonic bat wings before flying towards the deeper parts of the snow-covered mountain range.


    "YOU THINK YOU CAN ESCAPE FROM ME!?" Not paying too much mind to the very clearly crazy demonic cultivator that came flying towards his current attention, Xuan Hao retreated even further away as he tried his best to hide his presence.


    Whoosh~!


    As the crazy looking demonic cultivator filled with killing intent flew past him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a little relieved upon discovering that the other party didn''t notice him.


    Wait! Both of them are heading towards the Spiritual Herb!


    Following the two demonic cultivators slowly disappearing in the distance, Xuan Hao was just about to resume his journey towards the Transcendent Spiritual Herb when he suddenly realized that the two demonic cultivators were moving towards the exact location of the spiritual herb.


    Whoosh!


    Not daring to wait around after realizing this, Xuan Hao quickly used his Drifting Cloud Steps to chase after the two disappearing demonic cultivators in the distance.


    If it was just two normal demonic cultivators, the guardian demon beast would most likely have the ability to deal with them. The problem was the two demonic cultivators currently moving towards the deeper part of the snow-covered mountain range was far from normal!


    The weaker one being chased had very clearly reached the Third Demonic Transformation, while the stronger one should be half a step into the True Demon Realm!


    Even if the guardian demon beast had grown stronger over the thousands of years since Yi Min had seen it, he did not think that it would have grown strong enough to deal with a demonic cultivator half a step into the True Demon Realm!


    Thinking about it for a short moment while chasing behind the two, Xuan Hao doubted that he would have the ability to deal with a demonic cultivator half a step into the True Demon Realm!


    ¡­


    Feeling the two auras of the demonic cultivatorse to a sudden stop as the half a step True Demon Realm demonic cultivator had caught up, Xuan Hao also came to a stop as he observed the two demonic cultivators start fighting with each other.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Not even a secondter, two terrifying auras belong to the Third Demonic Transformation Realm appeared in the distance before shing violently with each other. Instantly destroying a few nearby mountains in the process.


    Watching the fight from a distance, Xuan Hao could not helpmenting over just how one-sided the fight between the two was. Even if the two had reached the same realm, it was easy to see that there was a massive gap in strength between both of them¡­


    "Aaaah-!"


    Not even a minute had passed since the start of the fight before the pitiful scream of the weaker Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivator echoed across the snow-covered mountain range.


    "Hmph!" Not intending to let his opponent escape again, the stronger demonic cultivator transformed one of his hands into severalrge tentacles that quickly tied up and stopped his opponent from running away.


    "Hehe, I would like to see you run away this time around!"


    "N-no! P-please don''t- Aaah!"


    Not knowing what he was watching anymore as the tentacles slowly began to suck away the yin qi of the demonic cultivator by forcefully entering his body, Xuan Hao decided to look away as he instead began to look for signs of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb that should be somewhere close to his current location.


    Inspecting his surroundings and only seeing snow-covered mountains in all directions, Xuan Hao wondered how he would be able find the exact location of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb.


    Maybe the guardian demon beast had already died of old age. Leaving no one behind to guard the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb¡­?


    Although this sounded like a good thing, as he would not need to deal with a guardian demon beast, it also made it way harder to find the Transcendent Spiritual Herb¡­ After all, the location Yi Min had given him was not that precise and could at most be considered a rough location. Given how the environment had changed over the past few thousand years since she had been there, it was even harder to find!


    "¡­"


    Looking out at the countless mountains covered in a thick white nket of snow looking the exact same, Xuan Hao felt like he might be forced to search through the entire ce with his divine sense. Resulting in him spending way more time in the Frozen Wastnd than he first expected.


    "Aaaaah~!"


    Hearing a weird scream of pain echo across the snow-covered mountains from the direction of the two demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine as he caught a glimpse of what was happening to the weaker demonic cultivator while the yin qi inside his body was sucked dry by the tentacles.


    Demon cultivators¡­ Were truly terrifying!

 Chapter 560: Guardian Demon Beast

    Chapter 560: Guardian Demon Beast


    Hiding himself further away from the demonic cultivator currently in the process of absorbing the yin qi inside the now dead demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao silently waited for the other party to finish, as he really didn''t want to fight the other party. Especially knowing what would happen to him in case he lost¡­


    Even if the chance of it happening with his current strength was close to none, he didn''t want to risk a fight when he didn''t need to. Hiding at the side until the other party left was a way better option!


    Not to mention, his ice domains hiding ability inside the frozen wastnd was far above that of other domains at the same level. Making it far easier for him to hide inside the thickyer of snow beneath him.


    "Haha! After absorbing that fool, I no longer have anything stopping me from reaching the True Demon Realm! Just a few months of closed-door meditation and I should be able to finish the demonic transformation and officially step into the True Demon Realm!"


    Oblivious to the fact that someone was hiding nearby, the demonic cultivator half a step into the True Demon Realm let out a loudugh. Not able to contain his happiness after sensing the fact that the bottleneck to the True Demon Realm had almostpletely disappeared after having absorbed the yin qi of the Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivator.


    Even from afar, Xuan Hao could sense that the demonic cultivator''s aura had very clearly changed and be far stronger than it was before. If before Xuan Hao thought he should be around the same level as the demonic cultivator half a step into the True Demon Realm, he no longer thought so, as the demonic cultivator seemed to have undergone aplete transformation after absorbing the yin qi inside the Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivator.


    A few secondster, the demonic cultivator retracted the tentacles beforending at the ground next to the dried-up body of his opponent.


    "P-please, k-kill me-"


    Hearing the voice from his hiding spot, Xuan Hao could not help shivering as he realized that the demonic cultivator who had all his yin qi sucked out of him was still alive.


    Given what he had gone though, it was easy to imagine just how much pain he was in as he only barely managed to get out a few words before gasping for breath in the cold environment, his body slowly starting to freeze up without the yin qi protecting it from the biting cold of the Frozen Wastnd.


    "Hmph! Given how much you helped me, I guess I should send you off properly¡­"


    Ptch!


    Frowning slightly upon hearing the words of what was left of his opponent, the demonic cultivator conjured a simple spear with his yin qi before stabbing into the dried-up body. Killing his opponent and erasing his soul instantly.


    "Now, let''s see if you have anything good~"


    Not affected by his opponent''s death, the demonic cultivator happily picked up his interspatial ring before going over the things inside of it. Taking all of them out to get a good look before putting them into his own interspatial ring


    "¡­"


    Watching this from the side, Xuan Hao could not help cursing to himself as he watched the other party take out several precious spiritual herbs and artifacts from the interspatial ring before slowly putting them back into his own interspatial ring.


    The demonic cultivator at the Third Demonic Transformation Realm was clearly someone very rich. Not to mention, it looked like he had just gotten back from robbing the treasure vault of a sect with all the spiritual herbs and artifacts he had on him.


    Even Xuan Hao felt tempted to fight for the resources that the demonic cultivator showed to him before slowly putting it all away in his interspatial ring.


    The main reason for this was not because the artifacts and spiritual herbs shown were high level, but simply because of the sheer quantity of them.


    If he could get his hands on so many resources, the Flying Sword Sect would definitely be able to have an easier time when moving the main sect in the future¡­ The only problem was that the demonic cultivator in front of him was far stronger than any opponent he had faced in the past. Making Xuan Hao hesitate to attack the other party, as he should be stronger than him.


    In such a situation, let alone killing the other party and taking away the interspatial ring, he might very well end up getting sucked all the qi out of him by the tentacles¡­


    Crack~


    "Hm?"


    BOOOOOM!


    Just at this moment, the ground beneath the demonic cultivator cracked apart as a violent explosion urred the next moment. Instantly melting any nearby ice and snow before vaporizing it.


    Whoosh!


    The demonic cultivator had barely managed to react in time, as he had used hisrge demonic bat wings to escape into the sky.


    "WHO IS IT!?" Clearly not having expected to be attacked all of a sudden while going over the treasures he had just gotten his hands on, the demonic cultivator yelled loudly towards the massive hole that had appeared where he had been standing just a moment ago.


    The hole in the ground was the location where the explosion had urred and also seemed to be the ce where his opponent was hiding!


    "You don''t want toe out? Then I will just have to force you out!" Along with these words, the demonic cultivator eyes filled with killing intent before a massive ball of eerie looking blue fire appeared above him.


    Having been formed by yin qi, the fire did not give off any heat, but instead carried a terrifying cold that seemed to freeze the world around it.


    "Hmph!"


    Swsih~!


    Not waiting for even a second after the massive ball of blue fire had formed above him, the demonic cultivator threw it into the massive hole beneath him before getting ready to fight.


    Even if he acted confident and fearless filled with killing intent, the demonic cultivator still understood that his opponent would not be weak given that the other party could hide from him and evenunch a sneak attack from beneath without him noticing!


    Whoosh~


    As the massive ball of blue fire entered the hole in the ground, it did not cause any wild explosion. Instead, it caused everything it came into contact with to freeze!


    ROOOOAR!


    Not even a secondter, a terrifying roar erupted from the hole in the ground as the blue fire reached the bottom.


    "A demon beast¡­?" Not having expected that his opponent was a demon beast, the demonic cultivator was slightly surprised before quickly calming himself down. In the end, it didn''t matter whether the other party was a demonic cultivator or a demon beast!


    "Wait¡­ If I absorb this beast¡­ Won''t I be able to directly break through to the True Demon Realm!?" As he felt the aura of the demon beasting up from the hole in the ground, the demonic cultivator could not help feeling excited as he realized this.


    Even if he had said he would be able to break through to the True Demon Realm after a few months of meditation earlier due to feeling his strength grow. The demonic cultivator still understood that it was not a guarantee that he would break through during his closed-door meditation.


    After all, breaking through to the True Demon Realm was a life and death situation!


    However, absorbing more yin qi and strengthening himself would increase his chances of surviving and reaching the True Demon Realm¡­


    For this reason, the demonic cultivator was not at all afraid when he sensed the powerful aura of the demon beast approaching from beneath him. Instead, he felt excited at the prospect of absorbing the demon beast to increase his chances of reaching the True Demon Realm!


    BANG!


    ROOOOOAR!


    Jumping up from the hole in the ground beforending on the ground beneath the demonic cultivator, the demon beast roared loudly filled with killing intent.


    Swish~!


    The demon beast itself looked like a massive version of the snow-white rabbits scattered all across the Frozen Wastnd, as it jumped into the air towards the demonic cultivator.


    "HAHA! Little rabbit, watch how I devour your blood and essence!" Seeing the appearance of the demon beast, the demonic cultivatorughed loudly filled with confidence as blue fire manifested around him. Ready to fend off the massive snow-white rabbit rushing towards him from below.


    ¡­


    Boom-boom-boom!


    "Looks like this should be the guardian demon beast¡­ That would mean inside the hole is the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb¡­" Muttering this to himself as he watched how the two shed with each other in the air above the snow-covered mountain range, Xuan Hao slowly began approaching the hole in the ground that the demon beast had appeared from.


    While the rabbit demon beast and the demonic cultivator were busy fighting each other, Xuan Hao nned to sneak in and take the spiritual herb away without any of them noticing¡­

 Chapter 561: Robbing the Rabbit Demon Beast~

    Chapter 561: Robbing the Rabbit Demon Beast~


    Moving closer and closer to the hole in the ground that the rabbit demon beast hade from, Xuan Hao made sure that he was not discovered as he slowly jumped down the hole without the rabbit demon beast or the demonic cultivator noticing him in the process.


    In a sense, Xuan Hao felt grateful that the demonic cultivator was kind enough to help him distract the guardian demon beast, as the rabbit demon beast was clearly far stronger than he had expected. Even having the ability to fight the demonic cultivator without being at a disadvantage!


    If he had to fight the guardian demon beast by himself, Xuan Hao doubted that he would have been able to win. Even if he did, he would most likely end up injured in the process¡­


    "Haa¡­ No use thinking about it, I just have to get the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb and get out of here before the fight ends¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while moving deeper down the hole that the rabbit demon beast had dug out, Xuan Hao nced towards the surface where the loud sounds of fighting constantly echoed out before continuing to make his way down the hole created by the rabbit demon beast.


    Not even a few seconds after he had started making his way down the hole, Xuan Hao reached a tunnel around the same size as the rabbit demon beast at the bottom of the hole.


    Having nowhere else to go and with the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb nowhere in sight, Xuan Hao did not stand around for long as he entered the tunnel.


    Soon finding himself in the middle of a rtively small underground space just barely big enough for the rabbit demon beast to live inside of.


    Looking around the small space that visibly carried the aura of the rabbit demon beast, it did not take long for him to find a small flower surrounded by extremely pure spiritual water at the centre. Especially given the fact that the flower itself leaked an extremely powerful aura that made it hard to ignore.


    "The Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb! From the looks of it, it should have already matured¡­ The rabbit demon beast should have been just about to devour it!" Instantly realizing that the flower was the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb that he had been looking for, Xuan Hao could not help smiling happily upon realizing that it had fully matured.


    As for how, Yi Min, who had not yet reached the Domain Lord Realm, would have been able to escape after having seen the flower in the past? Xuan Hao didn''t really care, as he carefully harvested it before taking out a small wooden container to store the flower inside of.


    The wooden container was of course not made of normal wood, but was made of spiritual wood and had been engraved with several different formations to make sure the spiritual herb would not be damaged in any way. At the same time, the wooden container also helped seal the aura of the flower!


    Of course¡­ This was not perfect, as parts of the aura still leaked out. Even when the flower had been ced inside his interspatial ring! The flower was simply way too powerful and Xuan Hao had no way to fully seal it without damaging it with his current cultivation!


    Swish~


    Not wanting to leave behind the pure spiritual water that the rabbit demon beast had likely gathered to help the flower mature, Xuan Hao decided to also take it away together with the flower.


    Not only the pure spiritual water, but Xuan Hao also took anything precious inside the rabbit demon beast''s home. Spiritual Herbs, spirit stones, artifacts and all kinds of things it had collected over its long life was directly taken away by Xuan Hao.


    In the end, he had filled up more than three interspatial rings!


    Whoosh~!


    The entire thing happened in an instant, as Xuan Hao harvested the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb and the rest of the rabbit demon beast''s treasures before rushing back towards the surface. Not wanting to stay around in case it returned and realized that its spiritual herb and all its treasures had been stolen.


    ¡­


    Now¡­ How do I get out of here without getting found¡­?


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Peeking up from the hole in the ground towards the battle taking ce only a short distance away from his current location, Xuan Hao did not sneak away with the use of his ice domain like he had done before¡­


    The main reason for this, was that he was certain that the two fighting in the air above him would notice the aura of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb the moment he left his current location and tried escaping.


    Digging through the ground trying to escape their vision was not an option either, as the act of digging through the ground would be far easier to spot. Let alone someone at the Domain Lord Realm. Even someone at the Nascent Soul Realm would notice him if he tried digging right under them!


    Of course, there were some exceptions to this¡­ Like the rabbit demon beast currently locked in a deadly battle with the demonic cultivator...


    "Haa¡­" Not seeing any way out of his current situation without the two spotting him, Xuan Hao wished that he could also be a rabbit demon beast and dig through the ground without anyone noticing him¡­.


    Bang!


    "Ah-!"


    However, this did of course not happen, as the demonic cultivator above was suddenly sent flying into a nearby mountain by the rabbit demon beast.


    ROAR!


    Roaring loudly filled with killing intent. Having shed his human form and looking like a massive demon that had crawled out from the depths of hell several timesrger than his normal size, the demonic cultivator pped his massive demonic wings as he and the rabbit demon beast violently ripped each other apart, causing rivers of blood to form beneath them as their massive bodies rapidly healed any damage they took.


    The fight seemed to get more brutal the longer it went on, as both parties continued the fight with no intention of retreating.


    "¡­"


    Watching this take ce, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say, as the demonic cultivator no longer used any techniques and instead used his physical body to fight with the rabbit demon beast.


    Maybe this is a chance¡­?


    Suddenly realizing that both the rabbit demon beast and the demonic cultivator seemed to be fully absorbed on each other as they violently ripped each other apart, Xuan Hao decided to sneak out from the hole in the ground under the cover of his ice domain. Slowly moving away from the battlefield of the rabbit demon beast and the demonic cultivator.


    Riiip~


    ROOOOAR!


    Just at this moment, the demonic cultivator suddenly seemed to have gained the upper hand in the brutal melee fight, as he ripped off two of the rabbit demon beast''s legs before throwing them towards the ground below.


    Whoosh~


    As the rabbit demon beast''s legs flew through the air, Xuan Hao who was just about to reach a safe distance away from the battle, could not help cursing at the demonic cultivator upon realizing that the rabbit legs were heading directly towards him!


    Swish!


    Not only that, but the rabbit demon beast was still very intent on keeping its legs, as it rushed in the direction that its legs were flying. After all, making a new pair of legs would require far more qipared to just reconnecting the pair that had been ripped off by the demonic cultivator¡­


    "Hehe, think I will just let you get your legs for free!?" The demonic cultivator wanted to take advantage of this fact, so he sneakily moved behind the demon rabbit. Prepared tounch a deadly attack the moment it tried to reconnect its legs!


    "¡­"


    Seeing the two rushing towards him, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say¡­


    Whoosh~!


    In the end, all he could do at this point was use the Drifting Cloud Steps to run away before the two got any closer to him. After all, there was no way he would be able to hide if those two ended up fighting next to him. Not to mention the fact that they would likely end up finding him even before they started fighting again¡­


    Roar?


    "Huh?"


    Seeing someone suddenly appear on the ground beneath them, both the demonic cultivator and the rabbit demon beast were left speechless as they stared dumbly in the direction that Xuan Hao had escaped in for a short moment. Not understanding how someone had been able to hide so close by without any of them noticing anything.


    ROOOOOOOOOAR!


    Suddenly feeling the aura of the Spiritual Herb that it had been taking care of for thousands of years in preparation to use it to reach the Soul Ascension Realm, the rabbit demon beast''s eyes went bloodshot, as it grabbed its legs before rushing in the direction that Xuan Hao had escaped in-


    Whoosh!


    Ignoring the demonic cultivator who had still not reacted to the sudden appearance of Xuan Hao¡­

 Chapter 562: Chased across the Frozen Wasteland!

    Chapter 562: Chased across the Frozen Wastnd!


    "You-! Wait for me!"


    Swish-!


    Suddenly finding himself standing alone watching the figure of the rabbit demon beast disappear into the distance, the demonic cultivator finally reacted as he angrily yelled in the direction of the rabbit demon beast before he used hisrge demonic wings to chase after it. Not intending to get left behind.


    This was especially true given the fact he had just been about tond a fatal blow on the rabbit demon beast before someone had suddenly appeared out of nowhere to interrupt his n! Not only that, but the other party had run away together with the rabbit demon beast, while he had just remained shocked on the spot.


    It was truly embarrassing for something like that to happen given his current cultivation realm¡­ For this reason, the demonic cultivator not only nned to kill the rabbit demon beast when he caught up, but also Xuan Hao who had interrupted him just when he was about to seed in taking down the rabbit demon beast!


    ¡­


    Whoosh!


    Dashing across the barrenndscape of the Frozen Wastnd, Xuan Hao could not help anxiously looking at the rabbit demon beast behind him.


    The speed of the rabbit demon beast was simply way too fast, as it jumped through the air. Crossing over the distance of several kilometers in an instant.


    The natural speed of this demon beast is simply way too strong¡­ The demonic cultivator had also appeared in the distance at this point as he was trying his best to catch up. Even though he was slightly slowerpared to the rabbit demon beast, the demonic cultivator would still be able to catch up the moment he and the rabbit demon beast started fighting!


    Thinking this to himself as he felt the rabbit demon beast get closer and closer together with the demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao further increased his speed with the Drifting Cloud Steps. Only stopping after reaching the limit of what he could handle at the moment.


    Increasing his speed any further with the Drifting Cloud Steps would require the use of spatial maniption. Not something Xuan Hao nned to try in his current situation, as he understood that he might idently end up teleporting backwards. Delivering himself to the rabbit demon beast.


    "It''s still getting closer?!" Realizing that the rabbit demon beast also increased its speed together with him and even started closing the distance between them at an even faster speedpared to before, Xuan Hao could not help eximing loudly as he felt a shiver run down his spine.


    The rabbit demon beast''s speed was simply terrifying! Even with a movement technique like the Drifting Cloud Steps, he had no way to outrun a demon beast focused on speed like therge snow-white rabbit chasing after him!


    At this rate¡­ Let alone escaping from the Frozen Wastnd, I won''t even be able to make it halfway there!


    Trying his best to think up a way to escape his current situation without having to face the rabbit demon beast and the demonic cultivator in a fight, Xuan Hao suddenly remembered the Frost Devil Sect that he had visited just a few days earlier.


    Even if he would not be able to leave the Frozen Wastnd before the rabbit demon beast caught up to him together with the demonic cultivator, he should still be able to reach the Frost Devil Sect¡­


    Whoosh!


    As this thought appeared in his mind, Xuan Hao changed directions from the closest way out of the Frozen Wastnd, to the location of the Frost Devil sect.


    "Wha-!? Why are you two so fast!?" Realizing that he was being left behind again as Xuan Hao and the rabbit demon beast both increased their speed, the demonic cultivator could not help cursing to himself before he took out arge blood vial from his interspatial ring.


    "Blood Sacrifice, Enhance Speed!"


    Roaring this to himself, the blood vial he had just taken out from his interspatial ring shattered.


    Whoosh~


    Shortly after the blood vial shattered, the demonic cultivator was covered in a red light for a short moment before his speed rapidly increased. Allowing him to catch up with the rabbit demon beast and Xuan Hao the next moment.


    ¡­


    Compared to the days it had taken him to travel to the location of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb, Xuan Hao used only half a day to reach the perimeter of the Frost Devil Sect!


    The main reason for this, was because he no longer needed to care about hiding his presence and being careful whenever he encountered any demonic cultivators. Instead, he could focus all his strength on escaping without caring if anyrge group of demonic cultivators managed to spot him.


    In the first ce, the demonic cultivators who spotted him would be scared silly the moment they noticed the terrifying rabbit demon beast and demonic cultivators chasing after him. After all, both the demonic cultivator and the rabbit demon beast were already one step into the Soul Ascension Realm!


    An existence like them stood at the peak of the outer region of the Frozen Wastnd! For this reason, most demonic cultivators decided not to follow when they saw them and instead chose to hide away¡­


    However, there were still a few demonic cultivators at the Third Demonic Transformation Realm who were brave enough to chase after them¡­ Sadly for these demonic cultivators, they soon realized that they were far too slow to keep up, as they soon chose to give up.


    "There it is!" Feeling the familiar auras of a few hundred demonic cultivators hiding around the entrance to the Frost Devil Sect in the distance, Xuan Hao could not help smiling happily as he felt a few terrifying auras re up from the direction of the Frost Devil Sect.


    Compared to when he had firste to the scout out the Frost Devil Sect to make sure that it was truly the main sect of the Frost Devil Sect without being found by hiding with his domain, this time around the elders from the Frost Devil Sect spotted him the moment he entered the perimeter of the sect.


    "WHO DARES BARGE INTO THE TERRIFTORY OF THE FROST DEVIL SECT!?" Just as he was about to reach the entrance of the Frost Devil Sect, an even more terrifying aura not the slightest bit inferior to the demonic cultivator and rabbit demon beast chasing him appeared from the core of the sect.


    Swish-!


    However, Xuan Hao did not care about this, as the sword gifted to him by Yi Min appeared in his hand before shing down towards the entrance of the Frost Devil.


    BOOOM!


    Although the entrance of the Frost Devil Sect had been reinforced and was strengthened by the sect''s defensive formation, it was far from strong enough to resist an attack at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and had no way to resist Xuan Hao''s sword. Directly shattering apart to reveal the Frost Devil Sect hidden behind it.


    Whoosh!


    Not waiting around, Xuan Hao directly rushed into the Frost Devil Sect before the formation managed to fully activate and repair the damage he had caused.


    "YOU-!?" Not expecting Xuan Hao to directly ignore him and shatter his sect entrance before rushing inside, the voice from the depths of the Frost Devil Sect erupted violently filled with killing intent before rushing towards Xuan Hao who had just entered his sect.


    Bzzz~


    Together with the angry voice, the formation covering the Frost Devil Sect also fully activated and repaired the damage Xuan Hao had caused. Instantly sealing him inside the Frost Devil Sect with no way out.


    "Hehe, you have no way out now! Why would you stupidly rush into my sect, your cultivation is not evenparable to mine-"


    BOOOM!!


    RUMBLE~


    Just as the Sect Master of the Frost Devil Sect appeared in front of Xuan Hao and started to taunt him, the formation of the Frost Devil Sect began violently shaking before cracks appeared all over it.


    The demon rabbit had arrived! Not only that, but it had directly attacked the formation of the Frost Devil Sect after realizing that the person who had stolen its spiritual herb was hiding inside of it.


    In the eyes of the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao had clearly escaped to the Frost Devil Sect and was working together with the Sect Master of the Frost Devil Sect! There was no way the rabbit demon beast would just allow him to hide away inside the Frost Devil Sect and get away with its chance to be a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast!


    Filled with killing intent as its gaze focused at Xuan Hao inside the formation of the Frost Devil Sect, the rabbit demon beast was met with Xuan Hao tauntingly smiling towards him, his eyes clearly filled with disdain!


    Crack~!


    BOOOOOOOOM-!


    Feeling its anger reach a new level upon seeing this, the rabbit demon beast used even more strength. Directly breaking apart the sect protection formation of the Frost Devil Sect!

 Chapter 563: Throw the Frost Devil Sect into the Fire and Run Away~

    Chapter 563: Throw the Frost Devil Sect into the Fire and Run Away~


    "My sect formation¡­" Seeing the sect formation that had taken years to build and countless resources copse after a few attacks from the rabbit demon beast, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect froze on the spot in a slightly dazed state. Not understanding what had just taken ce.


    Whoosh~


    "Master! Please help me!" Screaming this loudly upon seeing the dazed state of the Frost Devil Sect''s Sect Master, Xuan Hao quickly dashed behind him before the rabbit demon beast had time to reach him. cing the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect between himself and the rabbit demon beast.


    "Huh?"


    ROAR!


    Not able to say anything before Xuan Hao had dashed behind him to escape the attack of the rabbit demon beast charging into his sect, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect was suddenly met with the terrifyingly fast paw attack of the rabbit demon beast-


    BANG!


    Managing to defend against the attack in thest second, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect was not injured by the rabbit demon beast, as he was just sent flying backwards towards the ce Xuan Hao was standing.


    It''s all this guy''s doing! He wants to use me to deal with this rabbit demon beast!


    Realizing what was happening as he flew through the air towards Xuan Hao, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect narrowed his eyes as a terrifying killing intent appeared in the depths of his eyes.


    After all, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect was still an expert close to reaching the True Demon Realm! Using someone like that was never something that would be easy to do and Xuan Hao understood this very well as he took out the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb.


    "The sect master is truly powerful! I believe it will be no problem for the sect master to deal with this demon beast just as you nned! After that, the sect master is sure to reach the True Demon Realm with the help of the spiritual herb!" Saying this out loud, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling to himself upon seeing the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect freeze up once again after seeing the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb.


    Bang!


    Swish!


    Using the opportunity, Xuan Hao rushed forward with the help of the Drifting Cloud Steps and used the t side of his sword to send the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect flying back towards the rabbit demon beast.


    "You-"


    Realizing what had happened when it was already toote, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect could only curse at Xuan Hao in his mind, as the rabbit demon beast charged over filled with killing intent.


    From its expression, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect could clearly tell that it had heard what Xuan Hao had said. Even worse, it did not doubt his words¡­


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Not able toe up with anything to defend himself from being drawn into conflict with the rabbit demon beast, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect and the rabbit demon beast soon started fighting each other in the air above the Frost Devil Sect.


    The battle instantly caused arge part of the Frost Devil Sect to copse, as the battle between two experts half a step into the Soul Ascension Realm was simply not something the Frost Devil Sect could deal with. Especially now that their sect protection formation had been destroyed¡­


    "What in the world is happening¡­ Howe the rabbit suddenly started attacking the Frost Devil Sect¡­" Arriving to this scene, the demonic cultivator who had been chasing Xuan Hao and the rabbit demon beast all this time could not help tilting his head in confusion. Not understanding why, the rabbit demon beast had started fighting with the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect.


    "Ah! Brother ck Hand! Please help me out! This demon beast-"


    Bang!


    Familiar with the demonic cultivator who had arrived, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect called out to him for help. Only to have the rabbit demon beast take advantage of hisck of attention to use itsrge paw to m him into the ground below before using a special technique to slowly crush his body and soul trapped under itsrge paw.


    "This idiot¡­" Seeing the scene where the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect was easily supressed by the rabbit demon beast, the demonic cultivator revealed to be called ck Hand could not help shaking his head in disdain.


    The sect master of the Frost Devil Sect and the rabbit demon beast were both at the same realm, yet the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect had been supressed so easily by the other party within less than a minute of fighting!


    "Haa¡­ Guess I will have to help this idiot if I want to deal with this rabbit demon beast before it runs away again¡­" Muttering this to himself as he remembered just how much faster than him the rabbit demon beast was, the demonic cultivator decided to help the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect.


    Swoosh!


    Bang-!


    Sending the rabbit demon beast flying, the demonic cultivator called ck Hand easily helped free the now haggard looking sect master of the Frost Devil Sect.


    "Let''s deal with this rabbit¡­ I will of course take its body after-"


    "W-we can''t let that person escape! He is the one who set me up. Not to mention he also got his hand on a Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb!"


    Interrupting ck Hand before he could finish what he was saying, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect anxiously pointed towards a figure slowly disappearing in the distance.


    ¡­


    A little earlier after the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect and the rabbit demon beast started fighting with each other, Xuan Hao put away the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb before hiding himself with his ice domain before sneaking away from the Frost Devil Sect.


    In the first ce, his n had been to use the Frost Devil Sect to dy the rabbit demon beast and buy enough time for himself to put arge enough distance between himself and the rabbit demon beast so he could safely make it out of the Frozen Wastnd and back into the territory of the Sky Empire.


    "Hehe, when that demonic cultivator shows up and interrupts those two, I will already be gone!" Chuckling to himself as he thought about this scenario ying out, Xuan Hao could not help feeling grateful towards the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect for his help in holding back the rabbit demon beast.


    Even if it had been a gamble for him to enter the Frost Devil Sect and try to use its sect master as a distraction, Xuan Hao understood that he had no other way to escape from the rabbit demon beast.


    In the end, the rabbit demon beast was simply way too fast, and he had no way of reaching the border between the Frozen Wastnd and the Sky Empire before it caught up to him¡­


    Even if he reached the border of the Sky Empire and made his way over it, Xuan Hao doubted he would survive long enough for the experts of the Sky Empire guarding the border of the Sky Empire against any powerful invaders to notice ande over.


    Having made it far enough away from the Frost Devil Sect, Xuan Hao no longer bothered hiding himself. Instead using the Drifting Cloud Step to escape at the fastest speed possible. Even if the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect spotted him, he knew that the other party would be too busy fighting off the crazed rabbit demon beast to say anything.


    Swish-!


    Crossing the frozen tundra of the Frozen Wastnd at a terrifying speed, Xuan Hao barely managed to catch sight of the powerful demonic cultivator who had been chasing behind him and the rabbit demon beast arriving to save the struggling sect mater of the Frost Devil Sect before they were no longer in sight.


    However, he was no longer worrying about the three of them any longer as he had already managed to leave the three half-step Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the dust. Leaving them no chance of catching up to him before he had made it back inside the territory of the Sky Empire!


    No matter how brave the two demonic cultivators were, Xuan Hao doubted that they would dare follow him outside the Frozen Wastnd. After all, demonic cultivators were seen as the enemy of most cultivation sects, religions, kingdoms, and empires across the Ewaria Continent.


    Only inside the Frozen Wastnd could demonic cultivators move around freely without fear of being hunted down...


    Inside arge empire like the Sky Empire things were different, they would have to be prepared to not only be hunted down by experts on their own level, but also experts at the Soul Ascension Realm!

 Chapter 564: The Chase Continues...

    Chapter 564: The Chase Continues...


    "So, the person who just asked was had a Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb on him¡­?"


    "Yes! This is most likely the reason why the rabbit demon beast chased after him and even started attacking me after he convinced it that he was working for me to steal the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb!"


    Having managed to push back the angry rabbit demon beast momentarily, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect wasted no time in informing the demonic cultivator called ck Hand about what had taken ce.


    Of course, the knowledge of this was more than enough to stop ck Hand from continuing his attack on the rabbit demon beast. After all, a Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb would be far more useful than devouring the rabbit demon beast¡­


    That was not mentioning the fact that he would still have to kill the rabbit demon beast if he ever wanted to devour it. Not something he thought would be possible if the rabbit demon beast used all its strength to run away after sensing that it was about to die¡­


    ROOOOOAR!


    Roaring loudly filled with killing intent, the rabbit demon beast seemed to have realized that the person who it had been chasing had disappeared along with the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb.


    Whoosh~!


    Not waiting for the two demonic cultivators to finish talking with each other, the rabbit demon beastpletely ignored them as it rushed in the direction Xuan Hao had disappeared. Tracking him through the scent trail left behind by the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb.


    ""¡­""


    Not expecting for the rabbit demon beast to act faster than them, the two demonic cultivators looked awkwardly at each other before a pair ofrge demonic wings appeared behind both of them.


    p~


    pping theirrge demonic wings, the two demonic cultivators soared into the sky. Wanting to chase after the rabbit demon beast and Xuan Hao.


    "Sect master! What are we supposed to do!?"


    Having been left behind without knowing what had just happened, one of the elders of the Frost Devil Sect who had survived the battle yelled out loudly in hope that his sect master would answer him.


    Swoosh~


    Sadly, his sect master ignored him and soon disappeared behind the horizon together with ck Hand.


    Not only was ck Hand tempted by the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb, but so was the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect!


    The reason why he didn''t hide anything about the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb from ck Hand was because he understood that he had no chance of getting his hand on the spiritual herb alone¡­ Having ck Hand help him out and taking the spiritual herb away while he was busy fighting with the rabbit demon beast seemed like the best option!


    As for worrying about Xuan Hao who had run off with the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb? The sect master of the Frost Devil Sect did not really worry about him, as he had already realized that the other party was far weaker than him!


    ck Hand of course understood the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect''s train of thought, as he had already thought up a few ways to deal with his good friend when it came down to it and secure the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb for himself¡­


    Whoosh-!


    Like this, ck Hand and the rabbit demon beast resumed their chase. The only difference being the addition of the Frost Devil Sect''s sect master!


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was trying his best to make his way out of the Frozen Wastnd with two demonic cultivators half a step into the True Demon Realm and a demon beast half a step into the Soul Ascension Realm chasing him, Zhu Lian was about to reach the Flying Sword Sect under the protection of Zu Fei.


    "We will soon be back at the Flying Sword Sect, I hope the journey haven''t been too rough on you¡­" Saying this all of a sudden, Zu Fei looked a bit worried towards Zhu Lian.


    "I''m fine¡­ I should be able to keep going for a few more hours before needing to rest¡­" Understanding that Zu Fei was genuinely worried about her, Zhu Lian smiled warmly as she said this while doing her best to move forward without showing any signs of weakness.


    However, Zu Fei still managed to notice how much she was struggling to move¡­


    "I will carry you the rest of the way!" Lifting up the dead looking Zhu Lian, Zu Fei decided to carry her the rest of the way to the Flying Sword Sect.


    "I¡­ Fine¡­" Understanding that Zu Fei would not ept a refusal, Zhu Lian let Zu Fei pull carry her before rapidly moving towards the Flying Sword Sect where she would at least be able to get treated and stabilize her current condition.


    "Haa¡­"


    Seeing how much she was struggling with her current condition; Zu Fei could not help remembering how she had first seen Zhu Lian. Back then, Zu Fei had been shocked at just how damaged her body was and had wondered how she had even managed to keep her physical body alive in such a situation.


    Not only that, but after investigating the state of her body, Zu Fei had also discovered that her nascent soul had sustained some damage. Although not as much as her physical body, it was still damage to her soul!


    Luckily, it looked like most of it had been repaired by someone who she guessed was Xuan Hao¡­ If not for that, Zu Fei doubted that Zhu Lian would ever be able to recover from the injuries she had sustained¡­


    Of course, all of this made Zu Fei curious about just what had happened to Zhu Lian for her to end up in such a state. However, in the end she still decided not to ask her about it as it might not be something she wanted to talk about to a person she had just met for the first time¡­


    Thinking about it, Zu Fei realized that Zhu Lian had most likely not met anyone from the Flying Sword Sect outside of Elder Xuan and the new elder called Chi Hu ording to what she had been told about her before setting off to escort her to the sect!


    Hm¡­ If it''s like this, why don''t I be her friend¡­?


    As this thought appeared in her mind, Zu Fei could not help feeling a bit excited at the prospect of her bing friends with Zhu Lian. The main reason for this being that she did not really have any close friends among the elders of the Flying Sword Sect outside of the Core Elders who she met up with every now and then.


    However, all things considered, the other core elders were all old men well above a hundred years old¡­ Until the Spring Flower Sect and the Flying Sword Sect merged together, Zu Fei knew that she would most likely not get a female friend who was around the same strength as herself and wouldn''t die off after two or three hundred years¡­


    After all, for a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, the lifespan of a Core Formation Realm Expert would make it hard for them to truly be close and form a friendship¡­


    In a sense, most cultivators were like that, as they would not form close friendships or be daopanions with people below their cultivation realm. No one wanted to watch their best friend or lover slowly age away as death soon imed them!


    "Zhu Lian¡­ When we reach the Flying Sword Sect and your situation have stabilized, you cane to my ce, and I will show you around the sect." Feeling a bit nervous while saying this, Zu Fei waited for a response.


    "Sure, that sounds great!"


    Hearing Zhu Lian''s response, Zu Fei could not help smiling slightly to herself as she began looking forward to showing Zhu Lian around the Flying Sword Sect and the different ces she liked to cultivate whenever she didn''t feel like doing it inside her own pavilion.


    "Great! I will make sure that those people at the Alchemy Hall helps stabilize your situation as quickly as possible!" Saying this with a satisfied and happy expression on her face, Zu Fei increased her speed as she couldn''t wait to reach the Flying Sword Sect.


    Swish~!


    Acting nothing like how she normally did in the Flying Sword Sect in front of Zhu Lian.


    ¡­


    Finally! The border of the Frozen Wastnd!


    At this time, Xuan Hao could not help breathing out a sigh of relief as he saw the border of the Frozen Wastnd appearing in the distance.


    Even if the three half a step Soul Ascension Realm Experts were closing in on him, Xuan Hao understood that none of them would be able to catch up to him before he crossed over the border and entered the territory of the Sky Empire!


    Even the rabbit demon beast that was chasing him filled with an unbearable killing intent would not be able to catch him before he had crossed the border!

 Chapter 565: Crossing the Border

    Chapter 565: Crossing the Border


    Wasting no time keeping an eye on the three chasing after him filled with killing intent after making sure that none of them would have a chance to catch up to him before he made it back into the territory of the Sky Empire, Xuan soon crossed the border between the Frozen Wastnd and the Sky Empire.


    Whoosh!


    Of course, he did not stop after crossing the border as he very well understood that he would not be safe there. Even if the Sky Empire discovered the two powerful demonic cultivators and demon beast entering their territory, it would still take some time for them to respond and actually have someonee over to deal with them.


    After all, the three were just a single step away from the Soul Ascension Realm and were not someone that could simply be dealt with by the normal guards at the Domain Lord Realm patrolling around the massive borders of the Sky Empire. At the very least, someone with simr strength would have to show up¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao didn''t rush back to the Flying Sword Sect, but instead chose to make his way towards the core region of the Sky Empire. This way, he would not idently end up putting the Flying Sword in danger and at the same time would make it easier for the Sky Empire to show up and deal with the three following behind him.


    To be honest, Xuan Hao was a bit surprised when he looked back and saw all three cross the border between the Sky Empire and the Frozen Wastnd without the slightest bit of hesitation.


    "I need to find a way to properly hide the Ascendent Grade Spiritual Herb before the people from the Sky Empire shows up¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit worried.


    The reason why they had followed him into the Sky Empire without any hesitation was because of the Ascendent Grade Spiritual Herb!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao began to feel a bit nervous about the fact that the people from the Sky Empire might react in a simr way and try to take the Ascendent Grade Spiritual Herb from him.


    All things considered, he did not really have much of an identity inside the Sky Empire and the peopleing to deal with the two demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast would most likely not care about offending him for an Ascendent Grade Spiritual Herb that could help increase their chances of reaching the Soul Ascension.


    Before that happened, he had to find a way to properly hide the Ascendent Grade Spiritual Herb!


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao, the rabbit demon beast and the two demonic cultivators crossed over the border and entered the Sky Empire without making any attempt at hiding their presence, a half-asleep soldier waszily monitoring an artifact inside arge flying ship with the banner of the Sky Empire engraved into it


    "Hm?" Having suddenly seen something through the artifact, the soldier could not help raising his eyebrows as he decided to look closer.


    "This is¡­ Captain!" Not even a secondter, the solder stood up in surprise before calling out for his captain.


    Through the help of the artifact, he had quickly realized that several powerful people above the Nascent Soul Realm had suddenly appeared at the border between the Sky Empire and the Frozen Wastnd.


    In such a situation, the soldier understood just how important it was for him to inform the captain and have him do a thorough investigation with the help of the artifact they had on board for keeping an eye on the borders of the Sky Empire.


    After all, the only thing the soldier could see through the artifact was the fact that several powerful experts above the Nascent Soul Realm had appeared, he had no way to fully utilize the artifact with his current strength.


    Only the captain who had reached the Domain Lord Realm would be able to fully utilize the artifact onboard the ship to see this, as it required the strength of someone in the Domain Lord Realm to fully use the artifact.


    "What is it? Did someone strong perhaps appear?" Hearing the call of the soldier, the captain who was never too far away from the artifact used to monitor the border of the Sky Empire rushed over and asked.


    "Y-yes! Someone above the Nascent Soul Realm entered from the Frozen Wastnd! More than one-" Nodding his head anxiously as he said this the moment he saw his captain, the soldier was interrupted as the captain directly pushed him aside and picked up the artifact.


    "This is¡­" Not even a few secondster, the captain who had used the artifact to investigate what had happened frowned as a fearful expression appeared on his face.


    Compared to the soldier who only knew that it was four people above the Nascent Soul Realm who crossed over the border between the Sky Empire and the Frozen Wastnd, the captain of the flying ship could clearly see though the four people''s strength with the help of the artifact.


    Two demonic cultivators half a step into the True Demon Realm and a demon beast half a step into the Soul Ascension Realm! These three were all chasing after a cultivator who had reached the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    No matter which of these four it was facing him, the captain knew very well that he had no way to deal with any of them as he had only reached the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    As for why the two demonic cultivators and the demon beast were chasing the cultivator at the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­ He had no idea and he didn''t want to waste time thinking about it!


    For now, the most important thing was to get in contact with his superior and inform him about what was happening so he would be able to send someone strong enough to deal with the four people who had suddenly entered the Sky Empire.


    Even if the Seventh Stage Domain Lord was not anything to worry about, the same could not be said for the two demonic cultivators and the demon beast who had entered¡­ With their strength and identity, the captain could easily see them destroying the kingdoms and forces of the Sky Empire located in the border region!


    Swish~


    Disappearing directly in front of the small soldier who had been shell-shocked by his captain''s reaction, the captain rushed back to the control room before contacting his superiors about the situation. Hoping that they would be able to send someone over to deal with the two demonic cultivators and the demon beast before they started causing any damage.


    "C-captain¡­?" The soldier who slowly recovered from his shocked state called out in the direction his captain had left in a confused tone.


    It was not the first time he had encountered a situation where he spotted a group of experts above the Nascent Soul Realm entering the Sky Empire. However, it was the first time he had seen his captain act so panicked. Not even bothering to exin anything to him before disappearing.


    This of course made the soldier and the other soldiers nearby who had witnessed what had happened realize just how serious things were. At the same time, they also realized that the people who had entered the Sky Empire should be someone stronger than their captain and also someone who would very likely cause a lot of damage!


    ¡­


    As the captain ryed the information about the demonic cultivators and the demon beast that had entered the Sky Empire, the capital of the Sky Empire was informed, and a group of experts was quickly gathered and dispatched to deal with the two demonic cultivators and the demon beast. Half being from the imperial family, while the other half being from the noble families of the Sky Empire.


    Given that the church of the gue god was still causing trouble for the threerge religions inside the Sky Empire, the imperial family did not feel hesitant when sending out a group of experts to deal with the three troublemakers who had entered their territory.


    If not for the church of the gue god, the imperial family of the Sky Empire would have hesitated in sending a group of experts strong enough to deal with what was essentially three experts half a step into the Soul Ascension Realm due to the three religions possibly taking advantage of such a situation. Not to mention that the noble families would most likely not have agreed to help out so quickly¡­


    However, things were different now that the three major religions were tied up in a battle for faith with the church of the gue god. Allowing the imperial family to move without any restraints inside the capital city.


    In the end, the noble families could only refuse the imperial family if they had the help of the three religions, without them, there was no way for them to singlehandedly stand against the imperial family of the Sky Empire without repercussions!

 Chapter 566: Back to the Iron Sky Kingdom

    Chapter 566: Back to the Iron Sky Kingdom


    Now that I think about it¡­ I never really thought about just how long it would take for the people from the Sky Empire to show up¡­


    No matter how strong the Sky Empire was, it would still take them some time to gather a group of people strong enough to deal with the two demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast¡­ That was unless one of the Soul Ascension Realm experts from the imperial family ended up taking action to deal with the matter themselves!


    However, given the importance of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert, Xuan Hao doubted that one of the Sky Empire''s Soul Ascension Realm Experts would act¡­


    Watching as the rabbit demon beast had almost reached him, Xuan Hao could not help frowning after thinking about this.


    In the first ce, he still had to find a way to hide the Transcendent Grade Spiritual herb, as it was currently rather easy for someone in the Domain Lord Realm to notice its presence if they were close enough to the interspatial ring around his finger.


    "Haa¡­ How troublesome¡­ Wait- Maybe I can ask Yi Min for help¡­?" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao suddenly remembered Yi Min who had been the one to inform him about the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb in the first ce.


    Given that she was a renowned cksmith, she would likely also have a way to iste the aura of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb.


    Not to mention one of the two demonic cultivators chasing him at the moment, was none other than the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect that she had asked him to look for! Not only that, but with her status, Yi Min would most likely not care too much about the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb.


    After all, she had used more than one Transcendent Grade Spiritual herb and other Transcendent Grade Natural Treasures in the construction of the massive formation surrounding the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom, that was not mentioning the fact that she was the one who had given him the location of the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb in the first ce!


    Whoosh~!


    Havinge to a decision, Xuan Hao changed his direction and rushed towards the direction of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Compared to the past when he had gone together with Qing Yi, his speed was many times faster with the help of the Drifting Cloud Steps. At this speed, crossing a small kingdom only took a few minutes at most!


    "I should contact her first before just suddenly showing up at her doorstep with two demonic cultivators half a step into the True Demon Realm and a demon beast half a step into the Soul Ascension Realm¡­" Remembering just how powerful the three following behind him were, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly before taking out hismunication talisman to contact Yi Min.


    ¡­


    Crash-!


    "Hm¡­? What!? The sect master of the Frost Devil Sect is chasing you together with another demonic cultivator and demon beast at the same realm as him!? Haa¡­ Yes¡­ You cane over, I managed to repair the hidden danger left behind by those people already, so my formation is capable of operating at full capacity again! I will also contact the Sky Empire and have theme over-"


    Inside therge pce at the centre of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Yi Min who had just beenzily leaning against a window frame had jumped up with a surprised expression on her face, as the tray filled with all sorts of snacks located just next to her had fallen on the ground together with the cup of tea that had unfortunately been ced on the same tray as the snacks.


    "Ah-! No!" Realizing that her snacks and freshly brewed tea had fallen on the ground, Yi Min''s expression became downcast, as she understood that she would not have enough time to wait for her servants to make some new snacks before Xuan Hao arrived together with the two demonic cultivators and the demon beast.


    Looking down at the several cracked cookies and other snacks on the ground, Yi Min quickly calmed down as she picked themunication talisman back up before contacting the people from the imperial family. Informing them about the ce where the two demonic cultivators were going to show up.


    The imperial family member she contacted did not ask too many questions about this, but Yi Min still understood that the other party had guessed that she was somehow rted to the Domain Lord currently escaping from the three.


    In the end, Yi Min did not really care about this¡­ Xuan Hao had asked her for help, so he should at the very least expect that her enemies would think that he had sided with her after finding out about his identity and potentially start targeting him in the future.


    All things considered, her biggest enemy already knew to some degree about her involvement with Xuan Hao and the fact that they were on friendly terms¡­ Himing to her for help would only cement their rtionship as allies in these people''s eyes¡­


    "Not a bad thing at all¡­" Muttering this to herself as she thought about this, Yi Min could not help feeling a bit happy as her lips curled into a small smile.


    When the entire matter was over, Xuan Hao would not only owe her a favour for helping him out, but he would also be considered to have allied together with her in the eyes of the different factions inside the Sky Empire!


    "Now to check the formation¡­ No matter what, I can''t let that bastard from the Frost Devil Sect escape alive! The formation is also fully operational now¡­ Hehe, it''s been quite some time since I managed to truly use it! Even if you managed to reach the True Demon Realm, there is no way to escape as long as you enter my formation~" Saying this, Yi Min made her way out of the pce room she had been staying inside before making her way towards the borders of the Iron Sky Kingdom where she began checking each of therge towers located all around the border with a serious expression on her face.


    ¡­


    "To think I would gather so much attention on my way to the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­" Still making his way towards the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he looked back and saw close to a dozen angry Domain Lords chasing after him to no avail.


    These Domain Lords were the different kings of the kingdoms he had passed through during his escape. Not only did they not ignore him. Instead they decided to chase after him¡­ Very clearly, they had sensed the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb he was carrying! Otherwise, it made no sense for them to try and chase after him with the presence of the two demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast.


    However, in the end, this did not really matter to Xuan Hao, as the Domain Lords quickly got left behind with his speed.


    Even if more and more of them showed up, Xuan Hao understood that none of them were strong enough to catch up to him. After all, the Domain Lords in the border region were only at the lower levels of the Domain Lord Realm. The strongest he had seen so far had only reached the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Why they had chosen to chase him even knowing they had no way to fight him for the spiritual herb was a mystery, as they most likely just wanted to fish for benefits when the people from the Sky Empire arrived to deal with the two demonic cultivators and the demon beast-


    "HAHAHA, so many little fish showing up?! How lucky!"


    Just at this moment, the demonic cultivator called ck Handughed loudly as he appeared behind a group of Domain Lords chasing Xuan Hao together with them.


    Ptch!


    The next moment, several tentacles appeared from all over his body before piercing though the bodies of the Domain Lords. Not giving them any time to react and escape.


    Swish-!


    Devouring the blood and qi of these Domain Lords in an instant, ck Hand''s speed rapidly increased as a dark red light covered his body. All of a sudden, his speed far surpassed that of the rabbit demon beast!


    How in the world did he get so fast!?


    Watching this scene, Xuan Hao could not help cursing to himself as he watched the demonic cultivator called ck Hand rapidly approaching him.


    With his current speed, ck Hand would not only be able to overtake the rabbit demon beast, but he would also be able to catch up to him!


    At that point in time, let alone reaching the Iron Sky Kingdom, he would most likely not even get close enough for Yi Min toe out and help him!

 Chapter 567: Yi Mins Arrival!

    Chapter 567: Yi Min''s Arrival!


    Knowing that he would not be able to reach the Iron Sky Kingdom before the demonic cultivator managed to catch up to him, Xuan Hao frowned as he prepared himself to fight the demonic cultivator. Hopefully being able to survive long enough to reach the Iron Sky Kingdom...


    Swish~


    Suddenly sensing something wrong with the rabbit demon beast the moment the demonic cultivator was about to overtake it, Xuan Hao could not help opening both his eyes in surprise, as the rabbit demon beast suddenly appeared on top of the demonic cultivator before using him as a springboard tounch itself forward with increased speed.


    All of a sudden, the demonic cultivator had been sent flying backwards by the rabbit demon beast-


    BANG!


    Directly smashing into a nearby mountain after not having been able to stop the rabbit demon beast from sending him flying¡­


    "YOU DAMNABLE RABBIT!"


    Screaming loudly filled with killing intent, the demonic cultivator could only get back up before continuing to chase after Xuan Hao and the rabbit demon beast. However, this time around, he was so far behind that even with his increased speed, he would not have time to catch up with Xuan Hao before he reached the Iron Sky Kingdom!


    ROOOAR!


    Xuan Hao who had just felt a wave of relief wash over him upon seeing the demonic cultivator being sent flying back by the rabbit demon beast was shocked upon discovering that the rabbit demon beast had actually managed to get close enough to start attacking him, as arge fluffy looking rabbit paw menacingly descended down towards him filled with killing intent.


    Whoosh!


    Seeing the massive fluffy paw descending down towards him, Xuan Hao didn''t dare to be the slightest bit careless as he barely managed to use his ice domain to slow down the paw enough to dodge and continue rapidly moving towards the Iron Sky Kingdom without slowing down too much.


    Roar!


    The rabbit demon beast roared angrily upon seeing Xuan Hao slipping away once again before it resumed its chase.


    However, this time around, the rabbit demon beast had no difficulty catching up to Xuan Hao.


    This in turn resulted in Xuan Hao having to dodge a continued stream of attacks from the rabbit demon beast-


    "Wha-!?"


    Of course, this was not something that he could continue doing just by relying on his ice domain to slow down the movement of the rabbit demon beast whenever it got close enough, as it soon managed tond a hit and in turn causing Xuan Hao to first hand feel just how terrifying a demon beast half a step into the Soul Ascension Realm was!


    Bang!


    Being hit head on by the massive fluffy and soft looking paw of the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao was sent into the ground below, the paw of the rabbit demon beast being nowhere near as soft as it looked¡­


    Crack-!


    As the ground where hended cracked apart forming a small crater, Xuan Hao rapidly jumped out of the crater before continuing towards the Iron Sky Kingdom-


    BOOOM!


    Just barely managing to avoid the follow up attack of the rabbit demon beast as the area where he hadnded waspletely annihted. Leaving behind what could only be described as an empty wastnd where only the terrifying killing intent left behind by the rabbit demon beast could be felt!


    Feeling the terrifying killing intent and the powerful shockwave created by the rabbit demon beast''s attack, Xuan Hao could not help shivering as he realized that he would most likely not have been able to defend against such an attack without being injured!


    I hope Yi Min''s formation is strong enough to keep this rabbit and those two demonic cultivators out¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he looked back at the destruction caused by the rabbit demon beast''s attack, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit uncertain about whether Yi Min''s formation would really be able to defend against the two demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast.


    After all, he had seen the formation before, and he did have some doubts about whether it would really be able to hold out against the three.


    No, she would not have wanted to help me if her formation couldn''t hold up!


    Filled with renewed confidence after he thought about this, Xuan Hao who had unknowingly started slowing down once again rushed towards the Iron Sky Kingdom without any hesitation. After all, she would not only put herself in danger in such a situation, but her entire kingdom!


    Luckily for him, the rabbit demon beast that was closest to him had wasted quite some time on the destructive attack earlier, thus resulting in him still keeping a good distance between them. Even with him slowing down for a short moment.


    ¡­


    "Hm¡­ I wonder how long it will take for him to show up¡­" Having already finished checking on the formation that covered her kingdom, Yi Min could not help muttering this to herself in a slightly bored tone as she looked off into the distance that Xuan Hao would be showing up in.


    Normally, she would get a tray of snacks in such a situation, but she knew that she could not leave her current position for snacks in case Xuan Hao and the three following after him showed up.


    Yi Min really didn''t want to encounter a situation where she was toote to help out because she had to go and get a few snacks¡­


    Even if Xuan Hao ended up surviving and everything turned out fine in the end, it would simply be way too embarrassing for her!


    For this reason, Yi Min, who loved to have always have a snack to munch on in such a situation, was left standing mid-air without anything to do while waiting.


    "Maybe I can just go out and help him¡­? In the first ce, it shouldn''t be too hard to track him if he gives me his current location through themunication talisman¡­" Muttering this to herself as she pulled out hermunication talisman, Yi Min quickly contacted Xuan Hao and got his rough position.


    However, after finding out about his position-


    "He¡­ Is still so far away¡­" Realizing that he was far enough away to not show up for a minute or two, but still not far enough away for her to get a new batch of snacks and still have time to enjoy them, Yi Min could not help feeling depressed.


    "I should go out and help him¡­ At least this way I will have something to do¡­"


    Swoosh-!


    Coming to a decision the next second, Yi Min took out several different artifacts, some used to increase her flying speed, some used to properly pinpoint Xuan Hao''s current location and others prepared for the inevitable fight before flying in the direction of Xuan Hao.


    No matter what, Yi Min did not want to just sit around doing nothing!


    ¡­


    Swish~


    Ptsh!


    Being pieced by a ck sword, Xuan Hao frowned as he felt a foreign energy trying to invade and corrode his body.


    "I should soon be at the border to the Iron Sky Kingdom, but why did Yi Min suddenly ask for my location¡­?"


    Having continued his escape for thest five or so minutes, Xuan Hao was extremely exhausted after the demonic cultivator called ck hand managed to catch up to him and attack in a simr manner as the rabbit demon beast. Apparently, he had devoured a few more Domain Lords in the back and further increased his speed.


    Overtaking the rabbit demon beast without getting sent flying backwards and sessfullyunching several attacks towards him.


    Not to mention, ck Hand''s attacks were far more troublesome to deal with, as he could attack over a long distance!


    Compared to the rabbit demon beast that only attacked him with its paws, this was much more troublesome, as not only did the demonic cultivator not need to get too close to him, but he could alsopletely ignore his ice domain!


    Because of this, Xuan Hao had a harder time dodging the attacks and in turn, his speed had slowed down. At the same time, he had also ended up getting injured to the point that he felt that he might not be able to make it to the Iron Sky Kingdom before being forced to make a stand.


    If worst came to pass, he could still throw away the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb¡­ But looking at the eyes filled with killing intent of the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao doubted that it would let him go even if he did this¡­


    Swish!


    Haa¡­ Looks like I will have to fight it out here¡­


    Seeing a massive ck sword flying towards him from behind, Xuan Hao understood that he would have to stop and defend against it.


    If he didn''t, he would definitely end up getting killed by the ck sword!


    Swish-!


    "Hm?"


    It was just at this moment, that something suddenly flew past him-


    BOOOOM!


    Blocking the massive ck sword from reaching him.


    "This- Yi Min?!"

 Chapter 568: Trickery~

    Chapter 568: Trickery~


    "Yi Min!?"


    Turning around to see who had helped him block the attack of the demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked upon realizing that the person who had helped him was none other than Yi Min.


    After he had contacted her and asked for her help, Xuan Hao had expected that she would just be waiting around the edge of her Iron Sky Kingdom. Not wanting to leave her kingdom in fear of not only the two demonic cultivators and demon beast ganging up on her, but also due to the fact that some of her enemies might take advantage of the situation to attack her kingdom in case she was locked in battle with the two demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast!


    "Yes, it''s me!"


    Smiling proudly while saying this upon seeing the surprised expression on Xuan Hao''s face, Yi Min felt that it had been a good idea for her toe and help him. Even if she risked one of her enemies taking advantage of her absence to attack her kingdom, Yi Min was confident that her fully operational formation would be more than enough to hold anyone daring enough to attack her kingdom back. Even without her present to control it!


    Not to mention, given the situation she had found Xuan Hao in, there was a chance that he would never have been able to reach her Iron Sky Kingdom before being forced to fight it out with the two demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast-


    Wait¡­ Rabbit demon beast!? Isn''t it the same demon beast from back then¡­? To think it''s still alive¡­


    Suddenly realizing that the rabbit demon beast was the same demon beast she had seen back when she had first seen the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb, Yi Min could not help frowning slightly upon remembering how she had barely managed to escape alive from it back when she was still in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Back then, she had wandered the Frozen Wastnd looking for an opportunity to breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm and had chanced upon their of the rabbit demon beast that had just recently reached the Domain Lord Realm. Only after sacrificing almost all of her artifacts did she managed to escape. However, the loss of so many precious artifacts had taken her a long time to recover from¡­


    Not to mention the rabbit demon beast, it was also back then that she first encountered the demonic cultivators from the Frost Devil Sect-


    "Yi Min, we have to go before they catch up!"


    "Y-yeah, let''s get going."


    Hearing the voice of Xuan Hao beside her all of a sudden, Yi Min quickly realized that she had spaced out for a short moment thinking about her past as she answered him before both of them began making their way towards the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    This time around, it was much easier to deal with the attacks sent towards both of them by the demon beast and demonic cultivator called ck Hand. Mainly due to the fact that Yi Min threw out all kinds of artifacts to easily deal with their attacks without having to slow down. Never revealing her cultivation realm during the entire ordeal.


    ROOOAR!


    "To think he got the help of a cksmith¡­ We can''t let that bastard escape with the spiritual herb!"


    Of course, neither ck Hand nor the rabbit demon beast were happy about this development, as they came to some sort of understanding before starting to work together to catch up with Xuan Hao and Yi Min without attacking each other.


    Whoosh-!


    Using his secret blood techniques on the rabbit demon beast, ck Hand slowed down, while the speed of the rabbit demon beast once again increased. Reaching an unprecedented level.


    "Looks like we won''t be able to outrun them like this¡­" Muttering this to herself as she saw the rabbit demon beast rapidly approaching them, Yi Min took out a disc shaped artifact before jumping on top of it. Making sure not to reveal her cultivation base as she soon turned to look towards Xuan Hao beside her.


    Swish~


    Understanding what she wanted to do, Xuan Hao jumped on top of the disc shaped artifact before it flew into the distance, barely fast enough to stop the rabbit demon beast from catching up to them immediately.


    However, this was more than enough time, as they soon reached the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Swoosh-!


    Flying past therge towers surrounding the border and sessfully entering the formation!


    "Ah!?" Letting out a surprised scream after entering the Iron Sky Kingdom, Yi Min showed a panicked expression as the disc beneath her, and Xuan Hao suddenly seemed to lose power as it fell to the ground.


    Not understanding what was happening, Xuan Hao soon narrowed his eyes before deciding to y along with whatever Yi Min was up to, as he showed a simrly panicked expression while looking down towards the now destroyed disc that had fallen to the ground beneath them.


    "Oh no! The disc thingy!" Of course¡­ His acting was nowhere near as good¡­


    ROOOOAR!


    Not even a few secondster, the rabbit demon beast appeared behind them roaring angrily filled with killing intent before rushing past therge towers on the border. Not realizing the fact that there was a formation directly in front of it, as it remained focused on Xuan Hao who had stolen its Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb!


    However, it still came to a stop a short distance away from Yi Min and Xuan Hao and began to examine them with its divine sense after seeing their panicked expressions and the fact that the disc they had used to escape had run out of energy and had fallen to the ground below.


    "Haha! Not running anymore?"


    "Looks like the artifact beneath that woman is only useful for a short period of time¡­"


    Arriving a short time after the rabbit demon beast, the two demonic cultivators simrly flew past therge towers located on the border before entering the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Both easily realizing what had happened.


    "¡­"


    In the end, the reason was not wrong, as Yi Min had deliberately sabotaged the artifact beneath her to make it look like it had been rendered useless.


    The reason why she did this was simple, as she wanted to lower the guards of the rabbit demon beast and the two demonic cultivators enough for them to enter the Iron Sky Kingdom without inspecting the towers on the border too closely with their divine sense.


    After all, if they really did use some time to properly inspect the towers on the border, it would not take long for them to realize that there was a massive formation directly in front of them.


    At that point in time, there was close to no chance that the demon beast or the two demonic cultivators would dare entering the Iron Sky Kingdom. Especially considering the fact that they would have realized to some degree just how strong the formation was¡­


    If that happened, they would most likely just end up escaping back to the Frozen Wastnd. Knowing that they would have no chance of breaking through the formation before the people from the Sky Empire showed up.


    However, things were different now that she had managed to get all three of them to willingly enter her formation¡­


    At this point, there was no way she was going to let the three of them escape alive. Especially the rabbit demon beast and the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect whom she already had a grudge with¡­


    Thinking about this, Yi Min could not help smiling happily while she looked towards the two demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast.


    "Hm? Why are you smiling all of a-"


    Rumble~


    Having spotted the weird smile that suddenly appeared on Yi Min''s face the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect did not have enough time to finish his sentence before he suddenly felt tremoring from the ground beneath him.


    "What in the-"


    Simr to the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect, ck Hand also realized something was wrong.


    Bzzz~


    However, before he could retreat, the towers on the borders of the Iron Sky Kingdom suddenly lit up as they were covered in several ancient looking symbols.


    Whoosh~!


    Following which several thin lines of light connected the towers together before the ground beneath them were covered in simr looking ancient symbols spread across the entire Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "This is¡­ A formation!?" Realizing that he was inside a massive formation and coupled together with the odd smile Yi Min gave them, ck Hand quickly realized that he had fallen into a trap.


    Not only that, but he, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect and the rabbit demon beast also very quickly realized that the formation was not something that they would be able to easily escape from, as the aura of several different Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herbs and Natural Treasures could be felt throughout the formation the next moment.

 Chapter 569: Yi Mins Formation!

    Chapter 569: Yi Min''s Formation!


    Whoosh~


    Roar?


    As the two demonic cultivators who were looking around themselves filled with panic upon finding out that they had walked directly into a formation, the rabbit demon beast also looked around itself. However,pared to the two demonic cultivators, the rabbit demon beast looked around itself with a more confused than panicked expression, as the formation soon trapped all three of them inside the Iron Sky Kingdom without the rabbit demon beast having any idea about what had just happened.


    The reason for this, was that the rabbit demon beast had never really had the chance to see any formations in the area that it lived.


    Different from the two demonic cultivators, who had a far better understanding over their current circumstancespared to the clueless rabbit demon beast looking around itself with a now both confused and fascinated expression at the colourful symbols formed by the formation.


    However, this did notst, as the rabbit demon beast soon discovered that both Yi Min and Xuan Hao had disappeared-


    ROOOOAR!


    Causing the rabbit demon beast to once again be filled with anger as it charged towards the bright looking symbols that floated in front of it. Not realizing that it was charging headfirst into a formation¡­


    BANG!


    Not at all unexpected, the rabbit demon beast did not manage to break through the formation and was instead flung backwards before crashing into the ground below that had been simrly covered in the same symbols that floated all around them. Almost forming arge dome with a diameter of a few kilometers just barely inside the borders of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Ching~


    Not intent of giving up so easily, a sound of metal hitting metal soon sounded out across the dome that the rabbit demon beast and the two demonic cultivators found themselves inside of, as the rabbit demon beast tried digging into the ground to no avail.


    "Let''s work together to break out of this formation!"


    Knowing that they would not be able to break free from the massive formation by themselves, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect, took the initiative byunching an attack towards the formation that was soon supported by ck Hand.


    BOOOM!


    The attack of two half a step True Demon Realm demonic cultivator was devastating, but the formation showed no signs of budging. Only wavering slightly after the two''sbined attack!


    "Come on little rabbit! You know that we won''t be able to leave this ce alone!" Realizing that he could not escape from the formation even with his friend ck Hand''s help, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect showed a panicked expression on his face for a brief moment before motioning towards the rabbit demon beast that was still busy trying to dig into the ground below them to no avail.


    Roar¡­ Roar roar roar!


    Seemingly understanding what the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect said, the rabbit demon beast nodded itsrge fluffy head before dashing into the air where the two demonic cultivators were standing.


    "Let''s try again¡­"


    Seeing that the rabbit demon beast decided to cooperate with them, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect sighed in relief before attacking the formation once again-


    BOOOM!


    Crack~


    In the end, only a tiny crack appeared on the formation for a split second before the crack repaired itself.


    "Looks like it will not be easy to break this formation without going all out¡­ Rabbit, ck Hand, we have to go all out, or we won''t be able to escape! If we continue holding back, the people from the Sky Empire are likely to show up. At that time, none of us will be able to escape back to the Frozen Wastnd alive!"


    Saying this with a serious expression as he watched the area where they had created the small crack fully recover, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect could not help worrying about the fact that he might not be able to escape the formation before the people from the Sky Empire showed up to deal with the demonic cultivators and demon beast that had entered their territory all of a sudden.


    Even if he had some connections inside the Sky Empire, he very well understood that they would be of no use in his current situation. After all, the people sent to deal with them, had most likely been gathered together by the current emperor of the Sky Empire!


    ck Hand also understood this, as he prepared himself to use his strongest technique together with the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect.


    Roar?


    The only clueless party in this, was the rabbit demon beast. Not to mention the Sky Empire, it didn''t know much outside of the mountain range in the Frozen Wastnd that it had stayed inside of most of its life-


    ROOAR! (Fluffy Demon Paw of Death and Destruction!)


    Luckily for the two demonic cultivators, it still understood to some degree the danger that it was in, as it gathered its strength in one of its paws before being the first of the three tounch its attack towards the formation.


    Swish~!


    Seeing that the rabbit demon beast understood and used its trump card, both of the demonic cultivators soon followed it to attack the formation, as a pure ck domain manifested behind ck Hand, while a frozen tundra not to dissimr from the Frozen Wastnd manifested behind the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect.


    "Frost Devil''s Palm!"


    "ck Hand of Death!"


    As they arrived in front of the formation together with the rabbit demon beast, a massive ck hand came out from the domain that had manifested behind ck Hand, while a massive devilish blue hand stretched out from the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect''s domain before heading towards the formation.


    BOOOOOOOOOM-!


    CRACK!


    Not even a split secondter, three hand and paw rted attacksnded on the formation together. Instantly causing a massive creak to spread throughout the formation as a tiny gap to the outside world appeared at the centre of their attack!


    Swish~!


    Acting far faster than the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect and the rabbit demon beast, ck Hand dashed through the small opening created by theirbined attack and escaped to the outside world before the small hole in the formation rapidly closed itself behind him. Not giving the two demonic cultivators any time to escape the formation!


    ¡­


    "Ah? To think the damage caused to the foundation of the formation by those people back then was in more than one location¡­ Not to mention, theirbined attack actually managed to barely reach the Soul Ascension Realm¡­" Having reached the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom that acted as the core of the formation, Yi Min could not help feeling a bit surprised upon witnessing one of the demonic cultivators sessfully escaping.


    However, she did not feel too regretful over this, as the demonic cultivator who escaped was not the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect.


    Not only that, but it also made her realize that the foundation of her formation was still damaged. Not allowing the formation to reach its full potential where it could deal with someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. At least ording to her knowledge of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­


    "Is something wrong?"


    Not able to see what was happening to the two demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao could only ask this after seeing Yi Min suddenly showing a surprised expression while looking in the direction of the three.


    "It''s nothing¡­ The formation is just weaker than I expected, and it seems the damage to the foundation of it back then, was more severe than I imagined. Resulting in one of the demonic cultivators escaping..."


    "¡­"


    Hearing Yi Min say this, Xuan Hao had a feeling that he might not be as safe as he first expected inside of Yi Min''s formation¡­


    "No need to worry about it! I will take care of the remaining two quickly! Now, witness the power of my formation!"


    Feeling that Xuan Hao was starting to doubt her formation after hearing one of the demonic cultivators managed to escape, Yi Min felt that her pride had been hurt, as she took full control of the formation before activating all the killing formations inside of it to deal with the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect and the rabbit demon beast.


    RUMBLE~!


    As the killing formations that were a part of the massive formation activated, a terrifying sound could be heard from beneath as the entire formation before arge number of the symbols making up the formation began moving. Soon gathering in the area where the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect and the rabbit demon beast were located before all of them turned into a blood red colour. Menacingly shinning down on the dome from above.


    Even from far away, Xuan Hao could still clearly feel the terrifying aura of these symbols, as the entire Iron Sky Kingdom drowned out by their aura.

 Chapter 570: The Strength of Yi Mins Formation!

    Chapter 570: The Strength of Yi Min''s Formation!


    Along with the different symbolsing to a stop surrounding the dome that the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect and the rabbit demon beast was trapped inside of, Xuan Hao could not help shivering upon witnessing how close the newly activated offensive formations working together as all kinds of attacks entered the closed off dome in the next moment.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    In a way, they all seemed to work so well together that it looked like a single formation instead of several different formations that had been linked together¡­


    BOOM-!


    Not even a secondter, Xuan Hao could clearly feel the demonic cultivator and the demon beast struggling inside the dome, as their auras rapidly began weakening at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    Even if he could not see what was happening to them inside the dome created by the massive formation that they had been trapped inside of, Xuan Hao could still feel the aftershocks of the battle for survival that was currently taking ce inside the dome.


    Given how fast they were weakening, Xuan Hao doubted they would be able to hold on for more than an hour. Even if they survived for longer than that, the people of the Sky Empire would have already shown up at that point in time.


    So, even if they escaped after an hour of trying their all, they would only be met with the group of cultivators sent over by the Sky Empire¡­


    "¡­"


    Turning to look at Yi Min who was standing beside him controlling the formation, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit wryly after noticing the happy smile on her lips.


    From the looks of it, she was enjoying herself quite a bit¡­ Not something unexpected considering that both the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect and the rabbit demon beast were her enemies and had caused her to suffer quite a bit in the past.


    Not to mention the past, the damage caused by the Frost Devil Sect''s members to her formation was still around. Preventing it from reaching its full potential. Allowing for the demonic cultivator called ck Hand to escape before Yi Min activated the offensive part of the massive formation.


    I wonder if I would be able to survive if I was trapped inside this formation¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao nced towards the dome as he felt the aura of the demonic cultivator and demon beast inside it weakening more and more with each passing second.


    I would most likely not be able to survive¡­


    Shaking his head as he realized this, Xuan Hao vowed to not be enemies with Yi Min in the future¡­ And to learn how to set up such terrifying formations himself. Not only to better protect his sect and disciple while he was not there, but also so he would have an easier time breaking formations he might encounter in the future!


    ¡­


    "Ah-! What in the world is this formation to control such a terrifying fire!?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was vowed to be more skilled in the arts of formations, the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect was screaming loudly, as his body was burning inside a massive inferno that had suddenly appeared all around him. Even with his strength half a step into the True Demon Realm, he could only barely keep the terrifying inferno around himself at bay with his domain!


    The rabbit demon beast was no better even with its strong physical body, as it was trapped inside a vortex made out of countless wind des, each strong enough to instantly kill a Domain Lord who had yet to reach theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm.


    ROOOAR!


    Feeling the pain of the countless wind des slowly cutting into it, the rabbit demon beast let out a roar of pain as it used its terrifying strength to break the vortex of wind des-


    Fwoosh~


    However, it was to no avail, as the vortex reformed shortly after it had been destroyed by the rabbit demon beast!


    A burning inferno and a vortex made out of wind des each having the strength to restrain someone in the half a step Soul Ascension Realm. From this, it could be seen how strong Yi Min''s formation was!


    However, this was not the end of it¡­ Instead, it was only the beginning!


    Rumble!


    Not even capable of dealing with a single offensive formation at once, both the rabbit demon beast and the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect were horrified to suddenly witnessing what could only be described as a scene that depicted the end of the world, as both of them were soon swallowed up by thebined attack of close to a dozen offensive formation simr to the inferno and the vortex of wind des that had restrained them¡­


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    Not standing a chance to resist thebined attack of so many powerful offensive formations, both the rabbit demon beast and the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect were reduced to dust within less than five seconds under thebined attack.


    Fwoosh~


    Not even their souls were left behind, as the inferno that restrained the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect just a few seconds ago. Directly burned both their souls before they even had time to do anything after the death of their physical body!


    Like this, the rabbit demon beast, and the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect both perished to Yi Min''s formation. Not standing much of a chance against the terrifying formation Yi Min had spent most of her life and resources constructing!


    In the first ce, both of them had already been dead the moment they entered the formation, it was nothing more than a coincidence that ck Hand managed to escape due to Yi Min''s overconfidence in her formation resulting in her not activating the offensive part of the formation before ck Hand had already escaped.


    ¡­


    "Looks like the rabbit demon beast and the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect are both dead and what a surprise, those people just happened to show up the moment I killed both of them!" Muttering this to herself as she watched the soul of both the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect and the rabbit demon beast get burned in the inferno, Yi Min nced at the group of people that had just arrived outside her formation.


    "Both of them are already dead¡­?"


    A half step True Demon Realm demonic cultivator and a half step Soul Ascension Realm demon beast had died in less than a minute!


    Not hearing thest part of what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao only managed to pick up that one of the demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast that had been chasing him had died. Making him realize just how strong Yi Min''s formation was and why she was able to control the area with the richest spiritual metal ore in the Sky Empire!


    "Yi Min and Xuan Hao, we are under orders from the emperor to chase down the three invaders that arrived, I hope both of you wille out!"


    Suddenly, a loud voice could be heard echoing out across the entire Iron Sky Kingdom filled with power. Even from the voice alone, Xuan Hao could tell that the person behind the voice was no weaker than the two demonic cultivators and the demon beast that had been chasing through the Frozen Wastnd and all the way to the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Hm? This is-


    "Stay in here for now, I will be back shortly¡­ The people sent by the Sky Empire showed up!"


    Whoosh~


    Before Xuan Hao managed to finish his thoughts about the identity of the voice, Yi Min told him to stay inside the formation before she disappeared in front of him. Most likely going out of the formation that current engulfed the entire Iron Sky Kingdom to meet the person from the Sky Empire.


    I wonder why she told me to stay¡­ Is the person from the Sky Empire perhaps someone she does not get along with? Maybe she fears that he will try to take away the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb after realizing I''m carrying one on me?


    Not knowing why Yi Min had told him to stay inside the formation as it risked offending the people sent to hunt down the two demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast by the emperor of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao still decided to listen to what she said.


    Instinctively, he had a feeling that it would better to listen to what Yi Min saidpared to aplete stranger.


    Not to mention, he had clearly felt the contemptuous tone in which he had referred to both of them just a short moment ago¡­


    Even if he was not at the Domain Lord Realm, he still realized that the person shouting outside the formation likely did not have any good intentions. Not to mention, he and the people from the Sky Empire just so happened to show up just after the death of the rabbit demon beast and the Sect Master of the Frost Devil Sect¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao sat down to meditate while waiting for Yi Min to return.

 Chapter 571: Head of the Hollow Thunder Family

    Chapter 571: Head of the Hollow Thunder Family


    At the same time Xuan Hao sat down inside the capital of the Sky Empire to meditate, Yi Min made it to the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom where the dome trapping the sect master of the Frost Devil Sect and the rabbit demon beast had been just a few seconds earlier.


    "Haa¡­ To think that guy showed up as well, did he perhaps make up with the imperial family and decided to help them for no reason¡­?"


    Staring at the towers surrounding the border that formed into an enormous formation, Yi Min could not help muttering this to herself upon spotting the person standing at the forefront of the group of people standing just outside her formation.


    At least the formation prevented anyone other than her from looking through it¡­ If not, the people standing outside would surely have seen just how annoyed she was after seeing them¡­


    Swish~


    Having made sure who, the people standing outside her formation were, Yi Min didn''t stand around staring at them from behind her formation for much longer, as she took a step forward and left the formation.


    Soon finding herself face to face with the group of experts sent by the Sky Empire to deal with the two demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast that had entered the Sky Empire¡­ Causing no small amount of damage along the way.


    This was especially true for the demonic cultivator called ck Hand, as he had ended up killing quite a few weaker Domain Lords belonging to the Sky Empire along the way to further increase his speed during the chase and to help increase his own cultivation at the same time!


    "Haha, Yi Min, you finally decided toe out? I wonder where that Xuan Hao fellow is, is he perhaps noting out? Don''t tell me you told him to stay behind because-"


    "Shut it, aren''t you here to chase the two demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast that entered the Sky Empire? How do you have time to stay here to chat?" Not letting the man in front of the group finish his sentence, Yi Min rudely interrupted him before saying this. Not feeling the least bit apologetic over what she said.


    "You! How dare- Wait¡­ Didn''t you deal with the two demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast already¡­?" About to explode after hearing how Yi Min had interrupted him, the man at the forefront of the group suddenly realized what she had said.


    "Hehe~" Seeing the surprised expression on the man''s face, Yi Min could not help chuckling to herself upon realizing that the other party had thought she had dealt with both of the demonic cultivators and the rabbit demon beast already.


    "Nope, one of the demonic cultivators happened to escape, I think it would be a good idea for you to get going¡­ If not, you won''t be able to catch him before he runs away~" Saying this, Yi Min watched the expression of the man change greatly.


    After all, he, and the people behind him were all there to deal with the three intruders from the Frozen Wastnd.


    "Is that true? One of them escaped¡­?"


    "Which direction did he escape in?"


    "This damn bastard¡­ If the emperor finds out that we let one of them escape because we waited here for no reason¡­"


    "Let''s go, maybe we can still catch the demonic cultivator who escaped, he should be quite exhausted after escaping from such a powerful formation!"


    The only reason why the people behind the man had even bothered waiting in front of Yi Min''s formation, was because the man at the forefront had told them that all three of them were trapped inside Yi Min''s formation and were as good as dead.


    For this reason, they had decided to listen to the man and wait in front of the formation, so that even if they escaped, they would still be caught the moment they managed to escape from the formation!


    "He escaped in that direction!"


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Because of this, the people who hade under orders of the emperor of the Sky Empire used their movement techniques to move in the direction of the demonic cultivator that escaped the moment Yi Min told them the way he had escaped in.


    "¡­"


    Like this, only the man who had convinced the others to stay behind and wait in front of Yi Min''s formation. Hoping to use them to intimidate Yi Min, was left behind all alone. Only able to awkwardly stare at Yi Min staring down at him just beside her formation.


    Clearly, Yi Min was ready to jump back inside her formation the moment he decided to do anything suspicious¡­


    "So, might I be so bold as to ask for what reason the distinguished head of the Hollow Thunder Family decided to join the subjugation force set up by the emperor of the Sky Empire just to visit me? Surely your not just here to show you loyalty to the Sky Empire¡­"


    Revealing the identity of the man who had remained behind to be a member of the Hollow Thunder family, Yi Min calmly waited for his response.


    After all, even if she was confident in dealing with the man in front of her who was the head of the Hollow Thunder family, she had no confidence to deal with the Hollow Thunder family itself.


    The main reason for this being the fact that it was one of the Sky Empire''s noble families that enjoyed some form of protection by both the three religions and the Imperial family, who both tried to take control over them.


    The other reason was the fact that she was not confident in dealing with the ancestor of the Hollow Thunder family, as he had been rumoured to have reached the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Even if this might not be true in the end, Yi Min didn''t want to risk enter a life and death struggle with the Hollow Thunder family. Especially now that she had found out that her formation was still not fully repaired.


    "You know exactly why I''m here and- Wait! Your formation is clearly more than strong enough to deal with the two demonic cultivators and the demon beast. Howe one of the- You let one of the demonic cultivators escape earlier!?" Suddenly realizing something, the head of the Hollow Thunder family stared at Yi Min filled with surprise as he said this after having investigated her formation thoroughly with his divine sense during the short time they had spent talking.


    During this time, he understood to some extend just how scary the formation in front of him was. Even if he had tried breaking it with the group of experts from earlier, he might not be able to seed!


    How could one of the two demonic cultivators possibly escape in such a situation?


    "Maybe~ Who knows~?" Knowing that the weakness in her formation did not show itself unless someone was trapped inside of it, Yi Min decided to y along with the head of the Hollow Thunder family''s train of thought. Not forgetting to show a taunting smile along the way.


    "You! How- What- Ah!"


    Seeing the frustrated expression on the head of the Hollow Thunder family''s face, as he thought Yi Min had already known about him being in the group sent out to subjugate the two demonic cultivators and the demon beast and set up a trap for him to walk into, Yi Min felt extremely happy.


    "Hehe, if you are done ying around, how about giving me a reason as to your sudden arrival? I don''t have all day to waste time like a certain someone who is supposed to be chasing down a demonic cultivator right now~" Chuckling a bit to herself as she felt happy watching the increasingly pissed off expression of the person in front of her, Yi Min prepared herself in case the other party decided to attack her in a fit of rage.


    Even if it was not something an expert at the Domain Lord Realm would do, Yi Min understood that the people from the noble family''s seemed way more prone to this, as they lost control of their emotions rather easily¡­


    "Haa¡­ Don''t think I don''t know what you are trying to do! I will be back!"


    Swish~!


    Barely managing to stop himself from doing something stupid, the head of the Hollow Thunder family turned around after saying this before using a movement technique to rapidly move in the direction that the rest of the group of experts he hade together with had disappeared in just a few seconds earlier.


    No matter how much he wanted to continue talking with Yi Min and get to the reason as to why he hade to seek her out through such an unconventional method, he still understood that it would be a bad idea for him to abandon the mission which the emperor had bestowed upon him. Especially so considering the fact that he might end up being med for one of the demonic cultivators escaped¡­

 Chapter 572: Returning to the Sect

    Chapter 572: Returning to the Sect


    "Everything should be fine now; you should be able to return to your sect without any problems!" Having returned to the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom where Xuan Hao was patiently waiting for her, Yi Min said this with a happy expression on her face.


    Even just looking at her from afar, Xuan Hao could see how happy she was over the fact that she had managed to chase away the group from the Sky Empire without encountering any problems.


    "Thank you¡­ I don''t know what I would do without your help! All I have to repay you at the moment is the location of the Frost Devil Sect that you asked me to look around for. Not that it''s enough to repay you for your help¡­"


    Thanking Yi Min for the help she had provided during his time of need, Xuan Hao did not forget to take out the map of the Frozen Wastnds that she had given him during their short meeting just after the end of the alchemypetition.


    "No need to worry at all, I even managed to get rid of the Frost Devil Sect''s sect master so easily because of you and that is more than enough! Hehe, without their sect master and with the location of their sect, the Frost Devil Sect will be easy to deal with~"


    "¡­"


    Seeing Yi Min devolving into a not so friendly expression as a very clear killing intent appeared in both her eyes towards the end of her sentence, Xuan Hao decided to pretend that he didn''t hear her as he prepared to leave the Iron Sky Kingdom and return to the Flying Sword Sect.


    No matter what, it had already been a few weeks since he had left the sect to save Zhu Lian, find the Frost Devil Sect and finally get his hands on the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb needed to set up the Qi Gathering Formation required for the Flying Sword Sect to officially begin moving into the Shattered Star Peaks and use it as their main sect.


    At this point in time, Xuan Hao really wanted to get back to the Flying Sword Sect. Not only to check up on Qing Yi and Bai Ning who had not left for an adventure like Chu Yang, but also so he could inform Elder Song about the location of the undiscovered spirit stone mine that he had received from saving Zhu Lian.


    "I will be taking my leave¡­"


    Noticing that Yi Min was not saying anything after having talked about how she was nning to pay a visit to the Frost Devil Sect that nowcked a sect master, Xuan Hao quietly took his leave after a quick goodbye.


    "Sure~ See you again in the future!"


    Of course, only after Yi Min lowered her formation so he could leave. After all, with his current strength, he would have no way to leave her formation without her help¡­


    Swish~


    Leaving the Iron Sky Kingdom after Yi Min opened up a passage for him to pass through, Xuan Hao began his journey back towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    Making sure to go a bit slower and not reveal himself along the way and at the same time keeping an eye out for the group of experts sent by the Sky Empire in case he happened to encounter them while making his way back to the Flying Sword Sect.


    ¡­


    "Looks like the experts sent by the Sky Empire went in another direction when they chased after the demonic cultivator that managed to escape¡­" Muttering this to himself as he arrived back at the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao could not help breathing a sigh of relief as hended in front of his pavilion.


    Luckily, his journey back to the Flying Sword Sect went on without any problems appearing along the way.


    Not to mention problems showing up. During his journey, he did not even get in trouble with any of the Domain Lords whose territory he ended up passing through¡­ Although, thinking about it, the reason for this, was most likely the fact that he actually hid himself this time around.


    Of course¡­ That was not mentioning the fact that quite a few Domain Lords had ended up dying to the demonic cultivator called ck Hand back then.


    Thinking about it like that, most of the Domain Lords that had been present on the path between the Iron Sky Kingdom and the Flying Sword Sect had either died or been scared into hiding¡­


    "Hm? Bai Ning?"


    Spotting Bai Ning who just happened to leave the pavilion the moment hended in front of it, Xuan Hao could not help showing a slightly surprised expression. Not expecting to see Bai Ning suddenly appear in front of him.


    Even if he had already sensed him with his divine sense beforehand, he did not pay too much attention to who it was. Instead, being focused on his own thoughts about the group of experts sent by the Sky Empire and the demonic cultivator, they were chasing¡­


    "Master? Your back!"


    Hearing his master''s voice, Bai Ning showed a simrly surprised expression as he soon became excited upon realizing that his master was back.


    During the past few weeks, he had remained focused on increasing his cultivation and even managed to gain enlightenment while in the process of forging an artifact that allowed him to sessfully break through and reach the Ninth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    At that time, Bai Ning had not only realized that he could continue cultivating even while he was focused on forging an artifact, but he also realized that his cultivation speed was way faster this way!


    It was at that moment Bai Ning wholeheartedly began cultivating the Unformed Mantra with all his heart, because of this. Not only had his cultivation base strengthened, but his presence had also changed and be firmer.


    "You reached the Ninth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm already!?"


    At the same time Bai Ning was remembering what he had gone through over the past few weeks, Xuan Hao finally discovered that Bai Ning had actually broken through to the Ninth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm¡­ To say it was surprising would be an understatement, as Xuan Hao felt quite baffled over how Bai Ning had not only managed to break through to the Ninth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm but had even manged to reach the Peak of the Ninth Stage!


    Looking over Bai Ning''s cultivation base once more, Xuan Hao felt that it would not be wrong to say that Bai Ning was already close to reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    "Yes! I managed to understand how to properly use the mantra given by master and-"


    Filled with both pride and happiness upon seeing his master mention his cultivation realm, Bai Ning did not hide anything as he quickly went over how he had broken through and his discoveries regarding the Unformed Mantra and how it could be cultivated at the same time that he was forging artifacts.


    Not only that could he cultivate the Unformed Mantra while practicing cksmithing, but it actually increased his cultivation speed if he practiced it while he was forging!


    No wonder the Unformed Mantra is considered a Heaven Rank cultivation mantra¡­ It is indeed something specifically made for a cksmith!


    Feeling amazed after finding out about the hidden aspect to the Unformed Mantra that Bai Ning had discovered, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if the mantra that his other two disciples were practicing had a simr hidden aspect to them as well¡­


    "Master, I also practiced the palm technique that you taught me before, but I don''t seem to be able to further improve at all¡­"


    "Ah¡­"


    Lost in thought as he thought about whether or not the Heaven Rank cultivation mantras that he had given Qing Yi and Chu Yang had a simr hidden feature in them, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a slightly surprised voice after hearing Bai Ning''s question.


    You already managed to break through a small realm during the little time I was gone¡­ Howe you are still not satisfied¡­?


    "Don''t worry about it, its normal to spend more time learning a technique you are not as familiar with!" Even if he thought something different, Xuan Hao still showed an understanding expression as he said this with a wise look on his face.


    "I see¡­ I will have to spend some more time practicing the palm technique in the future¡­"


    "Hm¡­ Now that I''m back, how about I teach you?" Seeing the slightly sad expression on Bai Ning''s face after hearing his response, Xuan Hao decided to ask this. After returning to the sect, he was more than happy to spend some time teaching Bai Ning.


    In the first ce, informing Elder Song about the spirit stone mine and beginning the construction of the Qi Gathering Formation could wait a few hours¡­


    "Really!?"


    "Yes, let''s go to the training ground for now."


    Whoosh~


    Like this, Xuan Hao spent the next few hours in the training ground together with Bai Ning. Helping him not only improve his mastery over the palm technique, but also teaching him a few easier qi techniques to help him increase his control over his qi.

 Chapter 573: Reaching the Outer Walls of the Ancient City Ruins

    Chapter 573: Reaching the Outer Walls of the Ancient City Ruins


    "Finally¡­ The ancient ruins! I never expected that it would take so long for me to reach them¡­" As his master was busy teaching Bai Ning, Chu Yang let out a sigh of relief as he finally spotted a few ancient ruins further up the small river he had been following.


    Not to mention taking a few days to reach, it had taken him more than a week to find the ancient ruins that the three cultivators from the Explorer Union had told him about!


    Although¡­ He had ended up quite unlucky, as he only found the correct river leading to the ancient ruins after having followed the other small rivers all the way to their source... If he ended up following the correct river from the start. Not to mention it taking a few days to reach, Chu Yang doubted it would even take him a day with his current speed!


    "No use thinking about it! At least I managed to reach the ruins!" Muttering this to himself as he no longer thought about the pain he had gone through over the past few weeks; Chu Yang began making his way towards the ancient ruins he had spotted in the distance, while at the same time keeping an eye out for any demon beast that might be lurking in the surroundings.


    After all, the main reason why he wanted to find the ruins mentioned by the cultivators from the Explorer Union, was not to seek out any treasures that might still be left in the ancient ruins, but instead to hunt down the Core Formation Realm demon beast that he had been told were around the ruins.


    This way, he should be able to gain some realbat experience with opponents who had reached the Core Formation Realm just like himself! As for the bandit he had fought during the escort mission? It was far from enough for him to gain a clear understanding of his current strength after having reached the Core Formation Realm¡­


    ¡­


    Continuing towards the ruins he saw, Chu Yang soon found himself in front of what had once been some kind of stone house. Now, all that was left was the foundation of the house, with only parts of the walls still being intact.


    Observing closer, Chu Yang did not take long to find signs of several people having searched through the ruins in the past. Not too surprising considering that the ruins had been discovered long ago and all the treasures and artifacts that might be hidden there had already been looted by the members of the Explorer Unions that had once frequented the ruins upon its first discovery.


    "That should be the outer wall of the ancient city¡­"


    Looking into the forest just a short distance away from the ruins of what had once been a rtivelyrge house, Chu Yang barely managed to make out the broken down, mossy walls of what had once been arge city.


    The rest, hidden by therge forest located beside the small stream he had followed.


    The ruins themselves were an ancient city, the history of the city and who inhabited it was a mystery ording to what little information he had managed to gather from the locals while making his way out of the Small River Town.


    Not only that, but the ruins had first been discovered a little over three hundred years ago and along with its discovery, a branch of the Explorer Union had quickly been established in the Small River Town.


    Back then, the ancient ruins and the Small River Town were a hotspot for members of the Explorer Union looking for lost artifact or other treasures that might be hidden away inside such arge ancient city.


    However, things did notst for long and slowly the number of explorersing to the Small River Town began rapidly decreasing. Soon, most of the explorers inside the Small River Town were locals who were looking to make a living, or step onto the path of cultivation.


    This was not too hard, as there was a small library inside the Small River Towns Explorer Union contained a few cultivation mantras that one could ess and learn after bing a member of the Explorer Union.


    Although¡­ Thinking back, Chu Yang did not remember seeing the small library mentioned by the locals¡­


    Did it perhaps get torn down to expand the gambling den¡­?


    Understanding what had happened to the small library storing most of the cultivation mantras that could be found inside a small town like the Small River Town, Chu Yang decided not to think too much about it.


    After all, the matter of the gambling den did not have anything to do with him, it was a problem for the Explorer Union, and they would have to eventually deal with it themselves!


    Ching~


    Having slowly made his way towards the mussy broken-down outer wall of what had once been an enormous city in the past, Chu Yang pulled out his spear to make sure he was ready for battle in case anything happened.


    After all, the ancient city had be home to demon beast over the years, with the weaker ones having reached the Foundation Establishment Realm in the outer part of the city and the stronger having reached the Core Formation Realm being located at the core of the ancient city ruins.


    However, from time to time, demon beast at the Core Formation Realm could still be found roaming around the outer edges of the city looking for prey.


    With all this considered, it would not be difficult to predict that he would encounter a demon beast after entering the city.


    Crack~


    Stepping over a few branches on the ground, Chu Yang could not help feeling amazed as he looked up at what remained of the outer walls of the ancient city.


    Just standing in front of them, he could clearly feel a terrifying pressure enveloping him. Allowing him to understand that the walls in front of him had once been part of some sort of powerful protection formation that had likely been instrumental in protecting the city that stood before him.


    As for just how strong the formation had been, he had no idea¡­


    Given how terrifying the presence still left behind in the outer walls was, Chu Yang believed that it should at least be someone in theter stages of the Nascent Soul Realm. Maybe even stronger than that!


    In the end, his cultivation realm was too weak to properly pinpoint the strength of the presence that was still present inside the outer walls of the ancient city.


    Rustle~


    "Hm?"


    Just at this moment, the sound of something moving behind the outer walls could be heard, causing Chu Yang to tighten his grip around his spear-


    Swish~


    Before jumping on top of the barely standing outer walls of the city to get a better view of what had caused the sound.


    Rustle~


    Looking down towards the crown of a small tree that had almost merged together with the tall section of the outer wall he was standing on top of, Chu Yang could not help smiling a bit wryly to himself upon discovering the source of the rustling sound.


    Chirp chirp~


    The source in question being a pair of normal birds which had not even reached the Qi Condensation Realm!


    "Looks like I''m already on edge knowing that there could be a Core Formation Realm demon beast waiting in ambush on the other side of the wall¡­" Muttering this to himself as he lowered the spear, he had unintentionally been pointing towards the still unaware birds hard at work making a small nest in the tree crown below him, Chu Yang took a deep breath before calming himself down.


    Even if he ended up encountering a Core Formation Realm demon beast, he was still more than strong enough to deal with and was not the thing he was worried about.


    Instead, the thing he was worried about, was a Core Formation Realm demon beast catching him off guard in an ambush!


    If that really happened, it didn''t matter how much stronger he waspared to the demon beast! Even a Foundation Establishment Realm could potentially fatally injure him in a sessful ambush where he had let down his guard, let alone a Core Formation Realm demon beast!


    For this reason, Chu Yang did not dare lower his guard even the slightest bit after having entered the ancient ruins of the city.


    "Well¡­ At least this will help training my senses as well¡­" Muttering this to himself with a slightly wry smile on his face, Chu Yang turned away from the small birds in the tree crown below him before taking in the small part of the city that he could see from on top of the outer wall.


    Unfortunately, the forest was way too dense for him to see much of the city itself from his current location.


    "Demon beasts¡­"


    At least he did manage to spot a few demon beasts at the Foundation Establishment Realm roaming around what had once been the roads of the ancient city ruins.


    As for Core Formation Realm demon beasts? He did not manage to spot a single one¡­

 Chapter 574: Weird Translucent Stone

    Chapter 574: Weird Translucent Stone


    Well¡­ The Core Formation Realm demon beasts should normally not be present around the outer part of the ancient city ruins in the first ce¡­ Not to mention, it looks like the demon beasts here are not worried about anything in the first ce¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself while observing the Foundation Establishment demon beasts that he could see from the top of the outer walls of the city.


    The demon beasts were not really doing anything interesting, as almost all of them werezing around in the few spots where the sun broke through the thick tree canopy covering the ancient city ruins from above.


    Thump!


    Chirp!


    Jumping down from the outer wall, Chu Yang felt a bit bad as he watched the pair of birds in the process of building their nest fly away. From the looks of it, he had ended up scaring them away.


    At the same time, he had inevitably also ended up alerting some of the nearby Foundation Establishment Realm demon beasts that were hiding nearby.


    Rustle~


    Along with the rustling sound, a group of wolf demon beasts filled with killing intent moved over before surrounding him in a half circle. The outer walls of city located behind him; Chu Yang found himselfpletely surrounded by the group of Foundation Establishment Realm demon beasts.


    Grrr~


    Seeing that he had been surrounded without any way out, arge wolf moved to the front before growling towards him with a hungry expression in its eyes. Even from a nce, Chu Yang realized that the wolf demon beast had actually reached the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm!


    However, the group of wolf demon beasts along with the Core Formation Realm leader were not acting cautious at all. Allowing Chu Yang to understand that none of them had managed to see through his cultivation base. Instead, they thought he was just some random human who had happened to wander into their territory!


    Because of this, he had ended up looking like free dinner to them!


    Howl!


    Giving out a signal to the others, the leader of the wolf pack at the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm carelessly jumped towards Chu Yang. Not viewing him as a threat and instead just being eager to get the first bite of the human that had foolishly wandered into its pack''s territory!


    However, because of this, things did not end up going as the wolf pack leader had expected¡­


    Swish~


    "Mountain Piercer!"


    Before the leader of the wolves even managed to reach him, Chu Yang used the second move from the Divine Soul Spear Mantra, Mountain Piercer-


    Ptsh-!


    Catching the wolf demon beastpletely off guard, as the spear flew through the air before piercing through the stomach of the wolf demon beast with a terrifying momentum.


    HOOOWL-!


    As the energy from the attack spread through its body, the wolf pack leader could only let out a howl filled with pain before falling onto the ground, dead!


    Howl!


    Howl!


    Howl!


    Seeing their leader suddenly being killed with a single attack, the remaining wolf demon beasts howled loudly filled with panic at what had just transpired before fleeing in all directions without looking back.


    Given that they had been able to survive until the Foundation Establishment Realm inside the ancient city ruins filled with demon beasts far stronger than themselves, the wolves understood when to escape and when was a good time to fight¡­ With their leader being instantly killed, it meant that it was time for them to escape before they ended up with the same fate as their now former leader!


    Whoosh-!


    Watching the wolves disappear faster than they had appeared, Chu Yang could not help smiling a bit wryly.


    Even with his speed, he doubted that he would be able to catch up to more than one or two of the escaping wolf demon beasts!


    For this reason, Chu Yang decided to just ignore them as they ran away.


    Demon beasts like the wolves were cowardly and Chu Yang doubted that they would try to attack him again after they had learnt about his strength!


    "Hopefully I won''t encounter a pack of Core Formation Realm demon beasts¡­" Muttering this to himself as he realized that there was a possibility of encountering a pack of Core Formation Realm demon beast simr to the wolf demon beast he had just encountered, Chu Yang could not help shivering.


    No matter how easily he had dealt with the group of Foundation Establishment Realm wolf demon beasts, Chu Yang understood that the only reason why he had been able to do it was because he was in the Core Formation Realm and had been able to catch their leader off guard. Killing it and as a result scaring the rest of the pack away.


    A pack of Core Formation Realm demon beasts would not be that simple to deal with, as Chu Yang doubted that he would be able to kill the leader of such a pack easily.


    At that point in time, he might be forced to deal with close to a dozen Core Formation Realm demon beasts attacking him at the same time! No matter how strong he was for his cultivation realm, he was still only at the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm!


    I will have to avoid the core of the ancient city ruins for now¡­ Maybe after getting a better understanding of the powerful Core Formation Realm demon beasts in there, I can go there to explore and find some suitable demon beasts to fight¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Chu Yang felt something weird as he looked down on the body of Core Formation Realm wolf demon beast.


    After having been pierced through by his spear, the wolf demon beast had arge gaping hole through its chest. However, this was not what caused Chu Yang to suddenly look down an inspect the body.


    "Hm? What is this¡­?"


    Instead, it was a small, weird stone inside its body that had be visible.


    Digging the small almost translucent stone out of the wolf demon beast''s body, Chu Yang could not help frowning as he felt a weird energy suddenly seep into his body from the small translucent stone the moment, he picked it up with his hand.


    Not only that, but the energy from the weird stone directly entered his dantian!


    By the time Chu Yang realized a foreign energy was entering his dantian and let go of the weird stone, it was already toote, as the energy from the stone had already entered his dantian.


    Thump~


    Crack!


    The weird translucent stone that was nowpletely empty soonnded on the ground, as it directly shattered into pieces before seemingly dissolving into the surroundings. Leaving nothing behind for Chu Yang to inspect.


    "What in the world is this energy¡­" Muttering this to himself, Chu Yang quickly found a ce to hide inside the ruins of a nearby house before sitting down in a lotus position.


    Using his cultivation mantra to calm himself down, Chu Yang did not waste a single second as he felt the foreign energy that was now present inside his dantian.


    To his surprise, the energy did not do anything and just floated around his dantian with seemingly no aim. Not to mention harming him, the energy did nothing at all other than floating around.


    After a careful inspection, Chu Yang also discovered that the energy was far too weak to do any actual harm to his dantian. Allowing him to rx, though not too much, as he still had some sort of foreign energy floating around inside his dantian.


    Even if he knew that it couldn''t harm him in his current state, who would know for certain if it decided to attack him during a battle?


    If it really started to cause chaos inside his dantian while he was fighting, Chu Yang knew that the foreign energy might end up costing his life¡­ Not to mention, given his current location and goals, he was one hundred percent certain he would end up fighting in the soon to be future!


    For this reason, Chu Yang wanted to quickly get rid of the foreign energy that had entered his dantian.


    ¡­


    Like this, close to half an hour passed, as Chu Yang tried forcibly pushing the foreign energy out of his body to no avail.


    "Hah¡­ This damnable energy blob¡­ How persistent can it be!? Maybe I should try something different¡­" Muttering this to himself, Chu Yang stopped trying to push the energy out of his body as he tried to think of another way to deal with it that did not involve expelling it from his body.


    Ah! Why don''t I try using my golden core to forcibly refine the energy¡­? If it really seeds. Not only will I be able to get rid of this hidden danger, but I might also be able to increase the strength of my golden core!


    As this thought appeared, Chu Yang didn''t waste any time, as he slowly began drawing the foreign energy towards the red golden core at the centre of his dantian¡­

 Chapter 575: Chu Yang In Trouble~

    Chapter 575: Chu Yang In Trouble~


    Drawing the foreign energy inside his dantian towards his golden core, Chu Yang could not help frowning the moment he started the refining process.


    Not only could he refine the foreign energy from the weird translucent stone inside his dantian without any difficulties, but it was almost as if he was meant to.


    The foreign energy that had been refined had turned into an extremely pure form of qi that was quickly absorbed by his golden core. Strengthening it and allowing him to edge closer to the Second Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    Knowing that the foreign energy was not harmful to him in any way and instead helped him increase his strength after being refined, Chu Yang focused his full attention on refining the rest of the foreign energy inside his dantian before allowing his golden core to absorb it.


    Swish~


    Absorbing thest bit of the foreign energy inside of his dantian after a simple refinement with the help of his golden core, Chu Yang opened his eyes before standing up to inspect how much his strength had increased after absorbing the refined foreign energy from the translucent stone.


    "To think I actually managed to reach the Peak of the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm after absorbing the energy inside the weird stone¡­ I wonder what in the world that translucent stone inside the wolf demon beast actually was¡­ And more importantly if there are more of them inside the ancient city ruins?" Thinking this out loud, Chu Yang had a feeling that there were still some treasures hidden away inside the ruins. The weird translucent stone he had just found being one of them!


    Havinge to this conclusion, Chu Yang decided to spend some more time looking around the outer part of the ancient city ruins before heading towards the core part of the ancient city ruins where the stronger demon beasts were located.


    Hopefully, he would be able to find more of the weird translucent stones while searching through the outer part of the ancient city ruins.


    This way, he might also be able to breakthrough to the Second Stage, Third Stage, or maybe even the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm in less than a single day if he managed to find enough of the weird translucent stones!


    Understanding just what kind of opportunity he might have chanced upon; Chu Yang didn''t stay around inside the somewhat intact house ruins that he had been refining the energy from the translucent stone inside of.


    Swoosh~!


    Jumping outside, Chu Yang began searching his surroundings. Looking for not only any of the translucent stones that might be around, but also for any demon beasts. After all, the ce he had first found a translucent stone was inside the body of a demon beast!


    Roar¡­?


    Like this, an unknown cmity descended on the weak Foundation Establishment Realm demon beast in the outer parts of the ancient city ruins, as a certain human with a spear in hand began killing any and all demon beast that entered his eyes...


    Of course, something like this happening would not go unnoticed by the more powerful demon beast in the core of the ancient city ruins.


    ROOOOAR!


    Even more so given that most of the Foundation Establishment Realm demon beasts in the outer part of the ancient city ruins were their offspring!


    How could the powerful Core Formation Realm demon beast simply allow for someone to randomly go around ughtering their offspring?


    Roar!


    ROAR ROOOOAR!


    Roar? Roar Roar!


    Given how many of their offspring he had already killed, the demon beasts that were normally against each other fighting for territory easily came together with the simple goal of discussing how to deal with Chu Yang!


    Like this, the powerful demon beast at the centre of the ancient city ruins came together. Not taking more than a few minutes to decide that they would all work together to kill the impudent human who had been ughtering their offspring. Not nning to give him any chance to escape or fight back!


    ¡­


    "Hm? Why do I have a feeling that Chu Yang is about to get into a dangerous situation¡­"


    At the same time the powerful demon beast in the centre of the ancient city ruins were nning to band together to deal with his disciples, Xuan Hao had just finished teaching Bai Ning, as he was making his way down the mountain to meet up with Elder Song.


    "It''s probably nothing, I guess I''m just getting worried because he is out on his own. Not to mention he also encountered a young master ording to the system¡­"


    Shaking his head as he pushed the thought of Chu Yang being in a dangerous situation aside, Xuan Hao continued making his way down his mountain towards Elder Song.


    For now, he wanted to inform Elder Song about the location of the spirit stone mine that he had been given by the system as quickly as possible so he could make arrangement and sent a group of elders over and get ready to mine out the spirit stones.


    Having already secretly checked out the spirit stone mine in question on his way back to the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao understood just how massive it was.


    Gaining a brand-new spirit stone mine was no small thing to the current Flying Sword Sect.


    Not to mention, the spirit stone mine in question was by far thergest inside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect, it would not only allow more spirit stones to be distributed but would also be of use in the construction of the future main sect in the Shattered Star Peaks.


    The main reason why it would be such a big help, was because the spirit stone mine would be able to produce far more than 10 times the high-grade spirit stones yearly that the spirit stone mine on their border with the former Raging me Sect could!


    Even if he was not sure how many it would be able to produce, he was certain that it would be far more than what the Flying Sword Sect was currently producing!


    Thump!


    Landing on the ground beneath his mountain as he thought about this, Xuan Hao did not hurry towards the location of Elder Song. Instead taking his time as he observed a group of young disciples passing him while talking among themselves.


    Now that I think about it, there should have been another batch of new disciples not too long ago¡­ I should go and take a look and see if there is anyone talented among them after finishing things up with Elder Song¡­ Hm¡­ But it will be toote by then¡­ Maybe I should hold a lecture for the new disciples tomorrow? This way, I will also be able toplete the sect quest of holding a lecture for the sect disciples¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he continued moving towards the location of Elder Song, Xuan Hao decided to hold a lecture for the new disciples of the Flying Sword Sect the following day.


    Not only would he be able to search for any talented disciples that might have entered the sect without his knowledge, but he would also be able toplete the sect quest at the same time. Having Bai Ning join the lecture could also be a good idea as he might be able to make a few friends during the lecture.


    The main reason why he wanted Bai Ning to be friends with some of the new disciples, was due to the fact that the only friends other than his two older disciples and Zhi Ruo, was a bunch of middle-aged uncles and elderly cksmiths¡­


    Other than that, Xuan Hao was also a little annoyed by the fact that those elderly people constantly came to ask for Bai Ning whenever he was around!


    Those old people were clearly not friends with Bai Ning but were instead a bunch of old people trying to steal away his disciple while he was not around! No matter what, he had to prevent something like that from happening and the best way to do this, was to have Bai Ning get a few friends who were of simr age to himself.


    This way, he would also not have to worry about some old man trying to take in Bai Ning as his cksmithing disciple whenever he went to visit one of his friends!


    "Hm? Did something happen with Elder Song¡­?"


    Reaching Elder Song''s home while thinking about all of this, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he saw the state of Elder Song''s house. Not only was itpletely messed up, but he quickly understood the reason for this messed up appearance being the aftermath of a cauldron exploding!


    At least his alchemy knowledge came into use in something other than brewing potions. Although, it was not in a way Xuan Hao had expected.


    After all, since when did Elder Song be an alchemist? Not to mention it looked like he might have blown up his own cauldron¡­

 Chapter 576: Elder Songs Hidden Trouble

    Chapter 576: Elder Song''s Hidden Trouble


    Whoosh~


    Feeling curious and worried about Elder Song at the same time upon seeing the state of the house, Xuan Hao did not remain standing in front of the house for more than a few seconds before entering to find out what happened.


    "Cough! Elder Xuan? Is that you¡­?"


    Hearing the weak voice of someone calling out to him the moment he entered the half-destroyed house, Xuan Hao quickly turned in the direction of the voice. Only to be met with a person covered from head to toe in some sort of ck gooey liquid.


    "Elder Song¡­? I-is that really you¡­?" Already knowing who the person covered in some sort of ck gooey liquid was with a quick scan of his divine sense, Xuan Hao still did not dare believe it. After all, Elder Song''s current appearance was a stark contrastpared to what he was used to. The wise elder was nowhere to be seen and had instead been reced by a human shaped ck gooey liquid¡­


    "Yes, It''s me! I¡­ I happened to encounter an ident while refining the medicine for my granddaughter¡­" Smiling a bit awkwardly while saying this, Elder Song pointed towards the area at the centre of the disaster that had just taken ce.


    "I see that, it''s quite lucky for you that Song Jia is not here at the moment- Now that I think about it, where is your granddaughter? Did she perhaps run away after you locked her up at home for too long¡­?" Looking around the room as he realized that Song Jia was nowhere nearby, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit curious about what had happened to the little girl.


    After all, she had quite a good talent when it came to finding spiritual herbs and sensing the aura of people around her. Even if she was blind, she could still somewhat see the world around herself by sensing the aura of people and nts around herself¡­ At least that was Xuan Hao''s conclusion about Song Jia so far.


    Even more importantly than that, Xuan Hao understood that Elder Song would not be one to be wasting his time refining medicine if his granddaughter had run away!


    "My granddaughter? Ah! You don''t have to worry about her, I asked Zu Fei to help me look after her for the next few days so I could focus on refining her medicine without any worry! The Sect Master also helped take care of my usual workload¡­ Although I doubt, he will be able tost for more than a day or two¡­"


    "I see, that''s great! For a second, I thought she had run off to explore the demon beast forest just next to the sect¡­"


    "Haha! Indeed, that would be something that little one coulde up with! If that really happened, I would indeed not be able to calmly refine medicine for her¡­ Well¡­ Not that I even managed to refine any medicine in the first ce¡­"


    Assured that Song Jia had not run away to explore a demon infested forest or something even more dangerous, Xuan Hao focused his attention on the location where the cauldron had exploded and the ''medicine'' that covered Elder Song from head to toe.


    Analysing the spot where the cauldron had exploded first, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he realized just how strong the explosion of the cauldron had been.


    Even if he retreated in time, such an explosion would be more than enough to injurie someone at the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm like Elder Song!


    "¡­"


    Inspecting Elder Song more closely with his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help sighing in his heart upon realizing that the old man had been injured by the explosion. Not only that, but the injuries he had received would take up to a week to recover from!


    Looks like Feng Chen will have to take over for Elder Song for a bit longer than he expected¡­ Will he really be okay¡­?


    Preforming a silent prayer for Feng Chen, Xuan Hao focused his attention on the ck sludge that covered Elder Song from head to toe.


    From a nce, the ck sludge did not look special in any way, but after looking closely, Xuan Hao could clearly make out that several Spirit Grade Spiritual Herbs had been used in the making of the ck sludge. Allowing him to understand that the medicine Elder Song had been trying to make clearly a potion made by an Expert Alchemist! Not only that, but a Peak Expert Alchemist!


    "Now that you are on the topic, would you mind if I took a look at the medicine you are making for Song Jia? I''m quite skilled as an alchemist, so maybe I can help out?"


    Feeling curious about the medicine in question, Elder Song''s sudden alchemy skills and the reason why Song Jia needed the medicine, Xuan Hao could not stop himself from asking this as he waited for Elder Song''s response.


    "This¡­" Seeing Xuan Hao''s expectant look, Elder Song was caught slightly off guard, as he didn''t know how to answer. The fact that he had not asked the Alchemy Hall for help when it came to refining the medicine for Song Jia had to do with the origins of the medicine and the price one had to pay while making the medicine!


    However, after thinking it over for a short moment, Elder Song realized that there was no reason to hide anything about the medicine in front of Xuan Hao. In the first ce, he understood very well that he would not be able to refine the medicine by himself in time this time around with his current injuries¡­


    "Haa¡­ Actually, it''s like this-"


    Having decided to exin the medicine he was making for Song Jia to Xuan Hao in hope that he would help him make, Elder Song fully exined what the medicine in question actually was!


    "-The medicine is not really something belonging to the normal branch of alchemy like you might have expected. Instead, it belongs to the demonic branch of alchemy! The medicine-"


    Listening to Elder Song talk about the medicine he had been making for Song Jia, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked! Not because of the fact that it was a demonic medicine, but due to the price Elder Song paid every time he refined the demonic medicine for Song Jia! The price in question was his lifespan!


    Every time he refined the medicine, he would lose 1 year of his natural lifespan! Even if this did not sound like much, Elder Song had done it over the past 12 years and had lost 12 years of his lifespan due to this!


    The price in question was not something one would normally have to pay while refining the demonic medicine, but Elder Song was unwilling to sacrifice some innocent person to refine the medicine ording to the recipe. For this reason, he had used a year of his own lifespan as a substitute for this!


    Considering he had reached the Nascent Soul Realm; it did not sound like much. Especially when people in the Nascent Soul Realm could live for thousands of years¡­ However, constantly drawing on his own lifespan had caused a bacsh and he had ended up in his current situation. The reason for this, was that it was incredibly damaging to not only his body, but also his soul to forcibly extract his own lifespan!


    Not to mention, he had done it so many times.


    Xuan Hao could not help feeling a wave of shock go through him after realizing this. After all, Elder Song should have been incredibly exhausted and weak due to constantly draining his own lifespan¡­ But even with all this, he had never seen Elder Song exhausted before!


    Not only had he never seen him being exhausted before, but Elder Song was always the one to do the most work in the Flying Sword Sect! Even now, he was doing his best to help refine medicine for Song Jia without anyone knowing just how much he was sacrificing to do this!


    "Elder Song¡­ Take a rest for now, I will go over the medicine and see if I can came up with a way to safely make it without having to sacrifice something to make it¡­" Letting out a soft sigh as he said this, Xuan Hao used his power to clean up the house and Elder Song before making the old man get some rest.


    Over the years, Elder Song had always been giving his all to help him and the rest of the Flying Sword Sect out. Even if he had used demonic alchemy, Xuan Hao did not care about this at all. Especially considering the fact that he had been using his own lifespan to refine the medicine in question. This time around, he should be the one to help out Elder Song for once¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao quickly picked up the demonic medicine recipeying on the floor before starting to read through it.

 Chapter 577: Demonic Alchemy

    Chapter 577: Demonic Alchemy


    Looking at the recipe, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself after reading halfway through it.


    The spiritual herbs required for the medicine was nothing abnormal at first and just consisted of normal spiritual herbs that were not too hard to find inside the Flying Sword Sect. However, thest few things on the recipe were what truly allowed the potion Elder Song was refining to be considered a demonic medicine that belonged among something made by a demonic alchemist!


    Not only did the recipe call for a sacrifice, but it also called for a lot of different things Xuan Hao had never heard about being used in alchemy before like the blood directly extracted from the heart of a pure maiden and other vile materials!


    Feeling a bit doubtful when he saw so many disgusting things needed for the recipe, Xuan Hao could not help ncing curiously towards Elder Song. Wondering how he had used as a substitute for those things.


    "Ahm¡­ For the pure maidens heart blood, I used the sap of the blood jewel tree, while for the-" Understanding the meaning behind Xuan Hao''s gaze, Elder Song quickly told him what he had used to substitute the horrible things called for in the recipe.


    Making sure to exin all of the things in full detail so he wouldn''t end up getting misunderstood¡­


    "-Also, I don''t know much about the disease that Song Jia is suffering from. All I know is that she will die without getting the medicinal potion on time¡­!"


    "I understand. Most of those things needed should are already here, I just need to find a way to substitute the required sacrifice in a way that doesn''t result in me wasting my own lifespan¡­ Elder Song, you can go and rest up for now, I will take care of the medicine for Song Jia!"


    Swish~


    Not waiting for Elder Song to respond, Xuan Hao used his domain to send him outside before gathering all the spiritual herbs required for the medicine currently scattered around Elder Song''s house.


    Even if the explosion had been extremely destructive for Elder Song''s home, the spiritual herbs were all intact. Mainly because Elder Song had made sure they were kept in a safe container that had luckily managed to survive the st from the cauldron blowing up earlier.


    At least he would not have to start running around the Flying Sword Sect searching for the required spiritual herbs¡­ The only thing he needed to do was find a substitute for the sacrifice!


    As for refining the actual medicinal potion? Xuan Hao did not worry about this at all. After all, he was an Artisan Alchemist! Refining a Spirit Grade Potion was nothing difficult. Especially considering he had the recipe at hand.


    "Hm¡­ Now, what in the world can be used as a substitute for a sacrifice? Lifespan is something Elder Song found to work, but forcibly extracting my own lifespan will damage my foundation and will end up taking years to recover no matter how little I extract¡­" Muttering this to himself as he once again nced over the recipe of the demonic medicinal potion, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself.


    If possible, he did not want to extract his own lifespan to make the potion, but he could understand from Elder Song that if Song Jia didn''t get the potion in time, there was a high likelihood that she would die!


    "I should check out Song Jia first!"


    Swish~


    Not losing his calm because of anxious Elder Song was when he had sent him out, Xuan Hao left the small house of Elder Song together with the spiritual herbs required for the demonic medicinal potion.


    ¡­


    Appearing at Zu Fei''s pavilion where Song Jia was currently ying around together with some of Zu Fei''s younger disciples, Xuan Hao did not reveal himself as he used both his divine sense and domain to investigate Song Jia''s body with all his strength-


    "Hm? Nothing¡­?"


    However, even after using both his divine sense and domain, he found nothing wrong with her body!


    "Looks like the disease she is suffering from is more serious than I expected¡­" Not doubting the fact that Elder Song had told him the truth and that Song Jia was suffering from some sort of deadly disease, Xuan Hao remained focused. Continuing to search for any more abnormalities in Song Jia''s body.


    "Elder Xuan¡­?"


    "¡­"


    Fully focused on trying to find out the disease that Song Jia was suffering from, Xuan Hao could not help showing a slightly surprised expression when Song Jia suddenly came to a stop and looked towards him before saying this while tilting her head. Clearly confused as to why he was there¡­


    How could I forget¡­ She can sense my aura! I can''t hide from her at all¡­


    "Hello Song Jia¡­ I just happened toe by¡­" Not knowing what to say when he had been caught by the little girl, Xuan Hao could only give an excuse as he said this while continuing to investigate her body for any abnormalities with his divine sense and domain at the same time.


    "I see¡­ Are you perhaps here because of big sister Fei!?"


    Big sister Fei¡­? Since when did that olddy be a big sister¡­?


    "Yeah, I had something to talk to her about." Deciding to y along, Xuan Hao said this as he watched the little girl nod her head in understanding before pointing at a certain person approaching them from the side.


    "Big sister Fei is just over there- Look she ising over right now!"


    "¡­"


    Feeling the familiar presence of Zu Fei approaching from behind along with hearing what Song Jia said, Xuan Hao could not help cursing silently to himself.


    How in the world did he end up in his current situation!? He only wanted to investigate the disease Song Jia was suffering from, but now he had ended up getting caught in such a situation!


    Even worse, the disease was extremely elusive, and he needed more time to find it, so he could not even run away!


    To find out about a proper substitute for the sacrifice that did not involve using his own lifespan, Xuan Hao had to first get an understanding of the disease in question to find out what kind of spiritual herbs might work to supress.


    Maybe he would even be able to directly use his strength and qi to supress or destroy the disease himself after finding the disease. After all, he was still a Domain Lord. Most diseases and other sorts of illnesses could easily be removed with his qi after he found it. This not only counted for normal disease and illnesses, but also more special ones that cultivators suffered from!


    This way, he might be able to deal with Song Jia''s disease without even having to refine the demonic medicinal potion in the first ce!


    Of course, this was only a best-case scenario¡­ First, he had to find out about the disease itself and to do that, he had to find out where it was hiding inside Song Jia''s body.


    "Elder Xuan, I wonder for what reason you havee to visit my pavilion¡­ Did something perhaps happen?"


    Hearing the voice of Zu Fei from behind, Xuan Hao smiled a bit wryly as he tried thin king up a reason for his sudden appearance. After all, he did not want to mention Song Jia''s disease to Zhu Fei, as it would inevitably lead to talks about the medicine she needed.


    Knowing Elder Song''s image in the sect and in the eyes of the other Core Elders, Xuan Hao did not want to say anything about the fact that he had been making a demonic medicine.


    Even if the other Core Elders could understand, the disciples below would inevitably also learn about this. At that point in time, Xuan Hao doubted that these disciples would be able to understand that Elder Song had sacrificed himself to refine the demonic medicinal potion. Instead, they would most likely just end up focusing on the fact that he had refined a demonic medicinal potion!


    Thinking about all of this in an instant, Xuan Hao turned around to face the confused expression of Zu Fei.


    "Zu Fei¡­ Actually, I''m here regarding Feng Chen¡­"


    "Feng Chen!? Did something happen to him!?"


    Sorry sect master, it looks like I will have to sacrifice you for Elder Song''s reputation¡­ At least, you can consider this as repaying him for all the things he has done for you over the years!


    "Actually, Feng Chen was talking with Shu Yao and some of the Spring Flower Sect''s elders and they nned to head to the nned location of the new sect to check it out aler today-"


    "Those vixens!? You dare do this without telling me about it Feng Chen!?"


    Swoosh~!


    Before he even managed to finish what he was saying, Zu Fei had already disappeared filled with killing intent as she dashed towards the direction where he could sense Feng Chen was quietly cultivating by himself.


    Thanks for the help beforehand, sect master...

 Chapter 578: Black Spots

    Chapter 578: ck Spots


    Making sure that Zu Fei had left, Xuan Hao continued scanning Song Jia''s body, while the person in question was tilting her head in a slightly confused manner looking in the direction that Zu Fei had disappeared in. Clearly, she had been affected by Zu Fei''s outburst and the killing intent that inevitably leaked out into her surroundings.


    However, Xuan Hao was more than happy with Song Jia looking in the direction of ZU Fei lost in her own thoughts, as it would allow him to continue searching her body without having to deal with her being suspicious of what he was doing or why he had not left yet after talking with Zu Fei.


    "Hm? This should be it¡­" Having searched through her body from head to toe, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he noticed a few slightly dark spots located in both her eyes. The dark spots were small to the point of being invisible to the naked eye.


    Not only that, but there was also some sort of weird membrane covering the dark spots. Hiding it from both his divine sense and domain. The only reason why he had noticed them was due to one of these dark spots suddenly moving on its own when his divine sense swept over its location.


    However, even after discovering the small dark spots inside both of her eyes, Xuan Hao did not dare to carelessly try and remove them. After all, the eyes are an extremely sensitive part of the human body that would not be easy to recover in case he ended up damaging it while attempting to remove the dark spots inside them.


    That was not mentioning the fact that he still had close to no knowledge about the dark spots and what damage it might cause if they happened to be rted to Song Jia''s ability to see the aura of people and nts around herself.


    If that was the case. Removing the dark spots might end up causing Song Jia to truly be blind without being able to see anything at all¡­ Not really something he wanted to happen just because he acted without more knowledge.


    Ha¡­ Looks like I will have to spend more time on this than I expected¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao left Zu Fei''s pavilion before heading towards the Alchemy Hall.


    Even if he had no idea how to remove the dark spots in Song Jia''s eyes, he at the very least had some idea on how to supress them without having to use the demonic medicinal potion after having inspected them first hand!


    Swoosh~


    Silently leaving Song Jia who was still lost in thought thinking about the killing intent of Zu Fei from earlier, Xuan Hao made sure that some of the younger disciples under Zu Fei took care of Song Jia before disappearing in the direction of the Alchemy Hall.


    Now, all he needed to do was refine a Spirit Grade medicinal potion that could help supress the dark spots inside Song Jia''s eyes¡­ Not something that would be too hard given his current realm when it came to alchemy!


    Things might have been different if it was a Soul Grade Medicinal Potion, as medicinal potion was far harder to refinepared to normal potions. Not to mention that the current Flying Sword Sect might not have all the required Soul Grade Spiritual Herbs to refine a Soul Grade Medicinal Potion, as the strongest alchemist outside himself was still half a step away from reaching the Artisan Realm!


    ¡­


    BOOM!


    At the same time Xuan Hao was making his way towards the Alchemy Hall, his disciple, Chu Yang, was sent flying by the tail of an enormous snake demon beast in the Core Formation Realm.


    "Hah¡­ Where¡­ Hah¡­ Did all of these demon beastse from!?"


    Doing his best to breath properly as he looked at the swarm of demon beast that was surrounding him, Chu Yang could not help cursing after remembering how he had been leisurely hunting down demon beast in the outer parts of the ancient city ruins just a few seconds earlier.


    After he had found out about the transparent stone inside the demon beasts, Chu Yang had hunted down all the demon beast he met.


    As a result, he had discovered that the transparent stone that helped increase his strength was only present inside the demon beast who had reached the Core Formation Realm. No demon beast below the Core Formation Realm had a transparent stone inside them!


    Although he had managed to gather quite a few of the transparent stones during a short period of time, he had not yet absorbed any of them yet!


    If only he absorbed them, he should have been able to reach the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm and he would have a far easier time dealing with the siege of the demon beast¡­


    "Hah¡­ Not to mention¡­ Hah¡­ I lost mymunication talisman, so I can''t even contact my master for help!" Muttering this to himself as he looked at the close to dozen Core Formation Realm demon beasts that had surrounded him, Chu Yang shook his head helplessly. Not knowing how he would be able to get out of his current situation alive.


    ROOOOOAR!


    Not giving him any more time to think, Chu Yang was interrupted while trying to think of a way to escape, as arge boar the size of a small hill charged towards him filled with killing intent.


    Hm? This boar¡­ Maybe I can do that¡­


    Seeing the boar charging towards him filled with killing intent, Chu Yang suddenly thought of something as a small smile appeared on his face watching the hill sized boar getting closer and closer to him.


    Swish~


    Thump!


    In thest moment before the massive boar hit him, Chu Yang jumped into the air beforending on top of the massive boar that continued moving forward with a terrifying momentum after missing its target.


    Swish-!


    Not expecting this to happen, the massive boar demon beast did not have time to stop itself, as it continued forward-


    Roar¡­?


    Heading directly towards one of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts that were blocking Chu Yang''s escape path!


    Rumble~


    Along with the massive boar demon beast trying its best to prevent itself from crashing into its friend by forcibly stopping itself, Chu Yang used the momentum of the massive boar demon beast''s abrupt stop tounch himself over the blockage created by the demon beasts.


    Swish~


    Flying through the air above the demon beasts, Chu Yang soonnded on the ground a few hundred meters away from therge group of Core Formation Realm demon beasts that had surrounded him-


    BANG!


    Just in time to witness the hill sized boar crashing into its friend, as it had been unable to fully stop itself in time.


    ROOOOAR!


    ROAR?!


    ROOOAR!


    Bang-bang-bang!


    Of course, this was not met kindly by its friend, as the two demon beasts soon began roaring at each other before starting to violently fight.


    "¡­"


    Seeing all of this, Chu Yang used the sudden confusion created among the demon beast to silently slip away before they had time toprehend what had just happened and started looking for him.


    ¡­


    "Looks like I didn''t get too injured in the short battle with those demon beasts¡­ I will have to thank that boar demon beast in the future¡­ If not for its generous help, I don''t know how I would have escaped that situation alive!"


    A few minutes passed since then, as Chu Yang examined his injuries in a hidden location inside the ancient city ruins.


    Luckily, he had not been injured too badly by the demon beast, as the boar demon beast had helped him escape before the fight truly began in the first ce.


    "But¡­ Those demon beasts are very clearly after me¡­ Should I leave the ancient city ruins, or continue searching for more of the transparent stones to further increase my strength¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he clearly remembered how those demon beasts at the Core Formation Realm had surrounded him, Chu Yang had already realized that the demon beasts were targeting him from the beginning.


    Not only that, but the demon beasts were smart enough to sneakily surround him and trap him before attacking!


    The demon beasts were by no means dumb. Staying any longer inside the ancient city ruins would surely end up with him encountering the Core Formation Realm demon beasts once again.


    At that point in time, Chu Yang doubted that they would let him escape again¡­ But¡­ If he left, he would give up his chance to gather more of the transparent stones!


    Giving up on a chance to increase his strength was not something Chu Yang wanted to do!


    "Yosh¡­ Let''s do it like this then! I will first recover and absorb the transparent stones I gathered so far. After that, I will find a way to deal with the demon beasts!" Coming to a decision, Chu Yang sat down in a lotus position as he closed his eyes to start recovering from his injuries.

 Chapter 579: Absorbing the Transparent Stones, Soaring Strength!

    Chapter 579: Absorbing the Transparent Stones, Soaring Strength!


    Recovering from the injuries he had received during his encounter with the group of Core Formation Realm demon beast, Chu Yang directly took out the transparent stones he had gathered so far before absorbing all of them at once.


    Not even a secondter, his dantian was filled up with the weird foreign energy that had been stored inside the transparent stones he had gathered from the bodies of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts he had killed.


    The differencepared to the first time around when he had idently absorbed the first transparent stone, was that he now understood that the weird energy that was now present inside he dantian could be refined and absorbed by his golden core!


    Whoosh!


    Knowing what to do this time around, Chu Yang didn''t waste any time, as he directed the foreign energy from the transparent stone towards his golden core.


    Controlling it, as it slowly got refined and absorbed by his golden core. Allowing his strength to rapidly increase-


    BOOM!


    Having already reached the Peak of the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang managed to directly breakthrough to the Second Stage of the Core Formation Realm just after he began absorbing the refined energy from the transparent stones he had just absorbed.


    However, this was not the end of it, as he had only gone through a small amount of the energy contained inside the transparent stones.


    Today, he nned to not only break through to the Second Stage of the Core Formation Realm, but he nned to reach the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm. Depending on how unstable his foundation was after reaching the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang even nned to attempt a breakthrough to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm!


    If he really managed to reach the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, the group of demon beasts that had ganged up on him earlier, would be far easier to deal with.


    Even if he was not too certain about their strength, as he did not have the time to careful inspect them given the situation at the time, Chu Yang did not expect for any of them to be above the Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    After all, he was certain that they would not have let him escape if one of them had managed to reach step into thete stage of the Core Formation Realm!


    It didn''t matter if he reached the Third or Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, he would still have to be cautious when facing over a dozen demon beasts in the Core Formation Realm. Trying to catch them alone and take them out one by one would be a far better n than to face all of them at once¡­


    Thinking about all of this, Chu Yang shook his head as he focused his full attention on refining the foreign energy inside his dantian and turn it into his own strength.


    BOOM!


    Not even thirty minutes after his breakthrough to the Second Stage of the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang felt his strength increase once again, as he broke through to the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    However, this did note without cost, as Chu Yang clearly felt that his foundation had be unstable after breaking through two minor realms at once.


    Not only that, but the energy required for him to reach the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm was far more than he had first expected. Breaking through to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm with the remaining energy of the transparent stones would be impossible¡­


    For this reason, Chu Yang decided to stop trying to increase his cultivation realm for now and instead focused the remaining energy from the transparent stones inside his dantian on stabilizing his current cultivation realm.


    ¡­


    "Haa¡­"


    Letting out a breath of air as he opened his eyes after having spent close to half a day stabilizing his current cultivation realm, Chu Yang could not help smiling happily to himself after discovering how much he had managed to improve after reaching the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    Not only had his strength increased, but he could also feel that the durability of his body had increased by a lot.


    Ching~


    "To think my defence improved by so much¡­" Trying to use his spear to cut into his skin with the strength of someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm, Chu Yang could not help showing a surprised expression when noticing that he could not cut into it-


    Ptsh-!


    Only when his strength increased to the Core Formation Realm could he even pierce through his own skin!


    The durability of his body was far more than before and could be said to beparable to a demon beast!


    "With this¡­. Even if I''m not in the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, I should still be able to survive an encounter with the group of Core Formation Realm demon beasts from earlier!" Muttering this to himself as he realized this, Chu Yang could not help narrowing his eyes as he remembered the demon beasts that had ganged up on him and tried to kill him.


    If not for the help of the hill sized boar demon beast, he would not have been able to escape after having been surrounded by the Core Formation Realm demon beasts. However, things were different now!


    "Now¡­ I can hunt the Core Formation Realm demon beasts inside the ancient city ruins without worry! Maybe, I will be able to gather enough transparent stones to reach the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm!"


    Swish~!


    Not staying still inside the ce where he had hidden while breaking through to the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang silently snuck back outside before beginning his search for any of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts that had ganged up on him earlier.


    For now, Chu Yang had decided to first target the demon beasts that had ganged up on and attacked him before moving on to the rest of the demon beasts inside the ancient city ruins!


    ¡­


    After he had escaped close to one day ago, the group of demon beasts had searched for him for close to half a day before giving up and returning to their own homes thinking that the human had already left the ancient city ruins in fear of them finding him.


    Roar!


    It was at this moment that a painful roar sounded through the core area of the ancient city ruins, as the group of Core Formation Realm demon beasts quickly rushed over. Only to discover that the roar belonged to the hill sized boar demon beast.


    Not only that, but when they arrived, it had already died, as therge body of the boar could be seen lying on the ground with several holes all over it. Especially so around the chest area, where it looked like someone had deliberately dogged into its body!


    Roar!


    It did not take long for one of the demon beasts in the group to discover the aura of a human lingering in the air around the dead body of the boar demon beast. Not to mention it was a human''s doing, it was clearly the human who had escaped earlier who had done it!


    Even worse, they found out that he had already killed, and it was the boar that was regarded highly for its defence nheless¡­


    The demon beasts clearly understood what this meant for them¡­ If the human could kill the boar demon beast before they even had the time to arrive and help, it meant that the human had the strength to kill most of them in a simr fashion¡­


    Roar!


    ROOOAR!


    Roar!


    For this reason, the weaker Core Formation Realm demon beast in the group began panicking, as they understood that they might be next after the boar demon beast.


    After all, the human was clearly targeting them already and it would be obvious that he would target the weaker once in their group first!


    ROOOAR!


    Knowing the situation was not great, an unfamiliar demon beast who was not present in the earlier siege on Chu Yang roared loudly, as the panicking demon beasts quickly calmed down.


    From this alone, it could be seen that the unfamiliar demon beast was stronger than the others and at the same time seemed like it was in control.


    Roar Roar Roar!


    Saying something to the other demon beasts, the unfamiliar leader of the demon beast group soon left. The rest of the demon beasts did the same. However,pared to how they had arrived at the scene, the demon beasts all left in groups of two.


    Clearly, the leader had instructed for them to gather together so they could work together and fight off the human in case he showed up and tried something.


    The only one who was alone, was the leader of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts¡­ Very clearly, the new, yet unfamiliar demon beast was not the slightest bit afraid of Chu Yanging to kill him!

 Chapter 580: The Dumb Three Headed Horse and the Worried Bull Demon Beast!

    Chapter 580: The Dumb Three Headed Horse and the Worried Bull Demon Beast!


    "To think they actually started grouping up together after they found out about me killing the boar demon beast¡­"


    Watching the scene of the demon beasts leaving in groups of two, Chu Yang had a feeling that it would be hard for him to take out two of the demon beasts on his own before the other demon beasts showed up for support from now on-


    "Not to mention¡­ That new demon beast is clearly above the Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm!" Muttering this to himself as he recalled the new powerful demon beasts that had seemingly takenmand of the group of Core Formation Realm demon beasts, Chu Yang could not help wondering where it hade from.


    Perhaps, the group of Core Formation demon beasts he had encountered so far were not the most powerful demon beasts present in the core part of the ancient city ruins¡­ If that was really the case, the ancient city ruins would be a far more dangerous ce than he had first expected.


    However, it was still not enough to scare him away. After all, the transparent stones he could gather from the dead Core Formation Realm demon beasts were simply way too precious for him to give up just because there might be more powerful Core Formation Realm demon beasts at the core part of the ancient city ruins!


    As long as the demon beasts present in the core part of the ancient city ruins had not yet reached the Nascent Soul Realm, Chu Yang felt confident that he could escape with his newfound strength. Even if he had no chance to defeat the other party¡­


    "Haa¡­ For now, I should try and focus on killing the weaker Core Formation Realm demon beasts. Even if they are grouped up, I should still be able to kill one of them and escaping before the rest of them shows up¡­"


    Swish~


    Having decided on how to proceed after having found out the demon beasts had now started grouping up together to stay safe, Chu Yang silently followed two of the weaker demon beasts that were heading towards an area not far away from the outer walls of the ancient city ruins.


    The two demon beasts in question were both at the Second Stage of the Core Formation Realm, one of them being arge bull demon beast, while the other was some kind of weird looking horse demon beast with three heads.


    Even watching the two from a distance, Chu Yang decided that he would first kill the weird looking three headed horse demon beast¡­ The reason for this being that it was far smaller than the bull demon beast and would be easier for him to kill.


    After having killed the weird looking three headed horse, Chu Yang nned to try and kill the bull demon beast¡­ Of course, if the other Core Formation Realm demon beasts showed up, he would still escape before they had a chance to surround him again.


    Not that he was afraid that he would not be able to escape, but because he was afraid that the new powerful demon beast above the Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm might have a chance to injure him before he could escape¡­.


    If he ended up getting too badly injured, he might be forced to leave the ancient city ruins for the time being and be forced to spend a few days recovering¡­ In case of a really bad injury, he might even be forced to return to the Flying Sword Sect to spend a few months recovering!


    Chu Yang really did not want to return to the sect like that. Not to mention how Qing Yi would make fun of him, he didn''t want his master to see him returning all injured. Especially considering that his master might not allow him to leave the sect any time in the future after learning about how he had not only been injured, but also lost themunication talisman he had given to him¡­


    I should stop thinking about this¡­


    Shaking his head as he felt his train of thought bing negative. Thinking like he had already been injured and had been forced to return to the Flying Sword Sect earlier than he wanted, Chu Yang focused his attention back on to the two demon beasts as they slowly entered therge nest on top of what had once been arge tower overseeing the surrounding city.


    Now, the tower had instead turned into arge bird nest, in which the two demon beasts entered.


    As for which of the two demon beasts constructed thisrge bird nest on top of therge tower that looked like it was about to copse at any moment under the two massive demon beasts'' massive weight¡­


    It was of course the three headed horse demon beast¡­ How did he know this¡­?


    Neigh!


    Well, for one, the three headed horse demon beast began meticulously working on expanding the nest the moment it entered it, while the bull demon beast looked at the tower waying slightly under its weight with an uneasy expression on its face¡­


    Why did a three headed horse demon beast construct a massive bird nest on top of a tower that looked like it copse at any moment? Chu Yang had no idea, but what he could say for certain, was that the three headed horse demon beast, was indeed a rather weird demon beast. Even the bull demon beast that had followed it into its nest seemed to agree with this, as it began looking around itself more and more anxiously.


    Creak~


    This was mostly because the foundation of the tower was slowly starting to give in under the weight of the two massive demon beasts!


    Roar!


    Neigh¡­? Neigh!


    While the bull demon beast seemed to notice this and even informed the weird three headed horse demon beast, the three headed horse demon beast did not seem to understand the worries of the bull demon beast, as it carried on working on its home without the slightest care in the world-


    Creak~


    All while the foundation holding up the tower was slowly starting to give in under the massive weight of the two demon beasts.


    "Hm¡­ This might be a good opportunity¡­" Watching this scene y out as the several crack began forming along the bottom part of the tower that the two demon beasts were residing, Chu Yang narrowed his eyes as he felt like he might have an opportunity to kill both of the demon beasts in time if he took advantage of the current situation.


    CRACK-!


    Chu Yang did not have to wait long for this opportunity, as only a minuteter, the foundation that had held up the tower with the three headed horse demon beast nest on top of it, broke apart under the weight of the two demon beasts currently on top of it.


    ROAR?!


    NEIGHT!?


    As the two demon beasts were caught off guard by the towers sudden copse and started falling towards the ground together with the tower, Chu Yang took advantage of the two demon beasts currently in a state of confusion, as heunched forward with his spear in hand towards his first target, the three headed horse demon beast!


    Swoosh~!


    Piercing through the air with his spear in hand, Chu Yang soon appeared directly below the three headed horse demon beast before stabbing towards it without wasting any time. The small qi barrier that it had time to form, was far from enough to block Chu Yang''s spear!


    Even if the three headed horse demon beast noticed him in time, there was no way for it to change its path in time-


    Ptsh-!


    As Chu Yang managed to easily pierce through all three of its horse heads before it had any time to put up a any proper resistance...


    Swish~


    Quickly digging out the transparent stone located around its stomach before focusing his attention towards the bull demon beast a short distance away from his current location.


    Roar?


    By the time that the bull demon beast managed to regain its footing and look toward the three headed horse demon beast, Chu Yang had already killed it and was rushing towards it!


    ROOOOOAR!


    However,pared to the three headed horse demon beast that he had managed to catch off guard and easily kill just a moment ago, the bull demon beast had more than enough time to recover from the sudden fall, as it met Chu Yang''s spear thrust head on!


    BOOM!


    Even if it was at a disadvantage, Chu Yang clearly felt that it would not be so easy to take care of the Bull demon beast¡­ That was not to mention, their sh would be more than enough to alert the other demon beast in the ancient city ruins about what was happening and before long they would show up to help the bull demon beast...


    If he wanted to kill the bull demon beast, he had to do so before they showed up!

 Chapter 581: The Leader of the Ancient City Ruins Core Formation Realm Demon Beasts!

    Chapter 581: The Leader of the Ancient City Ruins Core Formation Realm Demon Beasts!


    Observing the bull demon beast that had just blocked his spear while continuing his attack, Chu Yang trieding up with a way to quickly kill it before the group of Core Formation Realm demon beasts showed up.


    Even if the bull demon beast did not currently look like it would escape as it effortlessly dealt with his spear, Chu Yang did not n to give it a chance to escape. After all, it would not be strange for it to be looking for an escape path after seeing how easily the three headed horse demon beast that was at a simr realm to itself had been killed¡­


    Bang-bang-bang!


    As he continued attack the bull demon beast, Chu Yang discovered that he was slowly gaining the upper hand in the battle. Forcing the bull demon beast into a corner¡­ But this was far too slow, as he could already sense the group of Core Formation Realm demon beasts that had once surrounded him charging towards his current location!


    In less than a minute, the group would arrive, and he would be forced to escape. Even worse, the demon beast above the Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm was also rushing over from the core part of the ancient city ruins!


    Seeing the speed of this demon beast, Chu Yang could not help silently cursing to himself as he began attacking the bull demon beast far more violentlypared to before!


    Not to mention having less than a minute, with the speed of that demon beast, Chu Yang realized that he might not even have 20 seconds left before it arrived!


    For him to kill the bull demon beast in such a short time, Chu Yang had a feeling that it would be close to impossible with his current strength.


    "Hm?"


    Having slowly forced the bull demon beast into a corner while looking for any opportunity tond a fatal blow on it and kill it, Chu Yang finally saw his opportunity, as the bull demon beast idently moved backwards and found itself stuck inside a small hole in the ground that had formed during their battle.


    Although the hole in question was not enough to stop the bull demon beast from moving backwards and it could easily free itself. The fact still stood that one of its feet were stuck in the ground for a split second-


    Swish~


    Giving Chu Yang more than enough time to use his spear like an axe, as the tip of the spear was strengthened before it came sweeping down towards the leg of the bull demon beast that was just about to be pulled out from the small hole in the ground¡­


    Ptsh!


    ROOOOAR!


    As the spear cut into the leg of the bull demon beast, it let out a painfilled howl as it watched one of its legs getting cut off. Instantly making the bull demon beast that relied on four legs to walk lose its stability.


    The fact that it lost its leg was not only painful, but also something that it would not be able to recover from. After all, different from demon beasts and cultivators who reached the Nascent Soul Realm and had the ability to rebuild their physical body in case they ended up loosing an arm or leg, a demon beast or cultivator at the Core Formation Realm could not do something like that.


    The only way someone like that could regrow a lost limb was through the help of some powerful technique, a rare spiritual herb, the help of a high-level alchemist, or the help of a powerful cultivator! There might be other ways, but those were far too rarepared to those four methods¡­


    ROOOOOOAR!


    The bull demon beast let out an even more sorrowful roar as it understood this. Realizing that it might never be able to walk on four legs in the future.


    Swish~!


    Ptsh-!


    Not one to sit behind and wait for the bull demon beast to recover from the sudden sorrow that followed losing one of its legs, Chu Yang''s spear swept over from the distance as it directly pierced through the head of the bull demon beast. Killing it before it had any time to fight back.


    Even if the entire thing took quite some time to exin, the entire battle had taken less than 10 seconds to y out, as Chu Yang had sessfully managed to kill both the three headed horse demon beast and the bull demon beast before the powerful demon beast above the Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm had time to show up and save the two demon beasts!


    Whoosh!


    Not standing around after having killed the bull demon beast, Chu Yang quickly extracted the transparent stone located at the centre of the bull demon beast''s stomach before escaping into the distance. Intending to hide for a few hours and wait for the group of Core Formation Realm demon beasts to leave before looking for his next target¡­


    ROOOOOOOAR!


    Arriving at the scene and seeing the dead bodies of the three headed horse demon beast and the bull demon beast, the leader of the group of demon beasts roared loudly filled with killing intent as it quickly scanned its surroundings for the human that had been behind this.


    However, this was to no avail, as Chu Yang had already escaped into the distance at this point in time. Giving the demon beast leader nowhere to vent its anger.


    Roar!?


    Roooooar!


    Roooar¡­


    As the other demon beasts at the Core Formation Realm showed up, they all let out sorrowful and fearful roars. Each of them understood that they might very well be next, so with this in mind, they also unconsciously turned towards their leader. Waiting for instructions.


    ¡­


    "Such a massive demon beast¡­" Watching this from a safe distance, Chu Yang observed the massive demon beast above the Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm with a surprised expression on his face.


    This surprise was not due to the face that the demon beast leader was more powerful than he had expected but was instead due to the appearance of the demon beast.


    Instead of it being a massive fear inspiring demon like he had first expected that the leader of the group of Core Formation Realm demon beast would look like, the demon beast leader was instead a small rabbit norger than his head with a pair of cute horns on top of its head¡­


    "How in the world did such a cute little rabbit even manage to make such a loud roar. Not to mention¡­ How in the world did such a small rabbit get so powerful? Does it perhaps belong to some kind of ancient demon beast bloodline I have never heard about before¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he tilted his head in confusion after seeing the appearance of the demon beast leader, Chu Yang could not help feeling that it was weird to see such a small rabbit being in charge of a group of massive demon beasts, each being the size of a small hill¡­


    ROOOAR!


    Hearing the roar of the small rabbit demon beast with a small pair of demon like horns on top of its head, Chu Yang could not help feeling amazed, as he witnessed the group of massive demon beast obediently listening to the rabbit demon beast before they slowly began leaving the area and heading back towards the centre of the ancient city ruins.


    From the looks of it, the demon beasts were not going to go out in pairs of two for safety anymore, but had instead decided to all gather together at the core part of the ancient city ruins for safety¡­


    Of course, this was the worst possible oue for Chu Yang, as he would not be able to take on the demon beast if they were gathered together in one ce.


    If they had split up in groups of three after this, he might have had a chance to still kill some of them and harvest the transparent stone inside their bodies¡­ But from the looks of it, that would no longer be possible!


    Now, all he could do was hunt the Core Formation Realm demon beast roaming the outer part of the ancient city ruins alone. However, these demon beasts were all weaker than those in the core part of the ancient city ruins and the transparent stone inside their body also had way less energy inside of it.


    Not to mention, he had already hunted down most of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts in the outer parts of the ancient city ruins¡­ If he wanted to continue gathering more of the transparent stones to increase his strength, he would have to fight with the Core Formation Realm demon beasts in the core part of the ancient city ruins. Something that was not possible now that they had decided to gather together for safety in fear of him taking them out one by one¡­


    "Haa¡­ I will have to think of something after dealing with the Core Formation Realm demon beasts still left in the outer parts of the ruins¡­"


    Swish~


    Muttering this to himself, Chu Yang shook his head before moving back into the outer part of the ancient city ruins just after the group of Core Formation Realm demon beasts had left.

 Chapter 582: Searching for a way to Suppress the Black Spot Disease

    Chapter 582: Searching for a way to Suppress the ck Spot Disease


    Back at the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao had visited the Alchemy hall as he burrowed several different spiritual herbs before finding an empty alchemy room inside the Alchemy Hall before taking out all the spiritual herbs he had just gathered.


    "Hm¡­ Now¡­ What kind of medicinal potion would work to supress the ck spots inside Song Jia''s eyes¡­?" ncing over the spiritual herbs he had just gathered, Xuan Hao closed his eyes as several different potion recipes appeared in his mind. All of which could be used to supress all kinds of different eye rted diseases.


    With the assistance of the alchemy knowledge, he had gained through the help of the system. Although most of the recipes he had could not be used to help supress the ck spots inside Song Jia''s eyes, they would still be able to help him get a better understanding over medicinal potions used to treat eye rted diseases.


    With time, Xuan Hao felt certain that he would be able toe up with a medicinal potion that could cure the eye rted disease Song Jia''s was currently suffering from¡­ The only problem with this, was the fact that he did not have a lot of time!


    ording to what he had seen when investigating the slowly growing ck spots hidden away inside Song Jia''s eyes and how anxious Elder Song was about refining the demon be medicinal potion, Xuan Hao could easily guess that he would not have more than a few days'' time toplete a medicinal potion that could supress the ck spots inside Song Jia''s eyes from growing and endangering her life.


    Whoosh~


    Not daring to waste a single second after having settled down and prepared what he needed inside the alchemy room, Xuan Hao began experimenting withbining several different spiritual herbs together in an attempt to look for something that would work in supressing the ck spots slowly growing inside Song Jia''s eyes.


    If things really came down to it and he couldn''te up with something and Song Jia could not hold on until he found another way to supress the ck spots that did not involve using a demonic medicinal potion, Xuan Hao would not hesitate to use a year of his own lifespan to make the demonic medicinal potion!


    Even if it ended up damaging his foundation to some degree, it would not be too bad, and he should be able to recover after a few years. Maybe only a few months if he was lucky.


    It would not be anywhere near as bad as what Elder Song''s situation was after having done such a thing for over 10 years¡­ Elder Song might not even be able to fully recover from the damage he had inflicted to his foundation after a hundred years of bitter cultivation!


    At least, soul rted spiritual herbs, pills and potions should be able to help him recover. The Purification Pill he had given him in the past that allowed him to reach the Nascent Soul Realm should also have helped him recover from most of the damage extracting his own lifespan had caused.


    If not for the Purification Pill, Elder Song''s situation might be far worse than it currently was and it was very likely that he would not have been able to survive histest attempt at refining the demonic medicinal potion!


    In the future, Xuan Hao really wanted to help him out in some way and allow the old man to recover from the damage he had inflicted upon himself¡­


    Shaking his head as these thoughts drifted through his mind, Xuan Hao focused his attention back on the different spiritual herbs in front of him before using all his power as an Artisan Alchemist toe up with different novel medicinal potions that could be used to supress the ck spots inside Song Jia''s eyes.


    Brewing more than one potion at the same time, Xuan Hao did his absolute best to go through as many different medicinal potions at once to find one that would work.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was busy refining all sorts of different medicinal potions inside the Alchemy Hall of the Flying Sword Sect, Elder Song had begun recovering from the explosion he had caused inside his house while trying to refine the demonic medicinal potion for Song Jia.


    "Haa¡­ I never expected for the refinement to fail this time around. Now I can only hope Elder Xuan is sessful¡­" Looking around himself, Elder Song was still standing outside his now ruined house as he couldn''t stop himself from worrying over whether or not Elder Xuan would be sessful in making a potion that could supress the weird disease Song Jia was suffering from.


    His worry was not for nothing, as Elder Song already understood just how weird the disease Song Jia was suffering from was¡­ Not to mention how hard it was to cure!


    In the past, he had even managed to get an Artisan Alchemist specializing in medicinal pills to look at her, but he had only shaken his head and proimed that he had no way to treat Song Jia.


    Back then, Elder Song had felt helpless after hearing what the Artisan Alchemist had told him and had helplessly wandered around the border regions of the past Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    It was then that he chanced upon the demonic medicinal potion recipe, and it was through this he had found a way to supress the disease Song Jia was suffering from!


    Unfortunately¡­ The demonic medicinal potion could only supress the disease for 1 year at a time and would have to be consumed again the next year!


    Even if he understood that he would not be able to continue using the demonic medicinal potion to supress Song Jia''s disease, he was left with no other choice, as he refused to just let the young Song Jia die!


    After watching her slowly grow up, Elder Song had ignored the slowly growing pain in his body after having extracted his own lifespan for such a long time, as he had continued refining the demonic medicinal potion...


    Of course, during all of this, he had looked for a way to cure Song Jia¡­ But all of this had been to no avail, as after over 10 years, the demonic medicinal potion was still the only way to supress the weird yet deadly disease his dear granddaughter was suffering from¡­!


    "Then again, Elder Xuan already helped me reach the Nascent Soul Realm and even helped recover some of the hidden injuries in my body with the Purification Pill¡­ If anyone can help Song Jia in the Flying Sword Sect, it should be him!" Muttering this to himself as he cleaned up his mostly ruined house before any elder passing by saw it in its current state, Elder Song grew a little more assured.


    After all, Xuan Hao was not only someone skilled in alchemy ording to what he had heard from the elders of the Alchemy Hall, but he was also someone who had reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    Elder Song personally didn''t know a lot about the Domain Lord Realm and most of what he knew was from legends and tales spread among the mortals.


    The means of someone in the Domain Lord Realm was far superior to someone in the Nascent Soul Realm. In the eyes of most people located on the border region of the Sky Empire, Domain Lords could almost be regarded as legendary existences that only existed in legends!


    Even if Elder Song didn''t believe in most things that was said about Domain Lords, he was still unknowingly influenced by this general fog surrounding cultivators who had reached this mythical realm, as his faith in Xuan Hao finding a way to solve his little granddaughter''s disease was amplified.


    Elder Song was not really too wrong in his faith in Xuan Hao, as Xuan Hao did indeed have confidence in curing his granddaughter''s disease. The only problem was the fact that he did not have enough time¡­


    "Elder Song¡­? Is that you? What in the world happened for your house to end up like this?"


    It was during this time when Elder Song was cleaning up his home that a voice sounded out from behind him. Catching the old man off guard, as he quickly turned around to face the owner of the voice with a surprised expression on his face.


    "Sect Master!? What are you doing here!?"


    Yes, the person who had suddenly showed up just outside Elder Song''s ruined house was none other than Feng Chen, the sect master of the Flying Sword Sect!


    "Actually, I came to ask you about something regarding the deployment of a group of elders¡­ But from the looks of it, you are quite busy¡­ What happened here? For you house to end up in such a situation¡­"


    Hearing Feng Chen''s question as he curiously looked over the state of Elder Song''s house, Elder Song froze as he didn''t know how to answer Feng Chen.


    He could lie to him, but he doubted Feng Chen would be unable to see through his lie in such a situation¡­


    Should I just tell him about the Song Jia''s situation¡­ After all, I did tell Elder Xuan about it already...


    Not knowing what to do, Elder Song felt like he was caught between a rock and a hard ce. Not knowing whether he should lie to Feng Chen about how his house had ended up in its current ruined state, or tell him the truth and possibly end up getting punished for using a demonic medicinal potion¡­

 Chapter 583: Feng Chens Bad Decision...

    Chapter 583: Feng Chen''s Bad Decision...


    "Actually¡­. The reason my house is in this state is because-" In the end, he had decided to tell Feng Chen about how he had ended up blowing up half his house due to refining a demonic medicinal potion.


    Of course, him suddenly confessing that he had been refining a demonic medicinal potion made Feng Chen shocked¡­ But after listening to Elder Song exining the reason why he had decided to make such a thing, Feng Chen''s shocked expression slowly turned into one of worry.


    The fact that Elder Song had sacrificed his own lifespan to make the demonic medicinal potion instead of using a live human sacrifice that most demonic potions or other kinds of demonic concoctions required, while it was a good thing in Feng Chen''s eyes, as it meant Elder Song had not ended up bing a demonic cultivator but was also something that caused Feng Chen to worry for Elder Song''s health.


    After all, as a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, he very clearly understood just how damaging it was to extract once own lifespan!


    "I see¡­ So that is what happened¡­ If only you told me sooner, I would have been able to help you¡­" Listening to Elder Song as he finished talking about the demonic medicinal potion and the disease Song Jia was suffering from, Feng Chen let out a sigh while thinking about how hard it must have been for Elder Song during thest few years.


    Not only did he have to deal with the constant pain that woulde along with him extracting so much of his own lifespan, but he was also the one who managed most parts of the Flying Sword Sect and made sure that everything could run smoothly without anything troublesome happening.


    Under his meticulous care, there had not been a single elder that acted out of line and none that dared even think about embezzling any of the sect''s spirit stones.


    Although they did turn out quitezy, it was something that both he and Elder Song were actively trying to fix. However, it had been taking way longer than both of them had expected it would to fix the Flying Sword Sect Eldersziness. The elders of the Flying Sword Sect were farzier than both of them had first anticipated¡­


    During all of this, he had never once noticed just what Elder Song had been going through¡­


    "Haa¡­ Elder Song, you should take the next week off as well, I will take care of the sect on my own! Don''t worry about your granddaughter either, I''m sure some of the other elders will be more than happy to look after her while you recover!"


    "A-are you sure sect master¡­? You should know just how much I-"


    "Yes! I''m sure Elder Song, you should go recover in the medical ward located next to the Alchemy Hall for now!"


    Having made up his mind to not let Elder Song suffer any more¡­ Well¡­ At least until he had recovered from the injuries he had very clearly received when he had failed to refine the demonic medicinal potion, Feng Chen interrupted the old man before he had a chance to retaliate against the week off, he had been given.


    "I understand sect master¡­ I will be going now, please help inform Elder Xuan about my whereabouts so he can tell me how things went with my little granddaughter!"


    "Yes, yes! Now go!"


    Rolling his eyes while saying this, Feng Chen watched as the old man slowly began making his way towards the medical ward located next to the Alchemy Hall.


    Whoosh~


    Only when the old man was out of sight did Feng Chen leave the area. Making his way back towards Zu Fei''s pavilion where he had been temporarily staying and doing his work as a sect master while his own pavilion was being rebuilt.


    It was only a few days after having sent the most productive member of the Flying Sword Sect on a week-long vacation, that Feng Chen would realize just how big of a mistake he had made when doing so!


    ¡­


    Swish!


    A spear swiftly moved through the night, as the moon that had just recently risen shone down from above. Illuminating the metal spear as it cut into arge frog.


    Croak!


    Letting out a surprised croaking sound, therge frog did not have any time to react before the spear pierced through its soft body. Killing it in one blow!


    Appearing above the dead body of therge frog, the owner the spear revealed itself to be none other than Chu Yang.


    After the Core Formation Realm demon beasts inside the ancient city ruins had gathered together for safety and he had killed the rest of the demon beasts at the Core Formation Realm that roamed the outer part of the ancient city ruins alone, Chu Yang had tried using the transparent stones he had gathered to break through to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    However, he had failed just a single step away from breaking through to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm. Hovering just between what could be called the early stage and middle stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    After having failed to break through to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang had left the ancient city ruins for the time being, as he began searching the surrounding area for any demon beasts in the Core Formation Realm in hopes of finding more of the transparent stones so he could reach the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    The reason why he wanted to reach the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, was because he would be far stronger after reaching that realm and would at the same time also be able to enter the core part of the ancient city ruins without having to worry about getting killed by the powerful rabbit demon beast with a pair of demon horns¡­


    "No transparent stone inside this one either¡­ But it clearly reached the Core Formation Realm, can I really only get transparent stones from the Core Formation Realm demon beasts inside the ancient city ruins¡­?" Feeling a bit agitated after failing to find any transparent stone in the body of therge frog on the ground, Chu Yang could not help wondering if it was only demon beasts inside the ancient city ruins that had a transparent stone inside of them after they reached the Core Formation Realm.


    Therge frog was not the first Core Formation Realm demon beast he had killed in the outskirts of the ancient city ruins, but it was simr to the others, as none of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts he had killed after leaving the ancient city ruins had a transparent stone inside of them.


    Not only that, but the Core Formation Realm demon beast located outside the ancient city ruins were also far weakerpared to those inside the ancient city ruins.


    Although he could still kill the ones inside the ancient city ruins, it would take far more effortpared to the frog demon beast that he had just killed¡­ Well¡­ With the exception of the three headed horse demon beast that he killed a few hours ago¡­


    "Do I really have to enter the core part of the ancient city ruins if I want to break through to the Fourth Stage¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he turned to look towards the outer walls of the ancient city ruins that were barely visible in the distance from his current location, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit helpless.


    He could always just leave the area and take his time to break through to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm by himself, but Chu Yang felt unwilling to do such a thing. Not only would it take a few months to reach the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm by himself, but he would also have to return to the Flying Sword Sect by that point in time. Essentially giving up his opportunity to explore the core part of the ancient city ruins.


    After all, he never knew when he would be able to get his master''s permission to leave the sect again for an adventure.


    If he had already reached the Nascent Soul Realm at that point in time, the things inside the core part of the ancient city ruins might bepletely useless to him at that point in time!


    Not to mention, Chu Yang could easily imagine how regretful he would be if Qing Yi had be stronger than him at that point in time and the things inside the ancient city ruins just so happened to have been things that would have been able to help him stay as the strongest disciple under his master if he had gotten his hands on them during his time in the Core Formation Realm...


    The time saved by consuming the transparent stones of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts inside the ancient city ruins was not something to scoff at either! Just the ones he had consumed so far, had helped him save months of time that he would normally have needed to reach his current cultivation realm!


    With all this in mind, Chu Yang really did not want to give up on entering the core part of the ancient city ruins. Unaware of the fact that absorbing the transparent stones to quickly increase his cultivation realm did note without a cost...

 Chapter 584: Entering the Core of the Ancient City Ruins

    Chapter 584: Entering the Core of the Ancient City Ruins


    Swish~


    Having decided to enter the core part of the ancient city ruins even without reaching the fourth stage of the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang left the corpse of the frog demon beast, as he jumped back over the outer wall of the ancient city ruins. Soon finding himself back inside the ancient city ruins again.


    Compared to when he had first entered the ancient city ruins, there was not a single demon beast in sight after he entered the ancient city ruins this time around¡­ The main reason for this, was that most of the demon beasts inside the ancient city ruin''s outer part had been scared into hiding after they had witnessed the ughter brought about by him not even a day ago.


    Not to mention his wanton ughter of any Core Formation Realm demon beast that he found in the outer parts of the ancient city ruins, the demon beasts hiding away had also been scared into hiding by the powerful Core Formation Realm demon beasts from the core part of the ancient city ruins when they had searched through the outer parts of the ancient city ruins for him!


    All things considered, the demon beasts below the Core Formation Realm still alive inside the ancient city ruins were all hiding away inside some of the still standing houses of the ancient city or inside small holes in the ground that they had dug out just a few hours earlier. Hoping that they would not end up dead to Chu Yang or any of the powerful Core Formation Realm demon beasts¡­


    Squeak!?


    Whoosh~


    Finding out about this through witnessing a small demon beast in the earlier stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm hiding away the moment it saw him, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit wronged.


    He had mostly just hunted down the demon beasts in the Core Formation Realm, yet the Foundation Establishment Realm demon beasts were avoiding him like the gue upon seeing him!


    "Thinking about it¡­ Most of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts I killed were leading arge group of demon beasts in the Foundation Establishment and Qi Condensation Realm¡­ Ah¡­ I think I understand why the demon beasts are so scared of me¡­"


    Realizing that he had essentially killed off all the leaders of the demon beasts in the outer parts of the ancient city ruins, Chu Yang could not help smiling wryly as he felt like he understood why the Foundation Establishment Realm demon beast had run away the moment it saw him. After all, there was a rather high chance that he had killed its leader not too long ago¡­


    No use thinking about all of this, my goal is not to be friends with the demon beasts in the outer parts of the ancient city ruins, its to enter the core part of the ancient city ruins! Hopefully without the group of Core Formation Realm demon beasts noticing me in the process¡­


    Swish~


    Shaking his head as he reminded himself of his goal for entering the ancient city ruins, Chu Yang ignored the fearful gazes he could feel from the demon beasts peeking at him from afar before heading towards the centre of the ancient city ruins.


    ¡­


    Swoosh!


    Coming to a stop just before entering the core part of the ruins, chu yang stared towards the centre of the ancient city ruins where several unfamiliar and familiar Core Formation Realm demon beasts were visible.


    Thest thing he wanted to happen was for these demon beasts to notice him the moment he entered the core part of the ancient city ruins and for this reason, Chu Yang slowed down and did his best to hide himself before truly entering the core part of the ancient city ruins.


    "As long as there aren''t any demon beasts in the Nascent Soul Realm with divine sense, I should be fine¡­" Muttering this to himself as he officially stepped into the core part of the ancient city ruins, Chu Yang could not help sincerely hoping that none of the demon beasts inside had developed their divine sense yet.


    After all, if any of the demon beasts inside had developed their divine sense or reached the Nascent Soul Realm, Chu Yang would have no way to hide from them no matter how much he tried.


    Divine sense was simply way too powerful. Allowing someone to easily grasp everything within one''s divine sense. The only thing that allowed someone to avoid someone''s divine sense, was something belonging to the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, like a pseudo domain or a domain belonging to the realm above the Nascent Soul Realm!


    No matter what it was, Chu Yang had neither of them and was still far away from any of those two things¡­ So¡­ If anyone inside the core part of the ancient city ruins had developed their divine sense, he would not be able to hide and would get found out the moment he unknowingly wandered into the range of the demon beast''s divine sense¡­


    Rustle~


    Still continuing forward, Chu Yang decided against trying to kill any of the many Core Formation Realm demon beasts that he saw wandering around the core of the ancient city ruins without the slightest bit of worry that anyone would suddenlyunch an attack on them.


    He understood very well that if he attacks any of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts, he would instantly get found by all the demon beasts inside the core area. At that point, he would not have a chance to enter the core part of the ancient city ruins any time in the nearby future. Not to mention, he had no idea if he could even kill a single of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts wandering around alone in time before more demon beasts showed up to help¡­


    Before trying to kill any of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts for the transparent stone inside of them, Chu Yang wanted to first explore the core part of the ancient city and see if he could find anything of interest that could help improve his cultivation base like the transparent stones, he had gathered from the Core Formation Realm demon beasts so far.


    At the same time, Chu Yang felt that it was weird that the Explorer Union and the members of the Explorer Union would stoping to the ancient city ruins all of a sudden due to it having been emptied out.


    After all, if he could tell how useful the transparent stones were to increasing his cultivation base, so could the many explorers of the Explore Union who hade before him¡­ Unless, something had changed in the ancient city ruins during the few hundred years that had passed since the Explorer Union lost interest in the ancient city ruins.


    Although explorers still came to visit the ancient city ruins from time to time. Most of them had only reached the Foundation Establishment Realm and was simr to the three explorers he had talked with before leaving the Small River Town and heading to the ancient city ruins.


    With their strength only at the Foundation Establishment Realm, there was no way for them to kill any of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts and get a chance to get their hands on one of the transparent stone located inside them!


    "I wonder if I will find an answer to this after reaching the centre of the city¡­" Muttering this to himself as all kinds of thoughts swirled through his mind, Chu Yang felt more and more curious about just what had taken ce inside the ancient city ruins to cause the transparent stone to appear inside the body of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts that lived inside the city ruins.


    Even if he understood it would be dangerous for him to go to the centre of the ancient city ruins, Chu Yang wanted to understand where the transparent stones hade from and more importantly understand why only the demon beasts at the Core Formation Realm inside the borders of the ancient city ruins could form a transparent stone inside of them while the ones just outside the outer walls could not!


    Chu Yang felt that understanding this might help him not only better understand the origins of the transparent stone he had devoured without any worry, but might also help him understand where he might be able to find more of the transparent stones in the future!


    After all, Chu Yang doubted that it was only the demon beasts inside the ancient city ruins who could form this weird transparent stone useful for increasing his cultivation realm inside their body, there had to be more simr ces out there¡­ And more importantly, there had to be a story behind this¡­


    Swish~


    Thinking this to himself, Chu Yang narrowed his eyes as he slowly began moving towards the centre of the ancient ruins while doing his best to avoid any demon beast along the way.

 Chapter 585: The Badly Damaged Pagoda

    Chapter 585: The Badly Damaged Pagoda


    Different from the outer part of the ancient city ruins, the core part of the ancient city ruins had seen far less destruction, as most of the houses and other buildings present in there were mostly still intact to some degree.


    Sneaking his way through the many still standing buildings, Chu Yang could not help feeling that it was rather lucky for him that most of the buildings at the core part of the ancient city were still standing. After all, they ended up providing him with great cover from any of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts roaming around the ce.


    Other than this, the fact that most of the buildings were mostly intact also allowed him to truly get an idea of just how beautiful the ancient city had been in the past before getting destroyed before getting forgotten in the long river of time.


    Even if he had no idea about the origin of many of the materials used in the buildings, Chu Yang still understood that it should be made up of something extremely durable to be able tost for however long the ancient city buildings had.


    This was especially so considering the Core Formation Realm demon beasts living inside the core part of the city fighting with each other every now and then-


    BOOM!


    Hearing arge explosion just as he thought about this, Chu Yang could not help hiding away inside a nearby buildings as he observed through the windows of the building how tworge demon beasts in the early stages of the Core Formation Realm shed with each other not too far away from his current location.


    The surprising part about their sh, was the fact that the buildings around them were almostpletely unharmed by the power of the two Core Formation Realm demon beast.


    Bang!


    One of the demon beasts even smashed directly into a small pagoda, where instead of destroying the small pagoda like Chu Yang had expected to happen, the demon beast instead smashed into it without harming the pagoda in the slightest-


    ROOOOAR!


    On the contrary, the sharp sides of the small pagoda''s roof pierced through the thickyer of scales on the demon beast''s body. Instantly causing it to roar out in pain before freeing itself from the pagoda and escaping into the distance before its opponent had time to catch up to it.


    From this alone, Chu Yang understood just how durable the buildings were¡­ Not even an early stage Core Formation Realm demon beast had the power to destroy the buildings in the core part of the ancient city! It was no wonder that the ancient city could still stand to some degree after it had been destroyed in the past.


    "I should get going¡­" Waiting for a few minutes until the two demon beasts fighting each other werepletely gone, Chu Yang continued making his way towards the centre of the ancient city ruins. Unaware of what he might find when he finally made it. Hoping that it would be something simr to the transparent stones that could help increase his cultivation realm.


    Ancient qi techniques or spear techniques that he could use to increase his strength was also something he would not mind getting his hands on if the opportunity was there. Not that he expected for any to still be present after the Explorer Union had cleaned up the ce in the past¡­


    At least from the fact that the transparent stones that could help increase his cultivation realm were still present together with the demon beasts made Chu Yang believe that the Explorer Union had not ended up getting everything when they explored the ancient city ruins in the past!


    Swoosh~!


    Continuing closer to the core of the ancient city ruins with a clear goal in mind, Chu Yang didn''t notice that the golden core inside his dantian had slowly begun acting strangely the closer he got to the centre of the ancient city ruins, as there was now also a hint of purple around the edge of his bright red golden core!


    Not only did hints of purple suddenly appear around the edges of his bright red golden core, but a weird energy simr to the energy he had absorbed from the transparent stones also began slowly being expelled from the purple spots on his golden core as the energy slowly began filling up his dantian.


    Although this would have been easy to discover under normal circumstances, Chu Yang seemedpletely unaware of the chance taking ce inside his dantian as he just continued moving towards the centre of the ancient city ruins without the slightest idea over just how dangerous his situation was getting.


    This was not only because his dantian was filling up with some sort of foreign energy that could very well harm him, but mainly because the foreign energy filling up his dantian was slowly recing his normal qi.


    If he fought and began using his qi on arge scale, he would easily discover this change taking ce inside his body. Sadly, for Chu Yang, he was currently busy trying his best to not enter a fight, as he even limited the amount of qi used to move around in fear that any of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts roaming around the core part of the ancient city ruins might spot him¡­


    All things considered; Chu Yang had unknowingly entered an extremely dangerous situation that he himself was still not aware of¡­ Well¡­ He should have been more cautious when consuming random stones that just so happens to easily increase his cultivation realm. After all, there was no way one would be able to improve so rapidly without any negative effects!


    ¡­


    "This should be the core of the ancient city¡­" Muttering this to himself as he arrived in front of a massive crater, Chu Yang could not help feeling shocked, as the centre of the ancient city ruins was nothing more than a giant hole in the ground.


    Even seeing the hole that had slowly been covered in all sorts of nts over the years, Chu Yang could easily imagine that it should have been created by some sort of devastating attack by a powerful ancient cultivator.


    The attack had created the massive crater in the ground and at the same time erased the centre of the ancient city!


    Just from a nce, Chu Yang roughly estimated that the diameter of the massive crate was at least 10 or so miles!


    Such a massive crater, just how powerful had the person attacking the ancient city in the past been? The Domain Lord Realm? Maybe even stronger than that?


    Feeling both horrified and amazed at the same time as he saw the massive crater, Chu Yang could not help feeling that he was still way too weak whenpared to experts strong enough to create such a massive crater¡­ That was not mentioning that the ancient city would not have gone down without a fight.


    The crater in the ground was mostly likely just created by the power that had been left after destroying the protective formation of the ancient city and the experts present inside!


    This thought alone made Chu Yang shiver, as he had a feeling that the person behind the destruction of the ancient city ruins should be someone far above his current understanding.


    Even if he wanted to say that it was a Domain Lord who had done it, Chu Yang still didn''t properly have a grasp over just how powerful someone in the Domain Lord Realm was, let alone having an idea over how strong someone above the Domain Lord Realm was¡­


    "Hm? Something is still intact at the bottom of the crater¡­?" Feeling amazed as he muttered these words to himself, Chu Yang focused his full attention on a badly damaged pagoda located at the centre of the crater.


    Even from the fact that the pagoda was still standing, Chu Yang could guess that it was made up of some sort of godly materials. The only question left on his mind, was whether or not there was anything left inside the pagoda.


    After all, given that the Explorer Union had already been to the ancient city ruins in the past and hadbed through the area for any treasures, Chu Yang was not too confident that there would be anything valuable left inside of the pagoda located at the bottom of the massive crater.


    If he had seen it and could guess how valuable it was, so could the explorers from the Explorer Union¡­ With that in mind, there was no reason why there would be anything valuable left inside the pagoda at the bottom of the massive crater¡­


    However, Chu Yang still felt hopeful that the Explorer Union might have missed something-


    Swish~


    For this reason, Chu Yang slowly began making his way down towards the badly damaged pagoda located at the centre of the massive crater.

 Chapter 586: Finding a new way to Suppress Song Jias Disease

    Chapter 586: Finding a new way to Suppress Song Jia''s Disease


    Reaching the badly damaged pagoda at the bottom of the massive crater at the centre of the ancient city ruins without encountering a single demon beast along the way, Chu Yang felt his curiously reach the peak as he poked his head inside the badly damaged pagoda.


    Not the slightest bit of cation visible on his face, Chu Yang soon finished looking over the mostly empty first floor of the pagoda.


    "Looks like the Explorer Union really did empty out this ce when theybed through the ancient city ruins in the past¡­" Muttering this to himself as he saw several empty bookshelves lined up along the walls of the pagoda, Chu Yang could not help feeling his hope for finding anything valuable inside the badly damaged pagoda slowly start disappearing.


    Creak~


    Stepping inside, Chu Yang ignored the creaking sounding from the wooden floor beneath him as he did another quick scan of the first floor of the pagoda before focusing his attention on the spiral staircase leading up to the second floor of the pagoda.


    Although he already had a feeling that he would not find anything of value after seeing the state of the first floor, Chu Yang was not one to give up exploring the rest of the pagoda now that he had already entered it!


    Whoosh~


    With this in mind, Chu Yang walked through the empty first floor of the pagoda before reaching the spiral staircase located directly at the centre of the pagoda.


    Taking his first step onto the spiral staircase, Chu Yang briefly felt a weird sensation in his dantian for a short moment before it disappeared.


    Creak~


    Not thinking too much about it, Chu Yang made his way up the creaking spiral staircase towards the second floor of the badly damaged pagoda. Wanting to find out if there was anything valuable left after the Explorer Union had cleaned up the ce some two hundred years ago.


    ¡­


    "Hm¡­ This is truly troublesome¡­" Back at the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao was looking over a dozen different potions that he had just finished brewing. Each of them was unique in their own way, with one being a purple bobbling liquid, while another could be mistaken for a small cloud trapped in a bottle,


    Every single one of the potions in front of him were brewed for the sole purpose of supressing the disease Song Jia was suffering from. The only problem left, was to test whether or not any of the potions would actually be useful in dealing with the disease Song Jia was suffering from¡­


    After all, thest thing Xuan Hao wanted, was to idently feed Song Jia a potion that ended up killing her due to him having made a miscalction somewhere along the line¡­


    No matter what, it had to be remembered that Song Jia was only in the early stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm. The power contained in the potions he had made was far too much for her to endure with her current strength. Only if the potion worked perfectly and used all its power solely on supressing the ck spots hidden away in her eyes would they be considered useful.


    If they ended up being absorbed by her dantian or some other part of her body, Song Jia might end up exploding due to the sheer amount of energy contained in the potions he had brewed¡­ Something Xuan Hao wanted to avoid!


    For this reason, he had to find a way to test the potions he had just finished brewing and test their effectiveness to see whether or not any of them could be used by Song Jia.


    However, how would he test the effectiveness of the potions¡­? The only person with the weird ck spot disease that he knew about was Song Jia and testing such powerful potions on her would most likely just end up killing her in the process before he could even find out what had gone wrong¡­


    "Ah! How on earth do I find out if these potions will work!?" Feeling a bit frustrated as he realized that he might not be able to help out Song Jia without using the demonic medicinal potion that Elder Song had already proved worked in supressing her disease, Xuan Hao picked up the recipe for the demonic medicinal potion as he began reading through it.


    Even though he had gotten his hands on the recipe back at Song Jia''s house, he had not yet fully looked through it, as he didn''t n on using it if possible, it was after all a demonic potion recipe.


    Even if he didn''t sacrifice anyone to make the demonic medicinal potion, he would still have to sacrifice his own lifespan to make it¡­ Something that he wanted to avoid, if possible, as recovering from doing something like that would make him unable to cultivate normally for months, if not years!


    "Hm?" Looking over the demonic potion recipe, Xuan Hao could not help freezing as he reached the list of spiritual herbs required for the potion.


    Why do I feel like I''ve already made this potion before¡­?


    Thinking this to himself as he continued reading through the demonic potion recipe, Xuan Hao could not help showing a slightly shocked expression as he finished reading through the demonic potion recipe.


    The reason for this was not simply that he felt that the spiritual herbs used in the recipe was simr to one of the potions he had just refined, but instead because they were the exact same except for a few of the weirder and more demonic ingredients like the sacrifice.


    Instead of these demonic ingredients, he had instead used some more expensive and rare spiritual herbs that would normally not be used in a Spirit Grade Potion.


    "Maybe this one could actually work¡­" Looking over the potion in question and recalling the spiritual herbs used in it, Xuan Hao felt confident that it should have a simr effect as the demonic medicinal potion.


    The reason for his confidence was not only because of the fact that the two potions needed mostly the same ingredients, but also because the brewing method he had used to make the potion was exactly the same as the one used for brewing the demonic medicinal potion!


    Of course, exactly the same when it came to mixing tougher the different spiritual herbs and other ingredients. The preparation of the different spiritual herbs and ingredients were of course different. After all, Xuan Hao did not find a sacrifice and used their blood and soul as an ingredient in the potion.


    Feeling more and more confident the more he looked through the recipe andpared it with one of the dozen potions he had refined, Xuan Hao slowly decided that he would try and give the potion to Song Jia¡­


    Even if there was a risk involved in this and he might end up making the situation worse, Xuan Hao felt confident that he would still be able to keep Song Jia alive in the worst-case scenario.


    All things considered; he was still a Domain Lord who had an ice domain. In the worst-case scenario, Xuan Hao nned to just freeze Song Jia alive and prevent the potion from doing any harm to her before slowly expelling it from her body.


    Although this was something he could do, the experience of being frozen alive was not something without any pain, as Song Jia would end up going through a lot of pain in such a situation as the failed potion was slowly drawn out of her body.


    Not to mention, he had no idea how the ck spots in her eyes would react after the potion failed to supress them¡­ If it really came down to it, Xuan Hao prepared to directly refine the demonic medicinal potion to deal with the ck spots if this happened.


    Even if it was something hard to refine for Elder Song, it was not something difficult for Xuan Hao who was already an Artisan Alchemist. Refining the demonic medicinal potion would at most take him half a minute or so, more than enough time for him to supress the ck spots in her eyes before they could do any damage to Song Jia!


    "Okay¡­ Let''s do it like that then. Now I just need to find Song Jia and get a quiet ce for her to consume the potion¡­" Muttering this to himself as he decided to move forward with getting Song Jia to first consume the non-demonic potion he had refined first; Xuan Hao used his divine sense to find Song Jia before scanning the Flying Sword Sect for a good location to have her consume the potion without someone idently disturbing them.


    Swoosh~


    "That should be a good ce¡­" Finding a small empty pagoda located at the edge of the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao felt like it would be a good location to have her consume the potion without anyone disturbing them.


    Not that the location was that important given that he could just use his domain to prevent anyone from finding them¡­


    "¡­" Realizing this, Xuan Hao smiled a bit wryly as he turned his attention away from the small pagoda before focusing on Song Jia busy ying around inside Zu Fei''s pavilion.


    The fact that Song Jia had spotted him earlier had momentarily made him forget that other people below the Domain Lord Realm would not be able to see him if he didn''t want them to¡­


    The little girl truly was a troublesome one¡­ She even made him think that he needed to find somewhere secluded as he forgot how powerful his hiding abilities actually were¡­

 Chapter 587: Suppressing the Black Spots

    Chapter 587: Suppressing the ck Spots


    Swish~


    Moving through the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao soon found himself back in Zu Fei''s pavilion. The only difference this time around, was the fact that Zu Fei had still not returned. After a quick look around the sect, Xuan Hao realized that she was apparently still looking for Feng Chen-


    "Ah¡­ Looks like they ran into each other¡­" Seeing Zu Fei finally find Feng Chen as he was making his way back towards her pavilion where he had been doing most of his work after his own pavilion was destroyed, Xuan Hao decided to look away.


    After all, from what he knew about Zu Fei, he had a feeling that Feng Chen would not be having a good time ahead of him¡­ At least Feng Chen''s sacrifice would allow him to freely move around Zu Fei''s pavilion without having toe up with an excuse as to why he had returned within such a short period of time¡­


    Walking towards the location of Song Jia, Xuan Hao had momentarily focused his attention on Feng Chen and Zu Fei, as he didn''t notice the fact that he had already arrived inside a small flower garden where Song Jia was currently ying around.


    "Elder Xuan¡­?"


    Hearing the all too familiar young voice calling out to him, Xuan Hao returned his attention to his surroundings.


    "Hm?"


    Only to discover that Song Jia had already arrived in front of him as she was curiously looking up at him with her cloudy pair of eyes that seemed to directly see through the domain, he had used to hide himself from any of Zu Fei''s disciples that were walking around inside the pavilion at all times.


    In front of Song Jia, his domain waspletely useless when it came to hiding¡­ Something that made Xuan Hao feel amazed every time he witnessed this special ability to easily find him no matter how well he tried hiding himself.


    "Song Jia, we meet again!"


    "Yes¡­ Is there a reason why Elder Xuan hase to visit me again¡­? Not that I have anything against it! It''s rather boring in here now that sister Zu Fei left¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as he had been the reason why Zu Fei had left her alone; Xuan Hao felt a bit embarrassed for a short moment before remembering the reason why he hade back.


    "There is indeed a reason why I came back again, Elder Song entrusted me with your medicine and asked me to give it to you as he is quite busy at the moment¡­" Saying this, Xuan Hao waited for Song Jia to respond as he was curious over whether she would willingly take her medicine.


    "I see¡­ It''s that time already, let''s get it done quickly¡­" Acting far more mature than Xuan Hao had expected her to, Song Jia let out a sigh before sitting down on a nearby bench. Prepared to take her medicine without the slightest form of resistance.


    From the looks of it, it seemed like she already had some idea as to what medicine she would be taking and was ready to face it.


    Well¡­ She did take a demonic medicinal potion before, so the resigned expression on her face was expected. After all, taking a demonic medicinal potion was a painful thing. Especially considering how strong the demonic medicinal potion she had been taking was, there was a chance it was just barely at a level that it did not kill her after consumption.


    Hopefully the potion I made will work and won''t be as painful¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he saw the resigned expression on the little girl''s face, Xuan Hao took out the medicinal potion he had made before he helped Song Jia drink it.


    "Mhh?!" Clearly feeling the difference in the potionpared to the one she had been used to taking once every year, Song Jia showed a surprised expression on her face for a short moment before greedily swallowing the rest of the potion.


    The potion tasted far too differentpared to the demonic medicinal potion she was used to taking, as it had a strawberry vour, while the demonic medicinal potion she had been taking before tasted more like sewer water mixed together with the dposing body of some dead animal¡­


    The difference between the two potions was like the difference between heaven and earth!


    Not only that, but Song Jia clearly felt the clear difference the moment it entered her stomach, as there was not the slightest bit of pain. Instead, afortable warmth spread all over her body before gathering towards her eyes.


    "Mwah~"


    Feeling this, Song Jia could not stop herself from letting out a small happy sound, as she felt the warmth from the potion surge towards her eyes. However, as the warmth spread towards her eye, Song Jia felt herself slowly slip into dreand.


    Zzzz~


    Before long, Song Jia''s gentle breathing could be heard as she had directly fallen asleep while sitting on the bench¡­ If not for Xuan Hao acting fast to support her body, she might have fallen to the ground due to suddenly falling asleep while sitting up.


    "Looks like the potion is working as expected¡­" Muttering this to himself as he inspected the current situation inside Song Jia''s body, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a breath of relief as he watched the potion taking action to supress the ck spots inside Song Jia''s eyes.


    Whoosh~


    Not a single bit of the potions power was wasted as all of it gathered in both her eyes to supress the ck spots that had grown increasingly big over the past few hours.


    Observing this, Xuan Hao still did not dare take his eyes of Song Jia''s situation, as he understood that even the slightest mistake might end up costing Song Jia her life. The potion was simply way to powerful for her small body to endure with only the strength of someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    This was also the reason why Xuan Hao had made sure that the potion made Song Jia fall asleep before it began the process of supressing the ck spots in her eyes.


    The reason for this, was that the process of supressing the ck spots in her eyes was extremely painful. Even if he did not use the demonic medicinal potion, this pain could not be prevented¡­


    For this reason, making Song Jia sleep through the process was the best solution he coulde up with. At least this way, she would not have to go through the pain like she had in the past when she had consumed the demonic medicinal potion.


    "I will have to find a permanent solution to this disease before next year¡­" Muttering this to himself while watching as the ck spots were supressed, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he felt Song Jia''s entire body trembling violently in his embrace. Although she was unconscious, the pain still managed to cause her body to tremble violently!


    Not only that, but Xuan Hao clearly felt that the potion was far too powerful for her body to bear as her dantian started showing signs of copsing at any moment due to the violent battle taking ce in her eyes between the potion trying to supress and the ck spots trying to resist the suppression.


    Whoosh~


    Injecting part of his own qi into her body to stabilize her dantian, Xuan Hao watched her trembling stop for a moment as he managed to stabilize her slowly deteriorating situation.


    Like this, Xuan Hao silently sat on the bench with Song Jia in his embrace for the next two hours, as he made sure that the ck spots in her eyes were properly supressed by his potion without anything going wrong in the process.


    Not only that, but Xuan Hao clearly felt that the potion was far too powerful for her body to bear as her dantian started showing signs of copsing at any moment due to the violent battle taking ce in her eyes between the potion trying to supress and the ck spots trying to resist the suppression.


    The battle between the two ended with the ck spots being sessfully supressed, but Xuan Hao was not the slightest bit happy, as he could clearly feel that Song Jia''s body had been extremely exhausted by this ordeal. Not only that, but without him present to keep her body under control, Xuan Hao was certain that Song Jia would have died after consuming his potion!


    Although the demonic medicinal potion was far more painful to use and the cost of making it was far more. At least it allowed Song Jia to consume it without any risk of dying as a result.


    To consume the more effective potion he had made, it would require someone who had at least reached the Domain Lord Realm to support them through the process from start to finish until the ck spots were properly supressed¡­


    "Hah¡­ At least this does not require anyone to waste their lifespan¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao watched Song Jia''s eyebrows tremble slightly as she was about to wake up.


    "Mhm~"

 Chapter 588: Stupid Sect Master~

    Chapter 588: Stupid Sect Master~


    "Mhm~ I fell asleep? Didn''t I just drink the medicine?" Watching as Song Jia slowly began opening her eyes before muttering something to herself, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes upon noticing that her eyes seemed to have be even more cloudy than before.


    Whoosh


    Waiting for Song Jia to fully wake up, Xuan Hao decided to use this time to investigate the current situation of her body with his divine sense.


    Although he could not find anything off with his divine sense. Knowing just how hard it had been for him to find the ck spots hidden away in her eyes, Xuan Hao understood that he might not be able to fully grasp whether or not everything was fine after she had consumed the potion to supress the ck spots in her eyes.


    Especially so considering that he had no idea why her eyes had ended up bing more clouded after the ck spots were supressed, if he had ended up affecting her already limited form of vision-


    "Hm? Elder Xuan, what happened just now¡­?" Hearing Song Jia calling out to him after she had mostly woken up and started, Xuan Hao quickly retracted his divine sense before focusing his full attention on the little girl nervously looking up at him.


    Just from a nce, Xuan Hao could tell that she was confused over why she had suddenly fallen asleep. After all, she clearly expected to go through a painful experience after drinking the medicine like she had done in the past.


    However, now that Xuan Hao had made a new medicine that could be used instead of the demonic medicinal potion, she did not have to go through the same painful experience as she had in the past!


    "You fell asleep after drinking the medicine. The medicine has already taken effect, do you feel any difort anywhere and do you feel like something changed after waking up?"


    Exining that she had fallen asleep after taking the medicine, Xuan Hao quickly started asking if she felt any pain anywhere and if anything had changed since she woke up. Mainly wanting to find out if her unique way of seeing the world had been affected by the potion.


    "No? I don''t feel anything wrong¡­? On the other hand, I feel like I¡­ I can see your aura way more clearly nowpared to the past¡­?" Tilting her head with a slightly confused expression, Song Jia looked around herself as her confused expression slowly transformed into one filled with happiness.


    "I can see things more clearly!" Eximing loudly in surprise, Song Jia had kjust discovered that the world around her seemed way more detailedpared to before.


    If before she could only see a rough outline when looking at people like Xuan Hao. Now she could to some degree see the facial features of the person she was looking at!


    Yes, she had just discovered that after drinking the medicine that was normally apanied by a terrifying amount of pain, there was no pain in her body and more importantly, she could now see the world around herself more clearly!


    "That''s great!" Smiling happily as he heard what she said, Xuan Hao could not help feeling relieved upon hearing that nothing bad had happened to her vision and it had instead improved.


    "Should we go and visit Elder Song and inform him about you sessfully drinking your medicine without any pain?" Remembering how bad Elder Song''s situation was when he had left him to recover from his injuries, Xuan Hao felt that it would be a great idea to visit the old man, so that he could see that his granddaughter was doing fine and had already consumed her medicine without experiencing any pain.


    "Yes! I''m sure he will be proud of me! I didn''tin even once this time and there was no pain either!" Nodding her head excitedly when she heard this, Song Jia could not wait to show off how well she had done to Elder Song.


    "Great, then let''s get going!"


    Swish~


    Not staying around Zu Fei''s pavilion after hearing her confirmation, Xuan Hao quickly left together with Song Jia.


    Whoosh-!


    This was just in time, as only a few seconds after Xuan Hao left the pavilion together with song Jia, Zu Feinded in the middle of the flower field that they had been staying in just a few seconds earlier.


    Thump!


    Landing on the ground just behind Zu Fei, Feng Chen had a confused on his face as he looked towards Zu Fei.


    "So, Feng Chen¡­ Don''t you think you have something to exin to me¡­? I heard you and Shu Yao met earlier today¡­ And you were nning to head out to the new sect location together?"


    "Hm? Yeah, we did n to examine the new sect location together soon, but we didn''t meet-"


    Not knowing why Zu Fei had suddenly kidnapped him and brought him back to her pavilion to talk about something like that, Feng Chen showed an even more confused expression on his face as he answered her. However, before he had a chance to finish, Zu Fei interrupted him as Feng Chen suddenly felt like a terrifying auraing from Zu Fei''s body pressed down on him.


    How is that even possible, I''m clearly way stronger than her?


    Not knowing where the scary aura wasing from, Feng Chen decided to remain silent. Clearly, he understood that Zu Fei was extremely angry about something.


    In such a situation, Feng Chen understood that it would be best to remain silent¡­


    "YOU! You even dare admit it?!" Narrowing her eyes as she said this, Zu Fei could not help feeling angry.


    Thankfully, Elder Xuan had told her about it¡­ If not, this stupid sect master might have been eaten alive by those Spring Flower Sect Elders!


    Thinking about this, Zu Fei could not help narrowing her eyes even further as she stared at Feng Chen who was still oblivious as to why Zu Fei had suddenly be so angry.


    ¡­


    As Zu Fei was thinking up various ways to make sure her sect master was not eaten up by some random elder from the Spring Flower Sect while she was not looking, Chu Yang had made his way up to the second floor of the badly damaged pagoda in the ancient city ruins.


    However, just like the first floor of the pagoda, there was nothing of interest on the second floor of the pagoda. The most precious thing there would be the wooden bookshelves that lined up the walls of the second floor.


    "Nothing on the second floor¡­ Maybe the third floor will have something¡­" Muttering this to himself after he finished looking through the second floor of the pagoda, Chu Yang made his way up the spiral staircase and soon found himself on the third floor of the pagoda.


    In the end, the situation on the third floor was the same as the second and first floor, so after a quick search, Chu Yang could only continue his way up the pagoda. Hoping that the remaining four floors would have something of value left.


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ Nothing¡­ Now there is only the seventh floor left¡­"


    However, much to Chu Yang''s disappointment, the fourth, fifth and sixth floor of the pagoda were all equally empty. From the looks of it, the Explorer Union truly left no stone unturned when they searched through the ce in the past.


    Not even a simple book could be found in the entire pagoda and now hisst remaining hope was the seventh floor of the pagoda. However, at this point in time, Chu Yang did not hold much hope for there being anything on the seventh floor after having gone through six empty floors in a row.


    To be honest, it would be rather weird if the seventh floor had something left on it given just how thoroughly the Explorer Union had cleaned up the other six floors of the pagoda¡­


    Swish~


    Thinking along this line, Chu Yang rushed up the spiral staircase and entered the seventh floor of the damaged pagoda. Ready for another disappointment.


    "Wha-!?"


    However, what met him upon reaching the seventh floor of the pagoda was not anything like he had expected.


    Instead of the seventh floor beingpletely empty like the previous floors of the pagoda, the seventh floor had something left inside it.


    Not only that, but the thing left inside the seventh floor of the pagoda was more than just a simple book¡­


    "Did no one enter the seventh floor before me¡­?"


    Yes,pared to the past six floors, the seventh floor looked like it had beenpletely untouched, as the bookshelves present were filled to the brim, while a few artifacts could also be seen lying on the floor for anyone to take.


    The entire thing was bewildering to Chu Yang and made him feel like something was wrong. After all, there was no way the people from the Explorer Union would simply have left the seventh floor untouched like this¡­

 Chapter 589: Seventh Floor of the Pagoda

    Chapter 589: Seventh Floor of the Pagoda


    ncing over the books neatly ced in the bookshelves together with some of theying on the floor like they had been dropped on the floor, the different artifacts carelessly left forgotten together with a few books, Chu Yang began getting an idea over the situation of the seventh floor.


    From the first nce, Chu Yang had been too surprised at the fact that the ce was not empty, but after a second nce he realized that the entire seventh floor was extremely chaotic and messy. Almost like there had been someone there in the past, but something had ended up causing them to escape without getting everything on the seventh floor with them¡­


    Just what on earth could have happened for someone to give up all the books and artifacts on the seventh floor¡­? Is there perhaps some sort of killing formation in ce that activates upon entering the seventh floor? Maybe the reason why the members of the Explorer Union who came here in the past left this ce intact because of something entirely different¡­ but what¡­?


    Stopping himself from taking a step forward off the spiral staircase and onto the seventh floor of the badly damaged pagoda, Chu Yang could not help feeling like he might end up encountering a dangerous situation if he took a step forward and official stepped onto the seventh floor of the pagoda¡­


    The only question was, what would happen? Would it be some ancient killing formation, or something different?


    "¡­"


    Standing still for a few minutes as he quietly observed the seventh floor of the pagoda, Chu Yang failed to find anything off with the seventh floor as he instead began looking over the different artifacts and books present on the seventh floor.


    Soon focusing his attention on a few books on the ground and a spear close to the spiral staircase.


    If something really was wrong with the seventh floor of the pagoda, Chu yang nned to focus on a few things close to him that he might be able to get his hands on and escape with¡­ Just in case the seventh floor of the pagoda really was dangerous.


    The fact that he did not see a single skeleton on the seventh floor of the pagoda also helped greatly boost his confidence in escaping in case something was really wrong with the Seventh floor of the pagoda.


    After all, the people from the Explorer Union who hade a few hundred years before him should at most have been in the Core Formation Realm! The skeleton of a Core Formation Realm Expert was far more durable than a mortal Skeleton. Even when left exposed to the elements, it could stillst for up to 500 years!


    If they could escape, so could he and more importantly, their skeletons should still have been around in case they died on the seventh floor of the pagoda!


    Swish-!


    Feeling confident about it, Chu Yang didn''t waste any more time standing around as he rushed towards the spear first. Deciding to focus on getting it before focusing on the few books that looked useful.


    Rumble~


    Like he had expected, the seventh floor of the pagoda was not simple, as several ancient looking symbols began dimly shinning all over the seventh floor. Although, most of them barely lit up. Even from a nce, Chu Yang could tell whatever formation he had activated upon stepping onto the seventh floor of the pagoda, it could barely operate.


    "What in the world!?"


    However, this barely operating formation was more than enough to terrify Chu Yang, as the feeling he got from it was clearlyparable, if not stronger than the feeling he got from his master when practicing with him. The difference this time, was that the formation clearly gave off the feeling of wanting to kill him!


    Even without it having done anything yet, Chu Yang felt his body freeze in ce for a short moment under this terrifying presence before he continued making his way towards the spear.


    Luckily, the formation was barely functional at this point in time, and he could resist the pressure and move. The formation was also slowly sealing off the seventh floor. However, with the sealing speed of the formation, Chu Yang did not worry about not being able to escape in time .


    On the other hand, if the formation was fully functional¡­ Chu Yang would be sealed inside the seventh floor of the pagoda the moment he entered. Only capable of waiting for the formation to kill him!


    Swoosh!


    "Got it!"


    Grabbing hold of the spear before rapidly picking up the few nearby books he had chosen on the floor next to the spear, Chu Yang began rushing towards the spiral staircase leading down from the seventh floor.


    The attack of the formation had yet toe, as the dimly lit ancient symbols floating around the seventh floor of the pagoda were in the process of transferring their power towards a single ancient symbol.


    Even if it was only a single symbol, Chu Yang did not dare to take its attack head on, as he could clearly feel a power beyond the Core Formation Realm brewing inside the slowly charging ancient symbol.


    "Hm?"


    It was at this moment that Chu Yang noticed something was wrong with his qi, as he felt like his qi reserves were about to dry out after using his movement technique for no more than a few seconds.


    I need to get out of here fast!


    Even though he wanted to find out why his qi reserve were about to empty up after barely drawing upon them, that would have to wait forter, as the most important thing at the moment was to leave the seventh floor before he ended up getting killed by the formation that was slowly getting ready to attack.


    However, things were not that simple, as at the same time Chu Yang was focusing his full attention on escaping from the seventh floor of the pagoda.


    At the same time, the weird energy that he had absorbed over the past few days to increase his cultivation realm had been seeping out from his golden core and into his dantian since he entered the core of the ancient city ruins.


    After the stimtion from Chu Yang using his qi, the process sped up rapidly, as the weird energy left Chu Yang''s dantian at an even faster speed than before


    Not long, all the weird energy Chu Yang had refined so far, was directly expelled from his golden core and into his dantian.


    Blub~


    The result was a massive blob of weird energy that took up most of the space in Chu Yang''s dantian!


    After having formed, the massive blob slowly began absorbing the qi inside Chu Yang''s dantian. Growingrger andrger the more of Chu Yang''s qi it absorbed!


    Bang!


    Chu Yang had just barely managed to throw his body on to the spiral staircase and officially leave the seventh floor out of the formations range when this happened.


    "AH-!"


    To say it was painful would be an understatement, as Chu Yang felt his qi get violently drawn from all over his dantian and golden core before getting devoured by the blob that had now formed inside his dantian.


    What in the world is that thing, didn''t I refine those transparent stones and the energy inside them?! Howe there is suddenly something trying to devour me!?


    Panicking as he felt his cultivation realm at the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm rapidly destabilize following the weird energy leaving his golden core, Chu Yang quickly calmed himself down to the best of his abilities before sitting down in a lotus position.


    Meditating with the Soul Spear Divine Mantra that his master had given him, he barely managed to stop the situation from detreating any further, as the blob inside his dantian could no longer absorb his qi.


    The only problem with this, was the fact that he had to keep meditating to stop it from absorbing his qi and at the same time, he did not deal with the blob of weird energy inside his dantian, he merely dyed it from devouring the rest of his qi¡­


    What to do, what to do¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Chu Yang suddenly recalled the books he had taken with him when he dashed into the seventh floor of pagoda just a moment ago.


    If he didn''t remember wrong, one of the books he had taken out with him should be about the transparent stones¡­ Well¡­ It didn''t mention anything called transparent stones, but it did mention some kind of stone located in the stomach of demon beasts who reached the Core Formation Realm!


    He could not really read more, as there had only been a short description about the content of the book on the back of it.


    But to read the book in search for a solution, I will have to stop meditating and allow the blob to absorb more of my qi! However, I don''t really have any choice at this point. My cultivation base is growing more and more unstable with each passing second...!

 Chapter 590: Exotic Energy

    Chapter 590: Exotic Energy


    Havinge to a decision, Chu Yang prepared himself for the inevitable pain that woulde after the blob of weird energy inside his dantian once again began to devour his qi.


    "Hmph!"


    Frowning heavily as he barely managed to hold himself back from screaming out in pain this time around, Chu Yang picked up the book that he suspected held knowledge regarding the transparent stones and hopefully also a way to get out of his current dangerous situation.


    Luckily for Chu Yang, his prediction of the book being rted to the transparent stone was proven urate the moment he opened the book and read over the first page of the book.


    However, even if he had been urate that the book was about the transparent stones he had found, he still needed to find a solution to his current situation!


    "Demon beasts with cores made up of an exotic energy¡­ Found in location where an ancient demon beast above the mortal realm perished¡­" Muttering this to himself as he rapidly read through the first few pages of the book, Chu Yang could not help frowning as many unfamiliar, yet familiar terms appeared in the book.


    For example, the exotic energy was likely what the weird energy currently inside his dantian was called.


    Another thing would be the ancient demon beast above the mortal realm¡­ For some reason, Chu Yang had a feeling that the mortal realm referred to in the book was not the same mortal realm that he knew about.


    When referring to someone still in the mortal realm, it was normally people without any cultivation, or in some cases those in the Qi Condensation Realm as well due to the fact that their lifespan was the same as normal people without any cultivation.


    No matter how he thought about it, there was no way he could connect the death of a demon beast in the Qi Condensation Realm to the exotic energy currently trying to kill him by devouring his qi¡­ If a Qi Condensation Realm demon beast had such abilities, it would be way too terrifying!


    Shaking his head at the thought of such a scary Qi Condensation Realm demon beast, Chu Yang returned his attention back to the book as he rapidly turned the pages. Continuing his search for a way out of his current situation.


    Other than information about the origin of the exotic energy that was current devouring his qi, the book also continained information on all sorts of different ancient demon beasts that Chu Yang had never heard about before.


    However, even though he wanted to read more about the different demon beasts written about in the book, he had no time to do so at the moment, as he rapidly turned the pages while skimming over each of the pages in search of a way to deal with the growing blob of exotic energy inside his dantian.


    "This! This should be it!" Eximing loudly filled with happiness, Chu Yang stopped turning the pages, as he came to a stop on one of thest pages of the book.


    The page had a fewrge words boldly written on top of it-


    "You stupidity absorbed the exotic energy, what to do."


    Reading the title of the chapter out loud, Chu Yang could not help smiling. This was just what he had been looking for!


    Although the chapter title called him stupid, Chu Yang did not really care about this and was instead far more interested in finding a way to deal with blob of exotic energy inside his dantian.


    "Stage 1, just absorbed the exotic energy¡­ Stage 2, the exotic energy is refined and helps increase cultivation realm¡­ Stage 3, exotic energy seeps out from core and forms a blob of exotic energy that absorbs the qi inside the dantian. Transforming it into exotic energy¡­ Stage 4, all qi inside dantian has transformed, exotic energy start devouring vital energy and lifespan¡­ Stage 5, death.


    Discovery of exotic energy after stage 3 makes it close to impossible to expel. The help of a skilled alchemist familiar with exotic energy is required together with the assistance of someone in the Soul Ascension Realm to ensure that the soul does not copse during the extraction of the exotic energy¡­"


    Almost whispering this to himself as he read about what would happen to him after the exotic energy had finished absorbing his qi, Chu Yang could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    At least the exotic energy had yet to reach the fourth stage¡­ If that really happened, he would most likely just have died on the stop. After all, where was he supposed to find a skilled alchemist familiar with exotic energy and a Soul Ascension Realm Expert¡­?


    But¡­ Even if it has yet to reach that state yet, it will happen if I don''t deal with it now!


    Narrowing his eyes as this thought appeared, Chu Yang focused his attention on the different treatment methods for the third stage that he was currently in.


    Different from the fourth stage that only stated a single solution, the third stage had dozens upon dozens of different ways to deal with it. The simplest of which was to get someone in the Domain Lord Realm to forcibly extract the exotic energy.


    "However, there is no way I can get back to the sect in time and I also lost themunication talisman master gave me during my time in the Burning Mountain Range¡­" Shaking his head as he recalled how he had foolishly lost hismunication talisman, Chu Yang focused his attention on some of the methods that would be doable with his own strength.


    ¡­


    "Will this even work¡­?" Reading through the different methods doable with his own strength for the next few minutes, Chu Yang could not help smiling a bit awkwardly even under the pain brought to him by the exotic energy blob constantly devouring his qi.


    The reason for this, was that the methods he could use to expel the exotic qi with his own strength. All required him to cripple his own cultivation to some degree¡­ All of them expect one! Absorbing the exotic energy blob back into his golden core!


    "Won''t I just die if I do something like this!?"


    Feeling hesitant about doing something like this since he had already tried refining the energy blob once and had ended up in his current situation, Chu Yang was understandably not too intent on absorbing it back into his golden core.


    After all, how would he know something like what happened today would not happen again? ording to what was written in the book, even a tiny amount of exotic energy left behind would be enough for it to slowly built up and eventually cause one to enter the third stage!


    In the first ce, the reason why he had ended up in his current situation was because he had failed to properly refine the exotic energy. Allowing some of it to remain when he absorbed it into his golden core to break through to the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    ording to the book, the exotic energy could be a great help to increasing the strength of someone in the Core Formation Realm and allow them to reach the Nascent Soul Realm more smoothly in the future¡­ But it had to be under the supervision of someone in the Domain Lord Realm or above, as only someone in that realm would be able to sense if the exotic energy had been properly refined.


    Absorbing the exotic energy without the supervision of such an expert was a stupid endeavour and would be the same as asking for problems in the future.


    Chu Yang fully understood this¡­


    "But¡­ Even if I fail to properly refine the exotic energy after absorbing it again, I should still be able to buy enough time to get back to the sect and have master help me! Other than absorbing the qi back into my golden core, Would be forced to use some of the more extreme methods that would end up crippling my cultivation¡­ I don''t want to cripple my cultivation¡­" Feeling his hesitancy slowly disappear, Chu Yang finally came to a decision as he closed his eyes and sat down in a lotus position.


    Whoosh~


    In the next moment, the blob of exotic energy inside his dantian suddenly began moving towards the centre of the dantian where Chu Yang''s bright red golden core was located.


    Bang!


    Before the blob had any time to resist, it was crushed by the bright red golden core before being absorbed by the bright red golden core. Not having any time to escape.


    As his golden core slowly began refining the blob of exotic energy, Chu Yang felt his unstable cultivation base stabilize. The qi reserves that had seemingly dried up also started filling up again.


    Slowly, the strength that had left his body just moments ago was returning!


    It was at this moment, the Devil Immortal Jade that had been floating around his dantian without doing anything from beginning to end-


    Swoosh~


    Suddenly started moving!

 Chapter 591: Attempting to Breakthrough

    Chapter 591: Attempting to Breakthrough


    As the devil immortal jade that had only been acting as something to boost his cultivation speed ever since it entered his dantian suddenly moved, Chu Yang let out a surprised sounds as he felt the devil immortal jade forcefully refine the exotic energy still left in his dantian together with the exotic energy he had already finished refining and had just absorbed with his golden core to stabilize his cultivation realm.


    "Wha-!?"


    The entire thing happened far too quickly for Chu yang to react to what the devil immortal jade was doing, as the moment he recovered from the shock of what had just happened, the devil immortal jade had already finished refining the exotic energy and had returned to its mostly dormant state floating around his dantian.


    If not for the fact that he could feel the exotic energy had all been turned into a massive amount of pure qi perfect for absorption, Chu Yang would have thought he had been imagining what had just taken ce.


    Knowing that he should not waste such an opportunity, Chu Yang didn''t think too much over what had just happened and instead focused on directly absorbed all of the pure qi inside his dantian into his golden core for now.


    Thest thing he wanted, was for the pure qi to disperse while he tried figuring out what had happened to the devil immortal jade. Not to mention, he was not really in a safe location at the moment and could encounter a dangerous situation the moment he left the pagoda.


    In such a situation, it was best for him to first stabilize his cultivation base at the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm and if possible, try to break through to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm with far stronger pure qi that was now present in his dantian after the help of the devil immortal jade!


    Fully intent on trying to breakthrough to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang quickly stabilized his cultivation base before starting to attack the barrier to the fourth stage with the help of the pure qi refined from the exotic energy.


    Boom!


    Attacking the barrier to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang very clearly felt that it was way harder to breakthroughpared to when he had tried breaking through to the second and third stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    The reason for this was also obvious, as entering the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm was considered as reaching the middle stage of the Core Formation Realm. The increase in strength was far more than what one would experience when going from the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm to the Third Stage!


    Hah¡­


    Taking a deep breath as he changed his form of attack to a more continues stream instead of trying to breakthrough through sheer brute force, Chu Yang understood that it would take some time for him to break through the barrier separating the third and fourth stage.


    Even if slowly breaking through would require far more time and would also require arge amount of qi to help support him during this, he had more than enough avable in his dantian thanks to the help of the immortal devil jade!


    Bang-bang-bang!


    Continuously attacking the barrier between the third and fourth stage of the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang hadpletely shut himself off to the outside world as he remained sitting in a lotus position on the spiral staircase of the pagoda. Not intending to get up again before he had sessfully broken through to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm!


    ¡­


    Back at the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao carried Song Jia with him and made his way to where Elder Song was recovering from the injuries he had received.


    Although he had received some bad injuries and still had to deal with the hidden injuries, he had received from extracting his own lifespan, Xuan Hao could already see that the old man had hidden the fact that he was in a bad condition.


    Even he had a hard time realizing the old man was injured without trying to find out!


    Not knowing how useful this would be against Song Jia, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head. The ability of Song Jia''s eyes was simply terrifying and there was a chance that she might see through Elder Song''s attempt to hide his injuries.


    However, even knowing this, Xuan Hao still nned to take her to see him. After all, not only did Song Jia want to show off the fact that she had properly taken her medicine, but Elder Song also wanted to make sure that she was fine.


    After all, he should know how painful it was for Song Jia every time she had consumed the demonic medicinal potion.


    At this point in time, Elder Song still had no idea that Song Jia had consumed apletely different potion that allowed her to lose consciousness during the time that the suppression of her disease took ce.


    Thinking about it like this, Elder Song most likely wanted to see his granddaughter as quickly as possible so he could personally make sure she was fine¡­


    Swish~


    Not taking too long to travel to the small, isted courtyard where Elder Song was slowly recovering, Xuan Haonded on the ground a short distance away from where the old man was sitting.


    "Grandpa!"


    The moment hended on the ground and let her down on the ground, Song Jia rapidly sprinted over to the old man while calling out to him. Immediately alerting the old man meditating of their presence.


    "Song Jia?!" Showing a slightly shocked expression on his face for a split second after seeing Song Jia suddenly appearing, Elder Song quickly recovered after realizing Xuan Hao was also there as well.


    In such a situation, it did not take long for the old man to put two and two together and understand what was happening.


    "¡­"


    Watching from the side as the old man and his granddaughter happily began talking with each other about what had happened during the time Song Jia had spent in Zu Fei''s pavilion along with the fact that she had taken her medicine without feeling the slightest bit of pain in the process, Xuan Hao could not help smiling as he saw the expression on Elder Song''s face.


    To be honest, Elder Song''s expression when he heard about her not feeling any pain after taking her medicine was rather funny, as the old man had clearly not thought Xuan Hao would actually seed in making a substitute for the demonic medicinal potion in such a short period of time.


    "Ah! Elder Xuan, I''m sorry for neglecting you like this¡­ I was a little too excited to see my dear granddaughter earlier. Normally she would not be in such a great condition after taking the potion and I-"


    "It''s fine, I just came here to deliver your granddaughter after all, there is no need to mind me. Now that I think about it, I actually have something different to inform you about that I happened to discover on my way back to the sect." Stopping Elder Song before he could continue, Xuan Hao switched the subject as he still wanted to inform Elder Song about the spirit stone mine that he had found out about from the system reward.


    "Hm? What is it?" Not realizing that Xuan Hao had suddenly changed the direction of the conversation, Elder Song asked this in a curious tone.


    "Yes, what is it!?" Song Jia also followed Elder Song over, as she asked in a simrly curious way Elder Song had. The only difference between the two, was that Song Jia was very clearly asking in a far more excited tone.


    In a sense, it felt like she was expecting Xuan Hao to pull out a gift of some sort the next moment¡­


    "Ahm¡­ It''s like this, I happened to chance upon a spirit stone mine located only a short distance away from the Shattered Star Peaks and¡­" As he started talking about the spirit stone mine, the curious expression on Elder Song''s face slowly became one filled with excitement.


    "For there to be such arge spirit stone mine and just next to our future sect location! I really can''t imagine how lucky we are that you found something like that Elder Xuan! It will surely be able to help when ites to-"


    Listening as Elder Song excitedly talking about all the things that would be possible with the spirit stones that could be gained from the spirit stone mine, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly before ncing towards Song Jia standing on the side with a disappointed expression on her face.


    "A spirit stone mine¡­? Can it be eaten?"


    She was not all too thrilled hearing about a spirit stone mine being discovered¡­

 Chapter 592: Chu Yangs Breakthrough, Badly Damaged Pagoda vs Demon Beasts

    Boom!


    I finally managed to break through that damnable barrier and reach the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm!


    After close to half a day of attacking the barrier to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang finally managed to break through the barrier and officially step into the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    Whoosh~


    At this moment, the qi from the world around him gathered towards him in response to his breakthrough, causing Chu Yang to stop himself from getting up as he quickly used the opportunity to absorb the qi from the world to stabilize his cultivation base.


    Not to mention, he had pretty much used all the pure qi refined from the exotic energy to break through and had none left to stabilize his cultivation base, it was a rather lucky thing that his breakthrough allowed him to draw on the surrounding qi from the world and use it to stabilize his cultivation realm¡­


    However, he understood that drawing in so much qi from the world around him would note without risks!


    At this point, all the demon beast in the core of the ancient city ruins should have sensed me¡­ Hah¡­ I really need to finish quickly so I can get out of here before I get overwhelmed by the demon beasts in here!


    No longer wanting to try and gather the transparent stones with exotic energy inside them after understanding just how dangerous they were, Chu Yang was only concerned with getting out of the ancient city ruins alive at this point in time.


    ROOOAR-!


    ROOOOOOOOAR!


    ROAR~


    The only problem was that getting out alive had be a rather difficult task now that all the Core Formation Realm demon beasts inside the core of the ancient city ruins were aware of his location¡­


    How troublesome¡­ It looks like I won''t only have to deal with the demon beasts in the Core Formation Realm¡­


    Hearing the countless roars outside the pagoda from all directions around him, Chu Yang could not helpmenting at how difficult it would be for him to escape the ancient city ruins, while at the same time doing his best to stabilize his cultivation realm as quickly as possible.


    ¡­


    At the same time Chu Yang was trying his best to quickly stabilize his cultivation base at the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, arge number of demon beasts had gathered together at the edge of the massive crater at the centre of the ancient city ruins.


    Roar!


    Rooooar!


    Roar¡­


    However, even after standing around for a few minutes, none of them dared entering the crater.


    Looking at the group of demon beasts, it was obvious to anyone watching that the demon beasts were afraid of entering the crater. No, it would be more urate to say they were afraid of the pagoda standing at the centre of the massive crater.


    Squeak!


    Even the rabbit demon beast above the Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm did not dare enter the crater as it stared towards the pagoda located at the centre of the massive crater with a fearful expression stered all over its small face.


    Whoosh~!


    As time passed, more and more qi got drawn towards the centre of the massive crater before gathering at the badly damaged pagoda where it was then absorbed.


    Attracting the qi from the world around him after his breakthrough, Chu Yang had not been the only one to benefit by using the qi to stabilize his cultivation, but the badly damaged pagoda had also managed to make use of the qi gathering towards it, as it had noticeably begun to recover some of its former prestige after absorbing most of the qi gathering towards Chu Yang.


    ROOOAR!


    The demon beasts saw this happening but were far too afraid to enter the crater and do something about it.


    Even if they understood that the pagoda recovering would be a bad thing for them, their fear of the crater was enough to keep them at bay for now, as the pagoda had only recovered a tiny amount of its strength so far. Not yet enough to move away from the crater.


    As long as the pagoda was far too weak to move on its own and was stuck in the massive crater, the demon beasts would not care if it managed to recover part of its strength¡­


    However, things suddenly changed as a small vortex formed above the badly damaged pagoda-


    WHOOSH~!


    Before the demon beasts standing around outside the crater had any time to react, the badly damaged pagoda burrowed Chu Yang''s momentary attraction of the qi between heaven and earth to form a small vortex to suck in all the qi and rapidly increase the amount of qi flowing towards it.


    SQUEAK!


    Understanding that things were taking a turn for the worse, the rabbit demon beasts acting as a leader of the demon beasts let out a loud squeaking noise before rushing into the massive crater towards the badly damaged pagoda.


    ROAR!


    ROOOOAR!


    ROAR-!


    The Core Formation Realm demon beasts that had gathered together with the rabbit demon beast seemed to have gotten some sort ofmand from the rabbit demon beast, as they simrly rushed towards the badly damaged pagoda.


    Swish-!


    BOOM!


    Reaching the badly damaged pagoda, the rabbit demon beast and the rest of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts allunched attacks towards the pagoda. Instantly causing the small vortex above it to copse and the absorption of qi to stop.


    Rumble~


    Following the absorption of qi by the pagoda being stopped, arge number of dim ancient symbols suddenly manifested out of thin air around the pagoda-


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Forming all kinds of different mystical attacks thatunched towards the group of Core Formation Realm beasts that had attacked the pagoda.


    Not a single one of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts that attacked the pagoda were able to escape unharmed, as all of them were injured to some degree by the pagoda.


    SQUEAK!


    However, the goal of stopping the pagoda from absorbing any more qi had already beenplete, so the rabbit demon beasts ordered for every to retreat as the group of Core Formation Realm demon beasts quickly escaped from the crater with the badly damaged pagoda before the pagodaunched another wave of attacks.


    The fact that most of them had managed to survive the attack of the pagoda was a miracle, as most of the pagoda''s power had been split into dozens of weaker attacks that they could just barely endue with their strength. Only a few of the weaker ones at the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm had died during the pagoda''s attack!


    All in all, the rabbit demon beast considered this a sess, as it returned to observing the pagoda where the human was hiding together with the rest of the demon beasts. Not forgetting to recover from the few injuries that it had just received from the pagoda.


    After escaping the massive crater, the Core Formation Realm demon beasts ended up being split up. Most of them being gathered in two groups, one at either side of the massive crater


    ¡­


    Looks like the qi stopped gathering towards me the moment I stabilized my cultivation base¡­ Not to mention, it seems like the demon beasts already started attacking the pagoda!


    Standing up after having fully stabilized his cultivation base at the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, Chu Yang thought this to himself as he felt the entire pagoda still shaking violently from what he expected to be the demon beasts outside attacking it.


    At least the pagoda seems to be strong enough to hold the demon beasts back for some time, but I don''t expect it tost forever. Leaving now when those demon beasts outside just finished attacking the pagoda and are still exhausted should be my best chance to escape!


    Narrowing his eyes as he realized this, Chu Yang did not bother staying any longer inside the badly damaged pagoda.


    Swoosh~


    Directly rushing down the spiral staircase to the first floor before leaving the pagoda the same way he entered. Not encountering any formation that prevented him from escaping along the way.


    "This is¡­"


    Just as he took his first step outside the pagoda, Chu Yang could not help muttering this to himself as he was faced with the dead bodies of three massive demon beasts just a short distance away from the pagoda.


    From the remnant auras swirling around the three dead bodies, Chu Yang did not take long to realize that the three dead demon beasts were in the Core Formation Realm. Not to mention, he could clearly tell a battle had just taken ce outside the pagoda.


    Did the demon beasts perhaps start fighting with each other around the pagoda? Maybe that''s why the pagoda is still intact, it only received a few stray attacks from the fighting taking ce nearby, it does not matter why they fought¡­ I just need them to be too injured to fight me!


    Thinking this, Chu Yang nced towards the demon beasts surrounding the crater in the distance.


    From a nce, it seemed like most of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts were gathered in two groups at either side of the crater, each being injured to various degrees.


    Looks like they did indeed fight with each other! This should be a great opportunity for me to escape this ce unscratched!


    Swish-!


    Having confirmed that the Core Formation Realm demon beasts surrounding the crater were indeed injured, Chu Yang didn''t bother wasting any more time in front of the pagoda. Rushing directly towards the weakest part in the encirclement around the crater.


    Fully intend on escaping the crater and leaving the ancient city ruins without fighting any of the demon beasts. Now that he was no longer interested in the transparent stone filled with exotic energy, he had no need to risk his life fighting the Core Formation Realm demon beasts of the ancient city ruins!

 Chapter 593: Escape from the Ancient City Ruins

    Roar?


    Only noticing Chu Yang after he had already managed to reach the edge of the massive crater, the Core Formation Realm demon beast standing closest to the location Chu Yang was rushing towards tilted its head in a slightly confused manner.


    It was only when Chu Yang jumped out of the crater towards the dense mostly intact ancient city buildings, that the demon beast realized who Chu Yang was.


    ROOAR!


    Roaring loudly upon realizing this, the demon beast quickly informed the other demon beasts still busy recovering from the earlier sh with the badly damaged pagoda before dashing towards the escaping Chu Yang.


    Squeak? Squeak!


    Swish!


    Reacting only shortly after hearing about this, the rabbit demon beasts with a pair of cute horns on its head responded to the information about the human escaping, as it charged in the direction Chu Yang.


    Rumble~


    Soon, the Core Formation Realm demon beasts that could still move after being injured by the badly damaged pagoda and the rest of the demon beasts below the Core Formation Realm all responded to the rabbit demon beasts call, as all of them began moving in the direction that Chu Yang had escaped.


    The only demon beasts still left staying around the crater at this point in time, were the Core Formation Realm demon beasts who had been too injured to move earlier and had been forced to stay in ce to recover before moving anywhere.


    ¡­


    Swish-!


    Escaping through the ancient city ruins without looking back in the direction he hade from; Chu Yang could not help feeling happy after recalling how he had managed to escape from the crater without having to fight a single demon beast.


    At first, Chu Yang had thought he would be forced to fight his way out of an encirclement before he could leave the crater¡­ But this had not happened, and he had been able to leave the crater without fighting a single demon beast on the way out.


    Mostly because the demon beasts that had blocked his path were all below the Core Formation Realm and had no way to stop him from jumping over them and escaping into the dense ancient city ruins behind them before they even had the chance to process the fact that he was even there in the first ce.


    But there is still that rabbit demon beast with the pair of horns¡­ It should be above the Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm. Having at least reached thete stage of the Core Formation Realm! Catching up with me should not be too hard for such a powerful demon beast, I just hope that it only reached the Seventh Stage of the Core Formation Realm and not anything above that¡­


    Remembering the powerful rabbit demon beast that had acted as a leader when the Core Formation Realm demon beasts were still scouring the outer parts of the ancient city ruins looking for him, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit afraid.


    After all, even if he reached the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, he had no idea how well he would fare against a demon beast that had reached the Seventh Stage of the Core Formation Realm. Not to mention, the rabbit demon beast might even be above that!


    "Hm?"


    It was at this moment that Chu Yang suddenly felt something behind him-


    Whoosh!


    Barely moving to the side in time, Chu Yang could not help feeling a cold shiver run down his spine, as he watched the rabbit demon beast with the cute pair of horns that he had just been thinking about sh down towards the location he had been less than a second earlier.


    Looking more closely, Chu Yang did not take long to realize that he had just barely managed to avoid the attack of the rabbit demon beast!


    Not to mention barely escaping with his life, Chu Yang was now close enough to the rabbit demon beast and could feel the true strength of the rabbit demon beast first hand.


    "Eighth Stage of the Core Formation Realm¡­"


    Unfortunately for Chu Yang, the rabbit demon beast was not in the Seventh Stage of the Core Formation Realm but had instead reached the Eighth Stage of the Core Formation Realm!


    Swish!


    This realization instantly made Chu Yang give up any thought of fighting with the rabbit demon beast, as he rapidly utilized his movement technique to escape in the opposite direction of the rabbit demon beast towards the outer part of the ancient city ruins.


    Even if he got lucky and won in a fight against the rabbit demon beast, Chu Yang had no ns to risk his life for it. Not to mention, the rabbit demon beast was not alone!


    Squeak?!


    Seeing its attack miss, followed by Chu Yang running away, the rabbit demon beast squeaked angrily as its small pair of eyes narrowed ever so slightly while looking towards Chu Yang''s disappearing figure.


    Clearly, the rabbit demon beast had not expected Chu Yang to react fast enough to dodge it. Now that he had done so, the rabbit demon beast started taking him more seriously.


    After all, it understood that if Chu Yang was strong enough to dodge its attack, he should also be strong enough to fight it!


    Even if that was not the case, the rabbit demon beast still decided to be cautious as it changed its ns of finishing off Chu Yang by itself to stopping him from escaping and buying enough time for the rest of the demon beasts inside the ancient city ruins to catch up and overwhelm him through sheer numbers.


    Having decided on a new way to deal with the murderous human that had killed so many of its subordinates, the rabbit demon beast narrowed its eyes even further as a clear killing intent appeared in them.


    ROAR!


    ROOOOAR!


    ROOAR!


    The other Core Formation Realm demon beasts who had just managed to catch up with their leader could not help roaring happily. Thinking that their leader had in the arrogant human that had caused them so much trouble over the past few days.


    Swish~


    However, in the end, they only to see their leader disappear in front of them the moment they appeared. Indicating that he had not managed to deal with the human yet!


    Roar!?


    Feeling surprised that the human had actually managed to survive an encounter with their leader, the Core Formation Realm demon beasts froze for a moment before the group of Core Formation Realm demon beasts all showed a simrly fearful expression.


    From a nce, it was very clear that the demon beasts had not expected for something like this to happen, as in their eyes, the human would easily be killed when their leader managed to catch up to him.


    The fact that the human was still alive, meant that even their leader could not easily kill him!


    In turn, this meant that the human was far more powerful than they first thought, it would most likely not be too hard for the human to kill any of them¡­


    Roar¡­


    Taking some time to fully calm down upon learning about this, the demon beasts took a few seconds to recover before they once again resumed their chase of the human. Following the scent trail left behind by their leader.


    However, these few seconds of time wasted for them to calm down, was crucial in making sure that Chu Yang could sessfully escape from the ancient city ruins!


    ¡­


    Squeak!


    Where in the world are those useless idiots!?


    As rabbit demon beast did its absolute best to stop Chu Yang from escaping. Keeping him in the same location for close to ten seconds, it could not help cursing out loud in its mother tongue as the Core Formation Realm demon beasts that were supposed to have shown up at this point in time was nowhere in sight.


    Whoosh~


    Watching as Chu Yang managed to break free from it and once again escape over the broken-down walls of the ancient city ruins, the rabbit demon beasts could only stare helplessly as the human disappeared outside its territory.


    Following was no longer possible, as the rabbit demon beast understood that it would be entering human territory by doing so.


    At that point in time, it might end up bing the one hunted down¡­ Not to mention, if any of the more powerful humans showed up, its entire territory might end up getting razed to the ground!


    ROAR!


    ROOOOAAAR!


    It was at this moment, that the Core Formation Realm demon beasts in question showed up¡­ Just in time to see their leader angrily turn towards them filled with anger.


    Roar?


    Not knowing what was wrong, one of the demon beasts stepped forward to ask its leader. However-


    SQUEAK-!


    BANG!


    This ended up being a mistake, as it was directly up by the rabbit demon beast before having any chance to react.


    Squeak¡­


    R-roar¡­?


    Understanding something was wrong, the rest of the demon beasts all shivered as they watched their leader approach them filled with anger before-


    Bang-bang-bang!


    Letting out all its frustration of not being able to catch the human on the demon beasts that had just arrived, the rabbit demon beast only held back enough to not kill them, as it violently beat up all the Core Formation Realm demon beast for showing upte!

 Chapter 594: Journey Back

    Chapter 594: Journey Back


    "Hah¡­ I actually managed to get away without getting seriously injured!"


    Havinge to a stop a short distance away from the ancient city ruins after discovering that the rabbit demon beast decided not to continue chasing after him outside the ancient city ruins, Chu Yang examined his surroundings before finding a ce to recover the qi he had used to fight with the rabbit demon beast earlier.


    Even though he had managed to escape in the end, the rabbit demon beast was far stronger than he had expected, almostpletely exhausting him after only 10 seconds!


    If not for the fact that it didn''t chase him after he left the ancient city ruins, Chu Yang was almost certain that he would lose to the rabbit demon beast¡­ Of course, this was also considering he only tried escaping and didn''t waste any of his energy trying to fight back against the rabbit demon beast.


    After all, fighting back against the rabbit demon beast would only result in him being stuck in the same ce. Giving the rest of the Core Formation Realm demon beasts more than enough time to catch up and gang up on him together!


    To be honest, Chu Yang had been quite surprised that the Core Formation realm demon beasts had not managed to catch up with him during the 10 seconds that the rabbit demon beast had managed to hold him in one location.


    However, Chu Yang just med this on the fact that there should still be some discontent among the demon beasts after having fought just a few minutes earlier. This infighting should have been what had caused the dy for the other Core Formation Realm demon beasts!


    At least, that was what Chu Yang thought given the conclusions he had drawn after seeing the tworge groups of injured demon beasts at either side of the massive crater.


    Never would he have expected that the reason why the Core Formation Realm demon beasts had been slower to show up was because they felt fearful towards the strength, he had disyed by surviving the rabbit demon beast''s sneak attack.


    Even if they had only hesitated to move for a few seconds, this was more than enough time for Chu Yang to escape from the rabbit demon beast''s grasp and jump over the outer walls of the ancient city ruins. Ensuring his own safety and at the same time ensuring a beating by the rabbit demon beast for them¡­


    Fwoosh~


    "This should be enough."


    Standing back up after spending a few minutes recovering the qi he had spent during his escape from the ancient city ruins, Chu Yang began making his way back towards the Small River Town. Leaving behind the ancient city ruins.


    The reason why he decided to make his way back to the Small River Town instead of heading directly back towards the Flying Sword Sect, was because Chu Yang did not want to risk once again losing his way while travelling on his own.


    For this reason, he wanted to make use of the Explorer Union of the Small River Town and try get an escort mission towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    Even if the Explorer Union was pretty bad in the Small River Town, Chu Yang thought that he should at the very least be able to get an escort mission out of the small town to another town closer to the Flying Sword Sect¡­ Hopefully that town would have a more functioning Explorer Union as well.


    Investigating the spiritual fruit trees at the Small River Town was no longer something Chu Yang wanted to waste time on, as at this point in time, he just wanted to return back to the Flying Sword Sect and get his master to check out the situation.


    Although he did not think the devil immortal jade missed any of the exotic energy when it forcefully refined it, he could never bepletely certain about this. Getting his master to check it for him was the best option for him.


    Not to mention, he was already rather happy with the things he had gained from his adventure outside the sect, a new spear, books on what he expected to be ancient spear techniques and more importantly¡­ His cultivation realm had improved all the way to the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm!


    Even if Qing Yi had managed to break through to the Core Formation Realm when he returned, he would still be able to easily win against her with his current strength!


    No matter what, there was no way Chu Yang would let himself get overtaken by her!


    Whoosh~


    Leaving the forest that the ancient city ruins were located inside, Chu Yang moved back to the small river and followed it back towards the Small River Town.


    At least, with a river to follow, he would not have to worry about getting lost.


    ¡­


    "Well then, I will get going¡­ Are you sure you are fine with having Song Jia around in your current state¡­?" Getting ready to leave after having spent a few hours talking with Elder Song about not only the spirit stone mine but also the future direction of the sect, Xuan Hao could not help asking this as he nced towards Song Jia gently sleeping on a couch next to them.


    "It''s fine, I already recovered enough to move around normally! Although¡­ Fighting is definitely not possible for another few days, I can still look after the little one by myself!" Gently leaning over to caress the head of the sleeping Song Jia, Elder Song smiled gently at her while saying this.


    Even after having been injured by failing to make the demonic medicinal potion just a few hours earlier, Elder Song was in no way showing any weakness in front of Xuan Hao.


    If not for the fact that he could clearly sense that he was injured, Chu Yang would doubt that there was anything wrong with the current Elder Song.


    "I understand¡­ But if you need anyone to look after her while you are recovering, you can always contact me."


    "Haha, I will be sure to remember that in the future!" Laughing happily when he heard what Xuan Hao said, Elder Song soon calmed down before watching as Xuan Hao took his leave.


    Soon enough, Elder Song was left alone together with the sleeping Song Jia beside him.


    Fwoosh~


    Not wasting any time after Xuan Hao left, Elder Song directly began absorbing the qi from the world around him, as he used it to repair the internal damage done to his body by the explosion of the cauldron earlier.


    As for the injuries to his soul from extracting his own lifespan over the past dozen years¡­ That would not be so easily repaired and would require not only a long time, but also precious potions, spiritual herb or natural treasures that could help recovering the injuries to his soul.


    At least the Purification Pill given to him by Xuan Hao had allowed him to not only breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm, but also allowed him to recover some of the worst injuries to his soul.


    ¡­


    "Hm¡­ I didn''t expect to get held up for so long with Song Jia''s matter all of a sudden, the lecture I nned to hold for never ended up taking ce¡­" Muttering this to himself as he slowly made his way back towards his pavilion under the light from the moon above, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head.


    Making sure Elder Song''s granddaughter Song Jia was safe, was far more important thanpleting the sect quest from the system.


    Not to mention, during this time, he also realized that it might not be a good idea to just suddenly hold a lecture without first informing the new disciples that he was actually going to hold a lecture.


    If he really did that, he might end up with no more than a handful new disciples at his lecture¡­


    "Now that I think about it, how does the Feng Chen and the others inform the rest of the sect about something important? They always seem to have spread any news they want spread throughout the sect in less than two days'' time¡­"


    Feeling curious about this as he made, he walked along the mostly empty path leading down from the area where Elder Song was living and into the more busy part of the sect where most of the restaurants and other entertainment facilities were located, Xuan Hao could not help ncing towards a few disciples happily making their way into arge building that looked like a restaurant he had seen before while outside the sect.


    The clear difference between this one and the one outside the sect, was that the one in the sect was clearly farrgerpared to the one he had seen outside. Another difference would be the fact that any restaurant inside the sect would be run by either the servant quarters or the sect''s elders. In rare cases, some of the senior disciples also ran their own shops and ces, though it was rather rare, as most of them had no time to do something like that.


    "Hm¡­ Asking the disciples should be a good idea. Although, I will have to change my appearance, so I won''t get recognized the moment I enter the ce."


    Whoosh~


    Coming to a decision and feeling like it would a more entertaining way to find out about how to quickly inform the rest of the disciples about his uing lecture, Xuan Hao changed his clothes and appearance before following the group of happy disciples inside therge restaurant.

 Chapter 595: Information Board...?

    Chapter 595: Information Board...?


    Entering the restaurant that he had seen the group of happy disciples enter in a disguise that made him look like an ordinary disciple, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit surprised after entering the restaurant.


    Not only were arge number of disciples sitting around enjoying themselves while eating and chatting together after a long day of hard work practicing their techniques together, but there were also quite a few elders present sitting in the quieter ces of the restaurant enjoying a meal together.


    "Ah¡­ Howe I have to work so hard these past few weeks? Elder Song is really ruthless, I didn''t even get to rx for more than a few days before getting a notice sending me to exterminate some rampaging demon beast in the territory of the Bright Flight Sect¡­"


    "You are one to talk¡­ I was on material transportation duty and have to constantly move back and forth between the Shattered Star Peaks and the sect. Even getting a day to rx is more than I could dream of for the past few days!"


    "Hopefully things will get easier when we move officially move to the Shattered Star Peaks together with the Spring Flower Sect Elders!"


    ""True!""


    Listening in on the conversation between a group of elders sitting in the corner of the restaurant, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly.


    From the looks of it, the elders of the Flying Sword Sect had not yet gotten full used to working to the degree that Elder Song had made them work.


    At the very least, it seemed like they were not angry or anything along that line. Only a bit disgruntled at not being able toze around for more than a few days after finishing a task.


    In the future when he got to setting up the Qi Gathering Formation and the sect was moved to the Shattered Star Peaks, things should start calming down and the elders would be able to get some more free time.


    Even if it was less than what they had before Elder Song and Feng Chen started making them work, it would still be far more free timepared to what they had now¡­


    As he was shaking his head a bit while thinking about this, Xuan Hao noticed a young man dressed in a standard servant attire moving towards him.


    "Hello! How can I help you?"


    "Ah, I''m just looking for a table to sit down and get something to eat¡­"


    "I understand. Please follow me!"


    Being guided to a small table sitting a bit in the corner of the restaurant by the servant, Xuan Hao didn''t manage to say anything more before the servant had already dashed to a group of young disciples that had entered just after him. Leaving him with a menu of the things he could order just before he ran away.


    "Looks like things are quite busy¡­" Muttering this to himself as he watched the young man who had shown him to his table run back and forth between different tables to get new peoples settled in and a t the same time take orders from the ones who had finished finding out what they wanted from the menu, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a little sorry for the hard working young servant.


    However, upon closer inspection, the young man was not the slightest bit exhausted from running back and forth so much.


    After a quick scan with his divine sense, Xuan Hao discovered to his shock, that the young man was actually in the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    Even by the Flying Sword Sect''s standards, he could be considered a genius to have reached the Foundation Establishment Realm at such a young age¡­ Why on earth was he running around as a servant at a restaurant? Did he perhaps enjoy the job¡­.?


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao focused his attention on the menu and ordered something light to eat from another servant passing by before focusing his attention on the conversations between the disciples currently present inside the restaurant with the simple goal of finding out about how information was spread by the other elders.


    Communication talismans were obviously not an option, as not every disciple would have one. Especially the new disciples who just recently entered the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    A notice board would not really work either, as most of the disciples trained at their own most of the week. Mostly only having a single lecture by an elder a week, while some of the older disciples could spent months, if not years cultivating on their own!


    Does the sect perhaps have something simr to a town crier that would inform all disciples about thetest news?


    Feeling extremely curious, Chu Yang nced towards an especially loud group of around 6 disciples sitting around arge table located towards the centre of the restaurant while wating for his food to arrive.


    ¡­


    "Did you hear? Apparently, the sect is going to move to the Shattered Star Peaks in the future after merging together with the Spring Flower Sect!"


    "That is old news already¡­"


    "But¡­ That ce is so dangerous! ording to rumours, anyone with a weak cultivation going up the mountains of the Shattered Star Peaks will die! How are we supposed to cultivate in such a ce in the future¡­?" Showing a fearful expression on his face after saying this, the young boy looked towards the disciple who had responded to him.


    However, the boy in question kept quiet. Showing an equally fearful expression on his face.


    Clearly, the Shattered Star Peaks was not viewed as a great ce by these disciples. Not something too surprising considering the fact that the Shattered Star Peaks were most famous for old Core Formation Realm Experts going up there to go through theirst attempt at reaching the Nascent Soul Realm or die trying¡­


    "Calm down, the sect elders certainly have a n in mind! Otherwise, they would not decide to move the sect to such a location in the first ce! Do you two perhaps think they are going to leave behind the entire younger generation and move to the Shattered Star Peaks by themselves?" Rolling her eyes as she said this, the oldest disciple sitting by the table could not help looking towards the two boys fearfully looking at each other with a slightly disdainful expression on her face.


    ""¡­""


    Indeed, there was no way the elders would just decide to leave behind the entire younger generation of the Flying Sword Sect for no reason. Not to mention, there was no way thosezy elders would be able to exist without them!


    If not for them, where were those elders supposed to get their daily meal and other daily necessities from?


    After all, if they could not live on the Shattered Star Peaks, there was no way the servants from the servant quarters could either¡­ And it was them that took care of most of the mundane chores and jobs around the Flying Sword Sect, with some of the younger disciples like them helping from time to time¡­.


    Without the servants from the servant quarters and the disciples from the younger generation, there was no way the sect would be able to function properly!


    "Sorry senior sister, it was a stupid question!"


    "Indeed, there is no way elders like our teacher Elder Far Cloud could live without us around¡­"


    Hearing what their senior sister said, the two young boys quickly calmed down as they reflected on their stupid way of thinking.


    "It''s good as long as you two understand, but¡­ Remember not to bad-talk the elders like this! I think you earned yourself a beating for tomorrows lecture¡­!" Nodding her head with a smile, the senior sister whispered thest part of her sentence while motioning the two towards an elder staring directly at them with narrowed eyes.


    Seeing the person that their senior sister motioned towards, both the boys panicked as they clearly recognized him.


    ""Elder Far Cloud!?!?""


    "Hehe, I hope you two are prepared for tomorrow''s lecture!" Holding back his anger from being talked about badly by two of his students in front of his friends and arge number of disciples, Elder Far Cloud transferred his voice to the two boys who quickly grew pale before returning to his meal with a sinister expression on his face. Plotting how to punish the two young boys during tomorrow''s lecture.


    Gulp~


    An audible sound of swallowing could be heard, as the two young boys nervously looked towards their senior sister for help.


    "Mmh! This is delicious!"


    Sadly, for them, their senior sisterpletely ignored them as she began eating the dessert that was in front of her.


    "Please let somethinge up on the information board tomorrow!"


    "Anything is fine, as long as we can avoid tomorrow''s lecture!"


    ¡­


    "Hm? It''s just an information board¡­?" Having gotten the information, he was looking for; Xuan Hao could not help frowning.


    He had hoped that the sect would be using some kind of mystical way to quickly spread information¡­ But from the looks of it, it was just a simple information board that should be spread throughout the Flying Sword Sect!


    Howe I''ve never seen this information board before? I should check it out on my way back¡­


    Watching as his food arrived, Xuan Hao no longer listened to the conversation of the group of disciples, as he focused his full attention on eating the food in front of him.


    Even if he had no need for food at his current cultivation realm, Xuan Hao still very much enjoyed the feeling of eating.

 Chapter 596: Elder Xuan is going to hold a lecture!?

    Chapter 596: Elder Xuan is going to hold a lecture!?


    "That was far better than I expected it to be..." Muttering this to himself as he left the restaurant after having finished his meal, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised at how good the food was.


    From the looks of it, the Flying Sword Sect not only had skilled cultivators, but also had some skilled chefs!


    Feeling quite happy at this revtion, Xuan Hao soon found himself in front of the information board that he had heard the younger disciples talking about.


    "Hm... Looks like it''s not as simple as I first thought!" Inspecting the information board closely, Xuan Hao did not take long to realize that the information board was in fact made using some kind of formation.


    After a closer look, Xuan Hao realized that the formation inside the information board was connected to all the other information boards across the Flying Sword Sect through the formation.


    Whoosh~


    Changing some of the information on the information board in front of him with the help of his domain, Xuan Hao observed as the rest of the information boards across the Flying Sword Sect simrly changed.


    "So, this is how it works! Looks like anyone in the Nascent Soul Realm or above will be able to change the information on the information board freely!" Finding out how the information board worked after spending a few more minutes ying around with it, Xuan Hao quickly put down the information about the lecture he nned to hold the next day for the new disciples of the sect.


    "Mhm!" Feeling satisfied, Xuan Hao looked at what he had written with a smile on his face before heading back to his pavilion for the night. Not knowing just how much of a stir the small note would end up causing the next morning.


    The notice itself was not unique in any waypared to the other lectures that could be found on the information board, but there was one stark contrast between the other lectures and that was the fact that he was the only Core Elder on the list of lectures that could be found on the information board!


    Normally, lectures done by core elders would not be advertised on the information board for and would most of the time be something that the disciples wouldpete for, as the lecture done by a Core Elder was far more beneficial than the lecture done by the Core Formation Realm Elders!


    Yet at this point in time, Xuan Hao had pretty much invited every single new disciple from thest selection to join his lecture without having to go through some sort of tournament to fight for a chance to join the lecture...


    Whoosh~


    "The information board changed; I wonder if anything happened for it to change at such ate time..." Just as Xuan Hao had left the information board after getting the information about his lecture on the information board, an older disciple that came running through the ce noticed that the information board had changed, as he could not help himself froming to a stop and taking a look.


    "WHAT!? Elder Xuan is holding a lecture for the new disciples tomorrow?! Isn''t he one of the core elders...?" Reading the information that Xuan Hao had just added to the information board, the older disciple stared speechlessly for a short moment before yelling out in shock.


    After all, the core elders of the Flying Sword Sect would normally hold a lecture for a few select disciples chosen through apetition. The only core elder that didrge scale lectures was Elder Song and that was only because he continued therge-scale monthly lectures he had been doing before reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    For most disciples in the Flying Sword Sect, the only way they could gain guidance from someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, was through the monthly lecture held by Elder Song and thepetitions hosted from time to time when another core elder wanted to hold a lecture.


    Not to mention, Elder Xuan was not someone in the Nascent Soul Realm but was actually an expert who had reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    "Why couldn''t I have entered the Flying Sword Sect a few yearster..." Muttering this to himself as he nced towards the part that said only for new disciples, the older disciple could not help feeling regretful that he hadn''t entered the Flying Sword Sect at ater time.


    "What!? Elder Xuan is holding arge-scale lecture for the new disciples of the sect?!"


    "Ah! Why could I not have entered the sect a yearter than I did!"


    "Hehe, I''m certain Elder Xuan will need a few disciples to keep order while hosting the lecture..."


    As more and more disciples arrived at the information board and learned about the lecture that was going to take ce the next day, most of them showed regretful expressions, while the rest tried toe up with different ways in which they could listen to the lecture from the side.


    After all, such arge-scale lecture for the younger disciples was bound to need some disciples or elders to keep order and make sure everything went well, it had to be remembered that most of the new disciples were still between 12 to 15 years old.


    Because of their young age, the people who discovered that a lecture was going to be held were mostly the older disciple... After all, the younger ones had mostly settled in for the night at this point in time!


    Only a few of them were still up at this point in time. Most moving around the sect together with their seniors. Even then, the number of young disciples who learned about the lecture that was going to take ce could be counted on a single hand...


    In a sense, Xuan Hao had not given these young disciples any time to prepare for his lecture, as most of them would end up finding out about it only a few hours before the actual lecture would take ce.


    Normally, this would not be an issue... But most of the new disciples were still below the Foundation Establishment Realm and would not be able to move around the Flying Sword Sect fast.


    No matter how small the Flying sword Sect seemed to someone like Xuan Hao or the other elders who could easily cross from one side to the other in a short span of time. The actual size of the Flying Sword Sect was extremelyrge in the eyes of these young disciples still in the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Going from one side of the sect to the other would easily take over half a day with their Qi Condensation Realm cultivation base!


    As the night slowly passed with the disciples and elders still awake the news about the lecture that was going to take ce, Xuan Hao who was deep in meditation back at his pavilion opened his eyes to wee a new day.


    ...


    "Hm... Should I take Bai Ning with me for the lecture? He is still in the Qi Condensation Realm and is also around the same age as the new disciples that I''m nning to hold a lecture for... Yes, let''s do that!"


    Standing up after meditating throughout the night, Xuan Hao looked towards the ce where Bai Ning was staying.


    At this point in time, he was meditating diligently. Having done so through the entire night, something quite difficult for someone in the Qi Condensation Realm that still required sleep and couldn''t yet rece it with meditation.


    Qing Yi was also meditating in her room at this point in time and had not moved around ever since she had washed up after breaking through to the Core Formation Realm.


    "Hm?"


    Looking a bit closer, Xuan Hao could not help raising one of his eyebrows in surprise.


    "Looks like she is trying to breakthrough from the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm to the Second Stage of the Core Formation Realm just after stabilizing her cultivation base... Quite dangerous, but it could save her a few months of time if she seeds!" Muttering this to himself as he instantly saw through what Qing Yi was trying to do, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head while smiling a bit.


    From the looks of it, both his disciples were trying their best to improve their strength.


    Chu Yang should not be any different, he should also be doing his best outside. Given that he has not contacted me yet. Everything should be going great for him... And here I was expecting for him to contact me after getting lost. Looks like I worried about nothing.


    Shaking his head as he thought about how he had worried about Chu Yang getting lost just after he had left the sect, Xuan Hao felt happy thinking that Chu Yang managed to find his way around on his own.


    Not knowing that his disciple had actually ended up losing hismunication talisman...


    "I should wake up Bai Ning and get going..."


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any more time, Xuan Hao went towards Bai Ning''s room to wake him up from his meditation so they could make their way towards the location where his lecture was going to take ce.

 Chapter 597: Xuan Haos Test for the Younger Disciples~

    Chapter 597: Xuan Hao''s Test for the Younger Disciples~


    "You''re going to hold a lecture for the new disciples?"


    "Yes, and I wanted you to join the lecture as well, as I''m nning to go over the Qi Condensation Realm and how to go from the Qi Condensation Realm to the Foundation Establishment Realm."


    "I want to join!"


    Having woken Bai Ning up from his meditation, Xuan Hao smiled happily upon hearing Bai Ning''s positive response.


    Even if he was not as interested in cultivation as he was in cksmithing, he still wanted to improve his cultivation realm after knowing not only the benefits it brought to his cksmithing, but also after knowing that he would be able to forge stronger weapons and artifact with a stronger cultivation realm.


    "Great! Let''s going then."


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any more time after hearing Bai Ning''s positive response, Xuan Hao directly used his domain to lift both of them off the ground before flying towards the location where he nned to hold the lecture for the new disciples of the sect.


    ¡­


    Whoosh


    Arriving at the location he had chosen for his lecture; Xuan Hao could not help frowning when he heard saw that there were so many disciples and elders present in front of the hall, he was going to hold his lecture.


    Among them, only a dozen or so were new disciples who hade to listen to his lecture. Did the rest of them just show up to see him?


    Honestly, Xuan Hao had no idea why so many elders and older disciples had shown up when he was only nning to hold a lecture for the younger disciples about the two first major cultivation realms¡­


    "Ah, its Elder Xuan and the boy next to him should be one of his disciples!"


    "Wah~ Elder Xuan looks so youngpared to the other core elders!"


    "Don''t let his appearance fool you, I''m sure he is already a few hundred years old and just chose to retain his appearance from when he was still young! Don''t forget how Core Elder Zu Fei also looks like she is in her mid-twenties but is actually several hundred years old!"


    "Indeed¡­ Almost had me fooled into believing that Elder Xuan was only in his thirties¡­"


    Listening to the conversation among the older disciples after they saw him together with their awed expressions, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head. Not knowing whether or not to chase them away and proceed with his lecture like nned with the dozen or so young disciples that showed up.


    Hm? Now that I think about it, why did only a dozen or so show up for my lecture¡­? I''m still a Domain Lord and a Core Elder, far more of these little ones should have shown up to listen to me-


    Ah¡­


    Suddenly realizing something as he looked over the dozen or so younger disciples that had shown up so far, Xuan Hao noticed that all of them were extremely exhausted and could barely breath, it was easy to see just how exhausted they were.


    Whoosh~


    Spreading out his divine sense across the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan hao could not help smiling wryly the next second, as he saw close to a hundred young disciples all across the Flying Sword Sect, dragging their exhausted bodies towards his current location.


    "No, I can''t give up like this! Just a little more!"


    "Elder Xuan¡­ Is this the reason why there was nopetition for joining the lecture? This is the test we have to go through¡­?"


    Listening the young disciples doing their best to drag their exhausted bodies towards the hall where he was going to hold the lecture, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say.


    From the looks of it, the younger disciples viewed reaching the hall in time, as a challenge he had set up for them. Only the strongest among them would be able to reach the hall in time for his lecture, while most of them would not be able to reach the hall in time with their Qi Condensation Realm cultivation base!


    "¡­"


    What on earth should I do in such a situation¡­?


    Not knowing what to do as he watched the young disciples who just entered the Flying Sword Sect a few months earlier do their best to reach him for a chance to join the lecture, Xuan Hao felt that just bringing them all here would not be good.


    Especially considering how they all viewed reaching the hall and getting the privilege to join the lecture as a reward forpleting a hard task given to them by him.


    "I will begin the lecture in one hour, the disciples who are going to join the lecture can enter the hall for now and get something to drink while waiting for the lecture to start!"


    Coming to a decision on what to do, Xuan Hao decided not to ruin the ''test'' for the young disciples who had alreadypleted it and those still trying their best. Instead deciding to give the ones who had still not reached the hall one hour to reach the hall.


    Given the location of most of the younger disciples making their way towards the hall to join the lecture, Xuan Hao expected for there to at least be fifty at the end of the hour.


    Far more than the number of disciples that core elders normally held a lecture for, while at the same time not being so many that the ones who reached the hall in time felt like they had worked hard for nothing.


    "Looks like reaching the hall was indeed a task set by Elder Xuan!"


    "Haha, to think he came up with such a genius way to test our endurance and willpower! If joining the lecture was decided through a fightingpetition like normal, I would have no way of joining¡­"


    "Heh, these young ones are truly lucky¡­"


    Whoosh~


    Entering the hall while both the disciples and elders outside were busy talking with each other about what he had just said, Xuan Hao found a ce to sit down and meditate inside the hall while waiting for the one hour to pass, Bai Ning was the same, as he obediently followed behind and found a ce to meditate next to him and wait for the lecture to begin.


    ¡­


    "Elder Xuan is holding a lecture for the younger disciples!? Howe I didn''t hear about this before now?" At the same time Xuan Hao was waiting for the one hour to pass, Feng Chen sitting inside Zu Fei pavilion sprang up from his chair as he asked the elder in front of him.


    "Sect master, ording to what I know, Elder Xuan announced that he was going to hold a lecture for the younger disciplestest night through the information boards when most of them were still sleeping. From what I have seen so far, it seems that it was nned that way, so the disciples would not have a lot of time to get to the location of the lecture after finding out about it."


    "Hm, I see¡­A test of endurance for the younger disciples, the reward is joining the lecture. Different from normal, but still a decent test for these young ones. Especially fitting given their current cultivation realms!" Smiling to himself as he heard about the test that the younger disciples had to go through, Feng Chen could not help feeling happy that Xuan Hao was teaching the disciple.


    After all, with his strength, a lecture by him was bound to cause a few disciples listening to experience a breakthrough!


    Even more, it would allow the disciples to have something more to look forward to when another lecture was held in the future. Not to mention, news about a Domain Lord Realm expert personally teaching the new disciples of the Flying Sword Sect would surely help when it came to helping draw in more talented disciples in the future!


    Maybe, they would even be able to start seeing disciples who came from more affluent backgrounds outside the territory of the Flying Sword Sect!


    "Hehe~"


    Just thinking about how the name of the Flying Sword Sect spreading attracting the younger generation of those strong ns with Nascent Soul Realm Experts backing them made him excited.


    Especially considering that most of those ns felt that they were far too strong to send their people into a ce like the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Remembering something from the past during an encounter with the head of one of these ns, Feng Chen could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    "Sect master, I will take my leave¡­" Noticing something from the entrance behind him, the elder who had just informed him about Xuan Hao''s lecture took his leave.


    "Sure-"


    Allowing him to leave, Feng Chen suddenly froze when he saw the person who had appeared at the entrance to the room.


    "Z-Zu Fei, Shu Yao!?"


    Well not person, but two people who had appeared at the entrance to his room.


    For some reason, Feng Chen had a feeling deep inside that it might be rted to what had happened between him and Zu Fei yesterday¡­

 Chapter 598: Shu Yao and Zu Fei... Working Together?

    Chapter 598: Shu Yao and Zu Fei... Working Together?


    "W-what are you two doing here¡­?" Not knowing that he sounded extremely nervous when saying this, Feng Chen nced towards the two women who had entered his temporary workspace inside Zu Fei''s pavilion.


    For some reason, Feng Chen had a feeling something bad was going to happen to him the moment the two of them entered the room. Now seeing how both of them just smiled at each other in response to his question made him even more certain that the two of them were up to no good.


    Even Zu Fei''s usualbative nature when in the presence of Shu Yao was nowhere to be seen at the moment¡­


    "I came here to inform you about something regarding the new sect location and happened to meet Zu Fei here along the way¡­ After some discussion, we decided on going about a few things a little differently~"


    "R-really¡­?"


    Hearing what Shu Yao said, Feng Chen could not help shivering a bit as he nced towards Zu Fei. Wondering just what the two of them had descused regarding the new sect location.


    I was originally going to oversee the ce together with a group of elders from both my sect and the Spring Flower Sect¡­ What did those two change¡­?


    "Yes! Instead of you going there to oversee the ce when the new main sect is being constructed together with a few elders from our sect and the Spring Flower Sect, we instead came to the decision that it would be better for both of us to be there to help you oversee the construction of the new main sect instead of it being a group of elders from both sects~"


    Smiling happily towards Feng Chen after saying this, Zu Fei moved forward before leaning closer to Feng Chen.


    "Aren''t you happy sect master~? Instead of dealing with a group of elders that might ck off, you will now be able to feel assured with both of us there to help you~"


    Rest assured my- How on earth am I supposed to get anything done with you two around!?


    "Haha¡­ Indeed, now we just have to wait for Elder Xuan to set up the formation before we can begin." Not daring to say any of the words on his mind out loud, Feng Chen justughed in response to Zu Fei''s words.


    He had no idea what had happened between Zu Fei and Shu Yao in such a short span of time. However, he was certain that whatever those two were nning, it would not be anything good for him¡­


    "Great! We will take our leave and inform Elder Xuan that he has to hurry up and get the formation set up so we can begin~" Nodding her head with a simr smile as Zu Fei on her face, Shu Yao turned around and left the room, Zu Fei following closely behind her as both of them soon left the room.


    Creak~!


    "Those two! They are surely up to no good, Zu Fei is still weaker than me, but Shu Yao¡­ I have to break through to the Domain Lord Realm as quickly as possible!" Muttering this to himself as he watched the door to his room close, Feng Chen felt like he had a new reason to reach the Domain Lord Realm as soon as possible.


    From the looks of it, he should probably seek out Elder Xuan and see if he had any way to help him reach the Domain Lord Realm. After all, he was the one who had helped Shu Yao break through to the Domain Lord Realm in the past.


    If he could help Shu Yao reach the Domain Lord Realm, he would also have a way to help him reach the Domain Lord Realm!


    Thinking this, Feng Chen decided to seek out Xuan Hao after his lecture for the younger disciples had finished and the two who just came to seek him were nowhere nearby¡­ He had a feeling that encountering both of them together again would not be a good thing, as all his momentum and power of a sect master seemed to be rendered useless in front of both of them.


    It was normal when facing Shu Yao, as she was a Domain Lord and the sect master of the Spring Flower Sect, but Zu Fe who was weaker than him was the same as Shu Yao when both of them were together-


    No, not only that, but both of them seemed stronger when working together!


    "Hopefully, they will fall out again soon¡­" Not used to Shu Yao and Zu Fei getting along so well to the point of working together, Feng Chen unknowingly found himself praying for both of them to return to how they had been in the past, with Zu Fei trying to fight Shu Yao whenever she saw her.


    ¡­


    As Feng Chen was left deeply troubled by the sudden friendship between Shu Yao and Zu Fei, the two people in question arrived in front of the hall where Xuan Hao was meditating while waiting for the one hour to be up.


    "Hm, so this is where Elder Xuan is holding his lecture¡­? Why one earth did so many disciples and elders show up when it wasn''t even a lecture for them, do they perhaps have nothing to do? I will make sure to inform Elder Song about this when-"


    "Ah! I have to return, my disciples are waiting for me to teach them a new technique!"


    "Haha, me as well, my disciples are all waiting for me."


    "I still have a lecture to hold in a few minutes, I should get going as well."


    "Hehe, the elders sure are diligent, we disciples still have all sorts of missions to clear."


    "Don''t forget we also have quite a few lectures scheduled for today!"


    ""Yeah!""


    Having heard what Zu Fei said when she arrived together with Shu Yao at the hall, the elders and most of the older disciples present in front of the hall escaped in all directions, while loudly proiming all sorts of random excuses.


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Soon enough, everyone who had been standing outside the hall hoping to somehow enter and listen to the lecture ran away. Leaving behind only a few exhausted younger disciples who slowly made their way inside the hall before finding some fresh water to drink and a ce to sit down while waiting for the time limit of one hour to be up and the lecture to begin.


    Seeing that the older disciples and the elders had already dispersed, Zu Fei made her way towards the hall together with Shu Yao, who had been rather amused after seeing how quickly the group of people gathered in front of the hall dispersed.


    The Spring Flower Sect was differentpared to the Flying Sword Sect in this regard, as the disciples and elders of her sect would have never used such obviously bad excuses before running away with their tail between their legs¡­ The excuse that the disciples and elders from her sect would have used in such a situation would have been way better than the ones from the Flying Sword Sect!


    Not saying any of her thoughts aloud, both Shu Yao and Zu Fei entered the hall where close to thirty disciples had already gathered waiting for the time limit of one hour to pass.


    Most of them turned their head to looks towards the two neers, but quickly turned away again after recognizing Zu Fei, a fearful expression clearly visible on their small faces!


    "¡­"


    Even if she tried to ignore it, Zu Fei could not help frowning when she saw this.


    It looks like someone have been spreading rumours about me to the new disciples-


    "Zu Fei? Shu Yao? What are both of you doing here? Do you perhaps have something to say to me?"


    Before Zu Fei could finish her train of thought, she was interrupted by Xuan Hao calling out to them with a curious expression on his face.


    "Yes, we have something to talk to you about¡­ I''m not sure if now would be a good time¡­" Answering Xuan Hao with a wry smile on her face as she nced around at the young disciples that had gathered to listen to the lecture of Xuan Hao, Shu Yao asked Xuan Hao.


    "Its fine, there is still half an hour left before I n to start the lecture, as long as it doesn''t take too long there is more than enough time." Signalling for both of them toe to him while saying this, Xuan Hao took out two cushions for them to sit on.


    "Then I will have to thank you in advance¡­"


    Whoosh~


    As both of them moved forward and sat down on the cushions Xuan Hao had taken out, Shu Yao used her domain to seal the area around them to make sure the young disciples sitting not too far away happened to hear them.


    "Hm? So secretive~ I wonder what it is that you want to discuss with me?" Feeling surprised that Shu Yao even went as far as to seal the area around them to make sure no one outside the three of them could hear their conversation, Xuan Hao felt even more interested in why the two who seemed to be fighting every time he saw them together hade to see him.


    Looking at each other for a short moment as nervousness appeared on both their faces before both of them locked eyes and nodded at each other in silence.


    Soon enough, Shu Yao narrowed her eyes before she began talking.


    "Actually¡­"

 Chapter 599: Start of the Lecture~

    Chapter 599: Start of the Lecture~


    "Actually, we wanted to talk to you about something regarding the construction of the new sect¡­"


    "Something regarding the construction of the new sect? Did something perhaps happen to the elders that were going to oversee the construction? Maybe there was a problem with the resources needed for the construction?" Hearing what Shu Yao said, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he thought something serious might have happened for both Zu Fei and Shu Yao toe to him for this.


    After all, Zu Fei and Shu Yao were not really getting along with each other in normal circumstances¡­ Yet, they hade to him about something regarding the construction of the new sect¡­ It could easily be imagined how serious things would be for both of them toe to him like that together!


    ""¡­"" Seeing Xuan Hao serious expression as he waited for one of them to respond, Shu Yao and Zu Fei could not help smiling a bit wryly.


    From Xuan Hao''s expression, they could clearly tell that he thought something had gone wrong and that was the reason why both of them hade to talk to him. After all, most normal problems could be solved by them.


    If something could not be solved by them...


    "Elder Xuan, it''s not as serious as you think! We just wanted to know when you n to set up the formation so we can begin building on the Shattered Star Peak and at the same time!"


    "I see¡­ I think I will start setting up the formation after this lecture finishes, as I have already gathered the required materials for its construction." Nodding his head with a suspicious expression on his face, Xuan Hao answered Zu Fei who had asked him after a short silence from her and Shu Yao.


    "That''s great! Then we will get going, we still have to make sure everything is ready for when the construction of the new main sect officially begins!"


    "Yes, we have to inform those elders to hurry up with the gathering the remaining resources needed!"


    Whoosh~


    Before Xuan Hao had a time to say anything, both Shu Yao and Zu Fei had disappeared from the hall, as he could see both of them rushing out of the sect and towards the Shattered Star Peaks through his divine sense.


    Not only that, but Shu Yap had also grabbed a few confused elders rxing in a small tea shop with her domain, as she carried all them through the air in the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    The confused elders in question, did not seem to have expected this to happen, as all of them showed a scared and confused expression on their face upon suddenly finding themselves several hundred meters in the air.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to see upon witnessing this, Xuan Hao decided to look the other way and not get involved in whatever Shu Yao and Zu Fei were nning. For now, his only worry was the lecture that he was going to hold in a few minutes.


    ¡­


    As thest few minutes of the time limit, he had set for the young disciples passed, Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes and looked down at the close to fifty young boys and girls patiently sitting in front of him. Patiently waiting for the lecture to begin.


    "Hm?"


    Looking around the hall, it did not take long for him to see those who had just arrived still breathing in and out with exhausted expressions on their faces. From a nce, it was obvious that they had not had enough time to recover from the exhausting journey to the hall.


    Fwoosh~


    Feeling that it would not be a good idea to begin the lecture with close to half of them in such an exhausted state, Xuan Hao directly used his domain to attract the qi between heaven and earth and helped guide it into the bodies of all the young disciples-


    "Wha-!? How did my qi recover so fast!?"


    "Me too, I suddenly feel like I''m full of energy again!"


    Thetest_epi_sodes are on_the ?????????????. website.


    Helping them recover from their exhausted state and return to their peak condition in an instant.


    It was not something difficult to do, as the young disciples were only in the Qi Condensation Realm. Helping them recover the qi they had used and have them return to their peak state was simple considering how miniscule the amount of qi was present inside their dantian at their current realm.


    "Thank you for your help, Elder Xuan!"


    """Thank you, Elder Xuan!"""


    Having realized the one behind their swift recovery, one of the disciples stood up before bowing in the direction of Xuan Hao as thanks, which was quickly followed up by the rest of the disciples doing the same.


    "Haha, it was nothing, can''t have half of you about to copse from exhaustion when I''m about to start my lecture." Signalling for the disciples to sit down after saying this, Xuan Hao suddenly felt fifty pairs of eyes locking on to him, as all of them grasped the fact that the lecture was about to begin from his words.


    The feeling of fifty young disciples staring at him at the same time with an expectant look in their eyes was new. Even if there were more than his first lecture in the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao wanted to smoothlyplete the lecture and hopefully help the young disciples increase their strength.


    Of course, this included Bai Ning sitting beside him listening to his lecture fully focused on everything he said.


    "Good, first off, let''s start with the Qi Condensation realm¡­"


    Taking a few seconds to adjust to the looks he was given by the young disciples; Xuan Hao began his lecture on the Qi Condensation Realm and how they could increase their chances of sessfully entering the Foundation Establishment Realm after reaching the Peak of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Before long, Bai Ning and the rest of the disciples listening werepletely absorbed in the lecture.


    ¡­


    "We arrived toote¡­" At the same time that Xuan Hao had begun his lecture, the disciples made it to the hall toote could not help copsing on the ground from exhaustion.


    They understood very well that there was no chance for them to join the lecture now that it had already started. In the end, the disciples who arrivedte could only me themselves for being toozy during the first few months of entering the Flying Sword Sect and not cultivating enough¡­ Something rather normal among most of the ordinary disciples who entered the Flying Sword Sect, as they got used the Flying Sword Sect and spent most of their time exploring what would be their new home for years toe.


    Well¡­ Not really years toe, as the Flying Sword Sect would be moving to the Shattered Star Peak where they would merge together with Spring Flower Sect.


    In the future, the current Flying Sword Sect would most likely end up as a major branch of the sect. After all, there was no way Feng Chen, Elder Song and the rest of the elders would just give up the foundation that had been built up over hundreds of years. The Spring Flower Sect would be the same, as Shu Yao and her elders would also like to keep their main sect active as a branch after moving to the new main sect.


    "There is nothing we can do about it¡­ Hah¡­ Let''s just get some water and wait for the lecture to finish. Maybe we can some guidance from Elder Xuan if we are lucky¡­" Shaking his head with a helpless expression on his face, another young disciple plopped himself down on a wooden chair located next to the entrance of the hall that the lecture was taking ce.


    ""¡­""


    The rest of the disciples who had slowly begun arriving in more and more numbers in front of the hall with exhausted expressions on their faces felt that it made sense.


    After all, they could not just return. At least they had to wait for the lecture to end and hope that Elder Xuan would at least give them some guidance to them.


    It would not be too weird if he did, as most higher-level elders who held lectures would make sure that none of the disciples who participated in the tournament or test, they arranged left empty handed.


    Mainly because it would leave a bad impression on the elder in question if he ended up not giving something to the disciples who had tried their best.


    In a sense, it was a participation award¡­ Nothing too amazing, but still something that would make it worth it for the disciples who did their best during the test or tournament arranged by the elder.


    Elder Song was especially known for this, as the participation rewards for his tournaments and other events, were by far the best¡­ One of the things that helped him reach his current level of fame in the sect.

 Chapter 600: End of Lecture, Reward

    Chapter 600: End of Lecture, Reward


    "¡­ And that''s it for today''s lecture!" Finishing his lecture, Xuan Hao nced towards the young disciples in front of him sitting motionless as they tried utilizing what they had just learned to improve their cultivation realm.


    Even Bai Ning sitting beside him did not seem to register that the lecture had already finished, as he was fully absorbed on meditating like the rest of the young disciples who had participated in the lecture. Not only that, but Xuan Hao could clearly feel that Bai Ning was about to reach the Peak of the Ninth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, with some help, he might even be able to directly break through to the Foundation Establishment Realm over the next few hours!


    Boom!


    Just at this moment, one of the disciples fully focused on cultivating broke through a minor realm in the Qi Condensation Realm. Going from the Seventh Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm to the Eight Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Boom!


    Boom!


    Boom!


    This was quickly followed by several other disciples breaking through shortly after. However, they still didn''t get up yet, as they instead focused on stabilizing their cultivation realm.


    From the looks of it, it should at the very least take a few hours before all of them had finished and were ready to leave¡­


    [Sect Quest: Hold a cultivation lecture for the disciples of the Flying Sword Sect. plete)]


    [Choose one of the following rewards uponpletion: Spirit Stones, Specialized Cultivation Mantras, Qi Techniques, Spiritual Herbs, Spiritual Metals.]


    [Repeatable: Once every 3 months]


    [Time left until avable: 3 months]


    Deciding to pull up the sect quest that he had justpleted with the conclusion of the lecture, Xuan Hao thought about which of the rewards he should choose.


    The spirit stones were out of the option, as he was not really in need of any spirit stones at the moment, and he had no idea what grade or how many spirit stones would be given to him forpleting the sect quest.


    The same could be said about the spiritual herbs and spiritual metals, as neither were anything that would be that useful for him in his current situation. The only reason he might choose the spiritual herb option would be to try and get a spiritual herb that could help Elder Song recover the damage inflicted to his soul, or maybe one that would help him when it came to repairing Zhu Lian''s damaged body.


    Outside of that, the best thing to choose would be the qi techniques and specialized cultivation mantras!


    Even if both of them were useless to him and his disciples, he could always give them to the sect and help increase the number of qi techniques and cultivation mantras avable to the younger generation.


    However then again, if he missed a chance to get a spiritual herb that could help Zhu Lian or Elder Song, he would surelye to regret it in the future¡­


    [Spiritual Herbs have been chosen as the reward! Are you sure?]


    [Y/N]


    Yes!


    Choosing to go with spiritual herbs in the end even though they might not be the best option, Xuan Hao nervously watched the system screen changing before disying a list of spiritual herbs that had automatically been transferred to his spatial ring.


    "Woodfire Tree Leaves, Ring Flower Roots, Earth Dragon Fruit¡­" Muttering the names of the different spiritual herbs that he had been rewarded out loud, Xuan Hao could not help frowning the further down the list he went.


    The spiritual herbs he had been rewarded, while still rare, they were nothing too special. After having gone through over half on the list. None of them had reached above the Soul Grade¡­


    "Spirit Blood Leaf!"


    About to give up hope of there being anything useful among the spiritual herbs from the system, Xuan Hao could not help eximing excitedly upon reading thest of the spiritual herbs on the list.


    While it was still not a Mystic Grade and only at the Soul Grade, the Spirit Blood Leaf was a magical spiritual herb when it came to helping someone in the Nascent Soul Realm rebuild their body after it had been destroyed. Perfect for helping Zhu Lian recover from her current situation!


    Not to mention, given that her body had not beenpletely destroyed, she might even be able to use the remaining power of the Spirit blood Leaf to break through to the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Even if he did not get anything that would be able to help out Elder Song, Xuan Hao was more than happy with the reward from the system.


    Zhu Lian''s situation was also a bit more urgentpared to Elder Song, as he should not have any obvious problems while cultivating after recovering from the injuries he had just received and would only really start seeing problems when he began the initial steps of constructing his own domain.


    Given that he could do the lecture sect quest once every three months, he should be able to get something that would be able to help Elder Song at some point. Hopefully before he reached theter stages of the Nascent Soul Realm and tried to construct his own pseudo domain¡­


    In the worst-case scenario, he would just have to go out and search for something that would be able to treat Elder Song''s condition! Maybe asking a well-connected Domain Lord like Yi Min for help was also an option-


    "No, I should not bother her any more for now¡­"


    Shaking his head as he thought about Yi Min, Xuan Hao smiled awkwardly as he returned his attention to the disciples sitting in front of him cultivating or stabilizing their cultivation base after just having broken through.


    "Hm?"


    Turning his attention away from the young disciples meditating silently in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help raising his eyebrow as he noticed close to a hundred disciples standing just outside the hall.


    Whoosh~


    Using his divine, Xuan Hao quickly realized that the close to hundred young disciples standing outside the hall were the disciples who had not arrived within the hour time limit he had given.


    Instead of leaving, they had instead decided to patiently wait in front of the hall for the lecture to finish¡­


    "I see, they hope I will give them some guidance on the way out? Well, I don''t really have much to do for the next hour or so¡­"


    Understanding the intentions of these young disciples, Xuan Hao decided to teach them for a bit until those inside the hall started waking up.


    Even if he had far less time, Xuan Hao was more than happy to teach these young disciples instead of mindlessly waiting inside the hall.


    "Hm, I should have more than enough time to go over the Qi Condensation Realm in an hour. Even if not as detailed, it should still be beneficial for these young ones¡­"


    Swish~


    Muttering these words to himself, Xuan Hao disappeared from the hall and appeared outside in an instant without anyone inside the hall discovering that he had left.


    ¡­


    Outside the hall, the disciples who were waiting for the lecture to conclude did not take long to discover Xuan Hao who had suddenly appeared in front of the entrance out of thin air.


    "E-Elder Xuan!?"


    "Elder Xuan is here!"


    "It''s really Elder Xuan!"


    Feeling the nervousness and excitement of these young disciples the moment, they saw him, Xuan Hao smiled happily as he felt the gazes of over a hundred young disciples between the ages 12 to 17 focus on to him.


    Even if there were a few unfriendly gazes among these young disciples, Xuan Hao ignored them. Understanding that it came from some of those unhappy with the test he had given them to join the lecture in the hall.


    "Hello everyone, you should already know who I am, and I won''t bother to go through a long drawn out introduction. Today, I happen to have some time left after today''s lecture and seeing as those inside the hall are busy absorbing what they managed to learn from my lecture, I decided to hold a short one-hour lecture on the QI Condensation Realm for all of you!"


    As he finished saying this, Xuan Hao saw therge group of young disciples quiet down as they all showed a surprised expression on their small faces.


    It was a given, as none of them had expected Xuan Hao to do something like this and had instead expected to be given a few spirit stones or something along that line. Maybe a few words of guidance if they were lucky.


    For them to get a one-hour lecture on the Qi Condensation Realm from a Domain Lord Realm Expert¡­ Even those unhappy with the test could not help feeling excited as they looked towards Xuan Hao filled with anticipation. None of them questioning why Xuan Hao was the only one who had left the hall after his lecture had ended, being too focused on Xuan Hao.


    "Haha, it''s great to see all of you so excited to listen! Well then, let''s begin~"


    Seeing therge flock of disciples waiting for him to start, Xuan Hao didn''t drag on any longer, as he began the short lecture of the Qi Condensation Realm for the younger disciples who had failed his test and arrived at the hallte.

 Chapter 601: Two Breakthoughs in a day!?

    Chapter 601: Two Breakthoughs in a day!?


    Finishing the short lecture on the Qi Condensation Realm for the disciples outside the hall, Xuan Hao returned back to the hall where most of the disciples meditating had already sessfully broken through and absorbed what they had learnt during his lecture.


    Bai Ning was no different, as he had managed to sessfully break through from the Ninth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm to the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    "Argh! What is this smell!? It''s killing me!"


    "This is... I can''t breathe!"


    "Why... I just managed to reach the Peak of the Qi Condensation Realm, is this how it ends...?"


    Listening to the young disciples squirming on the ground as a horrible smell covered the entire hall, Xuan Hao could not help rolling his eyes at the extreme responses of some of these younger disciples.


    The smell of the impurities was indeed bad, but it was far from enough to be able to kill someone!


    "Everyone, the lecture is over, you can leave the hall... I will have to clean up my disciple here-"


    "Yes!"


    "Freedom, fresh air! Here Ie!"


    "See you allter!"


    Watching as the young disciples interrupted him before he even managed to finish talking, Xuan Hao could not help frowning slightly as he watched all of them rush towards the entrance with happiness.


    "..."


    Looking over at Bai Ning who was covered in impurities from head to toe, Xuan Hao didn''t say anything as he just waved his hand and used his domain to pick him up before turning to leave the hall. Not forgetting to use his power to remove the impurities left on the ground where Bai Ning had broken through to the Foundation Establishment Realm. However, he could not get rid of the smell so easily...


    Given that the smell of the impurities had managed to stay on the ground for close to an hour, Xuan Hao guessed that it would be rather hard to get rid of the horrible smell of impurities that now permeated through the entire hall.


    Even if someone could get rid of it through cleaning, Xuan Hao did not bother about this, as it was a difficult thing to do and simply not worth it given that it was just a hall that stood empty without any use.


    The location he had chosen to hold the lecture was an abandoned hall located close to the edge of the Flying Sword Sect. The smell would not be a problem, as it should naturally go away after a few months at most.


    ...


    "Master... I will be going to the bath..." During the entire way back and since he had broken through to the Foundation establishment Realm, Bai Ning had not said a single word from beginning to end, it was only when they arrived back at the pavilion that he finally opened his mouth and said this before quickly disappearing in the direction of the baths.


    Looking at him slowly disappearing in the distance, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling silently to himself as he easily saw through the fact that Bai Ning had been rather embarrassed after having been faced with the other younger disciples half dead expressions after he had expelled arge quantity of impurities upon breaking through to the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    "Hm? Looks like Qing Yi also managed to break through..." Watching as Bai Ning disappearedpletely from his view, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face as he felt Qing Yi break through to the Second Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    In the span of a single day, two of his disciples had actually managed to sessfully break through! This was definitely something to be happy about!


    Whoosh~


    With a slight movement, Xuan Hao disappeared from his original spot in front of the pavilion and directly appeared in the room Qing Yi was staying in.


    "Congrattions on breaking through."


    "M-master?! Are you perhaps here because of my breakthrough?" Turning around in surprise upon suddenly hearing her master''s voice behind her, Qing Yi quickly calmed down as she asked with a curious look in her eyes.


    "Indeed, I was starting to get worried seeing how you haven''te out for so long and was rather relieved seeing your sessfully breaking through... Or are you perhaps going to stay in here until you reach the Nascent Soul Realm?"


    "No way!" Shaking her head in full denial upon hearing her master''s question, Qing Yi quickly got up from the cushion she was sitting on.


    "It''s already my limit to stay locked up for this long... I don''t n to enter secluded cultivation any time soon, it really made me wonder how some of the elders can enter secluded cultivation for years without any breaks..." Saying this, Qing Yi could not help shivering upon remembering the fact that some of the elders entered secluded cultivation that couldst dozens of years on end without any breaks.


    "Indeed. Entering secluded cultivation for such a long time, I have no idea how those elders do it..." Hearing what Qing Yi said, Xuan Hao could not help agreeing with what she said.


    At the moment, he could not imagine himself entering secluded cultivation for dozens of years on end without any interruptions.


    If he really did something like that, who was going to look after his disciples? Who was going to look after the sect in case someone powerful showed up? What about the repeatable sect quest from the system? Who was going toplete it if not him?


    The current him was still far away from ever entering such a long, secluded cultivation session. The only reason someone would ever willingly do something like that, was to ovee a bottleneck that had kept them at the same realm for a long time.


    The reason why most of the people who entered such long and isted cultivation sessions were of the older generation, was because those from the younger generation were more likely to go out on an adventure seeking an opportunity to break through, while the older generation preferred not to do such things.


    Mainly because their cultivation realm was higher and there was less of a chance for them to encounter an opportunity that would help them break through.


    Given that he had the system, Xuan Hao didn''t see himself doing that kind of thing. Training his disciples and helping them improve was a way better way to increase his strengthpared to that!


    "Master, I will take my leave... I really need a bath..."


    "Haha, no problem, get going then."


    Watching as Qing Yi escaped from the room before rushing towards the closest bath, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head.


    Qing Yi was only in the Core Formation Realm and could not easily clean herself up during such a long cultivation session.


    Although simple qi techniques worked for the first week or so, they started losing their efficiency the longer one went without taking a bath. Honestly, Xuan Hao could not help imagining just how dirty the Core Formation Realm Elders who entered secluded cultivation for over a year would be...


    It was only when reaching the Nascent Soul Realm would one truly be able to live a clean life without having to take a bath, Core Formation Realm Experts would still have to clean themselves the same way mortals did. Although far less, it was still required!


    "Well... There are still people like Elder Dust Ball who doesn''t clean himself no matter what..." Remembering a certain elder from the sect, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly.


    Even if most elders at the Core Formation Realm chose to keep themselves clean, there were some who didn''t. The most famous of which was an elder at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm called Elder Dust Ball, who never cleaned himself.


    Given that he had reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, he did not get sick like normal mortals would. Instead, he carried a poisonous air around him that could easily kill ordinary mortals and some weaker cultivators in the Qi Condensation Realm.


    One of the many reasons why he was prohibited from interacting with any disciples below the Foundation Establishment Realm...


    From what Xuan Hao could remember about this entric elder, other than the fact that he was by far the dirtiest person inside the Flying Sword Sect, he was also the most hardworking elder. Completing the work of 10 elders in half the time!


    This was the main reason why Elder Song had decided to look the other way in regard to this entric elder''s behaviour, as he had never really harmed anyone.


    "Would be an interesting person to talk to in the future..." Feeling like it would be fun to find this elder for a conversation in the future, Xuan Hao soon shook his head before leaving his pavilion.


    Whoosh~


    Making his way towards Zhu Lian with the Spirit Blood Leaf he had gotten from the system in hand.

 Chapter 602: Helping Zhu Lian Recover

    Chapter 602: Helping Zhu Lian Recover


    Arriving above the courtyard that Zhu Lian was currently staying in after she had arrived at the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised upon detecting the presence of several unfamiliar elders inside the courtyard.


    Whoosh~


    "I see... So, it''s a group of alchemists from the Spring Flower Sect who are trying to treat her." After a quick scan with his divine sense, Xuan Hao quickly found out who the group of elders present in the courtyard below was.


    "We will see you at ater time Elder Zhu! Although your body''s condition is terrible you should be able to recover given enough time, you are after all a Nascent Soul Realm Expert!"


    "Hehe, indeed, but I fear that might take a few dozen years to aplish..."


    "No need to be so negative about it! With your current lifespan, a few dozen years should not be anything to you!"


    "That is true, I will see you all again next week."


    "Bye~"


    Watching as the group of elders from the Spring Flower Sect left the courtyard, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about how Zhu Lian had managed to befriend this group of elders after having made it to the Flying Sword Sect.


    From the looks of it, it seemed like she was more friendly with the alchemy elders from the Spring Flower Sectpared to the elders from the Flying Sword Sect. Not something bad, as the two sects would be merging together... And who knew, maybe she had also managed to make friends with the alchemy elders of the Flying Sword Sect?


    Given the state of her body, they should at least have visited her when Zu Fei had brought her back and seen if there was anything they could do to help speed up the recovery of her broken body.


    "Hm... They also have their tournament for new members of the Alchemy Hall to take care of. Maybe they got the elders of the Spring Flower Sect to take up the task instead of them?" Muttering this to himself as he thought of another possibility, Xuan Haonded in front of the courtyard before making his way towards Zhu Lian still standing at the entrance to the courtyard.


    "Elder Xuan!?" To say she was surprised to see him suddenly descend in front of her would be an understatement, as Zhu Lian almost jumped into the air from the shock of suddenly seeing Xuan Hao appearing in front of her.


    If not for the fact that her body was still gravely injurie to the point that it was difficult for her to move like she wanted to, Xuan Hao was almost certain that she would have jumped a few meters into the air out of surprise.


    Although it would have been a rather entertaining thing to see, it was probably for the best that it didn''t happen... Mainly because he would have no idea what to do if she idently ended up injuring herself in the process...


    "Indeed, I''m here to help you out with your current condition like I told you back then... I got a bit dyed due to my disciples and a lecture popping up, I hope you don''t mind." Nodding his head to her question, Xuan Hao came up with a quick excuse as to why he didn''te to help her out the moment he returned to the sect like he had promised her. Not wanting to say that he actually didn''t really have anything that could help her recover fully at that point in time and just said it so she would make it to the sect without worrying along the way.


    It was not wrong either, as he had indeed been busy with his disciples and the lecture after returning to the sect.


    To be honest, if not for the reward from the system that could help out Zhu Lian, he might have forgotten about helping her and made his way to the Shattered Star Peaks to set up the Qi Gathering Formation...


    "Really!? You have a way to help me recover!?"


    "Of course! Let''s go into your courtyard for now." Feeling his lips twitch slightly upon hearing the doubtful tone of her voice, Xuan Hao instantaneously responded to her question before entering her courtyard.


    "Ah... Wait up!" Taking a second to process what had just happened, Zhu Lian showed an understanding expression for an instant before following behind him, as both of them entered the courtyard.


    ...


    "So... How are you going to help me recover? Given my body''s current state, it shouldn''t be something easy to do..." Finding a ce to sit down and rx her exhausted body after entering the courtyard, Zhu Lian asked this with a curious glint in her eyes.


    From what she had talked about with the group of alchemist elders from the Spring Flower Sect, she very well understood how bad the current condition of her body was and how hard it would be for her to fully recover within a short period of time.


    However, in the end she did not truly doubt Xuan Hao. After all, with his current position, there was no reason for him to lie to her about something like that.


    Given that he had said he could help her, he would have a way! Zhu Lian was just curious about how he was going to do it...


    "I n to have you eat this!"


    Swish~


    Taking out the Spirit Blood Leaf that could be used to recover her damaged body, Xuan Hao smiled confidently. Unaware of the scared expression that appeared on Zhu Lian''s face the moment she saw the appearance of the Spirit Blood Leaf.


    "This is... A human heart... You... Want me to eat this...?"


    "..."


    Hearing what Zhu Lian said, Xuan Hao had no idea how to respond as he turned to look down at the Spirit Blood Leaf in his hand.


    To be honest, this was the first time he saw the Spirit Blood Leaf in person... And Zhu Lian calling it a human heart was not too off the mark, as the spiritual herb in his hand truly did look like a human heart.


    Bump~ Bump~


    It was even rhythmically bumping like a normal human heart would, the only difference being that it was a spiritual herb and not a heart inside the chest of someone. How it even bumped to start with and why it did something like that was aplete mystery...


    "E-Elder Xuan... Are you sure eating something like that will help me recover...?"


    "Yes, I mean, this is not a human heart! It''s a rare spiritual herb called a Spirit Blood Leaf! Consuming it will help your body recover within a few hours at most!" Hearing the nervous voice of Zhu Lian echoing out from beside him, Xuan Hao was quickly brought out of his own thoughts as he quickly reassured Zhu Lian that the thing in his hand was not a human heart but instead a spiritual herb.


    "R-right... Not a human heart..."


    "..."


    Seeing Zhu Lian still clearly doubtful expression, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he had no idea how to convince her that it was not a human heart.


    "Hah... Open your mouth."


    "B-but- Agh!"


    Knowing that there was no chance that he would be able to convince Zhu Lian that the Spirit Blood Leaf in his hand was not a human heart, Xuan Hao directly forced her mouth open with his domain before forcefully feeding her the Spirit Blood Leaf.


    Fwoosh!


    Instantly following the Spirit Blood Leaf entering Zhu Lian''s stomach, the surrounding qi was drawn towards her, as her body began to recover at a speed visible to the naked eye. Not only that, but her cultivation realm also began increasing. Growing closer and closer to the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Knowing her current situation, Zhu Lian quickly sat down and focused on the power coursing through her body from the Spirit Blood Leaf. Not having any time toin over how Xuan Hao had force fed her what she believed to be a beating human heart, that would have to wait until after she had recovered and stabilized her current condition.


    ...


    BOOM!


    Not even one hour passed like this before Zhu Lian''s body managed to fully recover under the powerful healing powers of the Spirit Blood Leaf and at the same time allowing her to break through from the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Overtaking Elder Song who was now the only First Stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert in the Flying Sword Sect and cing her on the same level as her old friend Chi Hu, who had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm before her.


    "Hah..."


    Taking a deep breath as her cultivation base stabilized, Zhu Lian opened her eyes before staring directly towards Xuan Hao who was sitting not too far away from her. Making sure no one came to disturb her and at the same time being ready to help out in case something went wrong.


    I already told you it was not a human heart, but a rare spiritual herb...


    Rolling his eyes as he saw her staring towards him clearly demanding an exnation, Xuan Hao let out a sigh in his mind before he went on to reassure Zhu Lian that the thing, he had force fed her was not a human heart and instead a spiritual herb that just happened to look a lot like a human heart.

 Chapter 603: Explorer Union Branch? Here?

    Chapter 603: Explorer Union Branch? Here?


    "Okay¡­ I believe you¡­" After spending close to an hour talking with Zhu Lian, Xuan Hao finally managed to convince her that the thing she had eaten was not a human heart.


    If he had to convince her before she had eaten it, Xuan Hao feared that he might not have been able to leave her courtyard for the next few days¡­


    "Hm? It seems like some of your friends are about to show up, I will get going now that the problem with your body has been solved and there are no problems after you consumed the Spirit Blood Leaf." Sensing that the alchemy elders from the Spring Flower Sect were making their way towards the courtyard, Xuan Hao thought this was a good opportunity to slip away-


    Whoosh~


    As he quickly left the courtyard after saying that. Not waiting for Zhu Lian to respond. Fearing that she would start asking any more questions and keep him around for another few hours.


    "Ah? Elder Xuan-"


    Knock Knock~


    Calling out to Xuan Hao as he ran away, Zhu Lian was interrupted by a gentle knocking sounding from the entrance to her courtyard.


    "Elder Zhu, it''s us, we forgot something back when we left earlier and just came back to- What on earth happened?! Howe your body is fine all of a sudden!?"


    As the first person among the alchemy elders from the Spring Flower Sect stepped into the courtyard, she could not help eximing in surprise upon seeing the current condition of Zhu Lian''s body.


    After all, she had just finished inspecting her and knew very clearly just how bad the condition of her body had been! If not for the fact that Zhu Lian was someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, she would most likely have ended up dying with a body like that!


    Yet¡­ At this point in time, she was standingpletely fine in front of them without the slightest sign of having been injured in the first ce¡­ Not only that, but the auraing of her body was clearly far more powerful than it had been before!


    "How did you recover so quickly?! No more than an hour passed since we left!"


    "True, did you perhaps get the help of someone? Maybe you found a divine spiritual herb?"


    Hearing the group of alchemy elders from the Spring Flower Sect stare at her with expressions full of curiosity, Zhu Lian had no idea what to say as she remembered the ''spiritual herb'' Elder Xuan had given her.


    "Haha¡­ It''s nothing, I managed to get the help from one of my sect''s seniors." Not daring to say anything about the Spirit Blood Leaf that she had been force fed, Zhu Lian decided to throw the responsibility for her recovery over to a senior having helped her out.


    "I see¡­ The seniors of the Flying Sword Sect truly are powerful¡­"


    "Indeed, for them to have a way to help Elder Zhu, they are truly skilled in the art of healing!"


    "Or maybe they just had a precious spiritual herb they got while out adventuring."


    Seeing the trio''s attention move away from her, Zhu Lian let out a sigh of relief before helping the group get the things they had forgotten earlier. Wanting them to leave as quickly as possible so she could inspect the changes that had taken ce in her body after she had consumed the Spirit Blood Leaf.


    Even if Elder Xuan had told her there was nothing wrong with her, she could not help feeling a bit worried given the exotic appearance of the ''spiritual herb'' in question.


    ¡­


    Having left Zhu Lian courtyard, Xuan Hao began making his way towards the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Now that he had collected the things needed for the Qi Gathering Formation, all there was left to do was set it up.


    At the very least, the formation was not something difficult to set up. The main difficulty that came with setting up a Qi Gathering Formation, was the materials used in setting it up!


    Although it would definitely be more effective if set up by a skilled formation master, the Flying Sword Sect did not really have any formation master at that skill level currently, so that would have to wait for the future.


    Even if it was not operating at 100 percent efficiency, it would still be strong enough to keep the chaotic qi at the Shattered Star Peaks at bay and that was the main reason why he had wanted to set up the Qi Gathering Formation.


    Whoosh~


    "This ce¡­ Has grown quite a lot¡­"


    Arriving at the base of the first mountain of the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao could not help ncing towards the town that was located just next to his current location.


    The town that acted as the entrance to the Shattered Star Peaks and at the same time the ce where a Flying Sword Sect branch was located, had grown a lot ever since it was decided that the Shattered Star Peak would be the future location of the Flying Sword Sect after it merged together with the Spring Flower Sect.


    Even from a simple nce, it was easy to see that the town was already on the way to be transformed into a massive city in no way inferior to the Flying Sword City located just outside the entrance of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Actually, the city beneath the Shattered Star Peaks would most likely end up bing evenrger than the Flying Sword City, as it would have to amodate way more people and at the same time act as the Flying Sword Sect''s new gateway between the sect and the outside world-


    "Hm? This is¡­" Frowning slightly as he was looking over this rapidly growing city, Xuan Hao focused his attention on a massive building located next to the branch of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Watching the constant stream of people moving in and out of the building, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes.


    "The Explorer Union¡­ Why did they suddenly establish a branch here?"


    Indeed, therge building just next to the branch of the Flying Sword Sect belonged to the Explorer Union!


    Not only that, but Xuan Hao could clearly feel the presence of someone in the Nascent Soul Realm inside the branch building of the Explorer Union. Even if the person in question was only around the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm, this was still more than enough to alert Xuan Hao.


    The only reason why the Explorer Union would send someone like that would be if a new ancient ruin had been found nearby.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao could not help thinking about the Half Spirit Race and the other things he had found inside the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Did the Explorer Union perhaps discover something? Or maybe they finally decided to turn their attention towards the Shattered Star Peaks that had mostly been ignored by them due to the fact that nothing of interest had been found there and how deadly it was to explore for an extended period of time¡­


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes even further as he observed where the explorers going in and out of the Explorer Union were going.


    For now, it was important to know what the Explorer Union was up to and what had caused them to establish such arge branch.


    Establishing the Qi Gathering Formation could wait for a few minutes as he found out whether or not he would have to find a way to keep the Explorer Union out from the Shattered Star Peaks. After all, he didn''t really want them to find the rocks filled with blue divine energy that he had found on the peak of the Second- and First-Star Peak!


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I was worried for nothing¡­" After following the explorers leaving the Explorer Union for a few minutes and seeing where they were going, Xuan Hao concluded that the Explorer Union had not established arger than normal branch at the bottom of the Shattered Star Peaks because of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Instead, the reason why they had established such arge branch, was because they had discovered a massive underground ancient city that had been destroyed a long time ago.


    It just so happened, that the city at the base of the Shattered Star Peaks was the closest city to this underground ancient city ruins and became the perfect location for the Explorer Union to establish arge branch.


    The underground ancient city ruins had just been discovered and there was still many ancient treasures and dangers hidden inside it from the conversations he happened to listen to from the explorers making their way towards these ancient ruins located underground.


    From them, he even managed to overhear that a demon beast in the Nascent Soul Realm had been spotted after a team of explorer had managed to make it inside the core area of the ruins!

 Chapter 604: Future Sect Location, Throwing People Out~

    Chapter 604: Future Sect Location, Throwing People Out~


    Well, as long as they are not thinking about the Shattered Star Peaks¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he turned his attention away from the explorers moving towards the location of the newly discovered ruins underground, Xuan Hao began making his way up the Ninth Star Peak.


    On his way over, Xuan Hao had already decided on which on among the Star Peaks would be the ce for him to set up the Qi Gathering Formation and allow the Flying Sword Sect to settle.


    The mountains in question, were the Seventh and the Fourth Star Peak. ording to his investigation of the Shattered Star Peaks back when he had visited all of the nine mountains of the Shattered Star Peaks, these two were the most suitable ces to build the Flying Sword Sect.


    Most of the other mountains had something that prevented them from being a good location to build. For example, the Fifth Star Peak had a giantke on top of it, while the Sixth Star Peak was covered in holes all over.


    Building a sect in such ces would be far more difficult and would also take a far longer timepared to just building on top of a mostly empty mountain like the Seventh- and Fourth-Star Peak¡­


    As for the Eighth Star Peak, while it was a decent location to build, the Half Spirit Race was already living there, and Xuan Hao really didn''t want to kick them out when he was already nning on having Elder Song help integrate them into the Flying Sword Sect in the future.


    Whoosh~


    Moving towards the Seventh Star Peak first, Xuan Hao soon found himself hovering above the barren mountain peak before using his divine sense to peer into the depths of the mountain. Wanting to see if there might be anything dangerous hidden away inside the mountain.


    "Looks like there is nothing outside a few caves at the base of the mountain¡­" Finding nothing out of the ordinary that would prevent the Flying Sword Sect from setting up their future sect location there, Xuan Hao moved on to the Fourth Star Peak and did the same thing there to make sure nothing dangerous was hidden away inside the mountain itself.


    "Nothing here either, looks like both mountains are great ces to start setting up the Flying Sword Sect on the Shattered Star Peaks."


    Luckily, both of the mountains werepletely free from anything dangerous and were just boring mountains with nothing special to them outside the chaotic qi that was ever present on the Shattered Star Peaks.


    "In the future, we will surely expand and cover the entire Shattered Star Peak¡­ But that will be somewhere off in the future for when the sect grows bit enough and I solve the things on the Main and Second Star Peak!


    For now, we will have to choose a ce to start off¡­ The Fourth Star Peak is nice a secure and makes it easy to expand towards the other Star Peaks in the future, but it''s quite far away from the entrance to the Shattered Star Peaks and I doubt the Qi Gathering Formation will be able to stretch all the way there from the Fourth Star Peak¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao nced towards the Seventh Star Peak.


    Although it was closer to the entrance of the Shattered Star Peaks, the Seventh Star Peak was not only close to the entrance located at the base of the Ninth Star Peak, but it was also close to the Eighth Star Peak where the Half Spirit Race was located.


    Given the strength of the Qi Gathering Formation was supported by a Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb, it should be able to iste three mountains from the chaotic qi of the Shattered Star Peaks¡­


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao decided to set up the Qi Gathering Formation on the Seventh Star Peak!


    But for me to set up the Qi Gathering Formation, it would be best for there to not be anyone around on the Ninth Star Pea¡­


    ncing towards the lush forest on top of the Ninth Star Peak that had a few hundred people gathering spiritual herbs, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes with a small smile. Having decided to throw these people out and make sure that no random people ran up the Ninth Star Peak in the future.


    After all, if the Flying Sword Sect was going to move to the Shattered Star Peaks, it was obvious that the random peopleing to the Shattered Star Peaks to gather spiritual herbs from the Ninth Star Peak would be thrown out!


    The ones at the Third Star Peak were a little different, as Xuan Hao had already nned to make a special path for them at the other side of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Even though this path would be far harder to travelpared to the already established one, it should still be doable for someone in the Core Formation Realm. Maybe some stronger Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators would also be able to travel it, but that was it.


    The weaker Foundation Establishment Realm and the Qi Condensation Realm cultivators would no longer have a way to enter the Shattered Star Peaks!


    As for the ones at the Third Star Peak, Xuan Hao did not really worry about them, as they had mostlye to enter a life and death meditation in an attempt to breakthrough and increase their lifespan.


    If some of them actually managed to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm, the Flying Sword Sect would be able to easily swoop in and recruit this new Nascent Soul Realm Expert!


    In the first ce, there was less of a chance for them to cause trouble, as the Third Star Peak was rather far away from the Seventh Star peak and travelling to the Seventh Star Peak from the Third Star Peak without a proper path was dangerous. Even for someone in the Core Formation Realm!


    However, there would inevitably still be someone who would try to do this¡­


    To deal with this, a simple sect protection formation simr to the one ced on the current location of the Flying Sword Sect would be essential to make sure no unfamiliar people could just randomly waltz into the sect!


    After all, the Qi Gathering Formation only gathered qi from the surroundings and prevented the chaotic qi from entering¡­ It did not have any defensive functions!


    ¡­


    "I should deal with these people first."


    Arriving a few hundred meters above the lush forest of the Ninth Star Peak, Xuan Hao nced down on the cultivators happily moving around the lush forest as they collected the different spiritual herbs that were in abundance inside the lush forest.


    Whoosh~


    "Wha-?!"


    "W-what is happening!?"


    "M-my spiritual herb! I just managed to find a Peak Mortal Grade Spiritual Herb!"


    Waving his hand, Xuan Hao directly utilized his domain to pick up all of the people inside the lush forest.


    "The Ninth Star Peak and the rest of the Shattered Star Peaks outside the Third Star Peak is closed from this day onward. Anyone who vites this and still enters the Shattered Star Peaks will be considered an enemy of the Flying Sword Sect!"


    Swish~!


    Swish~!


    Swish~!


    Ignoring the panicked voice of these cultivators, Xuan Hao sent all of them down the mountain after saying this.


    As for the path leading to the Third Star Peak, he had already asked Shu Yao to deal with it for him while making his way to the Ninth Star Peak through his divine sense, as she was already present in the city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak.


    With her strength at the Domain Lord Realm, she should be more than capable enough to make a path leading to the Third Star Peak!


    Zu Fei who was also present in the city together with Shu Yao was also pulled into it, as she was instructed to spread the news of the new entrance to the Third Star Peak and at the same time close up the path leading up from the base of the Ninth Star Peak leading into the Shattered Star Peaks.


    "With this, I should be able to start setting up the Qi Gathering Formation¡­" Muttering this to himself as he did a quick search with his divine sense for any people he might have missed still wandering around inside the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao quickly made his way to the Seventh Star Peak after making sure that there were no more people around.


    Whoosh~


    Taking out all the things he had gathered for the Qi Gathering Formation, Xuan Hao quickly got to work setting up the formation.


    Making sure to follow the method given by the system, as his current skill level when it came to formations was far too low to set up such a massive formation without any help.


    The only reason why he could set up a high-level formation like the Qi Gathering Formation, was because it was a non-offensive formation that had nobat power and mainly drew its power from the treasures that it was set up using.


    Even if he didn''t understand much when it came to formations, Xuan Hao still understood that passive formations were the easiest to set up, while offensive formations were the hardest. Protective formations falling somewhere in between.

 Chapter 605: Building the Qi Gathering Formation

    Chapter 605: Building the Qi Gathering Formation


    Taking out the treasures he had gathered for the Qi Gathering Formation, Xuan Hao could not help taking a good look at the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Flower that would be the core of the Qi Gathering Formation.


    Even with alchemy knowledge he had gained from the system, he had no idea what the name of the flower was, as the knowledge itself did not include spiritual herbs at the Transcendent Grade.


    If not for the fact that the spiritual herb could be used in the Qi Gathering Formation, Xuan Hao would honestly have no idea what to use such a high-level spiritual herb on with his current cultivation realm.


    Consuming it was out of the question, as he still had no idea whether or not the spiritual flower was poisonous. If it was truly a poisonous spiritual herb and he ended up eating it... Luckily, he had a use for it and didn''t have to find a use for the spiritual flower!


    I should get started...


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any more time on useless thoughts, Xuan Hao ced the five Mystic Grade Natural Treasures that he had managed to gather in five different locations around the Seventh Star Peak. Having them form a pentagon formation with the Seventh Star Peak at the centre.


    Whoosh~


    As the five natural treasures were ced down, a line formed between all of them as all of the Mystic Grade Natural Treasure began moving from the position Xuan Hao had ced them in.


    The Pure Heart Spiritual Water flowed freely as it formed a thin barrier around the entire Seventh Star Peak.


    Followed by the Ash Sunstone merging together with the thin barrier of water formed around the Seventh Star Peak-


    Fwoosh!


    Which instantly caused a small fire to erupt just outside the thin barrier formed by the Pure Heart Spiritual Water.


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    The Seven Petal Sky Flower, Spiritual Dark Metal Ore and the Full Moon Ganoderma soon followed as they simrly formed a unique barrier of their own.


    Nodding his head happily upon seeing this, Xuan Hao soon waved his hand, as countless spiritual herbs, metals, and other kinds of natural treasures appeared from his interspatial ring before flying all around the Seventh Star Peak under the guidance of his power.


    Onlying to a stop after having reached the destination predetermined ording to the information about the Qi Gathering Formation that he had gotten from the system.


    Boom!


    Following the thousands of lower grade spiritual herbs, metals, and other natural treasures settling into ce all around the Seventh Star Peak, the barrier around the Seventh Star Peak seemed to undergo an earth-shaking change, as it rapidly began changing at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    Slowly, the five thin barrier that had formed from the fire, wood, water, wind, and metal Mystic Grade Natural Treasures began merging together with each other.


    Whoooooosh~


    Along with the five different unique barriers merging together, the thousands of lower grade natural treasures spread around the Seventh Star Peak all linked together before arge wave of natural qi belonging to the five elements that made up the five unique barrier surged into the massive barriers surrounding the entire Seventh Star Peak.


    Instantly causing the merging process of the five unique barriers to hasten.


    BOOOOOM!


    After spending close to two hours like this, the five unique barriers surrounding the Seventh Star Peak finally merged together as they formed a new barrier that lookedpletely different from before.


    The appearance of the barrier no longer reminded one of any of the five elements, but instead looked like something simr to chaotic qi that was ever-present in the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Bang!


    Following the change to the barrier, a friction seemed to appear between it and the chaotic qi, as the newly formed barrier began pushing out the chaotic qi inside the Seventh Star Peak!


    "It really works..."


    Even if it was slow and the Qi Gathering Formation was yet to be finished, Xuan Hao could not help showing a relieved smile upon seeing the unfinished Qi Gathering Formation start removing the chaotic qi from the Seventh Star Peak.


    For thest step of constructing the Qi Gathering Formation, he would need to add in the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Flower.


    Without it. Although the current unfinished Qi Gathering Formation could keep the chaotic qi at bay, it could not refine the chaotic qi into normal pure qi that could be gathered inside the formation and with time, it would slowly copse on its own under the constant attack from the chaotic qi outside.


    Only when the Qi Gathering Formation could gather qi from the outside to keep itself functioning and concentrate the qi inside it, would it be considered to be a real Qi Gathering Formation and for that, it required a Transcendent Grade Natural Treasure to act as a core!


    "However, I should probably wait until all the chaotic qi on the Seventh Star Peak is removed before setting up the core..." Muttering this to himself as he nced at the chaotic qi still swirling around on top of the mountain, Xuan Hao decided to wait until the unfinished Qi Gathering Formation had pushed out all the chaotic qi on top of the Seventh Star Peak out before starting to set up the core of the formation.


    After all, setting up the core of the Qi Gathering Formation was the most delicate part of setting up the Qi Gathering Formation and could easily go wrong even for a skilled formation master. Let alone someone like Xuan Hao who had close to no experience with formations!


    If not for the fact that he had a guide provided to him by the system, there was no way he would ever attempt to create a Qi Gathering Formation with his current skill level!


    For this reason, Xuan Hao wanted the environment to be the best possible when he created the formation core. Not wanting any chaotic qi to interfere while he was setting it up and idently ending up ruining the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Flower in the process...


    ...


    Over the next two hours, Xuan Hao waited patiently as all the qi inside the unfinished Qi Gathering Formation covering the Seventh Star Peak was slowly pushed out. Allowing the still unfished Qi Gathering Formation topletely remove any and all chaotic qi on the Seventh Star Peak.


    "This should be good enough..." Carefully scanning the Seventh Star Peak and making sure that there was no chaotic qi left, Xuan Hao carefully took out the small flower from his interspatial ring before cing it at the centre of the pentagon formation that had formed around the Seventh Star Peak.


    BOOOOOM!


    Following the small flower being ced down, a terrible power erupted from it before washing over Xuan Hao standing just a short distance away from it.


    The power erupting from the flower was far stronger than anything Xuan Hao had ever felt before and was very clearly above the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Hmph!"


    However, Xuan Hao did not let this intimidate him, as he quickly formed hundreds of different ancient symbols with his hands within an instant before directing all of them towards the small flower located at the centre of the formation.


    Whoosh~


    As the symbols flew over, all of them quickly merged together with the small flower, as an ancient pattern formed above the small flower. Quickly suppressing the terrible power erupting from the small flower before directing it towards the barrier.


    Crack-!


    As the thin barrier was suddenly met with the power of the flower, it rapidly began cracking all over, as it seemed like it would break apart at any moment.


    Bang!


    Swish-!


    However, just as the massive formation seemed like it would break apart, the ancient symbol formed above the ancient flower split apart into hundreds of different symbols before merging together with the barrier that surrounded the Seventh Star Peak.


    "..."


    In an instant, everything became quite on the Seventh Star Peak, as Xuan Hao watched in awe how the barrier kept silently changing in front of him, as it adapted to the power of the flower.


    All of this without him even lifting a finger!


    The ancient symbols that the system had taught him to set up the Qi Gathering Formation were truly wonderful. All he had to do was form the symbols and they would do the rest of the work while he just watched the Qi Gathering Formation getting constructed in front of him...


    Soon enough, everything fell into ce, as the small flower finally calmed down before it gently floated mid-air.


    "Did it seed-"


    BOOM!


    Before Xuan Hao even had the time to say anything, the formation around him began moving on its own, as he felt the chaotic qi outside getting drawn into the formation before being slowly refined and turned into pure qi that could easily be absorbed by cultivators.


    Feeling the pure qi slowly raining down from above after having been refined from chaotic qi, Xuan Hao instantly understood what had just happened.


    The Qi Gathering Formation had sessfully been created!

 Chapter 606: Unexpected Reward, War of the Three “Factions�

    Chapter 606: Unexpected Reward, War of the Three ¡°Factions¡±


    Feeling the Qi Gathering Formation drawing in chaotic qi from outside and refining it into something that could be freely absorbed by cultivators, Xuan Hao smiled happily to himself upon seeing the Seventh Star Peak slowly transforming from a deste mountain peak with nothing other than chaotic qi on it. Into a ce that would allow one to improve twice as fast with half the effort when cultivating there.


    Not only that, but after taking control of the formation through the small flower floating at the centre of the formation, Xuan Hao clearly felt that he could expand the formation far more than the area that it currently covered.


    So of course, he did so. Instantly having the Qi Gathering Formation expand many times-


    Whoosh~


    Soon the Qi Gathering Formation had expanded many times its original size and now instead of just covering the Seventh Star Peak, it also covered the Ninth- and Eighth-Star Peak!


    This was all within Xuan Hao''s expectations, but when he turned his attention away from the formation after having expanded it to cover 3 out of the nine mountains of the Shattered Star Peaks, a wave of shock ran through him as he read through the reward from the system after having sessfully set up the Qi Gathering Formation.


    [Limited Time Sect Quest: Gather the rest of the natural treasures needed for the construction of the Qi Gathering Formation and set up the Qi Gathering Formation inside the Shattered Star Peaks within two years'' time! (Complete)]


    [Reward: Cultivation Increase of 1 Minor Realm, Upgrade for Qi Gathering Formation.]


    The increase in cultivation was something he already knew about from when he had first gotten the quest. The thing that caught him off guard was not this and was instead the second reward, an upgrade for the Qi Gathering Formation!


    This was not something Xuan hao had expected at all, as he had honestly just thought that the system would give him some kind of rare metal or spiritual herb that he had absolutely no use for at the moment¡­


    "No use thinking too much about that¡­ For now, let''s see how strong the Qi Gathering formation gets after its upgraded!"


    [Redeem reward from Limited Time Quest?]


    [Yes/No]


    Yes!


    Choosing to im the reward without the slightest bit of hesitation, Xuan Hao seemed to see some sort of ancient treasures appear in front of him before merging together with the newly formed Qi Gathering Formation.


    Boom!


    However, he had no time to pay any attention to the change taking ce to the formation, as he suddenly felt a terrifying power spread throughout his meridians before gathering towards his dantian at a terrifying speed.


    Ah¡­ I seem to also have redeemed the cultivation increase-


    BOOM!


    Not having any more time to think, Xuan Hao could only close his eyes as he put all his focus on what was taking ce inside his body, as his cultivation rapidly began rising.


    Allowing him to quickly surpass the early stage of the Seventh Stage and reach the Peak of the Seventh Stage. Following which his improvement began slowing down as his strength got closer and closer to the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Whoosh~


    However just as he was about to breakthrough from the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, the small ice flower and the small silver sword located inside his dantian seemed to react to the sudden massive and seemingly endless flow of extremely pure qi entering the dantian, as both of them floated out into his dantian before beginning to rapidly devour the pure qi from the system that was trying to help him reach the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    "¡­"


    As the small ice flower and sword began devouring the qi that was supposed to help him breakthrough to the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could only watch from the side as the endless stream of pure qi poured into the small ice flower and silver sword that had floated out from his soul and ced themselves directly between the flow of pure qi and his dantian.


    Rumble~!


    Feeling the amount of pure qi slowing down as the small ice flower and silver sword grewrger andrger, Xuan Hao was just about to say something when he suddenly felt the slowly weaking stream of pure qi flowing into his dantian from somewhere unknown burst forth with unprecedented power, as a terrifying amount of qi far more powerful than before began entering his dantian.


    Did the system get offended by those two? Why do you have to drag me into this?!


    Not knowing what to say when he saw this, Xuan Hao could only smile helplessly to himself as he felt the terrifying amount of qi carrying some simrities to the divine power he had seen before course through his body before heading towards his dantian.


    Crack!


    Having to have such powerful qi course through his body was far too much for the current Xuan Hao to withstand, as he felt his body slowly start breaking apart under the terrifying qi that flowed through his body. Trying to help him breakthrough to the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    BOOM!


    BOOM!


    Devouring this terrifying qi for close to a minute, the small ice flower and the silver sword that had floated out from his soul finally seemed satisfied, as each of them stopped blocking the terrifying qi from helping Xuan Hao breakthrough to Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    However, instead of floating back inside his soul where they had been born, each of them floated towards one of the two vortexes that had formed inside his dantian. The ice flower settling down in the dark blue vortex, while the silver sword settled down in the silver vortex.


    Whoosh~


    Having nothing blocking its path anymore, the terrifying qi that was of far higher quality than anything he had ever seen before rapidly filled up his dantian.


    BOOOOOM!


    Feeling that he would blow up if he didn''t do anything with this terrifying qi, Xuan Hao directly broke through to the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Instantly making the system stop sending any more of the terrifying qi into his dantian¡­


    Crack~


    However, this did little to help him deal with the terrifying qi that was already inside his dantian!


    Should I just try to improve my cultivation more¡­?


    Thinking this for a short moment, Xuan Hao quickly put this thought down as he remembered the fact that he would not be able to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm without first merging his ice and sword domain together¡­ Something he was still far away from doing any time soon¡­


    Breaking through the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm was possible, but he would still be left with a lot of the terrifying qi. Not to mention, if he directly broke through to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in his current state, his cultivation base would get even more unstable than it already was¡­


    Even now, he could just barely keep his cultivation base stable¡­ If he broke through to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm now¡­


    Well, losing his cultivation base would be the best option, while at worst the terrifying qi still left inside his dantian would turn him into a human water balloon before making him go pop into a gory mess¡­


    Swish!


    Just at this moment where Xuan Hao felt lost not knowing what to do, the blue feather imprint between his eyebrows lit up before a gentle blue light extend from before reaching down towards his interspatial ring.


    "Do you perhaps also want to take advantage of my situation¡­?" Not knowing whether tough or cry when he suddenly saw this gentle blue light extend towards his interspatial ring, Xuan Hao just muttered this to himself as he watched the gentle blue light from the feather imprint enter his interspatial ring without the slightest bit of resistance-


    Bang!


    Before taking the three blue phoenix feathers along with the special one he had gotten from the temple of the Half Spirit Race and absorbing all of them. Instantly causing the feather imprint located between his eyebrows to gain a lot more detail and majestypared to before.


    Whoosh~


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, the feather imprint between his eyebrows did not stop there, as the gentle blue light soon returned before spreading all over his body. Healing the damage caused by the terrifying qi currently inside his dantian, while at the same time subtly changing his body and strengthening it in the process.


    Reaching his dantian, the gentle blue light from the feather imprint did not seem the slightest bit intimidated by the terrifying qi currently wreaking havoc inside his dantian, as it rapidly began devouring it without any signs of damage before retreating back to the feather imprint.


    "¡­"


    Seeing all of this, Xuan Hao remained silent as he just observed all of this taking ce. Not knowing what in the world just happened to him, as three different factions seemed to have just fought a battle inside his body and dantian.


    First the small ice flower and silver sword fought the terrifying qi before retreating, then the terrifying qi caused havoc and the blue feather imprint decided to act and devoured it¡­

 Chapter 607: Chaotic Qi Formation

    Chapter 607: Chaotic Qi Formation


    Inspecting the situation inside his body thoroughly following all the things that had just taken ce, Xuan Hao soon confirmed that the damage that had been caused by the terrifying qi from the system had truly all been repaired by the gentle blue light from the feather imprint between his eyebrows.


    Not only that, but other than breaking through to the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could also very clearly tell that the strength of his physical body had reached a brand-new realm following the gentle blue light not only healing but also helping strengthen his body.


    If before his body could be considered to be slightly stronger than someone at the same realm as him. Now his physical body had reached the level where he could fight someone at the Domain Lord Realm with his physical body alone!


    Such an improvement was not something Xuan Hao had expected, but he more than weed it.


    However, at the same time, it also made him curious about whether or not he might be able to use the feather imprint again in the future to further strengthen his body.


    "Hm? Ah! The Qi Gathering Formation!"


    It was at this moment that Xuan Hao suddenly noticed the qi around him as he jumped up from the ground before looking around himself.


    After having redeemed the reward from the system quest. Not only had it helped improve his strength and cultivation realm, but it had also upgraded the Qi Gathering Formation!


    Although he couldn''t really pay attention to what was happening to the Qi Gathering Formation during the process of it being upgraded, he instantly noticed the stark difference in the formation from when he had closed his eyes to focus on the things taking ce inside his body.


    Not only did the core of the formation change appearance from a small flower to a small formation disc with a flower engraved into it-


    Whoosh~


    Grabbing hold of the formation disc with the flower engraved into it, that was now the core of the Qi Gathering Formation, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he felt a terrifying power hidden away inside the small formation disc.


    Not only had the core of the formation changed, but it had also grown far more powerful than before!


    At this point in time, Xuan Hao had no idea what grade the natural treasure making up the core of the Qi Gathering Formation belonged to¡­ All he understood was that it should have reached a realm beyond that of the Transcendent Grade that the spiritual flower had once belonged to before the upgrade took ce¡­


    However, this was not all that had changed after the Qi Gathering Formation had been upgraded by the system, as through the formation disc, Xuan Hao quickly managed to understand the capabilities of the current Qi Gathering Formation.


    If before it could only keep out the chaotic qi and turn refine it into usable qi. Now it could iste the area inside it from the chaotic qi outside, while at the same time integrating the chaotic qi from the outside into a defensive and offensive formation!


    Not only that, but the area covered by the Qi Gathering Formation also changed from what it had been before.


    Holding the formation disc, Xuan Hao felt that he could make the current Qi Gathering Formation stretch out and cover the entire Shattered Star Peaks!


    Even with that, there would be no stress at the formation as it could easily expand far beyond that as long as there was enough chaotic qi for it to sustain itself.


    In a sense, it would not be fitting to call it a Qi Gathering Formation any longer, as gathering qi through refining the chaotic qi from the outside was only one of its functions.


    "Hm¡­ I will call it, the Chaotic Qi Formation¡­! I reallyck creativity when ites to naming things¡­" Muttering this to himself as he renamed the Qi Gathering Formation to the Chaotic Qi Formation, Xuan Hao shook his head as he had a feeling that he needed to work on naming things in the future.


    If things really continued down this path, he feared that he would end up with an ultimate move called big sword sh of doom or something along that line in the future¡­


    No, I can always let my disciples name things for me if something reallyes up in the future!


    Deciding not to think any longer about his naming sense, Xuan Hao injected a miniscule amount of qi into the formation disc with the flower engraved into it, as he quickly refined it and gained full control over the formation.


    With just a thought, Xuan Hao felt that he could summon the formation disc that acted as the core and control panel of the formation, while at the same time, a single thought could make it disappear and fully integrate back into the Chaotic Qi Formation.


    Whoosh~


    Activating the Chaotic Qi Formation, Xuan Hao could only stare in awe as he felt it rapidly expand in all direction before covering the entire Shattered Star Peak outside the Third Star Peak that he didn''t n on doing anything with for now-


    "Hm?"


    Well¡­ Almost everything that he had nned to cover with the formation was covered, as he felt that the formation couldn''t cover the top of the Second Star Peak where arge number of rocks filled with the blue divine power were located.


    The Main Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks was the same, as the formation couldn''t cover itpletely either. The presence of the blue divine power preventing it from getting anywhere near the two mountain peaks¡­


    "Looks like I will have to figure out how to deal with the divine power in the future if I want to the Flying Sword Sect to fully upy the Shattered Star Peaks¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced towards the two mountain peaks that couldn''t be covered by the Chaotic Qi Formation, Xuan Hao decided to just seal the path to the two mountains instead.


    Making sure that no one idently happened to enter the two mountain peaks in the future, something that was possible, as the path leading up the two mountains would no longer have any chaotic qi blocking anyone in the future.


    The sealing process was not really anything special, as it was just him using the defensive part of the Chaotic Qi Formation to form a defensive barrier all around the two mountain peaks. Even if they could still be essed from above, entering this way also meant one would have to survive the chaotic qi outside the formation!


    However, as long as he warned the Shu Yao and the rest of the other elders about not trying to enter the Second and Main Star Peak, everything should be fine¡­


    Just in case, the barrier would stop any curious elders or disciples who happened to make their way up the Second and Main Star Peak.


    After all, even at this point in time, Xuan Hao still hadn''t fully explored the Main Star Peak and didn''t know if there might be anything more dangerous than the formation and winged lion demon beast he encountered.


    Exploring the Main Star Peak would definitely be something he would have to do in the future. Especially so considering the fact that he and his sect were going to move into the Shattered Star Peaks in the future.


    Having some unknown danger lurking so close was definitely not something Xuan Hao felt great about, and it would also end up worrying him every time he left the sect for something in the future¡­


    "Hm? If I can iste the Main and Second Star Peak with the Chaotic Qi Formation, can''t I do the same with the Third Star Peak¡­?" ncing towards the Third Star Peak in the distance, Xuan Hao still felt rather worried about the fact that someone might end up entering the formation from the Third Star Peak, as it had no way to prevent them from doing so.


    However, this was no longer the case after the Qi Gathering Formation had been upgraded to the Chaotic Qi Formation!


    Whoosh!


    Not waiting around, Xuan Hao used the formation disc to control the massive Chaotic Qi Formation, as it quickly began moving around the Third star peak before isting the mountain peak from the rest of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Leaving behind only a small path leading down the mountain and out of the Shattered Star Peaks through the path that had just recently been created by Shu Yao.


    If anyone tried making their way towards any of the other Star Peaks, they would quickly run into the defensive barrier formed by the Chaotic Qi Formation. Preventing them from moving any further.


    With news of the Flying Sword Sect moving their sect to the Shattered Star Peaks, the cultivators moving around on the Third Star Peak would easily be able to understand the reason for why the barrier was there and shouldn''t think about trying to destroy it.


    Even if there was someone trying to break the barrier, Xuan Hao would be more than happy to find out just how strong the offensive part of the Chaotic Qi Formation was¡­

 Chapter 608: Preparing to Start Construction~

    Chapter 608: Preparing to Start Construction~


    "I wonder why Elder Xuan suddenly started throwing all the people on the Shattered Star peaks out¡­ Do you think he is setting up the formation?"


    "Maybe¡­ But the formation should not be thatrger? Or perhaps he is just worried about getting interrupt while setting up the formation¡­"


    At the same time Xuan Hao had started throwing people out of the Shattered Star Peaks, Shu Yao and Zu Fei were chatting with each other as they were both wondering why Xuan Hao had suddenly begun throwing people out of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Whoosh~


    Suddenly standing up and showing a surprised expression on her face, Shu Yao froze for a short moment before turning towards Zu Fei.


    "Elder Xuan just contacted me and asked me to make a new path leading to the Third Star Peak that doesn''t cross over any of the other Star Peaks¡­ And at the same time asked me to ask you to take care of the people he threw down from the Ninth Star Peak.


    Apparently, he also wants topletely close off the path leading inside the Shattered Star Peaks from the base of the Ninth Star Peak. In the future, only the Third Star Peak will be essible to outsiders¡­"


    Showing a confused expression on her face after saying this, it was clear to anyone watching that Shu Yao had no clue why Xuan Hao had told her what he had.


    No matter how powerful the formation he had was, there should be no way for it to cover the entire Shattered Star peaks¡­ Right?


    "Really!?" Feeling a simr confusion upon hearing what Shu Yao said, Zu Fei could not help asking for confirmation as she didn''t expect Xuan Hao to do something as drastic as shutting off the entire Shattered Star Peak expect for the Third Star Peak from everyone not part of the Flying Sword Sect.


    After all, it had to be known that the Shattered Star Peaks was a rather famous location for cultivators to explore. Especially the Ninth Star Peak, as there was an abundance of low-grade spiritual herbs growing there.


    Closing off everything expect for the Third Star Peak would definitely not go down well with those weaker cultivators who happened to earn a lot from journeying up the Ninth Star Peak and harvesting the spiritual herbs growing there.


    Then again, most of the people going up the Ninth Star Peak were weak cultivators mostly in theter stages of the Qi Condensation Realm or the earlier stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    No matter how angry they became with the sudden changes, there was not really anything they could do about it.


    If the Third Star Peak was also closed up, that would be something different, as Zu Fei truly didn''t want to deal with a horde of old fossils with half a step in the grave at the Pinnacle of the Core Formation Realm¡­


    "Yes¡­ Looks like I will have to get going immediately so there will actually be a path for those heading to the Third Star Peak." Nodding her head as she said this, Shu Yao also understood that it would be best to finish the path to the Third Star Peak as quickly as possible-


    Swish~


    Disappearing from the room both of them were located inside of before Zu Fei could say anything.


    "Looks like I should also get going¡­" Muttering this to herself as she quickly located the group of people sent down the Shattered Star Peaks by Xuan Hao, Zu Fei quickly left the room as she prepared herself to meet the crowd of confused people wondering what had just happened.


    ¡­


    Back to the present, Xuan Hao was carefully inspecting the Chaotic Qi Formation as it smoothly refined the chaotic qi outside before pure qi rained down from above inside the chaotic qi formation.


    Even though it would take a few months for the inside of the Chaotic Qi Formation to be filled up with the pure qi refined by the Chaotic Qi Formation. After that, the inside of the Chaotic Qi Formation would be nothing short of a holynd for cultivators, as cultivating in such a ce would allow one to rapidly improve!


    Although he could speed up the process in which the inside of the Chaotic Qi Formation was filling up with pure qi refined from the chaotic qi outside by limiting the area covered by the Chaotic Qi Formation, Xuan Hao did not n to do this, as building the sect and moving everyone to the Shattered Star Peaks would definitely take a few years!


    "Hm¡­ I should inform Elder Song about- Ah¡­ I should inform Feng Chen about the formation being sessfully set up and the fact that he can start the construction of the new Flying Sword Sect." Remembering that Elder Song was still recovering from his injuries after having tried to make the demonic medicinal potion, Xuan Hao quickly shook his head before changing the person he wanted to inform from Elder Song to Feng Chen.


    Given Elder Song was still recovering, the person who he should inform about the formation being sessfully set up was Feng Chen.


    Shu Yao already knew about it, as he had already informed her about the formation being set up shortly after he noticed that she had finished the new path leading up to the peak of the Third Star Peak.


    Probably before long, she would also inform the elders from the Spring Flower Sect without him doing anything and the construction of the new main sect of the Flying Sword Sect could officially begin!


    Swish~


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao quickly pulled out hismunication talisman before contacting Feng Chen.


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ Finally finished with today''s work, I never imagined it would be so stressing without Elder Song around¡­" Muttering this to himself as he leaned back in his chair inside his room, Feng Chen looked towards the empty desk located in front of him with a happy smile on his face.


    After the first day had passed with Elder Song taking a week off to recover, Feng Chen had suddenly been met with an unprecedented amount of work that he never imagined he would ever see.


    The thing that made it even worse, was the fact that on the second day, he realized that the work he had gotten on the first day was nothing inparisonpared to what he got on the second day of Elder Song''s week off¡­


    It was at that moment that Feng Chen realized that he needed to promote a few more elders in the future when he got time, so they could help keep up with the massive amount of work that endlessly flowed into his room.


    In the future when Elder Song returned to work again, Feng Chen decided to establish a special elder position that would only be focused on the management of the sect. Putting Elder Song in charge of this new group of elders was also something Feng Chen look forward to, as it would not only be able to help him out in case he needed to take over for Elder Song in the future, but it would also be able to lessen the work that would normally go to him!


    A win-win situation in Feng Chen''s eyes¡­ All he needed to do was survive the week without Elder Song and everything would be fine¡­


    "Hm¡­.?"


    It was at this moment that Feng Chen suddenly felt someone contacting him through hismunication talisman, causing him to instantly return from his fantasy of establishing a brand-new branch of elders dedicated to managing the internal problems of the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Elder Xuan? Did something happen?" Picking up themunication talisman and hearing the voice from the other side, Feng Chen could not help worrying that something had happened.


    "Ah, it''s not anything bad at all sect master! Actually, I just called you to inform you that I finished setting up the formation in the Shattered Star Peaks and you can start informing the elders in charge of construction about it. Don''t worry about Shu Yao and Zu Fei, I already informed both of them about it."


    "...."


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said, Feng Chen froze for a short moment as he unconsciously nced down towards the empty table in front of him¡­


    "Sect master? Are you there?"


    "Ah! Yes, yes, I''m here! I was just thinking about something, I will go inform the rest of the elders immediately¡­" Panicking slightly when he heard Xuan Hao calling out to him from the other side of themunication talisman after not hearing him, Feng Chen quickly responded in a helpless tone.


    Not long after, both of them agreed to meet at the base of the Ninth Star Peak, where Xuan Hao would show him the formation and where they could set up the new sect.


    "Haaaa¡­ Elder Song, please return quickly¡­" Muttering this to himself as he put down themunication talisman, Feng Chen soon made his way outside to inform the elders in charge of the new main sect''s construction before heading towards the Shattered Star Peaks.


    With the winged lion demon beast Xuan Hao had tamed around, Feng Chen was not really worried anything would happen to the Flying Sword Sect during his absence.

 Chapter 609: Zu Fei happened to accidently beat up a few people~

    Chapter 609: Zu Fei happened to idently beat up a few people~


    As Feng Chen was making his way towards the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao had finished inspecting the Chaotic Qi Formation and made his way down the mountain to meet Shu Yao and Zu Fei.


    ording to what he knew, Shu Yao, Zu Fei and Feng Chen were the people who would be in charge of the construction of the new sect.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao had decided to show all of them around and decide where to ce the new main sect of the Flying Sword Sect. After all, now that the Chaotic Qi Formation covered everything on the Shattered Star Peaks outside the Third Star Peak, there was more than one location that the main sect could be built.


    No matter where it was on the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao would leave it all in the hands of Shu Yao and the other two to decide.


    After all, when it came to deciding where to ce the new Flying Sword Sect, they should be more knowledgeable than him¡­


    However, the Fourth Star Peak that was covered in a special kind of alpine vegetation and the Seventh Star Peak that was barren like the Third Star Peak were by far the best locations to build on.


    The Fourth Star Peak had some vegetation and small trees that would surely begin growing rapidly flowing the pure qiing from the Chaotic Qi Formation slowly covering the entire Shattered Star Peak.


    The Seventh Star Peak on the other hand waspletely barren like the Third Star Peak. The positive with the Seventh Star Peak was that it was closer to the official entrance of the Shattered Star Peaks, while the Fourth Star Peak was located a bit farther away.


    Although this would not be a problem to anyone with a cultivation in the Foundation Establishment, it would surely end up bing troublesome for the disciples below the Foundation Establishment Realm wanting to visit the city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak¡­


    It should not be forgotten that even the smallest mountain, the Ninth Star Peak, already covered around three quarters of what the current sect of the Flying Sword Sect did!


    The Seventh- and Fourth-Star Peak were both covering and area over two times the size of the current main sect of the Flying Sword Sect¡­ And that was only considering the peak of the two mountains.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao soon arrived at the base of the Ninth Star Peak where Shu Yao and Zu Fei were already waiting, Feng Chen had not arrived yet and would still take some time to reach the Shattered Star Peaks. After all, Feng Chen was not a Domain Lord and could at most use a flying demon beast to increase his travelling speed.


    Standing at what had once been the ce for anyone willing to part with a few spirit stones to enter the Shattered Star Peaks and make their way up the Ninth Star Peak, Shu Yao, and Zu Fei both sat down on a small bench located next to the path as they waited.


    "Zu Fei, Shu Yao!"


    "Elder Xuan! You finally showed up!"


    Calling out to the two of them, Zu Fei was the first to respond as she jumped up from the bench before charging over.


    "Elder Xuan, why did you let me deal with all the people you threw down from the Ninth Star Peak!? Even after they knew I was a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, they still dared to pester me about the Ninth Star Peak being for everyone.


    Even after I gave them the spirit stones, they paid to enter the Shattered Star Peaks, they stillined and even wanted to fight me! Some unruly people even directly ignored me and began making their way back up the Ninth Star Peak even after I tried to stop them! Only after I beat up a few of them did they listen and disperse¡­"


    "Ahm¡­ My bad, I didn''t expect the people harvest spiritual herbs at the Ninth Star Peak to be so¡­ Aggressive¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as he heard Zu Fei exin how she had been attacked by a group of angry Qi Condensation Realm and Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators, Xuan Hao felt that it was rather surprising that Zu Fei had only beaten them up before letting them go-


    "Hm?


    Suddenly noticing something out of the corner of his eyes, Xuan Hao turned towards an open space located just next to the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak.


    "What is-"


    Swish!


    "Ahahaha, that is¡­ Don''t worry about it, Elder Xuan. Are you going to show us the formation you set up to keep out the chaotic qi?" Noticing where Xuan Hao was looking, Zu Fei showed a slightly embarrassed expression as she jumped in front of Xuan Hao to block his view while saying this.


    "¡­"


    You do know what a divine sense is¡­ Right? Doing this won''t stop me from seeing whatever is behind you¡­


    Not knowing what to say upon seeing Zu Fei like this, Xuan Hao rolled his eyes before using his divine sense to see the open space behind Zu Fei.


    Whoosh~


    However, as his divine sense swept over the open space behind Zu Fei, Xuan Hao could not help frowning.


    "Did a massacre take ce here?"


    Wait¡­ Is this perhaps the unruly people who wanted to go back up the Ninth Star Peak? Didn''t Zu Fei say she didn''t kill anyone¡­?


    "Ah- It hurts!"


    "W-why did this happen? My cultivation I cultivated for the past decade... All gone!"


    "P-please end it...!"


    "N-no more, I-I-I-I will listen, I won''t go up the mountain!"


    It was only at this moment that Xuan Hao realized that none of the peopleying on the ground all bloody were actually dead¡­ Instead, it looked more like someone had violently beaten them, so they were at the brink of death, it didn''t look like they had been simply ''beaten up'' like Zu Fei had said¡­


    "Zu Fei¡­"


    "I-I idently hit them a bit too hard¡­"


    ""¡­""


    How do you idently hit them just hard to not kill them, but still enough for them to be bedridden for at least a few years¡­


    Of all the people in the open space behind Zu Fei, most of them had been injured to the degree that they would need at least a few years to recover, while a small group of them had their cultivation directly crippled by Zu Fei. Not only that, but those people also had a certain part of their body destroyed.


    For some reason, Xuan Hao had an idea what the reason for their circumstances being so much worse than the rest of the people was¡­


    "Ah, looks like Feng Chen is here!"


    Wanting to turn the conversation away from the bloody massacre she had created, Zu Fei suddenly pointed into the air where a flying demon beast had appeared with Feng Chen on top of it.


    ""¡­""


    Knowing that the people beaten up by Zu Fei would not die and would only be bedridden for some time, Xuan Hao, and Shu Yao both turned to look towards Feng Chen approaching.


    ¡­


    "Hm? What in the world happened down there¡­?" Sitting on a flying demon beast only a short distance away from where he could see Zu Fei, Shu Yao and Xuan Hao waiting for him, Feng Chen could not help frowning upon seeing the bloody massacre that seemed to have taken ce just a short distance away from the three.


    Whoosh~


    Wanting to know what had happened, Feng Chen quicklynded the flying demon beast before jumping off and letting it return to the Flying Sword Sect by itself.


    "What happened here? Did someone perhapsunch an attack on out branch or something?"


    "Never mind that, let''s get going!"


    Brushing Feng Chen''s question aside almost instantly, Zu Fei grabbed hold of him before dragging him up the path leading towards the peak of the Ninth Star Peak. Not intending to say anything about how she was the one responsible for what had happened to the group of people squirming in pain just beside the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak.


    ""¡­""


    Xuan Hao and Shu Yao didn''t say anything either, as both of them didn''t want to waste any time exining how Zu Fei had beaten up a group of people that had wanted to go back up the Ninth Star Peak.


    "Hah¡­"


    Knowing that nobody was going to exin the bloody situation next to the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak to him, Feng Chen just let out a sigh before looking away from the bloody situation below.


    From the way Zu Fei acted, he had already guessed that she should be behind it¡­ And given the fact Xuan Hao and Shu Yao didn''t say anything, he could guess that both of them already understood why those people had ended up like that.


    ¡­


    As the group of four were making their way up the Ninth Star Peak, Shu Yao standing in the back together with Xuan Hao gently waved her hand towards the bloody group of people below.


    Whoosh~


    The wave made by Shu Yao soon caused a gentle green light to engulf the bloody people below as they began recovering rapidly. Everyone excluding the few people who had their cultivation crippled and a certain body part simrly crippled by Zu Fei¡­

 Chapter 610: The “New� Shattered Star Peaks

    Chapter 610: The ¡°New¡± Shattered Star Peaks


    "Did you perhaps ce the formation on top of the Ninth Star Peak?" Reaching the lush forest on top of the Ninth Star Peak, Feng Chen who was rather familiar with the chaotic qi on the Shattered Star Peaks could not help asking this as he clearly felt the absence of chaotic qi in the air around him.


    The only thing he could think of was the formation Xuan Hao told him that he would set up¡­ However, the formation Xuan Hao told him he would set up was clearly not supposed to be on the Ninth Star Peak!


    For this reason, Feng Chen felt confused as to why there was no chaotic qi present on the Ninth Star Peak.


    Maybe the chaotic qi on the other Star Peaks was far too violent and he decided to just go with the Ninth Star Peak as it is by far the ce with the weakest chaotic qi among the nine Star Peaks. Even if it can be considered a better location than the current location of the Flying Sword Sect, it would not be by much¡­ Not to mention, we would end up destroying the lush forest here in the process¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Feng Chen could not help looking towards Xuan Hao for an answer. Wondering if he had guessed correctly.


    "No¡­ The formation was not ced on the Ninth Star Peak. The reason why there is no chaotic qi present here is because the formation covers the entire Shattered Star Peaks-"


    "WHAT!? It covers the entire Shattered Star Peaks!? How is that even possible!? Just what kind of formation did you set up for it to be able to iste the entire Shattered Star Peaks from the chaotic qi¡­"


    Not able to finish what he was going to say in response to Feng Chen''s question, Xuan Hao was interrupted. Not by Feng Chen, but by Shu Yao who had mostly remained silent ever since they had made their way up the Ninth Star Peak.


    "Yes, it covers all of the Shattered Star Peaks. Except for the Third Star Peak and the top of the Main and Second Star Peak. Ah, I sealed off the Main and Second Star Peak, as its rather dangerous there at the moment." Not knowing what else to say, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling after seeing Shu Yao''s shocked expression.


    To be honest, he had never really seen her as shocked was after learning that the formation he had set up covered the entire Shattered Star Peaks.


    Well¡­ It was not too surprising that she was shocked. After all, the fact that the formation covered the entire Shattered Star peaks and even managed to keep out the chaotic qi, while at the same time refining the chaotic qi into normal qi that could be absorbed, was something that was far above the level of any formation he should have been able to create at his current realm.


    After all, the Qi Gathering Formation before being upgraded by the system would barely be able to cover three of the nine Star Peaks of the Shattered Star Peak¡­ And that formation used a Transcendent Grade Spiritual Flower as the core!


    For the current formation to be even stronger than that¡­ Shu Yao''s surprise was understandable, as she most likely thought that it was a formation set up using more than one Transcendent Grade Spiritual Treasure!


    If she found out that the Chaotic Qi Formation could cover an even wider area and that the core of the formation was something above the Transcendent Grade, Xuan Hao had no idea how she would react¡­


    "Covers all of the Shattered Star Peaks¡­ Won''t this mean that we are free to expand wherever we want inside the Shattered Star Peaks without having to worry about the chaotic qi!?" Muttering the first few words to herself as she went over what Xuan Hao said, Shu Yao soon eximed loudly once again before looking towards him filled with disbelief.


    Very clearly, she had not expected that they would be able to build across almost all of the Star Peaks!


    "Well¡­ Yes, it does, but I would rmend we start building on either the Fourth or the Seventh Star Peak as those are the two best locations. Not to mention, we don''t need to waste all our resources building all across the Shattered Star Peaks, as even after we merge together, our sect is still far too small to cover such arge area¡­" Smiling wryly upon hearing what Shu Yao said about expanding al over the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao quickly injected.


    No matter what, building a massive sect that covered the entirety of the Shattered Star Peaks, was a far too hard thing to aplish for the current Flying Sword Sect. Not to mention, they had far too few members to even fill out a fraction of such a massive sect. Even when merging together with the Spring Flower Sect, they would still be far away from such a thing.


    At the moment, a single Star Peak was more than enough to amodate the current Flying Sword Sect!


    On the other hand, expanding the sect would be easily done in the future with so much space left on the Shattered Star Peaks.


    "This is amazing¡­ I''m sure the elders won''t be unhappy about merging with the Flying Sword Sect after seeing this ce¡­" Muttering this to herself after having confirmed all the things on her mind, Shu Yao just began observing the barely visible formation above her as it absorbed and refined the chaotic qi outside before releasing it inside the formation as pure qi that could be absorbed with ease.


    Even though the concentration of qi was not that high yet, she could easily imagine how this ce would turn out a few months in the future¡­ It would be a holynd for cultivation!


    Not to mention cultivators, the nts growing on the Ninth Star Peak and across the Shattered Star Peaks should also begin to see substantial changes over the next few months and years toe, as they adapted to the qi rich environment.


    "This is indeed amazing¡­" Not understanding how powerful the formation was, Zu Fei was not as taken aback about the absence of chaotic qi and was only amazed by the fact that the formation covered the entire Shattered Star Peaks.


    "¡­"


    Feng Chen on the other hand remained silent as he gazed towards the Seventh Star Peak and the Fourth Star Peak in the distance.


    No matter which of those two peaks are chosen, I will end up having to do the preliminary work organizing the construction together with Zu Fei and Shu Yao¡­ Won''t I?


    Thinking this to himself while not showing the slightest bit of amazement at the formation Xuan Hao created, Feng Chen could not help sighing silently in his mind.


    Deep inside, he had a feeling that Zu Fei and Shu Yao had nned something for them to work together to get him to join them in the preliminary construction of the new main sect. The fact that they happened to do that during the time when Elder Song was on a week-long break solidified this feeling even further!


    p~


    "Well, let''s get going, I will introduce each of the Star Peaks as we go along and what makes them special. After that, we can decide which of them is best to start the construction on!" Seeing that everyone was slowly drifting away into their own thoughts, Xuan hao pped his hands together before saying this with a smile.


    Whoosh~


    Like this, the group of four slowly began making their way across the Shattered Star Peaks. Moving from mountain to mountain while Xuan Hao did his best to exin the things, he had found out about the different Star Peaks.


    From theke on top of the Fifth Star Peak that had now calmed down with the absence of chaotic qi, to the Sixth Star Peak that was filled with all sorts of small caves that covered it from top to bottom.


    However, among the different mountains, the one that garnered the most attention from Shu Yao, Feng Chen, and Zu Fei, was the Eighth Star Peak.


    The reason for this was rather obvious, as all of them had no idea about the fact that someone was already living inside the Shattered Star Peaks. Not to mention the other party belonged to apletely different race!


    It was also after telling the three about the Half Spirit Race that Xuan Hao realized just how shocking it was to someone familiar with the world to see a non-human sentient race.


    At the same time, it also made Xuan Hao feel more interested in just what had made the other sentient races disappear in the past. After all, ording to his conversation with the grand elder of the Half Spirit Race, there were far more races all over the ce in the past before something major had happened that caused every race outside the human race to either go extinct or into hiding.

 Chapter 611: Passing Time (1)

    Chapter 611: Passing Time (1)


    "So, which of the Star peaks do you think would be the best ce to build on¡­?" Finishing his tour of the Shattered Star Peaks together with Shu Yao, Feng Chen, and Zu Fei, Xuan Hao turned around and asked this.


    Hearing this question, Shu Yao, and Feng Chen both frowned slightly before thinking deeply about the question. After all, both of them understood very well just how important this question was and dared not answer it without thinking things through properly.


    "I think it would be best to go with the Seventh Star Peak. Not only are we closer to the entrance of the Shattered Star Peaks, but we would also be closer to the Eighth Star Peak of the Half Spirit Race and the Ninth Star Peak filled with spiritual herbs."


    Not thinking about it as deeply as Shu Yao and Feng Chen, Zu Fei directly answered Xuan Hao''s question-


    "Indeed¡­ If you say it like that, it does seem like the Seventh Star Peak is the most fitting location."


    "Yeah, it would also be rather difficult for the younger disciples to reach the city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak if we decided on the Fourth Star Peak¡­"


    Instantly causing both Shu Yao and Feng Chen to nod their head in agreement.


    "Well, it looks like the Seventh Star Peak will be home to the Flying Sword Sect in the future!" Smiling happily as he saw all three of them had decided on a ce, Xuan Hao knew that there was nothing more for him to do when it came to the construction of the new main sect.


    All he had to do now was leave it to the elders in front of him!


    Whoosh~


    Understanding this, Xuan Hao didn''t stay around the group of three for much longer, as he soon made his way back towards the Flying Sword Sect after a quick goodbye. Leaving the rest of the work in the hands of Shu Yao, Feng Chen, and Zu Fei.


    Over the next few days, Shu Yao, Feng Chen, and Zu Fei worked together on preparing the elders below and the workers for the construction of the new main sect.


    Everything went smoothly and soon, the construction of the new main sect for the Flying Sword Sect officially began.


    Given that most of the building materials for the new main sect had already been gathered in the rapidly growing city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak, this was not a problem at all, as transporting the materials to the Seventh Star Peak had been made easy by the fact that Xuan Hao had given Feng Chen over a dozen interspatial rings to make this process faster.


    Not to mention, Shu Yao could also use her domain to help carry the building materials to the Seventh Star Peak.


    The only thing that was weird when it came to the construction of the new main sect, was that even after Elder Song had recovered, Feng Chen was still the one taking care of the construction of the new main sect together with Shu Yao and Zu Fei.


    How they had managed to convince Elder Song to let Feng Chen stay at the sect construction site while he took care of the day-to-day management of the sect was aplete mystery¡­


    Xuan Hao did not really care about any of this, as he spent most of his time focused on training both Qing Yi and Bai Ning. Focusing most of his attention on helping the two adapt to their new strength, as Qing Yi had just reached the Core Formation Realm, while Bai Ning had just reached the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Like this, the days in the Flying Sword Sect slowly passed, days turning into weeks and soon a month passed.


    ¡­


    "Finally, back¡­" Spending close to a month to return to the Flying Sword Sect, Chu Yang could not help feeling a sense of happiness upon seeing his master''s mountain peak in the distance.


    At this point in time, he could clearly feel that the exotic energy had not beenpletely eliminated by the Devil Immortal Jade and was slowly starting to show signs of recovering, something Chu Yang wanted to prevent at all costs!


    Having spent such a long time to return from the Small River Town was not because he had ended up getting lost along the way or something along that line. Instead, it was because he had ended up encountering a group of Core Formation Realm demonic cultivators on his way back!


    The Core Formation Realm Experts were all close to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, so Chu Yang had no way to deal with them with his current strength and could only escape. Hoping that the demonic cultivators would soon give up and stop chasing after him.


    Unfortunately, this did not happen¡­


    Only after being chased all over the ce for close to three weeks was, he lucky enough to encounter a Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Spring Flower Sect making her wat towards the Shattered Star Peaks who helped him out, who easily dealt with the group of Core Formation Realm demonic cultivators.


    After telling her that he was a disciple from the Flying Sword Sect, she was even kind enough to help him get back to the Flying Sword Sect.


    If not for her help, Chu Yang had no idea how long it would have taken for him to get back again¡­


    "Her name was Shen Xuefeng if I remember correctly¡­" Remembering the awesome power disyed by the elder from the Spring Flower Sect as she smashed the group of demonic cultivators to death with a giant hammer, Chu Yang felt that he should repay the elder from the Spring Flower Sect in the future when he got stronger.


    Reaching the peak of the mountain and seeing his master''s pavilion in front of him, Chu Yang rushed inside to find his master.


    After all, only his master would be able to help him deal with the exotic energy showing signs of reappearing inside his dantian!


    ¡­


    "Hm? You lost yourmunication talisman¡­ The Burning Mountain Range¡­ Exotic energy¡­?"


    Hearing his disciple describing what he had experienced during his time outside the sect, Xuan Hao was at first surprised before feeling worried. At the same time, he also felt rather dumb for the fact that he had not thought about what to do in case one of his disciples lost themunication talisman.


    In the future, it would be a good idea to keep in contact with his disciple running around outside the sect at least once a week¡­ Just to make sure that they still had theirmunication talisman on them and could contact him in case something happened.


    However, for now, the main thing Xuan Hao focused on, was the exotic energy mentioned by Chu Yang. ording to him, the exotic energy was what had allowed him to reach the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm so quickly¡­ But at the same time, it also put him in mortal danger!


    If not for the fact that Chu Yang had told him about the exotic energy, Xuan Hao would have thought that the reason for his rapid increase in strength had something to do with the young master he encountered.


    Thinking about it, it seemed like Chu Yang and the young master he had encountered did not interact with each other and had merely passed by one another, a rather lucky considering that Chu Yang had no way to contact him in case the powerful expert behind the young master found by the system showed up¡­


    Swish~


    "Hm?" Deciding to get started on removing the exotic energy that Chu Yang had told him about inside his dantian, Xuan Hao could not help frowning upon seeing the situation inside his disciples dantian.


    Compared to the normal golden core he had expected to see upon entering his disciples dantian, the golden core was blood red as it gave off an eerie feeling. Making Xuan Hao think that he had entered the dantian of some demonic cultivator.


    Only after feeling the blood red golden core with his divine sense did, he realize that there was nothing wrong with his disciples dantian, as the qi inside both his dantian and golden core was normal. Albeit being blood red in colour.


    WHOOSH-!


    Finding the exotic energy that Chu Yang had talked to him about only a short timeter, Xuan Hao directly used his strength as a domain lord to eliminate it.


    "That should be it, you should return to your room to recover." Muttering this to himself as he did a quick scan of his disciple''s entire body to make sure there was no more exotic energy present, Xuan Hao directly instructed Chu Yang to go recover.


    The reason he needed to recover was that during the process of the exotic energy being erased, it had also erased arge quantity of the qi that Chu Yang had stored in his dantian.


    Although this would not cause any permanent damage, it would still force Chu Yang to spend a few weeks recovering the qi he had just lost.


    "Yes, master!" Feeling his dantian almost empty out all of a sudden, Chu Yang''s face turned slightly pale as he said this before making his way back to his room to recover the qi he had just lost.


    Like this, all his disciples were back again and with nothing really happening over the next few months while the new main sect was being built, Xuan Hao decided to spend the next few months training his three disciples, while at the same time improving his own skills and techniques.

 Chapter 612: Passing Time (2)

    Chapter 612: Passing Time (2)


    As time passed, things were calm in the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao spending most of his time teaching his three disciples, while at the same time learning all kinds of new techniques and skills. Not forgetting to spend some time learning cksmithing, so he could at least help out Bai Ning without beingpletely helpless when he came to ask him about cksmithing rted questions.


    During all of this, the new main sect was slowly being constructed on top of the Seventh Star Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks under the supervision of Shu Yao, Zu Fei, and Feng Chen. All three making sure that the construction progressed without any issues.


    Elder Song on the other hand¡­ Ended up withplete control over the Flying Sword Sect, as he used this newfound power to create the much-needed new branch of elders that both he and Feng Chen wished for.


    A branch of elders, whose sole purpose was managing the sect¡¯s internal matters!


    After the creation of this branch of elders, the operation of the Flying Sword Sect rapidly improved. The people who ended up most against this sudden branch of elders appearing was the elders belonging to the stables looking after the demon beasts¡­ As they once again felt a massive decrease in the spiritual stones avable to them¡­


    All things considered. Nothing big happened in the Flying Sword Sect outside of this. However, the same could not be said for the rest of the world.


    ¡­??ll new st??ries at n0ve/lbi/??(.)c??m


    Following the disappearance of Archbishop Soft Breeze and the holy sceptre that he had been carrying with him, the Cardinal of the Order of the Sky God had been doing his best to search for the mole from the church of the gue god that had caused this to happen.


    The only problem was¡­ That the mole hidden inside the Order of the Sky God was an Archbishop!


    Archbishop! Every single Archbishop was a core part of the Order of the Sky God¡¯s strength. Even losing a single one of them would be disastrous!


    For this reason, the Cardinal could not do things forcefully and just kill everyone who seemed suspicious. Instead, he was forced to slowly investigate the matter to make sure he caught the right one.


    The fact that Archbishop Soft Breeze had disappeared did not escape the eyes of the Cult of the Scarlet Moon and the Follower of the Fire God, as only a few weeks after Archbishop Soft Breeze had gone missing, both of them secretly began diverting their attention towards taking over the faith of the kingdoms that had formerly been under Archbishop Soft Breeze.


    Given that the church of the gue god had momentarily stopped trying to snake their way inside the Sky Empire, these two religious organisations had more than enough people to spare, as both of them soon began fighting each other in the shadows over the kingdoms that had formerly been under Archbishop Soft Breeze.


    The Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God clearly saw all of this, but he was helpless in doing anything about it, as he was busy trying to find the mole that had infiltrated the Order of the Sky God and caused this situation in the first ce.


    If he acted at this point in time to stop the two others from taking away the few kingdoms that were once under Archbishop Soft Breeze management, the mole still hidden inside his church might end up causing even more trouble!


    For this reason, the Cardinal could only angrily curse at the Cult of the Scarlet Moon and the Followers of the Fire God before using all his strength to find out which of his Archbishops was the mole.


    The faster the mole was found, the faster he could step in to prevent any further losses!


    ¡­


    A few months after the disappearance of Archbishop Soft Breeze, the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God found an abnormality in one of the Archbishops!


    ¡°Finally¡­ I got you!¡± Muttering this to himself as he stared down at a letter that had juste in from one of his good friends, the Cardinal smiled widely as killing intent began to overflow from both his eyes.


    During the time he had taken to find out who the mole was, the Order of the Sky God had already lost three kingdoms in the inner region of the Sky Empire!


    One to the Followers of the Fire God and two to the Cult of the Scarlet Moon!


    The worst of which was the kingdom they had lost to the Followers of the Fire God, as the kingdom they had managed to take was among the twentyrgest kingdoms in the Sky Empire!


    The number of people living in such a massive kingdom could be counted in the millions!


    Crack~


    Knowing that there were a few more kingdoms that were just about to leave his control, the Cardinal didn¡¯t waste any time as he directly tore apart the space in front of him before disappearing from the church he had been staying in over the past few months while trying to find out who the mole from the church of the gue god was.


    ¡­


    Crack~


    Only a short timeter, the cardinal appeared directly in front of a massive church located in the outskirts of the Sky Empire¡¯s Capital.


    ¡°Who dares- C-c-c-cardinal!?¡± The young priest standing in front of the church weing believers and at the same time making sure no one troublesome entered the sacred hall of the Sky God opened his eyes wide in shock upon recognizing the person who had just appeared in front of him.


    He had actually rudely called out to the Cardinal just now!


    Thump!


    Not daring to say anything after recognizing the person in front of him, the young priest quickly fell on his knees shivering. Hoping that the Cardinal would spare him for his disrespect.


    Whoosh~


    However, contrary to what the young priest had expected to happen, the Cardinal did not say a single word as he entered the church behind him. Completely ignoring the existence of the young priest standing at the door to the church.


    D-did I just escape death¡­?


    Feeling like a burden had disappeared from his shoulders as the Cardinal disappeared inside the massive church behind him, the young priest breathed out a sigh of relief as he decided to leave as quickly as possible.


    Some of the senior priests standing around the door understood what the young priest was thinking about as they decided to look the other way to the young priest leaving in the middle of his shift.


    One less priest looking after the door of such arge church would make no difference.


    WOOSH-!


    ¡°Hm?¡±


    Just at this moment when the young priest was about to leave, a holy aura suddenly spread out from the interior of the massive church before washing over everyone present. At the same time a massive sea of golden clouds manifested in the air above the church.


    T-this is the Archbishop¡¯s domain, what-


    BOOOOOM-!


    Before the young priest even had time toprehend what was happening, an even more pure and holy aura spread out from the church and instantly overwhelmed the aura of the Archbishop.


    The golden clouds that had manifested in the air above the church also shook violently before ultimately starting to crack apart.


    In an instant, the domain of the Archbishop had been supressed and was about to crack apart!


    Crash-!


    Not giving the young priest any time toprehend, a green ball of light burst through the roof of the church before disappearing into the distance.


    Swish~


    Following the green ball of light bursting through the roof of the church and escaping into the distance, a cold snort sounded out from inside the church before a figure suddenly appeared in the sky above the church.


    The figure was covered in ayer of golden holy light and a sea of golden clouds had manifested around him.


    Looking up at this figure that was shrouded in ayer of holy light, the young priest instantly realized that this person was the Cardinal!


    Thump!


    Not daring to look up any more after confirming the identity of the person in the sky above the church, the young priest fell to the ground as he began praying sincerely to the Sky God.


    Whoosh~!


    The Cardinal suddenly attacking someone in the outskirt of the imperial capital instantly caused a storm to sweep through the entire capital city, as several hidden experts sent out their divine sense to see what was happening.


    ¡°Ah!¡±


    ¡°Wh-what is this!?¡±


    ¡°S-Soul Ascension Realm¡­!¡±


    However, those below the Soul Ascension Realm quickly retracted their divine sense after feeling a terrifying power rapidly destroying their divine sense after it reached the location of the Cardinal.


    ¡­


    ¡°Hmph! Think I will let you escape so easily!?¡±


    Narrowing his eyes in the sky above the church, the Cardinal made a grabbing motion towards the green light in the distance.


    Rumble~


    This simple motion instantly caused the sea of golden clouds around him to expand rapidly towards the ball of green light in the distance before forming a massive hand made of golden clouds that slowly grabbed towards the small green light trying its best to escape.

 Chapter 613: Passing Time (3) “Ahhh-!�

    Chapter 613: Passing Time (3)


    ¡°Ahhh-!¡±


    As the massive hand formed by golden clouds grabbed hold of the green light, a miserable scream suddenly echoed out from inside the small ball of green light before it rapidly began expanding at a speed faster than the eye of anyone below the Domain Lord Realm could follow.


    Fwoosh!


    Soon the ball of green light that had been the size of an apple, had expanded to a size that wasparable to the massive hand formed by golden clouds.


    This in turn caused it to momentarily break free from the grip of the golden clouds, as the golden clouds were pushed back by the massive ball of green light.


    ¡°Hm? How interesting looks like something a one time use protective seal left behind by a someone in the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ However, do you really think you can escape with this?¡± Not the slightest bit worried upon seeing his attempt to catch the escaping Archbishop fail, the Cardinal just narrowed his eyes before attacking again-


    ¡°No-!¡±


    Crack~


    Following the helpless scream of the person hidden away inside the green ball of light, the hand formed by the golden clouds forcefully grabbed the massive ball of green light before violently crushing it!


    Looking in the sky where the hand formed by golden clouds was located, the ball of green light hadpletely disappeared, as there was now only an elderly man covered in blood present inside the hand formed by the golden clouds.


    At this point in time, the elderly man was fearfully staring towards the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God.


    It was also at this point in time that the people watching the battle taking ce from afar realized that the battle was between the Cardinal and an Archbishop from the Order of the Sky God¡­ Of course, this revtion left all kinds of questions in the minds of these people, as they had no idea why the Cardinal suddenly attacked one of his Archbishops.


    ¡°That is¡­ Archbishop Green Sky!?¡±


    ¡°Why is the Cardinal attacking the Archbishop?¡±


    ¡°Did Archbishop Green Sky perhaps do something to betray the order¡­?¡±


    Listening to the crowd whispering to each other below while staring up towards him filled with confusion, the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God could not help frowning as his eyes narrowed even further while looking towards the bloody elderly man in the distance.


    Whoosh~


    Not wanting to waste any more time and fearing that the Soul Ascension Realm Expert from the Church of the gue God might take action to save Archbishop Green Sky, the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God directly disappeared from his location above the church before reappearing directly in front of the bloody old man on the brink of death.


    Even though he had sessfully managed to run for a short moment, he had still faced three attacks from a Soul Ascension Realm Expert head on. The fact that he was still alive was a testament to how powerful he was, something that just caused the Cardinal even more heartache.


    ¡°Archbishop Green Sky¡­ I¡¯m disappointed that things came to this¡­ To think you would side with not only another god, but with an outsider¡­¡± Shaking his head while saying this, the Cardinal didn¡¯t give the old man any time to respond-


    Ptsh~


    Directly using his strength to reduce the bloodied Archbishop Green Sky into a blood mist. Erasing any trace of his existence.


    ¡°With this¡­ The Order of the Sky God here in the Sky Empire will at least need a few hundred years to recover from the loss of two Archbishops!¡±


    Not feeling the slightest bit happy after the killing the mole nted by the church of the gue god, the Cardinal only felt a wave of sadness engulf him. Even if he had managed to deal with the mole, the Order of the Sky God¡¯s strength had been drastically reduced!


    The three religious organisations in the Sky Empire each had a single expert at the Soul Ascension Realm at their core. Allowing them to mostly ignore the imperial family of the Sky Empire.


    However, the thing that truly allowed them to manage arge territory of the Sky Empire and harvest a massive amount of faith from the people living there, was the Archbishop who controlled dozens of kingdoms outside the core of the Sky Empire.


    Each of the three had five Archbishops and had perfectly split up the territory of the Sky Empire and decided who would be able establish a church in what kingdom.


    Now with the Order of the Sky God losing two Archbishops, the Cardinal could easily predict that the Follower of the Fire God and the Cult of the Scarlet Moon would get even more agrresive when it came to taking over some of the kingdoms under the Order of the Sky God¡­


    Even with him stepping in, there was no way to prevent the Order of the Sky God from losing at least a dozen or so kingdoms if those two decided to work together.


    ¡°For now, the best option should be toy low until we can get two new Archbishops¡­¡± Muttering this to himself, the Cardinal quickly left the ce before the people from the imperial family showed up to cause trouble for him after the damage, he had inevitably caused to the area just outside the imperial capital where he had attacked the fleeing Archbishop Green Sky.


    ¡­


    Following the death of Archbishop Green Sky, things went exactly like the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God had expected, as the two others quickly worked together to start taking away the kingdoms that had formerly been under the management of Archbishop Green Sky.


    The Cardinal understood very well that there was nothing to do about it, as while he could step in to prevent the two from taking the kingdoms that had been under Archbishop Soft Breeze, this was only the case because he was just missing.


    Archbishop Green Sky on the other hand¡­ Had been killed by him and everyone had seen it happen, there was no way for him to prevent them from taking away the kingdoms that had once been under him and splitting them up among each other.


    However, among all the major powers in the Sky Empire, the ones to benefit the most was the Church of the gue God, as they sessfully managed to convert half a dozen kingdoms in a short time the Cult of the Scarlet Moon and the Followers of the Fire God were busy trying to take away the kingdoms that had formerly belonged to the Order of the Sky God.


    By the time they discovered what was happening, it was already toote, as the Church of the gue God managed to sessfully establish itself at the border of the inner region of the Sky Empire.


    The only way that they would be able to expel the Church of the gue God at this point in time, was if the heads of at least two of the religious organisations worked together to forcefully push out the Church of the gue God.


    Normally, this would have been something the three would not have hesitated in doing¡­


    However, the Cult of the Scarlet Moon and the Followers of the Fire God, while they were working together and could push out the Church of the gue God, they were not really on friendly terms with the Order of the Sky God at the moment¡­


    If both of them left, there was no saying what the Cardinal from the Order of the Sky God would do to get revenge on them from taking away the kingdoms that had once been under his control.Diiscover new ??tories at n??ve/lbin(.)c/o??


    Even worse, the location that the Church of the gue God had established itself was only located next to kingdoms under the control of the Cult of the Scarlet Moon and the Followers of the Fire God!


    All things considered; the Order of the Sky God would not lose anything from watching the two fights against the newly established Church of the gue God¡­


    On the other hand, the Church of the gue God establishing themselves inside the Sky Empire might even be a good thing, as it would force the Cult of the Scarlet Moon and the Followers of the Fire God to move arge portion of their forces towards the kingdoms bordering the territory taken over by the Church of the gue God.


    Allowing the Order of the Sky God to hold on to arge portion of the kingdoms that had once been under the management of Archbishop Green Sky!


    ¡­


    The imperial family also took advantage of this situation, as they prepared to call in the sect¡¯s they had invited across their Sky Empire earlier and hopefully form a Sect Alliance to weaken the threerge religious organisations.


    Now that a new religious organisation had appeared and the already established religious organisations had fallen out with each other. The Emperor of the Sky Empire hoped to use this situation to further weaken them!

 Chapter 614: Passing Time (4)

    Chapter 614: Passing Time (4)


    Back in the Flying Sword Sect, close to half a year had passed since the construction of the new main sect on the Seventh Star Peak began.


    During this time, Xuan Hao had managed to learn a plethora of new techniques that he could teach his three disciples, while at the same time increasing his knowledge in the different professions that existed across the Ewaria Continent. Even learning about some of the more obscure professions that the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect had no experts in, like the art of tea and disguise.


    The art of tea was especially something he was interested in and while trying his hand on it himself one time in the kitchen located inside his pavilion. Unfortunately, he was not really skilled when it came to tea brewing¡­


    However, it was at this time that he happened to meet Zhi Ruo and after a short conversation on the topic of tea, he discovered that she had a talent when it came to the Art of Tea. Although she was not talented when it came to cultivation, Xuan Hao did not care much about this as she was not his disciple.


    Wanting to have someone skilled in the art of tea around him, Xuan Hao decided to get some books on the art of tea for Zhi Ruo to train with, something she was more than happy to do, as practicing the art of tea brewing would not only allow her to improve the quality of the tea, she made but would also help her mind clear up and allow her to increase her cultivation over time.


    "Thank you so much!"


    Seeing the happy expression on Zhi Ruo''s face after he handed over the stack of books filled with information on the art of tea, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a wave of happiness.


    In the future, I should try and get a few more books on the art of tea if possible¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao once again returned to his daily life of learning new techniques and teaching his three disciples. However, this time around, he would also spend some time together with Zhi Ruo to see how far she had improved in the art of tea brewing.


    Like this, another half year passed by peacefully.


    ¡­


    "Looks like the construction of the new main sect is finally about to bepleted." After little over a year of cultivating in peace at his pavilion and teaching his disciples, Xuan Hao stood up and stretched his body after a night of cultivating under the stars before looking in the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Over the past year, his cultivation realm had not changed, and he was still in the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    The main reason for this, was the fact that he had dedicated most of his focus onprehending his two domains in an attempt to merge the two together. Sadly, although he did make some progress and increased the strength of both his domains, he was still far away from merging them together into a single domain.??eew updates ??t n??vel/bi??(.


    Given his current speed, he would most likely take five to ten years to sessfully merge the two domains together without any help from external sources.


    After he merged his Ice Domain and Sword Domain together, he would then be able to attempt a breakthrough into the Soul Ascension Realm!


    As for reaching the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm? Xuan Hao didn''t doubt that he would be able to do that before merging both of his domains together. Not to mention, the system could always reward him with an increase in cultivation and allow him to reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    At the moment, the quests he had active was the sect quest to increase the strength of the Flying Sword Sect, the quest rted to Chu Yang''s sense of direction that was most likely just asking him to help Chu Yang reach the Nascent Soul Realm and the one that wanted him to spread out interspatial rings across the world¡­


    Among these three quests given by the system, the one rted to the strength of the Flying Sword Sect did not increase his strength and would instead increase the strength of the sect. Given the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect would be officially a single sect after thepletion of the new main sect, Xuan Hao expected toplete this quest after thepletion of the new main sect.


    The one rted to Chu Yang and the quest wanting him to throw away interspatial rings were both a mystery, as both of them did not state what reward he would gain frompleting them. An increase in cultivation could be one of the rewards, but it could also be somethingpletely different.


    Thinking about the limited time quest, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he pulled it up with the help of the system.


    [Limited Time Quest: You have found a brilliant way to recruit new potential disciples! Scatter 1000 interspatial rings around the world. The system will add a specific test to the ring that will test the potential future disciples. Interspatial Rings will only be counted towards the quest if they are scattered a certain distance away from each other. Timer will begin upon reaching the Domain Lord Realm!]


    [Time: 8.6 years]


    [1097/1000]


    [Reward: vary depending on the amount of sessfully scattered interspatial rings]


    In a sense he had alreadypleted the quest, but it seemed like he would not be able to get a reward before the timer ended and it looked like he would have to make more interspatial rings to throw away for a better reward. The only problem was¡­ The Moon Silver he had used to make interspatial rings had run out!


    It hadsted for a far longer time that he had expected, but in the end, he was now left with nothing to make new interspatial rings whenever he had time to waste¡­


    "Hah¡­ Looks like I will have to find some more Moon Silver in the future, or at least somethingparable to it that can be used for interspatial rings if I want to try and get a better reward from the system¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao inevitably thought about Yi Min.


    Given the number of spiritual metals in her possession, she would surely have a few suitable for making interspatial rings with-


    Hm? Who is it?


    Whoosh~


    Suddenly noticing an unfamiliar elder approaching his pavilion, Xuan Hao frowned before moving to the front of the pavilion to meet the elder who wasing.


    ¡­


    "Did something happen?"


    "Ah! Elder Xuan?! Y-you gave me a shock. Appearing in front of me like that¡­ No nothing serious happened, I just came here on behalf of myself and a few other elders who wanted to join your quarterly lecture that is starting in a few hours!


    You don''t have to worry about us interrupting your lecture! All of us will bepletely silent and will just listen on the side without saying anything." Almost jumping into the air upon seeing Xuan Hao suddenly appear in front of him, the elder quickly exined his reason for showing up. Making sure to exin he was here on behalf of not only himself but a group of elders.


    Ah¡­ That''s right, there is also the repeatable sect quest¡­ Because it was once every 3 months, I decided to get Elder Song''s help in arranging the lectures and helping select the participants for me.


    If I''m not wrong, this time around, the lecture should be for the older disciples in the Foundation Establishment and Core Formation Realm who won in a tournament set up by Elder Song¡­ No wonder these elders want to join in as well, they want to listen to Core Formation Realm part of the lecture!


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help smiling. The elders of the Flying Sword Sect might be a bitzy when it came to certain things, but when it came down to it, they still wanted to improve their cultivation.


    Maybe holding a lecture for the Core Formation Realm Elders in the future is a good idea¡­ I should ask Elder Song about thister.


    "Sure, you and the other elders are wee to join."


    "Thank you! I will go and inform the others as quickly as possible!"


    Not seeing any reason to refuse the elder, Xuan Hao chuckled silently to himself as he watched the elder excitedly run down the mountain before rushing towards a group of elders anxiously waiting not too far away from his mountain.


    Following the elder returning with the news of them being able to listen in on the lecture if they remained silent, the group of elders all jumped up excitedly before praising the elder who had ventured up the mountain to ask him.


    Visit ?????????????.???, for the best no_vel_read_ing experience


    It was a quite heart-warming thing to witness the old elders acting like this¡­

 Chapter 615: Passing Time (5)

    Chapter 615: Passing Time (5)


    Knowing that he would be holding another lecture soon, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what he would get this time around.


    During the past year, he had held a total of three lectures.


    The first one he had chosen the spiritual herb reward like he had done the first time around. Unfortunately, he had not gotten any spiritual herb that could help Elder Song recover from the injuries he had suffered from refining the demonic medicinal potion for over 10 years straight¡­


    However, this did not mean the spiritual herbs he had gotten was bad in any way, as although they were not what he had been looking for, they were still incredibly rare spiritual herbs that could not be found easily.


    For the second reward, he had decided to choose something different and had ended up getting rewarded with a Peak Earth Rank Qi Technique called Fire Dragon Sword.


    Even if it was mostly useless to him as the technique was suitable for Core Formation Realm and Nascent Soul Realm Experts, it still helped him improve his sword domain after learning it.


    In the end, one of his domains was a sword domain. Learning more sword techniques would help improve it. Even if the technique he learned was low level, it could still help him improve his understanding of the sword dao and in turn increase the strength of his domain!


    For this reason, the thing he had spent most of his time on during the past year, was learning all the sword techniques inside the Flying Sword Sect that he could get his hands on.


    Not to mention, after he had learnt the Fire Dragon Sword, he could give it to the Flying Sword Sect and in turn help increase the number of techniques avable for Core Formation Realm Experts and Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the sect.


    After all, even if the Flying Sword Sect had arge number of both Earth Rank and Heaven Rank Qi Techniquespared to other sects on their level, the number was still miniscule when considering how few in the Flying Sword Sect could actually learn these techniques.


    By far, one of the most important things when it came to learning a new qi technique was affinity with the technique itself! If one had no affinity with the qi technique, one could only give up on learning it and go on to the next¡­


    More qi techniques meant that there was a higher chance of finding a suitable one to learn for the elders in the Core Formation Realm.


    In turn, learning a powerful Earth Rank Qi Technique might help these elders who remained stuck in the Core Formation Realm gain some insight into the Nascent Soul Realm and breakthrough!


    From this, it could be seen how important it was for the Flying Sword Sect to get more qi techniques at the Earth Rank!


    Feng Chen, Shu Yao, Elder Song, and the rest of the elders from both of the sects also realized this, as they had already begun moving their cultivation mantras and qi techniques to a massive new library at the Seventh Star Peak where the techniques of both the sects would be gathered in the future!


    At this point in time, the Fire Dragon Sword technique he had gotten from the system had already been ced inside this new library at the Seventh Star Peak and quite a few elders from both the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect had already begun learning it. Allowing them to show signs of improving in their cultivation after having been stagnant for a long time.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao had decided to also choose a qi technique for the third reward and was given a Peak Earth Rank Qi Technique called the Green Flower Barrier. The Green Flower Barrier was pretty useless to him, but the same could not be said for the elders, as the elders from the Spring Flower Sect were especially interested in this Qi Technique.


    From what he heard, there was even a Nascent Soul Realm elder from the Spring Flower Sect that chose to learn the Green Flower Barrier after it was put into the library at the Seventh Star Peak. Not anything odd considering a Peak Earth Rank Qi Technique could only be fully utilized by someone in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Looking for a spiritual herb that could help Elder Song recover the damage to his soul was simply not something that could be done with the reward from the lecture sect quest, as it seemed like the rewards were limited within a certain range. Spiritual Herbs at the Mystic Grade could not be obtained, and Qi Techniques above the Earth Rank were simrly not something that could be gained through a simple repeatable quest.


    However, even if the rewards from the repeatable sect quest was not something that was useful to improving his own cultivation realm most of the time¡­ Or helping Elder Song recover, it was still more than enough to help improve the overall strength of the Flying Sword Sect¡¯s elders. Maybe even helping create more Nascent Soul Realm elders for the sect in the future.Nn¨ºw n0vel chapters are published on n0v/e/(lb)i(n.)co/m


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if there would be more repeatable quests in the future. Although they were not that useful when it came to improving his own strength, they were perfect when it came to increasing the strength of the Flying Sword Sect.


    ¡°Hm?¡± Suddenly feeling a familiar presence approaching him from the entrance to the pavilion, Xuan Hao soon saw Chu Yanging out before moving directly towards him.


    ¡°Chu Yang, what is it?¡± Seeing Chu Yange over all of a sudden, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit curious. From what he remembered; he did not have any lesson nned with him today.


    Could it perhaps be that he wants to go outside again¡­?


    ¡°Master, can I join you for the lecture today?¡± However, contrary to what Xuan Hao had expected Chu Yang to ask him, Chu Yang just came out to ask about him joining the lecture he was holding for the older disciples of the Flying Sword Sect today.


    Given that he was nning to also talk about the Core Formation Realm, it was not a waste of time for him to participate in the lecture.


    ¡°Sure, you cane with me if you want.¡± Not seeing any reason to refuse his disciple¡¯s request, Xuan Hao agreed without any resistance.


    ¡°Thank you master!¡±


    Following Chu Yang deciding to follow along and join his lecture, Xuan Hao spent the next few hours leading up to the lecture teaching Qing Yi the Dragon Fire Sword.


    With Qing Yi being skilled in both the sword and having a connection to the dao of fire through her divine physique, she easily managed to master the beginner part of the Dragon Fire Sword.


    Going to the lecture together with Chu Yang, Xuan Hao spent the rest of the day on the lecture. Only finishingte into the evening when the sun had already started moving down behind the mountains surrounding the Flying Sword Sect.


    The lecture itself was a major sess and was by far the best lecture he had held so far. The main reason for this, was the fact that three of the older disciples participating in the lecture at the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm had managed to break through to the Core Formation Realm!


    At the moment, the strongest disciples of the Flying Sword Sect were the core disciples. Different from the personal disciples of the elders that had varying degrees of power depending on their master.


    Not to mention, each and every core disciple of the Flying Sword Sect had reached the Core Formation Realm and could, as the name suggested, be considered to be the core of the Flying Sword Sect!


    Each of them would be the future elders of the Flying Sword Sect when they gained enough experience and grew stronger in the Core Formation Realm.


    One lecture creating three more core disciples was a major thing in the Flying Sword Sect and instantly caused the reputation of Xuan Hao to reach a new level.


    Although notparable to Elder Song, his reputation in the Flying Sword Sect had already reached a height far above the rest of the Core Elders and some of the younger disciples had even started referring to him as either the Supreme Elder or Ancestor¡­!


    Heck, he was not even thirty years old, yet these disciples had already started calling him ancestor¡­


    The fact that his strength was at the Domain Lord Realm, while the rest of the Core Elders of the Flying Sword Sect was still at the Nascent Soul Realm, was something that had ended up causing some confusion to the disciples who just joined the sect.


    In the end, Elder Song contacted Feng Chen about it and together with Shu Yao, the three of them decided that a new position was necessary for Xuan Hao.


    At the same time, they also decided to change the current hierarchy of the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect would have to be changed to a brand new one, as both sects ran on a system that was different.

 Chapter 616: New Sect Quest, Unique Cultivation Mantra

    Chapter 616: New Sect Quest, Unique Cultivation Mantra


    Following the end of his lecture, Xuan Hao waspletely unaware of the shock he had ended up causing to both the disciples and elders of the sect. Instead, the thing Xuan Hao was focused on was what reward he should choose after finishing his lecture.


    So¡­ A random Qi Technique again, or maybe I should try something different this time around¡­?


    As he had already chosen to get Qi Techniques three times in a row from the system, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about the other rewards. Especially the specialized cultivation mantra that the was among the rewards he could choose from.


    From what he understood, a specialized cultivation mantra should be something that solely focused on one element, simr to Qing Yi¡¯s Heaven Burning Mantra that was solely focused on the Dao of Fire and would help Qing Yi condense a fire domain in the future when she broke through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    ¡°Chu Yang, what do you think our sect is currentlycking? Qi Techniques or a wider array of cultivation mantras?¡± Not knowing what to choose, Xuan Hao decided to ask Chu Yang walking beside him.


    Given that Chu Yang was more active when it came to talking with other disciples inside the sect, he should have some idea about what the sect disciples would gain the most benefit of.


    ¡°What the sect iscking? The sect is not reallycking any Qi Techniques if you are talking about the disciples below the Core Formation Realm¡­ If I had to say anything, we have quite a small number of cultivation mantras at the Earth Rank and above. Not to mention, most of those techniques are sword based.


    Although this is fine as the sect¡¯s fundamental cultivation mantra is rather easy to learn, there are still some born with talents in certain elements that can¡¯t progress through this path and will have to choose an inferior cultivation mantra because the sect doesn¡¯t have any at the Earth Rank that fits them¡­¡± Finishing his long answer, Chu Yang turned his attention towards his master.


    ¡°¡­¡±


    Even from a nce, Xuan Hao could tell that he was curious about why he had suddenly asked him such a question.


    ¡°I was asking because, I wanted to gather some new qi techniques and mantras for the sect in the near future and was wondering which of the two was more urgent. From what you say, it seems like I will have to focus on getting my first-hand more cultivation mantras first!¡±


    ¡°I see! It will indeed be great if we can get some more cultivation mantras in the future! I¡¯m sure the disciples stuck practicing a cultivation mantra not fitting for them will be happy if they find out master is nning to gather some of the cultivation mantras that the sect iscking!¡± Nodding his head in understanding after hearing what his master said, Chu Yang could not help feeling excited thinking about a few friends he had made in the sect that werecking a proper cultivation mantra to practice.


    ¡°Yeah¡­ I¡¯m sure they will. Let¡¯s get back to the pavilion for now.¡± Feeling the all too familiar notificationing from the system after Chu Yang had finished speaking, Xuan Hao understood that his short conversation had ended up triggering a brand-new quest.


    Whoosh~


    For this reason, Xuan Hao used his domain and quickly flew both of them back to the pavilion instead of walking back.


    Now that he had gotten a new quest from the system, he really wanted to find out what it was.


    ¡­


    Returning back to his own room inside the pavilion, Xuan Hao did not immediately choose a reward for the repeatable quest and instead pulled up the system interface to check out the new quest he had gotten after his conversation with Chu Yang.


    [Sect Quest: Gather Unique Cultivation Mantras for the Sect.]


    [Description: The sect iscking when ites to the different cultivation mantras avable for the disciples. Gather 10 unique cultivation mantras. Not one can be the same and all of them have to at least reach the Earth Rank.]?iscover n??w chapt??rs ??n n0??e(l)bi??(.


    [Unique Cultivation Mantras: 0/10]


    [Reward: Enter a State of Enlightenment for one hour.]


    Although the quest in itself was not that easy toplete, it had no time limit, and he should be able toplete it using the repeatable sect quest. Even if it would take him some time, he should be able toplete in a few years.


    The only confusing thing about the sect quest, was the reward¡­


    Enter a state of enlightenment¡­? Xuan Hao had no idea what this meant!


    The only thing he could think of was the source crystal he had consumed when breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm¡­ Could it be that the state of enlightenment was simr to when one consumed a source crystal?


    If that was really the case, it might be able to help him figure out a way to merge his ice and sword domain together!


    Thinking this far, Xuan Hao could not help feeling excited as he wanted toplete the sect quest immediately and enter a state of enlightenment to figure out how he could merge his two domains together and have a clear path to the Soul Ascension Realm!


    However, he also understood that something like that was impossible, as he had no idea where to get so many new and unique cultivation mantras for the Flying Sword Sect outside of the repeatable sect quest that could only bepleted once every three months.


    Robbing the cultivation mantras from the sects under the Flying Sword Sect was not really an option either, as there was a high chance that the Flying Sword Sect already had a cultivation mantra simr to it. Meaning that their cultivation mantras would not be unique be a new unique cultivation mantra.


    If he wanted to rob cultivation mantras, he would most likely have to go outside the territory of what had once been the Heavenly Sky Kingdom or rob a stronger sect like the Seven Fates Sect¡­


    However, given that the sect master of the Seven Fates Sect had reached the Domain Lord Realm ording to Shu Yao, Xuan Hao did not really want to unnecessarily fall out with them for something he could simply wait a few months longer for.


    After all, even if he managed to find a way to merge his ice and sword domain together, he would still have to first reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm before he would be able to attempt breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm!


    There is no hurry for now and I¡¯m not even certain about what the reward really is in the first ce! What if it isn¡¯t like the source crystal and instead somethingpletely different?


    Shaking his head as this thought urred to him, Xuan Hao did not bother thinking about a way toplete the new sect quest quicker and instead decided to just take things slowly andplete it with the help of his repeatable sect quest.


    [Chosen reward: Specialized Cultivation Mantra?]


    [Y/N]


    Yes!


    Swish~


    [Unique Cultivation Mantras: 1/10]


    Choosing the specialized cultivation mantra as a reward for the repeatable quest, Xuan Hao watched a small book materialize in the air in front of him, while the sect quest for gathering unique cultivation mantras went up from 0 to 1.


    Even though it was still a long way from beingpleted, Xuan Hao felt happy knowing that his guess was indeed correct, and the repeatable sect quest could help himplete this brand-new sect quest.


    ¡°Hm¡­ I wonder what kind of cultivation mantra this is¡­¡± Turning his attention away from the system, Xuan Hao curious looked down at the small book that had manifested in front of him.


    ¡°Dark Shadow Demon Mantra¡­ Why does this feel like a demonic cultivation mantra¡­?¡± Reading the name of the cultivation mantra, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he muttered this to himself.


    Dark Shadow Demon Mantra, this sounded exactly like a demonic cultivation mantra no matter how he looked at it!


    Whoosh~


    Grabbing hold of the cultivation mantra still floating in front of him with the help of his domain, Xuan Hao quickly looked through it.


    Reading through the Dark Shadow Demon Mantra over the next few minutes, Xuan Hao could not help putting down the cultivation mantra with a shocked expression on his face.


    ¡°Dark Shadow Demon Mantra¡­ Dark Shadow Demon Mantra¡­ To think this is actually not a demonic cultivation mantra, but instead a cultivation mantra focused on cultivating a rare form of spiritual qi that only appears during the night¡­¡±


    Indeed, the Dark Shadow Demon Mantra was not a demonic cultivation mantra like he had expected but was instead a cultivation mantra specialized in cultivating a special qi that only formed during the night!


    Not to mention this¡­ It also required the user to have a special physique called the Dark Shadow Demon Physique!


    The system was indeed not wrong that this was a unique cultivation mantra!


    To be honest, Xuan Hao wondered if anyone in the Flying Sword Sect could even practice such a unique cultivation mantra in the first ce¡­

 Chapter 617 Qing Yi and Chu Yangs Progress

    Chapter 617 Qing Yi and Chu Yang''s Progress


    "Master, it''s Qing Yi, I wanted to ask you about something¡­"


    "Come in."


    Putting away the Dark Shadow Demon Mantra after hearing Qing Yi calling out to him from the entrance to his room, Xuan Hao allowed her to enter.


    Creak~


    Following what he said, Qing Yi soon opened the door to the room before entering with a somewhat nervous expression on her face.


    Looking at her, Xuan Hao could not help reminiscing over how much she had improved over the past year.


    Not only had she improved a lot when it came to alchemy and could already be considered to have reached the level of a skilled Expert Alchemist, close to the peak of the realm¡­ But she had also managed breakthrough to the Fifth Stage of the Core Formation Realm a few weeks ago!


    Even if her strength had not improved on the same level as Chu Yang, who had already managed to reach the Seventh Stage of the Core Formation Realm, she was notcking too far behind considering she was also spending arge amount of time improving her alchemy.


    If Chu Yang found a profession like Qing Yi in the future, Xuan Hao was almost sure that she would be able to catch up to him. Maybe even overtake him and be the strongest among his three disciples!


    "What is it you wanted to ask me about?"


    Turning his attention back to Qing Yi as he watched her nervously standing in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about what she hade to ask him about for her to be so nervous¡­ At the very least, he could tell that it should not be something rted to cultivation or alchemy for her to be like this.


    "I-I wanted to ask master if I could return to my family for a few days¡­"


    "Hm? Return to your family? Did something perhaps happen?" Hearing what Qing Yi said, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he thought something might have happened to her family. The first reason that popped into his mind was that the ck Rose Sect that hadpletely disappeared had reappeared and taken revenge on the people who had been rted to them being forced into hiding.


    "No! It''s not anything like that! I-I just wanted to go back and see my father again, as it has already been over a year since Ist saw him¡­" Not wanting her master to end up misunderstanding her, Qing Yi quickly exined her reason for wanting to visit her family.


    Seeing the expression on Qing Yi''s face as she exined why she wanted to go back to see her father, Xuan Hao quickly understood that the girl was missing her father. Different from Chu Yang and Bai Ning who had no family left in the world and only had him to look after them, Qing Yi still had a father that loved her very much.


    Not seeing her father for over a year, had obviously made her miss him very much¡­


    "I see¡­ You are free to go back and visit your family for a few days, there is no need to ask me about something like this in the future."


    "Thank you master!"


    Not wanting to restrict her disciple from seeing her father, Xuan Hao decided to let her go and see him. After all, he was not looking to force his disciple to only stay in the sect and give up her family from before he joined the sect!


    "You can go now. Go and see your father."


    "Yes!"


    Whoosh~


    Not waiting around after getting her master''s permission, Qing Yi rushed out of his room before making her way towards the stables to get her hands on a flying demon beast that would make her travel back home faster.


    Even if the number of flying demon beasts in the Flying Sword Sect were limited, Qing Yi could easily get her hands on one with her current strength and status as a disciple of the strongest elder of the Flying Sword Sect!


    "I should also get going, I still have to put the Dark Shadow Demon Mantra into the new library¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao jumped into the air before leaving for the Shattered Star Peaks. Intending to ce the new cultivation mantra he had just gotten his hands on into the new library located on the Seventh Star Peak.


    Given his current strength, the distance between the Shattered Star Peaks and the Flying Sword Sect could easily be covered in a minute or less time, something unimaginable to a normal Domain Lord.


    ¡­


    Whoosh~


    "Looks like they have already begun moving the elders and the disciples from the Spring Flower Sect over¡­" Arriving at the Seventh Star Peak, Xuan Hao felt a bit surprised watching arge number of both elders and disciples moving around the almost finished library with excited expressions on their faces.


    Different from the current Flying Sword Sect where the knowledge had been split up into several different pagodas, the new library would contain all the knowledge from both the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect!


    The Heaven Rank cultivation mantras and qi techniques were all stored in a special location inside the library itself, but outside of this, most of the knowledge were avable for these elders and disciples to read.


    The architect who hade up with this massive library located towards the centre of the Seventh Star Peak, was Shu Yao.


    Now that I think about it, I wonder what Zu Fei and Shu Yao ended up doing to Feng Chen¡­


    Remembering how the two of them had conspired together to get Feng Chen to work with them on the new main sect, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about what had happened to Feng Chen.


    At least he had not heard about anything happening to him yet, so he could at the very least confirm that the two had not done anything yet-


    Or perhaps they have already done something, but no one discovered anything yet¡­?


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao soon found a ce for the Dark Shadow Demon Mantra inside the library.


    "Hm¡­ If someone finds this in the future, they will surely think that its some kind of demonic cultivation mantra¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced down at the small book with the words Dark Shadow Demon Mantra written on it, Xuan Hao worried that it might end up scaring away anyone from practicing it in the future.


    "Ah! Why don''t I do it like that!?"


    Rumble~


    Eximing loudly as he suddenly had an idea, Xuan Hao used his domain to create a small bookshelf in a small empty location before cing the Dark Shadow Demon Mantra inside of it.


    "Hm¡­ Now for the finishing touch-"


    Whoosh~


    "That''s it!"


    Smiling happily while looking at the brand-new bookshelf he had just made, Xuan Hao could not help nodding his head in satisfaction before leaving the library.


    ¡­


    "Hey, are you not looking for a new cultivation mantra given that the one you are practicing now is ipatible with you?"


    "Yes¡­ I have been looking for a new cultivation mantra for the past two days, I thought that since we merged together with the Flying Sword Sect, they might have a cultivation mantra that would bepatible with me¡­ However, in the end, I have yet to find anything that works¡­"


    Shortly after Xuan Hao left the library, two young girls from the Spring Flower Sect walked towards the bookshelf he had just finished constructing.


    "Hm? What is that? I didn''t see this before¡­ Perhaps they brought in some new cultivation mantras for the library?"


    As one of the two spotted the new bookshelf, the other young girl who wasmenting over not being able to find a cultivation mantra that waspatible with her instantly rushed over before standing directly in front of the new bookshelf with only a single cultivation mantra on it.


    "Dark Shadow Demon Mantra? Is this some sort of demonic cultivation mantra¡­?" Reading the title of the cultivation mantra on the bookshelf, the young girl could not help frowning.


    [Demonic sounding cultivation mantras that are not demonic cultivation mantras]


    Just as she was about to put the Dark Shadow Demon Mantra back on to the bookshelf, she spotted a wooden board attached to the side of the bookshelf.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say when she saw this, the young girl could only smile wryly as her friend soon came over.


    "What is it, is it interest-"


    Only to stare speechlessly at the wooden board like her friend after seeing the Dark Shadow Demon Mantra in her hand.


    Given that the Dark Shadow Demon Mantra might be mistaken for a demonic cultivation mantra in the future, Xuan Hao had made a brand-new bookshelf for it. Writing in bold letters on top of a wooden board attached to the bookshelf.


    "Guess¡­ I will try it out¡­" Not having been able to find a cultivation mantra that was fitting for the past two days, the young girl with the Dark Shadow Demon Mantra in her hand, bit her lower lip as she said this.


    Intending to give the Dark Shadow Demon Mantra that sounded like a demonic cultivation mantra a try.

 Chapter 618 New Sect Hierarchy

    Chapter 618 New Sect Hierarchy


    At the same time that the Dark Shadow Demon Mantra was picked up by the young girl from the Spring Flower Sect, Xuan Hao arrived in front of arge courtyard located not too far away from the massive library.


    Creak~


    Entering the courtyard, Xuan Hao quickly caught sight of the three people sitting around a small table enjoying a light meal. The people in question were Shu Yao, Feng Chen and Zu Fei who were in charge of the construction on the Seventh Star Peak.


    "Elder Xuan? What brings you here?" Among the three of them, the first person to catch sight of him was Shu Yao, who had picked up on his presence the moment he entered the courtyard.


    "I''m just here to ask about the current progress of the sect¡­ From what I could see outside, it seems like everything is already finished outside a few of therger buildings." Answering Shu Yao before the other two had any time to react to his sudden appearance, Xuan Hao could not help mentioning what he had seen of the sect so far.


    From what he had seen when he hade to deliver the unique cultivation mantra to the massive library, most of the new main sect has already beenpleted.


    Only a few buildings like the massive library and the profession rted buildings had yet to bepleted. The residential area for the disciples and elders had already been finished, and so had the different pavilions, halls and other buildings for lectures, artifacts, trading, food and so on.


    "The current situation of the sect¡­?" Putting on a thoughtful expression as she thought about his question, Shu Yao nced towards Feng Chen.


    "Ahm! We have already started moving the disciples and elders from the Spring Flower Sect over and will soon be begin moving the disciples from the Flying Sword Sect over. Leaving a few elders and disciples at the location of the old main sects to manage them as branches in the future. After all, it would be a waste to just give up our past sects after building them up over so many years!" Understanding that she was looking at him for help with the question, Feng Chen who clearly understood the current situation better answered the question.


    "I see, I will have to prepare to move then- "


    Nodding his head in understanding after hearing that he would soon be moving to the Seventh Star Peak, Xuan Hao felt that there was something odd about the expressions on the trios faces just as he was about to turn around to leave.


    "Is there anything other than that?"


    Surprisingly, the one to step forward and say this was neither Shu Yao nor Feng Chen, but was instead Zu Fei, who had remained silent so far. "Yes¡­ Actually, we already discussed with Elder Song and the other important elders from the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect and decided to rename the sect now that we are merging together."


    "So, what name did youe up with? Or perhaps you haven''t decided on a name yet?" Not really caring much about the name of the sect in the first ce when hearing what Zu Fei said, Xuan Hao just felt curious after hearing that they had decided to change the name of the sect into something new after the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect merged together.


    "It has not been decided yet¡­ Several elders came up with all sorts of names like the Celestial Sword Blossom Sect, Astral Spring Sword Sect, Celestial Sword Sect, Golden Star Sect, Shattered de Flower Sect. However, among all of these, the most popr one so far was Shattered Star Sect that was suggested by an elder called Elder ying Ghost¡­


    At this point in time, the elder already managed to gain a lot of support among both the elders from the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect and if nothing happens, its highly likely that the name from Elder ying Ghost will be chosen¡­" Finishing her exnation of the current situation regarding the battle between the elders who wanted to help in naming the sect, Zu Fei secretly nced towards Xuan Hao, curious about whether or not he would also suggest a name.


    "Haha, the elders sure are creative, I''m curious about what name it will end up as in the end." However, much to Zu Fei''s disappointment, Xuan Hao did not suggest a name. Instead choosing to let the elders already dedicated to the cause find out a new sect name by themselves.


    In the first ce, if he joined in to such a conversation, he was almost sure that the elders would end up agreeing with whatever name he ended up suggesting¡­ No matter how bad it was¡­ Given his current status as the strongest person in the Flying Sword Sect.


    "There should be something other than deciding a new name for the sect¡­ Right?" Understanding that deciding a new sect name should not be all, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards Shu Yao who looked like she wanted to say something as he said this.


    Not letting down his intuition, Shu Yao nodded her head before she began talking. "Yes¡­ Other than deciding on a new sect name, we also decided to restructure the sect and remake the current hierarchy of the sect. The main reason for this is that both our sect''s current systems are mainly designed around the strongest elders being in the Nascent Soul Realm, while the strongest disciples would at most have reached the earlier stages of the Core Formation Realm¡­


    In the future, we are sure to have far more Nascent Soul Realm Elders and won''t be able to assign all of them as core elders. Not to mention, we don''t really have a status for anyone in the Domain Lord Realm like myself and Elder Xuan!"


    "So, what is this new system that you made?" Hearing what Shu Yao said, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious.


    The current system of the Flying Sword Sect was based on a traditional sect system that was popr in the surrounding few kingdoms, where the Sect Master at the top, followed by the Vice Sect Master, core elders, normal elders, core disciples, inner disciples and finally outer disciples. The Spring Flower Sect had a slightly different system, but it ran on the same principal where the sect master is at the top.


    Although this system was fine for new sects that had only existed for a few hundred years, it would not work forrger sects who had existed for thousands, if not tens of thousands of years.


    Sects like that would normally have dozens of ancestors whose strength far surpassed the sect master in control of the sect and would have far too many Nascent Soul Realm Experts for them all to be core elders¡­


    For this reason, Xuan Hao was rather curious about the new system Shu Yao had mentioned, as he was almost certain he would end up getting a new position above that of a core elder with his current strength!


    "The new system we decided on starts with applicants, the young people who have yet to join the sect and are waiting to enter the sect. Outer sect disciple, new disciples who just joined the sect and is around the Qi Condensation Realm and the Foundation Establishment Realm. This should be where most of the disciples are. After this, we have the inner sect disciple who can be considered the senior disciples of the sect, they should be around theter stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm and the earlier stages of the Core Formation Realm.


    Above them are the outer sect elders in charge of teaching the inner and outer sect disciples, who should at least have reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and- "


    "Wait¡­ Core Formation Realm for an inner sect disciple? What are the requirements for bing a core disciple¡­?" Stopping Shu Yao before she continued talking, Xuan Hao could not help asking her.


    After all, in the current Flying Sword Sect, the strongest core disciples were only in the Core Formation Realm, yet now they would all be demoted to inner disciples¡­? Even without hearing it, Xuan Hao could understand that the requirements for a bing a core disciple would be far harder than it currently was¡­


    "Yes! In the future, we should make sure that the core disciples are at the very leastparable to core disciples of other sects with Domain Lords in them. From what I know, this means that the minimum requirement of a Core Disciple should be below one hundred years and have a cultivation at the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    "Nascent Soul Realm below one hundred years to be a core disciple¡­?" Hearing what Shu Yao said, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly. Given the current state of both the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect, there was no disciples who had reached the Nascent Soul Realm below the age of one hundred. Maybe in the future, his three disciples could reach it, but that was for the future¡­


    "No need to worry about it, core disciples will be different in the future, as all of them are considered to be future sect elders and maybe even core elders! You have to remember that the strength of everyone in the sect should rapidly improve over the next few years and it won''t be weird if we have a few dozen core disciples some twenty years in the future. Especially considering how great the Seventh Star Peak is for cultivation!" Not backing down after hearing Xuan Hao''s doubtful question, Shu Yao proudly said this as if she could she a brilliant future spreading out before her where the strength of the sect had reached a far higher level.


    "Okay¡­ So, what about the remaining positions?" Knowing that he could not fight her on this, Xuan Hao decided to let it go and asked her about the remaining positions.


    "Ah, following the core disciples are the assistant elders, they will be in charge of managing the sect''s internal matters and while above the core disciples in terms of status, will not be required to have reached the Nascent Soul Realm, as their job will mostly revolve around managing the distribution of resources inside the sect and other matters."


    Listening to the description of the assistant elder, Xuan Hao could not help ncing towards Feng Chen. "I Take it that this was position was suggested by Elder Song and Feng Chen?"


    "Hehe, it was indeed suggested by me and Elder Song¡­" Awkwardlyughing after being called out, Feng Chen nodded his head as he acknowledged it.


    "Ahm, let''s continue! After the assisting elders are the normal sect elders who should at least have reached the Nascent Soul Realm, the Core Elders, who should have reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm and the brand-new position of Grand Elder For the Domain Lord Realm, that will be given to you and me!" Smiling happily as she announced her own and his new position, Shu Yao looked towards Xuan Hao for a reaction.


    "Grand Elder¡­? I see¡­" However, she did not get the reaction she had expected to see. Instead, she had just been met with a deadpan expression that didn''t really seem to care about the change in status.


    "Mou~ At least pretend to be happy¡­" Frowning as she said this, Xuan Hao could not help rolling his eyes as Shu Yao pouted angrily at him.


    "Are there any more positions other than the Vice Sect Master and the Sect Master position?" Not wanting to deal with an angry Shu Yao, Xuan Hao quickly tried to change the topic as he asked this.


    "Other positions than sect master and vice sect master? Hm¡­ There are the guest elders who are strong people we could recruit from outside the sect and also the ancestor position for when our hair starts going grey~" Thinking for a short moment before answering, Shu Yao could not help showing a teasing smile when saying thest part.


    "¡­" Not saying anything in response, Xuan Hao once again rolled his eyes. From the looks of it, Shu Yao was in a rather troublesome mood, and it would be best for him to escape as quickly as possible¡­

 Chapter 619 Qi Spring

    Chapter 619 Qi Spring


    Following what Shu Yao said, both Zu Fei and Feng Chenughed to themselves, as they looked like they were more than happy to watch from the side.


    "Seeing as you have already informed me about our new sect hierarchy, I will be taking my leave for now! From the looks of it, Feng Chen and Zu Fei are more than happy to continue the conversation with you." Taking his chance to leave before Shu Yao had the chance to start causing any more trouble, Xuan Hao directly took his leave from the courtyard. Not forgetting to get the two who had justughed at him in trouble.


    Whoosh~


    Before the group of three had any time to react to what he said, Xuan Hao directly used his strength at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and ran away.


    ""¡­""


    Feng Chen and Zu Fei could only stare at the location Xuan Hao had been standing just a second earlier speechlessly before turning their attention towards Shu Yao who was simrly staring towards the direction Xuan Hao had disappeared in with a frown on her face.


    From her expression alone, it could be seen that she had not expected for Xuan Hao to be able to run away so quickly without her even having a chance to see anything¡­


    They were both in the Domain Lord Realm, howe the difference in speed between both of them was sorge¡­?


    Soon shaking her head as she thought about how Xuan Hao had likely already far surpassed her own strength; Shu Yao turned her attention towards Feng Chen and Zu Fei standing not too far away from her as a mischievous spark appeared in her eyes.


    Just like Xuan Hao had expected, Shu Yao was in a rather dangerous state and from the looks of things, Feng Chen and Zu Fei would soon be her victims!


    ¡­


    Leaving the courtyard, Xuan Hao did not directly leave the Seventh Star Peak. Instead, he decided to take a look around the new sect, as he had not really taken his time to properly see in its current almostpleted state and also wanted to find out about where to stay in the future.


    Other than that, he also wanted to try and find a location to ce the five low grade and single mid-grade Qi Springs he had obtained in the past.


    Back then, he did not want to use them, as they could not be moved after being ced down and the fact that the main sect would move to the Shattered Star Peaks was already obvious at that point.


    Now however, the new main sect had pretty much already been finished and he didn''t expect for him and the rest of the sect to move anywhere new within a short span of time. Even if they moved somewhere new outside the Seventh Star Peak, it was very likely that the new ce they expanded towards would just be another of the Nine Star Peaks of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    With all of this in mind, it was a given that he would find a location for the Qi Springs he had obtained back then.


    The only problem was that he still had no idea what the Qi Springs actually did¡­ From the name alone, he could guess that they were likely something that would increase the concentration of qi in an area around themselves and make it easier for someone to cultivate, but other than that, Xuan Hao had no idea about the benefits that would be brought by the Qi Springs.


    However, this did not make Xuan Hao hesitate in cing them down. Instead, it just made him more curious and excited to find out just how useful the Qi Springs would be for cultivation.


    "Hm?" Walking along one of the new paths leading towards the centre of the Seventh Star Peak, Xuan Hao could not help noticing that the centre of the Seventh Star Peak had been left empty without any buildings, pagodas, pavilions and simr ced there.


    Would this not be a perfect location for the Spirit Springs¡­?


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao was just about to turn around and make his way back towards the courtyard with Shu Yao, Feng Chen and Zu Fei to ask them about whether or not anything was nned to be constructed at the location.


    "¡­"


    However, remembering the fact that he had just escaped from that ce a few minutes earlier, Xuan Hao decided against it and instead just asked a few of the elders walking around helping with the construction of the sect.


    "The centre¡­? As far as I know, there isn''t really anything nned for it."


    "No, we don''t have any ns with the centre part."


    "If I''m not wrong, Elder Zu Fei was talking about making it into some kind of garden or something along that line¡­"


    Hearing what the centre of the Seventh Star Peak did indeed not have anything important nned for it, Xuan Hao could not help showing a satisfied smile.


    [Redeem one Low Grade Qi Spring?]


    [Y/N]


    Yes!


    After knowing that the centre part of the Seventh Star Peak had nothing important nned for it, Xuan Hao pulled out the system without waiting and decided to redeem a single of the five avable low grade Qi Spring to start with.


    The reason why he didn''t directly redeem all the QI Springs, was because he wanted to find out what they did. Even if he had an idea of their usage, he did not n to waste all of them because of a simple mistake¡­


    Given that the Seventh Star Peak covered a rtivelyrge area, stretching for a mile or two out from the centre in all directions without anything around, Xuan Hao easily found a location to ce the Qi Spring that only covered an area of a few meters.


    Fwoosh~!


    Waiting for a few seconds, Xuan Hao soon watched as the area of the Qi Spring broke open as water stream erupted from the ground.


    "This is¡­" Not expecting for the thing toe out to be water, Xuan Hao watched the water stream erupting from the ground slowly calm down before flowing out into the area surrounding the new natural water spring.


    "The qi inside the water is so rich¡­ Is this perhaps what a Qi Spring is¡­?" Carefully inspecting the watering out from the ground, Xuan Hao could not help feeling surprised after realizing that the watering out from the spring was filled to the brim with an extremely pure form of qi that could easily be absorbed by either cultivating inside the water or by directly swallowing it.


    "Hm? It¡­ Doesn''t seem to be slowing down anymore¡­" Realizing that the flow of water filled with pure qi did not slow down any longer, Xuan Hao slowly came to a realization that the water filled with pure qi would likely continue flowing out from the Qi Spring created by the system!


    Although the flow of water filled with pure qi was not too fast, if things continued like this, the water would most likely cause a flooding on the Seventh Star Peak!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he looked towards the Qi Spring. More and more water filled with pure qi flowed out from it as the few meters around the Qi Spring had already started changing from a barrenndscape to a muddy one as the ground and water mixed together.


    Due to the fact that the water was filled with pure qi that could easily be consumed, the mud made from the water transformed into some kind of spiritual mud that could simrly be consumed¡­


    Whoosh~


    Not wanting to see things continue like this, Xuan Hao flew into the air and observed the centre of Seventh Star Peak from above.


    "I could create ake to contain the water and add in the other four low grade Qi Springs to fill it up. Not only would this be a great way to store the water. Cultivating inside theke and beside it should also allow one to absorb the pure qi from the water." Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao came to a decision as his strength erupted before violently smashing into the ground below him.


    Ching~!


    "Hmph, looks like this should be the Seventh Star Peak itself¡­" Frowning to himself as theke slowly began forming below him, Xuan Hao could not help marvelling over just how hard the ground became after digging through the few meters of dirt and loose rocks that had formed over the years since the Seventh Star Peak had been broken by the falling star.


    The strength required to make theke was no longer something a Nascent Soul Realm Expert would be capable of, as it required the strength of someone who had at least reached the Domain Lord Realm to dig into the rocks that was originally part of the Seventh Star Peak.


    Rumble~!


    The entire thing instantly caused the entire Seventh Star Peak to shake, as Xuan Hao used his full strength to dig out ake with a circumference of a few miles at the centre of the Seventh Star Peak.

 Chapter 620 Qi Spring Lake

    Chapter 620 Qi Spring Lake


    Rumble~!


    "W-w-what is happing!? Why did the entire mountain suddenly start shaking so violently!?"


    "Please don''t copse, I just finished this-"


    Crash!


    "Look over there, something is happening at the centre of the peak!"


    As all the people on top of the Seventh Star Peak felt the violent shaking originating from the centre of the mountain peak, most of them panicked for a short moment before rapidly rushing towards the ce where Xuan Hao was busy making theke for the Qi Spring Water to fill up.


    Well¡­ Everyone except a certain elder who stared helplessly at a copsed pavilion that he had just finished building.


    ¡­


    "Hmph!" Frowning as he felt the resistance from the rocks that made up the Seventh Star Peak increase even further, Xuan Hao tried his best to make theke he was making even deeper.


    RUMBLE-!


    This time around, he used his full strength to dig into the tough rocks of the Seventh Star Peak-


    Ching~


    However, in the end he only managed to go a few meters deeper before feeling that the strength required to dig deeper had increased once again. Far surpassing anything he had ever tried attacking when it came to durability, as even with his full strength, he could only barely scratch the rocks below. Not able to dig any deeper into the rocks.


    "Looks like I will have to reach the Soul Ascension Realm if I want to deepen theke any further¡­ Or at the very least be as strong as someone in the Soul Ascension Realm." Muttering this to himself as he gazed down towards the rocky surface below, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head as he decided to give up on making theke any deeper than it was for now.


    At the very least, he had managed to make it a few dozen meters deep already-


    "Won''t it take years to fill up thiske¡­?" Realizing just howrge theke he had just made actually was, Xuan Hao nced towards the low-grade qi spring that had lowered along with the terrain.


    The stream of water constantly pouring out from it that seemed sorge before, was now tiny inparison to the massive empty hole in the ground that Xuan Hao had wanted to be ake filled with the qi rich water of the qi spring¡­


    Fwoosh~


    Fwoosh~


    Fwoosh~


    Fwoosh~


    Knowing that it would take far too long with only a single qi spring, Xuan Hao directly used the four remaining low-grade qi springs and ced them at different location around the massive emptyke he had just made.


    "Still too slow¡­"


    However, the speed of these 5 low-grade qi springs were still far too slow, as Xuan Hao decided to use the mid-grade qi spring, he had also obtained together with the 5 low-grade qi springs.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao ced the mid-grade qi spring at the deepest part of the emptyke, that was conveniently located at the centre of it.


    BOOM!


    Not having to wait for more than a few seconds, as a massive stream of water erupted from the ground before reaching close to a hundred meters into the air, Xuan Hao standing directly above the location of the mid-grade qi spring had no time to react-


    Ssh~!


    As the water from the mid-grade qi spring hit him directly in the face before slowly calming down and turning into a calm stream of water simr to what the five low grade qi springs had done. The only difference being the amount of water pouring out was many timesrger and although it did not have any more qi inside of it, Xuan Hao could clearly feel from first-hand experience, that the water pouring out from the mid-grade qi spring somehow helped his mind calm down.


    The benefit of the water from the mid-grade qi spring was obvious, as it would allow one''s mind to calm down, thus allowing one to cultivate andprehend the dao with far greater ease¡­ Or for those still not at that stage yet. Allow them toprehend their qi techniques and cultivation mantras faster.


    "¡­"


    Silently using his domain to clean himself up, Xuan Hao gazed down at the 6 different qi springs below him as the formerly emptyke he had made was slowly starting to fill up.


    Although it would still take a few months to fill uppletely, Xuan Hao was more than happy with the current speed that theke was filling up in. After all, if it was too fast, it would end up overflowing and start causing damage to the surrounding buildings.


    Even if the water from the qi springs was useful, the qi contained inside of it, also allowed it to cause a certain amount of damage, as it was difficult to get rid of. Outside of absorbing it for one''s own cultivation.


    As long as the sect absorbed the water from the qi springs to keep theke from overflowing, everything would be fine.


    Not to mention this, as time passed, the water at the deeper parts of theke would start concentrating if left alone for long enough.


    "I''m sure Elder Song would be happy when he finds out about this¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about the different events and tournament Elder Song would host for both elders and disciples to get an opportunity to enter theke in the future, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself, as he felt that the qi springs and theke would be crucial to increasing the strength of the sect.


    "I should also let Qing Yi, Chu Yang and Bai Ning enter theke in the future when its filled up and the qi rich water starts concentrating at the bottom¡­" Already feeling excited about having his disciples enter theke in the future, Xuan Hao didn''t notice the fact that arge number of people had gathered around the massive hole in the ground that had suddenly formed at the centre of the Seventh Star Peak with shocked expressions on their faces.


    Among the people who had rushed over after feeling the violent earthquake like shaking that spread out across the entire Seventh Star Peak, Shu Yao was the first to arrive, as she very clearly felt the terrifying power that had suddenly erupted shortly before the violent shaking.


    "What on earth is this¡­"


    Arriving at the scene and seeing the qi rich water slowly filling up the massive hole that had suddenly formed, Shu Yao had no idea what to say, as she was momentarily rendered speechless. The yful mood she had just a moment ago when she had been talking with Xuan Hao and the other two waspletely gone.


    Arriving a few seconds after Shu Yao, Zu Fei and Feng Chen showed a simr expression as Zu Fei was the first to break the silence that had suddenly descended upon the three of them after seeing what had happened to the centre of the Seventh Star Peak.


    "This is¡­ Did Elder Xuan do this¡­?"


    "I think so¡­ But I have no idea what that water is and where ites from¡­" Almost whispering this, Shu Yao shook her head with a confused look in her eyes.


    Very clearly, she had no idea what the qi rich watering from the qi springs were, nor did she have any idea where it hade from.


    "I think we should ask Elder Xuan about this. From the looks of it, this should be his doing." Saying this barely loud enough for Shu Yao and Zu Fei to hear him, Feng Chen gazed towards Xuan Hao floating a few meters above the mid-grade qi spring as he was looking down towards it with a happy expression stered all over his face.


    "That''s a good idea."


    "I agree, Elder Xuan should understand what this is¡­ Maybe he can also answer me why this emptyke suddenly appeared at the location where I nned to make a flower pavilion to grow spiritual flowers!"


    As both Shu Yao and Zu Fei agreed to ask Xuan Hao what theke and qi rich water was about, Zu Fei obviously also nned to ask him about something different as both her eye slowly narrowed while gazing towards Xuan Hao silently floating in the distance.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Why do I feel like someone is looking at me?" Suddenly feeling a cold gaze focused on him, Xuan Hao turned his attention away from the mid-grade qi spring and the water pouring out from it.


    "Shu Yao, Zu Fei, and Feng Chen? Why are they here- Ah! Digging out theke should have caused quite amotion¡­ Looks like not only those three are here, but quite a lot of elders showed up as well¡­" Spotting Shu Yao, Zu Fei, and Feng Chen standing at the edge of theke, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he suddenly realized that most of the elders and disciples present on the Seventh Star Peak were making their way over, or had already reached the edge of theke.

 Chapter ?621 Fooled by...

    Chapter ?621 Fooled by...


    "Everyone, there is nothing to see here for now, you can go back to what you were doing before!" Having realized why so many people had gathered around to see what was happening, Xuan Hao was about to say something when Shu Yao beat him to it.


    Following what Shu Yao said, although reluctant to leave without finding out about what had happened to the centre of the Seventh Star Peak, the elders and disciples understood the intention behind what Shu Yao said, as all of them soon left the area. Leaving behind only Shu Yao, Zu Fei, and Feng Chen.


    "So¡­ Elder Xuan, would you mind exining what this is about...?" Seeing that the elders and disciples had left, Zu Fei was the first one to step forward and ask about what he had done to the centre of the Seventh Star Peak with a smile on her lips.


    "As you can see, I transformed the centre of the Seventh Star Peak into ake to hold this water for future use and at the same time to serve as a special ce for both elders and disciples toe and cultivate¡­." Feeling a shiver run down his spine for some reason when facing Zu Fei, Xuan Hao quickly brushed the feeling aside as he began exining his reason for suddenly making such argeke, while also remembering to motion towards the water spewing out from the 6 different qi springs below him.


    "Indeed¡­ This water is really useful for helping when ites to cultivation!" Having already made her way down into the emptyke that was slowly being filled up by the 6 qi springs during his exnation, Shu Yao nodded her head as she carefully pulled up some of the water before inspecting it.


    Even if she didn''t have enough time to thoroughly inspect the water, she could still understand just how useful it was for improving the strength of the sect. Especially so given that the 6 origin points of the water seemed to have no intention of stopping any time soon.


    "What Shu Yao says is indeed true, I''m sure both the elders and disciples will be delighted when they hear about this¡­ Not to mention, the presence of theke might make it easier to convince some of the older elders who are reluctant to leave toe over the Seventh Star Peak in the future!" Arriving shortly after Shu Yao, Feng Chen agreed with what she said, as he had already begun nning on how to use it for the benefit of the sect.n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "¡­"


    The only person who didn''t say anything after arriving at the bottom of the emptyke already covered by a thinyer of qi rich water, was Zu Fei, who instead narrowed her eyes before picking up some water from the ground simr to what Shu Yao had done.


    "Is something wrong?" Noticing this odd behaviour from Zu Fei, Xuan Hao asked this in a confused tone. Not understanding why Zu Fei''s reaction was so different from the other two.


    "Ah! It''s probably because she had nned to build a flower pavilion to nurture spiritual flowers here¡­ Before¡­ You essentially turned it into a massive hole in the ground¡­" Answering before Zu Fei, Feng Chen smiled wryly after saying this.


    "¡­"


    At the same time Feng Chen exined this to Xuan Hao, Zu Fei''s eyes narrowed even further, as her attention turned away from the water held in the palm of her hand beforending on Feng Chen.


    "I see¡­ I''m sorry¡­" Not knowing what to say as he had no idea Zu Fei already had ns for the centre of the Seventh Star Peak, Xuan Hao could only awkwardly apologies.


    Given that he had already ced down the qi springs, Xuan Hao had no idea what to-


    "Ah! How about this, you can build a pavilion on top of theke and use theke to grow spiritual water lotus flowers and water lilies? Although the deeper parts of theke is too deep for this, the shallow areas around the edge of theke should be a great location for this!" Havinge up with the idea, Xuan Hao looked towards Zu Fei as he watched her narrowed eyes rx before a thinking look appeared on her face.


    "Hm¡­ Given the quality of the water¡­ Growing water lotus flowers and lilies would indeed be a great idea. Given the high quantity of qi in the water, they should alsoe out as fairly high quality when finished growing up¡­" Muttering this to herself as she continued to look around the emptyke slowly filling up and the thinyer of water covering the bottom slowly rising, Zu Fei soon nodded her head with a satisfied expression on her face before turning towards Xuan Hao.


    "This sounds like a great idea¡­ I just hope you will stop Elder Song from using the water here before it fills up enough for me to start growing lotus flowers and water lilies!"


    "That is fine with me, I''m sure Elder Song will understand and hold back with whatever event he ends uping up with after seeing this ce." Smiling happily after seeing that Zu Fei was satisfied, Xuan Hao could not help cursing the elders he had asked about the ns for the centre of the Seventh Star Peak just minutes earlier.


    All of them had told him that no one had anything nned, yet it turned out that Zu Fei already had nned out something for the centre of the Seventh Star Peak¡­ And looking at how upset she had looked, Xuan Hao understood that it should be something that she had been looking forward to making.


    At least everything ended well, as Shu Yao would end up making a pavilion close to the edge of theke, where she would grow and harvest both water lotus flowers and lilies in the future.


    The use of these spiritual flowers was aplete mystery to him, as even with the knowledge he had gained through the help of the system, he still had no idea what the use of those two spiritual flowers were.


    The only reason why he had even thought about these two rather unique spiritual flowers, was because he had once seen Zu Fei caring for a few of them she had kept in a small pond back at the Flying Sword Sect.


    Back then, he had asked one of the elders about these two special spiritual flowers and had ended up learning that they were by far the most precious spiritual flower that the Flying Sword Sect produced and sold for spirit stones. The only producer and person who could take care of these delicate spiritual flowers was Zu Fei!


    Something rather shocking to him back then, as Zu Fei''s normal behaviour¡­ Was rather violent and if he had not seen it for himself, he would never believe she could take care of such delicate spiritual flowers.


    "That''s great! Then I will get to nning and make sure to get the pavilion built before the water rises any further and makes it difficult to construct!"


    Hit with a new wave of energy after hearing Xuan hao agree to her request, Zu Fei no longer looked upset and was instead extremely excited-


    Whoosh-!


    Leaving the emptyke with renewed energy without saying anything more.


    "Looks like you will have to talk to Elder Song about this soon¡­ From what I know about that old man, there is no way he would give up on using this water before it fills up this ce¡­"


    "¡­"


    Hearing what Feng Chen said just after Zu Fei left, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he felt like he had somehow been fooled by Zu Fei into doing something rather troublesome for her.


    Not to mention convincing Elder Song to not use the water before theke filled up, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the old man might just sneak in and take some away while he was not looking.


    Although the sight of Elder Song stealing the qi rich water would be a rather entertaining sight to behold, Xuan Hao understood that if Elder Song really did something like that after finding out how useful it was for the disciples and elders, and it ended up getting out¡­ Xuan Hao had a feeling that this would not have a negative impact on his reputation and would instead only serve to improve it even further!


    "Haaaa¡­ I will have to take my leave... It looks like I will have to have a small chat with Elder Song about this ce¡­" Shaking his head as he said this, Xuan Hao soon waved goodbye to Shu Yao and Feng Chen before making his way back towards the Flying Sword Sect.


    Officially, he had nned to go to the Main Star Peak and finish exploring, but now that would have to wait for a few hours as he first had to convince Elder Song about the virtues of waiting to reap the rewards at ater date¡­

 Chapter ?622 Spirit Chess

    Chapter ?622 Spirit Chessn/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Returning back to the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao quickly found Elder Song just having finished talking with a group of elders in the Flying Sword City located just outside the sect, as he was making his way back.


    Even without knowing what he had been talking about, Xuan Hao could easily guess that it had something to do with what would happen with the Flying Sword City now that most of the people from the Flying Sword Sect, except a few people left to manage the old sect, would be leaving soon.


    Given the fact that most of the people living inside the Flying Sword City were all somewhat rted to someone from the Flying Sword Sect, there was no way Elder Song wouldn''te up with a way to possibly move these people to the new and growing city located at the base of the Ninth Star Peak.


    Although the city located at the base of the Ninth Star Peak was still far smaller than the current Flying Sword City and there was no way for it to house if everyone from the Flying Sword City moved over there¡­ Not to mention, the Spring Flower Sect would most likely also be in a simr situation!


    If the city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak wanted to house both all these people, it would have to at least grow to twice the size of the current Flying Sword City¡­ Something that would at least take a few years. Even with the current speed that the city was growing.


    Whoosh~


    Not bothering to think too much about this, as Elder Song should have already thought about a solution for this problem, Xuan Hao descended from the sky andnded a few meters in front of Elder Song who had just stepped into the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Elder Xuan? Is there something I can help with?"


    Seeing Xuan Hao suddenly appear in front of him, Elder Song was not surprised and instead just showed a curious expression while asking him. Wondering why Xuan Hao hade to see him.


    "Actually, I do have to something to talk to you about¡­ Can we go to my pavilion and talk¡­?" Thinking that it would be taking quite some time to convince Elder Song, Xuan Hao said this as he signalled towards his pavilion barely visible in the distance.


    "Hm? Sure, let''s get going!" Feeling that it might be something serious after hearing what Xuan Hao said, Elder Song quickly put on a serious face before both of them headed towards Xuan Hao''s pavilion.


    What followed, could easily be considered the most painful time in Xuan Hao''s life so far, as he informed him about the qi rich water before trying his best to convince him about not using it for the next few months¡­


    In the end, Song Jia who just so happened to be currently staying at his pavilion to y with Qing Yi. Ended up being his saviour, as she overheard their discussion and jumped in to help him convince Elder Song to hold back on using the qi rich water for the next few months!


    For some reason, with Song Jia''s help, Elder Song had almost instantaneously agreed to not using the qi rich water before it had filled up theke¡­ Song Jia truly had far more power over Elder Songpared to him¡­


    If not for Song Jia''s help, Xuan Hao was almost certain that he would have been unable to convince Elder Song!


    After he had managed to convince Elder Song through Song Jia''s help, Xuan Hao didn''t stay at the Flying Sword Sect for long. Spending a short time ying together with both Song Jia and Qing Yi, who were ying a game called spirit chess.


    The game itself was simr to the chess he already knew when it was just two people ying. However, it was still different from the chess he knew, a simple example would be the fact that the pieces got all sorts of special abilities, one of which was called hell storm that would cause a small fire to sweep through the board it was yed on and reduce any pieces in its path to dust¡­


    "Well, I will have to get going, I still have something to do back at the Shattered Star Peaks-"


    "Master¡­ Are you just saying this because you lost¡­?"


    About to take his leave, Xuan Hao could not help frowning upon hearing what his disciple said.


    Looking down at the spirit chess board that showed aplete victory for one side, while the other had beenpletely erased without even taking a single of the victor''s pieces, Xuan Hao could not help feeling his frown deepen even further.


    "Ah, don''t leave yet, I promise I will not win too quickly next time!"


    Hearing Song Jia saying this as she jumped in from the side and looked towards him with a pitiful expression, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say as he felt like a sword had been stabbed through his chest for some reason.


    "No, I have to go, if I dy any further, it might cause problems for the rest of the elders!"


    Swish-!


    Not giving Qing Yi and Song Jia any time to respond, Xuan Hao flew into the sky and disappeared after saying this.


    For some reason, he had a feeling that saying for any longer would end up being seriously damaging to his mental state.


    ¡­


    Having made his way back to the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao did not go back to the Seventh Star Peak, but instead headed directly for the Main Star Peak.


    Back when he had created the chaotic qi formation, he had sealed off the Main Star Peak and the Second Star Peak with it. The main reason why he had sealed the Second Star Peak, was because not only was it dangerous, but he also didn''t really want anyone to know about the blue divine energy present there.


    After all, given his current strength, he had a feeling that the people who could potentially be interested in absorbing something like the blue divine energy¡­ Would be far stronger than himself!


    The Main Star Peak on the other hand not only had therge rock filled with the blue divine energy that had most likely been the reason for the other eight star peaks current conditions, but there was also the fact that he had not explored the ce fully yet.


    The formation he had been trapped inside of the first time he made his way onto the Main Star Peak, the winged lion demon beast and the pagoda, was more than enough for him to understand that someone should have stayed on top of the Main Star Peak in the past¡­ And that person had most likely been the target of the huge rock filled with blue divine energy!


    Even if that person was no longer alive, Xuan Hao did not doubt the fact that all kinds of dangers could still be present on the Main Star Peak. For this reason, he had left back then without exploring any further.


    Now that he could be considered to have enough strength to fight against someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao wanted to try and explore this ce again!


    If things ended up getting too dangerous, he could always leave ande backter when his strength had increased even further.


    Whoosh~


    With this thought in mind, Xuan Hao passed through the thin barrier formed around the Main Star Peak by the massive rock filled with blue divine energy.


    Rustle~


    Landing on the ground beside the massive rock filled with the blue divine energy, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes as the bush not too far away from him suddenly began moving before a familiar figure appeared in front of him.


    "You are¡­ The blue deer from back then¡­?" Muttering this, Xuan Hao watched the familiar looking blue deer happily stomping the ground before running over to him.


    Thump Thump!


    It was only when the blue deer had made it all the way over to him that Xuan Hao realized that it had already grown many timesrgerpared to when he hadst seen it.


    If it had been only half a meter in height before, it was now over one meter in height! The growth rate of the blue deer was simply incredible. Especially considering the fact that it had not only grown in height, but its cultivation realm had also increased. Reaching the Core Formation Realm!


    Not only that, but he also noticed that a small pair of antlers had appeared on top of its head.


    "Hm?"


    Looking even more closely, Xuan Hao discovered that small dragon-like scales had appeared all over its body¡­


    Why do I have a feeling that you are not just a blue deer¡­?


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao soon shook his head. Even if he wanted to find out what race the blue deer in front of him belonged to, he had no way to find out.

 Chapter ?623 Blue Deers Fate

    Chapter ?623 Blue Deer''s Fate


    Thump Thump!


    "Hm? What''s wrong little one?" Lost in thought as he was inspecting the scales that had suddenly appeared on the blue dear together with the small antlers, Xuan Hao was brought back from his thoughts as the blue dear stomped its hooves on the ground to catch his attention.


    Rustle~ Thump!


    "You want me to follow you?" Seeing the blue dear suddenly move towards the bushes it had emerged from before doing what could only be described as a ''follow me'' signal, Xuan Hao saw no reason to refuse it.


    After all,st time he had followed the blue dear to help it deal with the winged lion demon beast, he had ended up getting a quest and a pet Domain Lord Realm demon beast!


    Rustle~


    Noticing that Xuan Hao was following it, the blue dear did not wait around any longer, as it rushed into the bushes it had emerged from before rushing in a certain direction inside the small forest that surrounded the massive rock filled with the blue divine energy.


    Swish-!N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Following after the blue dear for what seemed like hours, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he once again had a feeling that he was trapped in some sort of formation that twisted space like he had been when he had first tried exploring the Main Star Peak in the past.


    However, after looking around and trying his best to feel his surroundings with his domain, Xuan Hao realized that nothing was wrong with the environment around him and the space around him was far too stable for any formation to be messing with it to trap him in some sort of loop


    Realizing this, Xuan Hao felt even more curious about just how big the Main Star Peak truly was. Even if he wasn''tpletely certain as of yet, Xuan Hao had already deduced that the Main Star Peak should be located in some sort of pocket dimension of sorts simr to a secret realm.


    The only difference was that the Main Peak was not located somewhere in the void outside the world he was a part of but was instead integrated into the world in some sort of way that he failed to understand with his currentprehension of space.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao understood just how powerful the past owner of the Main Star Peak should have been. Even if the person was not above the Soul Ascension realm, that person should at the very least have been far stronger than the current Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Sky Empire.


    After all, from what he could gather so far from the information through the book Yi Min had given to him, the current emperor of the Sky Empire should have only reached the Soul Ascension Realm a short time ago and hadn''t broken through again since then, while the ancestor was rumoured to be a minor realm above that.


    Xuan Hao had no idea how true it was, but at the very least, he could tell that it should not be too far from the truth, as the current position of the Sky Empire on the Ewaria Continent was considered average among the different empires that inhabited the central parts of the continent.


    Thump!


    Watching as the blue deer running in front of him suddenly came to a stop, Xuan Hao felt confused for a short moment before noticing what was in front of it.


    "This is... Your father...?" Recognizing the massive blue deerying on the ground in front of him as the father of the blue deer demon beast that he had seen back when he had first encountered the blue deer, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression before starting to inspect it.


    Given that the massive blue deer had not moved at all since his arrival, Xuan Hao could not help feeling something was wrong as he watched the small blue deer nudging the massive blue deer without getting any response from it, as it remained still on the ground without moving.


    "Haaaa..." After a short scan with his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sorrowful sigh, as he realized that the massive blue deer in front of him was not breathing and had the Nascent Soul that should be present inside its body given that it was a demon beast in the Nascent Soul Realm, was absent.


    From all of this, Xuan Hao did not take long to realize that the massive blue deer demon beast that had been in the Nascent Soul Realm thest time he saw it was dead!


    Not to mention this, but there wasn''t the slightest sign of fighting or resistance present in the surrounding area and there were also no wounds present on its body!


    "..."


    Looking back towards the blue deer still trying its best to wake up its father, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say or how to exin the current situation to the young blue deer. Even if he told it what had happened to its father, there was no way he could be certain that it would even be able to fully understand him in the first ce!


    But... What killed the blue deer? The winged demon beast that was most likely behind the mother of the blue deer''s death was already taken away by me! Given that it had reached the Nascent Soul Realm, it should be able to stay safe as long as it didn''t venture into any dangerous areas on the Main Star Peak... Or perhaps... It was not the winged demon beast that killed the blue deer''s mother, but something different!


    Frowning even further as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as his domain spread out and covered a few hundred meters around him.


    From the condition of the massive blue deer, he could tell that it had been killed instantaneously without any chance to fight back.


    The massive blue deer was at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm when he hadst seen it, so for something to be able to instantaneously kill it without any chance of resistance, the enemy should at least have reached the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Maybe even beyond that...!


    Against an unknown opponent that was at least in the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and likely even stronger than that, Xuan Hao didn''t dare to be the slightest be careless, as he full well understood that even if he was far stronger than someone at simr realm to himself, it would all be for naught if the opponent managed tond a fatal attack on him while his guard was down.


    Even if he managed to win in the end, he would likely be forced to spend dozens if not longer recovering after such a fight... Not something he wanted to do if it could be avoided.


    Thump! Thump! Thump!


    Seemingly having grown impatient after seeing that the massive blue deer was not responding, the small blue deer jumped up and down in an attempt to ''wake up'' the massive blue deerying on the ground.


    However, this did nothing, as there was no chance for the massive blue deer to ever wake up again...


    Thud~


    Ignoring Xuan Hao who was cautiously scanning his surroundings at this point in time for any sign of the one responsible for the death of the massive blue deer, the small deer slowly copsed on the ground beside the massive blue deer before letting out of small, yet soft cry filled with pain.


    From the sound alone, it was not difficult to realize that the small blue deer hade to the realization that its father would no longer wake up again...


    "..."


    Turning towards the sad blue deer as it cried out softly beside the massive blue deer, Xuan Hao decided to remain silent as he continued looking for any signs of the one responsible for the death of the massive blue deer.


    [Main Quest: Investigate what caused the death of the blue deer''s father.]


    [Description: Investigate what could have caused the sudden death of the blue deer''s father.]


    [Reward: Sky Watcher''s forgotten notes rting to celestial bodies]


    Before Xuan Hao had any time to find any clues about the one responsible, the system reappeared, as it gave out a new quest... However, different from the past few times... It was a main quest this time around!


    It had to be known that the rewards from the main quests were always something that was useful to him.


    "Sky Watcher''s forgotten notes rting to celestial bodies? What in the world is that...?"


    However, after reading the name of the reward that was for once not hidden away behind question marks, Xuan Hao could not help feeling confused, as he had absolutely no idea what the [Sky Watcher''s forgotten notes rting to celestial bodies], was about...

 Chapter ?624 Ignored

    Chapter ?624 Ignored


    Back at the Flying Sword Sect shortly after Xuan Hao had left, Qing Yi frowned slightly while looking in the direction that her master had left in.


    Shaking her head as she thought about something for a short moment, Qing Yi soon turned her attention towards Song Jia, who was still looking in the direction that her master had disappeared in with a curious expression on her face.


    Even with her only having met the young Song Jia a few times over the past year, it was not too difficult to understand that she was curious about how her master had suddenly disappeared before any one of them had a chance to react.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    To be honest, Qing Yi was also rather curious about this, as she had a feeling that it should not just be because of his strong cultivation, but instead some kind of movement technique that allowed him to move extremely fast-


    "Ah¡­ Now that master left, is there perhaps anything else you want to do other than spirit chess?" Realizing that she was thinking about her master again, Qing Yi could not help smiling wryly before shifting her attention back to Song Jia.


    "Hm¡­ I don''t know?" Not expecting the question from Qing Yi, Song Jia tilted her head as she put on a thinking expression.


    Like this, Qing Yi, and Song Jia both turned quiet, Song Jia thinking about an answer to the question, while Qing Yi had no idea what to say after seeing how concentrated looked when trying toe up with an answer on what they do now that her master had left after ying spirit chess with them for a short time.


    It was at this time someone suddenly appeared from the entrance of the pavilion.


    "What are both of you doing¡­?"


    "Chu Yang¡­ Ehm¡­ We just finished seeing master off."


    "He left already? Looks like things are rather busy at the Shattered Star Peaks¡­ I can''t wait to move there, as things are sure to get more calm around the sect and master will have more time to help me practice the spear!" Nodding his head without finding anything odd about the slight pause between words when Qing Yi answered him, Chu Yang nodded his head.


    Given that his master had been around for a year without having to leave for an extended period of time, Chu Yang had been taking full advantage of it, as he had found his master to practice with whenever he could.


    In the end, this had resulted in Xuan Hao restricting the time he would spend practicing with him every week. After all, he could not just train one disciple, while leaving the other two to fend for themselves!


    For some reason, Chu Yang had misunderstood the reason why his master had restricted the time he spends practicing with him and had ended up linking it together with the fact that most of the sect elders were busy with constructing the new main sect¡­


    Given his master''s strength and status in the sect, it was only obvious for him to y a crucial role in the construction of then new sect in Chu Yang''s eyes!


    "Hm? Who is- Ah! It''s the little girl that follows Elder Song around!"


    Spotting Song Jia standing a short distance away from Qing Yi, Chu Yang quickly realized the identity of the young girl in question.


    "I know! How about we go search the nearby demon beast forest for spiritual herbs!" Completely oblivious to the fact that Chu Yang had appeared, Song Jia suddenly eximed loudly before turning towards Qing Yi with an expectant look stered all over her face.


    "That''s a good idea, with this strong senior sister around, there is no need for us to worry about the demon beasts roaming inside the demon beast forest! Let''s get going!" Nodding her head in response to what Song Jia said, Qing Yi understood that she had deliberately ignored Chu Yang after he had tantly called her a little girl.


    As a friend of Song Jia, Qing Yi was more than happy to y along. Especially so considering Chu Yang had asked for it himself. After all, Song Jia was just a few years younger than him. Even if she was smaller than others her age¡­


    "Yay!"


    Smiling happily upon hearing Qing Yi agree, Song Jia happily ran towards the path leading down the mountain before beginning the long descent towards the base of the mountain.


    "Wait up for me!" Qing Yi was not too far behind, as she quickly disappeared down the path leading down the mountain together with Song Jia. Heading towards the demon beast forest filled with Qi Condensation Realm demon beast controlled by the Flying Sword Sect.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what just happened as he could only stare in the direction that the two girls had disappeared in, Chu Yang could not help tilting his head in confusion as he tried toprehend what had just happened.


    "Senior brother Chu Yang, can you help me with the movement technique master taught us- Did something happen?" Arriving shortly after the two girls had left, Bai Ning who hade to Chu Yang for help with a movement technique could not help feeling a bit confused after seeing the sight of Chu Yang starring towards the path leading down the mountain in confusion.


    "I have no idea¡­ Let''s go to the training ground." Shaking his head as he thought about what just happened without understanding why he had been ignored by the two girls, Chu Yang agreed to help Bai Ning without a second thought before making his way towards the training ground.


    "Yes!" Not expecting for Chu Yang to agree so easily, Bai Ning showed a happy smile as he followed him towards the training ground.


    To be honest, Bai Ning would not normally be trying so hard when it came to training¡­ But over the past few months, most of the cksmithing Hall had been torn down and been relocated to the Seventh Star Peak¡­ Thus, leaving him with nowhere to go a practice his cksmithing!


    Even if he was lucky enough to find a furnace, most of the precious metals used for cksmithing had all been moved to the Seventh Star Peak already. Making it hard for him to try and refine any higher-level artifacts even if he got a chance to craft anything¡­


    Bai Ning was not the only one to go through this, as the elders belonging to the cksmithing Hall, that had yet to get a chance to move to the Seventh Star Peak, were all turning towards cultivation now that they couldn''t do any crafting.


    Not only this, but all these cksmiths that had spent all their time on cksmithing all managed to breakthrough after they began seriously cultivating. Among which, the one to improve the most, was Elder Lou Wei, the current leader of the cksmithing Hall!


    After the movement of most of the cksmithing Hall''s furnaces and precious spiritual metals to the Seventh Star Peak, the old man had seen the ''suffering'' that his fellow cksmiths had to go through and decided to stay together with them instead of moving to the Seventh Star Peak.


    This was even after Elder Song had already personally asked Elder Lou Wei to oversee the construction of the new cksmithing Hall on the Seventh Star Peak!


    The decision of the old leader of the cksmithing Hall ended up proving to be a tremendously important decision for the old man, as over the past three months'' time, he had managed to break through from the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and officially reach the Nascent Soul Realm!


    ¡­


    "Finally found a clue¡­" As all three of his disciples were busy with their own things, a small smile crept up Xuan Hao''s face as he managed to catch a trace left behind by the one behind the death of the blue deer''s father.


    "But¡­ It''s far too faint for me to make out the strength of the other party¡­" Trying his best to analyse the small trace aura left behind, Xuan Hao could only shake his head as he had absoloutly no idea what the strength of the other party was.


    For all he knew, it could be someone at the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and at the same time, it could also be someone in the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Blindly following the small trace of aura left behind by the other party was definitely not a wise choice, as it might end up costing him his life if the other party was really someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Not to mention, he had no idea if the small trace of aura he had found was deliberately left behind by the one that had killed the father of the blue deer!


    If that was really the case, Xuan Hao had a feeling that it would be far harder for him toplete the main quest than he had first expected¡­

 Chapter ?625 Ancient Temple

    Chapter ?625 Ancient Temple


    "Hm?"


    Lost in thought thinking about whether or not to follow the faint aura left behind, Xuan Hao was caught slightly off guard, as the blue deer now spotting a few scales and a small pair of antlers appeared in front of him.


    "Is there perhaps something you want to say to me?" Not knowing what else to say as the blue deer that had just lost its father was starring directly at him with what he could only assume was a pair of serious eyes, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the blue deer might be able to help him withpleting his main quest... And at the same time find out what had happened to its father!


    Swish~ Rustle!


    Seeing that it had his attention, the blue deer did not stand still for even a second as it dashed into the nearby foliage of the forest and soon disappeared from Xuan Hao''s vision.


    "You want me to follow you...?" Muttering this to himself as he had already guessed what the intention of the blue deer was, Xuan Hao only thought about it for a short moment before deciding to follow the blue deer.


    The main reason why he decided to follow the blue deer was not because he trusted it, but was because the direction that the blue deer was running was the same as the indiscernible aura left behind led towards.


    Even he could barely sense this small trace of aura, so there was no way the small blue deer that was only in the Core Formation Realm had any way to sense it... With this in mind, the fact that the blue deer was following the trace aura left behind almost wlessly could only mean one thing...


    The blue deer knew something about what might have happened to its father!


    ...


    Following the blue deer for what felt like hours, Xuan Hao finally noticed that the fait aura that the blue deer had been steadily travelling alongside without knowing about its existence, was slowly getting stronger and stronger.


    Although he could still not sense the strength of the person who had left the aura behind, he could at the very least tell that he and the blue deer were getting close to the one responsible for the death of the blue deer''s father.


    It was at this moment that the blue deer suddenly came to a stop in front of a canyon with a calm river running through.


    However, the thing that caught Xuan Hao off guard about this canyon, was the fact that the ruins of a massive ancient temple could be seen covering the canyon.


    Old, moss-covered buildings could be seen built into the side of the canyon, while evenrger and more destroyed buildings could be seen atop the canyon, as several hundred stone bridges in both good and bad conditions connected the two sides of the canyon with each other. At the centre of all this, a massive temple could be seen still standing tall as it gave off an extremely terrifying aura far surpassing anything Xuan Hao had ever felt before.


    This massive ancient temple that had once been the home to a what had most likely been a powerful ancient religion, was now just a massive ruin...


    "But... Why can''t I see this ce through my divine sense?" Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the massive temple and the buildings built all around it, Xuan Hao could not help frowning.


    When he had seen the massive temple along with the countless buildings all around it in different states of decay and ruin, Xuan Hao was caughtpletely off guard by the appearance of the ancient temple because he had not been able to ''see'' it with his divine sense.


    Even when he tried to thoroughly inspect the ancient ruins in front of him again after having personally seen them now, he could still not see any of the ancient ruins through his divine sense. Almost like something was covering the entire ancient city in some sort of veil that made him unable to see the ruins hidden beneath.


    ncing up towards the top of the ancient temple located at the centre of all the ruined buildings, paths, bridges, and everything else still left intact, Xuan Hao could clearly feel that the reason behind all of this should be located at the top of the ancient temple stretching at least a few hundred meters into the sky.


    Not only that, but Xuan Hao could also tell that the aura belonging to the murder of the blue deer''s father seemed to be leading towards the massive ancient temple standing tall just next to the canyon.


    "Haaa... Why does this feel like I''m about to walk into some sort of trap...?" Letting out a sigh as this thought urred to him, Xuan Hao could not help taking out the sword he had been given by Yi Min, as he prepared himself forbat. Even if his worries were for nothing, it would not hurt to be cautious when going up the ancient temple-


    Thump!


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to make his way up the ancient temple, the blue deer stomped both of its feet on the ground.


    Whoosh~


    The stomp from the blue deer instantly caused a small golden mist to appear in front of it before floating towards Xuan Hao before being unintentionally sucked in by Xuan Hao .


    "Hm!?"


    Not expecting something like this to happen, Xuan Hao thought the blue deer had poisoned him for a short moment before feeling a clear and calming sensation spreading through his soul, as he felt his entire being calm down.


    "This..."


    It was only at this moment that Xuan Hao realized that the blue deer was not intending to poison him and had instead helped him, as after the calming down and feeling his mind clear up, he realized that his mind had somehow been influenced without him even knowing about it!


    Just a second ago, he was about to make his way up to the peak of the ancient temple where an entity that was at least in the Domain Lord Realm and maybe even above that was waiting.


    No... Given that the other party did not outright kill, it should not be someone in the Soul Ascension Realm!


    With that in mind, there should be some sort of formation in ce at the peak of the ancient temple that had in all likelihood belonged to the people that had once inhabited the Main Star Peak...


    At that point in time, even if the other party was only in the Domain Lord Realm, it would not be hard to kill him with the help of a powerful formation belonging to the Soul Ascension Realm or beyond!


    Thinking about all of this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    If not for the help of the blue deer, he had no idea how things would have ended up if he went up to the peak of the ancient temple to investigate...


    Knowing that the blue deer might have saved his life, Xuan Hao looked toward the blue deer with a grateful expression on his face.n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Thump Thump~


    Bang~


    Stomping the ground happily after seeing Xuan Hao had returned to his former self and was no longer looking towards the peak of the ancient temple with an odd expression on his face like he had unknowingly done before, the blue deer suddenly copsed on the ground.


    "Are you okay!?"


    Feeling worried about the blue deer suddenly copsing on the ground, Xuan Hao quickly rushed over as he used his divine sense to check up on the blue deer.


    "Looks like the little one just copsed from exhaustion..."


    Only after making sure that it had just copsed due to exhaustion did he let out a sigh of relief as he gently ced the blue deer on a patch of especially soft grass on the ground not too far away from their current location.


    No matter what happened, he would make sure to take good care of the blue deer in the future as thanks for its help, there was no way he would just allow it to die after saving him!


    "But... Now that I know that this is definitely some sort of trap intended for me... The question bes... How does that existence even know about me in the first ce? Did it perhaps find out about me when I fought the winged tiger beast back then? After all, the fight did cause quite amotion on the Main Star Peak.


    Other than that, why did it end up killing the father of the blue deer and was it also the one behind the death of the blue deer''s mother?"


    Feeling more and more questions appearing as he found out more about what had happened to the blue deer''s small family, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he narrowed his eyes while looking up towards the peak of the ancient temple.


    For some reason, he had a feeling that someone... Or something, was watching him...

 Chapter ?626 Unknown Existence on top of the Ancient Temple

    Chapter ?626 Unknown Existence on top of the Ancient Temple


    Deciding to not enter the ancient temple or any of the buildings scattered around it for now, Xuan Hao sat down next to the blue deer before closing his eyes to focus on trying to see if he could use his divine sense to forcibly pierce through the veil that seemed to cover the ancient temple and buildings all around it.


    The reason he didn''t use his domain to do this and was instead trying to use his divine sense for this, was that his domain would have no way to reach the peak of the ancient temple without him getting within a hundred meters of it¡­ At that point in time, he might as well just make his way to the peak of the ancient temple himself and find out who the other party was and if there really was some sort of formation up there¡­


    As Xuan Hao focused his attention on trying to pierce through the veil that covered the ancient temple standing only a few thousand meters away from his current location, the blue deer was going through some sort of change, as the scales all over its body grew more prominent, while the two antlers on top of its head grew slightlyrger.


    This was not the only change, as the strength of the blue deer seemed to improve from what could be considered the earlier stages of the Core Formation Realm to the middle stages of the Core Formation.


    All of this happened without the slightest fluctuation and without properly inspecting the blue deer, one would not be able to notice these changes.


    Even Xuan Hao did not manage to notice any of this, as his full focus was on the ancient temple in the distance and trying to use his divine sense to forcefully see what was hidden on the highest point of the temple where a powerful enemy was likely to be waiting for him.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Coo~


    It was only after hearing the weird breathing sounding from the blue deer lying beside him, that Xuan Hao turned around to see that the blue deer had suddenly experienced a massive increase in strength without him knowing.


    "How did it break through¡­ And more importantly, how did its cultivation base stabilize so quickly without affecting the surroundings. Even I didn''t manage to notice anything and I''m right next to it!"


    Not knowing what to say after discovering the sudden increase of strength that the blue deer had experienced after having used the weird golden mist to help him out, Xuan Hao tried using both his domain and divine sense to inspect the blue deer in an attempt to find out what had happened to it.


    Maybe even get an idea about what kind of demon beast it was¡­ After all, there was no way it was just some random demon beast given how quickly its strength increased!


    Whoosh~


    BOOM!


    However, just as he had entered the body of the blue deer and tried to delve deeper into its origin, a terrifying power erupted that had remained dormant inside the body of the blue deer erupted with a frightening power-


    "Ah!"


    Catching Xuan Haopletely off guard by this, the power forcibly pushed both his divine sense and domain out of the blue deers body.


    Swish!


    Feeling that the power erupting from the body of the blue deer, Xuan Hao decisively moved away from it, while cutting any connection that remained between himself and the blue deer.


    Rumble~


    With no target, the power slowly calmed down before disappearing back into the blue deer''s body where it once again entered a dormant state.


    "¡­"


    Watching this scene, Xuan Hao could not help breathing out a sigh of relief.


    If he was a second too slow earlier, the dormant power inside the blue deer that erupted when he was trying to investigate the origins of the blue deer, would undoubtedly have injured him.


    In his current situation, it was very likely that the one hiding on top of the ancient temple would have taken advantage of this to attack him. At that point in time, he would likely have been forced into a rather unfavourable fight that might have ended up costing him his life!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao decided that he should not try and investigate the blue deer''s origin before he got stronger!


    In his mind, Xuan Hao had already nned to take the blue deer with him to the sect when he left the Main Star Peak. After all, after both of its parent''s death, it had no one left to rely on. Not to mention, there was still the entity watching them from the top of the ancient temple¡­


    If he left the blue deer behind on the Main Star Peak, Xuan Hao had no idea if it would be able to survive or would end up turning out like its parents-


    Swish!


    Just as Xuan Hao was thinking about leaving the Main Star Peak together with the blue deer, a powerful attack in the shape of a massive golden palm descended from the top of the ancient temple. Heading directly towards him and the blue deer!


    "Hmph!" Frowning upon seeing the golden palm formed by some sort of pure and holy power, Xuan Hao stood up as both his sword and ice domain surged out to form an imprable wall in front of him and the blue deer to defend against the golden palm descending towards them.


    Boom-!


    As the attack collided with the wall formed by both his domains, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he felt the terrifying power behind the golden palm forcibly supressing both his domains, as it slowly began getting closer to him and the blue deer.


    Knowing that he would not be able to block the attack by just using his domains, Xuan Hao used the sword given by him by Yi Min tounch an attack-


    Fwoosh!


    Not a secondter, a beautiful silver crescent moon was formed in the air, as Xuan Hao shed down towards the golden palm that had descended from the top of the ancient temple.


    The sword attack was not someplicated technique or sword move but was instead an umtion of the different sword techniques and moves Xuan Hao had managed toprehend so far.


    Whoosh~


    Boom-boom-boom!


    This was also disyed as the silver sword light in the shape of a crescent moon split up into hundreds of different sword moves just when it was about to reach the golden palm before all of them attacked the golden palm simultaneously.


    Crack!


    Not able to withstand thebined sword moves all attacking it at once, the golden palm only resisted for a short moment before shattering together with the silver sword light that formed the different sword moves to attack it.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he nced up towards the top of the ancient temple.


    From the attack just now, he understood that the other party was indeed not someone in the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ But even then, the other party was far stronger than he had expected and should not be too far away from the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Not to mention, the attack just now, was just the other party testing out the waters¡­ The full strength of the other party was sure to be stronger than what they had just shown!


    "Wake up faster so we can leave this ce as quickly as possible¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about this, Xuan Hao understood that there was a good chance the other party was stronger than him!


    Moving the blue deer at the moment was not possible, as although the power inside it had gone dormant again, Xuan Hao was almost certain that it would emerge again to attack him if he tried moving the blue deer.


    Even if it was not the case, Xuan Hao did not want to take the risk after having personally experienced the power of the unknown entity on top of the ancient temple. Not to mention, that existence somehow had a way to affect his mind back when he had first arrived.


    Although it did not work anymore after the blue deer''s help, Xuan Hao still felt fearful knowing that the unknown existence on top of the ancient temple could affect his mind without his knowledge.


    Focusing all of his attention on the ancient temple, Xuan Hao did not dare to look anywhere else, as he silently waited for the blue deer to wake up so they could leave the ancient temple together.


    Leaving the blue deer behind was not something Xuan Hao thought about doing, as although he was fearful of the unknown existence ability to subtly influence his mind, he was not truly afraid of it.


    After all, if the unknown existence was far stronger than him, there was no way it would not have attacked him already and tried to kill him instead of just watching from the top of the ancient temple!


    For this reason, even if he felt that the other party might be stronger than him, Xuan Hao did not intend to run away and leave behind the blue deer.

 Chapter ?627 Kidnapping the Blue Deer~

    Chapter ?627 Kidnapping the Blue Deer~


    As half a day passed by with Xuan Hao and the unknown existence on top of the ancient temple without any of them making a move to attack each other after the earlier sh, the blue deer slowly woke up-


    Cooo~


    Making a cute sounding sound as it stretched its still tired body before standing up to take in its surroundings.


    Coo? Coo!


    Making the same sound as it looked around itself and saw Xuan Hao, the blue deer jumped up excitedly before running in a small circle around him. Happy to see that Xuan Hao was doing fine after having inhaled the golden mist it had created before it ended up fainting.


    "Looks like you are finally awake¡­ It''s great nothing bad happened." Seeing that the blue deer had recovered and was even jumping around him happily, Xuan Hao felt relieved that there was nothing wrong with the blue deer before looking back toward the top of the ancient temple.


    After the blue deer had recovered and started moving around, Xuan Hao could clearly feel the unknown existence at the top of the ancient temple had started to grow restless to the point that it wouldn''t be surprised if the other party suddenly decided to attack!


    "We should get out of here before the one up there decides to attack¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao nced towards the blue deer happily jumping around him-


    Whoosh~


    Coo?!


    Before grabbing hold of it and rushing back in the direction both of them hade from.


    BOOOOM-!


    This decision proved to be crucial, as a far more powerful attack from the unknown existence on top of the ancient templended at the ce Xuan Hao and the blue deer had been located.


    "¡­"


    Looking back as he moved further and further away from the ancient temple together with the blue deer, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he watched how the area where the attack from the unknown existence on top of the ancient temple hadnded.


    Even if he did not receive the attack himself, Xuan Hao could clearly tell just how strong the attack just now was.


    If he had stayed behind to resist such a powerful attack, he would have been forced to use all his strength and would not have been able to protect the blue deer! Not to mention, the unknown existence on top of the ancient temple had likely not shown its full strength¡­!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao decided not to pursue his new main quest for now, as it was simply far too dangerous with his current strength. At least, with the blue deer around, it was impossible for him to properly investigate the ancient temple without constantly having to fear that the unknown existence wouldunch an attack to kill it¡­


    Whoosh-!


    Speeding up even more than before as this thought urred to him, Xuan Hao sped across the different environments he had passed through before while following the blue deer to the ancient temple.


    The difference this time around, he was far fasterpared to back then, as he crossed the distance, he and the blue deer had taken hours to travel in a few minutes.


    The speed of a Domain Lord Realm Expert was far above that of the little blue deer that had only reached the Core Formation Realm. Even if the blue deer was faster than a normal Core Formation Realm demon beast¡­


    Thump~!


    Landing on the ground close to the massive rock filled with the blue divine energy, Xuan Hao didn''t dare let his guard down.


    Whoosh-!


    Fully utilizing both his domain and divine sense to observe his surroundings for any signs of the unknown existence on top of the ancient temple following them.


    Only after a few minutes passed without anything happening did he start to rx knowing that the other party had not followed him and the blue deer.


    But¡­ Why didn''t that person follow? He clearly didn''t want the blue deer to leave the ce alive¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he remembered thest attack of the unknown existence on top of the ancient temple, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that something was wrong.


    After all, with the strength disyed by the other party there was no reason to hide away at the top of the ancient temple.


    On the other hand, given that he would be focused on defending the blue deer while escaping earlier, it would have been the perfect opportunity tounch an attack, yet¡­ The other party remained on top of the ancient temple and just allowed him to leave without giving chase¡­


    No matter how much Xuan Hao thought about this, he could not help feeling that it was weird for the other party to stay on top of the ancient temple in such a situation. Maybe when his mind had momentarily been affected back then, it was not just to get him to enter some sort of ancient killing formation¡­ But was instead to get him to the top of the ancient temple!


    If that is really the case¡­ Perhaps the person on top of the ancient temple didn''t decide not to chase us because of caution, but instead because it was impossible to do so!


    As this thought dawned upon him, Xuan Hao felt that it made sense given what he had gone through over thest half day.


    The only thing that was still unanswered, was how the father of the blue deer had ended up dying. After all, the location of the blue deer''s father when he had died, was extremely far away from the ancient temple¡­ There would have been no way for the unknown existence to kill the blue deer''s father over such a distance!


    Xuan Hao understood this full well, as not only would the strength of the attack weaken the longer it travelled, but the father of the blue deer was also a Peak Nascent Soul Realm demon beast. Killing such a strong demon beast over such arge distance would be impossible for someone in the Domain Lord Realm!


    Coo~!


    As Xuan Hao was lost in his own thoughts, the blue deer let out a reluctant noise as it looked towards Xuan Hao with confusion. Wanting to know why he had suddenly picked it up before flying back to the ce they had met around a day ago.


    From start to finish, the blue deer had no idea about the existence on top of the ancient temple nor the danger that it had been in just a few minutes earlier.


    "Hah¡­" Seeing the wronged expression on the face of the blue deer, Xuan Hao could not help sighing to himself.


    "Little one, we were in quite a dangerous situation earlier¡­ If we didn''t leave, it would have ended up- You don''t understand what I''m saying¡­" Trying to exin what had happened to the wronged little blue deer, Xuan Hao could not help frowning upon realizing that the little blue deer for some reason looked like it didn''t understand what he was saying.


    Before this, it had always showed an expression of understanding and seemed to understand what he said to it¡­ But now, it looked like it didn''t understand a single word he said!


    Perhaps it was tooplicated for it to understand¡­?


    Shaking his head at this thought, Xuan Hao decided not to think about it any longer-


    Swish~


    Coo!?N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Grabbing the confused blue deer once again, Xuan Hao flew into the air before leaving the Main Star Peak together with the blue deer.


    With the unknown existence on top of the ancient temple targeting the blue deer for some reason, it was no longer safe for it to stay on the Main Star Peak. Especially so considering that both of its parents had already been killed.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao had decided to take the blue deer with him instead of leaving it on the Main Star Peak to fend for itself and hope that it didn''t end up dead like its parents upon his next visit.


    Leaving the blue deer at the Seventh Star Peak would also allow him to try and explore the area around the ancient temple without having to worry about something happening to the blue deer if a fight ended up happening between himself and the unknown existence on top of the ancient temple.


    Not to mention¡­ Xuan Hao was rather interested in finding out if the existence on top of the ancient temple could leave or not.


    If the existence on top of the ancient temple really couldn''t leave like he had thought, he would have free rein to continue exploring the Main Star Peak and try toplete the main quest without any worry.


    Hopefully, this would also mean that he would be able toplete his main quest faster and get the mysterious reward!


    Who knew, maybe the reward from the main quest would be something far more valuable than a simple increase in cultivation¡­

 Chapter ?628 Deer Caretaker Shu Yao~

    Chapter ?628 Deer Caretaker Shu Yao~


    Having returned to the Seventh Star Peak together with the blue deer, Xuan Hao found Shu Yao and asked her to look after the blue deer, as he wanted to return to the Main Peak and investigate the ancient temple without having to worry about anything happening to the blue deer.


    "You want us to look after this blue deer... with scales?"


    "Yes, I hope you will look after it for me!"


    "Sure, but-"


    Swish-!


    Hearing her agreement, Xuan Hao immediately left without any dy before making his way back towards the Main Star Peak. Leaving behind a speechless Shu Yao, who could only stare nkly in the direction he had left in without knowing why he was in such a hurry.


    "..."


    Turning around to look at the weird deer like creature Xuan Hao had suddenly left with her before disappearing, Shu Yao had no idea what to say. Not to mention exining where it hade from, Xuan Hao had not even told her if it was some sort of dangerous demon beast!


    Coo?


    Although... Looking at the innocent stare filled with confusion directed towards her, Shu Yao had a feeling that the blue deer was not some kind of dangerous demon beast. At the very least, she expected that Xuan Hao would have told her if the blue deer was some kind of dangerous demon beast before leaving it to her...


    "Hm? Core Formation Realm!?" It was only at this moment that Shu Yao discovered that the innocent looking blue deer was actually a Core Formation Realm demon beast. Not only that, but it was actually close to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm!


    "Elder Xuan... Just where did you find such an obedient demon beast...?" Muttering this to herself as she stared at the seemingly harmless blue deer in front of her, Shu Yao could not help remembering her brief encounter with the demon beasts of Flying Sword Sect a few days ago.


    The encounter back then hadpletely shifted her perspective on demon beasts to the point that she had momentarily forgotten how tamed demon beasts normally behaved...


    Well... Although the experience had ended up shocking for her, it had been even more shocking for those demon beasts. Especially considering she had made sure to take good care of one of the more arrogant once after getting permission from Feng Chen!


    Coo!


    Seeing Shu Yao suddenly show a weird smile while looking towards it, the blue deer suddenly felt a shiver run down its spine-


    Swoosh~


    As it quickly ran towards the nearest exit before escaping!


    "..."


    Not knowing whether tough or cry upon seeing the little blue deer escaping, Shu Yao could only me the fact that she hadn''t eaten anything today like she had grown used to since the construction of the new sect started before chasing after the blue deer.


    After all, with its strength close to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, it could cause quite a bit of damage. Not to mention the fact that some of the elders might attack it, thinking that it''s a wild demon beast that somehow got into the sect.


    ...


    "How in the world did a sect located so far away from the core region even manage to nurture a Domain Lord?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was returning to the Main Star Peak, a man dressed in a fierce looking suit of armournded a short distance away from the Flying Sword Sect with the flying demon beast he was sitting on top of.


    ncing towards the Flying Sword City that was located in front of the Flying Sword Sect in the distance, the man patted the head of the flying demon beast before leading it towards a river not too far away from where they hadnded.


    "Stay here and wait for me, I will be back shortly." Saying this after quickly scanning his surroundings, the man slowly began making his way towards the Flying Sword City that could be seen bustling with activity in the distance.


    "..."


    The flying demon beast that was left behind seemed to have understood what the man said, as itid down in the shade of a nearby tree just next to the river.


    Rustle~!


    The few weaker demon beasts drinking from the river instantly fled upon seeing the flying demon beast.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    This was an understandable reaction from these demon beasts, as the flying demon beast was actually a Nascent Soul Realm demon beast! Far stronger than any demon beast that these weak demon beasts located just next to the Flying Sword Sect had ever seen in their life!


    From the strength of this flying demon beast, it could also be seen that the man who had flown on top of it was not someone normal!


    ...


    "Hm... It looks like everyone here is quite busy, I wonder if something big happened recently?" Entering the Flying Sword City without any effort, the mysterious man could not help showing a slightly surprised expression after seeing just how busy things were inside the Flying Sword City.


    Given that the Flying Sword City was located just next to a sect with a Domain Lord in it, there was no way things would be as chaotic as they were now... Unless something big had happened!


    "What happened for everyone to be so busy?" Thinking about this, the man grabbed a random person running past him and asked in amanding tone.


    "Huh? The Flying Sword Sect is beginning to move a new group of disciple and elders to the new sect together with some more building materials! Everyone needs to lend a hand to make sure nothing goes wrong. Especially considering the Sect Master is no longer at the Flying Sword Sect and Elder Song is the one in charge!"


    Whoosh~


    Seemingly too upied with other thoughts, the person who had been grabbed by the man carelessly answered the question before freeing himself to join a group of people in carrying several smaller crates filled with different things towards the entrance to the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Moving... The Flying Sword Sect relocated...?" Muttering this to himself as he went over what the person, he had grabbed just told him, the man with the rather fierce armour on could not help frowning as he realized that he might have ended uping to the wrong location.


    The person he needed to speak to, was the sect master of the Flying Sword Sect. Not some random elder than had been left in charge of things while the sect master was not present!


    I can''t be sure what that person said is one hundred percent certain... I will have to ask a few more people to make sure that the Flying Sword Sect did indeed relocate too somewhere different.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, the man quickly began asking the people around him about the Flying Sword Sect, the whereabouts of the sect master, where they were moving and so on.


    Of course, a man walking around in a fierce looking armour and asking about the sect master and the Flying Sword Sect did not go unnoticed, as Elder Song soon managed to learn about this through several members belonging to the servant quarters that had been left in charge of monitoring the Flying Sword City for any potential intruders that might have snuck inside!


    ...


    "I wonder where this person is from... Given his attitude and arrogance when asking questions, he should not be from any of the nearby kingdoms and sects. Not to mention, he already knows that the Flying Sword Sect has the backing of a Domain Lord, yet he shows no fear and still acts like this..."


    Observing the man in question a few minutes after being informed about him, Elder Song could not help putting on a thoughtful expression as he watched the unknown man that had entered the Flying Sword City ask the people walking past him all sorts of questions regarding the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Hm... Is he perhaps from one of the three major religious powers inside the Sky Empire? But why would theye to the Flying Sword Sect... Unless it has something to do with the appearance of the Church of the gue God? Then again, they have already been dealt with and should not have appeared in quite some time...


    Maybe it''s not the three major religious powers... But instead, someone from the Sky Empire!" Thinking out loud to himself as he continued observing the man walking around asking questions, Elder Song felt like it made sense.


    "Is it perhaps rted to the sect alliance Shu Yao mentioned?" Remembering something Shu Yao had told him around half a year ago during one of their many meetings regarding the construction of the new sect, Elder Song could not help frowning.


    I should probably contact Shu Yao about this...


    Shaking his head as he realized that it would properly be best for someone stronger than him to represent the sect when it came to taking care of something like this, Elder Song pulled out amunication talisman before contacting Shu Yao.

 Chapter ?629 Ancient Language

    Chapter ?629 Ancient Language


    "I understand¡­ I will be there as quickly as possible¡­" Having been informed about the unknown person that had suddenly appeared inside the Flying Sword City by Elder Song, Shu Yao put away hermunication talisman before ncing towards the blue deer staring at her from the side with a cautious expression on its face.


    How could I forget about this¡­ Deer¡­ Elder Xuan left me to take care of!? Should I take the deer with me when going to the Flying Sword Sect to meet this unknown person that is highly likely from the Sky Empire¡­?


    Thinking this to herself as a frown made its way on to her face while looking at the blue deer, Shu Yao had no idea what to do about the blue deer Xuan Hao had suddenly left with her.


    Giving it over to Feng Chen was not possible at the moment, as he had just recently left the Seventh Star Peak to settle some matters that popped up around the borders of the Flying Sword Sect''s current territory.


    As for leaving the blue deer in the hands of Zu Fei¡­ No matter how desperate Shu Yao was, there was no way she would dare doing something like that. After all, who could say whether or not the blue deer was still around when she returned¡­


    "Looks like I will have to take it with me¡­" Muttering this to herself as she realized there wasn''t really anyone, she could confidently put in charge of looking after the blue deer, Shu Yao understood that she could only take the blue deer with her when going to meet the unknown person that had appeared in the Flying Sword City.


    If that person was really from the Sky Empire¡­ Shu Yao could only hope that the blue deer would not do something troublesome.


    Coo-


    Whoosh~


    Just about to say something, the blue deer was interrupted by Shu Yao using her domain to draw the blue deer towards her.


    "Calm down little one, we will just have to go to meet someone, and you have to remember to not do something troublesome¡­ Understand?"


    C-coo!


    Not knowing whether or not the blue deer had truly understood what she had said, or just responded due to the fear of suddenly finding itself being pulled directly in front of her by the power of her domain, Shu Yao didn''t have any time to waste.


    Swish-!


    Directly leaving after hearing the hopefully positive response of the blue deer.


    No matter what, there was no way she could waste too much time trying to convey what she wanted the blue deer to do. Especially considering that there might be someone from the Sky Empire in the Flying Sword City!


    If that person started causing trouble after not finding out only a few Nascent Soul Realm Experts in the earlier stages were there to greet him¡­ Shu Yao really didn''t want such a situation to happen, as she full well understood how arrogant the people sent out by the Sky Empire to inform the stronger sects all across the Sky Empire about the sect alliance were¡­


    At least, the current her was no longer in the Nascent Soul Realm and wouldn''t be as easy for the Sky Empire to simply disregard! A Domain Lord was considered part of the core strength of an empire like the Sky Empire!


    If there was no reason, the Sky Empire would not carelessly make an enemy of a Domain Lord. Not to mention, the sect that was the merger between the Flying Sword Sect and her Spring Flower Sect had more than one Domain Lord!


    ¡­


    At the same time Shu Yao had decided to bring the blue deer along with her to meet the unknown person that had entered the Flying Sword City and started asking random people questions about the sect, Xuan Hao had already made his way back to the ancient temple that he had left only a short time earlier.


    Focusing on the familiar aura that was still present on top of the ancient temple, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself after confirming that the one on top of the ancient temple had not moved at all.


    "That person is indeed still stuck on top of the ancient temple¡­ Looks like I was correct thinking that something is preventing that person from leaving!"


    Ignoring the gaze that locked on to him the moment he returned, Xuan Hao no longer cared too much about the person on top of the ancient temple.


    After all, as long as that person was stuck up there, it would be easy for him to avoid any attack throw his way. Not to mention, with the Drifting Cloud Steps, it would be far too easy for him to escape that person''s attack range if it became too dangerous!


    Now that he no longer had the blue deer to look after, Xuan Hao was no longer as restricted, as he slowly began moving closer to the ancient temple while investigating all the houses and smaller temples along the way.


    Entering the ancient temple was still not something that he dared to do, as he was still apprehensive when it came to the existence on top of the ancient temple. However, the same could not be said about any of the buildings and smaller temples located around the ancient temple.


    Even if he could notplete the main quest through this, he would at the very least be able to get a deeper understanding of the massive city cantered around the ancient temple. Maybe he could even manage to get his hands on some ancient text still left in the smaller temples located around the ancient temple!


    Whoosh~


    With this in mind, Xuan Haopletely ignored the very clear killing intent emitting from the top of the ancient temple, as he rummaged through the different smaller temples located only a short distance away from the ancient temple itself.


    ¡­


    Searching through the smaller temples located around the ancient temple, it did not take long for Xuan Hao to find several different ancient texts and scrolls stored in storage rooms attached to the small temples. However-


    "I can''t read any of them¡­"n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Indeed, all the ancient texts and scroll were written in some sort of ancientnguage that he had never seen before and couldn''t understand. Completely different from thenguage that was being used across the Ewaria Conti-


    "Ah! Now that I think about it¡­ The writing actually looks simr to the scroll I got from the stone hut inside the secret realm!" Suddenly remembering the scroll, he had gotten all the way back when he had explored the secret realm together with Chi Hu, Xuan Hao did not waste any time taking out the scroll in question before starting topare it with the ancient texts and scroll inside the small temple.


    Rustle~


    Thoroughlyparing the words on the scroll, he had gotten back in the secret realm with the scroll and texts inside the small temple, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes. Bing certain that the words from the ancient scrolls and texts inside the small temple and the scroll from the secret realm were the same.


    "How is the ancient temple rted to the secret realm¡­ Or is the ancient temple perhaps just from the same time as the secret realm?" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the scrolls and texts of the small temple without the slightest clue what was written in them, Xuan Hao could not help feeling frustrated over not being able to read these ancient words.


    If he could read them, he would have a way to find out about the ancient temple and just what might have happened to it in the past for it to end up in its current situation.


    Not only that, but he would also have a chance to learn about other powers simr to the ancient temple and the secret realm that had existed in the past. Maybe even getting a chance to learn what had caused the downfall of all these strong powers that should have at the very least had Soul Ascension Realm Experts, if not stronger, protecting them¡­


    Swoosh~


    Knowing that the ancient texts and scrolls might prove useful in the future when he had a chance to learn this ancientnguage, Xuan Hao used his domain to gather all of them before stuffing all of them into an empty interspatial ring.


    Swish-!


    Having emptied out all the intact ancient texts and scrolls from the small temple, Xuan Hao did not stop there, as he went to the other smaller temples located all around the massive ancient temple at the centre of everything. Gathering up all the texts, scrolls and books he could find still intact.


    However, doing this did note without any risk, as the person on top of the ancient temple was less than happy to see what Xuan Hao was doing¡­


    Rumble-!


    Not having any chance to react, Xuan Hao who was about to enter thest of the smaller temples suddenly felt everything around him shaking violently before a terrifying sensation enveloped from head to toe.

 Chapter ?630 Restriction

    Chapter ?630 Restriction


    Whoosh~


    Knowing that he was in danger, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time using the Drifting Clouds Steps to moved away from the small temple he was just about to enter.n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Boom-!


    Not a secondter, a familiar golden palm smashed into the small temple. Instantly destroying it along with everything inside of it.


    ¡­


    Escaping to a safe distance away from the ancient temple, Xuan Hao nced up towards the top of the ancient temple with a doubtful expression on his face.


    The golden palm that had been sent down from the top of the ancient temple was not hard to dodge and the power had also been far lower than when he had first exchanged blows with the existence on top of the ancient temple.


    The terrifying sensation that had caused him to escape thinking that it was a powerful attack heading towards him, had very clearly not originated from the golden palm, but hade from something different¡­


    No matter what, the current situation was clear to Xuan Hao. The golden palm attack was not aimed at him, but the small temple he was just about to enter.


    Obviously, a certain someone did not want him to take away the things inside the small temple¡­ But if that was the case, why had he not been stopped when going through the other small temples around the ancient temple?


    Perhaps¡­ There was something important present inside the small temple¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao used his divine sense to search through what remained of the small temple after having been violently destroyed by the golden palm just a few seconds earlier.


    "Hm? One of the ancient scrolls actually survived¡­?" Scanning through the ruins of what had once been a small temple, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes upon spotting a small, still intact ancient scroll buried beneath the rubble.


    Even if the golden palm attack that destroyed the temple was weaker than the two other attacks, he had experienced from that person so far, it was still more than enough to kill an ordinary Domain Lord, let alone a few ancient scrolls and texts that had existed for thousands of years.


    The fact that rubble still remained from the small temple was amazing enough, yet now one of the ancient scrolls inside the temple had also ended up surviving the golden palm attack¡­


    No matter what, Xuan Hao did not take long to realize that this scroll was most likely the reason why that person had destroyed the small temple.


    However, if that was the case¡­ Why not use a stronger attack to destroy the ancient scroll? Or perhaps, that person could not destroy the ancient scroll and wanted to try and hide it away under the rubble of the small temple. Hoping that he would not find it?


    As all sorts of different thoughts ran through his mind, Xuan Hao soon spotted a small tentacle like hand slowly extending out from the ancient temple towards the small temple with the ancient scroll hidden below the rubble.


    "¡­"


    Not showing any reaction to this, Xuan Hao could not help marvelling over the small hand sneakily extending towards the ancient scroll buried below the rubble of the small temple.


    The main reason why he was so amazed by this small hand was not due to it showing that the ancient scroll hidden below the rubble was indeed something precious, but the fact that the small hand waspletely invisible to his divine sense!


    The more he learned about the existence on top of the ancient temple, the more cautious he felt towards this unknown existence who seemed to have all sorts of unique and wonderous techniques at hand. From a way to subtly influence his mind, to the small hand invisible to his divine sense.


    For some odd reason, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the existence hidden away inside the ancient temple was far more dangerous than he had first thought. The different unique techniques disyed only strengthened this belief further¡­


    Watching as the hand extending out from the ancient temple was getting closer and closer to the ancient scroll hidden away beneath the rubble of the small temple, Xuan Hao smiled to himself before utilizing the Drifting Cloud Steps at its highest capacity without randomly teleporting around.


    Whoosh-!


    Seeing Xuan Hao suddenly rush forth, the hand sneakily making its way towards the rubble seemed to have realized that it had been discovered, as it simrly rushed towards the ancient scroll hidden beneath the small temple without hiding its presence.


    Given that it was far closer than Xuan Hao, it would be the first to reach the rubble and get the ancient scroll hidden beneath.


    Swish~


    Ptsh!


    At the very least, this would have been the case if Xuan Hao didn''t pull out his sword and shed down at the long snake like arm that the hand was attached to.


    Screech~!


    Not knowing how the hand like thing made such a sound as his sword cleanly cut through it, Xuan Hao quickly overtook the hand and grabbed hold of the ancient scroll while the cut part of the snake like arm reconnected before retreating back into the ancient temple after Xuan Hao got his hand on the ancient scroll.


    "That was easier than I expected¡­" Muttering this to himself as he put the ancient scroll into his interspatial ring, Xuan Hao was just about to make some distance between himself and the ancient temple before checking out the ancient scroll, when a chill suddenly ran down his spine for some unknown reason.


    RUMBLE-!


    Feeling the terrifying sensation from earlier together with a much more violent tremors spreading across the canyon with the ancient temple at the centre, Xuan Hao was just about to escape when he suddenly felt like the space around him had been restricted by some sort of unknown power. Preventing him from escaping with the Drifting Cloud Steps


    Even the random teleportation that he had started unconsciously counting on when it came to getting himself out of a dangerous situation, was not usable after the space around him had been restricted.


    If he was stronger or had a better understanding of the dao of space, he would have been able to escape the restrictions.


    However, the current him had no way to escape the space restrictions. Escaping could only be done by running normally. Although this was still fast, it was still far slowerpared to his speed when using the Drifting Cloud Steps.


    Whoosh~


    Looking up into the air above him, Xuan Hao also understood that he would not have time to escape like this, as not one, but three golden palms far stronger than the ones he had encountered before was heading towards him with a speed that made it impossible for him to dodge without the help of the Drifting Cloud Steps random teleportation feature!


    I will have to fight it¡­ Won''t I¡­?


    As this realization dawned upon him, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he focused on the three golden palm attacks heading towards him.


    Even if he could resist the three golden palm attacks, Xuan Hao was certain that it would note without a price!


    A fraction of a second after having decided to resist the attack, the three golden palms simultaneously smashed down on Xuan Hao-


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Meeting the power of the three golden palms head on with both his domains seemingly merging together as one to defend against the terrifying attack, Xuan Hao knew very well that his domains would not be able to defend against such a powerful attack.


    The only reason he used his domains, was to buy himself enough time to put up a proper defence against the attack.


    Crack~


    Not evensting for more than a few seconds, the sword domain was the first to bend under thebined might of the three golden palms, quickly followed by his ice domain that barelysted half a second longer.


    Earth Splitting!


    Swish~!


    Knowing the attack was just about to reach him, Xuan Hao barely managed to execute the Earth Splitting Sword from the Heaven Splitting Sword Art!


    BOOOOOOOOM-!


    Swoosh~!


    As the power of the three golden palms and the Earth Splitting Sword collided, a shockwave was formed with them at the centre, as it spread out, sweeping through, and destroying anything and everything that was not the ancient temple!


    Soon enough. Reducing what had once been a rtively intact ancient city situated around the ancient temple to rubble!


    However, things did not end there, as the power contained in the shockwave created by the two attacks colliding swept into the canyon located right beside the ancient temple.


    RUMBLE-!


    This in turn caused the walls of the canyon to start copsing, as tons upon tons of stones were turned to dust by the power, while even more fell into the calm river below.


    Ssh!


    Ssh!


    Ssh!


    Before long, the river that had once been running through the canyon disappearedpletely, asyers uponyers of stones and rocks covered it up.


    As things slowly started calming down, the canyon had transformed into what now looked more like a valleypared to a canyon¡­ If one could look away from the fact that rigged stones and massive holes were presents all across the bottom of this newly created ''valley''.

 Chapter ?631 Weird Person from the Sky Empire

    Chapter ?631 Weird Person from the Sky Empire


    Breathing out heavily as he stood at the centre of a massive crater that had formed around him, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he looked at the sword in his hands still lightly shaking after having collided with thebined power of the three golden palms.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling that the restriction on the space around him had been lifted, Xuan Hao didn''t dare stay behind for even a second longer, as he instantly used the Drifting Cloud Steps to move away from the ancient temple.


    Thest thing he wanted right now, was to endure such an attack again¡­ Not to mention, he had no idea if the next attack would be even more powerful than thest!


    If it really ended up being more powerful¡­ Xuan Hao had no idea if he would be able to defend against it, as the Earth Splitting Sword from the Heaven Splitting Sword Art, was by far the strongest technique that he could use at the moment.


    "That was¡­ Far more powerful than I imagined¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced towards the ce just next to the ancient temple where he had faced the powerful attack, Xuan Hao smiled a bit wryly.


    The destruction brought to everything around the ancient temple was simply terrifying, as other than the canyon being turned into some sort of valley, the buildings and smaller temples that had once been standing intact next to the ancient pagoda¡­ Had all disappeared!


    The power from the sh between the three golden palms and the Earth Splitting Sword was simply far too powerful, as almost nothing other than the ancient temple had been able to survive. The little rubble and other things that had managed to survive outside of the ancient temple was scattered in a radius of a hundred miles around the ancient temple!


    However, this was not all, as a massive crater a few thousand meters wide and close to a hundred meters deep could be seen just next to the ancient temple.


    Even looking at it from a distance, Xuan Hao could not help feeling amazed seeing the destruction that had taken ce. Not because the destruction was especially devastating, but because the crater and the environment around the centre of the sh had been created by nothing more than the remnant power of the three golden palms and his sword attack.


    Almost all of the power rom the two attacks had cancelled each other out, yet the small amount of power that leaked out into the environment had destroyed everything within a hundred-mile radius!


    From this alone, it could easily be seen just how powerful a Peak Domain Lord was and at the same time, it also helped Xuan Hao get a better understanding of his own strength.


    "But¡­ What was that space restriction from earlier¡­? Itpletely prevented me from using the Drifting Cloud Steps or any other movement techniques¡­" Observing the destruction that had been created around the ancient temple, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself. Remembering how he had suddenly found himself almost locked in ce, unable to dodge the three golden palms heading down towards him.


    Even if he had managed toe out unscratched, Xuan Hao still felt fearful when remembering how he had been unable to properly use his movement technique.


    "Is it perhaps because my understanding of space is far too low at the moment that I was unable to escape? Indeed¡­ Compared to the rest of my cultivation, I have indeed neglected increasing my understanding of spatial maniption. All I''ve done with it so far is create interspatial rings and randomly teleport around with the Drifting Cloud Steps¡­" Smiling a bit wryly as he realized just how much he had neglected increasing his understanding and proficiency in spatial maniption, Xuan Hao promised himself to spend some time trying to increase his strength when it came to spatial maniption after returning from the Main Star Peak.


    At the very least, he would not go anywhere near the ancient temple before his spatial maniption and usage of the Drifting Cloud Steps had increased enough for him to escape a situation where the space around him was restricted.


    In the future, he would not be helpless to just wait and try his best to endure the attack and would instead have a way to escape the attack without wasting all his energy defending passively like he had just done.


    Although he had indeed gotten out without any serious injuries, it would still take some time for his energy reserves to recover again.


    "But¡­ Howe the power behind the attackcked any form of support from a domain?" Muttering this to himself as looked towards the lingering power from the earlier sh located in the crater next to the ancient temple in the distance, Xuan Hao could not help feeling like something was wrong with the attack from earlier.


    For some odd reason, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the person on top of the ancient temple should not belong to the normal cultivation path that he followed, but some other kind of path. The path in question seemed simr to the one followed by the different religious orders, but at the same time also felt different from them, as the power contained in the golden palms seemed purer. Not in strength but-


    No use thinking about this for now. After increasing my understanding of spatial maniption and mastering the next level of the Drifting Cloud Steps, I will return and find out what power this ancient temple belonged to in the past¡­


    Shaking his head as he stopped trying to draw conclusion from the limited information, he had been able to gather so far, Xuan Hao nced onest time towards the ancient temple before leaving.


    Although he really wanted to check out the ancient scroll that had enraged the entity on top of the ancient temple enough tounch such a terrifying attack, Xuan Hao did not n on doing it before he had left the Main Peak and had returned to the safety of the Chaotic Qi Formation.


    ¡­


    Given that Shu Yao was already familiar with the people from the Sky Empire, it was not hard for her to determine that the person Elder Song had notified her about was indeed from the Sky Empire.


    "This is¡­ Looks like it is indeed someone from the Sky Empire!"


    Arriving in the air above the Flying Sword City together with the blue deer that was curiously moving around in the air right beside her under the support of her domain, Shu Yao instantly determined that the person was indeed someone from the Sky Empire.


    However, she could not help frowning upon noticing the weird behaviour of the person from the Sky Empire.


    "It is indeed someone from the Sky Empire, but¡­ Why is he so obsessed with asking random people the same questions again and again about the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect? At this point in time, he should know how many Domain Lords there are¡­" Muttering this to herself as she used her divine sense to listen to the same few questions that the person from the Sky Empire seemed to be asking everyone that passed by him, Shu Yao had a feeling that the Sky Empire had made a mistake and ended up sending a recently recruited soldier that had not yet been trained over.


    "Peak Nascent Soul Realm¡­"


    However, after seeing his cultivation realm, Shu Yao realized that the weird person from the Sky Empire was not some random trainee soldier that had been sent over by ident¡­


    Coo? Coo!


    Seeing Shu Yao''s worried face as she looked down at the person from the Sky Empire, the blue deer that had been trying to escape from her since Xuan Hao had left, gave her a short cheer before returning to running around in the air with the help of Shu Yao''s domain.


    "Eh? You are cheering me on now?" Seeing the little blue deer cheering her on before returning to ying around in the air, Shu Yao could not help smiling to herself for a short moment before a serious expression appeared on her face.


    No matter how weird the person sent by the Sky Empire was, she would still have to talk with him. After all, the only reason why the Sky Empire would send someone to the border region of the Sky Empire specially to visit them, would be something rted to the sect alliance!


    At this point in time, another person should also have arrived at the Seven Fates Sect, as they had also been invited to take part in the sect alliance arranged by the Sky Empire.


    Even if she understood the true purpose of the sect alliance, she also understood just how useful the sect alliance would be for the development of the sect when it came to gathering and trading resources. Not to mention recruiting new and more talented disciples from across the Sky Empire.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The rest of the sects joining the sect alliance were the same, as they all to some degree understood the risks. However, the benefits of joining the sect alliance were simply far too much for these sects to ignore and it was not like the Sky Empire and the three major religious orders would simply leave them alone forever!


    Better take this chance to further increase their strength and hopefully produce a Soul Ascension Realm Expert!

 Chapter ?632 Obedient Blue Deer

    Chapter ?632 Obedient Blue Deer


    Whoosh~


    Descending down from the sky with the blue deer following behind her, Shu Yaonded a short distance away from the person from the Sky Empire before walking over.


    "This is¡­ A Domain Lord!"


    Of course, given that she had not hidden herself from anyone while descending, her presence had instantly caught the attention of the person from the Sky Empire. In turn causing him to freeze up while staring towards Shu Yao approaching him in disbelief.


    From this reaction alone, Shu Yao could easily understand that this person from the Sky Empire did not expect for there to really be any Domain Lords inside the Flying Sword Sect or the Spring Flower Sect and that was even when he had been told that there was indeed two Domain Lords present by the people, he had been asking on the streets of the Flying Sword City¡­


    This was not even mentioning the winged tiger demon beast that not many people knew about! After all, even if it was just Xuan Hao''s pet, it was still a Domain Lord Realm demon beast!


    "Hello, I''m the current sect master of the Spring Flower Sect¡­ Are you perhaps someone sent by the Sky Empire?" Seeing that the person from the Sky Empire was still frozen and had yet to respond to her, Shu Yao took the lead as she introduced herself while also asking whether he was sent by the Sky Empire.


    Even if she was almost a hundred percent certain that the man in front of her was someone from the Sky Empire, she still decided to ask him just to be sure. After all, with his strength at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, there was no way he would dare impersonate someone from the Sky Empire. Especially considering that they were currently inside the Sky Empire¡­


    "Ah, y-yes! I''m from the Sky Empire!" Acting all nervous after realizing that the person in front of him was indeed a Domain Lord, the man from the Sky Empire answered quickly. Only regaining some of his courage after mentioning that he was from the Sky Empire.


    "So¡­ For what reason have someone from the Sky Empiree? Is it perhaps rted to the sect alliance?" Not wanting things to drag on, Shu Yao directly asked this.


    The faster things finished and the person from the Sky Empire left, the better¡­ Not to mention, she still had to look after the blue deer that was currently floating in the air a few feet above them. Having been hidden away by the power of her domain.


    At least, it seemed like the blue deer had not discovered anything odd and was still just ying around by itself. Allowing her to speak with the man from the Sky Empire without worrying about it causing any trouble.


    "Yes! I''m here regarding the sect alliance! However, we should properly go somewhere more private first¡­" Hearing what Shu Yao said, the man from the Sky Empire had already recovered from his earlier shock of discovering that a sect located in the border region actually had a Domain Lord supporting it, as he answered her full of confidence befitting of someone belonging to a massive empire like the Sky Empire.


    "Indeed¡­" Nodding her head in agreement with the man from the Sky Empire, Shu Yao secretly contacted Elder Song about a good location before making her way towards an isted pavilion close to the entrance of the Flying Sword Sect. The man from the Sky Empire following behind her, while the blue deer unknowingly floated behind them, still busy ying around in the air above them.


    Inside, Shu Yao could not help feeling thankful that the blue deer still seemed to be an innocent young child. Not yet easily bored of simple things like ying around in the air by itself.


    Although the feeling of moving around in the air was indeed something fun to do the first time around, one quickly got used to it. Even she had yed around for a few minutes in the air after breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "This is it¡­?"


    Ah? Yes!"


    Interrupting her train of thoughts as they reached the isted pavilion Elder Song had informed her about, the man from the Sky Empire quickly found a ce to sit down after hearing her confirmation.


    Whoosh~


    "First of all, take this, it''s an identification token, you will need it in the future when going to the capital of the Sky Empire for the sect alliance, without it, you won''t be able to enter the imperial capital!"


    Taking out a small token from his interspatial ring before handing it over to her after sitting down, the man from the Sky Empire quickly told her what it was for before patiently waiting for her to put it away.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    From a nce, it could clearly be seen that he was respectful towards Shu Yao. Not something surprising considering she was a Domain Lord, and he was only a Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    If something really ended up happening, the man from the Sky Empire understood that it would almost certainly end with his death! For this reason, he made sure to not act rude towards Shu Yao¡­


    If Shu Yao was a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, he would not have acted this kindly towards her, something Shu Yao understood very well, as she had already experienced just how arrogant the people sent by the Sky Empire were when she had first been invited to join the sect alliance¡­


    "Now, for the reason why I''m here¡­. I havee to inform your sect that the sect alliance will be set in ce soon and your sect will have to send someone to the imperial capital for this reason. The same is true for any of the other sects that will be part of the sect alliance!"


    Listening to what was said, Shu Yao could not help frowning. Feeling that the person in front of her should not only havee to tell her that the sect alliance would be established soon, and the sect needed to send someone to the imperial capital.


    "Hm? When is this¡­? I imagine that it should still be a few years off considering that a lot of the sects invited only have a Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert leading them. For someone like that to reach the imperial capital from the border region of the Sky Empire¡­ It would at least take two to three years'' time even with the help of flying demon beasts!" However, in the end, she did not ask about any of her doubts, as she had a feeling that the person in front of her would not answer her and it was not like she could force him given his identity as someone from the Sky Empire¡­


    "Indeed, the sect alliance establishment with the help of the imperial family will take ce three years from now. Normally your sect would have to send someone towards the imperial capital immediately to make it in time¡­ But from the looks of it, that is not needed.


    If you don''t mind, could I get some information on your sect? As it looks like our information is not up to date. Given that your Spring Flower Sect and the Flying Sword Sect is merging together from what I learned, it would also be helpful if we could get the name of the new sect noted down for when you join the sect alliance in the future."


    Answering some of her doubts, the person from the Sky Empire didn''t intend to talk more about the reason he was sent to the Flying Sword Sect and instead just asked about the name of the new sect that would be born from the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect merging together.


    "Sure¡­ The name will be the Star Shattering Sect!"


    Not seeing anything wrong with giving him the name that the different elders from both the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect had decided on, Shu Yao answered him honestly.


    "I see¡­ The Star Shattering Sect¡­" Nodding his head as he noted it down the name, the man from the Sky Empire soon took out a few more things for Shu Yao before exining a few general things about the sect alliance that she already knew about.


    Like this close to half an hour passed before the man from the Sky Empire left in the direction of the Seven Fates Sect.


    A part of Shu Yao was about to inform him that the Seven Fates Sect also had a Domain Lord, but in the end, she decided against it. Not for any malicious reason, but just because the man from the Sky Empire had been quite annoying to the people in the Flying Sword City before she arrived.


    Coo?


    Over thest hour or so, Shu Yao had grown to like the blue deer more, as it was obedient and didn''t cause any trouble. Even when it had grown bored of ying around in the air, the small blue deer had patiently waited for her to finish her conversation with the man from the Sky Empire. Only making a sound after he had disappeared.


    "Hm¡­ How about this, we will go back to the Seventh Star Peak and get something delicious to eat, what do you think?"


    COO!

 Chapter ?633 Content of the Ancient Scroll...

    Chapter ?633 Content of the Ancient Scroll...


    "Time to check out the Ancient Scroll¡­" Having left the Main Star Peak ande to a stop around the base of the mountain, Xuan Hao found a ce to sit down before taking out the ancient scroll he had gotten from the small temple.


    Opening the ancient scroll, Xuan Hao expected not to be able to understand anything that was written inside of it like the other ancient scroll and books he had gotten his hands on from the small temples around the ancient temple.


    However, this was not the case, as the ancient scroll was not written in the same ancientnguage and was instead written in anguage that seemed to be the fusion between the currentnguage used across the Ewaria Continent and the ancientnguage that was used in the ancient texts, scrolls and books he had just managed to get his hands on.


    "So, this is why that existence on top of the ancient temple didn''t want me to get my hands on this scroll¡­" Muttering this to himself as he understood why the existence on top of the ancient temple had tried so hard to prevent him from getting his hands on the ancient scroll, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself before starting to read through the ancient scroll.


    In the end, the information inside the ancient scroll was not anything too important and was just an ancient letter written by an ancient powerhouse addressed to someone simrly powerful from the ancient temple.


    The letter itself talked about a great cmity and was sent by someone asking for assistance. Unfortunately, it seemed like the letter had been damaged to some extent, causing both the name of the ancient temple and the one responsible for sending the letter to be unreadable.


    The damage to the letter was not caused by the earlier attack that the letter in the shape of a scroll had to endure, but instead because of something different¡­


    Even just holding the scroll in his hands, Xuan Hao could clearly feel the terrifying power of the person who had once written the scroll in his hands.


    Having already tried probing the scroll with his strength, Xuan Hao understood that the remnant power alone left in the scroll was more than enough to fully resist his full strength without any problem!


    The existence on top of the ancient temple also knew that there was no way to destroy the ancient scroll and therefore only tried taking it away before he noticed anything¡­


    From this alone, it was obvious that the person who had written the scroll in front of him was far more powerful than the Domain Lord Realm¡­ Maybe even some ancient powerhouse from the past that had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he remembered the cmity mentioned by the person in the letter.


    Given that an existence that had highly likely surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm had asked for assistance, it could easily be imagined just how terrifying this cmity was. Not to mention, for him to ask the ancient temple for assistance, it meant that the ancient temple likely also had someone who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm in the past.


    Maybe all of this was even rted to the reason why the Shattered Star Peaks had eneded up in their current situation!


    Not thinking too long about this as his strength was far too low to try and find out about such things for now, Xuan Hao finished reading through the ancient scroll.


    Although several parts of it were unreadable due to damage or due to the fact that it was far too close to the ancientnguage for him to understand, Xuan Hao could still read a majority of the letter without any problems.


    Through it, he discovered that other than the cmity mentioned towards the start, the scroll also mentioned several unknown factions and sects Xuan Hao had never heard about before. All gathering together to defend against the cmity.


    Nothing more of importance was left in the ancient scroll, as the rest was just a continues stream of words stating how important it was for the ancient temple to send help and how the ancient temple would not survive if the cmity was not stopped.


    "Although all of this is rather useless to me at the moment¡­ The fact that the scrollsnguage seems to be a fusion between thenguage of the current day and the one used in the past is extremely useful.


    The reason why the existence on top of the ancient temple wanted to stop me is likely because it knows that it won''t take someone with my cultivation realm more than a few years of dedicated study to decipher and understand the ancientnguage with this ancient scroll as a reference point¡­"


    Smiling to himself even after knowing that he would at least have to use a year or more to gain anything useful from the ancient scroll, Xuan Hao was not unhappy in the slightest, as he understood full well how useful it would be for him to understand the ancientnguage used in the past.


    Be it for understand ancient texts when exploring ancient ruins and secret realms, the use of the learning the ancientnguage did not stop there!


    Just imagining getting his hand on some ancient cultivation technique or powerful qi technique, yet not have the ability to understand it, was more than enough motivation for Xuan Hao when it came to learning the ancientnguage.


    Not to mention, he really wanted to learn more about the ancient temple from the ancient books he had taken with him, as it was something rted to the main quest from the system.


    After reading the letter, Xuan Hao understood that entering the ancient temple might be far more dangerous than he first expected and learning more about the temple was something he had to do if he wanted to enter without having to worry about getting caught in a trap of some sort the moment, he stepped foot inside.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Increasing myprehension of the Dao of Space and learning the ancientnguage¡­ Even if I''m fast, it should at least take me two years to do¡­" Muttering this to himself as he realized that he would not be able toplete the main quest for the next two years, Xuan Hao could not help looking up towards the Main Star Peak with a wry smile on his face.


    Xuan Hao had hoped he would be able toplete the main quest faster than thest time around¡­ But from the looks of it, it would take him even longer than before.


    At least, by that point in time, both the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect should have finished moving into the Seventh Star Peak and have fully merged together into a single sect.


    Not only that, but he his sect quest for increasing the strength of the sect should also bepleted at that point in time as long as he helped Feng Chen break through to the Domain Lord Realm, as the winged lion was not counted as part of the sect and was instead only considered as his pet in the eyes of the system.


    "Hah¡­" Shaking his head as he thought about the winged lion, Xuan Hao soon turned his attention back towards the ancient scroll before startingpare the currentnguage of the present with the one used in the past.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was doing his first ever attempt at trying to decipher the ancientnguage, arge group of elders had gathered together at the Seventh Star Peak as they were talking with each other.


    "So¡­ The name of the sect will be the Star Shattering Sect?"


    ""Yes!""


    The subject of these elders'' conversation was the new name of the sect!


    "Why¡­ Didn''t we decide on the Shattering Star Sect a few days ago¡­ Why the sudden change!?"


    "Elder ying Ghost, we didn''t do this for no reason, it was just that a few of the elders thought that the name sounded a little weak¡­


    Calling the sect, the Shattered Star Sect, is a bit like naming it the Broken Star Sect. Shattered gives the impression of a ss constitution. Fragile and prone to breakage."


    "Yeah, we just thought that it was more fitting and ended up deciding on it¡­ Not to mention we almost kept it the name the same!"


    "You guys¡­"


    Feeling like he had been betrayed, Elder ying Ghost looked around at the other elders with a feeling of disbelief.


    He had been gone for a few days as he entered secluded cultivation to prepare for his breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm, yet these elders had gone and changed the name of the sect that they had decided on during his absence!


    No matter what, Elder ying Ghost felt his face darken when staring at these old fossils from both the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect.


    "I will be entering secluded cultivation to enter the Nascent Soul Realm! Don''t bother looking for me in the future!"


    Whoosh~!


    Before any of the elders had a chance to say anything, Elder ying Ghost headed back into his own courtyard before shutting the door tightly.

 Chapter ?634 The Seventh Star Peak After 1 Year (1)

    Chapter ?634 The Seventh Star Peak After 1 Year (1)


    Following Shu Yao''s return to the Seventh Star Peak, she barely managed to spend any time together with the blue deer before Xuan Hao showed up again. However, given that she had started getting along with the blue deer, Shu Yao felt sad that she would have to part with it so soon.


    Coo!


    The blue deer was simrly sad when it realized Xuan Hao was going to take it away as it cried out, whether this was due to the fact that it could understand that Shu Yao had promised it food or because it had grown attached to her. No one would know for certain unless they managed to understand the blue deernguage¡­


    "¡­"


    Seeing this scene, Xuan Hao didn''t take away the blue deer and instead decided to leave it with Shu Yao. After all, they were now part of the same sect, it didn''t really matter to him where the blue deer stayed¡­ On the other hand, the blue deer staying with Shu Yao could also be considered a good thing, as he would no longer have to think of a way to take care of it!


    Like this, the blue deer ended up staying together with Shu Yao, as Xuan Hao soon took his leave again after listening to Shu Yao tell him about the visit from a member of the Sky Empire and the sect alliance''s formation three years in the future.


    ¡­


    Leaving the blue deer in the hands of Shu Yao, Xuan Hao soon made his way to Feng Chen, who was busy talking with a group of elders when he arrived.


    "Elder Xuan? What brings you here?" Not hiding himself when he arrived, Feng Chen quickly spotted him approaching, as he quickly signalled for the elders gathered around him to leave before making his way over.


    "I came because I wanted to know a bit more about the new sect you, Shu Yao and Zu Fei have been busy building over the past year. After all, the only thing I really know about so far is the new hierarchy of the sect that you came up with and the fact that it''s almostplete. Other than that, I never really got a chance to learn about anything else¡­"


    "Hm? Really?"


    "Yes¡­"


    Seeing Feng Chen''s surprised expression after hearing that he did not learn anything about the sect outside what they had talked about a few days ago, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly.


    It was indeed rather weird for him to not really know much about the new sect. After all, he hade here more than once over the past year to help out with different things. However, at that time, he did not really think to ask about theyout of the new sect¡­


    "I see¡­ Well, if that is really the case, I''m more than happy to exin it to you!"


    Hearing Xuan Hao really didn''t know much about the new sect that he had even been helping build over the past year, Feng Chen showed an exited expression.


    Exining what they had managed to aplish over the past year was something he had been proud of. Especially considering how much of an upgrade it would be from the Flying Sword Sect that they had been staying in so far¡­ Of course, the same could be said for the Spring Flower Sect!


    "First of all, the name of the sect changed and from now on, we will not be known as the Flying Sword Sect or the Spring Flower Sect, but instead as the Shattering Star Sect! The name was decided on by the elders from both sects and we have already begun informing the disciples about this, as in the future, they will not be disciples from the Flying Sword Sect or Spring Flower Sect, but disciples of the Shattering Star Sect!"


    "If I remember correctly, the disciples would be dived into outer, inner and core disciples, with personal disciples existing somewhere outside of this."


    "Indeed, we already finished constructing the ces for the outer and inner disciples to stay¡­ The only thing we need to build when ites to the disciples, is the one for core disciples. At least, given the new qualifications required for one to be a core disciple, there won''t be any core disciples for now, so we don''t need to worry about this¡­"


    Remembering the qualifications required for the different disciples, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he understood what Feng Chen meant when it came to them not having to worry about any core disciples in the soon to be future.


    After all, the requirement for a core disciple was the Nascent Soul Realm! Even his disciples had not reached the Nascent Soul Realm yet, let alone any of the other disciples in the sect!


    Even the requirements to be an inner disciple was rather brutalpared to the past, as it required a disciple to reach the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Most of the older core disciples should have reached this level, with some of them even reaching the Core Formation Realm¡­ However, there were still a few core disciples who had yet to reach the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    In the future, they would go from being a core disciple, to being an outer disciple¡­ Just imagining their reaction, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit of pity towards these disciples who had once been at the peak of the Flying Sword Sect. Hopefully they would be able to increase their strength in the future and at least be inner disciples¡­


    Thinking this, Xuan Hao looked towards Feng Chen. Wanting him to continue.


    "Ehm! The disciples, outer disciples will share a simple courtyard with a few other outer disciples, inner disciples will get their own courtyard, while core disciples will get a personalized courtyard simr to what the Outer Sect Elders will get. The core disciples will just be located a bit closer to the centre of the sect."


    Understanding what Xuan Hao wanted him to do, Feng Chen quickly continued from where he left off, as he exined the ces the disciples and Outer Sect Elders would be staying.


    Given the strength required for a normal sect elder being the Nascent Soul Realm now, it was obvious that most of the sect''s current elders would end up as Outer Sect Elders in the future.


    With this in mind, Feng Chen had already covered the ces that most of the sect would be staying in the future.


    "As for the sect elders, they will get to make their own ce even closer to the centre of the sect, while the core elders will be able to build their own courtyard, pce or whatever they desire to stay in next to theke and the same can be said for the grand elders, myself, and the Vice Sect Master. The n is for now is that the core of the sect''s strength will be staying next to theke at the centre of the Seventh Star Peak!"


    "I see, looks like I will have to find out what kind of ce I would like to stay in before I can officially move in." Showing a slight grin before looking towards theke he had made at the centre of the Seventh Star Peak, Xuan Hao did indeed notice that the area around theke was mostly empty. The buildings that stood close to theke when he had been there just a few days ago had seemingly vanished into thin air.


    From the looks of it, it seemed like the decision of moving the core power of the sect to gather around theke was a recent development that had happened in the short time he had visited the Main Star Peak¡­


    However, Xuan Hao didn''t mind this, as it would be a good thing for the sect''s core power to be concentrated around theke, as it would be far easier to cultivate around it when it finally filled up.


    Not to mention this, it would also help mystify theke for the disciples and make them look forward to visiting it in the future, as it would be rare for them to see it after different courtyards, pces, pavilions, pagodas and so on, obstructed the view of theke from what could be considered the outer part of the sect.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Already feeling like he could see how the Star Shattering Sect would look in the future, Xuan Hao could not help smiling as he looked forward to seeing it.


    During the next few years, the new sect that had been born through the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect merging would surely experience an explosive growth period as many of the elders who had been stuck at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm for a long time got a chance to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm in the new environment of the Seventh Star Peak!

 Chapter ?635 The Seventh Star Peak After 1 Year (2)

    Chapter ?635 The Seventh Star Peak After 1 Year (2)


    Finished exining about the ces where everyone would be staying in the future, Feng Chen went on to talk about the other things that had been built up over the past year.


    Among the most important things were thebat hall, a practice hall forbat-based training in different environments where the disciples could either spar with each other or practice by themselves. Thebat hall was something that had existed in the Spring Flower Sect and was created by the most powerful formation master of the Spring Flower Sect, who was not only an Artisan Formation Master, but also a Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert!


    "Can we check out thebat hall?"


    "Sure! It was just finished a few weeks ago and is just about to open up for disciples to start using it!"


    Feeling curious about thebat hall mentioned by Feng Chen, Xuan Hao wanted to see it for himself as he quickly stopped Feng Chen before he moved on to the next thing on the list of things he had yet to learn about.


    ...


    "So, this is thebat hall..." Landing together with Feng Chen a short timeter in front of a majestic building covering a massive area, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked when inspecting the hundreds of different formations weaved together to form thebat hall.


    Just a single nce was more than enough for him to understand that the formation master who set up the formations that made up thebat hall, was far more skilled than him when it came to formations! To be honest, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the formation master from the Spring Flower Sect was not someone who was merely in the Artisan Realm but should instead be someone closer to surpassing the Artisan Realm!


    This thought alone made Xuan Hao quite happy, as he had no idea that the Spring Flower Sect had such a powerful formation master.


    A formation master at that level would likely be something even the Sky Empire would be interested in, yet now the Star Shattering Sect had such a powerful formation master!


    Whoosh~


    Wanting to experience thebat hall for himself, Xuan Hao made his way inside before finding himself inside a massive forest in the next moment.


    Touching a tree next to him, Xuan Hao could not help showing a thoughtful expression on his face.


    "How interesting, the forest should be some sort of illusion formation... Yet I can actually touch and feel it like it''s a real tree in front of me. The formation almost feels like it''s turning illusion into reality... However, it''s still easily broken through with enough strength!"


    Crash~


    Putting a little more strength on to the tree in front of him, Xuan Hao watched as the tree shattered together with the forest around him.


    Swish~


    As he had only destroyed a small part of the massive formation that made up thebat hall, the forest soon appeared again in a few minutes.


    "Even if it''s useless to someone in the Domain Lord Realm like myself, it should still be useful for the disciples and the elders below the Domain Lord Realm..." Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling happy.


    Thebat hall would be able to simte different kinds of environments for the disciples and elders to practice in. Allowing them to be prepared for any kind of environment they might end up fighting in when outside the sect.


    At the same time, it should also allow those with more specialbat techniques that required a specific environment to train without any problems.


    This really makes me want to meet the formation master from the Spring Flower Sect...n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao soon made his way back together with Feng Chen who had patiently waited for him outside thebat hall. For now, he had to finish learning about the different ces on the Seventh Star Peak before meeting anyone!


    ...


    Having returned from thebat hall, Xuan Hao hurried Feng Chen to tell him more about the different ces that had been constructed over the past year. Visiting thebat hall had made him excited knowing what else had been made during the past half year, as he had not been too involved in the construction of the new sect. Outside of the Chaotic Qi Formation.


    Feng Chen did not disappoint his expectations, as he proudly began talking about the other different things that had been made during the past year.


    First was the Alchemy Pavilion, the alchemy hall where the alchemist of the Star Shattering Sect would gather to refine the different pills, potions, and elixirs that the sect needed. At the same time, it also served as a ce for the different alchemy disciples to gather a socialize with each other and discuss alchemy.


    Other than the Alchemy Pavilion for the disciples practicing alchemy, there was also the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces, which was the ce where the cksmiths of the Star Shattering Sect gathered... And as the name implied, it covered a massive area. Making cksmithing the profession that took up the most space on the Seventh Star Peak.


    The Formation masters, talisman masters and the rest of the professions present inside the Star Shattering Sect had also build a ce of their own on the Seventh Star Peak at this point in time, but they were far smaller whenpared to the Alchemy Pavilions and the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces. The reason for this was rather simple, as there was simply far more disciples and elders practicing these two professionspared to the rest of the professions.


    "... That should be thest of the different profession rted buildings that have been constructed so far. Next up should be the Grand Mission Pavilion..."


    As Feng Chen finished his exnation about the different profession rted buildings, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious upon hearing the next ce he started talking about.


    The Grand Mission Pavilion...


    From the name alone, Xuan Hao could already guess that it should be something simr to the Mission Hall from the Flying Sword Sect but given he had never really visited the Mission Hall back in the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao could not help feeling interested in what the Grand Mission Pavilion was.


    "The Grand Mission Pavilion is simr to the Mission Hall that you should already know about, but still quite different! The Grand Mission Pavilion is designed to not only be a ce for the disciples to pick up different missions that they canplete outside and inside the sect, but is also designed to be a ce for them to socialize with each other in... Of course, the Grand Mission Pavilion is also for the elders to socialize and pick up missions of their own.


    For this reason, the Grand Mission Pavilion is split into two floors. The first floor is thergest and is the ce where the disciples will gather to socialize or pick up missions toplete for different rewards, while the second floor is reserved for the elders to pick up missions of their own and spend some time to rx and chat with each other.


    Not only that, but we also introduced a new form of contribution points that can be gained throughpleting missions before being recorded inside a special token. The contribution points can be used by both elders and disciples to trade and exchange for different artifacts, pills, potions, spiritual herbs, and other treasures inside the Grand Mission Pavilion."


    Listening to Feng Chen''s exnation of the Grand Mission Pavilion, Xuan Hao could not help nodding his head in approval, the Grand Mission Pavilion sounded like a ce that would see great use in the future from what he heard so far. However, Feng Chen was not finished talking yet as he continued...


    "Following the Grand Mission Pavilion, me and the rest of the elders also decided to build an open market for the disciples to trade with each other located just next to the Grand Mission Pavilion. This will be ce where we also n to have serval different restaurants for the disciples to hang out and also allow them to set up different shops of their own by paying a few contribution points."


    As Feng Chen finally seemed to havee to an end exining the Grand Mission Pavilion and the open market that would be located around it, Xuan Hao could not help wanting to visit the Grand Mission Pavilion for himself.


    After all, from what Feng Chen had told him so far about it, Xuan Hao was almost certain that the Grand Mission Pavilion with the open market located around it would end up bing the ce where the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect would end up spending most of their time with the other disciples.


    Even without seeing the ce himself, Xuan Hao still understood just how important the Grand Mission Pavilion would be in the future!

 Chapter ?636 The Seventh Star Peak After 1 Year (3)

    Chapter ?636 The Seventh Star Peak After 1 Year (3)


    "Other than the Grand Mission Pavilion, several other important ces have also been set up over thest year. By far, the most important of these other ces is the Ninth Star Peak, that was transformed into a massive spiritual herb garden with the help of Shu Yao, Zu Fei, and the alchemy elders from both the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect."


    Hearing what Feng Chen said, Xuan Hao could not help remembering the Ninth Star Peak from when he had first visited together with Qing Yi and Chu Yang. Back then, the Ninth Star Peak was filled with all sorts of people searching the forest on top of the Ninth Star Peak for spiritual herbs.


    Even if the spiritual herbs were rather low quality back then, things should have changed now that the chaotic qi formation was in ce. Given the increase in qi at the Ninth Star Peak, it was not weird for higher quality spiritual herbs to start appearing.


    From what Feng Chen said, it seemed like Shu Yao, Zu Fei and the alchemy elders had taken advantage of the fact that spiritual herbs grew naturally on the Ninth Star Peak and ended up transforming it into a massive spiritual herb garden.


    In the future, the Star Shattering Sect would have more than enough spiritual herbs for the alchemist to make potions, pills, and elixirs¡­


    Thest thing on the list of important buildings in the Star Shattering Sect that Feng Chen had left forst, was the Grand Library where all the cultivation mantras, martial arts and differentbat techniques were stored.


    The Grand Library located close to the centre of Seventh Star Peak, was split into a total of three different floors.


    The first floor was where most of the different cultivation mantras andbat techniques were located, it was also here that most of the disciples would be spending their time. The higher-level cultivation mantras of the Heaven Rank could also be found here, but it would only be the first few volumes that had been copied from the original. Not the entire thing.


    The second floor of the library was differentpared to the first floor of the Grand Library, as one would have to at least be a core disciple or an elder at the Nascent Soul Realm. Meaning, Outer Sect Elders were not counted as those who could enter the second floor of the grand library!


    At the second floor of the library, the original copies of the different Heaven Rank Cultivation Mantras and Combat Techniques were stored and could be essed by the sect elders and core disciples.


    The Third Floor of the Grand Library was only essible to Core Elders and above, there was not really anything stored on the third floor of the Grand Library yet, but Xuan Hao could already guess that cultivation mantras that surpassed the Heaven Rank would be stored there. Maybe special scrolls like the ones he had found in the temple of the Half Spirit Race could also be stored on the third floor of the library if he happened to get his hands on more in the future.


    "Is that it?"


    "Yes¡­ That should be it for the important ces and building we finished up over the past years."


    Feeling a bit exhausted after having listened to Feng Chen talking for the past few hours, Xuan Hao let out a sigh of relief after hearing that the exnation was finally finished.


    Even if he was interested in all these important ces on the Seventh Star Peak and the Ninth Star Peak. Listening to Feng Chen talking for an extended period of time quickly became rather exhausting mentally. Especially considering how boring things started getting towards the end¡­


    "If that was all, I will be taking my leave for now and find out where to settle down on the Seventh Star Peak."


    Following a quick farewell, Xuan Hao didn''t stay around for much longer before leaving.


    Given that he nned to move his three disciples to the Seventh Star Peak given how much better it would be for them to cultivate there, Xuan Hao directly made his way towards his pavilion back at the Flying Sword Sect.


    nning to ask his disciples what kind of ce they would prefer to stay when moving before starting to build anything.


    ¡­


    "G-Grand Elder¡­ Are you sure we should try going outside? The increase in qi is not something bad and it won''t hurt to stay and wait until we be stronger!"


    "No! We have to find out the reason for the sudden increase in qi between heaven and earth! From what was recorded and written down by our ancestors, something like this happening is either due to some powerful expert ascending, the appearance of a powerful artifact or a powerful qi gathering formation! No matter which one it is, it is highly likely something that will end up endangering all of us!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was making his way back towards the Flying Sword Sect, a short old man shook off the hands of an equally small young man who was trying to hold him back.


    From a nce, it was obvious that these two people were members of the Half Spirit Race that lived in the Eighth Star Peak. The old man was the great elder Xuan Hao had talked to when he had visited, while the young man was a recently appointed elder of the Half Spirit Race who had just recently broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "But Grand Elder¡­ Our ancestors clearly warned us to never go outside unless someone manages to ascend sessfully! If we do go out before this, the ancestors clearly warned us about the experts of the human race which is currently in charge of the Ewaria Continent taking action to wipe us out!"


    "Bah! You worry far too much! Do you really think such a transcendent expert would really bother with our race which doesn''t even have a single expert at the Domain Lord Realm? Not to mention, all those experts should be located at the centre of the continent. Not anywhere near where we are currently!"


    Rolling his eyes at the young elders worry, the old man who was in charge of the Half Spirit Race waved his hand and sealed up the young elder to prevent him from causing any more trouble before slowly beginning his ascend out of the valley hidden away inside the Eighth Star Peak.


    "Grand Elder!"


    Not able to stop the Grand Elder from leaving to find out what was going on outside, the young elder could only let go as he anxiously stared towards the Grand Elder slowly getting closer and closer to the outside world.


    Even if the Grand Elder was someone who had already reached Half a Step into the Domain Lord Realm and had already condensed a pseudo domain, the young elder understood very well just how weak the Grand Elder was whenpared to the powerful experts described in the ancient texts written by his ancestors.


    Back when the Half Spirit Race was considered to be at their pinnacle and could move around outside without having to worry about another raceing along and wiping them out, there had been hundreds of experts in the Soul Ascension Realm ording to the ancient records.


    However, this was not what had made the Half Spirit Race stand tall in the world back then. Instead, it was the presence of three transcendent experts who had sessfully managed to surpass the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Only with an expert above the Soul Ascension Realm could a race truly keep itself safe in the world.


    Considering that the Half Spirit Race had three such experts in the past, their position in the world could be considered stable¡­ However, this all changed when a cataclysmic war erupted in the past.


    The war had not only split the world up, but had also ended up killing the three transcendent experts from the Half Spirit Race¡­ Back then, the few surviving experts of the Half Spirit Race had used an ancient teleportation formation toe to the Eighth Star Peak to seek refuge and hide away until another transcendent expert could emerge from the Half Spirit Race. Allowing them to appear in the world once again!n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    However, none of this had happened and the Half Spirit Race had instead ended up starting a slow decline until the strongest expert left had not even reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    The young elder was among the few members of the Half Spirit Race who knew about this part of their history, as he had dedicated his entire life to understanding the ancient records of his race, while at the same time keeping them intact before he broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm and became an elder.


    For this reason, the young elder was extremely nervous when watching the Grand Elder making his way outside their small safe space, as he full well understood the dangers of the outside world from the ancient records, he had spent his entire life reading through.

 Chapter ?637 Potential New Sect Members

    Chapter ?637 Potential New Sect Members


    Bang~!


    "What is this¡­?" Reaching the top and just about to leave the valley inside the Eighth Star Peak, the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race could not help showing a bewildered expression as he felt an intangible barrier blocking his path forward. Preventing him from reaching the outside world


    Trying to touch the barrier and finding out that it only stopped his path forward without harming him, the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race tried going around it-


    Bang!


    However, this was to no avail, as the intangible barrier covered all ways out of the valley inside the Eighth Star Peak. Even trying to destroy the barrier did not yield any results, as his strength at the Half a Step into the Domain Lord Realm, could not even shake the intangible barrier that prevented him from leaving the Eighth Star Peak.


    "Is this perhaps a barrier set up by our ancestors¡­?" Not knowing who had set up the barrier, but still understanding that the barrier did not seem to harm him, the Grand Elder could only think that the barrier was something that his ancestor had set up in the past to prevent them from leaving for the outside world before they were strong enough.


    The reason why an outsider like Xuan Hao could enter, was most likely because the barrier had to do so to prevent the barrier from being found easily by any powerful existences that would pass by the Eighth Star Peak.


    In the Grand Elder''s eyes, this was not too unreasonable, as he could only give up on leaving to investigate what was happening in the outside world.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any more time standing in front of the barrier, the Grand Elder made his way back towards the young elder anxiously staring up towards him from the ground below.


    From his expression alone, the Grand Elder could tell how nervous the young elder had been when he had seen him trying to leave earlier!


    "Haaaah¡­ It looks like our ancestors don''t want me to leave either, looks like we won''t be able to find out what is happening outside for now!"


    "Yes!" Nodding his head happily after seeing the Grand Elder giving up on leaving for the dangerous outside world, the young elder did not even bother hiding his happiness.


    "¡­ Inform everyone in the town that they should focus on cultivating. The increase in qi between heaven and earth is a great thing and should be able to help everyone improve! Not to mention, we have no idea when the density of qi between heaven and earth will start decreasing again¡­" Not knowing what to say when he saw the young elder''s beaming smile, the Grand Elder only let out a sigh inside his head before saying this.


    The increase in qi between heaven and earth was not something that would happen every day and his people had to take advantage of this, himself included!


    Maybe, the Half Spirit Race would finally be able to give birth to a Domain Lord Realm Expert after so many years of decline!


    "I will enter secluded cultivation trying to break through, inform the rest of the elders not to disturb me during this period of time!"n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Swish-!


    Knowing that he himself was the one with the highest chance of reaching the Domain Lord Realm among the people of his race, the Grand Elder did not waste any time. Directly rushing towards his home before entering secluded cultivation. Trying his best to break through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    As he had no clue what level of strength was required to break through the barrier blocking him for leaving, the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race felt even more motivated to try and reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    After all, the barrier set up by his ancestors might have weakened over the years¡­ Maybe him reaching the Domain Lord Realm would be enough to break through it!


    ¡­


    "Hm? Looks like someone from the Half Spirit Race tried leaving!"


    Having returned to his pavilion back at the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao suddenly muttered this to himself while staring in the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Back when he had left the Eighth Star Peak, he had made sure to put down a seal on the ce with his Domain Lord level strength. Preventing anyone below the Domain Lord Realm from entering the ce by ident, while also making sure that anyone forcefully trying to break through the seal would end up notifying him.


    Just now, Xuan Hao had clearly felt the seal he had left in ce being attacked. However, different from his expectations, the one attacking it was not someone trying to break through the seal from the outside but was instead someone from the inside trying to break through the seal to leave.


    Unexpectedly, Xuan Hao realized that he had idently ended up sealing the Half Spirit Race off inside the valley of the Eighth Star Peak¡­


    "But¡­ For them to suddenly try and leave, it should be rted to the chaotic qi formation increasing the qi between heaven and earth!"


    Not taking too long to realize why the Half Spirit Race, that had lived in peace in the same ce without moving for thousands of years suddenly wanted to go outside, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit wryly.


    After leaving the Half Spirit Race back then, he had told the Grand Elder about having him join his sect. However, in the end he had not been able to do so, as the construction of the new sect drew most of his attention.


    Now over a year had passed and the Half Spirit Race was still stuck inside the valley that was hidden away deep inside the Eighth Star Peak¡­


    "Now that I think about it, I should inform Elder Song about this and have him officially integrate the Half Spirit Race into the Star Shattering Sect¡­" Muttering this to himself as he felt a pang of guilt from forgetting about them, Xuan Hao directly left his pavilion before finding Elder Song to inform him about the Half Spirit Race and have hime up with a way to integrate them into the Star Shattering Sect.


    In the end, Elder Song did not take too long toe up with a way, as he soon rushed towards the Shattered Star Peak before Xuan Hao had even finished exining what little he knew about the Half spirit Race.


    It was easy to see that Elder Song was excited about the prospect of a brand-new race like the Half Spirit Race joining the Star Shattering Sect. Especially after knowing how strong they were.


    Even if they didn''t have any Domain Lord Realm Experts, the number of Nascent Soul Realm Experts in the Half Spirit Race was nothing to scoff at, as it would help the Star Shattering Sect get a batch of new elders at the Nascent Soul Realm for free.


    Not to mention, the Grand Elder was someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm and would be qualified to be a Core Elder!


    In the current Star Shattering Sect where there was still a ratherrgeck of normal elders and core elders who would do some of the more difficult work, the Half Spirit Race was like a blessing, something that would help the Star Shattering Sect more quickly stabilize themselves before beginning the more important expansion of the sect''s influence outside the now gone Heavenly Sky Kingdom!


    ¡­


    Not trying to stop Elder Song as he left towards the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao understood full well that the current Flying Sword Sect was more than fine without Elder Song for a few days. Especially considering the fact most of the Flying Sword Sect''s disciples and elders had already started moving towards the Seventh Star Peak.


    At this point in time, the Flying Sword Sect was almost fully operational as a branch of the Star Shattering Sect and would soon be able to operate without the oversight of someone like Elder Song.


    Even if it was far emptierpared to what it was before the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao understood that this would change in the future when the Star Shattering Sect started epting disciples from outside their currently small territory.


    To be honest, it would not be surprising if the Flying Sword Sect now turned branch, ended up growing evenrger given how close it would be to the main sect.


    Whoosh~


    Not thinking about this for too long, Xuan Hao soon left the empty pavilion that he and Elder Song had met up in before making his way back to his own pavilion.


    Now, all that was left for him to do in the Flying Sword Sect was getting his disciples ready to move to the Seventh Star Peak.


    Building the ce where he would be staying with them was something that would at most take a few days, if not hours after being decided.


    Not like Feng Chen''s pavilion that was mysteriously dyed several times for unknown reason as he was forced to continue staying with Zu Fei. Even at this point in time, the pavilion had still not been rebuilt¡­

 Chapter ?638 New Home

    Chapter ?638 New Home


    After returning back to his own pavilion and informing his disciples about moving to the Seventh Star Peak, a few weeks passed by before officially moving from the Flying Sword Sect to the Star Shattering Sect on top of the Seventh Star Peak.


    "This¡­ Isrger than I expected¡­"


    However, upon arriving at the ce where they were supposed to stay from now on, Xuan Hao could not help frowning upon discovering what could only be described as a small, yet majestic pce appeared in front of him.


    Remembering how he had asked a few of the elders to help him get the construction done, while making sure to include a few things his disciples had requested for, like an alchemy room for Qing Yi or a room for forging artifacts in Bai Ning''s case, Xuan Hao did not know how to react after discovering that the elders of the sect had ended up making a pce for him instead of the small manor or pavilion he had expected for them to make¡­


    "So majestic, this is where we will be living from now on?!"


    "Such arge room for forging artifacts, it''s at least five timesrger than the one I used at the cksmithing Hall before!"


    "There is even a small garden for growing spiritual herbs¡­"


    Compared to Xuan Hao who had no idea how to react after discovering that the elders had made a pce for him to stay in, his three disciples excitedly entered the pce before exploring the ce together.


    "To think I would be able to stay in a ce like this, will I be able to keep this ce clean by myself¡­?" Zhi Ruo who would also be living in the ce was simrly shocked, but also showed a worried expression after realizing she would be the only servant present to make sure that the pce in front of her was kept clean.


    Even if she had managed to increase her strength and break through to the Foundation Establishment Realm over the past year after she immersed herself in the art of tea brewing, it would still be hard for her to keep such arge ce clean all by herself¡­


    "In the future, feel free to recruit a few more servants if you need to."


    "Thank you, Elder Xuan!"


    Seeing the worried expression on Zhi Ruo''s face after seeing the pce, Xuan Hao understood what she was thinking, as he allowed her to recruit more servants if needed, something Zhi Ruo happily epted before she also entered the pce to explore her new home together with the rest of his disciples.


    "¡­"


    Seeing that everyone was excited about the pce that they would be staying in, Xuan Hao decided not to think about it too much, as he decided to simrly explore his new home together with his disciples and Zhi Ruo.


    Not a long after having explored the small pce, Xuan Hao, his disciples and Zhi Ruo fully settled into their new home beside theke that was only filled by a few centimeters at the centre of the Seventh Star Peak.


    ¡­


    Following Xuan Hao settling into his new home together with his disciples, time slowly started passing.


    On the outside, the Star Shattering Sect''s name began spreading among the kingdoms and powerful sects located close to what had once been the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    The news of a sect with more than one Domain Lord Realm appearing was more than enough to scare all of these kingdoms and sects bordering the territory of the brand-new sect called the Star Shattering Sect.


    All of them understood very clearly that a powerful sect like the Star Shattering Sect would start expanding at some point in the future after consolidating their strength. At that point in time, they would inevitably have to fight with the Star Shattering Sect if they wanted to keep the territory they controlled, something that was easier said than done in an area where a Domain Lord Realm Expert was considered an existence only spoken of in legends¡­


    For this reason, the sects and kingdoms located close to the Star Shattering Sect decided to either take everything precious they had with them before escaping to a different area to rebuild in a ce far away from the Star Shattering Sect.


    The weaker sects and kingdoms that did not have confidence in doing something like this tried to join the Star Shattering Sect before they started expanding. After all, in the world that they were living in, it was not a bad thing to be under someone powerful. Especially if that someone was a powerful sect with more than one Domain Lord!


    "Are you really sure that we should try and join the Star Shattering Sect? Even if they have more than one Domain Lord, our grand master is also close to breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm. At that point in time, even if the Star Shattering Sect wants to expand, they would still have to avoid us!"


    "Hm¡­ Indeed, we will wait and see if the grand master can break through before deciding. Not to mention, the strength of the Star Shattering Sect might be embellished!"


    However, in the end, the Star Shattering Sect was far too unknown for the more powerful kingdoms and sects. Most of them only knowing about the Heavenly Sky Kingdom that had copsed not too long ago and the fact that it had a few powerful sects under it.


    Not to mention the fact that most of the kingdoms and sects had never even seen anyone from the Star Shattering Sect, it was obvious that they would not just concede their territory just because of a few rumours that it was a sect with more than a single Domain Lord in it.


    Even if the rumours were true, most of these powerful kingdoms and sects already had elders who were Half a Step into the Domain Lord Realm.


    After the news of the powerful Star Shattering Sect, all of these powerful elders had entered secluded cultivation to try and break through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    As long as their elder managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm, they would not have to worry about the Star Shattering Sect. This was the thought passing through many of these powerful kingdoms, sects, and ancient family ns close to the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course, the Star Shattering Sect did not care about all the things that was taking ce in the outside world at the moment, as something far more important had been taking ce inside the Star Shattering Sect over the past few months following Xuan Hao and his disciple moving to the Seventh Star Peak.


    The thing in question was¡­ The integration of the Half Spirit Race into the sect!


    ¡­


    A few months earlier, after Xuan Hao had informed Elder Song about the Half Spirit Race and his conversation with the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race about them joining the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song had rushed towards the Shattered Star Peak to meet the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race and talk about this.


    "This is the Eighth Star Peak¡­?"


    Seeing the massive mountain towering above the clouds in the distance, Elder Song could not help marvelling at the sheer size of the mountains inside the Shattered Star Peaks. Each and every one of them were simply massive, like a territory the size of a small kingdom had been forcefully pulled from the ground by an all-powerful god.


    The size of the Star Peaks was far beyond any mountain Elder Song had ever seen before in his life! Even if he had been to the Shattered Star Peaks before, he still felt the same amazement whenever heid his eyes upon the massive mountains that made up the Shattered Star Peaks.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "The Half Spirit Race mentioned by Elder Xuan should be hidden inside a valley that is located inside the Eighth Star Peak. ording to him, the entrance of the valley should be located at the top of the Eighth Star Peak¡­" Muttering this to himself, Elder Song could not help ncing up the Eighth Star Peak.


    Although the Eighth Star Peak had its peak destroyed ording to legend like the rest of the Star Peaks, even with his strength at the Nascent Soul Realm, Elder Song did still not manage to see the top of the mountain in front of him.


    "Looks like this will be a long journey. At least the formation Elder Xuan set up removed the chaotic qi that would have prevented me from making this journey in the past¡­ Hah¡­ I have no idea if I should thank Elder Xuan or curse him for doing this¡­" Saying this to himself as he nced up the mountain that seemingly pierced through the heavens above, Elder Song felt a bit regretful that he had not asked Elder Xuan to help get him up the mountain.


    After all, Elder Xuan could just fly up the mountain, while he would still have to walk up the mountain¡­ Even if he was a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, this would still take quite some time to aplish¡­

 Chapter ?639 Elder Songs Visit to the Half Spirit Race

    Chapter ?639 Elder Song''s Visit to the Half Spirit Race


    "So, this is the valley where the Half Spirit Race is staying¡­?"


    Reaching the top of the Eighth Star Peak, Elder Song could not help feeling amazed when staring down the massive hole at the peak of the mountain, a small valley barely being visible below.


    Whoosh~


    Not thinking too much after seeing the valley below him, Elder Song didn''t wait for even a moment before jumping down towards the valley below. Not forgetting to use a mystic technique to slow down his fall.


    After all, injuring himself jumping down from a high ce would be rather embarrassing considering the fact that he was a Nascent Soul Realm Expert¡­


    Thump!


    Landing on the ground after falling for a few minutes without a single scratch, Elder Song began to inspect his surroundings with great interest. Not taking long to discover the small town located a few miles away from the ce hended.


    The town was not like any town he had ever seen before, as the buildings and people were far smaller than ordinary humans, their strength also far surpassed that of normal humans, as even the weakest inhabitants inside the town had reached the Qi Condensation Realm. Not one among them could be considered a normal mortal.


    From this fact alone, Elder Song realized just how great their potential for cultivation was, as he felt even more determined to have the Half Spirit Race join the Star Shattering Sect.


    Whoosh-!


    However, before he managed to make his way towards the town of the Half Spirit Race in the distance, a terrifying divine sense descended from above-


    Boom-!


    Soon enveloping him from head to toe, while also forcing him to the ground. Not allowing him to take a single step forward!n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Who are you and why have youe here?!"


    "I''m an elder of the Flying Sword Sect and I''m here on behalf of Elder Xuan to talk with the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race!" Not daring to waste any time after hearing the voice being transmitted to him through the powerful divine sense, Elder Song quickly answered the question.


    Introducing himself as an elder of the Flying Sword Sect instead of the Star Shattering Sect, as he understood that the meeting between the Half Spirit Race and Elder Xuan happened before the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect had merged together to form the Star Shattering Sect.


    If he said he was from the Star Shattering Sect instead of the Flying Sword Sect, the person currently supressing him might think he was lying and end up killing him even after he mentioned Elder Xuan!


    Even if the chance of this happening was low, Elder Song did not want to take the risk if it could be avoided¡­


    "Elder Xuan¡­ Flying Sword Sect¡­ Ah! The human expert who came here little over a year ago! I''m sorry for the impolite greeting¡­" Seemingly thinking about it for a short moment, the person who had suppressed him quickly lifted the suppression that had forced Elder Song to the ground before appearing in front of him and apologizing for how he had supressed Elder Song to the ground the moment hended inside the valley. Clearly, the other party was somewhat fearful when mentioning Xuan Hao¡­


    "No need to apologise, I understand how you must feel if a stranger suddenly shows up out of the blue. Now, you should already have some idea about why I''m here¡­" Shaking his head, Elder Song said this before moving the conversation towards the matter he hade to the Eighth Star Peak for.


    "Thank you and of course I do, let''s move to the town so I can gather the rest of the elders of my race. After all, this matter is something that concerns the future of my race¡­"


    "No problem at all!"


    Understanding full well how serious this matter was for the Half Spirit Race, Elder Song soon made his way towards the small town in the distance together with the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit race.


    During his approach to the town, Elder Song learned a lot of different things about the Half Spirit Race from the Grand Elder. For example, he learned that Xuan Hao had not appeared in front of them and that he would be the first human the rest of the Half Spirit Race saw in their life!


    At the same time, he also told the Grand Elder about what had happened to the Flying Sword Sect and the fact that they had merged together with another powerful sect to form the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not forgetting to mention the seal above that Xuan Hao had put in ce¡­ Something that the Grand Elder was rather surprised hearing about as he remembered how he had ended up smashing head first into the seal in question just a few days earlier¡­


    "Who is that?"


    "He is so big! Even my dad isn''t that huge!"


    "An outsider?!"


    "A member of another race! Is he perhaps here to attack us?!"


    "Dummy! Can''t you see the Grand Elder next to him?"


    Given that he already understood that he was the first human the people inside the town saw, Elder Song was not too surprised after noticing everyone from grown adults to children flocking over curiously when he approached the town together with the Grand Elder. The children curious about howrge he waspared to them, while the adults were a bit more cautious.


    Only after noticing the Grand Elder next to him, did these older members of the Half Spirit Race calm down before showing a curious expression simr to the children of the town.


    "I will be back shortly."


    Disappearing after reaching the town to discuss with the elders of the Half Spirit Race before beginning the talk with him about the future of the Half Spirit Race, the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race instructed a young elder who had just reached the Nascent Soul Realm to keep himpany during this time.


    The young elder in question was at first sceptical and only after talking with Elder Song for a little over an hour did, he start rxing.


    At the time that the grand elder and a few of the older elders appeared, Elder Song had already ended up getting acquainted to a rather interesting young elder from the Half Spirit Race.


    The simple reason for this, being the fact that both of them shared quite a few simrities when it came to their interests. In fact, Elder Song even had a feeling that the young elder from the Half Spirit Race would be a perfect match for the position of a record keeper in the Star Shattering Sect.


    The job of a record keeper who had to record the history of the sect for future generations and keep a record on different events happening in the past and present.


    Tedious, boring, and an often-forgotten role in arge sect, faction, kingdom, or empire.


    However, the young elder from the Half Spirit Race was extremely enthusiastic about ancient records, while also respecting his ancestors for the records they wrote down for him and future generation of his race to remember, to the point he had even started writing down the important events taking ce inside the small valley he had spent his entire life inside.


    For this reason, Elder Song was more than satisfied when he heard that the elders of the Half Spirit Race had decided that before the Half Spirit Race fully decided to integrate into the Star Shattering Sect, they would have one of their elders go with him to observe the situation of the sect first.


    After discussing the final details of the matter with elders of the Half Spirit Race, it was decided that the elder that would follow him back to the Star Shattering Sect would be the young elder that had just recently broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "I will be going to the outside world¡­?"


    The person in question was taken aback by this, as he could only stare upwards towards the only path leading out of the valley inside the Eighth Star Peak with a bewildered expression on his face.


    Very obviously, the young elder had not expected that he would be the first person in his race to leave the valley they had all spent their entire lives inside and enter the outside world.


    "Yes! Let''s get going!"


    Not wasting any time after the decision was made, Elder Song and the young elder from the Half Spirit Race soon made their way out of the Eighth Star Peak before moving towards the Seventh star Peak where the Star Shattering Sect was located.


    After Elder Song returned from the Half Spirit Race together with the young elder, the rest of the Star Shattering Sect quickly learned about the Half Spirit Race and only a few monthster, the integration of the Half Spirit Race into the Star Shattering Sect officially began!

 Chapter ?640 Chu Yang, Peak of the Core Formation Realm

    Chapter ?640 Chu Yang, Peak of the Core Formation Realm


    During the time that the Half Spirit Race started to integrate into the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao''s disciples didn''t ck off, as the one who made the most improvements after moving to the Seventh Star Peak was Chu Yang.


    Not one to ck off or focus on any professions on the side like the other two, Chu Yang managed to break through from the Seventh Stage of the Core Formation Realm all the way up to the Ninth Stage of the Core Formation Realm. Allowing him to only be a single step away from the Nascent Soul Realm!


    The fact that Chu Yang managed to reach the Peak of the Core Formation Realm did not escape the eyes of Xuan Hao, as Xuan Hao was already looking forward to his first disciple breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Given how the system had operated in the past, he could already guess that he would get some sort of reward from the first disciple breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm!


    However, breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm was still something that was dangerous and could end up killing his disciple if he was careless. For this reason, Xuan Hao decided to dedicate most of his time to helping Chu Yang improve and strengthen his foundation before allowing him to break through and face the Cloud Tribtion.


    After all, if his foundation was not strong enough, he would only end up facing the Bronze or Silver Cloud Tribtion¡­ And,pared to the Bronze or Silver Cloud Tribtions, the quality change the Golden Cloud Tribtion brought to the soul was far better and would at the same time help increase his chances of reaching the Domain Lord Realm in the future!


    The main reason for this, was that it would be rtively hard to improve one''s soul more after having reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. At that point in time, the improvement brought to the soul by the Golden Cloud Tribtion might end up being the crucial part that would help oneprehend a pseudo domain and officially take the first step towards the Domain Lord Realm!


    Even if he was not really too worried about Chu Yang being able to reach the Domain Lord Realm in the future with his help, it would still be better for him if he could go through the Golden Cloud Tribtion and improve the strength of his soul.


    The only thing that somewhat worried him, was the fact that the core inside his disciple''s dantian was red instead of the normal golden colour.


    Even after investigating the situation with his divine sense in the past, he could not find anything wrong with the core outside of it being far stronger than a normal Peak Core Formation Realm Expert.


    However, this time around, he managed to pick up the slight presence of the dao of blood from the blood red core. The presence of the dao of blood was not because Chu Yang hadprehended the dao of blood, but instead seemed to be due to his disciple having absorbed some sort of qi that had either been from an expert that had practiced the dao of blood or a special kind of natural blood qi.


    This should also be what had caused his core to be blood red, while at the same time being far stronger than other Peak Core Formation Realm Experts.


    In the end, Xuan Hao could not figure out where the presence of the dao of blood attached to the core inside his disciple''s dantian hade from and he could only keep an eye on the situation and see how it would develop for now.


    At the very least, he could tell that the presence of the dao of blood inside his disciple''s dantian did not have any negative effects on him. On the other hand, it would allow him toprehend the dao of blood more easily in the future¡­


    Comprehending the dao of blood together with the dao of the spear was not a bad thing¡­ But Xuan Hao felt worried that his disciple might end up in a simr situation as him with two domains. Forcing him to merge them together before he would be capable of reaching the Soul Ascension Realm.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao not only spent more time to teach Chu Yang so he could reach the Nascent Soul Realm more safely when the time came, but also to keep an eye on the situation inside his dantian.


    ¡­


    "¡­ And that should be it for today. Hm? do you have any questions?" Ending another lesson in how to strengthen his dantian and the core inside it in preparation for the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao realized Chu Yang looked like he wanted to say something.


    "Master, when do you think my foundation will be strong enough for me to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm?" Showing a somewhat nervous expression when saying this, it was clear to Xuan Hao that Chu Yang had been somewhat taken aback by the fact that he had made him stop improving his cultivation realm and instead focus on improving his foundation before increasing his cultivation realm any further.


    Thinking about it, this was understandable. Especially given the fact that Chu Yang had spent most of his time trying to improve his cultivation realm. The time he had spent improving his foundation without increasing his cultivation realm at the same time could be considered close to non-existent.


    Given how important it would be for one to make sure one''s foundation was strong enough before breaking through from the Nascent Soul Realm and onwards, Xuan Hao wanted to make sure that Chu Yang understood the importance of making sure his foundation was stable.


    After all, thest thing he wanted was for his disciple to end up improving too fast and end up entering qi deviation¡­


    "Hm¡­ I think you should be able to do so in a year. Maybe faster depending on how hard you work." Answering Chu Yang''s question after having thought about what kind of thoughts might be going through his head, Xuan Hao found the shocked expression on Chu Yang''s face after hearing this quite funny.


    Not to mention an entire year without improving his cultivation realm, Chu Yang had properly not gone half a year without improving his cultivation realm after bing his disciple!


    For this reason, the shock Chu Yang felt after hearing his master say he should focus on his foundation for the next year without breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm was massive. Not to mention, he also felt worried that Qing Yi might catch up to him during this period of time he would have to focus on improving his foundation in preparation to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Even worse, Qing Yi might even break through to the Nascent Soul Realm before him!


    No, this can''t do! I will have to work extra hard so I can break through to the Nascent Soul Realm faster, I can''t let Qing Yi reach the Nascent Soul Realm before me!


    "Master, I will work extra hard to quickly improve my foundation and reach the Nascent Soul Realm!" Feeling like a new wave of energy washed over him after thinking about Qing Yi breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm before him, Chu Yang quickly rushed back towards his cultivation room to strengthen his foundation. Not wanting to waste even a single second!


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to see after seeing Chu Yang so fired up about improving his foundation, Xuan Hao could only shake his head before leaving the training ground and making his way towards Bai Ning''s forging room a short distance away from the training ground.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even if he put most of his focus on Chu Yang due to the fact that he was close to reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao didn''t neglect his other two disciples, as he made sure they would also improve in both their cultivation and professions.


    Because of this, Xuan Hao had even used arge portion of his free time to learn new potion and pills recipes for alchemy that he could teach Qing Yi, while also learning cksmithing so he could properly teach Bai Ning without having to worry about him asking any questions that he would not be able to answer.


    Although his cksmithing had yet to reach the Artisan Realm like his alchemy, he had still managed to reach the Peak of the Expert Realm and was quite close to bing an Artisan cksmithing.


    The main reason he had been able to improve his cksmithing so quickly and even get close to bing an Artisan cksmith in less than a year, was due to a few quests from the system that had him help Bai Ning in improving his skills as a cksmith.


    Even if the quests didn''t directly help him be an Artisan cksmith, Xuan Hao was more than happy that he was able to improve so quickly.

 Chapter ?641 First Nascent Soul Realm Disciple!

    Chapter ?641 First Nascent Soul Realm Disciple!


    Time slowly passed in the Star Shattering Sect and soon enough the entirety of the Half Spirit Race moved into the Seventh Star Peak. Given that all of them were at least in the Qi Condensation Realm, it was not hard for all of the Half Spirit Race to move to the Seventh Star Peak.


    The disciples of the Star Shattering Sect were all happy when the members of the Half Spirit Race moved in, as they had a lot of Nascent Soul Realm Experts... And more Nascent Soul Realm Experts meant that they would have more skilled teachers in the future!


    For this reason alone, the disciple of the Star Shattering Sect wanted to leave a good impression on these new Nascent Soul Realm Elders, some of the younger disciples who did not have a master yet even hoped that some of the Nascent Soul Realm Elders from the Half Spirit Race would take them in as a personal disciple.


    None of them really cared about the fact that they were not from the human race like themselves. After all, strength spoke the loudest in a world revolving around cultivation!


    ...


    At the same time all of this was happening, Chu Yang was getting closer and closer to the Nascent Soul Realm with each passing day. After only little over a year after having moved to the Seventh Star Peak together with his master and fellow disciples, he had strengthened his foundation enough and was about to attempt breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Master, Bai Ning... And Qing Yi..." Looking towards the three people that were standing not too far away from him to observe his breakthrough, Chu Yang could not help feeling nervous for a short moment before quickly calming down. Closing both of his eyes as he began the process of breaking apart the golden core inside his dantian, or in his case, the blood red core at the centre of his dantian.


    Crack~


    As cracks spread through out the blood red core, Chu Yang''s face turned pale as a sudden feeling of weakness washed over him with each small crack appearing on his blood red core.


    Breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm involved breaking apart the golden core inside the dantian to give birth to the Nascent Soul and then having the newly born Nascent Soul ascend the Cloud Tribtion before officially stepping into the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Even if the Cloud Tribtion was the most dangerous part of the breakthrough, it was not the only life-threatening danger one could encounter during the breakthrough, as the act of breaking the golden core inside the dantian to give birth to the Nascent Soul could also fail. Resulting in the cultivator losing all his cultivation and being forced to start all over from the Qi Condensation Realm again.


    Crack~


    Not thinking about this, Chu Yang fully immersed himself in cultivation as more and more cracks appeared all over his blood red core, while the cracks already present began rapidly increasing in size.


    Slowly over the next half hour, the entire core was covered in cracks and inevitably began trembling more and more violently. Showing signs that it was about to break apart at any moment!


    ...


    "Looks like he will soon give birth to his Nascent Soul... I wonder if it will be different given how special his golden core is..." Standing a short distance away from the ce where Chu Yang was sitting, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself. His divine sense fully focused on the blood red core slowly breaking apart inside Chu Yang''s dantian. Ready to act in case anything went wrong.


    Even if he would not be able to help Chu Yang give birth to his Nascent Soul and ovee the cloud tribtion, he would still be able to prevent him from falling all the way back to the Qi Condensation Realm if he managed to act fast enough!


    Different from Qing Yi and Xuan Hao who understood what was happening to Chu Yang, Bai Ning had no idea what breaking through the Nascent Soul Realm involved.


    "Master... Will senior brother be fine...?" For this reason, he could not help asking this with a worried expression on his face after seeing Chu Yang trembling all over, while his face grew increasingly pale


    "He will be fine! Although breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm is something extremely dangerous to normal cultivators, your senior brother worked hard for the past half year to strengthen his foundation and is more than prepared for this!


    If someone like Chu Yang fails to breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm. Nascent Soul Realm Experts would be far rarer than they currently are, there might even be less Nascent Soul Realm Experts than Domain Lords around if someone like your senior brother can''t break through...!"


    Stepping in for her master, Qing Yi reassured Bai Ning that nothing bad would happen to Chu Yang. Even if it was slightly out of character for her to say something like that, Qing Yi did not mind as the person in question could not hear what she was saying due to him being way too focused on breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm at the moment-


    CRACK-!


    At this moment, a loud cracking sound could be hearding from inside Chu Yang''s body. Signalling that the birth of his Nascent Soul was imminent.


    ...


    CRACK-!


    Feeling the core inside his dantian fully breaking apart, Chu Yang could not help frowning as a tremendous wave of pain spread through his entire body.


    Whoosh~!


    However, the pain onlysted for a split second, as it all disappeared the moment a small nascent soul appeared at the centre of his dantian.


    The nascent soul looked extremely small and weak at the moment due to it just being born a few seconds ago, but at the same time, a powerful aura could clearly be felt from the depths of the small newly born nascent soul.


    Swish~


    Knowing that he would soon have to face the cloud tribtion that would follow after the birth of his nascent soul, Chu Yang took the short time he had left to take a proper look at his nascent soul with his powerful divine sense allowing him to see the inside of his dantian. Not that he really needed his divine sense to see the inside of his dantian, as he could just use his nascent soul to see this. The reason he used his divine sense was purely to see the appearance of his nascent soul!


    "This is... My nascent soul?"


    Gazing at his nascent soul through his divine sense, Chu Yang could not help feeling surprised after seeing the appearance of his nascent soul.


    Different from what the small ball he had expected to see inside his dantian, his nascent soul was rather unique, as a blood red mist filled with a bone chilling killing intent swirled around a small human figure.


    Not only that, but after looking closer, the small human figure also had a pair of bright red eyes that were filled with an equally terrifying killing intent.


    "..."


    Looking at the small nascent soul in his dantian, Chu Yang had no idea what to say.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    He understood his golden core was special from what his master had told him... He just didn''t expect for it to have such massive affects on his nascent soul! Not only was his nascent soul already shaped before he had transcended the cloud tribtion, but he could also very clearly feel that his strength had already reached the Nascent Soul Realm


    Even after moving around his nascent soul to make sure, it was truly his own nascent soul and making sure that it was truly his own nascent soul, Chu Yang could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine whenever he stared into the blood red eyes of his nascent soul. Vaguely, the image of an endless sea of blood could be seen when staring deep enough into the eyes of his nascent soul.


    Boom!


    Trying to look closer and thoroughly inspect his nascent soul, Chu Yang was caught off guard as a loud rumbling sound of lighting outside his body.


    "The Cloud Tribtion..."


    Not even having to think twice after hearing the sound of lighting outside his body to guess where the sound hade from, Chu Yang looked away from his nascent soul before focusing all of his attention on the clouds filled with lighting slowly gathering above him.


    Given that his nascent soul had already taken on a human shape before he had transcended to cloud tribtion, Chu Yang had a feeling that his tribtion would be different from a normal Bronze, Silver, or Gold Cloud Tribtion....


    RUMBLE-!


    As if to meet his expectations, the lighting cloud in the air above Chu Yang slowly started turning into a dark red before a terrifying power began gathering at the centre of the cloud in preparation to strike down Chu Yang''s newly formed Nascent Soul!

 Chapter ?642 Chu Yangs Cloud Tribulation

    Chapter ?642 Chu Yang''s Cloud Tribtion


    Rumble!


    Following a loud rumbling sound, the dark red lighting clouds gathered above Chu Yang rapidly descended towards Chu Yang.


    Whoosh-!


    As the red lighting cloud got closer and closer to Chu Yang directly below it and began shrinking rapidly in preparation to enter his dantian and merge together with his nascent soul, the violent lighting contained inside the red lighting cloud was forcefully pushed out-


    BOOOOM-!


    What followed was a loud thunderstrike, as Chu Yang was hit head on by the terrifying lighting of his cloud tribtion.


    "Ahh-!"


    Having no time to prepare or defend against almost instantaneous attack, Chu Yang could only let out a cry of pain as his body was charred by the terrifying lighting. The strength he had felt when breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm was nowpletely gone, as he was injured all over from the lighting strike.


    The speed of lighting was simply not something he could react to and defend against with his current cultivation realm¡­


    Swish~


    After the lighting had been purged the red lighting cloud that was no bigger than an apple at this point in time reached Chu Yang before forcefully entering his body and starting the process of merging together with his nascent soul. Not giving him any time to recover from the lightning strike he had been hit with just earlier.


    Not only that, but the moment the blood red cloud began merging together with his soul, part of the blood red cloud split up before transforming into a massive rain cloud that covered his entire dantian.


    Ssh~


    Ssh~


    Ssh~


    Not even a secondter, a blood red rain came down from the rain cloud that had formed inside his dantian. Soon filling up his entire dantian before spreading out to all corners of his body through his meridians.


    Crack~


    Following the blood red rainwater spreading through his meridians to his entire body, a loud cracking sound spread throughout his body, as the blood red rainwater began seeping into his body from his meridian. Slowly starting to forcefully change and refine his body.


    Feeling both a soul tearing pain from the small red cloud that had condensed down to the size of an apple merging together with his nascent soul, Chu Yang also felt the pain of having his body broken before being reconstructed again by the blood red rainwater.


    At this point in time, he could not pay any attention to what was happening outside and was fully focused on trying his best to remain conscious under the pain!


    The only thing that mattered to Chu Yang in this moment, was oveing his cloud tribtion and sessfully bing a Nascent Soul Realm Expert!


    if he failed now, he would in the best-case scenario have to start over from the Qi Condensation Realm and in the worst case, die¡­


    Even if he was still young and could cultivate back to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm again if he was lucky enough to survive, Chu Yang understood that it would forever leave a shadow in his heart and would also disappoint his master.


    Not to mention this, Qing Yi would overtake him and given the distance that would be ced between them if he failed and master saved him, Chu Yang understood that he would likely not be able to catch up to her if he failed to ovee the cloud tribtion¡­


    ¡­


    The lightning strike was more than powerful enough to kill a normal First stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert¡­ But it was only the first part of the Cloud Tribtion! Not to mention this, his cloud tribtion seems to be split into a soul tribtion and a body tribtion.


    Thinking this to himself as he kept an eye on the situation taking ce inside Chu Yang''s dantian, Xuan Hao could not help being taken aback by the cloud tribtion that his disciple was experiencing.


    After all, the red lightning cloud, the fact that the cloud tribtion had attacked him before entering his dantian to merge together with his nascent soul, the blood red rain. All of this was far from a normal cloud tribtion!


    Chu Yang was the first person, outside of himself, that he had seen experiencing a cloud tribtion different from the normal bronze, silver or golden cloud tribtion that wasmonce across the Ewaria Continent.


    "However, it''s different from the cloud tribtion I went through¡­" Muttering this to himself as he remained focused on the things taking ce inside Chu Yang''s body and dantian, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he recalled his own cloud tribtion.


    Back when then, he had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm and was faced with a cloud tribtion that waspletely different from the ones he had been told about by Feng Chen, Elder Song, and the rest of the core elders of the Flying Sword Sect, who had told him about their cloud tribtions to help him getting ready to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Given that he had never seen anything like it, he had just thought that he experienced a cloud tribtion belonging to the level above that of a golden cloud tribtion¡­ But after seeing Chu Yang''s cloud tribtion, Xuan Hao had a feeling that this was not the case.


    Even without knowing too much about cloud tribtions, Xuan Hao could still tell with some certainty that Chu Yang''s cloud tribtion was somehow affected by his special golden core. The theme of the cloud tribtion after it entered his dantian was a dead giveaway¡­


    But if that is really the case, how is my cloud tribtion rted to my golden core? From what I remember, it should not be anything special¡­ Or perhaps the cloud tribtion is not only affected by the golden core, but also the body¡­


    Not thinking anymore about this as he would not be able to get an answer to this question before his special physique awakened, Xuan Hao continued watching Chu Yang struggling at the brink of death against his cloud tribtion.


    After a few more minutes passed with Chu Yang at the brink of death, the cloud tribtion finally came to an end-


    BOOOOOM-!


    A violent explosion could be hearding from Chu Yang''s body, as he sessfully overcame the cloud tribtion and fully stepped into the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The blood red cloud inside his dantian finished merging together with his nascent soul and thest bit of blood red rainwater was absorbed by his body through his meridians!


    ¡­


    BOOOOOM-!


    Feeling an endless power filling up his body and soul, Chu Yang could not fully control his strength after having absorbed the blood red cloud tribtion. idently destroying his surroundings before his master stepped in to contain the outburst of power from spreading further.


    I¡­ I reached the Nascent Soul Realm!?


    However, all of this was not on Chu Yang''s mind, as he sat on the ground examining the situation of his dantian and body. Feeling the seemingly endless strength that now coursed through his meridians and filled him with a feeling of invincibility.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even if it was just a feeling and he wasn''t truly invincible after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, Chu Yang was still taken aback by this feeling, as he fully immersed himself in it. Understanding to some extent why some Nascent Soul Realm Experts ended up getting arrogant due to the massive increase in strength one would experience after breaking through from the Core Formation Realm to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    With his current strength, Chu Yang did not doubt that he would easily be able to kill a hundred if not more of his past selves before he had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Haaaa¡­." Slowly calming down after feeling how his master had forcefully restrained his power from spreading outside of a 20-meter area around him, Chu Yang could not help smiling wryly.


    Compared to master, I''m still far from being considered invincible¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Chu Yang quickly started the process of restraining his aura and controlling his strength. Dedicating all his attention to stabilize his cultivation realm. After all, he didn''t want to randomly burst out with his strength and destroy anything close to him when walking around the sect.


    ¡­


    "He really broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm¡­" Watching Chu Yang''s break through from start to finish, Qing Yi could not help showing an amazed expression on her face.


    Even standing beside her master and not being the target of the cloud tribtion, Qing Yi still felt terrified when she had seen the red lighting cloud forming above Chu Yang. The lighting strike that followed was even more terrifying, as Qing Yi understood that if she was faced with it, she would have died!


    With this in mind, Qing Yi could not stop herself from admiring Chu Yang and the fact that he had ovee such a terrifying cloud tribtion and reached the Nascent Soul Realm¡­

 Chapter ?643 Divine Void Eyes

    Chapter ?643 Divine Void Eyes


    Watching as Chu Yang started stabilizing his cultivation base after having sessfully broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the two quests that had beenpleted after Chu Yang overcame his cloud tribtion.


    [Side Quest: Help disciple Chu Yang improve his sense of direction, at least enough for him to not get lost in his master''s pavilion. plete)]


    [Reward: 10% of host''s physique is awakened.]


    The first quest he looked over, was the one he had gotten all the way back when Chu Yang first became his disciple. Now that Chu Yang had reached the Nascent Soul Realm and his divine sense became more than strong enough to cover the entire Seventh Star Peak, he should not have any problems getting lost when going anywhere. At least as long as it was not anywhere far away¡­


    "Hm? 10 percent of my physique will be awakened?" Seeing the reward that had been hidden up to this point, Xuan Hao was confused before feeling a wave of happiness wash over him.


    Ever since he had first realized that he had some sort of dormant physique, he had been trying to find ways to awaken it to no avail. Now with the system''s help, it looked like he would finally have an opportunity to get some clues about his physique.


    Maybe he could even use the information gained from this to find out about his background before he entered the Flying Sword Sect. After all, all his memories from before entering the Flying Sword Sect were gone and the only thing he knew about his past, was that he was from somewhere outside the Ewaria Continent¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling excited when looking at the reward from the system. Although it was just 10 percent of his physique that would be awakened, it was more than enough for Xuan Hao. Especially given the fact that he now knew that the system quests would be able to help him when it came to awakening his physique.


    [Hidden Main Quest: One disciple reaches the Nascent Soul Realm.]


    [Reward: 10% of host''s physique is awakened, Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms.]


    Seeing the rewards he gained from the second quest, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a wave of happiness wash over him after realizing that he would be able to awaken another 10 percent of his physique.


    "But¡­ What is the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms?" Even though he was happy that he would be able to awaken 20 percent of his physique in one go, Xuan Hao was still caught slightly off guard by the second reward that had followed.


    Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms¡­ From the name, it should be some sort of ancient text rted to cultivation realms, as for what it was about, he would have to redeem the rewards to find out. Not something he could do at the moment, as he still had to make sure Chu Yang properly stabilized his cultivation base at the Nascent Soul realm.


    If he redeemed the rewards from the system now and ended up unable to act in case anything went wrong, Chu Yang might end up idently hurting Qing Yi and Bai Ning standing nearby watching him stabilize his cultivation with curious expressions on their faces.


    For them, watching Chu Yang stabilize his cultivation base was not only useful for their cultivation, but would also be of help to them in the future when they would have to do the same thing after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm!


    With all of this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to wait for a few hours before he was sure nothing would go wrong with Chu Yang''s cultivation without him around.


    After all, he had no ns to stay around for the days or weeks it might end up taking his disciple to fully stabilize his cultivation base. Staying there for the first few hours when things could still end up going wrong was more than enough.


    Even if things went wrong after this point in time, Chu Yang should at the very least be able to stop himself from idently hurting Qing Yi and Bai Ning observing him from the side.


    With Qing Yi and Bai Ning sitting down to observe Chu Yang stabilizing his cultivation base, time slowly passed and soon enough, the sky above turned dark, and the moon rose high into the sky where it gently shone down at the ground below.


    "Looks like his cultivation base is more than stable enough for me to leave him alone, those two also seems to have gained quite a bit from observing his breakthrough¡­" Looking over Chu Yang who was fully immersed in cultivation, Xuan Hao soon turned to look over his two younger disciples, both of them in a simrly immersed state.


    Among the two of them, Xuan Hao even managed to sense Bai Ning''s cultivation take another step forward, with a bit more time, he should be able to reach the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm and begin preparing to breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm!


    Whoosh~


    Knowing that nothing would go wrong at this point in time and seeing that all three of his disciple were fully focused on cultivating and improving their strength together, Xuan Hao silently took his leave as he headed back into his personal room inside the small pce that the elders had made for him and his disciples.


    ¡­


    "I wonder what will happen after I awaken part of my physique¡­" muttering this to himself as he sat down on floor of his room, Xuan Hao spent the next few minutes calming himself down and stabilizing his mind in preparation of the changes that would inevitably happen after awakening a part of his physique.


    [Do you want to redeem the rewards for the twopleted quests?]


    [Y/N]


    Yes!n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Whoosh~!


    Directly redeeming the reward from both quests at once, Xuan Hao felt a traceless power entering his body before focusing towards both of his eyes.


    Fwoosh-!


    Reaching his eyes, a burning sensation soon spread through them for a short moment before a wave of information imprinted in the deepest parts of his soul was awakened before it seamlessly merged together with his soul. Allowing Xuan Hao to instantlyprehend and understand this new information.


    "This is-"


    [The physique awakening reached 20%, as a result the Divine Void Eyes belonging to the host''s physique is now essible!]


    Not needing the system to exin what had just happened to him, Xuan Hao could not help marvelling as he went over the information about the Divine Void Eyes that came together with him awakening part of his physique.


    The Divine Void Eyes gave him several special abilities. Among which, the most powerful one was called Empty Void. An ability that allowed him to return the area affected by this ability into primordial void. The space that existed before the beginning of the world!


    Of course, with his current strength, doing something like that was not possible. After all, if he could do something like that, he would already have more than enough strength to destroy the world he currently found himself inside of, something even someone at the Soul Ascension Realm was unable to think about doing!


    However, this did not mean that the Empty Void ability that came along with his Divine Void Eyes waspletely useless with his current strength, it only meant that he would not be able to use the ability to its full potential before getting stronger.


    At the moment, using the Empty Void ability would allow him to partially copse the space within a certain area. Not only would this kill some weaker Domain Lord''s, but it would also severely limit his opponents, as it would be incredibly hard to use the spatial maniption to escape or use a movement technique inside the partially copsed space.


    Normally, this would not have mattered if he was also affected by the copsed space himself, but after awakening 20 percent of his physique, Xuan Hao realized that he had grown far more connected to the dao of space. Even if space had partially copsed, he should be able to still use his movement technique without being affected.


    Well¡­ In most cases¡­ If he ended up fully copsing the space around him. Not only would he not be able to use his movement technique, but he would most likely also end up dying. After all, a true copse of space was something that could end up leaving a scar in the world that would take thousands of years, if not longer for the world to recover!


    "However¡­ I have no idea if any of this is true in the first ce, I would have to test it out for myself." Muttering this to himself as he went over the Empty Void ability again, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just what kind of physique he had.


    After all, he had awakened the Divine Void Eyes after only awakening 20 percent of his physique¡­ Who knew just how powerful it would be when he fully awakened it!

 Chapter ?644 Status Update~

    Chapter ?644 Status Update~


    "Haaa¡­ Still couldn''t find out anything about my background¡­"


    Finished going over the changes that had taken ce after he had awakened twenty percent of his physique and experimenting with his new abilities over the next few days, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head in disappointment.


    During his experimentation over thest few days, he had also tried finding out more about his background through parts of the information''s he had gained after awakening his Divine Void Eyes¡­ But in the end, all of it had been to no avail.


    If he really wanted to find out about his background and where he hade from, it looked like he would have to awaken more of his physique¡­ If even that did not work, he would have to search for answers outside the Ewaria Continent!


    Even if he had not paid any mind to his background over the years, Xuan Hao still felt worried deep down. After all, the fact remained that before losing his memories and reaching the Flying Sword Sect, he had been fleeing from something terrifying!


    "I wonder how much my status changed sincest¡­"


    Deciding not to think about his background any further for now, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the system before deciding to pull up his status for the first time in a long time.


    Curious if the system would show the name of his physique after he had awakened twenty percent of it.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Domain: Sword Domain, Ice Domain


    Talent: ???


    Physique: ??? (20% Awakened, Divine Void Eyes Awakened)


    Realm: Eighth Stage Domain Lord Realm


    Professions: Alchemist (Artisan), Formation Master (Expert), cksmithing (Expert)


    Sect: Star Shattering Sect


    Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering SectN?v(el)B\\jnn


    Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning


    Pet: Lazy Winged Lion


    Looking over his status, Xuan Hao could not help feeling disappointed when reading discovering that the system still did not show the name of his physique even after he had partial awakened it.


    However, there was still a few things that managed to catch his attention. For one, his winged lion pet had the wordzy added in front of it, while his status had changed to the Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Howe I had no idea I became a grand elder¡­?


    Shaking his head as he didn''t really get anything useful from his status other than finding out about the fact that his pet winged lion had grownzy during the time, he had left it in charge of defending the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao only thought that he would have to put the winged lion to work in the future.


    After all, with most of the Flying Sword Sect leaving for the Seventh Star Peak, there was no longer any reason for the winged lion to stay around in the Flying Sword Sect to defend it now that it was being transformed into a branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect.


    It was a much better idea to use the winged lion demon beast for something more useful like helping deal with demonic cultivators that showed up from time to time to cause chaos, deal with rampaging demon beasts that came down from the nearby Burning Mountain Range and other simr things.


    The winged lion would be especially useful over the next few years as the Star Shattering Sect finished stabilizing their position and would begin looking to expand to get their hands on more resources and have the ability to recruit more disciples.


    "Maybe I should inform Elder Song about this and allow him to use the winged lion to intimidate the nearby kingdoms when he begins the process of expanding the sect in the future¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about Elder Song who would most likely end up as one of the key people in charge of the sect''s expansion in the future, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly.


    Even after the Flying Sword Sect merged together with the Spring Flower Sect and formed the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song was not able to escape being put in charge of the management of the sect.


    The only difference this time around, was that an older female elder from the Spring Flower Sect simr to Elder Song was now there to work together with him on the management¡­ To be honest, Xuan Hao had felt rather odd upon first seeing this female elder from the Spring Flower Sect due to the fact that she seemed like the Spring Flower Sect''s Elder Song¡­


    No idea if it was due to them having been in simr positions before the two sect''s merged together, but Elder Song and this female elder ended up bing rather close friends as they were in charge of the Star Shattering Sect''s management.


    "Now that I think about it¡­ Was Elder Song perhaps the one who secretly promoted me to a Grand Elder of the sect without telling me about it?" Feeling like he guessed the reason for the change in his status, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly knowing that Elder Song was most likely the person behind his change in status.


    Given the fact that he was by far the strongest person in the Star Shattering Sect and one of the only Domain Lord Realm Experts, Xuan Hao did not have anything against the change in his status. After all, it would be weird for him to continue having the same status as the elders in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Even if some of them, like Zu Fei, had improved their cultivation over the years, it was still far from the Domain Lord Realm.


    Thinking about it, Shu Yao had also be a Grand Elder like him with her cultivation also having reached the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Now that I think about it, Feng Chen Shu Yao and Zu Fei were discussing about me bing a Grand Elder and had ns to increase my status from a normal core elder at some point in time..." Understanding that they should have gone ahead and done just that, Xuan Hao smilied a bit knowing that it was not just Elder Song''s doing


    "Hm... Not to mention myself, the sect elders below the Nascent Soul realm should also have been demoted to Outer Sect Elders over the past year..." Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao suddenly remembered the fact that the requirements to be a sect elder had changed to the Nascent Soul Realm, with this in mind, many of the sect''s elders below the Nascent Soul Realm would end up getting demoted to Outer Sect Elders.


    Elder Song wouldn''t just demote these people without telling them¡­ Right?


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as this thought urred to him, Xuan Hao suddenly had a feeling that many of the Star Shattering Sect''s Outer Sect Elders would only learn about their new positions a few weeks if not longer after they had been demoted from a normal sect elder to an Outer Sect Elder¡­


    "Hah¡­ No use thinking about all of this, I still have to check out the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms!"


    Shaking his head as he thought about all these elders suddenly learning about their new position through friends and disciples instead of the person who demoted them, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the ancient book he had gotten as a reward for his first disciple reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Whoosh~


    Taking out the book he had put away just after receiving it as he was more focused on his physique partially awakening, Xuan Hao could not help marvelling at the beautiful exterior of the book, the words [Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms] excluding a certain dao charm that indicated the ancient book had been written by a powerful expert.


    Given that even Xuan Hao felt like he had momentarily entered a state of enlightenment and both his domains got closer to merging together after just reading the title of the ancient book, it was certain that the person who had written the ancient book should be someone who had reached an unimaginable realm above the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "So powerful¡­" Not able to stop himself from muttering these words to himself after he regained consciousness again and felt that his ice domain and sword domain was one step closer to merging together, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine upon thinking about the how powerful the person who had written the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms was.


    At the same time, it also made Xuan Hao fell even more curious about just what was written inside the ancient book.


    The first four mortal realms were the Qi Condensation Realm, the Foundation Establishment Realm, the Core Formation Realm, and the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao already felt like he understood these four realms and didn''t have much more to learn¡­ But then again, given the system had given him the ancient book, it should not be something useless!


    Swish~


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao curiously opened the ancient book and began reading through the first chapter of the book that was about the Qi Condensation Realm-


    "This¡­ How can this still be considered the Qi Condensation Realm!?"


    To say he was taken aback by the content of the ancient book would be an understatement¡­

 Chapter ?645 Codex of the First Four Realms

    Chapter ?645 Codex of the First Four Realms


    Feeling a wave of disbelief wash over him as he read through the first chapter of the First Four Mortal Realms describing the Qi Condensation Realm, Xuan Hao felt shocked at how in depth the chapter was.


    Not only did it fully describe the process of going from the First to the Ninth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm along with a lot of information about the realm that he didn''t know anything about, but it also described a stage above the Ninth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm. The Perfect Qi Condensation Realm, simply described as the Tenth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm!


    Even if none of his disciple''s had reached this realm, Xuan Hao was still more than happy with the knowledge he gained from the first chapter of the ancient book, as it would be helpful for training his current disciples and future disciples.


    The Foundation Establishment Realm and Core Formation Realm chapter of the ancient book was simr, as they all helped Xuan Hao gain a more in depth understanding of these first few realms. In the future, it would be far easier for him to teach his disciples, while at the same time, he would also be able to share this new knowledge with the rest of the sect and allow them to improve as well.


    Although... With the current strength of the Star Shattering Sect, the only person who could truly put this information to use was Shu Yao, as that was the minimum requirement for someone to be able toprehend what was written inside the ancient book and have the ability to put it to use when teaching the disciples.


    However, upon reaching the Nascent Soul Realm chapter of the ancient book, things changed, and it was no longer something that someone at the Early Stages of the Domain Lord Realm like Shu Yao would be able toprehend... Heck... Even Xuan Hao felt like he had a hard time reading through the fourth chapter that detailed the Nascent Soul Realm with his strength!


    The fourth chapter not only contained a detailed exnation on the Nascent Soul Realm and how to increase the strength on one''s nascent soul, but it also contained detailed exnations on how to best prepare to startprehending a dao and prepare to establish a domain and enter the Domain Lord Realm!


    The different tribtions that one could go through to reach the Nascent Soul Realm was also listed here and they were:


    The Bronze Cloud Tribtion. The weakest cloud tribtion that would at most allow someone to reach the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm without any hope to break through to the Domain Lord Realm unless one encountered a lucky chance to strengthen the soul and make up for the insufficient strengthening of the soul that came from oveing the bronze Cloud Tribtion.


    The Silver Cloud Tribtion. The most normal cloud tribtion, one had the chance to breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm. Reaching the Soul Ascension Realm... This was close to impossible...


    The Golden Cloud Tribtion. Split into a lower-grade, middle-grade, and higher-grade golden cloud tribtion. Reaching the Nascent Soul Realm through a golden cloud tribtion would almost guarantee that one would be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm as long as the person in question did not die. The higher the grade of the golden cloud tribtion, the higher the chance of reaching the Soul Ascension Realm in the future!


    These three were the mostmon cloud tribtions and also the ones Xuan Hao had expected to see... However, thest one standing above the golden cloud tribtion realm was what truly caught Xuan Hao off guard.


    Unique Cloud Tribtion. A unique tribtion that rarely descends when the cultivator is deemed to have triggered certain conditions. The unique cloud tribtion is as the name suggests, unique to the cultivator and not one tribtion of this level is the same!


    The unique cloud tribtion can exceed the level of a higher-grade golden cloud tribtion, while at the same time also being weaker than it. However, most of the time, it is stronger and the benefits from reaching the Nascent Soul Realm through a unique cloud tribtion far exceeds that of the golden cloud tribtion.


    People who cross the unique cloud tribtion have the potential to surpass the Soul Ascension Realm and surpass the mortal realm!


    Although Xuan Hao had already somewhat guessed there was a tribtion existing above the golden cloud tribtion, he was still taken aback after getting a confirmation that this was indeed the case from the ancient book.


    Whoosh~


    Finishing the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms, Xuan Hao could not help feeling surprised, as he suddenly felt both his sword and ice domain start partially merging together.


    Even if they had not fully merged together after reading through the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms, they could no longer be considered two separate domains any longer...


    Using the two separately was also not an option after this merging process had started. Not that Xuan Hao really cared too much about this, as both of his domains were far stronger after having partially merged together with each other.


    "Looks like I will be able to merge both my domains together much faster than I had first expected..." Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help praying to get another Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms from the system again. Maybe even getting the Domain Lord Realm version that might have been written by the author of the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realm...


    "Hm? Looks like Chu Yang finished stabilizing his cultivation base."


    Just at this moment, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed that his disciple had already finished stabilizing his cultivation base at the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and was about to wake up again.


    Whoosh~


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao left his room and made his way towards the ce where his three disciples were located. All of them currently in a state of deep meditation, as they were all about to wake up again now that Chu Yang had finished stabilizing his cultivation base.


    ...


    "Master! I broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm!" Upon waking up from his deep meditation after having stabilized his cultivation base, Chu Yang excitedly proimed this as he looked towards his master for approval.


    "Indeed, you did a great job! Breaking through the Nascent Soul Realm below the age of 30 and bing the first Nascent Soul Realm disciple of the Star Shattering Sect. Even in the entire Sky Empire, I''m sure there are not many people who can aplish something like this!" Not seeing anything wrong with praising Chu Yang after he had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao made sure he knew about his achievements.


    "Thank you master!" Smiling happily as he said, this, Chu Yang was still ovee with happiness as he started experimenting with his new power. The most useful of which was the divine sense, as Chu Yang finally felt like he would be able to move around without getting lost all the time.


    Yes... In Chu Yang''s eyes, he didn''t see his divine sense as something useful for fighting and searching for enemies that might be hidden ready to ambush him while out and adventuring in the outside world... But instead as a tool that would prevent him from getting lost due to his bad sense of direction!


    "Hum~ You broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm and I have to admit it was far more dangerous than I had thought...However! I won''tck behind! I will also reach the Nascent Soul Realm soon! Don''t ck after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, or I will surpass you in no time!" Standing up and saying this just after she had awoken from her deep meditation shortly after Chu Yang. Qing Yi quickly ran away.


    Clearly Chu Yang reaching the Nascent Soul Realm had ignited her fighting spirit and she also wanted to reach the Nascent Soul Realm. As her master''s first disciple, there was no way she wouldck behind Chu Yang who had been eptedter than her!


    "..."


    Seeing his now junior sister run away before he even had a chance to respond, Chu Yang could only smile wryly before looking at his master for help.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Ah! Bai Ning, how was it did you manage to improve?"


    However, his master just turned around before focusing his attention on Bai Ning that had also just woken up. Pretending not to see Chu Yang starring at him for guidance on what to do in such a situation.


    "Yes master! I managed to improve my cultivation and even broke through after watching senior brother Chu Yang stabilizing his cultivation base!"


    "I see, that is great, we should quickly return to the pce and I, your master, will help you with stabilizing your cultivation base!"


    "Really?!"


    "Yes! Let''s go!"


    Whoosh~


    Not even having any time to say anything to his master before he left together with Bai Ning, Chu Yang could not help shaking his head as he looked at the destroyed terrain around the area where he had broken through before simrly making his way back towards the small pce that his master and two fellow disciples had already done.

 Chapter ?646 Flame Sky Kingdom

    Chapter ?646 me Sky Kingdom


    After Chu Yang broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm and became the first disciple of the Star Shattering Sect to reach the Nascent Soul Realm, his reputation quickly spread and he became known even among the youngest disciples of the sect due to his achievements of reaching the Nascent Soul Realm before the age of 30.


    Not to mention the Star Shattering Sect, Chu Yang''s reputation even managed to spread outside the Star Shattering Sect and reach the ears of some of the different powers bordering the Star Shattering Sect.


    To say they were shocked was an understatement, as most of them chose not to believe the fact that the Star Shattering Sect actually had someone break through and reach the Nascent Soul Realm before the age of 30.


    The main reason for this, was that the strongest person in their kingdom or sect was still someone in the Nascent Soul Realm. Now someone below the age of 30 had reached the same major realm that their ancestors and elders had spent hundreds of years to reach. How could they possibly ept something like this!?


    Among the different sects and kingdoms located close to the Star Shattering Sect, the ones who were already preparing to resist the Star Shattering Sect when they inevitably expanded didn''t believe the news that the Star Shattering Sect really had someone who reached the Nascent Soul Realm below the age of 30.


    Thinking that it was just a lie made up by the Star Shattering Sect to intimidate them.


    The ones who were the most outspoken about this, was a kingdom called the me Sky Kingdom, one of the strongest kingdoms located at the border region of the Sky Empire.


    ¡­


    "They are clearly just trying to intimidate us into submitting to them! There is no way someone is able to reach the Nascent Soul Realm so fast. Even those geniuses from the Sky Empire aren''t that fast!"


    At this moment several elders and other high-profile figures of the me Sky Kingdom had gathered together inside the main castle of the capital to discuss the news about the genius from the Star Shattering Sect. Among them, one elder was clearly at the centre, as he was adamantly against the Star Shattering Sect that had only recently showed up and overshadowed the Fire Sky Kingdom and the other powers at the border region of the Sky Empire.


    "But they have a Domain Lord Realm Expert to back them up¡­ Is there really a reason to make up something like this to intimidate others?" However, among the elders and high-profile people of the Fire Sky Kingdom, an elderly woman stood up and cast doubt on what the man said.


    "Hmph! Elder Sheng Mei, what do you know?! I''m sure they know about the formation at the capital of our kingdom having the power to resist someone in the Domain Lord Realm and fear that our ancestors will breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm!"


    "The ancestors might be Half a Step into the Domain Lord Realm¡­ But what will happen if none of them manage to sessfully breakthrough? Are we just going to vainly resist until the Star Shattering Sect decides tounch an attack?


    Don''t forget, the Star Shattering Sect is a sect. Not a kingdom and don''t follow the same way of fighting we do¡­ They won''t dere war or something along that line, but will just attack without any warning, what will happen to the people outside the capital at that point? Will we just continue hiding inside the formation protecting the capital city? Not to mention, the formation might be able to resist a Domain Lord Realm Expert, but it will not be able tost forever!"


    "You! How-"


    Whoosh-!


    "Sheng Mei, Hong Xuan, both of you quiet down! We will wait for the ancestors before deciding on anything¡­ This matter is far too important for us to make on our own without the ancestors!"


    Stepping in before the two elders belonging to the me Sky Kingdom started fighting each other, a middle-aged man unleashed his aura to calm the two elders down. Instantly showing off his strength at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    ""Yes, your highness!""


    Reluctantly giving up on saying anything more, both Sheng Mei and Hong Xuan stared at each other as they apologised to the middle-aged man located at arge throne not too far away from both of them.


    From the way they addressed the man, it was clear that he was the current king of the me Sky Kingdom. Given his cultivation had already reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, it would not be odd for him to hand over his position to his most talented son or daughter and focus entirely on trying to reach the Domain Lord Realm and be an ancestor of the me Sky Kingdom.


    All the past kings had done this¡­ But the current situation did not allow him to step down to focus entirely on cultivation, as the current me Sky Kingdom was far too unstable with the emergence of the Star Shattering Sect to have one of his sons or daughters ascend the throne.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The main reason why the me Sky Kingdom was getting unstable after the emergence of the Star Shattering Sect, was due to the fact that if the Star Shattering Sect expanded to the size of a normal sect with a Domain Lord Realm Expert watching over it, they would surely end up being swallowed up.


    For this reason, two factions had emerged inside the me Sky Kingdom. One side wanting to establish a friendly rtionship with the Star Shattering Sect, while the other wanted to remain independent from the Star Shattering Sect.


    The person who wanted to establish a friendly rtionship with the Star Shattering Sect was headed by Elder Shen Mei, an old Nascent Soul Realm Expert that was older than even some of the me Sky Kingdoms current ancestors.


    The one standing behind the move to remain independent was Elder Hong Xuan, a simrly old Nascent Soul Realm Expert that had once been a prince of the royal family before being thrown out after losing the battle for session.


    Both were people with massive power inside the me Sky Kingdom and was not people that the current king could afford to offend carelessly¡­


    "Haaa¡­ Everyone, we will end today''s discussion here for today¡­" Thinking about this, the king let out a sigh before sending everyone away. Silentlymenting about his fate inside his head.


    Why did the Star Shattering Sect have to show up just when he was about to retire and focus wholeheartedly on cultivating¡­?


    The king of the me Sky Kingdom wanted nothing more than to give his position over to one of his sons and daughters and enter the ancestral grounds to cultivate without a care in the world. However, none of his children were strong enough to do something like this. The strongest of his children was only in the Core Formation realm!


    ¡­


    Simrly in a state of worry like the me Sky Kingdom, some of the kingdoms and sects located around the territory controlled by the Star Shattering Sect that wanted to remain independent, were worried that the news of Chu Yang bing a Nascent Soul Realm Expert below the age of 30 might be a sign that the Star Shattering Sect would soon start expanding.


    One month passed like this, then two¡­ Three¡­


    Five months passed by without anything happening and the kingdoms and sects started rxing as they came to the realization that the Star Shattering Sect was not yet nning to expand.


    However, this peace of mind was short lived, as news of the Star Shattering Sect epting new disciples began spreading across the territory of these kingdoms and sects. Attracting the attention of many young people who had long since heard about the Star Shattering Sect at this point in time.


    The Star Shattering Sect was the only sect with a Domain Lord in the border region of the Sky Empire. For this reason, the Star Shattering Sect epting disciples for the first time since the sect had been established was more than enough to cause most of the young talents to take the risk and try to reach the Star Shattering Sect. Not bothering to enter a sect or kingdom close to them.


    After all, entering a kingdom or sect supported by at most someone Half a Step into the Domain Lord Realm, or entering the Star Shattering Sect that had the support of a Domain Lord Realm Expert that was only known to these young people in legends¡­ It was obvious which one was the best choice!


    Even if they had to risk their life to reach the Star Shattering Sect, it was more than worth it if they could enter the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not only would they not have to worry about their safety after entering such a powerful sect, but they might also get a chance to learn from a Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    Giving these young people hope that they might be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm in the future!

 Chapter ?647 Future Expansion Plans

    Chapter ?647 Future Expansion ns


    Along with the massive stream of people slowly making their way towards the Shattered Star Peaks to try and enter the Star Shattering Sect, the elders from the Star Shattering Sect wasted no time preparing a location where the massive number of people streaming over would stay.


    Ending up constructing several new buildings to house the people making their way over to try and join of the Star Shattering Sect. The buildings in question were all located in the city below the Ninth Star Peak and had instantly causing the city to expand far and wide, as it barely managed to surpass the Flying Sword City in size due to this.


    Other than the buildings for the young people who wanted to try and join the Start Shattering Sect, the thing that took the most time and effort, was preparing the different tests that these young people would have to go through to enter the Star Shattering Sect.


    The person who was in charge of these tests, was not only Elder Song, but also Feng Chen and a few other important elders.


    In the end, the tests that were prepared was split into three parts, a talent test, abat test, and aprehension test.


    The tests would test the cultivator''s innate talent, how well the person fared inbat against demon beasts and other humans and finally a test that would look at theprehension ability of the cultivator.


    After all three tests concluded, the top 1000 would join the Star Shattering Sect.


    A sect elder would also be able to choose a disciple and that disciple would not end up counting towards the top 1000 people entering the sect.


    Of course¡­ With the requirement of bing a sect elder being raised to the Nascent Soul Realm and close to half of these Nascent Soul Realm Elders being from the Half Spirit Race still adapting to their new environment and not really looking to take in any personal disciples, the chances of entering the Star Shattering this way was close to non-existent.


    However, this fact did not deter any of the young people showing up from dreaming about being epted as the personal disciple of an elder!


    After all, bing a personal disciple would not only allow them to enter the Star Shattering Sect, but would also allow them to instantly surpass the level of an outer sect disciple!


    ¡­


    "I didn''t expect so many people to show up after spreading the news of us epting new disciples¡­" Standing on top of the Ninth Star Peak withrge fields of spiritual herbs growing behind him, Elder Song could not help showing a surprised expression on his face when observing the massive number of people that had showed up to try and enter the sect below.


    "Well¡­ It is to be expected. After all, the Star Shattering Sect is the only sect located at the border of the Sky Empire that has a Domain Lord Realm Expert supporting it. Not to mention, more than one Domain Lord!


    Of course, people from all the surrounding kingdoms will stream over." Standing beside Elder Song, the elder who hade from the Spring Flower Sect and ended up managing the Star Shattering Sect with him, was not as surprised at the number of people showing up as Elder Song was.


    "I guess that is true¡­" Nodding his head in understanding after hearing this, Elder Song turned his attention back towards therge number of young people gathering towards the city located below the Ninth Star Peak.


    Staring at the stream of people that could still be seen entering the city, Elder Song could not help felling that only one thousand people getting epted into the Star Shattering Sect might be a bit too few¡­ But then again, the current eptance of new disciples was not to ept a massive number of disciples but was just to ept a few excellent ones to enter the Shattered Star Peaks.


    epting arge quantity of disciples was something that would normally be done in the branches of arge sect. From here, disciples of these branches would then be able to try and enter the main sect. Rarely did the main sect of arge sect with someone in the Domain Lord Realm backing it directly ept disciples itself.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    In the future, the Star Shattering Sect would also do something simr to that, but currently, the branches of the Star Shattering Sect were still not ready to ept arge quantity of disciples, as the sect elders at the Nascent Soul Realm were still mostly staying inside the main sect at the Seventh Star Peak.


    The only branch sects that were fully operating with one or more Nascent Soul Realm Elder watching over it, was the past main sect of the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect.


    Thinking about this, Elder Song felt determined to quickly get the Half Spirit Race fully settled down so he could send some of their Nascent Soul Realm Experts out as elders to manage some of the branches under the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Hm? It looks like there is also quite a few people from the surrounding kingdoms and sects mixed in among the people¡­ Looks like they are trying to find out more about us!" ncing down towards the stream of people below, Elder Song could not help frowning while saying this


    "Well, that is a given. After all, when we expand in the future, we won''t be able to avoid conflict with these different kingdoms and sects."


    "Indeed¡­ But I still hope we will be able to do things more peacefully. Given the fact that we have the support of Grand Elder Xuan Hao and Shu Yao, this should be doable." Turning his attention away from the stream of people moving into the recently expanded city below, Elder Song nced towards the old female elder that had been working together with him over the past year.


    Curious about her response.


    "Sure, but some of them are sure to resist even knowing they are going up against a Domain Lord. Especially the more powerful kingdoms with more than one Half Step Domain Lord Realm Expert supporting it!"


    "Haaa¡­ Guess we can''t avoid it; they should be hoping one of them breaks through to the Domain Lord Realm before we start expanding." Hearing what she said, Elder Song could not help sighing to himself as he thought about the more powerful kingdom located around the Star Shattering Sect.


    Given that the Star Shattering Sect would have to expand in the future, Elder Song already knew a bit about these powerful kingdoms. The most powerful of which was the me Sky Kingdom that had been the de facto leader of the small kingdoms located in the border region of the Sky Empire for the past thousand years without anyone being able to challenge their reign.


    Now that the Star Shattering Sect had suddenly appeared and inevitably threatened their existence, it was only given that Elder Song was already thinking up ways to deal with this kingdom without having to start an all-out war. Especially considering the fact that it was a kingdom that had more than one Domain Lord in it in the past and would definitely have some safety measures left from those Domain Lord Realm Experts.


    At least the informationwork of the Star Shattering Sect that was mainly operated by the servant quarters that had slowly begun expanding across the entire border region of the Sky Empire, had already managed to find out that the noble houses of the me Sky Kingdom was currently split up into two factions. One for establishing friendly ties with the Star Shattering Sect and one wanting to remain independent.


    ording to the information that could be gained so far, the royal family had yet to take a stance on the issue and was most likely waiting to find out if one of their Half Step Domain Lord Realm ancestors could break through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    However, this in turn had caused the tension between these factions to grow, as there were even signs of them starting a fight with each other.


    If that really happened, Elder Song would be more than happy to secretly start supporting the side that wanted to establish friendly ties with his sect. After all, if they ended up winning, the Star Shattering Sect should be able to easily expand across the me Sky Kingdom in the future without any resistance.


    Not only the me Sky Kingdom, but the same could also be done in the otherrge kingdoms with Half Step Domain Lord Realm Experts defending them¡­


    "Hehe¡­" Chuckling softly to himself as an unfitting evil smile appeared on his face while thinking about the different kingdoms that would end up standing in the way of the Star Shattering Sect expanding, Elder Song could not help wanting to expand the informationwork connected to the servant quarters of the sect even further so this could be done without any problems.


    After all, all things considered, the servant quarters informationwork was still far too small to cover the kingdoms located in border region of the Sky Empire close to the Star Shattering Sect.


    Let alone have the ability to secretly support the different factions in favour of the Star Shattering Sect inside these kingdom¡­

 Chapter ?648 Potential Fourth Disciple?

    Chapter ?648 Potential Fourth Disciple?


    "No. 245, Second Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, Failed"


    "No. 246, Seventh Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, you can move on to the next part of the talent assessment."


    "No. 247, Third level Stage of the Condensation Realm, Failed"


    As the city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak slowly got more and more crowded, the first round of tests officially began with arge number of outer sect elders in charge of the test, while a few of the sect elders watched over the procedure from afar. Keeping an eye out in case there was someone among the young people that they wanted to take in as a disciple


    "Looks like everything is going well so far¡­" Standing a bit further away from the talent measuring tests taking ce at the base of the Ninth Star Peak, Elder Song kept a close eye on everything to make sure nothing went wrong.


    This was the first time that the Shattering Star Sect epted disciples since it had been established, so Elder Song wanted to make sure that nothing went wrong during this time.


    For this reason, he made sure to keep an eye on the people sent over by the different kingdoms. Not wanting any of them to cause any trouble!


    Like this, time slowly passed and the talent assessment part of the tests to enter the Star Shattering Sect slowly came to an end with more than a hundred thousand young people having participated.


    However, in the end. Not all of them could move on to the next part of the assessments!


    Out of the over one hundred thousand people. Only the top ten thousand of these people ended up moving on to thebat part of the assessment for bing a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect.


    ¡­


    "To think so many people got eliminated during the first assessment¡­ I only barely managed to enter the top ten thousand with a rank of 9231!"


    "Huh? You think you have it rough? I was ranked 9997! Getting through thebat assessment will be impossible¡­"


    "Haha! Don''t sweat it! I''m sure you guys will do fine. After all, innate talent and real-lifebat are twopletely different things! If I''m not wrong, thebat assessment should involve us fighting demon beasts and the other participants!"


    "Hm... That does sound like abat assessment, with this, it might not be impossible to pass the assessment given I''m older and more experienced than most of the people here!"


    "Indeed, all three of us are already close to the age of 18 and should have far morebat experience than the rest of the people here. Not to mention, I just learned a powerful martial art used by my father and should be able to beat anyone at the same realm, with this, I should be able to easily pass thebat assessment even if my innate talent is among the worst!"n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As there was a short break before the start of thebat assessment, the disciples who had passed the first assessment started talking with each other. Curious what thebat assessment would be about and just as a way to calm themselves down for the uing assessment.


    After all, outside of the people who were in the top one hundred, none of the other participants felt certain that they would be able to pass thebat assessment. Not something odd, as all the participants were below the age of 18 and had close to zerobat experience¡­


    "Seeing as all of you got some time to rest up before the start of thebat assessment, I think it''s about time we get started! Thebat assessment is split into two parts. The first will have you hunt demon beasts in a nearby demon beast forest. Killing a demon beast at your own realm will give you a single point, killing a demon beast one realm above what your realm is will give 10 points, two realms above your realm will give you 100 points and so on.


    The top six thousand will move on to the next part of thebat assessment that will be a simple one on one duel where the winner will move on, and the loser will be eliminated. The top three thousand will then move on to the final assessment."


    Not wasting too much time after the first assessment on innate talent had finished, Elder Song moved forward and announced the start of thebat assessment, while also describing the two parts of the assessment before leaving to let the outer sect elders take over and guide a group of the participants towards one of three nearby demon beast forests that the Star Shattering Sect had taken control over shortly after it had been established.


    The three-demon beast forest were each made for a specific level of strength so as to better allow the participants to disy their full range of talent an abilities without having to waste their time dealing with weaker demon beasts that posed no challenge to them.


    For this reason, there was one demon beast forest for those younger participants still in the earlier stages of the Qi Condensation Realm. One for the participants who were in theter stages of the Qi Condensation Realm and finally, one for the few that had reached the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    To make sure nothing ended up going wrong during this part of the assessment, the outer sect elders hid themselves around the three different demon beast forests. Ready to jump in and act in case one of the participants were about to get killed.


    Of course, the outer sect elders helping, would mean that the participant would end up getting eliminated!


    ¡­


    Whoosh~


    Arriving when thebat assessment had already started and the first part of the new disciple assessment had already ended, Xuan Hao quickly began scanning over all the disciples present with the help of the system to see if there was anyone talented among them.


    "Hm? I didn''t expect to see you here Grand Elder Xuan¡­ Are you perhaps looking to see if there is someone interesting among the young ones?" Given that he had not hidden his presence when he arrived, Elder Song quickly spotted him as he made his way over with a happy expression on his face.


    Even if he didn''t say anything, Xuan Hao could clearly feel that the old man was extremely satisfied with the number of geniuses present in the assessment for future disciples of the sect. Not something surprising given that there were more than ten who had already reached the Foundation Establishment below the age of 18!


    The level of talented young people present was simply far superior to any assessment that the Flying Sword Sect had held in the past, it was obvious Elder Song would feel extremely happy knowing so many talented young people would end up joining the sect¡­


    "Indeed, I came here to see if there was anyone interesting enough to ept as a disciple!"


    "That is great! If Grand Elder Xuan could ept another disciple, I''m sure that the Star Shattering Sect will get another pir to keep it stable in the future!"


    Not hiding his reason foring, Xuan Hao felt a bit surprised upon seeing Elder Song''s excited expression when mentioning that he might ept another disciple.


    However, after thinking about it for a short moment, it was not too surprising. After all, all three of his disciples were extremely talented. Chu Yang had already reached the Nascent Soul Realm, Qing Yi was close to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and should be able to reach it in the future, while even Bai Ning was starting to show his brilliance when it came to cksmithing. Already being close to bing an Artisan cksmith.


    In Elder Song''s eyes, it was obvious that him taking in another disciple would only be a good thing, as all three of his disciples so far were by far the strongest disciples of the Star Shattering Sect!


    "epting another disciple¡­" Muttering this to himself as he turned his attention back towards the ten thousand disciple who were making their way through one of the three demon beast forest, Xuan Hao could not help feeling like it was indeed time for him to take in another disciple.


    Not because Elder Song was telling him to do so, but because he suddenly had a feeling that the system might reward him if he started taking in more talented disciple.


    Now, the only problem that remained, was for him to find a sufficiently talented disciple!


    "Hm? Natural talent 67!?"


    Not even having to look around for more than a few seconds, Xuan Hao could not help opening both of his eyes wide as he noticed a terrifyingly high talent number floating above one of the participants heads.


    "Who in the- Nascent Soul Realm cultivation?!" Looking towards the person in question, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked after discovering that the other party was hiding her cultivation.


    "Wait¡­ Why does the aura of this person feel so familiar¡­?" Starting to pay attention to this person, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes upon realizing that he felt somewhat familiar with the other persons aura. Meaning that he had met her before!


    The only question that remained was, when did he meet this person before¡­?

 Chapter 649 Chun Hua

    Chapter 649 Chun Hua


    "How interesting¡­" Watching the girl below acting like any normal First Stage Foundation Establishment Realm genius, Xuan Hao could not help smiling. Feeling even more curious about who the young girl was and where he had met her before.


    At the same time, he also wondered what the reason was for such a talented young Nascent Soul Realm cultivator to risk her life and try to sneak into the Star Shattering Sect that was already acknowledged as a powerful sect with more than one Domain Lord Realm Expert watching over it.


    "Could it perhaps be rted to the Second Star Peak and the Main Star Peak¡­?" Remembering the blue divine energy present at these two mountain peaks along with the many mysteries he had yet to explore on the Main Star Peak, Xuan Hao could not help guessing that the girl might have gained some information on the things hidden on one of these two peaks.


    However, with her talent, she should be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm without too much trouble. Risking her life for an opportunity before she had even reached the Domain Lord Realm seemed stupid in his point of view.


    Then again, in the end, he had no idea if this was really the reason why she had decided to try and secretly enter the Star Shattering Sect.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao had found out about the fact that a Nascent Soul Realm Expert had somehow managed to sneak her way inside the disciple selection, the person in question was carefully making her way through the most dangerous demon beast forest. Disying a strength at the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm and making sure not to make any mistakes when it came to fighting the demon beasts that showed up from time to time.


    From start to finish, she disyed enough strength to be considered a genius at the Foundation Establishment Realm. However, the strength she disyed was far from enough to ce her among the ones at the top of the assessment. Only barely allowing her to be ced between the top 10 and top 15 in thebat assessment.


    Although this was still more than enough to catch the eye of the sect elders, it was still far out shadowedpared to the ones fighting for first ce in thebat assessment!


    The main reason behind this, was that the top five in thebat assessment had all at least reached the Third Stage of the Foundation Establishment and were all showing a strength that far exceeded their cultivation realm. Not something that someone barely disying a cultivation at the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment with the strength to fight equally with a demon beast at the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm couldpare to.


    "I didn''t expect so many people in the Nascent Soul Realm to watch this selection of new disciples¡­ If not for my special constitution, I would have no way to hide my true cultivation realm from them!" Muttering this to herself as she continued hunting down different demon beasts, the girl who had disguised herself as someone in the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm to enter the Star Shattering Sect felt a shiver run down her spine.


    If she revealed her true cultivation level, it was easy for her to imagine her fate with so many Nascent Soul Realm Expert around.


    Not to mention the fact that the Star Shattering Sect was a sect with more than one Domain Lord Realm Expert watching over it!


    But¡­ If I want to enter that ce, I will have to enter the Star Shattering Sect. After all, the formation set up around the Shattered Star Peaks is far too powerful for me to sneak inside. If the formation manages to see through my cover¡­ Ah! Get yourself together Chun Hua! You can''t give up now that you are already here!


    Thinking this to herself as she managed to kill of a demon beast in the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm. The young girl hiding her true cultivation realm narrowed her eyes before making her way towards another demon beast in the distance. Not daring to show any abnormalities that might make the Nascent Soul Realm Experts watching the assessment through their divine sense pay more attention to her.


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­. Hah¡­ Finally, it ended¡­" Leaving the demon beast forest after the time limit was up, Chun Hua made sure that she gave of the impression of someone who had been fighting on the brink of copse for the three hours that the first part of thebat assessmentsted.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Thump~


    To make it even more believable, she even made sure toy down on the ground to recover her ''exhausted'' energy reserves.


    Rustle~!


    As Chun Huaid on the ground while pretending to be focused on recovering from the fierce battles she had just gone through. More and more young people showed up from the demon beast forest behind.


    Given that it was the strongest demon beast forest among the three. Only people at the Peak of the Qi Condensation Realm close to reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm and those who had already reached the Foundation Establishment Realm were there. For this reason, the number of people who came out of the demon beast forest ended up being no more than some fifty odd people.


    "Ah! I actually managed to make it through without dying!"


    "Haha! Dying? I''m sure the elders of the Star Shattering Sect were watching over us during the test to make sure something like that didn''t happen!"


    "Are you sure about that? I got cut up by a fierce demon beast and almost lost both my legs!"


    "Wow¡­ This must have hurt a lot¡­"


    "Of course, it did! My leg is only barely hanging in there at this point in time! I have no idea how I will participate in the next part of thebat assessment like this! Ah! For a Foundation Establishment Realm genius like me to get eliminated like this! What a tragedy!"


    Listening to the young people simrly copsing on the ground after leaving the demon beast forest before starting to talk with each other about what they had experienced, Chun Hua could not help rolling her eyes upon hearing one of the participants startining loudly about what she could only describe as a few bloody scratches on one of his legs.


    It was rather obvious that this young man had never experienced a true life and death battle in his life. Even if he had already reached the Third Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, Chun Hua had a feeling that someone like him would not be able to aplish much in the future¡­


    Whoosh~!


    As most of the participants were busy talking with each other and recovering from their earlier battles, a tall elderly man dressed in a robe with the symbol of the Star Shattering Sect etched into it, showed up.


    "It''s great to see that all of you managed to pass the first part of thebat assessment! Now, follow me and we will head towards the ce where the second part of thebat assessment will take ce!"


    Not giving the young participants any time to respond to what he said, the elderly man started leaving, it was clear that he wouldn''t wait for them to recover¡­


    This man¡­ He is at the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Instantly seeing through the elderly man''s strength, Chun Hua could not help bing even more cautious. The only elders that had guided her and the other participants so far, were at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm.


    Now, a Nascent Soul Realm Expert was the one guiding them!


    Even if she knew how good she was at hiding herself, Chun Hua could not help feeling nervous being so close to someone at the same realm as herself.


    The reason for this, was that it was far harder to hide herself when she was so close. Not to mention, her cultivation realm was not a major above the other party. Making it far harder for her to hide herself!


    Hm? The aura of this elder is rather unstable¡­ Perhaps¡­ Someone who just recently broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm!?


    Slowly calming herself down as she and the other participants followed behind the tall elder from the Star Shattering Sect, Chun Hua managed to notice that the elder guiding them had a somewhat unstable aura. Indicating that the elder had only just broken through to the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    At least the elder is only someone who just recently broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm. If it was someone above the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, I might not have been able to hide myself in such close proximity!


    Thinking this to herself as she secretly let out a sigh of relief after realizing that the elder guiding her and the other participants was only someone what had just recently reached the Nascent Soul Realm, Chun Hua felt a wave of relief wash over her, as she followed behind the elder with the rest of the participants without any worry.

 Chapter ?650 Second Part of the Combat Assessment

    Chapter ?650 Second Part of the Combat Assessment


    After reaching the second part of thebat assessment, Chun Hua and the rest of the participants got some time to recover before each of them were matched against someone with a simr cultivation realm as themselves.


    Remembering what the elder had said about being eliminated if one lost during the second part of thebat assessment, Chun Hua could not help frowning when staring at her opponent.


    As the number of Foundation Establishment Realm participants were already low, Chun Hua ended up being matched against someone in the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    Knowing that she would inevitably catch the attention of the elders by defeating someone in the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm while only being in the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm herself, Chun Hua could not help cursing at the elder who had arranged for her match.


    After all, although there were not a lot of Foundation Establishment Realm participants. Everyone other than her had somehow been matched with someone who had a simr cultivation realm to themselves, it was only her who was matched with someone stronger than herself!


    "Chun Hua¡­ Right? It''s time for your match!"


    Lost in her own thoughts about how to deal with her opponent, Chun Hua was caught slightly off guard when the elder who had led her and the other participants over to the stage where the second part of thebat assessment would take ce suddenly appeared behind her and said this.


    "Ah!? Y-yes! I will get going now!"


    Understanding that it would be best for her to not stay so close to a Nascent Soul Realm Expert and possible invoke some curiosity from the other party, Chun Hua dashed towards the stage located a short distance away from where she was staying.


    ¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Are both of you ready?"


    ""Yes!""


    Arriving at the small stage that had been set up for thebat assessment, Chun Hua kept her gaze focused on her opponent. Looking for any weakness she might be able to take advantage of during the fight to make her win with the strength of someone in the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm look like an ident, or something along that line¡­


    "Then, the match will start in 3¡­ 2¡­ 1-"


    Whoosh~


    Bang!


    The moment the elder finished the short countdown to the start of the match, both Chun Hua and her opponent dashed forward before shing with each other at the centre of the small stage.


    Whoosh!


    Rapidly retreating after the first sh, Chun Hua could not help frowning, while her opponent remained at the centre of the stage, a confident look slowly making its way onto his face.


    During the first sh, Chun Hua ended up on the losing side and was forced to retreat to prevent getting injured.


    From an outside perspective, it was obvious that Chun Hua was at a disadvantage and her opponent was the stronger one.


    Whoosh-!


    Understanding this, Chun Hua''s opponent dashed towards the retreating Chun Hua beforeunching using a powerful palm technique. Wanting to overwhelm her with his powerful strength and end things in a single move.


    Swish~


    However, Chun Hua seemed to just barely react in time to dodge the attack before returning an attack of her own towards her opponent''s unguarded back-


    Boom!


    "Ahh!"


    Directly sending the other party flying out of the stage and heavily injuring him in the process before he had the time to protect himself from Chun Hua''s attack.


    In the end, the fight did end in a single move¡­ But the person winning was not the young man in the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm but was instead Chun Hua who was at the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    This oue not only surprised the outer sect elders watching from the side, but also ended up catching some of the Nascent Soul Realm elders by surprise.


    After all, none of them expected for Chun Hua to be the one winning the fight, her winning with only a single move was more than enough to cause these Nascent Soul Realm elders who had thought she would end up being defeated, start re-evaluating her.


    "¡­"


    Feeling the divine sense of several Nascent Soul Realm elders lock onto her, Chun Hua could not help shivering as she prayed that none of them would be able to see through her cover.


    She had note to the Star Shattering Sect with any ill intentions and just wanted to enter one of the Shattered Star Peaks without causing any trouble.


    However, the entire Shattered Star Peaks being sealed off after the Star Shattering Sect was established and the only way, she could enter the Shattered Star Peaks was through bing a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Asking them if she, a stranger in the Nascent Soul Realm could enter their sect, was not really an option¡­


    If that was not the case, there was no way she would risk her life trying to enter the Star Shattering Sect while hiding her true cultivation realm!


    Deep down, she understood that even if she had note with any ill intentions, there was no way that the Star Shattering Sect would see it this way. After all, she was someone hiding her cultivation in order to secretly get into the Shattered Star Peaks that had be the core part of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory¡­


    For this reason, Chun Hua felt a shiver run down her spine as the divine sense of the different Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the Star Shattering Sect examined her from head to toe.


    Whoosh~


    Although it felt like an eternity, the divine sense of the different elders sweeping over hersted for no more than a few seconds and it was only when she felt that these elders were no longer paying any attention to her that Chun Hua could let out a sigh of relief before making it down the stage to meet with the elder who was in charge of her match.


    "You did really great young one! I didn''t expect you to be able to react in time and take advantage of your opponent''s carelessness to end things in a single move! You can move over to the rest of the participants and wait for the rest of the battles to end."


    "Thank you, elder!"


    Hearing the outer sect elder at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm praising her, Chun Hua could not help smiling wryly inside her head while she thanked him happily on the outside before walking towards the participants who had already finished their battles.


    "Hm? Why is that guy also here¡­?"


    Noticing that the person she had defeated just a moment ago was also present among the people moving on to the next stage of the assessments, Chun Hua could not help freezing for a short moment before she finally understood.


    All the people here are either at the Peak of the Qi Condensation Realm or the Foundation Establishment Realm below the age of 18, there is no way that the Star Shattering Sect would just eliminate them like this!


    Not knowing what to say after she realized that she didn''t need to show off and win earlier, Chun Hua had no idea what to say as she could only me the elder of the Star Shattering Sect for not informing her about this earlier so she could lose her battle in a convincing manner without garnering the attention of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the Star Shattering Sect!


    However, no matter how much sheined, there was no way to undo what had already been done and she could only find a ce to sit down while waiting for the rest of the battles to conclude and the final third assessment to start.


    ¡­


    "Hoho, how interesting, looks like that young girl has quite a goodbat awareness, I''m sure she will be someone great in the future! What do you think?" Observing the battle that had taken ce between Chun Hua and her opponent, Elder Song showed a look of approval while saying this before turning towards Xuan Hao.


    "Hm¡­ She is indeed¡­ Impressive, I''m curious how she will fare in the final assessment." Already knowing that the other party was a Nascent Soul Realm Expert hiding her true cultivation realm, Xuan Hao just rolled his eyes while answering Elder Song.


    With the strength that she showed, Xuan Hao was certain that this Chun Hua would be able to enter the Star Shattering Sect without any problem.


    Given that she went through so much trouble to secretly enter the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao felt curious what her reason for doing this was, as he nned to secretly observe her for some time to find out.


    If he just ignored her and she tried entering the Star Shattering Sect while hiding her cultivation realm, the Chaotic Qi Formation would forcefully remove her cover when she tried entering the Shattered Star Peaks after the end of the assessment¡­

 Chapter ?651 Third Assessment

    Chapter ?651 Third Assessment


    Following the end of thebat assessment, Xuan Hao continued curiously watching the participants who would soon be disciples of the Star Shattering Sect. Keeping an eye on Chun Hua at the same time.


    Although he could have just forcefully caught her and gotten her to tell him her reason for trying to sneak into his sect. Doing so could end up causing some trouble for the participants currently undergoing the third and final assessment.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Not to mention, he did not have any soul-searching techniques that would allow him forcefully to pry out the information from Chun Hua in case she wouldn''t answer his questions¡­


    Just waiting for her to reveal her reason for entering the Star Shattering Sect herself, was a far simpler thing to do¡­ And Xuan Hao didn''t mind waiting around for a few hours while the assessments for the new disciples took ce. After all, this way, he would also be able to see the new disciples who would be entering the sect.


    Given that he would likely teach them in the future during one of his lectures, it was not a bad thing to learn about them beforehand.


    Watching the participants slowly getting ready for the third and final assessment, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that he had absolutely no clue how Elder Song had nned to test theprehension of the young participants.


    From what he understood about the testing of different sects he had read about and visited so far, there was no way to test someone''s talent when it came toprehension, as it was constantly changing as the cultivator''s soul grew stronger and stronger.


    Testing it by measuring the soul strength of a cultivator was doable, but it would be extremely uncertain for cultivators below the Nascent Soul Realm, as their soul was simply far too weak to properly measure.


    Feeling curious about how Elder Song had nned to test theprehension talent of the participants after knowing all of this, Xuan Hao could not help himself from turning towards Elder Song.


    "Elder Song¡­ How will the third assessment be done? As far as I know, there is no artifact to test someone''sprehension talent and measuring through the strength of their soul is not doable with their current cultivation realm..."


    "How it will be done? They will each be handed a rather simple technique that is split into 99 different levels, I made specifically for this assessment! The result of the assessment will depend on how much they manage toprehend during the next few hours!" Smiling happily to himself as he said answered Xuan Hao''s question, Elder Song took out a small scroll before handing it over to Xuan Hao.


    "Here, this is the technique that I made for the test!"


    "Thank you¡­"


    Not having expected for Elder Song to go so far for a simple disciple recruitment assessment, Xuan Hao grabbed the small scroll Elder Song was handing him.


    For some reason, Xuan Hao felt like he began to understand why the disciples of the sect adored Elder Song so much.


    Even if he was not the strongest elder in the Star Shattering Sect, he was by far the one who put in the most effort when it came to helping the disciples¡­ And this was not even his own disciples, but all the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect, be it Outer Sect Disciples or Inner Sect Disciples!


    Swish~


    Not feeling like it would be all too entertaining to watch the participants sit down trying to learn the technique Elder Song had made for the test, Xuan Hao decided to open up the small scroll Elder Song had handed him.


    Curious about the technique Elder Song had made for the third assessment.


    "Hm? This is¡­ Quite impressive¡­" Muttering this to himself as he read through the technique Elder Song had made, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression.


    The technique Elder Song had made was, as he said earlier, split into 99 different levels. The technique was an attack technique that grew stronger with each level. However, after reading through it, Xuan Hao quickly came to realize that the technique was in no way simple.


    The 1 to 29 level was suitable for someone in the Qi Condensation Realm and Xuan Hao expected most the participants in the top 50 to at least reach the 29 level.


    Level 30 to 59 of the technique was different, as it was far more difficult and could be considered a Foundation Establishment Realm Combat Technique.


    Even if some of the Peak Qi Condensation participants could reach this level, it would not be more than a handful. Reaching level 59 of the technique within the few hours allocated to them would be close to impossible for someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm and would be a testament to the cultivator having an incredibleprehension ability.


    After all, reaching this level would mean they had the ability toprehend a Foundation Establishment Realm Technique in only a few hours!


    Above level 59 that symbolized a Peak Foundation Establishment Realm Technique, was level 60 to 89. Reaching this level, the simple palm technique would get far moreplicated, as it would officially transform from a Foundation Establishment Realm Palm Technique to a Core Formation Palm Technique!


    Among the participants, the only person with the ability to reach this level, was Chun Hua.


    If any of the Foundation Establishment Realm participants could master a Core Formation Realm Palm Technique within a few hours, they would be some kind of heaven defying genius!


    Level 90 to 99 was even more difficult to master, as the once simple Qi Condensation Realm Palm Technique had already transformed into a true Nascent Soul Realm Palm Technique!


    Although it was not at the Peak among Nascent Soul Realm Techniques, it was still a terrifying Nascent Soul Realm Technique that someone with Elder Song''s cultivation realm should not have been able to create!


    "¡­"


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help staring at Elder Song sitting beside him with an excited expression on his face while watching the participants below learning the palm technique.


    Elder Song''s talent when it came toprehension might be far more terrifying than he expected...


    Given thatprehension would only really start to y a big role after starting to form a pseudo domain, Xuan Hao felt like Elder Song''s strength would rapidly start increasing after he reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm in the future.


    I should try and find a way to heal his injured soul as quickly as possible¡­


    Not having forgotten about the injured state of Elder Song''s soul, Xuan Hao decided to put some more effort into trying to find a way to help heal his injured soul in future!


    ¡­


    At the same time, Xuan Hao was lost in his own thoughts while looking through the palm technique made by Elder Song, Chun Hua and the rest of the remaining participants were all curiously looking towards arge stone monument that had been ced in front of them.


    Etched into therge stone monument, was all the 99 levels of the palm technique Elder Song had specially made for the third assessment to test the participantsprehension.


    What kind of technique is this¡­? The one who made it is truly a genius toe up with such a unique way to test someone''sprehension!


    Reading through the different levels of the palm technique in front of her, Chun Hua could not help showing an expression filled with admiration, as she understood just how wonderous the palm technique in front of her was.


    Although it was not more powerful than some of her own techniques andbat arts, it was split into 99 different levels that were all seamlessly connected. Making the technique extremely easy to learn and progress in.


    If she had just reached the Nascent Soul Realm, this kind of technique would be wonderous, as it would allow a Nascent Soul Realm Expert to easily learn a powerful palm technique in at most a few weeks!


    It had to be known, that it normally took months, if not years to learn a Nascent Soul Realmbat technique. Not to mention, the more powerful the technique was, the longer it took to learn!


    Hm¡­ Most of the people here should only be able to learn somewhere between the first and twenty ninth level, with my strength showing as the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, it should be fine for me to learn up to the thirtieth level of the technique.


    nning on how to proceed with the assessment after seeing the palm technique in front of her, Chun Hua closed both her eyes before memorizing the palm technique.


    To make sure that she blended in with the rest of the participants, she also got up to spar with some of the other participants in the Foundation Establishment Realm. Making sure to show a steady progress in strength throughout the third assessment.

 Chapter ?652 End of Disciple Assessments, 1000 New Disciples!

    Chapter ?652 End of Disciple Assessments, 1000 New Disciples!


    "Next up is¡­ Chun Hua! You managed toprehend the thirty-first level of the palm technique and your official ranking for the third assessment is 14 out of 3000! Congrattions on sessfully bing a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect!"


    As the third assessment came to an end, Chun Hua passed the third assessment without any problems and sessfully became a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although her ranking was among the lowest of the Foundation Establishment Realm participants, Chun Hua did this in an attempt to get the elders of the Star Shattering Sect''s attention away from her without being too obvious.


    In the end, this worked perfectly, as other that the Peak Core Formation Realm Outer Sect Elders, none of the Nascent Soul Realm Elders kept their divine sense focused on her for a long time.


    The person at the centre of these elders was instead a young boy and girl, who had both managed toprehend the fiftieth level of the palm technique in such a short time with their Foundation Establishment Realm cultivation base.


    "If only these two could feel just how many different divine senses are locked onto them, I''m sure they would be scared to death!" Muttering this to herself while feeling grateful for these two''s help in taking away the attention of all the Nascent Soul Realm Elders watching over the assessment for the new disciples, Chun Hua found a ce to sit down and rx until the announcements of who among the three thousand remaining participants would enter the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    "Last, in the number one thousand ce and having sessfullyprehended the¡­ Fifth¡­ Level of the palm technique is¡­ Wai So Dim! Congrattions on bing an Outer Sect Disciple of the Star Shattering Sect! Even though your performance during theprehension assessment was the worst among everyone present, your performance in the rest of the assessments is enough for you to barely enter¡­"


    "Yes! I managed to get in!" Following the final participant being named, a cry of happiness could be heard from the person in question ignored what the elder said. Only focusing on the fact that he managed to get into the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Damn, how can a dim fellow like him get in, but I, whoprehended the twenty-first level of the palm technique can''t!?"


    "That''s right! Even if I wasn''t great, I should at the very least be better than that guy!"


    ""Yeah!""


    Although the people failing to be disciple was talking badly about him, it by no means meant that the young man called Wai So Dim was weak in any way.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    On the other hand, he was someone who had reached the Foundation Establishment Realm and could be considered one of the strongest among all the participants!


    The only thing dragging him down was the fact that it looked like hisprehension was abysmal¡­


    Swish~


    Before the participants who failed to be disciples of the Star Shattering Sect started attacking the young man who had cedst to vent their feelings, a kind looking old man appeared in front of therge stone monument.


    "Everyone, this marks the end of the disciple eptance of the Star Shattering Sect! For the one''s who failed to be disciples, if you still want to join the Star Shattering Sect and think you still have what it takes, you are all wee to join a branch sect and enter the Star Shattering Sect this way. The elders will help you with any question regarding the branch sects and their locations on your way out!"


    Watching the old man appearing before calming down the participants who failed to enter the sect, Chun Hua could not muster any admiration for the old man''s ability to calm the crowd of young people.


    The reason for this was simple, as she clearly felt that the old man was someone in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Before we get any further, I would like to introduce myself, I''m the current Vice Sect Master of the Star Shattering Sect and I will be giving all of you a brief introduction to the Star Shattering Sect and will be answering any questions you might have-"


    "¡­"


    Not daring to stand out knowing that the other party was a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, Chun Hua tried her best to make herself invisible as she listened to Elder Song exin the rules of the Star Shattering Sect and what they would be doing. From new disciple tournaments, choosing a profession to train and so on.


    "-With this, the new disciples of the sect, all of you can make your way up the Ninth Star Peak where a group of elders will guide you towards your new home!"


    Time slowly passed and Elder Song''s introduction to the Star Shattering Sect came to an end. Soon, Chun Hua found herself making her way up the Ninth Star Peak together with the thousand young people who had sessfully managed to pass all the different assessment to officially be disciples of the Star Shattering Sect.


    However, she couldn''t keep herself from shaking all over the closer she got to the Ninth Star Peak. From past experiences, she understood very well how terrifying the formation guarding the Shattered Star Peaks was.


    Back when she had first encountered it, if not for an ancient sacrificial artifact activating by itself, saving her life and teleporting her away in time, Chun Hua didn''t doubt that the formation guarding the Shattered Star Peaks would have killed her without her having any time to resist.


    Exactly because of this, Chun Hua only got more and more nervous the closer to this terrifying formation that she got. Wondering if she should just turn around and forget about entering the Shattered Star Peak¡­


    No! I can''t turn around now! If I give up now, how will I be able to reach the central region with my own strength? Even if I get stronger and eventual make my way there, it will all be far toote at that point in time!


    Thinking about her reason for entering the Shattered Star Peaks, Chun Hua showed a determined expression on her face as she walked the final distance and officially crossed the invisible barrier separating the Shattered Star Peaks from the outside world.


    Thump~


    "Huh¡­?"


    Not able to stop herself from letting out a small exmation of surprise after crossing through the invisible barrier formed by the terrifying formation, Chun Hua soon showed a relieved expression on her face as she realized that she had sessfully made it into the Shattered Star Peaks without getting killed by the formation.


    "W-what is this?! Why is the qi in here so dense!?"


    "T-this is the qi inside an immortal sect¡­? A true holynd for cultivation!"


    "Just cultivating here for a few days will be the same as a month on the outside¡­ No wonder the Star Shattering Sect is said to have more than one Domain Lord Realm Expert!"


    Around her, the rest of the disciples all showed a simrly surprised expressions on their faces, the reason however was a bit different than her¡­


    "This dense qi¡­"


    Calming down from the happiness she felt after having safely entered the Shattered Star Peaks, Chum Hua also began feeling the dense qi all around her as a frown slowly appeared on her face.


    For the qi here to be this dense¡­ The person in charge of the Star Shattering Sect should not be someone who is just in the Domain Lord Realm! But how is this possible!? A power with an expert at this level should be located close to the central region. Not close to the borders of the continent!


    Having far more knowledge than the rest of the young people present, Chun Hua could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine as she realized that the person behind the Star Shattering Sect might be someone above the Domain Lord Realm.


    If that was really the case, there was a high chance that the other party had already noticed her¡­


    "¡­"


    Thinking this to herself, Chun Hua could only pray that this was not the case and try to find what she came to the Star Shattering Sect for before leaving.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Looks like she might have guessed that someone might already know about her."


    Chun Hua was not surprised at the dense qi inside the Chaotic Qi Formation, but instead just showed a terrified expression on her face. Meaning that she had likely already experienced such a blessed environment before and had some idea about what kind of existence could create such an environment.


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao felt even more curious about her and where she hade from. Even if the Chaotic Qi Formation was still far away from its full potential when it came to the density of qi inside it, it was still not something that Xuan Hao could achieve with his current strength.


    To create something simr, he guessed that the strength of at least a Soul Ascension Realm Expert was required!

 Chapter ?653 Cover Blown!

    Chapter ?653 Cover Blown!


    Following one thousand new disciples entering the sect, everything became rather lively, with the formerly newest disciples happily teaching these new disciples about the sect as seniors. Making sure to inform them about the different special ces located all over the Seventh Star Peak, while making sure to warn them about not approaching the core of the sect without permission from the elders.


    During this time, Chun Hua also blended into the sect and didn''t do anything out of the ordinary. Secretly listening in on the conversations taking ce all around her while trying to learn as much as possible about the Star Shattering Sect through the senior disciples.


    Even if their knowledge about the sect was not at the level of an elder, Chun Hua still managed to gain a lo of information about the Star Shattering Sect from listening to these senior disciples.


    The most important thing she learned from this, was that the centre of the Seventh Star Peak was a ce where the Peak Experts of the Star Shattering Sect were gathered, a ce that she would avoid at any cost to avoid having her cover blown and end up dead.


    Other than that, she also managed to learn about some of the more famous elders and disciples of the Star Shattering Sect. The most spoken of elder was Elder Song, who she had seen when he introduced the Star Shattering Sect to them just a short time ago, while the most famous disciple was someone named Chu Yang, a disciple who had managed to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm below the age of 30!


    After hearing that there was actually such a talented disciple present inside the Star Shattering Sect, Chun Hua felt like her premotion of there being an expert above the Domain Lord Realm was true. After all, without such a powerful expert, how would such a genius disciple be nurtured properly?


    Even where she came from in the central region of the continent, someone breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm below the age of 30 could already be considered to be among the most talented young geniuses in the central region!


    "If I''m not wrong, the expert above the Domain Lord Realm should be the Grand Elder called Xuan Hao¡­ But why haven''t he caught me yet- Wait! Perhaps he is currently outside the sect!?" Muttering this to herself, Chun Hua suddenly had a feeling she understood why she had been able to enter the Star Shattering Sect without being discovered.


    If he truly is not here at the moment, I will have to find that ce as quickly as possible and leave before he returns!


    Coming up with a n on how to proceed, Chun Hua could not wait for her to be left alone so she could begin searching for the ce she had risked her life to find.


    Luckily for her, it did not take long for her to find an opportunity to leave the rest of the new disciples without anyone noticing!


    The fact that the Nascent Soul Realm Elders had left, and the strongest elder present was only at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm made this far easier.


    ¡­


    Still focused on keeping an eye on Chun Hua, Xuan Hao of course noticed it when she secretly snuck away before making her way down the Seventh Star Peak before heading back towards the way she hade from.


    "Hm¡­ After I sealed up the entire Shattered Star Peaks, the only way to enter is indeed by bing a disciple of the sect¡­ Looks like her reason for entering the Star Shattering Sect is not rted to the sect itself but was instead just to enter the Shattered Star Peaks." Muttering this to himself while watching Chun Hua, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if there would be more people like her in the future.


    Given the things he had seen on the Main Star Peak, the Second Star Peak, the Ninth Star Peak and the Eighth Star Peak, Xuan Hao was sure that the rest of the Star Peaks were also hiding something. The only problem was that it was far harder for him to discover what it was, as it was not as obvious as those 4 Star Peaks.


    Digging into the Star Peaks was not an option either, as he had already tried doing that with the Qi Spring Lake at the centre of the Seventh Star Peak. From this, he understood that his strength was still too weak to dig into the Star Peaks at the moment. Maybe even when he reached the Soul Ascension Realm, it would be impossible to dig into the Star Peaks of the Shattered Star Peak¡­


    "But for her to not move deeper into the Shattered Star Peaks¡­ It looks like she is heading towards either the Ninth Star Peak or the Eighth Star Peak¡­" Watching Chun Hua make her way to the base of the Seventh Star Peak before moving back in the direction of the Eighth- and Ninth Star Peak, Xuan Hao silently left the Seventh Star Peak before secretly appearing a few hundred meters in the air above Chun Hua.


    Hiding from a Nascent Soul Realm Expert like Chun Hua was not hard with the help of his domain and Xuan Hao was not at all worried that he would be discovered by the other party.


    ¡­


    Who in the world is that?!


    Unknown to Xuan Hao, Chun Hua moving towards the Eighth Star Peak in the distance below him had already found out about him appearing above her, as she barely managed to stop herself from freezing on the spot and showing anything that might give away the fact that she found out about someone hovering in the air above her.


    Not knowing what to do as all sorts of thoughts ran through her head, Chun Hua started panicking internally after discovering that someone was following her, her bright green eyes shone for a brief moment as she looked up into the air while pretending to look around for something.


    I''m unable to see through the domain of the other party! Is it perhaps the Domain Lord called Shu Yao¡­ Or perhaps the one called Xuan Hao!?


    Not daring to look for too long as it might cause some suspicion in the other party, Chun Hua quickly showed a happy expression outwardly before making her way towards the Eighth Star Peak, while deep inside, she was trying toe up with all sorts of ways to escape from her current predicament.


    Whoosh~


    Reaching the base of the Eighth Star Peak after only travelling for a short time, Chun Hua did not show any hesitation as she began ascending the mountain. Understanding that any hesitation might cause the person following her to take action to capture or kill her.


    If I can reach that ce, I should have a chance to escape¡­


    Already having a n on how to proceed, Chun Hua did not take long to reach the Peak of the Eighth Star Peak before she made her way down into the valley of the Half Spirit Race located below.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Thump~!


    Landing on the ground below, there was not a single member of the Half Spirit Race present, and the town located not too far away from where shended waspletely quiet.


    Around a year ago when the Half Spirit Race joined the Star Shattering Sect, they had at first sent only a single person, but at this point in time, the entire Half Spirit Race had already finished moving from their ancestral home and into the Star Shattering Sect on top of the Seventh Star Peak.


    As most of the members of the Half Spirit Race were secretly curious about the outside world and wanted to find out about the things outside the valley, they had spent their entire life inside, this move was not too difficult and had already beenpleted less than three months ago¡­


    "Hm?" Noticing this quiet town, Chun Hua could not help showing a confused expression on her face for a short moment. Not having expected for it to be empty.


    If I''m not wrong, the town should have been the home to a non-human race thest time I came here! Howe it disappeared!?


    Not knowing that the Half Spirit Race had be part of the Star Shattering Sect as she had barely stayed at the Seventh Star Peak for a few minutes before secretly running away, Chun Hua could not help feeling a wave of helplessness wash over her.


    I wanted to use the expert of this race to buy some time for myself to escape, but that is no longer possible. Now the only chance I have to escape is by using myst remaining Heaven Concealment Talisman¡­


    Thinking this to herself, Chun Hua showed a determined expression on her face before taking out a small talisman and attaching it to her body.


    ¡­


    "Hm?"


    Watching Chun Hua from above, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after seeing Chun Hua suddenly taking out a small talisman and attaching it to  Beforepletely disappearing from sight.


    "Ah¡­ No wonder she felt familiar¡­ So, she was the person who entered the ancient teleportation formation back in the primeval jungle!"


    Swish-!


    Understanding why he felt somewhat familiar with Chun Hua after having seen her use a talisman to hide herself, Xuan Hao did not wait around and directly used his movement technique to move toward the ancient teleportation formation located in the valley of the Half Spirit Race.

 Chapter ?654 Caught!

    Chapter ?654 Caught!


    Reaching the ancient teleportation formation less than a second after Chun Hua disappeared from his sight, Xuan Hao first encased the ancient teleportation formation in ayer of ice before his domain spread towards the location where Chun Hua had been standing before she disappeared.


    Fwoosh!


    Knowing that she was only hiding with the help of a talisman, Xuan Hao decided to use the simplest way possible to find her-


    RUMBLE-!


    And that was forcefully using his domain to destroy the surrounding area!


    Boom!


    Not able to escape from the attack of his domain in time due to the sheer speed at which Xuan Hao had managed to seal up the ancient teleportation formation in ayer of ice beforeunching an attack with his domain, Chun Hua bore the aftermath of the attack-


    "Ah!"


    Letting out a scream of pain as the talisman hiding her was directly shattered. Forcing her to appear only a second after she had first used the talisman in a vain attempt to hide herself from Xuan Hao.


    Given the difference in cultivation between herself and Xuan Hao, she had already expected that she would not have a chance to escape after she had been discovered by the other party¡­ But she didn''t expect for things to end so quickly!


    Not to mention her hiding herself before trying to escape through the ancient teleportation formation, she had barely even been able to take a few steps before she had been injured and the talisman hiding her was forcefully shattered!


    Even if she had been able to avoid the attack, Xuan Hao had already sealed up the ancient teleportation formation in a thickyer of ice to prevent her from escaping if this really happened!


    What should I do now¡­ Do I just have to wait for the other party to kill me¡­?


    Thinking this to herself as she felt how helpless her current situation was, Chun Hua could not help feeling regretful about trying to sneak into the Shattered Star Peaks through bing a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Maybe if she had cultivated diligently for a few hundred years and got lucky, she might be able to reach the Soul Ascension Realm with her talent. Even if she couldn''t reach the Soul Ascension Realm. Reaching the Domain Lord Realm should have been good enough!


    At that point in time, she would have been able to return to the core region by herself in time¡­


    But in the end, all of this didn''t matter, it was far toote for her to regret it at this point in time. Now she could only pray silently that the expert from the Star Shattering Sect would not kill her without even talking to her.


    Feeling pain all over her body after the attack earlier, Chun Hua turned towards the person that had seemingly appeared out of thin air a few meters away from her before asking this.


    In her eyes, the person was definitely the Grand Elder called Xuan Hao, as the other Grand Elder was a woman and not a man like the one that was currently standing in front of her.


    "Y-Your excellency¡­ Are you perhaps Grand Elder Xuan¡­?" Knowing that the other party should be an expert above the Domain Lord Realm, Chun Hua could not stop her voice from shivering when asking this. Knowing very well that her life and death was in the hands of the one standing in front of her.


    ¡­


    Thump~


    Watching as Chun Huanded weakly on the ground after being hit by the aftermath of his domain attack, Xuan Hao could not help feeling happy that he hadn''t idently ended up killing Chun Hua before he could talk to her.


    If he really ended up killing a potential disciple by mistake, he had no idea what to say, it was extremely difficult to find anyone talented enough to be his disciple and given that the system had not said anything about Chun Hua already having a master, Xuan Hao really wanted to ept her as his fourth disciple¡­


    "Y-Your excellency¡­ Are you perhaps Grand Elder Xuan¡­?"


    "Hm? Indeed, I''m Grand Elder Xuan!" Hearing the injured girl barely muster up her courage to ask him this, Xuan Hao didn''t bother hiding his identity.


    "So¡­ Might I ask who you are and for what reason you entered my sect¡­?"


    "Y-your excellency, I beg of you to s-spare me! I didn''t mean to enter your sect without permission! My name is Chun Hua and I''m from the Central Region''s Chun Family. My family is about to encounter a dangerous situation and I wanted to return as quickly as possible to warn them!


    The only reason I snuck inside, is because of the ancient teleportation formation here being the only one I know of nearby that would allow me to return to the central region with my current strength. "


    Seeing that Xuan Hao didn''t kill her outright and instead just asked her a few questions, Chun Hua showed a happy expression on her face for a short moment before quickly exining her situation.


    Not daring to hide anything from Xuan Hao, as she understood very well that those experts above the Domain Lord Realm would easily be able to tell if a small Nascent Soul Realm Expert like her was lying.


    From a family in the Central Region¡­?


    Hearing the Chun Hua was actually from a family in the Central Region of the Continent, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about the strength of the experts located in the Central Region of the Ewaria Continent.


    The only thing he knew about the ce so far, was that there were several different empires located in the central region. Among these different empires, the Sky Empire with two Soul Ascension Realm Experts was considered on the weaker side among the powers of the Central Region.


    After all, even the Sky Empire''s core of power was located in the Central Region of the Continent, Xuan Hao had never been there before and had no idea what the situation at the Central Region of the continent looked like.


    If Chun Hua was from the Central Region, she should at least have some understanding about the different powers there and might even be able to help him gain some more understanding about the Soul Ascension and the realms beyond it.


    "The Chun Family from the Central Region? Do you perhaps have any information about the strength of the different powers in the Central Region?" Putting aside the matter of taking her in as a disciple for now, Xuan Hao decided to first ask her about the Central Region to satiate his curiosity.


    "Ahm¡­ I¡­ I didn''t really get much time to learn a lot about the different powers and experts of the Central Regio, as my family happened to encounter a disaster shortly after I started cultivating. Forcing me to leave¡­ B-but I know that the most powerful experts around are at a realm above the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Outside of this, I don''t really know much about the strength of the different powers in the Central Regions¡­ To be honest, I never even knew about the Sky Empire before idently ending up here¡­"


    "¡­"


    Listening to what Chun Hua said, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say. Other than the fact that he now knew that there were experts above the Soul Ascension Realm present in the Central Region of the Continent, he gained close to nothing from what Chun Hua told him.


    "Haa¡­ By the way, I forgot to ask about this earlier, but what kind of race do you belong to¡­?"


    Given that her cover had already been blown, Chun Hua no longer looked like a normal human girl like she had done earlier.


    Instead, she had several vines attached to her body, some of them snaked around her arms and legs, while her hair had changed from a normal in ck to long brightly coloured flowy hair reaching down to her hip.


    A few flowers could even be seen growing from the top of her head. Making her look rather interesting in Xuan Hao''s opinion¡­


    "Ha? AH!"


    Just now realizing that the talisman she had been using to hide her real appearance was also destroyed earlier, Chun Hua showed a panicked expression on her face before looking towards Xuan Hao to see his reaction.


    Only after realizing that he was only looking towards her with a curious expression did she manage to rx slightly before building up enough courage to answer Xuan Hao''s question.


    "My race is¡­ My race¡­ Hm¡­ Ehm¡­ I¡­ I don''t know¡­?"


    "¡­ "


    Does this girl know anything? Did she perhaps just wander around aimlessly until she reached the Nascent Soul Realm and happened to end up here while escaping the Primeval Fire Ants and Emerald Demon spiders?


    Not knowing what to say after seeing the awkward expression on Chun Hua''s face after admitting that she had no idea what race she belonged to, Xuan Hao could not help feeling like this future disciple of his might be an airhead¡­

 Chapter ?655 Accepting a New Disciple Will Always Brings About New Troubles...

    Chapter ?655 epting a New Disciple Will Always Brings About New Troubles...


    W-what is going to happen to me¡­? Is the Grand Elder perhaps going to kill me due to not knowing anything about my race¡­ Or perhaps because of the fact that I''m not part of the human race. Grandfather did mention that some humans would kill me on sight after finding out that I''m not human!


    Seeing Xuan Hao suddenly go silent after she told him that she had no clue about what race she belonged to, Chun Hua could not help fearing that the worst was about to happen, as she anxiously waited for Xuan Hao to say something.


    ¡­


    Looks like I won''t be able to get any more information about the Central Region from her. At least her talent is great, and she has already reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Taking her in as a disciple would also give Chu Yang someone to spar with. After all, now that he has reached the Nascent Soul Realm, Qing Yi is not strong enough to spar with him and I can''t keep himpany all the time¡­


    At the same time Chun Hua was nervously waiting for Xuan Hao to do something, the person in question was thinking about the different benefits he could get from taking her in as his fourth disciple.


    The fact that she belonged to a nonhuman race did not bother Xuan Hao in the slightest. The only thing that mattered to him was whether or not Chun Hua was talented enough and wasn''t someone with a malevolent or troublesome personality that would cause trouble for him!


    From what he had seen so far. Although Chun Hua had snuck inside the Star Shattering Sect, her reason for doing this was not malicious in any way and she just wanted to try and return to the Central Region where her family was located.


    Even if he did not yet have enough time to judge her character, Xuan Hao felt that Chun Hua should not be someone who would end up causing trouble for him. Especially considering how well she had hidden herself and tried to avoid any sort of trouble during the assessments just a few hours earlier.


    With what he had seen so far, Xuan Hao was confident that Chun Hua would be the one to create the least amount of trouble among his disciples¡­ Well¡­ Excluding Bai Ning who had always been staying at the sect and befriending the different cksmithing elders.


    In a sense, Bai Ning was his most ideal definition of a perfect disciple. Never creating any trouble, just staying at the sect quietly cultivating while making friends with a few elders. Although it was a bit troubling that he still didn''t really have any friends around his own age outside of Chu Yang, Qing Yi, and Zhi Ruo, Xuan Hao didn''t believe that this would continue being the case in the future!


    Ah¡­ Still have to convince Chun Hua to be my disciple¡­


    Knowing that his thoughts were wandering while a certain someone was nervously looking towards him, Xuan Hao turned his attention back to Chun Hua.


    "No need to be so nervous, I don''t n to kill you on ount of the fact that you didn''t sneak into with any malicious intentions." Realizing that Chun Hua was shivering all over while looking up at him filled with fear, Xuan Hao quickly said this to calm her down a bit.


    "T-thank you, your excellency!" Feeling a surge of renewed energy fill her body after hearing that Xuan Hao had no intention to kill her, Chun Hua quickly gave a respectful bow filled with gratitude.


    At the moment, Chun Hua felt like she had just escaped from death.


    This was not an exaggeration, as most sects would kill anyone who dared to enter their sect without permission. The Star Shattering Sect was no different in this regard, as quite a few people had tried forcefully entering the Shattered Star Peaks shortly after the construction of the Chaotic Qi Formation. The fate of these people could be easily imagined, as the only reason Chun Hua had been able to survive was a sacrificial talisman that had barely managed to teleport her away in time before the formation had time to kill her¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "No need to bow like this, you said you wanted to return to the Central Region to warn your family. Right?"


    Remembering that she had said that her she wanted to use the ancient teleportation formation to return to the Central Region so she could warn her family about some kind of danger they were about to encounter, Xuan Hao could not help asking about this after stopping her from bowing any further, as she might end up hurting herself.


    "Yes! On one of my explorations of an ancient ruin in the primeval jungle, I learnt about some family ns nning to band together to destroy my family now that my family got weaker and weaker over the years...!" Nodding her head vigorously as she said this, a hint of killing intent could clearly be felt from Chun Hua when she talked about the people who were plotting to band together and harm her family.


    From this alone, Xuan Hao could tell that although it looked like Chun Hua had not spent much of her life with her family, she still cared deeply about them. Maybe her leaving her family back then was because she wanted to look for an opportunity outside to increase her strength and have the ability to help out her family.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao''s impression of Chun Hua improved, as he felt that taking in such a person as a disciple would only be a good thing.


    However, at the same time, he also caught on to the fact that her family seemed to be in some kind of trouble and Chun Hua wanted to return to the Central Region to help out her family. Although he had no idea about where her family was located, Xuan Hao had a feeling that it was not inside the primeval jungle.


    Even if Chun Hua was a nt girl, her family should not be nt people. At least Xuan Hao didn''t get the impression that they were the same as Chun Hua from what he had heard from her so far¡­


    "You really want to return to the Central Region to help your family¡­?"


    "Yes!"


    Not showing any hesitation when answering his question, Xuan Hao did not need Chun Hua to say anything more to know how worried she was about the trouble her family was about to encounter.


    At the same time, Xuan Hao understood that there would be no way for him to ept her as his fourth disciple without helping out her family and making sure that they were safe in the Central Region.


    What to do¡­ I don''t want to give up such a good potential disciple, but¡­ The Central Region is a ce that is filled with experts at the Soul Ascension Realm. Even people above the Soul Ascension Realm are present there!


    "Hm¡­ Let''s do it like this, I will allow you to return to the Central Region through the ancient teleportation formation, but in return I want you to gather information for me about the Central Region and return here within a year, I will imnt part of my domain inside your soul, it will help store the information you learn in the Central Region and make sure you don''t go back on your promise! What do you think?"


    "I will do it!"


    Not showing the slightest after hearing what Xuan Hao said, Chun Hua instead showed a happy expression on her face after understanding that she would be able to return to the Central Region and get to warn her family about the iing disaster.


    "¡­"


    Seeing Chun Hua''s reaction, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly.


    Imnting a part of his domain inside her soul and have it record the information that she learnt about the central region was possible¡­ But anything more was impossible. At most the part of his strength imnted in her soul would erupt when her life came under a serious threat, but that was it.


    In the end, this was how Xuan Hao decided to not only help her out if she encountered any life-threatening dangers during the disaster that was about to befall her family, but also a way to test her.


    If she really returned a yearter, Xuan Hao nned to take her in as his fourth disciple.


    If she didn''t return, they were simply not fated to be master and disciple¡­


    Fwoosh~!


    Not thinking about it any longer, Xuan Hao used his domain to imnt a part of his own power deep inside Chun Hua''s soul.


    "It''s done, but before going through the ancient teleportation formation, I will have to check out things on the other side first¡­" Having imnted part of his power inside Chun Hua''s soul, Xuan Hao said this before entering the ancient teleportation formation.


    He had not forgotten about the Primeval Fire Ants and the Emerald Demon Spiders that had been fighting on the other side of the ancient teleportation formation when he had first escaped through the ancient teleportation formation!


    With her current strength, there was no way for Chun Hua to escape from the underground tunnelwork on the other side of the ancient teleportation formation if one of these two races were present on the other side of the teleportation formation!

 Chapter ?656 Above the Domain Lord Realm?

    Chapter ?656 Above the Domain Lord Realm?


    "Hmph!"


    Reaching the other side of the ancient teleportation formation, Xuan Hao could not help frowning after feeling the familiar suppression on his domain and divine sense that he had experienced the first time he had entered the ancient teleportation formation.


    Although he was far stronger nowpared to back then, the suppression still prevented him from using his full strength. Flying was possible, but the consumption brought along by doing so would be far too terrifying for him to do so for more than a few minutes.


    "Hm? Looks like the fight between the Primeval Fire Ants and the Emerald Demon Spiders reached this cave¡­" Adjusting to the environment of the primeval jungle, Xuan Hao looked around himself and was shocked upon discovering piles upon piles of dposing corpses all around him. Belonging to either the Primeval Fire Ants or the Emerald Demon Spiders.


    Even without having seen the battle that had taken ce inside the cave himself, Xuan Hao could easily imagine how brutal the war between these to demon beast had been. The corpses piled up like small mountains all around the cave was more than enough for him to understand this.


    However, at the same time, it made Xuan Hao curious about which of the two had ended up winning.


    Given that there were no Primeval Fire Ants around and the cave had not been cleaned up, he guessed that the Emerald Demon Spiders might have been the ones who had won in the end. After all, the Primeval Fire Ants lived inside the cave tunnels and there was no way they would just leave so many corpses around without eating them¡­ Or at the very least cleaning the ce up to prevent the corpses attracting any powerful demon beast toe over.


    Whoosh~


    Not standing around the ce where the ancient teleportation formation had been hidden by him for long, Xuan Hao soon made his way towards the exit of the underground tunnelwork. Wanting to make absolutely sure that the ce was safe and there wasn''t any demon beast in the Domain Lord Realm lurking around that could kill Chun Hua before she even had a chance to make her way out of the primeval jungle.


    BOOM!


    Not even getting halfway through the tunnelwork, one such Domain Lord Realm demon beast appeared.


    "A Primeval Fire Ant at the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­ And from the looks of it, it was injured only a few hours earlier¡­"


    Observing the Domain Lord Realm demon beast that appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression. The fight between the Emerald Demon Spiders and the Primeval Fire Ants should have ended a long time ago, yet the Primeval Fire Ant in front of him looked like it had just returned from battle.


    Not only that, but through his limited divine sense, Xuan Hao could clearly sense at least a dozen or so Domain Lord Realm Primeval Fire Ants approaching his current location. Each of them injured in different ways, with some of the most grievously injured ones being only a single step away from death.


    Is the fight between the Primeval Fire Ants and the Emerald Demon Spiders still ongoing? Given the size of the Primeval Fire Ant colony and the Emerald Demon Spiders, they might actually still be fighting each other¡­


    Swish~!


    Thinking this to himself as the Primeval Fire Ant discovered him before charging over filled with killing intent, Xuan Hao casually waved his hand as a silver-coloured sword light swept towards the approaching primeval fire ant. Instantly killing it before it even had a chance to resist.


    Not only was it injuried, but it was also below him in strength. Making it quite easy for Xuan Hao to kill it in a single move.


    Whoosh!


    Whoosh!


    Whoosh!


    "Looks like the rest of the primeval fire ants noticed me¡­"


    Noticing the approaching primeval fire ants rapidly approaching with far greater speed than before after he killed the injured primeval fire ant, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he looked towards the direction that they were approaching from.


    Even if the approaching fire ants were all injured, there was still more than a dozen of them. Even if he was stronger than each of them individually, it would still take some effort to deal with more than a dozen Domain Lord Realm primeval fire ants!


    ¡­


    "Checking if everything is fine on the other side? Ah! That''s right! There was a colony of Primeval Fire Ants and Emerald Demon Spiders fighting back when I escaped through the ancient teleportation formation¡­" Muttering this to herself as she had watched Xuan Hao enter the ancient teleportation formation, Chun Hua could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine.


    If I really crossed over to the other side and the Primeval Fire Ants and Emerald Demon Spiders were still there fighting each other¡­


    Not having to think too long about this, Chun Hua could not help feeling thankful towards Xuan Hao who had entered the ancient teleportation formation to check things out for her and make sure she didn''t end up dying the moment she stepped on to the other side of the ancient teleportation formation.


    Along with the fact that he had only decided to lightly punish her for sneaking into the Star Shattering Sect by having her gather some simple information, Chun Hua felt that it might not be too bad that she had decided to sneak inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, if she didn''t try sneak inside the Star Shattering Sect, she might not have been able to find a way back to the Central Region for the next hundred or more years. At that point in time, her family might already be gone when she returned back home¡­


    Even if her life was still at risk from the power that had been imnted inside her soul by Xuan Hao, Chun Hua felt like this was a small price to pay if she could get back to her family and warn them about the iing disaster in time.


    Whoosh~


    Just at this moment, the ancient teleportation formation shone brightly for a short moment before Xuan Hao appeared in front of her, a distinct smell of fresh blood drifting off him indicating the fact that he had been fighting on the other side.


    "Everything is fine on the other side; you can leave the underground tunnelwork without having to worry about the Emerald Demon Spiders or the Primeval Fire Ants!"


    "Thank you for your help! I will make sure to gather as much information as possible on the Central Region before returning in a year!" Knowing that Xuan Hao had killed off the powerful demon beasts on the other side of the ancient teleportation formation, Chun Hua was filled with gratitude when saying this.


    "No need for this, you should get going now¡­ Or I won''t be able to ensure that it will be safe for you to leave the underground tunnelwork!"


    "Yes, I understand! Thank you for your help, I will be back in a year!"


    Understanding very well that the primeval jungle was an incredibly dangerous ce for someone like herself, Chun Hua stepped inside the ancient teleportation formation filled with determination.


    Leaving the primeval jungle would take months with her current cultivation realm and she would have to avoid the Domain Lord Realm demon beasts and other human cultivators along the way now that her disguise was gone.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even if she would be able to leave the underground tunnelwork safely, she would still have a long and dangerous journey in front of her and only after reaching her family would she be able to get a new disguise and a ce to rest.


    Whoosh~


    "W-what is this!?"


    Stepping through the ancient teleportation formation, Chun Hua was shocked at the corpses piled up in small mountains all around her as she could not help remembering what Xuan Hao had said about him clearing a path for her out of the underground tunnelwork¡­


    Was this perhaps his doing¡­?


    Thinking this to herself, Chun Hua could not help feeling that her guess about Xuan Hao being someone above the Domain Lord Realm was indeed true!


    Walking along the underground tunnelwork just before reaching the exit, she even came upon close to a dozen corpses of Domain Lord Realm primeval fire ants that were very clearly killed with no more than a few moves. The smell of the blood flowing out from their wounds was simr to the bloody smell she had smelled from Xuan Hao when he hade out of the ancient teleportation formation just before letting her enter.


    Looks like I was indeed correct, Grand Elder Xuan Hao should be someone who surpassed the Domain Lord Realm¡­!


    Feeling like she had confirmed that Xuan Hao was indeed an expert above the Domain Lord Realm after seeing the dozen corpses in front of her, Chun Hua nodded her head before leaving the tunnelwork and beginning her long journey to leave the primeval jungle.


    In her eyes, outside of an expert that surpassed the Domain Lord Realm, who else had the ability to kill over a dozen Domain Lord Realm demon beasts. Not to mention, Xuan Hao had only entered the ancient teleportation for a few minutes before returning!

 Chapter ?657 Simplified Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms and...

    Chapter ?657 Simplified Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms and...


    Chun Hua bing his fourth disciple would depend on whether or not she would be able to safely return to her family and deal with the iing disaster that was approaching them.


    Not to mention she would still have to make to through the primeval jungle after everything was settled to reach the ancient teleportation formation!


    In the end he did not lose anything from letting Chun Hua leave. Even if the location of the ancient teleportation formation was leaked, Xuan Hao nned to seal up the area around it with the help of the Chaotic Qi Formation.


    Given the strength of the Chaotic Qi Formation, Xuan Hao felt confidant that even if a Soul Ascension Realm Expert passed through the ancient teleportation formation, he or she would not be able to cause any trouble!


    "Haa¡­ I hope she will be able to return safely¡­"


    Whoosh-!


    Letting out a sigh as he watched Chun Hua disappear through the ancient teleportation formation, Xuan Hao shook his head before having the Chaotic Qi Formation seal up the area around the ancient teleportation formation.


    Swish~


    Only turning to leave the Eighth Star Peak after being sure that the ancient teleportation formation had beenpletely sealed up by the Chaotic Qi Formation.


    ¡­


    Following Chun Hua leaving to return back to her family, Xuan Hao made sure to exin the situation to the elders of the sect so they wouldn''t end up worrying about one of the new disciples suddenly having disappeared into thin air.


    Although they were at first shocked after learning that Chun Hua was someone strong in the Nascent Soul Realm that had snuck into the Star Shattering Sect, they quickly epted this as true. Even if they did not want to believe that they had been fooled by Chun Hua, there was no way they would doubt it. After all, the person telling them this was Grand Elder Xuan.


    As for the new disciples who had entered the sect together with her¡­ Given that Chun Hua had not really befriended any of the new disciples during the assessments and didn''t bother getting to know any of the other participants, none of the other new disciples realized that she disappeared.


    Even the disciple Chun Hua had fought during the second part of thebat assessment didn''t seem to have any idea about the fact that she had disappeared.


    In the following months, the new disciples of the Star Shattering Sect slowly settled in and became adjusted to their new life on the Seventh Star Peak.


    A sizeable portion of them even managed to improve their strength from the Qi Condensation Realm to the Foundation Establishment Realm during this time, while the most talented among the new disciples managed to breakthrough to the Fourth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, some even going even further and reaching the Fifth Stage!


    This not only allowed them to start taking on sect mission, but also allowed these new disciples to start mixing together with some of older disciples in the Star Shattering Sect. Even getting the chance to train together with some of the more senior disciple who had already reached the Core Formation Realm!


    In the current Star Shattering Sect, most of the outer sect disciples that had once been part of either the Flying Sword Sect or the Spring Flower Sect had already managed to breakthrough to the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    The main reason for all of this, was the environment of the Seventh Star Peak. The dense and rich qi that existed everywhere was easy to absorb and helped them improve at twice the speed with only half the effort.


    Even if they were not as talented as the inner disciple of the sect, most of them still managed to break through to the Foundation Establishment Realm after spending a year on the Seventh Star Peak!


    During this time, the number of inner sect disciples had also increased rapidly, as more and more disciples that had previously been stuck at the Peak or Late Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm managed to break through to the Core Formation with the help of the rich qi that was ever present on top of the Seventh Star Peak.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    At the same time that the disciples were all improving rapidly, the same could not be said for the elders. After all, reaching the Nascent Soul Realm was far more dangerous and harder to dopared to reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm or the Core Formation Realm.


    "Even with the help of the Nascent Soul Realm Elders from the Half Spirit Race, there is still far too few Nascent Soul Realm Experts for us to expand our sect and properly manage the territory under us! Grand Elder Xuan¡­ Did you finish the thing we talked aboutst time?"


    Knowing about this problem, Elder Song had already long started talking with Xuan Hao about finding a solution to this problem.


    "Yes! Yesterday I finished a simplified version of the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms that I told you about earlier, with this, we should be able to help some of the Outer Sect Elders at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm break through to the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    Nodding his head in response to what Elder Song said, Xuan Hao took out a small book before handing it over to Elder Song.


    "This is great! Compared to the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms that you showed me, this is far easier to understand!" Smiling happily after reading through the simplified version of the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms, Elder Song could not wait to share this with some of his old friends that had been stuck at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm for over a hundred years.


    At this point in time, all of these old friends were only a single step away from death and the only way for them to survive at the moment was breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm, it was especially for this reason that Elder Song was so happy when seeing the simplified version of the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms.


    If all of these old people who had been stuck at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm could break through to the Nascent Soul Realm, the Star Shattering Sect would be more than capable of expanding its territory without having to worry about things growing unstable-


    BOOM!


    Just at this moment, a loud explosion could be hearding from the centre of the mountain peak followed by a terrifying aura spreading out in all directions before covering the entire Seventh Star Peak.


    "Wha- This is!?"


    "No need to worry, it''s not something dangerous¡­"


    While Elder Song was showing a surprised expression on his face not understanding where the explosion and terrifying aura hade from, Xuan Hao calmed down Elder Song. Already understanding what was happening.


    "Looks like Feng Chen is finally breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm¡­ Took him long enough¡­"


    "Feng Chen¡­ Is breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm!?"


    "Yes¡­"


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said, Elder Song could not help showing a surprised expression on his face. After all, this was someone breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm! Not to mention the increase in strength the Star Shattering Sect would experience from having another Domain Lord Realm Expert supporting it, Elder Song was happy knowing that the person breaking through was none other than the current sect master.


    Given the fact that the Star Shattering Sect was rapidly increasing its strength and Nascent Soul Realm Experts were bing more and moremon, it was a little odd for the sect master to only be someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Even if he had already formed a pseudo domain, he had still not truly taken the final step and reached the Domain Lord Realm¡­ However, from now on things would be different, as the terrifying aura spreading out from the centre of the Seventh Star Peak began growing stronger and stronger.


    Swish~


    Moving outside, both Elder Song and Xuan Hao gazed towards the centre of the Star Shattering Sect where Feng Chen was cultivating in seclusion.


    At this point in time, a visual phenomenon of massive sword also began materializing above the location where Feng Chen was cultivating.


    "A sword domain¡­ How not surprising¡­" Muttering this to himself as he watched the massive sword hanging in the air slowly growingrger and stronger with each passing second, Xuan Hao was not at all surprised that the domain manifested by Feng Chen was a sword domain.


    Feng Chen had spent his entire life as a sword cultivator and had evenprehended true sword intent. If he ended upprehending a domain other than a sword domain, that would be odd¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao found a ce to sit down and observe Feng Chen''s breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if he was stronger than Feng Chen, observing his breakthrough would still allow him to deepen his understanding of the Domain Lord Realm and might even help him improve the strength of his own domain!

 Chapter ?658 Feng Chen Reaches the Domain Lord Realm!

    Chapter ?658 Feng Chen Reaches the Domain Lord Realm!


    At the same time Xuan Hao and Feng Chen discovered that Feng Chen was breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm, the rest of the elders and disciples also discovered that although a terrifying aura had engulfed them, it did not hurt them in the slightest.


    "This is¡­ Someone is breaking through! And from the looks of it, it''s not a simple breakthrough!"


    "The location of the aura is the sect master pavilion¡­ Did he perhaps break through to the Domain Lord Realm!?"


    As time passed, a few of the stronger elders quickly discovered the origin of the terrifying aura. Not taking too long to conclude that the terrifying aura and visual phenomenon was a result of Feng Chen breaking through to the Domain Lord Ream.


    "The sect master is breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm? Does this not mean that the sect will have another Domain Lord Realm Expert outside the two Grand Elders in the future!?"


    "To think the Star Shattering Sect is about to grow even stronger¡­ It was a good choice for me to join the sect instead of the local sect I originally nned to join!"


    The disciples and weaker elders soon caught onto this news, as all of them were filled with happiness knowing that the terrifying aura spreading across the entire sect was a result of the sect master''s breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Not only that, but it also helped these elders and disciples understand just how terrifying the strength of a Domain Lord Realm Expert was, unconsciously making them respect the two Grand Elders, Shu Yao, and Xuan Hao, who had already reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    ¡­


    Fwoosh-!


    At the same time that everyone inside the Star Shattering Sect''s attention was gathered towards the visual phenomenon that had appeared in the air along with the figure of Feng Chen that was barely visible at the centre of this phenomenon, the person in question had both his eyes closed. Remaining fully focused on his breakthrough without caring about what was happening in the world outside.


    Whoosh~


    Having entered a mysterious state, Feng Chen''s pseudo domain rapidly started expanding in all directions.


    "If its anything like my breakthrough-"


    Rumble-!


    Muttering This to himself as he watched Feng Chen''s pseudo sword domain rapidly expanding in all directions, Xuan Hao didn''t even manage to finish what he was saying before the building below Feng Chen was destroyed by the rapidly expanding pseudo domain.


    Although Feng Chen''s pseudo domain was far weaker than his own when he broke through to the Domain Lord Realm, it was still more than strong enough to kill the elders and disciples watching the breakthrough nearby.


    Swish-!


    For this reason, Xuan Hao jumped forward before using his own domain to protect the Star Shattering Sect. Forcing Feng Chen''s pseudo sword domain to expand over his domain that covered the Star Shattering Sect like a protective barrier.


    WHOOSH!


    The entire thing onlysted for a short moment, and by the time that the elders and disciple below realized that Feng Chen''s pseudo domain had expanded in all directions, it had already imploded and was rapidly reducing in size-


    Boom!


    Finallying to a stop after having reduced to a circumference of close to 20 meters in size. Although smallpared to Xuan Hao whose domain had reached a hundred meters, it was still consideredrge for other Domain Lord Realm Experts who had just broken through!


    "Nowes the most difficult part¡­" Seeing that Feng Chen''s Sword Domain had been formed, Xuan Hao could not help feeling worried for Feng Chen.


    After all, the most difficult part of reaching the Domain Lord Realm was merging the newly born domain together with the nascent soul and officially step into the Domain Lord Realm!


    Given that Feng Chen''s domain was bigger than normal, it would also mean that the difficulty of merging his domain and nascent soul together would be increased!


    Whoosh~


    Watching from afar, Xuan Hao saw Feng Chen Nascent Soul floating out from his body before starting to merge together with his new domain. Not a single ounce of hesitation was present in his actions, as he did this!


    ¡­


    Pain¡­


    This was the only thought that appeared in Feng Chen''s mind when he started merging together with his newly born sword domain, as a terrifying pain spread throughout his entire nascent soul. Digging into the very depths of his soul.


    Not only was it painful but merging his nascent soul and sword domain also brought along a special type of pain that made it feel like his soul was being sliced apart by his own sword domain!


    Soon, a few minutes passed as his nascent soul and domain got closer and closer to fully merging together, but at the same time, Feng Chen also felt that his nascent soul was growing weaker and weaker.


    No! I can''t let myself lose at this step!


    Feeling his nascent soul slowly starting to break apart, Feng Chen showed a determined expression on his face as he sped of the merging process-


    BOOOM-!


    Not even a secondter, Feng Chen''s sword domain merged together with his exhausted nascent soul.


    Whoosh~


    After his nascent soul returned to his dantian, Feng Chen suddenly felt an enormous rush of qiing from above him.


    The qi descending down from above was extremely beneficial and was of a way higher qualitypared to what he absorbed before. Even the qi that was present on the Seventh Star Peak was iparable to this qi!


    Crack~


    Soon Feng Chen felt himself being filled to the brim and before long his dantian underwent a drastic change and expanded by several times its former size. Announcing that he had directly reached the Domain Lord Realm!n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    But this was not the end as the qi continued to descend from above!


    Early, Mid, Late-


    BOOM!


    Peak First Stage Domain Lord!


    Feng Chen''s strength managed to improve all the way to the Peak of the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. After stabilizing his cultivation base, it would not be odd for him to break through to the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in a year or two!


    "This¡­ This is the Domain Lord Realm? I¡­ Can fly¡­?"


    Muttering these words to himself as he was oblivious to the many people staring up at him in awe, Feng Chen was standing in the air without the help of any artifacts with a look of amazement on his face before starting to use his new ability to fly around the Star Shattering Sect with a childish smile on his face.


    From a distance, Xuan Hao could not help rolling his eyes when he saw how Feng Chen was flying around above the sect.


    If you have time to admire your new ability to fly, could you at least restrain your sword domain?!


    Indeed, although Feng Chen had sessfully broken through to the Domain Lord Realm, his control over his sword domain was not ster¡­ Forcing Xuan Hao to keep his own domain out to cover the Star Shattering Sect. Preventing Feng Chen''s sword domain from idently destroying any buildings that happened to be near where he flew.


    ¡­


    "Haaaa¡­ This should be enough ying around¡­!"


    Seeing that Feng Chen was not showing any signs of stopping his victoryp around the sect while disying his new flight ability after close to five minutes, Xuan Hao decided to take matters into his own hands-


    Swoosh-!


    "Ha? AH!"


    Before Feng Chen had any time to react, a massive hand suddenly manifested in front of him before forcefully grabbing him.


    "Wha-what is this-"


    Swish~


    Not having any time to finish his sentence, Feng Chen felt himself being moved at a speed that far surpassed his understanding-


    Bang!


    "This- G-Grand Elder Xuan Hao¡­"


    Recovering from the sudden movement beforending on the ground, Feng Chen could not help shivering when he saw the person in front of him was none other than Xuan Hao. For some reason he felt that the Xuan Hao standing in front of him at the moment looked far more terrifyingpared to how he remembered, and he could not help feeling that he had done something wrong¡­


    "Ah! M-my domain!" Suddenly realizing something, Feng Chen showed an embarrassed expression on his face.


    Given the expression on Xuan Hao''s face, he understood that he had been the one who had made sure he didn''t idently end up destroying everything he flew over with his sword domain¡­


    "You understand why I interrupted your little victoryp?"


    "Yes¡­"


    "Haa¡­ You should focus on stabilizing your cultivation base for now. After all, you just broke through to the Domain Lord Realm!" Shaking his head as he said this, Xuan Hao didn''t bother scolding Feng Chen for his childish behaviour more than this.


    Even if it could have ended up causing quite a lot of damage to the sect for Feng Chen to fly around with his uncontrolled sword domain¡­


    For now, the most important thing for Feng Chen was to stabilize his cultivation realm and get his domain under control!

 Chapter ?659 Worry of the Nearby Powers

    Chapter ?659 Worry of the Nearby Powers


    A few hours after Feng Chen had been sent back to stabilize his cultivation base by Xuan Hao, the elders and disciples of the Star Shattering Sect slowly started calming down before returning back to what they had been doing before Feng Chen''s breakthrough.


    However, deep down, all of them felt happy knowing that the sect had gained another powerful expert at the Domain Lord Realm to support. Not to mention, the person who had broken through was none other than the sect master!


    When talking about a sect, the person who would normally be mentioned would always be the sect master. Even if he was not the strongest person in the sect...


    For this reason, the elders were especially happy that Feng Chen had broken through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    ...


    Following Feng Chen''s breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, the simplified version of the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms was passed on to the Outer Sect Elders and Sect Elders. Allowing the elders already in the Nascent Soul Realm to improve their strength, while the elders stuck at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm slowly started breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Of course, the people benefiting from the simplified version of the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms was not only the elders, as the elders who learned the codex began using it when teaching the disciples under them. In turn, this also caused the strength of the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect to experience a period of rapid growth, as all of them benefited from the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms.


    Outside the Star Shattering Sect itself, the different sects and kingdoms located closest to the Star Shattering Sect had already begun sending their envoys over in an attempt to submit before the Star Shattering Sect started expanding.


    The main reason for this was that the kingdoms closest to the Star Shattering Sect were not much stronger than what the Heavenly Sky Kingdom had been in the past before its fall, Elder Song who was in charge of talking to the envoys from these different kingdoms and sects was more than happy to ept these different powers submission.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Doing this would not only allow the Star Shattering Sect to expand more easily in the future without having to waste a lot of time and resources on taking control over these powers, but it would also put pressure on the different powers still considering whether or not to submit to the Star Shattering Sect before they even started expanding...


    Even if the Star Shattering Sect was a power with several Domain Lords in it, the number of elders and disciples in the sect itself was far smallerpared to what other Domain Lord Realm level powers had. This was also one of the reasons why the Star Shattering Sect had to wait until they had more Nascent Soul Realm Experts before expanding.


    After all, the people who would keep peace inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect in most cases would not be the Domain Lord Realm Experts, but instead the elders and disciples of the sect.


    Elder Song who had been in charge of the management of the Flying Sword Sect for many years understood this very well, as back then, the Nascent Soul Realm Experts would only guard important locations or the sect itself.


    The elders and disciples would be the ones to keep the different smaller sects and powers in order while dealing with the different small problems that appeared. From demonic cultivators to demon beasts, the elders and disciples of the sect would normally be the ones to deal with these as long as the problem didn''t involve anyone too powerful for them to handle!


    The new contribution system that was set up together with the new Grand Mission Pavilion in preparation for this.


    The Grand Mission Pavilion would serve as a ce for the disciples to find missions on different problems inside the territory of the sect,pleting these missions would reward them with contribution points that could be used for different things like buying pills and artifacts.


    However, even if there was a proper way to get the different missions to the disciples and enough rewards to encourage them to take on these missions, it could not change the fact that there were still far too few disciples in the Star Shattering Sect.


    To solve this problem, Elder Song ordered the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect that was now turned into branches of the Star Shattering Sect to start epting disciples. Not forgetting to transfer some elders over to teach these new disciples.


    The most talented of these disciples could work their way into bing disciples of main sect in the Shattered Star Peaks, while the less talented could work to be elders of their respective branches. If they grew strong enough in the future, there would of course also be a chance for these people to enter the main sect in the future.


    The news of this quickly spread and many disciples that had failed to enter the main sect of the Star Shattering Sect rushed towards one of these two branches. Having remembered what Elder Song had told them about being able to enter the Star Shattering Sect in the future if they worked hard enough and were able to make up for theirck of talent with hard work.


    At the same time that the Star Shattering Sect had started epting a massive number of disciples through the tworge branch sects that had once been the main sect of the Flying Sword- and Spring Flower Sect, the different powers that wanted to stay independent from the Star Shattering Sect could not help getting nervous.


    All of them understood that the Star Shattering Sect was recruiting arge number of disciples in preparations for expanding their territory, s, there was nothing they could do about it, as the Star Shattering Sect was back by two Domain Lords. Not knowing that Feng Chen had broken through to the Domain Lord Realm as well.


    The pressure on the ancestors of these different powers that were trying their best to breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm increased further, as the time they had left before they would have to deal with the Star Shattering Sect seemed to grow closer.


    ...


    "Looks like the Star Shattering Sect is starting to make preparations for expanding their territory..."


    Inside arge empty manor located on a small hill inside the capital city of the me Sky Kingdom, Elder Sheng Mei who had been trying her best to convince the king about the benefits of joining the Star Shattering Sect could not help muttering this to herself as she looked towards therge pce at the centre of the capital city.


    "Haa... Even if that old man manages to break through to the Domain Lord Realm, it won''t be any good for our me Sky Kingdom to be independent with what ising... Without the support of a powerful power, there will be no way for out kingdom to survive what is about toe..." Muttering these words as she turned away from the pce in the distance, Elder Sheng Mei''s face was filled with pain for a brief moment before she moved towards a small inconspicuous room in the manor.


    Creak~


    Using her divine sense to activate a small hidden formation inside this room, a small pair of stairs leading down soon appeared in the middle of the room.


    Step~ Step~


    Not saying anything after the appearance of this path leading down below the manor, Elder Shen Mei soon came to a small room filled with all sorts of ancient texts and books written in a long-forgottennguage that was no longer spoken on the current Ewaria Continent.


    If Xuan Hao was present, it would not take him long to recognize that thenguage of these ancient texts and books was none other than the ancientnguage of the forgotten past that he was trying to learn.


    Picking up one of the ancient books on a small table inside the hidden room below the manor, Elder Sheng Mei moved towards a small bookshelf before cing the ancient book inside it.


    Swish~


    cing the ancient book on the bookshelf activated a small formation hidden inside the ancient book, as the bookshelf itself seemed to turn into a mirage before disappearingpletely. Revealing yet another hidden path.


    Step~ Step~ Step~


    Walking along this hidden path, Elder Sheng Mei soon found herself in front of a massive space that was several miles wide. Looking closer, it was easy to see several scars of battle radiating a powerful killing intent left behind inside the massive underground space.


    "Great Lord Kubera... If only you were still around..." Letting out a sad sigh as she muttered this to herself, Elder Sheng Mei gazed sadly towards something inside the massive underground space in front of her-


    Swoosh~


    Ptsh-!


    "Ah-!"


    Trying to enter the wide underground space in front of her, Elder Sheng Mei could only let out a scream of pain before rapidly retreating.


    "Looks like I''m still far too weak to enter..."


    Swish~


    Shaking her head as she said this, Elder Sheng Mei turned around and left. Resealing the hidden paths behind her.


    The powerful killing intent left behind from the battle that had once taken ce inside was enough to force a powerful Nascent Soul Realm Expert like Elder Sheng Mei away even countless years after the battle that had once taken ce had ended.


    From this, it could easily be imagined how powerful the people fighting back then had been!

 Chapter ?660 Star Sword Scripture

    Chapter ?660 Star Sword Scripture


    Back at the Star Shattering Sect, shortly after having made sure Feng Chen was not causing any problems and was focusing on stabilizing his cultivation base, Xuan Hao was happily making his way back to his small pce.


    "With Feng Chen reaching the Domain Lord Realm, the sect quest for increasing the strength should have finished¡­" Muttering this to himself as he reached the small pce, Xuan Hao used the system to show the sect quest in question.


    [Sect Quest: Increase the strength of the Star Shattering Sect]


    [Domain Lord Realm Experts: 3/3] plete)


    [Nascent Soul Realm Experts: 20/20] plete)


    [Reward: Improved version of the Flying Sword Sect''s cultivation mantra, the Flying Sword Mantra]


    Other than the fact that the name of the sect had changed from the Flying Sword Sect to the Star Shattering Sect, everything was the same as he remembered it. Even the reward of an improved cultivation mantra for the Flying Sword Sect''s main cultivation mantra had remained the same.


    This made Xuan Hao quite curious whether or not the new improved cultivation mantra that he would get would be a sword rted cultivation mantra or somethingpletely new that would not only be suitable for the sword cultivators of the sect.


    [Want to redeem the reward?]


    [Y/N]


    Well¡­ There is no other way to find out what kind of cultivation mantra I will get other than this¡­ Yes!


    Whoosh~


    Redeeming the reward for the sect quest, Xuan Hao saw a thick ancient looking book appear in front of him. The ancient book hovered gently in the air, as a mysterious yet sharp aura could be felt drifting off it.


    Even just feeling the aura surrounding the ancient book, Xuan Hao did not have to look at the title on top of the ancient book to understand that it was indeed a sword cultivation mantra.


    "Star Sword Scripture?" Muttering the name of the cultivation mantra that he had received from the system; Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit disappointed knowing that it was a sword cultivation mantra and not a more universal cultivation mantra that could be used by all the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect.


    "This is!?"


    However, this disappointment onlysted for a short moment, as he opened the Star Sword Scripture and began reading through the introduction of the cultivation mantra on the first few pages-


    "The Star Sword Scripture is actually a cultivation mantra leading all the way to the Soul Ascension Realm!"


    Indeed, the Star Sword Scripture was not an ordinary cultivation mantra or like any of the cultivation mantras he had encountered before. Instead, it was a cultivation mantra that pointed directly towards the Soul Ascension Realm!


    If not for the fact that he hadprehended more than just the sword dao, Xuan Hao did not doubt that he would be able to breakthrough to the Soul Ascension Realm within the next few years with the help of the Star Sword Scripture.


    For cultivators cultivating the solely the dao of the sword, the Star Sword Scripture was a heavenly Scripture that would help them more easily walk the path from the Qi Condensation Realm to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even if the Star Sword Scripture was not too useful when it came to breaking through the Soul Ascension Realm himself, it was extremely useful for the many sword cultivators of the Star Shattering Sect. The one benefiting the most would definitely be Feng Chen, as the Star Sword Scripture contained several methods for someone who had recently reached the Domain Lord Realm with the dao of the sword stabilize their cultivation base¡­!


    "Hm? Even if it''s extremely useful for sword cultivators¡­ It might be too hard to understand¡­" Moving away from the introduction before starting to read through the Star Sword Scripture starting from the Qi Condensation Realm, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he realized that the Star Sword Scripture was far harder to understand than he expected.


    Even with his own strength close to the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, he barely managed to understand the first few parts of the Star Sword Scripture for the Nascent Soul Realm.


    If even understanding the entire Nascent Soul Realm part of the Star Sword Scripture was not something he could do in a short period of time. Comprehending the Domain Lord Realm and Soul Ascension Realm part of the Star Sword Scripture was most likely something that would take years to fullyprehend!


    "Looks like I got excited too quickly¡­ However even if its hard to understand, as long as someone manages toprehend it. Reaching the Soul Ascension Realm should only be a matter of time!" Shaking his head as he said this while looking at the ancient book in his hands, Xuan Hao had no idea how to feel about the Star Sword Scripture.


    He was excited knowing that the Star Sword Scripture was a powerful cultivation mantra leading all the way up to the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ But at the same time, he was sad knowing how hard it was to learn. Maybe only Feng Chen, outside of himself, would have a chance of learning it in the current Star Shattering Sect!


    From the looks of it, getting a new sect cultivation mantra that could be used by the entire sect was something that would have to wait until the future¡­


    Swish~


    After spending the next few hours looking through the Star Sword Scripture and thinking about what to do with it knowing just how hard it was to learn, Xuan Hao ended up finding Feng Chen first before giving him the Star Sword Scripture.


    Leaving shortly after to not disturb him too much, Xuan Hao had him put the first few chapters detailing the Qi Condensation Realm and Foundation Establishment Realm part of it on the first floor of the Grand Library for anyone among the disciples and elders to see, while theter parts of the Star Sword Scripture would be put on the Second floor and finally the third floor of the Grand Library before leaving.


    Hoping that this way, the chances of a disciple being able to learn the Star Sword Scripture appearing would increase.


    Feng Chen also understood this after first reading through it and understanding just how hard the Star Sword Scripture was toprehend.


    ¡­


    Like this, time slowly passed inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    Other than Feng Chen reaching the Domain Lord Realm and a new mysterious cultivation mantra that nobody couldprehend appearing in the Grand Library. Nothing much changed inside the Star Shattering Sect as days slowly turned into months.


    However, the same could not be said for the world outside the Star Shattering Sect!


    The tworge branch sects of the Star Shattering Sect started recruiting new disciples from everywhere. Soon filling up the two sects that had been emptied out after the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect had decided to move almost everyone to the Shattered Star Peaks where their new main sect was located.


    Not only the tworge branch sects had started epting disciples, but soon a lot of smaller branches of the Star Shattering Sect began appearing before also starting to ept disciples.


    These small branches were not too powerful and the strongest elder in charge of them was normally only at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm... However! These branch sects not only appeared inside the territory that was governed by the Star Shattering Sect, but also started appearing inside the territory of the nearby kingdoms and sects that had already submitted to the Star Shattering Sect.


    This of course caused the different powers that had yet submit to the Star Shattering Sect to start panicking, as they understood that the time for their ancestors to break through to the Domain Lord Realm was slowly starting to run out.


    It had only been a little over 2 years since the Star Shattering Sect had been established, yet they had already slowly begun expanding in all directions!


    The only power that did not get affected by this that was close to the Star Shattering Sect was the Seven Fates Sect.


    After the sect master of the Seven Fates Sect had reached the Domain Lord Realm, the entire Seven Fates Sect had stopped expanding andpletely isted themselves from the outside world.


    Given that the Seven Fates Sect had a Domain Lord in it and was not really hostile for now, Elder Song decided to ignore for the time being, as he instead decided to focus on expanding the Star Shattering Sect into the surrounding kingdoms and sects located around the Star Shattering Sect that had already submitted.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Dealing with the Seven Fates Sect was inevitably something that would happen and Elder Song understood this very well¡­ But at the same time, he also understood that it would be best if the Seven Fates Sect would willingly decide to leave for the core parts of the Sky Empire now that they had a Domain Lord Realm Expert backing them instead of fighting.


    From what he had learnt about the Sky Empire, Elder Song understood that this was what would normally happen when a sect or kingdom got a powerful expert at the Domain Lord Realm.


    After all, there were far more resources in the core parts of the Sky Kingdom. Not to mention the qi between heaven and earth was richer the closer to the core of the continent one got!

 Chapter ?661 The Time for the Establishment of the Sect Alliance is Approaching!

    Chapter ?661 The Time for the Establishment of the Sect Alliance is Approaching!


    As the time for the meeting regarding the new sect alliance of the Sky Empire approached, Xuan Hao was spending his time teaching his three disciples, holding a few lectures for the rest of the disciples, increasing his expertise of the different profession he had learned, and most importantly¡­ Getting closer and closer to fully merging his ice domain and sword domain fully together into a single domain!


    Although he was only a single step away from seeding at this point in time, this single step had caused him to stagnate for close to two months at this point in time!


    To try and breakthrough this barrier that had appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao decided to focus on finding unique cultivation mantra. The reason for this was rather simple¡­


    [Sect Quest: Gather Unique Cultivation Mantras for the Sect.]


    [Description: The sect iscking when ites to the different cultivation mantras avable for the disciples. Gather 10 unique cultivation mantras. Not one can be the same and all of them have to at least reach the Earth Rank.]


    [Unique Cultivation Mantras: 9/10]


    [Reward: Enter a State of Enlightenment for one hour]


    The reward forpleting the unique cultivation mantra gathering quest might be the key to oveing the barrier that prevented him from merging his two domains together perfectly into a single domain.


    Even if the state of enlightenment onlysted for a single hour, all he needed was a single push and he should be able to sessfully merge his ice and sword domain together into a single unique domain.


    "Only one more left and I will be able toplete it." Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help remembering the reward he had gotten frompleting the lecture sect quest just a few days ago.


    Not only did he not manage to get his hand on a new unique cultivation mantra, but he didn''t even get a good cultivation mantra!


    Instead, what he ended up with was an exact copy of a cultivation mantra that already existed inside the Grand Library of the sect.


    To be honest, Xuan Hao had not expected for something like that to happen¡­ But then again, the Star Shattering Sect had gained a ratherrge collection of cultivation mantras of the Earth Rank, so it was inevitable that he would idently end up getting a cultivation mantra that already existed.


    Originally, he had nned to try and use the enlightenment to ovee the barrier that prevented his domain from advancing before he would have to leave for the capital of the Sky Empire in preparation for the sect alliance officially being established.


    However, now that he had failed to gain thest unique cultivation mantra he required, this was no longer possible¡­


    "Whether or not my ice and sword domain manage to merge together won''t matter too much. After all, I will not be able to breakthrough to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and then the Soul Ascension Realm before reaching the Sky Empire¡­" Shaking his head as he said this to himself, Xuan Hao stood up before heading outside.


    Even if he could not reach the Soul Ascension Realm before going to the capital of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao did not worry too much about his safety.


    After all, reading through the book that Yi Min had given him that would record what was happening in the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao understood just how chaotic the Sky Empire was getting over the past few years.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Not only had the gue god begun to slowly establish themselves as the fourth major religion of the Sky Empire, but the Followers of the Fire God and the Cult of the Scarlet Moon had failed in stopping them from doing this.


    The main reason for this, was that these two religious organisations had fallen out with The Order of the Sky God, one of the three major religious groups already established in the Sky Empire¡­ Because of this, every time the Followers of the Fire God and the Cult of the Scarlet Moon tried attacking the church of the gue god. Mysterious people would always appear to attack them from behind to assist the church of the gue god¡­


    Although they already understood who these people belonged to, there was nothing they could do about it. After all, even if the Order of the Sky God had been severely weakened, their main supporting pir, the cardinal, was still alive and well!


    Having read about this, Xuan Hao was rather surprised that the church of the gue god had actually managed to establish themselves in the Sky Empire. However, the location that they had done so was nowhere near the Star Shattering Sect, so Xuan Hao didn''t really care too much about it¡­


    On the other hand, he was far more concerned about the increased appearance of demonic cultivators in the areas close to the Frozen Wastnds. Although the demonic cultivators appearing were at mostparable to Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, Xuan Hao still felt worried given how close the Star Shattering Sect was to the Frozen Wastnd.


    The only good news about this, was that the demonic cultivators increased appearances was not only in the ces close to the borders of the Sky Empire where the Star Shattering Sect was located, but also at the borders of other empires.


    One particr empire was especially unlucky, as a demonic cultivator at the True Demon Realm had appeared. The True Demon Realm¡­ This was the demonic cultivators name for a realm with the same strength as that of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    It was easy to imagine just how terrifying the appearance of such a demonic cultivator had been to an empire¡­


    Even with the Soul Ascension Realm Experts of the empire in question moving out the moment the demonic cultivator appeared, it still managed to destroy over a dozen kingdoms before they managed to make their way over.


    The fight that ensued afterwards was even more devastating, as the fight ended up causing the destruction of close to a hundred kingdoms before the demonic cultivator was being forced to retreat back into the Frozen Wastnd.


    If such a demonic cultivator appeared on the Sky Empire''s border with the Frozen Wastnd where the Star shattering Sect was located, Xuan Hao could easily imagine how bad it would be for the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if the sect could survive by hiding inside the Chaotic Qi Formation, the formation itself might end up catching the attention of these Soul Ascension realm Experts.


    Although Xuan Hao was confident in the Chaotic Qi Formation, he had no idea if it had the strength to deal with multiple Soul Ascension Realm Experts and if it could be avoided, he didn''t want to find out either-


    "Hm? Qing Yi? What are you doing here?"


    "Master! I was looking for you!"


    Seeing Qing Yi suddenly appearing in front of him with a haggard, yet energetic look on her face, Xuan Hao could not help feeling worried that something bad might have happened.


    "What is it? Did you run into any problems with your cultivation? Maybe some questions regarding alchemy?"


    "Yes and no¡­ From what Chu Yang told me, I know that you helped him strengthen his foundation before he tried breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm! Given that I already reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, I wanted to ask master if you could help me out with strengthening my foundation as well¡­"


    Going from overly energetic to a quieter tone towards the end, Qing Yi turned nervous as she waited for Xuan Hao''s response.


    "Oh? It''s just this? Of course, I will be more than happy to help you. Go rest for a few hours and we will start tomorrow morning."


    "Thank you master, I will go rest now!"


    Whoosh~


    Hearing her master''s positive response, Qing Yi sped off as she excitedly made her way back to her own room to rest.


    "¡­ How energetic¡­"


    Not knowing what else to say when seeing how excited Qing Yi was, Xuan Hao could only shake his head before making his way outside the small pce.


    During the past few months, Qing Yi was not the only one that had improved rapidly after focusing more on her cultivation due to Chu Yang''s breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm, but Chu Yang and Bai Ning had also managed to improve.


    Chu Yang had reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul realm and had grown familiar with his strength after practicing with the different Nascent Soul Realm Elders of the sect and his master. At this point he had already reached the Peak of the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and was only one step away from reaching the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    However¡­ Among the three disciples of Xuan Hao, the one who improved the most was not Qing Yi or Chu Yang, but Bai Ning!


    Over the short period of only a few months, he had managed to go all the way from the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm to the Ninth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    Evenpared to Chu Yang and Qing Yi, Bai Ning''s speed of cultivation was by far the fastest, the only bad thing about his rapid improvement, was the fact that Bai Ning had not spent much of his time learningbat techniques or movement techniques.


    Instead, spending most of his time improving his cksmithing skills and chatting with the different elders from the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces, a ce he had grown extremely fond of ever since moving to the Seventh Star Peak¡­

 Chapter ?662 Chaos in the Azure Sky Kingdom

    Chapter ?662 Chaos in the Azure Sky Kingdom


    As the day slowly passed with walking around the sect and talking to the different disciples and elders of the sect, Xuan Hao felt himself rxing as he soon found himself at the shore of the qi springke located at the centre of the Seventh Star Peak.


    Over the past few years since it had first been constructed, the qi springke had already been filled up. Allowing Zu Fei to start growing different kinds of lotus flowers like agreed, while at the same time finally giving Elder Song the chance to use the qi springke to help the disciples and elders enter and improve their strength afterpleting a difficult sect mission or as a reward for one of the many events he helped hosting.


    At first the elders and disciples didn''t really know much about the benefits brought by cultivating inside the qi springke, but after the first few people entered and returned having experienced a qualitive improvement in strength, the disciples and elders all tried their best to get a chance at entering the qi springke.


    "Looks like Elder Song knows how to manage the number of people entering the qi springke already..." ncing towards the qi springke that didn''t seem to show any signs of its water level lowering even after the sect disciples and elders got a chance to cultivate inside it, Xuan Hao could not help admiring Elder Song.


    Even without him having to say anything, Elder Song had already found a bnce in the number of people that could enter the qi springke to stop it from overflowing and at the same time does not end up drying it up.


    In the future, expanding the qi springke would not be a bad idea... Or maybe creating a few small rivers running off the side of the mountain to form a few smaller qi springkes that will be easier for disciples to ess...


    Thinking this to himself as he gazed over the peaceful qi springke at the centre of the Seventh Star Peak, Xuan Hao could not help feeling just how important the qi springke would be for the development of the Star Shattering Sect in the future.


    Even if the qi springke was not that important when it came to the safety of the sect itself, it was slowly starting to be a goal for the disciples and elders of the sect to enter the qi springke to cultivate and increase their strength.


    In a sense, the qi springke had started to serve as a form of motivation for the disciples and elders of the sect to continue improving and trying their best toplete the difficult sect missions or get a good ranking in some of the events hosted by Elder Song!


    "Hm? Someone trying to enter the Shattered Star Peaks? Is it perhaps another envoy from a power that wants to submit?" Suddenly feeling two people at the Nascent Soul realm appearing at the base of the Ninth Star Peak before patiently waiting in front of a small gate that had been created to symbolize entering the Star Shattering Sect and to prevent people from idently getting killed by the Chaotic Qi Formation when visiting, Xuan Hao thought about something for a moment before disappearing from the shore of the qi springke.


    ...


    "Are you really sure that the Star Shattering Sect would be willing to ept us? After all, our current situation is not too great. Especially considering the recent surge of demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds...!"


    "No need to worry about any of this, our Ascendant Frost Hall''s trouble is nothing to a sect the size of the Star Shattering Sect. Not to mention, considering how close we are to their territory, the demonic cultivators would inevitably start causing chaos inside their territory!


    At that point in time, it would not be odd for the Star Shattering Sect to forcefully take over the territory of our sect to ensure that they would be able to better prevent the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnds from entering their territory... Us joining them can only be considered a positive thing given our current situation!"


    At the same time outside the small gate leading into the Shattered Star Peaks located at the base of the Ninth Star Peak, the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts Xuan Hao had sensed were talking with each other with a serious tone.


    From their conversation, the two Nascent Soul Realm Expert were both elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall, the only sect inside the Azure Sky Kingdom that had managed to remain independent in the fact of Su Wuhan''s constantly trying to absorb them into being part of his kingdom.


    Swish~


    "..."


    Silently arriving a few meters above the two people and hearing their conversation clearly, Xuan Hao could not help thinking to himself.


    Compared to Elder Song who was rather familiar with the surrounding powers that he nned to expand over; Xuan Hao only knew a tiny amount of information on the different powers.


    Outside of the fact that there was rumoured to be a dangerous mystic realm inside their territory and the fact that they were the only sect that had dared ce their main sect on a mountain range that bordered the Frozen Wastnds filled with demonic cultivators.


    Given that the Ascendant Frost Hall spent most of their time fighting demonic cultivators trying to attack them from the Frozen Wastnds, Xuan Hao could understand why the Ascendant Frost Hall wanted to join the banner of the Star Shattering Sect now that the number of demonic cultivators appearing was increasing.


    Even before the increase in demonic cultivators showing up, they had only just barely managed to keep them at bay. Now that the number of demonic cultivators was increasing, it was obvious that they would end up getting destroyed without any outside help.


    Thinking about it like this, joining the recently emerging Domain Lord Realm level power located only a short distance away from them, the Star Shattering Sect, was the only way out of their current situation. Outside of producing a Domain Lord Realm level expert themselves...


    "Haa... Relying on help from the Azure Sky Kingdom is not really possible given their current situation. After the disappearance of that Su Wuhan, the entire kingdom copsed in on itself, I won''t even find it suppressing if the Azure Sky Kingdompletely disappears over the next 5 or 10 years...


    I agree that joining the Star Shattering Sect is our best option at this point in time, if I didn''t, I wouldn''t havee here together with you!"


    "Haha! At least you admit it this time around! Back in the sect, you-"


    "Shut it..."


    "Haha~"


    Listening to the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall chatting with each other, Xuan Hao could not help showing a thoughtful expression on his face after hearing the current situation of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Even after some time had passed, Xuan Hao still clearly remembered the massive amount of spiritual metal he had found below the capital city of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Now that the Azure Sky Kingdom was copsing on its own, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that this was the perfect ce for the Star Shattering Sect to start it first massive expansion.


    Not only would it be easy to secure arge territory without having to waste too much time dealing with the local powers, but it would also secure a source of spiritual metal for the sect in the long term!


    If the Ascendant Frost Hall joined them, this would be even easier to do. Especially considering the fact that they could now be considered the strongest faction inside the Azure Sky Kingdom after the disappearance of Su Wuhan and the fast copse of his kingdom.


    Having to deal with the demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnd was not something Xuan Hao was too worried about given the strongest that had appeared inside the Sky Empire so far was only in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not to mention, the Star Shattering Sect would have to deal with them when the Ascendant Frost Hall got destroyed any way, so why not just deal with it now and absorb the Ascendant Frost Hall in the process?


    Not to mention, fighting and dealing with demonic cultivators was a perfect thing for training the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect!


    After all, even if demonic cultivators at the Nascent Soul Realm had appeared, they were still rare. The mostmon demonic cultivators appearing were allparable to the Foundation Establishment Realm or the Core Formation Realm. The perfect opponent for the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect!n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Whoosh~


    Having made up his mind on how to proceed with absorbing the Ascendant Frost Hall and turn the Azure Sky Kingdom into a ce where the disciples of the sect could go to train in real lifebat against demonic cultivators, Xuan Haonded on ground before revealing himself-


    "You-!?"


    "An elder of the Star Shattering Sect?!"


    Causing both elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall to jump up from shock after suddenly seeing someone appearing from the other side of the gate leading up to the Ninth Star Peak.

 Chapter ?663 Elders From the Ascendant Frost Hall

    Chapter ?663 Elders From the Ascendant Frost Hall


    "Who-!?"


    "An elder of the Star Shattering Sect?!"


    Hearing the surprised exmation from the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall, Xuan Hao smiled slightly to himself as he felt a wave of happiness upon hearing one of the two addressing him as an elder instead of a disciple.


    Given his young appearancepared to most elders, he had been mistaken for a disciple not only when outside, but also by the newer disciples of the Star Shattering Sect that had no idea who he was.


    Then again¡­ The reason why he was addressed as an elder, might have something to do with the fact that he managed to approach the two of them without any of them noticing before he had already appeared in front of them¡­


    "Greetings elder, we are both elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall who havee here as representatives of our sect."


    Quickly recovering from the shock of seeing Xuan Hao, the oldest one among the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall bowed his head as a show of respect. The remaining elder of the Ascendant Frost Hall also did the same after recovering from the shock of Xuan Hao suddenly appearing in front of them.


    "We havee here to ask the Star Shattering Sect for help in dealing with the recent surge of demonic cultivators appearing from the Frozen Wastnd. In return, the Ascendant Frost Hall will be more than willing to join the Star Shattering Sect!"


    Not wasting any time, the elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall directly told Xuan Hao the reason why they hade to the Star Shattering Sect.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "This¡­"


    Having wanted to convince the elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall by himself, Xuan Hao froze for a short moment. Not really knowing what to say upon seeing both of the elders looking at him nervously.


    Not expecting that the elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall would just outright tell him that he wanted to join the banner of the Star Shattering Sect in return for protection against the demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnd.


    "I understand, the Star Shattering Sect is indeed looking towards expanding in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom first¡­ So, the Ascendant Frost Hall joining us would be a great thing."


    Thinking about what to say for a moment before saying this, Xuan Hao looked towards the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall. Curious about what they would say after knowing that the Star Shattering Sect was already nning to expand into the Azure Sky Kingdom where their sect was located.


    "This is great! If the Star Shattering Sect expands into the Azure Sky Kingdom and takes control over their territory along with our sect''s territory, we will no longer have to worry so much about dealing with the constant invasion of demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds!"


    "Haha, indeed! With a powerful sect like the Star Shattering Sect around, those demonic cultivators won''t be able to cause any trouble!"


    Contrary to the reaction he had expected from the elders of the Ascendant Frost Hall, the two elders happily eximed before excitement spread all over their faces. Looking like they had just escaped from the pits of hell and ascended into the heavens.


    "¡­"


    Just how bad is the current situation of the Ascendant Frost Hall¡­?


    Not able to stop this thought from appearing after seeing how these to elders of the Ascendant Frost Hall acted in front of him, Xuan Hao felt curious about just what had happened to the Ascendant Frost Hall after the recent surge in demonic cultivators.


    "Ah¡­ Elder, we are sorry for our behaviour just now¡­ We were just happy hearing that the Star Shattering Sect was willing to ept us. After all, the Ascendant Frost Hall is not a big sect and at most has a few experts at the Nascent Soul Realm¡­"


    Realizing how disrespectful both of them had been in a moment of happiness, one of the two elders quickly calmed down before stepping forward to apologies to Xuan Hao with an awkward expression on his face.


    "No need to worry about that, your happiness is understandable. For now, why don''t we enter the sect and discuss the matter in more detail?"


    Shaking his head not really caring about the behaviour of the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall, Xuan Hao decided to invite them inside the Star Shattering Sect to further discuss the matter about their sect joining the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not only would he be able to awe them with just how splendid the Star Shattering Sect was developing over the past few years, but he would also be able to find Elder Song for help with discussing the proper terms with them.


    The entire management thing and stuff like that was not really his thing¡­


    "Haha! Elder, we are more than willing!"


    "Yes!"


    Nodding their heads happily as they agreed to what Xuan Hao said, the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall soon made their way through the simple gate leading up the Ninth Star Peak together with Xuan Hao.


    ¡­


    "This is-!?"


    "The qi between heaven and earth is so rich here¡­ No wonder the Star Shattering Sect managed to produce more than one Domain Lord¡­"


    Stepping through the small gate that symbolized the start of the Star Shattering Sect, both elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall could not help eximing loudly as they felt the change in the qi all around them the moment they stepped through the small gate and onto the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak.


    "Elder Cui¡­ This ce is truly a heaven for cultivators, do you think we will have a chance toe here and cultivate after joining under the Star Shattering Sect?"


    "Maybe¡­ In normal circumstances of willingly joining a more powerful sect, there will be a chance for us to enter the main sect if we are strong enough. However, I have no idea about how the Star Shattering Sect operates..."


    "Haa¡­ Looks like we will only find out after joining them¡­ I really want toe here to cultivate in the future¡­"


    Walking up the path leading to the top of the Ninth Star Peak where the forest filled with spiritual herbs had been transformed into a massive spiritual herb garden, the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall secretly chatted with each other through their divine sense while following behind Xuan Hao.


    Not forgetting to look everywhere around them to take in the beautiful yet simple view of the Nine Star Peaks that slowly became visible the farther up they got.


    "¡­"


    Of course, none of the two were aware that their secret conversation was heard by Xuan Hao whose domain easily captured the conversation transmitted through their divine sense¡­


    "This-!? Wh-what is this ce?!"


    Finally reaching the top of the Ninth Star Peak after a few minutes making their way up the mountain, one of the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall could not stop himself from saying this after seeing the massive spiritual herb garden that appeared in front of him stretching on for miles on end.


    Although the entire Ninth Star Peak had not yet beenpletely covered due to just howrge of a task it was to transform the entire Ninth Star Peak into a spiritual herb garden, arge chunk of it had already been transformed and this was more than enough to awe the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall


    "This is the spiritual herb garden of the Star Shattering Sect. The different spiritual herbs used for alchemy or other things are grown here, as the Ninth Star Peak has the best environment for growing spiritual herbs among the different star peaks."


    ""¡­""


    Not knowing what to say when they heard what Xuan Hao said, the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall looked at each other with a simr quiet yet understanding expression on their face.


    Joining the Star Shattering Sect would be the best thing the Ascendant Frost Hall would experience since its first ever Nascent Soul Realm Expert appeared in the past!


    No matter what, they must do their absolute best to join the Star Shattering Sect!


    Whoosh~


    Not spending too much time on the Ninth Star Peak, Xuan Hao and the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall travelled through the recently constructed path going from the Ninth Star Peak to the Seventh Star Peak where the main sect of the Star Shattering Sect was located.


    ¡­


    "So¡­ This is the Star Shattering Sect¡­?" Unconsciously muttering this to himself when he witnessed the Star Shattering Sect slowly appearing in front of him, Elder Cui, the oldest person among the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall, felt like he finally understood the difference between a sect with a Nascent Soul Realm backing and one with a Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    Not only could he feel a terrifying aura from the centre of the sect in front of him that far surpassed the Nascent Soul Realm, but he could also sense several different experts in the Nascent Soul Realm far stronger than him sparring not too far away from the entrance of the sect itself.


    "Elder Cui¡­"


    "Calm down for now, let''s follow the elder from the Star Shattering Sect and see just how strong a sect with more than one Domain Lord Realm Expert inside it is!"


    Hearing his fellow elder nervously calling out to him, Elder Cui put on a strong front saying this through his divine sense, while deep down, he was extremely nervous about entering the Star Shattering Sect¡­

 Chapter ?664 Nascent Soul Realm Disciple!?

    Chapter ?664 Nascent Soul Realm Disciple!?


    "So many disciples in the Foundation Establishment and Core Formation Realm..."


    "This is amazing..."


    Watching the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall nervously following behind him as they kept looking around themselves, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling silently to himself as he felt proud seeing their reaction.


    Not to mention the sheer number of Nascent Soul Realm cultivators present inside the Star Shattering Sect that they could feel through their divine sense, the strength of the disciples walking around chatting with each other was more than enough to amaze the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    Back in their own sect, even a single disciple reaching the Core Formation Realm would be an amazing feat that would only happen once every few years... But just going through the entrance to the Star Shattering Sect on top of the Seventh Star Peak, they had already spotted more than a dozen such geniuses walking around chatting with each other.


    From this alone, the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall also realized that the disciples in the Core Formation Realm should not be the strongest disciples of the Star Shattering Sect and should at most be inner disciples!


    This thought alone caused both of the elders to shiver when thinking about just how strong the core disciples of the Star Shattering Sect would be if the inner disciples had already reached the Core Formation Realm.


    Would they have reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm... Or maybe even the Nascent Soul Realm...?


    Deciding not to think too much about this as they felt it would hurt their pride as elders standing at the top of a powerful sect, the two elders of the Ascendant Frost Hall quietly followed behind Xuan Hao as they made their way deeper inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    Deep down, both of them were hoping that they would not end up meeting one of the core disciples of the Star Shattering Sect along the way-


    "Master, I want to- Hm? Who are these two elders?"


    However, their wishes were not heard, as a young man only a little over eighteen years old suddenly appeared in front of them with a stable aura that was close to reaching the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    There really are disciples at the Nascent Soul Realm inside the Star Shattering Sect...


    To think I would only beparable to a disciple who looks like he is less than 20 years old... What was my cultivation over thest few hundred years for...?


    Realizing that there were indeed disciples inside the Star Shattering Sect, the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall felt like their pride as core elders had been damaged.


    "Chu Yang? These two elders are from the Ascendant Frost Hall, a sect that is located in the Azure Sky Kingdom." Not carrying too much about the interesting expressions that appeared on the faces of the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall after seeing Chu Yang, Xuan Hao instead turned his attention towards Chu Yang. Wondering what he hade to him for.


    Indeed, the young man who had appeared in front of them and shocked these two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall with his very clear Nascent Soul Realm cultivation base was none other than Chu Yang!


    "I see... Another sect that''s trying to join us." Nodding his head in understanding after hearing about the identity of the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall, Chu Yang began inspecting the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    Ever since the establishment of the Star Shattering Sect, arge number of sects and other powers hade to the Star Shattering Sect from time to time wanting to join under the banner of the Star Shattering Sect.


    However, as of now, there had not been any of these powers that had been invited up the Seventh Star Peak.


    In a sense, it could be said that the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall were the first outsiders to enter the Star Shattering Sect!


    "Ah! I almost forgot!"


    Suddenly remembering the reason why, he had been looking for his master while inspecting the two Nascent Soul Realm Elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall, Chu Yang turned his attention back to his master-


    "Master, just a few hours ago, Elder Song asked me to participate in one of the uing tournaments for new disciples as a judge over the next few days and I wanted to ask if master has any ideas on how to go about it... After all, it will be my first time joining a tournament as a judge..."


    Completely ignoring the fact that there were two outsiders present, Chu Yang said this while looking towards his master filled with expectations.


    "This is... You don''t have to worry too much about it, acting as a judge is not too hard and at most you would have to interfere in case a battle gets out of hand." Hearing that Chu Yang would be doing something that only elders would normally do, Xuan Hao was surprised for a short moment before answering his question.


    At the same time, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious as to why Elder Song wanted Chu Yang to participate in one of his tournaments as a judge.


    Perhaps Elder Song was already looking to help Chu Yang understand the responsibilities of an elder?


    No matter what it was, Xuan Hao didn''t feel that there was anything wrong with Chu Yang getting to meet the different elders and disciples of the sect.


    Even if there were some responsibilities to being a judge during a tournament, with Chu Yang''s cultivation realm having reached the Nascent Soul Realm, it would not be hard for him to interfere in case something happened in a battle between two Core Formation Realm disciples...


    "Thank you master! I will keep your words in mind and try my best as a judge during the tournament!"


    Whoosh~


    Not staying around for much longer after listening to his master, Chu Yang used a movement technique before quickly disappearing towards the outer part of the sect where most of the tournaments and otherpetitions would normally take ce.


    From the looks of it, Chu Yang was going to help out with some of the preparations for the tournament before it started.


    "Well then... Let''s get going, we should at least finish up the matter of your sect before it gets dark!" Looking back towards the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall that had remained silent during his short exchange with Chu Yang, Xuan Hao said this before signalling for them to continue.


    Nod Nod Nod~!


    Not saying anything, the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall obediently nodded their heads while secretly looking in the direction Chu Yang had disappeared in.


    From the looks of it, these two had been rather shocked after meeting Chu Yang.


    ...n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Knock Knock~


    Reaching the core part of the Star Shattering Sect not too far away from the qi springke at the centre of the Seventh Star Peak, Xuan Hao came to a stop in front of a small courtyard before gently knocking on the door leading inside.


    "Who is it- Grand Elder Xuan?! What brings you here?"


    Soon emerging from the small courtyard Elder Song opened the door with a surprised expression on his face after seeing the person who hade, a curious Song Jia could be seen gazing over from further inside the courtyard.


    "I came to discuss something regarding the future expansion of the sect... These two are both elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall who are looking to join our sect." Not beating around the bush, Xuan Hao directly stated his reason foring while introducing the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall that were following behind him.


    "Hm? Ascendant Frost Hall...? I understand, pleasee in." Showing an understanding expression after hearing where the two elders were from, Elder Song invited all three of them inside while secretly telling Song Jia to go over and spend some time with Zhu Fei through his divine sense.


    Whoosh~


    Entering Elder Song''s courtyard, the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall grew even more nervous, both of them understanding that the future of their sect would likely be decided during the uing conversation.


    "Well, for now, why don''t you tell me about the current situation of the Ascendant Frost Hall?"


    After everyone found a ce to sit down, Elder Song was the first to speak as he looked towards the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall with a serious expression on his face.


    Even standing at the side, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling in secret upon seeing Elder Song switch from his normal kind expression to one filled with extreme seriousness.


    "Yes! The current Ascendant Frost Hall is-"


    Taking the lead among the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall, Elder Cui quickly exined the current situation of the Ascendant Frost Hall. Allowing both Elder Song and Xuan Hao to understand just how bad things had gotten for this sect after the recent surge in demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds...

 Chapter ?665 Ascendant Frost Halls Unique Cultivation Mantra

    Chapter ?665 Ascendant Frost Hall''s Unique Cultivation Mantra


    "-And that is how it is¡­ If things go on for any longer, there is no doubt that the demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds will overwhelm us!"


    After Elder Cui from the Ascendant Frost Hall exined the current situation of their sect to Elder Song and Xuan Hao, he nervously turned to look towards both of them. After all, given the current situation of the Ascendant Frost Hall that he had exined to them, the Ascendant Frost Hall had no time to discuss things slowly over a few months and instead needed help to deal with the demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds as quickly as possible.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even a few weeks were too long to wait, as the demonic cultivators would more than likely have destroyed half the Ascendant Frost Hal at that point in time¡­ And that was only in the case that no stronger demonic cultivators appeared during this time!


    "Hm¡­ Given what I''ve heard about the recent surge in demonic cultivators together with what you are saying, things are indeed looking bad for your Ascendant Frost Hall¡­"


    "Indeed! That''s our main reason foring here! Joining the Star Shattering Sect would allow us to not survive this ordeal and at the same time would also allow your sect to take control of the Azure Sky Kingdom more easily!"


    Nodding his head upon hearing what Elder Song said, Elder Cui could not help stressing the matter of their reason foring to the Star Shattering Sect, while also mentioning the benefits of them joining the Star Shattering Sect.


    "¡­"


    Silently watching Elder Cui and Elder Song start discussing about the matter of the Ascendant Frost Hall joining under the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao could not help rolling his eyes before deciding to leave.


    Even if he didn''t understand the matter of absorbing a power like the Ascendant Frost Hall, Xuan Hao still understood that the discussion between Elder Song and Elder Cui would not end any time soon.


    For that reason, Xuan Hao decided to leave the two alone while going outside to do something else while waiting for the two to conclude their discussion.


    Swish~


    Simr to Xuan Hao, the remaining elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall also silently decided to leave the room during Elder Cui and Elder Song''s discussion to silently sit down and cultivate in the small garden inside Elder Song''s courtyard. Knowing that there was no ce for him to join the discussion between Elder Song and Elder Cui.


    "How curious¡­" Muttering this to himself as he gazed towards the second elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall that started cultivating, Xuan Hao could not help marveling at the uniqueness of the cultivation technique used-


    Wait¡­ Maybe the cultivation mantra of the Ascendant Frost Hall is unique enough toplete the sect quest!?


    As this thought urred to him while watching the second elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall, Xuan Hao felt like he had to get his hands on the cultivation mantra of the Ascendant Frost Hall before he left for the capital of the Sky Empire.


    But¡­ Knowing the speed that it would take for Elder Song to finish up everything and start officially taking in the Ascendant Frost Hall, Xuan Hao understood that this matter would at least take a few months toplete!


    Even if a group of elders at the Nascent Soul Realm were sent over to ensure that the Ascendant Frost Hall remained safe during this period of time, the different techniques and cultivation mantras of the Ascendant Frost Hall would most likely not enter the Great Library before he had already left for the capital of the Sky Empire¡­


    Not to mention, the techniques and cultivation mantras of the Ascendant Frost Hall entering the Great Library of the sect would not count towards thepletion of his sect quest!


    From the looks of it, his only chance at being able toplete the sect quest before having to leave for the capital of the Sky Empire, was getting his hands on the cultivation mantra of the Ascendant Frost Hall. Now the only question that remained, was how¡­


    Given that the Ascendant Frost Hall was going to join under the Star Shattering Sect, he could not really go and forcefully take away their cultivation mantra.


    Taking it away secretly was not really an option either, as the Ascendant Frost Hall would likely learn about their cultivation mantra having been stolen and put into the Great Library at some point in the future¡­


    "Hm¡­ If none of that works, why don''t I just visit the Ascendant Frost Hall personally and ask about it? With my strength, I should be able to set up some protection against the demonic cultivatorsing from the Frozen Wastnds and convince them to give me their cultivation mantra¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao soon nodded his head.


    "Yes, I will do it like that!"


    Swish~


    Havinge up with a way to get his hands on the cultivation mantra of the Ascendant Frost Hall, Xuan Hao turned around and made his way back inside Elder Song''s courtyard where Elder Song and Elder Cui were still energetically discussing with each other.


    ¡­


    "-And then we can go along with- Hm?"


    Suddenly seeing Xuan Hao reappear after having left just a few minutes earlier, both Elder Song and Elder Cui could not help stopping their conversation as both of them curiously turned to look towards him.


    "Grand Elder Xuan? Is there something wrong?"


    "Elder Song, I just thought about a way to deal with the Ascendant Frost Hall''s immediate problem with the demonic cultivators and wanted to suggest that instead of using arge number of Nascent Soul Realm Elders to deal with the matter."


    "Hm? Let''s hear it then! If it can be done without sending a dozen or so Nascent Soul Realm Elders over, I will be more than happy to follow along with your suggestion!"


    Narrowing his eyes in anticipation after hearing what Xuan Hao said, both Elder Song and Elder Cui gazed towards Xuan Hao, waiting for him to exin how he wanted to help the Ascendant Frost Hall with the demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds.


    "Instead of having a group of Nascent Soul Realm Elders go- I will go myself and deal with the matter!"


    "Wha- Don''t you have to leave for the sect alliance establishment in another few weeks?! How do you have time to deal with the matter of the Ascendant Frost Hall in this period of time?"


    Showing a doubtful expression on his face after hearing that Xuan Hao would be going to the Ascendant Frost Hall himself, Elder Song could not help reminding him that he would be leaving for the capital of the Sky Empire in a few weeks.


    With this in mind, there was no time for him to be going to the Ascendant Frost Hall and helping them deal with the surge in demonic cultivators. Even if he could go there for a week and keep things under control, he would still have to leave, and the Ascendant Frost Hall would soon enter into a state of crisis once again!


    "Don''t worry about it, I''m nning to leave a few things behind for the Ascendant Frost Hall to block out the demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds before leaving. Not to mention, I''m quite curious about the recent surge in demonic cultivators and also n to have a quick look inside the Frozen Wastnds to see if I can find out anything about what is happening and see if I can stop it from affecting us.


    After all, if things inside the Frozen Wastnds continue to escte and the demonic cultivatorsing out gets stronger and stronger, we will not only have to deal with demonic cultivatorsparable to the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    Reassuring Elder Song that he would properly deal with the matter of the Ascendant Frost Hall, Xuan Hao also told him about wanting to check out the situation of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Although checking out the situation of the Frozen Wastnd was not originally a part of his n and was only something he said to convince Elder Song, Xuan Hao did n to do it, as he was curious about the current situation of the Frozen Wastnd¡­


    "Hm¡­ I understand, you can take the other elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall with you when going to the Ascendant Frost Hall¡­ Me and Elder Cui will continue discussing the matter of them officially joining us."


    Given the fact that he had already told Elder Song about the appearance of a terrifying demonic cultivator surpassing the strength of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao understood that Elder Song would not refuse his suggestion, so him agreeing with his suggestion did note as a surprise.


    Instead, the thing that caught Xuan Hao slightly off guard, was the fact that Elder Song asked him to bring the second elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall along with him¡­ But then again, it would be far easier to exin his reason for showing up if he brought an elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall along with him¡­


    "Thanks, I still have some matters to finish before leaving¡­ So, with that in mind, I n to leave for the Ascendant Frost Hall around tomorrow."


    "Understandable, Elder Cui here should also want some time to discuss the matter with his fellow elder¡­"


    As Xuan Hao and Elder Song talked with each other, Elder Cui hadpletely zoned out trying to figure out what Xuan Hao''s identity was. Only when hearing his own name being called out did he realize both Xuan Hao and Elder Song were looking towards him.


    "Y-yes!"


    Not knowing what else to say, Elder Cui just answered with a simple nervous yes before seeing Xuan Hao turn to leave once again.

 Chapter ?666 Danger Approaching the Ascendant Frost Hall!

    Chapter ?666 Danger Approaching the Ascendant Frost Hall!


    Having already promised Qing Yi to teach her about strengthening her foundation just a few hours earlier, Xuan Hao decided to first do that before leaving together with the second elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall the next day.


    The main reason why he wanted to leave as quickly as possible, was due to the fact that he didn''t have long before he would have to leave for the capital of the Sky Empire.


    Not only did he want to help the Ascendant Frost Hall stabilize the current border they had with the Frozen Wastnd, but he also wanted to investigate the reason behind the massive increase in demonic cultivatorsing from there.


    Of course, going into the deeper parts of the Frozen Wastnds where demonic the more powerful demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm resided was not an option with his current strength.


    Even if he reached the Soul Ascension Realm in the future, the deeper parts of the Frozen Wastnd were still an extremely dangerous ce for a normal cultivator like himself. Especially considering the fact that most demonic cultivators had techniques that allowed them to devour their opponent''s cultivation base¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao soon returned to his pce before spending the rest of the day and the night preparing to teach Qing Yi before leaving for the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    Spending a few hours to point her on the right path should be more than enough to ensure that she would be able to sessfully enter the Nascent Soul Realm through a golden cloud tribtion, as for a unique cloud tribtion like the one Chu Yang went through¡­ There was not any special way to prepare for it ording to what he understood about the cloud tribtion so far¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Well, then let''s get started!"


    "Yes, master!"


    Having already prepared the day before, the matter of teaching Qing Yi did not take long at all. Especially considering that he had already grown extremely familiar with what was needed to properly strengthen someone''s foundation in preparation to reach the Nascent Soul after the time he had spent guiding Chu Yang before his cloud tribtion.


    Like this, a few hours quickly flew by with Xuan Hao teaching Qing Yi¡­


    "Thank you for your guidance master! I will try my best to strengthen my foundation ording to your teachings and break through to the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    "That''s great! I have something important to do for the next few weeks, so it would be great if you could inform Bai Ning and Chu Yang about my absence when they returnter today."


    "Yes, I will make sure to do so master!"


    "Then I will see you and the other two in a few weeks'' time."


    Whoosh~


    Turning to leave directly after seeing Qing Yi nodding her head with a serious expression on her face and agreeing to inform his other two disciples, Xuan Hao jumped into the air before moving towards Elder Song''s courtyard where the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall were staying.


    ¡­


    Thump~


    Landing inside Elder Song''s courtyard where Elder Song and the two elders were already waiting for him, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly upon noticing the nervous expression stered all over the faces of the two elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    Even from a nce, he realized that the two of them should have already realized the fact that he was one of the Domain Lord Realm Experts from the Star Shattering Sect. Even if they didn''t realize it before, they should at the very least have realized it after seeing him descending down from the sky beforending in front of them¡­


    "G-Grand Elder Xuan, g-greetings¡­"


    "No need to be that polite, we will be travelling together until we reach the Ascendant Frost Hall¡­"


    Hearing the shaky voice of the second elder that would be travelling with him to the Ascendant Frost Hall, Xuan Hao tried his best to ease up the atmosphere and stop the second elder of the Ascendant Frost Hall from shaking all over-


    Rustle~!


    Sadly, the second elder only started shaking even more violently as he didn''t dare raise his head to look directly at him.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say in such a situation, Xuan Hao turned towards Elder Song for help.


    "Ehm! Every second maters as the Grand Elder won''t be able to stay and help your Ascendant Frost Hall for more than a few weeks, so it would be best for both of you to set off as quickly as possible!"


    Understanding what Xuan Hao meant, Elder Song walked up to the nervous elder and reminded him about the importance of the matter.


    "Y-yes¡­ Yes! I understand, I''m sorry for my earlier behaviour¡­ It''s just my first time ever meeting someone in the Domain Lord Realm, so I got quite nervous¡­" Suddenly realizing how he had acted, the second elder of the Ascendant Frost Hall quickly apologised before indicating that he was ready to leave.


    "Well then, we will be leaving."


    "Safe journey Grand Elder Xuan, I hope you can deal with the matter of the demonic cultivators in my sect!"


    "Good luck, remember to inform me about the matter of the Ascendant Frost Hall when you return before you leave for the capital of the Sky Empire!"


    Whoosh~


    Hearing Xuan Hao was about to leave, both Elder Cui and Elder Song waved goodbye before Xuan Hao jumped into the air and began rapidly ascending to a proper flight height.


    "Wait! How are we going to traaaaaaaa-"


    Swish-!


    Stunned for a short moment after seeing Xuan Hao suddenly flying into the air while leaving him behind, the second elder of the Ascendant Frost Hall was stopped mid-sentence, as he was suddenly pulled into the sky by Xuan Hao''s domain.


    ""¡­""


    Seeing this scene, both Elder Song and Elder Cui could not help looking at each other.


    For some reason, both of them had a feeling that the second elder of the Ascendant Frost Hall would not be enjoying his time during the journey to the Ascendant Frost Hall¡­


    ¡­


    "So, this is the Azure Sky Kingdom? There qi between heaven and earth is so much richer herepared to the Frozen Wastnd¡­ But the yin qi here is close to none! The best way to cultivate in a ce like this is devouring the cultivation and souls of cultivators or devour arge quantity of mortals!


    Hehe¡­ Luckily, it looks like the Azure Sky Kingdom has more than enough mortals to spare, I''m sure they won''t mind if a few million go missing! Hehe!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao started heading towards the Ascendant Frost Hall, a demonic figure appeared at the natural border in the shape of a mountain range that separated the Azure Sky Kingdom from the Frozen Wastnd.


    It was also on top of this mountain range separating the Azure Sky Kingdom from the Frozen Wastnd that the Ascendant Frost Hall was located!


    Swish~!


    As arge pair of demonic wings appeared behind the demonic cultivator before he flew into the sky to cross the mountain range, the demonic cultivator suddenly came to a stop as he discovered the Ascendant Frost Hall that covered most of the mountain range separating the Frozen Wastnd from the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "Hm? Looks like there is a sect on the mountain range¡­ Hehe~ Given that it''s just some random sect at the borders of the Sky Empire, the strongest expert should at most be someone in the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm! Even if someone Half a Step into the Domain Lord Realm is really present, I can always escape through the air¡­


    If I can devour an entire sect filled with cultivators, I should be able to break through to the Third Demonic Transformation and be a true expert in the outer region of the Frozen Wastnd! Not only that, but I will also be one step closer to bing a true demon!"


    As a sinister smile slowly appeared on the lips of the demonic cultivator that revealed itself to be a demonic cultivator that had reached the Second Demonic Transformation,parable to the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, the demonic wings pped gently as the demonic cultivator soon made its way towards the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    "A demonic cultivator!? A-and a powerful one at that!"


    Given that the demonic cultivator didn''t even bother hiding himself as he flew towards the Ascendant Frost Hall, the Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the Ascendant Frost Hall quickly discovered him approaching.


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    In a short time, several people rushed out from the Ascendant Frost Hall ready to face the approaching demonic cultivator charging towards them filled with killing intent.


    Boom!


    A powerful auraparable to the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm also erupted from the centre of the Ascendant Frost Hall before an old woman with a solemn expression on her face appeared from the deepest part of the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    Even from a nce, it was obvious that this old woman was none other than the Sect Master of the Ascendant Frost Hall!

 Chapter ?667 Frost Guardian Formation

    Chapter ?667 Frost Guardian Formation


    "This demonic cultivator is far stronger than the rest. Even if it has not reached a realmparable to the Domain Lord Realm, it should not be far off¡­ Everyone! Get in position and get ready to mobilize the Frost Guardian Formation!"


    As the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall appeared, she didn''t waste any time beforemanding the Nascent Soul Realm elders of the sect-


    Whoosh-!


    Not long after, a bluish shield emerged from the borders of the Ascendant Frost Hall before covering the entire sect. The Nascent Soul Realm elders each supported a part of this massive formation, while the sect master herself acted as the centre of the formation.


    Fwoosh~


    Boom!


    Not only did the formation protect the Ascendant Frost Hall, but it also strengthened the sect master herself. Instantly allowing her strength to reach a brand-new realm with the support of the formation.


    "Hah¡­ To think I would be able to witness the might of the Frost Guardian Formation in my lifetime¡­" Muttering this to herself as she felt endless power surging through her body, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall turned to look up at the demonic cultivator that had momentarily stopped in the air above the sect after seeing the formation.


    Swish~


    Utilizing the formation to create small steps made of ice in the air, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost used these steps to move through the air before finding herself on top of the Frost Guardian Formation.


    Although it was far from true flight that a Domain Lord Realm Expert was capable of, it was still more than enough to allow her to face off against the demonic cultivator floating in the air above her.


    "How pathetic, this formation might allow you to reach my level for a short moment, but there is no way you will be able to defeat me! All this will do is prolong your own suffering!"


    Not at all intimidated by the formation that emerged to protect the Ascendant Frost Hall and strengthened the sect master, the demonic cultivator sneered disdainfully while looking down at the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall using the formation to move through the air.


    Knowing that there was no expert in the Half Step Domain Lord Realm or the Domain Lord Realm present inside the Ascendant Frost Hall, the demonic cultivator at the Second Demonic Transformation, there was no need for him to remain cautious!


    "Well, let''s see how strong this formation is!"


    Not bothering to say any more words, the demonic cultivator dived down towards the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall that had emerged from the top of the formation.


    BOOOOM!N?v(el)B\\jnn


    The sh between the demonic cultivator from the Frozen Wastnds and the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall instantly caused a storm of destruction to ravage through thend not protected by the Frost Guardian Formation.


    Not only did a few weaker demonic cultivators lurking nearby end up perishing due to this, but even a few disciples from the Ascendant Frost Hall that had no time to enter the sect in time ended up dying. Even a few mortal viges located far away from the mountain range were unlucky enough to get hit byrge chunks of rocks that had been blown off from some of the mountains.


    Whoosh-!


    Not stopping at only a single attack, the demonic cultivator erupted with a terrifying killing intent as several terrifying attacks rained down on the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    I have to finish it before those leeches shows up!


    Not wanting to risk another demonic cultivator with a simr strength showing up to take advantage of the situation, the demonic cultivator used all of his strength and went all out trying to kill the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    The faster he could kill the sect master, the faster he could destroy the formation.


    Like this, he would be able devour the cultivators of the Ascendant Frost Hall within the shortest span of time. Reducing the risk of another demonic cultivator showing up to steal away part of his resources!


    ¡­


    "The Azure Sky Kingdom changed quite a bitpared to thest time I was here¡­" Muttering this to himself as he flew through the air while looking down at the constant fighting happening everywhere below him, Xuan Hao felt quite surprised at just how chaotic the Azure Sky Kingdom had be since hest passed through it.


    Not only were the ordinary mortals fighting each other over food, but the different cultivation ns and sects of the Azure Sky Kingdom were also fighting with each other for the spirit stone mines and other precious cultivation resources now that the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom was no longer around to supress them.


    "Indeed¡­ Things rapidly deteriorated over the past few months due to the recent surge in demonic cultivators.


    Even if my Ascendant Frost Hall end up blocking most of the stronger demonic cultivators before they have a chance to enter the Azure Sky Kingdom, the sheer number of demonic cultivators make it impossible to stop all of them¡­"


    Having calmed down after spending close to an hour screaming in fear, the second elder of the Ascendant Frost Hall respectfully responded to what Xuan Hao said to himself.


    "That''s true¡­ Blocking the entire border between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Frozen Wastnds is impossible with the Ascendant Frost Hall''s current strength. Not to mention, the demonic cultivators can enter through other kingdoms bordering the Frozen Wastnd before making their way into the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­" Nodding his head before saying this, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards a fight taking ce only a short distance away from them.


    Ptsh!


    "Haha! Just a little more and I will be able to undergo the first demonic transformation!"


    Well¡­ It was not much of a fight, as a demonic cultivator in the Higher Demon Realm wasughing madly while ughtering a group of cultivators who were only in the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    A few cultivators in the Core Formation did pass by and see this scene, but in the end decided not to help out as they quickly left without even thinking about working together to deal with the demonic cultivator.


    Roaming freely around ughtering mortals and cultivators alike, the current Azure Sky Kingdom is slowly turning into a paradise for these demonic cultivators¡­


    Shaking his head as this thought urred to him, Xuan Hao slowly raised his hand as a silver light danced around his fingers before shooting towards the madlyughing demonic cultivator in the distance.


    "AHhhhhHHhh-!"


    Only able to let out a painful scream, the demonic cultivator didn''t even have time to react before his body and soul was reduced to dust by the silver light.


    "¡­"


    Watching this scene take ce from the side, the second elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall could not help shivering as the fear he had felt when learning about Xuan Hao being a Domain Lord Realm Expert returned.


    The reason for this fear was not due to killing the demonic cultivator, but more so the silver light that had killed it with such ease.


    Not only did the silver light take no effort for Xuan Hao to make, but the second elder also understood that if he was standing in the ce of the demonic cultivator, there was no doubt in his mind that he would have ended up just like the demonic cultivator!


    For someone like him that had always been at top ever since reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, this feeling of someone being able to easily kill you without the slightest effort waspletely new to the second elder.


    "I can''t kill all the demonic cultivators in the Azure Sky Kingdom, but at least I can kill those on the way." Shaking his head saying this, Xuan Hao seemed to not notice the expression on the face of the second elder.


    "I-Indeed! Making sure no more demonic cultivators can enter is the most important. After that, cleaning up the ones left inside the Azure Sky Kingdom should only be a matter of time¡­" Calming down a bit after hearing what Xuan Hao said, the second elder nodded his head in agreement before looking into the distance where another demonic cultivator had appeared.


    Whoosh~


    However, just before he could say anything, the demonic cultivator in question turned into dust.


    "¡­"


    Can you at least allow me to prepare myself first!?


    Not able to silently curse at Xuan Hao for suddenly giving him a heart attack, the second elder decided to not look at the ground below before reaching the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    Like this, Xuan Hao and the second elder of the Ascendant Frost Hall continued their journey towards the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    Any demonic cultivator that was unlucky enough to show up along the way would mysteriously turn into dust after being hit with a silver light that descended from the sky.


    This not only shocked a lot of people but also gave rise to a lot of different legends about the origin of the silver light among both mortals and cultivators alike¡­

 Chapter ?668 Terrifying New Enemy

    Chapter ?668 Terrifying New Enemy


    Bang!


    Barely managing to knock back the demonic cultivator that was trying its best to break through the Frost Guardian Formation protecting and strengthening her, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall could not help frowning.


    Fighting with the demonic cultivator was by no means something that she could continue doing. Even after fighting for only a few short minutes, she had almost fully exhausted the energy of the Frost Guardian Formation after forcing the demonic cultivator back just now.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Hehe~ Looks like those elders of yours won''t be able to keep supporting this formation of yours for much longer- Hm?"


    Hearing the mocking voice of the demonic cultivator before seeing him suddenly stop before looking back in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd that he hade from."


    "This is¡­ More demonic cultivators!?"


    Looking in the same direction as the demonic cultivator, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall could not help showing a look of despair upon noticing several demonic cultivators appearing in the distance. Even worse, all of them had a simr pair of wings indicating that they had at least reached the same realm as the demon she had barely been able to fight over thest few minutes with the help of her sect''s formation.


    Now that a group of these demonic cultivators appeared, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall understood very well that there would be no way for her to resist them. Even buying time for the elders and disciples to evacuate was not an option.


    "¡­"


    Knowing this, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall could not help looking towards the entrance of the mystic realm that was located just outside the border of the Frost Guardian Formation.


    Although not inside the formation itself, it would not be too hard to evacuate the sect inside the mystic realm without getting caught by the demonic cultivators. The only problem was¡­ Other than the lucky disciple that had managed to find his way back out of the mystic realm, they had close to no knowledge of just how dangerous it was inside!


    But then again¡­ Entering the mystic realm for a chance at survival would be a far better optionpared to dying at the hands of demonic cultivators!


    Turning to look towards the demonic cultivator that had stopped attacking her and instead focused his attention on the approaching demonic cultivators, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall secretly contacted one of the Nascent Soul elders helping maintain the formation before instructing him to begin evacuating the disciples and elders into the mystic realm.


    Whoosh~


    Not daring to waste any time after hearing what the sect master said, the elder in question quickly stopped supporting the formation before starting to gather up the elders and disciples in preparation for entering the mystic realm when the formation broke.


    In the end, this was the only time that they would be able to escape, as opening a small path in the formation for them to escape through would inevitably be a weak point that the demonic cultivator floating above could take advantage of.


    At least, when the formation broke, it would obscure the divine sense and view of the sect and those inside for a short moment. Giving the disciples and elders time to escape into the mystic realm before the demonic cultivator could catch them-


    BOOOM!


    However, before anything more could happen, a loud explosion could be heard in the distance, as one of the demonic cultivators flying over suddenly exploded mid-air before turning into a stream of blood that quickly flew into the distance.


    "Wha-!?"


    Boom!


    Boom!


    Boom!


    Not even having enough time toprehend what happened, both the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall and the cultivator she had been fighting watched with disbelief as the group of powerful demonic cultivators all exploded before turning into stream of blood that made their way back inside the Frozen Wastnd that the group of demonic cultivators hade from.


    Swish~


    Not a secondter, a new figure appeared from the Frozen Wastnd before devouring the streams of blood that the group of demonic cultivators had turned into before smiling with ecstasy.


    "Third¡­ Third Stage of the Demonic Transformation!"


    Before the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall could say or do anything, the demonic cultivator in the air above the Ascendant Frost Hall muttered this to himself as a fearful expression appeared on his face.


    Although he would have a chance to reach the Third Demonic Transformation after devouring the cultivators of the Ascendant Frost Hall, the demonic cultivator understood very well just how big the difference between the Second Demonic Transformation and the Third Demonic Transformation was.


    Even if he had no clue about this, the fact that the other party had just casually killed a group of demonic cultivators in the Second Demonic Transformation Realm should be more than enough for him to understand¡­


    Whoosh-!


    Not daring to waste any time, the demonic cultivator directly used a forbidden technique before escaping in the opposite direction with a speed far surpassing what someone is his realm should be capable of.


    Sacrificing some of his lifespan and cultivation base was a small price to pay if he could escape from his current life and death situation.


    After all, the demonic cultivator understood better than anyone else what would happen if he got caught by the other party!


    "This coward¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after seeing how fast the demonic cultivator fled, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall smiled wryly as she turned her attention towards the terrifying demonic cultivator in the distance.


    If he continues staying like this, I should have enough time to lower the formation and-


    Whoosh-!


    Before she even had time to finish her train of thought, the demonic cultivator that was still far away suddenly appeared a short distance away from the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    "Want to try and escape like that little fellow? Don''t worry, that won''t be happening¡­ Not to mention, I already ced a blood imprint on that little guy''s body, so he won''t be able to escape after I finish up devouring the blood of you little insects!"


    Hearing the demonic voice of what could only be described as some sort of demonic creature that had crawled out from the abyss, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall could not stop herself from shivering fearful. Only now realizing that the person in front of her no longer resembled a human.


    Although demonic cultivators who had reached the First and Second Demonic Transformation Realm could transform parts of their bodies for a certain period of time, they could not fully take on the form of a demon like a demonic cultivator in the Third Stage of the Demonic Transformation.


    Not only could a demonic cultivator in the Third Demonic Transformation Realm keep himself transformed for longer, but the time that the transformationsted would slowly increase the stronger the demonic cultivator grew.


    After the demonic cultivator could permanently keep his demonic form active, he would be able to attempt breaking through to the True Demon Realm!


    The demonic cultivator currently in front of the Ascendant Frost Hall had already reached this stage and could be considered at the final stage before the True Demon Realm!


    Of course, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall had no idea just how strong the demonic cultivator in front of her was. All she knew, was that the demonic cultivator was more than strong enough to easily destroy her Ascendant Frost Hall!


    "Well then, goodbye little human- Hm!?"


    Just as the demonic cultivator was about to make his move and destroy the formation of the Ascendant Frost that had already started cracking apart due to the sheer amount of stress it had been under just earlier, he narrowed his eyes before turning to look in the direction that the demonic cultivator from earlier had just escaped in.


    "Someone killed that demonic cultivator and erased my blood imprint!? To erase my blood imprint with such ease¡­ The other party should at least be someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!"


    "¡­"


    Not daring to say anything as she heard what the demonic cultivator said, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall could not help praying that the Domain Lord Realm Expert that the demonic cultivator mentioned woulde over and deal with the demonic cultivator about to destroy her sect!


    ¡­


    Ptsh!


    Having just killed a demonic cultivatorparable to a Peak Nascent Soul Realm cultivator using some sort of forbidden technique to escape from the direction of the Ascendant Frost Hall, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he felt a powerful imprint left behind inside the body of the demonic cultivator.


    Fwoosh!


    Erasing the imprint with his domain, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes before staring in the direction of the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    Not to mention the person who left behind the imprint, even the demonic cultivator he had just killed should be more than strong enough to destroy a sect like the Ascendant Frost Hall!


    "Looks like your sect might be in trouble, you should make your way over on your own, I will go ahead to check out what happened."


    Whoosh-!


    Not wasting any more time after saying this to the second elder and putting him down on the ground, Xuan Hao directly used the Drifting Cloud Steps before disappearing in the direction of the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    "¡­"


    The second elder of the Ascendant Frost Hall could only stare in the direction Xuan Hao had disappeared in with a confused expression stered all over his face, still not fully understanding what had just happened.

 Chapter ?669 Powerful Opponent! Third Stage Demonic Transformation Realm!

    Chapter ?669 Powerful Opponent! Third Stage Demonic Transformation Realm!


    Using the drifting cloud steps, it did not take long for Xuan Hao to reach the perimeter of the mountain range that the Ascendant Frost Hall was located on.


    "This is... A demonic cultivator at the Peak of the Third Demonic Transformation..." Discovering the demonic cultivator hovering in the air only a short distance away from the Ascendant Frost Hall, Xuan Hao could not help frowning.


    A demonic cultivator at the Peak of the Third Demonic Transformation Realm should beparable to a Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    At his current realm, although he was close to the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao had no idea about just how well he would fare in an actual battle against an opponent at this realm.


    To be honest, I''m starting to look forward to it...


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly. Ever since he reached the Eighth stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he had never gotten a chance to test out his strength properly against an opponent...


    The demonic cultivator floating in front of the Ascendant Frost Hall was truly a perfect opponent to test out his current strength!


    "So, you are the one that destroyed my imprint? If I devour your cultivation base, I''m sure I will have a chance to break through to the True Demon Realm!" Not bothering to hide his intentions of killing him and devouring his cultivation base, a sinister smile slowly appeared on the inhuman face of the demonic cultivator as he discovered Xuan Hao moving over.


    "Indeed..."


    "Hehe, this is great! I thought you might be someone more powerful... But from the looks of it, you have only reached the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm! Haha, killing you won''t even take me more than a few seconds!"


    "..."


    Hearing the demonic cultivator suddenlyughing at him, Xuan Hao didn''t bother talking with the other party-


    Swish-!


    Directly using the drifting cloud steps to close the distance between himself and the demonic cultivator before taking out his sword and shing down towards the demonic cultivator with all his strength. Not bothering to try and probe the true strength of the other party, something that wasmon to do in fights to get a feel for the strength of one''s opponent.


    "Wait- Aaah-!"


    BOOOM!


    Not having expected for Xuan Hao to suddenlyunch an all-out attack from the start, the demonic cultivator in the Third Demonic Transformation Realm could only cry out in pain as the sword cut into his flesh before trying to get to his soul.


    ROAAR!


    Letting out a primal roar as he felt the threat of death approaching, the demonic cultivator rapidly started growing in size while at the same time retreating in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd to attempt Xuan Hao fromunching a follow up attack.


    Bang!


    "Y-you! How dare you attack me like that!"


    Finishing his transformation and stopping the sword of Xuan Hao from getting to his soul, the demonic cultivator stared in the direction of Xuan Hao filled with killing intent. However, this time around the yful manner from earlier hadpletely disappeared.


    From the earlier attack, the demonic cultivator understood that Xuan Hao would not be an easy opponent to deal with!


    No... It would be more urate to say that the demonic cultivator had no idea if it could even kill him!


    "This should be far enough away from the Ascendant Frost Hall..." Looking in the direciton the demonic cultivator that had already retreated far into in the Frozen Wastnd due to his earlier attack, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief.


    Given just how terrifying a battle between cultivator at the Domain Lord Realm was, Xuan Hao wanted to move the demonic cultivator away from the Ascendant Frost Hall to prevent it from getting idently destroyed during their fight.


    "But... How did he grow so big...?" Muttering this to himself as he made his way over towards the demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao could not help feeling amazed at the sheer size of the demonic cultivator after his transformation.


    Not only had he grown to a size of around 30 meters, but he had also grown another pair of arms...


    Swish-!


    Knowing that he could not allow for the demonic cultivator to fully recover ande over to him, Xuan Hao made the first move as he moved toward the massive titan sized demonic cultivator.


    Not bothering to think too much about the sudden size change and new arms of the demonic cultivator...


    ...


    BOOOOOM-!


    Feeling the aftershocks of the powerful sword attack from Xuan Hao when he forced the demonic cultivator back into the Frozen Wastnd, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall could not help throwing up arge amount of blood as the Frost Guardian Formation slowly started crumbling away around her.


    Although the power from Xuan Hao''s sword sh was focused on the demonic cultivator, the tiny amount that leaked out and hit the formation of the Ascendant Frost Hall, was far too much for the formation to handle.


    Crack~


    Soon enough, the formationpletely broke down. Revealing the haggard state of all the Nascent Soul Realm Elders who had been using their power to support the formation so far.


    "This is a fight between Domain Lord Realm Experts..." Standing up after wiping away the blood around her lips, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall could not help staring in the direction that the demonic cultivator and mysterious human Domain Lord had disappeared in.


    Even in her current state, she still could not believe just what had happened today.


    First the constant stream of demonic cultivators and then, when everything had finally started calming down again, a powerful demonic cultivator showed up and forced her to go all out and use the Frost Guardian Formation to fight back.


    To make matters even worse, just when she was about to lose, an even more powerful demonic cultivator showed up!


    This time around, she thought her sect was done for sure... But then a mysterious human Domain Lord showed up in thest second and began fighting the demonic cultivator.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Just listening to the sounds constantly erupting from the Frozen Wastnds, she could easily imagine just how terrifying the battle was growing.


    "At this point in time I don''t even care anymore..." Muttering this to herself, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hallid down on the ground exhausted. Wanting nothing more than to return to her quiet days spent cultivating peacefully in seclusion without anyoneing to disturb her-N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "SECT MASTER!"


    "..."


    Hearing the loud voice calling out for her, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall could not help cursing at the heavens inside her head.


    Swish~


    "What is it...?"


    Turning her head in the direction of the loud voice, the sect master was not even surprised upon seeing the second elder suddenly appearing in front of her.


    "Sect Master... Is something wrong...?"


    "No, I just exhausted my dantian and nascent soul and need some time to recover... By the way, why are you here?" Coming up with an excuse for her current situation of lying like a dead fish on the ground without moving a single muscle, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall asked this.


    From what she remembered, the second elder should be making his way to the Star Shattering Sect to ask for assistance and...


    "Ah... Is the Domain Lord Realm Expert perhaps one of the Domain Lords from the Star Shattering Sect?"


    "Yes..."


    Not even giving the second elder any time to answer her question, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall quickly put two and two together and figured out the identity of the Domain Lord that hade to her rescue.


    "Wait... If a Domain Lord from the Star Shattering Sect is here... You seeded!?"


    "Well, yes, but-"


    Swish-!


    BANG!


    Interrupting the second elder before he had a chance to talk, a massive demonic looking arm suddenly came flying through the air beforending a few meters away from both of them. Looking closer it could clearly be seen that the demonic arm had been cleanly sliced off in one move.


    "It looks like the Domain Lord from the Star Shattering Sect is winning... Or at the very least, he should be doing quite well..."


    "Indeed, Grand Elder Xuan can be considered the strongest person in the Star Shattering Sect ording to what I learned so far!"


    "Grand Elder Xuan?"


    "Yes! Grand Elder Xuan is-"


    Swish-!


    BANG!


    Once again, the second elder was interrupted mid-sentence, as another arm came flying through the air beforending a short distance away from where the first hadnded.


    "Maybe we should move away from the sect for the moment until Grand Elder Xuan finishes his fight..."


    "Sound like a great idea sect master..."


    Coming to an agreement, the sect master and the second elder both made their way towards where the rest of the elders and disciples had gathered before starting to move away from the ce where the fighting between Xuan Hao and the demonic cultivator was taking ce.

 Chapter ?670 Strength of a Third Stage Demonic Transformation Realm Cultivator

    Chapter ?670 Strength of a Third Stage Demonic Transformation Realm Cultivator


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Not aware of what was happening back at the Ascendant Frost Hall after he had left, Xuan Hao could not help frowning while looking at the demonic cultivator standing over 30 meters tall in front of him.


    Wiggle~


    Along with a creepy sound, a new arm sprouted forth from the area he had just cut one arm off a few seconds earlier.


    The thing in question that frustrated him was the fact that after already cutting off one of the demonic cultivator''s arms twice, the demonic cultivator almost instantly managed to grow them back without showing any signs of being exhausted by regrowing tworge arms.


    He already understood that the main strength of a demonic cultivator was their physical strength¡­ But he had not expected for their recovery rate to reach such a terrifying level after reaching the Third Demonic Transformation Realm.


    Even after fighting for a few minutes, Xuan Hao could not find a way to kill the demonic cultivator in front of him¡­


    Maybe I can try and use thebined power of my ice and sword domain¡­?


    Keeping an eye on the demonic cultivator as this thought urred to him, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head.


    The fact that his two domains were still only partially merged together, meant that he currently had no way to control the force of his two domains after forcefully merging them together into an attack.


    Not only had he not tried doing something like that before, but it would also be dangerous for him if the power ended up backfiring-


    Bang!


    Barely manging to block the four massive fists of the demonic cultivator attacking him, Xuan Hao was forced to end his train of thought and focus on fighting the demonic cultivator.


    Swish~!


    Ptsh-!


    Directly using the Earth Splitting Sword to cut off another arm!


    ROAR!


    Wiggle~


    Not bothered by losing an arm, the demonic cultivator let out a primal roar before his arm grew back and he once again attacked Xuan Hao with all his strength!


    ¡­


    As the fight between Xuan Hao and the demonic cultivator continued over the next half hour with no clear winner, the damage caused by their fight was slowly starting to spread towards the direction of the Ascendant Frost Hall, something Xuan Hao had tried to avoid happening.


    After all, not to mention the Ascendant Frost Hall, the entire Azure Sky Kingdom might end up getting destroyed if their fight moved to the mountain range where the Ascendant Frost Hall was located.


    At that point in time, even if the people from the Ascendant Frost Hall had evacuated, they would not be able to stay safe due to just how widespread the destruction of a battle between experts in the Domain Lord Realm was¡­ And that was not considering the fact that both Xuan Hao and the demonic cultivator''s strength were far above that of a normal Domain Lord¡­


    Rumble-!


    With Xuan Hao and the demonic cultivator slowly getting closer and closer to the Azure Sky Kingdom, the impacts of their attack caused earthquakes in all direction.


    "What is happening!? Is the sky going to copse!?"


    "Dad¡­ What is that big arm over there?"


    "God¡­ The gods are fighting!"


    Although weak when they reached the borders of the Azure Sky Kingdom, they grew stronger and stronger, causing the mortals to start panicking.


    After more time passed and the earthquakes became more violent, the cultivators started noticing the fight taking ce in the Frozen Wastnds.


    "So powerful¡­ The people fighting should be above the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    "To think experts at this level are fighting so close by, I hope they won''t end up getting any closer to the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­"


    "Maybe I should escape in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect, it should be safe with more than one Domain Lord protecting it. Even if those two fighting end up reaching the Azure Sky Kingdom, there is no way they would carelessly offend a sect with more than one Domain Lord!"


    Part of them started praying that the fight wouldn''t end up reaching the Azure Sky Kingdom, while some cultivators decided escaping in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect. Hoping the two experts fighting wouldn''t dare wantonly cause chaos inside the territory of a powerful sect with more than one Domain Lord.


    Whatever their reaction was, all of them were simrly filled with fear looking in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd where the fight was taking ce. Deep down, they understood that they wouldn''t be able to escape in time if the fight was truly moving in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom!


    ¡­


    "What in the world is happening at our border with the Frozen Wastnd. Don''t tell me¡­ Did a powerful demonic cultivator perhaps show up!?"


    At the same time both mortal and cultivators of the Azure Sky Kingdom were panicking due to the aftershocks of the battle between Xuan Hao and the demonic cultivator starting to affect them, a middle-aged man sitting inside arge flying ship not too far away from the Azure Sky Kingdom could not help frowning as he looked down at the artifact in front of him.


    "General Liu! Did something happen- Wha-what is this energy reading!?"


    Walking over after hearing the loud voice, one of the soldiers who had been standing guard at the door could not help eximing in surprise after seeing the energy reading disyed on the artifact, while at the same time also giving away the identity of the middle-aged man as none other than one of the Domain Lords from the Sky Empire that had explored the secret realm before its copse.


    If Xuan Hao was here, it would not be hard for him to realize that General Liu was not only fine after escaping from the secret realm, but his strength had even increased to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    "Looking closer, it looks like there are two people and they should be fighting¡­" Muttering this to himself, General Liu could not help frowning.


    The fact that two powerful people had appeared from the Frozen Wastnd was not a good thing, as the only thinging from the Frozen Wastnd would be demonic cultivators!


    Even if the Sky Empire could deal with them, it would still take time to do so. During this period of time, there was no saying just how much destruction two demonic cultivators would be able to do.


    Luckily, both of them started fighting before entering the Sky Empire¡­ Or else there would have been no way to notice them with this artifact¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, General Liu didn''t waste any time to take out a high-qualitymunication talisman and informing his superior about it.


    "Everyone get ready, we are moving to the Azure Sky Kingdom, it should be the ce that the demonic cultivators will enter from!"


    Finished informing his superior about the emergency, General Liu didn''t waste any time before heading towards the Azure Sky Kingdom to keep an eye on the demonic cultivators that were about to enter the territory of the Sky Empire.


    Given his current strength, General Liu understood that there was no way for him to interfere in the battle¡­ But with the help of the flying ship, he would still be able to escape in case anything happened.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Of course, there was no way for him to tell that one of the "demonic cultivators" fighting was in fact not a demonic cultivator!


    ¡­


    BOOOM-!


    Blocking the attack of the demonic cultivator with a wall of ice made through his ice domain, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he looked back and saw the mountain range of the Ascendant Frost Hall getting closer and closer.


    Looks like I will have to use try and fully merge the power of my ice and sword domain if I want to have a chance at killing this demonic cultivator¡­


    Feeling his frown deepening even further as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling fearful thinking about what would happen in case it backfired, and he ended up wounding himself.


    Although he should be able to escape, the Azure Sky Kingdom and anything nearby would most likely end up getting devoured by the demonic cultivator in front of. Including the territory of the Star Shattering Sect!


    Well¡­ Except the Shattered Star Peaks that was protected by the Chaotic Qi Formation¡­


    But then again¡­ If he continued fighting with the demonic cultivator without making any progress in finding another way to kill him, they would eventually end up reaching the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and everything would end up getting destroyed from their battle¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao decided to give merging the power of his two domains together fully into a single domain.


    As for waiting for the Sky Empire to show up to deal with the demonic cultivator? Xuan Hao didn''t count on it happening any time soon. After all, the demonic cultivator was still not in the True Demon Realm and couldn''t really be considered a threat to the Sky Empire¡­

 Chapter ?671 Descend of the Ice God’s Sword

    Chapter ?671 Descend of the Ice God¡¯s Sword


    Having made up his mind, Xuan Hao focused his attention on his partially merged domain. Even though his ice domain and sword domain had not yet fully merged together, he could still clearly feel how much the power of his domain had increased after the partial merger.


    Fully merging his two domains together into one, the power of his domain would surly reach a brand new level that would allow him to break through the though defences of the demonic cultivator and kill him!


    Swish-!


    Not wasting any time, Xuan Hao directly forced his ice and sword domain to merge together. Instantly causing a violent ice storm to engulf the area over five miles around him.


    Not only did the ice storm created by him fully merging his two domains together fully end up freezing everything around him, but the demonic cultivator standing no more than a few hundred meters away from him was also swallowed up by the violent ice storm-


    BOOOOM-!


    Directly forcing him to erupt with a power demonic energy that protected his physical body and resisted the ever-present ice qi from the violent ice storm. Preventing it from entering his body and freeze his soul.


    Shing~!


    However, the ice storm manifesting was not the end, as an even more terrifying sea of swords emerged with Xuan Hao at the centre before merging together perfectly with the ice storm to create a massive domain spanning five miles in all directions!


    The domain not only froze everything it came in contact with, but the sea of swords hidden within the ice storm also sliced through everything it came into contact with.


    Ptsh!


    Ptsh!


    Ptsh!


    Having to deal with both an endless sea of swords cutting into him together with the ice qi trying to invade his body and freeze his soul, the demonic cultivator quickly began losing control of his body as thebined might of the ice and sword domain was far too much for him to resist!


    ROAR!


    Whoosh-!


    Knowing that he would not be able tost inside Xuan Hao''s domain for long, the demonic cultivator was not stupid enough to stay and decided to escape in the opposite direction of Xuan Hao. Wanting to leave the domain as quickly as possible.


    "Think I will let you escape that easily!?"


    Feeling the strain on his soul from forcefully merging his ice and sword domain together into a single domain, Xuan Hao understood that he wouldn''t be able to keep up his current state for a long time.


    In such a situation, there was no way he was going to let the demonic cultivator run away and wait for him to run out of energy!


    BOOOM-!


    Barely managing to control his now massive domain, Xuan Hao forcefully formed a massive pair of ice hands to grab hold of therge body of the demonic cultivator trying to escape before forcing him to the ground.


    RUMBLE-!n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "ROAR! HOW DARE YOU DO THIS TO ME! I WILL TEAR YOU APART WHEN I GET FREE!"


    Understanding that his life was at risk, the demonic cultivator roared angrily on the ground while trying to free himself from the grasp of the massive pair of ice hands formed by Xuan Hao''s domain.


    Crack~


    Given just how strong the demonic cultivator was, it did not take more than a few seconds for him to start weakening the massive hands formed by Xuan Hao''s domain as several cracks began forming all over them. Showing that they would break apart at any moment and free the demonic cultivator.


    "Hmph!"


    However, Xuan Hao already predicted this and by the time the demonic cultivator was just about to break free from the giant ice hands, as a massive sword of ice over a dozen meters in height rapidly started forming above the demonic cultivator.


    BOOM!


    Erupting with even more strength than before to break free from the ice hands, the demonic cultivator''s entire body shone in a bright crimson colour as the cracks on the pair of ice hands holding him in ce rapidly began expanding before-


    BANG!


    Shattering under the might of the demonic cultivator!


    "HAHA! FINALLY FREE AGAIN!"


    Laughing loudly after freeing himself, the demonic cultivator was just about to escape from Xuan Hao''s domain when he suddenly looked up and felt a shiver run down his spine.


    Having been too focused on trying to break free from the giant pair of ice hands holding him in ce on the ground and due to Xuan Hao doing his best to hide the presence of the sword with his domain, the demonic cultivator didn''t notice when the massive sword that was now hanging above him filled with killing intent had formed.


    Shing-!


    Not giving the demonic cultivator any time to react after breaking free from the restraints of the massive pair of ice hands, the ice sword hanging in the air above the demonic cultivator quickly descend. Carrying the power of the perfectly merged ice and sword domain along with it!


    "DAMN YOU!"


    Using all his strength to form a crimson barrier to block the descending sword, the demonic cultivator could not help cursing at Xuan Hao as he watched the sword hit his crimson barrier.


    BOOOOOOOOM-!


    Barelysting for a little over a second against the power of the descending sword of ice, the demonic cultivator could not help screaming out in pain as the sword broke through his crimson barrier and directly pierced through his massive body and reached his soul.


    "AAAaaAAhHHhhhHHhh-!"


    Although the pain he felt onlysted for a short moment before he was killed by the sword, this short moment felt like an eternity, as the pain from having his soul frozen before being cut into a million pieces by the power of the ice sword was far more terrifyingpared to any torture he had ever practiced over his long years as a demonic cultivator.


    Following the death of the demonic cultivator, the sword no longer had anything blocking its path and directly pierced into the ground below-


    RUMBLE-!


    Piercing a few meters into the ground, the surrounding area shook violently as everything within a hundred miles of the impact zone was instantly transformed into a frozen hell with anything inside being frozen to death.


    "STOP!"


    Feeling that the frozen hell created by the ice sword was still expanding as the ice sword moved deeper into the ground, Xuan Hao used all his strength to stop the ice sword from piecing any further into the ground.


    BOOM!


    As the ice sword stopped piercing further into the ground, the frozen hell created by it stopped expanding.


    At this point in time, the frozen hell had already expanded to cover hundreds of miles in all directions around it and was only a few miles away from where the Ascendant Frost Hall was located.


    "To think the strength of perfectly merging two domains together is this powerful... If I''m not wrong, the strength of this attack should have reached the Soul Ascension Realm..." Muttering this to himself as he exhaustedly sat on top of the ice sword after having stopped the ice sword from causing any further damage, Xuan Hao could not help marveling at the strength of thebined power of his two domains.


    Even if he had ended up exhausting almost all of his strength for only a single attack, the power of that single attack was far stronger than any attack he had learned so far.


    "Hm... I will call it Descend of the Ice God''s Sword..."


    Coming up with a new name for his new move, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling to himself as he soon stood up before leaving in the direction of the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    The frozen hell created by his attack was not really anything Xuan Hao cared about clearing up as it was located inside the Frozen Wastnd.


    Thinking a bit further about it, the frozen hell created by using his first ever personal technique, Descend of the Ice God''s Sword, would serve as a barrier preventing the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnd from entering the Azure Sky Kingdom and any of the kingdoms close to the Azure Sky Kingdom that simrly bordered the Frozen Wastnds.


    In the end, it looked like Xuan Hao had ended up creating a barrier that would keep the Ascendant Frost Hall safe from the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnd by ident...


    On one side, this was really not something Xuan Hao expected to happen... But on the other hand, this would give him a lot more time to explore the Frozen Wastnd and look for the reason why the demonic cultivators became so active all of a sudden.


    Of course, exploring the Frozen Wastnd would have to wait until he met with the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall and got his hands on their unique cultivation mantra for his sect quest!


    Even if he wanted to explore the Frozen Wastnd,pleting the sect quest that would help increase his strength took priority.

 Chapter ?672 Meeting the Sect Master of the Ascendant Frost Hall

    Chapter ?672 Meeting the Sect Master of the Ascendant Frost Hall


    Arriving at the border between the Sky Empire and the Frozen Wastnd only a short time after Xuan Hao had finished his battle with the demonic cultivator, General Liu could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he stared out into the frozen hell that had been created by Xuan Hao''s new technique that perfectly merged together the power of both his ice and sword domain.


    Even standing far away from the frozen hell created by the ice sword that was still present in the Frozen Wastnds, General Liu could very clearly feel the terrifying power contained inside of it.


    Domain Lord or not, General Liu felt like his life would be in danger if he carelessly stepped inside the frozen hell in front of him!


    "What in the world is this!? G-General¡­ Do you really think this was left behind by the battle of two demonic cultivators in the Third Demonic Transformation Realm¡­? To me it feels more like-"


    "Quiet! You should know what it would mean for our Sky Empire if an existence at that level appeared! Not to mention¡­ The one who caused this scene should havee from the Frozen Wastnds!


    Hearing the fearful voice of one of his subordinate standings at the deck of the flying ship, General Liu recovered from his momentary daze before reprimanding his subordinate for his careless words.


    "I¡­ I understand general, I will be more careful with my words¡­"


    Knowing that he had made a mistake earlier, the soldier in question quickly apologised before retreating back to avoid idently saying something stupid again.


    "I will have to inform his majesty about this! Everyone! Stay here and keep watch over the Frozen Wastnd. Report to me if anything abnormal happens!"


    Whoosh!


    Not wasting any time after understanding just how serious things were, General Liu rushed back inside the Flying Ship to inform the current emperor of the Sky Empire about what had taken ce in the Frozen Wastnd.


    After all, given the fact that it might involve someone above the Domain Lord Realm, the emperor had to be personally informed!


    "¡­"


    Being left alone to watch over the Frozen Wastnd, the group of soldiers who had barely reached the Nascent Soul Realm could not help looking fearfully at each other before looking in the direction of the eerily quiet frozen hell that now spread as far as they could see with their limited strength.


    The thought of it being done by a True Demon Realm demonic cultivator kept echoing in their minds!


    What had taken ce in the Frozen Wastnds was sure to cause waves in the Sky Empire. Even more so considering the very real prospect of a possible True Demon Realm demonic cultivator appearing to cause chaos!


    ¡­


    It looks like the people from the Ascendant Frost Hall made it quite far away from their sect. Well¡­ Given the fact that more than three of the arms I cut offnded in their sect, this should have been a good idea.


    If I ended up idently killing one of their elders or disciples with one of the arms I cut off, I really would have no idea how to ask them for their core cultivation mantra¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while flying in the direction of the members of the Ascendant Frost Hall, Xuan Hao could not help looking forward to getting his hands on their cultivation mantra and officiallypleting the sect quest.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Swish-!


    Given his current speed, Xuan Hao did not need long to reach the fleeing members of the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    "Hm?"


    Using his divine sense to scan through the group of Ascendant Frost Hall elders and disciples below him, Xuan Hao could not help eximing in a slightly surprised voice after noticing that almost everyone except a few exhausted elders had close to no injuries.


    The only person among them that was in a bad situation was an olddy at the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    However, she should be able to fully recover by herself with enough time.


    All things considered; it looked like the Ascendant Frost Hall had suffered close to no damage when it came to their core fighting power!


    To be honest, Xuan Hao had not expected this and thought that the sect master and a few of the Nascent Soul Realm elders might have ended up perishing due to being forced to fight off a powerful demonic cultivator by themselves before having resist the remnant power of him knocking the Third Stage Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivator further inside the Frozen Wastnds.


    The fact that none of the powerful elders of the Ascendant Frost Hall had ended up dying was great news for Xuan Hao.


    Swoosh~


    Not thinking about it anymore, Xuan Hao slowly began descending towards the group of disciples and elders of the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    "Who is it!?"


    "Look! Someone is flying!"


    "Not only that, but that person is descending down towards the direction of the sect master!"


    Not hiding his presence as he slowly descended down towards the area where the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall was slowly trying to recover her strength, both the disciples and elders of the Ascendant Frost Hall spotted him.


    Thump~


    """¡­""""


    Landing on the ground, none of the elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall dared saying anything. Only barely working up the courage to stand around their sect master for protection.


    "Grand Elder Xuan!"


    However, just as things were starting to get tense, a voice called out from behind the group of elders before the second elder made his way to the front with a happy expression on his face. Rendering the elders speechless and wondering what kind of connection the unfamiliar person who had just descended from the sky had to do with their Second Elder.


    "Second Elder, do you know who this is- Wait, is this perhaps the Domain Lord from the Star Shattering Sect!? I''m sorry for my earlier rude behaviour, this little one is known as Frozen Flower and is currently the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall!"


    Bang!


    About to ask the Second Elder who the person was, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall, Frozen Flower, quickly put realized Xuan Hao''s identity before the Second Elder even had a chance to say anything. Not wasting any time to prostrate herself in front of Xuan Hao by smashing her head into the ground¡­


    "No need, I''m just here to inform you that the demonic cultivator has been dealt with and its fine for you to return to your sect¡­"


    Not knowing what to say when an old woman looking like she was half a step into the grave with a young sounding name like Frozen Flower almost smashed her head into the ground trying to apologies for what was essentially nothing, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine as he quickly motioned for the olddy to get up.


    "Yes, your excellency!"


    "¡­"


    Feeling a bit worried when he saw that the old woman had actually started bleeding from her forehead, Xuan Hao could not help feeling like the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall might have some sort of problem.


    Even the elders standing at the side were looking a bit worried after seeing the actions of their sect master¡­


    "Ahm¡­ Grand Elder Xuan, is there perhaps anything else you want to say¡­?" Understanding that it would not be good for his sect master if Xuan Hao kept staying around, the Second Elder quickly said this while signalling Xuan Hao with his eyes for help, his fear from earlier when he had flown with Xuan Haopletely gone.


    "Yes, other than dealing with the powerful demonic cultivator, I have also finished dealing with the problem of the increasing number of demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds!"


    "Really!?"


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said, one of the elders could not stop himself from asking. After all, since the creation of the Ascendant Frost Hall, they had always had to deal with the constant harassment of demonic cultivators preventing them from ever expanding their territory beyond the mountain range that their sect had been created on top of.


    "Yes, you don''t have to worry about any demonic cultivators invading your sect in the near future!"


    Nodding his head as he reconfirmed what he had just said, Xuan Hao felt the way that the elders and disciples looked towards him changed from one of initial fear due to his unexpected arrival to one of awe and admiration.


    Even the weaker disciples of the Ascendant Frost Hall that were only in the Qi Condensation Realm very clearly understood just how much it would affect their sect that they would no longer have to dedicate most of their resources and people towards dealing with the constant harassment of the demonic cultivators.


    The elders understood this even more, as they would finally have time to properly focus on cultivating instead of fighting demonic cultivators all the time!


    After all, even if fighting was a good way to hone one''s strength, one would still need a quiet ce and time to cultivate and breakthrough. Only rarely would someone be able to break through while fighting!

 Chapter ?673 The Ascendant Frost Scroll

    Chapter ?673 The Ascendant Frost Scroll


    Knowing that the second elder had likely already exined what had taken ce in the Star Shattering Sect to his sect master during their escape from their sect, Xuan Hao decided to ask the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall for their core cultivation¡­


    "You want our core cultivation mantra¡­?"


    Not able to stop herself from frowning as her face became serious after hearing what Xuan Hao said, Frozen Flower thought hard about what he said.


    Considering that we really join the Star Shattering Sect, this probably going to happen anyway at some point in time. Not to mention, the cultivation mantras of the Star Shattering Sect should be far stronger than ours and our cultivation mantra should not hold any real use for them outside of being a bit uniquepared to ordinary cultivation mantras¡­ The reason the Grand Elder is asking for it might not be to get his hands on our cultivation mantra, but instead a way for him to show how supportive and willing we are when ites to joining the Star Shattering Sect to the rest of the elders of the Star Shattering Sect!


    After all, considering he travelled all the way here together with the Second Elder, he should be the main reason why the Star Shattering Sect wants us to join them!


    "Here! This is my Ascendant Frost Hall''s core cultivation mantra, The Ascendant Frost Scroll!"


    Not realizing that her thought process was a bit messed up as she nodded her head with an understanding look on her face, Frozen Flower took out an ancient looking scroll before handing it over to Xuan Hao without the slightest bit of unwillingness present on her face.


    "¡­ Thank you¡­"N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Not knowing what else to say as the current sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall willingly handed over her sect''s core cultivation mantra without any resistance, Xuan Hao felt that the entire things was a bit too easy¡­ But then again, he had just saved their entire sect from destructions, so some veneration and adoration from their elders and disciples were expected.


    The only thing that was unexpected, was that the one who seemed to admire and respect him the most was not the young disciples, but instead the old sect master¡­


    "Well then¡­ I will get going, someone should being to visit your sect soon to discuss the matter about officially joining."


    Swish~


    Not staying around for any longer after saying this due to the increasingly weird gaze he felt from the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall, Xuan Hao rapidly flew away with the core cultivation mantra of the Ascendant Frost Hall in hand.


    """¡­"""


    Having watched the entire scene of their sect master handing over their core cultivation mantra without any resistance or questions, the rest of the elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall had no idea what to say.


    For now, they could only pray that joining the Star Shattering Sect would allow their Ascendant Frost Hall to grow stronger. Maybe, they would even be able to takemand over the entire Azure Sky Kingdom and manage it for the Star Shattering Sect!


    ¡­


    Leaving the elders and disciples of the Ascendant Frost Hall to make their way back on their own, Xuan Hao began making his way back towards the Frozen Wastnds where he had fought the demonic cultivator just a few minutes earlier.


    As for returning to the sect toplete the sect mission for gathering unique cultivation mantras, Xuan Hao decided to wait with that until after he had investigated the Frozen Wastnds and what might have caused the sudden surge in demonic cultivators.


    Given that he had already managed to kill a demonic cultivator at the Third Demonic Transformation Realm, Xuan Hao didn''t worry too much about encountering any strong demonic cultivator during his short trip to the Frozen Wastnd.


    If he really ended up encountering a demonic cultivator at the True Demon Realm so close to the border of the Sky Empire, he could always try and escape back inside the Sky Empire and try to stay alive until the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Sky Empire showed up.


    Even if they might tolerate a demonic cultivator at the Third Demonic Transformation Realm, as the damage such a demonic cultivator could cause to an empire was limited and the fact that such a demonic cultivator could be used to help temper their Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert, the same could not be said for a True Demon Realm Expert!


    The only reason that Xuan Hao even felt that he was confident in escaping from a True Demon Realm Expert, was due to his drifting cloud steps.


    Although he had yet to fully master it, if he truly went all out using it with his current level of spatial maniption, he could archive a somewhat urate short distance teleportation with each step. Even if it was not a hundred percent urate, it would still allow him to cross a distance of a thousand miles at a speed far exceeding anything normally possible in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Whoosh~


    With all of this in mind, Xuan Hao was not at all worried about dying if he ended up encountering a True Demon Realm Expert as he passed the border between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Frozen Wastnds.


    If worst came to pass, he could always turn around and escape back towards the Sky Empire and wait for the Soul Ascension Realm Experts toe and deal with the problem for him!


    Not to mention, after having used the Descend of the Ice God'' Sword to kill the Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao was really curious about just how strong an expert in the Soul Ascension or True Demon Realm was and how they would fare against his attack¡­


    After all, at this point in time, he had yet to ever meet an expert who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm!


    ¡­


    "So¡­ Something that troublesome happened at the border with the Frozen Wastnd¡­ And just when the sect alliance is about to be established of all times¡­"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was making his way back into the Frozen Wastnd, a refined yet regal older man sat on top of a majestic throne as he gazed thoughtfully towards themunication talisman ced right beside him before turning towards a person dressed in a full te of metal armour made from spiritual metal of the highest grade found in the Sky Empire respectfully standing beside him without saying a single word.


    "¡­"


    The invisible pressure created by the gaze from the one on top of the throne seemed to cause a shiver to run down the man''s spine as he felt like his soul was about to get squished to death by some unknown force.


    "Go to General Liu and check out the situation of the Frozen Wastnds for me. Remember to keep a lookout for any of the churches. After all, even if they might be fighting with each other on the surface, there is no way to tell whether or not they are nning something beneath the surface!"


    "Yes, your majesty! This one will carry out your orders and make sure nothing will be able to harm the Sky Empire!"


    Swish-!


    Bowing his head filled with both respect and fear, the man in the full te of armour soon turned into a stream of light and disappeared from the throne room in the direction of the Frozen Wastnds.


    During the short interaction, not a second was wasted with useless chatter, as both of them had known each other for long enough to understand some of the unspoken words and what else to keep an eye on other than the three churches!


    At the same time, the identity of the majestic older man on top of the throne was also revealed to be none other than the current emperor of the Sky Empire! A Soul Ascension Realm Expert!


    ¡­


    "Something like that happened in the Frozen Wastnds!? Haha! I''m sure his majesty the emperor is thinking that we had something to do with it, that annoying dog of his should already be on his way to investigate the matter! Haha, I wonder how fun his expression will be when he finds out we have nothing to do with it!"


    Not too far away from where the Emperor of the Sky Empire was located, the cardinal belonging to the Order of the Sky God wasughing to himself as he looked outside at the streak of light quickly leaving the capital of the Sky Empire before heading in the direction of the Frozen Wastnds.


    "Haaah¡­ This is too good to be true, now that those two are busy focusing on the church of the gue god and his majesty has his attention focused on the Frozen Wastnds, I will have free reign to move around!"


    But then again¡­ The creator of the frozen hell located just outside our border with the Frozen Wastnds should at the very least be someone in the Soul Ascension Realm that has gone through the First Tribtion¡­


    Muttering the first part to himself as he looked outside, the cardinal soon narrowed his eyes upon thinking about the culprit behind what had happened at their border with the Frozen Wastnd.


    Even if he was unrted to the matter, the cardinal could still not help feeling a bit worried thinking that there might be an unknown Soul Ascension Realm Expert roaming around the Sky Empire¡­

 Chapter ?674 Other Side of the Frozen Hell...

    Chapter ?674 Other Side of the Frozen Hell...


    Arriving back at the border between the Frozen Wastnds and the Azure Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao did not take long to spot the flying ship located only a short distance away from the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    "If I''m not wrong, that should be a flying ship belonging to the Sky Empire..."


    Inspecting the flying ship, Xuan Hao did not take long to figure out who the flying ship belonged to, the symbol of the Sky Empire being etched into the side of the flying ship was especially helpful when it came to finding out where it was from...


    Swish~


    Not wanting to have to risk his full strength getting revealed and have to deal with the danger that might involve, Xuan Hao did not hesitate in the slightest when it came to using his domain to hide himself while moving close to the ground before sneakily making his way inside the frozen hell he had created not too long ago.


    Luckily for him, it seemed that the frozen hell he had created could not only be used for preventing demonic cultivators from invading the Azure Sky Kingdom, but it could also be used for hiding his presence from the people standing on top of the flying ship fully focused on keeping an eye on the Frozen Wastnds.


    After all, even if he could hide himself with his domain, he had no way to tell if the Sky Empire''s people had some kind of artifact that would be able to see through his domain.


    Using the frozen hell as a cover together with his domain was the best way for him to sneak past them without getting discovered.


    Like this, Xuan Hao slowly travelled through the frozen hell to not idently alert the people from the Sky Empire.


    "Looks like this should be far enough..."


    Only after the flying ship had left the range of his divine sense and he could no longer see it, did he start rxing before increasing his speed.


    Whoosh-!


    Not taking more than a few minutes to reach the other side of the frozen hell he had created after increasing his speed, Xuan Hao could not help momentarily freezing upon witnessing the scene on the other side of the frozen hell.


    "To think there are so many demonic cultivators at the First Demonic Transformation Realm and below here..."


    Indeed, different from his expectations of the demonic cultivators avoiding the frozen hell he had created, arge crowd of demonic cultivators below the Second Demonic Transformation Realm had decided gathered together on the other side of the frozen hell.


    Just looking over the massive number of demonic cultivators gathered, Xuan Hao could at least count over a hundred demonic cultivators with strengthparable to the Nascent Soul Realm, while there were over a thousand demonic cultivators who had strengthparable to the Peak of the Core Formation... And that was not counting the tens of thousands demonic cultivators below this level...


    Why did so many demonic cultivators gather here in such a short period of time?


    This thought appeared in his head the moment he saw the massive gathering of demonic cultivators. Making him even more curious about just what had taken ce inside the Frozen Wastnds for so many demonic cultivators to suddenly try and leave.


    Outside the majority of demonic cultivators that were just waiting around, there were some demonic cultivators gathered close to the frozen hell that would sometime try to brave the terrifying frozen hell with a desperate look on their face... Of course, the only oue of these demonic cultivators was death!


    "..."


    Deciding to try and get closer and see if he could find out anything from listening to the conversations between these demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao left the frozen hell before moving closer to the ce where the demonic cultivators were all staying.


    Given that none of the demonic cultivators were anywhere close to the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao did not bother hiding himself-


    "Who is it!?"


    "S-someone came out from the frozen hell!"


    "Flying... No wings... I-It''s a Domain Lord from the Sky Empire!"n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As a result, the demonic cultivators did not take long to spot him before they started panicking after realizing that he was flying without the help of wings or a special artifact. Not taking long to realize that person who hade from the frozen hell was not a demonic cultivator, but instead a Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    Swoosh-!


    Swoosh-!


    Swoosh-!


    Not daring to stay around knowing that the other party was a Domain Lord Realm expert from the empire that they had been trying to enter, the demonic cultivators rapidly began escaping in all direction. Knowing very well what would happen to them if the other party caught them!


    "Hmph!"


    Fwoosh!


    Not intending to let any of them escape, Xuan Hao used his qi to form a hundred small swords that soon descended on the demonic cultivators.


    "Agh-!"


    "No! Please spare me great-"


    "Damnable mainstream cultiva-"


    "M-mercy- Ah!"


    Given the sheer difference in strength between him and the demonic cultivators, what followed could only be considered to be a one-sided massacre. The hundred small swords formed by Xuan Hao beautifully dancing across the battlefield, cutting down one demonic cultivator after the other.


    "Please don''t I-"


    Ptsh!


    Before long, almost all of the demonic cultivators ended up dying under the hundred small swords formed by Xuan Hao.


    Not a single demonic cultivator managed to escape alive... Outside of a few demonic cultivators that had reached the First Demonic Transformation Realm that had deliberately been kept alive for information.


    "Killing them is good... If not, I''m sure they will end up causing trouble in the future."


    Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the small group of demonic cultivators he had spared in hopes of them having some understanding over just what was currently happening inside the Frozen Wastnd for so many demonic cultivators to do their best at escaping the ce.


    "So then... If you don''t mind, I have a few questions to ask..."


    """..."""


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said and feeling the terrifying pressure belonging to someone who had reached the Domain Lord Realm bearing down on them from above, the demonic cultivators in question could not help shivering all over.


    Not only had the person in front of them just killed over ten thousand demonic cultivators, but he had also done so within less than a minute!


    For this reason, the demonic cultivators had a feeling that the person in front of them was not a normal Domain Lord Realm Expert, but instead someone close to surpassing the Domain Lord Realm!


    This realization made the still surviving demonic cultivators shiver even more, as they understood that there was likely no way out of their current situation. Even if they answered all of his questions, they understood that the most they would be able to get was a painless death!


    After all, if they were in a simr situation as Xuan Hao, this is exactly what they would do. The only real difference would be the fact that they would most likely not even bother to ask any questions and would just devour the other party and try breaking through to the next realm.


    "Your excellency... Is there a chance that you will let me go if I answer all of your questions...?"


    Taking the first step forward, one of the demonic cultivators could not sit still for much longer as he shakingly stepped forward and asked the question that had been on all the remaining demonic cultivator''s mind.


    Even if they were almost certain of the answer, they could not stop themselves from hoping that there would be a way out of their current situation deep down.


    "Hm... It depends on the answer, I might let you go if its satisfying..."


    Not wanting for the demonic cultivators to end up killing themselves or refuse to answer his questions, Xuan Hao decided to not outright say that he would kill them and instead gave them a possible way out.


    At least his way, some of the demonic cultivators would do their best when it came to answering his question. Even if they understood deep down that it wouldn''t help their current situation.


    Oh well... I can always abolish their cultivation and let them go, that way I will keep my word, while at the same time preventing them from causing any damage in the future...


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao soon began asking the demonic cultivators about the current situation of the Frozen Wastnd.


    His main aim was to get a grasp over just what had been happening for so many demonic cultivators to start risking their life escaping from the Frozen Wastnds without caring about just how bad it would be for them to live in a ce controlled by people who would hunt them down.


    The surviving demonic cultivators did not bother hiding anything after hearing what he wanted to know and began fighting among each other to deliver the most in-depth answer. Hoping that there would be a chance for them to get out of their current situation alive.

 Chapter ?675 Fate of the Surviving Demonic Cultivators!

    Chapter ?675 Fate of the Surviving Demonic Cultivators!


    Having finished listening to the reason why the demonic cultivators were trying their best to escape from the Frozen Wastnds, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as a frown slowly appeared on his face.


    "So¡­ The reason why all of you are trying to escape from the Frozen Wastnd is because some powerful demonic cultivator is awakening from some sort of deep slumber?"


    "Yes! Rumours are that the one awakening is some sort of ancient demonic cultivator that was forced into a deep slumber to recover from a battle that took ce a long time ago.


    Of course, we have no idea how authentic the rumours we heard so far are but given that even True Demon Realm Experts are trying to escape, it''s easy to imagine just how terrifying this demonic cultivator is!"


    Hearing the response from one of the demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao could still not help feeling like something was wrong.


    Even if a powerful demonic cultivator appeared and a few of the True Demon Realm Experts decided to leave, it had nothing to do with these weaker demonic cultivators.


    After all, the reason why some of the True Demon Realm Experts left could be due to them having past grievances with the powerful demonic cultivator awakening or perhaps because they felt like there was a chance that the powerful demonic cultivator would find and use them to disy his strength to the rest of the Frozen Wastnds.


    All things considered, a new powerful demonic cultivator appearing in the Frozen Wastnds should have nothing to do with these weaker demonic cultivators that never entered the core parts of the Frozen Wastnds where these powerful demonic cultivators stayed!


    "Then, why did you decide to escape? Isn''t it better for you to stay in the Frozen Wastnds and join under such a powerful demonic cultivator?"


    Not able to understand why these weaker demonic cultivators had simrly chosen to run away, Xuan Hao decided to ask the group of demonic cultivators.


    "Actually¡­ the reason is rather simple, the demonic cultivator that is awakening is also know as the great demon of lust, it''s said that back when he was still around neither men nor women could escape his ws no matter how strong or weak, they were!


    Because of this, many of the demonic sects and ns from the core parts of the Frozen Wastnds escaped to the outer edges where we stay and inevitably took over the ce, we weaker demonic cultivators used to live in! Not wanting to fall prey to the great demon of lust¡­"


    "Yes, yes! Before this, the outer parts of the Frozen Wastnds rarely interacted with the core parts of the Frozen Wastnds! However, the news of the great demon of lust awakening changed all of this, as entire sects from the core part of the Frozen Wastnds uprooted themselves to settle down inside the outer edges of the Frozen Wastnds in hopes of avoiding the great demon of lust!"


    "¡­"


    Listening to the reason why so many weaker demonic cultivators were escaping from the Frozen Wastnds were trying to escape and seeing the group of demonic cultivators in front of him starting to get agitated when talking about how their territories had been taken away from them, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say.


    Of all the things he had thought about being the reason why so many demonic cultivators were leaving the Frozen Wastnds, this was not the answer he had expected¡­


    The most worrying thing about this news was the fact that some True Demon Realm Experts had decided to escape from the core of the Frozen Wastnds due to the awakening of the great demon of lust.


    This news alone was more than enough for Xuan Hao to understand that the great demon of lust should be a demonic cultivator that was stronger than ordinary True Demon Realm Expert. Maybe even a demonic cultivator that surpassed the True Demon Realm!


    At this point in time, let alone someone who had surpassed the True Demon Realm, Xuan Hao had never met someone in the True Demon Realm yet!


    Even if the Chaotic Qi Formation protecting the Shattered Star Peaks was strong, Xuan Hao had no idea if it was strong enough to resist someone who had surpassed the True Demon Realm¡­


    For this reason, Xuan Hao could not help feeling nervous knowing that a powerful demonic cultivator was going to appear inside the Frozen Wastnds.


    The only thing that prevented him from panicking after learning this news, was that the Frozen Wastnd was far toorge and the chance of the great demon of lust entering the Sky Empire was rather low¡­ And that was only considering that the great demon of lust actually left the Frozen Wastnds!


    At this point in time, Xuan Hao had yet to hear anything about experts who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm, but he was almost certain that someone like that existed in the core region of the Ewaria Continent.


    With this in mind, there was a chance that these powerful experts might act in case a powerful demonic cultivator appeared and started causing chaos!


    Of course¡­ There was no way he could be certain about any of this at the moment, as he still knew close to nothing about the core region and what took ce over there.


    For all he knew, they might not care about the demonic cultivators in the Frozen Wastnd and would just ignore them if they started attacking the dozen or so empires that bordered the Frozen Wastnds¡­


    "Your excellency¡­ Now that we answered your questions, can we-"


    Swish-!


    Knowing what the demonic cultivators wanted to ask him about, Xuan Hao didn''t bother answering them as he directly sent out a stream of sword qi that quickly split up before entering the dantian of the demonic cultivators nervously waiting.


    "Agh-!"


    "Ahhh!"


    "Nooo-!"


    Letting out screams of pain and unwillingness, the demonic cultivators had no way to resist as the sword qi that entered their dantian. Only able to scream in pain as their dantian was violently destroyed by the sword qi.


    "Y-you promised not to kill us if we answered your questions- Ah-!"


    "Indeed, I did¡­ And I''m not going to kill you as promised."


    "Then what-"


    "I only said I wouldn''t kill you¡­ I never said anything about not crippling your cultivation base!"


    Seeing the expression of disbelief on the demonic cultivators faces as they realized what was currently happening, they could not help screaming out in pain with even more unwillingnesspared to before.


    After all, to demonic cultivators like them, crippling their cultivation was worse than death!


    Not to mention, they were currently in the Frozen Wastnds. Although they might be able to survive in the short term due to their bodies still being far stronger than a normal mortal, it would not be able to stop other demonic cultivators from attacking them.


    Given that their bodies were of far higher quality and still retained some of the essence belonging to a demonic cultivator who had reached the First Demonic Transformation Realm, they would be the prime target for demonic cultivators wanting to breakthrough to the First Demonic Transformation Realm!


    Devouring them would essentially allow a normal demonic cultivator at the Peak of the Higher Demon Realm to easily break through to the First Demonic Transformation Realm!


    For Xuan Hao to not outright kill them but instead cripple their cultivation and leave them be, would essentially doom them to a fate worse than death!


    As demonic cultivators themselves, they understood this very well-


    Boom!


    Boom!


    Boom!


    And for this reason, close to half of the demonic cultivators decided to use the remaining power in their dantian before they werepletely crippled to blow themselves up. Preventing themselves from a fate of ending up getting devoured by another demonic cultivator.


    """¡­"""


    The demonic cultivators who had decided not to blow themselves up were all looking at each other with dark expressions on their faces. Not daring to say anything as they soon turned to look towards Xuan Hao with fear.


    Not only was the Domain Lord from the Sky Empire ruthless, but he had evene up with such an evil way to make sure he kept his promise with them while at the same time making sure that they would die.


    Even if they were all demonic cultivator and had done countless evil things to reach the Frist Demonic Transformation Realm, they could still not help feeling that the person in front of them was far more ruthlesspared to them.


    An exalted Domain Lord from the Sky Empire¡­ What is the difference between someone like this and a demonic cultivator!?


    "Well then, I will have to get going¡­ Good luck~"


    As all the demonic cultivators were thinking this while looking towards Xuan Hao with increasingly fearful expressions, the person in question carelessly waved goodbye before jumping into the air.


    Soon disappearing from sight.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    ¡­


    Rumble~!


    Moments after Xuan Hao left the reaming demonic cultivators could not help looking at each other with confused expressions as the ground beneath them began rumbling.


    "This is-!?"


    "Looks like it would have been a better choice to blow up earlier¡­"


    "Maybe it''s not toote, we just need to enter the Frozen Hell!


    However, not a secondter, this confusion turned into despair, as the demonic cultivators spotted arge group of demonic cultivators moving towards their current location¡­

 Chapter ?676 Bai Nings Strength is...

    Chapter ?676 Bai Ning''s Strength is...


    Solving the problem of the demonic cultivators that would attack the Ascendant Frost Hall while at the same time finding out the reason why so many demonic cultivators were trying to leave the Frozen Wastnds in less than a day, Xuan Hao didn''t see any need to stay in the Azure Sky Kingdom or the Frozen Wastnd-


    Whoosh~!


    Instead deciding to make his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect toplete the sect quest and hopefully find a way to perfectly merge his ice and sword domain together into a single domain.


    As for the remaining demonic cultivators that had already managed to enter the Azure Sky Kingdom, they would be left for the disciples and elders of the sect to deal with. At least it would serve as an excellent way to give them some realbat experience.


    No matter how great thebat hall was, it would never be able topare to a real life and death battle!


    In a way, with how chaotic the current Azure Sky Kingdom was, it had be a perfect training ground for the Foundation Establishment and Core Formation Realm disciples of the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    Given that a lot of disciples should be leaving the sect to help clean up the demonic cultivators of the Azure Sky Kingdom, it should be a perfect time for Bai Ning to go out and get somebat experience!


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help nodding his head as he got closer to the Star Shattering Sect.


    Bai Ning had close to zerobat experience and had spent most of his time since bing his disciple locked up in the sect all the time. However, even if he wanted to focus solely on cksmithing, he still needed to be capable of defending himself!n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    ¡­


    Not taking too long to return back to the Star Shattering Sect, the first thing Xuan Hao did was take out the Ascendant Frost Scroll that he had gotten from the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall before cing it inside the Grand Library of the sect with a look of expectation and nervousness on his face.


    Although the Ascendant Frost Hall''s cultivation mantra was unique, he was not sure whether or not it would qualify for the sect quest¡­


    [Sect Quest: Gather Unique Cultivation Mantras for the Sect. (Complete)]


    [Description: The sect iscking when ites to the different cultivation mantras avable for the disciples. Gather 10 unique cultivation mantras. Not one can be the same and all of them have to at least reach the Earth Rank.]


    [Unique Cultivation Mantras: 10/10] (Complete)


    [Reward: Enter a State of Enlightenment for one hour]


    "Looks like it did indeed count!" Muttering this to himself after pulling up the sect quest, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief after confirming that the sect quest had indeed beenpleted.


    Now¡­ Should I use the reward now or wait until I have more time to cultivate¡­?


    Now that the sect quest had already beenpleted, Xuan Hao could not help turning his attention towards whether or not he should use the reward from the sect quest now or wait until he was on his way to the capital of the Sky Empire.


    Although he might have more time to consume the rewards during his journey to the capital of the Sky Empire, he ran the risk of being interrupted during his travel by bandits or demon beasts that might decide to attack during this time.


    Using the reward now would not give him as much time, but he would at the very least be certain that he would be able to cultivate and consume what heprehended during the one hour of enlightenment for a few weeks without any interruptions.


    "Master? You are back already!?"


    "Ah?"


    Having unknowingly made his way back to his pce while thinking about when to use the reward from the sect quest, Xuan Hao was slightly taken aback upon hearing the voice of Bai Ning calling out to him.


    "Bai Ning, good that you are here, I actually have something to talk to you about¡­"


    Deciding to first talk with Bai Ning and inform him of his decision to send him to the Azure Sky Kingdom to get some realbat experience fighting against the bandits and demonic cultivators that roamed the kingdom at the moment, Xuan Hao put the decision about what to do regarding the sect quest reward to the side for the moment¡­


    "-And that is all. For the next few weeks, you will be going around the Azure Sky Kingdom and helping the clean-up of the kingdom!"


    Having finished exining that he nned to send him to the Azure Sky Kingdom and what he would be doing there, Xuan Hao could not help frowning after seeing the distraught expression on Bai Ning''s face after learning that he would be going to the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "M-master¡­ Are you sure I have to leave the sect?! Do I do something wrong?!"


    "Not leave the sect! You are just going to the Azure Sky Kingdom for a few weeks to gain somebat experience!"


    Feeling his frown deepen even further upon hearing what Bai Ning said, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say after seeing the increasingly depressed expression on Bai Ning''s face. From the looks of it, he wanted to avoid leaving the Star Shattering Sect!


    "Master¡­"


    "Hah¡­ No matter how much you want to focus all your attention on cksmithing, you still need to learn how to protect yourself in case something happens in the future!


    Even if your current cultivation realm is far above that of your peers, your actual strength is nowhere near your cultivation base! Fighting against someone in the same cultivation realm is not possible for you, while even someone a minor realm below you would be able to win against you with your non-existentbat experience!"


    "¡­"


    Watching as Bai Ning showed an understanding expression while at the same time blushing ever so slightly after hearing his master tell him that he was far weaker than others at his cultivation realm, Xuan Hao could not help feeling satisfied with his reaction.


    Even if Bai Ning''s cultivation realm had increased by leaps and bounds over the past few years, hisbat strength had not followed along with this rapid improvement¡­ The main reason for this was that Bai Ning focused most of his time towards cksmithing. Never dedicating more than a few hours a month to practicing in thebat hall.


    With this in mind, it was obvious that Bai Ning''s strength would be weaker than those at the same cultivation realm¡­


    "I understand master, I will go to the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­" Knowing that his master was correct, Bai Ning lowered his head as he gave up on trying to avoid going to the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    What his master had said about his current strength was indeed true and Bai Ning understood this better than anyone else. After all, the opponents he fought against in thebat hall would normally only be in the Sixth or Seventh Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm. Far from his current cultivation that had already reached the Ninth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    Thinking about it, Bai Ning did indeed feel that it was rather embarrassing for him to not even be able to fight someone at his own cultivation realm¡­


    "It''s good that you understand, I don''t expect you to be a genius when ites to fighting¡­ But I at the very least expect you to be capable of fighting someone in the same realm!"


    Nodding his head as he said this, Xuan Hao felt happy seeing that Bai Ning understood him.


    Hopefully, Bai Ning would be able to use a bit more time on training hisbat techniques after this¡­ Of course, without him stepping in to remind him¡­


    "Well then, you can get going for now, you should go meet Elder Song tomorrow and ask him to save a spot for you among the disciples that will be going to the Azure Sky Kingdom to clean the ce up!"


    Swish~


    Making his way back to his cultivation room inside the small pce after saying this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling like he had acted as a proper master for once!


    "Well then¡­ Now all that is left is deciding whether or not to use the reward from the sect quest¡­"


    Smiling a bit wryly as he turned his attention back towards the reward from the sect quest, Xuan Hao thought about it for a few minutes before finallying to a decision.


    [Use Reward: Enter a State of Enlightenment for one hour]


    [Y/N]


    "The risk of being interrupted during the journey is simply far too high¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the system interface, Xuan Hao didn''t hesitate any longer and decided to use the reward from the sect quest.


    Whoosh~


    The next moment, everything in his surroundings began shifting before he suddenly found himself sitting in apletely nk space stretching on without end in all directions around him.

 Chapter ?677 Enlightenment Space

    Chapter ?677 Enlightenment Space


    Whoosh-!


    Not having the chance to observe his surroundings, the nk space around him began rapidly changing. Transforming from apletely empty space into an endless frozen ne filled with a terrifying ice qi formed directly by the Dao of Ice. For a Domain Lord Realm Expert like Xuan Hao, this was something that was impossible to endure with his current strength!


    Crack~


    Even before he had any time to react, his divine sense that was always active in an area around his body was invaded by the ice qi and began breaking apart at a speed far too fast for Xuan Hao to react.


    Swish-!


    Not having any time to react to what was happening, the ice qi that invaded his divine sense soon began tracing it back towards him-


    Bang!


    However, before the ice qi could invade his body and turn him into a human popsicle, a thin greyish barrier had formed around him and prevented the ice qi from invading his body.


    "..."


    Not knowing what to say as everything had happened far too quickly for him to react, Xuan Hao remained sittingpletely motionless for a few seconds as he recovered from the shock of what had just happened.


    If not for the fact that he had some sort of barrier protecting him, he was certain that the ice qi floating around in the air around him would have directly killed him before he even had a chance to react!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine before turning his attention towards the greyish coloured barrier that was barely visible covering an area only a few meters around him.


    However, even after spending a few minutes observing it, he could not see through the greyish coloured barrier and was just about to try to examine more closely.


    "Hm?"


    It was at this moment that Xuan Hao suddenly noticed a small screen belonging to the system had appeared floating in the air not too far away from him at some unknown point in time.


    [Dao of Ice, Enlightenment Space: 16 Minutes Left]


    Seeing what was written on the small screen floating in the air, Xuan Hao did not take long to understand what was happening.


    The system had somehow transported him into some sort of space that would allow him toprehend the Dao of Ice!


    The enlightenment mentioned by the system was not some sort of profound state of mind he would enter but was instead referring to the system allowing him to enter a special space, that would allow him a closer proximity to the Dao and give him an easier time atprehending the dao!


    Understanding this, Xuan Hao did not bother thinking about the greyish coloured barrier protecting him as he quickly closed his eyes and tried toprehend the Dao of Ice.


    "This!?"


    Feeling how insights regarding the Dao of Ice that were untouchable and difficult to grasp started to appear inside his mind with ease after cultivating inside the enlightenment space for a short period of time, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked to the extreme.


    Not to mention perfectly merging his ice and sword domain together perfectly into a single domain, Xuan Hao had a feeling that if he could stay inside the enlightenment space for a few days, he would be able toprehend the Dao of Ice to a degree where the strength of his past attack that killed the Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivator could easily be replicated several times over!


    If I just focus all my attention on the Dao of Ice, I will...


    No!


    Feeling that his path was somewhat changing the more in-depth hisprehension of the dao of ice grew, Xuan Hao forcefully stopped himself fromprehending the dao of ice any further as he turned his attention towards the current situation taking ce inside his dantian.


    Unknowingly, as hisprehension of the Dao of Ice increased, his ice domain rapidly increased in strength and size. Making it far stronger than his sword domain!


    Looking inside his dantian, Xuan Hao could see his partially merged sword and ice domain far more closely connected with each other.


    However, upon closer inspection, this connection had nothing to do with them merging together but was instead due to his ice domain slowly devouring his sword domain!


    The somewhat unstable bnce he had created between the two domains that caused them to start merging together with each had now been broken.


    Now that his ice domain was now far stronger than his sword domain, it had begun to slowly devour it!


    Even if only for a short time, his sword domain had already weakened by a lotpared to before he had entered the enlightenment space...


    Looks like I won''t be able toprehend the Dao of Ice any longer, or I will risk my sword domain getting devoured and the time I used on trying to merge two domains together will be wasted...


    ncing up towards the system screen floating in the air that still had a few minutes left on it, Xuan Hao could not help feeling regretful as he turned, he decided to use his remaining time preventing his ice domain from weakening his sword domain and causing any further damage to it.


    ...


    Whoosh-!


    Feeling his surroundings change once again as he soon found himself in a new ce, Xuan Hao could not help breathing out a sigh of relief.


    Although he had stopped trying toprehend to Dao of Ice, the Dao of Ice was far too strong in the enlightenment space, and he had unconsciouslyprehended it even when he tried not to...


    Only after getting moved to a new space did the strength of his ice domain stop improving and he could finally let out a sigh of relief knowing that his sword domain was still there.


    Turning his attention away from the situation taking ce inside his dantian, Xuan Hao did not even have to look up at the system screen to realize what dao the current enlightenment space was connected to... The seemingly infinite number of swords in all shapes and sizes all around him was more than enough to give it away if the terrifying sword qi taking physical shape around him was not enough of a giveaway.


    [Dao of the Sword, Enlightenment Space: 20 Minutes Left]


    Yes, Xuan Hao now found himself inside the enlightenment space belonging to the Dao of the Sword! This was also the main reason why Xuan Hao was not too worried about his sword domain any longer, as he was certain it would experience a simr growth and be able to catch up to his ice domain.


    The only challenge would be to not increase its strength so much that it would end up devouring his ice domain...


    Swish~


    Although starting out growing slowly due to the suppression from the ice domain, it did not take long before his sword domain started increasing in both strength and size.


    After only a little over half of the twenty minutes had passed, his sword domain had already managed to reach the same level as his ice domain!


    Boom!


    The change caused by both of his domains once again reaching the same level was not something Xuan Hao expected, as both of them rapidly began merging together at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    Even if his sword domain was still increasing in both strength and size, it was toote for it to surpass the ice domain and try to devour it at this point in time.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    So, the ice domain devouring the sword domain was not just something bad... But it instead allowed my two domains to merge together more easily after reaching the same level of strength...


    Realizing what had happened to cause his two domains to suddenly start rapidly merging together, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked. Not knowing what to say after witnessing both of his domains getting closer and closer to merging into one.


    Fwoosh!


    Not having any ability to interfere in what was taking ce inside his dantian as his two domains merged together, Xuan Hao could not help showing an ugly expression on his face after feeling the terrible damaged that it ended up bringing to the inside of his body.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Not only did the power of his two domains rampage inside his dantian causing all sorts of damage while merging together, but the pain he felt through his soul was close to unbearable!


    The main reason why his soul felt like it would split apart at any moment, was due to the fact that it had already merged together with the two domains. Now, not only were his two domains merging together, but they were also rapidly increasing in strength the more they merged together...


    In return, as their strength increased and they got to merging together, the burden on his soul would simrly increase!


    If he could not endure this increased pressure brought by his two domains merging together... His soul would shatter and he would die!


    Something Xuan Hao did not think about before entering the Enlightenment Space created by the system, as both his domains were far weaker than they currently were after being strengthened!

 Chapter ?678 Nascent Sword Soul, Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!

    Chapter ?678 Nascent Sword Soul, Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Feeling the pain spreading throughout his soul as his two domains were getting closer and closer to merging together into a single domain, Xuan Hao focused all his attention on trying to stabilize his soul to make sure it didn''t end getting damaged by the pressure brought along by his two domains merging together.


    Opening his eyes after having momentarily stabilizing his situation, Xuan Hao looked around himself with a thoughtful expression on his face.


    How do I increase the strength of my soul enough for it to be able to handle the merger between my two domains in such a short period of time...? Perhaps...


    ncing around at the swords stuck in the ground all around him and the sword qi floating around in the air, Xuan Hao suddenly narrowed his eyes as he remembered that the next level of sword intent was rted to the soul.


    Even though he did not know much about the realm that came after reaching the True Sword Intent Realm other than the fact that it was named the Sword Soul Realm, he was currently located inside the enlightenment space for the Dao of the Sword...


    I should give it a try...


    Not seeing any other way out that could possibly increase the strength of his soul, Xuan Hao adjusted his sitting position before closing his eyes to try and see if he could truly gain any insights regarding the Sword Soul Realm that he had nevere in contact with before...


    Like this, time slowly passed with Xuan Hao trying his utmost to understand the Sword Soul Realm that came after the True Sword Intent Realm.


    Even if he had no clue about what the Sword Soul Realm was before, the enlightenment space created by the system was after all for the Dao of the Sword and although the sword intent and sword domain belonged to two different branches of the Dao of the Sword, they were ultimately still a part of it... And because of this, Xuan Hao did not take long to gain a rudimentary understanding of the Sword Soul Realm!


    ...


    To understand the Sword Soul Realm in full is really impossible in such a short period of time ...


    Shaking his head as he thought about this to himself, Xuan Hao looked up towards the screen from the system to see how much time he had left before he would be sent out from the enlightenment space rted to the Dao of the Sword.


    [Dao of the Sword, Enlightenment Space: 4 Minutes Left]


    "Although not a lot of time, I should be able to condense a nascent sword soul and increase the strength of my soul!" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he directly closed his eyes before starting the process of condensing a nascent sword soul.


    Condensing the nascent sword soul would increase the strength of the soul and could be considered to be the first step towards reaching the Sword Soul Realm.


    Given that he didn''t really have any more time left and was in rather urgent need of increasing the strength of his soul to be capable of fully merging with his new domain without getting destroyed, Xuan Hao didn''t have time to deduce any more information on the Sword Soul Realm outside of how to condense the nascent sword soul.


    Whoosh-!


    Not wasting any time and knowing what to do, Xuan Hao forcefully pulled out the sword intent that was merged together with his sword domain before condensing it into a small sword shaped object inside his dantian.


    If not for the fact that both his ice domain and sword domain were currently in a chaotic state due to them merging together with each other. Extracting the sword intent that had already merged together with his sword domain would have been close to impossible before this without forcefully destroying his own domain.


    Luckily, given the current state of things, extracting his sword intent from his sword domain did not cause any damage to sword domain outside of weakening it.


    WHOOSH-!


    However, in the end, this weakening of his sword domain only ended up bringing it back on the same level as the ice domain. Making the two domains start merging together even faster than before...


    "..."


    Not paying any attention to the chaotic situation caused inside his dantian as his two domains merged together with each other at an even faster speedpared to before, Xuan Hao carefully connected the nascent sword soul formed from the condensation of his sword intent to his soul.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Bang!


    The moment the connect between the nascent sword soul and his soul was officially established, Xuan Hao instantly felt a wave of power rushing through him as the strength of his soul rapidly started improving to a level far beyond what he had thought possible for the Domain Lord Realm.


    Not only this, but the pain to his soul brought along by his new domain slowly forming as the sword and ice domain got closer and closer to perfectly merging together also disappeared.


    At this point in time, Xuan Hao could be considered to have reached the Nascent Sword Soul Realm.


    Not truly having reached the Sword Soul Realm, but already having surpassed the True Sword Intent Realm... A transitional realm between the True Sword Intent Realm and the Sword Soul Realm.


    "This is... The situation inside my dantian is really... Bad..."


    Having strengthened his soul and dealt with the problem brought along by his two domains merging together, Xuan Hao could not help frowning upon discovering the current state of his dantian.


    If not for the fact that he had already reached the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and his survivability had reached a far higher levelpared to other Domain Lords, Xuan Hao did not doubt that the damage caused by his two domains merging together would have ended up killing him!


    Even considering the fact that he had survived so far, Xuan Hao was certain that it would at least take him a few weeks if not months to recover from the damage done to his dantian.


    And... Given that he required his dantian when it came to fighting, it would be quite impossible for him to fight anyone above the Nascent Soul Realm during this period of time...


    On the positive side of things, the damage caused by the two domains merging together had forcefully made it expand and at the same time forced him to breakthrough to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if it was not the kind of breakthrough Xuan Hao had expected, he was more than satisfied upon realizing that he had actually unknowingly broken through to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    BOOOOOOM-!


    Just at this moment, Xuan Hao suddenly felt like a violent explosion went off inside his dantian, further damaging it...


    "They finally finished merging together!"


    However, Xuan Hao did not care about the extra damage to his dantian, as he was instead far more focused on the origin of the violent eruption of energy inside his dantian... His two domains sessfully merging together to form a brand-new domain!


    Whoosh~


    Using the limited space avable to him inside the enlightenment space, Xuan Hao excitedly used thest bit of energy left inside his half destroyed dantian to try out his new domain.


    "So... This is my new domain...?"


    Seeing an almostpletely transparent domain unfurling around him, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly for a short moment before a happy expression reced it.


    Outside of the fact that he could not fully use his domain due to the current abysmal state of his dantian, he could clearly feel the ice-cold qi belonging to his ice domain and at the same time he could also very clearly feel the sharp sword qi belonging to his sword domain.


    If he wanted to use the Descend of the Ice God''s Sword that he had used to kill the demonic cultivator, it would only take a single thought to merge the two different powers together with each other.


    Although... The energy consumption from using the Descend of the Ice God''s Sword would still limit its usage. Unless absolutely necessary, it was definitely not a good idea to use such a powerful attack that would drain almost all of his strength...


    Whish~


    "Hah... Indeed... I can''t fully use my domain now due to the current state of my dantian..."


    Feeling the domain around him fading as he was reminded about the current state of his dantian, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head before catching sight of the screen floating in the air indicating the time, he had left inside the enlightenment space.


    Although condensing his nascent sword soul and the merger between his two domains felt like they took hours, they didn''t take more than a few minutes in total.


    [Dao of the Sword, Enlightenment Space: 19 Seconds Left]


    Hm? Now that I think about it... I spent 20 minutes inside the enlightenment space for the Dao of Ice and 20 minutes inside the enlightenment space for the Dao of the Sword... I should still have 20 minutes left!


    I wonder... What would thest enlightenment space b-


    Whoosh-!


    Not having a chance to finish his train of thought, Xuan Hao suddenly felt the familiar sensation of everything around him changing as he was moved to a new enlightenment space...

 Chapter ?679 Dao of...

    Chapter ?679 Dao of...


    As his surroundings began changing, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he got to work on healing his damaged dantian.


    Whoosh~!


    Only after feeling the now familiar sensation of something capable of killing him just outside the greyish barrier formed by the system, Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes to inspect the new environment that he found himself inside of.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Wiggle~


    "A... Tentacle growing from the ground...?"


    By far, the thing that caught Xuan Hao''s attention the moment he opened his eyes, was a weird tentacle like nt sticking out from the ground just outside the greyish barrier formed by the system...


    Wiggle~ Wiggle~


    No... Not only did it stick out from the ground and wiggle around weirdly, but it was also very clearly poking the greyish barrier trying to get to him!


    Not knowing what to say when he saw the tentacle continuing to try and get inside the greyish barrier and reach him to no avail, Xuan Hao decided to ignore the tentacle like nt wiggling around just a few meters away from him as he began inspecting the environment outside.


    "This... What kind of dao is this enlightenment space for...?" Not able to stop himself from showing a horrified and at the same time curious expression upon looking around himself, Xuan Hao had no idea how to feel after witnessing the environment he found himself in the middle of.


    The ground had a dark purplish hue and almost seemed alive, while at the same time looking like it was decaying into some sort of ck mass in several different locations. At the same time, countless weird tentacles, simr to the one just beside where he was sitting, moved around in all sorts of weird ways.


    However, this was not the only weird thing about the current enlightenment space he found himself inside of... Instead... The truly horrifying thing was the countless deformed, twisted, grotesque, ugly bizarre creatures aimlessly wandering the endless, decaying, tentacle infested, ne!


    Even if he had seen many different demon beasts through his divine sense after having travelled around by himself and with his disciples, Xuan Hao felt that he could not even begin to describe the appearance of these horrifying creatures... Words were simply far from enough to describe the horrifying appearance of these seemingly mindless creatures wandering around the purple tentacle infested nes!


    "So... It''s the Dao of Corruption..."


    [Dao of Corruption, Enlightenment Space: 20 Minutes Left]


    Reading the words on the screen made by the system presented to him, Xuan Hao could only turn to look around himself with a confused expression stered all over his face.


    Why had the system brought him to an enlightenment space for the Dao of Corruption?


    Was it perhaps because he didn''tprehend more than two different paths of the dao so far and he had as a result ended up in a random enlightenment space... Or perhaps, he was connected to the Dao of Corruption in a way that he had yet to discover himself...


    No matter what it is... Learning about a new dao should not be a bad thing. Even if the dao in question seems a bit... special...


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao put the injuries inside his dantian aside for the moment as he sat down and closed his eyes to focus on trying toprehend the Dao of Corruption.


    Hoping to at the very least gain some sort of rudimentary understanding of it so he could at the very least get some idea about what the environment and horrifying creatures wandering around outside the greyish barrier of the system were about.


    Like this, Xuan Hao ended up spending the next twenty minutes fully absorbed in the Dao of Corruption. Doing his absolute best trying to grasp this new dao.


    ...


    "In the end, I could only barely start understanding a few basic things rted to the Dao of Corruption..." Muttering this to himself as he opened his eyes and looked up towards the screen formed by the system slowly counting down thest few seconds, he had left inside the enlightenment space, Xuan Hao could not help feeling disappointed that he would not be able to stay for longer.


    The few basic things he had managed toprehend from the Dao of Corruption so far, did not only help him gain a better understanding into several other Daos that were connected to the Dao of Corruption like the Dao of Decay and the Dao of Death... But he also noticed that his soul had grown a tiny bit stronger afterprehending a small part of the Dao of Corruption.


    In a way,prehending the Dao should be another way to increase the strength of one''s soul... Although, it was a far slower way to do so.


    Even after spending twenty minutesprehending the Dao of Corruption inside the enlightenment space, the improvement and increase in strength brought to his soul was negligible whenpared to the qualitive change brought to his soul after he condensed his nascent sword soul and connected it together with his soul.


    However, even with all of this in mind,prehending the different Daos would be something that he could continue doing, while he could only condense one nascent sword soul...


    Whoosh-!


    As Xuan Hao was lost in thought thinking about the sudden increase in strength his soul had experienced, the environment once again began shifting around him as the horrifying creatures and the decaying purple environment of the enlightenment space belonging to the Dao of Corruption disappeared.


    Not even a second passed before the familiar soft sensation of the pillow he would normally sit on during cultivation could be felt beneath him.


    Yes... Xuan Hao used a very fluffy andfortable pillow made of extremely high-grade materials when cultivating. After all, who would choose to sit on some cold and hard bamboo mat for weeks if not months, if they could choose not to...


    "I''m back..."


    Making sure that he had indeed returned back to his cultivation room, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief.


    Although entering the enlightenment space had indeed been very beneficial to him. Allowing him to both merge his two domains together and at the same time breakthrough to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, it also ended up putting his life in danger!


    Even if he did not end up getting too seriously injured, it would still take weeks if not months for him to recover the damage that the merger between his two domains had caused to his dantian...


    "Hopefully I should be able to stabilize my cultivation, while at the same time repairing most of my dantian by the time I will have to leave for the Sky Empire..." Muttering this to himself as he thought about his slowly approaching trip to the capital city of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit nervous.


    Even though he had already managed to merge his two domains together and reached the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he had no idea how he wouldpare to someone who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Hah... For now, I should focus on repairing my dantian..."


    Knowing that it would not make any difference to try and guess how he wouldpare to a Soul Ascension Realm Expert when he had never had the chance to encounter one before, Xuan Hao decided to not think too much about it and instead to dedicate his time towards repairing his dantian.


    Even if his dantian could not fully recover in time for the journey to the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao wanted to at the very least have the strength to fight someone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    After all, travelling to the core of the Sky Empire was not safe for someone who had yet to reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    The Sky Empire could still keep order in certain ces, like the core of their empire... But the different kingdoms that were under them were not the same...


    Not to mention that there would be all sorts of powerful demon beasts along the way, there would also be all sorts of cultivators looking for an easy target to rob for cultivation resources to increase their own strength!


    For Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, the journey to the capital of the Sky Empire from the border region of the Sky Empire was an extremely dangerous journey that could take months if not years toplete!


    This was also one of the main reasons why the Sky Empire had given a three-year notice to the sects that would be a part of the sect alliance... Most of these sects did not have anyone in the Domain Lord Realm and the strongest person would in most cases be someone in the Half Step Domain Lord Realm or someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    For sects like this... Even three years might not be enough time for them to reach the capital of the Sky Empire!

 Chapter ?680 Annoying Young Girl

    Chapter ?680 Annoying Young Girl


    As Xuan Hao was focused on repairing his dantian ever since he had returned from the enlightenment space, Chu Yang had ended up bing the one to train together with Bai Ning for thest few days before he would be leaving for the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Not only making sure that Bai Ning managed to learn how to properly fight as someone in the Foundation Establishment, but also to make sure that he understood how to deal with certain situation that mighte up during his time in the Azure Sky Kingdom fighting demonic cultivators, bandits, and other troublemakers...


    "Good luck with helping out in the Azure Sky Kingdom, but¡­ You have to remember what I said earlier. Never take a fight you are not certain about. Keeping your life is the most important thing!"


    "I understand senior brother¡­!"


    Waving a final goodbye to his senior brother, Chu Yang, Bai Ning quickly made his way towards the gathering ce for the rest of the disciples who were going to the Azure Sky Kingdom. Feeling a little less bad about leaving the sect for some time after training with Chu Yang over the past few days.


    Even if he was still unwilling to leave and just wanted to stay inside the sect and practice his cksmithing. At the very least now, he felt curious about how his strength wouldpare against the other Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators of the Star Shattering Sect, a part of him wanted to prove to his master that he was not worse than someone who had reached the same cultivation realm as him¡­


    "Now that everyone is here, let''s get going!"


    Following Bai Ning reaching the ce where the rest of the disciples gathered in preparation for leaving the sect and going to the Azure Sky Kingdom, it did not take long before he soon found himself leaving the Shattered Star Peaks under the protection of a group of Nascent Soul Realm Elders that would be in charge of protecting them from the stronger demonic cultivators that were hiding inside the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    ¡­


    Riding the demonic beasts kept by the sect to travel, Bai Ning nned to spend his time during the journey on trying to think of all sorts of different artifacts that he would make after returning to the sect again¡­ However-


    "I have never seen you during any of the lectures before¡­ Are you perhaps an Inner Disciple!?"


    Another disciple of the sect was sitting together with him on the demonic beast and from the moment that they had gotten on top of the demonic beast¡­ She hadn''t stopped trying to talk to him!


    Even him ignoring her for the first half hour pretending like he was cultivating did not help, as she would try and ask him again only a few minutester¡­


    "Still not awake¡­ Is it really that important to cultivate at a time like this¡­"


    Hearing the all too familiar sounding words, Bai Ning could not help letting out a quiet sigh as hemented over the fact that he did not try to ask his master to help him get to the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    After all, without his master''s help, the journey to the Azure Sky Kingdom would at the very least take half a week on demonic beasts. Maybe even an entire week depending on how long they rested!


    Something Bai Ning didn''t think about before he set off together with the sect elders and other disciples from the sect¡­


    "Hm? W-w-what is that?!"


    Suddenly hearing the young girl sitting on top of the demonic beast together with him suddenly exim loudly in a surprised voice when he was deep in thought thinking about how much he had messed up by not asking his master for help in getting to the Azure Sky Kingdom, Bai Ning could not help opening both of his eyes to see what had surprised the young girl.


    "Haha! I knew it! You are not cultivating!"


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as he stared directly into the eyes of the young girl in question that had climbed in front of him at some point in time, Bai Ning had no idea what to say after realizing that her earlier exmation had only been a way for her to confirm whether or not he was truly cultivating¡­


    This girl¡­ Is smarter than I expected¡­


    Not thinking anymore about it, Bai Ning decided to pretend nothing had happened as he slowly closed his eyes and ignored the triumphant expression on the young girl''s face-


    "Hey! Don''t just close your eyes again!"


    Not intend on allowing him to escape, the young girl did not n to give up so easily after knowing that Bai Ning was just pretending to cultivate to ignore her.


    Rustle~


    Hm?


    Not able to see anything with his eyes closed, Bai Ning could not help feeling like something bad was about to happen after suddenly hearing a rustling sounding from the ce where the saddle, he was sitting on top of was connected and secured around the demon beast.


    "Don''t-!"


    Opening his eyes only to she the annoying girl in question trying with great difficulty to loosen his saddle, Bai Ning quickly sprang into action and stopped her before she had a chance to do anything.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Hmph! Prepared to not ignore me anymore?"


    "Yes¡­"


    Seeing the clearly triumphant expression on the annoying girl''s face, Bai Ning could not help rolling his eyes before agreeing.


    The annoying girl in question was very clearly smaller than him and should be no more than 14 or 13 years old, a few years young than him who was just about to reach the age of 16¡­


    If she was any older than this, Bai Ning would not have been so kind to her after she had annoyed him for so long¡­


    "So, I have never seen you during any of the lectures held by the different elders before¡­ Could it be that you are really an Inner Disciple¡­ Maybe even a personal disciple of one of the elders!?"


    "No, I''m not an Inner Disciple¡­ I''m a personal disciple and the reason why you haven''t seen me during any of the lectures is mostly because I spent most of my time focused on cksmithing. Not cultivation!"


    "Hm~ I see¡­ I''m still an Outer Disciple, but I already reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, so the elders allowed me to go on this trip to the Azure Sky Kingdom. Apparently, it will be a good chance for me to improve my strength!


    If I do well, the elders even told me that I would have a chance to get promoted from an Outer Sect Disciple to an Inner Sect Disciple! By the way¡­ Why did you join this trip to the Azure Sky Kingdom? To get stronger? Fight demonic cultivators¡­ Or maybe get your hands on some kind of rare spiritual herb located inside the Azure Sky Kingdom which location only you know about?"


    Listening to the annoying girl get all excited after hearing his answer before asking him a new reason, Bai Ning could not help regretting the fact that he even answered her question in the first ce¡­ And for some reason, thest reason she gave for joining the trip to the Azure Sky Kingdom seemed oddly specific¡­


    "My master told me to participate in helping deal with the demonic cultivators in the Azure Sky Kingdom to gain morebat experience."


    "Good reason, a lot of the other disciples are here for simr reasons. Although¡­ Most of them are also here for the contribution points that can be obtained from killing demonic cultivators.


    Hah¡­ with enough contribution points, you can get everything you need to help increase your safety when out adventuring or make it easier to increase your cultivation realm! If I could just get a few more contribution points, I would be more than safe going to that ce¡­"


    "¡­"


    Seeing the annoying young girl show a dazed look on her face after mentioning the contribution points that could be obtained through killing demonic cultivators, Bai Ning felt like he managed to find out one of the main reasons why the annoying young girl decided to participate in the trip to the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    For some reason, Bai Ning had a feeling that it was connected to some kind of rare spiritual herb hidden inside a dangerous ce that happened to be located in the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­


    "Ah! Did¡­ Did I perhaps say thest part out loud¡­?"


    "Yes¡­"


    "W-well, let''s change the topic! What is your name? My name is Hui Ying!"


    "My name is Bai Ning. By the way, what is the ce you mentioned just now? Something dangerous¡­?"


    Watching as the annoying young girl going by the name of Hui Ying was starting to get both embarrassed and nervous at the same time, Bai Ning decided to not let go of the small slip she had.


    After all, she was the one who had been annoying him for the past half hour! There was no way he would allow her to escape without paying a price¡­

 Chapter ?681 Hidden Records...

    Chapter ?681 Hidden Records...


    "That... I... It''s not something important! Hmph, I-I have to cultivate now, don''t disturb me!"


    Panicking after hearing Bai Ning asking about her slip up, Hui Ying pouted with an embarrassed expression on her face before escaping to the back of the demonic beast they were sitting on top of. Not wasting a second before closing her eyes tightly and starting to cultivate.


    From the reaction alone, Bai Ning became even more certain that this annoying girl called Hui Ying did indeed n to go to the Azure Sky Kingdom for something that was not rted to getting promoted to an Inner Disciple or earning contribution point.


    "However, it has nothing to do with me. At least this way, I won''t get bothered any more during the rest of the journey to the Azure Sky Kingdom..." Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while ncing towards Hui Ying, Bai Ning simrly closed his eye before resuming what he had been doing before Hui Ying had started annoying him.


    In his opinion, there was no need for himself to get involved with someone like Hui Ying. Especially considering the fact that she was most definitely nning to do something dangerous after reaching the Azure Sky Kingdom...


    After thest few days, he had spent under the guidance of his senior brother Chu Yang, Bai Ning had grown confident in dealing with people who had simrly reached the Ninth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm like himself.


    At this point in time, all Bai Ning wanted to do, wasplete the task of hunting down a few demonic cultivators in the Azure Sky Kingdom before returning to the Star Shattering Sect again and prove to his master that he could indeed fight someone at the same realm as himself!


    Finding out what the annoying girl called Hui Ying was up to was really not something Bai Ning nned to waste his time on. Especially considering that the time in question could be spent on way more important things... Like forging new artifacts!


    "Now... I wonder what kind of artifact I should make after returning...!"


    Having managed to make Hui Ying stop talking to him and instead focus on quietly cultivating without saying anything, the rest of the journey towards the Azure Sky Kingdom went off without anything major happening, Bai Ning focusing most of his attention towards trying toe up with a new artifact he could make after returning to the sect.


    During this journey, the only thing that really ended up happening that momentarily slowed down the progress, was some random group of bandits that overestimated their strength and tried to rob them when they were just about to reach the border between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    Of course... These bandits were quickly dealt with by the elders, who were more than happy to show off in front of the disciples of the sect.


    Like this, Bai Ning officially managed to reach the Azure Sky Kingdom after a little over four days of travel on demonic beasts.


    ...


    "Hm... Bai Ning should have reached the Azure Sky Kingdom at this point in time..."


    Having recovered part of his dantian after remaining in secluded cultivation since returning from the enlightenment space, Xuan Hao slowly looked in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Although he had been the one who had ended up forcing Bai Ning to go and get some real-lifebat experience in the Azure Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao could still not help feeling nervous when thinking about his disciple.


    After all, even if there were a lot of elders present who had already reached the Nascent Soul Realm and the strongest demonic cultivators still left inside the Azure Sky Kingdom should at most have reached the Peak of the Core Formation.


    In the worst-case scenario, a demonic cultivatorpared to the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm would still be hiding somewhere inside the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    However, given that there were so many elders in the Nascent Soul Realm present, the appearance of such a powerful demonic cultivator should instantly alert them and cause them to rush over.


    Even if the worst-case scenario really happened and Bai Ning was unfortunate enough to be the one to encounter the demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao had already made sure to secretly leave some of his power on his disciple before he left.


    Even if the strength of the power was extremely limited due to his current condition, it should be more than enough to not only warn him if something ended up happening, but it would also be more than strong enough to keep his disciple safe in case he encountered a powerful opponent in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    All things considered, even if he was in weakened state. At the end of the day, he was still someone at the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Even a tiny part of his power was more than enough to stop anyone below the Domain Lord Realm!


    Knock Knock!


    "Master, the sect master is here!"


    Just as he was lost in thought thinking about how Bai Ning was doing, the voice of Zhi Ruo could be heard together with a light knocking sound from the door leading into his cultivation room.


    "Well, I guess I forgot to inform anyone that I would be in secluded cultivation... You can just send him in." Whispering the first part to himself, Xuan Hao soon shook his head before informing Zhi Ruo to just let Feng Chene in.


    In the first ce, he had already woken up from his meditation to recover the injuries inside his dantian and there was no reason why not to see Feng Chen. Not to mention, given that he hade all the way to him meant that he had something important to say...


    Creak~!


    "Xuan Hao! I"


    Not even a minute passed after Zhi Ruo left before Feng Chen almost busted into the room without the slightest respect, a clearly excited expression stered all over his face as he called out to him.


    "First of all, calm down before you start speaking... Zhi Ruo, can you bring us some tea and a few light snacks?"


    "Yes! I will be back shortly."


    Rolling his eyes seeing just how excited Feng Chen was, Xuan Hao decided to first calm him down while calling for Zhi Ruo to get a few snacks and some tea for them in the meantime.


    ...


    "Hah... I''m sorry for my earlier behaviour..."n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Drinking the tea Zhi Ruo had brought for them, Feng Chen could not help apologising for his earlier behaviour when he had rushed into Xuan Hao''s cultivation room.


    "No need to worry about it. Now that you have calmed down, can you perhaps exin the reason for your sudden visit and excitement? To be honest, it was quite shocking to suddenly see you burst into my room with so much energy..."


    Not at all bothered by how Feng Chen had acted, Xuan Hao was more curious about what had caused him to act like he did.


    Given that he had already reached the Domain Lord Realm, things that could cause him to grow as excited as he currently was, would definitely not be something simple. Maybe it could even be that he managed to find something that would be able to help increase hist strength...


    "Haha! I understand what you mean and the reason why I rushed over here is simple... Do you remember the entrance to some sort of mystic realm that appeared next to your old pavilion?"


    "Yes... What about it- Did you perhaps manage to find out something about it in the records of the sect!?"


    At first nodding his head in understanding after hearing what Feng Chen said, Xuan Hao suddenly understands the reason why he hade to see him and could not help showing a surprised expression on his face.


    After all, the elders of the sect familiar with the sect''s records had already looked through the records for anything rted to the mystic realm that had been hidden next to his pavilion and didn''t find anything back then!


    What had suddenly happened for them to find out something now...?


    "Hehe, I understand what you are thinking right now. The reason why we didn''t find out anything before, was indeed because there was nothing about it in our sect''s records... But two days ago, when going through the old record hall back in the Flying Sword Sect, one of the elders in charge of managing the few less important records that are still kept in the Flying Sword Sect stumbled over a concealment formation hidden behind one of therge bookshelves!


    After informing the rest of the elders, I was soon informed and made a trip back to the sect. After arriving it did not take long for me to undo the already decaying protection formations hidden behind the concealment formation. Behind these formations, there were dozens of records from when our sect was first established... And among them was one about a mystic realm entrance located inside the sect! Here, take a look!"


    Hearing what Feng Chen told him, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face before taking the old worn-down book Feng Chen handed over to him.

 Chapter ?682 Mirage Sects Mystic Realm

    Chapter ?682 Mirage Sect''s Mystic Realm


    "Mirage Sect''s Mystic Realm¡­?"


    From the name on the front of the book Feng Chen had given him, it was easy to tell that the mystic realm had once belonged to a sect that was good at illusion techniques. Even without being able to enter the mystic realm, Xuan Hao could already guess how much of a pain it would be to explore¡­


    At least I won''t be the one to explore the mystic realm. After all, even if I could destroy the barrier guarding the entrance with my current strength, the entrance to the mystic realm would also end up getting destroyed in the process.


    I''m still far away from being able to lock onto the spatial coordinates of a secret realm¡­ Let alone a natural mystic realm that had once been controlled by an ancient sect!


    Currently only Chu Yang had reached the Nascent Soul Realm and had the qualifications to explore the mystic realm¡­ But Qing Yi was already preparing for her breakthrough and should not be too far away from reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    After her breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm, the two of them could explore the mystic realm together. This way, it would also be safer for both of them when exploring an unknown mystic realm that had once belonged to an ancient sect that had existed a long time ago!


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao soon opened the book before starting to read through it. The matter of exploring the mystic realm could be left to his disciples after they reached the Nascent Soul Realm!


    The Mirage Sect''s Branch Mystic Realm.


    "So, they have more than one mystic realm under them¡­"


    Just after opening up the old book about the Mirage Sect''s Mystic Realm, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly after reading the first line on the first page of the old book.


    From the looks of things, the Mirage Sect should have been a powerful sect when they were still around. After all, the size of a mystic realm was normally farrger than a secret realm.


    For the Mirage Sect to call a mystic realm a branch mystic realm, it was easy to imagine that they should have at least one more mystic realm under them where their sect was located¡­ Maybe they had far more mystic realms under them!


    No matter what it was, it was obvious just how powerful the Mirage Sect had been!


    "A pity¡­ The Branch Mystic Realm of the Mirage Sect does not allow anyone above the Nascent Soul Realm to enter¡­"


    Realizing just how powerful the Mirage Sect had been, Xuan Hao could not help regretting the fact that he could not enter the mystic realm himself. Given the strength of the Mirage Sect, he should be able to find out more information about the Soul Ascension Realm. Even information on realms above the Soul Ascension Realm would not be too unrealistic to find in a ce like that!


    All he could do at this point in time was wait for his disciples to explore the mystic realm¡­


    Rustle~


    Continuing to read through the old book Feng Chen had handed him aftering to terms with the fact that he had no way to enter the Mirage Sect''s Branch Mystic Realm, Xuan Hao only ended up growing more regretful the more he read¡­


    ording to the old book, the mystic realm not only contained a branch of the ancient Mirage Sect, but the majority of the mystic realm had been modified by the Mirage Sect and had been split into several different and unique environments with all sorts of demon beasts and spiritual herbs.


    The reason for this modification, was to make the mystic realm serve as a training ground for the disciples of the Mirage Sect. After the mystic realm had been forcefully modified, the disciples would be able to train in these different unique environments against all sorts of simrly unique demon beasts that would challenge the disciples in their own way.


    The spiritual herbs and other natural treasures spread out across all of these different environments could be said to be a reward that the seniors of the Mirage Sect had left for the disciples to find after oveing different challenges inside the different training environments of the mystic realm.


    After so many years had passed since the Mirage Sect had disappeared, it was impossible to tell what dangers lurked inside the mystic realm. After all, even if the Mirage Sect had disappeared from the mystic realm, the different demon beasts were still around and had likely grown far stronger than originally intended without the seniors and elders of the Mirage Sect there to keep them from growing too strong¡­


    "Given how much time has passed, there should at the very least be some demon beasts at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, a demon beast that has reached the Domain Lord Realm appearing is not too unrealistic either¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao quickly realized just how dangerous it would be for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm to enter and explore the mystic realm belonging to the Mirage Sect.


    Even if most of the demon beasts inside the mystic realm should at most be around the Core Formation Realm and the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm, there would definitely be a few more powerful ones that had reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul or even exceeded it!


    At the same time, the spiritual herbs inside the mystic realm and the prospect of exploring the ruins of a once mighty sect that possibly had experts above the Soul Ascension was not something that could easily be ignored¡­


    But¡­ Howe this book about the Mirage Sect''s Mystic Realm was hidden inside the Flying Sword Sect¡­?


    Thinking about it, Xuan Hao could really note up with any reason as to why the Flying Sword Sect would have any information on a mystic realm that belonged to an ancient sect like the Mirage Sect.


    All things considered, the Flying Sword Sect had only existed a little over a thousand years before merging together with the Spring Flower Sect to form the Star Shattering Sect, there was no way for such a young sect where the most powerful person had only reached the Nascent Soul Realm 10 years earlier could obtain such an ancient book.


    "Hm?"


    Now that I think about it¡­ The founder is rather odd, he brought all sorts of precious Heaven Rank cultivation mantras with him when establishing the Flying Sword Sect. Now a hidden room filled with old books detailing ancient information of a long-gone era has also been found¡­ No matter how I look at it, the old books Feng Chen and the rest of the elders found should be connected to the founder¡­!


    Narrowing his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help turning to look towards Feng Chen who was quietly enjoying his tea while waiting for him to finish reading through the old book with information on the mystic realm.


    "Sect Master¡­ Can I perhaps ask you about something?"


    "Hm? What is it? Why the sudden respectful tone?"


    Hearing Xuan Hao suddenly address him in a formal and respectful way, Feng Chen could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he looked towards Xuan Hao with a surprised expression on his face.


    Considering the fact that he was still the sect master, there was nothing weird with Xuan Hao addressing him respectfully with his title¡­ The only problem was¡­ It was Xuan Hao¡­ The current strongest expert of the sect!


    Not to mention, Feng Chen had already grown used to them talking normally with each other after Xuan Hao had entered the sect.


    "Ahm¡­ My bad¡­ Feng Chen, how much do you know about the founder of our sect- The Flying Sword Sect?"


    Asking the question on his mind, Xuan Hao could not help staring attentively at Feng Chen waiting for a response.


    Although he had heard a bit of information about the founder of the Flying Sword Sect before, it had always been covered in a veil of mystery and had never truly rified anything about where he hade from or why he had decided to establish the Flying Sword Sect.


    The only real information that he had heard so far was that the founder had escaped from somewhere and decided to quietly set up the Flying Sword Sect. Later, he had ended up disappearing. Leaving the sect''s management to an old elder in the Nascent Soul Realm who hadter be Feng Chen''s master.


    After the old elder''s lifespan ran out and he died, Feng Chen had ended up taking over as the Sect Master of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Any other information about the founder was impossible to find, be it his appearance or his cultivation realm.


    To be honest, Xuan Hao was not even sure about the gender of the founder. For all he knew, even if the founder was mostly depicted as a man in most of the records, with how limited the information on the founder was, he could also have been a woman!

 Chapter ?683 Founder of the Flying Sword Sect and Ancient Seal

    Chapter ?683 Founder of the Flying Sword Sect and Ancient Seal


    "The founder¡­ To be honest, what I know about our founder is not much more than you. After all, when I joined the Flying Sword Sect back then, the founder had already disappeared over 200 years earlier, and my master was the one in charge of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Not to mention, the Flying Sword Sect was in a rather unstable situation inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom when I joined.


    In the end, I spent all my time trying to get stronger to help lessen the burden on my master''s shoulders. Asking about the founder who had disappeared hundreds of years ago was never something I thought about¡­"


    Shaking his head as he said this, Feng Chen showed a sad expression when talking about his now gone master. Clearly reminiscing about his time struggling to increase his strength and help his master stabilize the situation of the Flying Sword Sect inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    "¡­"


    Seeing that Feng Chen was reminiscing about his past, Xuan Hao decided to not interrupt him as he slowly drank the tea in front of him while waiting for Feng Chen to finish reminiscing.


    At the same time, he could not help frowning upon thinking about the founder of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Even Feng Chen who had been the sect master of the Flying Sword Sect for hundreds of years had no idea about who the founder of the sect was nor did he have any clue about his origins and for what reason the Flying Sword Sect had even been established directly at the entrance to a mystic realm connected to the ancient Mirage Sect.


    No matter how he looked at it, everything about the founder was simply too suspicious¡­


    Could the founder be someone from the Mirage Sect? No, the Mirage Sect is clearly a sect that existed tens of thousands of years ago if not hundreds of thousands of years ago¡­ But if the founder is not from the ancient Mirage Sect, how did he gain information on the mystic realm and the fact that it belonged to the ancient Mirage Sect?


    What could it be, was the founder perhaps someone who lost power in a certain powerful empire and escaped to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to slowly recover with the help of the mystic realm?


    But then again¡­ To gain information on a mystic realm that had once belonged to an ancient sect like the Mirage Sect, there is no way the founder would have simply been someone in the Nascent Soul Realm! But if that''s the case, the mystic realm would have beenpletely useless...!


    "Haaaah¡­"


    Feeling like his brain was starting to hurt thinking about the founder and his or her origin, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a long-drawn-out sigh before deciding not to think about it anymore.


    The origin of the founder of the Flying Sword Sect was shrouded in a veil of mystery and he had no way to see through it and understand the actions of the founder nor get any clue as to why the founder had suddenly disappeared only a few dozen years after the establishment of the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Ah- My bad¡­ I just cked out for a moment there¡­"


    "No worries."


    Just at this moment, Feng Chen woke back up from his dazed state with a slightly embarrassed expression on his face.


    "Ahm¡­ Back to your question¡­ The founder... What did master say about the founder when going over the sect''s history back then¡­ Hm¡­"


    Recovering from his embarrassed state, Feng Chen tried his best to remember anything his master might have told him in the past about the founder-


    "Now that I think about, I think my master mentioned something about the founder just before he left this world¡­ But¡­ Back then, I was too sad upon finding out that my master was going to pass away to properly listen to anything he said¡­"


    Recalling the event in question, Feng Chen sorrowfully looked in the direction of the Flying Sword Sect before focusing back on the matter at hand.


    "If I''m not wrong, my master told me that the reason for the founder''s disappearance had something to do with an ancient seal weakening."


    "An ancient seal!? Did your master mention anything else?"


    "Yes¡­ If I''m not wrong, my master also mentioned that the founder had already settled part of the seal hidden in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom before leaving for the Frozen Wastnd where another part of the seal was hidden!


    Thest time my master heard from the Founder was just before the founder left for the seal located in the Frozen Wastnds¡­!"


    Even if he had not been able to remember what his master had told him back then due to not wanting to remember the sadness of losing his master, Feng Chen easily managed to recall it when he truly wanted to.


    After all, all things considered, he was still a Nascent Soul Realm Expert and had the ability to easily recall any moment in his life if he wanted to put in the effort of looking through his old memories.


    "Ancient Seal? Part of the seal is located in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ And¡­ Another part of the seal is located in the Frozen Wastnds¡­"


    Going over what Feng Chen had just told him, Xuan Hao could not help frowning.


    The two parts of the ancient seal that Feng Chen had just mentioned could not be rted to the seal located below the Raging me Sect and the mysterious crack that randomly teleported around the Frozen Tundra¡­ Right?


    After all, back when I first encountered the seal below the Raging me Sect back then, I had just recently broken through to the Domain Lord Realm and the ck miasma located there was more than strong enough to instantly kill me¡­ And that was not to mentioning the creature hiding inside the ck miasma!n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Shaking his head as he thought back to his encounter with the decayed pce and the ck miasma below the Raging me Sect, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a certain degree of fear towards whatever had been sealed away inside the ck miasma.


    If not for the divine runes making up the seal of that ce, it was doubtful whether or not he would have been able to escape alive back then!


    Even after reaching the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao understood that the existence being sealed below the Raging me Sect was far beyond his cultivation realm. Even reaching the Soul Ascension Realm did not feel like it would be enough for him to face whatever had been sealed below the Raging me Sect in the ancient past¡­


    But¡­ If the seal below the Raging me Sect is truly only a single part of arger seal, would that not mean what I encountered back then was just a part of that creature¡­


    Slurp~


    Not daring to think any further about it as he shivered at the thought of facing an unknown creature that had almost certainly surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao silently drank his already cold tea.


    Deep down, he understood that to ensure the safety of not only the Shattering Star Sect but also himself, he had to find out more about the creature that was sealed below the Raging me Sect and more importantly¡­ Find out how it was connected to the ancient seal that Feng Chen''s master had talked about!


    Especially considering the fact that the seal below the Raging me Sect might be weakening if it was truly a part of the ancient seal that the founder had told Feng Chen''s master about!


    "Looks like I will have to visit the seal below the Raging me Sect before leaving for the Sky Empire''s capital¡­"


    Silently whispering this to himself when Feng Chen was upied trying to remember if there was anything else about the founder that he might have forgotten to mention, Xuan Hao silently decided to visit the seal he had found located below the Raging me Sect before leaving for the Sky Empire''s capital.


    ¡­


    "Haaa¡­ Xuan Hao, I don''t think there is anything other than the ancient seal that master said the founder was going to check up on¡­"


    "No worries at all, the information you provided me is more than enough! And¡­ You should still not have finished looking through the ancient records you just found recently. Maybe after looking through them, you might be able to find out more information about the founder!"


    "Hm¡­ What you say makes sense¡­ I hurried over here the moment I found out one of the old books contained information about the mystic realm and had no time to look through any of the other books and records we found!"


    "Haha, I thought so!"


    "Well then¡­ I will get going and see if I can find anything!"


    Swish~!


    Seeing Feng Chen leaving, Xuan Hao could not help looking deeply at the book containing information on the mystic realm entrance located inside the Flying Sword Sect.


    From the looks of it¡­ The founder of the Flying Sword Sect was far more mysterious than he had first expected¡­

 Chapter ?684 Unfortunate Demonic Cultivator...

    Chapter ?684 Unfortunate Demonic Cultivator...


    Having decided to check out the seal located below the now destroyed Raging me Sect, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time in checking out how much his dantian had recovered over the past few days since his two domains had merged together and he had sessfully reached the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Still nowhere near fully recovered¡­ Looks like I will have to wait until I recover more before going to check out the seal below the Raging me Sect."


    Seeing that the state of his dantian was still far from good enough for him to enter the underground below the Raging me Sect where the seal was located, Xuan Hao closed his eyes and sat down before focusing back on repairing his dantian.


    Given the current recovery speed of his dantian, he should be able to recover enough to check out the seal located below the Raging me Sect over the next few weeks.


    At the very least, he still had some time before he would have to leave for the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was doing his best to repair the damage that had been done to his dantian during the merger between his two domains, Bai Ning, Hui Ying, and the rest of the disciples from the Flying Sword Sect officially entered the chaotic Azure Sky Kingdom-


    "So, this is a demonic cultivator¡­!"


    Not taking long before the group encountered their first demonic cultivator in the process of devouring the body of a dead cultivator through the use of some kind of primal demonic cultivation technique that required the demonic cultivator to eat the other party to devour their cultivation and improve his own.


    "Wow, I have never seen a demonic cultivator before¡­ To think they are evil enough to eat a human¡­"


    "So scary! Looks at the blood all over his face and the- Ah-!"


    "This blood¡­ He is eating someone!?!?"


    "Wah! Let''s just kill it!"


    The young disciple who had never seen such a scene before all showed different expressions filled with both shock and disgust at what they were seeing, some of the more faint-hearted disciples even ended up fainting after seeing what the demonic cultivator was doing¡­


    "Everyone, calm down! Remember that we are here to deal with these demonic cultivators and stabilize the current chaotic situation of the Azure Sky Kingdom!"


    Stepping up to stabilize the situation and calm down the young disciples of the Shattering Star Sect, one of the more senior elders said this before pointing towards the demonic cultivator that had just noticed the group of elders and disciples from the Star Shattering Sect.


    "This demonic cultivator here can be considered to be the weakest among demonic cultivators and has reached a realm known as the Lesser Demon Realm, a realm that isparable to the Foundation Establishment Realm. Above that are the Higher Demon Realm that isparable to Core Formation Realm.


    The demonic cultivators in the Lesser and Higher Demon Realm are the ones you will be fighting, while us elders will take care of the more powerful demonic cultivators roaming the Azure Sky Kingdom!"


    As the elder finished talking, all the disciples from the Shattering Star Sect nodded their heads attentively as they had already calmed down after listening to the elder. Even the demonic cultivator located not too far away from them no longer seemed as scary as before and instead invoked the fighting spirits of some of the disciples who looked like they were about to jump out and attack the demonic cultivator at any moment.


    ¡­


    "This¡­"


    At this moment, the demonic cultivator could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he also listened to what the elder from the Shattering Star Sect was saying.


    Just a few seconds earlier, he had been filled with happiness after breaking through to the Peak of the Lesser Demon Realm. However, this all changed when therge group of disciples and elders from the Shattering Star Sect showed up.


    Even if the demonic cultivator had no idea about where the group hade from, he understood very well that they belonged to some sort of sect, and they hade to the Azure Sky Kingdom to deal with the demonic cultivators that had recently entered the kingdom from the Frozen Wastnds.


    "Elder, can I deal with this demonic cultivator?"


    "No! Elder, senior brother Chua here already reached the Core Formation Realm! Let me deal with the demonic cultivator!"


    "What are you two talking about? Both of you are in the Core Formation Realm, you should let us Foundation Establishment Realm disciples deal with this Lesser Demon Realm demonic cultivator!"


    ""Yes!""


    "Let us deal with it, you seniors can deal with the Higher Demon Realm demonic cultivators!"


    Suddenly hearing the disciples start discussing who would get to "deal" with him, the demonic cultivator in question did not know whether or not tough or cry in his current situation.


    I should just have stayed back in the Frozen Wastnds¡­


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    As this thought urred to the demonic cultivator, a few seniors at the Core Formation Realm decided to attack the demonic cultivator before any of the younger disciples still in the Foundation Establishment Realm had any time to react-


    Ptsh-!


    Instantly killing the unfortunate demonic cultivator without giving him any chance to escape.


    "Ah! The seniors already attacked!"


    "How unfair¡­ Not even giving us juniors a chance to see how a demonic cultivator fights¡­"


    "Tch¡­ These seniors just want the contribution points. Not even caring enough to let their juniors gain a little fighting experience with a demonic cultivator!"


    Feeling his vision slowly going dark and the world fading from his view, the demonic cultivator did not know how to feel after hearing the junior disciples still in the Foundation Establishmentining over how their senior brothers and sisters had taken away a precious opportunity for them to learn about fighting demonic cultivators.


    Thank god those senior disciples ended things quickly¡­


    Not able to stop such a thought from forming as he slowly felt thest bit of life leave his body, the demonic cultivator died.


    ¡­


    So that was a demonic cultivator¡­


    Having seen the scene of the demonic cultivator devouring the body of a cultivator that he had killed, Bai Ning felt like he understood why demonic cultivators were so hated by everyone.


    "Well¡­ Now that the demonic cultivator is dead and we have arrived in the Azure sky Kingdom, all of you will split up into pairs of two people or more before going out to hunt down demonic cultivators on your own!


    You are already paired up with someone ahead of time, the person who is on the same demonic beast as you, will also be your partner during this time in the Azure Sky Kingdom!"


    Not wasting any time listening to theining disciple who wanted to fight with the demonic cultivator, the elder who had stepped up to exin a bit about demonic cultivators once again took control of the situation as he said this.


    "Wait¡­ I''m paired up with that annoying girl-"


    "Well then everyone, we wish you luck! Make sure to use the emergency talisman given to you beforehand in case you encounter a dangerous situation, we elders will go on ahead to deal with any of the stronger demonic cultivators that might be lurking around the ce!"


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Not giving any of the disciples any time to say anything about this arrangement, the elders seemed to have some kind of tactic understanding, as they all quickly jumped off their demon beasts before disappearing in the distance.


    The only elder who remained back was a Beast Taming Elder that was in charge of guarding the demon beast during the duration of their time in the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "The elders really left after pairing me up with that annoying girl¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after he saw the elders disappearing in the distance, Bai Ning turned to look toward Hui Ying who was simrly staring towards him.


    From the looks of it, they would have to work together to hunt down demonic cultivators during their time in the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­ And from the looks of it, the elders had no intention of allowing them to hunt demonic cultivators on their own.


    In a sense, Bai Ning understood that this was for safety and make sure that they would be safer in apletely unfamiliar ce. Especially considering that most of the disciples were still below the age of 20.


    But¡­ Why did I have to be put together with that annoying girl?


    In a simr situation as Bai Ning, Hui Ying looked like she was struggling to say something as both of them continued staring at each other without saying anything for a few minutes.


    "Wah-! You win! Your stare is far too much! Let''s just get going¡­ I have a feeling that beast taming elder will not be happy if we stay around for too long¡­"n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Giving up their little staringpetition first, Hui Ying jumped off the demon beast before signalling for Bai Ning to do the same.


    "Indeed¡­ Looks like we will have to get going¡­"


    Knowing that he would not be able to get another teammate, Bai Ning jumped off the demon beast before both of them made their way further inside the Azure Sky Kingdom together.

 Chapter ?685 Unfortunate Bai Ning...

    Chapter ?685 Unfortunate Bai Ning...


    "Looks like those of you still staying are not satisfied with your current partner and wants someone different... Fine! All of you can talk with each other and figure out who you want to team up with, just remember that everyone should have a partner by the end!"


    Shortly after Bai Ning and Hui Ying entered the Azure Sky Kingdom together to hunt for demonic cultivators, the beast taming elder who had started gathering together the demon beasts of the disciples who had already left suddenly turned towards the remaining disciples still standing around before saying this.


    "Thank you elder!"


    "Yay, thank you elder! Now I can be teamed up with my brother."


    "Let''s make a group of four, this way we will be able to hunt down stronger demonic cultivators and get more contribution points!"


    The remaining disciples who had been worried about being teamed up with someone they didn''t know all thanked the beast taming elder before splitting up from their original partner to form new and mostlyrger groups consisting of four people or more!


    "Hmph... You kids... Now get going or there won''t be any demonic cultivators left for any of you to fight!" Smiling slightly after he saw how happy the disciples were after forming new groups, the beast taming elder quickly chased them away after making sure that everyone had a partner.


    """Yes!"""


    Filled with confidence and feeling happy that they could team up with their friends, the disciples did not stay around the border of the Azure Sky Kingdom for long, as they soon rushed into the Azure Sky Kingdom. Feeling both nervous and excited about fighting the demonic cultivators.


    ...


    Not aware of what had taken ce just after they had left, Bai Ning and Hui Ying made their way towards a small town located not too far away from the border where they had gotten off their demon beasts.


    "This is horrible...!"


    Reaching the small town, Hui Ying could not help eximing loudly as her face soon filled with fear. Soon turning to look away from what remained of the small town.


    "..."


    Bai Ning felt a simr urge to look away as he looked inside the town, but different from Hui Ying, Bai Ning quickly managed to calm himself down again to properly inspect the situation of the town in front of them.


    The inside of the small town was filled with dead bodies belonging to both men and women, young and old.


    Blood could be seen all over the ce as a shabby looking formation had been drawn using the blood at the centre of the town, a weak blood red qi could still be seen flowing inside the blood red symbols that made up the demonic formation. Indicating that the formation had not been finished.


    "If I''m not wrong, the demonic cultivator from earlier likely passed through this town and was nning to use some kind of sacrificial formation to break through... The cultivator we saw him devouring was most likely someone who passed by and tried to stop him..."


    Saying this, Bai Ning turned towards the still scared Hui Ying in an attempt to calm her down. The scene of an entire town filled with corpses was simply far too much for her to take.


    Compared to her I...


    Shaking his head as he thought about something from his time before entering the Flying Sword Sect and bing Xuan Hao''s disciple, Bai Ning felt a tinge of pity when looking towards Hui Ying.


    "Let''s leave this ce to the seniors."


    "Yes..."


    Having seen a few seniors from the sect simrly having arrived at the small town, Bai Ning and Hui Ying didn''t bother exploring the dead town. Leaving the demonic formation still in ce for the seniors who were more experienced to deal with.


    Even if they might lose out on a few contribution points due to this, Bai Ning and Hui Ying didn''t really care about this.


    One of them needed to fight demonic cultivators due to his master''s orders, while the other didn''t want to go anywhere near the dead town!


    With this in mind, there was not reason for them to enter the dead town and deal with the iplete demonic formation when there already was a group of seniors present to deal with the issue for them.


    "Hui Ying... Do you have anywhere you want to go first?"


    After moving away from the dead town and seeing the Hui Ying had started calming down, Bai Ning took the opportunity to ask her this.


    First and foremost, to help her take her mind off the bloody scene she had just seen, while at the same time wanting to know if she had anywhere specific, she wanted to go inside the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "Anywhere I want to go inside the Azure Sky Kingdom!? N-no! I-I don''t have any ce I want to go!"


    "..."


    Trying his best to ignore the flustered expression that appeared on Hui Ying''s face as she did her best to answer his question in a calm voice, Bai Ning could not help rolling his eyes.


    It''s so easy to see that she is thinking about that spiritual herb she came to the Azure Sky Kingdom for...


    Even without her saying anything, it was obvious to Bai Ning that she was thinking somethingpletely different from what she was saying.


    "Then let''s go this way."


    "Okay."


    Deciding to choose a direction to travel in given that Hui Ying would not be doing so, both of them soon resumed their journey deeper into the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    ...


    Back at the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao who had remained motionless inside his room focused on repairing his dantian slowly opened his eyes.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Hm... It''s already been over a week since Bai Ning left for the Azure Sky Kingdom, I wonder how he is doing..." Muttering this to himself as he gazed out a nearby window in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about just how Bai Ning was doing after leaving the sect for the first time since he had taken him in as his third disciple.


    Even if he knew that nothing life threatening had happened as the power, he had left on him to protect him was still intact at this point in time, Xuan Hao was still a bit worried when thinking about Bai Ning.


    After all, he had close to no experience when it came to fighting. The only realbat experience he had outside of training together with him and Chu Yang, was from before he had even started cultivating!


    With that in mind, it was obvious that Xuan Hao felt worried about Bai Ning who was now in the Azure Sky Kingdom hunting down demonic cultivators...


    Well... If anything happens, I will know about it immediately!


    Shaking his head as he focused his attention back on his dantian, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself after seeing that he was still not anywhere near fully recovered yet.


    Whoosh~!


    Testing out the power of his domain as he kept his attention fully focused on his dantian to see what it could handle; Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief after seeing that he should be more than capable of using his power for a few minutes without worry.


    Given his current cultivation realm, this would be more than enough to kill off someone in theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm!


    This should be more than good enough for me to explore the ancient seal located below the Raging me Sect!


    Knowing that he did not have much time left before he would have to leave for the capital of the Sky Empire at this point in time, Xuan Hao decided to go and check out the ancient seal located below the Raging me Sect.


    Even if it was dangerous, he was more than confident in escaping in case something happened. Not to mention, he already understood that the biggest danger this time around would be the ck miasma.


    All he had to do, was make sure to properly monitor the ck miasma and escape in case it began acting weirdly in any way.


    However, this would only be the case if nothing had happened to the ancient seal that kept the ck miasma at bay.


    Well... If something really happened to the seal, then the ck miasma might have already escaped from the underground and reached the surface where the ruins of the Raging me Sect was located!


    If that was really the case, the thing hidden inside the ck miasma might even have escaped...!


    "No... If that creature really escaped, there is no way it wouldn''t be noticed!"


    Feeling that his train of thought was moving towards a rather negative direction, Xuan Hao shook his head as he calmed himself down.


    Swish-!


    Not wasting any time after calming himself down, Xuan Hao soon left the Star Shattering Sect. Moving towards the ruins of the Raging me Sect...

 Chapter ?686 Checking the Ancient Seal below the Raging Flame Sect

    Chapter ?686 Checking the Ancient Seal below the Raging me Sect


    "No ck miasma... The seal should still be fine..."


    Reaching the ruins of the Raging me Sect, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief as he looked down at the ruins that had once been the Raging me Sect, one of the four top sects of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    The precious materials that made up the different building were not really anything that was worth much to the Flying Sword Sect back then, so it had been left behind. Keeping the Raging me Sect mostly intact after its defeat at the hands of the Flying Sword Sect.


    However, even if the materials used in the construction of the Raging me Sect was not worth a lot to the Flying Sword Sect, the same could not be said for others...


    At this point in time, most of the precious materials used in the construction of the sect had already been taken away by scavenging cultivators who had passed by the ruins after the fight between the Raging me Sect and the Flying Sword Sect had concluded.


    Not to mention the Raging me Sect still being intact, the current Raging me Sect had already been stripped of anything precious that had been left behind after its defeat at the hands of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Only the less important parts of the sect that had been constructed using normal materials could still be considered to be in a somewhat intact condition. The damage to these buildings had mostly been caused by the fights over the remaining resources that had taken ce after the fall of the Raging me Sect...


    Bang!


    Even now, a group of people could be seen fighting for a small spirit stone one of them had found in the ruins of the Raging me Sect below.


    "Hm... I wonder if anyone managed to find the underground space where the seal is located..." Remembering that the entrance leading down to the seal was not too well hidden, Xuan Hao could not help gazing towards the mountain peak that the entrance was located on top of.


    With the number of cultivators who had passed by the ruins of the Raging me Sect, it would be rather odd if nobody had managed to find the entrance leading to the ancient seal at this point in time.


    The only real worrisome thing about it, was the fact that no news about the ancient seal located below the Raging me Sect had spread. Meaning that the people who had found the path leading down to the ancient seal below the Raging me Sect had most likely not been able to make their way back out again!


    Indeed, given that even he had almost died back then as someone who had already reached the Domain Lord Realm, it was not odd that the cultivators with strength ranging between the Qi Condensation Realm and Core Formation Realm would have no way to escape if they tried venturing deeper inside the underground space and the ck miasma suddenly started rising...


    Whoosh~


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao didn''t bother paying any attention to the fights taking ce in the ruins of the Raging me Sect as he flew towards the entrance leading down towards the underground space where the ancient seal was located.


    ...


    Entering the decaying pce on top of the mountain peak, Xuan Hao did not hesitate as he entered the hole in the middle of the decaying pce leading to the underground space located below the ruins of the Raging me Sect where the seal was located.


    I wonder how many people ended up jumping down into the hole only to end up falling into the ck miasma...


    Hovering above the ck miasma that was exactly the same as thest time he hade, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly after thinking about just how many people had ended up dying because they jumped into the hole instead of climbing down the side of the hole.


    The rope connected to the tform hanging from the ceiling of the cave had not changed a lot sincest time. The only difference was that it had been strengthened a few timespared to thest time. Indicating that someone had indeed entered the underground space after the destruction of the Raging me Sect!


    "Hm?"


    As he continued inspecting the underground space and the divine runes that were barely visible to him through his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help frowning after his divine sense came into contact with the ck miasma below.


    "This is... The Dao of Corruption?!"


    After havingprehended part of the Dao of Corruption in the enlightenment space, Xuan Hao had grown more familiar with any power rted to the Dao of Corruption... And... The ck miasma below gave off a very familiar aura belonging to the Dao of Corruption!


    So... The creature sealed off below the Raging me Sect is rted to the Dao of Corruption?" Muttering this to himself as he gazed at the ck miasma below, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as a dangerous idea appeared in his head...


    Maybe he could use the ck miasma below to gain a deeper understanding of the Dao of Corruption!


    Rumble~!


    But as soon as this thought appeared, it was quickly thrown away as the ck miasma below began moving upwards.


    Swish-!


    Already having expected something like this to happen before he entered the underground space, Xuan Hao did not stand too far away from the hole leading up to the surface and managed to leave the underground space before the ck miasma manged to rise more than a few meters.


    BOOM-!


    As the ck miasma crashed into the ceiling of the cave like it had done in the past, Xuan Hao patiently watched as the ck miasma started retreating back again. Waiting for the creature sealed below to make a move and attack the seal like it had done when he first entered the underground space.


    ROOOAAAAAR!


    Hearing the familiar roar yet terrifying roar from below, Xuan Hao could not help shivering.


    Now that he had reached the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and had some understanding of the Dao of Corruption, he could sense the power of the creature sealed below even more clearly than before.


    If he could only feel that the creature had far surpassed him in strength the first time around, this time, he felt like the creature had reached apletely different levelpared to him!


    Given that he still had no full grasp over the different minor realms that made up the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao could not clearly say whether or not the creature below had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm.


    The only thing he was certain of, was that it should definitely be far stronger than a normal Soul Ascension Realm Expert. Especially considering the fact that the seal below the Raging me Sect should only be one of four ancient seals that made up an evenrger seal!


    Even at this point in time, Xuan Hao had no way to fully imagine just how strong the creature in question would be if all four seals were undone and it could fully recover its strength back to its peak.


    Part of him had a feeling that its strength might surpass the Soul Ascension Realm at that point in time!


    Fwoosh-!


    ROOOAAR!


    Hearing the unwilling roar from the creature below as he watched the ceiling was covered in a myriad of different divine symbols and runes that merged together to supress the ck miasma, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of amazement. Wondering just who could have set up such a terrifying formation that was capable of supressing the ck miasma and keeping it sealed up underground for thousands of years.


    Considering that the Raging me Sect was a rather old sect before its destruction that had been around for at least five thousand years, Xuan Hao would not feel surprised even if it turned out that the formation below had been around for tens of thousands of years.


    If he was uncertain whether or not the creature sealed up below the Raging me Sect had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm, he could at the very least feel certain that the person who set up the formation to seal it had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "But... How is this formation connected to the founder...?"n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Remembering that the founder had left to check up on the formations that sealed the ck miasma, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he began wondering just how the founder of the Flying Sword Sect was connected to all of this.


    Even if the founder had just wanted to check out the formations due to worrying about them possibly breaking and endangering the Flying Sword Sect in the process... How did the founder even learn about the ancient seals and their locations in the first ce?


    And if he knew about them, why ce the Flying Sword Sect so close to one of them?

 Chapter ?687 Three Demonic Cultivators...

    Chapter ?687 Three Demonic Cultivators...


    "I have no idea what the founder was thinking back then. cing the Flying Sword Sect so close to such a dangerous seal..."


    Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao nced towards the ck miasma below onest time before taking his leave after confirming that the sealing formation had not weakened.


    In the first ce, he had note to try andprehend the ck miasma or try to understand the ancient formation that kept it sealed up... But only came to check if the seal was showing any signs of weakening since hisst visit.


    For now, the most important thing would be to continue repairing his damaged dantian and preparing to leave for the capital of the Sky Empire.


    Trying to investigate the ancient seal could wait for when he returned from the capital of the Sky Empire and had fully recovered his strength.


    Swish~!


    Not caring about the fighting that was still taking ce in the ruins of the Raging me Sect after having left the underground space, Xuan Hao did not stand around for even a second as he headed back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    From start to finish, none of the cultivators in the ruins of the Raging me Sect below noticed his appearance.


    ...


    Ptsh-!


    "Do you think he is dead now Bai Ning...?"


    "Yes... I don''t think he will be able to do much in his current situation..."


    Rolling his eyes as he said this, Bai Ning could not help looking away from the demonic cultivator that Hui Ying had just killed with no hesitation.


    Compared to how afraid she had been when they had seen the dead town at the border of the Azure Sky Kingdom, Hui Ying had grown a lot. Even when she had just been faced with a simr situation a few moments earlier, she had been able to keep her calm and fight without the now dead demonic cultivator in front of her without any issues.


    Over the past week. Not only had Hui Ying managed to grow a lot, but Bai Ning himself had also managed to grow in strength!


    "That''s great! Now there is no way for this evildoer to do any more harm! Let''s get going, we still have to stop hispanion before the demonic formation ispleted!" Smiling happily after hearing Bai Ning confirm that the demonic cultivator was indeed dead, Hui Ying didn''t waste any time as she began moving towards the deeper parts of the town filled with the corpse of the viges that had once lived there


    "Yes... Let''s get going..."


    Knowing that they could not waste any time as it would risk the demonic cultivator still hiding in the deeper part of the town breaking through to the Higher Demon Realm, Bai Ning quickly followed behind Hui Ying as they moved towards the deeper part of the town together.


    The town in question was not a veryrge town and should at most have a little over five thousand inhabitants before the arrival of a group of three demonic cultivators who had ughtered the inhabitants to set up a demonic formation to increase their strength.


    When the Bai Ning and Hui Ying reached the town, the demonic cultivators had already finished massacring the inhabitants and two of the demonic cultivators were already busy setting up the outer part of the demonic formation at the outer edges of the town barely finishing by the time both of them arrived at the outer perimeter of the town.


    If not for the fact that one of the two demonic cultivators had screamed for their older brother to save them when Bai Ning had killed the first of the two demonic cultivators, Bai Ning and Hui Ying would not have any idea that there was still a third demonic cultivator hiding inside the town.


    After all, the third demonic cultivator had not shown a single sign of appearing even when they had started fighting at the edges of the town!


    From this, Bai Ning and Hui Ying could both tell that this demonic cultivator should be in a crucial state of setting up the demonic formation... Or maybe he just decided to ignore the two other demonic cultivators and decided to use the demonic formation to strengthen himself alone.


    At least this way, the chances of this demonic cultivator breaking through to the Higher Demon Realm would increase by a lotpared to the demonic formation being used to strengthen three people...


    BOOM-!


    Just as Bai Ning and Hui Ying were about to reach the town square located at the centre of the town, a massive ball of blood red light rapidly gathered above the town square before exploding.


    "Not good-"


    "HAHHAHA, I FINALLY REACHED THE HIGHER DEMON REALM!"


    Not managing to finish his sentence, a loudughter filled with arrogance echoed out across the small town before a terrifying aura above that of the Foundation Establishment Realm spread out from the town square.


    Higher Demon Realm! The demonic cultivator actually managed to break through to the Higher Demon Realm!


    Frowning as he felt a shiver run down his spine, Bai Ning thought about what to do.


    Escaping at this point in time would be impossible as the other party had already reached the Higher Demon Realm and wasparable to a Core Formation Realm Expert.


    Fighting the demonic cultivator was not really a good idea either, as even if he had grown better at fighting, he was only a bit stronger than a normal Ninth Stage Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator. Far from enough to face off against a demonic cultivator who had already reached the Higher Demon Realm!


    "Bai Ning... What should we do...?"


    Simrly taken aback as a fearful expression appeared on her face after hearing the loudughter and feeling the scary aura belonging to a demonic cultivator in the Higher Demon Realm, Hui Ying moved a bit closer to Bai Ning before asking.N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Why don''t we try and fight him?"


    "Fight him!? But he reached the Higher Demon Realm! There is no way we can win!"


    Hearing Bai Ning''s suggestion, Hui Ying showed a shocked expression before questioning his decision to fight the demonic cultivator.


    This was a demonic cultivator in the Higher Demon Realm! A demonic cultivatorparable to a Core Formation Realm Expert! Even if there were two of them, there was no way for them to make up the difference of a major realm with only the two of them...


    "We can''t escape at this point in time, there is no way he is going to let us escape after killing his twopanions! Not to mention, we should have a chance of killing him now that he has just broken through and his foundation is still unstable!"


    Understanding what Hui Ying was thinking, Bai Ning quickly exined himself and the reason for his decision to fight the demonic cultivator.


    "That is... True... If we just wait, he will quickly stabilize his foundation with the help of the demonic formation ande chasing after us after he stabilizes his cultivation base. At that point in time, there will be even less of a chance for us to win in a fight..."


    Reluctantly nodding her head as she understood Bai Ning''s reason for wanting to attack the demonic cultivator before he had finished stabilizing his new realm, Hui Ying looked towards the town square where the demonic cultivator was located.


    With each passing second, the aura that had at first been extremely chaotic slowly started growing more and more stable with each passing second, they wasted contemting their options!


    "Ah! Let''s fight him! At least this way, we will have a chance at winning!"


    Knowing that it was not a good idea to waste any more time than they already had, Hui Ying reluctantly agreed with Bai Ning to attack the demonic cultivator before he finished stabilizing his foundation.


    Even if they might have a small chance of escaping if they ran away, the chance was close to negligible, as the town they were currently inside of was located in the middle of a massive empty in that would make it easy for the demonic cultivator to chase after them.


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Havinge to a decision on what to do, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying rushed towards the town square. Ignoring the increasing number of dried-up corpses belonging to the townspeople along the way.


    ...


    "Hahaha, I really reached the Higher Demon Realm! Second Brother, Third Brother, your sacrifice will not be in vain. Hehe, I will be sure to avenge you after I finish devouring the remaining blood essence in the formation and stabilize my cultivation base- Hm? Those two are actually not escaping... But areing straight for me!? Hehe, can''t wait to die?"


    At the same time Bai Ning and Hui Ying decided to fight with the demonic cultivator and moved towards the town square, the demonic cultivator in question quickly discovered them approaching as a disdainful smile appeared on his face.


    After reaching the Higher Demon Realm and feeling his entire body brimming with newfound strength, he was no longer fearful of facing off against Bai Ning and Hui Ying like he had been when they had first appeared and killed his second and third brother.

 Chapter ?688 Powerful Demonic Cultivator, Strength of the Higher Demon Realm!

    ?688 Powerful Demonic Cultivator, Strength of the Higher Demon Realm!


    "What a powerful demonic formation¡­" Reaching the town square where the core of the demonic formation was, Hui Ying could not help eximing in surprise as she stared at the blood red lines connecting to different demonic looking symbols floating in the air around the town square.


    Even without any knowledge on demonic formations, Hui Ying still managed to see through the usage of the demonic formation at a nce, as the red lines and demonic symbols all created a small stream of blood red liquid that slowly flowed towards the centre of the town square.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Looking towards the direction of the blood red liquid formed by the demonic formation, arge figure covered in a blood red aura filled with killing intent could be seen absorbing the blood red liquid as his aura got stronger and more stable with each passing second.


    "The demonic cultivator¡­" Starring straight at the figure of the demonic cultivator who was still ignoring them, Hui Ying could not help hesitating as she felt the terrifying aura of the Higher Demon Realm demonic cultivator.


    Even if she knew that the other party had not stabilized his cultivation yet and wouldn''t be able to fully use his newfound strength, she still felt scared deep down when faced with such a strong opponent. Especially considering that she had not reached the Ninth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm like Bai Ning¡­!


    Swish-!


    Seeing Hui Ying''s nervous expression as she looked towards the demonic cultivator in the distance, Bai Ning decided to make the first move as he charged towards the demonic cultivator without wasting any time. Understanding very well that the longer they waited, the more dangerous it would be for them.


    "Wha-!? Wait for me!"


    Swish-!


    Watching as Bai Ning took the first step and charged towards the demonic cultivator without any hesitation, Hui Ying froze for a short second before she quickly followed behind him.


    No matter what, there was no way she would just stand around and watch Bai Ning fight the demonic cultivator by himself!


    "Hm?"


    As Bai Ning and Hui Ying charged towards the demonic cultivator, the demonic cultivator stood up before looking towards Bai Ning and Hui Ying with a disdainful smile on his face.


    "Hehe, I really didn''t expect you toe here by yourself¡­ All you are doing is making things easier for me!" Chuckling to himself as he said this, the demonic cultivator quickly stopped the absorbing the red liquid from the demonic formation-


    Whoosh-!


    Not waiting for Bai Ning and Hui Ying to reach him, the demonic cultivator gathered his strength into a small red orb before throwing it towards the two.


    BOOM-!


    Not even a secondter, arge explosion shook the dead town as the red orbnded only a short distance away from Bai Ning and Hui Ying. Inevitably forcing both of them to rapidly retreat as they used their qi to shield themselves from the explosion of the blood red orb.


    In the end, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying ended up retreating back out of the town square to prevent the explosion of the red orb from harming them.


    Whoosh-!


    Not wasting any time after having avoided the attack, Bai Ning and Hui Ying both charged back towards the demonic cultivator once again-


    Boom!


    Only to once again be forced to escape as the demonic cultivator threw another red orb towards them the moment, they got too close.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    This cycle continued repeating itself for the next few minutes as Bai Ning and Hui Ying would charge towards the demonic cultivator at the centre of the town square. Only to end up retreating a few secondster after being met with the powerful red orbs created by the demonic cultivator forcing them to retreat.


    ¡­


    BOOOM-!


    "This¡­ This is the power of a Higher Demon Realm demonic cultivator! We can''t even get close to him at all..."


    Barely managing to defend herself from the explosion caused by the another red orb and retreat in time, Hui Ying could not help looking towards the demonic cultivator disdainfully smiling at them with a fearful expression on her face.


    Facing the power of a demonic cultivator who had reached the Higher Demon Realm was different from just feeling the powerful aura released by the other party. Even after sending out so many powerful attacks, the demonic cultivator still looked like he was full of energy without showing any signs of exhaustion!


    Hui Ying even got the feeling that the other party was just ying with them and wanted to slowly exhaust them before killing them¡­


    "Indeed, he is quite powerful¡­ But that red orb attack should not be something easy to use constantly¡­ Even for a demonic cultivator in the Higher Demon Realm¡­"


    Different from Hui Ying who was starring towards the demonic cultivator with a fearful look on her face after barely escaping alive from the other party''s attack, Bai Ning narrowed his eyes as he looked towards the demonic cultivator with a thoughtful expression on his face.


    "Hm? The demonic cultivator is not chasing after us- Is he really nning to let us tire ourselves out beforeing to kill us!? But¡­ If that is the case, why is he not stopping us from recovering now¡­?"


    As a few seconds slowly passed with them slowly recovery instead of going back in, Hui Ying was the first to interrupt the silence as she tilted her head in confusion while looking towards the demonic cultivator that remained at the centre of the town square.


    Not understanding why the demonic cultivator was just standing there without caring about them recovery some of the qi they had used during their attempts to reach him.


    "Not chasing after us¡­? Ah! That''s it!"


    Bai Ning who had been observing the demonic cultivator during this time suddenly jumped up as he seemed to have understood something after hearing what Hui Ying said.


    "What is it? Did you figure out why the demonic cultivator is not chasing after us?!"


    Not able to contain her curiosity after hearing Bai Ning''s sudden exmation, Hui Ying quickly asked him. No longer feeling too worried about the demonic cultivatoring to attack them after seeing that he remainedpletely unmoving at the centre of the town square.


    "If I''m not wrong¡­ The demonic cultivator should still be deeply connected to the demonic formation in some way that prevents him from moving without damaging himself in the process. This should be the reason why he only tries to attack us through ranged attacks instead of just fighting us normally.


    It would not be too odd if it was a normal cultivator, but this is a demonic cultivator! Demonic cultivators are far strongerpared to ordinary cultivators when ites to physical fights, while they are far weaker in things like qi techniques. The one in front of us is not an exception either, even if the red orb is powerful, it is only barely stronger than the Foundation Establishment Realm!"


    "Ohh! I see, so what should we do?" Nodding her head in understanding after hearing what Bai Ning said, Hui Ying quickly asked him what to do.


    Given that he could understand all of this, he should havee up with some way to deal with the demonic cultivator¡­


    Thinking this to herself, Hui Ying looked towards Bai Ning filled with anticipation.


    "Because he can''t move due to fearing that doing so would break the formation that is helping him stabilize his cultivation base and injurie him in the process, I say¡­ Why don''t we make the choice for him and break the formation¡­?"


    "That is¡­ A good idea! This way, he will not be able to stabilize his cultivation base and should also be injured by the destruction of the formation!"


    Hearing what Bai Ning said, Hui Ying thought about it for a short moment before agreeing with him.


    If Bai Ning was really correct in his assumption about the demonic cultivator still being deeply entwined with the demonic formation. Destroying it would surely be able to cause some sort of damage to the demonic cultivator, while at the same time stopping him from stabilizing his cultivation base.


    Even if it was wrong and the demonic cultivator was not connected to the demonic formation in the way Bai Ning though he was. Destroying it would still stop the demonic cultivator from further stabilizing his cultivation base.


    ¡­


    Hm? What is this feeling? Why do I feel like something bad is about to happen?


    At the same time Bai Ning and Hui Ying were hatching up a n on how they would destroy the demonic formation, the demonic cultivator could not help frowning after seeing the two of them no longer charging towards him.


    "How weird¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked towards Bai Ning and Hui Ying having retreated out from the town square-


    "Hahaha! Looks like I was worrying over nothing! I forgot that these little one''s are far weaker than me and can''t continue attacking so recklessly without any breaks! Hahaha!"


    Laughing disdainfully after realizing that they were just recovering their qi, the demonic cultivator no longer paid any attention to the two of them as he focused on stabilizing his cultivation base with the help of the demonic formation¡­

 Chapter ?689 Target, Demonic Formation!

    ?689 Target, Demonic Formation!


    Swish-!


    Havinge up with a n on how to destroy the demonic formation, Bai Ning and Hui Ying only ended up spending a few minutes recovering before both of them moved towards the town square-


    Bang-bang-bang!


    Crack~!


    Ignoring the demonic cultivator at the centre of the town square looking disdainfully towards them as he prepared to throw another blood red orb towards them, as they instead attacked the different parts of the town square where the core part of the demonic formation covering the entire small town had been engraved into the ground with the blood of the inhabitants that had once lived inside there.


    "Wha-!? HOW DARE YOU!"


    Not taking even a second to realize what Bai Ning and Hui Ying were up to, the demonic cultivator yelled loudly filled with killing intent before using all his strength to condense close to a dozen blood red orb.


    "DIE!"


    Not caring about the consumption required to condense so many of the blood red orbs at once, the demonic cultivator was filled with killing intent after seeing Bai Ning and Hui Ying trying to destroy the demonic formation. Not holding back in the slightest as he went all out trying to kill them off before they had a chance to do any significant damage to the demonic formation.


    The care that the demonic cultivator showed the demonic formation was obviously far above that of the two demonic cultivators that Bai Ning and Hui Ying had killed earlier¡­


    Swish~


    Swish~


    Swish~


    Seeing the demonic cultivator condensing so many of the blood red orb''s at once, Bai Ning and Hui Ying moved like they had already predicted the actions of the demonic cultivator. Not wasting even a single second before both of them had already started retreated back outside the town square ahead of the red orbs even getting close to them!


    "YOU DAMNABLE-"


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Realizing that he had been dupped by Bai Ning and Hui Ying into wasting his energy on a powerful attack, the demonic cultivator did not even have time to curse before the blood red orbsnded around the ce where both Bai Ning and Hui Ying had been standing only a second earlier.


    Looking at where the blood red orbs werending, the demonic cultivator could not help frowning. However, his frowning expression soon turned into a panicking one after recognizing one of the blood red runes eteched into the ground around the ce where the blood red orbs werending.


    "Wait¡­ That¡­ Isn''t that a blood storage rune-"


    BOOM-!


    Not having time to finish what he was about to say, a massive explosion far surpassing the strength of the previous explosions caused by the blood red orbs of the demonic cultivator swept through the small town.


    Crack~


    Instantly cracks spread all across the demonic formation before-


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    The demonic formation fully shattered. Triggering an evenrger explosion in the process.


    "Ahhhh-!"


    Located at the centre of the demonic formation where most of the energy from the demonic formation had gathered, the demonic cultivator could only forcefully cut his connection before using all his strength to protect himself from the terrifying explosion caused by the destruction of the demonic formation.


    Even if he could stay alive, there was no doubt that he would end up seriously injured after the explosion of the demonic formation!


    ""Ah-!""


    Not too far away from the town square where the core of the demonic formation was located and the massive explosion took ce, Bai Ning and Hui Ying had no way to fully escape in time, as both of them were thrown dozens of meters back by the explosion.


    Bang!


    Onlying to a stop after crashing into a small hill located just outside the town square.


    "Looks like you n worked and there really was a gathering point for the energy of the demonic formation there¡­ But¡­ To think he really ended up destroying his own formation in the end¡­"


    Being the first to get back up, Hui Ying could not help looking towards Bai Ning filled with both surprise and amazement after having witnessed the demonic cultivator destroying his own formation.


    "Don''t get happy yet, we only destroyed the demonic formation¡­ The demonic cultivator is still alive¡­ And I don''t doubt he wants nothing more than to kill both of us at this point in time!"


    Reminding Hui Ying that their battle was far from over, Bai Ning narrowed his eyes before looking towards the town square in the distance.


    At this point in time, the centre of the town square where the demonic cultivator had been standing had already turned into a small crater after the demonic formation blew up. The only sign left of the demonic formation was a few dim red symbols barely floating around the outer edges of the town square.


    Looking towards the small crater at the centre of the town square, Bai Ning could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine. No matter how injured the current demonic cultivator was, he could not help wanting to escape after sensing the terrifying killing intent leaking out into the surroundings from the crater!


    "¡­"


    Getting up from the ground before standing beside him, Hui Ying also looked towards the small crater without saying anything after feeling the terrifying killing intent from the demonic cultivator.


    Even without Bai Ning saying anything, she understood that the fight ahead of them would not be easy in any way¡­


    Heavily injured, unstable foundation and a less than optimal state of mind after being tricked into destroying his own formation. Even with all of these things helping them, the demonic cultivator had still reached the Higher Demon Realm!


    "AHAHAHA! GET READY TO ENDURE A WORLD OF TORTURE!"


    Swish-!


    Just as Bai Ning and Hui Ying were staring toward the small crater at the centre of the town square, a crazyughter echoed out from inside the small crater followed by the demonic cultivator covered in blood from head to toe rushing directly towards them!


    Boom!


    The difference in power between both of them was obvious!


    Having to face the demonic cultivator first hand for the first time since their encounter, Bai Ning could not help feeling a tremor run through his body as he stepped forward to block the attack of the demonic cultivator with one of his artifacts.


    Even if the demonic cultivator was heavily injured and could not disy his full strength, Bai Ning had no way to fight back against the overwhelming physical power of the demonic cultivator.


    The only thing allowing him to even face off against the demonic cultivator in the first ce was the fact that he carried arge number of artifact that he had crafted during his time in the sect¡­


    Bang!


    "HAHAHA! HOW WEAK! YOU WANT TO FIGHT AGAINST ME RELYING ON ARTIFACTS!? I WANT TO SEE HOW MANY ARTIFACTS YOU HAVE!"


    As a result, Bai Ning ended up on the losing side after only a short exchange!


    If not for the fact that the strength of the demonic cultivator was far lower due to his current bad situation and Bai Ning had arge number of defensive artifacts on him that could help mitigate some of the power contained in the demonic cultivator''s attack, it was easy to imagine how a fight between the two of them would have gone¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Bang-bang-bang!


    At the same time Bai Ning and the demonic cultivator were shing with each other, Hui Ying remained standing without knowing what to do in the current situation.


    Not only was she weaker than Bai Ning in terms of cultivation, but she also had no way to protect herself against the attacks of the demonic cultivator with defensive artifacts like Bai Ning.


    With this in mind, there was no way for her to interfere in the battle without causing more trouble for Bai Ning by endangering herself¡­


    No! I can''t just stand around doing nothing!


    Unwilling to just stand and watch as Bai Ning''s situation started growing worse with each defensive artifact that the demonic cultivator ended up destroying, Hui Ying showed a determined expression on her face before slowly making her way towards the ce where Bai Ning and the demonic cultivator were fighting with each other.


    ¡­


    Bang-bang-bang!


    Having reached an area less than a dozen meters away from where Bai Ning and the demonic cultivator were fighting with each other without being spotted, Hui Ying narrowed her eyes as she focused her full attention on the demonic cultivator.


    Closer¡­ Closer¡­ Just a little closer¡­


    Watching as Bai Ning and the demonic cultivator got closer and closer to the ce where she was hiding, Hui Ying started tensing up as she tightened her grip around the sword firmly held in her hands.


    Given that she could not fight the demonic cultivator head on like Bai Ning, Hui Ying decided to go for a riskier approach¡­ A sneak attack!


    Even if she understood that failing might end up causing a lot of trouble for her, Hui Ying didn''t want to just sit around doing nothing while Bai Ning was fighting with his life on the line!


    Now!


    Swish-!


    Seeing an opportunity appearing, Hui Ying used her movement technique to the limit as she stabbed towards the demon cultivator-


    Ptsh-!

 Chapter ?690 Fight for Survival

    ?690 Fight for Survival


    Swish-!


    Dashing out from her cover behind one of the buildings of the town, Hui Ying channelled all her strength into her sword as she stabbed towards the demonic cultivator without any hesitation.


    Ptsh!


    Not having expected for her to be there and being far too focused on his fight with Bai Ning, the demonic cultivator did not manage to react in time, as Hui Ying sessfully managed to stab the demonic cultivator with all her strength!


    "Die!"


    Ignoring the sword Hui Ying had stabbed into him, the demonic cultivator exploded with killing intent as he turned his attention away from Bai Ning and attacked Hui Ying who had just stabbed him.


    Whoosh-!


    Seeing the terrifying fist of the demonic cultivator covered in scarlet red light descending down towards her all of a sudden, Hui Ying had no time to react as she had not expected for the other party to still be capable of attacking her so quickly after having been stabbed in the stomach by her.


    Swish~


    Just as the attack of the demonic cultivator was about tond on the unprepared Hui Ying, Bai Ning who had already seen Hui Ying approaching earlier threw out a small defensive artifact that quickly unfolded into arge shield-


    BANG!


    Crack~!


    Not a secondter, the fist of the demonic cultivatornded on the defensive artifact. Instantly shattering it!


    Whoosh~


    But in the end, the short moment bought by the defensive artifact was more than enough for Hui Ying to let go of the sword still stuck inside the demonic cultivator and escape from the attack before it had chance tond on her.


    "Hmph! You dare!"


    Seeing Hui Ying escaping into the distance as he missed, the demonic cultivator turned his attention back towards Bai Ning as he resumed his attack after pulling Hui Ying''s sword out from his stomach.


    However, even with his current strength as a cultivator in the Higher Demon Realm, there was no way for him to fully recover from the damage Hui Ying had caused when she stabbed him with all her strength. Especially when considering the other injuries, he had received from the explosion of the demonic formation that started affecting him more and more the longer the battle went on for¡­


    For this reason, Bai Ning slowly started gaining the ability to fight back against the demonic cultivator. No longer being forced into a purely defensive position as the strength difference started decreasing as the injuries of the demonic cultivator grew worse and worse the longer the fight went on.


    Not good¡­ I can''t continue like this!N?v(el)B\\jnn


    The demonic cultivator of course realized his current situation as he felt the situation inside his dantian growing more and more unstable due to his injuries worsening the condition of his unstable cultivation base.


    Even if the demonic cultivator was not that smart among his peers, he still understood that he would end up dying if he could not deal with Bai Ning before his situation ended up getting even worse than it currently was¡­


    The main thing that made the demonic cultivator realize the fact that he would end up dying without doing anything drastic, was that he could clearly feel how fast his strength was decreasing after Hui Ying had stabbed him.


    Something that was quite hard to admit given that he was a major realm above Bai Ning¡­


    "Hm?"


    Noticing the very clear change in the demonic cultivator as he suddenly began attacking in a far more precise and deadly mannerpared to before, Bai Ning could not help frowning as the advantage he had gained after Hui Ying''s attack disappeared the moment the demonic cultivator started to fight like his life was on the line.


    Bang!


    Being knocked back by the demonic cultivator, Bai Ning could not stop a stream of blood leaking out from the corner of his mouth after stabilizing himself and getting ready to face the demonic cultivator once again.


    Even if the defensive artifacts could absorb most of the damage from the demonic cultivator''s attacks, there was no way for them to fully absorb everything. Especially given that he could not truly bring out the full strength of the stronger artifacts for the Core Formation Realm that he had crafted with his current cultivation base.


    Considering that the demonic cultivator had even started burning a part of his life essence to increase his strength, Bai Ning''s artifacts had no way to fully block the attacks of the demonic cultivator!


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ I have to thank Bai Ningter. If not for him¡­" Muttering this to herself as she let out the breath she had unconsciously been holding, Hui Ying looked back towards the ce where Bai Ning and the demonic cultivator were currently fighting.


    From the demonic cultivator pulling out the sword she had stabbed into it and left there, to the demonic cultivator starting to burn his blood essence to increase his strength in an attempt to break through the seemingly endless number of defensive artifacts that Bai Ning pulled out from thin air to protect himself.


    Even if part of her was curious where all the defensive artifacts wereing from, Hui Ying didn''t bother thinking about this at the moment. Defeating the demonic cultivator was far more important!


    And¡­ Given that the demonic cultivator had started burning his own life essence to increase his strength, it was obvious that he was close to losing!


    If¡­ If I can just find another way to get another sneak attack in, we should be able to finish him off!


    Thinking this to herself as she watched Bai Ning''s situation getting worse after the demonic cultivator strengthened himself with by burning his own life essence, Hui Ying narrowed her eyes as killing intent appeared in them.


    No matter what, there was no way she was just going to let the demonic cultivator kill her new friend!


    Swish-!


    ¡­


    Bang!


    Blocking yet another crazed attack from the demonic cultivator with one of his defensive artifacts before watching it get sent flying away, Bai Ning was just about to pull out another defensive artifact from the interspatial ring his master had given him when he suddenly froze.


    There wasn''t any artifacts left inside his interspatial ring!


    "¡­"


    Looking at the approaching demonic cultivator, Bai Ning could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he realized that he would have to face him without any defensive artifacts.


    Even considering that he was stronger than a normal Ninth Stage Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator, Bai Ning understood very well how dangerous it would be to face the demonic cultivator in front of him without any defensive artifacts to keep him safe¡­ Especially considering that the demonic cultivator was currently stronger than normal after burning his own life essence!


    "HAHAHA! FINALLY RAN OUT OF DEFENSIVE ARTIFACTS!?"


    Seeing that Bai Ning didn''t pull out another defensive artifact, the demonic cultivator could not helpughing loudly as he felt a sense of relief deep down.


    If Bai Ning had continued pulling out defensive artifacts every time, he knocked one away from him, the demonic cultivator doubted that he would be able to kill the other party before he ended up killing himself by burning all his life essence¡­


    Now that Bai Ning no longer had any defensive artifacts left to protect him, the demonic cultivator understood that it would not take long for him to kill the other party considering the strength difference between both of them!


    "Hehe, prepare to die!"


    Knowing that he was about to win, the demonic cultivator smiled sinisterly as he attacked Bai Ning with all his strength.


    Whoosh-!


    Even with his unstable cultivation base and his decreasing strength, by burning his own life essence, the power of the demonic cultivator had already reached a levelparable to a normal Higher Demon Realm Expert¡­ That included his speed!


    BANG!


    Without having the ability to use his defensive artifacts to protect him, Bai Ning had no way to avoid the attack of the demonic cultivator and could only do his best to use a qi technique to defend.


    "Ah-!"


    However, with the difference in strength, the demonic cultivator easily broke through his defence before sending him flying!


    If not for the fact that the Unformed Mantra had a side effect of strengthening his body, there was no way he would have been able to withstand the attack from the demonic cultivator!


    "HAHAHA- Hm?"


    Laughing loudly as he managed to send Bai Ning flying while throwing up arge mouthful of blood, the demonic cultivator momentarily let down his defences-


    Zing~!


    Ptsh!


    Allowing Hui Ying who had managed to retrieve her sword after the demonic cultivator had thrown it away, to once again sessfully sneak attack him!


    "AHHHHH-!"


    The only difference this time around, was that Hui Ying didn''t stab him through his stomach, but instead stabbed him through the back of the head! Killing him!


    Even if he was a demonic cultivator in the Higher Demon Realm, there was no way for him to survive being stabbed through the head...


    Only those in the Nascent Soul Realm and above would be able to survive in such a situation!

 Chapter 691 Towards the Capital City of the Sky Empire!

    ?691 Towards the Capital City of the Sky Empire!


    Bang~


    Fwoosh!


    As the body of the demonic cultivator fell lifelessly to the ground after he had his head pierced through by Hui Ying''s sword, his body was quickly consumed by the forbidden technique he had used to burn his life essence.


    Normally, the forbidden technique would not have ended up consuming the body of the demonic cultivator so quickly... But now that the demonic cultivator had died and there was no way to keep the forbidden technique under control, it quickly burned through the remaining life essence still left in the body of the demonic cultivator while taking the shape of a blood red me that burned the body of the demonic cultivator until nothing was left!


    "This... Is not how I expected things to end..."


    Walking over after seeing the demonic cultivator falling dead to the ground before being consumed by a blood red me, Bai Ning could not help inspecting what little remained of the demonic cultivator before turning towards Hui Ying with disbelief.


    No matter how he thought the battle would end, he had never expected for Hui Ying to be the one to deal the decisive blow and kill the demonic cultivator while it was focused on him.


    Not to mention the fact that the demonic cultivator had already been attacked once by Hui Ying and should understand that she would be able to do so again, Bai Ning was amazed over the power behind the sword attack of Hui Ying.


    Even considering that she had used all her strength to kill the demonic cultivator, the power behind her attack just now had clearly exceeded her current cultivation realm and reached a new level that was both faster and strongerpared to her first sneak attack.


    From the fact that the demonic cultivator had ended up getting killed without any time to react, it was obvious that he had not expected the sudden increase in strength from Hui Ying... To be honest, Bai Ning had a feeling that the demonic cultivator had not even noticed Hui Ying approaching him in the first ce...


    "Hah... That was... Hah... Exhausting..."


    "Indeed, we should get going before we end up running into another demonic cultivator in our current situation... Stay here for now and recover, I will pick up my artifacts first."


    "Fine by me! Call me when you are ready to leave."


    As Hui Yingid down on the ground exhausted from her earlier attack, Bai Ning who was in far better condition even after having fought with the demonic cultivator quickly moved around the dead town to pick up the different defensive artifacts that had survived the earlier sh and had only been sent flying.


    Even if the majority of the defensive artifacts had been damaged far too much, the most precious among the defensive artifacts were still intact without the slightest sign of damage.


    "That should be all of them... Let''s get going!"


    "Ah? Okayyyy~"


    After having collected thest of his still intact defensive artifacts, Bai Ning and Hui Ying soon left the dead town without looking back.


    The demonic cultivators had all been killed and the demonic formation had been destroyed, there was no reason for them to stay any longer and risk running into a group of powerful demonic cultivator before they had recovered fully from their fight with the Higher Demon Realm demonic cultivator.


    As for cleaning up the dead town? They did not dare do so, as that would take hours... And given their current circumstances, it was not worth the risk so in the end, they decided to just burn down the town and reduce the ce to ashes before leaving.


    At least this way, any demonic cultivators passing by would not be able to use the dead bodies of the town''s inhabitants for another demonic formation or ritual to increase their strength!


    ...


    "So... The time to leave is finally here, I wonder how Bai Ning is doing..."


    Looking out the window inside his cultivation room at the spirit springke just outside, Xuan Hao let out a short sigh as he thought about the journey to the capital of the Sky Empire, while also thinking about Bai Ning who was still hunting down demonic cultivators in the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    The past few weeks passed by in a sh, with most of his time being spent on recovering from the damage he had received to his dantian during the merger of his two domains.


    At this point in time, although he had not managed to fully recover, he was not that far away from it and would at most need another week to do so. More than enough time for him to recover before he reached the capital of the Sky Empire. Even if travelling would slow down his recovery speed...


    "Now that I think about it, who will be going with me for the sect alliance...? Is it Elder Song, Feng Chen... Maybe Shu Yao?" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao soon shook his head.


    Elder Song and Feng Chen were unlikely to be going with him. After all, the sect could not run without them being present for an extended period of time.


    Shu Yao on the other hand was busy helping Elder Song with the new disciples of the sect...


    "In the end... Am I going to the capital of the Sky Empire by myself?" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit ufortable at the idea of going to the sect alliance by himself.


    After all, he was not familiar with the Sky Empire nor was he familiar with any of the different sects and other powers that would be present for the sect alliance''s establishment.


    However, at least it would be easier to keep himself safe in case something ended up happening.


    I should just be going there for formalities sake and shouldn''t really have to do anything for the sect alliance of the Sky Empire other than showing up and agreeing to join the sect alliance. The other stuff of working together with other sects shoulde after the sect alliance is established and that should be something Elder Song will take care of together with Feng Chen...n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao looked towards the lotus farm Zu Fei had constructed close to the shore of the spirit springke.


    Even if there was not really anything to do other than show up for the sect alliance''s establishment and get to know some of the other sects that resided inside the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao still felt ufortable going to the capital of the Sky Empire alone.


    "Hah... I should get ready and inform my disciples before leaving..."


    Letting out a sigh, Xuan Hao turned around and left his cultivation room. Intending to inform his disciples before he left so they would at least have a chance to ask him any questions they might have before he left.


    Especially Qing Yi, who was in the process of preparing to breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Whoosh~


    Meeting up with Chu Yang and Qing Yi, Xuan Hao ended up spending the next three days teaching both of them and answering any questions they had about their cultivation.


    The one who ended up needing the most help was as expected Qing Yi, who was slowly getting ready to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm and catch up to Chu Yang who had broken through ahead of her.


    Bai Ning on the other... Was busy outside with hunting down demonic cultivators together with another disciple from the sect.


    At first, Xuan Hao nned to visit Bai Ning before leaving, but seeing that he was together with another disciple and was doing fine, he decided against it and just ended up informing him through hismunication talisman.


    After all, if he ended up showing up, he was sure that the rtionship between Bai Ning and the little disciple he was hunting demonic cultivators together with would change if he had not already informed her about who his master was.


    Bai Ning had finally made a friend that was not a living fossil from the cksmithing Hall... Or Sea of a Thousand Furnaces as it was called now. This was not something Xuan Hao wanted to ruin!


    Hopefully, Bai Ning would end up making more friends his age after returning from the Azure Sky Kingdom in the future.


    At the very least, Xuan Hao felt that sending Bai Ning to the Azure Sky Kingdom was a great idea.


    Not only did Bai Ning''s strength andbat experience increase a lot from what he had observed, but he had also started making friends with other disciples from the sect instead of the different cksmithing elders!


    ...


    "Time to leave... I hope the sect alliance thing ends up going well..."


    Returning to the Star Shattering Sect after having checked up on Bai Ning and already having informed Feng Chen and the other elders about him leaving, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes as he gazed off in the direction of the Sky Empire''s capital city.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling both nervous and excited at the prospect of finally meeting someone who had surpassed the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao began his journey towards the core of the Sky Empire!

 Chapter ?692 Elder from the Flame Sky Kingdom!

    ?692 Elder from the me Sky Kingdom!


    Leaving the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao decided to use a flying demon beast for the first part of his journey. This way, he would be able to recover his strength while also moving towards his destination at the same time.


    Although this was slower than him flying himself, he would be able to recover his strength far faster this way and he didn''t really expect to encounter any dangerous situations before reaching the core of the Sky Empire.


    Even if he ended up encountering a bandit group along the way, most bandit groups would not have any strong demon beasts avable to them¡­ And that was not mentioning that the flying demon beast he was using had reached the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Ordinary flying demon beasts would not be able to catch up to him, let alone try and pick a fight with him!


    Only after reaching the core region of the Sky Empire was there a possibility of him encountering more powerful bandits who had powerful demon beasts avable. Encountering a Domain Lord Realm Expert would not be odd either given that they were far moremon at the core region of the Sky Empire¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao closed his eyes and focused on fully recovering.


    No matter what, with the strength of the flying demon beast he was using, he should be safe for the next few days moving through the outer regions and border regions of the Sky Empire. Making his way towards the core region of the Sky Empire.


    Of course¡­ Considering that he avoided the few Domain Lord Realm powers that started appearing the closer he got the core region of the Sky Empire.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao had just left the Star Shattering Sect, an elder who had just recently broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm and had been promoted to an elder in charge of guarding the entrance to Star Shattering Sect, could be seen rushing back towards the Seventh Star Peak with a nervous expression on his face.


    Whoosh~!


    Rushing past the different elders and disciples who were looking at him with weird expressions on their face as they saw him dashing past them at an extremely fast speed, the elder soon found himself in front of Elder Song''s courtyard.


    Bang!


    Opening the door to Elder Song''s courtyard open without knocking first in a violent manner, the elder quickly spotted Elder Song who was sitting inside the small garden of the courtyard enjoying a cup of tea looking over towards him with a confused expression on his face.


    Obviously, Elder Song did not expect for someone to suddenlye barrelling into his courtyard without knocking.


    "What is it? For you to act like this, Elder ying Ghost, did someone important show up at the entrance?"


    Looking at the door leading to his courtyard that had almost been broken off by the Elder ying Ghost, Elder Song could not help narrowing his eyes.


    From how anxious Elder ying Ghost was, it was obvious that something had happened at the entrance of the sect. If not¡­ He would make sure to have a talk with Elder ying Ghost about not randomly breaking into other people''s home¡­


    "Someone from the me Sky Kingdom showed up and is saying that she wants to talk about the future rtionship between the me Sky Kingdom and the Star Shattering Sect!


    From what I could see, the person who showed up is at least someone in the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm... Maybe even someone who reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    Hearing what Elder Song said, Elder ying Ghost calmed down a bit before he began exining to Elder Song. Making sure to empathize the strength of the person who had showed up at the entrance of the sect.


    "Someone from the me Sky Kingdom? And someone who has at least reached the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul no less¡­ Hm¡­ Are they not one of the kingdoms that are waiting for one of their ancestors to break through to the Domain Lord Realm?" Muttering this to himself as a thoughtful expression appeared on his face, Elder Song tried his best to recall any information he could about the me Sky Kingdom.


    They are one of the more powerful kingdoms around the border that me and the rest of the elders are nning for the sect to expand into over theing years¡­ But, even if they know that we will be expanding into their kingdom, that is something that is still quite a few years away from now. During this period of time, they should be more focused on helping their ancestors break through to the Domain Lord Realm, why did someone from the me Sky Kingdom suddenly show up now?


    Did they encounter a dangerous enemy they could not deal with by themselves? Perhaps one of their ancestors actually managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm and they want toe and announce it in hopes of us leaving them alone? Maybe somethingpletely different¡­


    Not able to understand why someone from the me Sky Kingdom would suddenly show up now of all times, Elder Song silently let out a sigh before he put the cup of tea, he had been holding down on the table in front of him.


    "Looks like I will have to go and have a chat with this Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the me Sky Kingdom¡­ Elder ying Ghost, go and inform the sect master about this and tell him that I will be taking care of our guest from the me Sky Kingdom."


    "Yes! I will get going Elder Song!"


    Whoosh~


    Sending off Elder ying Ghost to inform Feng Chen about their guest from the me Sky Kingdom, Elder Song stood up before making his way towards the entrance of the Star Shattering Sect located at the base of the Ninth Star Peak.


    Even if the other party was someone who had at the very least reached the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, Elder Song was not the slightest bit afraid of the other party attacking him.


    Not to mention the fact that offending a sect with more than one Domain Lord Realm Expert was not a wise choice, Elder Song would always be able to escape back inside the Chaotic Qi Formation in case the other party tried anything.


    ¡­


    "I wonder if this is the correct choice¡­"


    A few minutes before Elder Song had been informed about someone showing up at the entrance of the sect, a female figure appeared below the Ninth Star Peak with a nervous expression on her face.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    This person was none other than Elder Sheng Mei, the old Nascent Soul Realm Elder from the me Sky Kingdom that wanted to establish a friendly rtionship with the Star Shattering Sect.


    After it had been decided that the me Sky Kingdom would take a wait and see attitude while waiting for one of their ancestors to break through to the Domain Lord Realm, Shen Mei had felt that doing so would damage their possible future rtionship with the Star Shattering Sect.


    Especially considering that Elder Hong Xuan, who wanted to fight it out with the Star Shattering Sect to the end by relying on the ancient formation that protected the capital of the me Sky Kingdom, had started gaining more power within the capital over the past few months¡­


    For this reason, Sheng Mei had decided to take the risk and go to the Star Shattering Sect herself to try and see if she could get the help of the Shattering Star Sect in helping her convince the me Sky Kingdom to join them instead of doing what Elder Hong Xuan was nning¡­


    All things considered, the Star Shattering Sect would not lose anything by doing this and might even be able to avoid a fight with the me Sky Kingdom in the future this way!


    The only problem is¡­ How do I convince them that I''m really trying to make the me Sky Kingdom join the Star Shattering Sect and that I''m not just someone trying to get my hands on the resources of the Star Shattering Sect to increase my own strength before running away¡­


    Shaking her head as she thought about this, Shen Mei walked up to the entrance leading up the Ninth Star Peak and informed the elder standing guard at the gate about who she was and why she hade.


    Whoosh~


    "Hehe~"


    Watching the elder showing a shocked expression on his face after hearing what she said before dashing up the Ninth Star Peak and disappearing from sight the next moment, Sheng Mei could not help chuckling to herself at how panicked the elder had been after realizing how strong she was.


    That little elder should just recently have reached the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ But, to think that someone at the Nascent Soul Realm actually guards the entrance of the sect¡­


    Thinking this to herself, Sheng Mei could not help looking forward to seeing the Star Shattering Sect, a sect with more than one Domain Lord Realm Expert behind it!

 Chapter ?693 Jungle Inside the Mountain

    ?693 Jungle Inside the Mountain


    "This is the elder from the me Sky Kingdom?"


    Reaching the base of the Ninth Star Peak where the entrance to the Star Shattering Sect was located, Elder Song could not help showing a surprised expression on his face when he spotted Sheng Mei patiently sitting on a nearby rock waiting.


    Even from a distance, he could clearly sense that she was indeed someone who had at least reached the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not that he had doubted Elder ying Ghost, but Elder Song really did not expect for the person sent over by the me Sky Kingdom to be so powerful. After all, an expert who had at least reached the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm should be among the most powerful people of the me Sky Kingdom, there was no reason for the me Sky Kingdom to sent over someone that powerful!


    "Ah! Greetings elder! I''m Sheng Mei, an elder from the me Sky Kingdom."


    Spotting Elder Song almost the moment he arrived, Sheng Mei stepped forward before respectful introducing herself in a polite tone.


    "Hello, Sheng Mei, I''m the current Vice Sect Master of the Star Shattering Sect, you can just call me Elder Song... Now, might I ask why someone like yourself came all the way here?"


    Introducing himself, Elder Song directly asked Sheng Mei why she hade.


    "This... Elder Song, I think it would be best to find another ce to discuss this. After all, it pertains the future of my me Sky Kingdom..."


    "I understand, follow me and we will discuss it in more details inside."


    Nodding his head as he understood what Sheng Mei was trying to say, Elder Song motioned for her to follow him as both of them soon made their way up the Ninth Star Peak. Making their way towards the Seventh Star Peak where the main part of the Star Shattering Sect was located.


    As for the danger that came along with letting someone as powerful as Sheng Mei inside the core part of the sect... Elder Song was not the slightest bit worried about this!


    After all, not only did the Star Shattering Sect have the Chaotic Qi Formation in ce... But Feng Chen who had reached the Domain Lord Realm was also present on the Seventh Star Peak together with Shu Yao who had simrly reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    If Sheng Mei really tried anything, Feng Chen and Shu Yao would be able to catch her before she could do anything!


    ...


    As Elder Song and Sheng Mei were about to discuss the matter of the me Sky Kingdom back in the Star Shattering Sect, Bai Ning and Hui Ying had bothe to a stop in front of a massive opening leading inside arge mountain.


    "Are you sure this is the ce where the so-called sacred spiritual herb you are looking for is located?"


    "Yes! I''m certain of it... Just remember to keep your promise! Okay?!"


    Rolling his eyes as he saw the dangerous look in Hui Ying''s eyes after she mentioned the promise they had made beforeing to the mountain where the sacred spiritual herb she was looking for was located, Bai Ning could not help remembering how she had ended up revealing her reason for joining the demonic cultivator hunt in the Azure Sky Kingdom.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Well... It was not really her revealing her secret and was more like him asking her about the spiritual herb she was searching for after they had hunted down a demonic cultivator.


    Following him mentioning it... It did not take long for the panicked Hui Ying to reveal everything with a both embarrassed and threatening expression on her face...


    "What is that supposed to mean? Sure, the spiritual herb is all yours... But just as we promised, the spiritual metals you said would be present in the area around where the spiritual herb grows are mine."


    Chuckling a bit as he saw the increasingly threatening look from Hui Ying after he remained silent for a short time without hearing him answer, Bai Ning could not help teasing her before answering her.


    "You-!"


    Not knowing what to say after being made fun of by Bai Ning, Hui Ying pouted angrily before increasing her speed towards the opening in the mountain without waiting for Bai Ning.


    Step~ Step~


    Seeing Hui Ying almost running towards the opening in the side of the mountain, Bai Ning did not intend to get left behind, as he soon increased his own speed to catch up with Hui Ying. However, this only ended up causing Hui Ying to move even faster than before-


    Swish-!


    Not one to be left behind, Bai Ning simrly increased his speed to match her.


    In the end, both of them soon reached the opening of the mountain and after a quick break to go over what little knowledge Hui Ying had gathered about the sacred spiritual herb she was looking for and the dangers that might be present, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying made their way into the mountain.


    ...


    Entering the mountain through therge opening, Bai Ning could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after they made it a few dozen meters inside the mountain.


    "How weird... The inside of this mountain is filled with all sorts of nts I have never seen before, it''s almost like they arepletely foreign to this ce..."


    Although he already had some clue about the environment inside the mountain from what little information Hui Ying had managed to gather about the so-called sacred spiritual herb that she was aiming for, Bai Ning was still surprised after seeing the normal rocky cave walls get covered with all sorts of weird nts he had never seen before.


    Even after learning about all sorts of different spiritual nts and normal nts from his senior sister Qing Yi, he still had no idea about the origin or name of the nts all around him.


    This was also one of the reasons why he ended up concluding that the nts were foreign to the ce where the Star Shattering Sect was located- No, it would be more urate to say that the nts that had started covering the cave walls werepletely foreign to the border of the Sky Empire!


    Feeling both amazed and worried after seeing all these brand-new nts, Bai Ning made sure to have his guard up.


    The main thing Hui Ying had mentioned about the sacred spiritual herb she was looking for, was the fact that it grew inside a jungle located at the centre of a massive mountain and was surrounded by a special kind of spiritual metal.


    At first, Bai Ning did not really believe it. After all, a jungle inside a mountain? He had never heard about something like that before. Not to mention, for a mountain to contain a jungle inside of it, just how big would that mountain have to be?


    Even if he was slowly getting convinced that Hui Ying was telling the truth regarding a jungle inside a mountain, he was still doubtful. After all, the mountain they were making their way inside of was far too small to contain a jungle inside it, a small forest covering a few hundred meters would be the be the limit of what was possible!


    Not to mention, they had already been walking for close to five minutes at this point in time!


    "How long will it take to reach the so-called jungle inside the mountain? At this point we will reach the other side of the mountain before we-!"


    Roar!


    Before Bai Ning managed to finish what, he was saying a loud roar echoed out not too far away from where they were standing. Shocking both Bai Ning and Hui Ying as both of them cautiously looked towards the direction that the sound hade from.


    "Nothing..."


    "Indeed..."


    Not seeing anything, both of them came to an agreement before both of them slowly began moving towards the direction of the roar with their weapons ready.


    Step~ Step~


    As both of them moved towards the origin of the roar, the cave covered in weird nts suddenly came to an end and what appeared before them was not the other side of the mountain that Bai Ning had expected to see. Instead, it was-


    "The jungle inside the mountain! We finally reached it!"


    "How does this even make sense... How can there be such a huge jungle inside such a small mountain?!"


    Indeed, what appeared in front of Bai Ning and Hui Ying was a dense jungle filled with all sorts of unique trees that Bai Ning had never seen before.


    Not to mention that a jungle had actually appeared inside the mountain, what made Bai Ning far more surprised was the fact that he could not see the end of the jungle!


    Given the size of the mountain they had entered, it should be impossible for such arge jungle to fit inside!


    Not to mention the sun and clouds floating in the air above them...


    Did we enter one of the secret realms that my master mentioned...?


    ording to his master, even someone in the Nascent Soul Realm might not be able to guarantee their own safety inside a secret realm, let alone someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm like himself!


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he guessed this, Bai Ning could look towards the dense jungle in front of him with fear.


    "Hui Ying, I don''t thin this ce is safe for us to explore, we should- Hui Ying?!"


    About to inform Hui Ying about his thoughts and wanting to leave the ce he suspected to be a secret realm, Bai Ning could not help showing a shocked expression as he realized Hui Ying had already entered the dense jungle in front of them without any hesitation!


    "This damnable girl!"


    Swish-!


    Cursing silently to himself as he watched Hui Ying disappearing inside the jungle, Bai Ning hesitated for a short moment before dashing after her.

 Chapter ?694 Bai Ning and Hui Ying in Danger!

    ?694 Bai Ning and Hui Ying in Danger!


    Rustle~


    Following behind Hui Ying, Bai Ning could not help feeling nervous as he kept looking around himself for any possible dangers along the way.


    From what little he had heard his master exin about secret realms, he understood that they were incredibly dangerous for someone like himself who had only reached the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    If he was unlucky enough, he might end up encountering a Core Formation Realm demon beast and in the worst case, a demon beast that had reached the Nascent Soul Realm... Maybe even the Domain Lord Realm!


    "Hui Ying!"


    Knowing just how dangerous it was for them to stay in a ce like this, Bai Ning called out to Hui Ying the moment he managed to catch up with her.


    "Hm? Bai Ning? Is something wrong?"


    Not understanding why Bai Ning had called out to her with a worried expression on his face looking like he had just faced a life and death battle, Hui Ying tilted her head to the side with a confused expression stered all over her face.


    "This... We have to get out of here as quickly as possible!"


    "Why?! The scared spiritual herb is definitely somewhere in here, there is no way we can just give up and leave now that we have made it this far!"


    Not understanding why Bai Ning had suddenly started insisting on leaving after they had just entered the jungle where the sacred spiritual herb, she was looking for was located, Hui Ying looked towards Bai Ning for an exnation.


    "If I''m not wrong, this ce should be a secret realm, a really dangerous ce with strong demon beasts surpassing the Core Formation Realm and-"


    ROOOAR-!


    Trying his best to give a quick exnation of a secret realm to make Hui Ying understand how dangerous a secret realm was, Bai Ning was cut short as a loud roar echoed out only a few dozen meters behind them.


    Roar!


    Roar!


    As even more roars began sounding out from behind them getting closer and closer to their current location, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying turned around to see what was happening behind them


    Bang!


    Just as they turned around, a loud sound of fighting could be heard, as both Bai Ning and Hui Ying saw two massive demon beasts shing violently with each other only a few dozen meters away from where they were standing.


    Roar!


    Crack!


    "This- Let''s leave before they notice anything..."


    Seeing the demon beast had not noticed them yet and were busy fighting each other, Bai Ning looked towards Hui Ying before whispering to her while signalling for towards an area covered in dense jungle foliage where they should be able to easily escape without the demon beasts noticing them.


    "Y-yes!"


    Nodding her head filled with fear as she said this, Hui Ying moved closer to Bai Ning before both of them slowly began moving away from where they were standing. Doing their absolute best to not make any sounds that might catch the attention of the two demon beasts busy fighting with each other.


    The main reason why both of them did not dare thinking about fighting the two demon beasts shing with each other in front of them was rather simple... The two demon beasts had both reached the Core Formation Realm!


    Not to mention that they had reached the Core Formation Realm, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying could clearly feel that the two demon beasts were had not simply reached the earlier stages of the Core Formation Realm... But should instead have reached theter stages of the Core Formation Realm!


    If not for the fact that they were busy fighting with each other, it was doubtful whether they would even have a chance to escape to begin with given their current strength-


    Crack~


    Just as they were about to reach the area with dense jungle foliage where they should be able to hide themselves better and increase their speed, the sound of a random twig being stepped on echoed out during the short silence after the two demon beasts had separated from each other to contemte their next move...


    Roar?


    Roar?


    ""...""


    Not to anyone''s surprise, the two demon beasts both turned towards the origin of the sound and soon made eye contact with Bai Ning and Hui Ying who now awkwardly stood frozen a few meters away from the dense jungle foliage from where they would have been able to use their movement techniques to escape without being noticed by the two demon beasts.


    "RUN!"


    Not daring to waste any time after seeing that the two demon beasts had spotted them, Bai Ning grabbed hold of Hui Ying before using his movement technique to its limit and dashing towards the dense jungle foliage.


    "Wah-"


    Caught off guard by Bai Ning suddenly pulling her along, Hui Ying could only let out a weird scream as both of them soon disappeared into the dense jungle foliage before the demon beasts did anything.


    ROOAR!


    ROOOOAR!


    Realizing that Bai Ning and Hui Ying had run away, the two demon beasts seemed to have forgotten about their earlier life and death fight-


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    As both of them charged after the two escaping humans who had suddenly appeared in front of them.


    ...


    Flying high above the ground on top of a Nascent Soul Realm demon beast at the same time that his disciple was desperately escaping for his life, Xuan Hao had taken a short break from repairing his dantian, as he decided to take some time to watch the scenery below him.


    "Hm... I wonder how Bai Ning is doing in the Azure Sky Kingdom with that little friend of his. Now that I think about it, he did improve quite a bit over the past few weeks..." Muttering this to himself as he flew over a small battle taking ce between a group of demonic cultivators and normal cultivator, Xuan Hao casually unleashed a stream of sword light towards the demonic cultivators.


    Swish~!


    Before they even had a chance to react, all the demonic cultivator who had all reached the Higher Demon Realm were all reduced to dust without even knowing what had killed them. Much to the surprise of the cultivators fighting them, who soon fell to the ground and began thanking him.


    Well... They couldn''t really see him with how high up he was and the fact that he had hidden himself by using his domain power to create a small cloud below him, but at least they had some clue that some expert had passed by and had helped them.


    As for why he was using a cloud he had condensed to hide himself instead of using his domain directly, it was rather simple, he had no way to keep his domain active all the time to hide himself before his dantian had fully recovered.


    Not to mention, using a cloud was far easier. Although... It looked rather weird from below if one paid attention, as the cloud moved far too fast to be considered a normal cloud. At least it would be less obviouspared to the flying demon beast flying past, it was far easier to spotpared to a fast cloud speeding across the sky high up in the sky that could only be spotted if someone with powerful enough strength happened to look up.


    "Hm? That is... Rather odd..."N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Suddenly turning his attention away from the people prostrating towards the sky on the ground, Xuan Hao looked towards a weird cloud flying in his direction.


    For some reason... This cloud... Looks simr to the one I made-


    Whoosh~


    Before Xuan Hao had any chance to finish his thoughts, the odd cloud in question passed by him and as he got a chance to see it up close, he noticed that someone was simrly sitting on top of a flying demon beast while also using a cloud to not get noticed by anyone below like him.


    "..."


    "..."


    As they passed by each other, Xuan Hao and the person who did the exact same as him to hide their presence from prying eyes below, silently made eye contact for a short moment.


    The person in question was a young woman who had reached the Nascent Soul Realm and the flying demon beast below her had simrly reached the Nascent Soul Realm and was even slightly stronger than her. Giving away the fact that she was someone with a rather high status to get her hands on such a powerful flying demon beast.


    Whoosh-!


    Not a secondter, the young woman disappeared in the distance without them talking to each other.


    Looking a bit surprised in the direction that the young woman was heading, Xuan Hao could not help wondering why someone like her would go towards the border region.


    Perhaps she is someone from the Sky Empire and is there to check up on the recent surge of demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds?


    Whoosh-!


    Not thinking too much about the young woman after she disappeared, Xuan Hao signalled for the flying demon beast below him to increase in speed as he resumed his journey towards the capital of the Sky Empire.

 Chapter 695 Lost~

    ?695 Lost~


    Whoosh~!


    Using his movement technique to its limits, Bai Ning dashed through the dense jungle together with Hui Ying who was dragged along with him during the fast escape-


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Behind them, the roars of the two demon beasts echoed out as they got closer and closer with each passing second.


    "H-how can we escape from them!? They are far stronger than us and will catch up to us soon!" Looking back towards the approaching demon beasts that were getting closer and closer to them, Hui Ying, who was carried by Bai Ning due to him being far faster than her in terms of speed, could not help eximing in a worried tone.


    Even if the demon beasts were slowed down due to the dense jungle foliage and trees blocking their path, it did not take a genius to figure out that the demon beasts would soon be able to catch up to them. After all, they were Core Formation Realm demon beast!


    "¡­"


    Understanding that they would indeed get caught by the two demon beasts if they could not find a way to lose the two demon beasts any time soon, Bai Ning remained quiet after hearing what Hui Ying said. Focusing his attention on trying to think of a way to escape from the two demon beasts in the Core Formation Realm chasing after them.


    "Ah! Bai Ning! Over there!"


    Just at this moment, Hui Ying called out in an excited tone as she pointed towards somewhere in the distance.


    "Hm?"


    Wondering what had suddenly gotten her so excited in their current bad situation, Bai Ning quickly turned towards the ce where she was pointing.


    "This is¡­ More demon beasts!?"


    Indeed, the ce Hui Ying was pointing, arge group of demon beasts ranging from somewhere in the earlier stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm to the Core Formation Realm could be seenzing around a smallke in the middle of an opening in the jungle. Counting them, there were at least fifty demon beasts!


    Whoosh~!


    Knowing why Hui Ying had be so excited after seeing the group of demon beasts, Bai Ning was simrly excited as he turned towards the group of demon beasts before using all his strength to rush towards them.


    Therge group of demon beasts could serve as a great distraction for them and help them escape from the two powerful demon beasts chasing after them¡­ But at the same time, it would also be dangerous for them as therge group of demon beasts consisted of at least four Core Formation Realm demon beast that could kill them just as easily as the demon beasts chasing after them!


    "Let''s hope those Core Formation demon beasts in front of us focus on the two Core Formation Realm demon beasts chasing after us¡­" Muttering this to himself as he kept his attention focused on the four especially powerful demon beast from the group of demon beasts in front of him, Bai Ning could not stop himself from getting nervous.


    The n of using the group of demon beasts in front of them as a distraction was not without any risks!


    If the four Core Formation Realm demon beasts decided to attack them instead of dealing with the two demon beasts chasing after them, they would properly not be able to escape¡­


    Roar? ROOAR!


    As they approached the opening in the jungle, one of the Core Formation Realm demon beastszing around the smallke noticed them before alerting the rest of the demon beastszing around.


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Not a secondter, countless roars could be heard as the close to fifty demon beasts rxing around the smallke jumped up and roared threatening towards Bai Ning and Hui Ying approaching them.


    Looks like they are not as aggressive as the other two demon beast, we should be fine as long as we don''t get too close to them¡­


    Letting out a sigh of relief after seeing that the demon beasts only roared threatening at them without getting up to chase after them, Bai Ning dashed forward before going around the opening in the jungle without getting too close to group of demon beasts roaring threateningly at them from the side.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Whoosh~!


    Not long after Bai Ning and Hui Ying made it to the other side of the opening of the jungle by going around the group of demon beasts, the two demon beasts chasing after them showed up.


    ROAAAR!


    Not showing the slightest bit of care towards the group of demon beasts, the two powerful Core Formation Realm demon beasts entered the opening and were about to make their way straight through it to where Hui Ying and Bai Ning were located-


    ROOOOOOAR!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    However, entering the opening in the jungle was seen as a tant provocation and threat by the group of demon beasts located around the smallke, as the Core Formation Realm demon beasts among them charged forward to protect the weaker once from what they viewed as a very clear attack.


    Swish-!


    Bang!


    ROOOOOAR!


    Not a secondter, the two demon beasts that had been chasing after Bai Ning and Hui Ying began shing with the group of demon beasts in the opening of the jungle.


    "Let''s get away before the fighting here ends¡­"


    Knowing that the fight was not going tost for long, Bai Ning put Hui Ying down before both of them quickly escaped in the opposite direction of the fighting.


    Going around and making their way back towards the ce where they had entered the jungle through was far too risky, as the two demon beasts chasing after them would be able to easily spot them and attack them.


    Although escaping into the deeper part of the jungle was risky, it was a far better choicepared to having to face off against to powerful Core Formation Realm demon beasts!


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ We should have¡­ Hah¡­ Escaped from them by now¡­"


    Copsing down on the soft grass that covered the ground beneath them, Bai Ning copsed on the ground from exhaustion.


    "Indeed¡­" In a simrly exhausted state from having used her movement technique for an extended period of time, Hui Ying alsoid down on the soft grass beside Bai Ning.


    During the past half hour after the group of demon beasts beside the smallke started fighting with the two demon beats that had been chasing after them, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying had not dared slowing down as they used their movement techniques to escape as far away as possible before the fighting between the demon beasts stopped.


    Rustle~


    Resting on the ground as they recovered from their exhausted states, Hui Ying suddenly thought of something as she turned towards Bai Ning with a somewhat nervous expression on her face.


    "By the way¡­ How are we supposed to find our way back out of the jungle again¡­?"


    During their escape, they had ventured deep into the jungle and had turned in all sorts of different directions to avoid the demon beasts chasing them. Now that they needed to find their way back out again¡­ It would indeed be rather difficult¡­


    "That is¡­ A good question¡­ I will try and use themunication talisman and see if we can contact any of the elders."


    Knowing that they were not likely to find their way out on their own without bumping into another Core Formation Realm demon beast, Bai Ning took out amunication talisman from his interspatial ring that the elders of the sect had given to them in case they ended up in a situation they couldn''t handle.


    Bzzz~


    "Indeed¡­ It''s of no use¡­ Looks like we are indeed inside a secret realm¡­"


    Not having expected for themunication talisman to work in the first ce as he remembered how his master had told him that such things did not work inside a secret realm, Bai Ning let out a sigh as he put the uselessmunication talisman back inside his interspatial ring.


    "Let''s try the one master gave me¡­"


    Not having too much hope that themunication talisman his master gave him would be any different, Bai Ning took out a far more high-qualitymunication talisman that his master had given him.


    Bzzz~


    "Also useless¡­" Muttering this to himself as he also watched the high-qualitymunication talisman given by his master not working, Bai Ning could not help feeling a wave of helplessness wash over him.


    Given their current circumstances, they did not have a high chance of making it out alive by themselves and at the same time, they could not rely on someoneing to help them out.


    "Bai Ning¡­"


    "It''s fine, we will just have to find a way back on our own and avoid the stronger demon beasts along the way. Maybe we can even find the sacred spiritual herb you are looking for along the way!" Seeing Hui Ying nervously looking towards him after the twomunication talismans failed, Bai Ning quickly cheered her up.


    Even if their current situation was bad, it was not totally helpless!

 Chapter ?696 Soul Contract

    ?696 Soul Contract


    At the same time Bai Ning and Hui Ying were trying to figure out what to do to safely find their way out of the massive jungle filled with all sorts of dangerous demon beasts that they now found themselves inside of, Elder song and Sheng Mei sat together inside a small, isted pavilion.


    Looking at them from a distance, it was obvious that a frown had appeared on Elder Song''s face as he stared towards Sheng Mei sitting across from him.


    "Are you sure what you said is correct!?"


    "Yes, without me, I''m sure that the me Sky Kingdom will end up taking a stance against your Star Shattering Sect when you start expanding inside their territory!"


    Hearing Sheng Mei say this, Elder Song frowned even more than before.


    From their conversation so far, he had managed to understand that Sheng Mei sitting across from him should be the leader of one of the two factions of elders that existed inside the me Sky Kingdom.


    One of the groups wanted to wait for one of their ancestors to reach the Domain Lord Realm so they could stay independent from the Star Shattering Sect.


    If one of the ancestors could not reach the Domain Lord Realm before the Star Shattering Sect started expanding into their territory, they wanted to retreat into the capital city that was protected by an ancient formation that had been created by a long dead ancestor of the me Sky Kingdom that had reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    The faction of elders Sheng Mei belonged to wanted to join under the Star Shattering Sect and strive for the benefits that could be obtained by working under a powerful sect with more than one Domain Lord Realm Expert in it.


    Other than this, Sheng Mei''s faction also wanted to gain the protection of the Star Shattering Sect by being under them.


    In the end, both of the factions had their own pr opposite goals.


    One wanting to join the Star Shattering Sect, the other wanting to stay independent and rely on their ancestors.


    The king and the ancestors had not yet taken a stance to fully support one of the two factions, but they were currently leaning towards the side that wanted to remain independent from the Star Shattering Sect.


    The reason why Sheng Mei had made the journey all the way to the Star Shattering Sect, was because she understood that her faction would end up losing if things continued like they were...


    "So... You want my sect to help you out in growing your faction''s power inside the me Sky Kingdom?"


    "Yes! This way, it will be far easier for the Star Shattering Sect to take control of the me Sky Kingdom when the timees... Not to mention, you will be able to avoid having to start war to take over the me Sky Kingdom this way!"


    Nodding her head with a serious expression on her face, Sheng Mei didn''t hide her reason foring to the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Indeed..."


    Not denying what Sheng Mei said as it would indeed to a great thing if the me Sky Kingdom willingly joined them without any resistance, Elder Song silently thought about.


    Soon, an eerie silence descended upon the small, isted pavilion.


    "..."


    Looking at Elder Song with a nervous expression on her face, Sheng Mei could not help feeling like every second passingsted for hours.


    Given that Elder Song''s decision on whether or not to support her and her faction of elders inside the me Sky Kingdom would decide her future actions and the fate of the entire me Sky Kingdom in the long run, it was not odd for Sheng Mei to feel nervous as she waited for Elder Song toe to a decision on whether or not he would let the Star Shattering Sect support her and her faction in growing their influence inside the me Sky Kingdom.


    "Hm... Supporting you and your faction gain more power in the me Sky Kingdom is something that will help my sect... But that is only considering the fact that you don''t just end up running away after being-"


    "I can sign a soul contract! With a Domain Lord Realm Expert in your sect writing the soul contract. Even if I reach the Domain Lord Realm in the Future, I would not be able to break it easily!"


    Interrupting Elder Song as she felt like he was going to refuse helping her, Sheng Mei quickly brought up using a soul contract.


    "A soul contract..."


    Showing a surprised expression after hearing what Sheng Mei said, Elder Song could not help looking a bit more closely at Sheng Mei.


    A soul contract was not something that could be done casually, as it was to some extend a demonic technique and the price for breaking a soul contract was in most circumstances the destruction of one''s soul!


    The strength required to break a soul contract without dying depended on the cultivator who set up the contract in the first ce... If like Sheng Mei had suggested, a Domain Lord Realm Expert of the Star Shattering Sect set up the soul contract. Even if she reached the Domain Lord Realm in the future, she would not be able to escape the soul contract without heavily injuring her soul.


    Not to mention... That was only if she reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    Given that she was still in the Nascent Soul Realm, there was no way for her to break the soul contract unless she happened to get the help of a powerful expert that was proficient in the art of soul maniption.


    "Hah... I understand that you indeed are willing to help us out with absorbing the me Sky Kingdom, I just wonder why you are willing to go so far for this...!"


    Narrowing his eyes towards the end, Elder Song scrutinized Sheng Mei even more deeply than before.


    Elder Song was not born yesterday, he understood very well that there had to be some kind of reason for Sheng Mei to go so far when it came to getting the Star Shattering Sect''s support in absorbing the kingdom she was from.


    "..."


    Realizing that she might have been a bit too overzealous in gaining the assistance of the Star Shattering Sect, Sheng Mei froze as she smiled wryly. Not knowing what to say when meeting the suspicious gaze of Elder Song examining her from top to bottom.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Actually I-"


    "No need, I understand that you should have your own reasons for going this far, as long as you sign a soul contract and don''t do anything that harms the Star Shattering Sect, I''m more than willing to secretly support you and your faction in gaining more power inside the me Sky Kingdom!"


    Interrupting Sheng Mei before she had a chance to speak, Elder Song agreed to help her in the me Sky Kingdom.


    "I... Thank you!"


    "No need to say this, you can stay here for now, I will be back with the soul contract shortly."


    Whoosh~


    Standing up, Elder Song directly left the small, isted pavilion.


    Given his many years of experience, he very well understood that trying to get Sheng Mei to tell him the reason why she was so adamant about getting the Star Shattering Sect''s support and helping her kingdom join under the Star Shattering Sect was impossible.


    Rather than wasting a few hours, it would be far more useful to just draft a good soul contract that would make it impossible for her to hurt the Star Shattering Sect.


    As long as that could be done, supporting her in faction inside the me Sky Kingdom would not be a bad idea!


    "Ah..."


    Suddenly realizing something as he was about to reach the sect master''s cultivation room, Elder Song momentarily came to a stop as an awkward smile appeared on his face.


    "I forgot how expensive it is to make such a high-level soul contract..."


    Indeed... Crafting a soul contract was not cheap and the higher level it was, the more high-quality materials would be needed...


    A soul contract made by a Domain Lord Realm Expert... The price of such a soul contract was something that even the current Star Shattering Sect would feel...


    "I hope that Sheng Mei will be useful... Oh well, I will just lower the budget for the beast tamers, they still have to pay back for all the spirit stones they wasted over the years! Hehe~"


    Chuckling to himself as he found out where he would get the resources required for the Domain Lord Realm level soul contract, Elder Song rxed as he made his way inside the sect master''s cultivation room where Feng Chen was already waiting for him.


    ...


    Roar?!


    Having moved to the base of the Seventh Star Peak toze around on arge rock located in the perfect spot for the sun to shine down on it, the winged lion demon beast suddenly felt a shiver run down its spine.


    For some reason, it had a feeling that someone was threatening its food supply...

 Chapter ?697 Hidden Path

    ?697 Hidden Path


    "Thank you so much for your help! I will make sure to uphold my part of the deal!"


    "That is fine with me, some people will transport the different resources you need to increase the power of your faction to the me Sky Kingdom¡­ If you need anything more, you can contact me through thismunication talisman."


    "Thank you! I will make sure to contact you in the future if somethinges up!"


    Swish-!


    Seeing Sheng Mei leaving with a happy expression on her face after their discussion had ended and she signed the soul contract, Elder Song could not hep shaking his head as he made his way back up the Ninth Star Peak on the path leading back to the Seventh Star Peak where the main part of the sect was located.


    From beginning to end, he had no clue why Sheng Mei had been so overly adamant on helping her kingdom join his sect.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "In the end, it does not matter now that she signed a soul contract. Not to mention, the resources she needs to strength her faction are not too outrages. At most I will take a little more from the beast tamers¡­"


    Not bothering to think too much about what had caused Sheng Mei toe and get the support of his sect, Elder Song threw the thought to the back of his mind as he instead focused his attention towards other more pressing matters.


    The most important of which was how he was going to convince the beast tamers to "willingly" give up a few more of their resources for the future of the sect.


    ¡­


    Rustle~


    Zing-!


    Ptsh!


    "Hah¡­ To think there were so many demon beasts around here-"


    Bang!


    Letting out an exhausted breath as she pierced through the head of a demon beasts, Hui Ying barely managed to react in time as she blocked the w of another demon beast that had taken the opportunity to attack her when she had pierced through the head of the demon beast.


    If not for the fact that she had already been aware of the other demon beast''s presence, she might not have been fast enough to block the w attack¡­


    "Bai Ning, we need to leave before we end up getting overrun by these demon beasts!"


    Holding back the demon beast that had attacked her, Hui Ying called out to Bai Ning who was dealing with two demon beasts in theter stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm on his own at the moment.


    "I understand that much-"


    BANG!


    "-But we will first have to find a way to kill them before we can think about leaving!"


    Having a difficult time fending off against two powerful Foundation Establishment demon beasts on his own, Bai Ning barely managed to say this before he was forced to put his full attention on dealing with the two demon beasts teaming up on him.


    Swish~!


    Ptsh!


    Understanding that there was not much Bai Ning could do in his current situation, Hui Ying used all her strength to quickly kill off the demon beast that had ambushed her before dashing towards Bai Ning to help him out.


    Even if she could not help too much when it came to the demonic cultivator that had reached the High Demon Realm back then, the same could not be said for the two demon beasts that were still in the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    Roar!


    Following Hui Ying joining forces with Bai Ning, the two demon beasts were quickly pushed back-


    Crack~!


    And soon enough, the first of the two demon beasts got crushed under one of Bai Ning''s artifacts.


    ROOOOAR!


    Swish-!


    Knowing that it would not be able to fight against Bai Ning and Hui Ying alone, thest demon beast gave up fighting and decided to run away before it ended up dead.


    "Finally¡­"


    Sitting down on the ground exhausted after the fight while Bai Ning was cleaned up the artifact he had used to crush the head of one of the two demon beasts.


    The group of demon beasts that had attacked them hade out of the blue and had caught both her and Bai Ning off guard when they were trying to think of ways to leave the jungle without encountering any powerful demon beasts.


    This attack allowed both of them to understand just how dangerous the jungle was with their current strength!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Just at this moment when she had barely sat down to recover her strength, Hui Ying could not help frowning as several loud roars echoed out in the distance getting closer and closer to their current location.


    "Let''s get going before more demon beasts show up¡­"


    "Yes!"


    Hearing Bai Ning call out to her as he looked towards the direction of the roars with a frown on his face, Hui Ying got up and soon enough, both of them silently decided to head in a direction moving away from the sound of demon beast roars behind them.


    Deep down, both of them were hoping that the direction they were moving in would lead them closer to the exit of the jungle and not somewhere even more dangerous!


    ¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Making their way through the jungle, Bai Ning suddenly came to a stop after noticing something on the ground.


    "Hm? What is it- Ah! Is it a-another demon beast?!"


    Not knowing why Bai Ning had suddenly stopped all of a sudden, Hui Ying could not help fearing that they had ended up running into a powerful demon beast.


    Only after looking in the same direction as Bai Ning and not seeing a demon beast did she let out a sigh of relief and calm down¡­ But just at this moment, she noticed what Bai Ning was looking at.


    "A stone¡­?"


    Indeed, what Bai Ning was focused on was a small stone lying beside arge tree towering more than a hundred meters into the sky.


    "Not just a stone! Look more closely!"


    "A stone with a weird face?"


    Listening to what Bai Ning said, Hui Ying looked more closely at the stone and discovered that a small face was carved into it. However, even then, she did not get why Bai Ning looked so closely at the small stone with a face.


    Was it perhaps because it''s a sign other people have been here before us?


    Realizing this, Hui Ying could not help inspecting her surroundings more closely than before. Trying her best to see if there were any buildings or ruins nearby that might be able to help them find a way to leave the jungle.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after seeing Hui Ying only looking at the stone once before beginning to carefully look around herself seemingly looking for something, Bai Ning walked up to the small stone with a face carved into it and pushed both his fingers into the empty eye sockets at the same time before injecting a small amount of qi into them.


    Creak~!


    Following the small amount of qi being injected through his fingers into the eye socket of the small stone, a loud creaking noise echoed out from below before a door sized hole opened up in therge tree that the small stone was lying beside.


    "The small stone is an artifact that, as you can see, opens a secret path!"


    Given how much time he spent around artifacts on a normal day before being forced to go to the Azure Sky Kingdom, it was only a given that he would be able to see through a hidden artifact like the small stone.


    If not for the fact that he was around, Bai Ning did not doubt that any other cultivator passing by would have acted like Hui Ying and just ignored the small stone after ncing over it for a few seconds!


    "¡­"


    Seeing Hui Ying''s speechless face after seeing a door sized entrance appearing in the side of the tree all of a sudden, Bai Ning could not help feeling a bit smug at his ability to easily recognize the fact that the small stone with a face was an artifact and at the same time figure out how to operate it.


    "Ahm-! Now¡­ Should we check out where this secret path leads? Maybe it will lead us to a way out of this jungle!"


    "Hm? Sure, but we should be careful, as the people who set up this ce could have set up traps inside. Not to mention, there might even be demon beasts hiding inside!"


    Ignoring the fake chough from Hui Ying, Bai Ning nodded his head as he reminded her of the dangers that might be lurking on the other side of where the secret door led them.


    Even if the secret path that the door that had appeared on the side of the tree might have a path leading out of the jungle, there was no way that there was no dangers lurking around in there!


    Inside the jungle, there was no safe ce for them to stay for more than a minutes at a time¡­ The undergroundwork that the secret path connected to would likely be the same!

 Chapter ?698 Nascent Soul Realm Demon Beast!

    698 Nascent Soul Realm Demon Beast!


    Making their way through the door sized opening that appeared in the side of the tree after Bai Ning activate the small artifact in the shape of a small stone, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying were taken aback by the beautiful spiral staircase on the other side leading down below the surface of the jungle.


    Not to mention the fact that spiral staircase was still perfectly intact after what had most likely been hundreds if not thousands of years going unattended, the fact that such a beautiful staircase was even there in the first ce made both of them wonder just what might be waiting for them at the bottom of it.


    At the same time, it also made both of them more careful when proceeding down the spiral staircase.


    ¡­


    "To think there was something like this below the surface of the jungle¡­"


    "Indeed¡­ So many precious spiritual herbs¡­"


    Reaching the bottom of the spiral staircase inside therge tree, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying could not help eximing in surprise, as they found themselves inside a small room decorated with all sorts of rare material.


    Even after most of the things inside the small room had sumbed to the long passage of time, the few things that had survived were all precious spiritual herbs or metals.


    Swoosh~!


    Not wanting to leave any of the precious spiritual herbs or metals behind, Bai Ning carefully picked up all of them and ced them into his interspatial ring after having made sure that there weren''t any traps around them.


    "¡­"


    Watching Bai Ning take away all the precious spiritual herbs and spiritual metals, Hui Ying did not say anything and just remained silent without saying anything.


    Given that their current situation was her fault because she had just carelessly rushed into the jungle without listening to what Bai Ning said before having hime and safe her, Hui Ying felt that it was only fair that he took the spiritual herbs and spiritual metals¡­


    "A pity that all the books and scroll in here has long since decayed and are no longer readable in any way¡­"


    Putting away thest few spiritual herbs and metals, Bai Ning did could not help feeling a hint of pity as he looked over the many long since destroyed books and scrolls everywhere around the small hideout.


    All of them had long since destroyed due to the passage of time. The material they had been written on was simply not of a high enough quality to withstand the passing of hundreds if not thousands of years in an underground room¡­


    "Ah! There is something over here!"


    "Hm?"


    Just as he was feeling great sadness looking over the many destroyed books and scrolls that possible contained information on how to get out of the jungle they were currently stuck inside of, Hui Ying called out as she pointed towards a small opening hidden beneath the spiral staircase.


    "This is¡­"


    Arriving beside Hui Ying before he looked through the small opening beneath the spiral staircase, Bai Ning could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he felt like something was looking back up at him.


    "A demon beast¡­?"


    Understanding that the feeling of something looking back at him had most likelye from some sort of demon beast, Bai Ning had a feeling that entering would not be any less dangerous than moving around the jungle above them!


    ROOOOAR!


    BANG!


    Just as Bai Ning was wondering whether or not to enter through the opening beneath the spiral staircase leading to an underground cavework below them, a loud roar echoed out above them before the sound of something massive crashing into the tree that functioned as the entrance to the small hideout shook violently.


    Fwoosh-!


    In response to what both Bai Ning and Hui Ying guessed to be a massive demon beast crashing into the tree serving as the entrance point to the hideout they were currently inside of, several dim runes lit up on the walls all around them before a terrifying pressure far above the Core Formation Realm demon beasts they had faced earlier appeared.


    "Nascent Soul Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he clearly understood the realm that the pressure belonged to, Bai Ning could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    If he had made a mistake when activating the entrance to the hideout earlier, the formation that had currently activated to fight off against the demon beast outside would have activated to attack them!


    Given that they were both only in the Foundation Establishment, Bai Ning understood very well that neither of them had any chance to resist the attack from a Nascent Soul Realm formation. Even with all his defensive artifacts put together, he would not have any way to defend against it!


    ROOOOOAR!


    However, the demon beast outside did not seem afraid of this formation and only seemed to be filled with even more killing intentpared to before. Allowing both Bai Ning and Hui Ying to understand that the demon beast had most likely reached the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    A Nascent Soul Realm demon beast!


    With their current strength, there was absolutely no way for them to face such a powerful demon beast!


    BANG!


    CRACK-!


    Feeling everything around them shaking as the demon beast outside attack the already decaying Nascent Soul Realm formation that protected the hideout, Bai Ning and Hui Ying could not help feeling a shiver run down their spine as they saw arge number of the symbols and runes covering the walls of the hideout start cracking apart.


    Given a few more attacks by the demon beast outside the already decaying formation would be broken down!


    ""¡­""


    Knowing very well that they had no way to face off against a demon beast that had reached the Nascent Soul Realm, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying inevitably looked towards the small opening beneath the spiral staircase leading down into an underground cavework beneath the jungle.


    Even if they understood that entering might end up being more dangerous than travelling along the surface of the jungle, they did not really have a better option with the powerful Nascent Soul Realm demon beast just outside¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Let''s leave this ce before the formation breaks!"


    "Yes!"


    Swish-!


    For this reason, neither Bai Ning nor Hui Ying hesitated in squeezing their way through the small opening beneath the spiral staircase before escaping as quickly as possible to get as far away from the underground hideout as possible before the formation broke.


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    The few demon beasts that had been observing them just earlier attempted to attack them, but to both Bai Ning and Hui Ying''s luck, these demon beasts had only reached the Qi Condensation Realm and were of no threat to them-


    Ptsh-!


    Allowing both of them to easily deal with them before continuing to escape in one of the many tunnels that branched off the underground cavework that they now found themselves inside of.


    Even if this might not be the smartest thing to do as they might end up running into a deadend this way, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying were far too upied with getting as far away as possible before the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast broke through the formation and entered the small hideout.


    After all, a demon beast in the Nascent Soul Realm had already developed a divine sense simr to human cultivators!


    If they were within the range of the demon beast''s divine sense when it broke through the formation, they would have no way to escape if it wanted to chase after them!


    ¡­


    BOOOOOM-!


    Only a short time after Bai Ning and Hui Ying had escaped through the small opening beneath the spiral staircase, the formation that had been protecting the small underground hideout broke, as a terrifying aura belonging to a Nascent Soul Realm demon beast spread through the nowpletely destroyed underground hideout.


    ROOOOAR!


    RUMBLE-!


    Along with a loud roar, the massive tree that served as the entrance to the underground hideout was forcefully pulled out from the ground together with the spiral staircase that had been connected to it.


    In the end, a massive hole leading all the way up to the surface appeared. Not only leading straight down into the small hideout, but also leading down into the undergroundwork that was located below it!


    Thump~


    Slowly, arge ball of what could only be described as hair rolled into the underground hideout. Almostpletely filling up the entire space with its sheer size.


    Not able to properly move around with its massive size, a gentle light soon covered the massive ball shaped demon beast.


    Fwoosh~!


    Following the gentle light disappearing, the massive ball shaped demon beast disappeared from sight. Instead, being reced by a small cute looking rabbit.


    If Xuan Hao was around, he would have realized that the rabbit was none other than the Nascent Soul Realm rabbit demon beast skilled at illusion techniques that he had encountered during his time in the Burning Mountain Range!

 Chapter ?699 Encounter

    ?699 Encounter


    At the same time that Bai Ning and Hui Ying had begun to explore the underground cavework of the jungle for a way out, Xuan Hao was taking a short break as heid on top of therge flying demon beast while admiring the vast and beautifulndscape below.


    The speed of a Nascent Soul Realm flying demon beast should beparable to the speed of an ordinary Domain Lord if I didn''t slow it down for me to fully recover by the point, I have to pass through the more dangerous locations of the Sky Empire!


    Even then, I should still be able to reach the Iron Sky Kingdom in another day or two with my current speed...


    Thinking this to himself Xuan Hao remembered the different things about the core region that had been written down in the book that Yi Ming had given to him during his time in the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Even if the core region of the Sky Empire sounded like a more peaceful ce due to the core of the Sky Empire being located there, this was simply not the case.


    From what information he could get his hands on through the book Yi Ming had given to him and what little he could learn from different records he hade across; the border of the Sky Empire was a far safer cepared to the core region of the Sky Empire.


    The main reason for this, was that almost all Domain Lord Realm Experts in the border region were from the Sky Empire and were stationed there to keep a watch on anyone trying to enter the Sky Empire. Few of them had any faction in the border region of the Sky Empire.


    For this reason, the scale of conflicts taking ce in the border region of the Sky Empire was limited to fights between Nascent Soul Realm Experts and although a Nascent Soul Realm Expert could cause quite a lot of destruction, it was nowhere near the level of destruction a Domain Lord Realm Expert could cause!


    Not to mention this, most Domain Lord Realm Experts that appeared in the border region of the Sky Empire would normally move to the core region shortly after due to the environment in the core region being far richer in resources and normally, it would not be easy for a Domain Lord Realm Expert to improve his cultivation realm without going to the core region.


    In the core region, there were far more resources that could help improve the strength of a Domain Lord Realm Expert, while at the same time, there were also older Domain Lord Realm experts that might get a chance to ask whenever one encountered a bottleneck.


    A case of a sect like the Star Shattering Sect appearing in the border region was an oddity that had never really happened before...


    Given how the core region was the ce where the top experts of the Sky Empire gathered, there were of course several special locations filled with both opportunities and life-threatening dangers, some of which were life threatening even to experts that had reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    During his journey to the capital of the Sky Empire, he would inevitably have to pass through a few of these special locations, some of which were dangerous even to Domain Lord Realm Experts!


    Of course, to the current Xuan Hao, he didn''t really think that going through any of these ces would pose any threat to him. Especially considering that he nned to fully recover before reaching any of them...


    "Hm?"


    Just as he was deep in thought thinking about the different ces he would have to pass throughter on when he reached the core region of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he sensed arge group of people approaching him from afar on top of flying demon beast.


    Even from afar, Xuan Hao could clearly sense that all of the flying demon beasts had reached the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Using his divine sense to investigate this group of people more closely, Xuan Hao could not help feeling surprised after realizing that there was close to twenty Nascent Soul Realm flying demon beasts, each with a Late Stage or Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert on top of it!


    Not only this, but there was also three people who had reached the Domain Lord Realm among the group of Nascent Soul Realm Expert!


    Looks like it should be a group of people from the Sky Empire or one of the three religious orders... I wonder what caused them toe to the border region...


    Not able to think about any other force inside the Sky Empire that would be able to amass such a powerful force outside of those, Xuan Hao could not help wondering why they had suddenly sent such a powerful force towards the border region.


    Looks like they also discovered me...


    Whoosh~!N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Feeling three different divine senses sweep over him just shortly after he finished inspecting the group, Xuan Hao decided to release his aura belonging to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Swish~!


    Not a secondter, the three different divine senses that hade from the group of people approaching his direction quickly retreated in a panic.


    From the reaction alone, it was obvious that they had not expected to encounter someone in the Domain Lord Realm at the border region... Let alone someone who had reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Hm? Looks like one of them ising over here...


    Noticing that the group of people came to a stop before one of the Domain Lord Realm Experts began approaching him, Xuan Hao decided to wait and see what they wanted...


    "Greetings senior!"


    Hearing the polite greeting from the Domain Lord Realm Expert that had arrived in front of him from the group now waiting in the distance, Xuan Hao could not help curiously examining him.


    Not only was he a Domain Lord Realm Expert in the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, but he was also covered in precious artifacts from head to toe!


    Even without knowing where the other party was from yet, it was obvious that it was arge power given how many artifacts he was powerful artifacts he was covered in...


    "Greetings, I''m a Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect. Might I ask where you are from...?"


    Deciding to introduce himself first before asking about where the man floating in front of him was from, Xuan Hao could not help secretly chuckling after seeing the puzzled appearances that appeared on the man''s face after he mentioned that he was from the Star Shattering Sect.


    It was obvious that although the Star Shattering Sect had started to gain fame in the border region of the Sky Empire, it was still not well known in the core region of the Sky Empire. Not something surprising given that the Star Shattering Sect had only been around for a few years at this point in time and had not been involved in the core region of the Sky Empire.


    "I''m a member of the Sky Empire''s Imperial Guard! Senior... I do not seem to have heard about the Star Shattering Sect before... Is it perhaps a new sect?"


    "Yes! It was just recently established and is located close to the border between the Sky Empire and the Frozen Wastnds!"


    "Close to the border between the Frozen Wastnds and the Sky Empire...?"


    "Yes!"


    Seeing the imperial guard showing an even more puzzled expression after hearing that the Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert in front of him imed to be from a sect located in the border region, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly.


    Indeed, considering that most of Domain Lords from the Sky Empire chose to build their factions in the core region where resources were the most abundant, it was indeed rather weird to hear about a new sect with a powerful Domain Lord Realm Expert behind it being established in the border region of the Sky Empire where resources were far harder to find...


    "Ahm-! Excuse my surprise... It''s my first time hearing about a senior of such high realm establishing a sect in such a deste ce..."


    "No problem at all! By the way... I was wondering why all of you havee all the way out here to the border region."


    Having already found out that the group of powerful cultivators belonged to the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao could not help asking why they hade to the border region.


    Although he understood that there was a chance that he might not get an answer, Xuan Hao still decided to ask.


    After all, for so many powerful cultivators to suddenly appear, something had definitely happened in the border region-


    Ah... The demonic cultivators... They are here because of the recent surge in demonic cultivators-


    "Sure, we are here to help deal with the recent surge in demonic cultivator in the border kingdoms close to the Frozen Wastnd!"


    Interrupting Xuan Hao''s train of thought, the imperial guard happily exined the reason why he and the rest of the people waiting a short distance away hade to the border region.


    Not to anyone''s surprise, they hade due to the recent surge in demonic cultivators...

 Chapter ?700 Stuck Underground

    ?700 Stuck Underground


    "Ah... If you are here to deal with the demonic cultivators, can you leave the Azure Sky Kingdom alone? My sect is currently already in the process of cleaning that ce up at the moment and using it to train some of our younger disciples at the same time."


    Hearing that they had indeede to deal with the demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao decided to ask them to leave the Azure Sky Kingdom alone.


    Not only was his sect already dealing with the demonic cultivators in the Azure Sky Kingdom, but Xuan Hao was also afraid that the Domain Lord Realm Experts among them might find out about the rich deposits filled with spiritual metal located below the capital of the Azure Sky Kingdom.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    If they really ended up discovering them, it might be difficult for the Star Shattering Sect to im them as their own before the Sky Empire came over to take a piece of the spiritual metals below the Azure Sky Kingdom...


    "Hm? Leave the Azure Sky Kingdom alone? Sure, we will be more than happy to do that! After all, we are already far too few people to handle the many kingdoms that have recently been overrun with demonic cultivators over the past few weeks, your sect taking care of one kingdom for us is a more than wee thing. Makes it easier for us!"


    Showing a happy expression on his face after hearing Xuan Hao mentioning that his sect was already dealing with the demonic cultivators in the Azure Sky Kingdom, the imperial guard happily agreed to leave the Azure Sky Kingdom alone.


    Given the fact that Xuan Hao was someone who had reached the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, the imperial guard did not doubt that his sect would be able to deal with the surge of demonic cultivators in a small kingdom.


    "That''s great... Well then, I won''t hold you up any longer."


    "Farewell senior!"


    Whoosh~


    Taking his leave after having made sure that the group of people from the Sky Empire would not be entering the Azure Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao resumed his journey.


    "The senior just now is from a sect located in the border region and his sect is already taking care of the Azure Sky Kingdom, so we will ignore that kingdom and focus on the other kingdoms bordering the Frozen Wastnd!"


    Informing the rest of the imperial guards that had been silently waiting from afar about his short conversation, the imperial guards all showed happy expressions on their faces after hearing that one of the kingdoms they were supposed to clean up had already been dealt with by the sect of the mysterious senior they had just encountered.


    "That senior just now... I wonder what his name is..."


    "Indeed and what sect is he from? Maybe we should check it out after we finish our job..."


    "For such a powerful senior to be unknown, I think he might be someone from another empire that fled to the Sky Empire and decided to settle down here!"


    "Hm... That does indeed seem usible, but-"


    "Everyone! Let''s get going before things end up getting even worse in those kingdoms!"


    Seeing the rest of the imperial guards start chatting with each other full of curiosity about the identity of Xuan Hao and his sect, the imperial guard that had just chatted with Xuan Hao quickly interrupted them and informed them about what they were here for.


    ""YES!""


    Hearing what their leader said, the rest of the imperial guards tensed up for a moment before all of them continued their journey towards the border between the Sky Empire and the Frozen Wastnd.


    "Hey, who was that just now?"


    "Yeah, and what sect is he from?"


    The two other Domain Lord Realm Experts did not say anything up till now quickly used the opportunity when the rest of the imperial guards were controlling their demon beasts to start asking the imperial guard that had been chatting with Xuan Hao.


    "Hah..."


    Knowing that he would not be able to satiate the curiosity of the two other Domain Lords due to him not getting much information about Xuan Hao, the imperial guard could not help letting out an exhausted sigh as he silently prayed that they would reach the border faster.


    ...


    "No matter what direction we move, we always end up running into a group of Qi Condensation Realm demon beasts! Just how many demon beasts are hidden down here and where are the stronger demon beasts!?"


    Having walked through the underground cavework of the jungle for close to an hour at this point in time, Hui Ying could not helpining after seeing a group of demon beasts appearing in front of them.


    After they had escaped from the underground hideout and dealt with the small group of Qi Condensation Realm demon beasts, it did not take long before they encountered another group of Qi Condensation Realm demon and after dealing with that group of demon beasts, another group of Qi Condensation Realm demon beasts appeared...


    The group of demon beasts in front of them that looked like a group of oversized rats was the seventh group of Qi Condensation Realm demon beasts they had encountered after entering the underground cavework!


    Even if they had no trouble dealing with the Qi condensation Realm demon beasts, Hui Ying could still not help feeling a bit annoyed when she saw another group of Qi Condensation Realm demon beasts appear in front of her...


    "Indeed... It''s rather weird that we have encountered so many Qi Condensation Realm demon beasts after entering the underground part of the jungle, while we have yet to encounter a single demon beast in the Foundation Establishment Realm or above."


    Nodding his head as he agreed with what Hui Ying said, Bai Ning also felt that it was weird that they had only encountered Qi Condensation Realm demon beasts so far.


    The only reason he could think of, was that the weaker demon beasts had hidden underground to safely grow and would leave after they broke through to the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    The only problem with this, was that they had yet to find any paths leading back up to the surface.


    "Hah..."


    Letting out a sigh as he thought about this, Bai Ning felt his head hurt as he turned his attention towards the group of Qi Condensation Realm demon beasts-


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    "Weird rats, how can you even roar in the first ce?"


    ROAR!


    "Fine! If you want to fight,e!"


    Swish~!


    BANG!


    "..."


    From the looks of it, Hui Ying had decided to deal with the demon beasts by herself...


    Looking away from the one sided massacre that was taking ce as Hui Ying easily beat up all of the oversized rats, Bai Ning instead began inspecting the cave that they were currently inside.


    Compared to the other ces they had been in so far, the current cave was actually lit up by some sort of crystals that had been exposed in the caves walls and ceiling.


    Allowing Bai Ning and Hui Ying to see their surroundings far more clearlypared to when they were forced to use their qi to enhance their eyesight to see in the darkness.


    Because of this, Bai Ning managed to see the cave they were inside far more clearlypared to any before-


    "Wha-!?"


    And it was at this moment that he realized that not only was the cave they were inside of was farrger than he had expected, but he could also see the ruins of what had once beenrger structures deeper inside the cave.


    "Follow me, we might be able to find a way out of here!"


    Calling out to Hui Ying with a serious expression on his face, Bai Ning understood just how important these ruins might be to them in their quest to find a way out of the jungle!


    Swoosh~


    Not waiting for Hui Ying, he cautiously began approaching the ruins in the distance.


    "What?! O-okay!"


    Bang!


    R-roar!


    Not knowing what had caused Bai Ning to be so serious all of a sudden, Hui Ying quickly dealt with thest remaining oversized rat demon beast before quickly running after Bai Ning.


    "Ruins!? Are they perhaps rted to the hideout we found earlier...?"


    Only after catching up with Bai Ning did she spot the ruins deeper inside the cave and realized why Bai Ning had suddenly be so serious.


    The ruins were farrger than the small hideout that they had found before and the chance of them finding something that could lead them out of the jungle in there was farrgerpared to if they had found another small hideout.


    After all, even if there might not be any spiritual herbs or metals inside, there was a high chance that there was some scrolls or books that had managed to remain intact inside.


    Given that the demon beasts inside the underground cavework did not really care about books and scrolls, they should still be fine inside the ruins if they had managed to remain intact over the years!

 Chapter ?701 Returning to the Iron Sky Kingdom

    ?701 Returning to the Iron Sky Kingdom


    "This ruin¡­ Is farrger than it looked from afar¡­"


    Standing in front of what could only be described as the ruins of a massive tower like structure towering all the way up to the ceiling of the cave a few hundred meters above them, Hui Ying almost whispered this to herself as she slowly began approaching the still somewhat intact entrance of the tower like structure.


    Rustle~


    "This is-!?"


    "So many books¡­"


    Entering the ruined tower while making sure to keep an eye out for any dangerous traps or demon beasts that might be lurking around inside, Bai Ning and Hui Ying were both taken aback by the rows of bookshelves towering more than a dozen meters tall that were covering everything inside the tower ruins.


    Even if they didn''t have a very clear what purpose the tower had once served, both of them had a feeling that the tower should have been a library of some sort. If not that, it might even have been a ce to store ancient records!


    No matter what purpose the tower ruins had served in the past, Bai Ning and Hui Ying both understood that their chances of finding a way out of the jungle had just increased by several times!


    "Let''s start searching for a book that can help us find a way out of the jungle. However, given how many books there are here, I have a feeling we might be here for some time¡­"


    "Ah¡­"


    Calming down as the excitement of possible finding a way out of the jungle died down, it did not take long before the two of them realized just how long it would take them to search through all the books inside the ruined tower.


    Not to mention the fact that there should at least be ten thousand or more intact books on the bookshelves in front of them, there was still a floor above the one they were current on¡­ And another floor after that¡­


    Given the sheer size of the ruined tower, there should be more than a hundred thousand intact books left!


    As this realization set in, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying could not help feeling depressed when looking at the countless still intact books in front of them.


    Maybe it wouldn''t be a bad thing if the number of books and scrolls that survived inside the tower were a bit lower.


    ¡­


    At the same time Bai Ning and Hui Ying werementing over the many ancient scrolls and books they would have to read through to only get a chance of finding a way out, Xuan Hao reached the borders of the Iron Sky Kingdom only two days after his encounter with the imperial guards of the Sky Empire.


    Whoosh~!


    Standing up from the back of the flying demon beast that had been carrying him so far, Xuan Hao could not help smiling after flying by himself once again.


    Chirp~?


    Not understanding why Xuan Hao had suddenly gotten off all of a sudden, the flying demon beast in the shape of a massive bird could not help tilting its head in confusion.


    "You can go back to the sect. Continuing any longer with your current strength will only end up endangering you¡­"


    Understanding that the road ahead would get far more dangerous after he passed through the Iron Sky Kingdom and entered the core of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao had already decided to sent the flying demon beast back.


    All things considered, he had almost finished repairing his dantian from the damage it had suffered back in the enlightenment space when he merged ice and sword domain together into a single domain.


    Other than the fact that he would not be able to focus his full attention towards cultivating, there was not any reason for him to keep the Nascent Soul Realm flying demon beast around. Especially considering that he might not be able to keep it safe when travelling through some of the more dangerous ces he nned to visit on his way to the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    Chirp!?


    Feeling heartbroken that it would not be able to travel together with Xuan Hao any more, therge bird demon beast looked towards Xuan Hao like a puppy being abandoned.


    "Why are you looking at me like that? You just want the mix of spiritual herbs and spirit stones I have been feeding you over thest week!"


    C-chirp¡­


    "Hah¡­ You can find your way back to the sect on your own."


    Swish-!


    Rolling his eyes after seeing therge bird avoiding its eyes after being called out, Xuan Hao turned around and left in the direction of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Even without him around, a demon beast in the Nascent Soul Realm like therge bird, was more than intelligent enough to find its way back to the Star Shattering Sect on its own!


    Chirp¡­


    Watching Xuan Hao leaving, therge bird demon beast let out a reluctant chirping noise.


    Even if it had just been for a week, the spirit stones and spiritual herbs Xuan Hao had given it to eat was far higher qualitypared to anything it would be able to get from the beast tamers back in the Star Shattering Sect. Especially over thest few months, where the quality of the food had decreased rapidly!


    Whoosh~!


    Remaining almostpletely still in the air just outside the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom for the next few minutes after Xuan Hao left, therge bird inevitably gave up and turned around to start its journey back to the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although the quality of food that it had been given was not considered good whenpared to what Xuan Hao had given it, it was still far better than anything it could find outside the Star Shattering Sect.


    Maybe it could ask to increase the quality of its food after returning to the Star Shattering Sect!


    After all, it had just recently reached the Nascent Soul Realm and felt that it deserved better food than the Core Formation Realm demon beasts!


    Chirp~


    Havinge up with such a brilliant n to increase the quality of its food, therge bird demon beast happily began making its way back towards the Star Shattering Sect. Unaware of the fact that although the quality of its food would be changing soon, it would not be in the direction that therge bird demon beast was hoping for.


    ¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Whoosh~


    Having left behind therge bird at the borders of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao soon arrived in front of the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Different from thest time, the walls surrounding the capital city looked far more pristinepared to before. Not only that, but Xuan Hao could clearly feeling a terrifying power lurking beneath the surface.


    "From the looks of it, Yi Min finished repair the formation around her capital and if I''m not wrong, it should be even stronger than before¡­" Muttering this to himself as he finished inspecting the pristine walls surrounding the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just how strong the formation was now.


    Given that it had the strength to resist someone in the Soul Ascension Realm if it reached its full potential before, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine thinking about how strong the current formation protecting the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "Hah¡­ I wonder just how many treasures and artifacts were used for this¡­"


    Knowing full well that Yi Min used a countless number of artifacts together with spiritual treasures to create the formation, Xuan Hao could not helpmenting over the wealth of a Master cksmith.


    The construction of the formation protecting her capital city was more than enough to bankrupt a dozen ordinary Peak Stage Domain Lord and that was only in case that they could actually get their hands on the different natural treasures used in its construction. After all, some of the natural treasures used in the construction process were tempting even to Soul Ascension Realm Experts!


    Even a Half-Step Soul Ascension Realm Expert would properly not be able to get his hands on some of the materials used in the construction of the formation¡­


    The only reason Yi Min could get her hands on some of the more precious natural treasures, was due to her identity as a Master cksmith!


    "Hm¡­ It''s been a few years since Ist visited the Iron Sky Kingdom together with Qing Yi, I wonder how Yi Min is doing¡­"


    Whoosh~


    Feeling curious about what Yi Min had been up to and at the same time wanting to ask her if she had any information about the dangerous ces he would be going through on his way to the capital of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao decided to pay her a visit before continuing his journey into the core region of the Sky Empire.

 Chapter ?702 The Name of a Great Sect~

    702 The Name of a Great Sect~


    "So, you wanted to ask me about those ces since you n to visit them on your way to the capital of the Sky Empire? Not to mention the fact that those locations are dangerous to someone in the Domain Lord Realm. Even with your current strength at the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, some of the more dangerous things hidden in those ces would still be life threatening to you!"


    Having told Yi Min about the different locations he nned to visit on his way to the capital city of the Sky Empire only shortly after they had started talking with each, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit worried after hearing what Yi Min said.


    Obviously, the different locations that he had nned to go through were far more dangerous than he had first expected given the little information he had been able to gather through the book Yi Min had given him


    Even if it noted down anything important happening in the Sky Empire along with several famous locations and the different experts that existed inside the Sky Empire, it was still not fully capable of describing just how dangerous some of the locations were due to just how rare it would be for someone to truly explore those locations.


    After all, all things considered, a location that was dangerous even to a Domain Lord Realm Expert would rarely get fully explored by someone in the Domain Lord Realm due to danger involved in doing something like that.


    Given that not all of the dangerous location located across the core region of the Sky Empire had any precious spiritual herbs or other natural treasures inside of them, it was obvious that Domain Lord Realm Experts would not dare risking their lives to enter these locations.


    As for those below the Domain Lord Realm that decided to still enter¡­ Well¡­ Most of them would end up dead, while the few who made it out alive would at most have travelled through the less dangerous outer region of those ces¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Hah¡­ Not to mention the fact that some of the ces you mentioned are far more dangerous than is noted down in the book I gave you due to it not being public information, some of the locations can even pose a threat to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm!"


    "¡­"


    If he really ended up going through one of those ces without knowing about the danger he might encounter¡­


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he thought about just how dangerous it would be, Xuan Hao could not help feeling happy that he had decided to visit Yi Min before entering the core region of the Sky Empire.


    ¡­


    "Then, I will be taking my leave. Thank you for your help!"


    "Haha, no problem! Have a safe journey- Ah! Wait a minute!"


    Having spent half a day talking with Yi Min about the different locations that would be safe to pass through or visit and which ces to avoid in the core region of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao was just about to leave when Yi Min suddenly seemed to remember something.


    "What is it?"


    Seeing Yi Min suddenly stopping him before he left, Xuan Hao looked towards Yi Min with a curious expression on his face.


    "I forgot to say this earlier, but you have to remember to avoid the seventh prince''s faction when you reach the capital city in the future! The general who attacked me together with someone from a demonic sect are both rted to the seventh prince and his faction¡­ Aaaaand¡­ Given what happened back then, I have a feeling that the seventh prince might try something if he gets the chance!"


    "I guess I have to thank a certain someone for getting me involved with this seventh prince¡­"


    "¡­"


    Rolling his eyes as he saw the guilty expression on Yi Min''s face after hearing what he said, Xuan Hao chuckled a bit to himself.


    Although a prince of the Sky Empire was not something an ordinary Domain Lord Realm Expert could deal with, he had already reached the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and could be considered to be one of the top powerhouses inside the Sky Empire outside of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    Unless it was the crown prince of the Sky Empire, there was no way that the Sky Empire''s imperial family would do anything to him. Not to mention, with his current strength, he didn''t fear the Soul Ascension Realm Experts of the Sky Empire.


    Actually¡­ A part of him wanted to fight with one of these Soul Ascension Realm Experts to test out the strength of his new domain!


    "I will make sure to be careful."


    Whoosh~


    Banishing the dangerous thoughts of fighting against a Soul Ascension realm Expert, Xuan Hao took his leave after realizing that Yi Min didn''t have anything more to say.


    After entering the core region of the Sky Empire, his journey would get far moreplicated.


    The main reason for this, was that he would have to make sure he avoided any of the extremely dangerous locations mentioned by Yi Min.


    As a result of having to avoid these dangerous locations, the time of around two months that he originally expected for it to take him to reach the capital of the Sky Empire increased to three months!


    Although this did not sound like a big deal, the establishment of the sect alliance would take ce in another two and a half months!


    Originally, Xuan Hao had thought he would end up reaching the capital city two weeks before the establishment of the sect alliance¡­ But instead, he would end up reaching the capital city of the Sky Empire two weeks toote if he ended up spending time exploring the different locations he had originally nned to explore on his way to the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    If he wanted to at least have some time to explore the different special and famous ces along his path to the capital city of the Sky Empire, it looked like he would have to increase his speed!


    Swish-!


    With this thought in mind, Xuan Hao rapidly increased his speed after leaving the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    ¡­


    Bothying down on a pile of books, Bai Ning and Hui Ying were looking at each other with expressions of despair as they were both trying their best to read through a book written in some sort of ancientnguage.


    Swish-!


    "Not to mention a map, there I can''t even understand- Ah!"


    Roll~


    Bang!


    Throwing away the book he had been reading, Bai Ning ended up losing his bnce as he ended up rolling down the small mountain of books he had beenying on top of.


    "What happened- Pft-!"


    Curiously peering over the edge of the small mountain of books she wasying on top of, Hui Ying barely managed to hold in herughter after seeing half of Bai Ning''s body covered in books that had fallen down after he rolled down.


    "Ah! Enough, let''s go to the second floor of this damnable book tower! I can''t spend another day in here reading looking through these ancient books written in somenguage we don''t understand! Even if there are a few understandable ones, they are still only barely readable! Are youing with me Hui Ying?"


    Not able to stop himself from yelling this in an angry voice after having spent thest few days looking through countless ancient books, Bai Ning stood back up as he looked towards Hui Ying waiting for her response.


    "Yes! This ce is so boring! The only information we even managed to get was that this ce was supposedly managed by some sort of ancient sect in the past¡­ Hm¡­ What was its name... The Marriage Sect¡­?"


    "No, it was the Great Divorce Sect, a ce that only took in middle-aged men going through a midlife crisis after their wife left them, as their disciples."


    "Really?!"


    Not knowing what to say after seeing Hui Ying suddenly be all excited, Bai Ning could not help rolling his eyes. Did she really believe there was a sect named the Great Divorce Sect?


    "Of course not! The name of the ancient sect that managed this sect was the Mirage Sect."


    "Ah¡­ I see¡­"


    Seeing Hui Ying getting all disappointed after hearing that there was no such thing as the Great Divorce Sect, Bai Ning had no idea what to say.


    Hopefully the Star Shattering Sect would not end up getting some sort of weirdly named branch sect in the future if Hui Ying ended up bing an elder strong enough to manage a branch sect by herself...


    "Let''s get going, we can also check up the rest of the floors in this tower before we continue trying to read through any more books!"


    Shaking his head as he didn''t dare think about a future where one of the Star Shattering Sect''s branches ended up with a weird name, Bai Ning began making his way towards the still intact spiral staircase leading up to the second floor of the tower.


    "Wait for me!"


    Seeing Bai Ning leaving, Hui Ying quickly dashed after him as both of them made their way up to the second floor of the tower.

 Chapter 703 Tenth Floor Of The Tower

    Making their way up to the second floor of the tower, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying frowned upon seeing that the second floor of the tower was simrly filled with still intact books.


    If the rest of the floors in the tower were in a simr condition, it would likely take them months, if not years, to fully look through all of the books inside of the tower¡­ And even then, they might not be able to find a map or something simr that could get them out of the jungle safely!


    "Let''s go to the next floor and see if there is something different up there¡­" Scanning over the second floor of the tower, Bai Ning quickly began making his way up the spiral staircase towards the third floor of the tower after seeing that there was nothing other than books on the second floor of the tower.


    "Yeah¡­"


    Following closely behind Bai Ning as he made his way up the spiral staircase towards the third floor of the tower, Hui Ying could not help feeling a headache after looking over the books that filled up the second floor of the tower.


    If possible, she wanted to avoid having to read through all of these books. Especially after spending thest few days reading through these ancient books which were mostly written in some kind of ancientnguage, she didn''t understand.


    For this reason, Hui Ying sincerely hoped that they would be able to find something that would be able to find something like arge still intact map of the jungle on of the remaining floors of the tower that were still intact¡­


    Not much different from the first and second floor of the tower, the third floor was also filled with books. The only difference was that there was arge hole in the side of the tower from where they could see the outside the tower. At the same time, there was also a massive hole in the ceiling of the third floor. Allowing them to see up into the fourth floor above them, which was simrly only filled with books without anything of interest like a still intact map.


    The Fifth floor¡­ Sixth floor¡­ Seventh, eighth and ninth floor were the same!


    "There is only one floor left¡­"


    As Bai Ning and Hui Ying slowly started losing hope in finding something that would be useful for them when it came to finding a way out of the jungle without having to spend the next few months looking through the books and hoping to find something inside them that would be of help, they both began making their way up towards the final tenth floor of the tower.


    If they could really not find anything on thest floor of the tower, they would be forced to either look through the books still intact inside the tower, something that would likely end up taking them months¡­ Of course, this was only considering that they would be able to survive for that long.


    After all, although they could survive for a longer period without food and waterpared to normal mortals, they could still notpletely survive off the qi between heaven and earth as someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm!


    ¡­


    "A door!?"


    Walking up the spiral staircase towards the tenth floor of the tower, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying were taken aback upon seeing that their path forward was blocked by a door.


    However, this surprise onlysted for a short moment before both of them grew excited.


    This was the first floor inside the tower that was differentpared to the rest of the floors they had visited so far. For this reason alone, Bai Ning and Hui Ying grew excited as they felt hopeful of finding something that would be able to get them out of their current predicament.


    Creak~


    Slowly opening the old door leading into the tenth floor of the tower, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying held their breath as they nervously looked inside. Hoping that they would not be met with the familiar scene of a room filled with only ancient books and nothing more...


    "A MAP! There really is a map in here!"


    Being the first to react, Hui Ying could not help eximing loudly as she was the first to spot arge map hanging on the wall not too far away from the door leading into the tenth floor of the tower.


    Hearing Hui Ying''s exmation, Bai Ning also focused his full attention on the massive map on the wall of the tenth floor.


    "Indeed¡­ And from the looks of it, the map seems to cover not only the underground part of the jungle that we are currently inside of, but it also covers the jungle above!" Inspecting the map more closely, Bai Ning could not help smiling as he felt a wave of relief wash over him.


    With the map of not only the underground of the jungle, but also the surface, Bai Ning understood that they would not have to waste the next few months looking through the hundreds of thousands of books inside the tower for a way out of the jungle.


    Although they had still ended up wasting a few days looking through the books without gaining anything more than the name of the ancient sect that should have constructed the tower in the past, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying did not care about this.


    Even if they had wasted a bit of the little food they had on them due to this, it was nothing to worry about now that they had a map that could be used to find a way out of the jungle and back to the territory of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "Let''s see if we can find out where we are first."


    Calming down, Bai Ning took the lead as he stepped inside the tenth floor of the tower before making his way towards the map to inspect it more closely to find out where they were and if there were any exits noted down on the map itself.


    "This¡­ Might be a bit harder to understand than I first thought¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the map, Bai Ning could not help frowning while looking over the different ancient looking letters on the map. The map itself and the locations on the map were all written in the same ancientnguage as the books, anguage that both Bai Ning and Hui Ying could not understand¡­


    However, even if what was written on the map was not something that Bai Ning and Hui Ying could understand, they were lucky enough that there were also different symbols beneath the different ancient words. Allowing them to at least make a guess as to what the different locations might be hiding.


    For example, it did not take them long to find what they thought to be the tower on the map, being the only ce symbolized by a small tower and a book on the underground part of the map.


    ¡­


    "The exits out of this ce should be the different portal like things on the map¡­"


    Having spent thest few hours trying their best to understand the map, Bai Ning and Hui Ying ended up determining that the small portals that were ced all over the map should be ways out of the jungle¡­ And at the same time they also managed to determine which of the different portals they should have entered the jungle through.


    The only problem¡­ Was that there was no way out of the underground part of the jungle that was anywhere close to the portal that they had originally entered the jungle through.


    In the end, this left them with two choices¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    One, try to make their way back towards the portal they had originally entered the jungle through or¡­ Second, try to make their way towards the closest of the portals to get out of the dangerous jungle as quickly as possible!


    No matter what choice they took, they each had their own benefits and drawbacks.


    Going to the closest of the portals could get them out faster, but they might end up in a far more dangerous location after passing through the unknown portal.


    The ce they had originally entered the jungle through on the other hand was far safer, the danger with going to that ce, was that they would have to spend a longer period of time inside the jungle.


    Given just how dangerous the jungle was, they would end up increasing their chances of encountering another demon beast in the Core Formation Realm during the journey back towards they had originally entered the jungle through.


    "Hah¡­ Let''s not think about this for now, we should first make our way towards the closest path out of this underground cavework¡­"


    Shaking his head as he understood the risks involved in both of the options, Bai Ning carefully stored the massive map away inside his storage ring before both him and Hui Ying began making their way out of the tower.


    Outside of taking a few of the books from each of the ten floors with them to hand over to the sect when they returned, there wasn''t really anything else of value inside therge tower.

 Chapter 704 Core Region Of The Sky Empire

    Given how far away the closest path leading to the surface is, it should at least take us two days before we reach it¡­


    Thinking this to himself after leaving the tower that they had been staying inside of for thest few days, Bai Ning could not help feeling a little nervous as he looked over therge empty cave that they were currently inside of.


    Even if they had not encountered any demon beasts outside of a few that had reached the Qi Condensation Realm after entering the underground part of the jungle, Bai Ning still felt that there should be some more powerful demon beasts lurking around inside the underground cavework!


    "Let''s get going! Hopefully we will be able to leave this jungle in less than a week if we are lucky!" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not knowing what Bai Ning was thinking about, Hui Ying was still filled with excitement after they had gotten their hands on the map, as she happily took the lead and made her way in the direction of the exit leading out of the underground cavework.


    "¡­"


    Smiling a bit wryly after seeing Hui Ying dashing forward, Bai Ning shook his head before following after her.


    If there really were more powerful demon beasts hidden somewhere in the underground cavework, there was nothing much they could do other than trying their best to avoid them if they had the chance to.


    Swish~!


    Like this, Bai Ning and Hui Ying began their journey towards the closest path in the underground cavework leading back up to the surface.


    As for going back up through the same way they had entered¡­ Neither Bai Ning nor Hui Ying dared thinking about taking that risk with a Nascent Soul Realm demon beast possibly lurking around in the area ready to pounce on them the moment they tried to make their way back to the surface.


    ¡­


    "So, this is the core region of the Sky Empire¡­ The qi here is indeed denser and the people living here are also far strongerpared to the border region. Not only that, but the demon beasts roaming around the ce are also far stronger, a few of them even reached the Nascent Soul Realm! No wonder it is so dangerous for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm to travel through the core region of the Sky Empire!"


    Having only just entered the core region of the Sky Empire for a few hours, Xuan Hao could not help feeling amazed at what he saw so far. Even the weakest city that he had encountered so far had someone in the Nascent Soul Realm guarding it!


    Well¡­ Considering that he had also encountered quite a few Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts roaming around below him, it was obvious that a city without a Nascent Soul Realm Expert guarding it would not be able to survive inside the core region of the Sky Empire!


    The outside of these cities and the small area around them that they protected, housed most of the people inside the core region of the Sky Empire. The rest of the core region was a dangerous ce that would be almost impossible to traverse for anyone below the Nascent Soul Realm.


    For this reason, the people living in the core region of the Sky Empire were doing their best trying to increase their strength so they could explore the outside world and have the opportunity to visit other ces without having to pay a hefty sum of money to join a powerful caravan that traversed between cities.


    The sects and kingdoms that controlled these different cities were not much better, as from what Xuan Hao could see, most of them were only in control of a small area ofnd that they could barely hold on to.


    The only difference, was the sects and kingdoms with a Domain Lord Realm Expert behind them!


    These kingdoms and sects could be considered the peak power of the Sky Empire and each of them controlled massive swaths ofnd. Keeping these massive territories safe from the demon beasts roaming around outside was not simple and could only be done through constructingrge barriers and having dozens of Nascent Soul Realm Experts standing guard.


    Without the support of a Domain Lord Realm Expert, it was impossible to control a proper territory inside the core region of the Sky Empire!


    "I wonder¡­ Is the dangerous environment the reason why the Sky Empire has not been able to fully control their territory and has instead allowed different independent sects and kingdoms do it as long as they are loyal to them?" Muttering this to himself as he flew over the first kingdom that was very clearly backed by a Domain Lord Realm Expert, Xuan Hao felt that he managed to understand why the Sky Empire allowed the different kingdoms and sects inside its borders to operate on their own without any supervision.


    In a sense, the Sky Empire didn''t have enough power to control their territory by themselves and needed these different kingdoms and sects¡­ Of course, that was not mentioning that some of the different powers that had been allowed to grown independently might have ended up giving birth to experts who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm!


    If that was the case, the current Sky Empire might not have absolute authority and control inside the Sky Empire like he had first thought¡­


    Even then, for them to still hold on to their current position, the imperial family of the Sky Empire should not be weak in any way and should still be the strongest force inside the Sky Empire!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao unconsciously looked in the direction of the Sky Empire with a curious expression of his face.


    "If the core region of the Sky Empire is already this dangerous, I wonder what the core region of the continent is like¡­"


    Shaking his head as he said this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling both scared and excited thinking about the fact that there should be experts who surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm inside the core region of the continent itself.


    Even if he was close to reaching the Soul Ascension Realm and only needed an opportunity to breakthrough after having merged his two domains together, he was still far away from the mysterious realm that came after the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Hm?"


    Suddenly sensing a powerful divine sense belonging to someone in the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm locking on to him as he was about to pass over the capital city of the kingdom which had the support of someone in the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao frowned for a short moment before realizing that the divine sense originated from somewhere inside the capital city of the kingdom below him.


    Knowing that the other party should have sensed himing over and was just trying to find out who he was and if he was hostile or not, Xuan Hao decided to just ignore the other party as he continued on his way.


    Whoosh~!


    However, just in case the other party might want to stop him, he decided to release a bit of his aura. Allowing the other party to identify his strength as someone in the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Whoosh-!


    Not too long after he released a bit of his power, the divine sense that hade over from the capital city of the kingdom below quickly retreated at a speed that far surpassed what Xuan Hao thought was possible for someone in the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Looks like it worked out~


    Chuckling to himself after seeing that the other party escaped the moment, he released a bit of his aura, Xuan Hao no longer paid any attention to the kingdom or capital city below as he continued on his way towards the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    In the first ce, he was already short on time and had no time to waste on any kingdom with a Domain Lord Realm Expert that he happened to pass through.


    ¡­


    "W-what was that!? Where did such a powerful experte from!?" At the same time Xuan Hao passed over the capital city of the unknown kingdom, an old man covered in sweat from head to toe could not help eximing as he fearfully looked up towards the sky where Xuan Hao was.


    "Ancestor!? Did something happen!?"


    "Ancestor, is a powerful demon beast approaching again!? Didn''t we just recently fend off that Domain Lord Realm Snake from the Thousand Poison Valley?!"


    At the same time the old man eximed in disbelief as he looked up towards the sky filled with fear, two powerful looking guards standing at the side not too far away quickly rushed over with worry stered all over their faces.


    Both of them had reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, so it was obvious that they had not been able to sense Xuan Hao flying past above them.


    For this reason, they thought that some powerful demon beast might be approaching to attack their kingdom.


    "Both of you, quiet down! I¡­ I need to contact a few friends¡­" Still not able to calm down after havinge in contact with Xuan Hao''s aura, the old man that was referred to as ancestor by the two Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert angrily yelled at the two of them before taking out amunication talisman.


    At the moment, the old ancestor wanted to inform his friends about what had happened and try to see if he could find out who the powerful expert just now was!

 Chapter 705 Thousand Wind Mountains

    Passing over the kingdom with the Domain Lord Realm Expert inside of it, Xuan Hao did manage to see what was taking ce between the Domain Lord Realm Expert and his subordinates through his divine sense.


    However, Xuan Hao did not go down to stop the Domain Lord Realm Expert from using hismunication talisman to inform his friends and peers about what he had just been through.


    In the first ce, Xuan Hao already understood that it was inevitable that his appearance would end up shocking the different powers of the core region of the Sky Empire, whether it happened earlier orter did not matter much to him.


    The only thing that worried him a bit, was that some of those different powers might decide to go and investigate the Star Shattering Sect while he was not there to protect it.


    Although the main sect was protected by the Chaotic Qi Formation and both Feng Chen and Shu Yao were there to keep the different branches outside safe, Xuan Hao could still not help worrying about something happening while he was gone.


    At the very least, Shu Yao and Feng Chen should be able to deal with most of the people that might show up during his time in the capital of the Sky Empire. As for the stronger experts that might show up... The winged lion demon beast should be able to deal with them.


    All things considered; the winged lion demon beast was still a powerful demon beast that had reached theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm. The number of people that would be able to fight equally with it inside the Sky Empire was limited. Let alone people who actually had a chance to beat it!


    Whoosh~


    Continuing past the unknown kingdom with the Domain Lord Realm Expert in it, Xuan Hao soon reached the first special location that he nned to visit on his way to the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    The ce in question was called the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    As the name implied, the Thousand Wind Mountains was arge mountain range stretching on for thousands of miles with no end in sight.


    Although the Thousand Wind Mountains was a dangerous ce that could even be dangerous to Domain Lord Realm Experts in some ces, it did not have any powerful demon beast living inside of it.


    The reason for this, was the terrifying wind that swept through the ce. Not only was the wind dangerous even to Domain Lord Realm Experts in some cases, but it also made it impossible for demon beasts to live in the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    The few demon beasts that did live there however, were mostly hidden away in small caves they had dug into the sides of the mountains where they would hide from the terrifying wind outside.


    For this reason, the Thousand Wind Mountain ended up bing a hotspot for special spiritual herbs rted to the dao of wind, which could now grow in abundance under the protection of the terrifying wind that constantly swept through the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    However, the fact that the Thousand Wind Mountains could produce a lot of high quality spiritual herbs was not an unknown fact... For this reason alone, many Nascent Soul Realm Experts and even Domain Lord Realm Experts ended up visiting the Thousand Wind Mountain every year. Each of them hoping to get their hands on the spiritual herbs growing on the mountains.


    Of course, given how deadly the winds inside the Thousand Wind Mountains were, the number of people who ended up dying there every year was staggering and from what Yi Min had told him, there was even a Third Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert who ended up dying in the deeper parts of the Thousand Wind Mountains just a few years ago!


    Even if the Thousand Wind Mountains did not have any dangerous demon beasts inside of it, it was obvious that it was still an extremely dangerous ce!


    WHOOSH-!


    Reaching the first mountain, Xuan Hao could not help feeling amazed as he felt the terrifying winds circling around the mountain up close. Even if the wind could not harm him, he could clearly tell that it was more than powerful enough to kill someone at the Core Formation Realm. Even someone who reached the Nascent Soul Realm would have some difficulty defending against the wind there without getting injured... And this was only the outer parts of the Thousand Wind Mountains!


    If the outer part was already this dangerous, Xuan Hao could easily imagine just how dangerous the core of the Thousand Wind Mountains would be. After all, a Domain Lord Realm Expert had died in there!


    "Hm? The power of this wind is rather erratic... Looks like it should grow weaker in another few minutes... Hm... It should take a few hours after that before it regains its past strength. This should be how those weaker cultivators below the Nascent Soul Realm are able to explore the Thousand Wind Mountains!"


    Examining the wind surrounding the mountain in front of him more closely, Xuan Hao did not take long to understand the pattern in which the wind would grow stronger and weaker over different periods of time.


    "With this in mind... As long as a Core Formation Realm Expert can enter at the weakest moment, he should be able to explore some of the mountains in the outer region of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    At the same time, someone in the Nascent Soul Realm might have a chance to explore the core region of the Thousand Wind Mountains where the most precious spiritual herbs are located!"


    Muttering this to himself as he looked over the wind in front of him slowly weakening, Xuan Hao suddenly felt like he managed to understand why so many Nascent Soul Realm Experts and Core Formation Realm Experts died at the Thousand Wind Mountains every year even though there was no danger from demon beasts in there.


    If he was not wrong, most of the deaths should havee from people spotting a really precious spiritual herb when entering a normally deadly location inside the Thousand Wind Mountains and trying to get their hands on it before inevitably ending up dead when the strength of the wind currents increase...


    Of course, he could also be wrong and there was a different reason why so many Nascent Soul Realm and Core Formation Realm Experts died inside the Thousand Wind Mountains that he still did not know about.


    All things considered, it was still a dangerous location that had caused the death of several Domain Lord Realm Experts over the years. Even if it was one of the more explored dangerous ces inside the core region of the Sky Empire, it was far from being fully explored and understood. Especially the deeper parts that was dangerous to Domain Lord Realm Experts...


    Well, I should check out the outer regions first to get a deeper understanding of this ce before heading to the more dangerous core of the Thousand Wind Mountains. At least I will save quite a bit of time by passing through the Thousand Wind Mountainspared to going around it...


    Swish~! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As this thought passed through his head, Xuan Hao nced over therge mountain in front of him along with the countless other mountains that made up the Thousand Wind Mountains before finally stepping forward to enter the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    ...


    "Everyone, let''s enter before the wind grows strong again!"


    "Indeed, if we are any slower, we might lose our chance to get our hands on the Windbloom Flower!"


    "Stop talking you two and move!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao made his way inside the Thousand Wind Mountains. Not too far away from where he had entered, arge group of people belonging to different powers were all rushing towards arge mountain where the wind had simrly weakened.


    The people here were almost exclusively made up of cultivators in the Core Formation Realm. Only a handful of people had reached the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul realm.


    The reason why all of these people from different powers had suddenly gathered together and were about to risk their life, was for a chance to get their hands on single spiritual herb, the Windbloom Flower.


    The Windbloom Flower was a spiritual herb that was unique to the Thousand Wind Mountains and the reason why so many people had gathered together and were willing to risk their lives to get their hands on the Windbloom Flower had something to do with this-


    "As long as I can get my hands on the Windbloom Flower, I will be able to enter the deeper parts of the Thousand Wind Mountains and harvest the precious spiritual herbs in there without having to worry about anything other than the core area!"


    "Hah! Keep dreaming! How can someone in the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm get their hand of a precious spiritual herb like the Windbloom Flower!?"


    "Hmph! You are one to talk? You are also in the Third Stage of the Core Formation Realm!"


    "You-!"


    Indeed, the Windbloom Flower could protect one against the dangerous wind that was ever-present inside the Thousand Wind Mountains!


    All of the people here understood just how much it would mean to get their hands on this flower. After all, if not for the fact that news about it had only recentlye out and had only spread among the few nearby cities, they were all certain that a Domain Lord Realm Expert would have long sincee over to take the Windbloom Flower for themselves!


    Even if it could not negate the most powerful wind in the deepest part of the Thousand Wind Mountains, it would still make it far easier to explore!

 Chapter 706 Hidden Scheme

    Entering the Thousand Wind Mountains, Xuan Hao did not take long to spot the massive group of people that were all rushing towards a mountain located at the edges of the outer region of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    "Windbloom Flower...? How interesting..."


    Listening in on the conversations talking ce between the different people who were all from different powers, Xuan Hao did not take long to understand why all of them were rushing deeper inside the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    Given how precious the Windbloom Flower was, it was understandable why these Core Formation Realm and early stage Nascent Soul Realm Experts were all risking their lives to get their hands on it.


    "But... Unfortunately for them, I''m here and I''m also quite interested in this Windbloom Flower!"


    Whoosh-!


    Not intending to let something like the Windbloom Flower just get into someone else''s hands when it could be useful for exploring the core of the Thousand Wind Mountains, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes before flying in the direction of the mountain that therge group of cultivators were moving towards.


    ...


    Not aware of the fact that Xuan Hao had already decided to get his hands on the Windbloom Flower. The different factions were getting more and more anxious the closer they got to the mountain where the Windbloom Flower was located.


    "No matter what, we have to get our hands on the Windbloom Flower! It''s the only opportunity our family has to recover our former glory!"


    "Family Head, with you around, I''m sure we will be able to get the Windbloom Flower. After all, Family Head is the only person in the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    Among these different factions, the Wind Sword Family was the most confident. Having the strongest expert present, an ancestor at the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Even if there were still other Nascent Soul Realm Experts present, they were only in the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. From this alone it was obvious why the people from the Wind Sword Family felt confident in being able to get their hands on the Windbloom Flower.


    With the strongest expert on their side, they already felt that the Windbloom Flower was in their hands...!


    Whoosh-!


    "Looks like it will take a few more minutes before those people reach this ce..."


    Reaching the mountain with the Windbloom Flower before any of the Core Formation Realm and Nascent Soul Realm Experts could even get close, Xuan Hao curiously began looking through the entire mountain with his divine sense.


    Even if the wind had weakened, it was still more than strong enough to kill someone in the Core Formation Realm if they were even the slightest bit careless.


    To be honest, Xuan Hao felt that there was no reason for the Core Formation Realm Experts to go so far inside the Thousand Wind Mountains. Not to mention the fact that they might not be able to escape in time before the wind grew strong again, their chances of getting their hands on the Windbloom Flower was close to none.


    Even without him there, they would still have to get through the Nascent Soul Realm Experts...


    "Well, with me around none of them will be able to get the Windbloom Flower." Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao turned to look up towards the peak of the mountain.


    From a distance, a small flower with pure white petals could barely be seen gently moving as the terrifying wind covering the mountain was slowly absorbed by it.


    "That should be the Windbloom Flower..."


    Swish~


    Moving up the mountain, Xuan Hao carefully looked over the small flower.


    Outside of its small size and the fact that it was slowly absorbing the terrifying wind that was ever-present inside the Thousand Wind Mountains, the Windbloom Flower just looked an ordinary white flower.


    How can such a small flower help resist the wind in this ce...


    "Hm?"


    About to pick up the Windbloom Flower, Xuan Hao suddenly stopped himself as he rapidly moved away from the small flower with a serious expression on his face. Even if it was just for an instant, he clearly felt a terrifying intent lingering on the Windbloom Flower that he was just about to pick up and take away.


    "Looks like this Windbloom Flower is more special than I first thought. Maybe I should allow one of those people to pick it and see what happens..." Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao turned around and looked towards therge number of people rapidly approaching the mountain before looking back down at the small innocent looking flower.


    After feeling the terrifying intent lingering on the small flower, Xuan Hao hesitated in picking it up by himself.


    Although the intent that was there should just be a remnant intent left behind on the Windbloom Flower by some expert above the Domain Lord Realm in the past and he should be able to erase it before anything could happen, Xuan Hao still felt both cautious and curious about why such a powerful expert would attach their intent to a Windbloom Flower instead of just taking it away.


    Even if he had no idea why yet, it was obvious that the expert who had left behind the intent on the flower instead of taking it away had some kind of n for it. Maybe the fact that no Domain Lord Realm Experts had shown up also had something to do with this!


    "..."


    Understanding that he might have identally messed up the carefully thought out n of some powerful expert above the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao quickly did his best to hide himself as he waited for the group of Core Formation Realm and the few Nascent Soul Realm Experts among them to approach.


    If he was lucky, the expert hiding behind the scenes had not managed to discover him as he should be focused on the group of people rushing over¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Not daring to stay around on the mountain with the Windbloom Flower on top of it as the expert in question would likely be paying attention to the ce when the group of Core Formation Realm and the few Nascent Soul Realm Experts showed, Xuan Hao moved to one of the mountains not too far away where he could keep an eye on the situation and see what would be happening after someone got their hands of the Windbloom Flower. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Given that the expert hidden somewhere nearby should be waiting for that to happen, Xuan Hao was more than happy to sit on the side and wait to find out what this expert was nning.


    At least when considering the effects of the Windbloom Flower, it was obvious that whatever this expert was nning had something to do with the deeper parts of the Thousand Wind Mountains!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao focused his attention on the few Nascent Soul Realm Experts that were present.


    As long as nothing unexpected happened, one of them should get their hands on the Windbloom Flower on top of the mountain!


    ¡­


    Fwoosh-!


    Getting closer and closer to the mountain where the Windbloom Flower was located, three of the First Stage Nascent Soul Realm Experts worked together as theyunched abined attack against the old ancestor from the Wind Sword Family.


    BOOM-!


    "Damn all of you!? You dare work together against me!?"


    Cursing loudly as he was forced to stop and defend against thebined attack of the three First Stage Nascent Soul Realm Experts, the old ancestor from the Wind Sword Family was filled with killing intent.


    Whoosh-!


    Not caring about the reaction of the old ancestor, the three First Stage Nascent Soul Realm Experts all charged towards the mountain with the Windbloom Flower on it after having knocked the old ancestor back.


    All of them understood very well that there would be no way for them to get their hands of the Windbloom Flower with a powerful old expert like the ancestor of the Wind Sword Family around.


    Even if they had a chance to fight him bybining their forces, this would likely not help if the old ancestor got his hands on the Windbloom Flower first and decided to use it to escape into the deeper regions of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    Boom-!


    Boom-!


    Boom-!


    However, the three First Stage Nascent Soul Realm Experts did not get to move for long before the remaining Nascent Soul Realm Experts who had been left behind at the start attacked them to prevent them from getting their hands on the Windbloom Flower before anyone else.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Not long after, the different Nascent Soul Realm Experts all began fighting with each other to prevent anyone from getting to the Windbloom Flower first, as the other party was likely to just escape into the deeper regions of the Thousand Wind Mountains after getting his or her hands on it.


    "Looks like we still have a chance to get the Windbloom Flower!"


    Of course, with the Nascent Soul Realm Experts all busy fighting with each other, the Core Formation Realm Experts were all brimming with excitement as they charged towards the mountain with the flower. All of them understood that they would have a chance to get their hands on the Windbloom Flower, as long as the Nascent Soul Realm Experts continued fighting with each other!

 Chapter 707 Fight For The Windbloom Flower

    As the Nascent Soul Realm Experts had started fighting with each other, the Core Formation Realm Experts who had been left alone were all filled with happiness as they rushed towards the mountain with the Windbloom Flower on top of it.


    If they had originally just showed up for the chance to fish in troubled waters and try to get any benefits they could from the people who would inevitably end up dying during the struggle for the Windbloom Flower. Now, they saw a real chance to get their hands on the Windbloom flower themselves.


    However, among the Core Formation Realm Experts that were happily rushing towards the mountain with the Windbloom Flower on top of it, there were still a few who were not so happy about what was happening-


    "Damn it! Those three! Do they want to fight it out with our Wind Sword Family after this is finished!? Do they think they will be able to resist the ancestor without working together!?"


    The group of Core Formation Realm Experts belonging to the Wind Sword Family were obviously the ones who were the most furious upon seeing their ancestor getting teamed up on by three different Nascent Soul Realm Experts. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Originally, they had already thought of the Windbloom Flower as their own... But now, this was no longer the case!


    At the moment, the few Core Formation Realm Experts from the Wind Sword Family all started rushing towards the mountain with the Windbloom Flower on top of it with their fastest speed possible. The only thing on their mind was to get the Windbloom Flower and hand it over to their ancestor so he could keep it safe.


    After all, even if their ancestor was currently getting teamed up on by a group of different Nascent Soul Realm Experts every time he tried advancing towards the mountain with the flower on top of it, the ancestor was still someone in Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    With the strength of the rest of the people present, there was no way for them to kill, let alone prevent him from escaping after he got his hand on the Windbloom Flower and got the ability to resist the terrifying wind!


    The only reason why they could stop him from moving forward at the moment, was due to the terrifying wind only having weakened in an almost straight line towards the mountain with the Windbloom Flower on top of it, which allowed them to form a barrier of people to prevent the ancestor in the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm from passing through them and reaching the Windbloom Flower... And because of this, all the Nascent Soul Realms ended up not moving towards the location of the flower.


    ...


    "Looks like none of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts fighting will be the first to get their hands on the Windbloom Flower..." Watching from the side as the first Core Formation Realm Expert reached the mountain and began making his way up towards the flower, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes.


    No matter how he looked at it, the winds only weakening in an almost straight line towards the mountain with the flower on top of it, the Nascent Soul Realm Experts giving the Core Formation Realm Experts a chance to get their hands on the flower... All of it felt like it was nned from the start!


    Now... The only question left, was why...


    After all, given that the expert who should have set this entire thing up was most likely someone who had surpassed the Domain Lord Realm and reached the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao could really not understand why such a person would go so far to set this entire thing up.


    If that person just wanted a Core Formation Realm Expert to be the one to get his or her hands on the Windbloom Flower, it would be far easier to just secretly help them obtain it without attracting so many people...


    "I really can''t understand what that person would want from this..."


    Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the Core Formation Realm Experts who were slowly starting to arrive at the base of the mountain before charging towards the peak with all their strength.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Not too surprisingly, the Core Formation Realm Experts also began fighting with increased energy the closer they got to the peak. The clear difference between them fighting and the Nascent Soul Realm Experts, was the fact that the Core Formation Realm Experts actually managed to get closer and closer to the Windbloom Flower. Although... A bit slower than if they didn''t fight each other along the way.


    Whoosh~!


    "Haha! I got it!"


    Not even a few minutester after the Core Formation Realm Experts reached the mountain, a Peak Core Formation Realm Expert that had managed to sneak his way through the people fighting managed to reach the peak before anyone and pick up the Windbloom Flower before using all his strength to rush down the mountain towards the deeper regions of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    "Hm? AH! Someone is already at the peak!"


    Discovering the Peak Core Formation Realm Expert, the moment he took the flower and was about to escape, the close to one hundred Core Formation Realm Experts present on the mountain all stopped fighting as they turned their attention towards him.


    "He got the flower! Everyone, stop him!"


    "If he makes it to the deeper regions where the wind is still in full power... We can''t let him get away!"


    "Let''s kill him!"


    """KILL!"""


    Feeling the killing intent of the close to one hundred Core Formation Realm Experts lock on to him, the Peak Core Formation Realm Expert that managed to get his hands on the Windbloom Flower could not help shivering as he directly used a forbidden technique that burned his lifespan to increase his speed to make it down the mountain and escape into the deeper regions of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    As long as he could make it to the deeper regions filled with all sorts of spiritual herbs, he would not care about losing a few dozen years of his lifespan. Especially considering he might get a chance to break through the Nascent Soul Realm and increase his lifespan even further.


    At that point in time, sacrificing a few dozen years was nothing!


    Swish~


    Ptsh-!


    However, before the Peak Core Formation Realm Expert had a chance to move more than a few dozen meters down the mountain, arge axe swung down and decapitated him. Killing him on the spot before he even had a chance to react.


    "Hehe, thanks for delivering me the flower." Chuckling to himself as he picked up the flower from the now dead Core Formation Realm Expert, a bulky man with a massive axe standing more than two meters tall slowly looked at the surrounding Core Formation Realm Experts that were about to attack him with a disdainful expression on his face.


    "He got the flower! Let''s kill him!"


    "There is no way for him to escape, we already-


    FWOOSH-!


    Before any of the surrounding Core Formation Realm Experts had the chance to react, the aura around the bulky man with the axe exploded as they were all violently thrown back while throwing up blood.


    "T-this-!? N-Nascent Soul Realm... A Nascent Soul Realm Expert hid among us?!"


    Being the first to understand what was happening, one of the Core Formation Realm Experts standing a little farther away that had not gotten injured, eximed loudly with a fearful expression on his face.


    It had to be known that the only reason why he and the rest of the Core Formation Realm Experts were daring enough to try getting their hands on the Windbloom Flower was due to the Nascent Soul Realm Experts all fighting with each other and not having time to interfere with what they were doing.


    Now that a Nascent Soul Realm Expert showed up and took the Windbloom Flower, all of the Core Formation Realm Experts understood that they would no longer have a chance to get their hands on it!


    ...


    "Hm!? A Nascent Soul Realm Expert actually hid among the Core Formation Realm Expert... And I couldn''t sense him..."


    Showing a surprised expression on his face as he saw the bulky man with the axe erupting with a powerful aura belonging to the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao soon used his divine sense to scan the man from head to toe. Wanting to find out how he had been able to hide from his divine sense.


    "Hm? Looks like there should be some sort of will or treasure attached to his body that prevents my divine sense from properly determining his strength..."


    Not taking long to get an idea on what might be behind him not being able to see through the other party''s strength, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about the man''s identity. Perhaps he might even be rted to the mysterious expert that was hiding behind the scenes...!

 Chapter 708 Anger Of The Wind Sword Family Ancestor~

    "What!? Someone actually managed to sneak through us!?"


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was curiously observing the Nascent Soul Realm Expert that had managed to get his hands of the Windbloom Flower, one of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts who had all been busy fighting since the start, eximed in surprise.


    "To think someone actually managed to hide among the Core Formation Realm Experts without any of us sensing him- We can''t let him escape with the Windbloom Flower!"


    Realizing what was happening, the rest of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts soon stopped fighting before all of them began rushing towards the bulky Nascent Soul Realm Expert that had managed to get his hands on the Windbloom Flower. All equally desperate to stop him from escaping into the deeper regions of the Thousand Wind Mountains where they couldn''t follow him.


    "Damnit! The flower should have been my family''s chance to recover our past strength!"


    Not reaction any differentpared to the rest of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts discovered that someone had actually managed to sneak through and get his hands on the Windbloom Flower, the ancestor from the Wind Sword Family that had reached the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm also rushed towards the bulky man with the axe.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    All of a sudden, the Nascent Soul Realm Experts that had been stuck fighting with each other united together, as they all wanted to prevent the bulky man with the axe from escaping with the Windbloom Flower.


    After all, they all understood that without the Windbloom Flower around, they would have wasted their timeing to the Thousand Wind Mountains... And some of them had even ended up offending the ancestor of the Wind Sword Family that had reached the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    For these Nascent Soul Realm Experts, only getting their hands on the Windbloom Flower would allow them to stay safe from the inevitable attack of the old ancestor from the Sword Wind Family after everything was over!


    "Hmph! Think you can catch me?"


    Swish-!


    Not one to just wait around for the close to dozen Nascent Soul Realm Experts to surround and attack him together, the bulky man with the Windbloom Flower sneered disdainfully before using a movement technique to rush down the mountain before charging towards the deeper regions of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    "STOP HIM!"


    Seeing this, the ancestor from the Sword Wind Family yelled loudly filled with killing intent as he could only watch the bulky man disdainfully smiling at him before disappearing behind a mountain where the wind had not weakened in the slightest!


    "..."


    Understanding that he would not be able to catch up to the other party, the ancestor of the Wind Sword Family was filled with killing intent.


    If only no one had stopped him, he would be the one with the Windbloom Flower...!


    Fwoosh!


    Knowing that he would not be able to get his hands on the Windbloom Flower, the ancestor of the Wind Sword Family slowly turned around before staring directly at the rest of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts rushing over. Specifically focusing on three of them...


    "R-Run!"


    Whoosh~!


    Understanding what the ancestor of the Flying Sword Family was about to do, one of the three Nascent Soul Realm Experts that had helped in preventing the ancestor from reaching the mountain with the Windbloom Flower on top of it earlier yelled loudly before escaping in the opposite direction.


    Whoosh!


    Whoosh!


    Whoosh!


    Not taking more than a few second, the rest of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts all showed a panicked expression on their faces before escaping as well.


    "Hehehe~ All of you wanted to work together to stop me from getting my hands on the Windbloom Flower just a moment ago, yet now all of you are trying to run away~? Hehe, don''t think I will let all of you escape that easily!"


    Having seemingly gone slightly mad after having lost the chance to get his hands on the Windbloom Flower that he had already taken as his own, the ancestor of the Sword Wind Familyughed loudly before chasing after the escaping Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    """..."""


    Watching the entire thing take ce, the Core Formation Realm Experts remained silent. Not daring to make a single sound. Fearing that the ancestor of the Wind Sword Family would end up taking his anger out on them.


    Even the Core Formation Realm Experts from the Wind Sword Family were no different, as they also decided that it would be best not to say anything...


    WHOOOSH~!


    "AH-!"


    Breaking the silence of the Core Formation Realm Experts only a short time after the Nascent Soul Realm Experts had all disappeared in the distance, a terrifying sound of something being cut apart followed by a horrified scream echoed out.


    Turning towards the origin of the sound, all of the Core Formation Realm Experts discovered to their horror that the strength of the wind had started increasing. The scream earlier hade from a Fourth Stage Core Formation Realm getting cut apart by the wind having suddenly increased in strength around the area he was standing.


    "This- The wind is starting to recover?! But... It has only been a few minutes! We should at least have an hour or more left!"


    "Maybe it was just a coincidence? We still have some time to look for other spiritual herbs before having to leave-"


    "Ah-!


    Not even having the time to finish speaking with each other about what had just happened, another scream echoed out as another Core Formation Realm Expert suddenly got cut into pieces and died on the spot without any chance to resist.


    "Screw this! I''m getting out of here!"


    Whoosh-! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Seeing this, one of the weaker Core Formation Realm Experts turned around and began rushing towards the location he and the rest of the people around him had entered the Thousand Wind Mountains Through.


    Whoosh!


    Whoosh!


    Whoosh!


    Seeing the first person escaping, most of the remaining Core Formation Realm Experts also decided to escape. Not wanting to risk their life any more than they already had.


    In the end, only a few people who felt unsatisfied with not getting anything from entering the Thousand Wind Mountains remained.


    ...


    Not caring too much about what the rest of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts and Core Formation Realm Experts that hade were doing, Xuan Hao focused his full attention on the bulky man with the axe who had taken the Windbloom Flower before heading towards the deeper regions of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    "Hm?"


    Following the man very closely, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he watched him not decreasing his speed in the slightest after getting to a ce where none of the Nascent Soul Realm Expert would be able to follow him, but instead increased his speed even further.


    Looks like he might know something is wrong with the Windbloom Flower... Or perhaps he is trying to get somewhere inside the Thousand Wind Mountains...


    Thinking this to himself as he did his best to hide himself with his domain before following after the bulky man from a distance, Xuan Hao felt even more curious about the identity of the bulky man and the person who had seemingly set up this entire thing for the bulky man to get his hands on the Windbloom Flower.


    Even if he still did not know what they reason was, he at least got a few clues that pointed towards a possible reason after seeing the bulky man ignore several spiritual herbs along his path and just continuing deeper into the Thousand Wind Mountains without stopping.-


    The man should know about some sort of secret location inside the Thousand Wind Mountains that the person hidden behind the scenes also wants to learn about...


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a hint of pity towards the bulky man who was desperately rushing towards the core region of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    Even if the man might have some idea about the entire thing being a set up and he wanted to resist the other party, he had no idea just how strong his opponent was.


    After all, even Xuan Hao who had reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm would be able to easily kill him, let alone the unknown expert behind the scenes who had very likely reached the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "Well... Even if he is doomed to die, I will at least be able to get a chance to see how strong a Soul Ascension Realm Expert ispared to someone in the Domain Lord Realm..." Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the bulky man with pity, Xuan Hao did his best to keep a distance as he waited in anticipation of the master mind of the entire thing showing up.


    [Ding~!]


    However, just at this moment, the familiar sound of the system rang out. Signifying the fact that a new quest had appeared...

 Chapter 709 New Quest!

    [Limited Time Quest: Find out what is hidden at the centre of the Thousand Wind Mountains.]


    [Time limit: 2 Hours]


    [Reward: Records of a Thousand Winds.]


    Looking over the new side quest that had just appeared, Xuan Hao could not help frowning upon seeing the time limit of only two hours.


    Given the sheer size of the Thousand Wind Mountains along with the dangerous winds that could even kill Domain Lord Realm Experts, two hours was far from enough to search through the entire core region of the Thousand Wind Mountains and find whatever was hidden in there¡­ And this was not taking into ount the fact that the thing he would be searching for might be hidden by some kind of formation!


    Without anything to act as a guide inside the massive Thousand Wind Mountains, there would be no way for him toplete the quest in time-


    "¡­"


    Suddenly realizing something, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes as he looked towards the bulky man with the Windbloom Flower in his hands moving deeper and deeper inside the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    Is the reason for the appearance of a new quest rted to the ce that man is going¡­?


    Thinking this to himself Xuan Hao could not help frowning. Even if it was not rted, he didn''t really have any other clue on how toplete the quest before the time limit was up. Two hours was simply far too short a time for him to even search a fraction of the area covered by the Thousand Wind Mountains¡­


    "I should just continue following him and see where he is going¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao shook his head before following behind the bulky man as he began making his way deeper inside the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    At the very least this way, even if he didn''t manage toplete the quest issued by the system, he should still get a chance to see the mysterious expert that was the one to set up the Windbloom Flower!


    Whoosh~


    At the same time Xuan Hao was going over his new quest, the bulky man with the axe who had gotten his hands on the Windbloom Flower was anxiously making his way towards the core region of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    From a distance, a gentle almost transparent barrier covered his body. Protecting him from the terrifying wind that was ever-present inside the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    "I should not be too far away from crossing the border between the inner and core region of the Thousand Wind Mountains¡­ Hopefully this Windbloom Flower won''t disappoint me¡­" Muttering this to himself as he tightly grasped on to the small flower in his hands, the man nervously looked at the transparent barrier surrounding him.


    Even if he had heard about the Windbloom Flowers ability to protect someone from the terrifying winds of the Thousand Wind Mountains, he could not fully trust what he had heard. After all, it was well known that the winds in the deeper regions of the Thousand Wind Mountains had the ability to kill Domain Lord Realm Experts!


    For him to believe that a small flower could protect him from the terrifying winds that could kill a Domain Lord Realm Expert¡­ This was a little difficult for a Nascent Soul Realm Expert without any significant background like himself¡­


    If not for the fact that he already knew that Domain Lords died fighting over the Windbloom Flower in the past and the fact that it was by far one of the most expensive spiritual herbs found in the Sky Empire, he would have never believed that the small flower currently in his grasp had the ability to protect him from something that could even kill a Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    ¡­


    Travelling for a little under an hour at his fastest speed possible, the bulky man came to a stop as he fearfully gazed up at the massive mountains towering high above the clouds blocking out his vision.


    WHOOOSH-!


    "This should be the start of the core region of the Thousand Wind Mountains¡­"


    Even without the ear piercing sound of the wind, it was not hard for him to understand that whaty in front of him was the core region of the Thousand Wind Mountains, a ce where Domain Lord Realm Experts had perished and would spell certain death for anyone below that realm foolish enough to enter!


    "If I''m not wrong¡­ That ce should be somewhere even deeper inside the Thousand Wind Mountains¡­"


    Remembering his reason foring to the Thousand Wind Mountains and risking his life in the first, the bulky man gently caressed a small simple looking pendant hanging around his neck before a determined expression appeared on his face. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Swish-!


    Not hesitating anymore, the bulky man stepped forward and officially entered the core region of the Thousand Wind Mountains-


    WHOOOOSH-!


    Not even a secondter, the sound of the wind outside became far louder than before. The almost transparent barrier protecting him also began violently shaking as if it was about to copse at any moment. Even taking a single step forward also became a challenge as his speed rapidly reduced.


    "¡­"


    Not saying a single word as the almost transparent barrier around him began shaking violent like it was about to copse, the bulky man only stopped for a short moment before continuing deeper into the Thousand Wind Mountains after discovering that the barrier created by the Windbloom Flower did not copse or show any cracks.


    ¡­


    "That is¡­ A more dangerous ce than I expected¡­" Watching this entire thing from afar, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he inspected the especially strong winds inside the core region of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    Even with his current strength, resisting the wind would take some effort and his speed would be far slowerpared to normal. Fighting in such an environment would be bad. Not to mention escaping from a fight would be close to impossible unless one used a movement technique rted to spatial maniption¡­!


    The power of the winds alone was more than enough to kill an unprepared First Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert¡­ But still far from enough from killing someone in the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm like the one that had recently died inside the Thousand Wind Mountains ording to what Yi Min had told him¡­


    Thinking about this as he carefully observed the howling winds in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help looking towards the deeper parts of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    Given that a Third Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert had ended up dying, he was certain that the winds would get even stronger deeper inside. The only thing that worried him, was that the barrier created by the Windbloom Flower looked like it was about to start breaking apart at any moment after having to protect the Second Stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the winds outside and the mastermind had yet to show up.


    If things continued like this, the barrier created by the Windbloom Flower would most likely end up shattering when the strength of the winds increased a bit more. At that point in time, with the bulky man''s strength, there was no way for him to survive inside the core region of the Thousand Wind Mountains!


    "At that point in time, the mastermind should appear to make sure that little one survives until he reaches his destination¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help focusing his attention towards the almost transparent barrier protecting the bulky man from the wind outside.


    Even if the mastermind was not going to show up in person to safe him when the barrier was about to break, Xuan Hao was not expecting something like that to happen before the bulky man reached the location he was searching for.


    Instead, the main thing Xuan Hao was looking out for, was the trace of power and aura that the other party would inevitably end up revealing when secretly protecting the bulky man!


    Even if the other party would only release a trace amount of power, it would be more than enough for Xuan Hao to determine the other party''s strength as long as that person''s realm was not too far beyond his own¡­ And after merging together his sword and ice domain, he felt more than confident in being able to at the very least detect someone in the First Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Whoosh~!


    Seeing that the bulky man was already making his way past the first of the massive mountains inside the core region of the Thousand Wind Mountains, Xuan Hao did not dare to wait around at the border for too long, as he used his domain to shield himself before entering the core region of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    As his dantian was already fully functional again at this point in time, this was not too difficult for the current Xuan Hao. At most, he was moving a bit slowerpared to normal due to the strong winds.

 Chapter 710 Plains Of The Thousand Wind Mountains

    Continuing deeper inside the Thousand Wind Mountains, the environment shifted away from mountains covering ever ce in sight and was instead reced by arge in filled with small hills where the strength of the wind once again increased.


    Whoosh~!


    Not hesitating for more than a few seconds when faced with the wind that was far stronger than before, the bulky man tightly clenched the Windbloom Flower in his hands before stepping foot onto the vast yet empty in.


    Crack~!


    Not long after, the Windbloom Flower in his hands shook violently for a moment as the almost transparent barrier protecting him rapidly began cracking apart at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    "This-?!" Not having any time to react to the barrier suddenly starting to crack apart around him, fear filled the eyes of the bulky man as gripped onto the Windbloom Flower even tighter than before while injecting his qi into it in hopes of helping strengthen the barrier around him.


    Fwoosh~


    Having closed his eyes not caring about his surroundings as he was using all his strength to try and help the Windbloom Flower resist the now far more terrifying winds all around him to no avail, the bulky man didn''t notice a small string carefully approaching without being noticed before attaching itself to the Windbloom Flower.


    BOOM-!


    Not even a second after the string had connected itself to the Windbloom Flower, the flower seemed to suddenly have evolved, its strength reaching a brand new level as the almost transparent barrier protecting the bulky man quickly stabilized. Allowing the bulky man to stop pouring his qi into the flower.


    "Did it evolve after I injected my qi into it!? This... It does seem like the connection has deepened and the power of the barrier is also far strongerpared to before... Looks like injecting my qi into it did indeed end up causing some qualitative change that allowed it to evolve!"


    Not knowing what had suddenly happened for the Windbloom Flower to rapidly increase in strength after he injected his qi into it, the bulky man presumed that it was him injecting his qi into it that had ended up causing it to evolve and ultimately increase its strength enough to resist the wind outside.


    The main reason why he thought that this was the case and not due to some external factor, was that his connection with the Windbloom Flower had deepenedpared to before. Allowing him to not only use its power to protect himself more easily, but also allowing him to sense the different wind currents all around him.


    In a sense, his connection to the Dao of Wind had deepened unknowingly and if he reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm in the future, he would not have any difficulty reaching the Domain Lord Realm with enough time!


    ...


    "So powerful..." Different from the bulky man that didn''t notice the thin thread filled with power connecting to the Windbloom Flower before disappearing, Xuan Hao saw everything as he sucked in a cold breath of air. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even if it was just for an instant, he had managed to get a grasp over the power behind the small thread connecting to the Windbloom Flower... And he was sure that the person who had been secretly following behind the bulky man like him was someone above the Domain Lord Realm.


    Not only was the quality of the qi that was infused into the Windbloom Flower through the thin thread of apletely different levelpared to his own, but the small glimpse he had managed to catch of the other party''s true strength was more than enough to confirm that the person in question had indeed surpassed the Domain Lord Realm!


    "..."


    Continuing to look towards the location that he had sensed the person in question should be hiding for the next few minutes, Xuan Hao remained silent without moving and using his divine sense in an attempt to get a better understanding of just how strong he or she was. Knowing very well that it would be best not to move before the bulky man recovered and began moving, while at the same time understanding that he would get found out the moment he used his divine sense to try and find out the strength of the other party...


    As a total of fifteen minutes passed by slowly and the time limit of the quest given by the system also reduced to less than an hour, the bulky man seemed to have fully recovered as he once again stood up before continuing deeper inside the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    Whoosh~!


    Different from the past however, the bulky man seemed to understand the different wind currents passing through the empty yet massive in of the Thousand Wind Mountains. Allowing him to move far fasterpared to the past by avoiding the more powerful wind currents that would end up slowing down his speed.


    At the same time, Xuan Hao who was following behind the bulky man as he made his way deeper and deeper inside the Thousand Wind Mountains could not help frowning when feeling the winds outside colliding with his domain.


    Even if it was still not anywhere near being able to pose a threat to him, the strength of the wind outside had already beparable to the attack of a Fourth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    Under such conditions, even a stronger Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm might end up dying!


    After all, even if a Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert might have the ability to easily defend against someone in the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, the wind constantly crashing against his domain was like constant stream of attacksunched by someone in the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if the Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert could withstand it for a short period of time, there was no way to continuously enduring such a powerful and consistent stream of attacks!


    If not for the fact that the strength of his domain had increased by an unfathomable degree after it had been formed by his sword and ice domain merging together, Xuan Hao would not have been able to ignore the wind outside like he was currently doing...


    "Hm? Looks like there is finally something different in this ce... Is this perhaps the ce that the bulky man was searching for?"


    Just at this moment, Xuan Hao discovered something different from the mountains and seemingly endless hilly ins of the Thousand Wind Mountains appearing in the distance on top of a small hill. In an instant, his entire body tensed up as he prepared himself-


    Understanding very well that he might encounter a dangerous situation if the ce the bulky man was moving towards was connected to the thing hidden inside the Thousand Wind Mountains from his quest.


    ...


    "Finally, I reached this ce...!" Coming to a stop in front of a small hill that looked the same as any of the other hills present on therge ins, the bulky man brimmed with joy as he looked towards the only identity on the small hill, a small, yet inconspicuous bird shaped statue no more than a dozen centimeters tall on top of the hill.


    If not for the fact that he had a way to track down the location of the small bird statue, there would be no way for someone like himself to ever find it inside therge ins of the Thousand Wind Mountains. Especially considering the fact that he could not use his divine sense due to the strong winds ripping it apart the moment he tried to use it outside the barrier created by the Windbloom Flower.


    "Now... All I have to do is offer some of my blood and use the secret technique from those ancient texts. After that, I should be able to open a path to the Thousand Wind Pce, the cultivation abode of an ancient cultivator!" Muttering this to himself as he gazed towards the statue of the small bird like creature on top of the hill, the bulky man was filled with excitement as he slowly began making his way up the hill. Soon finding himself directly in front of the small bird statue.


    Ptsh~


    Taking out hisrge axe, the bulky man did not show the slightest bit of hesitation as he cut arge opening in his arm, causing arge amount of blood to spill out and onto the small statue of the bird like creature.


    "Next is the technique for opening the passage to the Thousand Wind Pce..."


    Filled with determination as he saw the entire statue covered in his blood, the bulky man slowly began reciting some kind of ancient ritual in an ancientnguage that Xuan Hao watching from a distance had no way to understand.


    At most he could tell that it was rted to the ancientnguage he himself was still in the process of researching... Just... Older and far moreplex...

 Chapter 711 First Encounter With A Soul Ascension Realm Expert!

    Following the bulky man reciting something in some kind of ancientnguage, the blood that had formed a small pool around the statue of the bird like creature slowly started absorbing the blood before a human sized portal opened up in the air just above the small statue of the bird like creature.


    "The path leading to the Thousand Wind Pce is open!"


    Listening to what the bulky man was muttering to himself while he absentmindedly stared at the portal that had opened up in front of him, Xuan Hao''s entire body tensed up as he prepared for what was about to happen.


    Given that a portal had already been opened up, Xuan Hao understood that there was no more value in the mastermind keeping the bulky man alive for any longer-


    Crack~


    Not even a second after this thought urred to Xuan Hao, the almost transparent barrier protecting the bulky man started cracking apart at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    "Wha-!?"


    Not expecting for the barrier that had been protecting him all this time to suddenly start cracking apart all of a sudden, the bulky man could not help panicking as he looked at the terrifying wind outside. Even without having touched the wind outside first hand, he understood very well that doing so with his current strength would instantly kill him¡­


    At the end of the day, the only reason why he had been able to survive so deep inside the Thousand Wind Mountains was due to the protection of the Windbloom Flower, without it, he would undoubtably die!


    Swish-!


    Understanding this very well, the bulky man did not try and infuse his qi into the Windbloom Flower likest time in hopes of it evolving again and growing even stronger than before, but instead rushed towards the portal that he had just opened above the small statue of the bird like creature.


    Even if it might end up costing him his life, he didn''t hesitate in the slightest as he jumped towards the portal with all his strength-


    "Hmph!"


    Thump-!


    However, just as he was about to pass through the portal, a loud contemptuous snicker echoed out from above as a terrifying aura descended towards the bulky man who was just about to enter through the portal. Forcibly pinning him to the ground before he could pass through the portal and escape.


    "¡­"


    Not able to make a single sound as he suddenly felt himself pinned to the ground, the bulky man could do nothing but watch as the almost transparent barrier protecting him grew weaker and weaker with each passing second. Not having any idea about who the person pinning him to the ground and making him unable to move wa.


    However, different from the bulky man who could only stare nkly around himself as the barrier created by the Windbloom Flower was disappearing around him, Xuan Hao could clearly see the person who was supressing the bulky man and preventing him from escaping through the portal he had just opened.


    From the first nce, Xuan Hao could not help sucking in a cold breath of air as he carefully examined the man who had appeared in the air a short distance away from the hill where the bulky man was helplessly pinned to the ground as the barrier around him was disappearing at an increasingly fast speed.


    Even if he could not examine the other party''s features due a blood red mist hiding most of the party''s features, Xuan Hao could at the very least tell that the other person was a man from his body figure and tone of voice.


    Well¡­ He could always be wrong¡­ But Xuan Hao highly doubted that the other party would go through such effort to disguise his gender. Especially considering that the other party still seemed to have no idea about his presence and only thought it was himself and the bulky man who was about to die¡­


    Examining the man more closely without using his divine sense, Xuan Hao discovered that the strength of the other party was indeed above the Domain Lord Realm like he had guessed. Not only that, but Xuan Hao could clearly feel the qualitive difference in strength between himself and the man currently floating in the air above the bulky man.


    Is this the Soul Ascension Realm? How strong is this personpared to other Soul Ascension Realm Experts? Is he at the earlier stages of the realm or theter stages of it¡­?


    Thinking this to himself as he continued examining the man, Xuan Hao could not help feeling excited as he quietly waited without making any sudden movements that might end up alerting the other party.


    Even if he was confident in being able to fight the other party with the help of his domain, Xuan Hao didn''t want to risk it if he didn''t have to¡­ On the other hand, he was far more interested in finding out about what might be hidden on the other side of the portal that the bulky man had created.


    Especially considering that it had caused an expert at the Soul Ascension Realm Expert work so hard to make sure that the portal was created in the first ce.


    Even without having to see the thing that was on the other side, Xuan Hao understood that it should be something incredibly precious. Maybe even something that would be able to help him when it came to breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm in the future!


    CRACK-!


    Not aware of Xuan Hao watching from the side and only able to barely move his eyes around to see the barrier protecting him about to fully crack apart, the bulky man barely managed to muster enough strength to turn his head towards the statue of the bird like creature by breaking his own neck in the process.


    Although he had reached the Nascent Soul Realm and could heal from such an injurie as long as his nascent soul was still intact, the pain brought along by breaking his own neck was by no means something that a normal person could easily endure¡­ Yet, the bulky man barely said a sound as gazed directly into the small eyes of the small statue.


    Fwoosh-!


    Before long a gentle blood red aura suddenly appeared around small statue of the bird like creature before it extended out and covered the body of the bulky man-


    "HOW DARE YOU! DIE!"


    Thinking that the bulky man was just trying to kill himself to end things quickly instead of getting torn apart by the winds outside, the man floating in the air above did not have any time to react when he realized that this was not the case-


    Swish-!


    And just before he managed tond an attack on where the bulky man had beenying, the gentle blood red aura engulfing the bulky man forcibly dragged his body into the small portal above the small statue. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    BOOOOOM-!


    In the end, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert could do nothing but watch as his attacknded on top of the small hill without meeting its target.


    "Hm?"


    However, different from his expectations of the hill getting obliterated by his attack, the small statue and the hill remainedpletely intact after the attack hadnded-


    WHOOOOSH-!


    WHOOOOSH-!


    WHOOOOSH-!


    Not only that, but the winds all over the Thousand Wind Mountains started gathering towards the small hill with the statue on top of it before merging together to attack the Soul Ascension Realm Expert along with anything in the vicinity.


    "¡­"


    Being one of those things in the vicinity, Xuan Hao did not know whether tough or cry as he felt his domain being put under tremendous pressure from the winds that were gathering from all over the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    Not even a few seconds had passed, but the pressure he was under was already about to break his domain!


    If the winds from all over the Thousand Wind Mountains really ended up gathering together in a single location, let alone someone in the Domain Lord Realm. Even someone in the Soul Ascension Realm would get torn apart and killed on the spot!


    "Ah-! WHY IS THE WIND OF THIS DAMNED PLACE GATHERING TOWARDS ME!?"


    Just looking up at how the man who was the focus point of the wind all over the Thousand Wind Mountains was doing, was more than enough to understand this¡­


    Swish-!


    Not wanting to end up dead by standing around and waiting for all the wind of the Thousand Wind Mountains to truly gather together in one ce, Xuan Hao decided to rush towards the human sized portal that was still present on top of the small hill with the statue of the bird like creature on top of it.


    Even if he had no idea where it might lead him, he understood very well that his chances of leaving the Thousand Wind Mountains with all the winds gathering towards his current location, was close to impossible.


    Especially considering the fact that the winds themselves had begun to affect the stability of the space inside the Thousand Wind Mountains. Making it far harder to use his movement technique to move around¡­

 Chapter 712 Records Of A Thousand Winds

    Whoosh~!


    Entering the portal without any trouble, Xuan Hao felt his vision go dark for a short moment before he found himself at the base of arge mountain that rivalled the height of the Main Peak from the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Different from the Main Peak of the Shattered Star Peaks however, there was a beautiful path made from some kind of spiritual stone leading towards the top of the mountain. Even without having any cultivation base, it would not be hard for a mortal without any cultivation to reach the peak of the mountain given enough time. At least that was considering there was no dangers lurking that he had yet to discover at this point in time¡­


    "Hm? He is still alive¡­"


    Noticing the bulky manying on the ground not too far away from where he was, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a surprised that he was still alive. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Not to mention the fact that he should have been without the protection of the Windbloom Flower for a short moment when the gentle blood red light carried his body through the portal, the residual energy of the Soul Ascension Realm Expert from when he had pinned him to the ground just a moment ago should have killed him the moment the gentle blood red energy stopped protecting him.


    "Looks like the blood red energy didn''t just protect him for a short moment, but also removed the threat of the residual energy left behind by that Soul Ascension Realm Expert!" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao decided to leave the bulky man alone. Not wanting to idently end up offending the gentle blood red energy like the Soul Ascension Realm Expert had ended up doing¡­


    Having turned his attention away from the mountain and the bulky man who was lying unconscious on the ground, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after realizing that the small independent space he had been transported to contained nothing other the mountain itself.


    In a sense, it could not even be considered an independent space, but was more like an iplete secret realm that had not been finished yet. The only thing that had been made so far, was the mountain that had likely been intended as the core of this iplete secret realm.


    Outside of the small space that the mountain was inside of, there was nothing other than the empty void. Even if his strength had increased since he had first seen the void outside the world, Xuan Hao didn''t dare thinking about entering it with his current strength.


    Even when constructing a secret realm also known as an independent space outside of the world, the space in question would still be anchored to the main world and could in a sense be considered an extension of that world!


    To truly construct apletely new and independent world in the void was something far more difficult, as doing so would no longer allow one to rely on the protection of the main world.


    Not only would the void grow more dangers the farther away from the main world one went, ording to what little information Xuan Hao had managed to get his hands on so far about the void, but one would also have to deal with the inherent dangers that existed in the void between worlds.


    Just what this danger was and what it entailed; Xuan Hao had no idea¡­ But whatever it was, it was more than enough to cause even Soul Ascension Realm Experts to not dare venture into the void!


    Thinking about it. Maybe even experts who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm didn''t dare venture into the void either. Not to mention, actually entering the void itself was not something simple. Even with his current cultivation realm, Xuan Hao still had no way to enter the void between worlds outside of using the different secret realms and independent spaces he had encountered so far.


    The main reason for this, was that to leave the main world and enter the void between worlds, hisprehension of thews of space would have to be high enough for him to create a passage through the worlds natural barrier into the void outside.


    Even if this sounded like something simple to do, it was actually something extremelyplicated that only the most experienced Domain Lords could attempt with enough preparations.


    Not to mention, the only reason why it was even possible to do this without getting attacked by the world itself, was due to several different things. The most important of which was the fact that the person creating the passage to the void was someone native to the world itself.


    Given that Xuan Hao himself was in essence not a native of the world itself due to him having transmigrated over, he didn''t even dare think of creating a passage to the void outside the world if he had the ability to do so.


    Not to mention, the original Xuan Hao before the merger between two different souls might not have been from the world that the Ewaria Continent was located inside of in the first ce¡­


    No matter what it was, Xuan Hao did not n to try and create a passage through the world barrier to the void outside himself. Not wanting to risk thews of the world starting to attack him.


    After all, even if he surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm in the future, he doubted that he would have any ability to resist the power of an entire world¡­


    "Hah¡­ No use thinking about any of this for now¡­" Shaking his head as he turned his attention back towards the mountain at the centre of the small independent space, Xuan Hao realized that the quest he had gotten from the system waspleted.


    [Side Quest: Find out what is hidden at the centre of the Thousand Wind Mountains. (Complete)]


    [Reward: Records of a Thousand Winds.]


    "So this ce is located somewhere around the centre of the Thousand Wind Mountains¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he decided to redeem the reward from the quest, Xuan Hao was not too surprised when arge book materialized in front of him.


    At this point in time, he had already gotten used to the system just materializing things in front of him whenever he redeemed a reward, as for how it was done¡­ He had no idea¡­


    Swish~


    Deciding not to go up the mountain for now, Xuan Hao decided to open the book he had gotten from the system, curious about what the book was about.


    "This is-!?"


    Only turning the first page, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked as he realized that the first few pages were describing the history of the Thousand Wind Mountains!


    Not only that, but there a short description of the creator of the Thousand Wind Mountains was also present!


    Knowing that he might be able to find out more about what kind of dangers might be hidden on top of the mountain that was in front of him, Xuan Hao avidly began reading¡­


    ording to the Records of a Thousand Winds, the Thousand Wind Mountains was originally the cultivation abode of a wandering cultivator known as the Lord of a Thousand Winds, a cultivator that had passed through the Soul Ascension Realm and reached an even higher realm!


    In the past, when this powerful wandering cultivator had begun establishing his abode just outside the main world, he idently connected his still nascent independent space to an ancient mystic realm¡­ The consequences of this were terrifying, as the two smaller worlds ended up forcibly colliding with each other!


    In the end, the Lord of a Thousand Winds tried his best to stabilize the situation, but he had ended up miscalcting¡­ The mystic realm he had idently chanced upon was farrger and stronger than he could handle and when he tried to forcibly separate his still nascent independent space and the mystic realm, he ended up getting crushed between the two¡­!


    After the death of the wandering cultivator, the still nascent independent space created by him had no way to resist therge mystic realm and ended up shattering apart with most of the nascent independent space merging together with therge mystic realm, while the rest either drifted off into the void or fell back into the main world to form the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    At the end, the only thing that remained was the core of the Nascent independent space that had been protected by the Thousand Wind Pce.


    All that remained of the once legendary wandering cultivator, Lord of a Thousand Winds, was the gentle wind currents sweeping through the Thousand Wind Mountains¡­


    Not knowing what to say after he finished reading through it, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what the mystic realm being referred to had gone after the collision, while at the same time wondering just how strong the Lord of a Thousand Winds had been.

 Chapter 713 Back To The Surface

    Having spent a few minutes reading through the Records of a Thousand Winds and inspecting what little remained of the nascent independent space that the Lord of a Thousand Winds had created, Xuan Hao had ignored the bulky man who had just remained unconscious on the ground.


    "Mhm~"


    However, just at this moment, the bulky man began moving. Showing signs of waking up at any moment.


    "Hm? Looks like he is about to wake up¡­"


    Noticing this, Xuan Hao looked away from the Records of a Thousand Winds and focused his attention on the bulky man who was about to wake up for a short moment before focusing on the massive mountain at the core of the small independent space.


    Swish~


    Not wanting to wait around for the bulky man to wake up, Xuan Hao decided to make his way up the mountain to find out what was hidden on top of it.


    Even if there was not anything precious on top of the mountain, Xuan Hao at the very least hoped that there would be a way out of the small independent space, as the portal he had originally entered through had already closed by itself at this point in time.


    As for what had ended up happing to the Soul Ascension Realm Expert that was stuck outside, Xuan Hao had no idea and to be honest, he didn''t n to stay around for too long in case the Soul Ascension Realm Expert managed to find a way into the small independent space after escaping from the wind currents outside.


    After all, even if the wind had the strength to kill someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao doubted that the Soul Ascension Realm Expert would just wait around for this to happen. No matter what, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert would definitely try to escape if things got too dangerous!


    Thump~


    Throwing these thoughts to the back of his mind as he came to a stop just a short distance from the top of the mountain, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he looked up at the almost transparent mist that engulfed the entire peak of the mountain.


    Although the mist was almost transparent and it should have been easy to see through. For some reason, there was some kind of power present in the mist that prevented him from looking through it. Even using his divine sense did not work, as the mist covering the peak of the mountain prevented it from entering.


    Knowing that there was definitely something wrong with the mist that hid the peak of the mountain from view, Xuan Hao decided to slowly approach and see if he could examine the mist more closely. Not wanting to enter it before he was sure that it would not be dangerous to him.


    Whoosh~


    Approaching the mist, the sound of the wind could clearly be heard from the other side. However, different from the wind outside, it was obvious that the wind on top of the mountain was much calmer than the wind back in the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    "It doesn''t look like its harmful in any way¡­"


    Turning his attention towards the mist that covered the mountain peak, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes. Even when standing directly in front of it, he could not see through¡­ But he still managed to understand that the mist was not dangerous in any way and only seemed to be a natural formation of some sort that prevented someone from looking through it.


    In a sense, the mist was an incredibly powerful formation when it came to hiding. After all, even Xuan Hao did not sense or see it before he was close to the Peak of the mountain.


    At least the mist should bepletely harmless¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao looked towards the mist for a few seconds before taking a step forward into the mist.


    ¡­


    "Wah-!"


    Crawling out from a small hole in the ground beneath arge tree inside a massive jungle, Hui Ying was about to say something after getting out, when she suddenly tripped over one of therge tree''s roots and began rolling down the small hill the tree sat on top of. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Thump!


    "Ouch!"


    Letting out a painful sound as she rolled into a ratherrge stone at the bottom of the small hill the tree was located on top of, Hui Ying was just about to start cursing at the tree when she suddenly seemed to remember where she currently was.


    "So much for getting out without making amotion¡­"


    Crawling out from the hole in the ground beneath the tree, Bai Ning could not help shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while closely observing his surroundings for any demon beasts that might have been attracted to the sound Hui Ying had made.


    "¡­"


    Understanding what Bai Ning meant, Hui Ying could not help feeling a bit embarrassed before she also quietly began observing her surroundings for any demon beasts that might attack them.


    Given that they had spent most of the time inside the jungle being chased by demon beasts, she understood very well how dangerous it was if there really was any demon beasts around to hear her littlemotion earlier.


    Even if it was only some weaker demon beasts in the Foundation Establishment Realm, their fight with them might end up attracting even stronger demon beasts. Maybe they would even end up attracting a Core Formation Realm demon beast if they were unlucky enough!


    "Haaa¡­ Looks like we got lucky that there weren''t any demon beasts around¡­"


    Spending the next few minutes just quietly watching their surroundings, both Hui Ying and Bai Ning let out a breath of relief after no demon beasts appeared to attack them.


    Compared to their journey below the ground where the strongest demon beast they had to deal with was in the Qi Condensation Realm, the dangers above the ground was on a totally different level.


    Just the slightest bit of carelessness and they might end up dead!


    "Let''s get going, its best to get moving as quickly as possible."


    "Yes¡­"


    Not wasting any time after they were sure that there weren''t any demon beasts around, Bai Ning and Hui Ying began their journey towards the closest exit out of the jungle.


    During their two-day long journey underground, they had ended up deciding to go towards the exit closest to them. Even if they ended up risking ending up in a more dangerous situation by passing through an exit that they had no idea about what was on the other side, they still felt that it would be a better choice than having to pass through the area with two Core Formation Realm demon beasts roaming through it.


    After all, if they encountered the two Core Formation Realm demon beasts again, they might not get lucky enough to escape again!


    Not to mention this, Bai Ning and Hui Ying were also afraid of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast that they had encountered when they first entered the underground part of the jungle through the small secret hideout.


    Thinking about it, the main thing they were afraid of encountering was not really the Core Formation Realm demon beasts, they still felt confident in escaping as long as they could get close enough to the ce they had entered the jungle through¡­ The Nascent Soul Realm demon beast on the other hand, that was something both of them feared deeply!


    Even if the ce should not be too close to the path leading back towards the ce, they had originally entered the jungle through, both of them understood very well howrge of an area the divine sense of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert could cover¡­ Just getting within a few thousand meters of the demon beast in the Nascent Soul Realm would be more than enough for it to lock on to them.


    Given the difference in strength between the Foundation Establishment Realm and the Nascent Soul Realm, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying understood that the moment the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast locked on to them, they would be dead.


    Considering they had already met several elders from the sect that had reached the Nascent Soul Realm and in Bai Ning''s case, he had even fought with Chu Yang who had reached the Nascent Soul Realm.


    No matter what they did, there would be no way for them to escape a Nascent Soul Realm demon beast, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying understood this deep down¡­


    "This is-!?"


    "N-Nascent Soul Realm¡­!?"


    For this reason, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying could not help freezing on the spot when they suddenly came face to face with two demon beasts in the Nascent Soul Realm facing off against each other only a short distance away from the ce they had left the underground part of the jungle.


    The only positive about their current dangerous situation, was that the two powerful demon beasts did not seem to care about them and were instead fully focused on each other¡­

 Chapter 714 Strange Mist

    Roar!


    Not daring to make the slightest movement as they watched one of the two Nascent Soul Realm demon beast roaring threateningly towards the other, Bai Ning and Hui Ying both turned to look at each other for a short movement before slowly starting to back away from the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts and moving towards the entrances to the underground part of the jungle they had juste from.


    Given that both of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast were busy with each other at the moment, they hoped that they would be ignored and could sneak away before they decided to either start fighting with each other or worse, attack them.


    ROAR


    Causing both Hui Ying and Bai Ning to freeze on the spot once again, the demon beast that had roared earlier let out an even more terrifying roar. The difference being this time around-


    Swish-!


    It didn''t wait for a response and directly attacked!


    Boom-!


    What followed was a loud explosive sound followed by a shockwave that knocked down both Bai Ning and Hui Ying who were standing not too far away from where the two Nascent Soul Realm Demon Beasts had shed with each other.


    "We need to get out of here!"


    Understanding very well how dangerous it was for them to be nearby while two Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts were fighting each other, Bai Ning got up before quickly pulling Hui Ying who was still on the ground with him.


    Wasting even a single second at this point in time would put their life at risk, Hui Ying also understood this, as she let Bai Ning pull her towards the entrance to the underground part of the jungle that they had juste out of a few minutes earlier.


    Swish-!


    Luckily for both of them, the entrance to the underground part of the jungle was not too far away and they managed to reach it only a few minutes after they escaped from the ce where the two Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts were fighting with each other.


    "You should enter first, I will- Waaaah-!"


    Crack~


    Seeing Hui Ying slow down as she stopped in front of the hole to say something, Bai Ning ignored what she said and pushed her into the hole leading down into the underground part of the jungle. Not having the time to care about the few tree roots that she ended up breaking on the way down.


    Bang!


    "Time for me to enter¡­"


    Hearing the sound of Hui Ying hitting the ground, Bai Ning quickly jumped into the small hole without any hesitation-


    BOOOOM-!


    And not a second toote, as a massive explosion rang out from above them. Not only that, but both Bai Ning and Hui Ying could clearly feel everything shaking, as the cave the small cave that they were currently inside of started to show signs of copsing.


    ""¡­""


    Not having to say anything, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying got up and made their way out of the small cave. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    RUMBLE-!


    Just in time, as another powerful shockwave from the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts fighting reached the small hill that the cave was connected to. Instantly causing the small cave to copse.


    "This is¡­ Looks like we will have to look for another way up to the surface¡­"


    "Well¡­ At least we are safe¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as their way up to the surface got blocked, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying decided to move a bit farther away before looking of the map from therge tower¡­ Or book tower, as they had decided to name it.


    "Haaa¡­ Looks like the closest way out is at least three days of walk away and the way out of the jungle we will have to use will also be different, but we don''t have another choice at this point in time¡­"


    "Indeed, we are about to run out of food and won''t be able to reach any of the other exits in time and¡­ Eating the fruits or other things growing inside this jungle without knowing what is edible and what is poisonous, is a bad idea."


    As both of them looked down at the map Bai Ning had taken out from his interspatial ring together, they understood that they would not be leaving the jungle any time soon. Especially considering that even after they reached the closest exit out of the underground cavework below the jungle, they still had four days of travel through the jungle ahead of them.


    Considering what they had encountered so far every time they tried moving around inside the jungle, neither Bai Ning nor Hui Ying were looking forward to spending four days walking through the jungle.


    Together with the fact that they were also running out of food and wouldn''t be able to turn back again and head towards another exit out of the jungle in case their path forward was blocked, like what had happened just a few minutes earlier with the two Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying were even more nervous about their uing four day journey through the jungle above ground!


    "We should get going¡­"


    "Yeah¡­"


    Not wanting to waste any time knowing that their food supply was dwindling, Bai Ning and Hui Ying both began their journey towards the closest way out of the underground tunnelwork below the jungle.


    ¡­


    "How amazing¡­"


    Back at the mountain inside the small independent space, Xuan Hao stepped through the mist and was met by the sight of a massive pce covering the entire peak of the mountain. The mist that was now behind him seemed to have formed arge dome shaped barrier around the entire mountain peak. Not only helping obscure the pce from view, but also giving it a magical backdrop.


    "This should be the abode of the wandering cultivator who created this ce¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked up at the massive pce in awe, Xuan Hao could not help getting cautious after seeing thepletely intact pce.


    Given that the history of the Thousand Wind Mountains dated back hundreds of thousands of years, it was obvious that the pce in front of him should have long been broken down by the passage of time-


    "Hm?"


    Swish~


    Just at this moment, Xuan Hao noticed something off the corner of his eye as he quickly flew over to a smallmppost on the path leading up to the pce on top of the mountain peak.


    Swoosh~


    "This is¡­ Mist?!"


    Trying to touch themppost, Xuan Hao could not help eximing in surprise as his hand passed right through it, causing part of themppost to turn into mist before quickly reforming secondster.


    "So, everything here is made up from the mist?"


    Looking back up towards the majestic pce in the distance, Xuan Hao realized why the pce had managed to stay in a pristine condition over such a long passage of time.


    But at the same time, Xuan Hao also grew curious as to what had caused the mist in this ce to form such a real looking pce.


    If not for the fact that he was someone in the Domain Lord Realm and was currently using both his domain and his divine sense to observe his surroundings, it would have been impossible to detect that his surroundings was made up from some kind of special mist and he might have continued thinking that it was a real pce in front of him!


    "This kind of formation or technique is simply too terrifying, I guess I''m lucky that this is not some sort of killing formation¡­"


    Shaking his head as he grew even more curious about the Lord of a Thousand Winds who had made this ce in the past, Xuan Hao began making his way towards the pce.


    Even if he already knew that the entire pce and everything inside of it should be made from the special mist, he still wanted to see if he could find something inside of it that hadn''t disappeared after the long passage of time.


    At the same time, he also wanted to find out more about the strange mist that made up this ce. After all, even if he could only scratch the surface of it, he still understood that the mist should be rted to abination of the Dao of Wind and the Dao of Water!


    For Xuan Hao, this was the first time ever that he had encountered a technique of formation thatbined two different Daos together to form something.


    Not to mention, the profound usage of the Dao of Water in the mist itself, was more than enough reason for Xuan Hao to enter the pce and explore more and see if he could use it to deepen his understanding of the Dao of Ice¡­ Or even better,prehend the Dao of Water directly!


    As different thoughts passed through his head, Xuan Hao soon found himself directly in front of the massive pce of mist.


    A fewrge engravings on top of the gate leading inside spelling out¡­


    [Thousand Wind Pce]

 Chapter 715 Mysterious Book

    Looking up at therge engravings above the gate leading into therge pce of mist called the Thousand Wind Pce, Xuan Hao could not help sucking in a breath of cold air as he felt a shiver run down his spine.


    Even if the engravings above the gate were only made out of mist and should be nowhere near the original engravings when the Thousand Wind Pce had still been around, the remnant intent from the original engravings had carried over and had attached to the new engravings.


    From the remnant intent alone, Xuan Hao could clearly feel how powerful the creator of the Thousand Wind Pce had been when he was still alive!


    Compared to the Soul Ascension Realm Expert he had encountered outside¡­ The creator of the Thousand Wind Pce was on apletely different level!


    Looking over the engravings for a few more seconds, Xuan Hao stepped forward and entered the Thousand Wind Pce.


    Whoosh~


    Given that the entire ce was made of mist, it was not too surprising that it was rather easy to enter the Thousand Wind Pce. At most he had to use his domain to forcefully scatter the mist around him for a short moment as he passed through the gate. Nothing difficult with his current strength.


    However, the same could not be said for anyone below the Domain Lord Realm, as it would be quite difficult to pass through the mist that made up the Thousand Wind Pce.


    The Main reason for this being that the mist that made up the Thousand Wind Pce had been strengthened by the remanent intent of its creator. Making it far more difficult for someone to scatter the mist and make their way inside the Thousand Wind Pce.


    "Well¡­ I guess that Nascent Soul Realm Expert will end up rather disappointed after he reaches this ce¡­" Muttering this to himself as he shook his head with a hint of pity towards the unfortunate Nascent Soul Realm Expert at the base of the mountain, who had ended up getting used by the Soul Ascension Realm Expert, Xuan Hao soon began examining the interior of the Thousand Wind Pce for any possible threats.


    Different from any pce he had been to before, there were no decorations anywhere in sight. Likely due to the mist only having taken up the shape of the pce itself. Not the different decorations that had been inside it.


    Together with how much time had passed, the entire pce interior ended uppletely empty. Devoid of anything other than the few art pieces that were carved into the pce itself.


    As for threats¡­ There weren''t really any that Xuan Hao could feel. In the end, it looked like the Thousand Wind Pce was just arge empty pce without anything of interest inside of it¡­


    Whoosh-!


    Feeling that there shouldn''t be any powerful ancient demon beast or something dangerous lurking around inside the pce Xuan Hao spread out his divine sense to cover the entirety of the Thousand Wind Pce''s interior.


    The main thing that he was looking for, was something not made of mist and most importantly, the core of the natural mist formation!


    "I found it."


    Feeling his lips curling up slightly as saw a small ball of condensed mist at the centre of what he assumed to be the throne room of the Thousand Wind Pce, Xuan Hao took a step forward and disappeared from his original position before arriving directly in front of the small ball of condensed mist inside the throne room of the Thousand Wind Pce.


    "Ah!?"


    About to reach forward to grab the ball of condensed mist that acted as the core of the mist formation the engulfed the entire peak of the mountain, Xuan hao abruptly stopped himself as a terrified expression appeared on his face.


    What is with this thing? When I reached forward to grab it for a closer inspection earlier, I clearly felt like I would die the moment I did so¡­ Is this perhaps a warning left behind by the Lord of a Thousand Winds before his untimely demise?


    Not knowing what to do as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao decided to not touch the ball of condensed mist at the centre of the throne room.


    In any case, he was not about to test his luck and see if the Lord of a Thousand Winds still had some safety measures in ce on the ball of condensed mist.


    Even if hundreds of thousands of years had passed since his death, the Lord of a Thousand Winds was an expert that had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm!


    No matter how confident Xuan Hao was in surviving against a Soul Ascension Realm Expert after he had merged his ice and sword domain together, the same could not be said about an expert that had already surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm.


    For such a powerful cultivator, a single attack would be more than enough to kill him¡­


    After carefully determining that it was not worth risking his life for a random ball of condensed mist that he didn''t understand, Xuan Hao quickly left the throne room before appearing inside a different room of the Thousand Wind Pce.


    During his earlier scan of the Thousand Wind Pce''s interior, the condensed ball of mist inside the throne room was not the only thing that managed to catch his attention¡­ But there was also something different located in the deepest part of the Thousand Wind pce that caught his attention.


    Standing in front of it, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit excited, while at the same time hoping deep down that he would not end up encountering the same feeling of death he had when he was about to pick up the condensed ball of mist inside the throne room¡­


    "A book¡­"


    To be precise, it was a book that was not made from mist¡­ Meaning, that the book in front of him had managed to survive for over a hundred thousand years without decaying!


    Over such a long period of time. Even jade slips, the best way Xuan Hao knew about when it came to storing information for in a long period of time, would have be unreadable without proper maintenance.


    Yet¡­ The book in front of him looked as good as new. Almost like it had been written just a few days earlier!


    Whoosh~


    Picking up the book without feeling any threat to his life, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more excited as he slowly opened the book.


    "Of course¡­ Its written in that ancientnguage¡­"


    Feeling like a bucket of ice water had been thrown on him, Xuan Hao felt all his excitement from earlier disappear as he skimmed through the book with far less enthusiasm than before.


    Whoosh-!


    However, upon turning the final page of the book, Xuan Hao suddenly felt himself losing consciousness for a brief moment before waking up again.


    The fact that he had been knocked unconscious meant that his soul had been affected!


    Feeling a wave of fear wash over him as he woke up again, Xuan Hao understood very well how strong his opponent was to be able to knock him unconscious-


    "This¡­ Where am I¡­?"


    But the moment Xuan Hao looked around himself to find out what had happened, he discovered that he was no longer inside the Thousand Wind Pce. Instead, he found himself floating in the air above what could only be described as a massive battlefield that stretched as far as he could see!


    Boom-boom-boom!


    "This is-


    Listening to the constant fighting going on below him, Xuan Hao tried to look closer at the people fighting. Discovering that not only was he far higher up in the sky than he had even ventured before due to his strength not being able to withstand the chaotic qi at his current height, but all the people fighting below had at least reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    Among them, there was also no small number of Soul Ascension Realm Experts that brought devastation that he had never imagined before. In front of these Soul Ascension Realm Experts, the one he had seen in the Thousand Wind Mountains was nothing more than a candle beingpared to the power of the sun.


    Even among the Domain Lord Realm Experts fighting, Xuan Hao could clearly see several powerful ones that were not the slightest bit weaker than himself and there were also a few that were stronger than him!


    Outside of this, there were also a few people far stronger than the Soul Ascension Realm Experts... But the most shocking thing was not the Experts that had likely surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm or the many Soul Ascension Realm Experts present. Instead, it was what they were fighting! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Aren''t these¡­ The same creatures I encountered back in the enlightenment space of the Dao of Corruption?"


    Although the creatures on the ground looked different and were far bigger and more powerfulpared to the ones he had seen, Xuan Hao was still certain that they should be the same as the ones he had seen during his time in the enlightenment space!


    Their grotesques and warped appearance was not really something easy to replicate¡­

 Chapter 716 Experts Above The Soul Ascension Realm

    Now that I think about it, what happened to me and how did I appear here all of a sudden? Did the book perhaps have some sort of ancient teleportation formation inside of it that activated the moment I was knocked unconscious?


    Observing everything that was happening below him, Xuan Hao could not help thinking about how he had ended up in his current situation.


    "Hm? What happened to my body!?"


    Beginning to observe his body due to this thought appearing, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that his entire body had almost bepletely transparent. Even when he tried his best, he was only barely able to make out the shape of his body-


    Whoosh~


    But when trying to touch his arm, he ended up passing right through it!


    Ah... Perhaps I did not get teleported anywhere by the book and is instead experiencing the events written down in the book?


    As this thought appeared, Xuan Hao felt that his current situation made a bit more sense. At the very least it would exin how he was able to survive at his current height and the fact that no one on the battlefield below had spotted him yet.


    After all, even if the Domain Lord Realm Experts might not be able to spot him given how far up into the sky he was, they were the weakest among the people fighting below... And Xuan Hao highly doubted that the experts who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm would not be able to sense his presence...


    "I just when this battle happened... Given the age of the Thousand Wind Pce and the fact that the book has just stayed there for the past hundreds of thousands of years, this battle might have taken ce even longer ago!"


    Not feeling anymore fear from the terrifying battle taking ce below him after determining that everything around him should just be a scene of the past that the ancient book he had found inside the Thousand Wind Pce was showing him, Xuan Hao began observing everything around him with a far more curious and excited expression on his face.


    Not only was this a great opportunity for him to observe how strong Soul Ascension Realm Experts and those above the Soul Ascension Realm were, but it was also a good opportunity for him to examine the different Domain Lord Realm Experts below and learn from them.


    As long as he had enough time, Xuan Hao was certain that he would be able to figure out how to increase the strengthen his domain even further, while at the same time getting a better understanding of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Having turned his full attention towards the battle taking ce below between cultivators belonging to all sorts of different races, Xuan Hao noticed that there seemed to be three different major powers fighting on the massive battlefield below.


    One belonged to the grotesque creatures he had seen during his timeprehending the Dao of Corruption in the enlightenment space.


    Another belonged to an alliance of severalrge powers from different races that had allied together.


    "Hm? This is... Interesting..."


    Looking over tworgest of the three major powers on the battlefield below, Xuan Hao seemed to notice something when turning his attention towards the third and smallest faction fighting on the battlefield below... They were clearly being targeted by the other two major powers!


    At first, Xuan Hao had thought that all the different races below had united together to fight off against the creatures created by the Dao of Corruption... But upon closer inspection, the creatures of the Dao of Corruption were working together with therge number of powers from different races to supress the third major power!


    However, even when being outnumbered, the third major power held on!


    The main reason for this was quite easy to figure out, they had far more experts who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm. Only when the creatures from the Dao of Corruption and the alliance of therge powers from the different racesbined could they barely supress them-


    BOOOOOOM-!


    "Hm?"


    Just at this moment, a massive explosion could be heard below him as something rapidly flew into the air towards his current location and before he had any time to react, a man covered in blood standing close to four meters tall, stopped mid-air only a dozen meters away from where he was.


    This... Is an expert that has surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm...?


    Observing the tall and majestic looking man covered in blood, Xuan Hao could not help shivering as he clearly felt the soul tearing killing intent shaking the very space around him-


    Crack-!


    Not having any time to observe the tall and majestic looking man any further, the space a few hundred meters away was torn open before a handsome man with green hair and pointy ears stepped out from the crack in space.


    Even without knowing who the other party was, it was easy to determine that he was an enemy of the tall man from the sinister smile stered all over his face when looking towards the tall man.


    "You escape very quickly, or did I hit you a little too hard earlier? No matter, after this battle, there will be no ce in the divine realm for you and your sect!"


    Hearing the pointy eared man speaking, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a wave of excitement rushing over him.


    He understood what the other party was saying!


    Even if it was spoken in some sort of ancientnguage, he could very clearly understand what the pointy eared man was saying!


    Is it the book? Did it help me understand the ancientnguage? Anyways, this is a great thing. Maybe I will be able to get an idea about what happened here... Now, all I need is for them to not fight and instead continue talking!


    Filled with excitement from the little information he had already gotten from the pointy eared man just now, Xuan Hao curiously turned towards the tall man. Hoping that he would continue the conversation so he could get more information.


    "Hmph!"


    "..."


    However, to Xuan Hao''s disappointment, the tall man did not say a word. Instead just continuing to look towards pointy ears filled with killing intent. If not for the fact that he was gravely wounded, Xuan Hao was almost certain that he would have already jumped forward to kill pointy ears the moment he appeared...


    "Hehe, as silent as always, I would have loved for us to chat for a bit longer about the past, but I still have to get back and deal with yourpanions..."


    Chuckling to himself as he shook his head while saying this, pointy ears directly attacked-


    RUMBLE~! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Before Xuan Hao had any time toprehend what was happening, the space around himself and the tall man shattered as a terrifying aura engulfed the entire area.


    Ptsh!


    Not a secondter the space rapidly healed up. Allowing Xuan Hao to see the fight taking ce between the tall man and the pointy eared man.


    At this point in time, the pointy eared one had a triumphant smirk on his face as a countless number ofrge lush vines with all kinds of exotic flowers blooming on them snaked their way around the bloodied tall man.


    Crack~!''


    Even from a distance, Xuan Hao could clearly hear as the tall man''s bones were broken by the vines, while all kinds of exotic poisons from the flowers on the vines themselves were weakening him even further by attacking his soul.


    Everything had happened far too quickly for Xuan Hao to even grasp what had just happened and he could only watch with amazement as the vines slowly squeezed the life out of the tall man, while the poisonous flowers were doing their best to destroy his soul.


    "Hehe, bye bye old friend, I waited a long time to get a chance to do thi-"


    SCREEEEEEECH-!


    However just as the pointed eared man was about to end the life of the tall man, a loud screeching sound belonging to some kind of bird like creature echoing out across the entire battlefield. Instantly causing him to freeze on the spot as a look of horror appeared on his face before turning to look in the direction of the screeching sound.


    Looking at the battlefield below, Xuan Hao realized that almost everyone had stopped fighting as they were also simrly looking towards the origin of the voice filled with fear.


    Among the people below, the only ones that didn''t stop fighting were the creatures from the Dao of Corruption that had already surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm and the people they were fighting.


    From this, it was obvious that the screech just now seemed to have suppressed everyone that had yet to surpass the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "Haha! Her excellency is back!"


    Different from the fearful reaction of the pointy eared man, the tall man was filled with happiness as he eximed loudly.


    "How... How is this possible!? My master and the rest clearly went to fight her... How did she return!?"


    "Haha, of course those old ghosts are no match for the sect master. Even if you get the help of that thing from the abyss!"


    "You...!"


    Listening to the two experts talking, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about who the person they were talking about was as he simrly looked into the distance filled with anticipation.

 Chapter 717 Core Of The World

    RUUUUUUMBLE-!


    Looking towards the same direction as the two powerful cultivators floating only a short distance away from him, Xuan Hao didn''t manage to see anything before a loud rumbling sound echoed out across the entire battlefield. Instantly causing everyone who were looking into the distance filled with both fear and excitement to observe the ground beneath them with surprised expressions on their faces.


    "This¡­"


    "Wha-What in the world is this!?"


    Simrly shocked like the people on the ground below, the two people floating in the air not too far away from Xuan Hao were also looking down towards the ground to examine what was happening.


    Floating in the air still in his almost transparent state, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about what had suddenly caused these to experts to act in such a panicked state as he simrly began looking towards the ground below.


    RUMBLE-!


    At this point in time, the ground had started shaking even more violently than before, as massive cracks had formed leading down into the depths of the world. Even from his current height, Xuan Hao could clearly see the blinding light that came from the bottom of the cracks in the ground!


    "This is¡­ The core of the Divine Realm! But what are those ice crystals forming all over the core¡­?"


    "Hm? Those ice crystals you mentioned, I think someone is trying to-"


    CRAAAACK-!


    Before the pointy eared man had any time to respond to the doubts of the tall man, a loud cracking sound echoed out across the battlefield. Followed by a massive crack going across the entire battlefield opening up. Swallowing arge number of unsuspecting cultivators on the surface above, as they suddenly found themselves being pulled towards the blinding light at the bottom against their will.


    BOOOOOOOOM-!


    Not a secondter, the blinding light that the tall man had referred to as the core of the Divine Realm erupted violently with a power far above anything Xuan Hao had ever seen before.


    The Domain Lord Realm Experts, the Soul Ascension Realm Experts and even the experts who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm. All of them were erased from existence the moment they came in contact with the power erupting from the deepest parts of the world.


    Even the two powerful experts floating next to him were directly reduced to dust beforepletely disappearing. Leaving only Xuan Hao behind to watch as the powerful experts beneath him disappeared.


    "¡­"


    Everything had happened in an instant. Killing everyone present on the battlefield below. Even those above the Soul Ascension Realm had no way to escape!


    FWOOOSH-!


    As the only one left, Xuan Hao could only watch, as the core of the divine realm below the surface was slowly engulfed in ice before being covered up.


    CRAAACK-!


    Following the crack being covered up, the tworge masses ofnd that were torn apart slowly started getting pulled apart.


    During this, Xuan Hao slowly felt his vision get darker as he felt his spiritual body getting dimmer and dimmer.


    "So¡­ I''m about to get pulled back into my own body¡­"


    Understanding what was happening the moment he felt the spiritual body he was inside of disappearing, Xuan Hao decided watch as therge masses ofnd were getting pulled further and further away.


    Whoosh~!


    During hisst moment before everything went dark and he lost consciousness again, Xuan Hao barely managed to see an ancient painting of arge continent filled with ice surrounded by an endless ocean in all directions appearing in front of him.


    ¡­


    "What was thest thing I saw before losing consciousness¡­?"


    Opening both of his eyes Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he remembered thest thing he saw before he lost consciousness.


    Whoosh~


    "Ah! Here it is!"


    Skimming through the ancient book again, Xuan Hao found a small drawing of the ancient painting he had seen before losing his consciousness on thest page of the book.


    Even if he could not see the ancient painting clearly on the small drawing on thest painting, Xuan Hao was clear that it was the same as the one he had seen before he lost his consciousness.


    "Hm? The book¡­!"


    Just at this moment, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover as the ancient book was covered in ayer of gentle golden light before getting dissolved into small motes of golden light that soon disappeared from existence.


    Like this, without leaving a single trace behind, the ancient book that had taken him to see a scene from the ancient past¡­ Hadpletely disappeared!


    "Guess whatever power kept the book intact was used up when allowing me to see the scene from earlier¡­" Muttering this to himself as he shook his head, Xuan Hao understood that there was nothing he could do.


    Whoosh~!


    Extending his divine sense out again to cover the interior of the Thousand Wind Pce, Xuan Hao saw that nothing had changed from before he had lost consciousness. Even the ball of mist located at the centre of the throne room had not changed in the slightest from when hest saw it.


    "¡­"


    To be honest, part of Xuan Hao was expecting for the ball of mist in the throne room to be missing after he regained consciousness and returned to his own body again¡­ But then again, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert that hade to the small independent space with him, was far too weak to enter the Thousand Wind Pce.


    Even if he tried his best, he would never be able to enter the Thousand Wind Pce unless he reached the Domain Lord Realm-


    WHOOOSH-!


    Interrupting Xuan Hao''s train of thought, a loud sound of the wind could be heard all across the Thousand Wind Pce as therge gates made of mist scattered in all directions.


    "Haha! It really worked! I managed to enter!"


    "¡­"


    Hearing theughter belonging to none other than the Nascent Soul Realm Expert that he had just stated had no way inside the Thousand Wind Pce echoing out across the empty interior of the pce, Xuan Hao could not help frowning.


    For some reason, he could not help feeling like the small Nascent Soul Realm Expert had just pped him in the face¡­


    "I should see how that person managed to get inside with his current strength!"


    Whoosh~


    Shaking his head after calming down again, Xuan Hao quietly moved towards the Nascent Soul Realm Expert. Wanting to find out just how he had managed to enter the Thousand Wind Pce with his current strength.


    ¡­


    "This ce¡­ Where is this?"


    A short time earlier during the time Xuan Hao had lost consciousness and was sent to see a battle belonging to the long forgotten ancient past, the bulky looking Nascent Soul Realm Expert who had opened the portal leading to the independent space slowly woke up as he cautiously began looking around himself for any danger.


    Even if it had been only for a short time, he clearly remember how he had been supressed and knocked to the ground by some powerful cultivator after opening the portal.


    "That''s right¡­ I used the ancient sacrificial technique before losing consciousness. Haha! From the looks of it, I managed to sessfully use it and enter the portal before getting killed! I''m sure that person from earlier is still stuck outside trying his best to survive!" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Erupting inughter as he realized he had actually managed to escape alive from an opponent that far surpassed anything he had ever encountered before, the bulky man was filled with happiness as he justid on the ground for the next few minutes to recover enough strength to actually get up and move.


    After all, the sacrificial technique he had used did note without cost¡­


    Not only did he lose arge part of his lifespan, but all strength in his body had disappeared. Even his cultivation realm had regressed from the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    But even then, the bulky man was not the slightest bit depressed over just how much he had lost. Instead he looked up towards the peak of the mountain that was in front of him filled with confidence and desire.


    "The Core of the Thousand Wind Mountains¡­ ording to what I read in the ruins back then, the inheritance of an expert surpassing the Soul Ascension Realm can be found atop the mountain at the core of the Thousand Wind Mountains!"


    Almost whispering this to himself as he went over the things he had learnt when exploring some ancient ruins that had ultimately led him to his current situation, the bulky man could not help feeling even more excited as he gazed up towards the peak of the mountain.


    The inheritance of an expert that had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm!


    No matter what, the bulky man understood just how precious an inheritance like that was. Especially considering that he had only ever heard about Soul Ascension Realm Experts before, but had never heard about anyone who was above the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "I should get going!"


    Whoosh~!


    Having recovered part of his strength, the bulky man got up from the ground before starting his journey up the tall mountain stretching far above the clouds!

 Chapter 718 Power Of The Condensed Ball Of Mist

    Having reached the peak of the mountain and passed through the wall of mist covering the Thousand Wind Pce, the bulky man in the Nascent Soul Realm helplessly stared at therge pce gates.


    Even after spending close to five minutes trying to enter the Thousand Wind Pce, he could not find a way inside the Thousand Wind Pce.


    As for trying to enter through a window or another way, this did not work either, as the small gaps and windows leading into the Thousand Wind Pce were all covered up with mist¡­


    "How¡­ How do I get inside- Wait! Maybe I missed something from the ancient texts I found in those ruins!" Muttering this to himself, the bulky man quickly took out a stack of ancient papers from a small interspatial ring on his left hand.


    Swish~


    Not a secondter, the sound of paper being turned could be heard as the bulky man rapidly skimmed through the ancient papers on the ground with his divine sense. Looking for anything important that could point to a way inside the Thousand Wind Pce that he might have missed when first reading through them.


    "Ah! This is it!"


    Whoosh~!


    Having found something among the ancient paper, the bulky man quickly put away everything before dashing towards a small inconspicuousmppost lined up alongside the path leading to the castle gate.


    Ding~!


    Knocking on themppost that caused a small ringing sound to echo out, the bulky man''s face lit up before he used his qi to form a small wave like symbol that merged together with the inconspicuousmppost.


    Fwoosh!


    Reacting to the small symbol, a chain reaction seemed to take ce as all themppost lined up along the path leading to the pce gate lit up simultaneously.


    Followed by this, a terrifying wind simr to the wind he had encounter just outside the gate leading to the core of the Thousand Wind Mountains, began circting throughout the mountain peak.


    Whoosh-!


    As the wind was simply far too powerful for the mist to resist, the wall of mist around the Thousand Wind Pce was almost instantly blown away by this wind. The only thing made of mist on top of the mountain peak that managed to remain intact under the influence of this powerful wind was the Thousand Wind Pce and thempposts leading up to it.


    "This¡­ Is far more powerful than I imagined!"


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he could clearly feel the terrifying wind barely not hitting him, the bulky man could not help feeling happy when he watched the wind slowly gathering together before heading towards the gate of the Thousand Wind Pce with all its might.


    WHOOOSH-!


    "Haha! It really worked! I managed to enter!"


    Watching as the wind blew apart the gate made of mist before disappearing, the bulky man could not helpughing out happily before entering the Thousand Wind Pce filled with excitement.


    Given what he had read about the Thousand Wind Pce, the bulky man already knew that there wouldn''t be anything inside the pce itself outside of the inheritance mentioned to be located at the core of the pce.


    For this reason, he was not the slightest bit surprised when seeing the empty interior of the pce and instead just ignored it as he excitedly made his way deeper inside the Thousand Wind Pce.


    "The throne room¡­ The inheritance should be in here ording to the ancient texts¡­"


    Arriving in front of the throne room only a short time after entering the Thousand Wind Pce, the bulky man still filled with excitement, entered the throne room of the Thousand Wind Pce with no hesitation.


    "The inheritance!"


    Seeing the ball of mist floating at the centre of the throne room, the bulky man became even more exited as he rushed towards the ball of mist.


    ¡­


    Having watched the bulky Nascent Soul Realm cultivator from the moment he had stepped foot inside the Thousand Mist Pce, Xuan Hao could not help showing a confused expression on his face after hearing him talking to himself about the ball of mist being some kind of inheritance that had been left behind by the creator of the Thousand Wind Pce.


    "Inheritance¡­? The ball of mist is the inheritance of the Lord of a Thousand Winds!?"


    Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help curiously looking towards the bulky Nascent Soul Realm Expert as he rushed towards the ball of mist located at the centre of the throne room.


    Even if he felt certain that the ball of mist should be a natural formation core that kept the Thousand Wind Pce and the mist wall outside to manifest, he could never be truly certain about this as he had never examined the ball of condensed mist due to the terrifying feeling he had gotten the moment he tried grabbing it just a few minutes earlier.


    "Well¡­ Even it doesn''t matter if it''s an inheritance or not. At least this way, I will be able to see what will happen when someone grabs on to the ball of condensed mist¡­"


    Not moving to stop the bulky Nascent Soul Realm Expert from grabbing the condensed ball of mist, Xuan Hao decided to watch and see what would happen.


    In the first ce, he didn''t really think that there would be any way for the bulky Nascent Soul Realm Expert to escape from him. Especially considering that he still didn''t know about his presence and thought that he was alone inside the Thousand Wind Pce!


    ¡­


    "Haha, with this, I will surely be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm- No, The Soul Ascension Realm!"


    Not aware of the fact that he was being watched by Xuan Hao, the bulky Nascent Soul Realm Expert reached towards the condensed ball of mist filled with excitement when thinking about how powerful he would get after receiving the inheritance of an expert that had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even if his talent was mediocre and he couldn''t surpass that Soul Ascension Realm like the senior who had made the Thousand Wind Pce, the bulky Nascent Soul Realm Expert still felt confident in being able to reach the Soul Ascension Realm with the help from such a powerful experts inheritance!


    Grabbing on to the condensed ball of mist, the bulky man froze on the spot as the condensed ball of mist pulsed gently-


    Boom!


    Not even having any time to react, an explosion of information rushed into his head with no warning. Brining with it a soul tearing pain that instantly caused him copse on to the ground. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "¡­"


    Wanting to scream, the bulky man discovered to his horror that he could not say a single word as all parts of his body had be unable to move. Even his divine sense and vocal cords were cut offpletely!


    As for the information that was filling up his nascent soul forcing it to grow stronger with each passing second.


    Of course, the bulky man could not care the slightest bit about how the strength of his nascent soul was increasing at a speed visible to the naked eye, as the pain had already started overwhelming him.


    Even if he was at the Nascent Soul Realm, the pain brought by the seemingly endless information being stuffed into his nascent soul and in turn forcing it to grow stronger, was far too much for him to handle!


    Crack~!


    As time passed and the information flowing in from the dense ball of mist showed no signs of stopping, the nascent soul of the bulky Nascent Soul Realm cultivator could no longer keep up with the constant increase in strength, as cracks started forming all across it.


    In the span of only a short minute, the strength of his nascent soul had already far exceed the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and had climbed all the way to the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Only a short distance away from reaching the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    The growth speed was far too fast and there was no time for the bulky man toy down a proper foundation, let alone prevent the cracks appearing all over his nascent soul from rapidly increasing in size with each passing second.


    If not for the fact that a small stream of energy was flowing over from the condensed ball of mist to make sure his nascent soul didn''t directly explode. The bulky man who was barely conscious at this point in time, was sure that he would already be dead.


    After all, his strength had increased far too quickly!


    WHOOOSH-!


    As the connection between himself and the ball of condensed mist finally cut off just as his nascent soul was about to blow up, the bulky man could not help letting out a sigh of relief before closing his eyes and focusing all his attention at trying to stabilize his cultivation base and build a proper foundation with the energy left behind in his body by the condensed ball of mist.


    If he seeded, he would be able to directly be a Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert at the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, but if he failed to stabilize his cultivation and build a proper foundation for his now powerful nascent soul¡­ He would die!


    Going from the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm in a matter of a few minutes did note without any risks¡­ And the bulky man understood very well how important it was for him to grasp this opportunity to increase his strength¡­ Or die trying!

 Chapter 719 Possession...

    Watching as the bulky Nascent Soul Realm cultivator''s strength increased from the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he felt that something was wrong.


    Under normal circumstances, the bulky Nascent Soul Realm cultivator would have already died¡­ But instead, he was still sitting down in front of the condensed ball of mist without showing any signs of exploding due to the sudden massive increase in strength his nascent soul had just experienced. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    No matter what, increasing once cultivation was not something that could be done quickly and had to be done step by step. Even if the bulky man had the help of some powerful cultivator, he would not be able to directly skip over most of the Nascent Soul Realm and reach the peak of the realm in one step without properly taking some time toy down a foundation and stabilize his cultivation base after each breakthrough!


    All though he could sense the weird power that hade over from the condensed ball of mist, Xuan Hao couldn''t see through how it was able to make sure that the cultivation base of the bulky man didn''t end up getting destroyed.


    From his point of view, all he could see was the weird power that had flowed over from the condensed ball of mist slowly spreading throughout the body of the bulky man before it started merging together with him.


    The stabilization of the bulky man''s cultivation base could be said to be a side effect of this weird power slowly merging together with him¡­


    "Is it some kind of possession?"


    Not able to understand what was happening, he could not help thinking about the possibility of the Lord of a Thousand Winds having left behind a wisp of his soul inside the condensed ball of mist to look for a path to get reborn again after his untimely death.


    Even if hundreds of thousands of years had passed since then, Xuan Hao didn''t dare underestimate a powerhouse who had exceed the Soul Ascension Realm, as such an expert should have means at their disposal that he could never even begin to imagine with his current limited view.


    At least that would exin the dreadful feeling I felt earlier when I was about to touch the ball of condensed mist¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes as he carefully observed the changes taking ce in the bulky man.


    If it was truly a wisp of the ancient cultivator Lord of a Thousand Winds soul possessing the body of the bulky man, he couldn''t act carelessly, as even the smallest mistake might end up resulting in his death!


    The difference between an expert that had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm and someone in the Soul Ascension Realm was far toorge, Xuan Hao had seen this first hand through the scene shown to him by the ancient book.


    On that ancient battlefield, Soul Ascension Realm could be seen dying the moment they came too close to a battle between the experts that had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Let alone resisting, they didn''t even have a way to fight back and would be dead the moment the residual energy from these powerful experts hit them!


    ¡­


    Observing as the bulky man''s cultivation base slowly started getting more and more stable over the next half hour, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he realized that a pseudo domain had already started developing around the bulky man. Showing that he had already taken the first step towards the Domain Lord Realm!


    Something is wrong¡­


    Narrowing his eyes as he observed the newly constructed pseudo domain that covered the area around the bulky man, Xuan Hao could clearly feel that there was something wrong with the current state of the bulky man.


    Having his nascent soul rapidly increase in strength was one thing¡­ But suddenly establishing a pseudo domain was somethingpletely different!


    A pseudo domain was something that a cultivator had toprehend on their own and was something that would shape the future path of the cultivator. Even if the bulky man had the help of powerful cultivator that would himprehend a dao more easily, there was no way that it would allow the bulky man to establish a pseudo domain in less than thirty minutes¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that his cultivation base was still unstable after he had just gone from the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Is he going to break through to the Domain Lord Realm¡­?


    Observing as the domain around the bulky man increased rapidly in strength after having been established, Xuan Hao could not help thinking this to himself as he looked towards the bulky man with killing intent.


    If it truly was the Lord of a Thousand Winds possessing the body of the bulky man, there was a very good chance that he would kill him after his strength had recovered and he had finished taking over the body of the bulky man.


    For this reason alone, Xuan Hao could not help thinking about whether or not he should attack the bulky man and kill him before the possession waspleted.


    At the very least this way, he would have a higher chance of making it out alive before the strength of the bulky man increased even further-


    BOOOM-!


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to make a move and attack the bulky man quietly sitting inside the throne room fully absorbed in increasing his strength, a loud explosion echoed out across the entire independent space before a terrifying aura swept over the ce.


    Looks like I won''t have to do anything myself¡­


    Feeling the terrifying aura spreading through the small independent space, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself before quickly hiding his presence and leaving the Thousand Wind Pce.


    Fwoosh-!


    Almost at the same time Xuan Hao left the Thousand Wind Pce, the aura of a Domain Lord erupted from the throne room as the bulky man had directly broken through from the Nascent Soul Realm to the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Whoosh~


    Not even a second after the bulky man had broken through to the Domain Lord Realm did the Soul Ascension Realm Expert from earlier appear at the top of the mountain that now had no wall of mist around it to hide it from view.


    "This pce!? Perhaps that damnable insect is in there¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked down towards the Thousand Wind Pce, a clear look of greed appeared on his face before quickly being reced with one of killing intent upon thinking about the bulky man who had entered earlier than him.


    Given that he could not sense the bulky man anywhere else inside the small independent space when sweeping through the ce with his divine sense just a few seconds earlier, it was obvious to him that he should be hiding inside the Thousand Wind Pce, as that was the only ce his divine sense could not prate.


    Swish-!


    Thinking about how that person might already be consuming the inheritance all by himself and wasting precious spiritual herbs that might be part of the inheritance, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert didn''t waste any time as he rushed inside the Thousand Wind Pce before locking on to the bulky man sitting at the centre of the throne room.


    "This- How did that insect reach the Domain Lord Realm¡­ Did he already consume the inheritance by himself!?" Not thinking too much about how the bulky man had managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm so quickly, the Soul Ascension Realm expert was filled with killing intent after the thought of the inheritance already being used up appeared in his head.


    As for the condensed ball of mist still present inside the throne room, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert didn''t think too much about it as he didn''t think that something like that would be the only thing left behind by an expert that had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm.


    In his eyes, the bulky man had already consumed the entire inheritance a put away anything precious still left inside the Thousand Wind Pce in his interspatial ring.


    Swish-!


    For this reason, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert didn''t hesitate in the slightest as he gathered his power andunched an attack towards the bulky man who remained sitting in front of the condensed ball of mist as his cultivation was rapidly increasing at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    BOOOOOOOOM-!


    As the attack of the Soul Ascension Realm Expertnded on the bulky man, the top of the mountain together with the Thousand Wind Pce made of mist, was instantly destroyed by the powerful attack.


    "Wha-"


    However, different from what the Soul Ascension Realm Expert expected, the bulky man did not die after being faced with his attack. Instead, he now floated in the air above what remained of the tall mountain, quietly gazing towards the Soul Ascension Realm Expert. The condensed ball of mist quietly floating a few inches above his palm, as a fine mist flew out from it and surrounded him to form a thin barrier of mist.


    "This¡­ WHO ARE YOU!?"


    Clearly feeling something was wrong, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert narrowed his eyes before yelling this towards the bulky man. Understanding very well that the person floating in the air in front of him was not the same as the person he had been scheming against for the past few weeks!

 Chapter 720 Power Of The Possessed Bulky Man!

    Swish-!


    Not giving any response to the Soul Ascension Realm Expert''s question, the bulky man floating above the half-destroyed mountain waved his hand as a gentle mist flowed out from the condensed ball of mist before rapidly expanding to engulf the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator.


    "What in the world is this mist!?"


    Trying his best to blow the mist surrounding him from all sides away, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert could not help frowning upon discovering that the mist surrounding him only disappeared for an instant before once again surrounding him from all sides. Not only that, but he also discovered that the mist was slowly draining his strength!


    It should be the doing of that weird ball of mist¡­


    Whoosh-! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not taking long to pinpoint the origin of the mist that was slowly draining his strength, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert used a movement technique and appeared directly in front of the bulky man before the mist had enough time to surround him again!


    "Hmph! In the end you are still only in the Domain Lord Realm!"


    Bang!


    Knocking the bulky man to the ground before grabbing towards the condensed ball of mist, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert was taken aback upon discovering that the condensed ball of mist flew down towards the bulky man and merge together with him.


    BOOOOM-!


    Not even a secondter the aura around the bulky man grew extremely chaotic, as his cultivation base rapidly rose at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­ Fifth stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­ Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm-


    BOOOOOM-!


    Only when reaching the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm did the strength of the bulky man finally stop increasing any more. However, this sudden rapid increase in strength was more than enough to terrify the Soul Ascension Realm Expert, while at the same time also confirming that the bulky man was indeed being possessed by some powerful cultivator.


    After all, without something like that happening, there was no way for the cultivation base of the bulky man to go from the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm in less than an hour!


    "Is it perhaps a remnant soul of this ce''s creator or someone who happened to enter this ce before¡­? To think that someone actually sealed part of his cultivation base and soul inside the ball of condensed mist without caring about the consequences¡­" Narrowing his eyes as he felt the terrifying strength from the bulky man below him, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert could not help frowning as he realized what was happening.


    Part of a powerful expert''s cultivation base and soul had been sealed inside the ball of mist as a backup n in case he encountered some sort cmity that would result in his death.


    Now, the bulky man had ended uping in contact with the condensed ball of mist and had ended up activating the hidden formations on it that would begin the process of taking over the body of the bulky man. Allowing that ancient expert to get reborn again!


    Of course, doing something like forcefully sealing part of one''s own soul and cultivation base, was not without cost and would permanently reduce the strength of the cultivator doing so.


    Even if it could give that person another chance at life, it would deeply wound the soul to a degree that even the Soul Ascension Realm Expert felt a shiver run down his spine imagining.


    Underestimating such a powerful existence that was so insane as to do something like that to himself, was not a wise decision. Especially considering that he had still not fully recovered from being attacked by the powerful winds at the entrance to the small independent space!


    If that is really what is happening, I should kill this person before he manages to fully recover his strength!


    Whoosh-!


    Knowing very well that he would stand no chance against the other party if he had enough time to fully recover his strength back to his peak, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert''s eyes filled with killing intent as he used all his strength to attack the bulky man below-


    BOOOOOM-!


    Crack~


    Not caring the slightest bit about the fact that the small independent space was slowly starting to show signs of breaking, as it had no way to withstand the full might of a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator in its current iplete state.


    "¡­"


    Still remaining silent in the face of the increasingly powerful attacks from the Soul Ascension Realm Expert, the bulky man who now lookedpletely devoid of emotions casual waved his hands as several mist-like shields manifested in front of him to protect against the attacks of the Soul Ascension Realm Expert.


    Whoosh~


    At the same time, a thin mist instantly spread out and covered most of the small independent space. Instantly shing against the domain of the Soul Ascension Realm Expert that was bearing down at him from above.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    At no point during the fight did he attack the Soul Ascension Realm Expert. Instead, he focused all his attention on defending, as the aura surrounding him slowly began growing closer and closer to the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "You! AH! I will kill you!"


    BOOOOOOOOM-!


    Understanding very well what was happening, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert went all out in trying to break through the mist-like shields to no avail. Growing more and more anxious the closer the bulky man got to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even if the bulky man had not attacked him yet, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert understood that things would be different once the bulky man had broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Given the difference between himself and the person possessing the body of the bulky man, it was obvious who would win if they fought each other at the same realm¡­!


    ¡­


    This is¡­ To think that man is actually getting possessed by someone. Good thing I didn''t touch that ball of mist earlier!


    Watching the fight taking ce between the bulky man and the Soul Ascension Realm Expert from the edge of the independent space hidden by his domain, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief after realizing that the bulky man had been possessed by some kind of ancient cultivator that had left behind part of their cultivation base and soul inside the small, condensed ball of mist.


    Now¡­ What should I do? Escape this ce before it copses or help kill the possessed bulky man to avoid future problems¡­?


    ncing around the small independent space and seeing the massive cracks that had formed all over the ce due to the fight between the possessed bulky man and the Soul Ascension Realm Expert, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he looked towards the fight taking ce in the air above where the mountain had once been.


    Part of him wanted to escape from the ce through the portal that the Soul Ascension Realm Expert had opened up when entering the small independent space, but he also understood that allowing the possessed bulky man to leave alive was not a good idea.


    Given that the person had left behind something to get reborn by possessing the body of someone else, Xuan Hao was certain that the person in control of the bulky man''s body was not a good person and was highly likely a demonic cultivator¡­ And Xuan Hao didn''t really want a demonic cultivator who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm running around the Sky Empire.


    Even if some powerful cultivators from the core of the Ewaria Continent woulde and deal with this powerful demonic cultivator, there was a good chance that there would no longer be any Sky Empire left at that point in time!


    "Haaa¡­ Looks like I will have to help out¡­" Letting out a sigh as he thought about this, Xuan Hao slowly began moving closer to the ce where the battle was taking ce.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    At this point in time, the upper part of the independent space had already copsed as the void between worlds outside was clearly visible to the naked eye.


    Not only that, but both the Soul Ascension Realm Expert and the possessed bulky man were both showing signs of exhaustion after already having exchanged tens of thousands of moves in the short span of a minute or two. Even the possessed bulky man had changed from his expressionless expression and could be seen frowning after one of his arms had been cut off by the Soul Ascension Realm Expert!


    In a sense, this was the best time for Xuan Hao to strike now that both parties were exhausted and had no time to pay attention to their surroundings!


    Whoosh~!


    Understanding very well that he would only be able to sessfully attack one of the two, Xuan Hao drew his sword before using his movement technique to close the distance between himself and the possessed bulky man.


    "Wha-!?"


    Only when he had already reached within a few dozen meters of him did the possessed bulky man let out a surprised sound as he sensed his appearance-


    BOOOOM-!


    But at this time, it was already toote, as Xuan Hao''s domain exploded around him to destroy the mist domain.


    Zhing~!


    Not a secondter, Xuan Hao''s sword, empowered by his domain, shed down towards the possessed bulky man who could only look at him filled with shock.

 Chapter 721 Death Of The Possessed Bulky Man~!

    Swish-!


    As the sword shed down towards the possessed bulky man, it did not explode with power or destroy the surroundings. Instead, it silently cut through the air before arriving in front of the possessed bulky man-


    Ptsh-!


    Barely managing to set up somest-minute defensive measures, the possessed bulky man had no way to block Xuan Hao''s sword, as his body was directly cut in half!


    "Aaaaah-!"


    Even the remnant soul of the powerful cultivator taking over the body of the bulky man hidden inside the body could not escape and was simrly cut in half, causing a loud banshee like scream to echo out across the already copsing small independent space.


    The reason for the painful scream was that other than the remnant soul also getting cut in half by Xuan Hao''s sword, what remained of the small remnant soul of a once powerful expert was directly destroyed by the sword intent that had managed to enter it the moment it was cut in half.


    The pain caused by Xuan Hao''s sword intent ramping around inside the remnant soul was noughing matter. Even for an existence that had once surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm during their peak¡­


    Whoosh-!


    Having already made sure that the remnant soul possessing the body of the bulky man had been dealt with, Xuan Hao didn''t remain inside the copsing independent space as he dashed towards the portal that had been opened by the Soul Ascension Realm Expert after the one opened by the bulky man had closed.


    As for fighting the Soul Ascension Realm Expert¡­ he had no reason to do so. Not to mention, he would not be able to sneak attack the other party after having revealed himself. Even if he could win due to the injuries that the Soul Ascension Realm Expert had sustained during his time resisting the powerful winds of the Thousand Wind Mountains and the battle with the possessed bulky man, it would still take a long time to do so. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Considering that half of the independent space had already copsed before being consumed by the void in between worlds outside it, he did not really think it would be a good idea to fight it out with the Soul Ascension Realm Expert.


    Other than this, he also had no idea how to navigate the void between world. Not to mention finding a way back to the Ewaria Continent again, he had no clue if he could even survive in the void between worlds with his current strength!


    For all he knew, he could die the moment he came into contact with the void due to not having some special characteristic only obtainable after reaching a certain cultivation realm¡­


    With all of this in mind, Xuan Haopletely ignored the shocked Soul Ascension Realm Expert looking towards the now dead possessed bulky man-


    Swish~


    Silently entering the portal before the Soul Ascension Realm recovered from his shock andprehended what had just happened. The main reason it took him so long being that Xuan Hao made sure not affect him with his strength during his earlier sneak attack.


    After all, if he had sensed a threat to his life, there was no way for a Soul Ascension Realm Expert to remain shocked for such a long period of time. To be honest, even the second or so it took the Soul Ascension Realm Expert to recover from Xuan Hao killing the possessed bulky man was considered out of the ordinary and was only due to his current wounded and weakened state.


    If he was still at his peak, Xuan Hao would have had no way to leave the independent space without the other party stopping him. Let alone escape without the Soul Ascension Realm Expert having a chance to remember his domain, aura, or appearance¡­


    WHOOOOSH-!


    Feeling the terrifying wind all around him the moment he left the copsing independent space, Xuan Hao could not help frowning after realizing that the wind had grown even stronger than before.


    At this point in time, it would not be surprising for this to start attracting the attention of other Soul Ascension Realm Experts¡­


    "I should leave this ce to avoid any problems¡­"


    Not wanting to be caught up in something so troublesome, Xuan Hao quickly left the portal and made his way towards the opposite direction that he had entered the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    In the first ce, he entered the Thousand Wind Mountains to not only explore it, but also to cross over it and reduce the time he would take to reach the capital city of the Sky Empire by a few days.


    Even if he had spent some time following the bulky man and exploring the independent space, the time used on this far lesspared to if he had decided to go around the Thousand Wind Mountains. Not to mention, he ended up gaining a lot of useful information that would help him with not only strengthening his domain even further, but also reaching the Soul Ascension Realm in the future!


    Compared to him saving a few days of travel time, this was far more valuable!


    "I can''t wait for the other special locations along the way¡­"


    Flying through the terrifying winds while protecting himself with his domain, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself as he started looking forward to what he might find in the other special locations of the Sky Empire along the way to the capital city.


    Even if it was nowhere near what the value of the information, he had discovered in the Thousand Wind Mountains, he would be more than happy as long as it was something that would be able to help him increase the strength of his domain!


    ¡­


    "-and things in the Azure Sky Kingdom are proceeding rather well with the support of the Ascendant Frost Hall. Other than this, a few disciples went missing during the hunt for demonic cultivators¡­"


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, one of the elders who had gone to the Azure Sky Kingdom to watch over the disciple and also begin the initial steps of absorbing the territory of the Azure Sky Kingdom under the Star Shattering Sect, stood in front of Elder Song as he told him about everything that had happened. Frowning ever so slightly upon mentioning the disciples that had gone missing.


    "Hah¡­ It was expected for a few disciples to end up going missing. After all, there is no way to make sure to keep them absolutely safe¡­ Though, some of them like encountered a fortuitous opportunity in some long forgotten ancient ruins or something simr and the elders just couldn''t sense their presence¡­"


    Shaking his head as he said this, Elder Song was not too bothered about the missing disciples. After all, death was always around the corner, and they couldn''t always watch over the disciples of the sect after they left the territory of the Star Shattering Sect to train in the future.


    If they really did that, there would be no way for the disciples to grow and encounter their own fortunate opportunities.


    Elder Song understood this very well, as the only reason he had even managed to reach the Core Formation Realm in the first ce, was due to him encountering a certain ancient inheritance when he was still only in the Seventh Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Back then, the inheritance had allowed him who was already close to the end of his lifespan to breakthrough to the Core Formation and gain another chance at life.


    Without the encounter back then, he would have never reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, let alone reaching his current realm!


    "Elder Song, should we proceed with fully absorbing the territory of the Azure Sky Kingdom into the sect¡­?" Seeing reminiscing expression, the elder standing at the side lowered his voice as he asked this.


    "Ah? Ah! Yes, we have to proceed now to get the best effect. Remember to get the help of the Ascendant Frost Hall, as they should be far more familiar with the power structure of the Azure Sky Kingdom and how to best set up a proper power structure there."


    Blinking his eyes for a short moment as he stopped reminiscing about his past, Elder Song quickly sent off the elder before narrowing his eyes and looking in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "After today, the territory of the Azure Sky Kingdom will officially be a part of the Star Shattering Sect!" Muttering this to himself as he continued looking into the distance, Elder Song silently prepared himself.


    With the Star Shattering Sect officially taking over the territory of the Azure Sky Kingdom, it would signal that the Star Shattering Sect had finally finished getting their internal matters sorted and was ready to start expanding their territory.


    The different kingdoms and sects surrounding the Star Shattering Sect would soon be forced to make a choice between giving away their territory and bing a subordinate power under the Star Shattering Sect¡­ Or bing their enemies!

 Chapter 722 Empty Plains

    Whoosh~


    After leaving the Thousand Wind Mountain safely, Xuan Hao decided to stop for a short moment as he began observing his surroundings.


    ording to the maps of the Sky Empire he had looked at, the current side of the Thousand Wind Mountains that he found himself on should be arge empty in with a few demon beasts ranging from somewhere between the Qi Condensation Realm and the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Hm?"


    However, different from this, Xuan Hao discovered several small settlement spread all over the in that should have been empty outside of a few demon beasts that roamed the ce.


    The settlements were all new and had at least one person in the Nascent Soul Realm watching over it to prevent the demon beasts roaming the empty ins from destroying them. Not only that, but all of these settlements had the same symbol engraved into their walls, gs and armour. Even the Nascent Soul Realm Experts were no different as their armour also carried the same symbol.


    Is it perhaps a nearby kingdom expanding into this empty in? But then again, there should not be any kingdoms nearby as thisrge empty in should be surrounded by different dangerous special areas from all sides...


    Did a precious natural artifact or spiritual herb perhaps appear... But if this was the case, there would be no need to bring along so many people and set up settlements in this ce...


    Narrowing his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that something was odd about so many settlements appearing in such a ce. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not to mention the fact that there wasn''t anything of interest on the empty in, the sheer difficulty of moving so many people through one of the special areas that surrounded the in was more than enough to stop any ordinary Domain Lord Realm Expert. After all, the special areas surrounding the empty in all posed a certain level of danger to Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    For someone to transport so many people through such a dangerous environment. Even if it was through the safest route, it would still have to be someone at theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Swish~


    Feeling curious, Xuan Hao approached the closest settlement before appearing inside the main building of the settlement where the Nascent Soul Realm Expert was quietly cultivating by himself without making a single sound-


    Whoosh-!


    Not even a secondter, Xuan Hao used his domain to forcefully wake up the meditating Nascent Soul Realm Expert, while at the same time isting the meditation room from the outside world so he wouldn''t get noticed by anyone outside.


    Given that the current settlement he was inside of only had the Nascent Soul Realm Expert in front of him watching over it, it was obvious that no one would dare barge in without getting permission and with his domain, they wouldn''t even have a clue that something was happening inside the building in the first ce!


    "Ah!?"


    Having been forcefully awakened by Xuan Hao from his meditation, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert looked around himself filled with killing intent before freezing in ce the next second after realizing that both his divine sense and cultivation had beenpletely sealed without him noticing.


    "Hello, mind if I ask you a few questions?"


    Hearing Xuan Hao''s voice, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert started shaking with fear as he turned towards Xuan Hao who was standing a few meters away from him.


    A Domain Lord!


    Even with no way to perceive Xuan Hao''s cultivation base, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert understood very well that the only person who would be able to supress him so easily and seal both his cultivation base and divine sense without him noticing would be someone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    For this reason alone, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert was extremely fearful for his life. The only thing that allowed him to still remain somewhat calm, was the fact that the Domain Lord in front of him did not seem to have any intention of killing him. The fact that he asked for him to answer a few questions further solidified this in the mind of the Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    "W-what might I-I be able to help your e-excellency with?"


    Even then, he still ended up stumbling over his words as he said this while trying his absolute best to remain calm and respectful in front of Xuan Hao. Not forgetting to pray that the question he would be asked was something he could answer...


    "Not something difficult, I''m just curious about the settlements around here and why they are here. After all, this ce is not easy to reach..."<novelnext> mand them, it did not have full control over them. </novelnext>


    The more he learned about the Sky Empire, the more he understood just how powerful the imperial family of the Sky Empire was to remain as the most powerful. Outside of the ancestor of the imperial family and the current emperor of the Sky Empire, there was sure to be other Soul Ascension Realm Experts hidden inside the Sky Empire''s imperial family!


    "Thank you for your honest answer, but you will have to sleep for a bit..."


    "Wha-"


    Thump!


    Having already learned what he wanted from the Nascent Soul Realm Expert, Xuan Hao decided knock out the Nascent Soul Realm Expert. Putting his soul into a deep slumber that he would take a few years to wake up from. Making sure that it would look like the Nascent Soul Realm Expert had encountered some trouble while cultivating and was forced to enter secluded meditation due to this.


    Anyway, by the time the Nascent Soul Realm Expert woke up again, Xuan Hao would already have long since left the capital city of the Sky Empire. Not to mention, losing a few years of his long life sleeping, was not considered a bad thingpared to getting silenced the old-fashioned way...


    "Let''s just ignore this ce and not get involved with the Earth Dragon n..." Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao decided to just ignore the settlements all over the empty ins as he made his way towards the special area that he would have to go through next.


    However, even if he decided not to get involved with the noble family from the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao was still curious about the spiritual metal that the Earth Dragon n had discovered deep down-


    Whoosh~


    So, he decided to use his divine sense along the way to probe underground and see if he could find anything beneath the settlements along the way.


    "This is..."


    Doing so, Xuan Hao could not help opening both his eyes in shock after discovering the massive spiritual metal mines located beneath all of the settlements.


    Putting all of these mines together, it had already surpassed the spiritual metals Xuan Hao had found beneath the Azure Sky Kingdom''s capital and was even close to reaching the same level of the endless mines that covered Yi Min''s Iron Sky Kingdom!

 Chapter 723 Great Poison Swamp

    Stopping for a short moment as he looked down towards the different settlements spread all over the empty ins, Xuan Hao began to understand why the Earth Dragon n had decided to put so much effort into setting up the different settlements.


    Not to mention that the Earth Dragon n''s strength and wealth would increase by a lot due to getting their hands on such argeplex of spiritual metal veins, but it would also allow them to no longer have to buy their spiritual metals from other powerful experts like who already controlled massive spiritual metal mines and supplied most of the spiritual metals in cirction inside the Sky Empire.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao continued on his way through the empty ins towards the next special area he would have to pass through to reach the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    The special area in question was called the Great Poison Swamp. Although not as dangerous as the Thousand Wind Mountain, the number of Domain Lord Realm Experts that had perished inside the Great Poison Swamp far exceeded that of the Thousand Wind Mountains.


    The main culprit of this, was the myriad of exotic and extremely poisonous insects and demon beasts that were present inside the Great Poison Swamp¡­ And these poisonous insects and demon beasts were far harder to predictpared to the wind currents of the Thousand Wind Mountains, some of them even having the ability to threaten the life of some weaker Domain Lords! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    At first Xuan Hao thought about going through one of the other special areas that surrounded the empty ins after learning about the Great Poison Swamp and the many terrifying poisonous creatures that could be found inside the Great Poison Swamp, but he quickly changed his mind after finding out the other special areas were far worse to go through.


    The one located next to the Great Poison Swamp was even a ce that Yi Min had told him the Soul Ascension Realm Experts of the Sky Empire feared and didn''t dare enter¡­ Although he didn''t know a lot about this dangerous ce next to the Great Poison Swamp other than the fact that it was the main sect of an ancient sect that had long since been forgotten ording to Yi Min, Xuan Hao didn''t n on entering the ce after finding out that it was a ce that even the Soul Ascension Realm Experts of the Sky Empire didn''t dare enter!


    Even without knowing anymore about the ce, it was obvious that entering the ce would almost certainly put him in a dangerous situation. Possibly even killing him!


    As for the remaining special areas, they were far less dangerouspared to that ce, but still possessed a far greater threat to someone in the Domain Lord Realmpared to the Great Poison Swamp.


    After all, most of the poisonous creatures in the Great Poison Swamp did not have a strong enough poison to affect someone in the Domain Lord Realm and those that did were extremely hard toe by. Not to mention, poisonous creatures that had strong enough poison to kill someone in the Domain Lord Realm were incredibly precious.


    Considering that most of these poisonous creatures were extremely weak outside of their potent poison, the Great Poison Swamp became one of the most lively special areas in the entire Sky Empire, with hordes of cultivators entering the ce in search of poisonous creatures.


    The massive number of people entering the Great Poison Swamp was also one of the reasons why the death toll in the ce was so much higher than most other special areas except for a few with simr special environments like the Great Poison Swamp.


    Thinking about all of this, the Great Poison Swamp and its poisonous creatures didn''t seem that bad. Maybe it could even be a chance to find a few of the poisonous spiritual herbs that would thrive in a ce filled with poisonous creatures.


    Whoosh~!


    Not wasting any time, Xuan Hao soon saw the Great Poison Swamp appearing in the distance.


    However even if he already heard about the ce from Yi Min before, Xuan Hao could not help frowning when standing in front of the massive swamp that was covered in a thick poisonous miasma while stretching on for as far as he could see.


    "ording to what Yi Min said, this miasma is not only deadly to anyone below the Core Formation Realm, but it also carries some sort of restriction that prevents anyone from flying over the Great Poison Swamp. Even Soul Ascension Realm Experts are no exception and will be forced to go through the Great Poison Swamp on foot¡­" Muttering this to himself as he began observing the poisonous miasma covering the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about the restriction hidden inside of it mentioned by Yi Min.


    After all, there was a chance that the restriction hidden inside the poisonous miasma was not a natural one, but instead one that had been set up by a powerful cultivator proficient in formations in the past!


    Considering that the special area located right next to the Great Poison Swamp was the ruins of a long forgotten ancient sect that even Soul Ascension Realm Experts were fearful of, it would make sense that the restriction covering the Great Poison Swamp was set up by a powerful expert from that sect in the past¡­ Maybe the person who had set up the restriction was even someone who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Standing in front of the Great Poison Swamp as he thought about this, Xuan Hao felt even more curious about the ce where the main sect of a powerful ancient sect had been located. However, he still understood his limits and decided against going to that ce.


    After all, the ancient sect ruins had been known for a long time, yet none of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the Sky Empire or the surrounding empires had managed toe back after entering that ce ording to what Yi Min had heard.<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Maybe someone had already managed to that ce and had returned alive, it was just that it was not something someone in the Domain Lord Realm would be privy to and was only something that those in the Soul Ascension Realm had an understanding of.


    No matter what it was, it was obvious that the ce had been deemed far too dangerous even for those in the Soul Ascension Realm to enter in the end.


    "Maybe I will get a chance to explore the ce when I reach the Soul Ascension Realm in the future¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Haonded in front of the Great Poison Swamp before taking a step forward.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling the poisonous mist trying to enter his body, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes slightly.


    At the same time that the poisonous mist covered his body and tried to enter it, a strange power hidden inside of the poisonous mist began pressing down on him. Although the pressure exerted by this strange power was close to non-existent, it still carried with it a terrifying presence that could only be felt by someone who had reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    Whoosh-!


    Deciding to try and fly to test things out for himself, Xuan Hao did not manage to move more than a few meters into the air before the pressure exerted by the strange power suddenly increased to a degree that even someone like Xuan Hao who had already reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm could not resist-


    BANG!


    In the end, Xuan Hao crashed into the muddy swamnd below the next second!


    "¡­"


    Covered in mud from head to toe now, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he felt the terrifying pressure he had felt just a second ago disappear the moment he crashed into the mud.


    Whoosh~


    Using his power to clean himself and his clothes, Xuan Hao thought about how he might have ended up if he flew over the Great Poison Swamp when the restriction took action. Even if he was someone in the Domain Lord Realm, enduring the terrifying pressure for even a few seconds longer was sure to cause some injuries.


    Thinking about it, anyone trying to fly inside the Great Poison Swamp would end up in a simr situation as him. Cover in mud from head to toe.


    "Pft~!"


    Thinking about the different Domain Lords and Soul Ascension Realm Experts standing at the peak of the Sky Empire ending up covered in mud upon trying to fly inside the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao could not stop a small chuckle from escaping.


    After all, different from him, these people were likely to enter the Great Poison Swamp together with other people and would not be able to clean themselves without anyone seeing them covered in mud.


    It would be even worse if these bigshots had decided to enter the Great Poison Swamp together with their descendants to train them¡­

 Chapter 724 Extracting Poison, Refining Poison~

    Turning his attention back towards the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao observed a few different poisonous insects that were hiding in the trees and mud around the edges of the Great Poison Swamp.


    Even if these poisonous insects were far too weak to pose a threat to him and the strongest among them could at most kill someone in the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Observing them still allowed Xuan Hao to get a better idea about which ces would be best to avoid when he had to pass through the more dangerous parts of the Great Poison Swamp.


    After all, the powerful poisonous insects that had poison strong enough to threaten someone in the Domain Lord Realm did not grow more intelligent after their poison had reached such a terrifying level. Instead, they behaved just like the poisonous insects with weaker poisons! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    The only exception to this, was if the poisonous insect''s cultivation realm had also increased like the strength of its poison. Although insects had an extremely low chance of getting more intelligent after their strength increased, the chance still existed!


    However, considering that insects that managed to develop that level of intelligence was extremely rare to the degree that the number of such insects appearing inside the Great Poison Swamp over the years the years had not exceed ten, Xuan Hao was not really worried about encountering that kind of poisonous insect during his journey through the Great Poison Swamp.


    Instead¡­ The main thing he worried about, was the poisonous demon beasts that could be found inside the Great Poison Swamp!


    Different from the poisonous insects that were far easier to predict and go around, the poisonous demon beasts inside the Great Poison Swamp did not only have extremely potent poison, but also had a cultivation base that made them deadly even without their poison!


    In the deeper parts of the Great Poison Swamp, poisonous demon beasts reaching the Domain Lord Realm could be found¡­ And if he wanted to pass through the Great Poison Swamp, he would inevitably have to pass through the deeper parts of the Great Poison Swamp.


    At the very least, the strongest of the Domain Lord Realm poisonous demon beasts should only have reached the first few stages of the realm from what Yi Min had told him.


    Of course this did not mean that stronger poisonous demon beasts didn''t exist inside the deeper parts of the Great Poison Swamp, it just meant that they were extremely rare and hard to encounter.


    "Well¡­ With my current strength, I should be fine even if I encountered the more powerful poisonous insects or demon beasts¡­" Muttering this to himself as he gazed towards a small insect no bigger than a centimetre in length crawling up a small tree branch, Xuan Hao used his domain to catch the small insect before closely inspecting.


    Ptsh!


    Extracting the poison inside the small insects body. Killing the small insect in the process, Xuan Hao could not help looking towards the small drop of poison floating in front of him.


    How can a tiny bit of this drop of poison kill someone in the Nascent Soul Realm? The poisonous insects of the Great Poison Swamp really are amazing in their own way, but¡­ I wonder what would happen if I refined this drop of poison with alchemy¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao took out a small cauldron he had been carrying with him in his interspatial ring before throwing the drop of poison inside of it. Not wanting to risk the drop of poison exploding during the refinement process and ending up on him.


    Even if there was a good chance his domain would be able to stop it before this happened, Xuan Hao saw no need to take such a risk¡­ And the small cauldron also had an effect that would help it more smoothly process poisonous materials like the drop of poison he had just extracted from the poisonous insect¡­


    Fwoosh~


    Carefully igniting a small me, Xuan Hao carefully began to refine the drop of poison inside the caldron by slowly burning away the inherent impurities that were present inside of it.


    The process of refining the poison and removing the impurities inside was an extremely precise process that would be hard for someone below the Artisan Alchemist Realm to do. Even Xuan Hao who was already an Artisan Alchemist found it hard to precisely burn away all the impurities inside of the drop of poison without identally destroying it or causing it to explode.


    Whoosh!


    "Sess!"


    Spending the next few minutes carefully removing the impurities from the drop of poison extracted from one of the poisonous insects, Xuan Hao could not help smiling upon seeing that he had sessfully managed to remove the impurities from the drop of poison without causing any idents or destroying the drop of poison in the process.<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Well¡­ Even if he ended up idently ruining the drop of poison, there were more than enough poisonous insects around to get more poison from¡­


    "I wonder how strong this poison is now¡­"


    Carefully controlling the poison and having it float out from the cauldron so he could inspect it more closely, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face the next second.


    "This¡­ It''s actually strong enough to kill someone in the Fourth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!?"


    Feeling shocked as he muttered this to himself while looking at the drop of poison that only had the ability to kill someone in the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm before the impurities inside of it was removed, Xuan Hao began to understand why so many people came to the Great Poison Swamp for the numerous poisonous insects that could be found inside of it.


    For an alchemist focused on poisons, the insect from the Great Poison Swamp would allow them to increase the level of the poisons they made. Not to mention, the process of removing the impurities was a good way for an alchemist to train his or her control of fire.


    I should take a few drops of poison from different insects back with me for Qing Yi to train with¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he put away the drop of poison he had finished refining into a small ss vial before throwing it into his interspatial ring to end up forgotten in a few hours, Xuan Hao extracted the poison from a few dozen poisonous insects around him before gathering it in different ss vials and simrly throwing them into his interspatial ring.


    Whoosh~


    Not having anything more to do and already having a decent grasp over the behaviour of the poisonous insects roaming around inside the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao used a different movement technique he had picked up over the years called Earth Shrinking Steps.


    Although it was far inferior to the Drifting Cloud Steps that he normally used, the Drifting Cloud Steps were not really usable inside the Great Poison Swamp. After all, thest thing he wanted to do was make a mistake and idently teleport into the air and get pressed into the mud below by the restriction covering the Great Poison Swamp!


    ¡­


    "Senior Brother¡­ Are you sure it''s a good idea to follow Elder Proud Bear around¡­?"


    "Are you still thinking about what happened earlier when we first entered the Great Poison Swamp? Don''t worry about it, it happens to everyone who tries to fly inside the Great Poison Swamp¡­ To be honest, I even heard that the great ancestor of the Dark Sky Kingdom once came here with his grandson and ended up in a simr situation¡­"


    "Really!?"


    "Yes! What senior brother said is true, my aunt was around when it happened and she personally saw how the great ancestor of the Dark Sky Kingdom crashed down into the mud after trying to fly inside the Great Poison Swamp. Haha, she even told me that the old ancestor originally wanted to kill everyone around to stop what happened from leaking out, but one of the Sky Empire''s generals was also around, so that old ancestor could only give up on this!"


    "Haha, if it even happened to someone like the great ancestor of the Dark Sky Kingdom, it''s no wonder Elder Proud Bear who only reached the Domain Lord Realm a few years ago ended up in such a situation. Although¡­ It makes one wonder why he even tried to fly in the first ce even after knowing the oue¡­"


    At the same time Xuan Hao began making his journey to cross the Great Poison Swamp, a group of three youths were also making their way inside the Great Poison Swamp while happily chatting with each other without any worry on their faces.


    The main reason for this, was the old man standing not too far away watching over them.


    From their conversation alone, it was obvious that this old man should be the Elder Proud Bear they were talking about, a Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    For them to have such a powerful cultivator watching over them, it was obvious that these three youths did not have a simple identity¡­

 Chapter 725 Poisonous Devil Trees And Devil Bugs

    "But are we really going to be alright going so far into the Great Poison Swamp? Even if Elder Proud Bear is powerful and is capable of dealing with most of the poisonous insects and demon beasts, he won''t be able to ount for them more unique insects that appear in the deeper parts of the Great Poison Swamp¡­"


    As the group of three youths were continuing deeper inside the Great Poison Swamp under the watch of the elder in the Domain Lord Realm, one of the youths could not help nervously asking this after seeing an especially powerful demon beasts watching them from a distance.


    Even without the demon beast letting any of its killing intent leak out due to the presence of Elder Proud Bear, its strength was not hidden in the slightest. Allowing the three youths to understand that the demon beast was actually Half a Step into the Domain Lord Realm!


    "This¡­ You don''t have to worry about it. If it really ends up getting too dangerous, we can always get Elder Proud Bear to carry us and escape. From what I heard, the demon beasts here do not chase for too long due to them fearing that their territory will get invaded by all sorts of unknown poisonous insects that will end up posing a lethal threat if it can''t find all of them¡­"


    "Senior brother is correct, just look at all the demon beasts we encountered so far. Even the demon beasts that were far stronger than us and couldn''t see through Elder Proud Bear''s strength didn''t dare attack us if we were too far away from them."


    "I get it¡­ It''s just that I''m feeling a bit nervous with all the poisonous insects and demon beasts around. Especially after the recent news that one of the Dark Sky Kingdom''s Domain Lords went missing in here just a day earlier¡­" Hearing what his two fellow disciples said, the nervous youth started to calm down as he said this.


    ""¡­""


    Seeing that their friend had calmed down, the other two both kept silent as a serious expression appeared on their faces upon hearing what the nervous one had mentioned.


    A Domain Lord from the Dark Sky Kingdom had gone missing¡­


    Even if they understood that it was normal for a Domain Lord to go missing inside the Great Poison Swamp every now and then, they also understood why their friend got more and more nervous the deeper inside of the Great Poison Swamp they went.


    To be honest, both of them also understood what their friend was feeling, as both of them were in a simr nervous state. The only difference was that they didn''t outwardly show it¡­


    "Haha, you three are already getting nervous? We have only just crossed the outer region of the Great Poison Swamp and entered the boundary between the outer and inner region of the Great Poison Swamp!


    To get the Poisonous Devil Leaves from the Poisonous Devil Tree that you three are here for, we will have to cross the boundary. After all, the Poisonous Devil Tree can only be found in the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp!"


    Having walked over as all three youths had unconsciouslye to a stop in the middle of a small piece of drynd inside the mostly wet swamnd of the Great Poison Swamp, Elder Proud Bear could not help chuckling to himself as he said with a teasing smile on his face.


    Although he had been assigned to look after the three youths during their mission to get their hands of the leaves of the Poisonous Devil Tree, it wouldn''t hurt if he interacted with them for a few minutes.


    """Elder!"""


    Not expecting for Elder Proud Bear toe over, all three of them jumped up in surprise as they called out with happy expressions on their faces.


    Even if they understood Elder Proud Bear was watching over them from a distance due to them having to navigate the Great Poison Swamp and avoid the different poisonous insects by themselves, they could not help feeling happy after he showed up next to them


    "Calm down you three, I''m just here to tell you to get moving instead of standing around. Haven''t you noticed that the nearby poisonous demon beasts have already started encircling this ce?"


    "Wha-!?"


    "This¡­"


    "They really have started surrounding us¡­"


    Hearing what their elder told them, the three youths quickly looked around themselves and realized that the different demon beasts they had seen from afar before, were now only standing a few dozen meters away from them.


    If not for the fact that Elder Proud Bear had shown up an told them¡­


    "L-let''s get going! We still have to find the Poisonous Devil Tree and get the leaves before we can leave. The faster we get them, the faster we can leave the Great Poison Swamp!"


    ""Yeah!""


    Not wasting any time after hearing what their senior brother said, the two other youths quickly followed him as all three of them quickly made their way out of the almostplete encirclement by the poisonous demon beasts-<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    However, some of the poisonous demon beasts did not seem too happy about their pray just leaving, as they pounced forward the moment the three youths were about to fully leave the iplete encirclement.


    Fwoosh-!


    "Hmph!"


    However, just as these poisonous demon beasts were about to reach the three youths, a terrifying domain engulfed all of them.


    Roar-


    Bang!


    Not even able to even make a small roar, all the poisonous demon beasts were crushed to death beneath the terrifying domain!


    The only poisonous demon beasts that stayed alive was the one that was already Half a Step into the Domain Lord Realm, as it had already recognized the strength of Elder Proud Bear and was wise enough to stay away when the rest of the nearby poisonous demon beasts had decided to encircle the three youths and Elder Proud Bear.


    "Hm? What are you three standing there for? Get going!"


    Turning towards the three youths who were all gazing up at him filled with amazement, Elder Proud Bear waved for them to continue, while secretly smiling to himself upon seeing their reaction. Feeling quite happy at the admiration he got from the three youths after having disyed his power.


    "Y-Yes Elder!" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Filled with amazement after seeing the awesome disy of power by Elder Proud Bear, the oldest among the three youths was the first to calm down as he quickly bowed his head in respect before dragging his junior brother and sister along with him. Not wanting to attract more poisonous demon beasts and having to rely on Elder Proud Bear once again.


    ¡­


    "This should be the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp¡­"


    Seeing a very clear line of trees giving off a demonic feeling appearing in the distance, Xuan Hao slowed down his speed as he slowly approached the line of trees in the distance cautiously.


    Poisonous devil trees¡­ ording to what Yi Min said, these trees signal the beginning of the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp. Not only that, but their leaves are rather special and can be considered a great ingredient in not only poisonous potions and pills, but also healing ones¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes and focused on the small creatures crawling all over the leaves of the Poisonous Devil Trees.


    "Devil Bugs¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine upon remembering Yi Min''s description of these small insects.


    Devil Bugs were a special kind of insect that only lived on the Poisonous Devil Tree and would die the moment it went too far away from the tree. The insect in question was not that strong and its poison was only barely strong enough to kill someone in the Core Formation. However, things would be different if there was more than one Devil Bug around¡­


    "The more of them are around, the stronger they get and when the number of Devil Bugs reaches a certain level, they be near unkible, and their poison will get strong enough to even kill someone in the Domain Lord Realm!


    And¡­ The only ce where the concentration of Devil Bugs has reached this level, is the border between the outer region and the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp¡­" Shaking his head as he said this while looking towards the endless number of Devil Bugs covering the Poisonous Devil Trees in the distance, Xuan Hao could not help growing even more nervous as he got closer.


    Even if there was a rather simple way to pass through the border wall formed by the dangerous Devil Bugs and the Poisonous Devil Trees, Xuan Hao still did could not stop himself from feeling a bit fearful when facing the harmless looking Devil Bugs.


    After all, the Devil Bugs in front of him had imed the lives of many powerful cultivators before the method to safely pass through the border wall was found. ording to Yi Min, a powerful expert in the Soul Ascension Realm had even died to the Devil Bugs in the past before a method to safely enter the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp was found!

 Chapter 726 Cute Devil Bugs And Strange Situation~

    Thump~


    Coming to a stop a short distance away from the Poisonous Devil Trees covered in Devil Bugs while thinking about the method that Yi Min had told him to safely pass through the border that had been formed, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit nervous as he watched the Devil Bugs crawling all over the Poisonous Devil Trees in front of him.


    The thought of killing them never crossed his mind after personally seeing them and feeling how weak they werepared to himself, as he understood that they would be impossible to kill. Even for someone in the Soul Ascension Realm Expert ording to what Yi Min had told him.


    Not to mention that attacking the Devil Bugs would not do anything other than provoking them for no reason and making it impossible to enter the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp¡­ And that was considering that he would be able to escape from the Devil Bugs after attacking them!


    "Haa¡­"


    Taking a deep breath as he thought about this, Xuan Hao calmed down before taking a step forward and entering the smallyer of Poisonous Devil Trees separating the outer region of the Great Poison Swamp from the inner region.


    During this process, he moved at a slow pace and made sure to ignore the countless Devil Bugs that ended up crawling up his legs and all over his body.


    From what Yi Min had told him about passing through this ce, the most important thing was to ignore the Devil Bugs no matter what. Even when they crawled all over his body, he had to ignore them unless he wanted them to attack him.


    After leaving the thinyer of Poisonous Devil Trees where they lived, they would leave his body on their own.


    "¡­"


    Even then, Xuan Hao found it difficult to ignore the countless Devil Bugs that crawled all over his body.


    The outside!


    After spending close to half an hour slowly walking through the thinyer of Poisonous Devil Trees like this, Xuan Hao could not help happily eximing inside his head when he saw the row of Poisonous Devil Treesing to an end.


    Rustle~!


    Stepping outside only a few secondster, Xuan Hao could not help being filled with relief after feeling the countless Devil Bugs all over his body quickly leaving and rushing back towards the Poisonous Devil Trees again.


    Even if the Devil Bugs didn''t hurt him, it was not a pleasant sensation to have them crawling all over his body. If possible, he wanted to avoid something like that happening again¡­ But then again, he still had to pass through the border of Poisonous trees one more time if he wanted to leave the Great Poison Swamp¡­


    "I''m really not looking forward to that¡­" Shaking his head as he said this while looking back towards the Poisonous trees and the Devil Bugs behind him, Xuan Hao turned towards the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp that spread out before him. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Different from the outer region of the Great Poison Swamp where the strongest poisonous demon beast and insect would at most have the strength to kill someone below the Domain Lord Realm, the creatures found inside the inner region were far more dangerous.


    Not to mention the fact a normal Early Stage Domain Lord between the First and Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm would end up dead if not careful. Even someone who had reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm might die if they happened to get bitten by some of the most dangerous insects inside the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp!


    Of course, with a domain to scan the area around them, it was unlikely to get bitten by any of these insects unless they had developed a way to hide from the powerful senses of someone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    In the end, the main threat to Domain Lord Realm Experts came from the powerful poisonous demon beasts that could be found inside the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp. Although their poison was far weaker than the insects, their strength was already far stronger, with the most powerful ones even reaching theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm!


    For some reason, although it was said that the Great Poison Swamp was the safest of the special ces surrounding therge empty in, it seemed far more dangerouspared to the Thousand Wind Mountains¡­


    Could it be that the danger of the Great Poison Swamp only takes the outer region into ount?<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Smiling a bit wryly as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao decided not to think about it any longer. In the first ce, he had already decided to go through the Great Poison Swamp and it was not really like he would be in any danger against a few poisonous demon beasts in the Domain Lord Realm!


    Whoosh~!


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao began making his way deeper inside the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp. Intending to pass through the core of the ce and have a quick look around to see if he could find any precious poisonous spiritual herbs before continuing on his way out of the Great Poison Swamp and towards the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    ¡­


    BANG!


    "Hmph! These demon beasts are getting more and more powerful the closer I get to the core of the Great Poison Swamp¡­


    ording to what Yi Min said, the number of poisonous demon beasts that has surpassed the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and reached the Seventh Stage like this one should be extremely low, but I have already encountered three of them so far¡­ And that is not mentioning the number of Domain Lord Realm poisonous demon beast below the Seventh Stage!"


    Frowning as he looked down at the dead demon beasts beneath his feet, who''s head he had just crushed with a massive hammer made from ice a second ago, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both of his eyes as he felt the powerful aura belonging the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm still lingering around the dead demon beast.


    Even if killing it had been rather simple with his current strength, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that something was wrong with the number of powerful poisonous demon beasts he had encountered so far.


    Given what he understood of the Great Poison Swamp, he should still have quite a distance before reaching the most dangerous core of the Great Poison Swamp.


    If the strength of the poisonous demon beasts continued to increase like they were, Xuan Hao felt that he might end up running into a poisonous demon beast that had reached the Soul Ascension Realm by the point he reached the core of the Great Poison Swamp!


    No matter how confident Xuan Hao was in his strength, he didn''t want to risk his life fighting against a demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ Much less in a dangerous location like the Great Poison Swamp, where he might end up bitten by some dangerous poisonous insect duringbat!


    "But then again¡­ Turning around at this point in time would waste a lot of time and its not really like the rest of the special areas are in a much better state. In the worst-case scenario, I can always escape."


    Shaking his head as he said this to himself while looking towards the core region of the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao understood deep down that part of him was looking forward to encountering a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast.


    After all, ever since his sword and ice domain had merged together and his strength had surpassed what could be considered the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao had been looking forward to trying out his new strength.


    The Soul Ascension Realm Expert he had encountered inside the Thousand Wind Mountains would be a good opponent, but the situation was not really ideal and he didn''t want to risk exposing his current strength to the upper echelons of the Sky Empire as of now due to it possibly bringing unwanted attention to the Star Shattering Sect before it had enough strength to defend itself against the attack of someone in the Soul Ascension Realm without his or the Chaotic Qi Formations help.


    "Encountering a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast really is the best option¡­ Ah¡­" Unknowingly saying this out loud as he thought about what he might encounter when entering the core region of the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly before shaking his head and continuing towards the core region of the Great Poison Swamp.


    Fighting a demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm to test out his current strength really was the best possible option, as it wouldn''t risk him exposing his strength to the powerful experts of the Sky Empire.


    Not to mention, the strange restraining force engulfing the entire Great Poison Swamp didn''t just prevent him from flying, but also kept the overall stability of the Great Poison Swamp and prevented it from getting destroyed by a fight between powerful experts.


    Even if Yi Min had not told him anything about this, Xuan Hao had experienced it first-hand, when the strange restraining force inside the miasma forcefully dispelled the aftershocks of his attacks when fighting against the Domain Lord Realm demon beasts.


    Although the strange restraining power did not lower the strength of his attacks towards his opponent, it did lower the damage to the surrounding swamnd, which in turn made it far harder to sense that a battle was taking ce from far away!

 Chapter 727 Core Region Of The Great Poison Swamp

    At the same time Xuan Hao was making his way towards the core of the Great Poison Swamp, the three youths on the other side of the Great Poison Swamp had made their way to the border between the inner and outer region of the Great Poison Swamp where the Poisonous Devil Trees they were looking for could be found.


    Of course, the only reason why they could get this far in the first ce, was due to the fact that Elder Proud Bear was looking after them and making sure that none of the powerful poisonous demon beasts attacked them. Only letting a few weaker ones at the Core Formation Realm through for the three youths to fight.


    "So, this is the Poisonous Devil Trees located at the border between the outer and inner region of the Great Poison Swamp¡­" Standing in front of the Poisonous Devil Trees covered in Devil Bugs, the youngest boy among the three youths could not help muttering this to himself with a scared expression on his face.


    ""¡­""


    The junior sister and senior brother standing beside him were not in a much better situation, as they also looked towards the countless Devil Bugs crawling all over the Poisonous Devil Trees filled with fear.


    Even if they already knew about the Devil Bugs beforehand, it was a totally different thing to see them first-hand. Especially considering that they would soon have to get close enough to these terrifying insects to get their hands on the Poisonous Devil Leaves of the Poisonous Devil Tree!


    "As long as we don''t use any qi and ignore them, we should be fine. Not to mention, everyone has to go through this at some point if they want to be core disciples¡­ And so do we¡­"


    Being the first among the three youths to calm down, the junior sister who was by far the weakest among the three youths took the lead and made her way towards the Poisonous Devil Trees without waiting for the other two.


    Rustle~


    Rustle~


    Rustle~


    Ignoring the sound of the countless Devil Bugs crawling all over the ground beneath the Poisonous Devil Trees and on the branches above, the junior sister entered the small border of Poisonous Devil Trees that separated the outer and inner region of the Great Poison Swamp.


    "We can''tck behind whenpared to our junior sister if we want to be core disciples¡­"


    "Haa¡­ Indeed¡­ But why did the mission to be a core disciple have to be something like this? Could it not be easier to just have a test of strength like any normal sect instead of having use to this bug infested ce¡­?"


    "Hehe, you know this is not the final mission or test we will have to go through before bing a core disciple.. Right?"


    "¡­"


    Not wasting any time after seeing that their junior sister had already entered ahead of them, the older and stronger senior brother quickly entered behind her. Soon followed by the unwilling junior brother who tried his absolute best to remain calm as he felt the Devil Bugs start crawling up his legs before starting to explore his body.


    The fact that his senior brother and junior sister werepletely calmpared to him who was close to experiencing a mental breakdown barely allowed him to forcefully keep himself calm to not fall behind as they made their way deeper inside the small forest formed by the Poisonous Devil Trees.


    Unfortunately for the junior brother who was barely keeping himself calm, the Poisonous Devil Leaves that could be used for alchemy were all located deeper inside the small forest formed by the Poisonous Devil Trees.


    With his current state of mind getting worse and worse with each passing step he took forward, the junior brother had a feeling that he might be forced to give up his chance to be a core disciple if he didn''t want to risk his life. After all, the moment his barely kept calmposure broke, the Devil Bugs crawling all over him would attack.


    Even if the most powerful ancestor of his sect was present, the junior brother understood very well that there would be no way to safe him from the Devil Bugs if they turned hostile at this moment¡­


    "I don''t think he is going to make it¡­"


    "Indeed, he is far too nervous. Even the Devil Bugs around him have started getting livelier in response to hisposure slowly breaking¡­"


    Looking back towards their junior brother, the junior sister and senior brother could not help shaking their heads as they said this whilepletely ignoring the Devil Bugs that were crawling all over them.


    From a single nce, it was obvious that these two were doing far better than their junior brother who was about to get consumed by the Devil Bugs at any moment.<novelnext> </novelnext>


    "Haaaa¡­ He doesn''t look like he wants to give up¡­"


    Seeing that their junior brother continued to follow after them without leaving even when he was in such a bad situation, the senior brother could not help shaking his head as he turned around before continuing deeper inside the forest of Poisonous Devil Trees where the Poisonous Devil Leaves of good enough quality to be used for alchemy could be found.


    "¡­"


    The junior sister also turned around with a sad expression on her face before deciding to ignore the struggling junior brother behind her.


    Even if she wanted to help, there was nothing she could do to help her junior brother. The only way to make sure he was safe, was if he decided to give up on his chances to be a core disciple and leave the thin strip of forest that the Poisonous Devil Trees had formed.


    After all, not even an expert in the Soul Ascension Realm could deal with the terrifying Devil Bugs, let alone a child like herself who had only just recently reached the Core Formation Realm!


    ¡­


    "So, this is the start of the Great Poison Swamp''s core region¡­"


    As the three youths were making their way deeper and deeper inside the small thin strip of forest that had been formed by the Poisonous Devil Trees, Xuan Hao arrived in front of a thick wall of greenish miasma that prevented his divine sense from prating it.


    Even when he tried to use his domain to prate the thick greenish coloured miasma, it could not prate more than a few meters before being forcefully stopped by the miasma.


    "The miasma should not be damaging in any way and should only be stopping my divine sense and domain from passing through it¡­" Muttering this to himself as he remembered what he had been told about the miasma in front of him by Yi Min, Xuan Hao carefully approached the greenish coloured miasma before carefully sticking his hand inside it. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "I really am worrying for nothing¡­"


    Seeing nothing happening to his hand, Xuan Hao shook his head before stepping forward and soon finding himself on the other side of the miasma.


    However, different from all the things he had encountered so far on his journey through the Great Poison Swamp, Yi Min did not know a lot about the core region of the Great Poison Swamp, outside of the fact that it was a dangerous ce that was best to be avoided unless one had reached theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Whoosh~!


    For this reason alone, Xuan Hao carefully began inspecting his surroundings with a cautious expression on his face.


    Normally, someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm should have been safe when travelling through the core region of the Great Poison Swamp¡­ But considering just how many powerful demon beasts he had encountered in the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao doubted that this would be the case at the moment.


    Not to mention, there was a high likelihood that a poisonous demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm had appeared in the core region, let alone someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Even someone in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm would not be safe inside the core region of the Great Poison Swamp if there really was such a powerful poisonous demon beast around!


    "Hm?"


    Looking around himself with his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as a confused expression soon appeared on his face after grasping the situation around himself.


    "There is no poisonous demon beasts or insects around¡­?"


    Indeed, in the massive area covered by his divine sense, Xuan Hao did not manage to find a single poisonous demon beast or insect!


    "Could it be¡­ Are the powerful poisonous demon beasts I encountered in the inner region perhaps originally from the core region¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he remembered the many powerful Domain Lord Realm poisonous demon beasts, he had encountered in the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that there was indeed something happening inside the Great Poison Swamp, something that had scared away all the insects and demon beasts that originally resided in the core region of the swamp¡­

 Chapter 728 Danger Approaching!

    Understanding just how weird the current situation was, Xuan Hao decided to hide himself with his domain before slowly proceeding through the core region of the Great Poison Swamp.


    Even if there was no way for him to hide with his domain from a demon beast that had reached the Soul Ascension Realm. At the very least, it should allow him to sense the other party when he got found. Allowing him a short time to prepare himself.


    Whoosh~!


    Making sure that he was fully prepared for a fight at any moment, Xuan Hao continued forward while keeping an eye out for any poisonous demon beasts or insects that might still be around inside the core region of the Great Poison Swamp-


    "Hm?"


    Even then, Xuan Hao did not have to wait for long before he encountered a poisonous demon beast...


    "Its... Dead...?"


    The only problem, was that the poisonous demon beast in question, was already dead!


    Not only dead, but its blood has been drained and in a simr fashion as to how a demonic cultivator would drain the cultivation base of their opponents after defeating them.


    "So... I might not be dealing with a poisonous demon beast, but a demonic cultivator that is proficient in draining the cultivation base of demon beasts?" Muttering this to himself as he gazed down at the dead poisonous demon beast in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that this matter was getting far moreplicated than he had originally signed up for.


    Not to mention, dealing with a demonic cultivation that had reached the demonic cultivations equivalent of the Soul Ascension Realm, the True Demon Realm, would be far harderpared to a Soul Ascension Realm poisonous demon beast. The main reason for this being the fact that demonic cultivators were by far the hardest to kill, Xuan Hao had experienced this first-hand when fighting with a demonic cultivation in the Third Demonic Transformation Realm not too long ago...


    Maybe there might even be a group of powerful True Demon Realm Experts working together on something inside the core region of the Great Poison Swamp...


    "Haa..."


    Letting out a sigh as he thought about this, Xuan Hao contemted whether or not to just turn around now and leave before he ended up getting involved in something troublesome-


    BOOOOM-!


    However, before Xuan Hao had managed to make up his mind on whether or not to proceed on his path through the Great Poison Swamp at the risk of possibly encountering more than one demon cultivation in the True Demon Realm, a loud explosion filled with a power that made a shiver run down his spine echoed out behind him.


    "This... Looks like I won''t be able to turn around anymore..."


    Feeling the strength behind the explosion far surpassed the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he felt the sound of fighting in the distance growing closer and closer to his current location.


    If he didn''t move anytime soon, let alone leaving the Great Poison Swamp to avoid a troublesome situation, he would soon be forced to join the battle against his will!


    Normally, Xuan Hao would not mind getting an opportunity to fight with someone in the Soul Ascension Realm... But from what he could sense, the number of people who had surpassed the Domain Lord Realm fighting in the distance was far more than one or two people, a closer estimate would be between 5 or 6 people in the Soul Ascension Realm all fighting with each other!


    No matter how eager Xuan Hao was to test his newfound strength, there was no way he would join in on such a troublesome situation that almost certainly involved Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Sky Empire!


    I have to leave this ce!


    Whoosh-!


    Not wasting any time aftering to a decision, Xuan Hao quickly used all his strength to escape in the opposite direction of the fighting, while at the same time doing his best to not get spotted by the people who were busy fighting in the distance.


    Even then... Given that Xuan Hao couldn''t use the Drifting Cloud Steps due to the strange restrictive force inside the miasma, his speed was far lower than normal and it would only be a matter of time before the battle in the distance caught up to him.


    At this point, the only thing Xuan Hao could hope for was that the people battling it out would not be moving in the exact same direction as himself!


    ...<novelnext> </novelnext>


    "Even knowing that these devil bugs won''t do anything to me if I don''t do anything wrong. Forcefully sealing all my qi inside my dantian is far more difficult than I expected... At least the Poisonous Devil Leaves over there should be good enough and we should soon be able to leave this ce!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was trying his best to avoid getting involved in the terrifying battle taking ce behind him, the junior sister among the three youths could not help muttering this to herself as she looked towards the poisonous devil tree not too far away from herself and her senior brother''s current location.


    Different from the normal poisonous devil trees, the one that the junior sister was referring was far more colourful and was farrger than the rest of the poisonous devil trees around. Not just that, but the leaves of the tree were also slowly creating a thin hazy green mist that kept the devil bugs away. Allowing one to see the rare sight of a poisonous devil tree that was notpletely covered in devil bugs.


    "Indeed... It looks like this is a mature poisonous devil tree that is ready to have its leaves harvested..." Standing not too far away from her, the senior brother nodded his head happily before making his way towards the mature poisonous devil tree.


    Rustle~!


    Rustle~!


    Rustle~!


    Soon enough, both the junior sister and the senior brother reached the mature poisonous devil tree, as both of them happily watched as the devil bugs covering their bodies left and returned to the still immature poisonous devil trees around them.


    "Ah! Finally able to escape from those bugs!"


    "Haha, indeed! Let''s wait here for a bit to recover before harvesting the leaves!"


    Filled with happiness, the two quicklyid down to rx from the stress of having a seemingly endless number of insects crawling all over their bodies for what seemed like an eternity. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although both of them had managed to stay calm to the point of being able to talk with each other, there was no way they could remainpletely unaffected by the insects covering their body. Especially considering that both of them were still young.


    However, the most difficult thing for them to deal with, was stopping any of their qi from leaving their dantian!


    The moment even a sliver of qi left their dantian, the devil bugs covering their bodies would sense it and would attack them and with their strength at the Core Formation Realm, there was no way for them to resist for more than a few seconds before getting killed.


    Then again, the only reason they would be able to resist for such a long period of time, was because the strength of the devil bugs would increase depending on the opponent that they faced.


    The limit to the strength of a nest of devil bugs covering a single poisonous devil tree had enough strength to fight equally with someone in the Peak of the Core Formation Realm.


    As for the limit of the massive devil bug nest that covered the forest of poisonous devil trees that made up the border between the inner and outer region of the Great Poison Swamp...? That limit had not been found yet, but it was at the very least somewhere in the Soul Ascension Realm or above considering a Soul Ascension Realm had died facing the massive nest of devil bugs...


    Below the mature poisonous devil tree. Not only would they be able to not worry about the devil bugs crawling all over them, but they could also rx the restriction on the qi inside their dantian, as the mature poisonous devil tree helped obscure their qi from the devil bugs outside.


    Although it did not allow them to fully undo the restrictions they had put in ce, it was at a level that they could easily keep in ce. Allowing them to partially recover and prepare themselves for the trip back after they harvested the poisonous devil leaves.


    "By the way, I haven''t seen junior brother for quite some time, do you think that-"


    "He should have left ahead of us. After all, he should understand that he had no way to continue given his state of mind. Even if he wants to be a core disciple, there is no way he would be dumb enough to lose his life over it!"


    Interrupting the junior sister as she said this while looking back towards the location they hade from, the senior brother quickly shot her down. Not wanting something affecting his junior sister or his own current state of mind when they still had to get back outside safely without getting killed by the devil bugs.


    "..."


    Not saying any more after hearing what her senior brother said, the junior sister just gazed in the direction that they hade from with a sad expression on her face.


    Even without any of them saying anything, she understood very well that her junior brother would not be one to give up... And given that he had not appeared yet, it was obvious what had happened to him...

 Chapter 729 No Escape

    "let''s get going, we don''t want to waste too much time here¡­"


    Having stayed beneath the mature poisonous devil tree for a few minutes as both of the them had managed to recover a bit of their energy and calm down, the senior brother took the lead as he said this before beginning to carefully take a few of the mature poisonous devil tree''s leaves before cing them inside a small wooden container.


    Rustle~!


    Not saying anything upon hearing what her senior brother said followed by the sound of the him carefully breaking off the leaves of the tree, the junior sister just looked towards the direction they hade from with a sad expression on her face.


    Even if she understood that there was nothing she could do about the junior brother who had yet to show up, she still couldn''t help being filled with sadness when thinking about what might have happened to him.


    "Haaa¡­" Letting out a sigh as she slowly got up, the junior sister nced onest time towards the direction they hade from before turning around to help out her senior brother with gathering the leaves of the mature poisonous devil tree.


    The faster they finished harvesting the leaves, the faster they would be able to leave and find out if their junior brother had gotten out safely!


    ¡­


    This¡­ Where am I¡­?


    At the same time the senior brother and junior sister were preparing to make their way back outside the forest of poisonous devil trees the junior brother that had gone missing slowly opened his eyes with a look of confusion stered all over his face.


    "I clearly remember walking towards my senior brother and then¡­ I can''t remember?" Muttering this to himself as he slowly got up from the ground, the young boy could not understand what was happening as he looked around himself-


    "Ah!?"


    However, all he was met with was the corpse of a massive corpse of a toad like demon beast towering more than five meters into the air. Even without understanding how strong the dead toad was, the young boy could clearly sense the powerful aura around it-


    "Domain Lord Realm demon beast!?"


    For this reason, he could not help eximing in surprise upon realizing just how powerful the dead demon beast in front of him was.


    Not to mention the fact that the dead demon beast should have reached the Domain Lord Realm, the strength of its aura far surpassed that of Elder Proud Bear who had reached the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he began wondering how such a powerful demon beast had ended up dying, the young boypletely forgot about the fact that he had been inside the forest of poisonous devil trees, while covered from head to toe in devil bugs just a second ago.


    There is another corpse in the distance¡­ No, two- three- seven- W-why are there so many dead demon beasts!?


    Slowly calming down as he began to look around himself, the young boy soon started panicking even more than before, as he realized that there wasn''t just one or two powerful dead demon beasts around him. Instead, it would be more urate to say that there was at least a dozen corpse belonging to powerful demon beasts that all gave off a terrifying aura far surpassing that of Elder Proud Bear!


    "W-where is this ce!?" Barely able to say this as he was filled with dread when facing the massive corpses of demon beasts whose remaining aura alone was enough to make him almost throw up blood on the spot, the young boy tried to more thoroughly inspect his surroundings to get an idea about where he had ended up¡­


    The eerie silence, the swampy ground he was standing on and the ever-present miasma making it hard to see more than a few hundred meters away from his current location¡­


    After just a quick look, it was obvious to the young boy that he was still inside the Great Poison Swamp.


    Now the question just became, where in the Great Poison Swamp?


    However, given the strength of the dead demon beasts in front of him, the young boy already understood at the back of his mind that there was only one ce where such powerful demon beasts could gather in such numbers inside the Great Poison Swamp¡­ The core region of the swamp!


    "¡­"


    Given his current strength having just recently reached the Core Formation Realm, the young boy also understood very well his chances of leaving the core region of the Great Poison Swamp.


    Not to mention the danger posed by the demon beasts, any random insect inside the core region would have a poison more than potent enough to kill someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, let alone someone who had just recently reached the Core Formation Realm!


    "Hm?"


    As he was getting more and more depressed thinking about just how little chance, he had of escaping alive, the young boy suddenly noticed something in the distance shining through the thick miasma of the Great Poison Swamp.


    Rustle~!<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Feeling a weird sense of attractioning from the light in the distance that had managed to pierce through the thick miasma, the young boy unconsciously began moving towards it. Soon getting swallowed up by the mist, as only the dead corpses of the once powerful demon beasts remained in the location that the young boy had suddenly appeared not more than a few minutes earlier.


    ¡­


    Boom!


    Why are they all moving in the same direction as me!?


    As the young boy had suddenly found himself inside the core region, Xuan Hao was desperately trying his best to escape from the battle that was getting closer and closer to him with each passing second. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Whoosh-!


    Just at this moment, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine before narrowly dodging a massive spear shaped rock filled with a terrifying amount of energy thatnded right next to him


    This-!?


    Seeing the spear that hadnded right next to him suddenly start copsing as the energy inside the spear started gathering together with a power that had already far surpassed that of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao understood that there would be no way for him to defend himself without revealing himself to the people busy fighting behind him-


    Fwoosh!


    BOOOOOM-!


    Fully utilizing the power of his domain, Xuan Hao encapsted himself in ayer of ice that protected him against the explosion¡­ But in turn, this also ended up revealing himself to the people who were busy fighting behind him¡­


    "¡­"


    Hearing everything go quiet for a short moment after he had defended himself with no signs of movement, Xuan Hao decided to use this moment of confusion that had emerged to continue heading in the opposite direction of where the battle had been taking ce!


    Whoosh-!


    Even if he didn''t believe he could escape before those people caught up to him, he would at the very least be able to make some distance between himself and them. If he was lucky, he might even be able to stumble upon some special location inside the core region of the Great Poison Swamp that he could use to hide himself and avoid getting involved in the conflict between the group of Soul Ascension Realm Experts!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    However, sensing the speed of the people who had now given up on fighting as they instead focused on chasing after him, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing to himself as he realized just how much of a difference there was between his own speed and theirs.


    If just I could use the Drifting Cloud Steps I would be able to easily escape these people¡­ With this speed, let alone buying a few minutes, they will likely catch up to me in a few seconds¡­ Should I use the Drifting Cloud Steps and hope to not idently take a wrong step and get teleported a few meters into the air?


    Shaking his head as this thought emerged, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing the restricting power that covered the Great Poison Swamp.


    "Hm? What is that¡­?"


    However, just as Xuan Hao was about to ready himself to face the Soul Ascension Realm Experts that were chasing after him, a weird light suddenly pierced through the thick miasma in front of him. Catching him slightly off guard.


    "The disc isplete! Don''t let those demons get their hands on it, the person ahead is likely on of their aplice!"


    Swish-!


    Hearing a loud roar from the distance followed by a terrifying aura sweeping towards him, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing to himself as it seemed like he had somehow been bunched up with one of the sides that were fighting behind him.


    Not only that, but the person who had tied him to one of the sides fighting had sent forth a powerful attack that far surpassed the exploding earth spear from earlier!

 Chapter 730 Disc Of Light

    Fwoosh-!


    Facing the powerful attack that was heading towards him, Xuan Hao had no way to dodge and could only fully manifest his domain around himself to block it-


    Bang!


    Not even a second after Xuan Hao''s domain spread out and enveloped his surroundings, did the attack sh with the edge of his domain before slowly pushing its way through it towards Xuan Hao located at the centre of the domain.


    "Hmph!"


    Feeling the attack forcefully push its way towards him while cutting into his domain, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he utilized the power of his domain to gather together and crush the power heading towards from all directions-


    Boom!


    As the full power of Xuan Hao''s domain gathered on the attack before pressing down on it from all sides, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he felt the terrifying power contained inside the attack fighting back against his domain. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    BOOOM-!


    Even if he managed to forcibly destroy the attack before it reached him, Xuan Hao was not the slightest bit happy with this oue. After all, there was no way the attack just now had been the strongest attack from the other party¡­ But even then, he had still ended up in such a difficult situation trying to block the attack!


    The difference between the Soul Ascension Realm and the Domain Lord Realm is really not easy to cross¡­ Even if I can fight against someone in the Soul Ascension Realm with the help of my domain, I will be put at a clear disadvantage when fighting against someone in the Soul Ascension Realm¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he looked in the direction that the attack hade from, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he managed to get a better understanding of his current strength after the short sh.


    Although his current strength was more than enough for him to fight against someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao understood that he was stillcking whenpared to the Domain Lords he had seen through the ancient book in the Thousand Wind Pce.


    Let alone fighting equally with Soul Ascension Realm Experts, a few of those powerful Domain Lords could even fight multiple Soul Ascension Realm Experts at once ande out ahead!


    In a sense, his current realm was stillcking a lot whenpared to those Ancient Domain Lords¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Momentarily feeling his thoughts wander after having dealt with the powerful attack throw at him, Xuan Hao was brought back to his current situation by the terrifying presence of the experts in the distance all charging towards his current location. This time around, he could even feel a distinct killing intent from one of the people charging over!


    Not good!


    Whoosh-!


    Understanding that it would not be a good idea to stay around and wait for the people chasing after him to catch up, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he rushed towards the direction of the strange light in the distance.


    Although he was not certain where the light wasing from, he could at least be certain that it was something important from what he had heard the person with very clear killing intent towards him scream.


    ¡­


    Rushing towards the light for what felt like an eternity as he constantly had to avoid the attacks of the people chasing after him, Xuan Hao could not help showing an expression of surprise after reaching the origin of the bright light that had pierced through the thick miasma of the Great Poison Swamp.


    "A disc¡­ No, a portal!?" Eximing in surprise as he sawrge disc made of light, Xuan Hao did not take long to realize that the thing in front of him was not a disc of light, but was instead a portal leading to somewhere unknown.


    To stay and fight or enter the unknown portal¡­


    Stopping for only a short moment as he contemted his options of staying to fight an almost certain losing battle or get a chance to leave without entering a life and death battle with a group of unknown Soul Ascension Realm Experts, Xuan Hao did not hesitate to enter the disc shaped portal made up of light-


    SWISH-!<novelnext> </novelnext>


    However, just as he was about to step through the portal, a spear of dark blue light more than a hundred meters in length exploded forth with all its might only a short distance away from him.


    "This-!?"


    Seeing the massive dark blue spear erupt with a power that had already surpassed the normal level of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as the dark spear easily managed to pierce through the outeryer of his domain before heading towards him at a speed far surpassing that of the earlier attack.


    Even if the speed of the spear condensed from a dark blue light still had to go through his domain to reach him, Xuan Hao understood very well that there was no way for him to prevent it from reaching him. The power of the spear had far exceeded anything he could deal with and couldn''t bepared to the power of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts he had faced so far.


    From the strength of the attack, it was obvious that it did not originate from any of the people chasing after him¡­ But instead an artifact that had been able to store the attack of a powerful expert that had surpassed the first level of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Crack~!


    Feeling his domain starting to show sign of breaking as the spear continued heading towards, Xuan Hao quickly moved back towards the disc shaped portal of light. Understanding very well that there would be no other way for him to avoid the spear-


    Swish~!


    Just before the spear reached him, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief inside his head as he managed to step through the disc shaped portal of light before feeling a strange power engulf him and twist the space around him.


    At this moment, Xuan Hao realized that the disc shaped portal was not a portal but the disc of light was instead some kind of ancient teleportation artifact. Meaning¡­ It would take some time before he would be able to escape from his current precarious situation!


    "DAMNIT! EXPLODE!"


    Because of this, just before he was teleported away, a loud roar filled with killing intent echoed out in his ears followed by the massive spear made up of dark blue light still a short distance away from him suddenly condensing into a small ball of extremely concentrated energy.


    The short moment that it would take for the ancient teleportation artifact to activate, had obviously ended up giving his opponent a bit more time!


    "Not go-"


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    Not even managing to say anything more, Xuan Hao suddenly saw the small ball dark blue ball of light that contained all the energy of the massive spear explode-


    Ptsh!


    Even trying to block the powerful energy with his domain, Xuan Hao could barely hold on for a second before his domain was pushed back. Injuring his soul in the process.


    Not only that, but the power that was in the process of teleporting him was also affected to some degree as the space around the ancient teleportation artifact was messed up by the explosion. Even the strange power in the miasma that covered the Great Poison Swamp had momentarily been pushed back by the terrifying explosion!


    Riiiiip~!


    Feeling the space getting torn apart by the strange power inside the ancient teleportation artifact, Xuan Hao could not help praying that the location he appeared would not be too affected by the scrambling of space that had urred around the disc of light.


    Swish~!


    However, at the end of the day, Xuan Hao did not have much of a choice, as he let himself get sucked into the tear in space created by the ancient teleportation artifact without any resistance.


    Knowing very well that staying behind would be the same as certain death. Especially considering that at least of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts had gone all out to kill him before he could escape through the ancient teleportation artifact¡­


    "NOOOOO-!"


    Hearing the now familiar roar filled with killing intent just before he was sucked into the tear in space created by the ancient teleportation artifact, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself as he made sure to remember the presence of the owner of the voice. Wanting to make sure that he could repay him for all the care he had shown him just now¡­


    At the same time, Xuan Hao also prepared himself to possible have to fight for his life on the other side of the tear in space that he had been sucked inside of. After all, the space had been messed up quite a lot by the explosion and it was almost certain that he would not end up in the location that the ancient teleportation artifact had intended to send him!

 Chapter 731 Shadowy Figure

    Bang!


    Landing on the ground after having passed through the gap in space created by the ancient teleportation artifact, Xuan Hao looked around himself and could not help letting out a sigh of relief after discovering that there weren''t any powerful demon beasts or other dangers around him.


    Instead, the only thing around him was the all too familiar miasma and the swampy ground beneath his feet. The only change from the swamp he had been in just a second ago, was that the miasma around him was far thicker and more powerful. Preventing his divine sense from moving more than a few dozen meters away from his body before being corroded by the miasma.


    Whoosh~!


    Not thinking too much about the miasma after determining that he was not in danger, Xuan Hao used his domain to create a barrier around himself before focusing on the injuries he had received from the dark blue spear exploding before he had managed to cross through the tear in space created by the ancient teleportation artifact.


    "Hah... The power of that explosion from earlier really was too powerful. Even if only a small part of the power contained inside that spear managed to reach me before I got away, it still managed to injure me to this degree..."


    Looking over his injuries through his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh before closing his eyes and focusing on recovering.


    Given that he had arrived in an unknown location that might be far more dangerous than the core region of the Great Poison Swamp, it was best to first recover from his injuries before he started exploring his surroundings.


    At the very least most of the injuries he had received were not too bad and he should be able to recover back to full strength in less than an hour!


    ...


    "Where is this ce? I clearly remember approaching the bright light before I suddenly lost consciousness again..."


    At the same time Xuan Hao was quietly recovering from the injuries he had received, the young boy who had having been transported to a ce filled with corpses of powerful demon beasts, was looking around himself filled with confusion.


    Just a second ago, he had approached the light that pierced through the thick miasma covering the Great Poison Swamp and then... He once again lost consciousness before waking up in apletely unfamiliar ce that could barely be seen through the thick miasma that was present everywhere around him.


    "Why is the miasma so thick!? I can''t even see where I am- Hm? Why am I getting so dizzy all of a sudden...?"


    Not able to see more than a few centimeters in front of him due to the thick miasma, the young boy was about to take a step forward when he suddenly felt everything around him spinning before his breathing started getting erratic.


    "The poison in the mist is also stronger!?"


    Not taking more than a split second to realize what was happening to him after feeling what was happening to his body, the young boy began panicking as he clumsily reached into a small bag hanging by his waist before taking out a small green pill that he quickly swallowed.


    Soon after eating the green pill, the young boy felt his breathing growing stable again before he felt that the poison affecting his body had been dealt with by the green pill.


    "That was dangerous... If not for the detoxification pills Elder Proud Bear gave us before we entered the Great Poison Swamp, I would not have been able to resist the poison of the miasma!" Muttering this to himself as he felt grateful for the pills Elder Proud Bear had handed to him and the other two, the young boy''s expression soon took a turn for the worse as he nced back down into the small bags with the pills inside of it.


    Elder Proud Bear said that a single detoxification pill shouldst between one or two hours depending on how powerful the poison is... And I only have four left, I should really find a way out of this ce as quickly as possible!


    Feeling a frown slowly making a way onto his face as he realized this, the young boy did not dare waste any time as he quickly began moving in one direction-


    Bang!


    "Ouch!"


    However, he did not manage to make it more than a few meters before he suddenly crashed into a wall covered in all sorts of ancient symbol that shone with a barely visible light.


    "This... I''m inside a room!?"


    However, the young boypletely ignored the ancient symbols, as he was instead more focused on the fact that he found himself inside a room.


    Did the Great Poison Swamp have ruins...?


    Filled with confusion as he looked at the stone wall in front of him filled with all sorts of ancient symbols, the young boy tried his best to remember everything he had learnt about the Great Poison Swamp before havinge for the core disciple promotion test.<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Wait... Isn''t the core region of the Great Poison Swamp said to be connected to the dangerous ruins of an ancient sect just next to the Great Poison Swamp!?


    Feeling a shiver go down his thought as he remembered that the ruins of an ancient sect that were located just next to the Great Poison Swamp, the young boy could not help shivering all over as he looked at the wall in front of him filled with fear.


    The reason for this reaction was normal. After all, the ancient sect ruins located next to the Great Poison Swamp, was a ce that even Soul Ascension Realm Experts feared. For a small Core Formation Realm cultivator like himself, it would mean certain death to enter such a location!


    "I have to get out of here..."


    Standing frozen for what felt like hours as he realized just how much danger he was in, the young boy managed to calm himself down as he slowly began moving along the wall of the room to hopefully find a way outside where he hoped that he would be able to find a path out of the ce he now found himself inside of.


    "Hm? A door!"


    Not more than a few seconds after he had began feeling along the wall for a way out, he felt the handle of a door.


    Creak~


    Not wasting any time, he pulled on the handle and opened the door before making his way outside the room he found himself inside of. Soon smiling happily after noticing the miasma had grown thinner. Allowing him to see a few meters in front of him instead of a few centimeters.


    Thump! Thump! Thump!


    However, the happiness he felt from being able to see more soon disappeared when he heard the loud sound of heavy footsteps slowly approaching from the distance. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Whoosh~!


    Even without knowing what was approaching him, the young boy still understood very clearly that it would be best to hide, as he silently dashed towards a small crate just next to the door he had just left the room behind him through.


    Thump!


    At the same time that he heard the heavy footsteps stopping just beside the door leading inside the room he had appeared inside of, the young boy had already hidden inside the crate next to the door.


    "..."


    Silently peeking through a small hole inside the crate, the young boy felt a shiver run down his spine upon seeing the origin of the heavy footsteps he heard.


    Standing more than three meters tall, arge shadowy figure barely visible to him through the thick miasma stood silently in front of the door to the room he had been inside of just a second ago.


    Even if he could not clearly see the features of the shadowy figure, part of him felt certain that the figure in front of him was not human.


    Creak~!


    Hearing as the shadowy figure slowly opened the door before entering the room, the young boy felt his heart drop upon realizing that the shadowy figure had mostly arrived due to him appearing inside the small room.


    Should I try to escape before it gets back outside?


    Hesitating for only a short moment as this thought passed through his head, the young boy silently slipped out of the crate he was hiding inside of after seeing the door to the room that the shadowy figure had entered slowly closing.


    Swish~


    Doing his best to remain silent, the young boy quickly began moving away from the door and the room he had just been inside of. Not wanting to be anywhere near the ce when the shadowy figure discovered that there wasn''t anyone inside the room it had just entered.


    Beneath him, the young boy noticed that there was no muddynd like everywhere inside Great Poison Swamp. Instead, it was a paved stone road. Further confirming the fact that he was indeed not inside the Great Poison Swamp any longer!

 Chapter 732 Snakes, Miasma And Spiritual Herbs!

    Running along the paved stone path as he did his best to not make too much sound, the young boy could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine upon spotting severalrge shadowy figures a few dozen meters away from him through the mist.


    Thump! Thump Thump!


    Listening to the loud footsteps as theserge shadowy figures moved slowly through the miasma, the young boy had unknowinglye to a stop, as he fearfully observed therge shadowy figures slowly disappearing back into the miasma again.


    "They are moving in the direction of the room I came in from¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he realized the direction of therge shadowy figures, the young boy felt even more anxious and quickly began moving in the opposite direction of the shadowy figures once again.


    In the back of his mind, he had a feeling that if he did not manage to leave the ancient ruins he now found himself inside of, he would soon have to face the shadowy figures that had just passed by him!


    Even if the shadowy figures had not attacked him or even turned around to look towards him, it had to be know that the young boy could very clearly feel a terrifying aura far stronger than even the dead demon beasts he had encountered when he had been teleported to the core region of the Great Poison!


    No matter what, he was not dumb enough to believe that he would be able to fight with these shadowy figures just because he had managed to avoid getting detected by them. For all he knew, the reason he had managed to escape, could be because the shadowy figures simply didn''t care about him at the moment. After all, there would really be no way for him to escape if they were as strong as he believed them to be from what he had sensed so far¡­


    Whoosh~


    Increasing his speed as he decided to take a risk of not being as quite as before, the young boy was excited to discover that the shadowy figures walking past him still ignored him.


    Whoosh-!


    Knowing that he would not get attacked by the shadowy figures along the path, the young boy quickly increased his speed even further before going as fast as his current cultivation base and movement technique could handle.


    "This miasma is receding!"


    Continuing along the paved stone path for a few minutes like this while ignoring all of the shadowy figures moving past him, the young boy could not help smiling excitedly after realizing that the miasma around him had slowly started to grow thinner.


    At this point in time, he could already see over a dozen meters around him without any difficulties. Allowing him to see some of the ancient buildings located on the side of the massive road he was moving along-


    "This¡­ What in the world are those things!?" Unconsciously slowing down as he fearfully muttered this to himself, the young boy could not help shivering fearful while looking towards the tall shadowy figures.


    After the miasma grew thinner. Not only did he grow capable of seeing more of his surroundings, but he also grew capable of seeing through some of the shadowy mist that covered the over three-meter-tall figures moving in the opposite direction of himself.


    Different from what he expected, what was hidden beneath the shadowy mist in the shape of a three-meter-tall humanoid figure was not a puppet or golem like he had first expected, but was instead a mass of different coloured snakes that had been gathered together into the shape of a three meter tall humanoid figure!


    Not only this, but each of the snakes gave off an auraparable to Elder Proud Bear¡­ Of course, the individual aura of these snakes was not what shocked the young boy the most. Instead, it was the fact that the aura seemed tobine together and gathered the power of the mass of snakes together!


    "¡­"


    Even if the young boy had seen quite a lot before, he had no idea how to react to the reality behind the powerful shadowy figures¡­


    At first, he had been scared by what he saw¡­ But after some time, he grew confused as he looked at the shadowy snake humanoid¡­ puppets? Golems? Eh¡­ Snake people¡­? Moving past him.


    Part of him began to wonder where the snakes were moving, as he felt himself suddenly wanting to turn back and see what the snakes were up to-


    "Hm?"


    However, this dangerous thought was quickly purged the moment he felt his vision suddenly darkening again before feeling a familiar weakness spreading through his entire body.


    "The poison from the miasma!? It''s only been a little over 10 minutes! It should have at leaststed for one to two hours!"


    Quickly taking out another detoxification pill before swallowing it, the young boy no longer thought about finding out what the snakes were up to, as he continued along the paved stone road with a clear look of desperation on his face.<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Given howrge of an area the ancient sect ruin covered, the young boy understood very well just how difficult it was for him to leave with the little over half an hour of time he had left with the remaining three detoxification pills.


    For this reason alone, he even started increasing his speed beyond his own limit. Not caring much about the bacsh he would inevitably end up suffering because of this. After all, if he could not make it out in time before he ran out of detoxification pills, he would not just suffer a bacsh, he would die!


    ¡­


    "Hm?"


    Opening his eyes still surrounded by thick miasma, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after feeling that his injuries had all beenpletely healed in less than half an hour.


    Originally, he had thought it would at least take him an hour to recover from the injuries he had received, but when he started healing his injuries, he discovered that the nascent sword soul inside his dantian could actually help speed up the process by acting as a weaker second soul. Allowing him to heal more than one injury at a time!


    Even if it was far slowerpared to him doing it himself, it had still allowed him to recover almost twice as fast as he originally thought he would due to it taking care of the more easy to handle injuries¡­


    "Now¡­ To figure out where I am¡­" Looking around himself as he quietly said this, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes upon discovering that the miasma around him had actually grown far thinnerpared to before.


    If he could only cover an area of a few dozen meters around him before. Now he could easily cover an area of over a thousand meters with his divine sense! Allowing Xuan Hao to get a better grasp of his surroundings.


    Not too far away from where he had been recovering, Xuan Hao discovered that the swampy ground came to an end before a purplish green in began.


    "Purple Poison Grass¡­?"


    Seeing the purple green grass, Xuan Hao instantly managed to find out the name of the grass growing in front of him from the information he had been given by the system when he became an Artisan Alchemist.


    ording to this information, the Purple Poison Grass was not only a rare kind of spiritual herb used in all sorts of poisonous potions and pills, but it could only be found in small patches covering a few dozen meters.


    But¡­ In front of him was an entire in filled with Purple Poison Grass!


    Even without knowing howrge this in was due to the miasma still preventing his divine sense from expanding more than a few thousand meters around him, it was simply unimaginable how much the Purple Poison Grass in front of him was worth!


    "¡­"


    Feeling something, he had never felt before when he looked towards the Purple Poison Grass that was just sitting there free for the taking, Xuan Hao took out an empty interspatial ring before spreading out his domain to cover the beginning of the Purple Poison in in the distance.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Soon enough, a small river of Purple Poison Grass formed mid-air before flowing towards Xuan Hao and entering the empty interspatial ring that was now floating in the air in front of him.


    "Ah¡­ I still need to figure out where I am!" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Feeling that the interspatial ring floating in front of him had beenpletely filled up with the Purple Poison Grass, Xuan Hao quickly put it away before turning his attention back towards his current situation.


    Even if he had saved some time on recovering, he could not waste too much time waiting around in case the Soul Ascension Realm Experts that had chased after him showed up. Although¡­ Collecting a few tons of Purple Poison Grass that would be useful for Qing Yi and the alchemists of the Star Shattering Sect wouldn''t hurt anyone¡­

 Chapter 733 Snakes! Snakes Everywhere!

    Having put away the interspatial ring now filled to the brim with Purple Poison Grass, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the in filled with the poisonous grass in front of him.


    Even after he had filled up an entire interspatial ring with Purple Poison Grass, the in itself did not seem to show much of a change other than a small empty patch located around the edge of it where Xuan Hao had taken the Purple Poison Grass from.


    "Hm?"


    However, when looking towards the small patch where he had forcefully pulled up the poisonous spiritual grass from, Xuan Hao could not help frowning after noticing thousands upon thousands of snakes slithering around on the ground that was nowpletely barren.


    Even when he had pulled out the Purple Poison Grass from the ground, he had not noticed the fact that there was so many snakes hiding beneath the poisonous grass. From this, it was obvious that they had some way to avoid his divine sense... Not only that, but all the snakes below him had actually reached the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Just the small spot Xuan Hao had emptied of Purple Poison Grass had hidden away tens of thousands of these snakes, as for the entire in... There were easily millions of snakes!


    No matter what, Xuan Hao could not help feeling confused as to why there would be so many Nascent Soul Realm snakes present beneath the poisonous grass. In the first ce, how did so many snakes even manage to reach the Nascent Soul Realm in the first ce?


    Swish~!


    As he was looking towards the snakes slithering around on the ground below filled with confusion, the sound of something piercing through the air could be heard in the distance before arge shadowy figure soon appeared at the edge of Xuan Hao''s divine sense rushing directly towards him.


    "A snake... ball? Humanoid? Eh... I don''t even know..." Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the shadowy figure, Xuan Hao had no idea how to describe what was hidden beneath the shadowy mist that gave the shadowy figure its humanoid shape.


    As for preparing to fight the iing shadowy figure? Xuan Hao did not really care too much about this, as even after all the snakes forming the shadowy figure hadbined their strength, they had only barely reached a levelparable to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    With Xuan Hao''s current strength, the shadowy figure that barely had enough strength to beparable to someone in the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, did not pose the slightest bit of threat to the current Xuan Hao! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Whoosh~!


    Bang!


    Watching as the shadowy figure got within a few hundred meters of him before it gathered its strength together tounch an attack towards him, Xuan Hao simply used his to engulf the shadowy figure before directly crushing it. Not allowing the snakes on the inside to resist for even a second!


    "How weird... None of the snakes seem to have any soul inside them. Almost like they are already dead..."


    Frowning to himself as he looked towards the ce where the shadowy figure had just been destroyed by him, Xuan Hao soon turned his attention towards the snakes slithering around below him.


    Different from the snakes that had been inside the shadowy figure, Xuan Hao could tell at a nce that the soul inside the snakes slithering around below was still intact.


    Do the snakes lose their souls after they transform into the shadowy figures?


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more curious about where he had ended up being teleported by the ancient teleportation artifact.


    The only thing he understood about his new location so far, was that he should either be in some kind of special area that was located inside the Great Poison Swamp, or in the worst-case scenario, somewhere inside the dangerous ruins of the ancient sect located right next to the Great Poison Swamp.


    "Hm?"


    However, just at this moment, Xuan Hao saw a new quest appearing in front of him from the system that had remained inactive for quite some time.


    [Side Quest: Escape]


    [Description: Explore the ruins of the long-forgotten sect in front of you and look for a way to escape before dying.]


    [Reward: Staying alive, Great Poison Scripture]


    Looking at the quest that had appeared after a long time, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say.


    At least from the quest''s description, he could tell that he had indeed been teleported inside the dangerous area that contained the ruins of an ancient sect and the fact that he would die if he did not escape from the ce in time.


    Not only that, but the quest had also clearly stated that he would have to explore the ruins of the ancient sect, that should be located somewhere on the other side of the in filled with snakes and poisonous grass, to find a way out.<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Whoosh-!


    Not wasting any time after understanding that his life was in danger even ording to his usuallyzy system, Xuan Hao didn''t cast a second nce towards the snakes on the ground below as he flew over the poisonous grass in towards the ancient sect ruins that should be located at the end of the in.


    ...


    Wha- What in the world are those snakes doing all of a sudden!? Why did all of them suddenly start moving around so frantically!?


    At the same time Xuan Hao killed the shadowy figure made up of snakes, the young boy who had been trying his best to leave the ruins he found himself inside of, could not help shivering all over when he suddenly saw the calm shadowy figures getting chaotic.


    Swish~!


    BOOOOM-!


    Seeing a weird green cloud of air fly past him while only narrowly missing him before exploding into an inferno more than powerful enough to kill him, the young boy could not help shivering even more violently as he wondered what had caused all of the shadowy figures to behave so chaotically all of a sudden.


    Everything was fine just a second ago! Could it be something happened at the ce where they are all moving...?


    At this point in time, the young boy had already realized that the shadowy figures should not be going to the same location as where he had showed up and should be going somewhere different. After all, if they were really all moving to the ce where he had appeared to search for him, he was certain that they would have already realized he was missing and would havee to catch him.


    For this reason, the young boy had concluded that the shadowy figures were moving somewhere different deeper inside the ruins.


    As for why they ignored him... He had no idea. Not that he was one toin about this in the first ce...


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Hearing more and more explosions going off in the distance, the young boy could not help pushing himself to increase his speed just a little further to try and escape the dangerous ruins as quickly as possible. Wanting nothing more than to get out of the dangerous ruins and reunite with his senior brother and senior sister again.


    "Ah?"


    Just at this moment, the young boy felt several terrifying auras engulfing his body from afar. Instantly making hime to a stop as all colour drained from his face.


    I''m dead!


    Only able to think this as he felt the terrifying auras wash over him, the young boy had already resigned to his death after feeling the power contained in those auras.


    Even if he had no idea what kind of realm the auras belonged to, the young boy had once seen the sect master of his sect in person and even he was inferior to these auras!


    It had to be known, that his sect master was someone who had already reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. For the auras to be even above such a person, the young boy could only think of a realm that he had never seen before and could only dream of reaching. The Soul Ascension Realm!


    If he was not wrong, the auras that had engulfed him belonged to someone who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Hearing the sound of the wind being torn apart, the young boy trembled violently as he saw several ck shadow passing by him before disappearing from sight the next second.


    Even if he did not see them clearly, the young boy clearly realized that the terrifying auras he had just felt a second ago belonged to the ck shadows that had just rushed past him before disappearing.


    "J-just what in the world happened...?"


    Unknowingly muttering this to himself as he looked in the direction that the ck shadows had disappeared in, the young boy remained silent for the next few minutes before finally working up enough courage to continue along the path. Doing his best not to think too much about what happened and instead focusing on escaping before he ran out of detoxification pills.

 Chapter 734 The Terrifying Shadows

    "This should be the start of the ancient ruins that the system quest mentioned¡­" Having travelled over the in of poisonous grass, Xuan Hao could not help opening both of his eyes wide as he looked at the majestic buildings appearing in the distance.


    Although a long time had passed since the ancient sect had been destroyed, the buildings still remained intact with minimal damage over the long passage of time. Looking even closer, a faint yet powerful ancient aura lingered around these ancient buildings.


    Even if he could only see a small part of this once majestic ancient sect through the miasma, it was obvious that the size of the sect itself should cover an area farrger than that of the Great Poison Swamp itself!


    After all, the area that the ancient sect ruins covered on a map was close to fifty timesrger than the Great Poison Swamp that was located beside it! Even if most of thisrge territory was used for cultivation of spiritual herbs like the poisonous spiritual grass he had just flown over, the sect itself should not cover an area smaller than the area covered by the Great Poison Swamp!


    Putting it into another perspective, the area covered by the Great Poison Swamp was around the same as the past Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the Azure Sky Kingdombined!


    It was easy to imagine just how many disciples and how powerful a sect thatrge would be¡­


    Looking at the majestic buildings in front of him as he was slowly approaching this massive ancient sect that should have once been far more powerful than he could even begin to imagine, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes as he prepared himself.


    No matter what, after the fall of such a terrifying sect, it was obvious that the area around the sect itself had be an incredibly dangerous due to the many formations covering this ce master and the myriad of other defensive mechanisms no longer having any master still being active to some degree even to this day.


    Thinking about it more closely, the miasma that covered both the ruins of the ancient sect and the Great Poison Swamp should be one of these formations that had gone out of control after the fall of this ancient sect in the past!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    "Hm?"


    Just as he was at this moment when Xuan Hao had started to observe the miasma all around him more closely, three powerful auras appeared from the ancient sect ruins in front of him before threerge shadows flew out and floated in the air a few hundred meters away from where he was standing.


    Different from him who was still restricted by the strange power present inside the miasma, the threerge shadows that hade to a stop could freely fly in the air without any difficulties. Allowing Xuan Hao to understand that the three shadows floating in the air in front of him should be part of some sort of defensive mechanism of the ancient sect.


    More snakes!?


    Inspecting the shadows that hade to a stop mid-air, Xuan Hao could not help frowning after realizing that the three shadows were simr to the shadowy figure he had encountered after filling up one of his interspatial rings with Purple Poison Grass.


    However, different from the shadow figure that he had encountered at that time the three shadows floating in the air only a few hundred meters away from him gave off a far more powerful aura than the shadowy figure. Even Xuan Hao could not help frowning after feeling the power contained after the massive ball of snakes hidden inside the shadows hadbined together.


    "Even if they have not yet reached the Soul Ascension Realm, their strength should not be that far away from it¡­ Facing three of these shadows filled with snakes, even a Soul Ascension Realm Expert would have a hard time!"


    Rumble~!


    Floating in the air in front of the air for a few short seconds, a terrifying aura exploded from the three shadows before all their aurasbined together and formed thousands upon thousands of small green needles that all flew in the direction of Xuan Hao who was standing on the ground below!


    Swoosh-!


    Swoosh-!


    Swoosh-!


    Listening to the sound of the green needle piercing through the air as they flew towards him, Xuan Hao unsheathed his sword before gathering the power of his domain on his silver sword.


    Not daring to hold back when faced with thebined attack of the three shadows in the shape of threerge balls filled to the brim with snakes floating in the air above him, Xuan Hao directly executed the Earth Splitting Sword-


    RUMBLE-!


    As his attack met with the endless number of green needles, a loud rumbling sound followed by a terrifying shockwave instantly spread out in all directions.


    Hissss!


    Hissss!


    Hissss!<novelnext> </novelnext>


    With no way to defend themselves from the terrifying shockwave, the countless Nascent Soul Realm snakes hidden beneath the Purple Poison Grass were instantly killed by the shockwave.


    BANG!


    The ancient sect buildings on the other hand were not even scratched by the shockwave, the faint ancient aura still lingering around the majestic sect buildingspletely negating it!


    Whoosh-!


    On the other hand, Xuan Hao and the threerge shadows floating in the air werepletely unaffected by the sh just now!


    Looks like I will have to use something stronger than the Earth Splitting Sword if I want to defeat them!


    Seeing that the Earth Splitting Sword had actually not managed to even reach the three shadows floating in the air above him, Xuan Hao understood that thebined strength of the three shadows should have already reached the Soul Ascension Realm. Maybe they were even a bit stronger whenpared to the person who had been fighting back inside the core of the Thousand Wind Mountains!


    Because of this, the only thing Xuan Hao could think of that would allow him to fight with them was his Descend of the Ice God''s Sword. Although he did not know exactly how strong it was, it was stronger than the Earth Splitting Sword and should be able to at least allow him tond a hit on one of the three shadows filled with snakes¡­ As long as he could deal with one of them, their strength should weaken, and it would be far easier for him to deal with the other two!


    Boom!


    Boom!


    Just as he was about to try and use Descend of the Ice God''s Sword, two terrifying auras simr to the three shadows floating in the air above him appeared from inside the ancient sect before rushing towards his direction.


    Not good! If more of them show up andbine together, they will likely grow far too strong for me to fight!


    Understanding that he would have no chance of winning if more balls of shadows filled with snakes showed up andbined together, Xuan Hao''s eyes was filled with killing intent, as he looked towards the two shadows that appeared at the edge of his divine sense.


    Swish-!


    Not wasting a single second, Xuan Hao used all his strength to charge past the three shadows in the air just above the entrance to the ancient sect before arriving directly in front of the two shadows filled with snakes that were flying towards the three floating in the air above the entrance to the ancient sect.


    BOOM-!


    BOOM-!


    Using all his strength, Xuan Hao managed to directly pierce through the ck miasma and destroy all of the snakes inside before they had managed to put forth any defences! Having destroyed the two balls of snakes, he would now only have to deal with the remaining three floating above the entrance to the sect-


    Wait, why didn''t those three balls of snakes move¡­?


    Feeling something was weird, Xuan Hao quickly turned towards the three balls of snakes hidden away by an eerie ck miasma. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    This!? When did three new shadows appear?!


    However, when he turned his attention back towards them, Xuan Hao was horrified to discover that there was no longer only three balls of snakes covered in the eerie ck miasma. Instead, there was now six of them!


    Even worse, Xuan Hao could clearly feel that after their strength hadbined together, they had already surpassed the strength of the Soul Ascension Realm Expert that had attacked him before he had managed to escape through the ancient teleportation artifact.


    Although not on the same level as the spear made from dark blue light that had been thrown after him back then, Xuan Hao understood very well that it would only be a matter of time before that happened.


    BOOM-!


    BOOM-!


    BOOM-!


    The reason for this thought was simple, as Xuan Hao could now feel hundreds of auras simr to the shadows floating above the entrance to the ancient sect appearing from several all over the ancient sect that he could only see a small part of at this point in time!


    "No wonder even those Soul Ascension Realm fear this ce¡­"


    Barely whispering these words to himself as he looked towards the six shadows floating above the entrance to the ancient sect, Xuan Hao no longer had any thought of fighting with them¡­

 Chapter 735 Gate Of A Thousand Eyes

    Swish-!


    Feeling the different shadows from all over the ancient sect heading towards him, Xuan Hao didn''t dare stay around and continue to fight the shadows floating above the entrance to the ancient sect. Instead choosing to move deeper inside the ancient sect in search for a way out of his current situation.


    In the back of his mind, Xuan Hao began to understand what the quest given to him by the system meant with him having to explore the ruins of the long-forgotten sect and look for a way to escape before dying.


    If he really could not find a way to escape, the shadows approaching him from all directions really would end up killing him!


    ¡­


    "Wha-what was that!?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao entered the ancient sect ruins, the young boy who had been continuing along the paved stone road towards what he believed to be a way out of the ancient sect ruins, froze on the spot as he could clearly hear Xuan Hao shing with the shadows in the distance.


    Even if he tried his best not to show it, the young boy was extremely afraid deep down and the battle taking ce in the distance only further increased the young boy''s fear. Especially considering that he had just recently consumed hisst detoxification pill and was running out of time before the poison inside the miasma would consume him like it had almost done when he first arrived at the ancient sect.


    Although he had no idea what was happening, he did not take long to understand that the shadows he had seen passing by him just a few minutes earlier should be involved in the battle taking ce in the distance.


    Luckily the fighting is taking ce in the opposite direction from where I''m going!


    Letting out a sigh of relief as he thought this to himself, the young boy continued forward after without wasting a single second. After all, he at most had ten minutes left before the detoxification pill would lose its effect and the poison in the miasma would kill him!


    Unfortunately for the young boy, he was unknowingly moving deeper and deeper inside the ancient sect without even knowing that he was nowhere near the entrance to the ancient sect that he thought he was going towards¡­


    If Xuan Hao was there to observe the young boy as he moved along the paved stone road, he would long since have realized that the young boy was trapped in some sort of formation that slowly seemed to be guiding him deeper and deeper inside the ancient sect without his knowledge!


    "This- A gate! Did I finally find a way out!?"


    Just at this moment, the young boy who had spent over thirty minutes running on the paved stone road without seeing anything other than the majestic looking ancient buildings on either side of him could not help eximing in surprise after seeing arge gate appearing at the edge of his vision.


    Swish-!


    Soon enough, this surprise turned into happiness as the young boy charged toward the gate that appeared at the edge of his vision. Understanding very well that other than getting out of the ancient sect, he would also have to find a ce where the mist was thin enough for someone like himself to survive without the help of the detoxification pill.


    "Haha! It really is a gate leading outside!"


    Arriving in front of the gate, the young boy could not help eximing full of happiness after discovering that there was arge flower field on the other side of the gate.


    Even if there was still miasma covering thisrge flower field, the young boy could clearly feel that the miasma on the other side of the gate was far weaker and should be something he would be able to endure even without the help of the detoxification pill!


    Not hesitating for more than a few seconds, the young boy took a step forward and entered the flower field on the other side of therge gate-


    Creak~!


    Unaware of the fact that the gate behind him slowly closed after he entered before thousands upon thousands of demonic eyes appeared all over the gate. All greedily staring towards the young boy''s back.


    Whoosh~


    "Hm? Did I sense wrong? I could have sworn I felt someone looking towards me just now¡­" Muttering this to himself as he turned around and looked towards the gate that had closed behind him in confusion, the young boy didn''t think too much about it before continuing to move deeper inside the flower field. Believing that he had already left the ancient sect and was making his way out of the dangerous area that the ancient sect''s ruins were located inside of.<novelnext> </novelnext>


    As for worrying about the gate that had closed behind him¡­ The young boy didn''t even think about this, as to him, it still looked like the gate was open and he could make his way back ''inside'' the ancient sect anytime he wanted to!


    Of course, he would not do something like that even if he wanted to. After all, he had already run out of detoxification pills!


    Like this, the young boy made his way deeper and deeper inside the flower field. Unaware of the fact that what he was walking through was not a flower field, but somethingpletely different¡­


    ¡­


    BOOM-!


    Just how many of these things are there!?


    Crushing a shadow that had suddenly appeared behind him and killing all of the soulless snakes inside Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he looked into the distance where close to a dozen simr shadows were flying towards him.


    After he had entered the ancient sect and had begun exploring the ce looking for a way to escape from the ancient sect ruins, he had not gotten more than a few seconds to himself before one of the shadows caught up to him and attacked him.


    Although he could easily deal with a single one of them, doing so would buy enough time for more of them to show up and if he didn''t leave fast enough, he would end up getting surrounded and killed by them when theybined their strength to attack him!


    Considering all of this, Xuan Hao wanted to find the way out mentioned by the system as fast as possible. After all, other than having to constantly escape from the shadows that were trying their best to eliminate him, he also had to worry about any other dangers that might be present inside the ancient sect.


    One of the things he was worried about, was where the shadows hade from, they had only been created recently through the snakes in the poisonous grass in surrounding the ancient sect outside!


    Bang!


    "Hm?"


    Just at this moment as he knocked another of the shadows flying into the distance, Xuan Hao narrowed both his eyes as he looked towards arge gate that appeared at the edge of his divine sense located in the middle of a paved stone road.


    Even from a distance, Xuan Hao could clearly sense the massive formation that surrounded the area around this gate twisting the space around so one would always end up in front of the gate in the end.


    "Although this formation had its core damaged, it should still have the power to deceive someone in the earlier stages of the Domain Lord Realm¡­ If it was not damaged, I doubt I would have been able to even discover it!" Muttering this to himself as he was careful not to enter the massive formation surrounding the gate, Xuan Hao felt curious about the gate that was located in the middle of this massive formation.


    Even if he was still far away from it, he could still clearly feel that the gate acted as a portal of some sort that was connected to another location inside the ancient sect ruins¡­ n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Is this perhaps the chance to escape the ancient sect ruins that the quest mentioned?


    Thinking this to himself as he looked debated whether or not to enter the massive formation to take a closer look, Xuan Hao continued moving to avoid the shadows surrounding him.


    BOOOOOOM-!


    "This¡­ Looks like I''m going to check out the gate¡­" Feeling a terrifying aura far surpassing even that of the spear of dark blue light that had been thrown after him when he escaped from the group of Soul Ascension Realm Expert suddenly erupting not too far away from him, Xuan Hao didn''t dare waste even a single second as he entered the massive formation before moving towards the gate at the centre of it.


    No matter how bad the situation on the other side of the gate in the centre of the formation was, it would almost certainly be better than having to fight with whatever creature was behind the terrifying aura he had just felt!


    Swish-!


    Not thinking too much after havinge to a decision, Xuan Hao rushed towards the gate located at the centre of the formation¡­

 Chapter 736 Encounter With The Dao Of Corruption!

    Whoosh~!


    Entering the already crumbling ancient formation, Xuan Hao instantly felt the massive formation cantered around the gate trying to influence him to move towards the gate in question. Not that it really even mattered in the first ce as Xuan Hao was already moving towards the gate to escape the terrifying creature heading in his direction¡­


    "Hm? Something is weird about the gate¡­"


    Getting closer to the gate located at the centre of the crumbling formation, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he suddenly came to stop just in front of the gate before the frown slowly disappear from his face before being reced by a shocked expression.


    "The Dao of Corruption¡­?"


    Almost whispering this to himself as his eyes remained focused on the gate now directly in front of him, Xuan Hao easily managed to grasp the faint presence of the Dao of Corruption that lingered around the gate itself.


    Rumble~!


    Just as Xuan Hao was about to investigate the gate more closely, the terrifying creature he had felt from earlier suddenly increased its speed.


    Swish-!


    Not daring to waste anytime to inspect the gate and find out where the familiar presence of the Dao of Corruption hade from, Xuan Hao directly passed through the portal that the gate had been constructed around before feeling space around him twisting like when he had used the ancient teleportation formation. Soon transporting him to apletely different location.


    The only thing he could be sure of, was the fact that he should still be somewhere inside the ancient sect. After all, his quest was notpleted after he passed through the portal and still showed that he had not yet escaped from the ancient sect¡­


    "This ce is indeed rather weird¡­ But first I have to destroy the portal and prevent that creature from following me!"


    Knowing that just passing through the portal would not be able to ensure his safety, Xuan Hao only nced around his weird surroundings before turning his attention back towards the gate built around the portal that had led him to his current location.


    BANG!


    Not holding back in the slightest, Xuan Hao directly attacked the gate that had been covered in thousands upon thousands of demonic looking eyes at some point in time after he had walked through it.


    Using the full power of his domain to forcibly crush the gate and mess up the space around it that kept the portal at its centre stable, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine after all the eyes covering the gate suddenly turned to look at him filled with killing intent-


    Screech!


    Not able to understand what was happening, a loud screeching sound suddenly echoed out from somewhere deeper inside the ce he had just been transported to as the gate with the portal inside of it slowly started cracking apart under the constant attack of his domain from all sides.


    However, a small screeching sound was far from enough to stop Xuan Hao in destroying the portal!


    CRACK!


    BOOOOOM-!


    As the portal and gate filled with demonic eyes was directly crushed by his domain, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief. Understanding that he should have escaped from the terrifying creature on the other side of the portal.


    SCREEEEEEEECH-!


    Listening to the screeching that was far louder and now also carried a clear killing intent with it, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he had a feeling that he had just escaped one dangerous situation to end up in another¡­


    At the very least, it seemed that the creature making the screeching sound was not as powerful as the creature on the other side of the portal and had not yet decided to attack him. That or the creature making the screeching sound was restricted by something and could not attack him at the moment¡­<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided to ignore the screeching in the distance for now as he instead began looking around himself to see where he had ended up.


    "A flower field¡­ No¡­ Its just an illusion¡­" Muttering this to himself as he narrowed both his eyes, Xuan Hao slowly witnessed as the flowers all around him turned into weird tentacle like nts that stretched dozens of meters into the sky. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As for the ground beneath his feet, Xuan Hao slowly saw it turning into a purplish blue colour that looked eerily simr to the corrupted ground he had seen during his time inside the enlightenment space!


    At least I know where the fait aura belonging to the Dao of Corruption came from¡­


    Turning his attention towards the tall tentacle like nts stretching far into the air just a short distance away from him as he thought this, Xuan Hao focused his attention on the miasma that they slowly produced and released into the air around them.


    So, this is where the miasma covering both the ancient sect and the Great Poison Swamp ising from! To think the miasma was actually produced by a weird tentacle nt¡­ But where does the restricting present inside the miasmae from if the miasma is produced here?


    Finding out how the miasma itself was being produced, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he realized that the strange restrictive force that had been inside the miasma both in the ancient sect and the Great Poison Swamp was actually not present inside the miasma currently floating around him!


    On one side, he could now fly without having to worry about getting smashed into the ground, while on the other side, he now had to worry about how the strange restrictive force was merged together with the miasma before it was spread through out the ancient sect ruins and the Great Poison Swamp.


    In the best case scenario, this was done by some sort of ancient formation that had been able to survive until this day with minimal damage having been done to it.


    In the worst-case scenario¡­ The restrictive force was a small part of an ancient cultivator''s intent that had been manually added to the miasma by the cultivator! If that was really the case, then it was almost guaranteed that the ancient cultivator in question should be someone who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm.


    As for why such an expert would stay inside the ruins of an ancient sect¡­ Xuan Hao had no idea, his best guess was that it was for some sort of artifact or to recover in secret without being disturbed by anyone. If that was the case, the miasma, and the defensive mechanisms still active in the ancient sect ruins were more than capable of dealing with any of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the Sky Empire and the surrounding empires without standing out and attracting more powerful cultivators¡­


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he let his thoughts wander while looking at the surrounding corrupted ground, Xuan Hao could not help wondering how all of this was connected to the Dao of Corruption.


    If it truly was an ancient cultivator, was that cultivator someone who practiced the Dao of Corruption? Given what he had seen from the battle shown by the ancient book in the Thousand Wind Pce, Xuan Hao had a feeling that encountering an ancient cultivator proficient in the Dao of Corruption would not be that good of an experience¡­


    "Hm? Someone actually came here before me¡­ And it was actually someone who just recently broke through to the Core Formation Realm!?"


    Constantly scanning his surroundings as he was deep in thought thinking about what to do next, Xuan Hao could not help opening both his eyes in surprise after suddenly noticing the faint remnant aura belonging to someone in the Core Formation Realm leading further inside the corrupted zone he found himself inside of.


    Is this a trap?


    Not able to believe that someone in the Core Formation Realm had actually been able to enter the ancient sect ruins and survive, Xuan Hao was filled with doubt as he approached the faint remnant aura before beginning to inspect it more in-depth.


    However, even after closely inspecting the faint remnant aura, Xuan Hao could not discover anything off about it. All pointing towards the fact that a Core Formation Realm Expert had truly managed to enter ahead of him!


    "This¡­ Did a Core Formation Realm Expert really enter this ce before me? Ah¡­ Did that person perhaps use the ancient teleportation artifact that I used before it was messed with, or perhaps there is more than just one ancient teleportation artifact leading to the ancient sect ruins¡­"


    Filled with disbelief at this realization, Xuan Hao quickly linked the appearance of the Core Formation Realm Expert so deep inside the ancient sect ruins together with the ancient teleportation artifact.


    Indeed, if he could enter the ancient sect through an ancient teleportation artifact, so could others ahead of him!


    Whoosh~!


    Not wasting any time after determining that a Core Formation Realm Expert had indeed entered ahead of him, Xuan Hao jumped into the air and flew in the direction that the Core Formation Realm Expert had moved in.


    Now that he no longer had to worry about the strange restrictive force in the miasma, he could once again use the Drifting Cloud Steps!

 Chapter 737 Mountain Sized Palace!

    At the same time Xuan Hao had passed through the portal leading to therge "flower field" that the young boy in the Core Formation Realm had entered ahead of him, the young boy in question had already made it quite far inside as he came to a stop in front of a massive pce that seemed to reach several hundred meters into the sky.


    Earlier when he had been approaching this massive pce, the young boy had at first thought that it was a mountain given its sheer size. Only when he had made it all the way over to the massive pce did he realize that it was not a mountain¡­


    "Why is there a pce inside a flower field?" Muttering this to himself as he looked up towards the tall towers attached to the pce that pierced through the clouds floating above, the young boy could not help feeling a sense of awe wash over him.


    Even the pce of the strongest ancestor back in his sect did not have a pce the same size as the one in front of him. No¡­ It would be more urate to say that the difference between the two would be the difference between heaven and earth!


    Given that the ancestor in question was someone who had already reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, the young boy slowly realized that the massive pce in front of him had likely belonged to an even more powerful expert in the past¡­ And that would be someone who had surpassed the Domain Lord Realm!


    "This¡­ Should I enter¡­?"


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine after he realized that the massive pce in front of him had likely belonged to an expert who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm in the past, the young boy looked fearfully towards the massive gate of the pce that was wide open.


    If not for the fact that a golden mist was covering the entrance and preventing him from seeing what was inside, the young boy would have likely not been able to stop himself from entering after seeing the many precious artifacts and spiritual herbs that would be present inside the pce of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert.


    "Hah¡­ What am I hesitating for? I have to take this opportunity that has appeared in front of me, who knows¡­ Maybe it will allow me a straight path to the Soul Ascension Realm in the future!"


    Standing around for only a few short seconds as he thought about whether or not to enter, the young boy showed a determined expression on his face before moving towards the golden mist that covered the entrance of the massive pce and prevented him from peeking inside without entering.


    No matter what, the young boy understood just how important the inheritance of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert was. Not to mention the fact that he himself would have a chance at reaching the Soul Ascension Realm. The knowledge contained inside the inheritance of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert would be more than enough for him to use to increase his own status inside his sect slowly over time, while also making sure that the strength of his sect would get even stronger in the future!


    After reaching the Soul Ascension Realm in the future, he would even be able to increase the foundation of his sect even more by recording the entire inheritance he had gained today together with his own Soul Ascension Realm foundation!


    Whoosh~!


    As he felt himself getting immersed in his own desires, aspirations and dreams, the young boy quickly reached the golden mist before easily passing through the golden mist without any problems.


    The resistance that should be present in the golden mist that seemingly acted as a barrier to the massive pce waspletely non-existent!


    "This is!? Truly befitting of a pce that belonged to an Ancient Soul Ascension Realm Expert in the past!"


    However, the young boy didn''t seem to notice any of this, as he was instead filled with awe looking around the inside of the massive pce that was filled with spiritual herbs and powerful artifacts all around him.


    After stepping inside, the young boy even felt his exhaustion disappearing and his dantian fully recover from the strain of having to constantly deal with the poison in miasma on the outside! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Ah! The inheritance! I should get that first in case something happens!"


    Having grabbed close to a dozen precious spiritual herbs and artifacts that a small Core Formation Realm Expert like himself would never be able to get their hands on, the young boy suddenly seemed to remember the most precious thing inside the massive pce.


    Bang~


    Bang~<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Bang~


    Making his way towards the core of the pce with a multitude of precious spiritual herbs and artifacts in his hands that couldn''t fit inside his small interspatial ring, the young boy didn''t even notice when some of the precious spiritual herbs or artifacts fell to the ground. Instead, he focused way more of his attention on grabbing any of the precious spiritual herbs or artifacts that he encountered along the way.


    In the end, the young boy ended up forming a trail of precious spiritual herbs and artifacts behind him as he made his way deeper inside the massive pce. Heading towards the core of the pce filled with greed as he was already imagining himself learning the precious Soul Ascension Realm inheritance and using all the precious spiritual herbs to rapidly increase his cultivation base.


    When I leave this ce after learning the inheritance, I will have reached the Nascent Soul Realm. No¡­ The Domain Lord Realm! Haha! I will be an elder and then the sect master after I break through to the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Not knowing how unrealistic his thoughts were bing along the way as his thoughts became filled with more and more desire to get his hands on the inheritance and rapidly improve his own strength all the way to Domain Lord Realm and directly reach the Soul Ascension Realm soon after, the young boy''s expression slowly started getting twisted as the greedy expression on his face became evident for anyone around to see!


    ¡­


    After the boy had entered the massive pce, Xuan Hao simrly arrived in front of the mountain like pce. The only difference was that instead of the awed expression that the young boy had when he saw the massive pce, Xuan Hao''s expression was filled disgust as he looked at what could only be described as something that came straight out of a nightmare.


    Instead of a pce, what Xuan Hao saw was a massive octopus like creature the size of a small mountain lying dead on the ground with its mouth wide open.


    Filled with a profound sense of dread as he looked towards the weird octopus like creature, Xuan Hao could clearly feel the terrifying remnant aura of the creature that lingered around it.


    "What in the world is this thing¡­ The aura around it¡­ A creature thatprehended the Dao of Corruption¡­?"


    Almost whispering this to himself as he felt the clear presence of the Dao of Corruption that had imbued itself inside the aura and body of the dead creature in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help looking at the corrupted ground all around him.


    So¡­ The corrupted ground and the miasma covering both the ancient sect ruins and the Great Poison Swamp is a result of this dead body¡­?


    Coming to this realization, Xuan Hao could not help shivering as he wondered just what realm the octopus like creature in front of him had reached when it had still been alive.


    Had it reached the realm above the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ Or had it gone even beyond that¡­? Xuan Hao had no idea, but one thing was for certain¡­ The creature in front of him had definitely surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm when it had still been alive!


    But¡­ Howe the Core Formation Realm Expert entered the mouth of this creature. Even if this creature has been dead for a long time, the remnant aura merged together with the Dao of Corruption is more than enough to pose a threat to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, let alone someone in the Core Formation Realm¡­ Does he perhaps have a death wish?


    Thinking this to himself as he looked at the remnant aura left behind by the Core Formation Realm Expert leading towards the mouth of the mountain sized corpse in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling confused as to what the Core Formation Realm Expert was thinking when entering the mouth of such a terrifying creature.


    If he did not have a death wish, then what was it?


    Whoosh~!


    Not thinking about the reason for the Core Formation Realm Expert''s decision for too long, Xuan Hao decided to follow after him and find out.


    Even if the remnant aura of the mountain sized creature fused together with the Dao of Corruption would pose a threat to a normal Soul Ascension Realm Expert, this was not the case for Xuan Hao who had alreadyprehend part of the Dao of Corruption!

 Chapter 738 Ancestor Of The Feather Kingdom

    Whoosh~!


    Passing through the thin ck veil that seemed to cover the mouth of the long dead mountain sized creature, Xuan Hao spread out both his divine sense and domain to their limit to be ready for a fight at any moment.


    Even if the mountain sized creature had already been dead for thousands upon thousands of years at this point in time, the Dao of Corruption could give birth to all kinds of strange lifeforms when the presence of the dao was strong enough in a certain area.


    Although Xuan Hao had only witnessed this once during his time in the enlightenment space, Xuan Hao still remembered those terrifying creatures wandering the endless corruptednd inside the enlightenment space for the Dao of Corruption!


    Roar-!


    Not long after he had passed through the ck veil that covered the mouth of the long dead mountain sized creature, a roar echoed out from deeper inside the body. Confirming the fact that the presence of the Dao of Corruption was strong enough for it to start forming the strange and horrifying creatures he had seen back during his time in the enlightenment space¡­


    "Looks like I will have to be careful when making my way deeper inside- Hm? Why is there a trail of body parts going in the same direction as that Core Formation Realm cultivator¡­?"


    Narrowing both his eyes after hearing the roaring from deeper inside the body of the dead creature, Xuan Hao could not help freezing for a few seconds after discovering a trail made up of all sorts of different body parts belonging to creatures of different races and the aura of the Core Formation Realm Expert both moving inside towards the core of the mountain sized dead body.


    Given how old the body parts were, it was a bit weird for them to still be intact after such a long period of time. However after a quick scan with his divine sense, Xuan Hao discovered that most of the body parts belonged to cultivators who had at most reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, while the weakest had not even reached the Core Formation Realm!


    From this alone, it was obvious that the body parts all over the ce and the trail leading further inside the body of the mountain sized creature were new. Maybe they even belonged to cultivators in a simr situation as the Core Formation Realm cultivator that had ended up inside the mountain sized dead body!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help thinking about the roar he had heard just a few seconds ago. Although he could not tell the strength of the creature just from the roar alone, it was obvious that it had something to do with the body parts all over the ground. Perhaps it was even responsible for making the trail of body parts to lure in people like the Core Formation Realm Expert who had moved along the trail to go further inside the body towards the origin of the roar¡­


    Maybe the Core Formation Realm Expert already reached the core of the dead body and is about to get eaten by the creature formed by the Dao of Corruption inside!


    Swish-!


    Not wasting any time as he began following the trail of body parts further inside after this though appeared, Xuan Hao really did not want to see the Core Formation realm Expert who had entered this ce ahead of him to die.


    The reason for this was not one out of simple good will, but was more due to the fact that he was really interested in finding out how the Core Formation Realm Expert had entered the Ancient Sect Ruins in the first ce¡­ If he was lucky, he might be able to get some idea about how to leave and get out of the ancient sect ruins alive!


    After all, even if he had escaped from the terrifying creature that had suddenly appeared together with the shadows and his situation did not look dangerous on the surface, Xuan Hao understood very well that it was only a matter of time before the terrifying creature and the shadows managed to find a way to enter the ce he was currently hiding inside of!


    ¡­


    BOOOOM-!


    At the same time Xuan Hao was stuck inside the ancient sect ruins and one of his disciples was still struggling to find his way back outside the mysterious realm he had found himself inside of, a massive battle was taking ce between the soldiers of the Feather kingdom and the Star Shattering Sect.


    The Feather Kingdom was one of the kingdoms that had bordered the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the past and could only be said to be slightly stronger whenpared to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom during its prime.


    After the Star Shattering Sect started rapidly expanding over the past few weeks, the Feather Kingdom was inevitably one of the first to meet with the Star Shattering Sect as it tried expanding the territory under its control.<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Normally, this would not have been a problem, as a kingdom at the size of the Feather Kingdom would have no way to resist against a terrifying sect like the Star Shattering Sect that had multiple experts in the Domain Lord Realm¡­ But something thatpletely changed the situation happened- The ancestor of the Feather Kingdom broke through to the Domain Lord Realm! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    It didn''t matter whether it was the Star Shattering Sect or the surrounding kingdoms that were watching this battle from the side. Everyone had been caughtpletely off guard by the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    However, this onlysted for a short moment, as Shu Yao ended up taking action to supress the other party.


    Although both of them had reached the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Shu Yao had far more experience and quickly managed to gain the upper hand in the battle¡­ But the destruction brought along by a battle between two Domain Lords was simply not something that the people living at the border region at the Sky Empire had witnessed before!


    Although the battle onlysted for a few minutes before Shu Yao managed to supress the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom, the destruction caused by the short battle had ended up destroying close to 10 percent of the Feather Kingdom and killed an uncountable number of people who had no way to resist the remnant power of two Domain Lord Realm Experts shing with each other!


    ¡­


    "ARGH! I FINNALY REACHED THE DOMAIN LORD REALM, YET I''M ABOUT TO DIE LIKE THIS!?"


    In the air above arge deste in, the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom screamed loudly before looking towards the figure floating in the air not too far away from him filled with killing intent.


    "You chose this yourself! Don''t forget that we gave your Feather Kingdom the option to surrender, but you decided to start massacring the disciples of my Star Shattering Sect the moment you had broken through to the Domain Lord Realm!"


    Frowning as both her eyes narrowed with killing intent, Shu Yao did not feel the slightest bit of pity towards the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom in front of her.


    Even before they had attacked the Feather Kingdom, Elder Song had already proposed several different ways to solve the matter without having to go to war. From the Feather Kingdom bing a subordinate power to them getting a few years to leave and take what they wanted with them to start a new kingdom somewhere else, Elder Song had tried all sorts of different options before it was decided that they would go to war with the Feather Kingdom for their territory.


    At first, Shu Yao who was put in charge of the offensive against the Feather Kingdom had been confused as to why the Feather Kingdom had refused to surrender time and again no matter what¡­ But when she realized that the ancestor of the Feather Sky Kingdom had actually reached the Domain Lord Realm, she understood why.


    Even if he had just recently broken through to the Domain Lord Realm, he felt he was strong enough to resist the Star Shattering Sect''s current expansion into his kingdom''s territory and was even arrogant enough to start massacring the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect the moment he appeared.


    Thinking that the Star Shattering Sect would not want to offend someone in the Domain Lord Realm over him killing a few disciples¡­ Of course, he did not take into ount the fact that Shu Yao would suddenly appear and almost instantly supress him. Even worse, her cultivation base was actually the same as his own!


    "DAMN YOU-"


    FWOOSH-!


    Not wanting to drag things out with the already exhausted ancestor of the Feather Kingdom, Shu Yao directly created a massive fire lotus that quickly flew over and engulfed the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom before he had any time to react!


    "AHHHHhhh-!"


    Not able to resist the mes of the lotus fire with his domain for more than a few seconds, the ancestor of the Feather Kingdoms body and soul were directly reduced to ash!


    The ancestor of the Feather Kingdom, A First stage Domain Lord Realm Expert, had died at the hands of Shu Yao... Thus marking the end of the war with the Feather Kingdom and signalling the true beginning of the Star Shattering Sects expansion to the surrounding kingdoms and sects!

 Chapter 739 Creature Born Through The Dao Of Corruption

    Continuing further inside the dead body of the mountain sized creature, Xuan Hao could not helping to a stop when he reached the core of the body where the roar from the creature formed by the Dao of Corruption had originated from.


    "This is... The Core Formation Realm Cultivator...?"


    Not too far away from him, Xuan Hao speechlessly looked towards the Core Formation Realm Expert he had been tracking ever since passing through the gate covered in demonic eyes.


    "Hahaha! The inheritance! Its mine! Haha!"


    At this moment, the Core Formation Realm Expert in question, wasughing to himself filled with joy in front of arge heart in front of him, a small mountain of the body parts he had seen on his way over was ced next to him.


    Does the Dao of Corruption have some kind of mind altering effects on those too weak to resist it...?


    Not knowing what to say after seeing the weird behaviour of the Core Formation Realm Expert as he began bowing towards the long dead heart of the mountain sized creature while respectfully calling the dead heart master, Xuan Hao instead began focusing his attention on the roar he had heard when he had first entered the dead body.


    No matter how much he wanted to approach the Core Formation Realm Expert to find out just what was happening for him to have started calling a dead heart master, Xuan Hao still understood that it was more important for him to find the creature created by the Dao of Corruption hidden somewhere inside the dead body.


    Whoosh~!


    As he focused all his attention on his divine sense to search for the creature that had been born through the Dao of Corruption, Xuan Hao made sure to imbue some aspects belonging to the Dao of Corruption that he had learnt during his time in the enlightenment space.


    Although the aspects he attached to his divine sense did not strengthen his divine sense, it still helped it easily pass through the almost invisible miasma that had manifested after the presence of the Dao of Corruption grew strong enough.


    ROOOAR-!


    Not even a second after his divine sense spread out and covered the dead heart, the familiar roar echoed out across the hollowed out part of the dead body that the heart was located inside of.


    Riiiip~!


    Followed by a loud ripping sound, Xuan Hao narrowed both his eyes as he watched arge w ripping open the dead heart before arge creature slowly crawled out while staring directly towards him filled with killing intent.


    "Ahh~! Master! Great Immortal Master, please enlighten this little one!"


    Roar?


    Hearing the young Core Formation Realm Expert calling out to it the moment it crawled out of the heart; the creature showed an expression of confusion as it looked towards the young Core Formation Realm Expert already prostrating on the ground towards it filled with respect.


    Swish-!


    Not wasting this chance that the young Core Formation Realm Expert had unknowingly given him by distracting the creature that had crawled out from the dead heart, Xuan Hao used the Drifting Cloud Steps to instantly close the distance between himself and the creature born through the Dao of Corruption before shing down towards it.


    Ptsh-!


    Not having any time to protect itself from the sudden attack other than raise its arms up to block the sword shing down towards it, the creature felt its arms getting cleanly cut off before the power contained inside the sword exploded with full force-


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    ROOOOOOAR!


    Only able to let out a roar filled with pain; the creature managed to survive the impact before it was sent flying into fleshy walls that surrounded them-


    Bang-!


    However, although the creature they were inside of had long been dead, the power residing inside its dead body was still terrifying, causing the creature Xuan Hao had knocked flying to only barely pass through the fleshy wall that surrounded the hollow space that the dead heart was located inside of and entering another of the mountain sized dead creature''s organs.


    Swish-!


    Not even sparring a nce towards the Core Formation Realm Expert on who had been lucky enough to survive due to all the power of his attack being focused on the creature born through the Dao of Corruption, Xuan Hao directly used the Drifting Cloud Steps as he followed after the creature. Not intending to give it a chance to recover from the injurie he had just inflicted.


    Even if it was just for a moment, Xuan Hao had already realized that the aura around the creature had already reached the Soul Ascension. If he gave it a chance to recover, he might end up being the one getting killed!


    ...


    Following the Soul Ascension Realm Creature, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both his eyes as he looked down towards what could only be described as a massiveke filled with some sort of bobbling green liquid.<novelnext> </novelnext>


    This is... The stomach!?


    Feeling a profound terror when looking down towards the bobbling green liquid below him, Xuan Hao could clearly feel that he would not be able to survive for more than a few seconds if he fell into theke below.


    ROOOOAR-!


    As if to confirm his fear, the Soul Ascension Realm Creature that he had knocked flying emerged from the bobbling green liquid with half its body gone and the rest of it slowly dissolving due to some of the green liquid still being present on its body.


    Swish-!


    Dashing forward beforeunching another attack after having recovered from the shock of seeing the terrifying effect of the green liquid below, Xuan Hao did not intend to kill the creature on his own but was instead trying to knock the creature back into the green liquid below. After all, why bother fighting a long and exhausting battle with a Soul Ascension Realm creature born through the Dao of Corruption, when he could just use the stomach acid of the long dead mountain sized octopus like creature to kill it...


    BANG-!


    Manging to react this time around, the creature used its ws to block Xuan Hao''s sword-


    Whoosh~!


    But in the end, both of them were knocked back by the impact of the sh, Xuan Hao being knocked into the fleshy walls of what remained of the stomach, while the Soul Ascension Realm creature was once again sent flying into the green liquid below-


    Ssh~!


    RoOOOoooAaaaAAaAR!


    Hearing the pained roaring from below him, Xuan Hao quickly floated down before hovering in the air above the ce where the creature had fallen into the green liquidke. Intending to knock it back down the moment it tried to escape!


    Bang!


    Ssh~


    Not even having to wait for more than a few seconds before this happened, Xuan Hao ended up knocking the Soul Ascension Realm Creature back into the green liquidke once again-


    Roaaaaar-!


    Causing yet another pained roar to echo out across the normally quiet interior of the mountain sized dead body.


    ...


    R-r-rooaar...


    Listening as the roaring from the creature slowly stopped as its body finally couldn''t keep recovering in the green liquid, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief as he felt a hint of fear when looking down towards the terrifyingke below him.


    At this point in time, he had begun to understand just how powerful the mountain sized dead creature had been when it was still alive. Even after countless years had passed, what little remained of its stomach acid still had enough power to dissolve a Soul Ascension Realm Expert!


    Just how powerful was this creature when it was still alive? The realm above the Soul Ascension Realm... Or maybe even above that!


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao realized just how weak he was whenpared to the ancient creature. Even if he reached the Soul Ascension Realm, he would mostly not stand a chance against the mountain sized octopus like creature when it had still been alive!


    Not to mention, the mountain sized octopus like creature had still been killed in the end!


    I still have a long way to go before I can consider myself safe in this world... I should focus on reaching the Soul Ascension Realm as soon as possible and see if there is a way to help my disciples increase their strength faster!


    Narrowing his eyes as he felt an unknown sense of pressure when faced with the mountain sized ancient creature that had long since died, Xuan Hao felt more determined than ever to break through and reach the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even if he would not be able to face a creature like the one, he was currently inside of. At the very least he would feel confident in staying safe inside the borders of the Sky Empire!


    Whoosh~! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not staying around the dangerouske of green liquid inside the stomach for much longer after having confirmed that the creature had dissolved and waspletely dead, Xuan Hao made his way back towards the hollowed out space where the Core Formation Realm Expert was located.

 Chapter 740 A Path To Escaping!

    Shortly after Xuan Hao had begun his fight with the creature that had crawled out from the dead heart located at the centre of the small hollowed out part of the mountain sized dead creature, the young boy in the Core Formation Realm slowly got back up as he looked around himself filled with horror.


    "Wha-what is this ce!?"


    Almost screaming this to himself as he looked at the dead heart in front of him and the mountain of body parts next to him, the young boy could notprehend where the precious spiritual herbs, artifacts and the Soul Ascension Realm inheritance had gone.


    BOOOM-!


    ROOOOAR!


    Jus at this moment as he was looking around himself trying toprehend what had happened to him, a loud explosion followed by a roar filled with killing intent echoed out from a hole in the fleshy wall not too far away from him.


    Even if it was just for an instant after hearing the roar filled with killing intent, the young boy clearly understood that the one responsible for the roar was far stronger than him!


    I... I have to get out of here!


    Still not knowing how he had ended up in his current location, the young boy could only think about getting away from the dead heart and the fighting that was taking ce not too far away from him. Not wanting to get caught up in the battle that should be between a powerful cultivator and a demon beast.


    Whoosh-!


    Ignoring the fact that he had been covered in blood from head to toe at some point, the young boy made his way towards the entrance to hollowed out space with the dead heart inside of it.


    Just where did I end up...


    Still filled with fear as he cautiously made his way through the weird tunnels covered in flesh all around him, the young boy could not help shivering in fear as he finally reached arge wall made of ck miasma


    "This should be the way out..." Muttering this to himself as he encouraged himself that he was on the right path, the young boy ignored the dead body parts on the ground all around him as he passed through the wall of ck miasma-


    "Ahhh-!"


    Not even a secondter, the fearful scream of the young boy echoed out across the corruptednd all around him, as he saw the mountain sized dead body who''s mouth he had just walked out of!


    ...


    "Hm? It seems like the Core Formation Realm Expert managed to break the illusion created by the Dao of Corruption..."


    Arriving back inside the hollowed-out space where the dead heart was located after having killed the Soul Ascension Realm creature that had been born through the Dao of Corruption, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after realizing that the Core Formation Realm Expert had disappeared.


    All things considered, the fact that the Core Formation Realm Expert had managed to break through the illusion he had been trapped inside of, was most likely due to the fact that the presence of the Dao of Corruption around him had been pushed back for a short moment when Xuan Hao had first knocked the Soul Ascension Realm creature into what had once been the stomach of the mountain sized dead creature...


    In any case, it would be easy for him to catch up with a little Core Formation Realm Expert with his current cultivation realm.


    Swoosh-!


    Having locked on to the trail left behind by the Core Formation Realm Expert, Xuan Hao did not waste any time as he chased after him. Soon finding himself back outside the mountain sized dead body he had been inside of, with the Core Formation Realm Expert he had been searching for having fallen to the ground with a face full of fear while looking up towards the mountain sized creature.


    Even from a nce, it was obvious to Xuan Hao that the Core Formation Realm Expert should not know about the fact that he had willingly entered the dead creature''s mouth just a few minutes earlier...


    I should calm him down and see if I can find out how he entered the ancient sect ruins...


    Swish~


    Thump!


    Landing on the ground beside the young boy who had still not noticed him at this point in time, Xuan Hao felt somewhat surprised over the fact that the Core Formation Realm Expert he was searching for was only a young boy that looked no older than twenty or so years old.


    "Hello, mind if I ask a few questions?"


    Calling out to the young boy who had still not noticed him, Xuan Hao silently mobilized his domain to protect from the miasma slowly entering and poisoning his body. Even if the miasma was not any threat to Xuan Hao, it still posed a certain threat to someone in the Core Formation realm and would force them to spend most of their energy on trying to keep the miasma from entering their body and killing them.


    "Ah!?"<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Not noticing Xuan Hao who had suddenly appeared beside him, the young boy cried out in shock before turning to look towards Xuan Hao with a fearful expression on his face.


    "Not a demon beast... What do you want to know...?


    Only after realizing that Xuan Hao was not a demon beast and didn''t seem to be hostile towards him, did the young boy start calming down a little... Of course, he was not fully trusting towards the person who had suddenly appeared beside him and was still prepared to fight in case Xuan Hao decided to attack him.


    Not that he would have much of a chance considering how much weaker than Xuan Hao he was...


    Whoosh~!


    "I want to ask you how you managed to enter the ancient ruins!"


    Not wanting to waste time trying to convince the young Core Formation Realm Expert to tell him how he ended up inside the ancient sect ruins, Xuan Hao decided to fully release his aura as a Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert when asking.


    "This-"


    Feeling the terrifying power that suddenly exploded out from Xuan Hao''s body before it started to engulf him, the young boy understood full well that the other party could easily kill him and he would not have any chance to resist!


    Even the sect master is not this scary... Is this person perhaps someone in the Soul Ascension Realm!?


    Taking a deep breath as he thought about this, the young boy could not stop his body from trembling when faced with someone who was even stronger than his sect master.


    "So?"


    "I-I remember entering the forest of poisonous devil trees on the border between the inner and outer region of the Great Poison Swamp when-"


    Hearing Xuan Hao''s voice once again, the young boy did not waste any time before he began talking about how he had ended up in his current location. From the Devil Bugs he had encountered while entering the forest of poisonous devil trees, to the sudden teleportation to a ce filled with the corpses of over a dozen Domain Lord Realm demon beast and all the way to him following a strange light that suddenly resulted in him being teleported once again.


    "-After passing through the golden mist, I then made my way to the core of the pce to get my hands on the inheritance... But just when I was about to receive the inheritance from the immortal spirit left behind by the past owner of the pce, I was teleported inside... That thing..."


    ncing back up towards the mountain sized dead body filled with fear after he finished exining how he had ended up in his current situation, the young boy soon looked away before waiting for Xuan Hao to respond.


    All things considered; the young boy understood very well that his only way out of his current situation alive would be to get the expert in front of him to help him out.


    Without anyone''s help... The young boy doubted he would be able to leave whatever horrifying ce he now found himself inside of alive!


    "Hm..."


    Frowning to himself as he thought about what the young boy had told him, Xuan Hao had already realized that the young boy should have entered the ancient teleportation artifact he had also entered the ancient sect ruins through.


    The only difference between the way they had entered, was that the young boy should have entered the ancient teleportation artifact before him. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Wait... If he could enter the teleportation artifact before me, does that not mean the ancient teleportation artifact can be used more than once!?


    Feeling like another headache outside of the shadows and the terrifying creature he had encountered back inside the ancient sect itself was about to pop up in the form of a group of Soul Ascension Realm Experts, Xuan Hao felt more determined than ever to leave the ancient sect ruins as quickly as possible.


    At the very least he now had a clue from talking with the young boy, the room he had appeared in!


    Although the description given by the young boy of the room was not something he himself understood, Xuan Hao realized that the ancient symbols he had seen were most likely a teleportation formation of some sort that could be used to teleport someone back out of the ancient sect ruins again!


    [Side Quest: Escape, Updated!]


    [Description: Explore the ruins of the long-forgotten sect in front of you and look for a way to escape before dying. NEW: The ancient teleportation artifact that was used to enter the ancient sect ruins was anchored to a greater teleportation formation. Using the greater teleportation formation will allow you to connect with other teleportation artifacts outside the sect and use them to escape.]


    As if to confirm his train of thought, the description of the quest changed. Showing that he would indeed be able to escape through the room that the young boy had appeared in when he first arrived at the ancient sect ruins!


    Now the question became... How was he going to find the room with the greater teleportation formation after he had destroyed the gate back to the ancient sect in an attempt to prevent the shadows and terrifying creature from chasing after him...?

 Chapter 741 Greater Teleportation Formation

    Lost in thought as he was thinking about how to return back to the ancient sect to look for the greater teleportation formation, Xuan Hao could not help smiling happily as he suddenly saw two shadows appearing in the distance.


    "Looks like I don''t have to worry about finding a way back to the ancient sect ruins anymore¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the two shadows rapidly approaching him, Xuan Hao understood very well that their appearance meant they had managed to find another way inside the cursednd. Outside of the portal he had destroyed.


    For this reason alone, Xuan Hao did not feel the slightest bit unhappy over the fact that there was a high chance that he would soon be swarmed by the shadows once again.


    "Ehm¡­ Senior, there is something approaching from over there¡­"


    Hearing the sound of someone calling out beside him all of a sudden, Xuan Hao turned towards the young boy who had been quietly standing next to him without saying anything after he had finished his exnation of how he got into the ancient sect ruins.


    Hm¡­ Even if I reach the ancient sect ruins again, I will still have to find the greater teleportation formation, without any help, I probably won''t be able to find it before I either get overwhelmed by the shadows or the terrifying creature that appeared just before I escaped to this ce¡­


    Swoosh~!


    Grabbing hold of the young boy before jumping into the air, Xuan Hao looked towards the two shadows approaching them. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "S-senior?"


    Suddenly feeling himself getting lifted into the air, the young boy shivered all over before looking towards Xuan Hao with a confused expression on his face. Not understanding what was happening.


    "We are going to return to the ancient sect ruins and when we do, you will have to do your best to try and remember the location of the room that you first appeared in. After all, we likely won''t have a lot of time to find it after we reach the ancient sect ruins¡­"


    Swish-!


    Not wating any time after having said this to the young boy, Xuan Hao carried him along as he flew in the direction of the two shadows that were approaching them-


    Swoosh~


    Not bothering to waste time fighting with them as that would only end up giving more time for other shadows to show up, Xuan Hao instead used the Drifting Cloud Steps to easily move past them. Compared to back in the ancient sect ruins where the Drifting Cloud Steps was restricted, Xuan Hao had a far easier time avoiding the shadows this time around.


    Hisss~?


    Hisss¡­


    Not expecting for Xuan Hao to pass them so easily before moving in the direction they hade from, the two shadows momentarily froze mid-air for a few seconds before slowly turning around and chasing after Xuan Hao who had already long since disappeared at this point in time.


    ¡­


    Having already left the two shadows far behind at this point in time, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief after spotting a familiar looking gate in the distance.


    I wonder where this one leads inside the ancient sect ruins. Hopefully somewhere close to where the other gate was located¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he approached the gate, Xuan Hao nced down towards the young boy who was currently fully focused on trying to recall everything about the area around the greater teleportation formation he had entered the ancient sect ruins through.


    Even if he managed to find his way back to where the gate he had destroyed was located, the most important factor in escaping from the ancient sect ruins was still relying on the fact that the young boy would be able to remember the location of the greater teleportation formation.


    Whoosh~!


    Entering the gate and passing through the portal without any difficulties a few secondster, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both his eyes as his divine sense swept out to scan everything around him to get a better idea of where he was.


    In the end, he could only shake his head upon realizing that he did not recognize the buildings within the scope of his divine sense. Meaning that he had ended up somewherepletely different inside the massive ancient sect the size of the past Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Given that his divine sense could only cover a few thousand meters around him, Xuan Hao understood very well how difficult it would be for him to search through the entire sect for the location of the greater teleportation formation.


    Not to mention, he would have to do this before the shadows or the far more terrifying creature that he had felt approaching before escaping through the gate leading to the corruptednd, caught up to him!


    "S-senior¡­"


    "Is there something?"<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Hearing the voice of the young boy nervously calling out to him as he was trying to look for anything that could help him with finding out what direction to move in through his divine sense, Xuan Hao curiously turned towards the young boy.


    "Y-yes¡­ T-the pavilion over there I remember walking by it just after I left the room that I was teleported to¡­ I think the room I found myself inside of should not be too far away from here!"


    "Great! Let''s get going!"


    Swish-!


    Feeling a wave of excitement rush through him after hearing what the young boy said, Xuan Hao didn''t dare waste any time as he grabbed the young boy and moved to the pavilion he had pointed towards.


    "Now where!?"


    "T-this- S-senior¡­ Please give me a second!" Feeling like the world around him was spinning from suddenly getting picked up and moved in front of the pavilion, the young boy tried his best to calm down before beginning to inspect his surroundings for any clue that might help him remembering what direction the room with the greater teleportation was located.


    "This way! I remember passing by the tower over there around 10 or so minutes after I left the room I got teleported into, as long as you follow the road over there, we should be able to reach the room where I first appeared after getting teleported into the ancient sect ruins!"


    "So, we should find it as long as we follow the road here¡­"


    Hearing what the young boy said as he looked towards the tower before ncing down at the road located beside the massive tower-


    Swish-!


    Not wasting any time after having determined what direction to move in, Xuan Hao picked up the young boy before using a movement technique different from the Drifting Cloud Step to move along the road that the young boy had told him to follow¡­


    This should be it!


    Coming to a stop only a few secondster in front of a small house, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both his eyes upon feeling the stability of space around him having reached a level where it was impossible for him to disrupt it.


    "This is it!"


    As if to confirm what he was thinking, the young boy quickly eximed with a look of surprise on his face when looking towards the small house he had escaped from only a few hours earlier.


    So, this really is the ce where the greater teleportation formation mentioned by the system is located¡­


    Creak~!


    Entering the room without waiting for the young boy to catch up after having confirmed that the small house was really the ce where the greater teleportation formation was located, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on the spot after stepping inside and seeing the countlessplex and ancient symbols covering the walls, floor and ceiling of the small room inside the house.


    Whoosh-!


    However, he was quickly brought back to reality, as a shadowy figure inside the room dashed towards him filled with killing intent-


    Bang!


    Of course, the shadowy figure was far weaker than the shadows he had encountered, so it was easily dealt with by his domain before it managed to do any damage to the surrounding formation.


    Hm¡­ I might have alerted the surrounding shadows with this¡­


    Frowning as he looked towards the pile of dead snakes that was left behind, Xuan Hao quickly turned his attention towards the formation symbols all around him as he began trying to figure out how to use the greater teleportation formation.


    "Ah!? This is¡­"


    Entering the room just after Xuan Hao had dealt with the shadowy figure, the young boy could not help eximing in surprise upon seeing the pile of dead snakes.


    The senior dealt with these scary snakes so easily, I wonder how strong he is¡­ Perhaps he really is someone who has reached the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Filled with both fear and awe as he thought about this, the young boy quietly sat down at the ground as he watched Xuan Hao moving around the room while inspecting the different ancient symbols all over the ce. The miasma that had made it hard for him to see the room in the past already having grown far thinner under the influence of Xuan Hao''s domain.

 Chapter 742 Small Dark Vortex

    This formation is far moreplicated than expected...


    Looking over the wall in front of him covered in ancient symbols that glowed dimly beneath the thin miasma floating around the room, Xuan Hao could only give up trying to take control of the greater teleportation formation with his current understanding of formations. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    At the moment, the only thing he could barely do with his current understanding of the greater teleportation formation, was sacrifice close to half of the qi that he had stored up inside his dantian to get the greater teleportation formation to activate and teleport them somewhere outside the ancient sect ruins.


    Although this method was not preferred due to it cing him and the young boy in a random location outside the ancient sect ruins that was connected to the greater teleportation formation, Xuan Hao preferred this over staying inside the ancient sect ruins and risk getting caught by the terrifying creature he had already encountered once.


    As for the matter of sacrificing half the qi stored up inside his dantian... It was not something Xuan Hao thought too much about, as it would only take a short time for Xuan Hao to recover this qi with his current cultivation realm.


    ROOOOAR-!


    "Looks like its time to get going..."


    Hearing an all too familiar roar echo out across the ancient sect ruins followed by a terrifying aura washing over him, Xuan Hao didn''t hesitate any longer and directly injected his qi into the greater teleportation formation-


    Whoosh-!


    Instantly causing all the ancient symbols covering the walls, floor, and ceiling of the room to light up with a dark yellow light. Momentarily blinding the young boy who had been looking straight at one of the ancient symbols when they suddenly lit up.


    "Ahhh-!"


    Ignoring the scream of the young boy, who might have be the first Core Formation Realm Expert to get blinded by formation symbol, Xuan Hao focused on guiding the ancient symbols to form a small gate in the centre of the room.


    Swish-!


    Knowing that time was limited after the small gate had formed, Xuan Hao didn''t bother saying anything to the young boy, as he grabbed hold of him and dragged him into the small gate before it had time to close.


    ROOOOAR--!


    Only a second after the gate had disappeared together with Xuan Hao and the young boy, did a loud roar echo out just outside the small house. Followed by the sound of something massive descending from above towards the small house-


    BOOOM-!


    Before the sound of the roar ended, arge w broke through the thick miasma outside andnd on the small house with the greater teleportation formation inside of it. Instantly destroying both the small house and the greater teleportation formation!


    ...


    That was close...


    Letting out a sigh of relief as he looked back towards the gate that had been formed by the greater teleportation formation quickly disappearing behind, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine after remembering the terrifying aura he had felt engulfing him just before he passed through the gate created by the greater teleportation formation.


    Even if he had no idea what happened after he left, Xuan Hao was almost certain that he would have ended up dead if he had stayed for even a second longer!


    "But the miasma is still around... Did we really leave the ancient sect ruins?" Muttering this as he slowly started inspecting his surroundings, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit worried after seeing the miasma all around him.


    Even if the miasma was not only inside the ancient sect ruins and could also be found inside the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao was not a hundred percent certain that the greater teleportation formation had worked like he had thought it would. After all, the greater teleportation formation was an ancient formation that was far above his current understanding of formations, the fact that he could even get it to send him to a random location could be considered an aplishment far beyond his skill level...


    Ah! Can''t I just check and see if the side quest waspleted?


    [Side Quest: Escape (Complete)]


    [Description: Explore the ruins of the long-forgotten sect in front of you and look for a way to escape before dying. The ancient teleportation artifact that was used to enter the ancient sect ruins was anchored to a greater teleportation formation. Using the greater teleportation formation will allow you to connect with other teleportation artifacts outside the sect and use them to escape.]


    [Reward: Staying alive, Great Poison Scripture]<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Having remembered the side quest he had gotten, Xuan Hao quickly pulled up the system interface and was happy to see that the side quest had indeed beenpleted. Meaning that he had indeed been teleported to somewhere outside the ancient sect ruins!


    [Redeem reward: Y/N]


    Yes!


    Not thinking too much about the reward as he just nned to put away the Great Poison Scripture before making his way out of the Great Poison Swamp as quickly as possible, Xuan Hao was surprised to suddenly feel a small dark vortex of qi appearing inside his dantian


    "This-!?"


    Fwoosh-!


    Before even having a chance to react to what was happening inside his dantian, a small wisp of pure qi manifested inside his dantian before exterminating the small dark vortex of qi that had suddenly appeared.


    Whoosh~


    Not even having the time to react to what was happening inside his dantian before everything was over, Xuan Hao could only sit down on the ground with a surprised expression on his face as a small book with the words [Great Poison Scripture] written on top of it manifested in front of him.


    "What was that...?"


    Almost whispering this to himself as he went over what had just happened, Xuan Hao could not help looking towards the book floating in the air in front of him.


    This... Was the staying alive reward mentioned by the system perhaps not rted to the ancient sect ruins, but instead the small dark vortex of qi hidden inside my dantian? Now that I think about, since when did that dark vortex of qi appear inside my dantian? Is it from the terrifying creature in the ancient sect ruins... Or maybe even earlier than that...


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he thought about the small dark vortex of qi having been hidden inside his dantian, Xuan Hao understood full well how dangerous such a thing was.


    Even if the power of the small dark vortex of qi was not too strongpared to the massive vortex that had formed at the centre of his dantian after his two domains had merged together, the small dark vortex of qi could still end up costing him his life if it suddenly exploded while he was breaking through or during a life and death battle with someone equal to himself in strength!


    Whoosh~


    Putting the [Great Poison Scripture] into his interspatial ring before slowly standing up again, Xuan Hao tried his best to recall any circumstances that could have resulted in the small dark vortex of qi appearing inside his dantian. Among which, he felt that his visit to the ancient seal below the ruins of the Raging me Sect when he had first reached the Domain Lord Realm also had a very high probability for being the reason why the small dark vortex appeared inside his dantian.


    At the very least, given the strength of the being sealed away by the ancient seal, Xuan Hao did not find it unlikely for it to be able to imnt the small vortex inside his dantian. The only question left to be answered if that was really the case would be why? Did the small dark vortex perhaps have some other use after it grew stronger?


    But... If it really is rted to my visit to the ancient seal back then, it is possible that the ancient seal has already started breaking. The reason I couldn''t see anything wrong with the ancient seal is possibly due to the fact that my cultivation is still far too weak to see the true essence of the ancient seal!


    "Haaa..."


    After reaching the Soul Ascension Realm in the future, I will go back to investigate the ancient seal and see if I can find out more...


    Feeling like things were slowly starting to getplicated, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh before shaking his head and deciding to throw the matter to the back of his mind for now.


    All things considered; he was still far too weak to begin investigating the matter of the ancient seal...


    "S-senior... W-where is this? Did we leave the ancient sect ruins!?"


    Just at this moment, Xuan Hao heard the voice of the young boy who had remained frozen in shock for the past few second after he had dragged him through the gate formed by the greater teleportation formation.


    "We have- Hm?"


    Looking towards the young boy, Xuan Hao was just about to answer him when he suddenly felt a familiar presence appearing at the edge of his divine sense!

 Chapter 743 Half Dead Soul Ascension Realm Expert

    One of the Soul Ascension Realm Expert from earlier¡­


    Observing the Soul Ascension Realm Expert that had appeared at the edge of his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help frowning after discovering that the Soul Ascension Realm Expert did not seem to have noticed him as he continued moving in his direction.


    This¡­


    As the Soul Ascension Realm Expert got closer, Xuan Hao could not help showing an expression of surprise.


    Not only was the Soul Ascension Realm Expert in a horrible state with only half his body left intact, but over half of what remained of his body had already been covered by some sort of ck spot that was spreading to what remained of the body. Given another few minutes, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert would most likely be forced to abandon his body!


    Even if the Soul Ascension Realm Expert could survive, losing his body was sure to be a major blow that would result in him having to waste thousands of years recovering the damage his soul would inevitably receive by flying through the miasma of the Great Poison Swamp.


    After all, even if the miasma was easy to resist for someone as long as they reached the Domain Lord Realm, this took into ount the fact that one had a physical body!


    Wait¡­ With the restrictive force around, how will he even fly his soul out of this ce in the first ce¡­?


    Suddenly remembering the restrictive force that prevented him and others from flying inside the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit curious about whether or not the restrictive force would also affect someone who had no physical body. If it really did¡­ The Soul Ascension Realm Expert in front of him would end up dead the moment his physical body was consumed by the strange power eating away at it!


    Hm? Isn''t this... That terrifying creature from the ancient sect ruins!? But how did it appear here¡­?


    Cursing silently to himself as the Soul Ascension Realm Expert got close enough for him to properly start examining the ck spot slowly growing bigger, Xuan Hao subconsciously began moving away from the Soul Ascension Realm Expert.


    No matter how curious he was about the ck spot, Xuan Hao didn''t dare try his luck at investigating what had happened to the Soul Ascension Realm Expert after feeling the terrifying aura that lingered around the ck spot slowly consuming the physical body of the Soul Ascension Realm Expert.


    Even if he didn''t investigate the situation more clearly, he was at least certain about one thing, the group of Soul Ascension Realm Experts had also entered the ancient sect ruins. The only difference being that they ended up fighting against the terrifying creature that he had managed to avoid. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "¡­"


    Looking at the deteriorating situation of the Soul Ascension Realm Expert who ran within a distance of only a few dozen meters of him without noticing his presence, Xuan Hao felt happy that he was not the one that ended up facing the terrifying creature in a fight!


    He might be strong enough to face off against a Soul Ascension Realm Expert¡­ But there was no way he would be able to escape alive against a creature that had ended up destroying a group of at least 6 Soul Ascension Realm Experts!


    Let''s leave this ce for now¡­


    Not wanting to stay around the Great Poison Swamp for even a second longer after knowing that he might end up encountering the terrifying creature from the ancient sect ruins, Xuan Hao picked up the young boy before moving in the same direction as the half-dead Soul Ascension Realm Expert-


    Swish-!


    Given that he had no idea where he was inside the Great Poison Swamp, it was by far the best option he had, as the Soul Ascension Realm Expert should be doing his best at getting out of the Great Poison Swamp as quickly as possible before losing his physical body.


    "W-who!?"


    Having not bothered concealing himself as he was just trying to leave the Great Poison Swamp as quickly as possible, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert up ahead slowed down for a short moment as he looked towards Xuan Hao with a cautious expression on his face.


    "¡­"


    Swish~


    Seeing the reaction of the other party, Xuan Hao just ignored him as he increased his speed even further before directly overtaking the Soul Ascension Realm Expert who was barely able to use his movement technique at this point in time.


    Standing around and chatting with one of the people who had hunted him down earlier was not really something Xuan Hao was interested in. The fact that he didn''t return the favor by attacking the other party while he was in a half dead state could already be considered him being quite merciful.


    Not that Xuan Hao believed that the other party would be able to make it out of the Great Poison Swamp in his current state...<novelnext> </novelnext>


    The forest of the poisonous devil trees covered with devil bugs was still a thing and with the dark spot trying to devour his body, there would be no way for him to pass through the devil bugs without getting attacked!


    "Hey! Wait up fellow cultivator, I-"


    Listening as the sound of the half dead Soul Ascension Realm Expert faded away beforepletely disappearing, Xuan Hao focused his full attention on his surroundings to look out for any of the other Soul Ascension Realm Experts that should have been around¡­


    However, in the end, none of them appeared by the time he reached the wall of poisonous trees with devil bugs crawling all over them.


    ¡­


    I-I''m back at the poisonous devil trees again!


    As Xuan Hao reached the poisonous devil trees, the young boy who had been dragged along looked towards the poisonous devil trees in front of him with a dazed expression on his face. Not reallyprehending what had happened ever since he had left the ancient sect ruins¡­ Well¡­ To be honest, he didn''t really fully understand what he went through inside the ancient sect ruins either¡­


    "You helped me escape from the ancient sect ruins, so in turn also helped you leave that ce safely. Unfortunately, I can''t help you when ites to crossing this ce¡­ This is where we part ways, you will have to do the rest on your own¡­"


    Swoosh~


    Before the young boy had any time to say anything, he realized that Xuan Hao who had been standing right beside him casually strolled inside the forest of poisonous devil trees. Even when he was covered by the devil bugs, the young boy did not see his pace changing, as the young boy speechlessly watched how Xuan Hao soon disappeared behind a few trees.


    "This¡­"


    Not knowing what to do after seeing Xuan Hao dissapearing, the young boy could not help shivering all over as he slowly realized that he would have to enter the forest of poisonous devil bug trees once again to leave the Great Poison Swamp. Nobody would be able to help him when it came to this!


    "I¡­ T-these small bugs are n-nothingpared to the ancient sect ruins!"


    Encouraging himself as he said this, the young boy slowly felt his courage increasing as he began sealing off his dantian to prevent any qi from getting detected by the devil bugs.


    Swish~


    Moving closer and closer to the forest, the young boy could feel his heart beating loudly in his chest as he closed both of his eyes before taking the final step forward into the poisonous devil tree forest-


    Rustle~!


    Rustle~!


    Rustle~!


    The moment he took the step forward and entered the forest filled with poisonous devil trees, the young boy could not help freezing on the spot for a moment as he felt the countless small feet of the devil bugs making their way up his legs before quickly covering his entire body.


    I hate this!


    Not able to think anything more than this with the devil bugs crawling all over him, the young boy slowly began moving forward as he remembered how Xuan Hao had casually strolled through the poisonous devil tree forest while covered by devil bugs.


    From how casually senior treated this, I''m sure that the devil bugs won''t do anything as long as I act the same way senior did¡­


    Feeling a wave of confidence suddenly appear out of nowhere as he remembered how easily Xuan Hao had deal with the devil bugs, the young boy felt more confident than ever as he continued deeper inside the forest.


    Unknowingly, the young boy''s fear of the devil bugs had alreadypletely disappeared at this point in time. The only thing that remained was the fact that it was a rather ufortable experience to have countless small devil bugs crawling all over one''s body.


    Compared to the first time he entered the poisonous devil tree forest; it could be said that the young boy''s personality had changed on a fundamental level!

 Chapter 744 Jade Crystal Palace And Poisonous Life Lotus

    "Senior brother!? Senior Sister!?"


    Walking through the poisonous devil tree forest covered in devil bugs from head to toe, the young boy could not help eximing in surprise upon discovering his senior brother and sister in the process of harvesting the leaves of a mature poisonous devil tree in the distance.


    Out of all the things he expected to encounter while passing through the poisonous devil tree forest, thest thing he expected was to encounter his senior brother and sister in the process of harvesting the mature poisonous devil leaves!


    "Junior brother!?"


    Hearing him calling out, the young boy''s senior sister who was focused on gathering the mature poisonous devil leaves turned around as she looked towards her junior brother who had appeared out of thin air over an hour after they had begun the slow process of gathering the mature poisonous devil leaves without using their cultivation base.


    "Huh? Junior brother really appeared!?"


    Notcking too far behind the young boy''s senior sister, his senior brother also turned around and looked towards him filled with disbelief.


    It was obvious from first nce that both of them had not expected to see him again. Especially considering that it had already been over an hour since they had lost sight of him.


    "Hehe. Looks at both of you, be careful not to lose focus in case you end up alerting the devil bugs!" Chuckling to himself as he entered the mature poisonous devil trees sphere of influence and felt all the devil bugs on him escaping, the young boy could not help feeling happy after seeing his two seniors once again.


    "You... You are not even the slightest bit scared of the devil bugs anymore, what on earth happened to you over thisst hour...?"


    Picking up on just how different the behaviour of her junior brother waspared to when she hadst seen him, the senior sister could not help asking this as a curious expression appeared on her face.


    "Well... It''s a long story, I will tell you about it after we get out of here..."


    Knowing that it was not suitable for them to stay inside the poisonous devil tree for any longer than necessary, the young boy soon began helping his two seniors with gathering the mature poisonous devil leaves before all three of them finished taking thest of the poisonous devil leaves-


    Rustle~!


    Rustle~!


    Rustle~!


    Resulting in the devil bugs outside the sphere of influence created by the mature poisonous devil tree to swarm inside and cover all three of them over the next few seconds. Unfortunately for them, the mature poisonous devil leaves did not help with warding off the devil bugs after they had been taken off the poisonous devil tree...


    "Let''s get out of here..."


    ""...""


    Followed by the suggestion of the senior sister who could barely open her mouth to say this, the young boy and his senior brother both nodded their heads together before the group of three all began making their way out of the poisonous devil tree forest together.


    ...


    "I''m not ever going to return to this ce...!"


    Looking back towards the poisonous devil trees behind him as he said this, Xuan Hao vowed to himself to never try and enter the inner region of the Great Poison Swamp again. At least not before he had enough strength to enter the inner region without having to get covered by the devil bugs...<novelnext> </novelnext>


    Turning his attention away from the poisonous devil trees, Xuan Hao utilized his divine sense to its full potential as it spread out all around him-


    Whoosh~!


    Although it was still limited due to the miasma of the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao had managed to negate most of the restraining effect that the miasma had on his divine sense after he realized that the miasma was created by a nt closely rted to the Dao of Corruption.


    It looks like I managed to get out on the other side of the Great Poison Swamp...


    As his divine sense reflect the situation close to a hundred miles around him, Xuan Hao did not take long to figure out where he was from the different cultivators exploring the Great Poison Swamp all around him... But at the same time, Xuan Hao was taken aback by the sheer number of people wandering around inside the Great Poison Swamp looking for poisonous spiritual herbs or rare poisonous insects.


    Even if he had already expected for there to be a lot of people inside the Great Poison Swamp, the number of people cautiously moving around inside the Great Poison Swamp was far beyond any expectations he had.


    Not to mention the fact that most of these people exploring the dangerous Great Poison Swamp were actually not even in Core Formation Realm!


    Hm? Poisonous Life Lotus? A chance to be the personal disciple of a Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert?


    After focusing his attention towards the many weaker cultivators who had only reached the Foundation Establishment Realm searching through the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao did not take long to figure out why they had all entered a dangerous ce like the Great Poison Swamp.


    Apparently, one of the Peak Domain Lords in the Sky Empire had announced that he would owe anyone who could bring him a Poisonous Life Lotus a favour. Even promising to take in the person who brought him the Poisonous Life Lotus as a personal disciple if they wanted N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Among the people searching for the Poisonous Life Lotus, there was even rumours about the Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert ensuring that they would be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm!


    "Lord of the Jade Crystal Pce? Interesting..." Figuring out the name of the Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious as he recalled the information recorded about him in the book Yi Min had given to him.


    The Lord of the Jade Crystal Pce, one of the few Peak Domain Lord Realm Experts inside the Sky Empire and by far the oldest among them. From what little information that was essible, it was obvious that the Lord of the Jade Crystal Pce could be considered one of the strongest people in the Sky Empire.


    The Jade Crystal Pce that he was in charge of was thergest merchant organisations inside the Sky Empire and it was even noted that the Jade Crystal Pce itself was a part of a farrger merchant organisation that operated across the entire continent in a simr way as the Explorer Union. The only difference between the two was the fact that one focused on exploring unknown regions of the continent, while the other was solely focused on trading all kinds of spiritual treasures and precious artifacts.


    With all of this in mind, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more curious about the Poisonous Life Lotus that the Lord of the Jade Crystal Pce was searching for. After all, given that even someone like the Lord of the Jade Crystal Pce who was connected to a massive merchant group that had spread across the entire continent in a simr way as the Explorer Union, it was obvious that the Poisonous Life Lotus was incredibly hard to find...


    Even Xuan Hao who had managed to gain a deep understanding of all sorts of different spiritual herbs with the help of the system, had no idea what kind of spiritual herb the Poisonous Life Lotus was!


    Only after using his divine sense to scan over the description of it carried by the horde of Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators who had entered the Great Poison Swamp did he manage to understand what the Poisonous Life Lotus looked like.


    "It should be located somewhere in the core region of the Great Poison Swamp..." Muttering this to himself after doing a quick sweep of his surroundings while looking for the Poisonous Life Lotus that all the Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators were searching for, Xuan Hao quickly concluded that the Poisonous Life Lotus should be somewhere inside the core region of the Great Poison Swamp... Not a ce that these Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators would dare enter with their strength!


    Swish~!


    Not wasting any time as he began to leave the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao didn''t even think about entering the core region of the Great Poison Swamp to search for the Poison Life Lotus.


    Not to mention the fact that he had no idea what use the spiritual herb had, he would also risk running into the terrifying creature from the ancient sect ruins that was possibly inside the core region of the Great Poison Swamp at the moment!


    Even if he was lucky and the terrifying creature had not entered the core region of the Great Poison Swamp, Xuan Hao did not want to risk running into the group of Soul Ascension Realm Experts that were undoubtably not too far away from the half dead Soul Ascension Realm Expert he had met... Well... Considering they had managed to escape alive...

 Chapter 745 Dream Soul Flower

    Leaving the Great Poison Swamp without encountering any problems along the way, Xuan Hao found a quiet ce before taking out the Great Poison Scripture and starting to read through with a curious expression on his face.


    "An alchemy book...?" Muttering this to himself as he began reading through the book, Xuan Hao did not take long to understand that the Great Poison Scripture was a book about alchemy. However, different from a normal book about alchemy, the Great Poison Scripture only recorded different poisonous spiritual herbs, pills and potions.


    "To think that the Great Poison Scripture is actually something left behind by a Poison Master..." Narrowing his eyes as he continued reading through the Great Poison Scripture, Xuan Hao could not help eximing to himself after realizing that the Great Poison Scripture was actually left behind by an ancient poison master that had once been part of the ancient sect located beside the Great Poison Swamp.


    The title of Poison Master alone was something that only a highly skilled Master Alchemist focused on making poisonous pills and potions could obtain... And that is not mentioning the fact that the one who had written the Great Poison Scripture should have already surpassed the realm of a Master Alchemist!


    Even if he did not specialize in poison when it came to alchemy, the insights left behind in the Great Poison Scripture would be extremely useful for the current Xuan Hao. Maybe it would even allow him to breakthrough from the Artisan Alchemist Realm and officially be a Master Alchemist!


    Rustle~


    Putting away the Great Poison Scripture after understanding how precious it was, Xuan Hao decided not to read any more of the Great Poison Scripture for now. Fearing that he would end up getting too absorbed in exploring the mysterious work left behind by a powerful alchemist that was likely to have surpassed the Master Alchemist Realm...


    Whoosh-!


    Jumping into the air after having put away the Great Poison Scripture, Xuan Hao continued his journey towards the capital city of the Great Sky Empire.


    Different from his original n of exploring the different dangerous areas he would pass through if he wanted to reach the capital on time, Xuan Hao instead nned to avoid some of the more dangerous ces. Not wanting to end up trapped inside a dangerous ce like the ancient sect ruins he had just escaped!


    ...


    At the same time Xuan Hao was making his way towards the capital city of the Sky Empire, Bai Ning and Hui Ying who had been moving towards the nearest way out of the underground tunnelwork below the jungle, came to a stop in front of a small and narrow passage leading up to the surface of the jungle.


    Stopping in front of the path, Bai Ning could clearly feel how nervous both he and Hui Ying were at the moment.


    Given how dangerous things would be after they reached the surface, Bai Ning understood this, as he himself also felt afraid when thinking of them possibly encountering a Nascent Soul Realm demon beast again.


    "Are you ready...?"


    Turning to look back towards Hui Ying as he said this, Bai Ning could see how she tightened her grip around her weapon for a short moment before slowly nodding her head in response.


    Even if both of them wanted nothing more than to stay in the underground tunnelwork of the jungle to avoid running into the dangerous demon beasts above, they both understood that this wasn''t possible.


    Not only were they running out of food, but if they wanted to leave the jungle, they would have to venture above ground to look for one of the portals leading out of the jungle...


    Rustle~


    Beginning to make their way up through the narrow passage that only allowed one of them to pass through at a time, Bai Ning who was walking first cautiously approached a small rotting wooden hatch located at the end of the passage.


    Creak~!


    Pushing open the small hatch, Bai Ning did not rx in the slightest as he began inspecting his surroundings with one of his best defensive artifacts ready in case there was a demon beast lurking around the area ready to attack him the moment he stepped outside.


    "Wha..."


    Having pushed the small rotting wooden hatch out of the way and made his way above ground, Bai Ning could not help freezing on the spot for a few seconds as he ended up face to face with a massive demon beast easily the size of a small hill!


    "Hm? Did something happen- This!? What is this massive skeleton!?"


    Hearing Hui Ying calling out behind him, Bai Ning quickly recovered from his shocked state before he let out a sigh of relief.


    Indeed, the massive demon beast the size of a small hill had already been dead for a long time and did not pose any threat to them!


    Feeling himself calming down again after this thought passed through his head, Bai Ning turned his attention away from the massive skeleton of the demon beast before trying to figure out where they were.


    ording to the map, their current location should be some kind of outpost of sorts... However when Bai Ning looked around for the outpost that had been drawn on therge map, there was nothing other than a few ruined buildings that had all copsed over the years and been reduced to nothing more than a few scattered rocks on the ground.


    Out of all these ruins, the one that remained the most intact was the one Bai Ning and Hui Ying were currently inside of... And all that was left of that building was a stone wall barely a dozen centimeters in height...


    For the outpost to decay to such a degree, it could easily be imagined how many years it had been since the outpost had still been in use. Especially considering the stones and wood used in the construction of the outpost were all special kinds of spiritual stones and wood that would be able tost for thousands of years without showing any signs of age!


    "Bai Ning! Looks at this over here!"


    As Bai Ning was still inspecting their surroundings, Hui Ying who had also made her way outside called out with a surprised expression on her face as she pointed towards something inside therge skeleton.


    "Hm? What is it..."


    Hearing Hui Ying calling out to him all of a sudden, Bai Ning turned his attention away from the ruins located around them as he soon showed a simrly surprised expression on his face when looking towards the direction Hui Ying was pointing in-


    "A spiritual herb...?"


    Indeed, in the middle of the massive skeleton, Bai Ning could see an almost translucent flower surrounded by a rainbow-coloured mist.


    "Yes! It''s a Dream Soul Flower! The spiritual herb I was searching for is a weaker version of the Dream Soul Flower called a Dream Flower, I really didn''t expect to encounter the evolved version of the Dream Flower here!"


    Filled with excitement as she said this, Hui Ying was ovee with happiness as she looked towards the small flower. Almost not able to stop herself from directly rushing over to grab the spiritual flower.


    "Is it a really precious spiritual herb...?"


    "Yes! Even if its use is limited, it is extremely useful for people with a special physique!"


    "So... Does a Dream Soul Flower normally have a guardian demon beast watching over it...?"


    "Of course, it does! The Dream Soul Flower is really useful to demon beast who are in the Core Formation Realm and can in some cases even allow them to directly reach the Nascent Soul realm. Even demon beasts in the Nascent Soul Realm find it useful and will be able to break through a minor realm by consuming it- Ah..."


    Freezing on the spot as she suddenly realized what she was saying, Hui Ying slowly turned towards Bai Ning with a fearful expression on her face.


    "T-the guardian demon beast!"


    Barely saying this as she looked towards Bai Ning, Hui Ying understood that the weakest guardian demon beast of such a precious spiritual herb would have reached the Core Formation Realm, while the strongest might even have reached the Nascent Soul Realm!


    No matter what, there was no way for them to fight against such a powerful guardian demon beast!


    "Calm Down. From the looks of it, the guardian demon beast is not here at the moment. For now, we should still have some time to leave before it shows up... Let''s leave this ce as quickly as possible!"


    Calming down Hui Ying who had started looking around herself for the guardian demon beast, Bai Ning was about to start leaving when Hui Ying suddenly dashed forward and picked up the Dream Soul Flower before carefully putting it away in a small wooden box she had been carrying with her all this time. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Rolling his eyes as he saw this, Bai Ning walked up to Hui Ying and took the small wooden box before storing it away inside his interspatial.


    "Ah-! My Dream Soul Flower!"


    "Let me carry the spiritual herb in my interspatial ring so we won''t end up getting tracked down by the guardian demon beast."


    "Yes..."


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Not wanting to spend even a second longer in the ruins of the old outpost after the Dream Soul Flower had been put away, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying quickly left the ce.

 Chapter 746 Elder Dust Fairy

    "This should be far enough¡­ Even if the guardian demon beast of the Dream Soul Flower was in the Nascent Soul Realm, we should already have left the area covered by its divine sense!" Muttering this to himself as he cautiously looked towards the thick foliage behind him, Bai Ning could not help feeling a wave of exhaustion washing over him after having used his movement technique over the past few hours without rest.


    "Finally! Let''s take a break!"


    Thump~


    Standing beside Bai Ning with a far more exhausted expression on her facepared to Bai Ning who was stronger than her, Hui Ying almost copsed on the ground as she found a good position toy in before starting to recover by meditating in a rather unique position.


    "¡­"


    Not saying anything after seeing Hui Yingying on the ground recovering her energy, Bai Ning also found a ce to sit down before he started to recover like Hui Ying. Not wanting to waste even a single second that both of them had to rx inside the jungle. After all, a demon beast could show up at any moment to attack them!


    ¡­


    ROAR-!


    At the same time Bai Ning and Hui Ying had started recovering from running through the jungle for the past few hours, a loud roar echoed out across the ruins of the outpost.


    Bang!


    Not a second after the loud roar echoed out across the ce, arge demon beastnded on the ground in front of the massive skeleton before it turned to look towards the location that the Dream Soul Flower had been located just a few hours earlier before Hui Ying had taken it away and escaped from the ce together with Bai Ning.


    ROOOOOAR-!


    Seeing that the Dream Soul Flower was missing, the demon beast that hadnded on the ground in front of the massive skeleton let out an even louder roar than before, as a terrifying killing intent and the aura belonging to a Peak Core Formation Realm demon beast spread in all directions around the demon beast-


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Instantly terrifying any nearby demon beasts into letting out fearful roars of their own before they all began escaping as fast as possible!


    Whoosh~!


    Not wasting any time on these demon beasts that were scrambling around the ce to escape as quickly as possible, the Peak Core Formation Realm demon beast began searching in his surroundings for any clue of the Dream Soul Flower that had been stolen¡­


    Roar?


    Continuing to search like this for close to half a day, the demon beast only stopped after suddenly discovering the smell of a rather unfamiliar creature at the border of its territory. Although the demon beast had no idea what kind of creature the smell belonged to, it was certain of one thing-


    ROAR! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The unfamiliar smell of a foreign creature definitely had something to do with the face that its Dream Soul Flower had been stolen!


    Swish-!


    Knowing that it had found a clue to where its Dream Soul Flower had disappeared to, the demon beast didn''t waste a single second as it began following the traces left behind by the strange new creature.


    The fact that it would be leaving its territory for others to im while it was gone didn''t really matter to it, as the only reason it took over that territory in the first ce was because of the Dream Soul Flower!


    Now that the Dream Soul Flower was gone, there was no longer any need for it to stay and guard its territory. After getting back the Dream Soul Flower, it would directly eat it and try to reach the Nascent Soul Realm before finding an even better territory!


    ¡­


    "Haaa¡­ I never imagined that annexing the territory of the Feather Kingdom would be so troublesome, to think that the ancestor of that kingdom actually managed to break through and reach the Domain Lord Realm all of a sudden¡­"


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song was looking over the report he had gotten about the oue of the battle that had taken ce at the border of the Feather kingdom with a sad expression on his face.


    Although the number of casualties were low due to the interference of Shu Yao, the sudden attack of the Domain Lord Realm ancestor of the Feather Kingdom had still ended up costing the life of close to a hundred outer disciples and a dozen inner disciples.


    Even if he already understood that casualties would be inevitable in the battles that the Star Shattering Sect would have to fight when they expanded their territory, he still felt hurt knowing that some of the disciples he had taught over the years had ended up passing away in the battle.


    There is nothing to do about it now that they are already dead. For now, I should make sure something like this doesn''t happen again¡­ Looks like I will have to visit the servant quarters and have them expand their informationwork to get an understanding of the power of the surrounding kingdoms before we expand towards some of the more powerful kingdoms¡­


    Thinking this to himself as both his eyes narrowed visibly, Elder Song got up from his seat and put the report in his hand away before moving towards the servant quarters that had been located close to the edge of the mountain peak that the Star Shattering Sect was located on top of.


    Whoosh~!


    Using a profound movement technique that made him look like a sh of light passing by to the surrounding disciples, Elder Song did not take more than a few seconds before he arrived in front of the servant quarters.


    "Looking more and more majestic over the years¡­" Muttering this to himself as he smiled wryly at the massiveplex of all sorts of unique buildings that the servant quarters had turned into, Elder Song slowly made his way towards arge tower with a diameter of more than a hundred meters located at the centre of this massiveplex of buildings.


    Ever since a new headquarters for the servants who did the day to day task of the Star Shattering Sect had been constructed, Elder Song had watched first-hand how the servant quarters grew from a small part of the Star Shattering Sect that was used to carry out menial task and gather information inside the borders of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom to arge information that had begun spreading in all directions around the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not only did the size of the servant quarters expand to a terrifying degree over the past few years, but as the strength of the disciples inside the Star Shattering Sect grew, so did the strength of the servants inside the servant quarters¡­ At this point in time, all members of the servant quarters had already reached the Qi Condensation Realm!


    Creak~!


    Stepping through therge pair of doors leading inside therge tower that was at the centre of the servant quarters, Elder Song could not help marvelling over how clean and well organized the ce was.


    If just those elders under me put half as much effort into the management of the sect-


    "Elder Song? Is there anything I can help with?"


    Interrupting Elder Song''s train of thought, a kind elderly woman smiled kindly as she said this while walking up to him.


    "Hm? This is..."


    Showing a surprised expression on his face as he saw the person who had appeared in front of him, Elder Song could not help feeling even more surprised after sensing the strength of the elderlydy in front of him.


    "Elder Dust Fairy¡­ I didn''t expect you to still stay around here. Especially considering that you already reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Isn''t there anyone suitable among the people below you who can take over the management of the servant quarters?"


    "Haha, Elder Song, we both know very well that I can''t leave this ce after spending my entire life here¡­ Even if I have reached the Nascent Soul Realm, it was just by luck. Not to mention, with the servant quarters current size, I think its fitting for someone with my strength to be in charge of the ce!"


    "This¡­ You have a point¡­"


    Looking at the kind olddy in front of him, Elder Song could not help shaking his head as he heard what she said.


    The olddy, or Elder Dust Fairy, was one of the oldest members of the servant quarter and had been working there for her entire life. Even when it was discovered that she had a talent for cultivation, she still decided to stay in the servant quarters and ended up being called the Dust Fairy due to her superb cleaning ability.


    Even after reaching the Core Formation Realm and bing an elder, she still stayed inside the servant quarters and over the years became well known throughout the entire sect as Elder Dust Fairy.


    Out of all the people who had experienced a rapid growth in strength after the Flying Sword Sect had merged together with the Spring Flower sect to form the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Dust Fairy was one of the people who ended up growing the most. Breaking through from the Peak of the Core Formation Realm to the Nascent Soul Realm!

 Chapter 747 Too Weak~

    "Now¡­ For what reason did youe here Elder Song? As far as I know, you should still be busy dealing with the aftermath of the battle that took ce at the border of the Feather Kingdom."


    "Well¡­ I came here because of that! In order to prevent what happened in the Feather Kingdom from happening again, I n to allocate more resources towards the development of the servant quarters to help it expand."


    Hearing what Elder Dust Fairy said, Elder Song smiled wryly for a short moment before exining his reason foring to the servant quarters.


    "You want to expand the servant quarters so we will be able to get our hands on information regarding the different kingdoms that you n to expand the sect into? Hah¡­ I did expect for something like this to happen at some point in time, it just seems that it took a little longer than I expected.


    After all, if I don''t remember wrongly, I came to you just a few months earlier to ask for more resources to expand the servant quarters¡­ But you ended up refusing me saying that the resources would be put to better use as rewards for the missions that the disciples and elders could take on in the Grand Mission Pavilion¡­"


    Shaking her head as she said this with a somewhat teasing smile on her face, Elder Dust Fairy looked directly towards Elder Song.


    "This¡­ Ahm, that was indeed a mistake on my part, I will send an elder over with a report on the precise amount of resources that will be allocated to the servant quarters in the future!"


    Swish-!


    Not knowing why, he suddenly felt a shiver run down his spine when faced with the teasing expression of the Elder Dust Fairy, Elder Song directly escaped from the servant quarters after saying this.


    The matter he hade to discuss with Elder Dust Fairy was already thrown to the back of his mind as he decided to just let one of the elders working under him handle it. The main reason why he did this, was because he felt something dangerous was bound to happen if he ended up staying around inside the servant quarters for even a second longer!


    "¡­"


    Left behind inside the servant quarters, Elder Dust Fairy only narrowed her eyes for a split second after seeing Elder Song running away before returning to what she was doing before.


    ¡­


    "So¡­ What is your opinion on the Feather Kingdom?"


    At the same time Elder Song was escaping from the servant quarters and making his way back to his courtyard, Feng Chen and Shu Yao had met up inside Feng Chen''s pce to discuss the matter of the Feather Sky Kingdom.


    "From what I can see, things are developing smoothly after the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom was killed by me, some of the surrounding kingdoms even took the initiative to forfeit their territory after news of what happened to the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom started spreading!


    At this point in time, the only kingdoms and sects that have not given up are the older and more powerful ones like the me Sky Kingdom¡­ But¡­ For some reason, I can''t help feeling that the battle with the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom was far too easy considering we are both in the First stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    Saying this with a small frown on her face as she remembered her battle with the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom, Shu Yao could not help feeling that the battle had been far too easy for her. Even if the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom had just broken through to the Domain Lord Realm, he should still be able to put up a proper fight against her!


    In the end, he had been easily supressed by her before being killed. Making Shu Yao feel like something was wrong with the cultivation base of the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom for him to lose so fast¡­


    "Something wrong with the cultivation base of the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom? Do you mean that he used some sort of method to forcibly break through to the Domain Lord Realm?" Hearing what Shu Yao said, Feng Chen could not help frowning as he asked this.


    After he himself had reached the Domain Lord Realm, he understood just how difficult it was to reach.


    During his time before Xuan Hao had appeared in the Flying Sword Sect and reached the Domain Lord Realm, he had also spent a good amount of time looking for any shortcuts that might allow him to further improve his strength to make sure the Flying Sword Sect would be safe from the threat of the Raging me Sect that was ready to attack them at any moment back then.


    However even after learning thousands of different obscure methods that could forcibly increase his cultivation base and strength, he had never heard about a method that would allow him to forcibly raise his strength to the Domain Lord Realm for a short time, let alone allowing him to truly break through to the Domain Lord Realm!


    "Although I have no idea what method he used, I''m almost certain that the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom should have used some kind of method to forcibly raise his cultivation base to the Domain Lord Realm!


    Even if his strength was far weaker than my own, his strength was still far above that of a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator¡­"


    "Hah¡­ Looks like it might end up bing far more troublesome to take over the territory of those stronger kingdoms in the future¡­"


    Letting out a sigh as he said this after Shu Yao confirmed that the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom should indeed have used some sort of method to forcibly reach the Domain Lord Realm, Feng Chen understood that the method that the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom had used was likely to havee from some of the stronger and older kingdoms that the Star Shattering Sect nned to expand into.


    Even if these kingdoms did not have any Domain Lord Realm Expert supporting them at the moment, most of these older and more powerful kingdoms had all had a Domain Lord Realm Expert emerging from them at some point in time. Resulting in them having a far deeper foundationpared to a small kingdom like the Heavenly Sky Kingdom where the ancestor that had established the kingdom had only reached the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Indeed¡­"


    Nodding her head with a troubled expression on her face, Shu Yao also understood what it meant for the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom to have been able to break through to the Domain Lord Realm forcibly.


    Although it was almost guaranteed that there would be some kind of side effect to forcibly breaking through from the Nascent Soul Realm to the Domain Lord Realm, the kingdoms like the Feather Kingdom who were close to losing all their territory due to the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect might resort to this kind of drastic measure to ensure that they would be able to keep control over their territory¡­


    With all of this in mind, it could easily be seen how dangerous it would be if one of therger kingdoms with four or more ancestors all close to reaching the Domain Lord Realm decided to use this kind of forbidden technique to forcefully cross the barrier to the Domain Lord Realm.


    They might be weaker than a normal Domain Lord Realm Expert, but Shu Yao wasn''t delusional enough to believe that she would be able to deal with a group of these ancestors who had forcibly reached the Domain Lord realm!


    "We will take things slowly and focus on taking over the territory of the kingdoms that have already surrendered for now, as for the matter of therger kingdoms, I will ask Elder Song if he has any suggestions on how to deal with this matter. In the worst-case scenario, we can always ask Xuan Hao¡­"


    Whoosh~


    Finishing the conversation while saying this, Feng Chen didn''t wait for Shu Yao to leave before he stood up and made his way towards Elder Song''s courtyard.


    "Hm¡­?"


    Remaining inside the room even after Feng Chen had left, Shu Yao suddenly seemed to remember something as she looked towards a corner of the Star Shattering Sect with a thoughtful expression on her face.


    Maybe I can get thatzy winged lion Grand Elder Xuan brought back to help out¡­ Even after I reached the Domain Lord Realm, I still can''t sense its strength, so it should at least have reached the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    If I can get thatzy winged lion to help out, dealing with therger kingdoms should not be a problem even without the help of Grand Elder Xuan... But¡­ How can I convince thatzy lion? All it does is sleep and eat¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Narrowing her eyes as a frown appeared on her face while looking in the direction of the ce where thezy winged lion was sleeping, Shu Yao''s frown slowly started transforming into a smile as her eyes narrowed even further than before while looking towards the location of thezy winged lion.

 Chapter 748 Convincing The Winged Lion To Help Out...

    Roar~


    Having spent all its time since it had moved to the Shattered Star Peaksying around while eating the great food and spirit stones that was brought to it whenever it wanted, the winged lion demon beast felt happy and contended with its current life.


    The only bad thing it had discovered over the past few weeks was the fact that the number of spirit stones had started decreasing by a lot. At first it wanted to go andin, but after the beast tamers of the Star Shattering Sect brought it all kinds of delicacies, it decided not to mind the decrease in spirit stones and instead focused on getting its hand on more delicious food!


    Improving its strength further had never crossed the mind of thezy winged lion demon beast, as it had focused all of its efforts on enjoying its current lifestyle¡­


    "There you are!"


    Just at this moment as the winged lion waszily enjoying its carefree life, a voice suddenly called out as a woman soon appeared in front of it.


    Roar?


    Inspecting the woman more closely, the winged lion could not help tilting its head in confusion after realizing that the woman was not carrying any food along with her like any of the other people who hade to visit it.


    For some odd reason, as it watched the woman more closely and saw that she was actually someone who had reached the Domain Lord Realm, the winged lion suddenly had a bad feeling.


    "No need to look so worried, I''m only here to ask you to help out with something now that Grand Elder Xuan is not around¡­" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Roar!


    Feeling a shiver run down its spine after hearing the woman in front of it mentioning its master, the winged lion was one hundred percent certain that she hade with bad intentions!


    She was definitely here to disturb its peaceful life!


    "Now now, no need to look like that, you just have to help out with one little thing, and I will make sure you will be able to get even more delicious food in the future~!"


    Roar¡­?


    Hearing the mention of delicious food, the winged lion froze for a second before it remembered that the amount of food it got had also been decreasing.


    Although not as much as the spirit stones and the fact that theck of food could be made up by the increasingly delicious food that was delivered, the winged lion understood deep down that this problem would be worse in the future if its supply of food continued decreasing¡­


    For this reason, the winged lion began feeling tempted after hearing the woman in front of it mentioning that she would increase its food supply.


    In the first ce, how troublesome could the matter be in the first ce? At most it would get up and stretch its legs for a day or two and return to itszy lifestyle with even more delicious food than before!


    ROAR~!


    Coming to a decision that it would help out with the matter that the woman from its master''s sect wanted help with, the winged lion got up before proudly walking over and waiting for the woman to exin what she needed help with.


    ¡­


    "That was easy than I expected¡­"


    Leaving the ce while looking back towards the winged lion who had gone back to sleeping again behind her, Shu Yao could not help smiling wryly as she had no idea how to feel knowing that she had managed to convince the winged lion to help out with dealing with some of the more powerful kingdoms when it was time.


    Not only had she managed to convince the winged lion to help her out, but all it would end up costing the Star Shattering Sect was a little more food!


    At first, Shu Yao had already been fully prepared to part with a good amount of spirit stones to get the winged lion to help out¡­ But in the end, she only needed to offer it more food and it was more than happy to ept her request.


    To be honest, the entire thing was outside Shu Yao''s expectations¡­


    "Now¡­ To contact Grand Elder Xuan¡­" Shaking her head as she threw this matter to the back of her mind for now, Shu Yao made her way back towards the ce she was staying before picking up a high-qualitymunication talisman to contact Xuan Hao about the matter of burrowing his demon beast.


    Even if the winged lion had already agreed to help out for a bit more food, Shu Yao still understood that it would be best to contact Xuan Hao, the owner of the demon beast before she actually put the winged lion to use...


    Luckily for Shu Yao, Xuan Hao had already thought that the winged lion was being far toozy after it had settled down, so he was more than happy knowing that Shu Yao and the others would be putting it to work and agreed happily with what Shu Yao was nning to do.


    As for the winged lion encountering any danger due to this? Xuan Hao didn''t really think it was possible even with the method to forcibly break through to the Domain Lord Realm circting around the more powerful kingdoms.


    The main reason for this was due to the strength of the winged lion demon beast!


    Even if Shu Yao and Feng Chen would have some idea about how strong it was, they had no idea how strong it was and could at most guess that it should at least have reached the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    In reality, the winged lion was far stronger than this and had already entered theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm. Reaching the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Not to mention a few people who had forcibly broken through to the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Even in the entire Sky Empire, the number of people who could match the winged lion was limited!


    "This¡­"


    Having finished her conversation with Xuan Hao about the winged lion, Shu Yao had no idea what to say as she looked towards themunication talisman in her hands with a speechless expression on her face.


    Although she had already thought Xuan Hao was going to agree with her request to use the winged lion, she had never expected for it to be so easy¡­


    Not to mention, during their short conversation, she also learnt about just how strong the winged lion was!


    Although this was not likely to impact their current ns of first taking over the territory of the kingdoms that had already surrender after news of the fight in the Feather Kingdom, Shu Yao understood that it was different when it came to taking over the territory of thoserger kingdoms.


    I should inform Feng Chen and Elder Song about this first¡­


    As this thought passed through her head, Shu Yao used her divine sense to sweep through the Star Shattering Sect before finding Elder Song and Feng Chen both inside the same courtyard.


    Swish-!


    Not wasting any time after finding out where the two of them were located, Shu Yao took a step forward and disappeared in the direction of the courtyard.


    ¡­


    Following Shu Yao informing both Feng Chen and Elder Song about the winged lion and just how strong it was, all three of them decided that the winged lion would be the one to deal with any of the Domain Lord Realm Experts that might emerge from therger kingdoms when they attacked them in the future.


    For now, the development of the Star Shattering Sect was proceeding smoothly as the surrounding kingdoms all around the Star Shattering Sect that had already surrendered were slowly integrated into the increasingly vast territory that the Star Shattering Sect controlled.


    To control this increasinglyrge territory, new branch sects were constructed all across this new territory to act as a way for the Star Shattering Sect to slowly gain full control over their new territory and at the same time recruit new disciples.


    As time passed, it would not take long for the number of disciples in these newly constructed branch sects to surpass the number of disciples in the main sect of the Star Shattering Sect!


    It was at this moment that the biggest news outside of the Star Shattering Sect''s rapid expansion slowing down began spreading across the Star Shattering Sect and the surrounding kingdoms-


    The Seven Fates Sect had officially started moving their main sect to a better location inside the core region of the Sky Empire where resources were more abundant!


    Elder Song and the rest of the elders from the Star Shattering Sect had already expected for something like this to happen after the sect master of the Seven Fates Sect reached the Domain Lord Realm¡­ And this was also one of the main reasons why the Star Shattering Sect had not attacked the Seven Fates Sect located right next to it!


    For this reason, the Star Shattering Sect quietly watched on the side as the disciples and elders of the Seven Fates Sect all moved towards the core region of the Sky Empire under the protection of their sect master...

 Chapter 749 Path Out Of The Jungle

    As the Seven Fates Sect left for the core region of the Sky Empire over the next few weeks, the Star Shattering Sect did not take long before it moved in to take control over the territory that the Seven Fates Sect had left behind. Officially cementing itself as the only Domain Lord Realm power in the area now that the Seven Fates Sect had left.


    Although this didn''t cause any of the more powerful kingdoms around the Star Shattering Sect to surrender and give up their territory to the Star Shattering Sect, it still ended up causing the higher up of these kingdoms to feel even more nervous than before.


    At this point in time, they all understood that the Star Shattering Sect was bound to target them after they had finished establishing themselves in the territory of the smaller kingdoms that had already surrendered to them.


    Even if this might still take a few years, the time where they would have to surrender their territory or fight a hopeless battle with the Star Shattering Sect would inevitablye for them!


    ...


    At the same time that things between the Star Shattering Sect and the surrounding kingdoms had calmed down following the battle between Shu Yao and the ancestor of the Feather Kingdom, Bai Ning and Hui Ying both felt a sense of relief washing over them as they spotted arge hill in the distance towering over the tall trees of the jungle.


    "The path out of this ce should be located somewhere on the other side of the hill over there. Haa... Finally, we will be able to get out of this ce." Staring towards the hill, Hui Ying let out an exhausted sigh before a happy smile appeared on her face as she sat down and started recovering her energy for their final push towards the portal leading out of the jungle.


    "..."


    Seeing that Hui Ying had already sat down to recover, Bai Ning followed behind and simrly started recovering his energy in preparation for what they might encounter on the final stretch towards the portal.


    The main reason why they both had decided to recover when they were already so close to the portal, was mainly due to the fact that they had escaped from arge pack of demonic wolves just a few minutes earlier.


    Although the strongest among these demonic wolves had only reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, the number of them made up for theirck of strength.


    To be honest, given how many wolves were in that pack, Bai Ning doubted that he would have been able to win even if he had reached the Core Formation Realm.


    In a sense, they were rather lucky when escaping, as it seemed like arger demon beast in the Core Formation Realm had appeared at the back of the pack of wolves, causing them to shift their focus from both of them towards the Core Formation Realm demon beast that had attacked the rear of the pack.


    Still... The demon beast that appeared back there should be in theter stages of the Core Formation Realm. Dealing with the pack of wolves should only be a matter of time and if it continues moving in the same direction...


    Thinking this, Bai Ning could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine. If the demon beast in theter stages of the Core Formation Realm really did catch up to them, there was not much they could do given the sheer difference in strength between them and a demon beast in theter stages of the Core Formation Realm.


    Whoosh~!


    Closing his eyes as he no longer thought about it any longer, Bai Ning focused his full attention towards recovering the qi he had used when escaping from the massive pack of wolves earlier.


    Despite the fact that he was in a far better conditionpared to Hui Ying and could still go on for a bit longer, he did not want to take any risks. Especially considering that the portal leading out of the jungle could be guarded by a demon beast.


    Rustle~


    "Hm?"


    However only a few minutes after he had sat down to meditate and recover his qi, did one of the wolves that he and Hui Ying had just escaped from. Emerge from a nearby bush covered in blood.


    R-Roar!


    Barely able to let out a small roar in its current condition before threateningly looking towards both of them-


    Thump!


    The wolf demon beast copsed dead on the ground in front of them before being able to do anything more than let out a single weak roar.


    "This... Did the Core Formation Realm demon beast already deal with the pack of wolves!? Even if its in theter stages of the Core Formation Realm, it should at least take it another hour or two..."


    Waking up from her meditation due to the appearance of the now dead wolf, Hui Ying fearfully muttered this to herself as she grabbed her weapon and looked towards the direction that the wolf hade from. Ready to fight the powerful demon beast that had originally helped them get rid of the pack of wolves.


    "Let''s go, we should leave now before it actually shows up. If we are lucky, the wolf here is not thest one left and the Core Formation Realm demon beast has not yet finished off the pack of wolf demon beasts yet..."


    Seeing Hui Ying clutching on to her weapon as she looked ready to fight whatever showed up following behind the now dead wolf demon beast, Bai Ning rolled his eyes at her sudden bravery before grabbing hold of her to escape towards therge hill in the distance.


    Swish-!


    As long as they could make it through the portal leading out of the jungle, they would no longer have to worry about fighting the powerful Core Formation Realm demon beast. The only problem, was whether or not they could make it in time and if there really was some kind of demon beast blocking the portal out of the jungle.


    ...


    "Hah... This is... Hah... The portal out of this jungle...?"


    Standing on top of therge hill, Hui Ying barely managed to say this as she exhaustedly looked down towards a small pond of water at the other side of the hill.


    Given that she had not fully managed to recover enough to use her movement technique for more than a few minutes, she had almost ended up fully exhausting all of her energy by getting to the top of the hill.


    "Yes... Take some time to recover, I will scout out the situation first."


    Nodding his head as he said this, Bai Ning watched as Hui Ying exhaustedly copsed on the ground before she started focusing all of her attention towards recovering her qi.


    Whoosh~!


    As Hui Ying was recovering, Bai Ning didn''t waste any time moving down towards the portal to see if there was any demon beasts lurking around the area that would make it difficult for them to approach.


    "Hm? This is-!?"


    Stopping only a short distance away from the portal located inside the pond of water, Bai Ning could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he suddenly realized that there was a massive snake coiled around the pond of water.


    From a distance, the aura leaking out from this massive snake was more than enough to make Bai Ning freeze on the spot as he felt his entire body trembling all over.


    Peak of the Core Formation Realm!


    Even if the snake was sleeping at the moment and hadn''t discovered him yet, Bai Ning was certain that it would wake up the moment he and Hui Ying tried to enter the pond of water to leave through the portal below the surface of the water... And given the strength of the massive snake, he understood that they would have no way to swim through the portal before the snake caught up to them... n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    pAnD  Swish~


    Knowing that he would have to look for another way through the portal that did not involve just charging straight into the pond and hoping that the massive snakes speed was slow enough that he and Hui Ying could make it through the portal before being swallowed by it, Bai Ning quietly mad his way back to the top of the hill where Hui Ying was still busy doing her best to recover as much qi as she could with the limited time they had left.


    Rumble~!


    ROOOOOOAR-!


    "This... The Core Formation Realm demon beast that was busy fighting with the pack of wolf demon beasts!?"


    Suddenly hearing a loud rumbling sound in the distance followed by a loud roar filled with killing intent, Bai Ning could not help narrowing his eyes as a frown appeared on his face.


    Now that the powerful Core Formation Realm demon beast behind them had finished up the group of wolf demon beasts, the time avable to them before they would have to escape would at most be a minute or two...!

 Chapter 750 Clash Between Two Demon Beasts!

    "Hui Ying, we have to leave. Now!"


    Feeling like time was running out as he could see arge creature moving through the jungle towards their current location, Bai Ning decided to wake Hui Ying up from her current state of meditation.


    "Huh?"


    Looking around herself with a confused expression on her face for a short moment as she spaced out after having been forced out of her meditation by Bai Ning, Hui Ying soon showed a fearful expression on her face as she saw the massive demon beast barrelling through the jungle below towards their current location.


    Even without Bai Ning saying anything, it did not take her more than a few seconds to understand what was happening after seeing the demon beast getting closer and closer to them with each passing second.


    "Is the way to the portal out of here safe...?"


    Understanding that they would have to move immediately if they wanted to escape before the demon beast approaching the hill they were on top of, Hui Ying turned to look towards Bai Ning standing beside her as she asked this.


    "No, there is a Peak Core Formation Realm demon beast guarding the area around the portal..." Shaking his head as he said this, Bai Ning didn''t look at Hui Ying as he was busy trying to figure out a way that they could slip past the massive sleeping snake without getting discover.


    "A Peak Core Formation Realm demon beast..." Muttering this to herself as she looked down towards the pond of water where the portal out of the jungle was located, Hui Ying could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine remembering their encounter with two Core Formation Realm demon beasts when they had first entered the jungle.


    Although those two Core Formation Realm demon beasts were powerful, there was still a huge difference between them and a demon beast at that had reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm!


    Roar-!


    "We have to leave this ce!"


    "Yeah... Maybe we can try to hide close to the snake demon beast and hope that it will get distracted long enough for us to slip through the portal without getting noticed..."


    As the demon beast got closer and closer, Bai Ning and Hui Ying both began to move down the mountain before cautiously approaching the pond of water with the massive snake demon beast coiled around it.


    The only way that either of them hade up with to leave without getting eaten by the massive snake demon beast, was using the other Core Formation Realm demon beast approaching their current location as a distraction.


    Despite the fact that this did sound like a great idea, Bai Ning and Hui Ying both understood that doing this could possibly result in both of them dying if the massive snake decided to ignore the approaching demon beast... Or worse, kill them before the other demon beast showed up!


    Hissss~!


    Hearing the loud hissing sound that came from the direction of the pond of water as the roaring from the distance got louder and louder, both Hui Ying and Bai Ning could not help feeling a shiver run down their spine.


    The snake demon beast had woken up!


    Not only that, but Bai Ning and Hui Ying could clearly feel a pair of cold eyes locking on to both of them as they continued moving towards the pond of water hiding the portal out of the jungle.


    Even without seeing the snake, both of them understood that the snake guarding the way out had already discovered them!


    "..."


    Understanding that one wrong move could result in the snake demon beast attacking and killing them, Bai Ning did not dare get a single step closer to the pond of water as he froze on the spot.


    "W-w-what should we do now...!?"


    Freezing on the spot next to Bai Ning as she also felt the gaze of the snake demon beastnding on her, Hui Ying started trembling all over as she nervously turned towards Bai Ning who had simrly frozen on the spot beside her.


    "This... Let''s try and move back for now, it doesn''t look like it wants to attack us..."


    Almost whispering this to Hui Ying, fearful that the snake would attack them if they were too loud, Bai Ning and Hui Ying both began to slowly move backwards before they felt the chilling gaze of the massive snake disappearing. Allowing both of them to let out a sigh of relief.


    "Looks like we won''t be able to get any closer to the pond of water without being attacked by the snake... Let''s try and move around it for now, when the two demon beasts start fighting with each other, we can try to move closer to the pond of water."


    "Yes!"


    Swoosh~! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Swoosh~!


    Understanding the seriousness of their current predicament, Bai Ning and Hui Ying used what little energy they had left in them to move through the jungle to the other side of the pond of water where the snake demon beast was located-


    ROOOOOOAR-!


    Just barely making it before the demon beast that had been following them appeared on top of therge hill that the pond of water was located beside. Allowing both Bai Ning and Hui Ying to get a good look at the demon beast for the first time since they had learnt about its presence.


    Standing more than ten meters tall, the demon beast was covered in a thickyer of fur and tworge paws with a pair of deadly ws attached to them. If not for the fact that the demon beast also had arge pair of deer like horns and scales covering arge part of both its stomach and hands, it would not have been wrong to describe the demon beast as an oversized bear...


    "Let''s hope we don''t have to fight it..."


    "Yeah..."


    Watching the massive demon beast on top of therge hill staring down towards the pond of water filled with killing intent, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying sincerely hoped that they would not have to fight with it...


    Hisss-!


    Luckily for them, it seemed like the snake demon beast was not the slightest bit afraid of therge bear like demon beast, as it angrily hissed at it the moment it started making its way down therge hill towards the pond of water.


    Now we just have to wait...


    Narrowing both his eyes as he thought this to himself, Bai Ning quietly waited for a chance to rush towards the pond of water together with Hui Ying.


    ...


    Roar-!


    Letting out a warning roar after it realized that there was a simrly powerful demon beast in the Peak of the Core Formation Realm blocking its path towards the thieves that had stolen its Dream Soul Flower, the bear like demon beast didn''t want to fight with it and clearly signalled that it just wanted to pass through without fighting.


    Hisssss-!


    However, different from what the bear like demon beast had expected, the massive snake didn''t budge an inch and instead gave out a loud hissing sound filled with killing intent as it got closer.


    Roar...?


    Not understanding why, the snake demon beast was blocking its path for no reason, the bear like demon beast froze on the spot for a short moment as it tried figuring out why it had been stopped. Given its current strength, the snake demon beast should have let it pass through its territory without fighting!


    Did the snake perhaps discover the spiritual herb...?


    As its brain worked overtime, this thought suddenly appeared in the head of the bear like demon beast. If the snake demon beast that was also at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm discovered that spiritual herb, it would make sense for it to try and stop it!


    ROOOOOOOAR-!


    Having concluded why the snake demon beast was blocking its path, a terrifying killing intent erupted from the ten-meter-tall bear like demon beast followed by fear inspiring roar that caused both Bai Ning and Hui Ying standing on the other side of the pond of water watching to shake all over.


    Hisssss?


    Seeing that the bear like demon beast suddenly erupted with a terrifying killing intent, the snake demon beast could not help feeling confused upon realizing that its opponent had not backed down and was instead getting ready for a fight...


    What in the world is wrong with this oversized bear with a tail? Why does it suddenly want to start a fight!?


    Not knowing what to think of the oversized bear that had suddenly shown up at its sleeping spot to attack it, the snake demon beast momentary confusion allowed the its opponent to attack first-


    Swish-!


    BANG!


    Reaching the snake in an instant, the bear like demon beast violently smashed down at the snake. Not showing any mercy after it had concluded that the snake demon beast was after its spiritual herb to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm!

 Chapter 751 Escape From The Jungle!

    Bang!


    Observing the fight between the massive snake and the bear like demon beast taking ce not too far away from them, both Bai Ning and Hui Ying could not help feeling a shiver run down their spine as they saw the destruction caused by the two demon beasts shing with each other.


    Even without having fought with any of the two demon beasts themselves, both of them understood just howrge the difference between them and the demon beasts was!


    "Looks like they are really fighting with each other... Let''s see if we can get closer to the pond of water!"


    Not wasting any time after seeing that the two demon beasts were busy fighting with each other, Bai Ning took the lead as he slowly began moving closer to the pond of water that the portal out of the jungle was located inside of. Making sure to keep an eye on the massive snake in case it spotted them.


    Rustle~


    Moving through the thick foliage of the jungle that surrounded the pond of water like this, it did not take them more than a few minutes before they reached the edge of the pond of water.


    Luckily for both of them, the fight between the two demon beasts did not calm down in slightest during thest few minutes and instead only ended up growing more intense. Not allowing them to pay much attention to their surroundings as they fought with all their might.


    Of course, with such arge fight taking ce, it inevitably ended up catching the attention of different demon beast living nearby that were simrly in the Core Formation Realm. Although these demon beasts were not close to the snake and bear like demon beast in strength, they were still stronger than Bai Ning and Hui Ying!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    As the fight grew more intense and blood covered therge jungle trees, the roars of these demon beasts grew closer with each passing second and would soon reach the ce where Bai Ning and Hui Ying were standing!


    "We have to go now, or the snake demon beast discovering us will be thest thing we have to worry about!"


    Ssh-! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Ssh-!


    Understanding that they had no more time to wait around for an opportunity when the snake demon beast got further away from the pond of water, Bai Ning took the lead as both of them jumped into the pond of water before swimming towards the bottom of it where a small whirlpool shaped portal was spinning.


    Even if it was hard to see, the other side of the whirlpool portal slowly grew visible as they got closer.


    Different from what both of them had been expecting to be on the other side of the portal, a lush cave filled with all sorts of ancient vegetation that had long since gone extinct was what entered their view after they got close enough. No signs of any dangerous demon beasts or other things that could threaten them was visible on the other side of the portal. Allowing both Bai Ning and Hui Ying to let out a sigh of relief as they continued towards the whirlpool shaped portal at the bottom of the pond.


    The fact that both of them jumped into theke was of course sensed by the tworge demon beasts fighting in the distance-


    Hissss-!


    ROOOAR-!


    Causing both of them to stop fighting as they rushed back towards the pond of water, the snake wanting to stop them from entering the whirlpool portal, while the bear like demon beast thought that the snake was trying to get its hands on the Dream Soul Flower before escaping with it.


    Given the fact that the snake demon beast was by far faster than itself from what it had experienced so far, it was not too odd to think that this was the case. Especially considering that the snake demon beast had been on the losing side during their fight and was covered in blood with severalrge wounds all over its body at the moment.


    Just a few more minutes of fighting and the bear like demon beast was certain that it would have been able to kill the snake!


    Ssh-!


    Ssh-!


    How is that snake even faster in the water!?


    Looking behind himself to see the two demon beast entering the water, Bai Ning could not help cursing to himself after discovering that the speed of the snake demon beast had seemingly doubled after it entered the water.


    Even if they were only a few seconds away from the whirlpool located at the bottom, with the speed of the snake demon beast, it would be able to catch up to them before that!


    Haa... I really didn''t want to do this...


    Knowing that he would have to do something to dy the snake demon beast before it could catch up to them, Bai Ning had a painful expression on his face as he took out all the artifacts he had made ever since entering the Star Shattering Sect before pushing them upwards in the direction of the snake demon beast while forcefully activating all the energy stored inside the artifacts-


    The sheer amount of qi present in all the artifacts Bai Ning had pushed towards the snake demon beast instantly caused a terrifying aura of destruction to engulf the pond and area outside the pond. Even if the level the artifacts were not that heigh, Bai Ning had overloaded all of them and had caused them to enter a state of self-destruction as the energy stored inside them began to rapidly destroy the artifact they were inside of before merging together with the energy of the surrounding artifacts-


    Rumble-!


    As the energy of the different artifacts that had now disappeared merged together, the aura of destruction grew even stronger than before!


    Hiss-!


    Realizing how dangerous its current situation was, the snake demon beast wanted to turn around to dodge it... But just as it was about to retreat, the massive gathering of energy seemed to have reached a critical level as it violently exploded in front of the snake demon beast-


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    Not able to dodge the violent explosion, the snake demon beast was directlyunched flying out of the pond together with the bear like demon beast that had been following behind it.


    Bang!


    Even if most of the power from the explosion had been directed upwards towards the two demon beasts chasing after them, Bai Ning and Hui Ying were both pushed down towards the whirlpool shaped portal at the bottom of the pond by the force of the explosion.


    BANG-!


    Crack~


    Beingunched through the portal the next moment, both of them smashed head first into the rocky ground on the other side of the portal.


    Even with his strength having reached the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm, the force with which he had smashed into the ground was more than enough to render him unable to move for a short moment.


    Hui Ying who was weaker than Bai Ning was in a far worse situation, as she ended up fainting shortly after having smashed into the ground on the other side of the whirlpool shaped portal...


    "Hm? The portal..."


    As he recovered enough energy to move around a bit, Bai Ning turned to look back towards the location of the whirlpool shaped portal. Only to see that the portal had begun to rapidly close up after they had passed through it.


    From this alone, it was obvious that the portal should have run out of energy after they had used it-


    ROOOOOAAAAR-!


    Suddenly hearing a loud roaring sounding from the portal, Bai Ning could not help letting out a sigh of relief upon seeing the whirlpool shaped portal close just before the bear like demon beast could catch up to them and pass through the portal.


    Although both the demon beasts had beenunched flying by the explosion that all of his artifacts had caused after their self-destruction, the bear like demon beast had very clearly been far less affected and had almost managed to catch up with them again!


    "Luckily the portal closed before it could chase after us..." Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the ce where the whirlpool shaped portal had been located only a few seconds ago, Bai Ning took out themunication talisman that had been given to him before trying to contact the elders who hade along with them during the clean-up of demonic cultivators inside the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "Bai Ning? Is there anything you need help with?"


    "Yes! Hui Ying is injured and..."


    Hearing a voice from themunication, Bai Ning could not help feeling a sense of relief washing over him as he quickly informed the elder on the other side about Hui Ying''s current state without saying anything about the jungle they had been trapped in for the past few weeks.


    Whoosh~


    "Ah! There you two are!"


    Only a few minutes after he had used themunication talisman, an elder in the Nascent Soul Realm appeared at the entrance of the cave they were inside.


    Swish-!


    Not wasting any time after realizing both of them were injured quite badly, the elder didn''t say anything more, as he directly fed both of them a medical pill to stabilize their injuries before carrying both of the out of the cave towards the Star Shattering Sect.

 Chapter 752 Encountering A Bottleneck

    At the same time Bai Ning and Hui Ying were picked up by one of the elders in charge of looking after the disciples who were exterminating the demonic cultivators that had infiltrated the Azure Sky Kingdom, Qing Yi who had been strengthening her foundation over the past month opened her eyes before a small frown appeared on her face.


    "I have already reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and have improved my foundation ording to what master said... But for some reason, I still feel like I haven''t reached my limit yet..."


    Turning her attention towards her dantian as she said this, Qing Yi felt that she had reached a bottleneck when it came to improving her foundation anymore. Although she could still break through to the Nascent Soul Realm, she understood that she would not be anywhere near Chu Yang after he had reached the Nascent Soul Realm when she did so!


    Maybe I should look for Chu Yang and ask him...?


    Hesitating for a short time when she thought about asking Chu Yang for advice on how to further strengthen her foundation, Qing Yi soon got up before moving towards the Combat Hall of the sect.


    Ever since the Combat Hall had been constructed and had its formations further strengthened after its construction, it had already be the most used training location for the disciples and elders of the Star Shattering Sect.


    The main reason for this being that the Combat Hall''s formation were now strong enough to resist anyone below the Domain Lord Realm. Making it a perfect ce for the elders in the Nascent Soul Realm to train... And it was also for this reason that Chu Yang had ended up spending most of his time since reaching the Nascent Soul Realm inside the Combat Hall sparring with the different Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the Star Shattering Sect.


    ...


    "He should be in here..."


    Arriving in front of the Combat Hall, Qing Yi came to a stop as she looked at therge number of disciples gathered in front of the Combat Hal with excited expressions on their faces.


    Where did all of these disciplese from... And why are they just standing around without entering?


    Seeing therge gathering of disciples in front of the Combat Hall, Qing Yi curiously tilted her head to the side as she began guessing the reason why so many disciples had suddenly gathered in front of the Combat Hall without entering.


    Is something special happening in the Combat Hall. Perhaps another one of Elder Song''s tournaments? Given how many events Elder Song arranges for both the outer, inner and core disciples of the sect, this does seem to make sense... n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Smiling wryly as she began remembering the countless different events that were arranged by Elder Song after he officially became the Vice Sect Master, Qing Yi decided to just approach therge group of disciples standing in front of the Combat Hall and ask instead of trying to remember the long list of events that could be found on different information boards around the sect.


    "Hm? This..."


    However after walking up to the entrance of the Combat Hall where all the disciple were gathered with excited expressions on their faces did she discover that they were not waiting for a tournament to begin-


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Instead, they were all watching a fight that was taking ce inside the Combat Hall through a screen that had been formed by one of the elders in charge of the Combat Hall with the help of the formations making up the Combat Hall.


    "Wait... Isn''t that Chu Yang!?"


    Getting closer to the screen showing the fight taking ce inside the Combat Hall, Qing Yi could not help freezing on the spot upon discovering that one of the two people fighting was actually the person she hade looking for!


    Even more surprising was the fact that he was currently fighting evenly with an elder in the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm while only being in the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm himself!


    After seeing just how much stronger than her Chu Yang had grown after he had reached the Nascent Soul Realm, Qing Yi felt even more determined than before to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm herself and catch up to him.


    At the same time, she also no longer felt hesitant about asking him for help with strengthening her foundation.


    Swish~


    Not waiting around outside the Combat Hall to watch the fight that looked like it was about toe to an end, Qing Yi entered the Combat Hall before moving towards the practice room that Chu Yang was currently fighting inside of.


    Arriving in front of the entrance to the practice room that Chu Yang was inside, Qing Yi had no idea what to say when she saw therge number of female disciples waiting in front of the entrance.


    "The elder and senior brother should be fighting in here. Right?"


    "Yeah! I can''t wait to see that senior brother for myself!"


    "True, that senior brother should be one of Grand Elder Xuan''s disciples if I''m not wrong! Hehe, I wonder if that senior brother is looking for a dao partner~"


    Listening to the conversation and seeing the lovestruck expression on the faces of most of the disciple standing in front of the entrance, Qing Yi could not help frowning as she began to understand why these disciples had decided to stand in front of the entrance to practice room Chu Yang was inside of instead of watching the fight taking ce inside through the screen created by one of the elders outside the Combat Hall.


    I wonder what kind of reaction that guy will have when he leaves the practice room...


    Looking over therge number of female disciples, Qing Yi could not help looking forward to what kind of reaction Chu Yang would have when arge crowd of female disciples "attacked" him.


    Creak~


    Just at this moment, the door leading inside the practice room slowly began opening.


    "He ising out!"


    "Wah-! Let me stand in the front!"


    "No, let me!"


    "Ah! Don''t push me!"


    Watching as the crowd of what could only be described as fangirls began pushing each other around to get closer to the door that was slowly opening, Qing Yi could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine as part of her began worrying about Chu Yang.


    "Hm? Howe so many of you little ones are here?"


    However, to the disappointment of the many disciples waiting excitedly in front of the door, the one who came out from the practice room was not Chu Yang, but instead it was the elder in the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm that he had been sparring with inside the practice room!


    "Ah! It''s Elder Meng!"


    Swoosh~!


    Swoosh~!


    Swoosh~!


    Followed by the panicked scream of one of the female disciples, the rest of the disciples waiting in front of the entrance to the practice room for an opportunity to see Chu Yang up close, scattered at a speed that surprised both Elder Meng and Qing Yi who had made sure not to get too close to the group of female disciples.


    Elder Meng...?


    Watching the speed at which the group of female disciples had scattered, Qing Yi could not stop herself from curiously looking over the person who had just left the practice room.


    Looking like what would be more aptly described as a young girl, Elder Meng stood at the entrance to the practice room with a massive hammer held firmly in both her hands as she looked in the direction of the fleeing female disciples.


    She should be an elder from the Spring Flower Sect...


    Not recognizing Elder Meng as any of the Elders from the Flying Sword Sect, Qing Yi quickly realized that Elder Meng should be one of the Nascent Soul Realm Elders from the Spring Flower Sect before they had merged together.


    As for her being a member of the Half Spirit Race... Well... She was not that small...


    "Hm? Qing Yi? What are you doing here?"


    Just as Qing Yi was caught up in her own thoughts, the familiar voice of her master''s second disciple and her JUNIOR brother echoed out across the now mostly empty passage of the Combat Hall.


    "Ah? Ah! I had something to ask you about, so I came here... Is now a suitable time?"


    Feeling a bit nervous as she was about to ask him for help with how to got about strengthening her foundation further in preparation for breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm, Qing Yi''s voice ended up bing far more gentle than usual as she said this.


    "Hm? Sure, I just finished training for today and don''t have anything else nned. Ah, Elder Meng, thanks for taking the time to have a battle with me."


    "Haha, no problem at all! I will get going and let you two do your own thing! Bye bye~!"


    Swish~!


    As Elder Meng disappeared shortly after saying goodbye, Qing Yi told Chu Yang about what she needed help with as both of them headed back towards their master''s pce together not long after. Making sure to dodge the crowd outside the Combat Hall along the way...

 Chapter 753 Capital Of The Sky Empire

    Returning back to their master''s pce, Chu Yang was more than happy to help out Qing Yi with strengthening her foundation and helping her get ready to undergo the Cloud Tribtion that one would have to pass through before reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Now all you have to do is further strengthen your core this way and-"


    Although she was still a bit hesitant when receiving Chu Yang''s help at the start, it did not take long before Qing Yi began to seriously listening to Chu Yang as she began to follow his guidance.


    "Hm!? This is¡­ My foundation is actually getting stronger again!"


    Not even a few minutes after she had first started following Chu Yang''s guidance, did Qing Yi realize that her foundation that had stagnated over the past few days finally showed signs of improving again.


    Even if part of her might still be a bit hesitant deep down, after feeling her foundation growing stronger, this deep-seated hesitationpletely disappeared as she began to wholeheartedly follow Chu Yang''s guidance.


    Like this, Qing Yi sealed herself off as she once again began focusing all of her attention on improving her foundation to its limit with the guidance from Chu Yang.


    The next time she would leave secluded cultivation, would be when she was ready to attempt breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm!


    ¡­


    At the same time Qing Yi was doing her best trying to improve her foundation to the limit before trying to reach the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao arrived at a small mountain before looking into the distance where arge city that seemed to stretch on forever was barely visible.


    "The Capital City of the Sky Empire¡­"


    Narrowing both his eyes as he quietly said this, Xuan Hao could not help remembering what he had gone through over the past few weeks.


    Not to mention that he had to pass through several dangerous locations simr to the Great Poison Swamp and the Thousand Wind Mountains where he had to do his best to avoid ending up in any dangerous situation that might end up kill him or trapping him for an unknown period of time, he also had to deal with the numerous different demon beast that inhabited most of the Sky Empire''s territory.


    Although most of the demon beast that hade to attack him along the journey were only in the Nascent Soul Realm, they grew stronger the closer he got to the capital city of the Sky Empire, some even reaching the Domain Lord Realm!


    To be honest, Xuan Hao had ended up encountering far more demon beastpared to humans on his journey towards the capital city of the Sky Empire so far. Allowing him to understand why most of the cities and kingdoms he had seen along the way were all guarded by some kind of formation that would keep out the demon beasts that were present outside the small territories that had fallen under human control.


    In a sense, without anyone in the Domain Lord Realm, it was pretty much impossible for a kingdom or sect to grow in the core region of the Sky Empire. Even with the support of a Domain Lord Realm Expert, it would still be difficult to expand beyond a certain size without having to constantly deal with demon beasts trying to invade one''s territory.


    The abundance of resources in the core region of the Sky Empire was also something Xuan Hao witnessed first-hand¡­ The only downside was that one would need the strength to im these resources without dying to the countless demon beasts roaming around inside the core region of the Sky Empire!


    All of this waspletely different from the outer region of the Sky Empire, where things were far safer andnd was hard toe by and would often have to be fought over with adjacent kingdoms.


    Whoosh~!


    Standing on top of the small mountain as he was lost in thought for a short moment, Xuan Hao suddenly saw a small flying shipnding not too far away from him before a group of armoured people got out and began killing off a group of demon beasts that were moving towards the capital city in the distance.


    "Hm?"


    Looking closer at the group of people that had left the small flying ship to deal with the group of demon beasts that were in the process of getting one-sidedly beaten up, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after realizing that the weakest person among the soldiers killing the demon beasts had actually reached the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm while the strongest among them had already reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. Inside the flying ship, the presence of a First Stage Domain Lord could also be felt!


    The strength of this small hit squad in charge of dealing with a group of demon beasts that were only around the Core Formation Realm with the strongest only barely having reached the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, was more than enough for Xuan Hao to understand just how strong the Sky Empire waspared to any of the kingdoms or sects he had been to so far.


    If a small hit squad like this already had a Domain Lord in it, how strong would the overall strength of the Sky Empire be?


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit sceptical about the number of Domain Lord Realm Experts inside the Sky Empire that was listed inside the book Yi Min had given him.


    ording to that book, there should only be around 200 Domain Lords inside the Sky Empire¡­ But given that even someone like himself was still not listed inside the book as a Domain Lord Realm Expert, Xuan Hao felt that the number of Domain Lord Realm Experts inside the Sky Empire should already have exceeded the two or so hundred that were listed inside the book!


    Whoosh~!


    Watching as the Nascent Soul Realm Experts dealt with the demon beasts below before gathering the corpses and putting them away inside an interspatial ring before they returned to the flying ship and left in the direction of the capital city, Xuan Hao felt amazed at the speed at which they had dealt with the demon beasts and left without leaving anything behind.


    Even if their strength had far surpassed the demon beasts they were dealing with, their coordination and speed was not something Xuan Hao had ever seen before and was testament to the discipline among the soldiers of the Sky Empire. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "I should also get going¡­"


    ncing in the direction that the flying Ship had left, Xuan Hao stepped off the peak of the small mountain before flying in the direction of the capital city that only seemed to growrger the closer he got to it.


    ¡­


    Thump~!


    Landing on the ground a short distance away from the massive wall covered in all sorts of ancient divine symbols that glowed gently under the sunlight, Xuan Hao took some time to take in the sight of the massive wall that was essentially a part of a giant formation that covered the entire capital city of the Sky Empire.


    "This formation¡­ I will most likely end up dead if I get trapped by it¡­" Muttering this to himself with a wry smile on his face as he investigated the divine looking ancient symbols that connected the massive wall of the city together with thousands of different formations that connected together to form one single formation.


    Even whenpared to the realm destruction formation he had encountered back in the secret realm, it was not too far behind when it came toplexity.


    As for the power of the formation itself, Xuan Hao would had no idea with his current understanding of formations. Maybe if the formation was activated, he would have a chance to get an idea on just how powerful it was.


    In the end, no matter what, he still understood that he stood no chance against the powerful formation covering the capital of the Sky Empire¡­


    Well¡­ Not that I n to face off against that formation¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao slowly made his way towards the massive gate that served as the entrance to the capital city before stopping at the end of a long line of people slowly moving in through the gate after a quick inspection by the guards standing at the gate.


    Given his current strength, Xuan Hao didn''t doubt that he would be able to enter the capital city without having to go through this process by simply showing his strength and informing the guards about his identity¡­ But for now, he decided against giving away against that, as he still had a little under a week before the meeting for the Sect Alliance officially began.


    During this period of time leading up to the meeting, he wanted to look through the capital city of the Sky Empire and get a little more familiar with the different powers standing at the top of the Sky Empire without getting involved in anything with the Sky Empire''s imperial family that would almost certainly send someone to look for him after he announced his identity at the gate¡­

 Chapter 754 Self Proclaimed Dao Partner Of The Sunfire Sect’s Sect Master

    Waiting in the slow moving line for a little over an hour to enter the capital city of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao did not have any problems entering after reaching the gate and paying the guards a few spirit stones as entrance fee.


    Even the formation that he worried about stopping him due to his cultivation base did not do anything when he made his way through the gate and entered the capital city. From this alone, it was obvious that his strength had not yet reached a level where he would be considered a threat to the capital that would have to get permission to enter.


    Considering the fact that the people on top of the Sky Empire had all reached the Soul Ascension Realm, this was not too odd, as the difference in strength between the Soul Ascension Realm and the Domain Lord Realm was not something that could easily be crossed. Even with his current strength that could be considered far above that of a normal Domain Lord Realm Expert, Xuan Hao could only barely fight with a Soul Ascension Realm Expert and had no way to kill the other party...


    Calming down after looking away from the ancient divine symbols gently glowing on the gate and the wall behind him, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face as he looked at the busy streets andrge buildings in front of him made out of all sorts of different rare spiritual materials.


    Inspecting the strength of the different people moving around on the streets, Xuan Hao was even more surprised after finding out that almost all of the people walking around had at least reached the Foundation Establishment. Even finding a single person who was in the Qi Condensation Realm was difficult outside of the children who had only just started cultivating!


    "So, this is the capital city of the Sky Empire..."


    Seeing just how strong the normal people walking along the streets of the city was, Xuan Hao began to understand why so many Nascent Soul Realm Experts and Domain Lord Realm Experts could appear in the core of the Sky Empirepared to the outer region.


    Of course the most important factor that allowed this to happen was still the abundant resources and denser qi present in the core region of the Sky Empire...


    "Hm?"


    Feeling someone looking at him as he was inspecting the strength of the people walking around him on the busy streets, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes as he turned to look towards a middle aged man standing not too far away.


    Domain Lord... And someone in the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm! Did he perhaps sense my divine sense when I looked around...?


    Seeing through the strength of the middle-aged man looking towards him in an instant, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly after realizing that the other party had most likely sensed his divine sense when he used it to find out the strength of the different people on the streets of the capital just now.


    To be honest, this was quite surprising to Xuan Hao, as he had specifically limited his divine sense, so it didn''t spread more than a few hundred meters around him and even made sure to avoid any of the guards standing around the wall and gate of the city...


    With all of this in mind, even if an ordinary Domain Lord Realm Expert in the earlier stages had been around, it would be impossible for them to pick up his divine sense!


    The problem was... He didn''t expect for there to actually be someone in the middle stages of the Domain Lord Realm present!


    Rustle~


    Watching as the middle-aged man staring directly at him slowly got up from the small restaurant he was sitting in before making his way over towards him, Xuan Hao decided to wait for the other part. Feeling quite curious as to what the man would want from him knowing the difference in their strength.


    After all, even if the man in the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm could just barely pick up his divine sense, he would have no idea to see through the strength of his divine sense with his current strength.


    Although this allowed Xuan Hao''s true cultivation realm to be hidden from the man, it also allowed the man to understand the difference in strength between them. Even if he was not clear about Xuan Hao''s strength, he would at the very least be clear that he was at least someone in theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Greetings senior! I''m Elder Scarlet me from the Sunfire Sect. If I''m not being too rude asking, are you perhaps also here for the sect alliance meeting next week?"


    Hearing what the middle-aged man asked him after walking over Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face. Given how rare sects with Domain Lords in them werepared to kingdoms with Domain Lord Realm Experts in them, Xuan Hao didn''t expect to actually run into one of the rare few Domain Lord Realm Experts from a sect after just entering the capital city.


    Not to mention, he seemed to remember that Qing Yi had made friends with someone from the Sunfire Sect during the alchemypetition in the Iron Sky Kingdom!


    How odd... If I don''t remember wrongly, the current Domain Lord Realm Expert in charge of the Sunfire Sect should be in the earlier stages of the Domain Lord Realm and more important... Should be a woman. Not a middle-aged man...


    "Yes, I''m also here for the sect alliance meeting... But if I don''t remember wrongly, the Sunfire Sect only has a single Domain Lord and that person should be a woman..."


    Deciding to say this, Xuan Hao curiously looked towards the man standing in front of him. Wanting to know if he was really someone from the Sunfire Sect or not.


    "Ah, that... I''m actually the dao partner of the current sect master and just recently came back from exploring some ancient ruins located outside the Sky Empire and haven''t really shown my current strength enough for those people to find out about it. If I''m not wrong, you should be in a simr situation senior..."


    Listening to what the self-proimed dao partner of the Sunfire Sect''s sect master said, Xuan Hao felt that what he said made sense.


    Given that even he had still not been listed inside the list of Domain Lord Realm Experts of the Sky Empire, it was obvious that there would be other people in a simr situation as himself, Xuan Hao just didn''t expect to meet someone like that so fast. Not to mention, the other party also said that he was the dao partner of the Sunfire Sect''s sect master...


    "Senior, I''m telling the truth! See!"


    Clearly feeling Xuan Hao''s suspicious look the moment he said that he was the current dao partner of the Sunfire Sect''s sect master, the middle-aged man quickly took out the invitation to the sect alliance meeting for the Sunfire Sect and showed it to him.


    "This... I guess you are telling the truth, I just didn''t expect for the sect master to have such a powerful dao partner..."


    Seeing the middle-aged man get ready to pull out the family paintings from his interspatial ring after not getting a reaction from him after showing off the invitation to the sect alliance meeting, Xuan Hao stopped him as he said this.


    "But... Is there something you need from me?" Understanding very well that the man in front of him would not try so hard to convince him about his identity for no reason, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes before asking this the moment the man put away one of the family painting he had pulled managed to pull out before Xuan Hao stopped him.


    Even if one of his disciples had grown friendly with someone from the Sunfire Sect and he had a good impression from his short encounter with the people from the Sunfire Sect, Xuan Hao understood that the attitude of a few people was far from enough to get a good grasp over what kind of sect the Sunfire Sect was.


    For all he knew, the Sunfire Sect could be a hidden demonic sect simr to the ck Rose Sect that had disappeared into the thin air after being found out!


    "Actually... There is something I wanted to ask you about after finding out you were also here for the sect alliance meeting..."


    "So... What is it?"


    Not feeling the slightest hint of surprise after hearing what the man said, Xuan Hao patiently looked towards him as he waited to hear what it was.


    "This... Let''s go to a more quiet ce first, the things I want to talk about are not really good to discuss out in the open..."


    "Sure, you lead the way."


    Feeling even more curious about what this Elder Scarlet me wanted to talk about, Xuan Hao didn''t hesitate to follow after him to a more isted ce inside the capital city...

 Chapter 755 Remote Inn

    Moving through the busy streets of the capital city, Xuan Hao soon saw that the number of people around him began decreasing before everyone except for a few weaker people around the Foundation Establishment Realm were left on the street.


    Even without knowing where he was being led, Xuan Hao understood that it should be somewhere quiet and far away from any of the normal crowded streets that looked like they were everywhere inside the capital city upon first passing through the massive gates.


    "We are here. Follow me."


    Coming to a stop in front of a small inn after close to half an hour of walking, Elder Scarlet me opened the door leading inside the inn before signalling for him to follow. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "¡­"


    Standing in front of the inn without entering immediately, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about what Elder Scarlet me wanted from him. Even without entering the inn, he could still feel several powerful auras that had all reached the Domain Lord Realm. The strongest among them had even reached the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and was rather close to breaking through to the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even inside the Sky Empire, such a gathering of experts could normally not be found outside of thergest factions and even then, it would not be easy to gather so many Domain Lord Realm Experts together!


    Creak~!


    Stepping onto the wooden steps leading inside the rather high up door to the inn, Xuan Hao stepped inside before curiously inspecting the group of Domain Lord Realm Experts he had sensed from outside the inn.


    This¡­ There are more people in here than I expected¡­


    After inspecting the group of people, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that other than the seven Domain Lord Realm Experts that were sitting around inside the inn, there was also close to twenty or so Peak Nascent Soul Realm Experts sitting around the inn in small groups chatting with each other.


    Because he had focused most of his attention on the powerful aura belonging to the Domain Lord Realm Experts and had not used his divine sense to investigate the situation inside the inn earlier, he had idently ended up ignoring therge number of weaker Nascent Soul Realm Experts that were also present inside the inn.


    Recognizing most of the Domain Lord Realm Experts present as the leaders of different sects inside the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao turned to look towards Elder Scarlet me standing beside him with a questioning look on his face. Wanting to find out for what reason he had brought him to this ratherrge gathering of powerful experts from different sect all across the Sky Empire.


    "Elder Scarlet me, who is this? Someone new you found?"


    Before Elder Scarlet me had a chance to answer Xuan Hao''s questioning look, one of the Domain Lord Realm Experts inside the inn walked over and asked Elder Scarlet me with a small smile on his face as he curious looked towards Xuan Hao standing a few meters behind him.


    "Ah, senior here is also here for the sect alliance meeting next week and I thought it would be a good idea to also invite him to join us¡­"


    "I see- Wait, Senior!?"


    Nodding his head at first as he listened to what Elder Scarlet me said, the Domain Lord that had just asked him soon froze as a shocked expression appeared on his face as he heard how Elder Scarlet me addressed Xuan Hao.


    Obviously, Elder Scarlet me had already reached the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and could be considered to have reached the middle stage of the Domain Lord Realm. For him to address someone as senior, the other party had to at least have reached the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    With this in mind, it was obvious why the Domain Lord Realm Expert had a shocked expression on his face. After all, the strongest person currently present was only someone in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although there still was a difference in strength between Domain Lords in the fourth and the sixth stage of the realm. The difference was nowhere near what it was between someone in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    The main reason for this, was that there was that one''s strength would experience a rapid period of growth after breaking through from the third to the fourth stage of the Domain Lord Realm and when breaking through from the sixth to the seventh stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Senior? Someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm actually showed up!?"


    "Haha, with the support of a Seventh Stage Domain Lord, we are certain to do better in the uing meeting! Even the Sky Empire won''t be able to ignore us!"


    "But¡­ What sect is this senior from? I don''t seem to have seen him before¡­"


    Following what the Domain Lord Realm Expert who walked up said and also hearing the way Elder Scarlet me addressed Xuan Hao, the rest of the people sitting around chatting with each other inside the inn quickly turned their attention towards Xuan Hao before all of them began trying to figure out which sect he was from.


    "Elder Water Sparrow, let''s talk about this with the others in the back room."


    Seeing that everyone had focused their attention on them following what both he himself and Elder Water Sparrow said, Elder Scarlet me said this while signalling for both Xuan Hao and the other Domain Lord Realm Experts to follow him as he made his way towards arge empty room located in the back of the inn.


    ¡­


    "So¡­ Elder Scarlet me, care to exin to us now?"


    Sitting down around a small table at the centre of the room, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord was the first to step forward and ask Elder Scarlet me about Xuan Hao. Given that he had been the strongest person present just a few moment ago, he was obviously curious about the person Elder Scarlet me had brought back with him.


    Other than this, different from the other Domain Lords present who thought Xuan Hao was someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he could clearly feel that Xuan Hao was not just someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. After all, he himself had already taken a step into the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and was not too far away from reaching it.


    If Xuan Hao was really someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he would have been able to see through his strength, yet he could not¡­ This made it obvious to him that Xuan Hao should at least be someone in the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­ Even in the entire Sky Empire, such an expert could be considered to stand at the peak among Domain Lord Realm Experts. Only Ninth Stage Domain Lords and those old people just a single step away from the Soul Ascension Realm stood above them!


    "Actually, there isn''t much to exin, I just happened to run into senior when I was walking around the southern gate and found out that he had alsoe here for the sect alliance meeting. Hearing this, I thought it would be a good idea to invite him over and ask him to join us for the uing meeting. After all, the more Domain Lords we have, the better.


    Ehm¡­ Senior, if you don''t mind me asking, what sect are you from and what is your name¡­ It seems like I forgot to ask you about this earlier on our way to the inn due to me feeling excited at the prospect of having another Domain Lord join us for the uing sect alliance meeting¡­"


    Feeling a bit awkward as he suddenly realized that he had not really asked Xuan Hao about his name or what sect he was from, Elder Scarlet me turned towards Xuan Hao as he waited for him to introduce himself. Wondering about what sect he was from like the rest of the Domain Lord Realm Experts.


    "I''m a grand elder of the Star Shattering Sect, you can just call me Elder Xuan."


    Not seeing any reason to hide his identity from the group of Domain Lord Realm Experts in front of him, as they looked like they wanted him to join their group for something regarding the uing sect alliance meeting that the imperial family of the Sky Empire had nned out, Xuan Hao turned towards Elder Scarlet me after introducing himself.


    "So¡­ What did you bring me here for?"


    Narrowing his eyes as he said this, Xuan Hao stared directly at Elder Scarlet me. Wanting to find out just what this person wanted from him and how it was rted to the uing sect alliance meeting.

 Chapter 756 Plight Of The Independent Sects

    Hearing Xuan Hao''s question, Elder Scarlet me and the rest of the Domain Lord Realm Experts all looked at each other for a short moment beforeing to an agreement about something- n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "If you don''t mind, I will exin the situation..."


    Not even a secondter, Elder Scarlet me said this with a somewhat nervous expression on his face.


    "That is fine with me."


    Understanding that the group of Domain Lords should have talked to Elder Scarlet me through their divine sense and given him help as to what he should say, Xuan Hao decided to pretend he didn''t notice anything.


    At this point in time, he was just curious as to what had caused this group of Domain Lords and the Peak Nascent Soul Realm Experts outside to gather together inside a small inn located in a remote part of the capital city and how it was rted to the uing sect alliance meeting


    "As you already know, the sect alliance meeting ising up in a few days and the representatives from the different sects inside the Sky Empire are all showing up to join the meeting arranged by the imperial family to decrease the influence of the three big religions that have increasingly increased their power inside the capital over the past few years and they-"


    "Yes, I already know about all of this... But how does this rte to you needing my help?"


    Feeling like Elder Scarlet me was about to start reciting everything about why the sect alliance was being established in detail over the next few hours, Xuan Hao decided to interrupt him before he had a chance to start.


    "Ehm... During the meeting, five people who will be in charge of the sect alliance will be decided depending on the sects they can get to support them. All of us here gathered together because of this, to chose someone among us to represent all of our sects in the sect alliance!


    The thing I wanted to ask you for help with, was joining us during the uing meeting to increase our chances..."


    Understanding what Xuan Hao wanted, Elder Scarlet me directly told him what he wanted before nervously lowering his head and waiting for Xuan Hao to respond.


    "Interesting..." Muttering this to himself after hearing what Elder Scarlet me said, Xuan Hao looked around at the surrounding Domain Lords who were all looking towards him with anticipation.


    Given how much weaker the sects inside the Sky Empire werepared to the kingdoms, it was almost certain that they would be able to get one of the leader positions with someone in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm leading them. In a sense, there was no need for them to convince him to help them out during the meeting, as they should already be guaranteed to get a leader position without his help.


    "With your current strength, are you not already certain of getting one of the leader positions? Why is there a need for me to join you?" Feeling that things were a bit odd with how everyone looked towards him, Xuan Hao decided to ask the question that was on his mind.


    "This..."


    In return, Elder Scarlet me who had lowered his head just a second ago almost jumped up like a frightened rabbit before nervously looking towards the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert who let out a sigh the moment, he heard Xuan Hao''s question.


    "Allow me to exin... As you already know, the most powerful forces inside the Sky Empire are the different kingdoms under the Sky Empire. Unfortunately, because of this, most of the sects that are joining the uing meeting are not independent sects but instead subordinate powers of these kingdoms.


    Because of this, even if we gathered most of the independent sects together here, our chances of getting a leading position in the sect alliance when put against those subservient sects are close to non. Especially considering the fact that most of the powerful kingdoms who control these sects are unwilling to give us independent sects any influence..."


    "I see, but why did you ask me to join your group? Aren''t you afraid that I''m also from a sect under a kingdom?" Hearing what the old man in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm said, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit confused as he said this.


    "Well... To be honest, it''s because of your strength!"


    "My strength?"


    "Yes! Among the different sects in the Sky Empire, not a single one of them have produced someone above the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm due to the different kingdoms constant suppression!"


    "Wait! There isn''t anyone above the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm among the sects of the Sky Empire!?"


    "No, it was also because of this that Elder Scarlet me here and the rest of us are certain that you are not under any of those kingdom. Although... I''m quite curious about your sect. For it to still remain unknown inside the Sky Empire even with an expert such as yourself in it!"


    Listening to what the old man in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm said, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say.


    Even if he had found it a bit odd that he had never managed to see any sects inside the core region of the Sky Empire without them being located inside the territory of a kingdom, he never expected that it was because of something like this.


    Given the number of people he had seen inside the inn, there should only be around 40 independent sects inside the Sky Empire... And even among them, the number of independent sects that actually had any kind of power was less than ten!


    But why would independent sects be supressed so much? Even if a sect is independent from a kingdom, it is not much different from a kingdom in the way that it operates and manages its territory... Is it perhaps because of the threerge religions?


    Not able to shake off the feeling that something was wrong with the suppression of independent sects, Xuan Hao had a feeling that it might be rted to the three big religions. After all, different from the kingdoms, the three big religions could not get any faith from the territories managed by sects...


    As for why they could not get any faith, Xuan Hao had at first thought it was due to the difference in their cultivation path... But the cultivation path of the different kingdoms and even the entire Sky Empire was not different and followed the same path, so this idea had quickly been thrown out by Xuan Hao.


    In the end, he had no idea why the different religions could not get any faith from the territories of sects.


    "There is still a lot I don''t know about..."


    Understanding that he still did not know a lot about the world, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that his strength was still too weak. Not to mention the Sky Empire, there was still other more powerful empires, the dangerous core region of the continent and the gods that the different religions prayed to.


    After the meeting is over, I will try and find out how to breakthrough to the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought this, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the group of Domain Lords who were all looking towards him nervously.


    "Senior... Do you want to help us...?"


    Interrupting the silence that had engulfed the small room in the back of the inn, Elder Scarlet me nervously spoke out as he look pleadingly towards Xuan Hao. Even if he didn''t know Xuan Hao for more than an hour at this point in time, Elder Scarlet me still understood how important it was for them to get his help for the uing meeting.


    With someone like him around, they were certain to get one of the leader positions and also wouldn''t have to worry about the retaliation of the more powerful kingdoms.


    After all, a Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert who had reached theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm was different from someone in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm who was still in the middle stages of the realm and was not someone anyone other than the top forces of the Sky Empire could deal with.


    "Sure, I will help out in meeting if needed... But I will not be using my current identity!"


    Hearing the nervous voice of Elder Scarlet me and understanding what was passing through his head, Xuan Hao decided to ept the request to help them for the uing meeting.


    "If you need an identity, you can use my ancestors. ording to what the outside world knows he disappeared a little over two thousand years ago when he went looking for an opportunity to break through to the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm... But in reality, he returned a few hundred years ago and died during secluded cultivation!"


    "Hm... Sure, that would be fine... But are you sure about me using your ancestors identity?"


    "Haha, yes, I''m sure! With how strong you are, I''m sure my ancestor wouldn''t mind it either!"


    "Great, then let''s go with that when the timees."


    Seeing as all the Domain Lords were happily smiling and started chatting with each other after hearing that he would help them out, Xuan Hao decided to take his leave after finishing his short conversation with one of the Domain Lords who spoke up and gave him an identity to use for the uing meeting in case he was needed.


    "Haha, this is great! Let''s inform the younger ones outside and celebrate! With this, we are sure to get a leader position during the meeting!"


    Hearing the loud exmation behind him as he left the inn, Xuan Hao could not help rolling his eyes.


    The main reason he had decided to join them and help them secure a leader position in the sect alliance was to hopefully turn attention away from the border of the Sky Empire where the Star Shattering Sect was developing.


    Even if the attention on the Star Shattering Sect from the forces in the core region of the Sky Empire was still close to non-existent at this point in time, Xuan Hao understood that it would only be a matter of time before they started learning about it.

 Chapter 757 Hidden Sect And... System Malfunction...?

    "Haha, now that we have the support of a powerful expert in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, we won''t have to worry about the meeting!"


    "That is true¡­ We might even be lucky enough to get more than one position. After all, outside of those three leeches, the rest of the sects don''t even have someone in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm supporting them!"


    "Hehe, indeed, it looks like we really might end up getting more than one leader position during the meeting. At that point in time, all of our sects are sure to benefit from the resources that the Sky Empire will allocate to the sect alliance to help increase its strength enough to pose a threat to those religious organisations¡­!"


    After Xuan Hao left the remote inn, it did not take long for the Nascent Soul Realm Experts waiting in the front of the inn to find out what happened as all of them happily began celebrating after learning that they would have the support of a powerful expert in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm during the uing meeting about the establishment of the sect alliance.


    "Elder Xuan¡­ Star Shattering Sect¡­"


    The only person who remained silent not celebrating at this moment, was the old man in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm who was instead standing in a corner of the inn quietly muttering to himself with a frown on his face.


    Different from the rest of the people present, he very clearly understood that Xuan Hao was not someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm but someone even stronger than that!


    But where did someone that stronge from all of a sudden? Not to mention, I have never heard about the Star Shattering Sect before¡­ Could it be one of those legendary hidden sects left behind from the ancient era!?


    Deep in thought as he tried figuring out Xuan Hao''s identity and if he had ever heard of the Star Shattering Sect before, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm could note up with anything about Xuan Hao or the Star Shattering Sect.


    In the end, he remembered an ancient tale that his master had once told him when he was still around.


    Originally, his sect was not an independent sect that existed under the Sky Empire. Instead it had once been the branch of an ancient sect that had hidden itself after a cmity that had taken ce towards the end of the ancient era ording to his master.


    At first his sect had still been in contact with this main sect and had been visited on different asions¡­ But the visits grew more and more rare as the years passed.


    From a visit once every year, to a visit every ten years, until it became rare for someone from the main sect to visit even once every thousand years!


    As the visits from the main sect decreased, the branch sect slowly transformed from a branch sect into an independent sect that operated on its own.


    ording to what his master had told him back then, thest visit from the main sect that had hidden away had happened when his master was still young elite of the sect who was working hard to be the sect master.


    "If I''m not wrong, master said that the person who came to visit from the main sect back then was covered in blood all over and only stayed for a few seconds before leaving again¡­"


    Muttering this to himself, the old man let out a sigh as he thought about his master. Other than informing him about the fact that his sect had originally been a branch sect before bing an independent sect, his master had also told him that their main sect was not the only sect that had gone into hiding back then and that he should be careful not to carelessly offend any sects that had existed for tens of thousands of years or sects that weirdly appeared out of seemingly thin air¡­


    It was because of these words from his master that the old man in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm began suspecting that the Star Shattering Sect Xuan Hao belonged to was actually one of these ancient sect that had decided to start extending their power back into the world!


    "Even if he is not from one of those hidden sects, the sect of such a powerful expert should not be weak in any way. Especially considering that he only introduced himself as a grand elder! If the grand elder is already so powerful, how strong is the sect master and the ancestors¡­?"


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he quietly said this, the old man understood that it would be best to remain friends with Xuan Hao in the future.


    Bang!


    Hearing a loud noise behind him, the old man quickly turned around to see what was happening-


    "This¡­ Can you people act like elders for a second!?"


    Seeing one of the old men in the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm having copsed drunk on the ground after having allowed the alcohol to take effect, the old man could not help ring up at the shameful disy.


    Not to mention just him, the rest of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts were the same as they happily celebrated. Even a few of the Domain Lords had joined in on the celebration, Elder Scarlet me among them!


    What would their juniors think if they saw their elders acting like this!?


    """¡­"""


    Waking up from their happy mood the moment they felt the old man''s powerful aura washing over them. Everyone inside the inn froze on the spot before awkwardly smiling towards the old man with embarrassed expressions on their faces.


    "Hah¡­ You people¡­ Don''t make too much noise, I will go rest¡­"


    Understanding that he would not be able to supress this group of old people due to quite a few of the Domain Lords present had also joined in on the celebration, the old man just shook his head before making his way up to an isted room at the second floor of the inn before starting to cultivate.


    ¡­


    "Hm¡­ Should I investigate the core of the capital where the imperial pce is located or try to find out more about the noble families that only exist inside the capital city¡­?"


    At the same time that the old man at the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm felt troubled with the behaviour of the old people in his group, Xuan Hao was once again standing in front of the gate leading inside the capital city as he wondered where to go first.


    On one side, he really wanted to find out more about the imperial pce and what kind of power that the imperial family might be hiding¡­ But on the other side, he also felt curious about the noble families that only existed inside the capital city yet had a terrifying influence across the Sky Empire that almost rivalled that of the three big religious organisations! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Everyone out of the way! The young master of the Hollow Thunder Family ising through!"


    Hearing a loud voice yelling out all of a sudden interrupting his train of thought, Xuan Hao could not help showing a shocked expression on his face as he suddenly saw arge carriage charging through the busy streets of the capital city. Almost hitting close to a dozen people within the span of only a few second!


    If not for the fact that pretty much everyone here had reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, it was obvious that they would not have had enough time to jump out of the way as the carriage was far faster than the ones used by mortals¡­ And that is not mentioning the demon beast in front pulling the carriage forward.


    [Side Quest: A Wild Young Master Appears!]


    [Description: The young master of the Hollow Thunder Family that is enemies with you friend Yi Min suddenly appeared in front of you and seems to be in a hurry... How suspicious¡­ Investigate what caused the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family to act this way.]


    [Reward: ???]


    What kind of¡­ Did the system malfunction due to none of his disciples using one of its functions and it instead decided to use it on him instead¡­?


    Not knowing what to say when he suddenly saw the quest that had appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao could only shake his head with a bewildered expression on his face before using his domain to hide himself and follow after the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family who was quickly making his way towards the noble district of the capital city where the different noble families stayed.


    Even if the sudden quest from the system was rather unexpected, Xuan Hao did not n to ignore it. Even if it felt like the system trying its best to make use of the existence of a random young master¡­

 Chapter 758 Noble District

    Following behind the young master from the hollow Thunder Family as he made his way through the busy streets, Xuan Hao could not help feeling admiring the people standing in the way of the carriage who always somehow managed to jump out of the way just in time before the demon beast in front of the carriage hit them.


    Given his current cultivation base, it was easy for Xuan Hao to see the situation of the carriage that the third young master of the Hollow Thunder Family was inside of.


    However even with this in mind, he could not see anything out of ce and only saw a young boy in the Foundation Establishment Realm anxiously looking all over the ce as if he was about to face a life and death situation.


    How odd...


    Seeing the situation of the young boy anxiously pacing around inside the carriage that was moving through the busy streets of the capital, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious as to just what it was that had caused the system to issue a quest to him...


    Keeping an eye on the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family to see if he did anything, Xuan Hao kept following the carriage for close to half an hour before it finally came to a stop in front of arge gate with two guards at the Nascent Soul Realm standing in front of it.


    Not a secondter, the young boy that had been anxiously pacing around inside the carriage made his way outside before showing off a small token to the guards suspiciously inspecting him as he approached them.


    "Hollow Thunder Family!? Hm? I didn''t expect to see a young master of the Hollow Thunder Family at the southern gate! Is there perhaps anything I can help w-" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Don''t waste my time and just open the gate, I''m in a hurry!"


    "Ah? Ah! Yes, of course young master!"


    Hearing the aggressive tone of the young boy, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert narrowed both of his eyes for a short moment after being treated so badly before quickly showing a smile and signalling for the other guard to open the gate.


    From an outside perspective, it was very clear that this guard was not the slightest bit pleased with the behaviour of the young master... But in the end, there was nothing he could do about it.


    Not only was the Hollow Thunder Family a noble family, but it was also one of the most powerful noble families in the Sky Empire. The patriarch of the Hollow Thunder Family was even rumoured to be close to reaching the Soul Ascension Realm!


    With his strength having reached the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, there was no way for him to offend such a terrifying power. All he could do was push down his displeasure after being disrespected by a little boy who only reached the Foundation Establishment Realm and hope that the little boy would not end up finding trouble for him in the future...


    Creak~


    As therge gate slowly began opening and showing the pristine buildings on the other side, Xuan Hao watching the scene from the side could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after feeling the very clear difference in the quality of the qi between heaven and earth on the other side of the gate.


    A qi gathering formation!?


    Encountering a qi gathering formation for the first time outside of the one he himself had made with the help of the system, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious as he began using his divine sense to examine to formation from afar.


    Hm... Although the qi gathering formation is far smaller than the one, I made for covering a part of the Shattered Star Peaks, its effectiveness should not fall too far behind before it got upgraded to the chaotic qi formation by the system...


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he examined the qi gathering formation covering the noble district, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a hint of admiration for the formation master who set up the qi gathering formation.


    Although the formation was of worse qualitypared to the one he had been given by the system, the formation itself was still something that Xuan Hao had no way to make with his current understanding of formations.


    Even if the area covered was smaller and the formation itself looked far less stable, Xuan Hao still understood just how hard it was to construct a qi gathering formation. The only reason he had been able to set up a qi gathering formation in first ce, was due to the help of the system!


    Without it, there would have been no way for him to set up a qi gathering formation like the one in front of him. Not to mention the moreplicated one that the system had given him...


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the carriage with the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family.


    "Let''s go! We can''t waste any more time here!"


    After the gate had opened up, the young master poked his head out of the side window of the carriage before hurrying the person controlling the carriage to start moving.


    "Yes, young master!"


    Hearing what his young master said, the person only nodded his head respectfully before the carriage soon started moving inside the noble district.


    The only difference was that the carriage was moving far slowerpared to before.


    Obviously, the carriage driver understood that the people inside the noble district were not people that could be easily ignored like the people walking the busy streets outside.


    Creak~!


    Not even a few seconds had passed since the carriage entered the noble district before therge gate separating the noble district from the rest of the capital slowly began closing.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao didn''t wait around and directly used his movement technique as he rushed past the two guards and entered the noble district.


    Bang!


    Not aware of the fact that someone had just passed them and entered the noble district, the two guards continued closing the gate as it mmed shut with a loud bang before both of them returned to what they were doing before. Unaware of Xuan Hao who had slipped past them.


    ...


    This was far easier than I expected...


    Entering the noble district, Xuan Hao could not help feeling surprised at how easily he had managed to enter.


    Not to mention the fact that there wasn''t anyone at the Domain Lord Realm guarding the entrance with their domain to prevent anyone in the Domain Lord Realm from entering, there wasn''t any other formation outside of the qi gathering formation set up around the noble district.


    Because of this, anyone with a cultivation in the Domain Lord Realm would be able to easily enter the noble district without being discovered by the guards who were only in the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Feeling that this was rather odd, Xuan Hao soon discovered why this was the case as he saw arge estate located not too far away from the gate.


    Not only was the estate surrounded by arge wall that made it hard to look at what was happening inside, but Xuan Hao also discovered that the estate had a dozens of different formations protecting it from anyone entering.


    Even Xuan Hao with his current cultivation base would properly not be able to enter it without getting discovered by one of the formations covering therge estate!


    The rest of the estates and buildings inside the noble district were the same, as all of them were guarded by their own formations, therger estates and buildings owned by powerful noble families were covered in far better formations, while the weaker noble families barely had one or two defensive formations protecting their buildings...


    From this, it was obvious that the noble families did not cooperate as much as the qi gathering formation covering the noble district had first suggested...


    "Ah! I have to catch up before that young master disappears!"


    Realizing that the carriage with the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family had almost disappeared from his sight as he had stopped to inspect his surroundings, Xuan Hao quickly turned his attention away from the countless small formations that could be seen all over the noble district covering the many different buildings before following after the carriage that made its way towards the core of the noble district.


    Given that he was inside the noble district of the Sky Empire and that there should be quite a few powerful experts at the Domain Lord Realm present, Xuan Hao didn''t dare to carelessly release his divine sense to keep an eye on the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family. Especially considering what he had experienced after he released his divine sense after having entered the capital city...

 Chapter 759 Two Careless Spies~

    Making his way deeper inside the noble district following after the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family, Xuan Hao soon came to a stop after the carriage with the young master inside of it entered arge estate.


    Narrowing both of his eyes looking towards the estate that the young master had disappeared inside of, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing to himself after discovering that the formations guarding the estate were more than powerful enough to discover him.


    Even if he could still easily break them and forcefully make his way inside the estate, doing so would definitely end up alerting the people inside... And more importantly, the experts of the Hollow Thunder Family!


    "Hm?"


    Observing therge estate that the young master of the hollow Thunder Family had entered, Xuan Hao''s eyes shone for a short moment as he saw a group of servants entering the estate through a backdoor not too far away from the main entrance that the young master had entered through.


    The important thing about these servants was not the fact that they were entering through a backdoor... But instead, the fact that all of them carried a small token with them that allowed them to pass through the formation guarding the estate without triggering its defensive mechanisms.


    Whoosh~!


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao didn''t waste a single second, as he dashed over and secretly took away one of the servants tokens before entering therge estate through the backdoor.


    Although there was indeed someone guarding the back entrance and checking all of the servants, this person was only someone in the Nascent Soul Realm and had no way to discover Xuan Hao after he had used his domain to hide himself.


    Bang!


    "Ouch-!"


    A short time after Xuan Hao had entered therge estate with the stolen token in hand, the little servant girl that he had stolen the token from crashed headfirst into a barrier formed by the formation.


    "Huh!? Why did the formation activate- Ah!? Where is my token!?"


    Filled with confusion over what happened, the little servant girl quickly realized that her token was missing.


    Rustle~


    Beginning to look around for the token thinking that she had dropped it on the ground with a panicked expression on her face, the little servant girl suddenly felt a hand on her shoulder.


    "Little Yue... Did you forget your token again...?"


    Hearing the voice of the guard from behind, the little servant girl called Yue could not help blushing in embarrassment as she turned towards the guard not knowing what to say.


    Okay, she might have forgotten her token the past few times, but she could have sworn she had brought it with her today!


    "Little Yue... Hah... Don''t worry about it, take this token for now and don''t throw it away!"


    "Thank you, uncle guard!"


    Feeling even more embarrassment washing over her as the guard gave her a new token thinking that she might have thrown the other one away, the little servant girl could only bow her head and thank the guard before rushing inside therge estate. Not wanting to embarrass herself any further.


    "Hah... These new servants still have quite a bit to learn before they can be sent to the main estate..."


    Not too bothered about the missing token, the guard just said this to himself before he returned to watching over the back entrance of the estate.


    All things considered, the estate he was guarding was not an important ce to the Hollow Thunder Family and had no important people staying inside of it outside a few of the family''s young master anddies from time to time.


    With this in mind, the guard was not the slightest bit worried about the missing token of the little servant girl.


    ...


    Unaware of the fact that he had ended up embarrassing a young servant girl after stealing away her token, Xuan Hao began searching through therge estate for the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family without using his divine sense.


    All things considered, even if he got his hand on a token that would allow him to move around therge estate without triggering the defensive mechanism of the formations guarding the ce, he still did not dare carelessly release his divine sense. After all, he had no idea if there were any Domain Lord Realm Expert present inside therge estate.


    If there really was a Domain Lord Realm Expert present, he or she was likely to discover him the moment he used his divine sense. For this reason, Xuan Hao could only search through therge estate room by room until he found the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family that he was searching for-


    "Are you sure it''s the seventh young master? As far as I know, the seventh young master should be out adventuring at the moment..."


    "Yes, I''m certain! I saw him enter inner garden just a few minutes ago together with the Nascent Soul Realm elder in charge of this estate!"


    "Awesome! This should be a good opportunity to enter the main estate! Hehe, I really didn''t expect one of the young masters to show up only a few weeks after we began working for the Hollow Thunder Family..." n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Indeed, this should be a great chance for us to infiltrate the core of the Hollow Thunder Family. Let''s get going and see if we can catch the young master before he leaves!"


    Before Xuan Hao even had a chance to start searching through the estate on his own, two servant girls happily talked with each other about their ns to infiltrate the main estate of the Hollow Thunder Family by using the seventh young master without a care in the world.


    "..."


    Not knowing what to say when he saw these too careless servant girls who were obviously spies from another noble family, Xuan Hao decided not to say anything as he slowly followed them as they made their way through the many corridors of therge estate.


    Observing these two servant girls as they walked in front of him, Xuan Hao discovered that both of them had a cultivation base in theter stages of the Nascent Soul Realm that had been hidden by some kind of artifact.


    If not for the fact that he had been paying close attention to the two servant girls, it would have been close to impossible for even someone like himself to discover the cultivation base of the two servant girls!


    For them to have an artifact that even he had a hard time seeing through... Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious as to where these two spies hade from.


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, although they did talk a lot about the Hollow Thunder Family and even mentioned that the strength of the elder in charge of therge estate was only someone in the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, they never talked about the power that had sent them to spy on the Hollow Thunder Family.


    From the looks of it, even if they were rather careless when walking around by themselves, they still didn''t mention anything that would give away where they were from...


    "Shh... Be quiet, we are reaching the inner garden. Even if that elder in charge of this ce is only in the Nascent Soul Realm, his senses are far above that of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert. If we are not cautious, he might find out about us!"


    As one of the two servant girls said this beforeing to a stop, the other quickly stopped talking as she looked towards the ss door not too far away from them the led into arge gardenplex.


    "Let''s act normally and just say that we were assigned by the old head servant to take care of the young master during his stay here. From what I know, the old head servant won''t be back to work again for another week. During this time, we should be able to win over the young master and have him take us with him into the main estate!"


    "Good idea! That little boy stands no chance against us two! Hehe, let''s go!"


    Creak~


    As the two servant girls confidently made their way into the inner garden putting on the act of perfect servants, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly after witnessing theplete change in the two servant girls'' behaviour after they stepped inside the inner garden.


    Ignoring the two servant girls as they made their way towards the centre of the garden, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the two people talking with each other at the centre of the garden.


    One of them was the Eighth Stage Nascent Soul Realm Elder that the two servant girls had talked about, while the other was the young master he had been searching for!


    "Hm?"


    However, after seeing the young master he was looking for, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after discovering that the cultivation base of the young master had changed from the earlier stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm to the Core Formation Realm!

 Chapter 760 Secret Passage

    How did his cultivation base suddenly go from the Foundation Establishment Realm to the Core Formation Realm? Did he perhaps use an artifact simr to those two servant girls¡­?


    Not understanding how the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family had suddenly managed to improve his cultivation base from the earlier stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm all the way up to the Core Formation Realm within the short period of a few minutes since he had entered therge estate, the only reason Xuan Hao coulde up with was that the young master had used some sort of artifact to hide his cultivation base.


    Even then, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that there was some other reason for the change in the young master''s cultivation base. After all, the chances of the Hollow Thunder Family having an artifact that had the ability to fool someone who was in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm should not be that high.


    Even if the Hollow Thunder Family really did have such an artifact, there would not be any reason for a young master to be in possession of such a precious artifact!


    I guess I should just wait and see what happens. Maybe this is rted to the quest given by the system¡­


    Feeling that everything around this young master was indeed suspicious like the system quest had said, Xuan Hao decided to wait and see if he could find out what was happening with this young master.


    ""We greet the noble Seventh Young Master and Elder!""


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, the two spies he had followed to the inner garden showed up-


    "Hm? Who is this?!"


    "Servants¡­ Howe two servants showed up¡­?"


    Catching the attention of both the young master and the elder in the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, who were both surprised at the sight of these two servants that had suddenly shown up out of nowhere to interrupt their conversation.


    "Didn''t I order for no one to enter this ce!? Tell me, why did you twoe here?"


    "The head servant ordered us toe over and serve the seventh young master during his stay in the estate, we were not informed about not entering this ce¡­ If elder want us to, we can leave¡­"


    Seeing that the elder was frowning and looking towards both of them with a suspicious expression on his face, one of the two servant girls acted quickly and didn''t show any hesitation as she stepped forward and promptly answered the elder''s question before starting to slowly leave while dragging the other servant girl along with her.


    "No need for that, both of you can stay and serve the young master, we are already finished with our conversation. Hah, looks like I will have to pay a visit to those guards I ced in charge of stopping anyone from entering this ce¡­ I will see youter young master!"


    Stopping the two servant girls before they had a chance to leave, the elder soon let out a sigh before disappearing from the inner garden.


    "Hah.."


    As the elder disappeared, the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family could not help showing an annoyed expression on his face as he looked towards the two servant girls that had been assigned to take care of him by the head servant.


    "You two, don''t bother me and leave! Tell the head servant I don''t need anyone to serve me!"


    Swish-!


    Not bothering to say anything more than this, the young master directly used a movement technique to leave the inner garden without giving the two servant girls a chance to say anything to him before he had already left. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    ""¡­""


    Standing all alone in the middle of the inner garden, the two servant girls looked at each other with a surprised expression on their faces. Clearly, they did not expect that they would be dismissed so easily the moment the elder had left. Especially considering that the seventh young master had a rather bad reputation when it came to women!


    "This brat! How dare he! I think we sisters should teach him a lesson!"


    "Sister¡­ We can''t give away our identity because of this¡­"


    "But¡­ We can''t let this little brat get away with dismissing us like this! We have to-"


    Swish~


    Not bothering to stay around and listen to what the two spies disguised as servant girls were talking about after being dismissed so ruthlessly by the young master, Xuan Hao gave chase to the young master who had already left the inner garden.


    "¡­"


    Why does it always have to be somewhere underground¡­?


    Watching as the young master he was following behind entered a hidden passageway concealed by a formation before making his way down a spiral staircase at the end of the hidden passageway leading to somewhere below therge estate, Xuan Hao could not helpining that he always seemed to end up somewhere underground no matter where he went. Even the capital city of the Sky Empire was no different¡­


    "Hah¡­"


    Hesitating in front of the spiral staircase for a short moment, Xuan Hao made his way down the spiral staircase.


    ¡­


    How annoying, howe so many things showed up to dy me ever since I returned to the capital- Don''t tell me¡­ Did one of my brothers figure out what I''m doing!?


    Different from Xuan Hao who wasmenting over having to go somewhere underground once again, the young master he was following behind had somethingpletely different on mind as he made his way down the secret staircase.


    Rumble~!


    Reaching the bottom of the spiral staircase, the young master''s aura suddenly began fluctuating violently for a short moment before his cultivation base rapidly increased. Instantly going from the Core Formation Realm all the way up to the Nascent Soul Realm without a single bottleneck.


    "Looks like my body is already reaching its limit¡­"


    Contrary to his strong aura and cultivation base, several cracks had appeared all over the body of the young master following the sudden rapid increase in strength that defied logic.


    Bang!


    Copsing on the ground as the cracks all over his body began increasing in both size and number, the young master desperately pulled out a pill bottle from his interspatial ring before swallowing more than half of the pills inside the bottle.


    "Hah¡­ My body should be able to hold on for another few minutes with this¡­"


    Having swallowed the pills, the cracks that had started spreading across his body stopped expanding any further. Allowing the young master to muster enough strength to start walking along the small passage located at the bottom of the spiral staircase.


    Whoosh~!


    Just at this moment, a shadowy figure appeared in front of the young master before respectfully bowing down to him.


    "Master, everything is ready for your transformation!"


    Not showing any surprise at the sudden appearance of the shadowy figure, the young master just nodded his head before continuing making his way towards the underground room that had be visible at the end of the underground passage.


    "Master, do you need any help? I can carry you if needed-"


    "No, I will walk on my own. If you want to do anything, you can make sure that nothing is missing for my transformation and check if any of my brothers happen to be up to anything!"


    Brushing the shadowy figure aside as it tried to get closer and help him, the young master clearly did not enjoy the other party''s helpful attitude as he said this to get rid of the other party.


    "I understand¡­"


    Freezing for a short moment, the shadowy figure swayed gently under the dim light given off by the close to non-existent light from the few torches present in the underground passage before disappearing in the direction that the young master was moving in.


    "Damnable abomination! If not for the fact that the great master sent you to keep me safe, I would have long gotten rid of you¡­" Muttering this to himself as the shadowy figure disappeared, the young master showed a hint of disgust in his eyes for a short moment before focusing back on the difficult task of dragging his already weak body into the room located at the end of the secret underground passage.


    ¡­


    To think that the young master would suddenly break through to the Nascent Soul Realm... And that shadowy figure¡­ If I''m not wrong, it should have been some kind of artificial creature!


    Because of this it should not have any divine sense or domain. Even then it''s strength should still have reached somewhere around the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm from what I can see. This really makes me curious as to just what is up with this young master...


    How did he suddenly reach the Nascent Soul Realm without having to face the Cloud Tribtion, where did the artificial creature guarding hime from, what is the transformation mentioned that he is about to go through about?


    More importantly than all of this, who is the great master that the young master mentioned? The head of the Hollow Thunder Family¡­ Or perhaps someone different¡­

 Chapter 761 Source Of Energy

    Watching the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family slowly dragging his weak body towards arge pair of doors at the end of the underground passage that had been opened by the shadowy figure just a few seconds earlier, Xuan Hao could not help wishing that the shadowy figure would return and help carry the young master. After all, with the young master''s current speed, it would at least take him half an hour to make it to the end of the unground passage... And that is not considering whether or not his body would be able to survive for that long...


    I really don''t want to waste that much time watching this young master...


    As the thought of watching the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family for the next half hour as he slowly made his way towards therge pair of open doors, Xuan Hao inevitably turned to look towards therge pair of open doors that the young master was making his way towards.


    The quest given by the system is only about finding out about what the young master is up to. Not following him around... If I''m not wrong, the so-called transformation he wants to go through should be the thing that the quest wants me to find out about!


    Swish~


    Deciding to ignore the young master after realizing he had no need to follow him around any longer, Xuan Hao silently moved around the young master before reaching therge pair of open doors that the shadowy figure had disappeared inside of just a few seconds earlier.


    "This... A formation? No... A demonic formation!?"


    Standing in front of therge pair of doors, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after seeing a demonic formation on the other side of therge pair of doors.


    Even if he already knew that some people inside the Sky Empire like General Guan, dared cooperate with a demonic sect, he didn''t expect for the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family to do this.


    Not only was he cooperating with a demonic sect, but he had even gone as far as to hide a demonic formation inside the capital city of the Sky Empire!


    Cooperating with a demonic sect in secret outside the capital was one thing, building a demonic formation inside the capital city of the Sky Empire was another.


    No matter how high a mighty an old noble family like the Hollow Thunder Family was, Xuan Hao did not doubt that the imperial family would take action against them the moment they found out what the seventh young master was doing!


    Is the transformation that the young master talked about earlier perhaps using this formation to turn himself into a demonic cultivator...?


    Feeling like he was getting closer to understanding what the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family was nning, Xuan Hao began to carefully inspecting the formation that covered ever part of the underground room. Ignoring the shadowy figure motionlessly standing in a corner of the room looking towards the entrance.


    At the very least, the shadowy figure had no way to find him. Even if its strength had reached somewhere around the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm ording to Xuan Hao''s quick inspection, it was still just an artificial puppet that had no divine sense or domain to support it.


    Whoosh~!


    Knowing that there weren''t anyone inside therge estate that would be able to sense his divine sense after seeing that only the shadowy figure was inside the room on the other side of therge pair of doors, Xuan Hao decided to partially release his divine sense to cover the entire estate.


    "Hm?"


    Covering the entire estate with his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he looked towards the demonic formation that had been carved into the floor, walls and ceiling of the underground room in front of him.


    At first he had just thought that the demonic formation would be used to help the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family to transition from a normal cultivator to a demonic cultivator... But after his divine sense engulfed the entire estate, he discovered that there was another three simr underground rooms with simr demonic formations inside of them.


    Not only did the other three underground rooms also have an artificial puppet simr to the shadowy figure guarding it, but there were also three other people in a simr state as the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family slowly making their way towards the demonic formation at the end of the secret underground passage that they were inside of!


    "I see... The demonic formations are all connected together forming a singlerge demonic formation! If I''m not wrong, after the four demonic formations are activated, they will drain the cultivation base of the people activating it to serve as energy for activating therger demonic formation!" Muttering this to himself as he observed the situation through his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help looking back towards the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family.


    From what he could understand with his limited understanding of formations, the ''transformation'' that the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family talked about, should be him bing a human shaped energy source for therger demonic formation.


    With this in mind, the constant break through in strength that the young master was experiencing together with three other unfortunate souls, should be to have them store as much energy as possible before they in the end would get turned into human shaped energy batteries to fuel the activation of therger demonic formation.


    Thinking about it like this, the artificial puppets standing guard at each of the four smaller demonic formations were likely not only there to defend the demonic formations, but were also there to make sure the human shaped energy batteries didn''t escape after finding out what was happening to them!


    Even if the artificial puppets would not fare well inbat against a normal Domain Lord who could use a domain to fight, they would be more than strong enough to keep any of the human shaped batteries from leaving...


    [Side Quest: A Wild Young Master Appears! (Complete)]


    [Description: The young master of the Hollow Thunder Family that is enemies with you friend Yi Min suddenly appeared in front of you and seems to be in a hurry... How suspicious... Investigate what caused the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family to act this way.]


    [Reward: Divine Will Scripture]


    "Ah!?"


    Just as the thought about the fate of the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family and the rest of the unfortunate souls that were in the process of transforming into an optional state for helping activate therger demonic formation appeared in his head, the quest from the system appeared in front of him. Showing that he had been correct when it came to the sad fate of the young master of the Hollow Thunder Family and the three other unfortunate souls.


    Even if he could not understand what therger demonic formation would do after it activated with his current understanding of formations, this did not matter when it came to the quest. After all the goal for his quest was not to find out about therge demonic formation hidden beneath one of the Hollow Thunder Family''s estates. Instead, it was to find out about what the seventh young master of the Hollow Thunder Family was up to...


    "Hehe, as long as Iplete the transformation, I will no longer be left behind by my older brothers and I will finally have chance to be the next head of the family!"


    "..."


    Listening to the ramblings of the young master as he got closer and closer to the demonic formation, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head. Already imagining the despair that young master would go through after finding out that he had been turned into a human shaped energy battery.


    Even if he wanted to help him, there was nothing he could do with his current strength.


    Increasing the capacity of someone''s dantian that had the ability to carry the energy of an early-stage Foundation Establishment Realm Expert to suddenly having to carry the energyparable to someone in the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm was not without consequences! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Be it the young master''s dantian, body or soul. All three of them were on the verge of copse and could not be saved without the help of some godly expert!


    Other than this, the demonic formation that the young master was walking towards would also be able to artificially keep him alive as it drained the energy out of his body in an extremely painful manner over the period of a few minutes...


    No matter what, they young master was not going to survive, something that was certain to end up alerting the Hollow Thunder Family!

 Chapter 762 Descending Sea Of Flames

    I should leave this ce and find a good ce to observe what is going to happen next before things start getting troublesome¡­


    Not wanting nning to interfere with the demonic formation that was about to activate, Xuan Hao decided to leave the underground room with the demonic formation and the seventh young master of the Hollow Thunder Family inside of it.


    In the first ce, it was not his problem to deal with the demonic formation and he didn''t really want to give away his identity to mess with a powerful demonic cultivator that dared to set up a demonic formation in the backyard of the imperial family.


    Whoosh~


    Silently making his way out of therge estate before finding a good ce to observe the situation from afar, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he thought about what kind of reason a demonic cultivator would have to set up such arge scale demonic formation inside the imperial capital of the Sky Empire.


    Even if most of therge demonic formation and the four smaller ones had been constructed by others, the core of therge demonic formation would still have to be made by the demonic cultivator who was behind the entire thing¡­ Entering the Sky Empire to do something like this, the demonic cultivator had essentially put his life on the line to set up the demonic formation!


    After all, even if the other party might be a powerful True Demon Realm demon cultivator, Xuan Hao doubted that the other party would be able to escape alive if he got trapped by the terrifying formation that guarded the capital city of the Sky Empire¡­ And that was not mentioning the Soul Ascension Realm Experts present in the capital city¡­


    "Still setting up a demonic formation with this risk¡­ Just what is the goal of this formation¡­ Harvesting the life force of the powerful cultivators residing in the noble district?" Muttering this to himself as he was leftpletely bewildered about the true purpose of the demonic formation, Xuan Hao could only shake his head and continuing keeping an eye on therge estate waiting for the demonic formation to activate.


    All things considered; Xuan Hao doubted that the purpose of the formation was to harvest the life force of the powerful cultivators in the noble district. After all, for something like that to be possible, the demonic cultivator behind the formation had to be present to absorb the life force himself¡­


    RUMBLE-!


    Waiting around for what felt like an eternity watching therge estate of the Hollow Thunder Family, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both of his eyes as the entire noble district began shaking violently like it had just experienced a massive earthquake.


    "Wha-what is happening!? An earthquake!?"


    "Ah-! T-the formation is actually showing signs of breaking!"


    "Is the capital under attack!?"


    Watching as the nobles and servants moving around the noble district all began panicking as everything around him lit up as countless formations activated to protect the different buildings, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised as some of the formations guarding the different buildings of the noble district began breaking apart under the violent earthquake.


    Normally, it would be hard for something simple like an earthquake to destroy a formation¡­ But after investigating what had happened with his divine sense, he discovered that most of these formations were nothing more than a good light show. Only there to intimidate others and show off.


    As for him using his divine sense inside the noble district now, Xuan Hao wasn''t the slightest bit worried about doing this now. After all, at this moment, hundreds of different divine senses belonging to different experts swept over from all directions of the capital city the moment the earthquake took ce to find out what had happened.


    RUUUUMBLE-!


    As the different divine senses began to investigate the earthquake that had taken ce and trying to find the source, another more violent earthquake hit the noble district-


    "W-why is the earth shaking¡­?"


    "What is this- is the capital under attack!?"


    Bang~


    "Ah-! Where did that brick fall from!?"


    However, different from the first earthquake caused by the demonic formation, this earthquake spread beyond the noble district and affected the area surrounding!


    WHOOOSH-!


    The moment the earthquake started affecting the area outside the noble district, a terrifying will suddenly descended upon the noble district before locking on to therge estate that was hiding the demonic formation below it.


    This is the current emperor of the Sky Empire¡­ Or perhaps the rumoured ancestor who already surpassed the first minor realm of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­?


    Feeling the terrifying will descending before it locked on to the demonic formation in an instant, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine before retracting his divine sense to not get noticed by the other party.


    Even if he was confident that the he would not get noticed due to the sheer number of people that had already begun showing up inside the noble district after the first earthquake took ce, Xuan Hao didn''t want to take any risks. Especially considering that the other party was someone who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm!


    FWOOOSH-!


    Not wasting any time after locating the demonic formation, the terrifying will that had descended gathered together into a sea of mes that directly descended towards therge estate that the demonic formation was hidden below.


    "Ah-! M-mercy!"


    "D-don''t kill me!"


    "Nooooo-!"


    The people inside therge estate who had just managed to regain some sense of awareness after the tworge earthquakes, could only scream in fear and beg for mercy as the sea of mes descend from above without giving them any chance to escape.


    Given the sheer power of the sea of mes, everyone inside the estate were reduced to ash the moment they came in contact with it-


    "Why is this happening!? Ahhh-!" "I should have taken another missio-"


    The only two people who managed to stay alive for a little over a second inside the sea of mes, were the two spies who had both used a talisman that allowed them to form a shield strong enough to defend against an all-out attack of a Fourth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    Shortly after burning through therge estate and the people inside of it, the sea of mes came into contact with the demonic formation located below it before starting to slowly burn through the protective barrier that had been created by the formation to protect itself from the descending sea of mes trying to destroy it


    RUUUUMBLE-!


    As the two shed with each other, the entire capital city and the area around it began shaking violently.


    If not for the fact that the formation guarding the capital city had already activated to some degree and helped stabilize the situation to prevent the capital from suffering any more damage than it already had, it was obvious that the sh between the sea of mes and the demonic formation would have ended up reducing the entire capital city to rubble!


    After all, this was a sh between two powers that had reached the Soul Ascension Realm¡­


    "This¡­ What in the world is the idea behind this demonic formation¡­"


    Watching this scene taking ce from afar, Xuan Hao could not help feeling confused as he watched the sea of mes slowly starting to break through the barrier that had been formed by the demonic formation.


    Considering how difficult it had been to set up the demonic formation in the first ce, it made no sense for it to just cause a few earthquakes before forming a defensive barrier to defend itself against the inevitable response it would get from the top experts of the Sky Empire¡­


    Don''t tell me¡­ Is this perhaps a distraction¡­? N?v(el)B\\jnn


    As this thought urred to him, Xuan Hao quickly shook his head and dispelled this thought.


    The demonic formation being a distraction did not make any sense. After all, it only caused a single Soul Ascension Realm Expert to act. Not to mention, there was far easier ways to cause a distraction that did not involve the demonic cultivator behind this matter risking his life to set up a formation inside the capital city!


    "But¡­ If it''s not a distraction¡­ Then what is the use of this formation other than wasting the time of one of the Sky Empire''s Soul Ascension Realm Experts?"


    Feeling that the formation had not fully been activated yet and it had another purpose outside of wasting the time of one of the Sky Empire''s Soul Ascension Realm Experts, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes as he focused his attention towards therge hole in the ground that had appeared in the ce where therge estate had been seconds ago.


    The sea of mes were simply far too terrifying, therge estate of the Hollow Thunder Family had been directly reduced to a hole in the ground in the span of a few seconds¡­

 Chapter 763 Soul Sacrifice Formation

    FWOOSH-!


    As the sea of mes continued burning away the protective barrier around the demonic formation, the different experts from all over the Sky Empire below the Soul Ascension Realm had already started showing up to watch the spectacle in person. Hoping that they would be able to gain some insight and improve their own cultivation from watching the mystical techniques of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert.


    Not focusing his attention on the sea of mes like the rest of the cultivators present, Xuan Hao instead focused all his attention on the demonic formation. Wanting to figure out if all the demonic formation could do was create a defensive barrier to resist a Soul Ascension Realm Expert for a short duration.


    Hm? The demonic formation seems to be changing¡­


    Because of this, Xuan Hao was the first to notice that the demonic formation been hidden away below the sea of mes had rearranged itself during the short time since the sea of mes had descended from above to destroy it.


    "This¡­ "


    Observing the demonic looking formation symbols below the barrier rearranging themselves, Xuan Hao barely managed to get a glimpse of a faint connection established between the demonic formation and four other locations around the noble district.


    The demonic formation below the estate of the Hollow Thunder Family is only a part of an evenrger formation!? I have to get away from here!


    Swish-!


    Realizing that the demonic formation with power enough to resist a Soul Ascension Realm Expert was part of an evenrger formation that seemed to cover the entire noble district, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine before deciding to leave the noble district without any hesitation-


    RUMBLE-!


    However, before he could leave the noble district, the four other demonic formations linked together with the demonic formation about to get destroyed by the sea of mes.


    WHOOSH-!


    As the fiverge demonic formations linked together into a single massive demonic formation, the sea of mes that had descended was easily repelled by the now far more powerful barrier that protected the demonic formation.


    Whoosh~


    Following the sea of mes being repelled, a figure made of mes manifested in the air above the demonic formation before turning into a burly man standing more than three meters tall.


    "A Soul Sacrifice Formation? You actually want to sacrifice me to increase your own cultivation? From the looks of it, you are quite desperate to actually do something like this in the capital."


    Frowning visibly after seeing therge formation that had already isted the entire noble district from the rest of the capital city, the more than three meter tall man smiled disdainfully towards the centre of the massive formation where an normal looking old man had appeared at some point in time after the noble district had been isted by the Soul Sacrifice Formation.


    "Hehe, can you me me? My lifespan is about to run out and you people won''t ever leave the capital for more than a few hours at most¡­ So¡­ I can onlye here personally¡­"


    "Hmph! You think you can kill me before this Soul Sacrifice is broken!? Haha! Howughable! Even if your strength is above mine, there is no way for you to kill me in such a short period of time!"


    Laughing disdainfully as he said this in response to the old man who had appeared out of thin air at the centre of the massive demonic formation, the actions of the Soul Ascension Realm Expert that had been caught inside the Soul Sacrifice Formation spoke a different story as he covered himself in a divine armour and crushed several different talismans to form all kinds of protective barriers around himself.


    No matter how confident the Soul Ascension Realm Expert was, it was obvious that he did not dare be the slightest bit careless against the old man.


    After all, other than the fact that the old man should be stronger than him, the other party was also close to death due to his lifespan running out.


    Out of all the opponents one could end up facing, someone who''s lifespan was about to run out, was by far one of the worst!


    ¡­


    "This is¡­ A Soul Sacrifice Formation!? Just what demonic cultivator is bold enough to set up such a formation in the middle of the capital!?"


    "I have no idea¡­ But given the strength of this formation, its impossible for us to escape¡­"


    "You don''t say¡­ But from what those two said, the old man should be even stronger than the Cardinal¡­"


    As the old man and Soul Ascension Realm Expert were both talking with each other, the people watching this scene from afar all began fearfully talking to each other as they realized just how dangerous their current situation was.


    "¡­"


    Listening to the different conversation taking ce between the different Domain Lord Realm Experts that had showed up, Xuan Hao managed to learn that the more than three-meter-tall man floating in the air above the hole in the ground that had once been an estate of the Hollow Thunder Family was none other than the current cardinal from the religious order following the god of fire also know as the Follower of the Fire God.


    Not only that, but he also managed to learn about the Soul Sacrifice Formation that he was currently caught inside of.


    ording to what little information he could gather from the more knowledgeable Domain Lords present, the Soul Sacrifice Formation was a terrifying demonic formation that was used by some demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm to increase their strength.


    Using it, the Soul Sacrifice Formation could increase the strength of a True Demon Realm Expert by absorbing the souls of powerful cultivators and refining them into a pure form of soul energy that could then be used by the True Demon Realm Expert to increase his or her strength.


    The demonic cultivator who had appeared in the capital and set up the Soul Sacrifice Formation had very clearly done so to refine the Cardinal and use the massive soul energy from this to break through to a higher realm and increase his lifespan!


    "Hm?"


    Just at this moment, the demonic symbols all over the dome shaped barrier formed by the Soul Sacrifice Formation began shinning with a demonic red light-


    BOOOOOOOOM-!


    Not even a secondter, a terrifying explosion that sent a shiver down the spine of Xuan Hao could be heard from outside the dome shaped barrier covering the noble district as the strong looking barrier looked like it was about to break apart at any moment.


    "Wha-!? What is happening!?"


    "What kind of power is this¡­?"


    "Look! The Soul Sacrifice Formation! It''s getting attacked from the outside!"


    "Haha! It looks like the capital''s guardian formation has already been activated! Even if this barrier formed by the Soul Sacrifice Formation is powerful, there is no way it will be able to resist the attack of the capital''s guardian formation for more than a few minutes!"


    Feeling first-hand the terrifying might of the guardian formation protecting the capital of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao understood that he would have no way to resist it with his current strength!


    "Ha¡­ The guardian formationid down by the ancestor of the Sky Empire truly lives up to its fame. Even this Soul Sacrifice Formation I spent over a hundred years secretlyying down will at mostst a few minutes¡­ Looks like I won''t be able to chat with you anymore little fire boy. Hehe~"


    The moment the Soul Sacrifice Formation got attacked, the old man standing at the centre of the massive demonic formation let out a sigh as he said this with a look of awe on his face when mentioning the guardian formation.


    Crack~


    As a loud cracking sound echoed out across the entire noble district, the old man standing at the centre of the Soul Sacrifice Formation changed from a normal looking old man to a demon.


    In the end, when he finished his transformation, a demon standing more than 20 meters tall had reced the old man who had been standing at the centre of the Soul Sacrifice Formation just a second earlier.


    From the massive pair of bat like wings that had sprouted from his back, to therge pair of demonic horns that had emerged from his head. The old man had be a true demon without any human features remaining!


    ROOOOAR-!


    Swish-!


    Letting out a loud roar filled with killing intent after his transformation had ended, the terrifying demon took out a giant axe from its interspatial ring before charging towards the cardinal floating in the air close to the centre of the noble district.


    BOOOOM-!


    Not even a secondter, the massive demon and the cardinal shed with each other. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Ahh-!"


    "H-how can we survive this¡­?"


    "E-escape! Everyone, run to the edge of the noble district!"


    As the demon and cardinal began fighting, the people of the noble district all began panicking before escaping towards the edge of the noble district to avoid getting caught up in the fight between these two powerful experts.

 Chapter 764 Terrifying Power Of The Demonic Cultivator

    Boom-boom-boom!


    As most of the people present in the noble district all began escaping towards the edge of the Soul Sacrifice Formation to get as far away as possible from the battle between the cardinal and the demonic cultivator, the only people left behind to watch the fight were a few of the more powerful Domain Lord Realm Experts that didn''t escape to the edge and instead kept their attention on the fight taking ce.


    "If there is a chance, we should all try our best to lend the cardinal a hand in dealing with this demonic cultivator!"


    """¡­"""


    As this suggestion was made by a Domain Lord who had entered the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, the rest of the Domain Lord''s all looked at each other for a short moment before nodding in agreement to what the Seventh Stage Domain Lord said.


    Deep down, all of these people understood that their chances of survival would be close to zero if the demonic cultivator won and sessfully managed to use the Soul Sacrifice Formation to break through to a higher realm.


    After all, there was no way that the demonic cultivator would let all of them go after breaking through. Especially considering that he had a Soul Sacrifice Formation around¡­


    For this reason, all of the Domain Lords present agreed that they should take action to help the cardinal if a chance presented itself.


    ¡­


    Looks like everyone here is ready to join the fight the moment the opportunity presents itself¡­


    Watching the group of Domain Lords who remained close to the ce that the fight was taking ce, Xuan Hao could not help turning his attention towards the cardinal and the demonic cultivator fighting at the centre of the noble district.


    At this point in time, the centre of the noble district that had once been filled with all sorts of estates and other buildings had already been reduced to rubble. The only few buildings and estate that remained standing were thergest ones that were protected by powerful formations strong enough to withstand the battle between the two existences above the Domain Lord Realm.


    Those should be the main estates of thoserge noble families like the Hollow Thunder Family and the Earth Dragon n¡­


    Narrowing his eyes as he thought about this while looking towards the few remaining buildings at the centre of the noble district, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about just how strong these noble families were.


    Not to mention the fact that no one from any of theserge noble families had appeared to help the cardinal, Xuan Hao had a feeling that they were rted to the appearances of the demonic cultivator inside the capital city.


    After all, no matter how strong the demonic cultivator was, Xuan Hao didn''t think that he would have the ability toy down the Soul Sacrifice Formation over more than a hundred years without getting discovered by therge noble families who essentially had estates located directly above the locations of the different parts of the formation. Especially considering how easy it had been for him to discover the demonic formation hidden beneath therge estate belonging to the Hollow Thunder Family!


    Even if they might not have discovered the demonic formation at the start, they would have surely found out about it after more than a hundred years.


    "Ha¡­ Looks like I ended up getting caught in a rather troublesome situation by following after that young master from the Hollow Thunder Family¡­" Muttering this to himself as he realized that the differentrge noble families were involved in the construction of the Soul Sacrifice Formation, Xuan Hao could not help regretting that he had followed after the young master from the Hollow Thunder Family.


    BANG!


    As the sound of the cardinal getting smashed into the ground echoed out from afar, Xuan Hao and the rest of the Domain Lords present all got a clear look of the current state of the cardinal.


    From head to toe, the more than three meter tall man was covered in blood with one of his arms missing. Even if it was not possible to discern the current state of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert from physical injuries alone, it was obvious to everyone present that the cardinal was already close to loosing against the demonic cultivator¡­ And this was only after a little more than 20 seconds of fighting!


    At this point, it was obvious how big the difference in strength between the cardinal and demonic cultivator was. Even if the Soul Sacrifice Formation was not likely tost more than a minute under the constant attack of the capitals guardian formation, the cardinal was not even likely to survive for another 30 seconds in his current state¡­


    Whoosh-!


    As everyone were feeling a wave of despair wash over them after seeing the state of the cardinal, the demonic cultivator directly swung his massive axe down towards the cardinal inside the crater that had formed around him after he had smashed into the ground-


    Swish-!


    BANG-!


    However, before the axe of the demonic cultivator could reach the cardinal who had yet to recover from the impact, a small silver sword appeared out of thin air beside the massive axe descending towards the cardinal before striking it with a power that caused the already surprised demonic cultivator to momentarily lose control of the axe as it ended up not hitting the cardinal.


    Whoosh-!


    Understanding that he had been given another chance at life, the cardinal quickly jumped out of the crater before distancing himself from the demonic cultivator while recovering his injured body at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    "WHO!?" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Different from the cardinal who was filled with happiness after having escaped a certain death situation, the demonic cultivator was filled with killing intent as a terrifying divine sense swept through the entire noble district trying to locate the person who had made a move just now.


    However, no matter how hard he searched for the person responsible for the attack just now, he could not find the other party. The most he could find was the silver sword that had attacked him having been discarded on the ground after the sneak attack just now.


    This¡­ Just who is it that made a move? The only people present outside the cardinal that have some ability to interfere in the fight are those insects in the Domain Lord Realm¡­ But¡­ The strength behind that sword was clearly above the Domain Lord Realm! Don''t tell me¡­ Was it one of those noble families that decided to save the cardinal!? Hmph, I knew trusting them was not a good idea!


    Narrowing hisrge pair of blood red eyes, the demonic cultivator turned his attention towards the only remaining buildings left inside the centre of the noble district.


    Obviously, the strength of a Domain Lord was far too weak to have stopped his attack in time just now, the only people with the ability to stop him were the people from therge noble families!


    Whoosh~


    Transforming back into a normal looking old man, the demonic cultivator understood that he would not be able to kill the cardinal in time before the Soul Sacrifice Formation was broken by the capital''s guardian formation.


    Even if he was confident in killing the cardinal who had only broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm just recently before the Soul Sacrifice Formation could be broken, the same could not be said if he had to deal with another Soul Ascension Realm Expert who was hiding in the shadows.


    Riiiiiiiip-!


    Taking out a mystical scroll that gave of an aura that made the void around it shake, the demonic cultivator ripped the mystical scroll in half before the space around him ripped apart and formed a stable spatial tunnel that easily by passed the capitals guardian formation.


    "Hmph! Good! Even if I only have a few hundred years left, I will be sure to remember what happened today!"


    Not wasting any more time after that, the demonic cultivator entered the spatial tunnel before disappearing from the noble district filled with an unbearable killing intent that made some of the weaker Domain Lords close to the battle copse on the ground shaking in fear.


    BOOOOOOOOOOOM-!


    Having lost the support of the demonic cultivator, the Soul Sacrifice Formation that now only operated with the help of the small energy batteries that had been used to activate it and bait over the cardinal broke apart almost instantaneously under the attack of the capital''s guardian formation.


    "Everyone, out of the way!"


    "Haha! Freedom! I actually survived!"


    "I will never return to the noble district again! It''s far more dangerouspared to the rest of the capital!"


    As the Soul Sacrifice Formation covering the noble district broke apart. The people who had escaped to the edge of the formation did not waste a single second as all of them tried their best to get as far away as possible from the noble district.

 Chapter 765 Looming Danger

    Looks like everything worked out...


    Looking at the Soul Sacrifice Formation breaking apart under the tyrannical power of the capital city''s guardian formation, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief as he nced towards the cardinal who was still in the process of recovering the arm he had lost during the fight with the demonic cultivator.


    Whoosh~!


    Using the time when no one were paying attention, Xuan Hao used his divine sense together with a small string of qi to pull the silver sword that had been buried beneath some rubble from a nearby building that had copsed on top of it after the copse of the Soul Sacrifice Formation.


    Just a few seconds earlier, he had decided to make a gamble and help out the cardinal by stopping the demonic cultivator from killing him. Hoping that doing so would allow him to continue hiding his identity and strength... And from the way that the cardinal sometimes nced towards therge estates belonging therge noble families and the way that the few people who had emerged from thoserge noble families were looking suspiciously at each other, it was obvious that they all thought that the person responsible for saving the cardinal belonged to one of their noble families...


    In the end, it looked like his n to save the cardinal without anyone figuring out who was behind the attack and the cardinal at thest moment, was perfect!


    Swish~


    Knowing that it would no be a good idea to stay inside the noble district any longer, Xuan Hao decided to quietly blend together with therge number of people trying to leave the noble district now that the Soul Sacrifice Formation had been destroyed.


    Together with the fact that his strength was still only in the Domain Lord Realm, he managed to leave the noble district without any issues... Of course, it was also due to the fact that most of the Domain Lords who had observed the battle just now were doing the same as him. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Although... Their reason for leaving quickly was not so much about getting away from the noble district and was more about them returning back home so they could enter seclusion and try toprehend something from the fight they had just witnessed.


    After, a fight between a Soul Ascension Realm Expert and a True Demon Realm Expert was incredibly useful to someone in the Domain Lord Realm. Especially those who did not have a way toe into contact with the Soul Ascension Realm and had a hard improving after reaching a bottleneck.


    Even if these kind of people might not be able to directly break through a minor realm due to witnessing the fight. At the very least, they would be able to increase the strength of their foundation andy the groundwork for a smooth breakthrough in the future.


    ...


    Shortly after Xuan Hao left the noble district, a handsome middle-aged man covered in a regal armour appeared floating above the noble district as he scanned the ce where the battle had taken ce just a short time ago with his divine sense.


    "Hmph... To think a demonic cultivator managed to sneak inside the capital and even managed to set up a Soul Sacrifice Formation without being noticed. At least it looks like one of those half dead people decided to help out..." Muttering this to himself as he narrowed both his eyes while looking towards the only remaining buildings left standing at the core of the noble district, the handsome middle-aged man soon disappeared before reappearing beside the more than three meter tall cardinal who was still in the process of recovering from the battle that had just taken ce.


    "Y-your excellency!?"


    Seeing the handsome middle-aged man, the cardinal showed a shocked expression on his face followed by a fearful one that quickly disappeared in less than a second. However, from this alone, it was obvious that the cardinal was scared of the man who had appeared.


    "Tell me everything that happened since you arrived at the noble district, I don''t want you to leave out a single detail!"


    "Yes!"


    Hearing what the man said, the cardinal didn''t hesitate as he told him everything that had happened since his arrival in the noble district to deal with the demonic formation that had appeared out of thin air. From the appearance of the demonic cultivator to the mystical scroll he had used to escape, the cardinal didn''t leave out a single detail in his exnation to the mysterious man!


    The reason for this, was that the man standing in front of him was none other than the ancestor of the Sky Empire, an existence that had already surpassed the first minor realm of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Even if the three religious organisation were all trying to take away power from the imperial family, they still did not dare to truly fall out with them... And the main reason for this was the ancestor of the imperial family currently standing in front of him!


    The difference in strength between even a single minor realm in the Soul Ascension Realm was massive and it could be seen from how easily the cardinal had been beaten up by the True Demon Realm Expert just a few seconds earlier...


    "For a True Demon Realm Expert of this level to enter the capital... Even if he had help from the inside and his lifespan was about to run out, he should not have the courage to enter the capital. Hah... It looks like something is really wrong at the Frozen Wastnd... And from the looks of it, it should not just be some old True Demon Realm Expert awakening like most of the rumours state..."


    Frowning visibly as he said this to himself with a worried expression on his face after listening to what the cardinal said, the ancestor of the imperial family did not believe that the only reason that the demonic cultivator attacked the capital was to kill a Soul Ascension Realm Expert and use the soul energy refined from a Soul Ascension Realm Expert to break through and increase his lifespan.


    If that demonic cultivator wanted to do something like that, it would be far easier for him to target those Soul Ascension Realm Experts wandering around by themselves instead of targeting one in the capital of the Sky Empire that was protected by the guardian formation that had the ability to trap and kill him.


    "That scroll he used to create a spatial tunnel and escape, it had the ability to ignore the spatial lock of the guardian formation without me even noticing it... The person who made that scroll should at least be someone skilled in spatial maniption who crossed the Third Tribtion...


    Cardinal, I have something important to do, I will take my leave now. Recover your strength as quickly as possible... In case something happens..."


    Swish-!


    Before the cardinal had any time to respond, the ancestor of the imperial family had already disappeared after leaving those ominous words behind.


    "..."


    Leaving the cardinal to stare out into empty space as he wondered just what kind of disaster the ancestor of the imperial family had foreseen.


    "Your excellency! Are you alright!? "


    Only after hearing the familiar voice of his right-hand man and most trusted subordinate did he manage to somewhat recover again-


    "Ah! Your arm! Your excellency, why does your arm look like a baby arm!? What happened- Don''t tell me, is this a curse left behind by that demonic cultivator!? Oh, what horror! To embarrass his excellency like this, what a despicable demon!"


    Bang!


    However, after hearing what his dear subordinate said next, the cardinal could not help himself from sending him flying with a faint killing intent flickering through his eyes for a split second.


    Baby arm!? What do you know! My arm needs to regrow in some way!


    Swish-!


    Not waiting for his subordinate who had ended up buried beneath some of the rubble belonging to the different already ruined buildings he had crashed into along the way, the cardinal jumped into the air before making his way back towards the main church belonging to the Followers of the Fire God.


    For now, the most important thing was to figure out what the ancestor of the imperial family had meant with what he had said before leaving in a hurry.


    Even if the cardinal did not feel that the attack of the demonic cultivator was odd considering how close the other party was to running out of lifespan, he still decided to take what the ancestor of the imperial family said to heart.


    After all, the other party was far older and more experiencedpared to him and also had a far better understanding of the Frozen Wastnd and the demonic cultivators that settled the inhospitablend of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Maybe I should contact another branch and see if they have any information about what is happening in the Frozen Wastnd...


    Thinking this to himself, the cardinal increased his speed further. Wanting to find out just what the ancestor of the imperial family was worried about.

 Chapter 766 Terror Of The Guardian Formation

    Leaving the noble district, Xuan Hao decided to find somewhere to keep a low profile for a few hours before starting to move around the capital again.


    Even if he was sure that no one had spotted him when he took action from the reaction of both the cardinal and the demonic cultivator, he could not count out the fact that the people from therge noble families who had hidden away during the fight had noticed him.


    After all, even if they did not observe the outside through their divine sense during the fight, they should at the very least be aware of each other''s strength to some degree and understand that it was any of them that took action to save the cardinal but someone different.


    The reason they didn''te out to rify things should be due to the simple fact that the cardinal would not die before the Soul Sacrifice Formation broke like they had originally nned. Not to mention, doing so would pretty much be the same as them admitting to working together with the demonic cultivator to kill the cardinal!


    Even if they ended up helping out the demonic cultivator, there would be no way for them to kill the cardinal in time at that point in time. Not to mention the fact that there was also an unknown Soul Ascension Realm Expert hidden somewhere inside the Soul Sacrifice Formation. No matter what, the best option for these noble families at that point in time was to stay quite and not rify that it wasn''t them stopped the axe of the demonic cultivator.


    All things considered, at most they would have to stay quiet inside the capital for a few hundred years and wait for the lifespan of the demonic cultivator to run out...


    "But... Even if they keep a low profile and stays inside the capital city for the next few hundred years, I''m sure they will try and find out the identity of the person who ruined their n to kill the cardinal of that fire god religion..." Muttering this to himself as he looked back towards the noble district that was surrounded by arge number of experts at the moment, Xuan Hao couldn''t help feeling curious as to what had caused theserge noble families to work together with a demonic cultivator and risk getting wiped out by the imperial family of the Sky Empire.


    No matter what reason they had for doing this, it was certain that it should have been something incredibly precious. Maybe even to the point that it could help improve the strength of the peak experts in those noble families... But from the reaction of the demonic cultivator when I attacked, the experts from those noble families should also have reached the Soul Ascension Realm...


    "Something that can help a Soul Ascension Realm Expert increase his strength..."


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao realized that he still knew far too little about the Soul Ascension Realm. Maybe while waiting for things to calm down, he could try and ask those people from the independent sects if they had any information about the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Whoosh~!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao began making his way back towards the small inn that he had left just a few hours earlier. Considering how much he was going to help them out during the uing meeting, he was certain that they would not refuse this simple request. After all, it was not like he would be asking about their sect''s foundational cultivation technique or anything like that.


    ...


    A little before the Soul Sacrifice Formation had been broken by the guardian formation of the capital city, the group of experts happily celebrating the fact that they got a powerful expert in the Late Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to help them out for the uing meeting all froze upon feeling therge earthquakes followed by a terrifying demonic aura enveloping the entire capital city.


    "W-what in the world is happening in the capital!? Did a demonic cultivator infiltrate the capital!?


    "Not only that... But from the strength of this aura, it should at the very least be a demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm!


    "True Demon Realm... Why did such a powerful demonic cultivator enter the capital city? Does he perhaps have a death wish?"


    "Who knows... Looks, the guardian formation is already activating!"


    WHOOOOSH-!


    As the group of experts quickly used their power to sober up before discussing the origin of the terrifying demonic aura, it did not take long for them to turn their attention towards the massive formation that was activating above the capital city.


    The formation that had been the main defence for the Sky Empire against any outside forces, a formation that had caused the death of multiple Soul Ascension Realm Experts back during the time when the ancestor of the Sky Empire had first established the Sky Empire!


    Even if the demonic aura was terrifying,pared to the guardian formation of the capital city, it was insignificant...


    "So, this is the guardian formation... To think I managed to see it in action today..."


    "Indeed... Even someone in the Soul Ascension Realm would die the moment they are caught up in this formation, let alone someone at the Domain Lord Realm like us two..."


    "Hah... Truly worthy of its reputation as the Sky Empire''s strongest protection against outside attacks. The Ancestor''s reputation as a Grandmaster Formation Master is indeed valid...


    Whoosh~


    As everyone in the small inn felt awed by the massive formation that drowned out the demonic aura almost instantaneously, millions of golden arrows formed in the air above the noble district that had been covered by the Soul Sacrifice Formation.


    "Hm? Everyone! Looks over there! The guardian formation is attacking the source of the demonic aura!"


    Even from where they were standing, one of the Domain Lords inside the small inn still managed to notice the massive cluster of golden arrows that had formed in the air above the noble district located towards the centre of the capital city-


    BOOOOOOOOM-!


    Before everyone present in the inn had enough time to turn around to see the arrows that the Domain Lord Expert had mentioned, the sound of countless arrows piercing through the air followed by a loud explosion echoed out across the entire capital city.


    """...""" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Feeling the power behind the explosion just now as it tried to destroy the source of the demonic aura, everyone inside the inn felt a shiver run down their spine as they looked at each other in horror.


    The power behind the explosion caused by the millions of golden arrows just now was something far beyond their level ofprehension. Even the Domain Lord Realm Experts present felt insignificant in front of that power. Knowing that in front of the power just now, they would be no different from a random mortal. Having no power to even put up the slightest bit of resistance as they would only be able to wait to die.


    Even when they felt the terrifying demonic aura just now, they didn''t feel this sense of helplessness or despair.


    "The ancestor of the imperial family... Truly worthy of his reputation..."


    Among the group, the only one who barely managed to say something as the golden arrows reformed above the source of the demonic aura beforeunching another attack was the Sixth Stage Domain Lord that had juste outside after having felt the terrifying demonic aura and the guardian formation activating.


    Compared to the rest of the people present, he had alreadye into contact with people in the Soul Ascension Realm before and didn''t feel the same level of despair as the rest of the people present.


    But... Even then, he still felt shaken to the core upon realizing just how weak he waspared to the formation that had been set up by the ancestor of the imperial family.


    If the formation is already this strong, how strong is the ancestor, has he perhaps already surpassed the third tribtion... Maybe even the fourth...?


    ording to most rumours and information that was out there about the ancestor of the imperial family, the ancestor should be someone who had surpassed the second tribtion and reached the second minor realm of the Soul Ascension Realm... But from what he saw made him certain that the ancestor of the imperial family was not just someone who had surpassed the first two tribtions of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Thinking about this as he observed the formation continuouslyunching attacks that would be able to easily kill off some weaker Soul Ascension Realm Experts, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord who had just emerged from the inn could not feel a shiver run down his spine.


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    As the terrifying attacks continued descending towards the demonic aura that had appeared inside the capital. The entire capital grew quiet as everyone looked in the direction of the noble district filled with fear, awe, respect, terror and many other emotions.

 Chapter 767 Divine Sense Technique, Divine Will

    Making his way towards the inn that the group of experts from the different independent sects were located, Xuan Hao decided to walk along the busy streets of the capital instead of using a movement technique to reach the inn as quickly as possible.


    After all, rushing away from the noble district like that, might end up catching the attention of some of the experts from the Sky Empire that had begun to show up around the noble district. Especially considering that he was the only person in the Domain Lord Realm heading towards the outer part of the capital...


    Well, I can at least use this time to read through the Divine Will Scripture. Even if I can''t use my domain inside the capital city without gathering unwanted attention, I should at the very least still be able to cover the book in my hands without any problems...


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao secretly took out the Divine Will Scripture he had gotten frompleting the side quest that ended up trapping him inside the Soul Sacrifice Formation.


    Whoosh~!


    Using his domain to hide the book in his hands from any prying eyes, Xuan Hao opened the Divine Will Scripture with a curious glint shing past his eyes.


    Even if he had gotten the Divine Will Scripture from the system, he had absoloutly no idea what the Divine Will Scripture was about, it could be powerful cultivation mantra that could help him on his path towards reaching the Soul Ascension Realm or simply end up as some kind of weird religious text...


    No matter what it was, Xuan Hao felt that it shouldn''t be anything bad considering the dangerous situation that the system had ended up putting him.


    Even if the matter of the demonic cultivator did not seem that dangerous on the surface due to the Soul Sacrifice Formation only being able to hold on for a little over a minute, had he ended up revealing his identity and presence by fighting the demonic cultivator.


    Not only would he have to worry about therge noble families who were cooperating with it taking revenge in the future if this happened... But he would also have to worry about the ancestor of the imperial family possibly viewing him as a threat and deciding to just eliminate him on the spot to prevent future problems!


    At the very least, everyone seemed to believe that it was someone from one of therge noble families that had decided to save the cardinal at thest moment, something Xuan Hao was more than happy to see happen considering that thest thing he wanted at the moment was to fall out with the different major powers inside the capital of the Sky Empire...


    "Hm? This is... A divine sense technique...?"


    Feeling a hint of surprise after opening the first page of the Divine Will Scripture and reading through the introduction of it, Xuan Hao could not help unintentionally whispering this to himself with a shocked expression on his face.


    A divine sense technique... To be honest, Xuan Hao had never heard about a divine sense technique before and had never imagined that there would actually be techniques that could be used through one''s divine sense...


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao forgot about the matter of visiting the inn with the experts from the different independent sects to ask about the Soul Ascension Realm and instead found a quiet ce to sit down inside one of the many public parks that could be found all over the capital city to read through the Divine Will Scripture.


    ...


    As Xuan Hao started to read through the Divine Will Scripture, the sun in the sky disappeared before being reced by the moon. However even when it had already grownte at night, Xuan Hao simply ignored his surroundings as he was fully absorbed in the Divine Will Scripture. Allowing night to turn into day as time flowed peacefully with no oneing to interrupt him during this period of time.


    "How amazing... To think something like this existed..."


    The sun already high in the sky above the capital, Xuan Hao only looked away from the Divine Will Scripture after spending close to an entire day reading through the small book no more than a few pages thick.


    Even then, Xuan Hao had still not manged toprehend the technique record inside the Divine Will Scripture and had only barely managed to read through it over this period of time. The main reason for this being that the Divine Will Scripture was written in a mix between the ancientnguage and the currentnguage in use across the Ewaria Continent.


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, hisprehension of the ancientnguage had already improved enough for him to read through the Divine Will Scripture without any issues. Although... It did take him far longerpared to if the Divine Will Scripture had been written in the currentnguage of the Ewaria Continent.


    At least he had also managed to increase his proficiency in the ancientnguage in this way. Making him feel like the time when he was able to fully understand the ancientnguage that had once been used during the ancient era was growing closer.


    Back to the divine sense technique that he had discovered inside the Divine Will Scripture...


    Divine Will... Indeed, a fitting name for a technique found inside a book called the Divine Will Scripture... n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao recalled the information about the Divine Will technique written about in the Divine Will Scripture.


    Divine Will, a divine sense technique that allows the user to condense his divine sense together into a powerful will that can be used to directly attack the soul of others. The strength of the technique does not depend on the cultivation of the user, but instead draws its power from the soul. The stronger the soul, the more powerful the Divine Will created will be!


    The description of the divine will technique was rather simple and it was not something hard to learn. From what Xuan Hao had managed to analyse about it so far, the divine sense technique did not really have any requirements on cultivation realm and even someone in the Qi Condensation Realm would be able toprehend it if theirprehension was strong enough.


    Although the technique itself would not really be useful before a cultivator managed to reach the Peak of the Core Formation Realm where a cultivator would start give birth to divine sense.


    In simple terms, divine sense was an extension of a cultivators soul and allowed them to see the world around them in far more detailpared to normal mortals. The divine will technique made use of this extension of soul power and gathered it together to form a single brute attack that could be used to attack someone''s soul directly.


    Even if the divine will technique would not be able to kill opponents who were at the same level, it would still be able to force them to use their energy to defend their soul. In a battle, this would easily end up spelling the end for someone as they were now forced to focus arge part of their energy towards defending their soul.


    "Although it''s not a good killing technique, it''s a great auxiliary technique that will be useful for fighting... Hm... I should give this to the Elder Song when I get back..." Muttering this to himself as he put away the Divine Will Scripture, Xuan Hao understood very well how important something like the Divine Will Scripture would be for the Star Shattering Sect.


    If all the elders in the Nascent Soul Realm and above could learn this technique, the Star Shattering Sect''s strength would increase by another level. Not to mention, Xuan Hao had also discovered that by condensing one''s divine sense together into a divine will, one would also inevitably end up increasing the strength of one''s soul!


    Not only would the strength of the elders in the Nascent Soul Realm and above increase by training this divine sense technique, but their cultivation speed would also increase!


    Together with the qi rich environment of the Shattered Star Peaks, it would only be a matter of time before more Domain Lord Realm Experts emerged inside the Star Shattering Sect!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself as he thought about how much the Star Shattering Sect had improved over the past few years, he could not help looking forward to how the Star Shattering Sect would change after he handed the divine sense technique over to Elder Song and allowed him to teach it to the rest of the elders from the sect.


    But before all of that, I will have to reach the Soul Ascension Realm to ensure the safety of the Star Shattering Sect...


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about the strength disyed by the ancestor of the imperial family, Xuan Hao understood that the Star Shattering Sect would not be able to start truly expanding its influence without someone powerful in the Soul Ascension Realm backing it up.


    After all, even if he could fight someone in the Soul Ascension Realm with his current strength, there was still a difference between himself and someone who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm...

 Chapter 768 Xu Bao

    Feeling even more determined to reach the Soul Ascension Realm after having finished reading through the Divine Will Scripture, Xuan Hao stood up from the small bench he had been sitting on for thest day before making his way towards the remote inn where the group of experts from the different independent sects across the Sky Empire had gathered together.


    If he really wanted to start breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm, the most important thing was to first gather as much information he could about the realm. After all, currently, his information on the Soul Ascension Realm was extremely limited.


    Even to this day, he still had no clear idea about the different minor realms of the Soul Ascension Realm and only understood that the Soul Ascension Realm was split into 6 minor realms. Different from the usual nine minor realms that were present in the rest of the major cultivation realms so far.


    "Hm?"


    Reaching the remote inn within a short period of time, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised when he discovered that the group were all sitting outside the inn chatting happily with each other.


    Considering that they were trying to not get seen by anyone from therge kingdoms controlling most of the sects inside the Sky Empire and have them take action against them before the start of the sect alliance meeting, it was quite surprising to see all of them carelessly sitting together in small groups outside the inn chatting with each other.


    Well... Considering that I''m helping them now, they should not care too much about any retaliations from thoserge kingdoms of the Sky Empire.


    After all, no matter how powerful those kingdoms are, the strongest person inside them would have only reached the Late Stage of the Domain Lord Realm... And there is no way they would be willing to carelessly offend another Late Stage Domain Lord. Especially if that Domain Lord was actually someone above the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm...


    Thinking about this to himself as he made his way towards the remote inn, Xuan Hao avoided the group of people sitting outside and directly entered the inn before heading towards the strongest person among the group of experts from the independent sect that was currently inside a room somewhere at the second floor of the inn, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    No matter what, Xuan Hao had a feeling that it would be best for him to seek out the strongest expert present if he wanted to find out something about the Soul Ascension Realm. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Hey... Isn''t that-"


    "Yeah... It''s that senior..."


    "He already returned... Does he perhaps have something to ask the other seniors at the Domain Lord Realm before the meeting?"


    As Xuan Hao made his way inside the remote inn before heading up the stairs towards the room where the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert was located, the group of experts sitting in front of the inn and inside of it all began eagerly chatting with each other as they looked in Xuan Hao''s direction filled with curiosity.


    ""...""


    Of course, the other Domain Lord Realm Experts who were present also noticed Xuan Hao... But after seeing that he was heading up towards the second floor of the inn without greeting them, they decided to keep quiet.


    "What do you think the senior is here for?"


    "Hm... If I''m not wrong, he should be here to talk with that old man about something, I just have no idea what it could be he want to ask him about."


    "Maybe something rted to the uing meeting? After all, the senior did leave without hearing about our ns for the meeting, he could have returned this time to get a clear picture of our ns before the meeting officially starts."


    "Indeed... That sounds reasonable..."


    As the Domain Lords quietly chatted with each other about what reason Xuan Hao might have to show up now, Xuan Hao arrived in front of a rundown wooden door. Even without using his divine sense to see what was on the other side of the door, Xuan Hao could still feel the powerful aura belonging to a Peak Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert leaking out from the other side as the person behind the door had not fully restrained his cultivation base due to him being in the process of cultivating.


    Knock-


    "Come in."


    Barely manging to knock on the door, Xuan Hao felt the aura belonging to a Peak Sixth Stage Domain Lord disappear before a voice echoed out from the other side of the door before the door in question slowly opened. Showing a small room with only a simple bed and a small table inside it, the old man who was the leader of the group of independent sects could be seen sitting in the middle of this small, dpidated inn room.


    Even from a nce, it was obvious that the old man had not expected to see him from the surprised look that shed past his eyes for an instant after seeing him.


    "Greetings Senior Xuan, my name is Xu Bao, but most people just refer to me as Elder Xu. If you have any questions regarding the meeting, you can feel free to ask away, I don''t really have much to do before the meeting..."


    "Greetings Elder Xu, I''m indeed here to ask you about something, but it''s not about the meeting... Instead, it''s about the Soul Ascension Realm!"


    "Information on the Soul Ascension Realm...?"


    "Yes!"


    Seeing the confused expression on Elder Xu''s face as he triedprehending why Xuan Hao had asked him about the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao found a simple chair hidden away in the corner of the mostly empty inn room before sitting down and waiting for Elder Xu to respond to him.


    "The Soul Ascension Realm... I really don''t know much about the Soul Ascension Realm, but I can tell you what I know, Is that fine?"


    "Yes, I just want to know about the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Okay..."


    Having already formed the idea of Xuan Hao being from one of the sects from the ancient era that had hidden away, he could not understand why someone like that would ask him about the Soul Ascension Realm.


    In the end, he concluded that the reason should be that Xuan Hao was testing him to see if he was also someone from a hidden sect. After all, if he could guess Xuan Hao was from a hidden sect, the other party would also be able to guess that he was from a hidden sect.


    Given how much information he had about the Soul Ascension Realmpared to an ordinary person in the Domain Lord Realm. Even exceeding that of an ordinary Soul Ascension Realm Expert from an empire like the Sky Empire, it would be quite easy for Xuan Hao to tell that he should also be someone from a hidden sect!


    Maybe this would even be a chance for his sect to connect back with their original main sect again with the help from another hidden sect!


    Showing a determined expression on his face after understanding this, Elder Xu was fully prepared to show off his understand of the Soul Ascension Realm to this senior!


    "..."


    What on earth is with this expression? Why does he look like he is about to enter a life and death battle?


    Sitting on the chair watching the constantly changing expression of Elder Xu, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit confused over what was happening inside the head of the old man.


    Even without knowing what he was thinking about, Xuan Hao felt certain that the other party should have misunderstood something...


    Maybe I should ask him to make sure he has no misunderstanding about-


    "Senior! Do you want me to start from the process of reaching the first stage to face the first tribtion or just a direct exnation of the six minor realms and the six tribtions!?"


    Interrupting Xuan Hao''s train of thought, Elder Xu excitedly moved forward as he said this with a passionate expression on his face.


    "..."


    Not knowing what to say when Elder Xu suddenly came at him with such an excited expression, Xuan Hao almost felt certain that the old man had misunderstood something. The only problem was that he had no idea what he had misunderstood. After all, he was clearly talking about the Soul Ascension Realm and asking him what he wanted an exnation on regarding the Soul Ascension Realm...


    "You can just start from the beginning, you can start with how a Domain Lord reaches the Soul Ascension Realm."


    "Yes! Starting from the begging is indeed better, this would also make it easier for me to give a proper description of the Soul Ascension Realm!"


    Could I have misunderstood, and this old man is just excited to talk about the Soul Ascension Realm?


    Deciding not to think too much about it, Xuan Hao decided to just listen to Elder Xu for now...

 Chapter 769 Immortal Soul Tribulation

    "To start off with, to reach the Soul Ascension Realm, one will first have to go through a tribtion. However different from the Cloud Tribtion one would have to pass through to reach the Nascent Soul Realm, the tribtion one will have to go through to reach the Soul Ascension Realm is far more terrifying!


    The tribtion one will face when breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm is the first of seven tribtions that one will have to endure all seven tribtions to surpass the Soul Ascension Realm. From what I know, together, the seven tribtions are referred to as the Immortal Soul Tribtion!


    Not only that, but one will only have a limited time to prepare between each tribtion! From what I know, the time one can dy between each tribtion can be no more than five thousand years!"


    "The Immortal Soul Tribtion¡­"


    Listening to what Xu Bao said, Xuan Hao could not help feeling surprised. Even if he had already expected for the Soul Ascension Realm to include some kind of tribtion from what little knowledge about the realm that he had managed to gather so far, he had never expected that it would be like that.


    Having to face a deadly tribtion to break through a single minor realm was already hard enough, but one would also be forced to break through after staying at the same realm for five thousand years or die in the process!


    But then again¡­ Five thousand years was a long period of time. Especially for someone like Xuan Hao who was barely around thirty years old at this point in time.


    Even if others might be worried about having enough time to prepare for the different tribtions, Xuan Hao was not the slightest bit worried about this with his current cultivation speed.


    Now that I think about it, can''t you directly skip past the Soul Ascension Realm if you are strong enough? Perhaps the ancient geniuses who could fight and kill Soul Ascension Realm Experts I saw during the vision shown by the book in the Thousand Wind Pce were preparing to directly ascend the Immortal Soul Tribtion in a single step¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about this as he looked towards Xu Bao patiently waiting for him after seeing that he was deep in thought.


    "For the Immortal Soul Tribtion, what is the fastest speed you have heard of someone ascending the tribtion before?"


    "The fastest speed at which someone passed through the Immortal Soul Tribtion¡­? Hm¡­ From what I know, there is a few ancient records in my sect that mention something about the geniuses of the ancient era being capable of directly transcending the tribtion in a single step without having to prepare themselves between each of the seven tribtions¡­ But heavenly geniuses like that have never appeared since the ancient era¡­


    Outside of these heavenly geniuses, the fastest person I have heard about that passed through the Immortal Soul Tribtion is someone know as the Eternal Empress of Slumber that managed to ascend the Immortal Soul Tribtion at the age of one thousand¡­ But that was already before I was born. Even the Sky Empire wasn''t around when that figure rose to power!" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Hearing what Xu Bao said, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he heard the name of the person who had the record of surpassing the Immortal Soul Tribtion the fastest in the current era.


    Eternal Empress of Slumber... Why do I have a feeling that I have heard about this person before?


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao instead turned his attention towards the more important part of the information that Xu Bao had given him.


    During the ancient era, the powerful geniuses had indeed managed to pass through the Immortal Soul Tribtion in a single step without waiting between each of the different tribtions!


    But¡­ Given that those powerful geniuses of the ancient era had the strength to kill Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the Domain Lord Realm and had still not chosen to pass through the Immortal Soul Tribtion, Xuan Hao understood that he would definitely not be able to pass through the entire tribtion with his current strength.


    Not to mention, the Soul Ascension Realm Experts that those powerful Domain Lords fought were clearly far stronger than the Soul Ascension Realm he had encountered so far. Even the demonic cultivator from earlier was far weaker than them. Only the power from the guardian formation of the capital seemed to have reached the level of strength that those Soul Ascension Realm Experts fighting with those top geniuses of the ancient era had!


    "¡­"


    Thinking that he would need to get strong enough to deal with something as powerful as the guardian formation of the Sky Empire''s capital city in the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that he still had some way to go before he could reach break through to the next realm.


    At the very least, if he followed the same path as those ancient geniuses, he would be able to directly skip past the Soul Ascension Realm and reach an even higher realm!


    "Elder Xu¡­ Do you perhaps know how those ancient geniuses from the ancient era managed to get strong enough to directly ascend the Immortal Soul Tribtion in a single step?"


    "No¡­ If I did, I would be using whatever methods they were using to improve my own strength. If I had to guess, I would think that they continued strengthening their domain after reaching the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm instead of breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm, as for how they would continue strengthening their domain¡­ I have no idea¡­"


    Seeing Elder Xu shaking his head helplessly as he said this, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly to himself.


    Indeed, if Elder Xu knew how those ancient geniuses managed to increase their strength to such a terrifying level that they would be able to directly skip past the Soul Ascension Realm, he would certainly be using them to increase his own strength!


    From the looks of it, he would have to look for those methods himself in the future. For now, the only way he had to increase his strength further was to increase the strength of his domain byprehending the different Daos that had been integrated into his domain¡­

 Chapter 770 Troubled Xu Bao

    "Is there anything else I can help with senior¡­?"


    Seeing that Xuan Hao had been standing deep in thought for a few minutes without saying anything after hearing what he said, Xu Bao could not help growing nervous. Thinking that he might have messed up and caused the senior to doubt his identity as someone from a hidden sect


    "No, there is nothing more than this, you were a great help to me! I will see you again in a few days during the meeting for the sect alliance."


    "Yes senior! I will be waiting eagerly for that day!"


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said, Xu Bao could not help breathing out a sigh of relief before he eagerly escorted Xuan Hao all the way out of the inn under the confused expressions of the experts from the different independent sects who were all nervously waiting downstairs.


    "Brother Xu¡­ Did the senior request something easy for us to aplish?"


    "Elder Xu, what did the senior ask us for in return for his assistance?"


    "Elder-"


    Following Xuan Hao leaving the inn, the different Domain Lords present all rushed towards Elder Xu who had just returned back inside the inn with curious expressions stered all over the faces.


    "This-"


    Looks like this is going to take some time to exin¡­


    Not expecting for him to get surrounded the moment he stepped back inside the inn, Xu Bao had no idea what to say as he could only helplessly look at the curious Domain Lords surrounding him together with the eager Nascent Soul Realm Experts looking towards him from a distance with the same level of curiosity as the Domain Lords.


    If not for the fact that these people were only in the Nascent Soul Realm and didn''t dare rush up to him like the Domain Lords, Xu Bao was almost certain that he would have ended up getting squashed to death by thisrge group of eager people.


    ¡­


    Leaving the inn after getting a better idea of what the Soul Ascension Realm was, Xuan Hao did not go anywhere specific and instead began aimlessly walking around the capital as he thought about how he was going to increase his strength enough for him to have the ability to directly pass through the Immortal Soul Tribtion.


    Even if he could continue increasing his strength byprehending the different Daos that he had already integrated into his domain, he also understood that this process was extremely slow and would take a long time.


    Even with his current cultivation speed being far faster than others, he would still need at least a few thousand years before he could reach a level where he would have the ability to deal with a powerful defensive formation like the guardian formation of the capital!


    Although this speed was still incredibly fast whenpared to others, to Xuan Hao who was still under a hundred years old at the moment, the prospect of him spending over a thousand years stuck in the same Domain Lord Realm was not something he was looking forward to doing. Not to mention, it might not be something he had the luxury of doing¡­


    He still had to inspect the ancient seal below the ruins of the Raging me Sect after he returned from capital. Depending on whether or not the seal was damaged and how much, he might not have a thousand years to reach a level strong enough for him to pass through the Immortal Soul Tribtion!


    The ancient seal was by far the thing that Xuan Hao was the most worried about. Especially after he found out that the creature sealed by the seal was actually rted to the Dao of Corruption¡­


    "Have you heard? Apparently the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom is going to give a public lecture at the square in front of the ck Mist auction house!"


    "ck Mist auction house? Isn''t that the auction house under the Sky Mist Kingdom¡­? Are you sure this is not just a way to attract more customers for his auction house?"


    "Yes! I heard that he is indeed going to hold a public lecture! Even if it won''tst for an hour, a lecture from someone in the Domain Lord Realm is something hard toe by. Especially for people like us¡­" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Indeed¡­ Guess we will postpone the job for today and check out the lecture. Hopefully we will be able to improve our strength after the lecture."


    "Haha! I knew I could count on you! Let''s go!"


    Swish~


    A public lecture by a Domain Lord? Maybe I should go and take a look¡­


    Overhearing the conversation between two young men talking with each other, Xuan Hao could not help stopping for a moment as he looked in the direction that the two of them were running with a curious expression on his face.


    Ever since he had reached the Nascent Soul Realm, he had never gone to any of the lectures held by the elders of the sect.


    Considering that it had been a long time since he had gone to one and he was not getting any closer to solving his problem of how to improve his strength by just walking around, Xuan Hao thought about it for a few seconds before ultimately deciding to join the public lecture that was going to be held in front of the ck Mist auction house.


    All things considered, it would also be a good opportunity for him to get a better understanding of another Domain Lord''sprehension of the Domain Lord Realm and how he had managed to progress.


    If he was lucky, he might even be able to make some progress on how he could increase his strength further¡­ Well¡­ One could always dream¡­


    Swoosh~


    Not waiting around after havinge to a decision, Xuan Hao turned around before following after the two young men who were eagerly making their way towards ck Mist auction house while happily chatting with each other along the way.

 Chapter 771 Elder From The Sky Mist Kingdom

    Following behind the two young men as they made their way through the busy crowd of people, it did not take more than a few minutes before the ck Mist auction house appeared in the distance together with arge gathering of people who were eagerly waiting in front of the auction house. Most of these people being of the younger generation with only a few older people waiting around.


    They should be waiting for the Domain Lord from the Sky Mist Kingdom to show up and begin the lecture¡­


    Understanding at a nce why this group of young people were waiting in front of the auction house, Xuan Hao decided to find a ce to wait until the Domain Lord in question showed up. After all, he did not really want to stand in front of the crowded entrance to the auction house waiting for the Domain Lord to show.


    No matter how much he wanted to join in on the public lecture of this Domain Lord, there was no way he would ever act like the group of young people who had all huddled together excitedly in front of the entrance to the auction house while they were waiting to see the Domain Lord from the Sky Mist Kingdom¡­


    "Hm? Looks like something is finally happening¡­"


    Waiting for around ten minutes at a nearby cafe as the group of people huddling together in front of the auction house didn''t show the slightest sign of moving, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed that the group of people that had remained immovable in front of the auction house started moving.


    "Everyone, look! The supreme elder is here!"


    "Wah!? It''s really him¡­"


    "Everyone, back up and make space for senior!"


    Listening to the loud voices of the group of people that had gathered to wait in front of the auction house, it did not take more than a few seconds for Xuan Hao and the rest of the people waiting for the public lecture to start to realize what was happening.


    Swish~


    Following a path going straight through the group of people towards the centre of the square opening up, Xuan Hao narrowed both his eyes as he watched a kind looking old man making his way through the crowd of people with a confident expression on his face.


    From a nce, it was obvious that this old man was the supreme elder from the Sky Mist Kingdom that everyone here had been waiting for¡­ What''s more Xuan Hao realized that this old man was actually someone in the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Although Domain Lord Realm Experts inside the Sky Empire were far moremon and easier to be found, most of the Domain Lords present in the Sky Empire were between the first and third stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Anyone above that were an expert with influence spanning the entire Sky Empire and could even be considered someone that ordinary Domain Lords would have to look up to. For the person doing the public lecture to be someone like this in the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao really didn''t expect someone this powerful to do something like this for people that weren''t a part of his own kingdom or power¡­


    Maybe he wants to promote his auction house or something along that line?


    Curiously looking towards the old man as he made his way towards the centre of the square beforeing to a stop, Xuan Hao turned to look towards the ck Mist auction house that the old man had walked out of.


    Indeed, if he wanted to promote his auction house, doing something like this should be a good idea. After all, it was certain that the people who joined the public lecture would spread the word of it and where it had been held. In turn, word of the auction house would quickly start circting inside the capital.


    Although this method was not as effective as putting a precious spiritual herb or powerful artifact up for auction to attract attention, it was definitely a far cheaper method to do things. Especially considering that the lecture would notst more than an hour¡­


    "Hello everyone! I''m the current supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom and the current head of the newly opened ck Mist auction house. The lecture today will be hosted by me in hopes that all of you here will help me out in return by spreading the word of my auction hall and maybe take a look around inside after the lecture ends!"


    "Of course senior, it''s the least we can do!"


    "Haha, supreme elder, don''t worry! I will make sure to tell everyone I know about the ck Mist auction house after today!"


    "I will make sure to visit the ck Mist auction house after the lecture and buy some pills! Better to support a senior who is willing to give a lecture for us juniors than those greedy alchemist shops!"


    Listening to the old man as he directly stated his attentions followed by therge gathering of people all happily agreeing to help out, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say as he could only watch the group of people who hade to listen to the lecture start praising the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Sect for a straight ten minutes.


    Even worse was the fact that the elder showed no intentions of stopping the people praising him as he just happily smiled while listening to the group of people praising him.


    """¡­"""


    Having realized that the old man showed no signs of starting the lecture after over 15 minutes of restless praising and bootlicking had been done, the group of people slowly stopped what they were doing.


    At this point in time, all of them realized that the supreme elder from the Sky Mist Kingdom would not be the one to stop them from continuing and they had to do so on their own if they wanted to hear an actual lecture before the sun started going down¡­n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 772 Unfortunate Server~

    "Ahm... Let''s get this lecture started now that everyone is ready!" Feeling the countless pairs of eyes locking on to him as he heard the people praising him quite down, the supreme elder from the Sky Mist Kingdom smiled awkwardly for a split second before calmly announcing the start of the lecture without caring about the few people who rolled their eyes upon hearing him say this.


    "To start off with, in today''s lecture, I will do a brief description of the Qi Condensation Realm, Foundation Establishment Realm. Following this, I will do a more in-depth exnation of the Core Formation Realm and the Nascent Soul Realm and exin to you about my experience when going through those two major realms. At the end, I will allow all of you to see my domain as I will recount my breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Now, to start of with, the Qi Condensation Realm-"


    Understanding that it would be best not to dy the lecture any more than he already had, the supreme elder from the Sky Mist Kingdom gave a brief introduction to what he would be talking about before officially starting the lecture.


    In turn, this caused the unsatisfied people waiting for the lecture to forget about their dissatisfaction. All of them taking no more than a few seconds to sit down and listen to the lecture.


    All things considered, even if the old man had dragged out things for a little over fifteen minutes listening to people praising him, he was still someone in the Domain Lord Realm. Even if they were dissatisfied, they could not word out their displeasure. Especially considering that this was a public lecture that the senior had set up on his own!


    ...


    Listening to the lecture while sitting in a small cafe not too far away from the centre of the square that the public lecture was being held, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face as he continued listening to the old man''s exnation of the different cultivation realms.


    "This... Is worse than I expected..." ncing away from the lecture taking ce and instead focusing back down at the cup of tea in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head as he said this with a disappointed expression on his face.


    Just from listening to the Domain Lord''s exnation of the Qi Condensation Realm and the Foundation Establishment Realm so far, Xuan Hao could tell that his understanding of the two realms were far below that of himself!


    If it was already like this at the earlier cultivation realms, how much worse would this person''s understanding of the Nascent Soul Realm and the Domain Lord Realm bepared to him?


    Now that I''m already here, I should see if hisprehension of the Domain Lord Realm will be of any use-


    "Hello! Is there anything I can help with?"


    "Yeah, I want this, this and this!"


    Feeling like he might have ended up wasting timeing to listen to the public lecture given by the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit sad as he decided to order three different slices of cake to enjoy while waiting for the old man to reach the end of his lecture and start talking about the Domain Lord Realm and how he had reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Here you are~"


    "Thank you." n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Chomp~!


    Hm? This is better than I thought... Maybe it''s because I haven''t eaten anything for the past few months?


    Biting into the first slice of cake that arrived, Xuan Hao''s eyes could not help sparkling for a short moment before he consumed the first slice of cake in a matter of seconds.


    Chomp~! Chomp~!


    Not long passed before the remaining two slices of cake simrly disappeared into thin air, causing the few people sitting on the table beside him to look over with a surprised expression on their faces.


    "Ah... Can I get another three slices...?"


    Xuan Hao paid these people no mind and instead called out to the server who had just taken a new order after having given him the three slices of cake walked past him again.


    "Another three slices- Ah! Y-you are already done!? Ahm... I mean, Of course I will!"


    Understanding that Xuan Hao should be a possible gold mine for their small cafe, the server quickly nodded her head with a happy expression on her face before running off to the kitchen before returning with more cake for Xuan Hao.


    Unknowingly, time slowly began passing as Xuan Hao enjoyed all the different cakes that the cafe had to offer. The server who had at first looked at Xuan Hao as a possible gold mine had also started looking at him as some kind of monster, as she wondered where all the cake, he was eating disappeared to...


    "Now, the lecture is about to reach an end... But before that, I will do a quick demonstration of my domain and talk briefly about my experience when reaching the Domain Lord Realm!" As time had flown by with Xuan Hao enjoying all sorts of delicacies, the lecture was also slowlying to an end with the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom saying this with a proud expression on his face.


    "Finally... Reaching the important part..."


    Having not really paid too much attention to the lecture due to just how inferior the other parties understanding of the Qi Condensation, Foundation Establishment, Core Formation and Nascent Soul Realm waspared to himself, Xuan Hao could not help showing a happy expression on his face after hearing that the supreme elder would finally start talking about some of his experiences in the Domain Lord Realm.


    "..."


    Standing at the side of Xuan Hao''s table waiting for another order toe her, the server could not help showing a surprised expression on her face upon noticing that Xuan Hao was not ordering anything.


    I-is it finally over...?


    The server could not help eximing happily inside her head after this thought appeared. Even if she had reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, it was still exhausting for her to constantly run back and forth with new dishes and desserts for Xuan Hao all the time without a single second of rest.


    Although Xuan Hao was definitely a customer that would bring in a lot of profits to the small cafe, the server could not help wishing for it to end so she could take a break...

 Chapter 773 Self-Strengthening Domain!

    Whoosh-!


    "Wah!? What is happening!?" As the server was still happily celebrating over the fact that Xuan Hao had stopped ordering, she was suddenly caught off guard when the powerful aura of the domain belonging to the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom began spreading out to cover more than half of the square beforeing to a stop only a short distance away from the small caf??. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Of course, this was not the limit of the supreme elder''s domain, but he didn''t want to spread out his domain too much and offend someone by ident, he had only used his domain as a demonstration for the people listening to his lecture in the middle of the square to get a clear feeling over just how powerful his domain.


    Part of him doing this was because he wanted torge group of people to start praising him, while the other part of him wanted to genuinely allow these still weak cultivators toe into contact with his domain to get a clearer understanding of what a domain was so they would have an easier time establishing their own pseudo domain in the future.


    After all, if they really did, they were sure to remember this favour in the future and help spread the name of the ck Mist auction house! Even better if his teachings ended up helping one of them reach the Domain Lord Realm, as he would end up with one more friend in the Domain Lord Realm!


    No matter what, there was only benefits to him doing something like this... And this was also the reason why he was showing off his domain without holding back as he began giving a brief exnation of how he reached the Domain Lord Realm and what kind of domain he had. Even going as far as informing them how he would cultivate to increase the strength of his domain.


    In the first ce, the way he cultivated would not really be of any use to anyone other than those who cultivated a simr domain as him... And even if they did end up copying him from what he said today, he made sure to keep out the more important parts!


    "How interesting..."


    Looking at the domain that covered the centre of the square in an ethereal mist, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after he realized that he could not see the supreme elder or the people that had been in the middle of the square any long.


    Without the help of his divine sense or domain, there would be no way for him to see the situation taking ce inside the domain!


    "A mist domain, derived from the Dao of Mist..." Muttering this to himself as he observed the domain in close detail without alerting the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom inside, Xuan Hao could not help feeling amazed at the mist domain''s ability to hide people.


    Even if itsbat strength should be weakerpared to a morebat oriented domain like a fire domain or a sword domain, the mist domain made it close to impossible for someone in the same realm to kill the other party if he wanted to hide by merging together with the mist domain.


    As for what the supreme elder was talking about, Xuan Hao and the rest of the people outside the mist domain could still hear him clearly due to the domain not isting the soundsing from inside the mist domain.


    When the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom started exining how he would cultivate to increase his strength to the group of people sitting in front of him filled with admiration listening to everything he said, Xuan Hao was also listening with an interested expression on his.


    Compared to the way he had cultivated during the Domain Lord Realm byprehending the different Daos that his domain had been derived from, the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Empire was different from him!


    Instead ofprehending the Dao of Mist that his domain was derived from, he had instead decided toprehend the different Daos that were rted to the Dao of Mist andbine his new understanding of these rted Daos together with his domain of mist to strengthen it and allow it to grow closer to the Dao of Water that the Dao of Mist existed under.


    Hearing about this, Xuan Hao began inspecting the domain of mist in front of him more closely and did indeed discover a different dao present inside the domain outside of the Dao of Mist. The Dao of Rainwater!


    Although the presence of the Dao of Rainwater was faint, it formed a perfect cycle inside the domain that allowed it to constantly increase in strength, while at the same time strengthening the Dao of Mist present inside the domain. Inevitably causing the strength of the domain to grow and the cultivation realm of the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom to rise!


    "..."


    Seeing just how smart this elder was, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that his current domain was rathercking.


    Compared to the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom whose domain would continually increase in strength by itself, Xuan Hao had to constantlyprehend the different Daos that had been integrated into his domain to increase in strength.


    For the first time in quite some time, Xuan Hao felt like an inexperienced junior when hepared his own domain with the mist domain of the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom.


    Even if he was far stronger than the other party, Xuan Hao did not feel embarrassed to say that his domain wascking whenpared to the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom.


    To be honest, given the constant increase in strength that the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom''s domain was going through, Xuan Hao would not be surprised if the other party ended up reaching the Soul Ascension Realm in the future... Or even beyond that!

 Chapter 774 Elder Meng

    "Ehm... Excuse me..."


    "Hm?"


    Hearing someone nervously asking him from the side, Xuan Hao turned around beforeing face to face with the nervous server who had been standing beside him for thest five minutes wondering whether or not he was going to order something new or leave.


    "Ah! I forgot to pay... Here you go!"


    Thinking that the server was just there for payment, Xuan Hao had no idea what the cake and other delicacies he ate cost, so he ended up casually taking out a dozen or so spirit stones before handing them over to the server who froze on the spot after seeing the spirit stones, she had been given.


    "Well then, I will get going."


    Swish-!


    As Xuan Hao left the small cafe after paying, the server could only speechlessly stare down at the dozen or so spirit stones Xuan Hao had given her.


    Even if low grade spirit stones were not rare in the capital city of the Sky Empire, the one''s Xuan Hao had handed over were far above the level of low grade spirit stones!


    T-this... This is far too much!


    Not knowing what to do with the sudden windfall, the server looked around herself and saw that no one were looking as she quickly hid half the spirit stones she had been given before making her way back towards the kitchen.


    Even if she did not have anything against the owner of the caf??, there was no way she was going to just let that person enjoy all of these spirit stones by himself. Especially considering that the other party was the one who had forced her to work without break for the past few hours!


    Hmph! This is what you get for taking away my break!


    Thinking this to herself, the server was filled with smiles as she handed over the remaining spirit stones to the owner who happily took away the spirit stones before dashing away to put them in a more secure location.


    ...


    Leaving the small caf??, Xuan Hao didn''t immediately leave the square. Instead, he began walking toward the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom who was making his way back into the ck Mist auction house with a crowd of people following after him. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    From a nce, it was obvious that the old man''s method of holding a public lecture to attract more attention towards his recently opened auction house had worked... And he didn''t even have to find some sort of precious artifact or spiritual herb to do this. All it cost him was an hour time!


    Even if it was a less useful method, it was obvious that he was more than pleased with the result or it could be that he just enjoyed being praised by the people who were eagerly following behind him with smiles on their faces...


    Entering the ck Mist auction house, Xuan Hao ignored the different artifacts and spiritual herbs that were put in disy all around the auction house and gently pushed aside the crowd of people that had gathered around the supreme elder from the Sky Mist Kingdom as he made his way towards the old man.


    "Hm? You are..."


    Noticing Xuan Hao the moment he used his domain, the happy smile on the supreme elder''s face froze as both his eyes narrowed before looking towards Xuan Hao who had approached him.


    "You can just call me Bright Sword; I just have a few things I want to ask you about regarding the lecture you held just a few moments ago... If you don''t mind it of course."


    "Bright Sword, I don''t think I heard about you before... Are you perhaps new to the Sky Empire?"


    "Yes, I''m from the Explorer Union and just came here recently."


    Not intending to reveal his identity, Xuan Hao just used the name he had used back when he had first registered with the Explorer Union to get the location of the spiritual herb needed to awaken Qing Yi''s special physique. Although the name didn''t really provide much in terms of identity due to Bright Sword not really having much of a reputation, it could at least help him with the fact that he was apletely unknown Domain Lord.


    After all, the Explorer Union was spread out across the entire continent and had thousands of different Domain Lord Realm Experts under it that roamed across the continent in search of different ruins and other special locations that could help improve their strength and serve as a way to increase their status inside the Explorer Union.


    "I see, you can just call me Elder Meng, should we move somewhere more private to talk?"


    "Sure."


    Nodding his head in understanding after hearing that Xuan Hao was someone from the Explorer Union, the supreme elder of the Sky Mist Kingdom who introduced himself as Elder Meng waved the group of people around him away before signalling for a few people ensuring the safety of the auction house to help make sure no more people ran over to praise him.


    The main reason why he was not suspicious of Xuan Hao was the fact that he could clearly feel that the other party was far stronger than him.


    Although it was normal for some weaker Domain Lords to be unknown, it was close to impossible for the more powerful Domain Lords to remain unknown for a long period of time. After all, it took hundreds if not thousands of years to reach their current realm and for them to improve took even longer.


    For them to remain unknown for such a long period of time, they would have to iste themselves from the world!


    In any case, getting to know another Domain Lord and possible making a new friend that was stronger than himself, was something Elder Meng was more than happy to do. Even if it ended up dying the opening ceremony he had nned to further increase the reputation of his auction house, it could always wait untilter. At most he would have to do another public lecture...


    "..."


    Not expecting for Elder Meng to just ept his identity so easily, Xuan Hao was a bit taken aback as he followed him inside arge luxurious room that was isted from the rest of the auction house.


    "So... What is it you wanted to ask me about? Hm... Let me guess, you are new to the Sky Empire and want to ask a local like me about the current power structure of the ce and which forces would be best to avoid? Right?"


    Feeling a bit taken aback by what Elder Meng said, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit taken aback for a moment as he realized that there would not really be any other reason for a Domain Lord from the Explorer Union who had just recently entered the Sky Empire to seek out an unknown Domain Lord from the Sky Empire...


    "Yes... That and something different..."


    Given that he was currently using this identity, he could only give a wry smile to Elder Meng, who quickly showed a triumphant smile after hearing Xuan Hao saying this.


    All things considered, Xuan Hao did indeed feel a bit curious about the current power structure of the Sky Empire. After all, the only thing he knew about it so far, was the imperial family at the top. Followed by the three religious organisations and the different noble families from the noble district.


    Outside of these three major powers, he didn''t really know anything about the other powers that existed inside the Sky Empire.


    To be honest, even though there were tens of thousands of different kingdoms in the Sky Empire, with hundreds of them having a Domain Lord leading them, he still had no real idea about the different kingdoms of the Sky Empire nor did he have an idea what the strongest kingdom under the Sky Empire was...


    The only thing he knew something about, was the different experts recorded in the book Yi Min had given him... But considering that none of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts were recorded inside of it, he would not find it surprising if some of the more powerful experts with more influence in the Sky Empire had erased their name from the book entirely. Even then, there were still a few powerful kingdoms that had been mentioned in the description of a few of the more powerful Domain Lords...


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards Elder Meng who was simrly thinking about something-


    "Ah! Sorry for that my friend, I was a little lost in thought there for a second, I guess you would also want to know about the different ancient ruins and other interesting locations in the Sky Empire for explorationter... Well then, should we start with the more powerful forces that would mean certain death for Domain Lords like us to offend?"


    "Sure... That would be a good ce to start..."

 Chapter 775 Conversation With Elder Meng

    "To start off with. Avoiding the threerge religious organisations, the imperial family and therge noble families are all a good idea, as all of them are supported by someone in the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Outside of this, there are countless smaller forces inside the Sky Empire, the most important of which are the current three strongest kingdoms of the Empire, the Dark Sky Kingdom, the Blood Sky Kingdom and the Kingdom of the Sky God.


    All three of them are under one of the three religions, with the Kingdom of the Sky God having lost a lot of territory over thest few years due to the Archbishop from the Order of the Sky God in charge of the kingdom suddenly disappearing. If not for the fact that the Church of the gue God suddenly appeared and took control of over a dozen kingdoms, it was likely that the Kingdom of the Sky God would have ceased to exist¡­"


    "Church of the gue God? They took control of over a dozen kingdoms!? How did those threerge religions allow something like this to happen?"


    Hearing about the Church of the gue God after a long time, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised when he suddenly learnt that they had taken control of over a dozen kingdoms close to the border between the core and border region of the Sky Empire.


    At the very least he now understood why the Church of the gue God had disappeared from the Azure Sky Kingdom and the surrounding kingdoms that had been trying their best to deal with their sudden intrusion.


    From the looks of it, the Church of the gue God should have moved all their people over to these kingdoms to resist the attack of the three religions that had already taken control over most of the faith inside the Sky Empire¡­


    "Yeah, I also just learnt about this a few months ago. Apparently, a few years ago, the Church of the gue God tried to take over several kingdoms all around the border of the Sky Empire but had no real sess.


    Because of this, the three religions stopped paying any attention to them and only sent their Archbishops to check up on the matter ever few months if they managed to take control of a small kingdom.


    However, after a few years of things being like this, one of the Archbishops from the Order of the Sky God went missing. Not a long time after that, one of their strongest experts at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm was killed by the Cardinal due to him being a spy from the Church of the gue God!


    Hah¡­ Out of all the religions, the one who had it the worst is the Order of the Sky God that ended up losing two of its Archbishops in a short period of time. Especially after the two other religions took advantage of this weakness to take away territory from the Kingdom of the Sky God and some of the other kingdoms under the Order of the Sky God. Forgetting about the threat of the Church of the gue God. In the end allowing them to take advantage of thisck of attention to take control of a ratherrge kingdom before rapidly extending their control to the surrounding kingdoms before the other religions even had a chance to respond and stop them before they managed to sessfully establish themselves inside the Sky Empire¡­!


    Now¡­ On to the different powers that exist below these Soul Ascension level powers-" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Listening to what Elder Meng said, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say upon hearing how the Church of the gue God had managed to sessfully establish themselves inside the Sky Empire.


    Even if he had expected for the Church of the gue God to be strong, he had not expected for them to directly take control of over a dozen kingdoms located just around the border to the core region of the Sky Empire without the other three religions even having a chance to respond in time to stop them.


    From the looks of it, among the three- now four religions of the Sky Empire, the Church of the gue God should be the most difficult to deal with in the future¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao focused his attention on what Elder Meng who was in the process of exining the countless different powers that existed inside the Sky Empire that would be a good idea to avoid.


    ¡­


    "Given that your strength should at least be in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm from what I can tell, there aren''t that many other forces that you will have to be worried about inside the Sky Empire.


    Even if there are a few independent forces with Peak Domain Lord Realm Experts like the Iron Sky Kingdom in control of most of the spiritual metal circting through the Sky Empire, you should be able to easily avoid them."


    After spending close to half a day exining the different weaker powers existing below the one''s currently in control of the Sky Empire, Elder Meng finally finished his long and detailed exnation of the different powers inside the Sky Empire and some of the special ces that would be a good idea to visit. Allowing Xuan Hao to gain a far better understanding of the Sky Empirepared to what he had learnt before and also giving him a few locations that would be a good idea to visit of his way back to the sect after everything in the capital had finished up.


    No matter how useful the book Yi Min had given him and how many records he had managed to read through about the Sky Empire, it was all inferior whenpared to the detailed description of the current power structure that Elder Meng had given him.


    Not to mention gaining a better understanding of the different powers he had already learnt about beforehand, he also managed to learn who were allied with and if there were rumours of them having reached a higher realm than the one recorded in the book Yi Min had given him.


    Even without having talked much with Elder Meng, it was obvious to Xuan Hao that this old man was a rather special person. Not only did he have an extensive understanding of the Sky Empire, but he had alsoe up with a way for his domain to increase in strength by itself!


    "Hm? Is there something else you want to ask? I still have some time if there is anything more you are curious about¡­"


    Seeing Xuan Hao not saying anything after he had finished talking, Elder Meng could not help saying this as he curiously looked towards him. Wondering if there was anything more Xuan Hao wanted to know about the Sky Empire that he might have forgotten to talk about earlier during his extensive exnation of the different powers and more special locations inside the Sky Empire.


    "Ah? Ah! Yeah, there was actually something I wanted to know something about, but it''s not rted to the Sky Empire. The thing I want to know more about is your domain... Or to be more specific, your way of integrating a different domain into it."


    Realizing that he had remained silent for a good five minutes going over the information that Elder Meng had given him, Xuan Hao could not help being taken aback for a short moment before asking the question that had been on his mind ever since he had seen Elder Meng first show off his domain in the public square outside the ck Mist auction house.


    Even if he had managed to examine the domain from afar and had some ideas about how he had done things, he could never be certain about it, as he had never used his divine sense to observe the domain in detail.


    Not to mention, Xuan Hao already understood just how difficult it was for someone to integrate two domains together into a single domain after he had integrated his sword domain and ice domain into a single domain.


    The stress put on the soul was simply not something a Fifth Stage Domain Lord like Elder Meng could endure!


    Of course, this just resulted in Xuan Hao being far more interested in finding out how he had done it. After all, standing in front of him in person, he could clearly feel that Elder Meng''s soul should not be any stronger than an ordinary Domain Lord Realm Expert at his cultivation realm!


    With this in mind, how had he managed to sessfully integrated the weaker rainwater domain together with the far more powerful mist domain without any problems?


    "This¡­ Sure, I don''t mind telling you, it''s not really anything special like you might be expecting¡­"


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said, Elder Meng showed a surprised expression for a short moment before saying this with a somewhat sad expression on his face.

 Chapter 776 Secret Behind Elder Meng’s Domain

    Hm? Is there perhaps something wrong with what I asked...?


    Seeing the sad expression that appeared on Elder Meng''s face after he asked him about his domain, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more interested in how he had managed to integrate a domain derived from the Dao of Rainwater into his mist domain.


    "Hah... You should already know that after stepping into the Domain Lord Realm, if your talent is strong enough, you canprehend and create more than just a single domain... But as you know, there are not many people who do this. Even if someone is talented enough, they will avoid creating another domain if possible. The main reason for this, is that to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm, one will be forced to merge these domains together into a single domain.


    The act of merging one''s domains together is something that even someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm are unable to handle due to the terrifying pressure brought along to the soul by the newly formed domain..."


    "Yes, I know about this... And this is also the reason that I''m curious about the current state of your domain. Clearly you should just be in the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, but you are doing something that would easily kill someone in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm! Ever weirder is how weak your domain is even with two domains having fused together..."


    Nodding his head as he said this in response to what Elder Meng said, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he remembered the domain of Elder Meng.


    Even though his domain was the merger between two different domains, its strength was nowhere the same level of his domain after his ice and sword domain merged together and could even be considered to be weaker than an ordinary Fifth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert''s domain!


    Considering just how much one''s domain would increase in strength after they merged together. Even if Elder Meng had merged them together when he was only in the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, his domain should still have been far more powerfulpared to now!


    "Indeed... My domain should be far stronger than it currently is and I should be dead considering how strong my domain would bepared to the strength of my soul... But as you can see, it''s strength is even weaker than the domain of an ordinary Fifth Stage Domain Lord..."


    "Why is that?"


    "I think it''s better for you to see it yourself to understand it..."


    Whoosh-!


    Following Xuan Hao urging him to continue, Elder Meng went quiet for a short moment before his domain spread out and enveloped the small room they were inside of.


    "Try to focus on the mist part of my domain with your divine sense..."


    As the domain of Elder Meng enveloped both of them, Xuan Hao heard Elder Meng''s somewhat sad voice say this to him before he went quiet while waiting for him to inspect his domain with his divine sense.


    Whoosh~


    Not knowing why Elder Meng had suddenly be sad again, Xuan Hao decided not to say anything as he used his divine sense to inspect Elder Meng''s domain in-depth.


    Compared to what he had been able to do before where he had been watching from a distance without using his divine sense. Only barely capable of sensing the different Daos present inside the domain, this time around, he could get a clear understanding of the exact strength of Elder Meng''s domain and how far hisprehension of the Dao of Mist and Dao of Rainwater had progressed.


    "Hm? This is... Yourprehension of the Dao of Mist is actually this strong!?"


    Because of this, Xuan Hao was now able to clearly sense that the strength of the Dao of Mist inside the domain was not only far stronger than the Dao of Rainwater. Even if it was weak at the moment, the essence of the Dao of Mist present in the domain had actually managed to exceed the Domain Lord Realm!


    As for the Dao of Rainwater... The essence of the Dao of Rainwater present in the domain had only reached the level of an ordinary Second Stage Domain Lord.


    Although this would normally not be a problem, Xuan Hao did not take long to realize that the cycle formed between the two different Daos had resulted in the strength of the Dao of Mist being reduced to speed up the progress of the Dao of Rainwater advanced and bring it up to the same level as the Dao of Mist... And with the two of them reaching the same level, the cycle formed would begin showing its true power and help Elder Meng improve by leaps and bounds. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    But... Before all of this, the reduction in power of the Dao of Mist had resulted in the cultivation base of Elder Meng being forcefully reduced to its current state.


    Given the strength of the Dao of Mist present in the Domain, Xuan Hao realized that before he merged the rainwater domain into his mist domain, Elder Meng should have been someone who had reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. Maybe even someone who had reached the limits of the Domain Lord Realm and were preparing to undergo the first of the seven tribtions from the Immortal Soul Tribtion!


    For him to be able to bear the terrifying rebound of merging two domains together, it was obvious that his soul had been more powerful than normal. Even then, it should still have been injured to some degree. Resulting in Xuan Hao not having the ability to urately sense the strength of his soul.


    The fact that his soul was a bit weaker than someone in the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm was likely due to the damage his soul had suffered when merging the two domains together...


    Elder Meng forming a cycle between the two Daos present in his domain, was most likely ast ditch measure to save himself by reducing the strength of his domain to a level where it wouldn''t end up killing him...


    "So it''s like this... I never expected for Elder Meng to have experienced something like this..." Muttering this to himself as he understood why Elder Meng had showed such a sad expression whenever his domain was brought up, Xuan Hao could not help feeling bad for the old man.


    Elder Meng had once been someone just a single step away from the Soul Ascension Realm, yet in an attempt to increase the strength of his domain, he had ended up being forced back to the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm again.


    Even if he had a chance to recover again in the future, Xuan Hao understood very well that for someone like Elder Meng who had once reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm at the cusp of reaching the Soul Ascension Realm, the main thing holding them back would not be a bottleneck... But time!


    Considering just how badly Elder Meng''s condition was, it would likely take at least another thousands or two thousand years for him to recover back to his peak again and be ready to face the first tribtion and attempt to reach the Soul Ascension Realm.


    But... Someone like Elder Meng who had once reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and spent an unknown number of years trying to recover his strength already, should be close to the limit of his lifespan.


    Even if a Domain Lord could live for thousands of years and a much longer time than someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, it was agreed that the natural lifespan of a Domain Lord was around ten thousand years with only a few exceptions who could live a few thousand years longer due to having a special physique or encountering a godly spiritual herb that could help extend their life beyond this point.


    As he thought about all of this, Xuan Hao could not help turning his attention towards Elder Meng who was quietly sitting in front of him with closed eyes as he patiently waited for him to examine his domain.


    "Elder Meng... If you don''t mind me asking... How old are you?"


    Interrupting the silence that had fallen over the small room, Xuan Hao''s sudden question caused Elder Meng to open his eyes with a surprised light shing through them.


    "I didn''t expect for you to see through it so quickly, looks like you are not just someone in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm... Oh well... To answer your question, I''m not as old as you think. Actually, I just became three thousand years old a few decades ago!


    Back then, I reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm when I was two thousand years old and could be considered a geniuses! Later after my strength fell, I left my home and decided to settle down here until I recovered again..."


    Listening to what Elder Meng said, Xuan Hao could not help once again being surprised by the old man.


    Reaching the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm at only two thousand years old! Even across the entire Ewaria Continent, such a feat could be considered close to unheard of!

 Chapter 777 Demonic Cultivator’s Way Inside The Capital

    Hearing that Elder Meng was actually only a little over three thousand years old, Xuan Hao understood that it would only be a matter of time before he managed to recover back to his former peak and broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Other than this, Xuan Hao also caught on to the fact that Elder Meng was not originally someone from the Sky Empire but had onlye to the Sky Empire after his strength had regressed to the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Given how little he knew about the surrounding Empires and the situation outside the Sky Empire, he could only guess that it was due to the ce he was from being in a rather chaotic state where even Domain Lords were at the risk of dying if they did not have enough strength.


    Not to mention this, it could also be because he feared some of his enemies would take advantage of his weakness to kill him now that his strength had fallen by so much. After all, there was no way someone in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm had no enemies to worry about. Even if there was, there would definitely always be someone who would be interested in the precious artifacts and other resources possessed by a Peak Domain Lord...


    "Now... Do you have any other questions to ask? I will be more than happy to answer them, as having another friend in this ce is always wee. Especially considering that most of the Domain Lords present here are not really that happy about my presence here..."


    Hearing what Elder Meng said, Xuan Hao understood that the old man was trying to befriend him, something he was more than happy about considering how talented the old man was. Even if he did not know much about Elder Meng at the moment, he did not look like someone troublesome or bad from what he had seen so far.


    "I don''t have any other questions to ask other than this, the main thing I was interested in was the state of your domain. Now that I know how it ended up in such a condition, I already got an answer to the main thing I was curious about... And I will be more than happy to be your friend."


    Taking out hismunication talisman as he said this, Xuan Hao saw Elder Meng happily taking out his own as they soon established a connection between the two talismans so they could contact each other in the future through them.


    "Haha, thanks, if there is anything you need help with or want to understand about the Sky Empire in the future, you can always contact me. Even if I haven''t been in this empire for more than a thousand years at this point in time, my understanding of this ce should far exceed most people below the Soul Ascension Realm!" Smiling happily after seeing that Xuan Hao had agreed to be his friend, Elder Meng quickly put away hismunication talisman again before saying this.


    In Elder Meng''s eyes, he already considered Xuan Hao to be a Domain Lord from the Explorer Union that was unfamiliar to the Sky Empire and was also not part of any of the different powers inside the Sky Empire that was against him.


    Because of this, Elder Meng only saw it as something positive to befriend a Domain Lord like Xuan Hao who should at the very least have reached the Late Stage of the Domain Lord Realm ording to what he had seen so far.


    "No problem at all. Having a friend who knows this empire will also be helpful to me. Well then, I will see youter." N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Farewell, I hope we can meet up again like this in the future."


    Finishing his conversation with Elder Meng, Xuan Hao left the room before making his way out of the ck Mist auction house.


    Although Elder Meng was not someone he knew before now, the information he had given him about the Sky Empire was far more useful and in-depthpared to what Yi Min had given to him.


    From this alone, it was obvious to see just how good Elder Meng''s informationwork waspared to other Domain Lords... Well... Comparing the information a Domain Lord staying in the capital city of the Sky Empire had of the empire to a Domain Lord that was well known for never moving out of her kingdom, was not really fair...


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided to continue looking around the capital city and see if there were any more public lectures done by other Domain Lords.


    Even if they would not be someone like Elder Meng who had once been at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and had allowed him to see how he could potentially increase the strength of his domain in the future, Xuan Hao at the very least hoped that seeing the domain of other Domain Lords together with them exining their progress in the Domain Lord Realm might be able to help him gaining a better understanding of the realm and how to further improve the strength of his domain in preparation to ovee the Immortal Soul tribtion in the future.


    ...


    Wandering around the city and trying to find out if there were any other Domain Lords holding a public lecture like Elder Meng had done, Xuan Hao was currently walking past arge restaurant when arge group of guards suddenly marched in his direction beforeing to a stop only a dozen or so meters away from him.


    Are they here for me? Did an expert for one of those noble family perhaps see me before I escaped and informed the imperial family about me? No... They shouldn''t have done something like that as it could give away the fact that they had not done anything to deal with the demonic cultivator... But what is it then? Did the cardinal I saved see me or-


    "Look over there! The city guards are here again... Do you think it''s rted to what happened in the noble district?"


    "How would I know? The guards have all beening here once every three or so hours ever since that happened! To be honest, it''s quite a bother as they keep scaring the customers away..."


    As Xuan Hao was preparing for the worst case scenario while looking towards therge group of guards that hade to a stop in front of him, the voice of two people sitting by a small table in front of therge restaurant chatting together allowed him to let out a sigh of relief as he understood that the guards were not after him due to someone discovering his involvement in dealing with the demonic cultivator that had caused the destruction of close to everything inside the noble district.


    But if they are not here for me, why did so many guards gather here in first ce? And from what those two just said, it seems like they have alreadye here several time ever since what happened in the noble district...


    Deciding to slowly move to the side as he thought about this, Xuan Hao quickly blended in with the small crowd of people that had started gathering together to see what therge group of guards were up to.


    "Captain... Are you really sure this is the ce? This is already the tenth time we havee here, isn''t it about time to give up and look somewhere else...?"


    "No! I''m certain that thing is here! His imperial majesty also said that the crack in the formation that the demonic cultivator used to enter the capital without alerting the formation is around here!"


    "But... We have alreadybed through this ce several times without finding anything. Looking again will not help-"


    Swish-!


    "And you are not listening to me again..."


    Listening to the conversation between the captain of the guards that had showed up and the Vice Captain, Xuan Hao felt surprised that they were actually looking for a crack in the formation that the powerful True Demon Realm demonic cultivator had used to enter the capital and avoid the guardian formations detection.


    Considering that the guardian formation would react to anyone above the Domain Lord Realm entering it, it was obvious that the demonic cultivator had to find a way to enter the capital city without alerting it... But he just never expected for this method of entering the capital city to be through a crack in the guardian formation!


    Not to mention how difficult it would be to hide a crack in the formation, Xuan Hao had already seen the spatial tunnel that the demonic cultivator had created and used to escape from the capital city.


    Although he didn''t know much about the creation of spatial tunnels like the one the demonic cultivator had used to avoid getting blocked by the guardian formation, Xuan Hao had expected for the demonic cultivator to have used a simr method when entering the capital city by bypassing the guardian formation through some sort spatial tunnel.


    Never did he expect for him to use a method simr to the one that the demonic cultivators targeting Yi Min had used when entering her kingdom''s capital city...

 Chapter 778 Hidden Domain Lord

    "Hah¡­ Why do I have to follow this guy¡­?"


    Watching as the captain disappeared into the restaurant before he began to search through the entire ce with all his energy, the vice-captain of the group of guard could not help letting out a sigh before she signalled for the other guards to follow their captain inside the restaurant and look for anything that might help them find out where the crack in the formation was located.


    Even if she didn''t want to look through the area around the restaurant where the crack was supposed to be located for the eleventh time, she did not have the ability to stop her captain.


    At most she couldin to him about how ridiculous it was for them to continue searching the same location again and again without finding anything¡­


    "Ah? Guards! W-why are there guards here!?"


    Unfortunately for the restaurant owner who was sitting in front of the restaurant together with a friend, the people who were dinning inside the restaurant were soon chased out by the guards as they all came up with their own guesses as to why the guards had suddenly showed up all of a sudden


    "Perhaps the restaurant owner did something bad and they are here for him! Let''s leave this ce immediately!"


    "Good idea, I''m sure he evaded taxes or how else would he be able to afford so much expensive stuff to decorate his restaurant?"


    If I just didn''t built right next to the city wall, everything would have been fine¡­ But the price ofnd here is so much cheaper¡­


    Listening to the different reasons that his customers came up with to exin the sudden appearance of the guards, the restaurant owner could not helpying down on the small table in front of his restaurant with a dead look in his eyes upon understanding that he had once again lost over a dozen customers due to the guards.


    Although this would not be enough to put him out of business, the reputation of his restaurant would decrease even further than it already had over the past few days. Not to mention, even if he might not go out of business for now, the same could not be said if the guards continued showing up and scaring away his customers.


    "Should I go andin? Would that even work when they are clearly here to search for something¡­?" Muttering this to himself as heid dead on the small table while looking at the stream of guards entering his restaurant while a stream of customers left it at the same time, the owner could note up with any way to make the guards leave.


    In the end, all he could do was pray that the guards managed to find what they were looking for and left his restaurant alone.


    ¡­


    Watching all of this from the side as he learnt more about just how many times the guards had shown up over the past few days, Xuan Hao could not help growing more interested in the crack in the formation that they were looking for.


    Compared to the crack in Yi Min''s formation that had been easy to spot at a nce, it was obvious that the crack in the guardian formation of the capital city was not something that would be as easy to find. After all, if it had been easy to find, there would have been no way for the crack in the formation to have remained unknown for over a hundred years¡­


    From the conversations of the people observing the situation together with him from the side, Xuan Hao also managed to learn that the restaurant that the guards had entered to search for the crack had only been established for a little over fifty years at this point in time. Meaning that the restaurant had been constructed at the location of the crack in the formation without anyone even finding out about the crack being there in the first ce!


    Or it could also be that the restaurant had been constructed as a way to hide the formation by the noble families as the owner of the restaurant had been sponsored by a noble family when first setting up the restaurant ording to a few people standing beside him as they talked about the owner of the restaurant possibly asking this noble family for help dealing with the guards.


    Considering the fact that both the captain and vice-captain of the guards were in the Domain Lord Realm and them having been dispatched by the imperial family, Xuan Hao did not expect a noble family to be able to stop them from doing what they were doing.


    Even if they could, they would most likely not want to risk getting attention from the imperial family just after a demonic cultivator had infiltrated the capital city. Especially if the thing they stopped the guards from doing was investigating how the demonic cultivator had entered the capital city in the first ce!


    All things considered, the restaurant owner had no way to stop the guards and could only helplessly sit on the side and watch the guards chase away his customers as they began searching through his restaurant without leaving a single stone unturned.


    The only positive thing for the restaurant owner was that he had never done anything shady like avoiding taxes like some other business owners did, something he felt eternally gracefully for when the guards had first showed up to search through his restaurant.


    Shaking his head as he thought about the sad predicament of the restaurant owner, Xuan Hao slowly began moving closer to the restaurant that the guards were currently in the process of searching through.


    Although¡­ From what he could see, the only person among the guards that was really searching through the ce with all of his energy was the guard captain. The rest of the guards were obviously not too happy about the fact that they were now back to searching through the same ce they had already looked through ten times before.


    Even if they still did it due to it being their captains orders, it did not mean they would put in all of their energy to look through the ce¡­


    "Hm?"


    Walking up beside the restaurant owner who was still sitting in front of the restaurant watching as the guards were running all over the ce inside the restaurant, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he sensed something off about the person sitting together with the restaurant owner.


    Although he was just sitting down with a sad expression on his face watching the guards trashing a good part of his restaurant, Xuan Hao could see in the restaurant owners eyes that he did not really care about the matter and was more like the bystanders watching the thing from the side without really caring what was happening to the restaurant itself.


    Considering that the restaurant was his friend''s livelihood, this kind of look was rather odd in Xuan Hao''s eyes and made the restaurant owner''s friend quite suspicious.


    Is he perhaps someone arranged by the noble families to look after the crack in the guardian formation and ensure that it does not get discovered by the guards¡­ But if that is really the case, why would they attach themselves to the restaurant and not just secretly fund it instead of openly doing so? It''s obvious that funding the restaurant openly will cause a bacsh when the crack is inevitably found and the restaurant owner''s friend''s involvement in the matter is discovered¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Feeling that the entire matter did not really make much sense from the perspective of the noble families, as they did not have any reason to connect themselves to the matter of the crack in the wall like they had ended up doing by funding the restaurant located where the crack in the guardian formation was located, Xuan Hao curiously began inspecting the person sitting beside the restaurant owner.


    Dressed in ordinary clothes and looking like any random person that could be found on the streets of the capital city, a middle-aged man around histe forties sat beside the restaurant owner as he coldly looked towards the interior of the restaurant where the guards were located.


    However, this was not the main thing that caught Xuan Hao''s attention¡­


    I can''t sense his cultivation realm!?


    Instead, it was the fact that he couldn''t sense the other party''s cultivation base!


    It had to be known that everyone inside the capital city had at least reached the Qi Condensation Realm, with most ordinary people being around the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    For Xuan Hao to not be able to sense the other party''s cultivation base without using his divine sense to investigate more in-depth only meant one thing-


    The other party had at least reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he quickly distanced himself from the restaurant once again.


    Given that he could figure out how odd the friend of the restaurant owner was, Xuan Hao was certain that guard captain would also be able to find out about it. Maybe that was the reason why he had kepting back to the restaurant after not finding anything during thest ten times!

 Chapter 779 Door Shaped Formation

    Understanding this, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the guard captain still busy looking around inside the restaurant for the crack in the guardian formation. Even if he did not find anything no matter how hard he was looking around for the crack in the formation that he was searching for, the guard captain still showed no signs of stopping as he continued his search through the restaurant.


    I wonder what he is up to-


    Swish-!


    Caught off guard as both the guard captain and the vice-captain moved at the same time and charged towards the person sitting beside the restaurant owner, Xuan Hao didn''t manage to finish his train of thought before both of the Domain Lord''s exploded with power as their two domains descended and sealed the area around them. Not wanting to give the person sitting beside the restaurant owner any chance to escape!


    "Wha-!? They saw through my Hidden Shadow Technique!? I have to get out of here before more guards show up¡­!"


    Filled with surprise as the two Domain Lord Realm Guards were charging towards him, the person sitting beside the restaurant owner panicked before his own domain spread out and crashed into the domain of the guard captain and the vice-guard captain.


    BOOM-!


    As the three domains collided with each other, the area a few hundred meters around them were reduced to rubble in an instant. If not for the fact that the guardian formation was reinforcing the surrounding buildings and limiting the area that their fight could be affect, the damage caused by three domains shing with each other would easily have covered half of the massive capital city and killed millions!


    "Ah-! Everyone, out of the way!"


    "Th-There are Domain Lords fighting¡­ And it''s actually someone bold enough to fight with the guards inside the capital!


    "Let''s leave quickly, this is getting far too dangerous¡­"


    As the three Domain Lords began fighting, one trying to escape, while the other two tried to restrain him, the people spectating all understood how dangerous things had gotten as they all began moving away from the restaurant where the battle was taking ce¡­ Well¡­ What was left of the restaurant now that it had be the centre of a battle between three Domain Lords¡­


    "The guardian formation is restricting the area affected by their battle¡­ But a few dozen people together with the restaurant owner were still caught up in the initial sh of the formation before having a chance to escape¡­"


    Observing the battle from a distance together with the spectators who were bold enough to still stay around to observe the battle, Xuan Hao''s gaze remained locked on the person who had been friends with the now dead restaurant owner.


    From the sh between the three domains just now, Xuan Hao could clearly tell the strength of all three people involved in the fight.


    The Captain of the guards had reached the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and the vice-captain had reached the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, while the person who had hidden beside the restaurant owner as his friend was actually someone in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Normally the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert would win the fight against the two Domain Lord Realm Expert guards¡­ But he was not trying to fight back and was instead trying his best to escape as quickly as possible.


    Even if he had the ability to win the fight, it would at least take him half an hour or more to do so!


    Although there shouldn''t be any Soul Ascension Realm Experts showing up to deal with a matter involving Domain Lord Realm Experts, the Domain Lord Realm Experts in charge of keeping the capital city safe was sure to show up.


    At that point in time, even if it was only those First or Second Stage Domain Lord Realm Experts that showed up, he would still get encircled and supressed by the overwhelming number of Domain Lords.


    After all, the guards in charge of keeping the safety of the capital was by far one of the most powerful entities inside the capital and was directly managed by the imperial family. Not to mention the many Domain Lords among the guards, a Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert had also been assigned to manage the guards!


    Swish~!


    Dodging the attack of the two Domain Lord Realm Experts trying to prevent him from leaving, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert could not help frowning as several half transparent chains shot up from the ground below him before forcefully chaining him to the ground.


    "Hmph! Think you can stop me from leaving with this!?"


    Crack~


    BOOOM-!


    Using his strength to forcibly breaking the chains that had chained him to the ground, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord did not waste any time as heunched an attack towards the vice-captain who was about to attack him while he had been chained to the ground.


    "Wha-!?"


    Not expecting for him to break through the chains created by her captain''s domain to seal his movement, the vice-captain was caught off-guard as she could only take out a small talisman and crush it to form a small barrier in front of herself to protect against the sudden attack!


    Crack-!


    However, even the barrier she had created by using one of her life saving treasures was not enough to stop the full powered attack of a Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert-


    Bang!


    Even if she did not die, she was still sent flying with more than half of her body having been destroyed by the attack.


    Although she was someone in the Domain Lord Realm, losing more than half of her body rendered her unable to join the fight again.


    "You! You dare!?"


    Seeing his vice-captain almost getting killed by the attack of the Sixth Stage Domain Lord, the captain''s eyes was filled with killing intent as he charged towards him before he had the chance to escape.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    As the captain went all out, the destruction caused by their fight also began increasing as the restriction caused by the guardian formation''s inactive state could only resist a certain level of power without the formation having to be fully activated.


    "Ah-! They areing over here! Let''s leave before we end up like those unfortunate people from earlier!"


    "Good idea¡­ Even if it''s a good opportunity to watch a fight behind Domain Lord Realm Experts up close, its not worth it if we end up dying¡­"


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~ n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    As the destruction increased and the area affected by the fight grew wider, the spectators who were standing beside Xuan Hao who were mostly people in the Core Formation Realm or the Nascent Soul Realm at this point in time quickly turned to leave before they ended getting affected by the battle.


    Even if they could gain a lot by watching a fight between Domain Lord Realm Experts up close, they also understood how dangerous it would be. Especially when they remembered the fate of the people who had been too close to the Domain Lords when the battle first started¡­ Other than the group of guards who had evacuated safely in time, those people had all ended up dying without even knowing how!


    Swish~


    Watching as the fight grew more and more intense after the vice-captain had been knocked out of the battle, Xuan Hao decided to move forward while everyone was distracted and entered the now empty ruins of the restaurant where the crack in the guardian formation should be located ording to what he had heard from the conversation between the guard captain and his vice-captain.


    Swoosh~!


    "So, the crack is indeed hidden here¡­ Although it''s a little different than I expected¡­"


    Using his divine sense to cover the ruins of the restaurant without caring about the fighting taking ce outside moving further and further away from him, Xuan Hao could not help smiling happily after he discovered a small formation in the shape of a small door hidden a few hundred meters below the restaurant.


    Although the formation in the shape of a small door was not what Xuan Hao had expected the crack in the guardian formation to look like, he soon understood it as the formation in the shape of a door acted like a part of the guardian formation when closed.


    Bing impossible for the one in control of the guardian formation to sense it, unless the guardian formation was activated at the moment that the door shaped formation was opened to allow someone from outside to sneak inside the capital city!


    Whoosh~!


    Passing through the ground before arriving in front of the door shaped formation, Xuan Hao did not hesitate to use his domain to forcefully cover the door shaped formation before dismantling it.


    Even if the door shaped formation did not seem that special outside of its function to hide from the guardian formation when closed, the natural treasure acting as the core of the door shaped formation should at least be a Transcendent Grade Natural Treasure!


    Considering everyone was busy above ground, Xuan Hao decided to take a chance to search for the crack and see if he could take away the treasures that had been used to make the crack in the guardian formation of the capital city while no one paid any attention to the ruins of the restaurant¡­

 Chapter 780 Desperate Escape

    Looking at the small ne made out of some kind of unknown metal floating in the space that was left behind after he had dismantled the door shaped formation, Xuan Hao could not help feeling excited after feeling the unique aura of a natural treasure given off by the small ne.


    Even if he had only encountered a few natural treasures before, he could still tell that the small ne floating in the space where the door shaped formation had once been located was a natural treasure. Not only that, but from the aura alone, it had reached the Transcendent Grade!


    "There really was a Transcendent Grade Natural Treasure¡­"


    Not having really expected for the door shaped formation to have a Transcendent Grade Natural Treasure as the core, Xuan Hao was looked towards the ne for a few seconds as he muttered this to himself inside the quiet underground space where the door shaped formation and the crack in the guardian formation was located.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any time after seeing the natural treasure floating in the air in front of him, Xuan Hao grabbed it before putting it away and making his way back towards the surface.


    Now that he had dismantled the door shaped formation that had been used to hide the crack in the guardian formation, it would not take long before the Domain Lords currently in the process of fighting above ground discovered the abnormality below.


    Even worse, looking at just howrge the crack was after he had dismantled the door shaped formation, Xuan Hao understood that there was a good chance that the abnormality might attract the attention of one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the imperial family.


    After all, given the size of the crack in the guardian formation, it was not something someone in the Domain Lord Realm would have the ability to fix!


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Reaching the surface only a few seconds after putting away the Transcendent Grade Natural Treasure, the sound of battle that had been moving further and further away when he had gone underground to check out the crack in the guardian formation had somehow moved back towards the site of the restaurant where he was.


    How odd, the strength of the captain should not be enough to prevent that person from leaving for more than a few seconds, let alone force him back to this ce¡­ Even though the captain was supposed to be the weaker one, he had somehow managed to gain an advantage¡­


    Nothing had changedpared to before and there were no new people who had showed up to lend the captain a hand in dealing with the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert that was trying his best to escape.


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao looked towards the two figures shing with each other in the sky not too far away.


    Closely observing the two Domain Lords fighting in the air above the capital city, Xuan Hao discovered that whenever one of the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert''s attacks was about tond, a weird and almost invisible barrier appeared around the captain and stopped the attack before it could reach the captain.


    A defensive artifact? For it topletely negate the attacks of a Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert, it should be high level artifact as well¡­


    Not taking more than a few seconds to see through the origin of the barrier that was protecting the captain whenever he was about to get injured, Xuan Hao could not help feeling bad for the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert that was trying his best to escape. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Originally, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert would be able to look for a chance to escape from the captain when he was forced back and had to defend himself with his domain¡­ But given that the captain could fully focus on attacking and leave defence to his defensive artifact, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert had no way to escape.


    After all, even though he was stronger than the captain, the distance between both of them was not big enough for him to easily deal knock the captain flying like he had done with the vice-captain.


    Boom-!


    Because of this, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord grew more and more desperate as time passed. Understanding very well that with each passing second he wasted fighting the captain, he would get close to getting caught by the more powerful experts from the capital guards!


    Even if he had reached the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, there was no way he would be deluded enough to think that he would be able to escape after the more powerful experts started showing up.


    The only lucky thing for him, was the fact that the destruction caused by his fight had been limited by the power of the guardian formation.


    If not, the entire capital city would have already noticed it when he first shed with the captain in front of him. At that point in time, the entire capital guard would have mobilized and he would have been surrounded in seconds without a chance to escape.


    Another thing was also the fact that the captain in front of him had not contacted the rest of the guards in the capital city before attacking him¡­ But that was not really luck and more due to the fact that the guard captain was not cautious enough due to this being inside the capital city.


    "Hm? Looks like the rest of the guards are finally showing up¡­"


    Observing the fight as the Sixth Stage Domain Lord was pushed even further back by the captain, Xuan Hao suddenly raised his head and looked into the distance where several powerful auras all reaching the Domain Lord Realm appeared as they charged towards his current location¡­ Or to be more precise, the location where the Sixth Stage Domain Lord and the captain of the guards were fighting!


    "I should also get out of here before I end up getting caught up in this fight¡­"


    Swish~!


    Not wanting to get involved in the fight as it might end up attracting the attention of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert, Xuan Hao quickly used his movement technique to leave the ruins of the restaurant before the two people fighting in the sky above had any time to notice him.


    Given that he had already managed to get his hand on a Transcendent Grade Natural Treasure for free, Xuan Hao was quite happy at the moment and didn''t really care how the fight above ended.


    In the first ce, this was rted to the internal fight of the Sky Empire and did not have anything to do with him. For all he cared, it would be best if the different forces of the Sky Empire started fighting with each other and created a chaotic situation.


    At least this way, the Star Shattering Sect would be able to expand their territory more easily without having to worry about therge forces of the Sky Empire who would have their hands full with dealing with each other.


    "Haha! Looks like you won''t be able to escape any longer!"


    "T-this is-!?"


    Not too long after Xuan Hao left the ruins of the restaurant below the ce where the Sixth Stage Domain Lord and the guard captain were fighting each other, the two of them both felt the different powerful auras approaching in the distance. All of them having at least reached the Domain Lord Realm, with one of them even having reached the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    No, I can''t get captured by these people¡­ If I really get captured, that person will definitely not allow me to stay alive! Do I really have to use that¡­?


    As all sorts of thoughts passed through the mind of the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert in an instant, a desperate light soon shed through his eyes before he turned towards the guard captain filled with killing intent.


    "DAMNIT! YOU FORCED ME TO DO THIS!"


    Swish-!


    Before the guard captain had any time to react, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord took out a small blood red crystal a threw it towards him before dashing towards the restaurant ruins. Clearly intending to use the crack in the guardian formation to escape before the Domain Lords in the distance had time to catch up to him.


    "You-"


    BOOOOOOOOOM-!


    About to chase after the Sixth Stage Domain Lord, the guard captain was caught off-guard as the blood red crystal flying towards him suddenly erupted with a terrifying power far above that the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Whoosh~


    Bang-!


    Even with the help of the powerful defensive artifact that had rendered the attacks of a Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert useless, the power of the blood red crystal still managed to gravely wound the guard captain and send him crashing into the ground a few hundred meters away!

 Chapter 781 Use Of The Necklace

    BOOOOOM-!


    Whoosh~!


    Using the opportunity when the guard captain was forced back by the blood red crystal exploding in front of him, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert dashed back towards the ruins of the restaurant that directly below him.


    Even if the blood red crystal could buy him a second of two, it would not be enough for him to escape from guard captain. After all, even if he had managed to injure the other party, he would soon be able to recover and resume his earlier attack before he could leave.


    With this in mind, the only thing that the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert could do with the small window of time he had bought himself, was head towards the crack in the guardian formation located below the ruins of the restaurant that had been destroyed after the first sh between him and the guard captain.


    "To think I will have to risk going through the crack in the guardian formation¡­" Narrowing both his eyes as he thought about the crack in the guardian formation, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert did not feel the slightest bit happy about having to go through the crack in the guardian formation.


    Not to mention the fact that the formation might be closely watched by the ancestor of the imperial family at the moment, the crack in the guardian formation was created through an extremely unstable spatial channel that connected to a location far away from the capital city itself.


    Only someone in the Soul Ascension Realm would be able to pass through the unstable spatial channel without any issues, a Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert like himself would risk his life by going through such an unstable spatial channel, something he would never dream of doing unless his life was on the line!


    "Hm!? This is- What happened to the formation stabilizing the spatial channel and the crack in the guardian formation!?"


    However after reaching the small underground space where the crack in the guardian formation had been hidden away, the face of the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert went pale as he discovered that the formation that had not only kept the crack in the guardian formation hidden, but also helped stabilize the chaotic spatial channel had disappeared!


    "¡­"


    Looking into the chaotic mess in front of him that was the deadly spatial channel leading out of the capital city, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert understood that his n of escaping through the spatial channel was gone.


    The only chance of him staying alive at this point in time was if the guards of the capital city set him free and allowed him to live. Not something he expected would happen considering how much destruction he had caused in the capital city and the fact that he was rted to the matter of the demonic cultivator sneaking inside the capital city.


    Considering that one of the cardinals from one of the powerful religions had almost died to the demonic cultivator that had entered the capital city. Even if the guards somehow allowed him to leave with his life, the Followers of the Fire God and their cardinal was sure toe after him¡­


    "Looks like I can only take the chance and hope the goddess of fortune is on my side¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked toward the chaotic spatial channel leading out of the capital city that seemed to grow more and more unstable with each passing second, the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert pushed down his fear as he entered the spatial channel with a determined look on his face.


    Either he died in the spatial channel or made it out alive, there was no way he would let others be the one to decide his fate for him!


    Whoosh~!


    As the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert disappeared inside the spatial channel, the guard captain and a few other Domain Lords appeared inside the underground space where the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert had been standing only a second ago. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Looks like he escaped¡­ But at least we managed to find the crack in the guardian formation that the demonic cultivator used to sneak inside."


    "Indeed¡­ But from the looks of it, that person dismantled the formation and took away anything precious before leaving. Even the spatial channel has been messed up to prevent us from following. To think this guy nned out everything so well as to not leave a single clue behind as to who he was or what power he was from¡­ Truly a master!"


    "Yeah, he knows what he is doing¡­ Let''s hope we don''t encounter someone like that again in the future¡­"


    Inspecting their surroundings, the group of Domain Lords together with the guard captain could not help feeling shocked as they talked amongst themselves.


    In their eyes, everything from theck of a formation to conceal the crack in the guardian formation to the already chaotic spatial channel was all something that had been nned out by the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert for his escape from the capital.


    The fact that he had not only escaped, but also dismantled the formation and taken everything with him before preventing them from following after him was worthy of praise. Even if he was their enemy!


    "Let''s go back and report this so the crack in the guardian formation can get fixed as quickly as possible¡­ Two people should remain behind to guard this ce in case something happens."


    Seeing that they wouldn''t be able to catch the person that had caused trouble, one of the older experts present spoke up as he soon turned to leave together with most of the other Domain Lords, two powerful Domain Lords who had reached the Sixth Stage and Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm staying behind.


    The matter that took ce today was sure to cause waves in the already turbulent capital that had yet to calm down after the matter with the demonic cultivator that had only taken ce a few days earlier.


    ¡­


    "I wonder what use this ne has¡­"


    Not caring about what happened after he had dismantled the formation used to hide the crack in the guardian formation and had gotten his hands on the natural treasure that was acting as the core of said formation, Xuan Hao curiously inspected the Transcendent Grade Natural Treasure in the shape of a ne in a small deserted part of the capital with no people around to disturb him.


    Inspecting the small ne shaped natural treasure for the next few minutes, Xuan Hao soon discovered the use of the natural treasure as he injected a part of his qi into it.


    Whoosh~


    The moment he injected his qi into the ne, Xuan Hao felt a faint and almost untraceable energy gushing out from the small ne before it covered him and hid his presence to a degree where even someone in the Domain Lord Realm would find it hard to find him unless the other party was standing right next to him!


    "A natural treasure for concealment¡­ Not unexpected considering what it was originally used for, but still a bit disappointing¡­" Shaking his head as he found out the use of the natural treasure, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit disappointed as he looked at the small ne.


    Even though he had already expected for the use of the natural treasure be something rted to concealment, he was still disappointed when he found out that the only use of the natural treasure was to conceal his presence.


    Although the concealment ability of the small ne might even be strong enough to hide him from someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao would have been far more happy with an offensive type natural treasure he could have used for fighting or an auxiliary one he could have used to improve his strength¡­


    "Hm?"


    Just as he was about to put away the ne, Xuan Hao discovered that other than hiding his presence and concealing him, the ne also had another use-


    "It can actually change my aura and the presence of my domain¡­ Won''t I be able to easily hide my identity with this¡­?"


    Feeling shocked as he discovered this, Xuan Hao could not help taking back his earlier dissatisfaction with the ne. Even if it would not be useful for improving his strength or forbat, it had the ability topletely change him into someonepletely different and allowed him to perfectly hide his identity from others!


    Doing something like this after the Domain Lord Realm was close to impossible due to everyone having a unique domain that had its own unique and recognizable aura.


    After the uing meeting, Xuan Hao had thought about returning back to the sect after everything was over and just quietly cultivate without interacting with any of the Domain Lords from the Sky Empire¡­ But now it looked like there was no need for that with the help of the ne shaped natural treasure!

 Chapter 782 Progress Between Disciples

    Understanding how great the natural treasure would be for the uing meeting, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he quickly started familiarizing himself with its power by walking around the capital city while trying to hide himself as different people.


    Sometime he would be an ordinary resident who had only reached the Foundation Establishment, while other time a foreign Domain Lord Realm Expert that had only recently made his way to the capital city.


    Testing all kinds of different identities over the next few days against the different Domain Lord Realm Experts that could easily be found inside the capital city, Xuan Hao slowly mastered the power of the ne. Allowing him to perfectly disguise himself and avoid getting recognized by anyone in the Domain Lord.


    However, even if he could hide himself from someone in the Domain Lord Realm, he had no idea how well it would go when he was faced with someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Unfortunately, he did not have the opportunity to encounter any Soul Ascension Realm Experts while walking around the capital city to test it out on. Not that he would have actually tried to deceive a Soul Ascension Realm Expert, as the risk of doing so was not something Xuan Hao felt willing to take at the moment.


    In the end, the most important thing for the uing meeting was not so much to hide himself from the Soul Ascension Realm experts of the Sky Empire, as he doubted any of them would even be present in the first ce from the information he had managed to gather about the meeting from different Domain Lord Realm Experts he had met while walking around the capital city practising with the ne.


    ording to that information, the person that would be in charge of the meeting and oversee the establishment of the Sect Alliance, was one of the core elders of the Sky Empire, a Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert that was rumoured to be close to reaching the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Even if this elder was powerful, Xuan Hao still delt confident in being able to hide himself from the other party, as he was still ultimately in the Domain Lord Realm no matter how close to the Soul Ascension Realm he was¡­


    If any Soul Ascension Realm Experts really did show up, it would almost certainly be rted to the three religious organisations causing some sort of problem during the meeting itself. Not a situation where they would be able to pay much attention to the Domain Lord Realm Experts from the different sects that had shown up.


    "Hm¡­ I should hide my strength as someone at the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm during the meeting and try my best to hide away from the spotlight in case something really does end up happening¡­" Muttering this to himself as he came to decision on how to proceed with the meeting that was going to take ce in less than a day at this point in time, Xuan Hao began making his way towards the small inn where the Domain Lords and other experts from the different independent sects had gathered.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was trying his best to master the concealment function of the ne shaped natural treasure, Chu Yang and Qing Yi were sitting together inside the small training space of their master''s pce.


    "Chu Yang¡­ Are you sure this is it¡­?"


    "Yes, you only need to stabilize your foundation and you should be ready to undergo the Cloud Tribtion and step into the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    "To think I''m really about to reach the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ Thank you so much for you help over the past few weeks!"


    During the time that Xuan Hao had left, both of them had managed to grow closer due to Chu Yang helping Qing Yi whenever she had any question regarding her foundation and how she should go about oveing the Cloud Tribtion.


    For the first time since both of them had been taken in under Xuan Hao as his disciples, the two finally seemed like actual disciples under the same master¡­


    "No problem, I just hope you will keep your promise from yesterday and help me train some of mybat techniques after you reach the Nascent Soul Realm. After all, the elders always seem busy whenever I ask them for help for some reason¡­ Hah¡­ I guess Elder Song is really over working the elders now that the sect has been expanding so much."


    "This¡­ Of course, I will be more than happy to help you with practicing yourbat techniques after I reach the Nascent Soul Realm!" Hearing what Chu Yang said, Qing Yi could not help but freeze for a short moment before saying this. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    For some reason, she could not help feeling that something was wrong after hearing Chu Yang say that none of the elders had time to join him and help him practice hisbat techniques.


    Even if the elders had been more busy than usual due to the sect expanding and gaining a lot of new territory, they should not be so busy that they would always have something to do whenever Chu Yang found them¡­


    Whatever it is, there is no use for me to worry about this before I reach the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    Shaking her head as she thought about this, Qing Yi got back up before she left the small training room and made her way back towards her cultivation room with a determined expression on her face.


    After entering her cultivation room this time around, she would not leave before she had managed to perfect her foundation and was ready to breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm!


    ¡­


    "Senior! We have been waiting for you, the rest are all inside the inn preparing for the meeting tomorrow!"


    Reaching the inn after a short walk, Xuan Hao was greeted by Elder Scarlet me, the self-proimed husband of the Sunfire Sect''s Sect Master.


    "¡­"


    Giving a simple nod in response to Elder Scarlet me, both of them made their way inside the inn where Xuan Hao was met with a far more solemn atmospherepared to the first and second time he had visited the inn. From a nce, it was obvious how nervous everyone had be as the day of the meeting and establishment of the Sect Alliance grew closer.


    "Who- Ah! It''s senior!"


    "Senior? Oh! Senior is here!"


    "Senior showed up, it looks like we will be discussing the sect alliance meeting now¡­"


    As Xuan Hao stepped inside the inn together with Elder Scarlet me, the people sitting inside the small inn all turned their attention towards him filled with expectations. Dispersing the solemn atmosphere that had settled inside the inn in an instant.


    "Senior, I didn''t expect for you to show up so early¡­ Do you want to join in on our discussion of the meeting?"


    "Yes, I also wanted to gain a better understanding of the meeting and more importantly if there are any sects that I should look out for outside of thoserge ones supported by therge kingdoms."


    Seeing that Xu Bao who had been the strongest person among the independent sects before his appearance was the first person to step forward, Xuan Hao responded in kind as he said this.


    Like Xu Bao had asked him, his reason for showing up at the inn the day before the start of the meeting was indeed to gain a better understanding of the meeting and what sects he should look out for during the meeting.


    After all, considering the fact that the independent sects were not really considered a real part of the power structure of the Sky Empire, it was obvious that some of them would take an opportunity to supress them. This was also one of the main reasons that all of the independent sects that had been invited to the meeting had gathered together with only a few like the Seven Fates Sect missing.


    "Any sects that you should look out for? Hm¡­ Outside of the sects that are supported by therge kingdoms, there are also some sects that belong to smaller kingdoms that are not openly supported by anyrger power, but in turn receive the support of some noble families.


    Even if these sects do not seem that strong outside, the more powerful among these sects have power to rival even the strongest sects nurtured by the powerful kingdoms. The best example of such a sect would be the Dark Net Sect that whose Sect Master is rumoured to have to be at the Peak of the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Not only that, but the sects supported by the different noble families are always trying their best to take control of our sects or recruit us at any opportunity they see¡­"


    "I see, looks like the sects controlled by the different noble families are rather troublesome to deal with¡­"


    "Indeed¡­"


    As Xu Bao let out an exhausted sigh upon mentioning the sects controlled by the different noble families, Xuan Hao felt like these sects would be the most annoying ones during the uing meeting¡­

 Chapter 783 Trouble At The Border

    Other than the different sects that were controlled by the noble families, Xu Bao also taught him about a few other sects that spent most of their time trying their best to harass the different independent sects whenever they had the chance to do so for no real reason other than weakening the independent sects.


    Although these sects only belonged to some small kingdom and didn''t really seem to have anyone behind them, Xu Bao was convinced that there was someone more powerful secretly supporting these sects into harassing the different independent sects.


    This was also the reason why Xu Bao and the more powerful independent sects with Domain Lord Realm Experts in them had decided not to destroy these sects that were constantly annoying them and even out right attacking the weaker sects who had yet to give birth to an expert in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Looks like there will be quite a few annoying people during the meeting. At the very least, I hope they won''t do anything with me around¡­


    Not knowing what to say after he learnt about the many different sects that were acting against the independent sects to either weaken or outright destroy them at any opportunity they got, Xuan Hao felt like he understood why there were only around thirty or so independent sects strong enough to join the meeting for the sect alliance inside the Sky Empire.


    Considering just how hard it was for them to survive alone, it was also a given that they would be working together with each other for the uing meeting and even outside the meeting without any problems.


    "Senior¡­ Do you have any other question about the meeting? If you want, I will be more than happy to share our ns for what we intend to do after we get one of the leader positions in the Sect Alliance, we are just about to start our discussion and-"


    "No need, you can continue what you were doing before, I will be staying here for the night and we can make our way to the meeting together tomorrow."


    Not intending to be a part of their discussions on what they nned to do with one of the leader positions in the Sect Alliance, Xuan Hao made his way up the half-broken stairs of the inn and found an empty room to settle down and cultivate until the time of the meeting.


    After all, the only thing that Xuan Hao really wanted out of the Sect Alliance was for it to hopefully cause more chaos inside the Sky Empire and draw attention away from the border region of the Sky Empire and hopefully prevent the imperial family and the other major powers in the Sky Empire from finding out too much about the newly established Star Shattering Sect!


    """¡­"""


    Because of Xuan Hao''s quick exit, Xu Bao did not have time to say anything as he could only stare towards the upper floor of the inn for a short moment. The rest of the people who had been observing the conversation between both of them were the same as they all wondered why Xuan Hao had just decided to leave without hearing what they were nning to do with the power of a leader position in the Sect Alliance.


    "Ahm! Let''s continue where we left off earlier now that senior went to rest before the start of the meeting¡­"


    Making a rather awkward coughing sound in that situation, Elder Scarlet me woke everyone up from their momentary state of silence before restarting the discussion they had before the arrival of Xuan Hao.


    Although, now that Xuan Hao had showed up and even said he would be staying in the inn until the start of the meeting, everyone present were far more enthusiasticpared to before about the discussion and what they would do after they got a leader position in the Sect Alliance.


    However, among the things they talked about, the most important was for them to find a way to keep themselves safe inside the Sky Empire without having to worry about getting supressed all the time.


    Even if the Sect Alliance would still mainly be controlled by the different sects under the different major powers of the Sky Empire, it was still a chance for these independent sects to get real influence inside the Sky Empire.


    ¡­


    "Elder Song! I have something important to report!"


    At the same time that Xuan Hao was getting ready for the meeting about the establishment of the Sect Alliance, Elder Song wa quietly going through a mountain of documents rted to the recent expansion of the sect when he was suddenly interrupted by an elder who had just recently reached the Nascent Soul Realm bursting through his door into his office space.


    "Hm? What is it?" Understanding that the other party would not do something like this unless something urgent had happened, Elder Song kept calm as he said this while inspecting the elder who had burst into his room.


    Although it was not obvious at first nce, Elder Song still managed to see that the elder had almostpletely drained all of the qi present in his dantian. An obvious sign that he had been using his movement technique non-stop for hours on end to reach the sect at the fastest speed possible.


    "The demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnd have almost managed to take over the kingdom located beside the Azure Sky Kingdom that also has a border with the Frozen Wastnd! Not only that, but it has be a gathering spot for the different demonic cultivators who are trying their best to leave the Frozen Wastnd!"


    "Hm? What about the Domain Lord Realm Expert that was sent over by the Sky Empire? What happened to him?" Hearing what the elder said, Elder Song could not help frowning as he asked this. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "From the people ced to keep an eye on the situation, the Domain Lord Realm Expert and other Nascent Soul Realm Experts that came together with him are currently fighting it out with a group of powerful demonic cultivators. The demonic cultivators in question should be from one of the more powerful demonic sects in the Frozen Wastnd that decided to leave the Frozen Wastnd for some reason¡­


    Because of this, the people sent by the Sky Empire have no time to top the weaker demonic cultivators from crossing the border, when we found out, it was only because some demonic cultivators had started crossing the borders between that kingdom and the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­"


    "This is¡­ Troublesome¡­ You can leave for now, I will take care of this matter for now and inform the Sect Master!"


    "Yes, Elder Song!"


    Whoosh~


    Watching as the exhausted elder dashed out of the room, Elder Song''s expression could not help deteriorating as a deep frown slowly made its way on to his face.


    Considering that the kingdom that had was about to fall and get taken over by the demonic cultivators was located right next to the Azure Sky Kingdom that had now fallen under the Star Shattering Sect, it was obvious that it would only be a matter of time before the demonic cultivators started crossing the borders and started causing trouble- No, some weaker demonic cultivators had already started entering the Azure Sky Kingdom ording to what the elder just now said.


    No matter what, there was no way the Star Shattering Sect could allow the Azure Sky Kingdom that was now under their control to get invaded by demonic cultivators!


    "And here I was expecting for us to be able to leave this matter to the Sky Empire. Looks like they underestimated the surge in demonic cultivators trying to leave the Frozen Wastnd and didn''t send enough people over." Muttering this to himself as he looked out the window located right beside him, Elder Song got up from his desk before making his way out of his room to look for Feng Chen to inform him about this.


    Even if the Sky Empire was sure to send over more people after they found out about the fact that the demonic cultivators trying to leave the Frozen Wastnd and enter their territory was far stronger than expected, it would definitely take weeks- If not months for them to show up.


    During this period of time, the demonic cultivators would be able to take over the kingdom that they had entered and start swarming into the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Because of this, Elder Song understood that they would have to send over some of their elders to stop the demonic cultivators from entering the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    As most of the elders in the sect were currently focused on either training the disciples or helping expand the sect, this was not something Elder Song wanted to do if he could avoid it¡­ Well¡­ At the very least he could make use of the demonic cultivators and allow some of the older disciples to get a chance to fight¡­

 Chapter 784 Terrifying Demonic Cultivator!

    "-And that is what the elder who informed me about this matter told me, I think it would be a good idea for us to send over a group of elders immediately so we can stabilize the situation and prevent any of those demonic cultivators from causing damage to our new territory."


    Standing in front of Feng Chen as he finished exining what had happed to the kingdom located next to the Azure Sky Kingdom and the people from the Sky Empire trying their best to hold back a group of powerful demonic cultivators, Elder Song watched as Feng Chen showed a simr frown to the one, he had when he had first learnt about it.


    "The demonic cultivators really managed to avoid the people from the Sky Empire and entered the kingdom bordering the Azure Sky Kingdom!?"


    "Yes¡­"


    "Hah¡­ To think the Sky Empire would not send over enough people to deal with the matter¡­ Elder Song, you can take a group of elders and assign them to guard our border at the Azure Sky Kingdom. For now, I will go and check out the matter personally in case any of the powerful demonic cultivators manage to pass through the people from the Sky Empire!


    As for the matter about disciples joining in on the matter to gain some realbat experience against the demonic cultivators, I think we should wait with that until we make sure the situation is stable and no powerful demonic cultivator ends up appearing."


    "Yes! I will get it done immediately!"


    Whoosh~!


    Getting Feng Chen''s approval to deal with the matter, Elder Song solemnly nodded his head before quickly leaving to gather a group of elders.


    No matter what, considering that demonic cultivators had already started passing over the border and into the Azure Sky Kingdom, Elder Song understood that it would be best to deal with this matter as quickly as possible.


    "I hope Feng Chen can help stabilize the situation and prevent any powerful demonic cultivators from approaching the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­" Muttering this to himself as he swiftly moved through the sect, Elder Song unconsciously turned to look up into the air as he saw Feng Chen standing on top of his flying sword as he soon disappeared in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Given the speed of a Domain Lord Realm Expert like Feng Chen, it should not take long for him to reach the Azure Sky Kingdom and prevent the demonic cultivators from causing any damage!


    ¡­


    At the same time Elder Song and Feng Chen hade to a decision on what to do about the demonic cultivators that were likely going to start entering the Azure Sky Kingdom now that the experts from the Sky Empire had been held up by a group of powerful demonic cultivators, a group of elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall were just about to return to the sect when they had heard about demonic cultivators showing up along the border of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "This should be the ce where- Hm? Looks like there is indeed quite a few demonic cultivators here¡­"


    Having decided to investigate the matter, the group of elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall could not help freezing on the spot upon seeing close to a thousand demonic cultivators in the process of massacring the few unfortunate viges located next to the border of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Even if two of the elders in the group of close to ten elders had already reached the Nascent Soul Realm, the sheer number of demonic cultivators was not something they would be able to deal with. Especially considering that a few of the demonic cultivators present gave off a very clear aura that wasparable to the two elders in the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Not just a few, there are at least a few hundred- Maybe even a thousand of them! Not to mention that some of them should have reached a realmparable to the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    "Indeed, this is not something we can deal with; we should contact the Star Shattering Sect and get them to send help!"


    Understanding very well that there would be no way for them to deal with therge number of demonic cultivators, the group of elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall did not waste a second before they all turned around to leave, one of the elders even took out amunication talisman to immediately inform the Ascendant Frost Hall and have them contact the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Aaaahhh-!"


    However, before they had a chance to run away, one of the demonic cultivators that had justpleted the first demonic transformation after devouring an entire vige by himself, let out a painful yell as his entire body began deforming at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    "This- Did the demonic cultivator fail his breakthrough and suffered a bacsh as a result¡­?"


    Unconsciously stopping after hearing the painful scream of the demonic cultivator as all the elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall turned to see what was happening, one of the Nascent Soul Realm Elders could not help saying this as he together with the rest looked on in disbelief as the body of the demonic cultivator morphed into that of a massive demonic creature more than 10 meters tall.


    Even if these elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall did not have a clear understanding of demonic cultivators, they still understood that someone who had just managed toplete the first demonic transformation should not be able to fully transform into a demonic being.


    Only the demonic cultivators that had reached the Peak of the Demonic Transformation Realm that had strength equal to the Domain Lord Realm would have the ability to fully turn into a demon!


    ROOOOAR-!


    Hearing the loud bestial roar from the demonic cultivator that had transformed into a more than 10 meters tall demon, the group of elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall could not help trembling in fear.


    Among the group of elders, the most fearful ones were not the Core Formation Realm Elders, but instead the Nascent Soul Realm Experts!


    Compared to the Core Formation Realm Experts, these two Nascent Soul Realm Experts could clearly sense that the giant demon standing no more than a few miles away from them had surpassed the Nascent Soul Realm, something they could feel from the primal fear that they had experienced through their nascent souls after being hit head on with the aura from the demonic cultivator that had morphed into a more than 10 meter tall demon.


    "This is not a failed breakthrough¡­"


    Knowing that the demonic cultivator had not failed to breakthrough and had instead taken a step beyond the Nascent Soul Realm and reached a realm equal to the Domain Lord Realm, one of the two Nascent Soul Realm Elders could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he quietly muttered this to himself. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "What-!? It''s not a failed breakthrough!? Doesn''t this mean¡­"


    Hearing what the Nascent Soul Realm Elder said, one of the Core Formation Realm elders could not help eximing in surprise. Instantly catching the attention of the rest of the elders who remained spellbound by the massive demon more than 10 meters tall standing in the distance.


    "Quiet! We have to leave this ce. Now!"


    Knowing that they would not be able to escape if the demonic cultivator that had just managed to breakthrough to the Third Demonic Transformation Realm spotted them, the other Nascent Soul Realm elder quickly made everyone quiet down before taking the lead in escaping from the border region.


    """¡­"""


    Not saying anything after hearing this, the rest of the elders did not waste a single second as they began following after the elder who had begun leaving.


    Given how powerful the demonic cultivator was, they would need the help of the Star Shattering Sect. After all, they had no way to deal with a demonic cultivator that had reached a realm equal to the Domain Lord Realm!


    At the very least, the elder who had contacted the higher ups in the Ascendant Frost Hall had already informed them about everything they had seen so far.


    Given the speed of a Domain Lord Realm Expert, it should not take too long before one of the Domain Lord Realm Experts from the Star Shattering Sect would show up to take care of the terrifying demonic cultivator that had managed to sneak past the experts from the Sky Empire and enter the Azure Sky Kingdom without them noticing.


    ROOOOOOAR-!


    However, just as the group of elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall began rxing after having made some distance between themselves and the demonic cultivator, a terrifying roar echoed out behind them.


    "I-it discovered us¡­"


    As one of the elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall turned around, she could not help shaking in fear upon making eye contact with the more than 10 meter tall demon in the distance.

 Chapter 785 Unable To Escape

    ROAAAR-!


    As the demonic cultivator who ha broken through to the Third Demonic Transformation Realm looked towards them, the group of elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall all understood how dangerous their current situation was.


    Not to mention the fact that the demonic cultivator had managed to find them before they had a chance to escape, the rest of the demonic cultivators who had passed over the border also turned their attention towards them as arge number of them directly began charging towards them filled with killing intent.


    Even if the terrifying demonic cultivator who had transformed into a more than 10 meter tall demon had not made a move and was still in the process of stabilizing his cultivation realm after having just broken through, the elders of the Ascendant Frost Hall all understood that it would only be a matter of time before the demonic cultivator finished stabilizing his cultivation base and took action. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Let''s keep moving, we should be fine as long as we don''t get caught before the people from the Star Shattering Sect shows up¡­ "


    Understanding that it would bad for them if they ended up stuck in a fight with the demonic cultivators currently rushing towards them, one of the Ascendant Frost Hall elders took the lead as she said this.


    "Indeed, we should get going¡­"


    As the rest of the elders agreed with this, the group of elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall began leaving once again.


    However, just at this moment, the more powerful demonic cultivators chasing after them rapidly increased their speed for a short moment-


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Allowing three demonic cultivators with a strength simr to the two Nascent Soul Realm elders of the Ascendant Frost Hall to catch up to them. Forcing the group toe to a stop as one of the demonic cultivators directly blocked their path forward with a small smile filled with greed on his face.


    "Haha, look at these local cultivators! I''m sure consuming their life essence will be able to help me increase my strength!"


    Boom-!


    Not wasting even a single second after saying this, the demonic cultivator that had stepped in front of them to block their escape path directlyunched an attack towards one of the two Nascent Soul Realm elders.


    Bang!


    Getting caught off-guard by the sudden attack, the Nascent Soul Realm elder only barely managed to defend himself against the attack as he was sent flying into a forest located next to where they were standing.


    "This- Die you demon!"


    Not expecting for the elder who had been right beside him to suddenly get sent flying, the remaining Nascent Soul Realm elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall froze for a split second before he attacked the demonic cultivator filled with killing intent-


    Boom!


    His aura belonging to a Fifth Stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert spread out as all of his strength gathered together and smashed into the demonic cultivator.


    "Aaaahh-!"


    BOOOM-!


    As the elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall began violently beating up the demonic cultivator, the two remaining demonic cultivator watching from the side could not help freezing on the spot as they looked towards the elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall with fear.


    Clearly, they did not expect that they group of people they had moved to intercept had someone above the earlier stages of Nascent Soul Realm¡­ What''s more someone who had reached the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "Help me! Don''t forget the lord is still around, we only have to stop them from escaping!"


    As the two demonic cultivators were considering whether or not to join the fight and help the demonic cultivator in the process of getting beaten up by the powerful Nascent Soul Realm elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall, the desperate roar of the demonic cultivator in question echoed out just before he was once again sent smashing into the ground.


    ""¡­""


    Looking at each other for a short moment after hearing what the demonic cultivator said, the remaining two demonic cultivator didn''t hesitate any longer as both of them jumped in to help dealing with the powerful elder from the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    Even if the other party was stronger than them, they did not believe that the other party had the ability to kill them before their lord managed to finish stabilizing his cultivation base and came to help them.


    After all, even if they were weaker than the other party, demonic cultivators were well known for their powerful physical bodies and ability to survive a far bigger beatingpared to normal cultivators not of the demonic path!


    Bang-bang-bang!


    "Wh-what is this¡­?"


    By the time that the Nascent Soul Realm elder who had been sent flying returned, the three demonic cultivators were all in the process of getting beaten up as they tried their best to prevent the powerful elder at the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm from leaving together with the Core Formation Realm elders who could only stand around and watch from the side.


    Whoosh~


    Knowing that things were getting desperate as the aura of the terrifying demonic cultivator in the distance started growing more stable and powerful with each passing second, the elder didn''t waste any time after seeing this as he jumped in to help dealing with the three demonic cultivators.


    "Everyone, leave now!"


    As a result of the three demonic cultivators falling into a disadvantageous position, the Core Formation Realm elders finally saw an opportunity as they all used this opportunity to leave the area affected by the fight and escape in the opposite direction of the terrifying demonic cultivator in the distance.


    "Haha, looks like we still have a chance to leave!"


    "Indeed, let''s try to move away from here while keeping these three away from the rest of the elders¡­"


    Seeing that the Core Formation Realm elders were no longer at risk of getting killed by the demonic cultivators, the two Nascent Soul Realm elders worked together to stop the three demonic cultivators from chasing after them as they slowly moved further and further away from the terrifying demonic cultivator.


    BOOOOOOM-!


    However, just as the elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall were starting to once again rx and feel that they were out of danger, a terrifying aura filled with killing intent exploded from the distance before locking on to every single one of them.


    "This is- The demonic cultivator already finished stabilizing his cultivation base!?"


    As the most powerful person among the people present, the Sixth Stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Ascendant Frost Hall was the first to realize what was happening as he turned to look in the direction of the terrifying demonic cultivator filled with fear.


    "Looks like we won''t be able to escape this ce alive¡­" Muttering this to himself as the terrifying demonic cultivator in the distance slowly turned to look towards them again, the Sixth Stage Nascent Soul Realm elder felt his entire body freeze up as he felt like an ancient demon beast was looking at him.


    """¡­"""


    Hearing what the powerful Nascent Soul Realm Elder said, everyone turned to look towards the more than 10 meter tall demon in the distance filled with fear. The demonic cultivators included.


    Faced with a demonic cultivator that had reached a realm simr to that of the Domain Lord Realm, they all felt a primal fear welling up in them as they understood that they stood no chance against the other party. Even the thought of resistancepletely disappeared when confronted with the sheer difference in power between the Nascent Soul Realm and someone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Bang!


    Crack~!


    Followed by the sound of the ground shattering, the terrifying demonic cultivator that had be a more than 10-meter-tall demon took a step forward and instantly crossed half the distance between them-


    BANG-!


    With another step, the terrifying demonic cultivator had already arrived in front of them!


    Even if the demonic cultivators didn''t stop of us, there would be no way for us to escape in time against this speed¡­


    Understanding that there had never been a chance for them to escape in the first ce, the Sixth Stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Ascendant Frost Hall could not help feeling a sense of despair welling up inside of him upon realizing just howrge the distance between himself and someone in the Domain Lord Realm was.


    ROAR!


    Not saying anything in a human voice, the terrifying demonic cultivator only let out a single roar before his massive hands filled with demonic ws grabbed down towards the group of elders who had lost any will to resist the demonic cultivator at this point in time-


    Swish-!


    However, just before the demonic hand could reach them, a sword light swept over from the distance before cutting through the arm of the demonic cultivator-


    Ptsh~


    Bang!


    Directly severing it before the demonic cultivator had any time to respond to the sudden attack!


    ROOOOOOOOOOOAR-!


    Only able to let out a painfilled roar as it looked towards the direction that the sword light hade from.

 Chapter 786 Feng Chen Vs Demonic Cultivator

    Understanding just how powerful the demonic cultivator was, none of them had expected for the arm of the terrifying demonic cultivator to suddenly get severed just as it was about to reach them.


    "Wha-what was that!?"


    Because of this, all the elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall froze on the spot before they turned to look in the direction that the sword light hade from filled with both curiosity and fear. After all, the person responsible for the sword light should at the very least someone in the Domain Lord Realm!


    However, after turning around to see where the sword light hade from did they realize that the person responsible was none other than the current sect master of the Star Shattering Sect, Feng Chen!


    Although they had never met him in person before, they had still managed to see some paintings of him after the Ascendant Frost Hall came under the control of the Star Shattering Sect. After all, it would be bad if they ended up encountering the sect master of Star Shattering Sect at some point in the future and ended up not recognizing the other party!


    As for the rest of the important people from the Star Shattering Sect, these elders did not know a lot about them- Of course, this was not considering Xuan Hao who had once saved their sect from a powerful demonic cultivator who they had managed to see first-hand before.


    Whoosh~


    Seeing Feng Chen slowly descend down towards them as he kept his attention focused on the demonic cultivator that had retreated after being ambushed, the elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall all bowed their heads respectfully.


    """We Greet the Sect Master of the Star Shattering Sect!"""


    "No need for this, I think it would be best for all of you to get out of here as fast as possible."


    Ignoring the respectful greeting from the group of elders that bowed down to him as hended in front of them, Feng Chen instead remained fully focused on the demonic cultivator in the distance as he urged the elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall to leave as quickly as possible.


    "We will leave immediately! Thanks for your help senior, we will forever be indebted to you for this!"


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Knowing that they would only serve as a burden for Feng Chen to protect when he started fighting the demonic cultivator, the Sixth Stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert among the elders quickly said this before dragging the rest of the elders along with him to leave.


    In a battle between experts at the level of Domain Lords, the remnant energy alone would be more than enough to kill someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, let alone the elders present who had only reached the Core Formation Realm!


    ¡­


    "I really didn''t expect to encounter a group of elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall here. At least I managed to show up before the demonic cultivator had time to kill¡­ But, to think the demonic cultivator actually reached the Third Demonic Transformation Realm. Even with my strength, this will be hard to deal with¡­" Muttering this to himself as he kept an eye on the demonic cultivator as the elders from the Ascendant Frost Hall were escaping with all they got, Feng Chen silently got ready to face the demonic cultivator.


    Ever since he had reached the Domain Lord Realm, he had never had a real chance to fight with anyone at the same level. Outside of a few friendly battles with Shu Yao back in the sect.


    All things considered; this would be his first real Domain Lord level fight.


    The only good thing about this, was the fact that the demonic cultivator in front of him was in a simr situation and had just recently broken through. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    With this in mind, he should at the very least have the upper hand as he had long since gotten used to his strength!


    ROOOOAR-!


    Not wanting to wait around for any longer, the demonic cultivator who had been quietly observing Feng Chen ever since it had been ambushed by him, charged forward filled with killing intent!


    Swish-!


    BANG!


    "This- Is far stronger than I expected¡­"


    Even if Feng Chen had already been prepared for the terrifying physical strength of the demonic cultivator who had taken on a demon form, he was still taken aback when he gathered together the power of his domain to block the iing attack.


    Although he was in the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he was still pushed back by the powerful strength of the demonic cultivator.


    From this alone, it was obvious that even if a demon cultivator had just broken through to the Third Demonic Transformation Realm, they would be far stronger than a normal Nascent Soul Realm Expert who had just reached the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­ No¡­ If he had really been in the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Feng Chen doubted he would even be able to fight with the demonic cultivator in front of him!


    Ching~


    Feeling that the demonic cultivator showed no signs of stopping his attack as the ws of the demonic cultivator pressed down towards him trying to break through his sword domain, Feng Chen could not help frowning as he narrowed both of his eyes.


    "Hmph! Think it will be that easy to deal with me!?"


    Understanding that the demonic cultivator wanted to directly supress and kill him in a single attack, Feng Chen''s eyes filled with killing intent as the power of his sword domain gathered together into a single point in front of the demonic w-


    Swish~


    As the power of Feng Chen''s sword domain that had gathered together into a single point swept towards the demonic cultivator, the demonic cultivator rapidly retreated after feeling the terrifying power that had gathered in front of Feng Chen. Clearly, the demonic cultivator had not forgotten the fact that Feng Chen had managed to pierce through his skin and directly cut off one of his arms not too long ago.


    Even if he had not been prepared to defend himself back then, the demonic cultivator still understood just how terrifying the attack power of Feng Chen was after that short exchange. This was also one of the main reasons why it had tried to do a single all-out attack to finish up things before Feng Chen got another chance to attack again.


    Unfortunately for the demonic cultivator, he had underestimated the defensive power of Feng Chen''s domain and was unable to kill him in a single move and because of this, the demonic cultivator was forced to face the sword attack of Feng Chen head on-


    BOOOOM-!


    ROOOAR!


    Even if a demonic cultivator''s physical strength was far stronger than a normal cultivators physical strength, the demonic cultivator was still unable to fully block the sword attack from Feng Chen and as a result ended up letting out a loud roar filled with pain as several bloody wounds appeared all over his massive body.


    Although it might not have looked like it, Feng Chen had used all of his strength for the attack just now.


    Not only that, but he didn''t just stand around afterunching the attack towards the demonic cultivator and instead followed closely behind with sword in hand as he began using all kinds of mystical sword techniques to attack the demonic cultivator who was already starting to lose ground after the powerful sword attack.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Although the follow up sword attacks were not nearly as powerful as the first one, they were like a constant stream of attacks that were raining down on him without pause. Not allowing the demonic cultivator even a single second of time to recover andunch a counter attack.


    ROOAR-!


    Knowing that he had fallen into a disadvantageous position against Feng Chen, the demonic cultivator could not help letting out a roar filled with not only killing intent but also a hint of desperation.


    Resisting the constant stream of sword attacks of Feng Chen, the demonic cultivator had clearly realized that it was losing. Not only that, but if things continued like they were, it would only be a matter of time before it was exhausted and killed by Feng Chen!


    Considering that it had just broken through to the Third Demonic Transformation Realm, the demonic cultivator was not the slightest bit willing to die just after it had managed to break through!


    BOOOOOM-!


    Swish-!


    Because of this, the demonic cultivator gathered most of its power together andunched a powerful attack towards Feng Chen before escaping into the distance. Hoping that his attack would be able to buy enough time for him to escape out of the Azure Sky Kingdom and back towards the Frozen Wastnd where the situation was far safer for him to recover and sneak back into the Sky Empire at ater date.


    "Hmph! Think I will just let you go!?"


    Swish-!


    Blocking the powerful attack of the demonic cultivator before seeing that the demonic cultivator was trying to escape, Feng Chen could not help frowning before a sword appeared beneath his feet as he rapidly chased after the escaping demonic cultivator that was heading back towards the border of the Azure Sky Kingdom before going in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd.

 Chapter 787 Last Struggle Of The Demonic Cultivator

    "I never expected for these demonic cultivators to be this strong¡­ Hah¡­ Looks like we won''t be able to do much about the weaker demonic cultivators below before the reinforcements from the capital arrives. At least I hope they won''t be able to cause too much damage during this time¡­"


    At the same time Feng Chen was facing off against the demonic cultivator who had just recently broken through to the Third Demonic Transformation Realm after devouring one of the viges located at the border of the Azure Sky Kingdom, the leader of the three Domain Lord Realm Experts and the rest of the people from the Sky Empire who hade to deal with the recent surge of demonic cultivators, could not help muttering this to himself as he looked towards the endless wave of demonic cultivators that were risking their lives to escape from the Frozen Wastnds and make their way inside the territory of the Sky Empire.


    Even if he was someone in the Domain Lord Realm, there was no way for him to stop this massive flood of demonic cultivators from passing through him and his people. Not to mention, he did not only have to deal with these weak demonic cultivators who were at most around the Foundation Establishment Realm or the Core Formation Realm¡­


    Roar-!


    BOOOM-!


    As a roar echoed out in the distance, the leader of the imperial guards could not help letting out an exhausted sigh as he saw a massive demonic creature charging towards him from inside the Frozen Wastnd. Bloody wounds covered the creatures entire body, but it didn''t seem to care the slightest about any of this, as it remained fully focused on him filled to the brim with killing intent.


    "Hah¡­ Looks like this guy is back again¡­" Muttering this to himself as arge halberd more than two meters tall appeared in his hands, the leader of the imperial guards didn''t bother looking towards the demonic cultivators below as he charged towards the demonic creature.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    In a simr situation as himself, the two other Domain Lords that hade together with him were also busy dealing with a simr demonic creature that was the demon form of powerful Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivators.


    With all of this in mind, the weaker demonic cultivators didn''t have to worry about these powerful Domain Lords blocking their path into the Sky Empire.


    "Don''t let any of them pass! If it reallyes to it, make sure to prevent any demonic cultivators above the Core Formation Realm can''t pass us!"


    "Commander, we can''t hold them back!"


    "There are far too many of them, one close to the Nascent Soul Realm made it through!"


    "A demonic cultivator in the Nascent Soul Realm managed to make it through!"


    In the end, only a small group of Nascent Soul Realm Experts were left to deal with the endless wave of demonic cultivators.


    Even if they were far stronger than them overall, there was absolutely no way for them to prevent all of these demonic cultivators from making it past them and enter the small kingdom that was located behind them.


    At most they could try their best to stop the more powerful demonic cultivators who were above the Core Formation Realm.


    ¡­


    "Howe this guy is so fast all of a sudden!?"


    Chasing after the demonic cultivator who was escaping towards the Frozen Wastnd, Feng Chen could not help frowning as he felt the distance between both of them not getting any smaller.


    Considering that he was using his sword intent and flying sword together with his Domain Lord Realm cultivation base to increase his speed above that of a normal Domain Lord, it was rather surprising to Feng Chen that the demonic cultivator was able to keep a distance between both of them while escaping. Especially considering the demonic cultivator should have exhausted arge part of his strength after having used the powerful attack that allowed him a chance to escape in the first ce¡­


    Is he perhaps burning his lifespan?


    Not knowing what other method the demonic cultivator could be using to increase his speed at this point in time, Feng Chen could only guess that the other party had gone as far as to burn his own lifespan for a short burst in speed that would allow him to safely make his way back to the Frozen Wastnd.


    Given that the demonic cultivator had just managed to break through a major realm and increased his lifespan by a lot, it was not weird for him to burn some of it to make sure he could stay alive.


    "Looks like I will also have to do something or he will be able to escape¡­" Muttering this to himself as he observed therge number of demonic cultivators that could be seen on the ground below, Feng Chen understood that he would have to do something soon before the demonic cultivator reached the Frozen Wastnd.


    After all, if the demonic cultivator reached the Frozen Wastnd, he would not only have to deal with a single demonic cultivator but would most likely also have to deal with other powerful demonic cultivators who might jump in to help prevent the death of one of their own.


    Even if something was unlikely under normal circumstances, it would not be odd now that the demonic cultivators were working together to break through the barrier formed by the powerful Domain Lords from the Sky Empire and make their way inside the territory of the Sky Empire.


    When one also took into ount that the time they had to do this before the more powerful experts from the Sky Empire showed up, the chances of this happening increased by arge margin.


    Swish-! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Deciding to forcefully raise his speed by another level, Feng Chen instantly started closing the short distance between himself and the demonic cultivator.


    Although this did note without any costs, the cost was negligible as long as he could catch up to the demonic cultivator in the short term.


    ROOOOAR-!


    Feeling Feng Chen chasing after him suddenly rapidly increase his speed as he was closing the distance between them, the demonic cultivator could not help letting out a slightly desperate roar as he tried increasing his speed to no avail.


    Shing~


    Not even a secondter, the terrifying sound of a sword cutting through the air echoed out as the demonic cultivator had no choice but toe to a stop and defend against the approaching sword attack.


    BOOOM-!


    As the defensive barrier formed by the demonic cultivator collided with Feng Chen''s sword strike, the demonic cultivator didn''t have any time to let out a painful roar before he was sent flying in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd. Only a small part of his body still left intact after the impact!


    "I should finish things up quickly¡­"


    Knowing that the demonic cultivator would not be able to hold on for much longer and had only been able to survive due to his terrifying physical strength as a demonic cultivator, Feng Chen didn''t waste a single second as he chased after the demonic cultivator who had been knocked flying in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd.


    ¡­


    Boom-boom-boom!


    At the same time this was happening, a violent battle was taking ce just outside the border of the Frozen Wastnds as the leader of the imperial guards gathered his strength together and forcefully crushed the arm of therge demonic creature in front of him without showing the slightest bit of mercy.


    Whoosh~


    Watching as the arm he had just crushed recover the instant he let go of it, the leader of the imperial guards could not help frowning as he swung down his halberd and directly severed the arm of the demonic creature. Only to watch it grow back in less than a second.


    "This damnable thing really won''t die!"


    Lamenting over the powerful regenerative power of the demonic cultivator in front of him that had been transformed into a demonic creature more than 30 meters tall, the leader of the imperial guards could not help feeling a little helpless as he understood that he did not have the ability to fully kill off the other party.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    ncing towards the two other Domain Lords from the imperial guard fighting in the distance, the leader of the imperial guards could not help showing an even bigger frown after realizing that his subordinates were in a simr situation as himself.


    Without any help, there was no way for them to deal with demonic cultivators in front of them while also having to make sure to defend themselves against the constant attack of the demonic cultivators in question-


    Whoosh-!


    "Hm¡­?"


    BAAAANG-!


    Just at this moment as the leader of the imperial guards was lost in thought trying toe up with a way to deal with the demonic cultivators that had been holding them down and preventing them from dealing with the countless demonic cultivators trying their best to enter the territory of the Sky Empire, a massive body flew past him andnded on the ground a few miles away from where he was fighting.


    "Another demonic cultivator¡­?"


    Seeing that the body actually belonged to another demonic cultivator after a quick inspection, the leader of the imperial guards was just about to start cursing to himself at the prospect of having to deal with a fourth demonic cultivator at the Third Demonic Transformation Realm when a terrifying sword intent suddenly pierced through the air and headed directly towards the demonic cultivator that hadnded on the ground not too far away from him.


    "DIE-!"


    ROOOOOAA-


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    Followed by a loud roar filled with killing intent echoing out across the battlefield, the leader of the imperial guards barely had enough time to see a terrifying sword light descending towards the demonic cultivator who hadnded not too far away from him before directly killing the other party!

 Chapter 788 Shocked Imperial Guards

    Even if it was only for a short moment, the leader of the imperial guard had clearly sensed that the demonic cultivator that had justnded not too far away from him was in the Third Demonic Transformation Realm.


    Although he could not be certain about just how strong this demonic cultivator was among Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivators, he was sure that another one showing up would not be a good thing considering his current situation-


    Swish-!


    BOOOM!


    But before he had a chance to do anything the demonic cultivator that had just appeared out of nowhere, was directly killed before it had a chance to do anything, causing the leader of the imperial guards to freeze up on the spot as he could only speechlessly look in the ce where there had been a powerful demonic cultivator just a second earlier.


    ""...""


    Not unlike their leader''s reaction, the two other Domain Lord Realm Experts present also had a simr expression of shock appear on their faces. However, different from their leader who had been right beside the attack just now, they had no idea that the sword hade from someone different and only thought that their leader had managed to make some kind of breakthrough during the fight and managed to use this sudden increase in strength to catch the new demonic cultivator by surprise and instantly kill off the other party before he had a chance to react.


    Roar...?


    Different from the leader of the imperial guards and the two other Domain Lord Realm Experts from the Sky Empire, the demonic cultivator who was hovering in the air in front of the leader of the imperial guards let out a panicked roar filled with fear after seeing the death of a demonic cultivator that had reached the Third Demonic Transformation Realm.


    Even without having a chance to see who the person responsible for the attack was, the demonic cultivator understood that their current situation had taken a turn for the worse, as another powerful expert from the Sky Empire seemed to have shown up.


    As for the death of the demonic cultivator who had just shown up? The demonic cultivator in question didn''t really care much about it. The only thing that mattered, was the fact that another powerful human cultivator had shown up to help fight them!


    ROOOOOOAR-!


    Whoosh~!


    Understanding very well there would be no way for them to hold back four Domain Lord Realm Experts with only three people, the demonic cultivator didn''t waste a single second before rapidly retreating back into the deeper parts of the Frozen Wastnd after a warning the other two powerful demonic cultivator that hade with him to intercept the three powerful Domain Lord Realm Experts in an attempt for them to enter the Sky Empire.


    Roaaar~


    ROAR!


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Not long after the demonic cultivator facing the leader of the imperial guards began escaping back towards the Frozen Wastnds, the other two Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivators also began rapidly retreating-


    "Wha-!?"


    "Why are they retreating... Were they perhaps scared off just now...?"


    Not understanding why the two demonic cultivators had directly turned around before escaping back towards the Frozen Wastnd after witnessing the death of the demonic cultivator that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere, the two Domain Lord Realm Experts could only look at each other in confusion as they gazed in the direction that the demonic cultivators were escaping in.


    Given the fact that they had been caught off guard earlier by their sudden escape and had no way to chase them into the more dangerous parts of the Frozen Wastnd with their current strength, the two Domain Lords quickly made their way towards their leader. Wanting to find out just what had caused these demonic cultivator to escape so quickly....


    "Looks like there is no need for me to stay here any longer..."


    However, just as they were about to ask their leader about what had happened, an unfamiliar voice echoed above them, causing both the two Domain Lord Realm Experts who were still in a state of confusion and shock, together with their leader, to turn their attention towards the source of the unfamiliar voice.


    "You are..."


    Being the first to spot the handsome looking older man that had appeared in the air not too far away from them at some point in time, the leader of the imperial guards could not help narrowing both of his eyes as he inspected the other party.


    "Greetings Senior!"


    Even without sensing his cultivation base, it was obvious that the other party was someone in the Domain Lord Realm... And given the fact that he had been able to easily kill off a demonic cultivator who had reached the Third Demonic Transformation Realm just now, the leader of the imperial guards understood that the person in question should at the very least be someone in theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm. Maybe even someone who had reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm!


    For this reason alone, the leader of the imperial guards did not dare peep at the other party''s cultivation base and also made sure that the other two Domain Lords would not do something stupid by informing them about everything that had just happened through his divine sense.


    After all, there was no way for him to know that the demonic cultivator in question was already at deaths door after having exhausted part of his lifespan and all of his energy just after having broken through to the Third Demonic Transformation Realm...


    ""Greetings Senior!""


    Learning that the person who had appeared was actually a powerful senior Domain Lord who had managed to instantly kill off a Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivator, the two Domain Lords who had only recently reached the Domain Lord Realm themselves could not help shivering as they quickly retracted their divine sense and stopped themselves before they inspected the other party.


    Thest thing they wanted right now was to offend this mysterious senior who had suddenly shown up all of a sudden!


    "Hm? Greetings to you three as well, you don''t have to mind me, I just came here because that demonic cultivator entered the territory of my sect and started causing chaos..." n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Not expecting the group of Domain Lords from the Sky Empire to be so polite in front of him and even go as far as to respectfully address him as senior, Feng Chen could not help smiling happily before he said this while imitating Elder Song''s usual sage like demeanour.


    Hm? Entered the territory of your sect? Howe I never heard about such a powerful sect before...?


    Hearing what Feng Chen said, the leader of the imperial guards could not help feeling happy before a frown appeared on his face after hearing thest part of what Feng Chen said.


    "Your sect...? Senior... If you don''t mind me asking, what sect are you from? I don''t seem to remember any sect with a Domain Lord Realm in it around this ce... Ah! A-are you perhaps from the Star Shattering Sect...?"


    "Yes! Have you perhaps heard about us before!?"


    "Yes... We all had the opportunity to encounter a Grand Elder of your sect on our way here... Hm... But it doesn''t look like we managed to get his name back then..."


    "You are talking about Grand Elder Xuan, he should be the only Grand Elder currently outside the sect''s territory at the moment! Now that I think about it, how was he doing? Did he perhaps say anything to you when you met him?"


    "He was doing fine and didn''t seem troubled or anything, as for things he said... he told us to leave the Azure Sky Kingdom alone when we dealt with the demonic cultivators and-"


    As the leader of the group of imperial guards started talking with Feng Chen about his encounter from a few weeks earlier with Grand Elder Xuan and a few other things, the leader of the group of imperial guards could not help feeling increasingly shocked as he realized that the Star Shattering Sect was far more powerful than he had first expected.


    Outside of the Grand Elder he had already encountered, it also looked like there were far more powerful experts inside the Star Shattering Sect, the Sect Master in front of him had even directly mentioned another Grand Elder in their short conversation!


    Even if this Grand Elder was not at the same level as Grand Elder Xuan, the other party should still be close to the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm! Three Peak Domain Lord Realm Experts had suddenly appeared out of nowhere!


    Not to mention, when he secretly inquired about the structure of the sect, it seemed like there was a level even above that of a Grand Elder, a sect ancestor!


    Given that even the Grand Elder''s of the sect had reached the Domain Lord Realm, the leader of the imperial guards could easily imagine how powerful the ancestors of such a powerful sect would be!


    At the very least they should be Soul Ascension Realm Experts!


    I have to return to his majesty and inform him about this immediately... But I still have to deal with these demonic cultivators... And my high qualitymunication talisman got destroyed earlier when the demonic cultivator managed to damage my interspatial ring...


    "Well then, I will take my leave for now. Good luck dealing with the rest of the demonic cultivators here!"


    "Ah! Wai-"


    Lost in thought as he was thinking about whether to stay and deal with the demonic cultivators or rush back to the capital, Feng Chen had already finished what he came from and quickly began making his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect now that everything had been dealt with before the leader of the imperial guards could react.


    Well... At least it doesn''t look like informing his majesty about this is too urgent...


    Watching as Feng Chen disappeared in the distance, the leader of the imperial guards let out a silent sigh. Given how kind the sect master of this mysterious sect was, he didn''t feel like it was urgent to report this matter before dealing with the demonic cultivators.


    At most it would take them a year or two before the matter was finished. Not much would be able to change in such a short period of time...

 Chapter 789 Day Of The Sect Alliance Meeting

    "That was easier than I expected¡­" Making his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect, Feng Chen could not help muttering this to himself as he turned to look back towards the group of experts from the Sky Empire that had been so polite to him.


    To be honest, when he chased after the demonic cultivator and got closer to the border of the Frozen Wastnd where the people from the Sky Empire were busy doing their best to prevent the demonic cultivators from passing through, Feng Chen had felt a bit nervous about encountering the Domain Lord Realm Experts from the Sky Empire. Not knowing how they would react to an unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert suddenly appearing out of nowhere...


    But¡­ In the end they were far more polite and respectful than he had expected. Even more surprising was the fact that they had met Xuan Hao on their way to the border of the Frozen Wastnd and learnt about the Star Shattering Sect from him.


    The main reason why they were not too surprised when I first appeared should be because of what Xuan Hao said to them¡­ How wonderful, it looks like Elder Xuan already managed to establish some friendly rtionships with the people from the Sky Empire!


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Feng Chen secretly smiled to himself as he sped up in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Now that the matter of the demonic cultivators had been solved, he could return to the sect and allow Elder Song to send out some of the disciple to help clean up the demonic cultivators that had made their way into the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    If the demonic cultivators present in the Azure Sky Kingdom were not enough, he could always start sending them into the kingdom located beside the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Considering how many demonic cultivators were present from what little he had observed while chasing after the demonic cultivator just now, the people from the Sky Empire should be more than happy with a little help in cleaning up those demonic cultivators.


    ¡­


    After Feng Chen returned to the Star Shattering Sect and informed Elder Song about what had happened , it did not take long before Elder Song took the lead in gathering disciples to fight with the demonic cultivators.


    The main attraction for these disciples being the different rewards such as precious artifacts and spiritual herbs they would be able to obtain after killing the demonic cultivators.


    Of course, this was outside the precious things that the demonic cultivators were already carrying on them!


    As for the elders who were supposed to protect them and help deal with the more powerful demonic cultivators that had made, they way through the experts from the Sky Empire¡­ Elder Song had already dealt with this matter a short time after Feng Chen had left the sect.


    During this exercise, Elder Song also took the opportunity to allow some of the branch disciples to join in on fighting the demonic cultivators.


    The only difference between them and the disciples from the main sect, was that they would not be able to gain any treasures or spiritual herbs from killing the demonic cultivators¡­ Instead, they got a chance to enter the Core Sect if they performed well!


    For these branch disciples, arge part of them wereposed of those who had failed to enter the Star Shattering Sect in the past and were forced to instead move to one of the branch sects hoping that they would be able to enter the Star Shattering Sect in the future.


    For this reason alone, the few branch sects that had just recently been established went crazy with excitement. Soon enough, the branch disciples formed all sorts of tournaments on their own without the help of anyone. Wanting to determine who would be able to get the chance to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    Seeing as this happened, Elder Song who had originally only wanted to invite a few of the branch disciples as an afterthought could not help feeling surprised before contacting the elders of the different branch sects to help out the disciples in handling these sudden tournaments that sprouted up everywhere inside the branch sects of the Star Shattering Sect.


    To make sure everything went smoothly for these branch disciples, Elder Song even went out of his way to send a few spiritual herbs and artifacts that could be used as rewards during these tournaments by the branch disciples.


    At least this way, the branch disciples who were weaker would also join in and get a chance to win something if they gave it their all.


    In the end, this matter wouldst for a little over a week before a winner from the different branch sects could be chosen.


    However, considering just how many demonic cultivators were present in the kingdom adjacent to the Azure Sky Kingdom, Elder Song was not the slightest bit worried about the demonic cultivators getting killed off before these tournaments ended and the branch disciples could get a chance to participate in cleaning up the demonic cultivator. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The main reason for this, was that even if the elders from the Star Shattering Sect he had sent over gave it their all in cleaning them up, it would still at least take two month. Maybe even three months for them to clean up all of the demonic cultivators!


    Even if someone like Feng Chen in the Domain Lord Realm and the experts from the Sky Empire helped out, it would still at least take a month¡­ With this in mind, there was more than enough time for the branch disciples to hold a week long tournament!


    ¡­


    At the same time that the branch disciples were getting ready for their tournaments and the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect were getting ready to fight with the demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes as he looked out at the sun hanging high in the sky above the capital city of the Sky Empire through the window next to him.


    "It''s time¡­" Muttering this to himself as he turned to look at the crowd of peoplepromising of the different representatives from different independent sect that had gathered in front of the entrance to the inn, Xuan Hao casually inspected everyone there before finding Xu Bao and the rest of the Domain Lords standing in the front of the group talking to each other about something.


    Swish~


    "-And I really think we should-


    "Good morning, everyone."


    "Ah!?"


    Appearing in front of the Domain Lords before saying this before they had enough time to register his presence, Elder Scarlet me who had been talking unintentionally let out a surprised sound as he turned to look towards Xuan Hao who had suddenly appeared out of nowhere with a shocked expression on his face.


    "Haha! Looks at you! To think a Domain Lord would get scared so easily! Haha, this is a first!"


    "Shut it you little brat! At least I''m not the same height as an eight-year-old!"


    "Wah- YOU!"


    Boom-!


    Crack~


    "Senior! It''s great to see you." As Elder Scarlet me had was almost about to start fighting with a small old man in the Domain Lord Realm who was no taller than a kid, Xu Bao had already walked over forcefully knocked of them to the ground with his domain before smiling as he said this without looking towards the two people that had been smashed into the ground by his domain.


    "Ah, the feeling is mutual. Are we perhaps going to leave for the meeting immediately? From what I know, there should still be a few hours before we are supposed to be there."


    Deciding that it would be best not to pry into what had just happened to the two Domain Lords that had been transformed into human pancakes under the pressure of Xu Bao''s domain, Xuan Hao just asked about the meeting.


    "Oh, that? I guess I forgot to tell you yesterday, but we are nning to get to the meeting some time before it starts. The main reason for this is due to many of the sects, as you already know, are not too friendly to us independent sects.


    Even if we have senior around to help us out, I''m almost one hundred percent certain that they would try to block our way inside the meeting or prevent us from even reaching the meeting in the first ce. After all, most of the more powerful sects are supported by kingdoms with experts in theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    "I see¡­ That is understandable¡­"


    Nodding his head as he heard what Xu Bao said, Xuan Hao felt that it was reasonable for them to go early and not end up getting stopped midway by a group of random Domain Lords who wanted to prevent them from joining the meeting.


    Although he was more than strong enough to chase away anyone who would show up to try and stop them, he didn''t want to show off his true strength and wanted to keep the illusion of him being in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm for the meeting.

 Chapter 790 Trouble On The Way To The Meeting

    Making their way towards the location that the meeting would take ce together with the group of people from the different independent sects across the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao could not help noticing that the number of people walking on the streets today far exceeded the number of people that had been around during the week he had spent in the capital city.


    Even when the matter with the demonic cultivator in the noble district took ce, there were not this many people on the streets of the city. More importantly, the number of people in the Nascent Soul Realm and Domain Lord Realm present in the streets had also increased far beyond what it had been before.


    If he would normally be able to spot one or two Domain Lords walking through the city, this time around, Xuan Hao had already managed to see more than a dozen... And that was considering that they had yet to enter the core of the capital where the sect alliance meeting was going to take ce!


    From all of this, it was obvious to see how important the sect alliance was to all of the different powers in the Sky Empire. Even if it did not directly involve the imperial family or the threerge religions, the sect alliance was essential something that the imperial family hade up with to weaken the influence of the three religions of the Sky Empire!


    The main reason why the number of people present was also because most of them were curious whether or not the three religions would work together to mess up the sect alliance meeting... At this point in time, the matter of the sect alliance was no longer about the different sects that had gathered together from all over the Sky Empire but was instead a struggle for power between the tworgest factions inside the Sky Empire!


    "Senior... I think we might soon encounter a problem..." n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Just as Xuan Hao was lost in his own thoughts while observing the different people walking through the streets of the capital, Xu Bao suddenly used his divine sense to say this without anyone else hearing it.


    "Hm? What do you mean?" Not understanding why Xu Bao had suddenly said they would encounter a problem, Xuan Hao could not help asking this through his divine sense. Even if he didn''t understand what it was about, he at the very least still understood that it would not be a good idea to say this considering Xu Bao had informed him through divine sense instead of directly saying it to him.


    "I saw a few Domain Lords belonging to some of the sects that recently participated in trying to weaken not only the weaker sects who didn''t have a Domain Lord Realm Expert backing them, but also stronger independent sects like the Sunfire Sect that Elder Scarlet me is from.


    If I''m not wrong, these sects and Domain Lords should be backed up by one of the more powerful kingdoms that at least have someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in charge!"


    Frowning to himself as he heard what Xu Bao said to him through his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help following the old man''s gaze towards a group of Domain Lords observing them from a distance.


    Third Stage of the Domain Lord Real, First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Second Stage-


    "Are you sure these people will cause a problem and try to stop us? Even if they have the backing of a Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm, the strongest among them have only barely managed to break through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even without ounting for me or yourself, Elder Scarlet me Should be able to deal with this group of people by himself!" Feeling even more confused at why Xu Bao was acting so cautious after seeing through the group of Domain Lord''s strength, Xuan Hao turned back towards Xu Bao for an answer.


    "Hah... I forgot you are new to all of this... Senior, what I mean by them causing trouble for us is not so much them blocking our path by themselves, but the fact that they will begin to spread information about our location to the other sects that are hostile towards us independent sects.


    If I''m not wrong, it won''t be long before some of the more powerful sects that want us to disappear starts to show and when that happens, it''s only a matter of time before theye out do their best to stop us from reaching the meeting..."


    Hearing what Xu Bao said, Xuan Hao began to understand what he meant with them encountering a problem. Especially when he remembered just how many sects under the different kingdoms of the Sky Empire Xu Bao had told him were hostile to independent sects.


    Even if it was inurate estimate, the number of Domain Lords from these sects put together would at least amount to 60!


    Although most of these Domain Lords were only between the first and third stage of the realm, it was still a powerful force that could be ranked just below thergest powers of the empire when put together!


    "This... You really have a lot of people who like you..."


    "I... Hah... Let''s get going before we end up getting surround and unable to reach the meeting in time. Even if the Domain Lords that are going to show up won''t be strong enough to stop us, I fear that their backers might also make an appearance and at that point in time, we might end up having to deal with multiple people in theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm!" Not able toe up with a response to what Xuan Hao said to him through his divine sense, Xu Bao could only let out a sigh before saying this.


    Xuan Hao might be an extremely powerful expert that should at least have reached the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in the mind of Xu Bao, but he still understood that there would be no way for him to help them out if multiple experts above the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord realm appeared to block them.


    Not to mention, he had already understood that Xuan Hao did not want to reveal his true identity nor his true strength.


    With all of this in mind, it would be better for them to avoid a confrontation with these hostile forces.


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Informing the rest of the experts from the different independent sects about their current situation through his divine sense, it did not take long before everyone increased their speed as they rushed towards the core part of the capital where the sect alliance meeting was going to be held.''


    "Hm!? They discovered us, we can''t let them go before the rest show up!"


    "Yes, we have to prevent them from leaving or the lord will punish uster!"


    Noticing that they had been discovered, the group of Domain Lords watching them from the side looked like they were about to step forward and stop them-


    "Hah? Do you perhaps want to be the one to stand in front of that old man Xu?"


    ""...""


    However, the Third Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert who acted like the leader of the group quickly stopped all of the eager Domain Lords in their tracks with a single sentence, as all of the Domain Lords unconsciously turned to look at Xu Bao at the front of the group who was simr starring directly at them with a faint bit of killing intent leaking out from his eyes that sent a shiver down their spine.


    After seeing that the group of people from the independent sects had gathered together and were about to escape from them, they hadpletely forgotten about the existence of Xu Bao.


    The main reason for their fear when facing Xu Bao, was due to the fact that Xu Bao had been rumoured to be the one that killed a Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert who had once destroyed an independent sect that was on friendly terms with his sect. This was also the reason why nobody dared to go too overboard when dealing with the more powerful independent sects in the Sky Empire!


    After all, an expert that could kill a Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert was not someone anyone wanted to fall out with if it was possible to avoid. At most they would destroy the weaker independent sects and spend their time weaking the stronger ones as they waited for Xu Bao to die of old age...


    ...


    Rushing through the capital city beforeing to a stop in front of arge gate leading into the core of the capital where the imperial family and the three religions were located, Xu Bao and the rest of the experts from the different independent sects could not help letting out a sigh of relief.


    Leaving early had been a good idea, as the different people that would normally block them had not been able to show up in time. Now, as long as they entered the core of the capital, there would be no way for those people to interfere with them joining the sect alliance meeting!

 Chapter 791 Core Of The Capital

    Having reached the gate leading into the core of the capital city, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised as he saw the two guards standing on either side of the gate.


    Even from a nce, it was obvious that these two guards had both reached the Domain Lord Realm. Not only that but they were above the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and should at the very least have reached the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Two experts at least in the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm acting as simple guards in front of a gate was more than enough for one to understand just how powerful the imperial family of the Sky Empire was... And that was not mentioning the fact that there was more than one entrance into the core of the capital that should be guarded by simrly powerful experts!


    "Looks like we managed to avoid any of those people on our way here, it was really a great idea to move out a few hours before the start of the meeting. Even if they want to stop us, there is nothing they can do inside the core of the capital that is fully under the control of the imperial family.


    If they really decide to still try and do something, then we just have to cause a small ruckus and attract the guards over. Although they might be powerful inside the Sky Empire, there is no way that they will be able to go against the imperial family!" Walking up to Xuan Hao as he said this, Xu Bao smiled happily as he looked towards the group of Domain Lord Realm Experts who had followed them through the capital all the way to the gate leading inside the core of the capital.


    Although this group of Domain Lords wanted to stop them, they understood that there was no way for them to do this with their current strength. The best they could do was follow after them and keep and eye on them while waiting for the more powerful Domain Lords who simrly wanted to deal with the independent sects to show up.


    Now that their reinforcements had not showed up in time, these Domain Lords were all upset for obvious reasons as they could only watch them begin to make their way inside the core of the capital city.


    "..."


    Watching the happy expression that appeared on the faces of Xu Bao and the rest of the people from the different independent sects as they began making their way through the gate one by one, Xuan Hao could not help rolling his eyes as he nced towards the unhappy Domain Lords who were filled with unwillingness observing them from afar.


    Even if he could have dealt with them in case their reinforcements had showed up in time to try and stop them from making it to the meeting, Xuan Hao still felt happy that he did not have to show off his strength.


    After all, considering that several experts who were in theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm would have showed up, he would have been forced to show strength beyond the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm if he wanted to help everyone reach the meeting in time. Something he was happy that he had been able to avoid doing.


    "Are you here for the sect alliance meeting today?"


    "Yes."


    "Please show me your invitation."


    Passing through the gate leading inside the core of the capital city without much difficulty after showing the invitation that he had gotten from the Sky Empire soldier that had showed up in the Flying Sword Sect, a massive pce easily the size of a city appeared in front of him.


    Even without knowing anything about the pce, it did not take long for Xuan Hao to guess that the massive pce was none other than the legendary Sky Pce.


    Although he did not know a lot about the capital city of the Sky Empire, he had still heard about the Sky Pce that was located at the core of the entire city. Not only was it the ce where the imperial family of the Sky Empire lived, but it was also rumoured that the majestic city the size of an entire city was the core of the terrifying guardian formation and could be considered the most protected area of the entire capital city.


    Well... Considering the fact that the most powerful expert of the entire Sky Empire resided there, it was obvious that the most dangerous and well protected ce throughout the entire Sky Empire would be the Sky Pce!


    "Hm?"


    Finished taking in the majestic pce that had appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both his eyes as he spotted three simrly massive temples located around the Sky Pce. Looking like they were nking the pce from all sides.


    Those should be the main temples of the threerge religions...


    Not taking more than a few seconds to understand who therge temples belonged to, Xuan Hao could not help marvelling over just how bold these religions were to ce themselves inside the core of the capital city where the imperial family was located.


    Even if it wasn''t obvious at first, it was clear that these three wanted to deal with the imperial family of the Sky Empire andpletely take control of the Sky Empire.


    If not for the fact that the ancestor of the imperial family was still around and the guardian formation existed, Xuan Hao didn''t doubt that these three would have long since worked together to erase the imperial family and transform the Sky Empire into a religious empire split evenly between the three of them!


    "Senior, the meeting is going to be held over there..." Just at this moment as Xuan Hao was lost in thought while inspecting the majestic Sky Pce and three massive temples nking it, the voice of Xu Bao echoed out beside him.


    Turning to look at Xu Bao, Xuan Hao saw that he was pointing in the direction of a bright blue pce that was located not too far away from one of the three temples inside the core of the capital.


    "That ce is..."


    "The Pce of the Blue Sea, it''s the ce that the imperial family often uses for important meetings or to wee important people from other empires."


    Hearing what Xu Bao said to him, Xuan Hao felt that the name was indeed fitting for the bright blue pce that stood out like a sore thumb amidst the rest of the buildings and pces present inside the core of the capital.


    "Should we get going? I think it would be good for us to enter now so we can get a good ce to sit before the rest of the sects start to show up. After all, thest thing we want, is for us to end up getting separated by them due to the different strength among us independent sects..."


    "Sure, I think that would be a good idea as well."


    Not understanding too much about the minor details of the sect alliance meeting, Xuan Hao just nodded his head and agreed to what Xu Bao said without thinking too much about it.


    From his interactions with the old man so far, it was clear that he had everything nned out and under control, so it would not hurt to allow him to take control of minor things like this.


    As for spending some time looking around the core of the capital before the meeting officially began... Xuan Hao didn''t dare to do this as he still had no idea whether or not his disguise would work against someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even if the risk of encountering a Soul Ascension Realm Expert wandering around was close to none, the chance of this happening in the core of the capital city was far higher thanpared to the rest of the capital city.


    After all, even if only counting the Soul Ascension Realm Experts that had been made know to the wider poption of the Sky Empire, there would still at least be five Soul Ascension Realm Experts present inside the core of the capital city.


    Considering that the imperial family had the ability to scare off the threerge religions, Xuan Hao was almost certain that they had more than just the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts that had been made known to the wider Sky Empire... n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Swoosh~


    Not thinking too much about just how dangerous the core of the capital was, Xuan Hao followed behind Xu Bao as he made his way towards the Pce of the Blue Sea together with the rest of the experts belonging to the different independent sects.


    For now, the most important thing was to get through the sect alliance meeting and make sure that the independent sects would at least be able to secure one leader position in the sect alliance. Hopefully doing so without exposing his strength...

 Chapter 792 Secret Meeting

    Making his way towards the Pce of the Blue Sea together with Xu Bao and the others, Xuan Hao could not help noticing that although they hade a few hours before the meeting officially started, they were not the first people to show up for the meeting.


    Other than them, it also seemed like some of the weaker sects who only had someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm watching over them had shown up to make sure they would be there in time. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    After all, even if they didn''t have to worry about being blocked like the independent sects. Most of these weaker sects were still unfamiliar with the capital city and didn''t want to risk getting lost while making their way to the core of the capital in thest minute. For them, it was a good idea to show up early and not have to worry about something like that happening to them.


    "Hm? This is... The sect master of the Seven Fates Sect...?" Looking around at the different people who were slowly making their way inside the Pce of the Blue Sea, a person that Xuan Hao had only heard descriptions of through Shu Yao made his way through the entrance before disappearing inside the pce.


    Although he had never seen the sect master of the Seven Fates Sect himself before and had no idea what he was up to after his sect had left for the core region of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao was still curious what had happened to the Seven Fates Sect. Especially after learning how hard independent sects had it in the core region of the Sky Empire.


    Even if the Seven Fates Sect had the support of their sect master who had reached the Domain Lord Realm, the sect itself was still extremely weak whenpared to other sects and kingdoms in the core region of the Sky Empire and would be easy to weaken and possibly destroy as long as those kingdoms targeting Xu Bao and the other independent sects turned their attention towards the Seven Fates Sect!


    "Well... Considering that the sect master of the Seven Fates Sect decided to move his sect to the core region of the Sky Empire, he should have investigated the situation and gotten a grasp over the attitude that most kingdoms showed independent sects.


    For him to still move his sect into the core of the Sky Empire even knowing this, he should at the very least have a n on what to do to avoid the attention and attacks of these powerful kingdoms..." Muttering this to himself as he continued looking at the continuous stream of people entering the Pce of the Blue Sea, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head before throwing this matter to the back of his mind.


    In the first ce, what the Seven Fates Sect did had nothing to do with them after they left their old territory behind and entered the core of the Sky Empire. For now, the most important thing in front of him was to get through the sect alliance meeting without and secure a leader position for the independent sects without getting his true identity or strength leaked!


    Only doing so would he be able to turn most of the Sky Empire''s attention away from the Star Shattering Sect that was currently developing at the border and have them focus their attention on the sect alliance by having the independent sects secretly cause chaos between the rest of the sects controlled by different kingdoms in the sect alliance.


    Of course, the independent sects that would be doing this... Did not yet know anything about this...


    ...


    At the same time Xuan Hao, Xu Bao and the rest of the experts from the different independent sects were making their way inside the Pce of the Blue Sea to prepare for the sect alliance meeting, a group of people covered in a hazy mist like aura met up not too far away from the gate to the core of the capital that Xuan Hao and the rest had passed through just a few minutes earlier.


    "What!? Those people actually went to the core of the capital ahead of time without any of us noticing anything!? Hah... I should have expected this, you people are really useless! How did you even fail to find out where those independent sects were staying inside the capital!?"


    "We are useless!? Was it not you and your little friends who were supposed to keep an eye on those independent sects while they approached the capital? Howe I don''t seem to remember you contacting us about them getting close to the capital?"


    "You... They left far earlier than expected and had already left for the capital when me and my people reached their sects!"


    "Hmph! What a convenient excuse!


    "YOU-!"


    "Now-now, calm down you two, we still have to consider what to do next now that we failed in stopping those independent sects from making it to the sect alliance meeting."


    As two of the mist like figures began arguing with each other over who was at fault for allowing the independent sects to easily enter the core of the capital without any problems, a far older and more powerful voice sounded out from one of the remaining figures who had been silently observing the argument until now.


    "Senior... Fine, I understand..."


    "I guess I will let this matter go for now on behalf of senior, but don''t get happy too fast! I will make sure toe and ask you for somepensation for the time wasted by me and my people at ater!"


    Understanding that they would not be able to continue their argument any longer now that one of the seniors had grown impatient, both of the mist like figures who had been arguing with each other just a moment ago quickly stopped and quietly fell to the side as the mist like figure who had made them stop just a second ago stepped forward and faced the rest of the people present.


    "I think we all understand why we are here, none of us want those independent sects to gain any more power. Especially that Xu Bao, I fear he will soon breakthrough to the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and allow the independent sects to gain an official position of power inside the Sky Empire.


    No matter how much we fight with each other normally, we have to work together when ites to dealing with the independent sects! We can''t allow a new power to appear inside the Sky Empire and take away the resources that would normally be ours!"


    ""...""


    Not saying much after hearing what the old senior said, most of the people present just silently agreed with what he said as they waited for him toe up with a way that they would be able to do this.


    "Because of this, I n for us to work together and have the sects we nurtured over the years work together to suppress the independent sects during the meeting. Even if we can''t prevent them from joining the meeting at this point in time, we should still be able to stop them from getting a leader position if the sects we nurtured works together to suppress them together!


    I know that all of you want to get a leader position for your own sect and secure the resources offered by the imperial family, but if we want to prevent the independent sects from gaining any power and a chance to surpass us, we will have to work together now!"


    "But... Who is to say that you won''t just get your sect to secure a leader position while we waste our chance trying to suppress the independent sects? We will have to talk this through in more detail ande up with a better n that prevents you or others from doing something like that! After all, it''s not like any of us are friends and will just happily follow what is said..."


    ""...""


    Hearing someone spoke out the moment the owner of the old voice finished telling them his suggestion on how to suppress the independent sects, the people present all turned their eyes towards the mist like figure of the old voice''s owner.


    "Hah... It seem like we do have to talk about how to go about suppressing the independent sects. After all, all of you people don''t seem to trust my word-"


    "You damnable half dead fossil! Don''t forget how you stabbed me in the back 50 years ago and stole a spiritual herb from me! And you want me to trust your word now!?"


    "As I said... We will have to talk about the method we want to use... We should be fine, there is still a few hours before the start of the meeting..." Not knowing what else to say after hearing a familiar angry voice screaming at him filled with killing intent, the owner of the old voice could only retreat a bit as he said this. Understanding that he would not be able to get anywhere without the method of suppressing changed or they managed to get a way to guarantee that everyone would follow the n...

 Chapter 793 Arrival Of The Major Sects

    Unaware of the fact that a group of people had met up to find a way to interfere with the independent sects during the meeting after having lost their chance to do so before they made their way inside the core of the capital, Xuan Hao used the time before the meeting to look around the Pce of the Blue Sea by himself.


    Xu Bao and the rest of the experts from the different independent sects had already entered the main hall where the meeting was going to take ce to ensure they would have a good ce to sit and also to avoid running into any of the people from the sects that wanted them gone.


    After all, even if they could not do anything to them inside the core of the capital where the imperial familymanded absolute control over the entire ce, they could still mess with them in other ways.


    "Hm... I wonder who the imperial family will send over to be in charge of the sect alliance meeting. Considering the fact that there is a chance the three religions might intervene and cause trouble during the meeting, the person they sent over should be someone in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm..." Muttering this to himself as he wandered around the Pce of the Blue Sea, Xuan Hao could not help ncing towards the entrance of the pce located a few hundred meters away from his current location.


    Deep down, he was hoping with all his heart that the person sent over by the imperial family would not end up being one of their Soul Ascension Realm Experts. Even if the chances of this happening were low, it was not non-existent.


    Thump~ Thump~


    Just at this moment, arge group of people passed through the entrance of the pce with arrogant expressions on their faces before making their way towards the hall where the experts sent to the capital by the different sects of the Sky Empire had gathered.


    "This is..." Not knowing what to say when he saw the arrogant expressions on the faces of these people, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what had given them the confidence to act so arrogant inside the core of the capital under the control of the imperial family.


    The first thought about their identities that came to mind was that they were the people who hade over from the imperial family''s side to manage the sect alliance meeting... But this thought was quickly thrown away after he realized that the strongest among those people had only barely reached the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if the person sent over by the imperial family was on the weaker side, Xuan Hao would never believe that the imperial family would sent over someone who had not even reached the Late Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    If they really did that, there was no way that the different experts present during the sect alliance would show much respect to the imperial family outside of what was expected. In a sense, the control of the sect alliance meeting would almost certainly leave the control of the imperial family if something like this happened and instead fall into the hands of the different powerful sects that were controlled by even more powerful kingdoms...


    Rustle~


    "Ah? Elder Scarlet me? What brings you out here? Did something perhaps happen?" Suddenly seeing Elder Scarlet me approaching him from behind, Xuan Hao could not help showing a slightly surprised expression on his face as he began worrying that something might have happened during his short time walking around the pce and exploring it.


    "Nothing like that! I just came here to inform you that the sects who are against us are- Ah! Looks like they already arrived... I think we should get back before they reach the meeting hall!" About to say something to Xuan Hao, Elder Scarlet me suddenly spotted the group of people who had just made their way inside the pce as he quickly said this while pulling on him to leave and return to the hall where the rest of the people from the different independent sects were waiting for them.


    "Those are the people from the different major sects?" Feeling a bit surprised after learning the identity of therge group of people, Xuan Hao could not help curiously observing the people who had just entered the pce as he said this.


    Even if he did not think that they were the people who had been sent over by the imperial family, he didn''t expect for them to be the people from the sects that had been harassing and trying to weaken the independent sects.


    The reason for this was not due to their strength or anything like that. Instead, it was the due to how arrogant they were!


    Although they had the support of some major kingdoms inside the Sky Empire, there was no reason for them to act arrogant inside the core of the capital that fell under the control of the imperial family. The only ones capable of doing something like that was the imperial family or the three religions!


    Because of this, Xuan Hao also thought that the group of arrogant people might have been sent over by one of the three religions to cause trouble during the sect alliance meeting... But now it looked like this was not the case...


    "Yes! It''s them who always try to prevent us independent sects from growing whenever they get the chance to do so!" Nodding his head filled with anger as he looked towards the group of Domain Lords filled with killing intent, Elder Scarlet me looked like he was about to jump forward and attack them at any moment.


    "I see... Let''s go back and wait for the meeting to start..."


    Feeling and seeing the clear killing intent that manifested around Elder Scarlet me, Xuan Hao understood that it would be a bad idea for them to stay any longer in case those people discovered them or Elder Scarlet me decided against his better judgement to attack them in a moment of emotional upheaval.


    Even if those people were not his match, Xuan Hao far preferred not making his presence known before the start of the meeting.


    "Yes... Let''s go..." Looking a bit reluctant as he said this, Elder Scarlet me narrowed both his eyes for a short moment as he said this before both of them made their way towards the meeting hall together.


    ...


    "Killing intent!?"


    "Hm? Who was that just now?"


    "Someone sure is fearless! Think we won''t do anything after leaving this ce!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao and Elder Scarlet me left and made their way back towards the meeting hall, the group of people from the different major sects all looked towards the ce they had been standing just a second ago.


    From their reactions, it was obvious that they had noticed the killing intent Elder Scarlet me disyed just now. Not that it was hard to feel due to him not trying to hide it in the slightest. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "But... Who was that person? Does any of you know what sect he is from?"


    "I don''t know what sect that person is from, but if I''m not wrong, he should be an elder from one of the independent sects. Hmph! These people are getting more and more fearless with each passing day!"


    "Independent sects... Hehe! After today, we will make sure that they won''t be able to show themselves for a long time!"


    Realizing that the person who had looked at them filled with killing intent without the slightest bit of fear present on his face was someone from one of the independent sects, the group of people from the different major sects quickly calmed down before starting to cure at Elder Scarlet me.


    Even if they wanted to take revenge for the clear disrespect, they had been shown by someone weaker than themselves, they also understood that doing so would incur the wrath of Xu Bao. An existence that none of them had the ability to deal with.


    Only their backers had a chance to deal with this person... And they didn''t want to do so due to the fact that Xu Bao was rumoured to have enough strength to kill someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    No matter how much they wanted the independent sects gone, there was no way they wanted to risk their own life in killing them off. After all, they also had to worry about other kingdoms on the same level as themselves taking advantage of the situation to destroy their kingdom or kill them when they were in a weakened state!


    "Let''s go, our lords have alreadye up with a way to deal with those independent sects. All we have to do is follow theirmand!"


    Seeing that everyone hade to a stop as they throwing all kinds of different insults towards the independent sects, one of the people present spoke up and quickly got the group moving again as they made their way towards the meeting hall filled with arrogance.

 Chapter 794 Before The Start Of The Meeting

    Reaching the meeting hall that had been close to filled up with people at this point in time, Xuan Hao and Elder Scarlet me did not stand around at the entrance as they made their way towards the ce where the rest of the people from the different independent sects were sitting.


    At this point in time, the rest of the sects who were participating in the sect alliance meeting were already present and waiting for the people from the imperial family to show up and start the meeting and allow them to get a better insight into just what the imperial family wanted from the sect alliance.


    After all, even if everyone present had some idea about what the sect alliance would be doing and the different resources that the imperial family would be providing them with, they had never truly gotten an answer from the imperial family about just what they wanted out of the sect alliance.


    Although they had no way to refuse themand of the imperial family considering just how big the difference between the sects present and the imperial family was, the sects present still ounted for over 50 Domain Lords when put together!


    Even if the imperial family wanted to use them to weaken the influence of the three religions, they could not go overboard and directly ask them to sacrifice themselves by entering a kingdom controlled by the one of the three religions and fight with the local church that had been established in that kingdom...


    "Great to see you again senior! Hm? Did something happen to Elder Scarlet me?" Making their way to where the rest of the independent sects were sitting, it did not take long before Xu Bao who stepped out to wee them back noticed the killing intent that still lingered around Elder Scarlet me.


    "Nothing much, we just encountered the people from the major sects before making our way back here."


    "I see, that is understa- The major sects!? You encountered those people and managed to leave without them trying to stop you!? From what I know, there is no way they would have allowed you to just leave so easily after seeing you!" Hearing what Xuan Hao said, Xu Bao had a surprised expression as he said this.


    Different from Xuan Hao, he very much understood just how arrogant the different major sects were and just how little was needed before they would do everything in their power to kill the whoever was unlucky enough to cross their path. This was even more so after they learnt that the independent sects had also gotten an invitation to the sect alliance meeting with a very real chance to get a leader position inside the sect alliance!


    "Yes, the major sects, we left before they had a chance to cause any trouble. Not to mention, I don''t think they would dare to do anything in here with the guards of the imperial family guarding this ce..." Rolling his eyes upon seeing the panicked and surprised expression that appeared on the face of Xu Bao, Xuan Hao could not help saying this as he pointed towards the guards that were silently standing around the edges of the meeting hall.


    Even if they didn''t say anything and just stood there silently, their presence alone represented the imperial family and any trouble caused in their presence would be a clear sign of disrespect towards the imperial family and would not go unpunished. The difference in strength between these guards who were at most in the Nascent Soul Realm and the powerful Domain Lord Realm Experts from the major sects did not change any of this.


    Bang! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Just at this moment, one of therge doors leading into the meeting hall was violently flung open as one of the guards standing beside the door was forced to jump out of the way to avoid getting hit by the door that had suddenlye flying his way for no reason.


    Thump! Thump! Thump!


    Followed by the guard standing beside the door slowly recovering from the unexpected situation, a group of people filled with arrogance made their way inside the meeting hall while disdainfully looking at the people present in the hall. Not even the slightest bit of care towards these smaller sects could be seen on any of their faces.


    """..."""


    Seeing this scene, everyone present inside the meeting hall turned to look towards the source of themotion with surprised expressions on their faces. Not only had someone suddenly caused a scene, but they had also managed to almost smash a door directly into the face of a guard that was under the imperial family!


    As everyone''s attention was focused on the door that had been flung open, a young man in histe teens stepped through the door with a happy smile on his face. The pure white robe covering his body embroidered with the symbol that represented Followers of the Fire God was more than enough for everyone to understand why the young man didn''t care much about offending the guards of the imperial family.


    "Haha, calm down everyone, I just happened to idently push open the door a little too hard~" As the carefreeughter of the young man echoed across the entire hall, everyone felt a shiver run down their spine as they simultaneously felt a terrifying aura erupting from the body of the young man before they all felt their movements being restricted.


    Even Xu Bao who had reached the Peak of the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm found it difficult to move under this pressure!


    "This- This person should be one of the Followers of the Fire God''s Peak Domain Lord Realm Experts!" Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he muttered this to himself while looking towards the young man who had suddenly entered the meeting hall all of a sudden, Xu Bao could not help feeling that something bad was going to happen.


    After all, the sect alliance was essentially a way for the imperial family to weaken the influence of the three religions. For one of them to show up in the meeting that would serve as to officially establish the sect alliance... It was obvious that the young man had note with good intentions in mind. Especially considering he had appeared before the expert from imperial family showed up!


    "..."


    Sitting beside Xu Bao as the young man entered the meeting hall, Xuan Hao could not help ncing over the young man. However, different from Xu Bao, he could clearly see the other party''s cultivation base.


    Although the young man had hidden it to some degree, his cultivation realm had not yet managed to reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and he was actually still at the Peak of the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    With this kind of strength, there was no way that the young man nned to do anything, as his strength was far from enough to do anything about the close to 30 Domain Lord Realm Experts that had already gathered inside the meeting hall if they worked together to attack him.


    But... If this was not his goal... What was the goal of this follower of the fire god...?


    Feeling curious about what the young man was nning to do, Xuan Hao took a wait and watch attitude as he made sure that the other party had not noticed him.


    Thump! Thump!


    As silence fell over the entire meeting hall after the young man belonging to the Followers of the Fire God had shown up, the sound of loud footsteps could be heard echoing out from behind the young man, causing everyone present to tense up.


    However, at the next moment, the source of the loud footsteps appeared at the door just behind the young man and was revealed to be the people from the major sects whom Xuan Hao and Elder Scarlet me had encountered not long ago.


    "Hm!? Who is this little brat!? Daring to block the path into the meeting hall!"


    Starting to yell loudly filled with an obvious killing intent, one of the people from the major sects who had reached the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm walked up to teach the young man blocking their path a lesson.


    "Hmph! Just wait until I find out what sect you are from, and I will make sure to-" But just as he was about to do anything, the person from one of the major sects suddenly noticed the symbol embroidered into the robe of the young man who had been blocking the entrance, causing him to freeze on the spot without daring to continue what he had nned on doing.


    "..."


    Not having expected for someone to just randomly walk up on him and threaten him, the young man belonging to the Followers of the Fire God could not help freezing for a short moment as he tried processing what had just happened.


    Did someone from one of the sects who didn''t even have a single expert in the Late Stage of the Domain Lord Realm really just go up and threaten him for no reason and give him an excuse to beat him up...?

 Chapter 795 Hidden Expert From The Imperial Family

    "Ah... Excuse me, something suddenly came up and I will have to take my leave! Farewell everyone!"


    Not wasting a single second after having realized who he had offended, the Domain Lord Realm Expert in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm from one of the major sects turned around-


    Swish-!


    And escaped in the opposite direction of the young man belonging to the Followers of the Fire God before the other party could do anything.


    Given the speed of a Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert, there was no way for the young man to catch the other party without alerting the imperial family and ruining his superiors ns. All he could do was stare in the direction that the Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert had disappeared in with a speechless expression on his face.


    Hm? Didn''t that person show up with someone...?


    As he slowly managed to recover from what had just happened, the young man turned his attention towards the rest of the Domain Lord Realm Experts from the different major sects that had arrived together with the person who had yelled at him just now.


    "We have nothing to do with that person just now!"


    "Yeah, that person just ran in front of us and started acting rudely towards your excellency!"


    "That rude person deserves to get killed for his disrespect towards you!"


    "Yeah, we should just-"


    Understanding what was going through the head of the young man in front of them, the group of Domain Lord Realm Experts from the different major sects did not waste a single second as all of them jumped forward to try their best at distancing themselves from the person they had been walking alongside just a few seconds earlier.


    No matter what, there was no way they were dumb enough to give the person in front of them a reason to deal with them. After all, this ce was still under the imperial family''s control! As long as they didn''t give the other party a reason, there was no way that he would be able to do anything to them!


    "Hmph... I understand..." Narrowing both his eyes as a faint killing intent was visible in them, the young man gave up on using the group of Domain Lords in front of him.


    The main reason for this was not so much the fact that the imperial family would jump in to prevent him, but due to the fact that he would not be able to deal with the group of Domain Lords in front of him.


    After all, he was only in the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, while the group of Domain Lords in front of him had all at least reached the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, most of them being in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Even if he was close to the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, there was no way for him to deal with so many Domain Lords at once!


    "Thank you for your benevolence your excellency!"


    "Thank you, great divine lord!"


    "I will remember this sign of gratitude and make sure to engrave your name in my ancestral home to honour you!"


    """..."""


    Listening to the absurd praises from the group of Domain Lord Realm Experts from the different major sects as they slowly made their way past the young man and entered the meeting hall, everyone felt speechless at just how shameless this group of old people were.


    Where had the arrogance they had when talking to any other sect gone? It was no wonder how people like this had ended up bing the subordinates of thoserge kingdoms...


    As this thought passed through the head of most of the people present as they watched the Domain Lord Realm Experts from the different major sects moving to the front of the meeting hall before finding a ce to sit down, Xuan Hao was curiously looking towards the entrance of the meeting hall where the group had appeared from.


    Different from the rest of the people present, he had clearly felt a faint aura belonging to someone in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm appearing the moment that the young man looked like he was about to attack the group of Domain Lord Realm Experts from the different sects just now. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "It looks like the person from the imperial family has already shown up... But why has he not made his presence known yet...?" Muttering this to himself as he continued looking towards the direction where he had felt the faint aura from earlier, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about what the imperial family was nning. After all, it was clear that they were waiting for the young man belonging to the Followers of the Fire God to make a move first before they took action themselves...


    "Ahm! Everyone! Can I have your attention again!"


    Just at this moment, the young man from earlier loudly called out, causing everyone inside the meeting hall to tense up as they once again remember that one of the followers of the Fire God who the sect alliance was aimed against was still present in the meeting hall.


    ...


    At the same time Xuan Hao looked towards the entrance that the people from the different major sects had just passed through, a middle-aged man covered in a thin mist like screen quietly standing beside the entrance could not help frowning as his eyes rapidly scanned everyone present inside the meeting hall.


    Hm? Did someone spot me just now... No, the strongest person present here has only reached the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, it should just be due to me being too nervous recently. After all, his majesty said that the artifact should be able to conceal me from anyone below the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Thinking this to himself as he finished scanning over everyone present inside the meeting hall, the middle-aged man ended up attributing the feeling just now to him being too nervous. After all, for someone to hide from him, that person would at least have to have a simr artifact as himself... Or be an expert in the Soul Ascension Realm!


    No matter how much importance the three religions put on spoiling the sect alliance meeting there was no way for one of the cardinals to show up in person, as for another Soul Ascension Realm Expert to enter the meeting hall... This was impossible due to the guardian formation preventing any unknown Soul Ascension Realm Expert from entering the capital!


    As for there being someone other than him with a simr artifact... The middle-aged man threw out this thought even faster!


    Not only was the artifact something that would require a skilled cksmith in the Soul Ascension Realm to spend years to make, but it was also extremely difficult to acquire the special spiritual metals used to make the artifact. Even with the power of the entire Sky Empire, searching for these special spiritual metals had taken close to 500 years!


    "But... What do those people n by sending someone in the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm here? Even if he wanted to do something, the Domain Lord Realm Experts here should be more than enough to deal with him..." Narrowing both his eyes as he returned his focus to the young man who was standing no more than a few meters away from him, the middle-aged man did his best in holding himself back from teaching that person a lesson for barging into one of the pces under the imperial family.


    "Ahm! Everyone! Can I have your attention again!"


    Just as the middle-aged man was trying to figure out what the three religions were nning, the young man started talking again after seeing that the Domain Lord Realm Experts from the different major sects had gotten inside the meeting hall.


    "So~ Today I haven''te with any hostile intentions like all of you might be expecting. Instead, I havee with an offer for all of you-"


    Listening to the young man talking, the middle-aged man could not help frowning as a bad feeling welled up inside him.


    "-The offer is simple, all of us three religions havee together to offer all of you here an opportunity to join under us and convert to believers!"


    As the young man finished saying this, expressions of disbelief appeared on the faces of everyone present. None of them expected for the three religions to suddenlye together and want to convert them to join their side. After all, converting to be a believer and recing all of ones energy to the divine power cultivated by believers would at the minimum cause ones cultivation to decrease by a minor realm and in the worst cases an entire major realm!


    No matter what, none of the people present were willing to do something like this. Even if the three religions were willing to help make sure their cultivation base wouldn''t fall, doing this would still end up offending the imperial family. Not something any of the sect representatives present wanted...

 Chapter 796 Three Religions Offer

    This... What happened to the three religions...?


    Hearing the suggestion of the young man who hade on behalf of the three religions, the person from the imperial family that was hiding no more than a few meters away from the young man could not help frowning as a sh of surprise shed through his eyes for a brief moment.


    Compared to the people from the different sects who had shown up for the sect alliance meeting, he understood very well how much the three religions hated the different sects and wanted nothing more than to exterminate them if they got the opportunity to do so without having to worry about the imperial family or each other.


    For them to be willing to even take them in was not something he nor the rest of the imperial family had ever considered. Not only because the three religions would normally be unwilling to ever bring up something like this, but also because there was no way the experts from the different sects would ever be willing to reduce their strength to join them.


    After all, while they could escape getting attacked by the three religions by converting, they would in turn have to deal with the even more powerful imperial family that was the most powerful force inside the Sky Empire. Not something anyone from the different wanted to do. Even if they had the chance to convert without the risk of losing part of their cultivation base as a result...!


    Hmph... Does the three religions perhaps think these sects are unaware of the demerit behind converting-


    "As many of you already know, there is a chance of losing part of one''s cultivation base when converting to a believer and us three religions have alreadye together with an agreement that will make sure to cover for any loses you might incur during this process. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Not only this, but we will also do the same for your sect''s elders and disciples! With all of this in mind, we also n to assist you in advancing beyond your current realm after you converted!"


    Just as the middle-aged man from the imperial family began to snicker silently to himself while disdainfully looking towards the young man who hade as a representative of the three religions, the person in question interrupted him and directly proved him wrong.


    Just how many resources do they have... Did they perhaps contact their main branch in the core of the continent for help...?


    Remembering just now that the three religions were in fact only branches of a muchrger organisation that stretched across the entire continent, the middle-aged man could not help sighing to himself as he concluded on how the three religions would be able to afford helping so many people convert without having to worry about their loss in strength.


    Different from the rest of the people present, he understood just how expensive it was to do something like this. The resources needed to help a single First Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert convert without him losing any strength were already more than enough to help nurture three new Domain Lords!


    The resources needed to do something like this was not even something that the imperial family could afford to lose. Only the three religions with the help of their main branch in the core of the continent had the ability to waste so many resources without worrying!


    ...


    At the same time that the middle-aged man from the imperial family wasmenting over just how many precious resources would be wasted by the three religions to pull something like this, Xuan Hao who had been observing the entire situation could not help feeling curious after hearing what the young man said.


    Although he had heard about converting to be a follower of a god before, he had never thought about doing so. Especially after learning that his strength would reduce by a minor realm or in the worst case scenario, a major realm!


    Even if he had no idea about the amount of resources that would be needed to prevent this from happening, he still understood that it should be something astronomical from looking at the reaction of the person from the imperial family who remained frozen for a good five seconds after hearing that the three religions were willing to ensure no one would lose anything after converting.


    If it was just for the people present, it might have been fine... But the three religions promised to do this for everyone in the sect who agreed. Be it disciples or elders, they would cover the loss of everyone who converted to their religion!


    "I didn''t expect for the three religions to do something like this... I expected for them to crash the meeting and try to force it to disband or something simr... Looks like the three religions are really not doing well due to the sudden appearance of the Church of the gue God..."


    "Did something happen with the Church of the gue God?"


    Hearing Xu Bao muttering to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about the subject. After all, he had not really heard a lot about the Church of the gue God ever since it had disappeared from the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and the surrounding kingdoms where his sect was located. Them taking control of around a dozen kingdoms close to the edge of the core of the Sky Empire, was about the only thing he had heard about them so far.


    "Hm? Did I say that out loud... Excuse me... It''s just that the Church of the gue God has recently begun showing signs of starting to invade the two closest kingdoms that both happen to be under the control of one of the three religions.


    For this reason, the three religions are in an extremely tense state as two of them are getting prepared to fight against the Church of the gue God again, while thest one is left alone... And it just so happen that the one left behind is the Order of the Sky God, who has a bad rtionship with the other two religions, someone who will definitely look for an opportunity to weaken them while their focus is on defending their territory against the Church of the gue God!"


    "I see... It looks like they don''t want to end up dealing with an additional opponent and make their current situation even worse. Looks like the imperial family chose the perfect time to set up the sect alliance..." Shaking his head as he said this after hearing what Xu Bao said, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that the imperial family was far more scary than these three religions.


    Even if the three religions were backed by a far more terrifying power located at the core of the continent, the imperial family of the Sky Empire was not someone that was easy to mess with. This could also be seen from how they had managed to remain in power even with three powerful religions trying their best at taking control over the empire away from them and turn it into a faith empire that would allow them to more freely spread their own faith across the territory of the Sky Empire.


    After all, even if the three religions already spread their faith to most of the kingdoms in the Sky Empire, some of the more powerful andrger kingdoms that were under the direct control of the imperial family remained outside their sphere of influence.


    No matter how much they wanted to enter theserge kingdoms filled with millions upon millions of people that could be used to gather faith, there was no way that the imperial family would allow them to do this... And they could only give up considering that the imperial family was ultimately still in control.


    "Everyone, you don''t have to make a choice now and it can wait for after this little meeting..."


    Whoosh~


    Not staying around after having finished saying this, the young man directly left the meeting hall filled with representatives from all the different sects all across the Sky Empire.


    Even if no one had gotten to say anything about the offer given by the three religions, it was sure to influence the sect alliance meeting to a certain degree.


    In the worst case scenario for the imperial family, it could even result in the powerful sects who didn''t get what they wanted from the meeting using the offer given by the three religions to threaten the imperial family into giving away more resources to them...


    Those damnable religions! Even if no one ends up joining them, this is sure to cost the imperial family far more resources than intended!


    Understanding this very well, the middle-aged man who had been hiding in the corner so far, could not help silently cursing to himself as a hint of killing intent appeared in his eyes while looking in the direction of the young man who had just left the meeting hall.

 Chapter 797 Two Meetings

    "Ehm! It''s good to see that everyone is here."


    Understanding that it would not be a good idea for him to continue hiding now that the three religions had made their method of meddling in the sect alliance meeting obvious, the middle-aged man who had remained hidden so far stepped forward-


    "Ah!? Who!?"


    "Where did that guye from!?"


    "This- Perhaps it''s the person from the imperial family¡­ Don''t tell me he has been here the entire time!?"


    Appearing at the entrance to the meeting hall out of thin in the eyes of everyone who were still looking in the direction due to it being the same location that the young man representing the three religions had been standing just a few seconds earlier.


    The only person not surprised by the sudden appearance of the middle-aged man, was Xuan Hao, who had long since know about his presence from the moment he had entered the meeting hall. The artifact he had been using to hide himself having been rendered useless in front of Xuan Hao''s divine sense.


    "The Grand General¡­"


    Even Xu Bao who had been sitting beside Xuan Hao this entire time was surprised after seeing someone appeared at the entrance to the meeting hall. The only difference between his reaction and the rest of the people present, was that Xu Bao was not so much surprised about the other party suddenly appearing out of nowhere. Instead, he was more surprised due to the identity of the other party.


    Grand General¡­ Although Xuan Hao did not know who the other party was before, it did not take long for him to realize the identity of the middle-aged man from the imperial family after hearing what Xu Bao had unconsciously muttered upon seeing him.


    The Grand General was a famous person in the entire Sky Empire and was one of the few Peak Domain Lord Realm Experts in the Sky Empire that were rumoured to only be a single step away from reaching the Soul Ascension Realm. In simple terms, he was far stronger than an ordinary Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    The main thing that Xuan Hao found interesting about him was not this, but the fact that the Grand General was also the person in charge of the Sky Empire''s entire military operation and essentially had the power to mobilize every person inside the Sky Empire granted to him by the imperial family!


    Of course¡­ Whether or not the more powerful forces like the three religions would actually listen and obey such an order was another matter¡­!


    But¡­ Why did the imperial family sent someone like this to oversee the sect alliance meeting¡­?


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself while carefully inspecting the middle-aged man who stood proudly at the entrance of the meeting hall and inspected everyone present, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just what the imperial family wanted the sect alliance to do. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Although he had almost been certain that they wouldn''t outright ask them to attack the three religions and try to reduce their influence inside the Sky Empire, he no longer felt certain that the person in front of him wouldn''t ask them to do something like that. After all, the person in front of them was none other than the current person in charge of the entire military apparatus of the Sky Empire!


    "Now that all of you have settled down, let''s get started on the sect alliance meeting!"


    As Xuan Hao was trying to figure out just what the imperial family was nning, the Grand General seemed satisfied with everyone''s reaction, as he made his way to the centre of the meeting hall before saying this.


    Signalling the start of the long-awaited sect alliance meeting.


    ¡­


    "Looks like the Star Shattering Sect will soon start expanding into the territory of the Cloud Sky kingdom. Given what the elders of the sect have talked about, it seems like the royal family will be more than happy with this oue¡­"


    At the same time that the sect alliance meeting officially began, Ji Yichuan who had just recently managed to break through all the way to the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm was going over the most recent information he had received about the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if he understood the origin of the Star Shattering Sect far better than most others due to him once having been part of a demonic sect that had been enemies with the Flying Sword Sect, he was still taken aback at just how fast the newly established sect that hade into being after two of the most famous sects in now gone Heavenly Sky Kingdom had grown.


    Only a few years had passed, yet this newly established sect had turned into a terrifying power that contained more than one Domain Lord Realm Expert and was beginning to forcefully take over new territory to make sure its growth was smooth.


    Even the Flowing Cloud Sect that was located quite a distance away from the Star Shattering where he was currently staying had ended up getting affected by this, as the sect master was considering what to do after the Star Shattering Sect took over the Cloud Sky Kingdom that the sect was located inside of.


    Although the Star Shattering Sect had been rather gentle to most of the sects that existed inside the different kingdoms that the sect had taken control of, the more powerful sects who had Nascent Soul Realm Experts would all end up bing subordinate sects of the Star Shattering Sect.


    In the best case scenario, the sect could be a branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect and get countless resources that would help all of their disciples grow and at the same time enjoy the protection brought along with bing a branch sect of such a powerful sect.


    Even if this came with certain restrictions, these restrictions were not really worth mentioning whenpared to the benefits received after bing an official branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Rustle~


    "Hm?"


    It was at this moment that the sound of rustling leaves echoed out behind him before an old man dressed in the Flowing Cloud Sect''s inner elder uniform appeared behind him.


    "Elder Far Sky? Is there anything I can help with?" Recognizing the elder who had appeared in front of him as one of the elders who had helped him enter the Flowing Cloud Sect when he had firste to the Cloud Sky Kingdom, Ji Yichuan could not help showing a happy smile upon seeing the old man.


    Even if he had not done a lot for himpared to the princess of the Flowing Cloud Sect who had been the person that did the most when it came to helping him enter the Flowing Cloud Sect, Ji Yichuan still remembered how the old man had helped even when most of the elders were not too happy about him joining the sect due to his unknown background.


    "Of course, Old Ji! But first of all, what are you doing up here by yourself? Didn''t the sect master ask you to join him for the meeting today? I''m sure everyone will be happy to hear your input on the matter regarding what we should do after the Star Shattering Sect takes control of the Cloud Sky Kingdom!"


    "This¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after hearing the old man who had just barely reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm start scolding him like a senior scolding a child who had run away before an important test, Ji Yichuan could only smile wryly as the old man in front of him was indeed right.


    Today, the Flowing Cloud Sect had a meeting about the future of the sect after the Star Shattering Sect took over the Cloud Sky Kingdom¡­ But just before this meeting was about to start, he had decided to sneak away without anyone noticing.


    Well¡­ He thought nobody noticed him noticing, but from the sudden appearance of Elder Far Sky, it looked like he had been noticed¡­


    "Is it perhaps because you are afraid of us learning about your past? Although I don''t know a lot about you, I can tell that you are a good person Old Ji. Even if something happened in the past, I''m sure you had your reasons¡­"


    "¡­"


    Listening to Elder Far Sky, Ji Yichuan could not help freezing on the spot. Indeed, like Elder Far Sky had just said, a bit of him was scared of them learning about his past as a former demonic cultivator.


    Although he had never really thought about this matter after entering the Flowing Cloud Sect, a part of him still feared what would happen after they found out about. Especially after his rtionship with the princess of the Flowing Cloud Sect had managed to-


    "Ehm! It''s not what you think Elder Far Sky, I just had to get some air before the start of the meeting!"


    "If you say so¡­ Just remember that you will have toe to terms with the past at some point in time, you can''t escape it forever¡­"


    "¡­"


    As the conversation between both of them slowly came to an end, Ji Yichuan and Elder Far Sky made their way back towards the main pce of the Flowing Cloud Sect where the meeting about the future of the sect was going to take ce.

 Chapter 798 Bai Ning And Hui Ying

    Not too different from what was happening inside the Flowing Cloud Sect that Ji Yichuan was a part of, the different sects all across the Cloud Sky Kingdom and in the kingdoms bordering the Cloud Sky Kingdom all began to n for their future after the Star Shattering Sect inevitably ended up taking control over the kingdom they were living inside of, some even went ahead and directly sent over representatives to the Star Shattering Sect ahead of time to make sure that they could increase their chances of bing a branch sect instead of a normal subordinate sect.


    Other than this, a few number of sects who didn''t want to end up under the control of the Star Shattering Sect also used the time they had to leave their original ancestral grounds behind as they escaped towards another border region where they would be able to settle down without having to worry about some powerful sect showing up to take control of their territory.


    Of course, the number of sects that were willing to essentially uproot their entire linage and give up the rtionships that had been built up over thousands of years were not many... But even then, the number was still more than enough to weaken the overall number of Nascent Soul Realm Experts present in some kingdoms by more than twenty percent!


    However, in the end, the decrease in Nascent Soul Realm Expert didn''t really matter to the Star Shattering Sect. In the first ce, the expansion of the sect was not done to absorb these different Nascent Soul Realm Experts that had once been under the different kingdoms.


    In a sense, these people leaving could be considered a good thing to the Star Shattering Sect, as they wouldn''t have to spend time dealing with them in the future when they took over the kingdom that they resided in...


    "Hm... Everything is developing smoothly and it seems that those people from therger kingdoms have gone quiet after Shu Yao disyed her strength in the Feather Kingdom."


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song was going over all of this information about what was happening across all of these different kingdoms as he quietly muttered this to himself while leaning back in the chair he was sitting in with a small smile on his face.


    After the matter with the Feather Kingdoms ancestor had been settled by Shu Yao, therger kingdoms that had started scheming to do everything to resist the Star Shattering Sect went quiet and no longer openly dared say anything against the Star Shattering Sect.


    Clearly they had not expected for there to be more than a single Domain Lord Realm Expert inside the sect and had only believed that it was rumours spread by the Star Shattering Sect before they had witnessed Shu Yao in action through several different experts they had send over to observe what the Star Shattering Sect would do to deal with the sudden emergence of the Feather Kingdom''s ancestor who had reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    Well... It could also have something to do with the fact that Shu Yao had managed to convince the Winged lion to help out in dealing with thoserger kingdoms. From what he had heard recently, it seemed like she had gone to visit one of those kingdoms together with a small deer and the winged lion not too long ago...


    Thinking about it, Elder Song had a feeling that this might be the main reason why thoserge kingdoms had been so quiet over the past few weeks...


    "Maybe I should go and check up on the tournaments taking ce in the different branch sects and get ready to send the winners over to the border of the Azure Sky Kingdom to participate in getting rid of the demonic cultivators." Deciding to turn his attention towards something different, Elder Song got up from his chair before making his way out of his room to check up on how things were progressing when it came to the different tournaments that the disciples of the different branch sects were holding.


    Now that the first batch of disciples had already begun making their way towards the border at the Azure Sky Kingdom together with a group of elders, it would not be long before the official clean-up of demonic cultivators in the kingdom located beside the Azure Sky Kingdom would begin. At the same time, it would also be an opportunity for these disciples to increase theirbat experience and improve their strength.


    I wonder if there is anyone talented among those branch sects...


    Swish~


    Already looking forward to seeing who among the different branch sects would be heading towards the Azure Sky Kingdom for a chance to enter the main sect, Elder Song smiled to himself as he headed towards the closest branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect. The former Flying Sword Sect.


    ...


    Not too far away from the Seventh Star Peak where the Star Shattering Sect was located on the Shattered Star Peaks, Bai Ning and Hui Ying were walking along the recently constructed path connecting all of the different peaks of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    "I wonder what master is doing. ording to Elder Song, master should already have reached the capital city of the Sky Empire for some kind of important meeting..."


    "Hm... I''m sure your master is doing great at the meeting and talking about all kinds of important stuff... I think..."


    "..."


    ncing towards Hui Ying after hearing what she said, Bai Ning had no idea what to say when he was suddenly faced with the stupid look on her face starring back towards him.


    To be honest, after they had returned back to the sect, he had not thought he would ever get to see Hui Ying again after their adventure together in the weird jungle filled with all kinds of dangerous demon beasts... But the little girl had somehow managed to find him no more than a few hours after he had managed to recover.


    Ever since then, the little girl had been sticking close to him like glue and refused to leave him alone.


    In turn, now that Hui Ying was following him around all the time, the time he had for practicing his cksmithing had also ended up decreasing by a lot. Forcing him to instead spend his time walking around the sect and interacting with other disciples or cultivation, a true nightmare to Bai Ning who had been preparing himself to spend the entire time during his master''s absence on practicing his cksmithing skills without thinking about anything else.


    "Hmph! Why are you looking at me like that!?"


    "..."


    Having somehow ended up offending the little girl with his continuous stare, Bai Ning could only look away from her beforementing to himself over just what he had done to deserve something like this.


    Master... When are you going to return again!? I swear I will spend more time on cultivation as long as you can help me get rid of this little girl!


    Looking into the clouds floating past above, Bai Ning began praying that his master would return faster so he could help him escape from Hui Ying and hopefully give him more time to practice on his cksmithing skills. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Why are you looking up into the sky all of a sudden? Did one of those flying seniors pass by?" Not understanding why Bai Ning suddenly stopped to look up into the sky, Hui Ying who had been walking beside him curiously stopped before looking up into the sky like him. Thinking that one of the seniors who had reached the Domain Lord Realm might have flown past them.


    "No... I just spotted a funny looking cloud. Let''s get going, we need to reach the Ninth Star Peak before it gets dark or the elders guarding the entrance to the sect won''t allow us to leave without supervision..."


    Shaking his head as a small smile appeared on his face after seeing Hui Ying copying him and simrly looking up into the sky while searching for what she assumed to be a senior flying past them, Bai Ning once again started walking along the path again.


    "Ah! Wait up for me!" Causing Hui Ying who had been searching for the sky above to rapidly run after him.


    Swoosh~


    "Hm? Why are you-"


    "Race to the Ninth Star Peak! Don''t use your cultivation base to cheat!"


    Hearing what Hui Ying said before she continued straight past him before speeding towards the Ninth Star Peak without waiting, Bai Ning could not help showing a slightest suppressed expression on his face before being reced by one of understanding.


    The little girl clearly did not want to arrive at the Ninth Star Peak when it got dark, and they wouldn''t be able to leave the sect and explore the city below the Ninth Star Peak like they had originally been intending to do...


    "Hah... Guess I will y along this time..." Muttering this to himself as he looked towards Hui Ying''s disappearing figure in the distance, Bai Ning dashed forward and caught up in an instant-


    "Ah! You''re using a movement technique! Cheater!"


    Swish-!


    Before directly leaving her in the dust!

 Chapter 799 Unfortunate Elder Golden Sparrow

    Different from Bai Ning who was busy with Hui Ying, Chu Yang was spending most of the time while his master was gone training inside thebat hall with the different elders who had reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Doing his utmost in trying to fight with every single one of them, even to the point where he would challenge the more powerful elders who had already reached the Fourth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    As a result of this, although Chu Yang''s cultivation base had not improved a lot, his overall strength had managed to undergo an earth-shaking changepared to when he had first reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Allowing him to fight evenly with some of the elders who had reached the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and even hold on for quite some time against the elders who had reached the Fourth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Because of this, the elders of the Star Shattering Sect had all grown familiar with Chu Yang and the moment he appeared on the path leading up to thebat hall, all of them managed to recognize him in an instant-


    "He is here again¡­ Ah! I seem to have forgotten something when I left the lecture hall earlier, I will be taking my leave first!"


    "Oh my, it seems like I also forgot something at the restaurant earlier, I will also be taking my leave."


    "I''m the same, I will also be-"


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Not even a secondter, all of these elders disappeared from thebat hall before Chu Yang even had a chance to say anything to them.


    "Hm? Did something happen? Where did everyone go¡­?"


    Just at this moment, an elder who was making his way out of thebat hall looked around himself filled with confusion upon seeing that his group of friends whom he had been talking with just a few minutes earlier had disappeared without saying anything.


    "Elder Golden Sparrow! It''s great to see you again!"


    Only after hearing an all too familiar voice calling out to him and seeing the figure of Chu Yang striding towards him did this elder realize why all of his friends had seemingly disappeared into thin air all of a sudden.


    "C-Chu Yang¡­" Muttering the name of the person approaching him, Elder Golden Sparrow could not help shivering as he remembered thest time he had fought with Chu Yang inside thebat hall, as a cold shiver ran down his spine.


    Even if he had reached the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and could be considered one of the Star Shattering Sects most promising elders who had recently managed to get his time to shine after moving to the Seventh Star Peak, he could only barely keep up with Chu Yang who was at the Peak of the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    As a result of this, his fight with Chu Yang back then had been quite one-sided. Resulting in himing out of thebat hall all beaten up while Chu Yang had only ended up bing exhausted from beating him up¡­


    No matter what, I don''t want to fight with this person again!


    "Chu Yang, my friend, I sadly can''t help you out this time around no matter how much I want. Recently my good brother got injured and I need to go over and take care of him!"


    "Wait a moment¡­"


    Coming up with the best excuse he could think of in the short few seconds it took for Chu Yang to reach the entrance of thebat hall where he was standing, Elder Golden Sparrow was just about to leave when Chu Yang suddenly stopped him right in his tracks.


    "W-what is it¡­?" Feeling like something was wrong, Elder Golden Sparrow could not stop himself from sweating nervously as he asked this.


    "Nothing much, take this medicine, it was refined by my senior sister. I''m sure your aunt will be able to recover from her injuries."


    "Haha, you are too kind! My aunt is sure to make a recovery with this- Ah¡­"


    Realizing that he had made a mistake, Elder Golden Sparrow suddenly started sweating to sweat profusely as he turned to look towards Chu Yang who was smiling kindly at him. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Hehe, think this excuse will work more than once? If I''m not wrong, you should have more than enough time to spare for a small practice duel in thebat hall. No? Or could it be you are running away from this junior who has only recently reached the Nascent Soul Realm¡­?"


    "This- Of course not!"


    Not able to say anything after hearing what Chu Yang said along with the gazes of the surrounding disciples looking at him, Elder Golden Sparrow could only reluctantly agree in an attempt to not tarnish his reputation as an elder among the disciples.


    "Great! Then let''s get going!"


    The moment Elder Golden Sparrow agreed, Chu Yang didn''t waste a single second as he entered thebat hall together with Elder Golden Sparrow.


    "Hm? This¡­"


    However, just before he got dragged inside thebat hall by Chu Yang, Elder Golden Sparrow managed to spot the figures of the elders who he had nned on meeting up with observing him from a distance.


    You guys! You dare betray me like this and leave me behind!


    Not able to voice anyints before he disappeared inside thebat hall, Elder Golden Sparrow could only quietly curse at these elders as he swore to himself that he would make sure to return the suffering he was going to experience!


    ¡­.


    "So, you are from The Green River Sect from the Green Sky Kingdom¡­ And you want to be a branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect?"


    Not too far away from thebat hall where Elder Golden Sparrow got dragged into one of the many practice rooms for fighting, Feng Chen was having a meeting with a sect representative from one of the many sects that hade to the Star Shattering Sect ahead of time in an attempt to be a branch sect and gain the protection and resources that came along with this.


    The only problem was¡­


    "Yes! My Green River Sect is among the most powerful sects of the Green Sky Kingdom, our great sect master has even reached the Nascent Soul Realm and is expressing his intent on bing a branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect¡­ Of course, we also hope for the Star Shattering Sect to help us out with a few of our enemies¡­"


    Most of these sects came with the intention of making use of the Star Shattering Sect to get rid of their enemies or to get as many resources possible. Even worse was the fact that many of these sects did not have the slightest intention on truly bing a branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect. Only wanting the benefits that came along with it¡­


    "You really are quite brave toe all the way here-"


    "Hehe, I know! I had to journey through quite a few dangerous areas filled with demon beasts to get here! Not only that, but I also saved quite a few disciples of your sect while making my way here! Did I mention how I also took down this massive demon beast that was about to-"


    BANG-!


    Swish~


    Having originally wanted to send this person off with a few words, Feng Chen simply couldn''t be bothered after being rudely interrupted by the other party''s bragging. Deciding to knock the other party flying out of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Even without verifying anything he said, Feng Chen was certain that most of it was not true. After all, this person''s cultivation had only barely reached the Core Formation Realm. Not to mention saving the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect, some of the stronger Foundation Establishment Realm disciples would easily be able to beat up this fellow¡­


    As for the survival of the arrogant representative of the Green River Sect, Feng Chen had made sure not to directly kill the other party when heunched him flying just now. As for whether or not he survived thending¡­ That did not have anything to do with him¡­


    At least, considering that the other party had reached the Core Formation Realm, he should be able to survive if he used some secret technique to dampen the fall at the cost of his cultivation base¡­


    "Probably won''t be hearing anything more from this Green River sect¡­ Send in the next person!" Muttering the first part to himself before calling out for the elder who had been standing beside the entrance to the small pavilion where the meeting had taken ce to get the next sect representative, Feng Chen no longer thought anything more about the Green River Sect as he focused his attention on the new person who made his way inside the small pavilion.


    "Greetings, Sect Master of the Star Shattering Sect! I''m from-"


    Soon enough, a new meeting began¡­

 Chapter 800 Chun Hua’s Desperate Situation

    Different from the mostly peaceful circumstances of the Star Shattering Sect who didn''t really have anything dangerous taking ce, outside of the infestation of demonic cultivators that appeared in the kingdom bordering the Azure Sky Kingdom, Chun Hua, whom Xuan Hao had seen off to the core of the continent not too long ago, was caught in a dangerous situation as she found herself face to face with a powerful cultivator who had chased after her for the past few days.


    The reason was simple, he had realized that she wasn''t human¡­ But more importantly, her special physique could be refined into a special kind of pill that would be able to help a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator safely establish a domain and step into the Domain Lord Realm without any of the normal dangers associated with reaching the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even worse, the pill that could be refined by using her body was not only useful to people in the Nascent Soul Realm, but also people who had reached the Domain Lord Realm, Soul Ascension Realm¡­ And to a certain extend. Even those who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm!


    This was one of the main reason why she had been trying to keep her identity secret. Outside of the fact that she was not a member of the human race¡­


    "Hehe, why don''t you just give up! Given the difference between our cultivation realms, you won''t be able to win against me. At least if you surrender obediently, I will give you a swift death!"


    "Hmph! You are dreaming!"


    At this point in time, she had already been backed into a corner with no chance of running away.


    The two stood facing each other without saying anything for a short moment.


    One was a tall, muscr man with an arrogant expression and a powerful aura. The other a lithe, agile woman, whose eyes shone with a fierce determination.


    "If you want it that way, it looks like I will make sure you regret your choice!"


    Swish-!


    Without warning, the man attacked, his fist crashing down like a hammer. But Chun Hua was ready for this attack, dodging to the side before striking back with a swift and fierce kick enhanced by the qi spewing forth from her dantian into her leg. Giving it an eerie glow as it headed towards the man.


    Bang-bang-bang!


    The man was not one to be underestimated and countered with a flurry of punches, but Chun Hua was too quick, dodging and weaving through his attacks before striking back with a series of punches and kicks of her own.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    As the battle raged on, both of them summoned their inner energies, each drawing even more qi from their own dantian to enhance their physical abilities far beyond their limits. For a moment, the two were evenly matched due to Chun Hua''s skilful movements allowing her to dodge most of the attacks, both exchanging blows at lightning-fast speed-


    Fwoosh-!


    However, it was at this moment that the man unleashed a powerful energy st that could not be dodged. Understanding very well that the Chun Hua was not as easy to defeat as he had first expected. Forcing Chun Hua to go on the defensive-


    Boom-!


    Only barely managing to summon her own inner energy to take the shape of a green coloured protective shield that deflected the st. Allowing her to avoid getting blown up by the sudden powerful attack.


    "Die!"


    Understanding that most of her qi had been drained to stop the powerful energy st, Chun Hua let out a fierce cry before using a moment to close the distance between herself and the muscr man. Wanting to take advantage of the fact that the man should be in a simr exhausted state as herself after the powerful energy st he had thrown towards-


    Bang-bang-bang!


    BOOM-!


    Not wasting a single second to use thest bit of energy left in her already tried body to unleash a barrage of strikes that finally broke through his guard.


    "This¡­ Impossible!" The man could not believe what had just happened as he stumbled back before copsing on the ground, badly wounded, Chun Hua now standing over him, her eyes zing with killing intent.


    "You may be stronger than me, but you are far too arrogant! If you had just gone all out against me from the start, you might have ended up winning!" And with that, sheunched one final blow towards the man looking towards her filled with disbelief on the ground-


    Bang!


    Killing him before he got a chance to get back up again. The battle was won, and Chun Hua emerged as the undisputed champion.


    "Hah¡­ I have to get out of here and find a safe ce to recover¡­"


    Although not without cost, the man had been of a far higher cultivation base than herself, so even if she had managed to win, it would still take her weeks, if not months to recover from the damage she had sustained.


    Ever since she had managed to make her way back to the core of the continent again, she had constantly been faced with dangerous situations like this. The only problem this time around was that she had not been able to escape from her pursuer no matter how much she tried to use everything she had leant.


    Is this person perhaps in possession of some kind of special artifact that allows him to track down my location¡­?


    Narrowing her eyes as this thought urred to her, Chun Hua didn''t dare waste a single moment before searching through the belongings of the man-


    Rustle~


    "Here it is!"


    Not taking long to find his interspatial ring.


    Whoosh~


    "Hm? This is¡­!"


    Taking out everything from her now dead pursuers interspatial ring, Chun Hua could not help freezing on the spot as she discovered a small token with a pure ck lotus engraved into it located among the many different artifacts, pills, books, clothes and other things that the man had been carrying along with him.


    The main reason why Chun Hua froze up on the spot was not because the small token was some kind of precious artifact. Instead, it was what the small token represented!


    "The Shadow Lotus Sect¡­ To think that man was a member of the Shadow Lotus Sect¡­" Almost whispering this to herself as she looked at the token with the small ck lotus engraved into it, Chun Hua didn''t dare stay around any longer as she used all of her remaining energy to use her movement technique to leave the location of the fight.


    Although she did not have a good understand of the core region of the continent where the most powerful empires and powers were located, she still knew about the sect that the token on the man she had just killed belonged to.


    The Shadow Lotus Sect, a sect that was known throughout the core region of the continent as the masters of information gathering. Their members were skilled spies and assassins, known for their unique ability to blend into the shadows and gather information without being noticed by divine sense. The more powerful members were even capable of hiding themselves inside the domain of a Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    Despite their reputation as assassins and spies, there was also a few members of the Shadow Lotus Sect who were not assassins and acted as guardians for the different branches of the Shadow Lotus Sect located all across the core region of the continent where one could buy information¡­ Or facilitate the disappearance of one''s enemies... n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Considering the fact that the man she had just killed did not disy any of the Shadow Lotus Sect''s famous assassin techniques when fighting with her just now, Chun Hua was almost certain that the man she had just killed was one of these guardians in charge of protecting one of the core regions branch sects.


    Well¡­ Considering that the man had only reached the Nascent Soul Realm, he should still be a guardian in training. After all, the weakest guardian of the Shadow Lotus Sect in charge of guarding a branch would be in the Domain Lord Realm, the biggest branch she had heard about even had multiple Soul Ascension Realm guardians¡­


    In the end, she could not really bepletely sure about this. The Shadow Lotus Sect was highly secretive, and very few outsiders knew anything about them.


    For all she knew, the token that the man had been carrying with him could be fake and he could have used it to scare people when he was close to getting killed.


    Although this might be rather stupid as there was no way the Shadow Lotus Sect would let something like this go after finding out, it would always be a good way to safe himself in a dangerous situation.


    Swish-!


    No matter what, Chun Hua did not dare stay around to find out whether or not the man she had just killed truly belonged to the Shadow Lotus Sect.


    After all, if he really was a member of the Shadow Lotus Sect, the personing to investigate the matter would almost certainly be the Domain Lord Realm branch guardian who had been in charge training him. Not someone she had the ability to resist with her current strength¡­

 Chapter 801 Escape!

    Having escaped from the location where she had just fought with the possible member of the Shadow Lotus Sect, Chun Hua could not help freezing on the spot after she went around the massive mountain towering far about the ground that had originally blocked her path forward and forced her to fight with her pursuer.


    As far as she could see with her current cultivation realm, an endless expanse of rolling hills and gentle slopes, dotted with clusters of different wildflowers and special spiritual herbs that swayed in the wind spread out before her.


    Together with the sun hanging high in the sky above, casting a warm golden light across thend and the sky being a brilliant shade of blue without a single cloud to mar its perfection, Chun Hua understood that there would be absolutely no way for her to hide herself in this kind of environment if someone chased after her.


    "Turning around at this point in time is not an option, as I risk running into someone from the ck Lotus Sect¡­" Muttering this to herself as she understood that she would have to take the risk in running through the ins in front of her to get to a ce that would be easier for her to hide herself while recovering from the injuries she received during the fight with the presumed guardian in training, Chun Hua didn''t waste a single second longer before dashing across the ins at the fastest speed possible in her current state.


    ¡­


    Bang!


    Crack~


    Not too long after Chun Hua had escaped from the ce where her fight between the person, she suspected to be a branch guardian in training belonging to the ck Lotus Sect, had taken ce, arge shadowy figurended violently on the ground beside the dead body of the man while gazing towards the small mountain of items that had appeared beside him when Chun Hua had emptied his interspatial ring.


    "Looks like this is the ce where junior brother Fang was killed¡­" Narrowing both of his eyes as he saw the dead body along with the small mountain of items on the ground, therge shadowy figure instantly focused on the token with the small ck lotus on top of it that had been discarded not too far away from the pile of items.


    Whoosh~


    Picking up all the items together with the dead body and putting them all into his interspatial ring, the shadowy figure soon turned around and gazed towards the endless in that looked like a ocean of green in the distance.


    Even though Chun Hua had done her best not to leave any traces of the direction she had moved in, it was close to impossible for her to hide her traces when faced with someone who had reached the Domain Lord Realm. Especially when that person was from a sect that was mainly focused on information gathering like the ck Lotus Sect¡­


    "The person realized this child was part of the ck Lotus Sect and decided to run away while trying to hide the direction¡­ smart, but ultimately useless!"


    BOOOM!


    As the shadowy figure finished saying this, a dense murderous aura filled with an intense killing intent exploded all around him before destroying his surroundings.


    "Hmph! I will make sure to return what you did today in full! Even daring enough to kill someone from my ck Lotus Sect!"


    Swish!


    As his killing intent reached a new peak, the shadowy figure directly took a step forward and disappeared in the direction of the endless ins.


    Given that the other party should only be someone in the Nascent Soul Realm and not someone in the Domain Lord Realm from the clues left behind by the fight. The Domain Lord Realm Expert from the ck Lotus Sect was not the slightest bit worried about Chun Hua escaping.


    After all, he could also tell from the weakening energy she had left behind while escaping, that she was seriously injured and wouldn''t even be able to use her full strength to execute a movement technique to escape. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    ¡­


    "This!? Someone is actually chasing after me¡­ And that person even managed to pinpoint my location within such a short period of time!?"


    At the same time that the Domain Lord Realm Expert from the ck Lotus Sect began chasing after her, Chun Hua who had managed to reach a small isted forest that could only barely allow her to avoid someone who had yet to reach the Domain Lord Realm, could not help panicking as she looked down at a special magic artifact that she had taken with her back when she had left home.


    The artifact in question was not too special and just allowed her to see certain energy signatures of people nearby, a perfect artifact for avoiding dangerous situations when out exploring by herself.


    The only problem with such an artifact was that the other party would need to leak a massive amount of energy before being detected, something that would normally only happen when someone was fighting.


    In a sense, Chun Hua had been lucky that the person chasing after her had momentarily exploded with killing intent. Allowing part of his powerful energy to ravage the surroundings. Giving Chun Hua a chance to detect that someone was indeed chasing after her.


    "At least someone in the Domain Lord Realm¡­ Even worse, from the energy reading just now, the other party should not be someone in the earlier stages of the Domain Lord Realm¡­" Muttering this to herself as she looked over the artifact that had just detected the powerful burst of energy, Chun Hua could not help shivering all over as she realized just how powerful the person chasing after her was.


    Thest time such a powerful expert chased after her, she ended up getting caught even when using the special concealment talismans, she had been given by her family. The only reason she had escaped back then was due to the other party not having any hostile intentions towards her¡­


    Remembering her past encounter with Xuan Hao and how her special concealment talismans had not helped her escape, Chun Hua could not help feeling even more afraid as she looked at the powerful aura that was rapidly approaching her direction.


    Given the current speed of her pursuer, it would not take any more than a minute or two before he caught up to her. Not only that, but the energy around her pursuer that had allowed her artifact to pinpoint his location would fade in another few seconds. No longer giving her a chance to see the exact location of her purser. Leaving her in the dark as to when he would show up.


    "Even if the concealment talismans don''t allow me to escape. At least they should be able to buy me some time¡­"


    Whoosh~


    Knowing that she had no other choice than to use the concealment talismans she had left from when she had hidden from Xuan Hao, Chun Hua used all of her remaining talismans at once before rapidly escaping from her current location. After all, there was a good chance that her pursuer had managed to lock on to her energy signature with some unknown method.


    Even if this was not something she could do anything, she was at the very least confident that the concealment talisman would be able topletely hide her traces from the Domain Lord Realm Expert chasing after her.


    After all, even when she had been caught by Xuan Hao, this had only happened after she had decided to give up and reveal herself. Before this, he had not been able to find her and could only use the formation to ensure she didn''t leave the Shattered Star Peaks!


    ¡­


    Freezing on the spot mid-air the moment Chun Hua used the concealment talisman, the Domain Lord Real Expert who had been chasing after her could not help frowning as he wondered what had happened for her aura to just suddenly disappear.


    "Hm!? Where did that person go!? Howe I can''t sense their aura anymore... Did that person perhaps perish from the injuries received during the fight¡­?" Muttering this to himself as both his eyes narrowed, the shadowy figure could not help shaking his head.


    If the person he had been chasing after had died, the other party''s aura would not just simply disappear all of a sudden without any reason.


    "A concealment talisman¡­ And a quite powerful one at that¡­ Looks like this person is rather special¡­" Narrowing both of his eyes even further as he came to this conclusion after a few seconds of thinking, the shadowy figure did not waste a single second as he continued towards the small forest in the middle of the endless ins where Chun Hua''s aura had disappeared.


    As someone from the ck Lotus Sect, he was quite experienced with concealment talismans and knew a lot about them, thus it did not take him long to understand what had happened.

 Chapter 802 City States

    Escaping from the small forest that was isted in the middle of the endless in, Chun Hua made use of the fact that the concealment talisman would be able to keep her hidden to run out in the open. Not that the small forest would have been much use for her to stay hidden when faced with the powerful divine sense of a Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    "I should almost have reached one of the small city states located around the edges of this in..." Muttering this to herself as she continued using all the energy she could muster; Chun Hua could not help remembering one of the many maps she had gone through before she had left her home following a disaster that had severely weakened the strength of her family.


    Back then, she wanted nothing more than to grow stronger and have the ability to help her family...


    Shaking her head as some memories of the past appeared, Chun Hua focused her attention back on running in the direction that the closest city state bordering the endless ins should be located. Sincerely praying that she would be able to reach it before the concealment talismans she had activated to hide herself from the Domain Lord Realm Expert pursing her ran out...


    "What arge city..."


    After traveling for a few hours, a massive city slowly appeared in the distance, causing Chun Hua to open her mouth wide, marvelling at the sheer scale of the city that had appeared in the horizon.


    Although city states were normally not viewed as powerful due to most of them being controlled by someone in the Domain Lord Realm, this, by no way meant that they were small and insignificant.


    On the other hand, due to the strongest person in a city state being someone who had reached the Domain Lord Realm, these city states would often be a gathering spot for wandering Domain Lord Realm Experts not afflicted with any power.


    Giving them a safe ce to trade with each other without the fear of idently having a Soul Ascension Realm Expert take an interest to what they were trading... Or worse, end up offending a Soul Ascension Realm Expert!


    Therge number of Domain Lord Realm Experts present inside one of these city states, was also the main reason why Chun Hua felt that she would be able to hide herself there.


    Not only would therge number of Domain Lord Realm Experts serve as a way to limit her pursuer''s ability to search for her, but therge number of people inside the city itself would also make it impossible to find her exact location. After all, at this point in time, all her pursuer had to go with was the small bits of remnant energy she that was left lingering in the air due to her movement technique.


    On the endless in where there were close to no other forms of life around, this might be a good way to track someone... But inside arge city filled with millions of people, there was no way to use this method to track her down. Even if the other party was a Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    Of course this was not considering whether or not a member of the ck Lotus Sect had some other unique method to track her down.


    If that was truly the case, there would be no way for her to escape from her pursuer...


    "Hm? This is... That person is moving again- Ah! My concealment talisman is no longer working!?"


    Suddenly noticing that thest concealment talisman on her had run out, Chun Hua could not help panicking as she looked towards the massive city in the distance.


    Even if she would be able to escape her pursuer, that was only if she managed to enter the city before that person had time to catch up with her!


    Swish-!


    Understanding that her chances of survival was close to zero if that person managed to catch up with her, Chun Hua used every way possible to increase her speed as she dashed towards the city in the distance. Even going so far as to take out a special artifact that would allow her to increase her speed beyond her current realm by sacrificing arge part of her lifespan.


    Of course, she would only use such a dangerous artifact when her pursuer was about to catch up with her. After all, thest thing she wanted, was to throw away hundreds of years of her lifespan for no reason...


    ...


    ? At the same time Chun Hua was using all her strength to rush towards the nearest city state where she would have a far better chance to hide from her pursuer, the person in question was floating in the air above the small forest where Chun Hua had activated the concealment talismans with a confused expression on his face.


    "How odd... It''s already been a long time since the concealment talisman was activated. Normally, a concealment talisman at that level should at mostst for around an hour... Maybe that person has more than one...?" Not able to understand why Chun Hua had not shown up, the person from the Shadow Lotus Sect could not help feeling nervous as he constantly scanned his surroundings for any signs of Chun Hua.


    No matter what, he understood very well that there was no way a random person would have multiple concealment talismans capable of hiding from someone in theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm like himself.


    Even if the other party had been lucky an stumbled upon a hidden realm to get them, as a member of the ck Lotus Sect, he understood just how unlikely something like this was.


    The most obvious reason for why someone would carry so many high level concealment talismans, was that the other party had some kind of powerful backing!


    "But where is this person from...? In this region, the strongest powers should only be the differ city states. The only problem is, these city states power is at most in the Domain Lord Realm- Hm?" Just as the person from the ck Lotus Sect was trying to figure out what power Chun Hua was from, both his eyes narrowed sharply as he looked towards a specific direction.


    "Looks like the concealment talisman finally ran out of power...!"


    Knowing that there was not much time for him to waste, as he could feel the remnant energy left behind by Chun Hua approaching a massive city located at the border of the endless ins, the Domain Lord Realm Expert from the ck Lotus Sect directly used his movement technique-


    Swish-!


    Turning into a shadow that streaked across the empty yet peaceful ins below. Startling the few animals and demon beasts that roamed around the endless ins.


    Given the speed of a Domain Lord Realm Expert, it only took him a short time before the city Chun Hua was rushing towards became visible... And along with it, Chun Hua herself! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Hehe, looks like I managed to catch up in time-"


    Boom-!


    Just as the person from the ck Lotus Sect was about to use his domain to grab hold of Chun Hua not too far away from him, a loud explosion could be heard before a blood red light engulfed Chun Hua''s figure and carried her towards the city at a speed not inferior to someone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Hm? A sacrificial escape artifact? For someone in the Nascent Soul Realm to use something like this... Even a single second should drain 10 years off that person''s lifespan... But do you really think this is enough to escape from me?


    Narrowing both his eyes as he nced towards the blood red ball of light escaping towards the city in the distance, a cold smirk appeared on the face of the man from the Shadow Lotus Sect.


    Although the current speed of Chun Hua was indeedparable to someone in the Domain Lord Realm. Even being faster than someone who had just reached the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, it was far from enough to escape from him!


    Swish-!


    Not wasting a single second, the man from ck Lotus Sect once again turned into a shadow as he dashed towards Chun Hua engulfed by the blood red light from the sacrificial artifact she had just used.


    ...


    Allowing the artifact floating gently in front of her devour her life essence in exchange for carrying her towards the city at a speed far surpassing what she had before, Chun Hua could not help looking back towards the eerie shadow that was approaching her from behind with a look of shock and fear stered all over her face.


    "How... How is he so fast!?"


    Different from what she had expected, the shadow seemed to be far faster than what she had expected. Even worse, it was constantly increasing in speed as it got closer and closer to her!

 Chapter 803 Power Of The Soul Imprint

    W-what should I do? Is there even anything I can do...?


    Having exhausted all of her methods in trying to escape from the Domain Lord Realm Expert from the ck Lotus Sect, Chun Hua could not help feeling a wave of fear washing over her when she realized this.


    Even if she was someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, she could not stop herself from trembling upon thinking about what would happen to her after the person from the ck Lotus Sect caught up to her...


    "Hehe, you won''t be able to run away any longer!"


    Just at this moment, the voice of the man from the ck Lotus Sect echoed out all around her before a massive palm formed by shadows descended down towards her before grabbing hold of the blood red ball of light created by the sacrificial artifact that was engulfing her.


    Crack~


    Not even a secondter, the blood red light began cracking apart as it had no way to resist against the shadow palm of the man from the ck Lotus Sect. In the first ce, the blood red light''s main purpose was to escape. Not defend!


    Bang!


    For this reason, the sacrificial artifact in Chun Hua''s hands shattered together with the blood red light that had been engulfing her. Only able to resist against the powerful shadow palm for a little over a second at the cost of the artifact itself!


    Even the artifact grandfather entrusted to me in case I encountered a deadly situation did not survive... n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Seeing the artifact in her hands shattering under the powerful attack, Chun Hua could not help looking up towards the massive palm made up of shadows continuing to descend down towards her without showing any signs of stopping.


    As the palm hit her, Chun Hua felt the terrifying power of a Domain Lord Realm Expert first-hand as her body was destroyed. Leaving behind only her nascent soul to face off against the seemingly unstoppable power of the palm attack-


    BOOM-!


    It was just at this moment when her nascent soul was about to get destroyed by the powerful palm attack, that a terrifying energy in the shape of a small sword appeared from the deepest part of her nascent soul. Blocking the powerful palm attack of the Domain Lord Realm Expert from the ck Lotus Sect before it could destroy Chun Hua''s nascent soul!


    Whoosh-!


    However this was not the end as energy from the surrounding air rapidly gathered towards the small sword that was now floating in front of Chun Hua''s nascent Soul.


    Rumble~!


    As the small sword absorbed a massive amount of energy within a split second, the air around it started crackling with energy, and the ground all around it began violently trembling like an earthquake had urred.


    "What terrifying power..."


    Floating in the air not too far away from where Chun Hua''s nascent soul was, the Domain Lord Realm Expert from the ck Lotus Sect started shivering with fear as he saw the small sword that had gathered the energy from the surroundings. Allowing it to rapidly increase in power before he had a chance to do anything to it.


    "A soul imprint left behind by an expert... And from the power alone, it should be someone in the Soul Ascension Realm! This is not good... Even with my strength, I won''t be able to survive the attack of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert!" Understanding very well what the small sword floating in front of Chun Hua''s nascent soul represented, the Domain Lord Realm Expert from the ck Lotus Sect barely whispered these words to himself before turning around and escaping in the opposite direction of Chun Hua-


    Swish-!


    However, with a mighty roar, the small sword shed down in a powerful arc towards the escaping Domain Lord Realm Expert, the de slicing through the air with a sound like thunder!


    Rumble-!


    The force of the small sword was so great that the simple motion of it shing down created a shockwave that spread out in all directions with a devastating effect on the few trees found on the empty stretch ofnd around it.


    "Nooo-!"


    The Domain Lord Realm Expert from the ck Lotus Sect had no way to defend against the sheer power of the attack and was faced with the full force of the small sword!


    In just a fraction of a second, his body was bathed in the terrifying sword light and energy of the small sword''s attack, causing the terrifyingly powerful energy to enter his body and flow through him. Destroying him from the inside out-


    "Ahhh-!"


    The pain brought along by having both his body and soul torn apart at the same time was not something even a Domain Lord Realm Expert was able to endure!


    A few seconds that seemed like an eternity to the Domain Lord Realm Expert from the ck Lotus Sect slowly passed like this as the final bit of resistance left around what was left of his soul began crumbling apart under the sword energy that seemed to have only increased in strength during this period of time.


    RUMBLE-!


    Directly causing the ground nearby to crack apart as the sound of rushing wind and crackling lightning spread all across the endless ins and the nearby city states-


    "P-Please! S-show mercy! I''m a Branch Guardian of the ck Lotus Sect! If you kill me, the ck Lotus Sect won''t let-"


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    Before the Branch Guardian from the ck Lotus Sect had any time to finish his sentence, the sword energy seemed to have reached its peak as it exploded with even more power than before. Killing him in an instant, while also sending out a powerful wave of energy that tore the earth apart in a straight line from where the Domain Lord Realm Expert had been located and towards the small forest at the centre of the endless in.


    Swish-!


    After this was done, the small sword that had been weakened to the point of almost copsing appeared again before turning around and entering Chun Hua''s nascent soul floating in the air not too far away from the now massive ravine that had appeared in the endless ins.


    "..."


    If she had not lost her body, the look on Chun Hua''s face would have been one of absolute disbelief. After all, she recognized the aura of the small sword just now being the same as the elder called Xuan Hao whom she had encountered back in the Shattering Star Sect.


    Although she understood that he had given her a soul imprint of sorts after she left, she had never expected for the soul imprint of Xuan Hao to be that powerful!


    From the power alone, she was certain that Xuan Hao should not be someone in the Domain Lord Realm and should at the very least be someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Given the power of the attack just now, there was even a chance that he should be someone who had gone through more than one tribtion!


    Thinking this, Chun Hua could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine as she felt grateful for not ending up on the bad side of such a powerful senior before turning to look towards the city in the distance.


    I should get out of here before those Domain Lord Realm Experts from the nearby city states start appearing...


    Knowing that it would be a bad idea for her to stay around in her current state, Chun Hua used the little power she had left to fly away from the site of the battle just now. At least flying was possible for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm as long as they lost their bodies...


    Recovering my body again should not be a problem with my race''s powerful connection to the Dao of Life!


    Feeling happy that she was not a human and would be able to restore her body again with enough time due to her special race, Chun Hua quickly disappeared from the site of the battle.


    Luckily for her, the Domain Lord Realm Experts in the nearby city states were far too afraid to approach the site of the battle due to the power involved clearly having surpassed the Domain Lord Realm


    ...


    "Haaaa... So, exhausting..."


    At the same time the small sword exploded with all its power and killed the Domain Lord Realm Expert from the ck Lotus Sect, Xuan Hao sitting in the meeting hall in the capital city of the Sky Empire could not help letting out an exhausted sigh as he had transferred arge part of his energy through the soul imprint to allow it to explode with powerparable to a Soul Ascension Realm Expert for a single attack.


    Although a soul imprint could allow the owner of the imprint to transfer part of his power through the imprint, the imprint itself was far too small to endure so much energy and could normally only be used for a single attack... And that was not mentioning the massive loss in energy involved. Even a single attack had almost drained half of the qi inside Xuan Hao''s dantian...


    "Is something wrong Senior? Is the meeting perhaps boring? Don''t worry! The real part of the meeting where the voting for positions takes ce will only be a day or two from now!"


    "No, that was not- Never mind, it was nothing..."


    Seeing the worried expression on Xu Bao''s face, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head before turning his attention back towards what was happening in the middle of the meeting hall. Even if it was boring, he at least had to understand how the imperial family wanted the sect alliance to operate...

 Chapter 804 Greedy Major Sects

    Having returned his attention back towards the meeting currently taking ce Xuan Hao could not helpmenting over just how boring the meeting had been so far, with most of the time being spent on the few major sects trying to get as many resources as possible from the imperial family.


    "If the imperial family wants that much from us, it''s only obvious that we get the spiritual crystal mine at the Hollow Grave Valley. After all, I''m sure the three religions would be willing to part with a few spiritual crystal mines if we were willing to join them..."


    "Don''t forget the natural spiritual herb fields at the kingdom close to my sect... And a few spiritual metal mines! The three religions would surely not forget about something like this!"


    Even after close to two days since the meeting had been officially started by the Grand General of the Sky Empire, these few major sects were still busy doing their best to get any benefits they could out of the imperial family. Making sure to use the three religions offer to get more resources from the imperial family.


    "Is this really going to take another two days? Isn''t there a way to finish this part up faster?" Not wanting to wait for the same dozen or so people who were asking for some kind of benefits from the imperial family, Xuan Hao could not help turning towards Xu Bao sitting beside him as he asked this.


    Although he had already expected a meeting like this about the creation of a brand-new major power in the Sky Empire would beplicated, he had not expected that even the part about the different benefits would take such a long time to finish.


    Just thinking about this alone was more than enough to cause Xuan Hao a headache. After all, even if he joined the meeting willingly, he did not think it would take such a long time and merely thought that it would take a day or two at most...


    "Maybe we could ask for the Great General to move on to the next part of the meeting, but I''m sure that will end up offending those major sects and make them our enemies-"


    "Aren''t they already our enemies...?"


    "This..."


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said, Xu Bao seemed to freeze for a short moment before a look of realization appeared on his face.


    Indeed, the major sects had always done their best to try and weaken or destroy the independent sects. For what reason did they need to sit around and wait for these major sects to gain more benefits from the imperial family?


    "Great General! Can we move on to the next part of the meeting? Not all of us are here to watch a few people beg your imperial family for scraps!" Not wasting a single second after this thought urred to him, Xu Bao stood up and called out to the Great General. Not forgetting to insult the major sects in the process...


    "What is that guy doing!?"


    "Hmph! That old man is courting death!"


    "Hehe, that old man won''t survive for long after leaving this meeting hall!"


    Hearing that someone was daring enough to call out to the Great General while the major sects were doing their best to get as many resources from the imperial family as possible, the different representatives from the smaller sects could not help looking towards Xu Bao filled with surprise.


    "This is... someone from the independent sects? No wonder they don''t fear those people..."


    "The independent sects... I forgot they would also be joining this meeting..."


    Only a few of them recognized Xu Bao and remembered his identity.


    Considering the rtionship between the independent sects and these major sects, it was not odd that Xu Bao, who was considered the strongest expert among the independent sects of the Sky Empire, would step in and stop the major sects from gaining any more benefits and other resources from the imperial family.


    "This old man! He dares!?"


    "Hmph! This old man is getting bolder now that we are inside the capital city!"


    Hearing what Xu Bao said, the major sects could not help cursing to themselves as they stared towards Xu Bao filled with killing intent.


    Although they were bold enough to get more resources and other benefits from the imperial family due to their backing from some of the more powerful kingdoms of the Sky Empire, they understood that they would not be able to bring up this subject again in front of the Great General following what Xu Bao said.


    If they did that. Not only would they harm their reputation, but they would even damage the reputation of their backers... And when that happened, the chance of their backers investigating the matter was only a matter of time.


    At that point in time, there was a high chance of them finding out that they were using their names to secretly get more resources for themselves from the imperial family. Not something any of the people from the major sects wanted to happen.


    "Hm... Does everyone want to move on to the next part of the meeting...?"


    Hearing what Xu Bao said, the Great General understood what he was trying to do as he said this while looking around at everyone present, his gaze lingering at the different people belonging to the major sects most of the time.


    In his eyes, he did not really care about these few people from the major sects. Only seeing them as an extension of the powerful kingdoms that existed behind them asking for certain benefits through them to align themselves with the imperial family for the uing power struggle between the imperial family and the three religions.


    If the resources they were asking for was on behalf of their backers, they would not hesitate to continue to ask for more... but if it wasn''t, they would not dare continue asking for anything in fear of their backers finding out that they were using their names to get more resources while at the same time risking offending the imperial family...


    "Looks like everyone agrees that this has dragged on for quite some time now because of a few notable individuals... In the interest of not wasting anyone''s time, let''s move on to the next part of the meeting. The overall structure and purpose of the different parts of the sect alliance."


    Understanding very well that these major sects were indeed using their backing to get more resources for themselves after seeing their silence following his question, the Great General no longer bothered giving them any face on behalf of the people behind them as he moved on to the next part of the meeting.


    Following the major sects no longer stepping up to ask for all sorts of different resources every few minutes any longer, Xuan Hao could once again focus on listening to the Great General as he exined how the sect alliance was going to function, while also discussing some of the points with the representatives of the different sects present.


    From this, Xuan Hao managed to understand just how the imperial family wanted to make use of the different sects to weaken the three religions.


    The main way that the sect alliance would do this, was through the sect alliance poaching people from the different kingdoms under the three religions by establishing themselves just outside their territory.


    Although the three religions would be able to easily deal with a few branches like this, there was no way to deal with all of them due to just how many branches a power like the sect alliance would be capable of setting up.


    Even if they used their power to deal with all of them, this was almost sure to weaken them and give the imperial family a chance tond a deadly blow. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    After all, with all things considered, even if the sect alliance would not have any powerful experts at the Pinnacle of the Domain Lord Realm, the sheer number of Domain Lord Realm Experts was more than enough to stop the three religions from rashly attacking them.


    The different sects that existed inside the Sky Empire might not be powerful whenpared to the most powerful kingdoms who had existences that reached the Late Stage of the Domain Lord Realm... But they certainly had nock of experts who had reached the middle three stages of the Domain Lord Realm!


    ...


    As the meeting was growing closer and closer to the end where the voting for leader positions would take ce, Xuan Hao could clearly feel Xu Bao sitting beside him starting to get nervous...


    "Senior, it should not take more than a few hours before the voting for who gets the leader positions in the sect alliance begins. At that point in time, me and the rest of the people here will have to rely on your help..."


    "No need to worry like this, I already told you I would support you and the rest of the independent sects."


    "That is good..."


    Seeing Xu Bao calm down again after hearing what he said, Xuan Hao could not help silently chuckling to himself at just how quick this old man was to change his mood.

 Chapter 805 Vote For Leader Positions

    "... And with that we move on to thest part and most important part of the meeting. Choosing who will sit in the leader positions of the sect alliance!" As thest few hours of the meeting went by without much happening, outside of Xu Bao interrupting the few people from the major sects whenever they tried bringing something up, the Great General from the imperial family finally reached thest part of the meeting. The vote of who got a leader position in the sect alliance.


    "It''s finally time..." Sitting beside Xuan Hao, Xu Bao could not help tensing up as he turned to look at Xuan Hao with a nervous expression on his face without saying anythin. No matter how confident he was in Xuan Hao being able to help secure a leader position for him and the rest of the independent sects, he could still not stop himself from feeling nervous about it.


    Like Xu Bao, the rest of the people inside the meeting hall also tensed up upon hearing what the Great General who had been sent over by the imperial family said. All of them understood that the most important part of the meeting was about to start.


    Normally, they would all think that the leader positions would fall into the hands of the major sects who were by far the strongest present... But this was no longer the case with the independent sects around.


    Even if the independent sects did not have any kind of backing like the major sects did, they still had Xu Bao, who was by far considered the strongest person among all the sects currently present.


    With someone like him around, these different sects were no longer certain that all the leader positions would end up being given to the people from the major sects. After all, even if a lot of the sects present were to some extend backed by a kingdom or a noble family of some sort, it did not mean that they would just mindlessly follow what the major sects did.


    If there really was a chance for the independent sects to win over a leader position in the sect alliance, there was more than a few sects among the ones present that did not get along with the major sects and were willing to support them as a show of defiance towards the major sects.


    Observing the reactions of everyone present while also feeling the burning gaze of Xu Bao sitting beside him, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he understood that the next part of the meeting was not going to be as peaceful as it had been up to now.


    Although the chances of anyone resorting to violence in the presence of the Great General from the imperial family was low, it was not something that was a certainty. Especially considering that the people from the different major sects looked like they were about to jump off their seats and attack Xu Bao at any moment...


    "Now that it seems like everyone is ready, I will start the official process for choosing the leader positions of the sect alliance. The method itself is rather simple and will be based on voting. The sects that get the most votes will be chosen for the leadership positions!"Hearing the voice of the Great General suddenly echo throughout the meeting hall, Xuan Hao turned his head as he looked towards the centre of the hall where the Great General was located.


    The voting process was the most important part of the meeting and would also be what determined who would oversee the sect alliance. For this reason, not only Xuan Hao, but the rest of the people inside the meeting hall all turned their attention towards the Great General from the imperial family. Wanting to know how the voting process would work. After all, all of them understood that there would be no way a Domain Lord Realm Expert''s vote would hold the same power as someone who had only reached the Nascent Soul Realm...


    "For the voting, those below the Domain Lord Realm counts as one vote, as for the Domain Lord Realm, those in the First to Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm''s vote will count as 5, while those between the Fourth and Sixth Stage count as 10, 15 and 25 votes respectively. Anyone above the Sixth Stage will count for 100 votes!


    The voting will be done through someone standing up and announcing they want the position. Followed by everyone who wants to support that person announcing it. During this, you will only be able to vote for one person!"


    """...""" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    As the Great General finished talking, everyone inside the meeting hall fell silent. The one''s who had originally wanted to support the independent sects secretly without offending the major sects no longer dared to do this. After all, them standing up and announcing their support for the independent sects was sure to not only offend the major sects but also the kingdoms standing behind them!


    "This- This process of voting was clearly something that those kingdoms convinced the imperial family to do! Luckily, we have senior with us, or there would have been close to no way for us to get a single leader position during this meeting..." Muttering this to himself as he gazed towards the different people from the major sects who were smugly looking towards him from the other side of the meeting hall, Xu Bao could not help frowning as he realized that they should have had a hand in how the voting for leader positions was going to take ce.


    If not for the fact that Elder Scarlet me had managed to find a powerful expert who had reached theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm like Xuan Hao, Xu Bao was almost certain that this would have ended up resulting in the independent sects not getting a single leader position.


    After all, even if he himself was someone in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, the major sects had more than seven such experts when put together. Not to mention the fact that the number of experts that were in the three middle realms of the Domain Lord Rm supporting the major sects far exceeded that of the independent sects!


    "..."


    Feeling a sudden passionate gaze from Xu Bao who was sitting beside him, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say, as he turned to look towards the people from the different major sects who were smugly looking around themselves. Reassured that they would be able to get their hands on all of the leader positions.


    Looks like I''m bound to catch their attention, it was a good idea to disguise myself as a long-lost ancestor from one of these independent sects, that has just recently returned from adventuring outside the Sky Empire...


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling happy for the small ne around his neck, with it, he had been able to perfectly disguise himself without the Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert from the imperial family noticing anything.


    At this point in time, outside of the people from the independent sects who knew about him, the rest of the people present saw him as an old man with one step in the grave. Not too dissimr to Xu Bao who was sitting beside him.


    Although they did not know about him nor his cultivation base, Xuan Hao was certain that everyone from the different sects thought about him as an old ancestor from one of the independent sects.


    The only person present that had sensed the aura belonging to someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm that he had allowed to be seen, was the Great General from the imperial family who had been secretly ncing towards him from time to time. Obviously feeling a bit surprised over the fact that there was someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm among the people in the independent sects.


    "Now that all of you seems to have understood the voting process, the people who want a leader position can stand up... But remember, there will only be a total of four leader positions!"


    Whoosh~


    Not even a secondter, four people among the major sects stood up at the same time. Clearly, they had already agreed on how to split the leader positions in the sect alliance among themselves.


    "Looks like those people already came to an agreement on how to control the sect alliance..." Muttering this to himself as he looked over the four people from the major sects, who had all reached the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could not help ncing back towards Xu Bao who had simrly stood up to signal that he would also be going for one of the leader positions in the sect alliance.


    Even from a nce, it was obvious that the four people from the major sects were not too happy upon seeing Xu Bao standing up against them, but then again, it was something they had already expected to happen...

 Chapter 806 Final Vote

    "Only five people interested in the four leader positions for the sect alliance?" Following these words from the Great General, everyone inside the meeting hall remained quiet and just stared at the four people from the major sects. None of the people from the remaining sects inside the meeting hall dared to fight with the major sects for the four leader positions of the sect alliance. The only people who would do something like that, was the independent sects that were already enemies with the different major sects and had nothing to lose from going against them.


    "I see... Then I won''t waste any time and will move on to the voting part! First, let''s start with the elder from the Sparrow Sect." Rolling his eyes upon seeing that nobody dared stepping forward due to the major sects rather colourful reputation when it came to dealing with those who went against them, the Great General didn''t bother wasting any time, as he directly moved on to the voting process.


    "Hehe, I hope everyone here will vote for me!" The elder from the Sparrow Sect, one of the Sky Empire''s major sects, happily stepped forward with a smile on his lips after hearing what the Great General said.


    Clearly, he already believed that getting the leader position was only a matter of time. The fact that Xu Bao had decided to also stand up didn''t bother him in the slightest, as he understood that nobody other than the few independent sects present would dare to vote for him. After all, everyone present knew what would happen if they went against the major sects...!


    Not to mention, there was no benefit in them supporting the independent sect openly, outside of angering the major sects-


    "I support the elder from the Sparrow Sect!"


    "I support the Sparrow Sect-"


    Because of this, many the representatives from the different sects that were present all stood up in support of the elder from the Sparrow Sect, while also showing off their cultivation base for the Great General to see and count their votes correctly.


    "357 votes in total for the Sparrow Sect, next, we will move on to the elder from the Rock Fire Sect..." As the first of the votes came to an end, the Great General directly announced the total number of votes that the elder from the Sparrow Sect had managed to gather before moving on to the next person among the four people from the major sects.


    "I support the Rock Fire Sect in getting the leader position!"


    "I support-"


    The elder from the Sparrow Sect was not even allowed to gloat over how many votes he got before the voting continued moving on to the next person.


    ...


    Even with my support, it looks like it will just barely be enough for Xu Bao to secure a single leader position.


    Thinking this to himself as he observed the four people from the major sects, Xuan Hao could not help ncing towards the elder from the Sparrow Sect with a small smile on his face.


    Although everyone from the four major sects had managed to get around the same number of votes, the person with the lowest number of votes, was the elder from the Sparrow Sect. The reason for this being rather obvious from his arrogant and condescending expression.


    If given the choice, it was obvious that the rest of the sects inside the meeting hall would choose one of the other three people from the major sect instead of the one from the Sparrow Sect. In turn this had resulted in the difference in votes between him and the three other representatives from the major sects being a little over 50 votes...


    "Let''s start the final vote!" As the vote for the four people from the major sects concluded, it did not take long before the final vote for Xu Bao began.


    "I vote for Senior Xu Bao!"


    "I vote for..."


    Not wasting any time after the vote for Xu Bao began, the different experts from the independent sects didn''t waste a single second before standing up in support of Xu Bao. Not forgetting to show off their cultivation base in the process.


    "Hehe, do they really think that they have enough people to get a leader position? Even if they have 10 or so Domain Lords, most of them are in the early stages of the realm. If not for that old man Xu Bao, there is no way that the independent sects would have been able to survive until now!"


    Watching the different people from the independent sects getting up to show their support for Xu Bao, the elder from the Sparrow Sect could not help snickering to himself with a disdainful expression on his face. Not at all impressed by the disy of the independent sects.


    The number of Domain Lord Realm Experts and Nascent Soul Realm Experts among the independent sects had long since be known to these major sects over the many years they had spent trying to weaken and destroy them.


    Even if they did not recognize Xuan Hao who was sitting beside Xu Bao, they were not at all worried about one stranger being able to change the tide in the favor of the independent sects. At most thinking that he might be an old ancestor from one of the independent sects that was around the middle stages of the Domain Lord Realm.


    As for him being someone above the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm? This thought never crossed the mind of the people from the major sects. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Normally, the appearance of another Domain Lord Realm Expert on the side of the independent sects would not be able to make a difference when it came to the vote for who got the leader positions... But unfortunately for the major sects, they were about to discover that their carelessness and disregard for the independent sects would cost them one of the four leader positions!


    "I vote in support of Xu Bao for the leader position of the sect alliance!" Just as thest among the independent sects had finished showing their support for Xu Bao to take on the leader position, Xuan Hao got up in a simr fashion and voiced his support for Xu Bao-


    Boom-!


    Not a secondter, he released his cultivation base that was at the Peak of the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm with the help of the ne. Instantly causing everyone present to feel a shiver run down their spine due to the powerful aura of a Late Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    Even the people from the major sects were no exception, as all of them opened their eyes wide while fearfully looking towards Xuan Hao who was disguised as an old man. Not a single one of them expected that the old man sitting quietly beside Xu Bao to actually be a terrifying expert that had reached the Late Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    "This- When did the independent sects gain such a terrifying expert!?"


    "It should be an old ancestor that has just recently broken through to the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm..."


    "Just recently broken through to the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!? What are you talking about!? This old senior is clearly already at the Peak of the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Only a single step away from reaching the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!"


    "This... If that is the case, howe we have never heard about this senior before...?"


    "How would I know? Perhaps he has been cultivating in seclusion ever since reaching the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm..."


    As everyone inside the meeting hall began discussing the sudden appearance of such a powerful expert on the side of the independent sects, the faces of the people from the major sects transformed from one of surprise and fear, into one of regret.


    Given that they were all powerful experts at the Domain Lord Realm, it did not take them long to realize that the total number of votes for Xu Bao would end up surpassing the elder from the Sparrow Sect.


    Even worse, the number of votes that Xu Bao would surpass the Sparrow Sect with, was no more than twenty!


    "This- How can this happen!?" Realizing that he would not be getting a leader position, the elder from the Sparrow Sect felt like a bucket of cold water had been dumped on top of his head as his eye''s filled with disbelief.


    Not a secondter, his face twisted into one filled with fury before he turned to look towards the smaller sects that had chosen not to vote for him with killing intent.


    From the fact that he had only been beaten by twenty votes, he very clearly understood that he would have been able to avoid this if some of these smaller sects had chosen to vote for him instead of the three other major sects!

 Chapter 807 Old Ancestor From The Stone Ridge Sect

    "Now that the voting part of the meeting has concluded, thest part of the meeting will only be for the four who managed to get a leader position in the sect alliance. The rest of the people here may leave and wait to get contacted about the first steps in setting up the sect alliance."


    Not caring about how angry the elder from the Sparrow Sect was feeling after he realized that he would not be getting one of the leader positions, the Great General from the imperial family directly announced the end of the meeting for everyone who had not ended up getting one of the four leader positions.


    "This..." Not able to say anything to the Great General after he had announced the end of the meeting, the elder from the Sparrow Sect could only stare out into space helplessly.


    No matter how much he wanted toin to the Great General and ask for a new vote to be held, he understood that doing so would be the same as doubting the validity of the results, something that was certain to offend the Great General!


    Even if his Sparrow Sect had the support of a powerful kingdom inside the Sky Empire, there was no way that his backer would be happy to learn about him offending a Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert and there was even a chance that his backer would cut connections with his sect due to this... Because of all this, the elder from the Sparrow Sect could only get up from his seat with an unwilling look on his face before making his way out of the meeting hall.


    Notcking too far behind the elder from the Sparrow Sect who was among the first to get up and leave the meeting hall, the rest of the people from the different sects inside the meeting hall slowly began to make their way outside.


    All of them feeling surprised over the oue of the meeting, as none of them had expected for the independent sects to actually have the backing of an expert that had surpassed the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and reached the Peak of the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Not only was this going to affect the newly established sect alliance, but it was also going to have a profound impact on how the different sects interacted with the independent sects in the future. After all, there had never been an expert that had surpassed the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm inside the sects of the Sky Empire before this moment!


    Having the support of a power with an expert above the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and having someone who was part of the sect above the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord realm were twopletely different things!


    Even if the major sects had the support of powerful kingdoms with experts that were above the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Ultimately, those experts were not part of the major sects.


    ...


    As everyone was making their way out of the meeting hall, Xuan Hao did not get up to leave immediately. Instead turning to look towards the Great General who had been looking towards him ever since he had announced the end of the sect alliance meeting.


    From a nce, it was obvious to Xuan Hao that the Great General wanted to say something to him. Not too shocking considering that he was a Peak Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert that had appeared out of nowhere in the eyes of the Great General.


    When put together with how rare Domain Lord Realm Experts above the Sixth Stage were inside the Sky Empire, it was obvious that the Great General would want to know more about him and how a Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert had suddenly appeared among the independent sects.


    "Senior, I think that the person from the imperial family wants to talk with you..."


    "I know, he most likely wants to find out where an expert above the Sixth stage of the Domain Lord Realm suddenly appeared from." Nodding his head as he said this in response to Xu Bao, Xuan Hao could not help feeling happy that he had not shown up with his real identity as an elder from the Star Shattering Sect.


    If he really did show up as someone from the Star Shattering Sect and had a cultivation base above the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he was certain to not only catch the attention of the imperial family, but the entire Sky Empire.


    At that point in time, there would be no way that the Star Shattering Sect would be left alone to expand on its own without much resistance, some of the more powerful forces inside the Sky Empire would almost certainly interfere and try to prevent the growth of this new power. Especially the three religions and the different powerful kingdoms, who would be impacted the most by the sudden rise of a powerful independent sect.


    Even the imperial family would not leave the Star Shattering Sect alone if this happened. Instead, they would most likely try to use it to weaken the power of the three religions...


    "Greetings, fellow cultivator. I don''t think I have seen you anywhere inside the capital before. Might I ask what sect you belong to?"


    It was just at this moment as thest person outside of the three people from the major sects who had managed to get a leader position had left, that the Great General moved over to greet Xuan Hao with a polite smile on his face.


    Even if he was someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, the Great General still understood that it would always be better to have more friends. Especially if that friend was someone who had managed to reach the Late Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Greetings, Senior, I''m from the Strone Ridge Sect. The reason why senior might not have heard about this humble old man before today, might be because this old man left the Sky Empire close to a few thousand years ago to look for an opportunity to search for opportunities to increase my strength and have only recently returned."


    Understanding very well that the Great General wanted to not only find out more about him but also befriend him, Xuan Hao politely returned the greeting before using the identity that he had prepared beforehand with the help of a person from one of the independent sects.


    "The Stone Ridge Sect...? Hm... So you are that ancestor that left back then! No wonder I didn''t recognise you. Back then, I had only just reached the Nascent Soul Realm and hadn''t gotten a chance to familiarise myself with the different Domain Lord Realm Experts that were around inside the Sky Empire back then..." Nodding his head with an understanding expression on his face after hearing Xuan Hao''s response, the Great General did not doubt Xuan Hao''s identity.


    Not to mention the fact that there would be no benefits to impersonating someone from an independent sect to go against the powerful major sects, a Domain Lord Realm Expert that had entered thete stage of the realm could be considered as the pinnacle of power inside the Sky Empire below the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Because of this, the imperial family would normally do their best to rope in someone like this. Even if the other party did note from the Sky Empire, the imperial family would still be more than happy to recruit a powerful expert like this.


    Outside of the increase in strength such an expert brought to the imperial family, there was also the important fact that having another powerful Domain Lord Realm Expert that could teach the younger generation of the imperial family would be useful for increasing the future strength of the imperial family. After all, there was no way that the old Soul Ascension Realm Experts of the imperial family could waste their time to go around teaching every single member of the imperial family''s younger generation...


    "The Stone Ridge Sect... To think that old ancestor from back then actually returned as someone in the Peak of the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm... The luck of these independent sects is truly out of this world!"


    "Indeed... I don''t think our lords will be happy when they learn about this. Not only did such a powerful person emerge from the independent sects that we were supposed to supress, but we also lost one of the leader positions..."


    "Don''t worry too much about it, this old man is far older than any of us and can''t be considered our responsibility. Instead... he is a perfect excuse as to why we lost a leader position!"


    "Maybe..."


    "..."


    At the same time that Xuan Hao and the Great General began chatting with each other, the three people from the major sects listened in from the side with a look of realization on their faces upon hearing about Xuan Hao''s identity.


    All of them secretly feeling relieved that he was not someone from their generation...N?v(el)B\\jnn

 Chapter 808 Asking For Protection

    "Well then, Senior, I won''t take any more of your time and will be taking my leave for now. Hopefully the sect alliance will work out in favour of my sect and the rest of the independent sects!"


    After spending a few more minutes chatting with the Great General about what he had been doing during his time outside the Sky Empire and what kind of opportunities he had encountered that allowed him to reach the Peak of the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao got up and began to leave the meeting hall.


    "Haha, no worries at all fellow cultivator, I will make sure your Stone Ridge Sect will get treated well!" Smiling happily as he said this while waving goodbye to Xuan Hao, the Great General was clearly satisfied with their short conversation and the possible new friendship he had managed to establish.


    The same could not be said for the three people from the major sects who had listened to the conversation about Xuan Hao''s adventures outside the Sky Empire from the side.


    At this point in time, all three of them were feeling extremely ufortable knowing that one of their enemies had actually managed to gain an expert above the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Not only that, but it also looked like he had managed to befriend the Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert from the imperial family!


    No matter how they looked at it, they had a feeling that the sect alliance and the resources given to it by the imperial family would not be exclusively controlled by them and their sects. Something that was certain to cause some problems between them and the people who had backed them and helped them reach their current position.


    ...


    Having left the meeting hall, Xuan Hao did not continue to wander around the core of the capital city and instead directly left together with some of the other people from the independent sects that he hade together with. Knowing very well that staying around the core of the capital would bring with it, an increased chance of him encountering one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from either the imperial family or the three religions.


    Although the chance of this happening was low, he did not want to take the risk. Especially considering that he had no idea how well the ne he used to disguise his identity and cultivation base would work against someone who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even if it worked, there was still a chance that the Soul Ascension Realm Expert he encountered would not have any kind intentions towards him. This was especially true if that Soul Ascension Realm Expert happened to be from one of the three religions... If he encountered one of those three, he was almost certain that they would not let him leave easily!


    "Senior, are you going to wait for Senior Xu together with us at the inn?" Having made his way out of the core of the capital city where the most dangerous and powerful people of the Sky Empire was located, one of the people from the independent sects that were walking together with him asked this in a somewhat worried tone.


    "This... Is there perhaps a reason you are asking about this...?" About to leave them behind and start his journey back towards the Star Shattering Sect now that his primary goal for going to the capital city had beenpleted, Xuan Hao could not help stopping himself after seeing the worried expression on the face of the people from the independent sects.


    Even without knowing what they were worried about, it was obvious that they did not want to see him leave before Xu Bao got back...


    "Ehm... S-Senior... It''s just that now that Senior Xu is busy with thest part of the sect alliance meeting, there is no one around to stop the major sects or their backers from taking out their anger on us. After all, now that they lost one of the four leader positions, I''m certain that they are going to use this opportunity before Senior Xu returns!"


    "This..." As one of the people nervously stepped forward and exined the reason as to why they didn''t want him to leave, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he remembered how enraged the elder from the Sparrow Sect had been after he found out that he had lost the leader position in the sect alliance that he had originally thought was his.


    Given how temperamental this person seemedpared to normal Domain Lord Realm Experts, Xuan Hao would not find it shocking if this person took the chance while Xu Bao was not around to take revenge on the independent sects.


    Although he would not be able to kill any of them inside the capital city, he would still be able seriously injure them without getting in trouble with the guards of the capital city...


    "I understand, I will stay together with you until Xu Bao returns from the meeting." Not feeling that it would be too troublesome to stay together with these people and look after them until Xu Bao returned from the meeting, Xuan Hao let out a soft sigh as he said this.


    Troublesome or not, he understood that he would have to make sure that nothing happened to these people. After all, the independent sects were an important part of the n to make everyone in the Sky Empire pay less attention to the Star Shattering Sect while it was developing.


    "Thank you Senior!"


    Not wasting any time after hearing what Xuan Hao said, the person who had nervously asked him to stay together with them until Xu Bao returned, happily jumped over and thanked him with a happy smile stered all over his face.


    "Senior, thank you for staying behind and waiting for Senior Xu with us!"


    "Thank you for your help, Senior! I''m sure no one will dare target us now!"


    "Yes, thanks to Senior, we can rest easy until Senior Xu returns."


    The rest of the people who had nervously been waiting for an answer in the background did notck behind for long, as all of them simrly jumped forward to thank Xuan Hao with relieved and happy expressions on their faces.


    "You guys have far too much energy... Let''s get going." Feeling a little taken aback by how lively the group of old people from the independent sects got all of a sudden, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit wryly as he said this before beginning to make his way towards the inn where the group of people from the independent sects had been staying ever since entering the capital city.


    ...


    At the same time Xuan Hao was making his way back towards the inn with the people from the independent sects, the elder from the Sparrow Sect was standing in front of a shadowy figure in a dark corner of the capital with a fearful expression on his face.


    "You are telling me that you actually lost the leader position to that old man Xu from the independent sects!? Do you know how many resources I used to ensure that your Sparrow Sect was chosen to take up that leader position in the sect alliance!? Yet... You are now telling me that you lost that chance I used so many resources to get you, to someone from one of those independent sects!?"


    "I-I''m sorry my lord... But the appearance of a Peak Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert among one of the independent sects was not something we could have ounted for!"


    "Hmph! Do you think I don''t know about how you lost to them with only twenty votes!? Don''t think we don''t know what takes ce inside the meeting, you self-proimed major sects are not the only people among the sects that we are supporting!"


    "This- Forgive me for my failure my lord!"


    Thump!


    Knowing that he could not me his failure to secure one of the four leader positions on the sudden appearance of a powerful expert among the independent sects, the elder from the Sparrow Sect fell to the ground with a pleading expression on his face.


    At this point in time, he understood very well that he would not be able to avoid the me for losing the leader position that his lord and the backer of the Sparrow Sect had spent an enormous amount of resources to get his hands on. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Hmph! You only know how to beg now?"


    "My lord! Please give me another chance! I will do anything!" Knowing that there was a chance that his lord might abandon him and no longer provide resources to him and his sect, the elder from the Sparrow Sect became even more desperate than before as he said this.


    "Hm... Fine... Go out and find out more about this Peak Seventh Stage domain Lord that appeared out of nowhere. Ah! And also make sure to punish those independent sects! Hmph! How dare they take what is mine!?"


    "Y-yes my lord!"


    Whoosh-!


    Not wasting a second after hearing that he had managed to get another chance, the elder from the Sparrow Sect quickly left the area to carry out the order that had been given to him.

 Chapter 809 Approaching Danger

    Making his way back towards the inn located close to the edge of the capital city, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised that the fact that the elder from the Sparrow Sect did not show up to cause trouble.


    Considering how that elder had acted back inside the meeting hall and the clear killing intent he had directed towards him and the rest of the people from the independent sects, Xuan Hao had expected for him to be waiting for them close to the gate that separated the core of the capital city from the rest of the capital city for an opportunity to cause trouble... But in the end, he had been nowhere in sight so far.


    Was I worrying too much about that elder from the Sparrow Sect...?


    Walking along the streets of the capital together with the people from the independent sects, Xuan Hao could not help thinking this to himself as he carefully scanned his surroundings for any sign of the elder from the Sparrow Sect, but in the end, he found nothing during their journey back to the small broken down inn located at the edge of the capital city.


    The small broken inn was in the same state as it had been when they had left it behind earlier in the day, something that helped reassure everyone present that the major sects should not yet have found this hiding spot of theirs.


    Although it was inevitable that the small rundown inn''s location would be exposed now that they had travelled to it without hiding themselves on their way back from the sect alliance meeting, it should at the very least give them a little more time without having to deal with anyone from the major sects showing up to cause trouble...


    "Everyone! Remember to remain cautious! Even if we have the help of senior to ensure our safety, the capital city is ultimately not a ce that we have much power inpared to those major sects!" As everyone slowly started rxing upon stepping foot into the rundown inn, Elder Scarlet me who had been cautiously observing their surroundings during the entire journey from the core of the capital city, stepped forward and said this.


    Rustle~!


    Hearing what Elder Scarlet me said, the group of people from the independent sects that had slowly started rxing quickly tensed up before they started looking around themselves for any possible sign of the major sects that might be lurking just around the corner waiting for a chance tounch a sneak attack on them while their guard was down.


    Seeing this scene, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say about these people. The more he interacted with them, the more unreliable they seemed to be. To be honest, it was surprising that the major sects had not managed to deal with them...


    "There is no one around here waiting for us, you can rest easy for now." Not waiting for the group of people from the independent sects after saying this, Xuan Hao walked inside the rundown inn to find a ce to rx while waiting for Xu Bao to return from the part of the sect alliance meeting that only involved the four chosen leaders of the sect alliance and the Great General from the imperial family.


    "Senior-" Not able to react in time to what Xuan Hao said before he disappeared inside the rundown inn, it did not take long before the group of people from the different independent sects followed after Xuan Hao inside the rundown inn. No longer worried that a possible ambush from the major sects would be waiting for them inside.


    ...


    "So this is the ce where those independent sects have been hiding until the sect alliance meeting..." Arriving at a location not too far away from the rundown inn where Xuan Hao and the rest of the people from the independent sects were staying, the elder from the Sparrow Sect quietly muttered this to himself before a terrifying killing intent appeared in his eyes. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    If not for the fact that a terrifying expert in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm was present, he would have already sprung on the opportunity to deal a blow to these independent sects while Xu Bao was not around to protect them.


    Rustle~


    As the elder from the Sparrow Sect was lost in thought thinking about how to deal with the Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert that had appeared out of nowhere on the side of the independent sects, a young man slowly made his way over while ncing towards the rundown inn in the distance with a simr killing intent.


    "Elder... Are we really not going to attack them? Even if they have the support of a Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert, with the support of the other major sects and the lords, we should not-"


    "Impudent! What do you know!?" Not giving the young elder a chance to finish what he was saying, the elder from the Sparrow Sect directly interrupted him before starting to scold him with a somewhat disappointed expression on his face. "This is still inside the capital city and under the strict supervision of the imperial family! Tell me... What do you think will happen if suddenly start such a major battle inside the capital city? Do you really think that the imperial family will just sit around and do nothing?"


    "This- I''m sorry elder! I didn''t think this matter through!" Knowing that he had made a mistake in what he said, the young elder quickly apologised. Afraid that he would identally end up offending the old elder in front of him.


    "Hmph! As long as you know your mistake." Seeing how sincere the young elder was, the old elder from the Sparrow Sect did not pursue the matter further and instead turned his attention back towards the rundown in where the people from the independent sects were staying.


    Like he had said, the problem of dealing with the Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert was not something that was easy to do without alerting the guards that constantly patrolled the inside of the capital city.


    Even if the rundown inn was located at the edges of the capital city, it would not take more than a few minutes before guards started showing up if a fight broke out.


    Although this was still considered a long time to someone who had reached the Domain Lord Realm, it was far from enough time to deal with someone who had reached the Peak of the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Even with the help of people supporting the major sects!


    For this reason, he to use a different way to deal with the independent sects before Xu Bao returned and it got even more difficult to deal with them...


    "Elder... If we can''t attack them head on, why don''t we get them toe to us...?" Hearing the young elder who had gone silent after being scolded, the old elder from the Sparrow Sect could not help narrowing both of his eyes before turning towards him. "Do you perhaps have an idea on how to get them to leave that rundown inn? Do tell me..."


    "Actually, it won''t be that hard at all... Earlier today, I happened to overhear that the disciples from a few of these independent sects happened to also be present inside the capital city at the moment. Namely, the Stone Horn Sect and the Tree Flower Sect..."


    "Haha! I see! We could indeed use those disciples to force a few of those people inside that inn toe to us. No matter how strong that new expert is, there is no way he would be able to be at two ces at once!" Laughing happily as an evil smile made its way on to his face after listening to what the young elder said, the old elder from the Sparrow Sect did not take more than a few seconds to understand what the young elder wanted to do.


    Splitting up the different elders from the independent sects was indeed a great way to deal with the problem of having to face off against the Seventh Stage Domain Lord realm Expert.


    Not only would they be able to avoid having to deal with him this way, but in case he decided to help out the elders who wanted to save their disciples, they would always be able to target the remaining independent sects hiding away inside the rundown inn.


    In case all of the people from the independent sects decided to go to save those disciples, they could always split them up into several different locations all across the capital city. Giving them no way to save them unless they split up!


    "You will be in charge of taking care of the young disciples from the Tree Flower Sect and I will take care of the ones from the Stone Horn Sect!"


    "Yes, Elder!"


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Not wasting any time after havinge up with a way to deal a blow to the independent sects, the two elders from the Sparrow Sect did not waste a single second as they both disappeared in two different directions.

 Chapter 810 Kidnapping Disciples~

    They n to capture a group of disciples and use them to split us up? Good idea, but ultimately useless considering that they don''t know about my true cultivation realm...


    Standing inside the rundown inn, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head as he thought about this while looking in the direction that the two elders from the Sparrow Sect had disappeared in.


    Outside the two elders from the Sparrow Sect that had just left to catch the disciples from the Tree Flower Sect and the Stone Horn Sect, there was also arge number of Domain Lord Realm Experts belonging to the other major sects watching over the rundown inn.


    Given that he could already be considered to be infinitely close to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, there was no way that he wouldn''t be able to notice the elders from the Sparrow Sect and the rest of the experts from the other major sects lurking around the rundown inn waiting for an opportunity to strike... But then again, there was no way that these people would expect something like this in the first ce.


    "I will be going out for a short moment, make sure that you don''t leave the inn during this period of time!"


    "Huh? Senior, what do you mean that you will be leaving-"


    Swish-!


    "Senior!?"


    Knowing that he would be able to hide himself from the divine sense of the different experts belonging to the major sects outside, Xuan Hao left behind a group of confused representatives from the different independent sects, as he chased after the two elders from the Sparrow Sect. Not intending to let them take advantage of the disciples from the Tree Flower Sect and Stone Horn Sect.


    ...


    Having already parted ways with the old elder from the Sparrow Sect, the younger elder stopped in front of a small inn located close to the Explorer Union Branch inside the capital city.


    "This should be the ce where the disciples from the Tree Flower Sect are staying. Hehe, these disciples have no idea what is about to happen to them!" Chuckling to himself as he said this while gazing towards the small inn, the younger elder had once again returned to his former arrogant state now that his senior was no longer around. Not caring the slightest bit about the group of disciples from the Tree Flower Sect.


    After all, what could a group of young disciples who would at most have reached the Core Formation Realm do against a Domain Lord Realm Expert like himself? Even if they had some protective measures left behind by a senior from their sect, they would at most allow them to hold out for a few seconds!


    Another reason why the young elder was so confident in himself, was also because the strongest elder from the Tree Flower Sect had only barely reached the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, while he himself had reached the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if the ancestor of the Tree Flower Sect was present, there was no way that he would be able to resist him for long, let alone give away defensive artifacts or talismans that could deal with someone in the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm like himself!


    "There they are!" Using his divine sense to locate the group of disciples from the Tree Flower Sect inside the inn, the young elder didn''t bother wasting any time searching the inn any further. Directly using a movement technique to dash inside before arriving inside the room where the disciples from the Tree Flower Sect were staying-


    "Wha- W-who are you!?"


    Catching the five disciples from the Tree Flower Sect present inside the room by surprise. Clearly not having expected for someone to suddenly show up inside of their room all of a sudden without any of them noticing.


    "Hehe, you can ask your elders about thatter!"


    Swish-!


    Not bothering to exin anything to this group of young disciples who were mostly in the Core Formation Realm, the young elder from the Sparrow Sect waved his sleeve and knocked all five disciples out before taking them away from the inn.


    "So powerful... Who was it that visited the inn just now...?"


    "I don''t know, but the other party should at least be someone in the Domain Lord Realm!"


    "Domain Lord Realm... No wonder I didn''t manage to pick up on the other party before he had already left..."


    Everything happened far too fast for anyone inside the inn to realize what had happened before the young elder from the Sparrow Sect had disappeared.


    If not for the fact that the young elder from the Sparrow Sect had not bothered to hide his aura during the kidnapping of the five young Tree Flower Sect disciples, it would have been impossible for them to even notice anything in the first ce. After all, the strongest person inside the inn had only reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Far from enough to notice someone in the Domain Lord Realm if the other party wanted to stay hidden.


    However, unknown to the young elder from the Sparrow Sect who had just left the inn with the five disciples from the Tree Flower Sect before making his way towards a prearranged location to meet up with the older elder from the Sparrow Sect before beginning the next part of their n to split up the cultivators from the independent sects, Xuan Hao had already managed to catch up and was silently following him.


    In Xuan Hao''s eyes, it was far easier to wait until all the disciples from the independent sects had been gathered in one location before striking to take them away and safely retreat without having to fight with the two Domain Lord Realm Experts from the Sparrow Sect.


    Although fighting them before they had a chance to get their hands on the disciples from the independent sects was tempting, Xuan Hao also understood that doing so came with the risk of the other Domain Lord Realm Experts jumping in to join the fight.


    At that point in time, he would only barely be able to hold them back with the strength of an average Peak Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert. Not only that, but he would also risk the fight catching the attention of one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts inside the capital city.


    No matter how confident he was in the ability of the ne to hide his cultivation base from someone in the Domain Lord Realm, he had no confidence in it being able to hide his cultivation base from someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Especially not if the person who ended up paying attention to the fight was the terrifying ancestor of the imperial family...


    "Senior!" A few minutes after moving through the capital, the young elder suddenly came to a stop before calling out to the old elder from the Sparrow Sect who was waiting for him in an empty alleyway located at the edge of the capital on the opposite of the city to the rundown inn. Over twenty unconscious people on the ground next to him.


    Thump!


    "Senior, are we-"


    "Only five? I thought the Tree Flower Sect would have more disciples inside the capital city. The Stone Horn Sect had more than twenty disciples, one of them was even a genius that managed to reach the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    Putting the five disciples from the Tree Flower Sect that he had carried with him on the ground, the young elder didn''t even get a chance to say anything before the old elder interrupted him.


    "I didn''t expect for there to be so few disciples either... At the very least, these disciples should still be more than enough to force those independent sects toe out to rescue them. Especially that disciple in the Nascent Soul Realm, I''m sure that the Stone Horn Sect will do everything to get him back!" Not knowing what to say in response, the young elder could only say this before pointing towards a brawny looking young man among the over twenty Stone Horn Sect disciples'' unconscious on the ground.


    "Hm... Indeed, that disciple in the Nascent Soul Realm does represents a future Domain Lord Realm Expert for their sect, there is no way that the Stone Horn Sect will give up on getting him back!" Nodding his head as he said this after hearing what the young elder said, an evil smile appeared in the eyes of the old elder while looking towards the brawny young man in the Nascent Soul Realm. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    If not for the fact that killing the young man from the Stone Horn Sect would ruin their chances of splitting up the people from the independent sects, he would have already done so to ensure that the stone Horn sect didn''t gain another Domain Lord Realm Expert in the future.


    Oh well... He would always be able to kill the young genius from the Stone Horn Sect after the experts from the independent sects had split up...!

 Chapter 811 Sorrowful Elder From The Sparrow Sect

    Observing the two elders from the Sparrow Sect as they talked with each other whilepletely ignoring the knocked out disciples from the Stone Horn Sect and the Tree Flower Sectying on the ground beside them, Xuan Hao took the opportunity to slowly approach them. Making use of the ne to hide himselfpletely from the two talking elders from the Sparrow Sect.


    This should be close enough¡­


    Getting within a few meters of where the disciples from the two independent sects were ced on the ground, Xuan Hao narrowed both his eyes before getting ready to dash forward and take the unconscious disciples away with him without having to fight with the two elders from the Sparrow Sect.


    Considering the fact that he had disguised himself as someone who had reached the Peak of the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, it was not too unrealistic for him to be capable of escaping from the two elders from the Sparrow Sect while carrying the close to thirty disciples from the Stone Horn Sect and Tree Flower Sect with his domain.


    Even if they might get a bit suspicious about how he had managed to get so close without them noticing and how he knew what they were up to, they should attribute it to them having underestimated the strength of someone who had reached the Peak of the Seventh stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Maybe they might even think he had used some kind of special concealment talisman to approach them without them noticing!


    Whoosh~


    Having reached a distance that would allow him to easily grab the unconscious disciples before escaping, Xuan Hao decided to make his move-


    "Wha-!?"


    "This- You are!?"


    Catching both elders from the Sparrow Sect by surprise, as neither of them managed to react in time before Xuan Hao took away the unconscious disciples from the Tree Flower Sect and the Stone Horn Sect.


    "We can''t let him get away!" Recovering from the sudden turn of events the fastest, the older elder from the Sparrow Sect who had participated in the sect alliance meeting didn''t waste a single second before dashing after Xuan Hao. Understanding very well that the chances of them being able to do anything to the independent sects without using the disciples to split them up was close to zero.


    Not only that, but he would also have to exin how he hadn''t been able to get anything done to his lord once again!


    Although the old elder from the Sparrow Sect doubted that his lord would throw away a powerful sect like the Sparrow Sect which had several Domain Lords under it, he also understood that the resources the Sparrow Sect would receive from this lord was almost certainly going to decrease¡­


    As for the Sparrow Sect finding another backer¡­ The old elder didn''t even dare to think about this. After all, other than the resources and benefits that they were provided with for serving under a powerful kingdom of the Sky Empire, the kingdom in question also had several ways to ensure that the Sparrow Sect did not just find another backer after they had invested arge amount of resources into them. One of them being that they would be deemed as an independent sect and would end up facing the same level of suppression inside the Sky Empire as the rest of the independent sects that barely hang in there due to the backing of Xu Bao.


    The difference between the Sparrow Sect at that point in time and the independent sects, would be the fact that they would be considered the enemies of not only the major sects, but also the independent sects that they were a part of¡­ Not something any of the major sects wanted to happen to them!


    Swish-!


    As he thought about all of this while chasing after Xuan Hao who was slowly getting further and further away from him, the old elder from the Sparrow Sect that had reached the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, suddenly increased his speed even further. Allowing him to catch up with Xuan Hao andunch an attack.


    Not towards Xuan Hao, but instead the disciples from the two independent sects that he was carrying with him. Knowing very well that it would be far harder for Xuan Hao to defend these disciples while also escaping at the same time. Hoping that he would be able to buy enough time for the remaining people from the major sects to use this window of time where Xuan Hao was missing tounch an attack on the people from the independent sects that were hiding away inside the rundown inn on the other side of the capital city.


    Even if the chances of them being able to do any real damage before Xuan Hao managed to return was low, the old elder from the Sparrow Sect still hoped that they would at the very least be able to archive something as heunched another attack towards the disciples Xuan Hao was carrying before the first had time tond.


    Not even a secondter, the first attacknded on one of the disciples from the Tree Flower Sect-


    BOOOM-!


    However, different from what the elder from the Sparrow Sect had expected, Xuan Hao didn''t slow down to defend against the attack, but merely used the power of his domain to block the attack.


    "This- How is this even possible!? Is the domain of a Seventh Stage Domain Lord really this powerful!?" Not able to understand how his first attack had been blocked so easily without the other party even slowing down for a second, the elder from the Sparrow Sect could not help marveling over just how much stronger someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm waspared to someone like himself who had reached the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Even without seeing his second attacknding, he already understood that it would not be able to do anything to slow down Xuan Hao!


    ¡­


    At the same time the two elders from the sparrow sect were chasing after Xuan Hao who was making his way back towards the rundown in where the people from the independent sects were located, one of the elders belonging to one of the smaller major sects could not help showing a doubtful expression on his face while looking down at amunication talisman.


    "The Peak Seventh Stage Domain Lord snuck past us and is currently on the other side of the city¡­? If what that old man from the Sparrow Sect says is this true, then this is a good opportunity to attack the remaining people from the independent sects still inside the rundown inn¡­ But¡­ If the Peak Seventh Stage Domain Lord is still present, the oneunching the first attack is sure to face the wrath of this expert¡­" Muttering this to himself as he went over the information that had been told to him through themunication talisman, the elder understood how great of an opportunity this was to weaken the independent sects.


    The only problem was¡­ If the Peak Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert was still present, the person whounched the first attack would be sure to face the wrath of this expert head on.


    Even if he wouldn''t die from this due to his cultivation having reached the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he was certain that he would not be able to get out unscratched!


    With that in mind, the Sparrow Sect was already considered a troublesome sect among the most powerful of the major sects¡­ And it was not easy for this person, or the rest of the people from the major sects ced around the rundown in, to trust the words of the Sparrow Sect.


    For now, all the message sent out by the Sparrow Sect had archived, was to make the major sects lurking around the rundown inn start to test the waters in an attempt to figure out whether or not the Peak Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert had truly left. As for using the limited time they had to attack the independent sects inside the rundown inn? None of them had dared to trulyunch an attack.


    ¡­


    "These stupid people! How dare they doubt my words!" As a few people from the Sparrow Sect were still stationed around the rundown inn to keep an eye on the situation, the older elder from the Sparrow Sect of course ended up learning that none of the major sects present around the rundown inn had dared to make the first move and attack the independent sects.


    For a short moment, the elder from the Sparrow Sect could not helpmenting over his bad reputation within the major sects. If he had just earned the trust of at least one of the major sects present around the rundown inn at this moment, the opportunity to attack the independent sects would not be lost like this¡­!N?v(el)B\\jnn

 Chapter 812 Safe Escape, Back At The Inn

    "The people from the major sects have all started moving... Could it be that they found out about the fact that senior is missing!?"


    "This- This should not be the case... If they found out senior is missing, they should have alreadyunched an attack at this point in time!"


    "Indeed... From the looks of it, they only want to test the water and don''t truly want to start a fight..."


    "What should we do!? If Senior does not return in time and they realize he is not here..."


    Observing the movements of the people from the major sects from inside the rundown inn, the group of close to 10 Domain Lord Realm Experts among the independent sects could not help getting nervous as they realized what these major sects were up to.


    Even if the major sects were only going to test the waters, as long as Xuan Hao didn''t return in time, they all understood that these major sects were going tounch an all-out attack. Even if they could not kill them inside the capital city, they would still be able to cripple arge part of their cultivation base and leave them in a half-dead state. Recovering from such a state might be possible, but it would take hundreds- If not thousands of years! Essentially leaving them with no chance of improving their cultivation base in the future...


    No matter what, there was no way that they would want something like that to happen! Especially considering that they had just managed to secure a leader position for Xu Bao and were about to receive a lot of new resources from the imperial family that would be able to not only help in increasing their own strength, but also the overall strength of their sects!


    "Let''s try to drag things out as much as possible for now. Even if senior is not around, we cannot show any weakness when confronted by these shameless puppet sects that wants nothing more than to erase us and take all our resources for themselves!" Stepping forward with a confident expression on his face as he said this, Elder Scarlet me calmed down the group of increasingly panicked elders and ancestors of the different independent sects.


    Given that both Xuan Hao and Xu Bao were absent, he was more than strong enough to take the lead with his cultivation in the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    """..."""


    Hearing what Elder Scarlet me said, everyone inside the small inn quieted down. Understanding that for them to appear like nothing was wrong, they would have to go out and face off against the people from the major sects in case they got too close to the inn.


    Although doing this might work at the start, when one of the more powerful experts among the major sects approached, they would inevitably realize that the senior they relied on was gone. At that point in time, it was easy to imagine what would happen...


    In the first ce, it was not like they had the choice of escaping, as doing so would instantly confirm that they no longer had a powerful expert watching over them.


    ...


    ncing back towards the two elders from the Sparrow Sect chasing after him, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief to himself as he blocked another attack that had been sent flying towards one of the disciples he was carrying with his domain.


    From the short exchange he had with the two elders from the Sparrow Sect just now, he realized that the most powerful and older one among the two elders had should have only just recently reached the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and could only be considered to be in the early stage of the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Making it far more reasonable that he was able to easily escape them as someone who had reached the Peak of the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Whoosh~!


    As a few minutes passed like this, two chasing and one escaping, Xuan Hao could not help feeling surprised that no guards had showed up to stop them. On the contrary, the guards he spotted did not seem to care about him or his pursuers and instead just observed the situation from the side without doing anything.


    From the looks of it, the guards would truly not do anything unless it caused damage to the capital city or involved a life and death situation.


    Although Xuan Hao felt happy about this as he did not have to worry about a Soul Ascension Realm Expert showing up, he could not help feeling that the attitude of the guards was rather weird. Maybe the attitude of the imperial family was to just let the Domain Lord Realm Experts settle the matter between themselves. Only when it was a matter of life and death that could result in the weakening of the Sky Empire would they start to involve themselves. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Hm? The people from the major sects lurking around the in actually didn''t attack...?"


    Seeing the rundown inn appearing in the distance together with the different people from the major sects who looked like they were cautiously moving closer and closer to the inn, Xuan Hao could not help secretlyughing to himself. From the looks of things, the elder from the Sparrow Sect had a rather bad reputation among the other major sects. Not one of them trusted him enough tounch an attack on the inn...


    "That is- The Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert, he really was gone..."


    "Looks like that old man from the Sparrow Sect was telling the truth..."


    As Xuan Hao got closer to the rundown inn, it did not take long before the people from the major sects who were slowly approaching the inn discovered him. Allowing the to understand that the Sparrow Sect had indeed told them the truth when they informed them that the powerful expert watching over the independent sects was gone.


    But at this point in time, there was nothing they could do about it. The time that the Sparrow Sect had bought for them to attack the independent sects had already passed and now they would not be able to do anything without having to first go through the terrifying Peak Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    "That idiot, if he wanted to buy time for us to attack the independent sects by drawing away that person, why did he not inform us about it first!?"


    "Indeed, he should have known how little we trust him and his Sparrow Sect... Did he perhaps suffer some kind of mental problem recently...?"


    Showing up just in time to hear the people from the other major sects scolding him loudly with angry expressions on their faces, the old elder from the Sparrow Sect felt like throwing up a mouthful of blood in anger.


    He had indeed nned to inform all of them about his n to bait out and split up the people from the independent sects, the only problem was that the person he wanted to draw away the most had suddenly shown up before he had a chance to carry out his n.


    Not only that, but the disciples from the Tree Flower Sect and the Stone Horn Sect that he had nned to use for this had all been taken away before he had a chance to react. Taking him by surprise with just how close Xuan Hao had managed to get without him finding out about it... But then again, he also remembered a few things he had heard about concealment talisman during a conversation with his lord a few years earlier.


    Back then, he had learnt that not only did there exist concealment talismans that would be able to allow someone with only a Foundation Establishment Realm cultivation base to hide from someone in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, but there were even more powerful concealment talisman out there that would allow one to hide from someone who had reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Of course, he did not fully believe something like this. After all, just how powerful was someone in the Soul Ascension Realm... Let alone someone who had actually managed to reach the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm. How could a simple talisman allow some weak ant in the Foundation Establishment Realm to hide from someone like that!?


    The only reason why he even believed the existence of concealment talismans that could hide from the domain of a Peak Domain Lord Realm existence, was due to the fact that his lord had personally shown him one of these talismans in person during the visit back then!


    Swish-!


    At the same time that the elder from the Sparrow Sect was momentarily lost in thought upon hearing the scolding voice of the other major sects, Xuan Hao passed through the experts from the major sects blocking his path and entered the rundown inn. None of the people present daring to stop him!

 Chapter 813 No Chance To Resist

    Thump!


    Making his way inside the rundown inn, Xuan Hao directly ced the group of close to thirty young disciples that he had been carrying with him on the ground. Catching all of the elders inside the inn by surprise at therge group of unconscious people filling up arge part of the rtively small first floor of the inn.


    "This- Aren''t these the disciples from the Tree Flower Sect and the Stone Horn Sect...?"


    "Indeed, they are the disciples from the Tree Flower Sect and the Stone Horn Sect! I recognize the young manying over there as the current number one genius from the Stone Horn Sect... But why are they here?"


    "If I''m not wrong, we should have all agreed to not let our disciples roam outside our sects during this sect alliance meeting due to how dangerous it would be..."


    As the elders from the different independent sects began talking among each other, they soon turned their attention towards the two elders from the Stone Horn Sect and the Tree Flower Sect.


    "Don''t look at me! I have no idea how these young ones got here, I instructed my entire sect to enter a lockdown and not interact with the outside world until the sect alliance meeting finished!"


    "I-I-I''m the same, I have no idea how the disciples from my sect ended up here either..."


    "Are you two sure about that!?"


    "Hmph! Old man, what do you mean by that? Do you want to start something!?"


    Listening to the conversation between the elders from the side, Xuan Hao had at first wanted to see if he could find out how these disciples from the Tree Flower Sect and the Stone Horn Sect had appeared in the capital city. However, when the conversation suddenly went in another direction and the two elders from the two sects did not seem to know how their disciples had appeared inside the capital city, he decided to no longer listen in and instead excused himself before finding a quiet ce to wait for the still unconscious disciples to wake up and exin the matter themselves.


    All things considered; Xuan Hao had a feeling that their appearance inside the capital city just at the time that the sect alliance meeting was taking ce was not an ident. Even more so when considering that the young elder from the Sparrow Sect already seemed to know about their exact location.


    "Hm? W-where is this...?"


    Luckily for Xuan Hao and the elders who were close to starting a fight among each other at this point in time, the young genius from the Stone Horn Sect soon woke up before looking around himself filled with confusion.


    "Young Stone! You brat! Why are you here instead of the sect!? Do you perhaps not understand a simple order of not leaving the sect!?"


    "Ah!?"


    Hearing the voice of the elder from the Stone Horn Sect, the young genius that had just woken up could not help jumping up and fearfully look towards his master before discovering therge number of elders far stronger than him all looking towards him. "M-m-master!? W-what are you doing here- A-a-and who are all these s-seniors...?"


    "Answer my question brat, why are you here... And you better answer honestly!" Not caring about the terrified expression on his disciple''s face, the elder from the Stone Horn Sect instead said this in a far more strict tone. Understanding very well that if he didn''t do so, there was a high chance that some of the more powerful seniors present would do it. At that point in time, his disciple would be in for a really bad time...


    "Y-yes, master!" Understanding just how serious the situation was from therge number of seniors gathered all around him, the genius disciple from the Stone Horn Sect quickly nodded his head as he said this before starting to describe how he had ended up in the capital of the Sky Empire.


    From first sneaking out of the sect together with a group of friends due to one of them getting a hint that a treasure that would help increase his cultivation base would soon appear nearby. At first everything had been normal, but when he had been about to grab the treasure in question, he and everyone else had fallen into a teleportation trap formation that would randomly teleport them somewhere far away... And as luck would have it, that location happened to be no more than a few miles away from the capital of the Sky Empire.


    Because of all of this, the young genius from the Stone Horn Sect had decided to rest in the capital of the Sky Empire for a few days to recover before heading back towards the Stone Horn Sect. Wanting to return to the sect before his master returned... As he understood very well that he would be punished if he could not return in time...


    "This idiot! He was clearly fooled by someone and tricked into entering the capital city, but hasn''t realized it yet... Hehe, old man, looks like the disciple inherited his talents from his master!"


    "You-!"


    So, the presence of the disciples from the Tree Flower Sect and the Stone Horn Sect was deliberately done by someone beforehand, the most obvious culprit behind this should be that young elder from the Sparrow Sect.


    Not having to hear the Tree Flower Sect''s disciples'' side of how they had ended up inside the capital of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head as he had already managed to guess who the mastermind behind this entire thing was.


    The original intent of the n, however, should not have been targeted towards drawing him away, but should have instead been targeted towards drawing away Xu Bao. After all, there was no way that the young elder from the Sparrow Sect would have expected Xu Bao to win the leader position over his senior during the sect alliance meeting.


    If things had really yed out like the elder from the Sparrow Sect had wanted, it would certainly have ended up weakening the independent sects even further. Maybe there might even have been a chance that Xu Bao would end up getting critically injured. Well... All of this didn''t matter, as the n of the Sparrow Sect had gone up in smoke without archiving anything...


    All there was left to do now, was to wait for Xu Bao to return to take care of the independent sects and make sure they didn''t end up getting attack by the major sects on their way back. After which, he would begin making his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    ...


    At the same time Xuan Hao entered the inn together with the disciples that had been kidnapped by the Sparrow Sect, a shadowy figure watching over the entire matter narrowed both his eyes before a frown made its way on to his barely visible face.


    "That useless old man from the Sparrow Sect can''t do anything! From the looks of it, we will have to do something, or the independent sects will be able to walk away from the capital city with the leader position and use it to increase their strength... But... We have no way to deal with them inside the city without the imperial family noticing.


    Looks like I will have to consult the others about setting up an ambush outside the city to deal with that old man Xu Bao once and for all. Maybe we can also deal with that ancestor who just recently returned at the same time. Although, that ancestor can be ignored. After all, he should at most have a hundred years left to live considering his age!"


    However, just as the shadowy figure turned around to leave after havinge to a decision on how to deal with the matter regarding the independent sects, a terrifying freezing sensation enveloped him from head to toe.


    "Hm? T-this!? Who-"


    Whoosh~!


    Barely managing to react as he called out, the shadowy figure didn''t get a chance to say anything more before his entire body and soul was frozen solid. Forcing the shadowy figure to enter a deep slumber without the opportunity to resist. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    ...


    At the same time inside the inn, Xuan Hao looked towards the shadowy figure that had been turned into an ice statue with a slightly irritated expression on his face.


    "How troublesome... I really don''t want to deal with some ambush after leaving the city. At least this way, I won''t have to worry about anyone showing up due to the death of a Domain Lord Realm Expert. Havingprehended part of the Dao of Ice was truly a great thing for situations like this..." Muttering this to himself as he turned away from the shadow figure that had been turned into an ice sculpture in a hidden location no more than a few thousand meters away from the inn, Xuan Hao returned to quietly waiting for Xu Bao to return.


    Although it might not be within the range of a Seventh Stage Domain Lord''s domain, it was well within the range of Xuan Hao''s domain. Allowing him to easily utilize the power of his domain, that was already extremely close to the Soul Ascension Realm, to freeze him before the other he even had a chance to resist.

 Chapter 814 Leaving The Capital Of The Sky Empire

    Following the Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert who had been secretly watching over the entire thing from the side was frozen by Xuan Hao without a chance to resist, there was no longer anyone left to cause trouble for the independent sects. Even if the major sects outside had surrounded the rundown inn, there was no way that they dared tounch an attack with a terrifying expert in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm present on the side of the independent sects.


    As for the kingdom that the Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert that had been turned into an ice statue by him belonged to, Xuan Hao didn''t really worry about them showing up to cause trouble. After all, they had no idea what had happened to the Seventh Stage Domain Lord in the first ce, and he doubted that they would think that a Seventh Stage Domain Lord had been incapacitated without a chance to resist.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao and the elders from the independent sects ended up spending the next few hours quietly waiting for Xu Bao to return before they could leave the capital city¡­ Well¡­ Almost everyone¡­


    "Ah! M-master! P-please spare me!"


    "G-grand Elder, w-we just followed senior brother! P-please spare us!"


    The group of disciples from the Tree Flower Sect and Stone Horn Sect were all rather loud due to the punishment inflicted upon them by their elders...


    "Senior Xu Bao is back!"


    "Looks like thest part of the sect alliance meeting finally came to an end¡­"


    Like this, Xu Bao finally appeared at the entrance to the rundown inn with a haggard expression on his face. Even without asking him about what had happened during thest part of the meeting, it was obvious that it had been a rather draining endeavor for the old man who had been so confident before they had left him in the meeting hall.


    ? "Thank you for looking after them in my ce senior."


    "No problem at all¡­" Shaking his head as he said this to show that it was no problem at all on his side, Xuan Hao could not help seizing up that haggard state of Xu Bao at the same time. "But what on earth happened to you?"


    "This¡­ It''s a long story, but let''s just say that those three from the major sects are hard to deal with. Even if we didn''t fight, I feel like I just left a life and death battle with demonic beast at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm¡­ At least I had the help of the Great General, if not, I doubt I would be able to get anything for the independent sects during that meeting¡­!" Almost whispering thest part to himself, Xu Bao soon shook his head before his face was filled with energy once again before he turned to look directly at Xuan Hao. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Senior, you don''t have to worry about your sect gaining any unwanted attention due to the sect alliance, I managed to make sure that the sect alliance would not interfere in the development of any sects located in the border region of the Sky Empire!


    Although those three didn''t fight me that much on that point due to how weak most sects located in the border region of the Sky Empire arepared to those in the core region. If I''m not wrong, the reason why they fought me on that point should be due to them thinking that the reason I did this was to ensure that there would be more independent sects showing up in the future. After all, sects thate from the border region tend to end up bing independent sects. Just take the independent sects here, more than half are from the border region!"


    "Really?"


    "Yes! Senior Xu Bao is telling the truth, most sects in the core region of the empire do not really get a chance to develop without the interference of one of therger kingdoms. The Sparrow Sect is a good example of this, they were nurtured by a powerful kingdom ever since a Domain Lord Realm Expert appeared inside the sect¡­"


    "I see¡­ How interesting¡­" Muttering this to himself as he went over the new information that had been given to him, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just how much these independent sects had gone through to establish themselves in the core region of the Sky Empire where almost everyone would target them and look for an opportunity to destroy them.


    Although the imperial family itself did help ensure the safety of Domain Lords in most circumstances as it pertained to the overall strength of the Sky Empire as a whole, the three religions, powerful kingdom and major sects would from time to time find a way to destroy an independent sect and kill the Domain Lord watching over it.


    As for the weaker independent sects that only had Peak Nascent Soul Realm Experts watching over them, they would normally settle down close to, or directly inside of one of therger independent sect''s territories for safety.


    "Senior, I think we should get ready to leave the capital city. Although the major sects might not dare to do anything to us due to the strongest among them only having reached the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, the same cannot be said about the powerful kingdoms behind them.


    Even if they normally won''t do anything, I doubt they would be willing to just watch us leave after snatching away one of the leader positions for the sect alliance. Especially the kingdom behind the Sparrow Sect, I doubt they are happy about the fact that the sect under their control lost its leader position in the sect alliance¡­"


    "Indeed, leaving now before its toote is indeed a good idea." Nodding his head as he heard what Xu Bao said, Xuan Hao agreed that it was indeed a good idea for them to leave as fast as possible. Especially when one considered the fact that the Seventh Stage Domain Lord, that he now suspected to be from the kingdom behind the Sparrow Sect, was found by someone.


    Not long after this, Xuan Hao, Xu Bao and the rest of the elders from the different independent sects made their way out of the capital city together.


    "They are leaving¡­"


    "Is no one going to stop them!? We can''t just allow them to leave like this!"


    "Are you perhaps willing to make the first move then? Don''t forget that they not only have that old man Xu Bao support them now, but also a terrifying ancestor who has reached the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!"


    "¡­"


    As they left the capital city, the people from the major sects could only watch from the side with unwilling expressions on their faces. No matter how much they wanted to attack the independent sects, none of them were willing to make the first move and suffer the wrath of Xu Bao and the ancestor in the Seventh stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    In the end, the powerful kingdoms that some of the major sects had been hoping would make a move did not appear either, as the Xuan Hao along with the independent sects made their way out of the capital city without any problems before disappearing into the distance.


    ¡­


    Having travelled together with the Xu Bao and the rest of the people from the independent sects for a few hours after leaving the capital, Xuan Hao came to a stop before looking back towards the direction of the capital city, a concentrated expression appeared on his face for a short moment before he returned to his usual peaceful look.


    "This should be far enough away from the capital, I''m sure that the major sects or the people from the powerful kingdoms aren''t following us, so I''m going to take my leave." Turning towards Xu Bao as he said this, Xuan Hao had in fact just used his divine sense to sweep through their surroundings to make sure no one had been following after them tounch an ambush the moment they split up¡­ And just now, he had been able to confirm that there weren''t any such people around waiting to ambush them.


    If there really were someone, it would be someone who had already surpassed the Domain Lord Realm and reached the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ But Xuan Hao doubted that the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the three religions would have enough time to deal with a few independent sects at the moment. Especially with how busy they were with the church of the gue god.


    Even if they had the time, there was no way they would have waited for so long. After all, to a Soul Ascension Realm Expert, a Domain Lord was someone who could be killed with ease, a Seventh Stage Domain Lord or a Sixth Stage Domain Lord made no difference in the eyes of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert!

 Chapter 815 Parting Ways With Xu Bao And Qing Yi’s Breakthrough

    Hearing that Xuan Hao was about to leave, Xu Bao could not help freezing for a moment before a sudden feeling of loss washed over him.


    Over the past few days, he had grown used to the fact that he had the support of a powerful senior that would be able to help him, but now, he was once again back to being the only person who was able to support the independent sects when faced with the powerful kingdoms standing behind the major sects.


    Although he had long since know that this time woulde, he could still not stop himself from feeling a certain sense of loss when it was finally time for Xuan Hao was about to leave.


    Knowing that nothing woulde from just staring nkly into the distance, Xu Bao calmed down before turning towards Xuan Hao. "I hope you have a great journey back home. Remember to contact me if you need help with anything! Ah! You can also contact me if youe to the core of the Sky Empire again, I will be more than happy to have you visit at my sect!"


    "Of course, I will make sure to contact you in the future in case I visit the core region or need your help." Chuckling silently to himself as he saw the somewhat begging expression that had unconsciously appeared on the face of Xu Bao, Xuan Hao felt that it would be a good idea to visit Xu Bao and his sect when the Star Shattering Sect officially began expanding into the core region of the Sky Empire.


    If things worked out well, Xuan Hao had a feeling that he would be able to get Xu Bao and his sect to join under the Star Shattering Sect when that happened. At that point in time, it would not be hard to get the rest of the independent sects to join under the Star Shattering Sect.


    This way, when the Star Shattering Sect expanded into the core region of the Sky Empire in the future, they would already have a solid foundation in the core region of the Sky Empire due to these independent sects. The prerequisite to this, was of course that the independent sects would not get overwhelmed by the major sects or the powerful kingdoms behind them before this happened¡­


    Well¡­ That is a matter for the future. For now, I need to get back to the sect and see how my disciples are doing, I wonder if Qing Yi has managed to reach the Nascent Soul Realm yet¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about all of this, Xuan Hao did not stay around the group of elders and disciples from the independent sects for any longer-


    Swish-!


    Directly using the Drifting Cloud Steps to start his journey back towards the Star Shattering Sect. Wanting to return to see how far his disciples had managed to improve during the time he was gone.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao started making his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect after having split up with Xu Bao and the rest of the elders from the independent sects, Qing Yi was sitting in a small valley located at the bottom of the Seventh Star Peak. Chu Yang watching over her from a distance.


    Although the ce was not located far away from the sect itself, it was isted and not a ce that disciple or elders would normally visit when travelling between the different Star Peaks. For this reason, it was a perfect location for cultivators who were looking for a quiet ce to breakthrough in peace.


    Closing her eyes as she entered an optimal state of mind, Qing Yi focused on what she hade to this small, isted valley to do. Break through to the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "It''s finally time¡­" In the distance, Chu Yang could not help tensing up as he saw this, a hint of worry shed past his eyes as he focused on Qing Yi whose aura started violently fluctuating as she began breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    CRACK-!


    As Qing Yi''s aura seemed to have reached its peak, a loud cracking sound echoed out across the small valley. Signalling that the golden core floating around inside her dantian had started the process of breaking apart and the birth of her nascent soul was imminent.


    Bang!


    Only a few minutester, Qing Yi''s expression was filled with pain as her core fully broke apart. However, the pain onlysted for a split second, as it all disappeared the moment a small nascent soul appeared at the centre of her dantian following her core being broken.


    The newly born nascent soul was so small and weak that it looked like a small wind could blow it away, but at the same time, a terrifying aura could clearly be felt from within the depths of this small and seemingly weak nascent soul.


    Swish~


    Knowing that the Cloud Tribtion, that she had seen Chu Yang go through after he had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm, would soon descend, Qing Yi used the limited time she had left to observe the appearance of her nascent soul.


    Gazing upon her nascent soul, Qing Yi could not help feeling awestruck by its beauty. Different from an ordinary nascent soul, her nascent soul shone like a bright me, making it look like a small human shaped sun had appeared in the middle of her dantian. Not only that, but she could clearly feel that her innate divine physique had strengthened following the birth of her nascent soul.


    If she had been at the early stage of the Small Sun Realm of her divine physique before this, she had now managed to reach the middle stage of the Small Sun Realm!


    Although this could only be considered an increase by a minor realm, Qing Yi could clearly feel that the strength of her body had increased by several times and at the same time, her connection to the Dao of Fire seemed to have be even stronger than before!


    RUMBLE~!


    Just at this moment, a loud rumbling sound echoed out across the small valley, causing Qing Yi to turn her attention away from her nascent soul and on to therge cloud filled with lightning that had rapidly began to gather above her. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Different from the ordinary bronze, silver and gold coloured cloud tribtions, the one gathering above her was made up of all kinds of different coloured clouds that gathered together into a single massive rainbow coloured cloud that shed with all kinds of different coloured lightning.


    "Looks like I will also have to endure a special cloud tribtion like Chu Yang¡­" Smiling wryly to herself as she said this while looking up at the rainbow coloured cloud that was growingrger andrger above her, Qing Yi began preparing herself for the cloud tribtion to descend.


    BOOOOOM-!


    Not giving her more than a few seconds to prepare after it had finished absorbing all of the different coloured clouds, a loud p of thunder echoed through the surroundings as a rainbow coloured bolt of lighting descended towards Qing Yi sitting on the ground below.


    "Ahhh-!"


    Like what had happened to Chu Yang when he had been faced with his cloud tribtion, Qing Yi could only let out a painful cry as she felt her entire body being ripped apart by the powerful lightning. The only difference between her and Chu Yang, was the fact that her body was in a slightly better state due to her powerful innate divine physique¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Not waiting for Qing Yi to recover, the rainbow coloured cloud floating in the air above her rapidly descended towards her while at the same time shrinking down to the size of her head before forcefully entering her body before appearing directly in front of her newly born nascent soul-


    "Ahh-!"


    Not wasting a single second before it started the process of merging together with her nascent soul, Qing Yi soon felt the soul tearing pain from the small rainbow coloured cloud that had now shrunk down to the size of an apple merging together with her nascent soul.


    However, this was only the beginning, as part of the rainbow-coloured cloud split off and transformed into arge sea of energy that rapidly filled up her dantian before spreading to the rest of her body to begin the process of refining her body from that of a Core Formation Realm cultivator into that of a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator.


    "AAAAAHHHHH-!"


    Of course, the pain brought about by this transformation only made it worse, causing Qing Yi to let out a pain filled scream at the increase in pain from having her body forcefully reconstructed by the energy from the rainbow cloud. Even worse, the pain only increased due to the fact that her body was far stronger than Chu Yang''s when he had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm. Making the energy coursing through her meridians from her dantian spend far longer time between each reconstruction.

 Chapter 816 Qing Yi’s Tribulation, Hidden Main Quest

    "So powerful¡­" Unconsciously whispering this to himself as he saw the rainbow-coloured lightning hitting Qing Yi before the cloud shrunk down and forcefully began merging together with her nascent soul, Chu Yang could not help feeling a hint of surprise upon sensing the strength of the rainbow coloured lightning that had been formed by Qing Yi''s cloud tribtion.


    Although it was not by much, Chu Yang was certain that the power of Qing Yi''s cloud tribtion was above that one the one he had endured¡­ Yet, she had not suffered near the same level of damage that he had when struck by the lightning from her cloud tribtion. Only when the cloud floating above her shrunk down and began the process of merging together with her nascent soul did he realize just how powerful Qing Yi''s physical body was whenpared to his own when he had been in the Core Formation Realm.


    Keeping in mind that one''s body would get forcefully reconstructed and strengthened even further during the process of one''s nascent soul merging together with the cloud from the cloud tribtion, Chu Yang had a feeling that having a stronger physical body than normal would not always be something positive. After all, the pain one would have to endure would be far more unbearable-


    "Aaaahhhh-!"


    The pain filled scream echoing out across the small, isted valleying from Qing Yi, was more than enough to prove this¡­


    I hope she can make it¡­


    Unknowingly starting to get worried as he saw how much pain Qing Yi was experiencing, Chu Yang silently prayed that she would be able to ovee the process of her nascent soul and the cloud from the cloud tribtion merging and sessfully reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    BOOOM-!


    After a few more minutes passed with Qing Yi''s struggling to keep herself conscious under the extreme pain brought along by both the tribtion cloud merging together with her nascent soul and the pain brought by her body being reconstructed over and over again, the cloud tribtion officially came to an end as a terrifying aura belonging to a Nascent Soul Realm Expert erupted from Qing Yi sitting at the centre of the small, isted valley.


    Rumble~!


    Given that she had just broken through, Qing Yi had not yet had enough time to fully familiarise herself with her new powers. For this reason, the area a few hundred meters around her was destroyed by her rampaging energy. Instantly proving why she had chosen to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm inside a small, isted valley away from the sect instead of breaking through inside the sect.


    ¡­


    I finally managed to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm. Now I won''t be behind Chu Yang any longer!


    Feeling the power that was flowing through her entire body after the tribtion cloud fully merged with her nascent soul, Qing Yi could not help thinking this to herself as a happy smile appeared on her face when thinking that she had finally managed to catch up to Chu Yang who had reached the Nascent Soul Realm before her... Not realizing just how much damage her currentck of control over her newfound strength was causing to the area around her.


    Crack~


    Bang!


    "Ouch! W-what was- A tree¡­?"


    It was only when a cliff nearby was damaged by her ramping energy, causing a small tree located on top of said cliff to fall down andnd directly on top of her head before her rampaging energy could destroy it, that she realized just how much damage herck of control over her newfound power had caused to the small valley.


    Whoosh~


    Understanding that the small valley would suffer even more if she didn''t start to try and control her rampaging energy, Qing Yi ignored the tree that had fallen on top of her head and focused on trying to adapt to her newfound power.


    Even if she had reached the Nascent Soul Realm, she still needed some time to solidify her foundation after having broken through. Only when she had done this could her break through be considered to have finished¡­ But all things considered, she had already managed to make it through the most dangerous part and would not be at risk of failing any longer. All she needed at this point was time!


    ¡­ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Hm? Qing Yi broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm?" Coming to a stop mid-air above a small city only a few hours after having left Xu Bao and the other elders from the independent sects to start his journey back home, Xuan Hao could not help looking at the system notification that had suddenly appeared in front of him out of nowhere.


    [Hidden Main Quest: Have two disciples reach the Nascent Soul Realm. plete)]


    [Reward: 5% of host''s physique is awakened, Random Teleportation Talisman (Ewaria Continent).]


    Although he did expect for Qing Yi to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm during the time he was gone, he did not expect to get a reward from the system after she broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm. After all, he already had one disciple who had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm and with the Core Formation Realm and the realms below, it only gave out a reward for the first disciple that managed to break through.


    Maybe it''s because it''s more difficult to reach the Nascent Soul Realm whenpared to the Core Formation Realm. After all, when looking across the Sky Empire, Core Formation Realm Experts are plentiful even at the border of the empire. Nascent Soul Realm Experts on the other hand are the peak of power on the border of the Sky Empire. Even in the core region of the Sky Empire, Nascent Soul Realm Experts still have a certain degree of status¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help ncing down towards the small city below him. Not a single Domain Lord Realm Expert was present inside that city and the strongest expert was a Nascent Soul Realm Expert that had reached the Peak of the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Inside the core region of the Sky Empire, cities like these were the mostmon and could be found almost everywhere.


    Of course¡­ Due to this, it was also rathermon for these small cities to be affiliated with arger kingdom or one of the three churches. After all, arge portion of the Sky Empires poption lived inside these small cities that were scattered all across the territory of the Sky Empire.


    Turning his attention away from the small city below that was teeming with life, Xuan Hao focused his attention back on to the system notification.


    [Redeem Reward: Y/N]


    Yes.


    Not wasting any time, he directly redeemed the reward. Instantly feeling some unknown power appearing out of nowhere as it rapidly began coursing through his meridian before starting to temper and refine his body from inside out. Bringing the awakening percentage of his physique up from 20 to 25!


    The improvement might not have been a lot whenpared to what he got in the past, but Xuan Hao could still clearly feel that his strength had improved. Not only that, but he also felt his connection to the space around him had increased even further. Allowing him to not only utilize the Drifting Cloud Steps with far more ease, but also improve his speed atprehending the Dao of Space.


    Spatial maniption was something that everyone who reached the Domain Lord Realm would be capable of to a certain degree and it required a basic understanding of the Dao of Space that everyone who reached the Domain Lord Realm would get after breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although this understanding of the dao of space was something everyone breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm would acquire, it was far from enough to give them any true understanding on the Dao of Space. Only if they truly tried toprehend the Dao of Space would they be able to utilize it inbat and incorporate it into their own domain.


    The Empty Void ability that he had gained from awakening part of his special physique could be considered a way to use the Dao of Space to cause space to partially copse in a given area¡­ Of course, Xuan Hao did not really have the ability to do this due to hisprehension of the Dao of Space, but merely relied on his Divine Void Eyes to do this¡­


    "But¡­ What is this Random Teleportation Talisman¡­?" Having adjusted to his newfound strength and increased perception of the Dao of Space, Xuan Hao looked down towards the small inconspicuous talisman that had appeared in his hand.


    For some odd reason, Xuan Hao had a feeling that activating the talisman would not be a good idea, the word random in the title of the talisman and the Ewaria Continent on the back of it was more than enough for him to realize that the talisman was very likely to teleport him somewhere random on the Ewaria Continent. Possibly even the home of some terrifying demon beast that had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm¡­

 Chapter 817 Traitor Among The Independent Sects

    Deciding not to use the Random Teleportation Talisman, Xuan Hao carefully ced it inside his interspatial ring. Afraid that he would end up identally activating the talisman and end up getting send into a dangerous location on the Ewaria Continent.


    "That was far more nerve wracking than I expected..." Letting out a sigh as he said this after safely having put away the teleportation talisman, Xuan Hao did not stay around for much longer before resuming his journey back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    The small city below was unfortunately not in the same peaceful state of mind that Xuan Hao currently found himself in. Instead, all of them were looking up towards the air where Xuan Hao had been standing just a moment ago filled with fear.


    "J-just who was that terrifying expert that appeared above the city just now? Even the cardinal who has reached the Soul Ascension Realm is not that terrifying!" Even the Peak Eighth Stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert in control of the small city was no different, as he muttered quietly muttered this to himself while staring up at the empty spot in the sky where Xuan Hao was only a few seconds earlier.


    The reason for all of this, was that when Xuan Ha had redeemed the system reward and allowed it to improve his physique, it had unknowingly caused the inherent aura of the physique to leak out in the surroundings. Terrifying everyone in the city below him who suddenly felt petrified and unable to move when faced with the terrifying aura belonging to Xuan Hao''s special physique.


    "I-I have to inform one of the Archbishops, no, the Cardinal, about this!" Feeling that something big was about to happen in the Sky Empire due to the terrifying existence that had suddenly appeared above his small city for a short moment, the Peak Eighth Stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert did not dare hide this as he quickly left the small city. Leaving in the direction of the capital city as quickly as possible.


    Even if it would be hard for him to meet with someone like a Cardinal given his strength, he still understood that if he did not try, he would end up dead when the Cardinal ended up finding out in the future and learnt that he had note to inform him!


    Of course, all of this happening was unknown to Xuan Hao, as he had not discovered the fact that the aura belonging to his special physique had leaked out when he redeemed the reward from the system. Having been far too focused on the sudden increase in strength andprehension he had experienced after the improvement had finished.


    ...


    A few days after Xuan Hao had unknowingly caused an uproar in one of the small cities under one of the three religions, Xu Bao and the group of elders and disciples from the other independent sects came to a stop in a small opening.


    "I think some of the major sects are chasing after us, looking for an opportunity to strike the moment we split up to return to our own sects."


    "Senior Xu... Are you sure about this? If the major sects really followed us all the way out here, it will be quite hard for us to deal with them if they don''t first show themselves."


    "Yes... Unfortunately, the chances for us being followed is rather high from the few signs I could pick up, I think the best way for us to deal with is for me and Elder Scarlet me to stay behind and dy them for some time while the rest returns to their sects. Even if it gets dangerous, it should still be rather easy for both me and Elder Scarlet me to escape from them if we want to." Nodding his head as he said this, Xu Bao looked towards Elder Scarlet me to see his response.


    "I understand, I will be more than happy to stay behind and buy them a bit of time..." Understanding that this would be the only way that the disciples and the elders from the weaker independent sects that had only reached the Nascent Soul Realm to get back to their sects safely, Elder Scarlet me didn''t hesitate in agreeing in what Xu Bao said.


    No matter how dangerous it was for him to fight with the Domain Lords from the major sects, he understood that he would be able to escape safely due to hisrge number of escape techniques that would even render a Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert helpless in catching him!


    As for Xu Bao getting out safely, Elder Scarlet me understood far better than anyone present just how strong this old man was, even if an Eighth Stage Domain Lord showed up, Elder Scarlet me doubted that it would be enough to deal with him.


    The older the cultivator, the more trump cards they would have... And with this in mind, Xu Bao had already lived for several thousand years and could be considered an old monster that had countless trump cards up his sleeve. Dealing with someone like this was not something anyone wanted to do if it was possible to avoid. This was also one of the reasons why the major sects had not dared to group up to try and kill Xu Bao...


    "We understand... I will make sure everyone gets back to their sects safely, Elder Scarlet me, Senior Xu, thank you for your help once again!" Knowing that it was best not to waste any time, one of the remaining Domain Lords stepped forward and said this before starting to leave while caring part of the Nascent Soul Realm elders and disciples present together with him. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Considering how long the major sects and the independent sects had been fighting with each other, this was far from the first time something like this had happened... And Xu Bao would normally always be the person who stayed behind to make sure that the major sects wouldn''t be able to do anything.


    Although, different from the past, the number of experts from the major sects present this time around was sure to be far morepared to the past.


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Following the first Domain Lord taking the lead to leave first, the rest of the Domain Lords did not waste any time, as they all carried a group of people with them before leaving. Not forgetting to thank both Xu Bao and Elder Scarlet me for staying behind to ensure their safety first.


    "Looks like it''s just us two now... I really wish that senior was still around, it would be far easier for us to deal with the major sects if that was the case..."


    "Indeed, it would be far easier for us to deal with the major sects if that was the case, but the reason why they showed up now is likely due to the fact that they found out that senior is no longer travelling together with us... But... Considering how strong senior is, I don''t think they would have been able to observe us from afar without getting discovered by senior and they should know about this as well..."


    "Wait- Do you mean-"


    "Yes... I think there is a traitor among the independent sects, someone informed the major sects about the fact that senior left. If I''m not wrong, this traitor should most likely be someone from the Stone Horn Sect..."


    "This..." Not knowing what to say after hearing what Xu Bao said, Elder Scarlet me could not help being filled with killing intent upon thinking about the fact that someone among the independent sects had turned on them and secretly provided the major sects with crucial information that could severely harm all of the independent sects.


    Even if he understood that the culprit was most likely not the entirety of the Stone Heart Sect but only a few people or maybe only a single person from the Stone Heart Sect. Part of him still wanted to catch up with the people from the Stone Horn Sect and find out just who the traitor among them was... But in the end, he understood that this would be useless. The major sects already knew about their current situation and location. Killing a traitor would at most bring a short moment of happiness before the major sects showed up to ruin that moment.


    For now, Elder Scarlet me understood that staying behind to stop these major sects was far more important than catching the traitor hidden among the Stone Horn Sect''s people.


    Thinking about it, Xu Bao had already understood this fact far earlier than him, but had still decided not to mention anything about a traitor to the rest of the independent sects.


    He most likely already has an idea as to who the traitor is and at the same time also has a way to deal with the major sects that are chasing us.


    Shaking his head as this thought appeared, Elder Scarlet me could not help smiling wryly as he suddenly understood that the major sects were very likely about to enter a trap...

 Chapter 818 Cornered

    "They are here... " Hearing Xu Bao suddenly say this after having waited around for close to half an hour, Elder Scarlet me could not help turning in the direction that Xu Bao was looking in with a somewhat nervous expression on his face. Even if he trusted that Xu Bao had everything under control and should be more than capable of dealing with whatever the major sects had nned, he could still not stop himself from getting nervous upon seeing close to a dozen Domain Lords suddenly appearing in the distance. Especially when he realized that the weakest among them having reached the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm like him!


    "All of them are above the early stages of the Domain Lord Realm... Looks like the major sects really want to deal with us this time around..." Not knowing what else to say when faced with such a powerful lineup, Elder Scarlet me could not help turning towards Xu Bao. Curious how the old man nned to deal with therge number of powerful Domain Lords from the major sects.


    "Never expected for them to send out so many, there is even three of them in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm... Elder Scarlet me, let''s get out of here, there is no way for us to fight with all of them at once!"


    "Huh!? Wai-!"


    Swish-!


    Not even having the time to say anything in response to what Xu Bao said, Elder Scarlet me suddenly felt himself getting dragged into the opposite direction of the dozen or so Domain Lord Realm Experts from the major sects. At the same time, Elder Scarlet me also realized that the Domain Lords from the major sects used their movement techniques to chase after them without dy.


    This... This was not a part of Senior Xu''s n...?


    As these thought passed through his head while being dragged along by Xu Bao, Elder Scarlet me could not help feeling nervous while looking at therge number of powerful Domain Lords chasing after them.


    Although he would be confident in escaping from a Seventh Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert, he would not be able to escape if he ended up getting surrounded by a group of Domain Lords equal to him in strength as some of his methods of escaping only worked against a single person...


    "Hm? T-this-!?" Just at this moment, Elder Scarlet me could not help opening his mouth in surprise as he suddenly saw a terrifying energy attack approaching them from the front. Even without knowing where the attack hade from, it was obvious that the power behind it had far surpassed the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and should have already reached the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Hmph! To think one of those people decided to leave the capital city to ambush us... Are they not afraid of the imperial city finding out about this!?" Different from Elder Scarlet me who was shocked by the sudden attack, Xu Bao did not seem too surprised as he threw out a small talisman in the direction of the iing attack.


    Whoosh-!


    Activating just before the iing attack reached them, the talisman formed a massive shield-


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    Completely isting them from the devastating power of the energy attack that erupted the moment it hit the shield formed by the talisman.


    "This- Seventh Stage Domain Lord!?" Realizing the strength behind the attack after seeing it erupt firsthand, Elder Scarlet me could not help shivering as he suddenly felt less confident in being able to escape from someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Elder Scarlet me, you should escape from here as quick as possible. If I''m not wrong, their target should be me."


    "Senor Xu!? I... Even if I''m not as strong as you, I''m still more than capable of holding off against one of their Sixth Stage Domain Lords by myself for some time!" Hearing what Xu Bao said, Elder Scarlet me could not help freezing for a short moment before saying this. No matter what, there was no way he would just leave Xu Bao behind to fend for himself against close to a dozen Domain Lords, one Seventh Stage Domain Lord and possibly even more hiding somewhere nearby for an opportunity to attack.


    "Stay behind? Hold off one of them? Haha, no need to worry that much about me, to be honest, this is not the first time they tried to kill me off like this, all I have to do, is avoid them until someone from the imperial family shows up to intimidate them." Chuckling a bit upon hearing what Elder Scarlet me said, Xu Bao reassured Elder Scarlet me before a somewhat odd expression appeared on his face. "Not to mention, who says I''m the one at a disadvantage?"<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    "This... You already knew about the appearance of the people behind the major sects..." Muttering this to himself in a tone of disbelief, Elder Scarlet me could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine. From the looks of it, the major sects and their backers were indeed about to fall into a trap set up by Xu Bao like he had first expected.


    If that is the case, I should get out of the way so Senior Xu can fight without having to worry about me...


    Swish-!


    Understanding that it would be best for him to leave, Elder Scarlet me didn''t stay for a second longer. Directly using one of his many escape methods to turn into a sphere of light that rapidly flew past the Domain Lords from the major sects before disappearing in the distance. The main reason the escape was so smooth being that none of the Domain Lords attempted to stop him. Making it even more obvious that their sole target was Xu Bao.


    ...


    Elder Scarlet me should have managed to get far enough away by now... Hah... These people never do give up on trying to target me. Two... No three of them showed up this time around? How did so many of them manage to sneak out without the imperial family noticing, is the situation with the three religions really getting that bad?


    Normally, dying until the imperial family shows up would be fine... But if the three religions are interfering with the matter to possibly weaken the newly established sect alliance, I fear they won''t show up in time.


    Watching as Elder Scarlet me disappeared in the distance, Xu Bao silently thought about this while observing an old man that had appeared in front of him along with two simrly strong auras that had appeared on either side of him to block his path of escape.


    At first he had only thought a single expert in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm were following them. Now that he discovered that there was three of them, Xu Bao understood that there would be no way for him to escape with his current strength.


    No matter how many trump cards he had up his sleeve, escaping from the encirclement of three Seventh Stage Domain Lords working together with close to a dozen Domain Lords that had at least reached the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. The reason he had hinted at having a n to Elder Scarlet me was just so he would be able to get out of this encirclement alive while there was still time...


    "Xu Bao, there is no way out for you this time around! Even if we have to bear the wrath of the imperial family for killing a Domain Lord that is part of the Sky Empire in the future, we will make sure that your independent sects won''t ever be able to nurture anyone close to the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in the future, let alone someone as powerful as you!" Closing in on him as he said this, one of the Seventh Stage Domain Lords smiled with pride upon mentioning how the independent sects would lose their main support for being a rtively powerful force in the core region of the Sky Empire.


    "Hmph! Have you forgotten about the ancestor from the Stone Ridge Sect!? Even if you kill me today, the independent sects will still have someone even powerful than me backing them up!"


    "Hah? That old ancestor? Don''t think I don''t know how old he is, he won''t be around for more than a hundred years. Maybe he won''t evenst for fifty!" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "..."


    Listening to the old Seventh Stage Domain Lord, Xu Bao could not help silently cursing the fact that Xuan Hao had chosen an identity that would be so close to death ording to the natural lifespan of a Domain Lord.


    I hope senior managed to get my message in time...


    Knowing that there was nothing more for him to do, Xu Bao could only silently pray that Xuan Hao had gotten the message he had sent to him through hismunication talisman the moment he found out that the backers of the major sects hade out in person to try and kill him.

 Chapter 819 No Chance Of Escape

    This... To think that I wouldn''t notice that the major sects were actually chasing after us back when we left the capital city¡­


    Looking down at hismunication talisman after having learnt about the fact that Xu Bao had ended up getting surrounded by arge number of Domain Lord Realm Experts along with three who had reached the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could not help feeling surprised at the fact that he hadn''t noticed them following them before he had left.


    It had to be known that his divine sense covered an area several timesrger than that of a normal Domain Lord Realm Expert at the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. All things considered, if anyone had been secretly following them from behind, he should have been able to notice them during the sweep he did of the area around them with his divine sense before leaving them to start making his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    "I don''t have much time to waste if I want to safe Xu Bao¡­" Understanding very well that the independent sects would be of no use to the Star Shattering Sect if their strongest backer ended up dying, Xuan Hao did not waste any time before turning around to start moving in the direction of where Xu Bao had told him he had been surrounded.


    Swish-!


    However, even if his speed was far faster than that of a normal Domain Lord in the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, it had still been several days since he parted ways with Xu Bao and the rest of the independent sects. Even if he used the Drifting Cloud Steps at its full potential at, it would still take him two or three days before he could reach the location where Xu Bao had been surrounded.


    For now, all he could do was hope that Xu Bao would be able to hold on until he could reach him.


    ¡­


    BANG!


    "Aaaah!" Letting out a painful scream as he felt himself getting knocked flying into a nearby mountain by one of the Seventh Stage Domain Lords, Xu Bao could not help feeling regretful that he didn''t ask Xuan Hao to stay behind for a few more days after they had left the capital city.


    Although he did have his suspicions that there might be a traitor among the people from the Stone Horn Sect or the Tree Flower Sect after what had happened to their disciples, he had never expected that the traitor in question would be someone among the people who had gone to the capital city!


    Whoosh~


    As Xu Bao was struggling to get his badly damaged body up again, one of the Seventh Stage Domain Lords approached him with an arrogant smile on his face. "Haha! Old man! How much longer do you think you can escape? Don''t think that the imperial family will suddenly show up to rescue you this time around, they are far too busy to show up anytime soon!"


    "You-"


    "Hehe, now just die old man, we will make sure to take care of your sect and the rest of the independent sectster!" Interrupting Xu Bao before he had a chance to say anything, the arrogant Domain Lord floating above him directly gathered all of his power together in a single powerful attack before sending it down towards him.


    BOOM-!


    Barely managing to get up in time to defend against the iing attack, Xu Bao soon found himself standing in the middle of a massive crater that had appeared beneath him. The mountain he had been on just a second earlier had beenpletely destroyed by the terrifying attack of the Seventh Stage Domain Lord floating in the air above him.


    I won''t be able to hold on for much longer like this¡­


    Understanding that he wouldn''t be able to keep fighting back any longer if things continued like this with him passively getting beaten up, Xu Bao thought about trying to escape like he had done when he had first been surrounded.


    Although he had been injured back then and had been forced to use a powerful lifesaving artifact, he had spent a long time getting his hands on when he had been younger, it had still allowed him to escape for close to a day before they had managed to catch up with him again. Compared to thest day he had spent on getting beaten up while desperately using all kinds of different artifacts and other lifesaving tools to keep himself alive, Xu Bao far preferred the time he had spent running away.


    The only problem, there was no way that the one floating above him or the rest hiding not far away would give him the chance-


    BOOOOOOOOM-!


    Just at this moment, a terrifying sound echoed through the surroundings before a shockwave of energy passed over them from afar, tearing apart the ground and scattering debris in all directions. Catching Xu Bao and the rest of the Domain Lords present by surprise before all of them turned to look towards the location of the shockwave.


    In the distance, two people could be seen shing with each other, one could be seen unleashing a barrage of devastating attacks while the other defended without allowing a single attack tond. The sound of their battle alone was more than enough to send shivers running down the spine of Xu Bao and the rest of the Domain Lords fearfully looking towards the source of the terrifying energy shockwave that had just passed over them.


    Even without getting any closer, they all understood that the people fighting in the distance were not in the Domain Lord Realm, they were Soul Ascension Realm cultivators!


    Boom-boom-boom!<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    "Wait¡­ Aren''t they getting closer¡­?" As the battle in the distance raged on, the Seventh Stage Domain Lord floating in the air above Xu Bao quietly muttered this to himself with a look of both shock and fear stered all over his face.


    "W-we need to get out of here! No matter what, there is no way for us to survive if we get involved in the battle between two Soul Ascension Realm Experts!"


    "But what about that old man Xu Bao?" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Do you perhaps want to stay and keep fighting?"


    Following what the Seventh Stage Domain Lord said, the rest of the Domain Lords in the distance all started panicking, some even directly disregarded everything and used all their strength to escape as quickly as possible.


    Swish-!


    Understanding that a chance like this would note again, Xu Bao used this opportunity to try and escape-


    Bang!


    But the Seventh stage Domain Lord in the air above him was not just going to let this happen, as he appeared in front of Xu Bao before knocking him back in the direction of the two fighting Soul Ascension Realm Experts. "Hmph! Think I would allow you to escape just because of this!? Even if I can''t kill you today, I will make sure you won''t be able to leave this ce alive! Brothers,e and help me!"


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Appearing beside the Seventh Stage Domain Lord floating in the air not far away from Xu Bao, the remaining two Seventh Stage Domain Lords both looked towards Xu Bao filled with killing intent.


    "Sure, but we need be quick, we don''t want to be caught up in whatever is happening between those two Soul Ascension Realm Experts. Especially when the imperial family shows up to deal with the matter¡­"


    "I understand, I don''t want to be around when more Soul Ascension Realm Experts start showing up either¡­"


    As the three Seventh Stage Domain Lords came to an agreement, they all gathered their power together beforeunching abined attack towards Xu Bao who had just gotten back up from the earlier attack.


    WHOOOSH~


    As the powerfulbined attack of three Seventh Stage Domain Lordsnded on him, Xu Bao used everything at his disposal to fend off against the terrifying power-


    BOOOOOOM-!


    "Aaaaaah-!"


    But in the end, there was no way for him to fend off against the terrifyingbined attack. All he could do was watch as arge part of his body was destroyed by the energy before he was knocked in the direction of the battle between the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    They want to borrow the power of the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts fighting to kill me off¡­


    Not having to be a genius to figure out what the three Seventh Stage Domain Lords wanted to do, Xu Bao could not help silently cursing as he understood that his chances of getting out alive had disappeared.


    As for escaping¡­ The current state of his body did not allow him to do this in the short term, he would need at least a few minutes to recover from the powerfulbined attack just now.


    No matter what kind of trump cards he might have left, none of them would be able to help him defend for that long against the terrifying shockwaves that would hit him when the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts got a little closer!


    As for where these Soul Ascension Realm Experts came from in the first ce? This was simply not something he had the time or luxury to think about in his current situation¡­

 Chapter 820 Rescue Xu Bao

    "This is...!?" Arriving not far away from the location where Xu Bao had informed him that he had been ambushed, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on the spot as he sensed the terrifying power of the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts fighting in the distance.


    Although he had only just entered the range of the shockwaves from the battle itself, he had a far easier time when it came to understanding the strength of the two people fighting in distance... But this only caused a look of fear to appear on his face. The reason for this, was that the people fighting were not someone who had just broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm like the Soul Ascension Realm Experts he had encountered during his time in Great Poison Swamp. Instead, their strength was closer to that of the ancestor of the Sky Empire he had seen in action once during the demonic cultivator incident...!


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine when he remembered this, Xuan Hao could not help wondering why these two terrifying Soul Ascension Realm Experts had suddenly appeared inside the Sky Empire.


    I shouldn''t think about this now! First, I need to find Xu Bao.


    Shaking his head as he looked away from the fight that was taking ce in the distance, Xuan Hao concentrated back on the reason he hade to such a dangerous ce in the first ce. Understanding that Xu Bao would not be able to survive for long in a ce where he had to endure the terrifying shockwaves produced by the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts fighting with his current cultivation realm.


    At the very least, because the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts were busy fighting with each other, they should not have enough time to pay attention to him.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any time, Xuan Hao slowly began searching the area around the battle between the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts with his divine senses for signs of Xu Bao.


    ...


    Looks like this is the end...


    Feeling how thest bit of energy coursing through his meridian was about to get exhausted, Xu Bao could not help thinking this as he gazed towards the small talisman floating in the air in front of him while giving off a gentle light that prevented the powerful shockwaves from the sh between the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts from reaching him.


    The talisman in question was Xu Bao''sst lifesaving measure and had already drained most of the energy that had been left in his body after being hit by thebined attack of the three Seventh Stage Domain Lords who had ambushed him together with the major sects just a short time ago.


    To be honest, Xu Bao had at first wanted to escape with his remaining energy instead of ending up in a situation where he could only wait for death, but the three who had ced him in this situation had also made sure that he would not be able to do this. Making sure to keep an eye on him until the terrifying energy from the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts cut off his path of escape and prevented him from moving from his location without ending up dead in the process.


    Now, if he wanted to escape, he would have to endure the onught of the shockwaves from the battle between the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts without the protection of the talisman floating in the air in front of him, the energy left in his body simply didn''t allow him to both escape from the area affected by the two soul Ascension Realm Experts and also keep the protection talisman floating in front of him active at the same time.


    I wonder if senior managed to get my message...


    Knowing that his time was running out, Xu Bao mindlessly thought about this as he gazed down towards themunication talismanying on the ground beside him all torn to shreds due to him extracting what little energy was present inside it to supply the protection talisman keeping him alive.


    "Xu Bao!"


    "Hm? Now I even seem to hear senior talking to me..."


    Suddenly hearing Xuan Hao''s voice as he felt himself drifting closer and closer to the eternal sleep that would inevitably engulf him if things continued in its current direction, Xu Bao could not help muttering this to himself as he looked up into the sky above him-


    "Ah!? Senior!?" Only after mindlessly looking into the sky above him did he discover that the voice he had heard earlier wasn''t something he had heard, and Xuan Hao was indeed present!


    "Sorry for this, but we have to get out of here as quickly as possible!"


    "What do you- Aaaaaaaah-!"


    Not having the time to react before he suddenly felt an unknown power grabbing hold of his body before lifting him into the air, Xu Bao suddenly felt the environment around him passing by at a speed that far exceeded hisprehension. Not a secondter, he found himself on top of a mountain far away from the fight between the two terrifying Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    "Hm? What happened to my body!? Why do I suddenly feel so full of energy!?" Havinge to a stop, Xu Bao suddenly noticed that not only had his surroundings changed, but the inside of his body that had been dried up just a second earlier had been filled up with energy once again.


    Although his body had not recovered, the energy inside his body would speed up his recovery and at the same time also allowed him to move around without fear of not being able to defend himself.


    "I injected part of my energy into your body just now. Although it won''t be able to recover the damage to your body, it should be able to help you return to your sect from here."


    Hearing Xuan Hao''s voice, Xu Bao could not help turning around with a helpless expression on his face. "This- Senior- I-I don''t know what to say..."


    "It''s fine, just remember to make sure that the Star Shattering Sect doesn''t end up getting any attention from any of the major powers of the Sky Empire like we originally agreed on. Although... Given what is happening over there, I don''t think I will have to worry about something like that happening for now..."


    "This- Indeed, with something this big happening in the Sky Empire, I doubt the imperial family will have time to focus their attention on the border region..." Understanding what Xuan Hao was referring to, Xu Bao could not help smiling wryly while looking in the direction of the fighting taking ce in the distance. Understanding that Xuan Hao was not going to ask him for something after saving him.


    At the same time, part of him could not help wondering just how strong Xuan Hao was.


    Given how he had been able to save him so smoothly so close to two Soul Ascension Realm Experts fighting with each other, Xu Bao spected that he should at the very least have reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. Maybe even the Soul Ascension realm!


    Thinking about how there was a chance that the person standing in front of him had reached the Soul Ascension Realm, Xu Bao could not help but be filled with both happiness and an unknown sense of safety knowing that the independent sects had managed to gain the support of a possible Soul Ascension Realm Expert. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    After all, inside the Sky Empire and across the Ewaria Continent, a person who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm could be considered to have reached the peak of power. No matter where they went, they would be considered someone that no one wanted to offend. Even the more powerful empires that stood above the Sky Empire, a Soul Ascension Realm Expert was still considered to be the peak of power... At the very least ording to what he knew...


    ...


    This... What is that old man thinking about?


    "You should get going, it won''t be safe here for long..." Feeling the weird gaze of Xu Bao, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what he was thinking about before saying this. Understanding very well that the fight taking ce in the distance would soon start to affect the mountain they were standing on top of.


    "Hm? Ah! Yes senior! I will get going now!" Nodding his head in understanding as he also saw the battle between the two powerful Soul Ascension Realm Experts growing closer and closer with each passing second, Xu Bao soon took his leave. Leaving Xuan Hao standing behind alone on top of the mountain.


    Now... Should I leave... Or stay and find out what all of this is about...?


    Remaining on top of the mountain as the fight in distance got closer, Xuan Hao could not help thinking this to himself. Part of him really wanted to find out what had caused these two powerful Soul Ascension Realm Experts to suddenly appear inside the Sky Empire...

 Chapter 821 Terrifying Ancestor Of The Imperial Family

    I don''t think it will hurt for me to watch from afar, as long as I don''t get too close, I should be able to keep myself safe with my current strength. Even if the ancestor from the imperial family shows up, I doubt he will have time to care about a Domain Lord Realm Expert like myself when faced with two equally powerful Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the process of fighting not too far away from the capital city...


    Havinge to a decision that it would properly be a good idea to stay behind and try to figure out where these two powerful Soul Ascension Realm Experts hade from, Xuan Hao remained on top of the lonely mountain while watching as the fight in the distance got closer and closer to him. Not too worried about getting targeted by any of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts due to his current strength only showing as someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    On the negative side, to make his current disguise more believable, he would be forced to retreat further back when the shockwaves from the fight grew too intense for someone in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to handle.


    Of course, this was only considering that his current disguise worked against the powerful Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the first ce-


    Whoosh-!


    Just at this moment, a terrifying aura equal, if not superior, to the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts fighting each other, appeared in the direction of the capital city. Momentarily causing the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts busy fighting with each other toe to an abrupt stop before both turned to look towards the origin of the terrifying aura. Even without seeing who the aura belonged to, it was not difficult to guess who the aura belonged to.


    "So, the old ancestor from the imperial family finally decided to show up." Turning to look in the direction of the terrifying aura like the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts, Xuan Hao could not help quietly muttering this as he saw an old man covered in an imperial garment floating in the air with a stern expression on his face.


    From a nce alone, it was easy to guess that he was less than pleased at the fact that two foreign Soul Ascension Realm Experts had decided to start fighting with each other inside his territory. Especially when considering the current precarious situation that existed between the imperial family and the three religions...


    "Hmph! How dare you two cause trouble inside my empire!"


    Swish-!


    Without warning, the ancestor from the imperial familyunched a powerful strike towards the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    "How dare you!? Do you think you can just show up and attack us like this!?"


    "Hmph! Overestimating your own abilities!"


    As the attack of the old ancestor from the imperial family approached them, the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts that had been fighting just a second earlier stood their ground before saying this. Not retreating as they prepared to take the attack of the imperial family''s ancestor head on.


    Observing the scene from afar, Xuan Hao could not help showing a hint of surprise after sensing the terrifying power contained inside the attack of the imperial family''s ancestor. Even if he had been no problem dealing with a Soul Ascension Realm Expert that had gone through a single tribtion, he understood that he would have no way to resist against a Soul Ascension Realm Expert like the ancestor of the imperial family who had gone through four tribtions. Faced with someone like that, the only option for him would be to escape...


    Rumble-!


    Finishing his train of thought, the sounding area was bathed in a blinding light as the attack reached the two foreign Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    BOOM-!


    The ground trembled violently, as cracks the size of canyons formed around the centre of the impact, and the air was filled with the deafening roar of the wind-


    BOOOOOOM-!


    As the attack reached its peak, the ground erupted in a massive explosion. The shockwave from the attack spread outwards, obliterating everything in its path. In an instant, entire mountains and forests were erased around the ce where the two foreign Soul Ascension Realm Experts were standing!


    "This... Is the old ancestor of the imperial family really someone who has only gone through four tribtions...?" Feeling the shockwave carrying the remnant power of the attack wash over him, Xuan Hao could not feel a shiver run down his spine as he looked towards the old ancestor from the imperial family. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    The force of the attack was beyond anything he had ever seen before if he didn''t count what he had seen through the ancient book. Even whenpared to the more powerful Soul Ascension Realm Experts he had seen in action through the ancient book, the old ancestor from the imperial family did not seem tock that far behind!


    Whoosh~


    As the dust settled and the two foreign Soul Ascension Realm Experts came inro view, Xuan Hao did not have to inspect them closely to understand that they had been seriously wounded by the attack just now. Not only that, but the way they looked towards the ancestor from the imperial family had clearly changedpared to before.


    For a short time, an odd silence descended upon the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts that were locked in an intense staringpetition with each other following the attack just now. None of them making a move.


    "Y-you are not someone who has only gone through four tribtions!" Interrupting the odd silence that had fallen after the dust had settled, one of the foreign Soul Ascension Realm Experts bit his teeth together with a slightly fearful expression on his face as he said this while looking towards the ancestor of the imperial family.


    "Oh? You already knew about me, yet still decided toe to my empire to fight it out with your little friend? Not to mention fighting in the border region of my empire by ident, but you decided to sneak into the core of my empire a short distance away from my capital city to start your little fight. If I didn''t know better, I would think you were trying to set up an ambush for me... But this isn''t the case... Right?"


    "This... Of course not, senior, these two juniors will take their leave now!" Freezing up on the spot as a panicked expression appeared on his face for a short moment following what the old ancestor from the imperial family said, the foreign Soul Ascension Realm quickly turned around before leaving without waiting for his response. Not daring to stay for even a second longer after having faced the terrifying attack just now.


    "What about you? Are you going to leave as well?" Seeing that one of the foreign Soul Ascension Realm Experts had turned his tail and fled at a speed that even surprised him to some degree, the old ancestor of the imperial family looked towards thest remaining foreign Soul Ascension Realm Expert.


    "I will be taking my leave..."


    Swish~!


    Knowing that it would not be wise to stay any longer, thest remaining Soul Ascension Realm Expert also took his leave in the same direction that the first had left in.


    "Hmph! Those people are getting more and more bold with each passing day..." Quietly muttering this just barely loud enough for Xuan Hao to hear from where he was standing, the old ancestor from the imperial family made his way back towards the capital city. Disappearing from the ce as fast as he had shown up.


    "..."


    Left behind with only the destruction caused by the powerful attack just now to hold himpany, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say about the short yet destructive battle he had just witnessed.


    From the little information he had managed to gather and from what the three people involved had said during the short confrontation, it was rather obvious that the fight just now had just been a ruse to get the ancestor of the imperial family to leave the capital city where his guardian formation was in ce and ambush him.


    How they were going to do this, Xuan Hao had no idea, nor did he have any idea what power these two terrifying Soul Ascension Realm Experts belonged to... But then again, an obvious choice for where they hade from would be the three religions. After all, they were in essence only branches of a muchrger religion that was spread throughout the entire Ewaria Continent.


    Considering this, it would not be too odd if these powerful religions decided to send some of their more powerful experts over to deal with the old ancestor from the imperial family that was currently posing a threat to their presence inside the Sky Empire.


    Looks like things are going to get far more chaotic after this...


    Understanding this, Xuan Hao also understood that his time in the core region of the Sky Empire was over. Staying any longer was bound to get him involved in something troublesome...

 Chapter 822 Proud Elder Scarlet Flame...!

    "That damnable old man is far stronger than what we were told about! Not to mention, now that he has some idea about the fact that we are targeting him, the chances of getting him to leave his capital protected by his guardian formation is close to none! How in the world are we supposed to do anything to him in such a situation... Hah... It looks like we will have to inform an exalted pope if we want to ensure a continued flow of faith from the Sky Empire..." At the same time Xuan Hao was making his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect, one of the two foreign Soul Ascension Realm Experts that had been chased away by the ancestor of the imperial family was filled with anger as he said this.


    The two foreign Soul Ascension Realm Experts had indeed nned to ambush him like the ancestor from the imperial family had guessed. Not only that, but they had indeed also been from one of the three religions like he had suspected.


    "Involving an exalted pope!? Are you crazy!? Do you really think an exalted pope would care about a small Sky Empire located outside the core of the continent...?" Beside the angry Soul Ascension Realm Expert, the other Soul Ascension Realm Expert could not help eximing loudly with a shocked expression on his face upon hearing an exalted pope being casually brought up.


    "This... Indeed... Looks like we will have to find another way to deal with that old man from the imperial family. Maybe the other two would be interested in joining in. After all, it not only affects our flow of faith, but also their flow of fate...!" Understanding how difficult it was to get a pope to move, the other Soul Ascension Realm Expert quickly changed his approach as he brought up the remaining two religions that had yet to take action to deal with the imperial family.


    "Hm... Good idea. Considering how they would also be affected if the imperial family ended up destroying their branches in the Sky Empire, it is indeed usible that we can convince them to work together to deal with the ancestor from the imperial family. Even if the old man from the imperial family is powerful and has managed to go through five or six tribtions, I doubt he will be able to fight abined force of six Soul Ascension Realm Experts that have gone through four tribtions!" Nodding his head in agreement after thinking about the matter for a short moment, the other Soul Ascension Realm Expert agreed that working together with the other two religions was a good idea.


    "Great! Then let''s get going and find them beforeing out with a way to get that old man to leave the capital city again!" Feeling a wave of excitement after hearing the agreement, the other Soul Ascension Realm Expert didn''t waste any time before pulling out amunication talisman to get in contact with the experts from the other two religions.


    "..."


    Not saying anything upon seeing how excited his friend was to get back at the ancestor from the imperial family, the more cautious among the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts decided to just remain silent for now. Part of him understood that the reason for his friend''s behavior was not only because they were about to lose their branch inside the Sky Empire, but instead because of how he had been sent running by the ancestor of the imperial family a short time ago.


    Although the injuries they had received would heal within a few hours due to the powerful healing ability of the divine power from their god coursing through their bodies, the humiliation of being beaten up and sent running in a single attack, was not something that his friend was willing to endure. To be honest, deep down, he also wanted to get back at the ancestor from the imperial family!


    ...


    "To think I managed to survive..." After Xuan Hao left him and he began making his way towards the direction that the group of elders and disciples from the different independent sects had gone in, Xu Bao could not help letting out a quiet sigh as he muttered this to himself.


    If not for the fact that Xuan Hao had shown up just in time to save him back there, he doubted that he would have been able to make it out alive. Even if he noticed that the fighting hade to a stop shortly after he had left the area, he also understood that there was a chance for the people who had ambushed him would return to check on whether or not he died.


    Considering that he would have spent all of his energy trying to survive the terrifying shockwaves from the battle between the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts, he would have no way to defend himself and would only be able to motionlessly wait for them to kill him...


    "Hm? What are they doing stopping here!?" Spotting the group of independent sects appearing in the distance, Xu Bao could not help quietly muttering this to himself as surprised expression appeared on his face after realizing that they hade to a stop not too far away from the ce where he and Elder Scarlet me had first confronted the ambush by the major sects and their backers.


    Given how he and Elder Scarlet me had both risked their lives to buy time for them to escape, Xu Bao could not help feeling that something was wrong after spotting them having stopped only a short distance away from where he and Elder Scarlet me had split off from them.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any time after realizing something was wrong, Xu Bao directly flew forward beforending a short distance away from the small camp that had been set up by the independent sects-


    "Everyone! Look! Senior Xu is back!" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Senior Xu is back? Haha, those major sects have nothing on us independent sects!"


    "Senior Xu!? To think even thebined forces of the major sects can''t do anything... Senior Xu is truly powerful!"


    Not even a second after hended on the ground, the other Domain Lords present spotted him before calling out with joy upon seeing him return alive.


    "What happened, why are all of you here? Didn''t I tell you to escape while me and Elder Scarlet me held back the major sects!?" Narrowing both of his eyes as he said this, Xu Bao stared directly at the elder that hade forward first to greet him.


    . "Senior, it''s not that we don''t want to leave... It''s just that Elder Scarlet me stopped us from leaving after he returned and told us to wait for you..." Feeling Xu Bao focusing his attention on him, a shiver ran down the elder''s spine as he quickly said this before pointing towards Elder Scarlet me who was standing a bit further away.


    "Hm? Elder Scarlet me did?"


    "He is telling the truth; it was Elder Scarlet me that stopped us from leaving."


    "Yeah, it was indeed Elder Scarlet me! All of us wanted to escape, but he forced us to stay and wait for you to return!"


    "Indeed, Elder Scarlet me returned shortly after you two went off to stop the Domain Lords from the major sects and told us that everything was going ording to n and we just had to wait for your return, he even told us that everything had already been predicted by you and was under control...!"


    Hearing what the elders around him said, Xu Bao had no idea whether tough or cry as he looked towards Elder Scarlet me smiling proudly towards him while giving a small thumps up like he had done a good job at stopping the group of elders from the different independent sects from leaving.


    "What do you- Ah...!" Suddenly remembering how he had told Elder Scarlet me that everything had been under control, and he had already had some idea about what was happening and had ns to deal with it, Xu Bao could not help stopping himself from saying anything as he felt a wave of embarrassment washing over him.


    Out of everything he thought might be the reason that the independent sects had not moved any further, he had never expected that the reason for all of this, was the few careless words he had said to Elder Scarlet me. After all, back then, he had just said those words so as to make him leave. Not wanting him to get caught up in his fight with the three Seventh Stage Domain Lords Realm Experts that had already surrounded him at that point in time.


    "Senior Xu, I''m sure you took care of those people from the major sects already. Hehe, to think they dared to underestimate us independent sects! Serves them right!"


    "..."


    Hearing what Elder Scarlet me said with a respectful expression on his face as he came over, Xu Bao once again felt like crying. Elder Scarlet mes words causing him to remember the past few days of him escaping with his tail between his legs before getting one-sidedly beaten up by the experts behind the major sects...

 Chapter 823 Soldier

    "Senior Xu, are we going to deal with that matter now, or are we going to wait untilter?" As he got up to him, Elder Scarlet me sneakily used his divine sense to ask this.


    "This... We will wait until ater date; I still don''t have a hundred percent certainty in who the traitor from the Stone Horn Sect is as of now..." The thing in question that Elder Scarlet me was asking about being rather obvious to Xu Bao, who had to think about the matter for a short moment before answering in a way that would not give away the fact that he had no idea about who the traitor was, nor if there even was one in the first ce...


    "I see... That is understandable. After all, we don''t want to end up going after the wrong person. Only for the real traitor hiding inside the Stone Horn Sect to escape unharmed!" Nodding his head with a look of understanding on his face, Elder Scarlet me did not doubt what Xu Bao said and only felt that it was natural. Allowing Xu Bao to breathe a sigh of relief at the fact that he had managed to avoid the subject of the traitor.


    Following the matter of the traitor getting thrown to the side for the time being, Xu Bao, Elder Scarlet me and the rest of the elders and disciples from the other independent sects all began making their way back towards their own sects once again. Feeling far safer now that that Xu Bao had returned alive and was moving alongside them again. None of them having any idea just how badly damaged his body was...


    ...


    "Howe not a single person was sent over to help us deal with the demonic cultivators still rushing in from the Frozen Wastnds? Did something big perhaps happen after we left that prevented them from sending people over... But then again, what in the world could have happened back at the capital that would result in them not being able to send anyone over...?" Back at the border between the Frozen Wastnd and the Sky Empire, one of the soldiers that had been fighting with demonic cultivators for the past few days, could not help muttering this to himself with an exhausted expression on his face.


    For close to a month, he and the rest of the soldiers from the Sky Empire had been trying to block the constant stream of demonic cultivatorsing from the Frozen Wastnds from rushing into the kingdom located behind them.


    Although this had been to mixed degree of sess due to the sheer number of demonic cultivators that came at them day and night, they had at the very least managed to prevent any stronger cultivators from rushing past them and get into the territory of the Sky Empire where they could start causing chaos.


    "Now that I think about it, that Star Shattering Sect has also been a great help in cleaning up those weaker demonic cultivators that passed us..." Looking towards a group of disciples from the Star Shattering Sect not too far away from where he and his fellow soldiers were fighting against a group of powerful demonic cultivators who had just recently reached the Nascent Soul Realm by devouring some of the more powerful demonic cultivators that had died at their hands earlier, the soldier could not help feeling grateful for the fact that there was such a powerful sect located nearby.


    The group in question that he was looking towards had all reached the Core Formation Realm and were busy fighting with some of the weaker demonic cultivators that made it past them. Preventing them from making it further inside the territory of the Sky Empire. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Not only that, but a little further away, a group of Nascent Soul Realm elders from the Star Shattering Sect had joined them and helped in dealing with some of the demonic cultivators in the First Demonic Transformation Realm. Relieving arge part of the pressure put on them as a result.


    However, the most shocking thing was not that a sect located at the border of the Sky Empire had so many powerful disciples and Nascent Soul Realm elders. Instead, it was the fact that a Domain Lord Realm Expert had appeared to help in dealing with the demonic cultivators!


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Even now, the soldier could not help feeling a sense of awe as he looked towards the ce where his general was fighting together with three other Domain Lords. One of these Domain Lords being the Domain Lord from the Star Shattering Sect!


    "Hm? Wha-"


    Ptsh-!


    Being distracted by his own thoughts while thinking about the Star Shattering Sect, the soldier was suddenly caught off guard as one of the demonic cultivators managed to pierce through his defence and stab him through the heart.


    "Ahh-!" Rapidly retreating with a small pain-filled scream after having his heart pierced through, the soldier could not help feeling grateful that he was not someone in the Core Formation Realm. Although recovering his heart was difficult and required a long time. At the very least he did not end up dying.


    Whoosh~


    "Hm? Is something wrong?" About to jump forward and join the fight again, the soldier could not help showing a confused expression on his face after one of his friends stepped forward and stopped him.


    "Brother, you should leave for now and recover. Now that we have the help of the Star Shattering Sect, we are more than capable of preventing any First Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivator from getting through! Even if one gets through, I doubt the elders from the Star Shattering Sect watching over the disciples a little further away will allow it to get far..."


    "This..." Not knowing what to say after hearing what his friend said, the soldier could only gaze around at the elders from the Star Shattering Sect ensuring the safety of their disciples not too far away "I understand, I will find a ce to recover..." In the end, he could only agree and leave the frontline before looking for a ce to recover from his injuries.


    The support of the Star Shattering Sect was truly a great thing... But at the back of his mind, the soldier could not help wondering just what had happened back in the capital city that prevented any support from showing up even after a month''s time.


    ¦Ñ¦Á§ád¦Á §«?¦Í¨º|(§ã¨°m) No matter what it was, he was sure that it should involve something extremely important figures inside the imperial family. Not only that, but it most likely also had something to do with the three religions that had been looking to stir up trouble from far before he had left the capital city together with his general to sort out the increasing number of demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnd.


    Over the past few years, the Sky Empire has grown more and more chaotic with each passing day... Does this perhaps mean something big is going to happen soon? No matter, this is not something that a small soldier like me will be able to change. For now, I should just focus on keeping myself safe and ensuring that I stay alive....


    Thinking this to himself as he sat down to recover a short distance from where the battle with the demonic cultivators was taking ce, the soldier could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine before he began looking over towards the ce where the disciples from the Star Shattering Sect were fighting.


    No matter how hard he thought about it, he could not understand where such a powerful sect had appeared from. Not just that, but also the fact that this sect had decided to stay at the border of the Sky Empire instead of moving to the core region of the Sky Empire.


    Given the fact that the Star Shattering Sect had a Domain Lord Realm Expert guarding it, he understood that they had more than enough strength to move into the core region of the Sky Empire where the resources were far more abundant and there were far more opportunities present!


    Not only that, but the soldier had also overheard some of the disciples talking about a Grand Elder and a Sect Master that should also have reached the Domain Lord Realm. Making him even more confused as to why he had never heard about the Star Shattering Sect before.


    Just the fact that the sect had three Domain Lords should be more than enough for it to be well known across the entire Sky Empire.


    "Is the appearance of this Star Shattering Sect perhaps going to affect the current Sky Empire?" Letting his thoughts wander as he was recovering, the soldier could not help muttering this to himself before he slowly closed both of his eyes to fully focus on recovering as fast as possible without getting distracted by all the fighting happening around him.

 Chapter 824 Resolving The Crisis

    The fight to push back the demonic cultivators that had managed to pass through the border of the Sky Empire and enter the kingdom just next to the Frozen Wastnds, was already approaching its ends. At this point in time, the only way for the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect to find any demonic cultivators, was by moving closer to the border, where the demonic cultivators came from...


    As the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect were all fighting against the constant stream of demonic cultivators that came from the Frozen Wastnd, the Nascent Soul Realm Elders from the sect were busy doing their best in helping make sure that none of the disciples ended up getting attacked by a First Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivator or get overwhelmed by the sheer number of demonic cultivators that wereing out from the Frozen Wastnds.


    Due to this, the elders from the Star Shattering Sect ended up helping the people from the Sky Empire in ensuring that no powerful demonic cultivators could enter the small kingdom located behind them.


    The appearance of the young disciples and elders from the Star Shattering Sect had caught the people from the Sky Empire by surprise, they were happy knowing that the demonic cultivators that had made it past them had already been dealt with and they didn''t have to worry about hunting them down in the future.


    Shu Yao who had been fighting alongside the three Domain Lord Realm Experts from the Sky Empire was also someone from the Star Shattering Sect. Giving not only the soldiers from the Sky Empire fighting on the ground the impression of the Star Shattering Sect being a powerful sect, but also gave the three Domain Lords from the Sky Empire the impression that the Star Shattering Sect was a powerful sect.


    As for the reason why such a powerful sect had not been known before, the three Domain Lords had far more knowledge about the worldpared to the Nascent Soul Realm soldiers fighting on the ground and guessed that the Star Shattering Sect was an old reclusive sect that had kept to itself without interfering with the outside world.


    Although they were not certain whether or not this was the truth, they felt that this was the most likely reason for a powerful sect like the Star Shattering Sect with multiple Domain lord Realm Experts to suddenly pop up inside the Sky Empire without them having any prior knowledge of it before today.


    After all, for a sect to reach the level of the Star Shattering Sect, a lot of time was needed. Not to mention, a lot of resources would also be needed to allow their disciples to reach their current realm and the same could be said about the elders of the sect!


    Even if the group of Domain Lords from the Sky Empire knew that Shu Yao was only in First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, they had already witnessed the power of another Domain Lord Realm Expert from the Star Shattering Sect back when Feng Chen had in a Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivator.


    Although the group of Domain Lords from the Sky Empire had no idea about the true strength of this demonic cultivator, nor the fact that it had only just broken through to the Third Demonic Transformation Realm when Feng Chen had attacked it, they still understood that the Star Shattering Sect was among the most powerful sects inside the Sky Empire... And that was not mentioning their encounter with Xuan Hao earlier on their way to the border.


    Taking him into ount, this group of Domain Lords from the Sky Empire understood very well that the current strongest set inside the border of the Sky Empire was likely to be the Star Shattering Sect!


    Even if the sect itself might notpare to the most powerful kingdoms beneath the imperial family, the appearance of such a powerful sect in the current chaotic environment of the Sky Empire was sure to make therger kingdoms start panicking at the prospect of such a powerful newpetitor. Not to mention the fact that this new sect was not tied to any kingdom and was fully independent from what these three Domain Lord Realm Experts had seen so far.


    "I wonder how his majesty will react when he learns about the appearance of such a powerful sect..." Secretly ncing towards Shu Yao as he muttered this to himself, the general from the Sky Empire could not help wondering just what kind of reaction the imperial family would have to such a powerful sect inside their territory. Especially considering the current unstable situation between the imperial family and the three religions...


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Turning his attention away from Shu Yao and focusing on dealing with the powerful demonic cultivator in the Third Demonic Transformation Realm that was single handily beating up his two subordinates, the general and two other Domain Lords from the Sky Empire did not take long before they managed to heavily injurie the demonic cultivator and force him to escape back into the Frozen Wastnd.


    All because Shu Yao had managed to hold back the three remaining Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivators that were trying to interfere with the short three on one battle. After all, they understood very well what would happen if one of them ended up getting heavily injured without any way to join the fight again...


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Because of this, the moment they realized that their friend had been knocked back without any possibility to join the fight again, the three Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivators turned around and escaped back into the Frozen Wastnd. Not daring to stay behind and fight against thebined might of Shu Yao and the three Domain Lords from the Sky Empire... Although, there was also the option of them deciding to leave due to their injured friend, without much ability to fight left in him, provided a great opportunity for them to further increase their strength!


    In the end, Shu Yao and the Domain Lords from the Sky Empire would never find out which of these were the cause for the demonic cultivators retreating so fast. In the end, they were all rather happy that the close to month long struggle at the border of the Frozen Wastnds hade to an end. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    As for the weaker demonic cultivators that were still trying their best to make it through the defensive line formed by the soldiers of the Sky Empire and the elders of the Star Shattering Sect, they all did their best to escape back towards the Frozen Wastnd after discovering what had happened. Understanding very well that they would get targeted by the terrifying Domain Lord Realm Experts floating in the air above them now that the group of powerful Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivators had disappeared.


    BOOOOM-!


    However, before they had a chance to run too far, the terrifying might of the general''s domain descended on them. Locking the demonic cultivators trying to escape in ce without a single way to resist.


    "Hmph! Think it''s that easy to leave?" Snorting coldly as his eyes filled with killing intent while looking at these demonic cultivators, the general from the Sky Empire didn''t bother wasting any more words before directly killing all of the demonic cultivators that had been locked in ce inside of his domain-


    Boom!


    Boom!


    Following what the general did, the two other Domain Lords from the Sky Empire followed his lead, as they began killing the demonic cultivators that had yet to escape. Not intending to let any of them leave alive. After all, even if the soldiers of the Sky Empire had managed to hold back most of the demonic cultivators now that they had the help of the elders from the Star Shattering Sect, it didn''t mean that they didn''t suffer any losses.


    In fact, the soldiers from the Sky Empire ended up losing more than three people that had all reached the Middle Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Even worse, they had also lost a Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert due to a Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivators trying to sneak by the general and the rest of the Domain Lord Realm Experts being stopped by this Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    Although the arrival of Shu Yao had prevented any more casualties from this sneaky demonic cultivator, it had still ended up killing the Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Sky Empire that had ended up revealing it before being restrained.


    Even in the Sky Empire, a Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert was a rare existence that was hard toe by under normal circumstances and the general especially, would feel the pain of losing one of the most powerful subordinates under him. Even possibly losing out on a future Domain Lord Realm subordinate!


    Considering all of this, the anger shown by the general from the Sky Empire was reasonable...

 Chapter 825 Thoughts Of The General

    "The demonic cultivators shouldn''t try to cross the border again any time soon. Now I just need to return to the capital and figure out what happened during the month I was gone..." Muttering this to himself as he stared towards the Frozen Wastnd after killing off thest few demonic cultivators that had entered the border kingdom he was currently inside of, the general from the Sky Empire felt a sense of worry upon thinking about what might have happened back in the capital city.


    Knowing a bit about the situation inside the capital city, the general also knew about the fact that the imperial family was establishing a sect alliance to try and weaken the power of the three religions. However, even knowing about this, he did not think that the sect alliance would be able to cause arge enough problem that the imperial family would not be able to send over reinforcements to prevent demonic cultivators from entering and establishing themselves inside the borders of the Sky Empire.


    After all, all things considered, the strongest person among the sects of the Sky Empire had only reached the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm... And that was not mentioning the fact that most of the sects inside the Sky Empire were under the control of a more powerful kingdom. For them to be able to cause a problem for the imperial family was not possible with this level of strength!


    "Hm? But... What about that senior from the Star Shattering Sect? If I don''t remember wrongly, he was on his way towards the capital city when we met him and he should be far stronger than the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm..." Almost whispering this to himself as he suddenly remembered his encounter with Xuan Hao over a month ago when he had been making his way towards the border to deal with the recent surge in demonic cultivators trying to enter the Sky Empire, the general could not help turning to look towards Shu Yao who was in the process of talking with the elders from her sect that had helped out his subordinates.


    The appearance of the Star Shattering Sect had been far too sudden, and he had no idea how powerful it really, nor did he really have a clear idea about the strength of Xuan Hao whom he had met over a month earlier.


    Maybe that Grand Elder from the Star Shattering Sect is rted to the matter of the imperial family not being able to send over anyone? Maybe his majesty already knew about the Star Shattering Sect and saw no need to send over more people to deal with the matter...


    As his thoughts began running wild trying to think of what might have caused the imperial family not to send anyone over to reinforce him and prevent the demonic cultivators from establishing a path inside the Sky Empire, the general ended up attributing all of this to the Star Shattering Sect. Slowly starting to think that the imperial family already knew about the Star Shattering Sect beforehand and understood that they would be helping him out when it came to dealing with the demonic cultivators.


    All things considered; this was the reason that the general concluded to be the most likely one. In the end, there was no way that he would have guessed that a demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm had managed to sneak into the capital city and cause havoc. Not to mention the fact that the old ancestor from the imperial family had also been ambushed outside the capital city!


    If he knew about these things happening, he might havee to a different conclusion, but in the end, he had no idea about what had taken ce in the capital city and could only work off what information he had managed to gather about the situation by himself.


    "General! What should we do now that the demonic cultivators have been dealt with? We already talked with a few of the elders from the Star Shattering Sect that helped us out and they told us that they would clean up the ce and ensure that the kingdom here won''t get invaded by demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds again..."


    "Ah? Don''t worry about it and let them deal with it, gather everyone in preparation to leave for the capital city." Suddenly hearing one of his subordinatesing up to him and saying this, the general took a short moment to get out of his thoughts before saying this. Not feeling that there would be any problems with the Star Shattering Sect cleaning up the battlefield.


    In the first ce, the things carried by the demonic cultivators were mostly useless to normal cultivators and weren''t worth that much. The only one that had anything worth it was the Third Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivators, but only one of them had died... And that was due to someone from the Star Shattering Sect. No matter how shameless the general was, there was no way that he was going to offend a powerful sect like the Star Shattering Sect over something like this!


    "I understand, general! I will inform the others about this and get ready to leave for the capital!" Nodding his head dutifully upon hearing what the general said, the soldier soon made his way back towards the ce where the rest of the soldiers had stopped to rx after the demonic cultivators had been dealt with.


    ...


    "Grand Elder Shu Yao, we are going to send the disciples from the sect back before finding a good location to establish a branch sect inside this kingdom like Elder Song instructed... And getting this mess cleaned up..."


    "No need to tell me this, Elder Song is the person in charge of this matter... So do as you wish." Rolling her eyes as she said this while looking at the group of elders that had gathered in front of her following the end of the battle against the demonic cultivators, Shu Yao understood very well that this entire matter had nothing to do with her and was all part of one of Elder Song''s ns to expand the Star Shattering Sect and grow their sphere of influence.


    The only reason why she was present, was to make sure nothing unexpected happened and to prevent any of the Third Stage Demonic Transformation Realm cultivators from breaking through the three Domain Lords from the Sky Empire.


    "Thank you, Grand Elder! We will make sure to get everything done straight away!"


    "Yes, you don''t have to worry about anything!"


    "Haha, indeed! Now that there are no more demonic cultivators around, it will be an easy matter to establish a branch sect inside this small kingdom! As for cleaning up the battlefield, we will-" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    As the group of elders were happily reassuring her that they would get everything done, one of thest elders to talk suddenly froze midsentence after catching a glimpse of therge number of dead demonic cultivators all over the ce and the devastating damage caused by the fight between the three Domain Lords from the Sky Empire and the Third Stage Demonic Transformation Realm cultivators that hadsted close to a month.


    Even if he was someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, he had instantly realized that cleaning up the battlefield would not be a simple matter and would at least take a month or longer. Especially when considering that they would also have to fix up the damage that had been caused to the environment.


    """..."""


    The rest of the elders were in the same situation, as they all simrly realized the scale of the battlefield. All of them simtions turning to look towards Shu Yao filled with expectations.


    "Hah... I will help restoring the environment after you finish cleaning this ce up..." Understanding very well what these elders wanted to ask her but did not outright dare to ask after what they had just said, Shu Yao could not help smiling a bit wryly as she said this while shaking her head at how fast these elders changed after realizing the scale of the task they had happily agreed to take on.


    Although the matter would take some time, she was still a Domain Lord Realm Expert that had managed toprehend a nature rted domain. Restoring the damaged environment would not take that much effort on her part. However, because of her domain being a flower domain, the entire battlefield would most likely end up bing a massive flower field...


    "Thank you, Grand Elder!"


    "Haha, I knew the Grand Elder was a kind person!"


    Rolling her eyes once again upon hearing the group of elders start happily praising her, Shu Yao did not bother responding to them, as she directly turned around and left in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect. Now that the matter with the demonic cultivators had finished, she had no more reason to stay.

 Chapter 826 Apperance Of A Possible Enemy

    Already having ascended into the sky, about to fly back in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect, Shu Yao could not help frowning as she noticed the general from the Sky Empire approaching her from the distance.


    Even if part of her wanted to leave and let someone like Elder Song deal with the questions that the general from the Sky Empire would have for her sect, Shu Yao also understood that just leaving would be a bit too rude.


    "Thanks for the help earlier. If you don''t mind, would it be fine for me to ask a few questions...?"


    "Sure, ask away." Nodding her head in response to what the general who had showed up in front of her asked, Shu Yao could not help feeling a bit nervous as to what this person might want to ask her. After all, the person in front of her was a powerful person from the Sky Empire, that had the backing of multiple Soul Ascension Realm Experts!


    Even if he seemed kind on the surface, Shu Yao understood that it was best to remain cautious in the face of someone from the Sky Empire who could potentially cause a lot of trouble for the Star Shattering Sect in the future...


    "Great! I just wanted to ask you if your sect has a Grand Elder called Xuan."


    "Grand Elder Xuan...? Yes, he is from my sect..." Not understanding why, the person in front of her suddenly brought up Xuan Hao, Shu Yao could not help narrowing her eyes as she cautiously inspected the general from the Sky Empire in front of her.


    "Haha, looks like that senior is indeed from the same Star Shattering Sect as this one! Well, I will have to take my leave before my subordinates start to get impatient. Thanks for answering my question and don''t worry about any problems following this battle, I will make sure to take care of them when I return to the capital!" Unaware of the suspicious look Shu Yao was giving him, the general from the Sky Empire seemed to havee to his own conclusion on the matter and left the ce as quickly as he had appeared-


    Whoosh-!


    "What in the world was all of this about..."


    Not giving Shu Yao any time to understand what had just happened before everything was over and the flying ship belonging to the Sky Empire started floating back in the direction of the capital city without wasting any time.


    ...


    "How troublesome... I never expected for something like this to happen now of all times..."


    At the same time Shu Yao had been left in a state of confusion by the general from the Sky Empire''s sudden leave, Elder Song was hovering above a document on top of his table with a troubled expression stered all over his old face.


    The document in question was a general report on the current situation of the kingdoms located around the Star Shattering Sect. At first nce, everything seemed to be going well and was under the control of the Star Shattering Sect as it was slowly expanding and taking over the territories of these kingdoms.


    The problem in question that caused Elder Song''s expression to be so troubled was not this, but thest part of the document that stated that an old ancestor from a kingdom that had already fallen under the control of the Star Shattering Sect had returned from adventuring outside looking for opportunities.


    If this was the end of it, everything would have been fine... But the ancestor in question had managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm... And this was not the false Domain Lord Realm that was achieved through force like what the ancestor from the Feather Kingdom had done. Instead, it was a real breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm!


    After he found out about the fact that the kingdom, he had spent most of his life building up conceding and giving up theirnd to the Star Shattering Sect, he was furious and had directly beaten up the person who had overseen that royal family... But even more troublesome than this, he had started causing trouble for the Star Shattering Sect branch located inside that kingdom.


    "Well... he didn''t destroy the branch sect or kill anyone... But the damage he caused is almost the same aspletely destroying it..." Muttering this to himself, Elder Song could not help ncing down at the description of the damage done to the branch sect by this old ancestor. If not for the fact that he knew that the Star Shattering Sect had multiple Domain Lord Realm Experts, Elder Song did not doubt that this old ancestor would have already destroyed that branch...


    "I should consult Feng Chen about this matter, this is already something that far exceeds my capabilities..." Understanding very well that he had no ability to deal with a matter like this alone with his strength only in the Nascent Soul Realm, Elder Song decided to get up before leaving to find Feng Chen. Hoping that he would be able to settle this matter so he could focus his attention back towards the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect without having to worry about a Domain Lord Realm Expert suddenly starting to cause trouble inside the territory they had just taken control of.


    At the very, the Domain Lord in question did not seem to have broken through for too long and should still be at the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm ording to the description of his attack on the branch sect by the Nascent Soul Realm Elders who had witnessed it.


    Now that Xuan Hao was gone and was dealing with the sect alliance matter in the capital city of the Sky Empire, Elder Song really didn''t want to have a powerful Domain Lord Realm Expert as an enemy. Even if they could always hide on the Shattered Star Peaks until Xuan Hao returned, Elder Song understood very well that the progress that the Star Shattering Sect had made over the past few years in expanding would be ruined if this happened.


    Swish~


    Knowing how serious this matter was, Elder Song soon left his room before rapidly moving along arge road leading deeper inside the sect where Feng Chen''s home was located.


    "Wha- Elder Song!?"


    "Elder Song...? The quiet and kind elder who always sets up all kinds of events?"


    "Yes! I''m sure something happened for him to be like this all of a sudden!"


    As the older disciples and new disciples walking along the road saw Elder Song speeding past them, everyone could not help turning their heads as they wondered just what in the world had happened. After all, everyone in the Star Shattering Sect were familiar with Elder Song and almost instantly understood something had happened for him to be rushing through the sect suddenly.


    "Huh? Elder Song, what in the world happened...?"


    "How unusual. For Elder Song to be like this... Something serious should have happened!"


    "Hm? Isn''t that the direction of where the Sect Master is staying...?


    The elders who were a little more familiar with Elder Song reacted a little differently, as all of them understood that something serious had happened for Elder song to be rushing towards the core of the sect where Feng Chen, the sect master, was staying.


    Even without understanding the details of the what had happened, it still ended up causing all of the elders to tense up as they got ready for a possible emergency meeting that mighte following Elder Song''s meeting with the sect master.


    ... N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Elder Song? What in the world happened for you to be like this?" Seeing Elder Song who suddenly rushed inside the small garden he was rxing inside of while cultivating his sword intent, Feng Chen could not help showing a surprised expression on his face as he said this.


    "Feng Chen! Let''s go inside, I have something important to talk about!"


    "I understand, you can just exin the matter to me here, there isn''t anyone other than us present here." Understanding the seriousness of the matter from Elder Song''s tone of voice, Feng Chen signaled for him to sit down on a bench next to him before saying this.


    "A Domain Lord Realm Expert appeared among one of the kingdoms we have taken control of. Not only that, but..." Starting to exin the matter of the ancestor that had returned after reaching the Domain Lord Realm and the damage he had caused to one of their sect''s branches, Elder Song slowly started calming down after seeing how rxed Feng Chen was when he heard about the appearance of a possible enemy Domain Lord Realm Expert inside their territory.


    "... And that is all... Feng Chen, Ehm... Sect Master, do you have any way to deal with this matter?" Finishing his exnation of what had happened, Elder Song suddenly realized his somewhat disrespectful way of addressing Feng Chen, as he awkwardly corrected himself before looking towards Feng Chen to see if he had a way to deal with the Domain Lord Realm Expert that had suddenly popped up.

 Chapter 827 Caught By Suprise!

    "If possible, I think the best option would be to try and recruit this Domain Lord Realm Expert as an elder... But considering how we took over the territory of his kingdom while he was gone, I doubt he will just agree to something like this... How troublesome..." Feeling exhausted by just thinking about how troublesome this matter would be to deal with, Feng Chen could not help thinking about Xuan Hao''s pet, the winged lion demon beast.


    In the end, this thought was quickly thrown away after he remembered how grumpy it had be after Shu Yao had taken it to deal with some of the more troublesome kingdoms standing in the way of the expansion of the sect.


    Although there was a chance, he could persuade it, Feng Chen still felt a bit scared when faced with the winged lion demon beast. Especially because the winged lion demon beast was still grumpy after having been put to work by Shu Yao.


    I should see if I can deal with this matter by myself first. Even if things go bad and that old ancestor in the Domain Lord Realm wants to start trouble, I''m more than strong enough to deal with someone in the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. The only problem is if that old ancestor decides to run away and cause trouble for the different branch sects, we established over the past few years...


    Feeling a headache starting to set in as he thought about this possibility taking ce, Feng Chen shook his head as he turned to look at Elder Song who was patiently waiting for an answer on what to do regarding the Domain Lord Realm Expert that had suddenly popped up out of nowhere and started causing problems.


    "I will be dealing with this matter myself, Elder Song, you can head back for now and resume what you were doing earlier... If it turns out that ancestor who returned is stronger than the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm or proves to be a problem, I will just ask Xuan Hao''s pet for help. Even if it''s not in the best of moods at the moment, I''m sure some high quality spirit stone and roasted demon beast meat should be able to get it to move..."


    "I understand... Sect master, I will be taking my leave. Make sure to inform me in case you need help with anything!" Nodding his head upon hearing that Feng Chen would be dealing with the matter himself, Elder Song let out a breath of relief that he had unknowingly been holding in before taking his leave. Not forgetting to hand over the documents that described the attack of the Domain Lord Realm Expert to Feng Chen in case he wanted to look through it himself before going to face this unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    Swoosh~


    Watching as Elder Song left, Feng Chen turned his attention towards the documents now in his hands. Intending to read through them to get a better idea of the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert before heading over to face the other party.


    It was not that he doubted Elder Song''s assessment of the other party''s strength, but as someone in the Domain Lord Realm himself, he would be a far better judge of how strong the other party was!


    ...


    At the same time Feng Chen was reading through the documents describing the attack of the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert from a royal family of one of the kingdoms that had surrendered to them, the person in question was looking towards the branch of the Star Shattering Sect he had just destroyed rapidly getting rebuilt.


    "The Star Shattering Sect, where in the world did such a powerful sect appear from... And why are they located at the border of the Sky Empire...?" Filled with both curiosity and confusion as he muttered this to himself, the old ancestor could not understand why a powerful sect like the Star Shattering Sect had suddenly appeared at the border of the Sky Empire during the short hundred years he had been gone.


    As a Domain Lord Realm Expert himself, he understood just how few opportunities there was in the border region for someone to reach the Domain Lord Realm, let alone for someone to increase their strength after they had broken through to the Domain Lord Realm!


    Even if such a powerful sect had appeared, under normal circumstances, it should not stay in the border region and start expanding their power. Instead it should move towards the core region of the Sky Empire where the resources were more plentiful and opportunities were easier toe by.


    Originally, his n had been to do just this. Pick up his descendants before moving to the core region of the Sky Empire to carve out his own ce in the resource rich core region of the Sky Empire before trying to increase his own cultivation base and look for ways to possible get in the good graces of the imperial family.


    However, the sudden appearance of the Star Shattering Sect that had taken over his kingdom hadpletely ruined his original ns. Even if he could still take his descendants and leave for the core region of the Sky Empire, a part of him felt curious about the reason why a powerful sect like the Star Shattering Sect had decided to stay around and expand their power in a ce like the border region. The anger he had felt when he first discovered that a foreign sect had taken control of his kingdom''s territory had also disappeared after he destroyed the Star Shattering Sect''s branch sect. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    At this point in time, he wanted nothing more than to find out more about this mysterious sect that had suddenly appeared and why they were still staying in the border region of the Sky Empire.


    As for the matter of him destroying a branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect angering the Star Shattering Sect enough to go all out in killing him, he didn''t believe that this would happen. Especially considering how he had made sure to ensure that he didn''t injurie anyone when he attacked the branch sect, let alone kill anyone. Not to mention, he had every right to be angry since the branch sect he had destroyed was inside his kingdom!


    Even if the Star Shattering Sect wanted revenge, they would at the very least be able to understand that he did not intend to fight it out with them.


    "Someone from the Star Shattering Sect should be showing up soon... I hope I can find out more about this sect and maybe also get an idea of how strong it is." Muttering this to himself as he looked in the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks where the Star Shattering Sect was located ording to what little information he had managed to gather about the sect so far, the old ancestor could not help feeling a bit nervous.


    The strength of the Star Shattering Sect that he knew about, was that they apparently had at least two people in the Domain Lord Realm and an extremely powerful guardian beast in the shape of a massive lion with wings, that should be above the early stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    The fact that he even stayed behind to wait for an expert of the Star Shattering Sect to show up, was more than enough to show that he did not want to fall out with them.


    After all, why would he want to be enemies with such a powerful sect if it could be avoided? In the end, the territory that his ipetent descendants had lost in the border region was useless to a Domain Lord Realm Expert like himself. Not to mention that he had already nned to abandon this territory when moving to the core region of the Sky Empire...


    Rumble~!


    Feeling a terrifying sword intent heading towards his direction at a speed far above that of someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, the old ancestor could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he turned to look in the direction of the powerful sword intent.


    "Looks like he is here..." Seeing a person covered in a pure white robe with the symbol of the Star Shattering Sect embroidered into it, the old ancestor did not have to think for long before realizing the identity of the person who had appeared in front of him as one of the Domain Lord Realm Experts from the Star Shattering Sect.


    Whoosh-!


    As the expert from the Star Shattering Sect came to a stop, the old ancestor could clearly feel that the other party had surpassed him in cultivation. Not only that, but the other party was also a sword cultivator, someone widely know for being capable of fighting above their cultivation Realm!


    "So, you are the person that have been causing trouble...?"


    "Y-yes...!" Feeling the terrifying gaze of the sword cultivator, the old ancestor idently stumbled over his words as he answered like a junior talking to a senior-


    "Eh..." Catching the person from the Star Shattering Sect by surprise, as an awkward atmosphere appeared around both of them.

 Chapter 828 How Strong Is Master?

    Hm? The ancestor who broke through to the Domain Lord Realm is still waiting around the branch sect. Hopefully it means he is open to talking and isn''t too hostile towards us...


    Letting out a sigh of relief as he spotted the ancestor that had broken through to the Domain Lord Realm patiently waiting in the air not too far away from the branch sect he had just attack, Feng Chen understood that the other party was not outright hostile towards Star Shattering Sect.


    Whoosh~!


    Flying in front of the old ancestor who was floating in the air, Feng Chen could not help examining the other party''s strength. In the end, the ancestor was indeed someone who had just broken through to the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Far from being a threat, Feng Chen would be more than strong enough to catch and kill the other party if he truly wanted to cause any trouble. Especially since he could clearly sense that the old ancestor had yet to fully stabilize his cultivation base at the Domain Lord Realm and would have a hard time fully utilizing his strength inbat against someone above the Nascent Soul Realm!


    "So, you are the person that have been causing trouble...?" Filled with far more confidence knowing all of this, Feng Chen could not help narrowing his eyes as he said this while using his sword intent and superior cultivation base to pressure the other old ancestor.


    "Y-yes...!"


    However, unexpectedly, the old ancestor in front of him had a far bigger reaction to the sudden pressure than he had first expected. Directly acting like a junior who had been caught doing something he shouldn''t by a senior.


    "Eh..." For this reason, Feng Chen could not help letting out an awkward sound as a confused expression appeared on his face when looking at the old man in front of him. Not fully understanding what had just happened.


    "Ehm! I mean yes, it was me who destroyed the branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect. If I''m not wrong, you should be one of the Star Shattering Sect''s Domain Lord Realm Experts."


    "Indeed, I''m a Domain Lord Realm Expert from the Star Shattering Sect. For you to know this and still stay here after destroying one of my sect''s branches... Do you have anything you want to say or ask me about, or maybe you just have a death wish...?" Leaking a small bit of killing intent as he said thest part, Feng Chen could not help wondering just what this old man wanted from staying behind and waiting for him to show up.


    Given his current strength, the old ancestor should understand that he would not be able to win against someone in the Domain Lord Realm with his current unstable cultivation base. Even on the short end, he would at the very least need to stabilize his cultivation base for a few weeks and spend some time to get more familiar with his new strength. After all, the difference between the Domain Lord Realm and the Nascent Soul Realm was something that would take time to get used to.


    Yet, even knowing all of this, he had still chosen to stay and wait for him to show up...


    "I do indeed have a few questions I want to ask... And I hope this senior won''t make things difficult for me. In consideration of the fact that I didn''t harm anyone from your sect." Tensing up as he said this, the old ancestor from the royal family of the kingdom that Feng Chen was currently inside of, nervously looked towards Feng Chen for a response.


    "Hm... Fine, let''s find somewhere different to chat." Observing the old ancestor in front of him for a short moment as he tried to see whether the old man just wanted to ask him a few questions, Feng Chen felt like he was telling the truth and decided to have a chat with him and find out just what this old man wanted to ask him about.


    Considering that he hade here in hopes of possible recruiting the old man as a possible elder of his sect, Feng Chen felt happy deep down that it didn''t look like he would end up having to fight with him.


    ...


    "I wonder when master is going to return... It''s already been over a month since he left for that sect alliance meeting in the capital city of the Sky Empire..."


    At the same time Feng Chen was facing off against the old ancestor from a royal family that had just happened to reach the Domain Lord Realm during his adventures outside, Chu Yang was gazing off into the distance as he quietly said this.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Although he had made full use of his time during this month to challenge any and all of the Nascent Soul Realm elders of the sect that he could catch, he had started missing his master after realizing that the elders he sparred with weren''t able to help point out his mistakes after their battle. Even Feng Chen, whom he had managed to spar with once during this month, was not able to give him the same level of feedback that his master had been able to give him.


    To be honest, it was only at this point in time that Chu Yang had realized just how important it was for him to have a teacher that could point him in the right direction and help him further his cultivation. Although his strength was still constantly increasing even without the help of his teacher due to his own talent, Chu Yang could still clearly feel that his speed of improvement at the moment had slowed whenpared to when his master had been around to help point out any doubts he had along the way. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Who knows when he will be back? If I''m not wrong, the distance between our sect and the capital city of the Sky Empire is incredibly long. Long enough that it would take us several years to reach with our current cultivation base!"


    "Qing Yi?" Hearing a familiar voice behind him, Chu Yang could not help showing a somewhat surprised expression as he turned around to see Qing Yi standing a short distance away from him.


    "Indeed, it is me! Finally finished stabilizing my cultivation base at the Nascent Soul Realm and wanted to get out of that damnable secluded cultivation room I spent thest few months inside of without leaving- Ah! Why are youughing at me!?" As a slightly dark expression appeared on her face upon mentioning her time in secluded cultivation, Chu Yang could not help letting out a soft chuckle upon seeing the sudden change in expression.


    "Nothing, I just thought about something funny when listening to you and ended upughing."


    "Hmph! Sure, you did!" Narrowing her eyes for a short moment in response to Chu Yang''s response, Qing Yi decided to return to the subject of when their master was returning. "Anyway, with master''s strength somewhere in the Domain Lord Realm, I think he should be able to return in another month or so. Maybe even faster!"


    "Indeed, with master''s strength, he should be able to return far faster than those Nascent Soul Realm Experts participating in that sect alliance meeting. Even if he takes a little longer, I don''t think it will take him more than two months to return." Nodding his head in agreement with what his junior sister said, Chu Yang could not help wondering just how strong his master actually was and what his actual cultivation realm was.


    From what he had managed to gather, his master should be the strongest person in the Star Shattering Sect. Above the sect master, Feng Chen who had reached the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm ording to most rumors going around the sect.


    So, had his master reached the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm? Maybe even the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!?


    To be honest, Chu Yang had no idea about just what kind of realm his master had reached. All he knew was that his master was the strongest person he had ever met since he began cultivating. Even the faint terrifying aura he could feel from the Devil Immortal Jade that had now be a permanent resident of his dantian could notpare to the otherworldly aura he felt around his master.


    The aura in question did not seem toe from his master''s cultivation base, but instead seemed simr to the constant fiery aura he could feel around his junior sister due to her special divine physique.


    Maybe I should try and asak master how strong he is when he returns...?


    Thinking this to himself as he returned to looking into the distance, Chu Yang began looking forward to the day that his master returned.


    "..."


    Standing beside him, Qing Yi had also entered a quiet state, as both of them just stood side by side looking into the distance while enjoying a quiet and rxing time together.

 Chapter 829 Dao Domain Lord...?

    I wonder just how close the old ancestor from the Sky Empire is to the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­


    Making his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao could not help thinking about how powerful the old ancestor from the imperial family had been when he had faced off against the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts working together to fight him earlier.


    Compared to the fights he had seen between Soul Ascension Realm Experts before this, the power shown by the old ancestor from the imperial had been strong enough to make him feel a sense of dread that made him understand that he would have no way to resist against the other party if he ended up on the other end of the attack he had thrown towards the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts that had been working together to team up on him. Not only that, but he also had a feeling that he would not be able to escape. At least not with his current strength.


    "Hah¡­ I really need to improve my domain more if I want to stand a chance against anyone who has gone through more than a single tribtion in the Soul Ascension Realm¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao decided that after he returned to the Star Shattering Sect, he would focus all of his attention towards searching for ways to further enhance his strength without having to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Now that I think about it, it''s been a long time since Ist looked at my status through the system.


    Suddenly remembering the status that the system was able to construct of him, Xuan Hao felt curious as to how it had changed since thest time he had seen it. Considering how much his strength had increased and how his domain had changed, he felt that there should at least be some changes. Not to mention, he had more than enough time to kill on his journey back to the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword (Small Sess), Dao of Corruption (Elementary)


    Sword Intent: Nascent Sword Soul Realm


    Talent: ???


    Physique: ??? (25% Awakened)


    Realm: Initial Stage Dao Domain Lord


    Professions: Alchemist (Artisan), Formation Master (Expert), cksmithing (Expert) n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Sect: Star Shattering Sect


    Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect


    Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning


    Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Eighth Stage Domain Lord Realm)


    Reading through his status, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on the spot as he looked over the most obvious changes to his status.


    "Dao Domain¡­ Small Sess, Elementary¡­ Initial Stage Dao Domain Lord¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he read through his status one more time to make sure he had not seen wrong; Xuan Hao could not help wondering when he had reached a brand new cultivation realm.


    Not to mention, from what he knew, the realm that came after the Domain Lord Realm was the Soul Ascension Realm. Not the Dao Domain Lord Realm that he had currently reached!


    Whoosh~


    Just at this moment as Xuan Hao was feeling lost over the sudden change to his cultivation base, a small window from the system appeared in front of him in a timely manner.


    [Due to the host reaching the unique realm, Dao Domain Lord, a brief description of the realm is avable through the system.]


    [Read, Short Description of the Dao Domain Lord Realm?]


    [Y/N]


    "¡­"


    Why did you only appear after I inspected my status? Are you perhaps mad that I''m not using it more¡­? Hah¡­ Whatever, I should read through the description and figure out what this Dao Domain Lord Realm is¡­


    Not knowing what to say, Xuan Hao decided to not think about it and instead just read through the description that the system was offering to him.


    [The Immortal Soul tribtion is a tribtion one will have to go through to surpass the Mortal Realm. In total, there are two paths to ascending the Immortal Soul Tribtion. The most well-known path being to ascend the tribtion step by step, oveing a single tribtion at a time and using the tribtion to increase one''s strength. People using this method to ascend the Immortal Soul tribtion Realm are normally called Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    The Soul Ascension Realm itself consists of six minor realms, the First Tribtion Realm, The Second Tribtion Realm and all the way up to the Sixth Tribtion Realm, where the cultivator will have to prepare for the final seventh tribtion.


    The second and far less-known method is to ovee the entire Immortal Soul Tribtion in a single step. To have a chance at surviving all seven tribtions of the Immortal Soul Tribtion, one will need toprehend different Daos and fuse them together to form a Dao Domain. People using this method can still be considered to be in the Domain Lord Realm, but due to the fact that their strength far surpasses that of the Domain Lord Realm, they were given the title of Dao Domain Lords.


    The Dao Domain Lord Realm itself consists of four minor realms, the Initial, Intermediate, Late and Peak Stage, but a Dao Domain Lord can attempt to ascend the Immortal Soul tribtion at any moment. The goal of the Dao Domain Lord Realm is for the cultivator to increase theirprehension of the different Daos, they have alreadyprehended andprehend new Daos that they can fuse into their Dao Domain. Although, due to the sheer difficulty of this, most Dao Domain Lords chose to attempt the Immortal Soul Tribtion at the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.]


    "Wha- This is a short description!?" Eximing in surprise at the long and detailed description that the system had given him not only about the Dao Domain Lord Realm, but also the Soul Ascension Realm and the Immortal Soul tribtion Realm, Xuan Hao could not help feeling grateful towards the system.


    Not only did the description give him a clear path to work towards, but it also helped him gain a better understanding of the Immortal Soul Tribtion and the Soul Ascension Realm, something that he had not yet managed to gain a lot of information on before this moment.


    Now that he had a better understanding of the different minor realms that existed in the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao could not help growing curious as to what realm the old ancestor of the imperial family had reached.


    Did he reach the Fourth Tribtion Realm? Maybe the Fifth tribtion Realm¡­?


    Xuan Hao could not help guessing to himself as he recalled the two times that he had seen the old ancestor from the imperial family attacking. Even without too much reference material to go off, he was at least certain that the old ancestor from the imperial family should be somewhere in theter stages of the Soul Ascension Realm, yet not at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    If he had really reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao doubted that the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts that had tried to attack him would have been able to get out alive. After all, their strength should at most be somewhere around the middle of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Knowing that he would not be able to get an answer to this question in the near future, Xuan Hao decided to put this question to the back of his mind as he instead focused his attention on resuming his journey back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    Now that he had found out how to increase his strength and prepare himself to face the Immortal Soul Tribtion, Xuan Hao could not wait to return back to the Star Shattering Sect to try and explore the Daos he hadprehended, while also trying to see if he couldprehend any new Daos that could be used to strengthen his Dao Domain.


    On a side note, he also wanted to figure out what the small sess and elementary written next to the different Daos he hadprehended was about¡­ Although¡­ A part of him had a feeling that trying to figure this out was going to be a dead end. Especially when considering the fact that the system had not mentioned any of this in its description of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Maybe if I inspect my status more often in the future, I will be able to get a description of it from the system¡­" Shaking his head as he said this, Xuan Hao unconsciously took out an interspatial ring before throwing it towards a small forest below him.


    At this point in time, throwing out interspatial rings whenever he had the chance had already be second nature due to the interspatial ring quest from the system. To be honest, Xuan Hao did not really care too much about the reward from this quest and was just curious as to what kind of trial would be created for those who happened to obtain one of the interspatial rings he had thrown out over the years¡­

 Chapter 830 The Trial Given By The System

    At the same time, unknown to Xuan Hao, a young girl making her way back home after having spent the entire day gathering herbs in a small forest not far away from the small city where she lived. The only light left to guide her back being the bright moonlight from the moon above her illuminating the small downtrodden path that led out of the forest.


    "Hm? What is that...?


    It was precisely at this moment that the young girl happened to spot something small reflecting the bright moonlight from the moon hanging in the sky above her.


    For it to reflect the moonlight so well, I''m sure it has to be a precious silver coin or something made out of metal! No matter what it is, I''m sure I will be able to sell it and cover my food needs for the next week or two! Hehe, I won''t have to enter this dangerous forest and will be able to eat properly soon...


    Feeling her eyes brighten as she thought about what she might have found, the young girl who was an orphan from one of the many cities spread throughout the core region of the Sky Empire, could not help getting excited as she quickly made her way towards the small bush where the thing reflecting the bright moonlight was hidden.


    "A ring made from silver! Not to mention a few weeks, this ring should at the very least be able to cover my food expenses for the next half year!" Feeling ecstatic after realizing what she had found was not just a silver coin, but an entire ring madepletely of what she thought to be silver, the young girl reached down towards what she believed to be a small silver ring-


    Whoosh-!


    However, the moment she touched the ring, a weird power engulfed her and soon, both the young girl and the ring disappeared from the small forest.


    The next moment, the young girl found herself in the middle of arge empty tform that floated in the middle of an endless ocean of mist.


    "D-did I perhaps enter one of those legendary secret realms!?" Quivering in fear as she said this, the young orphan girl could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine.


    Although she was an orphan and did not have any cultivation base to speak of, she had still managed to hear a lot about the world from the different cultivators passing through the city on their way to explore a very famous ruin that was located a short distance away from the city itself.


    Even if it was only by chance, she had once managed to overhear two powerful Nascent Soul Realm Experts who had been catching up with each other.


    Listening to their conversation from the side, she had managed to not only learn how many treasures could be found inside a secret realm, but also how dangerous they could be... Not to mention a small orphan like herself, even powerful experts who had reached the Domain Lord Realm could die inside a secret realm!


    For this reason, the young girl could not stop herself from shivering in fear as she looked at the silent mist that surrounded her from all sides. Expecting a dreadful demon beast to jump up from the mist and devour her at any moment...


    Not daring to move a single muscle as she continued to observe the mist all around her, her eyes getting heavier and heavier with each passing second and before long, the young orphan girl could not fight the sleepiness that she had been trying to hold back.


    Creak~!


    A short moment after she fell asleep, a loud creaking sound echoed out from the tform beneath her-


    "Wha-!? What is happening!?" Instantly waking up the young girl who had just fallen asleep and was now looking around herself to find out what had happened.


    "A door- A way out!?"


    To her astonishment, the young girl discovered that arge door had suddenly appeared at the center of the tform during her short sleep... And due to her still half-asleep state, she didn''t think twice before stepping through the door in hopes of leaving the strange ce that she currently found herself inside of.


    Whoosh-!


    The moment she stepped through the door, a wave of energy entered her body. Filling her with vitality, like she had just woken up from a good night''s sleep.


    Surprised by the sudden energy boost, the young girl let out a surprised sound before starting to examine her surroundings-


    "Huh?"


    However, before she could even begin to examine her new surroundings properly, she came face to face with a weird box filled with letters floating in the air directly in front of her.


    [Wee, you have entered the trial space. The first trial is going to begin shortly and will be based on your current cultivation realm.]


    Reading the words written in the floating box, the young girl did not feel the slightest bit relieved. Instead, she felt a shiver run down her spine.


    From all the stories she had heard about trails set up by cultivators, all of them were about fighting different opponents to prove one''s strength... And none of them had a happy ending for the weak!


    Even if the words floating in front of her had said the trail would be adjusted to her cultivation realm, of which she had none, the young girl had close to no fighting experience outside of the few brawls she had been forced into to protect the little food and coins she had managed to gather. Faced with an experienced fighter, she stood no chance at all...!


    [The first trial is starting, please say your name. If no name is given within the next 10 seconds, a random name will be assigned to the trail taker. 10, 9, 8...]


    Having her chaotic train of thought interrupted as yet another box filled with words appeared in front of her, the young orphan girl could not help panicking as she saw that a countdown had appeared at the bottom of the box of words.


    As for saying her name... She had always been an orphan and had never been given a name in the first ce, so there was no name she could give to the strange box of words floating in front of her.


    [2... 1... 0! No name has been given. Proceeding with generating random name... Loading... Loading...]


    Feeling nervous as she watched the countdown reach the end, the young girl could only nervously watch as all sorts of different names shed across the box floating in front of her. The moment the floating box had chosen her name, the dreadful trail was going to start...!


    [Name Generation has beenpleted. A random name, Mui, has been chosen. The first trial, Test of Comprehension, is going to start now. The trial has been adjusted based on your current cultivation realm.]


    "My name is Mui...?" Muttering this to herself as she looked over the random name that had been chosen for her by the floating box in front of her, the young orphan girl could not help feeling a weird sense of happiness washing over her.


    Mui... I like this name... n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Smiling happily to herself as she repeated the name a few times inside her head, the young orphan girl, or now Mui, decided to keep the name that had been given to her.


    "Ah! Didn''t the box of words also say that the first trial is about to-"


    RUMBLE~!


    Not managing to finish her sentence, the ground beneath her shook violently before row after row of bookshelves shot up through the ground all around her. Transforming the empty space, she found herself inside of, into a massive and seemingly endless library that stretched as far as she could she in all directions.


    [The first trial, Test of Comprehension, will require you to search through the library in front of you to find a suitable cultivation technique and use it to take your first step on the path of cultivation by reach the Qi Condensation Realm. The time limit is one week, food and water will be provided throughout the trial to ensure that the trial taker, Mui, does not die of hunger or dehydration.]


    "Find a suitable cultivation technique... step on to the path of cultivation!?" Having no more than a few seconds to take in therge bookshelves that stretched hundreds of meters into the sky all around her, Mui could not help opening both of her eyes in surprise while looking over the box of words floating in front of her.


    The surprise she felt was not due to the objective of the first trial. Instead, it was due to the fact that she did not have to fight anyone like the many stories she had heard about the dangerous cultivator trials that would always be filled with life and death situations at every corner!


    Let alone having a trial that did not require her to fight, Mui had never heard about a cultivator trial that provided its participants with food and water throughout the trial!

 Chapter 831 Potential Disciple, Miu~

    Chomp~


    Biting down on one of the delicious fruits that had appeared in front of her shortly after the box of words disappeared, Mui could not help silently cursing the people and orphans, who had told her all sorts of scary stories about how dangerous cultivator trials were.


    How was the trial she was going through dangerous in any way? Not to mention the fact that there weren''t any terrifying demon beasts hunting her down like she had been told would happen, she was even being given a lot of delicious fruits to enjoy without having to do anything!


    Lost in thought for a moment, Mui could not help remembering how she had refused to join any of the recruitment trials that were set up by the differentrge powers that existed inside the city due to the scary stories she had heard about those trials ending up with most of the participants dying... But thinking about it again, Mui clearly remembered that the powerful forces would only ept a limited number of people every time they held a trial to pick new recruits or disciples to join them...


    "Did the others perhaps lie to me for a better chance to pass the tests and get taken in by those powers...!?" Muttering this to herself as she seemed to understand what had happened, Mui could not help feeling angry when thinking about the older orphans who had constantly told her stories of the terrifying trials they had once taken part in.


    Now that she thought about it, she always thought the people who didn''te back from joining one of those trials had ended up dead... But from the looks of it, they had most likely managed to pass the trial and enter one of thoserge powers in control of the city!


    "Ah! I shouldn''t waste my time like this!" Suddenly realizing that she had wasted more than half an hour of her time sitting in her own thoughts while chomping down the seemingly endless supply of delicious fruits that had been provided to her, Mui quickly got up and began to look through the books on one of the bookshelves in front of her. Beginning her search for a cultivation technique.


    Chomp~


    Not forgetting to bring a few of the delicious fruits along with her to enjoy during her search for a suitable cultivation technique.


    As for how to judge if she was suitable for a cultivation technique? Mui had no experience in this regard...


    For now, she had decided that the most logical way to judge this was to go off how well she understood the different cultivation techniques. In her head, the easier it was for her to understand a cultivation technique, the better suited for her it was!


    ...


    [The first trial set up by the system has been activated by a potential disciple, due to this being the first time a trial has been activated, you will be informed about their progress. After the trial is over, you will have the chance to transport the potential disciple to your location if the potential disciple sessfully ovees the trial.


    Be aware that this will only happen the first time, for the rest of the trials, the potential disciples will be given a special token and get informed about the Star Shattering Sect''s location and will have to find their way to the sect on their own.


    One of these special tokens can be found inside your interspatial ring, it is rmended that the host makes sure that potential disciples carrying the special token will have the ability to join the Star Shattering Sect even when the host is not present.]


    Flying above arge mountain range that stretched on for as far as the eye could see, Xuan Hao could not help looking towards the system prompt that had suddenly appeared in front of him out of the blue with a surprised expression on his face.


    "The trial inside one of the thousands of interspatial rings I threw out was activated!? Hm... I wonder just what kind of geniuses managed to aplish this..." Feeling a bit excited as he said this, Xuan Hao used the temporary function given to him by the system that allowed him to track the progress of the first trial.


    [Trial Participant: Mui (random name, generated based on native names from the Ewaria Continent)]


    "Huh...? Random name?" Reading the first part of the description of the person currently undergoing the trial hidden inside one of the interspatial rings he had thrown out, Xuan Hao could not help showing a confused expression on his face upon seeing what was written next to the trial participants name. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    [Status: Nameless Orphan]


    However, after reading the next part of the description, a look of understanding appeared on his face. Although... he had never expected for the first person to get the opportunity of entering one of the trials managed by the system to be a nameless orphan.


    [Age: 12]


    [Talent: 78]


    [Cultivation Realm: Nonexistent]


    [Progress: First Trial (Test of Comprehension)]


    [Time limit for First Trial: 7 Days]


    Reading thest bit of the description, Xuan Hao could not help wondering about something that had been on his mind for some time now. Two of his disciples, Bai Ning and Chu Yang, were also orphans who did not have any clue who their parents were before he took them in. Did bing an orphan happen to increase one''s natural talent...?


    Although he understood that there would be no way for him to answer this question, Xuan Hao had feeling that it might be a good idea to mention this to Elder Song when he got back, so he could ensure that the Star Shattering Sect made sure to send out people to recruit from the different cities located inside the territory to give these orphans a chance to enter one of the Star Shattering Sect''s branches.


    This way, the chance of them missing a possible heaven defying genius like Mui would reduce significantly...


    "I hope she manages to pass the trial given by the system, it would be a pity to not take in such a talented person as my disciple..." Quietly watching the floating screen in front of him for a few more seconds, Xuan Hao put it away before looking down towards the mountain range below him where a strange hole had appeared in the side of one of thergest mountains, whose peak was far higher up than the current height he was flying at.


    Ever since he had started flying over the mountain range, he had a feeling that there was something weird about the mountain range below him. All over the mountain range, countless simr holes could be seen in the different mountains of the mountain range, somerge and some small.


    The only problem was that he could not figure out what it was. Even using his domain and divine sense to investigate had not managed to yield any results.


    Now, the giant hole in the side of the mountain gave him a feeling that the origin of the weird feeling he had felt could be found if he entered therge hole.


    Hm... Should I ignore it and continue my journey back towards the sect, or should I explore-


    RUMBLE-!


    Just at this moment, as Xuan Hao was debating with himself whether he should enter the giant hole to explore where the weird feeling wasing from or not, a loud rumbling sound echoed out across the entire mountain range.


    RUUUUUUUMBLE-!


    Not a secondter, a massive worm like creature with a width easily the size of a small mountain emerged from the giant hole in the side of therge mountain before it burrowed into another side of the mountain before disappearing. Only leaving behind a brand-new hole the size of a small mountain in the now hollow looking mountain that looked like it was about to copse at any moment due to the two massive holes that were now present.


    "..."


    Swish-!


    Not wasting a single second after seeing this, Xuan Hao used the Drifting Cloud Steps to rapidly escape from the mountain range. Not wanting to stay there for even a second longer after having personally seen the massive worm-like creature that lived below the mountain range.


    Even if it had only been for a short moment, Xuan Hao had clearly been able to sense the strength of the worm-like creature that was even above that of the old ancestor from the imperial family!


    Although he understood that the territory under the Sky Empire was not truly under their control, he had never expected for such a terrifying worm-like creature to be present in one of the ces devoid of any cultivators... But then again, he also began to understand why some ces in the core region of the Sky Empire had been designated as ces even Soul Ascension Realm Experts could die in.


    The mountain range he was currently passing over was not one such location. Instead, it had been designated as still under investigation and was considered safe as long as one did not enter the holes in the ground...

 Chapter 832 Myriad Water Arts

    Escaping from the mountain range without looking back towards the hole he had seen the giant worm like creature disappear into, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he remembered the terrifying aura he had felt just a few seconds ago when the creature had surfaced for a few seconds before disappearing back into the ground below.


    Well, it''s only a given that areas still under investigation would be dangerous¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not helping to a stop just outside the mountain range with the terrifying worm-like creature hidden beneath it.


    Even if he did not end up having to fight the terrifying creature he had just seen, it allowed him to understand just how dangerous areas still under investigation could be and for the foreseeable future, he decided not to go through any of those ces on his way back to the Star Shattering Sec.


    "I should inform Yi Min about this when I pass through the Iron Sky Kingdom on my way back¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about all the information Yi Min had given him about the different dangerous areas that he should avoid on his way to the capital city of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao felt that the least he could do was give her the information about the danger lurking below the mountain range he had just passed through.


    Although this information would not be that useful to her, she would at least be able to give it to the Explorer Union in exchange for a few treasures. After all, from what he had learnt about the Explorer Union so far, they would be more than happy to exchange a few treasures for information on an area that they had yet to explore themselves.


    Not to mention, the appearance of such a powerful creature lurking beneath a mountain range in the Sky Empire might even attract the attention of the more powerful members of the Explorer Union. Maybe even resulting in some of the Explorer Unions Soul Ascension Realm Experts showing up to explore the area beneath the mountain range where the giant worm-like creature resided!


    But¡­ With even more Soul Ascension Realm Experts showing up in the Sky Empire, it was certainly going to cause the already unstable situation of the Sky Empire to be even more unstable.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help smiling. The more chaotic and unstable the Sky Empire was, the better it would be for the Star Shattering Sect. After all, with everyone in the Sky Empire preupied, there would be no time left for them to pay attention to the Star Shattering Sect located at the border!


    "Well¡­ It''s not certain that the Explorer Union will really end up sending over a group of Soul Ascension Realm Experts after learning about the giant worm-like creature, but even if they don''t, the appearance of such a powerful creature is still sure to cause some chaos among the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Sky Empire¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao did not bother staying around the mountain range any longer. Continuing his journey back towards the Star Shattering Sect. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    ¡­


    "Myriad Water Art?" Having walked through the library searching for a cultivation technique that would be the most suitable one for her, Mui had ended up stopping her search afternding on a water based cultivation mantra called Myriad Water Art.


    Although the cultivation technique might not be the most suitable one for her inside the seemingly endless library that spread out in all directions around her, she had already spent close to one day searching for a suitable cultivation technique.


    Even if she did not know a lot about cultivation outside of the names of some of the cultivation realms, she had still heard how long it took to cultivate and knew that the most difficult part of the First Trial was going to be for her to break through to the Qi Condensation Realm and take her first step on the path of cultivation.


    Normally, doing this would be a rather simple endeavor and could be aplished within a short period of time with the help of another cultivator¡­ But for Mui who had no teacher and had no information on how to cultivate outside of the cultivation mantra she had chosen to try and reach the Qi Condensation Realm with, breaking through to the Qi Condensation Realm would be a difficult thing. Especially considering that she only had six days left to do it!


    "I shouldn''t be wasting any time! For now, I should first try to get a better understanding of the Myriad Water Arts and on how to reach the Qi Condensation Realm." Focusing her attention on the Myriad Water Arts in her hands, Mui did not waste a single second before flipping open the cultivation technique and starting to thoroughly read through it in far more detailpared to the first time where she had just flipped through it to see if it was a suitable cultivation technique for her.


    "This¡­ So, I have to gather this thing called qi that is supposed to be everywhere into something called a dantian inside my body. After which I must form it into a small cyclone to officially be considered to have entered the Qi Condensation Realm¡­?" Reading through the Myriad Water Arts, Mui could not help feeling her head hurt, as she got introduced to brand new concepts she had never heard about before.


    The fact that a dantian was located inside her body was not new information to her, but the fact that there was qi everywhere in the air around her and she had to gather this mystical energy into a cyclone inside her body was apletely new concept. Although she had learnt a bit about cultivation before this, the information she had learnt about was based around how powerful cultivators were and how scary they were. None of it had been focused on cultivation itself.


    Shaking her head as she thought about how she had only been fearful of cultivators in the past and never thought about how they had gotten so strong in the first ce, Mui focused back on the Myriad Water Arts. Now curious if she could also be as strong as the cultivators, she had always heard stories about her entire life while wandering the streets of the city she had spent her entire life inside of.


    As a few hours flew past like this, with Mui deeply absorbed in trying her best to understand the Myriad Water Arts, she slowly ced the Myriad Water Arts on the ground in front of her before deciding to try and gather the qi around her-


    Whoosh~!


    Following the steps put down in the Myriad Water Arts, Mui slowly felt the qi around her rushing towards her body before rushing through her meridians towards her dantian.


    "So, this is what qi feels like¡­" Muttering this to herself as a smile bloomed on her face after feeling thefortable feeling of qi flowing through her body for the first time in her life, Mui soon felt her dantian for the first time in her life, as the qi rushing into her body finally managed to reach it.


    Given that she had not yet reached the Qi Condensation Realm, her dantian waspletely empty, without any sign of life.


    Whoosh~


    The moment the qi from outside rushed inside her empty dantian that had never seen this unknown energy before, it sprung forth with life-


    Rumble!


    Not even waiting for Mui to form a cyclone, her dantian started forming one by itself the moment it encountered qi for the first time.


    "Hm? This is far easier than I expected. Maybe reaching the Qi Condensation Realm is not as hard as I thought¡­?" Not having any idea about the fact that her dantian was actually helping her form the qi cyclone that was the foundation of a Qi Condensation Realm cultivator, Mui just thought this was normal and started to use the Myriad Water Arts to shape the qi cyclone that was slowly forming inside her dantian.


    During the entire process, Mui did not feel any burden or struggle that other people would have to go through when first trying to break through to the Qi Condensation Realm and form a qi cyclone inside her dantian.


    Everything went smoothly without any problems and before long, the qi cyclone finished forming inside her dantian-


    Boom!


    Signifying that Mui had managed to step into the First Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm and be an official cultivator. Even if her strength was not that much different from a normal mortal at the moment, her aura hadpletely changed.


    No longer was she a normal mortal. Instead, she was now a cultivator!


    A real cultivator that had reached the First Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm!

 Chapter 833 End Of The First Trial

    Feeling ted at having reached the Qi Condensation Realm and officially bing a cultivator, Mui didn''t notice that the box of words had returned-


    "The box of words!?" Only after calming down a bit from the happiness of having broken through to the Qi Condensation Realm, did she discover that the box of words was hovering no more than a few centimeters away from her face.


    [First Trial, Test of Comprehension, has been sessfully cleared. Proceeding to calcte participant Mui''s score for the Test of Comprehension...]


    "Score...? I thought it was just aboutpleting the trial in time..." Muttering this to herself as she read through the words hovering in the box in front of her, Mui kept her attention focused on the box of words. Feeling curious about what kind of score she would be given by the box of words.


    Considering that she still had a lot of time left before the time limit was up, Mui had a feeling that she should have done better than normal... But then again, she did not really know a lot about cultivation and how fast other people would bepared to her.


    [Calction finished, generating score in ordance to participant Mui''s performance during the First Trial, Test of Comprehension.]


    Keeping both her eyes focused on the box of words, Mui could not help starting to wonder what the next trial was going to be. After all, the box of words had mentioned that the Test of Comprehension was the first trial, with this in mind, there should at the very least be one more trial left!


    [Trial Participant: Mui]


    [Trial: Test of Comprehension]


    [Total Score: 91/100]


    [Evaluation: Passed, Reached minimum requirement for the second trial.]


    "Hehe, I passed the first trial! Now I just wonder what the second trial is about..." Seeing the evaluation and score she had been given by the box of words, Muiughed happily before starting to grow curious as to what the second trial was going to be about. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    At least she was not worried like she had been when she had first discovered that she had ended up entering a trial set up by a cultivator. Instead, it would be more correct to say that she was looking forward to the second trial. Not too surprising since the first trial had not only given her a chance to choose a cultivating technique. Allowing her to step into the Qi Condensation Realm... But it had also given her an endless supply of delicious fruits to eat from!


    Although the cultivation technique had allowed her to reach the Qi Condensation Realm, Mui was still not sure if it wasparable to the endless supply of delicious fruits. The fruits were simply far too delicious...


    Having experienced what, it felt like not having anything to eat, deep down, Mui felt like the endless supply of fruits she had avable inside the trial was by far the most precious thing she had gained so far. Enough for her to seriously consider staying inside the trial to continue eating the delicious fruit after the trial ended!


    If she could really do this, she would never have to worry about food again and could focus all her attention towards trying to understand the Myriad Water Arts. A peaceful existence that Mui preferred far more than her life of constantly having to worry about food or getting attacked by other orphans like herself.


    As for leaving the trial space... Mui thought she should at the very least increase her strength to the Core Formation Realm before doing this. After all, she had clearly seen that cultivators in the Core Formation Realm were people that didn''t have to worry about their safety while wandering around the city, she had even heard stories of therger forces of the city willingly taking in anyone that had reached the Core Formation Realm. Giving them a ce to live and food for free when they join them!


    Just thinking about this was more than enough for Mui to feel that she had to at least reach the Core Formation Realm before leaving the trial space. Leaving earlier was not an option, as she would have to find food on her own again, something Mui was not willing to do after she had experienced the luxury of an endless supply of delicious fruits provided by the box of words...


    [Second Trial, Test of Will, is going to start in seven hours, it is rmended that you rest before the start of the second trial.]


    "Test of Will...?" Looking at the words in front of her, Mui was left in a state of confusion. Having absolutely no clue what the second trial, Test of Will, was going to be about.


    Well... At least it does not want me to fight some kind of demon beast...


    Shaking her head as she thought about this, Mui decided to heed the warning given by the box of words-


    Rustle~


    Laying down on top of a small pile of soft books made from some sort of fluffy material before closing her eyes to take a quick nap. Not questioning the existence of soft and fluffy books. All she could think about was howfortable she was, as she slowly drifted off into dreand.


    Dreaming of having the ability to summon forth an endless number of delicious fruits even outside the trial space.


    ...


    At the same time Mui was having the best sleep of her life inside the endless library created by the trial space, Elder Song was standing in front of Feng Chen with a troubled expression on his face.


    "Ehm... So, can you please tell me why you asked me toe out and do something so troublesome instead of doing it yourself?" Trying his best to remain calm as he said this, Elder Song could not help ncing towards the elderly man that was standing no more than a few meters away from them, curiously observing the city located at the base of the Ninth Star Peak with a fascinated expression on his face.


    This elderly person was none other than the Domain Lord Realm Expert that had destroyed one of his sect''s branches no more than a few hours ago!


    Even if Elder Song was confident that Feng Chen would be able to deal with him, he had never expected that Feng Chen would end up bringing the other party back with him in such a short period of time. Not to mention, he had dragged him out of the sect to help in convincing the other party to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    If it was not a Domain Lord Realm Expert, Elder Song would not have been this troubled, but due to the other party having reached the Domain Lord Realm, Elder Song understood that it would be far from easy to convince someone like that to join the Star Shattering Sect. Especially when considering that the person asking him to join the Star Shattering Sect was just an elder that had reached the Nascent Soul Realm...


    This was also the main reason why Elder Song was so confused as to why Feng Chen had decided to drag him out of the sect to be in charge of this matter...


    "This... I wanted to do it on my own at first... But that old man is far shrewder than I expected, and I have a feeling that I might end up getting dupped by him if you are not around to take the lead. Given that we have been working together for so long, you should understand that I''m not good at dealing with people like this..." Whispering this with an awkward expression on his face as he used his domain to make sure the old man in question did not hear them, Feng Chen looked towards Elder Song with an almost begging look in his eyes.


    "..."


    Hearing what Feng Chen said, Elder Song could not help looking him dead in the eyes for a moment before ultimately letting out a sigh.


    "Fine, I will help you out this time around, but you really have to learn how to deal with people like this in the future, I won''t always be able to assist you like in the past. Managing the internal matters of the Flying Sword Sect and the Star Shattering Sect are twopletely different things and I don''t think I will also have time to manage things outside the sect like in the past..."


    "I understand... I will make sure to spend some time learning from that old fox in the future!"


    Looking at Feng Chen who was happily Nodding his head while saying this, Elder Song could not help smiling wryly upon hearing how he had referred to Shu Yao as an old fox.


    Well... Considering that she was a few hundred years old, it was not wrong, but Elder Song had a feeling if she would not be too fond of the nickname Feng Chen had given her...


    "Well then, let''s get this over with." Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the Domain Lord Realm Expert still busy observing the rapidly expanding city located below the Ninth Star Peak, Elder Song made a mental note to inform Shu Yao about what Feng Chen had nicknamed her.


    Wanting to ensure that she taught him how to handle the so-called old shrewd people like the one currently in front of him...

 Chapter 834 Second Trial, Test Of Will

    "Mmmh~ That was the best sleep I''ve ever had!" Stretching her body after a long rxing sleep at the fluffy and soft books, Mui wanted nothing more than to take these fluffy books along with her. Unfortunately, carrying so many books along with her was not possible. Especially considering that she still had a trial toplete!


    [The Second Trial, Test of Will, is going to start within the next two minutes. For your own safety, it is rmend to be prepared for the trial.]


    "Wah!? Only two minutes left until the second trial starts and it''s also warning me about my safety- Don''t tell me... Is the Test of Will perhaps some sort of dangerous trial!?" Feeling a hint of panic after realizing that the second trial might be far more dangerous than she had first thought, Mui sprung up from the small mountain of soft and fluffy books she wasying on top of before nervously waiting for the remaining two minutes to pass.


    "Hm? Wha- The books are disappearing!?" Having waited for what felt like an eternity, everything around her had started emitting a gentle light at some point in time... And before she had time to react to what was happening, the bookshelves all around her turned into wisps of light before disappearing into thin air.


    The books she had thrown on the ground during the First Trial were no exception, as they also turned into small motes of light before disappearing. The only exception being the Myriad Water Arts she had chosen as her cultivation mantra during the first trial.


    [The Second Trial, Test of Will, is going to begin.]


    "Begin? But there is nothing-"


    Rumble-!


    Not getting the chance to finish her sentence after having read through the short message that had been given by the box of words following the disappearance of the countless books and bookshelves, the ground beneath her started violently shaking.


    Crack~


    "Ah!?" Suddenly hearing a loud cracking sounding from the ground around a thousand meters away from where she was standing, Mui could not help opening both of her eyes in disbelief.


    RUMBLE-!


    From the small crack in the ground, what started as a small pointy rock, soon turned into arge mountain that pierced through the misty sky above. Even the ce where she had been standing had been lifted a few dozen meters off the ground. Turning into the base of the mountain.


    "Ah!? Wha-what is this, why does my body feel so heavy...?" Feeling a clear change in her movements after the appearance of the mountain, Mui could not help eximing this to herself as she searched around for the box of words. Wanting to find out what had happened... And at the same time also find out what she had to do toplete the second trial.


    Why is it so far away?


    Finding the box of words after looking around her now rocky surroundings, Mui could not help wondering why the box of words that had always appeared directly in front of her had now appeared on a location that was different from the past... But due to the weird weight that seemed to be pushing down on her, Mui did not think too much about this as she quickly made her way towards the box of words to find out what was happening.


    [The second trial, Test of Will, will require you to climb the mountain under a special pressure that will only affect your soul. The pressure will increase the higher up you climb. During the trial, there are special areas along the way that will allow you to rest. If you faint or fall asleep outside any of the special areas, the trial will be considered to have failed!


    The time limit is one week, food and water will only be provided inside the special areas found on different elevations of the mountain. The requirement forpleting the second trial is to reach the peak of the mountain.]


    Reading through the box of words, Mui could not help freezing up after reading thest part of the description given about the second trial. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "No... No more endless supply of delicious fruits...?" Muttering these words to herself, a somewhat hollow look appeared in her eyes, as she realized that she would no longer have a constant and endless supply of delicious fruits avable to her whenever she felt hungry.


    No... I can still get ess to the endless supply of delicious fruits if I reach one of the special areas higher up on the mountain!


    Turning to look up the mountain as she thought about this, it did not take long for Mui to spot one of these special areas that had been mentioned in the box of words. Not that the special areas were in any way hard to spot considering that they were all made out to be filled with small trees, flowers and other nts. Making them stand out on the deste rocky surface of the mountain without any other signs of life.


    Thump~!


    Fighting the part of her that wanted to rush up the mountain towards the closest special area where she could once again have ess to her endless supply of delicious fruits again, Mui sat down on the ground before closing her eyes.


    Although she had no clue about the pressure that was bearing down on her soul and causing her to have a more difficult time moving her body, Mui clearly understood how dangerous this was. Especially when considering the fact that this pressure was only going to grow stronger the farther up the mountain she made it.


    If she did not prepare herself properly, would she not end up turning into a pancake at some point in time!?


    Spending the next few minutes with her eyes closed trying to find a way to adjust herself to the special pressure on her soul, Mui ended up finding out that the pressure would grow weaker when she circted the Myriad Water Arts.


    Experimenting with this for a few more minutes until she was sure that the pressure on her did indeed grow weaker when she circted the Myriad Water Arts, Mui got up before starting to move towards the special area that was located closest to her. Officially starting her journey towards the peak of the mountain!


    ...


    Whoosh~


    At the same time Mui had started the second trial, Xuan Hao was flying above argeke that covered an area more than a dozen times the size of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Below him, all sorts of ships could be seen moving around. Travelling between the different small inds that could be found around the massiveke, sometimes a few demonic beasts living in theke could also be seening up to the surface to attack the ships travelling between the different inds located in theke.


    "I wonder how far that girl, Mui, has made it sincest." Not paying any attention to what was happening below him, Xuan Hao could not help wondering how Mui was doing inside the trial that had been set up by the system.


    Although her talent was by far the highest, he had seen so far. Given that she did not have any cultivation, he could not help feeling nervous about how well she would do in the trial given out by the system. After all, he had no idea what the trial was about and only had the title of the trial to go off...


    [Trial Participant: Mui (random name, generated based on native names from the Ewaria Continent)]


    [Status: A Young Orphan that has managed to take the first step on the path of cultivation.]


    [Age: 12]


    [Talent: 78]


    [Cultivation Realm: Qi Condensation Realm, First Stage]


    [Progress: Second Trial (Test of Will)]


    [Time limit for Second Trial: 7 Days]


    "She already made it through the first trial and moved on to the second trial!?" Using the system to view her progress, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of happiness and relief after discovering that she had managed to pass the first trial and move on to the second trial.


    At least it seemed like his worry had been for nothing. Not too surprising considering how focused the system was on the talent of the disciples he took in. Never really caring about what cultivation realm they had reached when he took them in.


    BOOOM-!


    However, just at this moment, a loud explosion took ce below him. Followed by two powerful auras shing violently with each other on one of the small inds.


    "Hm? Two Domain Lords?" Instantly seeing through the strength of the two people shing with each other below him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit curious about what had caused two Domain Lords to start fighting with each other, as he came to an abrupt stop before looking down towards the small ind where the two Domain Lords were located.

 Chapter 835 The Two Domain Lords

    Descending towards the ind where the two Domain Lords fighting with each other were located, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what had caused them to start fighting.


    The Sky Empire did not allow Domain Lords to kill each other because losing a Domain Lord would end up weakening the overall strength of the Sky Empire. Especially when it came to dealing with other empires that might try to attack them and take over part of their territory without Soul Ascension Realm Experts showing up.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Be it a grudge or a precious artifact, Xuan Hao could feel the clear killing intent present in the attacks of the two Domain Lords, as he hid himself just above the ce where they were fighting before starting to figure out what had caused these two Domain Lords to start fighting to the death. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Lord Windfall, you old scoundrel, I''m going to kill you!" At the same time Xuan Hao descended towards the small ind to figure out what had caused the two Domain Lords to start fighting each other to death, a loud voice echoed out across the small ind, as one of the two Domain Lordsunched a powerful attack filled with killing intent towards his opponent.


    "Hmph! How is all this my fault!? You are just taking out your anger on me because I''m more handsome than you!" Notcking behind the Domain Lord filled with killing intent, the Domain Lord that had been identified as someone called Lord Windfall, gathered his power together into a simrly powerful attack before charging forward to meet his opponent.


    BOOOOOM-!


    As the two shed with each other at the centre of the small ind, the impact of their fully powered attack was more than enough to sink part of the ind, while also sending out a powerful shockwave that swept over the part of the ind that had yet to sink into the water. Killing any cultivators and demonic beasts unfortunate enough to still be present on the small ind.


    The ships moving around on theke not too far away from the small ind were also affected by the shockwave, but due to the shockwave having weakened after travelling quite a distance from its origin, the cultivators present on these ships ended up surviving. At most one of the ships would roll over, causing everyone on board to get thrown into the water.


    Lord Windfall... Where have I heard this name before... Lord Windfall...


    Ignoring the fighting between the two Domain Lords for a moment, Xuan Hao went over the information that he had been given about the different Domain Lord Realm Experts present in the Sky Empire... And before long, Xuan Hao managed to recall some information about the Domain Lord called Lord Windfall.


    Windfall was the name of a small noble house and if his information was not wrong, one of the two Domain Lords currently fighting, was the head of the Windfall Noble House.


    The Windfall Noble House was not a well-known orrge noble family. Instead, it could be considered a rather small noble family inside the Sky Empire... But even then, they were quite well connected and had managed to befriend a lot of therger and more powerful noble families. Attacking them would inevitably end up offending these powerful noble families. Making Xuan Hao even more curious about the identity of the other Domain Lord.


    "Damn you! Even if it''s thest thing I do, I''m going to kill you today!" Screaming loudly filled with killing intent before Xuan Hao had the chance to try and figure out who he was, the unidentified Domain Lord Realm Expert''s power suddenly started rapidly increasing. Allowing his strength to directly reach the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Far surpassing his original cultivation realm!


    A forbidden technique that forcibly raises one''s cultivation base. Even if he makes it out of this alive, he will never have a chance at improving his cultivation in the future. Maybe his cultivation base will even start detreating to the degree that he won''t even be capable of dealing with someone in the Nascent Soul Realm...


    Instantly understanding what the unidentified Domain Lord Realm Expert had done after his strength rose to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could not help showing a shocked expression on his face.


    From the fact that the unidentified Domain Lord Realm Expert had decided to use a forbidden technique to forcibly raise his cultivation realm, it was obvious that he hade prepared to die together with Lord Windfall today!


    "What in the world did that Lord Windfall do to anger this person to this degree? Did he kill his entire family or something...?" Quietly muttering this to himself as he turned towards Lord Windfall, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards Lord Windfall to see what he was going to do now that his opponent was going all out to kill him.


    "Elder Green Wing, are you crazy!? I only slept with one of your sect''s elders one time and she was the one who came onto me first, there is no need for you to do something like this. Even if your Green Mountain Sect is among the major sects, my Windfall Family is inws with the Hollow Thunder Family!"


    Realizing that his opponent was risking his life to use a forbidden technique to kill him, Lord Windfall could not help showing a panicked expression on his face, as he yelled loudly towards the other Domain Lord. Also known as Elder Green Wing. In ast-ditch effort to get the other party to stop what he was doing.


    "Elder of my Green Mountain Sect- That was my wife!"


    "Ah... That is... Eh... My bad..."


    Following the words of Elder Green Wing, Lord Windfall froze on the spot as he could barely get any words out.


    How in the world should he have known that the person he slept with happened to be the wife of Elder Green Wing. Especially with how she had been the one to approach him first!


    Feeling like he had been wronged for now reason, Lord Windfall turned towards Elder Green Wing. nning to exin the matter to him and get everything resolved without having to continue their pointless fight.


    "Let''s first talk this over and-"


    "DIE!"


    Not waiting for Lord Windfall to finish his sentence, Elder Green Wing''s anger had reached its peak, as he charged towards Lord Windfall filled with killing intent.


    Obvious to everyone watching, Elder Green Wing was not willing to continue talking any longer. Only wanting to kill the person who had slept with his wife and forced him to wear a green hat in front of not only the elders from his sect, but also the disciples...


    "You old fool, you leave me no choice...!" Not willing to just get killed by Elder Green Wing without fighting back, Lord Windfall pulled out a small talisman from his interspatial ring before activating it. Instantly increasing his power to the same level as Elder Green Wing.


    The main difference between the two methods being the fact that one was archived through a forbidden technique that burned through one''s source of life and future potential, while the other was using the power stored inside a talisman to increase one''s strength for a short moment.


    Although both methods had clear side effects, the side effects brought on by using a talisman was far lower and wouldn''t affect one''s future achievements on the path of cultivation. Only weakening the user for a few months after the power in the talisman had been exhausted.


    Swish-!


    Not a second after Lord Windfall had used the talisman to forcibly raise his strength to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Elder Green Wing arrived in front of him-


    BOOOM-!


    As the two shed with each other, the terrifying power of two Fourth Stage Domain Lords constantly bombarded the small ind below them.


    Rumble~!


    Unable to handle this terrifying power, the small ind inevitably cracked apart before what remained was either swallowed up by the water rushing in from all sides or sent flying into the distance.


    "We have to get out of here before- Ahhhh!"


    "Nooo-! Spare me, I''m-"


    The ships belonging to some curious Nascent Soul Realm Experts who had approached the site of the battle between the two Domain Lord Realm Experts for a chance to gain enlightenment and break through to the Domain Lord Realm themselves, were caught in the crossfire, as their unwilling scream echoed out across theke. Scaring off any other Nascent Soul Realm Experts that had a simr n in mind from getting any closer.


    "..."


    Watching all this happening while hiding himself with his domain, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say.


    In a sense, this could be considered a good thing for the Star Shattering Sect. After all, if the noble families and major sects started fighting with each other, the Sky Empire would get even more chaotic. An added benefit would be that the other independent sects would also be able to stay safe from the major sects because of this...


    Whoosh~


    Havinge to this conclusion, Xuan Hao quietly left. Leaving as quietly as he had appeared, without any of the two even noticing he had appeared in the first ce.


    Swish-!


    However just before he left the area, he created a small sword that remained hovering in the air above. Directly targeted at Lord Windfall who had all his attention focused on dealing with the constant onught of a half crazed Elder Green Wing.


    If Elder Green Wing could not kill Lord Windfall, the sword above was going to descend and kill him on the spot before dissipating. Putting all the me of Lord Windfall''s death on Elder Green Wing, and by extension, the Green Mountain Sect. Making sure that the noble families and the major sects would end up starting to fight each other!


    After all, there was no way Xuan Hao was just going to leave a chance to make the Star Shattering Sect and the independent sects of the Sky Empire safer up to chance...

 Chapter 836 Death Of Lord Windfall

    A few hours after Xuan Hao had left the two Domain Lords to fight with each other, Elder Green Wing had managed to gain the upper hand due to him not caring about the injuries he received. Different from Lord Windfall, who very much still wanted to be able to continue cultivating after the battle was over.


    Swish-!


    Just at this moment, Elder Green Wing managed to slip past Lord Windfall''s defences- N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Ah-!"


    Directly cutting off the arm that Lord Windfall was using to hold the talisman that was strengthening him and allowing him to fight back against Elder Green Wing.


    "Haha, Lord Windfall, you are no match for me!" Laughing loudly as he watched the power of Lord Windfall rapidly declining at a speed visible to the naked eye before he ended up entering a weakened state, Elder Green Wing got ready to kill off the person who had made him wear a green hat in front of everyone from his sect.


    "Hmph! You really think I''m that easy to kill!? Don''t forget that my Windfall family is inws of the Hollow Thunder Family!" Filled with killing intent as he said this, Lord Windfall directly pulled another talisman out of his interspatial ring before activating it without wasting a single second.


    The moment the talisman was activated, the space around Lord Windfall started bending and distorting.


    "Hm!? A teleportation talisman!? How in the world did you get your hands on something like that- Don''t think I''m going to allow you to escape!"


    Knowing exactly what the reaction from the space around Lord Windfall represented, Elder Green Wing showed a shocked expression before using his most powerful movement technique to close the distance between them before the teleportation talisman could take effect and teleport Lord Windfall away... But in the end, he could only helplessly watch as the space around Lord Windfall started swallowing him up.


    Swish-!


    However, it was at this moment when Lord Windfall was about to get teleported away from the small ind, that the sword Xuan Hao had left hovering in the air above the two Domain Lords busy fighting with each other, sprang into action and descended towards the unsuspecting Lord Windfall.


    "Wha-"


    Ptsh-!


    Not having any time to react, Lord Windfall was directly cut down by the sword. Instantly killing him and destroying his nascent soul!


    Other than this, the sword attack also caused the space around Lord Windfall to grow unstable for a short moment. Not only dying the teleportation talisman from activating, but also making it hard for Elder Green Wing to notice the fact that Lord Windfall had already died.


    "Die!"


    With all thisbined, Elder Green Wing who was still unaware of the fact that Lord Windfall had been killed. Gathered all his power together into a single attack beforeunching it towards the location of the dead Lord Windfall.


    Swoosh~


    BOOOM-!


    Not a secondter, the attackunched by Elder Green Wing, violently crashed into the dead body of Lord Windfall.


    "Haha, your little teleportation talisman didn''t work fast enough!" Seeing that his attack had managed to reach its target and how Lord Windfall''s body fell lifelessly to the ground, Elder Green Wing was ovee with happiness. Not realizing that his opponent had already been killed before his attack had a chance to reach him.


    "Hehe, even if you have something as precious as a teleportation talisman, you still ended up dying to me in the end!" Descending from the sky towards the water where the dead body of Lord Windfall hadnded, Elder Green Wing was filled with arrogance as he said this. Not showing the slightest sign of caring about the fact that he had just ended up breaking one of the most basic rules put down by the imperial family.


    Whoosh-!


    Waving his hand towards the dead body of Lord Windfall, Elder Green Wing used the power of his domain to erase his body. Making sure that his opponent had not just pretending to have been killed off. Not forgetting to take away the interspatial ring before doing this...


    Ptsh-!


    Just at this moment, Elder Green Wing threw up arge mouthful of blood. Staining the water below him in a deep red colour.


    "This is... The side effects of the forbidden technique have already started to take effect!? I should get out of here before I lose all my strength and the worst part of the side effects start to kick in...!"


    Looking down at therge amount of blood he had just thrown up, Elder Green Wing could not help showing a panicked expression before jumping into the air. Using all the power left in his body to leave theke. Hoping to find a safe ce before the more deadly side effects of the forbidden technique started appearing.


    ...


    "This... A Domain Lord Realm Expert died!? Is the other person not afraid of what will happen after the imperial family learns about this...?" While Elder Green Wing "finished off" Lord Windfall, a Nascent Soul Realm Expert observing the battle from afar could not help muttering this to himself. Shocked at the fact that he had witnessed the death of a Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    "What do you know? It might be two wandering cultivators that happened to pass through the Sky Empire and ended up in a fight over some kind of treasure. The imperial family won''t care about something like this..." Standing beside the shocked Nascent Soul Realm Expert, another Nascent Soul Realm Expert rolled his eyes as he said this. Believing that the two Domain Lord Realm Experts fighting with each other to be two wandering cultivators that just happened to be in the Sky Empire.


    "I see, that is understandable-"


    "Wait a moment!" However, just as the first was nodding his head in understanding, a third Nascent Soul Realm Expert stepped forward.


    "If I''m not wrong, one of the two Domain Lords fighting should be an Elder from the Green Mountain Sect. As for the other one who ended up dying, I have no idea..."


    "What!? Now that you mention it, the one who died did look a bit like the current head of the Windfall family... But would an elder from the Green Mountain Sect really be stupid enough to kill the head of the Windfall family? After all, it''s not really secret that they are inws with the Hollow Thunder Family..."


    "Who knows... For now, I think it would be a good idea for us to leave before that Domain Lord from the Green Mountain Sect starts thinking about silencing the people who saw him..." Not willing to stay around and ponder about what had caused the two Domain Lords to start fighting each other, the third Nascent Soul Realm Expert jumped off the boat he was on before escaping in the direction of the shore.


    Not wanting to risk getting killed when the elder from the Green Mountain Sect started trying to silence anyone who had witnessed what had taken ce to stop the imperial family from learning about what he had done.


    "Indeed, we should leave" "Good idea, let''s get going."


    Nodding their head in understand upon hearing what the third Nascent Soul Realm Expert said, the two other Nascent Soul Realm quickly followed the third.


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Like them, the remaining Nascent Soul Realm Experts located around the ce where the battle had taken ce also scattered in all direction. All understanding that staying behind would be a bad idea.


    ...


    The moment that the sword floating above Lord Windfall descended to kill him, Xuan Hao, who had already travelled far away from theke where the two Domain Lords were fighting, came to a sudden stop before turning around to look back in the direction he hade from.


    "Hm? Looks like that elder from the Green Mountain Sect couldn''t finish up Lord Windfall by himself..." Muttering this to himself as he looked back in the direction of theke, Xuan Hao soon turned around before continuing his journey back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although it would have been best if he didn''t have to be the one to finish off Lord Windfall, it didn''t matter too much. Even if the elder from the Green Mountain Sect understood he wasn''t the one to kill Lord Windfall, he would still be the one that would end up taking the me for it.


    Not to mention the fact that the fight had been witnessed by arge number of Nascent Soul Realm Experts, the traces of the sword attack that had killed Lord Windfall would be impossible to spot for someone below the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even among Soul Ascension Realm Experts, the only person in the Sky Empire that should be capable of doing this should be the old ancestor from the imperial family... But for him to personally investigate the death of some random Domain Lord Realm Expert that was not even a part of the imperial family, Xuan Hao really doubted that something like this was going to happen...

 Chapter 837 Anger Of The Hollow Thunder Family, Third Special Area

    BOOM-!


    Only a few seconds after the death of Lord Windfall, a terrifying aura erupted from the core of the Hollow Thunder Family located in the capital city. Making the guards standing around guarding the core area of the Hollow Thunder Family start looking at each other with fearful expressions stered all over their faces.


    "Wha-what in the world is this!? Who is unfortunate to have offended the old master!?


    "I-I don''t know, b-but I''m sur they won''t be able to survive after a-angering the old master to this d-degree..."


    "Indeed, I think-"


    BANG-!


    As they all came to the same conclusion that the person who had ended up offending the old master of their family was as good as dead, therge doors leading into the core area was thrown open before an old man filled with killing intent stepped out. Instantly scaring all the guards into silence. None of them daring to say a single word in the presence of the old man.


    The silencested for close to a minute without the old man moving a single step. Only looking out into the distance with a terrifying glint in his eyes.


    "O-old master... I-is there something we can help with...?" Not able to take the silence any longer, one of the guards managed to work up enough courage to step forward and say this-


    "Hm?"


    But quickly regretted his choice after the old master turned around and focused his attention on to him.


    "I-I''m sorry for asking such a rude question old master, I will go to the discipline hall and ept my punishment!" Not wasting a single second in saying this, the guard who had asked the old master ran away the moment he had finished talking. Understanding very well that staying would be a bad idea. Especially so when considering the reputation of the old master...


    "All of you, leave!" Not caring too much about the guard that had escaped, the old master of the Hollow Thunder Family just turned towards the remaining guards before saying this. Making it obvious to anyone that he wanted to be alone.


    "Yes, yes! We will leave immediately!"


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Flying across the paved stone path of the ground the moment they heard what the old master said, the guards soon disappeared. All of them taking the chance they had been given to leave the scary old master filled with killing intent. Not forgetting to warn the rest of the guards that they met along the way that it would be best to leave the core areapletely for now if they cherished their life!


    "Elder Green Wing!? One of the elders from the Green Mountain Sect dared to kill my brother inw!? Does he really believe that my Hollow Thunder Family will just stand by doing nothing!? Not to mention us, the imperial family will probably also want to deal with this!" Following the guards having left, the old master muttered this to himself filled with killing intent.


    "If not for the fact that I left behind part of my will in the talisman I gave him, I would probably never have learnt that the person behind the death of my brother inw was someone from the Green Mountain Sect!" Remembering the image that had been transferred to him of his brother inws body getting erased by Elder Green Wing, the old master could not help trembling in anger.


    No matter how strong a major sect was and the fact that they all had the backing of powerful kingdom that would at least have one person in the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, there was no way he could just brush this matter aside. Especially because the person who had been killed was none other than his brother inw!


    "Hmph! Even if those major sects are hard to deal with under normal circumstances, I don''t believe I won''t be able to kill that Elder Green Wing. All I need to do is bring this matter to the imperial family!" Filled with killing intent as he said this, the old master turned to look in the direction of the imperial family before taking a step forward in that direction.


    Even if he had to work together with the imperial family for this matter, he was going to make sure that the Green Mountain Sect, and more importantly, Elder Green Wing, regretted killing his brother inw!


    ...


    Thump-!


    At the same time Lord Windfall met his end at the hands of the sword left behind by Xuan Hao and the old master of the Hollow Thunder Family was trembling in anger thinking about ways to take revenge on the Green Mountain Sect, Mui copsed on the ground exhausted inside one of the special areas along the path leading up towards the peak of the mountain.


    "Hah... That... Hah... Was far more exhausting than I expected!" Breathing erratically as sheid down on the ground, Mui did not hesitate to use her now working favourite ability ever, summon delicious fruits, to summon forth a delicious and sweet fruit!


    Chomp~!


    Not wasting a single second before biting into it, the exhausted expression from climbing up the mountain was soon reced by one of bliss. The delicious fruits did not only taste great, but they also helped ease her exhaustion.


    Remaining on the ground as she looked around at the beautiful trees and other lush nts that surrounded the small special area isted from the terrifying soul pressure outside, Mui could not help feeling a hint of sleepiness.


    At this point in time, she had already spent thest eight hours trying to climb the mountain. Fighting the terrifying soul pressure at every moment. Only stopping at two other special areas to rest so far.


    The only positive thing that had happened, being that the constant pressure bearing down on her had allowed her to break through from the First Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm to the Second Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Although this was just an increase of a minor realm, the increase in strength was what had allowed her to reach the third special area. If she had not managed to break through, there would have been no way for her to endure the soul pressure between the second and third special area!


    Chomp~!


    Being filled with energy after eating thest bit of the delicious fruit, Mui turned her attention towards the fourth special area that was located farther up the mountain... But upon doing this, a sense of helplessness welled up inside her after seeing that the distance between the fourth and the third special area was almost double that of the distance between the third and second special area.


    Even without starting her journey yet, Mui clearly understood that she stood no chance of reaching the fourth special area in her current state. Especially considering that she had just broken through to the Second Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm and still needed to stabilize her cultivation base...


    Before continuing towards the next special area, I should consolidate my cultivation realm... Maybe getting some sleep after I finish stabilizing my cultivation base isn''t a bad idea either... Ah! I also need to take a few of the delicious fruits along with me!


    Understanding just how unprepared she was when it came to attempting to climb to the next special area, Mui ended up deciding to stay inside the third special area for now. Wanting to make sure she was well rested and strong before challenging the difficult climb to the fourth special area.


    Not that this was a difficult decision. After all, she was more than happy with staying inside the special area filled with delicious fruits for longer. Time was not a problem and she still had over six days before the time limit for the trial was up. Not to mention, the third special area was located around the halfway point of the mountain.


    Keeping all of this in mind, Mui felt like resting for a day to stabilize her cultivation base and get some sleep in was not a bad idea. Especially if it meant that she wouldn''t have to risk failing on her way from the third special area to the fourth. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Thump~


    Havinge to a decision on what to do, Mui plopped down on the soft grass below before starting the process of stabilizing her cultivation realm through the usage of her cultivation mantra. Not something that would take a more than a few minutes to half an hour considering that she had only broken through to the Second Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm. Not a major realm or something like that.


    Whoosh~


    "Hm? It only took half a minute!?" However, to Mui''s surprise, it only ended up taking half a minute for her to stabilize her cultivation base at the Second Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm. Although she had no idea what the normal time required to stabilize one''s cultivation base after breaking through to the Second Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, she still somewhat understood that her speed of stabilizing her cultivation base should have been faster than normal.


    "Is it because of the weird pressure that it''s easier for me to stabilize my cultivation base? Hm... I think that should be the reason. After all, it does involve some weird stuff with the soul... On the positive side, I get more time to sleep now!" Not having any real understanding or exnation as to why she had managed to stabilize her cultivation base so fast, Mui just linked it together with the weird pressure she had experienced while climbing up the mountain and threw it away before finding afortable spot to sleep inside the special area.

 Chapter 838 Last Strech Towards The Peak

    "Mhhm~!" Stretching her body as she slowly woke up after having slept for what felt like days, Mui let out afortable sound before getting her hands on yet another delicious fruit to satiate the hunger that appeared the moment she woke up.


    Chomp~


    Finishing up the fruit in a single bite, Mui turned her attention towards the location of the Fourth special area located farther up the mountain. Even if part of her wanted to just stay inside the third special area where she couldze around with an endless supply of delicious fruits, she also understood thatpleting the trial was a top priority!


    I... I should get going...


    Feeling a bit afraid when she remembered how she had only barely managed to make it to the third special area due to suddenly breaking through to the Second Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, Mui could not help hesitating for a short moment before finally taking a step outside the special area.


    Whoosh-!


    Not even a second after doing this, Mui felt all too familiar terrifying pressure once again weighing down on her. Even if this was not the first time, the pressure was even stronger than it had been between the second and third special area.


    "I should start moving..." Knowing that the qi inside her dantian was extremely limited in how long it allowed her to do something simple like using her cultivation mantra, Mui did not dare waste a single second after she finished adjusting to the pressure. Directly beginning to make her way up the increasingly steep mountain path leading towards the fourth special area.


    The path up the mountain was not anything special and had at most been made smooth to make it easier to walk along... Of course, that was if one didn''t consider the terrifying pressure one would have to endure while traversing this path.


    At least, the simple and empty path made it far easy for Mui, as she slowly got closer and closer to the fourth special area without any problems.


    "Ah-!"


    Thump-!


    It was when she was just about to reach the fourth special area that Mui who had been ready to rx after the long climb, suddenly let out a painful scream before copsing on the ground. Unable to stand up again due to the pressure constantly bearing down on her.


    Wha-what happened!? Why did the pressure suddenly increase by so much!?


    Barely able to keep herself conscious, Mui could not help wondering why the pressure that had been rtively easy for her to withstand so far, had suddenly multiplied by several folds. Not even giving her a chance to resist before she was pressed to the ground.


    No! I can''t fail like this!


    Feeling her vision fading with each passing second, as she got closer and closer to fainting due to the pressure from above, Mui found what little willpower she had to use thest power left in her body to forcibly drag herself forward. Moving along the small rocks of the path leading up the mountain towards the fourth special area that was no more than a few meters away from her. Disregarding any pain, she felt from dragging her body along the small rocks while being pressed down towards the ground at the same time.


    Continuing forward towards her goal like this for an unknown period of time, Mui managed to drag her exhausted body inside the fourth special area. Allowing her to finally rx her battered and exhausted body.


    I... I made it!


    Thest ten meters of her journey towards the fourth special area had by far been one of the hardest things she had ever experienced, but in the end, she had made it!


    Now I can eat more delicious-


    ted and bursting with happiness after making it on to the soft grass that covered the fourth special area, Mui didn''t have any time to express her happy emotions before fainting on the spot. Falling into a deep sleep on the soft grass under the shade of arge tree filled with leavesrge enough to cover her entire body.


    ...


    Whoosh-!


    "Ah!? I fell asleep... Hun!? What happened to my injuries...?" Waking up after an unknown length of time, Mui jumped off the ground before suddenly realizing that the pain she had felt across her entire body before falling asleep hadpletely disappeared.


    "Hm? My strength also seems to have increased..."


    Investigating her situation further, Mui also discovered that the qi cyclone inside her dantian seemed to have grownrger and had reached the limit of the Second Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm. Only needing a single push to reach the Thirds Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm. Not only that, but it was alsopletely stable without her needing to due anything to stabilize the sudden increase in qi present inside her dantian!


    "This ce is amazing. Allowing my strength to improve rapidly... Maybe I can use this..." Muttering this to herself as she once again felt amazed by the fact that her strength had managed to take another leap forward without her doing anything, Mui began wondering whether she could use the pressure just outside the fourth special area to improve her strength even further before moving on towards the next special area.


    Rumble~ n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "What was that!?"


    However, before she had a chance to do this, a loud rumbling sound echoed out across the special area. Making Mui jump in surprise as she looked around herself for the source of the rumbling sound.


    Rumble~


    "Wait... the origin of the sound is-"


    It was only when the rumbling sound returned for a second time, that she realized it wasing from her stomach.


    "..."


    Feeling her face turning red in embarrassment upon this realization, Mui quietly got her hands on arge number of delicious fruits before starting to eat in silence. Instead using this time to look for the box of words, that could be found at every special area, to figure out how much time she had left toplete the second trial.


    "Ah, there it is." Finding the box of words half hidden behind one of therge trees inside the special area, Mui took a few delicious fruits along with her as she made her way over to the box of words.


    Rustle~


    Pulling aside a few leaves that was blocking the words on the box of words, Mui began reading through the information disyed on the box of words.


    [Second Trial, Test of Will]


    [Status: In Progress, Fourth Special Area Reached]


    [Time left: 8 Hours, 17 Minutes, 24 Seconds... 23 Seconds... 22-]


    "Waaaah! I only have 8 hours left before the trial is over!? Just how long did I sleep for!?"


    Letting out a both shocked and surprised sound after discovering that she only had a little over 8 hours left before the second trial came to an end, Mui could not help starting to panic. The n of using the pressure to increase her strength before continuing further up the mountain, was now useless, as she didn''t have the time to do this anymore.


    For the first time since she had started the trials, Mui felt like she didn''t have enough time toplete the trial.


    "At least I don''t have a long way to go to reach the top of the mountain..." Calming herself down as she said this while looking towards the peak of the mountain that was at most a little over a hundred meters away from her current location, Mui decided to not think about the terrifying pressure she had experienced just before reaching the fourth special area.


    After all, even with her improved strength, it would barely be doable to move ten to twenty meters further up the mountain... And that was not mentioning the fact that the pressure would most likely be even more terrifyingpared to what she had experienced on thest ten meters to the fourth special area...


    "Well... Considering I don''t have that long to the peak of the mountain, I should try and see if I can break through to the Third Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm before trying to climb to the peak..." Muttering this to herself as she very well understood she was far too weak to make thest hundred meter journey up the mountain to the peak, Mui decided to use what little time she could to reach the Third Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    At the very least, if she managed to reach the Third Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, she would have more qi avable in her dantian and should be able to utilize her cultivation mantra more efficiently to negate the pressure.


    Whoosh~!


    Havinge up with a n on what to do before attempting to climb thest bit of the way to the peak of the mountain, Mui sat down on the soft grass before focusing all her attention towards trying to break through to the Third Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm. Hoping to breakthrough and stabilize her cultivation base as fast as possible.

 Chapter 839 End Of The Second Trial

    Boom!


    Focusing all her attention towards trying to break through, it did not take long before Mui officially reached the Third Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm. Not only that, but her cultivation base waspletely stable after her break through. Not needing to spend any time on stabilizing it.


    "Still around five hours left." ncing over towards the box of words that was showing her how much time she had left; Mui could not help a sense of confidence from welling up inside her. After all, her strength had just increased, and she only had a little over a hundred meters to the peak of the mountain. The fear of failure she experienced just after having reached the fourth special area had already disappearedpletely.


    "Better now than never..." Knowing that it would be best not to dy for too long, Mui decided to take a few of the delicious fruits along with her before stepping outside the protection of the fourth special area and on to the path leading up towards the peak of the mountain-


    Whoosh~!


    Not even a second after she took the first step out of the fourth special area, Mui once again felt the terrifying pressure weighing down her body. However, different from what she had experienced during thest ten meters leading up to the fourth special area, she was not forced to the ground this time around and could instead remain standing.


    As for moving under the terrifying pressure...? That was close to impossible. For now, she focused all of her energy towards adapting to the pressure so she could start making her way up towards the peak of the mountain without having to worry about suddenly falling to the ground without any way to get back up again under the terrifying pressure.


    Spending the next few minutes like this, Mui slowly began making her way up the final bit of the mountain. The pressure not able to stop her from moving forward!


    Like this, time slowly passed with Mui getting closer and closer to the peak of the mountain. The pressure not able to stop her as she got within ten meters of the mountain peak-


    Bang!


    However, it was at this moment that the pressure suddenly increased by several folds and in a simr way like thest ten meters to the fourth special area, Mui felt her legs starting to give up under her. The only difference this time around, was that she had already been prepared for a sudden increase in the pressure she experienced-


    Swish-!


    So, before she was forced to the ground again, she used all the energy present inside of her dantian to forcefully push through thest ten meters of her journey, something that was only barely possible with the increased qi that was now in her dantian after she reached the Third Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Thump!


    "Hah... I-I made it!" Letting out an exhausted sigh as she reached the peak of the mountain, Mui was filled with happiness before a wave of exhaustion spread through out her entire body. Preventing her from getting back up again.


    M-maybe I should just stay like this for a bit...


    Knowing that her body had already been pushed beyond her limit, Mui decided to just stay on the ground until she had recovered enough energy to retrieve the delicious fruits she had brought along with her. After eating them, she was certain that she would be full of energy once again.


    ...


    Laying down on the small rocks that was scattered all over the peak of the mountain for what felt like days, Mui finally managed to recover enough strength to move one of the delicious fruits up to her mouth so she could take a bite out of it-


    Chomp~!


    The moment she bit down on the delicious fruit, she once again felt the exhaustion that had built up inside her body being washed away. Allowing her to return back to her peak condition. Almost like the exhausting journey up the mountain had never happened in the first ce.


    "These fruits are really great, I hope I can continue eating them even after the trial ends..." Muttering this to herself as she got back up, Mui began looking around the deste mountain peak for signs of the box of words.


    "Ah! There it is!" Spotting the box of words only a few meters away from where she was standing, Mui didn''t hesitate to rush over to check that she had indeed managed toplete the trial.


    [Second Trial, Test of Will, has been sessfully cleared. Proceeding to calcte participant Mui''s score for the Test of Will... Calction finished, generating a score in ordance to participant Mui''s performance during the Second Trial, Test of Comprehension.]


    [Trial Participant: Mui]


    [Trial: Test of Will]


    [Total Score: 5/5]


    [Evaluation: Passed, Made it through all five special areas and has met the minimum requirement for continuing on to the final trial.]


    "Final Trial...? There is still another trial left..." Reading through the information on the box of words, Mui could not help feeling a bit surprised after discovering that there was still another trial left after the second trial.


    Given how difficult the second trial had been for her toplete, it was not hard for her to imagine how hard the next trial was going to be.


    Rumble~


    "Wha-what is happening!? Wait... This is..." N?v(el)B\\jnn


    [The Final Trial, is going to start in two minutes, it is rmended that you are well rested and prepared before the start of the trial.]


    [Time left: 2 Seconds... 1 Second-]


    Lost in her own thoughts about the final trial that she was going to face, Mui didn''t even notice the new string of words that had appeared on the box of words before the two minutes were already up and the mountain below her feet started sinking into the ground below.


    Soon transporting her all the way back down to the ground beforepletely disappearing, like it had never even existed in the first ce...


    [No description of the trial will be provided this time around, participant Mui, will have to find out on her own. The Final Trial is going to start now.]


    "No description!? Wai-" Feeling taken aback by the box of words that suddenly appeared in front of her after she had reached the ground again, Mui was just about to say something when the box of words in front of her suddenly vanished into thin air.


    RUMBLE-!


    Following the disappearance of the box of words, the ground beneath her ones again began shaking violently like it had done before the mountain had sprung up from the ground. Making Mui start looking around herself for any signs of new things rted to the final trial appearing. Hoping that it would be something that would give away what the final trial was about...


    "This- What in the world is all of this!?"


    However, much to her surprise, what appeared was not a single thing. Instead, over a dozen massive gates made out of all kinds of mystical materials appeared in front of her. Not giving her any clue as to what they had to do with the final trial.


    "Do I perhaps have to enter one of the gates? But... Do I only get to enter a single one, or do I have to enter all of the gates...?" Inspecting the different gates that had appeared all around her as she felt her head starting to hurt, Mui silently prayed for the box of words to appear again and help her out with what she had to do. Just cing a bunch of gates in front of her was far from enough to figure out what the final trial was about!


    [A hint for the goal of the Final Trial is avable.]


    "Huh!?" seeing the box of words suddenly appearing in front of her just when she wished for it to appear, Mui could not help jumping back in shock.


    "The box of words- Ah! Yes! Please give me a hint!" desperately nodding her head as she looked towards the box of words now floating in the air no more than a few meters away from where she was standing, Mui answered almost instantaneously after realizing what was written. Not wanting to waste any time in case the box of words disappeared again.


    [Hint: The gates that have appeared around you are rted to the Final Trial; you can only enter one gate.]


    Whoosh~


    "..."


    Watching as the box of words disappeared only a few seconds after she had finished reading through the hint, Mui had no idea what to say.


    Entering one of the gates was already something she had nned to do and she already had a good hunch that they were rted to the final trial... The only real information she had managed to gain from the box of words, was the fact that she would only be able to enter a single gate, something she would have found out about after she entered one of the gates like she had originally been thinking of doing...

 Chapter 840 The Final Trial

    Standing around wondering about which of the gates she should enter after she had learnt that she would only be able to enter one of them, Mui could not help focusing her attention on a slightly smaller gate located in the back of a muchrger gate.


    Although the gate in question was far smaller than the rest of the gates that had appeared, it was obvious that the material used in its construction was of a far higher qualitypared to the rest of the gates present. At the very least, that was what Mui thought after seeing the beautiful wood that made up most of the gate along with the different mystical beasts that had been carved into it.


    Even if the other gates also had their own special charm, they could still notpare to the small wooden one ording to Mui!


    For this reason, Mui did not bother thinking about what gate to enter. Instead starting to slowly approach the smaller wooden gate in the distance. However, the wooden gate might have looked smaller whenpared to the other gates, but when she personally arrived in front of it, she realized just howrge the wooden gate was...


    "This... Isrger than I expected..." Mumbling this to herself as she stood in front of the more than a dozen meter tall wooden gate, Mui could not help starting to wonder how in the world she was going to push open such arge gate with her current strength.


    Not to mention her current self, opening such a huge wooden gate, she doubted that even if she reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, she would still not be able to do something like this...!


    Rumble-!


    Just as Mui was lost in her own thoughts thinking of how she was ever going to open such a huge gate by herself, a loud rumbling sound echoed out from the gate in front of her as therge wooden gate began to open slowly, the intricate carvings of mythical beasts on its surface became more visible and almost seemed toe alive. Each of the mythical beasts being shrouded in their own unique aura, with different features and expressions, some fierce and menacing, with sharp teeth and ws, while others were more elegant and serene.


    As therge gate continues to open, the room beyond is revealed to be shrouded inplete darkness. Only allowing Mui to make out the wooden floor on the other side.


    Whoosh-!


    As the gate reached its fully open position, a rush of cool air filled with qi flowed out through the opening. However, Mui had no time to focus on this, as the room behind therge wooden gate was now fully disyed in front of her.


    Dimly lit, with flickering candles that had ignited by themselves after the gate had opened spread out all around the room. The floor made of the same mystical, yet beautiful wood that the gate had been made of. In the centre of the room, arge, raised tform, surrounded by mats and cushions, could be seen.


    "A ce where cultivatorse to spar with each other...?" Not knowing too much about what the room in front of her was used for, Mui could only go off the small clues she could gather from the different weapons lined up along the walls of the room and what she had learnt about how cultivators would often spar with each other to hone their skills if they had the chance.


    Bang!


    "Ah!?" Jumping up in surprise at the sudden loud sound, Mui looked behind herself. Only to realized that she had unknowingly entered the room beyond the wooden gate. The origin of the loud sound she had just heard, was none other than therge wooden gate mming shut behind her. Preventing her from leaving!


    "Is this why the box of words said I could only enter one of the gates? Because the gate closes after I pass through it...?" Muttering this to herself as she remembered how the box of words had mentioned that she would only be able to enter one of the gates present, Mui felt herself calm down before returning to inspect the room she now found herself stuck inside of. Searching for anything that might point towards what she had to do toplete the final trial.


    Whoosh~


    It was at this moment, that a shadowy figure began to form on top of the raised tform in the middle of the room. The figure dark and indistinct at the moment, its form shifting and swirling like smoke in the wind, as the air around it started to crackle with energy, causing Mui to feel a shiver run down her spine at the sudden appearance of the shadowy figure.


    Whoosh-!


    As the still iplete figure takes shape, Mui was left in awe, as faceless warrior, d in ck and wielding arge greatsword over twice her size appeared on top of the raised tform.


    Zhing~!


    Starting to swing the massive greatsword, the warrior swiftly moved around the raised tform, its movements fluid and precise, the air around it seemed to shimmer and ripple with every movement.


    Not knowing what to do when she suddenly saw the shadowy warrior that had formed on top of the tform started practicing his sword techniques, Mui decided to sit down on one of the nearby mats before starting to observe the shadowy warrior. Feeling like its appearance should be the key to figuring out how toplete the final trial.


    Soon, the only thing that could be heard inside the room, was the sound of the shadowy figure''s sword as it cut through the air and the quiet breathing of Mui as she observed it from the side. Not daring to take her eyes off the figure in case she ended up missing something.


    Swish-!


    As the shadowy warrior finished disying its sword techniques, it seemed to dissolve back into the shadows from which it had been first shaped from. The air still rippling due to a side effect of the greatsword techniques that the shadowy warrior had just used while moving around the tform.


    "That''s it...?" Looking towards the spot that the shadowy warrior had been standing just a second ago, Mui could not help feeling a sense of disappointment. Not understanding why, the shadowy figure had already disappeared.


    Even if it was only for a short moment, she had clearly felt that the technique used by the shadowy warrior was extremely profound. If she could watch the shadowy warrior use this technique for a bit longer, she hoped that she would have a chance atprehending this powerful and profound greatsword technique herself!


    Although she was still not certain about what she had to do toplete the final trial. After watching the shadowy warrior for the past few minutes, she at the very least had an idea... And that was, learning the greatsword technique disyed by the shadowy warrior!


    Given how empty the room she was currently inside of was, and the shadow warrior that had appeared to disy a profound and powerful greatsword technique, Mui felt that this was a rather obvious conclusion to make.


    Now, the only problem left, was the fact that the shadowy warrior had disappeared before she managed to learn anything...


    "I should try and do the same that the shadowy warrior did earlier. Maybe it will help with trying to understand the greatsword technique he was using..." Knowing that she would get nowhere by just sitting on the ground hoping for the shadowy warrior to return to disy his greatsword technique again, Mui stood back up before walking towards the different weapons lined up along the side of the room. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Swoosh~!


    "Ah!? This- This is far heavier than I expected..." Trying to pick up a greatsword lined up along the wall, Mui ended up almost dropping it on the floor due to its weight. The weapon in question was only made from wood, but it was almost twice her size and was rather difficult to handle. Especially given the fact that Mui was only 12 years old. Even if she had reached the Third Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, it did not increase her physical strength by that much and she could only be considered at the level of a normal grown-up mortal...


    "Haaa!" Not giving up because of this, Mui slowly dragged the wooden greatsword along the floor. Soon making her way up to the raised tform in the middle of the room.


    Now I just need to repeat the movements that the shadow warrior did...


    Swish~


    Not wasting any time after reaching the middle of the tform, Mui began to move around the tform while swinging the massive greatsword like the shadowy warrior had done just a moment ago. The only difference between her and the shadowy warrior being the speed at which the different moves were executed... And the fact that Mui almost fell to the ground every time she swung the greatsword...

 Chapter 841 Hidden Mechanisms

    Trying her best to copy the movements of the shadowy warrior while moving around the tform, while just barely holding on to the massive greatsword almost twice her size, Mui''s movements slowly started to grow more fluid and precise with the passing of time. Soon enough, the clumsy movements from when she had first started trying to swing the wooden greatsword, hadpletely disappeared.


    "Hah... I should... Hah... Take a break..." Coming to a stop, Mui copsed on the ground with an exhausted expression on her face. The act of swinging around such arge great sword was an extremely exhausting thing for her. Especially considering that it was even difficult for her to lift the greatsword itself, much less move it in the same way that the shadowy warrior had done...


    At the very least, her efforts had paid off and she had managed toprehend a part of the greatsword technique that the shadowy warrior had demonstrated. Although she was still far away from reaching the level of the shadowy warrior, she could still be considered to have gained an initial understanding of the greatsword technique.


    "Am I just supposed to continue trying to lean the greatsword technique...? Will the final trial only be finished after I manage to reach the same level as the shadowy warrior?" Having enjoyed a few delicious fruits that, she could now consume endlessly once again, Mui could not help wondering out loud if the goal of the final trial only was for her toprehend the greatsword technique shown by the shadowy warrior and learn it herself.


    Maybe the true goal of the final trial is somethingpletely different and the shadowy warrior demonstrating the powerful and profound greatsword technique is only a distraction...


    Sitting on the ground as she thought about this, Mui could not help starting to look around the room once again. However, this time around, she decided to look more closely at the different weapons along the walls and the other objects ced around the room. Searching for anything that seemed out of ce.


    As she carefully looked through the room once again, she noticed that one of the weapons hanging on the wall looked slightly askew. Looking out of ce whenpared to the rest of the weapons that were all lined up perfectly along the walls.


    "Hm... Suspicious~!" Narrowing both her eyes upon seeing this, Mui got up from the ground before making her way over to inspect the weapon in question. Upon getting closer, she noticed that a small lever was hiding behind the weapon. Cleverly disguised to blend in with the weapon itself.


    "Aha! I knew something wasn''t right!" Smiling proudly after seeing this, Mui did not wait a second before pulling down on the lever-


    Creak~


    The moment the lever was pulled down, a panel in the wall just next to her, slid open. Revealing a dark, narrow path leading downward. The only light present being a small torch hanging at the entrance to the narrow path.


    This should be the ce where the real final trial is located...


    Feeling a sense of anticipation as she looked down the dark path, Mui did not hesitate for more than a few seconds before grabbing the torch and making her way down the narrow path leading towards what she believed to be the final trial.


    The walls rough and unpolished, while the air was cool and damp. The only source of lighting from the small torch, Mui was not bothered by her surrounding, as she continued walking along the dark and narrow path.


    "This...? Nothing!?" Walking along the path for what felt like close to half an hour, Mui could not help eximing loudly to herself upon discovering that the path had suddenlye to an end. Nothing other than stone present around her.


    Maybe there is some sort of hidden mechanism likest time...


    As this thought appeared in her head, Mui quickly began looking around the narrow tunnel. Soon noticing that the faint outline of a door, almost invisible against the stone wall. Trying to push it open, Mui was left defeated after realizing that the door didn''t budge even after she put all her strength into trying to push it open.


    Now she was left with trying to figure out how she was going to open the hidden door and continue. Luckily for Mui, it did not take long before she found a small niche in the stone wall next to the door, just big enough for her hand to enter.


    On a hunch, Mui did not hesitate to reach into the niche and feel around before finding a small button-


    Click!


    Pressing the button, the wall behind her slid away in a simr fashion as the wall that had revealed the dark and narrow passage, she now found herself inside of. The only difference this time around being that instead of revealing a path, it revealed a hidden mechanism that unlocked the door in front of her.


    Creak~


    Pushing open the stone door that had now been unlocked, Mui prepared herself to face another empty room with some kind of hidden mechanism she had to figure out as she entered the room on the other side.


    "Huh!? This is-"


    Passing through the stone door into the room on the other side, Mui could not help feeling surprised after noticing that the room on the other side was the same as the room with the shadowy warrior. Even the slightly askew weapon hanging on the wall with the lever behind it was the exact same. The only difference being that there was no lever hidden behind it this time around.


    Bang!


    Hearing the stone door behind her closing, Mui had a weird feeling that she had already experienced this once when she had first entered the room with the shadowy warrior inside of it...


    Whoosh~!


    Just as she was wondering if she was going to have to find another hidden mechanism again, the shadowy warrior from earlier suddenly formed on top of the raised tform in the middle of the room. However, this time around, he did not start demonstrating his greatsword technique. Instead, he remained silent on top of the raised tform without moving a single muscle. Almost looking like he had been frozen in time after appearing.


    [Congrattions, participant Mui, you have sessfully passed the first part of the final trial, finding the final trial. Thest part of the final trial will require you to defeat the warrior on top of the tform. After this, the trials will be considered to have concluded and you will be given a final score. The time left for the final trial is one hour.]


    "Ah!? Defeat the warrior on top of the tform... One hour left... I have to fight the shadowy warrior!?" Jumping back in surprise from the sudden appearance of the box of words, Mui could not help showing a shocked expression on her face after realizing that she had to fight the shadowy warrior standing on top of the tform in front of her.


    Even if she had only witnessed the shadowy warrior showing off his greatsword technique for a short moment, she very well understood just how powerful the shadowy warrior waspared to her. Not to mention the fact that she could not even properly wield the greatsword that was required for the onlybat technique she had learnt so far!


    [Participant Mui, the cultivation realm of the shadowy warrior has been reduced to the same level as you.]


    Almost like it had been reading her mind, a new sentence appeared on the box of words. However, this did not help make Mui any less ufortable at the prospect of having to fight the shadowy warrior. After all, this was going to be her first fight. Not counting the small skirmishes, she had participated in when defending her things from the other orphans when things were bad, and food was hard toe by.


    Thinking about it, those fights had mostly been her trying to push the other kids away before escaping until things calmed down again.


    "..." n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Looking up at the shadowy warrior standing menacingly in the middle of the tform waiting for her toe over and challenge it, Mui had a feeling that the pushing tactic she had used back then would not work against the shadowy warrior. At most, it was going to get her beaten up faster...


    "Looks like I will have to fight it with the greatsword technique if I want to have a chance at all..." Muttering this to herself as a helpless expression made its way on to her face, Mui did not feel the slightest bit confident when it came to fighting the shadowy warrior. In the end, she slowly made her way towards the wooden greatsword that had been ced along the wall in a simr fashion as the wooden greatsword she had used to practice with earlier-


    Bang!


    Even the weight of the greatsword was the same...

 Chapter 842 End Of The Trial

    Doing her best to hold on to the greatsword as she made her way up to the tform with the shadowy warrior motionlessly standing on top of it waiting for her, Mui could not help feeling nervous.


    Not to mention the fact that she had no experience when it came to using the greatsword in realbat, the intimidating aura of the shadowy warrior that locked on to her when she arrived beside the raised tform, was more than enough to make her freeze on the spot without daring to take a single step forward.


    "What am I hesitating for? It''s not like it''s going to kill me. At most I will fail the final trial..." Shaking her head as she quietly muttered this to herself, Mui took a deep breath before slowly stepping up onto the raised tform. Knowing very well that her chances of beating the shadowy warrior with her current experience inbat was close to none...


    Swish-!


    Without warning, the shadowy warrior charged towards her the moment she had stepped up on the raised tform, the greatsword held high in the air as it descended towards her with a terrifying might that made Mui second guess whether the shadowy warrior was truly in the same cultivation realm as her.


    Bang!


    Having already expected that the shadowy warrior was going to attack her the moment she stepped onto the raised tform, Mui dodged to the side, just narrowly avoiding the massive greatsword.


    "Hah!"


    Taking advantage of the small opening that had been created, Mui put all her energy into using what little she had learnt from the unnamed greatsword technique of the shadowy warrior, swinging the massive wooden greatsword almost twice her size towards the unprotected side of the shadowy warrior.


    However, the shadowy warrior was far faster than she had expected and easily managed to move his greatsword over to block her attack-


    "Waaaaaah!?"


    Even worse, the impact caused by the two weapons shing with each other, was enough to send Mui''s small body flying for a few meters beforending in the middle of the raised tform with her wooden greatswordnding on the ground right next to her. Having somehow been lucky enough to not only have her weaponnd next to her, but also avoid any injuries at the same time.


    This... How am I supposed to win against that thing!?


    Not having any time to feel happy about how she had managed to avoid any injuries during the sh that had sent her flying, Mui was panicking internally. During the short sh just now, she understood very well that her opponent was not someone, she had any chance of winning against.


    Even if the shadowy warrior had also been reduced to the Third Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, hisbat experience and mastery over the greatsword far exceeded her...


    Turning towards the shadowy warrior on the edge of the tform getting ready to charge towards her again, Mui grabbed the greatsword on the ground beside her as she got ready. Although she understood how low her chance of winning was, there was no way she was going to just give up without a fight!


    Swish-!


    As the shadowy warrior dashed towards her with its massive greatsword raised high in the air, Mui pulled up her greatsword from the ground in preparation to meet the shadowy warrior. However, because she had been too nervous, she idently used too much force when pulling therge greatsword up from the ground-


    Whoosh-!


    "Ah! M-my sword!"


    As a result, Mui could only watch as she idently let go of her greatsword. Sending the greatsword close to twice her height flying in the direction of the approaching shadowy warrior-


    BANG!


    Not having enough time to block therge greatsword that came hurling towards him, the shadowy warrior was hit directly in the head by Mui''s wooden greatsword. Directly sending him falling backwards towards the ground-


    Fwoosh~!


    Dissolving into ck smoke the moment he hit the ground; the shadowy warriorpletely disappeared from the tform. Leaving only a shocked Mui behind to stare speechlessly at the ce where the shadowy warrior had mmed into the ground.


    "H-he disappeared...?" Not fully believing what had just happened, Mui slowly made her way over to the ce where the shadowy warrior had dissolved to make sure that he had truly disappeared.


    "I... I won..." Only after seeing that the shadowy warrior did not reappear, did Mui manage to understand that she had indeed defeated the shadowy warrior. Although it was a rather unique victory, she did defeat the shadowy warrior...


    "Ah! The box of words!" remembering that the box of words should appear if she had trulypleted the final trial, Mui began looking around for it. Luckily, it did not take her long to find it hover no more than a few meters away from where she was standing.


    If she couldn''t find it and it turned out that defeating the shadowy warrior was not the final part of the final trial like the box of words had said, Mui had no idea what she would do. Struggling trying to find out what she had to do, was not something she enjoyed. Especially when the two other trials had been straightforward with what she had to do toplete them...


    [The Final Trial, Hidden Mechanisms and Combat, has been sessfully cleared. Proceeding to calcte participant Mui''sbined score for the entire trial... Calctions finish, generating final score in ordance with the overall performance during the trial... Generating the final score will take longer than normal... Transporting participant Mui to a morefortable location while calctions finish.]


    "Transporting to a morefortable location? What does it mean with- Waaah!"


    Whoosh-!


    Not getting to finish reading through the box of words, Mui suddenly felt her entire body getting swallowed up by something and before she knew it, she found herself in the middle of arge valley filled with all kinds of exotic nts and trees she had never seen before... But more importantly than this, Mui recognized a few of the fruits hanging from one of the exotic trees as the delicious fruits she had been eating during her time in the trial.


    "So, this is where the delicious fruitse from... Indeed, a far morefortable cepared to the weird training room filled with all kinds of different weapons... Hm?" As she took in her new surroundings, Mui suddenly noticed a small book on the ground beside her.


    "This is... The greatsword technique that the shadowy warrior used!" Opening the book itself, it did not take long before she realized that the book was none other than the nameless greatsword technique used by the shadowy warrior. Not only that, but she also discovered that the wooden greatsword she had used during her fight with the shadowy warrior was located right next to the book on the ground.


    Now, she not only had a cultivation mantra, but also had a fully fledged outbat technique. Everything she needed to continue increasing her strength without worrying about anything else! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    If I can stay in here and just continue increasing my strength without having to worry about food, then everything would be great, I just wonder how long it will take for the box of words to calcte my score... And if I can continue staying in here after I get my score and officially finish the trial...


    Thinking this to herself as she turned to look towards the box of words that only disyed, [Generating Score...], on it, Mui could not help silently hoping that the process would take a long time. At least that way, she would be able to stay inside the trial space for longer. Cultivating and enjoying the delicious fruits without having to worry about anything.


    ...


    [First Trial Participant, Mui, has sessfullypleted the final trial. The final judgement for the first trial participant, will be given to host.]


    "Hm?" Flying in the air above arge jungle located in between two dangerous location that was dangerous even to someone in the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could not helping to a sudden stop after seeing the message from the system that appeared in front of him.


    "I can give the final judgement...?" Muttering this to himself as he curiously looked over the message from the system, Xuan Hao''s vision was soon blocked out by a long list of information that described each of the three trials and what Mui had done to ovee them. Even mentioning herrge consumption of a certain spiritual fruit that had been provided to her as food during the trial itself.


    "How can one consume so many spiritual fruits..." Reading through the number of consumed spiritual fruits by Mui, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked at just how many spiritual fruits she had managed to eat during her short two or so weeks inside the trial space. Even his gluttonous pet wouldn''t eat that many spiritual fruits in a month, let alone half a month!

 Chapter 843 The Old Master Of The Hollow Thunder Family’s Situation

    "Hah... Looks like that little lion will have somepetition in the future..." Shaking his head as he could already imagine the winged lion''s reaction to another glutton simr to itself in the sect, Xuan Hao felt relieved that the Star Shattering Sect at the very least had the Ninth Star Peak to provide spiritual herbs and fruits for the sect. Although, it might be a good idea to nt a few more spiritual fruit trees to keep up with the increased consumption that was bound to happen in the future... N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Not thinking too much about it outside of that, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the system that was waiting for him toplete the judgement of Mui''s trial.


    From what he had managed to learn about her trial so far, she had managed to pass all three trials smoothly without any problems. Disying her powerfulprehension talent during the first trial, her strong will during the second trial and herbat ability during the third. Even if her method ofpleting the final trial was a bit unique, she had ended up sessfully beating a much more skilled opponent.


    The way he would have to judge her trial was notplicated in any way and only required him to consider her trial to have sessfully beenpleted or failed. The only problem, was that if he considered her trial to bepleted, she would end up getting teleported to his current location... And given that he was still a week or two away from reaching the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao did not want to do this now. Especially when considering that he still had to pass through a few dangerous locations...


    At this moment, Xuan Hao really wished that he could teleport around by tearing through space... But to do this, he would have to deepen his understanding of the Dao of Space. Not something he had time for before he returned to the sect.


    Should I wait until I return to the sect until I give the judgement for Mui''s trial...?


    Noticing that there wasn''t really any time limit on when he was supposed to give out the judgement for the trial, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if he should just wait until he had returned to the sect before giving out the judgement. At least, this way, he would avoid having to travel with her through the different dangerous locations that he had left on his journey back to the sect.


    "Hm... This shouldn''t be too much of a problem for her. After all, the location where she is currently, should be the location where the spiritual fruits she enjoys so much originates from..." Muttering this to himself as he thought about the description of the ce that Mui had been teleported while waiting for him to give out a judgement for the trial, Xuan Hao ended up deciding to have her stay there for now until he made it back to the sect again.


    Given how much she enjoyed the spiritual fruits there, Xuan Hao did not think she would be too unhappy about this. On the contrary, he had a feeling that she would be happy staying in the valley filled with not only the spiritual fruits she had enjoyed so far, but also many new spiritual fruits...


    "Guess she is staying inside the trial space for a week or two." Having decided to wait until he returned to the Star Shattering Sect until he gave a judgement for Mui''s trial, Xuan Hao continued his journey back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    Whoosh-!


    Using the Drifting Cloud Steps to teleport close to a dozen miles with every single step. Not only making his speed far faster than anything doable by someone in the Domain Lord Realm, but also allowing him toprehend the Dao of Space while travelling. Increasing the distance at which he travelled with every single step. Only being forced to slow down when passing through some of the more dangerous locations along his path.


    ...


    "So, this is the ce my brother-inw was murdered..."


    At the same time, the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family had arrived at the ce where the battle between Elder Green Wing and Lord Wind fall had taken ce.


    Whoosh-!


    Hovering midair above the ind that had been sunk due to the fight between the two powerful Domain Lord Realm Experts, the old master used his divine sense to scan the battle for any energy left behind by the fight.


    Even if he was almost a hundred percent certain that the person that had killed his brother-inw was Elder Green Wing, he still had to make sure that this wasn''t a set-up by someone who wanted to weaken his Hollow Thunder Family by having him start a fight with the Green Mountain Sect... But, as he scanned through the remnants of the battlefield, the killing intent present in his eyes began growing more and more intense!


    Rumble~!


    A few minutester, a terrifying aura at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm erupted around the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family. If Xuan Hao had been able to witness this, he would have discovered that the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family was not only at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, but the aura around him also carried a hint of power belonging to that of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Of course, there was no such thing as half a step into the Soul Ascension Realm. One had either reached the Soul Ascension Realm or in the Domain Lord Realm. The reason for the Soul Ascension Realm aura that had started forming around the old master of the Hollow Thunder Family, was because the old man had already begun the process of transcending the first tribtion. Meaning, his strength had surpassed the Domain Lord Realm, but the first tribtion had not descended yet...


    Before the death of his brother-inw, he should have been in secluded cultivation waiting for the tribtion to descend. The reason why for the old master''s terrifying killing intent towards the Green Mountain Sect and Elder Green Wing, was not just because of the death of his brother-inw, but more so the fact that the sudden news had ruined his perfect state of mind. Making the tribtion that he could face at any moment far more dangerous than it would have been if his state of mind had been perfect!


    For this reason, the old master not only wanted to kill Elder Green Wing from the Green Mountain Sect to avenge his brother-inw, but also because not avenging his brother-inw would create a w in his perfect state of mind. Normally, this would not have been a problem and could be resolved over time but given that he could face the first tribtion at any moment now, he did not have the time needed to slowly fix this w in his state of mind and could only brute force it by avenging his brother-inw.


    As for the repercussions that coulde from him killing Elder Green Wing without waiting for the imperial family toe out with their judgement on the matter-


    What did it matter after he reached the Soul Ascension Realm? Even the imperial family had to show a certain level of respect towards him after he reached the Soul Ascension Realm... Punishing him over the death of a single Domain Lord Realm Expert that wasn''t even part of the imperial family? That was impossible!


    "Hehe... Looks like it really was the work of that Elder Green Wing from the Green Mountain Sect! That Elder Green Wing sure does have a lot of courage! Did he really think I won''t dare doing anything to him because he is from one of those major sects!?" Having already finished examining the battlefield and confirmed that his brother-inw had indeed been killed by Elder Green Wing, the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family could not help showing a vicious grin as he looked back in the direction of the capital city.


    Through the remnant energy left behind by Elder Green Wing, he could roughly find out that he had gone in the direction of the capital city, or more urately, the Green Mountain Sect, whose main sect was located inside therge kingdom that was backing them!


    "Hehe, if you went straight for the capital city and hid in there, it might have been a bit difficult for me to kill you... But you decided to go back to your sect instead!"


    Laughing happily as he said this with a wide smile on his face, the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family did not bother wasting a single second before using his movement technique to fly in the direction of the Green Mountain Sect, a hint of desperation and fear barely visible on his face.


    Even if he didn''t show it or say anything about it, deep down, he understood that the tribtion would not only determine whether he became a Soul Ascension Realm Expert or not.


    There was only one ending for failing to ovee the tribtion... Death!

 Chapter 844 Death Of Elder Green Wing

    Following the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family leaving theke where Lord Windfall had been killed, a Nascent Soul Realm Expert that hade back to try and see if he could find any precious artifacts that might have been left behind by the fight, could not help shivering in fear as he looked in the direction that the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family had left in without moving.


    "What in the world is happening, why are so many Domain Lord Realm Experts appearing suddenly!? Not to mention the first two, this one is even more terrifying!" Muttering this to himself after seeing that the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family did not return, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert could not help breathing out a sigh of relief at having escaped a possibly life-threatening situation. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    This might be a good opportunity for me... Everyone else should still be far too afraid to approach the battlefield. Even more so with the sudden appearance of an even more powerful Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    Realizing that he should at least have a few hours to search through the battlefield by himself before any of the other Nascent Soul Realm Experts appeared topete with him, the lone Nascent Soul Realm Expert didn''t wait for a second longer before dashing towards the ce where the ind that had been at the centre of the fight between the two Domain Lord Realm Experts had once been.


    "Looks like there is still someone here, he should have some information about the battle here, so let''s try and ask him first before going to the Green Mountain Sect."


    However, just as he reached the area above the ind that had now sunk beneath the water, a strong voice sounded out from above him and before he lost control of his body and felt himself floating up into the air towards arge flying ship that had appeared at some unknown point in time.


    This is- The imperial family''s insignia!


    Seeing the detailed and beautiful insignia carved into the armour of the person floating in front of the flying ship looking down towards him, the lone Nascent Soul Realm Expert could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine. Compared to the powerful Domain Lord Realm Expert, the imperial family was far more terrifying!


    I hope they will let me go after answering their questions...


    Knowing that he had no way to resist the other party, the lone Nascent Soul Realm Expert silently prayed that the imperial family only wanted information and would let him go after he answered their questions. After all, he had been about to search the area for anything precious that might have been left behind after the battle, something that might end up offending the people from the imperial family, who most likely wanted anything that might help them in trying to figure out what might have caused a fight to the death between two Domain Lord Realm Experts to ur.


    "Hm? No need to be afraid, we only want to ask you a few questions and that is it, we don''t care about any of the things that have been left behind by the battle." Seeing the fearful expression present on the Nascent Soul Realm Expert, the Domain Lord Realm Expert from the imperial family that had lifted him into the air with his domain, could not help rolling his eyes before ensuring him that nothing would happen.


    Unknown to the Nascent Soul Realm Expert, the imperial family already knew that the person responsible for the death of Lord Windfall was one of the Domain Lord Realm elders from the Green Mountain Sect. The only reason why they had decided to dispatch a Domain Lord Realm Expert to the scene of the battle, was to assess the damage done and confirm that the information they had gotten was correct.


    As for the few half-broken artifacts that were left behind from the possible shattering of Lord Windfall''s interspatial ring... That was not something the Domain Lord Realm Experts from the imperial family was the slightest bit interested in.


    If there really had been something precious, the elder from the Green Mountain Sect would most likely already have taken it away. Not leaving it behind for others...


    "Thank you! I will do my best to answer any question you might have regarding the battle that took ce! Although my cultivation is far from enough to have seen it in detail, I was still lucky enough to observe the entire battle from a distance. Even hearing a bit of the conversation between the two Domain Lords before they started fighting!" Ovee with excitement upon hearing what the Domain Lord Realm Expert from the imperial family said, the lone Nascent Soul Realm Expert didn''t hesitate as he said this trying to show how useful he could be.


    "Hm? That''s great! Then tell me about their encounter and the fight, start from the beginning." Not having expected that the random Nascent Soul Realm Expert that he happened to pick up had witnessed the entire fight. Even managing to hear parts of the conversation between the two Domain Lord Realm Experts before they started fighting, the Domain Lord from the imperial family could not help urging for the lone Nascent Soul Realm Expert to start talking. Feeling curious as to what had ended up causing one of the Green Mountain Sect''s elders to kill Lord Windfall.


    "Okay, it started like this... Elder Green Wing and Lord Windfall arrived above the ind that is now below the water... Elder Green Wing confronted Lord Windfall... Elder Green Wing''s wife... Big explosion and..."


    As the lone Nascent Soul Realm Expert started recounting the events that had transpired before the death of Lord Windfall and the things, he had heard the two Domain Lord Realm Experts talking about, the Domain Lords from the imperial family listening became more and more shocked. None of them having expected for the cause of Lord Windfall''s death to be Elder Green Wing''s wife!


    ...


    "Hmph! That Lord Windfall had what wasing to him! Now I just need toe up with an excuse for when the imperial family shows up... No matter what, they won''t kill me. At most they will send me to guard somewhere along the border for a thousand years and have me give away some of my spirit stones and artifacts as punishment, I can just use this time to recover from the forbidden technique!" Not aware of just how much danger he was currently in, Elder Green Wing was leisurely making his way back towards the Green Mountain Sect with a smug expression on his face.


    Even if he understood that the punishment from the imperial family was going to be harsh, he also understood that they wouldn''t kill him. Thinking that his reason for killing Lord Windfall was reasonable and that the imperial family would take this into consideration when punishing him.


    All things considered; Elder Green Wing felt that it was worth it. Not killing Lord Windfall was simply not an option. Especially when he remembered the way that the elder and disciples from his sect had been looking at him ever since they learnt about what had happened between his wife and Lord Windfall while he had been gone-


    "Hehe, there you are!"


    "Hm!? Who!?"


    However, just as he was lost in his own thoughts thinking about how to exin the matter to the imperial family when they inevitably came for him, a voice echoed out behind him. Instantly causing Elder Green Wing to start panicking after realizing that someone had managed to approach him without his knowledge.


    Even if he was in a weakened state due to the forbidden technique he had used, he was still a Domain Lord Realm Expert, and it would be close to impossible for someone to get close to him without being discovered.


    This could only mean one thing... The other party was far stronger than him! Given his current situation, such a powerful Domain Lord finding him could only mean one thing...


    "The imperial fam-"


    "Hehe, wrong! Did you forget whose brother-inw you just killed? Do you really think a mere Green Mountain Sect can protect you...?"


    "Y-you! T-the Hollow Thunder Family...!" Feeling a shiver run down his spine upon realizing the identity of the person that had appeared behind him, Elder Green Wing did not know what to do as he froze on the spot.


    "Looks like you do have some idea about what you did... But its toote to regret it now!"


    Crackle~!


    Realizing what was happening as thunder started appearing around the old master, Elder Green Wing''s expression changed into one of sheer terror. "N-no! Please spare-"


    BOOOM-!


    Not showing any mercy towards Elder Green Wing, the old master from the Hollow Thunder family directly used the powerful thunder around him to kill Elder Green Wing on the spot. Not wanting to risk the experts from the imperial family showing up and stopping him, while at the same time not giving him any chance at escaping.

 Chapter 845 Chaos In The Capital City

    Following the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family killing Elder Green Wing, the Domain Lords sent out by the imperial family to investigate the matter and catch Elder Green Wing, both appeared above the ce where the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family had killed Elder Green Wing.


    "Elder Green Wing is dead!? Who in the world did this..."


    "The remnant power and the powerful lightning energy floating around suggest that the person who did this should be at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm... And the only person who fits these two criteria, is the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family!"


    Analyzing the situation while his friend was speechlessly looking at the ce where Elder Green Wing had been killed, one of the Domain Lords from the imperial family almost instantly managed to figure out who had killed Elder Green Wing. However, this realization was more than enough for the two Domain Lords to understand that this matter was something out of their control.


    After all, there was a big difference between an already wounded Domain Lord Realm Expert that had only barely reached the early stage of the realm and someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. Especially considering that they themselves had only reached the Fourth and Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Trying to deal with a Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert with their strength, was the same as courting death!


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    For this reason, the two silently looked at each other for a short moment before making their way back towards the capital city to find someone strong enough to confront a powerful expert like the old master of the Hollow Thunder Family.


    Rushing back towards the capital city, it did not take a long time before the two Domain Lords soon found themselves reporting the matter to their superior, who in turn quickly went off reporting the matter directly to the emperor. After all, the only person who had the ability to catch someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, was someone who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "I hope everything goes well... This matter is far too weird, I almost feel like someone is deliberately trying to cause chaos inside the Sky Empire." Walking out of the imperial pce after having handed over the matter of the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family to their superior, one of the two Domain Lords could not help voicing his suspicions of the true reason behind the death of the two Domain Lords.


    The entire matter seemed to be perfectly set up to make the noble families start a fight with the major sects and their backers, something that would make the situation inside the Sky Empire far more chaoticpared to before. Especially when considering that the sect alliance that had just been established by the imperial family to suppress the three religions would get thrown into the crossfire between these two powerful forces and might even get destroyed before it had a chance to do what the imperial family had intended. All of this seemed perfectly set up to destroy the sect alliance...


    "Indeed, I also get that feeling... Do you think it''s the Onyx Empire trying to cause chaos and seize control over part of our territory? Information on what is happening inside the Onyx Empire has been getting harder to get over the past few years and they should be preparing for something big!" Nodding his head in agreement before saying this, the other Domain Lord had clearly not thought about the sect alliance and the three religions. Instead thinking that this might be something done by the Onyx Empire.


    "Hm... Maybe? I can''t really say, there is far too many who would want to see the Sky Empire falling into a chaotic situation over the past few years... Let''s stop for now, we should go back and pick up the flying ship we left behind. After that, we can go to the Grand General and ask him about the situation."


    "Good idea, the general should know far more about the situation with the Onyx Empirepared to us."


    As the two Domain Lords finished talking with each other just outside the imperial pce, they soon left to pick up the flying ship they had left behind while chasing after the now dead Elder Green Wing.


    "Hm~ How interesting, two Domain Lords died, and it just happened to perfectly benefit the three religions! I just came to the imperial pce for a business deal but happened to hear something great~"


    Not long after the two Domain Lords left in a hurry, a young man stepped out from the shadows of arge tree just beside the entrance to the imperial capital, his movements graceful as a drifting cloud, and his striking appearance a sight to behold. His features like a god descended to the mortal realm, perfect and unblemished. Skin as smooth as jade, and a pair of charming eyes that shone like pools of liquid gold under the evening sun.


    "That is- The Lord of the Jade Crystal Pce!"


    "Ah!? The Lord of the Jade Crystal Pce is here!? How handsome, just as good looking- No even more handsome than the rumors!"


    "Indeed, deserving of the title of the most handsome man in the Sky Empire!"


    As the young man, now identified as the Lord of the Jade Crystal Pce, continued standing in front of the imperial pce thinking about the information that he had just learnt about from the two Domain Lords, a crowd of onlookers started gathering around him.


    Hm... Considering that they haven''t taken action to spread this and instigate the two to start fighting each other before the imperial family has a chance to calm down the situation, they shouldn''t know about this matter yet. Hehe, I wonder... How much would the three religions pay for this information...?


    Ignoring the people that had started to gather around him, the Lord of the Jade Crystal Pce smiled to himself as he thought about this.


    "Well then, I should get going before this information ends up leaking. At least with those two Domain Lords around, I doubt this information will stay hidden for long..." Muttering this to himself as a wry smile made it onto his face while remembering just how careless the two Domain Lords had been when talking about something that important, the Lord of the Jade Crystal Pce did not bother waiting around the entrance to the imperial pce-


    Swish-!


    Directly leaving in the direction of one of the three religions headquarters located a short distance away from the imperial pce. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    A few hourster news of what had happened to both Lord Windfall and the Elder Green Wing rapidly spread throughout the Sky Empire. Instantly causing tensions between therge noble families and the major sects to increase. In the end, the powerful kingdoms behind the major sects were also forced out.


    The chaos caused by this situation ended up causing the imperial family to momentarily step in to prevent the two sides from starting a fight inside the capital, something that only ended up making them grow even more restless as they felt that the imperial family had no business involving themselves in the matter. Especially considering that they hadn''t even started fighting yet!


    In the end, the chaos in the capital did not end up lessening due to the intervention of the imperial family. Instead, it increased. Changing from the older generation in the Domain Lord Realm and above, to a fight between the younger members below the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Given the special rules that the imperial family had set up inside the capital city, fighting between those below the Nascent Soul Realm was allowed. If it didn''t affect the normal citizen of the city!


    Because of this, the imperial family ended up deciding not to interfere any more in the fight between the younger people. Fearing that they might end up pushing either the major sect and the people behind them or the noble families towards the three religions as a result.


    ...


    At the same time, the person who had ended up causing the current chaotic situation was quietly observing everything from the side. An interspatial ring filled with all sorts of precious spiritual herbs and artifacts from the three religions firmly situated on his finger.


    "Eh... This is developing in a rather dangerous direction. Maybe I should leave the capital city for a bit until things calm down again..." Muttering this to himself as he nced down towards some of the younger members from the two sides that had already begun fighting with each other on the street, the Lord of the Jade Crystal Pce turned around and left.


    Understanding very well that the situation inside the capital city of the Sky Empire was only going to get more chaotic from now on. Even more so when since the three religions would be doing their best to ensure this happened.


    After all, to them, the best thing that could happen, would be for the imperial family to start exhausting their resources dealing with someone who was not them. Even better if that someone happened to be the major sects that had been set up to weaken them!

 Chapter 846 Visiting Yi Min~

    Unaware of just how much chaos he had ended up causing by making sure that Lord Windfall ended up dying, Xuan Hao made it to the Iron Sky Kingdom without encountering any problems along the way. At most he encountered a few random flying demon beasts that decided to court death by attacking him.


    "I should have a chat with Yi Min about the things that happened and the worm like creature I encountered..." Not forgetting his goal of having a chat with Yi Min about some of the different things he had learnt about and the dangerous mountain range with the powerful Soul Ascension Realm worm hiding beneath it, Xuan Hao did not immediately leave the Iron Sky Kingdom and instead made his way towards the capital city of the kingdom to find Yi Min.


    ...


    "Elder Xuan!? Why is he here...?" Noticing Xuan Hao, the moment he passed entered the formation that covered the Iron Sky Kingdom, Yi Min who was leisurely rxing in arge couch inside the pce at the centre of the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital city, could not help curiously turning to look in the direction that Xuan Hao was approaching from.


    However, as she focused her attention on Xuan Hao who was slowly making his way over towards her, Yi Mi''s curious expression suddenly transformed into one of surprise.


    "Ah!? Why can''t I see through his cultivation realm? My formation should be able to see through the cultivation base of anyone below the Soul Ascension Realm! Don''t tell... Does he have an artifact of some kind that allows him to hide his cultivation realm?" Muttering this to herself as she felt shocked at this realisation, Yi Min could not help wondering just what had happened during the short month he had been gone.


    Reaching the Soul Ascension Realm was obviously impossible in such a short period of time, so the only reasonable reason for her not being able to see through his cultivation realm, was that he had been lucky enough to get his hands on a powerful artifact that had the ability to hide his cultivation realm.


    Given the strength of her formation when it came to detection being around the same level as someone who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm, it was obvious that the artifact Xuan Hao had managed to get his hands on should have exceeded that of a normal Transcendent Rank Artifact!


    Thinking about this, Yi Min could not help feeling curious as to what Xuan Hao had gone through during his short time in the core region of the Sky Empire.


    Not long after, Xuan Hao arrived at the pce where he ended up spending the next few hours talking with Yi Min about the things, he had nned to inform her about. Outside of this, he also managed to learn that his n to make the situation in the Sky Empire even more chaotic had worked out perfectly from Yi Min.


    Now that the major sects were focusing all their attention on the noble families due to the death of Elder Green Wing and Lord Windfall, the other independent sects would have an opportunity to develop more smoothly with the help of the resources that the imperial family provided to the through the sect alliance. Not only this, but they should also be able to gain more control of the sect alliance if they yed their cards right and managed to reduce the trust of the imperial family in the major sects enough for them to intervene in the sect alliance and take away one or more of their leader positions.


    Although the chances of this happening were low because it was almost certain to anger the power behind these major sects and push them closer towards the three religions, Xuan Hao also understood that the imperial family would not hesitate to do something like this if the major sects continued to make the situation inside the capital more chaotic.


    It could already be considered being tolerant from the imperial family''s side to even allow them to fight things out with the different noble families inside the capital city. After all, them fighting inside the capital city also meant that the imperial family had been forced to call back some of their Domain Lords stationed around the Sky Empire to keep tight control over certain important locations, something that would aid the three religions in their attempts to weaken the imperial family...


    "Well then, if there is nothing else, I will be taking my leave now-"


    "Ah! Wait a moment, I have something I wanted to ask you!" Interrupting him just as he was about to take his leave, Yi Min almost looked like she was about to jump in front of him.


    "Hm? What is it?" Not having expected for Yi Min to have anything more to say, Xuan Hao could not help curiously asking this. Silently wondering what she wanted to ask him.


    "This- I just wanted to ask if you happened to- Ah..." About to ask Xuan Hao if he had managed to get his hands on a precious Artifact stronger than that of a normal Transcendent Rank Artifact that was specialized in hiding one''s cultivation, Yi Min froze midsentence after realizing that it was properly not a good idea to ask someone she barely knew if he had managed to get his hands on a precious artifact. In fact, it might even end up looking like she wanted to rob him of this artifact...


    "Hm? What is it?" Tilting his head slightly to the side with a confused expression on his face as he said this, Xuan Hao could not understand why Yi Min had suddenly frozen up on the spot before she even asked him anything.


    "Ah! It''s nothing! Just forget I ever said anything, I still have something to do, so I will take my leave first!"


    Whoosh-!


    Not waiting for Xuan Hao to answer, Yi Min dashed out of the room they were sitting inside of before disappearing out of sight the next instant. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "..."


    Feeling extremely confused at what had just happened, Xuan Hao decided not to say anything and instead just quietly took his leave.


    Whatever was taking ce up inside Yi Min''s little head, he in no way wanted to get involved in it. Especially considering that he wanted to return to the Star Shattering Sect within the next few days... And he had a feeling that he might end up stuck in the Iron Sky Kingdom for a few more days if he wanted to figure out what Yi Min had wanted to ask him just a moment ago before she had forcibly stopped herself...


    If it was under normal circumstances, he wouldn''t have minded staying in the Iron Sky Kingdom for a few more days to satiate his curiosity, but his future fourth disciple was still waiting inside the trial space for him to give the judgement so she coulde out of there.


    Although... Looking at the systems updates of what she was up to, Xuan Hao felt that she might be more happy staying inside the trial space filled with all sorts of different spiritual fruits for all eternity. The main reason why he didn''t want her staying there for much longer, was that the spiritual fruits inside the trial space was not unlimited and would in fact run out in another two or three days given the current consumption rate of his gluttonous future fourth disciple... Something that could havested a normal person close to a month...


    "Hah... Can the spiritual fruits present on the Ninth Star Peak really keep up with this girl''s appetite? Looks like it might be a good idea to also mention a possible expansion of our spiritual herb fields... And more importantly, spiritual fruit fields, when I meet up with Elder Song." Muttering this to himself as he remembers the current size of the spiritual fruit and herb fields located on the Ninth Star Peak, Xuan Hao felt like it might be a good idea to expand them to some of the other Star Peaks that currently stood empty at the moment.


    This was not only because he was going to take Mui in as a disciple, but also because it would be a good thing for the Star Shattering Sect to have more spiritual herbs and fruits avable for both the disciples and elders to eat, but also for the alchemist to use in making pills and potions that could be used or sold for spiritual stones.


    Thinking about this to himself while using the Drifting Cloud Steps with far more ease and speedpared to what he had done when he had first started his journey, Xuan Hao ended up reaching the Star Shattering Sect at a far faster speed than he had expected.


    From a journey between the Star Shattering Sect and the Iron Sky Kingdom that would normally take around a week, Xuan Hao managed to cross that distance in less than half a day''s time!

 Chapter 847 Mui’s Encounter

    "Hm? The tree does not have any fruits on it...?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was about to reach the Star Shattering Sect, Mui who was stuck inside the trial space could not help freezing up on the spot as she said this, a look of disbelief clearly visible on her face as she looked up at the empty branches of the tree in front of her.


    From what she remembered; this kind of tree should have been filled with fruits on all its branches... But there was nothing!


    Wait... Maybe I have already been at this tree before... But shouldn''t the fruits grow back after I finish eating them...? Don''t tell me... The supply of fruits is not endless!?


    Feeling shocked as she realized this, Mui could not help looking at the rest of the fruit trees around her-


    "Nothing...!"


    Like she had already started expecting, the fruit trees all around her were all empty without anything on them. All having been eaten by her earlier... The only fruit she could spot was hanging on a small tree that had been tucked away into the corner beneath arge rock, something that she hadn''t even noticed before when all her attention had been focused on eating fruits, training the unnamed greatsword technique and increasing her cultivation realm.


    "Won''t I end up starving like this...?" Realizing how bad her current situation was, Mui could not help turning her attention towards the box of words that had remained without any changes ever since she had first shown up.


    It was only now that she understood that staying inside the trial space for an extended period of time was not a good idea. Especially now that she had gone through all the fruits that would normally havested her for several months if she ate them slowly and only when she was hungry instead of eating them whenever she wanted to...


    [Generation of the score has finished and the reward forpleting the trial has been calcted.]


    [View the score and reward: Y/N]


    "It finished!? When did this happen- Ah... Maybe I was too absorbed on eating the different fruits and training that I didn''t even notice that the box of words had changed..." Noticing that the box of words had changed and had already finished generating her score, Mui had no idea to say.


    After she discovered that the box of words would take longer than normal to generate her score, she had not turned to look at it once during her entire time in the new andfortable location filled with delicious fruits. Instead, she had focused all her attention on eating the fruits and increasing her strength.


    For all she knew, the box of words could have finished generating her score a few minutes after she had arrived, but she would have had no idea about it...


    Pressing down the big yes button that had appeared below the box of words, Mui felt herself looking forward to what her score for the trial was going to be... But even more than this, she was looking forward to the reward mentioned by the box of words.


    Although she had managed to get both a cultivation technique and abat technique in the trial so far, Mui was still curious about whether she would get another reward afterpleting the trial. After all, from what she remembered about the stories she had heard about cultivator trials, other than being deadly, the reward forpleting one such trial would always be something amazing like the inheritance of a powerful cultivator. Maybe even a chance to directly increase one''s strength to a brand-new realm.


    [Trial Participant: Mui]


    [Evaluation: Managed to sessfully clear a total of three out of three trials. All three trials have been cleared in ordance with the minimum criteria to be given a chance of a reward.]


    [Reward: One Interspatial ring filled to the brim with spiritual fruits, a disciple token for the Star Shattering Sect, a chance to be the disciple of an elder within the Star Shattering Sect.]


    "Star Shattering Sect? Bing a disciple of an elder...?" Reading through the information that had been disyed by the box of words, Mui could not help tilting her head in confusion after reading past the part with the interspatial ring and spiritual fruits.


    To be honest, Mui did not have a clear understanding of what a disciple was. Even if she had heard about disciples before through the other orphans, she had grown up around, she still did not understand a lot about what a disciple was. All she understood was that it was a title for someone who was a part of a sect.


    As for the Star Shattering Sect that was mentioned, Mui had never heard about a sect like that before but considering that the box of words had mentioned it, she guessed that the Star Shattering Sect should be behind the trial.


    Thinking about it like this, Mui did not feel like it would be a bad idea to be a disciple of an elder from the Star Shattering Sect. Especially when considering that they should also have a lot of delicious fruits and provide her with a safe ce to live.


    The matter of returning to the city she had lived in before ending up in the trial was never really something she considered. The main reason for this being that she had seen firsthand what would happen to someone who carried a precious treasure or anything else with them without enough strength to defend themselves... Be it cultivators or normal people without cultivation!


    [You will be teleported out of your current location in five minutes and will appear in front of an elder from the Star Shattering Sect. The interspatial ring filled with spiritual fruits can be found in front of you.]


    [Reminder: Put on the interspatial ring before you get teleported away or the interspatial ring will be left behind!]


    [Time until teleportation: 4 minutes and 56 seconds... 55 seconds...]


    "Hm?" Lost in her own thoughts as she was thinking about the different rewards mentioned by the box of words, Mui suddenly noticed the next part of the message-


    Swish-!


    Not even a secondter, she leaped towards the interspatial ring that had appeared on the ground without wasting a single second.


    Even if she had no idea what an interspatial ring was or how it could even store the delicious fruits inside of it, Mui did not think too much about this, to her, the most important thing was the fact that the ring somehow had delicious fruits inside of it. Figuring out how to ess those delicious fruits and how it even stored them, was a problem forter. Maybe the elder from the Star Shattering Sect that she was being teleported to in a few minutes would be able to help her in this regard...


    Whoosh~!


    As the remaining four minutes passed by in what felt like an instant, Mui suddenly felt her entire body being enveloped in some kind of strange energy before everything around her turned blurry and she felt herself moving at a speed that was impossible toprehend with her current cultivation realm.


    Waaaaaah-!


    Not able to say anything while moving through space, Mui could only let out a silent scream at the brand-new sensation-


    Thump!


    However, the entire thing onlysted for a few seconds before she suddenly found herself standing in the middle of arge open field with nothing more than a few wild animals and birds in view.


    "Hm...? You are-"


    It was at this moment, that Mui caught sight of a man standing a few meters away from her looking into the distance. He appeared to be in histe twenties, with a tall and lean build, dressed in a simple white robe. But what caught her attention the most was the powerful and ethereal aura that surrounded him and seemed to emanate from his very being.


    Even if she had just started cultivating a short time ago and was still only in the Qi Condensation Realm, she still understood that the person in front of her was powerful. Far stronger than any of the cultivators she had seen during her time in the city!


    As she gazed at him, he turned his head and their eyes met, causing Mui to feel a sense of warmth, though she couldn''t quite understand why. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Without warning, the man spoke, his voice smooth and deep like a gentle stream. "Youngdy, do not be rmed. I am from the Star Shattering Sect, the most powerful sect in the Sky Empire."


    Mui unconsciously felt her heart skip a beat at his words. Although she had never heard about the Star Shattering Sect before, she understood what the Sky Empire was and what it represented. For the Star Shattering Sect to be considered the most powerful sect in the Sky Empire, it was easy for her to imagine just how strong this sect was!


    "It was sensed that one of the trials set up by my sect across the Sky Empire was triggered and sessfullypleted by you, youngdy, and I''m here to extend my invitation to not only bing a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect... But my personal disciple!"


    Listening to what the man said, Mui could not help feeling shocked. Even if she had already somewhat guessed that the Star Shattering Sect was behind the trial, it was another thing for it to be directly confirmed, what more, she also managed to learn just how powerful the Star Shattering Sect was!


    Not only that, but she was also going to be a disciple of such a powerful sect- No, she was going to be a person disciple of an elder from such a powerful sect!


    Not having any idea what to say as she thought about all of this, Mui momentarily froze on the spot. Forgetting her original goal of wanting to ask about the interspatial ring and how to get her hands on the delicious fruits inside.

 Chapter 848 Fourth Disciple, Mui

    A short time before Mui was teleported out from the trial space, Xuan Hao gentlynded on arge grass field. Looking into the distance, therge, towering mountains of the Shattered Star Peaks could barely be seen.


    "This should be more than close enough." Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the system panel that had appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao entered the judgement for Mui''s performance during the trial. Not forgetting to give her the most suitable reward among the choices given by the system. An interspatial ring filled to the brim with spiritual fruits like the spiritual fruits she had eaten inside the trial space.


    The rest of the reward was the token given by the system that would allow her to be a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect, while thest reward was going to be a chance to be a disciple of an elder from the Star Shattering Sect, something that had been set as a reward by himself.


    "Hm? A formation...?"


    Watching as the system panel disappeared after he had finished entering the judgement for Mui, Xuan Hao was surprised to suddenly see a weird formation the size of a small house appearing on the ground in front of him-


    WHOOSH-!


    Not a secondter, the formation began rapidly absorbing the qi in the air around him. Not even the chaotic qi in the sky was sparred, as a terrifying amount of qi entered the formation created by the system.


    "A teleportation formation... The formation is connecting to the trial space where Mui is located and teleporting her out...!" Sensing the clear changes to the space around him caused by the formation, Xuan Hao did not take long before he realized what the purpose of the formation was... But at the same time, it also made him realize that every interspatial ring he threw out didn''t have a unique trial space hidden inside of it. Instead, it looked like the interspatial rings he threw out were all carrying a teleportation formation made by the system. Ready to teleport any young geniuses picking up the interspatial ring.


    Indeed... This does make far more sense. After all, it would be a little too much if every single interspatial ring had a unique trial space of their own hidden inside them...


    Shaking his head as he thought about just how many interspatial rings, he had thrown out so far, Xuan Hao felt that it would be a bit overkill if every single one of them had a unique trial space hidden inside of them. After all, how many interspatial rings had he thrown out so far? 2000? 3000? To be honest, he had no idea, as he hadn''t really checked up on it in a long time due to the end of the quest itself still being a few years away from beingpleted.


    "Hm? The Dao of Space has be far clearer because of the formation!?" Suddenly sensing that the space around the formation had not only grown unstable due to the teleportation formation activating, but also made the Dao of Space far easier to sense, Xuan Hao focused all his attention on trying toprehend the Dao of Space.


    With such an opportunity in front of him, Xuan Haopletely ignored his surroundings as he focused on increasing hisprehension of the Dao of Space.


    "Hm...? You are-"


    Because of this, it was only when the rity of the Dao of Space had started weakening and a small voice called out filled with surprise that Xuan Hao realized that the teleportation formation had disappeared and had instead been reced by a young girl. Even without the young girl introducing herself, Xuan Hao had already guessed that she should be the young orphan girl that had ended up being named Mui by the system inside the trial space.


    However, looking at the current shocked expression on her face and how she was shivering through his divine sense, Xuan Hao understood that she should be in a state of shock. Feeling ufortable and fearful of the stranger that had suddenly appeared in front of her out of the blue.


    Looks like I will have to try and calm her down... Maybe also mention that I''m from the Star Shattering Sect so she will link it together with the reward that the system disyed for her inside the trial space before she was teleported out...


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao turned around before trying his best to copy how Elder Song talked when trying to reassure andfort some of the younger disciples of the sect. "Youngdy, do not be rmed. I am from the Star Shattering Sect, the most powerful sect in the Sky Empire."


    Observing Mui after he had introduced himself as someone from the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao felt himself let out a silent breath of relief upon noticing that Mui seemed to have calmed down significantly after hearing that he was someone from the Star Shattering Sect.


    Indeed, Elder Song is the best when ites to this sort of thing. Looks like I still have quite a bit I can learn from him when ites to teaching disciples...


    Knowing that things were working out and Mui was attentively looking up at him with a more curious expression on her face, Xuan Hao decided to just continue along the same way of talking in the same way as Elder Song. "It was sensed that one of the trials set up by my sect across the Sky Empire was triggered and sessfullypleted by you, youngdy, and I''m here to extend my invitation to not only bing a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect... But my personal disciple!"


    Allowing the young girl to be left thinking for some time, Xuan Hao quietly observed as her expression turned from one filled with shock into one filled with happiness. Even without hearing her answer to the invitation he had presented her; it was not hard to understand that she was going to ept the invitation to be a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect.


    As for bing his personal disciple... Xuan Hao did not think she would say no after joining the Star Shattering Sect!


    Waiting for another few minutes as the young girl was left thinking about the information she just had been given, Xuan Hao decided that she had been left to simmer in her own thoughts long enough. "Have you decided on your answer?"


    "M-my a-answer!?" Taken aback by what Xuan Hao said, Mui could not help nervously saying this before looking up at Xuan Hao with a somewhat confused expression on her face.


    "Yes, you don''t have to feel any pressure, my Star Shattering Sect isn''t a sect that forces others to join them... Except when ites to expanding the sect..." Whispering thest part to himself so that Mui couldn''t hear him, Xuan Hao nodded his head and waited for her response.


    "I-I want to join the Star Shattering Sect and be a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect!" Feeling extremely shy and nervous when faced with Xuan Hao who was looking directly at her and waiting for her to respond, Mui only barely managed to say this without identally biting her tongue in the process. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    That was scary- Ah! Didn''t I forget something!?


    "Ah...! I also want to be Elder''s disciple!" Realizing that she had forgotten the part of her bing the personal disciple of the Elder in front of her, Mui let out a small, surprised cry before lowering her head nervously.


    "Haha, no need to be that nervous. Let me formally introduce myself, my name is Xuan Hao, I''m a Grand Elder from the Star Shattering Sect and already have three personal disciples under me. The first is called Qing Yi, the second Chu Yang and thest Bai Ning. From this day forth, you will be my fourth personal disciple. In the future, I hope you will be able to get along well with your fellow disciples!" Seeing just how nervous this new disciple of his was, Xuan Hao decided to introduce himself and her future senior sister and senior brothers.


    "Fourth personal disciple... I-I have two senior brothers and a senior sister...?" Filled with surprise after learning that she was going to have three seniors, Mui could not help feeling curious about them as she said this without thinking. Her previous nervousnesspletely gone.


    "Yes... But I won''t talk too much about them here, I think it would be better if you met them yourself first." Feeling happy that he had seeded in calming down Mui by mentioning that she had three seniors, Xuan Hao felt curious as to just how his three disciples were going to react after finding out that they had gained a junior sister.


    "Yes! I want to see them!" Not showing any nervousness on her face as she said this filled with excitement at seeing her Qing Yi, Chu Yang and Bai Ning, Mui had unknowingly moved closer to Xuan Hao during their conversation.


    "Haha, that''s great! Then let''s get going!"


    "Huh...? What do- Waaaaaaaaaah-!"


    Not giving Mui any chance to hesitate, Xuan Hao directly used his domain to lift her into the air before flying in the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks that could barely be seen in the distance. Making sure not to go too fast so Mui had a chance to calm down and enjoy the journey.

 Chapter 849 Spiritual Fruits Of The Ninth Star Peak

    Reaching the nowrge city that had been built beneath the Ninth Star Peak, Xuan Hao did not immediately go back to the Star Shattering Sect with Mui. Instead deciding to explore the city where a lot of the disciple''s family members had decided to settle down and live their life in peace under the protection of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not only would it be a chance for Mui to see it, but it was also a chance for himself to get more familiar with the city that he had not really visited once since the Star Shattering Sect moved to the Shattered Star Peaks as far as he could remember.


    This ce has really grown since the time back when it was only acting as a small city for those climbing the Ninth Star Peak for spiritual herbs and those making their way towards the Third Star Peak to try a final attempt at reaching the Nascent Soul Realm...


    Thinking this to himself as he observed the entire city through his divine sense while Mui was walking beside him with a curious expression on her face, Xuan Hao could not help spreading out his divine sense until he reached the small town that had appeared close to the new path leading up to the Third Star Peak.


    Considering the current growth rate of the city, it would not take long before this small town would inevitably be engulfed and be a part of therger city.


    Considering just howrge the Star Shattering Sect had grown over the past few years, the number of people wanting to enter the city had also grown in a simr fashion. Even reaching the point at which Elder Song had limited the people who could live inside the city to those who had a family member inside the sect or had some other kind of special permission from the sect itself... But even then, the growth speed of the city did not slow down in the slightest even when the requirements for living inside the city were getting more stringent!


    The city itself was located right next to the entrance of the Star Shattering Sect so it was a rather obvious thing that the requirements to live there would be strict to prevent any spies or other people with bad intentions from causing trouble for the younger and weaker disciples that often entered the city to have fun or visit their families. Especially with the Star Shattering Sect starting to reach a level where the more powerful forces like the imperial family and three religions might start paying attention to them and think about sending someone over to investigate the true strength of the sect.


    At least it looked like those forces were far too busy to think about the Star Shattering Sect for now...


    "E-elder, are those people perhaps disciples from the Star Shattering Sect...?"


    "Hm? Ah, yes, they are. If I''m not wrong, they should have just recently joined the sect. Not too different from you." Lost in his own thoughts as he observed the city through his divine sense, Xuan Hao still managed to perfectly answer the question Mui had asked him while looking towards the group of young disciples standing a short distance away from them. Far too busy with the foodstand in front of them to notice Mui who was pointing at them with a curious expression on her face.


    "I see... I will also be able to eat delicious food like that from now on..." Showing an excited expression on her face as she almost looked like she was drooling, Mui quietly muttered this to herself. Only barely loud enough for Xuan Hao standing beside her to hear what she was saying.


    "..."


    As a result, Xuan Hao started wondering why this young girl had agreed to join the Star Shattering Sect and be his disciple. Did she do it to be stronger and progress further on the path of cultivation... Or just to eat more delicious food like the spiritual fruits she had eaten back inside the trial space?


    To be honest, Xuan Hao had no clear answer to this question... N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "E-elder... Can we get the thing they are getting...?" Not aware of her master''s thought, Mui nervously asked this while keeping her attention focused of the foodstand that the younger disciples from the sect were standing around chatting with each other. Not feelingfortable addressing Xuan Hao as elder. Mainly due to all the people known as elder that she had seen, were old people who looked like they already had one step in the grave. Not someone young like Xuan Hao.


    "Sure, go pick whatever you want." Nodding his head in agreement to Mui''s request, Xuan Hao watched as the girl happily jumped towards the foodstand to pick out the different things she had seen the group of young disciples from earlier get.


    Like this, Xuan Hao ended up spending the next two or so hours walking around the city located at the base of the Ninth Star Peak, both showing Mui around, while also getting to know the city himself through his divine sense and first-hand experience of walking along the streets together with Mui.


    ...


    Having left the city below the Ninth Star Peak behind and made their way up the Ninth Star Peak where most of the spiritual herbs and spiritual fruits were being grown, Mui could not help unconsciously swallowing at the sight of the spiritual fruits and herbs that seemed to go on forever from her point of view. "C-can I take some of the-"


    "Yes, but don''t take too many..." Not even having to wait for Mui to finish her sentence, Xuan Hao already understood what she wanted to say and allowed her to go take a few spiritual fruits. In the first ce, she would not be able to do any harm by eating a few spiritual fruits.


    The number of spiritual fruits produced on the Ninth Star Peak was something that would be difficult for her to impact in the short term. At the very least she would need a few months and the help of his gluttonous pet...


    "Yay~! Thank you!"


    Swish~!


    Not wasting a single second after getting his approval, Mui dashed towards the closest spiritual fruit tree before starting to happily chomp down on the delicious fruits. Not paying any mind to the disciples that tended to the spiritual herbs looking towards her with surprised looks on their faces after having witnessed how someone had been allowed to eat the spiritual herbs without first getting the approval from the elder in charge of the spiritual fruits and herbs on the Ninth Star Peak.


    Looking towards the elder in question to see what he was going to do to Mui who had just started eating the spiritual fruits without permission, the disciples were even shocked to discover that he didn''t say anything and instead just continued tending to a few new spiritual herbs without caring about Mui who had already consumed close to half of the spiritual fruits present on the spiritual fruit tree.


    "Is there something special about that girl?"


    "Maybe she''s a core disciple or the personal disciple of an important elder!"


    "Indeed, that would make sense. After all, there is no reason for elder to not start reprimanding her if she didn''t have some kind of special identity... I just didn''t expect for us to encounter someone like this on our first day working on the Ninth Star Peak..."


    Chatting with each other as they focused all their attention on Mui who was paying them no mind, the group of disciples tending the spiritual herbs and fruits on the Ninth Star Peak inevitably ended up stopping what they had been doing before the arrival of Mui and Xuan Hao-


    "You brats! Get back to work if you still want those spiritual herbs!"


    Resulting in the elder in charge of taking care of the spiritual herbs and fruits on the Ninth Star Peak angrily calling out to them.


    """Yes! Sir!"""


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Hearing the old elder calling out to them and even threatening with taking away the spiritual herbs they would get from tending the spiritual herbs and fruits on the Ninth Star Peak, every single one of the young disciples, that had stopped to observe what Mui was doing, quickly got back to what they were doing beforehand. Although, they did turn to look in the direction of Mui from time to time, still curious about just how many spiritual fruits this young girl was going to eat.


    ...


    "That should be more than enough spiritual fruits, we still need to reach the sect before it starts going dark!"


    "Okay..."


    Having to forcefully step in and stop Mui from continuing to the fourth spiritual fruit tree, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more certain that the Star Shattering Sect needed to expand their production of spiritual fruits and herbs in the future.


    "Let''s get going."


    Not wasting any time after he had managed to get Mui to stop going after the spiritual fruits, Xuan Hao soon left the Ninth Star Peak together with her.

 Chapter 850 Mui’s First Time In The Star Shattering Sect

    Continuing along the path leading down from the Ninth Star Peak and down into the small valley that was located in between the different Star Peaks, it did not take long before the Seventh Star Peak where the sect was located came into view in the distance. Leaving Mui, who had never seen anything outside of the small city in the core region of the Sky Empire where she grew up, open her mouth wide in disbelief.


    The beautiful buildings that were everywhere and the serene and peaceful surroundings that created a perfect environment for cultivating. If not for the fact that arge number of both disciples and elders could constantly be seen walking back and forth between the different buildings, she would have thought that they had idently made their way inside some kind of ancient forbiddennd from a long-lost era.


    "That is the main sect of the Star Shattering Sect and also the ce you will be staying from now."


    "..."


    Lost in her own thought as she looked up towards the Star Shattering Sect on the Seventh Star Peak filled with both amazement and awe, Mui did not even register what Xuan Hao said to her as she just mindlessly nodded her head before following him along the path leading up the Seventh Star Peak. Not able to stop herself from looking at the sect on top of the mountain growing closer and closer to her with each passing moment.


    "Wait... Who is that? I feel like- Isn''t that Elder Xuan!?"


    "But... Wasn''t he doing some sect alliance meeting in the capital city of the Sky Empire...? It can''t be... Ah! I-It really is him...!" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Elder Xuan returned from the sect alliance meeting!? We should inform the sect master and Elder Song about this! Maybe we can get a different assignment that doesn''t require us to leave the sect!"


    At the same time Mui was making her way up the Seventh Star Peak together with Xuan Hao, a few of the elders making their way down the mountain discovered them and froze in surprise for a short moment before rushing back up the mountain. Disappearing back inside the sect.


    Hm? Those elders seemed really surprised just now when they saw my master. Does my master perhaps have a higher position than a normal elder?


    Even if Mui had not been able to hear what the elders were talking about due to how far away, they had been, she had still been able to see the shocked expressions on their faces when they saw her master and could not help feeling curious as to just what kind of identity her master had inside the Star Shattering Sect for them to react like this upon seeing her master.


    "As I said earlier, I''m a grand elder of the Star Shattering Sect. The position of a grand elder is above that of a normal elder and can even be considered above that of the sect master in some circumstances. Outside of me, there is only one more person that holds the status of a grand elder... But my circumstance can be considered a bit special, as I''m currently the strongest person in the Star Shattering Sect and my position can be considered above that of a grand elder." Feeling the curious and almost questioning gaze from Mui after she had witnessed the surprised group of elders running back up the mountain after seeing him, Xuan Hao did not mind giving some more details on his position inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    No matter what, she was going to learn about it sooner orter, so Xuan Hao did not really see any problems with telling her about his current identity inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Grand Elder... Most powerful in the Star Shattering Sect...?" Muttering this to herself as a look of disbelief made its way onto her face, Mui froze on the spot as she tried toprehend what her master had just told her.


    Not only was her master above the rest of the elders of the sect, but he was the most powerful person in the sect! For a moment, Mui found it hard to believe that she had managed to be the disciple of such a powerful person...


    "No need to think about it so much, you are more than qualified to be my disciple. Even if you are only in the Qi Condensation Realm at the moment, I believe that it won''t take long before you reach the Nascent Soul Realm and even beyond that!" Seeing the doubt on the face of Mui, Xuan Hao quickly reassured her. Not that anything he said was wrong, as with her talent, it would indeed not take long before she reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Especially with his support!


    "Me... Reaching the Nascent Soul Realm...?"


    "Yes, I believe it won''t be a problem for you to reach Domain Lord Realm, let alone the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    "T-thank you master..." Showing a flustered expression on her face due to the clearpliments given by her Xuan Hao, Mui no longer thought about whether she was qualified to be Xuan Hao''s disciple. Instead, starting to look forward to meeting her seniors and finding out where she was going to stay.


    Seeing that she had started happily smiling to herself after hispliment, Xuan Hao decided not to say anything more as they continued the rest of the way up the Seventh Star Peak. During which, Mui spent most of her time looking at the different disciples and elders that passed by from time to time, who were also curiously looking at the young girl that was walking together with Elder Xuan.


    For them, it was surprising to see someone who was not among Xuan Hao''s three disciples to be walking together with him. Especially considering that this person was not even wearing the standard uniform of a disciple nor that of a core disciple.


    The main thought of these people was that she was possibly a new disciple of Elder Xuan or a talented person that was going to be part of the sect in the future.


    As for her being an elder. None of the people passing by thought about this. After all, she was far too young to be an elder... Well, unless she was someone who had managed to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm at such a young age and decided to keep her appearance like that on purpose.


    ...


    Walking the final way to his pce located close to the centre of the sect where the qi springke was located, Xuan Hao could not help rolling both of his eyes as he very clearly sensed the divine sense of both Feng Chen and Elder Song sweeping over him several times along the way.


    Even if they wanted to find out about the sect alliance meeting and the person, he had brought back with him, Xuan Hao did not n to leave Mui and thus decided to ignore the two curious old men for now. Exining what had happened during the sect alliance meeting and telling them about his new disciple could wait a few more days. Especially considering that they had already been waiting for a few months, waiting for another day or two wouldn''t hurt them.


    If there really was anything serious that they wanted to talk about, they would have already shown up personally. Not just use their divine sense to subtly hint at the fact that they wanted to talk with him.


    "Ah! Master, is this the ce where I will be living!?"


    "Hm? Yes, you will be staying here in the future together with me and your three seniors." Suddenly being interrupted by Mui who called out to him, Xuan Hao looked ahead and realized that they had already reached his pce and had already moved past the front entrance.


    "Wow... I will be staying in a pce in the future...!" Muttering this to herself as she seemed to be in a daze after hearing what her master said, Mui had no idea what to say as she still felt like thest few weeks had been a dream.


    From risking her life looking for food inside arge forest with demon beast in it and living on the streets to suddenly bing a cultivator and finally the personal disciple of a powerful elder inside a sect called the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although she had never heard about the Star Shattering Sect before, she didn''t doubt the words of her master when he had told her that it was the most powerful sect in the Sky Empire. Even more so after she personally saw the sect and felt the different powerful auras from the different elders and disciples walking past her along her way to the sect.


    Even if she had not said anything, Mui had been shocked when she had realized that everyone, she had met so far, was far more powerful than the so-called experts she had encountered in the city she had spent her entire life inside.


    Of course, there was no way for Mui to understand that the so-called experts she had encountered back then were actually not real cultivators, but merely a bunch of people pretending to be in an attempt to earn the admiration and respect of the different orphans...

 Chapter 851 Airhead Senior Sister

    At the same time Xuan Hao was busy showing Mui around the pce where she was going to live in the future, Chu Yang was standing in front of the Combat Hall waiting for a certain elder to show up.


    The elder in question was one of the stronger Nascent Soul Realm Elders in the Star Shattering Sect and Chu Yang had been looking forward to challenging him to a duel inside the Combat Hall. The only problem was that the elder in question always seemed to disappear whenever he showed up...


    Fortunately for Chu Yang, things would not end up like that this time around, as he had seen the elder in question entering the Combat Hall to teach some of his disciples around one hour ago and should be finished ande back out again. After which, he would be ready to challenge him before he could disappear like he had done in the past!


    "This time around, I won''t miss the chance!" Muttering this to himself as he remained fully focused on the entrance to the Combat Hall, Chu Yang didn''t notice Qing Yi''s figure appearing behind him.


    "Junior brother-"


    "Ah! Qing Yi?" Almost jumping up in shock as Qing Yi suddenly talked directly beside him, Chu Yang turned around and looked at Qing Yi with a confused expression stered all over his face. Understanding very well that his senior sister would not normally seek him out without it being about something important. Especially after she had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm and started using most of her free time on getting familiar with her new strength.


    "Master is back again! I already informed junior brother Bai about it, and he should be leaving the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces after he finishes the artifact he is in the process of crafting. Although, knowing junior brother Bai, it might be a few days before this happens... Anyway, let''s get going!"


    Not noticing the confusion on her junior brothers face as she said this, Qing Yi started excitedly dragging him away from the Combat Hall. Clearly intending to go back to the pce and see their master, who had just returned.


    "Master returned...?" Not expecting for his master to have returned, Chu Yang was even more surprised as he unconsciously said this. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Yes, I heard about it from a group of disciples who recently returned to the sect after having visited the Ninth Star Peak to transport some fresh spiritual herbs to the Alchemy Hall. Not only that, but he was apanied by a young girl who did not seem to be part of the sect! Do you know what this means? We might be getting a new junior sister!" Talking at an extremely fast speed while saying this with an excited expression on her face, Qing Yi could not wait to meet this new junior sister.


    Given that she had been the only female disciple of Xuan Hao, it was obvious why she was so excited at the news that she was going to get a junior sister. Zhi Ruo did not really count, as she was busy dealing with the cleaning of the pce most of the time and always seemed to mysteriously disappear whenever she was not cleaning the pce.


    "We got a new junior sister!? Hm... But I really want to challenge that person today, or I might not get the chance again..." Almost whispering thest part to himself as he thought about whether he should leave the Combat Hall, Chu Yang suddenly spotted the elder he had been waiting for leaving the Combat Hall together with two of his disciples.


    "Ah! He is here! Qing Yi, I will go backter, I have something important to do!" Not wasting a second, Chu Yang quickly ran over before the elder had a chance to disappear. Leaving Qing Yi behind with a surprised expression on her face. Not having expected that Chu Yang would not follow her back to greet their master after he had returned and instead rushed over to challenge an elder that had juste out of the Combat Hall.


    "Guess I will just greet master on my own and see my cute new junior sister..." Not wanting to waste any more time trying to get her two junior brothers to join her in weing their master back, Qing Yi decided to just go back to the pce and greet her master on her own.


    On the positive side, by being the only disciple that came back, she would be the first that got a chance to spend some time together with their new junior sister.


    ...


    "So that is my new junior sister..." Arriving at the pce only a short time after leaving the Combat Hall, Qing Yi could not help feeling a little nervous as she spotted the young girl standing beside her master. Even from a distance, it was clear that her master was currently showing her around the pce. Making it rather obvious that the young girl was indeed her new junior sister.


    As for the young girl''s cultivation realm only being in the Qi Condensation Realm, Qing Yi didn''t really worry about this. Even if the cultivation realm was a bitckingpared to the younger disciples that were around her age inside the current Star Shattering Sect, Qing Yi also understood that there was no way that her master would take in someone with bad talent.


    Not to mention, back when she had be his disciple, she had been even worse whenpared to the rest of the disciples that had been her age. Only after entering under the guidance of her master did, she get a chance to rapidly improve her strength and reach a level she had never imagined she could reach before!


    Not only that, but because of her increase in strength, her family had also-


    "Qing Yi, are you going to just stand around over there, or are you going toe over?"


    "Ah!? M-master?!" Lost in her own thoughts as she started reminiscing about the past, Qing Yi was caught by surprise when she suddenly heard her master calling out to her.


    Not only that, but when she turned to look towards the pce, she also discovered that her new junior sister was curiously looking towards her together with her master...


    "Y-yes, I''ming... I was just a bit lost in my own thoughts earlier..." Showing a slightly embarrassed expression on her face as she said this, Qing Yi made her way over to the entrance of the pce where her master and new junior sister were standing.


    ...


    Having walked around the pce and seen the room she was going to live in, Mui and Xuan Hao had both made it back to the entrance of the pce, where a girl looking like she was in her early twenties could be seen spacing off while looking like she was thinking about something.


    Is that person perhaps my senior sister?


    Guessing that the person could be one of the seniors that her master had mentioned to her earlier, Mui could not help feeling even more curious about the young woman. The only problem was that she didn''t seem to notice them at all...


    "Master... Is that person over there my senior sister?" Seeing that the person in question was spacing off without noticing them, Mui turned towards her master and asked him.


    "Yes, that person is your senior sister, Qing Yi. Although... She seems to be thinking quite deeply about something for her to not even notice us..."


    "Qing Yi... So, it''s senior sister Qing Yi! Hehe, I hope she is kind..." Hearing what her master said, Mui happily muttered this to herself as a smile made its way onto her face. Making it obvious to anyone about just how happy she was to have a senior sister.


    "This girl..." Seeing the happy smile on his newest disciple''s face, Xuan Hao could not help turning his attention towards his first disciple that was still spacing off.


    "Qing Yi, are you going to just stand around over there, or are you going toe over?"


    "Ah!? M-master?! Y-yes, I''ming... I was just a bit lost in my own thoughts earlier..."


    Having decided to call out to her, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head upon seeing the flustered state of his first disciple when she discovered him and Mui standing at the entrance to the pce.


    "Master, is this perhaps my new junior sister? Howe I never knew I had such a cute junior sister before today!?" Not wasting a second to try and steer the conversation in another direction after she made her way over, Qing Yi smiled kindly towards the curious Mui standing at the side inspecting this new senior sister of hers that had appeared.


    "Indeed, that is your new junior sister, I met her on my way back from the capital of the Sky Empire and decided to take her in. Now that you are already here... I have something to do, why don''t you take care of her for me and show her around the sect in my ce?" Realizing that it might be a good idea if Qing Yi was the one to show Mui around the sect instead of him, Xuan Hao did not waste a second before handing her over to Qing Yi.


    "Of course, master! Don''t worry about this junior sister, I will make sure to take good care of her!" Nodding her head happily in agreement to what her master said, Qing Yi was ted upon hearing that she would be the one to show around her new junior sister.


    This was a perfect chance for her to get to know more about this little junior sister and find out how she had even encountered her master in the first ce!

 Chapter 852 Embarrassed Mui

    Seeing how happy Qing Yi was to show Mui around, Xuan Hao waited for Qing Yi to introduce herself to Mui and for Mui to growfortable around this new senior sister before leaving the two of them alone. Deciding that it would be a good idea to meet up with Elder Song and Feng Chen while Qing Yi was busy showing Mui around.


    As for introducing her to his other two disciples¡­ That was something that could wait forter, or maybe Qing Yi would be able to do this for him if she met up with those two while showing Mui around the sect. After all, it would be good if his disciples could take care of something like that by themselves instead of needing him to be around to do the introductions.


    "I will be going now, if there is anything, you can always contact me through amunication talisman, and I will be there immediately!"


    "I understand master, you don''t have to worry about it, I''m more than capable of showing this cute little junior sister around. Not to mention, I''m not nning to leave the sect. At most I will show her around the base of the Seventh Star Peak and some of the different training grounds that have been established down there by a few of the younger disciples." Nodding her head as she said this, Qing Yi did her best to look trustworthy. However, this only ended up making Xuan Hao second guess if it would really be a good idea to leave Mui in her care.


    I hope everything works out well¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao did not say anything more before leaving in the direction of the sect master pce where both Feng Chen and Elder Song were currently located. Leaving Mui in the care of Qing Yi.


    ¡­


    "Now its just us two¡­ How about we introduce ourselves to start with? My name is Qing Yi and I''m the first disciple of master. Currently my cultivation realm is the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ But I''m not the strongest among master''s disciples. At least not yet¡­" Taking the chance to formally introduce herself the moment her master had left, Qing Yi could not help turning towards Mui. Waiting for her to introduce herself as well.


    "Nascent Soul Realm!? As expected, senior sister Qing is really strong¡­! I''m only at the Fifth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm." Hearing that Qing Yi was someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, Mui could not help opening both of her eyes up wide as she looked at the girl that looked no more than 10 years older than her filled with shock.


    It had to be known that the only Nascent Soul Realm Experts she had heard about before, was the kind that had cultivated for hundreds of years before reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, she had never heard about anyone reaching the Nascent Soul Realm at such a young age. Not to mention, the senior sister in front of her was not even her master''s strongest disciple!


    Once again, Mui understood just how powerful the Star Shattering Sect was for there to be disciples that had reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Even the few rumors she had heard about the capital city of the Sky Empire, Nascent Soul Realm Experts still had a rather high status and would often be considered part of the older generation. Not the younger generation like it seemed to be in the Star Shattering Sect!


    Then¡­ If someone in the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm is still a disciple, how powerful are the elders of the Star Shattering Sect? The Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ Or maybe they are all powerful seniors above the Nascent Soul Realm!?


    Thinking this to herself, Mui could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine. Even if she understood that the Star Shattering Sect would be powerful, she had never thought that it would be so powerful!


    "No need to overthink it."


    "Huh?" Suddenly having her train of thought interrupted by Qing Yi, Mui could not help tilting her head to the side in confusion as she looked over towards her senior sister.


    "The Nascent Soul Realm might be considered strong in your eyes, but whenpared to how long the path of cultivation is, the Nascent Soul Realm can''t be considered strong in the slightest. Especially whenpared to the Domain Lord Realm and Soul Ascension Realm above it Not only that, but-" Listening to Qing Yi who had suddenly begun to lecture her on how weak the Nascent Soul Realm was in the grand scheme of things and the different realms that came after the Nascent Soul Realm, Mui was left speechless and could only nod her head mindlessly while listening to her senior sister.


    During the lecture, she not only managed to learn about the Domain Lord Realm that was above the Nascent Soul Realm, but also learnt about an even stronger realm above that of the Domain Lord Realm called the Soul Ascension Realm.


    All of this was brand new to her and Qing Yi had no idea just how powerful people in these cultivation realms were. Especially when considering she had never encountered someone that strong before, let alone get a chance to see them fight.


    "-And that would be all. By the way, I never learnt what your name is?" As Qing Yi finished up her small lecture and said this, Mui who had been listening to what her senior sister was saying could not help showing a surprised expression on her face after realizing that she had not told Qing Yi her name.


    "Ah! My name is Mui!" Not wasting a second after knowing this, Mui did not think for a second before using the name that had been given to her inside the trial space. After all, she did not really have another name to use, and she had already grown to like the name after more than three weeks inside the trial space. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "So, it''s Mui, what a cute name. Hm¡­ I think we should get going now if we want to look around the sect before it starts getting dark, what do you think?"


    "Y-yes, I''m f-fine with going now¡­" Feeling a wave of embarrassment washing over her upon being called cute by Qing Yi, Mui barely managed to respond before lowering her head to not show Qing Yi how embarrassed she was.


    "Hehe, okay then~ Let''s get going!"


    Of course, there was no way for Mui to hide her embarrassment from Qing Yi, who just chuckled happily to herself upon seeing the cute reaction from Mui before they began their journey around the Star Shattering Sect.


    ¡­


    At the same time Qing Yi had begun showing Mui around the sect, Xuan Hao was slowly walking towards Feng Chen''s pce as he thought about how he was going to help Chu Yang and Qing Yi improve their strength now that they had both reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Although the Divine Will Technique from the Divine Will Scripture would help them to some degree, it was far from enough to help them continue their current speed of increasing their strength¡­


    Hm¡­ Now that I think about it, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang have reached the Nascent Soul Realm now. Maybe It''s time for them to try and enter the mystic realm that had an entrance at my old pavilion in the Flying Sword Sect¡­


    Frowning to himself as he thought about the entrance to the mystic realm that had appeared at his old pavilion in the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if it was time to let them go in and explore this mystic realm together.


    Considering that the mystic realm was essible even for those below the Nascent soul Realm, it shouldn''t be too dangerous for them. Especially considering that they would be going together and would be able to help each other in case anything happened.


    In the worst-case scenario, he could always leave a few trump cards for them so they could escape if they encountered a powerful enemy that they couldn''t deal with.


    "This does seem like the best thing to help them get some realbat experience, while at the same time also get a chance at a fortunate encounter inside the mystic realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought the matter through, Xuan Hao decided to send Qing Yi and Chu Yang into the mystic realm.


    Considering that both had been locked up in the sect for a long time at this point without getting out, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the two of them would be more than happy with this. Especially Chu Yang, who had been looking for every possible chance to fight with someone. Given how dangerous a mystic realm was, he should get more than enough opportunities to fight in there¡­

 Chapter 853 Talk With Feng Chen And Elder Song

    Having decided on sending his two disciples to the mystic realm now that they had both reached the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao made his way towards the pce in front of him where both Feng Chen and Elder Song were patiently waiting for him to arrive and inform them about how thing had gone during the sect alliance meeting... And at the same time, also find out about the young girl he had brought along with him as his fourth disciple.


    "Maybe I should check out the situation in the rest of the sect and outside the sect before meeting those two~"


    Knowing very well that Feng Chen and Elder Song had both alreadye to know about him arriving outside the pce and could hear what he was saying, Xuan Hao could not help wondering how they would react if he just decided to leave them waiting like this.


    Would theye out or just stay inside the pce and-


    Swish-!


    "Ah! Elder Xuan! How great to see you here, why don''t we go inside and discuss the matter about the sect alliance now that you are already here?"


    Not even able to finish his train of thought, Feng Chen rushed out of the pce. Stopping him before he even had the chance to turn around and leave.


    "Sure, I don''t have anything else to do at the moment."


    Almost not able to stop himself from chuckling upon seeing the desperate expression that had appeared on Feng Chen''s face after he had stormed out of the pce to prevent him from leaving, Xuan Hao decided not to say anything about it and just followed Feng Chen inside the pce where Elder Song was waiting. However,pared to the somewhat desperate expression that had been on Feng Chen''s face when he hade rushing out of the pce to stop him from leaving, the expression on Elder Song''s face was calm and rxed, as he quietly sipped on a cup of tea.


    "Elder Xuan, it''s great to see you again. I hope the sect alliance meeting in the capital city went well and would love to hear about it. Especially if you have any idea about whether the imperial family, or any other major power in the Sky Empire, is going to interfere with the expansion and development of the Star Shattering Sect. Knowing such things now, would make it far easier for me to start preparing." N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Information about the sect alliance meeting? Sure, I''m more than happy to exin what happened during my time in the capital city..." Hearing what Elder Song said, Xuan Hao did not bother wasting any time before starting to exin what had taken ce during his time in the capital city.


    From the demonic cultivator that had managed to enter the capital city and cause chaos before escaping, to the different independent sects he had met and how they managed to get control over one of the four leader positions in the newly established sect alliance.


    In the end, Xuan Hao told Elder Song and Feng Chen about everything he had gone through during his time in the capital city. Excluding how he had been involved in the matter with the demonic cultivator or anything simr that could cause problems for him and the Star Shattering Sect if they became known...


    "Hm... I see... Looks like we won''t have to worry about anything for the next few years due to how chaotic the situation inside the Sky Empire is and the different major sect should have focused their attention on the other independent sects. Haaa... This is really a perfect time for us to expand and develop the sect without having to worry about some more powerful force jumping out to suppress us..." Nodding his head with a relieved expression on his face as he said this after having listened to Xuan Hao''s exnation of the current situation inside the Sky Empire and what he had seen take ce during his time in the capital city, Elder Song returned to quietly drinking his tea. The main change being that he was far more rxed than before.


    This old man... Did he only want to know if he could continue developing the sect without worrying about anyone interfering?


    Thinking this to himself as he saw Elder Song''s rxed expression, it did not take a genius to understand what was going through the mind of Elder Song at this moment. Even if it was not directly rted to the development of the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao was sure that it should be connected to it in some way.


    "Now that we have found out that the sect alliance meeting was a sess... Well... At least as it pertains to our sect, can I ask you about the young girl you brought back with you? Is she perhaps a new disciple?" Having learnt that there was nothing to worry about for at least a few years due to the current chaotic situation in the Sky Empire, Feng Chen instead decided to ask about Mui.


    All things considered; Xuan Hao was the strongest person in the Star Shattering Sect. For him to take on a new disciple was a big thing. Especially given his three other disciples were all talented, with two already having reached the Nascent Soul Realm, while thest was a prodigy when it came to cksmithing. Already having surpassed many of the elders in the cksmithing branch of the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Yes, she is someone I took in as my fourth disciple. By the way, I have something to inform both you and Elder Song about-" Taking out the token from the trial that he had been given by the system, Xuan Hao ignored the confused looks that the two gave him before continuing.


    "This a special identification token that can be obtain by talented young people through some different trials and tests I scattered around during my journey to the capital city of the Sky Empire and is something I intend to continue doing whenever I leave the sect from now on.


    From now on, I want you two to make sure that anyone that shows up at the sect with a token like this will be able to be a disciple of the sect. Don''t worry, there won''t be any problems with the talent of the people chosen. As for the behavior and mindset of these young people... I will leave that for you and the rest of the elders to judge if I''m not there to oversee the matter."


    "You scattered different trials around on your way back!?" Being the first to respond to what Xuan Hao said, Feng Chen could not help looking towards Xuan Hao with a look of disbelief on his face. Making it rather clear to both Xuan Hao and Elder Song how surprised he was upon hearing that Xuan Hao had somehow scattered all kinds of different trials all over the ce on his way back from the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    Not to mention how he had managed to get the different resources and other things required to construct so many trials, Feng Chen was mainly curious over where Xuan Hao had found the time to construct the trials when he had only been gone for around two months'' time...


    "You really do some amazing and at the same time weird things... I will make sure to inform the rest of the elders about this and make sure that the different elders in charge of the branch sects also know about this. After all, I think there is a far higher chance of someone passing one of your trials appearing at one of the branch sects. Especially now that we have expanded so much outside of the original Heavenly Sky Kingdom..." As Feng Chen was stuck trying to figure out how Xuan Hao had managed to do something like that, Elder Song just nodded his head before saying this. No sign of surprise on his face. "Is there anything else that you want to inform us about?"


    "Yes, I do indeed have one more thing." Seeing how Elder Song had already figured out he had more to say, Xuan Hao could only nod his head in agreement. Compared to Elder Song, Feng Chen, the current sect master, still had quite a bit to learn. Even though he was technicality the older one among the two...


    "What is it then? Did you leave some other things behind on your way back from the capital city... Or maybe you happened to find some kind of massive spirit stone mine passing through a nearby kingdom?"


    "No, not at all, it''s a special technique called the Divine Will Scripture, I found during my time in the capital city." Rolling his eyes upon hearing what Elder Song said, Xuan Hao did not waste any time before taking out the divine sense technique from the Divine Will Scripture. Allowing for both Feng Chen and Elder Song to read through it by themselves.


    Given their cultivation realm, it would not be hard for them to figure out just how beneficial the divine sense technique would be for the Star Shattering Sect!

 Chapter 854 Divine Sense Technique

    "A technique will allow us to increase the strength of our soul!? Even if I still don''t understand how useful it will be for someone in the Domain Lord Realm, it will be incredibly useful for those at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm trying to reach the Nascent Soul Realm and will be even more useful for those in the Nascent Soul Realm!" Being the first to understand the benefit of the divine sense technique from the Divine Will Scripture, Feng Chen could not help eximing loudly with a look of disbelief on his face.


    Even if he would not be able to fully grasp just what kind of impact the divine sense technique was going to have on the, he still understood that it would transform the Star Shattering Sectpletely. Allowing far more people in the sect to reach the Nascent Soul Realm, while also increasing the chance of those already in the Nascent Soul Realm of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although it might take some time before this would happen, Feng Chen did not really worry about this and was instead far more interested in finding out if he would be able to increase his strength by using the divine sense technique. Especially now that his increase in strength had slowed down significantly after reaching the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Increase the strength of the soul!? So that is what this technique is used for¡­ How amazing!" Muttering this to himself as he also had a shocked expression on his face, Elder Song looked towards Xuan Hao filled with gratitude. Understandably so, as the divine sense technique would be capable of helping him heal the damage that had been done to his soul over the years of him refining the demonic medicine for Song Jia.


    "It''s great to see that both of you are excited about the divine sense technique, I hope that both of you will spread the technique to the rest of the elders in the sect." Seeing that both Elder Song and Feng Chen could not wait to start studying the divine sense technique, Xuan Hao did not hesitate to dump the matter of circting the technique throughout the sect on them. Not that he had ever nned to do this himself in the first ce¡­


    "Sure, it''s the least we can do-"


    "Elder Song, you should leave it up to me, you already have a lot to do in the first ce and I''m sure you would also want some time to study this divine sense technique yourself. If I can''t even circte a single technique among the elders of the sect, what kind of sect master would I be?"


    "This- Ha¡­ Fine, I will leave this to you sect master, but you must make sure to inform me in case anything happens! Even if it''s something minor, it could easily cause a major problem for the sect!"


    "I know, you don''t need to worry so much about it."


    Watching as Feng Chen took on the matter of circting the divine sense technique, Xuan Hao did his best to stop himself fromughing at the odd back and forth between the two.


    Feng Chen was the sect master, but in front of Elder Song who was the real person in charge of the sect''s internal matters, Feng Chen had obviously fallen behind. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Well¡­ That is what he gets for focusing close to all his attention towards improving his strength while leaving the management of the sect in the hands of Elder Song.


    Thinking this to himself as he thought back to the time before the Star Shattering Sect where Feng Chen had been the sect master of the Flying Sword Sect and always had to worry about the Raging me Sect, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh.


    Although the Flying Sword Sect had ended up bing the Star Shattering Sect, some things never changed. Feng Chen was still trying to improve his strength, while Elder Song was still in charge of the management of the sect. Even if it was only the internal matters of the sect, with the current size of the Star Shattering Sect, the number of things he needed to do did not decrease in the slightest¡­


    "Do you have anything else? Maybe you happened to find a precious artifact or stumbled upon an ancient abandoned spiritual herb field on your way back? No need to hesitate, I- we will make sure that it is taken care!" As things quieted down again, Feng Chen could not help himself as he asked this with a look of expectation on his face.


    "No, I don''t have any artifacts for you, and I unfortunately was not lucky enough to stumble on an ancient spiritual herb- Ah¡­"


    "Hm? D-did you remember something? Did you really end up stumbling over an ancient spiritual herb!?" Seeing how Xuan Hao had ended up suddenly stopping midsentence, Feng Chen, who had asked the question about the ancient spiritual herb field and artifact in a half joking manner, had no idea what to say after noticing the reaction from Xuan Hao.


    "Well, I didn''t really stumble on an ancient spiritual herb field, but I did happen to find a lot of Purple Poison Grass during my time exploring the ruins of an ancient sect on my way to the capital city. I thought about giving it all to Qing Yi, my first disciple, but on second thought, it might be a bit too much to give her an entire interspatial ring filled with Purple Poison Grass-"


    "Purple Poison Grass!? And one interspatial ring of it!? Even if your little disciple spent the next hundred years only making potions or pills based on Purple Poison Grass, she won''t even be able to use half of it, let alone all of it! Not to mention, I doubt she would even use that much Purple Poison Grass by herself in the first ce!" Interrupting Xuan Hao, Elder Song almost jumped up from the chair he was sitting on as his normal calm and collected appearance disappearedpletely.


    "I-I see¡­ I will leave this for you to take care of the as long as you make sure my disciple is able to get-"


    Swish-!


    "No need to worry about that, I will make sure that your disciple will get all the Purple Poison Grass that she needs." Taking the interspatial ring with the Purple Poison Grass inside of it before he even had a chance to finish what he was saying, Elder Song did not show the slightest hint of shame on his face as he said this.


    "¡­"


    Just how precious is the Purple Poison grass? I''m sure it shouldn''t be anything that precious¡­


    Not having any idea why Elder Song had reacted so strongly when learning about the Purple Poison Grass, Xuan Hao could only look towards him with a confused expression on his face. Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, Elder Song had no intention of saying anything and instead just put the interspatial ring away before sitting back down like nothing had happened.


    "Ehm¡­ I think that should be everything- Unless you have anything more to share with us Elder Xuan? As for the situation about what happened during your absence, I''m sure your disciples will tell you about it when they see you again." Knowing that there wasn''t really anything important left for them to talk about, Feng Chen decided that it would be a good time to end their conversation.


    As for the matter regarding what had happened at the border of the Frozen Wastnd and their encounter with the soldiers from the Sky Empire, Feng Chen figured that Xuan Hao would be able to learn all of this through his disciples. After all, one of his disciples, Bai Ning, had been involved in the cleaning up of demonic cultivators.


    Even if Bai Ning didn''t know anything about the Sky Empire''s people, it would not be too hard for Xuan Hao to learn about this matter by chatting with the other elders in the sect about the matter. Especially considering that quite a few of the sect''s elders had been there to ensure the safety of the disciples clearing out the demonic cultivators in the kingdom next to the Azure Sky Kingdom that had now fallen under theplete control of the Star Shattering Sect.


    "I have nothing more to talk about other than the fact that I would like for our sect to start recruiting disciples from among the orphans that can be found across our territory, with that in mind, I will be the first to take my leave. After all, I just took in a new disciple and need to get her settled in when she and Qing Yies back from their tour around the sect."


    "Haha, that is understandable, we won''t be holding you up any longer Elder Xuan, you should go back and make sure you take care of your new disciple!"


    "Indeed, you should go back and apany your new disciple. Don''t leave everything to your disciples or the rtionship between the two of you will grow distant!"


    Swoosh~!


    Hearing what both feng Chen and Elder Song said, Xuan Hao did not bother staying around for any longer, as he soon left the pce before moving back towards his own pce to wait for Qing Yi and Mui to return back from their tour around the sect.

 Chapter 855 Meeting Chu Yang For The First Time

    "Amazing! So, this is the ce where people go to fight with each other?"


    "Yes, the Combat Hall is the ce where the disciples and elders spar with each other. Of course, its not the only ce they spar and fight with each other in the sect, as there is still a lot of different training grounds that they also use for this. The Combat Hall just happens to be the most used ce for this."


    "I see¡­ Guess I will also visit this ce in the future¡­"


    "Indeed. Although you still have some time before that, as you need to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm before being able to use the Combat Hall."


    At the same time Xuan Hao finished up his conversation with Elder Song and Feng Chen, Qing Yi and Mui had bothe to a stop in front of the Combat Hall as Qing Yi was introducing the ce and answering any questions Mui had. Acting like a perfect guide for her new junior sister.


    It was just at this moment when Qing Yi and Mui were about to turn around and continue off towards the next location, that Chu Yang walked out from the Combat Hall filled with energy, while an exhausted elder could be seen leaving together with him.


    Even if Qing Yi did not know for certain what had happened during the fight between Chu Yang and this elder, it was rather obvious that Chu Yang should have been the one toe out ahead. Considering that this elder had reached the Fourth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, this was more than enough for one to understand just how strong the current Chu Yang waspared to other Nascent Soul Realm cultivators at the same cultivation realm!


    "S-senior sister, who is that¡­?" Feeling Chu Yang'' looking over in their direction, Mui could not help shivering as she hid behind Qing Yi while asking this. Not something odd considering how fierce the current Chu Yang looked just after a fight with a powerful Nascent Soul Realm elder of the sect.


    Even if Chu Yang was not intentionally trying to scare her, his battle intent was far too intense for someone who had just recently taken their first step on the path of cultivation and was still only in the Qi Condensation Realm.


    "Hah¡­ that person is unfortunately one of your senior brothers¡­"


    "One of my senior brothers!? I-Is he dangerous¡­?" Nodding her head as she said this while still hiding herself behind Qing Yi, Mui could not help inspecting the scary young man that had juste out of the Combat Hall before starting to move in their direction.


    "Haha, no need to worry about him. Although he might look like a brute that loves fighting all the time at first nce, he is not scary at all. On the contrary, he is quite kind when you get to know him." Not able to stop herself fromughing after hearing what Mui said, Qing Yi did her best to reassure her that Chu Yang was not dangerous.


    "Brute!? What do you mean with that Qing Yi?!" Getting close enough just in time to hear Qing Yi calling him a brute, Chu Yang rushed over to the two, but quickly came to a stop upon noticing Mui who was standing right next to Qing Yi.


    "And who is this- Ah! Is this perhaps our new junior sister?" Even if he was angry at Qing Yi, Chu Yang still managed topose himself upon seeing the young Mui next to her. Taking no more than a few seconds to realize that she was the new junior sister that Qing Yi had mentioned to him before he had gone in to fight with the elder in the Fourth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm earlier.


    "G-Greetings senior brother, m-my name is M-Mui¡­!" Seeing the Chu Yang was looking towards her, Mui hid herself even more behind Qing Yi before nervously introducing herself to the best of her ability.


    "Greetings Mui, my name is Chu Yang and I''m the second disciple of master. If you ever encounter any problems, you can alwayse to me and don''t listen to what Qing Yi said, I''m not a brute, I just spent most of my time training in the Combat Hall." Trying his best to reassure Mui that he was not someone dangerous while introducing himself, Chu Yang only ended up making the young girl more afraid after mentioning that he spent all his time in the Combat Hall. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    After all, even if Mui did not know a lot about the Star Shattering Sect yet, she had just found out that the Combat Hall was a ce that people went to fight with each other to improve themselves. Spending a bit of time training there would be fine¡­ But being there all the time? Mui could not help feeling that her senior sister''s describing him as a brute that loved fighting all the time was correct.


    As for him not being scary and instead being a kind person? Mui felt she would need some time to properly interact with this senior brother before finding out whether this was true¡­


    "This¡­ Qing Yi, you two are on a tour of the sect. Right?"


    "Yes."


    "Great, I just happen to have finished up my fight with the elder I had been looking for. So, I will be joining both of you!"


    Realizing that his new junior sister had formed a bad first impression of him from the way she was still hiding behind Qing Yi, Chu Yang did not waste a second before saying this. Fully intend on joining the two during their tour through the sect. Hopefully being able to change his new little junior sister''s opinion on him during this period of time.


    "¡­"


    Knowing what Chu Yang was intending to do, Qing Yi did not say anything and just looked towards Mui who was hiding behind her to see her reaction after hearing that Chu Yang would be following them during their tour through the sect. If she was ufortable about it, she would make sure to refuse Chu Yang and find some other way that Mui would be less afraid of Chu Yang.


    Luckily for Chu Yang, Qing Yi''s worry was for nothing, and Mui did not seem to mind the fact that Chu Yang would being along with them. Even if she was still hiding behind Qing Yi, it was mostly due to the battle intent that Chu Yang had been releasing ever since leaving the Combat Hall. At least now, it seemed like he had reigned it in and no longer seemed as scary as before to Mui.


    "Now that you already met the first of your two senior brothers, how about we go visit the second one?"


    "Second senior brother? Yes! Let''s go visit him, I really want to see what my second senior brother is like!"


    Hearing Qing Yi''s suggestion of going to see the final disciple under her master that she had yet to see, Mui nodded her head excitedly. Even if her first senior brother was not a handsome older brother like she had first expected him to be, there was still one more senior brother that she had not seen yet!


    "Great, then let''s get going! If I''m not wrong, we should still be able to find him at the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces where he spends most of his time refining artifacts."


    "My second senior brother is a cksmith that refines artifact!? The powerful artifacts that are used by cultivators to fight and do all kinds of amazing things!?"


    "Yes, he is. Not only that, but your second senior brother, Bai Ning, can be considered the most talented cksmith among the younger generation of the Star Shattering Sect. Even surpassing some of the elders!"


    "Wow¡­" Hearing about her second senior brother who was called Bai Ning, Mui could not help showing a look of adoration on her face.


    Even if she did not know a lot about artifacts that cultivators used when fighting and doing all kinds of amazing things she could only have dreamt about before bing a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect, Mui had still heard a fair bit during her time as an orphan. Back then, most of the orphans, including herself, dreamt about obtaining a powerful artifact that would help them on to the path of cultivation or at the very least out of their current identity as orphans.


    It was also for this reason that Mui herself was filled with both awe and adoration after hearing that her second senior brother was someone who refined the powerful artifacts she had heard about during her time as an orphan.


    As for how strong her second senior brother was¡­ Mui had automatically ced him above that of her first senior brother, Chu Yang. After all, one spent all his time fighting people in the Combat Hall, while the other refined powerful and mystical artifacts that was the stuff of legends in her eyes!

 Chapter 856 Improvement Of The Blue Deer And Zu Fei

    As the group of three left the Combat Hall and made their way towards the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces where Bai Ning was spending his time honing his cksmithing skill by refining different artifacts that would either be kept for his own use or given away to the sect as a form of repayment for letting him freely use the different spiritual metals and other materials without having to do any sect missions or other things for them, Xuan Hao arrived back at his now rather empty pce.


    "Hm? They joined up with Chu Yang and are heading towards Bai Ning. Looks like I don''t have anything to worry about, Qing Yi is doing a great job showing Mui around and at the same time also introducing her to the other two¡­" Using his divine sense to figure out the current situation of his disciples, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself after knowing that everything was going well and there was nothing for him to worry about.


    For now, it would be best to just leave his disciples to themselves and let them get along with each other without his interference. After they had returned and got some time to rest, it would be time to see how far they had gotten during the time he had been away from the sect.


    As for Mui, he would need to properly introduce her to the life of a cultivator and at the same time also teach her some of the basics of cultivation. After all, even if the trial space had taught her a lot about cultivation and the different cultivation realms, it had taught her nothing when it came tomon sense and other well-known things among cultivators.


    One clear example of this would be how she had just been eating the spiritual fruits without trying to refine the energy contained inside of them, thus resulting in most of the benefits of eating the spiritual fruit being wasted¡­


    Although this might not have mattered that much when she was inside the trial space and was consuming the spiritual fruits that would have never been eaten if she hadn''t done it, it was different for the spiritual fruits that came from the Ninth Star Peak, as those spiritual fruits would normally be fully utilized by the other disciples or elders who would otherwise have eaten them.


    Even if his status in the sect was more than enough to still allow Mui to continue eating the spiritual fruits like she had been doing so far without refining the energy inside of them, he also understood that doing so would negatively impact the sect. Not to mention, it would be bad if she ended up encountering a precious spiritual herb in the future and chose to just eat it without using the energy contained inside of it¡­


    Maybe I should see how that deer is doing?


    Knowing that there would not be anything for him to do for at least a few hours now that his disciples were out showing Mui around the sect, Xuan Hao decided to go and check in on the blue deer he had left in the care of Shu Yao before leaving for the capital city.


    Thinking about the blue deer, Xuan Hao also remembered the ruins at the Main Star Peak that he had escaped from thest time he went up there. Given that he had now reached the Dao Domain Lord, he should be strong enough to deal with whatever was hiding inside the ruins. Even if it was an existence in theter stages of the Soul Ascension Realm, he should at the very least be able to escape with his current strength.


    As for the existence he had sensed inside the ruins being above the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ Xuan Hao didn''t think this was possible. After all, if the other party had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm, there would have been no way for him to momentarily resist the attack back then and escape safely¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao used his divine sense to find the blue deer in the process of ying around outside the pavilion Zu Fei had set up close to the edge of the Qi Spring Lake to harvest the water lotus flowers and lilies she had been growing there.


    ¡­


    "You are eating my water lotuses again!? That damnable Shu Yao¡­ Why does she keep leaving you here whenever she decides to do something outside the sect!?" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Arriving at the pavilion Zu Fei had established on the edge of the Qi Spring Lake, Xuan Hao was met with the sight of Zu Fei trying her best to prevent the blue deer from eating the water lotuses that she had recently harvested, something that did not seem to be working, as Zu Fei also tried her best to restrain her strength in an attempt to not idently hurt the blue deer in the process.


    "Elder Xuan!?" Spotting Xuan Hao a few seconds after hended on the ground in front of the pavilion, Zu Fei was at first confused before both her eyes lit up. "Are you here to pick up this one!? If so, please help me or I will lose this month''s entire harvest of water lotuses!"


    "No problem."


    Whoosh~


    Waving his hand, Xuan Hao used his domain to stop the blue deer from eating any more of the water lotuses-


    "Hm? This is¡­"


    However, in doing so, he discovered that the strength of the blue deer had already reached Nascent Soul Realm. Making it obvious why Zu Fei had not been able easily restrain it with her strength.


    Is it perhaps because of the water lotuses that it was able to break through and reach the Nascent Soul Realm?


    Turning his attention towards the water lotuses that Zu Fei had rushed over to get the moment he used his domain to restrain the blue deer, Xuan Hao did not find anything unusual about the water lotuses that would help the blue deer reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Although the water lotuses were spiritual herbs that were beneficial when consumed and when used by alchemists to refine different pills and potions, it did not have any special effect when it came to helping someone reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Thank you for the help Elder Xuan, I don''t know what I would have done without your help now that the little deer reached the Nascent Soul Realm¡­"


    "Hm? It only just reached the Nascent Soul Realm?"


    "Yes! If I''m not wrong, it broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm a day or two ago. Making it far harder to stop it from eating the water lotuses without injuring it in the process¡­ By the way, did you juste for the little deer, or did youe for something different?"


    "Yeah, I just came to check up on the little one, though I never expected to find it stealing your water lotuses¡­"


    "Hehe¡­ Indeed, I never expected it either¡­"


    As the two both turned to look towards the blue deer that was trying its best to break free from the restraints that had been formed around it by Xuan Hao''s domain without even noticing the person that had restrained it, Xuan Hao decided to let it go after the Zu Fei finished putting away all the water lotuses.


    Thump!


    Landing on the ground freed from the restrains created by Xuan Hao''s domain, the blue deer first rushed towards where the water lotuses had been¡­ But soon froze on the spot after noticing that they were gone.


    "It''s been a while little one, I see that you have grown quitefortable in the sect during your time with Shu Yao?" Walking up to the blue deer as he said this, Xuan Hao watched as it suddenly came back to life and turned around to look at him with a wronged expression on its face. Clearly having figured out who it was that had stopped it just now.


    This little one¡­ Looks like I will have to ask Shu Yao to start teaching it not to steal spiritual herbs from others!


    Rolling his eyes upon seeing the reaction of the blue deer, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards Zu Fei who was also looking at the little deer ying innocent, he noticed that the blue deer was not the only one that had be stronger during his time away from the sect, Zu Fei had also be stronger.


    Not only had she managed to go all the way to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Officially reaching the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, but after careful inspection, he could also sense that the initial shape of a pseudo domain had already been created by her. At this point in time, she was only a single step away from constructing a pseudo domain that would put her only a single step away from the Domain Lord Realm!

 Chapter 857 The Mysterious Young Man At The Sea Of A Thousand Furnaces

    No wonder I didn''t see her around Feng Chen earlier, it looks like she has been focusing all her attention towards increasing her own strengthtely. Maybe she feels that her current strength iscking whenpared to Shu Yao and Feng Chen?


    Thinking this to himself after seeing how much Zu Fei had improved in such a short period of time, Xuan Hao could not help wondering how talented Zu Fei was. After all, to go from the Fifth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm was not easy. Not to mention, she was already close to establishing her own pseudo domain and would soon be starting to prepare herself for breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm!


    No matter what it was, it was a good thing for the sect if Zu Fei could break through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    As for Feng Chen, who would once again have to deal with Zu Fei after she reached the Domain Lord Realm? That was a worthy sacrifice for the sect to have one more Domain Lord Realm Expert¡­


    "Hm?"


    Turning his attention back towards the blue deer that was still looking up at him with a wronged expression on its face, Xuan Hao could not help noticing that the scales on the body of the blue deer had grown more pronounced than before. Even the antlers on top of its head that had almost not been visible before had grown.


    "Why do I get a feeling that you are not a deer that just so happens to be blue¡­" Muttering this to himself as he inspected the different changes of the blue deer, Xuan Hao felt even more certain than before that the blue deer was not just a deer that happened to mutate in a certain way, but instead apletely different animal.


    "Elder Xuan? Is there something- D-did I injure it earlier¡­?" Seeing Xuan Hao suddenly focus all his attention on the blue deer, Zu Fei could not help asking this with a nervous expression on her face. Worried that she might have identally ended up injuring the blue deer earlier.


    "No, it didn''t get injured, I was just taken aback by how much it changedpared to thest time I saw it."


    "Haaa¡­ That is great! Shu Yao would have killed me if she found out I injured the little one. If you don''t have anything you need from me, I will go back to what I was doing before." Letting out a sigh of relief after hearing what Xuan Hao said, Zu Fei turned around before making her way back inside the pavilion together with the interspatial ring where she stored the water lotuses.


    Looks like she is going back to cultivating, I really hope she will keep up this good attitude and focus her attention on cultivating even after reaching the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Seeing Zu Fei disappearing inside the pavilion, Xuan Hao shook his head before turning around to look back towards the blue deer.


    At first, he only wanted toe and check up on the blue deer and how it was doing, but now that he had discovered the changes that it had gone through over the past few months under the care of Shu Yao, he felt curious about what kind of race it belonged to.


    Even if it could be something on the moremon side like a scaled demon beast, a part of him still had a feeling that it should be something more amazing than that. Especially when considering that it had both scales and a pair of antlers. Making it more than possible that its race contained some sort of ancient dragon bloodline that had been diluted over the generations!


    Ha¡­ No matter what it is, there is no way for me to figure any of this out now¡­


    Shaking his head as he turned to the blue deer that was staring towards the pavilion Zu Fei had disappeared inside in a state of confusion, Xuan Hao felt a bit taken aback over just how obsessed the blue deer was with the water lotuses.


    Did they perhaps have some sort of beneficial effect for its hidden bloodline that had yet to show itself? Or maybe it was like Mui and just really liked the taste of the water lotuses-


    Swish-!


    Not knowing anything about what was going through Xuan Hao''s head, the blue deer suddenly woke up from its state of confusion and soon disappeared behind a nearby building. Not wasting a second longer at the side of the Qi Spring Lake after discovering that there weren''t any water lotuses for it to eat. Leaving Xuan Hao alone in front of the pavilion.


    Did I just get left behind by that deer¡­? Whatever, I will just let Shu Yao continue taking care of it in the future. At least it seems like the two of them have been getting along quite well during the past few months, so it shouldn''t be a problem.


    Swoosh~


    Leaving the pavilion, Xuan Hao made his way back towards his pce to wait for his disciples to return. Even if there was something else, he could do, like continue his exploration of the ruins at the Main Star Peak, they were all things that would at least take a few days or longer toplete.


    ¡­


    "This is the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces?!" As Mui arrived at the entrance to the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces, she realized that it was nothing like what she had expected. Instead of arge building for the cksmiths to work in, the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces was, as its name stated, a sea of a thousand furnaces!


    Observing this vastwork of thousands of different forges, each with its own team of disciples, materials, and techniques. In rare cases, there were also some of the forges that only had a single person standing beside it¡­ But Mui quickly realized that the people at these forges were all elders who had a forge of their own. Out of all of them, the number disciples who had their own forge could be counted on a single hand.


    Despite the difference between all the different forges, all of them shared amon purpose ¨C the creation of powerful artifacts!


    Understanding this, Mui could not help feeling a sense of excitement as she watched the different cksmiths at work.


    Cling~ Cling~ Cling~


    Each swing of a hammer, each twist of the metal, everything seemed to be imbued with a kind of mystical energy, as if the cksmiths were channeling the very essence of the earth into their work.


    Before long, Mui managed to see all kinds of weapons taking shape. From swords with des that glowed with a powerful me to spears that crackled with lighting, Mui felt like the stories she had been told about cksmiths and their powerful artifacts had been understated!


    "Why is she so amazed by a few pieces of scrap metal made by those disciples in the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­?"


    At the same time Mui was looking around at the different artifacts that were taking shape all around her, Chu Yang who was walking behind her could not help grumbling to himself as he watched the awe on the little girl''s face.


    "Oh~? Are you perhaps jealous that you couldn''t make a good impression during your first meeting with your new junior sister and is currently losing to a bunch of low-level artifacts~?"


    "O-of course not!" Hearing Qing Yi suddenly calling out to him in a teasing voice while giving him a knowing smile, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit embarrassed as he responded.


    No matter what, there was no way he would ever admit that he had indeed felt a little jealous after seeing how his new junior sister had responded with awe and amazement upon seeing the different artifacts! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Hm~ I see~ So that is how it is~" Chuckling to herself as she saw the embarrassed expression on her junior brother''s face, Qing Yi decided not to tease him anymore as she turned her attention towards the core of the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces.


    Barely visible among the hundreds of busy forges in the core area of the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces, the lone figure of a handsome young man could be seen surrounded by a group of disciples that were watching his every move.


    Cling~ Cling~ Cling~


    His muscr arms flexing as he worked the glowing metal with precise, practiced movements. Sweat glistened on his forehead, but he paid it no heed as he poured his soul into the artifact that was slowly taking shape in front of him.


    With each hammer blow, he imbued the artifact with power through some mystical cksmithing technique until it started giving off a terrifying aura that spread out enough for even Mui who was standing close to the entrance to sense it.


    "Hm?" Feeling a chill run down her spine after sensing the terrifying aura of the artifact, Mui could not help turning in the direction of the young man with a curious expression on her face.

 Chapter 858 Mui And Bai Ning’s Blossoming Friendship

    "Who is that?" Seeing the young man who was surrounded by a group of disciples looking at him filled with admiration, Mui turned towards Qing Yi who was standing beside her before asking this. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "That is your second senior brother, Bai Ning."


    "My second senior brother!?" Hearing that the young man crafting some sort of powerful artifact was her second senior brother, Mui could not wait to meet him and find out what kind of artifact he was in the process of making. Maybe she would even get a chance to find out how artifacts like that were created, something she had just be even more interested in after seeing the precise and beautiful process of her second senior brother crafting.


    "Let''s get going, he should just have finished with the artifact he was in the process of crafting and if we wait for too long, he will start making another artifact¡­ And we won''t have a chance to talk with him in the next few hours¡­" Muttering this just barely loud enough for Qing Yi and Mui to hear, Chu Yang didn''t stand around admiring the artifact Bai Ning was craft. Instead starting to make his way towards the forge that Bai Ning was crafting at.


    Knowing that if they ended up wasting too much time on this, Bai Ning would start crafting a new artifact and from prior experience, he understood all too well that it would be impossible for them to talk to him before said artifact had finished.


    Maybe the only person that could make him pause while he was in the process of crafting was master¡­ But understanding his master, Chu Yang understood that there was a bigger chance of Bai Ning stopping his crafting process after seeing them, than his master showing up to help them get Bai Ning to do it¡­


    From what he knew about his master, he would not really care about their trip around the sect taking a day or two longer. At most he would be checking up on them from time to time.


    "Okay- Ah! Wait up!" Seeing that Chu Yang had already started to make his way deeper inside the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces without waiting for her and Qing Yi, Mui quickly rushed after him. Not showing any signs of being afraid of him any longer.


    Not long after, the group of three arrived in front of Bai Ning who had already begun finding new spiritual metals and other materials for a new artifact. Not giving the artifact, he had just crafted more than a single look before throwing it into a pile of artifacts located at the corner of the forge.


    "Hah¡­ Still not there¡­ Looks like its far harder than I expected to craft an artifact above that level. Maybe if I ask master- Hm? Senior sister, senior brother?" Just about to start crafting a new artifact, Bai Ning realized that his senior brother and sister had suddenly appeared in front of him.


    "Indeed, we are here to introduce our new junior sister to you, I take that you already know about it from when I informed you earlier. Right?"


    "Ah? New junior sister?" Hearing what Qing Yi said, Bai Ning froze for a second before turning to look down towards the young girl that was standing beside Chu Yang looking up at him filled with curiosity, while also looking around his forge from time to time. Focusing most of her attention on the pile of artifacts in the corner of the forge.


    "Hm? Are you perhaps interested in cksmithing? If so, I would be more than happy to help you get started on creating your first artifact!" Realizing in an instant that Mui was interested in cksmithing from the way she was constantly looking around the forge. Especially how she focused her attention on the artifacts he had crafted, Bai Ning''s eyes started shinning as he said this.


    Although he had been happy after learning that he would get a new junior sister and wouldn''t be the youngest disciple any longer, he did not care too much about¡­ But now that said junior sister was interested in cksmithing, it was apletely different thing!


    If he could teach this junior sister cksmithing and she grew up to be a skilled cksmith, he would have one more person to talk about cksmithing with. After all, at his current skill level, there weren''t really any disciples in the sect that couldpare to him. Not to mention, he had started surpassing most of the elders in the sect when it came to cksmithing. Making it harder and harder for him to find someone to discuss cksmithing with whenever his master was not around.


    "Really!? You will teach me how to make artifacts!?" Not understanding what was going through the head of Bai Ning, Mui could not help opening her mouth in surprise as she said this. Not having expected that her second senior brother would be willing to teach her cksmithing.


    "Yes! I will be more than happy to do that."


    "Wow¡­ Thank you! I will make sure to make a lot of awesome and powerful artifacts for senior brother in the future!"


    "Haha! I believe that you will!"


    As Bai Ning and Mui both started talking excitedly about cksmithing, Qing Yi and Chu Yang were left on the side as Mui made her way inside the forge where Bai Ning started showing her around while also introducing the different spiritual metals and other materials, he had just gathered for the next artifact he was nning to craft.


    Seeing just how happy Mui was to learn about cksmithing, Chu Yang who had been about to inform her and Bai Ning about moving on to the next location inside the sect, could not help stopping himself as he turned towards Qing Yi standing beside him. "Should we let her y around with Bai Ning for a bit and try her hand on cksmithing?"


    "Yeah, that sounds fine. Especially with how interested in cksmithing and artifacts she is¡­ Hm¡­ But¡­ I think this will take some time, should we go see master while waiting for them to finish?" Nodding her head in agreement before saying this, Qing Yi also didn''t want to stop them.


    "Sure, I will inform Bai Ning about it and have him return to the pce with Mui when they are done."


    As Qing Yi and Chu Yang came to an agreement to let Mui stay with Bai Ning and try her hand at cksmithing, Qing Yi went over and informed Bai Ning about it before they left the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces in the direction of their master''s pce. Leaving Mui in the care of Bai Ning, who was more than happy to help his new junior sister learn cksmithing.


    ¡­


    "Hm? I didn''t expect that girl would be so interested in cksmithing¡­ Oh well, this will also give me some time together with Qing Yi and Chu Yang before I start teaching her the basics about cultivation and cultivators.


    As for visiting the rest of the important locations in the sect like the Grand Library and the Grand Mission Pavilion, I will leave that for Qing Yi to do tomorrow." Having observed the interaction between his four disciples, Xuan Hao quietly muttered this to himself before retracting his divine sense while waiting for Qing Yi and Chu Yang to show up.


    Given that the two of them had reached the Nascent Soul Realm and he had already decided to send them into the mystical realm with an entrance at his old pavilion in the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao wanted to give them a few things to protect themselves inside the mystic realm in case they encountered something that they could not deal with.


    Other than this, he also nned to teach them the divine sense technique from the Divine Will Scripture, as it would be incredibly useful for them and would help them rapidly improve the strength of their nascent soul and in turn help make their cultivation speed faster!


    Is there anything else- Ah! I also need to teach Qing Yi about some of the things I managed to learn from the Great Poison Scripture, but that can wait forter. For now, the most important thing is to help them prepare for the mystic realm.


    Remembering the Great Poison Scripture that should have belonged to an Alchemist that had surpassed the Master Alchemist Realm, Xuan Hao reminded himself that he needed to set aside some time to teach Qing Yi some of the things that he had managed to learn from it in the future.


    Outside of this, I will also need to test theirbat techniques and see how much they improved over the past months and see if there is any way that I can help improve-


    ""Master!""


    Just as Xuan Hao was lost in thought trying to think up what he needed to go over Qing Yi and Chu Yang before sending them into the mystic realm. The two people in question appeared at the entrance to the pce.

 Chapter 859 Reunited

    Seeing his two disciples who had just called out to hime running towards him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of happiness that he had not felt before. Maybe it was due to him missing his disciples during the time he had been gone from the sect or maybe it was due to somethingpletely different. No matter what it was, it made him want to dy sending them into the mystic realm for a few days.


    Considering that he didn''t have anything pressing to take care of at the moment, this also seemed like a good idea. Not only could he spend some more time with his disciples this way, but he would also be able to better prepare them for entering the mystic realm!


    "Master, can we go to the practice area!? I really need to show you how far my spear techniques have made it during the time you were in the capital city of the Sky Empire!"


    "No! Master just returned today. Having him join you for practice when it''s already thiste is a little too much. Not to mention, master still needs to take care of junior sister Mui when she returns from the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces together with junior brother Bai Ning!"


    "Ah¡­ I forgot about that¡­"


    "Hehe, that is a given considering that fighting and improving your spear techniques are the only thing on your mind~!"


    "No, it''s not! I also do other things, like¡­ Like¡­ Eh¡­"


    "Hm? Did You say something~?"


    "You-!"


    "Calm down both of you, I have more than enough time to teach Mui when she returns and see how much both of you improved over the past two or so months that I was not here." Listening to his two disciples as they started arguing with each other the moment they stopped in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help smiling fondly at the interaction between the two before he said this.


    Realizing that they were in the presence of their master, Qing Yi and Chu Yang both froze on the spot for a short moment before silently nodding their heads. Understanding very well that they had acted a bit too childish in front of their master just now.


    "Now that both of you have calmed down, do any of you have anything you want to ask me?"


    "Yes! Master, I want to know about your journey! From what I learnt when asking to Grand Elder Shu Yao about the Sky Empire, even someone in the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm won''t be able to guarantee their safety when travelling from the border region to the core region of the Sky Empire and even Domain Lord Realm Experts can lose their lives within some of the more dangerous areas located inside the core region of the Sky Empire!" Not wasting a second after hearing what his master said, Chu Yang excitedly jumped forward at the opportunity to learn more about the different powerful experts and demon beasts that he might have a chance at fighting in the future.


    "About my journey to the capital city?"


    "Yes! I''m sure Qing- Senior sister also wants to know about it! Right?"


    "Yes¡­!" Nodding her head with a curious expression on her face as she said, Qing Yi did not hesitate in agreeing with Bai Ning. Making it clear to Xuan Hao that both of his disciples wanted to learn about what he had been through. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Hm¡­ Let''s see¡­ The first interesting encounter I had on my way to the capital was at a ce called the Thousand Wind Mountains¡­" Feeling the curious and excited stares of his two disciples, Xuan Hao did not waste any time before starting to retell some of the encounters with powerful experts or demon beasts he had during his journey to the capital city. Limiting it to things that would not cause him any trouble if his disciples talked about it with the rest of the elders and disciples from the sect.


    Of course, there was no way Qing Yi and Chu Yang would know that their master was only talking about some of the weaker demon beast and experts within the Domain Lord Realm that he had encountered. Not the more powerful experts in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    In the end, the only Soul Ascension Realm Expert outside of those involved in the scuffle inside the capital city, was therge worm like demonic beast that he had seen on his way back. However, this alone was more than enough to make both his disciples shiver at the thought of encountering such a powerful demonic beast themselves.


    "Master, is there a chance of such a powerful demonic beast hiding beneath our sect¡­?" Being the first to recover from the shock of realizing that such a powerful andrge demonic beast existed, Chu Yang could not stop himself from asking this. After all, who knew. Maybe there was a simr demonic beast hiding beneath the Shattered Star Peaks!


    At the side, Qing Yi could not help nervously looking towards her master after hearing what Chu Yang said, she also wanted to know if such a powerful andrge demonic beast might be lurking beneath them!


    "Pft- Haha! You two sure do have an active imagination! Did you forget just howrge the mountain range with the worm like demonic creature was? Not to mention the countless holes located all over the mountain range that were created whenever the worm surfaced!" Not able to stop himself fromughing after seeing the nervous way his two disciples were looking at him, Xuan Hao reassured them that there wasn''t anyrge demonic creature lurking beneath the Shattered Star Peak.


    Even if there was, Xuan Hao was confident that the formation would have been able to detect them!


    As for the Main Star Peak and if there were any powerful demonic beasts up there¡­ Well, Chu Yang technically only asked whether there was any powerful demonic beast beneath the Shattered Star Peaks. Not above ground¡­


    ""¡­""


    Seeing the way that their master responded, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both felt a sense of embarrassment after realizing just how weird it would be for such a powerful demonic beast to be lurking beneath the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Not to mention the fact that demonic beasts that powerful would be incredibly rare and hard to find, it would also need to stay hidden without being noticed during the time that the few years that the Star Shattering Sect had been established at the Seventh Star Peak.


    Even if it had managed to do all of this, it would also have needed to stay hidden during the past thousands of years that the Shattered Star Peaks had regrly been visited by desperate cultivators trying to reach the Nascent Soul Realm or weaker cultivators looking for spiritual herbs in the forest that had been present on the Ninth Star Peak before it was turned into a spiritual herb garden for the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    All these things put together made it close to impossible for a powerful demon beast to have been lurking beneath the Shattered Star Peaks.


    "Are you two still thinking about the possibility of there being a powerful demonic beast hidden beneath the Shattered Star Peaks?"


    "No, I just thought about master''s amazing journey and the many powerful experts present in the Sky Empire''s capital city!"


    "Yes, me too!"


    Seeing how the two tried their best to pretend that they were not thinking about the giant worm demon beast, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling to himself.


    "Now then, we don''t have a lot of time before Bai Ning and Mui return, so how about you tell me what you two have been up to during the past two months'' time? From what I can see, both of you have improved by quite a bit. Especially you Qing Yi, sessfully breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm!" Following these words, it did not take long before Qing Yi and Chu Yang started talking about what happened during his absence from the sect.


    From how Chu Yang had spent almost all his time challenging the different Nascent Soul Realm elders to the fact that Feng Chen had killed a demonic cultivator in the Third Demonic Transformation Realm in front of a group of people from the imperial family, Xuan Hao managed to learn about everything that had taken ce during the time he had been away from the sect. Even learning about Shu Yao taking out his pet to intimidate some of the kingdoms that started causing problems for Elder Song and his ns of expanding the sect.


    Out of everything his disciples told him about, the most troublesome thing that happened, was Feng Chen killed a demonic cultivator that had reached the Third Stage of the Demonic Transformation Realm in front of a group of people from the imperial family and Shu Yaoter showing up to help them out with the flood of demonic cultivatorsing from the Frozen Wastnd.


    Along with the fact that he had already met this group of soldiers from the imperial family, it did not take a genius to figure out that the imperial family would learn about the Star Shattering Sect and the fact that they had at least three Domain Lord Realm Experts. One even having the ability to kill a demonic cultivator in the Third Stage of the Demonic Transformation Realm!


    The only positive was that the imperial family would be far too busy dealing with the increasingly dangerous situation in the capital city to contact them. Especially considering that the Star Shattering Sect was not located in the core of the Sky Empire, but the border. Making it hard to reach even for a Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    As for the imperial family mobilizing a Soul Ascension Realm Expert¡­ Xuan Hao doubted that the three religions would allow this!


    For now, it looked like things were still fine and the Star Shattering Sect could remain uninvolved in the things happening in the capital city¡­ But¡­ Xuan Hao doubted that this couldst when the conflict between the imperial family and three religions grew more intense.

 Chapter 860 Possible Dangers Of A Mystic Realm

    "Qing Yi, Chu Yang. Now that both of you have reached the Nascent Soul Realm, I intend to let both of you enter a mystic realm to gain more experience. The mystic realm in question is located beneath my old pavilion in the Flying Sword Sect and both of you should already be familiar with what I''m talking about."


    Turning his attention back towards his two disciples before saying this, Xuan Hao found it hard to keep a straight face after seeing the happiness stered all across Chu Yang''s face. Even without him saying anything, it was obvious just how excited he was at the prospect of exploring a mystic realm and challenge the different demon beast or other creatures that might be lurking inside.


    As for Qing Yi¡­ Although she didn''t show it outwardly, he could still tell that she was curious about the mystic realm that he had mentioned. Not the slightest bit surprising considering that a mystic realm was something even more mysterious and harder to find than a secret realm. Something that could be considered a given with a secret realm being created by cultivators, while a mystic realm was something that had been naturally created by the world itself.


    "Master, how strong are the demon beast inside the mystic realm? Are they in the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm- or even stronger!?" As expected, the first among his two disciples to step forward and ask about the mystic realm was Chu Yang.


    "Hehe, already getting excited? Don''t worry, the strength of the demon beasts inside the mystic realm will be from the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm and all the way to the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ But you must remember, a mystic realm is a dangerous ce that can even threaten the life of someone in the Domain Lord Realm!" Chuckling to himself at first before saying this, Xuan Hao did not forget to also warn his disciples about the danger of entering a mystic realm.


    Even if both of them had reached the Nascent Soul Realm and could be considered more than capable of dealing with a Nascent Soul Realm Expert in the Middle Stages of the Nascent Soul Realm by working together, they were far from strong enough to be considered invincible in the Nascent Soul Realm, let alone capable of fighting someone that had reached the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Not to mention the demon beasts that exist inside the mystic realm, there are also many other dangers, like remnants of old civilizations that might have once inhabited said mystic realm, natural killing formations, ces where the space is unstable and might copse and much more." Noticing that both of his disciples were looking towards him with surprised expressions on their faces, Xuan Hao decided to seize the moment to exin the many dangers that could be found inside a mystic realm.


    Of course, the things that he had mentioned were not from his own experience, as he had never been inside a mystic realm personally, but instead from bits and pieces of information that he had managed to gather about mystic realms through different texts and ancient records he had read through. Among which, the most useful sources of information, was an ancient record of exploring a mystic realm, left inside the Flying Sword Sect- Now the Star Shattering Sect, by the mysterious founder of the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Remnants of old civilizations¡­ Natural killing formations¡­ Mystic realms are indeed dangerous, but in remnants of past civilizations, relics and powerful artifacts can be found, while natural formations often have precious spiritual herbs hiding inside them! Hah¡­ Entering a mystic realm is filled with both danger and opportunities¡­" Muttering this to herself after hearing her master exin just how dangerous a mystic realm was, Qing Yi''s eyes shone with anticipation. Making it clear how excited she was about entering a mystic realm.


    Not feeling too worried about the danger that might be lurking inside. After all, there was no way that their master would be sending them into a mystic realm filled to the brim with Domain Lord Realm demon beasts everywhere. At most there should be one or two demon beasts like that at the core of the mystic realm.


    In a sense, Qing Yi was correct. The mystic realm had a limit of the Nascent Soul Realm and the few demon beasts that Chu Yang and Bai Ning had encountered when they had identally entered the mystic realm had been far below that of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not only that, but the fact that they had managed to enter the mystic realm and leave without any problem made it rtively safe to explore, as they would always be able to leave the mystic realm in case it got too dangerous. This was also the one of the reasons why Xuan Hao felt confident in letting Qing Yi and Chu Yang enter the mystic realm.


    "Master, when are we going to enter the mystic realm?" Suddenly realizing that her master had not mentioned when they were going to enter the mystic realm, Qing Yi could not help asking. After all, she had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm not too long ago and still wanted to further solidify her foundation and get more familiar with her new strength.


    "Don''t worry, I know you just broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm and still need some time to adjust and nned for you to enter the mystic realm in half a month''s time." Understanding what Qing Yi was worried about, Xuan Hao quickly reassured her that she would have more than enough time to get familiar with her strength before entering the mystic realm. Especially considering that he would be around to help her out after he was done teaching Mui the basics.


    "Do any of you have any more questions regarding the mystic realm? If not, I think it''s about time for your junior sister and brother to show up-"


    "Ah! I have a question master! How long are we going to stay in the mystic realm? Is it only for a few days or longer?" Energetically jumping up as he said this, Chu Yang almost ended up hitting Qing Yi who was standing beside him-


    "¡­"


    Earning re from the person in question that had just narrowly avoided getting hit.


    "Hm¡­ Honestly, I don''t have any ns for how long you are going to stay inside the mystic realm and nned to just let you decide on your own how long you wanted to stay. Be it a day or a month, it is up to you two to decide¡­" Answering Chu Yang''s question, Xuan Hao turned towards the entrance of the pce where two figures had just appeared. "And looks like your two juniors are here, I will be teaching you two in a few days to prepare you for the mystic realm after teaching Mui the basics."


    ""Yes, master!""


    Realizing that Bai Ning and Mui had arrived, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang suddenly stood up straight as they answered in sync, like a pair of perfect disciples obediently listening to their master. None of the excitement and curiosity from earlier was present on their face. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Both of you can return to what you were up to before¡­"


    ""This disciple will take his/her leave!""


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Not able to stop himself from rolling his eyes after seeing the disy put on by Qing Yi and Chu Yang to show off in front of their new junior sister before they left through the shiest movement technique they had learnt, Xuan Hao decided to ignore them as he instead turned his attention towards Bai Ning and Mui who was making their way over towards him.


    On one side, Mui was beaming with happiness, as she carried what looked like a piece of scrap metal in the shape of a sword? Mace? Axe? Honestly, he couldn''t really tell what it was.


    As for Bai Ning¡­


    "Hm? Did something happen¡­?" Looking at Bai Ning who was walking beside Mui, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit worried after noticing the empty look in his eyes as if he had experienced some sort of traumatic event.


    "Master! Look! I made a sword together with senior brother Bai Ning!"


    "I see, it''s indeed a¡­ Unique sword¡­" Not giving him any time to try and figure out what had happened to Bai Ning, Mui proudly walked up in front of him before showing off the piece of scrap metal that was apparently a sword of some sort.


    "Yes! I couldn''t have made it without the help of senior brother Bai Ning! He is reeeeeeally amazing at making artifacts!" Beaming with joy as she said this while showing off the piece of scrap metal, Xuan Hao noticed the expression on Bai Ning''s face getting even worse after Mui mentioned how she and Bai Ning had made the scrap met- unique sword together.


    Ah¡­ So that is why his expression is so bad¡­


    Not taking long to understand why his third disciple''s expression was so bad after seeing this, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling to himself.

 Chapter 861 Major Sects Meeting

    Even without Bai Ning saying anything, it was obvious that he felt ashamed after being named as one of the creators of the¡­ Unique sword, that Mui was proudly showing off.


    But at the same time, it also made him curious as to just what could have happened to produce such a unique sword in the first ce.


    Even if Mui did not have any experience when it came to cksmithing and essentially had no idea how to do anything, Bai Ning was incredibly skilled when it came to cksmithing, even surpassing arge number of the cksmithing elders in sect. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    For this reason, it should have been easy for him to help Mui in producing some lower grade artifact, and if not, at least some normal weapons. No matter what, he should have been able to prevent the unique sword currently in Mui''s hand from appearing¡­


    "¡­" Knowing this, Xuan Hao could not help looking curiously towards Bai Ning standing a few meters behind Mui. Looking like he was about to jump forward and take the sword in Mui''s hands away by force before destroying it and any evidence that he had ever been part of the process in making it.


    At this point, the only thing stopping him from doing this, was that he didn''t want to take away the prized possession of his new junior sister and damage their rtionship. Especially considering that she was the only one among his master''s disciples other than himself that was genuinely interested in cksmithing!


    Unaware of the internal struggle that Bai Ning was going through as he kept his eyes focused on the sword in Mui''s hands, Xuan Hao signalled for Zhi Ruo, who had arrived at some unknown point during the conversation, toe over.


    "Mui, this is Zhi Ruo, the person in charge of keeping the pce clean and help out with things like bringing snacks or food."


    "Greetings, youngdy Mui."


    "G-greetings!" Hearing how she had suddenly been called a youngdy by Zhi Ruo, Mui stuttered nervously before tightening the grip around the sword.


    Out of everything that had happened over the past day since she had entered the Star Shattering Sect, she had never expected to be addressed as a youngdy. Bringing in the reality of just how much her status had changedpared to a short time ago when she had still been trying her best to survive inside one of the independent city states in the core region of the Sky Empire.


    "Given that it''s already gotten ratherte and both of you should be exhausted, I think now would be a good time to end things for today. Mui, Zhi Ruo will be showing you to your room. From tomorrow, I will begin teaching you the basics of cultivation and the world."


    "Yes, master!" As Bai Ning turned around and left in the direction of the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces after saying this, Mui did not fall behind, as she repeated what he said- "Yes, master!" Before following Zhi Ruo inside the pce. Heading towards the room that she would be sleeping inside of from now on.


    "This is-!"


    Arriving inside her new room, Mui could not help freezing on the spot while staring towards thergefortable bed located inside her room with a dumbstruck expression on her face.


    The reason for this was rather simple, as she had never slept on a bed before. Always having to look for the mostfortable ce on the ground during her time living as a street orphan in a city in the core region of the Sky Empire. Even during the few rare moments that she was lucky and managed to sell a higher-than-normal quality herb for a lot of coins, she had never thought of getting something to sleep on. Although¡­ The main reason for this, was that there was a high chance of it being stolen if she really ended up buying a bed or something to sleep on, something she had seen happen more than once!


    Swish-!


    For this reason, after the shock had worn off, Mui didn''t waste a single second before diving into the fluffy and soft bed. Not taking more than a few seconds before her eyelids started growing heavy and she ended up drifting off into dreand. Leaving Zhi Ruo to take off the pair of shoes she had forgotten to take off before jumping into the bed.


    As for cleaning the dirt that had inevitably ended up in the bed due to this-


    Whoosh~


    Zhi Ruo used a cleaning specialized technique that she had invented to deal with it without waking Mui, who had just fallen asleep, up in the process.


    ¡­


    At the same time Mui had drifted off into dreand with a blissful smile on her face as she was buried in the fluffy and soft bed, arge number of important elders and sect masters belonging to the different major sects inside the Sky Empire had gathered together to talk about the things currently taking ce inside the Sky Empire.


    "That old man Xu Bao is still alive!? How is that possible!? We clearly saw him get engulfed by the power of the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts in a half dead state!"


    "Not only that, but we also stayed around to observe the situation for a good few minutes before things got too dangerous. Even if he had some kind of artifact that would allow him to resist the power of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts, I doubt that it would havested for long. If it really did, a treasure like that would be sure to catch the attention of those two Soul Ascension Realm Experts!"


    "But¡­ The information given by our spies are all saying that Xu Bao returned to his sect alive and well. Even if the chance of him being well might not be true, I doubt our spies would have mistaken someone else as him¡­"


    "Hmph! Even if he returned alive, it''s not something we can do anything about in our current situation. Dealing with the independent sects now that most of our major sect''s resources are focused on fighting off the Hollow Thunder Family will only cause our position in the Sky Empire to worsen even further. All because of the Green Mountain Sect not being capable of controlling their own elders!"


    "Ha!? Do you want to fight it out old man!? This is clearly something that was nned by the noble families to weaken us major sects. Even if Elder Green Wing didn''t do anything, they would just have found another reason to attack us. Not to mention, Elder Green Wing is already dead!" As the conversation moved away from Xu Bao and towards the Green Mountain Sect, the sect master of the Green Mountain Sect instantly got up to defend Elder Green Wing before ming the entire matter of the Hollow Thunder Family and the rest of the noble families.


    Considering that the major sects had always been somewhat against these noble families due to them often shing with each other over different things like control of certain spiritual herb valleys, spirit stone mines or other things. Many of the people present did not feel that it would be odd if the Hollow Thunder Family had indeed made everything up as an excuse to attack them to prevent the imperial family intervening to stop it before it even had a chance to involve the younger generation of the two.


    However, not everyone believed blindly in this and some of them had even personally known Elder Green Wing before his death¡­


    "Hehe! You really think everyone will believe in that? Don''t think we have no idea about this Elder Green Hat of yours!"


    "Who!?" Hearing that he was being called out by someone, the sect master of the Green Mountain Sect could not help turning towards the origin of the voice filled with killing intent. "So, it''s you!"


    Realizing that the person that had called him out was the sect master of another major sect that he had fallen out with a few hundred years ago, the killing intent in the eyes of the sect master of the Green Mountain Sect only increased further as his aura erupted before he directlyunched an attack without holding back.


    "Hehe, what a quick temper¡­ But don''t think I will just stand still!" Not one to fall behind, the other sect master simrly erupted with all his power beforeunching an attack in response-


    "SILENCE!"


    It was just at this moment, as the two attacks were about to collide with each other, that a terrifying aura erupted from the entrance meeting. Instantly reducing the two powerful attacks of the Domain Lord Realm sect masters to nothing.


    ""¡­""


    Everything happened far too fast for the two sect masters to react, as they could only stare towards the origin of the terrifying aura filled with fear after realizing what had happened.


    Even if it had only been for a brief moment, the terrifying aura clearly did not belong to someone in the Domain Lord Realm...!

 Chapter 862 Ancestor Of The Dark Sky Kingdom

    As the figure slowly made his way towards the center of the meeting room, none of the people from the major sects dared to say a single word after realizing just how powerful this neer was. Even if they worked together, they would not be able to make up the difference in power between the Soul Ascension Realm and the Domain Lord Realm without the assistance of a formation that would allow them tobine their strength¡­ But even in that case, there was no chance their opponent would just wait for them to set up such a formation...


    For this reason, the faces of everyone present were filled with fear as they looked towards the unknown person that slowly came to a stop after reaching the center of the meeting room where the experts above the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm belonging to the different kingdoms supporting the major sects were located.


    "What is the ancestor of the Dark Sky Kingdom doing here and howe you are getting involved with the internal matters of the major sects!? Especially now that we have fallen out with the Hollow Thunder Family, do you perhaps think we won''t attack you? Hmph! Don''t think we have no idea about the forbidden technique of yours, we know very well that you haven''t truly reached the Soul Ascension Realm even if your power resembles that of one!" Not intimidated like the different sect masters and elders from the major sects, one of the people standing at the center called out to the person that turned out to be the ancestor of the Dark Sky Kingdom with a clear hostility on his face.


    "So, he is not someone in the Soul Ascension Realm¡­"


    "Haaa¡­ I was just about to have a heart attack!"


    "Me as well, I was just about to leave you all behind."


    At the same time, he had also revealed the fact that the person that had just arrived was not a real Soul Ascension Realm Expert, but instead just seemed like he had reached the Soul Ascension Realm due to some sort of forbidden technique. Making the nervous and afraid elders and sect masters from the different major sects calm down.


    Even if the Ancestor of the Dark Sky Kingdom was one of the most powerful experts in the Sky Empire and had already reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, they also understood that he would stand no chance against them if they worked together. Especially considering that the person who had called out to him just now was a powerful expert that had reached the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Although he had not yet reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and was still some distance away from reaching it, he alone would be more than capable of fighting the ancestor from the Dark Sky Kingdom, let alone if he also had the help of the close to fifty Domain Lord Realm Experts that had gathered for the meeting!


    "Don''t look at me like that, I''m not here for something rted to the Hollow Thunder Family. Instead, I''m here to give you something that might help you when ites to dealing with the Hollow Thunder Family." Sneering as he said this with a disdainful expression on his face, the ancestor from the Dark Sky Kingdom took out a small storage ring before throwing it over to the Domain Lord Realm Expert that had called out to him just a moment ago.


    "Hm? What in the world are you up to?" Narrowing his eyes after catching the interspatial ring that the ancestor of the Dark Sky Kingdom had thrown towards him, the Domain Lord Realm Expert did not waste a single second before using his divine sense to scan through the things inside the interspatial ring. Knowing very well that the answer to this question would likely be answered by the content of the interspatial ring. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "This is-"


    At first, he had thought that the ancestor of the Dark Sky Kingdom might havee to facilitate a reduce in tensions and possible ceasefire between them and the Hollow Thunder Family, with the objects in the interspatial ring being rted to this¡­ But after looking through the interspatial ring with his divine sense, it did not take long for him to realize that this was not the case¡­


    "Information on the Hollow Thunder Family and the rest of the noble families. Not only this, but also information on all the geniuses from therge noble families and their locations to secretive storage locations for spiritual herbs, metals and artifacts that the different noble families gathered over the years!" Muttering this to himself with a look of disbelief on his face, the Domain Lord Realm Expert could not help turning towards the ancestor from the Dark Sky Kingdom standing a few meters away from him.


    "I said that this would be useful to you. Hehe~ Now that my job here is done, I will take my leave, I hope that you and the rest of the people present here will make sure to take good care of the noble families. Of course, limited to the degree that the imperial family won''t have any reason to interfere!"


    "You are one of the three religions spies in the noble families!?" Having already figured out what was happening and what the ancestor from the Dark Sky Kingdom wanted him and the rest of the kingdoms and major sects around him to do, the Domain Lord Realm Expert who was holding on to the interspatial ring could not stop himself from asking this with a look of shock stered all over his face.


    "Hehe~ Who knows? I will be taking my leave now." Not properly answering the question of the Domain Lord Realm Expert, the ancestor from the Dark Sky Kingdom did not bother staying around for any longer after he had delivered the interspatial ring-


    Whoosh~!


    Directly disappearing from the meeting hall using a powerful movement technique that allowed him to teleport a short distance. Disying just how great his mastery over space was whenpared to ordinary Peak Domain Lord Realm Experts.


    Because everyone present had reached the Domain Lord Realm, it also meant that every single one of the people present had managed to overhear what the Domain Lord Realm Expert had muttered to himself after having looked through the content of the interspatial ring.


    Instantly causing an eerie silence to descend upon the entire meeting, as no one present had any idea what to say after the sudden revtion that the ancestor of the Dark Sky Kingdom was one of the three religions spies inside the noble families.


    Even if it was obvious to everyone present that the three religions were trying to use them to cause more chaos in the Sky Empire and make things harder for the imperial family, they also understood that the secretive storage locations of the noble families that had been mentioned were far too tempting to let go of.


    Although none of them, other than the person currently holding the interspatial ring, had any idea just what was inside these secretive storage locations belonging to the different noble families. The secretive storage locations that had been used to store the different noble families'' resources over a period of thousands to tens of thousands of years would not be small.


    Not to mention, the different noble families of the Sky Empire had far more territory filled with precious spiritual herbs or spiritual metal under their controlpared to the major sects and the kingdoms of the Sky Empire. Mainly due to most of them having ancestors that had been a part of the establishment of the Sky Empire and in turn were given resource rich territories as a reward.


    Rustle~


    It was at this moment, as the experts from the different sects and kingdoms were thinking about whether to jump forward and take the bait that the three religions had dangled in front of them, that an old man who looked like he was one step in the grave walked up to the person with the interspatial ring. Attracting the attention of everyone present.


    "Everyone! It''s clear that the three religions want to use us to cause more chaos in the Sky Empire, but¡­ The rewards for doing this are more or less equal in value to the risk posed by doing something like this. No, I would say that the rewards are worth more!


    Don''t forget, the fighting will be limited to the younger generation. Even if we rob the secretive storage locations, I doubt the imperial family will allow the fighting to involve us seniors. Not to mention the secretive storage locations won''t store the most precious artifacts and spiritual herbs of these noble families and should not be enough for the imperial family to allow a full-blown war between us and the noble families!"


    "That¡­ Is indeed true, there is no way that the imperial family will allow a war to take ce in the current state of the Sky Empire, they would fear that one of us turns around and supports the three religions¡­"


    "I vote for us to y along with what the three religions want us to do. Even in the worst-case scenario, we can always me them for being behind and trying to sow discord between the noble families and us."


    "Haha! I''m all for it, I-"


    Following the words of the half dead looking old man, the rest of the Domain Lord Realm Experts present soon followed and before long, everyone present had agreed to raid the secretive storage locations of the noble families and in turn make the situation in the Sky Empire even more chaotic in the process.

 Chapter 863 Escalation, Beginning Of Chaos

    Not long after, news of the noble families being robbed by the major sects and the kingdoms behind them spread across the Sky Empire. Bringing the conflict between the two major powers to apletely different levelpared to before.


    No longer was it something that only involved the Hollow Thunder Family and the noble families under them, but instead something that had ended up affecting all the noble families. Making it hard for the imperial family to keep this matter limited to fights between the younger generations.


    Unable to stop the Domain Lord Realm Experts from the two sides from fighting with each other outside of the capital city, where the noble families had managed to gain the upper hand due to the simple fact that they were stronger than the major sects and the kingdoms behind them, and this was even with some of therger noble families on a simr level as the Hollow Thunder Family deciding not to involve themselves because the imperial familypensated them for part of what they had lost if they didn''t and the simple fact that getting involved in the matter would draw them into the center of the current chaotic situation of the Sky Empire. Not something that any of therge noble families wanted if it could be avoided.


    After all, even if they could get more from getting involved in the conflict, they also understood that a simr risk would be associated with this. Especially since the reason for most of the chaos taking ce in the Sky Empire was due to the influence of the three religions.


    Because of this, although the scale of the conflict had escted after the major sects andrge kingdoms behind them had decided to attack the secretive storage locations of the different noble families, it never escted to the degree that it ended up involving anyone above the Third stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even then, the fact that the Domain Lord Realm Experts between the two major powers had started fighting with each other outside of the capital city, was still more than enough to make the rest of the powers in the Sky Empire start panicking about what might follow and if they would end up getting involved in the power struggle. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The main reason for this, being the fact that most of the Domain Lord Realm Experts in the Sky Empire were in the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm or below. The only reason that the situation was still somewhat under the control of the Sky Empire, was due to the simple reason that none of the Domain Lord Realm Experts on both sides had died as a result of the fighting. At most having been injured and forced to retreat as a result.


    However, this would notst forever and the imperial family understood this very well. Enough that they began sending out some of their own Domain Lord Realm Experts to ensure that none of the Domain Lord Realm Experts fighting ended up dying.


    Of course, doing this also allowed the three religions to cause more trouble now that less Domain Lord Realm Experts were around to keep watch over them.


    Luckily for the imperial family, the three religions could not dedicate their full attention on causing chaos inside the Sky Empire, as they still had to deal with the church of the gue god, which was in the process of fully stabilizing itself inside the core region of the Sky Empire. Even if it was at the border of the core region, it would still provide a perfect entry for the church of the gue god to start spreading across the entire Sky Empire in the future, something that all three religions wanted to avoid.


    In the end, the situation in the Sky Empire was barely be kept at a manageable level for the imperial family due to church of the gue god''s presence.


    Of course, due to this, the imperial family did not have luxury to send one of their Domain Lord Realm Experts over to the Star Shattering Sect after learning about them. Especially when considering that they only knew that the Star Shattering Sect had three Domain Lord Realm Experts of unknown strength, that was in the lower end of the Domain Lord Realm since the Star Shattering Sect was located at the border of the Sky Empire.


    With all of this in mind, their assistance in the current chaotic situation wouldn''t have any tangible benefit that would justify using the limited resources to get apletely unknown sect like the Star Shattering Sect to join them. Outside of preventing the three religions from convincing them to join them, something that was already extremely unlucky considering that the Star Shattering Sect was a sect.


    As for the matter about Feng Chen killing a demonic cultivator that had reached the Third Demonic Transformation Realm¡­ This was considered due to the Domain Lords of the Star Shattering Sect having teamed up to deal with it before it had been finished off in front of them by Feng Chen, who had chased after it to finish it off.


    The general who had personally witnessed the strength of the Star Shattering Sect of course tried to speak up for them, but ended up beingpletely ignored after mentioning that the Star Shattering Sect had a Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert supporting them. Even making the imperial family worried whether his soul had suffered some kind of injury after fighting against the demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnd for over a month straight.


    After all, while the imperial family might be able to believe that a sect with a few Domain Lords in the early stages of the realm could have appeared without their notice, they did not believe that a power with a Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert would be able to appear without their knowledge. Especially considering that the general in front of them had mentioned that the sect in question was native to the Sky Empire and not some power that had migrated over from another empire.


    Not to mention, if the Star Shattering Sect had really migrated over from another empire, the imperial family would have already learnt about this, as a power with an expert at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm would have been known even outside the empire it was based inside of!


    For this reason, the imperial family decided to ignore the Star Shattering Sect and instead focus all their attention towards the three religions and the problems they were causing all across the Sky Empire. Not to mention, the ancestor of the imperial family was worried that more powerful experts belonging to the three religions would show up now that he had revealed part of his strength when fighting off the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts a short time ago.


    Unwilling to even let the rest of the powerful experts from the imperial family leave the capital city due to the possibility of the three religions setting up a trap.


    Although the Sky Empire was more than strong enough to handle the loss of a few Domain Lord Realm Experts, the same could not be said for those that had already reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, as they were far too rare and precious. Not only serving as a good way to project the power of the imperial family, but at the same time also being capable of assisting in fight between Soul Ascension Realm Expert that had just undergone the first or second tribtion.


    ¡­


    "Hmph, looks like the imperial family is far too busy dealing with the three religions and doesn''t care about the fight between us noble families and the major sects, as long as the battle is limited to those in the younger generation and the fighting outside of that doesn''t result in death!"


    "Indeed, I think we should increase our attacks on the major sects and make them pay for stealing from us¡­ But the old master went into secluded cultivation the moment he returned from killing that Elder Green Wing from the Green Mountain Sect and haven''t given any orders on what to do other than keepunching useless attacks towards those major sects and the kingdoms behind them, I really wonder what the old master n is¡­"


    At same time that the weaker experts form the different noble families and the major sects, and their supports were fighting with each other, two powerful elders from the Hollow Thunder Family that had been put in charge of guarding the entrance to the forbidden ground where the old master was staying were chatting with each other. From time to time turning to look back towards the forbidden ground behind them with confusion, wondering just what the old master was nning to do by going into secluded cultivation now of all times.


    Even if they could avoid stronger experts joining the fighting for now, they also understood that this would not always be the case. Especially considering that the three religions would do everything in their power to ensure that the noble families and the major sects began fighting more seriously and with their powerful experts in the middle andter stages of the Domain Lord Realm.

 Chapter 864 Tribulation Clouds Gathering

    ?


    "What is that above the forbidden ground? Clouds...?" Just as the two elders in front of the forbidden ground of the Hollow Thunder Family turned their attention back towards the forbidden ground while curious about what the old master might be up to, one of the two could not help noticing the increasinglyrge and dark clouds that had started to gather in the air above the forbidden ground.


    "That is weird, with the formation in ce around this entire ce, there should be no way for clouds to form above the forbidden ground¡­ Unless¡­"


    "Hm? Do you know something?"


    "Yes, the only way for clouds to form above the forbidden ground where the old master is located, is if the clouds are tribtion clouds, as there is no way for the formation to prevent something like tribtion clouds from entering¡­ But¡­ For a tribtion cloud to be forming above the forbidden ground just after the old master went into secluded cultivation-"


    "Soul Ascension Realm Tribtion!" Not able to stop himself from eximing this out loud as he realized what his friend meant, the elder looked up towards the tribtion cloud above the forbidden ground that was slowly increasing in size and strength with each passing second, as a sense of fear slowly welled up inside of him.


    Breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm was something that was filled with danger, and one could lose one''s life to the terrifying tribtion at any moment. The elder understood this very well and was not the slightest bit happy or filled with joy after realizing what they meant. Instead, the only thing left was fear.


    Fear of what might happen if the old master failed to ovee the tribtion. Leaving the Hollow Thunder Family without the protection of a powerful Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    Even if the Hollow Thunder Family still had other powerful Domain Lord Realm Experts, the second strongest in the Hollow Thunder Family, the Grand Elder, was only at the Peak of the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Far from strong enough to ensure the safety of the Hollow Thunder Family and the territory under their control¡­ And that was not to mention the fact that they were currently at war with the major sects and the kingdoms behind them!


    "Calm down, what would the old master say if he knew what you were thinking? The old master isn''t dead yet. Stop acting like he is! For now, we should seal this ce off and ensure no one can disturb the old master during his breakthrough to the Soul Ascension Realm!" Seeing the fearful expression on the face of his friend and equal, the other elder present could not help rolling his eyes as he said this before taking out a small jade talisman that acted as an ess point to the massive formation enveloping the forbidden ground-


    Fwoosh-!


    Instantly sealing off the entire ce from the outside world so that no one would be able to interfere with the old master''s breakthrough.


    "This- I''m sorry, I have just been a bit too tense as ofte due to what happened over the past few days¡­" Feeling a sense of embarrassment overwhelm him as he realized just how pathetic his behavior just now had been, the elder in question could not help wanting to find a hole to jump into.


    If the old master learnt about how he, a Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert, had acted just now, he was certain that he would be lucky if he got sent to protect one of the mining territories next to one of the dangerous locations outside the capital city¡­


    "No problem, I will open a passage in the formation for you to go through and inform the rest of the family that the activation of the formation is nothing to worry about, as for why it activated¡­ You can just say that the old master is in the process of testing and strengthening the formation to ensure that it''s prepared in case the major sects and the kingdoms behind them decide tounch an attack while he is not around." Knowing that his friend was not in the best state of mind following the old master suddenly beginning his breakthrough to the Soul Ascension Realm, the other elder opened a passage in the formation before allowing his friend to leave the forbidden ground.


    Understanding very well that there was no need for this, as they could just use amunication talisman to do it instead of showing up personally.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the tribtion clouds appeared above the forbidden ground of the Hollow Thunder Family, the old ancestor of the imperial family who was busy looking through a stack of ancient scroll turned in the direction of the Hollow Thunder Family as both his eyes narrowed slightly.


    "Oh? That old man from the Hollow Thunder Family is attempting to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm? How interesting¡­ If he seeds, I will send that brat out to settle the matter with them and the major sects." Muttering this to himself as he watched the formation around the forbidden ground activate in an attempt to conceal the cloud tribtion before anyone had the chance to notice it, the old ancestor turned his attention back towards therge number of ancient scrolls in front of him.


    Hiding something happening inside the capital city from him was impossible with the strength of the Hollow Thunder Family. Not to mention, even after they activated the formation to hide the forbidden ground from view, the old ancestor of the imperial family still had the ability to easily see through the formation with his strength. At most the formation would prevent someone who was in the First or Second Tribtion Realm from peeking inside¡­


    As for preventing the rise of a new Soul Ascension Realm Expert that might turn into a possible enemy? The old ancestor of the imperial family didn''t really care too much about this with his current strength. The only thing that worried him was the possibility of the more powerful experts from the three religions that existed at the true core of the Ewaria Continent.


    Even if his knowledge of how strong the true experts from these religions were, he still understood that they were far stronger than the ones currently present in the Sky Empire, that much he had learnt after two of them had tried to kill him not too long ago¡­


    Hm? Looks like that brat is here because he noticed something. At least he is not that useless of a son¡­


    "Come in." Noticing a familiar presence at the entrance to his room, the old ancestor called out-


    Bang!


    "Father! Did you notice the powerful fluctuation just now!? It felt like someone unfamiliar, and the strength should be in the Soul Ascension Realm!"


    And not a secondter, a middle-aged man with an excited expression unbefitting of his age rushed into the room.


    "Calm down, it was just that old man from the Hollow Thunder Family beginning the first tribtion. Nothing to fuss over. You are the current emperor of the Sky Empire; you should act like it. Not some brat still wet behind the ears." Feeling a sense of displeasure after seeing his son, the current emperor of the Sky Empire, barreling into the room like some child, the old ancestor could not help scolding him while his aura red up for a moment.


    "Sorry father¡­" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Just keep your attitude in mind¡­ Hah¡­ This brat, always so troublesome¡­ If there is nothing more, you can leave." Shaking his head before turning his attention back towards the ancient texts, the old ancestor waved his hand towards the door. Signaling for the emperor to leave now that he had found an answer to the thing he hade for.


    "Father¡­ There is something else I wanted to ask you about¡­" Knowing his father very well, the emperor could not help showing a slightly nervous expression on his face as he said this.


    "¡­ What?" Knowing that whatever his son was about to ask would end up making him angry, the old ancestor tried his best to remain calm as he once again turned away from the ancient texts and looked towards his son.


    "You see¡­ As you know, I n to appoint a sessor to take the role of emperor soon, but I can''t choose which of my children should be the one to take the position after me. My Seventh Daughter? My Seventeenth Son? Or maybe even my Second Son? I really can''t choose one and hope father would be able to help me out."


    "¡­"


    "F-father¡­?" Noticing something was wrong after getting no response from his father, the emperor suddenly felt a chill run down his spine as a killing intent far more terrifying than anything he had ever experienced before engulfed him. Making him truly experience the difference in power between himself and the origin of the killing intent, his father.

 Chapter 865 Tribulation Of Fire

    "You brat¡­ You dare to ask me about this!? Did you forget what I told you back when your first daughter was born?"


    "That I shouldn''t fool around so much¡­"


    "And what did you do? Hmph! It''s your responsibility to handle the infighting between your children. Stoping to me with these kinds of things. If the child you choose is really unfitting to take over the role of emperor, I will make sure that you know about it!"


    Not knowing what else to say upon hearing what his father said, the emperor could not help feeling a sense of exhaustion wash over him after being reminded of his children that were currently in the process of doing their best to show that they were the only one worthy enough to inherit the role of emperor after he abdicated and focused all his attention towards increasing his cultivation realm. Simr to what his father had done back when he had abdicated the throne and handed it over to him.


    The only difference between his father and his own situation, was the fact that his father only had a single child that could inherit his position, while he had close to fifty¡­


    "I will excuse myself¡­" Feeling that it would be bad if he stayed any longer, the emperor turned around and left before his father had another chance to start scolding him.


    Leaving the old ancestor alone once again, as he didn''t waste any time in returning his attention back to the ancient texts. Not showing the slightest bit of care towards the children of the current emperor of the Sky Empire nor the old master of the Hollow Thunder Family that was currently in the process of breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    ¡­


    Not much different from how the emperor of the Sky Empire had noticed the unfamiliar Soul Ascension Realm presence that had appeared for a moment before disappearing again, the Cardinals from the three religions also noticed this.


    The only clear difference was that they had no idea about the fact that the Soul Ascension Realm presence they had just felt did not belong to some unfamiliar Soul Ascension Realm Expert that had entered the capital city.


    Instead, they started to draw their own conclusions as to who the new Soul Ascension Realm Expert that had managed to enter the capital city was. The most likely guess being that it was a friend of the old ancestor, who had been called over to help ensure the stability of the sky Empire and keep them in check.


    Something that they were less than happy about. Especially so when considering that the current chaotic situation in the Sky Empire would inevitably calm down a bit due to the presence of another Soul Ascension Realm Expert on the side of the imperial family.


    Although this would notst for a long time, it would still buy time for the imperial family to try and mend the rtionship between the noble families and the major sect!


    ¡­


    While all the Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the capital city, outside of the old ancestor of the imperial family, were focused on the unfamiliar Soul Ascension Realm presence that had suddenly appeared for a split second before disappearing wondering just who it was-


    FWOOOSH-!


    BOOM-!


    "AHHHH!"


    The person in question was suffering under the first tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, the Tribtion of Fire. Only barely holding on against the sea of fire and lighting that engulfed him and tried to destroy both his body and soul.


    The first tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, the Tribtion of Fire.


    The Tribtion of Fire was known as the easiest tribtion to overe among the seven tribtions of the Immortal Soul Tribtion¡­ But, even if it might not be that difficult to ovee whenpared to the rest of the tribtions and was known as the easiest tribtion, it still had to be known that it was at the same time also considered to be the deadliest due to just how many people ended up dying to it in their attempt to breakthrough to Soul Ascension Realm.


    For everyone who had reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, the Tribtion of Fire was not the easiest tribtion in the Soul Ascension Realm. Instead, it was the most difficult and terrifying tribtion that they had encountered since stepping on to the path of cultivation.


    Even affecting some Peak Domain Lord Realm Experts so much that they end up looking for another path by joining a religion or bing a demonic cultivator to avoid having to go through the Tribtion of Fire!


    The old master of the Hollow Thunder family was not like this, he instead chose to face the Tribtion of Fire head on with everything he had. Pouring out everything he had learnt over his long years as the most powerful person in the Hollow Thunder Family in order to protect himself from the sea of fire and lighting that engulfed him and seeped into his dantian and soul to destroy them.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    The battle between the sea of fire and lighting and the old master of the Hollow Thunder Family seemed to continue for what felt like hours before the tribtion clouds above slowly started fading-


    Swish-! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    BOOOOOM-!


    However, just as thest bit of the tribtion clouds faded, a powerful streak of light descended from above before exploding forth violently with a power that instantly destroyed what little remained of the forbidden ground of the Hollow Thunder Family and the formation in ce to hide it from the outside world while the old master was undergoing his tribtion.


    Instantly attracting the attention of the different Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had all secretly been trying to find the origin of the Soul Ascension Realm presence from earlier-


    "HAHAHAHA, I FINALLY BROKE THROUGH TO THE SOUL ASCENSION REALM!"


    However, at this point in time, the old master of the Hollow Thunder Family had already sessfully managed to pass through the Tribtion of Fire. Officially having stepped into the Soul Ascension Realm!


    ¡­


    Not rted to the current chaotic situation that was taking ce inside and around the capital city of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao opened both of his eyes after a rxing night of sleep, something he had not done in a long time because of the simple fact that there was no need for it at his current cultivation realm. Especially when meditating would bring about the same benefits, while also increasing one''s strength at the same time.


    But then again, Xuan Hao could not help feeling morefortable than he had in a long time. Making him think that it might be a good idea for him to sleep every now and then. Even if it only ended up being a few times a month.


    Whoosh~


    Getting up from his bed afterzing around for a few minutes, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time before making his way out of his room into the somewhat empty space that was in front of the pce, where the small figure of Mui could already be seen patiently waiting for him with a nervous expression on her face.


    "M-master!? Good morning!" Spotting himing over, Mui fumbled over her words in surprise before greeting him.


    "Good morning. Did you sleep well?"


    "Yes! The bed was far softer than anything I''ve ever slept on. Not to mention the fluffy pillows. Everything was perfect!" Excitedly nodding her head as she said this, it was obvious to anyone watching just how happy she was when remembering her soft and fluffy bed.


    "That''s great, it looks like we can begin today''s lesson immediately!"


    "I-immediately¡­?"


    "Yes, don''t worry too much about it, I''m only going to teach you some basic knowledge of cultivation today. Nothingplicated, that will have to wait. For now, let''s sit down over there before we start with something simple. Hm¡­ How about basic etiquette when addressing someone stronger than yourself¡­" Not wasting a single second, Xuan Hao guided Mui towards a small resting spot in front of the pce before he began teaching her the basics of cultivation.


    From the simple etiquette of how to address someone stronger as oneself to the importance of always having a backup n in case something went wrong, Xuan Hao made sure to teach Mui about all the things he deemed important before she could start roaming around the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and explore it by herself in the future¡­ Of course, also adding some of his own things to remember, like the dangers of someone in a spiritual form approaching her while praising her talent and asking for her to be their disciple!


    No matter what, he had to make sure that Mui did not end up getting fooled by some old grandpa or grandma in a magical ring when she left the sect to gain experience in the future. Making it especially clear that contacting him and running away would be the best thing to do if she encountered such a situation.


    "¡­ And with that, we will finish up the lesson for today." The entire teaching session ended upsting for a little over three hours, a rather long period to be sitting still in one spot for a young girl like Mui. Luckily for her, Zhi Ruo was there to provide snacks and tea the entire time. Making all three hours an enjoyable experience for Mui, who had previously never tasted anything as delicious as the snacks and tea Zhi Ruo made.

 Chapter 866 Spirited Sparring Session

    Having finished his first lesson with Mui, Xuan Hao turned towards the young girl as she was busy eating the multitude of different snacks Zhi Ruo had brought out for her to enjoy along with the tea that was still sitting untouched on the side.


    "Mui, is there anything you didn''t understand or want to know more about?"


    "Hm? Not really, I feel like I understood what master said- Ah! If possible, I would like to know where thesee from!" Not paying too much attention to what her master said as she was busy eating a small shortcake, Mui suddenly jumped up after realizing that she had a chance to figure out where the delicious snacks she had been eating came from.


    This girl¡­ Can she only think with her stomach¡­?


    Following a silent sigh escaping his lips while thinking about this, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards Zhi Ruo, who had been quietly standing not too far away during the entire lesson in case Mui would need any new snacks. "Zhi Ruo, can you take care of Mui and show her how to make these snacks?"


    "Yes, master, it would be my pleasure to show her how I made them!" Nodding her head with a far livelier expression than normal, Zhi Ruo happily agreed to take care of Mui and show her how she had made the different snacks that she had eaten during the lesson.


    "Looks like you are lucky, Zhi Ruo here will be taking care of you while I go and check up on my other disciples."


    "Thank you master!" Not wasting any time after thanking him, Mui excitedly ran towards Zhi Ruo before both made their way inside the pce. Heading in the direction of the kitchen that was located a short distance away from the entrance of the pce itself.


    Why does she seem so much more excited about this than she was about my lesson¡­?


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao reminded himself that Mui had been an orphan who had been living on an empty stomach most of the time before bing his disciple. Making it reasonable for her to be so much more excited at the different food and snacks she could now eat without having to worry about anything.


    In time, she would calm down after adjusting to her new life in the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    As this thought passed through his head, Xuan Hao turned around before leaving in the direction of the training ground next to the pce where Chu Yang and Qing Yi were busy training with each other in preparation for the mystic realm that they would soon enter.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was busy teaching Mui, Chu Yang and Qing Yi had decided to engage in a spirited sparring session while waiting for their master to finish teaching their new junior sister.


    "Go big sister Qing and big brother Chu!"


    Not too far away from where they were fighting, Song Jia could be seen sitting with an excited expression on her face as she watched the sparring session between Chu Yang and Qing Yi. Even if she could not see anything since she was blind, she could still sense what was happening to some degree, as it looked like two massive clouds of energy were constantly shing with each other.


    As the two fought with each other, it was obvious for anyone watching the fight that Chu Yang was far stronger whenpared to Qing Yi, as he effortlessly moved his spear to intercept and counter her attacks. Each movement carrying with it the weight of his cultivation base, allowing him to control the flow of the battle without giving Qing Yi any chance tounch a proper attack before being forced back by his spear.


    However, Qing Yi was already aware of the fact that she was weaker than Chu Yang when it came to fighting. Especially considering that she had firsthand witnessed the effort he had put in to increase his strength during the two months that their master had been gone¡­ But even with this, she still decided to do her best to show she was off her swift footwork and nimble maneuvers befitting someone practicing the sword.


    The only problem was¡­ Chu Yang was far faster than her, with his movements also being far more fluid due to continuous practice against the different Nascent Soul Realm Elders of the sect. Even if Qing Yi might have been able to do well against someone normal in the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm with her currentcking Nascent Soul Realm fighting experience, she stood no chance against Chu Yang who had already be strong enough to face off against someone in the Fourth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm-


    Ching~!


    This became obvious as the battle intensified, and Qing Yi was forced to use all her strength to defend against Chu Yang''s spear that constantly came whistling through the air towards her in a seemingly endless stream of attack that gave her no time to breath. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Bang-bang-bang!


    With each sh of metal, small shockwaves were sent rippling through the training ground without damaging anything in the process, symbolizing just how good they were at controlling their strength and making sure none of it went to waste-


    Boom-!


    Well, almost everything, Qing Yi had after all still not managed to fully grasp her Nascent Soul Realm strength. Resulting in some of the energy shockwaves released by her being a little more destructive-


    "Ah!?"


    One even getting close to hitting Song Jia who was observing the fight between the two. Making Qing Yi turn her attention away from the battle and towards controlling her own energy in order to ensure she did not end up idently hitting Song Jia.


    Swish-!


    As Qing Yi momentarily focused her attention away from the battle and towards the destruction that she had ended up causing to part of the training ground when almost hitting Song Jia, Chu Yang made full use of this opportunity to break through her defenses-


    Zhing~!


    Knocking her sword away before stopping just as the tip of his spear hovered only a short distance away from Qing Yi''s neck. Signaling the end of the battle.


    "I give up, you win!" Knowing that she had lost, Qing Yi helplessly put up her hands in defeat.


    Although the fight did feel like it was long, it had onlysted for a little over a minute. Showing just how much stronger Chu Yang waspared to her, something she had somewhat already expected given just how much time Chu Yang had spent training in the Combat Hall over the past two months. Not to mention the fact that he had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm before her and was already at the Peak of the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Only a single step away from reaching the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    "That was a great sparring session! Even if you only just reached the Nascent Soul Realm, your strength has already surpassed that of some elders in the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm that I''ve faced. Given you have time to familiarize yourself with the Nascent Soul Realm and get some more fighting experience, I don''t doubt you will be able to reach my current level¡­ But at that point in time, I would have already be stronger! With that in mind¡­ How about another match before master shows up!?" Smiling happily as he said this, Chu Yang ''s fighting spirited had already been ignited by thest fight, as he wanted to go again.


    "That-"


    "Good to see both of you are so lively even without me around."


    However, before Qing Yi had a time to respond, the familiar voice of their master sounded out from the entrance to the training ground-


    ""Master!""


    Causing both Qing Yi and Chu Yang to turn around with surprised expressions on their faces. Clearly, they had not expected their master to show up so fast. Having thought that the lesson with their new junior sister wouldst for a longer time considering that the first lesson they had with their master hadsted for the entire day.


    "Elder Xuan!"


    Song Jia on the other hand did not show a simr surprised expression and instead just happily bounced towards Xuan Hao before greeting him.


    "It''s good to see you again Song Jia, how have things been going sincest? Is Elder Song back more often now?"


    "Grandpa Song? Hm¡­ Grandpa Song has indeed been back more often to y with me. Although he stillins about some of the elders under him being far toozy¡­" Hearing the question from Xuan Hao, Song Jia tilted her head looking deep in thought for a short moment before answering with a smile on her face. Making it rather obvious how happy she was that Elder Song seemed to have more free time to spent with her now that he at least had some help in managing the sectpared to before¡­

 Chapter 867 Unfamiliar Domain Lord

    "Sounds like Elder Song is finally able to rx some more now that he isn''t the only person in charge of managing the sect¡­" Muttering this to himself as he heard what Song Jia said, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit relieved after hearing that Elder Song had finally started to have some more free time.


    Hm? A new Domain Lord Realm Expert?


    It was just at this moment that Xuan Hao suddenly sensed an unfamiliar Domain Lord Realm Expert making his way through the formation without being stopped before moving towards the Seventh Star Peak. From this alone, it was obvious that the Domain Lord Realm was not someone unfriendly and should have already been allowed to enter the sect by Feng Chen and Elder Song. The most likely scenario being that it was one of the elders that had managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm during his time away from the sect.


    Whoosh~!


    Not wasting any time, Xuan Hao directly used his divine sense to investigate the other party-


    "Not someone from the sect¡­?"


    But was soon surprised to discover that the Domain Lord Realm Expert was not one of the elders of the Star Shattering Sect like he had first expected. Instead, it was someone he had never seen before. Making him feel even more curious as to just what kind of person this was.


    "Qing Yi, Chu Yang, do any of you know about a new Domain Lord Realm Expert in the sect?"


    "A new Domain Lord Realm Expert? No, I don''t think I heard about that."


    "Me neither, I haven''t heard about a new Domain Lord Realm Expert in the sect."


    Asking his two disciples to see if they knew anything, Xuan Hao ended up disappointed, as neither of them had heard anything about this new and unfamiliar Domain Lord Realm Expert that had suddenly appeared. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Looks like I will have to ask Feng Chen and Elder Song about thister-


    "Ah! I know, I know!"


    Just as he was about to give up learning more about this unfamiliar Domain Lord Realm Expert for now, Song Jia who had been quietly standing beside him suddenly jumped up with an excited expression on her face as she said this.


    "You know about this Domain Lord Realm Expert¡­?" Not having expected Song Jia to actually know something about this unfamiliar Domain Lord Realm Expert, Xuan Hao could not help asking again.


    "Yes! I remember that Grandpa Song mentioned how he and the sect master found a powerful expert from one of the kingdoms that is now under our sect''s control and is trying to get him to join the sect!" Nodding her head before saying this, Song Jia beamed happily after noticing the surprised expressions on the face of Chu Yang and Qing Yi, who had not expected for her to know about the things taking ce between the sect master and vice sect master.


    But then again¡­ She was the granddaughter of Elder Song, so the information regarding the internal and external matters of the sect that she had ess to would be far more expansivepared to what they had.


    The main reason for this, was that even if their master was the strongest person in the Shattering Star sect, he did not really participate in the internal matters of the sect¡­ And even if he did, he did not share any of it with them. Deeming it as something that was not important for them to know about.


    "So, it''s a potential new elder for the sect. Looks like Feng Chen and Elder Song have been working hard to increase the strength of the sect during the time I was gone¡­ Thank you for the information."


    Whoosh~!


    Throwing a small interspatial ring filled with a few different things that would be useful for someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm, Xuan Hao did not bother to think any more about the unfamiliar Domain Lord Realm Expert. Instead leaving the matter in the hands of Elder Song and Feng Chen, as they already seemed to have the entire thing under control.


    "This is?" Grabbing the interspatial ring that Xuan Hao had thrown to her, Song Jia could not help tilting her head with a confused expression on her face. Not understanding what the small ring was. Not something odd when considering that she had never held an interspatial ring before in her life and thus had no idea about what it was or how to use it.


    "It''s called an interspatial ring and can be used to store things, I filled it with different things that will be useful for improving your strength in the Foundation Establishment Realm. If you can''t figure out how to use it, you can always ask Elder Song, he should know how to do it."


    "Thank you, Elder Xuan!" Not having expected that the small ring she was now holding was actually something precious, Song Jia froze for a second before happily hugging Xuan Hao as thanks before dashing off in direction of Elder Song''s courtyard located a short distance away. Using a simple movement technique in the process. Excited to get the things inside the ring out and find out what Elder Xuan had given to her.


    So much energy¡­ At least I can begin teaching my disciples now that she left¡­


    Shaking his head with a small smile present on his face as he thought about this, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards his two disciples who were looking in the direction Song Jia had left in with surprise.


    All things considered, this was the first time they had seen the blind young girl run so fast without a single sign of idently running into someone or something. Not to mention, she had even used a movement technique!


    If not for the fact that they knew she was blind, they would have thought it was just something that she had made up. Of course, there was no way for them to know that she was not fully blind and could still sense the aura and presence of the things and people. Allowing her to see a general outline of the world around her.


    Still¡­ The fact that she had been able to use a movement technique without running into someone or something, was still an impressive feat.


    "Now that Song Jia has left, we will begin training both of you in preparation for entering the mystic realm!" Seeing that his two disciples were still looking in the direction that Song Jia had left in, Xuan Hao reminded them why they were here.


    ""Yes, master!""


    Making both of them turn their attention back towards him, filled with anticipation upon hearing him mention the mystic realm that they were going to enter.


    Although neither of them had any idea about what they might find inside the mystic realm, they still looked forward to leaving the sect and to experience the world outside of the territory controlled by their sect. Even if the entrance of the mystic realm was still inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, they also understood that there was a rather big chance that other entrances outside of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory were out there.


    In turn, this presented a chance for them to possibly encounter cultivators from outside not only the Star Shattering Sect''s territory, but even outside the Sky Empire because the Star Shattering Sect was ced on the border of the Sky Empire and from what they had learnt during the short night after leaving their master.


    In that short time, they had looked through all the information on mystic realms that they could get their hands on. Wanting to know more about the possible danger they were going to encounter during their trip, but at the same time also wanting to know more about mystic realms.


    From that, the most important thing they had managed to learn, that their master had not mentioned, was the size of a mystic realm.


    ording to what they had managed to learn, even the smallest mystic realm could easily cover an area the size of the entire Sky Empire, as for therger ones¡­ They had no way to fully grasp just how big these mystic realms were.


    As for the uracy of the information they had gathered¡­ That was highly likely not the best. Especially considering that the information hade from what seemed like a standard adventure book about someone exploring different realms.


    The main reason why both of them had some level of trust in the information of the book was that the descriptions of mystic realms and secret realms were far tooplicated for anyone without actual knowledge on the matter to know about.


    As for why they didn''t mention anything about this to their master¡­ Well¡­ That was because they thought it was something he already knew about¡­


    "Okay, seeing as both of you are ready, let''s begin!" Not aware of the fact that his disciples had stumbled on a book filled with information on mystic realms, Xuan Hao began training his two oldest disciples for the first time in over two months.

 Chapter 868 Guest Elder

    At the same time Xuan Hao scanned the unfamiliar Domain Lord Realm Expert with his divine sense, the person in question felt a chill run down his spine as he felt like some terrifying existence was looking directly at him for a short moment before looking away.


    "W-what was that just now? A powerful ancestor of the Star Shattering Sect?" Mumbling this to himself as he thought about the possible origin of the feeling just now, the man once again understood that the Star Shattering Sect was far more terrifying than he had first imagined when he heard about it after returning from his journey around the continent in order to look for a way to reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if he might have hesitated whether to join the Star Shattering Sect or not, he now felt certain that it would be a good thing to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    All things considered, he very well understood that his talent was nothing special whenpared to other Domain Lord Realm Expert and his strength would at most be able to reach the Peak of the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm without any external help. Maybe he could reach the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm if he got lucky¡­ But with the help of a powerful sect like the Star shattering Sect, his chances of improving and going further on the path of cultivation would increase!


    In the end, this was the reason why he had returned to the Star Shattering Sect after his conversation with Elder Song instead of just returning to his kingdom to gather everything of value before leaving for the core region of the Sky Empire to rebuild his kingdom there-


    "Hm?"


    Coming to an abrupt stop, the Domain Lord suddenly noticed that he had already reached the base of the Seventh Star Peak, causing him to freeze on the spot as he looked up towards the majestic buildings that made up the main sect of the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Looks like I''m getting a bit nervous now that I''m here¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, the Domain Lord took a deep breath before starting to walk up the path leading to the peak of the Seventh Star Peak. Already feeling a sense of excitement welling up inside him at the thought that he was going to be part of such a powerful sect in the future.


    ¡­


    "Elder Song, the ancestor of that caused trouble earlier is here, should I send him in?" Not more than a few minutes after the arrival of the unfamiliar Domain Lord Realm Expert, one of the assistant elders that had been helping Elder Song with the management of the internal matters of the Sect walked over to Elder Song before informing him about his arrival.


    "Hm? The ancestor who caused trouble- Ah! The Domain Lord that showed up out of nowhere and caused problems for one of our branches! What was his name¡­ Wan Linyun? So, he decided to return after our conversation¡­ Hehe, looks like the Star Shattering Sect is going to get another Domain Lord Realm Expert!" Muttering this to himself as a small chuckle escaped his lips, Elder Song nodded his head. Signaling for the assistant elder to send him in.


    Not more than a few secondster, the Domain Lord Realm ancestor from one of the kingdoms that had fallen to the Star Shattering Sect, Wan Linyun, made his way inside the room with a nervous expression on his face.


    Although Elder Song was far weaker than he was and had not even reached the Domain Lord Realm, he still understood just how much power this seemingly ordinary Nascent Soul Realm elder had. Not doubting that if he ended up offending him, his chances of entering the Star Shattering Sect would be reduced to nothing¡­


    "Greetings, Elder Song."


    For this reason, Wan Linyun did his best to be as polite as possible to Elder Song. Not daring to look down on him because he was only in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Good to see you again, have youe to a decision regarding the things we discussedst time?" Nodding his head in appreciation before asking this, Elder Song looked directly at Wan Linyun. Wanting to make sure that his answer was sincere.


    "Yes, I want to join the Star Shattering Sect." Feeling a shiver run down for some unknown reason as he felt Elder Song looking directly at him, Wan Linyun answered the question with a serious expression on his face. Earning a small smile from Elder Song in return. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Great! You can leave for now and one of the assistant elders will help you get sorted out. For now, you will be designated as a guest elder. In the future, you will have the chance to be an official sect elder after you have proven yourself as an elder, but¡­ You should already be aware of this from ourst conversation."


    Having already expected something like this beforeing, Wan Linyun solemnly nodded his head in understanding. All things considered, bing a trusted elder of a sect like the Star shattering Sect, that already had several Domain Lord Realm Experts stronger than himself, would be weird.


    "Indeed, I''m already aware of it and it''s fine with me. After all, it''s not like I expected to just directly be an elder of the sect without doing anything¡­"


    "Haha, it''s great to see that you already understand this. After all, how could we just allow anyone in the Domain Lord Realm to enter the sect without properly making sure they weren''t spies belonging to another power?" Laughing happily before saying this, Elder Song silently let out a sigh of relief inside his head after seeing that Wan Linyun did not react negatively to only being a guest elder.


    To be honest, Elder Song had not expected this from Wan Linyun, he was after all someone in the Domain Lord Realm and would under normal circumstances be capable of bing the core member of any sect or power he wished to join. Even the major sects of the Sky Empire would act like this, let alone the smaller powers in the Sky Empire that at most had a single Domain Lord Realm Expert¡­


    For him to be willing to join the Star Shattering Sect as a guest elder, it was obvious to Elder Song how much he valued the Star Shattering Sect.


    Be it because the qi present inside the Star Shattering Sect had far surpassed that of the outside world or that the Star Shattering Sect already had three Domain Lord Realm Experts and could be considered one of the strongest powers in the Sky Empire. No matter what it was, Elder Song was just happy that the Star Shattering Sect had managed to gain another Domain Lord Realm Expert. Even if the Domain Lord was not an elder that had been lucky enough to break through from the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Elder Song, did you call for me?"


    Just at this moment, the assistant elder that had informed him about the arrival of Wan Linyun just a short time earlier, entered the room with a stack of unfinished documents in hand.


    "Ah, Zeng Wu, this is Wan Linyun, he has just be a guest elder of the sect. The reason I called you here is to help him find a new courtyard where he can stay from now on."


    "Guest elder? Help find a new courtyard?" bing one big question mark after hearing what Elder Song said, Zeng Wu took a few seconds to process what he had just been told before a shocked expression made its way on to his face.


    The Domain Lord Realm Expert actually ended up joining the sect! He didn''t even be a sect elder and has instead be a guest elder!


    Trying his best to remain calm as he processed this information, Zeng Wu could not help feeling more shocked as he realized that a Domain Lord Realm Expert had only be a guest elder. Even more surprising was the fact that the other party had epted the role of guest elder!


    In a sense, as an assistant elder at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, his status in the Star Shattering Sect was currently above that of Wan Linyun, a Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    This alone was more than enough to make Zeng Wu feel a sense of pride from being an elder of the Star Shattering Sect that he had never felt before.


    "Please follow me, I will show you where you will be staying from now on."


    With this rush of pride and happiness that came out of nowhere, Zeng Wu smiled from ear to ear, as he said this without showing any hint of fear that would normally be present when someone in the Core Formation Realm was talking to someone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Impressing Wan Linyue in the process, as the two soon left the room. Leaving Elder Song to deal with the all too familiar mountain of documents that seemed to have magically grown during his short meeting with Wan Linyue.

 Chapter 869 Spiritual Metal Mine

    Not long after Wan Linyun had be a guest elder of the sect. News about the addition of another Domain Lord Realm Expert started to spread among the elders of the Star Shattering Sect, two of these elders were happily chatting with each other about this over a cup of tea.


    "Have you heard? Apparently Elder Song managed to recruit a Domain Lord Realm Expert into the sect."


    "Huh!? A Domain Lord Realm Expert!?"


    "Yes, but this is not the most shocking thing! From what I heard, the Domain Lord Realm Expert did not even be a sect elder, but instead became a guest elder!"


    "Guest elder¡­ Does this no mean that our current status in the sect is above his?"


    "Yes! Although¡­ No matter what his current status is, he is still a Domain Lord Realm Expert¡­" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Indeed¡­ Knowing Elder Song, he should also get promoted to a normal sect elder in a few years and at that point in time, it would be best not to have be enemies with this Domain Lord by doing something stupid¡­"


    Nodding their head in agreement with each other about this, the two elders agreed that even if their status was currently above that of the Domain Lord Realm Expert, it would be best for them not to do anything that would offend this new Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    Like them, most of the elders who learnt about the new Domain Lord Realm Expert joining the sect were excited at the news and couldn''t wait to find out who this Domain Lord Realm expert was.


    As for the fact that their status was higher than Wan Linyun¡­ None of them thought for a second that they were above a Domain Lord Realm Expert. Especially the Outer Sect Elders and Assistant Elders who were still in the Core Formation Realm.


    "Did you hear, the sect apparently recruited a Domain Lord Realm Expert!"


    "Another Domain Lord!? Do you think he will be teaching us like Grand Elder Shu and Grand Elder Xuan does every few months?"


    "No idea, but I really hope so!"


    Following all the elders discussing the matter of Wan Linyun, it did not take long before some of the disciples managed to hear about it. Resulting in the news of Wan Linyun spreading across the entire sect. Not taking long before even the normal servants running the day-to-day operations of the sect knew about the fact that the Star Shattering Sect had managed to get another Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    In the end, the news caused everyone to feel a sense of pride at the growth of the sect, both elders and disciples being happy at the addition of a new Domain Lord Realm Expert, as they would all be benefiting from this.


    ¡­


    While the entire Star Shattering Sect was celebrating a new Domain Lord Realm Expert joining the sect, Wang Hu, one of the Flying Sword Sect''s original core elders, was busy overseeing the construction of a massive mine that almost reached the same level as the main mine located at the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    The location of the mine in question was none other than the city that had once been the capital city of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Back when Xuan Hao had discovered the rich spiritual metal ore deposits below ground, he had informed Elder Song about this. However, because the sheer scale of the mine had been something that would be hard to construct and protect for the Star Shattering Sect at the time, Elder Song had deliberately dyed the construction of a spiritual metal mine until the sect had grown stronger.


    It was only after the Sky Empire''s visit to deal with the invading demonic cultivators and the control of any kingdom next to the Azure Sky Kingdom had fallen under the control of the Star Shattering Sect, that Elder Song had officially decided to start the construction of the spiritual metal mine. Not forgetting to do his best to keep this matter hidden for as long as possible.


    After all, he understood how important spiritual metal was for production of artifacts and doubted that the Sky Empire would just sit on the side and watch the Star Shattering Sect take control of such arge spiritual metal mine. Not to mention the three religions, the noble families and the rest of the powerful forces in the Sky Empire.


    The only reason why someone like Yi Min had managed to control arge spiritual metal mine by herself, was because she had a terrifying formation that even someone in the Soul Ascension Realm would have a hard time breaking without the risk of getting heavily injured and attacked by their enemies who would be more than happy to take advantage of something like this¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that Yi Min was already a terrifying expert at the Peak of the Domain Lord realm. Only a single step away from reaching the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "Looks like everyone is happy celebrating the arrival of a new Domain Lord Realm Expert back at the sect, are you not going to go back and join them Wang Hu? I even heard your brother is holding a small get together with some of the other elders."


    As Wang Hu was busy overseeing the construction of the spiritual metal mine that now covered what had once been the capital city of the Azure Sky Kingdom, a kind voice sounded out behind him.


    "Senior Lou¡­? Ha¡­ You gave me a shock there; I thought you would be down inspecting the new passages of the mine¡­" Letting out a sigh of relief as he turned around and faced the old man that had snuck up behind him, Wang Hu could not help shaking his head at the old man''s antics.


    Ever since he had be the Grand Elder and de facto leader of the Flying Sword Sect''s cksmithing hall, he had always been more yful than his age would suggest. After he reached the Nascent Soul Realm and got put in charge of the Star Shattering Sect''s cksmithing branch, he only seemed to have be more like this.


    "Hehe, I already finished doing that, so I came back up to see what you were up to¡­ So, how about it? Are you going to return to the sect to celebrate the new Domain Lord Realm Expert?"


    "You know that I can''t do that even if I wanted. The spiritual metal deposits located below the capital city of the Azure Sky Kingdom are far too important and any dy when ites to getting a proper mine up and running will end up negatively influencing you and the rest of the sect''s cksmiths."


    "Hm~? Howe I didn''t know you cared so much about the cksmiths of the sect? Did you perhaps take interest in one of the new cksmithing elders from the Spring Flower Sect?"


    "You¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after being teased by the old man, Wang Hu froze on the spot. Renderedpletely speechless by the fact that the person in front of him was actually someone close to two hundred years old¡­


    "Hehe, I''m only joking with you."


    "I really have no idea what to say¡­"


    "No need to say anything, I will be off again, I still need to check up on the most recent batch of spiritual metals that were mined."


    Swish~


    Watching the old man leave as fast as he had shown up, Wang Hu could not help shaking his head before turning his attention back towards the construction of the mine. Knowing very well just how important it was for not only the cksmiths of the Star Shattering Sect, but also for the Star Shattering Sect''s ability to trade with other nearby powers.


    After all, even if the Star Shattering Sect was able to produce a lot of the spiritual herbs and spiritual metals that they needed, there was ultimately some rare spiritual herbs that could not be produced in the sect and some rare spiritual metals that could not be found in the ground beneath the former capital city of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Even if this was not the case, it would always be good for the Star Shattering Sect to trade with surrounding powers, as they would still be able to get their hands on arge amount of spirit stones this way.


    In turn, they would then be able to use these spirit stones to further increase the strength of the sect and maybe even get their hands on more precious things, like Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herbs and Metals that could be used in the creation of more powerful artifacts and formations for the Soul Ascension Realm. Making the foundation of the Star Shattering Sect even stronger!


    Of course¡­ All of this was still far off in the future. For now, the Star Shattering Sect still had take care of the remainingrge kingdoms before stabilizing their new territory.

 Chapter 870 Lu Wen And Yi Xuan

    At the same time that the rest of the sect was busy celebrating the new Domain Lord Realm Expert, a group of female disciples had gathered together in a small corner of the sect. Forming a small circle around a handsome young man, as they showered him in all kinds of praises.


    "Senior brother Lu Wen is amazing, to think you managed to reach the Core Formation Realm at such a young age! Among the Inner Sect Disciples of the sect, you should be ranked first!"


    "Yes, senior brother Lu Wen is amazing, I-If it isn''t too much, how about teaching this junior sister?"


    "What are you saying, why would he do that? Now that junior brother Lu Wen has reached the Core Formation Realm, isn''t it much better for this junior brother to get some lessons from this big sister who is already in the Fourth Stage of the Core Formation Realm~? Hehe, this big sister will promise you a good time~"


    "Go away you old hag! Don''t think we have no idea what you n to do to senior brother Lu Wen!"


    "Yes, go away!"


    "Evil senior sister, go away!"


    "Hmph! You brats!"


    As one of the older female disciples took things a little too far in the opinion of the surrounding female disciples, she was quickly expelled and pushed out before the female disciples once again started praising the senior brother called Lu Wen.


    Another Domain Lord Realm Expert appeared in the sect¡­ Maybe I will have a chance to meet this expert and be his personal disciple, that way my strength will improve even faster and-


    Unknown to this group of female disciples, their senior brother in question, was lost in his own thoughts as he was thinking about the new Domain Lord Realm Expert and how he could get in contact with him and possibly be his personal disciple.


    "Big brother Lu Wen! I was looking for you!"


    Just at this moment, a voice called out to him from behind. Interrupting the female disciples who were busy trying to catch his attention, while also causing him to return to reality.


    "Hm? Yi Xuan? What are you doing here?" Noticing that the owner of the voice, Lu Wen could not help calling out in a surprised voice before making his way over towards her. Completely ignoring the group of female disciples that had gathered around him in the process-


    "This- Who is that girl!?"


    "How dare she!"


    "Ah! I know! She is the personal disciple of Elder Zu Fei!"


    "Zu Fei!? As in the former vice sect master¡­?"


    "Yes, that Zu Fei! No way I''m getting involved in any of this, I''m out of here!"


    Resulting in the group of younger disciples who had been trying their best to catch Lu Wen''s attention turning towards Yi Xuan filled with anger before quickly escaping upon finding out that Yi Xuan was rted to Zu Fei.


    Even if Zu Fei might not be a scary person in the eyes of Xuan Hao, she was quite a scary person in the eyes of most disciples of the Star Shattering Sect that had once been a part of the Flying Sword Sect in the past¡­ And in turn, these disciples had spread the tales of her to the new disciples of the sect. Resulting in not only the former Flying Sword Sect disciples fearing her, but also the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after seeing the female disciples all escaping from her like they had encountered the pest, Yi Xuan could not help feeling like she had been wronged. Even if her master was a bit scarier than the normal elders of the sect, it was a bit too much for them to run away the moment they saw her!


    "Ehm¡­ Lu Wen, I came here today because I had something important to inform you about!" Deciding not to think about the rude female disciples that had run away, Yi Xuan instead focused her attention back on to Lu Wen as she said this with a serious expression on her face. Doing her absolute best to look like a proper personal disciple of one of the strongest elders of the sect.


    "So serious, what is it?"


    "As you already know, a new Domain Lord Realm Expert just joined the sect¡­ But what you might not know is that arge merchant group selling all kinds of antiques from all across the continent recently arrived outside the city at the bottom of the Ninth Star Peak!"


    "A merchant group selling antiques¡­ Are you sure this is not some sort of scam?" Hearing what Yi Xuan said, Lu Wen could not help rolling his eyes as he asked this. After all, it was not the first time since they had joined the Star Shattering Sect that this girl hade to him and informed him about some entric merchant group selling antiques from all around the continent.


    Last time he followed her to one of these merchant groups, he ended up losing most of the spirit stones he had earned bypleting sect missions to a normal Earth Rank Artifact, that he could have bought over a dozen times over with the spirit stones he had spent¡­


    "It''s not some scam! Beforeing here, I heard that some of the senior disciples already went to visit it and came back with all sorts of rare and exotic artifacts that can''t be found anywhere in the Sky Empire, one even getting lucky enough to get his hands on a Peak Soul Rank Artifact for only a few low-grade spirit stones! Nowe, we need to get there early before all of the good artifacts are gone!" Puffing her small cheeks in anger as she said this, Yi Xuan started dragging Lu Wen towards the path leading down the Seventh Star Peak and towards the entrance of the sect.


    "Fine, I will join you. No need to keep pulling on my clothes." Understanding that there was no way for him to convince Yi Xuan, Lu Wen decided to follow her to check out the antiques of merchant group that had suddenly shown up not too far away from the sect.


    At least this way, he would be able to make sure that Yi Xuan didn''t end up getting scammed, like what had happened to both of them in the past. Although, asking Yi Xuan about it, they didn''t get scammed and just happened to be unlucky and pick the wrong antiques.


    ¡­


    Not long after they had left the sect and arrived at the small market that had been set up outside the city at the bottom of the Ninth Star Peak, Lu Wen let out a sigh as he looked over the different antiques disyed all around him.


    "Looks like this is another scam¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Lu Wen turned towards Yi Xuan, prepared to return to the sect¡­ But did not take long to discover that the girl in question had already disappeared. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "How troublesome." Not knowing what to say at the sudden disappearance of Yi Xuan, Lu Wen was just about to take out a simplemunication talisman to contact her-


    "Hm? This is¡­"


    When he suddenly noticed something special about one of the antiques right next to him, it was as if there was some sort of connection between him and the antique.


    "Young man, does this little antique of mine interest you? Haha, that should be a given, this antique was an ancient relic that was found in the ruins of a long-lost ancient empire that once ruled most of the continent. Even being rumored to have immortal generals with power enough to snatch down the stars from above and rip apart heaven and earth! Anything found from that ancient empire is of immense value!" Not missing a beat, the merchant who was selling the antique immediately noticed this as he started bragging about how precious the antique was.


    Even without knowing anything about the antique in question, it was obvious to Lu Wen that the merchant was lying and trying to make his antique sound more valuable¡­ But given the weird connection he felt between himself and the antique, Lu Wen could not help feeling curious about the antique and why he had some sort of connection with it.


    "How much do you want for it?"


    "Don''t worry young man, even if this precious antique is from a once power ancient demon beast n, I will give it to you for cheap. Only 5000 low-grade spirt stones, I will also ept high grade spirit stones if you have any!"


    "Wha- That is far too expensive! How can you expect a normal disciple to have that many spirit stones!? Can''t you go a bit lower?" Not able to stop himself from eximing in surprise upon hearing the outrageous number of spirit stones that the merchant wanted, Lu Wen could not help asking for a lower price-


    "Hehe of course, of course, I feel like you and the antique have a special connection, so I will lower the price and also ept any artifacts you might have as payment!"


    Ultimately resulting in him falling into the merchant''s trap¡­

 Chapter 871 Strange Stone

    Not too long after Lu Wen finished negotiating with the merchant and ultimately paid most of what he owed for the strange antique that he could feel some sort of connection from, Yi Xuan who had disappeared not too long after they had reached the temporary marketce set up by the entric antique trading merchant group, appeared with a pile of antiques that she had managed to buy for no more than a dozen or so spirit stones.


    "Lu Wen? What happened to you¡­?" Spotting Lu Wen who had a half dead look on his face while holding on to a small antique in the shape of what looked like some sort of ancient teapot, Yi Xuan could not help tilting her head in confusion before asking this. Not understanding why Lu Wen looked like he had just survived a life and death situation, while only getting a small, ancient looking teapot out of it.


    "Yi Xuan?" Hearing Yi Xuan suddenly calling out to him, Lu wen turned around to look at her with dead look in his eyes. Making it obvious to her that something had happened, during the short few minutes she had wandered off to look for some promising antiques to buy.


    "Ah! Did you perhaps get scam-"


    "Quiet! There is no way someone like me, a young, genius, Core Formation Realm cultivator, would ever get scammed by some lowly merchant! Ehm! Let''s return to the sect for now, I don''t think there is anything of real value here!" Jumping up before rapidly starting to make his way back towards the sect after realizing that Yi Xuan was about to expose the fact that he had just been scammed of everything he had on him, Lu Wen didn''t bother waiting for Yi Xuan before disappearing in the direction of the Ninth Star Peak.


    "Hmph! This guy¡­ He definitely ended up getting scammed and lost everything he had taken with him in the process!" Rolling her eyes as she instantly managed to see through what had happened, Yi Xuan did not bother spending any more time in the temporary antique market and instead chose to chase after Yi Xuan.


    Part of her wanted to find out what he had ended up buying, while another part of her was curious about just how much he had ended up losing for him to storm off without even waiting for her.


    ¡­


    Returning to the sect before making his way back to the privacy of his own courtyard, Lu Wen didn''t bother wasting a single second before taking out the ancient teapot he had ended up buying with everything he had brought with him.


    Rustle~


    Following Lu Wen all the way into his courtyard, Yi Xuan curiously leaned forward to inspect the ancient teapot that Lu Wen had begun to examine for anything that might point towards it being some kind of powerful artifact that would make the sacrifices he had made worth it. "Hm? Is this the antique you bought? How much did you pay for it? One hundred spirit stones?" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "¡­"


    "Don''t tell me¡­ One thousand spirit stone!?" Seeing that Lu Wen remained silent after hearing what she said, Yi Xuan could not help showing a shocked expression on her face as she said this. Even for a normal outer sect elder, one thousand spirit stones were not a small number of spirit stones and would take months to get back again!


    As for someone like Lu Wen who was a little more prominent among inner disciples, it was not something he was unable to pay, but was still something that would take years for him to recover from. The only exception to this being that he was lucky enough to win one of the different events that Elder Song hosted every now and then.


    "It wasn''t just a thousand spirit sto- Ahm! I mean, I didn''t lose anything, I managed to get this precious antique from a long-lost ancient empire for a cheap price and its worth Is much more than just a few spirit stones!" Feeling like she had hit a sore spot, Lu Wen quickly defended himself as he began showing off the ancient teapot. Making sure to retell the things that the merchant had told him in an attempt to convince Yi Xuan that he had not wasted his spirit stones¡­


    "Sure¡­ So, what does this half-broken teapot do?"


    However, Yi Xuan easily saw through this and just rolled her eyes before moving closer to inspect the ancient teapot up close. Part of her feeling curious as to just what was so special about it that had caused Lu Wen, who was normally not easy to deceive, to buy it for such an astronomically high price without first making sure that he was not in the process of being scammed.


    "Ah! Don''t touch it so carelessly, what if it-"


    Crack~


    Not even a second after Yi Xuan touched the ancient teapot and began to inspect it in detail, a clear sound of something cracking apart sounded out before the ancient teapot broke in half. Taking both Yi Xuan and Lu Wen by surprise.


    "This¡­ Sorry, I didn''t expect for it to be that fragile¡­" Not knowing what to say after seeing the ancient teapot breaking the moment, she touched it; Yi Xuan could only smile awkwardly before apologizing to Lu Wen for destroying the ancient antique he had just wasted all his wealth to buy.


    "My spirit stones and artifacts¡­ All gone for nothing!" Not responding to what Yi Xuan said, Lu Wen just stared mindlessly at the now broken teapot while therge number of spirit stones and artifacts he had given up for the ancient antique, passed through his mind.


    Even if he deep down understood that he had been scammed by the merchant, he was not willing to admit it. Believing that the connection he had felt between himself, and the ancient teapot was real and showed that it should be some amazing treasure that the merchant had just mistaken for some junk that he wanted to use to scam him with¡­ But now that he was faced with the broken teapot that was destroyed even by a light touch, he was no longer able to convince himself that he had not been scammed. Losing what had essentially taken him two or three years to gather.


    Hm? But if the ancient teapot has been destroyed, why is the connection from earlier still there¡­?


    About to give up on the broken teapot, Lu Wen suddenly noticed that the connection he had felt from it back at the market was still present.


    Crack-!


    "Lu Wen? Is something wrong?"


    Ignoring Yi Xuan, Lu Wen fully broke apart the ancient teapot before starting to search the broke piece of the teapot. Looking for the origin of the connection that he felt. Understanding very well that the connection he felt did not originate from the ancient teapot itself, but instead originated from something inside the ancient teapot!


    Not a secondter, he found what he was looking for as he pulled out a small stone that looked like a normal pebble that could be found everywhere on the ground. The only difference between the small stone and a normal pebble was the fact that the small stone had a small barely visible symbol etched into it.


    "Looks like my assumption was correct." Happily muttering this to himself as he felt the clear connection between himself and the small stone in his hand, Lu Wen could not help feeling curious as to just what the small stone was. Not wasting a single second before he began to examine it closely.


    "¡­"


    As a result, Yi Xuan, who had no idea about the connection between Lu Wen and the small stone, could only stare weirdly as her respectable senior brother suddenly began to excitedly examine what looked like a small pebble to her.


    Not caring about the weird look, he was getting from Yi Xuan, Lu Wen turned his attention towards the small symbol that looked like a small teapot, simr to the ancient teapot that had been destroyed just a few seconds earlier.


    "Hm? What will happen if I inject some of my qi into the symbol, will it perhaps cause some kind of change?"


    Whoosh-!


    Not thinking too much about it, Lu Wen decided to inject a small part of his qi into the symbol on the stone to see if it had any reaction-


    "What are you-"


    Seeing this, Yi Xuan was about to ask him what he was doing. However, before she had a chance to say anything, a weird power engulfed them. Transporting them to some unknown location.


    ¡­


    At the same time Lu Wen and Yi Xuan were transported somewhere by the small pebble with the teapot symbol on it, Xuan Hao who had been busy teaching his disciples suddenly narrowed both his eyes as his divine sense swept out and began examining the location Yi Xuan and Lu Wen had been standing less than a second ago.


    "How weird, there was a change in the space inside the formation, but I can''t find any clues to what might have caused it¡­ Did someone practice a space rted technique¡­? No, the shift in space was too big and it shouldn''t have been something that would have been possible for anyone below the Soul Ascension Realm. Maybe a natural space abnormality that just happened to take ce inside the sect''s formation?"


    Not able to find anything after looking through the area with his divine sense, Xuan Hao just shook his head before returning to training his disciples. Not thinking too much about it as it didn''t look like the change in space had caused any damage to the formation or the sect.

 Chapter 872 Floating Island

    "Ahhh-!?"


    Feeling the air rushing against her face the moment she opened her eyes, Yi Xuan could not stop herself from screaming in fear, as she realized she had been transported somewhere above the clouds. Given that she had yet to reach the Nascent Soul Realm, falling from such a height was almost certain death. Making Yi Xuan start panicking even more.


    "Can you quiet down for a moment? Don''t you see that we aren''t falling?"


    "A- Huh?"


    Suddenly hearing the voice of Lu Wen calling out to her from the side, Yi Xuan could not help tilting her head in confusion before starting to look around herself.


    Indeed, like what he had said, she wasn''t falling any more. Instead, she was sitting on top of one of the clouds she had first seen after being transported by the weird stone with the teapot symbol on top of it.


    "What in the world is this- And where are we!?" subconsciously grabbing hold of the cloud below her as she said this, Yi Xuan looked towards Lu Wen with a questioning expression on her face. Wanting to know just what was happening and how she had suddenly ended up so far up that the ground wasn''t even visible when looking down because of a denseyer of clouds covering everything beneath her-


    "How would I know? I just inject some of my qi into the stone with the teapot symbol on it and then we ended up being transported here."


    However, she had forgotten the fact that Lu Wen likely did not know any more than her about their current situation¡­


    Whoosh~! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Just at this moment, the clouds surrounding them began moving all over the ce before suddenly changing into all sorts of different things, one cloud materialized into a small forest, while another materialized into arge floating ind that the forest was ced on top of right next to where Yi Xuan and Lu Wen were standing.


    ""¡­""


    Not able to get say a single word at the serene floating ind that suddenly materialized beneath their feet within the span of a few seconds, both Yi Xuan and Lu Wen could only stare silently at each other in disbelief over what had just happened.


    If not for the fact that they could clearly feel the ground beneath their feet and the soft grass that covered the entire floating ind, they would have thought that the floating ind was some kind of illusion.


    "Hm? Is that a house¡­?" Being the first among the two to recover from the shock of a floating ind suddenly materializing from clouds beneath them, Lu Wen soon noticed a small house located at the center of the floating ind.


    The house was not special and looked no different from the house of a normal mortal. No special material had been used in its construction other than normal wood and stone. If not for the fact that the house was located on top of a floating ind, it would have been easy to ignore such an ordinary-looking house¡­


    "Let''s go and take a look, we might be able to find a way out of this ce inside the house." Nudging Yi Xuan who had still not fully recovered from the shocking scene of the clouds gathering together to form the floating ind that they were currently standing on top of, Lu Wen began making his way towards the ordinary-looking house at the center of the floating ind.


    Part of him felt curious about what might be hiding inside the small house, while another part of him was scared about the potential danger they might encounter.


    "Ah? Ah! Wait up for me!" Realizing that she was getting left behind, Yi Xuan quickly got up before dashing after Lu Wen. Not wanting to be left alone on the edge of the floating ind. Especially when she had no idea whether there was anything dangerous lurking somewhere on the floating ind.


    After all, even if it seemed unlikely for a demon beast to get formed by the clouds in a simr way that the floating ind had been materialized, she didn''t dare to take the chance!


    ¡­


    Creak~


    Arriving in front of the small house without encountering any problems along the way, Lu Wen and Yi Xuan cautiously proceeded to open the door of the small house before peeking inside-


    "This is¡­"


    "An ordinary house¡­?"


    Being met with what looked like a normal house without anything special about it.


    However, given the fact that they were currently on top of a floating ind in some unknown location, both Lu Wen and Yi Xuan could not help feeling surprised that there was nothing special about it like they had been expecting.


    "Hm? That is¡­ The stone with the teapot symbol on it!?" Continuing to look around the interior of the small house, it did not take long before Lu Wen suddenly spotted a stone, that looked eerily simr to the stone that had ended up transporting them to their current location, on top of arge wooden table.


    Not only that, but when he looked through his belongings, he discovered that the small stone was nowhere to be found. Meaning that the small stone located on top of the table was most likely the same stone that he had identally used to transport them to their current location!


    "The stone! Does this mean we can get out of here if you inject your qi into it!?" Unlike Lu Wen, who had not moved after spotting the small stone with the teapot symbol on top of it, Yi Xuan didn''t waste a single second before jumping forward to grab the small stone.


    Swish-!


    "Here you go. Now get us back to the sect by doing the same thing you did to get us here in the first ce!" Handing the small stone over to Lu Wen before saying this with a look of expectation on her face. Clearly, she did not want to stay on the weird floating ind for even a second longer. Understanding very well that it was dangerous for them to stay in an unknown location filled with all sorts of unknown dangers that might end up killing them if they were unlucky.


    "Fine¡­" Knowing that he had been the one at fault innding them in an unknown situation that might turn out life threatening at any moment, Lu Wen agreed to her request, while in the back of his mind deciding to return to explore the mysteries of the floating indter by himself if it was possible.


    The main reason for him wanting to do something like this was not only because he wanted to find something of value on the floating ind to justify all the spirit stones and artifacts, he had lost to buy it, but also because he had clearly felt the connection from the stone with the teapot symbol on top of it had grown stronger after being transported to the floating ind.


    Even more mysterious was the fact that the connection between himself and the small stone was not the only connection he felt after reaching the floating ind. Instead, he now also felt a far greater connection to something different on the floating ind. The only problem was he could not properly pinpoint the exact origin of this connection. Only capable of feeling how strong the connection was and the rough location being somewhere on the floating ind.


    "Let''s hope this works¡­" Muttering this to himself as he threw the thought of the strong connectioning from somewhere on the floating ind to the back of his mind, Lu Wen poured his qi into the small stone with the teapot symbol on top of it once again-


    Whoosh-!


    And not a secondter, both Lu Wen and Yi Xuan disappeared from the small house. Leaving no trace of them even being there behind.


    ¡­


    "We are finally back! Haaah¡­ For a moment I thought we wouldn''t be able to get back from that floating ind¡­" Letting out a long sigh of relief after seeing that they had indeed managed to return to the sect again, Yi Xuan could not help feeling a sense of happiness well up inside her.


    Even if they had only been gone for a few minutes, it had still been a scary experience for her. Especially considering that she had not yet left the sect for experience like Lu Wen had been doing.


    "Indeed, it was good that we could get out of there safely. For now, we should- Y-you are!" Just about to say something in response to Yi Xuan, Lu Wen froze mid-sentence as he suddenly noticed someone had appeared in front of them.


    "Hm? What''s the matter Lu Wen, what happened?"


    Having her back facing the direction that Lu Wen was looking, Yi Xuan could not help tilting her head in confusion before turning around to see what he was looking at. Not understanding what had suddenly caused him to freeze on the spot with a fearful expression stered all over his face.


    "E-elder Xuan!?"


    However, the moment she turned around, she could not help freezing on the spot like Lu Wen after seeing the person that had appeared behind her...

 Chapter 873 Origin Of The Spatial Abnormality

    Hm? That spatial abnormality from earlier is there again!?


    Noticing the spatial abnormality, the moment it appeared, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes before his divine sense once again swept towards the location that the abnormality had originated from. Not wanting to miss anything that might help him figure out just what the spatial abnormality was and how it had managed to manifest inside the sect without disturbing the chaotic qi formation.


    After all, the chaotic qi formation also had control over the space inside the formation, being more than capable of stopping anyone from affecting the space inside the formation without first getting permission, something only the disciples and elders who had already be part of the sect had!


    "Two disciples? And from the looks of it, both are rather talented as well."


    Observing the ce where the spatial abnormality had taken ce, Xuan Hao instantly noticed Lu Wen and Yi Xuan who had suddenly popped out from a small portal that had appeared for an instant before disappearing along with the spatial abnormalities that had been formed as a side effect of the portal.


    Managing to observe the entire thing y out this time around, Xuan Hao also noticed that the reason why the portal was only open for an instant, was due to the chaotic qi formation forcibly stabilizing the space and as a result erasing the portal in the process.


    If the portal had been established somewhere outside the sect where there wasn''t some terrifying formation to forcibly erase it, it would most likely have been able to stay open for an extended period of time.


    "But more importantly- Where did the portale from, where does it connect to¡­ And what does those two disciples have to do with it?" Muttering this to himself as he once again focused his attention on the two disciples who hade out from the portal, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about them and whatever they had used to open the portal.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any time as he was filled with questions for these two disciples, Xuan Hao directly left his pce. Leaving Qing Yi and Chu Yang to wonder what had happened for their master to suddenly leave in the middle of a lesson.


    ¡­


    Arriving in front of the two disciples who had not noticed him yet, Xuan Hao decided not to say anything as he began examining the two disciples more closely.


    One of them was a young woman in herte teens and was covered in the standard inner disciple robes. After looking a bit closer, Xuan Hao realized that he recognized the young girl as one of Zu Fei''s disciples. As for her cultivation realm, she was only a single step away from reaching the Core Formation. Indeed, she is more than qualified to be the personal disciple of a core elder like Zu Fei.


    Although¡­ Thinking about it, Xuan Hao felt a sudden sense of curiosity towards Zu Fei''s disciples and how she taught them.


    From what little he could remember of the few chances he had to see them, none of them were like their master. All being well-behaved and polite.


    As for the young man¡­ Xuan Hao almost instantly recognized him as the boy who Wang Hu had showed interest in taking in as a disciple during the neer tournament when Qing Yi had just entered the sect.


    Thinking about it, I never found out whether Wang Hu ended up taking him in as his disciple¡­


    Inspecting the young man as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help nodding his head in approval. Not only had he reached the Core Formation Realm at such a young age, but even his foundation was strong and robust. Even surpassing that of some Third Stage Core Formation Realm Experts.


    Outside of his disciples, it also looked like there were other geniuses present in the sect. Ensuring that sect would not becking powerful experts in the future!


    Oh, looks like he finally noticed me¡­


    Seeing the young man suddenly turn around before freezing on the spot the moment he noticed him; Xuan Hao could not help chuckling to himself upon seeing this.


    Considering that he was the most powerful person in the sect and had suddenly appeared behind them, the reaction was rather normal. Especially when considering that he had just returned to the sect through some kind of portal.


    "Hm? What''s the matter Lu Wen, what happened?"


    Still having her back turned to him, the young woman did not understand why her senior brother had suddenly frozen up as she asked this in a rather confused voice before turning around to see what it was that had caused her senior brother to freeze up all of a sudden-


    "E-elder Xuan!?"


    Not a secondter, she simrly froze on the spot with a nervous expression on her face. Not understanding why, the most powerful elder of the sect had suddenly appeared behind them.


    "No need for both of you to be that afraid, it''s not like I''m here to punish you. The reason I came was just because of the spatial abnormality that you two caused when leaving and returning from the sect just now." Saying this, Xuan Hao could not helpughing silently as he watched the two get even nervous after he mentioned the spatial abnormality, both taking no more than a few seconds to understand that the spatial abnormality that he mentioned had something to do with them being teleported away from the sect and back again.


    "E-Elder Xuan¡­ it''s like this¡­" Understanding that there would be no way for them to lie in the face of a powerful expert like Xuan Hao, the young woman, that Xuan Hao found out was called Yi Xuan, directly told him about the small stone with the teapot symbol on top of it and what they had experienced during the few short minutes they had been gone.


    "Other than this, there is also a weird connection between me and¡­" Not willing to be left behind without being able to say anything, Lu Wen also jumped into the conversation. Exining the connection between himself and the small stone with the teapot symbol on top of it and the weird new connection he had felt after reaching the floating ind that had been materialized from clouds.


    After the two had finished exining everything that had happened to them and what they had managed to learn so far, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about the small stone with the teapot symbol and the floating ind with the small house on top of it.


    No matter what it was, it was clear to Xuan Hao that the floating ind should be some kind of inheritance space and that the connection Lu Wen felt should be rted to the inheritance located somewhere on the floating ind.


    "Hm¡­ How interesting, would you mind I take a look at the small stone?"


    "O-of course not! Here, Elder Xuan!"


    Taking the small stone with the teapot symbol on top of it that Lu Wen handed over to him, Xuan Hao directly used his divine sense to thoroughly inspect the small stone-


    "I see, so that is how it work¡­"


    Not taking long to figure out how the small stone had been able to create a portal to transport Lu Wen and YI Xuan, even when they were inside the sect.


    Essentially, the small stone contained a profound formation that seemed to link up with an even more powerful formation located in an unknown location, that then directly established a momentary spatial corridor leading directly to the floating ind.


    Something like this¡­ Even for Xuan Hao, it was difficult toprehend just how powerful this formation was, for it to be capable of forcibly creating a portal inside the Star Shattering Sect without triggering the chaotic qi formation. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Of course, now that he knew about it, he could change the formation a bit so this would no longer be possible...


    Swish-!


    Having finished inspecting the formation inside the small stone and managing to get a glimpse of the powerful formation it was connected to, Xuan Hao threw the small stone back to Lu Wen.


    "Huh?"


    Making him let out a surprised sound. Not understanding why Elder Xuan had given the small stone back to him. Part of him already having prepared for Elder Xuan to take away the small stone.


    "Keep it and. The opportunity contained inside it is yours¡­. And¡­ Unless you have a death wish don''t tell anyone else about it¡­"


    Swoosh~


    Not waiting for Lu Wen or Yi Xuan to recover, Xuan Hao directly left.


    As for not taking the small stone for himself¡­ The small stone and the portal that could be opened through it had certain restrictions, one of them being that one had to be below the Nascent Soul Realm, while a special physique also seemed to be needed to fully take on the inheritance.


    Forcing his way through with brute force was not something he nned to do. Especially after seeing the terrifying formation that the small stone was connected to. Even without personally seeing it up close, he was certain that it should have been something that had been constructed by someone who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Not to mention, Lu Wen was still someone from the Star Shattering Sect. Even if the powerful inheritance didn''t end up in the hands of his disciples. At the very least it would still help to increase the strength of the Star Shattering Sect!

 Chapter 874 Game Of Chance

    "He just left without taking the stone away..." Muttering this to himself as he looked in the direction that Xuan Hao had left in, Lu Wen could not help feeling shocked that he had managed to keep the mysterious stone. Especially considering that he was certain that it was rted to some sort of precious treasure due to how Elder Xuan had warned him to keep it secret before leaving. Making him even more confused as to why he had been able to keep the small stone capable of teleporting him to the floating ind.


    The elders from the Star Shattering Sect are really different whenpared to the elders from any of the other sects I was thinking about entering in the past¡­


    Thinking about this as he came to terms with everything that had just happened, Lu Wen could not help feeling happy that he had chosen to enter the Star Shattering Sect instead of going to any of the other sects that had been located closer to him back when he went out to search for a sect to join.


    Back then, the only reason why he had chosen to make the long journey to the Star Shattering Sect from where he lived, was because he had been lucky enough to encounter a group of young people on their way to the Star Shattering Sect after having heard rumors about the sect having a legendary existence above the Nascent Soul presiding over it.


    If not for this information convincing him to follow them to the Star Shattering Sect, he would have most likely never have entered the sect and would instead have ended up in one of the smaller sects that were now under the influence of the Star Shattering Sect!


    Shaking his head as memories of the past began appearing, Lu Wen decided not to think too much about as he chatted a bit with Yi Xuan about what they had experienced before making his way back towards his courtyard. Keeping the words that Elder Xuan had told him about not telling anyone else about the small stone in the back of his head.


    ¡­


    "Ahm! As all of you already know, with the new Domain Lord Realm Expert joining the sect, it is almost certain that Elder Song is going to speed up the process of the sect''s expansion over the next few years and he might even start to set his sight on thoserger kingdoms that we have mostly decided to ignore for now because of the weird technique allowing them to forcefully breakthrough the Domain Lord Realm for a short time.


    The reason why I called everyone here is for us to find out who among us are going to be leaving the sect to take up the task of protecting the new territory of the sect, as we all know that none of us really want to leave due to the cultivation environment inside the main sect¡­"


    As Lu Wen and Yi Xuan were making their way back to their respective courtyards after parting ways, arge number of both outer sect elders and normal sect elder had gathered together in a small pavilion in the outskirts of the sects.


    The weakest among them being the outer sect elder at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, while the strongest was the old elder from the Half-Spirit at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, who had also been the person to take the lead and speak up just now.


    "Senior, I understand this, but how are we going to figure out who can stay and who will have to leave the sect to ensure the safety and stability of the new territory of the sect?" Stepping forward with a doubtful expression on his face, one of the outer sect elders could not help asking this.


    Fearful that the former grand elder of the half spirit race would propose something like them fighting it out with each other. Understanding very well that if something like that happened, his chances of being able to stay back at the sect and focus all of his attention towards breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm would be gone. After all, among the elders currently present, he was by far one of the weakest, even among the other outer sect elders in the Core Formation Realm¡­


    """¡­""" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Hearing what the outer sect elder said, the rest of the outer sect elders could not help showing a simr nervous expression. All of them realizing that their chances of being able to stay in the sect would not be much better if the matter ended up being decided bybat.


    "Haaa¡­ you people¡­ Have you forgotten that all of you are only in the Core Formation Realm? Other than managing one of the branch sects, you won''t be able to protect the sect''s territory with your current strength!"


    Seeing the nervous expressions that had appeared on the faces of all the outer sect elders present, one of the Nascent Soul Realm sect elders could not help rolling his eyes as he said this.


    "Ah¡­!"


    "That is true¡­"


    "¡­"


    Hearing what the sect elder said, the outer sect elders who had all been nervously looking towards the former grand elder of the half spirit race, could not help blushing in embarrassment after being called out for being too weak.


    Even if what the sect elder had said was true and they were far too weak to stabilize the new territory of the Star Shattering Sect, the outer sect elders could not help feeling even more motivated to reach the Nascent Soul Realm and be a core part of the sect''s strength. Not willing to remain as outer sect elders for the rest of their lives!


    "Well¡­ Now that everyone seems to have calmed down again, I was nning for us to find out who will be leaving the sect through a simple game of chance in the shape of a simple roll of the dice or something simr." Not wanting things to drag on for too long, the former grand elder of the half spirit race once again stepped forward and gave his suggestion on how he had nned for them to find out who was going to be the ones to leave the sect.


    "Ha? A game of chance? A roll of a dice?"


    "You want us to decide something this important through something like that!?"


    "This is¡­ Not what I expected¡­"


    Hearing what the former grand elder of the half spirit race said, the elders present all had different reactions. Even then, the most widespread reaction was still one of surprise over just how unexpected the solution given by the former grand elder of the half spirit race was¡­


    Out of everything that they had thought about, be a small-scale tournament between different elders of simr cultivation realm to everyone giving their own reason for why they should stay in the sect while the rest would vote for whether or not it was a more valid reason than the others. None of the elders present had expected the suggestion to be something simple like a game of chance.


    On the other hand, this way, everything would be up to fate and none of them would have any sort of advantage over the other.


    As the elders all slowly came to this realization, they understood that the suggestion given by the former grand elder of the half spirit race might be the best way to solve this problem. Especially when considering that the time avable to them before Elder Song showed up was limited.


    All of them having a clear understanding of just how fast the old man acted when he first decided on something. Even them having a few more hours would be surprising, let alone enough time to hold a tournament or something simr that would take a long time.


    "I think we should go with a simple dice throw, this way we can solve this quickly and won''t have to worry about Elder Song showing up while we are still trying to figure out who is going to stay and who is going to leave¡­"


    "Indeed, I also think it''s a good idea, we can also ensure that no one is cheating with all of us keeping an eye on the dice."


    "Haha, looks like we have alle to an agreement! What are we waiting for, let''s roll a dice and find out who is lucky and who is unlucky!"


    Realizing this, it did not take long before some of the elders took out a few different dices and began the process of rolling them to find out who would stay inside the sect and who was going to be stationed somewhere outside to stabilize the new territory of the sect. The rules of the game being rather simple, the one rolling the highest won, while the one rolling the lowest lost.


    Roll~


    Roll~


    Roll~


    Not long after the first had started, the rest of the elders quickly followed the rest.

 Chapter 875 Angry Elder Song

    "Nooo-! How can this be!? How did I lose when I rolled a five!?"


    "Haha! Looks like I''m the one who is going to be staying in the sect! With this, I should have more than enough time to breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm and be an official sect elder!"


    "Ah-! How is this possible, I rolled a one!?"


    "Wow... Never expected someone to be that unlucky. Hehe, at least you ended up as my opponent!"


    Arriving at the small pavilion where the group of elders had gathered together to find out who would stay in the sect and who would be leaving, Elder Song could only stare speechlessly at the group of elders as they were all rolling dice while loudly eximing every time, they rolled a dice.


    Even if Elder Song had seen a lot of different things during the time he had acted as the person in charge of the Flying Sword Sect- and now the Star Shattering Sect''s internal matter, this was still a first to him.


    "What are all of you doing¡­?" Realizing that none of the elders had noticed him ande over to exin what was happening, Elder Song could only make his presence known as he asked this-


    "Who- Ah!? Elder Song?!"


    "What!? Elder Song is here!?


    "Finish- We have to finish the game of chance and figure out who will be going and who will be staying!"


    As a result, the elders who had been fully focused on rolling dice to figure out who would stay in the sect and who was going to leave, started panicking, as they scrambled to finish things up before Elder Song began to talk about the expansion of the sect and asking who would be willing to leave the sect to secure the new territory of the sect.


    "¡­" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Seeing this, Elder Song who had just asked to figure out what the group of elders were up to, could not help narrowing his eyes upon seeing how desperate the group of elders were to finish the game of dice they were ying. Not understanding why these elders were so absorbed in the dice rolling game¡­ But given that he was not too busy at the moment, he decided to wait for them to finish before moving on to what he was nning to talk to them about.


    After all, he was the one who had suddenly shown up while they were in the middle of enjoying a good time together. However, as he continued waiting for them to finish their game of dice up, Elder Song could not help wondering why the elders had suddenly gathered together like this without him hearing anything about it.


    Considering that so many elders were involved in this hangout event, it should have taken a few days to n and spread around to make sure that the different elders didn''t have something else to do. Not only that, but he could also hear them mention something about leaving the sect every time they lost or won-


    Don''t tell me¡­


    Suddenly realizing something, Elder Song''s face could not help darkening as he stopped waiting and instead made his way over towards the group of elders still busy rolling dice, causing most of the Nascent Soul Realm Elders to stop what they were doing before turning to look towards the approaching Elder Song.


    "Hm? Elder Song ising over!? Could it be we took too long, and he grew impatient?"


    "Who knows, we can only wait and see for now¡­"


    Under the observant eyes of all the Nascent Soul Realm elders present, Elder Song came to a stop directly behind one of the outer sect elders. Unfortunately for this outer sect elder, his strength was only in the Core Formation Realm, so he didn''t notice the fact that Elder Song had appeared behind him and was still nervously rolling dice with another outer sect elder, who had simrly not noticed Elder Song.


    "Greetings Elder Fire Lama, I just arrived and was wonder why everyone is rolling dice? Is it just for the fun of it, or is it because of something different?"


    Hearing the question asked by Elder Song and the answer from the outer sect elder, all of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts watching from a distance could not help shivering as they suddenly realized what was happening. However, they did not have a chance to inform Elder Fire Lama before he answered Elder Song''s question.


    "Haha, of course not! It''s to decide who among us will be the unlucky ones to leave the sect when Elder Song decides to- Wait¡­ Y-you are- E-Elder Song!?" Happilyughing due to him just winning his match before answering the question of who he thought to just be an elder that had arrivedte, the outer sect elder called Elder Fire Lama suddenly realized that the person behind him was none other than Elder Song.


    "Hm¡­ I see¡­ To decide who is unfortunate enough to be the one to leave the sect¡­" Smiling ominously as he said this, all of the elders inside the small pavilion felt a shiver run down their spine as they understood that Elder Song was angry, something that rarely happened and only a few elders from back during the time of the Flying Sword sect had experienced before.


    To be honest, these elders had never thought they would ever get to see a kind elder like Elder Song angry before and had doubted the few elders who had told them about it-


    "Well¡­ Seeing as all of you are unwilling to leave the sect and just want to stay here andze around, I thought of a perfect way to arrange the uing allocation of who will be leaving the sect to stabilize the new territory. Hehe, it just so happens that the number of people present here should be just enough to stabilize the new territory that will be part of the sect over the next few years.


    And now that I think about it, the alchemists from Alchemy Hall requested me to send over a few elders to gather some rare spiritual herbs and other materials for them. At first, I was wondering where I would be able to get any elders considering how busy we are going to get over the next few years, but¡­ From the looks of it, all of you here won''t have much to do before the new territory is under the sect''s control, so sending all of you to work for a bit in the Alchemy Hall shouldn''t be much of a problem.


    Haha, I can already see how motivated all of you are, no need to thank me, I will get going and make sure to let the Alchemy Hall know about it."


    However, as they watched Elder Song leave after saying this, they realized just how scary an angry Elder Song was!


    Even if he didn''t out right say how unhappy he was about them doing something like this in order to continue cultivating in the sect without doing anything to help out the sect, all of the elders in the small pavilion, were filled with fear as they looked in the direction that Elder Song had left in.


    The few short words he had said before leaving had essentially doomed them to be outside the main sect for the next ten or so years!


    "¡­"


    However, among the group of elders gathered in the small pavilion, the one who had ended up losing the most, was the former grand elder of the half spirit race.


    Although, he had been the one to gather all of elders to figure out who would be leaving the sect and who wouldn''t, he had only done this under the request of another elder from the half spirit race, who didn''t want to leave the sect because he was close to a breakthrough and wanted to make use of the qi present in main sect to speed up this breakthrough.


    After all, with his strength at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, he wouldn''t have to leave the sect under normal circumstances and would not be among the elders required to leave the sect to help stabilize the new territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Increasing his strength and possibly reaching the Domain Lord Realm was far more important and the current Star Shattering Sect did notck Nascent Soul Realm Experts. Especially considering that arge number of the former Peak Core Formation Realm Experts from both the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect had managed to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm after spending a few years on the Seventh Star Peak.


    Because of this, the former grand elder of the half spirit race was filled with regret as he looked in the direction that Elder Song had left in. Regretting that he had agreed to the request back then.


    As for going against the arrangements set up by Elder Song? That was not something he dared to do¡­ No matter what, Elder Song was still the current Vice Sect master!

 Chapter 876 Fall Of A Large Kingdom~

    Not too long after Elder Song officially began to implement his ns of starting to expand into therger kingdoms that they had ignored over the past few years while taking care of the smaller kingdoms and stabilizing them following this, the differentrge kingdoms all started panicking at the prospect of the Star Shattering Sect starting to invade their territory.


    "What!? The Star Shattering Sect has started expanding into the closestrge kingdoms!? Didn''t you say that they had stopped going after therger kingdoms after learning they had a method to forcibly reach the Domain Lord Realm for a period of time!?


    Ha¡­ And here I thought our kingdom would be able to remain outside the Star Shattering Sect''s sphere of influence because we were lucky enough to have our borderspletely surrounded by three differentrge kingdoms¡­"


    Among all of the kingdoms that would inevitably have to face the Star Shattering Sect, a certain small kingdom that had managed to avoid falling under the control of the Star shattering Sect due to its good location in between threerge kingdoms, was the one that started panicking the most after learning about the Star Shattering Sect once again attempting to expand into therger sects.


    Even if everyone understood that this would only be a matter of time deep down, none of them had expected it to happen so fast.


    After all, even if the method that allowed someone to forcibly reach the Domain Lord Realm onlysted for a short period of time, it would still be more than enough time to cause arge amount of damage to the Star Shattering Sect. Possibly even having the ability to heavily injure one of the Star Shattering Sect''s Domain Lord Realm Experts if there was more than one person who forcibly broke through to the Domain Lord Realm at the same time.


    For this reason, most of therge kingdoms and small kingdoms that had managed to avoid the Star Shattering Sect so far, had expected for the Star Shattering Sect to stop expanding further and instead focus all their attention towards strengthening themselves for a few hundred years before expanding again. Allowing therge kingdoms some time to either have someone break through to the Domain Lord Realm or move everything of value away and settle down somewhere where the Star Shattering Sect couldn''t reach them.


    However, all of this was no longer possible now that the Star Shattering Sect had started to expand again. Moving the important people of their kingdom might be a doable in a year or two, but the different mines and other precious resources present in their territory was a different thing.


    Even by using all of their energy and forcibly trying to get everything of value out of their spirit stone mines would at least take a hundred years or more¡­ And that was only considering that their Nascent Soul Realm Experts were also present to help out with the mining of the spirit stones, something that would be hard to do if they were busy fighting against the Star Shattering Sect.


    In the end, none of therger kingdoms were prepared for the Star Shattering Sect expanding into their territory. Resulting in the Star Shattering Sect managing to directly take over one of the smaller kingdoms among those who had managed to get their hands on the technique allowing them to forcibly reach the Domain Lord Realm with close to no resistance.


    Because of all this, the king of the small kingdom that had managed to avoid the Star Shattering Sect was especially troubled about what to do. Part of him wanting to leave, while another part of him didn''t want to give up thend his family had spent the past thousands of years building up¡­


    "What in the world am I supposed to do? Should I really just abandon thend my ancestors built up? Maybe I could do the same as other small kingdoms and join the Star Shattering Sect in hopes that they aren''t going to take everything away from me." Muttering this to himself as he turned towards his son, the crown prince, who was waiting for him to give out an order on what they were supposed to do in response to the Star Shattering Sect''s sudden expansion, the king could not help feeling even more anxious than before as he thought about therge kingdom that had fallen to the Star Shattering Sect.


    As unlucky as he was at the moment, it just so happened that therge kingdom, which had been taken over by the Star Shattering Sect, was none other than one of the threerge kingdoms surrounding his kingdom.


    Considering this, he didn''t really have a long time left before he would be forced to decide on whether to join the Star Shattering Sect like so many others in a simr situation to him had done before or run away.


    If he didn''te up with an answer to this question soon, the elders from the Star shattering Sect would most likely soon be at his doorstep and at that point in time, there would not be any chance of him running away with the precious spiritual herbs and other treasures that had been stored in the royal treasury by his family since the establishment of the kingdom.


    "Father¡­ Are we really going to leave behind ournd? Is the Star Shattering Sect really that impressive? From what I heard; therge kingdoms don''t seem like they are going to lose with the powerful forbidden technique that allows them to forcefully break through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if the Star Shattering Sect has more than one Domain Lord Realm Expert, there is no way for them to resist if 10 or more elders from therge kingdoms forcefully breaks through to the Domain Lord Realm and decides to attack them!"


    Seeing that his father was lost in thought while muttering something to himself, the crown prince could not help growing impatient as he said this. Not showing the slightest bit of fear towards the Star Shattering Sect like his father.


    Making it rather obvious to anyone watching that he had no idea about the strength of the Star Shattering Sect nor the simple fact that those who forcibly broke through to the Domain Lord Realm would only barely beparable to the weakest First stage Domain Lord Realm Expert for a short period of time.


    Instead thinking that therge kingdoms had the strength to fight against the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    "Fight against the Star Shattering Sect!? How dumb are you, son!? Do you really think thoserge kingdoms canpare to a sect like the Star Shattering Sect with several Domain Lord Realm Experts in it just because of some forbidden technique!? Have you perhaps also forgotten that winged lion demon beast that showed up on the side of one of the Domain Lord Realm Elders of the Star Shattering Sect and how it easily tore apart that ancestor who had forcibly broken through to the Domain Lord realm!?"


    Hearing what his son said, the king could not help losing his temper as he angrily reprimanded him, as images of the terrifying figure of the winged lion popped up in his head.


    Although he had only seen it once during a visit to one of therge kingdoms, the scene of the winged lion tearing apart one of the ancestors from therge kingdom who had forcibly broken through to the Domain Lord Realm, was still vivid.


    Even if he himself reached the Domain Lord Realm, he would not dare to go and fight with the Star shattering Sect knowing that they had such a terrifying guardian demon beast around. Not to mention the even more terrifying implications of the Star Shattering Sect having such a terrifying guardian demon beast around!


    "Father-"


    "Go back to your room and contemte your mistakes, I wille up with a decision on what is best for our family and kingdom in the meantime!"


    "Yes¡­ Father¡­" Frowning unhappily as he said this, the crown prince reluctantly left the throne room and made his way back towards his pce located a short distance away from the main pce. Not feeling the slightest bit convinced about therge kingdoms losing against a single sect.


    As for the terrifying demon beast that had appeared to kill one of the ancestors of arge kingdom that had forcibly broken through to the Domain Lord Realm? He merely med this on the fact that the ancestor in question had not managed to fully utilize the forbidden technique and had actually still been in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    At least this would help exining how easily he had died. After all, everyone knew just how much more powerful someone in the Domain Lord Realm waspared to someone in the Nascent Soul Realm. Especially when it came to demon beasts, as they were more often than not, stronger than normal Domain Lord Realm Experts when they broke through!N?v(el)B\\jnn

 Chapter 877 New King, Suspicious Elder Song

    "Father has really gone senile after his encounter with the guardian demon beast of the star Shattering Sect¡­" Muttering this to himself as he made his way out of therge main pce, the crown prince could not help frowning with an unsatisfied expression on his face. Not the slightest bit happy with the inaction of his father.


    "Hm? That is¡­" Just at this moment, the crown prince froze on the spot as he spotted a tall man standing at the entrance gate to the wall surrounding the main pce.


    Although his appearance was covered by arge cloak that made it impossible to discern his true appearance, his presence alone was more than enough to intimidate any of the servants passing by from approaching. Even making the guards standing guard at the entrance gate look the other way, as they were simrly intimidated by the tall man.


    Noticing the crown prince at the same time that the crown prince saw him, a small smile made its way onto the face of the tall man before he began making his way towards the crown prince. "Your highness it''s good to see you again."


    "Greetings elder, it''s great to see you again." Not caring about his identity, the crown prince respectfully bowed his head to the tall man with a respectful expression on his face. Allowing everyone watching the interaction from afar to understand just how important the tall man, while at the same time making them curious about who the tall man and where he came from.


    After all, the crown prince was the most influential person in the entire kingdom and outside of the king, no one could make him bow his head in the kingdom. Meaning that the tall man who had just made the crown prince respectfully bow his head, should be a powerful person from one of therger kingdoms!


    "Your highness let''s go somewhere more secluded where we can talk more privately. "ncing around at the servants and guards observing them as he said this, the tall man signaled for the crown prince to follow him out of the main pce.


    "Of course! We can go to my pce, there won''t be anyone to disturb us there." Nodding his head obediently as he said this, the crown prince quickly jumped ahead of the tall man to lead the way to his pce, something that the tall man tactically agreed with, as both of them soon made their way out of the main pce and into the smaller pce belonging to the crown prince.


    "So, have youe to a decision regarding the thing we talked aboutst time we met?" Coming to a stop inside a small, isted room of the crown prince''s pce, the tall man directly asked this with a serious expression on his face, causing the crown prince who to momentarily freeze on the spot.


    "This¡­ Is it really necessary for me to get rid of my father¡­?" Hesitating for a moment before he turned around and asked this, the crown prince quickly looked around himself with a nervous expression on his face after realizing what he had just said. Only rxing again after making sure that there wasn''t anyone secretly spying on him.


    "Hmph! You think that father of yours would agree to go against the Star Shattering Sect? His weak mindset will inevitably end up ruining this kingdom and you know that as well. Only by disying your strength and standing up against the Star Shattering Sect together with therge kingdoms, will you and your kingdom have a chance to rise up in this world!" Sneering disdainfully as he said this, the tall man looked directly at the crown prince for a response.


    His terrifying aura made it clear that he would not ept anything other than a straightforward answer. Not wanting to give the crown prince a chance to dy the answer like he had done thest time they met up.


    If father really doesn''t want to fight back against the Star Shattering Sect and ensure the kingdom''s prosperity and continued existence, it might be time for me to step up in his ce and ensure that the kingdom remains strong. Maybe even growing strong enough to contend with therge kingdoms. Possibly even stronger than that!


    Feeling like his ambitions to lead his kingdom to greater heights had been ignited, the crown prince turned to look towards the tall man, still hidden beneath arge cloak, with a determined look in his eyes.


    "Oh? Have youe to a decision?" Not able to stop himself from smiling after noticing the determination of the crown, the tall man chuckled silently to himself as he asked this question. Even if he already knew the answer to the question.


    "Yes! I will do what you said and lead my kingdom to fight against the Star Shattering Sect!"


    "Hehe, great! I will be informing my master about this development so he can prepare the necessary things required for your kingdom to have the strength to fight against the Star Shattering Sect. Although¡­ I hope you will have taken care of your father and be the king by the time I return. If not¡­ My master will be forced to intervene and put someone other than you in the position of king!"


    Whoosh-!


    Disappearing from the room after he finished saying this, the mysterious tall man didn''t leave any traces of him being there behind.


    As for the crown prince¡­ He was looking back in the direction of the main pce was located with a difficult expression on face. Although the man had not outright told him to kill his father, the crown prince understood that there would be no other way than this if he wanted to be the king.


    After all, he understood his father very well and there was no way that his father would just hand over his position to him and make him the new king. Especially considering the current chaotic situation that was taking ce due to the Star Shattering Sect starting to expand into therger kingdoms that had previously been left alone for a short period of time.


    "Haa¡­ Father, I hope you will make the correct decision¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked towards therge pce at the center of the capital where his father was staying, the crown prince turned around before making his way out of capital to make the required preparations for taking the position away from his father by force!


    ¡­


    Not too long after the short encounter between the crown prince and the mysterious tall man, the citizen of the small kingdom, woke up to news of the king being poisoned to death by one of the factions that had been defeated by the king in the past when he ascended the throne.


    Luckily, the crown prince was around at the time of the poisoning and managed to catch the culprit before he had a chance to escape. Executing him on the spot.


    The heroic actions of the crown prince killing the assassin quickly spread through the kingdom and all the citizen and nobles gave their support to the crown prince as he smoothly ascended the throne without any problems.


    Not a single person thought that the crown prince might have been behind the death of his father. The reason for this being that the crown prince was the only legitimate heir of the kingdom and would inevitably take over the kingdom in the future, there was no need for him to kill his father only to ascend the throne a few years earlier!


    Like this, the small kingdom located in between threerge kingdoms smoothly changed owners without anyone noticing anything odd about it. Even the people from therge kingdoms who had been friends with the now former crown prince''s father did not think there was anything odd about his death¡­


    ¡­


    "Hm? The small kingdom just next to the kingdom we took control of changed owners?"


    At the same time that the information of the small kingdom started to spread out beyond the borders of the small kingdom itself, Elder Song who was currently focusing arge part of his attention on that specific area due to therge kingdom that had just entered the control of the Star Shattering Sect being located there, inevitably learnt about it.


    "Yes, from the looks of it, it should be one of the factions that had been fighting against the now dead king when he first ascended the throne. The person in charge of the kingdom now is the crown prince, who would originally have ascended the throne in another five to ten years."


    "Killing the current king who is already getting close to death, but not his child? How weird¡­ Looks like there is something more to the death of that king¡­" Narrowing his eyes as he muttered this to himself, Elder Song did not waste any time in contacting the servant quarters to have them gather more information on the crown prince who had taken control of the small kingdom. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Part of him feeling that everything about what had happened in the small kingdom felt odd¡­

 Chapter 878 Passing Time, One Month Later

    Not paying any attention to the expansion of the sect, Xuan Hao instead focused all of his attention on training his four disciples. Among whom, Mui was the one that ended up benefiting the most. Progressing from the Fifth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm all the way to the Foundation Establishment Realm in a short month.


    Bai Ning on the other, hand had been focusing most of his attention on improving his cksmithing at the start of the month but had soon returned to the pce to learn from his mater and attempt to teach his new junior sister the art of cksmithing, something which unfortunately ended up as a failure.


    On the positive side, the failure had not deterred Bai Ning and only caused him to work harder. In the end resulting in him finally breaking through from the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm to the Core Formation Realm.


    Chu Yang and Qing Yi did notck behind either, as Xuan Hao also made sure to train both of them whenever he wasn''t training Mui. Allowing Chu Yang to finally break through from the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, while Qing Yi managed to fully stabilize her cultivation base at the Peak of the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Even if their cultivation base had not managed to improve at the same level as Mui had, both of them had grown far strongerpared to a month ago and were more than capable of fighting against someone in the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm by working together. Even if they encountered someone in the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, they would at least have the strength to escape alive with their current strength, something that none of the other Nascent Soul Realm Experts around the same level in the sect could do.


    At this point, both of them had finished making all the preparations to enter the mystic realm and were excitedly waiting for their master to send them off-


    "It''s great to see that both of you are excited about entering the mystic realm¡­ But can you wait until I finish my lesson with Mui¡­?"


    Maybe a bit too excited about it, as they were currently disturbing their master''s lesson with their newest junior sister¡­


    Luckily for both of them, they didn''t have to wait for more than a few hours before their master finished his lesson and officially sent them off towards the entrance to the mystic realm that was located below his pavilion in the Flying Sword Sect, that had now been transformed into the biggest branch of the Star Shattering Sect over the past few years. Only the former main sect of the Spring Flower Sect beingparable to it.


    The entrance to the mystic realm itself had been sealed off by Xuan Hao in the past, so as to prevent anyone from identally entering it by mistake like his disciples had done in the past. Other than this, the current elder in charge of the Flying Sword Sect, made sure that no one wandered up to the now abandoned pavilion.


    As for any other entrances to the mystic realm? Xuan Hao had no idea where they were located nor if there really were any other entrances beside the one located below his pavilion. The only possible entrance to the mystic realm that he could think of, was the weird secret realm that Bai Ning had idently entered together with another disciple from the sect during his time hunting down demonic cultivator.


    Unfortunately, when he had gone to investigate this weird secret realm over the past month, the entrance that Bai Ning had mentioned, was nowhere to be found. Even using his domain to scan the mountain cave that the entrance was located inside of proved to be of no use. In the end, he could only give up on searching for the entrance and concluded that it had copsed after Bai Ning and the other disciple that had gone in together with him, had left¡­


    "Now that both Chu Yang and Qing Yi have left and I finished teaching Mui the basics, it should be time for me to go back and fully explore the Main Star Peak and find out just what it is that is hiding inside the rundown temple¡­" Muttering this to himself as he watched Chu Yang and Qing Yi enter the mystic realm before disappearing from sight, Xuan Hao soon turned around and made his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect. No, it would be more urate to say that he made his way towards the Main star Peak.


    Not only was it to figure out who the person located inside the rundown temple was and what kind of secrets were hidden inside of the temple itself, but it was also toplete the main quest and figure out what had caused the death of the blue deer''s father.


    After all, he had left the main quest alone for such a long time now and had a feeling that the system would not be issuing him any new quests before hepleted it. Of course, this was not the only reason he wanted toplete the main quest; the main reason was that he was also curious about what had happened to the blue deer''s father¡­ And more than that, the reward from the main quest!


    Even if he had no idea what the [Sky Watcher''s forgotten notes rting celestial bodies], was about, he still understood that it should be something important. Especially considering how dangerous it had been for him to look into the death of the blue deer''s father so far.


    ¡­ n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Hm¡­ It looks exactly the same as thest time I was here¡­"


    Arriving at the ravine where the temple was located, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he looked towards the temple still standing tall with the same terrifying aura surrounding it as before. Even the damage that had been done during his struggle to escape with the blue deer back then was still visible.


    The main difference whenpared to back then, was that with his current cultivation in the Initial Dao Domain Lord Realm, he could clearly feel that the strength behind the terrifying aura was around the earlier stages of the Soul Ascension Realm. Not something he would have been able to fight against if he had really made his way inside the temple back then.


    Whoosh-!


    Knowing that the other party was not stronger than himself, Xuan Hao didn''t bother restraining his divine sense, as he used it to search for the origin of the terrifying aura and the person who had attacked him and the blue deer back then-


    "Hm? What in the world is this!?"


    However, when his divine sense reached the top of the temple where he thought the person in question should be located, he was shocked to discover that instead of a person, there was arge floating gem the size of arge ball.


    The terrifying aura originated from thisrge gem and without needing to investigate any further, it also became obvious that the thing that had attacked him and the blue deer back then was none other than therge gem¡­ Or to be more precise, it was the consciousness stored inside therge gem that had attacked them.


    This realization made Xuan Hao feel a shiver run down his spine as he fully understood how powerful someone would have to be for just a remnant consciousness to have the strength of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert in the earlier stages of the realm.


    Even without having to investigate it any further, it became obvious that the remnant consciousness belonged to an expert that had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm!


    For there to be such a powerful remnant consciousness, I will have to be careful when entering the temple. Even if I''m stronger than the remnant consciousness, I have no idea what kind of weird and powerful methods an expert surpassing the Soul Ascension Realm has, there might even be some kind of possession method that allows the remnant consciousness to forcibly take control of my body!


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help cautiously looking up towards the top of the rundown temple where therge gem containing the remnant consciousness was located.


    Hesitating for a short moment as he thought about what to do in case the remnant tried to take control of his body or some other weird and obscure techniques that it might have learnt, Xuan Hao took a step forward and entered the rundown temple.


    Rumble~!


    Not a secondter, the remnant consciousness located at the top of the temple discovered his appearance.


    Swish-!


    Not wasting a single second before sending an attack down towards him!

 Chapter 879 Remnant Consciousness

    Seeing the iing attack, Xuan Hao causally waved his hand as his domain swept out and formed a massive ice barrier in front of him-


    Bang!


    Blocking the attack of the remnant consciousness before it even had a chance to reach him!


    Rumble~!


    However, before he had a chance to counterattack, therge pirs holding up the temple started copsing before transforming intorge stone chains that hovered in the air as several intangible golden inscriptions appeared all over them. Even without personally inspecting therge stone chains with his divine sense, Xuan Hao could still feel a sense of danger from them that far exceeded the danger he had felt from any attack done by the remnant consciousness so far!


    Whoosh!


    Not nning to give him too long to try and analyze therge stone chains covered in golden inscriptions, the remnant consciousness divine sense spread out before covering the stone chains-


    Swish-!


    And not a secondter, the newly formed stone chains all flew towards Xuan Hao, their presence alone sealing off the space around the entire temple. Making escape through spatial movement impossible!


    "Looks like the remnant consciousness does indeed have a few things prepared¡­" Muttering this to himself, as he saw the stone chains covered in golden inscriptions flying towards him, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes as he fully unleashed his domain without holding back.


    RUMBLE-!


    As his Dao Domain shed together with the stone chains, the chains changed their form of attack and instead of heading towards him, they curled around his domain before it had a chance to fully expand towards therge gem with the remnant consciousness located at the top of the temple. Forcibly restraining it from expanding any further and possibly threatening the remnant consciousness¡­ But at the same time, this also resulted in the chains being unable to get any closer to Xuan Hao. Making the two sides enter a momentary standstill, as neither the dao domain nor the chains showed any signs of being stronger than the other.


    These chains¡­ They aren''t made from some kind of special spiritual metal or stones, but actually still have the power to forcibly restrain my dao domain! Is it perhaps because of the golden inscriptions¡­?


    Not feeling nervous about his current situation as he had already expected for the remnant consciousness to have a way to fight back against him even with its limited strength, Xuan Hao was instead more curious about the golden inscriptions that had allowed the chains made from rather ordinary stones to resist his dao domain.


    After all, it had to be known, his current dao domain was more than strong enough to kill someone in the earlier stages of the Soul Ascension Realm. For a few chains made from ordinary stone to restrain it without showing any signs of budging¡­ The power of these chains had to be far stronger than that of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert who had undergone the First or Second Tribtion.


    What''s more, after observing the stone chains more closely, Xuan Hao discovered that the golden inscriptions on them were already in a state of decay and weren''t capable of showing off their true power. If not for this, Xuan Hao was certain that his dao domain would not have stood a chance against these stone chains!


    But then again¡­ This dao domain is far from the only form of attack I have!


    Swish-!


    Having finished observing the golden inscriptions on the stone chains, Xuan Hao pulled out the silver sword before directly using the sword attack, he had invented back at the border between the Sky Empire and the Frozen Wastnds, Descend of the Ice God''s Sword!


    BOOOOM-!


    Not able to resist both the dao domain and the ice sword at the same time, the stone chains were directly forced back as the ice sword and dao domainbined together into a single attack heading directly towards the top of the temple where therge gem with the remnant consciousness was located. Knowing that the faster he managed to finish the battle, the less time there would be for the remnant consciousness to prepare another attack.


    For example, he had already lost a good opportunity to attack when the pirs of the temple had copsed and formed intorge chains covered in golden inscriptions. If he hadn''t been taken aback for a short moment back then, he might have had a chance to destroy therge gem and the remnant consciousness inside of it!


    Whoosh-!


    However, just as he was about to reach therge gem where the remnant consciousness was residing, a phantom whose appearance was impossible to discern appeared in front of therge gem.


    Swish-!


    Casually waving its hand, the ice sword and dao domain that had been used to enhance the strength of the ice sword directly dispersed without any resistance, while at the same time causing Xuan Hao to freeze on the spot without being able to move a single muscle.


    What is this!? Is this the power of someone who surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm and overcame the Immortal Soul Tribtion¡­


    Already feeling shocked after seeing how his attack had been dealt with, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of powerlessness that he had never felt after losing control of his body.


    At this point in time, he realized that the existence in front of him was not an existence in the Soul Ascension Realm, but instead someone who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Even if it was just a small remnant consciousness left behind by this expert, he was stillpletely powerless to resist after the remnant consciousness had awoken¡­


    "You, you are the one who awoke me? Hm? This is¡­ Why is there a Dao Domain Lord in this fragment!?"


    Hearing the phantom floating in front of therge gem suddenly talking, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine after hearing it mention the fact that he was a Dao Domain Lord. So far, other than some information he had acquired through the system, this was the first time he had ever heard anyone mention the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Making it even more obvious that the phantom floating in front of him was not someone from the current era.


    "Oh? Don''t want to answer me? Oh well, I should be able to recover part of my true soul by absorbing your dao domain!"


    Not caring about the thoughts running through Xuan Hao''s head, the phantom casually waved its hand again-


    Crack~!


    Following which, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a terrifying force pressing down on him from all directions. Seeking to directly squash him to death.


    Fwoosh-!


    It was at this moment, as Xuan Hao was about to be crushed by the phantom, that the small phoenix imprint that had remained hidden without doing anything since thest time he had absorbed a phoenix feather lit up before a beautiful blue me covered Xuan Hao''s entire body. Preventing the terrifying force from crushing his body.


    Seeing the feather imprint that had appeared between Xuan Hao''s eyebrows, the phantom didn''t even care about the fact that his power had been forced back. Instead, he was far more focused on feather imprint itself.


    "This- T-the mark of that phoenix-!? No¡­ This should be impossible! We clearly saw her dying back then! How is it possible for her to still be around!?" Screaming this in an unwilling tone filled with both fear and killing intent, the phantom that had seemed arrogant and above everything a short moment ago, was reduced to a terrified mess.


    FWOOSH-!


    Not caring about the reaction of the phantom, the blue me that had engulfed Xuan hao and protected him, started expanding rapidly. Soon reaching the phantom-


    BOOOM-! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    As the mes got close to the phantom, it quickly recovered from its terrifying state before a terrifying power far above that of the Soul Ascension Realm erupted from it in an attempt to resist the blue mes.


    Rumble-!


    As the power of the phantom shed with the blue mes, it instantly became obvious that it was no match for the blue mes. Instead, the power released by the phantom ended up serving as fuel for the blue me. Making it stronger and stronger with each passing second before it managed to reach the phantom itself.


    "Aaaaaah-! No! I don''t want to die like this! I spent such a long time trying to recover! DAMN YOU-"


    The moment that the mes started burning the phantom, the phantom let out an unwilling scream as it was soon reduced to nothing. Only leaving behind therge gem that it had once used to hide and recover inside of.


    Whoosh-!


    Following the death of the phantom, the blue mes quickly retreated back inside the feather imprint between Xuan Hao''s brows before disappearing, like it had never appeared in the first ce.


    As for Xuan Hao, he could barely keep himself conscious. Fainting a few seconds after the blue mes disappeared.

 Chapter 880 Magical Gem

    Waking up after his body had managed to recover from the sudden drain that the appearance of the blue mes had put on it, Xuan Hao found himself in the middle of the temple. No, it would be more urate to say what remained of the temple. The only thing that had been left in an intact state, was therge gem that had once housed the remnant consciousness of the expert who had been killed off by the blue mes.


    "What in the world was that blue me from earlier¡­" Getting up from the ground as he unconsciously ced his hand on top of the location where the phoenix imprint was hidden, Xuan Hao could not help trying to use his divine sense to examine the condition of the blue divine energy that had been absorbed into the feather imprint.


    Even though he could not fully examine it due to it automatically destroying his divine sense if he got too close to the blue divine energy stored inside, he was still able to figure out that the amount of blue divine energy stored inside the feather imprint had decreased after the feather imprint had activated to destroy the phantom. In the end, the total amount of blue divine energy stored inside the feather imprint had decreased by around 30 percent.


    Although, when thinking about how it had been used to destroy the remnant consciousness left behind by someone who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm, it could not be considered that much of a loss. Especially considering that the blue divine energy stored inside the feather imprint was not something he had any way to use. On the other hand, it made him rather uneasy knowing how powerful the blue divine energy was and the fact that it was stored somewhere inside his body.


    If the blue divine energy suddenly erupted and targeted him instead, he understood that he would have no way to resist it with his current strength. Even if he surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm in the future, it looked like it would still not be easy to resist the blue divine energy when it was used to attack.


    At the very least, the blue divine energy inside the feather imprint had only ever reacted when he was in danger. Never really showing any sort of intelligence nor malicious intent towards him¡­ But then again, one could never be too careful.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards therge gem that had once housed the remnant consciousness of the expert who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm. Out of everything in the temple, it had been the only thing to survive even when exposed to the blue mes made from the blue divine energy. From this alone it was obvious that it was far more durable than he had first expected.


    Thinking about it, his original n to destroy therge gem and destroy the remnant conscious inside of it seemed rather stupid now. After all, if the blue mes capable of destroying the remnant consciousness belonging to an expert who had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm could not destroy it, how in the world would he be able to destroy it with his current strength?


    Now that everything was already over, Xuan Hao realized just how reckless he had been to enter the temple without any proper preparations or knowledge of his opponent.


    "Well¡­ Everything is already done, and I ended uping out with only a few injuries that should have recovered in a day or two. Now¡­ To figure out what this gem that the remnant consciousness used is about¡­" Muttering this to himself as he walked towards therge gem on the ground, Xuan Hao made sure to use both his domain and divine sense to ensure that there weren''t some weird traps ced on the gem before he slowly picked it up and started to examine it.


    Inspecting the gem, Xuan Hao soon found out that there was a small space the size of a small room located inside the gem. However, unlike an interspatial ring, he found out that he could enter the small space himself without any problems.


    Not only that, but the gem also automatically absorbed qi from the outside world and transferred it into the small space. Allowing one to stay hidden inside without having to leave. In a sense, the space inside the gem could be considered a miniature secret realm that could be moved around!


    Whoosh~


    As he was busy trying to figure out if there was something left behind inside the small room of the gem that might be of use to him, Xuan Hao suddenly discovered another function of the gem, as he felt a slight tugging sensation stemming from the gem on his soul.


    "Hm? Is this another function? A soul-based attack¡­ But why is it so weak?"


    Examining the function more closely, Xuan Hao could not help feeling bewildered over how weak the barely noticeable tugging force on his soul was. The gem was clearly a rather high-level artifact, so it made no sense for its soul-based attack function to be so weak¡­


    Swish~


    Deciding to test out what the function that soul-based attack function was trying to do, Xuan Hao left the ruined temple before finding a small frog demon beast that had only barely reached the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Whoosh~


    Using the soul-based attack function on the Qi Condensation Realm frog demon beast, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes as he saw the soul of the weak demon beast getting sucked out of its body before floating towards therge gem in his hands before being absorbed by it.


    Only a short time after the soul of the weak frog demon beast had been absorbed, Xuan Hao watched in shock as the soul of the frog appeared inside the small space of the gem-


    Whoosh-!


    And not a secondter, a weird power engulfed the small frog soul. Transforming it into a pure form of yin qi.


    This is not a soul-based attack, but a soul absorption function!? Looks like the remnant consciousness from earlier should have belonged to a powerful demonic cultivator!


    Understanding this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine upon imagining what would have happened to him if he had not been saved by the feather imprint back then.


    "Wait¡­ The gem has the ability to absorb souls and it should have been used like this by that demonic cultivator before I showed up. Does that not mean that the fate of the blue deers father¡­" Muttering this to himself as he suddenly realized what had happened to the blue deer''s father, Xuan Hao was greeted by the all too familiar appearance of the system as it appeared in front of him.


    [Main Quest: Investigate what caused the death of the blue deer''s father. (Complete)] N?v(el)B\\jnn


    [Description: Investigate what could have caused the sudden death of the blue deer''s father.]


    [Reward: Sky Watcher''s forgotten notes rting to celestial bodies.]


    [Would you like to redeem the reward?]


    [Y/N]


    Reading through the system panel that appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao could not stop himself from smiling as he felt a sense of happiness, he had not felt in a long time because of how little he had seen the system over the past few years.


    Outside of the repeatable quests that he could do again and again for a small reward, it had truly entered a state of hibernation ever since the Star Shattering Sect had been established¡­ Or maybe this was just the system''s way to show that it was unsatisfied with the fact that he had not taken in any more disciples.


    Indeed, whenpared to the other elders of the sect like Elder Song or Feng Chen, he had not had a lot of disciples. Even whenpared to someone like Zu Fei who most of the disciples tended to avoid, he still had six or so less disciples than her.


    Considering that he was also the strongest expert in the sect, he should be thinking about taking in a few more disciples in the future. Not only because it would strengthen the sect, but also because it might make the system give him more rewards and be a bit more active than it was now.


    "Haa¡­ No use thinking about that for now, I should first check out what this Sky Watcher''s forgotten notes are all about." Throwing the thought of epting more disciples to the back of his mind for now, Xuan hao redeemed the reward from the system, as a small book appeared in his hand.


    The book in question did not have anything extraordinary about it and looked like an ordinary book that could be found in a normal mortal''s home, but Xuan Hao understood that this did not mean it was ordinary by any means. Not allowing this to stop him from slowly opening the book.

 Chapter 881 Mysterious Hole

    "W-what in the world is this mess?!" Not able to stop himself from eximing as he was met with what could only be described as a mess, Xuan Hao suddenly understood why something called the Sky Watcher''s notes hade in the form of a book instead of arge stack of notes.


    Given that he had already expected the book to be difficult to understand, Xuan Hao had already prepared himself for the extended period of time that would be required to understand it¡­ But when he looked down on the first page of the book, he understood that he would be spending far longer than he had first expected if he wanted to understand it...


    From the first page, it was rather obvious that the book was not something that the Sky Watcher had made to gather his notes together in a single ce. Instead, it was a mess made from stuffing all of the Sky Watcher''s notes together into a single book without any order to them!


    Even if he could understand thenguage in the book itself, it might as well have been written in a differentnguage with how messed up the different notes were. First of all, it looked like he would have to spend some time sorting out the notes after returning to the sect.


    "Haaa¡­ I really hope there is something useful in this book¡­" Knowing that he would not be able to gain anything from the book containing the messed-up notes of the Sky Watcher in the short term, Xuan Hao carefully put it away in his interspatial ring together withrge gem before jumping into the air in the direction of the temple ruins that were located a short distance away from his current location.


    Although a part of him really wanted to read through the book containing the notes of the Sky Watcher, he also understood that it was something that could wait. For now, his objective was to properly explore the Main Star Peak and figure out if there was anything dangerous like the temple still hiding somewhere on it¡­


    Not long after, Xuan Hao arrived back at the ruins of the temple. Nothing changed and the only thing that came into view was the rubble of what had once been the temple itself and the surrounding buildings. Any of the artifacts or other precious treasures that might have been hidden inside having already been destroyed by the sh between the blue me formed by the blue divine energy and the remnant consciousness.


    Whoosh~!


    However, just to make sure he didn''t end up missing something, Xuan Hao still decided to thoroughly search the ruins of the temple with his divine sense.


    "Nothing survived¡­"


    However, after searching through the ruins for close to an hour, he could only let out a regretful sigh and conclude that nothing of value had managed to survive the sh between the two powers above the Soul Ascension Realm.


    In a sense, it was already good that he could get his hands on the gem that the remnant soul had used to hide inside of. Even if it was a demonic artifact that could produce pure yin qi and wouldn''t have much use for himself, he never knew if he would end up getting a disciple that could make use of it.


    "Well¡­ before that, I will first have to start epting more disciples¡­" Shaking his head as he realized this, Xuan Hao soon left the temple ruins to continue exploring the Main Star Peak. Not intending to leave before he had managed to explore the entire Main Star Peak.


    ¡­


    Over the next few days Xuan Hao searched through the rest of the Main Star Peak without encountering anything of interest. At most he had managed to encounter a Domain Lord Realm demon beast that was hiding inside a small pond when he had tried to explore it. Outside of this, he did not encounter anything that could evene close to the same level as the remnant consciousness hidden inside the temple.


    As for spiritual herbs and artifacts? He did not manage to encounter anything special outside of a sword that had been hidden beneath arge stone in a corner of the Main Star Peak, but¡­ Even if the sword was a decent artifact, it was still inferior to the silver sword he had been given by Yi Min¡­


    "Looks like there is only one ce left for me to explore¡­"


    Coming to a stop in front of what could only be described as a hole in the ground, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both of his eyes as he stared down into the hole leading straight down.


    Outside of the temple with the remnant consciousness hiding inside of it, the hole in front of him was by far the most mysterious thing he had encountered on the Main Star Peak. Not because of the fact that it was the only path leading into the mountain that he had found so far, but because his divine sense disappeared for some unknown reason the moment it entered the hole.


    Even with his current cultivation base in the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he had no way to properly gauge just what was hidden inside the mysterious hole in the ground. Making him hesitate on whether to enter the hole and explore it or not.


    Just at this moment as he was hesitating on whether to enter the mysterious hole in the ground or not, the system panel appeared in front of him with a brand-new main quest-


    [Main Quest: Enter the Mysterious Hole on the Main Star Peak and find out what it''s hiding]


    [Description: There is a mysterious hole on the Main Star Peak that renders divine sense useless, enter it and find out what might be hiding away inside it.]


    [Reward: Organization of the book containing the Sky Watcher''s notes]


    But after looking through the new main quest, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing at the system. For some reason, he felt that the system was deliberately annoying him with the reward this time around.


    "Whatever, I was nning to enter the hole anyway. At least this will save me few months of trying to sort out the notes by myself¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao didn''t botherining too much as he dove headfirst into the mysterious hole in the ground. Prepared to fight in case there was some kind of demon beast or other threat inside.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao made his way down into the mysterious hole on the Main Star Peak, Chu Yang and Qing Yi had finally managed to make it through the underground cave part of the mystic realm that they had ended up in after entering the mystic realm through the entrance located beneath their master''s old pavilion in the Flying Sword Sect.


    "So, this is the what the mystic realm looks like outside of that cave¡­ To be honest, if not for the fact that I know we are inside a mystic realm, I would have thought we were still in the outside world!"


    "Indeed, this is amazing, I never thought a mystic realm would look the same as the world outside¡­"


    What appeared in front of them was arge and expansive world with no end in sight. Even the sun hanging in the sky above them looked the same as the one they had seen outside the mystic realm. Making them doubt whether they were still inside a mystic realm.


    ROOOOOAAARRR-! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    However, this onlysted for a moment before the loud roaring sound of demon beast echoed out in the distance.


    "Indeed, a mystic realm is filled with demon beast, just like master told us¡­ And from the looks of it, they are far stronger than the few Foundation Establishment Realm and Qi Condensation Realm demon beast we encountered so far¡­" Letting out a sigh filled with amazement as she said this, Qing Yi could not help feeling a sense of awe when looking at the massive forest that covered most of what they could see of the mystic realm.


    "Yeah¡­ It looks like we will have to be more careful from now on. Not to mention stronger, I already sensed a demon beast above the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm not too far away from our current location!" Nodding his head in agreement with what Qing Yi said, Chu Yang pointed towards arge snake demon beastzily sleeping on a stone no more than a few hundred meters away from their current location.


    "Ah¡­ Indeed, it looks like we will have to be far more carful from now on¡­" Seeing the snake demon beast Chu Yang pointed towards, Qing Yi could not help feeling shocked that such a powerful demon beast was right next to them.


    "Yes¡­ From now on, our exploration of the mystic realm will truly begin!" Smiling excitedly as he said this, Chu Yang didn''t bother waiting for Qing Yi-


    Swish-!


    "Ah! Wait up!"


    As he directly dashed towards the snake demon beast.

 Chapter 882 Reaching The Bottom

    Unaware of the fact that his two disciples had just engaged in their first real battle inside the mystic realm against a snake demon beast in the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao had all his attention focused on the pitch-ck darkness below him as he slowly descended down the mysterious hole. Not daring to go too fast because of his limited ability to see what was in front of him with his divine sense.


    Other than this, there was also the simple that he did not want to identally enter some kind of trapping formation like the first time he had carelessly wandered around the Main Star Peak¡­


    Whoosh-!


    Continuing down the hole for what felt like hours, Xuan Hao soon came to an abrupt stop.


    "Looks like I finally reached the bottom¡­" Looking at the ground that was no more than half a meter away from him, Xuan Hao did not immediatelynd on the ground. Instead deciding to first examine it and make sure there wasn''t any sort of hidden formation or powerful demon beast lurking just around the corner.


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, his divine sense was still severely restricted by the weird power that seemed to permeate throughout the small underground space that he now found himself inside of¡­ And after trying to search for any possible threats that might be lurking around the corner, he quickly discovered that the restriction on his divine sense had be far stronger now that he had reached the bottom of the hole.


    If he could still cover a distance of around 10 to 20 meters before, his divine sense had now been restricted down to around 5 meters. Making it far harder for him to react in case he was attacked.


    As for using his dao domain to search through his surroundings?


    Xuan Hao had already tried doing this but found out that it had been simrly limited like his divine sense¡­


    With this in mind, he could only slowly move around the small underground space that he now found himself inside of, as he tried his best to try and figure out what it was that had even caused the restriction on his divine sense and domain in the first ce.


    It was just at this moment while looking through his surroundings, that Xuan Hao suddenly discovered that the ground below him was covered in some sort of weird purplish substance-


    "Wait! Isn''t this purplish ground rted to the Dao of Corruption!?" Not able to stop himself from eximing loudly after realizing this, Xuan Hao began examining the purplish colored ground below him in more detail before making sure that it was indeed simr to the ground, he had seen during his other encounters with the Dao of Corruption so far.


    The only clear difference between this time and the other times was that he could not feel the presence of the Dao of Corruption.


    Hm? Maybe if I use my domain through the bit of the Dao of Corruption that I haveprehended so far, I might be able to use it without it getting restricted by the weird power restricting my domain and divine sense at the moment. Even if my domain will be far weaker, it should at the very least allow me to get a proper look at my surroundings and figure out where the weird restrictive power ising from. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Suddenly realizing that he might be able to use his littleprehension of the Dao of Corruption for the first time, Xuan Hao did not waste a single second before spreading out his domain only by using the power stemming from the Dao of Corruption.


    Whoosh~!


    As his domain began spreading out, Xuan Hao was excited to discover that the restrictive power did not affect his domain now that it only had the presence of the Dao of Corruption in it.


    Other than feeling relieved at the fact that he would now get a chance to properly investigate his surroundings, Xuan Hao also felt a sense of unease at the fact that the restrictive power ignored his domain after it only carried the presence of the Dao of Corruption, as this made it rather obvious that the restrictive power hade from something rted to the Dao of Corruption¡­ And from what he had learnt about the Dao of Corruption so far, Xuan Hao did not feel the slightest bit excited about this new knowledge.


    "What is that¡­?"


    Just at this moment, Xuan Hao realized that there was something only a short distance from him. To be more precise, the thing in question was a ratherrge corpse of what he thought to be some sort ofrge demon beast.


    Observing it more closely, Xuan Hao discovered that it had a faint and almost impossible to detect presence, belonging to the Dao of Corruption. Meaning that when it had been alive, the demon beast should haveprehended the Dao of Corruption. Not too different from the giant squid-like demon beast he had encountered inside the ruins of the ancient sect located next to the Great Poison Swamp.


    The only clear difference between the two demon beast corpses being the fact that therge squid-like demon beast the size of a small mountain, was obviously far stronger than the dead demon beast in front of him now.


    At the very least, he could to some degree estimate the strength of the dead demon beast in front of him now to be somewhere around theter stages of the Soul Ascension Realm, while he had absolutely no idea how strong the squid-like demon beast was. Only understanding that it should have far surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Hm? Is it just me, or is there something hidden beneath the dead body of the demon beast?"


    Just at this moment, as he was analyzing the dead body of the demon beast, Xuan Hao realized that there was something hidden beneath the body of the demon beast.


    Looking closer, it did not take long before he realized that the thing hidden beneath the dead demon beast was a small door that looked like nothing out of the ordinary.


    Of course, that was only considering that the seemingly ordinary door was ced in the door frame of a normal mortal house. Not below the corpse of a powerful demon beast that had reached theter stages of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that it to some extent looked like the demon beast had died trying to ensure that the door stayed closed. Even going as far as throwing its own body on top of it!


    Is it a fixed spatial passage leader to somewhere? Maybe the entrance to an ancient secret realm?


    Feeling his head filling out with all sorts of thoughts as he began wondering what the door might be, Xuan Hao slowly began approaching the dead body of the demon beast that blocked him from examining the door in detail.


    Thump-!


    Using his domain to push aside the dead body of the demon beast after ensuring that it was indeed dead and not just pretending to take him by surprise, Xuan Hao began closely examining the ordinary looking door.


    It was only after doing this that Xuan Hao realized that the ordinary looking door was not made from ordinary wood but had instead been made from some kind of spiritual wood that he had never seen or heard of before. Not only that, but there were also a few small and almost impossible to spot carvings of small birds all around the edge of the door, with what should have been the centerpiece in the middle of the door missing.


    Outside of this, Xuan Hao also found out that the door was indeed some sort of spatial passage like he had first expected! The Restrictive power he could feel limiting his divine sense also came from behind the door¡­


    Now¡­ The only question that remained¡­ Was where the spatial passage led to!


    Would it be somewhere different on the Ewaria Continent or maybe a secret realm? No matter what it was, it would without a doubt be dangerous to enter the door and pass through the spatial passage.


    After all, he had no idea if there might be a powerful demon beast like the one nowying dead on the ground beside him on the other side. Not to mention, there was always the chance of the other side of the spatial passage having degraded to the degree that entering the spatial passage would just end up sending him to somewhere random on the Ewaria Continent.


    At that point in time, it would be no different from him using the talisman that the system had given to him¡­


    "Hm? Ipleted the new main quest!?" Just as he was wondering what to do next, the system panel suddenly appeared in front of him. Alerting him to the fact that he had already found out what the hole in the ground was hiding.

 Chapter 883 Ancient Battlefield

    Feeling curious about what the notes would look like after they had been organized, Xuan Hao directly redeemed the reward from the system, causing the book containing the Sky Watcher''s notes inside his interspatial ring to be covered by a golden light for a few seconds before returning to normal again like nothing had happened.


    Did the notes really get organized¡­?


    Not knowing whether the notes had been sorted by the golden light or not, Xuan Hao could not help taking the small book out of his interspatial ring before starting to look through it.


    "This- Is this really the same notes as the ones from earlier!?"


    However, the moment he opened the book again, Xuan Hao could not help showing a shocked expression on his face, as he discovered that the content of the book had beenpletely changed.


    If what he had seen before was a disorganized mess with different notes jumbled together that would have been impossible to understand without months of hard work organizing them and making sure what was what, it was now fully organized and easier to understand.


    Even if the notes themselves were still incredibly difficult and hard toprehend, he would at the very least be capable of starting to understand them now. Although¡­ Given how difficult it was to even understand the first page, it looked like it would still have to be something that had to wait until he returned to sect again-


    Whoosh~!


    However, before he could even think about leaving behind the weird and mysterious door, the system showed up with a brand-new main quest¡­


    [Main Quest: Pass through the mysterious door, Part 1]


    [Description: You see a mysterious door in front of you that might lead to somewhere filled with danger. Pass through it and find out just how dangerous it is on the other side.]


    [Reward: Unlock next part of the quest]


    Looking at the new main quest that had appeared in front of him at some unknown period of time, Xuan Hao slowly returned the book containing the Sky Watcher''s notes to his interspatial ring before turning to look towards the mysterious door leading to somewhere unknown.


    Even if it had not been obvious before, the new main quest pretty much gave away the fact that the system had wanted him to enter the hole and go through the mysterious door from the start!


    As for why the system wanted this¡­ Xuan Hao could only think that it should be rted to him encountering a really talented potential disciple or something that would help him increase the strength of his disciples. No matter what it was, Xuan Hao at least felt a bit more confident about going through the mysterious door.


    At least he didn''t think he didn''t think that the system would issue him a quest that would kill him the moment he passed through the door. Even if he did find out that it was far more dangerous than he could handle with his current strength, he should be more than capable of escaping back through the spatial corridor that the door in front of him was connected to and return at ater time. Simr to what he had done when he realized that the remnant soul hiding inside the temple had been far too strong for him to handle back then.


    Swish~


    Deciding to take the risk and check out what was on the other side of the mysterious door, Xuan Hao stepped forward and opened the door before stepping through it. Entering the spatial corridor that had been created between it and somewhere unknown.


    ¡­


    As the sun dipped below the horizon in an unknown location far away from the Shattered Star Peaks, a spatial distortion appeared in the air, and a rippling corridor materialized.


    Stepping out of the corridor, Xuan Hao appeared as he hovered in the air just outside the spatial corridor before starting to use his power to stabilize the spatial corridor. Ensuring that it wouldn''t just suddenly copse and close out his only path of escape.


    Whoosh-!


    As the spatial corridor was locked in ce for at least the next few days, Xuan Hao began to survey the destendscape that spread out all around him-


    "Hm? An ancient battlefield¡­? N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Not having to take more than a simple look to notice the remnants of a terrifying battle from the past that stretched out in all directions around him. The air itself was still crackling with residual energy that had been left behind during the battle. Allowing Xuan Hao to understand just how powerful the people who had participated in the battle had been, with the weakest energy having reached the Domain Lord Realm and the strongest having reached the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Then again, he was still on the outer edges of the battlefield at the moment, if he entered the core of the battlefield where the most powerful experts would have fought each other, he didn''t doubt that there would be residual energy left behind by experts above the Soul Ascension Realm present!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help remembering the ancient battle he had once seen through the golden book from his trip through the Thousand Wind Mountain. Maybe the battlefield he was on at the moment was the same as the one he had seen back then. If not, there might still be a chance it was a battlefield that had been rted to the conflict that had taken ce back then¡­


    Feeling that the possibility of this being rather high, Xuan Hao could not help examining his surroundings more closely than before. Looking for any clue that might point towards the ancient battlefield, he now found himself on, being rted to the battlefield he had seen through the golden book.


    The oncerge and serene forest that should have covered the ce in the past before the battle, had been reduced to nothing more than a wastnd. Only a few parts of ancient spirit trees leaving behind traces of the once great forest that had existed where there was now only a wastnd. Everything else rted to the natural terrain of the ancient battlefield having beenpletely destroyed during the battle back then.


    Scattered throughout the ancient battlefield, Xuan Hao could also see the remnants of shattered weapons and armor, half-buried in the earth or draped over the skeletal remains of fallen cultivators who had once participated in the ancient battle. The metallic gleam of the now useless broken artifacts, silently passing on the feelings of despair that their owners had felt in theirst moments before ultimately falling.


    "¡­"


    As his gaze swept over the decimatedndscape and remains of the once powerful cultivators that had once fought there, Xuan Hao felt his heart filling with a mixture of awe and trepidation. The aftermath of the battle that had take ce around him was simply not something he couldprehend with his current strength and understanding of the world¡­ But even then, he still understood that the battle should have had some kind of great importance for the world. Having left its own unique mark upon history.


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, he still couldn''t determine whether the battlefield really was the one he had seen back then or not. No matter what it was, he still prepared himself for the challenges thaty ahead, as he got reader to unravel the secret concealed within this ancient battlefield and perhaps uncover some more information about what had happened in the past. Maybe even uncovering some forgotten treasures in the process¡­


    As for why he had decided to enter the ancient battlefield and explore it¡­ That was because it would be a good opportunity for him to try and learn from some of the remnant power left behind by the powerful experts that had once fought in this ce.


    More importantly than this, he did not find anything dangerous that could threaten him, and the system had once again appeared to issue the next part of the main quest just after he had passed through the spatial corridor and reached the ancient battlefield.


    [Main Quest: Explore the Core of the Ancient Battlefield, Part 2]


    [Description: Explore the Core of the Ancient Battlefield and find out what secrets are hiding there.]


    [Reward: Strengthen Dao Domain]


    To be honest, with the new main quest reward being a direct increase in strength, Xuan Hao really did not want to give up on it if he had a chance toplete it. Especially considering how long it had been since he had actually gotten a direct increase in strength as a reward from the system.


    While a part of him had thought he would not get any more direct increase in strength with his cultivation realm having reached the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it looked like that had been a needless worry.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao began making his way towards the core of the ancient battlefield.

 Chapter 884 Remnants Of Powerful Experts

    ?


    Travelling through the ancient battlefield, Xuan Hao also felt that the restrictive power had grown stronger and had started to forcibly supress his power. Luckily it did not take him long before he discovered that he could use the Dao of Corruption to negate this suppression.


    The only problem was that it would be harder to negate the stronger the suppression grew. Although he could keep it from affecting his strength for now, he also understood that if the restrictive power continued to grow stronger, he would not be able to stop it from negatively affecting his strength!


    At the very least, the ancient battlefield was devoid of life, and he didn''t have to worry about having to fight any demon beasts. The only real thing he had to look out for so far, was the remnant energy left behind by the powerful cultivators who had once fought on the ancient battlefield.


    The remnant energy left behind by a Domain Lord Realm Expert or Soul Ascension Realm Expert might not be so threatening given how much they had weakened over the years and the fact that he was in the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­ But the same could not be said about the remnant energy belonging to cultivators above the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Although he had only encountered the remnant energy of cultivators above the Soul Ascension Realm twice so far and it had been far away from him and hadn''t really posed any threat, Xuan Hao still managed to feel just how terrifying the power still left after thousands upon thousands of years had passed.


    Even if his strength was above that of a normal Soul Ascension Realm Expert, he still understood that he would stand no chance of resisting that remnant energy. The most he would be able to do if it targeted him, was try his best to escape as fast as possible¡­


    "Hm? That is-!?"


    Lost in his own thoughts as he was slowly making his way towards the core of the ancient battlefield, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on the spot as he suddenly noticed a figure moving in the distance. Not daring to move a single muscle as he inspected the lone figure moving in the distance.


    "Another phantom!?" Not able to stop a shiver from running down his spine as he realized that the lone figure in the distance was a phantom like the one belonging to the demonic cultivator he had encountered in the temple, Xuan Hao tensed up as he prepared to escape back towards the spatial corridor in case the phantom started moving in his direction.


    "It''s not doing anything¡­?"


    However, after noticing that the phantom didn''t do anything over the next five minutes and just wandered around aimlessly without any clear goal in mind, Xuan Hao began rxing his expression as his earlier fear of possibly encountering another life and death situation, turned into one filled with curiosity.


    Given that his knowledge about these kinds of phantoms formed by remnant souls of powerful experts was extremely limited, Xuan Hao wanted to know more about them. Not only because it would help hime up with ways to fight them, but also because it might give clues as to what the realm above the Soul Ascension Realm was and maybe even help him in reaching that realm.


    After all, the only thing he understood about the phantoms, was the fact that they had been constructed by the remnant souls of a powerful experts above the Soul Ascension Realm. Other than this, he had no idea them.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao could not stop himself as he slowly approached the phantom aimlessly wandering around not more than a few thousand meters away from where he was standing. Making sure that he didn''t approach too fast as he still wanted to be able to escape in case the phantom suddenly decided to attack him.


    ROOOOAR-!


    Just at this moment as Xuan Hao had managed to get within a hundred meters of the phantom aimlessly moving around in front of him, a loud roar echoed through the ancient battlefield. Shattering the silence that had been ever-present before.


    "What in the world is that¡­" Turning towards the origin of the loud roar, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he had clearly felt the terrifying power behind the roar not being the slightest bit inferior to the phantom, he had been slowly approaching in the hope of learning more about it.


    Not only this, but when Xuan Hao turned to look towards the phantom, he discovered that the roar had caused it to simrly stop and turn to look in the direction that the roar hade from. The only difference was that instead of the slight fear present in his own eyes at the possibility of encountering an opponent above the Soul Ascension Realm, the only thing present in the eyes of the phantom was a deep and terrifying killing intent.


    "This is¡­ Looks like I have to get out of here before the owner of the roar from earlier shows up¡­" Discovering the look in the eyes of the phantom while also feeling a terrifying aura rapidly approaching his current location, Xuan Hao understood that it would be best of him to leave the ce before the phantom and the owner of the roar started fighting with each other¡­ And given that the owner of the roar appeared from the outer part of the ancient battlefield, Xuan Hao could only proceed deeper inside the ancient battlefield as he doubted the owner of the roar would leave him alone like the phantom had done.


    Not to mention, the roar had clearlye from a demon beast. Meaning that he would soon see the first real living being ever since stepping foot on the ancient battlefield, something that both excited and terrified him at the same time, as it would mean he would have to be far more careful when exploring the deeper part of the ancient battlefield where some of these powerful demon beast might have decided to set up nest due to the higher concentration of qi on the ancient battlefield, that only increased the closer to the core one got.


    ¡­


    "This should be far enough away¡­" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Having made it on to a small hill that had been cut in half by a giant sword whose remains still littered the ground around the hill, Xuan Hao came to a stop before turning to look back towards the phantom that remained frozen on the spot while staring in the opposite direction of him filled with killing intent.


    ROOOOAR-!


    Not a secondter, arge demon beast the size of the small hill he was standing on top of, came charging towards the phantom filled with killing intent.


    "Another phantom¡­?" However, when he saw the demon beast, Xuan Hao discovered that it was also a phantom and not a real living demon beast like he had expected after hearing the loud roar earlier.


    Swish-!


    Not wasting a single second after spotting the phantom demon beast, the humanoid demon beast that had been standing silently ever since hearing the roar charged forward as an almost invisible weapon made from pure energy manifested in its hands.


    BOOOM-!


    Following this, the two phantoms, one humanoid and one demon beast violently shed with each other, causing even Xuan Hao standing far away to get forced down to the ground by the terrifying shockwave created from the two shing with each other!


    How powerful¡­ And to think this is only the power left behind by a small remnant soul¡­


    Watching as the two fought with each other, Xuan Hao could not help feeling amazed once again over just how powerful those above the Soul Ascension Realm were. Even if he had yet to meet a single person that was still alive and above the Soul Ascension Realm, the little interaction he had with the remnant souls of these powerful experts was more than enough to understand that he still had a long way to go if he wanted to be strong enough to keep himself and his sect safe in the future.


    At least by observing the two phantoms fighting with each other, Xuan Hao managed to gain a deeper understanding of the power of someone above the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, the battle did notst for long, as the two phantoms ended up exhausting what little energy they had-


    Whoosh-!


    Resulting in both of them losing their form and turning into clouds of energy that soon faded away like they had never been there in the first ce. Only leaving behind the aftermath of their fight as a testament to what had happened.


    In the end, Xuan Hao could only watch as everything on the ancient battlefield grew quiet once again. The only change to the battlefield being a few more battle scars that would end up indistinguishable from the rest of the battlefield in another few years.

 Chapter 885 Core Of The Ancient Battlefield

    Continuing to move deeper into the ancient battlefield, more and more phantoms began appearing. Even the more aggressive kind that started fighting with other phantoms started to be moremon. Not only limited to phantoms of demon beasts, but also started to include human shaped ones.


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, it looked like the aggressive phantoms were far too busy fighting with the non-aggressive phantoms to care about him. Allowing him to travel through the ancient battlefield rtively easily by avoiding the locations where the phantoms were fighting.


    During this time, he also managed to gain a better understanding of the phantom fighting with each other. Realizing that the non-aggressive side that would ignore him even if he walked right next to them belonged to one of the sides who had participated in the battle that had taken ce on the ancient battlefield in the past, while the aggressive phantoms made up from both demon beasts and human like figures belonged to the other side.


    Other than this, he also found out that the aggressive phantoms were far more numerous whenpared to the non-aggressive ones, who in turn were stronger than the aggressive phantoms on average. Making the overall fight between the different phantoms equal and without a clear winner. Resulting in every single battle he had witnessed so far ending with both parties exhausting their strength and dissipating into a cloud of energy that soon disappeared from the ancient battlefield.


    However, after having seen this happen over a dozen times, Xuan Hao realized that the phantoms didn''t die after this and instead seemed to hide away in some unknown location to recover the energy they had lost beforeing out to fight again in future. Repeating the cycle of fighting, recovering and going back to fighting over and over again.


    Thinking about it, this constant cycle of fighting was most likely the main thing that had prevented the ancient forest that had once covered the ancient battlefield from recovering again. Ensuring that only a few trees were able to stand around the outer edge of the ancient battlefield where the fighting didn''t take ce as often as the deeper parts of the ancient battlefield where most of the powerful experts had perished in the past.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Just at this moment, the familiar sound of fighting sounded out from behind him, causing Xuan Hao to turn around-


    BOOOOM-!


    However different from the fight between two phantoms that he had imagined, he was instead met with the sight of two massive demon beast phantoms overwhelming one of the non-aggressive phantoms. Destroying it through one of the demon beast phantoms sacrificing itself to let itspanionnd a deadly blow on the non-aggressive phantom. Leaving behind one of the two demon beast phantoms that soon turned around and looked directly at Xuan Hao who had watched the entire ordeal y out filled with killing intent.


    This¡­ Looks like it''s time for me to leave¡­


    Whoosh-!


    Understanding very well that he stood no chance against the phantom demon beast even when it had been significantly weakened, Xuan Hao didn''t waste a single second before turning around and escaping.


    ROOOOAR-!


    Roaring loudly filled with killing intent after seeing that Xuan Hao had decided to escape, the demon beast didn''t waste a single second before it used all of its power to chase after the escaping Xuan Hao. Showing no care for the fact that it was rapidly using up what little energy it had left. Only caring about catching up to Xuan Hao as quickly as possible so it could kill him.


    Swish-!


    As it caught up to Xuan Hao in less than a second, it gathered all of its remaining power into itsrge ws the size of normal human before swiping down towards him in a simple yet powerful attack. The power of the attack instantly locking on to him, while at the same time sealing the space all around him. Preventing him from dodging the attack and forcing him to face it head on.


    This damnable demon beast¡­ Is it trying to use all of its remaining energy tounch a final all-out attack to kill me before dissipating!?


    Cursing silently to himself as he saw this, Xuan Hao gathered the power of his dao domain in an attempt to resist the ws heading down towards him-


    WHOOSH-!


    "Ah!? My Domain!?"


    Just at this moment, he was rudely reminded of the fact that his dao domain was useless on the ancient battlefield, being forcibly suppressed the moment he attempted to use it to defend himself from the deadly attack of the phantom demon beast. Leaving him only capable of using the Dao of Corruption to defend himself against the attack¡­ Something that would not end up well considering that even with his full strength, his chances of surviving would still be abysmal. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Crack~!


    And as he expected, the w attack of the phantom demon beast managed to almost instantly destroy the meager defenses he had formed with the Dao of Corruption. Leaving his only hope of survival up to the phoenix imprint-


    BANG-!


    However, just before the ws of the demon beast managed to hit him, a simple spear appeared out of nowhere and directly blocked the w of the phantom demon beast before turning to stab straight through it.


    ROAR!?


    Killing it on the spot within the next instant¡­ Or at least making it forcefully dissipate for now.


    "Huh?"


    Leaving Xuan Hao in a state of bewilderment over what had just taken ce. Only capable of staring towards the small cloud of energy representing the phantom demon beast slowly disappearing.


    Swish-!


    Not waiting for him to respond, the phantom charged into the distance where another demon beast phantom had appeared.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Soon enough, the sound of fighting could be heard from the distance, as the phantom with the spear shed with the demon beast phantom.


    I should just continue to move deeper inside the ancient battlefield and finish the main quest before leaving this ce¡­


    Not knowing what to say, Xuan Hao decided not to think about it as he just turned around and continued making his way towards the center of the ancient battlefield, while also deciding to not carelessly approach the phantoms. Instead deciding to get as far away as possible if he spotted any of the aggressive phantoms. No longer feeling as excited as before about learning more about them¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Like this, Xuan Hao slowly continued moving deeper and deeper into the ancient battlefield. Finding the phantoms appearing more often and stronger than before, while at the same time also feeling the suppression from the restrictive power starting to affect his strength and in turn also the speed that he could travel.


    In the end, Xuan Hao was just about to give up and make his way back towards the spatial corridor, when he suddenly spotted something different from the war-ravaged terrain appearing on the ancient battlefield.


    In the middle of a crater spanning close to a dozen kilometers, arge construct easily the size of a small mountain wasying down in the middle of therge crater. Almost like it had entered a state of deep sleep or simply just run out of energy to continue operating¡­ But what was even more shocking than this, was that the origin of the strange restrictive power seemed to originate from somewhere inside the colossal construct!


    "Look like I won''t have to turn around and leave the main quest for ater time!" Smiling to himself as he said this, Xuan Hao entered the massive crater before slowly starting to make his way towards the colossal construct.


    In the process, he didn''t notice that the phantoms that had almost always been visible and fighting around him hadpletely disappeared from sight at this point in time. The few that could still be heard fighting in the distance were all far away from therge crater, with none of them getting within a certain distance of the crater itself.


    ¡­


    "This thing is really amazing¡­ Really leaves one wondering just how powerful this thing was back when it fought, was it in the realm above the Soul Ascension Realm or maybe even stronger than that? How powerful would someone have to be to have the ability to create something like this?"


    Arriving at the foot of the colossal construct, Xuan Hao could not help whispering this to himself with a look of awe on his face. Feeling a sense of admiration towards the person who had managed to build the colossal construct in the past. Feeling that the person should have reached a realm far beyond his current understanding.


    Standing around and observing the construct for a few minutes to try andprehend some of the intricate inscriptions still visible on it, Xuan Hao could only give up after realizing that he had no way to understand any of the inscriptions left on it.


    Turning his attention away from the feet of the construct and instead focusing his attention on the rest of its massive body. Trying to search for a way inside.

 Chapter 886 Head Of The Construct And Oversized Chicken

    ?


    Moving along the massive body of the construct in search of a way inside of it, Xuan Hao was left speechless over just how little it had been damaged. Even the inevitable decay caused by the passage of time had not done much to the colossal construct, a testament to the powerful materials that had been used in its construction.


    As he continued moving along the side of the massive construct and got closer to the ce where the head was located, Xuan Hao soon noticed that the ground beneath him had changed to a familiar purplish colour. Indicating that there was something rted to the Dao of Corruption nearby.


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao became more cautious than before, as he approached the ce where the head of the construct was located. Making sure to also keep an eye on the ground beneath him to track if he was getting closer or further away from the thing that had caused the ground to be corrupted.


    Reaching the ce where the head of the construct was located walking like this for a little over 10 minutes, Xuan Hao could not help being taken aback by what he saw.


    Not only was there a massive hole in the head of the construct, but the Dao of Corruption had affected the area around the hole in the head to such a degree that some kind of weird tentacle like nts had started growing around the hole itself. Almost instantly reminding him of the ones he had seen during the time he hadprehended the Dao of Corruption.


    "Hm? My strength is getting weaker the closer I am to the hole in the head of the construct?!" As he was inspecting the massive hole in the head of the construct while unconsciously moving closer to it at the same time, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed that the strength he could use had begun to rapidly decrease. Even using the Dao of Corruption became harder, let alone the rest of the things he hadprehended¡­


    Understanding that his strength would soon be reduced to a level simr to a Nascent Soul Realm Expert due to the restrictive power, Xuan hao stopped approaching the hole in the head of the construct. Instead deciding to observe it from a distance to avoid any dangers he might encounter if he ended up getting attacked by a phantom demon beast while his strength was only at the level of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    Hm¡­ From the looks of it, if I want toplete the main quest given by the system and find out what the origin of the restrictive power is, I will have to enter the construct¡­ But given the power of the restrictive power, I won''t be able to protect myself if I end up encountering any danger inside. Even escaping would be close to impossible and I would only be able to rely on the feather imprint saving me.


    Then again, even if I had my full strength, I doubt I would be able to do much if I really ended up encountering a phantom demon beast inside the construct¡­


    Lost in thought as he thought about whether to enter the construct or leave it be for the future, Xuan Hao realized that the feather imprint, was only thing he would be able to rely on for safety. Even if he did not get weakened by the restrictive power, he would stand no chance against the powerful phantom demon beasts in a fight.


    Standing silently in front of the head of the construct the size of a mountain for what felt like hours, Xuan Hao finally narrowed his eyes looking into the hole in the head of the construct and the weird nts of the Dao of Corruption that covered everything inside. Making it hard for him to see more than a dozen meters inside the hole itself. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao had just reached the construct located in the middle of the giant crater at the center of the ancient battlefield, Chu Yang and Qing Yi were both running through a dense forest, arge demon beast in the shape of an oversized chicken chasing after them from behind.


    The demon beast in question was a powerful demon beast that had reached the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and even if it just looked like an oversized chicken, it was terrifying enough to even contend against Ninth Stage Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts. The only demerit it had being its speed only being slightly better than that of a normal Nascent Soul Realm Expert in the earlier stages of the realm.


    In turn, this was what had allowed Chu Yang and Qing Yi to escape from the demon beast so far.


    As for how they had ended up being chased by such a powerful demon beast in the first ce-


    "I told you not to randomly attack demon beasts without knowing how strong they are! Why did you have to go and attack that chicken when its clearly far stronger than you!?"


    "Wha- There is no way I''m weaker than that oversized chicken!"


    The reason was none other than Chu Yang, who had mistakenly challenged the oversized chicken demon beast. Having believed it would be weak and easy to deal with. In the end, he had beaten up by it without a chance to fight back and had only barely managed to escape with his life before finding Qing Yi, who had been searching for spiritual herbs not too far away¡­ Thus, resulting in their current situation of escaping through the forest with an oversized chicken chasing after them from behind.


    "If you didn''t lose to that chicken that is really the case, why don''t you turn around and face it?!" Rolling her eyes after hearing Chu Yang''s response, Qing Yi pointed back towards the chicken as she said this. Given him every opportunity in the world to prove that he was not weaker than the oversized chicken.


    "This- I happen to have had an ident during the fight earlier and can''t fight it at the moment!" Unable to answer for a short moment as a hint of fear appeared on his face after recalling how he had been beaten up just a few minutes earlier, Chu Yang quickly came up with an excuse as to why fighting with the chicken at the moment was impossible.


    "You- Haaa¡­ Let''s just get out of here before it catches up to us¡­" Knowing very well that Chu Yang didn''t want to admit defeat to the oversized chicken, Qing Yi decided to not pursue the matter any longer and instead focusing on trying to find a way to escape the oversized chicken.


    All things considered, she understood that Chu Yang did not mean to provoke a demon beast much stronger than himself and in turn cause it to chase after both of them.


    "Indeed, we should look for a way to escape for now. After that, we should look for an opportunity to kill off this oversized chicken!"


    "¡­"


    Not even bothering to say anything upon hearing what Chu Yang said, Qing Yi just let out a silent sigh as shemented over the fact that she was not strong enough to explore the mystic realm by herself.


    Over the past few days, other than the few times Chu Yang had caused trouble by idently attacking a powerful demon beast that they had no ability to deal with, like now, she had learnt just how good it was to adventure together with someone that could help in finding spiritual herbs, fight demon beast that would be too strong for her to deal with on her own and most importantly, guard her when she was recovering from a battle!


    If she truly had to explore the mystic realm by herself, she doubted she would be able tost for more than a day or two inside of it. Making her understand why their master had told them to explore the mystic realm together instead of letting them explore it by themselves.


    Like Qing Yi, Chu Yang was also grateful that he had Qing Yi around while exploring the mystic realm. Although the reason why he was happy about her presence differed from Qing Yi.


    The main difference being the sheer wealth of knowledge regarding spiritual herbs she had. If not for her being around, Chu Yang didn''t doubt that he would have ended up walking past several precious spiritual herbs that would be hard toe by outside of the mystic realm.


    Outside of this, the most important reason why he was happy to have Qing Yi around, was that she helped him escape whenever he ended up idently offending a demon beast that was too powerful for him to fight with his current strength-


    "Follow me, we will hide in here, the chicken is far toorge to follow after us!"


    Just like now, where she found a small opening in a cliff appearing in front of them.


    Cluck Cluck!


    Allowing both of them to squeeze inside and escape from the oversized chicken demon beast.

 Chapter 887 Dangerous Chicken~

    "That was a close call¡­"


    Watching as the oversized chicken tried to squeeze in through the opening in the cliff to no avail, Chu Yang could not help letting out a sigh of relief. Understanding that they should be safe inside the small opening of the cliff for now.


    Rustle~


    However, just at this moment, a distinct sound of something moving could be heard from behind them, causing both Qing Yi and Chu Yang to turn away from the oversized chicken trying to force its way through the gap in the cliff and instead turn towards the source of the sound they had just heard.


    "This- I-I think it will be better for us to leave this ce and fight with the chicken¡­" Turning around to see what had caused the sound, Qing Yi did her best to stop herself from shivering as she said this with a fearful expression on her face.


    "Indeed¡­ I think its best for us to face the chicken¡­" Not disagreeing with Qing Yi''s proposal to leave the ce and face off against the Eighth Stage Nascent Soul Realm demon beast in the shape of a giant chicken, Chu Yang didn''t have to say anything more-


    Swish-!


    As Qing Yi directly used her movement technique to slide below the head of the oversized chicken that had gotten itself stuck enough that it didn''t have time to stop her.


    "Ah! Wait for me!"


    Swish!


    Realizing that Qing Yi had already escaped, Chu Yang didn''t waste a single second before simrly sliding under the head of the oversized chicken before starting to escape from the cliff together with Qing Yi. Not one of them daring to slow down in the slightest during the entire process. Having been too scared by what they had seen hidden inside the small crevices of the cliff.


    Cluck?


    Not knowing why its prey had suddenly escaped from the rtively safe ce inside the cliff, the oversized chicken could not help letting out a confused clucking sound as it wondered what exactly had caused them to do something so dumb. After all, it was a Nascent Soul Realm demon beast and was far smarter than a normal animal. Understanding very well that the two stood less of a chance of surviving outside the hole, as it would be able to catch up to them eventually.


    Rustle~


    It was just at this moment, as the oversized chicken was about to pull out its head to chase after Chu Yang and Qing Yi, that the rustling sound that had ended up causing them to escape in the first case, could be heard by the oversized chicken.


    Cluck¡­? CLUUUCK!


    Turning to look in the direction of the rustling sound, the oversized chicken had a confused expression on its face at first before suddenly starting to violently thrash around to get its head loose from the cliff opening.


    The reason for this was simple, as in front of it, close to a hundred spiders the size of human heads were slowly making their way towards it. Each of them having at least reached the Core Formation Realm, while the stronger ones among them had reached the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Even if they were weaker than the oversized chicken, the chicken understood very well that it stood no chance when facing such arge number of spiders. Especially so if its head remained stuck and they were allowed to attack it without it having a chance to fight back.


    Crack-


    BANG!


    Manging to free itself just before the spiders could reach it, the oversized chicken didn''t waste a single second before escaping. Only now understanding why Qing Yi and Chu Yang left without attacking it while it waspletely defenceless.


    No matter how much dumber the chicken waspared to a normal human, it was obvious that they wanted to use it as bait for the spiders!


    CLUCK-!


    Realizing this, the oversized chicken let out an angry clucking sound before changing its escape direction to be the same as Qing Yi and Chu Yang.


    Even if it had been used as bait by others, there was no way it was going to just allow them to get away for free, it would make sure that they would have to deal with the spiders themselves!


    ¡­


    "This should be good enough¡­ That oversized chicken should have discovered the spiders and escaped with them following behind¡­" Coming to a stop beside argeke located in the middle of arge opening in the forest, Chu Yang grinned happily at the fact that they had managed to escape from two dangerous situation that could have easily killed them if they were not careful.


    "Indeed¡­ But we should still stay moving just in case the chicken decide to chase after us together with the spiders!" Not feeling as rxed as Chu Yang about their current situation, Qing Yi could not help saying this before getting ready to continue escaping.


    "Rx, What''s the worst that could happen? Let''s stay here for a few minutes and recover before continuing to escape-"


    RUMBLE-!


    Just as Chu Yang waved for Qing Yi toe and sit down to recover from all the running they had done over the past few hours, a loud rumbling sounded out from the outer edge of the opening that they had juste from-


    CLUCK CLUUUUCK!


    Not a secondter, the angry clucking sound of the oversized chicken could be heard before the chicken in question crashed through the trees at the edge of the opening!


    "This- Run!"


    Understanding what the appearance of the oversized chicken signified, Qing Yi pulled Chu Yang up from the ground before escaping in the opposite direction of the oversized chicken, causing Chu Yang who was momentarily left in a stunned state by the sudden appearance of the oversized chicken, to start running on his own instead of getting carried by Qing Yi.


    Rustle~!


    Only a few seconds after the oversized chicken''s appearance, what looked like a ck wave made up of spiders appeared before washing over any of the weaker demon beasts in the Foundation Establishment and Core Formation Realm that happened to be present around theke.


    ROOOOAR!


    To make matters worse, Qing Yi and Chu Yang just barely made it out of the opening in time beforeing face to face with another terrifying demon beast that had reached the Later Stages of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Whoosh~!


    However, ignoring the terrifying demon beast, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang ran straight past it before it had time to react. Leaving the demon beast wondering why the two clearly weaker creatures had not been frozen in fear after seeing it.


    RUMBLE-!


    Unfortunately for the demon beast in the Later Stages of the Nascent Soul Realm, it did not take long before it found the answer to its question, as it saw the oversized chicken getting chased by the spiders numbering in the thousands by now.


    R-Roar!


    Knowing that it would end up dead if it didn''t escape, the demon beast only barely managed to recover from shock in time to run alongside the oversized chicken. Soon causing the two powerful demon beasts to escape beside each other, both growing increasingly frustrated at the fact that the spiders behind them didn''t show any signs of slowing down.


    Even worse, they noticed that as more time passed, more and more spiders seemed to join the ck wave of spiders behind them. Making it more and more scary.


    What might have been even more surprising, was the fact that other than more spiders joining in, there also seemed to be a constant stream of strong demon beast escaping from the ck wave of spiders joining them in escaping.


    ROOOAR!


    ROAR!


    ROOOAR!


    CLUCK!


    In the end, all these demon beasts had one thing inmon¡­ And that was the fact that all of them had ended up encountering Qing Yi and Chu Yang before ending up in their current situation!


    For this reason, all of them hade to a tactic understanding of moving in the same direction that Chu Yang and Qing Yi were escaping in. None of them wanting them to escape. Instead, it would be more urate to say that all the powerful demon beasts hade together with the simple goal of making sure that Qing Yi and Chu Yang ended up dead for causing them to end up in their current situation.


    In the end, the leader of this weird alliance between powerful Nascent Soul Realm demon beast wanting nothing more than to kill Chu Yang and Qing Yi, ended up bing the oversized chicken that had been the first demon beast to chase after the two of them.


    ¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Why are there so many high-level demon beasts!? Can''t we just escape without the constant stream of dangerous demon beasts blocking our path!?" At the same time, Qing Yi and Chu Yang were also struggling, as it was bing increasingly hard for them to run past the demon beast that seemed to block their path more and more often.


    Unkowingly, they had been moving deeper and deeper inside the mystic realm while escaping from the oversized chicken and the spiders...

 Chapter 888 Entering The Body Of The Construct

    ?


    As Chu Yang and Qing Yi were wondering why the number of high-level demon beasts that they were running into were increasing, Xuan Hao was still standing in front of the head of the construct. Inspecting the hole from a distance for any possible signs of dangerous demon beasts that might be lurking inside of it.


    Unfortunately, even if he tried his best to search for any possible signs of demon beasts or other creatures that might be hidden inside the construct, he couldn''t analyze it fully because he couldn''t see more than a dozen or so meters inside the construct because of the weird nts from the Dao of Corruption blocking his line of sight.


    The only thing that gave him some confidence that there wouldn''t be any dangerous demon beasts or other creatures waiting to attack him the moment he entered, was the fact that he had noticed that none of the phantoms or phantom demon beasts that had been fighting all around him had appeared during the time he had been inspecting the construct.


    Since he had always been able to see some of the phantoms either fighting or wandering around aimlessly during his journey to the core of the ancient battlefield, where he was now, it was rather odd that no phantoms had appeared during this period of time. Only the sound of their fighting in the distance could barely be picked up due to his powerful cultivation base.


    "Haaa¡­ Even if I encounter something dangerous, the blue divine energy left inside the feather imprint should still be strong enough to keep my life safe one more time¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while touching the location between his eyebrows where the feather imprint was located, Xuan Hao began to slowly make his way towards the massive hole in the head of the construct in front of him. Not too worried about his own safety, as he had already personally witnessed just how strong the blue divine energy inside his feather imprint was!


    On the other hand, part of him was hoping that he would encounter a dangerous situation that would reduce the amount of blue divine energy inside the feather imprint even further. After all, even if it had saved him once and helped improve his strength, he didn''t feel toofortable knowing that such a powerful energy was inside his body without him having any control over it¡­


    Rustle~


    Stepping inside the head of the construct, Xuan Hao pushed aside some of the weird tentacle like nts before slowly feeling the suppression of the restrictive force reach its limit. Directly rendering his Dao of Corruption useless and no different from any of the other Daos he hadprehended. Making the use of his dao domain impossible.


    At least, his strength did not directly end up falling to the same level as that of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, as the strength of his physical body remained together with the special abilities that came along with his special physique. Allowing his current strength to be somewhere around the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm by only relying on his physical body alone, something that would have been impossible for any other Domain Lord that didn''t have some kind of special physique or divine body.


    Not thinking about this for too long, Xuan Hao began making his way through the weird tentacle like nts that had been blocking his view from outside. Making sure to keep an eye on the weird nts in case they had the ability to attack. Not ruling anything out, as they were still something that had been given birth to through the Dao of Corruption.


    However, in the end, he managed to pass through the weird tentacle like nts without any problems and soon passed through what should have been the throat of the colossal construct before reaching what was the core body of the construct where the stomach, heart and other organs would be located inside a human.


    Of course, considering that he was not inside arge human body, these organs should not be present-


    Thump-! Thump-! Thump-!


    "This- A heart¡­?"


    At least that was what Xuan Hao had expected until he saw a massive heart the size of arge demon beast. Not only that, but the heart was still beating asrge ck veins filled with some sort of purple liquid in the process of being pumped around the body of the construct-


    Wait¡­ ck veins, purple colored liquid¡­


    Suddenly realizing something was off about therge heart located inside the body of the construct, Xuan Hao recovered from his earlier shock before starting to examine the heart in detail. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    The heart that was easily the size of the winged tiger in itsrge form, was pitch ck with arge number of veins containing some sort of purple liquid inside of them¡­ But that was not the most important thing. Instead, it was the fact that he clearly felt that the restrictive power that had suppressed his strength originated from therge ck heart in front of him!


    Looking even closer, he got the feeling that therge ck heart was not originally a part of the colossal construct but was more like some kind of parasite that was trying to take control of the body of the construct that had already been defeated in the battle that had taken ce in past.


    Thinking about it for a bit longer, Xuan Hao could not help looking back towards the direction that he had entered the construct''s body.


    For some reason, he got the feeling the size of the ck heart was around the same size as the hole in the head of the construct. Not to mention, the path from the hole and into the body of the construct from the hole in the head just so happened to end at the location where the ck heart was located¡­ And if that was not enough to determine that the ck heart was not originally a part of the construct, there was also the fact that the ck heart was clear aura belonging to the Dao of Corruption around the ck heart.


    Something odd considering that the construct should have been defeated by an attack using the Dao of Corruption from what little information he had managed to gather from observing the hole in the head of the construct¡­


    RUMBLE-!


    Just at this moment, as Xuan Hao had be certain that the ck heart was indeed not rted to the construct and instead some parasite that should have been ced inside of it in the past during the battle that had taken ce on the ancient battlefield, the space around him began trembling violently, as he suddenly felt himself slipping down towards the ck heart-


    "Wha-!?"


    Taken aback by this sudden change, Xuan Hao took a few seconds before moving towards a small half broken stone tform to prevent himself from falling into the ck heart-


    Bang-!


    Only just reaching it in time before it would have been toote.


    "That was close¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the edge of the half broken stone tform down towards the ck heart that was not located below him, Xuan Hao definitely did not like the feeling of not being able to fly because of the restrictive force rendering his domain unusable.


    "But what just happened? Howe the ck heart is suddenly below m-" Freezing on spot unable to finish his sentence as he was looking down towards the ck heart, Xuan Hao suddenly realized what it meant for the ck heart to now be located below him- The construct was notying on the ground any longer, but was now standing up!


    This realization caused a shiver to run down his spine as he now understood why none of the of the phantoms had dared to approach the crater- The parasite in the shape of arge ck heart was not in the process of taking control of the colossal construct but had already been sessful in taking control of the constructs body!


    How much of the construct that the ck heart had managed to control did not matter, as Xuan Hao understood very well that even a fraction of its power would be more than enough to kill him!


    The only thing that made him feel some degree of safety at the moment was the fact that he had not felt like the ck heart had noticed him and should still be in the process of trying to gain full control of the construct. Meaning that he still had a chance to escape without being found!


    Hm? But how do I leave the body of the construct without the ability to use my domain to fly out¡­?


    Suddenly realizing his current situation as he looked up towards the throat that was now located a few hundred meters above him, the hope of escaping without being noticed quickly disappeared.

 Chapter 889 Attempting To Find A Hiding Spot...

    Understanding that he had no way out of his current situation, Xuan Hao decided to remain quiet as he leaned over the edge of the half-broken tform to look down towards the ck heart. Curious about what it was nning to do after getting the colossal construct to stand up. Hoping that it was just testing how to move around and wouldy down on the ground again so he would be able to leave without it finding out.


    Rumble~!


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, the construct didn''t get down again and was instead shaking violently as the ck heart seemed to be in the middle of a battle trying to get it to move. Making Xuan only capable of waiting for things to calm down.


    As for attacking the ck heart and trying to overpower it while it was struggling to gain control of the construct? Xuan Hao didn''t even dare think about this.


    Not to mention the fact that his strength was currently reduced because of the restrictive power, he also doubted that he would be able to do any damage to the ck heart in the first ce. After all, there had to be a reason why the phantoms formed by the remnant souls of powerful cultivators who once participated in the ancient battle didn''t dare approach the fallen construct and the ck heart.


    Hm? Observing the ck heart actually makes it easier toprehend the Dao of Corruption!?


    It was only after having half seriously observed the ck heart for a few minutes, that Xuan Hao suddenly realized that it was far easier for him toprehend the Dao of Corruption by observing the ck heart!


    Well¡­ I should at least take advantage of this opportunity to deepen my understanding of the Dao of Corruption. Maybe if I''m lucky, I will be able to improve enough to remove the restriction enough to fly out of here without getting discovered.


    Having nothing better to do, Xuan Hao sat down and closed his eyes toprehend the Dao of Corruption. Only leaning over the edge of the tform to observe the ck heart when he felt hisprehension speed slowing down. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Unknowingly, time slowly began flowing as he fully immersed himself inprehending the Dao of Corruption. The rumbling sounds of the colossal construct disappearing amidst the passage of time, yet this didn''t stop Xuan Hao as he had entered a state ofprehension. No longer paying any attention to his surroundings as he was only focused onprehending the insights regarding the Dao of Corruption that he had managed to grasp on to through observing the ck heart while it had been trying to take control of the construct.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao had entered a state ofprehension and was fully focused onprehending the Dao of Corruption, his two disciples were escaping from the tide of both demon beasts and spiders that had formed behind them. Still not having managed to lose them over thest few hours of using all the tricks they could think of in an attempt to stop them from following them.


    "Let''s go in here and hide!"


    Not deterred by this fact, Qing Yi called out to Chu Yang running beside her as she pointed towards a small cave where they could hide while the terrifying demon beasts and spiders behind them passed by.


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Not having to say this twice, Chu Yang nodded his head in response before both of them entered the small cave to hide away from the terrifying spiders and demon beasts chasing them from behind-


    ROOOAR!


    However, the moment they entered the cave, a roar filled with killing intent echoed out from deeper inside the cave, as arge bear demon beast in the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm appeared in front of them.


    "Bad cave! Let''s leave!"


    Not wasting a single second after seeing the bear demon beast, Chu Yang and Qing Yi acted like they had practiced how to respond in such a situation, both dashing back out of the small cave before the bear demon beast had a chance to reach them.


    Roar?


    As a result, causing the bear demon beast to let out a confused roar before sticking its head out of its cave to look in the direction that Chu Yang and Qing Yi were escaping in. Not understanding how they had managed to run away so fast.


    RUMBLE-!


    It was just at this moment, that the bear demon beast suddenly heard a loud rumbling sound from behind and felt the entire forest around it start shaking violently, causing it to turn around to see what had caused this-


    ROAR!?


    However, after turning around, the bear demon beast''s eyes went wide with fear as it saw the tsunami of spiders and demon beast moving towards it. Not wasting a single second to rush out of its small cave before escaping. Ending up as one of the few demon beasts that Chu Yang and Qing Yi had encountered, who was strong enough to escape in time before the spiders had a chance to lock on to it.


    ¡­


    "Why are the number of demon beasts still increasing? More importantly, they are getting stronger and stronger, this is already the fifth demon beast in the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm that we have encountered so far! Won''t we end up encountering Domain Lord Realm Demon beast soon at this rate!?"


    Having escaped from the small cave before the bear demon beast had a chance to attack them, Chu Yang could not stop himself from saying this as he grew frustrated over how they seemed to have no way to escape from their current situation.


    If things continued to develop like this, wouldn''t they end up getting forced to use the limited talismans that their master had given to them before they had entered the mystic realm?!


    "Indeed¡­ We can''t continue escaping like this, I''m already starting to feel the effects of continuously using my movement technique for such a long period of time. Even if my qi does not run out, my body won''t be able to hold on for much longer escaping at this speed¡­"


    Feeling a simr sense of frustration over their current situation as Chu Yang did, Qing Yi nodded her head as she said this, while also informing Chu Yang about the fact that she soon wouldn''t be able to keep escaping any longer due to strain put on her body from using her movement technique far beyond what she was capable of with her current strength to make sure that she wouldn''t fall behind and get caught by the spiders and demon beasts behind them.


    All things considered, both Chu Yang and Qing Yi understood that they would have to find a way to escape from the demon beasts and spiders chasing behind them if they wanted to get out of their current situation alive.


    After all, even if their master had left some talismans that could save their lives in a dangerous situation, they had no idea if the talismans that their master had left for them would be able to deal with the sheer number of demon beasts and spiders chasing after them.


    Considering how strong the demon beasts and spiders were, if even a few were left alive, they would still not be able to escape with their own strength¡­ And that is not even mentioning the fact that when they used the talisman left behind by their master, they would end up catching the attention of the more powerful demon beasts above the Nascent Soul Realm lurking deeper inside the mystic realm and would have to hide for a long time before things calmed down again.


    Other than all of this, there was also the fact that exploring the mystic realm would be incredibly dangerous after using the talismans that their master had given them, as they would no longer have any way to deal with a Domain Lord Realm demon beast in case, they ended up running in to one. Forcing them to stay away from the deeper parts of the mystic realm where most of the opportunities and precious spiritual herbs were located.


    If possible, they both wanted to avoid something like this happening. This was also the reason why they had not directly used the talismans left by their master and had instead chosen to escape. Something that in hindsight might have been a bad idea, as dealing with the oversized chicken would at most have taken a single talismans left by their master to deal with, while the wave of demon beasts and spiders chasing after them now might require everything they had to deal with.


    "Let''s try one more hiding spot, if things don''t work out, we will use the lifesaving talisman left by master to deal with the demon beasts and spiders!"


    "¡­"


    Knowing that they did not have any other choice, Chu Yang silently nodded his head with a reluctant expression on his face after hearing Qing Yi''s suggestion as both of them began looking around themselves for any ce they might be able to hide.

 Chapter 890 Underground Ravine

    Searching through their surroundings while escaping, it did not take long before arge ravine appeared in front of them. Even better, the ravine was filled with hundreds of small crevices that they could hide inside of!


    "Let''s try and hide here¡­"


    Swoosh~!


    Not wasting any time after discovering the ravine, Qing Yi and Chu Yang both came to a quick decision before rushing towards the ravine and hiding inside one of the hundreds of small crevices.


    Roar!


    However, not even a second after entering the small crevice, a loud roar could be heard from deeper inside, causing them to panic for a short moment while turning to look at the owner of the angry roar-


    "Only Peak Foundation Establishment Realm¡­?"


    "Haaa¡­ Looks like we finally found a ce where we can hide!"


    Luckily, as they turned around to see the demon beast that had made the angry roar earlier, it turned out to be nothing more than a weak demon beast that had only barely reached the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm, something that they were more than capable of dealing with!


    R-Roar¡­!


    Suddenly realizing something was wrong after seeing the Qing Yi and Chu Yang was not scared of it, the demon beast let out another roar as it threateningly barred its fangs at them-


    "Hm? What is this thing doing¡­?" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "I don''t know¡­ Maybe it wants to y or something?"


    Unfortunately for the demon beast, it did not get the reaction it had wanted and was instead met with the ridiculing words of the two creatures that had dared to enter its home without permission!


    ROOOAR!


    Swish-!


    Not intending to y nice anymore, the demon beast let out a far more powerful roar filled with killing intent before charging towards Chu Yang, who was standing closest to it-


    Ptsh-!


    However, before the demon beast had any chance to react a spear had suddenly pierced through its body. Killing it instantly!


    Thump~


    "How weird, I for sure thought that it wanted to y with us just a moment ago¡­" Muttering this to herself with a confused expression on her face after seeing how the demon beast had suddenlyunched an attack towards them, Qing Yi looked down at the dead body of the demon beast with a hint of pity in her eyes.


    Even if she had only known the demon beast for a few seconds, it was still rather cute and was in the shape of a rabbit. Reminding her of some of the wild rabbits that could be seen roaming around thend outside the sect. The only difference being that it was slightlyrger than that of a normal rabbit and had a pair ofrge and dangerous looking ws and fangs.


    "Qing Yi¡­ It''s a wild demon beast. Not a tamed one like the demon beasts in the sect¡­" Not knowing what to say after hearing what his junior sister said, Chu Yang could only remind her that it was a wild demon beast and not like the tamed demon beasts in the sect.


    Rumble-!


    "They are here! We have to block the entrance to prevent getting found!" Hearing the all too familiar loud rumbling sound from therge number of demon beasts and spiders that had been chasing after them for thest few hours, Qing Yi turned her attention away from the dead rabbit demon beast before pointing towards the small opening that they had used to enter the crevice.


    "I''m on it!"


    Understanding that Qing Yi was too weak at the moment, Chu Yang moved past her before using his spear to dislodge some stones located around the opening, they had entered the small crevice through-


    Bang!


    Causing the stones to fall down and block their path back out of the crevice, while at the same time also making everything around them dark now that the sunlight from outside had been blocked from entering.


    As for how to get out again¡­ This was not something they worried about for now, as escaping from the powerful demon beasts and endless number of spiders chasing after them was far more important. Not to mention, it shouldn''t be too hard for them to break a few stones to make a path outside after they had recovered their strength.


    All things considered; they were still in the Nascent Soul Realm. If they could not even break a few stones, they would probably be considered the weakest Nascent Soul Realm Experts out there¡­


    RUMBLE-!


    At this point, the shaking all around them grew more intense than before, as both Qing Yi and Chu Yang could feel the hundreds of terrifying auras rushing past above them. Soon being followed by the endless wave of spiders chasing from behind.


    ""¡­""


    Not daring to say a single word as they felt them passing by above them, Chu yang and Qing Yi silently prayed that they wouldn''t get discovered and the demon beasts and spiders would pass by them without noticing the fact that they had hidden right below them.


    Rumble~


    For what felt like hours, Chu Yang and Qing Yi waited nervously below the ground before the ground stopped shaking and the sound of the demon beasts and spiders grew distant. Allowing them to finally let out a sigh of relief. Having managed to sessfully escape from the powerful demon beasts and endless swarm of spiders without having to use any of the talismans that their master had given them.


    Even with this, Chu Yang and Qing Yi decided to remain quiet without saying anything before finding a small open space inside the crevice where they could sit down and recover some of the energy, they had used during their escape earlier. Not wanting to leave the crevice only to end up in another dangerous situation with no energy left to fight or run away.


    Like this, time slowly passed inside the small dark space inside the crevice without any of them knowing what had happened to the demon beasts or the spiders who had been chasing after them.


    ¡­


    Finally managed to fully recover! Hm¡­ Given the state of Qing Yi, it should still take her another half hour before she recovers fully¡­


    Being the first to fully recover between the two of them, Chu Yang got up before turning to look towards Qing Yi who was still deep in meditation. Even without knowing what she was thinking about, it was still obvious that she was focusing all of her attention towards recovering as fast as possible.


    "Hm? I didn''t expect the crevice to be so deep¡­" Looking away from Qing Yi and instead turning his attention towards inspecting the ratherrge crevice that they now found themselves inside of, Chu Yang could not help showing a somewhat surprised expression on his face after looking down and discovering that outside of the entrance part of the crevice where they had been staying so far, the crevice made a straight drop down a few dozen meters further inside.


    Not only that, but Chu Yang also noticed that he was not able to see the end of the crevice that seemed to continue deeper inside the earth than his divine sense could see. Even starting to expand. Making it look more like an underground ravine than a small crevice in the side of a ravine.


    "Wait¡­ What is that¡­"


    Suddenly noticing something deeper inside the crevice¡­ Or now underground ravine, Chu Yang could not help narrowing his eyes as he tried to make out what he had seen¡­ But no matter how hard he tried; he could not make out anything outside of the fact that there was something deeper inside the ravine.


    As for finding out what it was¡­ Chu Yang did not want to take the risk to figure it out while Qing Yi was still in the process of recovering. Especially considering how much trouble he had ended up getting them into since entering the mystic realm.


    At least this time around, he was going to wait for Qing Yi''s opinion on the matter instead of letting his curiosity get the better of him and recklessly charge forward to find out what was hiding deeper inside the underground ravine.


    Remembering how he had almost ended up getting both of them killed with the oversized chicken a short time ago, Chu Yang could not help feeling ashamed of his reckless behavior.


    Rustle~


    However, just as he was fully set on staying and waiting for Qing Yi to finish recovering, he caught sight of something moving inside the underground ravine-


    "Hm!? Did something just move?! Don''t tell me¡­ Is there a demon beast hiding deeper inside the underground ravine¡­?"


    Causing him to feel an all too familiar curiosity welling up inside him as he did his absolute best to stop himself from trying to head inside the underground ravine to figure out what it was.


    Like this, Chu Yang remained quietly standing beside Qing Yi, while never looking away from the underground ravine. Doing his best to try and figure out if there really was a demon beast hiding inside.

 Chapter 891 Possible Danger

    After Chu Yang had barely managed to stop himself from exploring the underground ravine for a little over half an hour, Qing Yi finally opened her eyes before standing up with a relieved expression on her face. Only now understanding the fact that they had managed to escape from the spiders and demon beasts on their own.


    Even if they had both managed to learn more about just how dangerous the mystic realm was and she could even feel that herprehension of her movement technique had improved to a level that would normally have taken her months to reach, Qing Yi would personally have preferred that they did not encounter such a situation again in the future. Especially considering that there was no guarantee that they would get lucky enough to escape again.


    "Qing Yi, are you fully recovered?"


    As she was feeling thankful for escaping the life and death situation that they had ended up in, Chu Yang asked her if she was fine. Resulting in her nodding her head in agreement, while thinking about how they were going to make their way back towards the outer edges where things were safer, now that they had ended up getting chased into deeper parts of the mystic realm''s forest.


    "Great! There is an underground ravine up ahead. Let''s go and explore. Although, I think there is some kind of demon beast hiding in there, so we have to be careful!"


    "¡­"


    However, the next words from Chu Yang made her doubt whether or not he had learnt anything from their life and death situation earlier, while at the same time also being surprised at the fact that the small crevice that they had hidden inside of happened to be the entrance to an underground ravine.


    "Senior sister, I don''t think the underground ravine is too dangerous. Even if there really is a demon beast hidden inside of it, its strength should not be that strong considering that the rabbit demon beast from earlier had managed to live in here before we showed up!"


    Seeing that Qing Yi did not answer and was looking towards him with a judgmental look in her eyes, Chu Yang didn''t waste a second before exining why he thought exploring the underground ravine was safe¡­ And more importantly say this before Qing Yi ended up thinking that he just wanted to explore the underground ravine without thinking about the dangers that might be lurking inside of it.


    "This is¡­ Reasonable¡­" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Hesitating for a short moment after hearing what Chu Yang said before saying this, Qing Yi used her divine sense to look through as much of the underground ravine as she could with the current strength of her divine sense.


    Whoosh~


    Only after having swept over what should be around half of the underground ravine without discovering anything dangerous or being faced with the divine sense of a powerful demon beast, did Qing Yi start rxing. Understanding that if there really was some dangerous demon beast hidden inside the underground ravine, it should have noticed her divine sense and made itself known.


    Everything made it seem like there was nothing wrong with the underground ravine, she had even managed to spot a few more of the rabbit demon beasts nesting inside the underground ravine. Making her almost certain that the true identity of the underground ravine, was some kind of nesting location for the rabbit demon beasts, a ce where they could safely reproduce without having to worry about the powerful demon beast wandering the forest above them.


    "So, can we explore the underground ravine¡­?"


    "Fine¡­ We will explore it, but be careful and if anything happens, we will escape immediately!"


    "Yes!"


    Getting Qing Yi''s agreement, Chu Yang smiled happily before starting to slowly make his way inside the underground ravine. Keeping Qing Yi''s words to mind as he did his best to be careful and not disturb the remaining rabbit demon beast nesting inside the underground ravine.


    "¡­"


    Seeing how careful Chu Yang was actingpared to how he would usually do things, Qing Yi could not help feeling a sense of relief as she soon followed behind him inside the underground ravine with a somewhat curious glint in her eyes.


    Even if she didn''t say it outright, she was also curious about just what was hidden inside the underground ravine. Would it be filled with nests of rabbit demon beasts? Or would there be something more exciting hidden in the deepest part of the underground ravine¡­?


    Continuing inside the underground ravine with this thought in mind, Qing Yi moved forward while making sure to keep an eye on the rabbit demon beasts and her surroundings while moving deeper inside the underground ravine together with Chu Yang.


    "This is¡­"


    As his divine sense was more powerful than hers, Chu Yang was the first to fully see the entirety of the underground ravine¡­ And of course, also what had been hiding in the deepest part of the ravine.


    "What is it? A spiritual herb or a powerful artifact? Maybe¡­ A powerful sleeping demon beast!?" Seeing how he had suddenly frozen on the spot without saying anything more than a short exmation, Qing Yi could not help growing impatient as she asked this. Curious about what he had seen, while at the same time also getting ready to escape in case it was something dangerous like a powerful demon beast that had been sleeping and just so happened to start the process of waking up due to the foreign divine sense of Chu Yang sweeping over it.


    "No, its not anything like that¡­ The only thing inside this underground ravine other than the rabbit demon beasts, is a single tree with some weird blue leaves¡­" Shaking his head as he said this, a disappointed expression appeared on Chu Yang''s face. Clearly having expected to encounter something different from a random tree.


    "A tree with blue leaves¡­? Maybe a spiritual tree?" Not feeling disappointed like Chu Yang, Qing Yi didn''t give up hope on the tree possibly being some sort of spiritual tree, as she continued moving deeper inside the underground ravine to see the tree for herself.


    "I already said its nothing valuable¡­" Muttering this to himself as he watched Qing Yi moving deeper inside the underground ravine, Chu Yang shook his head before following after her.


    In any case, it would not be good for them to split up inside the mystic realm. Even if it was for a short moment. None of them had any idea when a dangerous situation would emerge-


    Rumble-!


    "Wha- The ceiling is copsing!?"


    BOOOOM-!


    As the ceiling above them suddenly started copsing, Chu Yang and Qing Yi were forced to move deeper inside the underground ravine towards the small tree with the blue colored leaves.


    ROAR-!


    ROOOOOAR-!


    ROAAAR-!


    It was only after things had calmed down a bit that the familiar roars of demon beastsing from the now copsed part of the underground ravine allowed them to understand who was behind the sudden copse of over half of the underground ravine.


    "The demon beasts from earlier¡­ They didn''t give up chasing after us¡­" After Chu Yang said this, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang felt a shiver run down their spine when thinking about what might have happened to them if they had decided to leave the crevice and make their way back to the forest above ground. Would they not have ended up in exactly the same situation they had been in before entering the crevice to hide¡­?


    "Hm? But¡­ what happened to the spiders-"


    RUSTLE~!


    Just as Qing Yi was about to voice her doubt over what had happened to the spiders that had been chasing behind the demon beasts, the familiar sound of thousands upon thousands of small legs skittering along the ground could be heard.


    R-ROAR!


    R-R-ROOOOAR!


    ROAR!?


    Soon being followed by the panicked roars of the demon beast as they quickly escaped in the opposite direction that the spiders came from. Moving towards what should be the outer edge of the mystic realm where they had first entered the mystic realm.


    Thinking about it, it shouldn''t be possible for the demon beasts inside the mystic realm to leave the mystic realm¡­ Right?


    Feeling a hint of surprise as this thought appeared, Qing Yi realized that she had absolutely no idea whether or not the demon beasts inside the mystic realm could leave the mystic realm.


    If they really had the ability to leave the mystic realm, it was easy to imagine what would happen to the old Flying Sword Sect that only had a few elders in the Nascent Soul Realm present at the moment to make sure it could still function as a branch sect.


    If those demon beasts and spiders really have the ability to leave the mystic realm, I can only hope that master is close enough to deal with the situation before those demon beasts and spiders cause any damage to the sect¡­


    Realizing that thinking about this wouldn''t help, Qing Yi focused her attention on the small blue leaf tree that Chu Yang had mentioned earlier.

 Chapter 892 Stone Door

    "Hm?" Having turned to inspect the weird small tree with blue leaves, Qing Yi could not help letting out a surprised sound, as she discovered that the small tree that Chu Yang had described to her was far bigger than a normal tree. Almost standing a full fifty meters tall, while also filling out most of the space in the underground ravine. Only leaving a few small spaces empty where the rabbit demon beasts were nesting.


    Didn''t Chu Yang say that it was just a small tree with blue leaves? How is this in any way considered to be a small tree?


    Feeling doubtful about Chu Yang''s earlier exnation of the tree, Qing Yi turned to look towards him with a confused expression on her face. Clearly not understanding how he could have mistaken a tree that filled out almost all the avable space of what was left after the copse of arge part of the underground ravine.


    "Why is it so big!? I could swear that it was far smaller when I saw it through my divine sense earlier!" Simrly taken aback by the sheer size of the tree, Chu Yang looked up at therge tree filled with disbelief. Making it obvious to Qing Yi, that he was also taken aback by the size of the tree.


    But¡­ He should have already known about the size of the tree after investigating it with his divine sense earlier¡­


    Narrowing both as she thought about this, Qing Yi''s gaze became even more intense than before, as she grew more curious about why Chu Yang had been unable to see the true size of the tree through his divine sense.


    "Senior sister¡­ I really have no idea how the tree suddenly became so big! Earlier when I saw it through my divine sense, it looked no different from an ordinary tree. Expect the blue colored leaves." Feeling the intense look Qing Yi was giving him, Chu Yang understood that she wanted to find out how he had managed to make a mistake. Unfortunately, he also had no idea why his divine sense had not managed to grasp to true scale of the tree with blue colored leaves.


    "Haaa¡­ I guessed as much from your earlier reaction." Shaking her head as she said this with a somewhat disappointed expression on her face, Qing Yi soon turned her attention back towards therge tree with a hint of fear in her eyes. "For now, we should find out whether or not the tree is dangerous. Don''t trust what you see through your divine sense, as the tree clearly has some sort of effect on it¡­" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Indeed, for it to be able to mess with my divine sense without me discovering anything, it might be something dangerous. Maybe even one of those demonic spiritual trees that I read about¡­" Nodding his head in agreement with what Qing Yi said, Chu Yang could not help being reminded of the more dangerous type of demonic spiritual trees that devoured the blood and soul of cultivators to increase their own strength.


    If they really had encountered a demonic spiritual tree that had the ability to mess with his divine sense without him realizing anything was wrong, Chu Yang understood that they were in an incredibly dangerous situation, as messing with someone''s divine sense required far greater strength than the other party. Given his own strength, Chu Yang understood that only someone in the Domain Lord Realm would have the ability to do something like this.


    For this reason, he had already taken out one of the talismans that had been given to him by their master. Ready to use it the moment that he discovered something off about the tree that indicated that it was a demonic spiritual tree.


    Whoosh~


    As both Qing Yi and Chu Yang were cautiously looking towards therge tree. Waiting to see if it was going to do something, a gentle breeze swept through the underground ravine before reaching the tree, causing the blue leaves to gently move in the wind.


    Rumble~!


    "Wha-!?"


    "This¡­"


    Already starting to tense up even more than before after feeling the weird breeze that had suddenly emerged out of nowhere, Chu Yang and Qing Yi could not stop themselves from letting out a shocked sound, as the ground beneath therge tree where the roots were located suddenly rose up by a few meters before forming a small hill that therge tree now stood on top of.


    However, this was not the most shocking thing. Instead, it was the fact that a well decorated stone door had appeared on the side of the hill that was facing them!


    "Well¡­ This is not suspicious at all¡­ Does that tree demon really think it can fool us into walking into what is a disguised version of its mouth?! Hmph! Let''s see if you will continue hiding your true appearance if I start attacking you!" Having fully settled on the conclusion that therge tree was some sort of demonic spiritual tree after seeing the small hill with the small, decorated stone door appearing, Chu Yang was readied his spear and got ready tounch an attack on therge tree-


    "Stop! It''s not a demonic spiritual tree!"


    However, before he had a chance to attack, Qing Yi jumped in and stopped him at thest second.


    "Hm? What do you mean? Did you figure out what kind of tree this is¡­?" Knowing that Qing Yi would not stop him without a good reason, Chu Yang calmed down and put down his spear before asking this.


    "Yes, I think I have an idea about what kind of spiritual tree this is. Although, the information on it was extremely limited and only came from a few ancient records that I managed to find while looking through the sect''s records on mystic realms. If I''m not wrong, the spiritual tree in front of us should be a passage tree!"


    "A passage tree¡­?" Hearing what Qing Yi said, Chu Yang could not help showing a confused expression on his face. Not understanding what kind of spiritual tree, the passage tree was.


    "Yes, a passage tree. From the little information I found about mystic realms. If I''m not wrong, passage trees are a special kind of spiritual tree that are used by powerful cultivators who wanted to develop a mystic realm and use it.


    As for what purpose these spiritual trees serve in helping develop a mystic realm, I have no idea, the only information about them other than this, is that the passage trees are also used as some sort of gateways between different parts of the mystic realm." Shaking her head as she said this with a look of amazement on her face, Qing Yi could not help gazing towards therge passage tree in front of them with a sense of awe in her voice.


    "Gateway between different parts of the mystic realm¡­ Serving as a way to help powerful cultivators develop a mystic realm¡­ Qing Yi¡­ You mean to tell me that this mystic realm was once developed and used by some kind of powerful cultivator¡­?"


    "Ah¡­ I didn''t think about that¡­"


    Suddenly realizing the implications of her earlier words after hearing what chu Yang said, Qing Yi could not help freezing on the spot.


    "This¡­ it looks like the mystic realm that master send us into is more amazing than we first thought¡­ But, if the mystic realm really was developed by a powerful cultivator in the past, this also means there are a lot of opportunities for us if we are lucky enough to find some of the ruins left behind by this powerful cultivator! More importantly than this, it means that the tree in front of us is not some kind of demonic spiritual tree!" Filled with a simr sense of amazement and awe as he said this, Chu Yang also began fantasizing about the different powerful artifacts or other things that they might be able to find if they could encounter the ruins left behind by the powerful expert that had once developed the mystic realm.


    "Indeed¡­ it should also be safe for us to go through the stone door. The only problem is whether the ce on the other side of the door is dangerous and filled with powerful demon beasts-"


    RUMBLE-!


    ROOOAR!


    ROOAR!


    Just as Qing Yi had started talking, the familiar rumbling sound followed by demon beasts suddenly sounded out from somewhere above them. Getting louder and louder with each passing second.


    "Well¡­ Even if it''s dangerous on the other side, I doubt it will be more dangerous to stay behind and face those demon beasts¡­ I doubt they will be kind enough to let us escape again. Not to mention, I think they will find us this time around."


    "That¡­ Is true¡­"


    Whoosh-!


    Understanding that it was not a good idea for them to stay behind, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang charged towards the stone door.

 Chapter 893 Dao Of Corruption, Small Success

    Bang!


    Just as they were about to reach the stone door, the ceiling of the underground ravine copsed, as the familiar oversized chicken demon beast could be seen looking down towards them filled with killing intent.


    Roar!


    ROOOAR!


    Not too far behind the oversized chicken that was the first to make its way inside the underground ravine, close to a dozen demon beasts no weaker than the oversized chicken appeared. All filled with killing intent as they looked down towards Chu Yang and Qing Yi, who had just reached the stone door at the same time that they entered the underground ravine.


    "I hope this door isn''t locked¡­" Reaching towards the handle of the stone door with one hand while grasping on to the talisman that had been given to him by his master with the other, Chu Yang silently prayed for the stone door to not have been locked before trying to push it open-


    Creak~


    Luckily for both of them, the stone door opened without any problem. Showing a wide and beautifully decorated stone tunnel on the other side.


    Whoosh-!


    BANG!


    However, Chu Yang and Qing Yi didn''t have any time to admire the beautiful architecture of the tunnel. Not wasting any time before closing the door and rushing forward. One oversized chicken was already terrifying enough, let alone over a dozen demon beasts with simr strength, there was no way they were going to stay behind and risk having to face off against them just to admire the beautiful decorations of the tunnel!


    Unknown to them as they were rushing through the tunnel, trying to get as far away from the demon beast that had been chasing after them, they had failed to realize that the demon beasts chasing after them were far too big to enter the stone door, as it was only barely big enough to fir a normal human, let alone a demon beast the size of a small house¡­


    ROOAR!


    ROAAAR-!


    Although they did try to force their way through the stone door and into the tunnel, they soon found out that no matter what they did, they could not leave a single scratch on the stone door or the big tree that was ced on top of it-


    Rustle~


    Even worse, the familiar sound of small legs skittering across the ground above, made the demon beasts start panicking as they all charged back out of the almostpletely copsed underground ravine. Not daring to stay for a second longer, as they all understood that their chances of survival would be close to zero if they had to face the endless swarm of spiders inside a small underground space.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Not a secondter, all of the demon beasts gave up on getting revenge on Chu Yang and Qing Yi and after reaching the surface, it did not take long before they began escaping in all directions.


    Unfortunately for the demon beasts, they soon discovered that escaping from the spiders like this was not possible. The number of spiders had grown by far too much during their chase so far. Making them more than capable of splitting up to chase after them individually. In the end, the demon beasts soon ended up together in a single group once again. The main difference this time around being that they had no way to escape from the swarm of spiders chasing them. Forcing them to once again try and make their way towards the outer edges of the mystic realm.


    The fact that they had spent such a long time trying to chase after Qing Yi and Chu Yang had inevitablye back to haunt them.


    ¡­


    At the same time his two disciples had once again just barely managed to avoid the demon beasts that had been chasing after them, Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes after having remained motionless on top of the small copsing tform above the ck heart for an unknown period of time.


    Even if he was not clear about how much hisprehension of the Dao of Corruption had managed to increase, he could still clearly feel that it had taken another step forwardpared to before. Enough for it to allow him to once again use his domain like he had done before making his way inside the body of the construct. The only negative being that flying would be far more taxing on his energy than it had been before.


    "I wonder how much my strength increased since thest time I viewed my status¡­ And when will that main quest bepleted. Do I perhaps have to find out what the ck heart is before it is considered to bepleted?" Muttering this to himself as he looked down towards the ck heart, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that the main quest might be far too difficult for him toplete with his current strength.


    "For now, I should check my status before making a decision about continuing to try and find out more about the ck heart or leaving." Shaking his head as he said this to himself, Xuan Hao turned his attention away from the ck heart before using the system to view his status for the first time in what felt like forever.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword (Small Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess)


    Sword Intent: Nascent Sword Soul Realm


    Talent: ???


    Physique: ??? (25% Awakened)


    Realm: Initial Stage Dao Domain Lord parable people who just broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm)


    Professions: Alchemist (Artisan), Formation Master (Expert), cksmithing (Expert)


    Sect: Star Shattering Sect


    Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect


    Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui


    Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Eighth Stage Domain Lord Realm)


    Looking through his status, it did not take long before Xuan Hao to find out what had changed since thest time, he had looked through his tatus.


    "The description beside the Dao of Corruption changed from Elementary to Small Sess¡­ But what is the difference between Elementary and Small Sess?" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the Dao Domain part of his status where the different Daos that he hadprehended were located, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just what meaning the words beside the different Daos meant.


    A realm of some sort? Maybe just a name to indicate one''s progress in a specific dao? Or maybe somethingpletely different¡­


    In the end, Xuan Hao could only give up on trying to figure out what it was, as he once again understood just how little he knew about the Dao Domain Lord Realm and the things associated with it. Even if he wanted to find out more about the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he had no idea where he would be able to find information on it, as it seemed like the Dao Domain Lord Realm hadpletely disappeared from the world.


    The only ces where he could find anything on the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the current world being the ruins of the ancient era that had existed long before the current order of the world had been established¡­ Something easier said than done. Especially when considering how dangerous ancient ruins like this were. Not to mention, his only real encounter with someone who knew anything about the Dao Domain Lord Realm had tried to kill him¡­


    "For now, the most important thing is figuring out what the main quest means with secrets hiding in the core of the ancient battlefield. Is it really something that requires me to find out more about the ck heart, or something different¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the main quest that had not yet beenpleted even after he had entered the body of the colossal construct and found the ck heart inside of it, Xuan Hao wanted to see if he had missed something when he had first read through the main quest.


    [Main Quest: Explore the Core of the Ancient Battlefield, Part 2]


    [Progress: 3/4 Secrets Discovered]


    [1: Find the crater at the center of the ancient battlefield plete)]


    [2: Find the colossal construct at the center of the crater plete)]


    [3: Enter the construct and find the ck heart trying to take control of the construct plete)]


    [4: Move past the ck heart and find the ¡ö¡ö¡ö trying to resist the ck heart (iplete)]


    [Description: Explore the Core of the Ancient Battlefield and find out what secrets are hiding there.]


    [Reward: Strengthen Dao Domain] n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "¡­"


    Seeing that there had actually been a change to the main quest at some unknown period in time, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say, as it looked like thest thing, he needed to find out about toplete the main quest was hidden behind the ck heart.


    Now¡­ Only one tiny little problem remained for him toplete the main quest¡­ And that was the fact that the thing he needed to find out about, was located behind the ck heart¡­

 Chapter 894 Tiny Flame

    Looking down towards the ck heart that he would have to move past if he wanted toplete the main quest, Xuan Hao could not help hesitating. Even if he had not seen the ck heart attack, he did not doubt that it had the ability to do this. After all, if it didn''t have any ability to protect itself outside of the restrictive power, there was no way that the phantoms roaming the ancient battlefield would have left it alone.


    But¡­ The reward from the main quest was far too tempting for him to just let go without and given that the ck heart had still not managed to notice him at this point in time, he felt confident that he should be able to sneak past it without getting discovered and find thest secret mentioned by the system before leaving.


    In the first ce, he didn''t need to fight against the ck heart or take anything away¡­


    "Hm¡­ I will try approaching the ck heart for now. If it shows any signs of attacking or does anything suspicious, I will escape immediately." Muttering this to himself as he came to a decision, Xuan Hao looked around himself in search of a safe path that he could use to move past the ck heart without getting discovered.


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, there was a long stone structure attached to the sides of the construct''s insides located no more than a few meters away from the copsed tform that he was on top of going right past the ck heart. Although he had no idea what kind of purpose the stone structure had served in the past, he was certain that it would be his best shot at moving past the ck heart without getting discovered.


    Whoosh~!


    Not wasting any time after havinge to a decision, Xuan Hao silently flew towards therge stone structure before starting to slowly descend down towards the ck heart. Not daring to descend too fast, as it might end up revealing his presence.


    Thumb~ Thumb~ Thumb~


    Getting closer to the ck heart, Xuan Hao could clearly hear it beating in a slow and powerful rhythm, as the purplish liquid from inside the ck heart was pumped into the construct. Almost like it was trying to transform the construct from something made of stone and metal, into something made of flesh and blood. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    What was more shocking, was that Xuan Hao could actually see this happening in the area around the ce where the ck heart was located, as the surrounding stones had turned into some sort of grotesque mess of blood and flesh. Making Xuan Hao even more certain that the ck heart was indeed still in the process of taking control of the construct and had still not managed to seed.


    After all, if it had seeded and was in control over the construct, it would no longer be a construct made of stone, but would instead be some sort of abomination made of blood and flesh. Not something he would have dared enter no matter what kind of reward the system would offer him!


    Trying his best to ignore everything about the ck heart as he slowly made his way past it, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after discovering what was hidden behind the ck heart.


    "A me?"


    Indeed, behind the ck heart,pletely surrounded by the weird messy flesh that had grown from the ck heart, a tiny me could barely be seen burning gently without showing any signs of being affected by the flesh all around it.


    On the contrary, it was the messy flesh that had grown from the ck heart that was affected by the tiny me, as the flesh surrounding the tiny me would burst into mes from time to time. Sending some of the mes back towards the ck heart, where the ck heart would then have to use all of its strength in an attempt to resist the mes from destroying it.


    From the looks of it, the reason why the ck heart had not attacked him was not because it did not notice him, but instead because it was far too busy dealing with the tiny me and simply didn''t have any energy to spare to attack him.


    Now knowing that he should be safe from the ck heart attacking him as long as the tiny me was around, Xuan Hao was not in a hurry to leave the construct any longer as he began observing the tiny me that was preventing the ck heart from expanding and gaining more control over the construct.


    "What is that me?" Seeing how the ck heart was using all of its strength trying to suppress the tiny me, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just what the me was and how it was rted to the construct.


    [Main Quest: Explore the Core of the Ancient Battlefield, Part 2 plete)]


    [Progress: 4/4 Secrets Discovered plete)]


    [Reward: Strengthen Dao Domain]


    "Hm? The main quest waspleted?"


    Just at this moment, a system panel appeared in front of him. Signaling that he hadpleted the main quest, while also confirming that the thing resisting the ck heart was indeed the tiny me in front of him.


    Wait¡­ Did the description for the fourth secret change¡­?


    Remembering how the system had given him a simple description of the different secrets when he had viewed the main quest just a short time earlier, Xuan Hao did not waste a second before expanding the text below the progress part of the quest. Showing him the simple description of the four secrets again.


    "First secret, find the crater- Second find construct- Third-" Looking through the four simple descriptions, it did not take long before he found the fourth one at the bottom.


    [4: Move past the ck heart and find the tiny ember of phoenix fire resisting the ck hearts attempt to take control of the construct and transform it into it an abomination of the Dao of Corruption.]


    It did indeed change! But¡­ A tiny ember of phoenix fire? The tiny me is actually only the embers of phoenix fire? Just how powerful would the fire be if it was not just a few embers barely keeping the ck heart at bay¡­?


    Seeing the new description that had been added about the tiny me in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help showing a look of awe on his face as he looked towards the tiny me that was resisting the ck heart without a single problem.


    Just at this moment, as Xuan Hao was looking towards the tiny me filled with awe at just how powerful it was, the tiny me suddenly red up-


    FWOOOSH-!


    The tiny me that had only been the size of a small apple, suddenly grew at a speed visible to the naked eye. Instantly reducing the messy flesh and veins carrying the purplish liquid from the ck heart into the rest of the construct''s body. Not leaving anything behind, as everything was reduced to ashes. Only the ck heart remained, as it was doing its best to just barely resist the tiny me that had suddenly burnt down all of its hard work and engulfed itpletely with the clear goal of destroying it.


    As a result of the ck heart losing what little control over the construct that it had managed to build up over a period of thousands upon thousands of years, the construct that was currently standing up under the support of the ck heart-


    RUMBLE-!


    Lost its support and fell towards the ground!


    "Whaaaa-!"


    Taking Xuan Hao by surprise, as he could only let out a surprised scream upon suddenly feeling himself plumet down towards the ground together with the construct.


    BOOOOOOOOOOOOM-!


    Not a secondter, the construct crashed into the ground. Sending the ck heart that was no longer attached to the construct through the veins and other flesh tumbling around therge space inside the body of the construct. The tiny me still engulfed itpletely during all of this. Continuing to burn through the ck heart, causing its size to noticeably decreasepared to the first time Xuan Hao had seen it.


    "Hm? The restrictive power disappeared!?" Watching all of this unfold as he stabilized himself a few centimeters above the ground, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that the restrictive power that had restricted him before hadpletely disappeared at some point during the battle between the tiny me and the ck heart. Allowing him to use his dao domain and divine sense once again. Even then, Xuan Hao had no intention of staying behind to watch the battle between the two unfold. Understanding very well that it would be dangerous, and more importantly, he wouldn''t really gain anything from staying behind¡­


    Swish-!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao began ascending towards the head of the construct where the way out was located-


    Whoosh~!


    However, just as Xuan Hao began making his way towards the hole in the head of the construct that he had used to enter it, the tiny me that had expanded to engulf the ck hear separated from it before returning to its original size.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao had at first thought that the tiny me had been exhausted by the ck heart-


    "Ha? AH!?"


    But this thought quickly turned into fear, as he realized that the tiny me was heading straight for him!

 Chapter 895 Bottleneck

    ?


    Not able to do anything other than do his best to use all of his strength to rush in the direction of the head where the exit out of the construct was located, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing to himself as he discovered that he had no way to fully use his movement technique due to some sort of restriction on the space inside the construct.


    In the end, this meant that he could only helplessly watch the tiny me getting closer and closer to him. Not something he felt the slightest bit excited about. Especially when considering how he had just witnessed the tiny me did to the ck heart a moment ago.


    Whoosh-!


    Unable to escape the tiny me as it caught up with him, just as he was about to reach the head of the construct, Xuan Hao got ready to resist it with all hist strength. Not having any ns of sitting back and just allowing the tiny me to burn him like it had done to the ck heart-


    Whoosh~!


    Using the power, he had just managed to recover after the ck heart had been attacked by the tiny me, Xuan Hao channeled his energy through his dao domain, creating a massive ice barrier to resist the tiny me that was now only less than a hundred meters away from him.


    At the same time, he also used his sword tounch several attacks towards the tiny me in an attempt to hopefully slow it down, so he had more time to escape from the inside of the construct. Something that would hopefully allow him to make full use of his movement technique to escape back towards the spatial channel he had entered the ancient battlefield through.


    Bang!


    Despite all of this, the tiny me easily brushed off the sword attacks, that were more than strong enough to kill off someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Soon arriving directly in front of his ice barrier before colliding with it-


    Fwoosh~


    Easily burning through it, like it was burning through a simple piece of paper. Not even slowing down in the process as it kept moving towards him with the same speed as before. Making Xuan Hao feel the same level of helplessness that the ck heart should have felt when engulfed by the tiny me earlier without any chance to fight back.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Of course, he still continued to attack the tiny me in an attempt to slow it down¡­ but it was all useless, as the tiny me easily burnt through any attack of defensive technique he used-


    "Wha-!?"


    Unable to stop the tiny me and thinking it was about to start burning him alive like it had done to the ck heart earlier, Xuan Hao watched with a mix of astonishment and fear, as the tiny me came to a stop in front of him for a short second before directly entering the feather imprint between his brows.


    As the tiny me enters the mark between Xuan hao''s brows, a profound transformation begins to take ce inside the space where the blue divine energy was stored and soon spreads to the rest of his body-


    "Ah-!"


    Triggering a violent reaction from Xuan Hao, who barely managed to make his way out of the construct beforending a few hundred meters away. Not wasting a second before sitting down in a lotus position and closing his eyes. Focusing all of his attention towards the changes that had started to take ce inside his body after the tiny me had begun to change the hidden space of the feather imprint.


    First, the tiny me''s heat spread throughout his body, permeating every cell and meridian. Second, the heat transformed into a scorching energy that was then infused into his muscles and bones, causing them to pulsate and glow with an ethereal me surrounding them. Almost like they were being reforged¡­ And in a sense, this was exactly what happened!


    Xuan Hao could clearly feel that his physical form was being strengthened by the scorching energying from the hidden space between his brows. Making it more resilient and stronger with each passing second¡­ But this did not make him rx. Instead, it made him more nervous, as the rate at which the scorching energy entered his body did not decrease with time, but instead seemed to increase.


    Whoosh~


    As the scorching energy coursing through his meridians increased, it started to stimte the flow of qi inside them, causing the qi to surge with increased vigor and power. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    At the same time, this also forced his meridian to expand and be more expansive to amodate both his qi and the scorching energy that was now flowing through them. Releasing some of the pressure that the sudden growth in strength was putting on his body, while at the same time giving Xuan Hao some much needed control over the scorching energy coursing through his body.


    Although this control did not allow him to forcible push the scorching energy out of his body to prevent it from killing him, it still allowed him to move it away from the ces that had already been strengthened and wouldn''t make it through another transformation by the scorching energy.


    The first ce that he redirected the scorching energy towards, was his internal organs-


    "Mhm! This is far more painful than I expected...!" Feeling the scorching energy start refining his internal organs, Xuan Hao could not help eximing this to himself with a painful expression on his face. Even if he had already expected it to be painful, the pain of his organs being refined was far more painful than he had first expected.


    However, he managed to bite the pain in him and continued. Soon seeing small impurities that he had never even known were present being purged by the scorching me.


    Slowly, his organs were strengthened in a far lengthier process thanpared to the rest of his body, but when it was done, Xuan Hao felt a clear change in his strengthpared to before. His heart absorbed the essence of the scorching energy, pumping with a fiery vitality, while his lungs were fully purified. Allowing him to easily absorb the qi between heaven and earth.


    In the end, his entire body started harmonizing with the scorching energy. Allowing him to pick up the subtle fluctuations of the Dao of Fire hidden deep inside the scorching energy.


    The crackling sound that could be picked up from the scorching energy transforming his body slowly became a symphony to his ears, guiding him closer to the Dao of Fire.


    Unbeknownst to Xuan Hao, his appearance began to undergo subtle changes. His eyes taking on a fiery hue, reflecting the intensity of the scorching energy within. Wisps of ethereal mes started dancing around his body before gathering together on the feather imprint, causing it to change from a feather to a small me with an even smaller phoenix inside it.


    With each passing moment, Xuan Hao''s connection to the Dao of Fire grew stronger and hisprehension of the Dao of fire itself deepened with the support of the endless supply of scorching energy.


    Hm?


    It was just at this point that Xuan Hao suddenly opened his eyes with a somewhat confused expression on his face. For some reason, he felt like he hit some kind of barrier, causing him to be forcibly pulled out of the wonderful state he had just entered.


    A bottleneck?


    As this thought urred to him, Xuan Hao did not think about what to do for more than a few seconds before closing his eyes again to attack the barrier that had suddenly appeared in front of him and blocked him from improving.


    If this had happened under normal circumstances, he might have tried to understand the bottleneck more and how to safely break through it¡­ But considering that the scorching energy was still entering his body without any signs of stopping, Xuan Hao understood that he would end up dead if he could not find a use for this constant flow of energy-


    Rumble-!


    For this reason, Xuan Hao did the most obvious thing and prepared all of the scorching energy inside his body to attack the bottleneck with all his might.


    [Redeem Reward: Strengthen Dao Domain?]


    Yes!


    Not forgetting to redeem the reward from the system, Xuan Hao soon felt the strength of his dao domain start subtly increasing¡­ But this was more than enough to loosen the bottleneck that had appeared in front of him. Giving him a perfect chance to attack the bottleneck head on!


    Boom-boom-boom!


    As the scorching energy bombarded the barrier blocking his path forward for a few minutes without progress, cracks soon started appearing before a loud cracking sound could be heard throughout his entire body before-


    BOOOM-!


    The barrier shattered under the constant flow of scorching energy. Not a secondter, Xuan Hao felt hisprehension of the Dao of Fire start improving again before being integrated into his dao domain-


    Whoosh-!


    As a result of this, the core of his dao domain and soul started improving at a speed visible to the naked eye, Xuan Hao could even feel that that his dao domain covered had already doubled and looked like it was still expanding without showing any signs of stopping!

 Chapter 896 Intermediate Stage Dao Domain Lord

    As the strength of both his dao domain and soul was rapidly increasing after breaking through the bottleneck, Xuan Hao felt the scorching energy inside his body being redirected towards his dao domain. Acting as fuel for it to continue expanding even when he had already used up all the energy that had been stored inside his dantian. Allowing his dao domain to reach a size around 5 times what it had been previously before the constant flow of scorching energy slowed down and disappeared a short timeter.


    "Haaa¡­ I wish there was more of the scorching energy¡­" Muttering this to himself as he felt a hint of sadness over the disappearance of the scorching energy that had been close to killing him just a short time earlier, Xuan Hao started stabilizing his cultivation base after the sudden increase in strength. Understanding very well that not doing so, could result in his foundation growing unstable and lead to problems the next time he tried to break through a bottleneck or worse, it coulde back to fight him during a fight.


    As for how much his strength had increased, he would inspect that after he had finished stabilizing his cultivation base. After all, he was still inside an ancient battleground, and he didn''t dare risk moving around while his foundation was still unstable. Already able to imagine how his movement technique would end up failing while trying to escape from one of the many phantoms roaming the ancient battlefield.


    Even if it was still not safe for him to stay around the construct, as the ck heart should not have been killed yet, it was still far safer than trying to make it through the ancient battlefield in his current state. Not to mention, the ck heart had already been reduced to a state where it could barely move, so Xuan Hao didn''t think that it would be able to recover before he finished stabilizing his foundation and left the ancient battlefield and destroyed the spatial corridor leading to the ancient battlefield to prevent it from possibly finding its way to the Shattered Star Peaks.


    ¡­


    Unbeknownst to Xuan Hao, the moment the tiny me had entered the feather imprint between his brows, and he escaped from the body of the construct, the ck heart rolled back to its original location in the middle of the constructs body beforerge veins filled with purple colored liquid spread out towards all the limbs of the construct.


    Now, without the tiny me to hold it back, the inside of the construct started rapidly transforming at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    Outside of the fact that its size was now smallerpared to before, the ck heart seemed to have beenpletely unaffected by the attack of the tiny me.


    Rumble~


    In a short period of time, the construct that had fallen to the ground once again showed signs of moving again. The main difference this time around being that it didn''t look like it was just going to stand up without moving around. No, it looked like the ck heart had finally managed to gain full control over the construct now that the tiny me was gone.


    ¡­


    "Finally stabilized my foundation¡­" Standing up with a satisfied smile on his lips after a little over a week, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of satisfaction after having sessfully managed to stabilize his foundation in such a short time. Especially considering how he had expected it to take at least a month or longer with just how much his strength had managed to increase.


    The reason why he had managed to stabilize his foundation so quickly was because the Dao of Fire not only increased the strength of his dao domain but had also made its foundation stronger. Making the stabilization of his strength far easier than it would have originally been if he had broken through the bottleneck without the help of the Dao of Fire that he hadprehended.


    Hm¡­ I wonder how much my status has changed after this¡­


    As he was about to leave and make his way back towards the spatial corridor leading back to the Main Star Peak, Xuan Hao could not help wondering about this, as he soon used the system interface to view his status. Curious about what had changed following his recent breakthrough.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword (Small Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess)


    Sword Intent: Nascent Sword Soul Realm


    Talent: ???


    Physique: ??? (40% Awakened)


    Realm: Intermediate Stage Dao Domain Lord


    Professions: Alchemist (Artisan), Formation Master (Expert), cksmithing (Expert)


    Sect: Star Shattering Sect


    Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect


    Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Eighth Stage Domain Lord Realm)


    "Myprehension of the Dao of Fire directly skipped past the elementary realm and directly reached the level of small sess!? Not to mention, I actually managed to break through to the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm!" Muttering this to himself with a sense of disbelief on his face, Xuan Hao could not believe that he had actually managed to improve by so much-


    Wait! My physique also improved! Going from 25 percent awakened to 40 percent!


    Even taking a few seconds to calm down before discovering that the awakening progress of his physic had also taken a massive leap forward. Most likely due to the fact that the scorching energy had refined his entire body and improved it far beyond what it had been before.


    The scorching energy could be said to have been a blessing in disguise. The only problem was that he still did not have a clear idea about what had happened to the tiny me after it disappeared into the space where the blue divine energy was stored. Even more worrying, the feather imprint had changed into a small me with a tiny phoenix inside it.


    Although it did not do anything different from before, he could clearly feel that the space used to amodate the blue divine energy had grown in sizepared to before.


    However, even if he wanted to find out more about what was going on inside the space of the blue divine energy, he had no way to do so with his current strength. Even the divine sense of an Intermediate Dao Domain Lord, was instantly destroyed by the blue divine energy the moment he came into contact with it. No different from thest time he had tried to use his divine sense to investigate the space that the blue divine energy was stored inside, he didn''t evenst longer¡­


    Rumble-!


    "Hm? What was that?" Just as Xuan Hao retracted his divine sense before the blue divine energy had a chance to cause any more damage, a loud rumbling sound could be heard echoing across the entire ancient battlefield.


    Wait¡­ Didn''t thate from behind me¡­?


    Suddenly realizing where the loud sound hade from, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as a terrifying premonition appeared in his head.


    I think its about time for me to leave this -


    BANG-!


    About to jump into the air and run away, Xuan Hao suddenly froze on the spot as the giant hand of the construct smashed into the ground just a few meters beside him.


    RUUUUUMBLE-!


    Not a secondter, Xuan Hao watched as the colossal construct on the ground behind him slowly used its hands to push itself up from the ground before finally standing up. Towering thousands of meters into the sky, it''s head now covered in the familiar tentacle like nts that were rted to the Dao of Corruption. Making it obvious that the ck heart was the one currently in control of the colossal construct.


    "This- The ck heart managed to recover faster than I expected¡­ And it even managed to restore and improve its control over the construct!" Filled with fear as he looked up at the colossal construct, Xuan Hao could not help regretting the fact that he had not taken the risk and tried to leave the ancient battleground earlier.


    Even if he might have to risk some damage to his foundation. At least he would not have to be faced with something like the construct currently standing in front of him!


    Swish-!


    Having regained movement over his body again, Xuan Hao didn''t bother staying around to observe what the construct was going to do, as he made his way back towards the location of the spatial corridor that he had entered the ancient battlefield through.


    Boom-!


    However, just as he was about to leave the crater and once again enter the rest of the battlefield where the different phantoms could be seen fighting with each other, the colossal construct suddenly took a step forward. Instantly crossing a distance of several thousand meters¡­ And it just so happened that the direction of the construct was the same as him!

 Chapter 897 Rise, Construct!

    Bang!


    Craaack-!


    Watching as the ground shattered the moment the massive foot of the constructnded on the ground, Xuan Hao could not help feeling the sense of happiness from his earlier breakthrough disappearpletely.


    Even if he did not know how strong the ground of the ancient battlefield was, he had still seen how the phantoms with strength above the Soul Ascension Realm had only barely been able to leave a few marks in it!


    Rumble~


    Still in a state of disbelief due to the sudden movement of the construct that, Xuan Hao was woken up by the loud rumbling sounding from the construct preparing to take another step forward¡­ And it just so happened that he was in the path of the massive foot that had started descending down towards him with an overwhelming sense of power.


    Swish-! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    BANG!


    Using his movement technique to dodge the descending foot of the construct just in time, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he looked towards the stone like foot of the construct that was no more than a few centimeters away from him.


    Given the sheer power of the construct, even if he had reached the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he doubted that he would be able to survive being crushed by the foot of the construct. After all, the different inscriptions and other symbols that had started gently shinning on the surface of the construct was not just for show and would have all kind of effects that would enhance the simple looking foot of the construct and turn it into a terrifying attack!


    Whoosh-!


    As he was feeling a sense of relief having dodged the massive foot of the construct in time, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a terrifying killing intent locking on to him-


    Hm? Is¡­ Is it looking at me¡­?


    And this killing intent just so happened to originate from the giant construct that had been about to step on him a moment ago!


    Don''t tell me¡­ Is it because the tiny me merged together with the feather imprint!? I have to get out of here as fast as possible before the ck heart manages to get more control of the construct!


    Swish-!


    Not taking more than a few seconds to understand that the ck heart controlling the construct should have targeted him because of the tiny me that was now hiding somewhere inside the space between his brows where the blue divine energy was stored, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time before using his movement technique to the limit as he escaped in the direction of the spatial corridor that he had used to enter the ancient battlefield.


    As for staying behind to test out his new strength against the colossal construct and try to get rid of the ck heart? There was no way he was going to do something that stupid, the strength of the construct at its peak should have surpassed the realm above the Soul Ascension Realm and even if it was weakened to the extreme, it was still not something that he would ever be capable of fighting against with his current strength.


    Maybe if his strength had reached the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he might have tried fighting it¡­ But there was still a long way to go before he could reach that realm. Not to mention, the Dao Domain Lord Realm was not a simple realm like the Soul Ascension Realm that required one to slowly ovee one tribtion at a time before finally oveing the Immortal Soul Tribtion and stepping into the next major realm.


    The Dao Domain Lord Realm would allow one to directly start ascending the Immortal Soul Tribtion at any moment¡­ And after reaching the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could also clearly feel that he could initiate the Immortal Soul Tribtion at any moment. Of course, with his current strength, this would be no different from suicide¡­


    However, given what little information he knew about the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he could still understand the strength of the four minor realms to some extent.


    The most crucial piece of information that the system had provided about the realm being that most Dao domain Lord Realm Experts chose to ascend when they reached the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    This information was more than enough for Xuan Hao to understand that someone in the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm should be in theter stages of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ And for them to be capable of transcending the Immortal Soul Tribtion, a Peak Intermediate Stage Dao Domain Lord should have reached a strengthparable to someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Although he had no idea how strong he himself was at the moment, it was obvious that the strength of someone who had reached the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm should have surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm in strength and should be more than strong enough to face off against the construct in its current weakened state.


    Lost in his own thoughts while escaping from the construct controlled by the ck heart that had just recently learnt to walk, Xuan Hao was not too worried about being caught by it at the moment. At the very least, it would still be some time before the ck heart managed to get familiar with moving as the construct.


    During this period of time that the ck heart was still adapting to its new body, Xuan Hao nned to pass through the most dangerous part of the ancient battlefield where most of the phantoms were gathered together fighting with each other.


    Even if he had managed to pass through this ce once already, he also understood that he had far more time to slowly move forward and wait for the different battles between the phantoms to move away back then. Not something he had the luxury of doing with the construct behind him.


    For now, could only pray that he wouldn''t end up encountering a group of phantoms fighting with each other. Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, that was exactly what he encountered after travelling for no more than a few minutes¡­


    Boom-boom-boom!


    One, two, three, four, five- Agh! Why are there so many phantoms here!?


    Listening to the loud explosions and sound of metal shing in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing to himself as he gazed towards the over ten phantoms that were violently shing with each other in front of him.


    What should I do? Do I risk it and charge through them in hopes of not getting targeted or do I take the long way around and give the construct more time to catch up with me!?


    Not knowing what to do, Xuan Hao was left floating midair with a hesitant look on his face. Unable to decide on what the best option was-


    Rumble~!


    Bang!


    Even worse, he could clearly hear the sound of the construct behind him getting closer and closer with each second, he wasted hesitating on what to do.


    "Ah! Damn it all! Even if going straight through the battlefield is risky, I should still be able to survive an attack or two of these phantoms with my current strength!"


    Swish-!


    Feeling the increasingly thick killing intent from the construct that was approaching him from behind, Xuan Hao forced his fear of the phantoms down before dashing forward into the massivebat zone that had been created by them.


    No matter what happened, he had a feeling that he might not be able to escape from the ancient battlefield if he decided to take the long way around therge area where the over ten phantoms were shing with each other¡­ And that was not mentioning that there would always be the risk of there being another simr battle at the edge of thebat zone of the ten or so phantoms, there was also the simple risk of the phantoms moving in the same direction that he was moving in¡­


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    The moment he made his way into thebat zone of the phantoms, Xuan Hao instantly felt several terrifying divine senses lock on to him before quickly turning away before focusing on something else.


    Even without any ability to track where the divine senses hade from, it was still obvious to Xuan Hao who the owners of the different terrifying divine senses had been¡­ And from the looks of it, none of them had taken an interest in him. Making it clear that they had no energy to spare on someone weak like him, as they were far more concentrated on defeating their opponents.


    Or well¡­ Almost everyone¡­


    It just so happened that one of the phantoms in the shape of a demon beast had taken an interest in him¡­ And it was not the friendly kind of interest!

 Chapter 898 Collapsed Spatial Corridor...?

    Roar-!


    As the phantom demon beast let out a roar before charging towards him, Xuan Hao continued to move through the battle zone of the phantoms.


    The phantom fighting with the phantom demon beast should not let go of such a good chance to attack¡­


    Thinking about this as he turned to look towards one of the phantoms that had just lost his opponent, Xuan Hao decided to ignore the approaching phantom demon beast. Instead focusing all of his attention on dodging the powerful attacks of the other phantoms that happened to fly in his direction from time to time.


    Roar?


    Boom!


    Just like he had expected, a loud explosion soon echoed out behind him, as the phantom that had just lost his opponent, had taken advantage of the phantom demon beast ignoring him tounch a powerful ball of fire that had instantly evaporated the phantom demon beast. Reducing it to nothing more than a barely visible mist that slowly drifted away before disappearing into the distance.


    Not too long after this, the two sides that had been equal with each other just a moment ago, suddenly ended up bing one-sided. The side that had lost to the phantom demon beast getting killed off one by one before only a single phantom remained helplessly fighting against six phantoms by the point Xuan Hao reached the edge of the battle zone established when the phantoms had first started fighting with each other.


    RUMBLE-!


    However, just as thest phantom was about to get destroyed by thebined might of the six remaining phantoms on the other side, the ground beneath them suddenly shook, as the construct appeared at the edge of the battle zone where the remaining phantom were gathered.


    Turning around to see the construct that had just appeared within his vision, Xuan Hao froze for a short moment before continuing to escape in the opposite direction of the construct.


    I didn''t expect for it to change so much¡­


    Remembering the appearance of the construct at the edge of the battle zone as he used all of his strength to increase his speed, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    Compared to the time when the ck heart had just managed to take control of the construct, the construct that had appeared at the edge of the battle zone established by the phantoms, waspletely different!


    Not only was the entire head of the construct covered in all sorts of tentacle like nts that hade together to form some sort of mouth at the hole that he had entered the body of the construct not too long ago, but the rest of the construct''s body had also started cracking apart, as several familiar tentacle-like nts could be seen growing from the cracks.


    It had indeed started transforming into some kind of abomination of the Dao of Corruption. Simr to the one''s he had seen when he had firstprehended the Dao of Corruption. The only difference being that the construct was farrger than them!


    As he was only focused on escaping before the construct could catch up to him, Xuan Hao didn''t stay to witness what was going to happen to the phantoms that were now standing directly in front of the construct.


    But if he had stayed behind to witness what was happening, he would be met with the single horrifying image of the colossal construct grabbing all of them before swallowing them through the opening on top of its head. Not giving them any chance to resist as they all disappeared inside the body of the construct.


    Even the small mist that would normally escape after the phantoms died, did not appear. Signifying that the phantoms that had been swallowed by the construct, were all dead without any chance of recovering!


    ¡­


    Over the next few days, Xuan Hao crossed through dangerous locations where phantoms were fighting with each other more than a dozen times. Even if he did not always manage to get out unharmed, with his current strength, he was still more than capable of taking a few attacks from the phantoms without dying.


    During all of this, he had also managed to get an approximate estimate of his current strength byparing it to the different Soul Ascension Realm Experts he had seen in the past. In the end cing his strength somewhere around the Fourth Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Although this was not the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, he was still happy knowing that his strength had now reached a level where even the old ancestor from the Sky Empire wouldn''t be able to easily deal with him. Unless he fought inside the capital city of the Sky Empire, that protection formation was simply far too terrifying when it was used by a powerful Soul Ascension Realm Expert like the old ancestor of the Sky Empire¡­


    Rumble~!


    "It''s here again¡­" Hearing the familiar sound of somethingrge hitting the ground, Xuan Hao turned back to see the construct that had now been almostpletely covered in the tentacle-like nts.


    Over the past few days, he had already grown familiar with the sight of it and his fear had drastically decreased after realizing that its speed did not increase any more.


    At this point in time, he understood that he would be safe from the tentacle covered construct as long as its speed remained what it was now, and he didn''t slow down any further. Something that was unlikely to happen considering that he had already reached the outer edge of the ancient battlefield where phantoms were far harder to encounter.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    For this reason, Xuan Hao could not help starting to panic a bit when he discovered that arge number of phantoms were fighting each other in front of him. Even worse, the location where they were fighting just so happened to be the same ce that the spatial corridor leading out of the ancient battlefield was located!


    "Wha- M-my spatial corridor!"


    Making Xuan Hao freeze on the spot with a look of horror on his face. Understanding very well that there was close to no chance that the spatial corridor could survive in the middle of such arge fight for long. Not to mention, looking at how exhausting the different phantoms fighting were, it was obvious that the fight had been ongoing for a long time and was just about to conclude. Giving the spatial corridor an even smaller chance of survival.


    RUMBLE-!


    I can''t continue wasting time like this, I can only hope that the spatial corridor managed to survive¡­


    Hearing the sound of the construct getting closer and closer with each second, he wasted without moving, Xuan Hao could only suppress the feeling of helplessness that had appeared inside him the moment he spotted therge number of phantoms fighting in the area where the spatial corridor was located.


    Not even bothering to try and find out why so many phantoms had even appeared at the border region to start fighting each other in the first ce.


    ¡­


    Boom-!


    Bang-bang-bang! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As he approached the battlefield of the phantoms, Xuan Hao could not helping to a stop, as he realized that the phantoms had close to no distance between each other. Making it close to impossible for him to dodge their attacks if he tried pass by them¡­ But even more terrifying than this was the fact that all of the phantoms were fighting with each other without any clear opponent.


    Different from the other phantoms he had seen fighting before, there were no two sides fighting with each other. Instead, they were all fighting each other in a massive free for all. Making it even more dangerous for him to enter the battlefield they had created. After all, with there being no clear sides, there was a chance of one of the phantoms targeting him without any of the other phantoms jumping in to help him out like had happened the other times he was forced to move through one of the phantoms battles.


    What is the reason for this? Did something cause them to act like this¡­?


    Not able to ignore the odd behavior of the phantoms after realizing that his chance of reaching the possibly destroyed spatial corridor had reached close to zero, Xuan Hao could not help scanning the battlefield of the phantoms with his divine sense as he did his best to avoid idently hitting any of them in the process.


    "This is- The spatial corridor is still there! But¡­ From the looks of it, the phantoms are deliberately avoiding the spatial corridor- Ah! Could it be that they want to use the spatial corridor to leave the ancient battlefield as well¡­ But then why did they all start fighting with each other in this manner?"


    First feeling relieved at the appearance of the intact spatial corridor, Xuan Hao soon became confused again. Still not understanding what had caused the phantoms to fight with each other in such a chaotic manner.

 Chapter 899 Opportunity

    The weird behavior of the phantoms protecting the spatial corridor was odd to say the least, but the more worrying thing was that they might try and prevent him from approaching the spatial corridor¡­ And with how strong the phantoms were, he would stand no chance of reaching the spatial corridor with his current strength.


    Rumble-!


    As he remained frozen just barely out of range from the battlefield of the phantoms, the sound of the construct taking a step forward once again echoed out across the ancient battlefield. The only difference this time around being that it was close enough to affect the area where the phantoms were fighting with each other.


    Resulting in some of the phantoms fighting on the ground missing their target, ending up with their opponent taking advantage of this to attack them instead.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    All of a sudden, more than five phantoms were reduced to nothing more than a small mist that soon drifted off into the distance before disappearing because of this.


    Whoosh~!


    The sudden death of so many phantoms at the same time did not go unnoticed by the rest of the phantoms. Instantly causing the rest of the phantoms fighting with each other toe to an abrupt stop before looking in the direction of the colossal construct that had ended up being the main culprit behind the death of the five phantoms.


    Are they nning to attack the construct¡­?


    Seeing how all of the phantoms had suddenlye to a stop before focusing all of their attention towards the construct, both of Xuan Hao''s eyes started shining as he thought this to himself.


    Out of everything that could happen, the best-case scenario would be for the phantoms and the construct to start fighting with each other. This way, he would be able to easily reach the spatial corridor and escape from the ancient battlefield without having to risk his life in the process.


    Swish-!


    Boom-!


    However, just as he was looking hopefully towards the phantoms, one of them decided tounch an attack towards one of the other phantoms still focused on the construct in the distance. Instantly reducing it to a small mist as a result.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Soon enough, the phantoms returned to fighting with each other like they had done before. Completely ignoring the construct that was slowly getting closer to them¡­ Well¡­ Almostpletely ignoring it, they had moved all of their fighting above the ground and into the air now.


    Of course, things would not be that easy¡­


    Smiling wryly as he watched the phantoms resume their chaotic fight like nothing had happened, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of helplessness wash over him. From the looks of it, the phantoms were going to ignore the construct for now. At least until it reached their battlefield and started getting closer to the spatial corridor, they wouldn''t bother with it.


    In the end, Xuan Hao was left with the exact same problem as before and would have to somehow figure out a way to approach the spatial corridor without getting killed by the phantoms in the process-


    Wait¡­ Isn''t the area that the phantoms are fighting rather small¡­


    Suddenly realizing that the area where the phantoms were fighting was not that big due to how close they were to each other, a n slowly started taking shape inside his head.


    If I can make use of the construct, I might be able to draw away the phantoms guarding the area around the spatial corridor!


    Not wasting a second after this thought had appeared in his head, Xuan Hao made his way around to the other side of the small battlefield. Making sure to not identally enter the crossfire of any of the phantoms busy fighting, while at the same time making it so that the construct would have to pass through the phantoms if it wanted to reach him.


    Rumble-!


    As the colossal construct got closer and closer, Xuan Hao could not help feeling nervous as he watched the ground starting to crack apart under the terrifying weight of the construct. Even the phantoms that had ignored the construct at first, had now started to fight in a more restrained manner. Some of them would even turn towards the approaching construct from time to time.


    "It''s here¡­"


    Not long after, the construct reached the location that the phantoms were fighting. Instantly making all of the phantoms stop what they were doing, as they focused all their attention on the construct-


    Roar-!


    Roar!


    Some of the demon beast phantoms were a little more impatient and directly charged forward to attack the construct. Not caring about the fact that it was clearly far stronger than them. Only caring about stopping the construct from getting any closer to the spatial corridor.


    Whoosh~!


    As a result, the phantom demon beasts were soon faced with the numerous tentacles that had grown all over the phantom. However, different from the first encounter the construct had with phantoms, the demon beast phantoms this time around were not so easy to deal with. All of them narrowly managing to dodge the tentacle like nts trying to grab hold of them before using their teeth and ws to rip apart the tentacle like nts.


    Not only that, but also working together to save each other in case the tentacle nts managed to get hold of one of them. Actingpletely differentpared to the chaotic mess of a fight that had taken ce before. Making it obvious that the construct was seen as amon enemy. At least to the phantom demon beasts, the humanoid phantoms had not yet moved and were still cautiously observing the construct fighting against the phantom demon beasts.


    Why are they not moving? If things continue like this, the phantom demon beast won''t be able tost for long!


    Watching the humanoid phantoms remaining motionless while one of the phantom demon beasts ended up being swallowed by the construct after not being able to escape in time, Xuan Hao could not help growing nervous as he watched the construct getting closer and closer to the spatial corridor located at the center of the small battlefield.


    If the phantoms didn''t do anything soon, the construct might end up walking straight through the spatial corridor. Something that would definitely end up destroying the spatial corridor. Meaning that his only way out of the ancient battlefield would be gone.


    No, I can''t allow this to happen!


    Swish!


    Knowing that he would not be able to survive if he ended up stuck inside the ancient battleground, Xuan Hao decided to take a risk and made his way towards the spatial corridor. Although this had attracted the attention of the phantoms, he quickly found out that they didn''t care much about him. Instead focusing most of their attention on the colossal construct that already killed off three phantom demon beasts at this point in time.


    Of course, this didn''t mean that he was able to get close enough to the spatial corridor to ignore the phantoms and make a dash for it. Even if the phantoms were only paying a little attention to him, they would still attack him if he got too close. For this reason, Xuan Hao decided to get as close as possible before nervously turning his attention back towards the approaching construct.


    Because of the inaction of the humanoid phantoms, his n had changed from allowing the phantoms and construct to fight each other before using this as an opportunity to go through the spatial corridor would not work any longer. Instead, he had toe up with a new, far riskier, n.


    The n was rtively simple, if the humanoid phantoms decided to attack the construct, make use of that to escape¡­ But if they didn''t do anything soon, he would be forced to take the risk of charging through therge number of phantoms.


    Even if his chance of survival was going to be low in that case, he would at the very least have a chance at survival, something he doubted he would have if he ended up staying inside the ancient battlefield together with the construct wanting to kill him.


    RUMBLE-!


    BANG!


    Just as he decided on the new n for hopefully making it through the spatial corridor, thest phantom demon beast was hit by the enormous fist of the construct that had suddenly started moving for first time. Indicating that the ck heart had managed to increase its control over the construct.


    Not taking long before it once again began moving towards him. Not only that, but Xuan Hao also realized that it was moving faster than it had done before. Signaling that the construct''s speed had now surpassed his own-


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    But at the same time, the humanoid phantoms that had remained unmoving so far. Only observing the construct without doing anything. finally made a move. Giving Xuan Hao the opportunity he had been waiting for!

 Chapter 900 Through The Corridor

    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    As the humanoid phantoms moved in a single group towards the colossal construct, Xuan Hao saw his opportunity to escape from the ancient battleground. Not wasting a single second before charging towards the spatial corridor.


    Swish-!


    However, before he could reach the spatial corridor, a powerful hammer made out of qi appeared a few meters above him-


    BANG-!


    Crack!


    Before directly smashing into his body into the ground. Not giving him any chance to defend himself with anything more than a simple barrier formed by his dao domain that had been set up at thest moment before the hammer hit him.


    "This- Who attacked me!?"


    Feeling like his entire body was about to crack apart due to the hammer that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere before smashing him into the ground, Xuan Hao could not help feeling abination of both fear and confusion. If not for the fact that he broke through to the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he might have ended up dead from the attack just now!


    Whoosh~!


    Knowing his current precarious situation, Xuan Hao used his divine sense and dao domain to search for the person that had managed to sneak attack him-


    One of the phantoms!? Didn''t all of them leave to attack the construct? To think one of them actually remained hidden around the spatial corridor!


    Not taking long before spotting a nearly invisible humanoid phantom floating in the air not too far away from the spatial corridor. Given therge hammer made of spiritual qi floating beside the humanoid phantom, it was not hard to figure out who had attacked him just now.


    "It''s just one phantom¡­ If I use all my strength, I should be able to bypass it without getting too heavily injured in the process. Not to mention, from the strength of the attack just now, it should be one of the weaker phantoms. Even with my current strength, I should still be able to take two or three more hits from it without dying¡­"


    Narrowing both his eyes as he muttered this to himself while looking towards the phantom and the hammer floating beside the spatial corridor, Xuan hao understood that although it would be harder to escape, it was still not impossible. Especially when considering that the phantom was weaker than normal, while at the same time also being exhausted from the chaotic fighting earlier. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Boom-boom-boom!


    As he was trying to figure out the best way to approach the situation and make it past the phantom guarding the spatial corridor, the loud sounds of the fight between the rest of the humanoid phantoms and the colossal construct suddenly echoed out across the ancient battleground. Signaling the official start of their battle, while at the same time signaling the fact that he didn''t have much time left to leave the ancient battleground.


    After all, just looking once towards the ce where the humanoid phantoms and the construct were fighting, it became obvious that the phantoms stood no chance against the construct.


    Even if they hade up with some sort of ancient battle formation to fight somewhat equally against the construct, it would only be a matter of time before their energy ran out¡­ And at that point in time, they would all be caught by the tentacle-like nts growing all over the constructs body.


    Before all of this happened, he had to make good use of his time and find a way to bypass the phantom blocking his path, pass through the spatial corridor and of course, close the spatial corridor after reaching the other side.


    He might not believe something the size of the construct would be able to pass through a spatial corridor only a little bigger than its hand, but one could never be too certain.


    Swish-!


    Knowing that his time was running out, Xuan Hao ended up deciding on the simplest tactic to make it through the phantom blocking his path. Forcing his way past it and trying to avoid any form of confrontation that might end up losing him precious time.


    As a result of this, Xuan Hao was once again attacked by the hammer of the phantom-


    BANG!


    However, this time around, he did not end up getting smashed into the ground, forming another crater. Instead, he made use of his recently strengthened physical body and dao domain to forcibly resist the first hammer attack of the phantom and continue moving towards the spatial corridor.


    Whoosh-!


    Seeing this, the phantom emotionlessly waved its hand as a new hammer made of spiritual qi appeared above him while the one behind him turned into mist that quickly dispersed into the air.


    Hm!? Isn''t this hammer stronger than before?


    Instantly noticing something different about the new hammer that had formed above his head, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine as he watched it rapidly descending down towards him. Even if he had felt that he should be able to handle one or two more attacks from the phantom. For some reason, he had a feeling that if he allowed the new hammer to hit him, he would not be able to make it out of the ancient battleground¡­


    No! I can''t allow it to hit!


    Feeling increasingly desperate as he watched the hammer getting closer and closer, Xuan Hao tried to forcibly increase the speed of his movement technique to no avail. The space of the ancient battleground being far too stable for him to fully use his movement technique to teleport a short distance forward and avoid the attack.


    Hm? The dao of space here is far more stable¡­ Does this not mean that the dao of space in this ce is far more perfected than the dao of space outside the ancient battleground!?


    Looking around at the spatial ne that could be seen all around him, covering everything and anything on the ancient battleground, Xuan Hao suddenly saw the small spatial nodes located everywhere around him. From reading the Drifting Cloud Steps, he understood that these spatial nodes were what he would use when teleporting forward thousands of meters with a single step.


    Although he could feel these spatial nodes to some degree, he had never been able to fully see them. At least¡­ Not before now!


    Rumble~


    Feeling his understanding of the Dao of Space suddenly take a massive leap forward, Xuan Hao ignored the hammer above. Instead focusing all of his attention on a spatial node located just beside the spatial corridor before taking a step forward in ordance with the Drifting Cloud Steps-


    Swish!


    BAAAANG!


    Instantly teleporting just beside the spatial corridor, while at the same time avoiding the terrifying hammer of the phantom just in time.


    "Haha! To think my Drifting Cloud Steps actually managed to break through! Not only that, but I also feel that myprehension over the Dao of Space has taken a significant step forward after this!"


    Not able to stop himself fromughing happily as he felt all sorts of new profound ways to use the Dao of Space appearing in his head, Xuan Hao took a step forward into the spatial corridor. Not turning to look back towards the phantom that was looking towards him with a hint of confusion present in its eyes.


    ROOOOAR-!


    However, just as he took this step forward and felt himself getting drawn into the spatial corridor, an earth-shattering roar echoed out across the ancient battleground.


    Whoosh-!


    Bringing with it, the all too familiar feeling of suppression that he felt even before going through the spatial corridor.


    The ck heart!


    Instantly realizing that the ck heart had grown even stronger, Xuan Hao forcibly used his strength to break free from the suppression of the ck heart and fully enter the spatial corridor, but¡­ This was not the end!


    Rumble-!


    The constructpletely ignored the humanoid phantoms attacking it. Charging towards the spatial corridor that had already started closing after Xuan Hao had entered it and undid the things, he had done to prevent it from closing earlier.


    Even if Xuan Hao wanted to close it faster and prevent the construct from following him, there was nothing he could do about the speed at which the spatial corridor was closing. Going out of the spatial corridor and closing it manually was not really an option.


    I have to close the spatial corridor the moment I reach the other side!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao left the ancient battleground under the power of the spatial corridor. Soon only able to see the entrance of the spatial corridor that connected to the ancient battleground shrinking at a speed visible to the naked eye-


    Rumble-!


    Just at this moment, as the entrance was about to fully close to the ancient battleground, a part of the constructs arm forcibly entered the spatial corridor before reaching towards him-


    Riiiip~!


    However, the spatial corridor soon closed, severing the part of the arm that was already inside the spatial corridor in the process. Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, he soon discovered that the severed arm of the construct was not dead and was still chasing after him!

 Chapter 901 Birth Of A God

    Appearing back inside the underground space of the Main Star Peak, Xuan Hao did not waste a single second before turning around to forcibly destroy the spatial corridor he had juste out from. Not wanting to give the arm under the control of the ck heart any chance of reaching him and possibly endangering the Star Shattering Sect.


    Whoosh~


    Following the destruction of the spatial corridor, Xuan Hao let out a sigh of relief, as he saw the arm of the construct chasing after him disappear in the spatial turbulence caused by the sudden destruction of the spatial corridor.


    Now that both sides of the spatial corridor were destroyed, there would be no way for the arm to escape the chaotic spatial turbulence and it would most likely end up drifting along in space until it got destroyed or was teleported somewhere random by the chaotic flow of space.


    No matter what happened to the arm, Xuan Hao understood that there was nothing more he could do about it. For now, he would just hope that the arm didn''t end up getting teleported to a location close to the Star Shattering Sect. The best-case scenario being that it became lost in the chaotic flow of space and was destroyed by it.


    "I should get out of here for now¡­" Muttering this to himself as he took onest look around the underground space without finding anything of value, Xuan Hao turned around and made his way back outside the hole.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was making his way back outside the hole and began exploring the Main Star Peak for more simr dangerous things like the spatial corridor, the arm of the construct was aimlessly floating around in the chaotic space that the spatial corridor had been located in. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Crack~!


    Even with the terrifying strength of the construct''s arm, it still started cracking apart almost the moment it lost the protection of the spatial corridor and came into contact with the chaotic space outside. A testament to the terrifying location that the ancient battleground was located in, while also showing just how many ws were present inside the arm of the construct after the countless years it had beenying on the ground without being repaired.


    In a sense, the nts rted to the Dao of Corruption that had been growing through some of these small cracks and other defects, ended up weakening the arm of the construct even more than it had already been-


    CRACK-!


    As a result, it did not take long before the most densely covered location of the arm broke off and was almost instantly ripped apart by the currents of the chaotic space. Not standing any chance of survival without the protection of the different talismans and formations carved into the arm of the construct.


    From the looks of how quickly the arm was starting to break apart, it looked like it wouldn''t get a chance to survive for long enough to get a chance to leave the chaotic space-


    Rumble~


    However, just as the arm looked like it was about to fully crack apart and get lost in the chaotic space, a small whirlpool appeared beneath it as a portal just big enough for it to pass through opened up. The only problem being that it looked like it was about to shatter at any moment after havinge into existence, the terrifying spatial storms of the chaotic space clearly being far too much for it to handle.


    Whoosh-!


    Not wasting a second, the arm that still seemed to be under the control of the ck heart, moved directly towards the small whirlpool. Understanding very well that it was the only chance of escape that it had before getting destroyed¡­ And from the looks of it, the ck heart had no ns of losing even a single part of the constructs body.


    Not even bothering to observe what was on the other side of the small whirlpool, the arm of the construct sessfully managed to leave the chaotic space.


    RUMBLE-!


    Reaching the other side of the whirlpool just before the whirlpool shattered due to the terrifying spatial storms of the chaotic space, the arm of the construct found itself hovering in the air above arge altar filled with blood of tens of thousands of people. The blood on the altar flowing together into some sort of formation that had been concentrated together and used to forcibly distort thews of space, which had ended up connecting to the chaotic space that the arm of the construct had been floating in.


    Not too far away from the altar, arge gathering of people could be seen looking awestruck towards the giant hand that had appeared out from the whirlpool in the sky just before it had shattered. The leader of therge gathering, an old woman with arge ceremonial robe on, standing on a small, raised tform in front of therge altar. From a nce, it was obvious that the old woman was already in her twilight years and didn''t have long to live, what''s more, her strength had only barely reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm. No different from a normal mortal in the eyes of the giant arm hovering above.


    "Oh, Great Arm of God, please save these humble servants of yours. Bless us with your divine might and banish the evil tyrant!"


    Before the arm floating in the air had chance to kill the people below like it had done to the phantoms that it had encountered earlier, the old woman in the ceremonial robe suddenly knelt down on the ground before saying this.


    "The Arm of God? Praise be to the Arm of God!"


    Following behind what the old woman did, a middle-aged man who had been standing beside her, also knelt on the ground before saying a simple prayer filled with awe and excitement.


    """Praise be to the Arm of God!"""


    Not too long after these too knelt down, the rest of the people gathered around the altar quickly knelt down before repeating the praise of the middle-aged man. All of them filled with excitement and happiness at the appearance of what they believed to be the arm of their god.


    Rumble~


    Not caring about any of this and just wanting to kill off the mortals below and absorb their life essence and cultivation assist it in recovering from the damage it had taken earlier in the chaotic space, the arm of the construct began to descend towards the humans below-


    Whoosh~


    But just as it was about to squish the old woman in the ceremonial robe, it froze on spot, as a small stream of foreign energy drifted into it and began slowly repairing the damage that had been caused to it by the chaotic space. Not only that, but it could also feel that the inherent issues and hidden ws that had been built up over countless years were slowly being mended by this foreign energy.


    The most surprising part of all this, was that the origin of this foreign energy was none other than the old woman in the ceremonial robe!


    Although this change was extremely miniscule, it still symbolized a very important thing to the arm- No, the ck heart back in the ancient battleground. The inherent ws of the construct that had caused its strength to drastically fall could be repaired!


    For this reason alone, the ck heart did not want to kill the old woman.


    As for the rest of the humans gathered around, the ck heart didn''t want to kill them either, as it could also feel more of the foreign energy from earlier emerging from them before entering its body and starting to repair it. Even if the quantity was far smaller, therge number of humans still managed to generate a lot of foreign energy.


    More importantly than all of this, it actually discovered that the foreign energy from the humans praying to its hand, appeared all the way back in the ancient battleground where its main body was located!


    A thin connection had been formed between itself and the people in front of therge altar¡­


    Given this situation, the ck heart back in the ancient battleground remembered the whirlpool from earlier.


    If it could make use of this thin connection that had formed, strengthen it, and make a farrger sacrificial ceremony, it might have a chance to leave the ancient battleground and make it to the ce where its arm was currently located.


    At that point in time, it would also be able to make full use of the foreign power and use it to fully repair the construct it now resided inside of. Maybe even strengthen it even further¡­


    But for all of this to happen, it had to increase the number of humans praying to it, otherwise, not to mention leaving the ancient battleground, it would most likely take thousands of years for its arm to fully recover given how little foreign energy the humans provided at the moment¡­

 Chapter 902 Strange Tree

    At the same time that the ck heart began preparing to expand its sphere of influence and gather more of the foreign power in the ce where its arm hadnded, Xuan Hao found yet another strange structure hidden away on the Main Star Peak.


    The structure was nothing like anything he had ever seen before, and the material of the structure itself made it invisible to his divine sense. If not for the fact that he happened tond in the small, forested area it was hidden due to a rather peculiar demon beast catching his interest, he might not have found it in the first ce.


    Inspecting the structure that weaved together into some sort of strange-looking tree, Xuan Hao soon realized that there wasn''t anything hidden inside or around the strange tree. The only thing of interest he found was the remnant of what should have been incense sticks.


    "Is it perhaps a shrine of some sort? Is it perhaps rted to the people who lived on the Main star Peak before the Star Peaks were shattered?" Not able to think of anything else, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about the people who had once lived on the Main Star Peak.


    Other than the old temple with the demonic cultivator, the pagoda at the center of the Main Star Peak that the winged lion had been guarding and a few other ruins, he had not really managed to find a lot of things left behind. The overall state of the Main Star Peak was empty and deste, with nothing more than a few demon beasts and forested areas sprinkled around the almost t mountain peak.


    No, the reason why there aren''t much left behind of the people who once lived here, should be due to the person in control of the blue divine energy¡­


    Narrowing his eyes as he realized this, Xuan Hao could not help thinking back to therge number of rocks filled with blue divine energy on the Second Star Peak and therge rock filled to the brim with blue divine energy on the Main Star Peak.


    Therge gathering of smaller rocks filled with divine energy was already scary enough if it was used for an attack¡­ But the blue divine energy gathered together in therge rock on the Main Star Peak was far scarier. Even the colossal construct under the control of the ck heart was nowhere near the same level of the power contained inside that rock.


    Maybe even if the construct managed to recover, it might not be able to resist the terrifying blue divine power inside that rock¡­


    Even the presence of the rock alone was enough to keep the chaotic qi outside from entering the area around the peak and ensured that even someone without cultivation would be able to move around without any problem.


    Faced with a power like that, it was rather obvious that the people originally living on the Main Star Peak had no chance to resist and were thoroughly annihted as a result. Leaving only a few traces of their existence behind!


    "I wonder just who the owner of the blue divine energy is¡­ And what happened back then to cause the destruction of this ce." Muttering this to himself as he gazed over towards the strange tree in the middle of the small, forested area, Xuan Hao did not stay around for long before leaving after not finding anything of us around the strange tree.


    However, instead of returning to the Star Shattering Sect like he had nned to do after finishing his exploration of the Main Star Peak, Xuan Hao instead decided to go through some of the locations that he had already been to in the past.


    Intending to try and see if he could find anything simr to the strange tree that could not be seen through his divine sense.


    Whoosh~


    Like this, Xuan Hao ended up searching through some of the different locations he had already been to in the past. However, due to the fact that he was not using his divine sense to search, it also meant that the speed at which he could search the Main Star Peak had reduced by several orders of magnitude.


    If he could search through the entire Main Star Peak in a little over a week in the past, now he would have to spent at least a few years- maybe even a decade before he could search the entire Main Star Peak without his divine sense¡­ And that was also considering that he didn''t use any time on resting and instead used all avable time searching through the Main Star Peak.


    Of course, even with all of this, there was always a chance that he might miss something because of howrge the peak of the Main Star Peak was.


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, it did not take more than a few days of searching before Xuan Hao managed to find another structure like the strange tree.


    Thump!


    "Another strange looking tree¡­ Looks like there are indeed other structures that are invisible to divine sense." Landing in front of what looked like a replica of the strange tree structure from earlier, Xuan Hao did not show any disappointment on his face. Instead, a faint smile appeared on his lips after seeing the strange tree.


    The reason for the smile was simple, the appearance of another structure that he couldn''t see through his divine sense had confirmed his earlier suspicion about there being more structure like the strange tree hidden on the Main star Peak.


    Although it was a replica of the same thing, it still carried some uniqueness to it, as instead of remnants left behind by incense, there were instead several bones and skulls lined up around the strange tree. Making it clear to anyone passing by that a sacrifice of some sort had been made to the strange-looking tree structure. Confirming that the strange tree was indeed some kind of shrine of sorts.


    As for what kind of god the strange tree represented, he had no idea. Maybe it was not even a god, but something different. After all, the sculptures of gods that he had seen so far were humanoid and would at most have a few unique characteristics, like wings, horns, tails, or something along that line. None of them being in the shape of a demon beast, let alone a tree¡­


    Of course, this could just be because the gods of the past had died out or disappeared after the cataclysm that had taken ce in the ancient era and no longer existed in the Ewaria continent. Maybe outside the continent, non-human gods would be moremon.


    Not to mention this, one would also have to consider the fact that the only race found on the Ewaria continent was the human race!


    Even if the demon beasts did have a bit of control over the continent, the territory that they controlled was negligible whenpared to the human race. Not to mention, demon beasts was not a single race, but a gathering of all sorts of different races¡­


    Thinking about all of this, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head. Whether or not the sculpture of the strange tree really represented some sort of ancient god that had once existed in the world didn''t matter.


    After all, it was nothing more than a slowly decaying structure that would no longer be remembered for what it had once represented. The only thing that was left in Xuan Hao''s eyes was nothing more than a strange structure that happened to be invisible to his divine sense. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Is this perhaps what will happen to the Star Shattering Sect in the future¡­?" Not able to stop himself from muttering this to himself as he turned to look back in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao felt a strange sense of mncholy as he looked back at the strange tree that seemed to have started an extremely slow process of decay.


    Even if it could survive for the next thousand years, what about ten thousand years? A Hundred thousand years? One million years? No matter how durable it seemed, it would inevitably disappear in the long river of time.


    The Star Shattering Sect was starting to enter period of rapid growth and would soon cement itself as the most powerful sect inside the Sky Empire¡­ But Xuan Hao could not help wondering about something after seeing the strange tree.


    How long would the Star Shattering Sectst? Would he be capable of continuing to support the sect and help it grow stronger, or would he end up reaching a bottleneck at some point that he would not be able to ovee, doomed to remain stuck as the river of time slowly erased him from history like it had done the strange tree¡­.


    Whoosh~


    As Xuan Hao was standing in front of the strange tree with a helpless expression on his face, a gentle mist began to flow out from the strange tree, slowly moving towards his body.

 Chapter 903 Strange Mist

    As the mist got closer to his body, it slowly started changing from being gentle and almost invisible, to a thick tree demonic looking tree root that seemed to be connected to the strange tree structure.


    During all of this happening, Xuan Hao did not notice therge root that had suddenly appeared in front of him and was instead still staring towards the strange tree structure with an increasingly helpless expression on his face.


    Ten meters, five meters, three meters, slowly the tree root closed the distance and was soon no more than two meters away from reaching him!


    However, just at this moment, the small me symbol located between his brows suddenly lit up. Followed by this, a blue me covered his entire body-


    "Hm? Ah!?"


    Swish-!


    Instantly waking him up from the state of helplessness that he had been trapped in. Allowing him to just barely escape from the tree root before it could reach him. Even if he had no clue what the tree root was, he had still instinctively felt the danger of it touching him, thus resulting in the almost instantaneous escape the moment he had recovered.


    Whoosh~


    Following Xuan Hao escaping into the distance, the tree root that had manifested from the gentle mist dispersed back into gentle mist that was soon absorbed into the strange tree structure. Returning everything back to normal, like nothing had happened in the first ce.


    "¡­"


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he looked back towards the strange tree structure in the distance, Xuan Hao felt could felt a sense of fear that he had never experienced before. The feeling of being trapped in the feeling of helplessness without even realizing that he had been trapped, was not something he wanted to experience again.


    If not for the fact that the small me imprint had suddenly activated and freed him from the weird trance he had entered, he would not even have realized that he had been trapped and would be at the mercy of the tree root!


    "What was that just now¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he slowly calmed down, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just what the strange tree had done to him.


    A soul-based attack?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao realized that this would be the only thing that made sense. After all, for something to affect his emotions, it would first have to be something that was targeted at his soul. The only problem was that he had never sensed something happening to his soul, let alone being affected by some sort of attack!


    From this alone, it became clear that the strange tree structure was far more terrifying than just a simple shrine left behind by the people who had once lived on the Main Star Peak in the past.


    As for what would have happened to him if the tree root had managed to reach him, Xuan Hao didn''t dare think about this, but¡­ From ancient records and other historical texts that he had gone through in the past, the most logical conclusion would be some sort of ancient spirit killing his soul and taking control of his body! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    However, techniques like this had a critical w¡­ And that was the fact that it would be close to impossible to seed if the opponent was already aware of what was happening, as the other party would be able to keep an eye on their own emotions and notice any abnormality that might ur.


    Of course, to do this in the first ce, it was still required for someone to at least have reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, as having developed a divine sense was the minimum requirement.


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao cautiously began to approach the strange tree structure to see if the strange mist and the tree root was going to appear again. Ready to react the moment he felt a change in his emotions.


    "Nothing¡­?"


    However, to his disappointment and relief, the strange tree root did not appear to try and attack him again. Instead, the strange tree remained quiet without anything happening. Even when he felt his confidence increase and tried to touch the strange tree, nothing happened.


    If not for the fact that he had personally witnessed the strange mist and tree root, he would have thought there was nothing wrong with the strange structure, outside of the fact that it was invisible to his divine sense.


    Did it get scared off by the me imprint?


    Knowing that there had to be a reason for the strange mist hiding away and not daring to attack him again, Xuan Hao could not help touching the me imprint between his brows. From the looks of it, other than saving him earlier, it had also ended up scaring the strange tree from attacking him again.


    Ching~


    Boom-!


    Trying tounch an attack to see if he could force the strange tree to act, Xuan Hao was left speechless after seeing his sword attack bounce off the strange tree before flying into the distance and destroying a small hill a few thousand meters away.


    "This¡­"


    Even if he had not used all of his strength in the attack just now, it would have been more than enough to kill someone who had undergone a single tribtion in the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Maybe I should just leave it alone for now. My strength is clearly too weak to do anything to it at the moment¡­


    Knowing that he would not be able to force the strange mist from earlier to appear, Xuan Hao could only give up on trying to find out more about the strange tree for now and explore the rest of the Main Star Peak. Maybe, if he was lucky, he might have a chance to encounter a strange tree that was in a far more damaged state than the two he had encountered so far. At the very least, this way, he should be able to properly examine it and figure out more about the strange mist from earlier.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao resumed searching through the Main Star Peak without the use of his divine sense, Chu Yang and Qing Yi were hiding beneath arge mushroom more than a dozen meters tall.


    ""¡­""


    Both of them did not dare to say a single word as they looked fearfully towards arge mouse demon beast busy searching for something beneath a simrlyrge mushroom. No, they were not looking towards therge mouse demon beast, but instead therge shadow that had appeared on top therge mushroom in the distance.


    Even if they could not clearly sense the strength of therge shadowy figure on top of the mushroom, they had still instinctively felt how dangerous it was. In the end, this was what had caused both of them to immediately hide.


    Squeeeak!


    Havin found what it was searching for, the mouse demon beast excitedly jumped around filled with joy,pletely oblivious to therge shadow that had slowly started descending down towards it from the top of the mushroom cap.


    "A Transcendent Grade Spirit Shroom Root!?"


    However, just as therge shadowy figure was about to reach the unsuspecting mouse demon beast below, Qing Yi ended up eximing loudly with a shocked expression on her face. Having discovered how precious the spiritual herb that the mouse demon beast had found was.


    Not to mention the Star Shattering Sect, even when considering the Sky Empire, Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herbs were nowhere to be found. The only reason Qing Yi recognized the Spirit Shroom Root, was because it was amon spiritual herb that could be found in different grades, all the way down to the Mortal Grade that was considered one of the mostmon spiritual herbs used for practicing beginner alchemy potions and pill.


    For this reason, Qing Yi could not stop help herself from showing a shocked expression on her face after realizing that the spiritual her that the mouse demon beast had dug up was actually a legendary transcendent grade spiritual herb.


    Squeak!? Squeaaaak-!


    However, the sudden exmation from Qing Yi, allowed the mouse demon beast to realize that there were others around-


    Swish-!


    Thud~


    Allowing it to just narrowly avoid the fangs of the shadowy figure that had been preparing to ambush it. Resulting in the fangs prating the rocky ground instead of the mouse.


    Following the shadowy figurending on the ground, this allowed both Chu Yang and Qing Yi to see the true form of the shadow figure.


    "This-"


    "A spider!?"


    Indeed, the identity of the shadowy figure lurking above was a giant spider demon beast, that was easily the size of therge mushroom caps of the trees around them!


    What''s more¡­ It seemed like the earlier exmation from Qing Yi, that had ended up scaring the mouse demon beast into running away, had caught the attention of therge spider demon beast...

 Chapter 904 Chased... Again...

    "Qing Yi... I think it''s best for us to leave before the spider decides to attack us." Looking towards Qing Yi who had pretty much ignored the spider after seeing it and instead fully focusing her attention on the spiritual herb sticking up from the ground beneath it, Chu Yang could not help nudging her shoulder gently before saying this.


    No matter how precious a Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb was, there was no way they would be able to get their hands on it with the spider demon beast around. Especially when considering that the spider demon beast had at least reached the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and should be far more powerful than the oversized chicken from earlier.


    Even if the oversized chicken had reached the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, it was not really that strong for an Eighth Stage Nascent Soul Realm demon beast. Thinking about the oversized chicken, Chu Yang could not help wondering just how such a demon beast had even managed to survive inside the jungle and reach the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Leave!? But what about the spiritual herb? Even if the spider demon beast is strong, it should still be possible for you to hold it back for a short period of time. During which, I can snatch the spiritual herb." Shaking her head with an unwilling expression on her face as she said this, Qing Yi clearly did not want to give up on the Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb. After all, this was something that even Domain Lord Realm Experts would start risk their lives over, let alone someone in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not to mention, she was not too worried about the spider demon beast with Chu Yang around. Feeling that he should be more than strong enough to hold it back alone for a short period of time. buying enough time for her to grab the spiritual herb. Completely forgetting how she had scolded Chu Yang not too long ago about attacking a demon beast far stronger than himself.


    Well¡­ In a sense, it was understandable why she would act like this. After all, a Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb was far too precious and was more than worth it for them to take a risk. Not to mention, they still had the talismans given to them by their master in case things got too dangerous.


    "¡­"


    At the same time Qing Yi wasing up with all sorts of reasons why it would be a good idea for them to attack the spider demon beast and try to snatch away the spiritual herb, Chu Yang could not help wondering whether or not to do as his senior sister said.


    On one side, it would be dangerous to engage with the spider demon beast considering how much stronger than him that it was. Not to mention they had already experienced just how dangerous it was to have a powerful demon beast chasing after them for an extended period of time above ground, something that would almost certainly be more dangerous in the limited underground space that they now found themselves inside of.


    But on the other hand, he really wanted to fight with the spider demon beast and try and see if he could use some of the things, he had learnt from fighting against the oversized chicken. Even if most of what he had learnt would not be of that much use, considering that a spider and chicken were twopletely different demon beasts. The experience of fighting a much stronger opponent would still be useful and could be further honed by fighting against the spider demon beast.


    "Fine, I will be holding the spider back while you get the spiritual herb." Nodding his head in response to Qing Yi''s suggestion after having thought it through, Chu Yang gazed towards the spider demon beast in the distance.


    Although it had already spotted them, it didn''t bother looking towards them for more than a few seconds before focusing all of its attention on the spiritual herb partially out of the ground below it. From the looks of it, it seemed like the spider had some idea that the spiritual herb was incredibly precious.


    "Yes~!" Smiling happily after having heard that Chu Yang agreed with her n of snatching the Spirit Shroom Root, Qing Yi''s expression also started bing a little worried after noticing that the spider demon beast had started digging into the ground around the Spirit Shroom Root. "But it looks like we will have to start immediately, or the spider will end up eating the Spirit Shroom Root. Considering how useful it is for demon beasts, the spider might end up directly breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm after eating it!"


    "Indeed¡­ Then, I will go first!"


    Swoosh~!


    Understanding that they could not waste any time after seeing that the spider demon beast had almost finished digging the Spirit Shroom Root out of the ground, Chu Yang took out his spear before charging towards the spider.


    Raising its head from the ground the moment Chu Yang moved, the spider demon beast made close to no sound as itsrge legs moved away from the Spirit Shroom Root and instead got into an attack posture. The only sound generated being the fine hairs on its legs gently brushing against the rocks on the ground. Showing just why it was the perfect assassin for the underground world that Chu Yang and Qing Yi now found themselves inside of after their escape from therge number of powerful demon beasts above ground.


    Ching~


    Soon, the sound of Chu Yang''s spear shing with the small ws at the end of its long legs echoed throughout the underground space. Attracting the attention of a few small demon beasts that had been hunting or sleeping nearby.


    Swish-!


    At the same time the small demon beasts began showing up to see what was happening, Chu Yang narrowly managed to avoid one of the spider''s other legs that came flying towards him the moment his spear was blocked by the small ws of the first leg with ease. Making it once again clear that the spider was indeed far stronger than him-


    "Huh?"


    Something that only became more obvious after he realized that he could not pull back his spear again, the two small ws at the end of the spider leg perfectly grabbing hold of it.


    CHiiii-!


    In the end, he could only use a spear technique to forcibly ovee the powerful grip of the two small ws before being able to free himself.


    ¡­


    "Looks like it''s now or never¡­" Muttering this to herself as the fight between Chu Yang and the spider began to move away from the location of the Spirit Shroom Root, Qing Yi slowly began approaching the Spirit Shroom Root. Making sure to not move too fast, as it might end up catching the attention of the spider demon beast.


    After all, even if it was a demon beast, it still instinctivly understood that the Spirit Shroom Root was something good that would increase its strength if eaten.


    With this in mind, there was no way it would allow her to just approach it and take it away without doing anything.


    For now, the main n was to get the spider as far away as possible before she began digging out and taking away the Spirit Shroom Root, while Chu Yang would do his best to keep the spider demon beast away during this period of time. After this, they would then work together to escape from the spider demon beast, or, if it was weaker than expected, kill it.


    The n was great, but, there was just one little problem with it-


    ROAR!


    And that was the fact that they didn''t ount for any other powerful demon beasts showing up during the short timeframe that it would take to carry out the n¡­


    For this reason, therge mouse demon beast at least double the size of the spider demon beast appearing just as she managed to free the Spirit Shroom Root from the ground, was not within their expectations of how things would turn out. Especially the fact that therge mouse demon beast was also in the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Dealing with one such demon beast with their current strength was fine, but two? This was not something they could deal with, even if they worked together!


    "Run!"


    "Right behind you!"


    Swoosh-!


    Swoosh-!


    Because of this, Chu Yang and Qing Yi didn''t waste a single second before escaping in the same direction. None of them wanting to repeat the same chase that they had experienced above ground.


    All things considered, they had still managed to get their hands of the Spirit Shroom Root, but¡­ They had also managed to get two angry- no, greedy would be more appropriate considering their main target being the Spirit Shroom Root, demon beasts chasing after them.

 Chapter 905 Gathering Of Elders In Front Of The Sect Gate

    Not aware of the dangerous situation that his disciples had once again found themselves in, Xuan Hao continued exploring the Main Star Peak without the use of his divine. Finding more of the strange tree structures scattered all across the Main Star Peak, each with their own unique offering ced beside them.


    However, even after finding more of the strange tree structures, Xuan Hao still did not manage to find any that had been damaged enough for him to try and grasp the interior situation of the strange trees. All he could do was observe the nk outer shell that remainedpletely immune to any attack he tried to use.


    Even when he had tried to attack a practicallyrge crack on the most damaged one among the structures, he still did not manage to do any damage to the strange tree. On the other hand, he ended up getting hit by part of the attack that was reflected by the strange tree.


    Although he could block most of the damage from the attack, it had still resulted in him not using his full strength to test out the strange tree structures. After all, his full-strength attack was more than enough to injure himself.


    "Should I just leave the Main Star Peak alone for now?" Muttering this to himself as he gazed down towards the decaying pieces of talismans paper located beneath yet another strange tree, Xuan Hao felt that he would be better off leaving the exploration of the Main Star Peak forter. The main reason behind this being the fact that he had still not managed to find anything other than the strange trees¡­ And given how big the Main Star Peak was, Xuan Hao did not really feel like dedicating the next five or ten years to fully searching it for the possibility of encountering a strange tree that had been damaged to a degree that he would be able to break it apart.


    On the other hand, it would be far more effective to use this time to increase his strength. Maybe returning after he managed to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm to see if he would be able to find out more about the strange trees was the best option for now¡­


    Swish~


    Turning away from the strange tree with a brand-new kind of offering beneath it, Xuan Hao began making his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    All things considered; he had managed to get a lot out of his trip to the Main Star Peak this time around. Not only did he manage to break through to the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, but he had also managed toprehend a brand new dao, the Dao of Fire. Allowing his dao domain to grow more stable with the addition of an additional dao.


    Outside of this, he had of course also managed to gain a deeper understanding of just how rare the Dao Domain Lord Realm was from the reaction of the remnant soul of the demonic cultivator. If his guess was not wrong, the Dao Domain Lord Realm should not be a realm that existed in the current era.


    Instead, it looked more like there was only the Soul Ascension Realm. Of course, outside of this, there still existed the True Demon Realm for demonic cultivators and a simr realm for the followers of the different gods.


    The main difference between the two and the Soul Ascension Realm being that Xuan Hao still didn''t know how they would surpass their respective realms and ascend to the realm above the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Would they have to go through the immortal soul tribtion like those in the Soul Ascension Realm? Or would they have to go through somethingpletely different?


    No matter what the answer was, Xuan Hao was certain that it should not be any less dangerous than the immortal soul tribtion.


    After all, if it was easy to aplish, there would be far more powerful demonic cultivators and followers of the different gods¡­ But at the moment, it seemed like normal cultivators following the path of transcending the immortal soul tribtion was far moremon.


    Whoosh~


    Lost in his own thoughts thinking about the three different cultivation paths, Xuan Hao arrived back at the Star Shattering Sect just in time to see arge group of elders gathered at the entrance of the sect. Looking like they were about to leave at any moment.


    The main thing that caught Xuan Hao''s attention about these elders was the number of elders. Not to mention Peak Core Formation Realm Elders, just the number of Nascent Soul Realm Elders present exceeded twenty. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    If it was just when the Star Shattering Sect had settled down on the Shattered Star Peak, this could be considered all of their Nascent Soul Realm Experts. Even if things had changed from back then, the number of Nascent Soul Realm Experts present still made up over a third and close to half of the total Nascent Soul Realm Experts present in the entire Star Shattering Sect!


    Hm? Isn''t that Elder Song and the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race?


    Spotting the familiar figure of Elder Song talking to none other than the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race not too far away from where therge group of elders were gathered, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly to himself. Understanding that all of this had something to do with Elder Song.


    As for what it was about, Xuan Hao decided to descend down towards the base of the Ninth Star Peak where the main entrance of the sect was located, and therge number of elders had gathered together.


    Swish~


    "Hm? Who is- Ah!? G-Grand Elder!?"


    "It''s Grand Elder Xuan!"


    "Why is he here?"


    "Maybe he is also going to join in on the offensive against those major kingdoms?"


    "No way, Elder Song would not have gathered so many of us if that was the case¡­"


    Following Xuan Hao''s sudden appearance, the elders all focused their attention on him as they began excitedly talking with each other about why he had suddenly shown up.


    "Greetings, Elder Song, Grand Elder, it''s been some time since west met. How are you doing in the sect?" Ignoring the elders excitedly looking towards him while chatting with each other, Xuan Hao directly went over to greet Elder Song and the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race.


    "Xuan Hao! It''s great to see you, Song Jia has been asking about you since she knew you returned to the sect a few weeks ago. How about taking a few hours to teach her together with your disciples before leaving again? I''m sure that would make her happy."


    The first to respond to his greeting was not the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race that his question had been directed towards, but instead Elder Song, who happily told him about how Song Jia had been asking about her spending more time together with him and his disciples.


    "Sure, I will make some time and also ensure that my disciples take care of her when I''m gone. My newest disciple is also new to the sect and should be more than happy to make a new friend." Considering that Song Jia likely did not have any other friends in the sect outside of his disciples, Xuan Hao agreed with Elder Song''s request. In the first ce, he would not really lose anything by doing this and it would also be a good way to help Mui get adjusted to the sect through someone other than just his disciples.


    "Greetings, Grand Elder Xuan. It''s been some time since ourst meeting, I have been doing quite well in the sect and so has the rest of the people from my sect, I even feel like reaching the Domain Lord Realm is now within reach!" Not following too far behind, the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race showed a grateful smile as he said this.


    Since entering the Star Shattering Sect, the Half Spirit Race had indeed been doing well, a lot of their members experiencing a massive increase in strength, some of their Nascent Soul Realm Experts even breaking through a minor realm or two over the past few years. A speed that had been impossible before they left their small, isted valley and entered the Star Shattering Sect.


    Hm? Looks like the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race is indeed close to reaching the Domain Lord Realm!


    Using his divine sense to analyze the current state of the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race following what he said, Xuan Hao could not help showing an approving smile on his lips.


    Even if the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race had not yet reached the Half Step Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao still managed to sense that a pseudo domain had already started forming!

 Chapter 906 Future Expansion Plans Of Elder Song

    Following the discovery that the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race was about to form a pseudo domain; Xuan Hao gave him a few pointers to help make the process of forming his domain easier.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any time, the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit found a ce to sit down before fully immersing himself inprehending the pointers Xuan Hao had given him. Understanding how valuable the pointers of an expert in the Domain Lord Realm were for someone like himself.


    "Elder Xuan, is there perhaps something you want to ask about?" Seeing how Xuan Hao had specifically given the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race a few pointers, Elder Song did not take more than a few seconds to realize that he had done this to make the other party leave.


    Although, even if the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race knew about this, he would not be the slightest bit mad. After all, the pointers Xuan Hao had given him on the Domain Lord Realm were real and would help him in reaching the Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    "Hehe, can''t hide anything from you Elder Song, I only wanted to ask about why so many of the sect''s elders have been gathered here. As far as I know, nothing major should have happened during the few weeks I was gone." Chuckling to himself as he said this, Xuan Hao felt that Elder Song was indeed the smartest person among the elders of the sect. Nothing could elude his sharp senses.


    If not for the fact that he was only in the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao would have been more than happy to have him take on the mantle of Sect Master. Feng Chen would most likely also have be more than happy if someone skillful like Elder Song could take his ce as Sect Master and allow him to focus all of his attention towards increasing his cultivation.


    Although the strength of the Sect Master did not matter too much in the grand scheme of things, as the main power of a sect always resided in the ancestors and powerful elders who had long since stepped aside to focus all their attention on cultivation or training a select few skilled disciples. The strength of the Sect Master could still not be too low, as it would at least have to be within the upper echelons of the sect.


    Something that had now changed from the Nascent Soul Realm to the Domain Lord Realm since the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect became the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    "Gathering of elders? You want to know about the ns I have for the sect''s expansion?"


    "Sect''s expansion? Sure, I''m curious about what you were up to."


    "Hehe, that is great!" Realizing that Xuan Hao wanted to know more about his ns, Elder Song''s eyes started shining for a brief moment before he started talking.


    "The reason I gathered so many elders here is because I was nning to begin the next phase of the sect''s expansion into the major kingdoms. Considering how much stronger andrger those kingdoms arepared to the rest of the kingdoms we have set up branches in so far, the number of elders present here is only barely enough to establish a foothold for now.


    In the future when the sect grows stronger and we get more Nascent Soul Realm Experts, I was nning to send out a few more to stabilize the new territory and ensure that the sect can hold on to its new territory without it developing into a chaotic mess where ouws gather.


    Other than this, I also nned to establish a few trading sections in the new branch sects that are going to be established to ensure a stable flow of resources and-"


    Listening to Elder Song as he continued talking about all the different things he had nned when it came to the different branch sects, future trade routes between sects, disciple recruiting, management of the different minor powers under the major kingdoms and so on, Xuan Hao could not help sighing in amazement over just how detailed Elder Song''s n was.


    Not to mention the fact that it involved over a thousand different minor powers that would be managed by the Star Shattering Sect in the future, Elder Song had even included the different mortal viges and cities in his ns.


    Although most sects and kingdoms would neglect these mortals, Elder Song understood just how important they were for the continuation of the sect. After all, most of the sect''s future disciples woulde from these different mortal cities and viges. For this reason alone, Elder Song had seen it as vital to make sure that they would do well.


    "Looks like you have already thought things through¡­" Knowing that Elder Song was not going to stop talking on his own any time soon, Xuan Hao decided to interrupt him before he ended up dying the group of elders from leaving today. Even now, he could feel all of them looking towards him and Elder Song.


    "Hm?"


    Stopping his very in-depth exnation of how he nned to establish a new group of elders in the Star Shattering Sect that would be in charge of recruiting new disciples from all across the sect''srge territory. Sending the most talented to the main sect, while the rest would go to the closest branch sect.


    "Look at how the time flies; the sun has already started going down. Hehe, Xuan Hao, if you will excuse me, I have something to attend to." Letting out an awkwardugh upon realizing that the sun had started going down, symbolizing the fact that he had spent over half a day talking, Elder Song quickly returned to therge group of elders behind him. Not wasting a second before starting to give out instructions to them like nothing had happened. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    """¡­"""


    The group of elders in question could only silently cry to themselves at the fact that they had been ignored, as they were soon sent off by Elder Song. All heading towards the location where they would be in charge of establishing a new branch sect over the next few years.


    As for Xuan Hao, he quickly left the Ninth Star Peak and made his way back towards the Seventh Star Peak where the sect was located. Preparing to keep his promise with Elder Song and have Song Jia join one of his teaching sessions with Mui.


    ¡­


    "Hong Xuan¡­ Does he really want to fight it out with Star Shattering Sect even after finding out about that terrifying guardian demon beast? Even if one of the old ancestors really reached the Domain Lord Realm, I doubt it will make any difference." At the same time that the Star Shattering Sect was about to move against the different major kingdoms, Elder Sheng Mei, one of the two most influential elders of the me Sky Kingdom was quietly cursing the other most influential elder of the me Sky Kingdom.


    The reason why she was so annoyed at Elder Hong Xuan was because she had just recently found out that he had made a visit to the ancestors of the royal family and somehow managed to convince them to leave seclusion to side with him on the matter. Instantly destroying any sort of influence in favor of joining under the Star Shattering Sect that she had managed to build up over the past few years.


    No matter how much influence she had as an elder, she was still nothing when faced with the old ancestors who were only a single step away from the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although they were only separated by a single minor realm, this minor realm was like the difference between heaven and earth. An Eighth Stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert like her simply did not stand a single chance in the face of a Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert with a pseudo domain!


    "But¡­ What on earth did that fellow use to convince them to leave seclusion and take his side on this matter? No matter how little they know about the outside world due to focusing all their attention towards reaching the Domain Lord Realm, they should at the very least be aware of just how strong the Star Shattering Sect is¡­ And more importantly, how terrifying that guardian demon beast is.


    Even I can tell that it should at least have reached the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, maybe even the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!" Feeling a shiver run down her spine as she recalled the terrifying guardian demon beast, Elder Sheng Mei could not understand what had caused these ancestors to have the confidence in going against the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Hm? Wait¡­ There seems to be something that might exin it, what if they managed to get their hands on that powerful forbidden technique that some of the other resisting kingdoms got their hands on- No, maybe the person behind this forbidden technique was the one to convince them to follow the word of Hong Xuan!" Freezing on the spot as she suddenly realized this, Elder Sheng Mei could not help feeling something was wrong.


    Even she knew the side effects of the forbidden technique, so the ancestors would know them as well. Considering the attitude of doing anything to reach the Domain Lord Realm, she doubted that these old ancestors would willingly use such a forbidden technique that would essentially kill them.


    In the end, what had caused them to still go forward with resisting the Star Shattering Sect?

 Chapter 907 Expanding To The Major Kingdoms

    Following the group of elders from the Star Shattering Sect starting to make their way towards the location Elder Song had told them to establish a new branch sect, one particr elder who had just recently managed to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm, arrived outside a small town at the edge of the me Sky Kingdom territory.


    "So, this is the ce where Elder Song wants me to establish a new branch sect? Haaa¡­ Even if the spiritual qi on the mountain range a bit further away from this ce is decent, it is nowhere near the same level of the Shattered Star Peaks¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced over the small town filled with mortals before turning towards the small mountain range located a few thousand meters away from the town, the elder of the Star Shattering Sect could not helpmenting over how bad the current environment waspared to the Shattered Star Peaks.


    "If I just didn''t participate in that meeting back then, I would have been able to stay in the main sect and continue enjo- working hard to increase my cultivation." Shaking his head as he said this to himself, the elder slowly began making his way towards the small town. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even if his job was to establish a branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect, he would of course not be the person building the sect up from scratch all alone. Instead, his main job was to first scout out any potentially strong cultivators that might be lurking around before making sure to take care of any hostile forces around.


    After all of this, he would then contact the sect and have them send over people and materials to begin constructing the branch sect under his protection.


    Given the fact that his location in specific was one of the ces furthest away from the Star Shattering Sect, he would also be one of the people who would be required to stay for longer.


    Ahhh, why didn''t I get chosen for one of those nearby branch sect locations!? If I did, I would at most have to spent two or three years before I could return to the main sect again¡­


    Lamenting over this fact, the elder from the Star Shattering Sect arrived at the entrance to the small town.


    Given the fact that the small town was at the edge of the me Sky Kingdom and did not have any real strategic value to the me Sky Kingdom, the strongest person present in the town had only barely reached the Foundation Establishment.


    Although this might be a powerful existence in the eyes of the mortals without any cultivation. In the eyes of the elder from the Star Shattering Sect who had reached the Nascent Soul Realm, this person was no different from these mortals in terms of strength.


    Not to mention, the Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator in the small town was not someone young and talented but was instead an old man who at most had a few years left to live.


    "Stop! You can''t enter the town unless you are someone from the me Sky Kingdom!"


    Just as he was about to make his way inside the town to see it firsthand and get more familiar with the town that would most likely end up developing rapidly as a result of the new branch sect he was going to establish in the mountain range a few thousand meters away, a burly guard who had been half asleep in front of the small entrance to the town suddenly jumped up and stopped him from entering the town.


    Even from a nce, it was obvious that this guard wanted to get this over with quickly and return to cking off.


    "Hm? What is this about? Aren''t the borders of the me Sky Kingdom open to anyone passing by?" Not affected by the rude behavior of the guard in front of him, the elder of the Star Shattering Sect was far more curious about why he had been stopped, as he asked this with a curious expression on his face. Wanting to figure out anything important that might have taken ce in the area he would be in charge of over the next few years.


    After all, although every single elder had been given a description of the current situation in the kingdom they were sent to, the situation could easily change during the weeks- or in his case months, that was used to travel to the location given to them by Elder Song.


    "Open borders? Your information is outdated, the me Sky Kingdom closed its border one week ago. Only those who can prove their identity as a citizen of the me Sky Kingdom are allowed to enter!" Snickering towards the elder as he said this, the guard clearly did not hold any respect for this stranger who had appeared and disturbed his sleep.


    "Closed borders to everyone not a citizen of the me Sky Kingdom? What is the reason for taking such a drastic measure to stop people from entering the kingdom?" Not at all affected by the behavior of the guard, the elder just continued asking about the situation of the me Sky Kingdom.


    In a sense, the reason why he was being looked down upon by this guard most likely had to do with the fact that he had disguised himself as an ordinary wanderer instead of using the elder robe of the sect. Knowing that using it would end up catching far too much attention and possibly result in the me Sky Kingdom sending a Nascent Soul Realm Expert to prevent him from entering the me Sky Kingdom in the first ce.


    All things considered; he knew that his own strength was far from enough to resist the attack of the me Sky Kingdom. In his eyes, it was far better to leave something like this to the more powerful elders who had simrly gone to the me Sky Kingdom to establish a branch sect like him. Especially the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit, when he started building a branch sect close to the capital of the me Sky Kingdom, there was no way they would have the time to pay attention to someone like him at the border of their territory.


    "You- How would I know about something like that!? It''s probably something rted to that new sect, I think it was called the Star Shattering Sect, starting to expand into the territory of the me Sky Kingdom. Now that I answered your questions, scram, I still have some important work to do!" Not bothering to pay any more attention to the elder from the Star Shattering Sect after this, the angry guard returned to his seat at the entrance to the small town before closing his eyes and returning to his half-asleep state. Only barely keeping himself awake enough to pay attention to anyone trying to enter the town.


    "So, the other elders have already started moving¡­ If that is the case, there shouldn''t be any problem with me beginning the construction of a branch sect here¡­" Muttering this to himself as a sense of relief washed over him after hearing what the guard said, the elder of the Star Shattering Sect felt much more at ease knowing that the me Sky Kingdom would be busy trying to stop the other elders of the Star Shattering Sect.


    With this in mind, he did not waste a second and directly changed out of his disguse and into the robe representing his status as an elder of the Star Shattering Sect before confidently making his way inside the town. No longer worried that his appearance would end up attracting a powerful Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the me Sky Kingdom.


    Realizing that the person he had just stopped was about to enter the town, the guard who had once again been woken up, angrily yelled as he prepared to draw the small sword at his waist to stop him. "Hm? Ah! Hey, I told you that you can''t enter unless-"


    Of course, his anger soon turned into fear when he realized the new robe and the striking symbol of the Star Shattering Sect beautifully embroidered on it. Even if he was only a random guard from the me Sky Kingdom who had barely managed to reach the Qi Condensation Realm, he still recognized the symbol of the Star Shattering Sect.


    "T-this- The Star Shattering Sect!" Feeling a profound sense of fear welling up inside him as he remembered how he had treated this elder just a few seconds earlier, the guard copsed on the ground. Fainting as a result of the overwhelming fear that suddenly overwhelmed him.


    "What the¡­ Ehm¡­ Whatever, I will just continue exploring this town¡­"


    Whoosh~


    Not knowing what to say after seeing the guard copsing on the ground before a small puddle of liquid formed around his lower region, the elder of the Star Shattering Sect quickly made his way inside the small town. Making sure to avoid the unconscious guard.

 Chapter 908 Fall Of The Cloud Sky Kingdom

    At the same time that the elder of the Star Shattering Sect was making his way into the town at the border of the me Sky Kingdom, simr situations were happening across all the major kingdoms around the Star Shattering Sect. Soon causing all of the major kingdoms to start panicking at the sudden realization that the Star Shattering Sect began expanding into their territory.


    In the eyes of these major kingdoms, most of them had thought they would still have fifty to a hundred years left before the Star Shattering Sect stabilized their new territory and began expanding into their territory.


    However, this thought was proven wrong with the Star Shattering Sect resuming their expansion after only a few years after taking control of the smaller kingdoms around them. By the point these major kingdoms realized what was happening, the Star Shattering Sect had already started building a branch sect in their territory.


    In a sense, the me Sky Kingdom could be considered one of the kingdoms who had been impacted the least by the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect so far due to being located at the edge. Resulting in them having more time to prepare for the inevitable arrival of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course, they were not able to fully prevent the Star Shattering Sect from entering their territory and could at most dy the construction of the different branch sects. After all, no matter how eager the me Sky Kingdom was to be independent from the Star Shattering Sect, they also understood how devastating a war with the Star Shattering Sect would be for them. Especially when considering that none of the other major kingdoms had started fighting back against the Star Shattering Sect yet.


    At least they had the advantage of being one of the kingdoms farthest away from the Star Shattering Sect, so they had not yet been as affected as some of the major kingdoms located right next to the star Shattering Sect.


    For now, the choice of the me Sky Kingdom and some of the other major kingdoms located far away from the Star Shattering Sect, was to wait for one of the more affected major kingdoms located close to the Star Shattering Sect couldn''t endure any longer and decided to retaliate against the Star Shattering Sect.


    It was in this tense situation between the different major kingdoms that something unexpected happened¡­


    "What!? The Cloud Sky Kingdom gave up?!"


    "Yes¡­ News is that they didn''t even fight back and just gave up after an envoy from the Star Shattering Sect showed up at their capital!"


    "Hmph! You guys know nothing! Apparently, the main reason they surrendered was not due to the Star Shattering Sect showing up, but because the Flowing Cloud Sect and the rest of the sects in the Cloud Sky Kingdom already reached an agreement with the Star Shattering Sect!"


    "Flowing Cloud Sect? No wonder then, that sect is almost as strong as the royal family of the Cloud Sky Kingdom. Facing both the internal pressure Cloud Sect and external pressure of the Star Shattering Sect, its no wonder they decided to give up without fighting."


    "Indeed, at least this way, they can still keep themselves alive¡­"


    The Cloud Sky Kingdom, the major kingdom located the closest to the Star Shattering Sect among the many different major kingdoms and also the main kingdom that the rest of the major kingdoms were expecting to start fighting back against the Star Shattering Sect, surrendered!


    This unexpected turn of events instantly caused the major kingdoms looking towards the Cloud Sky Kingdom to panic. Not just because of the surrender of the Cloud Sky Kingdom, but because they understood that the Star Shattering Sect had also reached some sort of agreement with the Explorer Union located in the Cloud Sky Kingdom.


    After all, the main people in charge of the Cloud Sky Kingdom were not only the royal family, but also the Explorer Union, who had one of their biggest branches in the border region of the Sky Empire in the Cloud Sky Kingdom.


    For them to agree to the Star Shattering Sect taking control of the Cloud Sky Kingdom was a huge blow to these major kingdoms due to the fact that it meant the Explorer Union acknowledged the strength of the Star Shattering Sect. Something that had never happened in the border region of the Sky Empire before!


    In the end, the major kingdoms were forced to rethink their ns of fighting the Star Shattering Sect, as they now not only faced the retaliation of the Star Shattering Sect, but also the possible retaliation of the Explorer Union. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    No matter what, there was no way these major kingdoms dared to take a chance and possibly provoke the Explorer Union. After all, it was quite well known on the Ewaria Continent just how terrifying the Explorer Union was.


    Not to mention these major kingdoms, even an empire like the Sky Empire did not dare provoke the Explorer Union!


    Because of this, all of the major kingdoms focused their attention on trying to find out what had caused the Explorer Union to agree with the Star Shattering Sect taking over the Cloud Sky Kingdom that they had been settled in for the past thousands of years.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the major kingdoms stopped thinking about attacking the Star Shattering Sect''s elders that had entered their territory, Elder Song was reading through a report about how these major kingdoms had all sent their people to the Cloud Sky Kingdom in an attempt to figure out the rtionship between the Star Shattering Sect and the Explorer Union.


    "Hehe, looks like everything is working out perfectly! Now the elders should at least have a year or two to work on establishing the branch sects without worrying about the retaliation from any of the major kingdoms!" Chuckling to himself as he said this, Elder Song could not help remembering what had happened a month ago when Xuan Hao had returned to the sect from exploring the Main Star Peak.


    Back then, he had gone to find Song Jia after having sent off the elders and ended up finding her at Xuan Hao''s ce. In the end, he ended up talking about something that was troubling him, the Cloud Sky Kingdom.


    Although the kingdom was not the strongest, it had a major branch of the Explorer Union in the middle of its capital. Meaning that the kingdom was to some degree under the protection of the Explorer Union and it was because of this, he could not think of any way to take over the territory of the Cloud Sky Kingdom without possibly offending the Explorer Union as a result.


    For this reason, he had only decided to have some of the elders establish a few small branches around the edges of the Cloud Sky Kingdom for now. Not daring to ce one close to the capital. Fearful that it might end up drawing the ire of the Explorer Union. No matter how strong the current Star Shattering Sect was, Elder Song understood very well that there was no way for them topare with a terrifying organization spanning the entire continent.


    Unexpectedly, when he was talking about this, he managed to find out that Xuan Hao was friends with one of the elders from the Flowing Cloud Sect, a sect that had grown to be the most powerful sect in the Cloud Sky Kingdom over the past few years due to the emergence of a new and powerful elder.


    Hearing about this, he was excited. The main reason for this was because the Flowing Cloud Sect was no less powerful than the royal family of the Cloud Sky Kingdom and even looked like they were about to topple them and take control of the Cloud Sky Kingdom. Bing an independent sect simr to the Star Shattering Sect.


    However, the most important thing was not this, but the fact that the Explorer Union did not interfere in this struggle for power. Most likely just seeing it as some sort of internal struggle instead of an external one¡­ Or maybe the Explorer Union did not care as much about the Cloud Sky Kingdom as he and the surrounding kingdoms thought. No matter what the answer was, no one was willing to test it out themselves.


    Not thinking too much about the Explorer Union, Elder Song decided to ask Xuan Hao to contact this friend of his. Soon resulting in him meeting with an elder of the Flowing Cloud Sect called Ji Yichuan.


    Following this, he spent the next month cooperating with this Ji Yichuan to find out more about the royal family and their rtionship between the Cloud Sky Kingdom and the Explorer Union. In the end, it did not take long before he found out that the Explorer Union had absolutely nothing to do with this royal family and wouldn''t care whether they lived or died if nothing happened to their branch in the capital.


    The rest was history, as Elder Song came to an agreement with the Flowing Cloud Sect before forcing the royal family to surrender with the assistance of the Flowing Cloud Sect and the different sects under them. Something that the royal family had no way to resist without the guise of the Explorer Union supporting them to hide behind.

 Chapter 909 Shu Yao Accidentally Damages Infrastructure...

    <h4>Chapter 909 Shu Yao identally Damages Infrastructure...</h4>


    Having watched how Elder Song managed toe to an agreement with the Flowing Cloud Sect through a connection Ji Yichuan had managed to form between himself and the sect master of the Flowing Cloud Sect, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised after finding out how much Ji Yichuan had changed from theirst meeting.


    Not only did he gain a lot of power in the Flowing Cloud Sect, but his own strength had also increased. Having already broken through to the Fourth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Firmly cing him in the middle stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, a realm that was unattainable for most Nascent Soul Realm Experts in the Cloud Sky Kingdom.


    As for how Ji Yichuan had even managed to get so close to the sect master of the Flowing Cloud Sect and managed to convince her to ally with the Star Shattering Sect in taking down the royal family of the Cloud Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao understood that this should be rted to him reaching the Fourth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Even if the Middle Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, consisting of the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, was not considered anything amazing in the current Star Shattering Sect, the same could not be said for a smaller sect like the Flowing Cloud Sect.


    Thinking about it like this, it was reasonable for Ji Yichuan to have enough influence in the Flowing Cloud Sect to help Elder Song convince the sect master about joining the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Looks like it''s better to just let Elder Song do his thing..." Knowing that there was no need for his help in the establishment of the different branch sects, Xuan Hao focused all his attention on Mui and Bai Ning, while also teaching Song Jia every now and then.


    Considering how things were going, he did not think it would take more than a few years before Elder Song officially began the process of taking away control from the different major kingdoms through the use of the many branch sects currently in the process of being built. Until that time, there shouldn''t be much resistance from the different major kingdoms, as they would be too worried about the link between the Star Shattering Sect and the Explorer Union to do anything about the branch sects being constructed in their territory.


    Although they all understood what the Star Shattering Sect wanted to do, they were helpless to do anything about, one of smallest and weakest among the major kingdoms even ended up directly surrendering after realizing how hopeless it would be to struggle against the Star Shattering Sect. Hoping to retain some form of power by willingly throwing in the towel and surrendering to the Star Shattering Sect before even attempting to fight them. Drawing almost unanimous condemnation from the remaining major kingdoms, who still very much wanted to keep their territory and power intact as a result.


    In the end, this matter caused some of the major kingdoms to start secretlyunching attacks against this smaller and weaker major kingdom. Not daring to attack openly in fear of having to deal with the retaliation of the Star Shattering Sect. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Of course, there was no way for the Star Shattering Sect to just stand by and do nothing when what had essentially just be part of their territory was constantly being attack, with severalrge spirit stone mines and spiritual herb fields being sabotaged or outright destroyed.


    In the end, Shu Yao personally ended up going to that major kingdom to calm down the situation... And with calm down meaning annihting any of the people secretly sent over by those major kingdoms!


    Even if doing this did cause quite a bit of damage to some of the spirit stone mines and spiritual herb fields, it did result in none of those major kingdoms daring to send any more people over. Understanding very well that the Star Shattering Sect cared little about maintaining the spiritual herb fields and spirit stone mines when fighting them.


    Not to mention the damage done by the people secretly sent over by the different major kingdoms, even if those major kingdoms all invaded, it was doubtful if they would even be able to cause the same level of destruction that Shu Yao had done during her purge of those secret spies from the different major kingdoms.


    One example would be a spirit stone mine where one of the spies from a major kingdom had been about to sabotage the crane used to lift the spirit stones out of the mine and up to the surface.


    To get rid of that one spy, Shu Yao had ended up using her domain to pull out all of the miners before sending an attack down in the spirit stone mine to kill the spy. Instantly causing the death of the spy, but at the same time causing the entire spirit stone mine to copse a short time after she left due to the structural damage caused by her attack. Forcing the miners on the surface to rebuild their mine from scratch.


    Shu Yao did not intend for something like this to happen and only intended to kill the spy, but because her strength was far too much for the fragile wooden beams holding up the spirit stone mine to endure. Even if they had been strengthened by different talismans to make them stronger. It had ended with the spirit stone mine copsing a few minutes after she had left.


    Unknowingly to Shu Yao, herck of control over her own strength had ended up causing a disaster. The main reason for this being ack of experience when it came to fighting in the Domain Lord Realm.


    After all, even if she had managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm, she had not really had any real fighting experience with other Domain Lords outside of the fake Domain Lord from the Feather Kingdom. Not someone that really served as anything more than a punching bag.


    Elder Song, who learnt about the damaged caused by Shu Yao after she had left the area where the spies were located, almost instantly informed her, and told her to stop, but... It was already toote at that point in time.


    The damage had already been done and all of the spies exterminated, all Shu Yao could do was go back and help out with the damage she had ended up causing.


    At least now that she understood just how bad her control over her own strength was, she was nning to seek out Feng Chen. Knowing that it would be far more effective for her to fight with Feng Chen and figure out things by herselfpared to seeking out Xuan Hao. Understanding that the difference in strength between them would end up making things far more difficult.


    ...


    "Shu Yao... To think she ended up causing so much damage trying to kill off the spies from the different major kingdoms, why didn''t she just use her domain to restrain and kill them instead of sending down her attack into an enclosed space like a spirit stone mine? Did she perhaps forget about the existence of her domain?" Not knowing what to say after learning about what Shu Yao had done, Xuan Hao could only shake his head andugh to himself at just how ridiculous the entire matter was.


    Different from someone like Elder Song who still didn''t know too much about the Domain Lord Realm, he understood very well that no matter how little control over her strength Shu Yao had, she would still have the ability to use her domain to forcibly restrain the spies and kill them without causing any damage to her surroundings.


    Just the fact that she had pulled out the miners from the different spirit stone mines she visited was more than enough to show that she had no problem with controlling her domain.


    In the end, Xuan Hao could only me it on her being a little too focused on getting rid of the different spies. Forgetting that there was a far more effective way to kill them without also causing damage to the different ces that she was protecting from the spies.


    All things considered, with Shu Yao helping out, it would not take more than a few months before the different spirit stone mines and spiritual herb fields she had destroyed got up and running again.


    On the other hand, considering that Shu Yao was also experienced in formations, Xuan Hao thought that this might end up being a positive thing for the weaker major kingdom, as the formations set up by Shu Yao was sure to improve their spiritual herb fields and spirit stone mines in the future.


    It was also for this reason that Elder Song did not get too angry about the damage she had caused after learning that she would be staying behind to help rebuilt some of the things she had ended up destroying.

 Chapter 910 Anomaly At The Old Pavilion

    Rumble~!


    At the same time that Shu Yao was busy rebuilding the different spirit stone mines and spiritual herb fields that she had ended up destroying and Xuan Hao was busy teaching Mui, a loud rumbling sound suddenly echoed out across the entire Flying Sword Sect-


    "What in the world is happening!? Is there someone fighting close to the sect?"


    Instantly alerting the elder who had been put in charge of the Flying Sword Sect after it had been transformed into a branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect, who did not waste a second before trying to find out where the loud rumbling sound hade from.


    "Huh? The origin of the rumbling sound seems to be¡­ Grand Elder Xuan''s old mountain peak!?" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Taking no more than a few minutes to find the origin of the rumbling sound, the elder froze on the spot after realizing that it was the old mountain peak that Grand Elder Xuan had lived on before the establishment of the Star Shattering Sect. Even if he was a Nascent Soul Realm Elder of the sect, he understood that climbing the mountain without prior approval from the Grand Elder would be a bad idea.


    Whoosh~


    For this reason, the elder decided to take out hismunication talisman to try and contact Xuan Hao. Making sure to keep an eye on the mountain peak in case something other than the increasingly loud rumbling sounds, that could now be heard by everyone in the sect, took ce.


    Meanwhile, in the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao suddenly discovered someone trying to contact him through hismunication talisman.


    "Song Jia, Mui, it looks like someone is trying to contact me, can I leave you two on your own?"


    "Yes! I will make sure to keep an eye on Mui!"


    "Ye- Huh? An eye on me?"


    Not bothering to stay behind to listen to the two girls'' conversation after hearing that they would be fine by themselves, Xuan Hao made his way into his mediation room before answering hismunication talisman-


    "What!? Something happened to my mountain peak back at the Flying Sword Sect!? No, don''t approach it for now, I will be there shortly!"


    Learning about the weird rumbling sounding from his old mountain peak, Xuan Hao didn''t take long to put two and two together. Almost instantly realizing that the loud rumbling sound that the elder in charge of the Flying Sword Sect had heard should havee from the entrance to the mystic realm, that was located beneath his old pavilion.


    Did those two disciples of mine do something?


    Not having forgotten the fact that Chu Yang and Qing Yi were currently inside the mystic realm, Xuan Hao could not help thinking that his two disciples might have done something that had ended up causing the loud rumbling sound heard by the elder in charge of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Even if it was unlikely considering that his disciples were still in the Nascent Soul Realm and should have no way to cause any meaningful damage to a formation that he had no way of damaging, Xuan Hao didn''t dare underestimate their ability to cause trouble.


    Although their strength might becking, there should be nock of ancient formations and powerful demon beasts inside the mystic realm. idently activating one of those ancient formations or awakening a powerful demon beast might have a certain effect on the stability of the mystic realm''s entrance.


    The only thing that allowed him to be rtively calm after learning about the change that seemed to have taken ce inside the mystic realm, was the fact that he could still feel the different protective measures left with his disciples. Meaning that they were either not rted to the change that had taken ce in the mystic realm, or that they had not encountered something dangerous enough that they were unable to handle it by themselves.


    Even if all of this was reassuring Xuan Hao still did not want to waste too much time knowing that there was something wrong with the mystic realm entrance-


    Whoosh~!


    Directly using the Drifting Cloud Steps to almost instantaneously teleport to the Flying Sword Sect located almost right next to the Star Shattering Sect. Although he had not been able to directly move to the Flying Sword Sect in a single step, it would have looked no different from actual teleportation in the eyes of someone in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. Something that had only been possible due to his recent improvement in the Dao of Space.


    "G-Grand Elder Xuan!?"


    In turn also working well in scaring the elder who had just contacted him about the anomaly on his old mountain peak, who had just put down themunication talisman before the person he had just been talking to showed up in front of him.


    "Hm¡­ I see, there is indeed a rather interesting rumbling sound originating from my mountain peak¡­" Not bothering too much with the shocked elder beside him, Xuan Hao instead narrowed both of his eyes as he focused all of his attention towards the entrance to the mystic realm hidden away beneath his old pavilion.


    A simple scan with his divine sense was more than enough to reveal that rumbling sound that he had begun to hear after arriving at the Flying Sword Sect did indeed originate from the entrance to the mystic realm.


    "Grand Elder Xuan, is there anything I can help with?" Having calmed down and seeing how Xuan Hao had suddenly narrowed both his eyes while looking up towards the peak of the mountain with a visible frown on his face, the elder beside him mustered all the courage he could before asking this. Knowing that, getting the attention of a powerful Grand Elder like Xuan Hao might help him return back to the main sect and hand over the job of watching over the Flying Sword Sect to someone else.


    After all, even if it was an honor to watch over the Flying Sword Sect, one of the two original sects that made up the Star Shattering Sect, the cultivation environment of the Flying Sword Sect was far worse than the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Not to mention the fact that he had to spend most of his time managing the sect, having little time to focus on cultivating¡­


    "Help? No, there isn''t. If you can, I think it would be best to ensure that no elders or disciples approach the area around my old mountain peak for a few days." Not at all aware of the inner thoughts of the elder beside him, Xuan Hao casually brushed off his attempt to butter up to him and soon refocused his attention back on the entrance to the mystic realm.


    During this period of time, his divine sense had managed to detect some unusual changes in the formation guarding the entrance to the mystic realm.


    The changes in question were small and almost undetectable, but it had allowed Xuan Hao to spot some ws in the ancient formation. Allowing him to see a possibility of ignoring the cultivation limit ced on the entrance and sneaking inside the mystic realm himself.


    But in the end, this onlysted for a short moment, as the ancient formation automatically repaired the ws before he could properly understand and make use of them.


    Indeed, a terrifying formation, even after reaching the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, I am at most able to spot a few minor ws. Breaking the formation is still something impossible with my current strength. At most I might get a chance to sneak past it with the help of the abnormality taking ce inside the mystic realm¡­


    Swoosh~


    Knowing that it would be easier for him to investigate and keep and eye on the changes taking ce inside the mystic realm next to the entrance, as he could only see the inside with his own eyes due to the formation blocking his divine sense from entering, Xuan Hao made his way up the mountain.


    Not aware of the helpless and sad expression on the face of the elder who had been thoroughly ignored after Xuan Hao had noticed the abnormality at the entrance to the mystic realm.


    "No need for my help¡­" Muttering this to himself as he gazed up the mountain where Xuan Hao had disappeared, the elder who had been hoping for an easy way out of his current job of watching over the Flying Sword Sect, understood that he would not be able to return to the main sect any time soon.


    Even worse, considering what Xuan Hao had said about not allowing anyone close to his mountain peak over the next few days, it meant he would have to drive away some of the branch elders and disciples living in the mountain peaks located right next to it.


    Something that would inevitably draw the attention of the rest of the branch elders and disciples in the sect¡­

 Chapter 911 A Path To Entering The Mystic Realm

    Arriving in front of the entrance located below his old pavilion, it did not take long before Xuan Hao noticed therge number of demon beasts on the other side of the entrance to the mystic realm. Although most of these demon beasts were no stronger than the Foundation Establishment, it was obvious that they were all filled with fear as they looked in the opposite direction of the entrance to the mystic realm. Making it rather obvious that some kind of powerful demon beast should have made its way inside the underground space.


    Given that the loud rumbling sound that he had heard from the moment he arrived at the Flying Sword Sect also seemed to originate from the direction that the group of demon beasts were looking towards filled with fear, it became rather obvious that the loud rumbling sound should have originated from the thing these demon beasts had been fleeing from¡­ And given just how loud the rumbling sound was, Xuan Hao expected there to be more than just a single powerful demon beast.


    ROAR!


    As if on cue, a loud roar echoed throughout the entire underground space located below the entrance before arge demon beast the size of a small house appeared in the distance. Even from a nce, Xuan Hao could tell that this giant demon beast had already reached the Later Stages of the Nascent Soul Realm. Even showing signs of reaching the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    ROAR-!


    ROOOOAR!


    Not long after the first Nascent Soul Realm demon beast showed up, it did not take long before more demon beasts began showing up one after the other. All having at least reached the Nascent Soul Realm.


    As a result, the weaker demon beast who had been fearful shivering since the arrival of the first Nascent Soul Realm demon beast, had gathered together in a corner at the edge of the cliff leading up towards the entrance, or in their case, exit to the mystic realm. Not daring to make a single sound. Fearful that it might end up attracting the attention of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts who had been ignoring them so far.


    However, the continuous arrival of new demon beast soon caused the space beneath the cliff to start getting crowded, causing some of Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts to swallow up some of the weaker Foundation Establishment or Qi Condensation Realm demon beast to make more space for themselves beneath the cliff.


    From the perspective of Xuan Hao who was looking down on these demon beasts from above, all of this seemed rather odd. After all, they had not done anything after arriving at the bottom of the cliff.


    Even if it was understandable for the Qi Condensation and Foundation Establishment Realm demon beast to not have the ability to climb up the cliff with their strength and ratherrge bodies unsuitable for climbing, the same could not be said for the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast.


    After all, with their current strength, they should have more than enough strength to simply jump up the cliff with the use of their powerful physical strength, let alone scaling the cliff!


    The fact that none of them had even tried doing this was rather odd, making Xuan Hao believe that the entrance to the mystic realm had some kind of concealing effect that hid it from the different demon beasts living inside the mystic realm. Other than this, he could not think of any other reason as to why the demon beasts would crowd together beneath the cliff instead of just climbing up towards the exit located directly above them. Of course, it could also be that they had already tried this before and knew that there was some kind of formation in ce to stop them from leaving.


    No matter what it was, it did not make Xuan Hao any less curious about what was taking ce in the underground space below him. After all, from the behavior of these demon beasts that seemed to have been the origin of the loud rumbling sound, it looked like their state was no different from the weaker Qi Condensation and Foundation Establishment Realm demon beast. All looking in the direction they had juste from filled with fear.


    Rustle~


    It did not take long before the culprits behind the fearful Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts showed themselves, as what looked like a special kind of spider demon beasts began filling up the underground space. Leaving no ce for the demon beasts to escape.


    Although most of the spiders had not reached the Nascent Soul Realm and were at most in the Core Formation or Foundation Establishment Realm, with the majority only having reached the Qi Condensation Realm. The sheer number of spiders present was more than enough to make up for theck of strength.


    Not to mention these Nascent Soul Realm demon beast, Xuan Hao even doubted someone in the First stage of the Domain Lord Realm would be able to kill all of these spiders before running out of strength and being overwhelmed by them. Something that was easier said than done considering just how easy it would be for someone in the Domain Lord Realm to kill arge number of these spiders through the use of a domain¡­


    "Hm? One of them is actually trying to climb up the cliff?"


    Observing how the spiders were getting closer and closer to the fearful Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts who had realized that there was no path for them to escape, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed one of the more agile demon beasts in the Foundation Establishment Realm trying to climb up the cliff in an attempt to escape form both the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts and the iing swarm of spiders. Havinge to the realization that climbing to the top of the cliff and finding a crack to hide inside might be the only chance to escape its current precarious situation alive.


    Will it be able to leave the mystic realm? Or will it be stopped by the formation before it can leave?


    Narrowing his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao ignored the fighting that started to take ce between the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts and the endless swarm of spiders. Feeling far more interested in whether or not the demon beasts inside the mystic realm had the ability to leave the mystic realm.


    After all, if they really did have the ability to leave the mystic realm, it meant he would have to set up some kind of formation of his own to prevent the demon beasts inside from suddenly appearing in the middle of the Flying Star Sect and start causing problems.


    Although this would not be hard for him to set up a formation that would stop anyone in the Nascent Soul Realm, it would also depend on whether or not the strength of the demon beasts leaving the mystic realm were also limited to the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    If the limit was still in ce for these demon beasts, everything would be fine, but¡­ If the limit did not work on the demon beasts, it would be difficult for him to set up a powerful enough formation to prevent Domain Lord Realm demon beasts from passing through with his current skill in the art of formations. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even if he could get the help of the elder from the Spring Flower Sect who was skilled in formations and make a formation strong enough to stop anyone in the Domain Lord Realm from forcibly making it through and into the Flying Sword Sect, it would be impossible to make a formation strong enough to stop a demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Whilst the chance of a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast appearing inside the mystic realm was low, Xuan Hao did not think it would be impossible. Especially considering that the person who hadid down the formation preventing him from entering the mystic realm should be someone above the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Whoosh~


    Roar!


    Lost in his own thoughts as he looked at the ancient formation symbols that were faintly visible in the air that separated him and the mystic realm, an exhausted roar filled with happiness suddenly sounded out beside him, as the weak Foundation Establishment Realm demon beast managed to ascend the cliff before using all of its strength to push through thest part. Directly passing through the barrier separating the mystic realm and the Flying Sword Sect.


    Roar-


    Swish~


    Suddenly realizing that it was not alone, the demon beast barely managed to let out a surprised roar before it was reduced to a bloody mist. Having been instantly killed by Xuan Hao''s domain after it had managed to pass through the formation.


    "So, demon beasts from the mystic realm can pass through the formation, but¡­ It seems like the formation also weakens for a short moment when a demon beast from inside passes through it..." Muttering this to himself as he ignored the bloody mist that slowly drifted away before disappearing in the wind, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes as he focused his attention on therge number of demon beast below the cliff.

 Chapter 912 Dealing With The Nascent Soul Realm Demon Beasts

    Following the Foundation Establishment demon beast disappearing, it did not take long for one of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts to notice the fact that it had disappeared without a trace. Making it realize that there might be another path out of the underground space, that did not involve fighting with the swarm of spiders that was blocking the path it and the rest of the demon beasts had used to enter the underground space.


    Swish-!


    Not wasting a second after realizing this, the demon beasts did not bother informing the other demon beasts. Instead choosing to use all of its strength to climb up the cliff towards the ce where the weak Foundation Establishment Realm demon beast had disappeared just moments earlier. Knowing very well that it might lose this chance to escape in time if any of the more powerful demon beasts present discovered that there was a way out.


    After all, its strength was only around the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm and could in no waypare with some of the more powerful demon beasts present, who had reached the Later Stages or even the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    ROOOAR!


    Even then, it did not take long for the rest of the demon beasts below to discover it climbing up the cliff. Not taking long to realize what had happened before they also started rapidly making their way up the cliff, some of the more powerful ones even directly using their strength to jump all the way to the top before mysteriously disappearing like the Foundation Establishment Realm demon beast from earlier had. Looking like they had moved through solid rock in the eyes of the rest of the demon beasts below.


    Rumble~


    Before long, these demon beasts who had been prepared to fight it out with the spiders all began climbing up the cliff. Leaving behind the weaker demon beasts who were far too weak to try and climb up the cliff with all the powerful demon beasts around. Resulting in them having to face the terrifying spiders all by themselves.


    Although the demon beasts had no idea what would meet them after climbing up the cliff, none of them thought it would be worse than staying behind having to face the endless swarm of spider demon beasts.


    ¡­


    "It didn''t take them long to notice¡­" Muttering this to himself as he saw the first demon beast in the Nascent Soul Realm make its way through the entrance to the mystic realm before appearing directly in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes focused on the formation that trembled for a short moment after the demon beast passed through it. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although the slight trembling was far from enough to give him an opportunity to slip past and enter the mystic realm, it was still more than enough to confirm that the demon beasts from inside the mystic realm leaving did have some kind of weakening effect on the formation. Not only that, but the effect caused by stronger demon beast in the Nascent Soul Realm leaving, was obviously far stronger than the effect of a Foundation Establishment Realm demon beasts.


    The main difference being that the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast leaving had actually caused the formation to tremble, something that he couldn''t even do with his current strength in the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm!


    Different from Xuan Hao who did not pay too much attention to the demon beast after he confirmed that the demon beast from the mystic realm had the ability to momentarily weaken the formation by passing through it, the demon beast who had just managed to pass through the formation and leave the mystic realm was filled with confusion as it suddenly found itself on top of a strange mountain.


    However, the most important part was not this, but the fact that it was unable to move no matter what it did. Even trying to use the qi flowing through its body was impossible, as it seemed like it had beenpletely sealed up.


    This strange situation was more than enough to cause the demon beast to start panicking as it looked around itself filled with fear.


    Roar!?


    Spotting Xuan Hao standing only a short distance away from it, the demon beast suddenly felt a shiver run down its spine. Understanding at a single nce just how terrifying the person standing in front of it was. Even if it had not personally witnessed the other party to anything, it instinctively understood that the reason why it couldn''t move and had its strength sealed was because of this person!


    As for what this person wanted to do with it¡­? It could onlyy down submissively on the ground and pray that the other party didn''t want to eat it!


    Rumble-!


    Only a short time following the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast epting its uncertain fate, the rest of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts started emerging from the mystic realm one after the other before getting stuck in a simr fashion without being able to move. Soon filling out the entire mountain peak with all sorts of unique demon beasts that could not move a single muscle. Only capable of looking towards Xuan Hao who was standing beside the entrance to the mystic realm filled with fear.


    Crack~!


    It was at this moment, a cracking sound echoed out across the entire mountain.


    "A chance!"


    Whoosh~!


    Hearing the cracking sound and seeing the small crack that had formed on the formation blocking his path into the mystic realm, Xuan Hao directly used his domain to forcibly keep it open before the formation had a chance to repair it.


    Allowing him to momentarily establish a small passage leading into the mystic realm without having to pass through the formation-


    Rumble-!


    Although, from the fact that the formation was still trying its best to repair the crack he was forcibly keeping open, he doubted he would have more than a few minutes to enter before the chance to enter the mystic realm would be gone.


    "¡­"


    ncing over the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts who were all fearfully looking towards him, Xuan Hao soon pulled out hismunication talismans before contacting his lovely pet, the winged lion.


    ROOOOAR-!


    No more than a minuteter, the excited roar of the winged lion echoed through the entire Flying Sword Sect-


    "W-what is that!?"


    "A-a-a giant lion! A-and it has wings!"


    "Are we under attack!?"


    Instantly scaring the elders and disciples present in the sect. The only people capable of keeping themselves calm in the face of the giant winged lion that suddenly appeared, being the elders who had already been to the main sect and had a chance to see this lionzing around somewhere.


    Although, the unquestionable majesty and power exuded by the winged lion made them doubt it was the samezy winged lion they had seenzing around in the Shattered Star Peaks¡­


    Roar!


    Ignoring all of the elders and disciples who had stopped what they were doing and looked up towards it filled with both awe and fear, the winged lionnded a few meters away from Xuan Hao before letting out a small greeting roar before turning to curiously look at all the demon beasts covering the entire mountain peak.


    Although it had been called over by Xuan Hao, it had no idea what it had been called over for and could only guess that it should have something to do with the demon beasts around it.


    Could it be all of these demon beasts are for me to eat!?


    As this thought ultimately emerged in the head of the winged lion, its gaze towards the demon beasts on the mountain peak slowly changed.


    Making all of the demon beasts start shivering in fear.


    Even though they might not have understood Xuan Hao and why he had captured them, they understood full well the gaze of a fellow demon beast. Especially when said demon beasts started salivating while looking towards them!


    Bang!


    "They are not for you to eat!" pping therge paw of the winged lion as it was about to grab arge horned sheep demon beast, Xuan Hao stopped the winged lion before it started getting any more ideas. "The reason I called you is to watch over these demon beasts, I n for them to be part of the sect. After all, the sect has beencking in stronger demon beasts with its current rapid growth."


    ROAAAR!


    Hearing that the demon beasts were not for eating, the winged lion let out an unwilling roar as it looked towards the horned sheep demon beast filled with regret.


    "Don''t look like that, if you do a good job in watching over them while I''m gone, I will let you take a demon beast of your choosing when I return." Knowing that there would be no way for the winged lion to do a proper job without a reward, Xuan Hao decided to give up one of the demon beasts in exchange for it watching over them. In the first ce, it was not like he wascking Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts¡­

 Chapter 913 Inferno And Natural Formation

    Roar~


    Hearing that it would be able to keep one of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts after watching over them, the winged lion let out a happy roar before turning to look back towards the horned sheep filled with anticipation. Even without it saying anything, it was obvious that the winged lion had already chosen what demon beast it was going to eat in the future.


    Something that caused the horned sheep demon beast to start shivering violently.


    Outside of the immediate problem of possibly being eaten by the terrifying winged lion demon beast, it had also managed to learn what Xuan Hao wanted to do with it and the rest of the demon beasts. The most important thing being that the terrifying winged lion demon beast looking at it with the clear intent of eating it in the future, could only chose one demon beast to eat!


    During the unknown period of time that Xuan Hao would be gone, its only chance of survival was to get the terrifying winged lion more interested in some of the other demon beasts. Not that hard considering that it had already spotted a few demon beasts who were both stronger andrger than itself.


    Unfortunately, it looked like these demon beasts had also overheard what Xuan Hao had said to the winged lion, causing them to try their best to use their limited strength and movement to shrink their size or make themselves look less appetizing.


    One decided to shed parts of its fur in an attempt to look less appetizing, while another decided to shrink itself to a smaller size with less meat for the winged lion to eat.


    For the bigger ones who could not shrink themselves, they decided to go for more extreme measures to ensure their own safety. For example, one of the more talented demon beasts the size of a small hill, used its limited movement to roll around in what looked like its own¡­ Excrement... Truly sacrificing any and all respect it might have had with the other demon beasts around¡­


    "This¡­ I will be leaving for now, make sure none of them leaves this mountain. In case some of them do end up escaping, you can do whatever you want with them." Seeing the demon beasts starting to frolic around the mountain after he had silent removed some of their movement restrictions, Xuan Hao gave some instructions to the winged lion demon beast before rushing towards the crack in the formation leading into the mystic realm-


    Whoosh~!


    Just barely making it through the crack in the formation before it closed up. Sooning face to face with thest remaining demon beasts trying their best to escape and the endless swarm of spider demon beasts chasing after them from behind.


    Roar?


    Seeing someone appearing in front of them, the demon beasts about to leave the mystic realm let out confused roars as they looked up towards Xuan Hao filled with confusion. None of them understood where this weird looking demon beast had appeared from.


    As for the fact that he was not even a demon beast to begin with¡­ This was something that these weaker demon beasts in the Qi Condensation and Foundation Establishment Realm had never thought about. After all, all they had ever seen of living things had been demon beasts. The reason why the more powerful demon beats in the Nascent Soul Realm had known that Xuan Hao was different, was due to abination of their increased intelligence and their instincts.


    "So many spiders¡­" Not caring about these weaker demon beasts as he was sure the winged lion would be taking care of them after they left the mystic realm, Xuan Hao instead focused his attention on the endless swarm of spiders in front of him.


    Although he had thought that their number should have been just barely enough to deal with someone in the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he changed his opinion after being able to use his divine sense to find out just how strong they were and the overall number of spiders.


    However, he soon ran into a problem after using his divine sense to investigate these spiders-


    "This¡­ My divine sense is not big enough to cover all of the spiders!?"


    And that was the fact that his divine sense was notrge enough to cover all of the spider swarm!


    Instead, the only thing interesting he managed to find was a First Stage Domain Lord Realm spider located somewhere at the edge of his divine sense.


    Finding this Domain Lord Realm spider demon beast not only meant that the strength of the spider swarm had far exceeded his initial impression.


    At the very least, considering that the Domain Lord Realm spider he found should be male and didn''t seem to be the one in charge of the swarm itself, there should at the very least be a queen spider who was above the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes as he looked towards the approaching swarm of spiders. Understanding that he would not be able to leave this ce before he dealt with the swarm of spiders all heading towards the direction of the formation leading outside the mystic realm.


    Even if the winged lion might be capable of taking care of these spiders with time, it would not be easy considering their number and the fact that he had no idea if there were more Domain Lord Realm spiders present in the swarm.


    If the winged lion ended up stuck in a fight with these Domain Lord Realm spiders, it was easy to imagine what would happen to the rest of the Flying Sword Sect without the support of the winged lion. Especially considering that the Flying Sword Sect did not have a powerful formation like the one at the Shattered Star Peaks¡­


    Fwoosh~


    As the endless swarm of spiders encroached on him, Xuan Hao''s eyes ignited with an infernal ze, reflecting the profound power belonging to the Dao of Fire. The Dao he had just recently managed toprehend and what had allowed him to break through from the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and reach the Intermediate stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    With a flick of his wrist, Xuan Hao conjured a sea of fire, pure and filled with a power far exceeding that of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Fwoosh-!


    As the sea of fire danced and swirled in the air in front of him. The spiders, sensing the scorching heat of the mes, hesitated for a moment-


    Rustle~


    But their fear when faced with the sea of fire did notst for long, as their instinctual hunger drove them towards the weaker demon beasts who had taken advantage of this opportunity to try and climb up the cliff.


    "They are¡­ Ignoring me?" Not having expected the spiders to just ignore him, Xuan Hao didn''t know what to feel as he watched the swarm of spiders continue charging towards the fleeing demon beasts below him.


    "Hmph! I would like to see if you can ignore this!"


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Feeling somewhat offended after being ignored by the swarm of spiders who had at most reached the Nascent Soul Realm without counting the one Domain Lord Realm spider, Xuan Hao thrust his hands forward, causing the sea of fire in front of him to condense into a torrent of scorching fireballs that hurtled towards the swarm of spiders below.


    Rumble~!


    FWOOOOOSH-!


    As the fireballs smashed into the ground, they soon reformed into arge inferno that rapidly grew in size as it swallowed up the swarm of spiders without showing any signs of stopping its expansion.


    Screeeech-!


    The spiders caught in the inferno could only screech and writhe in pain as the mes of the inferno consumed them before they had a chance to fight back.


    But the spiders somehow still managed to persist, their sheer numbers seemingly never ending as new spiders would soon rece the ones that had been swallowed by the fiery inferno. Soon, the spiders entered some sort of weird state where they merged their power together into a single entity that momentarily stopped the inferno.


    "Hm? A natural formation?"


    Seeing how the spiders hade together and stopped his mes, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face. Not having expected the spiders to actually have the ability to merge together and form some kind of unique natural formation.


    From the fact that they had the ability to stop the inferno he had created, it meant that their strength should at least have reached a levelparable to that of a First Tribtion Soul Ascension Realm cultivator!


    This alone was more than enough to make Xuan Hao stop for a short moment as he felt a renewed sense of respect towards the spiders. Even if they had ignored him earlier, it should have been because they had been confident in dealing with any possible danger, they might encounter by using this powerful natural formation. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    If it had been before reaching the Intermediate stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it would have been difficult for me to deal with these spiders. Especially considering that they can easily rece any of the spiders that are killed. Making it close to impossible for someone in the early stage of the Soul Ascension Realm to break through the natural formation formed by them¡­ Unfortunately for them, I''m not someone in the earlier stages of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao raised his hand and made a grabbing motion towards the inferno below-


    Whoosh~!


    This simple action caused the ragging inferno constantly smashing into the swarm of spiders to suddenly stop before turning into stream of fire that gathered together inside the palm of his hand.


    "Hm¡­ I never really got a chance to try out how strong the Dao of Fire is, this should be the perfect opportunity!" Looking at the small ball of fire that had gathered inside the palm of his hand, Xuan Hao used one of his fingers to make a small swirling motion in the ball of fire. Creating a small swirling vortex of mes in the palm of his hand before letting it fall down towards the spiders that had already reached the bottom of the cliff.

 Chapter 914 Still Alive?

    As Xuan Hao dropped the small swirling vortex of fire down towards the spider swarm below, it seemed like some sort of restriction had been removed, causing the fire vortex to rapidly expand in all directions. By the time that the swirling vortex reached the swarm below, it had already grown enough to cover half of the spiders present inside the underground space.


    FWOOSH-!


    Not even stopping for a single second when faced with the natural formation of the spiders, the fire vortex directly burned through it like a hot knife through butter. Soon engulfing the spiders below, reducing them to nothing more than cinders that soon crumbled and became one with the ground below.


    SCREEECH!


    Even the Domain Lord Realm spider didn''t stand a chance when faced with the fire vortex that had by now turned into an unstoppable fire cyclone that swept through anything living inside the underground space. Soon consuming the rest of the spiders that had been unable to make their way inside the underground space.


    Whoosh~


    Together with thest spider being reduced to nothing more than ash that soon drifted away in the strong wind created by the fire cyclone, an eerie silence soon overtook the underground space as the fire cyclone dispersed. The only sound outside of the faint crackling embers of what remained from the powerful Domain Lord Realm spider being the hastened breathing of the terrified weaker demon beasts clinging on to the side of the cliff with all their strength.


    None of them dared to move even a single muscle, as they all looked down towards Xuan Hao who was standing amidst the molten rocks of what had once been the rocky ground of the cave system that they had spent their entire life inside of.


    All of them understood that the only reason they were still alive was because that person had ignored them. If not, they would have ended up like the spider swarm below!


    For this reason, all of these weaker demon beasts silently prayed that Xuan Hao would just leave without caring about them.


    "Even without the use of a technique to strengthen it, the Dao of Fire is actually so powerful!" Not aware of the thoughts going through the heads of the weaker demon beasts motionlessly looking down at him from the cliff, Xuan Hao muttered this to himself while taking in the damage caused by the fire cyclone. Astonished over just how powerful the Dao of Fire was when used for attacking.


    Even the Dao of Ice, that he had invented and learnt several techniques for, was nowhere near as strong as the Dao of Fire. Only the Dao of the Sword came anywhere close to the Dao of Fire whenparing the power and destruction it could cause.


    In that sense, the Dao of Ice was more of a supportive type of Dao that weakened his enemy and helped enhance the strength of his other Daos, like Descend of the Ice God''s Sword, a technique thatbined both the Dao of the Sword and the Dao of Ice into a single powerful attack.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if he would be able to create a simrly powerful technique bybing the Dao of Ice and the Dao of Fire, but¡­ Thinking about it for a few more seconds, it would probably make more sense tobine the Dao of Fire and the Dao of the Sword. The only problem he could foresee with this, was that the merger of the two into a single attack might cause some kind of instability due to just how violent the two powers were¡­


    Shaking his head as he decided to put the matter of finding a way to merge the Dao of Fire and the Dao of the Sword together into some sort of attack technique, Xuan Hao began making his way towards the path leading out of the cave system he had found himself inside of after entering the mystic realm.


    Bang-bang-bang


    Much to the relief of the weaker demon beasts clinging on to the side of the cliff with all the strength left in their bodies, who let go of the cliff side and fell to the ground the moment he left.


    Roooaaaar~!


    Roar! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Roar~


    All of them let out small roars filled with happiness, some of the weakest Qi Condensation Realm demon beasts had even burnt part of their life essence in an attempt to not fall down from the cliff and catch Xuan Hao''s attention earlier, their strength and future potential being permanently damaged as a result.


    In the end, the demon beasts were just happy to have survived, as they all soon left the area below the cliff before beginning the long process of recovery back in what remained of their home. None of them dared to take the risk and climb up the cliff to find out where the rest of the demon beasts had gone. Fearful that they might encounter another terrifying being like Xuan Hao on the other side.


    ¡­


    Coming out of the cave system that the entrance at the Flying Sword Sect was connected to, Xuan Hao could not help stopping to admire the endless forest that spread out before him. If not for the fact that he knew that he was inside a mystic realm, he would have thought he was still somewhere on the Ewaria Continent.


    Looking at the mystic realm in another way, it was no different from a different world. After all, to the demon beasts living inside the mystic realm, they had no idea about the Ewaria Continent that the mystic realm was attached to and would not think that there was a much bigger world out there.


    Then again, who was to say that he was different from the demon beasts of the mystic realm? From what he knew, there should still be another three continents out there that he had still not visited. Not to mention there might be even more worlds out there simr to that of the world that the Ewaria Continent and other three continents existed inside of. Maybe there were worlds evenrger than that and he just didn''t know, simr to the demon beasts who had no idea about therger Ewaria Continent outside their mystic realm¡­


    Well, even if that is the case, my current strength is far too weak for me to concern myself about the possibilities ofrger worlds existing in the void outside¡­


    Understanding that his cultivation was far too weak to start deliberating on these kinds of questions for now, Xuan Hao decided not to think anymore about what might be lurking in the seemingly endless empty void outside the Ewaria Continent. Instead, he decided to focus his attention back on what remained of the spiders on the ground in front of the entrance to the cave system.


    "Hm? What in the world¡­"


    In doing so, Xuan Hao suddenly discovered the ck ash left behind after the death of these spiders had actually started moving along in the ground in a slow motion that even his divine sense had not managed to pick it up at first due to just how slow the ck ash was moving.


    Whoosh-!


    Knowing that this should be impossible given that he had made sure to kill the spiders earlier, Xuan Hao directly used his dao domain to lift some of the ck ash on the ground up into the air before starting to thoroughly inspect it with both his dao domain and divine sense. Not wanting to miss anything.


    This¡­ The ck ash is actually still connected by the natural formation from earlier!?


    Analyzing the ck ash with the help of both his dao domain and divine sense, it did not take long for him to discover that the natural formation that the spiders had used to defend against his attack earlier, was still active and the thing behind the slow movement of the ck ash.


    "But¡­ What is providing the energy to keep the formation active? It doesn''t absorb qi from the outside, as I would already have sensed it if that was the case and the spiders that kept the formation active before are all dead!" Muttering this to himself as he felt a sense of confusion he had not felt in a long time, Xuan Hao could not figure out where the energy to keep the formation active came from.


    Even if the energy it used at the moment was miniscule whenpared to before, it would still be burning through the qi equivalent to the full dantian of a Core Formation Realm Expert every hour to move such arge amount of ck ash!


    For this reason, there had to be somewhere that the energy wasing from, it was just that he could not see it, something that frustrated Xuan Hao to no end. Especially considering that he should have already killed the other party, but now, what little remained of the other party, suddenly got up and began to leave.

 Chapter 915 Undying Soul

    Not able to find out how the natural formation was still able to stay active even after the death of the spiders had died, Xuan Hao decided to once again use the Dao of Fire to destroy the natural formation that was moving the ck ash away from the cave system. Hoping that destroying the natural formation might be able to give him some idea of where the energy fueling the formation wasing from.


    Crack~


    The natural formation stood no chance against the terrifying me and soon copsed, causing the ck ash to stop moving. However, this onlysted for a short while before the natural formation reappeared. The ck ash resuming journey out of the cave system.


    Observing all of this happening, Xuan Hao was not too surprised after seeing how the natural formation had appeared again after he destroyed it. After all, he had already destroyed it once before when killing the spiders earlier, so he had expected it to some extent. Instead, the thing he was surprised about was the source of energy fueling the natural formation.


    Although he had only managed to get a brief nce following the formation being reconstructed after he destroyed it just now, he finally located the source of the formation and the thing that kept it from being fully destroyed, a cluster of small floating lights located at the center of the mass of ck ash.


    The souls of the spiders!? But how are they still alive? Shouldn''t they have been killed by the attack earlier¡­?


    Seeing the small cluster of floating lights that appeared at the center of the ck ash, acting as fuel for the natural formation, Xuan Hao could not help opening his eyes in surprise after realizing what the cluster of small lights was.


    To put it simple, it was indeed the souls of the spiders¡­ But looking at it in another way, the souls of the spiders had already been destroyed and reduced into a form of soul energy that was flowing through the ck ash from the cluster of light. Only capable of keeping the natural formation active through the remaining intent of the Domain Lord Realm spider that had been able to keep some level of its consciousness alive through the protection of the soul energy. At the same time also allowing it to escape his detection.


    If not for the fact that he had noticed the fact that the ck ash had been moving because of the natural formation, he would probably have ended up missing the fact that the Domain Lord Realm spider was still alive. Something that could have caused quite a few problems considering that there was a high chance that it would inform the rest of the nest that it came from about what had happened and how the demon beasts they had been chasing suddenly went missing.


    Although it might not be a problem for him to deal with the spiders and the queen spider that was undoubtedly behind the spider swarm. Even if the spider queen had reached a realmparable with the Soul Ascension Realm, the same could not be said for the Flying Sword Sect that would not have him around to protect it constantly. Not to mention, setting up a formation to stop someone in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm or above that, was not something he had the ability to do with his current mastery of formations.


    All things considered, the most likely oue if the Domain Lord Realm spider got away and informed the rest of the spider swarm, would be the inevitable destruction of the Flying Sword Sect, as there was no way for him to stay at the Flying Sword Sect all the time to ensure its safety.


    Maybe I should try and improve my mastery over formations after returning to the sect- No, I should properly also improve on my alchemy and cksmithing¡­


    Suddenly realizing that he had been neglecting his professions after having reached the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head awkwardly before turning his attention back towards the floating orbs of light that the remaining consciousness of the Domain Lord Realm spider was hiding inside of.


    Although it was hard for him to find these orbs of light containing the souls of the dead spiders at first, now that he had already found them, it would be close to impossible for him to lose sight of them again. Especially considering that the souls didn''t have any way to move without the help of the formation, as it seemed like they had been bound together with the ck ash that had once been their bodies.


    Even the Domain Lord Realm spider''s soul was no exception to this, as it was also bound to the mass of ck ash through the formation. Likely a side effect of using the souls of the other spiders to protect itself.


    Whoosh~!


    Waving his hand in the direction of the soul cluster at the center of therge mass of ck ash, a silver light streaked through the air before turning into a single sword that soon split up into an endless number of smaller swords, each heading towards one of the countless souls contained inside the cluster of light.


    The only exception was the Domain Lord Realm spider''s soul, who was instead greeted with close to a thousand of these smaller swords, who soon merged together into a single powerful silver sword. More than powerful enough to deal with a weaker Soul Ascension Realm Expert, let alone the remnant soul of a First Stage Domain Lord Realm demon beast¡­


    Screeech-!


    Realizing that it had been discovered and was about to die, the Domain Lord Realm spider let out a terrified screeching sound before trying its best to escape from therge silver sword-¦Ñ¦Á§ád¦Ás `n?¦Í?| §ãom


    Swish~!


    In the end, it had no way to outrun the silver sword given that it was still bound to the ck ash, unable to escape as the silver sword pierced through its ethereal body.


    Scree-


    Not even able to scream in pain before the core of its essence was shattered and its soul began to disintegrate at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    Only the brief expression filled with terror as its existence was consumed by the silver sword gave him some idea of the agonizing pain it must have experienced when its soul disintegrated.


    At leastpared to the Domain Lord Realm spider, the rest of the spider souls had already lost consciousness and were nothing more than empty husks of what they had once been and wouldn''t even realize that they had died.


    Rumble~


    Following the death of the souls, the mass of ck ash on the ground trembled for a short moment before it settled on the ground, this time without any small movements outside of the bits outside the cave system getting carried away by the wind every now and then.


    "Everything should be fine now¡­" Muttering this to himself with a sense of uncertainty, Xuan Hao could not help inspecting the ck ash on the ground again. Just to make sure that the Domain Lord Realm spider didn''t have another special technique up its sleeve. After all, he had been fooled by it not too long ago and was in no way willing to let that happen again.


    For this reason alone, Xuan Hao ended up spending far longer than he would normally have on inspecting the remains of the spider swarm. Making extra sure to check the area around the ce where the Domain Lord Realm Spider had died, and the cluster of souls had been located¡­ And because of all this, Xuan Hao did end up finding an anomaly around the ck ash where the Domain Lord Realm spider had died.


    "Don''t tell me¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as he focused his attention on the anomaly, Xuan Hao was left speechless at the small fragments of the Domain Lord Realm spider''s soul that seemed to have somehow survived his attack once again.


    Looking more closely at these small fragments, he even had a feeling that they would be able to gather together again over a long period of time. Allowing the Domain Lord Realm spider to recover at some point in the future.


    What in the world is this thing? Its soul is far more tenacious than a Domain Lord- No, even the soul of someone in the Soul Ascension Realm isn''t this tenacious¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Feeling a sense of fear when faced with the seemingly undying soul of the spider demon beast, Xuan Hao once again used his sword to destroy all of the fragments before searching through everything around its remains once again.


    In the end, he ended up spending far longer than before on searching for any more traces of the spider demon beast without finding anything. However, deep down, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the spider demon beast was still alive somewhere and in the process of recovering.


    ?¦Á?d¦Ás¦Ç¦È¦Í¦Å| As for how long it would take for it to recover from its current state? Xuan Hao estimated it to far exceed the lifespan of someone in the Domain Lord Realm!


    But then again, the spider demon beast was not really normal, so he did not dare say whether or not it could recover in the future¡­

 Chapter ?916 Safe Escape~

    ?916 Safe Escape~


    At the same time Xuan Hao officially left the cave system connect with the cliff leading back to the Flying Sword Sect, his two disciples, Chu Yang and Qing Yi, copsed on the ground beneath a tall mushroom standing more than forty meters tall. If not for the fact that the ceiling of the cave above prevented it from growing any taller, there was no doubt that the mushroom would have been even taller.


    As the most exhausted of the two, Qing Yi was the first to show a relieved smile as sheid on the mushy ground beneath the mushroom, happily inspecting the Transcendent Grade Spirit Shroom Root that she had managed to get her hands on while Chu Yang had been distracting the giant spider demon beast.


    Although thest few days had been exhausting for both of them, she understood that it had been worth it for the Transcendent Grade Spirit Shroom Root. Especially when considering that they had only ended up exhausted and hadn''t been forced to use one of the talismans that their master had left for them.


    Now, all that was left for them before they could begin to try and find a way out of the underground world that they now found themselves inside of, was to recover the energy they had spent escaping from the giant spider demon beast.


    Bang!


    However, just as they started the process of recovering, a loud sound of something bignding on the ground made them stop what they were doing.


    "Please don''t be that damnable spider, we just escaped from it¡­" Fearful that the big thingnding on the ground might have been the giant spider they had spent thest few days escaping from, Qing Yi who had beenying on the ground jumped up before looking in the direction that the sound hade from with a nervous expression on her face.


    "¡­"


    Chu Yang had a simr reaction, as he also got up and prepared to face off against the spider demon beast once again. After all, with how exhausted Qing Yi was at the moment, there would be no way for her to help out in the fight against the giant spider. On the other hand, her joining the fight might end up bing a distraction that could cost both of them their lives.


    Thumb~


    As they were preparing for the worst possible oue, a mole several timesrger than the demon beast spider appeared at the edge of their divine sense.


    "A mole demon beast?"


    "Yes¡­ And from the looks of it, its moving in our general direction!"


    Processing what they were seeing through their divine sense, it took Qing Yi and Chu Yang a few seconds toprehend that the big thing that hadnded on the ground, was actually a massive demon beast farrger than the spider demon beast that had been chasing after them for the past few days.


    Not that the appearance of a farrger demon beast was any better than the spider demon beast. On the contrary, it might be worse considering that the strength of the mole demon beast was far stronger than the spider demon beast. Having reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm from what Chu Yang and Qing Yi could tell so far, but¡­ Both of them highly doubted that the mole''s strength had only reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. Even suspecting that its physical body might have already broken through to the Domain Lord Realm. Combined or not. Dealing with such a powerful demon beast was not something they could do with their current strength.


    The only positive thing about the sudden appearance of the mole demon beast was the fact that it did not seem to have noticed them. If it had noticed them, it might even bepletely uninterested in them due to how weak their current aura and appearance was.


    To be honest, with how exhausted both of them were at the moment, it would not be hard to misjudge their strength for someone in the Core Formation Realm.


    Luckily for Chu Yang and Qing Yi, it seemed like their current weakened state might have ended up bing beneficial to them.


    Rumble~


    "We have to get out of here before the mole gets any closer!" Hearing the loud sound of the mole getting closer to them slowly turning into a small-scale earthquake that made it look like the cave around them could copse at any moment, Chu Yang called out to Qing Yi who soon nodded her head before both of them made a quick escape before the mole had a chance to reach them.


    ¡­


    Having moved to a location far away from the scary mole demon beast that had suddenly appeared and interrupted before they had a chance to recover from their earlier chase, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both began to cautiously scan their surroundings for any possible threats. Not wanting to end up finding out that they had actually decided to recover inside some kind of demon beastir in a few minutes.


    "Everything should be fine¡­"


    "Yeah, I don''t see anything dangerous around that might indicate that there are any demon beasts nearby."


    Looking at each other as both of them let out a sigh of relief at not finding anything dangerous, Chu Yang and Qing Yi did not dare waste a single moment as both of them started meditating. Drawing qi from the world outside into their body to speed up the recovery process.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    By now, both of them understood that they couldn''t waste any time when they had used up all their qi. Understanding that any second wasted could prove fatal for them inside the mystic realm, as there seemed to be powerful demon beasts waiting for them around every corner.


    Even if what they thought was a rtively safe ce for them to recover turned out to be a demon beastir, they would have a better chance of surviving said demon beast attacking them if they had the strength to fight back.


    Not to mention, they were still inside a mystic realm and there weren''t really that many safe ces so to speak. One of the main things they had learnt since entering the mystic realm.


    Like this, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang entered a state of silence, as both of them focused all of their attention on recovering. Only using the bare minimum amount of energy on keeping their divine sense active to look out for any demon beasts or other dangerous situations that might need them to escape. After all, thest thing they wanted, was for a demon beast like the mole demon beast to suddenly appear in front of them without noticing it¡­


    "Finally, back to full strength again!" Being the first of the two to recover after spending close to 10 hours meditating, Qing Yi could not help smiling happily as she got up and stretched her half-asleep body.


    Compared to Chu Yang who had been the one to fight with the giant spider demon beast and distracting it while she dug out the Spirit Shroom Root, she had managed to escape without any injuries and only needed to recover the energy she had used during the escape.


    In contrast to her, Chu Yang had been injured quite a bit from the fight with the giant spider demon beast and took a longer time to recover.


    Wait¡­ Haven''t I just been doing nothing but cause trouble since we entered the underground space¡­?


    As she thought about this, the initial excitement from having recovered disappeared. Instead, it was reced by a feeling of embarrassment over how she had ended up relying on Chu Yang to do all the fighting while she had essentially done nothing more than to escape together with him or drag him down due to the fact that she was a bit slower than him when it came to movement technique.


    Even worse, the reason why they were in their current situation, was because she wanted the Spirit Shroom Root.


    Although a Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb was indeed something extremely precious, it did not warrant them risking their lives. Especially so when considering the fact that she had no real use for the spiritual herb, and she doubted that it would be of that much use to the sect.


    "The situation between us seems to have shifted ever since we entered the underground space. Now I''m the troublesome one¡­" Muttering this to herself with a visibly sad frown on her face, Qing Yi could not help reflecting over her actions over the past few days.


    Not only when it came to the Transcendent Spiritual Herb, but also a few incidents when they were escaping. The most troublesome of these incidents being when she had stopped during their chase whenever a precious spiritual herb appeared, which then ended up resulting in the giant spider demon beast catching up to them¡­

 Chapter 917 Path Out Of The Underground World

    Spending the next few days watching over Chu Yang as he recovered from the injuries, he had sustained during his fight with spider demon beast, Qing Yi found out that there was nock of demon beasts passing by them during this time.


    "He should be waking up soon¡­" Muttering this to herself as she looked towards Chu Yang who had been showing signs of waking up at any moment, Qing Yi could not help remembering the many demon beasts she had faced over the past few days.


    Although most of the demon beasts passing by during these few days were only in the Foundation Establishment or Core Formation Realm and kept their distance when they sensed her terrifying presence, there was still the many Nascent Soul Realm demon beast that would show up and attack her.


    Luckily for her, the strongest demon beast she had faced so far had only reached the Peak of the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, something she was more than capable of dealing with by herself.


    Even then, there had still been a few dangerous encounters. From a sneaky snake demon beast trying to ambush her to an innocent looking mouse suddenly transforming into a terrifying abomination trying to kill her. The most dangerous of all of these was when two of these Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts showed up to attack her at the same time. Back then, the two demon beasts teamed up to attack her at the same time. Pushing her to the limit, as she fended off against the two Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts.


    If not for the fact that one of her techniques had managed to break through under the stress of the two Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts, she doubted that she would have been able to deal with them alone. After all, it was harder to deal with two First Stage Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts, than a single Third Stage demon beast due to the fact she constantly had to look out for two attackers at the same time¡­ And it did not really help that one of them tried to attack Chu Yang from time to time. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Just at this moment, Chu Yang suddenly opened both of his eyes before surveying his surroundings.


    "Hm? Oh, looks like you did well on your own over the past few days. The number of demon beasts here should be impossible for someone normal in the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to deal with. Even someone in the Third stage of the Nascent Soul Realm would have a hard time!" Noticing the piles of different demon beasts still present on the ground around him from Qing Yi''s battles over the past few days, Chu Yang could not help feeling surprised as a hint of admiration appeared in his eyes while looking towards Qing Yi.


    Even if he had sensed the battles that took ce through his divine sense, he had not really paid that much attention to it because Qing Yi seemed to have everything under control, it was only after seeing the corpses around him that he realized just how hard it must have been for Qing Yi to deal with all of the demon beasts by herself. After all, other than fighting the different demon beasts, she would have also needed to spend some time to recover after every battle.


    In a sense, Qing Yi had been extremely lucky over the past few days, as most of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts showing up to fight her had only appeared after she had already recovered from thest battle¡­


    "Hehe, I made sure to take care of all the precious material from these demon beasts already, so we can leave at any moment." Feeling a bit embarrassed at the sudden praise from Chu Yang, Qing Yi smiled happily before focusing back on their current situation. For now, the most important thing for them was to leave their current location as fast as possible.


    The fights that had taken ce over the past few days would inevitably end up drawing the attention of more powerful demon beasts. At that point in time, they wouldn''t be dealing with the simple First Stage Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts that she had been facing so far.


    In the worst-case scenario, they might even end up drawing the attention of the terrifying mole demon beast that they had encountered earlier. At least now that they had recovered their strength, there was a far bigger chance that the mole demon beast would take an interest in eating them¡­


    "Then let''s get going. For now, let''s try and look for a way back up to the surface." Knowing very well that it would be dangerous for them to continue staying in the same ce for an extended period of time, Chu Yang understood what Qing Yi meant and both of them soon left in search of a way out of the underground world that they now found themselves inside of.


    After all, even if there wasn''t much of a difference between the world above and below ground when it came to danger, they both wanted to be on the surface where they at the very least had a chance to figure out how far away the exit was.


    ¡­


    As they were wandering around the underground mushroom forest looking for any tunnel or cave connection that might lead upwards towards the surface, Qing Yi suddenly stopped as she looked up towards the cave ceiling. Her eyes started to shine more with each passing second.


    Not knowing what might have happened to his senior sister, Chu Yang could not help looking up towards the naked cave ceiling with a questioning look on his face before turning towards Qing Yi. "Qing Yi? Is something wrong with the cave ceiling?"


    ¡¤?¦Èm "Hm? Ah! Junior brother, I was just thinking about something¡­ If I''m not wrong, given the sound we heard before the mole demon beast appeared within the range of our divine sense, it should have fallen from somewhere high.


    If that high ce happened to be the ceiling of the cave we are inside of, we might be able to use it to reach the surface. Even if we can''t reach all the way to the surface, we should be able to dig out way out if the mole demon beast''s tunnel doesn''t end too far away from the surface. Because of this, I thought to myself. Can''t we use the hole that the mole demon beast created?"


    "¡­"


    Hearing what Qing Yi said, Chu Yang had no idea how to respond to her. For some reason, he felt like her ideas were getting more and more dangerous the longer they spent underground.


    For example, did she forget the fact that entering the mole demon beast''s tunnel might result in them encountering said mole demon beast inside its tunnel? Not to mention, what if there was more than one mole demon beast living in the rocky earth around the underground caves, they now found themselves inside of?


    "Ah! You don''t have to worry about the mole demon beast. Even if we do encounter it, it should not be that hard to escape from, as we copse the tunnel on top of it before escaping in the opposite direction. At that point, we should have more than enough time to escape before it can catch up to us and if it does catch up to us, we can just copse the tunnel behind us again and repeat this until we are out safely!"


    Having already expected Chu Yang''s questions before he had time to say anything, Qing Yi smiled happily as she told her simple n for dealing with such a situation.


    Simple indeed, but it should work just fine. The only problem would be them running in to a dead end but considering that their divine sense could cover a ratherrge area, it should not be too hard for them to navigate inside the tunnels of the mole demon beast.


    "Fine, we can go with the mole tunnels, but we have to make sure that the mole demon beast is not anywhere near it before entering. Not only that, but if we encounter any other mole demon beast, we should leave immediately, it will be far too difficult to escape from multiple moles at once." Reluctantly nodding his head in agreement to Qing Yi''s newest dangerous n, Chu Yang could not help getting a feeling that they were about to end up in yet another troublesome situation again.


    The reason why he had agreed with Qing Yi''s idea even with this feeling was because he also had a feeling that staying in the underground world of the mystic realm for too long would be even more dangerous.


    As for the reason why the underground world was dangerous? Like any wise cultivator would say in his situation, he had absolutely no idea other than a vague feeling of danger¡­

 Chapter 918 Strange Mountain Range

    At the same time that Qing Yi and Chu Yang began their search for the tunnel that the mole had used to enter the cave, Xuan Hao was making his way deeper inside the mystic realm. Different from his two disciples, he did not have to worry about possibly encountering a Domain Lord Realm demon beast. On the other hand, the demon beast would be the one that had to worry about encountering him¡­


    "Hm?"


    As Xuan Hao moved deeper inside the mystic realm, his divine sense soon picked up a mountain range covered in an ethereal mist that blocked his divine sense in the distance.


    Whoosh~


    Intrigued by the mountain range and the mist that could block his divine sense, Xuan Hao descended down towards a small path located at the bottom of the mist covered mountain range. Deciding not to directly force his way through the mist, as he had no idea what might be present on the other side of the mist. Given that the mist had the ability to block his divine sense, he at least had to show some degree of cautiousness when entering the mist covered mountain range.


    Thumb~


    Landing on path leading up into the mist covered mountain range, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes after feeling the thick spiritual qi drifting down from the mountain range in front of him. The level of spiritual qi present in the air outside the mountain range was close to the same level as the Shattered Star Peak¡­ And this was only the area outside the mountain range! It was easy to imagine just how thick the spiritual qi in the air inside the mountain range would be¡­


    The only thing that made Xuan Hao pause and not continue forward after sensing the pure spirit qi drifting down from the mountains, was the fact that he had a feeling that something was wrong.


    The level of spiritual qi present beneath the mountain range was already this strong, indicating that the level of spiritual qi inside the mountain range covered by the misty veil should have far exceeded that of what should only be a negligible amount of spiritual qi drifting down the mountains.


    From his experience in setting up the chaotic qi formation and the fact that it had been upgraded by the system after beingpleted, Xuan Hao also understood just how hard it would be to gather arge amount of qi in one ce and prevent it from leaking out. The difficulty would only increase as the purity of the spiritual qi gathered increased!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao doubted that there was a natural formation powerful enough to surpass the power of the chaotic qi formation covering most of the Shattered Star Peaks-


    "Ah!? A new quest!?" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    However, before Xuan Hao could decide on whether or not to take the risk and explore the mysterious mountain range, the sound of the system followed by the appearance of a new quest took him by surprise.


    [Side Quest: Mysterious Mountain Range, Part 1]


    [Description: You have stumbled upon a mysterious mountain range hidden by an enchanting veil of mist. Passing through the ethereal veil will undoubtedlye with dangers that will not be easy to resolve, but at the same time, treasures and other mystical rewards would undoubtedly also be present amid the danger hidden behind the veil. Show your unwavering courage and enter the mountain realm to find out what is lurking behind the mysterious veil of mist!]


    [Reward: Unlock Part 2]


    Reading through the new quest that had appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help looking back up at the mountain range in front of him.


    Other than the fact that the quest had mentioned that he needed to go through the mist enter the mysterious mountain range, it had also given him some crucial clues as to what might be hiding on the other side of the mist.


    Mentioning both dangers that would be difficult to resolve and treasures.


    Although Xuan Hao did feel tempted to just rush up the mountain after getting the quest, he also understood that for the system to specifically mention dangers that were difficult to resolve, it meant that there should at the very least be something dangerous enough to threaten someone in the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm on the other side of the mist. Something that dangerous was not something that would be easy to resolve. Not to mention, he had no idea if it would be something even more dangerous than that!


    But¡­ There should be no way I will instantly die from entering the mist. If that was the case, I doubt I would get a quest telling me to enter the mist.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao soon decided to follow the path leading deeper into the mountain range and directly towards the veil of mist that made it impossible to see most of the mountain range hidden beneath.


    Following the winding path guiding him through the dense foliage and towering ancient trees at the base of the mountain, Xuan Hao felt a sense of anticipation coursing through his veins as he approached the misty veil that began a few hundred meters up the mountain.


    "So, this is the mist stopping my divine sense?" Muttering this to himself as he came to a stop in front of the misty veil, Xuan Hao casually grabbed the mist and tried to investigate it to no avail. Be it his divine sense or dao domain, none of them could prate through the thin looking mist. Even after he had separated it from the rest of the mist.


    In the end, Xuan Hao could only let go of the mist he had grabbed and watch it slowly fall to the ground before dispersing into the surroundings, like it had never even existed in the first ce.


    Looks like entering the mist is the only way to find out what is on the other side¡­


    Feeling a bit nervous as he looked at the mysterious mist in front of him, Xuan Hao slowly took a step forward into the mist. Soon, the mist enveloped him, caressing his skin with a cool, ethereal touch and before long his entire body was swallowed up.


    ¡­


    Having entered the mist, Xuan Hao found himself traversing a series of treacherous cliffs and perilous ravines on a narrow path barelyrge enough for one person to walk on. If not for the fact that the path had been marked by small stonempposts gently guiding him through the mist, Xuan Hao was certain that he would have ended up getting lost inside the mist. Especially considering that he could not use his divine sense or dao domain to find his way inside the mist. All he could do was follow the gentle light of the stonempposts and hope they didn''t lead him somewhere dangerous.


    After traveling along the narrow path for what felt like days, he finally left the mist and arrived at a serene teau.


    A short distance away stood an awe-inspiring sight¡ª a grand temple, carved into the mountain itself. Its stone pirs reaching towards the sky above, adorned with all sorts of intricate engravings depicting different celestial beings either battling each other or peacefully cultivating.


    Approaching the temple''s entrance, Xuan Hao could not help feeling awed at the massive wooden doors intricately carved with different mythical creatures, some like the celestial dragons and soaring phoenixes, while others were aplete mystery.


    Although he had not encountered any of the dangers that the system had mentioned so far, he had a feeling that the quiet temple was not as harmless as it looked from the outside.


    Creak~


    Pushing open therge doors of the grand temple, Xuan Hao hesitated for a moment before stepping inside and was greeted by an eerie silene that seemed to echo across the empty hall on the other side of the doors.


    The vast hall was in a state ofplete darkness. The only source of lighting in through the pair of doors that Xuan Hao had just opened. Only barely illuminated some of the golden scriptures that lined the walls of the vast hall.


    "Why is this ce so creepy¡­" Not knowing what to feel when he saw the dark hall filled with nothing more than golden scriptures telling long forgotten stories of the people who had once lived in the grand temple, Xuan Hao could not help felling an unknown sense of difort wash over him.


    So far, the grand temple was by far one of the creepiest ces he had ever been¡­ And the worst part was the fact that the grand temple seemed to go even deeper into the side of the mountain.


    At this point in time, Xuan Hao wanted nothing more than for a demon beast or something to show up and dispel the eerie feeling that had managed to engulf him.

 Chapter 919 Mysterious Stone Tablet

    As he walked deeper into the temple, Xuan Hao was soon met with a massive stone tablet, adorned with engravings of mythical creatures, celestial figures and profound symbols that seemed to have been left behind by powerful cultivators with a deep understanding of different Daos. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Just observing the profound symbols on the massive stone tablet from a distance was more than enough for him to feel hisprehension increase by substantial margin.


    An artifact able to increase one''sprehension by staying close to it!?


    Realizing just how precious the massive tablet in front of him was, Xuan Hao could not help feeling tempted to take it away. Not only would such an artifact be useful when it came to increasing the strength of his Daos, but it would also be able to help the Nascent Soul Realm Elders of the sect inprehending their own domain.


    If he could return to the sect with the tablet in front of him, it would, without a doubt, result in more Domain Lord Realm Experts appearing in the Star Shattering Sect. Not only this, but it would also make the path to the Domain Lord Realm smoother for anyone who happened to reach the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm in the future!


    Eager to get his hand on the precious artifact that had appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao did a simple scan of his surroundings before making his way towards the massive stone tablet after having made sure that there wasn''t anything dangerous hidden around it.


    Approaching the massive stone tablet, Xuan Hao could not help feeling his gaze shift towards a symbol located at the corner of the stone tablet.


    "Hm? This symbol¡­ It should have been carved by a powerful cultivator in the Dao of the Sword in the past!" Feeling a sense of awe as he looked at the symbol that radiated a powerful sword intent far surpassing the level of his own. It was a masterpiece disying the power and grace of the sword cultivator who had carved it in the past.


    In a sense, the symbol embodied the essence of the Dao of the Sword!


    "How amazing, I wonder what realm the person who carved this symbol had reached¡­ Unfortunately, only a fraction of the original sword intent is still left, and I won''t be able to gain much from it in its current iplete state" Spending the next few minutes observing the sword symbol, Xuan Hao could not help regretfully shaking his head.


    Although the sword intent that had been used to carve the symbol on the tablet was still present to some degree, its current state was far fromplete. Making it close to impossible for him to try and use it to gain an understanding of what came next after he condensed the nascent sword soul in his dantian.


    Looking at the rest of the symbols and engravings present on the stone tablet, Xuan Hao discovered that they were in a simr or worse state than the sword symbol. Meaning that none of them would be able to provide any directions on the different Daos that they represented.


    Realizing this, Xuan Hao could not help looking at the massive stone tablet in front of him with a thoughtful expression.


    The increase inprehension provided by the massive stone tablet was most likely the result of all the different symbols carved into it by powerful cultivators in the past merging together to form a unique dao aura around the stone tablet itself that then increased theprehension of anyone close to the tablet itself.


    Thinking along this line, the dao aura created by the ancient engravings and symbols carved into the tablet should be significantly weaker than it was when the tablet had first been created. If it had been before these symbols had decayed to their current state, Xuan Hao did not think that the effect brought by the dao aura of the tablet would only slightly impact hisprehension!


    "If I''m not wrong, the tablet should have been used to train the younger generation of these ancient cultivators in the past, the dao aura serving to increase their cultivation while they wouldprehend the dao from one of the many symbols and engravings¡­" Muttering this to himself as he gently touched the sword symbol, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of confusion.


    What had happened to the power that had once been in control of this ce? Given the power needed to create the stone tablet and the fact that so many different Daos of varying uniqueness had been used in its creation, it was obvious just how strong the power back then had been. Even if he had no clue just how strong the people who left behind an engraving of symbol of their own were, he was certain that they should at least have surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Letting out a quiet sigh as he thought about this mysterious power that had just seemingly evaporated into thin air at some point in time, Xuan Hao picked up the massive tablet easily a dozen meters tall with his domain before putting it into one of his interspatial rings.


    Bang! Bang!


    Having taken away the stone tablet and stuffed it into one of his interspatial rings, Xuan Hao was taken aback, as a loud banging sound suddenly echoed across the entire temple.


    Thumb! Thumb! Thumb!


    Only a short time after the loud banging sound, the eerie sound of somethingrge moving soon reced it.


    "This¡­"


    Hearing the loud banging followed by the loud footsteps that seemed to be moving in his direction, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine-


    Swish-!


    Not wasting a single second before turning around and making his way out of the grand temple.


    No matter how dumb he might be from time to time, there was no way he was nning to stay behind inside the temple to figure out how strong therge creature moving in his direction was. Considering the power that should have built this grand temple in the past, it was not hard for him to imagine that the strength of therge creature might far exceed his own.


    Other than this, he already got his hands on the tablet that could increase theprehension of those around it, so he did not really have that much interest in exploring the deeper areas further inside the grand temple.


    Even more so now that a creature of some sort was wandering around thepletely dark halls buried deep inside the mountain¡­


    Whoosh~


    "That was close."


    Having escaped the moment, he had realized there was something else with him inside the grand temple, Xuan Hao soon came to a stop in the air a short distance away from the gates of the grand temple. Not daring to take his eyes off the entrance in case the creature inside decided to chase him outside.


    In his hurry, the doors of the grand temple had been swung wide open. Allowing him a full view into the vast hall on the other side of the gate. Although his vision was somewhat limited by the fact that the light did not reach the farthest part of the hall where he had picked up the tablet. Not daring to directly use his divine sense, as he feared that he might end up drawing the attention of the creature inside the grand temple¡­ And if it was really far stronger than him, he didn''t want to get discovered.


    Thumb! Thumb! Thumb!


    Just at this point, he could once again hear the loud footsteps that he had heard from deeper inside the grand temple after he had taken away the tablet. The only difference this time around was that the creature it belonged to had arrived inside the vast hall!


    "¡­"


    Observing the barely visible figure that had appeared at the edge of where the light from outside the grand temple reached, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine when he found out what the creature was.


    Standing more five meters tall, the creature looked humanoid in shape, but after a quick inspection it became rather obvious that it was not a human. After all, as far as he knew, humans could not grow over five meters in size. The only people who could do this kind of thing would be those cultivating special techniques that would temporarily increase their size while they were fighting.


    Of course, in the case of people like that, they would only be bigger for a short period of time and couldn''tst long.


    All of this was not even mentioning the weird eyeball connected to some sort of tentacle like arm that had poked out of the darkness at the end of the vast hall and was staring directly at him-


    Wait! It''s looking directly at me!?


    Realizing that the creature lurking in the darkness had actually spotted him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine. Preparing to leave the moment the creature showed the slightest sign of chasing after him.

 Chapter 920 Ilussion

    "Just how long is it going to continue staring at me!?" Having remained frozen on the spot as he waited for the creature to jump out of the shadows and chase after him for what felt like hours, Xuan Hao could not help growing impatient as the creature had showed no signs of moving. The eyeball poking out and the tentacle-like arm connected to it was the only thing that the creature had revealed of its body.


    Even then, Xuan Hao had not allowed his curiosity to get the better of him this time around. Not using his divine sense to investigate the creature, as he understood that this might end up provoking the creature into attacking him.


    This was not to say that he had not managed to gain any new information about the creature during this, as he had managed to get some idea of the creature''s strength by detecting the faint energy waves emanating from the eyeball as it stared at him. Allowing him to guess that its strength should have reached a realmparable to the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Allowing him to feel grateful that he did not use his divine sense to investigate the creature earlier and risk provoking it in the process. After all, even if his current cultivation was not too far from beingparable to the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension, he had never faced anyone that strong before and felt that it would be best to exercise cation. Not to mention, he had no way to tell if the creature was hiding part of its strength and had just showed him a bit of it to make him lower his guard.


    Feeling that it would be a waste to continue his staringpetition with the creature that refused to move out of the shadows inside the grand temple, Xuan Hao decided to leave. Although he still made sure to keep an eye on the creature in case it happened to get any ideas.


    Rustle~


    Moving back through the small shrubs behind him, the eyeball of the creature did not seem affected by his sudden movement and still kept its attention focused on him without showing any signs of leaving the shadows and entering the light that came in from the open doors of the entrance to the grand temple.


    Continuing like this until the eyeball finally disappeared behind a fewrge rocks on the slope of the mountain, Xuan Hao could not help letting out the breath he had unknowingly been holding during his earlier staringpetition with the strange creature.


    Even if he was still far from being safe from the strange creature lurking inside the grand temple, he could at least begin to use his divine sense again without having to worry about identally provoking the strange creature. If the creature was still within his divine sense, it could only mean that it had decided to leave the hall of the grand temple and follow after him!


    Feeling a bit nervous as his divine sense spread out and moved back in the direction towards the grand temple, Xuan Hao soon opened both of his eyes in surprise as he discovered that the creature that had been lurking in the darkness had actually moved all the way up to the entrance of the grand temple.


    Upon closer inspection, Xuan Hao realized that the creature had more than four arms and was covered in all sorts of weird tentacles with different colored eyeballs attached to them. From a first nce, it looked simr to the abominations created by the Dao of Corruption, the only difference between it and the abominations created through the Dao of Corruption, was that there was no presence of the Dao of Corruption around the strange humanoid creature. Instead, it seemed to be giving off some sort of holy glow that didn''t match its current horrifying appearance.


    Whoosh~


    BANG!


    Sensing his divine sense, the strange creature rushed forward and shut therge doors of the grand hall. Instantly causing the part of his divine sense inside the grand temple to be cut off, while at the same time preventing him from looking inside the grand temple again without opening the doors. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    During the short moment the creature took to close the door, a faint mist simr to the one he had passed through when entering the mountain range could be seen around one of the eyeballs of the creature as it seemed to try to tell him something.


    "What in the world was that¡­" Not knowing what to say as his divine sense could only linger around the entrance to the grand temple, Xuan Hao could not help wondering just what the strange creature was and what it meant with the strange jiggling of one of its eyeballs.


    From the little knowledge he had on things rted to gods, he could only think that the strange creature should be rted to some sort of god given the holy glow that had been present around it, but¡­ Its appearance did not seem to match what one would normally consider a holy beast.


    On the contrary, he would have believed it more if its appearance was that of a small bird with a lizard tail twice its own size. At least that seemed to fit the aesthetics of holy beast more.


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao turned his attention away from the now closed doors of the grand temple. At the very least it didn''t look like the creature was going to leave the temple and chase after him. Only closing the door to block out the lighting in through the doors he had left open when escaping from the temple.


    No longer worrying about the creature from the grand templeing out to attack him, Xuan Hao remembered the quest from the system. Although it had only required him to pass through the mist, it had still not beenpleted even though he was clearly not inside of the mist any longer.


    "I wonder if I just missed it because I was too excited about the stone tablet earlier¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked through his system quests, Xuan Hao did his best to ignore a certain time limited quest that seemed like it was going to be with him for the rest of his life and instead focused on the side quest.


    [Side Quest: Mysterious Mountain Range, Part 1]


    [Description: You have stumbled upon a mysterious mountain range hidden by an enchanting veil of mist. Passing through the ethereal veil will undoubtedlye with dangers that will not be easy to resolve, but at the same time, treasures and other mystical rewards would undoubtedly also be present amid the danger hidden behind the veil. Show your unwavering courage and enter the mountain realm to find out what is lurking behind the mysterious veil of mist!]


    [Reminder: The mist is not as simple as it seems, passing through it requires more than simply walking through.]


    [Extra Reminder: It is rmended not to get trapped in the mist, as it can slowly drain away the life essence of living things if exposed for an extended period of time.]


    [Reward: Unlock Part 2]


    Hm? Reminders? Why are there suddenly reminders on the quest¡­ And why are they about the mist? Don''t tell me-


    RUMBLE-!


    Suddenly realizing something, Xuan Hao directly used his dao domain to violent rip apart the mountain around him-


    Whoosh~


    However, before he could do any damage to the mountain around him, his surroundings started twisting like the surface of ake after a stone had been thrown into it. Soon changing from a peaceful teau into treacherous cliffs and perilous ravines that were soon covered by the all too familiar mist that he had been traveling through just a short time earlier. The narrow path he had used to traverse also appeared beneath his feet once again.


    This- Was I trapped in an illusion created by the mist earlier!?


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he thought about what had just happened, Xuan Hao quickly looked through his interspatial ring to see if the stone tablet was still there¡­ And to his surprise, it was indeed still there. Meaning that he should not have been trapped in an illusion just now, or it would make no sense for the stone tablet he had picked up in his illusion to still be there.


    Unless the illusion only affected what I saw and didn''t restrict my movement. Meaning I could have still gone somewhere off the narrow path and found the stone tablet! Now that I think about it, the strange move from the creature before it closed the door to the grand temple, was it perhaps trying to inform me about the fact that I was still inside the mist¡­?


    Remembering what the strange creature had done before closing the door to the grand temple, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that it had indeed been trying to warn him.


    Maybe the strange creature looking like some kind of abomination was indeed a holy beast. Not to mention the fact that the appearance of the creature he saw might not even have been the real appearance of the creature.

 Chapter 921 Strange Creature And Strange Cave

    Remembering the reminder from the system, Xuan Hao didn''t dare waste too much time and quickly began following the narrow path up the mountain once again. Not daring to let his guard down in case he ended up trapped in the weird illusion of the mist again. Not feeling the slightest bit interested in finding out whether or not he would really end up starting to lose his life essence if he stayed inside the mist for long enough.


    ¡­


    Moving along the narrow path without seeing any end in sight even after walking for close to a day, Xuan Hao could not help starting to get worried that the path he was walking on was not leading him out of the mist and was instead just going in circles around the mountain range. After all, with his current speed, he should have long since made his way through the mist and reached the interior of the mountain range.


    Although the path was safe to some degree, considering he had not encountered any problems other problems since escaping from the illusion earlier, it was also obvious that he would not be able to pass through the mist by just following the path.


    If he wanted to get out of the mist and reach the mountain range, he would most likely have to leave the path and venture through the treacherous cliffs and other obstacles present outside the narrow path.


    In normal circumstances this would not have been a problem considering that he would just be able to fly over everything, but inside the mist, he had to be careful and not attract any unwanted attention to himself.


    The earlier encounter with the strange holy creatureparable to a cultivator who had reached the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, was more than enough proof of just how dangerous the area outside the narrow path was. Even if the appearance of the creature might have been altered by the illusion, its strength was not, and neither was the stone tablet securely ced inside his interspatial ring.


    Feeling that he had no other choice than to leave the narrow path if he wanted to find out what was hiding inside the mountain range, Xuan Hao looked over the edge of the path and into the ravine right next to it with a hint of hesitation shing through his eyes. The bottom of the ravine was impossible to see due to the thick mist that was everywhere and there was a chance that a powerful creature simr to the one he had encountered in the illusion was lurking around at the bottom of the ravine.


    "I won''t make any progress if I just continue to stand around worrying about what might and might not be hiding in the mist." Muttering this to himself as he understood that he could alwayse up with excuses for not venturing off the narrow path and into the unknown with nothing to guide him through the mist, Xuan Hao stepped forward and slowly began floating over the ravine.


    Whilst he did not intend to fly due to risks of exposing himself to possible enemies lurking around inside the mist when using his domain, he did not intend to climb down the ravines and other holes blocking his path. Even if using his domain to gently glide across these ravines and other obstacles might end up risking some of the strange creatures inside the mist attacking him, he felt that it should be far safer than entering those ravines and other things blocking his path.


    More importantly, it would also end up saving him a lot of time.


    Although he still had no real idea when the mist would start to affect his life essence like the system had told him, he felt that it would be best if he could leave the mist as fast as possible and hopefully not find out how long it would take the mist to kill him.


    ¡­


    Wandering through the rough and difficult to traverse terrain of the mountain slope, Xuan Hao did not have to walk for more than a few minutes before encountering another strange creature living inside the mist.


    Observing the strange creature that did not seem to have noticed him, Xuan Hao managed to get a good look of the strange creature that looked like thebination of a giant rat and a lion with three different tails and two heads as it mindlessly wandered around the edge of arge cave located at tall part of the slope.


    The cave itself was nothing special and there seemed to be no reason for the mindless movement of the strange rat lion creature, almost like it had lost its spirit and could only wander around aimlessly. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even after making eye contact with him on several asions, the strange rat lion creature did not seem to care about him and just continued its aimless journey around the cave entrance.


    Could it be that the strange creatures living in the mist are not going to attack me?


    Thinking back to the strange creature in the grand temple that didn''t attack him and instead seemed to have helped him discover that he had been trapped in some sort of illusion, Xuan Hao felt that this made sense.


    Maybe I should test it out¡­


    Roughly gauging the strength of the creature to be far weaker than his own, Xuan Hao decided to test out his theory and find out if the creatures in the mist were really harmless.


    Rustle~


    Slowly beginning to make his way towards the rat lion creature that continued to move around like he didn''t exist, Xuan Hao gently ced his hand on top of the weird mane on one of the big rat heads.


    "Looks like it''s really harmless- Hm?"


    Suddenly noticing something moving around the jagged stones located around the entrance to the cave as he was touching the mane of the rat lion creature, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine as he felt something bad was about to happen-


    Swish-!


    And without caring about the rat lion creature or any other strange creature around discovering him, Xuan Hao jumped backwards before moving in the opposite direction of the rat lion creature and the cave.


    RUMBLE-!


    Not a secondter, a loud rumbling sound echoed out across the silent mountain slope as therge cave that the rat lion creature had been wandering around turned into a giant mouth filled with razor sharp teeth that lunged forward.


    Roa-


    Not even able to let out more than a half-finished roar, the rat lion creature had no way to fight back before it was swallowed by the giant mouth covering an area a few hundred meters in diameter. More than enough to cover the ce that Xuan Hao had been standing just a short time earlier.


    Bang!


    Rumble~


    As the rat lion creature and anything that happened to be within the area covered by the giant mouth was swallowed, Xuan Hao could only watch in shock, as the rest of the body that the mouth belonged to appeared for a short time before it dug back into the ground. Creating a brand-new hole in the process.


    "It swallowed a creatureparable to a Second Tribtion Soul Ascension Realm Expert with ease¡­ Good thing that I didn''t venture down any of the holes and instead chose to fly over them¡­" Having managed to discern the strength of the rat lion creature during itsst hopeless struggle against the giant mouth that swallowed it without a care, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    The memory of his encounter with the giant worm during his time in the core region of the Sky Empire inevitably reappeared as hepared it with the giant worm he had just seen.


    Although the worm in the core region of the Sky Empire had been farrger, it should not have been stronger than the worm he had just seen. After all, given its ability to easily devour a creatureparable to the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, it was clear that its strength should have reached theter stages of the Soul Ascension Realm. Maybe it had even reached a realmparable to the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, putting it at the same level as the creature he had encountered in the grand temple.


    The only difference between the two being the fact that he had no idea if the worm would appear again to attack him. For this reason, Xuan Hao decided to not linger around and test his luck-


    Swish-!


    Leaving the area before the worm finished consuming the creature it had just swallowed.


    Only after travelling for over half an hour did, he feel safe enough to slow down and resume travelling in a safer manner. Now feeling even more worried than before about possibly alerting any of the nearby strange creatures and at the same time reevaluating his earlier idea of the strange creatures being harmless¡­

 Chapter 922 Escaping The Mist, Part 1

    Resuming his journey through the mist after having made sure the massive worm wasn''t following after him, Xuan Hao did not take long to encounter another strange creature. However, this time around, he didn''t approach it and just passed by it without doing anything.


    Even if the strange creature seemed to have noticed him, it didn''t move an inch and ignored him like the rat lion creature had done.


    Like this, Xuan Hao travelled through the mist for close to four hours before abruptlying to a stop. In front of him, a familiar looking pair of doors could be faintly seen through the mist.


    "The grand temple¡­?" Recognizing therge pair of doors in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help opening his mouth in surprise. Not having expected to stumble upon the grand temple that he had encountered in the illusion.


    Not only that, but outside of the surroundings being covered in a thickyer of mist that made it hard to see more than a dozen or so meters around himself, there was no change from therge pair of doors he had seen in the illusion.


    Is the strange creature inside perhaps also the same as in the illusion¡­?


    Seeing that the grand temple was exactly the same on the outside as in the illusion, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if the strange creature with a presence simr to that of a holy beast was also the same as in the illusion.


    Whoosh~


    However, just when he was lost in his own thoughts thinking about the strange creature inside the grand temple, a strong wind appeared out of nowhere. Pushing the mist away for a short moment before it began drifting in from all sides to fill up the gap created by the strong wind.


    Witnessing therge passage in the mist that had been created by the strong mist, Xuan Hao could not help opening both of his eyes in surprise as he saw the mountain slope filled with nts and trees located at the end of the passage.


    "This¡­ A path out of the mist!" Realizing this, Xuan Hao didn''t bother wasting any time on the grand temple that he had already explored once, as he used all of his strength to rush towards the end of the passage that had been created by the strong wind. Not wanting to miss the chance to escape from the mist.


    Even if he felt that he was getting closer to leaving the mist on his own, he also understood that there was a chance that the mist might be messing with him. After all, it should not have taken more than a half an hour to one hour to cross the mist¡­ And that was only because he slowed down to try and avoid drawing some powerful strange creature to attack him. If he had used his normal speed, it wouldn''t have taken more than a minute or less to cross!


    Swish~!


    Because of this, Xuan Hao was not too worried about reaching the end of the passage before the mist had a chance to fill it in again. Instead, the thing that worried him, was the possibility of a powerful strange creature would appear and attack him after sensing his movement-


    ROAR-!


    Almost like it had read his thoughts, a loud roar echoed out across the mist covered mountain slope. Even if he could not see what kind of creature had made the loud roar, he could still feel the terrifying aura belonging to the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm that burst forth together with the loud roar getting closer to him with each passing second.


    Other than the strange creature that he had encountered inside the grand temple whose strength was hard to fully grasp, it was by far the strongest creature that he had encountered inside the mist so far!


    Something that was especially impressive considering that all of the strange creatures that he had encountered inside the mist had at least reached a realmparable to the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "It shouldn''t be able to catch up to me before I escape from the mist¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced back in the direction of the powerful aura that was getting closer and closer to him before looking towards the end of the passage, Xuan Hao didn''t feel too worried about the powerful creature.


    Even if he couldn''t defeat someone in the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm with his current strength, he should be more than capable of keeping himself alive. For now, the most important thing to Xuan Hao was not how well he would do in a fight against the other party, but whether or not he would be able to escape from the mist before the other party caught up to him.


    After all, fighting inside the mist ran the risk of provoking even more of these powerful creatures that might end up joining the fight as a result, something that would undoubtedly result in him being forced to leave the mountain range.


    Whoosh~


    Not more than a few secondster, Xuan Hao manages to leave the mist andnd on the green ground covered in a thickyer of moss and grass.


    "Finally, I''m out¡­"


    Feeling a sense of relief at finally getting out of the mist that he had ended being trapped for over a day inside, Xuan Hao could not help unconsciously rxing his body.


    ROAR!


    However, this sense of rxation was soon interrupted as an enormous demon beast emerged from the dense mist a few meters behind him. Its menacing presence sent tremors through the air, as its ws ripped through the mist down towards where Xuan Hao was standing.


    "Hm!?"


    At that very moment, Xuan Hao''s entire body tensed up in response to the sudden attack-


    Swish-!


    Reacting with lightning-quick reflexes, he used Drifting Cloud Steps to their limit together with spatial maniption-


    BANG!


    Narrowly evading the ferocious attack of the demon beast.


    Landing gracefully on a nearby boulder, Xuan Hao narrowed both his eyes as his divine sense locked on to the imposing demon beast.


    Swish-!


    Not giving Xuan Hao any time to prepare, the demon beast lunged forward. Its massive ws shed through the air at a speed that made it appear like they had instantly appeared in front of him. Not nning to give Xuan Hao any chance to dodge this time around!


    "Wha-"


    Bang!


    Despite his best efforts, Xuan Hao found himself unable to resist the full power of the demon beast head on. Getting knocked back before being met with an onught of attacks from the demon beast that seemed intent on ending things fast.


    Bang! Bang!


    Each strike from the demon beast pushed him further back and made it increasingly difficult to block. The impact of the attacks sending shockwaves sweeping through the surroundings.


    If not for the fact that his Dao of Ice was specialized for defending and could block the attacks of the demon beast after being strengthened by his dao domain, Xuan Hao would have had no way to defend himself against the powerful attacks of the demon beast.


    Looks like I will have toe up with something if I want to continue exploring this ce. Maybe it''s time to test out how powerful the Dao of Fire is¡­


    Feeling that his current situation was getting worse with each passing second and he had to do something before reaching the point of being forced to escape unless he wanted to die, Xuan Hao dedicated part of his attention towardsing up with a n that would allow him tond an attack on the demon beast without having to worry about getting killed by the ws of said demon beast in the process.


    Although his strength was only two minor realms below the demon beast, this small gap was the difference between someone in the Middle Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm and someone in the Late Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm. Not something that was as easy to ovee as it was in the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    "Ah! I got it!"


    Finding the opportunity, he had been looking for just when the ice barrier he used to block the demon beast was about to break, Xuan Hao willingly allowed the ice barrier to shatter under the attack of the demon beast before using the millions of small ice shards in tandem with his Sword Dao to transform the small ice shard into ice sword that formed a blizzard that surrounded the demon beast.


    WHOOOSH-!


    Although this ended up preventing the demon beast from attacking him, it put an enormous stress on his dao domain and drained the qi in his dantian at a speed visible to the naked eye. Even with his seemingly endless supply of qi, he would not be able to hold on in his current state for more than a minute. Showing just how powerful the demon beast was.


    However, Xuan Hao''s goal was not to keep it trapped for as long as he could.


    BANG!


    ROOAR!


    So, not wasting a single precious second, Xuan Hao shattered the small ice swords in the blizzard before gathering them together into arge ice pir beneath the demon beast that knocked it into the air.


    Exposing its vulnerable and unprotected underbelly in the process!N?v(el)B\\jnn

 Chapter 923 Escaping The Mist, Part 2

    Seizing the opportunity that he had created for himself; Xuan Hao executed a swift and calcted strike in the form of a concentrated ball of fire that had been created by using all his knowledge of the Dao of Fire and most of the qi still left inside his dantian.


    FWOOOSH-!


    Roooar-!


    As the ball of fire hit the thick hide covering the underbelly of the demon beast and began burning through it at a speed visible to the naked eye before beginning to wreak havoc inside its body, a howl filled with pain soon echoed out across the green mountain slope.


    Whoosh~


    Followed by the mes now covering the entire body of the demon beast dissipating after close to two minutes of continuous burning, Xuan Hao could not help looking at the massive body still moving after the mes had dissipated in shock. "It''s actually still alive¡­"


    Although the light in the eyes of the demon beast visibly dimming downpared to before and its body had been heavily injured by the attack just now, it still stood up and looked like it could fight, a testament to just how powerful the body of a Sixth Tribtion of Soul Ascension Realm demon beast was.


    If it had been a normal human cultivator, Xuan Hao doubted that they would have been able to endure the me containing his insights of the Dao of Fire for more than half a minute¡­


    ROOOOOAR!


    Knowing that it had managed to survive the attack, the demon beast let out a proud roar as it looked down towards Xuan Hao filled with killing intent.


    Though the me had not been fatal, it had caused a ratherrge amount of damage to its body that would take a long time to recover¡­ And that was not even mentioning the fact that there might be other demon beasts or strange creatures in the mist who would want to try and take advantage of its weakened state to devour it!


    "¡­"


    Seeing the proud expression of the demon beast as it looked down towards him filled with killing intent, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself as he understood that he would not be able to defeat the other party with his current strength.


    Even if the demon beast had been weakened by the earlier attack, he was not in a much better situation, as his dantian had almostpletely dried up after thest attack.


    Do I really have to escape and leave the mountain range?


    Understanding that he would not stand a chance against the demon beast in his current state, Xuan Hao could only prepare to escape from the mountain range with thest bit of qi still present in his dantian. Not the slightest bit interested in fighting to the death with the demon beast in front of him when he could guarantee his own safety by running away.


    Only someone with something wrong in their head or faced with no other choice would enter a life and death battle. Especially so for cultivators who had lived for a long time!


    Roar!


    Continuing their short staring contest for another few seconds, Xuan Hao felt his entire body tense up when the demon beast finally let out a short roar.


    However, instead of attacking him, the demon beast turned around and escaped back into the mist behind it.


    "This¡­"


    Seeing the demon beast suddenly turning around and escaping into the mist, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of relief washing over his body.


    From the looks of it, the demon beast had the same thoughts as him and didn''t want to take the risk and continue the fight. After all, even if it might win, it should have also understood that it would have ended up in a far worse situation at the end of the battle. Putting it at an even greater risk of being attacked and killed when recoveringter.


    "For now, I should find a ce to recover before another demon beast shows up." Muttering this to himself as he looked back in the direction that the demon beast had disappeared in, Xuan Hao did not linger around the edge of the mist for long before finding a small empty cave not too far away that he could recover inside of.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any time on the quest that had beenpleted when he passed through the mist, Xuan Hao focused all of his attention on recovering his strength as fast as possible. Even using the spirit stones stored in his interspatial ring to speed up the process.


    After all, he had no idea what might be lurking inside the mountain range. For all he knew, it could be far more dangerous than the mist had been, but¡­ Even then, he still decided to take the risk. Not wanting to leave the mountain range now that he had finally managed to find his way through the mist.


    ¡­


    Opening his eyes at dawn the next day, Xuan Hao rose from his meditation spot and stretched his limbs, feeling the renewed strength coursing through his veins.


    "Finally, back to normal again. Guess its time to check out the side quest and see what the second part of it is about." Smiling to himself as he said this, Xuan Hao nced towards the system panel that had popped up in front of him.


    [Side Quest: Mysterious Mountain Range, Part 1 plete)]


    [Reward: Unlock Part 2]


    Reading through the quest and seeing that it had indeed beenpleted this time around and he wasn''t trapped in some sort of illusion created by the mist again, Xuan Hao unconsciously let out a sigh of relief.


    If he found out that he was still inside the mist, it would properly be time to leave, as the mountain range would have been far too dangerous for him to explore with his current strength.


    Luckily, that was not the case.


    "Redeem reward¡­" Not thinking too much about the, what if scenario, Xuan Hao directly redeemed the reward for the first part of the side quest. Feeling curious as to what the second part of the side quest would be about.


    [Side Quest: The Three Celestial Gates, Part 2]


    [Description: You have reached the mysterious mountain range hidden behind the mist. To uncover the secrets hidden inside the mountain range, you must find three ancient celestial gates and pass through them.]


    [Objective: Seek out the Three Celestial Gates and defeat the guardians within.]


    [Reward: Starlight Essence]


    "Three Celestial Gates?" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Reading through the new quest that had appeared, Xuan Hao felt himself growing increasingly curious as to what was hiding inside the mountain range and what kind of secrets it might contain. Maybe it contained information on the ancient power that had once controlled the mystic realm in the past, or maybe he would finally be able to find out what came after the Soul Ascension Realm.


    After all, since he had reached the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he had yet to encounter any substantial information about the realm that came after the Soul Ascension Realm. Not even able to get a name on the realm itself.


    The only clue he had so far about a potential name for the realm was the old soul he had found inside a ring proiming itself as a Divine Moon Immortal.


    Divine Moon Immortal could be the title for someone who had reached a certain cultivation realm, while it at the same time could also just be the title used to address certain experts inside a powerful empire or sect. In the end, there was no way for him to know what it was¡­


    Thinking back to how he had just ended up throwing the ring away in fear of the old soul trying to snatch away his disciples, Xuan Hao could not help hitting himself over the wasted opportunity to find out more about the cultivation realms above the Soul Ascension Realm, as that old soul should have definitely belonged to an ancient expert above the Soul Ascension Realm.


    But then again, he had no way of knowing about this back then and just wanted to ensure his disciples stayed with him. Not wanting to run the risk of his disciples being taken away.


    "Haaa¡­ Looks like I should just hope that the Three Celestial Gates have some information on the realm above the Soul Ascension Realm." Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao decided not to think about the old man in the ring that he had thrown away in the past.


    As for the Starlight Essence listed as the reward for the quest? Xuan Hao had no clue what it was and understood that it would be useless for him to ponder on its purpose beforepleting the quest.


    For now, Xuan Hao made his way out of the small cave that he had spent thest day inside of before slowly starting to make his way up the mountain in search of the Three Celestial Gates mentioned by the quest.

 Chapter 924 A Path Out Of The Underground World

    Different from the terrain inside the mist that was filled with all sorts of deadly ravines and holes that one could fall into if not careful, the mountain slope was covered in a thinyer of grass and moss with a few trees appearing from time to time. Making it far easier to traverse. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    The only thing keeping Xuan Hao from just spreading his divine sense out in all directions around himself to search for the Three Celestials Gates, was the fact that he had no idea if there were any powerful demon beasts lurking around in the small caves he spotted along his way up the mountain. After all, he had already fought with one demon beast at the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and had no ns to fight another one if he could avoid it!


    Slowly ascending the mountain like this, Xuan Hao soon stepped foot on the peak of the mountain without encountering any demon beasts or anything remotely dangerous along the way.


    "Nothing¡­?"


    However, after reaching the peak of the mountain, he was met with nothing more thana barren tform made of stone and a few half-broken benches that were overlooking the surrounding mountains.


    Although the few benches located on the edge of the stone tform would have been an excellent ce to sit down and admire the expansive mountain range from above, it was not what Xuan Hao had been hoping to encounter at the top of the mountain.


    "Looks like I won''t be able to count on finding some abandoned abode and get some clues about the possible location of the Three Celestial Gates¡­" Muttering this to himself as he sat down on one of the few benches that had managed to remain intact, Xuan Hao turned to the other mountains of the mountain range.


    Empty¡­ Is the Three Celestial Gates perhaps not located on top of one of the mountains?


    Realizing that they were in an empty state without anything on top of them or just covered in a simple viewing tform like the one he found himself on top of, Xuan Hao turned to look down towards the small patches of forest located in between the different mountains of the mountain range.


    If the Three Celestial Gates were not on top of any of the mountain peaks, they could only be hidden somewhere inside the small forests below, a ce that just so happened to also be perfect for any demon beast that might be living inside the mountain range to live.


    Hopefully I won''t end up encountering any¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao began scaling down the side of the mountain. Heading down towards a small forest that was located in a small valley in between the mountain he was on top of and a few other mountains. Only connected to the rest of the small forests of the mountain range through a small passage located at the base of the two mountains located farthest away from his current location.


    Reaching the base at the mountain where the small forest started, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he gazed up at the trees standing more than a hundred meters tall in front of him. The so-called small forest that he had seen from above, was farrger than he had expected.


    But this did not deter him, as he soon entered the forest in search of the Three Celestial Gates. Not forgetting to be ready for an ambush at any moment, as therge trees and thick foliage covering the ground would be perfect for any potential ambusher tounch a surprise attack.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao started his search for the Three Celestial Gates, Chu Yang and Qing Yi had already found the hole in the ceiling of the cave that the mole demon beast had fallen through a few days earlier and were currently trying their best to figure out a way to reach the hole in the ceiling.


    After all, they were not in the Domain Lord Realm and couldn''t fly up to reach the hole in the ceiling and enter the mole demon beast''s tunnel this way. Jumping was also out of the question, as the ceiling was too high up for them to reach.


    Not to mention, doing any of this also came with the risk of getting noticed by the demon beasts roaming around the underground world. Maybe even resulting in the mole demon beast noticing and following after them!


    "Hm?"


    As both of them were lost in thought trying toe up with ways that they could actually reach the entrance to the mole beast''s tunnel above them, Qing Yi suddenly noticed therge roots sticking out from the cave wall just a short distance away from where the hole was located. "Can we perhaps use the roots over there?" Poking Chu Yang''s should as she said this, Qing Yi did not forget to point towards the roots she had spotted.


    "Roots?" Hearing what Qing Yi said and feeling her finger poking him in an increasingly energetic manner, Chu Yang turned to look in the direction she was pointing with a confused expression on his face.


    "Ah! Of course! Great idea senior sister!"


    Seeing the countless roots sticking out from the side of the cave wall, Chu Yang instantly understood what Qing Yi wanted to do and began making his way towards the roots. Not falling too far behind, Qing Yi also made her way over towards the root covered cave wall.


    "Hm? The roots are far smaller than they looked from a distance¡­"


    Arriving at the wall filled with roots beside Chu Yang, Qing Yi could not help feeling a sense of unease after realizing that the roots covering the cave wall were far smaller up close.


    Given their current size and width, would they even be able to hold up their weight without breaking?


    "Do you want to go first, or should I have the honor?" Noticing the small frown that had appeared on her face, Chu Yang could not help jokingly asking this.


    "You can go first. After all, we still need someone to test if these roots can even hold or weight in the first ce" Rolling her eyes upon hearing what Chu Yang said, Qing Yi took the opportunity to let him test out the durability of the roots.


    If he really wanted to make fun of her, he should be prepared to take responsibility for his own words!


    "¡­"


    Feeling like he had been caught in some kind of borate trap, Chu Yang had no idea what to say as he could only stare speechlessly at Qing Yi for a short moment before turning towards the cave wall filled with roots.


    Looking at it again, he noticed that the roots sticking out from the cave wall did indeed look small and fragile.


    However, the thing that made him pause for a moment, was the roots located at the top that barely connected the cave wall to the hole leading into the mole demon beast''s tunnel. Those roots were barelyrge enough to grab hold of, let alone strong enough to carry his or Qing Yi''s weight for more than a second. Maybe not even that long¡­


    Creak~


    Grabbing hold of one of the roots before starting to climb up the root covered cave wall the next moment, Chu Yang ignored the creaking sound of the roots that looked like they were about to break apart under his weight at any moment. In any case, even if one of them broke, he would have more than enough roots avable to grab on to. Not to mention, with his strength in the Nascent Soul Realm, he was more than capable of sensing if the root he was using to support himself was about to break.


    "Looks like the roots are still strong enough tost for a few seconds¡­" Muttering this to herself as she watched Chu Yang smoothly climb up the small roots without any of them breaking under his weight, Qing Yi soon grabbed hold of a root before starting her climb up the root covered wall. Not wanting to get left behind by Chu Yang who soon reached the top of the cave wall.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting a second after having reached the top of the cave wall filled with roots, Chu Yangunching himself off the side of the wall towards one of the small roots hanging down from the ceiling-


    Creak~


    Whoosh~


    Grabbing hold of the small root that only barely fit in one of his hands, Chu Yangunched himself forward in the direction of the next small root on the way towards the hole leading inside the mole demon beast''s tunnel before the root had a chance to get pulled out from the cave ceiling.


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Continuing this all the way until he finally managed to reach the hole in the ceiling that luckily had arge rock hanging down just inside of it where he could wait for Qing Yi to catch up with him-


    "Wah!?"


    Bang~


    Something that didn''t take long, as his senior sister ended up miscalcting her speed. Resulting in herunching herself straight into the rock he was standing on. Needing him to grab her before she ended up falling back into the cave below.

 Chapter 925 Brutal Fight Below!

    Creak~


    "Hm?"


    Feeling the rock that they were now both standing on starting to sink downwards, Chu Yang took a few seconds toprehend what was happening before he quickly grabbed Qing Yi and carried her deeper into the mole demon beast''s tunnel without saying anything. Understanding that the longer they ended up staying on the rock, the faster it would dislodge itself and fall to the ground. Alerting any nearby demon beast below about something falling down from the hole¡­ And in the worst-case scenario, alerting the mole demon beast to the fact that something happened inside its tunnel.


    "W-what happened!?" Unaware of this, Qing Yi could only patiently wait before Chu Yang came to a stop before asking with a confused expression on her face. Not understanding why her junior brother had suddenly picked her up before carrying her deeper into the tunnel to a ce where they could stand freely without the support of something hanging out from the side of the tunnel.


    "Senior sister¡­ Didn''t you notice that the rock you flew into earlier was about to fall down into the cave?"


    "Ah¡­ This¡­ I didn''t notice¡­ Sorry¡­"


    Hearing what Chu Yang said and looking down towards the rock that was slowly starting to free itself from the tunnel wall, Qing Yi quickly realized what had happened, as a small blush made its way to her face. Understanding that she might have caused trouble for both of them once again.


    "No problem. Let''s just get out of here before the rock alerts the demon beasts below and the mole demon beast shows up to investigate the matter¡­" Knowing that it would be best for them to get going as fast as possible due to the risk of the rock falling alerting the mole demon beast hunting for prey somewhere in the cave below, Chu Yang didn''t me Qing Yi for her blunder of smashing head first into the rock and instead focused on them leaving and finding a way out of the underground world and back to surface again.


    In the first ce, he understood that it was just an ident that she had smashed headfirst into the rock. Not to mention, the rock was positioned in a rather odd way that made it hard to see from the small roots. Making it easy to not see and identally hit when entering the tunnel of the mole demon beast.


    "Yes¡­" Understanding that they should indeed be moving instead of just standing around, Qing Yi nodded her head with a still somewhat embarrassed expression on her face before following Chu Yang deeper into the tunnel of the mole demon beast.


    Although the tunnel itself was ratherrge and should have been easy for them to traverse, its steep incline upwards ended up making it harder for them to travel at their normal speed.


    However, this steep incline upwards did not discourage them in the slightest. On the contrary, it made them even more excited, as they understood this meant that they were getting closer to the surface!


    Even if they had no idea how far underground, they were at the moment. At least they now had a feeling that they were making progress in getting back up to the surface again, where they would once again have a chance to start exploring the mystic realm.


    This time without having to worry about the massive swarm of spiders and a horde of powerful demon beasts chasing after them-


    ROOOOOAR-!


    Just at this moment as they felt like they had managed to enter the tunnel and wouldn''t have to worry about anything for the next few hours or days if they were lucky, a loud roar strengthened by a powerful cultivation base suddenly echoed out behind them.


    Rumble~!


    Generating a shockwave of sound that caused the entire tunnel and cave beneath them to start shaking violently as a result.


    "Did the mole demon beast already return!?"


    "Maybe¡­ I can''t make out what kind of demon beast the roar came from¡­ "


    ROAR!?


    As Chu Yang and Qing Yi were nervously looking in the direction of the entrance to the tunnel that had already disappeared from view, another roar filled with pain suddenly came following the loud roar filled with killing intent from earlier.


    "This¡­ Maybe the mole demon beast encountered another powerful demon beast and is currently fighting beneath the tunnel entrance¡­?" Hearing the two roars that sounded like they hade from different demon beasts, Qing Yi could not help drawing her own conclusion from what she had heard.


    "Indeed, that would make sense¡­ But if the mole demon beast really is fighting down there, we have to get out of here as fast as possible before the fight ends, and it returns to the tunnel!" Nodding his head as he felt what Qing Yi said made sense, Chu Yang also didn''t forget to remind Qing Yi about their current dangerous situation.


    "Ah, of course!" Agreeing with what Chu Yang said, both of them soon resumed their journey up the steep tunnel of the mole demon beast, this time moving a little faster than before with the extra motivation from the fight that was taking ce below them.


    ¡­


    Unknown to both Chu Yang and Qing Yi, the mole demon beast that they had been worrying about, just so happened to show up beneath the entrance to the tunnel a few seconds after they had left the rock and began following the tunnel upwards towards the surface.


    Roar?


    Coming to a stop just as it was about to head back up into the tunnel above, it came to a stop before starting to sniff the air around it. Slowly a distinct killing intent spread out from around the mole demon beast, as it picked up the scent trail left behind by Chu Yang and Qing Yi leading directly into its tunnel!


    If it had been a normal demon beast that had reached the limits of the Nascent Soul Realm, it might not have been able to pick up the faint scent left behind by Chu Yang and Qing Yi, but it was a mole demon beast with a far more sensitive nosepared to ordinary demon beast!


    ROOOOOOOAR-!


    Letting out roar filled with all of the anger that had been building up after it first noticed that someone had entered its tunnel, part of the mole demon beast''s cultivation base ended up amplifying the loud beastial roar even further-


    RUMBLE-!


    Making the entire cave around it shake violently and causing all of the nearby demon beasts to escape in fear.


    Crack~


    Whoosh-!


    However, unexpectedly, the roar of the mole demon beast also ended up causing the already loose rock in the side of the tunnel entrance to fully free itself beforeing hurtling down towards the angrily roaring mole demon beast below.


    Roar?


    Noticing the rock falling down towards it the moment it was dislodged; the mole demon beast didn''t worry about it. After all, what was a normal rock going to do to a demon beast like itself? It had already experienced its own tunnel copsing on top of it several times in the past and hade out just fine. For this reason, it felt more than confident in its own strength to resist a small rock.


    BANG! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    However, the moment the rocknded on its body, an unimaginable pain began spreading throughout its entire body without showing any signs of stopping.


    ROAR!?


    It was only at this moment that the mole demon beast realized that the rock was not an ordinary rock but was instead a special kind of rock made from a toxic spiritual metal that would poison everything around it the moment it was broken.


    Back when it had dug out its tunnel, it had specifically dug around it to ensure that it wouldn''te into contact with the toxic spiritual metal, as the poison released by the spiritual metal when broken, was more than strong enough to kill an existence at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. Even if its physical body had already managed to surpass the Nascent Soul Realm and step into the Domain Lord Realm, it would still be difficult for it to suppress the poison spreading throughout its body in the short term. Not to mention, it would also have to worry about the other Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts in the underground world during this time.


    For now, it no longer had the ability to arrogantly walk wherever it pleased in the underground world-


    Rumble~


    And without wasting a second, the mole demon beast dug into the ground to hide away from any potential demon beasts looking for a chance to devour it in an attempt to increase their own strength. No longer having any energy left to chase after Chu Yang and Qing Yi who had entered its tunnel.


    At least until it managed to recover again and fully get rid of the poison that was spreading throughout its entire body at a breakneck speed, Chu Yang and Qing Yi would be able to safely traverse its tunnels without any threats outside of a few earth worms that would idently dig into its tunnel from time to time¡­

 Chapter 926 Transformation, Trapped

    Making his way through the valley nestled between a few of therge mountains of the mist covered mountain range, Xuan Hao searched through the entire valley within only a few days. Having first made sure that there weren''t any powerful demon beasts around before sweeping through the entire ce with his divine senseter.


    Although he did not end up finding the Three Celestial Gates that he was looking for, he still managed to find out more about the mountain range from searching through the entire valley. The most shocking being that the demon beasts inside the mountain range were far weaker than the ones hiding inside the mist surrounding the mountain range.


    From what he knew about mountain ranges with demon beasts present in them, the strongest demon beasts would always reside at the center of the mountain range where the qi would be thicker, and the spiritual herbs would be more abundant.


    But from what he had seen of the mist covered mountain range so far, the strongest demon beast in the valley had only barely reached the Nascent Soul Realm, while the reaming demon beasts roaming around the forest were in the Foundation Establishment or Core Formation Realm. None of them anywhere near the Soul Ascension Realm that all the demon beasts and strange creatures inside the mist had reached!


    "The Three Celestial Gates should be somewhere deeper inside the mountain range¡­" Muttering this to himself as he arrived on the small path leading out of the valley and deeper into the next forest of the mountain range, Xuan Hao gazed back towards the tall trees covering the valley behind him before continuing along the small path leading away from the outer edge of the mountain range and towards the inner parts of the mountain range where he had seen therger mountains and forests being located from the top of the mountain not too long ago.


    Whoosh~!


    As Xuan Hao followed the path and stepped into the inner parts of the mountain range, the air grew dense with spiritual energy and thendscape around him transformed. The mountains that had been no taller than the mountains of the Burning Mountain Range next to where the Raging me Sect had been in the past, became towering peaks stretching towards the heavens above, their majestic size casting long shadow over the sprawling forests that adorned the slopes and valleys below. The forests themselves also seemingly blending together into one massive forest.


    This- Did I perhaps get trapped in an illusion again!?


    Seeing the sudden transformation of his surroundings, the first thing Xuan Hao thought about was the fact that he had been trapped in an illusion again. After all, each and every single one of the towering mountain peaks had surpassed the height of the Main Star Peak back in the Star Shattering Sect!


    Not wasting a second as he began observing the mountain right next to where he was standing, it did not take long before he discovered something wrong with the mountain and its sudden drastic increase in size.


    "It''s not an illusion, but¡­ Something different¡­" Frowning visibly as he muttered this to himself while trying his best to understand just what had happened to cause all of the mountain to suddenly shoot upwards and turn into towering mountains farrger than anything he had ever seen before, Xuan Hao did notice that something was off about the mountains. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The only problem was that he couldn''t tell what it was, the only thing he was certain of, was the fact that he had not been trapped in an illusion. Instead, something had happened to the mountains and the surrounding environment¡­


    Using the next few hours earnestly trying his best to inspect and analyze the mountain and forest not too far away, Xuan Hao could only let out a defeated sigh before deciding to turn around and leave the erged mountain range in front of him. Understanding that his current strength was far too low for him to understand what had happened and he had spotted a group consisting of at least a dozen Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts lurking around the edges of the massive forest that now looked like they had swallowed up most of the mountain range.


    Even if he was confident in his current strength, there was no way he had the ability to face off against a dozen demon beasts in the Soul Ascension Realm!


    However, upon turning around and trying to make his way back to the small valley filled withrge trees he had searched through earlier-


    Bang!


    "Ouch!?"


    He ended up walking headfirst into an invisible wall that now blocked the path back.


    "This¡­ Did I perhaps end up walking into a trap?" Not having even thought about this possibility before now, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine. After all, for him to not even sense the fact that he had entered some kind of trapping formation, the creator of said formation had to at the very least be a skilled formation master at the pinnacle of the Soul Ascension Realm, or someone above the Soul Ascension Realm¡­


    Given that he could understand nothing about what had happened and the fact that a lot of Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts had ended up simrly trapped with him, he could easily conclude the creator of the formation to be someone above the Soul Ascension Realm!


    BOOOM-!


    Attacking the invisible barrier blocking his path, Xuan Hao could only helplessly watch as his absorb was absorbed without causing a single ripple on the invisible barrier. Even using all of his strength, he could not affect the invisible barrier in the slightest!


    "¡­"


    As this realization set in, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing himself for being careless, it should have been rather obvious that something was not right with the mountain range with how the strongest demon beast he encountered had only reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Especially considering how dense the spiritual qi inside was. Even a demon beast without any talent would be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm if they were to spend long enough inside such an environment.


    Although theirprehension would be severelycking, the strength of their physical bodies would still be at the Domain Lord Realm. Far above that of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast he had seen before finding himself in his current situation!


    ¡­"


    Knowing that there would be no way to brute force his way through the invisible barrier, Xuan Hao could only go with the next best option. Searching for weak points in the formation.


    Even if said weak points would still have been far too strong for him to make use of with his current strength, the umted damage to these weak points over time might give him a chance to break through and escape from the formation.


    "Looks like I have no choice but to explore this ce¡­" Muttering this to himself as he gazed in the direction of the Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts roaming around the edges of the massive forest in front of him, Xuan Hao slowly began descending from the mountain pass.


    At least the demon beasts he had spotted were hanging around in the vicinity of severalrge trees. Making it hard for them to spot him while he descended from the mountain pass a few dozen meters above the valley where the forest started.


    Of course, this would only be the case if the demon beasts'' divine sense hadn''t developed to the level of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert and only their physical body had managed to reach this realm.


    Thumb~


    "Haaa¡­ Looks like they their divine sense isn''t on par with their physical bodies¡­" letting out a relieved sigh the next moment as he managed to bypass the demon beasts without any of them noticing his presence, it became obvious that the demon beasts had only managed to reach the Soul Ascension Realm because of the dense spiritual qi gathered in the mountain range.


    Without this spiritual energy, they would most likely not even have reached the Domain Lord Realm. Even now that they had reached the Soul Ascension Realm, their strength should be far worse than normal demon beasts who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm through constant fighting for spiritual herbs that would increase their strength. In this regard, the demon beasts in the mist should be far stronger than these demon beasts!


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao didn''t dare to linger around the same ce for too long, as he soon began moving deeper into the forest that seemed to cover the entire mountain range.


    After all, he had no idea if there were any stronger demon beasts lurking around the core of this massive forest that seemed to go on forever. For all he knew, he could encounter another demon beast at the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm again. Maybe even something stronger!

 Chapter 927 Stone Pedestal

    Starting to explore the forest with the help of his divine sense now that he had managed to bypass the Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts at the edge of the forest, it did not take long before another demon beast appeared to block his path.


    However different from the demon beasts at the edge of the forest, this demon beast had appeared directly in front of him. Making it impossible for him to hide himself in time before getting discovered.


    Roar?


    "¡­"


    Observing the demon beast that had shown up, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief after noticing that the strength of the demon beast had only reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    Swsih-!


    Ptsh~


    Not giving the demon beast any time to alert the flock of Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts located at the edge of the forest!


    Thumb~


    Watching the lifeless body of the demon beast falling to the ground, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time before moving deeper into the forest. Not wanting to wait around for the demon beasts living in the forest to be attracted to the smell of blood from the now dead demon beast in front of him.


    Even if the corpse of the demon beast had only reached the Domain Lord Realm, consuming its flesh would still be beneficial for demon beasts in the Soul Ascension Realm and without a doubt, the demon beasts on the edge of the forests would soon be attracted to the smell of blood from the now dead demon beast. Even if he used his Dao of Fire to burn it, it would already be toote. Not to mention, using the Dao of Fire would inevitably attract far more attentionpared to the Sword Dao¡­


    Ignoring the few loud roars that echoed out behind him from the direction of the demon beast he had killed and assuming that it should just be the demon beasts who had started fighting over the corpse and who got to devour it, Xuan Hao soon came to a small clearing with a stone pedestal in the middle of it.


    "¡­"


    Not entering the clearing directly, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that something was wrong with the clearing itself. After all, a lone stone pedestal in the middle of a demon beast infested forest that had somehow managed to survivepletely unharmed until now.


    Although he could not sense anything with his divine sense or domain from the clearing, outside of a small scroll ced on top of the pedestal, he still couldn''t shake off the feeling that something was wrong. Especially considering that the scroll on top of the stone pedestal waspletely empty.


    Whoosh~


    Deciding to test things out by throwing a small rock on the stone pedestal, Xuan Hao watched as the small rock hit the pedestal before being reduced to nothing. Disappearing like it had never even existed in the first ce.


    Well¡­ This is not suspicious at all¡­


    Having observed the entire ordeal with his divine sense and domain to try and catch anything that might happen, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of awe as he looked towards the stone pedestal.


    Although it had only been for a brief moment, he did manage to see a small symbol had shed on one side of the pedestal before the space around the small rock began violently twisting before copsing in on itself. Destroying the space around the rock and the rock together with it. Leaving a small scar on the space where the rock had once been for a short moment.


    Spatial copse?!


    Seeing this weird and violent twisting of space before it ultimately copsed in on itself and the target locked inside, the only thing Xuan Hao could think of was the spatial copse described through the Divine Void Eyes.


    It had to be known, even with his current strength, he could at most cause a partial copse of space by relying on his Divine Void Eyes and his Dao Domain Lord Realm cultivation. Archiving a true copse of space was something that he had no way to aplish on his own with his current understanding of the Dao of space.


    Not to mention, the strength required to cause a true spatial copse was something hecked at the moment. After all shuttling through space with different movement techniques or shattering space and using it to teleport was somethingpletely different from causing space to copse.


    A true spatial copse was something that would permanently leave a scar on the world itself, that would take thousands- if not tens of thousands of years to heal without the aid of someone skilled in the Dao of Space!


    Although the copse that the stone pedestal had caused was not a true spatial copse and should instead be a partial spatial copse, it was still not something he dared to underestimate. Understanding very well that he had no way to fight back if he ended up trapped inside a spatial copse with his current understanding of the Dao of space, even if it was only a partial copse of space¡­


    Whoosh~


    For this reason, Xuan Hao decided to sit down and throw another rock towards the stone pedestal.


    Rumble~


    Watching closely as the space around the rock began twisting violently before copsing in on itself, erasing the rock from existence.


    Whoosh~


    Sitting down before throwing another rock towards the stone pedestal, Xuan Hao observed everything about the space around the rock with his divine sense and domain. Making sure to not miss out on anything as the third rock was soon erased from existence.


    "This¡­ Isn''t this a perfect ce toprehend the Dao of Space¡­?" Mumbling this to himself as his eyes remained focused on the stone pedestal in the middle of the clearing, Xuan Hao realized just how precious this stone pedestal was. Not for the empty scroll on top of it, but because of its defensive ability.


    As long as heprehended the Dao of Space that was perfectly demonstrated by this stone pedestal, he would undoubtably be able to take another step forward when it came to the Dao of Space! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    ¡­


    ROOOAR-!


    Not more than a few minutes after leaving the corpse of the demon beast, a loud roar spread throughout the forest before arge demon beastnded on the ground right next to the corpse. The killing intent it exuded spread out in all directions as it searched for the one responsible for the death of the demon beast in front of it.


    Roar-!


    Rooooar!


    Roar!


    Following behind this demon beast, close to a dozen other demon beasts appeared around the corpse with excited expressions on their faces as they looked greedily towards the corpse of the demon beast in front of them. No doubt they all wanted to devour the corpse to increase their own strength.


    ROOOOOAR!


    However, before any of these demon beasts had a chance to jump forward and try to devour the corpse of the Domain Lord Realm demon beast, the demon beast that had been looking around to search for the killer of the dead demon beast let out a terrifying roar that instantly made the approaching demon beasts freeze in ce. None of the daring to take a single step forward, let alone attempt to devour the corpse in front of them.


    Even if it was only for a split second, all of these demon beasts had sensed the strength inherent in the roar just now far surpassing their own. Making it tantly obvious that the other party was far stronger than them!


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Because of this, these demon beasts that had onlye for a possible free meal, did not waste any time before turning around and leaving. The only thing they could think of, was how to run away from the terrifying demon beast that had ced itself beside the corpse as fast as possible. No longer thinking about the possible increase in strength they might experience after devouring the corpse.


    Roar¡­


    Different from therge number of demon beasts that had shown up to devour the corpse of the dead Domain Lord Realm demon beast, the powerful demon beast did not have this thought in mind, as it instead just let out a sad roar while looking down at the dead body filled with sadness.


    If Xuan Hao had been there, he would have easily found out that the dead demon beast resembled a smaller version of the powerful demon beast that had just managed to scare away therge number of demon beasts.


    Drawing the conclusion that these two demon beasts were rted with each other from this, was a rather simple task. The only problem with this conclusion, was the fact that it meant he had unintentionally ended up offending a powerful demon beast strong enough to scare away a group of Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts by itself!


    ROAR!


    Like this, unknown to Xuan Hao, a powerful demon beast began searching for the killer behind the death of the small Domain Lord Realm demon beast¡­

 Chapter 928 Dao Of Space, Elementary Understanding

    After days of meditation and observation on the partial spatial copse caused by the stone pedestal, Xuan Hao found himself at the precipice of a breakthrough. Only a single step away fromprehending the Dao of space and officially reaching the Elementary Realm in the Dao of space.


    But this single step was far harder to ovee than he had first expected and slowly, days turned into weeks as he remainedpletely absorbed in trying toprehend the Dao of Space. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Shut off to the outside world, as he delved into the mystery of the Dao of space, seeking to find the thing he was missing to realize his breakthrough. The concept of time hadpletely disappeared.


    As he delved into the Dao of Space through the help of the stone pedestal, Xuan Hao felt his consciousness expanding, transcending the boundaries of the material world for a short moment. Allowing him to perceive the intricate web of spatial energies interwoven throughout the world around him and far beyond, like ethereal threads connecting every corner of existence.


    It was in this heightened state of awareness devoid of the concept of time, that he began toprehend the essence of space.


    Whoosh~


    Soon the space began twisting around him, making his figure unrecognizable as it was twisted in millions of different ways. At the same time, also signaling that he had finally managed to find the missing piece toprehending the Dao of Space¡­ But Xuan Hao didn''t intend to stop things here, as he made use of his current heightened state of awareness far above that of anything he had ever experienced before to further increase his understanding of the Dao of Space.


    As the burning sun in the sky disappeared in the horizon and was reced by the gentle moon, Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes.


    Within the depths of his eyes, stars flickered in and out of existence, nebe burst forth with radiant colors, while gxies spiraled around in a grand performance without any set destination. It was as If a microcosm of the universe resided in his eyes, a reflection of the vastness andplexity of the Dao of Space itself.


    However, this onlysted for a short instant before disappearing again. After all, he had yet to fullyprehend the Dao of Space and had only just begun to scratch the surface. Even then¡­ Just scratching the surface of the Dao of Space, was more than enough for him to understand just how hard it was toprehendpared to any of the other Daos he hadprehended so far.


    Even if he had only reached the Elementary Realm when it came toprehension, the strength of the Dao of Space had already reached the same level as his other four Daos!


    "Hm?"


    Standing back up prepared to experiment with the new things he had managed toprehend from the Dao of Space, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on the spot, as he looked towards the stone pedestal in the middle of the small opening in the forest.


    Different from the empty clearing he had seen before, now that hisprehension of the Dao of Space had increased, he could see an endless number of small threads covering the small opening in the forest. All of which was connected to the stone pedestal.


    Even without touching these threads or using an extended period of time to analyze them, it was not hard to guess that these threads were what had triggered the partial spatial copse when they hade into contact with the stones he had thrown towards the pedestal.


    I wonder if I will be able to gain any new insights into the Dao of Space by observing how the threads cause the partial spatial copse to happen¡­


    Feeling a sense of excitement rush through him as he thought about this, Xuan Hao did not waste a single second before picking up another small rock from the ground before throwing it towards the stone pedestal.


    His divine sense and dao domain both focused on the small stone as it hit the threads that almost formed apletely imprable wall around the stone pedestal.


    Whoosh~


    However, as the stone was swallowed up by another partial spatial copse, Xuan Hao could only watch in confusion as the threads seemed to do nothing whening into contact with the stone. No fluctuations or transfer of energy back towards the stone pedestal, or maybe it was just because he was still too weak to detect the minute fluctuations that happened when something touched the threads around the stone pedestal.


    "I was expecting too much¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao gave up on trying to learn more about how the stone pedestal and the weird threads all over the ces functioned. Understanding that it was out of reach with his currentprehension of the Dao of Space.


    The only useful thing he managed to gain from observing the threads around the stone pedestal was the fact that there seemed to be a small path devoid of threads leading directly up to the pedestal where the empty scroll was located.


    I wonder if its really empty or just a spatial distortion that makes it impossible to read from a distance¡­


    After seeing this small path leading up to the empty scroll, Xuan Hao didn''t immediately rush forward to get it, but instead began to curiously explore the space around the empty scroll with his divine sense-


    "Indeed, the space is distorted to some degree around the empty scroll. Making it impossible to read without removing it from the distorted space!"


    Not taking too long to discover the small abnormalities in the space around the empty scroll.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling his curiosity about this strange scroll grow by the second after realizing that it was not empty, Xuan Hao began exploring the path leading through the threads and directly up to the stone pedestal. Making sure that it was safe and there weren''t any traps along the path.


    After all, even with his current strength and understanding of the Dao of Space, he would not be able to fight back against a partial spatial copse and might even die if he was trapped in one. Not to mention, he had no idea if the stone pedestal had the ability to trigger a true spatial copse and he didn''t want to find out!


    "Looks like everything is safe¡­" Finished checking the path leading up to the stone pedestal, Xuan Hao slowly began moving along the small passage that cut through the countless threads covering the entire opening. Preparing to escape the moment he sensed any changes in the threads around him or the stone pedestal in front of him.


    No more than five minutester, he arrived in front of the stone pedestal with the empty looking scroll on top of it.


    "¡­"


    However, instead of giving into his urges to grab the empty scroll and leave the opening in the forest as fast as possible, Xuan Hao silently began analyzing the stone pedestal in depth. Understanding that it should be some kind of formation created by a powerful formation master with a deep understanding of the Dao of Space.


    If he could only grasp a little of the mystery contained inside the ordinary looking stone pedestal, he would be able to improve his understanding of formation by leaps and bounds!


    Rumble~!


    Lost in his own thoughts, a loud rumbling sound suddenly came from the stone pedestal before thousands of small intricate symbols covered it in its entirety.


    Danger!


    Not knowing what had triggered this change in the stone pedestal, Xuan Hao only felt a terrifying sense of danger overwhelm him as the threads covering the entire opening in the forest retracted back into the stone pedestal¡­ And that was not even mentioning that fact that the space around the stone pedestal had started violently twisting to a degree that made it look like it was about to copse at any moment!


    Swish-!


    Not wasting a single second after realizing how much danger he was in, Xuan Hao picked up the empty scroll before rushing back out of the opening. Not daring to stop before he was sure that he was at a safe distance from the stone pedestal.


    RUUUUMBLE-!


    Riiiiip-!


    The moment he came to a stop at what he thought was a safe distance, the ground shook violently for a short second before a loud ripping sound reced it. Almost like the very fabric that made up the world was being ripped apart.


    Forcing him to the ground as he felt his eardrums rupture and the qi in his dantian going out of control inside his body.


    Luckily, all of thissted for no more than a few seconds before everything went silent again.


    "Haaa¡­ W-what was that!?"


    Raising his head that was now filled with blood from both his ruptured eardrums and the qi going out of control, Xuan Hao turned to look back towards the opening of the forest with a fearful expression on his face.


    Only to be met with an empty void of nothing where the stone pedestal had once stood.


    "True spatial copse¡­"


    Allowing him to understand what he was looking at, was the scar left behind by a true spatial copse¡­

 Chapter 929 Demon Beasts Gathering

    As the ringing in his ears subsided, he slowly took a deep breath, Xuan Hao soon felt his tensed-up body starting to calm down as he regained control of his qi and began healing the damage it had ended up causing during the short time that it had gone out of control.


    Although the damage that had been caused by his qi going out of control was only superficial, it would still take a few minutes to heal. During which he decided to ignore the empty scroll still firmly grasped in his hand and the empty void that had reced the stone pedestal. Understanding that it was far more important to recover in his current dangerous environment. Especially considering that the loud sound caused by the true spatial copse, would inevitably end up drawing demon beasts to his current location from all directions. Making it close to impossible for him to leave without encountering a demon beast.


    Even if he could have been lucky enough to run away from the scene without encountering any demon beasts, part of him also wanted to stay andprehend the mysteries of the Dao of Space contained inside the void left behind the true spatial copse¡­ And with his current strength, he was more than confident in escaping from any Soul Ascension Realm demon beast.


    This confidence not only came from his current Intermediate Stage Dao Domain Lord Realm that put his strength on the same level as someone in the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, but also from the fact that he had managed toprehend the Dao of Space, further enhancing the power of his Drifting Cloud Steps. Allowing them to reach a brand-new level in terms of speed¡­


    Whoosh~


    Only a few minutes after having closed his eyes and focused on recovering from the superficial damage caused by being too close to the true spatial copse, Xuan Hao once again opened both of his eyes as he looked down on the empty scroll that he had taken from the now gone stone pedestal.


    "Spatial Shift? Maybe I should¡­"


    Reading the words that had appeared on top of the now not-so-empty scroll, Xuan Hao felt tempted to read through the scroll and immerse himself in learning just what would be written inside a scroll that had to be protected by something like a stone pedestal that had the ability to trigger a true spatial copse-


    No, I should focus on trying toprehend the Dao of Space from the void left behind by the true spatial copse while I still can.


    But in the end, he stopped himself and instead turned his attention towards the empty void left behind by the true spatial copse. Understanding that he would always have time to read through the scroll in the future, while the same was not true about the empty void that acted as a scar that even the world itself was unable to heal.


    Although his current cultivation base andprehension was far too low to fully grasp the mysterious hidden inside, it would still be beneficial to try and understand, as it might prove helpful when trying to reach the next realm ofprehension in the Dao of Space.


    Not caring too much about this, Xuan Hao dedicated almost all of his attention towards the empty void in the middle of the opening. Only using a small part of his divine sense to keep an eye out for any demon beasts that might end up showing up¡­


    ROAR!


    Unfortunately, he did not have to wait for more than a few minutes before the first demon beast showed up. Even worse, the demon beast was not in the Domain Lord Realm, but had instead reached the Soul Ascension Realm. Even if its strength was far below his own, he also understood that fighting with it would only attract more demon beasts to his current location. Not to mention the fact that he wouldn''t be able toprehend the Dao of Space from the empty void while locked in a fight with a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast.


    RUMBLE~!


    FWOOOSH-!


    For this reason, Xuan Hao decided to release his aura of someone in the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, while at the same time using his Dao of Fire to further enhance the strength of his aura in an attempt to scare away the demon beast or at the very least stop it from attacking him-


    R-roar!


    Luckily the demon beast in question was only in the earlier stages of the Soul Ascension Realm and copsed into a trembling mess filled with fear after sensing his powerful aura.


    Not too surprising considering his Intermediate Dao Domain Lord Realm together with the Dao of Fire gave off a pressure simr to that of someone at the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. An existence that the demon beast that only barely had the strength of someone in the Soul Ascension Realm had no ns of offending. Knowing very well that it would stand no chance fighting against someone that strong.


    Ignoring the demon beast after seeing it trembling in the cover of a few trees, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the empty void left behind by the spatial copse.


    Following the first demon beast showing up, more and more demon beasts slowly began appearing around the opening in the forest over the next half hour. All of them having at least reached the Domain Lord Realm, while the strongest among them had reached the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    R-r-roar~


    Roar¡­


    Even then, none of these demon beasts dared approach him after feeling the terrifying aura surrounding him. All of them keenly aware of just how dumb it would be for them to attack without any spiritual herb or simr to fight for.


    As for the empty void in the middle of the opening¡­ Although these demon beasts were all interested in it, they also inherently understood that the empty void was something dangerous.


    The only reason why they had not decided to leave was because they had also felt that staying around the empty void would be beneficial to them and would improve their strength.


    The powerful spatial energy constantly leaking out from the empty void acting as a powerful tonic that helped strengthen the bodies of the demon beasts when they came into contact with it over an extended period of time.


    In the future, the empty void that had been created by the spatial copse was bound to turn into a hotspot for powerful demon beasts to gather and try to im control over it in a bid to increase their own strength to the next level. Maybe it would even allow some of the more powerful demon beasts already at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm to finally break through to the next major realm!


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was focused on trying toprehend the Dao of Space from the empty void, a demon beast somewhere deep inside the forest that spread out across the entire mist covered mountain range, opened itsrge eyes before they filled with confusion before a trace of fear shed past them.


    Roar¡­


    Hesitating for a short moment as it seemed to think about something, the demon beast slowly got up-


    Rumble~


    Resulting in the surrounding trees copsing as its body slowly revealed it to be a massive turtle the size of a hill, its shell still having a small forest on top of it following it standing up.


    Bang! Bang!


    Having already decided on something before getting up, the massive turtle demon beast slowly began making its way in the direction of the empty void where Xuan Hao was currently located. Each step causing the ground beneath it to tremble under its weight.


    The aura around it indicating that it had already reached the limit of the Soul Ascension Realm and was only a single step away from breaking through to the realm beyond the Soul Ascension Realm. Even then, it was obvious that this single step had kept the massive turtle demon beast trapped for a long time.


    Even now, the only thing that made the turtle wake up was that it sensed the spatial energy leaking out from the empty void and the fact that it had a beneficial effect that allowed its body to start improving again after countless years of stagnation.


    No matter how much the turtle demon beast wanted to remain stationary without doing anything, it could not give up a chance to break through after spending such a long time without any progress.


    ROOOOOOAR-!


    ROOAR!


    ROOOOAR!


    Simr to the turtle demon beast that had begun making its way towards the empty void created by the spatial copse, arge number of simrly powerful demon beasts that had remained stuck at the peak of the Soul Ascension Realm for countless years, all began making their way towards the empty void. All of them feeling excited at finally seeing a glimpse of possibility of surpassing the Soul Ascension Realm.

 Chapter 930 Spatial Shift

    ROAR-!


    Forced to turn his attention away from the empty void after hearing a loud roar filled with killing intent directed towards him, Xuan Hao soon came face to face with a giant demon beast in the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Different from the weaker Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts that had gathered around him so far, it could clearly see through the fact that his strength was not truly at the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    ROOOOAR!


    However, before this demon beast had a chance tounch an attack towards him, an even more powerful roar echoed out across the small opening in the forest, as an evenrger demon beasts appeared-


    Rumble~!


    Its presence alone instantly suppressing the demon beast at the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Making it clear that even if their cultivation realm was the same, it had far surpassed the level of an ordinary Sixth Tribtion Soul Ascension Realm demon beast and had already reached the absolute pinnacle of the Soul Ascension Realm. Only a single step away from surpassing it!


    Bang! Bang!


    Not even a few seconds, a massive turtle the size of a hill appeared not too far behind it, each of its step causing the earth beneath to tremble under its sheer weight. Signaling the appearance of another Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast!


    This is bad¡­ I have to get out of here before they start fighting and end up dragging me into it!


    Understanding that his time forprehending he Dao of Space was up, Xuan Hao didn''t dare stay around for a second longer-


    Swish-!


    Deciding to leave before even more Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts appeared, or worse, the two already present started fighting with each other.


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, neither one of the two demon beasts cared about him. Instead, they remained focused on the empty void that would be their chance for breaking through their current realm. Not even wanting to waste a second fighting with Xuan Hao.


    After all, even if his strength did not reach the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm and was onlyparable to the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, they still understood that dealing with him in a short time would not be easy. Not to mention, their opponent might take advantage of them while fighting tounch a sneak attack.


    Because of the hesitation from both of the powerful demon beasts to make a move on him, Xuan Hao managed to slip past both of them without any issues before escaping in the opposite direction of the opening with the empty void inside of it.


    Even if only two Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts had shown up so far, he understood that more would be showing up before long¡­ And at that point in time, a fight would almost certainly ensue.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao wanted to get as far away from the empty void as possible. Maybe even using the opportunity while the powerful demon beasts of the forest were busy fighting with each other, to look for a way out of his current situation.


    Hopefully now that his understanding of the Dao of Space had increased, he would have a far easier time looking for ws in the formation and escaping when he found any.


    But before that, I should probably look through the scroll from the stone pedestal¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he got further and further away from the empty void where the powerful demon beasts of the forest were gathering, Xuan Hao took out the scroll with the words [Spatial Shift] written on top of them.


    "Hm? This¡­ What in the world!? Spatial Shift is actually a technique that allows long distance teleportation!?"


    However, after reading the first few lines of the scroll, Xuan Hao froze in shock as he looked down at the scroll in his hands.


    Long distance teleportation was something difficult to master and could only be learnt after reaching the Soul Ascension Realm. Although he had long since reached a sufficient cultivation realm after reaching the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he had not managed to get his hands on a long distance teleportation technique so far.


    Even if the Star Shattering Sect had developed well over the past few years, it was still far from having the ability to get their hands on such a specialized teleportation technique only usable by those in the Soul Ascension Realm and above. The only people in the Sky Empire who had the ability to get their hands on techniques like that would be from the three religions, who were essentially acting as branches of muchrger powers that existed in the core of the continent.


    The imperial family might also have a technique like that, considering how powerful the old ancestor was.


    As for the rest of the powers in the Sky Empire, none of them should have a long distance teleportation technique.


    Thinking about this as he looked at the thin scroll in his hands, Xuan Hao could not help feeling excited. Not only would this scroll help him move around far more easilypared to before. Giving him the ability to reach the capital of the Sky Empire in only a fraction of the time he had used in the past, but it might also help him when it came to escaping his current situation.


    Continuing to read through the scroll beneath the tworge trees, Xuan Hao managed to gain a better understanding of the spatial shift technique that was recorded on the scroll.


    The Spatial Shift technique was divided into five levels, each representing a higher degree of mastery over the Dao of Space.


    The first level was a simple teleportation ability that allowed for short distance instant movement. The technique was notplicated and didn''t require a lot. Making it possible for even people in the Nascent Soul Realm toprehend and make use of it. Not too dissimr from the earlier stages of his Drifting Cloud Steps.


    The next level was a form of short distance teleportation. Looking more closely at the exnation of this level, Xuan Hao felt that his movement technique, Drifting Cloud Steps, should have reached this realm of short distance teleportation. Reading through, Xuan Hao even realized that it was far simpler than his Drifting Cloud Steps and should be rather easy for someone in the Domain Lord Realm to learn.


    The third level of the technique was where long distance teleportation finally appeared. The first part of this level was about long distance teleportation and was not too hard to understand. Only bing difficult towards the end where it began going into detail of how to traverse distances on the scale of several Sky Empires in an instant.


    However, the most important part was that he should be able to escape from the formation he was currently trapped inside of if he learnt how to perform long distance teleportation. Even if he couldn''t, he would at the very least have a far easier time finding a way out of the formation.


    As for the fourth and fifth level of the technique¡­ To be honest, Xuan Hao didn''t want to think too much about it.


    The fourth level was about something called a dimensional leap, that would give one the ability to teleport across dimensions and teleport to different realms. The best he could think of when reading through the iprehensible description of the fourth level, was that the dimensional leap would give someone the ability to teleport to things like secret realms and mystic realms without the need of an entrance to said realm. Maybe even allowing one to teleport to the three other continents outside of the Ewaria Continent. No matter what it was, it was something far away from the current Xuan Hao.


    Well at least it was still understandable to some degree, something that could be said about the fifth level¡­


    To put it simple, would be an iprehensible mess, the only thing he could make out from the description was the word space folding, as for the rest, it quickly turned into a blur that disappeared the moment he looked away from the scroll. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Not wanting to spend too long looking at thest two levels of the teleportation technique, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the first three levels. Even if the third level was still difficult for him to understand, it was notpletely iprehensible like thest two levels of the teleportation technique.


    As for moving further away from the gathering of powerful demon beasts that was taking ce not too far away from his current location¡­? Xuan Hao didn''t think about any of this, as hepletely absorbed himself into studying theplicated teleportation technique in front of him. Knowing that he might be able to escape from the formation after learning the long distance teleportation technique.


    Soon the sound of space twisting and turning echoed out around him, as he began practicing the teleportation technique. Starting from the first level that only took him a few minutes to learn before moving on to the second¡­

 Chapter 931 Turtle Sliding!

    Managing to learn the first and second level of the Spatial Shift Technique after only a few hours, Xuan Hao ultimately ended up hitting a wall when trying to learn the third level involving long distance teleportation. Even with his current understanding of the Dao of Space, it was far too difficult to even learn the most basic parts of the third level within a short span of time, let alone learning it in a few days and using the long distance teleportation to escape from the mist covered mountain range like he had first wanted to do.


    At this point in time, it was obvious that he would have to look for another way out if he wanted to escape any time soon.


    Boom! Boom!


    Not to mention, the fighting of the powerful demon beasts that had begun a few hours earlier, had already started getting dangerously close to his current location. Meaning that even if he wanted to continue practicing the third level of the Spatial Shift Technique, he still had to stop and look for a safer ce to practice first.


    "Huh?"


    As he looked back in the direction of the empty void where the demon beasts had already begun their chaotic fight for control over the empty void and the spatial energy leaking out from it, Xuan Hao who had already decided to put learning the Spatial Shift Technique on hold for now, was shocked to discover that somethingrge was heading in his direction. Even worse, it did not seem like it was a weaker demon beast that had decided to escape from the chaotic fight between the powerful demon beasts-


    ROOOOAR!


    ROOAR!


    Instead, it looked very much like the two powerful demon beasts at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm that he had seen before leaving the empty void, both rolling through the forest floor as they destroyed anything in their path. Even the tall trees standing hundreds of meters tall did not seem to put up any resistance against these demon beasts, as they were directly toppled over before being reduced to nothing more than a few broken pieces of wood.


    Even worse, these two powerful demon beasts fully absorbed on killing each other, just so happened to be on direct collision course with the two massive trees he had been practicing beneath for the past few hours¡­ Or in more simple terms, the two demon beasts were heading directly towards him at a speed that made it hard to escape unnoticed¡­ And to make matters even worse than they already were, therge turtle demon beast was forced on to its back by the other demon beast as it was trying its best to attack the less underbelly of the turtle.


    Whoosh~


    As a result, the giant turtle shell turned into a massive sled that further increased the speed at which the two demon beasts were approaching him, their speed almost making it look like they were teleporting towards him in a simr way as when he was using the Drifting Cloud Steps!


    Swish-!


    Utilizing his qi to execute a short distance teleportation as the turtle shaped sled with a giant demon beast on top of it was about to hit, Xuan Hao barely managed to avoid getting hit-


    ROOAR!


    But this did not go unnoticed by the demon beast currently on top of the turtle demon beast, as it jumped off the turtle in the direction he had teleported before opening its massive mouth filled with several rows of razor-sharp teeth in an attempt to swallow him alive.


    The reason for this violent attack filled with killing intent was rather simple, to prevent Xuan Hao from sneak attacking it while it was busy fighting with the turtle demon beast. After all, the demon beast was not dumb and understood just how precious its body was to other demon beasts!


    Even if it was a demon beast in the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, like it had perceived Xuan Hao to be, consuming its body would allow it to breakthrough to the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm without any side effects!


    This was also the main reason why demon beasts often hunted each other. Even outside the mystic realm, demon beasts would much rather fight with each other over humans, as the qi contained in the body of a human was far less than that of a demon beast that spent all of its energy and time strengthening its body.


    The only exception to this were demonic cultivators who simrly focused on strengthening their bodies. In the eyes of demon beasts, these demonic cultivators were just as tempting to consume as their fellow demon beasts.


    Of course, consuming the body of a demonic cultivator came with its own difficulties for these demon beasts, as they would still have to deal with the negative effects of the powerful yin qi contained inside the bodies of the demonic cultivator. Not that they had any idea about what yin qi was nor the negative effects it might have on them, as all they would see was a powerful body filled with energy ripe for consumption¡­


    In the end, if they ended up consuming enough bodies of demonic cultivators, they might end up transforming into a yin beast, a powerful demon beast that resembled the demon beast version of a demonic cultivator. The only clear difference being the fact that yin beasts were far rarer than demonic cultivators, with even the weakest yin beast having at least reached the Domain Lord Realm. Weaker than that and the yin qi would end up killing them instead of turning them into yin beasts¡­


    Chomp~!


    As the mouth of the demon beast closed around him without giving him any chance to avoid, Xuan Hao was not the least bit worried-


    Ching~


    Using his sword and dao domain to stop the teeth from biting into him before finding himself safe and sound inside the mouth of the demon beast.


    I might have overestimated the intelligence of this demon beast¡­


    Floating above the massive tongue of the demon beast, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say after being swallowed alive by the demon beast. Even if the demon beast had underestimated his strength earlier when swallowing him, it should at the very least have done its best to spit him out after discovering that he was still alive.


    FWOOSH-!


    Knowing that it would only be a matter of time before the three- two brain cells left in the head of this demon beast put two and two together and figured out it would be bad to have someone still alive inside its mouth, Xuan Hao directly used the Dao of Fire to conjure forth a massive ball of fire that he pushed down the throat of the demon beast that had been bold enough to swallow him alive. Even if this would be far from enough to kill a Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast, it would at the very least be seriously injured.


    ROOOOAR!


    Realizing what was happening the moment it felt something starting to burn it up from the inside, the demon beast used all of its strength to mobilize its massive tongue to push Xuan Hao back outside its body.


    "Hmph! Don''t think it will be that easy to get rid of me after swallowing me!"


    Of course, Xuan Hao didn''t intend to just allow himself to get pushed out, as he used his sword to forcefully cut into the massive tongue of the demon beast trying its best to push him out- N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Swish~


    PTSH-!


    In the end, the demon beast only barely managed to push him back out of its mouth at the cost of its tongue bing a forked tongue that would have a hard time recovering back to its original shape in the future due to the remnant scar left behind by thebined power of the Sword Dao and Dao of Fire.


    ROOOOOOOOOOAR-!


    Feeling the pain of having its tongue cut in half and a terrifying me starting to burn its body up from the inside, the demon beast let out a terrifying roar filled with both agony and a bone deep hatred towards Xuan Hao who had caused it to go through this intense pain.


    "Hm¡­ Maybe now is a good time to run away?" Feeling the bone deep hatred and overwhelming killing intent directed towards him at this moment, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself as he looked towards the demon beast whose mouth he had just escaped with a somewhat helpless expression on his face.


    Even after the damage he had done to it, this demon beast at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm did not show any signs of weakening. The body of a demon beast at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm was truly terrifying¡­


    Swish~!


    Knowing that staying around would only end up with said demon beast attacking him, Xuan Hao didn''t waste a second before turning around to try and escape.

 Chapter 932 Path To The Surface

    Rumble~!


    However, before he had a chance to escape, the turtle demon beast''s massive body appeared in front of him. Blocking his path of escape.


    "So, you don''t intend to let me get away after helping you out?" Not feeling too surprised about the behavior of the turtle demon beast, Xuan Hao could still not help feeling a bit disappointed that the turtle demon beast had not just decided to take advantage of its weakened opponent and ignore him.


    In the end, both of the demon beasts had reached a simr conclusion and were unwilling to let him leave alive, as it would prove dangerous for both of them if he decided to ambush themter on after their fight had finished. For this reason, the turtle demon beast stopped remaining inactive the moment he was about to run away and went in to block his path of escape.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling the killing intent of the demon beast behind him and looking towards the turtle demon beast that had blocked his path, Xuan Hao decided to directly use his Drifting Cloud Steps to teleport right past the massive turtle before continuing to escape. Ignoring the turtle demon beast that had only blocked his path and hadn''t really attacked him yet, likely feeling vary after seeing what had happened to the other demon beast.


    Roar¡­? N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Realizing what had just happened, the turtle demon beast let out a confused roar as it turned and looked in the direction of Xuan Hao filled with confusion. Making it rather obvious that this demon beast had never witnessed teleportation before and had never thought of such a possibility when blocking his path just now.


    Considering that the demon beast inside the mist covered mountain range had never encountered any humans before him and most of them were focused on cultivating their physical body instead ofprehending a dao, it made sense that they had nevere into contact with somethingplicated like using spatial maniption for short distance teleportation.


    Swish-!


    Not bothering to stay behind and wait for the confused turtle demon beast to recover from the shock of witnessing teleportation for the first time, Xuan Hao used his Drifting Cloud Steps to the limit, as he soon disappeared from the small opening created by the short sh between him and the demon beast that had been bold enough to swallow him alive.


    ROOOAR!


    Only the reluctant roar of the demon beast filled with killing intent after having its tongue cut and insides burned up, echoed through the forest before the two demon beasts inevitably started fighting again.


    Bang! Bang!


    The only difference this time around was that neither of them dared to go all out again. Fearing that Xuan Hao might be lurking around somewhere in the forest, waiting to ambush them when they had used all of their energy.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was escaping from the two Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts as fast as possible, his two disciples were still stuck underground. Having spent thest week wandering through the seemingly endless tunnels that had been dug out by the mole demon beast.


    Although they had yet to encounter the mole demon beast, they both understood that this would notst forever and they would inevitably end up running into the mole demon bast if they didn''t find a way back to the surface.


    The only problem was that they had already tried digging their way up to the surface several times without sess. The longest distance they had managed to cover so far, was around a hundred or so meters. In the end, they were forced to return back to the mole demon beast''s tunnels, as their own quickly ended up copsing on top of them after they tried to dig any further.


    From this, it was clear that digging a tunnel in the rocky soil of the mystic realm was not as easy as they had first imagined after seeing the countless tunnels of the mole demon beast. Different from them, the mole demon beast seemed to be using some kind of special technique to keep its tunnels from copsing. Unfortunately for Chu Yang and Qing Yi, neither of them could figure out how to copy this tunnel building technique after wandering through the tunnel of the mole demon beast for the past week.


    "Haaa¡­ These damnable tunnels will never end! When was thest time we found a tunnel leading upwards!?" Seeing yet another tunnel leading back down as they continued forward; Qing Yi could not stop herself fromining as part of her felt increasingly fearful that the mole demon beast would find them before they escaped from the underground world and made it back to the surface.


    Even if the surface was dangerous, they at the very least still had an exit to escape to if they ended up getting chased down by demon beasts again. Underground, they had no escape path and would only be able to continue running and hope that the one chasing them would grow tired and stop chasing after them. Not a good n if the one chasing after them was faster than they were¡­


    "Calm down."


    Knowing that his senior sister was starting to lose hope of finding a way out, Chu Yang lightly patted her on the shoulder to calm her down before pointing towards a new tunnel that had just appeared in the distance. "There is another tunneling up over there¡­ And from the looks of it, its going up instead of down!"


    "Really!? Ah! You are right! Finally, another tunnel going up! Maybe we can finally make it to the surface this time around." Hearing what Chu Yang said, Qing Yi quickly calmed down before excitedly eximing with a happy smile stered all over her face after discovering that the new tunnel did indeed lead up.


    Not only that, but after both of them reached the tunnel, they discovered that it continued up for hundreds of meters before the rest of the path disappeared behind arge rock that the mole demon beast had maneuvered around when constructing the tunnel.


    "This¡­ We might finally have found a path to the surface!"


    "Yeah. Even if this path doesn''t reach the surface, it should at the very least get us close enough to dig the rest of the way ourselves!"


    As both of them were filled with excitement over having finally found a path back to the surface after a week wandering in the dark and seemingly endless tunnels of the mole demon beast, constantly on edge as their divine sense kept scanning their surroundings for the mole demon beast, it happened.


    Rumble~


    The mole demon beast that both of them had been worried about, emerged from one of the dozen or so tunnels behind them-


    ROOOOAR-!


    And it didn''t look too pleased about the fact that someone had dared barging into its tunnelwork without permission, as it directly charged towards them without caring about idently damaging the structure of the tunnel. Understanding very well that even if the tunnel ended up copsing as a result of this, it would still be fine, as for Chu Yang and Qing Yi? They would have no way to escape from it if they ended up getting buried alive by the tunnel that had already started copsing around them.


    From the looks of things, the mole demon beast was also nning to copse the tunnel in an attempt to prevent them from running away. The only difference between the mole demon beast''s way of doing things and how Chu Yang and Qing Yi nned to do it, was the fact that the mole demon beast was trying to copse the entire tunnel. Not just a single part to dy them.


    "Run!"


    Not daring to waste any time after seeing the mole demon beast, Chu Yang dashed into the tunnel leading upwards with Qing Yi following closely behind him. No matter how much he wanted to try and copse the tunnel above the mole demon beast to dy it before entering the smaller tunnel leading upwards, he also understood that doing this would run the risk of copsing the entire tunnel and end up burying both him and Qing Yi beneath the earth. Trapping them in a ce where the mole demon beast would be able to easily kill them!


    ROOOAR!


    Seeing that they entered another tunnel and that it wouldn''t be able to archive anything by copsing the tunnel it was currently inside of, other than buying more time for Chu Yang and Qing Yi to run away, the mole demon beast stopped destroying the tunnel and instead focused all of its energy on chasing after Chu Yang and Qing Yi.


    Swoosh-!


    Swoosh-!


    Escaping through the smaller tunnel leading upwards, Qing Yi and Chu Yang soon reached the stone that the mole demon beast had tunneled around in the past.


    "Junior brother! Let''s use the rock!" Shouting this before beginning to push the rock that had already been loosened by the tunneling of the mole demon beast, Chu Yang quickly understood what she wanted to do-


    ROAR!


    RUMBLE~


    And the moment the mole demon beast entered the smaller tunnel leading upward, they managed to free the rock and send it tumbling down towards the mole demon beast that had begun rapidly closing the distance between them.

 Chapter 933 Back To The Surface

    Seeing therge rock tumbling down towards it, the mole demon beast at first wanted to ignore it and go straight through-


    Roar!?


    But just as it was about to do this, it realized that the rock was exactly the same poisonous spiritual rock that it had destroyed a week earlier!


    Swoosh~


    Remembering just how painful the past week had been due to it getting poisoned after destroying one of these special spiritual poisonous rocks, the mole demon beast didn''t waste a single second before turning around and escaping out of the small tunnel before the rock had a chance to crash into it.


    Although this did end up buying more time for both Chu Yang and Qing Yi to escape, the mole demon beast understood very well that this was a far better ouepared to getting poisoned again. Especially considering that there was a very real possibility of Chu Yang and Qing Yi taking advantage of its weakened state due to poisoning to kill it!


    For this reason, the mole demon beast patiently waited at the entrance to the tunnel for the rock to roll out and into therge tunnel.


    Bang!


    RUMBLE-!


    Unfortunately for the mole demon beast, the moment the rock in question tumbled out of the tunnel entrance, the force of it smashing into the already weakened wall of therger tunnel, caused therger tunnel to start copsing directly on top of the mole demon beast.


    ROAR!?


    Not even giving it any chance to react, as it was buried beneath a mountain of rocks and dirt.


    Even if this did not kill the mole demon beast, it inevitably ended up giving Chu Yang and Qing Yi even more time to escape up the smaller tunnel towards what they hopped to be an entrance leading to the surface, or at the very least somewhere close enough to the surface that they would be able to dig their way up by themselves¡­


    "Hehe, looks like it didn''t expect us to push down the rock. Let''s push another rock down if it shows up again!" Smiling happily, unaware of the fact that the rock she had pushed down with the help of Chu Yang was filled with a special kind of poison, Qing Yi motioned towards another rock that had simrly been avoided by the mole demon beast when digging the tunnel appearing a few hundred meters ahead of them.


    "Sure¡­" Feeling that something was off with how desperately the mole demon beast had tried to avoid getting hit by the rock, Chu Yang decided not to think too much about it for now and just agreed to Qing Yi''s suggestion.


    Just like that, Chu Yang and Qing Yi continued making their way up the small tunnel-


    Rumble~


    ROOOOAR!


    Rolling a rock down towards the mole demon beast the moment it appeared. Not caring about the increasingly thick killing intent that the mole demon beast directed towards them.


    In the end, this continued for over half an hour before the end of the tunnel finally came into view. Making both Chu Yang and Qing Yi let out a sigh of relief after continuing up for what felt like forever. Only now realizing just how deep underground they had been transported after going through the stone door in the underground ravine to escape from the horde of demon beasts without having to rely on the talismans that their master had left for them.


    If not for the fact that they found this tunnel leading up and they could see a few tree branches sticking in through the tunnel entrance, they would have thought that the end of the tunnel would not lead them back to the surface, but instead into a brand-new tunnel created by the mole demon beast.


    "Finally, I was honestly starting to doubt whether or not we had been transported into some kind of world filled with nothing but dirt and rocks¡­" Reaching the entrance and seeing the forest that spread out in front of her like an endless sea of green and the blue sky above, Qing Yi muttered this with an exhausted expression on her face.


    Although she had already reached the Nascent Soul Realm, thest half hour of escaping was by far one of the hardest things she had experienced so far. Not because she had been using her movement technique to the limit over the past half hour, but because she and Chu Yang had been forced to stop dozens of times to push down massive rocks towards the mole demon beast approaching them.


    At one point during their escape, she had tried using a little more power to push down one of these rocks, but this soon turned into a disaster, as she found out why the mole demon beast would always try its absolute best to avoid crashing into the rocks. In the end, the small amount of poison that had leaked from the crack she ended up creating cost her close to seventy percent of the qi inside her dantian to rapidly suppress before she could continue escaping. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Because of this, she was only left with a little more than ten percent of her qi when reaching the surface¡­


    "First, let''s get out of here before starting to rx!"


    On the other hand, Chu Yang was in a far more favorable position, as he was still far away from being exhausted like Qing Yi. Taking the initiative to carry the exhausted Qing Yi before escaping into the forest-


    RUMBLE-!


    Just in time before the mole demon beast emerged from the tunnel behind them filled with a terrifying killing intent that instantly sent any nearby demon beasts running away in terror!


    ROOOOOAR!


    Seeing that they had already escaped into the forest, the mole demon beast hesitated for a short moment at the entrance before the overwhelming killing intent that had engulfed its mind won over. Understanding very well that if it hesitated for too long, the scent trail of Qing Yi and Chu Yang would end up disappearing. Making it impossible for it to chase after them.


    Bang! Bang!


    As a result, it''srge body soon crashed through the trees of the forest as it chased after Chu Yang and Qing Yi without showing the slightest bit of care towards the fact that doing something like this would inevitably end up alerting the surrounding demon beasts.


    After all, in the mind of the mole demon beast that had spent its entire life wandering the underground world where the strongest demon beast it had encountered only reached the Nascent Soul Realm, it was the most powerful and there was no one who could challenge it!


    In the end, this confidence made the mole demon beast underestimate the strength of the demon beast on the surface. Thinking that even if they were different, they would still be weaker. Even if it encountered someone it couldn''t deal with, it always thought that it would just be able to bury into the ground if need be¡­


    Roar?


    Unfortunately for the mole demon beast, its arrogant and loud way of chasing after Chu Yang and Qing Yi, ended up drawing the attention of a particrly powerful demon beast that just so happened to be sleeping in the path that Chu Yang and Qing Yi were escaping in¡­


    "What is tha-"


    Spotting the massive body of the demon beast that had just been woken up by the mole demon beast, Chu Yang froze on the spot as he felt therge demon beast looking over him for a short moment before turning to look in the direction of the approaching mole demon beast.


    Even if it was only for a few seconds, the look that the demon beast gave him sent a shiver down his spine.


    Chu Yang was already familiar with people in the Domain Lord Realm considering that the Star Shattering Sect had a few and his master was also in the Domain Lord Realm. For this reason, he had instantly realized that therge demon beastzilyying on the ground in front of him was a Domain Lord Realm demon beast.


    Not only that, but it was also a Domain Lord Realm demon beast that hadprehended a domain. Making it far more terrifying than an ordinary Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    Swish-!


    Knowing that the demon beast was not targeting them and was instead looking towards the approaching mole demon beast, Chu Yang didn''t dare waste a single second before escaping.


    Although he had already taken his master''s talisman out and was prepared to use it the moment the Domain Lord Realm demon beast showed any signs of attacking, he still didn''t feel fully confident that the talisman of his master had the ability to deal with the demon beast.


    After all, even if his master was in theter or middle stages of the Domain Lord Realm from what he knew. Dealing with a Domain Lord Realm demon beast in person and dealing with one through a talisman that had stored part of his power, were twopletely different things!


    For this reason, he wanted to leave and not take the risk if he had the chance¡­

 Chapter 934 Thunder Descends

    ROOOOAR!


    Unfortunately for Chu Yang, the mole demon beast appeared just at this moment and jumped forward to block his path. Not noticing therge demon beast on the ground that was staring directly at it with a hint of interest in its eyes. Curious about why this little mole that had only reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm had dared to start causing trouble inside its territory.


    As for Chu Yang and Qing Yi who had been blocked by the mole demon beast? It simply didn''t care about them. In the eyes of a Domain Lord Realm demon beast, Chu Yang and Qing Yi ''s Early Stage Nascent Soul Realm cultivation base made them no different from ants.


    The only positive about this, was the fact that this powerful demon beast would not bother to kill them, as they were simply far too weak to provide it any benefits after consuming them. Especially considering how small their bodies were. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    In its eyes, it was far better to let Chu Yang and Qing Yi escape. Allowing them to growrger and more powerful would be more beneficial to it than killing them now. Not aware of the fact that humans wouldn''t grow asrge as demon beasts¡­


    Roar!


    Still not aware of the fact that a muchrger and more powerful demon beast was staring at it with curiosity and a hint of hunger in its eyes, the mole demon beast let out a roar filled with confidence before using therge ws on its front legs to sh down towards Chu Yang and Qing Yi.


    Ching~


    Using his spear to block therge ws of the mole demon beast, Chu Yang felt his entire body tremble under the enormous power of the mole demon beast. Even if he was confident in dealing with demon beasts stronger than himself, he understood that trying to fight a Peak Nascent Soul Realm demon beast with his current strength was impossible.


    Even if the mole demon beast had been weakened by the poison from the rocks, he doubted that it would make much of a difference in a fight where he could only barely use all of his strength to block a single attack!


    Roar!?


    Seeing how Chu Yang had managed to block its ws before deflecting them away, the mole demon beast was not the slightest bit happy after seeing the blood that ran down the corner of his mouth after having forcefully resisted the attack of someone much stronger than himself.


    Instead, the mole demon beast only cared more about the fact that someone who had only reached the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm had somehow managed to resist its attack.


    ROOOOAR-!


    As a result, the mole demon beast violently rushed in for another attack. Intent on ending things before the ants that had caused it trouble for thest week before they had a chance to run away again.


    Rumble~


    However, before the mole demon beast had a chance to attack Chu Yang and Qing Yi again, a loud rumbling sound echoed through the forest.


    Roar?


    Not aware of the fact that there was another demon beast present, the mole demon beast could only stop mid attack, as it finally noticed the massive demon beast at least five times its own size that had suddenly appeared no more than a few hundred meters away from it.


    Even without knowing the strength of therge demon beast many times its own size, the mole demon beast''s instincts told it that it was far stronger than itself and its only chance of staying alive was escaping back underground as fast as possible.


    ROOOOOOOOOOOOOAR-!


    However, just as the mole demon beast was about to run away, a loud roar suddenly erupted from the massive demon beast followed by a terrifying power descending from above and locking it in ce. Preventing it from diving into the ground and escaping back into the underground world where it had spent its entire life.


    All of a sudden, a memory that seemed to have disappeared for a long time appeared in the deepest recesses of the mole demon beast''s mind.


    Back when it was young and had just reached the Nascent Soul Realm, it had been curious and adventurous. In the end, this caused the young mole demon beast to dig a long tunnel up before finally reaching the surface for the first time in its life.


    Exploring this new and mystical world, it did not take long before it stumbled on a rare spiritual herb that helped it breakthrough to the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm on the spot. Unknown to the young mole demon beast back then, the spiritual herb already had an owner!


    Not long after consuming the spiritual herb, arge demon beast far bigger and more powerful than itself appeared before beating it half dead. Only through sheer luck had it managed to escape back underground when a simrly powerful demon beast had appeared and challenged the one beating it up.


    Due to this terrifying encounter during its youth, the mole demon beast had never dared to use its old tunnel leading to the surface. In the end, the memory slowly disappeared with time and the mole demon beast forgot the fear it felt toward the surface. Ultimately resulting in its current situation where its old memory from its youth finally reemerged with the appearance of the powerful demon beast many times its own size.


    R-roar!


    Only able to let out a terrified roar after feeling its entire body being locked in ce, the mole demon beast could only watch helplessly as therge demon beast slowly made its way over towards it. The hungry look in the eyes of the massive demon beast only increased the closer it got to the mole demon beast.


    Even to a Domain Lord Realm demon beast, arge demon beast like the mole demon beast who was just about to break through to the Domain Lord Realm was a delicacy that would give it a chance at increasing the strength of its body by a small realm. Something normally only doable by consuming the body of another Domain Lord Realm demon beast!


    Swish~


    At the same time that the two demon beasts were facing off against each other, Chu Yang took the chance to quietly slip away before the Domain Lord Realm demon beast decided that it would eat them as well. Even if he didn''t intend to eat them now, it could always change its mind after eating the mole demon beast.


    Luckily for Chu Yang and Qing Yi, the Domain Lord Realm demon beast didn''t spare them a single nce as they slowly slipped away. Instead, all of its attention was focused on the mole demon beast fearfully shivering in front of it.


    Roar~


    Letting out a pleasurable roar as it started salivating at therge body of the mole demon beast, the Domain Lord Realm demon beast opened itsrge mouth wide before biting down towards the immobile mole demon beast. Intending to take a test bite out of it to check if it was poisonous before eating it.


    Rumble!


    However, before the Domain Lord Realm demon beast had a chance to bite into the mole demon beast, a loud rumbling sound echoed out from inside the mole demon beast''s body-


    Crack-!


    Not a secondter, the domain that had been used to restrain the mole demon beast shattered violently, as a terrifying aura belonging to the Domain Lord Realm erupted around the mole demon beast. Instantly forcing the massive Domain Lord Realm demon beast back.


    RUUUUMBLE-!


    Followed by the Domain Lord Realm aura appearing around the mole demon beast, arge number of thunder clouds appeared above the mole demon beast.


    Roar!?


    Understanding just what these thunder clouds symbolized, the demon beast that had already reached the Domain Lord Realm began to rapidly retreat-


    Swish-!


    Only to be stopped by the mole demon beast that quickly caught up with it andtched itself onto the body of therger demon beast.


    Roar-!


    Knowing just how terrifying the thunder clouds above were and feeling that their power seemed to have increased after the mole demon beast grabbedtched itself onto it, the massive demon beast let out a panicked roar as it tried its best to remove the mole demon beast and escape from the thunder clouds.


    Unfortunately for therger demon beast, the body of the mole demon beast that had only been a step away from reaching the Domain Lord Realm, had just managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm. Making it close to impossible for therger demon beast to remove in a short period of time, let alone before the Domain Lord Realm tribtion descended!


    RUUUMBLE-!


    Boom! Boom!


    As if nned, the tribtion directly descended on the mole demon beast and the unfortunate demon beast that had been unable to escape in time!

 Chapter 935 End Of The Mole Demon Beast!

    The power of the tribtion ended up being further enhanced due to the presence of the massive demon beast already in the Domain Lord Realm. Resulting in the strength of the tribtion reaching a level far above something that even a normal Domain Lord Realm Expert would be able to endure-


    ROOOOOAR-!


    ROOOAR!


    For this reason, the painful roars of two demon beasts soon echoed through the entire forest, as the tribtion clouds above continued to send down endless streams of thunder, each more powerful than thest.


    In the end culminating in a vortex of thunder gathering above the two demon beasts who had already been reduced to a half dead state under the constant attack from the tribtion above. The power contained inside the vortex far surpassing anything the two demon beasts had ever witnessed before!


    A testament as to why one should never try to interfere someone else''s in a tribtion¡­


    Crackle~!


    As the power of the thunder gathered in the tribtion seemed to have reached the limit of what could be archived by a Domain Lord Realm Tribtion, the thunder vortex rotating menacingly above the two demon beasts, unleashed its devastating power.


    RUMBLE-!


    Bolts of lightning streaked down,shing out at the two half-dead demon beasts below. Each strike carried an unimaginable force that would even leave a Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert shivering in fear, as they tore through the demon beasts already wounded forms and shrouding them in an ethereal radiance.


    BOOOOOOOOM-!


    The unleashed energy reverberated through the forest, causing shockwaves that swept across thend, uprooting everything in their path. Soon reaching the escaping Chu Yang and Qing Yi-


    "Ah!?" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Waaaaa-"


    Who were both sent flying by the powerful shockwave with a few minor injuries. Having at the very least managed to escape far enough that the power of the shockwave had weakened significantly by the time that it reached them.


    BOOM! BOOM!


    ROOOOAR-!


    The deafening cacophony of thunder and the agonized cries of the demon beasts that weakened with each passing second continued for another few minutes before the thunder clouds above slowly dispersed. Leaving behind a massive crater thousands of meters wide and a forest that had been reduced to nothing more than ash.


    Even if the forest was still around, the scar created by the tribtion cloud of the mole demon beast would forever be present in the forest. Something that could not be said about the mole demon beast, that hadpletely disappeared from the surface of the earth following the tribtion clouds disappearance¡­


    The only people left alive to have witnessed the entire scene, was Chu Yang and Qing Yi, who had just gotten up again after a rather roughnding.


    "Did the mole demon beast and the Domain Lord Realm demon beast¡­ Die?"


    "I think so¡­"


    As they ignored their injuries for a short time and decided to take in the scene of destruction left behind, Chu Yang and Qing Yi finally realized that they had just witnessed the death of the mole demon beast and a Domain Lord Realm demon beast.


    Domain Lord Realm, a realm that was still far away from them at the moment¡­ And now they had actually witnessed the death of such a powerful expert. Not to mention, it was a Domain Lord Realm demon beast that was normally stronger than that of a human Domain Lord Realm Expert!


    Other than this, the most important thing was that they had managed to get a chance to witness the tribtion of someone trying to break through to the Domain Lord Realm. Even if the strength of the tribtion had been far stronger than a normal tribtion, it was still a valuable experience that would be able to help them in the future when they were about to go through the Domain Lord Realm Tribtion by themselves. Not to mention, part of the lightning from the tribtion could still be seen flowing through the ground at the center of the crater.


    Although the lightning was weak, after observing it with their divine sense, Qing Yi and Chu Yang both felt that their understanding of lightning increased.


    ROOOAR!


    ROOOOAR!


    ROOAR!


    However, before they could continue observing the traces of lighting still flowing through the ground around the center crater, several loud roars no weaker than the Domain Lord Realm demon beast that had just died, could be hearding from all around them.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Not even a secondter, tworge figures appeared in the air above the crater-


    Whoosh-!


    Followed by a third, all of which had reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    "I think it''s time for us to leave."


    "Indeed¡­


    Knowing that nothing good woulde from staying, both Chu Yang and Qing Yi didn''t dare stay for even a second longer, as they ran away as fast as possible before any of the Domain Lord Realm demon beasts happened to notice them.


    ¡­


    Not aware of the dangerous situation that his disciples had once again found themselves in, Xuan Hao looked behind himself for any signs of the two Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts. Only after making sure that none of the two Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts had chased after him, did he allow himself to rx before starting to examine his surroundings.


    Taking in the tranquil stillness that pervaded through the forest and the towering trees, Xuan Hao marveled at the magical scene of the vibrant moss and delicate vines adorning their thick trunks. Only now that he took some time to rx, realizing just how beautiful theserge trees covering the entire mountain range were.


    "Hm?"


    Turning his gaze away from the towering trees and the canopy blocking out most of the light from the sun above, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after turning his attention towards the forest floor beneath his feet.


    Amidst the towering trees, something catches his attention, a faint, meandering path, barely visible in the vibrant carpet of emerald-green moss beneath him.


    "A path? Why is there a path like this in a forest filled with demon beasts? Unless¡­"


    Intrigued by the appearance of a path in a ce where he had only encountered demon beasts so far, Xuan Hao realized that this might have something to do with the formation that had trapped him and curiously began inspecting the path beneath his feet.


    The path itself continued deeper into the forest and with nothing to lose given his current trapped state without learning the long distance teleportation from the third level of the Spatial Shift technique, Xuan Hao decided to follow the path. Making sure to keep his distance from the path just in case it was trapped.


    Having already walked on the path inside the mist, Xuan Hao didn''t want to end up in a simr situation again. Especially considering that he might end up identally walking back in the direction of the empty void where all of the powerful demon beasts were currently gathered if the path was simr to the one in the mist.


    Gradually, as he continued walking beside the path deeper into the forest, it slowly transformed from a barely visible path, into a slender trail of downtrodden grass and earth that winded its way around the towering trees in seemingly endless manner without any endpoint in sight.


    If not for the fact that the path was constantly changing and bing more visible, he would have thought that it would be the same as the path in the mist and would end up leading him around in a circle through the entire forest.


    "Hm? Looks like the path ising to an end¡­"


    After walking for what ended up feeling like an hour or two, Xuan Hao let out a sigh of relief as he looked at the path that slowly came to an end a dozen or so meters ahead of him.


    To be honest, after an hour of following the path, he had started to think about the possibility that the illusion was more advanced this time around and had the ability to change the path slightly as he moved alongside it. Luckily, it looked like this was not the case, as the path dide to an end.


    "A gate¡­?" Looking at the ce that the path ended, arge gate towering above the surrounding trees quietly stood there. Although calling it a simple gate would be doing it a disservice¡­


    Towering high up into the sky, its grand archway carved from luminous spiritual stones that gave off an ethereal radiance. borate patterns, intricate andplex, adorned its surface, telling tales of ancient legends and wonders beyond mortalprehension.


    Whoosh~


    Streams of shimmering energy filled with spirituality flowed along its edges, like the entrance to a higher ne of existence. Looking closer, the gate itself almost seemed to possess a sentience of its own, emanating a palpable aura of primordial power.


    Compared to a simple gate, a resplendent marvel of divine craftmanship was a more fitting way to describe the gate.

 Chapter 936 First Celestial Gate

    "One of the Three Celestial Gates...?" Even without knowing if it was true or not, Xuan Hao automatically associated the divine gate in front of him with the three celestial gates that had been mentioned by the system quest.


    Wait¡­ If this is one of the Three Celestial Gates, doesn''t that mean I might be able to use it to leave the trapping formation after going through it!?


    Realizing this, Xuan Hao could not help excitedly looking towards the divine gate in front of him. Even if there was some kind of guardian on the other side of the gate ording to the quest from the system, he felt that it would be better than staying inside the massive forest. After all, by staying in the forest, he would risk encountering the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts.


    Even if the powerful demon beasts were all busy with the fight for control over the empty void, they would inevitably start leaving to roam around the forest again after the battle came to an end. In there would never be a chance for all of the demon beasts to peacefully absorb the spatial energy leaking out from the empty void together, there simply wasn''t enough spatial energy to go around for a single demon beast, let alone all of them¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao cautiously began approaching what he assumed to be one of the Three Celestial Gate before finding himself directly in front of the already wide-open gate. The scene on the other side in a somewhat blurry state that made it impossible to see just what was hiding on the other side of the gate. Even then, Xuan Hao had a feeling that he already knew what was behind the thin ethereal veil that covered the opening.


    Whoosh~


    Deciding to first use his divine sense to try and explore the other side of the gate in more detail, Xuan Hao was not too surprised to discover that his divine sense could not pass through the thin ethereal veil enveloping the gate.


    "Guess I can only explore the other side of the gate by going through it¡­" Knowing that it was no use to try and get a glimpse of what was on the other side of the gate before passing through it, Xuan Hao slowly took a step forward into the ethereal veil that covered the area a few meters around the gate.


    Soon, the feeling of getting dragged forward by a powerful force enveloped his entire body, as he felt himself getting closer to the gate with each passing second.


    Even if the force that dragged him towards the gate was not really that strong in the first ce and should have been created by the hint of sentience that the celestial gate had given birth to over the many years, Xuan Hao decided to not resist the force and allowed it to drag him through the gate. In the first ce, he had already decided to enter the gate, so there was no reason to resist it.


    WHOOSH-!


    As he passed through the gate, the space around him twisted and turned in all sorts of weird manners that were iprehensible even with his current understanding of the Dao of Space before finallying to a stop after an unknown period of time.


    By the time that he opened his eyes and took in his new surroundings, he found himself in the middle of arge za the size of a smaller mountain range like the Shattered Star Peaks. If not for the fact that he could sense the countless buildings that surrounded the za, he would have thought he had been transported on top of some kind ofrge tform in the middle of nowhere.


    The main reason why he would have thought this was because the za itself waspletely empty without a single sign of life. Even the buildings in the distance did not show any signs of life and only gave off a terrifying aura that made him feel a deep sense of terror that he had never felt before. Especially therge pagoda the size of a small mountain located at the center of this enormous ancient city that he now found himself inside of.


    Rumble~


    As he was still trying to figure out just where he had now ended up, the ground in front of him suddenly slit open to reveal a small pedestal that soon ascended up through the small hole in the za. Looking closer, Xuan Hao discovered that there was a small scroll ced on top of the pedestal that had suddenly emerged from the ground in front of him.


    "Scroll of Trials, Trial of the Eternal City?" Reading the words at the top of the scroll, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat confused expression on his face before realizing that the scroll was an introduction to a trial that he had apparently already started the moment he stepped through the celestial gate. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    From what he had read from the quest, he thought he would just have to defeat some kind of guardian that resided inside the different celestial gates, but from the looks of things, he would also have to go through a trial of some kind inside the celestial gates.


    The scroll of trials at the very least mentioned that the difficulty of the trial would be based on the strength of the one taking the trial. Making him at the very least feel a sense of security knowing that he would not end up facing some kind of powerful guardian that had already long since surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm.


    After all, if it really turned out that the guardian had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm, he would have been far better staying inside the jungle and use his time searching for another way to escape from the formation. At the very least this way, he would have a better chance ofing out of his current situation alive¡­


    Rumble-!


    Just at this moment, as he finished reading through the scroll of trials, the quiet za beneath his feet suddenly lit up in all sorts of colors before aplicated array of ancient symbols merged together into arge formation that covered the entire za in a thin mist that made it harder for him to use his divine sense. Even if he could still use it to cover the entire za, the energy and effort required to do this was not something that was sustainable for more than a few minutes.


    Having already read about this scenario in the scroll of trials, Xuan Hao did not panic, but instead turned his attention towards therge pagoda the size of a small mountain. ording to the scroll of trials, the guardian, Aria, was currently residing inside the pagoda and would be emerging shortly after the activation of the formation that covered the entire za in the thin mist and isted it from the rest of the enormous city that was now barely visible through the mist.


    Swish~


    Creaaaak~


    Only a few secondster, the sound of a gentle wind reached his ears before therge gates of the pagoda slowly opened before an otherworldly stillness descended on the za, as the formerly active formation seemed to quiet down for a moment. Allowing the soft light passing through the mist to illuminate the surroundings, casting an ethereal shimmer across the empty za.


    It was within this mystical ambiance that the guardian, Aria, emerged from the pagoda. Her ethereal beauty transcending mortal understanding, while her very form seemed to merge seamlessly with the surrounding mist, as if she was an embodiment of the ethereal realm that now enveloped the za. Her figure radiating a soft, gentle luminescence that seemed toe from within.


    Opening her eyes before turning to face him, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine, as he felt the ancient power slumbering deep within those eyes. Even if he understood that her strength should not be too far above his own ording to the scroll of trial, he still felt insignificant when faced with those eyes that seemed to contain ancient wisdom far beyond the confines of anything he had ever encountered before.


    Whoosh~


    As she slowly took a step forward before gliding towards him in a fluid and effortless manner, Xuan Hao discovered that he couldn''t move.


    Something is wrong!


    It was only at this moment that he woke up from the strange trance that he had found himself in. Even when trying to move away to dodge the iing Aria, he could not move a single muscle. The mist around him seemingly pressing down on his body from all sides with a steadily increasing strength, as if it wanted to crush him to death.


    At this point, he was only able to remain frozen in ce, staring directly towards Aria, who was slowly getting closer and closer to him with each passing second¡­

 Chapter 937 Aria, Guardian Of...

    Boom!


    Gathering all of his power together and forcefully exploding it outwards, the mist restricting his movement was momentarily pushed back. Allowing him to regain control over his body again and have his dao domain spread out and prevent the mist from getting close enough to rescript his movement again.


    However, his domain did nothing to stop the approaching guardian, who didn''t show any signs of being affected by his dao domain, as she rapidly approached him at a speed visible to the naked eye. Treating his dao domain like it wasn''t there in the first ce.


    "This¡­" Feeling a sense of disbelief and confusion after seeing how the guardian was able to ignore his dao domain, Xuan Hao could not help trying to recall anything from the scroll of trials that might help him understand what is happening before the guardian had a chance to reach him.


    Unfortunately, the scroll of trials did not provide a lot of information on the guardian herself. The information inside the scroll instead covered the formation that created the mist and the goal of the trial-


    Wait! The goal of the trial mentioned something about the powerful abilities of the guardian being able to bend the very fabric of reality itself to her will. Maybe this is not meant as a way to show off how powerful she was but was instead meant in a way to describe her ability to make use of illusions to bend one''s very perception of reality itself!


    Realizing this, Xuan Hao turned his attention away from the approaching guardian that was now only a few dozen meters away from him and instead began paying more attention to his surroundings.


    There!


    It was through this that he managed to spot a small unnoticeable wisp drifting towards him.


    The wisp seemed ordinary and look like it had almost mergedpletely together with the thin mist covering the za, but after taking a second nce at the unassuming wisp that was drifting closer to him at a speed no slower than that of the approaching guardian, it did not take long for Xuan Hao to realize that the small wisp was far more dangerous than the guardian that was now only a few steps away from reaching him.


    Swish-!


    Ignoring the guardian, Xuan Hao turned around and stabbed towards the unassuming wisp with all his power!


    Swish~


    Not a secondter, the figure of the guardian directly passed through him before dissolving into small motes of light that merged together with the thin mist, while the small and unassuming wisp transformed into the beautiful and breathtaking figure of Aria, the guardian of the trial.


    BOOOM-!


    Just in time to resist his sword attack at thest moment before her figure dissolved into countless small wisps that spread out across the entire za. Making it hard for Xuan Hao to figure out which of them was the real guardian.


    "How annoying¡­" Seeing how the guardian had managed to resist his attack before dissolving into countless small wisps, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a headache setting.


    The guardian was clearly strong enough to fight him given that she had been able to easily resist his sword attack just now, but instead of doing this, she had instead decided to deal with him through illusion techniques.


    Although he now had a feeling that the trial was set up to test him in these aspects, he could still not stop himself from feeling a sense of annoyance after seeing the countless wisps spread out across the massive za. Even if his divine sense was strong and superior to that of most Soul Ascension Realm Experts, it had still taken him some time to find the small wisp that had been approaching him from behind.


    Not to mention, the only reason he had managed to find it was that there was nothing other than that one wisp and the fake guardian approaching him. Nothing like the countless wisps that now covered the entire za¡­


    RUMBLE-!


    For this reason, Xuan Hao directly conjured a sea of swords in the air above him through the Sword Dao-


    Swoosh~


    Swoosh~


    Swoosh~


    Before waving his hand and sending the countless swords gathered in the small sea of sword out towards the countless wisps spread out across the enormous za. Knowing that it would take him an eternity if he decided to go through each of the wisps and check them individually with his divine sense¡­ And that was on the assumption that Aria didn''t have any method to change her true body to one of the wisps he had already checked!


    Because of this, the simplest and easiest way to go about things would be tounch an attack on all of the wisps at once. The wisps that had the ability to defend itself would be the true body of Aria, while the rest would be illusions, simple as that.


    Bang! Bang!


    "Ah? More than one!?"


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, things did not work like he had expected, and his swords encountered resistance at more than a hundred of the different wisps. Indicating that the true body of Aria was not a single wisp like the first time but had instead split up into several different wisps!


    Hmph, you won''t be able to deal with me this easily!


    Recovering from the shock of suddenly realizing that Aria had the ability to split her body into a hundred different wisps, Xuan Hao focused the countless swords floating aimlessly around the za after having stabbed through the illusory wisps that were not part of Aria''s true body, towards the hundred or so wisps that were.


    Boom! Boom!


    Not a secondter, over a hundred sword streams formed above each of the wisps that were part of Aria''s true body before beginning to rain down on the small wisps. Giving them no chance to resist as the constant stream of swords engulfed thempletely. Keeping them trapped without any way to escape.


    Slowly, the size of the wisps decreased, and their luminescent glow reduced began growing dim. Making Xuan Hao narrow both of his eyes as he prepared for the inevitable counterattack.


    Swish-!


    However, just at this moment, one of the illusory wisps that he had already deemed as nothing more than a simple harmless illusion, sprung forth with a terrifying power far beyond that of any of the other wisps that he was currently in the process of grinding down with his Sword Dao.


    "Huh?" Not at all expecting something like this, Xuan Hao could only let out a somewhat stupid sound before realizing the seriousness of his current situation. Even if he wanted to use his spatial movement technique to move away, the space inside the za was far too stable for him to do something like this with his currentprehension of the Dao of Space.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao could only do his best to dodge the terrifying wisp heading directly towards him. Not having enough time to do more than put up a basic defense with his dao domain-


    Crack~


    However, the small and unassuming wisp was far too powerful, as it directly pierced through the ice barrier that had been formed by his dao domain before turning into a sharp ethereal spear that was heading directly towards his head!


    Ptsh-!


    "Ah-!"


    Feeling the spear piercing through his head before continuing into the distance, Xuan Hao could not stop a small scream from escaping what was left of his mouth, as most of his head had been destroyed by the ethereal spear that continued moving into the distance before disappearing beyond the za.


    Whoosh~


    Rapidly consuming the qi in his body, Xuan Hao didn''t waste a single second before repairing the ratherrge hole that had been left in his head by the ethereal spear. Although he was in the Dao Domain Lord Realm and this was far from enough to kill him, the amount of qi required to recover from such an injure was not small. Especially considering that if he didn''t recover in time, his body would end up dying and he would be left with nothing more than his soul that would then have to steal a new body that he would have to recultivate or build his own. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    No matter which of these two, they both came with all sorts of negatives. Stealing a body from someone would never allow his soul to be in proper sync with the body. Preventing him from continuing to advance on the path of cultivation, while the act of rebuilding his body from scratch was something that could take hundreds, if not thousands of years¡­


    It was also because of this that cultivators would never view abandoning the body as an option for survival. The only people who could do something like this, were the demonic cultivators who had all sorts of ways to recover far faster and continue their cultivation even in a brand-new body that they were not ustomed to.


    For powerful demonic cultivators, as long as they had a few powerful bodies stored up, there would be no problem for them to rapidly recover their strength again after abandoning their original body¡­

 Chapter 938 End Of The Trial

    "Hah..." Taking in a deep breath of air after he finished recovering, Xuan Hao could not help looking in the direction of the ethereal spear with a hint of fear present in his eyes.


    By far, this was the closest he had been to death. Even the encounter with the remnant soul of the demonic cultivator that had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm didn''te close to him almost having his head blown off.


    At the same time, it also made him understand that the trial was not as harmless as he thought at first, there was still a very real chance of him dying, even after the difficulty had been lowered to a level fitting for his current cultivation realm ording to what was written in the scroll of trials.


    Another idea also appeared in his head at this moment, and that was the idea that the trial itself might have decayed after the long passage of time. Although the celestial gate did not look the slightest bit damaged from the outside, he had no idea about the inner workings of the celestial gate and the formations that kept it active all these years.


    No matter if it was a formation that had decayed after a long period of time or the original purpose of the trial. The only thing that mattered was the fact that he now understood that there was a very real chance of him losing his life inside the formation!


    Bang! Bang!


    Losing his concentration and control over the swords currently suppressing the wisps that were part of Aria''s true body for a moment due to the surprise attack of the ethereal spear, the wisps made use of this opportunity to break free from the swords before gathering together into the shape of Aria. The only difference this time around was that the gentle glowing light that came from her skin had turned into a dark green color.


    Whoosh~!


    Following the transformation of Aria, the ancient symbols of the formation seemed to react to the dark green glow of her skin before the mist covering the za suddenly started growing thicker.


    "The mist is growing stronger¡­" Muttering this to himself as a frown appeared on his face, Xuan Hao felt the mist pushing against his dao domain with more power than before. Not only that, but the power that the mist was using to push against his dao domain was steadily increasing with each passing second.


    If things continued like this, he would soon be forced to put all of his attention towards making sure that his dao domain didn''t end up copsing under the pressure of the mist. Something that would inevitably force him to turn his attention away from Aria and give her a perfect chance tounch another sneak attack towards him!


    Swish-!


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao charges towards Aria with an intent to end things before it gets to that point. At the same time, the ethereal mist around him seems toe alive at that moment, as if responding to the threat he poses to the guardian.


    Whoosh~


    The mist that had remained inactive and only passively pushing against his dao domain so far, morphs into phantom-like shapes, swirling around Xuan Hao with far more powerpared to before as his dao domain began shrinking at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    "¡­"


    Aria''s luminous eyes that had been staring out into the air during the entire encounter so far finally had a reaction, as she turned to look at the approaching Xuan Hao. The expression on her face still remains serene, even in the face of the approaching Xuan Hao.


    Whoosh~


    Raising her delicate hand, a melodic hum started to resonate through the air. Responding to this melodic hum, the mist around Xuan Hao began to pulse with the rhythm of hermand, intensifying its assault.


    Crack~


    Realizing the gravity of his current situation as parts of his dao domain began cracking under the intense assault of the mist, Xuan Hao used his sword in an attempt to push back the mist, but it was rendered useless, as the mist seemed to regenerate almost instantly.


    Boom! Boom!


    Each breath bes a battle against the all-epassing mist, and the strain on his dao domain grows with every passing moment.


    As the sh continues, the ethereal energies of the mist seem to be even more unforgiving. Yet, Xuan Hao''s determination remained unwavering as he got closer to Aria. Subconsciously, he already understood that his only chance of making it through the trial was if he managed to defeat Aria, and to do this, he mustered up all of his strength and focused his mind on finding a way to do this.


    "There!"


    In a moment of profound rity, Xuan Hao found the weakness he had been looking for and crossed thest bit of distance between himself and Aria before the mist had a chance to fully break through his already crumbling dao domain.


    Rumble! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Channeling his energy into the silver sword with newfound intensity, Xuan Hao unleashed a powerful strike, aiming to sever the ethereal ties that connected Aria with the formation and the za beneath him.


    BOOM!


    As the attacknded, the ethereal mist stopped attacking for a short moment, momentarily disrupted by Xuan Hao''s formidable attack.


    "¡­"


    Aria''s serene expression remained unchanged, but a glimmer of surprise appeared in her empty eyes. As if she had not expected him to find the ethereal strings that bound her together with the za and formation. At the same time, a hint of respect could also be seen in her eyes. Acknowledging Xuan Hao''s strength and determination.


    "HAAAA-!"


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    With a mighty roar and a final surge of energy, Xuan Hao directly broke through the ethereal strings, causing the phantom-like shapes that had been assaulting his dao domain to dissipate into nothingness together with the rest of the mist. Returning the za to the same empty state that he had seen it in when he had first stepped through the celestial gate.


    "Finally, its over¡­" Standing victorious, an exhausted smile made its way to his lips before he looked up Aria floating in the air a few meters away from him.


    Her ethereal form remained unscratched, but her demeanor conveyed an air of eptance. Xuan Hao had proven himself worthy, not just through hisbat skills, but also through his resilience and fast decision making. After all, if he had hesitated inunching an attack against her just now, the mist would have overwhelmed him before he had a chance to reach her.


    As the confrontation came to an end, the ethereal mist that made up Aria''s body began to dissipate like the rest of the mist.


    However, before she had a chance to disappearpletely, she opened her mouth for the first time since she had appeared.


    "You have passed the Trial of the Eternal City. Farewell for now, may you sessfully ascend the tribtion and step into the Earth Immortal Realm in the future."


    "¡­"


    Watching silently as Aria''s figurepletely disappeared from the za without a trace, Xuan Hao had no idea how to react to the few words she had left behind before dissipating.


    Earth Immortal Realm? Was that the realm that came after the Soul Ascension Realm?


    Rumble~


    "Ah!?"


    Feeling like he had been given far too little information and wanting to find out more about the Earth Immortal Realm that he had just learnt about, Xuan Hao could not help jumping in surprise when he suddenly felt the ground beneath him moving.


    "Is the trial not over?! Is there perhaps a second part to the trial?!" Not knowing what was happening, Xuan Hao cautiously moved away from the ce he had been standing before carefully observing the changes of the ground where he had been standing a few seconds ago.


    Even if Aria had told him that the trial had alreadye to an end, he could never be too sure. Especially after sensing the weird change that was taking ce.


    "Hm?"


    However, after waiting around for a few seconds, Xuan Hao realized that the origin of the strange change was nothing more than arge and familiar looking gate that had emerged from the ground in the middle of the za. To be more precise, it was an exact copy of the celestial gate that he had walked through to enter the trial.


    "So, it was just the way out of here appearing and scaring me in the process¡­" Letting out a sigh of relief as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao felt his entire body rx again. If he had to face another opponent like Aria in his current state, he had no idea if he could evenst for a minute or two.


    After all, thest attack of his had taken all of his energy and he would need at least a few days to recover. Especially from the trauma of having part of his head blown off. Not something he wanted to experience again¡­

 Chapter 939 Winged Lion Demon Beast’s Change

    Standing in front of the celestial gate leading out of the empty city, Xuan Hao decided to not leave for now and instead focused on recovering from the battle he had just gone through. Thest thing he wanted was to go back to the demon beast infested forest and encounter a Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast in his current state.


    Although the recovery was going to take a few days, it didn''t look like he was going to be forced out of the ancient city. The only unfortunate thing was that the formation that had created the mist was still active to some degree. Preventing him from leaving the za and exploring the empty city that surrounded it.


    As for destroying the formation and forcing his way through it¡­ Xuan Hao had long since given up on this thought. Not only because the formation itself was far too powerful for him to break through with his current strength, but also because he feared that attacking the formation might result in the formation attacking him in return.


    Considering that he had already experienced the terrifying mist generated by the formation just a short moment ago, Xuan Hao was in no rush to face off against it again.


    "Guess I can also use this time to see if anything changed about the quest afterpleting the trial. After all, I still have no idea if this trial was really one of the three trials mentioned by the quest¡­" Knowing that he would not be leaving the empty za for a few days, Xuan Hao decided to also use this time to pull up the quest and see if anything had changed from thest time. Curious about whether or not the trial he had just gone through was really one of the three trials mentioned by the system.


    [Side Quest: The Three Celestial Gates, Part 2]


    [Description: You have reached the mysterious mountain range hidden behind the mist. To uncover the secrets hidden inside the mountain range, you must find three ancient celestial gates and pass through them. So far, you have sessfully passed through the First Celestial Gate, the Gate of the Eternal City.]


    [Objective: Seek out the Three Celestial Gates and defeat the guardians within.]


    [First Trial: Trial of the Eternal City (Complete)] n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    [Reward: Starlight Essence]


    "Looks like this was indeed one of the three celestial gates¡­" Feeling relieved that he had indeed happened to go through one of the three celestial gates, Xuan Hao also felt a bit disappointed that the description didn''t include any information on how to find the other two celestial gates.


    With how dangerous the mist covered mountain range was, it would take a long time for him to find the other two celestial gates if he wanted to ensure his own safety at the same time. Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts were still far too strong for him to face with his current strength.


    Now that I think about it, I wonder if anything changed about my status¡­


    Feeling a sudden curiosity towards his current status even though his strength had not really experienced any significant change since thest time he had viewed it, Xuan Hao decided to pull up his status. In the first ce, it was not like he had much else to do while recovering.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword (Small Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess), Dao of Space (Elementary)


    Sword Intent: Nascent Sword Soul Realm


    Talent: ???


    Physique: ??? (40% Awakened)


    Realm: Intermediate Stage Dao Domain Lord


    Professions: Alchemist (Artisan), Formation Master (Expert), cksmithing (Expert)


    Sect: Star Shattering Sect


    Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect


    Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui


    Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm)


    Looking through his status, Xuan Hao discovered that there had indeed been a few changes sincest time, the most obvious of which was the fact that he had nowprehended the Dao of Space and reached the Elementary level in terms ofprehension.


    However, other than this, there was also an unexpected change when it came to his pet, the winged lion. Different from the past, its cultivation realm had changed from the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to the Ninth stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Given that the winged demon beast should still be guarding the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts back at his old mountain peak in the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit confused. Wondering how the winged lion had managed to break through to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm within such a short period of time.


    From what he knew, the winged lion would at least need a dozen or so years to break through to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm without any form of external assistance-


    "Unless¡­"


    Remembering therge number of Nascent Soul Realm demon beast that he had the winged lion watch over before entering the mystic realm, a few ck lines appeared on his face as he had a feeling that he already knew what had caused the winged lion''s sudden explosive growth in strength.


    Hopefully his imagination would be wrong, and the winged lion demon beast had just happened to undergo enlightenment and break through to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm during his short absence¡­


    "Hah¡­ Who am I fooling, thatzy thing definitely ate arge number of those Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts¡­" Muttering this to himself with a slightly awkward smile on his lips, Xuan Hao decided to not think about the matter any longer and instead focus his full attention on recovering.


    The winged lion would have to wait until he left the mystic realm, but when he left, it better pray that it had broken through to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm this way through a sudden enlightenment!


    ¡­


    Roar!?


    Unaware of what was happening in the mystic realm, the winged lion demon beast, who waszilyying on top of its master''s old mountain peak suddenly jumped up before looking around itself filled with fear.


    Roar?


    However, after seeing that there was no one around it other than the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts that its master had left behind for him to watch over, the winged lion''s fearful expression turned into one filled with confusion. Just a moment ago, it had clearly felt a shiver run down its spine, like some kind of terrifying existence was staring directly at it, but¡­ Now that feeling had disappeared like it had never been there in the first ce. Rendering it confused as to what had just happened.


    Thinking that it might have something to do with the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts, the winged lion turned around and looked over the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast who had been obedientlyying on the ground without making a single sound after finding out that it was a Domain Lord Realm demon beast.


    Outside of the few Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts who had tried to escape just when its master had left and made his way inside the mystic realm, none of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts had dared to move a single muscle, too fearful that they would end up in a simr state as those who tried to run away.


    As for what happened to those demon beasts¡­ They had all met the same fate. Gathered together inside a certain demon beast''s stomach.


    Thinking about how delicious those demon beasts had been and the fact that they had allowed it to surpass the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and step into the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, the winged lion could not help turning around and hungrily look towards the remaining Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts gathered at the mountain peak.


    Considering that the demon beast that his master had originally intended to hand over as a reward had been among the demon beasts trying to escape earlier, perhaps he would get another chance to choose a reward among the remaining Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts¡­


    Salivating at the thought of this, the winged lion could not help starting to seize up the remaining Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts on the mountain peak. Especially focusing its attention on a few ratherrge and powerful demon beasts who were now shivering fearfully.


    Even if they had no idea what the winged lion was thinking about, they recognized the expression of winged lion to be the exact same as the one it had before it had eaten the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts who had tried to escape earlier!


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Filled with an unknown resolve and gaining new enlightenment in the face of a life and death situation, severalrge demon beasts suddenly managed toprehend their own profound body maniption techniques. Instantly using their newfound technique to shrink their own body and make themselves less appetizing in the eyes of the winged lion¡­

 Chapter 940 Sentient Trees?

    Over the next two days, Xuan Hao managed to fully recover from his fight with Aria, the guardian of the first celestial gate. At the same time, he also realized that the formation had begun to reproduce the mist from his fight with Aria. The only difference this time around was that the density of the mist increased at a much slower pacepared to how fast it had happened during his fight. Even if after two days, he could still resist the mist with his physical body alone and it would most likely still be another five days before he would be forced to leave the za.


    Although it seemed like the trial was not forcing him to leave immediately, there was still a time limit for how long he could spend inside. Unless he had enough strength to resist the power of the mist when it reached its full strength.


    However, Xuan Hao didn''t really care too much about this, as he had already managed to fully recover and had no reason to continue staying inside the trial space. The only thing he could get from staying at this point in time was expand his understanding of formations by observing the formation that was producing the mist and keeping him from leaving the za, but¡­ His current strength was far from enough to gain anything useful from observing aplicated formation like that for a few days and that was not even mentioning that his current qualifications as a formation master had only reached the Expert Realm¡­


    Given that an Expert Realm Formation Master was onlyparable to the Core Formation Realm in terms of the formations that they could set up, Xuan Hao did indeed feel like he wascking considering his current cultivation realm. After returning to the sect again, he really needed to spend some time improving on his profession. Not only because it would be useful for him in certain circumstances, but more importantly because he would need to ensure that he didn''t fall behind his disciples.


    If he really did end up falling behind his disciples when it came to professions, he would no longer be capable of helping them improve in this regard. Although it had been some time since he had been rewarded by the system by an improvement that his disciples had made, he still didn''t dare ck off in this regard!


    Shaking his head as he decided not to think about this anymore, Xuan Hao got up and turned to look in the direction of the celestial gate that had remainedpletely unchanged since its appearance two days earlier.


    Standing around for few seconds to admire the beauty of the celestial gate, Xuan Hao took a step forward and almost instantaneously crossed the short distance between himself and the celestial gate-


    Swish~!


    Passing straight through the gate only a momentter. Soon followed by the familiar feeling of space twisting and turning around him in iprehensible ways before finding himself back on the ground again.


    "Huh?"


    However, different from the tall trees and demon beast roars in the distance that he had expected, he found himself at the base of a tall mountain piercing straight through the clouds above before disappearing. Even without any knowledge of the mountain that he now found himself at the base of, he was still very clear that this was not the same location that he had entered the celestial gate through two days earlier.


    Not just that, but after looking around himself and not just the mountain in front of him, Xuan Hao discovered that the trees of the forest behind him werepletely different from the ones he had encountered so far inside the mist covered mountain range. Standing only around a dozen meters tall with normal sized trunks, or in simpler terms, a normal-looking tree that could be found everywhere.


    The only slight difference that these trees had from normal trees was their color. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    The trunk of the tree was a bluish-green color, while the leaves were a bright red with a subtle glow.


    "Hm?" Observing the trees more closely with his divine sense, Xuan Hao also noticed that the weird colored trees also had a subtle aura simr to that of a demon beast around them. Looking even closer, he even noticed that each of the trees had a cultivation base of sorts.


    However, different from the cultivation base he had seen in humans, demon beasts or other races like the half spirit race, the trees in front of him seemed to follow apletely different cultivation system!


    Thinking about it for a few seconds, this made sense. After all, trees were a bit different from humans or other living things so to speak¡­ And considering that there were several different cultivation systems among humans, like demonic cultivation and the different followers of gods, it only made sense that the trees would have their own unique cultivation system.


    "Wait! If the trees have their own unique cultivation path, doesn''t that mean that they are sentient to some degree!?" Suddenly realizing what it meant for the trees to have their own unique cultivation system, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both of his eyes cautiously for a short moment before calming down again the next second.


    The reason for this being rather obvious, the trees in question were far too weak. At most the energy contained inside the strongest among the trees had barely reached the threshold of the Foundation Establishment Realm. Far from enough to threaten someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, let alone someone who had already reached a realmparable to the Fourth Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Rustle~!


    Sensing the terrifying power of his divine sense that had momentarily burst forth for a short time, the trees located in front of Xuan Hao all started shivering violently as they began shrinking at a speed visible to the naked eye-


    Fwhoop~


    And before Xuan Hao could understand what was happening, the rapidly shrinking trees began disappearing underground. Hiding away from the terrifying existence that they had just sensed. Even though their intelligence had clearly not fully been developed yet, they still had a basic survival instinct and understood when to run away, or in their case, hide underground.


    "¡­"


    Deciding that it might be best to just ignore the somewhat sentient trees behind him, Xuan Hao focused his attention back on the tall mountain that he had appeared in front of after passing through the celestial gate. For now, he had to find out where on the mist covered mountain range he was and more importantly, if he had managed to escape from the formation.


    Whoosh~


    Not thinking too much about it, Xuan Hao decided to try the simplest way of figuring out if he was still trapped inside the formation. Go in one direction and see if anything ended up stopping him-


    BANG!


    Not something that ended up taking more than a few seconds before he gloriously crashed into a seemingly invisible barrier and fell to the ground with a rather painful expression on his face. Although he was strong, it still hurt to some degree when flying at full speed into a solid barrier without any preparation.


    "So, I''m still inside the formation¡­"


    At the very least, this short experiment allowed him to understand that he was still very much inside the formation¡­ And from the looks of it, he had been teleported to somewherepletely unknown inside the area covered by the formation.


    Luckily, the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts should still be busy fighting over the empty void and the spatial energy that it was slowly producing.


    On the not so lucky side of things, he was now in apletely unfamiliar ce and had no way to know if there was anything dangerous like the stone pedestal that had created the spatial copse nearby.


    Rustle~


    "Hm? The trees are back?"


    Just at this moment, the sound of leaves rustling sounded out behind him, inevitably causing Xuan Hao to turn around. Expecting for the scared trees to have popped back up from the ground again.


    "This¡­"


    However, what he witnessed was not the expected small trees that had popped up from the ground again. Instead, he came face to face with a giant tree standing close to three hundred meters tall, with countless small vines dangling down from above. In a sense a giant version of the smaller trees.


    The problem about this giant version of the smaller, cutter trees, was that the giant tree''s cultivation realm was no weaker than that of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts he had encountered during his escape from the copsed void left behind by the stone pedestal.


    RUSTLE-!


    And from the looks of things, the giant tree did not look friendly, as itsrge branches swayed menacingly in the air above him. Not giving him enough time to ask the question about how such arge tree had even managed to sneak up on him in the first ce.

 Chapter 941 Change Back At The Empty Void...

    Seeing the branches moving around menacingly above him, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine as he jumped to the side-


    BANG! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Just barely managing to avoid therge branches that came crashing down into the ground where he had been standing only a few seconds earlier. If he had not been fast enough to react, it was easy to imagine how bad his situation would be after being hit by thoserge branches. Even the ground that was far stronger than in the rest of the mystic realm was easily shattered under the terrifying power of those branches.


    Whoosh-!


    Not giving him any time to rx, the branches that had smashed into the ground soon came flying towards him at a terrifying speed that made it impossible to avoid in time-


    Bang! Bang!


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao used his dao domain to create several ice spikes beneath the approaching branches before having the pierce through the branches, slowing them down just enough for him to avoid the attack again.


    Swish-!


    However, different from thest time, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time before escaping in the opposite direction of therge tree. Knowing very well that his current strength was far from enough to fight against someone who had surpassed the strength of even the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts that he had encountered so far.


    Not to mention, during the short sh he had when using his ice spikes to slow down the branches, he had firsthand experienced just how tough the bark of the tree was. Even if he used all of his strength, he doubted that he would be able to do any significant damage to it¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that he had no idea if there were other simrly strong trees around!


    Although it looked like all the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast had been attracted to the empty void created by the spatial copse. Different creatures like the tree he was currently escaping from, were not as attracted to the spatial energy leaking out from the empty void.


    Rustle~


    Seeing Xuan Hao escaping, the towering tree standing more than three hundred meters tall shook itsrge crown in a satisfied manner before shrinking into the ground and disappearing like it had never been there in the first ce.


    "Hm? It left?"


    Of course, Xuan Hao discovered this, but decided to continue moving away from the weirdly colored trees. Understanding that the reason therge tree left should have been because he had also left. If he decided to go back and try to find out more about the weird trees, therge tree would almost definitely return again, and he had no way to know if it would chase after him at that point in time.


    Thump~


    Coming to a stop after travelling like this for a little over half an hour, Xuan Hao used his divine sense to sweep through his surroundings and make sure that there weren''t some powerful demon beasts nearby that would ambush him the moment he stopped paying attention.


    In the end, the most powerful demon beast was only a small boar that had just reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. Even if it attacked him without him defending himself, he doubted that it would even be able to leave a scratch with its strength. However, it was unlucky enough to be the sole focus of his divine sense for a short second-


    Roar?!


    Something that scared it so much that it fell on its back with all its legs in the air before it began showing its defenseless stomach.


    "Why is a boar demon beast doing this? Isn''t this the wrong animal¡­?" Not really something Xuan Hao had expected to see from a boar demon beast.


    No, that doesn''t matter, I need to figure out what I''m going to do now!


    Shaking his head as he looked away from the unique boar demon beast that he had the joy of meeting, Xuan Hao turned his attention to the important question at hand.


    Given that most of the dangerous creatures in the forest were busy fighting for control over the empty void, he should be rtively safe traversing the forest. For this reason, he had two options on how to use this time. The first was to search for a way out of the forest, while the other was to try and find the remaining two celestial gates.


    Considering the fact that the first celestial gate had been inside the formation, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the other two would also be inside the formation. The only problem with this was the fact that he had no idea where these two celestial gates were and would have to search through the entire forest. Not like the other option, where he would only have to search around the edges for a weak point in the formation.


    "Haaa¡­ Why am I even thinking about this, obviously I will stay inside the formation and try to find the remaining celestial gates¡­" Muttering this to himself as a wry smile made its way to his lips, Xuan Hao took a step forward and disappeared deeper inside the forest.


    Roar?


    Leaving a terrified boar demon beast shivering in fear not too far away, its small feet and defenseless stomach facing the air for all of the other nearby demon beasts to look on with confused expressions. None of them understood what had happened to the strongest demon beast in their little part of the forest.


    ¡­


    ROOOOOAR!


    At the same time Xuan Hao had decided to search for the remaining two celestial gates, a loud roar echoed out across the battlefield back at the empty void. Following which one of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts fell to the ground withouting back up.


    Not too far away, the demon beast responsible for the terrifying roar earlier dashed forward and bit into the throat of the motionless demon beast on the ground. Killing it before it had a chance to mount any form of resistance. Officially marking the first death of a Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast during the struggle for control over the empty void and the spatial energy that it produced. Showing just how important it was for these Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts who had remained stuck at the same realm for thousands of years without any sign of progress.


    Outside of just this, the demon beasts present also felt that after breaking through, they would be able to escape from the small forest and finally explore the world outside.


    Although most of the demon beasts had been born inside the forest, they still had a certain level of intelligence and had long ago managed to understand that there was a far bigger world outside of their small forest by interrogating the small demon beasts that happened to make their way inside the forest by ident from time to time.


    ROOOA-


    Ptsh-!


    Letting out another roar to assert its dominance over the rest of the demon beast and also state its im on the empty void with its superior strength, the powerful demon beast that had just managed to kill a Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast didn''t have the time to finish its roar before a small and feeble looking rabbit demon beast suddenly appeared behind it and stabbed its hand right through its chest. Instantly killing the unprepared and exhausted demon beast in the process.


    Squeak~!


    Making a cute squeaking noise after having killed the massive demon beast with the strength to kill a Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast, the small and feeble looking rabbit demon beast established its dominance like the now dead demon beast had tried to do just a second ago.


    Unfortunately, the cute squeaking noises of the small rabbit demon beast was far less intimidating and didn''t have any effect against the rest of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts.


    ROOOAR!


    ROOOOOAR!


    ROAR!


    On the other hand, it seemed like it had a negative effect, as the rest of the demon beast all began charging towards the small rabbit demon beast filled with killing intent. None of them viewed the rabbit demon beast as a threat due to its small size and its strength that had only reached the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    As for how a small rabbit demon beast in the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm had managed to kill a Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast that had the strength to kill other Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts? They all thought that it was due to the other demon beast having been severely weakened after its battle and not paying attention to its surroundings. Giving the weak rabbit demon beast a chance tounch a sneak attack and kill it!


    SQUEAK!?


    Having expected that its awesome power and majestic visage would intimidate the rest of the demon beasts into submission, the rabbit demon beast let out a surprised squeak before realizing the danger of its current situation before quickly turning around and escaping.


    ROOOAR!


    ROOOOOOOOOAR!


    ROAR!


    Unfortunately for the rabbit demon beast, the rest of the demon beasts present had been thoroughly enraged by its earlier disy of arrogance and decided to momentarily put a halt on the fight for the empty void as they all began chasing after the small rabbit demon beast. None of them cared too much about leaving the empty void for a short time. After all, to experience any effect from the spatial energy, they would need to absorb it for at least a few years¡­

 Chapter 942 Troublesome Rabbit Appears

    SQUEAK-!


    "Hm? A rabbit?" Searching through the massive forest that seemed to be never ending for close to 10 hours without encountering anything of interest, Xuan Hao could not help showing a confused expression on his face as a small rabbit demon beast suddenly appeared at the edge of his divine sense before heading straight for where he was standing. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    If it was just a normal rabbit demon beast that should have been somewhere around the Qi Condensation or Foundation Establishment Realm, he wouldn''t have cared too much about it, but the rabbit demon beast that had appeared at the edge of his divine sense had actually managed to reach the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Even if he was stronger than the rabbit demon beast, it still posed a certain level of danger considering that it had reached the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Whoosh~


    For this reason, Xuan Hao didn''t dare be the slightest bit careless, as his dao domain spread out and blocked the rabbit demon beast before it could get any closer to him.


    Squeak!?


    Not having expected its path to get blocked, the rabbit demon beast froze on the spot with a confused squeak emerging from its small mouth. Having no idea what it was going to do now that its path forward had suddenly been blocked.


    ROOOAR!


    However, before Xuan Hao or the rabbit demon beast had a chance to do anything other than stare at each other from the distance, a loud roar echoed out across the forest followed by arge demon beast appearing not too far behind the rabbit demon beast.


    "Peak Soul Ascension Realm¡­" From a single nce, Xuan Hao realized that the demon beast that had just appeared had reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, a demon beast that he wanted nothing more than to avoid if possible. The only positive thing was the fact that the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast didn''t seem to care about him and had its full attention focused on the rabbit demon beast that hade to a stop in front of his dao domain.


    At the very least, it looks like I will be able to escape without having to deal with a Peak Soul Ascension-


    ROOOAR!


    ROAR!


    ROOOOOOAAAR!


    Not even managing to finish his thoughts, several loud roars suddenly echoed out behind the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast that had just shown up before arge number of simrly powerful demon beasts appeared. All of them staring towards the rabbit demon beast filled with killing intent. Not a single one of them seemed to pay any attention to him and insteadpletely ignored him.


    Realizing that the demon beasts did not care about him and were instead fully focused on the rabbit demon beast in front of him, Xuan Hao felt himself rx a bit as he began feeling curious as to what in the world a small rabbit demon beast had done to anger so many Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast.


    Even if he tried his best, he doubted he would be able to get so many Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts to chase after him¡­


    Squeak!


    Realizing the danger of its current situation with its enemies having caught up to it and its path forward blocked, the rabbit demon beast started panicking. Only now realizing that it might have made a mistake earlier when it decided to assert its dominance over the other demon beasts.


    Roar!


    Hearing the roar of one of the demon beasts that had been chasing after it for the past few hours before it slowly began making its way towards it with an arrogant expression on its furry face, the rabbit demon beast could not help feeling an intense sense of anger built up inside of it.


    If not for the fact that it was currently trapped with nowhere to escape, it would have taught that arrogant demon beast a lesson!


    ROAR!


    Not aware of the thoughts going through the head of the rabbit demon beast, the rest of the demon beasts also began to make their way towards the rabbit demon beast. All of them savoring the intense fear and panic spreading across the face of the rabbit demon beast as it realized that it had nowhere to escape from them.


    "¡­"


    Watching this entire thing take ce, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say. The only thought going through his head being that the high-level demon beasts in front of him were truly unique¡­


    Well, I should get going before I end up getting caught up in this.


    Swish-!


    Not wanting to end up attracting the attention of the demon beasts after they had finished off the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao retracted his dao domain before leaving in the opposite direction of the demon beasts.


    In the first ce, he still needed to find the two remaining celestial gates. The fact that the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts that he thought would be gathered at the empty void had all appeared at the same time only ended up making him feel like he was running out of time.


    For this reason, he didn''t realize that he ended up leaving an open path for the rabbit demon beast to escape in when he had retreated his dao domain before the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts had a chance to get their hands on it.


    The rabbit demon beast who had been looking for any chance to escape from its current situation on the other hand-


    Squeak!?


    Swish!


    Instantly noticed the escape path and jumped on the opportunity to escape from the demon beasts who were arrogantly approaching it filled with killing intent. Escaping in the exact same direction that Xuan Hao had left in. Not because it wanted to chase after Xuan Hao, but because the other paths had already been blocked out by the demon beasts chasing after it at this point in time.


    Roar? ROOOAR!


    Seeing the rabbit demon beast that they had finally managed to corner escape again, the demon beasts who had been preparing to torment the arrogant rabbit that had dared to humiliate them, all began roaring violently as even more killing intent appeared in their eyes.


    Not to mention the fact that the weak rabbit demon beast had actually managed to escape from them only having passed the Second Tribtion, but they had actually been fooled by it once again.


    Roar!


    Remembering the person that had blocked its escape path earlier, one of the demon beasts could not helpining to the rest of the demon beasts. Thinking that Xuan Hao was in on it and had nned all of this out together with the rabbit demon beast to make a fool of them!


    Although none of them had any clue if this was really the case, the rest of the demon beasts were soon convinced. In the end, Xuan Hao had unknowingly be the target of this group of Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts without doing anything other than identally stand in front of the rabbit demon beast and block its escape path for a short moment.


    If he knew this would end up causing him to get targeted by a group of Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts, he would have run away the moment that the rabbit demon beast had appeared in his divine sense instead of remaining in the same location until the group of demon beasts showed up.


    ¡­


    Squeak!


    Having left the rabbit demon beasts and the powerful Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts and continued to move withouting to a stop for over two hours where he happened to find some clues pointing towards a possible path simr to the one that he had found leading to the first celestial gate, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself as he turned around and looked at the familiar looking rabbit demon beast that appeared in front of him.


    "Why is this thing here again? Did it escape those Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts?" Muttering this to himself as he observed the exhausted looking rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao could not help secretly admiring the demon beast for having the ability to escape so many Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts with its current cultivation base. Even if it was also in the Soul Ascension Realm, its strength was far below those Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts.


    Squeak!


    Letting out another squeak after it spotted Xuan Hao, the rabbit demon beast did not stop likest time when it encountered his dao domain, but instead continued straight into it-


    "Hm? What does thing little thing want?"


    Confusing Xuan Hao who had no idea about what this little thing was up to.


    In the end, curiosity got the better of him and he decided to observe and see what it was up to instead of using his dao domain to attack it. After all, with his current strength, he didn''t fear that the rabbit demon beast would be able to do anything to him when inside his dao domain.

 Chapter 943 Second Celestial Gate

    Squeak!


    Seeing that Xuan Hao did not attack it, the small rabbit demon beast felt its confidence grow as it made its way over to Xuan Hao. Not because it wanted to have him fight off the demon beasts currently chasing after it, but because it felt that following him might give it a better chance at escapingpared to just running around in circles without any set goal in mind like it was currently doing. Not to mention, there was no way that it expected Xuan Hao to have the ability to fight against so many Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts.


    "This¡­ Does it want to follow after me? Does it perhaps think I know a way out of this forest?" Muttering this to himself as he watched the rabbit demon beast stop a few meters away from him before obediently waiting for him to move like a normal pet, Xuan Hao was once again left speechless by this weird rabbit demon beast- N?v(el)B\\jnn


    ROOOOAR!


    And hearing the loud roaring sound growing closer to his current location, he decided to leave and follow the barely visible path in the grass. Deciding to ignore the rabbit demon beast for now and instead focus on finding the second celestial gate.


    As for the demon beasts chasing after the rabbit demon beast? With his current strength andprehension of the Dao of Space, they wouldn''t be able to catch up to him if he didn''t want them to. Not to mention, if the rabbit demon beast couldn''t keep up with him, it wouldn''t be able to follow him in the first ce!


    Continuing deeper into the forest along the path, it did not take long before arge gate simr to the first celestial gate that he had encountered appeared in front of him. Even without inspecting the gate personally, it was easy to conclude that the gate in front of him was one of the two remaining celestial gates that he was looking for.


    "Hm!? This is¡­"


    The celestial gate itself was not much different from the first that he had encountered and filled him with the same sense of powerlessness that he had felt back then when first facing the terrifying primordial power dormant inside the first celestial gate. Even if he had already experienced it, the fraction of power leaking out from the celestial gate in front of him was more than enough to cause a shiver to run down his spine.


    Although the celestial gate in front of him was simr to the first celestial gate, after calming himself down, he still managed to spot a clear difference between the gate in front of him and the first celestial gate¡­ And that was the fact that the thin mist engulfing the second celestial gate was a bright green color. Filled with a seemingly boundless and inexhaustible vitality.


    Thump~


    But Xuan Hao didn''t end up standing around more for a few seconds to examine the mist before he stepped forward into the bright green mist without the slightest bit of hesitation.


    Whoosh-!


    Different from the twisting and turning of space that he had observed after stepping through the first celestial gate, the bright green mist began moving around him gently pushed him through a bright green portal before carrying him through the void without any signs of the Dao of space being used in the process. Making Xuan Hao doubt whether or not the Dao of Space was the only way to travel through the void over long distances. However, this thought soon disappeared, as he understood that his current cultivation realm was far too low to even attempt trying to do something like teleporting without the use of the Dao of Space.


    The sheer power required for something like that was something that he couldn''t evenprehend in his current realm.


    Squeak?


    Arriving at the celestial gate only a few secondster, the rabbit demon beast curiously tilted its head as it looked up towards therge gate that had suddenly appeared in front of it. Even when faced with the terrifying primordial power that was leaking out from the gate, it remainedpletely unaffected. Instead, it was far more focused on the remnants of Xuan Hao''s aura that pointed towards him entering the gate-


    Squeak!


    Swish~


    So, not wasting a single second on observing the gate any further, the rabbit demon beast directly jumped into the green mist before disappearing from the forest.


    Rustle~


    A few minutester, the first of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts emerged from the thick foliage around the celestial gate-


    Roar?!


    However, different from the rabbit demon beast, it started shaking violently with a fearful expression on its face. Not even daring to look towards the celestial gate in front of it!


    Roar!


    Roar!


    A few other demon beasts that emerged behind it were in a simr state, as none of them dared to approach the celestial gate. Only capable of observing it from a far with fearful expressions on their faces. Deep down, their instincts told them that death would be the only oue if they dared to pass through the towering gate in front of them.


    Bang!


    Crack-!


    It was at this moment that arge ape demon beast more than a dozen meters tall smashed through a few trees before arriving at the opening where the second celestial gate was located.


    ROOOOAR-!


    Looking towards the celestial gate, instead of retreating fearfully like the rest of the demon beasts had done, it felt like the primordial power was challenging it and began charging towards the celestial gate filled with killing intent-


    Whoosh~


    However, before it had a chance to attack the celestial gate, it ended up passing straight through the bright green mist. Disappearing from the forest without even getting a chance to leave the green mist surrounding the entrance of the gate.


    Roar?


    Seeing this, the surrounding demon beasts who were fearfully quivering in front of the second celestial gate could not help looking up with surprised expressions on their faces. Only now realizing how cowardly they were acting.


    If the rabbit demon beast had dared to go though the gate, how could they, as the senior demon beasts, not do the same!?


    As the surrounding demon beasts thought about this, a hint of shame appeared on their faces before being reced by anger-


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    And the next moment, these demon beasts all charged forward into the celestial gate. Suppressing the inherent fear that they felt from the primordial power with the anger they felt towards the rabbit demon beast that had dared to humiliate them. Soon enough, not a single demon beast was left waiting in front of the celestial gate as all of them had decided to charge into it!


    ¡­


    Unaware of the fact that the rabbit demon beast and all of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts had been fearless enough to follow him inside the celestial gate, Xuan Hao began to curiously inspect his surroundings as he wondered what kind of guardian, he would have to face this time around.


    Looking around himself in an attempt to find out more about his new environment, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit baffled when he realized that there was nothing other than grass ins stretching endlessly in all directions around him.


    "Hm? Other than being tall, the grass here also has the ability to restrict my divine sense to some degree!?" Discovering that the grass covering the endless ins also had the ability to restrict his divine sense, Xuan Hao understood that this was most likely something that had to do with the guardian of the second celestial gate.


    As for what it had to do with the guardian, he could only hope that it wasn''t something simr to Aria, who had managed to take control of the mist and use it to attack him.


    If the guardian of the second celestial gate really did have the ability to control the endless sea of green and use it to attack him, Xuan Hao really doubted he would be able to face off this kind of guardian with his current strength. After all, from what he could gather from a short look at the grass around him, its toughness was already on par with some demon beasts in the Earlier Stages of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Although it would not be impossible to fight against, it would not be easy in any way. Especially considering how much grass was around him.


    Now that I think about it, I wonder if there is another Scroll of Trials somewhere in here as well¡­


    Whoosh-!


    Remembering the Scroll of Trials that he had encountered inside the first celestial gate, Xuan Hao did not waste any time before jumping into the air and using his eyes to scan the endless sea of green for anything that stood out now that his divine sense had been rendered close to useless by the tall grass.


    "Found it!"


    Not taking too long to spot an odd stone pedestal with a scroll on top of it in the distance, Xuan Hao descended to the ground before making his way towards the stone pedestal.


    Squeak!?


    Unknown to Xuan Hao, not too far away, a certain rabbit demon beast that had chased him into the celestial gate happened to spot him when he jumped into the air.

 Chapter 944 Emerald Serpent

    Reaching the pedestal that was barely visible in the tall grass, Xuan Hao examined the scroll on top of it for any hidden traps or other things that might prove dangerous. Even if the first Scroll of Trials that he had encountered did not have any sorts of defenses or traps guarding it, there was no guarantee that it would be the same for the other trials.


    Only after finding no traps or hidden defense mechanisms inside or around the pedestal did Xuan Hao pick up the Scroll of Trials for the second celestial gate. Feeling curious about what kind of guardian he would encounter this time around and if there were any weaknesses that he could take advantage of. Maybe more important. Finding out if the guardian had the ability to control the tall grass all around him.


    If it really had the ability to control the tall grass, he would have to figure out ways to deal with the seemingly endless sea of green all around him without exhausting himself too much in the process¡­


    "Hm? Trial of the Emerald Serpent? So, the guardian of this trial is a serpent?" Muttering this to himself as he read through the first part of the Scroll of Trials, Xuan Hao could not help ncing towards the tall grass that surrounded him from all sides. For some reason, he had a feeling that he understood why the trial took ce on a seemingly endless grassy in.


    Turning his attention back to the Scroll of Trials before reading through the rest of it, Xuan Hao managed to get a general idea about the guardian that he was going to face.


    The guardian itself was a special kind of demon beast called an Emerald Serpent, a demon beast that specialized in hunting in environments with tall grass. The environment that he now found himself inside of was one such environment. The only difference being the fact that the tall grass all around him was a special kind of grass called Sense Depravation Grass that reduced the sense of anyone below the Earth Immortal Realm ording to the Scroll of Trials.


    As for why the Scroll of Trials had been so kind to provide this much information this time around¡­ That was because he didn''t just need to face a single Emerald Serpent but had to kill at least three before being able to sessfully pass the trial!


    Although killing three demon beasts might not sound like a lot, it still had to be known that the weakest Emerald Serpent had at least reached the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, while the stronger ones had reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    To make matters even worse, the Emerald Serpents below the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm all hunted in groups of three or more!


    A special demon beast that tends to gather in groups when its strength is below the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ What in the world caused the difficulty of this trial to increase by so muchpared to thest!?


    Feeling a hint of fear as he finished reading through the Trial of Scrolls, Xuan Hao could not understand why the difficulty of the second trial seemed to have increased by so muchpared to the first. Even if he was more than confident enough to kill a demon beast that had reached the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, the same could not be said when there were two other demon beasts with simr strength around.


    As for killing a Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast? He had already tried fighting one before and understood very well that killing a demon beast like that was not something that was going to be easy with his current strength. Even if he did seed in killing one, he still had to think about possible ambushes from other Emerald Serpents.


    ROOOAR! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Lost in thought as he thought about why the difficulty of the second trial had suddenly spiked by so muchpared to the first trial, a loud roar that sounded nowhere near the hissing sound of a serpent, echoed out across the empty grass in.


    "Hm? I''m sure that was not one of the Emerald Serpents, but what- Ah! The demon beasts who were after the rabbit demon beast! Don''t tell me¡­ Did they perhaps enter the celestial gate!?" Turning to look in the direction that the loud roar had emerged from, Xuan Hao could not help showing a shocked expression on his face after spotting arge demon beast the size of a small hill making its way through the tall grass without the slightest bit of cation present on its face.


    "The difficulty increases depending on the cultivation base of the one taking the trial." ncing back down at the Scroll of Trials still in his hands, Xuan Hao could not help repeating thest sentence on the scroll before a hint of realization appeared in his eyes.


    The difficulty of the trial increased depending on the cultivation base of the one taking the trial¡­ And given that there was more than one person taking the trial, with most of them having reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, the trial changed ordingly to fit their cultivation base.


    Killing a group of Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts below the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm or a single Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon presented level of difficulty that could almost be considered simr with its own unique challenge. In a sense, the trial was well constructed for someone who had reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm. The only problem was¡­ He was still far away from reaching the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "Hah¡­ Maybe I should have just killed that rabbit and prevented it from following me¡­" Shaking his head as he remembered the rabbit demon beast that should have followed him inside the celestial gate, causing the rest of the demon beasts to also enter the celestial gate, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit regretful that he didn''t do anything to prevent the rabbit demon beast from chasing after him.


    ROOOOOOAR!


    BOOOOM-!


    Just at this moment, a simrly loud roar once again echoed out once again before a loud collision of two powerful energies suddenly overtook it. Even without having seen who attacked the hill sized demon beast, he could still tell that both sides had reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "One of the demon beasts from the forest encountered one of the Emerald Serpents." Hiding himself as he poked his head above the tall grass to observe the fight that was taking ce, Xuan Hao began to examine therge emerald colored serpent in the process of coiling itself around the massive hill sized demon beast.


    Considering that he had to at least kill three Emerald Serpents before being able toplete the trial, he did not n to give up an opportunity to observe itsbat abilities firsthand and see if he could find any weakness that he could take advantage of.


    Bang! Bang!


    As the two demon beasts violently thrashed around in the tall grass without the slightest bit of care towards possibly attracting more Emerald Serpents and other demon beasts to their location, Xuan Hao got a perfect chance to observe some of the Emerald Serpent''s attack patterns, special abilities, and weaknesses. For one, he learnt that the Emerald Serpent had a weak spot on its scaly body located just a few meters below its head on its underbelly. Another would be the Emerald Serpents weird ability to suddenly grow poisonous spikes all over its body and shoot them out in all directions-


    Ptsh-!


    ROOAR!?


    He really needed to thank the hill sized demon beast for its help after the battle ended. If not for the demon beast''s help in finding out what kind of abilities the Emerald Serpents had, he would really end up suffering with how many deadly techniques the Emerald Serpent began to show off in its battle against it.


    ¡­


    ROOOOOAR!


    Unaware of the fact that Xuan Hao was watching it getting beaten up by the Emerald Serpent without the slightest chance to fight back against it, the demon beast in question could not help letting out a loud roar filled with both pain and anger before looking towards the Emerald Serpent, that had grown brand-newyer of poisonous spikes all over its body, filled with killing intent.


    If not for the fact that the snake in front of it was far too slippery, it would have long since jumped forward to rip it apart. After all, even if both of them had reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, the Emerald Serpent did not have the same level of defense as the hill sized demon beast who could continue to take a beating without dying.


    Comparable to an unkible giant like this, the Emerald Serpent was rathercking. Even the single sh from the start had been more than enough to seriously injure it. All things considered, the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast from the forest was stronger than the Emerald Serpent and not by a small margin.


    The only thing that kept the Emerald Serpent alive, was the fact that it was extremely slippery and hard to hit¡­

 Chapter 945 Possible Future Sect Guardian Beast

    As the fight between the two demon beasts continued without any winner appearing, the sound of loud roars began echoing out in the distance before arge number of powerful auras appeared in the distance before rushing towards the direction where the hill sized demon beast and the emerald serpent were fighting. Something that both of these Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts were not the slightest bit excited about, as both of them understood that these demon beasts would only wait on the side until they were exhausted and unable to mount a proper defense.


    Although, considering the fact that the emerald serpent''s defense was far weaker, it was by far the one who worried the most after sensing five different Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts approaching its current location-


    Swoosh~


    And without wasting a single second, it disengaged from therge demon beast that it had entangled itself with before disappearing into the tall grass. Not leaving a single trace of its presence behind in the process.


    Roar!?


    Not expecting its opponent to just run away so quickly, the hill sized demon beast let out a surprised sound before it turned to look in the direction of the approaching demon beasts. Unlike the emerald serpent that had been able to easily slip away, it did not really have the same level of agility and speed. At the very least, it had not sustained any serious injuries during its short fight with the emerald serpent and was more than confident that it would be able to fight back in case any of the approaching demon beasts happened to think that they could take advantage of its current injured state.


    ROOOOOAR!


    Letting out a loud roar filled with killing intent and its powerful cultivation base, it fully demonstrated that it was more than strong enough to fight back in case any of the five approaching demon beasts had any ns to do so¡­ And the rapid decrease in speed of the five approaching demon beasts who had been using all of their strength to dash towards its current location was more than enough to show that these five demon beasts had indeed been thinking about taking advantage of it during its battle.


    Although the demon beasts who had alle from the forest to chase after the rabbit demon beast were more than happy to work together with each other inside an unfamiliar environment, they also wouldn''t let go of the chance to get rid of a possible contender for the empty void.


    The danger that the grass in and emerald serpents posed to them was far from enough to make these powerful demon beasts work together without stabbing each other in the back if a chance presented itself. The earlier fear that they had felt towards the celestial gate before entering it had almostpletely disappeared after they realized that the strongest creature on the other side had only barely reached a cultivation realm simr to their own. Even if it was still dangerous, this was far from enough to make them feel the same level of fear that they had felt when first facing the celestial gate... Unless there was something even more terrifying lurking in the tall grass.


    Watching all of this unfold from the side, Xuan Hao could not help curiously looking in the direction that the emerald serpent had disappeared in. Despite the fact that it had already disappeared from view, it was still possible for him to sense the faint presence of the emerald serpent lurking around in the tall grass around the hill sized demon beast.


    Unfortunately for the hill sized demon beast, it didn''t look like it had realized this. Instead keeping its attention focused on the approaching demon beasts.


    Hm? Did it notice me!?


    Feeling a gaze suddenly locking onto him, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes as his dao domain silently began spreading out in the area around him without alerting therge demon beast in the distance.


    If the emerald serpent had really noticed him, it would be impossible to avoid alerting therge demon beast not too far away, but¡­ If it hadn''t noticed him, he at the very least wanted to make sure that he didn''t end up drawing its attention by using his dao domain to prepare himself for a possible attack. Especially considering that using his dao domain like he would do normally, would not only draw the attention of the emerald serpent and therge demon beast, but also the five approaching demon beasts.


    No matter how confident he was in his current strength, he did not really feel confident in his odds of surviving a fight with seven Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts¡­


    Squeak!


    However, instead of the emerald serpent that he expected to appear in front of him, what appeared was instead the small rabbit demon beast that had followed after him and ended up leading all of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast inside the celestial gate. In the end resulting in the increased difficulty of the second celestial gate''s trial.


    "¡­"


    Staring at the small rabbit that had caused his current precarious situation, Xuan Hao could not help feeling like he wanted to enjoy some rabbit stew to calm himself down.


    Squeak~!


    Not aware of its current dangerous situation, the small rabbit demon beast let out a happy squeaking sound before walking over to Xuan Hao. After having followed him, the rabbit demon beast had already understood that its best chance of surviving therge number of powerful demon beasts who wanted it dead was to continue following after him.


    As for the possible danger that Xuan Hao could pose to it¡­ The rabbit demon beast didn''t think too much about this, as it had already witnessed how Xuan Hao had decided to ignore it instead of attacking it like the other demon beasts had done. Making it think that it had finally met someone who had recognized its awesome power.


    "This¡­ Does it perhaps want me to take it in?" Not aware of what was going through the head of the small rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao could only guess what the rabbit demon beast wanted from its behavior¡­ And in his eyes, it looked like the rabbit demon beast was trying its best to have him take it in.


    Despite the fact that the rabbit demon beast might not be that strong in his eyes, it was still a demon beast in the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Even in the entire Sky Empire, it would be hard to find such a powerful demon beast outside of a few forbidden regions. If took it in and made it a guardian demon beast for the Star Shattering Sect, the sect would be far stronger than before and at the same time, it would also serve as an encouragement for a certainzy lion to improve its strength if it wanted to be the number one demon beast of the sect again.


    It was because of this Xuan Hao didn''t immediately decide to enact his revenge on the small rabbit in front of him and instead just observed it.


    Squeak!


    Seeing that Xuan Hao was observing it, the small rabbit proudly squeaked towards him as it thought he wanted to take in its majestic aura before deciding to show off its silky-smooth fur by rolling around on the ground to show off every single part of its beautiful fur with a prideful expression on its face.


    "Is this a sign of submission¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he looked down at the rabbit demon beast who had suddenly begun rolling around on the ground with a somewhat weird expression on its face, Xuan Hao felt that this was a confirmation of his earlier believe that the rabbit demon beast was indeed trying to submit to him and have him take it in.


    Well¡­ If it really wants to, I don''t mind making it the guardian demon beast of the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    Whoosh~


    Thinking about this as he continued observing the weird behavior of the small rabbit, Xuan Hao decided to use his dao domain to draw up a simple blood contract. Although this kind of contract was one closer to that of equals and didn''t require any essence blood from the demon beast like the blood pact he signed with the winged lion demon beast, it was one of the mostmon kinds of contracts between humans and demon beasts.


    The content of the blood contract was rather simple, the rabbit demon beast would be a guardian demon beast of the Star Shattering Sect and in return it would get spirit stones and other resources that would help it increase its strength.


    As long as he was stronger than the rabbit demon beast, he didn''t have to worry about it breaking the contract.


    Squeak?


    Not understanding the weird floating contract in front of it, the rabbit demon beast thought it was some kind of gift due to the thick spiritual qi gathered inside the blood contract that had been created by Xuan Hao-


    Whoosh~ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Squeak!


    It dashed headfirst into the contract before absorbing it. Unknowingly epting the blood contract in the process¡­

 Chapter 946 Narrow Escape

    Thump~


    Squeak?


    Landing on the ground as the blood contract disappeared after being absorbed by it, the rabbit demon beast let out a slightly confused squeaking sound before looking around itself with an even more confused expression on its face. Not understanding where the spiritual energy inside the blood contract had disappeared after it finished absorbing it.


    The spiritual energy inside the blood contract was plentiful as it had contained part of Xuan Hao''s own power. If not for this, it would have been impossible for the blood contract to work with a powerful demon beast in the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. This was also the reason why the rabbit demon beast had been so tempted to absorb the blood contract in the first ce. Of course¡­ Unknown to the rabbit demon beast, this spiritual energy had been used up shortly after the blood contract had been epted¡­


    Not aware of this fact, the rabbit demon beast thought that it might have identally wasted the spiritual energy inside the contract by mistake in its earlier haste to absorb it as quickly as possible-


    Squeak~


    And not wasting a single second, it turned to look up towards Xuan Hao who had given it the spiritual energy with a sad expression on its small cuddly face. Almost looking like it was begging for more of the delicious spiritual energy that it had only managed to get a small taste of before it had disappeared.


    This¡­ Does it perhaps want the spirit stones that were promised ording to the agreement of the contract now?


    Rustle~


    Squeak!


    Deciding to take out a few spirit stones in front of the rabbit demon beast to test if this was the case, Xuan Hao watched as the rabbit demon beast happily jumped forward before swallowing the spirit stones in front of it in an instant before happilyying down on the ground to absorb the spiritual energy that it had just devoured. Confirming his suspicion that it did indeed want the spirit stones that was agreed on ording to the blood contract.


    But¡­ What am I going to do with it now?


    Looking down at the rabbit demon beast that was nowying on the ground in front of him, Xuan Hao felt a bit helpless as he remembered the powerful demon beasts who were getting closer to his current location. Even if the hill sized demon beast and the emerald serpent had not managed to detect him yet, it didn''t mean that the approaching demon beast wouldn''t do so. Especially considering that the emerald serpent and hill sized demon beast were busy fight with each other¡­ And that was not mentioning the rabbit demon beast lying on the ground in front of him without the slightest care about what was happening around it.


    Different from him, the rabbit demon beast didn''t really have a way to properly hide its presence. On the other hand, it looked more like it was trying to get found with how its cultivation base had started leaking after it had started absorbing the spirit stones.


    If not for the fact that he had jumped in and used his dao domain to block the aura of the rabbit demon beast from leaking any further, it would have been impossible for the hill sized demon beast and the emerald serpent to not have noticed its presence.


    I should first assess the situation of the demon beasts before I do anything-


    "This¡­"


    Deciding to poke his head up above the tall grass to get a better idea of the current situation, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on the spot as he not only realized that the five Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts were far faster than he had expected, but they had also decided to split up and encircle the hill sized demon beast who was looking less than happy at the current situation.


    From the looks of things, the five Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts had alle to the single decision of encircling the hill sized demon beast from all sides.


    As for the reason they would do something like this¡­ It was rather obvious that they hade decided to team up and kill the already injured demon beast.


    Even if its size and defensive powers were superior to that of an ordinary Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast, it had still been weakened to some degree by the emerald serpent''s earlier attack and couldn''t make full use of its power. Something that the approaching demon beasts had realized at some point in time and decided to take advantage of.


    Normally, all of this would not really have been a problem for Xuan Hao and the rabbit demon beast, as he should be able to keep both of them hidden if he used his dao domain to hide the rabbit demon beast, but¡­ It just so happened that the decision to encircle the hill sized demon beast had resulted in one of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts moving in a straight path towards the location where he and the rabbit demon beast were currently hiding.


    Although his dao domain could be considered decent at hiding from others, this would only work at a certain distance if the other party was in the Soul Ascension Realm. Especially if that other party was stronger than him.


    Even at their current reduced speed, it would not take more than a few seconds before one of them would be close enough to detect the small rabbit demon beast in front of him through his dao domain before also finding him!


    Whoosh-!


    Knowing that there was not any time to waste with the demon beast growing closer to his current location, Xuan hao decided to pick up the rabbit demon beast who was still fully absorbed in absorbing the spiritual energy of the spirit stones without the slightest care in the world before moving in the opposite direction of the approaching demon beast.


    Although this would make him move closer to the hill sized demon beast, he would at the very least buy some more time for himself and the rabbit demon beast. Using the Dao of Space for short distance teleportation was not really an option, as the space around him was like an unmovable rock when he tried using his Drifting Cloud Steps. Even basic forms of spatial maniption with his current understanding of space were close to impossible, the only thing he could barely perform was the basic flight he learnt after reaching the Domain Lord Realm-


    "Hm?"


    Suddenly realizing something as he was getting closer and closer to the hill sized demon beast, Xuan Hao came to an abrupt stop.


    ROAR!?


    Only a secondter, the surprised roar of a demon beast sounded out a few hundred meters behind him, as one of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts in the process of encircling the hill sized demon beast, found him and the rabbit demon beast.


    Squeak!?


    Finally waking up from its spirit stone absorbing power nap, the rabbit demon beast let out a fearful squeak upon realizing that one of the demon beasts who had been chasing after it was now directly in front of it.


    ROOOOOAR!


    Recognizing the rabbit demon beast, the moment it heard its squeaking, the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast let out a roar filled with killing intent-


    ROOOAR!


    ROAR!


    ROOOAR!


    Alerting the other demon beasts at the same time. Instantly saving the hill sized demon beast in the process, as all of the demon beasts now turned their attention towards Xuan Hao and the rabbit demon beast.


    After all, the goal of them entering the trial in the first ce, was to hunt down the rabbit demon beast. In the end, killing the rabbit demon beast was far more important to them than getting rid of a possible contender for the empty void!


    Swish~! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Feeling the killing intent directed towards him and the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao did not panic and instead used the opportunity to jump into the air before ascending at a rapid pace. Soon disappearing inside one of the clouds floating above the grass in.


    ROOAR!


    Seeing this, the demon beasts on the ground let out roars filled with killing intent before jumping into the air. Intending to follow after him, but-


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    All of them soon realized that they had lost their ability of flight and ended up falling back down again after having reached a height of close to a thousand meters.


    Different from Xuan Hao who hadprehended the Dao of Space and used his understanding to at the very least retain his ability to fly, the demon beasts nowying on the ground with confused expressions on their faces, did notprehend the Dao of Space and did therefore not retain their ability to fly.


    If it had been a bird demon beast, Xuan Hao would really not have known how to escape, but luckily all of the demon beasts present werend based and did not have a pair of wings that they could use to chase after him¡­

 Chapter 947 Chaotic Battle

    Roar!


    Roooar!


    Only able to let out roars filled with both confusion and panic after discovering that they had lost their ability to fly, the five Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts could only watch as Xuan Hao and the rabbit demon beast as they disappeared inside one of the clouds above.


    Swish~


    Making full use of the opportunity when the five Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts were distracted, the hill sized demon beast chose to ignore Xuan Hao and the rabbit demon beast and directly ran past the encirclement formed by the five Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast before escaping into the distant. Not daring to slow down and give them the opportunity to encircle it again.


    Roar!?


    Realizing this toote, the five demon beasts who had hatched a perfect n to deal with the hill sized demon beast only a few seconds ago, were left with nothing other than a few superficial injuries from their earlier unexpectednding.


    ¡­


    "That was close¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked down towards the demon beasts who were left in a state of confusion after what had just happened, Xuan Hao could not help feeling relieved that he hadprehended the Dao of Space.


    If not, he doubted he would have been able to escape from the five Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts together with the rabbit demon beast. Even on the off chance that he would have been able to escape, it would not havee easy.


    Rustle~


    Poking its small head up to survey the situation at this moment, the rabbit demon beast soon tilted its head in a surprised manner upon spotting the angry group of demon beasts below them. Not understanding what had caused them to stop chasing after them.


    Squeak? Squeak!


    Turning towards Xuan Hao who was carrying it, the rabbit demon beast seemed to have thought about something, as its confused expression became one of admiration.


    "¡­"


    What in the world is this rabbit thinking about now¡­


    Not understanding what the strange gaze filled with admirationing from the rabbit demon beast meant, Xuan Hao decided to ignore it and instead focus his attention on the demon beasts below, or more specifically, the emerald serpent that was trying its best to hide among the tall grass next to the five Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast.


    Although the tall grass had made it impossible to spot when on the ground, it became rather easy to find when standing in the air high above the tall grass.


    "Hm? There are more emerald serpents around?"


    However, the discovery of the emerald serpent who had been fighting the hill sized demon beast only a short moment ago, also led to the discovery of other emerald serpents hiding in the tall grass.


    Observing these emerald serpents, Xuan Hao discovered that there was at least a dozen of them, with more than half of them having reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm. Unfortunately for the five demon beasts, who were still in the process ofprehending the fact that their n had failed through angrily roaring in his direction or the direction that the hill sized demon beast had escaped in, these emerald serpents happened to be slowly closing in on them from all directions.


    Even without knowing whether or not the emerald serpents were intending to attack the five demon beasts, it was rather obvious that they had also been attracted by the loud fight between the hill sized demon beast and the emerald serpent.


    Wait¡­ If the emerald serpents and the demon beasts starts fighting, won''t this be a great chance for me to take advantage of the chaos to kill three emerald serpents and pass the trial this way? Considering how dangerous it will be to go and find emerald serpents by myself and the fact that I might identally end up getting ambushed by other emerald serpents during a fight, it should be far safer. Not to mention, even if I can fly with the help of myprehension of the Dao of Space, I can already feel it starting to take a toll on my dantian¡­


    Narrowing his eyes as he thought about this to himself, Xuan Hao took out a small spirit stone from his interspatial before throwing it towards one of the emerald serpents hiding in the tall grass while quietly approaching the five demon beasts who were lost in a state of anger over their failure only seconds earlier.


    Whoosh~


    Roar?


    Even if the spirt stone was small and almost impossible to spot, the demon beast below did not take long to notice it, as they were all left in a state of confusion, wondering just why Xuan Hao had decided to suddenly throw a spirit stone down towards them-


    Bang!


    Hisss-!


    However, as they watched the spirt stone fly straight past them andnd on what just looked like an ordinary patch of tall grass, the group of demon beasts were shocked to discover arge serpent head poking up from the tall grass where the small spirit stonended.


    ROOOOAR!


    ROOAR!


    Discovering this, it did not take the demon beasts long toprehend what had happened, as all of them exploded with killing intent. Someone had actually dared to use their own tactic on them!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Not a secondter, all five demon beasts descended on the unlucky emerald serpent who had barely reached the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm-


    BOOOOOM-!


    Hissss!


    Hisssss!


    Instantly killing it before any of the other emerald serpents could react in time to assist their unluckypanion. In the end only exposing their own locations in the process.


    Swish~!


    Bang! Bang!


    Having already made their presence known, the emerald serpents no longer bothered hiding, as they allunched an attack on the five demon beasts, who responded in kind. Feeling more than happy at the chance to vent their anger.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Soon enough, a massive battle erupted between the demon beasts and the emerald serpents, causing shockwaves powerful enough to kill anyone below the Soul Ascension Realm to spread through the endless grass field.


    HISSSS!


    ROOOAR!


    Something that only ended up alerting more demon beasts and emerald serpents to the battle that was taking ce. In the end, causing arge number of powerful demon beasts and emerald serpents to rush towards the location of the battle. Even if the first of them would need at least a few minutes, their arrival would inevitably end up making it far more dangerous for Xuan Hao to try and kill three of the emerald serpents.


    But then again, this was the best way to weaken the strength of the emerald serpents enough so that he could swoop in from above and deliver the killing blow. Without this, he had no idea how long it would take him toplete the trial, nor if he could evenplete it in the first ce with his current strength¡­


    "Hm? Looks like one of the weaker emerald serpents got hit and was forced to retreat." Keeping his full attention on all of the emerald serpents below, Xuan Hao instantly noticed when one of the weaker emerald serpents in the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension was injured and forced to retreat by one of the five Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts.


    Swish~


    Not wasting any time seeing that an opportunity had appeared, Xuan Hao rapidly descended towards the oblivious emerald serpent who had its full attention focused on the five demon beasts in front of it. Not aware of the danger from above. Only the moment Xuan Hao''s sword appeared directly in front of it did it realize that it was being attacked-


    Ptsh-!


    Unfortunately, it was far toote for the emerald serpent at that point in time, as Xuan Hao''s sword flew out from his hand before piercing through its soft underbelly. Killing it before it had any time to resist. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Swish-!


    Not wasting any time after killing the emerald serpent, Xuan Hao quickly ascended back into the sky before hiding himself inside one of the clouds to wait for the next opportunity. Not intending to give the other emerald serpents a chance to take revenge for their fallen friend.


    Hissss!?


    Not knowing how to respond to this and with Xuan Hao already gone, the emerald serpents decided to unleash their anger on the five demon beasts, who in turn ended up being filled with even more killing intent towards Xuan Hao.


    At this point in time, it would not be wrong to say that they now cared far more about killing Xuan Haopared to the rabbit demon beast who had originally caused them to enter the celestial gate against what their instincts were telling them.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Although now that they were facing the constant onught of the emerald serpents, who were by no means weaker than themselves, they were starting to regret that they had decided to enter the celestial gate in the first ce¡­

 Chapter 948 First Time Using The Dao Of Corruption

    Having sessfully managed to kill one of the emerald serpents, Xuan Hao did not rx and instead kept his attention fully focused on the battle taking ce below. Ready to move the moment one of the emerald serpents retreated from the battle in an injured state. For now, he still had to kill another two emerald serpents before the trial would be considered to have beenpleted.


    Hissss!


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, it looked like the emerald serpents were no longer as careless before and made sure to take things slow and avoid getting injured by the five demon beasts that they had surrounded. Even if they ended up getting injured, they would not just retreat from the battle like the first emerald serpent had done but would instead linger around the more powerful emerald serpents. Preventing him from reaching them without getting attacked by one of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm emerald serpents. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even if the emerald serpents were busy dealing with the five demon beasts at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, they still outnumbered the demon beasts. Not to mention, there was also arge number of emerald serpents approaching their current location, as long as they could just keep the five demon beasts from escaping and exhaust them over time, they would inevitably be able to overwhelm them.


    As for therge number of demon beasts also approaching their location? These emerald serpents didn''t care too much about this, as they understood that the number of approaching emerald serpents was far higher than the number of approaching demon beasts.


    All things considered, the grass field was still the home of the emerald serpents and their numbers had far exceeded that of the demon beasts who had unknowingly walked into this den of serpents¡­


    "I can''t continue watching like this, or it will be impossible for me to kill the two remaining emerald serpents!" Also noticing therge number of approaching emerald serpents that slowly started to be visible among the tall grass, Xuan Hao realized that it would be close to impossible to kill any of the emerald serpents if they had a chance to gather together in a single group.


    Although the number of approaching demon beasts had grown to a little over twenty at this point, the number of emerald serpents that slithering through the tall grass had already exceeded fifty, with more than half of them having reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Even if he could fly, the burden it put on his dantian was not something he would be able to sustain for an extended period of time. At some point, he would have tond on the ground to recover. cing him in danger of being attacked by the emerald serpents in an exhausted state, something that he wanted to avoid if possible.


    Whoosh~!


    Knowing that he was limited on time with therge number of approaching emerald serpents, Xuan Hao decided to take the chance to attack one of the weakened emerald serpents at the same time that one of the five demon beastsunched an attack towards the Peak Soul Ascension Realm emerald serpent watching over the weakened emerald serpent. Hoping that the demon beast would prevent the emerald serpent from stopping his attack.


    Ching~!


    However just before his attack managed to reach the exposed underbelly of the weakened emerald serpent, the weakened emerald serpent managed to block his attack before it could reach its intended target-


    Bang! Bang!


    Not letting this stop him, Xuan Hao continued his attack on the weakened emerald serpent. However,pared to the first emerald serpent he had killed, this one had managed to reach the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and was not that easy to kill within a short span of time.


    Hissss!


    Because of this, the remaining emerald serpents who were busy fighting with the five demon beasts quickly took notice before some of them broke off from the chaotic battle with the five demon beasts and instead made their way back to where Xuan Hao and the weakened emerald serpent were fighting. Intending to assist their injuredrade.


    I have to finish things fast¡­


    Knowing that he would be forced to run away if he had to face more than a single emerald serpent, Xuan Hao concentrated the power of his dao domain together on his sword before unleashing it in a single graceful swing down towards the weakened emerald serpent.


    Fwoosh-!


    Considering that the attack was in essence just the concentrated power of his dao domain, it did not stay as a simple sword attack and almost instantly transformed into a zing sword covered in mes, representing the Dao of Fire, as it descended towards the emerald serpent-


    Whoosh-!


    However, this did not continue for long, as part of the me suddenly transformed into an icy blizzard, infused with the frigid power belonging to the Dao of Ice, that began shing violently with the searing mes belonging to the Dao of fire. Even if the power of the attack was weakening rapidly due to the fact that the attack itself had essential begun a process of destroying itself, its power was far stronger than any other attack Xuan Hao would have been able execute within such a short span of time.


    Hissss!


    Seeing the iing attack, the weakened emerald serpent could do nothing to escape, as it was soon enveloped by the terrifying blizzard and searing me. Finding itself in the middle of this violent sh between the Dao of Fire and the Dao of Ice.


    Whoosh~


    It was at this moment, when the emerald serpent was struggling to defend itself against thebined power of the Dao of Fire and Dao of Ice, that the edge of the blizzard and searing mes suddenly transformed into a dark and sinister purple color, which seeped into the two shing attacks, imbuing them with a strange power that began sapping away the emerald serpents already weakened life force. Making it far harder for it to resist the constant onught of the searing mes and the frigid blizzard.


    Swish-!


    Understanding that its situation was getting worse, the emerald serpent tried to desperately escape from the area covered by the attack-


    Bang!


    However, it soon discovered that something had grabbed onto its body at some point in time and ended up crashing back into the ground as a result.


    Hisss!?


    Not knowing what had stopped it, the emerald serpent turned around to see what it was and was horrified to discover that hundreds of small purple tentacles like nts had emerged from the ground at some unknown point in time and had attached themselves to its body.


    At a closer inspection, it discovered that these tentacle nts were actually transformed from the former tall grass. Making breaking them and escaping close to impossible in its current state. After all, the strength of the tall grass made it difficult to break, even for someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Breaking more than a hundred of them? The emerald serpent understood that something like this would be hard even for some of its seniors at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Hisss¡­!


    Understanding that it would not be able to escape the emerald serpent let out a reluctant hissing sound before it was swallowed up in the sh between the searing mes and frigid blizzard. Marking the death of the second emerald serpent!


    Swish-!


    Having confirmed that the emerald serpent was dead, Xuan Hao didn''t dare stay around for a second longer as he jumped into the sky. Barely avoiding the fangs of one of the emerald serpents who hade to help itsrade.


    "Hah¡­ That was a close call¡­" Only when he was safe back in the sky outside the range of the emerald serpents below did he let out a sigh of relief as he looked back down at the ce where the attack containing the concentrated power of his dao domain hadnded.


    The ground that had been filled with tall grass had transformed into a small forest of the familiar tentacle nts that seemed keen on attacking anything that approached them, the best example of this would be the emerald serpents who had just been about to reach him, who were now struggling to get out of the tentacle nt forest they found themselves inside of.


    Even if the power of the attack had already dissipated shortly after the death of the weakened emerald serpent, the power of the Dao of Corruption seemed to have attached itself to the tall grass and was using the powerful life force inside the tall grass to sustain itself and continue existing even after the qi he had supplied for the attack disappeared.


    However, the most shocking thing was the fact that Xuan Hao realized that he could control the tentacle nts below. Making them continue their attack on the two emerald serpents caught inside the tentacle nt forest without using more than a miniscule amount of qi to do this.

 Chapter 949 End Of The Second Trial

    Taking advantage of this new ability to control the tentacle nts that he had ended up creating by ident when the Dao of Corruption came into contact with the tall grass, Xuan Hao used all the power that he could squeeze out of the tentacle nts to keep the two unfortunate emerald serpents from escaping the tentacle nt forest that they had ended up entering. Even if he knew that the tentacle nts were far too weak to kill any of them, his goal was to exhaust them enough that he could swoop down and kill one of them before the other emerald serpents came to help them.


    As long as he killed one of them, he would havepleted the trial of the second celestial gate and an exit would hopefully appear before he ran out of energy to keep himself up in the air and out of danger.


    At the same time, below Xuan Hao, the two emerald serpents were struggling to break free from the seemingly countless number of tentacle nts that had suddenly grabbed hold of them.


    Rumble~!


    As they thrashed around on the ground in an attempt break free from the tentacle nts, the two emerald serpents began growing increasingly desperate after realizing that the grip of the tentacle nts didn''t weaken in the slightest. On the contrary, it seemed like their strength was starting to weaken, as the tentacle nts were slowly sapping away their life force.


    Hissss!


    Knowing that their time was running out, the two emerald serpents gathered their remaining strength in ast-ditch effort before violently attacking everything around them-


    BOOM-!


    Crack!


    As one of the two emerald serpents had reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm while the other had passed the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, the power that the two emerald serpents exploded with when going all out was far above the limit of what the tentacle nts could endure, as they shattered under the powerful attack. Giving the two emerald serpents a chance to escape from the tentacle nt forest trapping them.


    "What a perfect opportunity to strike!"


    However, it was just at this moment, when the two emerald serpents had gone all out to escape, that Xuan Hao had been waiting for-


    Swish-!


    And in an instant, Xuan Hao dived down towards the weaker of the two emerald serpents, covering the distance between himself and the emerald serpent in the blink of an eye, while his sword shone in a sharp silver light before he swung it down towards the emerald serpent with all his might. Using almost all the remaining qi left in his dantian for the simple yet powerful sword attack.


    Ching~!


    Soon, the sh of metal against scales resonated through the tentacle nt forest, and for a moment, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine. The sword had indeed reached its target, but the emerald serpent''s strength had surpassed his expectations and had actually managed to block the attack with its tough scales.


    Squeak!


    Swoosh~


    Realizing the seriousness of the current situation, the rabbit demon beast who had remained inactive during thest two attacks jumped into action and used its qi to help amplify the strength of Xuan Hao''s sword attack. Helping increase its strength just enough for Xuan Hao''s sword to sh through the tough scale and bury itself deep inside the head of the emerald serpent before the sword energy contained inside violently spread throughout the body of the emerald serpent.


    Hisss-


    BOOOM-!


    Not having the energy left to fight against the violent sword energy wreaking havoc inside of its body, the emerald serpent directly exploded.


    Swish-!


    Having sessfully killed the final emerald serpent with the timely help of the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao let out a sigh of relief before escaping back into the sky before the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast had time to exact revenge for its deadrade.


    "That was the final one, the exit should appear now that Ipleted the trial." Though exhausted to the point where his entire body was in pain, Xuan Hao knew that he wasn''t safe yet and kept looking around the grass in. Searching for the gate that would hopefully be appearing before thest bit of energy inside his body ran out and he ended up falling into the ratherrge number of emerald serpents who wanted nothing more than to kill him.


    Rumble-!


    Not disappointing him, the ground beneath began violently shaking before it split open directly below where the five demon beasts and emerald serpents were fighting with each other-


    ROAR!?


    HISSS!?


    As a result of the ground beneath them suddenly opening up, the emerald serpents and demon beast ended up falling straight into the opening in the ground. Instantly putting a stop to the fighting, as the remaining demon beasts and emerald serpents who had been lucky enough to stand at the edge where the hole in the ground opened up observed the weird change with cautious expressions on their faces. None of them understood what had happened and if the demon beasts and emerald serpents who had fallen down into the hole were dead or alive.


    Rumble~


    However, it did not take long before the emerald serpents and demon beasts who had disappeared into the hole appeared again. The only difference was that instead of being on top of the ground, this time around, they were all on top of a massive stone tform that slowly ascended from the hole before reaching the same level as the surrounding terrain. In the middle of the enormous stone tform, a gate simr to the second celestial gate could be seen opening up the moment the stone tform had settled in ce.


    "It''s here!"


    Swish!


    Observing this from above and seeing the second celestial gate, Xuan Hao used all of his remaining strength to rapidly descend from the sky before rushing through the celestial gate before any of the demon beasts or emerald serpents had any time to react to what was happening-


    Whoosh~! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Disappearing from the trial space the next moment.

 Chapter 950 Recovery And Potential Problem With The Dao Of Corruption

    Roar!?


    Seeing Xuan Hao disappearing together with the rabbit demon beast, the demon beasts beside the celestial gate and those approaching from the distance all realized that the celestial gate that had appeared was exactly the same as the one they had passed through before finding themselves inside the trial space-


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    And considering that Xuan Hao and the rabbit demon beast had already left, these demon beasts no longer saw any reason to stay inside the trial space. After all, even if they were confident in their own strength, they would like to avoid having to fight with the emerald serpents if possible.


    Hisssss!


    Seeing the demon beasts all trying to leave through the celestial gate that had suddenly appeared, the emerald serpents that had remained hidden all sprung forth and attacked them. Not intending to let them leave so easily. Especially considering that three of their own had already been killed, while none of the demon beasts had died so far.


    In their eyes, there was no difference between the demon beasts and Xuan Hao. Meaning that they also viewed these demon beasts as the ones behind the death of three of theirrades!


    Boom! Boom!


    Soon, violent shockwaves spread through the trial space, as the emerald serpents shed with demon beasts who were trying their best to ignore them as they rushed towards the exit. None of them were willing to risk getting stuck inside the trial space if the celestial gate ended up disappearing.


    Hissss!


    Hisss!


    Hiiisssss!


    Even more so because they now realized just how many emerald serpents were hidden inside the tall grass!


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ That was a close call¡­" Having sessfully managed to escape through the celestial gate before any of the demon beasts or emerald serpents could stop him, Xuan Hao could not help copsing on the ground with an exhausted expression on his face.


    The few minutes that he spent inside the second trial had ended up draining himpletely. Only the bare minimum qi was still present inside his dantian to make sure that he could still move around. Outside of this, he couldn''t even do something basic like flying in his current state, let alone fighting.


    Squeak? Squeak!


    Popping its small head up from a small hidden pocket in Xuan Hao''s robe that it had hidden inside of the rabbit demon beast curiously examined Xuan Hao''s current state before jumping out of the pocket with a heroic expression on its cute and cuddly face.


    Even if Xuan Hao didn''t understand a single thing of what it was trying to say, he still understood that it intended to protect him while he recovered.


    Whoosh~!


    So, without caring about where he had ended up inside the massive forest of the mist covered mountain range, Xuan Hao closed his eyes and focused all his attention on recovering from the earlier battles. Only keeping a bare minimum divine sense active outside of his body in case something happened.


    Given that the rabbit demon beast had already epted the blood contract and be the Star Shattering Sect''s official guardian beast, he didn''t worry about the rabbit demon beast attacking him while he was recovering.


    Squeak!


    Seeing Xuan Hao closing his eyes before starting the process of recovering, the rabbit demon beast let out a happy squeak, as it felt joyful knowing that Xuan Hao trusted it enough to do something like this. After all, in the mind of the rabbit demon beast, it thought Xuan Hao did this due to him trusting it. Not aware of the fact that there was a certain blood contract in ce that would prevent it from trying to kill him in the first ce¡­


    Following this, time slowly passed in the small clearing that Xuan Hao and the rabbit demon beast had been teleported to after leaving the trial space. One hour turning into a day before long an entire week had passed since they had left the trial space.


    During this period of time, no particrly strong demon beast appeared, but there were still a few Domain Lord Realm demon beasts appearing every now and then. Of course, with the rabbit demon beast around, these demon beasts didn''t stand a chance.


    From the looks of things, the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast who should have left the trial space at this point in time, had ended up inpletely different locations from them. If they were lucky, these demon beasts would have given up on chasing after them and had returned back to the empty void to continue their fight for control over it.


    Whoosh~


    As a gentle wind passed through the leaves of the tree that the rabbit demon beast was sleeping on top of at the moment, Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes after a week of recovery. Although he didn''t just spend the past week solely on recovering, but also used part of this time to study the dao domain attack he had used.


    Although the dao domain attack was a powerful attack that essential carried the power of the different Daos he hadprehended and integrated into his dao domain, Xuan Hao also understood that this kind of attack had no control and could end up backfiring on himself if he was not careful enough.


    If he wanted to fully use the power of his dao domain for an attack like that, he would have toprehend how the different Daos had reacted to each other and figure out a way to harmonize them into a single attack. Not the chaotic mess of an attack that he had ended up using.


    At the very least, the attack did give him some precious insights into how he could use the Dao of Corruption in the future. Although, he did feel like something was wrong with the Dao of Corruption. After all, there had to be some kind of reason that the only ones he had seen using the Dao of Corruption were abominations.


    Maybe my current strength andprehension of the Dao of Corruption is too low to figure out what is wrong¡­


    Shaking his head as he threw the problems with the Dao of Corruption to the back of his mind for now, Xuan Hao turned to look at the rabbit demon beast sleeping on top of tree branch not too far away from where he was sitting.


    No matter how he looked at it, the behavior of the rabbit demon beast was more akin to a cat than a rabbit¡­N?v(el)B\\jnn

 Chapter 951 Third Celestial Gate... Below?!

    Feeling Xuan Hao''s gaze, the rabbit demo beast woke up and jumped down from the tree before waltzing over with a proud expression stered all over its small cute, furry, and cuddly face. Almost like a child looking for praise after it had done a good job.


    "You did well¡­" Not knowing what else to say when faced with this kind of behavior, Xuan Hao took out a few spirit stones and threw it to the rabbit demon beast who happily jumped up and swallowed them before closing its eyes to absorb the spiritual energy inside the spirit stones and turn it into its own qi.


    Asleep again¡­ Oh well, it at least deserves some rest after watching over me for the past week.


    Shaking his head as the rabbit demon beast once again went into a state of cultivation, Xuan Hao instead turned his attention towards the system or more specifically the side quest rting to the three celestial gates. Curious about what had changed after he passed the trial of the second celestial gate, while a small part of him was hoping that it would give him some clues as to the location of the third and final celestial gate, so he didn''t have to search through the massive forest again.


    Even more so than before, as he had now ended up offending most of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts inside the forest¡­


    [Side Quest: The Three Celestial Gates, Part 2]


    [Description: You have reached the mysterious mountain range hidden behind the mist. To uncover the secrets hidden inside the mountain range, you must find three ancient celestial gates and pass through them. So far, you have sessfully passed through the First Celestial Gate, the Gate of the Eternal City and the Second Celestial Gate, the Gate of the Serpent ins. Only the third and final Celestial Gate remains. Luckily, you happened to be teleported right on top of it after leaving the trial of the Second Celestial Gate.]


    [Objective: Seek out the Three Celestial Gates and defeat the guardians within.]


    [First Trial: Trial of the Eternal City (Complete)] n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    [Second Trial: Trial of the Emerald Serpent (Complete)]


    [Third Trial: ???]


    [Reward: Starlight Essence]


    Reading through the description of the side quest once again after having confirmed that he had indeed sessfully passed through the second trial, Xuan Hao was overjoyed to discover that there was indeed a clue about the location to the third Celestial Gate inside the description.


    The only problem was that he had no idea where the Celestial Gate that he was apparently on top of was. From what he could see, the only thing beneath him was the familiar soil and foliage of the forest. Nothing out of the ordinary.


    Unless the third celestial gate is located inside some kind of underground cave¡­


    Realizing this, Xuan Hao didn''t waste a second before using his divine sense to pierce into the ground beneath him in search of the cave that the third celestial gate should be located inside of.


    "Huh?"


    However, after only a few dozen meters, Xuan Hao was left baffled as he discovered that there was nothing beneath him. No dirt, no stones, no cave, just arge sea of clouds that seemed never ending with simr inds like the one he was on top of appearing every now and then in this sea.


    "I ended up on top of one of the mountains!?" Taking a few seconds toprehend just what had happened, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked at where he had ended up after leaving the trial of the second celestial gate.


    For some reason, he now understood why none of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts hade to find him during the past week.


    Even if they wanted to find him, it was unlikely that they would think of climbing up one of the terrifyingly tall mountains to do this. Even if they intended to do something like this, it would not be an easy feat to aplish as they might end up running into a unique race simr to the weird tree race, he had encountered after leaving the trial of the first celestial gate.


    Even if the demon beasts had also reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, they were still far weaker whenpared to the terrifying tree he had encountered back then!


    But¡­ Now I at least know why the description said that the third celestial gate was directly below me. The only problem left to solve is how to get down to the forest again¡­


    Although he only needed to get down and not climb up the mountain, Xuan Hao still felt that doing this wouldn''t be much safer than climbing up the mountain.


    As for just jumping off the mountain and flying down through the sea of clouds to reach the forest below¡­. Xuan Hao did think about this, but quickly changed his mind after seeing a demon beast falling off the side of one of the mountain peaks into the sea of clouds before getting devoured by some kind of strange creature living inside the sea of clouds.


    From the short nce he had managed to get of the creature, he understood that its strength was no less than therge tree from the weird tree race. Making the act of jumping off the mountain peak and descending down through the sea of clouds a far less appealing way of getting back down to the forest below again.


    At least for now, it looked like slowly climbing his way down the mountain would be the safest way for him down.


    Swoosh~


    Havinge to this conclusion, Xuan Hao grabbed the rabbit demon beast before starting to make his way down the tall mountain. Making sure to remember the location that was directly below the ce where he had ended up after leaving the trial of the second celestial gate.


    Not bothering to question the weird shape of the mountain peak that he had ended up on during the entire process¡­

 Chapter 952 Cloud Demon Beast

    Going down the side of the mountain together with the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao didn''t end up encountering anything dangerous like he had first expected and managed to reach the location where the mountain met the sea of clouds.


    However, instead of plunging directly into the clouds that was blocking his view, Xuan Hao came to a stop a dozen meters away from the clouds and began carefully examining them for any traces of the strange creature that he had seen swallow up a rather unlucky demon beast only a few minutes earlier.


    Although the chance of encountering the strange creature hidden inside the sea of clouds should be far lower by sticking to the side of the mountain where he would be harder to spot, there would always be a chance that he was unlucky and ended up running into the strange creature the moment he tried passing through the clouds. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Only after making sure that there was nothing inside the clouds directly in front of him with his divine sense, did he proceed down into the sea of clouds below.


    Whoosh~


    As Xuan Hao stepped into the sea of clouds, he was immediately captivated by the ethereal beauty of the sea of clouds that seemed to stretch on endlessly, its misty waves rolling and swirling like an otherworldly spectacle. Drawn by the allure of this mystical ce, Xuan Hao momentarily forgot about the danger lurking beneath the beauty of the ce.


    ROOOAR!


    Just at this moment, a loud roar rippled echoed through the sea of clouds. Followed by a strange creature emerging from the depths of the ce, its immense form obscured by the swirling clouds. Its body was filled with dozens of flowing tendrils that looked like flowing clouds and a pair of sharp horns could be seen on top of its head. The limbs of the creature werepletely obscured from view and were impossible to discern at his current distance, but Xuan Hao could easily imagine them in a simr flowing state as the tendrils.


    All things considered, Xuan Hao believed that the creature was farrger than any demon beast he had met before and should only have been surpassed by the corpse of therge squid-like creature belonging to the Dao of Corruption that he had seen during his time in the ancient sect ruins in terms of size.


    However, the most shocking thing he discovered about this creature was not its size nor its unique appearance, but instead its strength.


    When he first got a nce of what should have just been one of the small tendrils sticking up from the sea of clouds to devour the unlucky demon beast who had ended up falling into the sea of clouds, he had perceived the creature to have reached a simr strength as the powerful tree from the weird tree race, but¡­ Now that he saw it in person, he realized that the strength of the creature in front of him was far above that of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    If he was not wrong, the creature in front of him should have already surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm and reached the Earth Immortal Realm that the guardian Aria had mentioned to him!


    Even worse, the creature''s mouth was wide open, revealing its razor-sharp teeth as it looked towards him with what could only be described as a hungry expression.


    The overwhelming fear of being targeted by a terrifying existence like this momentarily caused him to freeze on the spot. After all, different from the remnant soul of the demonic cultivator he had encountered in the temple at the Main Star Peak, the creature in front of him was a genuine Earth Immortal Realm demon beast. Not something that he had any way of resisting with his current strength.


    Rustle~


    Also feeling the terrifying aura of the Earth Immortal Realm, the rabbit demon beast woke up from its cultivation state and poked its head up before turning to look towards the approaching cloud demon beast-


    Squeak?


    However, different from Xuan Hao who had momentarily frozen in fear when faced with the cloud demon beast, the rabbit demon beast waspletely unaffected by the terrifying aura and instead looked just as arrogant as always while facing another demon beast.


    ROOAR!


    Seeing the arrogant expression on the face of the rabbit demon beast who seemed to be looking down on it, the cloud demon beast let out another terrifying roar filled with killing intent. This time directed towards the rabbit demon beast in an attempt to force it into submission through its disy of strength-


    Squeak? SQUEAK!


    Unfortunately for the cloud demon beast, the rabbit demon beast didn''t react the way that it had wanted it to and instead just let an angry squeaking sound. Feeling offended by the cloud demon beast''s attempt to scare it.


    "Huh?"


    It was also at this moment that Xuan Hao managed to recover from the impact of the Earth Immortal Realm aura of the cloud demon beast. Only to be left speechless at the scene of the small rabbit demon beast norger than his fist arrogantly facing off against the immense cloud demon beast that eclipsed it in both size and strength.


    What in the world is this rabbit, is it perhaps stronger than I first thought?


    Seeing this scene, Xuan Hao could not help guessing that he might have misjudged the strength of the rabbit demon beast. Although it disyed the strength of someone who had just passed the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, it might actually secretly be hiding its true strength.


    Considering the fact that he had no clue about the abilities of Earth Immortal Realm demon beast and had no idea if he would be able to see through the disguise of such a powerful demon beast, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that it made sense if the rabbit demon beast had been able to hide its true strength from him.


    Swish-!


    Bang!


    SQUEEEAAAK!


    However, as one of the tendrils came flying over and hit the body of the rabbit demon beast who ended up getting being knocked flying in a state that could be considered at the brink of death, Xuan Hao quickly threw the thought of the rabbit demon beast secretly being a powerful demon beast in disguise out.

 Chapter 953 Earth Immortal Realm Demon Beast

    "..."


    Not knowing what to say after seeing the rabbit demon beast getting send flying before hitting the side of the mountain before rolling down and out of the sea of clouds, Xuan Hao had no idea whether to call the rabbit demon beast stupid of genius for escaping the sea of clouds in this manner.


    Although, part of him had feeling that this was not the intended oue that the rabbit demon beast had been hoping to archive¡­


    Roar?


    In a simr confused state after seeing the rabbit demon beast disappearing, the cloud demon beast also seemed to have thought the rabbit demon beast was some kind of strong demon beast that was hiding its true strength. In a weird coincidence, both Xuan Hao and the cloud demon beast were left in a confused state looking in the direction that the rabbit demon beast had disappeared in.


    Ah! I still have to escape as well!


    Swoosh-!


    Suddenly realizing that he also had to escape from the cloud demon beast, Xuan Hao took advantage of the cloud demon beast still being in a confused state to follow the rabbit demon beast.


    ROOOOAR!?


    Realizing that Xuan Hao was trying to escape, the cloud demon beast let out a loud roar filled with killing intent. Feeling an unknown anger that it had never felt before spreading through its body as it looked at the escaping Xuan Hao.


    So far, all of the creatures it encountered would end up shivering in fear without moving. Never had there been any prey daring enough to escape from it before today!


    BOOOOM-!


    Thinking about this, a far more terrifying energy exploded forth from the cloud demon beast. Soon enough, its Earth Immortal Realm cultivation base was on full disy.


    Rumble!


    As a result of this, the entire sea of clouds started violently trembling violently like it was about to copse under the terrifying pressure brought about by the Earth Immortal Realm cultivation base.


    "So, this is the Earth Immortal Realm! How I wish my first encounter with a living expert in the Earth Immortal Realm would have been more friendly¡­" Muttering this to himself while desperately trying to escape the terrifying cloud demon beast, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of helplessness wash over him when faced with the full strength of the cloud demon beast.


    Only at this point in time did he truly realize just how big the difference between someone in the Soul Ascension Realm and Earth Immortal Realm was. Even if he could reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future, he doubted that it would be enough for him to stay alive in the face of someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Whoosh~


    As the entire sea of clouds was on the brink of copse under the terrifying aura of the cloud demon beast, a change suddenly took ce, as the formation that had been trapping him in the center of the mist covered mountain range reappeared-


    Roar?


    "Huh?"


    Rendering both Xuan Hao and the cloud demon beast confused.


    Whoosh-!


    However, this confusion soon turned into fear as the formation expanded at a speed visible to the naked before covering the entire mist covered mountain range before stretching far beyond the boundaries of the mist covered mountain range itself. Soon enough a terrifying aura rendering even the cloud demon beast insignificant gathered in the sky far above the mist covered mountain range.


    Looking through the sea of clouds that had already copsed at this point in time, the location where the power was gathering through the formation became visible.


    The power is gathering¡­ In the sun!?


    Feeling like his mouth unintentionally opened in disbelief after realizing where the formation was gathering power, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine as a thought appeared in his head.


    The guardian formation guarding the entire mystic realm activated!


    Although he had managed to sneak past the formation and make his way inside the mystic realm with the help of the demon beasts who helped destabilize the entrance for him, he still understood just how terrifying this formation was.


    Even using his full strength, he couldn''t even cause a small ripple to appear when it was in a passive state. Now that the formation had activated, he could only imagine how terrifying it was¡­


    RUUUUUMBLE-! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Just at this moment, the formation seemed to have gathered enough power, as the sun in the sky violently exploded before a stream of mes descended down towards the cloud demon beast still locked in state of shock and fear.


    I have to get away from this ce!


    Not caring about anything else, after realizing that the target of the formation was the cloud demon beast, Xuan Hao jumped off the side of the mountain before rapidly falling towards the ground. Trying his best to escape before the mes could reach the cloud demon beast.


    Squeak!


    At this time, Xuan Hao noticed the rabbit demon beast still in the process of rolling down the side of the mountain beside him.


    "¡­"


    Swish~


    Using his dao domain to grab the rabbit demon beast on his way down, Xuan Hao once again focused on trying everything to increase the speed at which he was descending towards the forest below. Hoping that he could make use of the third celestial gate to escape from the powerful sh of energy that would soon take ce between the cloud demon beast and the terrifying mes.


    "There it is!"


    Spotting the third celestial gate just as he was about to reach the ground, Xuan Hao could not help happily eximing to himself as he rushed towards it with all his strength-


    BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM-!


    However, just at this moment, a terrifying explosion echoed out from behind him followed by a terrifying heat wave that instantly melted or burnt everything on his body expect his interspatial rings and the rabbit demon beast that he barely managed to save in time. If not for the fact that he hadprehended the Dao of Fire, he doubted that he would have even been able to protect himself¡­


    Even without turning around, Xuan Hao realized that the sh between the cloud demon beast and the mes descending from the sun had begun.


    Luckily for him, he didn''t have to experience any more of the sh between the two, as the third celestial gate was directly in front of him-


    Whoosh-!


    And not wasting a single second, he rushed into it.

 Chapter 954 A Sudden Dangerous Rise In Temperature

    Far away from the mist covered mountain range, both Chu Yang and Qing Yi were sitting down at the edge of a smallke as they both let out a small chuckle while talking about what they had gone through since the death of the mole demon beast.


    Rumble!


    It was at this moment that a loud rumbling sound suddenly echoed out behind them, causing them to turn around.


    "Hm? What was tha-"


    BOOM!


    Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, Chu Yang was just about to ask Qing Yi if she saw something when a shockwave suddenly hit both of them-


    Ssh!


    Throwing both of them into the smallke before they had any time to react or resist the shockwave.


    Not knowing what happened, Chu Yang and Qing Yi decided to not immediately surface and instead remained inside of the water. Having guessed that the shockwave they had been hit by was the result of two powerful demon beasts fighting with each other.


    Judging that they had no way to resist the shockwave nor even notice the shockwave approaching them, the strength of the demon beasts fighting should at least have reached the Domain Lord Realm!


    With this in mind, it would be best for them to try and stay hidden. After all, with their current strength, they would have no way to fight back if they ended up getting targeted by a Domain Lord Realm demon beast¡­


    BOOOOOM-!


    As if to prove them right, a far more terrifying sound echoed out above them, as terrifying heatwave caused the water of theke to boil before rapidly starting to evaporate. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even if they could endure the boiling hot water with rtive ease given their current cultivation realm, Chu Yang and Qing Yi could not help starting to worry after seeing the water level of theke lowering.


    From the looks of things, the heatwave was not like a simple shockwave passing over them once before disappearing, but instead something that lingered around above them without disappearing. If they could not find a ce to hide before the remaining water of theke dried up, they would have to face the terrifyingly high temperature that was already starting to make some of the rocks close to theke start melting.


    The fact that theke could even endure for such a long period of time was due to a special kind of ice crystal growing on the side of theke. The ice crystal itself was not really that special outside of lowering the temperature of the water, but at this point in time, these seemingly useless ice crystals had ended up buying them more time.


    Crack~!


    Unfortunately, these ice crystals were shattering at a speed visible to the naked eye, as they had no way to endure the heat the moment the water around them evaporated.


    "Let''s go deeper and hope theke is deeper than it looked from the shore¡­" Not knowing what else they could do at this point in time, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both began making their way deeper into theke. Silently praying that it was deeper than it looked and there were more powerful ice crystals at the bottom to help protect them from the terrifying heat.


    "Over there!" Reaching the bottom of theke with the surface of theke now only a few meters above them at this point in time, Qing Yi called out as she spotted a massive ice crystal at the center of theke.


    Even with the water of theke evaporating at a speed visible to the naked eye, the water next to the ice crystal still remained close to the freezing point. Although the ice crystal was still showing signs of starting to crack, the speed was far slowerpared to any of the other ice crystals on the bottom of theke.


    Whoosh~!


    Not wasting a single precious second, both Qing Yi and Chu Yang rushed towards the massive ice crystal before finding a small hole in the side of it. From where they could squeeze inside the ice crystal.


    Although the temperature was freezing and forced them to use their qi to protect themselves from turning into human popsicles, it was still far better than being burned alive by the terrifying heat that was rapidly evaporating the water of theke.


    Slowly, the water inside the ice crystal drained out from the small hole they had used to squeeze inside the ice crystal-


    Crack~!


    And before long, a cracking sound followed by a steady increase in temperature followed.


    "Theke is gone¡­" Not having to think too hard about what had happened, Qing Yi could not help muttering this to herself as she prepared one of the defensive talismans that her master had given her. Prepared to use it the moment the ice crystal broke apart.


    "¡­"


    Chu Yang didn''t say anything but had simrly prepared himself with one of the defensive talismans in hand.


    CRACK-!


    BANG!


    Only a short momentter, the ice crystal finally couldn''t hold up against the terrifying heat as it shattered. Exposing both Chu Yang and Qing Yi to the terrifying temperature outside the ice crystal-


    Whoosh~


    "Huh!?"


    "Waaaah!?"


    However, before any of them had a chance to use the talisman of their master to protect themselves from the heat, they fell into a small hole located directly beneath the now shattered ice crystal that they had been hiding inside.


    Luckily for them, the ice crystal that had been above the hole prevented the heat from fully entering the hole before it shattered-


    Ssh!


    As a result, both Chu Yang and Qing Yi once again ended up in the water after falling for a few dozen meters.


    Swish~


    Understanding that the water would soon start heating up before also evaporating, Chu Yang grabbed the cor of Qing Yi, who was still in a state of panic after the sudden drop, before diving down into the water filled hole without any hesitation.

 Chapter 955 Underground River And Empty Desert

    "Huh?"


    Continuing down for what felt like hours, Chu Yang suddenly realized that he was being dragged down by a powerful force. Even if he tried and resist this downwards pull, it was to no avail, as he got dragged down together with Qing Yi.


    Rumble~


    Soon the faint sound of rushing water could be hearding from beneath them and before they had any time to react before the hole ended abruptly and they once again found themselves falling-


    "Waaaah!? Not again!"


    Something Qing Yi was not too thrilled about. Especially after noticing the massive underground river that slowly came into view beneath them.


    Ssh!


    However, she could do nothing but cling onto Chu Yang as they fell into the water and were along with the powerful current. Even if they could fight against it, it would be a hopeless endeavor, as they would end up running out of energy before, they had a chance to escape from the massive underground river. After all, they were still in the Nascent Soul Realm and couldn''t fly like someone in the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    All things considered; they could only pray that they didn''t end up inside their of some powerful demon beast when the currents of the underground river finally calmed down enough for them to make their escape.


    ¡­


    Not aware of what his disciples were going through due to the sh between the cloud demon beast and the main guardian formation of the mystic realm, Xuan Hao was cautiously making his way through arge desert.


    The desert itself was a vast and deste expanse, stretching as far as he could see. Its golden sands almost like an ocean frozen in time that only moved under the constant power of the wind. Only the towering dunes andrge cliffs dotted the barrenndscape.


    Different from the other two celestial gates he had gone through so far, there was no sign of any stone pedestal or Scroll of Trials that would help him understand what the trial was about. The only thing apanying him was the scorching sun dominating the empty sky above.


    I wonder if the fight between the cloud demon beast and the guardian formation is over¡­


    Having already wandered through the desert for over an hour without finding anything at this point in time, Xuan Hao could not help wondering about what had ended up happening to the cloud demon beast.


    Given that the guardian formation was far more powerful than the cloud demon beast from what he had managed to see before escaping, the fight should have ended rtively quickly, but then again, he had no idea how powerful the cloud demon beast really was. After all, the Earth Immortal Realm was still far away from the current him and he could only specte as to what had ended up happening from the difference in power between the two.


    For all he knew, the cloud demon beast could have never disyed its true strength and might have ended up escaping before the formation had a chance to kill it.


    As for the cloud demon beast winning against the formation? Xuan Hao never thought about this, as the cloud demon beast was obviously still trapped inside the mystic realm. Meaning that it was too weak to break through the formation and leave.


    Hm? Maybe the cloud demon beast was just waiting for an opportunity to strike and took this chance tounch an all-out attack towards the guardian formation to break free from the mystic realm.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help getting worried about his two disciples who were still inside the mystic realm. Different from him who could resist the aftereffects of the sh between the cloud demon beast and the mes from the sun in the sky of the mystic realm, his two disciples would have no way to resist even a fraction of power from such a powerful attack.


    Considering that the talismans containing part of his power had not yet been activated, he could at the very least feel at ease that his disciples shouldn''t be anywhere close to where the cloud demon beast and guardian formation were shing with each other.


    However, at the same time, he also understood that things might not always be like this, as the fight between the two might start expanding and affect arger part of the mystic realm in the process.


    For now, he could only hope that his two disciples were far away from the mist covered mountain range and if they happened to be close enough to see the battle taking ce from a distance, he hoped they would be smart enough to make their way back towards the exit of the mystic realm.


    If this was not possible, he at the very least hoped they would escape as far away as possible from where the battle was taking ce¡­


    Rumble~


    "Hm?!"


    Whoosh~!


    Suddenly feeling a faint shaking from the sand beneath him, Xuan Hao threw the thoughts of his two disciples to the back of his mind as he jumped into the air to avoid any possible ambush from beneath-


    Bang!


    And this was just in time as a giant mouth broke through the sand beneath the ce, he had been standing just a second ago.


    Rumble!


    Having missed its target, therge mouth filled with countless teeth lined up in hundreds of rows inside wiggled around for a few seconds in confusion before diving back into the sand again. Giving Xuan Hao a chance to marvel at the massive size of what could only be a giant sandworm. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even from the short glimpse he managed to get of it above ground, he could easily guess that the sandworm must have reached a length of several kilometers¡­ And the sandworm in front of him had only reached the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    If the sandworms grewrger the stronger, they were, Xuan Hao could not even imagine howrge a Soul Ascension Realm sandworm would be. Even the cloud demon beast and the dead squid like demon beast belonging to the Dao of Corruption wouldn''t be anywhere near the size of such a sandworm¡­

 Chapter 956 Scroll of Trials and a rather Unique Dao...

    956 Scroll of Trials and a rather Unique Dao...


    Deciding tond on one of the nearby cliffs instead of going back on the ground again after his brief encounter with the sand worm, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he spotted something in the distance.


    Hidden by severalrge cliffs which blocked his view from the ground, arge structure could be seen on the other side.


    The structure itself was a massive sandstone tower that was partially buried in the shifting sands of the desert. Even if he could only get a general outline of the structure at his current distance, it was still possible to see some of the worn-out carvings and symbol etched into the surface of the tower.


    Swish~!


    Seeing this sandstone tower, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time before making his way over to investigate it. After all, it was the only structure that he had encountered so far in the desert and might contain a clue as to what the trial of the third celestial gate was about.


    Hopefully, the trial would not require him to hunt down a certain number of sandworms¡­


    "Hm? The Scroll of Trials?"


    Reaching the sandstone tower, Xuan Hao was surprised and relieved to find the familiar stone pedestal present at the top of the tower.


    Given that he had not found the stone pedestal after such a long time, he had thought that there wouldn''t be any scroll of trials present inside the third celestial gate, but from the looks of things, it was just a little harder to find this time around.


    Whoosh~


    Examining the top of the sandstone tower for any traps with his divine sense, Xuan Hao slowly descended beforending on top of the sandstone tower beside the stone pedestal after making sure that there weren''t any traps or anything else guarding the scroll of trials.


    "Trial of the Great Sandworm? Defeat the guardian of the desert to pass the trial¡­" Reading through the scroll of trial, Xuan Hao felt like one of his fears had been confirmed, as he did indeed have to defeat a sandworm. The only positive thing about it was the fact that he would only have to defeat a single one like the first trial he had gone through.


    Then again, he didn''t have over a dozen Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts entering the celestial gate together with him this time around. Meaning that the difficulty of the trial should at the very least be easier to aplishpared to the trial of the second celestial gate.


    If not for the fact that he had managed to take advantage of the fight between the emerald serpents and the demon beasts, he doubted he would have ever been able toplete the trial of the second celestial gate with his current strength¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao focused his attention back on the scroll of trials again. Looking for any clues as to where the guardian of the desert was located and hopefully also a few weaknesses that he would be able to take advantage of while fighting the guardian.


    "Ah, there is something here!" Finding a part that listed the different Daos that the guardian was weak against, Xuan Hao could not help feeling his head start hurting after seeing the endless list of Daos that he had never heard about before appearing in front of him.


    "Dao of Curses, Dao of Seals, Dao of Illusions¡­ Why is this sandworm weak to so many different Daos!?" Muttering this to himself as he continued reading through the long list of Daos that the sandworm was weak against, Xuan Hao could not helpmenting to himself over just how many different Daos existed in the world.


    Among these different Daos, the weirdest one was a Dao called the Dao of Beast Riding. For some reason, it made him think about the beast tamers back in the Star Shattering Sect. Maybe the path that they were going would result in themprehending a Dao like this in the future¡­?


    Reading through the long list filled with countless Daos also made him feel amazed at the sheer number of Daos that the power who had constructed the celestial gates were knowledgeable about. Maybe only the empires located at the center of the continent woulde anywhere near this level of knowledge on different Daos¡­ And this was not even mentioning the fact that the list in front of him was only Daos that the sandworm was weak against¡­


    "Hm? Dao of Ice? Ah!? It''s weak to the Dao of Ice!" Mindlessly reading through the long list for what felt like hours as the scroll seemed to magically expand whenever he reached the end, Xuan Hao could not help eximing when the Dao of Ice suddenly appeared on the list of Daos that the sandworm guardian was weak against.


    Not only was he filled with excitement learning that the guardian was weak to the Dao of Ice, but it also gave him a boost in confidence when it came to fighting the guardian of the desert.


    Now, the only thing he needed to find out about was where this guardian was located. After all, given howrge the desert was, it would take him a long time to search through it by himself. Especially considering that he still had no clue about just howrge the desert was in the first ce.


    So far, the only thing he knew about the desert other than the fact that it was inhabited by giant sandworms living beneath the desert itself. Outside of that, he had no idea just how big this desert was nor if there were other living creatures inside the desert.


    To find out about this, he could only continue reading through the scroll of trials-


    "Hm?"


    However, a problem soon urred, as the list of Daos that the guardian of the desert was weak to came to a sudden end without there being any information on the location of the guardian in question¡­


    1/2


    Bitte with first chapter as I was busy dealing with some family stuff. Next chapter will be out in another hour or two... Or three (thest part was not edited inter! I promise!) :3


    PurpleSpringn/?/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 957 Search For the Guardian of the Desert

    957 Search For the Guardian of the Desert


    "How am I supposed to find a sandworm hiding beneath the sand in this massive desert without any clues about its whereabouts?" Feeling a sense of helplessness wash over him as heprehended the true difficulty of the trial ahead of him, Xuan Hao could not help looking down at the endless sea of sand beneath the sandstone tower.


    Even if he ended up searching through the entire desert, he realized that he might not be able find the guardian of the desert that he was looking for, as it still had the ability to hide underground like the sandworm he had encountered not too long ago.


    "Maybe I should explore the rest of the sandstone tower and see if I can find anything useful for finding the guardian of the desert¡­" Knowing that it would be useless for him to just stand around andment over the difficulty of the trial, Xuan Hao ced the scroll of trials inside his interspatial ring before making his way down the smalldder next to the stone pedestal leading down into the sandstone tower.


    "Looks like there won''t be much to find in here¡­" Muttering this to himself as he made his way down thedder, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a disappoint sigh as he saw the empty interior of the floor directly below the top of the sandstone tower. Sand all over the ce and what little furniture and other things that might have been present inside the tower in the past, had long since decayed and disappeared from the world.


    If not for the fact that thedder was made up of the same sandstone that the tower was built out of, it would most likely also have disappeared in the long passage of time. Not giving him much hope for the rest of the sandstone tower, as it seemed only the scroll of trials had somehow been able to endure the long passage of time.


    Continuing down, it did not take long to confirm this.


    All things considered; the interior of the sandstone tower was not much more interesting than its worn down exterior.


    However, after reaching what should have been the bottom of the empty sandstone tower, Xuan Hao discovered that it kept going down far beyond the surface of the sand.


    "Hm?"


    Not only that but leaning over the side of the sandstone spiral staircase that had appeared at the bottom floor, he realized that there was a muchrger structure beneath the sandstone tower, or more specifically, the sandstone tower was only a small part of this massive structure that was still sticking up above the surface of the sand. The rest had been buried beneath the sand over countless years.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling a cold gust of wind drifting past his face as he was leaning over the edge of the spiral staircase, Xuan Hao took a step forward and jumped off the edge of the spiral staircase-


    Swoosh~


    Bang~


    Plummeting directly down to sandstone floor at the bottom of the spiral staircase. Not nning to go in circles for what would have been a few thousand times before finally reaching the bottom of the staircase when he could just jump over the edge skip the tedious task and prevent himself from ending up dizzy in the process.


    Given that he did not spot any traps or living things with his divine sense, he did not really worry about jumping into some kind of trap.


    "Indeed, this ce is not as simple as I thought at first¡­" Getting a chance to inspect what could essentially be considered the true bottom of the sandstone tower, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of surprise upon seeing the countless murals and other paintings covering the walls and ceiling of the small side hall that he found himself inside of.


    The reason for the surprise was not that these murals and wall paintings had managed to survive during the long passage of time, but due to the fact that he was already familiar with many of the murals and wall paintings, or more specifically, the stories that they were presenting. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "This is the battle of the ice phoenix fighting against thebined power of the different races¡­" Muttering this to himself as he realized the implications of the different murals and paintings covering the small hall, Xuan Hao froze on the spot as he began to examine the different murals and paintings more carefully.


    Feeling curious if there was something different about these murals and paintingspared to the ones he had seen before. However, outside of being far more detailed with more races present in the battles, it did not look that much different from the murals he had seen so far.


    Although he already knew that the mystic realm should have belonged to an ancient sect called the Mirage Sect that was skilled in the art of illusions ording to the information Feng Chen had found, he had no idea what kind of sect this was nor how they had suddenly disappeared from the world.


    Considering that they might have allied together with the ice phoenix depicted as the enemy of everyone in the murals and painting. Maybe they were even the sect that the ice phoenix was a part of, if that was the case, it would make a bit more sense how the Mirage Sect had disappeared.


    "Why do I feel like learning more about this ice phoenix only ends up making things more confusing than before?" Muttering this to himself as he nced up at the mural depicting the ice phoenix all by itself in the face of the countless different races, Xuan Hao felt like his head had started to hurt.


    With his current limited information, it was nothing more than a pipe dream if he wanted to figure out just what these murals were depicting. Outside of what was shown.


    In the end, he could only throw this to the back of his mind once again before making his way towards therge pair of doors leading out of the small hall.


    2/2


    Will be a bit more on the main plot of the novel for once, rare, I know...


    ___


    Rant below can be ignored~


    __


    I want to also start writing on my second novel again from tomorrow and try to see if I can do daily chapters for that as well.


    For some reason I feel like I want to write far more than before at the moment. No idea if this sudden drive to write more is due to me starting to enjoy writing the same I did before I got contracted, even before this novel existed, but I want to continue this, as its far more enjoyable for me to write than before at the moment. Not that I didn''t enjoy it before, just like it more now xD


    PurpleSpring

 Chapter 958 Preservation Golem

    Standing in front of therge pair of sandstone doors leading out of the small hall, Xuan Hao couldn''t help marveling at the intricate carvings on the surface of therge doors. Even with the passage of time, these intricate and mystical carvings of different mythical creatures had managed to remain intact.


    Taking a step forward before trying to push open the pair ofrge sandstone doors, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he felt the terrifying weight of the pair of doors in front of him.


    Rumble~


    Deciding to put more strength into his arms and raising the strength used all the way up to the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, therge sandstone doors finally began to show signs of moving-


    Creeeeaaak~!


    However, it was only when his strength reached a levelparable to that of the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm that the sandstone doors finally gave in and opened up to reveal arge hallway on the other side.


    "Just what kind of sandstone is this door made of¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he briefly nced over the now open pair of sandstone doors, Xuan Hao soon turned his attention towards therge hallway leading deeper inside the massive underground structure buried beneath the sand.


    Although he had no idea what kind of purpose the structure had served in the past for the trial, he felt that it should have some other use than just being the ce where the scroll of trials happened to be located.


    If that was the case, there would have been no need to construct such a massive structure in the first ce, just leaving the stone pedestal somewhere near the ce he had appeared after entering the trial like the other two trials had done would have been far simpler¡­


    "Hm? This is¡­" Observing the walls of the hallway, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he noticed a thin line of energy connecting to the sandstone door traveling along the side of the wall before disappearing behind a corner a few hundred meters ahead.


    The reason that this thin line of energy happened to catch his attention was not due to the fact that it was there, but more so the fact that he hadn''t sensed it with his divine sense earlier and should have only just appeared after he opened the sandstone door.


    I hope this isn''t some kind of trap¡­


    Feeling a sense of unease as he kept his attention focused on the corner that the thin line of energy had disappeared behind, Xuan Hao prepared himself for whatever kind of trap might have been triggered by him opening the sandstone doors.


    Tap~ Tap~


    Not a secondter, the sound of something light moving through the hallway could be heard. Instantly causing Xuan Hao to prepare himself for the worst as his dao domain spread out together with his divine sense.


    "Huh?"


    However, what appeared in front of him was not some kind of powerful guardian demon beast nor some kind of puppet that might have been activated as a result of someone entering the structure forcefully. Instead, what appeared in front of him was a human-sized golem made up of what could only be described as some kind of mud. Not to mention over half of its body was missing, causing it to slowly limp towards him at a speed that even a normal mortal could outrun.


    The only thing forcing him to take the golem seriously even in that condition, was the fact that he could feel a terrifying power no weaker than the cloud demon beast inside the golem.


    Although it was faint and clearly close to extinguishing at any moment, he didn''t dare being the slightest bit careless when faced with something that had to do with the Earth Immortal Realm, the feeling of absolute suppression that he had felt when facing the cloud demon beast was still fresh in his mind.


    Thump!


    Just as the golem was about to reach the area covered by his dao domain, it came to a sudden stop before its head turned to look directly at him.


    "Greetings trial participant, you have not reached the minimum requirement for redeeming a secret technique. Entering the exchange hall without fulfilling the minimum requirement will result in a response from the Protective Formation in ce that might kill you.


    The Mirage Sect is not responsible for any trial participants who die after viting the rules. Please turn around and return only after reaching the minimum requirements for exchanging a secret technique."


    "It can talk!?"


    Taken by surprise by the golem suddenly starting to talk, Xuan Hao momentarily froze as he looked towards the golem filled with confusion. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Talking is a normal feature of a preservation golem, as they are required to converse with trial participants on asions and prevent them from recklessly activating the protective formations of the Celestial Trials and get themselves killed in the process." Not caring about his confused state, the preservation golem promptly answered the surprised exmation without missing a beat.


    What in the world is this thing¡­ And Celestial Trials? Is it perhaps talking about the trials of the celestial gates?


    Taking a few seconds to calm down as he looked towards the self-proimed preservation golem, Xuan Hao could not help feeling confused about the new information that he had obtained from the golem.


    Even then, through the information that it had given him, he could at the very least determine that it shouldn''t be an immediate threat to his safety and just came out to warn him before he ended up idently walking into a so-called protective formation guarding part of the underground structure¡­ And given the other formations he had seen so far after entering the mystic realm, he felt rather lucky that he didn''t end up walking into one again.


    Other than that, he also found out about the fact that the golem belonged to the Mirage Sect and that there was some kind of exchange hall with secret techniques inside the underground structure.


    As for any more information, it looked like he would have to try and see if he could get any more information from the golem in front of him. Maybe even try to figure out what the Celestial Trials and requirements it had mentioned was about¡­

 Chapter 959 Celestial Trials And Exchange Hall

    "Can you give me an exnation of the Celestial Trials?" Feeling that he might as well try to see if he could get any more information from the preservation golem, Xuan Hao decided to ask something simple to start off with.


    "The Celestial Trials is the official name of the trials managed by the Mirage Sect."


    "What about the Exchange Hall?" Hearing the answer from the golem, Xuan Hao could only roll his eyes as the golem didn''t really get any new information before trying to see if he would have any more luck asking about the Exchange Hall. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "The Exchange Hall is the ce where Trial Participants can exchange for secret techniques."


    "¡­"


    From the looks of things, it would not be answering his question in a detailed manner that would allow him to understand the Celestial Trails or the Exchange Hall in greater detail, but instead just a simple exnation that shed no light on just what the Celestial Trials and Exchange Hall was nor why the Mirage Sect had decided to construct them in the first ce.


    Hm¡­ If it doesn''t have any more information about the Exchange Hall and the Celestial Trials. Maybe it can help me understand when I have the qualifications to enter the Exchange Hall¡­


    "Is there any way I can find out when I have met the requirements to enter the Exchange Hall?"


    "Yes, would you like to view your current progress trial participant?"


    "Yes?" Not expecting a positive answer, Xuan Hao agreed without thinking-


    Swish-!


    And before he had any time to react, the half-broken golem that could barely move had appeared directly in front of him. Passing through his dao domain like it wasn''t there in the first ce. Even if the golem did not show any signs of attacking him, it still caused a shiver to run down his spine, as he felt thankful for not identally attacking the golem earlier on.


    "Initial examination will begin now, please do stand still during this process as movement might cause inuracies in the examination."


    Hearing the instructions of the golem that seemed far scarier than before at the moment, Xuan Hao decided to do as it said and remainedpletely still without moving a single muscle.


    Rustle~


    Having woken up due to the suddenmotion happening outside, the rabbit demon beast that had somehow managed to sleep through the sandworm encounter slowly poked its tired head out of the small hidden pocket in Xuan Hao''s robe.


    Squeak?


    Coming face to face with the half-broken golem that was standing directly in front of Xuan Hao at this point in time as it was in the process of examining him, the rabbit demon beast could not help tilting its head in confusion. Not understanding what was going on or why Xuan Hao was standingpletely motionless without moving a single muscle.


    SQUEAK!?


    As it turned its attention towards the half-broken golem, the rabbit demon beast suddenly seemed to have noticed something as it jumped up in fear before escaping back into the pocket.


    Confusing Xuan Hao as to just what had happened to the fearless little rabbit that didn''t even fear a demon beast in the Earth Immortal Realm to cause it to be so fearful all of a sudden.


    "Examination has beenpleted; would you like me to list your current progress?"


    "Yes."


    However, before he had a chance to investigate this any further, the golem finished the examination and not wanting to do anything wrong, Xuan Hao decided to respond as fast as possible. Throwing the matter of the rabbit demon beast''s fearful behavior to the back of his mind for now.


    After all, even if he wanted to figure out what had caused the rabbit demon beast to be so fearful all of sudden, there was not really much he could do given that it couldn''t talk. Even then, he already had a guess, as it had been rather obvious that it was something about the half-broken golem that had caused it to be so fearful all of a sudden¡­


    "Confirmation of trial participant granted; I will now list your current progress in the Celestial Trials¡­" Not wasting a single second after hearing Xuan Hao''s response, the golem began speaking again.


    "¡­ Cultivation realm of trial participant, Intermediate Stage Dao Domain Lord, number of trialspleted, 2, requirement to enter Exchange Hall at the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, 3, faction, no information avable, unable to gather more information. No more information can be gathered on trial participant, it is rmended that trial participant leave the Exchange Hall and only return afterpleting at least three trials.


    Trial participant has notpleted the Trial of the Great Sandworm yet and is rmended toplete it, the guardian of the desert can be found living between the tworge cliffs sticking up from the ground south of the Exchange Hall."


    Listening to the golem, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a hint of excitement as he realized that the golem not only gave him the answer as to what he needed to enter the Exchange Hall, but also gave him the location of the guardian of the desert that he had been looking for.


    "It''s rmended that trial participant leave the Exchange Hall immediately, or the protective formation will automatically kick the trial participant out. The Mirage Sect is not responsible for any trial participants who die after viting the rules. Be warned, this request has already been given twice and there is no third warning."


    Lost in his own thoughts for a short moment as he felt excited learning about the location of the guardian of the desert that he had been looking for, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine upon hearing what the golem in front of him said.


    "No worries, I will be leaving immediately!"


    Swish-!


    Not wanting to stay around inside the so-called Exchange Hall for even a second longer after knowing that it might possibly end up costing him his life, Xuan Hao didn''t waste a single second as he left back through therge sandstone doors and made his way back up to the surface again.


    Even if he had no clue if the golem had any strength left to fight him nor if the protective formation was still in ce, he saw no reason to risk his life testing out these things, it would be far safer to first deal with the guardian of the desert before returningter after having defeated it when he had reached the minimum requirements for entering the Exchange Hall¡­

 Chapter 960 The Guardian Of The Desert

    Rumle~!


    Just at the moment that he reached the top of the sandstone tower, a loud rumbling sound echoed out beneath him as he saw several ancient symbols appearing all over the interior of the sandstone tower. Even without knowing the meaning of these ancient symbols, it was not hard to guess that this should be the protective formation that the preservation golem had mentioned to him.


    Whoosh~!


    Having now confirmed that the formation guarding the Exchange Hall was still around, Xuan Hao didn''t dare waste even a second as he jumped off the sandstone tower beforending on arge sand dune just below the sandstone tower.


    Looking back towards the sandstone tower that was now covered in all sorts of ancient symbol brimming with power that made a shiver run down his spine, Xuan Hao understood that he would not be able to return to the Exchange Hall without first fulfilling the minimum requirement mentioned by the preservation golem.


    In a sense, he could be considered lucky that he had stumbled upon the Exchange Hall before the formation had activated, as he had no idea how he would find the location of the guardian of the desert without the help of the preservation golem inside.


    Even if he could still search through the entire desert for the location of the guardian of the desert, it would most likely end up taking months if not years to do so. Especially considering that he would have no clue what he would even be looking for without having the chance to read through the trial of scrolls located at the top of the sandstone tower¡­


    Remaining focused on the sandstone tower now covered in all sorts of ancient symbols, Xuan Hao tried to see if he could gain anything from trying toprehend them. However, with his current limited understanding of formations, this was easier said than done, as he could only give up after a few minutes before turning to look south from the sandstone tower.


    "The golem mentioned tworge cliffs sticking up south from the Exchange Hall, but no matter where I look, I can''t seem to find the cliffs that it mentioned." Muttering this to himself as he scanned the desert south of the sandstone for the tworge cliffs that the golem had told him about, Xuan Hao realized that it would not be as easy to find the guardian of the desert as he had first expected.


    If even the Exchange Hall had been buried beneath the sand over the passage of countless years, so it would only be obvious that the cliffs mentioned by the golem had also been buried beneath the sand over the years.


    Hah¡­ Looks like it will still require some effort to find the guardian of the desert¡­


    Letting out a sigh as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could only hope that a part of the cliffs was still above ground like the sandstone tower of the Exchange Hall. If this was not the case, it would be far harder to find the guardian of the desert.


    Whoosh~


    Deciding not to think about it anymore, Xuan Hao floated a few meters off the ground before starting to move south of the Exchange Hall. Not forgetting to use his divine sense at the same time to scan for the presence of the two cliffs beneath the sand at the same time.


    Although this did carry the risk of identally giving away his location to any of the sandworms living beneath the sand, he was more than willing to take this risk if it meant that he would be able to find the guardian of the desert faster. Not to mention, he should be able to easily escape from the sandworms by flying, as he doubted that they would be able to chase after him above the sand.


    Even if the sandworms had the ability to fly, he didn''t think they would be fast enough to chase after him given their size, but¡­ A part of him really wanted to see what it would look like for one of the giant sandworms to fly.


    "Hm?"


    However, just as Xuan Hao was preparing himself to spend the next few days searching through the desert for any signs of the two cliffs that might have disappeared beneath the sea of sand, tworge spikes adjacent to each other suddenly appeared in the distance.


    "This was easier than expected¡­" Not knowing what to say upon noticing what could only be the two cliffs that the golem had mentioned sticking up from the ground, Xuan Hao quickly slowed down as he prepared himself to face the guardian of the desert that should be hidden beneath the sand in between the tworge cliffs.


    Even if he had no idea how strong the guardian of the desert was, he could at the very least still guess that it should at least be somewhere around the same strength as the guardian Aria whom he had faced alone. No, considering that he also had the rabbit demon beast with him, it might even be slightly stronger than Aria! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Thump~


    Landing on the ground a few thousand meters away from the tworge cliffs, Xuan Hao spread out his dao domain and allowed it to prate the ground beneath him to help guard against any attack from below.


    Rumble!


    Only a few seconds afternding and having his dao domain spread out, a loud rumbling sound echoed out from beneath him, as the sand beneath his feet started shifting. Soon revealing arge mouth opening up directly beneath him-


    Swish-!


    Of course, having already been prepared for an attack from beneath, Xuan Hao didn''t show any surprise after seeing the giant mouth filled with rows upon rows of teeth opening up beneath him, as he instead used his movement technique to quickly avoid the surprise attack before the mouth had a chance to close around him.


    Bang!


    Not a secondter the enormous mouth closed shut with tremendous force!


    "So, this is the guardian of the desert¡­"Landing a few hundred meters away, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he witnessed this giant mouth closing shut before swallowing everything within a few kilometer of where he had been standing just a moment ago. Only now realizing just howrge the guardian of the desert waspared to the sandworm he encountered earlier on...

 Chapter 961 Weaker Than Expected?

    RUMBLE-!


    Realizing that it had missed its target, the sandworm emerged from beneath the desert''s surface, its massive form causing the sand on top of it to cascade down its body like a waterfall running down the side of a mountain.


    Turning its massive body in the sand for a few seconds as Xuan Hao watched on in awe, as he wondered whether it would even be possible for him to kill such a massive creature in the first ce. Not only was the size of the sandworm a problem, but its strength was by far the most worrying. Having reached the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Although the Fifth Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm might not sound like too much of a problem considering the fact that Xuan Hao''s current strength wasparable to that of someone in the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, it also had to be noted that the physical body of the sandworm in front of him was far stronger than just a Fifth tribtion Soul Ascension Realm demon beast.


    Observing it with his divine sense, Xuan Hao had a feeling that even the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts from the massive forest of the mist covered mountain range would be nowhere near the same level of the sandworm in front of him. Even worse, he could sense a few simrities between the power given off by the enormous body and the cloud demon beast!


    If he was not wrong, the physical body of the sandworm in front of him should have reached a realm that was only a single step away from the Earth Immortal Realm¡­


    ROOOOOAR!


    Not caring about what Xuan Hao thought about it, the sandworm let out a deafening roar, its dark eyes fixed on Xuan Hao, as it recognized him as the same person who had escaped from its attack a few seconds earlier.


    Rumble~


    Wasting no time after this, the sand worm rushed towards him as its giant mouth opened side enough to blot out a part of the sky.


    Swish-!


    Dodging the mouth of the giant sandworm by leaping into the air, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if he had overestimated the strength of the sandworm. Even if it had a strong body, it would not be too difficult to deal with if its only form of attack was opening its mouth wide and trying to swallow him. Especially so with how he would be able to simply fly into the air to dodge this kind of attack with no effort on his part.


    The only limiting factor was that the space of the desert still limited his ability to fly for a prolonged period of time. Although not to the degree of the emerald serpent trial, it still used a significant amount of energy, something that would be best to avoid when it came to fighting against a powerful creature like the sandworm below him.


    Thump!


    For this reason, instead of remaining in the air above the sandworm, Xuan Hao firmlynded on top of it before the silver sword appeared in his hands as he gathered his power at the tip of the sword before stabbing into the scales covering its body-


    Ching~!


    However, the defensive ability of the sandworm was not something that easy to breakthrough, as the sword barely scratched the surface of the scales before bouncing off without doing any real damage to the enormous creature.


    If he wanted to do any real damage to the sandworm with his current strength, he would first have to find a weak point, a chink in the scaly armor of the sand worm.


    ROOAR!


    Feeling Xuan Hao trying to stab through its scales, the giant sandworm roared in anger before it began violently thrashing beneath him in an attempt to throw him off. Even if he did not seed in breaking through its scales, it was still a rather painful experience to be hit with the full blunt force of his sword attack.


    Bang! Bang!


    Roar!


    Soon realizing that it was unable to throw off Xuan Hao who continued probing its body for any possible weakness by using his dao domain to conjure thousands of different sword attacks to attack all over its body, the sandworm decided that enough was enough-


    RUMBLE-!


    And before Xuan Hao had any time to react, the enormous body of the sandworm over a dozen kilometers in length suddenly rolled over. Resulting in Xuan Hao finding himself getting dragged down beneath the sand in the process.


    The change in surroundings didn''t affect him too much as his dao domain kept the sand at least a few dozen meters away from his body, but at the same time, he also understood that it would be far harder to escape the attacks of the sand worm. Especially considering that he was at least a hundred meters beneath the sand at this point in time.


    However, as long as he remained attached to the sandworm, there would be no way for it to attack him-


    "Huh?"


    It was only at this point in time that Xuan Hao realized that the scales of the sandworm that he had been standing on top of only a moment ago hadpletely disappeared. Instead, being reced by ayer of solid sand that felt simr to them.


    The sandworm has the ability to manipte sand!?


    Even if he realized this now, it was already toote at this point in time, as the sandworm had already managed to fool him and somehow escape without him noticing.


    It did not really help that his divine sense had been severely limited due to him being underground and the fact that the sand had a rather unfortunate property of also restraining the area he could cover with his divine sense in a simr way as the tall grass from the emerald serpent trial. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    In a sense, he was nowpletely defenseless against the giant sandworm hiding somewhere nearby, just waiting for an opportunity to strike.


    All of a sudden, Xuan Hao no longer felt that the sandworm was weaker than expected¡­

 Chapter 962 Attack From Beneath

    Knowing that trying to escape back towards the surface would end u putting him at a disadvantage when it came to defending or avoiding a possible attack, Xuan Hao decided to remain motionless in the sand as he waited for the sandworm to make the first move. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    It''s here¡­


    Feeling the sand around him moving, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes before focusing his full attention on his divine sense. The moment the sandworm approached him to attack, he would be able to react and get out of the way before making his way back up to the surface of the desert where it would be far safer for him to fight the sandworm.


    Rumble~


    "Huh?"


    However, instead of trying to swallow him like he had expected it to do, the sand beside him started rapidly hardening. Making it far more difficult to move aroundpared to before. Even if it was still possible to move, it would be close to impossible for him to dodge an attack from the sandworm.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat ugly expression on his face upon seeing the sandworm appearing directly beneath him.


    Opening itsrge mouth, the moment it entered the range of his divine sense, the sandworm began rapidly ascending towards Xuan Hao, who waspletely surrounded by the hardened sand that had turned into some kind of sandstone at this point in time. Not intending to give him any chance to escape like he had done before.


    Bang!


    Swish-!


    Knowing just how bad his current situation was, Xuan Hao could only use all of his energy to forcefully break through the sandstone all around him before rushing towards the surface.


    Unfortunately, the process of breaking through the sandstone caused his speed to slow down as the sandworm caught up to him-


    RUMBLE-!


    And through his divine sense, he could see the razor-sharp rows of teeth surrounding him on all sides slowly closing in on him. Essentially, he had just entered the mouth of the sandworm and it was currently in the process of closing its mouth in an attempt to use the countless rows of teeth to rip him apart.


    Different from the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast that had ended up swallowing him back in the forest of the mist covered mountain range, the sandworm did not have any weakness he could take advantage of and attack, as all parts of its mouth was covered in rows upon rows of sharp teeth.


    Entering its body to cause damage was also out of the question, as it was simrly guarded by even more teeth that would be impossible for him to break through!


    As for where the sand it swallowed ended up going¡­ From what he could see through his divine sense, it seemed like it had countless small openings inside its mouth that allowed the sand to filter out without entering its stomach.


    From the looks of things, if he didn''t figure out a way to escape his current situation, he would really end up getting skewered by the sharp rows of teeth rapidly closing in on him!


    Maybe I can take advantage of the small openings in the mouth of the sandworm and try to see if I can cut open a hole big enough to fit through¡­


    Feeling like he was growing desperate as therge teeth started getting closer along with the hole representing the way out of the mouth getting smaller, Xuan Hao decided to try and take advantage of the small openings in the mouth of the sandworm to possibly create a path out of the mouth.


    Even if he had been unable to break through the scales of the sandworm so far, it could be said that the small openings presented a way for him to attack the scales of the sandworm from beneath and possibly cut them off the sandworm entirely this way.


    Swish-!


    Not wasting a second after havinge up with this n, Xuan Hao gave up on trying to outrun the sandworm and instead allowed himself to fall deeper into the mouth before moving towards one of the ces in the mouth where the sand filtered through before being expelled from the mouth.


    Swoosh-!


    Using his silver sword enhanced by his sword intent and further strengthened by the power of his dao domain, Xuan Hao began shing at the ce where the sandworm was filtering the sand out of its mouth.


    Ptsh!


    The de soon cut into the tough, leathery flesh covering the inner part of the sandworm''s mouth, causing arge amount of blood to spray out, dying the surrounding sand bright red in the process-


    ROOOOOOOOAR!


    And at the same time causing a deep howl filled with pain to erupt from beneath him as the sandworm howled in pain at the sudden attack inside of its mouth. Although it was only superficial damage so far and hadn''t really done much damage to the sandworm itself, it was still a painful experience for the sandworm.


    However, more importantly than all of this, the sudden pain caused the sandworm to momentarilye to a stop as its body twisted in response to the pain.


    "Hm!?"


    Not having expected this when he was trying to desperately dig his way out of the sandworm''s mouth, Xuan Hao''s eyes shone with excitement at the brief window of opportunity that had presented itself-


    Swish-!


    Not one to let go of this chance, Xuan Hao abandoned his n of digging a hole through the mouth of the sandworm and instead seized the moment to muster all of his strength before escaping from the jaws of the sandworm.


    Bang!


    Crossing thest few dozen meters to the surface, Xuan Hao leaped into the air before stepping to the side-


    BANG!


    Narrowly avoiding the sandworm, that had already managed to recover from the pain, as it burst up through the sand beneath him in a rather majestic disy of its massive body that was now fully out of the sand for the first time.

 Chapter 963 The Sandworm’s Weak Spot

    Watching as the sandworm continued up for a few more seconds after having missed him before gravity kicked in and dragged its massive body back towards the ground again, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of awe when faced with the sheer size of the sandworm. By far, it was thergest creature that he had ever encountered so far. Even the weird squid creature and the cloud demon beast came nowhere near the size of the sandworm gracefully falling towards the ground in front of him.


    As Xuan Hao spected earlier, the giant sandworm was too big to fly.


    Maybe it was due to the fact that the space inside the trial space was far more stable than the outside world, making it far harder to fly, or maybe it was simply due to the fact that the sandworm had never thought about trying to do it in the first ce.


    No matter what it was, this all resulted in the sandworm now falling back down towards the ground without being able to slow its fall.


    But¡­ More importantly than that, the sandworm''s current state presented a perfect opportunity for Xuan Hao tounch an attack-


    Swish!


    And having already managed to find one of the sandworm''s possible weak spots during his short stay inside its mouth, Xuan Hao was more than happy to jump at this opportunity to test out whether or not he could make use of the tiny filters to get beneath the scales of the sandworm and start doing some real damage inside of it.


    Ching~!


    Hitting the scales of that covered therge head of the sandworm, Xuan Hao didn''t flinch and instead focused on controlling the energy contained inside the sword to spread out to cover the head of the sandworm instead of trying to break through the close to indestructible scales. Allowing it to search for the small openings that had been used to filter the sand out from the mouth earlier on.


    Although this was not easy to do with how little time he had left before the sandwormnded on the ground and had the chance to escape or try and swallow him again, Xuan Hao already knew the rough location of where these filters were located on the head of the sandworm-


    "There!"


    And a short moment before the sandwormnded on the ground, he finally found them!


    Whoosh-!


    Wasting no time after finding his target, Xuan Hao used arge portion of his qi to create arge amount of sword energy that soon gathered in the palm of his hand before violently smashing it into the location where the openings that the sandworm used to filter sand out of its mouth was located.


    BOOOOOOM-!


    The second his palm filled with sword energy hit the body of the sandworm, it violently exploded forth with a terrifying might before rushing into the small openings in the body of the sandworm.


    ROOOOOOOOOOOAR!


    Feeling the terrifying sword energy that had infiltrated its body before traveling beneath its scales directly towards its vital organs, the sandworm could not help letting out a both panicked and painful roar, as it felt the sword energy tearing apart its body in the process.


    Even worse, when it tried to expel the sword energy running rampant inside of its body, it quickly discovered that the scales that normally protected it, was now making it far more difficult for it to forcibly expel the sword energy from its body. Not only that, but it soon discovered that Xuan Hao had appeared on the opposite side of its head-


    BOOOOM-!


    And before it had a chance to react, another palm filled with sword energy fell on the sand filter, as even more sword energy rushed inside of its body before starting to cause even more damage.


    ROOOOAR!


    At this point in time, the sandworm was no longer thinking about swallowing Xuan Hao, but was instead thinking about how to escape before things got worse¡­ And the best way to do this was by digging into the sand where it would be able to exert its full power.


    In the head of the sandworm, as long as it could hide away beneath the sand, it would be able to easily escape from Xuan Hao and find a safe ce to expel the sword energy from its body.


    Understand this as well, Xuan Hao tried his best to destroy the sandworm from the inside before it had a chance to reach the sand, but in the end, he also realized that the body of the sandworm was simply far toorge for him to kill in such a short amount of time.


    Even if he had free ess to run rampant inside the body of the sandworm at the moment, it didn''t matter.


    And that was not even mentioning the fact that the sandworm also had an abnormally fast recovery speed. If he didn''t dedicate part of the sword energy to making sure it didn''t regrow the parts that he destroyed, it would end up recovering almost immediately after he had done any damage¡­ n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    I won''t be able to kill it in time like this, but how can I kill the sandworm faster than now?


    Knowing that he would have to think of something else if he wanted to kill it before it could escape, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he thought about all possible solutions he could think of-


    Wait¡­ Maybe I can try and use the Dao of Corruption. If it works, it should feed on the energy inside the body of the sandworm and devour it from the inside!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao thought about a few other ideas, but in the end, only the Dao of Corruption seemed like it was going to work and not having any time left to think of other ways to kill the sandworm, Xuan Hao decided to use the Dao of Corruption.


    Swoosh!


    In one swift motion, the Dao of Corruption spread through his Dao domain and entered the body of the sandworm. Using the many passages carved out by the sword energy to rapidly spread through the entire body of the sandworm.

 Chapter 964 The Sandworm’s Dao

    Although the Dao of Corruption had only just begun devouring its vitality, the speed at which it was spreading through the paths carved out by the sword energy was increasing and before long, the Dao of Corruption had spread throughout the entire body of the sandworm.


    Roar!


    Feeling the Dao of Corruption rapidly starting to devour its vitality, the sandworm let out a painful roar as a terrifying killing intent emerged from the depths of its eyes. Although it was in a rather bad situation when the sword energy permeated throughout its body, it did not truly believe that Xuan Hao would be able to do any real damage before it reached the sand below, but this changed the moment it felt the Dao of Corruption infiltrating its body before starting to devour its vitality.


    Even if it should be able to reach the sand before the Dao of Corruption devoured itpletely from the inside, it understood that it would be left in an extremely weak state and would be unable to defend against any follow up attacks from Xuan Hao.


    Not to mention Xuan Hao, even if it managed to escape, it would also have to worry about other sandworms taking advantage of its weakened state to try and devour it to increase their own strength.


    Compared to Xuan Hao, where it could escape from by digging into the sand, there was no way that this kind of escape would work against a fellow sandworm¡­


    BANG!


    Just at this moment, the tail of the sandworm finally crashed into the sand below, causing arge amount of sand to fly into the air as the rest of the sandworm began crashing into the sand. Although this was the case, it would still take some time before the entire body of the more than a dozen kilometer long body of the sandworm was back on the ground again.


    Rumble! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    However, this was more than enough for the sandworm to establish a connection with the sand, as the entire desert beneath it starting violently trembling before it rushed up body of the sandworm before covering its entire body-


    BOOM!


    And before Xuan Hao had a chance to understand what the sandworm was nning to do; a terrifying force was exerted through the sand.


    Whoosh-!


    As the sand was pressed up against the body of the sandworm, a strange reaction took ce between the scales of the sandworm and the sand, as a strange yellow qi began oozing out from the sand before being absorbed by the sandworm the next moment.


    Not knowing what was happening, Xuan Hao could only continue to observe the situation inside the body of the sandworm, as the yellow qi soon arrived at the areas where the sword energy and Dao of Corruption was present.


    Bang! Bang!


    Not a secondter, the yellow qi began shing with the Dao of Corruption and the sword energy at the same time. Stopping any further damage to the inside of the sandworm''s body, while at the same time also started to push back before slowly starting to recover some of the damage that had been done by the sword energy or the Dao of Corruption.


    "Huh?"


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao could not help showing a confused expression on his face. Not understanding how the sandworm had suddenly managed to mount a defense and push back against him, Xuan Hao began to more closely observing the yellow qi as it coursed through the body of the sandworm and fought back against the sword energy and the Dao of Corruption with his divine sense.


    The yellow qi did not act like normal qi, but instead behaved in a simr fashion to his sword energy and the power from the Dao of Corruption that had infiltrated the body of the sandworm.


    This yellow qi¡­ If I''m not wrong, it should be the Dao that the sandwormprehended¡­


    Observing the battle inside the body of the sandworm for a few seconds, Xuan Hao came to this conclusion.


    Although he had not seen the sandworm use any form of domain so far, it was still a demon beast at the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. No matter how bad itsprehension was, it should still haveprehended a domain at its current realm.


    As for what kind of Dao it had ended upprehending, it was rather obvious.


    So, itprehended the Dao of Sand, I thought that its ability to manipte the sand was due to the fact that it was a sandworm, but¡­ Now it looks like the reason it has this ability is because itprehended the Dao of Sand!


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao realized that it would be impossible for him to kill the sandworm with the sword energy and Dao of Corruption before it could escape underground¡­ And watching as half of the sandworm''s body had already been submerged in the sand, Xuan Hao could only try and think of another way to kill it before it had a chance to escape.


    Hm? What about the Dao of ice¡­ It should be weak to it ording to the scroll of trials, but¡­ Is this weakness perhaps alluding to the fact that the Dao of Ice has some sort of restraining effect on the Dao of Sand?


    During this time, Xuan Hao suddenly remembered how the scroll of trials had listed the Dao of Ice as one of the weaknesses of the sandworm.


    Although he had no idea how the sandworm would be weaker against the Dao of Icepared to any of the other Daos he hadprehended before, he now finally had an idea as to how the sandworm would be weak against the Dao of ice-


    Whoosh~!


    And not really having any other options left, Xuan Hao gathered most of his remaining power together in a single attack using the Dao of ice before pushing it through the small openings and along the path carved out by the sword energy and into the body of the sandworm.

 Chapter 965 Fall Of The Guardian Of The Desert

    Swoosh~!


    As the freezing cold power of the Dao of Ice rushed inside the body of the sandworm, it immediately transformed into small ice crystals that froze everything they passed by before recing the already exhausted power from the Dao of Corruption and the sword energy in fighting against the yellow qi belonging to the Dao of Sand.


    Crakle~


    Following the ice crystals meeting the yellow qi, a noticeable crackling sound could be heard throughout the body of the sandworm, as the ice crystals attached themselves to the yellow qi before freezing them in ce.


    Roar!?


    Trying to gather more yellow qi from the surrounding desert to fight back against the ice crystals, the sandworm could not help letting out a panicked roar, as it realized that the yellow qi had met its natural enemy. No matter how much yellow qi it gathered from the sand around it, it couldn''t do anything to the ice crystals that were rapidly spreading throughout its entire body without slowing down.


    Whoosh-!


    Before long, some of the ice crystals inside the body of the sandworm began following the yellow qi out of the body of the sandworm before spreading into the sand that covered the sandworm-


    Roar!?


    And before the sandworm realized what was happening, the sand all over its body that it was using to create the yellow qi, froze in ce. Not only that, but the sand around its body also froze overpletely. Locking the sandworm in ce and preventing it from escaping into the sand below.


    ROOOOOOOAR!


    Knowing how bad its current situation was as it clearly felt the ice crystal starting to freeze its entire body from the inside, the sandworm began thrashing around in an attempt to free itself from the frozen sand that imprisoned it-


    Crack!


    Given just how powerful the physical body of the sandworm was, the frozen sand had no way to hold the powerful sandworm in ce, as it directly shattered apart after the sandworm began thrashing around.


    Of course, Xuan Hao had never expected to keep the sandworm in ce. All he really wanted to do was buy more time for the freezing cold power of the Dao of Ice to spread through the body of the sandworm.


    Rumble~


    For this reason, Xuan Hao decided to use what little power was still left in him to create dozens of small ice chains that from the broken frozen sand on the ground to bind the sandworm and hold it in ce before it had a chance to escape beneath the sand.


    ROAR!


    Feeling the dozens of chains that was now holding it in ce, the sandworm''s killing intent exploded again as it began thrashing around to break free from the chains.


    Craaaaack-!


    However, different from the frozen sand that had held it in ce before, the sandworm had grown noticeably weaker during this short period of time as the ice crystals continued spreading inside of its body. Making it harder and harder for it to make use of its powerful physical body to break free from the icy chains.


    Craaack-!


    Even when it broke apart one of the chains, it was soon reced by a new one, as Xuan Hao used whatever energy he managed to recover to create new ice chains that could prevent it from escaping. Not intending to let it run away after going through such a long and exhausting battle.


    R-Roar!


    Realizing that it was no use, as it felt the ice crystal starting to spread to its vital organs, the sandworm could not help letting out a final defiant roar before the ice crystal managed to fully engulf its vital organs. Killing its body before freezing its soul to death a short timeter.


    "Finally¡­"


    Feeling the soul of the sandworm disappearing along with all signs of life from its body, Xuan Hao let out a sigh of relief as he stopped providing qi to the ice chains holding its body in ce-


    Craaaaaaack~


    Bang! Bang


    Instantly causing the dozens of ice chains to shatter before falling to the ground inrge chunks of frozen sand.


    BOOOOM-!


    Only a short secondter, the massive body of the sandworm fell to the ground. Not able to remain upright any longer without the help of therge ice chains.


    Thump~


    Not able to keep himself in the air due to exhaustion any longer, Xuan Hao used thest bit of qi left I his body tond on the ground before closing his eyes to recover as fast as possible. Although he had managed to defeat the guardian of the desert, he also understood that there were still other sandworms in the desert and given his current exhausted state, he would most likely not even be able to face off against the Domain Lord Realm sandworm that he had encountered earlier on¡­


    Rustle~


    Poking its small head out at this moment before rapidly scanning its surroundings for something, the rabbit demon beast soon showed a relieved expression on its face after realizing that the preservation golem from earlier was nowhere to be found before turning its attention towards Xuan Hao.


    Squeak?


    Seeing Xuan Hao''s exhausted state as he was fully focused on recovering, the rabbit demon beast could not help tilting its head in confusion. Not understanding what had happened during the time that it had hidden away inside his robe.


    Squeak!?


    Beginning to scan the surroundings for something that wasn''t the preservation golem, the rabbit demon beast soon spotted the giant frozen sandwormying no more than a few hundred meters away from it. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Squeak¡­


    Feeling the terrifying power still lingering in the air around the sandworm before looking back towards Xuan Hao who hadpletely shut off the world outside to recover as fast as possible, the rabbit demon beast could not help showing a hint of admiration on its almost permanently arrogant little face.


    For the first time since it had decided to follow after Xuan Hao, the little rabbit demon beast began to admire him.

 Chapter 966 Gluttonous Rabbit Demon Beast

    Having defeated the guardian of the desert and with the rabbit demon beast guarding him, time slowly passed as Xuan Hao was focused on recovering his strength. Outside of a small part of his divine sense that he was using to keep an eye out for any potential enemies approaching, he was blind to his surroundings and what the rabbit demon beast was up to during this time.


    Unknown to Xuan Hao, after the first day passed, the rabbit demon beast had begun to look towards therge dead body of the sandworm filled with hunger. For a demon beast like itself, the body of a demon beast whose physical body was already a step into the Earth Immortal Realm was something incredibly tempting.


    Even if it understood that Xuan Hao was the one who had killed the sandworm and it would essentially be stealing from him, the rabbit demon beast felt its reason disappear with each passing second as it started focus more of its attention on how great the sandworm would taste than on keeping an eye out for any approaching demon beast who might try to cause trouble.


    Squeak¡­


    Finally reaching a breaking point on the third day, the rabbit demon beast cautiously approached the dead body of the sandworm before slowly starting to nibble away at the frozen body.


    Chomp~ Chomp~


    At first it only intended to take a few bites of the giant sandworm without Xuan Hao noticing, but it soon lost control over its body after feeling the clear and distinct increase in power brought along by consuming the body of a more powerful demon beast. Even with its Second Tribtion Soul Ascension Realm cultivation base, it still clearly felt its cultivation increasing as it consumed the body of the sandworm and absorbed the inherent power inside the flesh.


    BOOOOM-!


    Before the rabbit demon beast could get itself under control again, its cultivation base directly broke through to the limit of the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Squeak!?


    Recovering its senses, the moment it identally broke through the limits of the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, the rabbit demon beast let out a surprised squeaking sound before looking up into the air above it where a small and almost invisible tribtion cloud had started forming.


    Whoosh~


    Following the tribtion clouds forming, an illusory bolt of lighting shed through the sky before descending towards the unprepared rabbit demon beast. From the surprised and panicked expression of the rabbit demon beast, it became rather obvious that it didn''t know that breaking through the limit of the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm would instantly result in the third tribtion of the Immortal Soul Tribtion descending.


    If it had known this beforehand, it was almost certain that it would not have continued mindlessly consuming the body of the dead sandworm. After all, each and every single tribtion of the Immortal Soul Tribtion was a life and death matter. Unless absolutely necessary, demon beasts and humans alike would prepare beforehand undergoing the tribtion to increase their chances of survival¡­ And given how the rabbit demon beast was still feeling stuffed from eating so much sandworm meat, it could be said that it was far from prepared to deal with this tribtion¡­


    Bang!


    SQUEAAAK!


    As the illusory lightning bolt flew through the air before smashing into the panicked rabbit demon beast, the rabbit demon beast could only let out one final panicked squeak before its eyes went nk and it copsed on the ground without showing any signs of movement.


    "Huh?" Opening his eyes and looking over due to the ratherrgemotion that had been caused by the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a surprised sound as he managed to catch a glimpse of the illusory lightning bolt before it smashed into the body of the rabbit demon beast.


    Although only for a short moment, the terrifying power contained inside the small illusory lightning bolt was more than enough to cause a shiver to run down his spine as an almost primordial feeling of fear appeared in the depths of his soul.


    This is¡­ The Third Tribtion of the Immortal Soul Tribtion¡­?


    Taking a few seconds to calm down and examine the situation, Xuan Hao could not help opening both of his eyes in surprise after realizing just what had happened. Although he was not familiar with the Immortal Soul Tribtion, he could still put two and two together after noticing the obvious increase in strength of the rabbit demon beast.


    Not to mention the obvious tribtion clouds hanging in the sky above the rabbit demon beast¡­


    But how did it manage to reach the Peak of the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm so quickly and even challenged the third tribtion? As far as I know, it should not have been too long ago that it passed the second tribtion from what I could tell-


    Lost in his own thoughts as he looked over the rabbit demon beast wondering how it could have improved so fast, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed that arge part of the dead sandworm seemed to be missing.


    Ah¡­ So that is what happened¡­


    Putting two and two together, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say for a short moment before a somewhat helpless expression appeared on his face. "This little thing, so gluttonous. Maybe this will be a good lesson for it if it manages to survive the tribtion."


    At this point in time, there was nothing he could do but hope that the rabbit demon beast managed to ovee the tribtion and sessfully reach the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Only then would it have a chance to learn from its mistake.


    "It looks like I won''t be able to return to recovering for now¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the motionless rabbit demon beast that seemed to be locked in some kind of internal struggle, Xuan Hao sat down not too far away as his divine sense spread out to cover his surroundings in full force.


    Even if the rabbit demon beast had ended up in a dangerous situation due to its gluttony and might end up dying because of it, Xuan Hao had no ns of giving up on the rabbit demon beast. Intending to give it his all in protecting the rabbit demon beast while it was going through the third tribtion. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although his strength had not fully recovered yet, it should be fine as long as he didn''t end up encountering another guardian of the desert.


    Hm¡­ Maybe I should check out the side quest while I''m waiting. At least it should have beenpleted now that I killed the guardian of the desert.


    Knowing that he wouldn''t have too much to do in the foreseeable future, Xuan Hao decided to check on his side quest and see what had changed now that he had killed the guardian of the desert¡­


    [Side Quest: The Three Celestial Gates, Part 2 (Complete)]


    [Description: You have reached the mysterious mountain range hidden behind the mist. To uncover the secrets hidden inside the mountain range, you must find three ancient celestial gates and pass through them. So far, you have sessfully passed through the First Celestial Gate, the Gate of the Eternal City and the Second Celestial Gate, the Gate of the Serpent ins. Only the third and final Celestial Gate remains. Luckily, you happened to be teleported right on top of it after leaving the trial of the Second Celestial Gate and soon made your way into the third and final celestial gate. Soon oveing this final trial.]


    [Objective: Seek out the Three Celestial Gates and defeat the guardians within.]


    [First Trial: Trial of the Eternal City (Complete)]


    [Second Trial: Trial of the Emerald Serpent (Complete)]


    [Third Trial: Trial of the Great Sandworm (Complete)]


    [Reward: Starlight Essence]


    Reading through the side quest, it had indeed already been noted down asplete after he killed the guardian of the desert without him needing to leave the trial space first. Outside of being noted down asplete, only a few things had changed in the description.


    However, he decided against redeeming the reward forpleting the side quest for now. Not only because he had no idea what the Starlight Essence was, but also because he feared that redeeming the reward might end up rendering him unable to move or do anything for a period of time¡­ And considering that he was currently watching over the rabbit demon beast, this would have to wait untilter.


    At the very least, it seemed like there wasn''t any kind of time limit as to when he would need to redeem it like with the cultivation increase. If there had been something like this, he would have thought that the system might be trying to get him into trouble, but then again, the system didn''t really keep him out of trouble in the first ce¡­

 Chapter 967 Fate Of The Rabbit Demon Beast...

    Having finished reading through the side quest and with nothing more to do while watching over the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao decided to use his dao domain to slowly cut up what remained of the sandworm. Given that the sandworm was already dead, this was far easier to dopared to when he had first tried to break through its defenses.


    Whoosh~


    After cutting up the sandworm into smaller and more manageable chunks, he separated the scales, meat, teeth, and other useful materials before cing them inside a few spare interspatial rings that he carried with him. After all, given the size of the sandworm, there was no way he would be able to fit everything inside single interspatial ring¡­


    In the end, not only did he manage to harvest a lot of meat that would be beneficial for the growth of demon beasts, but he also managed to gain a lot of other useful materials that could be used in the creation of powerful artifacts and alchemical concoctions of the Soul Ascension Realm. The only problem was that there wasn''t really anyone in the current Star Shattering Sect that could make use of the Soul Ascension Realm materials for now.


    "Even if the materials harvested from the sandworm isn''t useful to the current Star Shattering Sect, they should at the very least serve as encouragement for the elders and disciples to improve. Maybe I could even try to use some of the materials myself¡­" Muttering this to himself as he put away thest few parts of the sandworm, Xuan Hao soon shook his head. Although he wanted to try and use the scales and teeth of the sandworm to make something, he also understood that his current level when it came to cksmithing was far too low. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Maybe if he improved his alchemy a bit further and reached the Master Realm, he would be able to make something using a few unique materials harvested from the sandworm, but that would be it. If he wanted to make use of the more powerful materials, he would have to surpass the Master Realm in alchemy.


    All things considered; Xuan Hao once again felt that his professions werecking too far behind whenpared to his current cultivation realm. Not only that, but he also felt that the current Star Shattering Sect wascking when it came to experts specialized in different professions.


    The Star Shattering Sect might be improving quickly at the moment, but it would inevitably end up running into a barrier at some point in time if there were no artifacts, potions, pills, or talismans to support the rapid growth of the sect.


    Looks like I will have to ask Elder Song about this after returning to the sect and see if he already has some ns to deal with this issue. Given how he is, I don''t doubt that he already has some ideas about this issue¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly when thinking about Elder Song.


    Without him, there would have been no way for the Star Shattering Sect to grow so fast and still remain stable. In a sense, Elder Song was the most suitable person for running the Star Shattering Sect and he didn''t doubt that Feng Chen would be more than happy to hand over the role of sect master as long as Elder Song managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    Unfortunately, the damage that his soul had suffered while taking care of his granddaughter had still not been fully recovered after he used the purification pill. Even then, he wouldn''t have any problem reaching the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. Forming a pseudo domain should also be possible, as that mainly relied onprehension and didn''t involve any kind of tribtion.


    Breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm and having to face a tribtion that was specifically targeting his soul on the other hand¡­ That was not something he could endure without his soul fully recovering.


    At least there was still a long time until Elder Song reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm considering that he was still in the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm and there should be more than enough time to find something to help remove thest bit of hidden injuries in his soul.


    Although this might have been difficult before, it should not be too hard to find something like this with his current cultivation realm. Not to mention, he could always try to go through the Explorer Union and buy something through them.


    After all, the Explorer Union was spread across the entire continent and sold countless precious materials and spiritual herbs. Even if the price of spiritual herbs or medicine that could heal the hidden injuries inside a soul were expensive, he was not really poor. Especially when considering thatrge number of special materials he had managed to gather from the sandworm.


    Given its size alone, the number of defensive artifacts that could be crafted from its scales alone would be more than enough to make him the riches person in the Sky Empire, let alone if he decided to include things like its teeth and the meat containing part of the power belonging to the Earth Immortal Realm.


    In a sense, after killing the sandworm and harvesting its materials, Xuan Hao had be the richest person in the Sky Empire. The only problem was that even if he wanted to sell part of the sandworm, he doubted that there would be anyone who could pay the price. Maybe only the Explorer Union would be able to do this, but they would properly need some time to transfer over these resources first¡­


    Squeak¡­


    Lost in his own thoughts as he had nothing better to do while watching over the rabbit demon beast, an exhausted squeak soon echoed out beside him, as the rabbit demon beast slowly opened its eyes before a powerful aura belonging to the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm emerged around it.


    It had sessfully passed through the tribtion!

 Chapter 968 Back To The Exchange Hall

    Squeak!


    Recovering some energy after seeing Xuan Hao sitting next to it, the rabbit demon beast jumped up with what little energy it had left before showing off its new strength. However, it severely overestimated how much energy was left in its body after the tribtion-


    Thump~


    As it ended up falling t on its face in front of Xuan Hao.


    Squeak¡­!


    Ending up in an embarrassing situation like this, the rabbit demon beast let out a somewhat embarrassed squeaking sound before it used thest bit of its energy to climb up Xuan Hao''s robe before quickly hiding away inside of it, its proud nature not allowing it to show its face after such a shameful disy.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after witnessing this, Xuan Hao could only shake his head before getting up to leave. Although he had not fully recovered yet, he didn''t want to stay inside the trial space for too long after havingpleted the trial. After all, from his experience with the first trial, there should be a limit as to how long he would be able to stay inside a trial afterpleting it.


    Although he did not find anything like this with the second trial, he had been too busy trying to escape at that time.


    Given the limited knowledge he had on this matter, he believed that the normal time would be around one week. The only problem was that he had no idea where the gate leading out of the desert was located, it did not neatly appear in front of him after he killed the sandworm. Even worse, it had already been six days since the death of the sandworm.


    If he had the same amount of time to leave as the first trial, he was left with less than a single day before the situation inside the desert would be life threatening!


    "Guess I can only go back to the Exchange Hall for now and see if I can find out anything from the preservation golem guarding the ce. At least I should be able to enter the Exchange Hall now¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced in the direction of the sandstone tower with the Exchange Hall beneath it, Xuan Hao could only pin his hope on the preservation golem and hope that it also knew the location of the gate out of the trial space.


    Whoosh~!


    Having decided where to go, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he jumped into the air before making his way back towards the sandstone tower.


    ¡­


    Arriving in front of the sandstone, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes as he saw the thin barrier covering the area around the sandstone tower. Different from before, the protective formation mentioned by the preservation golem was now fully activated.


    "The protective formation, I wonder if I will be fine just walking into it¡­" Feeling the ancient power flowing through the ancient symbols on the sandstone tower and into the thin barrier, Xuan Hao hesitated in front of the formation.


    If the formation did not recognize him as someone who hadpleted three trials like the preservation golem said was required to enter the Exchange Hall, he might end up in a far more dangerous situation than facing off against the guardian of the desert if he decided to step inside the formation in front of him. Not only that, but there was also the fact that he did not have a long time left before the seven-day time limit was up.


    It''s not like I have a much better choice¡­


    Taking a deep breath, Xuan Hao closed his eyes for a short moment-


    Thump~


    Before taking a step forward into the formation.


    "Haaaa¡­ Why is this so nerve wrecking¡­?" Waiting for a few seconds without anything happening, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief after making sure that the formation did not attack him.


    Swish~


    Now knowing that he was fine to enter the Exchange Hall, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time before making his way into the sandstone tower and down the spiral staircase. Soon finding himself in front of therge pair of sandstone doors that had closed again at some point in time.


    Creaaak~


    Slowly pushing open therge pair of sandstone doors again, Xuan Hao did not wait around like he had done thest time and instead began making his way along the old worn-down hallway that was on the other side. Not feeling too worried about any danger now that he knew that the ce should be safe for him to move around.


    "Hm?" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Moving along the hallway for a few minutes, arge pair of wooden appeared at the end. In front of which, two golems could be seen standing motionless without any signs of life.


    On closer inspection, Xuan Hao discovered that the two golems looked exactly the same as the preservation golem that he had encountered when first entering the Exchange Hall. The only difference was that the state of these golems was far worse than the one he had encountered, both of them long since having decayed to the point where they could no longer function-


    Whoosh~


    "Ah!?


    Or at least that was what he thought, as one of the two golems suddenly lit up for a brief moment before turning towards him.


    "Greetings trial participant, it seems you have sessfullypleted three trials and have the qualifications to enter the lower section of the Exchange Hall. Would you like a basic introduction to the Exchange Hall?"


    "Yes?"


    Listening to the golem that looked like it was about to copse at any moment, Xuan Hao could only hesitantly nod his head in agreement. Not knowing if the golem in front of him even had enough energy left inside of it toplete an introduction of the Exchange Hall in the first ce¡­


    "Great, I will now begin a ba-"


    Crack~


    Bang!


    "¡­"


    And almost like it had been nned beforehand, the golem copsed before it had time to finish the first sentence¡­

 Chapter 969 Buried In Sand

    Not knowing how to react to the golem copsing in front of him all of a sudden, Xuan Hao remained frozen on the spot for a few seconds before a helpless expression appeared on his face. Even if he had somewhat expected this oue given the state of the golem, he had at least hoped that it would be able to give him an introduction as to how the Exchange Hall functioned. Unfortunately, it looked like he would have to figure this out by himself.


    I was expecting far too much from this broken golem¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao slowly began to approach therge pair of wooden doors. Part of him was silently praying that the pair of wooden doors weren''t sealed by some sort of ancient formation that required the help of the two broken golems on either side of therge pair of doors.


    Creeeaaak~


    Lucky, when he tried pushing open therge pair of doors, there was no resistance. However, the sight that met him on the other side of was not anything like he had expected-


    "The ceiling of the Exchange Hall copsed!?"


    Instead, what Xuan Hao was met with was a barely intact room that had mostly been buried beneath the sand. From what he could see with the help of his divine sense, it looked like none of the things that had been buried beneath the sand had managed to survive the passage of time without the protection afforded to them by the formation of the Exchange Hall and the preservation golems.


    Wait! The formation should have been created for the sole purpose of protecting the Exchange Hall. If the formation is still around, there should not have been a chance for the formation to still exist, as it would have to be destroyed before the ceiling of the Exchange Hall would have a chance to copse¡­


    Feeling that the current situation in front of him didn''t make any sense, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes before focusing his divine sense on the ce where the ceiling copsed.


    The ce was big enough to cover around two thirds of the now buried Exchange Hall, but with his current divine sense, it was not too difficult to examine the entire thing.


    "Huh?"


    However, after covering the entire copsed part of the ceiling with his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not stop a surprised sound from escaping his lips followed by a hint of disbelief appearing in his eyes.


    "This¡­ The ceiling didn''t cave in due the constant stress put on it by the sand from the outside, but because someone destroyed the ceiling with brute force!" Muttering this to himself in shock at this revtion, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine.


    Given the power of the formation in ce surpassing even the strength of the cloud demon beast that he had encountered back in the sea of clouds, Xuan Hao could not imagine how strong someone would have to be to breakthrough the formation and destroy the most important part of the Exchange Hall. Even if it was someone in the Earth Immortal Realm, he doubted that it would be possible to do anything to the ancient formation guarding the Exchange Hall.


    Someone above the Earth Immortal Realm¡­?


    As this thought urred to him, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the rest of the Exchange Hall that had been buried beneath the sand. Looking at it again, it seemed like every single one of the secret techniques that the preservation golem had told him about had ended up being destroyed by the attack back then.


    The person who did this should have been one of the Mirage Sect''s enemies. Maybe even one of the people behind the destruction of the Mirage Sect¡­ n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Guessing the identity of the person who had caused the destruction of all the Exchange Hall''s secret technique, Xuan Hao did not continue to search through the sand. Understanding very well that there was no way that any of the secret techniques would have been able to survive the attack of an existence who possibly exceeded the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Even if some of the secret techniques had ended up miraculously surviving the attack, there was also the fact that they would have to survive beneath the sand for thousands of years without any form of protection.


    Feeling a sense of disappointment welling up inside of him as he nced over therge pile of sand covering everything inside the Exchange Hall except a small area around the wooden doors, Xuan Hao turned around and made his way back into the hallway.


    Hopefully there is more to this ce than just this single room. Maybe the person who attacked this ce didn''t get to destroy everything. After all, the formation is still active- Meaning that the core of the formation should still be intact¡­


    "Hm¡­ Maybe I should try and see if I can find the preservation golem from earlier and see if it can help me find the gate out of this trial space. At least it seemed like it had more than enough energy to hold a conversation." Muttering this to himself as he remembered the preservation golem that he had encountered when first entering the Exchange Hall, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit more hopeful.


    Given how big the underground structure that the Exchange Hall was located inside of was, there was no way that it would only contain a single room filled with secret techniques. If he was not wrong, there should be far more rooms like the one buried in sand.


    The only problem was that he had no idea if these rooms had ended up encountering a simr attack and ended up getting destroyed¡­ But then again, there was no way to figure this out before looking for himself. Not to mention, he still had to find the gate leading out of the trial space!

 Chapter 970 Tier Three Trial Participant

    Walking back through the hallway, Xuan Hao decided to explore the different paths branching off the side of the hallway. However, no matter which of these paths he followed, he would always end up in a room that had beenpletely destroyed from the outside.


    From time to time, there would be preservation golemsying broken on the ground in front of these rooms or along the way, but no matter, none of these golems were still active and he was only met with an eerie silence whenever he tried speaking to them.


    In the end, he soon found himself back at therge pair of sandstone doors. The preservation golem that he had encountered the first time he made his way inside the Exchange Hall having seemingly disappeared into thin air.


    "Will I really need to leave without getting any information on the gate out of this ce? How will I even be able to find the gate with less than half a day left before the seven-day limit is reached!?" Feeling a slight sense of panic as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help looking back into the long hallway that seemed to go on forever.


    Although he had not managed to find the preservation golem that was still active when searching through the countless destroyed rooms connected to the long hallway, he did not think that it had left. Guessing that it was most likely located in the same ce where the core of the formation was located. After all, that would be the only ce he had not managed to find inside the underground structure that made up the Exchange Hall.


    Knowing this made no difference, as there was no way he would be able to find the location of the formation core with his current strength without it showing itself.


    Even someone who had possibly surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm had been unable topletely destroy this formation, let alone someone like himself who had only reached the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Whoosh~


    However, just as he was about to give up on continuing to search for the active preservation golem, the golem in question suddenly appeared in front of him.


    "This is-"


    "Greetings trial participant, as a tier three trial participant, you only have one hour left inside the Exchange Hall to choose a secret technique at the third tier before being forced out. If you require any rmendations for secret techniques, please refer to the sect elder in charge of maintaining the trial ground. If even this does not help, the elder will help you leave through the gate.


    Please remember, the gate inside the Exchange Hall is different from those outside the boundaries of the Exchange Hall and is only essible by the elder in charge. Any attempt to use it without permission will be met with swift punishment."


    Not caring about Xuan Hao''s shocked expression, the golem emotionlessly stated this before patiently waiting for an answer.


    The gate is located inside the Exchange Hall!? And¡­ Tier three trial participant? Is it perhaps referring to my new status afterpleting three celestial trials? And sect elder¡­ I never expected a sect elder to be in charge of this trial in the past. Maybe this is also one of the reasons why the formation managed to survive to this day. Although, considering how long it has been, that sect elder should have long since passed away¡­


    Not answering the preservation golem immediately as he thought about the information that it had just provided him with, Xuan Hao remained standing in front of the sandstone doors for a few seconds before an idea suddenly popped into his head.


    The preservation golem had mentioned that he could visit the elder and ask for the elder''s guidance on what secret technique to choose and ess to the gate, but¡­ Given that the elder in question should have already died after the long passage of time, he would not be able to find the gate by asking the elder.


    Instead, it seemed like it would be better to use this chance to enter the core part of the Exchange Hall and try to gain ess to the core of the formation that should normally be guarded by the elder from the Mirage Sect.


    Despite the fact that his current understanding of formation could be considered abysmal whenpared to the ancient formation protecting the Exchange Hall, he should still be able to do this if he had ess to the formation core.


    If it seeded, he should be able to find out if there were any hidden locations inside the Exchange Hall that he had missed and more importantly, find out where the gate out of the desert trial was located.


    "Great, can you help guide me to the elder?" Havinge to a decision, Xuan Hao felt a bit nervous as he asked this while looking at the emotionless golem in front of him.


    "Yes, as a tier three trial participant, you are entitled to ask an elder for assistance once before bing a tier two trial participant. Are you sure you still want to visit the elder?"


    "Yes!"


    Not hesitating in the slightest after hearing what the golem said, Xuan Hao eagerly nodded his head.


    So, what if he could only visit an elder in charge once as a tier three trial participant? It was not like the Mirage Sect was still around to keep the celestial trials running, where would he possibly make use of this chance to visit a sect elder in the future?


    "Confirmed, I will now guide you to the core section of the Exchange Hall where the elder resides. The elder in charge of this trial is the Myriad Sands Elder, its rmended to remain respectful in front of the elder to avoid possible penalties." Saying this, the golem stepped out of the hallway and into the small hall that Xuan Hao had just barely stepped inside of before a strange power flowed out from it and entered therge pair of sandstone doors-


    BOOOOM-!


    Only a secondter, strange ancient symbols flowed across the surface of the sandstone doors before they mmed shut.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 971 Elder Of The Mirage Sect...?

    Creaaaak~!


    Following the change in the sandstone door, the golem pushed open the door to reveal a dark and empty hallway before walking over to stand in front of the now far more awe-inspiring sandstone doors like a solemn guard.


    "The elder is waiting on the other side, please remain respectful to avoid possible penalties." Saying this, the golem motioned for him to enter the dark hallway before falling silent.


    Looks like I will have to go the rest of the way myself¡­


    Seeing how the golem was motioning him to continue inside the eerie and dark hallway that had been revealed on the other side of the sandstone door, Xuan Hao could not help hesitating for a moment as he felt a sense of unease upon seeing the dark hallway.


    Different from the rest of the underground structure that had remained lit up by some sort of magical crystals ced along the sides and ceiling of the structure, the dark and eerie hallway had none of these. Not only that, but there seemed to be some sort of dark mist oozing out from the side of the hallway. Making it even more creepy and eerie than it already was.


    Whoosh~


    However, after a quick scan of the dark mist and hallway, he soon realized that there was nothing dangerous about the dark mist that shrouded the hallway.


    Maybe it''s an aesthetic choice of the elder in charge of this ce? After all, he might be someone who found it fun to show off his might to the trial participants whoe to ask him for guidance¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao stepped into the dark and eerie hallway before making his way towards the barely visible pair of doors at the end of the hallway-


    BANG!


    However, the moment he stepped inside the dark hallway, therge pair of sandstone doors mmed shut behind him. Plunging the entire hallway into darkness.


    "This¡­"


    Taken by surprise, Xuan Hao froze for a short moment before calming down, it was most likely that the preservation golem had closed the door behind him due to the fact that it was still operating as if nothing had happened to the Exchange Hall.


    At least given that everything still worked like normal with other trial participants present in the trial space, it only made sense for the golem to close the door behind him as other trial participants might need to use the rest of the Exchange Hall where the secret techniques were located.


    Although he understood this logic and would not have a problem navigating inplete darkness with his current cultivation realm, it was still not a nice feeling to have the sandstone doors m shut behind him.


    "Hopefully I will be able to leave this ce without the help of an elder¡­" Not bothering to try and push up therge pair of sandstone doors now covered in all sorts of ancient symbols, Xuan Hao began making his way deeper inside the dark hallway.


    Swish~


    Taking only a short time to reach the pair of doors located at the end of the hallway.


    "Hm?"


    However, the moment he was about to open the pair of doors, a shiver ran down his spine as he felt a terrifying aura lock on to him from the other side of the doors. Even with his strength at the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, the terrifying aura instantly rendered him unable to take a single step.


    The elder in charge of the trial space is not dead?! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Feeling the terrifying aura rendering him unable to move at all, a terrifying thought appeared in his head as he looked towards the pair of doors in front of him filled with fear. Although the owner of the terrifying aura had not said anything yet, Xuan Hao already felt his imagination run wild as he shivered in fear in front of the closed pair of doors.


    Even his encounter with the cloud demon beast in the Earth Immortal Realm had been nowhere near as terrifying as running into an elder from an ancient sect that had possibly surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm!


    "¡­"


    However, as a few minutes turned into hours in front of the closed pair of doors and nothing ended up happening, Xuan Hao slowly regained some sense of control over his body and mind under the terrifying pressure.


    Using all of his strength, he slowly made his way out of the small area in front of the door, that was within the range of the terrifying aura-


    Thump!


    And two long hours of taking a meager three steps backwards did Xuan Hao manage to escape the range of the terrifying aura, as he directly copsed on the ground covered in sweat with a fearful expression still stered all over his face.


    Why isn''t the elder appearing¡­?


    Only after somewhat recovering from what he had just gone through, did he realize that the elder who should have been responsible for the terrifying aura was nowhere to be seen.


    Given that he had now spent a little under six hours in front of the pair of doors, this was a rather odd situation. After all, the elder should have long since known about his presence even before he had made his way inside the sandstone tower and down into the Exchange Hall¡­


    How odd¡­


    Feeling that something was wrong, Xuan Hao could not help curiously looking towards the pair of doors that the elder should be located behind.


    Maybe the terrifying aura is not from the elder in charge of the trial, but instead something different like the core of the formation, with the strength of the formation, it would very likely have a terrifying aura far stronger than that of the cloud demon beast!


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt that this made far more sense than the elder of the Mirage Sect still being alive on the other side of the door. The only problem with this, was that he now had to find a way through the terrifying aura that rendered him almostpletely unable to move¡­

 Chapter 972 Ingenious Way Of Entry

    Standing in front of the door just outside the range of the terrifying aura, Xuan Hao turned around and looked back towards the sandstone doors that were now hidden behind the dark mist that covered the dark and eerie hallway behind him.


    At first, he had thought he would be able to make use of the formation to find a way out, but given the terrifying aura present, he began to doubt whether or not he had overestimated his own abilities. Even if the formation was in a worse shape due to the passage of time and didn''t have anyone in charge of it any longer, it was still a powerful formation that was far beyond hisprehension.


    Thinking about it for just a few seconds, Xuan Hao understood that he had been a little too arrogant when thinking that he would ever be able to gain any level of control over such a powerful formation even if he managed to find the formation core.


    Not to mention trying to get some level of control over the formation core, his current strength was not even enough to approach it!


    No, I should be able to approach it if I can adjust to the terrifying pressure.


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided to try and approach the door again, soon feeling the terrifying aura envelop his entire body and soul before locking them in ce. Although he could still move, it was at an incredibly slow pace¡­


    Knowing that it would possibly take weeks before he could even reach the door at his current speed, Xuan Hao decided to close both of his eyes as he used what little power, he could still use to calm himself down before starting to adjust to the terrifying pressure. Only after adjusting enough to move at a normal pace would, he have a chance to find out where the terrifying aura wasing from.


    Whoosh~


    Pushing the inherent fear, he felt when affected by the terrifying aura, Xuan Hao felt the pressure on his soul and body lessen significantly. Although he was still far from being able to move properly under the terrifying pressure, he clearly felt that it had be easier to move. Meaning that it was indeed possible for him to adjust to the pressure.


    With a bit more time, I should be able to pass through the doors and find out where the terrifying pressure is from¡­


    Thinking about this as he looked towards the wooden doors in front of him, Xuan Hao soon closed both of his eyes as he focused his full attention on trying to adjust his body and soul to the terrifying pressure.


    Like this, time flew by and by the time Xuan Hao opened his eyes again, it had already been over nine days since the death of the guardian of the desert. Making Xuan Hao doubt his earlier prediction of only being able to stay inside a trial space for seven days afterpleting the trial.


    In turn, making him start to regret the fact that he had decided to return to the Exchange Hall to look for the gate out of the trial space. Considering that there seemed to be no limit on how long he could stay inside the desert trial, it would have been far safer for him to just search through the desert for any sign of the gate instead of risking his life going into a ce that had already demonstrated how dangerous it was when he first encountered the preservation golem.


    Well¡­ it''s not like I can just go back anymore¡­


    Understanding that there was nothing he could do now that he had ended up trapping himself inside the core part of the Exchange Hall, Xuan Hao only shook his head in regret as he thought about this before focusing his attention back on to the pair of wooden doors in front of him.


    After spending thest two days trying to adjust to the terrifying pressure that came from something on the other side of the wooden doors, he had already sessfully managed to reach a level where he could walk normally under the terrifying pressure.


    Of course, this was still not something that came without a cost, as he would not be able to use any of his power to defend himself while moving. The only form of defense that he had was his physical body¡­


    Thump! Thump!


    However, Xuan Hao didn''t care too much about this as he began moving towards the wooden doors. If he really ended up encountering an enemy who could attack under the terrifying pressure, he doubted that his Intermediate stage Dao Domain Lord Realm strength would be able to do anything in the first ce. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Reaching the wooden door in only a few steps, Xuan Hao used all of his strength to try and push it open-


    "Hah? This- Why is it so hard to open!?"


    Unfortunately, he quickly discovered that there was no way for him to push the door open with the strength avable to him. Even if a normal mortal would have been able to easily open the wooden doors, there was no way for him to even exert this little bit of strength under the terrifying pressure.


    What to do¡­ If I can''t get past a simple pair of wooden doors, how am I ever going to leave this ce!?


    Feeling a sense of unease welling up inside him after realizing he had been defeated by a simple wooden door, Xuan Hao wanted nothing more than to burn the pair of wooden doors in front of him.


    But¡­ If I can''t push open the wooden doors, can''t I just use my own weight to push them open!?


    Thinking about this the next moment, Xuan Hao didn''t bother trying to think about any other solution as he allowed his body to fall forward into the pair of wooden doors-


    Bang!


    Falling straight into them and pushing them open in the process, Xuan Hao soon smashed into the ground with over half his body now on the other side of the wooden doors.

 Chapter 973 Formation Core And Origin Of The Terrifying Aura

    At least I managed to open the doors¡­


    Slowly getting back up again, Xuan Hao began to examine the dark room on the other side of the wooden doors where the terrifying aura originated from. Not taking long to spot the severalrge bookshelves filled to the brim with all sorts of ancient-looking books and scrolls.


    Unlike the rest of the Exchange Hall, the books and scrolls located inside the core section of the Exchange Hall did not seem to have suffered any damage. Making him certain that the enemy who attacked the Exchange Hall in the past, should not have managed to break through to the core section where the formation core was located.


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, he did not take long to realize that all of these bookshelves were covered by a thin protectiveyer belonging to the protective formation. From the looks of things, he wouldn''t be able to get his hands on any of the secret techniques or possible precious information stored inside the books.


    Then again, without the presence of the protectiveyer, these scrolls and books would most likely have decayed at this point in time¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao began making his way deeper inside the room. Moving past therge bookshelves that covered most of the room before finding himself in front of the formation core.


    The formation core was not a traditional core that would be made up of different precious materials lined up together in a specific manner, but was instead a palm sized crystal sphere, delicately suspended at the center of the room by an ornate golden pedestal.


    Observing closer, Xuan Hao discovered all sorts of intricate runes and symbols etched into it, as it pulsed with an ethereal radiance that seemed to resonate with the rest of the formation in a strange manner that also seemed to supply it with the energy needed to keep functioning normally.


    Surrounding the crystal sphere, an arrangement of slender jade pirs encircled it, forming some kind of protective circuit that both served as conduits for energy to be more easily supplied to the rest of the formation, while at the same time also serving as guardians that keeping anyone from interfering with the operation of the crystal sphere.


    The size of the jade pirs and crystal sphere almost filled up three quarters of the entire space avable inside the ratherrge room. The bookshelves now almost seemed to only serve as a cover to prevent anyone peeking inside from seeing the formation core located on the other side. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Something that might have made sense in the past when trial participants woulde to visit the elder in charge for guidance, as the Mirage Sect might not have wanted the exact location of the formation core to leak out¡­ And at the same time also needed the elder to guard it at all times.


    Maybe this was one of the reasons why the core section of the Exchange Hall had managed to survive the attack in the past and still remain somewhat operational after thousands of years.


    "But¡­ How am I supposed to break through the jade pirs guarding the crystal sphere¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he felt a sense of helplessness when looking over the slender jade pirs forming a protective barrier around the crystal sphere preventing anyone from approaching, Xuan Hao could not help regretting that he had ever thought he would be able to take control of such a powerful formation with his current cultivation realm.


    Even if the formation had been severely weakened over the years, the core itself showed no signs of decay and looked like it hadn''t been affected at all. Bad news for Xuan Hao who had been nning on taking control of the formation core and trying to use it to find out where the gate mentioned by the preservation golem was located.


    "Hm? The terrifying aura isn''ting from the formation core¡­?" Focusing all of his attention on examining the crystal sphere and the jade pirs covering most of the space inside the now not so dark room, Xuan Hao realized that the terrifying aura that was still suppressing him did note from the formation core. Instead, it seemed toe from somewhere behind the formation core at the back of therge room.


    On the other hand, the formation core seemed to perfectly retain every bit of energy circting through, with not a single bit of it leaking out into the surroundings.


    Is it perhaps really the elder from the Mirage Sect!? But¡­ If it really is the elder from the Mirage Sect, why has he still not done or said anything over the past few days?


    Feeling himself starting to grow nervous as he thought about this, Xuan Hao slowly began making his way around the core of the formation.


    "This-!?"


    Finally reaching the back of the room behind the formation core, Xuan Hao could not help eximing in surprise as he saw a figure sitting in a lotus position in the middle of a small formation connected to therger formation core.


    The figure in question was bathed in a soft, ethereal light as an expression of wisdom was visible in his frozen features. From the outside, it looked like he was meditating. However, the aura of death surrounding his body gave away the fact that he had long since passed away.


    "T-the elder from the Mirage Sect!?"


    Realizing who the person in front of him was, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he finally found out where the terrifying aura wasing from.


    In a sense, the terrifying aura was not the result of a powerful expert releasing his cultivation to suppress him nor the powerful energy of the formation core leaking out. Instead, it was merely due to the remnant power left inside the body of the elder from the Mirage Sect. Even after thousands of years, this power did not disappear and still lingered in the world!


    "How powerful was this elder when he was still alive¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the dead body of the elder from the Mirage Sect. If not for the fact that there was a very clear aura of death surrounding his body, he would have thought that he was merely meditating at the moment. Even the passage of time didn''t seem to have any effect on his body.


    "Oh? Someone actually managed to reach this ce after so many years?"


    However, just as he was busy examining the elder from the Mirage Sect, a voice suddenly sounded out inside his head-


    "Ah!? Who!?"


    Causing him to jump up in shock before looking around himself for the origin of the voice. However, no matter how hard he looked, he found no one other than himself inside the room.


    "I''m in front of you."


    Hearing the voice again, Xuan Hao could not help looking towards the elder from the Mirage Sect with a shocked expression stered all over his face. "You- the elder from the Mirage Sect!?"


    "Indeed, although my current state won''t be able tost for long. Even with the supply of energy from the celestial guardian formation, I will at most be able to keep this remnant part of my consciousness around for another minute.


    With that in mind, it''s great to see that the celestial trials still have some use for the younger generation after so many years. Although, from the fact that no one came from my sect after all these years, it seems like the Mirage Sect isn''t around any longer¡­"


    Feeling a profound sense of sadness in the voice, Xuan Hao decided not to say anything as he quietly listened. Understanding that this was a priceless opportunity to obtain information on what had ended up happening in the past that might have caused the fall of the Mirage Sect.


    "Ah, what am I talking about, there is no time for this. Junior, I can see that you have reached the Intermediate stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and carry the mark of the Frozen Sovereign and one of the three bloodlines flow through your body, so I won''t have to waste energy on checking if you are one of them."


    "Frozen Sovereign? Three bloodlines?"


    "Huh? You don''t know¡­? What kind of state are those three in that- Ah¡­ I don''t have time for this! Before I ended up disappearing, I originally wanted to give you my inheritance, but that is something that would take at least a few weeks if not longer. Because of that, I have instead decided to give you myprehension of when I went through the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the past.


    Although I only managed to reach the Later stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm before I took on my tribtion in the past, it should still be useful for you. Seeing as you very clearly didn''t have anyone to guide you so far, the information on the Immortal Soul Tribtion might also prove useful for when you go through the tribtion in the future."


    Whoosh~!


    Not allowing Xuan Hao to say anything after he said this, a strange power suddenly erupted from the body of the elder before entering his body the next moment before he had any time to react.

 Chapter 974 Escape From The Celestial Trial (Part 1)

    Rumble~ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As the power rushed inside his body, Xuan Hao soon felt it reach his dantian where his soul was located before rapidly merging together with his soul. Not giving him any chance to resist during the process, as he soon felt arge amount of information appearing in his head.


    Going through the new information that had appeared in his head, Xuan Hao could not help opening his mouth in shock as he realized that it was indeed information on the Immortal Soul Tribtion and Dao Domain Lord Realm that the remnant consciousness had mentioned. Not only that, but Xuan Hao also discovered that there was a lot of information on the realms before the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Although this would not be that useful to him, it would prove useful when it came to helping his disciples and the rest of the sect improve.


    Among all of the information on the realms below the Dao Domain Lord Realm, the most important part by far, was the part about the Domain Lord Realm, as it contained a simr level of information on the realm as the codex of the first four realms that he had been given by the system in the past.


    Even if the codex had not been that much use for him back then, it was one of the main reasons why the Star Shattering Sect had managed to gain so many Nascent Soul Realm Experts in such a short period of time.


    Back then, he even specifically created a simplified version of the codex that Elder Song then handed over to the outer sect elders at the Peak of the Core Formation. Allowing most of these old Peak Core Formation Realm Experts who had remained stuck at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm to finally find out what they werecking before taking on the Cloud Tribtion and reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Now with information simr to the codex on the Domain Lord Realm, it would not be wrong to say that it would be far easier for the elders and disciples of the Star Shattering Sect to reach the Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    Of course, the current Star Shattering Sect did not really have that many Peak Nascent Soul Realm Experts at the moment, but one person who would definitely benefit from this the moment he returned, was the grand elder of the half spirit race. Even if he had already guided the old man and he would reach the Domain Lord Realm if given time, the new information would undoubtedly help him shorten the time by a few years!


    "That should be everything I''m able to transfer in my current state. Unfortunately, the power required to transfer information on the Earth Immortal Realm or above is far too much in my current state as they have already transcended the mortal realm..."


    "Elder, this information is already extremely useful and will help me reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future, there is no need for anymore." Hearing the sad voice of the elder from the Mirage Sect echoing out in his head again, Xuan Hao could not help interjecting before the remnant consciousness ended up bing depressed again.


    "More than enough? I see, I''m even being pitied by a junior in the Dao Domain Lord Realm now¡­ Hah¡­ Whatever, I used most of my remaining energy on transferring the information over just now, so I don''t have long before my remnant consciousness disperses into nothingness together with my body.


    Given that I connected myself to the formation here to keep my consciousness alive for such a long period of time, this will most likely result in it copsing soon after my death. Although this won''t destroy the trial space, it will destroy the two gates connected to it leading out of the trial space-"


    "I will be trapped inside the trial space!?" Not able to stop himself from eximing in surprise after hearing that he would be trapped inside the trial space, Xuan Hao began unconsciously looking towards the formation core that seemed perfectly fine from his point of view.


    "Patience junior, I said it will copse shortly after my consciousness disperses, you still have more than enough time to use the gate located inside this ce before the formation copses."


    "This¡­ Sorry senior¡­" Feeling a sense of embarrassment that he had never felt before when being addressed like this, Xuan Hao silently apologized before shutting his mouth. Understanding that it wasn''t a good idea for him to waste any more of the senior''s already limited time. Especially considering that he was the only person who could tell him where the gate leading out of the trial space was located.


    "No worries, well then, the gate in the core section of the Exchange Hall is located just behind me inside this room, you can just use that to leave when the timees."


    "Behind you?" Hearing what the elder from the Mirage Sect said, Xuan Hao could not help looking at the empty wall behind his body with a look of confusion stered all over his face. No matter how hard he looked at the wall with his divine sense, dao domain or just normal eyes, there was no gate.


    "It''s hidden by the formation at the moment and can only be essed by an elder like myself or through proper identification. Given that you have neither of these requirements, the only way for you to use this gate will be through the celestial robe on my body. Putting it on, you will have an identity simr to mine inside the Exchange Hall or trial space for that matter. Meaning you will be able to use the gate without any problems.


    Unfortunately, my body is currently under the protection of the formation, so you will have to wait until this remnant consciousness of mine disperses before you can take it. At least the part of the formation guarding my body should copse before the core of the formation, so you should have a chance to take the robe before this entire ce gets destroyed¡­" Ignoring the fact that he felt like the remnant consciousness of the elder was rolling his nonexistent eyes at him as he said this, Xuan Hao solemnly nodded his head. Understanding that this might be his only chance to escape from the trial space.

 Chapter 975 Escape From The Celestial Trial (Part 2)

    ?


    "Great, it looks like you understand. Guess this is it for me then, I hope you will remember the help I gave you in the future junior. If you encounter anyone from the Mirage Sect, I hope you will help them as well, as I doubt, they will be in a good position considering the current state of the celestial trials¡­"


    Whoosh~


    As the voice of the remnant consciousness echoed out inside his head for what would be thest time, the body of the elder from the Mirage Sect suddenly turned into dust before disappearing from the world. Leaving the celestial robe to gentlynd on the stone floor inside the smaller formation that had protected the elder of the Mirage Sect for the past thousands of years.


    Rumble~


    Shortly after this happened, the entire room started violently trembling as the formation core located in the middle of the room began breaking down at a speed visible to the naked eye-


    Bang!


    And before Xuan Hao had managed to recover from the fact that the elder from the Mirage Sect had disappeared from the world, one of therge jade pirs surrounding the crystal sphere on top of the golden pedestal shattered.


    Bang! Bang!


    Following closely behind the first jade pir, the rest of the jade pirs started shattering one by one.


    Realizing what was happening, Xuan Hao nervously turned to look at the formation that surrounded the ce where the elder from the Mirage Sect had been sitting only a moment ago. Focusing all of his attention on the celestial robeying in the middle of this small formation.


    Even with more than half of the jade pirs shattering, the small formation protecting the celestial robe left behind by the elder of the Mirage Sect was still functioning and didn''t show any signs of weakening. On the other hand, it looked like the smaller formation was drawing more power from the formation core to sustain itself in case its connection to the formation core was cut off.


    This¡­ How am I supposed to get the celestial robe if this small formation ends up holding on for longer than the core formation!?


    Seeing what the smaller formation was doing, Xuan Hao could not help panicking as he realized just how dangerous his current situation was. If the smaller formation didn''t break before the formation core like the elder from the Mirage Sect had told him, he would end up getting killed by the copse of the formation core. Even if he ended up miraculously surviving, he would end up trapped inside the trial space with no way out.


    WHOOSH-!


    However, just at this moment, the formation core seemed to have noticed the smaller formation trying to siphon away energy, as it violently reacted by reversing the process. Forcefully sucking out all the energy from the smaller formation that had no way to resist the might of the core formation-


    Crack!


    And without any energy to keep itself running any longer, the smaller formation instantly copsed.


    Swish-!


    Knowing that he was already running out of time, Xuan Hao dashed forward the moment the formation broke before grabbing the celestial robe and putting it on like the elder from the Mirage Sect had told him to do.


    Whoosh~ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Putting on the celestial robe, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that the robe melted away the robe he had been wearing before neatly fitting on to his body-


    SQUEAK!?


    Taking the rabbit demon beast who had been sleeping inside a small hidden pocket of the robe by surprise, as it suddenly found itself falling to the ground. Only barely managing to grab hold of the celestial robe before it hit the ground.


    Swish-!


    Not giving the rabbit demon beast any time toprehend what was happening, Xuan Hao used his dao domain to keep it in ce before rushing towards the gate that materialized in front of the empty wall the moment he put on the celestial robe. Not daring to waste a single second, as the jade pirs keeping the formation core safe had almostpletely disappeared at this point in time. Only three of them were still left standing-


    Bang!


    Only two of them were left standing, keeping the formation core from growing unstable.


    Squeaaaaaak-!


    Having no clue about the current dangerous situation it found itself in, the rabbit demon beast now forced to remain in ce by Xuan Hao''s dao domain could not help letting out an unwilling scream as it looked at the ground rapidly moving below it.


    Even with all of this, it didn''t try to fight against Xuan Hao''s dao domain, as part of it had still sensed the dangerous aura that had slowly started to leak out from the core formation that was rapidly breaking down behind them.


    nk!


    Shing~


    "Greetings elder, the gate is active. The current coordinates are locked on to the southern spring garden, would you like to change the co-"


    Swish~!


    Reaching the gate and seeing a small golem suddenly pop up from the ground, Xuan Hao wasted no time talking to the strange small golem as he jumped through the gate before it even had time to finish what it was saying.


    No matter how dangerous the southern spring garden mentioned by the small golem was, he doubted that it would be any worse than staying inside the Exchange Hall.


    Not a secondter, Xuan Hao felt himself travelling an enormous distance in a short span of time as the space around him twisted violently before everything came to a stop.


    "Hm?"


    Looking around himself, Xuan Hao discovered that he was standing on top of the foundation of what should have once been arge pagoda that had now long since decayed to the point where only the foundation and a small part of the pagoda itself remained.


    The area around him on the other hand, was made up of countless terraced pools of crystal-clear water that seemed to stretch on for several kilometers. Taken together, the formations of these terraced pools almost looked like a huge dragon snaking its way through the surrounding mountains.

 Chapter 976 Fall Of The Southern Spring Garden (Part 1)

    Not caring about their new surroundings, the rabbit demon beast jumped out of the celestial robe the moment it felt Xuan Hao''s dao domain no longer holding it in ce-


    Squeak!


    Letting out a loud squeaking sound to show its dissatisfaction over what had just happened. Not only was it rudely woken up, but it was retrained without being able to move the moment it grabbed hold of the robe to prevent itself from falling to the ground.


    "Huh? Oh, sorry about that earlier, I didn''t really have time to exin." Seeing the angry rabbit demon beast that almost looked like a small stuffed toy, Xuan Hao did his best not tough at it as he said this. Trying not to anger the rabbit demon beast any further.


    Squeak! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Puffing its small cheeks in anger after noticing the very clear smile on Xuan Hao face as he said this while trying his best not tough at the rabbit demon beasts current cute looking appearance, the rabbit demon beast decided that its pride had been injured, as it gave onest squeak filled with anger in Xuan Hao''s direction before bouncing off the side of the foundation and into the crystal clear water below-


    Ssh!


    Not showing the slightest bit of care as itnded in the water before paddling awkwardly for a few moments before reaching the side of the terraced pool of water where it then crawled up into a small thin tree hanging over the edge of the next pool of water.


    Rustle~


    Only after reaching afortable branch around the top of this small thin tree did the rabbit demon beast settle down before going to sleep again. Having decided to ignore Xuan Hao as it attempted to sleep away the embarrassment that it had just experienced.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after seeing this, Xuan Hao decided not to say anything and just ignore the rabbit demon beast. At least for now, he was far more interested in finding out where this southern spring garden was located and if he was still inside the mystic realm or had ended up being transported somewherepletely different. After all, considering that the gate would normally only be used by elders and had several different locations that it could ess, it would not be odd if one of these locations ended up leading to somewhere outside the mystic realm.


    The only thing that made him believe that this might actually not be the case and he should still be inside the mystic realm, was the fact that the elder from the Mirage Sect had decided against using the gate to leave and try to find a way to recover, but then again, this might be due to the fact that his situation was already far too serious to move without the help of the formation. Not to mention, there was also a chance that the enemies of the Mirage Sect might have been waiting for him on the other side.


    Given the current state of the pagoda, whose foundation was the only thing left behind, he had a feeling that the southern spring garden should have encountered a simr attack back then. The only difference between this ce and the Exchange Hall in the desert trial space, was the fact that the Exchange Hall had managed to hold on against the attack and avoidplete annihtion.


    Although¡­ Considering the state of the elder from the Mirage Sect, it could not really be said that the Exchange Hall had managed to survive, as the most important secret techniques stored inside the Exchange Hall had all gotten destroyed by the attack. The only techniques that had managed to survive were left in the core section of the Exchange Hall that was unassable due to them being sealed away by the core formation.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao began to slowly examine the foundation and what was left of the pagoda that had once stood upon it. Even though he didn''t expect to find anything useful in the ruins of the pagoda, he still wanted to make sure that there wasn''t anything dangerous left behind and ensure the location was safe before he chose to redeem the reward from the system.


    "Hm?"


    Examining the foundation, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he noticed a few very distinct w marks on the side of the foundation. In size alone, these w marks stretched across the entire surface of the foundation that spanned for a few hundred meters. Giving a sense of just how big the demon beast who had left these w marks was, while at the same time confirming his earlier suspicion about someone having attacked the pagoda and destroyed it in the past.


    However, different from the Exchange Hall that had very clearly been blown open in several precise attacks by what should have been some sort of powerful qi technique. The one who had attacked the pagoda on the other hand, was very obviously a demon beast. Lacking the precision and skill of the person who had attacked the Exchange Hall.


    So¡­ the ones who attacked the Mirage Sect back then was abination of different races?


    Thinking this to himself as he arrived in front of therge w mark spanning across the entire foundation, Xuan Hao gently touched the w mark-


    BOOOM-!


    However, the instant his hand touched the harmless looking w mark, a terrifying killing intent on par with the power released by the elder from the Mirage Sect suddenly exploded outwards before it engulfed him. Overwhelming him in an instant!


    Whoosh~!


    Before he had any time to pull his hand away from therge w mark, he felt the scenery around him change before he suddenly found himself in front of majestic pagoda stretching hundreds- If not thousands of meters into the sky above him. Countless cultivators could be seen all around him as they went to and from therge pagoda through severalrge gates that seemed to act as teleportation points connecting to somergerwork.

 Chapter 977 Fall of the Southern Spring Garden (Part 2)

    <h4>Chapter 977 Fall of the Southern Spring Garden (Part 2)</h4>


    Observing therge pagoda that had appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao was suddenly taken aback as he felt a terrifying killing intent descending from the sky before arge shadow appeared above the majestic pagoda.


    ROOOOOOOAR-!


    Before he even had time to look up, a loud roar echoed out across the southern spring garden, causing Xuan Hao and the countless cultivators walking around on therge za located in front of the pagoda to look up in terror and disbelief at the massive dragon that had appeared in the sky above the pagoda.


    RUMBLE-!


    Not even having any time toprehended what had happened and how he had suddenly ended up in this situation, the entire pagoda trembled violently as a countlessplicated formation symbols flowed out from the pagoda before gathering together into severalrge golden arrows that shot of towards the demon beast.


    Boom! Boom!


    By the time Xuan Hao realized what was happening, the dozen or so golden arrows had already reached therge demon beast in the sky above as they exploded with a might far more terrifying than the power shown by the cloud demon beast. Even if the dragon was powerful, Xuan Hao found it hard to believe that it would be able to escape unscratched from such a powerful attack-


    ROOAR!


    WHOOSH-!


    But different from what Xuan Hao imagined, the demon beast in the sky didn''t seem to be affected by the terrifying golden arrows, as it merely shrugged them off before it swung itsrge ws down towards the pagoda filled with killing intent.


    "SOUTHERN DRAGON KING! YOU DARE ATTACK MY MIRAGE SECT!?"


    However, before therge ws of the dragon had a chance to reach the majestic pagoda, a loud voice echoed out from inside the pagoda before arge golden hand appeared to meet therge ws midair-


    BOOOOOOM!


    The collision between these two powerful existences instantly caused a terrifying shock wave to spread through the surroundings. Instantly killing any of the cultivators who had been unfortunate enough to be outside the protection of the barrier covering the area around the pagoda.


    Among these unlucky cultivators, there was no shortage of people who had surpassed him and reached the Earth Immortal Realm, there were even a few who seemed to be even stronger than the ones who had reached the Earth Immortal Realm.


    But in the end, none of them survived the terrifying shock wave produced by the collision between the golden hand and the massive dragon ws¡­


    "This¡­ I''m fine? Wait¡­ Is this perhaps a scene from the past? But how did I get to witness it? Is it perhaps due to the w mark on the foundation?" Only now realizing what he saw in front of him was nothing more than a vision of past events, Xuan Hao''s earlier fear towards therge dragon in the air above the pagoda quickly turned into curiosity as he began more closely observing the battle that was taking ce in the air above the pagoda.


    BOOM! BOOM!


    Following the initial sh between the golden hand and the dragon ws, a golden shadow had rushed out of the pagoda before starting to violently sh with therge dragon in the air above. The constant sh between the two terrifying existences caused the earth beneath to tremble violently, as everything around the pagoda was destroyed. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although his cultivation was far too low to observe the fight in full and figure who was winning, it was not too difficult to guess the result from what he had seen before being shown this vision of the past. In the end, the loser would ultimately be the elder from the Mirage Sect guarding the pagoda, but Xuan Hao did not let this affect him, as he made full use of this opportunity to observe the fight between these two powerful experts.


    Even with his strength, he was still able to perceive the profound use of the different Daosprehended by these two terrifying experts and try to remember it and apply it to his own fighting style even more.


    ROOOOAR!


    with his dao domain. After all, whenpared with how these two were using their dao, what he did could only be described as rudimentary and child''s y¡­


    The sh between the two was a beautiful dance between the golden mystic powers of the elder from the Mirage Sect and the powerful elemental energy of the dragon. Even with insufficient strength, it was still clear to Xuan Hao that he still had long to go when it came to his ownprehension or strength. The sight of the two terrifying existences from the past only fueled this desire even more.


    ROOOOAR!


    "DAMNABLE ELDER! YOUR MIRAGE SECT WILL BE NO MORE AFTER TODAY!"


    As battle continued for hours like this, with neither side budging, the dragon spoke up for the first time as it cursed the elder from the Mirage Sect who had stopped him from destroying the pagoda.


    "YOU-"


    RUUUUUMBLE-!


    Not giving the elder from the Mirage Sect any time to respond, the dragon made use of this momentaryck of attention to rapidly gather its power before unleashing a final, devasting surge of elemental energy towards the elder from the Mirage Sect-


    "AHHHHH!"


    Caught off guard by the sudden all-out attack by the dragon, the elder was unable to mount a sufficient defense as he was struck by the full force of the attack.


    BOOOOOOOOOOM!


    The impact was catastrophic, causing a cataclysmic explosion that soon engulfed the elder and the pagoda below him in a blinding ze of elemental energy.


    "HAHAHAHA!"


    As the dust settled, only the loudughter of the dragon in the sky above was left behind, as the elder from the Mirage Sect had vanished from the world. Only the barely standing formation protecting the pagoda was left behind.


    Rumble~!


    And that was not for long, as the massive dragon once again brought down itsrge ws-


    Crack~!


    BANG!


    Instantly destroying the already weakened formation before itsrge ws tore through the majestic pagoda. Killing all the cultivators inside of it!

 Chapter 978 Fall of the Southern Spring Garden (Part 3)

    <h4>Chapter 978 Fall of the Southern Spring Garden (Part 3)</h4>


    RUMBLE~!


    Following therge dragon ws tearing through the pagoda, what was left standing of the pagoda started to copse on top of the foundation that had managed to hold on against therge pair of dragon ws.


    ROOOOAR!


    Seemingly offended by the fact that the foundation had managed to remain unscathed even after its attack, therge dragon brought down itsrge ws once again-


    Chiiing~


    However, even this was not more than enough to leave a w mark on the foundation. Far from enough to actually destroy it.


    ROOOAR!?


    Showing a somewhat surprised expression on its massive scaly face upon discovering this, the dragon could not help freezing on the spot as it looked down towards the foundation of the pagoda with a hint of suspicion. Obviously, it made no sense for the foundation of the pagoda to be this strongpared to the pagoda itself. If the pagoda had been made from the same material as the foundation, there would have been no way for it to destroy it so easily.


    What is with the foundation, why is it so much stronger than the pagoda itself? Although it would not be wrong for the foundation to be stronger than the pagoda, this is far too much¡­


    Also feeling that something was wrong with the foundation he was currently standing on top of, Xuan Hao could not help curiously examining the foundation again. For some reason, he had a feeling that something was about to happen. Not only because the dragon would not leave behind any more than the single w mark it had just left behind, but because a few barely visible symbols had appeared all across the foundation following the dragon''s attack.


    "This!? Why in the world are the symbols belonging to that snow bird present on the foundation of the Mirage Sect''s pagoda- Unless¡­ I have to get out of here!"


    WHOOSH-!


    Having realized something after the appearance of the barely visible symbols that now covered the entire foundation, the dragon''s suspicious expression transformed into one of terror, as it turned around before pping its massive wings-


    Rumble~


    However, before the dragon had time to escape, a low rumbling sound echoed out from the foundation as the barely visible suddenly lit up with a blinding brilliance that rendered Xuan Hao blind for a short moment.


    ROOOOOOOAR-!


    BOOM-!


    All he could do was listen to the painful roar of the dragon before he heard something massive falling to the ground in front of him.


    "Huh?"


    When the bright light finally subdued enough for him to see again, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover the body of the dragon hovering midair above the southern spring garden. However, the most surprising part was that its entire body had been frozen solid without any signs of life left in it-


    Craaaaack-!


    Bang! Bang!


    And before Xuan Hao had time to react, the body of the dragon suddenly broke apart before raining down on the dested terrain below it. Slowly shaping out the terraced rough shape of the terraced pools of crystal-clear water that he had seen before being shown this vision of the past.


    As for where the crystal-clear water that would fill up these terraced pools hade from¡­ It became rather obvious when looking at the massive chunks of ice covering the body parts of the dragon spread out across therge roughly shaped terraced pools. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Whoosh~


    However, before Xuan Hao had a chance to examine the chunks of ice and the body parts of the dragon more closely, the space around him began twisting violently before he once again found himself in front of the dragon w mark that ran across the foundation of the pagoda.


    Not only that, but he also found the terrifying killing intent left behind inside the dragon w mark trying to make its way through the meridians in his arm and follow them back towards his dantian where his soul was located-


    Whoosh-!


    Even without thinking for a second, Xuan Hao removed his hand from the dragon w mark, cutting off the terrifying killing intent that was trying to make its way through his body and into his dantian.


    Although he had no idea what the killing intent left behind by the dragon in the past, he had no ns to find out. After all, this was an expert that far exceeded his understanding. For all he knew, the dragon might have a way to use the remnant killing intent left behind back then to revive itself. No matter what it was, Xuan Hao had no ns to allow the killing intent anywhere near his dantian where his soul was located.


    As for the killing intent that had already entered his body¡­ It quickly began to disperse after being cut off from its source.


    "I really can''t be careless when dealing with anything rted to the Mirage Sect¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the dragon w mark in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he distanced himself a bit further away from the dragon w mark. Not intending to give the remnant killing intent any chance of getting close to him again.


    Even if it did help him see a vision of what had caused the destruction of the pagoda in the past. The reason that it showed him this scene was most likely to prevent him from noticing the killing intent slowly making its way along his meridians and towards his dantian.


    If he had been any weaker and the energy coursing through his meridian hadn''t already had a chance to ustom itself to a simr level of pressure due to his encounter with the elder from the Mirage Sect, the killing intent might have already reached his dantian and infiltrated his soul at this point in time¡­


    Feeling another shiver run down his spine as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided to go over and check up on the rabbit demon beast. After all, there might be some remnant intent left behind in terraced pools of water that had been created by the body of the dragon in the past¡­

 Chapter 979 Ice Phoenix, Snow bird, Frozen Sovereign

    <h4>Chapter 979 Ice Phoenix, Snow bird, Frozen Sovereign</h4>


    Leaving the dragon w mark behind, Xuan Hao made his way over towards the edge of the foundation before looking around for the small thin tree that the rabbit demon beast had decided to sleep in.


    "There it is, looks like nothing happened to it¡­" Muttering this to himself after noticing that nothing had happened to the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of relief. Although he was not attached to the rabbit demon beast given how little time they had spent together, he was still aware of how valuable its existence was to the Star Shattering Sect.


    The main reason why this was the case was due to the fact that the current Star Shattering Sect didn''t have any experts in the Soul Ascension Realm. Without him present, the Star Shattering Sect wouldn''t be able to safely expand beyond the limits of the border territory of the Sky Empire.


    The rabbit demon beast who had reached the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm solved this problem, as only the old ancestor of the Sky Empire had the strength to fight against it¡­ And given that the ancestor of the Sky Empire could not leave the capital city without risking another attack from the experts belonging to the three religions, the Star Shattering Sect would be able to expand freely throughout the territory of the Sky Empire.


    As for dealing with the threerge religions¡­ Xuan Hao hadn''t really thought of a way to this yet, as he understood that he was still too weak to fight with the stronger experts from these three religions. Although, given that the three religions in the Sky Empire were only small branches located outside the core of the continent where the main churches and temples of these religions were located, Xuan Hao felt that it should be fine if he just ignored these three religions and the territory under their control for now.


    As long as he didn''t directly attack the three religions and reduced the faith they were currently gathering from the kingdoms and territories under their control, the core of these religions located in the core of the continent shouldn''t send out any powerful experts in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Thinking about all of this, Xuan Hao turned his attention away from the rabbit demon beast, as he focused it back on to the foundation beneath his feet. Although he had not managed to see what had ended up killing the dragon, he had still seen the ancient symbols that had covered the foundation before the death of the dragon.


    Other than this, the only clue he had to who was behind the death of the dragon, was thest sentence that the dragon had screamed in a panic before trying to flee.


    "Snow bird¡­ Is it perhaps rted to the ice phoenix?" Whispering this to himself as he curiously crouched down to inspect the foundation more closely, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if the snow bird mentioned by the dragon was the same as the ice phoenix whose feathers had already merged together with him.


    Other than that, there was also the mark of the frozen sovereign that the elder from the from the Mirage Sect had mentioned as one of the reasons for him trusting him to not be from any of the forces that had destroyed the Mirage Sect.


    Given this, it was not hard for him to understand that this frozen sovereign mentioned by the elder from the Mirage Sect was likely the ice phoenix whose feathers had merged together and formed the me imprint hidden between his brows¡­ And with this in mind, the snow bird that had created the symbols protecting the foundation of the pagoda was most likely the same as the frozen sovereign mentioned by the elder from the Mirage Sect.


    Fwoosh~


    Gently touching the location between his brows where the me symbol was hidden and feeling the blue divine power inside churning with power, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of disappointment as he remembered how the elder from the Mirage Sect had passed away before he had a chance to ask him about the frozen sovereign.


    This was the first time he had found someone who actually knew about the ice phoenix, but in the end, he had not managed to gain anything substantial. The only information he had managed to gain was the fact that the ice phoenix was allied with the Mirage Sect in the past. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    At least I now know that I should be able to gain more information on the ice phoenix by searching through the remnants of the Mirage Sect. Maybe I will even be lucky enough to encounter another elder who managed to survive the battle back then¡­


    Feeling a bit more positive as he thought about this, Xuan Hao didn''t forget that the entire mystic realm had once been under the control of the Mirage Sect, it was inevitable that some of the records of the past should have managed to survive like the elder in the Exchange Hall. After all, from the battle that had taken ce at the pagoda, it didn''t seem like the Mirage Sect was weaker than its opponent, but merely that it had been caught off guard by the sudden attack.


    Compared to the pagoda, the main sect of the Mirage Sect should not have perished so easily. Maybe the attack on the Mirage Sect in the past had even served as the catalyst for the battle depicted in the murals and paintings of the ice phoenix facing off against thebined might of countless different races on its own.


    But in the murals, there wasn''t any depictions of the Mirage Sect¡­ Did the Mirage Sect fall before the battle began or did something else happen?


    Finding it a bit weird that the Mirage Sect that seemed to be one of the core allies of the ice phoenix was not depicted at all in the murals or paintings of the great war he had seen in the past, Xuan Hao could only shake his head after realizing that he wascking far too much information to try and figure out what had ended up happening to the Mirage Sect back then.


    For now, he could only resume examining the remnant left behind by it¡­

 Chapter 980 Starlight Essence

    <h4>Chapter 980 Starlight Essence</h4>


    Using close to half an hour meticulously searching the foundation for any signs of the symbols he had seen in the vision of the past, Xuan Hao ended up finding nothing. Even trying to use the me imprint between his brows to try and see if it would cause some sort of reaction didn''t prove useful and, in the end, Xuan Hao could only give up trying to find out more about the foundation.


    After all, it was not like he could break part of it to see what might be hidden inside with his current strength. On the other hand, doing something like this might result in the symbols seeing him as an enemy and attacking him¡­. And whenparing his own strength with the dragon who had almost instantly been killed by the symbols, he didn''t really feel like he had the strength to try and forcefully break open the foundation and find out what might be hidden inside of it.


    "Ha¡­ I guess I will have to give up on that for now¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while looking down towards the smooth surface of the foundation beneath his feet, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the system panel showing the different quests he had been issued.


    ncing through the list of quests, Xuan Hao decided to ignore the limited time quest that seemed to never run out of time before turning his attention towards the side quest for the celestial gates that he hadpleted close to a day ago at this point in time.


    [Side Quest: The Three Celestial Gates, Part 2 (Complete)]


    [First Trial: Trial of the Eternal City (Complete)]


    [Second Trial: Trial of the Emerald Serpent (Complete)]


    [Third Trial: Trial of the Great Sandworm (Complete)]


    [Reward: Starlight Essence]


    Not bothering to read through the long description of the side quest again, Xuan Hao instead focused his attention on the Starlight Essence. Although he had an idea that it should be something precious, he honestly had no idea what it was nor what it did. In the end, this was also the reason why he had chosen not to redeem the reward while he was still inside the trial space.


    After all, for all he knew, the Starlight Essence might be something that forcibly made him enter a state of enlightenment or something simr after redeeming it. Even if this might be a good thing on the surface, it was not really safe to enter such a state inside the trial space where a giant sandworm could be lurking beneath him at any moment¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that the desert might get more dangerous the longer he ended up spending inside of it.


    Although he was no longer as sure as before that the trial space would kill him after seven days, he still had a feeling that something bad would have happened to him if he stayed in there for a period longer than seven days¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the side quest as a small panel appeared in front of him.


    [Redeem Reward: Y/N]


    Yes!


    Only ncing over the small panel for a short moment, Xuan Hao unconsciously nodded his head as he thought this to himself-


    Whoosh~


    Not a secondter, a delicate crystal that emitted a gentle, ethereal glow resembling the stars in a moonlit sky, appeared hovering a few centimeters in front of him as it pulsed with a soothing rhythm.


    So, this is starlight essence.


    Observing the strange, yet beautiful crystal that had appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao unknowingly felt a mixture of awe and reverence appearing in the depths of his soul as he looked at the delicate crystal floating in the air in front of him.


    However, upon closer inspection of the delicate crystal, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that there seemed to be several small stars hidden inside of the crystal, each one blending together in a unique constetion that seemed to contain the essence of the universe.


    Even if Xuan Hao understood that this should be nothing more than an illusion created by the inherent power contained inside the starlight essence, it still made him feel an undeniable desire to learn more as he entered an all most spell bound state while starring into the seeminglyrge universe hidden inside the delicate crystal hovering in the air in front of him.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao entered a trance while looking at the starlight essence, the rabbit demon beast let out azy yawning sound before stretching its entire body on top of the thin tree branch that seemed like it was about to break at any moment under its weight.


    Squeak~


    Finished stretching its body, the rabbit demon beast that seemed like it had just woken up from a short nap slowly began climbing down the thin tree hanging over the edge of the terraced pool of water before jumping into the water and making its way back towards the foundation where Xuan Hao was located.


    Having decided that it had punished Xuan Hao with waiting for long enough.


    Squeak?


    However, when it reached the foundation of the pagoda, it could not help letting a confused squeak escape from its small mouth as it saw Xuan Hao staring nkly into the air. In the eyes of the rabbit demon beast, he looked like a lost soul who had lost its purpose. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Squeak¡­


    Feeling like it knew what had caused him to end up in this lost state, a rare apologetic expression appeared on the face of the rabbit demon beast.


    Maybe I was too harsh on him¡­


    Along with this simple line of thought going through its head, the rabbit demon beast decided to quickly make its way over to Xuan Hao. Intending to show its magnanimousness towards Xuan Hao by forgiving him for the early scare he had given it earlier.


    Squeak¡­ Squeak, Squeak, Squeak? Squeak!


    Arriving in front of Xuan Hao, the rabbit demon beast lifted its head "Huh!?"


    to look at him as it graciously forgave him for his earlier transgression. Knowing full well just how much its forgiveness was worth¡­


    "Huh!?"


    And just like the rabbit demon beast had been expecting, it soon saw the expression on Xuan Hao''s face starting to light up again before a joyful expression appeared on his face.


    Swish~


    Feeling happy and a tad bit embarrassed upon seeing this reaction, the rabbit demon beast hurried up along the new a far morefortable robe that he was wearing before finding a muchrge hidden pocket than before that it could hide inside of. Now that it had forgiven Xuan Hao, he should resume their journey out of this ce¡­ And hopefully also supply it with more of the delicious rocks that he had been giving i!


    Squeak~


    Thinking about the delicious rocks it had eaten and how there would be more of them appearing in the future, the rabbit demon beast felt itself getting drowsy as it soon drifted off into sleep once again. For some reason, the energy inside of its body had almost beenpletely drained after swimming back to the foundation.


    As for how it was possible for a short swim to drain the energy of the Third Tribtion Soul Ascension Realm demon beast¡­ The rabbit demon beast didn''t really think about this, as its thoughts were already preupied with thinking about the delicious rocks that it would be eating in the future.


    ¡­


    "Huh!?"


    Feeling himself suddenly waking up from the strange trance that he had somehow found himself in, Xuan Hao could not help looking at the delicate crystal floating in the air in front of him with a nk expression on his face before it was soon reced by one filled with joy.


    During the short moment that he had been staring straight into the delicate crystal and observing the unique constetion hidden inside. During this process, he realized that the starlight essence was a strange form of energy stored inside of the delicate crystal. In a sense, the delicate crystal served the simple purpose of not allowing the starlight essence stored inside to leak out and disperse into the surrounding environment.


    Not only that, but the small bits of starlight essence leaking out from the delicate crystal, gave him a chance to absorb the starlight essence¡­ And doing this, he discovered that his body seemed to have a reaction aftering into contact with the starlight essence- no, it was more urate to say that his special physique that was still in a dormant state seemed to have a reaction to the starlight essence.


    Not just a reaction, the starlight essence is clearly helping in awakening it!


    Feeling a joyful expression appearing on his face after this realization, Xuan Hao understood just how precious the starlight essence in front of him was. Even if he couldn''t fully awaken his physique, he should at the very least be able to get close to fully awakening it¡­

 Chapter 981 Absorbing the Starlight Essence, Increase in Strength

    <h4>Chapter 981 Absorbing the Starlight Essence, Increase in Strength</h4>


    Feeling his hands tremble with a mixture of excitement and nervousness at this realization, Xuan Hao carefully reached out towards the delicate crystal filled with starlight essence-


    Whoosh~


    The moment his fingertips touched the delicate crystal''s surface, a surge of warmth spread through his body as he felt the small bits of starlight essence lingering around the edge of the crystal enter his body and resonate with his still dormant physique. Although only for a brief moment, Xuan Hao felt like his body had improved after the bits of starlight essence lingering around the crystal had been fully absorbed by his body.


    [Physique: ??? (40.1% Awakened)]


    Hm? The awakening progress of my physique actually improved¡­


    Looking over his status, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face after noticing that his physique had indeed grown closer to awakening after he finished absorbing the small bits of starlight essence that had leaked out from the crystal.


    Even if it didn''t improve more than one tenth of a percent, it still confirmed the fact that absorbing the starlight essence would indeed be useful for helping his physique awaken faster.


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time, as he grabbed the crystal floating in the air in front of him before sitting down and closing both of his eyes before focusing his full attention on extracting the starlight essence stored inside of the crystal.


    Rumble~


    Now entering his body in a farrger quantitypared to before, the starlight essence seemed to resonate with the qi inside his dantian and meridian. Resulting in not only his body growing stronger, but also the qi in his body being refined by the mystical starlight essence.


    As Xuan Hao felt the starlight essence flowing through his body, a change soon took ce, as he felt like his physique managed to reach another milestone. Resulting in an influx of insights regarding the Dao of Space flooding his mind. Improving hisprehension of the Dao of Space at a speed that was even faster than when he had been observing the true spatial copse back in the forest of the mist covered mountain range.


    Unknowingly, an hour passed like this before thest bit of starlight essence inside the delicate crystal was fully absorbed by Xuan Hao-


    Crack~


    And the moment this happened, the delicate crystal shattered into tiny pieces before scattering in the wind. Leaving no traces behind of its existence. Unable to exist without the support of the starlight essence.


    Opening his eyes with a somewhat disappointed expression on his face, Xuan Hao looked at the remnants of the crystal that had been holding the starlight essence slowly dispersing across the foundation and into the water not too far away.


    "How unfortunate that there isn''t any more¡­" Muttering this to himself before shaking his head in regret, Xuan Hao began to examine his body. Although the primary use of the starlight essence was to help his physique awaken, it also helped refine the qi inside his dantian. Allowing it to improve in qualitypared to before.


    Not only that, but he also felt that hisprehension of the Dao of Space had increasedpared to before. Even if it had not broken through to the Small Sess Realm yet, Xuan Hao clearly felt that the starlight essence had allowed the dao of space to fully merge together with his dao domain and fully integrate into. Increasing the strength of his dao domain in the process.


    Although Xuan Hao had no idea how much the starlight essence had managed to increase his strength, he felt that his current strength should at the very least have surpassed the level of someone in the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and reached the level of someone who had reached the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm at this point in time.


    Even if this might not sound like a lot, it was an important milestone that signified that he had solidified his foundation and could no longer be considered to be someone who just broke through to the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Instead, it would be more urate to say that he had reached the middle part of the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord.


    Narrowing both of his eyes with satisfaction as he thought about this while examining his body and dantian, Xuan Hao clearly remembered the information that the elder from the Mirage Sect had transferred to him about the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    The information did not contain a lot on the Intermediate Stage or Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, but it did contain the way that the elder from the Mirage Sect had used to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm during his youth.


    The method in question was notplicated, but still came with a terrifying difficulty that was impossible for most people to even dare think about attempting to ovee,prehend six different Daos and integrate them into your dao domain.


    However,prehending the six Daos and integrating them into the dao domain was only enough for someone to reach the Peak of the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Giving them strength equal to that of the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm. To break through to the Late stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, theprehension level of the six different Daos needed to have at least reached the Small Sess Realm, while at least one needed to reach the Large Sess Realm.


    "ording to this information, I only need toprehend one more Dao and integrate it into my domain before I can reach the peak of the realm and start thinking about breaking through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    Understanding that he was still far away fromprehending a Dao to the level of Large Sess, a realm ofprehension that he didn''t even know about before meeting the elder from the Mirage Sect, Xuan Hao instead decided to put his focus on first reaching the Pinnacle of the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm before thinking about any of this.


    At the very least, even if his Dao of Space didn''t reach the Small Sess Realm, it was not far off.


    Shaking his head as he stood back up, Xuan Hao decided to also check through his status to see if any significant changes had taken ce after he finished absorbing the starlight essence¡­


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword (Small Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess), Dao of Space (Elementary)


    Sword Intent: Nascent Sword Soul Realm


    Talent: ???


    Physique: ??? (65% Awakened)


    Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened)


    Realm: Intermediate Stage Dao Domain Lord


    Professions: Alchemist (Artisan), Formation Master (Expert), cksmithing (Expert)


    Sect: Star Shattering Sect


    Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect


    Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui


    Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm)


    [Reminder: Profession, cksmithing, is at the same level as disciple Bai Ning, it is rmended to stay above the realm of the disciple to ensure that you can provide proper guidance.]


    "Huh?" Not able to stop a surprised voice from escaping his lips as he looked over his status, Xuan Hao was not surprised because of the sudden reminder from the system that Bai Ning seemed to have broken through to the Expert Realm in cksmithing, but instead due to the sudden addition of a bloodline in his status.


    As far as he knew, he did not have any bloodline thest time he checked through his status!


    Is it perhaps because of my encounter with the elder from the Mirage Sect?


    Not able to think of anything else other than his encounter with the elder from the Mirage Sect who seemed to say he carried some kind of special bloodline; Xuan Hao could not think of anything else that might have caused this change in his status and the sudden appearance of a bloodline in his status.


    "Hm? There is a description avable¡­?" Focusing hard on the bloodline part that had appeared inside his status, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that there was a short description avable beneath the bloodline.


    [Three Immortals Bloodline (Half Awakened] N?v(el)B\\jnn


    [Description: The bloodline stems from one of three immortal bloodlines, half-awakened state makes it impossible to determine which one of the three bloodlines it belongs to, special abilities rted to the bloodline are unavable, increase in talent from bloodline is caried over.]


    [Special Note: The bloodline is now shown under status because the host became aware of its existence before it fully awakened. The bloodline cannot be forcefully awakened and can only awaken naturally after host reaches a certain level of strength.]


    "¡­"


    Reading through the description and special note at the end, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say. From the looks of things, the bloodline had always been there, the system had just deemed that it was of no importance given that he couldn''t do anything to speed up its awakening process.


    "Haaa¡­ I wonder if there is anything more hidden in my status that I don''t know about yet¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the status panel floating in the air in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of helplessness thinking about what other things the system might have hidden in his status.

 Chapter 982 Dangerous Water~

    <h4>Chapter 982 Dangerous Water~</h4>


    Ignoring the bloodline that had appeared in his status, Xuan Hao also noticed that the awakening of his physique had gone up from 40% to 65%. Meaning that absorbing the starlight essence had allowed his physique to progress by an entire 25%, as long as he could get another two crystals filled with starlight essence, he would be able to fully awaken his physique!


    Understanding this, Xuan Hao could not help looking forward to the next quest that the system was going to issue, as he hoped that it would give him more starlight essence.


    "Hm? When did the rabbit get there?" Suddenly feeling the small rabbit moving around inside his robe, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face. After all, he hadn''t even noticed when the rabbit demon beast had crawled inside of his robe in the first ce. Even if his attention was focused on absorbing the starlight essence, he should still have noticed the rabbit demon beast approaching him, let alone crawling inside his robe and finding a hidden pocket to sleep inside of. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Maybe its because I was too absorbed on making sure to absorb all of the starlight essence and disregarded the presence of the rabbit demon beast due to the fact that it''s not an enemy¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided not to think too much about it. Deciding to just me it on his ownck of attention to his surroundings during the absorption process of the starlight essence.


    "Well¡­ It''s about time to leave this ce." Muttering this to himself as he nced down at the foundation beneath his feet, Xuan Hao understood that it would be impossible for him to get anything more from trying to investigate what might be hidden inside of the foundation. Even the terrifying dragon from the past had only barely managed to leave behind a single scratch on the foundation and in the end, the single scratch had resulted in the defensive formation in ce on the formation activating before killing said dragon¡­


    Swish~


    Jumping off the side of the foundation, Xuan Hao was about to fly in the direction of the mountains a few kilometers away from his current location, when suddenly-


    "Huh!?"


    Ssh!


    He found himself falling straight down into the crystal-clear water around the foundation.


    Ssh~ Ssh~


    Sshing around in the water as he attempted to use his dao domain to lift himself out of the water, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that his dao domain didn''t help him get out of the water. Instead, it felt like the water was forcefully drawing away the energy that he was using in an attempt to lift himself out of the water. The more energy he put into his dao domain, the more energy the water absorbed.


    Realizing that it was useless to use his dao domain to lift himself back out of the water and that it was instead rapidly decreasing the qi inside his dantian, Xuan Hao immediately stopped using his dao domain and instead remained floating in the water without trying to lift himself out of the water into the air.


    Wait¡­ Is this perhaps the reason why the rabbit demon beast jumped into the water and decided to slowly swim across to the edge where the tree is located!? But how did it know about this? Does it perhaps have some kind of special ability that allows it to notice things like this?


    Remembering how the rabbit demon beast had just jumped into the water without even trying to fly over it, Xuan Hao could not help suspecting that the rabbit demon beast might have some kind of hidden ability that allowed it to see through the weird abilities of the crystal-clear water.


    Now that I think about it, the rabbit demon beast didn''t seem to have any problems when swimming through the water normally¡­


    Feeling like this might work as he felt the drain on his energy decrease the moment, he stopped trying to escape from the water with his dao domain, Xuan Hao began to slowly swim through the water only using his physical strength.


    Given that his physical strength was far superior to that of an ordinary mortal, he should have been able to cross the distance of a few hundred meters of where the edge of the terraced pool of water was located, but he found out that traveling this short distance seemed to take far longer than what a normal mortal would have needed to travel this short distance. Not only that, but he also noticed that the drain on his energy seemed to increase the longer he stayed inside the water.


    "Haaa¡­ That was far harder than I expected it to be¡­" Feeling a wave of exhaustion washing over him as he dragged himself out of the water and on to the edge where the small thin tree was located, Xuan Hao could not help wondering how the rabbit demon beast had managed to reach the tree at a speed far faster than him. Back then, he had not even seen the slightest sign of exhaustion on the face of the rabbit demon beast!


    Maybe it gets more difficult to swim through the water the higher one''s cultivation is? Or maybe its because there is some kind of special way to travel through the water¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he nced towards the location where the rabbit demon beast was sleeping inside his robepletely isted from the water by a thin energy barrier created by the robe to prevent it from getting wet, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if he should throw the rabbit out from his robe and try to see if the rabbit demon beast really was using some kind of special ability to swim through the water.


    Squeak?


    Having somehow sensed the danger that it was in, the rabbit demon beast suddenly woke up before it crawled out of Xuan Hao''s sleeve before turning to look at him with a cute expression filled with confusion.

 Chapter 983 Spatial Tunnel

    <h4>Chapter 983 Spatial Tunnel</h4>


    "..."


    Faced with the innocent expression filled with confusion, Xuan Hao stopped himself just as he was about to grab the rabbit demon beast and throw it into the water.


    Squeak?


    Not understanding why Xuan Hao was looking at it in a rather weird way, the rabbit demon beast slowly tilted its head with an even more confused expression than before present on its small fluffy face. Resulting in Xuan Hao feeling even more awkward about what he had been nning to do.


    But¡­ If I don''t throw it in the water, there is no way I will be able to figure out how it was able to make it through the water so easily¡­


    Whoosh~


    Squeak!?


    Ssh!


    Before the rabbit demon beast had any time to react, Xuan Hao gently shook his sleeve over the edge of the terraced pool. Resulting in the rabbit demon beast falling straight into the crystal-clear water below.


    SQUEAK!


    Ssh~ Ssh~


    Not at all having expected to suddenly end up in the water, the rabbit demon beast sshed around in panic for a short moment before calming down. Soon beginning to slowly swim toward the edge of the terraced pool before starting to climb back up to the small dry stop with the tree where Xuan Hao was standing and observing its every move with his divine sense.


    Squeak!?


    Reaching the top, the rabbit demon beast let out a confused squeak filled with anger. Not understanding why Xuan Hao had suddenly waved his arm, that had ended up causing it to fall out of the sleeve and into the water below.


    "My bad, I thought you were holding on to my sleeve¡­" Not intending to admit that he had nned for it to fall into the water, Xuan Hao somewhat awkwardly apologized to the rabbit demon beast who was now staring directly at him with what could be described as the cutest frown he had seen, while he handed over a handful of spirit stone.


    Squeak!


    Only letting out a slightly offended squeak, the rabbit demon beast grabbed the spirit stones Xuan Hao handed it before climbing back up his robe. Entering s sleeve before hiding away inside the small hidden pocket inside of it. Not showing any signs of wanting toe out any time soon, Xuan Hao also felt the presence of the rabbit demon beast''s aura change, as it consumed the spirit stones and entered a state of meditation.


    "At least I managed to get the information I wanted¡­" Muttering this to himself as he decided to leave the rabbit demon beast alone, Xuan Hao thought about what had happened to the rabbit demon beast when it fell into the water.


    Different from what he had seen when he casually observed the rabbit demon beast swimming through the crystal-clear water in the past or what he himself had managed to observe during his time in the water, this time around, Xuan Hao could clearly see what happened to the rabbit demon beast the moment it entered the water.


    To start with, the speed that the energy of the rabbit demon beast was being absorbed was noticeably slowerpared to when he had entered the water and there was no sign of this being due to some special ability of the rabbit demon beast. Meaning that there was no way for him to slow down the speed at which his energy was being absorbed by the crystal-clear water.


    Although this had not been a problem so far considering that he only had to swim a little over a hundred meters so far, there were some terraced water pools up ahead that stretched on for close to a kilometer. Even with his strength, he doubted he would be able to hold on long enough to swim to the other side before his energy ran out and he was swallowed by the crystal-clear water.


    However, he also discovered that the space around the rabbit demon beast was twisting and stretching in the direction that the rabbit demon beast was swimming. Trapping it in some kind of spatial tunnel, that made travelling a distance of a few meters be several kilometers long. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    But¡­ how am I supposed to use my dao domain to negate this with the Dao of Space, when keeping my dao domain active for a few seconds uses up most of my energy? Even if it increases my speed of traversing the water, I doubt that it will be anymore effective than just swimming through the spatial tunnels¡­


    Gazing towards the mountains in the distance as he thought about how to make it through the water without using all of his energy before reaching the other side, Xuan Hao could not help feeling worried when looking at therge body of water located in between the mountains and the ce where the smaller terraced pools of water were located.


    Haaa¡­ Given that I will have to recover my energy every time I pass through one of the terraced pools of water, it will at least take a few days before I can reach thest one located between the mountain and the rest of the terraced pools. Maybe I will be able to find a way to negate the effect of the spatial tunnels created by the water now that I know that they are there¡­


    Whoosh~


    Ssh!


    Not wasting any more time, Xuan Hao stepped over the edge and plunged into the water of the next terraced pool of water before starting to swim towards the edge of it. Not rxing in the slightest during this time, as he also made sure to release his divine sense to observe the spatial tunnel that trapped him the moment, he entered the water. Trying to figure out if there were any ws in the spatial tunnel that he would be able to take advantage of, while at the same time also trying to experiment with how much energy he would have to put into his dao domain to start affecting the spatial tunnel.

 Chapter 984 Chu Yang and Qing Yi’s Journey Back to the Surface

    <h4>Chapter 984 Chu Yang and Qing Yi''s Journey Back to the Surface</h4>


    Rustle~


    At the same time Xuan Hao was trying to figure out a way to cross therge body of water between him and the mountain range, the exhausted figures of Qing Yi and Chu Yang crawled out from a small hole in the ground. Even then, it was still obvious that the aura around both of them had undergone a significant change, with both of them having made significant improvements in their cultivation over the short time since they had been forced underground by the strange rise in temperature a little over a week earlier.


    Chu Yang going from the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, while Qing Yi had not only managed to break through to the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, but even looked like she was about to reach the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm as well.


    However, from their exhausted figures, it was also obvious that this rapid improvement did note easily.


    Thump~


    "Finally, back to the surface again! I never want to go back underground ever again!" Flopping on to the ground covered in a softyer of grass, Qing Yi didn''t bother waiting for a response as she closed both of her eyes and fell asleep on the spot. Considering that she was someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, the fact that she was exhausted enough to fall asleep on the spot meant that she had overdrawn her own energy far beyond her own limits.


    Although this wouldn''t result in any permanent damage to her soul, it still meant that she would enter a deep sleep that she wouldn''t be able to wake up from for a few days or longer depending on how exhausted her soul was.


    Even if sleeping was a good way to recover energy for normal mortals and help speed up their healing process to some extent, the same could not be said for cultivators. Although it was still helpful to some degree, the process of recovery took far longer than meditation.


    "Looks like she couldn''t hold on any longer¡­" Looking at the already sleeping Qing Yi from the side, Chu Yang muttered this to himself as he remembered what they had gone through over since falling into the massive underground river that swept them deeper underground.


    At first, everything had been fine, and they had spent a little over a day being pulled along by the current before they encountered their first demon beast in the turbulent underground river, arge fish demon beast. Although this demon beast was only in the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, weaker than both of them, it was impossible for them to fight it, as it could move around freely in the river unlike them.


    Because of this, they ended up spending the next two days desperately trying to fight off the constant attacks of the fish that would attack the moment they let their guard down before escaping the moment they tried attacking it.


    In the end, Qing Yi managed to fool the fish demon beast by pretending to have run out of energy to fight back. Killing it the moment it tried to go in for the final attack. However, this did note without cost, as Qing Yi ended up getting injured in the process.


    After this, they ended up attracting more fish demon beast and with no end in sight, it looked like they wouldn''t be able to escape the turbulent underground river alive, that was, until that thing appeared¡­


    Arge snake-like creature half the size of the massive underground river that they were trapped inside of!


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he thought about the giant snake-like creature, Chu Yang could not help feeling thankful for the talismans that their master had given to them before they made their way inside the mystic realm. If he hadn''t managed to activate one of the talismans when the snake was about to swallow them along with the different fish demon beasts attack them, he was certain that he and his senior sister wouldn''t have been able to make it out of the underground river alive¡­


    "But¡­ I wonder just how strong master is¡­" Whispering this to himself as he nced down at his interspatial ring where thest talisman given by his master was stored, Chu Yang remembered therge sword that appeared in front of them the moment he activated the talisman and how the snake-like creature fearfully tried escaping to no avail as the giant sword shed down towards it, killing any of the smaller fish demon beast that had yet to get swallowed before shing it in half.


    Not only that, but the sword had even shed apart therge underground river. Opening up a path to several different underground cave systems running along the side of the river that they had been unable to find out about before due to the constant attacks from the different fish demon beasts.


    Having no time to even think about how therge snake-like demon beast that should have reached the Later Stages of the Domain Lord Realm had been killed with such ease back then, they both used all of their remaining energy to escape from the turbulent underground river as fast as possible. Not daring to risk staying inside the underground river for even a second longer now that they finally had a path out of it.


    Even if there should be far more demon beasts present inside the underground cave systems, they would at the very least be able to fight back against them. Far betterpared to the constant harassment of the different fish demon beasts inside the turbulent river.


    At least, this was what both of them had thought at first¡­


    In the end, both of them ended up locked in a constant state of battle over the next five days, as they used up all of the talismans their master had left them except one to fight their way back up to the surface again.


    The intense and constant pressure that both of them had been under during these five days was what caused their cultivation to improve rapidly, Qing Yi being the one who improved the most, as she was far less experienced when it came to the constant battle. Resulting in her current cultivation being on the cusp of reaching the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Compared to their first time underground and their encounter with the mole demon beast, it was only now that both of them managed to understand just how dangerous the underground world of the mystic realm was.


    In a sense, their first journey into the underground world of the mystic realm could be considered a walk in the park without any real threat to their life. Theplete opposite of their second time, where they both realized that there was a very real chance that the talismans of their master would run out and they would end up dying inside the mystic realm¡­!


    Shaking his head as he thought about how they had just barely managed to escape alive, Chu Yang sat on the ground before starting to meditate with the purpose of recovering from his current exhausted state as fast as possible. Understanding very well how dangerous it was for both of them now that they had no energy left to defend themselves against the different demon beast lurking around the surface of the mystic realm.


    At the very least, they had been lucky enough to end up on a location that didn''t have any powerful demon beasts nearby, while they could use their Nascent Soul Realm cultivation base to intimidate some of the weaker demon beasts.


    Well¡­ Considering Qing Yi''s current state, it looked like he would be the only person capable of doing anything in case they ended up encountering a demon beast-


    Roar!


    And to make matters worse, it hadn''t even been a few minutes before the first demon beast appeared. Although only at the Seventh Stage of the Core Formation Realm, it still ended up forcing Chu Yang out of his meditation to deal with it.


    Roar!


    "This is going to be annoying¡­" Hearing another demon beast roar not too far away after he finished dealing with the first, Chu Yang could not stop a silent sigh filled with exhaustion from escaping his lips. Even if the demon beasts attacking them weren''t stronger than the Core Formation Realm so far, if they continued attacking before he had a chance to recover, he might end up bing too exhausted to even use his aura to intimidate them!


    Boom!


    At least that time was still a bit off, as Chu Yang used his aura to cover the area around him- N?v(el)B\\jnn


    R-Roar¡­


    Scaring away any of the nearby demon beasts who had been approaching them in the process. Buying himself some precious time to recover without having to worry about being ambushed by some random Core Formation Realm or Foundation Establishment Realm demon beast in the process.

 Chapter 985 Crystal Fish

    <h4>Chapter 985 Crystal Fish</h4>


    Not aware of the fact that Chu Yang and Qing Yi had almost used all of the talismans he had given them and would soon only have thest protective measure that he had secretly left on them before they entered the mystic realm, Xuan Hao arrived in front of the final body of water between himself and the mountain range surrounding the terraced pools of water and the remnant of the pagoda, arge ring shapedke.


    Having be aware of the spatial anomaly that seemed to affect the crystal-clear water, Xuan Hao did try his best to figure out a way to reduce the effect of the spatial anomaly without using up all of his energy in the process.


    Not taking too long to find out that although it was simple to undo the effect of the spatial anomaly trapping him in some kind of spatial tunnel through a simple brute force release of his dao domain, the energy used to do this would at most allow him to cross a distance of a few hundred meters. Far from enough to reach the other side of therge ring-shapedke in front of him.


    If he wanted to reach the other side, he at first thought that he might be able to find some way to make use of his Dao of Spaceprehension to undo or at least reduce the effect of the spatial anomaly without using the same level of energy as he had used through a simple brute force release of his dao domain, but¡­ This proved to be wrong.


    Hisprehension of the Dao of Space was far too insignificant at the moment to even begin to grasp the workings of the spatial anomaly covering the terraced pools and the seemingly random spatial tunnel that it would trap him inside of the moment he entered the water.


    On the other hand, he ended up using far more energy only using his Dao of Space to deal with the spatial anomaly than if he had just used the full power of his dao domain. Forcing him to try and figure out some other way that he might be able to reach the mountain range.


    In the end, this allowed him to find out that the simple solution of just teleporting to the other side was not an option either due to the spatial anomaly affecting the space and causing him to end up in random locations as a result.


    Although he might end up at the base of the mountains because of this, there was also a chance that he could end up getting teleported to the middle of the widest part of the ring-shapedke. Not only cing him five kilometers away from any safe ce in the middle of the ring-shapedke that drained his qi, but also trapping him inside a spatial tunnel that would make it close to impossible for him to escape.


    Instead of doing something this dangerous, Xuan Hao preferred to try and figure out another way he could reach the mountain range without having to rely on luck to not end up in a deadly situation. Not to mention, the spatial anomaly might end causing him to end up somewhere under the crystal-clear water.


    From the single time that he had tried to go under the water to test out if it was better than staying above the water, Xuan Hao didn''t dare to do this again, as even with his strength, he felt his energy being drawn out at a speed that would end up reducing him to a lifeless husk in less than a half a minute¡­.


    Because of this, Xuan Hao wanted to avoid any situation that could cause him to end up beneath the crystal-clear water. Meaning that teleportation was out of the question if he couldn''t find some way to ensure that he wouldn''t end up finding himself beneath the water or the more dangerous locations on the ring-shapedke.


    Rustle~


    Squeak?


    Poking its small head out of his sleeve at this moment, the rabbit demon beast had just finished absorbing all of the qi stored inside the spiritual stones that Xuan Hao had given it and had nowe out to ask for more¡­ Or at least that was what Xuan Hao believed from the way that the rabbit demon beast was looking at him.


    "Do you want more spirit stones?"


    Squeak!


    Jumping up in excitement the moment it heard Xuan Hao mention spirit stones, the rabbit demon beast momentarily forgot the fact that it was standing at the edge of one of the terraced pools of water-


    Squeak!?


    And before itnded back on the ground again, it suddenly realized that it had identally ended up jumping off the edge of the terraced pool of water and now found itself in the air above the crystal-clear water of the ring-shapedke that surrounded the terraced pools and the remnants of the pagoda. Soon finding itself plummeting into the water below.


    Ssh!


    "¡­"


    Not knowing how to react to the rabbit demon beast seemingly jumping into the water on its own volition, Xuan Hao could only watch as it hit the water and sank beneath the surface before rapidly swimming back up-


    "Hm?"


    However, as the rabbit demon beast was about to try and swim its way back to the surface again, arge crystal fish the size of a small house appeared behind the rabbit demon beast as it opened itsrge mouth to swallow the rabbit demon beast.


    Bang!


    Of course, this did not work out as therge crystal fish was nned, as the rabbit demon beast abruptly turned around in the water before unleashing a deadly blow that instantly sent therge crystal fish flying into the distance. Not too surprising when considering that therge crystal fish had the strengthpared to the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm, while the rabbit demon beast had already reached the Soul Ascension Realm.


    On the other hand, it could be considered a miracle that the crystalrge fish had even managed to get knocked flying with an intact body. Even if the blow from the rabbit demon beast had long since destroyed the soul inside the body¡­


    How can it fly? Is it perhaps because it''s already dead? But more important than that, howe a mere Nascent Soul Realm fish can survive inside the water that constantly drains the energy of anyone entering? Even if it might be able to survive for a few minutes, there should be no way that it could live inside the water, unless¡­ The water doesn''t affect anyone below a certain cultivation realm!?


    Squeak! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Lost in his own thoughts about what he had just witnessed, Xuan Hao failed to realize that the rabbit demon beast had still not left the water before he heard its panicked squeaking from below, causing him to turn his attention away from the direction that the body ofrge crystal fish had been sent flying in.


    "What in the- Where did all these weird crystal fishe from!?"


    Looking back down at the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao could not help eximing in surprise after spotting the close to a thousandrge crystal fish gathered in front of the rabbit demon beast now backed up against the edge of the terraced pool where Xuan Hao was standing.


    The reason why the rabbit demon beast didn''t just escape back up to him, was that a dozen or so of the stronger crystal fish in front of it, created long sea grass tendrils that grabbed hold of the rabbit demon beast''s body. Preventing it from escaping, as even if it destroyed the sea grass, the sea grass would almost instantly grow back again. Wasting the rabbit demon beast''s energy as a result.


    SQUEAK!


    As a result of this, the rabbit demon beast could only desperately call out to him, as it had no other path to escape from therge number of crystal fish slowly approaching it. After all, although these crystal fish weren''t much stronger than the Nascent Soul Realm and Domain Lord Realm, their numbers more than made up for this.


    Not to mention, the rabbit demon beast also had to deal with the constant drain on its energy from the surrounding water, something that didn''t seem to affect theserge crystal fish in the slightest.


    Swish-!


    Not having any time to figure out where these fish had suddenly popped up from, Xuan Hao jumped down to the rabbit demon beast and cut it free before jumping back to the edge of the terraced pool before any of the stronger crystal fish had the chance to catch him and bring him into the water. Understanding very well that he wouldn''t fare much better than the rabbit demon beast if he ended up getting caught and was forced under water.


    Of course, Xuan Hao didn''t forget to catch a few of the crystal fish in the process of getting the saving the rabbit demon beast. Intending full well to study them and see if there might be something other than a lower cultivation realm that might be the reason these fish could live inside the crystal-clear water without any problems¡­

 Chapter 986 Strange Organ

    <h4>Chapter 986 Strange Organ</h4>


    Squeak!


    Not wasting a single second after it was rescued, the rabbit demon beast dashed inside Xuan Hao''s sleeve before hiding away inside the hidden pocket. Forgetting to get the spirit stones that it hade out for in the process. In the back of the rabbit demon beast''s mind, it had already decided that it wouldn''t leave the small hidden pocket inside Xuan hao''s robe before they reached the mountains on the other side of therge ring-shapedke.


    Ignoring the rabbit demon beast as it moved around inside the hidden pocket trying to make itself morefortable, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the crystal fish that he captured when rescuing the rabbit demon beast.


    Different from any other fish demon beast that he had seen so far, the crystal fish werepletely transparent outside of a few vital organs that were still somewhat visible through their skin. Making them extremely hard to spot inside the crystal-clear water that already made it hard to use divine sense over arge area due to its absorption of anything that touched it.


    "No wonder I didn''t see any of them before, they are practically invisible in the water if one doesn''t know about their presence. Good thing I didn''t end up entering the water just now¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the crystal-clear ring-shapedke, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine when he realized how close he was to ending up in a life and death situation.


    Even if the crystal fish were far weaker than him, their numbers more than made up for this. Not to mention, the crystal fish were not affected by the spatial anomaly or the absorption of qi. Meaning that they could just draw things out and wait for him to exhaust himself to death.


    However, the presence of the crystal fish hinted at there being some way to avoid the effect of the crystal-clear water and the spatial anomaly¡­


    Turning his attention back towards the crystal fish now on the ground in front of him, Xuan Hao smiled slightly as his divine sense and dao domain spread out and began to examine every single part of the crystal fish who could do nothing but p around in a panic after being forced out of the water.


    Demon beasts or not, they had never thought about leaving the water before and as a result hadn''t adapted to being outside of the water. Although they could survive for a far longer time due to their cultivation base, they couldn''t exert more than a small fraction of their power and under Xuan Hao''s powerful divine sense and dao domain, they couldn''t even continue pping around the ground anymore. Forcing them to give up on their futile attempt to get back into the water again.


    Whoosh~


    Not able to resist in the slightest, Xuan Hao''s divine sense slowly seeped into their transparent bodies and began analyzing every single part of them, while the dao domain kept them in ce and prevented them from moving or trying to escape.


    "Hm?"


    Searching through the bodies of the crystal fish for anything interesting, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he noticed a special kind of organ inside one of the crystal fish that seemed to radiate some kind of strange aura. Looking closer, Xuan Hao realized that all of the crystal fish had this special organ inside of them, radiating the same strange aura that seemed to serve no purpose other than radiating the strange aura that seemed to create a thin barrier of sorts that covered the entire body of the crystal fish.


    Ptsh-!


    Extracting the special organ from one of the crystal fish to inspect it more closely, Xuan Hao realized that it didn''t stop producing the strange aura after being extracted, but instead began covering him in the strange yet harmless aura that now no longer covered the crystal fish whose organ had just been cut out.


    Is this perhaps what is allowing the crystal fish to live inside the crystal-clear water without being affected by the absorption or the spatial anomaly? What will happen to it if I throw it back into the water like this?


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao nced back down on the crystal fish that seemed perfectly fine after having one of its organs cut out-


    Whoosh~


    And deciding to test out his hypothesis, Xuan Hao threw the crystal fish who had just barely managed to close the wound back into the water.


    Ssh!


    Watching as the crystal fishnded in the water and soon became almostpletely invisible beneath the crystal-clear water, Xuan Hao saw the crystal fish happily swimming around for a few seconds before suddenly freezing on the spot before violently wiggling around in the water for another few minutes before slowly loosing power and sinking to the bottom without any signs of life left.


    Confirming the fact that the special organ was indeed responsible for the crystal fish being able to live inside of the crystal-clear water without dying. Not because their cultivation realm was lower than the Soul Ascension Realm like he had first suspected after not seeing any crystal fish above the Domain Lord Realm.


    Now the only question left on Xuan Hao''s mind, was whether or not he would be able to use the strange aura covering his body from the strange crystal fish organ.


    If he really could, the difficulty of crossing the ring-shapedke would be close to negligible, as a distance of two kilometers would take no more than a few seconds to travel with his current strength. Even if he couldn''t use any of his movement techniques or abilities.


    Well¡­ There is only one way to find out¡­


    Ssh!


    Deciding to jump into the water just next to the edge of the terraced pool that he was standing on top of so he could escape in case he was wrong; Xuan Hao felt the crystal-clear water surround his entire body as he firmly held the strange crystal fish organ in one of his hands.


    However, even after a few seconds passed, nothing happened.


    The spatial anomaly that would trap him inside some kind of spatial tunnel was nowhere to be seen and the crystal-clear water didn''t absorb as much as a single bit of his qi.


    All things considered, the crystal-clear water that could kill him if he stayed inside of it for too long, was now nothing more than ordinary water that didn''t have any kind of danger inside of it. Outside of the few crystal fish, but with their strength, Xuan Hao didn''t have to worry about them now that he was no longer affected by the crystal-clear water and the spatial anomaly. Only the restriction on the space itself that prevented teleporting and his movement technique was still around.


    "Looks like it does work¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked at the strange organ in his hand, Xuan Hao was just about to cross the ring-shapedke, when-


    Bang!


    Ssh~


    The strange organ of the crystal fish exploded in his face, covering the thin barrier created by his dao domain around his body. Following which, the familiar sensation of space around him twisting and his qi being forcefully drawn out of his body returned. Not only that, but the crystal fish who had been observing him from afar also began cautiously making their way towards him.


    Although they didn''t dare to attack him as fast as they did with the rabbit demon beast due to how he had captured two of them and saved the rabbit demon beast not too long ago, it would only be a matter of time before they worked up enough courage to start attacking him.


    Swish-!


    Understanding this and how dangerous his situation was now that the strange organ had blown up all of a sudden, Xuan Hao didn''t waste a second before rushing out of the water and back up to safety at the edge of the terraced pool of water. Not daring to stay in the water and having to deal with the attack of the crystal fish like what had happened to the rabbit demon beast. Different from the rabbit demon beast, he didn''t really have anyone who would show up to save him.


    So, the strange organs can''t exist outside the body of the crystal fish for an extended period of time¡­


    Standing back up on the edge of the terraced pool of water, safe from the crystal fish and crystal-clear water below, Xuan Hao went over the things he had just learnt about the strange crystal fish organ.


    In the end, he decided to test things out in more detail with the remaining two crystal fish and ended up concluding that the strange organ could only protect him for a little over two seconds after he entered the water.


    To cross the distance of two kilometers without any movement technique or abilities assisting him, he would at least need ten or more seconds¡­ And that was considering nothing unexpected happened¡­N?v(el)B\\jnn

 Chapter 987 Hidden Below

    <h4>Chapter 987 Hidden Below</h4>


    Knowing how to cross the water now, Xuan Hao ended up spending the next few minutes trying to catch more of the crystal fish, but ultimately failed, as they had now be far harder to catch because none of them dared to go anywhere near the edge of the terraced pool after seeing him catch a few of them from the water earlier.


    The fact that they had also witnessed what happened to the crystal fish who had been thrown into the water after having been caught by Xuan Hao, only served to make them no longer dare approach the edge of the terraced pool.


    So far, the only way to get them to approach him would be for him to enter the water again and wait for them to regain their courage and try to attack him after he was weakened by the spatial anomaly and the water.


    Crack-!


    Ssh!


    Thinking about whether or not to jump into the water to try and catch more of the crystal fish, the edge of the terraced pool that he was standing on top of suddenly started trembling as arge part of it broke off and fell into the water below.


    "This¡­." Seeing that the edge of the terraced pool he was standing on top of had somehow started breaking. Allowing arge amount of water to rush out of the terraced pool and into therge ring-shapedke, Xuan Hao noticed that the same had started happening for the terraced pools behind him.


    Rumble-!


    Watching as the terraced pools broke one by one and merged together into a singlerge pool of water behind him, Xuan Hao did not take long to realize that it would not be long before all of the terraced pools of water broke apart and flowed together with the ring-shapedke surrounding the terraced pools of water.


    At that point in time, he would no longer have anywhere to escape from the constant drain of the water and would inevitably end up running out of energy and get overwhelmed by the countless crystal fish hiding inside the crystal-clear water¡­


    Swish-!


    Ssh~


    Knowing that he didn''t have any time left to try and figure out a way that he could bait the crystal fish to approach him without putting himself in danger, Xuan Hao jumped into the water before using all of his power catch arge number of unsuspecting crystal fish who had no time to react before their special organ was extracted by Xuan Hao.


    "Haaa¡­"


    Feeling a wave of exhaustion wash over him as he felt close to 80% of his energy had been drained in the short time, he had used his full power inside the water to catch a little over a dozen of the crystal fish, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a wave of fear wash over him as he realized just how close to death he was at that moment.


    If not for the fact that some of the crystal fish had grown curious and approached after seeing part of the edge of the terraced pool he was standing on top of break off, Xuan Hao doubted that he would have been able to reach the other crystal fish who had remained far away from him due to fear of him catching them like he had done to the crystal fish from earlier.


    This is not the time to rx, the fish I caught will only barely be enough for me to reach the other side of theke¡­


    Swoosh-!


    Not wasting any time after feeling the strange aura from the strange crystal fish organ protect him from the absorption of the crystal-clear water and the spatial anomaly, Xuan Hao used all of his remaining energy to rapidly swim through the water at a speed far exceeding that of the crystal fish who had been watching the entire scene from afar and were trying their best to escape in the opposite direction of Xuan Hao.


    Unfortunately for some of these crystal fish, the path that they chose to escape in happened to be the same one Xuan Hao was travelling towards the base of the mountains on the other side of the ring-shapedke-


    Ssh~ Ssh~


    And Xuan Hao was more than happy to catch a few of these crystal fish in case he happened to run into any unexpected situation that would extend the time he needed to reach the other side of theke.


    RUMBLE-!


    As if to answer his worries, a loud rumbling sound echoed out from the center of the ring-shapedke before a crystal fish several hundreds of meters long emerged from the depths of the crystal-clear water, its size alone only barely fitting inside the two-kilometer-wide part of the ring-shapedke.


    At the same time, this also made it impossible for Xuan Hao to avoid it, as the colossal crystal fish had appeared directly in front of him. Especially considering the fact that he still couldn''t fly due to the spatial anomaly still preventing or disrupting anything that had to do with spatial movement or maniption.


    "So, there is indeed a crystal fish in the Soul Ascension Realm¡­" Freezing for a moment as he saw the colossal creature that had appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself as he felt a sense of urgency.


    Although the massive crystal fish in front of him had only reached the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm like the rabbit demon beast and was weaker than him, his current condition didn''t really allow him to fight with the enormous crystal fish. Not to mention, the number of smaller crystal fish still left on him would only allow him to stay inside the water for a little over 15 seconds. Far from enough, even if he was at full strength.


    ROOOOOAR-!


    Not at all carrying about the thoughts going through Xuan Hao''s head as he was thinking about how to avoid the colossal crystal fish that had suddenly appeared in front of him and blocked his path, the crystal fish in question didn''t intend to let him wait, as it opened itsrge maw before biting down towards Xuan Hao in an attempt to swallow him whole.


    "Not again¡­"


    Seeing the massive maw of the crystal fish about to close around him, Xuan Hao inevitably ended up getting a shback to the time when the sandworm and Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast from the forest had also swallowed him.


    Swish-!


    Not thinking too much about how this was already the third time that a demon beast was attempting to swallow him since he entered the mystic realm, Xuan Hao dived underwater and moved to the side-


    Bang!


    Just barely avoiding getting swallowed by a giant demon beast again.


    Roar!?


    However, the colossal crystal fish was not done with just this, as it turned around and tried to swallow him again-


    Rumble!


    But unfortunately for the colossal crystal fish, Xuan Hao didn''t n on giving it a chance to swallow him again, as he gathered the power of his dao domain before smashing it into the head of the crystal fish-


    BOOOOOM-!


    Showing it just howrge the distance in strength between someone in the Third Tribtion of Soul Ascension Realm and someone in the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm was.


    R-Roar!


    Only able to let out a painful roar as part of its head was blown to bits by the powerful attack-


    Swoosh~!


    Giving Xuan Hao a much-needed opportunity to slip past the colossal crystal fish before it had any time to realize that its opponent had already escaped.


    ROOOOAR!


    By the time that it realized Xuan Hao was missing, it could only let out a roar filled with killing intent before charging towards Xuan Hao who had already managed to reach the base of the mountain range.


    "Hehe, you want to fight me now that I''m out of the water?"


    However, it was already toote for the colossal crystal fish to do anything to Xuan Hao, as he was now no longer limited by the few seconds bought to him by holding the strange organs of the crystal fish. Even if he only had a little below 20% of his qi left inside his dantian at this point in time, the crystal fish was no longer his opponent.


    ROOOOOAR!


    In the end, the crystal fish didn''t seem to care about this, as it let out a terrifying roar that caused the rest of the ring-shapedke to start trembling violently-


    ROOOAR!


    ROAAAR! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    ROOAR!


    And before Xuan Hao had any time to react, dozens of simrlyrge crystal fish began emerging from the depths of the crystal-clear water before also charging towards him.


    "This¡­"


    Seeing therge number of colossal crystal fish emerge from the water before rushing towards him, Xuan Hao lost his confident expression before turning around to rush up the mountain range in the opposite direction of therge number of Soul Ascension Realm crystal fish who had suddenly emerged from the water.

 Chapter 988 Brutal Rabbit~

    <h4>Chapter 988 Brutal Rabbit~</h4>


    Squeak!?


    Having felt the dozens of terrifying auras no weaker than itself that suddenly appeared, the rabbit demon beast who had hidden away inside of the hidden pocket in his robe, poked its head out as it looked back towards the dozens of crystal fish emerging from the water as they dived into the rocky ground like it was the same as the water in theke behind them.


    Although slower than in the water, they did notck speed whenpared to the current Xuan Hao who couldn''t use his movement technique.


    However,pared to Xuan Hao, the crystal fish had one very clear advantage over him¡­ And that was the fact that the qi left inside of Xuan Hao''s dantian was far too low for him to continue escaping like this over an extended period of time with the spatial anomaly still present.


    The only real chance he had to escape from the crystal fish who seemed bent on catching up to him, was to get out of the area covered by the spatial anomaly and start using his movement technique again. If he could do that, there would be no way for the colossal crystal fish to catch up with him. On the other hand, they would have to worry about him, as he would be able to easily attack them without them being able to do anything about it.


    Squeak¡­?


    Not understanding any of this, the rabbit demon beast calmed down after realizing that the crystal fish weren''t able to catch them and instead began to curiously observe the strange almostpletely transparent fish chasing after them.


    Squeak¡­


    After observing the approaching crystal fish, the rabbit demon beast could not stop its mouth from watering when it noticed a particrrge shiny thing inside the body of the first colossal crystal fish to appear and also the one Xuan Hao had knocked away before escaping to the mountain range.


    For some reason, in the eyes of the rabbit demon beast, therge shiny thing inside the body of the colossal crystal fish closest to them, seemed awfully a lot like one of the spirit stones that Xuan Hao had given to it in the past.


    SQUEAK!


    Not able to control itself when faced with such arge meal waiting to be eaten, the rabbit demon beast jumped out of Xuan Hao''s robe before thetter had any time to react and flew towards the colossal crystal fish in the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension realm just behind them-


    Ptsh!


    And before the crystal fish had any time to notice the existence of the small rabbit demon beast whose cultivation base was rather hard to spot due to it having done its best to hide it, a loud sound of something sharp cutting through flesh echoed out, as the small rabbit demon beast easily pierced through the crystal fish''s skin and entered its body.


    R-Roar!?


    Feeling something suddenly enter its body before starting to cause havoc as it began digging its way towards its vital organs and the ce where its dantian was located, the colossal crystal fish stated panicking, as it came to a stop and tried using all of its strength to deal with the rabbit demon beast that was now inside of its body.


    Unfortunately for the crystal fish, even though they were both at the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, the rabbit demon beast was already inside of its body and there was no way for the crystal fish to use its full strength to deal with it, as doing this might end up destroying its own body. Inevitably killing itself in the process of trying to get rid of the rabbit demon beast inside of its body.


    Squeak!


    crystal fish freeze for a moment with terror in their eyes as they watched the small rabbit demon beast emerge from the body of the Ignorant to the fear that the crystal fish was feeling as it tried everything it could to deal with the rabbit demon beast now inside of its body, the rabbit demon beast in question let out an ted squeaking sound as it found what it was looking for.


    Crack~!


    Not wasting a single second to break it free and happily start making its way back out the colossal body of the crystal fish.


    ROOOOOOOOOAR! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    At the same time that the rabbit demon beast broke the thing free, the colossal crystal fish let out a terrifying roar filled with pain, as it copsed unconscious on the ground. Making the approaching crystal fish freeze for a moment with terror in their eyes as they watched the small rabbit demon beast emerge from the body of the crystal fish covered in the blood of the crystal fish.


    ROOOAR!


    ROAR!


    However, this onlysted for a short moment, as they instantly began roaring filled with anger and killing intent. No longer moving towards Xuan Hao who was staring at the odd scene taking ce, but instead moving towards the rabbit demon beast who was happily carrying some sort of strange object as it happily bounced back towards where Xuan Hao was standing. Either ignoring the dozens of colossal crystal fish filled with killing intent rushing towards it, or simply not caring about them.


    Squeak~


    "This¡­"


    Seeing the small rabbit demon beast stopping in front of him with a proud expression stered all over its small face before starting to show off the strange object that it had dug out from the body of the crystal fish, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say.


    Rumble~


    However, the sound of therge number of crystal fish swimming through the rocky ground in his direction soon woke him up, as he grabbed the rabbit demon beast and continued to run away. Not daring to stay around and face all of the crystal fish. Especially now that all of them had been enraged even further by the rabbit demon beast''s sudden strange action of digging into the body of one of them and extracting some kind of strange object the size of a small apple.


    Swish!


    No matter what it was, Xuan Hao decided to store it inside one of his interspatial rings for now-


    Squeak!?


    Much to the dismay of the rabbit demon beast who had been nning to eat the strange object after safely returning to the hidden pocket inside Xuan Hao''s robe. Only able toin for a short moment before being stuffed inside Xuan Hao''s sleeve.


    Swish!


    Over the next few seconds, Xuan Hao did his best to avoid the long distance of the crystal fish chasing after him, as he finally managed to reach the peak of the first mountain of the mountain range.


    "Huh!? This¡­ the fog covered mountain range!?"


    However, after reaching the peak of the first mountain, he discovered that he was still inside the fog covered mountain range with the massive forest that he had found himself trapped inside of before entering the Third Celestial Gate.


    To be more precise, he was located in the opposite direction of where he had first entered the fog covered mountain range, with the massive forest filled with Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast now directly in front of him, or what remained of the massive forest after the terrifying sh between the cloud demon beast and the guardian formation of the mystic realm came to an end.


    In the end, it looked like only a small part of the once massive forest had managed to survive, with a few of the mountain peaks having directly melted into molten rock that now filled up arge part of the burnt down forest. No signs of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast or the cloud demon beast was present in the eerily quiet path of forest still left directly below him.


    ROOOAR!


    Hearing the loud roars of the crystal fish behind him, Xuan Hao didn''t bother to think too much about what had ended up happening to the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts or the cloud demon beast, as he rapidly descended down towards the small part of the forest that had been left intact. Hoping that he would be able to escape that range of the spatial anomaly after reaching the forest, as he had never felt any kind of spatial anomaly preventing him from using his movement technique inside the massive forest.


    Even if the formation surrounding the forest itself kept him from escaping, it didn''t restrict his use of the Dao of Space inside of the formation itself. Not to mention, Xuan Hao doubted that the formation had managed to survive the sh between the guardian formation and the cloud demon beast, as the formation would have been standing in the way of the guardian formation and prevented its attack from easily reaching the cloud demon beast.


    Although he felt like this should be the case, he had no way to be sure and had to risk possibly ending up trapped inside the formation again to be able to properly use his movement technique again.


    In the worst case scenario, he would always be able to try and find the celestial gates again and use them to hide inside of until the crystal fish left.

 Chapter 989 Wasteland

    <h4>Chapter 989 Wastnd</h4>


    Making his way inside what was left of the forest, Xuan Hao did not take long to discover that the formation that had covered the massive forest before was no longer present. Meaning that even when entering the small part of the massive forest that was still left, he didn''t end up trapping himself inside the formation again.


    On the other hand, he also discovered that the spatial anomaly was still present after he made his way inside the forest. Meaning that the formation that had covered the forest before, had most likely also been responsible for keeping the spatial anomaly from affecting the forest. Now that the formation was gone, there was nothing left to stop the spatial anomaly from spreading into the forest.


    I wonder just how much of the fog covered mountain range the spatial anomaly covers¡­ Is it only this small part left of the forest, or has it also spread to the area outside the mountain range?


    Turning to look back towards the crystal fish who were rapidly approaching him, Xuan Hao could not help thinking about this as he inevitably started getting a little nervous.


    If the spatial anomaly had really spread and covered the entire fog covered mountain range and beyond it, he doubted that he would be able to escape from the crystal fish before he ended up running out of qi. Not to mention, on second thought, he also realized that his earlier n of escaping into one of the celestial gates wasn''t that bright of an idea, as he would inevitably have to face a powerful opponent if he did this.


    Facing an opponent like Aria, the guardian of the first celestial gate, in his current condition, was nothing short of a death sentence. Not to mention the endless number of emerald snakes present inside the second trial.


    As for the third¡­ He doubted that it had managed to survive the copse of the Exchange Hall''s formation. Even if it did, it might be in a far more dangerous state than the first and second celestial gate. Especially when considering that the damage caused by the copse of the Exchange Hall''s protective formation, might have caused a malfunction to the part of the celestial gate that determined the difficulty of the challenge he would face after entering the celestial gate.


    Even if he had no idea how likely any of this was, he still didn''t dare think about entering the third celestial gate after realizing that he might end up being judged the same as someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­


    In the end, Xuan Hao decided to try and see if he could leave the area influenced by the spatial anomaly for now and only escape into one of the celestial gates after determining that he wouldn''t be able to escape from the influence of the spatial anomaly before he ran out of qi or the colossal crystal fish managed to catch up to him.


    Squeak!


    Unaware of the dangerous situation and chaotic thoughts racing through Xuan Hao''s head as he tried finding other ways that he might be able to escape from the crystal fish chasing after him, the rabbit demon beast who had ended up bing a new target for the crystal fish in question escaped from Xuan Hao''s sleeve as it beganining about the fact that Xuan Hao had stolen therge shiny object it had just extracted from the crystal fish who had been closest to them.


    However, more important than all of this, it was furious about the fact that Xuan Hao had dared to stuff it inside of his sleeve after stealing what it thought to be arge spirit stone.


    "¡­" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Hearing the angryints of the rabbit demon beast who seemed to havepletely forgotten about the presence of the dozens of Soul Ascension Realm crystal fish chasing after them, Xuan Hao didn''t bother saying anything as he instead just too the small creature out of his sleeve before showing it therge number of crystal fish rushing towards them-


    Shocking the angry rabbit demon beast who was suddenly met with the terrifying killing intent of over a dozen Soul Ascension Realm crystal fish.


    Squeak!?


    However, this shock was not due to fear at seeing therge number of Soul Ascension Realm crystal fish chasing after them but was instead due to the fact that it noticed that several simr shiny objects could be seen inside the body of the other crystal fish as well.


    "Hah¡­ "


    Only able to let out a somewhat exhausted sigh as he watched the rabbit demon beast excited expression while looking towards therge number of powerful crystal fish approaching them, Xuan Hao decided against trying to make the rabbit demon beast understand their current dangerous situation and instead just stuffed the rabbit demon beast back into his sleeve again.


    Squeak! Squeaaaak!


    Not caring about the constantints and protestsing from the rabbit demon beast inside. Instead staying far more focused on making sure that he didn''t end up getting ambushed while travelling through the small part of the forest that was between him and the wastnd that was the rest of what had once been a massive forest.


    At the same time, he also made sure to keep an extra eye out for any of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts that might have managed to survive the sh between the cloud demon beast and the guardian formation of the mystic realm.


    Rumble~!


    Roaar!


    Roar!


    Not too far behind him, the colossal crystal fish finally managed to reach the small part still left of the forest, as they ripped apart any tree whose roots ended up getting in the way of them as they swam through the forest with far more ease and speed thanpared to the mountain that was nothing more thanrge rocks and boulders everywhere.


    "This- They are faster!?" Noticing that the crystal fish all began increasing in speed the moment they left the rocky base of the mountain and entered the far less dense dirt of the forest, Xuan Hao unconsciously turned towards therge wastnd that was left behind where the massive forest had once been.


    Without saying anything, a frown visibly made its way onto his face, as he realized that the wastnd in front of him was filled with all kinds of molten rocks and different liquid metals. Although the temperature would require the crystal fish to use part of their energy to protect themselves, their speed would inevitably end up reaching a level far exceeding their current one.


    Although this speed was not really that fast whenpared to his own, this was only the case if he could use his movement technique¡­ And now that he was unable to use it, the crystal fish would be able to easily catch up to him and prevent him from escaping after entering the wastnd-


    Swish!


    Crack~


    "Huh!?"


    Losing his focus for a short moment as he was thought about the uing problem that was therge wastnd, one of the long-distance attacks from the crystal fish ended up piercing through the protectiveyer of his dao domain before hitting him-


    BOOOM-!


    Only able to put up ast second ice barrier against the attack that had pierced through his dao domain, he was soon sent flying by the powerful attack.


    Bang! Bang!


    Resulting in crashing through arge number of towering trees before ultimately smashing into one of the older and thicker trees that had managed to hold on when he hit it.


    Swish-!


    Only ncing down at his shoulder where the attack hit him and making sure that his arm hadn''t been destroyed or cut off, Xuan Hao didn''t waste a second embed in the old tree before getting back up and escaping in the opposite direction of the approaching crystal fish. Not daring to use the limited qi left inside his dantian to repair the damage that had been done to his arm for now.


    Although the crystal fish were all weaker than him, they were ultimately still in the Soul Ascension Realm, and he couldn''t let his guard down against them and let his thoughts wander too much.


    Rumble~


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, having sensed that the now leading crystal fish had managed to injurie him, the rest of the colossal crystal fish all began to excitedlyunch their own long-distance towards Xuan Hao in an attempt to take advantage of his now injured state.


    Swoosh~


    Not deterred by therge number of long-distance attacks that the crystal fishunched toward him, Xuan Hao didn''t let his mind wander this time around, as he gracefully dodged them before increasing the distance between himself and the crystal fish who had all momentarilye to a stop tounch their own long-distance attacks towards him.


    In the end resulting in the leading crystal fish being far ahead of the rest of the crystal fish-


    Squeak¡­


    Something that the rabbit demon beast suppressed inside his sleeve seemed to have noticed, as it took advantage of Xuan Hao''s injured arm to poke its head back up from his sleeve before greedily turning to looks towards the leading crystal fish¡­

 Chapter 990 Terrifying Rabbit!

    <h4>Chapter 990 Terrifying Rabbit!</h4>


    Squeak!


    Swish!


    The moment Xuan Hao noticed the small head of the rabbit demon beast poking out from his sleeve once again, the rabbit demon beast already finished determining its target, as it shot out from his sleeve and flew in the direction of the crystal fish who had managed to get ahead of the rest of the crystal fish.


    Roar?


    Not expecting for the rabbit demon beast to suddenly emerge from Xuan Hao''s sleeve before rushing directly towards it, the crystal fish could not help showing a surprised expression on its face before it was reced by one filled with fear. Remembering just what had happened to the crystal fish who had faced the rabbit demon beast only a short time earlier.


    Even if the strength shown by the rabbit demon beast was at the same level as its own, it didn''t believe it in the slightest, as it had personally seen how easily the rabbit demon beast had managed to enter the body of the crystal fish before fatally wounding it. Not aware of the fact that the crystal fish in question had decided topletely ignore the rabbit demon beast as it chased after Xuan Hao. Allowing it to enter its body while its defenses were lowered. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Whoosh~


    Squeak!?


    Seeing the crystal fish with what it thought to be arge spirit stone inside of it starting to escape, the rabbit demon beast let out a surprised sound before increasing its speed even further as it chased after the escaping crystal fish.


    R-Roar!


    Growing increasingly panicked as it watched the rabbit demon beast approaching it with a dangerous look in its eyes that resembled a starving animal hunting for anything edible, the crystal fish let out a roar filled with terror. Trying to warn the other crystal fish and have them help it escape from the terrifying rabbit demon beast chasing after it.


    Rumble~


    Responding to the call of their friend, the dozens of Soul Ascension Realm crystal fish all focused their long-distance attacks on the rabbit demon beast in an attempt to slow it down and but enough time for their friend to escape.


    Squeak?


    Seeing the countless attacks heading towards it, the rabbit demon beast didn''t panic, as it used its terrifying speed far above that of a normal Third Tribtion Soul Ascension Realm demon beast to easily dodge the different attacks-


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Resulting in all of the attacks hitting the ground just beside the rabbit demon beast without doing any harm to it in the process.


    R-R-Roar¡­!


    Unaware of the fact that the rabbit demon beast had just dodged the attacks and thinking that it had taken it head on due to the massive cloud of dust being kicked into the air after the first attacknded, the leading crystal fish who had momentarilye to a stop could not help letting out a roar filled with terror as it watched the rabbit demon beast emergepletely unscathed from therge cloud of dust. Reinforcing its belief that the rabbit demon beast was far more powerful than the strength that it showed outwardly and had just been hiding its strength.


    The reason for the rabbit demon beast hiding its strength also became clear when it remembered how it had extracted the crystal core of its friend earlier. The crystal core itself was the result of the crystal fishes'' own unique cultivation path and was a symbol of reaching the Soul Ascension Realm, but more importantly than that, it was also the ce where close to half of their qi cultivated by the crystal fish was stored.


    Making it clear to the leading crystal fish that the objective of the rabbit demon beast was to lure them out of the water where they were weaker than normal and take the chance to steal their crystal cores.


    R-Roar¡­!


    R-R-Roar!


    The rest of the crystal fish also started trembling in fear as they watched the rabbit demon beast emerge from the dust cloud without a single scratch present on its body. Unaware of the fact that the rabbit demon beast had just managed to dodge the slow and predictable long-distance attacks with its superior speed, they also seemed to have reached the same conclusion as the leading crystal fish-


    Whoosh!


    Whoosh!


    Whoosh!


    And without waiting for the leading crystal fish who was still staring towards the rabbit demon beast who had just emerged from the cloud of dust in fear, they turned around and began escaping towards the ring-shapedke where they would be able to hide or use their full strength if needed.


    ROAR!?


    Realizing that its friends had decided to abandon it to escape from the rabbit demon beast by itself, the leading crystal fish let out a both horrified and angry roar. Not able to believe that it had been left behind so easily.


    Ptsh!


    However, before it had time to calm down and escape as well, the rabbit demon beast caught up to it and easily pieced through its thin unprotected skin. Reaching the special crystal core that the rabbit demon beast still firmly believed to be a spirit stone.


    Riiip~!


    Not a secondter, the rabbit demon beast cut the crystal core out and left the body of the now fatally wounded crystal fish before making its way back towards Xuan Hao who could only stare speechlessly at the escaping crystal fish and half dead leading crystal fishying on the ground not too far away from him with a terrified look in its eyes.


    From the looks of things, he no longer had to worry about escaping from the crystal fish¡­


    Squeak~


    Hearing the rabbit demon beast happily making all sorts of joyful sounds as it carried the strange object that looked like a spirit stone, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say.


    Squeak!


    Having misunderstood Xuan Hao''s gaze as him also wanting to take away the crystal core, the rabbit demon beast protectively held it as it rapidly climbed up his robe before hiding away inside the hidden pocket where it slowly began to absorb the dense qi contained inside of the crystal core.


    "Haaa¡­ Whatever, at least I should be able to start recovering now¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while looking at the ce where the hidden pocket with the rabbit demon beast inside of it was located, Xuan Hao decided not to think too much about it and instead found a secluded spot inside the forest where he sat down and began to recover from the escape.


    In the process of this,pletely ignoring the presence of the two crystal fish who had been fatally wounded by the rabbit demon beast not too far away from where he was recovering. Not believing that they would be much of a threat in their current state. Even less so after he recovered his strength.


    Like this, a day flew by before Xuan Hao opened his eyes again filled with renewed power as he had managed to fully recover the qi he had used up and fixed his arm.


    The main reason for such a fast recovering being the fact that the dense qi from the massive forest had all gathered together in the managed to scan the entire area with his divine sense and discovered that the strongest demon beast still left alive had only small part of the forest that remained after the sh between the cloud demon beast and the guardian formation of the mystic realm.


    Not only that, but after a day inside the small forest, Xuan Hao also managed to scan the entire area with his divine sense and discovered that the strongest demon beast still left alive had only managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm. None of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts were anywhere to be seen. Meaning that they might have perished during the terrifying sh.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of relief. After all, if he had to deal with a Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast, it would be hard for him to escape given that the massive forest that had provided him cover in the past had been reduced to a small patch of trees that could easily be covered with his divine sense.


    Rustle~


    Standing back up again at this moment, Xuan Hao gazed out into the wastnd that seemed to go on for hundreds of kilometers in the ce where the massive forest had once been.


    Guess its best to leave this ce now that the side quest has beenpleted, but¡­ I wonder if the empty void created by the true spatial copse is still around¡­


    As he thought about this while observing the charred ground, Xuan Hao soon shook his head in disappointment after realizing that there wasn''t anything in the direction where the empty void created by the true spatial copse was located.


    Swish~


    In the end, Xuan Hao stood around for a few minutes to see if there was anything that had managed to survive the sh other than the small part of the forest where the qi had been funneled into before ultimately beginning to make his way back in the direction, he had entered the massive forest from.

 Chapter 991 Disappearance of the Strange Creatures in the Fog

    <h4>Chapter 991 Disappearance of the Strange Creatures in the Fog</h4>


    Making his way through the empty wastnd with only a few charred remnants of the most powerful of the trees sticking up from the barrenndscape, Xuan Hao discovered that other than the empty void created by the true spatial copse, the celestial gates that should have been visible now that the forest had been burnt down had also disappeared. Leaving behind no traces of them being there in the first ce.


    However, given how powerful the celestial gates were, Xuan Hao doubted that they had been destroyed by the sh between the cloud demon beast and the guardian formation of the mystic realm like the rest of the forest. Instead, he felt that there should be some other reason for their sudden disappearance after the forest was burnt down.


    The only problem was that he had no idea what the reason for their disappearance might be, nor did he n to remain inside the mountain range and try to potentially find out where the celestial gates had disappeared to. After all, he had already entered all of them and wouldn''t be able to gain anything from them even if he found them.


    For this reason, it didn''t take Xuan Hao more than a few hours before he reached the small valley nestled in between severalrge mountains located just next to the mist that shielded the mountain range from the rest of the mystic realm.


    "Hm?"


    However, different from the area behind him that had been destroyed by the powerful sh, the small forest and the demon beasts living inside the valley seemed to have been unaffected by it. Not even a single part of the valley had been affected and looked exactly the same as when he had wandered through it in the past. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Is it perhaps because the mountains shielded the area from the effects of the sh?


    Turning to look up towards the towering mountains that encircled the entire valley, Xuan Hao felt that this was possible.


    Of course, if he knew what kind of effect the battle between the guardian formation and the cloud demon beast had on the area outside the mountain range, he would have been able to realize that there was something else to the small valley than it just being protected by the towering mountains¡­


    Unaware of this, Xuan Hao didn''t think too much about how the valley had managed to survive, as he didn''t n to stay inside of it and just wanted to leave the fog covered mountain range and make his way back out of the mystic realm.


    The main reason for this being that he feared that the winged lion might end up eating all of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts before he had a chance to return.


    Although, a part of him already felt might be toote considering the winged lion demon beast''s sudden increase in strength¡­


    In the end, Xuan Hao soon made his way to the fog that separated "Finally¡­"


    Feeling the restrictions brought upon by the spatial anomaly that the mountain range from the rest of the mystic realm. Making hime to a sudden stop, as he discovered the effects of the spatial anomaly had finally stopped affecting him.


    "Finally¡­"


    Feeling the restrictions brought upon by the spatial anomaly that now covered most of the fog covered mountain range disappearing, Xuan Hao could not stop himself from smiling as he tested out his movement technique and made sure that he was really outside the range of the spatial anomaly.


    Roar!


    However, just as Xuan Hao was feeling ted at finally being able to use his movement technique and other space rted techniques, a loud roar echoed out from the fog in front of him. Reminding him of the strange creatures lurking inside the fog in front of him.


    Frowning visibly as he realized this, Xuan Hao was just about to begin figuring out how to sneak past the hostile strange creatures inside and make his way back out of the fog, when he realized that he didn''t have to do any of this.


    Without the spatial anomaly around and given the fact that he was no longer unaware of what was on the other side of the fog, like he had been when he had tried to pass through it and enter the mountain range toplete the quest given by the system, there was no reason for him to try and sneak past the hostile strange creatures.


    Not wasting any time after realizing this, Xuan Hao directly used the Drifting Cloud Steps for the first time after absorbing the starlight essence to increase both his cultivation andprehension of the Dao of Space-


    Swish-!


    Resulting in a single step taking him several thousand meters into the fog.


    "This¡­" Feeling a sense of profound shock at just how far he had managed to travel with only a single step Xuan Hao froze for a short moment before examining the qi used to perform the single step.


    "No difference, its actually the same as before!?"


    Only to end up even more shocked after discovering that there was no difference in consumption whenpared to when he had used the Drifting Cloud Steps in the past.


    Roar!?


    Roar?


    During the process of Xuan Hao examining the impact of using the Drifting Cloud Steps with his newfoundprehension of the Dao of Space, a startled group of demon beasts who had been in the process of devouring the dposing body of a muchrger demon beast were all panicking at the sudden appearance of Xuan Hao, who had essentially appeared out of thin air and was now hovering directly above the dposing body.


    Rumble~


    Fearing that Xuan Hao was a powerful demon beast, all of the scavenger demon beasts who had been munching away happily at the dposing body rapidly began retreating far away from Xuan hao. Onlying to a stop after realizing that Xuan Hao did not chase after them and instead just remained hovering in the air above the dposing body without moving.


    Roar?


    Having retreated away from Xuan Hao, one of the leading demon beasts, unaware of the that Xuan Hao was just in the process ofprehending his usage of the Drifting Cloud Steps, misunderstood Xuan Hao''s silent appearance hovering above the body without moving, as him wanting to snatch away the body from them and take it for himself.


    ROOOOOAR!


    Feeling like it was being looked down upon and unable to let go of such arge prey to what it now perceived as a single scavenger like themselves, the leading demon beast let out a loud roar filled with killing intent. Informing the rest of the demon beasts about what it perceived to be the truth of the matter.


    After all, if Xuan Hao was really a powerful demon beast like it had first thought, he should have already attacked them or begun devouring therge demon beast on the ground below him.


    Roar!


    Roooar!


    Rooar!


    Filled with a simr anger after hearing this, the rest of the scavenger demon beasts, who had run away in fear after the appearance of Xuan Hao, all turned around before charging back towards Xuan Hao filled with killing intent. Not willing to lose such arge and powerful demon beast body, as it would be extremely helpful in increasing their own strength.


    Whoosh~


    Havingpletely ignored the group of demon beasts when he first arrived above the dposing body of what should be a Domain Lord Realm demon beast due to their strength only being around the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao finally used his divine sense to scan the approaching demon beasts.


    Huh? Demon beasts? Howe there are demon beasts here? Where are the strange creatures I encounteredst time I went through the fog?


    However, he was shocked to discover that the group of demon beasts charging towards him were not the strange creatures that he had encountered when first making his way through the mist.


    Did they perhaps end up being forced to enter the fog during the sh between the cloud demon beast and the guardian formation of the mystic realm?


    Feeling that this made sense, as even the weakest creature he encountered inside the fog back then had reached the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao began to wonder how this group of Nascent Soul Realm demon beast had even managed to survive inside the fog.


    Given the noise they made and how they didn''t attempt to conceal themselves in the slightest, it should have been easy for the hostile creatures living inside the fog to spot them and kill them, but none of this happened.


    Did something perhaps happen to the creatures living inside the fog?


    Only now realizing that he couldn''t sense any of the strange creatures, hostile or not, nearby, Xuan Hao didn''t bother ncing towards the approaching demon beasts as he merely waved his hand in their direction.


    Whoosh-!


    Sending a wave of cold air containing the power of the Dao of Ice towards them before increasing the area covered by his divine sense, curious to see if he could find any of the strange creatures that had seemingly disappeared into thin.


    Roar?


    Unaware of the danger approaching them, the leading demon beast only let out a somewhat confused roar upon seeing the cold air approaching them before being turned into an ice sculpture by the cold air the next second.


    Roa-


    The rest of the demon beasts who were following behind it didn''t even have time to react before they met the same fate under the terrifying cold air that turned all of them into ice sculptures in less than a second.

 Chapter 992 Escape From the Fog

    <h4>Chapter 992 Escape From the Fog</h4>


    Hovering around for a few minutes after dealing with the group of demon beasts that had been turned into ice sculptures, Xuan Hao finished examining his surroundings for any signs of the strange creatures before giving up and continuing to make his way out of the fog.


    In the end, he could not find a single sign of the strange creature or any clues as to where they might have disappeared to and just guessed that they should have hidden away or escaped from the fog when the sh between the cloud demon beast and the guardian formation of the mystic realm took ce. No matter what, Xuan Hao didn''t n to spend any longer inside the mystic realm and just wanted to leave the ce before the winged lion demon beast ended up eating all of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts that he had ordered it to watch over.


    Of course, this was considering that the winged lion demon beast hadn''t eaten all of them in its attempt to breakthrough¡­


    Swish-!


    Rapidly moving through the fog with the now far more powerful Drifting Cloud Steps as he thought about this, Xuan Hao didn''t notice a pair of eyes eerily following him from behind. Slowly, with each step he took in the direction out of the fog, it got closer and closer, until-


    Whoosh~!


    Xuan Hao broke through the fog and officially left the fog covered mountain range just before the owner of the pair of eerie eyes following behind him could catch up.


    Thump~


    Coming to a stop on top of a small hill a few thousand meters away from the fog covered mountain range, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes fearfully as he turned to look back towards the fog that now hid most of the mountain range hidden inside of it.


    Although he did not sense that he was being followed at first, he did notice it when he was about to leave the fog.


    Originally, he wanted to stop and find out who or what was following him, but his survival instincts kicked in the moment he started to spread out his divine sense to find out what was behind him and made him continue forward until he was safely out of the fog before using his divine sense to prevent possibly alerting the creature following behind him.


    Even if just for a split second, the moment he was about to use his divine sense to see what had been following him, a terrifying killing intent no weaker than the clod demon beast covered him before disappearing when he directed his divine sense down towards the ground. Doing his best to pretend that he was just looking out for any potential attacks from the ground. Not daring to make the creature aware of the fact that he had noticed it tailing behind him.


    In the end, he continued moving like this with the creature getting closer and closer to him until he used all of his strength to cross the distance that would normally take two steps in a single one. Sessfully leaving the fog one step faster than he would with his normal speed.


    As a result, the creature that was following behind him didn''t have enough time to reach him before he left the fog and stopped following after him the moment, he left the fog.


    What was that?


    Looking back towards the fog that didn''t show any signs of abnormality, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he wondered what kind of creature had been following behind him inside the fog. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Inevitably, he began to link the sudden strange and powerful creature that should have reached the Earth Immortal Realm together with the sudden disappearance of the strange creatures that he encountered when entering the fog in the past.


    "I should probably find Qing Yi and Chu Yang and leave this ce¡­" Muttering this to himself as his gaze remained locked on the fog covering the mountain range, Xuan Hao realized that if even he found himself in a dangerous situation, his two disciples would be in a far worse situation.


    The only thing allowing him to remain calm was the fact that the part of his power that he had secretly hidden inside of their bodies had not yet activated. Meaning that no matter how dangerous their situation was, they were still safe.


    However, as he made up his mind to find his two disciples before leaving the mystic realm, he quickly realized that he first had to find them, something that would be close to impossible given the sheer size of the mystic realm.


    Outside of the power he had secretly hidden inside of them that would activate when their life was in danger, he had no way to locate them.


    Not to mention, for the power hidden inside of them to activate and allow him to track its location, their life had to be in danger, something that would only end up happening when they ran out of the talismans, he had given them to keep themselves safe from the dangers that might be lurking in the mystic realm.


    Even if he knew would know where they were after the power surged forth to protect them, it would also mean that they had run out of ways to protect themselves and would be in an extremely dangerous situation. Especially if they happened to encounter a powerful Soul Ascension Realm demon beast that wouldn''t be killed by the power.


    In such a situation, the power would only serve as a protective shield to buy him a short time to reach the location of his two disciples before the power would be unable to hold back the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast¡­


    "Hah¡­ I hope this- Huh!?"


    Just as Xuan Hao was feeling a sense of unease at the prospect of his two disciples encountering a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast, he felt the power he had secretly hidden inside of Qing Yi activate-


    Swish-!


    And without wasting a single second, he turned into a blur before disappearing in the direction that he had felt his power activate to protect Qing Yi. Knowing that he didn''t have a single second to waste as he soon felt the power hidden inside Chu Yang simrly activate in an attempt to strengthen the power that had burst forth from Qing Yi.


    In an instant, Xuan Hao realized that his two disciples had encountered a powerful enemy that should at least have reached the Soul Ascension Realm, as he used what little control, he had over the power to form a protective barrier around his disciples. buying more time for himself to reach them in time.


    Ignoring the burnt downndscape that stretched for thousands of kilometers in all directions around the fog covered mountain range.


    ¡­


    "If I''m not wrong, we should have passed through this ce in the past when we got chased by the horde of demon beast. From what I can see, we should be able to reach the ce where the exit of the mystic realm is located in another day or two."


    Having fully recovered and begun to make their way back towards the exit of the mystic realm, Chu Yang and Qing Yi were both filled with relief and happiness as Qing Yi recognized their current location as not too far away from the exit to the mystic realm.


    "Great! Looks like we can finally leave this ce! Even if it was enjoyable to fight a lot of strong demon beasts, I still feel like I need a break from the constant fighting¡­"


    Even Chu Yang, who had been eager to fight with the demon beasts of the mystic realm when he first entered, just wanted to go back at this point in time. Having understood that it was far too dangerous for them to continue wandering around the mystic realm without the talismans of their master to protect them from the powerful Domain Lord Realm demon beasts that now seemed to bemon inside of the mystic realm.


    ROOOOOAR-!


    Whoosh-!


    However, before the two could even react, a loud roar came from behind them as a giant demon beast farrger than any demon beast they had ever seen before suddenly appeared in front of them before swiping itsrge ws down towards them-


    BAAANG!


    Just as the two thought they were going to die without having the chance to activate thest talisman left by their master still inside Chu Yang''s storage ring, a powerful qi suddenly erupted from somewhere inside Qing Yi''s body as it forcibly blocked the ws descending down towards them before knocking therge demon beast flying.


    ROOOOAR!


    Unfortunately, the demon beast didn''t suffer any substantial injuries and quickly returned to continue its attack. The difference this time around, was that it was filled with far more killing intentpared to before-


    Bang! Bang!


    However, as the powerful qi that had emerged from Qing Yi''s was about to copse, the same powerful qi emerged from Chu Yang''s body before merging together with what was left behind from Qing Yi to form a thick barrier that blocked the attacks of therge demon beast that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

 Chapter 993 Fire Sea Talisman

    <h4>Chapter 993 Fire Sea Talisman</h4>


    "Wha-?!"


    Shocked at what had just happened, Chu Yang and Qing Yi could only stare in disbelief as therge demon beast that had suddenly appeared in front of them started violently wing and biting at the barrier that was now protecting them-


    Crack~


    And as the barrier slowly started showing signs of breaking under the constant attack, they both realized that the demon beast would soon break through the barrier.


    "W-what should we do¡­?" Feeling herself starting to panic at the thought of the barrier protecting them breaking at any moment, Qing Yi turned towards Chu Yang as she said this.


    "This¡­ I only have one of the talismans left by master. Maybe I can use the talisman the moment the barrier breaks, and we can use the opportunity to try and escape." Hearing what Qing Yi said, Chu Yang could only shake his head as he said this while looking down at the talisman that he had already pulled out and was ready to use the moment the barrier protecting them was broken by the demon beast outside.


    Although he did not personally feel too confident that the talisman would be able to buy them a lot of time, as the power contained inside the barrier protecting them was far stronger than the power, he had seen being disyed by the talismans their master had given to them.


    Even if it could buy them some time, he doubted that it would be enough for them to escape from the terrifying demon beast that had clearly surpassed the Domain Lord Realm demon beasts that they had encountered so far inside of the mystic realm. The strength of the demon beast was far too high for it to simply lose them after a few seconds.


    Craaaack~!


    As Chu Yang was preparing himself for the worst with the talisman firmly held in his hand, a crack farrger than any of the other cracks suddenly appeared on the left side of the barrier where the ws of the demon beast had justnded before starting to spread across the rest of the barrier at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    ""¡­""


    At this moment, both Chu Yang and Qing Yi understood that the barrier was about to break apart as they both began looking around themselves for any possible escape path that might give them a chance to escape alive from the terrifying demon beast in front of them.


    Roar~!


    Different from Chu Yang and Qing Yi, who were panicking at the sight of therge crack, the demon beast let out a joyful roar upon seeing therge crack that was starting to spread across the surface of the barrier before attacking the barrier even more violently in an attempt to break it faster now that it knew the barrier had already reached a breaking point.


    CRACK-! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    BANG!


    No more than a few secondster, the barrier finally gave in and broke apart under the constant barrage of attacks from the demon beast-


    Swish!


    However, Chu Yang and Qing Yi had both been prepared for this moment, as they rapidly began escaping in the opposite direction of the demon beast who was about to attack them now that the barrier wasn''t protecting them.


    Roar!


    Seeing the two escaping, the demon beast let out a somewhat yful roar. Understanding very well that the two had no way to escape from it with their current strength.


    Swoosh~


    However, just as it was about to charge forward and put an end to their escape, Chu Yang threw out a talisman in the direction of the demon beast.


    Roar?


    FWOOOOSH-!


    Caught by surprise at the sudden appearance of the talisman that seemedpletely harmless, the demon beast had no time to react before the talisman seemingly ignited in front of it before turning into a sea of fire that soon engulfed it.


    ROAR!?


    Feeling the terrifying sea of fire engulf its entire body before starting to forcibly try to enter its body and burn it from the inside, the demon beast started panicking, as it understood that it would have to use all of its strength to resist the sea of fire.


    As for escaping the sea of fire? The demon beast didn''t even think about this, as it clearly felt that the power of the sea of fire was far above its own. If it really did attempt to escape from the sea of fire, it didn''t doubt that the sea of fire would take this opportunity to forcibly invade its body and kill it.


    Because of this, the demon beast chose to remain stationary inside the sea of fire as it did its best to protect itself from the sea of fire. Understanding that it would inevitably run out of qi to keep itself burning-


    FWOOOOSH!


    Unfortunately for the demon beast, the sea of fire talisman that contained an attack that used Xuan Hao''sprehension of the Dao of Fire also had the ability to forcibly draw in qi from the air around it. Allowing it to burn for far longer than the qi stored inside the talisman would normally allow it to burn. Even if this would only buy a few extra seconds, a few seconds were extremely precious to the current Chu Yang and Qing Yi.


    ROOOOOAR-!


    Also realizing that the sea of fire was burning for far longer than it had first thought it would burn given the qi it had sensed when the talisman activated, the demon beast inside the sea of fire could not help panicking as it finally discovered that the sea of fire had the ability to absorb the qi from the outside world to fuel itself and burn for a longer period of time.


    BOOOM-!


    Knowing that it could not just stand around and hope for the sea of fire to run out of qi after realizing this, the demon beast, who had no idea how much qi the sea of fire was actually absorbing from the outside world, could only use all of its strength in an attempt to break out of the sea of fire before it used up all of its own qi to protect itself inside the sea of fire.


    Bang!


    As the demon beast used all of its strength to break through the sea of fire and escape from it, itnded on the ground next to the fire filled with exhaustion. Understanding that if the sea of fire could continuously burn with the constant supply of qi from the outside world, it would end up exhausting itself to death by staying inside the sea of fire and trying to wait things out.


    Rumble~


    However, just as the demon beast thought that it had managed to escape from the sea of fire and was about to chase after Chu Yang and Qing Yi who were using all of their strength to escape from it, a loud rumbling sound echoed out behind it.


    Roar?


    And turning around, the demon beast discovered that the motionless sea of fire that had engulfed it after the talisman was activated, had condensed together into a singlerge ming spear that was aiming directly at it-


    Roar¡­


    Letting out a somewhat helpless roar upon seeing therge ming spear that had condensed from the raging sea of fire, the demon beast understood that there was no way for it to escape the power of the talisman that had locked on to it.


    RUMBLE-!


    Wasting no time, the demon beast tried to put up a defense against the fire spear, but the spear in question didn''t give it any time, as it flew towards the demon beast the moment it had finished condensing all of the remaining qi left inside the sea of fire.


    ROOOAR!


    BOOOOOOOOOOOOM-!


    As the powerful demon beast and the spear of fire condensed from the sea of fire collided with each other, a powerful shockwave swept across the surroundingndscape-


    "Ah?!"


    "Wha-!?"


    Catching both Chu Yang and Qing Yi by surprise, as they found themselves getting swept up by the powerful shockwave before both of them found themselves flying through the air. Only barely managing to hold each other''s hands at thest moment so as to not get separated because of this.


    Roar!?


    Roar?


    Roar!


    Not too far away, arge group of demon beasts who had been attracted by the fight that had been taking ce between the Roar!?


    Even a Domain Lord Realm demon beast who had been hiding powerful demon beast and the barrier protecting both of them, were simrly swept away by the powerful shockwave.


    Roar!?


    Even a Domain Lord Realm demon beast who had been hiding somewhere nearby, did not have any power to resist the shockwave, as it was simrly swept away and flung far into the distance. Having been unfortunate enough to stand closest to the ce where the fire spear and powerful demon beast shed with each other. Taking the full power of the shockwave as a result.


    On another note, the Domain Lord Realm demon beast taking the full power of the shockwave did weaken it to some degree and made it far more bearable for Chu Yang, Qing Yi and the nearby demon beasts¡­

 Chapter 994 A Single Swift Motion

    <h4>Chapter 994 A Single Swift Motion</h4>


    Did it die?


    Not able to stop this thought from running through their heads as they ignored their injured bodies to stand up and look back in the direction of the demon beast, Chu Yang and Qing Yi both waited in anticipation for any signs of the demon beast. Understanding that they were in no condition to escape after being injured by the shockwave just now.


    Even if they decided to try and run away, they would at most be able to cover a distance of a few hundred meters before being forced to sit back down to prevent their injuries from killing them.


    Rumble~


    As Chu Yang and Qing Yi were nervously waiting to find out if the demon beast had survived or not a little over ten thousand meters away from where the sh between the demon beast and the fire spear had taken ce, the sound ofrge rocks being knocked away echoed out across therge part of the forest that had been turned into a wastnd by the shockwave that had just swept through it.


    However, more important than this, it signaled the fact that the demon beast had survived the sh just now and was in the process of removing the countless rocks that had ended up on top of it as a result of being buried underground by the powerful force of the fire spear.


    "It''s still alive¡­" Muttering this to herself as she just stared in the direction of the demon beast as it slowly made its way out from beneath the rocks and dirt that now buried it underground, Qing Yi felt an overwhelming sense of helpless wash over her body. Comprehending the simple fact that there was no way for them to escape from this powerful demon beast that had clearly far surpassed any of the Domain Lord Realm demon beasts that they had encountered so far.


    "¡­"


    Not saying anything, Chu Yang subconsciously tightened the grip around his spear before narrowing both of his eyes in the direction of the demon beast that had now be visible.


    Although it had clearly been injured from the countless burns and long bloody wound going across its entire body, it was also clear that it didn''t suffer any fatal injuries.


    The most obvious sign of this was the fact that its aura didn''t seem to weaken in the slightest. Instead, it had grown even more terrifying than before- At least it felt like it had grown stronger as he felt the terrifying killing intent of the demon beast locking on to him¡­


    I can''t give up like this!


    Fighting the primordial sense of fear that he felt from the very depths of his soul when confronted with the terrifying killing intent of the demon beast, Chu Yang felt himself enter a trance as he managed to resist the killing intent through sheer willpower alone.


    Rustle~


    Not doing as well as Chu Yang, the sound of Qing Yi''s robe rustling as she trembled in fear under the terrifying killing intent was the only thing that entered Chu Yang''s ears. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Hm?


    But when he was about to try and calm down his senior sister, he realized that even though she was trembling in fear, she didn''t let go of her sword and remained fully focused on the demon beast that was taking its time digging itself back out of the ground.


    Rumble!


    Having returned his gaze back towards the location of the demon beast, Chu Yang was just in time to see the demon beast dragging thest bit of its body out from underground. Even though it had not been fatally injured, it was still injured to the point that it had affected its strength to some degree.


    Maybe we can defeat it if-


    ROOOOOOOOAR!


    Just as Chu Yang began to think about whether or not they would be able to fight back against the weakened demon beast, the loud roar that emerged from it quickly brought him back to reality again.


    No matter what the two of them did, there was no way for them to resist the demon beast no matter how injured it was¡­


    Whoosh-!


    Not caring about the different thoughts going through the head of Chu Yang and Qing Yi at this moment, the demon beast stood up before rushing towards both of them. Crossing the distance of tens of thousands of meters in an instant.


    Roar?


    Opening itsrge mouth, the demon beast was just about to bite down and swallow up Chu Yang and Qing Yi who had not even managed to react yet, when a shiver suddenly ran down its spine as it felt like a terrifying presence appeared in the air not too far away from it-


    Swish-!


    And without thinking, it turned around and escaped in the opposite direction, using all of its remaining strength to go as fast as possible. The primal survival instinct buried deep in its soul kicking in at this moment to keep itself safe.


    "Where do you think you are going?"


    However, just as the demon beast thought it would be able to escape, a thunderous voice echoed out behind it, as a figure had appeared at the edge of its divine sense above the two humans it had been about to swallow just a few seconds earlier.


    Roar!


    Understanding that this figure was the reason for the primordial sense of fear that it felt, the demon beast didn''t hesitate as it began forcibly using its lifespan in an attempt to increase its speed, something that was less than effective considering that the demon beast was not burning its lifespan through some kind of secret technique, but was instead just burning its lifespan to keep its already empty dantian from drying up.


    The two earlier attacks of the fire sea talisman havingpletely used up almost all of the qi inside of its dantian. In a sense, what it had used when attacking Chu Yang and Qing Yi just now was just its physical body¡­ And although it was more than enough to deal with two Nascent Soul Realm Experts, it was far from enough to escape from its current life and death situation¡­


    ¡­


    Arriving above both of his disciples just before they were swallowed by a demon beast who had crossed a single tribtion and had somehow ended up wandering all the way to the edge of the mystic realm, Xuan Hao ignored the escaping demon beast who ran away the moment it sensed his presence as he instead began to examine his two disciples with his divine sense.


    Hm¡­ Although both of them suffered quite a few serious injuries, it looks like both of them should be able to recover in a few weeks.


    Feeling a sense of relief after discovering that none of his disciples were in any kind of life-threatening condition, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes as he turned his attention towards the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast who was trying its best to run away.


    Although it had not been able to escape too far away given its current bad condition after having faced off against the power he had hidden inside both of his disciples and the fire sea talisman that he had sensed Chu Yang activating only a short time earlier, Xuan Hao still understood that it would be hard for him to find this demon beast if it managed to escape the area covered by his divine sense and chose to hide underground-


    "Where do you think you are going?"


    For this reason, Xuan Hao fully released his strength at the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm as he said this. Forcibly using his superior cultivation base to suppress the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast who was trying everything it could to escape.


    R-Roar!


    Feeling the terrifying aura belonging to the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm pressing down on it, the demon beast who had just thought that it was about to safely escape, let out a pitiful roar filled with fear as it felt its speed slow down under the terrifying pressure.


    Swish~!


    In the next second, something that made the demon beast feel even more helpless happened, as Xuan Hao took a single step forward and appeared directly behind it. Even though Xuan Hao hadn''t made a move yet, the demon beast understood that it had lost its chance to escape at this moment.


    ROAR!


    Rumble!


    Understanding this, the demon beast did not intend to just give up without a fight. Gathering all of its power and burning most of its remaining lifespan to gather power for a single powerful attack.


    Hm? It actually managed to gather enough power to beparable to someone at the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm by burning what''s left of its lifespan¡­


    Not at all faced by thest-ditch attempt of the demon beast, Xuan Hao just showed a hint of curiosity thatsted for no more than an instant after realizing that the demon beast had managed to raise its strength by a minor realm by burning what was left of its lifespan.


    Ching~


    And before the demon beast even had time tounch its attack, Xuan Hao unsheathed the small silver sword before gently shing the air in front of the demon beast-


    Swish-!


    Cutting it in half before it even had time to register what had just happened. Killing it in a single swift motion.

 Chapter 995 Leaving The Mystic Realm

    Bang!


    As the body of the demon beast was cut in half and crashed into the ground below, Chu Yang and Qing Yi were both frozen solid as they tried toprehend what had just happened.


    One moment, the demon beast had appeared directly in front of them and was about to swallow them whole, while the next moment, it had been cut in half and crashed into the ground thousands of meters away from them.


    Everything had happened at a speed far surpassing the Nascent Soul Realm. Making both of them freeze on the spot as they hadn''t evenprehended the fact that their master had appeared in front of them- n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Chu Yang, Qing Yi, are both of you there?"


    "Y-Yes!"


    "Yes!"


    Only when he called out to them did both of them recover from their dazed state as they almost jumped in surprise while answering. Not having expected their master to show up inside of the mystic realm. After all, they had managed to learn about the fact that there was a cultivation restriction on entering the mystic realm and didn''t expect him to suddenly show up and save them.


    However, now that he had appeared, they felt themselves rx-


    Thump~


    And before Xuan Hao could react, both of them copsed on the ground. The exhaustion and injuries that they had been suppressing finally made them fall unconscious after realizing that their master was there to protect them.


    In the end, they fainted because they rxed themselves too much.


    Although there wouldn''t be any side effects from this, it would end up taking them far longer to recover depending on how fast they woke up¡­


    "These two¡­" Seeing both of his disciplesying on the ground, Xuan Hao could not help rolling his eyes. Not having to use his divine sense to figure out what happened to them.


    Roar!


    Roooar!


    At this time, the sound of some of the demon beasts, who had been lucky enough to survive the shockwave from earlier, echoed out across the wastnd that had been left behind by the shockwave, as they tried their best to intimidate any of the nearby demon beasts lurking nearby from taking advantage of their weakened state to attack them.


    Rustle~


    Unfortunately, this attempt was met with little sess, as arge number of demon beasts slowly began emerging from the forest surrounding therge wastnd-


    Ptsh-!


    Roar!


    And not a secondter, the painful roar of one of the weakened demon beasts that hadnded right next to the tree line where the wastnd began echoed out, as arge boar demon beast had emerged from the forest and attacked it the moment it. Biting down on it before starting to drag the still struggling demon beast back into the forest where several other boar demon beasts could be seen waiting in anticipation.


    What happened after the weakened demon beast was dragged into the forest was not hard to imagine, as its pitiful and painful roars soon stopped. Announcing its departure from the world, but at the same time also serving as a go ahead for the other demon beasts hiding around at the edge of the wastnd, as therge number of demon beasts began surging in from all directions. Searching for any weakened demon beast to devour.


    Roar-!


    Filled with confidence and being far too weak to have seen how Xuan Hao had killed the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast, one of the demon beasts rushing into the wastnd inevitably saw Xuan Hao standing beside his two fainted disciples and rushed towards him without a second thought. Believing that it had been lucky and managed to find three weakened demon beasts all by itself and although it couldn''t sense Xuan Hao''s cultivation base, it could still sense Chu Yang and Qing Yi''s cultivation base at the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Thinking that Xuan Hao should be somewhere around the same level of strength as them, the demon beast was filled with even more confidence as it used its powerful cultivation base at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm in an attempt to intimidate Xuan Hao-


    "Hm?"


    However, contrary to what the demon beast filled with confidence had expected to happen after it showed off its Peak Nascent Soul Realm cultivation base, Xuan Hao just turned around and red towards it. Instantly resulting in the confident demon beast freezing on the spot as it felt an overwhelming sense of fear welling up inside of it.


    Whoosh~


    Not even having any time to react or escape, the demon beast could only fearfully look in Xuan Hao''s direction as it felt its body and soul being frozen. Killing it in an instant.


    "Looks like its time to leave before any more powerful demon beasts end up showing up." ncing over at the now frozen demon beast, Xuan Hao picked up both of his unconscious disciples with his domain before heading in the direction out of the mystic realm.


    Not caring about the fearful and shocked looks he got from the rest of the demon beast in the wastnd who had just witnessed how a Peak Nascent Soul Realm demon beast had been frozen to death in an instant without any ability to resist.


    ROOOAR!


    However, the silence that had fallen on the wastnd onlysted for a few seconds after Xuan Hao had disappeared, as one of the demon beasts finally found the dead body of the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast. Inevitably causing a massive battle to erupt among the demon beasts, as all of them understood just how precious the dead body of a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast was.


    Even if they couldn''t directly reach the Soul Ascension Realm after devouring the dead body, they should at the very least be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    Rooar!


    For this reason, the demon beasts already targeting some of the weakened demon beasts in the wastnd dropped their battle as they also focused their attention on getting their hands on the body of the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast.


    In the end, this gave the weakened demon beasts an opportunity to slowly slip away without being noticed. Silently hoping they would be able to recover fast enough to join in on the battle for the dead body of the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast.


    ¡­


    How am I going to leave the mystic realm?


    Arriving in front of the cave system that would ultimately lead to the ce where the mystic realm was connected to his old pavilion at the Flying Sword Sect, Xuan Hao could not helping to a stop as he thought about the problem that he had thrown to the back of his mind ever since making his way inside the mystic realm.


    Swish~


    Given that the formation guarding the mystic realm didn''t allow anyone above the Nascent Soul Realm to pass through it and he didn''t know if he could gather arge enough number of Nascent Soul Realm demon beast to throw through the exit in hope of weakening the formation enough for him to pass through again, Xuan Hao decided to make his way to the exit for now and see if he could leave.


    If he really couldn''t leave, he could go back to the wastnd where arge number of Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts were currently gathered and try his luck at catching as many as possible before trying to leave the mystic realm the same way he entered it in the past¡­


    "Hm?"


    However, when he arrived in front of the cliff that should lead back up towards his pavilion, Xuan Hao was surprised to discover that the exit was not at all hidden like it had been when he had first passed through it and entered the mystic realm.


    Wait¡­ That is not it, the exit is still hidden, but I can see it¡­


    After a quick scan with his divine sense, it did not take long for Xuan Hao to realize that the exit of the mystic realm was still hidden, as it looked no different from a normal cave ceiling through his divine sense.


    "Is it perhaps because I''m not originally from the mystic realm?" Muttering this to himself as he remembered how his disciples had been able to easily find their way back out of the mystic realm after first entering it by ident, Xuan Hao felt this made sense.


    Maybe the exit was only hidden to the demon beast living inside of the mystic realm¡­


    Feeling a sense of renewed confidence in being able to leave the mystic realm after realizing this, Xuan Hao began to slowly float up towards the exit-


    Whoosh~


    And without any problems, he smoothly made his way through the thin barrier covering the exit together with his two disciples Leaving the mystic realm without any problems.


    "Hm? The robe¡­"


    However, during the process of passing through the guardian formation of the mystic realm, Xuan Hao noticed several ancient patterns shing across the surface of the robe that the elder from the mystic realm had given to him¡­

 Chapter 996 Punishing The Winged Lion

    Not paying any attention to therge number of Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts who were still alive and currently looking towards him filled with happiness at his return, Xuan Hao ced his two disciples back on the ground before turning around and going back through the thin barrier separating his old pavilion from the mystic realm.


    Whoosh~


    And soon, he found himself back inside of the mystic realm. The guardian formation that had blocked him before was now doing nothing to stop him from entering the mystic realm.


    "The robe that the elder from the Mirage Sect gave me actually allows me to enter the mystic realm even with a cultivation base above the normal level allowed by the formation!" As a surprised expression shed across his face as he muttered this to himself back inside the mystic realm, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what else the robe could do.


    Given that it was the robe of an elder from the mystic realm who had far surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm, it wouldn''t be surprising if the robe also had some defensive properties that would help ensure it didn''t easily get destroyed.


    Although these defensive properties might not be that useful to an elder of the Mirage Sect who might even have surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm, they would be extremely useful for someone like himself who had not yet reached the Earth Immortal Realm.


    "I should test out the robe and see if I can find out more about it after returning to the sect¡­" Muttering this to himself as he scanned the area around where the exit of the mystic realm was located, Xuan Hao left behind a small part of his power to inform him in case any powerful demon beast appeared and attempted to break out of the mystic realm before making his way back to his pavilion where his two disciples and therge number of Nascent Soul Realm demon beast he had caught close to a month earlier were located.


    Although, when he had nced across the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts present on his old mountain peak, it was rather obvious that arge number of them were missing. Making a certain winged lion demon beast in charge of watching over these demon beasts the main suspect of this missing demon beast case.


    Whoosh~


    Landing back on his old mountain peak in front of his old pavilion where he had put down his two unconscious disciples just a few seconds earlier, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards a certainrge, winged lion sleeping on arge stone with the sun shinning down on it from above.


    Even after having returned, it seemed like the winged lion demon beast hadn''t noticed him yet and was still sleeping peacefully in the sun.


    As for the remaining Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts, none of them dared to take this chance to try and escape from the mountain peak, likely due to the winged lion demon beast having done this before to try and get as many of them try to escape¡­


    So¡­ This is how it ended up eating so many of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast¡­ Haaa¡­ What an oversight on my part¡­


    Understanding that the winged lion demon beast had not broken any of the rules he had put down for it before hastily entering the mystic realm, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head in defeat.


    Although the winged lion demon beast looked rather dumb, it didn''t seem to be that dumb when it came to figuring out how to get its ws on more food¡­


    Rustle~


    Waking up at this moment, the winged lion demon beastzily stretched its body as it scanned across the different Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts before letting out a disappointed sound after discovering that none of them had tried to escape.


    Roar?


    However, just as the winged lion demon beast was about toy down and sleep again, it discovered Xuan Hao standing not too far away from it with a somewhat annoyed expression on his face.


    Roar¡­


    Having somewhat understood the reason for the annoyed expression that had made its way to its master''s face, the winged lion demon beast began to slowly retreat down from its sunbathing stone before beginning to descend the mountain peak-


    "Wait right there! Didn''t you forget your reward for watching over these Nascent Soul Realm demon beast for the past month?"


    However, before the winged lion demon beast could leave, it felt its entire body being grabbed by some unknown force as it felt itself being dragged back up the mountain peak.


    Roar! Roar, roar! Roooar!


    During the process of being dragged back up the mountain, it tried its best tomunicate that it didn''t need any kind of reward for its job, but all of this was useless as it soon found itself face to face with its master again.


    However, different from the annoyed expression from before, he now had an ominous smile that made the winged lion feel a shiver run down its spine, as it began to regret tempting so many of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts into escaping...


    "Now, I should repay you properly for keeping so many of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts alive." Narrowing his eyes dangerously at the winged lion demon beast as he said this, Xuan Hao decided to punish it and make sure that it wouldn''t do something like this again.


    Even if around half of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts were still alive, the winged lion demon beast had still ended up eating more than thirty of them.


    Although it might not be worth anything to him personally, it was not the same for the Star Shattering Sect!


    After all, demon beasts were not only useful for transportation and fighting but were also extremely useful when it came to helping the disciples of the sect train and prepare themselves for when they would encounter demon beasts while out adventuring. Not to mention, the current Star Shattering Sect was in a period of rapid growth and was in dire need of things like powerful demon beasts that would help in the training of not only the disciples, but also the Nascent Soul Realm elders.


    R-Roar¡­.


    Knowing that there was no way for it to escape punishment, the winged lion demon beast could only let out a pitiful roar as Xuan Hao took a step forward and began giving it a lesson it would not forget¡­


    Roooooaaaaar!


    Soon, only the painful roar of the winged lion demon beast echoed out from Xuan Hao''s old mountain peak.


    At the same time, the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts still left on the mountain were enjoying the sight of the winged lion demon beast finally getting what it deserved.


    From the way it had tortured them over the past weeks in trying to constantly tempt them with freedom, even trying to bait them out with different precious spiritual hers from time to time, some of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast watching the show felt that Xuan Hao was being far too gentle and silently prayed that he would cook and eat the winged lion demon beast the same way that the winged lion demon beast had done to some of the unfortunate demon beasts who had caved in and tried escaping from the mountain¡­


    Of course, these prayers were left unanswered, as Xuan Hao had no intention of eating the winged lion demon beast.


    ¡­


    Roooooaaaaar!


    "What is that sound?"


    "I don''t know¡­ Hm¡­ Maybe it''s the mating call of some demon beast from the demon beast forest?"


    "That makes sense, but¡­ We shouldn''t be able to hear it all the way back in the sect. Right?" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "That is true¡­ Maybe the mating call of a demon beast from the beast tamers ce?"


    As the painful roars of the winged lion demon beast continued until the sun was reced by the moon in the sky, the disciples and elders present in the Flying Sword Sect all began discussing the matter with each other.


    "Haaa¡­ No matter what it is, I hope they get it under control soon, I really can''t sleep with all of this roaring¡­"


    In the end, arge number of disciples and elders ended up gathering at the base of the mountain where Xuan Hao was in the process of teaching the winged lion demon beast a lesson. All in an attempt to try and put an end to the loud sounds that made them unable to cultivate properly or get a good night''s sleep.


    "This¡­ Guess this should be enough for now¡­"


    Upon seeing therge number of disciples and elders gathered at the base of his mountain peak, Xuan Hao decided to let go of the winged lion demon beast.


    Roar¡­


    Swish-!


    Not wasting a second after it was let go, the winged lion demon beast let out a pitiful roar before pping itsrge wings and escaping in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect¡­

 Chapter 997 One Month Of Expansion, Major Kingdoms Alliance

    Looking down at therge number of elders and disciples that had gathered together at the base of his mountain, Xuan Hao did not feel like exining what had happened and instead decided to leave together with his two disciples and the around thirty Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts who had managed to survive.


    Whoosh~


    Using his powerful domain to make himself and therge number of demon beasts he was carrying invisible to these elders and disciples before flying in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect. Not at all worried about anyone finding the entrance to the mystic realm, as he had already made sure to seal the entrance with his power.


    Although hisck of skill when it came to formations made it far worse than what would be normal given his cultivation base, it should at the very least prevent anyone beneath the Soul Ascension Realm from entering the mystic realm. Even if someone in the Soul Ascension Realm passed by the mystic realm entrance and found a way to forcibly enter like he had done, he would at least be alerted about this through the seal.


    As for the strange rumors that would emerge in the future after some of the elders decided to go up the mountain to find the origin of the strange roaring sound, Xuan Hao didn''t really think about any of this and even if he did, he wouldn''t really care about a few rumors about his old mountain peak.


    ¡­


    Returning to the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao handed over the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts to the excited elders and disciples from the beast taming hall.


    However, before leaving, Xuan Hao decided to ask about the happenings in the sect over the past month. Soon Learning about the few important things that had taken ce inside the sect over the past month, like the emergence of a new group of powerful disciples who were close to reaching the Nascent Soul Realm and the newest elders who had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    However, other than all of this, the beast taming elder was far more excited about the brand-new hall for the beast tamers that had been constructed at the base of the Seventh Star Peak facing the direction of the Sixth Star Peak.


    Transforming the rtivelyrge valley located between the Seventh Star Peak and the Sixth Star Peak to the new living space for the growing number of demon beasts living inside the sect. Giving the beast tamers a farrger space to take care of their demon beasts without having to be worried about the inherent problems that would emerge from keeping a group of powerful demon beasts close together in the small space inside the main sect located at the Seventh Star Peak.


    In the end, the elder from the beast taming hall excitedly told him about how Elder Song had been the one to spearhead the construction of the new hall for the beast tamers. Making it rather obvious just how much these beast tamers had begun to worship Elder Song, even though he should have also taken a ratherrge portion of the spirit stones they would normally get from the sect away from them over the past month.


    Elder Song¡­ That old man really knows how to do things, even after losing most of the spirit stones and other resources they had grown used to getting, the beast tamers are still praising him to the high heavens¡­ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Shaking his head as he thought about this to himself while looking at the elder in charge of the new Hall of Beast Tamers almost getting down on his knees to worship Elder Song, Xuan Hao decided to leave after making sure that the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts wouldn''t cause any problems and made his way in the direction of where Elder Song was after leaving his two disciples back in their own rooms to recover.


    Other than the clear improvement that the sect''s elders and disciples had experienced over the past month that he had been gone, he was even more curious as to how the expansion of the sect had been progressing¡­ And although he could ask the beast taming elder about it, he felt that Elder Song would be a far better person to ask about something like this.


    After all, he was the person in charge of the expansion of the sect and would know far more than a Nascent Soul Realm elder who spent most of his time taking care of demon beasts inside the sect.


    Whoosh~


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao soon arrived above arge lecture hall where Elder Song was currently in the process of teaching a group of Foundation Establishment Realm disciples about how to best prepare themselves for the Core Formation Realm.


    Even with all the things he finds himself busy with, he still finds time to teach¡­


    Thinking about this as he observed Elder Song teaching therge number of attentive disciples, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that Elder Song was once again overworking himself. However, this was also what caused his reputation in the sect to surpass that of all other elders.


    Even Feng Chen as the sect master was less known by these disciplespared to Elder Song who did his best to teach them whenever he had any free time.


    ¡­


    "-And that will be all for today''s lesson. If any of you have any questions regarding the Core Formation Realm, you can always ask the other elders or your seniors in the Core Formation Realm."


    As the lesson came to an end over the next few minutes, Elder Song watched the disciples reluctantly get up and leave before turning around himself and making his way out of the lecture hall in the direction of his courtyard-


    "Huh? Xuan Hao!?"


    However, before he left the now empty lecture hall, Xuan Hao, who had been waiting for the lecture to end from above, slowly descended from above andnded in front of him.


    "Good to see you again Elder Song, I hope you have some time to talk about what took ce in the sect over the month that I was gone."


    "It''s great to see that you are back again as well and of course I have time, let''s go to my courtyard for now and I will exin what has happened over the past month." Hearing what Xuan Hao said and the fact that he had returned to the sect again, Elder Song was happily saying this and before long, both of them made their way back to his courtyard to talk about what had been happening both inside and outside the sect over the past month.


    Even though not much had taken ce in the first two weeks since he was gone, the same could not be said for the final two weeks that he was gone, as Xuan Hao was shocked to learn that the me Sky Kingdom and otherrge kingdoms that the sect was in the process of expanding into had joined forces and formed an alliance to fight against the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although the strength of a few kingdoms with at most someone at the Half-Step Domain Lord Realm was not really anything to worry about given the current Star Shattering Sect''s strength, the same could not be said after arge number of these peak experts from the differentrge kingdoms used a forbidden technique to forcibly break through the barrier separating the Domain Lord Realm from the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Even if someone who had forcibly broken through to the Domain Lord Realm was far weaker than someone who had broken through to the Domain Lord Realm normally, it would still not be easy for the Star Shattering Sect to deal with the over 10 Domain Lord Realm Experts that had suddenly appeared because of this.


    At least, that was what Xuan Hao had thought when he had first learnt about it from Elder Song¡­


    In the end, things had not gone the way that the peak experts from the differentrge kingdoms had nned and one of the important elders from the me Sky Kingdom had apparently informed Elder Song about this over a week before it happened.


    As a result, the different peak experts who had forcibly broken through to the Domain Lord Realm and were nning to destroy the different branch sects of the Star Shattering Sect that were located inside their kingdom or around it was met with nothing but empty buildings.


    In the end, before the side effects of forcibly breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm ended up setting in, these peak experts could only desperately rush to the core territory of the Star Shattering Sect where Feng Chen and Shu Yao were both waiting for them to show up.


    Even if there were more than 10 Domain Lord Realm Experts, they had all forcibly broken through to the Domain Lord Realm and wasn''t anywhere near the real strength of a Domain Lord Realm Expert. Meaning that it was no problem for Feng Chen and Shu Yao to deal with them by working together. Especially considering that Feng Chen had also just managed to break through to the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm a few days earlier¡­

 Chapter 998 News Of Lord Kubera

    Hearing about how the differentrge kingdoms had actually banded together in an attempt to fight back against the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect. Even going as far as to have the Peak Experts of these kingdoms use a secret technique to forcibly increase their own strength for a short duration of time at the cost of their future, Xuan Hao could not help feeling confused.


    Why would those people already close to reaching the Domain Lord Realm do something like this all of a sudden? Is it just because they want to stop the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect and ensure control over their own kingdom? But¡­ If that is really the goal, they would only end up crippling themselves by having their Peak Experts use a forbidden technique that will undoubtedly kill or cripple them after a few days¡­


    Unable to think of a reason for the Peak Experts of therge kingdoms to take such a drastic and unnecessary action, Xuan Hao could only turn towards Elder Song. Hoping that he would be able to shed some light on the purpose behind the seemingly suicidal actions taken by the Peak Experts of therge kingdoms.


    "Haaa¡­ I know that you want to know why the Peak Experts of these kingdoms decided to do something like this. Unfortunately, the only information I managed to gather about this was that someone seemed to have met with the ancestors of the me Sky Kingdom before they decided to use the secret technique to forcibly increase their strength and attack our sect.


    The information came from the same elder of the me Sky Kingdom who informed me about this possible attack beforehand, I think her name was Sheng Mei, she is currently trying to take control of the me Sky Kingdom with our support following the death of their ancestors. If you are interested in finding out more, you can try to visit the me Sky Kingdom and ask her."


    Throwing over a small jade that had the appearance and basic information on Sheng Mei recorded on it, Elder Song began rummaging through a few papers on his desk looking for something. Giving Xuan Hao a chance to go over the information recorded in the jade.


    Sheng Mei¡­ Her position in the me Sky Kingdom is rather high given the fact that she knew about the attack. Not only that, but it also looks like she has a good rtionship with arge number of elders from the me Sky Kingdom. Even forming a faction that wants to peacefully join us- Huh? This is¡­


    Reading through the information stored inside the jade containing a basic introduction of Sheng Mei and her status as an important elder at the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao suddenly froze on the spot as he reached thest part of the jade that contained some information about her earlier life- or to be more specific, he noticed a familiar name that he hadn''t heard about or seen for years.


    "Lord Kubera¡­ To think I would see this name again¡­ Hm¡­ From the information in the jade, it seems like this Lord Kubera is the same as the Lord Kubera, whose notebook I obtained in the past¡­"


    Still feeling a bit shocked at suddenly seeing the name of the familiar name of the former city lord of the now destroyed City of Kubera that he had suspected to at the very least have reached the Domain Lord Realm and at the same time be a Master Alchemist, Xuan Hao could not help blurting this out¡­


    "Is there something wrong with this Lord Kubera? From what I could gather about him, it just seems like he had picked up the young Sheng Mei in the past and helped take care of her until she reached the Core Formation Realm before disappearing. If you want to find out more about him, I can try and look into it for you and see if I can find any more information about this Lord Kubera."


    As a result of hearing Xuan Hao''s sudden surprised voice, Elder Song quickly looked up from his stack of papers as he said this, while at the same time also starting to grow curious about Lord Kubera, who could cause such a huge reaction from Xuan Hao.


    After all, Lord Kubera, although mysterious and powerful from the little information he had gathered about him from his time in the me Sky Kingdom, he should have been nowhere near the level where his name could shock someone like Xuan Hao. Especially considering that Elder Song didn''t have any idea about the notebook of Kubera that Xuan Hao had found in the past and handed over to Feng Chen after having read through it before it had ultimately ended up in the hands of the Alchemists of the Sect.


    "No need, I will go and pay a visit to this Sheng Mei myself and ask about this after Chu Yang and Qing Yi wakes up." Shaking his head as he said this in an attempt to not end up overworking Elder Song even more than he already was with trying to find out more about Lord Kubera, Xuan Hao was just about to excuses himself when he noticed the worried expression that had appeared on the old man''s face-


    "Chu Yang and Qing Yi wakes up!? Did something happen to those two?!"


    And before he had time to ask what was wrong, Elder Song sprung up from behind his desk with a worried expression stered all over his old face.


    "Ah- No need to worry about those two, they just sustained a few injuries during their time in the mystic realm and ended up falling unconscious as a result. From what I could tell through my divine sense, they just need a few weeks before they are fully recovered."


    "That''s good, that''s good¡­ Haaa¡­ Looks at this old man worrying for nothing, its great that those two young ones are fine. After all, they can be considered the future pirs of the sect when us old- Ehm¡­ When I and the rest of the elders decide to retire and focus all our energy on cultivating in seclusion Hehe¡­" Awkwardlyughing towards the end, Elder Song let out a sigh as he turned his attention down towards the mess he had created when jumping over his desk earlier.


    "It''s understandable, but you have to remember that you are in the Nascent Soul Realm now. The lifespan of someone in the Nascent Soul Realm is normally around a thousand years. By that standard, you can still be considered to be young whenpared to most other Nascent Soul Realm Experts."


    "Young¡­ Huh¡­" Hearing what Xuan Hao said, Elder Song momentarily turned his gaze away from the mess on the ground and towards the window behind his desk where a few disciples could be seen eagerly making their way towards a nearby lecture hall not too far away. "I guess I do have longer to live now that I broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm, but I wouldn''t really considered someone who just recently became 200 years old young¡­"


    "¡­"


    Not saying anything as Elder Song continued to just gaze out at the disciples passing by with a look befitting of an old man reminiscing about his past, Xuan Hao decided to slowly take his leave without disturbing Elder Song who was lost in his own thoughts.


    At the same time, he also realized that the courtyard he was currently in, was not the original one that Elder Song had been given close to the Qi Spring Lake where the qi was denser. Instead, it was located at one of the busiest ces in the sect.


    Although the ce didn''t really have any specific name due to it just being a gathering of different buildings that were used for the simple purpose of teaching the younger and older disciples of the sects the basics or moreplicated things about cultivation, it was still one of the most important ces in the sect. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Maybe he couldn''t get used to the tranquility andck of disciples running around at the edge of the Qi Spring Lake¡­" Muttering this to himself as he made his own conclusions as to why Elder Song had decided to move to this noisy and busy ce instead of staying at his tranquil courtyard next to the Qi Spring Lake, Xuan Hao jumped into the air before making his way back to check up on his two unconscious disciples.


    At the same time, he also began to think about how to improve his different professions. After all, he had at least a few weeks before he nned to leave the sect again to find out more about this Lord Kubera that he suspected to have at least reached the Domain Lord Realm and also having at least reached the Master Realm in Alchemy.

 Chapter 999 Worrisome Disciple

    Returning back to his pce again where Chu Yang and Qing Yi were still recovering while still lost in thought thinking about how to improve his profession, Xuan Hao could onlye up with going to the Grand Library and look through the books and scrolls there for something that would help him-


    "Master!"


    However, before he even had a chance to do any of this, his youngest disciples, Mui, suddenly appeared at the path leading up to the entrance of the ce before happily rushing towards him. Clearly overjoyed that her master was back again.


    "Mui, it''s great to see you- Hm? I see that you have also managed to reach the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm during this time, looks like you didn''t ck off over the past month." Noticing the fact that Mui had managed to break through to the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm during the month he had been gone, Xuan Hao didn''t hold back as he showered the young girl in praise.


    Even though, with the girl''s talent, it would have been obvious that she would have broken through a minor realm over the past month, it wouldn''t even have been surprising if she had ended up breaking through more than just a single minor realm during this period of time¡­


    "Hehe~"


    Unaware of the thoughts going through her master''s head, Mui just smiled embarrassedly at her master''s praise before looking down on the ground to avoid his gaze.


    Although she had managed to adjust to life in the Star Shattering Sect and had started to open up morepared to how cautious she was at first, she was still feeling far too shy to look up at her master after the sudden praise.


    "By the way, where is your senior brother?" Knowing that the little girl was embarrassed, Xuan Hao decided to give her a way out as he asked about Bai Ning''s whereabouts.


    After all, given that he would have been the main person to watch over Mui when Elder Song or some of the other elders who should have taken turn watching over her during his absence was not there, it was quite confusing when he realized that Bai Ning was nowhere near the pce- or to be more precise, he no longer sensed Bai Ning''s presence anywhere in the Shattered Star Peaks like he had done when he first returned to the sect and met up with Elder Song after handing over the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts.


    Meaning that he should have left the sect somewhere in between me arriving at the sect and finishing up my conversation with Elder Song¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards Mui, who by this point, had started fidgeting nervously with her hands without saying anything.


    "Is there something wrong? Did something perhaps happen to your senior brother?" Sensing that something was off from the sudden weird behavior, Xuan Hao asked in a slightly sterner tonepared to before.


    "This- Well¡­ Senior brother told me not to tell master¡­"


    "¡­"


    Hearing what Mui said, Xuan Hao could not help pausing for a moment before looking towards the increasingly nervous Mui who was staring straight into the ground without daring to lift her gaze to meet his. Looking like a young child who had been caught doing something they shouldn''t.


    "Mui¡­"


    "Ah! I- I will talk but promise you won''t tell senior brother!"


    "Okay¡­"


    Not knowing what had suddenly happened to Bai Ning during the short period of time he had ended up talking with Elder Song, Xuan Hao just nodded his head in agreement, curious as to why his third disciple had decided to run away all of a sudden.


    "Then¡­ It started a few minutes earlier when senior brother learnt about master''s return to the sect¡­" Following her master agreeing to not tell on her to Bai Ning, she began to talk about what had happened that ended up causing Bai Ning to leave the sect.


    At first, the two had been making their way towards the Combat Hall where Bai Ning was nning to help train Mui, but before they had managed to reach the Combat Hall, they got news about their master returning to the sect from a beast tamer disciple of the sect who had seen him when he handed over the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts to the elder from the Hall of Beast Tamers.


    Apparently, when Bai Ning heard about his master returning to the sect, he was overjoyed and about to make his way back to the pce and wait for his master, but just at this moment, he seemed to have thought about something and quickly instructed her to head back on her own as he went to sort out something important outside of the sect.


    Having been extremely confused over the sudden weird behavior of her senior brother, Mui had questioned him, but in the end, he just told her that it was important, and he would at most be gone for a few days and made her promise not to tell their master about him leaving the sect. Instead, if their master asked, she should just inform him that he was not at the sect and had gone out toplete a mission a few days earlier and would be back again soon.


    Of course, when it came time for her to tell her master what her senior brother had told her to tell him, she had forgotten about it, the moment her master had praised her and only when he had asked about where he was did, she remember it.


    However, at that point in time, she had been far too nervous to actually lie to her master and didn''t go through with it. Only able to nervously fidget around with her hands as she looked down at the ground without daring to meet her master''s gaze.


    Hearing Mui''s exnation of what had happened, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he tried to ask for any more information that might help him figure out what had caused the sudden weird behavior of his third disciples¡­ And in the end, he did manage to figure out that he had momentarily taken out amunication talisman before his face had gone ashen.


    What in the world happened? And for him to not inform me about it when he knows I''m back in the sect¡­


    Feeling even more worried than before after hearing how Bai Ning had been informed about something through hismunication talisman before leaving the sect in a hurry without informing him- No, not only not informing him, but actively trying to make sure he knew nothing about it¡­


    "Mui, how about we go to visit your big sister Song Jia?" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Huh? Why do we have to visit big sister?"


    Not understanding why her master suddenly asked her this, Mui didn''t get an answer before she found herself in front of Elder Song''s courtyard located close to the Qi Spring Lake. Although Elder Song didn''t use the courtyard and would spend most of his time in the courtyard located close to the lecture halls, the same could not be said for Song Jia, who spent most of her time cultivating in this ce.


    Creak~


    "Mui- Elder Xuan!?


    Opening the door and making his way inside with the confused Mui, Xuan Hao, and Mui both soon arrived in front of Song Jia who opened both of her eyes in surprise upon sensing the two entering the courtyard all of a sudden. Feeling especially surprised at the sudden appearance of Xuan Hao, whom she hadn''t seen in over a month and had no idea was back in the sect again.


    "Hello Song Jia, I have to check up on a rather worrisome disciple of mine, so I will be leaving Mui here in your care for the time being if that is fine with you."


    "Huh? Ah! No problem at all, little sister Mui is always wee here!" Nodding her head as she said this in a still confused voice, Song Jia didn''t hesitate to take care of Mui.


    Although she had no idea what had happened, she understood that it should be something serious given that Xuan Hao had decided to leave Mui in her care. At the same time also understanding that it might not be something that would be solved in a few minutes.


    "Thank you, Mui, take care, I should be back in a few days as well. After all, I have to figure out what that troublesome child is up to¡­" Shaking his head as he said this, Xuan Hao gave a slight smile as he jumped into the air and left in the direction of the Ninth Star Peak where the exit to the Shattered Star Peak was located. Hoping that he would be able to catch Bai Ning with his divine sense before he ended up going too far away from the entrance to the Shattered Star Peaks.

 Chapter 1000 Sneaking Out

    <h4>Chapter 1000 Sneaking Out</h4>


    Leaving the Shattered Star Peaks, it did not take long before he found traces of Bai Ning who had already rushed out of the city located at the base of the Ninth Star Peak. Even more worrisome was the fact that it was rather obvious that he had not left the city alone, but instead together with a group of people numbering at least a few hundred.


    What in the world is that disciple of mine up to¡­


    Feeling even more than before that something was wrong, Xuan Hao took a step forward as the space around him twisted before he disappeared in the direction that Bai Ning had left in.


    ¡­


    A short time earlier, Bai Ning hade to a stop just outside the sect as he nervously looked around himself. "To think that would happen now of all times¡­" Muttering this to himself at this time, he suddenly remembered the short conversation he had earlier over themunication talisman before spotting a petite figure approaching him rapidly.


    "Hui Ying¡­" Seeing the person approaching him, Bai Ning muttered the young girl''s name as he instantly recognized her as none other than the same person who had ended up stuck inside what he believed to be a secret realm in the past.


    However, simr to himself, she was also slightly nervous as she quickly made her way over towards him while ncing around at the people constantly moving in and out of the entrance to the sect located at the base of the Ninth star Peak where he was currently standing.


    "Bai Ning¡­ Let''s go, or they will leave without us!"


    "¡­"


    Hearing what Hui Ying said, Bai Ning just nodded his head before following her as both of them soon made their way outside the city where arge caravan filled with both people and demon beasts were getting ready to leave the city at any moment.


    If not for the fact that most of the people in the caravan consisted of disciples from the Star Shattering Sect and other young people who had all at least reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, it would have been no different from the countless simr sized caravans that would constantly enter and exit the city located at the base of the Ninth Star Peak every single day¡­ And of course, this oddity did catch the attention of the few nearby people, who were all left wondering if the Star Shattering Sect was preparing some sort of training excursion to help the younger disciples get some real-life experience.


    But¡­ If this was the case, there would almost certainly have been a group of Nascent Soul Realm elder present to guide them and ensure their safety, something that was clearly missing from this mixture of Star Shattering Sect disciples and younger cultivators who had most likelye from the branch sect or the Explorer Union.


    "Good, looks like everyone is here now, let''s set out before any of the elders notices us¡­" Seeing Bai Ning and Hui Ying appearing, one of the older disciples in the Core Formation Realm nodded at both of them before informing the rest that it was time for them to leave-


    Rumble~


    And no more than a minuteter, the caravan set off from the city and headed in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom at a speed far faster than that of a usual caravan of this size.


    "Haaa¡­ We managed to make it in time¡­" Slumping down inside one of the carriages attached to a demon beast, Hui Ying let out a sigh of relief as she muttered this to herself before turning to look back at the Shattering Star Peaks growing smaller and smaller in the distance.


    "Indeed, my master just came back, and I thought I wouldn''t be able to get here in time because of it¡­" Nodding his head as he said this, Bai Ning could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine when he remembered how he had just decided to run away before greeting his master. Hopefully his junior sister would convince their master that he had always been out adventuring and would return in a few days.


    Although, at the back of his head, he had a feeling that there would be no way that Mui would be able to deceive their master¡­


    "Huh¡­? Your master returned to the sect!? But isn''t that Grand Elder Xuan!?"


    "Yes? Why?" Hearing Hui Ying suddenly call out to him with a shocked expression stered all over her face, Bai Ning could not help tilting his head in confusion as he said this. Not understanding why she had suddenly gotten so worked up.


    "Nothing¡­ Just¡­ You are really brave, to run away just when your master returns after a month away from the sect. Not to mention, this is Grand Elder Xuan we are talking about, he probably used his powerful divine sense to scan the entire sect the moment he returned. Meaning that he should already know that you suddenly decided to run away¡­"


    "Huh¡­ This¡­"


    Suddenly realizing just how wed his attempted cover up by using his junior sister was after hearing this, Bai Ning could not help freezing on the spot before nervously looking back in the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks that was growing smaller and smaller. Part of him was already expecting his master to show up at any moment to scold him for suddenly running away like that.


    Only when the Shattered Star Peaks hadpletely disappeared beyond the horizon did he let out a sigh of relief before slumping back into his seat again.


    If his master had noticed him leaving, he should have caught up by now. Meaning that he should have been lucky that his master hadn''t used his divine sense after returning to the sect and his junior sister had managed to convince him that he had already gone out adventuring before he returned to the sect.


    "Hehe, look at you, so scared of your own master."


    "Hmph! You are one to talk? Don''t forget how you acted after entering the carriage just a few minutes earlier!" Hearing the teasing voiceing from Hui Yingying on a row of seats opposite of him, Bai Ning rolled his eyes as he said this.


    "Ah¡­" Freezing on the spot after hearing what Bai Ning said, Hui Ying decided not to try and tease him anymore. After all, all of the people present in the caravan were the same as him, as they had all gathered together and essentially run away without informing the elders of their sect. The only people who were not like this was the ones from the Explorer Union.


    Compared to them, they had all the time in the world and didn''t have to inform any elders when they were leaving the city. On the other hand, they didn''t really have much of a backing either, as the Explorer Union normally wouldn''t meddle in the affairs of their outer members and would only care about those who were part of the core of the Explorer Union¡­


    "I hope the thing mentioned by senior brother Yang is really as useful as he said. If it really is, this will be a good opportunity for us to increase our strength- Ah, but I guess you are more interested in the spiritual metals that can be found around that ce.


    After all, without something that could help improve your cksmithing, there would have been no way someone like you would have ever left the sect willingly, hehe~"


    "Not only spiritual metal, but also the notes left by an ancient cksmithing prodigy from the past era in that ce! If there really is something like that, I might be able to surpass the Expert cksmithing Realm faster than I expected and step into Artisan Realm!" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not feeling offended at all by the slightly teasing tone in Hui Ying''s voice as she mentioned the ce they were going to and the spiritual metal that was rumored to be around that ce, Bai Ning instead corrected her and also mentioned the notes of an ancient cksmith that one of their seniors in the sect had mentioned when describing the ce, they were going.


    As for the reason why, they had all decided to leave the sect without informing any of the elders about it, it was due to the fact that the person who knew about the location of the spiritual metal, ancient cksmith notes and the rest of the things that should be useful for increasing their cultivation base, was someone from the Explorer Union.


    Due to not having the ability to enter the ce on his own, he decided to ask a group of disciples from the Star Shattering Sect, but¡­ Given just how powerful the Star Shattering Sect was, he did not feel that he would be able to get anything if he involved the elders of the sect given that he was only in the Core Formation Realm himself.


    For this reason, he had specifically asked some disciples of the sect for help and required them to not inform any of their elders about it or he wouldn''t take them to the ce¡­ And in the end, word had gotten to Hui Ying, who then asked Bai Ning if he wanted to join¡­

 Chapter 1001 Hidden Tunnel

    <h4>Chapter 1001 Hidden Tunnel</h4>


    Whoosh~


    As Bai Ning felt himself calm down again and began chatting with Hui Ying about the special cave that they were going to, Xuan Hao arrived directly above therge caravan that was heading in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom before listening in on what the two were talking about. Not taking long before he got a general understanding of what was happening.


    "So¡­ He just wanted to take part in this adventure and was scared of being turned away if he informed me about it¡­ Haaa¡­ Considering the fact that there is some ancient cksmithing notes on the line, I understand why he wouldn''t thin twice about doing something this dumb, but what about the rest of the disciples, did none of them inform any of the elders secretly?" Muttering this to himself as he nced around at the rest of the disciples from the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head after discovering that there weren''t any elders of the Star Shattering Sect hidden among them.


    Given that a few of the disciples present were older and had a lot of experience in the outside worldpared to Bai Ning and Hui Ying who were still rtively young whenpared to most inner sect disciples, Xuan Hao honestly felt quite surprised that none of them had informed the elders about this excursion outside the sect.


    To be honest, what are they all thinking? Didn''t a single one among them think that this might be some kind of trap to lure them out of the sect? Especially so when considering the ce, they are heading towards is located right next to the Frozen Wastnds filled to the brim with demonic cultivators¡­


    Not knowing what to say as he thought about this to himself while looking over the close to thirty inner sect disciples who were present inside of therge caravan heading towards the Azure Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao could only shake his head in disappointment before deciding to follow the caravan in case something happened.


    After all, if someone had truly tried to lure out the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect, demonic cultivator or not, they were simply asking for a beating!


    ¡­


    "Looks like we are going to pass through the border of the Azure Sky Kingdom soon. Although there isn''t any kind of border patrol, when I talked to Elder Song, he mentioned that there would be an elder at the Nascent Soul Realm wandering around the area to ensure that no demonic cultivators snuck through and entered the core territory of the sect."


    "Really!? If that is the case, I doubt we will be able to enter the Azure Sky Kingdom without the elders finding out about it¡­!"


    Unaware of the fact that his master was already present above them, Bai Ning and Hui Ying were chatting with each other inside one of the carriages when a few loud voices could be hearding from outside the carriage. Not to mention, they also realized that shortly after the loud voices echoed out, therge caravan came to a sudden stop.


    "Do you think we should go out and see what is happening? From what was said earlier, it seems like we will have to find a way to avoid the elder patrolling the border with Azure Sky Kingdom."


    "Indeed, it looks like that is the case, let''s go outside and take a look."


    As both Hui Ying and Bai Ning wanted to find out what was going to happen now that some of the people in the caravan wanted to try and sneak through the border now that they had found out about the fact that there was actually a Nascent Soul Realm elder of the sect patrolling the border from time to time, they soon got up before making their way out of the carriage-


    ""Huh!?""


    However, the scene that met them after leaving the carriage was nothing like what they had expected, as they watched the group of twenty or so people from the Explorer Union gathered together to use their power to dig into the ground before revealing arge underground passage leading a few dozen meters below the ground before going straight in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Not only that, but the passage was also very well maintained, with several magical stones illuminating the dark tunnel that was just big enough to fit a carriage inside of it.


    "What in the world is this!? No, more importantly, why do any of you know that there is such arge underground tunnel here of all ces!?" Feeling taken aback by the sudden appearance of such arge underground tunnel that seemed to stretch on for several dozens of kilometers in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom, one of the older disciples close to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm narrowed both of his before turning to question the person in charge of the group of people from the Explorer Union.


    "This is a passage that was used in the past by merchants during the battle between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom. Even after the war ended and both kingdoms ended up getting destroyed and ultimately reced by your Star Shattering Sect, it was abandoned and mostly forgotten about, outside of a few bandits using it from time to time to escape through.


    As members of the Explorer Union, we know about this passage because the Explorer Union also used it to transport goods and other things to a branch inside the Azure Sky Kingdom during the war."


    Not missing a single beat after hearing the clear suspicion in the voice of the older disciple from the Star Shattering Sect, the person in charge of the group of people from the Explorer Union quickly exined the history of the underground tunnel and where he had learnt about. Understanding very well that it wouldn''t benefit him in the slightest to not do this.


    "Hm¡­ I see but given the length of the tunnel and the fact that there is no connection to the ground above, the air quality inside of it will definitely not be something that a normal mortal could survive inside of. Especially if both entrances are sealed like this."


    "That is true, which is why the weakest person here is at least in the Foundation Establishment Realm. Even if there is no air to breath, we can use the qi from the world around us to breath instead."


    "Indeed¡­ And given that this is a few dozen meters underground, unless the elder from our sect actively searches for us, there will be no way for him to notice us underground¡­ Okay, everyone, we are going underground to avoid the detection of the elder!" Nodding his head in agreement with what the person from the Explorer Union said as he couldn''t find anything wrong with it, the older disciple from the Star Shattering Sect, who had taken a leading role due to him being one of the strongest disciples present, signaled for everyone to move underground. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    At least, given the size of the tunnel, it was more than big enough for the carriages and other things to fit inside of the tunnel when going in a single line. Although it would slow them down to some extent, it would not be anything significant-


    Rumble~!


    And soon enough, the carriages and supplies being pulled by demon beasts formed a single line before moving into the tunnel going straight in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    ""¡­""


    Having moved back into their carriage after seeing the conversation take ce and the tunnel they were slowly moving towards, Bai Ning and Hui Ying didn''t say anything, but a part of them felt ufortable with entering this hidden tunnel.


    The only thing that made them not think too much about this, was the fact that the tunnel was located close enough to the ground that they would be able to dig their way up to the surface and escape in case anything ended up happening to them inside the tunnel.


    ¡­


    "There is actually a tunnel here?"


    Just as surprised as his two disciples about the sudden appearance of a tunnel in such a weird location that went below the border separating the Azure Sky Kingdom and what could be considered the core territory of the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao decided to use his divine sense to scan ahead of his disciple and the rest of the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect to figure out if this was a trap of some kind-


    "Nothing?"


    But after reaching the end of the tunnel at the other side of the border, Xuan Hao found that there weren''t any traps inside the tunnel. Instead, it only contained a small bandit group with a few Foundation Establishment Realm bandits and a single Peak Foundation Establishment Realm Expert in the lead, that would soon be unlucky enough to run into the group his disciple was a part of.


    Not really anything that would be considered dangerous given that Bai Ning would be able to beat this group of bandits up by himself, let alone now that there were more than sixty fellow disciples who had at least reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, a few even having reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm¡­

 Chapter 1002 Bandit Encounter

    <h4>Chapter 1002 Bandit Encounter</h4>


    "There is someone up ahead! Everyone, get ready!"


    As Bai Ning and Hui Ying traveled through the tunnel for a little over five minutes while being on edge, a loud shout suddenly echoed out from the front of the caravan, as the person leading the way through the tunnel had stopped another group making their way through the tunnel from the other side¡­ And considering the fact that the tunnel was apparently only used by bandits since the end of the war between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, it made sense that he called out for everyone to get ready in case it really was a group of bandits.


    In a sense, everyone hoped that the group approaching them were bandits, as none of them wanted to attempt to turn around inside the tunnel that was only barely big enough to fit their carriages and demon beasts inside of. If it really was bandits, at least they would be able to destroy their carriages or other things that might block their path after dealing with them.


    "Let''s get out and see what-"


    ng~ ng~


    Ching-! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Aaaaah-!"


    As Bai Ning was about to make his way out of the carriage to see if the group of people blocking their path were bandits or possibly other members of the Explorer Union who also happened to be using the underground tunnel, the sound of weapons shing with each other followed by the painful cries of what he and Hui Ying could only assume to be the bandits echoed out towards the front of the caravan.


    "Everyone, it was just a small group of bandits in the Foundation Establishment Realm, no need for everyone toe over. After clearing out the tunnel, we will continue forward."


    Not even a second after the battle had begun, the same voice that had called out and informed them about the group approaching them, called out once again and informed them that everything had been dealt with.


    "Well¡­ That was easy¡­" Not knowing what else to say after hearing that the supposed bandit group that had blocked their path had been dealt with in a few seconds after their arrival, Bai Ning could only sit back down again and try to look out the window of the carriage to see if he could catch a nce of the bandits that had ended up unfortunate enough to run into their group.


    Creak~


    Not having to wait for too long, as the carriage soon began moving again before the sad oue of the bandit group appeared outside the window.


    In one word, their condition was pitiful, as they hadn''t even been capable of putting up the slightest bit of resistance before the Core Formation Realm disciple sitting at the front of the caravan had singlehandedly dealt with all of them before having moved everything to the side so the caravan could push through the underground tunnel.


    At least it looked like some of the older disciples had stepped out of their carriage to bury the dead bodies of the bandits. After all, it would not be that nice to encounter the dposing bodies of these bandits when they made their way back through the tunnel again in the future¡­


    Although both of them had already experienced a lot after hunting down demonic cultivators, they still decided to sink back inside their carriage after seeing the oue of the group of bandits.


    ¡­


    At the same time above ground, Xuan Hao could not help ncing towards the figure rapidly moving in the direction of where the caravan was currently located underground.


    "Looks like the elder patrolling this ce noticed the fight underground." Shaking his head as he said this, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he flew down in front of the Nascent Soul Realm Elder who was about to forcibly blow open a hole into the underground tunnel to find out what was happening below ground.


    Whoosh~


    "Hm!? G-Grand Elder Xuan!?" Seeing Xuan Hao suddenly appearing in front of him, the elder froze on the spot just before he forced his way inside the underground tunnel.


    "Indeed, you don''t have to worry about the people below ground, it''s just a few of our disciples who ran away for an adventure without informing anyone and a group of younger people from the Explorer Union and as you can see, I''m here to make sure nothing ends up happening to them. Mainly because one of the disciples who happened to run away is one of my disciples¡­"


    "This- I understand, Grand Elder Xuan. But might I ask about the underground tunnel they are using? As far as I know, there shouldn''t be any kind of tunnel in this ce." Showing a somewhat confused expression at first after hearing who was below ground, the Nascent Soul Realm soon nodded his head before asking about the underground tunnel they were using.


    "Ah, the tunnel is-"


    Given that the Nascent Soul Realm elder was in charge of guarding the border and the fact that the underground tunnel was indeed something that would allow people to sneak through without being noticed, Xuan Hao understood what the elder wanted to know and quickly exined the origin of the tunnel before giving him the two points of entry into the tunnel.


    "Thank you for the information, Grand Elder Xuan." Giving a sincere bow as thanks for informing him about the possible blind spot he didn''t know about before now, the elder quickly turned around to leave. Understanding that there was no reason for him to stay around with Xuan Hao around. Especially considering that the people who had been fighting below ground were their disciples.


    As for the reason why these disciples had decided to sneak out of the sect together with a group of young people from the Explorer Union? The elder didn''t bother to think too much about this, as he felt that nothing would go wrong with Xuan Hao watching over the group.


    Even if the group of people from the Explorer Union had malicious intentions, the fate of messing with someone as powerful as Xuan Hao was obvious with how he was even stronger than the Sect Master who had reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    ¡­


    "Haaa¡­ Finally, back outside again¡­" As a few hours went by traveling underground without any incidents, Bai Ning could not help taking in a deep breath of fresh air as the sun once again shone down from above.


    Even if nothing more than the bandit encounter happened underground, he couldn''t get used to having to use his qi for breathing. Especially considering that he wasn''t able to recover his qi faster than he consumed it while underground due to the presence of yin qi that he was forced to expel from his body whenever he absorbed any qi from the surrounding environment.


    Although he would have been able to hold on in such a situation for days and he could always break the ceiling above and go back to the surface, the feeling of slowly running out of qi that he used to sustain himself was not something he had ever felt before.


    Looking at Hui Ying who was sitting beside him, she was in a simr situation, as an ted and happy smile was stered all over her face after leaving the underground tunnel. Different from him, she had not yet managed to reach the Core Formation Realm and was still in the Foundation Establishment Realm. Meaning that the experience for her was far worse than his own.


    However, the people who fared the worst were the group of disciples who were still in the earlier stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm. Even though they had not done anything other than sitting inside their carriages to try and negate the yin qi and breath through their qi, they ended up almost running out of qi after passing through the tunnel and had already jumped out of their carriage to sit down to absorb the qi now devoid of any yin qi to recover.


    "Everyone, we will take a break and continue in another two hours." Understanding how exhausted these weaker disciples were and the fact that it would be harder for them to recover inside a moving carriage, the older disciple who had taken the lead of the caravan yelled for everyone to stop.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Not a secondter, a group of slightly stronger disciples also rushed out of their carriage as they sat down among the weaker disciples to recover. Even though they hadn''t reached the same level of exhaustion as the ones in the earlier stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm, they weren''t in that good of a state either.


    Not to mention, it was a great opportunity for them to recover outside together with the rest of the disciples.


    "Guess we should go as well¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced over at Hui Ying, both of them soon left their carriage and joined the rest of the disciples outside.

 Chapter 1003 Unknown Observer

    Given that he would be able to fully recover what little qi he had by simply walking around normally for a few minutes, Bai Ning decided to take a look around the ce where they had ended up after leaving the underground tunnel, while the rest of the people in the caravan were focused on recovering from the trip through the tunnel.


    "A vige?" Spotting a small vige, no more than a few minutes away from where they were staying, Bai Ning decided to go over and take a look before the two hours were up. Feeling quite curious about how different the territory of the now gone Azure Sky Kingdom would be from the first time he visited.


    Back then, the Azure Sky Kingdom had been overrun with demonic cultivators who were wreaking havoc everywhere and he had also been there together with a group of elders from the sect and other disciples to hunt for these demonic cultivators.


    However, after entering the small vige and exploring it for himself, Bai Ning realized just how different the ce waspared to the demon infested mess it had been back then.


    At the same time, it also made him realize just how quickly the ce had managed to recover from the almostpletely destroyed state most of the viges and cities of the Azure Sky Kingdom had been left in after the arrival of the demonic cultivators.


    Although the Star Shattering Sect did have a hand in this quick recovery, Bai Ning did hear that the Ascendant Frost Hall, who had decided to be a sect under the Star shattering Sect, was the main reason that the territory had managed to recover so quickly.


    Even if he didn''t know too much about the Ascendant Frost Hall who was now essential in control of the territory of the now gone Azure Sky Kingdom, he still felt a sense of respect for them after witnessing firsthand how fast the ce had recovered from the demonic cultivator invasion only a few years earlier. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Part of him also wanted to visit the sect, as it had been around for a long time and was bound to have gathered some unique cksmithing blueprints!


    "Oh? Looks like it''s about time to return back to the caravan." Having been lost in his own thoughts while wandering around the vige, Bai Ning suddenly realized that the two-hour break was about to end-


    Swish~


    So, without wasting a single second, he left the vige and returned to the caravan with a few minutes to spare.


    ¡­


    Having watched the entire scene of Bai Ning entering the small vige and staying there for a little over an hour, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both of his eyes as he turned his attention back towards the caravan.


    Someone is observing the caravan from far away through some kind of technique¡­


    Narrowing both of his eyes even further as he looked towards an empty point in the sky above the caravan that was getting ready to leave again, Xuan Hao managed to spot a small eyeball hidden by dozens of different concealment formations and other means to hide it from any prying eyes.


    The power contained inside some of the concealment formations ced around the eyeball were strong enough to hide from the divine sense of someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and required at least someone in the Domain Lord Realm to construct it!


    If not for the fact that he had reached the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he doubted that he would have been able to find it back when he had been in the Domain Lord Realm. Meaning that whoever was behind this eyeball hovering in the air above the caravan was not someone that his disciple or the rest of the disciples from the sect had any way to deal with.


    Even whenbining their strength, the most they could do, would be to fight a weaker Nascent Soul Realm Expert. Far from enough to deal with a Formation Master who had reached the Domain Lord Realm...


    But¡­ Why would such a person target Bai Ning and the rest like this? Is it perhaps because he has something against the Star Shattering Sect? Maybe even an enemy I ended up making without knowing about it?


    Feeling his thoughts starting to wander as his curiosity towards the owner of the eyeball floating in the air above his disciple and the rest of the caravan, Xuan Hao began to slowly probe the eyeball with his divine sense. Trying his best to find the connection between the eyeball and its owner, so he could follow it back and find out where the owner in question was located, while at the same time making sure to not identally alert the person behind the eyeball in the process.


    However, after close to half an hour of trying to find the connection between the eyeball and the person using it to observe the caravan that was moving deeper into the Azure Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao could only give up. Unable to find out where the person controlling it was located.


    In the end, he could still forcefully locate the owner of the eyeball. The only problem was that this would inevitably alert the other party into escaping¡­ And given that he had no idea how far away the other party was and if he could reach the ce in time, there was a very real chance that the other party could escape.


    Not something he wanted to see happen, as a powerful Domain Lord Realm Expert secretly targeting the Star Shattering Sect was not something that he wanted to see happen. Especially considering that Feng Chen and Shu Yao were still far too weak to deal with something like this.


    Whoosh~


    For this reason, Xuan Hao decided to silently retract his divine sense from the floating eyeball before spreading it out into the area around where the caravan was travelling. Deciding to use them in a bid to lure out the potential enemy.


    Even if the other party was in the Domain Lord Realm and was skilled in the art of formation, Xuan Hao didn''t really feel any sense of threat from the other party. After all, when all was said and done, his strength had already far surpassed the Domain Lord Realm. Making him more than confident in both protecting the disciples from his sect, while also dealing with the unknown person observing them.


    ¡­


    "Huh!?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao retracted his divine sense from the eyeball floating in the air above the caravan, an old man sitting cross legged in front of an artifact that looked like a bigger and far moreplicated metal version of the eyeball in the air above the caravan, opened both of his eyes in surprise.


    Around him were dozens of other simr artifacts that were each watched over by other people of different ages and cultivation realms. The weakest having reached the Nascent Soul Realm, while the strongest had reached the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­ And the old man just so happened to be this Fifth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    "What was that¡­?" Narrowing both of his eyes as he muttered this to himself, the old man began to thoroughly examine the artifact in front of him. However, after finding nothing unusual he could only shake his head and give up.


    "Oh? Did something happen?"


    Just as he sat back down again and was about to get back to his job of keeping an eye on the caravan that the eyeball was hovering above, a voice echoed out behind him before a middle-aged man walked over.


    "This humble servant greets Lord White Soul, I felt something odd about the ethereal eye and decided to investigate it. However, I didn''t end up finding anything¡­"


    "Hm? Something odd about the ethereal eye?" Hearing what the old man said, the middle-aged man who had been referred to as Lord White Soul narrowed both of his eyes as he walked up to the artifact before examining it with his own divine sense.


    Whoosh-!


    As the powerful divine sense spread out, some of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts present fainted on the spot whening into contact with it, while the rest were left shivering at the terrifying divine sense. Even though the divine sense was far from powerful enough to cause someone in the Domain Lord Realm to faint, they all understood that it wouldn''t be that difficult for the owner of said divine sense to kill them.


    """¡­"""


    For this reason, everyone inside therge hall filled with different ethereal eyes, stopped what they were doing and nervously waited for Lord White Soul to finish his inspection.


    "Hm¡­ This is odd, I don''t find anything off about the artifact and nothing out of the ordinary on the other side. This group of people, where do theye from? Did you perhaps end up targeting some powerful sect?"


    "N-No! I didn''t, the people in that caravan are all from the Explorer Union or some recently established sect that is supported by three people in the Domain Lord Realm!" Answering the question with a terrified expression on his face, the old man also began going over the information of the people in the caravan inside his head.


    He was absolutely certain that the people inside the caravan didn''t have any powerful backing. Especially considering that the sect disciples were all from a recently established sect at the border of some weak empire.


    Even if the sect had three Domain Lord Realm Experts and could be considered a bit special from the information he could gather, it was far from enough to be considered a powerful backing in the eyes of someone like Lord White Soul!


    "I see, keep an eye on the progress of the caravan and inform me if anything out of the ordinary happens."


    Not wasting any time after saying this, the middle-aged man turned around and made his way out of the hall. Giving the old man a chance to breath a sigh of relief before he quickly turned his attention back towards the eyeball shaped artifact. Not daring to look away for even a second, as hepletely locked on to the scene of the caravan making its way deeper into the former Azure Sky Kingdom, that it disyed.


    Rustle~


    Noticing that the middle-aged man had left, and his divine sense had simrly disappeared, the rest of the people inside the hall also got back to what they were doing.


    From looking at the different eyeball shaped artifacts hovering slightly above the ground in front of all of them, it became obvious that every single one of them were observing different things- or to be more specific, they were observing different groups of people¡­

 Chapter 1004 Injured Soul Ascension Realm Expert...?

    <h4>Chapter 1004 Injured Soul Ascension Realm Expert...?</h4>


    ?


    Oh? It looks like someone used the eyeball to send over his own divine sense to investigate the situation by himself, did the owner of the eyeball perhaps notice me earlier when I was trying to find him?


    Having clearly noticed the divine sense that was transferred through the eyeball before it started to thoroughly examine the area around the eyeball, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he thought he wondered if he had been noticed by the other party when he had used his divine sense to try and find the owner of the eyeball just now.


    Even if it would have been difficult to perceive him given the fact that he had deliberately restrained himself to make it harder for him to get noticed, the power behind the divine sense had far surpassed the Domain Lord Realm and had clearly entered the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Although he couldn''t tell just how many tribtions this Soul Ascension Realm Expert had passed through, the divine sense alone was strong enough that he wouldn''t have been able to hide from it and only through sheer luck was he already been outside the area that it covered when it emerged from the eyeball. If not for this, he would undoubtedly have been spotted by the other party earlier.


    Haaa¡­ When did the Star Shattering Sect make this kind of enemy? Even the ancestor of the Sky Empire shouldn''t be this strong¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he nced in the direction of the mysterious eyeball hovering above the caravan, Xuan Hao felt far more ufortablepared to before now that he knew there was a powerful expert in the Soul Ascension Realm behind the floating eyeball observing his disciple and the disciples of his sect. Especially considering that he had no idea just how powerful this person was and the fact that his initial impression was pointing towards the other party being someone in the Later Stages of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    He might have reached the Intermediate stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and had the strength to fight someone who had reached the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, but he also understood that he was far from invincible in the Soul Ascension Realm. The encounters he had with the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts back in the mystic realm of the Mirage sect were more than enough to make him understand this.


    Not to mention protecting Bai Ning and the rest of the disciples from his sect, he wouldn''t even be able to protect himself if the person behind the eyeball turned out to be someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­


    "But¡­ Do I take Bai Ning and the rest away before the other party can show up in person? If I really do this, it might end up leaving a hidden problem for the sect in the future. Not to mention, it isn''t certain that the other party is at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    If that is the case, this might be a perfect opportunity to get rid of this hidden threat before it ends up causing problems for the rest of the sect and my other disciples¡­" Muttering this to himself as he kept his attention focused on the eyeball hovering above the caravan, Xuan Hao began to debate whether or not to allow his disciple and the rest of the disciples from his sect to continue moving forward to find out who this hidden threat was.


    All things considered, he might be overreacting to the matter and his disciple, and his group just happened to enter the area where someone had decided to either cultivate or recover from a battle. In that case, the eyeball should just be a security measure of this expert, as he didn''t want anyone to interrupt him¡­


    Even if Xuan Hao felt that this was unlikely, there was indeed a chance of this being the case given how close the former Azure Sky Kingdom was to the Frozen Wastnd. Especially when considering that the Frozen Wastnd had grown more and more unstable since the demonic cultivator invasion.


    The Star Shattering Sect might not have felt much after his personal interference in the matter, but the rest of the kingdoms bordering the Frozen Wastnds were not in the same situation, as they were stuck dealing with a constant influx of demonic cultivators.


    The different empires behind these kingdoms had, ording to Elder Song, also begun to send in their peak experts into the Frozen Wastnd to figure out what had caused this sudden exodus from the Frozen Wastnds.


    The Empires sending in experts were not just the weaker empires like the Sky Empire who barely had a handful of Soul Ascension Realm Expert but was also the more powerful empires located close to the center of the continent. Meaning that it wouldn''t be that odd if one of these experts who had entered the Frozen Wastnd happened to be recovering inside one of the small kingdoms bordering the Frozen Wastnd.


    Although it would be inside the territory of another empire, it was far safer than recovering inside the Frozen Wastnd that was getting increasingly dangerous with each passing day. Even more so considering that the powerful True Demon Realm Experts had also begun wandering around the outer parts of the Frozen Wastnds.


    "Guess I will just observe for now and see if the eyeball continues to follow after them¡­" ncing in the direction of the Frozen Wastnds as he said this to himself, Xuan Hao decided to not do anything that might possibly alert the other party for now.


    After all, given that they had not yet shown themselves, it was obvious that his divine sense hadn''t been noticed. Instead, it should have been due to a sudden feeling of unease the other party might have felt when he began to secretly search the eyeball with his divine sense.


    Whilst it might be a bit of out of the ordinary to do something like this while trying to hide inside an unfamiliar empire, it would not be too odd to do something like this if the owner of the eyeball was in an injured state and fearing someone had found him in this weakened state. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt himself calm down as he looked at the eyeball fully focused on the caravan making its way deeper inside the former Azure Sky Kingdom. Given that they were the strongest people around, it made sense that the eyeball would keep an eye on them.


    Even if Bai Ning and the rest were far from strong enough to threaten someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, it was still clear that they were part of a powerful sect or kingdom given their age and strength and given that the other party was not familiar with the Star Shattering Sect or possibly even the Sky Empire, he or she didn''t want to take any chances and possibly offend a Soul Ascension Realm Expert¡­


    Whoosh~


    Feeling like he had figured out the origin of the eyeball and the reason why it was observing his disciple and his group after thinking things through, Xuan Hao felt himself calm down even more as he no longer felt the same level of worry that he had before when looking at the eyeball hovering above the caravan.


    Instead, he was filled with far more curiositypared to before about the owner of the eyeball and what might have happened to cause a powerful Soul Ascension Realm Expert to hide away inside the Sky Empire to recover from what he thought to be an injure that should have been inflicted by one of the more powerful True Demon Realm Experts inside the Frozen Wastnds.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Are we about to arrive at the location?" Unaware about what had happened in the sky above him a few hours earlier, Bai Ning curiously poked his head out of the carriage before turning to ask one of the people from the Explorer Union who happened to be just outside his and Hui Ying''s carriage. Having clearly felt that they had slowed down significantly all of a sudden.


    "Yes, we should be there in another hour or so, we are currently going a little slower as we are about to enter a rather dangerous part of the Azure Sky Kingdom. Well¡­ Not really too dangerous considering that we have so many people in the Core Formation Rm with us."


    Nodding his head as he said this, the person from the Explorer Union clearly didn''t notice the fact that Bai Ning was one of these Core Formation Realm Experts, as his face was filled with awe while looking towards the older disciples of the sect.


    "Indeed¡­ Looks like we won''t have to worry too much¡­" Not wanting to scare the person from the Explorer Union, Bai Ning decided to just nod his head as he said this before retreating back inside the carriage to wake up Hui Ying who had fallen asleep at some point during the journey through the Azure Sky Kingdom.

 Chapter 1005 Demon Beast Ambush

    <h4>Chapter 1005 Demon Beast Ambush</h4>


    Shortly after the conversation with the person from the Explorer Union, Bai Ning discovered that they had made their way inside a mountainous part of the Azure Sky Kingdom. Even without knowing anything about this ce, it was still rather obvious that such a ce would have a lot of demon beasts. Especially if there weren''t any sects that had decided to make the ce their home and keep the demon beasts in check.


    However, from how deste and rundown the road they were using was, it was clear that there wasn''t any sect around keeping the demon beasts living on the mountains around them in check. Making it clear why the person from the Explorer Union had been so uneasy about entering the ce.


    Roar!


    Not even a second after he thought about all of this, a demon beast in the earlier stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm jumped out from the bushes located near the ce where his and Hui Ying''s carriage was passing through-


    Swish-!


    And not a secondter, someone in the Later Stage Foundation Establishment Realm Expert descended upon the demon beast and blocked its path before it had a chance to do any damage to the caravan-


    Roa-


    Ptsh!


    Overpowering and killing it in a few short exchanges!


    Roar!


    Rooooar!


    Unfortunately, this was not the end, as dozens of loud roars soon echoed out from all around the caravan before arge number of demon beasts made their presence known as they soon descended down towards the caravan filled with killing intent. Among which, there was nock of Core Formation Realm demon beasts.


    "This- Everyone, get ready to fight!" Following the sudden ambush that was about to reach them, the older disciple at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm called out to everyone before jumping forward and into the approaching demon beast. Heading directly towards arge spider demon beast at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm that seemed to be the most powerful among the attacking demon beasts.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Reacting to the loud yell of the oldest disciple, the Core Formation Realm Experts from both the Star Shattering Sect and the Explorer Union all rushed out to meet the approaching demon beasts. Making sure to each target the more powerful demon beasts in an attempt to prevent them from reaching the caravan and possibly damaging it as a result.


    Soon enough, the sound of battle echoed throughout the mountains as the people in the Foundation Establishment Realm rushed out of their carriages to face the remaining demon beasts.


    ¡­


    Watching therge battle taking ce below as a sudden horde of demon beasts had descended upon Bai Ning and the rest of the caravan, Xuan Hao soon turned his attention back towards the eyeball hovering in the air above the caravan after making sure that Bai Ning and the rest were capable of dealing with the demon beasts by themselves.


    The eyeball is still following after them¡­


    Compared to when the eyeball had first shown up and he had suspected that it just belonged to some injured Soul Ascension Realm Expert secretly recovering nearby, he was now certain that this was not the case.


    The main reason for this being the fact that his disciple and the rest had passed through severalrge towns with Nascent Soul Realm Experts inside of them, yet the eyeball had not even nced in the direction of these Nascent Soul Realm Experts and had instead remained fully focused on them.


    If the eyeball really did belong to an injured Soul Ascension Realm Expert who was just injured and recovering inside the Azure Sky Kingdom, there was no way he or she would feel Bai Ning and the rest were a bigger threat than someone in the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    "Haaa¡­ Looks like it is indeed someone specifically targeting them, but where did this Soul Ascension Realm Expert pop up from all of a sudden? Be it the Sky Empire or the surrounding empires, someone this powerful is impossible to find outside of the most powerful people in said empires, like the ancestor of the Sky Empire¡­" Muttering this to himself as he kept his attention focused on the eyeball, Xuan Hao could not think of where this Soul Ascension Realm Expert had appeared from all of a sudden.


    Even if there was a chance that he was one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from one of the more powerful empires who had gone to the Frozen Wastnd, it made no sense why someone like that would target the disciples of his sect.


    Not only that, but there was also the fact that this Soul Ascension Realm Expert chose to keep an eye on them as they made their way through the Azure Sky Kingdom instead of just directly capturing them. After all, given the difference in strength between someone in the Soul Ascension Realm and the Core Formation Realm, doing this would be as simple as breathing.


    Is there perhaps another reason for this that I''m unaware of?


    Not knowing what the best thing would be to do in this kind of uncertain situation, Xuan Hao ultimately decided to continue observing the group below as they continued on with their adventure without doing anything.


    In case they encountered a dangerous situation or the Soul Ascension Realm Expert behind the eyeball appeared with hostile intentions, he would escape with them before anything could happen. No matter what, his current strength was stillparable to someone who had passed through the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and with his recentprehension of the Dao of Space, he was confident in escaping in case the other party was stronger than him.


    The only problem with this, was if the other party was really targeting the Star Shattering Sect. At that point in time, he would have to find a way to deal with a far more powerful opponent if he wanted the branch sects of the Star Shattering Sect located outside the Shattered Star Peaks to survive¡­


    Well¡­ If it reallyes down to it, I could always try and bait the person into the Shattered Star Peak before using the formation there.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao unconsciously nced away from floating eyeball and looked down at Bai Ning locked in a fight with a Second Stage Core Formation Realm demon beast.


    Although he was holding his own against the demon beast that was one minor realm above him, it was clear that he had no way to defeat the demon beast and was instead slowly being pushed back by the stronger demon beast. Demonstrating that he was nowhere near the same level as Chu Yang and Qing Yi when it came tobat experience.


    Then again, this was a given, as the only realbat experience he had was when he had hunted down demonic cultivators and entered what he believed to be a secret realm for a few days where he and Hui Ying spent most of their time hiding or escaping from different demon beasts. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    When it came to actually fighting demon beasts, he had close to no experience. Especially after having reached the Core Formation Realm, as he had not left the sect after recovering from the injuries he had received back then. Focusing all of his time on either improving his cksmithing or cultivating. Using as little time as possible on actualbat training.


    "Maybe it would be a good idea if Bai Ning went out a bit more in the future¡­" Seeing theck ofbat experience of his third disciple on full disy, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself as he already began nning to inform Elder Song to have his disciple set out for some of the sects excursions outside the sect designed to help the disciple gainbat experience.


    Although it was fine that Bai Ning was not as good at fighting as Chu Yang or Qing Yi, he felt that it was uneptable that he wasn''t capable of fighting equally with a demon beast only a single minor realm above himself.


    ¡­


    Ching~


    "Hehe, found it!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was nning on how to better train his disciple after returning to the sect, the older disciple facing off against the Peak Core Formation Realm demon beast sessfully found a weak spot in the spider''s exoskeleton-


    "Haaa!"


    Ptsh!


    Taking advantage of the weakness, he didn''t waste a single second as his sword pierced through the weakness with surgical precision. Instantly killing therge spider demon beast before it had a chance to defend itself.


    Swish-!


    Having killed off the spider demon beast, the older disciple didn''t stand around doing nothing, as he turned around and began killing his way through the remaining demon beasts who were far weaker than the Peak Core Formation Realm spider he had just killed. Almost instantly causing the tide of the battle to swift heavily in their favor, even causing some of the smarter demon beasts to jump away and escape from the battlefield.

 Chapter 1006 Hidden Cave

    <h4>Chapter 1006 Hidden Cave</h4>


    Not long after the older disciple at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm joined in on the battle, did ite to an end. Only the smarter demon beasts who decided to escape after seeing the death of the spider demon beasts managing to run away in time before they got surrounded and killed, something that ended happening to the demon beasts who were still blindly attacking the caravan.


    "Looks like everything is over¡­" Feeling a wave of exhaustion washing over him following the Second Stage Core Formation Realm demon beast in front of him getting killed by one of the more powerful older disciples, Bai Ning used thest bit of strength left in his body to drag himself back inside the carriage.


    Although the battle itself shouldn''t have been anything too difficult given the fact that the demon beast he faced was only a single minor realm above him, he ended up wasting a lot of his qi during the fight as he wasn''t used to fighting at the Core Formation Realm. Having prioritized his cksmithing and cultivating overbat training. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    After returning to the sect, I should properly use a bit more time onbat training¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Bai Ning nced around the carriage and saw that Hui Ying was already sitting down cross legged. Busy recovering from the battle.


    Whoosh~


    Following her example and feeling the exhaustion that came from overexerting himself by fighting a more powerful opponent, Bai Ning simrly sat down and began to recover the qi he had used during the fight.


    As for the rest of the disciples and people from the Explorer Union, they did the same as it was unanimously decided that they would recover before moving any deeper into the mountainous terrain. Understanding very well that they wouldn''t be able to escape unscratched if they ended up encountering a simr ambush without having recovered.


    Like this, the next few hours passed by without anything happening before the first few people got up and began to clear out a path through the dead demon beasts now stacked up around the caravan, while also protecting the rest of the caravan from any of the nearby demon beasts who had been attracted by the smell of blood.


    Luckily, the strongest among these demon beasts had barely reached the Foundation Establishment, while most of the remaining demon beasts approaching the caravan were only in the Qi Condensation Realm. Not proving to be any problem for the few people who had gotten up to clear the path through the dead bodies of the demon beasts blocking their path deeper into the mountainous terrain.


    In the end, by the time Bai Ning and Hui Ying opened their eyes again, having fully recovered from the earlier battle, the caravan had already begun heading deeper inside the mountains¡­ And after asking around a bit with the disciples from the sect, they both found out that they would be reaching the hidden cave that the person from the Explorer Union had told everyone about beforehand.


    Apparently, from the information that the rest of the disciples told them, the cave was located at the base of one of the mountains and was guarded by a powerful Core Formation Realm demon beast.


    The main reason why this person from the Explorer Union had asked for help was because the Core Formation Realm demon beast was far stronger than he first expected. Not even with the help of everyone he knew in the Explorer Union could he defeat it.


    All things considered; this was what ultimately ended up causing him to go to the Star Shattering Sect''s disciples for help.


    However, even if the Star Shattering Sect had a good reputation, he had still been cautious and didn''t dare to get any elders of the sect involved, as he feared that they might take advantage of him given the fact that he was not a core member of the Explorer Unions and could only be considered someone random who had joined the Explorer Union as an adventurer to make a living¡­ And more importantly than all of this, he had only reached the Core Formation Realm, a cultivation realm that could be considered insignificant in the eyes of a powerful sect like the Star Shattering Sect.


    As for how he knew about the precious things hidden away inside the cave that the demon beast guarded, that was because he had managed to enter the cave on his own when he had found it.


    Back then, the demon beast was nowhere near the entrance of the cave, and he entered it without a problem and found all of the precious metals, spiritual herbs, and other things inside, but¡­ Just as he was overwhelmed with joy at the discovery, a loud roar had sounded from deeper inside the cave before the demon beast appeared and chased him out of the cave before he could take any of the precious things covering the ground inside the cave.


    "Indeed, unfortunate, but this also gives us a chance to get our hands on some of the precious things inside the cave. Especially those high-quality spirit stones, with something like that to help out during cultivation, it won''t take long for me to break through to the Core Formation Realm!" Muttering this to herself as they had just heard the entire story about how the person from the Explorer Union ended up asking the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect for help, Hui Ying could not stop herself from growing excited after mentioning the spirit stones.


    Although the spirit stones would not be able to directly help someone increase their cultivation realm, they would undoubtably help increase one''s cultivation speed. Especially so when one was below the Nascent Soul Realm.


    In simple reductive terms, the main limiting factor for increasing one''s cultivation base in the Qi Condensation, Foundation Establishment and Core Formation Realm was how fast one could absorb qi and secondly stabilize the new qi inside the dantian into either a qi vortex, pirs, or a core.


    With the help of spirit stones, the time needed to be used on absorbing qi would be reduced depending on the quality of the spirit stone, leaving most of the time for stabilizing the new qi to break through a higher realm.


    All I really care about are the spiritual metal and the cksmithing notes that he mentioned seeing inside the cave, as long as I can get my hands on them, I won''t care about the spirit stones. If I really need any spirit stones for my cultivation, I can always ask master for some¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this after hearing what Hui Ying said, Bai Ning didn''t realize just how lucky he was to be in such a position as he was looking forward to getting his hand on the spiritual metal and the cksmithing notes.


    Although, when all was said and done, the thing he was the most interested in by far, was the cksmithing notes. After all, he had no idea how far this cksmith had gone and what the notes contained. For all he knew, it might be notes belonging to an extremely powerful cksmith that had far surpassed any cksmith he had heard of or seen before.


    Of course, this was just what Bai Ning hoped for deep down. In reality, he understood very well that the chances of this being the case was unlikely. Especially considering that it was inside the Azure Sky Kingdom, a ce where the best cksmith he knew about had at most reached the Expert Realm in cksmithing, a realm that he himself was currently in.


    Even if it isn''t some precious blueprint by a powerful cksmith far above the Expert Realm, I at the very least hope that it''s something unique that will help me better master the Expert Realm of cksmithing and help me more easily advance in the-


    "Everyone! We are here! Those in the Core Formation Realm,e out and prepare, the demon beast in question is just up ahead!"


    Just as Bai Ning was lost in his own thoughts about the cksmithing notes and what might be contained inside of them, a loud roar outside interrupted his train of thought-


    Rustle~


    However, upon realizing what was said, Bai Ning quickly got up and left the carriage together with Hui Ying.


    Even if he had only reached the First Stage of the Core Formation Realm and wouldn''t be of that much help, he still understand that it would be better than nothing to have more Core Formation Realm Experts around to attack the powerful demon beast, something that the older disciple in the lead had also thought about when calling for all Core Formation Realm Experts earlier.


    I wonder what kind of demon beast it is and how strong it is, it should at least have reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm.


    Thinking this to himself as he made his way towards the spot where everyone was gathering together with Hui Ying, Bai Ning could not stop himself from growing nervous as he thought about this.

 Chapter 1007 Bear Demon Beast and the Floating Eyeball

    <h4>Chapter 1007 Bear Demon Beast and the Floating Eyeball</h4>


    Gathered together with the rest of the disciples and the people from the Explorer Union, Bai Ning followed the guidance of one of his seniors and turned to look down the side of the mountain path towards a small clearing at the base of a nearby mountain.


    Inside the clearing, a massive bear demon beast was peacefully sleeping with half of its body inside a cave next to the clearing. Even from a distance, it was obvious how powerful this demon beast was.


    "So, this is the Peak Core Formation Realm demon beast?" Having noticed therge bear demon beast in the clearing at the base of the mountain, Bai Ning could not help growing uneasy as he felt the terrifying aura around the demon beast. Even the Core Formation Realm elders back in the sect who had reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm were nowhere near as terrifying as the bear demon beast.


    Although, this could just be because these elders had decided to restrain their Peak Core Formation Realm strength in an attempt to not scare the younger disciples, but¡­ Looking at the expressions of the other Core Formation Realm disciples of his sect who were far stronger than him, this did not seem to be the case. Even the Peak Core Formation Realm senior brother who had taken the lead was visibly frowning as he remained focused on the sleeping bear demon beast below.


    From the looks of it, the bear demon beast is stronger than a normal Peak Core Formation Realm demon beast¡­


    As he thought about this, Bai Ning unconsciously tightened his grip around his already drawn weapon.


    No matter how strong the bear demon beast, there should be no way for it to resist thebined attack of so many Core Formation Realm Experts.


    ¡­


    "Oh? Would you look at that, a Peak Core Formation Realm demon beast only a single step away from the Nascent Soul Realm. If I''m not wrong, it should currently be in the process of preparing to step into the Nascent Soul Realm and should be able to seed in another day or two."


    Different from Bai Ning and the rest who were nervously looking at the bear demon beast wondering just how strong it was, Xuan Hao had instantly seen through its strength and the fact that it was currently in the process of attempting to reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Although it was strongerpared to normal Peak Core Formation Realm demon beasts, it was far from enough to pose a threat to Bai Ning and the rest of the caravan. The main thing that made them unable to gauge the true strength of this demon beast was just the initial aura of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert that had formed around the demon beast. Making it look far stronger than it actually was.


    "Hehe, in the eyes of that Peak Core Formation Realm disciple, the demon beast is properly far more terrifying considering that he should be more familiar with the Nascent Soul Realm aura present around it. Oh well, he should be able to figure out things soon enough¡­"


    Chuckling to himself as he turned his attention towards the Peak Core Formation Realm disciple who was visibly frowning with an uneasy expression on his face as he looked down towards the sleeping demon beast, Xuan Hao was looking forward as to how this new genius of the sect would handle things.


    After all, Bai Ning was far too weak to fight against a demon beast that was only a single step away from the Nascent Soul Realm with his First Stage Core Formation Realm strength. At this time, the main person fighting would be the older disciple at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm.


    As for the rest of the Core Formation Realm Experts¡­ Xuan Hao didn''t think there would be a need for them to interfere in the battle, the main reason why this disciple had called out for their help just now, should be because he was unclear about the true cultivation of the demon beast and thought that it might have just reached the Nascent Soul Realm and was hoping to overwhelm it with numbers before it had a chance to stabilize its cultivation base.


    Swish-!


    Not a secondter, the older disciple seemed to have realized the situation as well, as he rushed down towards the sleeping demon beast without exining anything to the others who had gathered together in preparation for dealing with the demon beast.


    The main reason for this being the fact thatpared to Xuan Hao who could see that the demon beast was still a few days off actually breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm, he had no idea how close the demon beast was to reaching the Nascent Soul Realm and feared that it might end up breaking through at any moment.


    Roar!? N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Soon enough, therge bear demon beast opened its eyes filled with both confusion and anger-


    Bang! Bang!


    And before long, the sound of battle echoed out inside the clearing as the older disciple and the bear demon beast began to violently sh with each other in an intense battle fitting of two Peak Core Formation Realm Experts.


    Even if the other Core Formation Realm Experts wanted to join in, none of them dared to venture down into the chaotic battle, as it might very well result in them bing a burden if they weren''t able to properly cooperate and instead ended up needing the older disciple to save them.


    """¡­"""


    Stuck in this kind of situation, they could only watch as the battle below continued growing more intense. Preparing themselves in case the situation turned bad, and they needed to help out.


    "Hm? The eyeball is finally moving¡­?" Having focused his attention on the battle taking ce below, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed that the eyeball that had remained in the air hovering above the caravan since they had entered the Azure Sky Kingdom suddenly started moving.


    If this had happened before they had passed through any of therger cities with Nascent Soul Realm Experts present inside of them, Xuan Hao would not care much about this, but now that he felt the person behind the eyeball was targeting his disciple and the disciples from his sect, this was no longer the case!


    "¡­"


    Watching intently as the eyeball descended towards the ce where the chaotic battle was taking ce with neither of the demon beast and human fighting to the death with each other noticing its presence, Xuan Hao watched as it passed right through the bear demon beast before entering the cave behind it before continuing inside.


    Whoosh~


    Knowing that it shouldn''t be up to any good and also feeling like he might get a chance to find out who the person behind the eyeball was, Xuan Hao descended from above before chasing after the eyeball. Making sure to keep a certain distance in case the owner of said eyeball decided to scan the surroundings again likest time.


    "Hm? This is¡­"


    However, after actually entering the cave, a frown could not help making its way on to his face, as he discovered that there was no spirit stones or spiritual herbs like what the person from the Explorer Union had talked about when describing the inside of the cave. Even the cksmithing notes and spiritual metals that Bai Ning had finally left the sect for was not present.


    Instead of all this, there were a fewrge lines carved into the ground and walls of the cave. Forming some kind of iplete formation.


    Looking at the direction of the eyeball going deeper into the cave, Xuan Hao didn''t think too much about this for now as he also made his way deeper inside the cave. Feeling even more curious as to what purpose the owner of the eyeball had in the now rather obvious attempt to get the disciples of his sect and the few young people from the Explorer Union toe here.


    Is it perhaps some demonic cultivator who wants to drain their qi and blood?


    As this thought inevitably made its way through his head as he made his way deeper inside the cave, Xuan Hao could not help preparing himself for the worst. Even if it was not some kind of demonic cultivator that had made use of the Explorer Union to lure his disciple and other disciples from his sect here, it was clear that the person behind all of this didn''t have any kind intentions.


    This only became clearer after he reached therge hall-like structure located at the end of the cave where the eyeball hade to stop as it kept its attention focused on the entrance. Clearly waiting for his disciple and the rest to defeat the bear demon beast outside and enter.


    Inside the hall and in the area just outside of it, a formation that would activate the moment someone opened the door of the hall itself had been carved into the ground¡­

 Chapter 1008 Bear Demon Beast’s Hidden Bloodline!

    <h4>Chapter 1008 Bear Demon Beast''s Hidden Bloodline!</h4>


    "A teleportation formation and a quiteplicated one at that¡­" Observing the formation, it did not take long before Xuan Hao realized what the purpose of the formation.


    However, this conclusion left him with the question of where this teleportation was connected to. At the same time also making him more interested in finding out just what the owner of the eyeball hovering just on the other side of the hall was up to. After all, from what he saw so far, it was rather obvious that the other party was trying their best to not leave any traces behind after taking his disciple and the rest of the disciples from the sect.


    Thinking about it, it would not be too surprising if the formation would self-destruct after having teleported them away. Having the cave copse to leave even less clues behind as to what had happened inside.


    "But¡­ I guess the other party didn''t expect for someone proficient in the Dao of Space to show up before the formation even had time to activate.


    Although the formation itself is far tooplicated for me to understand, the Dao of Space contained inside of it is at best rudimentary and should be the work of someone who hasn''tprehended the Dao of Space and is instead just channeling its power through the formation." Shaking his head as he muttered this while hidden from the eyeball hovering at the entrance to the hall, Xuan Hao slowly descended before stopping a few inches above the ground where the formation began.


    Given the obvious difference between his ownprehension of the Dao of Space and the creator of the formation, it would be a simple task for him to track the spatial nodes that the formation was anchored on and follow the path to where the formation ended.


    The only problem was that doing this would undoubtedly alert the person controlling the eyeball, but at this point in time, Xuan Hao didn''t really care too much about this, as it had be obvious howcking that person''sprehension of the Dao of Space was.


    "Even if the other party has some kind of powerful formation or is someone at the peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, it should still be rtively easy for me to escape¡­ Why not take this chance and find out who this person targeting the Star Shattering Sect is?" Narrowing both of his eyes as he said this, Xuan Hao was just about to force his divine sense into the teleportation- n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Roar-!


    Boom!


    However, a loud roar followed by a loud explosion interrupted him, as he turned around and realized that the bear demon beast had managed to forcefully break through to the Nascent Soul Realm under the pressure of fighting the older disciple at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm. Resulting in the rest of the Core Formation Realm Experts present jumping into action to help out, Bai Ning included.


    "Haaa¡­" Watching the sudden turn of events outside the cave, Xuan Hao could not help letting out an annoyed sigh as he full well understood there was no way for them to defeat the bear demon beast, as it had not only reached the Nascent Soul Realm, but also seemed to have awakened some kind of hidden bloodline that was constantly increasing its strength with each passing second.


    Even in the short time it had taken him toment over the sudden turn of events outside the cave, the hidden bloodline in the bear demon beast''s body had already suppressed the cloud tribtion before it could cause any problems and elevated its strength to the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not only that but given the dormant power in the hidden bloodline currently in the process of awakening, it looked like the bear demon beast''s strength would continue to increase until it reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. Maybe there was even some kind of inherent domain inside the hidden bloodline that would allow it to go all the way to the Domain Lord Realm!


    Without his help, it was obvious that his disciple and the rest stood no chance against this kind of cheating demon beast that seemed intent on ascending to the heavens in a single step.


    Whoosh~!


    However, before he had a chance to do anything, the eyeball that had remained stationary above the entrance to the hall moved. Flying out of the cave before a thick poisonous mist seeped out of it and entered the bear demon beast-


    ROOOOAR!?


    Instantly resulting in the strength of the bear demon beast forcefully dropping back down to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm.


    "It failed to break through!" Not at all aware of what had caused the strength of the demon beast to drop back down to the Core Formation Realm, the older disciple just thought it had failed to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm-


    Swish!


    Ptsh-!


    And taking full advantage of the bear demon beast''s confusion over its sudden drop in strength, he sessfully cut through its thick fur and pierced through its vital organs. Fatally wounding it to the degree that it had no way to continue fighting any longer and could only helplessly struggle for a few seconds before ultimately dying at the hands of the older disciple.


    Whoosh~


    Only after seeing the death of the bear demon beast and the fact that Bai Ning and the rest were preparing to enter the cave did the eyeball turn around and made its way back inside the cave again. Having sessfully removed the threat of the bear demon beast without being discovered by Bai Ning or the others.


    Swish-!


    Unfortunately, the moment it made its way back inside the cave again, a silver sword suddenly appeared in front of it-


    Boom!


    Giving the controller of the eyeball no time to react before it was destroyed by the silver sword.


    "Well¡­ Now the other party definitely knows about my presence¡­" Emerging from the shadows of the cave as he nced over the ce where the eyeball had been hovering just a short moment earlier, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he turned around and took a step forward. Appearing directly in front of the teleportation formation.


    Whoosh~


    Knowing that he did not have a lot of time after having destroyed the eyeball, his divine sense swept out and covered the entire teleportation formation before forcefully extracting the spatial coordinates of the different spatial nodes connected to it.


    "Got it!"


    Only a few secondster, he sessfully managed to deduce the location that the teleportation formation led to. Unfortunately, after examining the location in detail, he quickly realized that it was somewhere inside the Frozen Wastnd.


    Not only that, but it was somewhere far away from the Sky Empire''s side of the Frozen Wastnd and could be considered to be on the other side of the Frozen Wastnd. Facing an empire that he didn''t even know the name of¡­


    What in the world would someone from all the way over there want with disciples from my sect? Not to mention, howe there is a teleportation formation like this inside the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­


    Feeling a sense of unease at the sudden realization that the teleportation formation actually led to somewhere so far away, Xuan Hao didn''t dare to activate the formation to try and find out more about the person targeting the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if he could use the formation to teleport to the location on the other side of the Frozen Wastnd, his currentprehension of the Dao of Space was far from enough to teleport him back to the Azure Sky Kingdom. Not to mention, he had a feeling that the person who constructed the formation was not the same person who was behind the floating eyeball.


    Rustle~


    As he was lost in thought about what to do about the formation and the potential enemy on the other side of the Frozen Wastnd, the sound of footsteps andining voices could be hearding from the entrance to the cave as his disciple and the rest had finished resting and had entered the cave only to find it empty.


    "Haaa¡­ I should just destroy this ce for now and think about itter¡­" Havinge to a decision on what to do about the ce, Xuan Hao gently waved his hand-


    Rumble!


    Soon enough, resulting in his dao domain erupting to destroy the teleportation formation and the hall.


    "What is that!?"


    "Something is happening up ahead! Is it perhaps where the treasures are located?!"


    "Huh? Ah! Yes! The treasures are all up ahead!"


    Hearing the sound of people growing closer as all of them began rushing over upon hearing the sound of the underground hall and teleportation formation copsing and being reduced to nothing but dust, Xuan Hao retracted his dao domain before hiding himself.


    Whoosh~!


    However, before he did this, he threw out a few spirit stones, spiritual metal, and spiritual herbs around the nowrge empty cave for the disciples and members of the Explorer Union. Including a few cksmithing notes, he had found but hadn''t yet given to Elder Song to enter into the sect''s library.


    Given how hard they had worked for it, he felt that they should at least get something for their troubles. At least he wanted to ensure that Bai Ning got what he came looking for, as he hoped it would make him more excited and interested in leaving the sect for other adventures in future where he could in turn also increase hisbat experience.

 Chapter 1009 Underground Treasury

    <h4>Chapter 1009 Underground Treasury</h4>


    "Huh? The artifact stopped working?" At the same time Xuan Hao destroyed the eyeball back in the cave, the old Domain Lord Realm Expert in charge of watching over the artifact controlling the eyeball could not help showing a surprised expression on his face as he said this.


    Although Xuan Hao had expected to be found out at the moment he attacked and destroyed the eyeball, he didn''t think that the person controlling the eyeball was just someone at the Domain Lord Realm.


    For this reason, the next few steps of covering his tracks and destroying the teleportation formation after realizing it was anchored somewhere on the other side of the Frozen Wastnd so quickly.


    This was all done with the thought that the one controlling the eyeball was someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. However, due to the fact that the old man controlling the eyeball had only reached the Domain Lord Realm, he did not manage to pick up what had happened and was just left in a state of confusion. Not understanding what had just happened to the artifact that was working perfectly fine only a few seconds earlier.


    "Maybe something unexpected happened on the other side¡­ Looks like I will have to contact Lord White Soul¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced in the direction of therge doors of the hallway that Lord White Soul had left through earlier, the old man could not help shivering in fear at the thought of having to go and exin something unexpected happened to one of the ethereal eyes that had been made using several precious and hard to find spiritual metals and other rare materials.


    Even if he knew that he should inform Lord White Soul, he could not help hesitating, as he very clearly knew that he would be the one to suffer the consequences if something really did end up happening to the ethereal eye.


    And given his Domain Lord Realm cultivation base, there would be no way for him to repay the cost of a single ethereal eye without working like a ve for the two or three hundred years he had left to live. Something that would undoubtedly mean giving up any and all chances of reaching the Soul Ascension Realm in the future¡­


    Maybe I''m just overreacting, it could just be that the ethereal eye powered down after they sessfully entered the cave. By now, they have probably reached the hall with the teleportation formation.


    Knowing how bad it would be if something really did happen to the ethereal eye, he convinced himself that nothing out of the ordinary had happened and the group he watched over should have already proceed to enter the cave and were about to pass through the teleportation formation.


    Standing up the next moment, the old man who had managed to convince himself that nothing had happened to the ethereal eye, made his way towards the exit that was guarded by a Domain Lord Realm Expert who was in charge of watching over the hall with the ethereal eyes inside of it.


    "Hm? Did your group pass through the teleportation formation already?"


    "Yes, everything is done." Feeling a bit nervous on the inside as he answered the person in charge of guarding the entrance, he made sure not to show any of this as he calmly left the hall after getting a quick nod of approval in response.


    Considering that he was the strongest person among the people present inside the hall and only happened to take on the job of watching over one of the ethereal eyes due to having been low on spirit stones, the person in charge of watching the exit didn''t think twice after hearing that it was over. The fact that he was faster than the rest could also be considered normal given the fact that he was older and wiser than the rest of the people present in the hall.


    Rustle~


    So, after noting down that the old man had sessfullypleted his task, he no longer thought about it. Not even bothering to go up and check the ethereal eye, as it was clear that it had already been powered down.


    Only after everyone had finished in their tasks inside the hall did a general inspection of the ethereal eyes take ce¡­ And it was at this moment that it was discovered that there was a fault with one of the ethereal eyes.


    However, in the end, it just looked like a mistake in how it had been powered down and didn''t cause any real damage to the eye and after the elder guarding the hall told them that the old man in charge of the ethereal eye had powered it down on his did they understand how he might have made a mistake and damaged the artifact in the process.


    In the end, the repairs ended up costing the old man around half of the spirit stones he got frompleting the task and was soon forgotten after this.


    The only trace of something having gone wrong would only appear yearster in the future, but at that point in time, it would be impossible to deduce where this mistake had urred.


    ¡­


    "The sound from earlier came from this ce!" Back at the cave that Xuan Hao had filled with all sorts of different things that would be useful for those in the Foundation Establishment Realm and the Core Formation Realm, the older disciple of the sect who had taken the lead in charging inside after hearing the sound of the hall and teleportation formation getting destroyed called out to the people behind him-


    "Huh!?" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Before freezing on the spot upon discovering the seemingly countless precious things scattered all over the cave in front of him.


    Although he had reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm, it was his first time encountering such arge number of spirits stones, artifacts, spiritual herbs, and other precious materials gathered in a single location.


    The only ce where he had in essence seen so many precious materials gathered in one location was when he had visited the spiritual herb fields at the Ninth Star Peak, or the piles of spiritual metals piled up at the core of the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces.


    Never had he ever encounter anything like it when adventuring outside the sect, something that had made him initially doubt the description of the person from the Explorer Union, but¡­ Now faced with the real thing, he had nothing to say. Only capable of remaining frozen on the spot with a speechless expression on his face while the rest of the people from the caravan slowly made their way inside the cave.


    "To think it was real¡­"


    However, much like the older disciple who had entered therger "Wha- This is¡­"


    "Wah~ So many shiny things~!"


    "To think it was real¡­"


    However, much like the older disciple who had entered therger section of the cave where all the precious things were stored, they also ended up freezing on the spot as they stared speechlessly at the countless treasures in front of them. Not knowing what to say as none of them had ever imagined that the description given by the person from the Explorer Union would actually be urate- No, it would be more urate to say that it had been an understatement¡­


    In the end, Xuan Hao dumping a few of the things he had picked up during his journey inside the mystic realm and other adventures and considered useless was worth far more than just a few things that would be useful to those in the Foundation Establishment and Core Formation Realm. On the other hand, the total value of all the treasures stacked up inside the cave could be considered to exceed the value of all the treasures carried by a normal Nascent Soul Realm Expert at the middle stages of the realm¡­


    "So¡­ How are we going to divide the treasure¡­?"


    Only when one of the weaker disciples in the Foundation Establishment Realm asked this question did everyone start to wake up from their frozen states and started to discuss loudly with each other how to properly divide the treasures among each other.


    "cksmithing notes¡­"


    Not at all caring about any of this, Bai Ning instead began searching through the treasures for the cksmithing notes together with Hui Ying who had volunteered to help him out instead of participating in the discussion that was happening back at the entrance to therger section of the cave.


    "¡­"


    Observing all of this happening from a corner of the cave where he had hidden himself before the older disciple had shown up, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly after realizing that he had thrown out more than just a few useful things.


    But in the end, he did not really care too much about it, as it could indeed be considered useless junk that just took up space inside his interspatial ring. Not to mention, most of it would be going to the disciples of his sect anyway¡­

 Chapter 1010 Grand Sect Meeting

    <h4>Chapter 1010 Grand Sect Meeting</h4>


    Staying around to watch as Bai Ning got his hands on the cksmithing notes and blueprints he had scattered around among the other treasures inside the cave, Xuan Hao began making his way back to the sect after making sure that there wasn''t any other teleportation formation located around that the people behind the first teleportation might be capable of using to check out why the teleportation formation had been destroyed together with the floating eyeball. Not feeling too worried about the owner of the eyeball showing up given just how far away he or she should be from the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Even if the other party was more skilled in the Dao of Space than the teleportation formation suggested, it would still be impossible to reach the Azure Sky Kingdom from the other side of the Frozen Wastnd in a short period of time. Not to mention, there were also the powerful demonic cultivators lurking in the core of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Without proper preparation, it would be impossible to cross the core section of the Frozen Wastnd safely¡­ And that was not mentioning the current chaotic situation of the Frozen Wastnd where even True Demon Realm demonic cultivators could be found roaming in the outer parts of the Frozen Wastnd.


    In a sense, it might not be too shocking if a demonic cultivator surpassing the True Demon Realm ended up appearing in the core part of the Frozen Wastnd¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Well¡­ If such a powerful demonic cultivator really does end up appearing inside the Frozen Wastnd, I hope they won''t go anywhere near the Sky Empire¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about how powerful an Earth Immortal Realm demon beast like the cloud demon beast had been, Xuan Hao could only pray that a demonic cultivator that powerful wouldn''t end up appearing anywhere near the Sky Empire.


    After all, even if the Sky Empire had a few Soul Ascension Realm Experts and the presence of three different- Four differentrge religions, it had no way to deal with an existenceparable to the Earth Immortal Realm. Not to mention, the one to suffer first would not be the Sky Empire but would instead be his Star Shattering Sect located at what could essentially be considered the border between the Sky Empire and the Frozen Wastnd.


    Maybe the location of the Star Shattering Sect will end up benefiting the Sky Empire¡­


    Smiling wryly as he thought about this, Xuan Hao shook his head before passing through ayer of clouds and descending back down towards the Ninth Star Peak.


    Given the improvements his movement technique had received after heprehended the Dao of Space and his strength took another step forward, the distance between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Shattered Star Peak could be almost instantly covered. Taking no more than a few steps with his current strength.


    Of course, he could always use the Dao of Space and try to teleport all the way back to the Shattered Star Peaks, but¡­ Given that he did not really have that much experience when it came to things like teleportation, outside of the short distance teleportation used during fights, he ran the risk of idently teleporting into a rock, a tree or possibly some unexpecting disciple''s bathtub¡­ Not really something he wanted to run the risk of doing to save a few seconds of time¡­


    Whoosh~!


    However, afternding on the Ninth Star Peak and using his divine sense to scan across the Shattered Star Peaks like he would normally do when returning to check up on how his disciples were doing and how much stronger the elders and disciples had grown, he was shocked to discover that there were more than a dozen new Nascent Soul Realm auras present on the Seventh Star Peak¡­ And observing the owner of these new auras more clearly, it became obvious that none of them were elders or disciples from the Star Shattering Sect.


    Where did all of these peoplee from? Are they perhaps negotiators sent over by the different major kingdoms? But if that was the case, there would be no need to send so many of them. Not to mention, it also looks like there are quite a few unfamiliar Peak Core Formation Realm Experts present as well¡­


    Investigating the new and unfamiliar auras who seemed to have appeared inside the sect, Xuan Hao discovered that there was an evenrger number of unfamiliar Core Formation Realm Experts. Most of which had either reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm or were at the Late stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    This number of experts that had seemingly appeared out of nowhere was quite surprising. Especially when considering that Xuan Hao felt certain that these people were not any of the elders who had been ced in charge of the different branch sects located across the new territory of the sect.


    Swish-!


    Noticing that Elder Song had left his courtyard and was at the same location as Feng Chen, Zu Fei and a few other elders from the sect, Xuan Hao decided to go over and ask them instead of just specting on his own.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao had just begun making his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song, and the rest of the important elders of the Star Shattering Sect had gathered together inside a meeting hall located close to the Qi Spring Lake at the center of the sect.


    Be it Feng Chen, Zu Fei, Shu Yao, the two Wang brothers, even more secluded elders who didn''t participate in most normal meetings like Elder Dust Fairy had shown up.


    "So, have everyone arrived?" At this time, Elder Song who had been looking over everyone present turned to ask one of the newer elders of the sect who had just recently broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Yes, Elder Song, everyone who could show up, has shown up for this meeting. Outside of Grand Elder Xuan, everyone is here!


    As for the different sects that are under our management¡­ A little over 700 sects have shown up. Although, most of these representatives are either the ancestors or sect leaders of these sects. Even a few of the sects from the recently captured Rock Sky Kingdom have managed to make the journey and show up with the short time avable to them.


    If we wait for another few days, there will undoubtedly be more people showing up for the meeting, but I doubt they will be strong enough to make a difference. All things considered, I think we should start the meeting now and get the matters of how to deal with the rest of those major kingdoms sorted out before they get a chance to cause trouble likest time!" Responding to Elder Song, the young Nascent Soul Realm Elder stepped back and nervously looked up at Elder Song.


    Even though he had suggested that they started the meeting, he did not hold any real power to do so and could only patiently wait for Elder Song to give him the go ahead to begin the meeting.


    After all, even if he knew that the most powerful elder of the sect, Grand Elder Xuan, didn''t like participating in official matters like this, he also understood that today''s meeting was far more important than any other meetings that had taken ce since the creation of the Star Shattering Sect. Maybe onlyparable to the creation of the Star Shattering Sect in the past.


    The main reason for this, was the subject of the meeting that involved not only the ns for dealing with the different major kingdoms, but also how the new territory of the Star Shattering Sect was going to get divided after the fall of these major kingdoms.


    In the end, all of the sects who had shown up today had alle with the express purpose of trying to be put in charge of some of the more important resources that were located inside these major kingdoms. Understanding very well that if they could be put in charge of collecting resources from some of therge spiritual herb fields, sprit stone mines or spiritual metal mines, their sect would experience a leap in strengthpared to the past.


    Especially so when considering that most of the sects present at most had someone in the Core Formation Realm. Controlling a rich spirit stone mine might allow a sect like that to finally produce someone in the Nascent Soul Realm. Allowing their sect to experience a leap in strength that they could only dream about before!


    "Indeed¡­ It looks like everyone is here, we shouldn''t wait for Grand Elder Xuan, I doubt he is interested in something time consuming like this in the first ce¡­" Smiling wryly as he said this, Elder Song gave the go ahead for the young Nascent Soul Realm Elder to go and inform the different representatives of the sects anxiously waiting, that the meeting was going to begin.

 Chapter 1011 "Happily" Joining the Gathering

    <h4>Chapter 1011 "Happily" Joining the Gathering</h4>


    Just at the moment that the young Nascent Soul Realm Elder left the meeting hall and made his way towards the buildings that had been dedicated to housing the hundreds of different representatives who had shown up to participate in the meeting, Xuan Hao arrived at the entrance to the meeting hall. Bumping into the young Nascent Soul Realm Elder who had just stepped out of the meeting.


    "G-Grand Elder Xuan?!"


    "No need to be so nervous, I''m just here to look for Elder Song, you can just ignore me and continue what you were doing before."


    "Y-y-yes! I-I will get going!" Fidgeting nervously with his hands, the young Nascent Soul Realm Elder didn''t waste a second after hearing what Xuan Hao said and soon disappeared in the direction of one of the buildings filled with representatives from the different sects and other powers located across the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    "¡­"


    Am I really that scary¡­?


    Not knowing what to make of the reaction from the elder just now, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what had caused the elder to react like that. Hopefully, it had nothing to do with his appearance¡­


    Crack~


    Deciding not to think too much about it, Xuan Hao made his way into the meeting hall and was instantly met with the curious gazes of a little over thirty elders who had all at least reached the Nascent Soul Realm. In a sense, outside of the elders in charge of guarding the different branch sects, almost all of the important elders of the sect seemed to have gathered together inside the meeting hall.


    "Am I interrupting something¡­?" Not having expected to be met with such a situation the moment he entered the meeting hall where he had sensed Elder Song''s presence, Xuan Hao showed a somewhat awkward smile as he said this. Feeling quite embarrassed at having seemingly barged into some kind of important meeting between the higher ups of the sect.


    "Xuan Hao! Haha, not at all, we were just in the process of making a fewst-minute preparations for the uing meeting with the different sects and other powers inside our territory."


    "Uing meeting? Is this perhaps rted to therge number of unfamiliar people who are currently gathered at the sect?"


    "Yes, they are all representatives from the different sects and powers inside our territory. Although¡­ Most of these representatives are actually just the sect masters, family heads, ancestors and so on of these different powers."


    Jumping forward to exin the situation before anyone else had the chance to do so, Wang Hu, who had been one of the original Nascent Soul Realm Elders in the Flying Sword Sect and had gotten along quite well with him, exined the matter in detail while at the same time making sure to dismiss his earlier worry of possibly having barged in during an important meeting.


    "I see¡­ So, that is why there are so many unfamiliar people inside the sect." Nodding his head in understanding as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao finally understood where therge number of people had appeared from. At the same time, he also took this opportunity to inspect the different elders of the sect.


    Outside of Feng Chen, Shu Yao, and Elder Song, whom he would often interact with and had a far clearer picture of how they had been doing since the establishment of the Star Shattering Sect, the same could not be said for the rest of the elders, who he didn''t really interact with.


    For example, the two twin brothers, Wang Hu and Wang Lan had both managed to far surpass their earlier cultivation at the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and were now both in the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Far surpassing most other Nascent Soul Realm elders in the sect and even showing some promise of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    Other than them, there was also Chi Hu, that he had helped join the sect in the past, who had already managed to step into the middle stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Reaching the Fifth Stage of the Nascent Soul realm. Although not as big an improvement as the two Wang brothers, it was still far better than the average elder of the sect. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    However, out of everyone present, the person who had made the biggest improvement was not any of the former elders of the Flying Sword Sect, but was instead an elder called Shen Xuefeng, who had originally been from the spring Flower Sect.


    Although he had not seen her more than a few times, he was still taken aback when he saw her current cultivation base, Eighth stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Even whenpared to his own disciples, her growth was not far behind and possibly even faster considering that it was harder to improve in the Nascent Soul Realm and his two disciples currently in the Nascent Soul Realm were still in the earlier stages of the realm.


    Without a doubt, Shen Xuefeng would definitely be able to break through to the Domain Lord Realm in the future!


    Feeling himself thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help growing a bit more curious about the rest of the disciples of the sect. Wondering if there was anyone as talented as Shen Xuefeng, whom he had not discovered yet among them.


    Maybe I should start doing public lectures for the younger disciples again, who knows, I might find myself another disciple if I''m lucky enough¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao turned his gaze away from the gathering of sect elders standing in front of him with curious expressions stered all over their faces. Making it more than obvious that most of them were curious about why he had suddenly shown up inside the meeting hall all of a sudden.


    "Ehm, I just wanted to know why so many unfamiliar people had shown up inside the sect during my short absence. No need to worry about anything, I will be taking my leave again." Not wanting to worry these elders into thinking he had shown up because something bad had happened, Xuan Hao hurriedly said this before making his way towards the doors that were still wide open. Not intending to stay around for any longer now that he had the answer to the question he hade for.


    Although the person who answered him wasn''t Elder Song whom he had originallye to ask, it didn''t really matter as the oue wouldn''t have been much different- No¡­ Thinking about it, if it was Elder Song answering the question, he would undoubtedly have been given a far longer exnation and would have ended up staying around for at least half an hour as he exined the reason and goals of the gathering¡­


    As he thought about this, Xuan Hao secretly felt happy that Wang Hu had jumped out to exin the situation to him before Elder Song got a chance to do it. At least he saved a lot of time because of this-


    "Wait up."


    However, just as he was about to leave while secretly feeling happy that he didn''t end up listening to a half an hour-long exnation of the goals and reason for the meeting, a familiar voice called out behind him. Making hime to a stop with one foot out the door.


    "Elder Song¡­ Is there anything I can help with¡­?" Feeling a bit reluctant to stay around and possibly get caught up in some kind of oveplicated exnation of the political situation of the sect and the different powers under it, Xuan Hao could not help unconsciously swallowing his saliva as he turned around and did his best to calmly face Elder Song who had stepped forward and was currently smiling in his direction.


    "Ah, Grand Elder Xuan, I know that you normally don''t like participating in these kinds of meetings, but I think that it would be a good idea for you to participate in this one. Not only because of the importance of today''s meeting, but also because I think it would be good for you to show yourselves to these sects.


    After all, they have only heard about what you have done over the years and have never seen you in person. As one might say, it''s hard to believe what others say and easier to believe what one sees in front of them. Hopefully Grand Elder Xuan has a bit time to spare for this asion¡­"


    "¡­ Sure¡­"


    Hearing what Elder Song said, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine. Although Elder Song was far weaker than him and was nowhere near being a threat to him with his Nascent Soul Realm cultivation base, something in the way he was looking at him was far more terrifying than any of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm Experts he had faced back in the mystic realm¡­

 Chapter 1012 Grand Meeting Hall

    <h4>Chapter 1012 Grand Meeting Hall</h4>


    "Haha, that is great! I''m sure everyone will be excited to learn that you are joining the meeting." Laughing happily after hearing Xuan Hao agreeing to participate in the meeting, Elder Song pretended like nothing had happened before signaling for one of the Core Formation Realm Elders standing guard close to the entrance of the meeting hall to prepare an extra seat for the meeting.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao could only let out a somewhat reluctant sigh as he made his way back into the meeting hall in the direction of Feng Chen and the rest of the elderly.


    Considering that he was now going to participate in the meeting, he wanted to at the very least get a better understanding of what the meeting would be about. Even if he couldn''t get an in-depth exnation given that it looked like the meeting was just about to start from what he could see, he at least wanted to know when it would be possible for him to sneak away without causing anymotion after his introduction.


    "Well then, let''s get going to the Grand Meeting Hall."


    However, before he even had a chance to attempt a conversation with Feng Chen or any of the other elders present, Elder Song happily announced this before leaving together with the rest of the elders. Leaving Xuan Hao frozen on the spot for a short time before ultimately turning around to follow after Elder Song and the rest of the elders.


    ¡­


    Following behind the rest of the elders as he caught up with Feng Chen, Shu Yao and Zu Fei who were walking somewhat in the back of the group of elders while chatting with each other, Xuan Hao managed to learn a bit more in-depth information on the meeting itself and what Elder Song hoped to archive with it.


    At the same time, he also managed to learn that the Grand Meeting Hall mentioned by Elder Song was a brand-new building located at the base of the Seventh Star Peak with the sole purpose of serving as a ce for the elders of the sect to meet with the representatives of the different sects, family ns and other powers inside the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    After all, although it wouldn''t be a problem to hold the meetings inside the main sect at the Seventh Star Peak at the moment, it would undoubtedly be hard to do when the size of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory expanded to incorporate tens of thousands of smaller powers.


    In a sense, even the Grand Meeting Hall that had been constructed at the base of the Seventh Star Peak was not a permanent answer to this future problem and could only be considered a temporary solution until a muchrger facility for the management of the different powers got constructed in the growing city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak.


    The main reason why the structure that would be used for the management of the different powers under the Star Shattering Sect would be located outside the Shattered Star Peaks was rather simple, as there would be a lot of people not from the Star Shattering Sect constantly moving around inside such a building.


    Although the Star Shattering Sect didn''t really have to worry too much about enemy spies at the moment, as the sect didn''t really have any real enemies targeting them inside the Sky Empire, this might not be the case in the future. Especially considering the fact that there was no way that the Star Shattering Sect would be limited to the border territory of the Sky Empire¡­


    Well, considering that Elder Song is preparing tond a final blow on thoserge kingdoms, it won''t be long before the Star Shattering Sect''s territory borders the core region of the Sky Empire¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help growing a bit nervous when he realized that the Star Shattering Sect might soon end up falling out with the Sky Empire.


    Even if therge empire didn''t care much for what power under them was in control of their border territory, they would undoubtedly start to worry when the entire northern border of their empire was suddenly under a single power that was also starting to expand into their core territory.


    At that point in time, it would honestly be surprising if the Sky Empire didn''t start to consider the Star Shattering Sect a hostile entity.


    As for why he was feeling nervous about this even though his strength had already surpassed the ancestor of the Sky Empire, that was due to the existence of the three religions that existed in the capital of the Sky Empire. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Religions and sects had always been hostile to each other across in question had some degree of control over.


    the continent for as long as history was recorded. Although the reason for this was attributed to different things, like the different cultivation paths, one preaching of serving a higher power, while the other wanted to go against the heavens that the higher power in question had some degree of control over.


    But this was far from enough for them to reach the current level of hostility that naturally existed between them. After all, those from the different kingdoms and empires also walked the path of cultivating the dao most of the time.


    "Maybe they tolerate the kingdoms and empires because they can still gather faith from them, and their strength is not at a level where it threatens them.


    From what little I actually know about the different religions on the continent, they might not be so friendly to the empires and kingdoms at the core of the continent who has cultivators above the Soul Ascension Realm¡­" Falling a bit to the back of the group as he muttered this to himself while gazing down towards therge building that had appeared at the base of the Seventh Star Peak, Xuan Hao could only to try and guess the reason behind the seemingly inherent hostility between the different sects and religions on the continent.


    Maybe when he went to the core of the continent in the future, where the different religions were located, would he be able to find an answer to this question. At the same time, he might also get a chance to find out just how strong the gods that these religions preached about were. At least, he felt certain that they should have exceeded the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Rustle~


    Just at this moment, Shu Yao, who had been pushed away by an all too eager Zu Fei, who wanted nothing more than to use this precious opportunity to chat with Feng Chen, slowed down until she reached Xuan Hao.


    Seeing Shu Yao suddenly appearing beside him, Xuan Hao turned his attention away from the future sh with the religions of the Sky Empire and instead turned to look curiously at Shu Yao, wondering if there was something she wanted.


    "Hehe~ No need to look at me like that, I''m not going to bite you~"


    "Ahm- Is there something I can help with?" Almost feeling himself choking at the sudden flirtatiousment, Xuan Hao awkwardly smiled as he asked this. Partly praying that she had note to him just because she was bored and wanted to poke fun at him.


    "Oh~? I do indeed have a little something that requires your assistance~" However, Shu Yao didn''t listen to his inner thoughts as she teasingly asked this with a small smile on her face.


    "¡­ What is it¡­?" Not knowing what to do in this kind of situation, Xuan Hao could only let out an internal sigh before saying this. From what he had seen happen to Feng Chen or the other elders who had been targeted by Shu Yao when she wanted to tease someone, he understood that it would be best not to say anything and just go with the flow.


    "Buuu~! You are no fun Elder Xuan!" Frowning visibly as she said this, Shu Yao quickly gave up on teasing him as her expression became a bit more seriouspared to before. "Any way, I did want to ask you about something, the blue deer that you left me to take care of has grown quite a bit and I was wondering if you had any ns for it or intended for me to continue taking care of it.


    Ah! I don''t mean to say that I don''t want to take care of it, it''s just that it has grown quite a bitpared to before and I wanted to know if it would be fine for me to build it a bit more permanent home if I am to continue looking after it in the future."


    "Huh? Blue deer- Ah! Yeah, you can continue to look after it!" Hearing what Shu Yao said, Xuan Hao froze for a short second before nodding his head in approval. Having briefly forgotten about the blue deer he had left in her care¡­

 Chapter 1013 Future of the Blue Deer and Speculations of the Different Powers

    <h4>Chapter 1013 Future of the Blue Deer and Spections of the Different Powers</h4>


    "Great, I was hoping for you to say that. Now that I think about it, I also think Zu Fei will be quite overjoyed over this news, as she won''t have to guard her water lotuses against the blue deer after it gets a proper home." Smiling happily after hearing Xuan Hao''s response, Shu Yao could still not help chuckling to herself after mentioning the unfortunate fate of Zu Fei''s water lotuses.


    "This¡­" Outside of the one time he had found Zu Fei trying to get the blue deer away from the water lotuses she had been growing inside the Qi Spring Lake, it looked like the blue deer had decided to visit the water lotuses a few more times after he had left for the mystic realm¡­


    "Hehe~ No need to think too much about it, the number of water lotuses eaten by the blue deer over the past few months are negligiblepared to how many little Zu Fei has grown. Not to mention, they helped the blue deer rapidly increase its strength in the Nascent Soul Realm and can be considered to have be quite sought after among the beast tamers of the sect because of this.


    Now that I think about it, the water lotuses that was eaten by the blue deer are nowhere near the number of water lotuses that have been scheduled to go to the beast tamers when they are fully grown."


    "¡­"


    Hearing Shu Yao suddenly start defending the blue deer''s action of obvious that she had grown attached to the blue deer during the time he had left it in her care.


    stealing Zu Fei''s water lotuses before he had a chance to say anything, Xuan Hao could only roll his eyes as he saw the expression on Shu Yao''s face. Even from a single nce, it was obvious that she had grown attached to the blue deer during the time he had left it in her care.


    Considering that he had now officially handed it over to her, he felt like he would be hearing more about the blue deer whenever he met her in the future. Not only that, but he also had a feeling that the blue deer might be able to break through to the Domain Realm faster than he had first expected with someone like Shu Yao taking care of it.


    For some odd reason, he had a feeling that most of the water lotuses that Zu Fei seemed to have decided to give the beast tamers to help increase the strength of the sect''s demon beasts would end up going to the blue deer. Thinking about it, it wasn''t that bad of a thing, as the talent of the blue deer far surpassed any of the demon beasts under the care of the sect''s beast tamers.


    If it could break through to the Domain Lord Realm faster because of a constant supply of water lotuses, it wouldn''t be considered a loss for the sect, the only people losing out would be the demon beasts who would originally have eaten the water lotuses that ended up going to the blue deer, but¡­ All things considered; they should be able to get their hands on them again in the future after the blue deer had managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    The only thing that worried him slightly about this possible future arrangement, was the fact that the blue deer might not want to give up on the water lotuses after reaching the Domain Lord Realm. Even if their usefulness for its cultivation would be close to negligible.


    But thinking a bit more about it, there was no way Elder Song, who was overseeing where all the resources inside the sect went, would allow something like that to happen.


    Helping it reach the Domain Lord Realm faster might be tolerable to him, but gobbling up resources that would normally help increase the sect''s strength for no reason was uneptable!


    "Hm? Already at the entrance?" Lost in his own thoughts as he continued moving down towards the Grand Meeting Hall, Xuan Hao suddenly heard a voice call out to him as he realized that he had already reached the entrance of the Grand Meeting Hall.


    "Grand Elder Xuan, your seating spot is located close to the center of the Grand Meeting Hall together with the Sect Master, Grand Elder Shu Yao and a few other important elders." Coming up to him at this moment, a slightly older disciple that seemed to have just recently broken through to the Core Formation Realm and was currently standing guard at the entrance together with a few other disciples and elders, politely said this before pointing in the direction of a path heading towards the core section of the Grand Meeting Hall.


    A short distance behind him, the other disciples who had been standing guard at the entrance were all looking over towards him enviously, as they obviously missed the chance toe over and talk with.


    Am I perhaps more popr among the disciples of the sect than I first thought?


    "Thank you." Thanking the Core Formation Realm disciple in front of him as these thoughts ran through his head, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that he was more popr among the sect''s disciples than he had thought.


    But then again, it was obvious that he would be popr among the disciples of the sect. After all, he was still the strongest person in the Star Shattering Sect¡­ And given that cultivators strived to reach a higher realm, it was obvious that they would have a sense of curiosity and admiration towards the strongest person in the sect.


    Looking more closely at the way that these disciples were looking at him, it suddenly became rather obvious that they were secretly hoping that he would take them in as his disciple and tell them about how they had some kind of hidden potential that could help their cultivation soar far above their peers¡­ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao slowly made his way inside the Grand Meeting Hall together with the rest of the elders.


    ¡­


    "Both of the Star Shattering Sect''s Grand Elders are participating in the meeting!? Wasn''t it said that Grand Elder Xuan didn''t participate in the sect''s internal management and focused all his attention on cultivating and training his disciples!?"


    "Yes¡­ That is what we managed to learn about him from asking around among the disciples of the sect. Not only that, but apparently, he also recently stopped holding lectures over the past few months due to him focusing on training his disciples.


    To be honest, I don''t understand why someone like that would suddenly decide to participate in today''s meeting. Even if it''s an important meeting that will carve up the future territory of the Star Shattering Sect, there shouldn''t be a need for- Ah! Unless¡­"


    "Hm? Did you think of something, old man, you better share with the rest of us!"


    Hmph! Calm down you stinking old fossil! The reason for the appearance of Grand Elder Xuan might have to do with the recent movements of the major kingdoms. Even if the Star Shattering Sect is far stronger than them, it is obvious that they have some sort of secret backing. The reason for Grand Elder Xuan''s appearance at today''s meeting might be because of this¡­"


    "Indeed, but for it to require Grand Elder Xuan''s appearance, I fear that the secret backing of these major kingdoms are far more powerful than we first expected¡­"


    "Huh? Secret backing? Howe I haven''t heard about this before? But then again, if that is really the case, the appearance of Grand Elder Xuan makes sense¡­ And did you just call me stinking old fossil?! Are you trying to pick a fight!?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao and the rest of the Star Shattering Sect''s elders made their way to the Grand Meeting Hall, the news of the meeting starting together with the news that Xuan Hao was going to participate in the meeting rapidly began to spread among the different representatives gathered together at the Seventh Star Peak.


    Among which, the most popr opinion was that the appearance of Xuan Hao at the meeting had something to do with the secret backing of the major kingdoms.


    After all, given that some of these sects and other powers had once been part of some of the major kingdoms that had already fallen to the Star Shattering Sect, it made sense that they had heard something about the secret technique and the fact that it had been provided by an outside force.


    Even if they had no idea who this outside power was nor how strong they were, they understood that it would be the main force when it came to resisting the Star Shattering Sect''s expansion into the remaining major kingdoms¡­ And given that even the strongest elder of the sect had now shown up at today''s meeting, these different powers could not help specting about how strong this hidden power was to cause such a reaction from the Star Shattering Sect.

 Chapter 1014 Suspicious People~

    <h4>Chapter 1014 Suspicious People~</h4>


    The inside of the Grand Meeting Hall was made up of a singlerge chamber with a little over a thousand seating spots that formed a half circle centered around a few seats located at the front of the half circle. Among these seats, it was obvious that the one at the center was reserved for Feng Chen, the current sect master of the Star Shattering Sect, while the few seats located beside him should be for the important elders of the sect.


    So, that is where I will be sitting¡­


    Not knowing how to feel about the attention he would inevitably end up drawing because of this, Xuan Hao unconsciously nced in the direction of Elder Song, who in return gave him a victories grin. Fully aware of the fact that it would be impossible for him to sneak away in the middle of the meeting without being noticed.


    "Well yed, old man¡­" letting out a sigh as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao gave up on his n of trying to escape in the middle of the meeting.


    At least, it could not be considered a total waste of time, as he would get an opportunity to get a better understanding of the sect''s current state and the state of the different powers inside of its now ratherrge territory.


    Rustle~


    Not wasting any time aftering to this decision, he quickly made his way towards the mostfortable looking seat before sitting down and closing his eyes. Given that none of the representatives had arrived yet, it would likely still be some time before the meeting began. Time that could be used to try and figure out how he was going to improve his different professions after the meeting came to an end, the most important of which was cksmithing, as there was no way he wanted to end up in a situation where he wouldn''t be able to help Bai Ning due to his own ipetence on the subject.


    Like this, time slowly passed as the different representatives of the sects and other powers across the Star Shattering Sect''s territory slowly made their way into the Grand Meeting Hall¡­


    "Looks like everyone is here. Ehm! Everyone, wee to the first official meeting involving the future distribution of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory." As everyone had made their way inside the Grand Meeting Hall, Feng Chen got up from his seat and began the meeting.


    "Given that the size of the territory has already grown to a degree where it will be hard to manage without the help of smaller powers like yourselves overseeing some of the less important areas of the territory, we of course want to ensure that you also get your share of benefits and¡­" First and most importantly going over the main objectives of the meeting that could be boiled down to finding out who would manage what inside the now muchrger territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course, the most important resources would still be controlled directly by the Star Shattering Sect, with the main focus of the meeting instead being on the smaller mines and spiritual herb fields that would be distributed among these smaller powers.


    How boring¡­


    Watching how Feng Chen began exining the meeting followed by a heated discussion between the smaller powers starting as they tried to argue for why they would be the best choice for managing a certain resource spot, Xuan Hao could not help rolling his eyes in boredom.


    Although he had already expected something like this to happen when he had first reluctantly agreed to join the meeting, he was still a bit disappointed that nothing more than a few discussions on resource management was what came up at the meeting. Even if he knew that this was something important for the future growth of the Star Shattering Sect, it didn''t make it any less boring.


    The only interesting thing was the asional verbal fights that took ce when two of the smaller powers were eyeing the same mine and neither wanted to give up on getting their hands on it.


    Unfortunately, when something like that happened, Elder Song would be quick to step in and calm both parties down beforeing up with a solution that helped both parties involved.


    For the first time in a long time, Xuan Hao found himself wishing that Elder Song wasn''t so good at these kinds of things. At least the meeting would have been far more entering if that was the case.


    Rustle~


    "Hm?"


    Feeling the familiar sensation of something moving around inside his robe, Xuan Hao could not help ncing at his sleeve as a small fluffy head poked out.


    "I almost forgot about you. Finallying out of hiding? Don''t cause any trouble in here!"


    Squeak~!


    Letting out azy squeak in response to his question, the rabbit demon beast who had fallen asleep inside his sleeve curiously began to examine its surroundings with interest.


    Compared to the mystic realm that was filled with all sorts of exotic vegetation, forests, mountains and demon beasts, the current noisy room filled with humans who were all too busy discussing with each other was far from anything that the rabbit demon beast had ever seen before.


    If not for the fact that Xuan Hao had given it a warning just now, it would already have jumped out of his sleeve to examine the humans in front of it. After all, it had already seen through their strength and understood that there was no way for them to fight against it.


    Squeak?


    Observing the humans for a few minutes without doing anything, the rabbit demon beast could not help turning its head up towards Xuan Hao before letting out a sound to catch his attention.


    "Is there something wrong?" Not knowing what the rabbit demon beast wanted, Xuan Hao asked curiously as he turned his attention away from the ongoing discussion centered around a spirit stone mine that more than 10 of the smaller powers present wanted to get their hands on.


    Squeak! Squeak, squeeeaaaak!


    Not able to properlymunicate due to thenguage barrier between a human and a demon beast, the rabbit demon beast could only try its best to exin what it wanted to say by moving around its small head and paws, while also trying its best to use the connection that had been established between them after the blood contract to convey the meaning behind these gestures.


    "You mean to say that something is off about one of the people here?" Although he didn''t fully understand what the rabbit demon beast wanted to convey to him through the borate movements, the blood contract at least allowed him to understand that the rabbit demon beast was trying to tell him that there was something weird about one of the people present in the Grand Meeting Hall on the side of the smaller powers who had shown up. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Squeak!


    Nodding its small fluffy head in response to hearing what Xuan Hao said, the rabbit demon beast discreetly pointed its small fluffy paw in the direction of a small group of people located at the back of the Grand Meeting Hall.


    "Hm?" Following the small fluffy paw in the direction of this small group of people, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he understood what the rabbit demon beast had meant with weird about someone in this group of people. More specifically, one of the people inside the group, that looked ordinary on the surface, had a clear problem with his cultivation base.


    Although his cultivation base was outwardly showing as someone in the Eighth Stage of the Core Formation realm, upon clearer inspection, it became clear that this wasn''t the true cultivation base of this person. In reality, the true strength of this person was somewhere around the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    However, the most surprising thing was not this, but the fact that he hadn''t managed to notice this before it was pointed out by the rabbit demon beast, who clearly was far sharper than him when it came to spotting this person.


    Or maybe it was just that the artifact that he was using to hide himself didn''t take demon beasts into ount. Making it easier for the rabbit demon beast to spot himpared to someone like himself¡­


    No matter what, Xuan Hao understood that this person shouldn''t havee with good intentions given that he was hiding his cultivation base and had snuck inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    The only problem left was finding out just where this person hade from. For him to have ess to an artifact that could even fool his senses¡­ it was obvious that he belonged to some sort of powerful force, but where did this powerful forcee from and what rtionship did it have with the Star Shattering Sect?


    Was it perhaps the mysterious force behind the appearance of the secret technique allowing the old Nascent Soul Realm Elders of the different major kingdoms to suddenly reach the Domain Lord Realm¡­?

 Chapter 1015 Mysterious Disappearance of the Snacks~

    <h4>Chapter 1015 Mysterious Disappearance of the Snacks~</h4>


    Observing the Fourth Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert that seemed to have snuck inside the Shattered Star Peaks together with the rest of the smaller powers participating in today''s meeting, Xuan Hao began to turn his attention towards the people standing beside him. Hoping to find out what force he belonged to among the smaller powers, but upon closer inspection, he realized that the people standing beside the Domain Lord Realm Expert was not people. Instead, they were very well-crafted golems that imitated the appearance of what he could only guess to be a group of representatives from some of the smaller powers who had been invited to join the meeting.


    As for the oue of the people who had been reced by these golems¡­ Xuan Hao could only hope for their own sake that they had just not managed to reach the sect in time and the Domain Lord Realm Expert happened to learn about this and ended up taking advantage of this to sneak inside.


    Now that I think about it, I might need to set up a few extra safety measures around the entrance to the sect to ensure that Feng Chen doesn''t end up letting someone like this enter the sect by mistake again¡­


    Shaking his head as he only now realized this obvious w with the chaotic qi formation protecting the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao could not help feeling grateful that it was only someone in the Domain Lord Realm who had managed to sneak inside.


    If it was someone in the Soul Ascension Realm- Or maybe even the Earth Immortal Realm who managed to sneak inside, the situation would have been far worse. After all, although the power of the chaotic qi formation would not be affected and he could still use it to iste the person who had forced their way inside, it would be far harder and would inevitably end up causing a certain level of damage to the sect as a result¡­


    Squeak~


    Seeing Xuan Hao had discovered the suspicious person, the rabbit demon beast let out a cute squeal before sneakily crawling over his arm and on to the desk in front of him where a small tray of snacks was located-


    Whoosh~


    And before anyone among the smaller powers or elders from the Star Shattering Sect had a chance to see anything, the snacks much to react like this¡­


    "Hm? Where did the spirit flower cake go?"


    ced on top of the table with Xuan Hao and the rest of the Star Shattering Sect''s higher ups disappeared without a trace.


    Among everyone present, only Xuan Hao noticed this happening¡­


    "How troublesome¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced down towards the ce on his robe where the hidden pocket that the rabbit demon beast had decided to make its home was located, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly at its behavior.


    At one point, it was interested in everyone present and looked like it was about to jump out to examine them in person, while the next moment, it used all of its strength to dash forward and take away all the snacks on the table in front of him before escaping back inside his robe to hide away inside the hidden pocket where it then began to gobble down on the stolen snacks.


    The proud and curious behavior from earlier hadpletely disappeared when faced with a few snacks. Even if they were made using spiritual fruits and other high-quality ingredients, it was a bit much to react like this¡­


    "Hm? Where did the spirit flower cake go?"


    At this time, the surprised exmation from Shen Xuefeng could be heard beside him, as she discovered that the cake, she had just been in the process of eating had disappeared.


    Different from the rest of the elders present among the higher ups of the sect, she was in a simr state of boredom like himself and had instead focused her attention on eating the snacks present on the table while ignoring the ongoing discussion. Leaving it to the more senior elders who were far more experienced than her.


    "Wait¡­ Where did the rest of the snacks go¡­?" For this reason, she was the first person to discover that not only her spirit flower cake, but all the snacks ced on the table had seemingly disappeared into thin air. The only thing left being the decorative flowers that didn''t taste like anything and would be rather uninteresting to eat on their own¡­


    "Is something wrong?" Sitting beside the young Shen Xuefeng, who was currently in a state of both confusion and sadness over the disappearance of the only thing that made the meeting bearable for her, Meng Lingxin, another elder from the former Spring Flower Sect who had also managed to be a core part of the Star Shattering Sect over the past few years, quietly asked her what was wrong. Not wanting to interrupt the ongoing discussion about the spirit stone mine that seemed to be about to reach a conclusion.


    "The snacks disappeared! All of them! Gone!"


    "Haaa¡­ Didn''t I tell you to eat in moderation earlier? I will call a few of the servants and get more¡­" Hearing what Shen Xuefeng said, Meng Lingxin could not help rolling her eyes as she said this before discreetly picking up amunication talisman to call for a few more snacks from the servants who were on standby throughout the Grand Meeting Hall.


    "That is not what I mean, I didn''t eat them! They disappeared on their own, like "puff" and they were gone all of a sudden!" Feeling that she was not taken seriously, Shen Xuefeng did her best to exin how she was not the one who had eaten the snacks and they had in fact disappeared on their own.


    "Sure, sure¡­" Something that didn''t sound the slightest bit convincing to Meng Lingxin, who just informed the servants on standby to bring out a few more snacks before turning her attention back towards the ongoing discussion. Although she was not participating in it herself, she was curious about who would ultimately end up getting this spirit stone mine. Mainly due to the fact that it would show which of these 10 smaller powers would end up with the highest chance of producing someone in the Nascent Soul Realm in the future.


    "Hmph! Then I will just figure it out on my own!" Feeling quite offended, Shen Xuefeng decided to investigate the situation herself now that her big sister didn''t believe her.


    Whoosh~


    Soon enough, she began to suspiciously nce around at everyone present among the Star Shattering Sect''s higher-ups. Trying her best to find out who it was that stole her snacks and more importantly, who had the gall to steal her half-eaten cake!


    "¡­"


    Watching this happening, Xuan Hao had no idea how to exin the rabbit demon beast''s actions to Shen Xuefeng. So, without thinking too much about it, Xuan Hao decided to ignore the matter and leave Shen Xuefeng to herself. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    At least she had something to do now¡­


    Whoosh~


    Turning his attention back on to the Domain Lord Realm Expert who had snuck inside the sect, Xuan Hao directly used his divine sense to carefully examine him without being noticed. Trying his best to find anything that might help in figuring out where this person hade from.


    "Nothing¡­?"


    However, after thoroughly searching him with his divine sense for a little over five minutes, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself.


    Be it the interspatial ring that he had hidden inside his pocket or small teleportation talisman that he was hiding in his right hand for an emergency escape, there was nothing on the Domain Lord Realm Expert that helped him in understanding his identity or where he hade from.


    On the other hand, it only made more questions appear, as the teleportation talismans hidden in his hand were not something that someone in the Domain Lord Realm should be able to get their hands on. Even if they had reached the Peak of the realm!


    With his understanding of the Dao of Space, he could tell that the teleportation talisman was far more powerful than a simple short distance teleportation and should have the power to directly teleport a distance that was equivalent to the entirety of the Sky Empire when activated.


    Of course, this was considering that it didn''t encounter any obstacles in its path. Given that this Domain Lord had already entered the chaotic qi formation, there was no way for him to escape even if he activated the teleportation talisman.


    In the end, this was also one of the main reasons why Xuan Hao didn''t feel a need to make a move to catch him immediately- With the chaotic qi formation around, where could this person escape to? Even someone in the Soul Ascension Realm would be unable to break through the chaotic qi formation, let alone someone who had only reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    A small teleportation talisman would make no difference, as the formation also sealed the space to prevent someone from just teleporting inside the Shattered Star Peaks.

 Chapter 1016 End of the Meeting

    <h4>Chapter 1016 End of the Meeting</h4>


    With all of this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to just quietly observe the Domain Lord Realm Expert as the meeting continued without any interruption. Intending to wait for him to reveal anything that might point towards who was behind him and more importantly, give him a chance to find out why this power had suddenly decided to target the Star Shattering Sect for seemingly no reason.


    Rustle~


    Outside of the rabbit demon beast asionally leaving his robe to look for more snacks and further confusing Shen Xuefeng, who had no idea where her snacks went, nothing out of the ordinary happened during the rest of the meeting and the different locations with resources was distributed among the hundreds of smaller powers present. The most notable of which was a ratherrge spirit stone mine that went to a sect called the Gold Fortune Sect.


    The Gold Fortune Sect could be considered a rtively new sect that had emerged under rather simr circumstances to the Star Shattering Sect, with two different sects merging together. Instantly allowing this new sect to propel itself to be one of the strongest subordinate sects under the Star Shattering Sect. Boasting a total of two elders in the Nascent Soul Realm, with one of these Nascent Soul Realm Expert even having reached the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Now that they would be supported by arge spirit stone mine, it should allow their strength to reach a new level. Maybe even allowing the Seventh Stage Nascent Soul Realm Expert to reach the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Of course, these benefits were mainly a way for Elder Song to try and secure the loyalty of these smaller powers and show off the benefits they could receive in the future. After all, if not for something like this, there was no way arge spirit stone mine would have been given to one of these smaller powers to manage.


    "¡­. And this marks the end of the meeting. In the future, we n to construct a new building in the city below the Ninth Star Peak where the main management of the territory will take ce. After its construction is done, it''s expected that each of you will send a representative there."


    Listening as Elder Song as the meeting officially came to an end with all of the new and future resources that would be avable after the fall of the remaining major kingdoms were dispersed among these smaller powers to manage, Xuan Hao continued to keep his eye on the Domain Lord Realm Expert who had remained hidden in the back of the Grand Meeting Hall without saying anything during the entire meeting.


    The only thing he did during the meeting was control some of the golems to join the discussion and win over a few mines and spiritual fields for the sects that the golems were disguised as. Outside of this, he only listened to the conversations taking ce. Making Xuan Hao even more curious as to what reason this person had to sneak inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, the information on who got their hands on what resources would be rtively easy to gather after the end of the meeting and didn''t hold any real significance when it came to the Star Shattering Sect''s battle against the different major kingdoms.


    At most, the information could be used to sabotage some of the resource spots mentioned before these smaller powers could get their hands on them, but doing something like this would at most dy things for a bit and wouldn''t do any real damage to these smaller powers, let alone the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Xuan Hao! Thank you for joining today''s meeting. Hehe, look over there, quite a few of those smaller sects are awed at your presence and looks quite satisfied having seen all the higher ups of our sect today." Interrupting his train of thought, one of the two Wang brothers, Wang Hu, happily walked over as he said this while pointing towards some of the people making their way out of the Grand Meeting Hall while constantly turning around to nce in his direction filled with awe.


    Indeed, like Wang Hu said, another reason why these different smaller powers had shown up was not only due to resources that they could get their hands on but was also to see the people who were now essentially in control of them and their territory. Among which, all of them wanted to catch a glimpse of Xuan Hao, who was considered the strongest person in the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not only because they felt curious about him, but also because they wanted to ensure that none of their disciples or elders ended up identally offending him in the future. After all, different from someone like Elder Song or Shu Yao, who were active outside the sect and were easy to identify, Xuan Hao never appeared outside the sect¡­ And when he did appear for a short period of time, like when dealing with the powerful demonic cultivators at the border of the Azure Sky Kingdom, he would disappear just as fast. Not giving anyone enough time to get a proper look at him.


    Because of this, many of these smaller powers thought that only by entering the Star Shattering Sect did they have a chance to catch a glimpse of this illusory Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect¡­ And having understood this, Elder Song had ended up making Xuan Hao join the meeting to satisfy the curiosity of these smaller powers that would now be working under them.


    Simr to these smaller powers, Elder Song didn''t want an incident where someone from these smaller powers ended up doing something stupid that would end up offending Xuan Hao. Not because he cared that much about these smaller powers, but because he didn''t want to deal with the aftermath that woulde following one of these smaller powers being destroyed by someone who was an elder of the Star Shattering Sect. At the moment, he already had enough work to do¡­


    "Wang Hu¡­ I have something to do, so I will be taking my leave first."


    "Huh? Not staying around for the-"


    Whoosh~


    Not waiting for Wang Hu to finish his sentence as he noticed the Domain Lord Realm Expert who had snuck inside the sect making his way out of the Grand Meeting Hall, Xuan Hao directly stood up and teleported out of the Grand Meeting Hall before hiding himself with his domain as he silently followed the Domain Lord Realm Expert who beelined directly for the Ninth Star Peak where the path out of the Shattered Star Peaks was located.


    This could be considered the first time that he did something different from the rest of the smaller powers, who were all staying around the outskirts of the Grand Meeting Hall chatting with each other about the meeting and discussing the future together.


    Of course, more important than this, was the fact that none of them wanted to leave the Shattered Star Peaks due to the rich qi present everywhere that made it far easier to cultivate. If these experts from the different smaller powers really had the chance, it was doubtful whether or not they would want to return to their sect again after experiencing the wonderful effect of the chaotic qi formation¡­


    Needless to say, Xuan Hao didn''t care too much about these smaller powers who just wanted to increase their own strength. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Swish~!


    "Hm? He turned around?"


    Continuing to follow behind the Domain Lord Realm Expert who had been making his way towards the Ninth Star Peak in a rtively rxed manner that didn''t arouse any suspension from any of the disciples or elders walking along the path as well, Xuan Hao was taken aback when the Domain Lord Realm Expert suddenly turned around and headed back in the direction of the Seventh Star Peak.


    However, different from before, he had nowpletely hidden himself with some kind of artifact that made it hard to notice him. Even with his cultivation base at the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm!


    Not only that, but the golems disguised as representatives from some of the smaller powers had been absorbed back into the interspatial ring of the Domain Lord Realm Expert. Making it seem like he had already left the sect in case anyone asked about his presence in the future.


    Hehe, I wonder what you are up to¡­


    Not at all feeling uneasy at this turn of events, Xuan Hao instead felt a bit excited about this turn of events. After all, from the behavior of the Domain Lord Realm Expert, it was obvious that he was about to show him why he had dared to sneak inside the Star Shattering Sect¡­ And with the chaotic qi formation around, he didn''t have to worry about him escaping nor causing any sort of trouble for the elders and disciples of the sect.

 Chapter 1017 Fifth Star Peak...?

    <h4>Chapter 1017 Fifth Star Peak...?</h4>


    As the Domain Lord Realm continued moving back towards the Seventh Star Peak where the main sect was located, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes as he drew upon the power of the chaotic qi formation to separate the Domain Lord Realm Expert from the area around the Domain Lord Realm. Ensuring that he would not be able to do any damage to the sect or the disciples and elders wandering around just below the Seventh Star Peak.


    Whoosh~


    However, contrary to the possible attack that he had expected to happen, the Domain Lord Realm Expertpletely ignored the Seventh Star Peak and flew straight past it before heading deeper inside the Shattered Star Peaks. Not even bothering to make sure that no one had spotted him. Although, this was likely due to him feeling confident in the artifact being able to hide from Shu Yao and Feng Chen.


    Not only that, but he also felt confident that he could avoid him¡­


    Haaa¡­ Talk about overconfidence¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while following behind the Domain Lord Realm expert who continued moving deeper inside the Shattered Star Peaks without showing any signs of stopping, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if the Domain Lord Realm Expert had identally thought about him as someone simr to Feng Chen and Shu Yao, who had both only just recently broken through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    If the Domain Lord Realm Expert had really calcted his cultivation base to be somewhere around the earlier or possible middle stages of the Domain Lord Realm, it meant that he didn''t have some kind of powerful identification artifact on him.


    On the other hand, it could also just be the fact that his aura wasn''t that much different from someone in the Domain Lord Realm if he didn''t use his dao domain, which might have resulted in a misunderstanding¡­


    Well¡­ No matter what it is, it''s a fact that he didn''t notice me and showed no signs of even suspecting that his artifact didn''t work.


    Watching as the Domain Lord Realm Expert reached the Sixth Star Peak, Xuan Hao decided not to think about this matter any longer and instead focused his full attention on trying to figure out what this Domain Lord Realm Expert was nning to do.


    After all, he couldn''t have just entered the Star Shattering Sect for an opportunity to enjoy the view of the towering Star Peaks in person. If that was really the case, Xuan Hao felt like he would have to seriously question the intelligence of the person he was following and also the people who had supplied him with so many rare and precious artifacts.


    Whoosh~ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    However, just like the Seventh Star Peak, hepletely ignored the Sixth Star Peak and continued deeper inside the Shattered Star Peaks in the direction of the Fifth Star Peak.


    Thump~


    Only after reaching the base of the fifth Star Peak did, he finallye to a stop before starting to slowly make his way up the Fifth Star Peak.


    "Oh? Looks like he has finallye to a stop, but what could he want from the Fifth Star Peak? The only thing there is ake that agitates the surrounding chaotic qi¡­" Noticing that the Domain Lord Realm Expert finallying to a stop before he started making his way up the Fifth Star Peak, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself as he curiously followed behind the Domain Lord Realm Expert as he slowly approached the peak of the Fifth Star Peak where theke was located.


    Although almost the entirety of the Shattered Star Peaks had been covered by the chaotic qi formation at this point in time, there were still a few ces that it did not yet cover, either due to certain limitations, or the fact that the formation was not powerful enough to cover certain parts of the Shattered Star Peaks, like the Main Star Peak.


    And among these different special ces, the top of the Fifth Star Peak was one of the ces that had not been covered by the chaotic qi formation yet. The main reason for this being the fact that theke''s effect of agitating the surrounding chaotic qi made it harder for the chaotic qi formation to absorb the chaotic qi and in turn would just end up destabilizing the chaotic qi formation if it was included.


    Not only that, but Xuan Hao also felt a certain level of fear that theke wouldn''t just agitate the chaotic qi after being integrated by the chaotic qi formation, but that it would also start to agitate the normal spiritual qi inside the chaotic qi formation. Not something that would be beneficial to the sect nor himself, who relied on the rich and calm qi present inside the chaotic qi formation to cultivate.


    As he was going through his own thoughts, the Domain Lord Realm Expert who had been making his way up the Fifth Star Peak finally reached the top of the mountain and began smiling happily after seeing theke located at the top of the top of the Fifth Star Peak.


    "To think it''s still here¡­" Not letting go of the smile that was now covering his face, the Domain Lord Realm Expert remained fully focused on theke in front of him as he said this. Making Xuan Hao, who was still observing him in secret, narrow both of his eyes in surprise. After all, from what the Domain Lord Realm Expert just said, it was obvious that he knew about the Fifth Star Peak and had been there in the past.


    Even if the Star Shattering Sect had only been around for a few years at this point in time and the Shattered Star Peaks had been rtively easy to enter in the past when it had been regarded as nothing more than a ce to harvest a few lower quality spiritual herbs or a ce to go for the final attempt to reach the Nascent Soul Realm, the ce had still been under the management of the Flying Sword Sect for hundreds of years before this!


    Although it would be impossible to detect a Domain Lord Realm Expert entering the Shattered Star Peaks back then, he really doubted that this person only came to visit theke at the Peak of the Fifth Star Peak.


    Ssh~!


    And as if to prove him correct, the Domain Lord Realm Expert took out a small strange metal object from his interspatial ring before throwing it into theke-


    Rumble~


    Not a secondter, the entire Fifth Star Peak started trembling. Although not violent, it was still more than enough to be felt by anyone present inside the Shattered Star Peaks and might even have affected the area surrounding the Shattered Star Peaks to a certain extent.


    Swish-!


    Of course, Xuan Hao didn''t want this to happen, so he quickly acted before the effects from the Fifth Star Peak''s sudden violent behavior had a chance to spread throughout the Shattered Star Peaks and beyond, sealing up the entire area around the Fifth Star Peak with the help of the chaotic qi formation. Not forgetting to ensure that the Domain Lord Realm Expert didn''t notice anything odd happening in the process.


    However, even if I hide it like this and he can''t sense me, he will undoubtedly start growing suspicious after not seeing Feng Chen and Shu Yao show up¡­ After all, with such arge event taking ce, they should show up quickly to investigate the origins of the sudden earthquake.


    Narrowing both of his eyes even further as he thought about this, Xuan Hao kept his full attention focused on the Domain Lord Realm Expert still standing at the shoreline of theke filled with anticipation as he looked at the ce where he had thrown in the few weird objects earlier.


    Different from the somewhat panicked reaction that he expected the Domain Lord Realm Expert to show after realizing that Shu Yao and Feng Chen, two Domain Lord Realm Experts, should have noticed him by now, he was instead filled with excitement as he remained fully focused on theke in front of him. Seemingly waiting for something to happen.


    Ssh~! Ssh~!


    Rumble~


    It was at this moment that something emerged from the depths of theke.


    Soon, it became obvious that the thing in question that had emerged fromke, was some sort of spiral staircase surrounded by some sort of strange white rock leading straight down into what he could only describe as some sort of structure that had managed to remain hidden under the surface of the water filled to the brim with chaotic qi.


    "I have to inform master about this!"


    Swish-!


    Not at all caring about Xuan Hao''s surprise at the sudden realization that there was some sort of structure hidden beneath theke of the Fifth Star Peak, the Domain Lord Realm Expert didn''t waste a single second after seeing the spiral staircase before turning around and rushing in the direction of the exit out of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Most likely in anticipation of Shu Yao and Feng Chen showing up at any moment.

 Chapter 1018 Blue Sea Empire

    <h4>Chapter 1018 Blue Sea Empire</h4>


    Bang!


    However, before the Domain Lord Realm Expert had a chance to leave the Fifth Star Peak, an invisible barrier suddenly appeared in front of him and blocked his path. Not only that, but he could also clearly feel a simr barrier all around him that was slowly bing smaller with each passing second.


    "This- Where did this barriere from!?" Panicking at this sudden unexpected development, the Domain Lord Realm Expert froze for a short moment in front of the barrier before realizing his current dangerous situation-


    "I have to get out of here!"


    And without wasting a single second aftering to this realization, he directly chose to use the precious teleportation talisman that he was still holding on to in case he was caught with no way out.


    Riiip~!


    The moment he used the teleportation talisman, the space around him was violently torn apart before a powerful suction force emerged from torn space. Dragging the Domain Lord Realm Expert inside before the barriers surrounding him had a chance to capture him, allowing the Domain Lord Realm Expert to just barely escape.


    "Hah¡­ That was close¡­" Feeling a sense of relief upon feeling himself shuttling through space far away from the Shattered Star Peaks, the Domain Lord Realm Expert felt himself rx as he understood that there would be no way for anyone in the Star Shattering Sect to chase after him after he had used the teleportation talisman.


    Even if there was someone who could trace the direction of the teleportation talisman, due to the distance that it covered, he would be long gone by the time someone from the Star Shattering Sect appeared.


    "But¡­ What was that just now? Did the formation covering the Shattered Star Peaks perhaps get activated just now?" Feeling reassured about his own safety after convincing himself that there was no way for the experts of the Star Shattering Sect to chase after him, the Domain Lord Realm Expert could not help muttering this to himself as he looked back in the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Although the only thing he could see was the ck empty void that seemed unchanging even as he moved through it at a terrifying speed, a shiver still ran down his spine when remembering how close he had been to getting caught just now.


    If not for the fact that he had the teleportation talisman, he would undoubtedly have been caught just now!


    When I return and tell master about this, I have to thank him for the teleportation talisman¡­


    Thinking about this as he remembered how he had told his master how he didn''t need something precious like a teleportation talisman when infiltrating a small sect located at the border of a low tier empire, he could not help feeling a sense of embarrassment.


    In hindsight, his master had been right in giving him the teleportation talisman, as the small border sect in question turned out to be far stronger than he had first expected upon hearing about it from his master.


    Riiiip~!


    "Looks like this is as far as the teleportation talisman takes me¡­" Feeling the space around him start to shake violently as a bright light appeared in front of him from a tear leading out of the empty ck void, the Domain Lord Realm Expert could not help muttering this to himself as he understood that the teleportation talisman had run out of power and couldn''t transport him any farther.


    Whoosh~


    Not a secondter, he passed through the tear in space in front of him and found himself inside a small forest. Not too far away, a few deers could be seen looking over towards him filled with both surprise and terror. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "A normal forest without any demon beasts? This really is a low tier empire¡­ Hah¡­ Whatever, I should return to master as soon as possible!" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, the Domain Lord Realm Expert didn''t think too much about the ce he had appeared in and pulled out a smallpass artifact before flying in the direction that thepass was pointing towards.


    Unaware that, a few minutes earlier when he had first activated the teleportation talisman, Xuan Hao had decided to follow after him to try and find out more on the power behind him. Able to follow along the path that had been carved through the void by the teleportation talisman before it repaired itself.


    After all, travelling a distance equal to the entire Sky Empire in a few minutes was not something that was doable for Xuan Hao at the moment with his currentprehension of the Dao of Space. Maybe in the future, but for now, doing something like that would still take a few hours considering he also had to avoid certain dangerous areas due to not having learnt any form of long-distance teleportation yet.


    Whoosh~


    Appearing just a few seconds behind the Domain Lord Realm Expert who had already run away, Xuan Hao curiously examined his surroundings.


    "I wonder where I ended up¡­" Muttering this to himself as he used his divine sense to get a better grasp of where he had ended up, it did not take long to find out that his current location was somewhere just outside the Sky Empire''s border located in the opposite direction of where the Star Shattering Sect was located.


    If I''m not wrong, this should be the Blue Sea Empire¡­


    Not taking too long to figure out what empire he had ended up inside of, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he remembered what little information, he had managed to learn about the Blue Sea Empire in the past.


    Different from the Sky Empire that could be considered among the worst empires present on the continent, the Blue Sea Empire was a truly powerful empire that stretched far into the core of the continent and could even be considered to be one of the most powerful empires.


    However, the main thing that the Blue Sea Empire was famous for was not its strength, but the massive ind sea located at the center of the empire. The ind sea was by far thergest body of water on the Ewaria Continent and was also the main reason why the Blue Sea Empire was powerful to begin with, as the ind sea contained countless treasures and other resources that had helped the empire reach its current position.


    In a sense, a powerful empire like this should not have shared its borders with a small empire like the Sky Empire located at the edge of the continent, but it just so happened that arge river connecting the ind sea to the ocean ran straight through arge part of the Sky Empire, causing this small empire to end up sharing its borders with this far more powerful empire.


    Even with his current strength at the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he wouldn''t be considered among the strongest inside such a powerful empire that undoubtedly had experts in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­


    "But¡­ Why is someone from such arge empire sneaking into the Shattered Star Peaks?" Muttering this to himself as he nced in the direction that the Domain Lord Realm Expert was escaping in, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more confused as to what the identity of this Domain Lord Realm Expert was.


    At least he was sure that it shouldn''t be someone too powerful inside the Blue Sea Empire, as there would have been no way someone like that would have bothered to have someone sneak inside a sect located at the border of a low tier empire like the Sky Empire.


    Or maybe there is some kind of internal struggle taking ce¡­


    Smiling wryly as he thought about this, he sincerely prayed that he and the Star Shattering Sect wouldn''t end up getting caught up in some sort of power struggle taking ce inside the Blue Sea Empire.


    Although he had already been caught up in the power struggle of the Sky Empire to some extent, it wasn''t a problem due to the fact that his current strength outstripped anyone else in the Sky Empire.


    "Haaa¡­ I''m worrying too much about this, I haven''t even confirmed that he is really someone from the Blue Sea Empire yet¡­" Stopping himself before he could continue along this train of thought, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the Domain Lord Realm Expert who was continuing deeper inside the Blue Sea Empire without slowing down in the slightest.


    For now, he had to decide on whether he should continue secretly tailing behind him or just capture him now before he had a chance to make it any farther inside the Blue Sea Empire.


    After all, for all he knew, the master that the Domain Lord Realm Expert had mentioned to himself, could very well be someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­ And if that was the case, he would be in trouble¡­

 Chapter 1019 Blue Sea Empire Border Guard

    <h4>Chapter 1019 Blue Sea Empire Border Guard</h4>


    I''m already inside the territory of the Blue Sea Empire and this is still far away from the core where the powerful experts should be residing, it won''t hurt to follow the Domain Lord Realm Expert for a bit longer and see if I can get a better idea of his identity¡­


    Continuing to look in the direction that the Domain Lord Realm Expert had disappeared in as he thought about this, Xuan Hao ultimately decided to continue following him deeper inside the Blue Sea Empire. In any case, he was indeed far away from anywhere important where there might be someone in the Earth Immortal Realm present.


    At most, he expected to encounter someone in the Soul Ascension Realm patrolling the border between the Blue Sea Empire and the Sky Empire. After all, the difference between the two empires was like that of a small lizard crawling on the ground and a majestic dragon perched on top of arge mountain.


    No matter how the Blue Sea Empire looked at an empire like the Sky Empire, they posed no threat to it and didn''t warrant any powerful experts guarding their only existing border with this kind of weak empire who at most had a handful of Soul Ascension Realm Experts present inside of it.


    Swish~


    Just as he decided to follow the Domain Lord Realm Expert deeper inside the Blue Sea Empire instead of catching him immediately to try and get as much information out of him as possible, the sound of something cutting through the air heading directly towards him could be heard across the small forest that he now found himself inside of.


    "Hm? Someone is here¡­?" Narrowing both of his eyes visibly as he realized that the sound came from someone rushing towards him, Xuan Hao prepared himself for battle. After all, for the other party to have noticed him faster than he could notice him, it was obvious that the other party should at least have reached the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Maybe even stronger than that!


    Rumble~ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Not a second after Xuan Hao had prepared himself for a possible fight, a middle-aged woman dressed from head to toe in a heavy armornded on the ground a few hundred meters in front of him, destroying the surrounding trees and other small nts in the process.


    "What is your purpose for entering the Blue Sea Empire? Anyone in the Soul Ascension Realm and above are required to register before entering!" Not wasting a single second afternding on the ground as she said this, the woman looked like she was just about to draw therge heavy sword on her back to cut him down¡­ And if he didn''t give her a satisfactory answer, he didn''t doubt that this would happen¡­


    "Greetings, I''m someone from the Sky Empire and just happened to enter the territory of the Blue Sea Empire by ident when following behind someone who broke into my abode and used a teleportation talisman to escape when discovered. If I''m not wrong, you should have also sensed the Domain Lord Realm Expert who appeared here a few seconds before me."


    Not at all wanting to take any chances and lie to this person who was very likely the person from the Blue Sea Empire in charge of guarding this part of therge empire''s borders, Xuan Hao decided to just tell her the truth. In any case, he was sure that she wasn''t with the Domain Lord Realm Expert he was chasing.


    If that was the case, he highly doubted she would have bothered to talk with him in the first ce and he would most likely be locked in a deadly fight right about now¡­


    "Hm¡­ Teleportation talisman¡­?" Muttering this to herself as she thought about what he said for a short moment, the woman''s eyes didn''t leave him for even a second as she examined him from head to toe at the same time.


    "Hah¡­ If that is the case, I understand that you wouldn''t be able to register before crossing the borders of the Blue Sea Empire. Not to mention, I did indeed sense a spatial abnormality earlier and saw the little fellow you mentioned¡­


    For now, I can look past the transgression of entering the Blue Sea Empire unregistered. However, I will have to register you and make sure of your identity if you want to continue chasing after the little fellow you are chasing." Saying this after having thought things through, the woman rxed her guard ever so slightly.


    "Thank you! What would you need for me to register myself?" Feeling a sense of relief that he didn''t have to fight the woman who had clearly reached the pinnacle of the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao retracted part of his dao domain to show that he didn''t mean any harm.


    As for registering with the Blue Sea Empire? He didn''t really think too much about it, as there would be a lot of people entering the Blue Sea Empire at all times and he could always give a false identity instead of his real identity. At most it would result in the person possibly behind the Domain Lord Realm Expert discovering some links between a powerful expert entering from Sky Empire and the death of the Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    Considering that he nned to use a false identity, this wouldn''t end up affecting the Star Shattering Sect and had a higher chance of affecting the Sky Empire who would have to bear the burnt of this powerful expert possibly showing up to investigate the matter by himself.


    After all, the current Star Shattering Sect was still located around the border of the Sky Empire, and it would still be some time before it started expanding into the core territory of the Sky Empire¡­ And when that happened, he should have been able to be strong enough to face off against someone in the Earth Immortal Realm!


    "Good, I will ask you a few questions and you just have to answer them. After this, I will register your aura to make sure you don''t end up changing your identity in the future and cause trouble inside the Blue Sea Empire!" Feeling relieved that Xuan Hao was so cooperative, the middle-aged woman covered in armor from head to toe also let out a sigh of relief as she said this before walking over to him.


    Although she hadn''t shown it outwardly, she had also been on edge ever since she saw Xuan Hao who had suddenly appeared out of nowhere a few thousand kilometers inside the Blue Sea Empire. Not only because of his sudden appearance, but also because she couldn''t see through his strength.


    Considering that she herself had already reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, this could only mean one thing¡­ Either he was also someone at the peak of the Soul Ascension Realm or he was someone who had reached the Earth Immortal Realm!


    No matter what it was, it was not someone she had wanted to fight if she could avoid it. In turn, this was also the main reason why she didn''t just directly attack Xuan Hao when he had first appeared so far inside the Blue Sea Empire. After all, standard procedures would have her kill anyone daring enough to enter the Blue Sea Empire above the Domain Lord Realm without first registering with the border guard stationed at the countless small checkpoints all around the Blue Sea Empire''s borders.


    "First of all, you are from the Sky Empire¡­"


    Family, independent power like a sect, Explorer Union-"


    "Explorer Union, my title in the Explorer Union is Bright Sword." "Yes."


    "Okay, what power do you belong to in the Sky Empire? Imperial Family, independent power like a sect, Explorer Union-"


    "Explorer Union, my title in the Explorer Union is Bright Sword." Not nning to give away his identity as someone from the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao instead decided to make use of his identity from the Explorer Union.


    Although he had never used this identity since the time, he needed to find the spiritual herb required to awaken Qing Yi''s special physique, it was indeed a real identity that there weren''t any mistakes with.


    As for him not having used the identity more than once and the Explorer Union only having Bright Sword registered as someone either in the Core Formation Realm or Nascent Soul Realm¡­ This didn''t matter to Xuan Hao. After all, what did the Explorer Union''s mistaken information have to do with him?


    "Hm? Explorer Union? Haaa¡­ I see, now I just need you to ce your hand on this artifact and your aura will be officially registered. If you do anything to harm the Blue Sea Empire, we will find you!" Nodding her head as she took out a strange looking artifact in a somewhat threatening manner, the middle-aged woman signaled for him to put his hand on the strange artifact and let it register his aura.


    Whoosh~


    Not intending to fight her, Xuan Hao did as he was told and ced his hand on top of the strange artifact. Allowing it to absorb part of his aura.

 Chapter 1020 Secret Outpost

    <h4>Chapter 1020 Secret Outpost</h4>


    cing his hand on top of the strange artifact, Xuan Hao felt part of his qi being drawn out-


    Sizzle~


    However, after part of his qi had been drawn, the artifact started making a weird sizzling sound simr to that of boiling water before part of the artifact lit up for a brief moment. After which the middle-aged woman extracted a small note from the side of the artifact that she began to read through in silence.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing anything about how this artifact worked nor what was written on the small note that the artifact had just spit out for the woman in front of him to read, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit uneasy. Wondering if there had been any problem with his registration just now.


    "Hm¡­ From the looks of it, everything is in order, and this is the first time you have been inside the blue Sea Empire. Unless you snuck inside at some other point in time. Oh well, everything seems to be fine, so I will be on my way. Have a good time hunting down that little fellow. Given that he is only someone in the Domain Lord Realm, he shouldn''t have managed to escape too far away over our short conversation.


    Ah! A slight warning for you, the Blue Sea Empire is not only a ce for the different powers that exist under the Blue Sea Empire but is also a major trading spot for a lot of other powerful forces. Make sure that the little one you are chasing is not from one of these forces¡­ And if he is, I would rmend not leaving any traces behind. At the very least, I can confirm that he does not belong to anyone from the Blue Sea Empire."


    "Thank you for the reminder, I will keep it in mind."


    "Good, I will take my leave then."


    Swish~


    Jumping into the air after she had made sure everything was in order, the middle-aged woman at the pinnacle of the Soul Ascension Realm disappeared into the distance. Although someone like Xuan Hao was rare to encounter, he was far from the only person who ended up crossing the border without first registering at the border guard.


    Boom~!


    Hearing the audible explosion that echoed out not too far away in the direction that the border guard had just disappeared in, it was quite obvious that one of these people trying to sneak inside had met a rather quick demise. Different from the preferential treatment he had ended up receiving, a clear benefit of having a high enough cultivation that the border guard wouldn''t just kill him without asking any questions¡­


    If I entered some of the more guarded areas deeper inside the territory of the Blue Sea Empire where Earth Immortal Realm Experts are present, I would most likely have ended up being attacked first as well¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while looking in the direction where the explosion had urred just a few seconds earlier, Xuan Hao jumped into the air before moving the direction that the Domain Lord Realm Expert had escaped in.


    Although he had managed to run out of the range covered by his divine sense, it was not too hard to chase after him, as he had still left quite a few traces behind during his escape. Not to mention, he thought that he was safe now and didn''t know that anyone was chasing after him. Meaning that he left behind even more traces than he would have done if he knew someone was right behind him.


    Whoosh~


    "Hm? What is he doing?"


    Catching up with the Domain Lord Realm Expert in less than five seconds, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat confused expression on his face as he watched how the Domain Lord Realm Expert in question hade to a stop at the edge of a small ravine cutting through a small forest.


    Did he discover me?


    Only able to think about this as he watched how the Domain Lord Realm Expert didn''t do anything and had seemingly given up, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if one of the many artifacts that he carried might have detected him. Resulting in the Domain Lord Realm Expert giving up on escaping.


    After all, he should know very well that he stood no chance of escaping from someone with Soul Ascension level strength without any teleportation talisman with his current cultivation realm.


    "Haha! Found it!" However, not even a few secondster, the Domain Lord Realm Expert proved his worries wrong as he jumped in joy over something before jumping into the small ravine filled with excitement. Making Xuan Hao momentarily question if something was wrong with him, as he had not noticed anything out of the ordinary about the small ravine.


    The only thing out of the ordinary about the ravine was the fact that it was not a natural ravine and should instead have been created as a result of a battle between powerful cultivators in the past. Likely someone who had tried to cross the borders of the Blue Sea Empire without registering and had promptly been dealt with¡­


    "Huh?"


    However, as he watched the Domain Lord Realm Expert pass through the solid ground at the bottom of the small ravine, Xuan Hao could not help showing a dumfounded expression on his face.


    Whoosh~


    Calming down as he realized that he might be stepping into a rather dangerous situation, Xuan Hao used his divine sense to thoroughly analyze the bottom of the ravine in detail. Making sure to also use his dao domain to further enhance his divine sense.


    "A concealment formation? And one powerful enough to even fool someone at the like me¡­" Only after doing all of this, did he realize that the bottom of the ravine was covered in an extremely powerful concealment formation. Even after knowing that it was there, he could still not look through it and could only barely analyze the surface of the formation. Making him once again realize the importance of improving his understanding of formations.


    Swish~


    Hesitating for a short moment above the concealment formation that the Domain Lord Realm Expert had disappeared inside, Xuan Hao stopped hovering above the ravine and focused all of his strength on creating a protective shield around his body. Allowing gravity to take hold of him as he plunged into the ravine-


    Swoosh~


    Soon passing through the concealment formation. Finding himself inside arge underground space that was lit up by countless small crystals covering the sides of the underground space. Allowing him to see the dozen or so buildings below him filled with people moving around in a panic as they carried some kind of special crystal towards arge formation located at the center of the buildings.


    "Hm? A teleportation formation?" Looking closer at the formation located at the center of the buildings at the bottom of the ravine, it did not take more than a single nce for him to realize that it was a teleportation formation.


    Not only that, but the teleportation formation was by far the mostplicated one he had seen. Even the teleportation gate that he had found inside the small territory of the Half Spirit Race was at mostparable to this teleportation formation in terms ofplexity. Meaning that the distance covered by the teleportation formation in front of him should be leading to somewhere outside the Blue Sea Empire. Maybe even leading directly to the core territory of another major power of the central region of the Ewaria Continent!


    From the looks of things, it was obvious that this was a secret outpost that had been created inside the Blue Sea Empire by the power behind the Domain Lord Realm expert¡­ And now, this secret outpost had switched their full attention towards gathering the required materials to activate the teleportation formation and send the Domain Lord Realm Expert away from the Blue Sea Empire.


    "At least the strongest person here is only at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and has not yet noticed me¡­" Muttering this to himself as he observed the people below running all over the ce, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes.


    No matter what, he could not allow the Domain Lord Realm Expert to escape again. After all, if he followed after him like he did before, he might very well end up facing someone in the Earth Immortal Realm!


    RUMBLE~!


    As he thought about this, he no longer bothered hiding himself any longer as his aura violently exploded out in all directions.


    "Wha-!? What is that!?"


    "Who!?"


    "Don''t tell me¡­ The Blue Sea Empire found us!?" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    At the same time his aura spread out, all sorts of panicked screams could be heard from below as the people running all over the ce began panicking. All of them thinking that they had been discovered by the Blue Sea Empire, as they started rushing towards the teleportation formation in an attempt to activate it before it was ready and get away from the outpost before it was toote.


    None of them were thinking that the person who had shown up was not someone from the Blue Sea Empire...

 Chapter 1021 Heavenly Dragon Temple

    <h4>Chapter 1021 Heavenly Dragon Temple</h4>


    "How did the Blue Sea Empire mange to discover us now of all times- Wait¡­ Is it perhaps because of that person!?"


    "Yeah! The Blue Sea Empire just so happened to discover this ce shortly after that guy entered and made us prepare the teleportation formation, I''m sure he knew he was being chased by someone from the Blue Sea Empire and wanted to escape before the other party caught up!"


    "Hmph! This damnable core disciple, he really wants to take advantage of his position and leave us all to die!"


    "Hm? Maybe the person from the Blue Sea Empire is only after that guy. If we hand him over, we might have a chance to escape this situation alive!"


    "Huh? Indeed¡­ What you say makes sense, maybe this senior is generous enough to let us escape alive if we hand over that damnable core disciple!"


    As Xuan Hao had fully revealed himself and was about to kill the people below and catch the escaping Domain Lord Realm Expert for information, arge number of people below, who had been preparing the teleportation formation and were trying their best to escape, suddenly turned around and focused their attention on the escaping Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    "Wh-what are all of you looking at!? Hurry up and activate the teleportation formation so I can get out of here! I have important information that I need to hand over. None of you can afford the price if my master doesn''t get this information!"


    Feeling the clear hostility from the surrounding people, the escaping Domain Lord Realm Expert could not helpshing out, as he reminded them about how his master was going to punish them if he learnt about anything happening to him.


    """¡­"""


    However, unfortunately for the escaping Domain Lord Realm Expert desperately trying his best to get them to activate the teleportation formation and send him away from the Blue Sea Empire, none of the people listened to him-


    "I will ensure that he doesn''t cause any harm, Hou and Ling, you two will be in charge of restraining him¡­"


    Instead, the expert at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm stepped forward and said this while signaling to two Peak Domain Lord Realm experts.


    "Y-you! You can''t do this! I''m a core disciple, my master will- mhhh!"


    Considering that there was a clear difference in strength between the three people and the so-called core disciple, he was easily restrained by the three. Not only that but given that none of them wanted to listen to hisints and curses, one of the Domain Lord Realm Experts quickly pulled a rag hanging out of one of the nearby building windows and stuffed it into his mouth. Making sure to use part of his power to ensure that the rag wasn''t destroyed or spit out.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any time after this, the expert at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm grabbed the iling core disciple desperately trying to free himself and flew up towards Xuan Hao who was watching the entire thing y out with interest.


    "Senior, I hope you will let go of us, we are all from the Heavenly Dragon Temple and don''t mean any harm. The reason we are here in the Blue Sea Empire is just for some basic information gathering on who enters and leaves the Blue Sea Empire from this part of your border. Nothing more!" Not giving Xuan Hao a chance to say anything, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert did his best to exin that they didn''t do anything that would harm the Blue Sea Empire and at most observed who was entering and leaving the Blue Sea Empire. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Although this would still be something that the Blue Sea Empire would undoubtedly crack down on. Especially considering that they had essentially done this without informing the Blue Sea Empire about their presence, it was still something that could be forgiven if the power behind this operation was strong enough that even someone like the Blue Sea Empire had to be cautious of them.


    The Soul Ascension Realm Expert also banked on the fact that he was from one such power and the fact that he had willingly handed over the core disciple and informed him about what he and the rest of the people here had been up to.


    "Hm? The Heavenly Dragon Temple?"


    Not knowing anything about the Heavenly Dragon Temple that the Soul Ascension Realm Expert had just mentioned, Xuan Hao decided to take advantage of the situation and put on a thoughtful expression.


    Even if he had already ensured that his identity couldn''t be tracked back to the Star Shattering Sect, it would be far better if these people ended up thinking that someone from the Blue Sea Empire was behind the entire thing.


    Given that the Heavenly Dragon Temple should be a force strong enough that even the Blue Sea Empire had to take them seriously, it would make sense that he let these people go back and spread this news to the rest of the Heavenly Dragon Temple to ensure their own innocence in the disappearance of this core disciple. In turn, this would also end up washing away any suspicion that might end up being directed towards a small fringe sect like the Star Shattering Sect or someone from the Sky Empire being behind the disappearance of the core disciple.


    Not only that, but it was doubtful whether or not this Heavenly Dragon Temple would even dare to ask the Blue Sea Empire about this matter. After all, one of their secret outposts inside the territory of the Blue Sea Empire had just been found.


    Thinking about it, it might be better for the Heavenly Dragon Temple to try their best to bury this matter in case the Blue Sea Empire showed up for an exnation regarding this secret outpost located inside their territory¡­


    "I understand, I will look the other way regarding this little outpost and hope you and your friends below will leave the Blue Sea Empire immediately!" Nodding his head sternly after having pretended to seriously think this matter through for a minute, Xuan Hao grabbed the terrified core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    Different from the rest of the members from the Heavenly Dragon Temple present, he had clearly recognized Xuan Hao as one of the two Grand Elders of the Star Shattering Sect. Unfortunately for him, he had no way to convey this to the Soul Ascension Realm Expert who was jumping with joy after hearing that they had been allowed to leave alive.


    "Thank you! Thank you senior! We will leave this ce immediately!" Not wasting any time as he was ovee with happiness, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert quickly descended towards the people nervously waiting below before giving all of them the good news¡­ And before long, all of them rapidly began to pack away everything inside the secret outpost. No longer caring about the core disciple or what would end up happening to him.


    In their eyes, this core disciple was the reason why they had been found by the Blue Sea Empire in the first ce, so it was only fair that he paid them back by ensuring that they could leave alive¡­


    "Well¡­ That was easier than I expected." Muttering this to himself as he looked down at the people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple below, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the core disciple who was now hovering in the air a few meters away from him. "Now, why don''t we go somewhere a little more private and have a chat?"


    "Mmmh!"


    Showing an even more terrified expression on his face after hearing what Xuan Hao said, the core disciple fully understood that there was no way for him to escape his current situation. Even if he tried to use the Heavenly Dragon Temple to threaten Xuan Hao, he understood that it was of no use given that the Heavenly Dragon Temple would think the Blue Sea Empire were the ones who had taken him away.


    As for how Xuan Hao had even managed to chase after him when he had essentially crossed through the entire Sky Empire and entered the borders of the Blue Sea Empire? The question didn''t even cross his mind, as he was far more focused on trying toe up with a way to escape alive from his current situation.


    Regrettably for this core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, there was no way Xuan Hao was going to let him go knowing his identity.


    Doing something like that would inevitably end up attracting the ire of the Heavenly Dragon Temple. Not to mention, he still had no idea why this core disciple of such a powerful force had suddenly snuck into the Shattered Star Peaks to visit the Fifth Star Peak.


    The only real clue he had was the weird ruin that had revealed itself after the core disciple threw something into theke at the top of the Fifth Star Peak. Unfortunately, even if he wanted to investigate the ruin more, it had snuck back below the surface of theke just a short time before he chased the core disciple to the Blue Sea Empire.


    "Hopefully this guy will give me a little more information on that ruin¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced at the terrified core disciple onest time to make sure he didn''t have some kind of special artifact that would allow him to escape, Xuan Hao grabbed him by the neck before caring him out of the secret outpost at the bottom of the small ravine.

 Chapter 1022 Interrogation

    <h4>Chapter 1022 Interrogation</h4>


    Flying out of the secret outpost together with the terrified core disciple from the Heavenly Dragon Temple, Xuan Hao found a small, isted spot at the base of a nearby mountain tond before carving out a small cave where he could question the core disciple about his reason for breaking into the Star Shattering Sect without anyoneing to disturb him in the process.


    "W-what do you want to do!? The Heavenly Dragon Temple isn''t going to let you go after doing something like this to a core disciple and- Mmmh!" Hearing the core disciple startining loudly without showing any signs of understanding his current situation, Xuan Hao put the rag back into his mouth and prevented him from continuing to threaten him with the might of the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    Although he thought that this core disciple might have figured out that there was noneing to avenge or search for him after his disappearance due to the fact that the people back in the secret outpost going back and informing the rest of the Heavenly Dragon Temple that someone from the Blue Sea Empire had taken him away- Or maybe he had already realized this and intend to remain silent to the end¡­


    "How troublesome¡­ I''m only going to ask you this once, what is the reason you broke into the Star Shattering Sect? Was your goal only to find that ancient ruin at the Fifth Star Peak or did you also have some other goal for entering the Star Shattering Sect?" Removing the rag once again after he had finished talking, Xuan Hao penitently gazed down at the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    Different from before, the core disciple didn''t start cursing and threatening him like he had done before. Instead, his eyes darted back and forth between Xuan Hao and the exit of the cave as a struggling look appeared on his face.


    Although he understood that there was no way Xuan Hao would let him escape given that he knew about his identity as someone from the Star Shattering Sect and would undoubtedly tell his master and the rest of the Heavenly Dragon Temple about what had happened, he still found himself hesitating.


    "You¡­ Can you ensure that I can leave alive if I tell you why I broke into your sect¡­?"


    In the end, the fear of death was simply far too terrifying for a core disciple of a major power who had never really been in any real life and death situation before today.


    "Sure, but I hope you understand that I will put a few restrictions on you to ensure you don''t end up causing trouble to the Star Shattering Sect in the future." Nodding his head with a slight smile on his face in response to what the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple said, Xuan Hao didn''t mind agreeing with his request of being able to leave alive. In any case, he was still someone in the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he had more than one way to ensure that he wouldn''t end up implicating him in the future.


    For now, the most important thing was to learn why someone from a powerful force like the Heavenly Dragon Temple had suddenly decided to send someone to the borders of a small empire like the Sky Empire.


    "Thank you senior!" Understanding that Xuan Hao had no reason to lie to him in his current situation, the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple was ovee with joy upon hearing him agree on him leaving alive. Even if he understood that all sorts of restrictions would end up being ced on him as a result of this, it was still far better than being killed.


    Not to mention, after he returned to the Heavenly Dragon Temple, he could always ask his master to help him undo the restriction. After all, he highly doubted someone from a backwards empire located at the edges of the continent to be more powerful than his master, one of the pirs of the Heavenly Dragon Temple!


    "No need to waste time, the sooner you finish, the faster you can leave."


    "I understand senior. Ehm¡­ First off, the reason why I entered the Star Shattering Sect was to investigate the state of the ruins located at the Fifth Star Peak and see if they were about to open up. After all, the ancient protective formation ced on those ruins far exceed the Earth Immortal Realm and is not something that can be dealt with by someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­ And, from my investigation, it looks like the ruins were indeed about to open up.


    Outside of this, I also ran into some people before entering the Star Shattering Sect who asked me if I could gather some information about the strength of the Star Shattering Sect. Normally, I would never do something like this, but the people who asked me already knew about my identity and had also reached the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Although I could escape by using the teleportation talisman my master gave me, I decided not to and agreed to help them. After all, if I used the teleportation talisman before even entering the Star Shattering Sect, I would have failed my master''s mission¡­" Going quiet after he finished saying this, the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple nervously fidgeted with his hands as he looked towards him filled with fear.


    Even if he had gotten Xuan Hao''s word that he would spare him if he told him the reason for him entering the Star Shattering Sect, he didn''t fully believe that Xuan Hao would allow him to leave alive. After all, if he could think of his master helping him with the restrictions, so could Xuan Hao¡­


    "Hm¡­ I understand, do you know anything about the ruins on the Fifth Star Peak?"


    "N-no¡­ My master never told me anything other than the fact that the ruins once belonged to a powerful ancient sect from the past." Shaking his head fearfully as he instantly responded to Xuan Hao''s question, the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple began feeling even more nervous about his fatepared to before.


    "Haaa¡­ Do you know anything about the people who asked you to investigate the strength of the Star Shattering Sect? Given that they had reached the Soul Ascension Realm, you should at least have some impression of them." Shaking his head in disappointment after hearing the answer from the core disciple, Xuan Hao instead decided to try and ask about the group of people who had stopped him before he snuck inside the Star Shattering Sect. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    All things considered. Finding out who these people were was far more important than the ancient ruins about to open at the Fifth Star Peak.


    Not only did they clearly sound hostile to the Star Shattering Sect from the task they had given to the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, but they were clearly also powerful enough to know about a power like the Heavenly Dragon Temple, someone that he had never heard about inside the Sky Empire before today.


    Maybe they are the people behind the secret technique spreading among the different major kingdoms¡­ But why would someone like that target the Star Shattering Sect? Is it perhaps rted to the ancient ruins about to open up at the Fifth Star Peak?


    As he thought about all of this, the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple nervously looked at the visible frown on his face and understood that he might not be able to leave the Blue Sea Empire alive if he didn''te out with any useful information-


    "S-senior¡­ Although I''m not certain about the identity of those people, I might have an idea¡­"


    For this Reason, he could only use everything he had. Even if his master was going to kill him personally if he found out¡­


    "Hm? Go on¡­"


    "Thank you senior¡­ The people who recognized me and asked me to investigate the strength of your sect might also be rted to my Heavenly Dragon Temple¡­"


    "Also rted to the Heavenly Dragon Temple? What do you mean?" Not knowing what to say when he heard that the group of people causing trouble for the Star Shattering Sect in the Sky Empire might be rted to the Heavenly Dragon Temple as well, Xuan Hao could not help showing a confused expression on his face as he asked for the core disciple to rify what he meant.


    "To be more precise, I think they are part of a special group trained by my master outside the supervision of the Heavenly Dragon Temple. My presence here to investigate the Fifth Star Peak might not have been to help my master learn about the state of the ancient ruins at the Fifth Star Peak but should be a rouse to mislead the rest of the elders from the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    If I''m not wrong, my master should have wanted to falsely show me that the ancient runs were nowhere near opening and have me report this back to the rest of the sect, just¡­ He miscalcted and didn''t ount for a powerful sect like the Star Shattering Sect to appear and upy the Shattered Star Peaks before he could set any of his ns into action¡­"


    "This¡­"


    Listening to what the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple said, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on spot as he realized that things were far moreplicated than he had first expected. Not to mention, it looked like he wouldn''t be able to avoid the Heavenly Dragon Temple¡­

 Chapter 1023 "Punishment" From the Blue Sea Empire

    <h4>Chapter 1023 "Punishment" From the Blue Sea Empire</h4>


    Letting out a somewhat frustrated sigh as he realized that he would still have to deal with the Heavenly Dragon Temple, Xuan Hao could not help silently hoping that the master of this little core disciple in front of him ended up getting held up by the other elders of the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    After all, from the information he had managed to gather so far, it seemed like this little core disciple''s master was up to something that didn''t align with the overall interests of the Heavenly Dragon Temple. Even going so far as to nurture a force of his own outside the Heavenly Dragon Temple¡­


    "Hopefully the Heavenly Dragon Temple will continue to be chaotic for a few more years until I be strong enough to face off against someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the fearful core disciple from the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    Even if he had given him his word that he would not kill him, it was rather obvious that this core disciple didn''t trust his words and had partlye to terms with the fact that he might not be able to return to the Heavenly Dragon Temple alive.


    "No need to look at me like that. If I wanted to kill you, you would already be dead." Rolling his eyes as he said this in response to the terrified core disciple already prepared for death, Xuan Hao didn''t Following this, he forcibly infused his qi into his body and effortlessly broke through any defense around his dantian. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    wait for him to say anything, as he made his way over and ced his hand on top of the core disciple''s head before he had a chance to say anything.


    Whoosh~


    Following this, he forcibly infused his qi into his body and effortlessly broke through any defense around his dantian.


    "Here it is¡­" Finding what he was looking for after his qi flooded the dantian of the core disciple, Xuan Hao didn''t hesitate as his qi entangled itself with the panicked nascent soul inside the dantian-


    Crack~


    And before the core disciple had any time to realize what was happening, he applied pressure on the nascent soul and the dantian, causing the dantian to show signs of fracturing while the nascent soul waspletely destroyed in the process. Only leaving behind a small bit of the core disciple''s soul. Rendering the Domain Lord Realm cultivation base of the core disciplepletely useless, as his strength fell all the way to the Core Formation Realm.


    Although this did not end up killing the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, it essentially crippled his cultivation together with the memories he had umted ever since forming his nascent soul. Only leaving behind iprehensible fragments of his life after having reached the Nascent Soul Realm.


    In a sense, he was left in the same state as he had been when he had been at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm. The only clear difference was the fact that his physical body was far stronger than someone in the Core Formation Realm and made him close to invincible against anyone below the Domain Lord Realm.


    In the future, he would also be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm again more easily, as it was only a matter of recovering his lost cultivation base.


    The only real permanent damage that he sustained from this, was the damage caused to his soul after his nascent soul had been destroyed¡­ And the fact that arge chunk of his memories had been destroyed.


    "Huh? W-where am I- Who are you!?" Seeing the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple slowly recover as he looked around himself filled with confusion as he called out to him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit bad about what he had done, but¡­ Considering the strength of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, this was the only way he could ensure that his identity didn''t leak out if he decided to keep the core disciple alive!


    "I''m a border guard from the Blue Sea Empire, you are a core disciple from the Heavenly Dragon Temple and was found to have created a secret outpost inside the borders of the Blue Sea Empire. In return, you were interrogated, and your life was sparred, but¡­ Offending the Blue Sea Empire does note without punishment!


    You are free to leave and return to the Heavenly Dragon Temple, but! Make sure to inform them that there won''t be a next time!" Putting on a stern expression filled with killing intent as he said this to the terrified core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, Xuan Hao didn''t bother staying around for any longer, as he left the small cave after saying this.


    As for what happened to the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple who was now missing arge chunk of his memories¡­ That had nothing to do with him, he had already upheld his part of the promise to let him leave alive, whether or not he made it back to the Heavenly Dragon Temple again had nothing to do with him.


    ¡­


    "Huh!? I actually managed to be a core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple!? But¡­ Blue Sea Empire? Punishment? Just what happened and where am I¡­"


    Only waking up from his dazed and terrified state half an hour after Xuan Hao left, the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple felt an overwhelming sense of shock at what he had just learnt. After all, from what he could remember, he had just set out to prepare for the deadly entrance tests of the Heavenly Dragon Temple and was nowhere near being one of the legendary core disciples he had only ever heard of before.


    As for the Blue Sea Empire that the terrifying person just now had mentioned¡­ He had absolutely no idea about it.


    "For now, I should get out of this ce. Maybe if I go to the Heavenly Dragon Temple, I will be able to find out what happened and how I ended up in this ce¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked out the small cave towards the forest located at the base of the mountain, the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple felt that this was the only reasonable course of action, as he took a step forward and began his journey down the mountain.


    Picking a random direction to walk in, as he had no idea where the Heavenly Dragon Temple was located or where to find it. Not to mention, he was clearly inside some sort of powerful empire that didn''t seem to fear the all-epassing Heavenly Dragon Temple he had grown up learning about as the strongest power in the world.


    ¡­


    "Wait! Isn''t that the core disciple that the senior from the Blue Sea Empire took away earlier!? What happened to him? Why is his aura so weird¡­?"


    "Huh? Ah! You are correct! But¡­ What will happen to us now that the core disciple is still safe and sound!? Won''t he tell on us to the higher ups!?"


    "AH! You are right! But we can''t do anything about this by ourselves, let''s inform the captain first and have him deal with the situation¡­"


    Not too long after the confused core disciple had made his way down the mountain, he was identally spotted by a few of the people from the secret outpost, who were makingst minute preparations before leaving the Blue Sea Empire.


    Luckily for the confused core disciple, the two of them didn''t dare to attack a core disciple by themselves, so they rushed back to get the Soul Ascension Realm captain in charge of the secret outpost and have him deal with the situation.


    "What!? That core disciple is still alive!?"


    In the end, when they arrived back at the secret outpost and informed their captain, he didn''t wait a second before rushing out to confirm things for himself. After all, if the core disciple really did survive and made it back to the Heavenly Dragon Temple and informed the elders about what happened, he and the rest of the people in the outpost would be as good as dead!


    "Huh?"


    However, after seeing the core disciple in person, he quickly realized something was wrong¡­ And after a thorough examination, he realized that the core disciple had his nascent soul destroyed. Erasing most of his memories in the process.


    Although this could be considered as mercy from the side of the Blue Sea Empire, it was still an incredibly cruel punishment.


    "But¡­ This way, I don''t have to worry about exining the death of a core disciple to the elders. Not to mention, he won''t ever be able to recover the memories of what happened! Hah¡­ I don''t know whether or not to thank the person from the Blue Sea Empire for this¡­" Muttering this to himself after realizing the situation, the captain went forward and picked up the confused core disciple before he had any time to react and brought him back to secret outpost in the process of being dismantled.


    At least, he now had a way to defend himself from any severe punishment from the elders¡­

 Chapter 1024 Blue Sea Empire’s Eight Immortals

    <h4>Chapter 1024 Blue Sea Empire''s Eight Immortals </h4>


    Having left the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple to fend for himself after having made sure that he would not be able to pose any threat to the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao made his way back in the direction of the Sky Empire.


    Although he had entered the Blue Sea Empire by mistake and was curious about it, he did not n to stay around and explore it. After all, who knew when he would end up running into someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Not to mention, the Blue Sea Empire was also a gathering ce for other powerful forces ording to the border guard he had encountered. Meaning that he would most likely not only have to worry about encountering the Earth Immortals from the Blue Sea Empire, but also the Earth Immortals from these different powers.


    Whoosh~!


    However, just after leaving the mountain with the core disciple from the Heavenly Dragon Temple still in a state of confusion, Xuan Hao froze on the spot as someone was rapidly approaching his current location. Not only that, but from the speed alone, it was obvious that this person was someone in theter stages of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "Wait¡­ Isn''t that the border guard from earlier?" As the person entered the range of his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression on his face as he recognized the person as none other than the woman who had stopped him just a short time earlier. Not only that, but from the panicked look on her face, it was clear that something unexpected had happened.


    Noticing Xuan Hao at the same time that he saw her, the border guard''s eyes shone briefly as she said this before making her way over towards him.


    "Is there anything I can help with¡­?" Not knowing why, she had suddenly decided to approach him, Xuan Hao could not help asking this in a somewhat cautious manner. Not wanting to end up getting involved in anything troublesome, just as he was about to leave the Blue Sea Empire and make his way back into the Sky Empire.


    "No, but I rmend that you leave this ce as fast as possible. If I can, I would rmend you follow me to the nearest city, we will be far safer moving togetherpared to alone." Shaking her head before saying this, the border guard was just about to grab him to drag him along with her to escape in the opposite direction of the Blue Sea Empire''s border with the Sky Empire-


    Whish~


    "First of all, what happened to cause even a border guard from the Blue Sea Empire to run away like this?" However, Xuan Hao easily dodged her before asking the question that had appeared the moment, he saw her rushing in his direction.


    Even if she was just a border guard of the Blue Sea Empire, she was still someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm. For her to run away like this¡­ it was obvious that something serious had happened.


    "I don''t have enough time to exin, but to make a long story short, one of those damnable ancient demon beasts sleeping all across the waters of the Blue Sea Empire seems to be awakening, I have already informed my superiors about this, and someone will be here to deal with this in at most a few minutes.


    If you are not aware of what I''m talking about, just know that the weakest of these demons are in the Earth Immortal Realm! Now, let''s get out of here before it''s toote!"


    Whoosh~!


    Not wasting any time after finishing her rapid exnation of what was happening, the border guard used all of her strength to escape in the opposite direction of the border. Although she would be safer if she was together with Xuan Hao due to them possibly being able to resist the awakening demon beast in question for a few seconds, she didn''t want to waste too much time exining things to him.


    "This¡­" Realizing the seriousness of the situation that he suddenly found himself inside of, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more certain about his earlier decision of leaving the Blue Sea Empire as fast as possible.


    Unfortunately, for now, it looked like he wouldn''t be able to leave the Blue Sea Empire for the time being¡­


    As for trying to teleport past the ancient demon beast in the process of waking up¡­ He didn''t really want to risk his life on whether or not the demon beast in question had the ability to catch up with him.


    Swish-!


    In the end, he decided to go with the far safer option, that was, following after the border guard and hiding in the city that she mentioned until her superiors showed up to deal with the ancient demon beast. In any case, she had said that they would be there in at most a few minutes, so he didn''t really worry too much about being stuck inside the Blue Sea Empire for a long period of time due to this.


    Not to mention, if the fight ended up dragging on, he could always try and return to the Sky Empire through some of the other empires connected to the Blue Sea Empire who also happened to share a border with the Sky Empire. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Hm? Decided to escape as well. Good decision!" Seeing Xuan Hao catch up to her, the border guard nodded her head happily as she said this through her divine sense while they continued rapidly moving deeper and deeper in the Blue Sea Empire.


    Soon enough, a massive city many timesrger than the capital city of the Sky Empire came into view.


    The city was located at the banks of a massive river that seemed to go on forever, while a wall more than a dozen meters tall surrounded it. On closer inspection, these walls were covered in all sorts of ancient symbols that seemed to make up some kind of massive formation covering the entire city. Not only that, but Xuan Hao also felt a terrifying aura erupt from the center of the city the moment they saw it.


    RUMBLE-!


    Not a secondter, the origin of this terrifying aura shot up from the city before rushing past both of them in the direction of the borders. Only allowing him to catch a glimpse of the person who the aura belonged to.


    Just who was that? Someone in the Earth Immortal Realm? But that person was clearly far stronger than the cloud demon beast¡­


    Feeling an intense shock at the disy of power, Xuan Hao could not help turning around to look in the direction that the mysterious person had disappeared in.


    Deep down, he was wondering if he would have been able to escape alive if that person had targeted him just now¡­ And in the end, he could only helplessly shake his head in defeat. Even with the help of his Dao of Spaceprehension, he had yet to master long distance teleportation and would undoubtedly be caught before he had a chance to escape from the other party.


    In a sense, this was the first time that Xuan Hao had encountered someone who was far stronger than himself and also had the ability to catch up to him, something that only made him want to leave the Blue Sea Empire even more than before¡­


    "Looks like Senior Peng decided to make a move himself. Looks like the awakened demon beast is stronger than expected¡­" Different from Xuan Hao who was thinking about how to leave the Blue Sea Empire as fast as possible, the border guard was looking in the direction of the mysterious person filled with a sense of both awe and respect.


    "Senior Peng?" Catching on to the fact that she knew the other party, Xuan Hao curiously turned to ask the border guard looking like a young maiden in love as she stared fixedly in the direction that the mysterious person had left in.


    "Ha!? You¡­ You don''t know Senior Peng!? Senior Peng is one of the Blue Sea Empire''s Eight Immortals! An exalted existence that even Earth Immortals have to look up to! Not only that, but Senior Peng also-"


    Seeing that Xuan Hao had no idea about the identity of the person who had just flown past them just now, the border guard proudly introduced him. Unaware of the fact that Xuan Hao had no idea what the Eight Immortals of the Blue Sea Empire was.


    "¡­"


    In the end, the only thing he managed to gather from the fan girl like behavior that the border guard suddenly decided to engage in during thest bit of their journey to the city, was the fact that Senior Peng was someone who had surpassed the level of ordinary Earth Immortals.


    Other than that, he also learnt a lot more useless information about this Senior Peng, like the type of food he enjoyed and where he liked to cultivate¡­

 Chapter 1025 Leaving for the Sky Empire

    <h4>Chapter 1025 Leaving for the Sky Empire</h4>


    Arriving in front of the gate leading into the massive city, it did not take long before one of the guards stationed at the gate recognized the border guard and came running over.


    "Senior! Why are you here!? Did something happen at the border?"


    "Yes, an ancient demon beast began to awaken below the surface of the main river that runs through parts of the Sky Empire."


    Listening in on the conversation between the two as they began to discuss what had happened and how long it would take to resolve now that this Senior Peng had taken action to deal with the ancient demon beast, Xuan Hao realized that he would at least have to stay in the Blue Sea Empire for a few days. Unless he decided to risk trying to pass through the ce where the battle between the ancient demon beast and the expert from the Blue Sea Empire was likely about to start.


    Or I could go through one of the adjacent empires¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided to leave the border guard to do her own thing and made his way inside the massive city.


    Even if he didn''t intend to stay in the Blue Sea Empire, he was still curious about the difference between arge empire like the Blue Sea Empire and the Sky Empire.


    In the end, he ended up spending the next half hour wandering around the entrance of the city browsing the different shops filled with all sorts of artifacts, spiritual herbs and other rare materials that would normally be hard to find inside the Sky Empire. Not only However, different from any of the other branches of the Explorer Union that he had seen inside the Sky Empire, this branch only that, but he also ended up stumbling on a branch from the Explorer Union located close to the entrance of the city.


    However, different from any of the other branches of the Explorer Union that he had seen inside the Sky Empire, this branch only specialized in selling different potions and pills made by alchemists.


    After chatting with one of the store clerks, he also managed to learn that it was not the main branch inside the city but was just one of countless smaller branches of the Explorer Union Branch inside the city and was only in charge of selling different items and products rted to alchemy.


    Other than that, he also found out that the main branch of the Explorer Union inside of the city was guarded by someone in the Earth Immortal Realm. Making him once again realize just how big the difference between a ce like the Blue Sea Empire and the Sky Empire was.


    Although he was only at the borders of the Blue Sea Empire, he had somehow already managed to encounter a ce with two people in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that one of these two people had apparently surpassed the level of an ordinary Earth Immortal. Not that he had any idea what that even meant in the first ce, as he was still rather unfamiliar with the Earth Immortal Realm¡­


    "It really is no wonder that the Blue Sea Empire is considered one of the strongest on the entire continent¡­" Muttering this to himself as he left the small branch of the Explorer Union, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a profound sense of fear after realizing just how strong the Blue Sea Empire was.


    Not because he felt fearful that the Blue Sea Empire would do something to him, but because he realized that the Heavenly Dragon Temple should be around the same level as the Blue Sea Empire in terms of strength.


    Even after reaching the Earth Immortal Realm, he doubted that he would be able to do anything to such a terrifying existence. Meaning that he needed to find some way to protect himself and the Star Shattering Sect in case the Heavenly Dragon Temple decided to attack before he had a chance to be strong enough to resist them.


    At least, for now, he wouldn''t have to deal with the entire Heavenly Dragon Temple and just had to worry about the possible Earth Immortal Realm elder who clearly had some kind of ns for the ancient ruins at the Fifth Star Peak. Not that it was that much better considering that he was still nowhere near strong enough to fend off against someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­


    "Haaa¡­ I should really leave this ce before I end up idently offending someone from the Blue Sea Empire as well¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while looking in the direction of the center of the city where the main branch of the Explorer Union in this city was located, Xuan Hao began making his way back in the direction of the gate leading out of the massive city. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although it was still dangerous for him to return to the Sky Empire given that he would have to pass through the ce where the powerful ancient demon beast and the senior from the Blue Sea Empire was fighting, he thought things through and realized that he should be capable of avoiding the two with his movement technique.


    Even if the ancient demon beast ended up trying to attack him, he had realized that there was no way that the senior from the Blue Sea Empire would allow something like that to happen. Not because he would care about aplete stranger like himself, but because it would present a perfect opportunity tounch an attack.


    Other than that, a part of him was also curious about how a battle between Earth Immortals would be like. After all, outside of the short glimpse of the cloud demon beasts struggle with the guardian formation of the mystic realm, he had never seen someone in the Earth Immortal Realm fighting in person. The glimpse of the past he had seen back during his visit to the Thousand Wind Mountains didn''t really count, as he was only strong enough to observe the battles taking ce between those in the Domain Lord and Soul Ascension Realm.


    The battles between those above the Soul Ascension Realm had not even entered his eyes back then, likely due to them happening away from the ancient battlefield he had ended up on or that they were just taking ce somewhere far above him.


    Whoosh~!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao soon left therge city at the banks of the river. Making his way back in the direction he hade from.


    ¡­


    "Hmph! To think one of those old, fossilized creatures actually managed to wake up after going to sleep¡­ Haaa¡­ And I was just about to return to the capital for the uing auction hosted by the Explorer Union¡­"


    Further down the river that Xuan Hao was following back in the direction of the Sky Empire, the Senior Peng that the border guard had gone full fan girl mode over, wasining with a visible frown on his face, while looking down at an enormous snake head below him that had just popped up from the river below.


    Even from a nce, it was obvious that the size of the demon beast below him was far toorge for the river below, the head alone almost taking up the entire width of the more than a hundred-kilometer-wide river.


    "How on earth did you even manage to drift all the way here in the first ce? Or are you perhaps trying to swim ind ande from the ocean? If you only identally ended up here from the ocean, I have to ask you to leave!" Not showing any signs of fear or panic when faced with the absurdlyrge snake beneath him, Senior Peng just casually asked this as he seemingly waited for therge creature to respond.


    "Sssss~ Human, Ie from the ocean and have seen far more powerful creatures than you, little creatures, do you really think I would leave just because you tell me? Not to mention, the ind sea is said to be filled with all sorts of precious things that will make my evolution smoother!" Unexpectedly, therge snake responded to Senior Peng floating in the air above it. Different from other mindless demon beasts, it could fullymunicate and was no different from a human in terms of intelligence.


    Unfortunately for Senior Peng, the response he got from therge snake was not the response he wanted¡­


    "Haaa¡­ I see, looks like there is no way out of a fight then¡­ And here I hoped I would be able to end things early¡­"


    RUMBLE-!


    Not wasting any time after having confirmed that therge snake demon beast had no intention of leaving, Senior Peng unleashed all of his power as he attacked therge snake demon beast without a second thought-


    BOOOOOM-!


    Giving it close to no time to react, as it was suddenly hit directly on the head. Sending it back down beneath the water.

 Chapter 1026 Difference Between Earth Immortals

    <h4>Chapter 1026 Difference Between Earth Immortals</h4>


    "Hm? What is that..."


    Following the river back in the direction of the Sky Empire, Xuan Hao was suddenly shocked to discover arge wave of water hundreds of meters tall heading in his direction. Not only that, but upon closer inspection,rge chunks of fleshrger than even the tallest building back in the Star Shattering Sect could be seen in the water. Coloring parts of the water a distinct reddish color that stood out from the normal darkish blue water of the river.


    Whoosh~


    Moving higher into the air to avoid the iing wave of water, Xuan Hao was surprised to discover that on the other side of the wall of water, there was an enormous snake barreling directly towards him.


    "Huh?" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Only able to let out a somewhat stupid sound when suddenly faced with an enormous snake flying directly towards him, Xuan Hao quickly realized the seriousness of his situation-


    Swish-!


    Allowing him to just barely use his movement technique to move out of the way before the massive snake mmed into.


    BANG!


    RUMBLE-!


    Continuing through the air, therge snake smashed into a small mountain range located beside theke. Instantly reducing the mountain range to rubble, while also causing a massive earthquake that destroyed everything within the area that itnded.


    On the positive side, this part of the Blue Sea Empire did not have a lot of people living in it, outside of the massive city he had been to. Meaning that the only once to suffer were the few unfortunate cultivators wandering around the small mountain range and the different demon beasts and other animals living around the area where the enormous snake had ended upnding.


    If something like this had happened in the middle of a more popted area, it would be easy to imagine just how many deaths the simple earthquake would have caused, let alone the ones unfortunate enough to be crushed beneath the enormous body of the snake.


    "Sssss~! HUMAN! YOU ARE DEAD!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was lost in his own thoughts staring down at the massive snake that hadpletely erased the small mountain range and any living creatures within a few hundred kilometers, the snake in question suddenly let out a loud roar filled with killing intent.


    It can speak¡­?


    However, the most surprising thing to Xuan Hao was not the fact that the snake was still alive and moving, but the fact that it could speak like a normal human.


    Not only that, but it was also at this moment that Xuan Hao finally managed to get a real feeling of the snake''s strength¡­ And to put it simply, he was terrified, as the strength disyed by the snake was obviously above that of the cloud demon beast he had encountered back in the mystic realm.


    "So, this is the ancient demon beast the border guard was talking about¡­" Allowing him to finally put two and two together, as he realized that the snake on the ground not too far away from him, was none other than the ancient demon beast that the border guard had mentioned to him.


    Swish-!


    Not even a second after he had realized this, a person appeared in the air above the snake before a golden fist almost twice as enormous snake manifested above him and began rapidly descending towards the snake that was in process of getting back up-


    BOOOM-!


    As a result, a massive crater was created with the snake at the center where the rubble from the mountain range had been just a second earlier.


    "Ah! Nooo!"


    "W-what is happening!?"


    Roooar!


    The few cultivators and other demon beasts who had been lucky enough to escape earlier, were ultimately swept up by the terrifying fist attack and almost all of them ended up dying. Only a few Domain Lord Realm cultivators and demon beasts had been able to hide beneath the ground managing to escape with their lives.


    Bang!


    "So, this is the power of someone in the Earth Immortal realm¡­" Feeling his hands shaking as he felt the terrifying power from the aftershock still coursing m into his dao domain. Soon causing it to start showing sign of cracking apart under the pressure, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked at just how much stronger the senior from the Blue Sea Empire waspared to himself.


    Although it had just been the aftershock of the attack just now, it had almost ended up destroying his dao domain!


    Even if he reached the Peak of the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he doubted that he would be able to face the fist attack just now head on. Only after reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm would he have a chance to survive such a terrifying attack.


    As for fighting the other party¡­ That would depend on how much stronger he would be after reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Ssss! YOU DARE ATTACK LIKE THAT AGAIN!? PREPARE TO DIE ARROGANT HUMAN!" Seemingly not affected by the attack just now, the snake demon beast sprung up from the massive crater and opened its mouth wide as its two hill sized fangs bared down on the tiny Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire.


    "Hmph! To think your scales are this tough¡­ Haaa¡­ Looks like I won''t be able to attend the Explorer Union''s auction this time around¡­" Not at all worried or fearful of the giant mouth that was about to swallow him whole, Senior Peng just let out a disappointed The next moment, he raised the snake up into the air before starting to violently m it into the ground again and again, sigh filled with frustration as heined about not being able to attend some kind of auction. Making it rather clear that he was annoyed with the snake''s tough scale that made it hard to kill.


    RUMBLE-!


    The next second, Senior Peng''s aura violently exploded all around him as he conjured two massive hands with his qi before using them to forcibly grab the tworge fangs. Stopping the snake before it had a chance to swallow him.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    The next moment, he raised the snake up into the air before starting to violently m it into the ground again and again, creating massive earthquakes, while at same time also destroying the surrounding terrain. Killing a few of the lucky Domain Lord Realm demon beasts and humans who had managed to hide underground in process.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as he saw this one-sided battle y out, Xuan Hao understood that there was a very clear difference between Earth Immortals. Even if the snake demon beast didn''t die and managed to hold on to its tough scales and great defensive abilities as a demon beast, it was obvious that it was only a matter of time before it would lose¡­


    Maybe I should leave them alone and get on my way. After all, there isn''t much to learn from this one-sided battle. Not to mention, I really don''t want to identally end up offending that Earth Immortal¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he continued observe the one-sided beating of the snake demon beast that had already started to painfully cry out whenever it was mmed into the ground, Xuan Hao came to the decision that it would be best for him to leave before the battle came to an end or he possibly ended up catching the attention of the rather annoyed looking Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Swish-!


    Not wasting any time aftering to this decision, Xuan Hao directly used hisprehension of the Dao of Space together with his movement technique to rapidly escape from the ce before any of this ended up happening.


    At the same time, he vowed to never take a single step inside the Blue Sea Empire again before he had at least reached the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Before that, he simply did not dare to return.


    After all, outside of the Senior Peng whom he had just encountered, there should be at least seven other people at the same level as him inside the Blue Sea Empire ording to what the border guard had told him about the Eight Immortals of the Blue Sea Empire that this Senior Peng was a part of¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that these Eight Immortals were not part of the imperial family. Meaning that there were likely even more terrifying experts present inside the Blue Sea Empire. Maybe there was even someone above the Earth Immortal Realm!


    Just thinking about this made a shiver run down his spine. Not to mention someone above the Earth Immortal Realm, he didn''t even have any confidence to face someone in the Earth Immortal Realm!


    To face someone above the Earth Immortal Realm, he would likely have to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm or maybe even ascend the Immortal Soul Tribtion before he stood a chance against someone like that!

 Chapter 1027 Back in the Sky Empire

    <h4>Chapter 1027 Back in the Sky Empire</h4>


    Following what little was left of the river after the Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire and the enormous snake demon beast had passed through, Xuan Hao could not help looking behind himself from time to time with a worried expression on his face.


    Although he didn''t have any interaction with the Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire before leaving and didn''t think the other party was going to chase after him, he was still worried that the direction of the battle would start moving in his direction. After all, there was no way that the senior from the Blue Sea Empire would allow the battle to reach the city located further down the river.


    Instead, it was far more likely that he would direct the battle towards the borders where there weren''t that many people around¡­


    "SSsssss~!"


    As if to confirm his suspicions, a loud hissing sound suddenly echoed out behind him before the enormous snake came flying directly towards him.


    Is he aiming for me or something!?


    Not able to stop himself from quietly crying at the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Blue Sea Empire after realizing that the snake demon beast was once again heading directly towards him, Xuan Hao wasted no time in using his movement technique to dodge out of the way-


    BOOOOM-!


    RUMBLE~!


    Once again, only barely managing to avoid the enormous body of the snake demon beast before he rapidly escaped in the direction of the Sky Empire. Not intending to stay behind and give the Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire a chance to idently throw the demon beast directly at him again-


    "SSSsssss-!"


    However, only a few minutester, Xuan Hao was once again met with the scene of a giant snake demon beast blocking out the sun as it came barreling down towards him from above. Making him begin to seriously question whether or not the Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire was messing with him on purpose.


    "Haaa¡­ No mater what it is, I should be fine as long as I leave the Blue Sea Empire¡­" Muttering this to himself as he dodged the enormous body of the snake demon beast with far more easepared to the first two times, Xuan Hao looked at the thin line of towers that had appeared in the distance.


    The towers in question were not ordinary towers holding the guards of the Blue Sea Empire in charge of guarding the border but were instead formation towers that would record everyone entering the Blue Sea Empire.


    Although he had never seen these towers before in person due to his rather unique way of entering the Blue Sea Empire, he had read about them before and seen illustrations of them in the few books he had found about the powers existing outside the borders of the Sky Empire back in the now ratherrge library of the Star Shattering Sect.


    The only problem was that the snake demon beast and the Earth affect the Star Shattering Sect located far away from the border between the Sky Empire and the Blue Sea Empire, he was still Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire had begun fighting a short distance behind him and were moving in his direction.


    Even if he didn''t really care too much about the damage that their fight might end up causing to the Sky Empire, as it wouldn''t really affect the Star Shattering Sect located far away from the border between the Sky Empire and the Blue Sea Empire, he was still worried that the Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire might ignore this powerful snake demon beast after it was throw out of the Blue Sea Empire and didn''t show any intentions of trying to break inside again.


    If something like that really ended up happening, he would have to start worrying about what this snake demon beast would do after being left alone. The best oue being it going back to the ocean, while the worst would be it destroying the Sky Empire in a fit of anger over being beaten up by the Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    No, I can''t allow something like that to happen, but¡­ What in the world can I even do to stop a demon beast in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­?


    Whoosh~


    Coming to a stop a few hundred meters away from the formation towers carving out the border between the Sky Empire and the Blue Sea Empire as he thought about this, Xuan Hao turned to look back in the direction of where he hade from. Half expecting the snake demon best toe flying towards him at any moment.


    However, even after waiting around for a little over five minutes, nothing ended up happening. Not only that, but he couldn''t feel the vibrations that the fight between the senior from the Blue Sea Empire and the snake demon beast in the ground beneath him.


    "Did the fight perhapse to an end? But how did the snake demon beast lose so fast? Even if it was at a clear disadvantage and was losing, its scales should at least be able to hold up for a few days before the relentless attacks of the Expert from the Blue Sea Empire managed to cause any serious injuries.


    Not to mention, if it was really in a life and death situation, I doubt it would continue to stay around and fight to the death. After all, the snake demon beast was obviously far smarter than ordinary demon beast¡­" Muttering this to himself as he continued to keep his attention focus in the direction that he hade from, Xuan Hao could not help feeling like something was wrong.


    For this reason, he decided to continue waiting around the border of the Blue Sea Empire and the Sky Empire for half an hour. If nothing ended up appearing during this period of time, he would turn around and make his way back into the Sky Empire.


    Like this, time slowly passed as Xuan Hao continuously scanned his surroundings with his divine sense to ensure that nobody could sneak up on him without him first knowing about it.


    Whoosh~


    After the thirty minutes were up, Xuan Hao did onest sweep of his surroundings with his divine sense before turning around and making his way back into the Sky Empire that was on the other side of the formation towers.


    Well¡­ No matter what ended up happening to the snake demon beast, as long as it doesn''t end up affecting the Star Shattering Sect, I should be fine¡­


    With this in mind as he chose not to think too much about the fate of the snake demon beast who had ended up going against the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao smoothly made his way back in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect. Doing his best to avoid any dangerous ces that might end up dying his journey back to the sect where he intended to try and increase his cultivation base beyond the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    All for the simple goal of having the ability to stand up when faced with terrifying powers like the Blue Sea Empire and the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    Although he doubted that he would be able to intimidate theserge powers after reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he should at least have grown strong enough that these powers wouldn''t regard him as someone that could be messed with for no reason.


    Even if the Blue Sea Empire was more than strong enough to deal with someone in the Earth Immortal Realm, it would undoubtedly still be a troublesome and risky thing to do. Especially if they went around offending everyone in the Earth Immortal Realm without being a part of some of the otherrge powers on the Ewaria Continent¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that some of these Earth Immortals might be deliberately hiding their true identity in a simr fashion to what he had done when confronted by the border guard.


    If the Blue Sea Empire ended up identally killing someone important from a simrlyrge power because of this, it was obvious that they wouldn''t be in for a good time hen said power began taking revenge¡­


    BOOM!


    Thinking about all of this as he continued making his way back in the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao suddenly heard argemotion taking ce not too far away from his current location.


    "Hm? What is tha-"


    However, the moment he turned to look in the direction of themotion, he froze on the spot, as he realized that the origin of themotion was none other than therge snake demon beast whom he had been expecting to fall on him for a fourth time at the border between the Blue Sea Empire and the Sky Empire.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Not only that, but it was currently locked in a deadly battle with the expert from the Blue Sea Empire!


    The only problem with all of this¡­ Was the fact that the battle was now taking ce inside the borders of the Sky Empire¡­!

 Chapter 1028 Two Earth Immortals, Chaos In the Capital City

    <h4>Chapter 1028 Two Earth Immortals, Chaos In the Capital City</h4>


    Scanning the area around the battle, Xuan Hao discovered that three Soul Ascension Realm Experts had already shown up and were nervously watching the terrifying battle from afar. Upon closer inspection, it became obvious that these three Soul Ascension Realm Experts were rted to the Sky Empire. However, given that he didn''t really know much about the Soul Ascension Realm Experts of the Sky Empire, outside of the old ancestor from the imperial family, he could only guess where these three came from. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Of course, the most obvious being that they belonged to either the noble families or one of the three religions. The only problem with this was how they had managed to reach the border so quickly. After all, the capital city of the Sky Empire was nowhere near the border of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Well¡­ their identities don''t really matter; they are far too weak to interfere in the battle between the snake demon beast and the Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire. If they had been at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, they might have been able to lend a hand in killing the snake demon beast.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this after having finished examining the strength of the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts, Xuan Hao focused his attention back on the chaotic battle taking ce. The strongest among the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts had only barely reached the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Nowhere near strong enough to interfere in a battle between Earth Immortals¡­


    "Look, someone new appeared from the Blue Sea Empire! I can''t sense his cultivation either, is he perhaps another expert above the Soul Ascension Realm!?"


    "Maybe¡­ It might be best for us to retreat a bit further away in case the battle moves deeper into the Sky Empire¡­"


    At the same time Xuan Hao examined the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Sky Empire, they had also noticed him appearing from the Blue Sea Empire''s side of the border. Making them guess about his identity and strength, while at the same time retreating further into the Sky Empire to avoid the battle that was slowly inching deeper into the Sky Empire with each passing second.


    Compared to Xuan Hao who could still somewhat easily resist the remnant power that was thrown all over the ce as a result of the snake demon beast and Senior Peng shing with each other, these three were far too weak to do something like that and were forced to retreat to avoid getting killed by this remnant power.


    The reason why they didn''t run away from the battle was rather simple, as they cherished this opportunity to watch a battle between powerful cultivators far beyond themselves. Different from Xuan Hao, who was still young and hadn''t experienced any real bottleneck so to speak, they were all close to reaching the time of their next tribtion and were eager for any opportunity that might help them improve their strength enough to survive the tribtion.


    It was also because they witnessed how Xuan Hao was unaffected by the remnant power of the battle that they thought he was someone in the Earth Immortal Realm like the two currently locked in a deadly fight. After all, the three of them had felt just how terrifying the remnant power was and understood that there would be no way for someone like themselves to survive it.


    Not thinking that he might be someone who had just reached the Later Stages of the Soul Ascension Realm due to not at all being familiar with the Later Stages of the Soul Ascension Realm. Not too surprising considering that the strongest person in the Sky Empire had only reached the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ And that was not even considering the fact that this person had never really shown off his power before he was forced to face the people who had been called over from the different religions to deal with him¡­


    "Hm?"


    Having focused his full attention on the battle between Senior Peng and the snake demon beast, Xuan Hao could not help turning around to look in the direction of the Blue Sea Empire after sensing a terrifying presence no weaker than the two rapidly approaching.


    Rumble~!


    As the terrifying presence grew closer, the snake demon beast and Senior Peng also seemed to notice that someone was approaching, causing both of them to momentarily stop their fight as both of them turned to look in the direction of the terrifying presence.


    "Hahaha! I didn''t think you would show, here to help me deal with the oversized worm before it bes toote for the auction back at the capital?"


    However, before Xuan Hao or the snake demon beast had a chance to guess the identity of the terrifying presence rapidly approaching, Senior Peng suddenly beganughing out loud as he called out in the direction of the Blue Sea Empire that the terrifying presence was approaching from.


    "Peng! You know full well that you are the one holding most of the spirit stones for the uing auction, how am I supposed to go there without any spirit stones!?"


    Not a secondter, an angry roar echoed out across the now deste wastnd that had been created by the battle between Senior Peng and the snake demon beast over the past few minutes-


    Swish-!


    Following this loud roar filled with anger, a tall woman close to two meters in height appeared in the air a few hundred meters away from the deste wastnd, her gazepletely focused on Senior Peng while she ignored the panicked expression that had made its way onto the scaly face of the snake demon beast after it realized that another Earth Immortal had appeared. Especially after it realized that this Earth Immortal was on the same side as its opponent!


    Whoosh-!


    Thinking fast and knowing that it would end up losing if the two Earth Immortals from the Blue Sea Empire started working together to fight it, the snake demon beast used all of its strength to escape from the battle. Not wasting a single second before diving into therge river and escaping in the direction of the ocean where it knew it would be safe from anyone chasing after it.


    "Oh? It looks like your little friend is taking the opportunity to escape¡­ Are you not worried that it might cause problems in the future?"


    "And whose fault is that¡­?"


    "Yours, of course!"


    "¡­ Just, help me deal with it¡­"


    Knowing that it would only take longer to catch the snake demon beast if he continued arguing with the tall woman, Senior Peng decided to just ask for help before he turned around and dived into the river to chase after the escaping snake demon beast.


    Although it wouldn''t make much of a difference when it came to speed, he would at least be able to better sense the snake demon beast inside the water, while at the same time having a better angle for attacking.


    "Hehe, quite a troublesome one, I guess I will help out." Shaking her head as she muttered this to herself while looking at the enormous snake demon beast slowly disappearing in the horizon together with Senior Peng as they moved deeper inside the territory of the Sky Empire, the tall woman didn''t continue standing around for long before she simrly chased after the escaping snake demon beast.


    "Hm? Isn''t that the direction of the capital city¡­?" Curiously looking in the direction that the three had disappeared in, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself after realizing that the three were moving directly towards the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    Only after trying to recall information on the part of therge river in front of him that ran through a part of the Sky Empire did Xuan Hao realize that the river passed close by the capital city at some point before going directly past it and into the neighboring Onyx Empire.


    Even without being able to follow behind the three rapidly approaching the capital city of the Sky Empire, it was not that hard for him to imagine the panic that they were going to cause.


    ¡­


    "W-w-what is that?!"


    "S-SNAKE! A GIANT SNAKE!"


    "Who is that fighting the giant snake!?"


    "More importantly than all of that, why are they heading directly towards us!?"


    At the same time, in the capital city of the Sky Empire, arge number of people noticed the enormous snake that had suddenly emerged from the river and begun to fight with the two Earth Immortals from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Unfortunately for the Sky Empire, these two Earth Immortals just happened to catch up with the snake demon beast just outside the capital city of the Sky Empire. Meaning that the old ancestor of the Sky Empire could only activate the guardian formation of the capital in an attempt to minimize any damage that the remnant power of these powerful cultivators and demon beast might end up causing, while silently praying that they would get any closer to the capital city¡­

 Chapter 1029 Guardian Formation on its Last Leg

    <h4>Chapter 1029 Guardian Formation on its Last Leg</h4>


    "From the looks of it, it seems like the two Earth Immortals from the Blue Sea Empire are not intending to let the snake demon beast escape. Meaning, I won''t have to worry about it showing up at the Star Shattering Sect, something that can''t be said for the imperial capital¡­" Muttering this to himself as he gazed in the direction that the snake demon beast and the two Earth Immortals from the Blue Sea Empire had disappeared in, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit curious as to whether or not the imperial capital of the Sky Empire was strong enough to survive these three passing by.


    After all, although the none of the three would deliberately target the capital city, the remnant power from their fight would be more than enough to destroy the guardian formation over time and that was not even mentioning how bad things would be if the snake demon beast ended up getting thrown into the capital city!


    Considering that the snake demon beast had already been close to hitting him three times at this point in time, Xuan Hao didn''t feel that this would be too unrealistic. Especially if the two Earth Immortals caught up to the snake demon beast close to the capital city itself. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although the Sky Empire would weaken with the fall of the capital city, it was not realistic to think that the old ancestor was going to die because of something like that, as he would have more than enough time to escape before any of this happened. Not to mention, when the Sky Empire weakened enough, the surrounding empires, like the Onyx Empire, would undoubtedly jump at the opportunity to take some of the Sky Empire for themselves.


    No matter what ends up happening to the capital city and the old ancestor of the imperial family, it can be considered a good thing for the Star Shattering Sect if this ends up weakening the Sky Empire as a whole¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao nced at the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts who were still busy trying toprehend what had just happened before turning around to leave in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Hm? That person left as well¡­ Did he follow the other two to chase down the snake demon beast?" Noticing Xuan Hao leaving, one of the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Sky Empire recovered as he almost whispered this to himself while looking at the ce where Xuan Hao had been just a few seconds earlier.


    "Who knows where he went. The important thing is the direction that the two experts from the Blue Sea Empire and the snake demon beast were moving in! Haven''t nay of you realized that this river runs directly past the capital city!?" Recovering from his daze following the words of his friend, another one of the three Soul Ascension Realm Expert eximed loudly as a panicked expression slowly made its way on to his face.


    ""Ah!""


    Realizing the seriousness of the situation and just how dire the situation of the Sky Empire was after hearing what their friend said, the other two began to panic as well. Understanding very well that there would be no way for the capital city to survive if those three ended up fighting in front of it.


    Even if the guardian formation was powerful and should be able to withstand someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm if the old ancestor of the imperial family was the one in control of it, there was no way for it resist when faced with someone above the Soul Ascension Realm!


    At the end of the day, the difference between the Soul Ascension Realm and the Earth Immortal Realm was not something that could be ovee with the help of a simple defensive formation. At most it would allow the capital city to survive for a few minutes longer.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Knowing this, the three didn''t waste any time before they shot into the sky and rushed back towards the capital city at the fastest speed possible. All of them hoping that they would be able to get back in time to evacuate their people out of the capital city in case the worst-case scenario really ended up happening.


    ¡­


    Boom-boom-boom!


    At the same time, back at the capital city, the battle between the snake demon beast and the two Earth Immortals from the Blue Sea Empire had moved closer to the capital city. Inevitably causing the guardian formation protecting the capital city to show signs of cracking apart as it was put under more stress.


    Even the fact that it had been able to hold up was a testament to just how strong the old ancestor of the Sky Empire''s imperial family was. Especially when considering that the formation was not just protecting a single person, but the entire capital city, the area it covered was enormous and in turn, the remnant power crashing into it was also far more than what a single person standing close to the fight would ever experience¡­


    "Why did these three appear here all of a sudden!? Is this perhaps something done by those three- No, they wouldn''t do something like that, as the destruction of the capital wouldpromise their position in the Sky Empire and potential attract other religions to try their hand at entering the Sky Empire...


    But if its not any of those three''s fault, is it perhaps just a coincident that three Earth Immortals suddenly decided to have a life and death battle in front of my capital!?"


    Standing at the center of the guardian formation as he used all of his strength to try and resist the terrifying power constantly bombarding it, the old ancestor of the imperial family could not help cursing to himself as he looked out at the battle that was slowly moving closer and closer to his city.


    Deep in his soul, a profound sense of fear had already started to take root, as he realized just how helpless he was when faced with someone in the Earth Immortal Realm. Not to mention fighting back, he already had a difficult time resisting the remnant power from the battle taking ce outside his city.


    BOOOM-!


    Just at this moment, a wave of energy far more powerful than before suddenly swept towards the capital city-


    Craaack-!


    Catching the old ancestor off guard, as the formation began cracking in several locations for the first time since its construction.


    "This¡­"


    Although the guardian formation still managed to hold up, the old ancestor understood that it was not going to hold up for more than a minute. Meaning that, if the three fighting outside didn''t stop before that, the capital city of the Sky Empire would have to face the terrifying power that was being released by these powerful experts without any kind of protection.


    For everyone below the Soul Ascension Realm, this was essentially a death sentence!


    "I really hope those three leave¡­" Not able to do anything other than silently pray for them to leave, the old ancestor prepared himself for the worst as he contacted his son, the current emperor of the Sky Empire, through his divine sense before having him leave the city together with a few of the more important members of the imperial family.


    Managing to leave the capital through a secret teleportation formation that had been put in ce for just such a situation. Allowing the weaker members of the imperial family to escape without having to worry about getting killed by the terrifying energy that was destroying everything outside the guardian formation that kept the capital city intact.


    ¡­


    "Hey¡­ Peng¡­ I think we are identally in the process of destroying that¡­ Ehm¡­ What was the name of this empire again?"


    Having managed to gain the upper hand in the now even more one-sided battle with the snake demon beast struggling to keep itself alive, the tall woman who was currently in the process of cutting off arge part of the snake demon beast casually called out to Senior Peng, who was holding the snake demon beast in ce as it tried to free itself and escape back into the water.


    "The Sky Empire."


    "Yeah, that was it! Old Peng, we might be identally destroying the capital of this Sky Empire¡­" Nodding her head as she said this, she quickly motioned towards the capital city of the Sky Empire a short distance away from them.


    "Hm? What do you mea- Ah¡­ I see what you mean¡­" Turning around to see what she was motioning towards; Senior Peng could not help showing a somewhat awkward smile upon seeing the state of the guardian formation that looked like it was about to crack apart at any moment.


    Only now realizing that they were actually fighting right next to the capital city of an empire, having been far too focused on getting rid of snake demon beast so he could return to the Blue Sea Empire and make his way to the capital before the auction of the Explorer Union began¡­

 Chapter 1030 Chaos Among the Remaing Powers of the Sky Empire

    <h4>Chapter 1030 Chaos Among the Remaing Powers of the Sky Empire</h4>


    "If we identally ends up destroying the capital city of a low tier empire, the imperial family will definitely find trouble with us¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked back at the capital city of the Sky Empire, Senior Peng could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine when remembering a certain agreement that had been made between the differentrge powers at the core of the continent.


    Although he was not fully clear on the reason behind this agreement, he understood that it prevented the stronger empires and other powers at the core of the continent from attacking the lower tier and weaker empires located at the edges of the continent.


    The only people who dared to go against this, was the different religions, who had somehow managed to avoid any trouble by not sending anyone too powerful to the edges of the continent. Resulting in most of the low tier empires forming a rtionship with these religions, existing together with them in a way simr to the Sky Empire and the three major religions.


    If anyone else was found in vition of this, the differentrge powers would band together to attack the offending party. Most notably, this had once led to the destruction of one of thergest and strongest empires at the center of the continent.


    With this in mind, it was likely that the Blue Sea Empire would deal with them before any of the other major powers learnt about some of their experts identally destroying the capital city of a low tier empire. Even if they would not be killed due to their strength and position, it was likely that they would be locked up for a few thousand years until the rest of the major powers forgot about the matter¡­


    Whoosh~


    Not wanting to end up in such a situation, Senior Peng didn''t waste a single second as he dedicated part of his power to create a protective barrier around the capital city of the Sky Empire. Preventing the already crumbling guardian formation from breaking at thest possible moment.


    ROOOOAR! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Sensing the grip of Senior Peng weakened as he protected the capital city of the Sky Empire, the snake demon beast let out a bestial roar filled with power, as it used all of its strength to forcibly free itself before diving into the river in the direction of the ocean.


    "Don''t let it get away!" Seeing the snake demon beast taking advantage of the opportunity to escape, the tall woman yelled to Senior Peng before diving into the water to chase after the snake demon beast.


    This- Ah! If not for that damnable agreement, I-


    Feeling like he had made a mistake earlier when protecting the capital city of the Sky Empire, Senior Peng could not help silently cursing to himself as he became visibly annoyed at the fact that the formation of the capital city-


    07:25


    CRAAAAAACK-!


    snake demon beast had managed to escape.


    "Hmph!"


    Because of this, he let out his anger on the already copsing formation of the capital city-


    CRAAAAAACK-!


    BOOOM-!


    Destroying it before jumping into the water to chase after hispanion and the snake demon beast.


    Ptsh~!


    Much to the surprise of the old ancestor who was still bound together with the formation, causing him to receive a bacsh after its sudden destruction that made him throw up arge mouthful of blood.


    "Huh? This is- Aaaaah!"


    However, before he couldprehend what had just happened, a terrifying power belonging to the Earth Immortal Realm suddenly found its way into his body before his connection to the guardian formation disappeared. Resulting in his strength to momentarily falling down to the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Not only that, but it also ended up injuring the old ancestor''s soul, causing him to ckout before falling towards the pce of the imperial family below him.


    "Father!"


    Not having left like his father had told him to do, the current emperor of the Sky Empire saw his father suddenly throw up blood before losing consciousness and falling towards the ground.


    Swish-!


    So, before anyone else had a chance to attack the old ancestor or do anything to him, the emperor rushed out and grabbed the old ancestor before rushing back into the imperial pce with him-


    Whoosh~!


    Not wasting any time before using the secret teleportation formation to take them away from the capital city. Knowing very well that the three religions or the new Soul Ascension Realm Expert from the noble families might take advantage of the old ancestor''s state to overthrow the imperial family and take control of the Sky Empire.


    Although doing this would still end up damaging the Sky Empire and gave a chance for these different powers to wither away the imperial family''s power, it would still leave a chance for the imperial family to return after the old ancestor woke up again and recovered from his injuries.


    The only real threat in the eyes of the emperor was if any of the nearby empires took advantage of the situation to start expanding into the Sky Empire during this period of absence. The most likely one being the Onyx Empire who was already on bad terms with the Sky Empire and was constantly probing the borders for any sign of weakness.


    Despite the fact that the Domain Lord Realm Experts guarding the border wouldn''t move after the disappearance of the imperial family, as none of the powers inside the Sky Empire wanted to see an outside party show up, the situation would only remain stable for as long as the information regarding the disappearance of the imperial family remained hidden from the outside world.


    Unfortunately, with things likemunication talismans being widely avable because of the Explorer Union, what happened in the capital city would not remain hidden for long. The only hope of all therger powers in the Sky Empire, was that none of the spies inside the capital city had ess tomunication talismans powerful enough to transfer information all the way back to their own empires.


    Of course, this was nothing more than an empty hope. Even if the spies inside the capital city didn''t have ess to amunication talisman powerful enough to transfer information all the way back to their own respective empires, they would undoubtedly be able to contact a secret outpost located somewhere inside the Sky Empire that would then be capable of sending the information back home.


    Although this would dy the speed at which the information was transferred back, it would at most be by a day or two.


    After which, these empires would undoubtedly begin preparations to invade the Sky Empire before it had a chance to recover. Especially after learning how the guardian formation of the capital city had been broken and was no longer around to act as a deterrent for anyone trying to take on the Sky Empire.


    ¡­


    Knowing how dire the situation was, the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the capital had gathered together toe up with a solution on how to deal with the impending invasion from the surrounding empires looking to take advantage of the imperial family''s absence.


    "We have to find a way to keep out those empires¡­ I suggest that we band together for now and deal with them before splitting up the Sky Empire ordingly. If the imperial family ends up returning in the future, we can band up again to deal with them!"


    Among the group of people gathered, the first one to step forward was none other than the old master of the Hollow Thunder Family who had just recently broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Band together? Do you really think something like that will work? Those empires already expect something like that to happen. If we want to stand a chance of keeping those opportunistic empires at bay, we have toe up with something different." Not at all convinced by the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family, an old man dressed in a luxurious crafted from the finest silk with all sorts of gemstones carefully woven into it, scoffed disdainfully as he shot down his suggestion.


    "You-"


    "Now, now, no need to start fighting, the ancestor of the Earth Dragon n is correct, we need to do something more than just band together to fight those empires off. The main problem is that without the protection of the guardian formation, we won''t be able to safely do anything without having to worry about someone suddenly showing up to destroy our homes."


    "And how are we supposed to do that!?"


    "This¡­ Maybe we could¡­"


    As more people chimed in to join the conversation, the old master from the Hollow Thunder Family could not help letting out a sigh filled with sadness.


    "Haaa¡­ How ironic, we finally got rid of that damnable imperial family, but we can''t properly defend thend now that we don''t have their guardian formation around to ensure our families safety¡­" Muttering this to himself, the old master could not help silently hoping that the imperial family would return again¡­

 Chapter 1031 Slow Awakening

    Not aware of what had happened in the capital and how chaotic the Sky Empire was going to get, Xuan Hao managed to make his way back to the Star Shattering Sect in less than a day. Spending a few hours longer on the journey back to the sect because he avoided any of the dangerous ces on the way. Not wanting to end up stuck in a situation simr to what ended up happening to him when he went to the Great Poison Swamp in the past. No matter how much stronger he had grown since that time, he didn''t feel like trying his luck at potentially ending up inside the ruins of an ancient sect again.


    Especially after remembering therge squid like demon beast rted to the Dao of Corruption that he had encountered inside that ancient sect. Even if it was dead, it would have been far more powerful than just the Soul Ascension Realm when it had been alive. Meaning that if he ended up encountering one alive, he would most likely end up in a rather helpless situation, simr to how he had escaped from the ancient battlefield with therge golem that ended up being controlled by the Dao of Corruption¡­


    As he thought about this while descending down towards the Ninth Star Peak, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what had ended up happening to the golem that had been taken over by the Dao of Corruption.


    Although it had been sealed away inside an ancient battleground, it was more than strong enough to tear apart the fabric of space that kept the ancient battleground sealed with if given enough time. At that point in time, it would either end up getting destroyed in the void between worlds or end up finding a safe path.


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao sincerely hoped that it would not be able find its way out of the ancient battleground. The main reason for this being the fact that even its weakened state after taking over the golem had already far surpassed the strength of someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. If it managed to fully utilize the strength of the golem¡­ Just thinking about it was more than enough to send a shiver down his spine. Especially after remembering how he had essentially caused it to lose one of its arms when it had been trying to catch him.


    If it really ended uping to the Ewaria Continent, it would undoubtedlye looking for him for revenge¡­


    "G-Grand Elder Xuan!?" As he was lost in his own thoughts thinking about the potential future enemy he would have to face, one of the disciples in charge of guarding the Ninth Star Peak noticed him before rushing over. "I-Is there anything I can help with¡­?" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "No, I''m justing back after a short trip." Noticing the nervous disciple who hade rushing over, Xuan Hao decided to throw the matter of the golem to the back of his mind as he tried to calm down the nervous disciple in front of him.


    "I-I see, I-I-I will take my leave then!" Hearing what Xuan Hao said, the nervous disciple didn''t say anything more as he turned around and ran away like a terrifying demon beast was chasing after him.


    "¡­"


    Earning a rather awkward smile from Xuan Hao, who had no idea why the disciple was so terrified of him. Not at all thinking about the current difference in status between them as he soon began walking along the path leading back to the Seventh Star Peak. Not feeling too hurried about starting to cultivate, as he understood that he wouldn''t be able to rx for a long time after he began cultivating to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Well¡­ That was not entirely true, as he would still need to set aside some time to teach his disciples and improve his understanding of the different professions that he had ended up falling behind in over the years¡­


    If he wanted anything right now, it would be for the system to give him a quest to help improve hiscking professions like it had done in the past. At least this way, he would not have to spend so much time on trying to improve all of his professions by himself.


    "But there is no way something like that would happen¡­" Muttering this to himself as he walked past the Eighth Star Peak, Xuan Hao nonchntly nced through his status, something he had not done since he had broken through to the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword (Small Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess), Dao of Space (Elementary)


    Sword Intent: Nascent Sword Soul Realm


    Talent: ????


    Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened)


    Physique: ??? (66% Awakened)


    Realm: Intermediate Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm)


    Professions: Alchemist (Artisan), Formation Master (Expert), cksmithing (Expert)


    Sect: Star Shattering Sect


    Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect


    Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui


    Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm)


    Looking through his status for the first time in quite some time, Xuan Hao didn''t notice any major changespared to after he had broken through to the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. The only real change was that the awakening process of his physique had actually gone up by a single percent.


    Although it might not sound like a lot, this was the first time that his physique awakening process had improved without him breaking through. Meaning that his cultivation should have reached a level where the physique could start awakening on its own!


    Even if he had no idea how long exactly it would take for his physique to awaken on its own, it was still better than nothing. At least he could now throw out his earlier though of first having to break through to the Earth Immortal Realm before his physique could awaken fully.


    Outside of this visible change, there was also another change to his cultivation realm, as it was now kind enough to disy the realm that his current strength wasparable to. Not that it really mattered, as he was well aware of how strong he waspared to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Then again¡­ It might be useful for when he reaches the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, as the status should disy whether or not he wasparable to someone in the Earth Immortal Realm. Sparing him the effort of finding an Earth Immortal topare his own strength against.


    "Ah! Grand Elder Xuan! I was looking for you!" Just as he was looking through his status for any other changes that might have taken ce, an excited voice called out to him before a small figure blocked his path.


    "You are¡­ Shen Xuefeng¡­" Recognizing the petit young woman as none other than one of the most promising elders for reaching the Domain Lord Realm in the future that he had seen during the meeting that had taken ce only a few days earlier before he had ended up chasing the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple all the way to the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao could not help examining the young woman in more detail.


    From her short stature and cute appearance, it would be easy to misinterpret her as a young disciple who had only recently joined the sect, that was¡­ If one didn''t see the giant hammer that she was carrying around with her like some kind of oversized toy.


    Theical sight even made Xuan Hao wonder why she didn''t just keep the hammer in her interspatial ring while walking around the sect.


    "Ah! I forgot to put it away! Sorry, I rushed over from training in thebat hall and forgot¡­!" Seeing how Xuan Hao was eyeing up her hammer, Shen Xuefeng suddenly became aware of its presence as she quickly put it away with an embarrassed expression on her face. "Ahm, the thing I wanted to say was that senior sister Shu asked me to bring you over."


    "Shu Yao? Did something happen while I was gone?" Hearing that Shu Yao was looking for him and had even sent out Shen Xuefeng to pick him up the moment he returned to the sect, Xuan Hao could not help fearing that the Heavenly Dragon Temple had learnt about what happened to their core disciple and decided to exact their revenge.


    "No, nothing of notice happened, I think it''s just something regarding the next step for the sect or something along that line. At least from what I could gather after listening to parts of the conversation between senior sister Shu and Elder Song." Shaking her head as she said this, Shen Xuefeng tried her best to put him at ease.


    "I see¡­ Let''s get going then, I''m quite curious about what Shu Yao wants to talk about¡­" Feeling himself rx as he said this, Xuan Hao and Shen Xuefeng soon made their way back towards the Seventh Star Peak together before heading directly for where Shu Yao was waiting.

 Chapter 1032 Domain Lord... Zu Fei...?

    <h4>Chapter 1032 Domain Lord... Zu Fei...?</h4>


    Along the way to where Shu Yao was waiting for him, Shen Xuefeng could not hold back her curiosity as she used the little time, she had together with him to ask all sorts of question. From simple questions rting to her cultivation and how she should prepare for reaching the Domain Lord Realm in the future, she also asked about the Sky Empire and beyond. Filled to the brim with curiosity about whaty outside the constantly expanding borders of the Star Shattering Sect.


    As he didn''t see any reason in not telling her about the Sky Empire and the world outside of it, Xuan Hao happily shared his most recent journey to the Blue Sea Empire, causing her to open her eyes wide in surprise upon hearing about the fight between the two Earth Immortals from the Blue Sea Empire and the snake demon beast that had simrly reached the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Obviously, this was the first time she heard about the realm that came after the Soul Ascension Realm, a realm she hadn''t even thought about existing after hearing how powerful Soul Ascension Realm Experts were from one of her senior sisters.


    The Domain Lord Realm was already powerful and beyond that was the even stronger Soul Ascension Realm. If that was the case, just how powerful was someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­?


    As she was left thinking about this while listening to Xuan Hao''s detailed description of the fight he had watched, Shen Xuefeng felt herself getting pumped up over the thought of reaching the Earth Immortal Realm-


    "I will take my leave Grand Elder Xuan!"


    And after Xuan Hao finished up retelling the battle he had witnessed, Shen Xuefeng excused herself before rushing back to try and break through to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm as fast as possible so she could begin trying to reach the Domain Lord Realm. "Senior sister, Elder Song and a few others are waiting in the pavilion over there!" Only barely pointing him in the direction of a pavilion not too far away before she disappeared out of sight.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as he was left alone a little over a hundred meters away from the pavilion that Shen Xuefeng had pointed him towards, Xuan Hao could only me himself for getting her fired up for cultivating. If she really ended up being sessful in reaching the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm due to this. Maybe she might even end up reaching the Domain Lord Realm before Zu Fei¡­


    No¡­ Zu Fei already created a pseudo domain and is only a single step away from the Domain Lord Realm. The only way for Shen Xuefeng to stand a chance at reaching the Domain Lord Realm faster than her, is if she manages to create a pseudo domain of her own directly after reaching the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help looking back in the direction that Shen Xuefeng had run off in. For some reason, he could not help looking forward to seeing if she could really create a pseudo domain of her own directly after breaking through to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    After all, in terms of talent alone, Shen Xuefeng was far above that of any other elder in the Star Shattering Sect. Even Feng Chen and Shu Yao, who had reached the Domain Lord Realm, were inferior to her.


    Maybe in the entire Star Shattering Sect, the only onesparable to her in terms of talent were his own disciples!


    "Shen Xuefeng¡­ I hope you sessfully break through¡­" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not intending to stand around for any longer as quite a few disciples and elders walking by had started recognizing him, Xuan Hao quietly took a step forward before appearing directly in front of the pavilion before making his way inside.


    "Zu Fei!?"


    Seeing someone he did not expect the moment he entered the pavilion as he didn''t really investigate the ce with his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a somewhat surprised exmation.


    Considering how she had seemingly disappeared from the sect as she focused all of her energy on trying to reach the Domain Lord Realm so as to not get left behind by Shu Yao and Feng Chen, he really didn''t expect to see her so fast after the meeting with the different powers under the Star Shattering Sect ended.


    "Xuan Hao! You are here!" Hearing her name being called out, Zu Fei reacted quickly, as she turned around and excitedly called out to him.


    "Hm? Wait¡­ This aura¡­" Suddenly realizing something different about Zu Feipared to how she had been a few days earlier before he had ended up in the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes as he used his divine sense to examine her-


    "You¡­ You reached the Domain Lord Realm!?" Not a secondter, he unconsciously eximed in surprise once again, as he realized that Zu Fei had actually managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm. Not only that, but from her stable and calm aura, it was obvious that she had somehow managed to stabilize her strength already.


    I should only have been gone for a little over two days. How in the world did she manage to break through to the Domain Lord Realm and also stabilize her strength in such a short period of time? From my earlier calctions, it should at least have taken her three years to reach the Domain Lord Realm. Maybe two in the best-case scenario¡­


    Filled with questions as he stared directly at Zu Fei, it was rather obvious to everyone present inside the pavilion that he wanted to know how she had managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm in the short time that he had been gone from the sect. Not only that, but also how she had managed to stabilize her cultivation base so quickly.


    "Xuan Hao, allow me to exin¡­" Being the first to pick up on the questions that Xuan Hao had, Elder Song stepped forward before starting to exin what had happened after he left the sect to chase after the core disciple from the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    ¡­


    A few days earlier after Xuan Hao left the sect¡­


    "Is this the ce themotion from earlier came from?" Arriving at the Fifth Star Peak, Shu Yao narrowed both of her eyes as she scanned the surroundings with her divine sense. Leaving no stone unturned as she was fully prepared forbat.


    Whoosh~


    "Yes¡­ Xuan Hao informed me that someone managed to sneak inside the sect during the meeting and he chased after them. The person already used some kind of teleportation talisman to escape, and Xuan Hao chased after him, but¡­ I have no idea what that thing on the Fifth Star Peak is, Xuan Hao didn''t mention it before chasing after the intruder¡­"


    Arriving beside her at this time, Feng Chen nodded his head as he told her about what Xuan Hao had said to him before chasing after the core disciple from the Heavenly Dragon Temple before turning to curiously look at the strange staircase that had popped up from the water on the Fifth Star Peak. Not knowing what it was, as Xuan Hao hadn''t said anything about it before chasing after the core disciple from the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    "I see, we should probably leave it alone until Xuan Hao returns. After all, even if the Shattered Star Peaks are now essentially our main sect grounds, it still has a lot of unknown dangers hidden inside of it."


    "Indeed, waiting for Xuan Hao is the best option as he is also the one with most experience regarding the Shattered Star Peaks. Especially considering that he examined all of them before choosing the Seventh Star Peak as the best location for the sect to be built."


    Both concluding that it was best to wait for Xuan Hao to return before thinking about investigating the strange staircase that had popped up from the water at the Fifth Star Peak, they suddenly noticed that someone was approaching.


    "Hm? Zu Fei? Elder Song? What are you two doing here?"


    "Sect Master, Grand Elder, we just came here because of the earliermotion, but from the looks of things, everything has already been solved."


    "Yeah, good job you two¡­ I just tagged along because I thought it would be dangerous for Elder Song toe here by himself. After all, the fluctuations from earlier were at least in the Domain Lord Realm-"


    RUMBLE-!


    Just as Zu Fei was about to finish her sentence, a loud rumbling sound suddenly echoed out from the Fifth Star Peak before a bright light lit up beneath the surface of the water-


    Whooosh~


    And before any of them had the chance to react, a terrifying wind swept through the surroundings-


    "Huh?"


    Knocking the dumbstruck Zu Fei into the air and down the spiral staircase that had emerged at the top of the water¡­

 Chapter 1033 Strange Cave, Strange Creature, Strange... Everything...

    <h4>Chapter 1033 Strange Cave, Strange Creature, Strange... Everything...</h4>


    "ZU FEI!"


    Seeing Zu Fei being knocked flying by the violent wind before tumbling down the spiral staircase and disappearing from sight, Feng Chen and the others started panicking as they rushed over to see if anything had happened to her-


    WHOOOSH-!


    However, before they had a chance to get anywhere near the spiral staircase that had popped up from theke on top of the Fifth Star Peak, the violent wind forced them back. Even with Shu Yao and Feng Chen having reached the Domain Lord Realm, there was no way for them to approach the spiral staircase.


    This was not only because of the violent wind forcing them back but was also due to the fact that the top of the Fifth Star Peak was essentially outside the chaotic qi formation that covered the Shattered Star Peak. Meaning that approaching the spiral staircase would mean they had to first pass through the chaotic qi on top of the Fifth Star Peak.


    Normally, this would have been fine, but faced with the violent wind at the same time, it became impossible for them to take more than a few steps before being forced to retreat.


    In the end, they were forced to wait in front of theke on top of the Fifth Star Peak until the violent wind calmed down and gave them an opportunity to reach the spiral staircase that Zu Fei had been forced down just a few seconds earlier.


    ¡­


    At the same time that Feng Chen and Shu Yao were nervously waiting in front of the Fifth Star Peak for the violent wind to calm down and give them a chance to enter the spiral staircase, Zu Fei pushed herself up from the ground before starting to examine her surroundings.


    "Hm?"


    Having expected to see the spiral staircase that she had been rolling down for what had felt like hours to her, Zu Fei could not help showing a confused expression on her face after seeing no signs of the spiral staircase that she had just rolled down. Instead, upon closer inspection, she realized that she was inside some kind of cave.


    The cave itself didn''t look much different from some of the caves she had seen before while out adventuring. Outside of one simple detail, water. The cave was covered in small puddles of water that had been formed from water dripping down from the ceiling above and water running down from the sides of the walls.


    If she was wondering whether or not she was still inside the underwater structure that the spiral staircase should have led down towards, she was now certain that she was indeed somewhere underwater. Although, it could not be considered something that had been built and should be more of a natural cave that the spiral staircase had somehow been attached to.


    "Huh?" Continuing to look around the underwater cave that she now found herself inside of with her divine sense, Zu Fei could not stop a small gasp from escaping her lips as she noticed something deeper inside the underwater cave.


    Swish~!


    However, before she had a chance to investigate the thing in more detail, a creature appeared inside the range of her divine sense. Not only that, but it was also rushing directly towards her!


    "Hmph!"


    Even if there was a chance that the creature was not nning to attack her, Zu Fei didn''t dare take a chance on this considering that she was currently in an unknown location without any knowledge on how to leave.


    Bang!


    Because of this, the creature had no time to react before colliding with her palm attack-


    Boom!


    Resulting in the creature exploding into a gooey mess that flew everywhere, covering the walls and ground in some kind of weird slimy liquid.


    "This¡­ What kind of creature is that¡­?" Not having expected the creature to just explode, Zu Fei could not help showing a confused expression on her face as she examined the weird liquid on the ground only a few meters away from where she was standing.


    Wait¡­ Is it still alive!?


    Other than realizing that the creature should only have been somewhere around the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, she also discovered that the strange slimy liquid was still moving and had started to gather together. Not only that, but it seemed like its strength had also started increasing as it was gathering together again.


    Although the gathering speed was incredibly slow and would at least take a few days, it should be able to reform its body again- No¡­ It would not only be able to reform its body but would also be stronger than it had been before!


    Realizing this, Zu Fei could not help feeling shocked. If given enough time and if it could continue growing stronger in this way, the strange creature might be able to reach the pinnacle of the world in the future!


    Boom-!


    This idea only became more ingrained after she tried to destroy the weird slime unsessfully again.


    "Hm? What is that¡­?"


    However, just as Zu Fei was filled with admiration and fear towards the strange creature that she had failed to kill twice now, she discovered a strange crystal on the ground not too far away.


    The crystal shone gently in the dark cave, but the thing that caught Zu Fei''s attention was not this, but instead the fact that the weird slime of the strange creature seemed to be gathering towards the crystal. Even starting to form a thinyer around the crystal. Making it harder to see due to the slime of the creature being a deep blue color that also made it hard for already weak glow of the crystal to pass through it.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling like curious about the strangeness of this crystal that seemed to attract the remains of the slimy creature, Zu Fei wasn''t the slightest bit polite as she went over to pick it up to examine it more closely-


    Crack~


    Unfortunately, the moment she picked up the strange crystal with no more strength than a normal mortal, it shattered between the two fingers she had used to pick it up.


    What in the¡­ How is it so weak!?


    Feeling a sense of profound bewilderment over how the crystal had shattered from such a weak touch, Zu Fei could not help wondering if she had identally applied more pressure than she had thought she did. After all, she had just started the process of forming her pseudo domain. Maybe this had caused her to misjudge her own strength¡­


    St~


    As Zu Fei was lost in her own thoughts, thinking about whether or not she had misjudged the strength her two fingers had applied to the strange crystal, the slimy liquid that seemed to be gathering towards the strange crystal suddenly came to aplete stop before copsing into several small puddle all around her.


    "Huh!?"


    Not at all having expected this development, Zu Fei could not help looking even more confused as she was trying her best to try andprehend what had just happened to the weird slime creature.


    Wait! Are the two perhaps rted? If the crystal is shattered, the slime creature dies¡­?


    Whoosh~


    As her brain was working overtimeprehending what had just happened, a small stream of blue energy suddenly seeped out from the shattered remains of the strange crystal on the ground in front of Zu Fei-


    "Wha-!?"


    And before Zu Fei had any time to react to the strange new energy that had appeared in front of her, the blue energy rushed into her wide-open mouth before entering her dantian.


    "W-w-what just happened!?" Feeling herself starting to panic as some kind of strange unfamiliar energy had suddenly rushed into her body before entering her dantian, Zu Fei started to understandably panic at the realization that something unknown had just forced its way inside her dantian.


    No¡­ I need to calm down. First of all, I should find out what that strange blue energy is¡­


    Calming herself down over the next few seconds, Zu Fei didn''t waste any time before sitting down to investigate the situation inside her dantian and prepared herself for a possible internal battle with the foreign energy now inside her dantian¡­ n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Only after a few minutes stand off with the blue energy doing nothing but float around inside her dantian, did Zu Fei decide to take the initiative to investigate the strange blue energy and try to find out what it was by herself-


    Whoosh~!


    However, the moment that she tried to reach out and start to investigate the blue energy with her own qi, the blue energy suddenly sprung to life as it merged together with her qi before she had a chance to fight back against it. Even when she had her full attention focused on the blue energy for just such a situation, its speed was simply far above anything she could handle¡­

 Chapter 1034 Use Of The Blue Energy

    "Wah!?" Letting out a somewhat panicked scream as she felt the blue energy merging together with her qi, Zu Fei tried her best to stop it from doing anything, but by the time she managed to regain control over the situation, it was already toote for her to do anything about the strange blue energy. Not because it had perfectly merged together with her qi, but because removing it at this point would damage her foundation.


    Although it wouldn''t have been too much of a problem under normal circumstances, considering that she was in the process of forming a pseudo domain at the moment, any damage to her foundation might end up disrupting this process. Meaning that she might be forced to start all over in trying to form a new pseudo domain.


    Unless it was absolutely necessary, Zu Fei wanted to avoid something like that happening. Resulting in her just observing her own qi for now instead of outright trying to do anything in her power to remove the blue energy that had merged together with it.


    At least for now, the blue energy waspletely harmless. The only real change it caused to her qi, was turning it blue. Not really anything that would warrant her damaging part of her foundation to remove.


    "Hm? This is¡­"


    However, as she felt the blue energy blending together with her qi, bing part of her own power, she realized that herprehension of the Dao of Water seemed to experience a qualitive change all of a sudden. Making it far easier for her to grasp the Dao of Water.


    Rustle~


    Not wasting the opportunity that had been given to her, Zu Fei sat back down and focused all of her attention on trying toprehend the Dao of Water. No longer bothering to think about the blue energy that had now fully merged together with her qi.


    Whoosh~!


    Only a few minutester, the increased sensitivity towards the Dao of Water disappeared. Only leaving a small and almost negligible permanent increase in sensitivity towards the Dao of Water behind. However, Zu Fei didn''t care about this at all-


    "I¡­ I sessfully created a pseudo domain!?"


    Instead, she was far more excited over the gentle yet powerful pseudo domain of water that had formed around her. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although the increased sensitivity had onlysted for a little over ten minutes, it had still allowed her to grasp a small part of the Dao of Water and use thisprehension to sessfully form a pseudo domain of her own. Taking the final step needed before reaching the Domain Lord Realm.


    Now, the only thing she needed to do, was grow her pseudo domain enough to transform it into a real domain that she could merge together with her nascent soul to break through to the Domain Lord Realm!


    "Wait¡­ If I find more of those slime things with the blue energy that increases myprehension, won''t I be able to grow my pseudo domain at a far quicker speed and reach the Domain Lord Realm faster!?" Muttering this to herself as she suddenly remembered the slime like creature that contained the blue energy, Zu Fei realized that if she found more of the slime creatures, she would be able to grow her pseudo domain far faster than if she just cultivated normally.


    This¡­ Is a great opportunity!


    Not wanting to let go of such a great opportunity, Zu Fei only thought about the matter for a few seconds before she got up and began searching through the underwater cave for any more of the slime creatures.


    ¡­


    "The wind finally stopped! Let''s go in and find Zu Fei before anything bad happens to her! Elder Song, you stay here and keep an eye on whether or not shees out while we are inside. If she doese out, try to contact us through themunication talismans. Although¡­ Given that Zu Fei hasn''t contacted us, I doubt they work inside¡­"


    At the same time Zu Fei was excitedly searching for more slime creatures inside the underwater cave that she had found herself inside of, Feng Chen was giving out instructions to Elder Song before he and Shu Yao worked together to approach the spiral staircase after the violent wind had subsided.


    "Hm? The chaotic qi is gone?" Instantly feeling the change, the moment he stepped on to the first step of the spiral staircase, Feng Chen was surprised to discover that there was no chaotic qi past the point where the spiral staircase started.


    Considering that Zu Fei was still only at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, this could be considered a good thing, as it was doubtful whether or not she would have been able to survive inside the chaotic qi for more than few seconds¡­


    "Let''s get going, we don''t know when this structure will submerge below the surface again. Finding Zu Fei as fast as possible should be our priority!" Seeing Feng Chen freeze on the spiral staircase, Shu Yao stepped in and reminded him that they had to get going.


    "Yeah¡­" Feeling a bit embarrassed that he had frozen, Feng Chen didn''t say anything else as they both began descending down the spiral staircase. Soon disappearing out of sight from Elder Song who was nervously watching them from afar.


    "I hope all three of them return soon or I will have to try and find Xuan Hao for help. The only problem is, I have no idea where Xuan Hao disappeared to. All I know is that he chased after an intruder who broke into the sect¡­" Letting out a small sigh as he said this to himself while staring nervously towards the spiral staircase just above the surface of the water, Elder Song took out hismunication talisman as he silently waited at the boundary where the top of the Fifth Star Peak and the chaotic qi formation met each other.


    Given that he was still only in the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm, there was no way for him to help out, outside of waiting around to see if anyone appeared and if there were any changes to the spiral staircase.


    For the first time in a long time, Elder Song felt that he was too weak and needed to increase his strength so the gap between himself and the rest of the sect''s important elders didn''t end up bing too big.


    After all, even if he did have the respect of everyone in the sect, he also understood that it wasn''t a good image for the vice sect master to only have reached the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm while there were several people in the Domain Lord Realm present in the sect.


    "Haaa¡­ Looks like I will have to take some time off in the future and spent some more time on cultivating¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about this matter, Elder Song ultimately ended up deciding that it would be best for the sect as a whole if he took a few days off from time to time to focus on cultivating.


    Although this would undoubtedly end up having a negative effect in the short term, it should pan out well in the long term. Especially considering that he could use these off days to test the new line of elders specialized in the management of the sect.


    In a sense, taking a few days off could be considered far more beneficial to the sectpared to him always being around. After all, with him around all the time, there was no way for these new management elders to test their skills and show off what they had learnt.


    Rumble-!


    As Elder Song was lost in his own thoughts,ing up with new ns on how to properly keep the sect running without him around every single day, a loud rumbling sound suddenly echoed out from theke in front of him-


    "Huh? Ah! The staircase is sinking!"


    And upon turning to look at theke where the sound hade from, it did not take him long to discover that the rumbling sound hade from the spiral staircase slowly starting to sink below the surface.


    Even if the speed that it sank down was unimaginably slow, it was only a few centimeters off the surface of theke and would at most stay above the water for another minute or two.


    Rustle~


    Knowing that there was no time to waste, Elder Song fumbled nervously with themunication talisman before trying to contact Feng Chen and Shu Yao through to inform them about the sinking spiral staircase.


    "Elder Song? What is wrong?"


    "Feng Chen! The spiral staircase has started to sink into the water, you have at most two minutes before it sinks below the surface!"


    Miraculously, themunication talisman managed to get through and Elder Song didn''t waste a single second before informing them about what was happening above them.


    Crack~!


    However, before Feng Chen had a chance to respond to the sudden terrifying news, the connection between them was disrupted.


    "¡­"


    Resulting in Elder Song only being able to helplessly look at the slowly sinking spiral staircase while praying that Feng Chen and Shu Yao would be able to get out with Zu Fei before it was toote.

 Chapter 1035 Illusions

    Only a few minutes earlier, Feng Chen and Shu Yao had made their way down the spiral staircase and arrived inside a long hallway that seemed to go on forever. Different from the underwater cave that Zu Fei had found herself inside of after she recovered from tumbling down the spiral staircase.


    "Zu Fei is not here¡­ Did we perhaps get trapped in some kind of illusion while moving down the staircase¡­?" Being the first of the two to speak, Shu Yao narrowed both of her eyes as she said this while examining the makeup of the hallway that they found themselves inside of.


    The fact that Zu Fei was not on the bottom of the staircase was already weird enough, but the endless hallway had caused all of her senses to warn her not to enter the hallway and instead remain on the staircase.


    "Indeed¡­ Zu Fei should have been at the bottom of the staircase. Even if she decided to get up and move around, we should at least have been able to find some trace of her¡­" Simrly feeling suspicious about their current situation, Feng Chen also decided to stay on the spiral staircase as he joined Shu Yao in examining the strange hallway with his divine sense.


    "Hm?"


    However, the moment he began examining the hallway with his divine sense, he discovered that his divine sense was seemingly swallowed up by some kind of strange power. Preventing it from leaving the confines of the spiral staircase that he was still standing on¡­ And looking over at Shu Yao standing beside him, he made eye contact with her and realized that she had encountered a simr situation as him.


    Dangerous!


    Considering that they had no idea if the reason behind their divine sense being swallowed up was some kind of defensive formation to protect against probing divine sense or an incredibly powerful demon beast whose aura alone had caused their divine sense to copse before they had a chance to see anything.


    No matter what had caused their divine sense to get swallowed uppletely after trying to gauge the endless hallway, they both understood that it was something dangerous that neither of them had any ns of trying to confront. All they could do was silently hope that Zu Fei hadn''t ended up falling into the endless hallway.


    Unfortunately for them, they couldn''t think of anywhere else that Zu Fei could have ended up as they had already reached the bottom of the spiral staircase with no sign of Zu Fei-


    "Wait¡­ What if this is not the bottom of the staircase¡­?"


    Having suddenly realized something, Shu Yao carefully took a step forward into what should have been the floor of the endless hallway-


    Thump~ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    However, instead of hitting the floor of the hallway, her foot passed straight through the floor and insteadnded on a brand-new step of the spiral staircase leading even deeper under the surface of theke.


    "It does indeed go deeper! Let''s go, Zu Fei should have fallen further down the staircase." Smiling happily upon discovering this, Shu Yao rushed down the spiral staircase without waiting for Feng Chen''s response. Soon disappearing below the floor of the endless hallway.


    "Ah! Wait for me!" Not wanting to be left alone inside the hallway that seemed to be hiding something dangerous, Feng Chen quickly rushed after her as both of them continued moving down the spiral staircase.


    Taking a little over a minute to reach the true bottom of the spiral staircase that ced them inside the same underwater cave that Zu Fei had found herself inside of after regaining her senses from being violently thrown down the spiral staircase.


    "This presence¡­ Looks like Zu Fei was indeed here at some point in time!"


    Taking no more than a second to pick up the remnant energy that Zu Fei had left behind from her fight with the strange slime creature, both Shu Yao and Feng Chen understood that they had found the ce where Zu Fei hadnded.


    The only problem now was that Zu Fei had wandered deeper inside the cave instead of just staying around the spiral staircase. Not only that, but from the fact that she could still fight, she should have been more than capable of making her way back up the spiral staircase, but she instead chose not to do this¡­


    "Hm¡­ Maybe some powerful demon beast appeared and chased her away before she had a chance to escape up the spiral staircase. After all, there is no sign of any body, so whatever she fought should have been powerful enough to resist her and force her to run away¡­"


    Coming to this conclusion after analyzing the cave in front of him, Feng Chen could not help getting worried. After all, if she had really encountered a demon beast powerful enough to force her to escape, her current situation would definitely not be good!


    "Indeed¡­ At least she left traces of her energy behind that we can follow¡­" Nodding her head as a worried expression also made its way onto her face, Shu Yao also began fearing what kind of horrible situation Zu Fei might be stuck in.


    Thump~


    As both of them understood how dangerous and deadly Zu Fei''s current situation might be, they both took a step forward and entered the cave-


    Whoosh~!


    However, just as they did this, the spiral staircase behind them disappeared and seemingly turned into a part of the cave wall. Showing no signs of it ever having been there in the first ce.


    "Huh!?"


    "This¡­"


    Seeing this, both Shu Yao and Feng Chen began panicking as they began trying to leave the cave-


    Whoosh~!


    Luckily for them, it was only an illusion, and the spiral staircase was still there, causing both Feng Chen and Shu Yao to let out a sigh of relieve that they didn''t suddenly end up identally trapping themselves inside the cave that Zu Fei had also ended up inside of.


    "Hm? Elder Song is contacting me?"


    It was just at this moment that Feng Chen felt Elder Song trying to contact him through hismunication talisman.


    "Elder Song? What is wrong?"


    "Feng Chen! The spiral staircase has started to sink into the water, you and Shu Yao have at most two minutes before it sinks below the surface!"


    "This¡­ I understand. Continue keeping an eye on the spiral staircase and inform us if anything new happens!"


    "Yes, just¡­ Never mind, I hope I will see all three of you soon¡­"


    "Of course!"


    As the conversation finished, Feng Chen showed a visible frown on his face as he turned towards Shu Yao standing beside him. Although neither of them said anything to each other, they both understood that if they didn''t find Zu Fei soon, they would be forced to leave her behind and escape from the underground structure before it sank beneath the water.


    Swish~!


    Knowing this, they didn''t waste any time, as both of them used all of their strength to rush in the direction of Zu Fei''s presence. Hoping that she hadn''t wandered too deep inside the cave in the short period of time she had been inside of it.


    ¡­


    "Hahaha! If I just get a few more, I should be able to break through to the Domain Lord Realm and establish a water domain. Not only that, but my connection with the Dao of Water has also grown a lot stronger. Even without any more of these strange slime creatures, myprehension of the Dao of Water is already far above any other dao that I tried toprehend in the past!"


    A short time before Shu Yao and Feng Chen arrived in the cave below the surface of theke, Zu Fei was happilyughing to herself filled with joy as she watched her pseudo water domain growing at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    At this point in time, she had already killed a little over a hundred of the strange slime creatures and absorbed the strange energy from them. Allowing her pseudo domain to grow at a speed far beyond anything she had ever seen or heard about before. Even reaching the point where she was now about to directly enter the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Not only that, but because she had ended up absorbing so much of the strange blue colored energy, it had permanently altered the color of qi. Transforming it into a blue color, creating what looked like a genuine ocean inside of her dantian.


    However, given that it didn''t really affect her cultivation, Zu Fei didn''t really care too much about this and was instead far more focused on trying to find more of the strange slime creatures to reach the Domain Lord Realm and finally catch up with Feng Chen and Shu Yao, who had left her far behind after both of them reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    No longer would she be the only person among them that was still stuck in the Nascent Soul Realm!

 Chapter 1036 Zu Fei’s Two Braincells Working Overtime...

    Whoosh~


    Using her now powerful pseudo water domain to create several small spheres of water all around herself, Zu Fei waved her hand as the water spheres flew out in all directions. Capturing any unlucky slime creatures that they encountered along the way before sending them back for Zu Fei to personally kill so she could absorb the blue energy contained inside of them to further strengthen her pseudo domain.


    Soon enough, her pseudo domain seemed to have reached a barrier, as Zu Fei had officially managed to reach the absolute pinnacle of the Nascent Soul Realm. Needing only to take a single step to officially evolve her pseudo water domain into a real water domain.


    After this, she just needed to fuse her new andplete domain together with her nascent soul to sessfully reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    "This is it¡­!" Feeling that her pseudo water domain had reached the limit, Zu Fei didn''t waste any time before breaking through the barrier blocking her-


    Rumble-!


    Instantly resulting in a terrifying sound echoing out around her, as her domain evolved from what could be considered an early formation of a domain into a true domain.


    Whoosh~


    Not only that, but with her water domain now turning into a real domain, it began the process of merging together with her nascent soul-


    "Aaaaaah-!"


    Something that Zu Fei had momentarily forgotten about as she was fully focused on trying to reach the Domain Lord Realm as fast as possible after having experienced the fast and smooth growth that the slime creatures provided her with. Not at all having thought about the inherent danger that was involved in the process of fusing one''s domain and nascent soul together before it was already toote for her to regret.


    Even if it was not a tribtion like the cloud tribtion one would have to experience to reach the Nascent Soul Realm, the process of fusing one''s domain and nascent soul was far more deadly.


    Just looking at the Sky Empire as a whole was more than enough to tell just how difficult it was to sessfully make it through this process, as someone in the Nascent Soul Realm could be found everywhere in the Sky Empire, while there was at most a few hundred people in the Domain Lord Realm inside the entire Sky Empire¡­


    "Zu Fei!"


    I-I should have waited until I got out of this ce¡­ Hm¡­ Is that¡­ Feng Chen¡­?


    Barely managing to catch a glimpse of a familiar figure appearing at the entrance to the small cave she had decided to break through to the Domain Lord Realm inside of, Zu Fei was forced to close herself off to the outside world and focus her full attention on breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm. Doing her best to ignore the terrifying pain originating from the depths of her soul that was slowly starting to spread throughout her entire body.


    ¡­


    A short time earlier, in one of the tunnels that Zu Fei had run through not too long ago while collecting slime creatures to increase her own strength, Shu Yao and Feng Chen both came to an abrupt stop as Shu Yao frowned visibly before examining the walls of the tunnel.


    "Her presence is growing stronger, she should be somewhere nearby and from the looks of it, her strength has also increased by quite a bit. If I''m not wrong, she should have sessfully managed to form a pseudo domain¡­" Muttering this to herself as she felt something wrong about the sudden increase in strength that Zu Fei had seemingly archived out of nowhere, Shu Yao decided to keep her suspicions to herself.


    For now, it was not important how Zu Fei had suddenly managed to increase her strength. Instead, it was far more important to get out of the underwater structure that they were currently inside of before it ended up sinking below the surface of theke¡­ And from the time that Elder Song had given them, they should only have a little over 40 seconds left before this ended up happening!


    "Looks like she got rid of the demon beast chasing after her or we should have seen far more signs of fighting along. Now we just have to find her before this entire ce sinks below theke¡­" Understanding this as well, Feng Chen didn''t say anything more than this before both of them continued moving in the direction of Zu Fei''s presence.


    Rumble-!


    Just at this moment, the entire cave system began violently shaking before a terrifying aura spread through the countless tunnels, carrying with it a distinct calm yet powerful feeling that forced both Shu Yao and Feng Chen to freeze on the spot. Not because the powerful aura had overwhelmed them or caused them to have second thoughts about continuing deeper inside the cavework, but instead because both of them almost instantly realized what this terrifying aura represented and more importantly, who it belonged to!


    "This aura¡­ Someone is breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm!"


    "Yeah¡­ And from the look of it, that person is very likely Zu Fei¡­" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As both of them just stared at each other for a few seconds as they came to terms with this, Shu Yao, and Feng Chen both rushed into the area now covered by Zu Fei''s brand-new water domain. Protecting themselves with the help of their own domains to not end up getting killed by the chaotic water domain that was still far from being under Zu Fei''s control.


    "Zu Fei!"


    Spotting Zu Fei only a short timeter, Feng Chen tried to call out to her, but ended up getting no response as she waspletely focused on trying to break through to the Domain Lord Realm. Nothing could get through to her, as even the slightest bit of error at this point in time could result in the fusion between the nascent soul and domain failing. Killing her on the spot.


    "No need, she can''t hear you. Let''s work together and try to get her out of here while we still can¡­" Understanding this, Shu Yao didn''t waste a single second as she rushed forward while saying this before using her domain to create an enormous flower thatpletely engulfed the unresponsive Zu Fei before carrying this flower to leave in the direction they hade from.


    "This¡­"


    Leaving Feng Chenpletely speechless at the disy. Although he knew that Shu Yao''s domain could be considered a flower domain that dealt in the Dao of Nature, it was the first time that he had seen her use it outside ofbat¡­ And it was far more versatile than his sword domain that could almost exclusively be used for fighting¡­


    "Ah!? Wait for me!" Suddenly realizing that Shu Yao and Zu Fei were getting further and further away from him, Feng Chen didn''t continue linger around either as he chased after Shu Yao.


    Luckily, due to the fact that Shu Yao was also carrying Zu Fei who was currently in the process of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm, it did not take long to catch up with her. Not only that, but he also realized that he had to help carry the burden of transporting Zu Fei, as the pressure caused by Zu Fei''s water domain trying to expand inside the flower was getting more and more powerful.


    Even if Shu Yao was stronger than Zu Fei, putting a halt on her breakthrough was not something she could do with her current strength. At most, she could forcibly dy it for a few seconds until they had made their way back to safety.


    Crack~!


    But¡­ Considering that the flower surround Zu Fei had already begun cracking the moment they reached the spiral staircase. Even with Feng Chen''s help, it was doubtful whether or not they would be able to make it back out in time.


    Whoosh~!


    However, having seemingly sensed the trouble that Feng Chen and Shu Yao was going through to try and help her, Zu Fei managed to sessfully fuse with part of her domain. Resulting in the expansion of her water domain slowing down just enough for Shu Yao and Feng Chen to make their way out of the underground structure.


    Craaaack-!


    And not a secondter, the flower created by Shu Yao''s domain began shattering-


    Whoosh~!


    Giving Shu Yao just enough time to throw Zu Fei inside the protection of the formation before it fully shattered, while Feng Chen quickly grabbed her exhausted body and carried her inside the formation as well before the chaotic qi had a chance to cause any problems.


    As for Elder Song¡­


    "Huh?! What is that terrifying aura? Did Shu Yao and Feng Chen escape? Hm? A flower- Wait! Why is iting directly towards me!?"


    He suddenly found himself running for his life as a certainrge flower with Zu Fei inside of it was heading directly towards him without showing any signs of stopping¡­

 Chapter 1037 Future Trouble

    <h4>Chapter 1037 Future Trouble</h4>


    Boom-!


    Following the flower shatteringpletely without the support of Shu Yao, Zu Fei''s water domain rapidly began expanding in all directions without showing any signs of stopping. Giving Elder Song no chance to escape, as Feng Chen needed to jump in and save him before he ended up getting killed by the chaotic water domain that was still far from under Zu Fei''s control.


    "Are you okay?"


    "Yes¡­ Just a little shocked..." Recovering from the shock of what had just happened, Elder Song did his best to demonstrate that nothing had happened to him before turning his attention towards the figure that had broken free from the flower that had been hurled towards him.


    "Hm? Is that¡­ Zu Fei? What happened to her¡­?" Recognizing the person as none other than Zu Fei, Elder Song could not help showing a confused expression on his face as he unconsciously muttered this to himself. Even though it was rather obvious that her strength had grown a lot stronger from before, he had no idea how she had managed to increase her strength by so much in such a short period of time.


    "Indeed, it''s Zu Fei. As for her increase in strength¡­ I have no idea what happened to her inside that ce. All I know is that when we found her, she had already begun the process of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm." Shaking his head as he said this, Feng Chen also turned his attention towards Zu Fei. "From what little I have gathered so far; it seems that she encountered something that allowed her to increase herprehension of the Dao of Water. Allowing her to establish the water domain that she is now using to break through to the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    Although it was just a guess, Feng Chen had no idea how close to the real answer that he actually was, that is¡­ If he considered the act of killing the helpless slime creatures an opportunity¡­


    "I see, so that is what happened¡­ Hopefully she manages to sessfully reach the Domain Lord Realm¡­" Hearing what Feng Chen said, Elder Song felt that it made sense as he silently began to watch Zu Fei''s expanding water domain with a hint of excitement present in his eyes.


    The process of watching Zu Fei''s break through might not mean a lot to Feng Chen and Shu Yao, who were already in the Domain Lord Realm, but it presented a great opportunity for Elder Song to get more familiar with the process involved in breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although he was still far away from reaching the Domain Lord Realm himself, this kind of experience was extremely precious. After all,pared to reading about the process, it would always be far more beneficial to see the process in person¡­


    As time slowly began to pass at the base of the Fifth Star Peak, Zu Fei struggled in a sate between life and death with both Feng Chen and Shu Yao standing guard at her side in case something they could help with came up, while Elder Song eagerly took in everything, he could learn from watching Zu Fei''s breakthrough.


    Rumble~


    Close to a day after her breakthrough had begun and in a state that was only a single step away from entering the underworld, Zu Fei''s breakthrough officially came to an end as a powerful aura belonging to the Domain Lord Realm emerged from her. Announcing to the world that she had sessfully managed to fuse her nascent soul and domain together and step into the Domain Lord Realm!


    ¡­


    "So¡­ That''s what happened? Zu Fei killed a few random slime creatures and managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm in a few minutes without any side effects? Not only that, but her chaotic cultivation base also stabilized by itself a few hours after she broke through¡­?"


    Back on the Seventh Star Peak, Xuan Hao could not help asking this as he finished listening to Elder Song exining what had happened with the help of Feng Chen, Shu Yao, and Zu Fei. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Well¡­ Yes¡­"


    Knowing just how weird the entire thing was, Elder Song could only show a somewhat awkward smile as he said this. Understanding very well that Xuan Hao was hoping for a better exnation on how Zu Fei had suddenly managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm in such a short period of time.


    Unfortunately, this was the best he could do, as the entrance to the structure beneath theke on the Fifth Star Peak had already been covered in the dangerouske water and there was no way for them to return to investigate what Zu Fei had told them.


    Entering theke itself waspletely off limits, as it was essentially a gathering spot for chaotic qi. Even if Shu Yao and Feng Chen used all of their strength to try and enter theke water, they would still end up dying the moment they ended uping in contact with theke water.


    "Haaa¡­ How troublesome¡­ Looks like I will also have to allocate some time to investigating the Fifth Star Peak in the future." Muttering this to himself as he was fully aware that neither Shu Yao nor Feng Chen were strong enough to endure theke water, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of helplessness when recalling how he had told himself that he would focus on increasing his cultivation realm after returning from the Blue Sea Empire.


    No¡­ I should focus on my cultivation for now. Investigating the Fifth Star Peak can wait. Getting strong enough to resist the Heavenly Dragon Temple is far more important. Not to mention, there is a lot of other things I have yet to check up on, like the strange seal below the Raging me Sect, the likely origin of the strange ck vortex of qi¡­ Hm¡­ Now that I''m at the topic, that small vortex did seem to grow stronger along with me before it was exterminated by the system...


    Closing both of his momentarily as he was thinking about this, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards his dantian before focusing on the ce where the tiny ck vortex had been in the past.


    Although the small dark vortex had done nothing to him before it was destroyed by the system, its presence alone had left a small scar on his dantian that had taken quite some time to recover. Not to mention, he was always thinking about whether or not it would return in the future. Especially after he came to the realization that the small ck vortex of qi was rted to the ancient seal below the Raging me Sect¡­


    No use thinking too much about it, I already destroyed it. Maybe only after making a trip to the seal will I be able to understand how it managed to enter my dantian-


    "Xuan Hao, is something wrong?"


    "Hm? Oh, it''s nothing, I was just thinking about something." Hearing Elder Song suddenly call out to him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit embarrassed as he said this.


    "No problem, I understand, I also feel troubled thinking about how Zu Fei could have sessfully broken through to the Domain Lord Realm so quickly without any side effects. Makes me really interested in just what the slime creatures she mentioned were and if we can make use of them in the future to help the sect give birth to more Domain Lord Realm experts.


    Even if it can''t directly help someone reach the Domain Lord Realm, it should at least be able to help quite a lot and make the process simpler and easier for our sect elders and disciples. Maybe we might even be able to use the slime creatures to trade with others. Considering how desperate for a chance to reach the Domain Lord Realm some Nascent Soul Realm Experts get at the end of their life, we should be able to get a lot of resources if we can sell the slime creatures! Not only that, but¡­"


    Listening to Elder Song who suddenly began to talk excitedly about the slime creatures that Zu Fei had encountered and how they could be used to benefit the Star Shattering Sect and help increase the strength of both disciples and elders, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of helplessness washing over him as he turned to look at Shu Yao, Feng Chen, and Zu Fei.


    "¡­"


    However, they didn''t provide much help, as they were simrly staring at him with a clear suggestion for him to stop Elder Song before they ended up in a lesson on the importance of trade for the next few hours.


    "Well, I have to get going, can''t leave my disciples alone for too long now that I''m back again."


    Swish~!


    However, understanding that it was easier said than done to stop Elder Song when he first started, Xuan Hao instead came up with a quick excuse and left before anyone had a chance to say anything.


    Having already learnt about Zu Fei''s breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, there was really no reason for him to stay behind for the lecture¡­

 Chapter 1038 Fighting a Soul Ascension Realm Expert in the... Nascent Soul Realm...?

    <h4>Chapter 1038 Fighting a Soul Ascension Realm Expert in the... Nascent Soul Realm...?</h4>


    Leaving Feng Chen, Shu Yao, and Zu Fei to deal with Elder Song by themselves, Xuan Hao made his way back home before checking up on Qing Yi and Chu Yang condition. Not taking more than a few seconds to realize that both of them were fine. Outside of the fact that Qing Yi had not yet managed to wake up, stillying inside her room as her soul recovered from the stress it had been put under during the final fight before he had found both of them.


    Chu Yang on the other hand had fully recovered and was currently chatting with his two younger disciples about their journey inside the mystic realm. Not showing any shame on his face as he gave a rather unrealistic description of how he had in hundreds of powerful demon beasts in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Oh well, at least it seems those two are feeling more inspired to cultivate because of it¡­" Shaking his head as said this to himself while observing how excited Mui and Bai Ning looked after listening to the nonsensical and absurd tales Chu Yang told them about his fights with the different demon beasts in the mystic realm, Xuan Hao decided not to interfere.


    After all, if it could have a positive effect on his two younger disciples drive for cultivation, he wouldn''t mind. Especially when it came to Bai Ning, who would spend most of his time focused on cksmithing instead of his cultivation, to the point where he had even managed to catch up to him when it came to cksmithing.


    Not only that, but Chu Yang also gave a rather heroic description of how he hade and saved them at thest minute, so who was he to interrupt?


    Whoosh~


    As he thought about this, Xuan Hao made his way back into his room before sitting down to cultivate.


    Although he also wanted to spend some time improving his professions like he had first intended to do after returning to the sect from the mystic realm, it was more important to increase his strength so he could deal with someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    This was not only due to the fact that the Star Shattering Sect would likely end up shing with the Heavenly Dragon Temple at some point in the future but was also due to his earlier encounter with the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts from the Blue Sea Empire and the powerful snake demon beast.


    The encounter not only allowed him to see just how strong someone in the Earth Immortal Realm waspared to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, but the appearance of the snake demon beast also made him feel a sense of unease he hadn''t felt in a long time.


    For all he knew, there might be other powerful demon beasts lurking inside the river flowing through part of the Sky Empire from the Blue Sea Empire¡­ And at any moment, one of these demon beasts might show up and destroy a small empire like the Sky Empire.


    After all, no matter how strong the current Sky Empire was, there was no way for them to resist a demon beast in the Earth Immortal Realm. In a sense, it could be considered lucky if the higher ups of the empire could escape in time to reconstruct the empire after the demon beast in question left.


    "Well, I should be able to dedicate some time to improving my cksmithing or I will really end up getting left behind by Bai Ning in the future¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced in the direction of Bai Ning who was still listening to Chu Yang''s tales of his and Qing Yi''s adventures inside the mystic realm, Xuan Hao closed both of his eyes as he focused all of his attention towardsprehending the Dao of Space.


    Having already reached the Peak of the Elementary Realm ofprehension for the Dao of Space, he would not need too long to help promote it to the Small Sess Realm.


    After this, all he needed was to have one of the Daos he hadprehended reach the Large Sess Realm andprehend a brand-new Dao all the way to the Small Sess Realm and he could be considered to have reached the Peak of the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Although this would undoubtedly be a difficult thing to aplish as he needed toprehend a brand new Dao and reach a level ofprehension that he had no knowledge about, Xuan Hao had a feeling that it would be far harder to merge all of these different Daos together into his dao domain like the elder from the Mirage Sect had told him was how he had reached the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the past.


    I still have a long way to go until I can think about challenging someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­


    Feeling the difficulty of the task in front of him, Xuan Hao decided to enter closed door cultivation for a few weeks to try and reach the Small Sess Realm for the Dao of Space before thinking about what Dao he would try andprehend for his sixth dao.


    The matter of reaching the Large Sess Realm waspletely thrown to the back of his mind for now as he decided to first focus on reaching the Small Sess Realm in six different Daos.


    ...


    "I never expected the mystic realm to be so dangerous¡­ Senior brother, did you really manage to outsmart so many Domain Lord Realm demon beasts!?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao began his secluded cultivation back in his room, Mui was brimming with excitement as she said this after listening to Chu Yang describe his and Qing Yi''s encounter with the horde of demon beasts¡­ Of course, he might have identally inted the strength of these demon beasts to the Domain Lord Realm¡­ n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Haha, of course! If not for the fact that we got cornered by that powerful demon beast towards the end and master had to intervene to save us, there is no way a few Domain Lord Realm demon beasts would have been able to catch me and your senior sister!" Not showing any shame on his face as he said this, Chu Yang could not help smiling happily as he saw the reaction of his junior sister.


    Even if what he said wasn''t entirely true, it would not be too long before he reached the Domain Lord Realm and could do something like that, and it seemed to inspire his little junior sister and brother to cultivate. At least that was what he thought considering how fast he had managed to progress through the Nascent Soul Realm so far.


    "Awesome! Senior brother, was the powerful demon beast you mentioned perhaps above the Domain Lord Realm!? From what I heard some of the elders talk about, the realm above the Domain Lord Realm seems to be called the Soul Ascension Realm and is faaaaaar more powerful than the Domain Lord Realm!" Saying this as both her eyes shone with admiration, Mui excitedly mentioned the Soul Ascension Realm that she had heard some of the elders talking about while walking through the sect.


    Although she had no idea what the Soul Ascension Realm was, she understood that it was the realm that came after the Domain Lord Realm and people in this realm were far stronger than those in the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Huh? Ah¡­ Y-yeah, the powerful demon beast should have been stronger than a normal Domain Lord Realm demon beast, but I don''t know if it actually reached the Soul Ascension Realm. After all, there are nine different minor realms in the Domain Lord Realm, each stronger than the other¡­" Feeling a bit flustered when he heard Mui suddenly mention the Soul Ascension Realm, Chu Yang quickly tried to deny that the demon beast he had ording to his story, fought off bravely for close to an hour before their master showed up and saved them had reached the Soul Ascension Realm.


    After all, it was far too unrealistic for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm to fight off someone in the Soul Ascension Realm for over an hour¡­


    "Oh¡­ I see¡­ But fighting a strong Domain Lord Realm demon beast in the Nascent Soul Realm is still difficult!" Showing a somewhat disappointed expression on her face after hearing that Chu Yang had not fought off a demon beast in the Soul Asension Realm, Mui quickly tried to cheer up Chu Yang, who had an increasingly embarrassed expression on his face.


    Only now did Chu Yang understand that his little junior sister had no concept of any of the higher cultivation realms.


    "¡­"


    Even Bai Ning who had been silently listening to Chu Yang talk about the epic battles he and Qing Yi had been through inside the mystic realm, showed a somewhat wry smile on his face after hearing how Mui seemed to think that the Soul Ascension Realm was something that someone in the Nascent Soul Realm stood a chance against.


    As for fighting someone in the Domain Lord Realm as a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, Bai Ning didn''t think too much about this, as he had heard of geniuses being able to cross a major realm and fight against stronger experts. Not realizing that this was something that happened in the lower realms, like a Peak Foundation Establishment Realm genius winning against someone at the earlier stages of the Core Formation Realm.


    Not someone at the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm fighting someone at the Domain Lord Realm!


    In a sense, both Mui and Bai Ning had no real idea about the difference in strength between the different cultivation realms¡­

 Chapter 1039 Reunion Between Disciples

    <h4>Chapter 1039 Reunion Between Disciples</h4>


    Having clearly sensed the disappointment from Mui the moment he said that his opponent had not been in the Soul Ascension Realm and was instead just a powerful Domain Lord Realm demon beast, Chu Yang did his best to try and win back the admiration of his junior sister over the next few hours as he continued to borate on the things he and Qing Yi had gone through during their time inside the mystic realm. Even starting to make up a few different scenarios that sounded especially interesting to both Mui and Bai Ning.


    During the entire process, Chu Yang not only managed to win back the admiration of Mui, but also managed to gain the admiration of Bai Ning, who was filled with excitement upon hearing about the underground part of the mystic realm. Especially after mentioning the special rock that he and Qing Yi had run into while escaping from the mole demon beast.


    For some reason, Bai Ning wanted to know everything he could about this weird exploding rock¡­ And not one to disappoint his junior brother, Chu Yang tried his best to tell him anything he had managed to learn about the strange exploding rock before he and Qing Yi escaped from the seemingly endless tunnels of the mole demon beast.


    Luckily for him, although he didn''t know a lot about the strange exploding rock, it was enough for Bai Ning, as the boy began starting to mumble something about wanting to go explore the underground part of the mystic realm in the future when he got stronger.


    Not thinking too much about hearing his junior brother''s sudden drive to enter the mystic realm that he had clearly described as a death trap filled with countless Domain Lord Realm demon beasts, Chu Yang just thought the boy felt inspired after hearing him talk about how he and Qing Yi had fought off several demon beasts far more powerful than themselves.


    At least, that would have been his reaction if he had been in the same situation as Bai Ning and heard about all of this.


    Not to mention, even if Bai Ning wanted to explore the mystic realm, Chu Yang understood that he would first have to get the approval of master before being allowed to go there¡­ And considering that Bai Ning was still in the Core Formation Realm, there was no way that their master would allow him to enter a dangerous ce like the mystic realm.


    Nodding his head as he thought about just how dangerous the mystic realm was, Chu Yang suddenly froze on the spot.


    Wait¡­ Not to mention the Core Formation Realm, that ce is deadly even to someone in the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Recalling the ratherrge number of high-level Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts and Domain Lord Realm demon beasts that he and Qing Yi had ended up encountering inside the mystic realm, Chu Yang suddenly came to the realization that the mystic realm was in no way safe for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not to mention someone at the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm like himself and Qing Yi, he doubted that someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm would be able to survive more than a few days inside the mystic realm.


    After all, when he thought back on his and Qing Yi''s journey through the mystic realm, he realized that there would have been no way for them to survive without the help of the talismans that their master had given them before entering the mystic realm.


    The time where they didn''t need the help of their master''s talisman, was only when they were stuck exploring the edges of the mystic realm and even back then, they could be considered rather lucky to not have encountered any powerful Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts.


    "Bai Ning, Mui, Chu Yang¡­? What are all of you gathered for?"


    As Chu Yang was busy thinking about how dangerous the mystic realm really was, while Bai Ning and Mui had begun chatting with each other about the different demon beasts he had talked about, a familiar voice suddenly sounded out behind him.


    "Huh? Qing Yi!? You recovered already!?" Turning around and seeing the familiar face of Qing Yi standing at the entrance leading inside the pce, Chu Yang could not help letting out a somewhat surprised exmation upon seeing her.


    Not only because she had been in a deep sleep just a few hours earlier when he had woken up, but also because he was clearly aware of just how exhausted her soul had been when she had fallen asleep together with him after being saved.


    Given her state, it should at least take another few weeks. Maybe even months before she could wake up again, yet¡­ Now she was standing directly in front of him without a single sign of being exhausted from having pushed herself far beyond her limits.


    Is this perhaps because of her divine physique?


    Reaching this conclusion, Chu Yang could not help looking at Qing Yi filled with amazement. Feeling a bit jealous that he didn''t have something amazing like that himself.


    "Ha? What do you mean? And why are you looking at me like that¡­ Are you perhaps not happy to see me?" Having no clue about the thoughts going through his head, Qing Yi could not help frowning after seeing Chu Yang''s surprised reaction.


    Not only that, but she also felt that he had begun to observe her in a rather weird manner¡­


    Feeling that his senior sister was starting to form some kind of weird misunderstanding, Chu Yang quickly jumped forward and rified himself "This¡­ I just thought that it would take you a few more weeks to recover and was surprised to see that you already managed to fully recover and-


    "Big Sister!" "Senior Sister!"


    However, before he had a chance to rify himself, Bai Ning and Mui came running as both of them realized that Qing Yi had shown up.


    "Bai Ning, Mui, how have you two been doing? Did the two of you get along in our absence?" Unfortunately for Chu Yang, Qing Yi chose to ignore the matter and turn her attention towards Bai Ning and Mui.


    "Yes! Big Brother Bai made sure to show me around the sect and even introduced me to a lot of interesting elders- Ah! He also taught me cksmithing, but¡­ The furnace started exploding every now and then when I practice my cksmithing.


    I don''t know why. Maybe something is wrong with the furnace or maybe the materials¡­ Ah, no matter what it is, I have to show you and Senior Brother Chu some of the artifacts I made! Hehe, they are quite amazingpared to the ones I made when master first took me in!"


    Not wasting a second after hearing what Qing Yi said, Mui jumped over excitedly as she began talking about what she had been up to during their journey into the mystic realm. Making sure to show off some strange ck balls that had been made from melting countless different metals together. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Hehe, these are the great destruction balls! They are my most powerful artifact so far. Even with my strength in the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, they are difficult to carry, a testament to their power!"


    "This¡­ Amazing! You are so awesome Mui!"


    Hearing Mui''s description of the weird ck balls that looked like they had been made from scrap metal being forced together into a ball shape, Qing Yi froze on the spot for a split second before showing a bright smile on her face as she praised Mui.


    "Hehe~ Here, you can have one big sister~"


    Smiling from ear to ear after being praised, Mui happily handed over one of the ck balls as a gift.


    "T-thank you¡­"


    Forcing Qing Yi to ept the strange metal ball with a grateful smile.


    ""¡­""


    Observing this scene, both Bai Ning and Chu Yang did their best to stop themselves fromughing at the interesting position that their senior sister found herself in.


    This was even more so for Bai Ning, who had personally witnessed the creation of these metal balls.


    Not only did their creation end up taking up over a dozen different metals, but it also ended up including three different kinds of spiritual metals that Mui had somehow managed to get her hands on without his knowledge.


    Although he had wanted to stop her from wasting these precious spiritual metals, by the time he found out about them, it was already toote, as they had been thrown into the furnace¡­


    In a sense, the reason why the ck metal balls were so heavy that even someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm would have a hard time carrying them was because of these spiritual metals that had been included in the weird metal mixture Mui hade up with when creating them.


    A mixture that Bai Ning hoped he would never see any cksmith use ever again¡­

 Chapter 1040 Xuan Hao is... A Soul Ascension Realm Expert!?

    <h4>Chapter 1040 Xuan Hao is... A Soul Ascension Realm Expert!?</h4>


    "By the way, where is master? Isn''t he supposed to be back as well¡­?"


    As the four of them finished catching up with each other, Bai Ning could not help asking this as he realized that their master was nowhere to be seen. Under normal circumstances, their master should have noticed them gathering and should have shown up at this point in time, but looking around, he was nowhere to be seen.


    "I''m in secluded cultivation for the foreseeable future. Other thaning out every now and then to teach all of you, I will be spending most of my time focused on cultivating. If you really have something important to inform me about, you can go to my room at the core of the pce." Having partly followed along in their conversation since his return, Xuan Hao decided to answer Bai Ning''s question, while also taking the opportunity to inform them that he would be in secluded cultivation for the foreseeable future.


    "Secluded cultivation?! Master, are you about to breakthrough to a higher realm?!" Hearing what Xuan Hao said, the first person to react was Chu Yang, as he excitedly asked this. Understanding very well that this was the most likely reason why his master would suddenly decide to enter secluded cultivation.


    Although he had no idea just how strong his master was at the moment, the general consensus among the disciples of the sect was that he should at least have reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. Meaning that it was very likely that his master was about to try and break through to the Soul Ascension Realm!


    It had to be known, that the Soul Ascension Realm was the highest cultivation realm that Chu Yang had heard about so far¡­ And even in the entire Sky Empire, the number of Soul Ascension Realm Experts he had heard about could be counted on one hand.


    If his master really managed to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm, the Star Shattering Sect would automatically be one of the strongest powers in the entire Sky Empire and the sect would also hold some sway outside the borders of the Sky Empire.


    Just thinking about this was more than enough to make Chu Yang feel excited.


    "Breakthrough?! How strong will master be after he breaks through?" Hearing what her senior brother and also seeing the excited expression stered all over his face, Mui could not help tilting her head slightly as she asked this with a questioning look on her face. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "No idea, but I think it should be the Soul Ascension Realm¡­" Shaking his head as he wasn''t too clear about just how strong their master was, Chu Yang just said this before turning his attention back towards the pce. Hoping that their master would give them an answer.


    ¡­


    Well¡­ I guess I never really told anyone in the sect about his cultivation realm, it''s a given that they would grow curious about my strength at some point in time.


    At the same time back inside the pce, Xuan Hao could not help opening his eyes after seeing his disciples stare intently at the pce.


    "But¡­ I can''t tell them that I''m in the Dao Domain Lord Realm, as it might create problems considering that the realm is pretty much extinct in the current day and age. Maybe I should just tell them that I''m in the Soul Ascension Realm. Considering my current strength, it wouldn''t be that wrong¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked over his four disciples with his divine sense.


    "Indeed, I am in secluded cultivation to try and break through. However, I''m already in the Soul Ascension Realm and its just a minor realm."


    In the end, he decided to tell them that he was in the Soul Ascension Realm. Not only to satiate their curiosity, but also to have them spread this information out to the rest of the sect, that would then spread it to the world outside. Ensuring that the Sky Empire wouldn''t dare to mindlessly try and deal with them after they began expanding into the core of their empire, but also as a way to help Elder Song with his quest for conquering the surrounding kingdoms and bring them under the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although these kingdoms had still barely managed to hold on over thest few months, they would undoubtedly give up after learning that the Star Shattering Sect had someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Even if they had no idea what the Soul Ascension Realm was, they would inevitably find out that it was the realm above the Domain Lord Realm.


    At the same time, this might also result in the people supporting these kingdoms facing off against the Star Shattering Sect to show up. Although¡­ Xuan Hao already had an idea as to who these mysterious people were¡­


    "Woooow~ Master is amazing, to think you are in the Soul Ascension Realm! Not only that, but you are still getting even stronger! Hehe~ Master is the most powerful!"


    Smiling a bit to himself as he saw the cute reaction from Mui, who looked both overjoyed and amazed at the same time, Xuan Hao shook his head before he closed both of his eyes and resumed his cultivation. Focusing his attention back on trying toprehend the Small Sess Realm of the Dao of Space.


    ¡­


    "To think master is actually in the Soul Ascension Realm. No wonder that powerful demon beast willingly follows does what he says¡­" Muttering this to himself with a hint of amazement on his face after his mater personally confirmed that he had already reached the Soul Ascension Realm, Chu Yang could not help remembering the winged lion demon beast that had been protecting the sect even when his master was not around.


    "Indeed, if master wasn''t strong enough, I doubt a powerful demon beast like the winged lion would willing listen to him and watch over the sect even when he is gone." Nodding her head in agreement, Qing Yi also had a surprised expression on her face as she said this.


    Although she had suspected that their master had already reached the Soul Ascension Realm, it was different from him actually being in the Soul Ascension Realm. After all, the Soul Ascension Realm was far beyond the Domain lord Realm that she had believed to be the most powerful realm just a few months earlier.


    "Hehe~ Master is sooo powerful! Even the big kitty has to submit!" Not at all showing them the same level of seriousness as her two seniors, Mui just continued to happily smile as she said this. Feeling happy that her master was strong. Not really caring too much about anything else.


    "Soul Ascension Realm¡­" Bai Ning on the other hand just silently looked in the direction of the pce with a somewhat bewildered expression on his face. Never having imagined that he would actually end up as a disciple of such a strong cultivator.


    In the end, all four of them had different reactions to finding out about their master being in the Soul Ascension Realm. Resulting in them spending the next few hours chatting together about what they knew about the Soul Ascension Realm, as the realm itself was rather unknown to them considering that there was no Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the border region of the Sky Empire. Outside of their master.


    ¡­


    Following Chu Yang, Qing Yi, Bai Ning, and Mui learning about their master being in the Soul Ascension Realm, it did not take more than a day before it spread through the entire Star Shattering Sect. Resulting in every single disciple and elder learning about Xuan Hao being in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Xuan Hao is actually in the Soul Ascension Realm!? Hmph! To think that brat hid it so well¡­ Did he perhaps leave the sect when ascending the tribtion?"


    Also learning about Xuan Hao being in the Soul Ascension Realm, Feng Chen cursed loudly at how well he had managed to hide it from him and the rest of the elders. However, the smile on his face gave away the fact that he was filled with joy after learning about this matter.


    Not only would the Star Shattering Sect have a Soul Ascension Realm Expert from now on, but they would no longer have to be so careful when expanding in the direction of the Sky Empire''s core territory in the future.


    "Hehe, no need to be mad at him, with this we should be able to get those kingdoms to surrender in a few days." Sitting on a chair not too far away from Feng Chen, Elder Song was simrly smiling as he said this while at the same time picking up hismunication talisman to inform someone to begin spreading this news to the still resisting major kingdoms.


    Given that Xuan Hao had revealed his cultivation base to his disciples, Elder Song understood that he wanted him to spread this information out to help the Star Shattering Sect have a smoother time expanding, while at the same time serving as intimidation for anyone with ns of attacking the Star Shattering Sect¡­

 Chapter 1041 Growing Conflict

    <h4>Chapter 1041 Growing Conflict</h4>


    Following Elder Song learning about the fact that Xuan Hao was in the Soul Ascension Realm, it did not take long before this information began spreading throughout the major kingdoms still standing against the Star Shattering Sect. Not only that, but at the same time, Elder Song also utilized some of the people he had sent out to infiltrate these kingdoms to instead focus on trying to split the different powers inside these major kingdoms up.


    The main reason he did this was not just to split up the different powers inside these major kingdoms but was also because he understood that there was a rather high chance that these major kingdoms wouldn''t believe the information about the Star Shattering Sect having a Soul Ascension Realm Expert. After all, Xuan Hao had not personally appeared to fight against them. For them to believe that the Star Shattering Sect did indeed have someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, a little help was required from some of the spies inside these major kingdoms.


    A few rumors spreading among the major forces of these major kingdoms and the Star Shattering Sect going out to announce Xuan Hao reaching the Soul Ascension Realm should be more than enough to fully convince them.


    Hopefully allowing the Star Shattering to smoothly take control of these major kingdoms without too many problems. After all, with the information that they were fighting against a sect with a Soul Ascension Realm Expert, some of the strong forces in these major kingdoms would inevitably have second thoughts about continuing to fight with the Star Shattering Sect.


    In the end, all Elder Song wanted to do was add a little more motivation and help the major kingdoms surrender faster without wasting too many of the Star Shattering Sect''s resources in the process¡­ n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "This¡­ How is this possible!? Soul Ascension Realm!? Who would believe such an obvious lie! Even if this Soul Ascension Realm really exists, there is no way that the Star Shattering Sect would have someone like that, the strongest person in the sect should only have reached the Domain Lord Realm a few years ago!


    Even if they want to lie to get us to surrender, they should at least havee up with something better than just trying to convince us that there is someone in Soul Ascension Realm in the Star Shattering Sect!"


    "Hehe, if there really is a Soul Ascension Realm Expert in the Star Shattering Sect, there is no way they would have allowed us to stay alive after fighting for so long!"


    "For them to spread this kind of information¡­ Is the Star Shattering Sect perhaps running out of resources and is looking for an easy way to deal with us? If that is the case, isn''t this the best time for a counterattack!? Maybe we can even take down the Star Shattering Sect in one fell swoop."


    Like Elder Song had expected, the different rulers of the major kingdom all reacted with disdain and contempt after hearing the news of there being a Soul Ascension Realm Expert in the Star Shattering Sect.


    In their eyes, this was nothing more than a vain attempt to make them surrender without doing anything.


    Of course, there was no way that the rulers of the different major kingdoms would be fooled by something like this. Instead, some of them felt that this was a sign of weakness from the Star Shattering Sect. Potentially hinting at the fact that the Star Shattering Sect was running out of resources to keep up their continued expansion, a weakness that they might be able to take advantage of.


    Although they doubted that they would be able to destroy the Star Shattering Sect, even with the secret technique, they still hoped that they would be able use this chance to stop them from expanding any further and keep their kingdoms intact. After which they would be able to buy themselves enough time to produce a Domain Lord Realm Expert of their own.


    At least¡­ That was what most of the major kingdoms believed. Having put their hope on possibly being able to use the secret technique that had been given to them to break through to the Domain Lord Realm without dying a few dayster.


    ¡­


    Somewhere inside the capital of one of the major kingdoms still resisting the Star Shattering Sect, a group of four people belonging to the different major forces in the kingdom had gathered together inside a small restaurant to talk about the recent developments in the defensive war against the Star Shattering Sect-


    "Did you hear? Apparently the Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm, I heard that he appeared on the battlefield of the Mist Sky Kingdom and killed all of the old ancestors of the royal family in a single attack.


    If you doubt my information, I can say with certainty that the person who informed me about this is a close friend of mine and I personally don''t doubt him."


    However, instead of keeping to the topic of how well their kingdom was currently doing in resisting the Star Shattering Sect, one of the four suddenly spoke up as he mentioned some information that he had recently managed to get his hands on from one of his most trusted informants.


    "Wha- Really!? No wonder I didn''t hear anything from my friends in the Mist Sky Kingdom when we were supposed to meet up a few days ago. Looks like they all ran away after the fall of the royal family¡­" Not showing the slightest hint of doubt after hearing what was said, another one of the four eximed loudly as he told the three others about how he hadn''t been able to contact his friends in the Mist Sky Kingdom before drawing up his own conclusion as to why this had happened.


    The fact that the Mist Sky Kingdom had been attacked and essentially destroyed by this powerful Grand Elder from the Star Shattering Sect seemed to fit in perfectly with how his friends had suddenly stood him up without informing him beforehand.


    "Indeed, it looks like it won''t be long before the Star Shattering Sect finishes up the remaining kingdoms. At that point in time, we will end up under the control of the Star Shattering Sect if we are lucky and dead if we aren''t¡­" Nodding his head in approval, the third also agreed with the other two and concluded that it was only a matter of time before the Star Shattering Sect appeared and finished things.


    """¡­."""


    As a result, the other three quickly frowned as they all understood how dangerous their current situation was. If they didn''t want to end up dying when that powerful Soul Ascension Realm Expert from the Star Shattering Sect appeared, it might be a good idea to run away while they still had the chance. At least that way, they would be able to stay alive.


    Although¡­ Doing something like that would inevitably end up damaging their forces. Not to mention, there was no guarantee that they would even be able to find somewhere to set up base again after leaving.


    After all, the strongest among them had only reached the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ And it was doubtful whether or not anyone would willingly allow them to settle down inside their territory.


    As for leaving the Sky Empire¡­ This was never something any of them considered, as they all understood that this would be the same as a death sentence for their families and those below the Nascent Soul Realm.


    There was a reason why only those stuck at the peak of the Core Formation Realm or those who had at least reached the Nascent Soul Realm dared to leave their native kingdom to travel the continent, one of these reasons being the countless powerful demon beasts and bandits roaming the ce.


    "Maybe¡­ Maybe we could try and ally ourselves with the Star Shattering Sect before the kingdom falls? If that is the case, we should at least be able to remain without needing to escape. At most there will be a change in the person above¡­"


    "This¡­ Are you-"


    "Wait now, I think he has a point. Not to mention, what has the royal family ever done for us? Even now, my family''s disciples are acting as the frontline while most of the soldiers from the royal family looks on from afar¡­"


    "Indeed, at least it looks like there might be a way out for us if we decided to ally with the Star Shattering Sect before our kingdom surrenders. Not to mention, it might be better for us in the future. After all, we will have the backing of a sect with a Soul Ascension Realm Expert in it!"


    "Then¡­ Let''s do that, we will secretly inform the Star Shattering Sect together before the Grand Elder shows up!"


    As the four came to a decision that would ultimately spell the end for their kingdom, simr things were happening across the other major kingdoms still fighting against the Star Shattering Sect.


    Unknown to all of them, everything they heard had been fabricated by the Star Shattering Sect''s informationwork, the only thing true was the fact that the Mist Sky Kingdom had been destroyed.


    How this had happened on the other hand was apletely different story¡­

 Chapter 1042 Sheng Mei’s Decision

    <h4>Chapter 1042 Sheng Mei''s Decision</h4>


    Over the next few weeks countless smaller powers belonging to the different major kingdoms still fighting the Star Shattering Sect secretly contacted the Star Shattering Sect. All of them were looking to build an alliance with the Star Shattering Sect before the Grand Elder in the Soul Ascension Realm appeared in their kingdom.


    Because of this, Elder Song was forced to recruit more elders to contact and negotiate with therge number of powers wanting to join forces with the Star Shattering Sect. Even going as far as to use some of the more talented Core Formation Realm disciples when negotiating with some of the weaker powers. Seeing it as a perfect opportunity for them to learn, while at the same time disying the talent of the sect to these different powers.


    After all, even if these different powers had heard about the Star Shattering Sect and might even have fought them at some point, they had never encountered the disciples of the sect before and had only ever been in contact with the elders of the sect. At most they would have been able to encounter some of the disciples from the branch sects that had begun popping up inside their kingdom, but in the end, these disciples could not be considered as the real disciples of the Star Shattering Sect.


    The true foundation and future of the Star Shattering Sect was not in the disciples of these branch sects, but instead the disciples nurtured at the main sect located in the Shattered Star Peaks, a ce that was impossible for them to ess considering their current hostile rtionship with the Star Shattering Sect.


    As a result of this, the different powers in the major kingdoms were all taken aback by just how strong the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect were. Not only were there arge number of Core Formation Realm disciples, but there were even a few who had approached the Middle Stages of the Core Formation Realm.


    If not part of the Star Shattering Sect, these Core Formation Realm disciples would be equivalent to the true heirs and future leaders of these powers. Maybe even above that!


    Because of this, these different powers who had originally been a little hesitant on whether or not to join the Star Shattering Sect were fully convinced that they were making the correct choice. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    As a result, it did not take long before Elder Song began to make use of these different powers to rapidly expand the Star Shattering Sect''s influence in the different major kingdoms from.


    By the time they realized what was happening, it was already toote for them to fight back... And soon enough, the only major kingdoms still standing were the three oldest and most powerful kingdoms who had given birth to a Domain Lord Realm Expert in the past and still had some ancient artifacts left behind to stabilize the situation.


    Among these three, the me Sky Kingdom was the most powerful due to the ancient formation guarding their capital and their almost full control over any power inside their borders.


    Of course, there was no way that Elder Song had forgotten about them, it was just that taking them down without having Shu Yao or Feng Chen go personally was a little harderpared to the other major kingdom.


    ¡­


    Standing alone inside one therge rooms of the me Sky Kingdoms royal pce, Sheng Mei could not help narrowing her eyes as she looked over a report one of her subordinates had handed her a few minutes earlier.


    In it, it described clearly how almost all of the major kingdoms trying to fight back against the Star Shattering Sect had already fallen due to a sudden internal struggle that allowed the Star Shattering Sect to sweep in and take down the royal families of these kingdoms before they had the time to deal with the internal problems that had appeared seemingly out of nowhere.


    "To think only three are left now¡­ The Star Shattering Sect is far more effective than I first imagined¡­" Muttering this to herself as she understood just how difficult it was to do something like this without anyone noticing anything off beforehand, Sheng Mei could not help recalling the conversation she had with Elder Song a few days earlier.


    Although she had already decided to ally with the Star Shattering Sect in taking down the current royal family of the me Sky Kingdom, she had never imagined that the day woulde so soon.


    Thinking about it, she had expected toy low for a few more years as she gathered more support among the different elders of the kingdom before starting a rebellion with the goal of overthrowing the royal family with the support of the Star Shattering Sect.


    However, this was not what the Star Shattering Sect had wanted. At least that was made clear by Elder Song during their conversation a few days earlier, where he had outright denied this n of hers as it would take far too long.


    At first, she had not understood what he meant by it taking too long, as bringing down the me Sky Kingdom in a few years'' time could already be considered extremely fast. Especially when considering just how big the me Sky Kingdom was and the fact that they had several different artifacts left behind by a Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    Only after she learnt about the fall of the other major kingdoms did shee to understand what Elder Song meant by it being far too slow.


    "Haaa¡­ It''s obvious that the Star Shattering Sect wants to end things fast so they can begin to integrate the territory over the next few years and begin thinking about expanding their borders even further. After all, now that they have someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, there is no way they will be satisfied with just remaining in the border region¡­" Letting out a sigh as she said this while turning to look in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect, Sheng Mei picked up a small token that had beenying on the table in front of her before making her way out of the small room.


    Considering that the Star Shattering Sect had already taken care of the other major kingdoms, she no longer felt any hesitation in carrying out the ns that Elder Song had proposed to her during their meeting a few days earlier.


    Even if it meant that the royal family of the me Sky kingdom would no longer exist after today!


    ¡­


    Not too long after Sheng Mei left her room, she immediately went towards the throne room and requested to speak with the ancestors and the king. Essentially, all of the higher-ups in the me Sky Kingdom.


    "Hm? Elder Sheng Mei is requesting an audience with the king and the old ancestors? What does she want now? Doesn''t she know how bad the current situation is or does she perhaps want to take advantage of the situation to convince some of the old ancestors about surrendering to the Star Shattering Sect!?


    Hmph! Whatever it is that she wants, I really want to see if she dares to continue supporting the Star Shattering Sect. From what I know, this might possibly be thest time the ancestors and king will tolerate her attitude towards our enemies!"


    Learning about this, Elder Hong Xuan, who had been adamantly against Elder Sheng Mei and her constant attempts to convince the ancestors and king about joining the Star Shattering Sect was snickering disdainfully to himself as he looked in the direction of the throne room where Sheng Mei was patiently waiting in front of therge pair of doors without moving.


    Even if Sheng Mei hadn''t been sessful in convincing the ancestors that surrendering to the Star Shattering Sect was the best option for the me Sky Kingdom, she had already been sessful in convincing arge number of the elders in the me Sky Kingdom¡­ And in the end, this had resulted in arge number of elders who had originally supported Elder Hong Xuan starting to support Sheng Mei.


    In the end, this had caused Elder Hong Xuan''s power to shrink continuously over the past few years.


    Although he still had the ancestors and the king''s support in fighting the Star Shattering Sect, the elders of the me Sky Kingdom had increasingly begun to protest the war against the Star Shattering Sect. Not seeing any reason to continue the fight with such a powerful sect. Especially so after the Star Shattering Sect had offered to allow them to retain their positions and continue managing their territory even after they took over with only a few restrictions.


    No matter what, to most of the elders, the ancestors had been blinded by Elder Hong Xuan and couldn''t see things clearly. Making many of them borderline hostile towards him, as they saw him as someone forcing the me Sky Kingdom into a dead end.

 Chapter 1043 Sensing Danger

    <h4>Chapter 1043 Sensing Danger</h4>


    Hearing what Elder Hong Xuan said while waiting in front of the entrance to the throne room, Sheng Mei could not help rolling her eyes as she felt the disdainful and scornful gaze from the person in question.


    Although she had indeed caused his power in the me Sky Kingdom to weaken significantly among the younger elders of the kingdom, the same could not be said for the older elders of the kingdom. Most of whom werepletely on his side. All of them feeling tempted by the possibility of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm if they could figure out a way to use the secret technique without the obvious w of dying a few days after using it.


    Even if this seemedpletely delusional to someone like herself, she understood the reason why these older elders of the kingdom chose to believe this, as most of them were close to reaching the end of their life. The only chance at living that they had was breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm before their lifespan ran out.


    Not only that, but she had also recently leant that the person who had originally handed over the secret technique for forcefully breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm had appeared and was actively doing everything to make the me Sky Kingdoms ancestors continue the fight against the Star Shattering Sect.


    I wonder which power that person belongs to¡­ Is it perhaps one of the Star Shattering Sect''s enemies trying to stir up trouble in an attempt to weaken them?


    As she found herself waiting longer than expected in front of the entrance to the throne room, Sheng Mei could not help remembering some information that she had recently chanced upon.


    Although she did not know much about the person who had given the me Sky Kingdom the secret technique that allowed those old ancestors to forcibly break through to the Domain Lord Realm for a short period of time, she understood that this person was likely someone belonging to a power that was enemies with the Star Shattering Sect.


    At least, considering that this power did not directly attack the Star Shattering Sect and instead used underhand methods to try and weaken them, it was obvious that it was weaker than the Star Shattering Sect or at least didn''t dare to face it head on. Meaning that it shouldn''t be too dangerous for her to go against the person from this unknown power with the support of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not to mention, she already got a few special things from Elder Song to deal with this person-


    Creak~!


    "Ah?"


    "Elder Sheng Mei, you can enter."


    Interrupting Sheng Mei''s train of thought, a muscr servant opened the door to the throne room and called for her to enter.


    "Elder Hong Xuan, you can enter as well."


    However, the servant didn''t only call for her, but also turned towards Elder Hong Xuan standing not too far away and called for him to enter the throne room as well.


    "Huh?"


    Catching both Hong Xuan and Sheng Mei by surprise, as neither of them had expected the servant to ask him to enter as well. After all, he had note to throne room to talk to the ancestors or the king but had just shown up to scoff at Sheng Mei from a distance andugh at her when she would inevitably fail to convince the ancestors and king once again.


    "Are you sure they called for me as well? I don''t remember asking for an audience¡­?"


    "Yes, they specifically called for both of you."


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what had caused the ancestors or king to call for him, Hong Xuan could only keep quiet as he frowned visibly while walking over before making his way inside the throne room ahead of Sheng Mei.


    No matter what reason the ancestors or the king had called for him, he had no ns of refusing them. Not only because of their superior position, but also because they were his strongest support at the moment. Refusing them for no reason would possibly result in his status plummeting even further than it had already done among the younger elders.


    Hm¡­ Something is wrong¡­


    Watching as Elder Hong Xuan entered the throne room ahead of her, Sheng Mei could not help narrowing both of her eyes. Feeling that something was wrong with how the ancestors and the king had suddenly decided to call on Hong Xuan just when she had informed them about wanting to speak to them.


    However, even if I''m suspicious of something being wrong, I still have to enter¡­


    Feeling a tinge of regret as she stared into the throne room, Sheng Mei tightly gripped the small token that Elder Song had given her before entering the throne room. Preparing herself for the worst-case scenario.


    "Hm? This is¡­"


    Stepping inside the throne room prepared for something bad to happen at any moment, Sheng Mei was taken aback when she realized that the old ancestors that she had wanted to speak to were nowhere to be seen. Instead, the only person present was the king who was sitting on top of his throne while emotionlessly looking down at her and Hong Xuan who had walked in ahead of her.


    Although she had also wanted to talk with the king, as he was the current ruler of the me Sky Kingdom, he was not the main person she wanted to talk to. After all, when all things were said and done, he was still below the ancestors in terms of status.


    The main reason for this difference in status being the fact that the strength of all the old ancestors had at least reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm while the king was still in the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, the same realm as her.


    If she wanted to get the me Sky Kingdom to surrender to the Star Shattering Sect, she would have to convince the old ancestors. Not just the king who had no way to do something like that without the approval of the old ancestors.


    "¡­" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Feeling even more uneasy than before entering the throne room with no one other than the king present, Sheng Mei unconsciously began slowing down as she approached the throne located at the end of the throne room with the emotionless king sitting on top of it. Even starting to scan her surroundings for anything out of ce.


    "Your majesty, it''s great to see you again, I wonder what reason you called me for?" Not at all affected by the strange circumstances or the odd emotionless state of the king, Hong Xuan carelessly waltzed in front of the throne as he asked this.


    Given his rtionship with the king and the old ancestors being far better than Sheng Mei, he saw no reason to fear them even if the current situation was rather odd. At most he thought to himself that this was because the old ancestors were nning to punish Sheng Mei for her consistent urging of them to surrender to the Star Shattering Sect.


    Part of him was even hoping that this was the case, as he smiled happily to himself while waiting for the king to respond and start dishing out punishments for Sheng Mei. Even going as far as to think that the reason the king had called for him was for him to witness Sheng Mei being punished.


    After all, their constant back and forth was quite well known among the elders of the me Sky Kingdom even before the appearance of the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    However, over half a minute quickly passed without the ting saying a single word as he just emotionlessly stared down at him and the approaching Sheng Mei.


    "Is there something wrong your majesty?" Beginning to feel that something was off as well, Hong Xuan could not help asking as he turned to look up at his king with a somewhat confused expression on his face. Not understanding why his king had not responded to him. Especially considering that they were rather close and there was no reason for him to outright ignore him.


    "¡­"


    Noticing the oddity as well after covering around half of the throne room, Sheng Mei froze on the spot and stopped moving deeper inside the throne room. No matter what was wrong, her earlier feeling of danger when she had first entered the throne room had gone off the rails as she understood that something was wrong with the way that the king acted.


    Not only that, but she had also noticed a few faint formation markings on the floor just a few meters in front of her.


    Although she had no idea what these formation markings on the floor were for, she had never seen them before and felt that they were somehow rted to the dangerous feeling she had felt when entering the throne room.


    "Hehe~ Looks like at least one of you is smart enough to sense the danger, but its already toote for both of you to leave!"


    Just at this moment, a low crackling voice filled with killing intent echoed out from behind the throne of the king. Shocking both Hong Xuan and Sheng Mei, as they watched a person slowly walk out from behind the throne.

 Chapter 1044 Unkown Domain Lord

    <h4>Chapter 1044 Unkown Domain Lord</h4>


    Hearing the voiceing from behind the throne followed by an unfamiliar person suddenly walking out from behind the king, both Hong Xuan and Sheng Mei tensed up. Even going as far as to grab their weapons after feeling the dense killing intent that now permeated the entire throne room.


    Although they were still inside the throne room where such a thing was not permitted under normal circumstances, there was no way any of them cared about this with the sudden turn of events. Especially Hong Xuan who was closest to the throne and felt the most threatened by the sudden appearance of someone he had never seen before behind the king.


    Not only that, but the sudden appearance of this person also made both of them understand that whatever had happened to the king that and caused him to enter his current emotionless state where he was barely moving his head around to look at them from his throne should be rted to this person.


    "You, what do you mean by that and what did you do to his majesty!?" Being the first to start talking as he noticed the unknown man slowly walking towards him, Hong Xuan unconsciously began taking a few steps back to keep the distance between them.


    "Hehe, I didn''t do much to him, he did this to himself- No¡­ I think it would be better to say that he was encouraged by his ancestors to do this, and I mean what I said earlier, you are truly stupid. Didn''t you notice that you entered my formation already? n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The reason why I said your friend over there was at least a little smarter than you, is because she at least noticed the formation and didn''t mindlessly step inside of it like you did."


    "Huh!?"


    Hearing what the unknown man said as he was chuckling to himself, Hong Xuan felt a shiver run down his spine before he slowly began to use his divine sense to scan his surroundings¡­ And sure enough, he quickly noticed the formation markings covering the floor and pirs surrounding the throne. All of them stopped just a few meters in front of Sheng Mei who was standing behind him.


    This is bad!


    Thinking this to himself, Hong Xuan didn''t bother trying to fight the unknown man as he directly turned around and tried to escape the throne room. Understanding very well that he had walked directly into a trap and would likely not be able to win against the other party. Not only that, but he would likely not be able to escape if the formation had time to activate and trap him inside.


    Whoosh-!


    However, it was toote to think about this now, as the formation activated just before he could leave-


    Bang!


    Causing him to crash headfirst into the transparent barrier that now separated him from the outside world.


    "Wha-"


    Standing back up with an expression of disbelief stered all over his face, Hong Xuan realized that he had been too slow and had no way to escape from the throne room without first destroying the formation in front of him.


    The only problem with this was that he could clearly sense that it would at least take him half an hour to an hour to forcibly break through the formation in front of him¡­ And considering that the unknown man was approaching him with a very clear killing intent, he didn''t have the luxury of breaking out of the formation.


    Looks like my only choice is to fight-


    Rumble~!


    Just as Hong Xuan wasing to terms with his current situation and was about to get ready to fight the unknown man, a terrifying aura belonging to the Domain Lord Realm suddenly erupted from the unknown man. Destroying any hope that Hong Xuan had of fighting back.


    "Domain Lord Realm!?"


    Feeling the powerful Domain Lord Realm aura that suddenly erupted from the unknown man, Sheng Mei could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine as she tightly gripped the token given to her by Elder Song.


    Only now did she understand why the unknown man had said that there wouldn''t be any way for her to escape¡­


    "Hehe, seems like both of you understand your situation better now!" Smiling sinisterly as he relished in the terrified expression on Hong Xuan and Sheng Mei''s faces, the unknown man deliberately slowed his speed as he watched Hong Xuan start to desperately try and w his way through the formation to no avail.


    Swish-!


    Also understanding that staying inside the throne room for any longer was a bad idea, Sheng Mei didn''t waste a second after she calmed down enough to regain movement of her body before At the same time that she was escaping, she quickly pulled out amunication talisman that had been given to her by Elder Song in case of an emergency and used it to inform him about her current situation whilst not forgetting to ask for help.


    In her eyes, the fate of Hong Xuan had already been sealed and there was no way for her to help him in the current situation. If he was lucky, he would not be killed instantly by the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert and would instead end up in a simr state to the king-


    Crack~!


    "Aaaaaah-!"


    However, this thought was quickly proven wrong, as the painful scream of Hong Xuan echoed out behind her just after a loud cracking sound that sounded like bones being broken. Even if the king had been kept alive for some unknown reason, it looked like the unknown Domain Lord didn''t have the same ns for them.


    "I have to at least stay alive until one of the Domain Lords from the Star Shattering Sect shows up." Silently muttering this to herself as she calcted the distance between the capital of the me Sky Kingdom and the Star Shattering Sect in her head, Sheng Mei could not help growing a bit dispirited.


    The me Sky Kingdom could essentially be considered to be located at the edge of the territory that the Star Shattering Sect had nned to expand into. Even with her current strength at the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, it would at least take her half a week to reach the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if someone in the Domain Lord Realm could fly and would be far faster than her, it should at least take a few hours before someone from the Star Shattering Sect appeared¡­ And given that the person chasing after her was someone in the Domain Lord Realm, her chances of evading capture during this period of time were close to none.


    If she wanted to survive long enough for help to show up, she had rushing back out of the throne room before the unknown man in the Domain Lord Realm could catch her.


    Whoosh~


    to find another way to avoid the Domain Lord Realm Expert chasing after her. The only problem was¡­ The senses of a Domain Lord Realm Expert were far sharper than someone in the Nascent Soul Realm. Making it close to impossible for her to hide unless she found a special way to hide her aura.


    Hm!? Wait a second, can''t this thing be used to hide my aura¡­


    Suddenly thinking about something as she turned her attention to the small token she had been tightly holding in her hand since entering the throne room, Sheng Mei quickly contacted Elder Song and found out that she could indeed use the token to hide her aura from someone in the Domain Lord Realm for a few hours.


    Whoosh~!


    Not a secondter, she injected some of her qi into the token. Instantly activating it before guiding the terrifying power stored inside of it to cover her body and seal it off from the outside world. Hiding her presencepletely in the process.


    "I hope this will be enough¡­" Muttering this to herself as she felt the terrifying power covering her entire body, isting her aurapletely, Sheng Mei didn''t waste a second as she rushed out of the capital and into arge forest beside the capital to hide herself while waiting for help to show up.


    Deciding to not try and escape too far away as it might end up causing ws to appear in the cover formed by the token if she moved too fast and caused the power to run out faster as it repaired these ws.


    ¡­


    "To think a Domain Lord Realm Expert appeared in the me Sky Kingdom and got rid of the royal family before we had the chance¡­ Haaa¡­ Maybe it''s the mysterious force behind that secret technique finally showing themselves?


    Luckily for that Sheng Mei, the token created by Shu Yao should be able to keep her hidden for an hour or two."


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song looked down at themunication talisman that Sheng Mei had just contacted him through filled with interest as he said this to himself.


    "Now, who should I ask to go, Feng Chen or Shu Yao¡­?"

 Chapter 1045 Trap

    <h4>Chapter 1045 Trap</h4>


    Not too long after finding out about the situation in the me Sky Kingdom, Shu Yao was officially chosen to take care of the matter as she headed in the direction of the me Sky Kingdom.


    Given that she had no idea just how strong this unknown Domain Lord that had seemingly appeared out of nowhere was, she decided to bribe the winged lion demon beast into going with her to the me Sky Kingdom. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Just in case, the unknown Domain Lord was far too strong for her to deal with. Not something too unrealistic considering that she was still in the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and could at most contend with some weaker Second Stage Domain Lords with her current strength.


    If the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert was someone above that and she ended up going there on her own, it might require Xuan Hao toe and help, something she wanted to avoid if possible. Especially considering that Xuan Hao was currently in secluded cultivation¡­


    Rooar!


    Whoosh~!


    Unaware of the thoughts going through Shu Yao''s head as they made their way in the direction of the me Sky Kingdom, the winged lion demon beast let out a somewhat dissatisfied roar before using its overpowering strength to throw a surprised Shu Yao on his back.


    "Huh!?"


    Not giving her any time to react as it soon flew off in the direction of the me Sky Kingdom at a far greater speedpared to before.


    "So¡­ You want to deal with this as soon as possible and get your reward¡­?" Understanding what was going on in the head after calming down for a few seconds on its back, Shu Yao could not help smiling wryly to herself as she felt the wing violently crashing into her.


    Roar!


    Nodding itsrge head in acknowledgement, the winged lion did not feel that there was anything wrong with what it had done as it soon increased its speed even more-


    "Waaah!?"


    Causing Shu Yao to tightly grab hold of it with all her strength. Fearing that she might end up getting thrown off the winged lion demon beast if she did not do this.


    Swish-!


    Not at all carrying about Shu Yao using her full strength as a First Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert to grab hold of it, the winged lion demon beast just continued flying in the direction of the me Sky Kingdom at a speed no worse than someone who had just broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    The reason it was so fast being that it had already reached the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and was inherently faster than normal Domain Lord Realm demon beasts due to the fact that it was originally a flying demon beast. Even if it didn''t really look like a flying demon beast outside of itsrge pair of wings.


    No matter how skilled someone in the Domain Lord Realm or the Soul Ascension Realm might be when it came to flying, they would ultimately almost certainly be inferior whenpared to a flying demon beast who was inherently born with the ability to fly.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Seems like something happened in the me Sky Kingdom¡­"


    Having been about to leave his room to teach his disciples like he had been doing once a week since entering secluded cultivation in an attempt toprehend the Dao of Space to the Small Sess Realm, Xuan Hao managed to learn what was happening through his divine sense.


    "Wait¡­ Could it be the people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple? No¡­ Those people should have at least reached the Soul Ascension Realm. Not to mention, there is no reason for them to suddenly kill off the higher ups of the me Sky kingdom if they wanted to try and weaken the Star Shattering Sect over time with the help of the surrounding major kingdom.


    Not to mention, they should have realized that those major kingdoms won''t be able to do anything to the Star Shattering Sect¡­ So¡­ Who is it¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he looked out of his room in the direction that Shu Yao and the winged lion demon beast had disappeared in, he could not help feeling a bit uneasy about the entire thing.


    Rustle~


    For this reason, he began to gently shake his robe before-


    Thump!


    A very confused rabbit demon beastnded on the wooden floor in front of him.


    Squeak!?


    Not understanding why, it had suddenly been shaken awake and thrown out of what it now perceived as its new home, the rabbit demon beast let out a confused squeaking as it looked up at Xuan Hao. Waiting for him to exin the sudden abuse.


    "Don''t look at me like that, I should have found you a new ce to stay after returning to the sect, you can''t just live inside my robe forever-"


    Bang!


    SQUEAK!


    Interrupting him before he had a chance to finish what he was saying, Xuan Hao was forced to use his dao domain to block the rabbit demon beast as it suddenly attempted to rush back inside his robe again.


    "You¡­ Let me finish speaking, will you? I have a task for you¡­"


    Restraining the rabbit demon beast so it didn''t try to enter his robe again, Xuan Hao began exining the reason why he had thrown it out of his robe.


    In simple words, he wanted the rabbit demon beast to secretly follow Shu Yao and the winged lion demon beast and help keep them safe in case the person who had appeared at the me Sky Kingdom was not someone in the Domain Lord Realm but instead one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    Considering that the rabbit demon beast had reached the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and could even escape from over a dozen Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts, he didn''t feel that anything would happen to it even if the person ended up being someone in the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    In the worst-case scenario, it could inform him about the situation before escaping with Shu Yao, Sheng Mei, and the winged lion demon beast.


    This way, he would also be able to continue cultivating in peace without worrying about suddenly deciding to spend the next few weeks investigating the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    Also making sure to promise the rabbit demon beast a small mountain of spirit stones if itpleted the mission. Not caring too much about the spirit stones he was giving to the rabbit demon beast as it could be considered spirit stones he had collected on his own and was not directly from the sect''s treasury like where the winged lion demon beast got most of its spirit stones from.


    Squeak!


    Swish-!


    Hearing about the mountain of spirit stones that was waiting for it after itpleted what could essentially be considered a short trip, the rabbit demon beast didn''t bother trying to enter his robe again as it rushed out of the room in the direction of the winged lion demon beast the moment Xuan Hao released it from his dao domain.


    Although the winged lion demon beast''s current speed wasparable to someone who had just broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm, there was no way for it to get anywhere near the speed of the rabbit demon beast who had managed to outrun over a dozen Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast.


    In the end, it didn''t take more than a few seconds before the rabbit demon beast caught up to the two and began to slowly follow them while remaining hidden on the ground below. Looking just like an ordinary rabbit from above, that was, if one didn''t consider its terrifying speed.


    ¡­


    At the same time that Shu Yao, the winged lion demon beast, and the rabbit demon beast were making their way towards the me Sky Kingdom, the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert that Shen Mei had identified before escaping from the royal pce was hovering a dozen or so meters above her with a disdainful smile stered all over his emaciated face.


    "Hehe, she actually thinks that she can hide from me with the help of that little artifact created by a mere First Stage Domain Lord Realm Expert. If not for the fact that I''m waiting for the creator of this little artifact to show up, there is no way she would still be alive¡­"


    Snickering to himself as he watched how Sheng Mei was cautiously scanning her surroundings, the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert turned his attention towards the border between the territory of the me Sky Kingdom and the Star Shattering Sect in the distance.


    "I really want to see just how this Grand Elder Xuan is¡­" Muttering this to himself, the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert began to withdraw hundreds of small paper talismans from his interspatial ring-


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting a second after withdrawing these paper talismans, he spread them out across the entire forest before using his qi to draw thousands of small formation symbols that flew out and merged into the ground. Forming small lines on the ground connecting the paper talismans together into a single entity.


    All of this without Sheng Mei noticing anything in the process. Making it very clear that the formation back in the throne room was nothing more than an illusion created to make Sheng Mei think she had a chance to escape by getting help from the Star Shattering Sect¡­

 Chapter 1046 Prey Walks Into the Trap

    <h4>Chapter 1046 Prey Walks Into the Trap</h4>


    Arriving at the border between the me Sky Kingdom and the Star Shattering Sect where a few skirmishes between the elders stationed at a nearby branch sect and the elders of the me Sky Kingdom in charge of guarding the border, Shu Yao jumped off the winged lion with a somewhat bewildered expression on her face.


    "To think it only took a little over half an hour to reach the me Sky Kingdom¡­" Muttering this to herself after jumping off, Shu Yao turned around to look up at the winged lion hovering in the air beside her. "Has anyone ever told you how awesome you are?"


    Roar~!


    Hearing Shu Yao''s praise, the winged lion demon beast let out a happy roar as a prideful expression appeared on its face. Even if it was powerful and was often looked up to by all the disciples and elders who came to give it food, it felt something different in the way Shu Yao praised it.


    "We should get going, the token I crafted for Sheng Mei won''tst forever."


    Knowing that they didn''t have more than half an hour or little over an hour left before the energy stored in the token ran out and exposed Sheng Mei''s location to the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert, Shu Yao didn''t waste too much time after jumping off the winged lion demon beast before starting to make her way in the direction of the me Sky Kingdom''s capital city.


    Although Sheng Mei wasn''t hiding inside the capital city, she was not too far away from it ording to what Elder Song had told her. Not to mention, as long as she got close enough to the token, she would be able to easily sense it.


    After all, the token was crafted by her, and the power contained inside of it was her own. If Sheng Mei could hide from her with her own power, it would be rather embarrassing for her. Not only that, but it would also mean that she would have to wait until the token ran out of power.


    "Looks like she is inside the forest beside the capital city of the me Sky Kingdom." Luckily for Shu Yao, this did not end up happening as she easily managed to pick up Sheng Mei''s location after getting closer to the capital city of the me Sky Kingdom.


    However, she also realized that the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert that Sheng Mei told them was chasing after her was nowhere to be seen. Even looking at the winged lion demon beast that was obediently following after her, it did not seem like it had picked up anyone powerful nearby.


    Did the Domain Lord Realm Expert perhaps leave the capital already?


    Thinking about this as she slowly approached the forest where Sheng Mei was hiding while constantly scanning her surroundings for any signs of the Domain Lord Realm Expert, Shu Yao could only conclude that the Domain Lord Realm Expert should have already left the capital city at this point in time.


    Maybe he did leave the city to chase after Sheng Mei in the direction she had gone before using the token or maybe he realized that she was working with the Star Shattering Sect and decided to escape in an attempt to avoid shing with the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, considering that the Star Shattering Sect had someone in the Soul Ascension Realm now, there was no way an ordinary Domain Lord Realm Expert would dare to offend them unless forced to do so. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Domain Lord Realm or not, everyone valued their lives and wouldn''t carelessly throw it away if there was another way out. Even more so for those who had lived for a long time and wanted to do everything in their power to extend their lifespan.


    "There she is."


    Spotting Sheng Mei only a few seconds after reaching the forest, Shu Yao didn''t slow down as she entered the forest and made her way over towards Sheng Mei who was currently in the process of nervously looking around herself for any signs of the Domain Lord Realm Expert, she had seen back in the throne room.


    Although she was confident that the token should be able to hide her from the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert, she still felt uneasy whenever she remembered how the Domain lord Realm Expert had essentially allowed her to leave the throne room without chasing after her. Instead, having chosen to stay and slowly deal with Hong Xuan.


    Rustle~!


    "Huh!?"


    For this reason, she could not stop herself from jumping up in surprise when she suddenly saw the bush not too far away from where she was standing part ways as Shu Yao appeared-


    Thump!


    To the point where she ended up losing her footing whennding back down again, causing her tond on her back in a rather painful manner.


    If not for the fact that she was in the Nascent Soul Realm, the fall would undoubtedly have broken her back in several ces¡­


    "Sheng Mei, I''m an elder from the Star Shattering Sect, I''m here to help you." Seeing theical scene of Sheng Mei sprawled all over the ground after the fall, Shu Yao did her best to hold in herughter as she introduced herself.


    "Ah? Ah! Grand Elder Shu Yao! It''s a pleasure to meet you, sorry for thete greeting, I¡­ happened to see something interesting one the ground¡­" Realizing that it was just the elder from Star Shattering Sect who hade to help her, Sheng Mei awkwardly got up before greeting her. Doing her best to not admit how she had fallen t on the ground just now.


    "It''s fine, we should get going before that Domain Lord Realm Expert shows up. So¡­ If you will excuse me for a moment-"


    "Hiii!?"


    Knowing that it would be best for them to leave before anything troublesome happened, Shu Yao casual walked over to Sheng Mei and lifted her up before carrying her out of the forest before cing her on top of the winged lion demon beast that quickly flew off with both of them in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect.


    During the entire process, they didn''t encounter the Domain Lord Realm Expert that Sheng Mei had informed them about beforehand. So¡­ Shu Yao concluded that it should just be a Domain Lord Realm Expert who happened to have grudge with the royal family of the me Sky Kingdom.


    Now that the me Sky Kingdom''s royal family had been destroyed, he should have seen no reason to chase after Shu Yao and instead decided to leave. Fearing that she might be rted to the Star Shattering Sect, a power with a Soul Ascension Realm Expert.


    Feeling like this made sense, she also decided to inform Elder Song about this on her way back to the sect¡­ And Elder Song also agreed with her conclusion. Feeling that it made sense.


    After all, the me Sky Kingdom had been around for a long time and had made countless enemies over the years.


    This time, it just so happened that one of those enemies managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm and came for revenge when they were struggling to deal with the Star Shattering Sect, and they didn''t pay too much attention to anything else. Likely giving him a chance to find a w in the formation guarding the capital city of the me Sky Kingdom and sneak inside without being noticed.


    Of course, all of this did make perfect sense to Shu Yao and Elder Song considering that the Domain Lord Realm Expert Sheng Mei had told them about was nowhere to be seen.


    ¡­


    A few minutes earlier when Shu Yao had just entered the forest, the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert who had decided to hide himself above where Sheng Mei was hidden and wait for an opportunity to attack the Grand Elder from the Star Shattering Sect was frozen on the spot without being able to move a single muscle as he stared directly into the eyes of a small cute looking rabbit standing on a small cloud a few hundred meters in front of him.


    "This¡­ What in the world is that!?" Not able to say anything else as he felt like a small helpless animal being stared down by a powerful predator, he could only nervously stare back at the cute looking rabbit floating in front of him. Not daring to make a single move to attack Shu Yao and Sheng Mei below.


    Rustle~


    Even when Sheng Mei and Shu Yao made their way out of the forest, he still didn''t dare to move a single muscle as he remained fully focused on the small rabbit in front of him.


    Although he had no idea how strong the small rabbit was, he felt like he was no longer the hunter waiting patiently for the prey to walk into the trap. Instead, he had be the prey who had walked into the trap¡­

 Chapter 1047 Display of Power!

    <h4>Chapter 1047 Disy of Power!</h4>


    Rumble-!


    Knowing that the rabbit demon beast should at least have reached the Soul Ascension Realm for it to give him such a terrible feeling of danger, he decided to reveal his true strength. Hoping that the rabbit demon beast would leave him alone after finding out that he was also in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Squeak¡­?


    However, contrary to what the man believed would happen, the rabbit demon beast instead just tilted its head curiously when it felt his aura change from someone in the Domain Lord Realm to someone in the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Not an ounce of fear was present in its soft fluffy looking face.


    On the other hand, it would be more urate to say that his sudden increase in strength had intrigued the rabbit demon beast.


    Not only that, but he also noticed that the rabbit demon beast was no longer carelessly staring at him from a distance but had instead moved into abat position. Making it clear that the rabbit demon beast had no intention of running away after seeing his strength.


    "This¡­" Realizing this, he could not stop a shiver from running down his spine. Demon beasts would most of the time choose to escape if their opponent was stronger than them. If they chose to stay around like the rabbit demon beast in front of him did, it could only mean one thing¡­ The rabbit demon beast thought that it was stronger than him.


    Where in the world did such a powerful demon beast pop up from!? Shouldn''t most of the Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts in the Sky Empire be somewhere inside the core territory of the empire in certain special locations!? S-should I escape and leave the people from the Star Shattering Sect alone for now, but¡­ Doing so would go against master''smand¡­


    from the Star Shattering Sect alone for now, but¡­ Doing so would go against master''smand¡­


    Feeling a sense of panic setting in as he realized just how bad his situation was, he contemted going against his master and just escape without killing the people from the Star Shattering Sect-


    Swish-!


    However, before he even had time toe to a decision on what to do, the rabbit demon beast made a move. Appearing directly in front of him before swinging down its small, cute feet without giving him any time to react.


    "Wha-!?"


    BANG!


    Caught off guard by the sudden attack, he could only put up ast second defense against the deadly rabbit foot attack before being sent flying into a nearby hillside.


    "Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­" Showing a terrified expression on his face as he realized just how strong the rabbit demon beast was, the man didn''t waste a second before escaping in the opposite direction of the rabbit demon beast.


    Although there was only a difference of a single minor realm, it was like the difference between heaven and earth. Not to mention, he had already been hit once without being able to put up a proper defense. Resulting in his current state being less than favorable when it came to fighting an opponent stronger than himself.


    I have to get out of here as fast as possible and inform the rest about this demon beast in case it ends up disrupting more of master''s ns for dealing with that Star Shattering Sect¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he escaped, the man directly used all of his strength to increase his speed. Soon leaving the me Sky Kingdom far behind. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Squeak¡­


    Seeing the man running away at the first sign of danger, the rabbit demon beast let out a dissatisfied squeak while its curious expression changed to one filled with disdain.


    Although it had just followed Shu Yao and the winged lion demon beast to ensure their safety, it had been somewhat excited when it noticed someone in the Soul Ascension Realm setting up a trap to attack them.


    In the end, it had even ended up revealing itself before the other party had a chance to do anything because of the excitement of a possible fight that would allow it to disy its mighty strength to Shu Yao, Sheng Mei, the winged lion demon beast, and the rest of the people in the me Sky Kingdom.


    However, all of this had been ruined because its opponent had decided to run away without even fighting after a simple tap with one of its feet¡­


    Squeak!


    Not intending to just let things end like that, the rabbit demon beast jumped back down on the ground before putting all of its strength into its feet-


    CRAAAAACK-!


    Soon enough, massive cracks spread around the tiny rabbit and in the next second-


    BANG!


    It pushed off the ground, sending it flying in the direction of the escaping Soul Ascension Realm Expert at a speed that was in no way inferior to a demon beast in the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Leaving behind a massive crater in the ce of the forest beside the capital city of the me Sky Kingdom, while at the same time destroying the part of the capital city that was next to the forest together with the formation that had protected it for the past thousands of years.


    WHOOSH-!


    Not even a secondter, before the people in the capital of the me Sky Kingdom had the time to react to what was happening, the rabbit demon beast appeared directly behind the escaping Soul Ascension Realm Expert.


    "Huh?"


    BANG!


    Only barely managing to pick up the rabbit demon beast with his divine sense, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert had no time to react as he felt a terrifying force smashing directly into him. Once again sending him into the ground.


    The only difference this time around being that he had no time to set up any proper defense. Resulting in countless internal injuries that made it impossible for him to utilize his full strength to escape like he had done before.


    Whoosh~!


    However, the rabbit demon beast had no intention of letting him escape again in the first ce, as it used its qi to form a giant rabbit phantom around its body before attacking the Soul Ascension Realm Expert with all of its strength.


    BOOM-!


    Soon enough, the terrifying power of two Soul Ascension Realm Experts spread through the surrounding mountains and rivers.


    "Aaaaah-!"


    Of course, this did notst for long, as the man on the ground soon let out a painful scream. Only having been able to resist the rabbit demon beast for a few seconds before being crushed by one of the giant rabbit phantom''s feet.


    Even if the difference between both of them was only a single minor realm, it was obvious that the rabbit demon beast''s strength was above that of ordinary demon beasts in the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Resulting in the one-sided fight.


    "DAMNABLE RABBIT! IF MY MASTER WAS HERE, HE WOULD MAKE RABBIT STEW OUT OF YOU! AAAAAHHH-!"


    RUMBLE-!


    Letting out onest painful scream filled with unwillingness, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert used up all of his remaining strength to forcibly pierce through the phantom rabbit and use a final attack.


    SQUEAK!?


    Showing a surprised expression on its face as it saw the man piercing through its phantom and rushed towards it filled with killing intent, the rabbit demon beast''s expression soon became one filled with excitement as it realized that its opponent had decided to not run away¡­ And not wasting a single second, it also used its most powerful attack.


    BOOOOM-!


    As the two terrifying attacks collided with each other, the man in the Soul Ascension Realm didn''t even have the chance to make a single sound as he was almost instantaneously erased by the terrifying power generated by the two attacks. Having not put any power into trying to protect himself.


    The rabbit demon beast on the other hand did its best to protect itself from the terrifying power that was trying to forcibly enter its body and destroy it from the inside and outside at the same time.


    WHOOOOOSH-!


    As a result of this, the rabbit demon beast found itself flying through the air in an unknown direction. Having been knocked flying at a speed far above what could normally be archived by someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Squeak----!


    Not able to do anything to stop itself as it was busy trying to prevent itself from being killed by the power left behind by the man in the Soul Ascension Realm, the rabbit demon beast could only continue flying in an unknown direction at a speed that had should only have been archivable by someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    In the end, the rabbit demon beast could only silently hope that it didn''t end upnding somewhere dangerous before it had dealt with the power trying to kill it. Even if it would not take more than a few seconds, the speed of someone in the Earth Immortal Realm was nothing to underestimate, these few seconds might be enough for it to end up on the other side of the Sky Empire¡­

 Chapter 1048 Trouble Approaching the Iron Sky Kingdom

    <h4>Chapter 1048 Trouble Approaching the Iron Sky Kingdom</h4>


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Ending up crashing directly through close to a dozen mountain peaks as it flew through the Sky Empire, the rabbit demon beast finally managed to fight off the power trying to invade its body and destroy it from the inside just before smashing into a mountain peak located close to the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    Although it had no idea where it was, it still sensed several different humans at the Soul Ascension Realm rushing out from the capital city and heading directly towards its current location.


    Squeak!?


    Swish-!


    For this reason, the rabbit demon beast didn''t hesitate for a second before turning around and escaping in the direction it hade from. Even if these humans were far weaker than itself, it had no idea if there were any stronger humans around¡­ And given that there were so many Soul Ascension Realm Experts present, it concluded that a stronger one should show up at any moment.


    At least it had managed to somewhat remember the path it had been knocked flying by the earlier sh and felt confident in its ability to escape the pursuit of anyone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Of course, there was no way for the rabbit demon beast to know that the strong human that it was anticipating had been injured just a few weeks earlier and was no longer in the capital of the Sky Empire.


    ¡­


    "I''m sure I felt something powerful over here just a few seconds earlier¡­ Could it be that one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Onyx Empire came to spy on the capital to make sure that earlier¡­ Could it be that one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Onyx Empire came to spy on the capital to make sure that the old ancestor of the imperial family is gone?"


    Arriving at the ce where the rabbit demon beast had just barely managed to stop itself before smashing into one of the mountains bordering therge fields producing food for the capital city, one of the old Soul Ascension Realm Experts from one of the noble families could not help muttering this to himself before narrowing both of his eyes while gazing in the direction that the rabbit demon beast had escaped in.


    Although he had not managed to see the other party with his divine sense before the other party had escaped, he was certain that the other party was someone in the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ And given the current state of the Sky Empire, it was only obvious that he thought of the rabbit demon beast as one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Onyx Empire who hade to spy on them.


    Considering that something like this had indeed happened not too long ago, as the Onyx Empire and the other surrounding empires were trying their best to confirm the fact that the old ancestor of the imperial family had indeed disappeared like they had been told by their spies, it was not odd for the old noble ancestor to think something like this upon feeling the Soul Ascension Realm aura lingering in the air around the mountain peak.


    "Old man, you are worrying too much, I don''t think it was someone from the Onyx Empire this time around. Instead, I think it should just have been some demon beast that was attracted by the lingering presence of the giant snake demon beast from a few weeks ago. After it sensed us rushing over, it should have been scared away."


    Flying over beside the old noble ancestor who was carefully scanning his surroundings while keeping his attention focused on the direction that the rabbit demon beast had left in, the cardinal from one of the three religions calmly stated this while using part of his power to capture some of the lingering aura left behind by the rabbit demon beast before showing it off to the old noble ancestor. "See, this is definitely not something left by a human."


    "This¡­" Hearing what the cardinal said and using his divine sense to analyze the remnant aura left behind by the rabbit demon beast, the old noble ancestor froze on the spot before a somewhat embarrassed expression made its way onto his old, wrinkled face. "Maybe I was too nervous due to the recent developments that took ce over the past few days¡­"


    "Indeed, you have to rx a bit more. Even if the Onyx Empire or any of the other empires decided to attack us, they won''t do so by sending a single Soul Ascension Realm Expert to the capital city.


    After all, none of the empires wanting to end up in a life and death struggle with all of us. Even if the old ancestor of the imperial family isn''t around, we are also in the Soul Ascension Realm and dealing with all of us isn''t that easy¡­ Instead of something that troublesome, they will choose to slowly take away our territory bit by bit while doing their best to avoid fighting with us..."


    Nodding his head as he walked over from behind the two, the old master of the Hollow Thunder Family could not helpmenting to himself as he said this.


    ""¡­""


    It was not that they didn''t understand the idea behind the different empires doing something like this, it was just that they were too weak to do anything about it, as the moment they decided to split up would be the time that the powerful Soul Ascension Realm Expert of one of these empires moved.


    Meaning they were forced to stay together in a single group in the capital of the Sky Empire where their most important people and things were located.


    In the end, this meant that they could only watch as the surrounding empires slowly took away the territory of the Sky Empire bit by bit.


    The only positive thing was that they could now monopolize the resources that had been taken up by the imperial family before. Meaning that they could at least afford to lose some of the territory and still be in a positive position overall.


    "Haaa¡­ Let''s not think about this for now, the most important thing should be for us to get as many resources as possible from the spirit stone and spiritual metal mines located along the borders of the empire before they get taken over by those empires."


    Seeing how everyone suddenly went quiet following what he said, the old master of the Hollow Thunder Family reminded all of them about what they should be focusing their attention on.


    "Doing this might end up damaging these mines in the process and drive down their value in the long term-"


    "And do you think we can keep control of those mines in the long term? Even if it destroys parts of those mines, it''s at least better than just handing them over." n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "This¡­ Indeed, its better that we at least get something out of those mines before we lose them¡­"


    Understanding that they had a limited time to make use of those mines considering that the empires were about to move and start their attempts to take control of outer parts of the Sky Empire that were the least protected, the other Soul Ascension Realm Experts quickly agreed with what the old master of the Hollow Thunder Family said.


    Even if it would damage some of the more important ces for spirit stone sand spiritual metal extraction in the Sky Empire, they would at least be able to get something out of it in the short term.


    "So¡­ Now that we have decided on our next course of action, we should start out with the more important mines located close to the border region. Among which, I think the spirit stone mines in the Crystal Sky Kingdom and the spiritual metal mines in the Iron Sky Kingdom should be the most important for us to deal with."


    "The spirit stone mines of the Crystal Sky Kingdom shouldn''t be too hard to deal with, as the strongest person in that kingdom is only in the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, but dealing with the Iron Sky Kingdom will not be easy."


    "Indeed, Yi Min is already in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and together with her formation, she is more than capable of fighting someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. If we want to take control of her spiritual metal mine, we will have to go personally¡­ And more than one person if we want to ensure our sess¡­"


    "This¡­ Maybe we can make use of the time while the different empires are still hesitating on whether or not to attack us to deal with Yi Min."


    "No, it''s far too risky-"


    "Hmph! Should we just give up such a precious spiritual metal mine? You should know full well that there is no way she will cooperate with us considering her ties to the imperial family!"


    "But what if-"


    As the group of Soul Ascension Realm Experts began discussing their situation and how to deal with Yi Min who was more than strong enough to resist someone in the Soul Ascension Realm by herself, the group ultimately ended up deciding that three of them would leave to take care of her and take control of the spiritual metal mine while the rest remained back in the capital.


    With three people in the Soul Ascension Realm present, they expected to be more than strong enough to deal with Yi Min, while also having the strength to escape together in case one of the powerful Soul Ascension Realm Experts from one of the surrounding empires appeared to attack them.

 Chapter 1049 Yi Min’s Decision

    <h4>Chapter 1049 Yi Min''s Decision</h4>


    Returning back to the Star Shattering Sect after a little over half a day had passed, the rabbit demon beast didn''t waste a second before rushing back into Xuan Hao''s robe.


    Did something happen¡­?


    Feeling that it was a bit weird for the rabbit demon beast to just rush inside his robe without even asking for a reward for the task it had justpleted, Xuan Hao could not help poking the spot on his robe where the rabbit demon beast was nesting. Curious about what had caused it to react in such a frantic manner that it didn''t even ask him for a reward.


    Squeak!


    Feeling Xuan Hao poking it from the outside, the rabbit demon beast let out a squeak in protest before informing him about what had happened through their blood contract. Even though the blood contract didn''t allow him to fully understand what the rabbit demon beast said, it at least helped him get a general understanding of what it was saying.


    Allowing him to at least understand that the rabbit demon beast had killed someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, who had been waiting at the me Sky Kingdom. In the end, this had resulted in it being knocked far away. Ending up in a ce where it had been chased away by a group of Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    Although he had no idea about who the group of Soul Ascension Realm Experts that the rabbit demon beast encountered were, he was fairly certain that the soul Ascension Realm Expert at the me Sky Kingdom should be the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert that Sheng Mei had informed Elder Song about earlier.


    Even without having to guess too much, it was fairly obvious that this Soul Ascension Realm Expert should be one of the people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple that the core disciple from the Heavenly Dragon Temple had mentioned encountering before sneaking inside the sect.


    "But¡­ What are those people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple nning? Do they want to draw me out of the sect and deal with me in a ce where I don''t have the support of a formation before dealing with the rest of the Star Shattering Sect?" Muttering this to himself as he tried to think about why the Heavenly Dragon Temple might have decided to do something like that, Xuan Hao could only shake his head helplessly. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    No matter what, they should understand that a single person in the Soul Ascension Realm would not be enough to deal with him¡­


    So why did they still go forward with the ambush? Did they perhaps think that he had not reached the Soul Ascension Realm like the rumors spread around by Elder Song suggested, or did they just n to fail at killing him so they could use it as an excuse to ask for more help from their master?


    Lost in his own thoughts as he momentarily stopped his cultivation, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit worried about the Heavenly Dragon Temple. Especially considering that he was still rather far away from reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    "Haaa¡­ No mater what they have nned, I will only be able to do something about it after reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­" Shaking his head as he said this, Xuan Hao closed both of his eyes again as he ignored his surroundings and focused his attention back on trying toprehend the Dao of Space.


    At the moment, the Heavenly Dragon Temple was simply not something he could deal with before he broke through.


    ¡­


    At the same time that Xuan Hao returned back toprehending the Dao of Space and the group of three Soul Ascension Realm Experts began making their way towards the Iron Sky Kingdom, Yi Min was sitting on top of a smallfortable couch as she looked out arge window overlooking the entire capital of her kingdom with a worried expression stered all over her face.


    "What to do¡­ Those people are definitely going to try and attack me now that the imperial family is gone. At least they shouldn''t be able to send too many people over due to the threat of the surrounding empires making a move to destroy the capital city while they are gone¡­" Muttering this as she turned her attention towards therge walls that served as the core part of the formation guarding her capital city, Yi Min could not help worrying about the future.


    Although her strength had improved a lot over the past few years, she had still not managed to reach the Soul Ascension Realm and was still stuck at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even though she had a clear path towards the Soul Ascension Realm and felt like she would be able to reach it in another year, she didn''t think the people who had been suppressed by the imperial family back in the capital could wait that long.


    Not to mention, even if they didn''t make a move to try and take over her kingdom and the massive spiritual metal mine located beneath the capital city, the surrounding empires would definitely do so in another month or two.


    Only by reaching the Soul Ascension Realm and using her formation at the same time did she stand a chance at keeping her kingdom from any outsiders who might want to seize it for themselves.


    Is my only choice to forcefully try and break through to the Soul Ascension Realm?


    Continuing to gaze out the window as she thought about this, Yi Min slowlyid down on the small couch as she stared up at the ceiling with a helpless look in her eyes.


    Although she was only a single step away from being able to take on the first tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, she didn''t dare to try and take this step before she was absolutely certain about being able to ovee the tribtion because of the danger involved.


    Failing the tribtion didn''t just mean death but rumors also said that it would destroy the true soul if one failed to ovee it. Destroying any hopes of reincarnating.


    Even if the concept of reincarnation wasn''t anything that had been directly proven to exist in the first ce, most cultivators on the Ewaria Continent believed that one''s true soul would reincarnate after death. Even powerful experts who had long since reached the Nascent Soul Realm or above believed in this, the only difference being that they thought of the true soul as another part of their soul that remained hidden inside of their nascent soul after they broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Like most people on the continent, Yi Min also believed in reincarnation. In the end, this was also one the main reasons why she hesitated so much when it came to taking on the tribtion before being fully prepared.


    After all, even if she ended up dying, she believed that she would have another chance at life after going through the cycle of reincarnation.


    Of course, all of this was something taking ce in the subconscious part of her head, and she didn''t really think about any of this as the reason why she didn''t want to take on the tribtion. Instead, just thinking to herself that her nervousness and fear of the tribtion was due to her not being fully prepared.


    Bang!


    Just as she was lost in her own thoughts contemting whether or not she needed to take on the tribtion and try to reach the Soul Ascension Realm ahead of time, the double doors to the room swung open violently as a young woman dressed in a formal maid attire rushed inside the room.


    "Your Highness!"


    Thump!


    "What is it? Why are you barging in like that? Did something happen?" Hearing the desperate cry from the maid before she half copsed on to the ground to catch her breath, Yi Min didn''t waste a second as she jumped off the couch before starting to question the exhausted maid. Understanding very well that there had to be a good reason for her to barge into her personal quarters like that.


    "The¡­ The noble families and three cardinals just issued¡­ Hah¡­ A request for us to give up the spiritual metal mines¡­ O-Or they would personallye to take them!" Saying this with all of her power as she fought the exhaustion from running across the entire pce with her meager Foundation Establishment Realm cultivation base to deliver this news-


    Thump~


    The maid promptly copsed on the ground from exhaustion.


    "This¡­ They are acting faster than I expected¡­" Hearing what the maid said before she copsed, Yi Min could not help frowning visibly as she signaled for the two guards standing at the door to take the maid to the infirmary.


    Only when the door was shut again did the reality of the situation set in for Yi Min, as she realized that her only way out of her current situation was to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm.

 Chapter 1050 Did Master Starve to Death!?

    <h4>Chapter 1050 Did Master Starve to Death!?</h4>


    "I have no time to waste, those people should already be on their way¡­ And if they show up before I breakthrough and destroy the formation, I won''t stand a chance even after reaching the Soul Ascension Realm¡­" Muttering this to herself as she fully decided on breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm, Yi Min didn''t waste a second as she made her way out of the room before heading in the direction of the room she had prepared for her break through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Outside of feeling like she could still improve herself a bit more before trying to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm, she had already taken care of everything else that was needed for her breakthrough.


    Among all of these, the most important was therge storage of spirit stones that would supply the formation during her breakthrough to the Soul Ascension Realm in case anyone decided to attack her during this time.


    Although¡­ Given that her enemies were in the Soul Ascension Realm, she doubted that the small mountain of spirit stones that she had gathered for this would be able to hold on for more than half a day. Maybe even shorter depending on how many people came to try and get rid of her.


    "Haaa¡­ No use worrying about this. For now, I should focus all my attention on breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm." Shaking her head as she muttered this to herself while making her way through the long corridors of the pce, Yi Min soon reached the room she had prepared and stepped inside without a second thought.


    Inside the room there were several different healing potions and pills that would be helpful during her tribtion. Other than this, the ceiling of the room was also opened up so as to allow the tribtion to descend, while also giving her a chance to fly out of the room to face the tribtion head on in case it started damaging the pce.


    "It''s finally time¡­" Quietly whispering this to herself as her eyes wandered across the room for a short moment, Yi Min put on a determined expression as she walked into the middle of the room before sitting down and closing her eyes. Focusing her full attention on trying to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    During the entire process, she didn''t inform any of her servants or subjects about her ns to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm. Fearing that there might be a spy among them that would inform her enemies in the capital about her attempt to break through the Soul Ascension and in turn make them rush over before she had a chance to break through.


    Rumble~!


    Soon enough, a few hours passed as the first tribtion of the Immortal Soul Tribtion, the tribtion of fire-


    FWOOOOSH-!


    Descended!


    ¡­


    At the same time that Yi Min had begun the process of breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao''s two youngest disciples had gathered together not too far away from the room he was cultivating inside of.


    Although he had been gone for more than a few weeks at a time, this was the first time Bai Ning and Mui had seen him enter secluded cultivation.


    Not to mention, it was also the first time they had seen anyone enter secluded cultivation, only having heard about it from other disciples, whose masters entered secluded cultivation. Making them curious as to when their master woulde out again and what he was doing all alone inside the rtively small room for such a long period of time.


    Given that Bai Ning focused most of his attention on cksmithing and Mui was still only in the Foundation Establishment Realm, neither of them knew a lot about the process of entering secluded cultivation, as only the elders would do something like this when they encountered a bottleneck that they couldn''t break through no matter what they did.


    "I wonder when master wille out again, it''s already been a few weeks now."


    "Indeed, master has never been in secluded cultivation for that long before. Not to mention, he hasn''t evene out to eat anything and I haven''t seen Zhi Ruo bring him anything either-"


    "Wha-!? Master hasn''t eaten anything for weeks!?" Hearing what Bai Ning said, Mui didn''t even allow him to finish as she asked this in a panicked voice before turning her attention towards the door to her master''s meditation room.


    "Don''t tell me¡­ D-Did master starve to death!?" Quietly muttering this to herself as she stared directly towards the door with an even more panicked expression on her face as she looked like she was about to rush over and open the door at any moment-


    "Hm? Bai Ning, Mui? What are you two doing here?"


    Chu Yang suddenly appeared around a corner not too far away as he called out to the two. Wondering what they were doing in front of their master''s cultivation room.


    "Ah!"


    Swish~!


    Seeing her senior brother appear, Mui decided against her n of rushing inside her master''s cultivation room as she instead rushed over to her senior brother to ask him about the situation. "S-Senior brother! Do you know when master wille out again? Is he going to be okay without eating anything for so many weeks?!"


    "This¡­" Seeing the panicked look on his little junior sister''s face, Chu Yang paused for a moment before a look of understanding appeared in his eyes. "He is going to be fine, Mui, after someone reaches the Nascent Soul Realm, they only need to absorb the qi between heaven and earth to stay alive. Your master isn''t going to starve to death unless the qi disappears."


    "Don''t need to eat¡­? Survive on qi between heaven and earth- Ah! So, master can eat the qi instead of normal food!"


    "Well¡­ I guess you could say that¡­" Listening to Mui''s conclusion of the process of using the qi between heaven and earth to sustain the body instead of normal food, Chu Yang could not help chuckling a bit as he gently patted her head.


    Even if the description given by Mui was a bit off, it was not that wrong as it could be considered eating in some odd way.


    "I see¡­ So, after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, I can begin to eat qi instead of normal food. Hm¡­ I wonder what qi tastes like, does the taste change depending on the element of the qi¡­?" Showing a look simr to an enlightened schr, Mui curiously began whispering some rather interesting things that Chu Yang had never thought about before.


    And not long after that, Mui rushed back to her room to continue cultivating. Intend on reaching the Nascent Soul Realm as fast as possible so she could find out what qi tasted like¡­ And more importantly, how delicious it waspared to normal food. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Leaving behind a somewhat confused Chu Yang and Bai Ning, who were left rather baffled by their junior sister''s reason for reaching the Nascent Soul Realm. Not for strength or to increase her lifespan, but instead because she wanted to find out what qi tasted like.


    ¡­


    Having woken up from his state ofprehension due to the ruckus caused by Mui just outside his room, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat wry smile on his face as he nced in the direction that Mui had left in.


    Looks like she managed to motivate herself to work hard on improving her strength even without me doing anything. Although¡­ Her reason for wanting to reach the Nascent Soul Realm is rather¡­ Special¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while using his divine sense to spy on Mui who was now sitting down in her room focusing all of her attention on gathering the qi around her to build the third foundational pir in her dantian, Xuan Hao felt that it shouldn''t be that much of a problem as long as she had a goal to work towards. Even if the goal was not something ordinary, at least it motivated her to improve.


    Hm? Now that I think about it, I wonder how that grand elder from the Half Spirit Race is doing, he should be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm soon. Especially now that he also has a guide simr to the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms for the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Remembering how he had handed over the information on the Domain Lord Realm that he had gained from the inheritance of the elder from the Mirage Sect inside of the mystic realm to Elder Song a few days after entering secluded cultivation, Xuan Hao could not help looking forward to more Domain Lord Realm Experts appearing inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not only that, but the information would also be helpful to those that had already reached the Domain Lord Realm, like Feng Chen, Shu Yao, and Zu Fei. Helping them improve even faster.

 Chapter 1051 Yi Min’s Fire Tribulation

    <h4>Chapter 1051 Yi Min''s Fire Tribtion</h4>


    Seeing Chu Yang and Bai Ning leaving a short time after Mui had left, Xuan Hao retracted his divine sense and focused his attention back onprehending the Dao of Space again.


    Although he had not yet managed to break through to the Small Sess Realm, he could feel that he was getting closer with each passing day. At his current rate of improvement, he expected to reach the Small Sess Realm in around two months.


    Normally, two months could be considered extremely short considering the sheer difficulty that was associated with increasing one''sprehension of a certain dao. However, due to the fact that he had already reached the Peak of the Elementary Realm of Comprehension and also had a far deeper connection with the Dao of Space due to his special physique, it could be considered a bit more normal that he only needed to spend two months to reach the Small Sess Realm.


    Of course, the Dao of space was never one of Xuan Hao''s concerns when it came to reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Instead, it was the fact that he had toprehend a new dao all the way up to the Small Sess Realm.


    More difficult than this, he also had to somehow reach theprehension realm above the Small Sess Realm, the Large Sess Realm, a realm that he hadn''t even gotten close to touching with any of his Daos...


    Whoosh~


    Not thinking about any of these future problems, Xuan Hao quietly used the partial copse of space ability that he had gained from his special physique to tear small holes into the space around him. Allowing him to use the small tears in space to get a better look at the structure of space and deepen his understanding of the Dao of space at a speed far faster than just sitting down and mindlessly trying toprehend it.


    Having learnt from his time in the mystic realm that doing this would increase the speed at which he could understand the Dao of Space.


    Although the power required to use the partial spatial copse was still rather significant, it was not too much if he kept the affected area limited and only used it to observe the structure of space instead of trying to use it inbat.


    In turn, it allowed him to indefinitely keep the tear in space created by the partial spatial copse open without the world repairing it. Only when he stopped using the partial spatial copse ability would the fabric of space repair itself and return to normal again.


    ¡­


    BOOOM-!


    "Aaaah-!"


    Back in the iron Sky Kingdom, Yi Min let out a loud pain filled cry as part of the fire that had descended during the tribtion suddenly exploded violently in her face-


    Boom-boom-boom!


    As if to trigger the next phase of the tribtion of fire, the fire that had only been trying to reduce her to dust so far, began violently gathering together into small fireballs before exploding. Forcing Yi Min to fly out of her cultivation room and into the sky to avoid identally destroying her pce during her breakthrough.


    Soon enough, everyone in the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom became aware of the tribtion that was taking ce. However, this no longer concerned Yi Min, as she understood that there was nothing, she could do to hide the fact that she was going through her tribtion in her current state.


    Even if she had the strength to suppress the power of the tribtion earlier on, she was far too weak to do that now. Especially when considering that she had to use all of her power just to ensure that she could stay alive under the constant bombardment of the fireballs condensed from the fire that had descended to kill her.


    "When is this going to end¡­ The fire tribtion shouldn''tst for more than a few minutes¡­"


    However, as time passed, and the fire tribtion showed no signs of stopping and instead began ramping up in strength, Yi Min could not stop herself from growing nervous. No matter how much stronger she was whenpared to other Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert, her strength was limited, and she could not continue resisting the fire forever.


    If the fire tribtion really continued for much longer, she would likely end up as a pile of dust on the ground below, her body and soul being consumed by the terrifying fire as what would be left of her qi would scatter and return to the world.


    Not only that, but the fire left behind by the tribtion would most likely end up destroying the capital below her.


    After all, even if she died, the fire created by the tribtion would not just disperse after her death. Instead, it would burn the ground below until all the power of the tribtion was used uppletely. This was also one of the main reasons why the first tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm was so dangerous.


    Even if you weren''t the one taking on the tribtion, you might end up suffering from it all the same if the person taking on the tribtion failed, and you happened to be close enough. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not to mention, it would be even worse if the person affected by the failed fire tribtion was someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, as it would end up triggering their own fire tribtion the moment, they ended uping into contact with the remnant fire from the failed fire tribtion.


    In the end, if something like this happened, it would almost certainly be a death sentence for the unlucky Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert affected, as they were likely nowhere near strong enough to take on the fire tribtion and have a real chance at reaching the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Although¡­ There was always exceptions to this and there were a few lucky people who just barely managed to pass through the fire tribtion that had been identally triggered by a failed fire tribtion. Unintentionally resulting in them breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm on the spot.


    "Hmph!"


    Not intending to have her fire tribtion turn into a failed fire tribtion that would end up causing death and destruction to all of the people below, Yi Min frowned visibly as she used all of her strength to fight back the fire while at the same time swallowing close to a dozen different healing potions.


    All of them being worth far more than the total wealth of an ordinary Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert. Showing off just how wealthy she was with the support of her cksmithing and the support of a massive spiritual metal mine.


    Boom-!


    As a result of this, her appearance began drastically improving. Allowing her to regain some energy in the fight against the fire tribtion, while at the same time momentarily forcing the mes back a few meters. Giving her a chance to recover the parts of her body that had been burnt by the mes or been blown off when the mes werepressed into small explosive fireballs.


    RUMBLE-!


    Over the next five minutes, Yi Min went through all of the healing potion, pills and special spiritual herbs she had gathered for her attempt to ovee the fire tribtion, causing everyone watching the struggling taking ce in the sky above the capital city to feel a sense of awe at the sheer power disyed by their leader.


    Even if they had no idea how strong she was, they could clearly sense how terrifying the mes were¡­


    BOOOOOOOOOOM-!


    It was just at this moment, when everyone had their attention focused on her, that Yi Min used all of her strength to forcefully disperse thest bit of the fire tribtion before rapidly rushing back into the pce before activating all of the defensive formations in the pce.


    Although the people watching the scene had no idea what had happened and just saw that Yi Min had dealt with the fire that had suddenly appeared in the sky above them, the spies controlled by the different major powers in the Sky Empire were not the same. All of them understood that Yi Min had sessfully managed to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Not only this, but they also understood from the countless formations now covering the pce, that Yi Min already knew about their existence to some extent and had decided to hide inside the pce while stabilizing her cultivation base. Not wanting to risk getting attacked during this process.


    After all, even if the spies were far too weak to kill her, they were more than strong enough to jump in and force her to use her unstable cultivation base to deal with them.


    In the end, doing this would further destabilize her cultivation base and make it take far longer for her to stabilize her cultivation base at the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Rather than dealing with any of this, Yi Min concluded that it would be far better for her to just seal herself away inside the pce while stabilizing her cultivation base so she could face off against the Soul Ascension Realm Expert that would undoubtedly show up to try and take away her spiritual metal mine.

 Chapter 1052 Siege of the Iron Sky Kingdom (Part 1)

    <h4>Chapter 1052 Siege of the Iron Sky Kingdom (Part 1)</h4>


    "What do we do now¡­? There is no way she would do something like this without knowing about us!"


    "Indeed, if we stay here until she stabilizes her cultivation base, she will undoubtedly find us. The only way for us to stay alive is by escaping from the Iron Sky Kingdom before this happens. Don''t forget, her formation doesn''t just cover the capital, but the entire kingdom!"


    "But¡­ How do we do that when she closed off the capital and the kingdom with her formations before entering seclusion to stabilize her cultivation base?"


    "I¡­ I don''t know¡­ Maybe we can try and contact our superior and hope they can break through the formation before she finishes stabilizing her cultivation base¡­"


    As the spies gathered together to discuss their next course of action, they all ended up concluding that the only way for them to escape from the Iron Sky Kingdom safely was if their superiors saved them. Outside of that, there was no other way for them to leave the Iron Sky Kingdom after the formations had been activated by Yi Min.


    Although most of them were in the Domain Lord Realm and they could try to sabotage the formation from the inside, they also understood that doing this would expose them to Yi Min and in turn make them a target for the formation.


    Before their superiors appeared and forced the formation to use most of its power to defend itself, there was no way for them to do anything other than wait around and pray that the formation didn''t discover them before this.


    At the very least, they didn''t have to worry too much about being discovered by the formation that wasn''t being personally controlled by Yi Min. The only real way that the formation would discover and attack them at this point in time was if they decided to willingly reveal themselves, something that none of the spies dared to do without their superiors present.


    In the end, all they could do was desperately contact their superiors before finding a decent hiding spot to wait for them to show up.


    ¡­


    Opening her eyes inside a small room located in the depths of the pce, Yi Min frowned slightly before turning to look in the direction of the Iron Sky Kingdom''s border with the core region of the Sky Empire. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even though there was arge wall blocking her way, it didn''t stop her divine sense from piercing through it as the scene at the border soon became visible to her¡­ And not too far away from the border of her kingdom, three lonely figures could be seen floating in the air as they examined the formation in front of them.


    "Looks like they are here¡­" Spotting three people floating in the air just in front of the borders to her kingdom while also examining the formation in detail, it did not take more than a few seconds for her to realize that they were the Soul Ascension Realm Experts that hade over from the capital of the Sky Empire to deal with her.


    Although she didn''t recognize any of them other than the cardinal from one of the three religions standing in the middle of the three people, she didn''t dare to underestimate them-


    Whoosh-!


    Wasting no time, she directly took out her personal supply of spirit stones and pushed them into the space below the pce where the true core of the formation was located. Hoping that it would be enough to hold them off for another few hours.


    After all, even if it had already been a little over a day since she had broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm and she had used all sorts of precious spiritual herbs, potions, and pills to speed up the process, she had still not fully managed to stabilize her cultivation base and still needed a few hours to do so.


    If she didn''t manage to do this and just decided to take control of the formation to fight off against the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts, her unstable cultivation base might cause some problems for the formation during an extended fight, something she wanted to avoid if possible.


    Even if she had to burn through the wealth she had umted during her time as a skilled cksmith and owner of one of thergest spiritual metal mines in the Sky Empire!


    Not even a secondter, the three outside had finished examining her formation, as the first attacknded-


    BOOOOM-!


    Sendingrge shockwaves through area outside the formation, while a loud banging sound echoed out for everyone inside the formation to hear-


    Boom-boom-boom!


    However, this was only the beginning, as the other two Soul Ascension Realm Experts soon joined in and attacked the formation as well. Momentarily causing everyone inside the Iron Sky Kingdom to feel like the heavens above were about to shatter, as the terrifying sounds and small earthquakes caused by the attacks made it feel like a prelude to the sky shattering.


    ¡­


    "This formation is stronger than thest time I was here. Looks like Yi Min already predicted that she would be in trouble after breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm."


    "Indeed, even if all of us work together to attack it, it will take at least a few hours for us to break through the formation. Maybe even longer depending on how many spirit stones she managed to gather over the years."


    Having thrown a few probing attacks towards the formation now covering the entire Iron Sky Kingdom, the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts not from one of the three religions could not help eximing in admiration as they firsthand experienced just how strong the formation was.


    Even if it should only be able to hold on for a few hours on its own, this alone was more than enough to demonstrate just how powerful it was. After all, even the guardian formation that had protected the capital city of the Sky Empire would be having a difficult time holding back three Soul Ascension Realm Experts without the assistance of the old ancestor from the imperial family.


    Of course, the formation in the capital of the Sky Empire would not just passively defend like Yi Min''s formation was forced to do and would instead use powerful killing formations to attack the moment it was attacked.


    Unfortunately, the formation that had once made everyone around the Sky Empire think twice about attacking the capital city was now gone together with the old ancestor. Making the Sky Empire a far easier target to attackpared to before.


    "Both of you, stop talking and continue attacking the formation. The faster we destroy the formation, the faster we can deal with Yi Min and leave this ce. Even if everything seems fine and safe on the surface, it won''t stay like that for long." Calling out to the two soul Ascension Realm Experts in the process of admiring the formation protecting the Iron Sky Kingdom, the cardinal didn''t wait before continuing tounch a flurry of attacks towards therge formation-


    Rumble~


    Causing the entire formation to shake violently as dozens of small cracks appeared all over it before rapidly being repaired again before they had a chance to develop intorge cracks that could potentially create a way for the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts to enter the formation.


    ""¡­""


    Hearing what the cardinal said, the other two Soul Ascension Realm Experts remained silent for a short moment before joining him in attacking the formation. Both of them understood what he meant.


    Even if everything seemed fine and they hadn''t been attacked by anyone during their journey to the Iron Sky Kingdom, it didn''t mean that things would continue like that.


    If they stayed outside the capital of the Sky Empire for long enough, one of the powerful experts from one of the empires eyeing the Sky Empire would make a move to test the waters and see if the old ancestors of the imperial family had indeed disappeared and wasn''t just trying to set up a trap to turn around and attack them when they least expected it.


    After all, from their point of view, the imperial family of the Sky Empire had just disappeared after a group of powerful experts had fought close to their capital city. Even more suspiciously, the other powers inside the capital city were fine without any casualties.


    It was also because of this that the three religions and other powers left in the capital city were able to continue going about their day in peace for thest few weeks.


    However, this would notst forever¡­


    Boom-boom-boom!


    For this reason, all three Soul Ascension Realm Experts used all of their strength to attack the formation covering the Iron Sky Kingdom. Wanting to take it down as fast as possible and not give Yi Min a chance to stabilize her cultivation base and fight back against them.

 Chapter 1053 Siege of the Iron Sky Kingdom (Part 2)

    <h4>Chapter 1053 Siege of the Iron Sky Kingdom (Part 2)</h4>


    Having focused all of their power on trying to break through the formation as fast as possible, it did not take more than three hours before the formation started to show signs of breaking. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Crack~


    Countless small cracks that had automatically been repaired before now covering the entire formation showing no signs of disappearing. Instead, these cracks slowly began to grow bigger under the constant attacks from the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    Even if the formation still had an ample supply of spirit stones avable, it could not keep up with the pace of the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts and had thus started to break far faster than Yi Min had originally expected. Giving her far less time to stabilize her cultivation and take control of the formation before it broke.


    After all, if the formation ended up breaking, she would no longer have any way left to defend herself.


    If she was lucky, she might be able to escape with her life, but this would also mean that she would have to give up on the Iron Sky Kingdom and allow the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the capital city of the Sky Empire to destroy it.


    Considering that she had spent her entire life creating and strengthening the Iron Sky Kingdom, this was thest thing she wanted to see happen!


    Even if she deep down understood that she would have a chance to rebuilt it again in the future now that she had broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm, she still didn''t want to just watch her life work get destroyed if she had the strength to prevent it from happening.


    Not to mention, she had no way to take any of her people with her when escaping¡­ And she doubted that the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts would allow any of them to leave alive.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling that the formation would at most hold for a few minutes in its current state, Yi Min got up before flying into the air above the pce.


    "Looks like I have no choice but to try and fight them like this¡­" Looking over in the direction of where the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts were attacking the formation as she said this, Yi Min closed both of her eyes as she used her still unstable power to merge together with the formation and take control of it before it was destroyed.


    RUMBLE-!


    Following Yi Min taking control of the formation, a terrifying aura began to spread out from the Iron Sky Kingdom before engulfing all three of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts violently attacking the formation with all of their strength.


    "Wha-!?"


    "This is-?!"


    "Hmph!"


    And before any of the three had any time to react, the killing formations that had been inactive to ensure the formation being able to defend against the three Soul Ascension Realm Expert without Yi Min around, activated.


    Even if these formations had only reached a strengthparable to someone in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, when stacked together, they became more than strong enough to fight back against the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts who were only around the First Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    In an instant, the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts were forced to stop their relentless attacks as they had to defend against the attacks from the dozen or so powerful killing formations that had been merged together with the massive formation covering the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Only the cardinal whose strength had surpassed the First Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm had the power to continue attacking the formation under the attack of the dozen or so killing formations.


    "Both of you, focus all your strength on defending, she shouldn''t have fully stabilized her cultivation base yet. No matter how strong she seems now that she has taken control of the formation, she won''t be able to continue this for too long.


    For now, we just have to wait until her unstable cultivation base grows more chaotic and inevitably ends up either killing her or messing up the formation. At most it should take two to three days¡­"


    Seeing that his twopanions were left in a difficult situation as they struggled to reach the formation again under the constant stream of attacks bombarding them, the cardinal emotionlessly said this before focusing his attention on both defending and attacking at the same time.


    ""Yes!""


    Hearing what the cardinal said, the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had been struggling to try and get close enough to attack the formation again quickly let go of this as they focused all of their power on defending themselves against the attacks from the killing formations.


    Considering the fact that these attacks were onlyparable to someone in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm attacking them, they didn''t suffer any real damage after doing this.


    Now, all that was left for them to do was patiently wait for Yi Min''s cultivation base to grow chaotic enough that she either ended up destroying the formation or killing herself.


    Although they highly doubted that she would go so far that she ended up killing herself in the process of trying to keep the formation intact.


    Even if the formation was destroyed, she should still be able to escape from them as long as her state wasn''t too bad.


    After all, they had no ns of chasing after her considering that the people from the other empires might appear at any time to attack them. All they wanted to do was ensure their control over the spiritual metal mine so they could use the next few weeks to force out anything of value in it before the surrounding empires decided to attack the Sky Empire.


    As for Yi Min showing up to get revenge in the future¡­ None of them thought much about this when they already had to deal with the Soul Ascension Realm Experts of the surrounding empires in the future.


    Not to mention, what could Yi Min possibly do? She had only just reached the Soul Ascension Realm and they had no ns of leaving the capital city where most of their important people were located.


    Only when the situation in the Sky Empire finally stabilized would they have to deal with her, something that would likely take hundreds of years without the old ancestor of the imperial family returning or someone equally powerful appearing to fill the gap. Even worse, there was also the chance that one of the surrounding empires decided to risk it all and fully destroy the Sky Empire¡­


    As the Iron Sky Kingdom was besieged by the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts, Yi Min did not take long to realize what they were nning, causing her to curse at all three of them.


    Deep down, she had hoped that she would have been able to scare them away by using all of her killing formations at once, but from the looks of it, her n didn''t work and the three had decided to remain.


    Not only that, but from the fact that two of them had given up on attacking and focused all of their energy on defending, it was obvious that they understood that she hadn''t managed to fully stabilize her cultivation base.


    If she had managed to stabilize her cultivation base in time, she would have been able to keep the stalemate going indefinitely, but¡­ Now that her cultivation base was still not fully stable after her breakthrough to the Soul Ascension Realm, it was only a matter of time before it went out of control and ended up causing her control over her qi to dwindle before ultimately making it turn into a chaotic mess that would damage her whenever she tried using it.


    In the worst-case scenario, she might even enter qi deviation and lose her cultivation base¡­


    "Am I really forced to give up on the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­?" Muttering this to herself as she felt her qi slowly heading in this direction, Yi Min could not help frowning visibly as she stared towards the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts outside her formation filled with killing intent.


    "M-Master, why don''t you try asking that person from the Star Shattering Sect for help?"


    Just at this moment, one of her trusted people and the second strongest person in the Iron Sky Kingdom, arge muscr man covered from head to toe in a beautiful set of armor appeared in the air a few meters away from her. Showing off the fact that he was in the Domain Lord Realm.


    "The Star Shattering Sect¡­? Why am I supposed to ask them for help? What can someone in the Domain Lord Realm do against three people in the Soul Ascension Realm?" Hearing what the man said, Yi Min could not help frowning as she asked this. Not understanding why, he had mentioned the Star Shattering Sect all of a sudden.


    "Ah! That''s right, you might not have heard because of your focus on reaching the Soul Ascension Realm over the past few weeks, but Grand Elder Xuan managed to reach the Soul Ascension Realm not too long ago-"


    "He- WHAT!?"

 Chapter 1054 Asking For Help

    <h4>Chapter 1054 Asking For Help</h4>


    " Is what you say true!? Did that person really manage to reach the Soul Ascension Realm!?" Overwhelmed by the sudden news that Xuan Hao had actually managed to reach the Soul Ascension Realm before her, Yi Min could not help grabbing the muscr man and shaking him to try and get an answer out of him.


    "Y-Your majesty, please, please put me down first or you will end up killing me!" As a result, the muscr man had to call out for her to stop. After all, with her strength now having reached the Soul Ascension Realm, it was far from something that he could endure with his Domain Lord Realm strength. Especially given that Yi Min had yet to fully control her strength¡­


    "Ah.. Sorry, my bad¡­"


    Realizing this as well after hearing what he said, Yi Min awkwardly let go of him before waiting for him to regain his breath and exin what he had just said. After all, if Xuan Hao had really reached the Soul Ascension Realm, she might have another way out of her current situation. One that didn''t involve her being forced to leave her kingdom and escape by herself.


    "Ahm¡­ As I was trying to say earlier, you can ask the Grand Elder from the Star Shattering Sect and yes, he has broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm. Not only from what the people of the Star Shattering Sect, but also from what the surrounding kingdoms against them said.


    From what I know, the stalemate that happened between the Star Shattering Sect and the kingdoms around them after they officially became a sect with Domain Lord Realm Experts was broken because of this. Only a few of the strongest kingdoms who once had Domain Lord Realm Experts backing them still remain at this point in time. Although, I doubt they willst for more than a week or two¡­"


    Finishing his exnation of the Star Shattering Sect''s current situation and where he had gotten the information from, the muscr man nervously took a few steps back to avoid getting grabbed again.


    "Hm¡­ I see¡­ You can leave for now." Luckily for the man, Yi Min didn''t do anything this time around and just nodded her head deep in thought before waving him away while focusing her attention back on dealing with the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts outside.


    "¡­"


    Seeing that Yi Min had returned to concentrating on the formation and didn''t intend to say anything more, the muscr man decided to remain silent as he flew back down into the capital below.


    Although he didn''t say anything, he felt extremely scared about the current situation. Understanding very well that there was no way that Yi Min had the ability to fight against three Soul Ascension Realm Experts after just having broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm herself. Even with the help of the formation, he understood that it would only be a matter of time.


    This was also the reason why he had decided to bring up the matter of Xuan Hao having reached the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even if there was a chance that he didn''t reach the Soul Ascension Realm, it would at least be better to try and ask for help than just helplessly wait for death.


    As for whether or not Xuan Hao would even lend a hand to begin with? That was something he couldn''t answer¡­ For now, he could only hope that Yi Min had managed to establish a good enough rtionship with Xuan Hao that he was willing toe to her help in a time of need.


    ¡­


    "Hm?"


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao opened both of his eyes with a somewhat annoyed expression on his face as he looked over towards themunication talisman he had ced on a small table in the corner of the room.


    It had only been a short time since he had returned toprehending the Dao of Space after his disciples decided to y around outside his room¡­


    "Oh? Isn''t this Yi Min? What could she want all of a sudden?"


    However, upon noticing who it was that was contacting him, Xuan Hao''s annoyed expression changed into one filled with curiosity.


    Outside of the times he had contacted her about information regarding the Sky Empire, he had not talked to her in quite some time. Not to mention, this was the first time she had contacted him instead of it being him contacting her.


    Whoosh~


    "Yi Min, I wonder why you contacted me like this all of sudden? Did something happen?" Using his qi to guide themunication talisman over, Xuan Hao didn''t miss a beat as he asked this before Yi Min even had a chance to say anything.


    "Ah- This¡­ I- Something did indeed happen¡­ But first! Did you really break through to the Soul Ascension Realm!? Or is it just another rumor spread by that Elder Song to dampen the fighting spirit of the kingdoms resisting your sect''s expansion?" Hearing Xuan Hao''s question, Yi Min fumbled over her words for a short moment before directly asking about whether or not he had broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Compared to the muscr man who didn''t fully understand the situation between the Star Shattering Sect and the surrounding kingdoms, she at the very least had some idea as to what was happening before the most recent development and understood the fact that Elder Song would often use different tactics to try and demoralize the opponent into surrendering without the Star Shattering Sect even having to do anything.


    "Oh? You heard about it already? Yes, I did break through to the Soul Ascension Realm some time ago now, it''s just that it was only recently spread by Elder Song. Didn''t want to end up being attack by someone before I had the time to properly stabilize my cultivation base and familiarize myself with my new strength."


    Hearing that she just wanted to ask about him reaching the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao decided to just go with the narrative that Elder Song had created for him. In any case, it wasn''t wrong considering that his strength was already close to the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even if someone came to try and test him in the future, he would still be more than capable of dealing with them. Maybe it might even allow the influence of the Star Shattering Sect to grow more after he personally took action to deal with someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    After all, when all things were said and done, the only things that Elder Song had attributed to him were a few random attacks on the surrounding kingdoms.


    The strongest person in these kingdoms was still far away from the Domain Lord Realm in terms of strength, let alone the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even if Elder Song had managed to convince these kingdoms about him being in the Soul Ascension Realm, the same could not be said for the rest of the kingdoms in the border region. Not to mention the even stronger kingdoms and sects in the core region of the Sky Empire¡­


    "You¡­ You really reached the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ This- This is great! Xuan Hao, I just recently broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm myself and was almost immediately attacked by three other Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the capital of the Sky Empire before I had time to stabilize my cultivation base.


    Although I''m capable of holding them back for now with the help of my formation, I doubt I can continue to do so for much longer¡­"


    Listening to the person in question confirm to her that he had indeed broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm, Yi Min froze for a short moment before telling him about her current desperate situation. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "I understand, you want me toe and help you out?" Knowing what Yi Min wanted to ask the moment he heard about her current situation, Xuan Hao decided to directly ask her instead of beating around the bush. Considering that her situation was already bad from what she said, it was best not to waste too much time.


    "Yes¡­" Having been seen through, Yi Min could only quietly agree.


    Given the fact that her formation could only hold on for so long before her qi grew too chaotic to control it and Xuan Hao also needed some time to reach her kingdom, she wanted him to get to her as fast as possible.


    Even if he reached her kingdom in time, they still had to find a way to deal with the three Soul Ascension Realm Expert¡­


    "Okay, I will be there shortly."


    Whoosh~


    Not having any reason to refuse Yi Min''s request for help, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he put away hismunication talisman before using the short distance teleportation of the Drifting Cloud Steps to silently leave the Star Shattering Sect.

 Chapter 1055 Assassin?

    <h4>Chapter 1055 Assassin?</h4>


    "Haaa... I hope he shows up soon..."


    Back in the Iron Sky Kingdom, Yi Min quietly whispered this to herself as she stared down at hermunication talisman before putting it away and focusing her attention back on the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts outside. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Even if she had managed to gain the help of another Soul Ascension Realm Expert, it would still be some time before he showed up. Not to mention, even when he did show up, they still had to figure out a way to deal with the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts outside.


    After all, Xuan Hao did not have any experience with her formation and would not know how to control it properly. Although it was tempting to try and teach him, it might also end up with Xuan Hao identally doing something wrong when trying to take over control of the formation from her. Resulting in the formation breaking in the process¡­


    The main problem was not so much the two people who had reached the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Instead, it was the cardinal who had surpassed the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and should beparable to someone in the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even with Xuan Hao''s help, she didn''t know how they would be able to deal with someone that powerful. For now, all she could do was try her best to hold back the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts while waiting for Xuan Hao to show up¡­


    Unknown to Yi Min, Xuan Hao had arrived only a few seconds after he had finished his conversation with her and was currently observing the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts who were trying their best to break through the massive formation covering the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Although he had yet toprehend the long distance teleportation, with the use of the Drifting Cloud Steps short distance teleportation, his speed was already close to the Earth Immortal Realm. Maybe even surpassing some slower Earth Immortal Realm Experts.


    ¡­


    So, those three are the Soul Ascension Realm Experts Yi Min mentioned? But¡­ Who is that person?


    ncing over the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts for a few seconds, Xuan Hao soon turned to look towards a small forest located a few dozen kilometers away from the ce where the three were trying to break through Yi Min''s formation.


    At the edge of the small forest, a thin figure covered in a robe with a small dark colored lotus embroidered into it that obscured any identifiable features was quietly observing the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    If not for the fact that the other party had at least reached the Fourth Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm and might be even stronger than that, he would have already dealt with the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    Although doing this would undoubtedly put the Star Shattering Sect against the religion that the cardinal belonging to, Xuan Hao didn''t really care too much about this considering how bad the rtionship between sects and religions already was in the first ce.


    Not to mention, he doubted that they would be able to just send over someone in the Earth Immortal Realm. Even if they did, he should have been able to break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm by the time they showed up¡­


    Whoosh~


    Hm? Is that person nning to do something?


    Feeling a divine sense originating from the thin figure sweeping over towards him all of a sudden, Xuan Hao wasted no time in hiding himself before observing the divine sense as it silently enveloped the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    Of course, it was impossible for the thin figure to hide the divine sense from the three. All of them had reached the Soul Ascension Realm and the cardinal had even reached a realmparable to the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm-


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Because of this, the three wasted no time in stopping their attack and retreating from Yi Min''s formation while cautiously looking in the direction that the divine sense had originated from.


    "Might I ask who this senior is¡­?" Spotting the thin figure hidden at the edge of the small forest only a few secondster, the cardinal cautiously asked this while ready to defend against any attack that the other party might throw at him.


    Given that they had only just noticed the person after the other party tantly used their divine sense to examine them, it was obvious that the person was stronger than them¡­ And not just a bit stronger¡­


    "¡­"


    Unfortunately for the cardinal and the other two Soul Ascension Realm Experts, the thin figure remained silent without saying a single word.


    Swish~


    "Aaaaah!"


    Instead, the sound of something piercing through the air was all they heard followed by one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts letting out an ear-piercing scream, causing the other two to look over and discover that his arm had been cut off from the base.


    Not only that, but they discovered that a purple liquid had covered the ce where the arm had been cut and was rapidly spreading to the rest of the body at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    "Poison¡­ Y-You are an assassin!? And the mark on your robe¡­ Someone from the Shadow Lotus Sect!? Why is someone from the Shadow Lotus Sect here- Unless¡­ The main church did something to offend you and you are taking revenge on the less protected branches¡­" Having recognized the identity of the thin figure and figured out the reason why someone like that would appear, the cardinal could not help showing a panicked expression on his face as he said this out loud.


    Swish-!


    Giving the cardinal no time to react, the assassin from the Shadow Lotus Sect leaped forward before appearing directly in front of the panicked cardinal.


    Crack~


    However, before the assassin had the chance to kill the cardinal, the cardinal managed to shatter a small crystal that had been caried in a ne around his neck-


    RUMBLE-!


    Following this, a terrifying aura erupted from the cardinal as his panicked expression disappeared, being reced by one filled with one of indifference.


    Whoosh-!


    Seeing this scene, the assassin who had been just about to pierce through the head of cardinal abruptly turned around and escaped in the opposite direction of the cardinal.


    "A mere mortal dares attack one of my servants? And now you even try to run away? How bold!"


    As the indifferent cardinal saw this scene, a voice that didn''t sound like him at all came out from his mouth-


    "Die."


    Boom!


    And following only a single word, the assassin who had already run over a hundred kilometers during the short period of time, turned into a ball of fire that violently exploded.


    Bang!


    This¡­ Just the remnant power is this strong!?


    Feeling the remnant power contained in the shockwave as it hit him, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he turned to look at the cardinal who had already returned to his former panicked expression.


    The power in the shockwave alone was more than enough to make things difficult for someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, let alone the strength of the explosion itself. Even with his current strength, he doubted that he would have been able to survive it.


    But¡­ What on earth was that? Did the cardinal get possessed by someone just now?


    Filled with question while at the same time also feeling far more cautious about attacking the cardinal after what he had just witnessed, Xuan Hao decided to continue observing the three until he figured out what had just happened and if the cardinal could do it again.


    ¡­


    "Wha-what was that just now?! How did you get so strong all of a sudden!? I thought for sure we were dead¡­" As things calmed down and the dust settled, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert who didn''t have his arm cut off could not help asking this as he turned towards the cardinal.


    "I used a special tool that allows my god to descend for a short moment. Although the duration and power that can be used depends on the quality¡­ And the one I have is the worst quality. Only capable of using a single weakened attack¡­" Shaking his head as he said this, the cardinal showed a painful expression on his face as he looked down at the shattered ne in his hand.


    The small crystal that allowed his god to descend was his final trump card and also the reason why he had dared to leave the safety of the capital city during the current dangerous time. Now that he no longer had it, he wanted nothing more than to return to the capital as fast as possible.


    "Ahm! Don''t think too much about it, let''s get rid of this formation first so we can leave!"


    Whoosh~!


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Having not used any of his strength to deal with the assassin. The cardinal did not waste any time before continuing his attack on the formation again.

 Chapter 1056 Surprise Attack...

    <h4>Chapter 1056 Surprise Attack...</h4>


    "A tool that allows a god to momentarily descend¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he heard what the cardinal told his twopanions, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine upon imagining what would have happened to him if he had attacked the cardinal before the assassin from the Shadow Lotus Sect.


    Although he had no clue what kind of power the Shadow Lotus Sect was, he could at least be certain that it was a power from the central region of the continent. Not only that, but it shouldn''t be any weaker than the religion that the cardinal belonged to considering that they had dared to try and assassinate their people.


    Hm? But if the Shadow Lotus Sect is so powerful, wouldn''t they already know about the tool that allows the god of this cardinal to descend? Shouldn''t they have sent someone more powerful if this was the case? Unless¡­ They didn''t expect the cardinal here to have that kind of tool on him as it''s normally not given to someone of his status!


    Feeling like he figured out what had gone wrong for the assassin from the Shadow Lotus Sect, Xuan Hao felt a sense of relief. From his prediction, the tool that the cardinal used shouldn''t be that easy to procure and the one he had should have just been obtained through luck or from a senior who had been pleased with him. Meaning that he shouldn''t have any more of those tools on him! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even if the cardinal had implied that he didn''t have any of those tools left when talking to hispanions, he could always be lying to them to keep a trump card ready in case something ended up happening. For example, he had no idea if there were any more assassins from the Shadow Lotus Sect present.


    Although they might have been scared away by the earlier disy, they might also be lurking somewhere nearby waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike.


    The current calm disy by the cardinal as he continued to attack the formation was not true to the current fearful emotions he felt deep inside. Not able to stop himself from constantly scanning his surroundings with his divine sense for any signs of another assassin from the Shadow Lotus Sect.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling this divine sense sweeping over him every few seconds, Xuan Hao became even more certain that he didn''t have any more of those special tools left as he continued to observe the cardinal.


    I should be able to make a move without any problems emerging. Even if the cardinal still has another of those tools left, I might be able to kill him before he has a chance to use it. In the worst-case scenario, I can try to escape before he gets a chance to attack.


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao began to slowly approach the cardinal. Intending to kill him before he had a chance to do anything.


    The only problem with this n was the fact that the cardinal was currently on edge and was fully focused on his surroundings. Making it impossible for him to get anywhere near the area covered by his domain without being discovered.


    On a positive note, the distance he would have to cover could be covered in a single step with the help of the Drifting Cloud Steps. Only giving the cardinal the time between him using the Drifting Cloud Steps to him appearing in front of him to defend himself.


    As for the other two Soul Ascension Realm Experts¡­ Xuan Hao didn''t care too much about these two, as they had only reached the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and wouldn''t be able to do anything to help out the cardinal. Dealing with them could wait for after the cardinal was dead.


    Craaaack~!


    "Huh? The formation is breaking faster than expected!" Suddenly seeing the formation in front of him starting to break at a speed visible to the naked eye, the cardinal momentarily focused most of his attention on the formation. "I think Yi Min might have been affected by the earlier attack from my god!"


    Filled with pride upon mentioning his god, the cardinal was unaware of the danger approaching as he began preparing for onest final hit to break through the formation.


    Wanting nothing more than to finish the Iron Sky Kingdom so he could return back to the safety of the capital and contact his superiors to find out what had happened for the Shadow Lotus Sect to suddenly sent someone to kill him.


    Seeing this as an opportunity, Xuan Hao leaped out from the shadows-


    Swish!


    And before the cardinal had any time to react, he had already appeared directly in front of him, his sword covered in his sword intent as it pierced through the air towards the surprised cardinal.


    "Wha-!?"


    The cardinal sensed the impending danger and attempted to create a protective barrier to block the sword, but it was toote-


    Ptsh!


    The de cut through the protective barrier and found its mark, striking down the cardinal with deadly uracy. Giving him no time to recover from the injury as a terrifying surge of sword intent flowed through the de and into the body of the cardinal. Killing him in both body and soul as what remained of him soon copsed to the ground.


    Fwoosh~!


    However, even after this, Xuan Hao used his Dao of Fire to burn off what little remained. Not nning to take any chances in case the cardinal somehow had a way to revive himself through the help of his god.


    Although all of this felt impossible to him, he had no idea how strong a god was and what was possible, so he could only do his best to ensure that nothing ended up happening.


    "Huh¡­?"


    Witnessing the scene of the cardinal who had just been happily informing them about how powerful his god was and the fact that they would soon be able to break through the formation being killed and erased from the world before they even had the chance to do anything, the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts froze on the spot in fear. Both of them feeling terrified at what they had just witnessed.


    All things considered; the cardinal was still someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Even if he ended up getting killed, it shouldn''t happen that fast!


    "Now for thest two¡­"


    Only when they heard Xuan Hao say this as he turned around to face them did the two realize their current dangerous situation-


    Swoosh-!


    Swoosh-!


    And knowing that they stood no chance fighting against Xuan Hao after seeing how easily he had killed the cardinal, both of them directly took out everything they had before escaping in opposite directions.


    "Hm?"


    Seeing the two escaping, Xuan Hao was just about to chase after them when he noticed the formation covering the Iron Sky Kingdom start crumbling at a speed visible to the naked eye. Even without the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts attacking it.


    BANG!


    Not even a secondter, the formation fully broke apart and revealed the Iron Sky Kingdom on the other side.


    Did something happen to Yi Min?


    Feeling worried that something was wrong with Yi Min and not wanting to risk losing someone that he had already intended to recruit for the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao didn''t bother chasing after the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts and instead made his way in the direction of the Iron Sky Kingdoms capital city where he could feel Yi Min''s presence.


    Swish-!


    Swish-!


    Of course, this didn''t mean he nned to let the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts escape, as he created two small swords that he sent flying after the two escaping Soul Ascension Realm Experts. Considering the difference in strength, he believed that the two swords containing a sizeable portion of his power should be more than enough to deal with them.


    ¡­


    "This¡­ He didn''t chase after us¡­?"


    At the same time, one of the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts noticed that Xuan Hao didn''t chase after them and instead went into the Iron Sky Kingdom, causing him to slow down as he realized that his life wasn''t in danger any longer-


    Swish-!


    At least that was what he thought, as a small sword suddenly appeared directly behind him the moment his speed slowed down-


    "Wh-"


    Ptsh-!


    And before he could react, the sword lodged itself deep in his chest as it began emitting a terrifying me that reduced him to ashes in less than five seconds!


    "This¡­"


    Seeing his friend being killed from afar, thest remaining Soul Ascension Realm Expert didn''t dare slow down as he continued escaping-


    Swish-!


    However, no matter how fast he was, the small sword chasing after him soon caught up to him and pierced through his heart. The only differencepared to what happened to the other Soul Ascension Realm Expert, the second sword emitted a freezing qi that turned the second Soul Ascension Realm into a human ice cube that soon fell from the sky-


    Crack!


    Causing him to shatter into thousands of small pieces. Officially ending the life of the final of the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts.

 Chapter 1057 How is he that strong!?

    <h4>Chapter 1057 How is he that strong!?</h4>


    A short time before the death of the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts, Yi Min frowned visibly as she wiped away the stream of blood that came out from her mouth while keeping her attention focused on the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts outside her formation.


    Even though she had thought she would be able to hold on for at least a few days, her current situation had started rapidly deteriorating as the situation inside her dantian grew more and more chaotic with each passing second. Making her painfully aware of the fact that she most likely wouldn''t even be able to hold on for a single day before her qi went out of control and made it impossible for her to control the formation.


    The main reason for this sudden turn of events was not that she had been wrong in her earlier calctions, it was just that she had forgotten to ount for the fact that the qi being reced whenever she used some to sustain the formation was more chaotic and harder to controlpared to before.


    In the end, this had caused the time she had before losing control over her qi decreasing from an estimated two or three days to a single day¡­ And that was only if things went well, a more realistic estimate might be half a day. Meaning that even if Xuan Hao did show up, she would be far too weak to do anything other than maintain the formation for a short period of time. Far from enough to drive away the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts outside¡­


    "I wonder how long it will take for him to show up. Given the distance between the Iron Sky Kingdom and the Star Shattering Sect, it might take him half a day and that is only if he wasn''t somewhere else¡­" Muttering this to herself as she realized how bad her current situation was, Yi Min could not help silently praying for a powerful demon beast to pass through and get rid of the three.


    Even if this would also put her in danger, at least the demon beast shouldn''t be willing to wait around after realizing that her formation wouldn''t break easily.


    "Aaaaah!"


    "Huh?"


    Suddenly being caught off guard by a loud scream from one of the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts, Yi Min couldn''t help showing a somewhat surprised expression on her face.


    Did a demon beast really show up and attack the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts?


    Thinking about this, Yi Min wasted no time in using her divine sense to check out the situation outside.


    "Assassin? Shadow Lotus Sect? Sent to kill the cardinal!?"


    As a result of this, she managed to hear what the cardinal said and was more than overjoyed upon learning that it was not a demon beast, but instead an enemy of the cardinal. Far better than a powerful demon beast showing up, as the demon beast might also end up attacking her.


    Although there was still a chance that the assassin also attacked her after killing the cardinal, the chance of this happening was far lower than a demon beast.


    Swish-!


    Not even a secondter, the assassin finally made a move-


    RUMBLE-!


    However, different from the deadly battle she imagined, a terrifying aura suddenly emerged from the cardinal followed by the cardinal easily killing off the assassin with a single move.


    Whoosh~!


    Only a short time after the death of the assassin, the shockwave arrived at the edge of the formation, causing an enormous pressure on the already unstable formation.


    Not only that, but different from the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts outside, who only had to defend themselves, the formation covered a farrger area and had to deal with a lot more of the remnant power contained inside of the shockwave.


    Craaaaack~


    As a result, the formation began breaking at a speed visible to the naked eye. Even when she went over her limit to tried to stop it from breaking, she could only dy it for a short time-


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Even worse, the cardinal had already resumed attacking the formation again like nothing had happened. Making it even harder for her to keep the formation from breaking. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    At this point in time, Yi Min had already far exceeded her limit and no longer had any chance of escaping from the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts. All she could do was hope that the assassin didn''te alone and one of hispanions would show up to finish off the cardinal and the other two Soul Ascension Realm Experts before they had a chance to break through the formation.


    "Wha-!?"


    It was at this moment that the surprised voice of the cardinal sounded out once again-


    Ptsh-!


    Only this time around, he didn''t manage to react in time and was killed before he had a chance to react. Everything happened far too fast for even Yi Min to realize what was happening before the cardinal was already dead.


    "This¡­ Xuan Hao!?"


    Seeing the person who killed the cardinal, Yi Min could not stop herself from eximing in shock. Never in her wildest dreams having expected that Xuan Hao could show up in such a short period of time, let alone have the strength to easily kill the cardinal. Especially after she had witnessed how the cardinal had just killed off the powerful assassin from the Shadow Lotus Sect.


    Although she had no idea how strong the assassin was, she was still certain that it should be above the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    This¡­ This is definitely not the strength of someone who just recently broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Thinking this to herself as she watched Xuan Hao turn his attention towards the two remaining Soul Ascension Realm Experts, Yi Min felt a sense of relief washing over her.


    Even if she had no idea why Xuan Hao was so strong all of a sudden, it was clear that he wouldn''t have any problem dealing with the two remaining Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    Ptsh-!


    As she realized that she was no longer in danger, Yi Min suddenly threw out arge amount of blood before her consciousness started to fade. No longer able to suppress the damage that had been done to her internal organs and dantian by the chaotic qi.


    Even the fact that she had been able to keep herself conscious and in control of the formation after it had been hit by the shockwave just now could be considered a testament to her strong willpower.


    CRAAAAAACK-!


    Following Yi Min slipping into a state of unconsciousness, she also let go of her control over the formation. Resulting in the massive formation covering the entirety of the Iron Sky Kingdom crumbling.


    "Dad! What is that? Is the sky falling down?"


    "What do you- Huh!? T-t-the sky is falling down!?"


    "The end ising! The heavens areing down!"


    "Is this the end¡­?"


    "Great Lord, please save us¡­"


    However, the speed at which the formation fell apart was slow enough for the people of the Iron Sky Kingdom to notice, causing widespread panic as none of them had any idea what was happening.


    Although Yi Min had used the formation on several asions to deal with different opponents, there was also a special function in the formation that made it appear like nothing was happening to the people inside. Only when the formation shattered would it briefly be visible to the ordinary people of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Unfortunately for these ordinary people, and the weaker cultivators unaware of the formation''s existence, it really did look like the sky was about to fall on top of them.


    At least the fragments of the formation that looked like fragments of the sky falling towards the ground soon disappeared-


    "Huh? Nothing happened? Where did the fragments of the sky go?"


    "It''s really gone¡­ Did someone push up the sky and repair it?!"


    "Aaaah! We are blessed by the Great Lord!"


    Leaving behind a rather confused crowd of people who had been fearfully staring up at the sky only a few seconds earlier.


    In the end, these people beganing up with all sorts of stories to exin the unforgettable thing they had just witnessed.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the people of the Iron Sky Kingdom were creating different story about the copsing sky, Xuan Hao arrived at the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom just in time to catch the unconscious Yi Min who was about to smash headfirst into the pce below her.


    "Looks like she exhausted herself quite a bit. Not only that, but with the current state of her dantian, it will take a few days before she can wake up again." Muttering this to himself as he examined Yi Min''s current condition, Xuan Hao descend into the pce below and gently ced Yi Min in what he assumed to be her bed before finding a ce to sit down and wait for the Domain Lord Realm Expert he sensed rushing over in his direction.

 Chapter 1058 Muscular Domain Lord and Waking up to a strange scene...

    <h4>Chapter 1058 Muscr Domain Lord and Waking up to a strange scene...</h4>


    Bang!


    "Master! What happened?! Who is-" Violently breaking through the door to the room, the muscr Domain Lord Realm Expert that Yi Min had been talking with just a short time earlier froze on the spot as he spotted Yi Min lying unconscious on her bed with Xuan Hao sitting not too far away.


    Although he couldn''t sense Xuan Hao''s strength, he was certain that he was far stronger than him and had likely also reached the Soul Ascension Realm like his master.


    Wait¡­ The formation already broke and none of the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts trying to break through the formation just a short time earlier has shown up¡­


    Thinking about how the Soul Ascension Realm Experts working on breaking the formation had still not appeared even after the formation had copsed, the muscr Domain Lord Realm Expert froze on the spot as he looked towards Xuan Hao filled with fear.


    Even though he had not seen it personally, it was obvious that the person sitting next to his master had something to do with the sudden disappearance of the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts!


    At least it did not look like he was an enemy. On the contrary, he had taken care of his master.


    Is it perhaps a friend of my master¡­?


    "Is there something you want to ask?"


    Feeling the burning gaze of the Domain Lord Realm Expert who had just burst through the door, Xuan Hao did his best to start a conversation and end the awkward silence that had been created. Not wanting to spend the next few days until Yi Min woke up with arge muscr guy staring directly at him with a burning gaze that could easily be misunderstood by anyone passing by.


    "Huh? Ah! Yes! First of all, might I ask who senior is? Other than that, I''m also quite curious as to what happened to the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts outside of the formation? From what I know, those three should not just have left for no reason and they seemed quite intend on killing my master¡­" Hearing what Xuan Hao said, the muscr Domain Lord froze for a short moment before almost jumping forward while asking this.


    During the entire process, he showed no fear whatsoever. Showing that he had already seen Xuan Hao as someone on his side.


    Not that it was that hard toprehend given the fact that he would most likely have killed him and his master if he was not on their side. After all, his master''s current condition didn''t really allow her to fight back.


    "I''m a Grand Elder from the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao, you might have heard about me before given one of my disciples participated in the alchemypetition here in the past. As for what happened to the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts outside, I have taken care of them, and they won''t pose any problem in the future." Not bothering to hide anything as there was no need for it, Xuan Hao decided to just tell him that he had dealt with the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts after introducing himself.


    "Dealt with the three- Ah!" Realizing what Xuan Hao said, the muscr Domain Lord Realm Expert froze on the spot for a short moment as he looked towards him with an expression of disbelief stered all over his face.


    Although he had expected Xuan Hao to be someone strong in the Soul Ascension Realm and he might have been able to chase away the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts outside, he never in his wildest dreams imagined that he had killed the three.


    No matter what realm, there was a huge difference between killing someone and making them run away. The first being far harder to aplish and considering how fast he had killed the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts; it was obvious that he was far stronger than them.


    As a result of this, the muscr Domain Lords evaluation of Xuan Hao''s strength increased from someone who was around the earlier stages of the realm to someone who might beparable to the old ancestor of the imperial family!


    "Huh? Wait a second¡­ Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect?" Suddenly realizing something important from what Xuan Hao said, the muscr Domain Lord Realm Expert froze once again as he stared towards Xuan Hao filled with even more disbelief than before. "You are the elder from the Star Shattering Sect who came to the Iron Sky Kingdom during the alchemypetition!? But weren''t you in the Domain Lord Realm back then!?"


    Although he had not been present during the alchemypetition, he had heard about an elder from the Star Shattering Sect who had shown up during thepetition together with one of his disciples.


    However, this person had obviously been in the Domain Lord Realm. Nowhere near the Soul Ascension Realm, let alone theter stages of the Soul Ascension Realm that the person in front of him should have reached.


    Unless¡­ He hid his cultivation back then!


    Feeling like this was the only thing that made sense, the muscr Domain Lord didn''t continue asking any more questions and instead decided to take his leave after confirming that his master was fine. Leaving her in the care of Xuan Hao during her recovery, as he felt that someone in the Soul Ascension Realm would be far more knowledgeable on what could help his master recoverpared to someone like himself who was still in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Instead, the muscr Domain Lord turned his attention towards stabilizing the rather chaotic situation that had begun spreading in the Iron Sky Kingdom after the formation was destroyed, while also beginning the preparations for repairing the formation in the future.


    Even if all of these things were rtively simple to aplish with his strength and therge quantity of resources that was still avable in the Iron Sky Kingdom, it was not something that could be done in the short term and would likely take months to aplish. Maybe even years depending on the damage that had been done to the foundation of the formation.


    "Looks like I will be staying here for a few days until she wakes up again¡­" Watching how the muscr Domain Lord left without any worry for his master, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head in disbelief. Even if he had dealt with the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts, he should at least show some degree of suspicion towards someone who was essentially aplete stranger to him.


    And yet¡­ Now he was left to watch over Yi Min by himself¡­


    Might as well take this chance to continueprehending the Dao of Space. After all, there is not much I can do to help improve her condition other than provide a safe environment for her to recover by herself.


    Closing his eyes as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao beganprehending the Dao of Space. Although he had made progress towards the Small Sess Realm over the past few weeks, he was still a few months away from reaching it. Not to mention, after reaching the Small Sess Realm, he still had toprehend a brand-new Dao and elevate one of his other Daos to the Large Sess Realm. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    ¡­


    Hmmmh~ Where am I?


    Opening her eyes after what felt like a long and rxing nap, Yi Min drowsily looked around herself while stillying down on the bed with a somewhat confused expression on her face. Not yetprehending where she was due to her current state still being ratherplicated because of the chaotic qi still present inside of her dantian.


    Although she had managed to suppress it to some extent at this point and stabilized her condition enough to wake up, she was still quite a bit away from being able to be considered fully recovered.


    Huh? This is my bed. Did someone carry me here after I passed out- Ah! That''s right! Xuan Hao!


    Suddenly remembering what happened before she had passed out, Yi Min quickly sat up on her bed as she scanned her room. Soon spotting Xuan Hao who was sitting only a few meters away from her bed-


    "Wh-what is that¡­?"


    However, when she saw Xuan Hao sitting beside her bed, she was instantly drawn to what could only be described as small holes in space around him, some remaining stable without any change, while others popped in and out of existence. Seemingly being forcibly repaired by thews of the world before being torn open again by some powerful force and then repeating the process endlessly in a loop.


    Even if she had seen her fair share of strange things over the years, this was by far one of the weirdest and more terrifying things she had seen so far. After all, tearing open the fabric of space itself was not something easy to aplish. Even for someone in the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ And that was not mentioning that it looked like the small holes in space was nothing more than a side effect of Xuan Hao''s cultivation to her¡­

 Chapter 1059 Teto... What?

    <h4>Chapter 1059 Teto... What?</h4>


    "Wh-what is that¡­?" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Hearing the surprised voice of Yi Min while he was still fully focused onprehending the Dao of Space, Xuan Hao closed the small holes in space that he had created with the partial spatial copse before opening both of his eyes.


    Coming face to face with the curious eyes of Yi Min who was leaning over the side of her bed in an attempt to get a better look at what she perceived to be strange holes in space that had been created by him as a result of his cultivation.


    "Ah!?"


    Thump~


    Not expecting Xuan Hao to suddenly open his eyes, Yi Min momentarily lost her bnce as she fell over the side of the bed andnded on the floor. Putting her in a rather awkward position.


    "Are you okay¡­?" Seeing Yi Minnd on the floor in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help asking this. Feeling quite worried about her given the fact that she had not managed to react in time to prevent the fall with her Soul Ascension Realm cultivation base.


    Even if her cultivation was currently in a bad state due to the chaotic qi still present inside of her dantian, it shouldn''t have been to the degree that she didn''t even have the energy to prevent herself from falling over the side of her bed. This thought was also what stopped him from using his domain to prevent her fall.


    "¡­ I''m fine¡­ My mind was just somewhere else, and I didn''t pay any attention..." Almost whispering this to herself with an embarrassed expression on her face, Yi Min slowly got up from the floor before sitting back on her bed. "But more importantly than that, the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts! How did you suddenly get so strong. Thest time I saw you, you were clearly still in the Domain Lord Realm, and I doubt you were hiding your cultivation base considering how oblivious you were about the Sky Empire."


    "This¡­" Not knowing what to say when faced with the curious and questioning look from Yi Min, Xuan Hao froze for a short moment. "I guess you can say I had a lucky encounter in a mystic realm that helped speed up my cultivation¡­" In the end, he decided to just put his rapid improvement on the mystic realm of the Mirage Sect.


    Even if it was not true, it was far more believablepared to him saying he had broken through on his own.


    "A mystic realm¡­ No wonder¡­" showing a look of understanding after hearing this, Yi Min''s expression changed into one of admiration.


    Although she had never had the chance to explore a mystic realm herself, she had long since heard rumors about the countless treasures and dangers that could be found inside of them. Not to mention someone in the Domain Lord Realm, even someone in the Soul Ascension Realm could easily lose their life inside a mystic realm if they were not careful enough.


    Of course, because of this danger, the opportunities that could be found inside a mystic realm could be considered far beyond her current understanding. For Xuan Hao to be able to reach the Soul Ascension Realm and even grow strong enough to easily kill the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts, it was obvious how much danger he would have to go through to grow to this degree in such a short period of time!


    "Ehm!" Feeling the burning gaze filled with admiration staring directly at him, Xuan Hao did a rather awkward fake cough to bring her back from her trance like state. "Now that I answered your question, I think it''s about time for you to answer one of mine." "Huh? Ah! Sure." Hearing Xuan Hao wanted to ask her something, Yi Min instantly came of her somewhat dazed state.


    "Great! Do you have any idea why those three suddenly decided to attack you? Given the current state of the Sky Empire, I doubt they would have dared to leave the safety of the capital city if it wasn''t something important." Remembering some of the information about all the powerful forces in the Sky Empire gathering together in the capital to create safety in number, Xuan Hao could not help asking this.


    Feeling rather curious as to what had caused these three to take the risk of being attacked by a powerful expert from one of the surrounding empires.


    Even if the spiritual metal mine in Yi Min''s possession was precious and could give them a lot of useful spiritual metal in the short term, it shouldn''t be enough for them to risk their lives, but then again¡­ The terrifying divine tool of the cardinal should have given some level of confidence. Maybe the other two also had their own trump cards and just didn''t have the time to use them before dying.


    "This¡­" Hearing Xuan Hao''s question, Yi Min froze for a short moment as she began fidgeting with her hands while suspiciously looking around the room for no apparent reason. "Actually, there isn''t just a spiritual metal mine below thisnd, but also arge deposit of Tetonite ore below the capital. To be more specific, directly below the pce¡­"


    "T-Tetonite Ore¡­?" Bing onrge question mark upon hearing what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao disyed why his cksmithing skills were about to be overtaken by one of his disciples¡­


    "¡­"


    Not having expected this reaction from Xuan Hao, Yi Min also froze on the spot with a look of disbelief stered all over her face. Even without her saying anything, it was still rather obvious what she was thinking from the way she was staring at him¡­


    "This¡­ You don''t have to look at me like that, what is this¡­ Tetonite ore you mentioned? Is it important enough for three Soul Ascension Realm Experts to risk their lives?"


    "I never thought you wouldn''t know what Tetonite is¡­ Do you remember the silver sword I gave you?"


    "Yes?" "Its core is made out of Tetonite. Although it''s a rather small amount and of the lowest quality, you should at least be aware of just how strong it is. Now, the Tetonite that is down below the pce is above that in terms of quality.


    The only reason why I haven''t begun mining it yet is because the minimum required strength to mine out Tetonite of the lowest quality is the Soul Ascension Realm. The deposit was only recently discovered, and I just recently informed the imperial family about its presence. Because of this not a single bit of it has been mined for now. The piece of Tetonite used in the silver sword was something I got as a gift from an old friend. Even at the core of the continent, Tetonite is one of the strongest and most sought-after metals!"


    Whoosh~


    Hearing what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao could not help showing a shocked expression on his face as he took out the small silver sword Yi Min had given him in the past before starting to examine it.


    "This¡­"


    Spotting the small core that only made up a single gram of the entire sword''s mass after using his domain and divine sense to investigate the sword in depth, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that outside of the core that was made up from Tetonite, the rest of the sword was actually made up of rtively normal spiritual metal.


    The only thing that gave the silver sword its strength and allowed it to handle its current strength was the small bit of Tetonite that had been mixed into it. Not only that, but the Tetonite in the sword was apparently of the lowest quality ording to Yi Min.


    If a sword was made up entirely from Tetonite of a higher quality, it would allow his strength to increase many times over!


    "I see that you realized how precious the Tetonite ore deposit is. Even if they had to risk their lives, they might have wanted to get their hands on the Tetonite to invite a powerful expert from outside to help them stabilize the situation in the Sky Empire.


    The only problem is¡­ I have no idea where they found out about this from. The only person I managed to inform about the existence of the Tetonite mine was the current emperor of the Sky Empire but given how the imperial family disappeared following the old ancestor''s injuries I doubt they would have found out about it from the imperial family." Saying this, Yi Min could not help frowning. Not understanding how the different powerful powers in the capital had managed to find out about the Tetonite ore deposit.


    "Don''t worry too much about it for now, it might have only been the cardinal and the other two who knew about the Tetonite. If others knew, I doubt the other two religions would willingly allow one of them to go over by himself." Feeling that she might be overreacting a bit given that they had no way to be sure that they hade for the Tetonite in the first ce, Xuan Hao did his best to try and calm her down.

 Chapter 1060 Leaving for the Star Shattering Sect

    <h4>Chapter 1060 Leaving for the Star Shattering Sect</h4>


    "Indeed... They might not even have known about the Tetonite¡­" Calming down after a few minutes of Xuan Hao reassuring her that the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts most likely had no idea about the Tetonite located beneath the pce, Yi Min flopped on to the bed exhausted.


    Although she had managed to suppress the chaotic qi enough for her to have a conversation and move around, it was still exhausting to do so. Laying down on her bed was a far easier thing to aplishpared to sitting up.


    "How long do you think it will take for you to recover?" Asking this as he noticed just how exhausting it was for her to move around, Xuan Hao could not help secretly wondering if her earlier fall from the bed had made her situation worse. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    On second thought, it was rather unrealistic for someone in the Soul Ascension Realm to end up in such a state due to a small fall from a bed¡­


    "I don''t know but given the fact that the chaotic qi managed to spread throughout my entire body and makes up most of the qi present inside my dantian, it wouldn''t surprise me if it took me a month or longer to fully recover¡­" Lifting her head just enough to make eye contact, Yi Min thought about something for a short moment before continuing. "But I doubt I could ask you to stay around for that long, you still have to look after your sect. Especially now that the surrounding empires are looking to invade the Sky Empire." "Not only that, but there is also the threat of the Frozen Wastnds. Although things have calmed down over the past few months, the situation across other empires bordering the Frozen Wastnds have only grown worse, I even heard about an empire far stronger than the Sky Empire falling to a terrifying demonic cultivator¡­" Showing an expression filled with fear as she said this, Yi Min rolled around in her bed to shake off the fear she felt after mentioning the situation with the Frozen Wastnds.


    In a sense, one of the reasons why the surrounding empires had not yet decided to attack the Sky Empire was also because of the current situation in the Frozen Wastnds.


    Even though the situation of the Frozen Wastnd had yet to truly affect the Sky Empire, it could only be considered a matter of time when looking at the seemingly endless number of demonic cultivatorsing out of the Frozen Wastnds.


    "Indeed, it is rather unfortunate that the Star Shattering Sect is located right next to the Frozen Wastnds. If something does end up happening, the Star Shattering Sect will likely be the first to suffer in the Sky Empire¡­" Remembering his past experience with the demonic cultivators trying to enter the Azure Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he said this.


    The barrier he had created back then might be able to scare off the demonic cultivators below the True Demon Realm, but the moment a demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm appeared, arge number of demonic cultivators would likely attempt to enter the Sky Empire again.


    As for the other kingdoms of the Sky Empire bordering the Frozen Wastnds¡­ Most of these kingdoms had already been reinforced by several Domain Lord Realm Experts and arge number of Nascent Soul Realm Experts before the imperial family went into hiding.


    Even after the imperial family had disappeared these Domain Lord Realm Experts remained at the border to the Frozen Wastnd to prevent any demonic cultivators from entering the Sky Empire.


    It was also because of this that the surrounding empires had not targeted these Domain Lord Realm Experts. After all, if they killed them, they would have to dispatch dozens of their own Domain Lords to deal with the constant influx of demonic cultivators trying to enter the Sky Empire and the surrounding empires.


    In an odd twist of fate, this had caused the small kingdoms located around the border of the Frozen Wastnd to be one of the safest locations during the current tumultuous period that the Sky Empire was going through. Making it one of the most desired locations for people wanting to avoid the uing war to stay or keep their families during the chaos, some even choosing to join these kingdoms in an attempt to avoid fighting in the uing war.


    As a result of this, the small kingdoms ended up growing at a speed that even made Elder Song back in the Star Shattering Sect amazed. At this point in time, one of the small kingdoms had even managed to produce a Domain Lord Realm Expert from therge quantity of resources flooding into them due to the presence of so many powerful cultivators.


    The only reason why the Azure sky Kingdom had been left alone from thisrge influx of powerful cultivators was due to the presence of the Star Shattering Sect. Even if the Sky Empire had no idea about the Star Shattering Sect having someone in the Soul Ascension Realm yet, they had long since be fully aware of the fact that the sect was home to someone who had at least reached the Later Stages of the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if the Star Shattering Sect should begin trying to attract more experts to settle down in the territory of the Star Shattering Sect. Despite the fact that this would destabilize the territory of the Star Shattering Sect for some time, it should be helpful when it came to increasing the overall strength of the Star Shattering Sect as the different powers entering the territory of the Star Shattering Sect would inevitably end up bing subordinate powers of the sect in the future. Whether or not they wanted to¡­


    Whoosh~


    Feeling like this should be a viable n for increasing the strength of the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao took out hismunication talisman and informed Elder Song about right away. Hoping that the old man could fune the idea and implement it in the best possible way.


    Well, it should be time for me to get back to the sect. Even if the situation with the Frozen Wastnds have not affected the Star Shattering Sect, what Yi Min said make sense and it never hurt anyone to be-


    "Ah! Now that I think about it, Yi Min, how are you going to protect yourself during your recovery with your formation gone?" About to turn around and leave Yi Min to recover by herself, Xuan Hao suddenly remembered the fact that the formation Yi Min used to protect her kingdom had been destroyed.


    "Huh? Ah¡­ I didn''t think about that¡­" Caught off guard by the question, Yi Min suddenly realized that she didn''t have any form of protection left after her formation was destroyed. Even if she did have a thousand different artifacts, she had no way to use any of them in her current state¡­


    Although the muscr Domain Lord Realm Expert should be more than strong enough to keep the Iron Sky Kingdom stable without her present, there was no way for him to protect her if another Soul Ascension Realm Expert ended up appearing¡­ And given the current state of the Sky Empire with the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the surrounding empires roaming around the ce, it was not too unlikely for another Soul Ascension Realm Expert to show up.


    "Hm¡­ For now, do you want toe with me to the Star Shattering Sect?" Thinking about the problem for a moment, Xuan Hao decided to suggest this. Feeling like it would be a good opportunity for Yi Min to recover faster in the rich environment of the Shattered Star Peaks while at the same time getting to know the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Huh? Go to your sect?"


    "Yes, even if you leave your kingdom for a month or two, I doubt anything will happen unless one of the surrounding empires decides to invade the Sky Empire and ends up targeting your kingdom for the spiritual metal mine, but¡­ If that really does happen, you won''t be able to do anything about it in your current state."


    "That¡­ Indeed, I won''t be able to do anything even if I remain here. On the other hand, my presence might even attract the attention of any Soul Ascension Realm Experts passing through the area." Muttering this to herself, Yi Min soon came to an agreement with Xuan Hao that she would leave with him to stay in the Star Shattering Sect for the next few months while she recovered.


    The only thing she had to do before leaving was inform the muscr Domain Lord Realm Expert about her leaving and instruct him on what to do during her absence, while also making sure that he would just tell the rest of the people in the kingdom that she was in secluded cultivation to recover from the fight during her absence.


    The fewer people knew about her absence, the better, as her disappearance would inevitably cause some people to be greedy for the spiritual metal below.

 Chapter 1061 Journey Back

    <h4>Chapter 1061 Journey Back</h4>


    "Wh-what am I supposed to do now!?" Following Yi Min leaving together with Xuan Hao to recover the Shattered Star Peaks, the muscr Domain Lord Realm Expert could not help loudly eximing to himself as he looked down at all the different materials, he had prepared for repairing the formation.


    Now that his master had left, these materials would just end up gathering dust on their own, as he had no way to repair the formation without the guidance of his master. Not only that, but without his master around, he understood that some people might start to grow suspicious and start thinking about ways to take advantage of the situation to benefit themselves.


    "I¡­ I won''t get a moment of rest before master returns¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked out in the direction where the different important families and ns that had helped Yi Min manage the Iron Sky Kingdom in the past, the muscr Domain Lord realized that he would be visiting them a lot of the next few months.


    Even if these families and ns had supported the Iron Sky Kingdom without showing any hint of greed or disloyalty, he knew that they were justcking an opportunity. Especially the younger generations, who had been punished by him and Yi Min''s guards whenever they caused trouble.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the muscr Domain Lord wasmenting over being left to deal with the management of the Iron Sky Kingdom for the next few months, Yi Min was curiously observing the ground below her while being caried by Xuan Hao.


    During their journey to the Star Shattering Sect, Yi Min decided to make full use of her time to observe the different kingdoms that they passed through. Observing their strength and how stable these kingdoms were.


    As a result of this, she noticed that most of these kingdoms were in a state of instability or had directly copsed into a gathering of smaller powers vying for power over the territory.


    The reason for this was not too hard to find, as she noticed several people from different empires creating discord between the powers of these different kingdoms. Doing their best to create instability that would destroy these kingdoms from the inside.


    Although this would not influence the Sky Empire in the short term, the chaos starting in the border regions of the empire would inevitably end up spreading towards the core region where the more powerful kingdoms were located. Giving these empires a chance to swoop in and take over arge chunk of territory without much resistance.


    At least for now, it looked like kingdoms with Domain Lord Realm Experts, or a lot of Peak Nascent Soul Realm Experts had managed to escape this chaos for now, but¡­ It would only be a matter of time before they would also be targeted.


    "Hm? Are we inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect?" Because of this, Yi Min immediately noticed when the chaotic atmosphere below her changed into a far more peaceful one with close to no people running around causing problems.


    "Yes, this can be considered the current borders of the Star Shattering Sect. Although, with Elder Song around, I doubt it will remain the border for long¡­" Nodding his head in response, Xuan Hao could not help giving Yi Min a curious look. Silently wondering how she knew they had entered the territory of the Star Shattering Sect. After all, it was not like there was any border patrol or branch sect nearby for her to identify. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not paying any attention to the curious look from Xuan Hao, Yi Min was instead busy observing thend below. The obvious change after entering the territory of the Star Shattering Sect made her curious about how the Star Shattering Sect managed its territory. Especially given that the current ce they were flying over should not have been part of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory for more than a few months.


    "How did you manage to stabilize the territory so quickly? Shouldn''t it have been a kingdom at war with you only a few months earlier?" Not able to contain her curiosity, Yi Min turned away from the ground below and stared directly up at Xuan Hao.


    "The kingdom below is¡­" Hearing what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the kingdom below. Not taking long to identify the kingdom as the Cloud Sky Kingdom. The kingdom where Ji Yichuan, the former demonic cultivator had ended up settling down after joining the Flowing Cloud Sect.


    "It should be the Cloud Sky Kingdom; it has been under the Star Shattering Sect for a few years already. Not to mention, it willingly came under the Star Shattering Sect. If the Star Shattering Sect couldn''t even manage a ce that willingly came to our side, it would be quite an embarrassing ordeal¡­" Saying this, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling a bit at the surprised expression on Yi Min''s face. Clearly, she did not expect that the kingdom below them was a kingdom that had willingly joined the Star Shattering Sect years ago. After all, she had only recently learnt about the Star Shattering Sect expanding into the surrounding kingdom. Not having learnt that the Star shattering Sect had already expanded years ago.


    At the same time, Yi Min also came to the realization that she had no idea howrge the territory under the Star Shattering Sect was, nor did she have any idea just how strong it was. The only thing she had really learnt of the Star Shattering Sect was the fact that it was the sect that Xuan Hao was from and that was it¡­


    In an instance, Yi Min''s curiosity reached the peak as she could not wait to see the Star Shattering Sect.


    ¡­


    Not flying too fast so as to let Yi Min take examine her surroundings with what little divine sense she could muster in her current state, the towering mountains of the Shattered Star Peaks soon became visible in the distance.


    "Huh?"


    Lifting her head to see the towering mountains of the Shattered Star Peaks appearing in the distance, Yi Min could not help asking this as she looked towards the nine mountains towering above the surrounding grass ins.


    Although she had seen her fair share ofrge mountains when she wandered around during her earlier years, the Shattered Star Peaks were by far the tallest mountains she had ever seen. Especially the Main Star Peak that looked like it was piercing through the sky and reaching into the heavens above.


    "Is that the Star Shattering Sect¡­?" Not knowing whether or not a sect could be built on top of mountains like that, Yi Min could not help hesitantly asking this as she kept her gaze focused on the towering mountains slowly growingrger in the distance.


    "Yes, the mountains are known as the Shattered Star Peaks and the Star Shattering Sect is located at the peak of the Seventh Star Peak." Feeling an unknown sense of pride when he saw the amazed look on Yi Min''s face, Xuan Hao smiled happily as he confirmed her doubts.


    "To think a sect can be built in such a ce¡­ I never really understood why sects always chose to build on top of mountains instead of just staying on the ground. Even if there is less qi between heaven and earth, it can be made up for with the help of a qi gathering formation. Not to mention, its far easier to expand if one is located on the ground¡­"


    "¡­"


    Hearing what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao''s earlier happiness disappeared as he was left speechless. Having no idea how to respond to what Yi Min said. In a sense, she was correct, the Star Shattering Sect would be able to expand faster on t ground where there was no need to worry about running out of mountains to build on¡­


    But thinking about it for more than two seconds, Xuan Hao realized that this would be impossible considering that the chaotic qi formation required the chaotic qi that was especially dense in the Shattered Star Peaks to function properly.


    Then again, it still made him wonder why other sects decided to establish themselves on top of mountains instead of on the ground. Maybe it was just a cultural thing that sects had to be located somewhere with mountains or directly on top of a mountain¡­


    "Oh!? You do have a city! I didn''t even notice it before." Not aware of the fact that she had made Xuan Hao question the choice of sects to establish themselves on top of mountains instead of on the ground like most other powers did, Yi Min excitedly called out as she spotted the city located at the base of the Ninth Star Peak.


    The city in question had been first established by the Flying Sword Sect long ago but following the Flying Sword Sect and the Spring Flower Sect merging together and moving their main sect to the Shattered Star Peaks, it had undergone a process of rapid development. In the end, it had now be a massive city housing over a million people. Most of which were rted to the Star Shattering Sect in one way or another.

 Chapter 1062 Past Incident in the Blue Sea Empire...

    <h4>Chapter 1062 Past Incident in the Blue Sea Empire...</h4>


    Landing on the ground just a short distance away from the city, Xuan Hao didn''t carry Yi Min all the way back to the Star Shattering Sect as she wanted to explore the city before she entered the Star Shattering Sect and began her process of recovery.


    Although¡­ Because Yi Min was still too weak to walk on her own, he still had to carry her while they made their way around the city. Exploring the different important locations inside the city.


    At least he could still use his domain to make them invisible to the people wandering the busy streets of the city. Even if not everyone in the Star Shattering Sect knew about his appearance, a lot of people had still seen him before. Especially after therge sect meeting with the different subordinate powers that had taken ce not too long ago.


    During the meeting, Elder Song had wanted him to appear as a way to both intimidate and inspire these different subordinate powers and as result of this, most of the elders in the sect knew what he looked like. Not to mention, quite a few disciples had learnt from him in the past.


    With this in mind, he would end up in a rather embarrassing situation if any of the disciples or elders happened to pass by and see him carry Yi Min around while she was acting like an excited child exploring the city.


    "I didn''t expect for there to be a branch from the Explorer Union in here, are you not worried about them being so close to your sect?" Just at this moment, Yi Min suddenly said this as she looked towards the branch of the Explorer Union located in the core of the city close to the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak and into the Star Shattering Sect.


    "What do you mean? Is there a reason why I should worry about them? The strongest person present in this branch is only at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, what can someone like that possibly do?" Hearing what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao could not help asking this.


    Even if the strength of the person in charge of the Explorer Union had been reced by someone stronger after the Star Shattering Sect had settled down and decided to develop the city, this person had only reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm and had absolutely no way to threaten the Star Shattering Sect with his strength.


    Not only that, but he had never heard about the Explorer Union fighting anyone other than the times that someone had been stupid enough to try and destroy one of their branches. On the other hand, the presence of a branch from the Explorer Union helped increase the number of cultivators visiting the city it was ced in and helped the overall development of the area with a flow of new goods and resourcesing from both the Explorer Union and the cultivators.


    "I guess you aren''t that familiar with the Explorer Union¡­ Although they are neutral most of the time and don''t involve themselves in any conflicts unless necessary, the same cannot be said if a ruin or an unexplored region is involved.


    Given how special the Shattered Star Peaks are from what little I can see from down here, it will only be a matter of time before one of the higher ups from the Explorer Union shows up and asks to explore the ce.


    Considering that its essentially your sects main base, I doubt you would want people from the Explorer Union starting to explore the Shattered Star Peaks¡­"


    "This¡­ Would they really do something like that¡­?" Hearing what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat shocked expression on his face as he asked in a doubtful voice.


    No matter what, he could not imagine that the Explorer Union would show up and ask to explore what was essentially the main sect of the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Yeah¡­ Unfortunately, it is something they might do. For example, do you know about the Blue Sea Empire?"


    "Yes, I have visited one of their cities not too long ago."


    "I see, did you notice any branch of the Explorer Union inside that city?"


    "Yes, I saw one and it specialized in selling alchemy rted things. If I''m not wrong there should be arger one located at the core of the city, but I didn''t take the time to visit it." Not understanding what Yi Min was trying to get at, Xuan Hao could only answer with a somewhat confused expression on his face.


    "Hehe~ Outside of that, I believe that you shouldn''t have seen any of the all-toomon explorers from the Explorer Union during your time inside the city... Right?"


    "Yes?" Remembering how he had indeed not seen any people from the Explorer Union outside of the people working inside the alchemy rted branch and the powerful expert he had sensed in the main branch of the city; Xuan Hao could not help feeling that it was indeed odd that he hadn''t spotted any of the usual explorers that should have been present inside such arge city.


    Even when looking at the city below the Ninth Star Peak that they were currently inside of, it was easy to spot someone from the Explorer Union walking past them every now and then.


    "Hehe~ You noticed! Indeed, the Explorer Union does not have any real operations inside the Blue Sea Empire outside of a few treasure halls and other shops. Not only that, but any member of the Explorer Union entering the Blue Sea Empire will be noted down and watched closely when they get anywhere near the capital city of the Blue Sea Empire! Are you curious? Do you want to know why?"


    "¡­"


    Ignoring the somewhat excited expression on Yi Min''s face as she said this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling his expression darken. Remembering how he had introduced himself as someone from the Explorer Union when confronted by the border guard. Even allowing her to record his aura while thinking that it shouldn''t be a problem given the Explorer Union being a neutral force that existed all across the continent.


    However, from the way Yi Min was talking about it, it was obvious that something had happened between the Explorer Union and the Blue Sea Empire in the past. Meaning that the identity he had given to the border guard might end up causing him problems if he visited the Blue Sea Empire in the future¡­


    "Hm? Are you not curious¡­?" Seeing Xuan Hao remaining silent with a rather depressed look on his face, Yi Min curiously poked his face in an attempt to get a reaction.


    "Huh? Ah¡­ I was just thinking about how I might have used the identity of someone from the Explorer Union to enter the Blue Sea Empire back then¡­"


    "Ah¡­ That is¡­ Troublesome¡­" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Indeed, it is¡­ So, what is the reason for there to be no explorers from the Explorer Union present inside the Blue Sea Empire?" Feeling a bit depressed over learning that he might have identally ended up creating a problem for himself in the future, Xuan Hao pulled away the curious finger that was still actively poking him without showing any signs of stopping what it was doing. At this point, he wanted to know just what had ended up happening between the Explorer Union and the Blue Sea Empire.


    "S-sorry about that¡­" Feeling that the chaotic qi might also be affecting her state of mind, Yi Min blushed in embarrassment at being caught red-handed doing such a thing before quickly apologizing. "Ehm¡­ The reason why the Blue Sea Empire and the Explorer Union are not getting along is actually rather simple.


    As you should know, the Blue Sea Empire got its name from the massive ind sea that the capital city is located in the middle of¡­ And the Explorer Union really wanted to explore this ind sea. Not just the sea but everything inside of it. Including the location where the capital city is located¡­"


    "They¡­"


    "Yes¡­ They decided to send a force to explore the entire capital city of the Blue Sea Empire. Not only that, but the experts they send over happened to break into the main pce in the center of the capital when the emperor at the time was having an intimate¡­ Meeting¡­ With one of his concubines¡­


    From what I hear, a massive battle broke out following this. Resulting in almost every single one of the Explorer Union''s branches in the Explorer Union being thrown out. In the end, they have only recently been allowed to return in some capacity to do trade after a new emperor ascended the throne and the old one retreated to cultivate in seclusion¡­"


    "¡­"


    Listening to what had happened between the Explorer Union and the Blue Sea Empire in the past, Xuan Hao understood why Yi Min thought it would not be a good idea to have the Explorer Union anywhere near the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Not only because it would be best to avoid what had happened to the former emperor of the Blue Sea Empire, but also because there were some things, he didn''t want others to find out about on the Shattered Star Peak, like the divine stones on the Second Star Peak or the things hidden on the Main Star Peak.


    Although he could stop them with the chaotic qi formation, it would be better if he could avoid any form of confrontation with the Explorer Union. After all, it was a terrifying force that covered the entire continent.


    Only a powerful empire like the Blue Sea Empire, with several experts in the Earth Immortal Realm and possibly experts beyond that, had the chance to fight back against such a terrifying force.

 Chapter 1063 Reaction From the Forces of the Sky Empire

    <h4>Chapter 1063 Reaction From the Forces of the Sky Empire</h4>


    "I never expected the history between the Explorer Union and the Blue Sea Empire to be thisplicated. If I had known about this earlier, I would not have introduced myself as someone from the Explorer Union¡­" Muttering this to himself as Yi Min had finished her exnation of what had happened between the Blue Sea Empire and the Explorer Union in the past, Xuan Hao could only shake his head in regret over not having known about this sooner.


    "I think you should be fine, I never heard about the Blue Sea Empire attacking any of the individual explorers from the Explorer Union who visits the Blue Sea Empire from time to time. Although¡­ I would rmend not going anywhere near the capital city." Understanding what Xuan Hao was thinking about, Yi Min decided to jump in and reassure him that he shouldn''t worry too much about it.


    Even if the two major powers had fallen out with each other, the fight was mostly between the different higher ups and wouldn''t involve the weaker members of the two powers unless they went to war with each other again.


    "I see, that''s great¡­" Feeling an unknown sense of relief was over him as he heard what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao nced towards the branch of the Explorer Union located almost right next to the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak.


    In the future, he would have to discuss this matter with Elder Song and make ns for moving this branch as far away from the Shattered Star Peaks as possible. Maybe even adapting the same methods of the Blue Sea Empire and only allowing the business part of the Explorer Union to enter the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    But then again, doing something like that would undoubtedly end up angering the Explorer Union. Resulting in some kind of retaliation¡­ And considering that he already had to worry about the Heavenly Dragon Temple, he didn''t want to end up also having to deal with the Explorer Union.


    At the very least, it would have to wait until the matter with the Heavenly Dragon Temple was dealt with and the Star Shattering Sect grew stronger. For now, the most he could do was pray that the Explorer Union wasn''t interested in the Shattered Star Peaks.


    At least for the past thousand years that the Flying Sword Sect had been in charge of the Shattered Star Peak, the Explorer Union had never taken an interest in the Shattered Star peaks¡­


    "Hm~? Already thinking about a way to get rid of that branch? Hehe, I did the same back when I learnt about this. The only problem is, once a branch of the Explorer Union is established, it''s close to impossible to force them to leave. In my humble opinion, your best choice would be to use an excuse like building a new and more grand entrance for your sect to move them to the edge of the city." Seeing the thoughtful expression on Xuan Hao''s face as he looked in the direction of the Explorer Union branch, Yi Min could not help chuckling to herself as she said this.


    Remembering the struggle, she had gone through to push the Explorer Union inside her capital far away from her pce as possible. Not wanting to have someone suddenly sneaking around to pce under the guise of wanting to investigate the core of the spiritual metal mine located directly below the pce.


    "I will have to consult some of the other elders about this first and have them decide on a solution. If you want to, I think they would be happy to have your assistance in the matter when the timees. After all, you are far more experienced in dealing with the Explorer Union from what you said."


    "Hm¡­ That''s fine with me. Especially considering that I will be staying at your sect for the foreseeable future." Nodding her head in response to this, Yi Min didn''t see anything wrong in helping the Star Shattering Sect deal with the Explorer Union. On the other hand, she saw this as a good opportunity to repay the Star Shattering Sect for letting her stay in their main sect to recover.


    "Great!" Smiling happily upon hearing this, Xuan Hao understood that this would not only be a great help to the Star Shattering Sect when it came to dealing with the matter regarding the Explorer Union, but it would also be a good chance for Elder Song to work his magic and show off his skills.


    In the end, Xuan Hao also had his own ns for taking Yi Min back to the Star Shattering Sect¡­ And that was to recruit her to join the Star Shattering Sect together with her Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Even when the spiritual metal mine in the Azure Sky Kingdom still under development was fully developed, the overall output of spiritual metal in the mine below the Iron Sky Kingdom would still be higher. Not to mention the Tetonite Ore Deposit that was also located beneath the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Outside of this, there was also the fact that she was someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    No matter what, by the time Yi Min fully recovered and dealt with the chaotic qi in her dantian, he nned for her to be a member of the Star Shattering Sect!


    ¡­


    "WHAT!? Are you telling me that those two died together with the cardinal?! Not only that, but you are even telling me that Yi Min broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm?!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao began making their way up the Ninth Star Peak in the direction of the Seventh Star Peak, a loud roar filled with anger, killing intent and more importantly, fear, echoed out from one ofrge noble families. The person in question who had just screamed out was none other than the current family head of the noble family that one of the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts following behind the cardinal belonged to.


    Given that this was the only Soul Ascension Realm Expert in this noble family, his death also symbolized the death of this noble family in the eyes of the other noble families and strong powers who still had Soul Ascension Realm Experts backing them.


    Even if they could survive the current chaotic situation that the Sky Empire was going through, they would undoubtedly end up being suppressed by the others. Only if they could give birth to a new Soul Ascension Realm Expert would they have a chance to regain the lost status and have the ability to discuss with the other powerful forces of the Sky Empire.


    The power that the other Soul Ascension Realm Expert who had followed the cardinal was also in a simr state of panic and despair, also having realized that they would no longer have the ability to be considered a peak power inside the Sky Empire any longer.


    However, different from the noble family, this power at least had someone in the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm to back them up and keep their situation from deteriorating too much¡­


    "The¡­ Cardinal died¡­" Simr to the two who had lost their Soul Ascension Realm ancestors, the current Archbishop present inside the Cult of the Scarlet Moon could not help showing a panicked expression on his face as he muttered this to himself.


    Although the Cult of the Scarlet Moon still had a way to promote a new cardinal now that the current one had died, it would take time¡­ And the Archbishop now in charge of this branch of the Cult of the Scarlet Moon understood full well that they didn''t have time.


    Not only was there the impending invasion of the surrounding empires, but there was also the Church of the gue God¡­


    By far, the most dangerous among these two for the continued existence of the Cult of the Scarlet Moon inside the Sky Empire was the Church of the gue God, as they would undoubtedly take advantage of this situation to try and take over everything that was under the Cult of the Scarlet Moon inside the Sky Empire.


    Even if the archbishop tried to contact his superiors for support, he understood that it might take years for them to show up¡­ And that was only if they decided to send someone over. In the worst-case scenario, they might think it would be too much of a waste of time and effort to continue trying to reestablish a branch in the chaotic Sky Empire.


    If that ended up happening¡­ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Haaa¡­ I hope it doesn''te to that¡­"


    Remembering how the Cult of the Scarlet Moon dealt with failures that directly harmed the faith gathering process, the archbishop could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he took out amunication talisman to order the members of the Cult of the Scarlet Moon to abandon anything that wasn''t a core part of their faith collection in the Sky Empire. Meaning that they would focus all their power on trying to keep the three strongest andrgest faith kingdoms intact, as it would barely qualify them to still be a functioning branch in the eyes of therger Cult of the Scarlet Moon¡­

 Chapter 1064 Shocked Yi Min

    <h4>Chapter 1064 Shocked Yi Min</h4>


    "Hm!? Did we pass through a formation just now¡­ And this qi¡­"


    Passing through the chaotic qi formation, Yi Min could not help letting out a surprised voice as she felt the presence of qi between heaven and earth growing far denserpared to before- No, it could not simple be described as the amount of qi present growing denser. Instead, it would be more urate to say that the quality of the qi present had also increasedpared to outside the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Even with her experience, she had never experienced such a good cultivation environment before. The only time she had gone anywhere near this good for cultivation was when she was younger and had just broken through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Back then, she had happened to chance upon a secret realm with a simr environment. However, it had onlysted for a few years before the secret realm ended up copsing as a result of stimting the qi between heaven and earth.


    The experience of cultivating in such an environment for a few years had ended up allowing her strength to rapidly improve. Having helped her break through to the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm while also taking significant steps towards the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    If not for that chance encounter back then, she might not have been able to smoothly establish the Iron Sky Kingdom andter grow into one of the pinnacle existences of the Sky Empire.


    "What kind of qi gathering formation is this powerful¡­" Muttering this to herself as she thought about this, she could not help looking back towards the ce where she had felt them passing through some kind of formation just a short time earlier.


    Although she couldn''t see the formation in question, she knew it was there. Not only that, but she felt certain that the formation should have other uses than just gathering qi. The most obvious being protecting the Shattered Star Peaks from any outside force that might have an interest in attacking the Star Shattering Sect.


    But if that was the case, the formation should be far beyond the strength of her formation back in the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    Thinking up to this point, Yi Min could not help looking back up towards Xuan Hao with a somewhat suspicious look on her face.


    No matter how powerful Xuan Hao was, he should still be someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, there should be no way for him to create such a powerful formation. Meaning¡­ The Star Shattering Sect might be backed by a powerful power from the central part of the continent- At least that was what Yi Min wanted to believe¡­


    Given her interactions with Xuan Hao so far, she was certain that he was not someone from the central part of the continent as his knowledge of the world was far too shallow for that. Even if he pretended to be someone from the Sky Empire that didn''t have any knowledge about the central part of the continent, there was no reason for him to not know anything about the Sky Empire and need her help to learn about it¡­


    Then¡­ Did he just happen to find this powerful formation?


    Only able toe up with this after close to five minutes of thinking about all sorts of ways that Xuan Hao might have managed to get his hands on such a powerful formation, Yi Min didn''t notice the slightly awkward smile that had appeared on Xuan Hao''s face.


    "Yi Min¡­ Is there perhaps something you want to say to me?"


    "Huh?"


    somewhat surprised voice as she stared nkly at him for a few seconds before a look of realization appeared on her face.


    "This- I- No- There isn''t anything, I-I was just thinking about something¡­" Trying her best to keep calm as she said this, Yi Min quickly stopped staring up at him and instead turned to look down at the ground with a somewhat flustered expression.


    For the first time in her life, Yi Min had a feeling of wanting to dig a hole and hide away.


    Unfortunately for her, she couldn''t even walk properly in her current state and had to be carried. No matter how much she wanted to run away, there was no way for her to do so and she could only try her best to try and calm herself down.


    "¡­"


    Not understanding what was happening with Yi Min as she turned to look down at the path below them with a rather intense look in her eyes, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if she had noticed something special about the path. After all, it had survived for thousands of years. Maybe even longer than that.


    Perhaps she found something special about the path and wanted to investigate it. Guess I should slow down a bit and give her a chance to properly examine it¡­


    In the end, as Yi Min showed no intention of taking her eyes off the path and looked towards it with an almost spellbound look on her face, Xuan Hao decided to slow down his speed and give her a chance to properly examine whatever it was she had noticed about the path. ¡­


    WHY ON EARTH IS HE GOING SO SLOW!? IS HE DOING THIS ON PURPOSE TO TORTURE ME!?


    Unaware of the reason behind Xuan Hao slowing down, Yi Min could not help screaming inside her head as they had still not reached the Seventh Star Peak after two hours of walking along the path.


    Not only that, but she still felt a sense of unknown shame whenever she was about to turn around and ask Xuan Hao about his reason for slowing down. Resulting in her current predicament of continuing to stare at the path below while being slowly carried towards the Seventh Star Peak.


    ¡­


    "We arrived, do you want to continue investigating the ancient path or do you want to enter the sect now?"


    Arriving at the base of the Seventh Star Peak after a little over three hours of walking along the expanded ancient path going through the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao came to a stop just in front of the newer path leading up the Seventh Star Peak before asking this.


    Given Yi Min was so focused on examining the ancient path without showing any signs of looking away, he felt like it was best to ask her in case she wanted to continue investigating the ancient path.


    Considering that he was nning on having Yi Min join the Star Shattering Sect, he wouldn''t mind staying with her for a few days as she investigated the ancient path.


    Of course, there was also the fact that she might have discovered the reason why the ancient path had managed to remain even after thousands of years!


    "Huh¡­?" Letting out a somewhat confused sound as she heard what Xuan Hao said, Yi Min could not help looking more closely at the path beneath her.


    Did he really think the reason why she kept staring down at the path was because she wanted to investigate it? Not only that, but from what he said, the reason he slowed down should have been because he thought I was investigating the path¡­ But¡­ This can be considered better than him realizing what really happened¡­


    "Yes! I want to enter the sect!" Deciding not to think too much about it, Yi Min decided to just pretend like she had really been investigating the path. Feeling that it would be better than Xuan Hao finding out she had been too embarrassed to turn around and face him after being caught staring directly at him for a rather long period of time.


    "Great, I will take you to my pce for now, it''s located close to the core of the sect and is by far one of the best locations to stay inside the sect. After that I will inform some of the elders about your presence and arrange for you to meet them when you recovered enough to walk around on your own again." Not feeling anything odd about the way Yi Min was acting, Xuan Hao just nodded his head before making his way up the Seventh Star Peak.


    Whoosh~


    Considering that it was alreadyte and the number of disciples and elders around them had almost been reduced to none, he decided to undo the invisibility created by the domain before jumping into the air and making his way back to his pce. Not thinking that any of the disciples around would be able to see him.


    "Ah? Is that Grand Elder Xuan!? But who is he carrying?"


    Unknown to Xuan Hao, an older female disciple walking alongside a younger disciple happened to spot him on their way back to the sect from a trip to the spiritual herb fields at the Ninth Star Peak.


    "Huh? You are right¡­ And I don''t know¡­ Maybe someone got injured and he''s carrying them back to the sect?"


    "Hehe~ I don''t think that''s the case!"


    "Senior sister? What do you mean?"


    "Hehe~ Little junior brother, I think it would be best if we don''t say these kinds of things out in public, why don''t youe with this senior sister, and I will tell you in private¡­" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Huh? Sure!"

 Chapter 1065 Lover?

    <h4>Chapter 1065 Lover?</h4>


    Following Xuan Hao carrying Yi Min back to his pce, he decided to give her one of the many empty rooms before returning to his room to cultivate. Intending to wait until the night passed before informing Elder Song and the rest of the elders about Yi Min presence. After all, even if most cultivators wouldn''t sleep and instead spent their time cultivating during the night, it was still rather rude to show up when it was all dark outside.


    Not to mention, it was also considered a rare period of rest for most cultivators who would spend their time during the day training their cultivation techniques orpleting different missions for contribution points.


    Whoosh~


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao fully immersed himself inprehending the Dao of Space as he waited for night to turn into day.


    ¡­


    Early the next morning, Elder Song was curiously looking up at Yi Min after a simple introduction from Xuan Hao. Not having expected for him to appear at his doorstep with an unknown Soul Ascension Realm Expert when he was supposed to be cultivating in seclusion.


    "So, Senior Yi here will be staying at the sect while recovering?"


    "Yes, she will be staying here for a few months¡­ And considering her experience, I think it would be a good idea for both of you to get to know each other. Especially concerning the matter with the Explorer Union that I mentioned to you earlier."


    "Huh? Ah! Of course, I understand, I will make sure to seek Senior Yi''s guidance when the timees."


    Hearing Xuan Hao''s response to his simple question, Elder Song almost instantly realized the real reason behind what he was saying as he nodded his head in agreement.


    I never thought Xuan Hao would actually be trying to recruit a Soul Ascension Realm Expert¡­ Hehe, if this is sessful, not only will the strength of the Star Shattering Sect increase, but we will also have the Iron Sky Kingdom under our control!


    Silently thinking this to himself as he looked up at Yi Min with an increasingly kind expression on his face, Elder Song prepared himself to do anything in his power to draw Yi Min into the Star Shattering Sect and make sure she joined them.


    After all, even though the Iron Sky Kingdom was located rather far away from the Star Shattering Sect at the moment, it was only a matter of time before the Star Shattering Sect expanded enough to border the Iron Sky Kingdom. Not to mention, therge amount of spiritual metal and weapons produced by the Iron Sky Kingdom was sure to increase the speed at which the Star Shattering Sect could expand.


    Even by moderate estimates, it would decrease the time that the Star Shattering Sect needed to expand to the borders of the Sky Empire''s core territory by at least a dozen years. Maybe even more when considering they would also be gaining the assistance of the different experts of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "Thank you, I will be looking forward to our future cooperation, Elder Song."


    Not at all aware of the secret conspiracy brewing behind the scenes to try and make her and her kingdom part of the Star Shattering Sect, Yi Min happily smiled at Elder Song as she said this. Part of her looking forward to exploring the Star Shattering Sect when she recovered enough to start walking around on her own again.


    With that in mind, she was at least thankful that they could have their current conversation while she sat down on a small chair that had been located next to the entrance of Elder Song''s courtyard¡­


    "Hehe, I''m also looking forward to our future cooperation. By the way, I''m rather curious about your kingdom and¡­"


    As the conversation slowly turned into Elder Song asking Yi Min about different things concerning the management of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Considering that both Yi Min was the ruler of a kingdom and Elder Song was the main person in charge of the management of the Star Shattering Sect, both of them got along quite well as they found amon ground on their interest in the management of their respective kingdom and sect.


    Like this, a few hours quickly flew past with Xuan Hao using most of the time quietly listening in on the two from the side. Making sure that nothing disturbed the two, as it was beneficial to his overall goal if Yi Min could befriend more people in the sect outside of himself.


    "¡­ And that is how I prefer to punish people going against the sectws. Although your method of throwing them into the mines for hardbor for a few months also seems like a good punishment. Hm¡­ Maybe I might also suggest that as a punishment in the future¡­" "Haha, I think that would be a great idea. After all, your sect doesn''tck any mines from what I know. Having quite a few spirit stone mines scattered all over the ce." "Hehe, indeed. Hm? Looks like it''s already quitete and the management elders will start to worry if I don''t show up soon¡­ Senior Yi, it was a pleasure talking to you, but it looks like I will have to get going if I want the sect to continue operating normally."


    "No problem, we can always chat again in the future when you have time."


    As the conversation between the two came to an end with Elder Song realizing howte in the morning it had be, Elder Song quickly sped off in the direction of a small gathering hall located not too far away where the elders in charge of the sect''s management had gathered together for an early morning meeting.


    Although, because of Elder Song, it looked like it was going to be ate morning meeting instead of an early morning meeting¡­


    "Should we get going?"


    Seeing Elder Song disappearing, Xuan Hao turned to ask Yi Min who was looking in the direction of Elder Song with a rare sense of admiration present in her eyes.


    "Yes, the faster I can recover, the better." Nodding her head as she said this, Xuan Hao gently scooped her up and took her back to his pce where she settled down inside of her room and began her process of recovery.


    ¡­


    "Who is the new person staying in the pce? A new disciple?"


    "I don''t think so. From what I could see, it seemed like her strength is far stronger than ours. Not only that, but even the Sect Master and Grand Elder Shu Yao is nowhere near the pressure I feel when looking at her!"


    "Hm¡­ It might be a friend of master who is visiting the sect."


    "That''s unlikely, have you ever seen master bring any friends before? Does master even have any friends outside of the elders?"


    "Ah¡­ Indeed, master has never brought any friends over before¡­"


    As Yi Min stayed inside the pce and focused on recovering her strength over the next few days, it did not take long before Xuan Hao''s disciples discovered her and began trying to figure out who she was and where she hade from.


    "Maybe its master''s lover!"


    In the end, it was the simple guess from Mui that ended up making the other three momentarily freeze on the spot.


    "Indeed¡­ She might be master''s daopanion¡­"


    "This¡­ Maybe we should try and ask Elder Song to be sure first, he might know more about this¡­"


    As Chu Yang and Qing Yi began wondering out loud if what Mui had said was really the case, they both looked at each other for a short moment before dashing out of the pce in the direction of Elder Song''s courtyard.


    "Ah! Wait for me!"


    Not wanting to miss out on something that important, Bai Ning didn''t waste a second as he chased after Chu Yang and Qing Yi. Leaving behind a confused looking Mui, who had yet to understand what was happening and why everyone had run off all of a sudden.


    "Why did everyone run away¡­ Hm¡­ I should go and ask the big sister if she really is master''s lover!" Muttering this to herself as she looked in the direction that the three had run in, Mui didn''t stand around for long as she soon made her way in the direction of Yi Min''s room. Intending to find out if she was really her master''s lover!


    ¡­


    "Hey, have you heard? Apparently Grand Elder Xuan¡­"


    "Wha-!? Really!?"


    "Yes! I heard it from one of the Grand Elder''s personal disciples just earlier. Apparently, they even went to Elder Song to confirm it!" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Now that I think about it, I think I heard some disciples talk about something like this earlier¡­"


    Following Xuan Hao''s three oldest disciples making their way over to Elder Song to get a rification on their master''s rtionship with Yi Min, they happened to identally spread the news to some of the curious disciples who hade up to ask them what they were up to after seeing their somewhat flustered appearances.


    As a result, a wave of rather interesting rumors pertaining to Xuan Hao and Yi Min began spreading throughout the Star Shattering Sect¡­

 Chapter 1066 Unrest, Start of War...

    <h4>Chapter 1066 Unrest, Start of War...</h4>


    As Yi Min settled down in the Star Shattering Sect and managed to recover the ability to walk around without any help, it did not take long before she began getting acquainted with the different elders of the sect.


    At the same time, she also used some of her time to explore the Star Shattering Sect by herself. Ending up rather surprised after finding out about the existence of the winged lion demon beast that waszing around not too far away from the Seventh Star Peak.


    Even if she had expected to find other Domain Lord Realm Experts inside of the Star Shattering Sect, she had never expected to find a demon beast. Not only that, but the demon beast had actually reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm!


    If not for the fact that she had already broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm, she doubted that she would have been able to win against such a powerful demon beast without the assistance of her formation back in the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Even more surprising than that, she found out that the demon beast had not recently been epted into the Star Shattering Sect but had instead been around for several years already. Meaning that it was likely that Xuan Hao had managed to subdue the demon beast before he had broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Considering that a demon beast would normally be a bit stronger than a human at the same realm due to their powerful physical bodies, she could easily guess just how strong Xuan Hao was for him to be capable of subduing such a powerful demon beast in the Domain Lord Rm.


    "Hm¡­? Why is it justying around?"


    However, after observing the majestic demon beast for a few hours, she was shocked to discover that the winged lion demon beast spent most of its time just sleeping in the sun on arge warm rock while having the disciples of the secte over with spirit stones and other foods for it. Even if demon beasts would normally spend most of their timeying around, they would at least be cultivating in their own way to increase their strength during this time.


    Looking at the winged lion demon beast, it didn''t even seem to be doing this and was indeed just sleeping or eating all the time.


    Maybe all he needed to do to subdue it was offering a ce to sleep and food to eat¡­


    Thinking this to herself as she looked towards the winged lion demon beast, Yi Min felt that she understood how Xuan Hao had managed to subdue such a powerful demon beast and have it be part of the Star Shattering Sect. Not wasting too much time observing the winged lion demon beast after she came to this realization, Yi Min went around and saw the different important locations of the Star Shattering Sect. From the Qi Spring Lake located at the center of the sect that made the density of qi to the Grand Mission Pavilion that had a constant flow of disciples entering and leaving at all times, Yi Min only felt more impressed the more she found out about the Star Shattering Sect. Especially the Combat Hall.


    Although the ce didn''t seem that impressive on the surface as it was just a ce for the disciples and elders to practice theirbat techniques, the same could not be said after she personally entered one of the rooms of the Combat Hall.


    Almost instantly, she was taken aback by the fact that the space inside of one of the rooms was farrger than it seemed on the outside. Showing off the Star Shattering Sect''s mastery over space. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    But this was not what caused Yi Min to admire the Combat Hall. After all, there was a fair number of powerful experts in the Sky Empire that could create their own secret realm with enough resources, let alone expand space inside a room with the help of a formation.


    Instead, the thing that caused Yi Min to admire the Combat Hall was the fact that the environment inside of these rooms could change ording to the needs of the disciple or elder using them. From a volcanic area filled with fire qi to a nk empty ocean filled to the brim with water qi. Allowing them to fully use some more specialized techniques that could only show off their full power in these kinds of environments.


    Of course, outside of that, there was also the fact that the rooms of the Combat Hall were durable, to the point that it gave her a feeling that she wouldn''t even be able to destroy one of them after she recovered her strength.


    This fact alone was more than enough to make admire the Combat Hall while at the same time also wonder who in the Star Shattering Sect had managed to make such a building filled with countless different formations that even a First Tribtion Soul Ascension Realm Expert like herself couldn''t break.


    Given that she had already witnessed Xuan Hao''s skill when it came to alchemy and the fact that the likelihood of him being even more skilled in the art of formations was incredibly low, Yi Min ended up concluding that there should be an incredibly skilled formation master in the Star Shattering Sect. Not only that, but maybe that formation master had also reached the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "If that is really the case, I will have to reevaluate the strength of the Star Shattering Sect again¡­" Muttering this to herself as she left the Combat Hall, Yi Min soon left the ce. Finding herself wandering back towards the center of the sect where Xuan Hao''s pce was located.


    ¡­


    As Yi Min returned to the pce and focused her attention back on getting rid of the chaotic qi present inside her dantian after looking around the sect and meeting a few of the sect elders, Elder Song began to move forward with his ns for stabilizing the new territory that hade under the Star Shattering Sect following the surrender of thest remaining kingdom standing against them.


    Although it wouldn''t be a difficult thing to aplish with the Star Shattering Sect''s current strength and the fact that they now also had someone in the Soul Ascension Realm to crush any ambition that some of the remaining powers inside these kingdoms might have, it would still take years before these kingdoms could be considered to officially have been integrated into the Star Shattering Sect.


    Outside of that, there was also the increasing unrest that had begun spreading through the Sky Empire. Even though it had yet to affect the Star Shattering Sect due to the strength of the Star Shattering Sect serving as a deterrent for anyone wanting to start up trouble inside their territory, it would only be a matter of time before the surrounding empires set their sights on the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, even if they heard about the presence of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert in the Star Shattering Sect, it would be far from enough to stop them. In a sense, the only reason why the Star Shattering Sect had been ignored by these empires was because it was located at the border of the Sky Empire, while also bordering the Frozen Wastnds.


    In case something ended up happening with the Sky Empire''s border with the Frozen Wastnds, one of the first ces affected would be the Star Shattering Sect. If there was a Soul Ascension Realm Expert there, it would be beneficial for them, as he would draw the attention of the demonic cultivators away from the rest of the Sky Empire. Potentially giving them enough time to destroy and divide the Sky Empire before the demonic cultivators managed to reach the core region of the Sky Empire.


    Because of this, a month slowly passed with Elder Song sending out countless elders to stabilize the new territory of the Star Shattering Sect, while the situation in the Sky Empire continued to grow more chaotic with each passing day.


    However, this did notst for long, as the Onyx Empire who had been enemies with the Sky Empire for a long time, officially crossed the border and entered the Sky Empire.


    ¡­


    "Huh!? The Onyx Empire crossed the border!?"


    "Yes, I heard that they mobilized three Soul Ascension Realm Experts for this. Apparently intending to take over the Earth Hill Spiritual Metal Mines¡­" "This¡­ Isn''t most of our spiritual metaling from that ce following the Iron Sky Kingdom cutting off their supply of spiritual metal?"


    Back in the capital city of the Sky Empire, this news spread like wildfire as everyone began panicking. Understanding that the surrounding empires had concluded that the imperial family and the old ancestor were indeed gone.


    Not only that, but the Onyx Empire had decided to go after one of the most important mines in the Sky Empire from the start. Intending to take control of it before any of the other empires had the chance to¡­

 Chapter 1067 Gathering of the Independent Sects

    <h4>Chapter 1067 Gathering of the Independent Sects</h4>


    Following the invasion by the Onyx Empire and their seizure of the Earth Hill Spiritual Metal Mines that had only been protected by a few Domain Lord Realm Experts, the rest of the surrounding empires wasted no time in following in their footsteps. Each of them invading the Sky Empire from different directions as they seized different important resources close to their borders that they had been eyeing for a long time.


    Still, none of them dared to move further inside the Sky Empire. Not wanting to be the first who ended up having to fight with the Soul Ascension Realm Experts hiding away inside the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    After all, even if the strongest among these Soul Ascension Realm Experts had reached the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and had no way topare to the peak experts of these empires who had at least reached the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, they still had more than enough numbers to make up for this.


    Even if the attacking empire might still be able to win in the long run due to the presence of the peak expert, they would undoubtedly end up suffering a lot of losses. Giving the other empires an opportunity to sweep in and finish both of them.


    However, this didn''t mean that these empires had given up on trying to invade the core region of the Sky Empire and finish them off once and for all. Instead, it just meant to digest the territory they had conquered before deciding on their next n of action.


    Although this would take a bit longer than just directly rushing to the capital city to fight it out, it was far safer.


    ¡­


    At the same time that news of the Onyx Empire invading the Sky Empire reached the core region of the Sky Empire, the people from the different independent sects had gathered together to discuss the matter in a remote ce hidden away from any potential spies that might still be present inside their sects.


    "So¡­ What are we going to do? Are we going to try and support the Sky Empire or are we going to try and stay neutral during this conflict and not involve ourselves?" Seeing that no one said anything for a good five minutes after they had gathered together, Xu Bao was the first to speak up among the different sect representatives present. Breaking the eerie silence that had fallen upon the meeting before it even had a chance to start.


    "This¡­ ording to the Sect Alliance that was set up by the imperial family before their disappearance, we are supposed to help out, but¡­ Although we are supposed to help out the Sky Empire, we really have no reason to do so considering that the imperial family is gone.


    Even if the other sects have all relocated to the capital city, the only reason they did so was because their mastersmanded them to do so¡­" Hesitating for a moment before stepping forward to say this, one of the representatives didn''t even bother hiding his intention to not join the war.


    """¡­"""


    Hearing what he said, the other representatives from the independent sects didn''t say anything as they all silently agreed with the statement.


    Not to mention that the Sky Empire was outssed by therge number of empires trying to invade them, but the imperial family had also disappeared and was nowhere to be seen.


    Although they had been supported to some extend with different resources from the Sky Empire following the establishment of the Sect Alliance, it had only been in ce for a few years and was far from enough to make them join a seemingly hopeless fight together with the people whom they considered to be their enemies.


    Instead of this, everyone present felt that it would be far better for them to remain on the sidelines during the uing war and just go under whichever empire ended up in control of the territory that their sect was located on. At least this way, they would have a better chance at survivalpared to if they joined the fight.


    "By the way, now that we have all agreed that we won''t be joining in on the uing war, does anyone know what the Star Shattering Sect is going to do? Senior Xuan did not seem to be present inside the capital city as far as I am aware, so his sect might also have decided to not join the war as well¡­"


    As the conversation about what to do seemed to have silently concluded with everyone in silent agreement on not joining the war, one of the people present suddenly stood up and asked.


    Considering that Xuan Hao and his sect was by far the strongest independent sect among the independent sects in the Sky Empire, it made sense to be curious about what their stance on the matter was.


    "Hm¡­ Indeed, I haven''t heard anything about Senior Xuan recently. Maybe it would be a good idea for us to find out. After all, it seems like his sect should be far more powerful than any of us."


    "From what I heard, it seems like the Star Shattering Sect is located somewhere at the border between the Frozen Wastnds and the Sky Empire, I haven''t really heard much about the sect other than the fact that it should have only been created a little over a dozen years ago¡­"


    "A dozen years ago!? Looks like the Star Shattering Sect is far more mysterious than I first thought¡­"


    "Indeed, for it to have only been around for a few dozen years and be so strong, it''s obvious that it should be a branch of an even more powerful sect or a sect who has only recently emerged from hiding. No matter what it is, the Star Shattering Sect might be far stronger than we first thought¡­"


    As everyone present began sharing what little information they had about the Star Shattering Sect, they slowly became more and more shocked. Realizing that the Star Shattering Sect was far from a simple independent sect that just happened to produce a single powerful expert.


    "¡­"


    Hearing all of this, Xu Bao just silently smiled to himself as he thought about how he had long since realized that the Star Shattering Sect should be an ancient hidden sect from the ancient era. Although he was not certain at first. After looking into the Star Shattering Sect and finding out how they had seemingly just appeared out of nowhere on an ancient mountain range that had been uninhabitable before ended up fully convincing him that the Star Shattering Sect should be one of those legendary hidden sects.


    As for the information floating around about the Star Shattering Sect being thebination of two smaller sects from a now gone kingdom, he didn''t think too much about this, as it should just be a rouse created by this ancient hidden sect to conceal their emergence back into the world.


    After all, how could two random sects from a border kingdom possibly produce a powerful expert like Xuan Hao?


    Even if he had no idea just how strong Xuan Hao was, he estimated that he should at least have reached the Soul Ascension Realm. Possibly even having surpassed that and stepped into a higher realm!


    "Ah! Everyone, I seem to have recently heard from one of my friends who visited the border of the Frozen Wastnd for some business, that the Star Shattering Sect had begun aggressively expanding in all directions around themselves.


    Even more surprising than this, there were also rumors floating around that the Star Shattering Sect had someone in the Soul Ascension Realm presiding over them. Although I have no idea if this news is real¡­"


    Just at this moment, one of the people present seemed to remember something as he loudly interrupted everyone present to say this.


    "Soul Ascension Realm!? Are you sure about that!?"


    "Yeah! If that is really the case, they might be strong enough to keep those empires away during the uing turmoil!"


    Filled with doubt, everyone could not help turning towards the person who had just said that the Star Shattering Sect might have a Soul Ascension Realm Expert. Understandable considering that the independent sects in the Sky Empire had never produced any Peak Domain Lord Realm Experts, let alone someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Yes! I''m certain. Although I didn''t have time to confirm this news myself¡­" Nodding his head as he confirmed his earlier words, it did not take long for everyone present to start eximing loudly in surprise-


    "Wow! This is amazing, maybe we-"


    "Hahaha, a Soul Ascension Realm Expert among us independent sects! That is-" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Maybe we can-"


    "SILENCE!"


    However, before things got out of hand, Xu Bao stepped in and silenced everyone before things had a chance to be too chaotic.


    "I understand everyone''s enthusiasm, but we still have to decided on how we are going to stay neutral during the uing turmoil. Even if we want to stay neutral and not involve ourselves, we have no way to guarantee that those empires will leave us alone."


    """¡­"""


    Knowing what Xu Bao said was right, everyone''s happy smiles soon turned into frowns as they understood that this was indeed the case.


    Although they might want to stay neutral, there was no guarantee that those empires would just leave them alone and allow them to continue existing after getting rid of the Sky Empire, they needed something that could help ensure their safety during the uing conflict outside of just staying out of it¡­

 Chapter 1068 Decision of the Independent Sects

    <h4>Chapter 1068 Decision of the Independent Sects</h4>


    " Maybe we could band together with the Star Shattering Sect during the uing turmoil and increase our safety that way. Given that there might be someone in the Soul Ascension Realm in the Star Shattering Sect, those empires should not want to meaninglessly offend them if they decide to stay out of the conflict¡­"


    Seeing that everyone was lost in their own thoughts trying to think up ways to ensure the safety of their sects, one of the younger sect masters present nervously stepped forward and suggested this.


    "Band together with the Star Shattering Sect for safety¡­? Can we really do something like that? Not to mention the distance between our sects, but also the fact that the Star Shattering Sect might not want such arge influx of people in their territory¡­"


    "Indeed, if it was me, I wouldn''t allow so many people to enter the territory of my sect all of a sudden. Not to mention the fact that there might not be enough resources present to sustain all of our sects at the borders of the Sky Empire. After all, there is a reason why it''s called the border region and only a few Domain Lord Realm Experts can be found there under normal circumstances¡­"


    "Not only that, but it might result in a hostile rtionship development as our sects take control of what is essentially their territory. No matter how good our current rtionship is, none of us have any real rtionship with the Star Shattering Sect outside of the brief interactions during the establishment of the Sect Alliance."


    Hearing what the young sect master said, the older and more experienced seniors present didn''t waste a second before voicing their doubts to the suggestion.


    Even though the independent sects did stick together and had worked together for hundreds of years to fight off the different puppet sects established by the different powerful kingdoms of the Sky Empire, the same could not be said for the Star Shattering Sect that had appeared out of nowhere and had no significant contact with them outside of the establishment of the Sect Alliance.


    Compared to them, although the Star Shattering Sect was also an independent sect, it was strong enough to not care about the different kingdoms that had caused them to grow close and work together over the years. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    For them to suddenly show up in the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and try to settle down in an attempt to avoid the chaos that would inevitably sweep through the Sky Empire¡­ In the best-case scenario, the Star shattering Sect would ignore them and in the worst case, they might end up bing hostile. Resulting in them not only having to worry about the invading empires, but also the Star Shattering Secting after them!


    "Everyone, calm down. Even if those empires have started invading the Sky Empire, it will at least take a few years before they begin trying to invade the core region of the Sky Empire¡­ And when that happens, I doubt they will have enough time to care about us if we don''t join the Sky Empire in fighting them.


    For now, I think the best course of action would be for one of us to head to the Star Shattering Sect and see if we can figure out a solution before, we start thinking about moving our sects into their territory without saying anything."


    Having to step in once again as the people from the independent sects began growing unruly once again, Xu Bao reminded all of them about the fact that they still had a few years before they would have to face off against the invading empires.


    Although moving their sects also took time, with every independent sect having at least one person at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm and the strongest one having Domain Lord Realm Experts leading them, it would not take more than a year for them to pack up and leave.


    Of course, when the stronger sects finished moving, they could always have their Domain Lord Realm Expertse back and help the weaker sects.


    In the end, it shouldn''t take them more than a three or so years to relocate to the Star Shattering Sect. Even if the Sky Empire would undoubtedly be chaotic at that point in time, they were moving away from the core region of the Sky Empire and had several Domain Lord Realm Experts.


    More than enough to stay safe against therge number of rogue cultivators and bandits that would inevitably appear to fish in troubled waters¡­


    As everyone was thinking about what Xu Bao said, Elder Scarlet me, who had remained silent during the meeting so far, stepped forward. "Senior Xu, I think you should be the one to go to the Star Shattering Sect."


    "Hm? Why do you say so? I''m by far the strongest among all of us, if I go, it might give those people now huddled up in the capital city a chance to strike. Even if they obediently followed their mastersmand, there is no saying whether or not they will stay in the capital after learning about my absence¡­" Frowning visibly as he heard what Elder Scarlet me said, Xu Bao didn''t agree and instead questioned him.


    "I agree with what you say, but¡­ You are the person who has the best rtionship with the elder from the Star Shattering Sect. If you go, there is a higher chance of seeding."


    "This¡­"


    "Not to mention, if they really decide to leave the capital and try to destroy us during this chaotic time, I doubt the surrounding empires would stand still at a chance to kill so many enemy Domain Lords. Especially after they finished confirming the absence of the imperial family and the old ancestor..."


    "Haah¡­ Fine, I understand¡­"


    Seeing Elder Scarlet me''s unwavering expression and how the rest of the people present seemed to be silently agreeing with him, Xu Bao could only let out a sigh as he gave up. Understanding that everyone had silently decided that it was best to send him to the Star Shattering Sect for negotiations.


    Considering that he was indeed the one who had the most interaction with Xuan Hao and was also a member of branch member of an ancient sect, he couldn''t deny that he did indeed have the best chance in negotiating with the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, from what he knew through the ancient records and what his master had told him before passing away, the different ancient sects that had survived through the ancient era stood together and protected each other in times of need. If things really did end up getting troublesome, he could always try and leverage this to his advantage in trying to obtain a rtively safe ce for him and the rest of the independent sects to stay during the uing chaos.


    "Haha, I knew I could count on you. Don''t worry about your sect, I will make sure to watch over it during your absence. If any of those cowardly old fossils appear, I will make to send them crying back to their master!" Laughing happily after Xu Bao agreed to go, Elder Scarlet me confidently assured him about the safety of his sect during his absence.


    Considering that the Sunfire Sect he was from had two Domain Lord Realm Experts, he could afford to say this, as he could leave the protection of the Sunfire Sect to his wife, the sect master of the Sunfire Sect, who had also reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    "If you say so, I feel more at ease. Now¡­ Given that we don''t have much time to waste, I will take my leave immediately." Shaking his head as he said this with a slight smile on his lips, Xu Bao didn''t bother saying anything more as he directly turned around to leave-


    Whoosh-!


    Giving some of the weaker people at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm no time to react as he disappeared before they even had the time toprehend how he had left.


    "Hehe¡­ Now that the old man left, why don''t the rest of use up with some ns on evacuating the core region? After all, we still need a proper n to move so many people and things!" As Xu Bao left, Elder Scarlet me''s happy expression almost instantly changed into a stern and authoritative one.


    """Yes!"""


    Understanding that this matter was not something they could take lightly as it involved the survival of their sects, everyone solemnly nodded their heads in agreement.


    Soon enough, they officially began discussing how they would move all of their disciples, elders, resources, and other important things to the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    No matter how they might think something like this was doable in three years with their current strength, they also understood that it would be far harder to aplish than they might first think. Having no idea what kind of unexpected things might ur during their three year long journey¡­

 Chapter 1069 Stuck in the Capital City...

    <h4>Chapter 1069 Stuck in the Capital City...</h4>


    Following the independent sects deciding to start preparing to move their sects to the Star Shattering Sect, it did not take long before the rest of the sects in the Sky Empire took notice and began getting ready to scout out the situation for any opportunity tounch an attack during this process.


    Unfortunately for them, even if they wanted to take advantage of this tounch an attack on them, the major powers in the capital city didn''t want to see arge number of their Domain Lord Realm Experts leaving the capital city to deal with these few independent sects.


    After all, even if these independent sects might seem strong in the eyes of the rest of the sects under the different kingdoms of the Sky Empire. In the eyes of the different Soul Ascension Realm Experts, they were not worth mentioning, let alone a big enough problem for them to risk the safety of their own Domain Lord Realm Experts.


    If it had been before the invasion of the different empires, the situation might have been different, but now there could be Soul Ascension Realm Experts lurking around just outside the capital city. Waiting for anyone dumb enough to walk out of the area covered by the capital city during this period of time.


    Luckily for the different independent sects, none of them were anywhere close to the capital city.


    In a sense, this was due to the influence of the different sects under the major kingdoms preventing them from building their sects anywhere close to the capital city¡­ And now, this fact allowed them to escape a possible attack from these different sects.


    Not only that, but because these sects were forced to stay inside of the capital city, the rtionship between them and the kingdoms above them began deteriorating. Soon resulting in a clear split between the Domain Lord Rm Experts belonging to the different kingdoms and the Domain Lord Realm Experts belonging to the sects.


    In normal circumstances, these kingdoms would give them a lot of different resources to make sure they would be obedient and do what they said¡­ But, with the situation in the capital growing worse as the resources avable became less and less with each passing day, the sects no longer saw a reason to continue serving under these kingdoms.


    Not only that, but with the invading empires taking over more and more territory, the resources avable would continue to shrink in the foreseeable future. Giving these sects even less of a reason to continue staying inside the capital city.


    If not for the fact that the kingdoms had the backing of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the capital, it would long since have caused the situation to reach a level where the Domain Lord Realm Experts from the different sects might start having thoughts about leaving the capital and cutting themselves off from these major kingdoms.


    After all, when all things were considered, these sects were not truly a part of the Sky Empire and could at most be considered a faction associated with the Sky Empire through the Sect Alliance. Given that they didn''t participate in the battles, these sects felt they would have a better time staying neutral like the independent sects had decided to do.


    Unfortunately, it was already toote for them, as the Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the capital city didn''t want to willingly allow so many Domain Lord Realm Experts to just leave and potentially join their enemies.


    ¡­


    As the situation inside the capital city continued getting worse for the different sects who had been instructed to move their people into the capital city of the Sky Empire for protection, the Domain Lord Realm Experts of the sects gathered together in a small corner away from the rest of the people in the capital city.


    "Haa¡­ What are we supposed to do. If we just refused the invitation toe to the capital back then, we might have had a chance to avoid the uing battle¡­"


    "Indeed, even if we are in the Domain Lord Realm, we will be reduced to nothing more than cannon fodder in a battle between Soul Ascension Realm Experts."


    "You two are forgetting the fact that most of our resources were sized in a bid to ensure there would be enough if a possible siege of the capital ended up happening. Hmph! From what I saw, they just took them and used them on their own people without even thinking about the so-called siege of the capital that they talked about. If a siege really does end up happening, those people will be the first to run away¡­"


    "But what are we supposed to do? Even if we want to do something about it, there is nothing we can do with our current strength. At most we will be able toin away from them like we are doing now."


    """¡­"""


    Not knowing what to say, everyone froze on the spot as before silently looking at each other helplessly.


    Indeed, no matter how much theyined, there was nothing they could do with their current strength. At most they couldin in secret. Hoping that the people above them wouldn''t learn about what they were saying and decide to punish them.


    Leaving the capital city of the Sky Empire was far from something they could do even if they wanted to, the Soul Ascension Realm Experts would undoubtedly notice them the moment they tried to and would punish.


    Not to mention, they still had arge number of disciples and elders inside the capital city. Although not all of them could be moved there in such a short period of time, the most important and strongest ones were all in the capital city.


    If they did leave and managed to somehow seed in escaping from the capital city, the people from the different kingdoms would undoubtedly take out their anger on their disciples and elders still left inside the capital city.


    Even if some of them still wanted to run away, they also understood that the rest of the people present might report this meeting to those kingdoms in hopes of not being punished when someone decided to try and escape.


    "Looks like we can only keep quiet for now and hope those empires decide not to attack the capital city and stops expanding after taking control of a few mines and spiritual herb fields¡­" Noticing the fear and nervousness present in everyone, one of the older elders present decided to end their little meeting with this as he turned around and left.


    No matter how on edge everyone present was when thinking about the possibility of having to fight against someone in the Soul Ascension Realm to protect the capital city of the Sky Empire, he also understood that there was a chance those empires wouldn''t go so far.


    After all, dealing with therge number of Domain Lord Realm Experts and Soul Ascension Realm Experts currently inside the capital city of the Sky Empire was no simple matter. Even for someone who might have reached the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Following the words of the old elder, the rest of the people from the different sects also took their leave. Each of them understood that they might be forced to leave behind their people if they wanted to leave the capital city.


    As for the possibility of the different empires leaving the capital city alone¡­ None of them thought that this was a likely scenario. After all, the Soul Ascension Realm Experts staying alive might result in their current expansion into the Sky Empire being wiped out in the future when a powerful expert emerged.


    ¡­


    "Ah! Someone left the capital cityst night without being noticed before already having left the area under the protection of the capital city!"


    "Huh!? Who was it!?"


    "From what I heard; it was the Grand Elder of the Violet Mist Sect!"


    "That is old news, I heard that it wasn''t only the Grand Elder of the Violet Mist Sect, but also the sect master and several of their elders and most talented core disciples."


    "Wow¡­ Are they really nning to ditch everyone else and try to reestablish their sect outside the Sky Empire?"


    "Who knows¡­"


    Indeed, the next morning after the meeting between the different elders of the sects serving under the kingdoms. News of someone leaving the capital city spread through the city the next day.


    "This isn''t looking good for the Violet Mist Sect¡­ I doubt those people will let them go after learning about this¡­" At the same time, the people from the other sects in the capita city began looking in the direction of the Violet Mist Sect. Understanding that it would only be a matter of time before someone showed up to punish them¡­ And considering that this was the first time someone had fled from the capital city, they would undoubtedly make a spectacle out of it to warn anyone else having thoughts about running away.

 Chapter 1070 Unlucky Xu Bao

    <h4>Chapter 1070 Unlucky Xu Bao</h4>


    Following the first people belonging to the sects locked up in the capital city of the Sky Empire running away, it did not take long before more people began trying to run away without caring about the disciples and elders who had to remain in the capital city and would be punished.


    In the end, close to half of the Domain Lord Realm Experts from these sects ended up escaping over the next few weeks, causing the Soul Ascension Realm Experts to jump in and ensure that the rest of them had no chance to run away. Killing one of the escaping Domain Lord Realm Experts as an example to the rest.


    The main reason why they didn''t do this sooner being that it would inevitably cause the morale of the rest of the Domain Lord Realm Experts to drop if they knew that they were not allowed to leave the capital city and might end up dead if they tried.


    Although they had already been told that they could not leave the capital city, it was different when they saw a Domain Lord Realm Expert being executed for attempting to leave.


    Be it the remaining Domain Lord Realm Experts of the sects or the Domain Lord Realm Experts from the different kingdoms. None of them dared to have any thoughts about trying to leave the capital city!


    ¡­


    "This should be the start of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory¡­"


    At the same time that the situation in the capital of the Sky Empire became increasingly unstable following the death of the Domain Lord Realm Expert trying to leave the capital city, Xu Bao arrived at the edge of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory with an exhausted look stered all over his face.


    Over the past few weeks, Xu Bao had been through several life and death situations during what he had thought to be a peaceful journey that should at most take a week.


    From encountering a random demon beast at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm that happened to have just woken up and was out looking for a light snack, to a small strike force of Domain Lord Realm Experts belonging to one of the invading empires who just happened to be about to cause chaos in the kingdom he was flying through.


    No matter what it was, he seemed to have be a ma for trouble over the past few weeks as he couldn''t catch a single break. Even with his strength beingparable to the Late Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he was still in half-dead state when he finally reached the borders of the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Haaa¡­ I hope I can reach the Star Shattering Sect without encountering any problems inside their territory¡­" Muttering this to himself as he stared down towards the small outpost bearing the symbol of the Star Shattering Sect located close to the border, Xu Bao didn''t waste any time as he flew into the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if his current state was not optional, he also understood that any time wasted would increase the chances of the different independent sects being destroyed by anything from the sects under the major kingdoms to the people from the invading empires.


    Screeeech-!


    However, just at this moment, a terrifying high-pitched screech suddenly echoed out behind him as a bird the size of a small castle appeared behind him filled with killing intent as it stared directly towards him.


    "This- Howe this bird is still after me!? It''s already been five days!" Recognizing therge bird as none other than the Peak Domain Lord Realm demon beast that he had encountered over five days earlier; Xu Bao could not help panicking as he wasted no time in increasing his speed and escaping in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although he really didn''t want to show up with a demon beast chasing after him, he also understood that he was nowhere near strong enough to deal with such a powerful demon beast by himself.


    For now, he could only hope that the Star Shattering Sect wouldn''t hold it against him that he showed up with such arge demon beast whening to visit-


    Of course, that was only if he could reach the Star Shattering Sect before the bird demon beast had a chance to catch up to him-


    Swish-!


    And looking back towards the bird demon beast that was now getting closer and closer to him with each passing second, Xu Bao could not help feeling that might end up bing bird food before he had a chance to reach the Star Shattering Sect and get help from them¡­


    Do I have to contact Senior Xuan and ask for him toe over and help¡­?


    Feeling a bit embarrassed as he thought about this, Xu Bao could not help looking down at themunication talisman that had somehow managed to make its way out of his interspatial ring and into his hand.


    Screeech-!


    Looks like I don''t have a choice if I want to continue staying alive¡­


    Hearing the now happy screech of the bird demon beast as it was almost close enough to grab hold of him with its ws, Xu Bao could only push down his embarrassment as he activated themunication talisman.


    ¡­ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Hm? Who is it?"


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he noticed someone trying to contact him through hismunication talisman just as he was about to break through to the Small Sess Realm with his Dao of Space.


    "Oh? It''s Xu Bao¡­ What could he want?"


    However, after noticing the person contacting him was Xu Bao, his annoyance changed to curiosity as he wondered what the strongest person among the independent sects wanted.


    Not long after that, he became aware of Xu Bao''s current dangerous situation and the fact that he was actually at the borders of his sect''s territory. Even though he was curious about why Xu Bao had suddenlye to his sect''s territory, he decided to suppress his curiosity for now. For now, the most important thing was to ensure that Xu Bao didn''t end up being eaten by the bird that had managed to somehow find itself inside the territory of his sect.


    Considering that the bird demon beast was at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, it was not something that Feng Chen, Shu Yao or Zu Fei had the strength to deal with. Meaning that only the winged lion demon beast and the rabbit demon beast were strong enough to deal with this¡­ But¡­ Given that Xu Bao was not too close to the sect, and it would take time to reach him, they weren''t fast enough¡­


    "Looks like I will have to make a move¡­ Oh well, I guess I can use the opportunity to stretch my muscles after spending thest few weeks locked upprehending the Dao of space¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao took a step forward-


    Rumble~


    Causing the space inside his cultivation room to twist and turn as he soon appeared outside the Star Shattering Sect in the sky above the city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak.


    "Hm~ Ah! There he is!" Locking on to the location of Xu Bao with his divine sense in the next second, Xuan Hao took another step forward and disappeared before anyone had a chance to notice his appearance in the sky above the city.


    ¡­


    SCREEECH-!


    At the same time, the bird demon beast had finally managed to catch up to Xu Bao, as itsrge ws descended towards him with terrifying speed-


    BAAAANG!


    Only barely giving him enough time to block the ws before they had a chance to bury into his exposed back.


    Whoosh-!


    Bang!


    Flinging him thousands of meters away before ultimately crashing into the ground.


    "Haaa¡­ Damnit, my strength is already exhausted to the point where even a single attack is enough to defeat me¡­" Standing up with great difficultly as he muttered this to himself, Xu Bao helplessly looked up at the castle sized bird demon beast that was now descending towards him at an even greater speed than before.


    Even though he had blocked the attack just now, he understood that it had taken all of his strength. If he tried to do it again, he would undoubtedly end up dying¡­


    "Oh, looks like I arrived just in time."


    However, just at this moment, a familiar voice sounded out beside him as the bird demon beast rapidly descending towards him suddenly froze mid-air.


    "S-Senior!"


    Not paying any attention to the bird demon beast, Xu Bao turned around and happily called out to Xuan Hao who had just appeared beside him.


    As for the bird demon beast-


    Ptsh-!


    It didn''t even have the time to realize what was happening as its body was cut up by Xuan Hao''s domain the moment he appeared. Instantly killing it.

 Chapter 1071 Dao of Space, Small Success Realm

    <h4>Chapter 1071 Dao of Space, Small Sess Realm</h4>


    "Wha-!?" Not knowing how to react upon witnessing the demon beast that had been chasing him for the past week getting killed in an instant, Xu Bao could only open his mouth in disbelief as he looked towards Xuan Hao who had appeared beside him. Although he expected Xuan Hao to be strong, he had never imagined it would be to this degree!


    "Xu Bao, I never expected to see you here. Especially with such arge demon beast chasing after you."


    "Ah! Senior, I- Thank you for saving me." "No problem, so, why are you here? As far as I know, your sect should be quite far away from this ce¡­"


    "This¡­ I''m here on behalf of the rest of the independent sects to ask the Star Shattering Sect for something¡­" Feeling the curious gaze mixed in with a bit of suspicion from Xuan Hao, Xu Bao didn''t dare hide the fact that he hade to ask something from the Star Shattering Sect. Not only for himself, but on behalf of all of the independent sects as well.


    "Hm? Here on behalf of the independent sects? As far as I know, you and the rest of the independent sects shouldn''t be involved in the current struggle taking ce in the Sky Empire. Unless you decided to join the Sky Empire in fighting back against the invading empires and want my sects help in the matter¡­?" Seeing Xuan Hao narrow both of his eyes as he said this, Xu Bao instantly felt a shiver run down his spine.


    "N-No! That is not it, we haven''t joined in on the current fight, it''s just that our current situation isn''t looking too good at the moment. Even if we remain neutral, we fear that the invading empires might still destroy us.


    Because of this, we thought about the possibility of moving our sects to your sect''s territory during this period of time to ensure our safety¡­. And now I''m here to ask your sect for permission to do this. After all, we don''t want to enter the territory of your sect before first getting approval."


    rifying to the best of his ability that he was not here to drag the Star Shattering Sect into the conflict between the Sky Empire and the surrounding empires, Xu Bao nervously looked up at Xuan Hao. Only feeling relieved after discovering that his expression had softened.


    "I see, but this is not something you should discuss with me. Even though I''m an elder of the Star Shattering Sect, I''m not the person in charge of these kind of things. With that in mind, I will make sure to get you in touch with someone who can."


    "Thank you!" Hearing that Xuan Hao didn''t outright deny his request after hearing about it, Xu Bao could not help letting out a sigh of relief as he gently bowed his head in thanks. Understanding that it would be much easier to convince the Star Shattering Sect about him and the rest of the independent sects setting up a ce of their own inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect with Xuan Hao''s help.


    Although it was only a referral, it would at least allow him to talk with someone who could allow him and the rest of the independent sects to settle down in the territory of the Star Shattering Sect¡­ And considering that he and the rest of the independent sects were only looking to stay temporarily, it shouldn''t be that hard to aplish if they just settled down around the borders of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory and gave them some of their resources aspensation.


    In more simple terms, it could be considered them paying the Star Shattering Sect protection fees to keep them safe during the turmoil in the Sky Empire.


    ¡­


    Looks like Elder Song will be even busier in the uing days¡­ Looking at the excited Xu Bao who was flying beside him as they made their way towards the Star Shattering Sect together, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense guilt welling up inside him as he thought about Elder Song.


    Although there were other people who could handle the matter of the independent sects settling down inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect during the current turmoil that the Sky Empire is going through, Elder Song was by far the most experienced when it came to handling these sorts of things.


    Not to mention, with the strength of the independent sects, it was only natural that only the best would handle this. Even if it came at the expense of Elder Song being overworked once again¡­


    Maybe I should try and encourage Feng Chen to assign more elders to the management of the sect.


    Thinking this to himself as he arrived at the base of the Ninth Star Peak together with Xu Bao, Xuan Hao contacted Elder Song and had hime over to take Xu Bao into the sect and go over the matter with the independent sects.


    Even if it was a risk to have them enter the territory of the Star Shattering Sect given that they should still have some spies left from the different major kingdoms inside of them, it would be a significant boost to the Star Shattering Sect''s strength if Elder Song could manage to turn them into subordinate sects.


    After all, when everything was said and done, the independent sects did have several Domain Lord Realm Experts and a lot of Nascent Soul Realm Experts that would help increase the Star Shattering Sect''s strength. Allowing them to make up for the currentck of experts to manage the increasinglyrge territory under the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course, all of that would be for the future. For now, the independent sects first had to be settled down inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect before any decisions on taking them in permanently could be made. Not to mention, the spies still lurking inside of them also had to be dealt with before all of this.


    At least with Elder Song on the case, Xuan Hao felt confident that everything would work out in the favor of the Star Shattering Sect. Even if it might take a few years of hard work from him and the rest of the sect''s management elders. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    ¡­


    Not long after Xu Bao and Elder Song entered the Star Shattering Sect together to discuss the matter of the independent sects, Xuan Hao returned to his cultivation room and focused his attention back onprehending the Dao of Space.


    Considering that he was already on the brink of breaking through to the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Space, it did not take more than a few days before the first signs of reaching the Small Sess Realm appeared.


    Boom-!


    And only week after having rescued Xu Bao from therge bird demon beast, he sessfully managed to breakthrough to the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Space. Officially taking him one step closer to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Unfortunately, now he had toprehend a brand-new Dao to the Small Sess Realm and integrate it into his Dao Domain before he could officially begin thinking about the final step of having one of his Daos reach the Large Sess Realm.


    Only then would he be able to break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and obtain the strength to face off against someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Before that, he would have no way to face off against the powerful empires and other powers like the Heavenly Dragon Temple in the central part of the Ewaria Continent. At least for now, his strength within the Soul Ascension Realm should allow him to face off against someone in the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. After all, the Dao of Space could be considered special among the different Daos and would allow him far more versatility when it came to fighting. Even more so considering that the strength of the Divine Void Eyes increased alongside hisprehension of the Dao of Space and his movement technique also became stronger the higher hisprehension of the Dao of Space was.


    Although he couldn''t yet use the True Spatial Copse with his Divine Void Eyes, he clearly felt that it was far easier to use the Partial Spatial Copse after hisprehension of the Dao of Space reached the Small Sess Realm. While before, he could only use it to practice and it wasn''t that useful when it came tobat, he now felt like he could attach the Partial Spatial Copse to his attacks and enhance their power, like a sword strike that would cause the space to start partially copsing everything it hit. Although, he would still need to test out things before he could be certain about how it worked and how much stronger it made him.

 Chapter 1072 The Forgotten Quest...

    <h4>Chapter 1072 The Forgotten Quest...</h4>


    So... What Dao should I try toprehend?


    Opening his eyes after breaking through to the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Space, the first thing on his mind after examining his newfound power became what Dao he should try toprehend now that he had finishedprehending the Dao of Space to the Small Sess Realm.


    Considering that he had managed to have some sort of encounter or had been helped by the system whenever he hadprehended the other five Daos, he had no idea where to begin when it came to trying toprehend a new Dao from nothing. Especially considering that the system had entered what seemed like an inactive state for the past few months. Not giving him any new quests toplete.


    Why the system had decided to do something like that was not something he had any idea about, but at least he could guess to some extent that it was because his disciples had not made any significant improvements after Chu Yang and Qing Yi reached the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Maybe only after one of them reaches the Domain Lord Realm will start to show some life again¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao understood that he couldn''t rely on the system to help him out with his Sixth Dao; he would have toprehend it on his own.


    Now the question became whether or not he should stay in the Star Shattering Sect and continue his secluded cultivation and try toprehend a new Dao that way or leave the Star Shattering Sect and try to seek an opportunity toprehend a new Dao.


    Although staying in the Star Shattering Sect was by far the safest choice, it would also take a long time for him toprehend a brand-new Dao without any form of external help. Leaving the Star start to show some life again¡­


    Dao; he would have toprehend it on his own.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao understood Now the question became whether or not he should stay in the Star that he couldn''t rely on the system to help him out with his Sixth Shattering Sect and continue his secluded cultivation and try to Shattering Sect and searching for an opportunity should be faster but would also be far more dangerous.


    The danger in question didn''te from the fact that he would leave the Star Shattering Sect and search for an opportunity, but instead came from the fact that an opportunity that could help himprehend a new Dao would most likely be located in a dangerous location.


    In the worst-case scenario, he might even have to leave the Sky Empire if he couldn''t find anything in the dangerous locations in the central region. Having to move closer to the central part of the continent where more opportunities toprehend the Dao could be found. Of course, this would also mean that the people he encountered would be stronger than those in the Sky Empire and the surrounding empires. Not counting the Blue Sea Empire.


    Peak Soul Ascension Realm Experts might not exist in any of these empires, but the same could not be said for the empires located closer to the core of the continent. Maybe he might even end up being unlucky enough to encounter someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­


    "Even if I canprehend a new Dao on my own by staying in the Star Shattering Sect, I still have toprehend it to the Small Sess Realm. Not to mention, I also have to reach the Large Sess Realm with at least one of my Daos to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    And I have to do all of that before the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple shows up¡­" Muttering this to himself as frown formed on his lips, Xuan Hao realized that he would at most have a few years to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if his currentprehension was far above that of anyone he had seen so far, be it his disciples or the other elders from the sect, he understood that this was far too short a time for him toprehend a brand-new Dao to the Small Sess Realm without any help, let alone have one of his Daos reach the Large Sess Realm¡­


    "Haaa¡­ Even if I don''t want to, it looks like I will have to seek out an opportunity¡­" Turning to look at his four disciples working hard on improving their cultivation through his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if Bai Ning and Mui would be able to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm and possible trigger a change in the system.


    But considering that Mui was still in the Foundation Establishment Realm, he felt that it was a bit too much to ask for.


    As for the reward from the time limited quest that wanted him to scatter interspatial rings across the world¡­


    [Limited Time Quest: You have found a brilliant way to recruit new potential disciples! Scatter 1000 interspatial rings around the world. The system will add a specific test to the ring that will test the potential future disciples. Interspatial Rings will only be counted towards the quest if they are scattered a certain distance away from each other.] [Time: 4.9 years] [5789/1000] [Reward: vary depending on the amount of sessfully scattered interspatial rings]


    There was still around five years left before the timer ran out¡­ And with how many interspatial rings he had managed to get his hands on after reaching the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he didn''t doubt that he would be able to scatter more than ten thousand interspatial rings by the time the timer ran out.


    Even if he had no idea what the reward was, he hoped that his efforts would be rewarded fairly. After all, the worth of the thousands of interspatial rings that he had thrown away for the quest over the years were worth a fortune.


    Originating from therge amount of special spiritual metal that he had used to create the interspatial rings. After all, the original spiritual metal he got from the system in the past had already run out and he had been forced to go after the sect''s storage of spiritual metal used for creating interspatial rings.


    At least, with his current identity, no one questioned him or asked why he needed so much spiritual metal for creating interspatial rings. Although, he could already feel Elder Song being less and less excited about the fact that he had essentially taken away over half of the special spiritual metal stored in the sect that could be used for the creation of interspatial rings.


    Even if it didn''t really affect the sect that much, it still slowed down the development of the sect to some extent, as the spiritual metal mine located beneath the old capital city of the Azure Sky Kingdom had yet to be fully operational.


    Well¡­ Enough about that, I shouldn''t think too much about that damned quest¡­


    Shaking his head as a wry smile made its way onto his face, Xuan Hao could not help remembering the time he had raided the sect''s treasury because he had run out of spiritual metal for creating interspatial rings.


    Back then, he had ended up running into Elder Song, who upon seeing him carry away over half of the sect''s spiritual metal for the creation of interspatial rings, had given him a rather interesting look¡­


    As for the reason why, he had suddenly managed to reach the staggering level of scattering over 5000 interspatial rings¡­ That was mainly due to his improvements in the Dao of Space making it far easier for him to create interspatial rings.


    At this point in time, the creation of interspatial rings had almost be second nature to him, and he could create them even when he wasprehending the Dao of Space.


    Not only that, but because of the sheer number of interspatial rings he had created likely exceeding what most normal cultivators would ever create during their lifetime, the interspatial rings created by him were also far higher quality than normal.


    For example, if a normal interspatial ring created with the lowest quality of spiritual metal had a space of 10 cubic meters, it would have close to double that!


    Thinking about it, now that his Dao of Space had broken through to the Small Sess Realm, it might even exceed that¡­


    "Ah¡­" Realizing that he was just trying to avoid the topic of leaving the sect by thinking about interspatial rings and his rather pointless mastery in the art of creating interspatial rings, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head as he slowly got up and made his way towards the door leading out of his cultivation room. Deciding to leave the sect before, he ended up finding some sort of excuse to dy his departure.


    Although¡­ I haven''t been teaching my disciples for the past few weeks and I will be gone for quite some time this time around. Maybe it wouldn''t hurt to first spend a few days teaching them before leaving.


    Coming up with this excuse just as he was about to use his movement technique to leave, Xuan Hao began moving in the direction of the Combat Hall where Mui and Qing Yi were currently training together¡­

 Chapter 1073 Reluctantly Leaving

    <h4>Chapter 1073 Reluctantly Leaving</h4>


    Over the next week, Xuan Hao spent most of his time teaching his disciples. Even using some of the time toplete the repeatable quest from the system and hold a lecture for some of the newer disciples of the sect that had entered the sect during thest recruitment period of the sect. Also giving the new disciples a chance to mingle with some of the older and more experienced disciples trying their best to join in on the lecture.


    After all, even if the lecture was about the Qi Condensation Realm and didn''t revolve around the Foundation Establishment Realm that most of them were in, it was still useful for them to get a better understanding of the Qi Condensation Realm. Not to mention, they were all curious about Xuan Hao after a certain rumor began spreading throughout the sect over the past few months.


    Luckily for them, Xuan Hao didn''t pay too much attention to what the disciples of the sect were talking about among themselves. In turn, he never found out about the fact that there was a rumor going around in the sect about him before the week he had set aside for teaching his disciples arrived.


    ¡­


    Even if I used these scrolls, my talent in the Dao of Wind and the Dao of Wood is far from enough to reach the Elementary Realm in a few years, let alone the Small Sess Realm¡­


    Standing outside the entrance to his pce as he thought about the three scrolls that he had obtained from the temple of the Half Spirit Race that could to some extent help increase theprehension of certain Daos, Xuan Hao could not helpmenting at the fact that his talent in the Dao of Wind and the Dao of Wood was abysmal whenpared to any other Dao he had triedprehending in the past.


    Even more unfortunate was the fact that thest scroll was for the Dao of Fire, that was useful in himprehending a new Dao. Although, it might prove useful when he needed one of his Daos to reach the Large Sess Realm in the future.


    The only other thing he had on him that might be able to help himprehend a new Dao without leaving the Star Shattering Sect was the mysterious stone tablet that he had obtained from the illusion of the mist covered mountain range inside the Mystic Realm of the Mirage Sect.


    Unfortunately, when he had tried to take the mysterious stone tablet out of his interspatial ring to investigate it more closely after leaving the mystic realm, he discovered that the mysterious tablet had changed into some kind of illusory state that made it impossible for him to deduce the Dao carvings he had seen back when he had first grabbed it inside the illusion of the mist.


    No matter what he tried to do, he had no way to return the mysterious stone tablet to the state he had first seen it in. Leaving him to keep it inside his interspatial ring for now. Hoping that he would be able to find a way to change it back from its current illusory state. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    If he could do that and share it with the Star Shattering Sect, it would undoubtedly result in the sect undergoing a period of rapid growth. Not only would it help those in the Nascent Soul Realm looking toprehend a domain of their own and step into the Domain Lord Realm, but it would also be helpful for those already in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Of course, there was also the fact that it would also be useful to him. Not so much because of the increase inprehension speed, but because he had a feeling that he would need toprehend more Daos in the future if he wished to step into the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Well¡­ That is a matter for the future. For now, I will still have to leave the Star Shattering Sect if I want to stand a chance at reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm before that person from the Heavenly Dragon Temple decides to show up¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while ncing down towards his interspatial ring, Xuan Hao didn''t draw out the matter any longer as he took a step forward-


    Whoosh~!


    Disappearing from the Star Shattering Sect the next moment. Heading in the direction of the core region of the Sky Empire to check out the different dangerous locations there.


    Not caring too much about the war between the remaining Soul Ascension Realm powers and the surrounding empires that was about to unfold. After all, the strongest person in these empires would at most have reached the Fourth tribtion- Maybe the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Considering that his current strength should be enough to fight someone in the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm after his Dao of Space broke through to the Small Sess Realm, he didn''t really worry about them.


    Not to mention a Peak Soul Ascension Realm Expert, with his currentprehension of the Dao of Space, he even felt confident in escaping someone in the Earth Immortal Realm!


    ¡­


    "My cultivation has almost finished stabilizing, I should be able to fully stabilize my cultivation at the Soul Ascension Realm in another week or two¡­" At the same time Xuan Hao silently left the Star Shattering Sect, Yi Min was smiling happily to herself as she went over her recent progress.


    Before arriving at the Star Shattering Sect, she had expected to need at least two months before she could stabilize her cultivation base. Maybe even longer than that depending on the environment of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    However, after spending less than a month at the Star Shattering Sect, she could already feel that her cultivation base was about to fully stabilize. Even if she left the Star Shattering Sect now and returned to the Iron Sky Kingdom, she would still be able to disy strength far above what she had before- Of course, she had no ns of doing this, as she nned to take full advantage of the great cultivation environment of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    In the back of her mind, she even felt a sense of unease knowing that she would soon have to leave the Star Shattering Sect and return to the Iron Sky Kingdom again. After all, with the cultivation environment on the Shattered Star Peaks, she had long since realized that it would be far more beneficial for her to cultivate therepared to her own kingdom.


    Even with her small qi gathering formation inside of her cultivation room, it was nowhere nearparable to the chaotic qi formation that extracted the chaotic qi above and refined it into pure spiritual qi of a far higher quality than anything her small qi gathering formation could ever aplish.


    "Maybe it won''t hurt to stay for a few weeks longer¡­ And Elder Song also needed my help to deal with the matter regarding the Explorer Union branch located in the city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak. Yes! Helping them deal with the Explorer Union can be considered repaying the favor of letting me stay at the Seventh Star Peak to recover!" Saying this to herself as both her eyes shone, Yi Min got up and made her way out of the room that Xuan Hao had given her inside his pavilion before she made her way in the direction of Elder Song''s courtyard.


    Considering that she had made up her mind to fully support the Star Shattering Sect in dealing with the Explorer Union branch, she decided to go over and inform Elder Song about it beforehand. After all, she had only helped a bit when it came to helping Elder Song and the other elders understand the Explorer Union more over the past few weeks. Not having assisted them in conversing with the Explorer Union as she had still focused most of her time on trying to stabilize her cultivation base over the past few weeks.


    ¡­


    Not more than half an hourter, Elder Song could not help looking in the direction of Yi Min who made her way out of his courtyard with a curious expression on his face.


    Hm¡­ I wonder why she suddenly wanted to join in on our discussion with the Explorer Union¡­ Could it be that she wants to repay Xuan Hao''s favor of saving her and her kingdom? Or maybe she is unwilling to leave the Star Shattering Sect now that she personally experienced the benefits of cultivating here¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he watched her figure disappearing in the direction of Xuan Hao''s pce, Elder Song could not help secretly chuckling to himself. No matter what her reason was, he understood that it would be far easier to recruit her to join the Star Shattering Sect in the future.

 Chapter 1074 Two Months...

    <h4>Chapter 1074 Two Months...</h4>


    Following Xuan Hao leaving the Star Shattering Sect, it did not take long before he began searching through the first dangerous location in the core territory of the Sky Empire. However, after only a few days of searching through the ce, he quickly discovered that there wasn''t anything that would help his attempt toprehend a new Dao inside.


    In the end, the only thing he got out of it was a few precious spiritual herbs and an artifact suitable for someone in the Domain Lord Realm, something that would end up in the treasury of the Star Shattering Sect after he returned.


    Thinking that it might just have been bad luck, he just shrugged it off and headed to the next dangerous location in the core territory of the Sky Empire, a ce that had once been home to an ancient sect now filled with countless traps that had even imed the life of someone in the Soul Ascension Realm ording to what little information he could gather about the ce.


    Unfortunately, the ce turned out to have long since decayed to a point where nothing inside the ancient sect ruins was working, outside of the killing arrays and trapping formation strong enough to kill someone in the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm that kept most ordinary people from exploring the ce.


    Knowing that he might just have gotten unlucky two times in a row, Xuan Hao didn''t give up and chose another dangerous location in the core territory of the Sky Empire to explore¡­


    A famed mountain range that was said to be filled to the brim with Domain Lord Realm demon beast and countless spiritual herbs that helped oneprehend the Dao¡­


    Awork of vast underground cavers that covered an arearger than the current Star Shattering Set, filled with all sorts of dangerous creatures and precious spiritual herbs, said to contain the tombs of ancient cultivators that had far surpassed the cultivators of the present¡­


    A mystical flower meadow filled with rare and magical flowers. Each with their own special effect when used during alchemy or meditation. From allowing one to connect to the Dao to helping improve one''s inherent talent. Hidden inside arge bamboo forest with countless powerful demon beast inside of it¡­


    Over the next two months, Xuan Hao searched through every single one of the Sky Empire''s dangerous locations. Only avoiding a few special ces that he felt would be too dangerous to enter, like the ancient sect located beside the Great Poison Swamp.


    "Nothing¡­"


    However, even after all of this, he had not found a single thing that would help himprehend a new Dao. The so-called dangerous locations of the Sky Empire were mostly filled with things that would be helpful for someone in the Domain Lord Realm or below. Nothing useful for someone trying toprehend a new Dao.


    Even worse, with the war between the Sky Empire and the surrounding empires starting to grow over the past two months, some of the more promising dangerous locations located close to the capital city of the Sky Empire that he had nned to explore, had been destroyed in shes between the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from both sides as the surrounding empires began testing the strength of the Sky Empire''s Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    Thinking about it, if he had known that the surrounding empires would make a move so quickly, he would have explored those ces first. Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do now that those ces had already been destroyed-


    "Hm? Someone in the Soul Ascension Realm?"


    Or so he thought, a Soul Ascension Realm Expert from one of the empires who had taken part in destroying those dangerous locations just so happened to be flying past him at this moment¡­


    BANG!


    Whoosh-!


    Not a secondter, the poor Soul Ascension Realm Expert in the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm was knocked flying before he had any time to react-


    "WAAAAaaaah¡­"


    Only able to let out a scream as he disappeared into the distance with a few broken bones. Not knowing what had just happened or who had knocked him, flying back out of the Sky Empire after he had barely taken a single step inside the core territory.


    Don''t tell me¡­ Did the ancestor of the imperial family return and knock me out of the Sky Empire as warning!? As his thoughts ran wild trying toe up with an exnation for what had just happened to him, the culprit was silently looking off in the direction he had disappeared in as his somewhat tensed expression visibly began rxing.


    "Haaa¡­ I really needed that¡­" Muttering this to himself as he let out a sigh, Xuan Hao felt himself rxing after knocking the Soul Ascension Realm Expert flying.


    The past two months had really not been good for him, as he had essentially wasted two months of time gathering resources that could only be used by someone in the Domain Lord Realm or below. Nothing that would help himprehend a new Dao.


    As a result, it made him start reconsidering his decision to leave the sect instead of just continuing to cultivate in peace and hope he managed to break through before the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple appeared.


    At this point in time, he understood that if he wanted to continue searching for opportunities, he would have to leave the Sky Empire and head towards the more dangerous core of the continent where more opportunities existed.


    Of course, with more opportunities, there would also be more dangers involved!


    "¡­"


    Turning to look in the direction of the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao hesitated for a short moment before disappearing¡­


    Rumble-!


    Only a short minuteter, a terrifying aura appeared from the direction that he had knocked the Soul Ascension Realm Expert in-


    Boom!


    Not a secondter, a muscr figure standing more than three meters tall appeared at the spot Xuan Hao had been standing only a minute earlier, both of his eyes narrowing as a frown appeared at the corner of his mouth.


    If Xuan Hao had been there, he would have been shocked to discover that this person was not someone who had just reached the Fourth or Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm but was instead someone who had reached the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Only a single step away from reaching the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "Hmph! This is definitely not that old turtle¡­ To think someone this powerful appeared inside the Sky Empire..." Muttering this to himself as his frown deepened even further, the titan of a man turned to look in the direction Xuan Hao had left in, a hint of unease present in depth of his eyes.


    "Looks like I will have to take a more passive stance when ites to the Sky Empire for now. At least until I figure out if that person was just someone who happened to pass by¡­" Shaking his head after a few minutes of silence, the man turned around and left in the direction he hade from. Deciding not to chase after Xuan Hao.


    Not only because he was uncertain whether or not Xuan Hao was an enemy or just a powerful expert passing through the Sky Empire that his subordinate had happened to identally offend, but also because he sensed some traces left behind by Xuan Hao when he left using his Drifting Cloud Steps.


    The profoundness of the Dao of space used was more than enough to make him give up any hope of chasing down the other party, as people skilled in the Dao of Space were close to impossible to catch without any proper preparations or overwhelming difference in strength.


    ¡­ n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Looks like I won''t be able to drag it on for much longer, the situation back home also seems to be growing out of control¡­" At the same time, back in the Star Shattering Sect, Yi Min was silently whispering this to herself as she sat inside her room with a sad expression on her face.


    Over the past two month, she had managed to fully stabilize her strength at the Soul Ascension Realm while also helping the Star Shattering Sect convince the Explorer Union to move their branch to what could be considered a small town located outside of the main city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak.


    The reason why the branch of the Explorer Union had only been moved, but all the way outside the rapidly developing city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak was in part due to her effort over the past two months. Managing to convince the far too inexperienced staff in charge of the branch before any of their superiors took notice of the rapidly expanding Star Shattering Sect and sent over someone more skilled to manage the branch.


    In the end, this was the main reason why she had stayed at the Star Shattering Sect far longer than she first intended.


    However, now that she had stabilized her cultivation base and helped out the Star Shattering Sect, it was time for her to return to the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­

 Chapter 1075 Confused Yi Min~

    <h4>Chapter 1075 Confused Yi Min~</h4>


    Mulling over the fact that she had to return to the Iron Sky Kingdom for the next few hours, Yi Min ended up deciding to stay for a little longer as she found out that her subordinate could still keep things stable back in the Iron Sky Kingdom for now.


    Even if the different aristocratic families and cultivation ns inside her kingdom had indeed started to cause trouble, it was still within a manageable range for her subordinate. After all, when everything was said and done, he could still be considered the strongest person in the Iron Sky Kingdom after her.


    Only when these different powers decided to join forces could the situation be considered to have escted to a degree where her subordinate wouldn''t be able to handle the situation, something she had calcted to at least take a few weeks.


    Not knowing that she was just pushing back the time for her to leave after experiencing how beneficial it was for her to cultivate in the Shattered Star Peaks, Yi Min closed both of her eyes as she began meditating.


    Oblivious to the fact that Elder Song and some of the other elders she had interacted with over the past two months were already nning on how to make her officially join the Star Shattering Sect and make the Iron Sky Kingdom part of the Star Shattering Sect.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Where did Elder Song and the rest of the elders go?" Arriving at the spot where she would normally find Elder Song and the rest of the sect''s management elders the next morning, Yi Min could not help showing a confused expression on her face.


    Although she had only stayed at the Star Shattering Sect for a little over two months, she had long since be aware of Elder Song''s reputation in the sect and how hard working he was. Never missing a single meeting and always there to assist the other elders in managing the sect.


    For him to be missing together with the management elders¡­ Yi Min had a feeling that something important should have happened. Important enough to not only draw the attention of Elder Song, but also all of the management elders.


    "Elder Song!?"


    However, just as she was about to turn around and find someone to ask if they knew where Elder Song and the rest of the management elders had gone, the person she had been about to search for appeared in front of her.


    "Senior Yi? Is there something I can help with?" Hearing Yi Min calling out to him, Elder Song could not help asking as he made his way over to her. Even without her having said anything, it was rather obvious that she was looking for him from her reaction.


    "Ah- It''s nothing important, it''s just that with the branch of the Explorer Union gone and my cultivation stabilized, I thought it would soon be time for me to return back to my kingdom and came to inform you about it as it seems Xuan Hao left the sect. After all, I can''t continue staying here for too long or my kingdom might end up copsing. Especially when considering the current situation of the Sky Empire¡­" Saying this with great difficulty, Yi Min felt a bit nervous as she looked towards Elder Song.


    Although what she said was indeed the truth and she needed to return to her kingdom, she had wanted to drag things out for another two weeks and make full use of the great cultivation environment of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    However, when she opened her eyes this morning and went to look for Xuan Hao to talk about this, she discovered that he had left the sect at some point in time without informing her or his disciples about it, causing her to feel like it wasn''t a good idea to continue staying at the Star Shattering Sect now that the person who had first invited her had disappeared.


    Even if she had managed to be friends with quite a few of the elders in the sect during this period of time, it was far from enough for her to continue living inside the Star Shattering Sect in her eyes. Especially considering that she began feeling like she was taking advantage of the kindness that these elders had shown her.


    "Leave? I understand¡­" Hearing what Yi Min said, Elder Song frowned for a short moment before pausing for a second. "When are you nning to leave? If it''s not within the next few days, could I ask you for some help with something?" "I''m not in a rush¡­ I can stay for a few weeks longer if you need my help with something, it''s the least I can do to repay Xuan Hao for saving me." Whispering thest part to herself as she answered Elder Song, Yi Min was more than happy to get an excuse to continue staying inside the Star Shattering Sect for a few weeks longer.


    Not to mention, she would also be able to help out the Star Shattering Sect in the process. Making her feel like she wasn''t just leeching off the Star Shattering Sect during this time!


    Indeed,pared to a certain someone who spent all of their timezing around somewhere in the Shattered Star Peaks while being fed arge number of spirit stones by a group of far too enthusiastic disciples and elders, Yi Min''s mindset was far better¡­


    "Great! If you follow me, I can brief you on the situation and what I need your help with." Knowing very well that his chances of having Yi Min join the Star Shattering Sect would be far lower if she left, Elder Song smiled happily after hearing her agree before taking off in the direction of the Ninth Star Peak.


    "Okay?"


    Leaving behind a confused Yi Min, who soon followed after him, curious about just what Elder Song needed her help with. After all, she was still someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, for him to need her help¡­ It was easy to see that it was not something simple.


    ¡­


    Finding herself outside the Star Shattering Sect only a short timeter together with Elder Song, Yi Min could not help curiously ncing at the group of people who were standing not too far away from the entrance to the city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak.


    From what Elder Song had told her, the group of people were the representatives from the different independent sects of the Sky Empire who hade to seeke to seek the protection of the Star Shattering Sect during the current chaotic time that the Sky Empire was going through. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Although she spent most of her time inside her kingdom and didn''t interact much with the different powers of the Sky Empire, outside of a few special trade agreements concerning the spiritual metal her kingdom produced, she had still heard about the independent sects before. Even if all she had heard was the fact that they existed and were at odds with the different major kingdoms.


    At least from the lineup of at least three people in the Domain Lord Realm in front of her, she could tell that these independent sects weren''t weak by any means. Not that she thought they were weak in the first ce considering that they had managed to stay alive while being hostile towards the major kingdoms of the Sky Empire.


    No matter how tolerant some of the major kingdoms might be, there was no way that they would spare the independent sects if they weren''t strong enough.


    Hm¡­ But, with these independent sects possibly settling down inside the Star Shattering Sect, doesn''t that mean the Star Shattering Sect is going to have to expand their territory to amodate them?


    As she looked at the different representatives, Yi Min suddenly thought about this as a shocked expression appeared on her face.


    Indeed, the current territory of the Star Shattering, although big for an ordinary Domain Lord Realm force in the Sky Empire, the current Star Shattering Sect was still far too small to amodate so many independent sects.


    Meaning¡­ The Star Shattering Sect would have to expand if they wanted to amodate them!


    As she realized this, Yi Min could not help looking towards Elder Song with a somewhat shocked expression on her face, could it be that the reason he wanted her help was to facilitate the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect more easily?


    But as she thought about this, she also soon came to realize that if the Star Shattering Sect wanted to expand enough to amodate so many independent sects, it would end up almost directly bordering her Iron Sky Kingdom. Is the reason why Elder Song asked for my help because he is worried about identally offending me in the future when the Star Shattering Sect ends up bordering my kingdom?


    Feeling confused over just what n Elder Song had in mind, Yi Min decided to just silently wait for him to exin it¡­

 Chapter 1076 Pest Control

    <h4>Chapter 1076 Pest Control</h4>


    As she quietly waited for Elder Song to exin, Yi Min was taken aback as she made her way over to the representatives of the different independent sects together with Elder Song and ended up spending the next few hours listening to Elder Song and the representatives discuss where they would settle and repay the Star Shattering Sect for protecting them.


    During this time, she didn''t have to do anything as Elder Song smoothly negotiated with the representatives from the different independent sects.


    In the end, it was decided that the independent sects would take over arge number of kingdoms all the way to the border of her kingdom and the core territory of the Sky Empire. Making the territory of these kingdoms part of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not only did this give the independent sects more than enough space to settle down, but it also helped the Star Shattering Sect expand towards the core territory of the Sky Empire. Although it would undoubtedly take some time to reintegrate the territory after the situation in the Sky Empire calmed down and the independent sects left.


    As she thought about this to herself, Yi Min could not help turning to look over at Elder Song standing no more than a few meters away from her.


    "Hm¡­?"


    Seeing the happy smile stered all over his old face as he engaged in small talk with the different representatives of the independent sects after the discussion had finished, Yi Min couldn''t shake the feeling that Elder Song wasn''t nning to let the independent sects leave after joining under the banner of the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    But¡­ What is it that he wanted my help with? Subdue the independent sects?


    Feeling even more confused as to what Elder Song wanted her help with as the negation between the independent sects and the Star Shattering Sect ended smoothly without any problems, Yi Min could not stop herself from giving Elder Song a confused look.


    Unfortunately for her, she could only continue staring curiously at Elder Song for the next thirty minutes, as the old man continued chatting with no end in sight. Only when thest of the representatives left did her turn his attention back towards the rather confused Yi Min.


    "Sorry to have kept you waiting like that¡­ I''m sure you are curious as to what I needed your help with, but I couldn''t really say it before I finished up the discussion and made sure that those independent sects were going to help my Star Shattering Sect expand." Showing a somewhat apologetic expression as he said this, Elder Song was only met with the curious expression of Yi Min waiting for him to exin.


    Although she had been left hanging with nothing to do for the past few hours, she didn''t feel mad about it. After all, she had agreed to help out Elder Song and understood that he should have had a reason for taking her along even though she did nothing more than stand around for the past few hours.


    "First of all, the reason I wanted you here during the negotiations with the independent sects is due to your Soul Ascension Realm strength. Showing that the Star Shattering Sect is more than strong enough to protect them even if someone above the Domain Lord Realm appears. After all, Xuan Hao is not around at the moment¡­ And even if he was, I doubt he would join me in standing around to intimidate some representatives from the independent sects¡­"


    "¡­"


    Did he really just have her stand around for the past few hours to intimidate the representatives from the different independent sects? Did those representatives even have the ability to sense that she had reached the Soul Ascension Realm in the first ce?


    Not knowing what to say as she heard this, Yi Min could only stare speechlessly at Elder Song with even more confusion present in her eyes.


    "Ehm¡­ Now, for the more important matter and the main reason why I need your help¡­ The different independent sects are not exactly perfect and contain several spies deeply rooted inside of them belonging to the different major kingdoms and other forces of the Sky Empire.


    Given that you are someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, I thought it would be easy for you to find these spies¡­"


    So, you want me to act as pest control?


    Understanding what Elder Song wanted to say, Yi Mi could not help rolling her eyes. Although it would indeed be easy for her to find the spies lurking inside the different independent sects, it would take her far longer than the few weeks that Elder Song had told her about earlier.


    Not to mention weeks, given that all of these independent sects were located inside the core territory of the Sky Empire, it would be a miracle if she could finish looking through all of them in half a year¡­ And that was not even considering the danger involved in entering the core territory of the Sky Empire at the moment.


    Even though her strength had reached the Soul Ascension Realm, it might help her that much considering that she was quite well known among the Soul Ascension Realm Experts of the surrounding empires as the best cksmith in the Sky Empire. The main problem didn''t stem from this, but the fact that her rtionship with the imperial family was also well known. Even if the imperial family had disappeared, the invading empires would undoubtedly consider her an enemy if they spotted her. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Thinking about it, the only reason why her kingdom had been left alone for now was because the surrounding empires still thought of her as someone in the Domain Lord Realm who didn''t pose any threat to them.


    If they found out about her reaching the Soul Ascension Realm, it was doubtful that her Iron Sky Kingdom would be able to survive for more than a few days¡­


    Because of this, Yi Min could not help shaking her head in response to Elder Song''s request. "Elder Song¡­ This request is a bit much¡­"


    Even if she wanted to repay the kindness shown by the Star Shattering Sect elders, she wouldn''t go as far as to risk her life to investigate a group of independent sects that weren''t even a part of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Maybe if Xuan Hao had been the one to ask, things might be different, but there was no way she would risk her life for a bit of kindness.


    "Senior Yi, you misunderstood me, I don''t want you to go all the way to the core territory of the Sky Empire and search through these independent sects. Instead, I was hoping that you would be able to look through them when they cross through from the core territory of the Sky Empire and enter the border territory." Seeing the visible frown on Yi Min''s face and hearing her outright rejection, Elder Song did his best to hurriedly exin himself in a calm manner.


    "Hm? But why did you ask me if I was avable for the next few weeks? As far as I know, even at their fastest speed, it would at least take another three years for the first independent sect to arrive at the borders of my kingdom and another half year to a year before reaching your sect''s territory¡­"


    "Ah, this¡­ It''s because I wanted to make sure everything was in order and the final parts of the independent sect''s future arrival is in ce."


    "I see¡­" Not fully buying what Elder Song said, Yi Min decided to just nod her head and not think too much about it. Even if Elder Song was very clearly hiding something from her, she felt that it shouldn''t be anything bad. "Hehe, let''s not dwell on these matters any longer, why don''t we head back to the sect for now and continue from where we left off during ourst conversation about the internal management of power struggles between subordinate powers?"


    "Sure, I have been quite curious as to how your Star Shattering Sect does manage the power struggles between your subordinate powers¡­"


    Knowing that Elder Song was trying to change the conversation away from the independent sects and what he needed her help with, Yi Min happily responded as she was of the same mind. Soon resulting in both of them making their way back to the Star Shattering Sect while discussing how to ensure the continued growth of subordinate powers withoutpromising the overall strength of the forces that could be mobilized by the Star Shattering Sect.


    Unknown to Yi Min who was happily enjoying this conversation, she would soon find out why Elder Song asked her to remain in the Star Shattering Sect for a few weeks longer.


    However, that was a story for another time- Or at least until Xuan Hao returned to the sect and found out what had ended up happening¡­

 Chapter 1077 Back in the Blue Sea Empire

    <h4>Chapter 1077 Back in the Blue Sea Empire</h4>


    Returning back to the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao made sure that everything was in order before officially crossing the border and making his way inside the Blue Sea Empire. Not wanting to end up getting stopped by a border guard again. Especially so after learning about the current rtionship between the Blue Sea Empire and the Explorer Union. Once again, making him regret identifying as someone from Explorer Union back then¡­


    Squeak~!


    After crossing the border between the Blue Sea Empire and the Sky Empire, the rabbit demon beast that had remained in a state akin to hibernation inside his robe, emerged and made its way on top of his shoulder as it took in the view whilezily chomping down on a few spirit stones.


    From what it had informed him about through their connection, it had grown bored of just staying inside his robe and had decided toe out to see what was happening. Although nothing much happened, it was at least a nice change of pace for Xuan Hao to have a travelpanion.


    Even if he did in a sense also have this travelpanion for the past two months, it was different having the rabbit demon beast on top of his shoulder curiously looking around while enjoying a few spirit stonepared to it just silently staying inside his robe without showing any sign of existing.


    "Hm? This is¡­"


    However, just as he was lost in his own thoughts, a familiar yet powerful aura rushed over in his direction.


    Whoosh~


    Not a secondter, an all too familiar female cultivator with arge heavy sword on her back appeared in front of him with a mild surprise present in her eyes.


    "Fellow cultivator Bright Sword, I never expected to run into you again so fast¡­ More importantly than that, is the demon beast on your shoulder your contracted demon beast?"


    "Ah? Ah! Yes, it is my contracted demon beast." Taking a few seconds to respond as he remembered that the name he had used when registering with the border guard was Bright Sword, Xuan Hao awkwardly nodded his head. Already guessing that the reason why she had appeared must have been because she had picked up on the rabbit demon beast sitting on his shoulder.


    Although¡­ Last time I visited the Blue Sea Empire, she didn''t notice the presence of the rabbit demon beast. Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao realized that the robe from the elder of the Mirage Sect should be far more powerful than he had first thought. Even having the ability to hide the rabbit demon beast from whatever detection method that the Blue Sea Empire was using to ensure no powerful expert snuck inside their territory without their knowledge.


    Maybe I could also make use of the robe to hide myself from the detection method of the Blue Sea Empire¡­


    "Haaa¡­ And I take it that you aren''t familiar with the Blue Sea Empire''sws regarding bringing demon beasts into the empire?" Not giving Xuan Hao any time to continue his train of thought regarding his growing curiosity towards the true abilities of the robe that the elder from the Mirage Sect had handed over to him before passing away, the border guard let out an audible sigh as she said this.


    "Eh¡­ Sorry¡­" Not knowing what else to say as a somewhat awkward smile made its way to his lips after seeing the annoyed expression on the border guard''s face, Xuan Hao felt that he should really spend some time learning about thews of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even if it ended up taking away some time from his cultivation, it would at least prevent him from getting stopped at the border for a third time in the future. At least he hoped that it would prevent something like that happening again when making his way back to the star Shattering Set in the future.


    "No worries, you just have to make your demon beast do the same thing as you didst time when I registered you. After that, I will ensure that the demon beast is listed as your demon beast. Although¡­ I have to warn you that if your demon beast does something troublesome inside the Blue Sea Empire, you will be held responsible for it."


    Whoosh~


    Wasting no time after finishing her short exnation, she took out the artifact that she had used to record his aura a few months earlier and signaled for him to get the rabbit demon beast to touch it so its aura could be recorded.


    Squeak? Not knowing what was happening as it felt both Xuan Hao and the border guard staring at it, the rabbit demon beast lifted its head up with a spirit stone still half inside its small mouth.


    ""¡­""


    In the end, Xuan Hao decided to just lift the rabbit off his shoulder and ce its paw on top of the artifact as its aura was recorded before cing it back down on his shoulder. During which the rabbit demon beast just stared at him strangely with the spirt stone slowly disappearing inside its mouth during the process. Not understanding why Xuan Hao had suddenly lifted it up and ced its paw on the strange artifact.


    Even if it wanted to question him after being ced back on the shoulder again, it was stopped when Xuan Hao handed over a small interspatial ring filled with spirit stones to it¡­


    "Quite an interesting demon beast you have¡­ I will have to get back to my duties, so I won''t be staying any longer." Feeling a bit surprised by the odd behavior of the rabbit demon beast as she said this, the border guard didn''t bother staying any longer now that she had finished recording the aura of the unfamiliar demon beast she had sensed-


    Whoosh-!


    Disappearing before Xuan Hao had a chance to respond to what she said.


    Even if she would normally have to punish or fine Xuan Hao for bringing in a demon beast without first registering it, she didn''t have any ns of starting a conflict with someone she perceived to have possibly reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    In her eyes, it was far better to not cause trouble and instead have a friendly rtionship with someone like that. After all, even if she was someone from the blue Sea Empire, she also understood that it was best not to make any unnecessary enemies.


    Not to mention, Xuan Hao hadn''t really done anything hostile against the Blue Sea Empire and was just unfamiliar with thews of the Blue Sea Empire¡­


    Squeak~!


    Breaking the silence that had emerged following the border guard abruptly leaving, the rabbit demon beast began to happily devour the spirit stones inside the interspatial ring. Not showing the slightest bit of care towards what was happening around it.


    In the eyes of the rabbit demon beast, the most important thing at this moment was to test out the new spirt stones that Xuan Hao had given it.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head as he decided to continue deeper inside the Blue Sea Empire. Heading directly towards the massive city located not too far away from the border that he had visited in the past.


    Even if a part of him was not too keen on visiting a ce with someone in the Earth Immortal Realm present, he also understood that his best chance at getting information on possible locations that could help himprehend his sixth Dao would be there. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Hopefully, the ces he would have to go wasn''t somewhere even deeper inside the Blue Sea Empire. In the best-case scenario, it would be one of the other empires bordering the Blue Sea Empire.


    After all, even though the Blue Sea Empire held far better opportunities for him to improve his strength, he also understood that the danger would be far higher¡­ And that was not even mentioning that he might end up unlucky and get caught in the middle of a battle between two Earth Immortal Realm Experts¡­


    Given his past experience with the snake demon beast and the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Blue Sea Empire during his first unintentional visit to the Blue Sea Empire, he didn''t feel like the chances of something like this happening was low.


    On the other hand, considering that he now knew that therge river flowing out into the ocean from the ind sea at the core of the Blue Sea Empire contained ancient demon beast that had been hibernating for who knew how long, he had a feeling that the chance of encountering another Earth Immortal Realm level battle wasn''t low!


    As he thought about all of this along with how to deal with such a situation if it ended up happening, Xuan Hao managed to reach the massive city by the time the sun went down and the moon began ascending from the east.

 Chapter 1078 Branch of the Blue Sea Empire’s Intelligence Department

    <h4>Chapter 1078 Branch of the Blue Sea Empire''s Intelligence Department</h4>


    Different from the first time he had visited the city, Xuan Hao clearly sensed that the Earth Immortal Realm Expert that should have been from the Explorer Union inside the city was nowhere. Not only that, but he also noticed that the Earth Immortal that the border guard had told him guarded the city and whom he had seen fighting the giant snake demon beast in the past was also nowhere to be seen.


    From the looks of things, the Earth Immortal Realm Expert in charge of protecting the city should still be dealing with the snake demon beast. Making him curious about just how far away the Sky Empire was from the ocean.


    After all, the snake demon beast''s goal was to escape to the ocean¡­ And given the speed of someone in the Earth Immortal Realm and the fact that over two months had passed since then, it was obvious that the ocean should be farther away from the Sky Empire than he had first thought.


    Of course, there was also the possibility that the snake demon beast found it impossible to escape into the ocean and instead escaped somewhere else to hide away from the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts chasing after it.


    On the other hand, he had no idea why the Earth Immortal Realm Expert that he guessed to be from the Explorer Union had left the city.


    But¡­ No matter what the case was, it at least meant that he didn''t have to worry about any Earth Immortal Realm Experts during his time inside the city. Making him feel far more at easepared to the first time he visited the city.


    At least this time around, he felt that he could explore the city without fearing running into an Earth Immortal Realm cultivator or more realistically, offending someone rted to one of the Earth Immortal Realm Experts inside the city.


    Feeling far more rxed than before, Xuan Hao wasted no time in asking a few of the locals about where it would be best to get information and to his shock, he found out that the best location for information was not the Explorer Union branch located inside the city. Instead, it was the city hall located at the center of the city.


    Apparently, when it came to information inside and surrounding the Blue Sea Empire, the Explorer Union had no way topare with the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even if the Explorer Union had been better when it came to this sort of thing in the past, it was obvious that them being partly blocked from the Blue Sea Empire had weakened their influence in this part of the continent severely.


    Not only that, but when trying to ask the locals about the Explorer Union, it was rather obvious that they weren''t too keen on talking about them. Making it clear that the hostility towards the Explorer Union didn''t juste from the imperial family of the Blue Sea Empire, but also the normal people below them.


    I wonder what caused the ordinary citizen to not like the Explorer Union¡­


    As he thought about this to himself while making his way towards the city hall at the center of the city, Xuan Hao could not help ncing towards the branch from the Explorer Union that was located not too far away from the center where he had sensed the Earth Immortal Realm Expert thest time, he had visited the city.


    From a nce, it was not even a branch of the Explorer Union like he had been told before, but instead just arge treasure hall for exchanging and buying different artifacts and other useful things for cultivation.


    Even if it had been called a branch of the Explorer Union by quite a few people he had talked to since entering the city, it was obvious that this was not the case.


    Considering that the Explorer Union should still not be allowed to have any branch inside the Blue Sea Empire due to their past actions, Xuan Hao also felt a sense of relief after confirming that it was just a treasure hall. Not because he had anything against the Explorer Union, but because he was happy that the information Yi Min had given him seemed to match up with the current situation in the Blue Sea Empire.


    That was¡­ If one didn''t mention the fact that the ordinary citizen also seemed to be hostile towards the Explorer Union.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao suppressed the curious part of himself that wanted to explore the treasure hall of the Explorer Union and instead made his way towards arge pceplex covering an area the size of a city on its own.


    "ce your hand here."


    Following the stream of people entering the pceplex that housed the governmental buildings of the city, Xuan Hao didn''t think too much as he ced his hand on the all too familiar strange artifact after being asked to do so by one of the guards standing at the entrance to the pceplex.


    "Hm?! Explorer Union!?"


    "Is something wrong?" Hearing the sudden exmation from the guard as he rummaged through his information, Xuan Hao could not help feeling like something bad was going to happen as he asked this.


    Although he had expected his identity as someone from the Explorer Union would be bad inside the Blue Sea Empire, he had never expected such a reaction from the guard after looking through his information. Especially so after his rtively peaceful encounters with the border guard.


    "You-"


    Whoosh~!


    Just as the guard was about to say something, his colleague grabbed him by the shoulder and pointed towards something on the strange device.


    "Ah¡­"


    Not a secondter, the guard''s face went pale as he began trembling fearfully. Not daring to say a single word as he nced towards his colleague for help.


    "Excuse my friend''s behavior just now, you can continue inside."


    "No problem¡­"


    Not knowing what had happened, Xuan Hao just nodded his head and made his way inside the pceplex where several different buildings for the different departments in charge of managing the city were located.


    "You idiot! Didn''t I tell you that we can only turn away those from the Explorer Union at the Domain Lord Realm and below!? What in the world gave you the courage to try and turn away someone in the Soul Ascension. Not only that, but someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm!?"


    "I-I''m sorry senior! I just got used to-"


    Smack!


    "Hmph! Don''t try and make excuses! Even if our Blue Sea Empire is at odds with the Explorer Union, it won''t be good for us to directly offend a powerful existence from the Explorer Union. After all, even if we are at peace at the moment, someone like that would be able to easily get rid of two Domain Lords like us without anyone finding out!"


    "Sorry¡­"


    Not too long after Xuan Hao left, the slightly more experienced guard wasted no time in scolding his junior.


    Even if they were guards of the town hall and belonged to the Blue Sea Empire, it didn''t mean that they could just go around offending anyone they liked. Even more so when it came to experts in the Soul Ascension Realm and above.


    After all, they might end up unlucky enough to encounter a solitary expert who didn''t care about the Blue Sea Empire and decided to kill them before leaving and never return again.


    Considering the strength of the border guards, someone who could do this would at least have to be in the Soul Ascension Realm, hence the reason why these guards would try their best to avoid offending anyone in the Soul Ascension Realm¡­


    At the same time that the newer guard was in the process of being scolded by his senior, Xuan Hao arrived in front of a rtively small building located at the far north of the pceplex.


    The reason why he hade to the pceplex was none other than this small and rather inconspicuous building.


    "Blue Sea Empire, intelligence department." Reading the words on the sign above the entrance to the small building, Xuan Hao didn''t hesitate as he made his way inside. Soon finding himself face to face with a rather exhausted looking woman who looked to be in her early twenties. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Is there anything I can help with? If you are here from the central department, please inform them that we have already submitted the required-"


    "Ehm¡­ I''m not here for that, I''m here to buy information." Interrupting the woman who looked like she was about to turn around and leave after she finished talking, Xuan Hao felt her suddenly narrow her eyes as she scanned him from head to toe.


    "You want to buy information? Haaa¡­ And here I thought it was something from the central departmenting toin again¡­ Follow me and we will talk about it in a private room¡­" Hearing her let out a sigh of relief as she said this before signaling for him to follow, Xuan Hao decided to just remain silent as he followed her into a private room located at the back of the building.


    To his shock, he discovered that outside the exhausted looking woman, there were only a few dozen people inside the building. All of them buried inrge stacks of paper as they used their divine sense to rapidly scan through all of them and note down anything of importance.

 Chapter 1079 Buying Information

    <h4>Chapter 1079 Buying Information</h4>


    "So, what is it that you want to know? For your information, we don''t sell any information rted to the imperial family or any of the Blue Sea Empire''s Earth Immortal Realm Experts. If we did something like that, I doubt the imperial family would allow our information department to exist in the first ce¡­


    Ah, I also have to remind you that the minimum price we take is around a thousand spirit stones. Even if the thing you want to know about is the color of the carpet at the entrance to the main pce." Sitting down as she said this, the woman stretched out her hand with a small smile on her face. Showing very clearly that he would first have to pay the minimum price before they continued.


    Rustle~


    Not feeling that there was anything wrong with this, Xuan Hao casually took out a thousand spirit stones and handed them to her. Given his current level of wealth, it wasn''t really a problem to take out a thousand spirit stone.


    On the other hand, he had enough spirit stones on him to supply the entire Star Shattering Sect for a few years. Although it might not sound like too much, it should be known that the daily expenditure of the Star Shattering Sect when it came to spirit stones had already reached the tens of thousands and was only looking like it was going to get more expensive in the future.


    If not for the fact that the Star Shattering Sect now controlled hundreds of spirit stones mines after their recent expansion, it would have been impossible to keep up with the current consumption speed of the sect¡­


    "Thank you~"


    Smiling happily as she pulled the spirit stones inside her interspatial ring, she seemed to recover some of her energy before she turned to look at Xuan Hao. Patiently waiting for him to tell her what information he wanted.


    "I want to know about locations that have opportunities forprehending a Dao inside of them. Preferably outside the Blue Sea Empire." Sitting down as well as he said this, Xuan Hao kept his eyes on the woman in front of him to observe her expression for any changes after he mentioned what he wanted to know about.


    After all, locations that could help someoneprehend the Dao were not easy toe by. Even inside arge empire like the Blue Sea Empire, it would still be hard to find somewhere where one couldprehend the Dao without it already being under the control of the Blue Sea Empire.


    This was also one of the main reasons why he asked for it to preferably be somewhere outside the Blue Sea Empire as he understood it would be hard for him to gain ess to the ces under the control of the Blue Sea Empire. Especially so considering his current identity being that of someone from the Explorer Union.


    "ces toprehend the Dao¡­ Depending on his rtionship with the Blue Sea Empire, he might be able to gain ess to some of the locations where the children-." Muttering this to herself, the woman suddenly froze as she seemingly remembered Xuan Hao specify it to be somewhere outside the Blue Sea Empire if possible.


    "Given that, he likely doesn''t have the best rtionship with the imperial family¡­ As for locations outside the Blue Sea Empire¡­ That is a bit difficult, and I will have to look through a few documents and see if I can find anything¡­"


    Going quiet all of a sudden upon realizing that she would have to look through quite a few documents to find the relevant information, the woman let out quiet sigh before abruptly standing up from her chair. "Wait here for a moment, I will be back in a few minutes!"


    Swish~


    And before Xuan Hao had time to say anything, she disappeared out of the private room. Unaware of the fact that she had voiced her thoughts in her obviously still exhausted state.


    "This¡­"


    Being left alone, Xuan Hao could only smile wryly as he began wondering just what had caused her to be so exhausted that she voiced her thoughts without even realizing it.


    All things considered; she was still someone in the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    In the end, Xuan Hao ended up waiting around inside the private room for a little over an hour before the woman returned with a half-dead expression on her face and arge stack of documents under her arm. Almost looking like she would copse at any moment.


    "Sorry, it took a little longer than expected to find the information. Now, let''s discuss the price. Depending on the level of the location, the price will increase. The lowest being around ten thousand low quality spirit stones, while the highest is a little over half a million top grade spirit stones. Other than that, you can also pay with source crystal. Of course, we will pay above the current standard price for source crystals if you have any."


    "¡­"


    Hearing what she said, Xuan Hao could not help feeling his heart drop. Even if his current wealth was quite good for someone of his strength, it was nowhere near the level of being capable of taking out half a million top grade spirit stones to pay for some information, let alone source crystals!


    It had to be said that top grade spirit stones were essentially the tier of spirit stones above high-quality spirit stones and were normally used by those in the Soul Ascension Realm and above. Even a single top grade spirit stone was worth over a hundred high quality spirit stones.


    Even after everything he had been through, the number of high-quality spirit stones that he had didn''t number more than a few thousand. At most enough to exchange for a dozen or so top-grade spirit stones.


    As for using source crystals¡­ that was even more out of the question!


    Having personally experienced how useful source crystals were for increasingprehension during his breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, he could never imagine himself using something that precious to exchange for a bit of information¡­


    "Is something wrong?"


    "No, I want to exchange information for a location worth a thousand high-quality spirit stones." Seeing the slightly confused expression that had made its way onto the woman''s face, Xuan Hao quickly shook his head and took out a thousand high-quality spirit stones.


    Even if it was arge chunk of his current wealth, he didn''t feel like it would be wasteful as it could in a sense be considered an investment inprehending his sixth Dao. Of course, there was also the fact that high-quality spirit stones weren''t really that useful for him after he broke through to the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    If he wanted to use spirit stones to increase his cultivation speed, he would have to use top-grade spirit stones, something that he had yet to encounter during his time in the Sky Empire.


    "A thousand high-quality spirit stones¡­ Hm¡­ Ah! Found one." Rummaging through therge stack of documents that she had carried in with her after swiftly storing the spirit stones away inside her interspatial ring, she soon handed over a document to Xuan Hao.


    "Hm?"


    Seeing the document in front of him, Xuan Hao epted it before curiously reading through it. Wondering what kind of location, a thousand high-quality spirit stones had managed to buy him.


    "A location that contains both the Dao of Illusions, the Dao of Mist and the Dao of Mirages!?" not able to stop himself from eximing in surprise after seeing that the location in question not only contained one, but three different Daos, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that the thousand high-quality spirit stones were well spent.


    Even if he had difficultyprehending one of these Daos, he would always be able to try one of the other two. No matter what, Xuan Hao didn''t believe that he would be unable toprehend one of the three. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Huh¡­?"


    However, as he continued reading through the description of the location, his happy expression soured as he realized that the location was inside the Blue Sea Empire.


    Although it was nowhere near the ind sea where the capital city of the Blue Sea Empire was located, it was still far further insidepared to where he was at the moment.


    The only positive thing was that the description of the special location clearly described that the ce had not yet been explored by anyone before and had only recently been registered with the intelligence department a few years ago without anyone having bought the information on it yet.


    "Looks like you are satisfied with the information, with this, the transaction can be consideredpleted." Not caring about Xuan Hao''s inner thoughts as he finished reading through the document, the woman just stood up with a happy smile after seeing he had finished reading through the document before signaling for him to leave.

 Chapter 1080 Chun Hua, Primveal Jungle and Old Teleportation Formation

    <h4>Chapter 1080 Chun Hua, Primveal Jungle and Old Teleportation Formation</h4>


    Not knowing how to feel about being shooed away, Xuan Hao decided to just silently ept it and make his way out of the intelligence department.


    For some reason, he had a feeling that the intelligence department of the Blue Sea Empire wouldn''t refund him if the location they provided contained Daos that he had alreadyprehended. Thinking about it, it was his own fault for not first specifying that the locations shouldn''t contain certain Daos¡­


    Stepping back out of the intelligence department only a little over an hour since he had first entered it, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he looked back through the entrance and managed to catch a glimpse of the young woman who had given him the information happily jumping around the room with the interspatial ring filled with high-quality spirit stones inside of it.


    "Haha! I struck it rich! ording to official policy, I get to keep an entire 10% as amission fee!"


    "¡­"


    Barely managing to catch what she was saying to herself as she jumped around happily, Xuan Hao could only roll his eyes as he began making his way out of the pceplex.


    Considering just how precious one hundred high-quality spirit stones was to someone in the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao didn''t feel the slightest bit surprised over the happy exmations of the young woman from the Blue Sea Empire''s intelligence department. On the other hand, it made him feel that she was more normalpared to the exhausted state he had first seen her in.


    Although it wasn''t out of the ordinary for normal people to be that exhausted after a day of hard work managing mountains of paperwork, the same could not be said for a cultivator. Especially someone who had reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    The only way someone like that could get that exhausted from just paperwork was if they used their divine sense for days without rest¡­ And so far, the only person Xuan Hao had seen do something like that before today was Elder Song!


    For the Blue Sea Empire to also have people like Elder Song, it was easy to see why the Blue Sea Empire was considered one of the pinnacle powers on the continent.


    Although¡­


    He had a feeling that the people he had seen inside the intelligence department were driven by something different than the continued growth of the Blue Sea Empire¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao made his way out of the pceplex.


    However before leaving, he could not help taking a few nces at the main impressive pce located at the center where the Earth Immortal Realm Expert, he had seen fighting the snake demon beast in the past, should be staying in the process.


    Even if the Earth Immortal Realm Expert in question was nowhere to be seen, his presence still lingered around the pce itself. Scaring off anyone daring enough to approach.


    If not for the fact that his current strength had reached the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he felt that even looking at the pce would be enough to cause a shiver to run down his spine.


    At least at his current cultivation realm, the Earth Immortal Realm Expert needed to be present for something like that to happen...


    Leaving the pceplex, Xuan Hao didn''t stay inside the city for long before officially beginning his journey towards the special location that contained a chance for him toprehend a new Dao. Not wanting to stay too long as the Earth Immortal Realm Experts currently missing from the city might end up returning at any time.


    Unfortunately, although the special location was not located close to the ind sea where the Blue Sea Empire''s core of power was located, it was still far away from the border between the Blue Sea Empire and the Sky Empire. Even with his current strength, it would at least take him a month to reach¡­ And that was if nothing happened along the way.


    Compared to the border part of the Blue Sea Empire that he was in at the moment; the special location could be considered to be at the inner section of the Blue Sea Empire ording to the information recorded in the document that the woman from the intelligence department had given him.


    Although not the core of the Blue Sea Empire, it could still be considered to be part of the continent''s central region.


    With this in mind, this would be his first time entering the core of the continent. If one didn''t count the time that he had identally ended up inside the primeval jungle.


    The ce he ended up inside the primeval jungle might not be a true part of the central region, but it shouldn''t be anywhere less dangerous given what he had ended up encountering back then.


    "Hm? Now that I think about it, I wonder what ended up happening to Chun Hua." Remembering the young girl that he had considered taking as his third disciple back then, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what had ended up happening to her.


    Given the sheer size of the primeval jungle, it should take her years to cross it and reach the core region of the continent. Even with her strength at the Nascent Soul Realm, she might still not have managed to reach the core region of the continent to this day.


    If not for the fact that he could sense that she was still alive through the part of his domain that he had left inside her soul back then, he might have thought that she would have ended up dead inside the primeval jungle long ago.


    After all, even when he had been in the Domain Lord Realm back then, he couldn''t move around for long before being forced to run for his life.


    "Now that I think about it, from what I remember, her race should be rted to nature in some way. Maybe she could use this to her advantage inside the primeval jungle¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while flying alongside the massive river leading him deeper inside the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao felt even more curious than he had in the past about Chun Hua''s race.


    In the future, if he had a chance to take her in as his disciple, he would make sure to find out just what race she belonged to. Not only to satisfy his own curiosity, but also to help his future disciple gain a better understanding of her own abilities and heritage.


    At the same time, it might also shed some light over the reason why she had to hide her special race in fear of others hunting her down.


    Asking around for information about the Chun Family during his time in the core region of the continent might not be a bad idea either. Maybe he would even be able to find out where it was that his future disciple was worried about and help her out.


    The only problem was¡­ Even after hearing about the Blue Sea Empire and the surrounding empires and powers from Yi Min, he had never heard about the primeval jungle. Making him realize that the primeval jungle that his future disciple was trying to cross through to reach the central region was nowhere near the Blue Sea Empire. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao felt like he would have to reevaluate the teleportation formation back at the Half Spirit Race''s old home again. After all, there was no way the teleportation formation he had examined back then had the strength to move someone over such a massive distance.


    It might have barely been eptable if the primeval jungle was located somewhere close to the Blue Sea Empire and not too far away from the Star Shattering Sect, but any further than that would be unrealistic with what he had seen from his short examination of the teleportation formation back then.


    Now that he hadprehended the Dao of Space and even reached the Small Sess Realm in it, he was even more clear of just how difficult it would be to teleport someone over such a great distance in such a short period of time.


    Even if he personally reached the Large Sess in the Dao of Space and his cultivation reached the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he doubted that he would be able to do the same as the rundown teleportation formation that had looked like it was about to break apart at any moment¡­


    "Well¡­ One more thing to do after I return to the sect¡­" Shaking his head as he realized this, Xuan Hao decided to throw it to the back of his mind for now as he continued following the river upstream. Part of him wondering if he should take some time to visit the intelligence department of the Blue Sea Empire again on his way back.

 Chapter 1081 Wave From Upstream

    <h4>Chapter 1081 Wave From Upstream</h4>


    Following the river upstream for the next few weeks, Xuan Hao encountered several different towns and cities along the way. Although smaller than the city he had visited close to the border and the absence of anyone in the Earth Immortal Realms, these cities and towns were by no means small and weak.


    On the other hand, even the weakest town had someone in the Soul Ascension Realm watching over it. The stronger cities on the other hand at least had a dozen Soul Ascension Realm Experts present inside them with one expert at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm from the Blue Sea Empire watching over the city.


    Just the Soul Ascension Realm Experts present in a single city of the Blue Sea Empire''s border region was more than powerful enough to tten the current Sky Empire!


    Even if the ancestor of the Sky Empire''s imperial family was still around with his guardian formation and all the Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the Sky Empire worked together, they would still not be able to stand against the dozen or so Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    After all, outside of there being a lot of them, their average strength was far above the Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the Sky Empire, who were mostly between the First and Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Not to mention, there was still a Peak Soul Ascension Realm Expert, who was more than strong enough to destroy the Sky Empire by himself!


    All of this was more than enough to solidify just how strong the blue Sea Empire was¡­ And the worst part was that this was only the outer region of the empire. Still far away from the Blue Sea Empire''s core of power.


    "I wonder if I will start to encounter Earth Immortal Realm Experts after reaching the cities in the inner region¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced down towards a rtivelyrge town by the side of the massive river, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of unease.


    After all, he had not even entered the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire and had already encountered so many Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    If things continued like that, it would only make sense for him to encounter Earth Immortal Realm Experts after reaching the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire, something that he wanted to avoid given his current strength being nowhere near strong enough to contend against someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    At the moment, the best he could do was take advantage of his Dao of Space to run away before the other party had the time to attack.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao continued his journey upstream. ording to what he knew, he should be reaching the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire soon-


    Rumble-!


    Having only just turned his attention away from the small town below him, a loud rumbling sound suddenly echoed out upstream.


    RUMBLE-!


    Not even a few secondster, an even more terrifying sound could be heard as what could only be described as a wave of water the height of a small mountain appeared in the distance before rapidly approaching his current location at a speed that even someone in the Soul Ascension Realm would find it hard to match.


    Even standing more than a thousand meters above the ground, it was only barely enough to stay above the top of the enormous wave of water¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that the wave of water seemed to be strengthened by the Dao of Water.


    Even with his current strength, he had a feeling that it would be difficult to face the wave of water head on. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Wha-what in the world is that?!"


    Given how loud the rumbling sounds earlier were and the fact that it was quite hard to miss the wave the size of a mountain range moving towards them, it did not take long before the people in the town below him realized that danger was approaching¡­


    "A mountain range- Huh? I-is that mountain range moving closer or is it just me?"


    "That is-!? I-I-I don''t want to die like this!"


    "Me too! Let''s run away while we still have time!"


    "Hmph! Given the speed of that wave, only someone in the Soul Ascension Realm would be able to do something like that¡­"


    "T-then¡­ Maybe we can hide underground and try to keep the water out with a formation instead of facing it head on¡­"


    As everyone in the city below began panicking upon realizing that the enormous wave of water was approaching them, the town lord in charge of protecting the town had other ns-


    "What a terrifying use of the Dao of Water, I can''t deal with something like that with my strength! I have to get out of here!"


    Whoosh-!


    And before any of the other people in the town had the time to fullyprehend the danger of the current situation, the town lord who had been put in charge of the town by the Blue Sea Empire to ensure the town''s continued survival and growth. Disappeared without a trace.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao felt a sense of admiration for the town lord. Not because he had abandoned his town and the people inside of it, but because he had been able to urately perceive that the wave had been strengthened by the Dao of Water.


    Even for him, it was quite hard to pick up on this, let alone for someone who was only in the earlier stages of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Of course, after understanding that the wave of water had been strengthened by the Dao of Water, the town lord also understood that he would only end up dying if he decided to continue staying inside the town and try to protect it.


    "Hm¡­ I wonder where this wave of water came from. Given the strength behind it, it should have either been created by a Peak Soul Ascension Realm Expert specializing in the Dao of Water or¡­" Stopping midsentence as he thought about the second possibility, Xuan Hao could not help feeling an urge to turn around and escape in the direction he hade from.


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    Swish-!


    However, before he had a chance to decide on what to do, a terrifying explosion echoed out from upstream. Followed by something passing through the wave and flying over the town at a speed that even made it difficult for him to perceive what it was-


    BANG!


    Smashing into the ground only a few thousand meters away from the town filled with terrified people.


    "This is¡­"


    Seeing "what" had smashed into the ground in front of the town, Xuan Hao froze for a second as he realized that the second possibility hade true!


    Whoosh-!


    Wasting no time after realizing this, Xuan Hao directly used the Dao of Space to escape in the direction leading away from the river. After all, the thing that hadnded on the other side of the town just so happened to be blocking his escape path downstream¡­


    "Ahhh! How dare you attack me inside the Blue Sea Empire!?"


    Not even a second after Xuan Hao escaped from the town with the help of the Dao of Space, a terrifying roar filled with killing intent echoed out from the ce that the "thing" hadnded. Making it clear that it wasn''t a thing, but instead a person who had been knocked through the wave of water.


    Swish-!


    Wasting no time following the loud roar, the person who hadnded just outside the town jumped into the air before rushing back in the direction he hade from. In the process of doing this, he passed through the wave again-


    WHOOSH-!


    The only difference was that this time around, his terrifying qi tore apart the wave of water the size of a mountain range, causing it to copse in on itself. Losing any of the power it had before.


    "We are saved!"


    "Thank you senior!"


    "Ah! The great immortals blessed us!"


    Although arge amount of water was still heading towards the town at this moment, it was far from strong enough to pose any threat to the city without being strengthened by the Dao of Water. Resulting in the people of the town began happily celebrating as they thanked the senior who had destroyed the wave of water and saved them.


    Indeed, it was as I feared¡­ A battle between Earth Immortal Realm cultivators! The wave should just have been created during their fight inside or around the river¡­


    Having already created a ratherrge distance between himself and the town at this point in time, Xuan Hao looked back at the wave of water that was still in the process of copsing.


    Although he had expected to encounter someone at the Earth Immortal Realm after entering the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire, he had never expected to run into a battle between two Earth Immortal Realm cultivators!

 Chapter 1082 Crazy Earth Immortal Realm Experts, a True Fight to the Death!

    <h4>Chapter 1082 Crazy Earth Immortal Realm Experts, a True Fight to the Death!</h4>


    ?


    Boom!


    Hearing the sound of the battle between what he assumed to be the Earth Immortal who had crashed into the ground a short distance away from the town and the Earth Immortal Realm Expert who should have been responsible for knocking him into the ground, Xuan Hao decided to take the long way around the ce where the battle was taking ce.


    Although he could not see the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts in question, he didn''t want to, as it would mean that they would also be able to notice him¡­ And such a situation might end up causing him to get involved in their fight.


    Not so much because they would want to involve him, but because one of the two people had tantly attacked someone from the Blue Sea Empire inside of their territory and undoubtedly wanted no one to spread the news. At least that was what he could conclude about the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts from the loud roar that the person who hadnded beside the town had made before rushing back to continue the battle.


    Escaping from the Blue Sea Empire the way he hade from was also an option, but after thinking it through, he realized that he would never reach his location if he ended up running away every time, he encountered someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    After all, just from the fact that he had already encountered two at the border between the inner region and the outer region of the Blue Sea Empire, it was obvious that he would encounter far more of them in the future.


    With this in mind, he instead came to the decision of just keeping his distance whenever encountering someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Of course, that didn''t mean rapidly escaping whenever he saw someone in the Earth Immortal Realm as that might end up drawing unwanted attention instead of helping him stay out of view of these experts.


    The only reason he had done so this time around was because the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts in question were already busy fighting with each other and didn''t have time to pay attention to anyone trying to run away from their battle.


    Even if he had used the Dao of Space and escaped at a speed far greater than what was possible by someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, it was clear that none of the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts had noticed this due having their full attention focused on each other. Different from what would happen in case he ended up running into an Earth Immortal Realm Expert inside a city or just someone who weren''t putting their life on the line for a battle to the death like the one that was taking ce not too far away from him¡­


    Thinking about it as he moved around the ce that the battle was taking ce, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit curious as to what had ended up causing these two Earth Immortals to enter a life and death battle.


    All things considered, one of them was after all from the Blue Sea Empire and should be able to just run away and wait for reinforcements, there was no need for him to stay around and continue fighting to the death¡­ And although he had no idea about the identity of the second Earth Immortal Realm Expert, he understood that the best course of action for this person would be to escape from the Blue Sea Empire as fast as possible.


    After all, even if he did end up victorious at the end of the battle, he would undoubtedly end up in a weakened state. Giving the reinforcements from the Blue Sea Empire more than enough time to catch up with him and kill him before he had a chance to escape from the Blue Sea Empire.


    The only way he could safely escape in this kind of situation, would be through the use of a teleportation talisman¡­ And even then, he might still not be safe depending on whether or not someone skilled in the Dao of Space was among the reinforcements and decided to chase after him through the spatial traces left behind by using a teleportation talisman. Simr to how he had ended up at the Blue Sea Empire when chasing after the core disciple of the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    "No matter what, it seems like a bad option for both of them to continue fighting like this¡­"


    Concluding that it was indeed a battle without any value to continue, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if there was something he was not thinking about, like a personal grudge or a precious ancient relic of some kind that might be the reason behind the fight continuing.


    "DIIIIE!"


    BOOOOOOM-! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Just at this moment, a loud roar filled with killing intent echoed out from the direction of the battle between the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts. Followed by an evenrge explosionpared to before, causing even Xuan Hao standing far away from the battle to stop and use his domain to protect himself from the residual energy from the powerful attack.


    If not for the fact that the battle itself had moved further in the direction of the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire over the past few minutes, the residual energy from the attack just now would undoubtedly have ttened the town that had just managed to escape death not too long ago.


    Although, considering the strength of the residual energy, some of it should still have reached the town¡­ And considering that the Soul Ascension Realm Expert who was tasked with guarding the town had already run away, it was doubtful whether or not the Domain Lord Realm Experts still left in the city would be able to resist the small bit of residual energy that reached them¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about the fate of the town that had encountered one disaster after the other, Xuan Hao turned his attention back on the ce where the fight between the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts was taking ce.


    In spite of the fact that he couldn''t observe the battle due to being too far away, he could still sense the state of the battle to some extent through terrifying energy fluctuations that happened whenever they shed with each other.


    It was through this that he was able to clearly sense the strength of both Earth Immortals rapidly decreasing following the big sh just now. Showing that they had both exhausted a ratherrge part of their strength in the terrifying sh earlier.


    "Huh?"


    As he slowly continued to make his way around the battlefield between the two, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on the spot when he suddenly sensed the strength used by the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts decreasing all the way down to the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    What in the world are those two thinking¡­ For their strength to decrease to such a degree, did they perhaps use a forbidden technique to burn their lifespan and enhance their strength earlier and are currently suffering from the side effects?


    Feeling a sense of bewilderment over the situation as he thought about this, Xuan Hao continued looking in the direction of the two Earth Immortals whose strength was now in the process of dropping from the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm to that of a normal Sixth Tribtion Soul Ascension Realm Expert.


    Even if they were fighting to the death for some kind of precious artifact or opportunity to increase their strength, it shouldn''t be to the degree that they would sacrifice their own lifespan and cultivation base.


    No matter how great the opportunity might be, doing this would give some of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had drawn over and were observing the fight a chance to go for this opportunity as well.


    "If that''s the case, the only reason I can think about behind all of this is a personal grudge. Nothing else would justify this kind of self-destructive behavior¡­" Muttering this to himself as he concluded the reason behind the fight between the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts, Xuan Hao felt far more at easepared to before.


    Not only because the two were clearly not interested in anything other than killing each other, but also because their strength was no longer at a level where it posed a threat to him. On the other hand, if they continued like this, he might be strong enough to kill both of them by himself¡­


    Of course, he didn''t dare to do something like that. Even if the treasures and wealth of an Earth Immortal Realm Expert might be tempting, one of them was still from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Not to mention, arge number of Soul Ascension Realm Experts had already started to appear around the ce where the battle was taking ce, some who were almost certainly here for that exact reason and wouldn''t allow anyone to seed before them¡­

 Chapter 1083 Death of An Earth Immortal

    <h4>Chapter 1083 Death of An Earth Immortal</h4>


    Seeing a few of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had begun to appear also start eying him up, Xuan Hao increased his speed as he continued moving around the edge of the battle. Doing his best to avoid any of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts along the way, while also making sure to keep an eye on the situation taking ce between the two Earth Immortal Realm cultivators.


    Although the battle had not ended, it was obvious that the presence of the Earth Immortal, who should be from the Blue Sea Empire, weakened at a far faster speedpared to his opponent.


    Even worse for him, it looked like none of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts present had any intention of jumping in to help. Having judged it to not be worth it to risk their lives to join the battle at this point in time.


    After all, when everything was said and done, the two people fighting were still Earth Immortal Realm Experts. Even if their current strength was nowhere near that level at the moment, they had no idea if the person attacking the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Blue Sea Empire still had some trump cards left that would allow him to recover his strength¡­


    However, as the strength of the two people grew weaker with each passing second, the Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had been observing the fight from far away began to slowly move closer.


    Whoosh~


    Knowing that things were about to get chaotic and other Earth Immortal Realm Experts were bound to show up at any point in time, Xuan Hao didn''t care about all of this as he focused his attention on using his movement technique to weave in between the now close to a fifty Soul Ascension Realm Experts gathered around the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts.


    Soon managing to safely reach the other side of the battle. Officially stepping into the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even then, Xuan Hao didn''t slow down as he followed the river deeper into the inner region. Not daring to stop for a second before he was certain that he was outside the area that would be affected by the uing brawl, that was bound to happen when the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts grew weak enough for the surrounding Soul Ascension Realm Experts to build up the courage needed to join the battle.


    At that point in time, it wouldn''t matter if he wanted to join the battle or not, he would likely still end up being drawn in by someone viewing him as a threat.


    "Aaaaahhh!!"


    For this reason, Xuan Hao could not help feeling his heart drop as he heard a painful scream echo out behind him as the presence belonging to the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Blue Sea Empire disappeared without a trace.


    The Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire died¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine. Not because it was the first time, he had seen someone in the Earth Immortal Realm die, but because it gave all of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts surrounding the ce where the two Earth Immortals had been fighting a good reason to attack.


    No longer would they worry about a possible retaliation from the Blue Sea Empire from killing one of their Earth Immortal Realm Experts. Instead, they were now jumping in to avenge the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even if the treasure belonging to both Earth Immortals ended up going missing, the Blue Sea Empire might not investigate the matter and just let it go as a form of repayment for avenging their Earth Immortal...


    "How dare you kill an honored Earth Immortal of our Blue Sea Empire! I Yung No Mo will personally kill you!"


    As expected, one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had been waiting for just this moment jumped forward and tried to announce how he would avenge the now dead Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Blue Sea Empire.


    "No! I, as a city guardian under the Blue Sea Empire will be the one to enact justice on behalf of my senior!"


    "Wait! You should not risk your life like that as a precious city guardian, allow me, a wandering cultivator to risk my life in dealing with this person!"


    "No! It''s my duty as-"


    "No, no, no, let me-"


    "No, I will-"


    Not a second after the first Soul Ascension Realm Expert stepped forward and announced that he would take revenge on behalf of the now dead Earth Immortal, it didn''t take long before the rest of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts jumped forward as well. All of them trying to outdo each other as they all began moving closer to the exhausted Earth Immortal Realm Expert.


    Even if he had managed to leave the ce and was continuing to get further away without any of the Soul Ascension Realm Expert stopping him, Xuan Hao could still not help feeling a sense of unease as thest of these greedy Soul Ascension Realm Experts were outside the range of his divine sense.


    Only travelling for a little over half an hour with the speed rivaling someone in the Earth Immortal Realm and seeing a city appear in the distance, did he feel himself calm down.


    No matter how much the battle between the Soul Ascension Realm Experts ended up escting, he doubted it would reach all the way to his current location. Not to mention, the city he had spotted in the distance also had the presence of someone in the Earth Immortal Realm watching over it¡­ And for once, he wasn''t feeling the slightest bit uneasy about the presence of the Earth Immortal Realm Expert.


    At the very least, if the fight between the Soul Ascension Realm Experts did end up reaching all the way here, there would be an Earth Immortal to deal with the matter.


    Whoosh~ n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao slowed down to a normal speed for someone in the Soul Ascension Realm before making his way into the city to get a proper sense of where in the inner region he needed to go to reach the special location he had paid quite a few spirit stones to know about.


    Although he didn''t feel uneasy about the presence of the Earth Immortal Realm Expert, he still didn''t n to show off his strength and potentially catch the attention of this expert. Even if Soul Ascension Realm Expert were still top experts in the Blue Sea Empire, they were far more abundantpared to a small empire like the Sky Empire.


    ¡­


    Boom-boom-boom!


    At the same time Xuan Hao entered the first city he had encountered since entering the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire, the Soul Ascension Realm Experts back at the battlefield between the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts had already begun a massive brawl with countless attacks flying all over the ce.


    Be it the weaker or stronger Soul Ascension Realm Experts, all of them seemed to have gone crazy as they fought with all of their might to get closer to the dead body in the middle of the now expanding battlefield. Ignoring the shriveled up old man who was sitting next to the dead body with a nk expression on his face.


    "To think things would end like this¡­ I got my revenge and survived, but in the end, I''m still going to join you¡­" Muttering this to himself as he continued to stare down nkly at the dead body in front of him, the old man who looked like he was about to fall over at any moment turned to nce at the Soul Ascension Realm Experts fighting all around.


    "Hehe, the Blue Sea Empire is just like I remember it. Nothing more than a bunch of greedy vultures watching their senior die. Ready to pick at his corpse for anything of value the next second." Chuckling to himself as he said this, the old man bent down and picked up the interspatial ring on the dead body before putting it on his own finger.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Even with this happening, the surrounding Soul Ascension Realm Experts didn''t show any signs of stopping their fighting. None of them caring about what the old man did, as his cultivation had already been destroyed and he would end up dying in another few minutes anyway.


    "Hm¡­? These young ones really think I''m just going toy here and die? Haaa¡­ Guess they are still inexperienced when ites to dealing with someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­" Seeing that no one reacted to him picking up the interspatial ring, the old man could not help shaking his head as he muttered this to himself.


    "Well, I guess its my duty as a senior to teach them!" Saying this, an evil smile made its way onto the old man''s face as he retrieved a small pill from his interspatial ring before popping it into his mouth-


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    And before any of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts had the time to react, his strength seemingly recovered as he jumped into the air and escaped into the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire. Knowing very well that there would be no way for him to cross the border in his current state.

 Chapter 1084 Search for the Special Location

    <h4>Chapter 1084 Search for the Special Location</h4>


    "Huh..? He, he still has strength left!?"


    "A-after him!"


    Not knowing how to react when the person, whom they had regarded as already dead, got up and escaped, the Soul Ascension Realm Experts fighting to death with each other momentarily froze on the spot before chasing after him.


    Although they had no idea how the old man had suddenly managed to recover enough strength to run away, they also understood that it shouldn''tst for long.


    If he had really managed to recover his fully strength, he would have chosen to kill them instead of just running away¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that he didn''t escape in the direction of the border but instead chose to escape into the inner region. Making these Soul Ascension Realm Experts even more certain that the sudden recovery of the old man was only temporary and wouldn''tst for long.


    But¡­


    The fact that he had entered the inner region was still problematic for them. Especially considering that their original goal of seizing the treasures of the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts had now be far harder.


    Not only did they have to chase after the old man and find him, but they would now also have to worry about information spreading to some of therger cities in the inner region. Potentially attracting the attention of an Earth Immortal in the process.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Unfortunately for them, there was nothing they could do about this. Only capable of using all of their strength to chase after the escaping old man. Hoping that he wouldn''t be able to escape too far away and find somewhere to hide before they had a chance to catch up.


    ¡­


    Unaware of what had taken ce back at the battlefield created by the two Earth Immortals, Xuan Hao had his full attention focused on arge map hanging on the wall inside a rtively small shop selling different kinds of maps for the different ces in the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "So, I still have a few days of travel left before reaching that ce¡­" Muttering this to himself as his gaze remained locked on a specific ce on therge map, Xuan Hao took out a few spirit stones and handed it over to the shopkeeper standing a short distance behind him.


    "Thank you, I hope the grand map was of use to you senior!" Smiling happily as he grabbed the spirit stones that were sent his way, the shopkeeper waited for a few seconds before stepping forward to pack away therge map on the wall.


    Given that Xuan Hao had already paid him and looked like he was about to leave, he wanted to pack away the map again before any new customer entered the shop and ended up seeing the map before having paid him anything¡­ Or were at least a senior figure in the Soul Ascension Realm like Xuan Hao.


    After all, seniors like that wouldn''t care about a few spirit stones. In most cases, they would even end up overpaying for a simple thing such as viewing a map if they were satisfied, something that had ended up happening just now, as Xuan Hao had thrown out far more than the dozen or so spirit stones required to view therge map.


    Whoosh~


    Not caring about what was going through the head of the shopkeeper, Xuan Hao turned around and left the small shop after getting a proper idea about where in the inner region he was supposed to go. Soon arriving outside the city before taking off in the direction of the special location.


    However, different from how he had travelled in the past, he could no longer use the river as an anchor point for knowing where he was as he now had to hope the information on therge map was at least somewhat urate.


    In a sense, no longer travelling beside the river ended up making him feel far more at ease.


    Not so much because he liked the idea of possibly getting lost in the massive Blue Sea Empire, but because the river contained all sorts of dangers. From possible Earth Immortal Realm demon beast to the countless towns and cities that seemed to be located alongside it.


    Even if he had yet to encounter anything dangerous outside of the two Earth Immortals fighting with each other, he had a feeling that this would no longer be the case after entering the inner region. Not to mention, following the river would only end up leading him closer to the ind sea where the Blue Sea Empire''s capital and most powerful experts were located.


    Given his current strength still being somewhere around the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, he really wanted to avoid a ce that possibly contained experts above the Earth Immortal Realm for now.


    Not to mention, he was still seen as someone from the Explorer Union in the eyes of the Blue Sea Empire and might end up in trouble if he ended up in the capital of the Blue Sea Empire. Possibly invoking the memories of a certain past emperor¡­


    Lost in his own thoughts as he continued journeying deeper and deeper into the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao ended up spending the next few days peacefully travelling without encountering any problems.


    The most dangerous thing he ran into during this time was a demon beast, who had just recently broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm and decided to challenge him.


    In the end, the rabbit demon beast had been the one to step up and kill the arrogant demon beast before it had the chance to beg for mercy or surrender. Wasting no time digging out its core and consuming it before retreating back into his robe again to digest it.


    After that, Xuan Hao no longer saw the elusive rabbit demon beast as he arrived at a small town not far away from where the special location should be hidden.


    The only problem left for him to solve at this point in time being finding the special location.


    At least the information that he had bought from the intelligence department contained a general location of where it was, and it shouldn''t be too hard to find by searching through the ce. At most it would take a few months or weeks. Depending on how lucky he was.


    Of course, there was another far more effective way to find out where the special location was¡­ And that was asking the locals in the area for directions, something that Xuan Hao nned to do. Not feeling too excited about the possibility of spending the next few weeks or months searching for the special location.


    Although this might end up giving away the special location in the process, Xuan Hao didn''t care too much about this as the speed at which information would spread about a possible treasure or ruin in the area would take years. Maybe even decades before it caught the attention of someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Instead, it was far more likely that the intelligence department of the Blue Sea Empire would end up selling the information on the special location to another person before it had time to spread out.


    No matter what ended up happening, Xuan Hao hoped that he would at least be able to monopolize the ce for a few years. Long enough for him to hopefullyprehend one of the three Daos present in the ce to the Large Sess Realm.


    Shaking his head as he thought about all of this, Xuan Hao descended down towards the small town-


    "Huh?! Who is- Flying!? A-a Domain Lord Realm senior!"


    Instantly catching the attention of the singr guard standing at the entrance to the small town.


    Considering that the town itself was small and only had someone in the Domain Lord Realm guarding it, Xuan Hao was not shocked at the guard''s surprised exmation upon seeing him.


    This was also the reason why he had chosen toe to this town to search for a guide that could help him find the area where the special location was hidden. Given that it was a small town, information would also travel out of the ce at a far slower pacepared to arge city with an Earth Immortal Realm Expert watching over it.


    "Can you help me find someone knowledgeable about the surroundings?" Throwing out a few high-quality spirit stones after saying this, the guard obediently nodded his head.


    "Y-yes! Follow me senior!"


    Not long after, Xuan Hao was guided to a Nascent Soul Realm elder in the town, who in turn referred him to an old woman that could help him find the area he was looking for¡­ And in only a few short hours, Xuan Hao managed to pinpoint the area where the special location was hidden with the help of the old woman. Handing over a few spirit stones and random artifacts he had no use for as payment.

 Chapter 1085 Sea of Mist, Ephemeral Forest, Valley of Illusory Beasts

    <h4>Chapter 1085 Sea of Mist, Ephemeral Forest, Valley of Illusory Beasts</h4>


    "Hm¡­ ording to the information from the intelligence department, the cave should be located next to a forest and in front of ake¡­"


    Following the person who had guided him leaving, Xuan Hao remembered the description of the entrance that was contained in the information he had bought from the Blue Sea Empire''s intelligence depart before starting to scan his surroundings with his divine sense. Searching for the cave acting as the entrance of the special ce where the three different Daos were present.


    Although he still had no idea which of the Daos, he would end up attempting toprehend first, he figured that he would just try the one that seemed to be the simplest to reach the Small Sess Realm in.


    Whoosh~


    Spotting the cave after only a few seconds, Xuan Hao dashed forward and made his way into the cave after ensuring that there wasn''t any kind of trap in ce at the entrance of the cave. Soon finding himself passing through a wooden gate of some sort that moved him into a different space filled with an illusory mist as far as he could see.


    Outside of the wooden gate behind him, there was nothing other than the seemingly endless sea of mist in all directions around him¡­


    If not for the fact that the information from the intelligence department had described just this kind of environment, he would have thought that he had been trapped in some kind of illusion after passing through the wooden gate.


    "This should be the Sea of Mist where the Dao of Mist is the easiest toprehend¡­" Muttering this to himself as he closed his eyes for a short moment to feel the Dao of Mist, Xuan Hao soon opened them with a hint of shock on his face.


    Although it had only been for a short moment, he had clearly felt hisprehension of the Dao of Mist deepen at a speed that was iparable with hisprehension speed back in the Star Shattering Sect.


    If it would normally take him two years toprehend the Dao of Mist to the Elementary Realm back in the Star Shattering Sect, it would only take a little over two months inside the Sea of Mist!


    Of course, after reaching the Elementary Realm in the Dao of Mist, his speed would undoubtedly start to slow down, but still¡­ He didn''t think it would take him more than a year toprehend the Dao of Mist to the Small Sess Realm inside the Sea of Mist.


    Feeling excited as he realized this, Xuan Hao could not help wondering about the two other areas connected to the Sea of Mist as he looked towards the two wooden gates barely visible deeper inside the Sea of Mist.


    ording to the information he had about the ce, the two wooden gates hidden in the Sea of Mist connected the other remaining sections of the ce, the Ephemeral Forest, and the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    Among the two, the Ephemeral Forest was a peaceful forest affected by the Dao of Mirages, causing the trees inside to shift in and out of existence, allowing one toprehend the Dao of Mirages more easily by observing the trees. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Simr to the Sea of Mist, the Ephemeral Forest didn''t contain any dangers, something that couldn''t be said for the Valley of Illusory Beasts¡­


    As the name suggests, the Valley of Illusory Beasts had all sorts of different beasts roaming the ce. Not only that, but all of the beasts were at least in the Domain Lord Realm, with the information from the intelligence department specifically warning that there might be illusory beasts strong enough to contend against someone in the Earth Immortal Realm deeper inside the valley.


    Out of all three areas, the Valley of Illusory Beasts was by far the most dangerous, but¡­ This did note without its fair share of rewards, as ording to the information, fighting the illusory beasts would be a perfect way toprehend the Dao of Illusions in action.


    Even without visiting the ce himself, it was obvious that the Valley of Illusory Beasts was the best ce toprehend a Dao, the only problem was the fact that it was also the only ce that was dangerous.


    In the end, Xuan Hao sat down on the ground as he began thinking about which of the three Daos he wanted toprehend.


    The reason for onlyprehending one of them to the Small Sess Realm being the simple fact that he still had toprehend a Dao to the Large Sess Realm and break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm before the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple caught wind of what had happened in the Sky Empire and decided to make a move to resolve the problem personally.


    Although he didn''t know how long he had left before this, he doubted it would be more than five years. Far from enough time for him toprehend the Dao of Mist, the Dao of Mirages, the Dao of Illusions, and break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Hm¡­ The Dao of Mist can be considered the safest choice as it seems easy for me to grasp and won''t take too long. The Dao of Mirages on the other hand, can be considered to be a part of the Dao of Illusions in the same way that the Dao of Ice can be considered a part of the Dao of Water. Comprehending it will give me a far easier time grasping therger and more difficult Dao of Illusions in the future.


    As for entering the Valley of Illusory Beasts toprehend the Dao of Illusions¡­ This might not be a bad idea. Especially considering that the time required toprehend it should be far lower than the other two. Maybe there will also be a chance for me to raise it to the Large Sess Realm! The only danger is the fact that there might be illusory beasts far stronger than myself present inside the valley¡­"


    In deep thought as he said this to himself while staring towards the two wooden gates in the distance, Xuan Hao''s slowly focused in on the wooden gates furthest away from him. The gate leading to the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    Dangerous or not, he understood that the thing hecked the most was time.


    Even if he expected for the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple to take at least five years before he appeared, he had no actual clue if this was really the case. For all he knew, the Earth Immortal Realm Expert might already have left the Heavenly Dragon Temple and be on his way towards the Shattered Star Peaks to find out what had happened to his disciple and subordinates.


    Whoosh~


    Having made the decision, Xuan Hao no longer wasted any time and rushed into the wooden gate leading him to the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    "Huh?"


    The next moment, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that he was surrounded by tall mountains on all sides as a valley that seemed to go on forever appeared in front of him in a simr fashion to the Sea of Mist previously.


    ROOOOAR!


    ROOAR-!


    The only difference this time around being the loud animal roars echoing out in the distance as a group of illusory beasts appeared beneath arge tree not too far away from him beforeying down on the ground to sleep. Not having sensed his presence.


    Whoosh~


    Taking this chance, Xuan Hao descended upon the unsuspecting beasts and instantly killed the only Soul Ascension Realm Expert among them before getting rid of the rest before they had the chance to cause amotion that might end up forcing him to leave the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    It was only after killing them that Xuan Hao discovered that other than having somewhat transparent bodies, the illusory beasts were no different from the demon beasts he encountered out in the wild or back at the Star Shattering Sect.


    Other than this, he also discovered that killing the illusory beasts gave him a chance to observe how the Dao of Illusions worked as their bodies began dissipating.


    Although it was only for a few short minutes, the insight he managed to gain in the Dao of Illusions from observing the process of the illusory beasts dissipating was equal to spending a full two weeks fully focused onprehending the Dao of Illusions outside the Valley of Illusory Beast!


    Despite the fact that he could clearly sense that hisprehension speed of the Dao of Illusions had decreased with time, he didn''t get any less excited.


    After all, what he needed now was not a long term way to improve hisprehension of a certain Dao, but instead a short term one that would be able to help him reach the requirement for breaking through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm as fast as possible!

 Chapter 1086 First Battle in the Valley of Illusory Beasts

    <h4>Chapter 1086 First Battle in the Valley of Illusory Beasts</h4>


    Rumble~


    At the same time Xuan Hao had his first encounter with the illusory beasts inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts, the old man who had managed to escape from the encirclement of over fifty Soul Ascension Realm Experts with the help of a special pill arrived above the small town he had been inside of only half a day earlier.


    "This should be far enough for now. Even if those juniors want to catch up to me, it will at least take them a few days." Muttering this to himself as he nced at the small town below him, the old man''s face rxed slightly after seeing that the strongest person present was only in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if he couldn''t keep up his current state for long and his strength had already started decreasing at a speed visible to the naked eye, it would still be impossible for someone in the Domain Lord Realm to discover him.


    Whoosh~


    Knowing this, the old man lowered his guard a bit as he began using his divine sense to search for somewhere to hide and recover from the terrifying injuries, he had received during the battle earlier.


    Although he understood that it would be impossible to fully recover his strength without some kind of heavenly treasure, it wouldn''t be impossible for him to recover his strength back up to the lowest level of the Earth Immortal Realm. At least that would be enough for him to safely leave the Blue Sea Empire.


    Unfortunately, he also understood that it was unlikely for him to find a ce where he could spend the next few years recovering without any disturbances. The fifty or so Soul Ascension Realm Experts were bound to find him if he didn''t find some kind of abandoned secret realm or special space to hide inside of¡­


    "Hm?"


    Just at this moment, a slight fluctuation appeared at the edge of his divine sense. Not an ordinary fluctuation from two cultivators fighting with each other. Instead, it was an all too familiar spatial fluctuation from a spatial gate of sorts being activated!


    "This, an abandoned secret realm!?" Feeling a sense of excitement as he looked in the direction that the fluctuation hade from, the old man who was about to revert back to his half dead state wasted no time in rushing towards the direction that the spatial fluctuation hade-


    Swish-!


    Soon arriving directly in front of the wooden gate that Xuan Hao had passed through only half a day earlier.


    "Indeed¡­ It looks like it''s an abandoned secret realm." Smiling happily to himself as he said this, the old man quickly used most of his remaining strength to put down a few simple formations to hide the appearance of the wooden gate and prevent any of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts chasing after him from noticing it.


    Although the formations wouldn''t work if any of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts entered the cave that the wooden gate was located inside of, it would at least make it harder for them to discover the cave, while at the same time preventing any random animals from wandering inside the gate and possibly alerting any nearby Soul Ascension Realm cultivators to its existence.


    Whoosh~


    Having done everything he could to ensure his safety, the old man stepped through the wooden gate and made his way inside what he assumed to be an abandoned secret realm-


    "Huh? Th-this is¡­ Special space abundant in the Dao of Mist!?"


    Only after stepping through the wooden gate did, he realize that it was not a secret realm and was instead a special space that was abundant in the Dao of Mist, a heaven on earth for anyone adapt in the Dao of Mist to cultivate in.


    After calming down a bit, the old man quickly began to scan his surroundings while he still had some strength left. After all, ces where a certain dao was abundant would always have some kind of danger present inside of it.


    Whoosh~


    As his divine sense swept through the Sea of Mist, the old man could not help letting out a sigh of relief to himself upon realizing that there weren''t any dangerous creatures hidden inside of the mist. The only thing inside the mist were the two wooden gates simr to the one he had just passed through.


    Looks like everything is safe, outside of those two wooden gates further inside the sea of mist. For now, I should avoid those two ces before I recover my strength¡­


    Thinking this to himself, the old man sat down on the ground and focused all of his attention on recovering his strength.


    Ignoring the small squirrel that was sitting confused on the ground not too far away from him. Having already concluded that it must have been the culprit behind the spatial fluctuation he had felt earlier.


    Even if the squirrel wanted to leave, it was impossible after the old man had finishedying down the different formations on the wooden gate earlier¡­ And in the end, the squirrel ended up stumbling through the mist for a few days before stumbling into the Ephemeral Forest. The abundant qi present in the space keeping it from starving to death.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the old man in the Earth Immortal Realm settled down in the Sea of Mist, Xuan Hao was busy fighting an illusory beast in the Soul Ascension Realm- Or to be more specific, an illusory beast in Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even if he had not originally intended to try and fight any of the stronger illusory beasts before ensuring that they were alone, and a battle wouldn''t end up attracting even more powerful illusory beasts¡­ The illusory beast in front of him happened to spot him just as he had finished going over his gains from killing the small group of illusory beasts.


    Giving him no time to react before it angrily pounced on him without a second thought¡­


    Boom-boom-boom!


    As the illusory beast used all kinds of soul attacks that sought to destroy his soul and deadly illusory constructs seeking to kill him, Xuan Hao had a revtion.


    Observing the different attacks used by the illusory beast allowed him to increase his understanding of the Dao of Illusions. Not just increasing hisprehension, but also giving him insights as to how to utilize the Dao of Illusions inbat.


    In a sense, the illusory beasts were truly the best tool for anyone who wanted to increase both their understanding and utilization of the Dao of Illusions, a pity that the ce was so far away from the Star Shattering Sect, and he couldn''t take it back with him and use it to train his disciples and the rest of the people from the sect¡­


    Roooar!


    Having realized that it couldn''tnd a single attack on him and that its soul attacks were rendered useless due to Xuan Hao''s soul being far stronger than a normal Fifth Tribtion Soul Ascension Realm cultivator, the illusory beast let out a roar filled with anger before starting to rapidly absorb the white and almost cloudlike qi that permeated the entire valley.


    Rumble-!


    "Looks like I won''t be able to make use of it any longer¡­" Noticing what the illusory beast was doing and feeling how its strength was starting to increase at a speed visible to the naked eye, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of regret as he understood that he wouldn''t be able to make use of the illusory beast any longer.


    But this feeling didn''tst for long as he remembered that there were still countless other illusory beasts present in the valley.


    "Haaa¡­"


    Taking a deep breath, Xuan Hao gathered his qi-


    Swish!


    And with a swift motion, he drew his sword and lunged towards the illusory beast!


    Roar!


    Having already expected this, the illusory beast stopped absorbing the white qi and changed its original cloud-like lion shape into that of arge illusory serpent. Moving with an otherworldly grace to dodge Xuan Hao''s sudden attack. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Bang!


    However, Xuan Hao continued to press onwards and ultimately ended upnding a series of precise strikes on the illusory serpent-


    Rooar!


    In turn, the illusory serpent stopped dodging and instead met Xuan Hao head on.


    Ching~!


    Even though it had been interrupted and didn''t get a lot of time to absorb the white qi, its strength had still increased to a certain degree. Putting its current strength infinitely close to the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Giving it more than enough strength to meet Xuan Hao''s sword head on.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    As a result, the sh between Xuan Hao and the illusory beast became more intense as neither party had the upper hand. The illusory serpent beast constantly using everything it had, while Xuan Hao''s sword unleashed waves of terrifying sword qi that cut through its illusions and dispelled its illusory constructs before they had a chance to do anything.


    Of course, at this point in time, Xuan Hao had only been using his Sword Dao to fight against the illusory beast¡­

 Chapter 1087 Dao of Illusions, Elementary Realm

    <h4>Chapter 1087 Dao of Illusions, Elementary Realm</h4>


    As the fight continued for more than a minute with no definite winner in sight, Xuan Hao could not help ncing deeper inside the valley with a hint of hesitation on his face.


    Although the fight so far was useful for him in bothprehension of the Dao of Illusions and the way to use it inbat, he also understood that there was a limit to how long he could fight with the illusory beast in front of him before some of the more powerful illusory beasts nearby managed to pick up on what was happening and decided toe over to investigate what was happening.


    To make matters worse, he and the illusory beast had slowly begun moving deeper and deeper inside the valley as their fight continued.


    If he didn''t end the battle soon, the chances of alerting another powerful illusory beast would just be a matter of time¡­


    Boom!


    Because of this, Xuan Hao decided to use his dao domain instead of just relying on his Sword Dao to fight against the illusory beast.


    Roar!?


    Taken aback by the sudden eruption of Xuan Hao''s dao domain, the illusory beast was momentarily caught off guard by Xuan Hao''s sudden increase in strength, causing it to get caught up in his dao domain before it even had the chance to try and resist it.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Following the illusory beast getting caught up inside Xuan Hao''s dao domain, it did not take long before it used all of its strength to try and defend against the constant attacks from both Xuan Hao''s sword and his dao domain-


    Roooar-! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    In the end, the illusory beast couldn''t hold on for long before it was overwhelmed by the constant onught, being cut down before it had a chance to escape from his dao domain.


    Whoosh~


    Doing the same as he had done after witnessing the death of the first illusory beast, Xuan Hao began to observe the process of the illusory beast dissipating. Focusing all of his attention on trying to increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions as much as possible before the body of the illusory beast disappeared.


    In the end, the body of the illusory beast managed tost for a little over five minutes before disappearing. Longerpared to the first batch of illusory beast who had at moststed a little over two minutes.


    Not only that, but after he finished observing the now gone illusory beast''s body dissipate, he also realized that the insights he managed to gain in the Dao of Illusions far surpassed that of the weaker illusory beasts. If the first group of illusory beasts allowed him to skip through two weeks of progress in only a few minutes, the more powerful illusory beast had managed to help him skip through close to a month worth of progress!


    Given his current understanding of the Dao of Illusions, after what should have been no more than half an hour inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Xuan Hao already felt like he was close to reaching the Elementary Realm in the Dao of Illusions.


    With this kind of progress, he began feeling like he might be able to reach the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions if he stayed inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts for a few months.


    Of course, he also understood that this kind of progress could notst forever, as he would undoubtedly begin to slow down the higher hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions became.


    Even then, his current progress made him positive that he might be able to break through to the Elementary Realm in the Dao of Illusions before the day was over. Showing just how beneficial it was to hunt down illusory beasts.


    The stronger the illusory beast, the more he would gain. If he wanted to increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions as fast as possible, he understood that he would have to make his way deeper inside the valley and hunt down more illusory beasts.


    The risks that came from the possibility of encountering an illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm was well worth it considering how much killing the illusory beast helped increase his strength. Other than that, he also felt confident that he would be able to escape from an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast with the help of his Drifting Cloud Steps and Dao of Space in case he ended up encountering one.


    Swish-!


    Having made up his mind, Xuan Hao directly made his way deeper into the valley after having finished getting everything he could from the now dead illusory beast.


    ¡­


    Over the next month, Xuan Hao used all of his time inside the valley hunting down any illusory beasts in the earlier stages of the Soul Ascension Realm or below that he found. Making sure to keep his distance from the more powerful illusory beasts who were at the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm or above.


    The reason for this was not that he wasn''t confident in killing them, but because he understood that he had no way to kill them in a short period of time and had to use at least a minute or longer to deal with them¡­ And although this would normally not have been a problem, it just so happened that he was currently inside the territory of a powerful illusory beast at the Pinnacle of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    As for how he knew about this powerful illusory beast¡­ That was because he had ended up encountering it almost the moment, he had decided to venture into the valley in search of illusory beasts to help increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions.


    Back then, he had only barely managed to escape because of his swift reaction and speed. Escaping before the illusory beast even had the chance to attack him.


    In the end, this encounter had resulted in him investigating his environment more thoroughly, causing him to realize that there would always be a Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast in charge of any territory of the valley that he ventured inside of. No matter where he went, before he had the strength to kill these Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts, he was forced to stay quiet and only go after the weaker illusory beasts that carried the lowest risk when it came to increasing hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions.


    Even with all of this, he had still managed to promote his Dao of Illusions to the Elementary Realm over the past month. Not only that, but he was already around halfway through to the Small Sess Realm at this point in time. In at most one or two months, he should be able to reach the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions.


    Unfortunately, not all good things could continue¡­ And just over the past few days, Xuan Hao hade to realize that killing the Domain Lord Realm illusory beasts no longer helped improve hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions. Even killing some weaker First Tribtion Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts were the same and had lost their usefulness.


    "If I want to continueprehending the Dao of Illusions at my current speed, I will have to find a way to deal with Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast¡­" Muttering this to himself as he unconsciously turned to nce in the direction of arge hill located in the middle of the forest he was inside of at the moment, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit hesitant.


    No matter how strong he was whenpared to ordinary Fifth Tribtion Soul Ascension Realm Expert, he could at most fight against someone in the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm with his current strength. Far from enough topare with Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts whose strength was beyond that of a normal Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast due to their unique and terrifying soul attacks.


    Although the soul attacks of from the illusory beast at the Peak of the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm was too weak to threaten him, the same could not be said for the soul attacks of the Peak Soul Ascension Ream illusory beasts.


    Even if his encounter with one of them had only been for a brief moment before he had run away, he could clearly feel the terrifying soul energy that almost seemed to have surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm washing towards him back then.


    His dao domain and the many different Daos he hadprehended helped increase the soul of his strength, but¡­ It was far from enough to defend him against a soul attack that might have reached the Earth Immortal Realm! If he could really resist against such a powerful soul attack, he might as well already have broken through to the Large Sess Realm in one of his Daos and further strengthened his soul in the process- Or maybe even reached Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­

 Chapter 1088 Fooling the Illusory Beast

    <h4>Chapter 1088 Fooling the Illusory Beast</h4>


    Havinge to the decision that he needed to find a way to deal with the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast that was in control of the current area of the valley he found himself inside of at the moment, Xuan Hao began to try and look for any weakness that he might be able to exploit in the illusory beasts. Using the countless weaker Domain Lord Realm illusory beasts present in the valley to find these weaknesses.


    During this process, he also realized that the illusory beasts he had killed over the past month would reappear after a set amount of time had passed. The weaker the illusory beasts were, the faster they would reappear.


    Although, during this time, only illusory beasts below the Soul Ascension Realm had appeared again. Maybe this was case he hadn''t discovered this happening earlier, as he mostly focused his attention on the Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts who helped himprehend the Dao of Illusions.


    Not to mention, he still didn''t get the opportunity to witness just how these illusory beasts came into existence.


    Even then¡­ He had a few guesses as to how this happened, the most logical one being that they were an amalgamation created by the white qi everywhere in the valley and something else that seemed to give them a consciousnessparable to a demon beast that had yet to reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not only that, but he also began suspecting that this thing that helped the illusory beast gain a certain level of consciousness was what allowed him toprehend the Dao of Illusions more easily after killing the illusory beasts¡­


    As he focused his full attention on finding a weakness in the illusory beasts that he could exploit in a fight against the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast over the next month, Xuan Hao finally managed to understand the illusory beasts to the degree that he felt confident in fighting against the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts.


    Not so much because he had managed to find a critical weakness that he would be able to exploit, but because he came to realize that the illusory beasts were dumb, dumb to the point where he felt confident in being able to trick the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast to let down its guard and allow him to get close enough to fatally wound it without it getting the chance to defend.


    The only thing he needed to do was reduce his cultivation base to the Domain Lord Realm and make it believe that he was just in the Domain Lord Realm.


    From experimenting with other illusory beasts, he had realized that they would not use too much strength when dealing with a much weaker opponent.


    The main difficulty in doing thisy in the fact that the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast''s soul strength was far beyond that of an ordinary Peak Soul Ascension Realm cultivator. Making tricking it into believing that he was weaker than he actually was quite a difficult thing to aplish.


    But even then, Xuan Hao felt it was worth an attempt. Even if he ended up being discovered, he was more than confident in being able to run away and leave the Valley of Illusory Beasts. Not to mention, he felt quite curious about just how strong he waspared to the illusory beast if he went all out.


    Whoosh~


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao slowly began approaching the hill where the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast was located. Keeping a distance from any illusory beasts along the way, as fighting them might end up alerting the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast, something that was easier said than done considering that the illusory beasts surrounding the hill with the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast on top of it had all reached the Soul Ascension Realm.


    The one positive thing was their strength didn''t exceed the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Even if it took some extra time and effort on his part, he eventually managed to sneak past them.


    "I hope this works¡­" Standing no more than a few thousand meters away from therge hill that the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast was located, Xuan Hao lowered his cultivation base to the Domain Lord Realm before beginning to move towards the hill.


    Roar-!


    Not even a second after doing this, a loud roar echoed out from the top of the hill as arge illusory beast appeared at the top of the hill staring directly down towards him. Just from its presence alone, it was obvious that it was far stronger than any of the illusory beasts that he had encountered so far.


    Whoosh~


    However, even with the illusory beast appearing, Xuan Hao didn''t hesitate in continuing to move towards the hill.


    The main reason for this was simple, the illusory beast had not managed to see through his disguise!


    If it had really seen through the fact that he was concealing his true strength and was not someone at the Domain Lord Realm, it wouldn''t have just casually appeared at the top of the hill and roared at him. Instead, it would have attacked him without giving him a chance to get any closer.


    After all, even if the illusory beasts weren''t especially weak when it came to closebat, they still preferred to fight at a distance where they would have more than enough time to utilize the Dao of Illusions. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Roar?


    Seeing Xuan Hao still approaching even after it had appeared, the illusory beast could not help tilting its head in confusion. Not understanding why, a weak creature in the Domain Lord Realm still dared to approach it after it had unted its strength.


    Considering the obvious difference in strength between them, it had expected him to either freeze in fear or just outright run away.


    This difference between what was happening and what it expected to happen momentarily caused it to stare down at Xuan Hao in confusion.


    The main reason why something like this could even happen was due to the simple fact that the illusory beast didn''t really view Xuan Hao as a possible threat due to only perceiving him as someone in the Domain Lord Realm


    By the time it decided to take action to kill him, it only used a simple soul attack that was only strong enough to kill someone in the earlier stages of the Soul Ascension Realm. Although strong enough to kill someone in the Domain Lord Realm, it was far from enough to do anything to Xuan Hao.


    Roar!?


    For this reason, Xuan Hao managed to make it halfway up the hill before the illusory beast figured out that something was wrong¡­ Of course, it was already toote at that point in time, as Xuan Hao was more than close enough to instantly close the distance between them-


    Swish-!


    And doing just that, Xuan Hao appeared directly in front of the still confused illusory beast. Wasting no time to in using his Dao of Ice to slow down the illusory beast to slow down any response from the illusory beast, while also using his dao domain to strengthen his sword as he cut into the confused illusory beast before it had any time to muster a proper defense.


    ROOOOAR!


    A split second after the sword managed to pierce into the somewhat soft and cloudlike body of the illusory beast, the illusory beast finally realized what had happened as it rapidly retreated before Xuan Hao''s sword could do any more damage-


    Whoosh-!


    Of course, Xuan Hao had already expected this as he chased after the retreating illusory beast without slowing down his attack in the slightest. Knowing very well that he would lose his initiative if he gave the illusory beast the chance to retreat and attack from a distance using the Dao of Illusions.


    The injurie he had managed to inflict on the illusory beast so far was far from enough to give him any real advantage in a fight if the illusory beast could keep him at a distance and prevent any new injures, something Xuan Hao was doing his absolute best at trying to stop from happening as he relentlessly attacked the retreating illusory beast.


    Ptsh-!


    Due to this, it did not take long before Xuan Hao managed to properly wound the retreating illusory beast, causing its strength to decrease as it did its best to put a stop to the rampaging energies that infiltrated its body through the wound and were causing no small amount of damage.


    In turn, this caused the illusory beast to no longer have the ability to properly fight back against Xuan Hao. Resulting in even more injuries that weakened it even further.


    By the time that the fight had been going on for a minute and the illusory beast finally managed to fight back against Xuan Hao''s constant onught, its strength had already been reduced down to a level that wasparable to the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension¡­

 Chapter 1089 Dao of Illusions, Peak Elementary Realm

    <h4>Chapter 1089 Dao of Illusions, Peak Elementary Realm</h4>


    Having its strength reduced down to the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, even if the illusory beast had managed to stabilize its situation and fight back against Xuan Hao it had no way to gain an advantage and was even losing out in its fight against Xuan Hao.


    If things continued at its current pace, it was obvious that it was going to get overwhelmed and killed by Xuan Hao over the next few minutes. Maybe not evensting that long considering that Xuan Hao''s strength with the help of his dao domain bordered on the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Roar!


    Realizing just this, the illusory beast began to grow more desperate-


    Boom-boom-boom!


    However, no matter what it tried to throw at Xuan Hao, it didn''t work. Instead, it just caused its situation to grow even worse. Especially so after it gathered arge part of its remaining strength into trying to destroy his soul through different soul attacks which ended up being destroyed by the nascent sword soul present inside his dantian. Not even needing the assistance of the dao domain to fend off against the soul attack.


    ROOOAR!


    Not wanting to go down just like that, the illusory beast something Xuan Hao had never seen an illusory beast do since he had entered the Valley of Illusory Beasts, it escaped- Or at least tried to do so, his dao domain didn''t really give it much of a chance to escape after it had first been engulfed by it.


    The only way that the illusory beast would be able to escape in the current situation was if it somehow managed to first break through his dao domain, something that was close to impossible for it to aplish in its current state. Not to mention, there was no way Xuan Hao was willing to give it a chance to run away after he had used so much energy trying to kill it.


    Other than that, there was also the fact that the illusory beast escaping might end up attracting the attention of another nearby Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast. Even if it didn''t, it would undoubtedly draw more attention to the ce they were fighting.


    Although there shouldn''t be any Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts too close to the hill, there was quite a few Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast with nock of those in the Fourth and Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Whoosh-!


    Catching up to the illusory beast, Xuan Hao directly used the Dao of Ice to create a small vortex of sword qi around the illusory beast-


    BOOOOM!


    Not a second after its creation, the vortex exploded violently, causing the sword qi inside of it to pierce into the illusory beast before it could put up a proper defense-


    Swish-!


    Ptsh!


    Giving Xuan Hao the time needed tond a fatal blow on the illusory beast. Killing it before it had the time to recover and try to escape again. Not even giving it the chance to let out a single sound as its body fell to the ground as it began the process of disappearing.


    The main difference between the body of this illusory beast and other illusory beasts being that it took far longer to disappear. Even whenpared to the illusory beast in the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm that he had killed in the past, there was a clear difference between the time and process between the two.


    Whoosh~!


    Knowing that this was an opportunity to potentially have his Dao of Illusions reach the peak of the Elementary Realm and possibly break through to the Small Sess Realm, Xuan Hao wasted no time in sitting down beside the body of the illusory beast and focus his full attention onprehending the Dao of Illusions.


    Rooar!


    Roar!


    Even with the asional roars from illusory beasts close to the hill that had picked up on themotion, Xuan Hao didn''t n to pay any attention to them unless they decided to attack him. After all, the body of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast would only be around for so long and any time wasted on fighting other illusory beasts would reduce the time he could use to improve his Dao of Illusions.


    ¡­


    As time passed, Xuan Hao found himself being fully immersed in the Dao of Illusions beside the slowly disappearing body of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast.


    Luckily for him, most of the powerful illusory beasts didn''t dare to approach the hill. The main cause of this being the terrifying energy from the battle between him and the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast that still lingered in the air around the hill.


    Even if the illusory beasts could be considered less smart that ordinary demon beast, they at the very least still had a survival instinct that told them approaching the hill was a bad idea¡­


    Roar!


    Of course, not all of illusory beast were intimidated and some still made their way to the base of the hill where the body of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast and Xuan Hao were located-


    Ptsh-!


    Unfortunately for them, they were at most in the Domain Lord Realm and ended up being almost instantaneously killed by Xuan Hao''s dao domain.


    Although his dao domain was only passively defending without him doing anything, it was more than enough to kill anyone below the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ And in case some of the illusory beasts in the Soul Ascension Realm decided to show up, it would at least provide him with a few extra seconds to leave his current state ofprehension and prepare to face off against them.


    However, the few illusory beasts in the Soul Ascension that had cautiously followed after the Domain Lord Realm illusory beasts were almost instantly scared off after witnessing the quick death of the Domain Lord Realm illusory beast. Not daring to make a move on Xuan Hao. Giving him all the time, he needed to fully focus onprehending the Dao of Illusions.


    ¡­


    After spending close to half an hour beside the slowly dispersing body of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast, Xuan Hao opened both of his eyes with a hint of regret.


    "Almost there¡­ Haaa¡­ To think the illusory beast decides to fully disperse now of all times¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked at thest motes of light that had once been a part of the illusory beast disappearing, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a hint of sadness over his current situation.


    Even though the body of the illusory beast had been around for half an hour before disappearing, he had only managed to reach the Peak of the Elementary Realm in the Dao of Illusions, a single step away from breaking through to the Small Sess Realm.


    The worst part of the entire thing was that he could clearly sense that breaking through to the Small Sess Realm would at least require him to find another Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast orprehending the realm on his own. The weaker illusory beasts simply wouldn''t provide thest bit of insight required to break through the barrier between the Elementary Realm and the Small Sess Realm.


    How long that would take to do it on his own was not something he had any idea about; it might take a few days, or it might end up taking months to break through to the Small Sess Realm.


    As for killing another Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast¡­ That was not really something he thought would be as easy. Mainly because the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast that he had chosen was by far the weakest among the ones he had sensed inside the valley so far.


    If he tried to ambush another Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast, he might not end up seeding. Not to mention, escaping would be harder the further inside the valley he went.


    The reason for this was not just because the illusory beasts grew stronger the deeper, he went, but also because he had sensed that the space inside the valley became tougher and harder to manipte the deeper inside the valley he went.


    Although this was not enough to affect him during his fight with the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast, he doubted things would stay like that if he went further inside the valley.


    All things considered, the safest option for him was to break through to the Small Sess Realm on his own. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Now came another problem¡­ The Valley of Illusory beasts, although perfect for increasingprehension of the Dao of Illusions when killing illusory beasts, it didn''t provide any other benefits now that he was stuck at the Peak of the Elementary Realm and killing weaker illusory beasts didn''t help his breakthrough.


    "Maybe I should try the Ephemeral Forest¡­ The Dao of Mirages is after all connected to the Dao of Illusions¡­" Muttering this to himself as he remembered the only part of the secret location he hadn''t been to, Xuan Hao could not help ncing towards the wooden gate he hade out from- Or to be more specific, a simr wooden gate located no more than a few meters away from the one he had entered the valley from.


    The gate in question led directly to the Ephemeral Forest, connecting the valley and the forest without him needing to go back through the Sea of Mist. Not that it mattered that much any way considering there wasn''t really anything dangerous in the Sea of Mist¡­


    Swish-!


    Not thinking too much about it, Xuan Hao got up and made his way back to the wooden gates before heading into the one connected to the Ephemeral Forest. Not bothering to head back into the Sea of Mist just to make his journey longer for no reason.

 Chapter 1090 Dao of Illusions, Small Success Realm

    <h4>Chapter 1090 Dao of Illusions, Small Sess Realm</h4>


    Whoosh~


    Arriving at the other side of the wooden gate, Xuan Hao found himself directly in front of arge forest that seemed to constantly change with each passing seconds as different trees appeared out of seemingly nowhere, while other trees seemingly faded out of existence in a random and unpredictable manner.


    Even with his currentprehension of the Dao of Illusions, he could not help freezing for a few seconds at the mystical sight that unfolded before him. Feeling a sense of wonder at the odd forest in front of him. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "So¡­ This is the Ephemeral Forest¡­" Almost whispering this to himself as he recovered from his shocked state, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about the Dao of Mirages behind the weird state of the forest in front of him.


    It might just be a branch of the muchrger Dao of Illusions, but it was still amazing in its own way and would undoubtedly be good at confusing opponents when fighting.


    "Hm?" Just at this moment, Xuan Hao noticed something jumping around from tree to tree inside the forest-


    Rumble-!


    Instantly causing him to instantly take on a defensive stance with his dao domain while his divine sense rapidly spread out in the direction of the small creature he had seen jumping around inside the forest.


    No matter how safe the information he had bought from the Blue Sea Empire''s intelligence department said the Ephemeral Forest was, he didn''t n to let his guard down just because of this and mindlessly enter a potential death tra-


    "Huh?"


    However, after his divine sense managed to catch up to the creature inside the forest, Xuan Hao could not help freezing at the spot as a weird expression made its way to his face.


    "A squirrel¡­?"


    Yes¡­ The small creature was nothing more than a normal squirrel. Not only that, but its strength seemed to have only barely broken through to the Qi Condensation Realm a few hours earlier.


    With this in mind, it should just be an ordinary squirrel that identally ended up stumbling its way inside the Sea of Mist before making its way to the Ephemeral Forest where it had officially broken through to the Qi Condensation Realm and be a demon beast. Taking its first step on the path of cultivation.


    Although¡­ Looking at the squirrel, it might not even have realized that it had broken through to the Qi Condensation Realm as it was far too busy jumping from tree to tree before the tree itnded on disappeared.


    From the looks of it, the squirrel could sense when the trees disappeared to some extent. Showing that it had an inherent talent when it came toprehending the Dao of Mirages, something Xuan Hao had not expected to see from a normal squirrel¡­


    At the very least, he could rx a bit more knowing that it was just a squirrel and not some powerful demon beast proficient in the Dao of Mirages hiding inside the forest.


    Whoosh~!


    Retracting his divine sense after having made sure that the squirrel was indeed the only other living thing other than himself inside the Ephemeral Forest, Xuan Hao found a good location to sit down and observe the forest before entering a state of cultivation. Ignoring everything around himself as he put his full attention towardsprehending the Dao of Illusions through the Dao of Mirages present in the Ephemeral Forest.


    Even if the squirrel somehow managed to break through to the Foundation Establishment Realm during his attempt to reach the Small Ses Realm in the Dao of Illusions, it wouldn''t be able to do anything to him as his dao domain would still kill anything below the Soul Ascension Realm that approached him during this period of time.


    As long as the squirrel didn''t approach him and the rabbit demon beast didn''t decide to leave his robe to hunt it down, it should be fine and might even be able to turn into a powerful demon beast in the future by staying inside the Ephemeral Forest.


    Rustle~


    Unfortunately for the squirrel, who was now observing Xuan Hao cautiously from a distance on top a fading tree, the rabbit demon beast just happened to run out of spirit stones and had decided toe out to ask Xuan Hao for more-


    ""¡­""


    As a result, it instantly locked eyes with the terrified squirrel that was already on edge after having spotted Xuan Hao appearing inside the Ephemeral Forest.


    Squeak?


    Tilting its head in confusion as it saw the terrified squirrel looking at it, the rabbit demon beast could not help wondering if something was wrong with the squirrel. Not because it was looking at it, but because the tree branch it had been standing on was fading away-


    SQUEAK!?


    And after two long seconds passed, the branchpletely disappeared beneath the squirrel, causing it to let out a surprised cry as it found itself rapidly descending down towards the ground below. Even worse, given that it was only in the Qi Condensation Realm and the forest floor was filled with all sorts of thorny nts more than sharp enough to kill it, the squirrel understood that it had to think fast if it didn''t want to turn into a fresh serving of skewered squirrel.


    Whoosh~


    Summoning what little qi it had unknowingly managed to gather inside its body in this desperate life and death situation, the squirrel unconsciously made a small branch grow from the slowly fading tree that it had been on top of just a short moment earlier. Allowing it to grab hold of the branch and jump to safety just before the newly created branch disappeared into thin air.


    Squeak¡­?


    Watching this scene unfold from afar, the rabbit demon beast could not help narrowing both of its eyes curiously at the unique ability disyed by the squirrel.


    Even without seeing anything more, it understood that the squirrel was specialpared to other demon beasts.


    Squeak!


    It was because of this realization that the rabbit demon beast suddenly had a brilliant idea pop into its small head-


    Swish-!


    Wasting no time as it rushed into the Ephemeral Forest before appearing directly in front of the squirrel without it even noticing the fact that a rabbit around twice its size had suddenly appeared beside it.


    Thump~


    Squeak!?


    Only when it felt something grabbing hold of it and dragging it somewhere did it realize this, but at that point in time, it was already toote. Not that it could escape from the rabbit demon beast in the first ce.


    In the end, it could only silently resign itself to its fate as it was dragged in the direction of the terrifying creature it perceived Xuan Hao to be. Not having enough space left in its little head to wonder why it had not been killed yet.


    ¡­


    Unaware of the situation that was taking ce around him as he had only dedicated a minimum level of attention to keep an eye out for any enemies that might try to ambush him, Xuan Hao was fully immersed inprehending the Dao of illusions through the Dao of Mirages. Using the presence of the Dao of Mirages in the forest to deepen his understanding of the Dao of Illusions.


    Hoping that it would be enough to help him break through the barrier separating the Elementary Realm and the Small Sess Realm.


    After all, even if the Dao of Mirages could be considered a branch of the Dao of Illusions, it was still an independent Dao on its own. Comprehending it and applying it to the Dao of Illusions came with its own difficulties.


    If not for the fact that he could clearly feel his understanding of the Dao of Illusions deepening as he began toprehend the weird trees of the Ephemeral Forest, Xuan Hao would have doubted that he would be able to make use of the Dao of Mirages to break through to the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions¡­


    Like this, two weeks passed inside the Ephemeral Forest without any incidents taking ce-


    BOOOOOOM-!


    Allowing Xuan Hao to smoothly pass through to the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions. Officially fulfilling one condition to break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Now, the only thing he needed to aplish before he could break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm was to make one of his six Daos reach the Large Sess Realm and fully integrate all of them into his dao domain.


    "Hm?"


    Lost in his own thoughts after his breakthrough, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that other than the rabbit demon beast there was another presence close to him.


    "¡­"


    Opening his eyes to see who or what it was, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that the unfamiliar presence was none other than the squirrel he had spotted upon first entering the Ephemeral Forest.


    Not only that, but it seemed like it was following the rabbit demon beast for some reason¡­

 Chapter 1091 Possible Danger...

    <h4>Chapter 1091 Possible Danger...</h4>


    Squeak!


    Not having noticed Xuan Hao opening his eyes and staring at it filled with confusion over just what had happened during his cultivation session, the rabbit demon beast let out amanding squeak as it looked down at the squirrel, who in turn nodded its head and began gathering the qi present in the air inside the Ephemeral Forest with a look of concentration on its face.


    From an outside perspective, it looked like the rabbit demon beast was teaching the squirrel how to cultivate by gathering the qi present in the air around it into its body, where instead of forming a qi cycle, it used the qi to strengthen its body.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after seeing this, Xuan Hao decided to remain silent for now as he went over what he had gained from reaching the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions.


    From the fact that he now had the ability to use the Dao of Illusions inbat to either confuse the opponent with different illusions or conjure different illusory construct that could be used to attack the soul, the most important change was that he could clearly feel the strength of his soul had increased after he had broken through to the Small Sess Realm.


    The increase in power his soul had experienced was almost the same as when he had broken through to the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Far from beingparable to the increase in strength his soul had experienced whenprehending any of his other Daos to the Small Sess Realm.


    Thinking about it, this was most likely rted to the fact that the Dao of Illusions was rted to the soul and in broader sense, it could even be considered a branch of the Dao of Creation, a Dao that was far more difficult toprehend than anything he hadprehended so far.


    If not for the fact that he had been lucky enough to find a ce that was perfectly suitable forprehending the Dao of Illusions and given that his talent was far above average, he doubted that he would have ever had the chance toprehend the Dao of Illusions on his own.


    Hm¡­ Now that I think about it, it''s rather odd for the Blue Sea Empire to willingly give out the information on a ce like this for only a few thousand high-quality spirit stones. Just the benefits I managed to gain after a little over two months are more than enough to justify using this amount of spirit stones, let alone if I continue staying here for a longer period of time¡­


    Realizing just how odd it was for the Blue Sea Empire''s intelligence department to sell him the information on such a great location forprehending the Dao of Illusions instead of monopolizing it for themselves and using it to train their younger generation, Xuan Hao could not hep frowning to himself as he nced over in the direction of the wooden gate leading back to the Sea of Mist where the exit to the special space was located.


    Even if he had already visited all of the ces inside the space and hadn''t found anything that stood out from the information that he had been provided, he had a feeling that there had to be some reason why the Blue Sea Empire had decided to give up on the ce and not monopolize it for their own use. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Out of everything, the only thing he could think about was the Valley of Illusory Beasts. Maybe the illusory beasts located in the depths of the valley were far more terrifying than the information given by the intelligence department had said¡­ Well, the information did already state that there should be Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts present, so he had never nned to approach the depths of the valley in the first ce...


    Wait¡­


    The illusory beasts reappear after they are killed¡­ Does this perhaps also hold true for the illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm? And if that is the case, what in the world is it that makes this possible in the first ce¡­?


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he thought about what kind of creature or artifact had the power to create illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao had a feeling that he had some idea why the Blue Sea Empire had decided to give up on the ce.


    Perhaps the reason was not because they didn''t see any use in monopolizing the ce, but was instead because they couldn''t take control of the ce and deemed it far too dangerous for their juniors to train in. Instead deciding to hand it over to the intelligence department as a way for them to at least earn something from selling information on the ce to anyone looking for a ce toprehend the Dao of Illusions¡­


    Thinking that this was a reasonable exnation, Xuan Hao could not help feeling himself grow more curious about what it was in the deeper regions of the valley that had scared the seniors of the Blue Sea Empire away.


    After all, the Blue Sea Empire had nock of Earth Immortal Realm Experts and should even have experts exceeding the Earth Immortal Realm.


    For them to decide that the Valley of Illusory Beasts was not worth dealing with, the danger existing in the deeper regions of the valley should be enough to threaten someone above the Earth Immortal Realm- Far more dangerous than the potential presence of an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast that had been included in the information he had bought from the intelligence department.


    No matter what the case was, he also understood that the Valley of Illusory Beasts was incredibly helpful when it came toprehending the Dao of Illusions.


    Even after he had broken through to the Small Sess Realm and essentially managed to get what he wanted from the ce, he also felt that he should be able to break through to the Large Sess Realm far faster in the Dao of Illusionspared to any of his other Daos with the help of the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    Although there would undoubtably be a risk to him doing this, he also understood that nothing in this world ever came without risks and if he wanted to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm before the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple appeared, he would have to take some risks.


    Considering that he had been fine even after two months of killing illusory beasts, Xuan Hao felt that it would be reasonable for him to continue increasing hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts, as long as he didn''t venture too far into the valley.


    The only problem with this was the fact that he had no idea if there was some powerful existence deep inside the valley that already knew about his presence and just decided to not do anything to him due to the fact that he had only lingered around the outer edges of the valley and hadn''t really killed any powerful illusory beasts before the one two weeks earlier where he had left almost immediately afterwards¡­


    Squeak!


    Lost in his own thoughts on whether or not to return to the valley and continue killing the illusory beasts to increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions, Xuan Hao was suddenly brought back to reality by the loud squeaking sounding from the rabbit demon beast not too far away from where he was sitting.


    "¡­"


    Turning his head to look at just what was happening, Xuan Hao was left speechless as he saw the rabbit demon beast using its paw to press down at the squirrel with a proud expression on its face.


    Looking closer, it did not take long to realize that the two had just finished a short fight with the rabbit demon beast emerging victorious. Not at all surprising considering the difference in strength between the two.


    If there was anything, Xuan Hao was far more surprised to discover that the squirrel had actually managed to reach the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm during the two weeks he had been focused on breaking through to the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions.


    Even if demon beasts progressed differently from humans and the current location seemed perfect for the squirrel''s cultivation, it was still surprising for it to have improved so much over such a short period of time without any kind of external help in the form of special medicine or spiritual herbs.


    Is it perhaps because of the rabbit demon beast? Did it do something to help the squirrel''s strength increase?


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help staring towards the rabbit demon beast as he wondered just what had happened during the past two weeks.

 Chapter 1092 The odd Squirrel and the Talented Rabbit

    <h4>Chapter 1092 The odd Squirrel and the Talented Rabbit</h4>


    Squeak!


    Still unaware of the fact that its master was staring at wondering what it was up to, the rabbit demon beast continued training the squirrel. Not giving it any time to rest as it used all of its power to teach the squirrel the best way to absorb the qi between heaven and earth and use it to strengthen its body.


    At the very least, considering that the squirrel had already managed to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm in only two short weeks, it was obvious that the rabbit demon beast knew what it was doing and also understood just how to properly train the squirrel.


    Squeaaaak¡­!


    Having only started cultivating for real after being guided by the rabbit demon beast, the squirrel let out a painful sound as it forcefully began to absorb the surrounding qi between heaven and earth to strengthen its body ording to the rabbit demon beast''s instructions.


    Maybe because it was scared of the rabbit demon beast or because it had felt just how much its strength had improved during the past two weeks, the squirrel didn''t dare to voice anyints under the grueling and painful training. Doing everything the squirrelmanded it to do.


    At some point in time, it had even forgotten about the existence of Xuan Hao and could only think about whatever the rabbit demon beast ordered it to do.


    "What in the world is this torturous training¡­?" Seeing all of this firsthand, Xuan Hao could not help quietly whispering this to himself as he watched the squirrel go beyond its own limits and forcibly train its body far beyond what should be possible for a normal demon beast in the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    It was to the point that Xuan Hao even began to secretly investigate the squirrel with his divine sense to figure out if it had some kind of hidden bloodline that might be the reason why it was able to strengthen its body far beyond what should be archivable for a normal demon beast.


    In the end, it even caused him to try and use the system''s inspection ability on a demon beast for the first time-


    [A random squirrel that can be found almost everywhere where the climate and environment is suitable for its survival]


    [Talent: 26]


    And the result was quite shocking in itself. Although, he still didn''t find any traces of a special bloodline in the squirrel, he at least managed to find out that the talent of the squirrel was quite high, even getting close to that of his disciples¡­


    The only odd thing about the details from the description was the long paragraph that had reced what would normally just be a name. Instead turning into a short description of the squirrel and where it could be found in the wild.


    Other than the fact that this might be useful in the future if it could also be used on other demon beasts or animals, Xuan Hao didn''t really manage to figure out how the squirrel had seemingly broken through its natural limits. After all, a high talent didn''t just mean that it would be able to ignore its natural limits and improve its strength beyond what normal demon beast could.


    Maybe the reason for it does not lie with the squirrel, but instead the weird training methods of the rabbit demon beast¡­


    Thinking about this to himself as he nced over towards the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao felt himself growing curious about the identity of the rabbit demon beast as he once again decided to try and use the inspection ability of the system.


    [Royal Rabbit, Prince]


    [Talent: 47]


    [Bloodline: Royal Emperor Rabbit (In the process of awakening)]


    "¡­"


    Reading through the information disyed about the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on the spot for a moment as he stared speechlessly at the small rabbit training the squirrel with all of its strength.


    Although he had expected the rabbit demon beast to be talented considering the fact that it had reached the Soul Ascension Realm and even had the ability to escape from a group of Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts, he had never expected for the rabbit demon beast to be this powerful.


    Not only did its talent exceed both Qing Yi and Bai Ning, but it even had a special bloodline that was still in the process of awakening. Meaning that its current talent was most likely not its full potential. In the future, it might even exceed his two other disciples by the time that it managed to fully awaken its bloodline.


    "Haaa¡­ I really have to find a way to help my disciples in the future, I can''t have them lose out to this little one¡­" Muttering this to himself as he shook his head, Xuan Hao waved his hand and grabbed the two surprised demon beasts in the middle of training before putting them away inside his sleeve.


    Considering the fact that both of them were now stuck inside of the small pocket in his sleeve, he made sure to expand the space inside the pocket by a few meters. Not daring to expand the small space anymore, as he feared that it might begin to negatively affect the defensive capabilities of the robe.


    Although it was not much, it was still far betterpared to before. At least the two demon beasts wouldn''t have toy on top of each other to fit inside of his sleeve, while at the same time giving the rabbit demon beast more than enough space to continue training the squirrel.


    Whoosh~


    Following that, Xuan Hao headed directly for the wooden gate leading back to the Valley of Illusory Beasts. Having decided to try and increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions through ughtering the illusory beasts.


    Even if this would end up being dangerous and might even end up with him escaping from an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast in the soon to be future, the prospect of being able to rapidly increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions and potentially break through to the Large Sess Realm was far too hard to resist.


    ¡­


    "Where in the world did the half dead old man go!? Howe he suddenly disappeared from the world all of a sudden!?"


    "It''s odd indeed, he should not have been able to go on for more than a few hours in his state back then. Even with the help of some kind of medicine, he would at most have held on for half a day before being forced to enter seclusion to recover from his injuries."


    "That''s the weird part! Even after over two months of searching around the ce where his aura disappeared, none of us have managed to find a single clue as to where he is hiding!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao returned to Valley of Illusory Beasts, not too far away from the entrance to the Sea of Mist, arge group of Soul Ascension Realm Experts had gathered together in the sky as they talked with each other in loud and angry voices.


    If Xuan Hao or the old man hidden inside the Sea of Mist saw these people, they would instantly recognize them as none other than the group of Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had been prepared to ambush and kill the old man after his battle finished and his strength had disappeared.


    However, from the number present in the air, it was obvious that a few of the people had decided to leave. Not wanting to chase down the injured Earth Immortal Realm Expert. First because they had no idea how long it would take them or if they could even seed and second, because they feared the possible trump cards that the old man might still be hiding.


    "He can''t be hiding too far away, maybe we should just destroy this entire ce and force him out of hiding!"


    Rumble-!


    Interrupting therge number of Soul Ascension Realm Experts discussing with each other over how they were going to find the injured Earth Immortal Realm cultivator, one of them lost his patience as his aura exploded with terrifying momentum.


    "DON''T! If we cause suchrge-scale destruction, it will inevitably attract the attention of the Earth Immortals of the Blue Sea Empire. At that point in time, there will be no way for any of us to gain anything!"


    "Yeah, let''s think about it, we can''t make any hasty decisions."


    "That''s right, let''s try and search for a bit longer before taking any drastic measures."


    Seeing this, the rest of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts quickly jumped in to calm him down and stop him before he had a chance to destroy the mountain range below them.


    "Fine¡­"


    Relenting, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert retracted his aura before joining in on the discussion.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    In the end, they decided to continue searching through the surrounding environment with their divine sense and look for any signs of the injured Earth Immortal Realm cultivator. Unaware of the fact that one of the mountains in the mountain range they were floating above was the ce where the cave leading to the Sea of Mist was located¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 1093 Unfamiliar Aura In the Depths of the Valley

    <h4>Chapter 1093 Unfamiliar Aura In the Depths of the Valley</h4>


    Emerging from the wooden gate back inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Xuan Hao didn''t immediately rush forward and start killing the illusory beast to try and increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions. Instead, he decided to observe the situation inside the valley over the next few days to make sure that there wasn''t some powerful illusory beast that had emerged during his two-week absence following the death of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast.


    Luckily, after observing the valley closely, he didn''t find any signs of a powerful illusory beast hiding anywhere. The only thing he found during the few days spent observing the valley was that a few of the Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts that he had killed earlier had reappeared inside the valley. Giving him an official confirmation that Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts could indeed reappear like the Domain Lord Realm illusory beasts if given time.


    I should start with clearing out the Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast that has returned before making my way deeper inside the valley. Not only that, but I should properly also start to check up on the other Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast deeper inside the valley¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he nced in the direction of the closest Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast''s territory, Xuan Hao could not help wondering how he would fare against the more powerful Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts now that he had reached the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions.


    At the very least, considering that the strength of his soul had experienced a substantial increase in strength following the breakthrough to the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions, he should in theory be far more resistant to the different attacks of the illusory beasts and have a far easier time dealing with thempared to before.


    Although he hadn''t personally tested it yet, he felt more eager than ever to challenge the other Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts in the valley, that is¡­ If he didn''t fear potentially provoking a more powerful existence lurking deeper inside the valley¡­


    For now, he decided to go with safest option and kill the weaker illusory beasts until they no longer proved useful for increasing hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions. Only then would he think about targeting the rest of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts in the valley.


    Whoosh~


    Ptsh-!


    "Hm? The effect reduced by so muchpared to before¡­"


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, after killing his first Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast after returning from the Ephemeral Forest did, he discover that the increase inprehension had decreased to a point where it was almost negligible.


    Even from his best estimates, he doubted he would be able to go on for more than three months before anything below the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm ended up bingpletely useless in increasing hisprehension of the Dao of illusions. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Whoosh-!


    However, even knowing this, Xuan Hao didn''t let it affect him as he began focusing all of his attention on killing the illusory beast to increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions. At the same time making sure not to kill off all of the illusory beast he encountered. Fearing that killing all of them might end up catching the attention of the more powerful existences that might be hidden deeper inside the valley.


    That was of course if they had not already be aware of his presence.


    ¡­


    A few minutes earlier when Xuan Hao had suddenly pulled the rabbit demon beast and the squirrel into the small space inside his sleeve, the squirrel could not help letting out a panicked squeak as it began looking around itself filled with confusion.


    Squeak? Squeak!


    However, this confusion soon turned into greed as it spotted thatrge pile of spirit stones in a corner of the space. Even if the squirrel had no idea about what spirit stones were, it could still inherently feel that eating them would prove beneficial for increasing its strength-


    Whoosh-!


    Wasting no time, the squirrelpletely forgot about the existence of the rabbit demon beast as it rushed towards the pile of spirit stones. Ready to devour all of them-


    SQUEAK!


    BANG!


    Unfortunately, before the squirrel had the chance to reach the spirit stones, the rabbit demon beast flew into action and knocked some sense into the greedy squirrel.


    No matter how kind it was to the squirrel, there was no way that the rabbit demon beast would ever give it any of its spirit stones.


    The only reason why the squirrel had even managed to approach the spirit stones just now was because the rabbit demon beast had been shocked at the sudden growth of the space that it had already begun to think of as its own home.


    Other than that, there was also the fact that the pile of spirit stones had been ced there by Xuan Hao when he had expanded the space inside the pocket and the rabbit demon beast had no idea about their presence before the squirrel had begun rushing towards them with an expression of greed stered all over its face.


    S-squeak¡­


    Having understood that the spirit stones were not something that it could touch, the squirrel slowly got up from the ground as it bowed its head in apology towards the rabbit demon beast.


    Squeak!


    Showing a very cute looking frown in response, the rabbit demon beast wasted no time as it resumed the training of the squirrel. Making full use of the now muchrger space.


    S-s-sq-squeak!


    Soon enough, the painful squeaks of the squirrel echoed out across the small space, while the rabbit demon beast was instructing it from atop therge pile of spirit stones. Enjoying a few spirit stones every now and then as it taught the squirrel.


    ¡­


    As the days came and went inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Xuan Hao began grow increasingly worried as he felt the effectiveness of the illusory beasts when it came to hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions reducing at a speed exceeding his first estimate.


    After no more than a month since returning to the valley, the only illusory beasts brining him any form of benefits were the ones at the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and above¡­ And continuing at his current pace, it would not be long before only those in the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and above would be of any use to improving hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions.


    The worst part was that he had no idea how far away from the Large Sess Realm he was. In a sense, he still felt like he had barely scratched the surface and was far away from reaching the halfway point, let alone the Peak of the Small Sess Realm.


    It was only at this moment that Xuan Hao realized just how difficult it would be toprehend a dao to the Large Sess Realm.


    Even with the assistance of the illusory beasts and his rather high talent, he still felt that it would at least take another year or two¡­ And that was only considering that he could continue to find illusory beasts that helped increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions.


    If he was on his own and didn''t have the boost inprehension that came along with killing the illusory beasts, he feared that it might take a dozen years or longer to reach the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions. At which point it might be better for him to focus on a dao he was more familiar with and had a better way to ensure stable progress.


    In the end, the only reason why he was focusing on the Dao of Illusions was because of the presence of the illusory beasts¡­


    ROOOOAR-!


    Just as Xuan Hao was thinking about what to do in case wouldn''t be able to use the illusory beasts to increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions, a loud roar echoed out from deep within the valley.


    "This is¡­"


    Turning to look in the direction that the loud roar hade from, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both his eyes as he clearly felt two powerful auras shing with each other the next moment.


    "Someone is fighting an illusory beast¡­?" Noticing the distinct aura belonging to an illusory beast and one belonging to a normal cultivator, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both of his eyes in surprise.


    Given how he had not met anyone during the four or so months he had spent inside the valley so far, he had expected to have been the only person inside the valley, but¡­ From the looks of things, that was not the case!


    Then again, he bought the information about the ce from the intelligence department of the Blue Sea Empire, it was not odd that they had already sold information about the ce to others before him.


    The only worrying part was that the strength of the person deeper inside the valley had clearly reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm and even felt like it was infinitely close to the Earth Immortal Realm.

 Chapter 1094 Illusory Beast vs Unknown Cultivator

    <h4>Chapter 1094 Illusory Beast vs Unknown Cultivator</h4>


    Boom!


    As the battle taking ce deeper inside the valley grew more intense as the illusory beast and unknown cultivator began fighting with each other, Xuan Hao felt himself growing curious about whether or not his earlier thoughts about possibly alerting the more powerful illusory beast deeper inside the valley had been wrong.


    After all, whenpared to his own short battle back then, the current battle taking ce was far more intense and it was only a matter of time before the surrounding Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast would notice or maybe they already had noticed the battle.


    "¡­"


    However, as five minutes passed with the battle only growing more intense and none of the surrounding Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts showing up to join in on the fight, Xuan Hao could not help feeling himself growing confused.


    Did he perhaps get something wrong about the illusory beasts and how they behaved? Perhaps after reaching a certain level, they would no longer pay attention to anything happening outside of their territory¡­


    Staring towards the ce where the battle was taking ce as he thought about this, Xuan Hao felt like he had to reevaluate his current view of how the illusory beasts behaved- Or at the very least reevaluate the behavior of illusory beasts at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Hm¡­ Maybe I should take the chance and try to ask the cultivator if he managed to learn anything during his time inside the valley. Of course, after he finished up his current fight with the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast¡­" Muttering this to himself as he kept his attention focus on the battle that seemed to show no signs of any of the two being stronger than the other, Xuan Hao began to slowly make his way towards the ce where the battle was taking ce.


    Making absolute sure to hide himself with his dao domain. Following which he used the Dao of Illusions for the first time since he hadprehended to hide himself from any prying eyes. Appearing to look like a small illusory beast that only barely seemed to have reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    Not only did he appear to look like a normal and weak illusory beast to the outside, but Xuan Hao also soon managed to discover that none of the illusory beasts that he had passed by attacked him. Showing just how much both his Dao of Illusions had improved, while also showing just how strong his current hiding ability was.


    Compared to other Soul Ascension Realm cultivators, Xuan Hao felt that his hiding ability should far surpass that of ordinary Peak Soul Ascension Realm cultivators now that he also had the help of his Dao of Illusions to assist him when it came to hiding.


    As a result, the only demon beasts that seemed like they could still sense his presence to some extent, were the ones who had at least reached the Peak of the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    The illusory beasts who had yet to reach this cultivation realm thus had no idea about his presence, thus allowing him to safely reach the edge of the battlefield between the unknown Peak Soul Ascension Realm cultivator and the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Coming in such close proximity to the battle, he also began to feel the terrifying energy fluctuations from the two shing with each other. Forcing him to dedicate some of his dao domain''s power towards defending against the powerful fluctuations that had more than enough strength to kill someone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even then, he remainedpletely hidden and out of sight of the two powerful entities busy fighting with each other due to the presence of his Dao of Illusions. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Though he did not yet get a chance to test out the dao inbat, it was already proving to be rather useful when it came to situations like his current one¡­


    "Hmph! You annoying beast! Can''t you just die already!?"


    At this moment, a loud roar echoed out from the battlefield happening not too far away from him. Followed by both the cultivator and the illusory beasting to a stop for a split second before resuming their fight once again.


    However, this time around, Xuan Hao had his full attention focused on the fight taking ce, as he began to examine the different methods the two used. Not only to learn more about a potential enemy in case the cultivator turned out to be hostile, but also to learn more about the fighting style of Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts, as his first battle with one didn''t reallyst long enough for him to understand or witness the different powerful abilities that an illusory beast might have mastered.


    "Hm? Dao of Illusions¡­ No wonder that person is staying in this ce to cultivate. Maybe he might be looking for the final step needed to reach the Earth Immortal Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced towards the cultivator holding his own against the terrifying soul attacks and weird constructs created by the illusory beast, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of amazement after realizing he might get a chance to witness the process of someone breaking through to the Earth Immortal Realm in the soon to be future.


    Even if something like that would not be useful to him at the moment, as he still has a long way to go before being able to leave the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it never hurt to be prepared. Not to mention, witnessing the process personally would always hold more value than learning about it in a book.


    "Aaaah!"


    Bang!


    As he was somewhat lost in thought thinking about witnessing the possiblest part of the Immortal Soul Tribtion of the unknown cultivator, the person in question let out a pain filled scream as he was knocked into the ground by one of the powerful constructs created by the illusory beast-


    Swish-!


    Giving him no time to recover after being smashed into the ground, the illusory beast unleashed all of its power to create 6 towering constructs in the shape of 6 giant arrows that rapidly began descending down towards the injured cultivator.


    Rumble-!


    Realizing that his situation was not so good at the moment, the cultivator no longer had an irritated or angry expression on his face, as he used his own power to create 6 simr constructs to match the illusory beast.


    BOOOOOM-!


    As a result of the two powerful attacks colliding with each other, Xuan Hao was forced to take a few steps back when met by the sudden and terrifying energy fluctuations that had appeared because of this-


    Roaaar!


    Roar!


    Rooaaaar!


    In the end, his situation was still far better than some of the nearby illusory beasts who had no time to escape or defend themselves against the sudden and terrifying energy fluctuation. In the end resulting in death of countless Domain Lord Realm illusory beasts. Even being strong enough to kill an illusory beast who had reached the First Tribtion of the soul Ascension Realm.


    If he had some thoughts in the back of his mind that the surrounding Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts might not have noticed the fight taking ce yet, he was now undoubtably certain that the surrounding Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts had deliberately chosen to ignore the battle and not get involved.


    Something that couldn''t be said about the illusory beasts below the Peak of the Soul Ascension, who had already begun to turn their attention towards the location of the battle, some of the stronger illusory beasts had even begun to appear around Xuan Hao as they observed the fight taking ce.


    Given the sheer number of illusory beasts in theter stages of the Soul Ascension Realm that had begun gathering, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit uneasy.


    Even if the unknown cultivator ended up emerging victorious in his battle again the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast, he now also had to deal with therge horde of illusory beasts that had gathered around the battlefield.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    However, even with this, the scale and destruction caused by the battle didn''t slow down in the slightest and instead only seemed to increase with each passing second, to the point that it looked like the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast had begun to run out of steam.


    Not so much because it was weak in any way, but because the constant use of powerful techniques and abilities was extremely taxing on both its body and soul-


    Ptsh!


    And just like that, the unknown cultivator managed to pierce through the defense of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast andnd a fatal attack. Killing the powerful illusory beast before it had the chance to recover and fight back against the unknown cultivator-


    Rustle~


    At the same time, also causing the surrounding illusory beasts to grow restless as they all began getting ready to attack the unknown cultivator.

 Chapter 1095 Hidden Quest... Completed?

    <h4>Chapter 1095 Hidden Quest... Completed?</h4>


    Roooar! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Taking the lead, one of the illusory beasts at the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm took the lead as it charged forward. Soon causing the rest of the impatient illusory beasts to simrly charge forward.


    Boom-!


    However, before the first illusory beasts had a chance to reach the unknown cultivator, a loud explosion could be heard as the area around the unknown cultivator blew up. Following which the unknown cultivator disappeared together with the dead body of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast.


    Roar!?


    Causing the illusory beasts about to attack to enter a state of confusion as they stared at the ce the unknown cultivator had been standing just a short second earlier. Not knowing where he had suddenly disappeared to.


    Out of everyone present, the only one who managed to pick up on what had just happened to the unknown cultivator was Xuan Hao, who barely managed to see that the unknown cultivator had actually used the Dao of Illusions to hide himself the moment he had destroyed the surroundings. Following which he used the momentary confusion caused by therge explosion to sneak away before any of the illusory beasts had time to realize what had just happened.


    Even knowing what had just happened, Xuan Hao still ended up losing sight of the unknown cultivator as he disappeared deeper inside the valley together with the dead body of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast.


    "I Should properly get out of here for now before those illusory beasts end up finding me¡­" Muttering this to himself as he noticed that some of the illusory beasts had begun to search the surroundings for any signs of the missing cultivator, Xuan Hao decided to leave the ce before he ended up getting discovered by any of the illusory beats.


    After all, even if he was more than strong enough to deal with some of them and was more than confident in being able to escape when things got dangerous, he also understood that there were simply far too many illusory beasts present for him to be capable of fighting back for more than a few minutes before being overwhelmed by them.


    Outside of that, there was also the fact that he didn''t want to reveal his existence to the unknown cultivator without first making sure that he was not someone hostile, who might want to try and kill him to ensure that he could monopolize the Valley of Illusory Beasts for himself before more people started to show up. If not that, he might also want to kill him just to ensure that he wouldn''t have to worry about being ambushed during a battle in the future¡­


    Whoosh~


    Not thinking too much about this as he left the ce after ncing over in the direction that the unknown cultivator had disappeared in, Xuan Hao left the deeper part of the valley that he found himself inside of. Soon arriving back in the rtively safer outer part of the valley where the wooden gate leading back to the Sea of Mist was located together with the wooden gate to the Ephemeral Forest.


    For now, he decided to continue hunting the illusory beasts in the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm until they were of no use to him. Deciding to hold out on going any deeper inside the valley in search of Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts before it became the only way for him to continue his current speed of improvement.


    ¡­


    As half a month went by like this, the illusory beasts at the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm also ended up bing useless for improving hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions. Leaving only the ones that had reached the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm for him to hunt down in the outer part of the valley.


    Unfortunately, the illusory beasts in the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm were far harder to findpared to the ones in the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Rm and he soon realized that the only way for him to continue increasing his strength was to go deeper inside the valley.


    Well¡­ That, or he could wait for the illusory beasts to reappear again¡­ And considering that only a single illusory beast at the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm that he had killed before had reappeared after four months inside the valley, he had a feeling that he would be waiting around for a long time before the illusory beasts at the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm began to reappear.


    In the end, the only way he could continue to increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions at his current speed was to head deeper into the valley and risk running into the powerful unknown cultivator.


    Haaa¡­ I''m thinking far too much about this, even if that person is hostile and decides to attack me, I''m still more than strong enough to fight back. Not to mention, I should be able to escape with the help of the Dao of Space as long as I don''t go too far into the valley where the space is too solid and rigid for me to use the Drifting Cloud Steps.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this to himself, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time before he began to make his way deeper into the valley. Making sure to go at a rather slow pace so he could keep an eye on the state of the space around him and not end up going so far inside the valley that his movement technique would be rendered useless by the immovable and hard to manipte spatial structures of the space that made up the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    Even if it increased the time it took him to travel back to the spot where he had first witnessed the battle between the unknown cultivator and the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast by over seven hours. At least he was certain that the space along the way was easy enough for him to manipte with his current understanding of the Dao of Space.


    Of course, there was also the fact that he killed a few illusory beasts at the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm along the way¡­


    [Hidden Main Quest: Have four disciples reach the core Formation Realm (Complete)]


    "Huh?"


    It was just at this moment that a screen from the system suddenly appeared in front of him. Ruining the rather tense feeling of returning back to the ce where he had watched the unknown cultivator fighting with countless powerful illusory beasts ready to pounce the moment the fight ended.


    To be honest, Xuan Hao was not expecting the system to do anything, yet it decided to show up now of all times. Alerting him to the fact that he now had four disciples in the Core Formation Realm¡­ And considering that he only had a single disciple who had yet to reach the Core Formation Realm, it was rather obvious who had reached the Core Formation Realm.


    The only problem was¡­ Mui had only been at the Second Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm when he had left the sect. For her to reach the Core Formation Realm in a short four months, her talent of 78 was not just for show, she had already far exceeded his other disciples in terms of cultivation speed.


    Not to mention, he didn''t really have to guide her much, outside of the basics, after he had given her the Myriad Water Arts for cultivation¡­


    Outside of Mui, his three other disciples should also have improved by a lot during the time he had been gone. Especially Chu Yang, who focused most- If not all of his energy and time on improving his strength.


    Not only his disciples, but the rest of the sect should also have seen significant changes over the past few months as the new territory of the different major kingdoms became more and more integrated into the Star Shattering Sect and allowed far more resources to flow back into the Star Shattering Sect and promote the strength of both the young and old¡­


    Fighting back his curiosity over just what had happened during the four months he had been gone from the sect, Xuan Hao turned his attention back to the screen floating in the air in front of him before the entire quest appeared before him.


    [Hidden Main Quest: Have four disciples reach the core Formation Realm (Complete)]


    [Description: Have at least four disciples reach the Core Formation Realm below the age of 25.]


    [Reward: Awakening of physique advanced by 10%]


    [Bonus Reward Requirements: Have four disciples reach the Core Formation Realm within the first year of taking a disciple, all disciples below the age of 20. (Failed)]


    [Bonus Reward: Fully Awaken physique.]


    "¡­"


    Looking at the quest and the rewards, Xuan Hao at first felt a sense of happiness when seeing the awakening percentage of his physique would increase before feeling a sense of disappointment after seeing the so-called bonus reward presented by the system.


    Even if he failed getting the bonus reward in a hidden quest, there was no reason for the system to show him what he missed out on like this¡­

 Chapter 1096 Improvements and Unfortunate Encounter

    <h4>Chapter 1096 Improvements and Unfortunate Encounter</h4>


    Deciding not to think too much about what he had lost out on, Xuan Hao instead focused his attention back on the reward that he actually got from Mui breaking through to the Core Formation, bing his fourth disciple to reach the Core formation Realm.


    For now, I should redeem the reward from the system and get stronger before starting to search for any illusory beasts that might be able to help increase myprehension of the Dao of Illusions¡­


    ncing around at his surroundings as he thought about this to himself, Xuan Hao soon spotted a small, secluded spot not too far away. A perfect ce for him to enter a short seclusion while he redeemed the reward from the system to increase the strength of his physique and bring it one step closer to awakening.


    [Redeem reward: Y/N]


    Yes!


    Whoosh~!


    Not even a second after ensuring that the ce was safe and he had ensured that he wouldn''t end up getting found by any of the illusory beasts that might pass through the ce, Xuan Hao redeemed the reward from the system. Soon feeling the familiar power of the system flowing through his body as the strength of his body began increasing rapidly, while at the same time strengthening his connection to the Dao of Space


    However, the most obvious change taking ce was not the clear increase in the strength of his physical body or the Dao of Space growing clearer and easier toprehend. Instead, it was the special ability that came along with his physique''s awakening, the Divine Void Eyes, which had changed from being able to cause a partial spatial copse to being capable of causing a true spatial copse!


    Although he had no idea just how exhausting it would be for him to create a true spatial copse with his current strength, he felt a sense of excitement as he remembered the true spatial copse he had witnessed back in the mystic realm.


    Back then, the true spatial copse had left behind a scar on the world that didn''t show any signs of healing even after a long period of time. Different from the partial spatial copse that was almost instantly repaired.


    Of course, it could also just be because the true spatial copse had happened in a mystic realm that could in sense be considered outside the world itself even thought it was intimately connected to it through countless spatial passages and had in essence been created by the world over a long period of time.


    But even if the true spatial copse didn''tst as long before being suppressed and erased by the forces that kept the spatial structure of the world intact, the true spatial copse would still provide him a great opportunity for him toprehend the Dao of Space.


    Even if the speed ofprehension might be lower when it waspared to killing illusory beasts to improve hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions, it would provide him a stable path for reaching the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space in the future¡­ And if he couldn''t continue killing the illusory beasts, he could also switch over toprehending the Dao of Space instead.


    The only problem with this was the fact thatprehending the Dao of Space was a far harder ordealpared to the Dao of Illusions. Even with the assistance of the true spatial copse ability of his Divine Void Eyes, he doubted that he would be able to reach therge Sess Realm in it without at least five or ten years of time.


    A terrifying speed whenpared to other cultivators, but far too slow if he wanted to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm before the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple appeared to investigate what was happening at the Shattered Star Peaks.


    After all, outside of reaching the Large Sess Realm in one of his Daos, he also had to fully integrate them into his dao domain, something that might take months- even more so when considering that he had yet to integrate his Dao of Illusions into his dao domain.


    Smiling a bit wryly as he thought about this to himself, Xuan Hao decided to pull up his current status and see how much he had improved. Feeling curious about how far his physique was from awakening given that it would also slowly awaken on its own without the help of the system.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword (Small Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess), Dao of Space (Small Sess)


    Not integrated into Dao Domain: Dao of Illusions (Small Sess Realm)


    Sword Intent: Nascent Sword Soul Realm


    Talent: ????


    Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened)


    Physique: ??? (76% Awakened)


    Realm: Intermediate Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm) n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Professions: Alchemist (Artisan), Formation Master (Expert), cksmithing (Expert)


    Sect: Star Shattering Sect


    Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect


    Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui


    Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Peak Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm)


    Indeed, looking through his status, Xuan Hao realized that a few things other than his physique had changed since he hadst seen his status.


    First of all, the awakening progress of his physique had reached 76%, meaning that it had indeed improved a bit on its own without his cultivation realm improving. Next, the systems evaluation of his current strength had changed from the fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm to the Sixth tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, a clear sign that he was indeed getting closer to reaching the Peak of the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    However, the thing that surprised him the most was that the winged lion demon beast''s strength had improved from just being in the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to the Peak of the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Meaning that it should be in the process of getting ready to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    But¡­ Considering howzy the winged lion demon beast was, he highly doubted that its sudden increase in strength was due to it being diligent and cultivating hard on its own during his absence. Instead, it was far more likely that it had found something to eat that could help increase its strength.


    Now, the main question became what it had eaten to increase its strength to a degree that it was about to reach the Soul Ascension Realm¡­


    Deciding to not think too much about this for now as it would only make him worried about the state of the sect''s demon beasts, Xuan Hao used his divine sense to check if there were any powerful illusory beasts nearby before leaving the small cave, he had hidden inside of to redeem the reward from the system.


    Roooar!


    However, just as he stepped outside the small cave, a loud roar could be heard not too far away from him as an illusory beast at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm appeared out of nowhere charging directly towards him.


    "This¡­"


    Not having expected to be met with such a sight after having made sure there was no powerful illusory beasts around just a second earlier, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself as he wasted no time in using his dao domain and Dao of Illusions together to hide himself from the approaching illusory beast.


    Even if it had just appeared all of a sudden and was charging directly towards him, it was also obvious from the fact that it kept looking behind itself that it did not see him and just happened to be moving in his direction while roaring loudly.


    "Come back! Don''t you dare escape from me!"


    Soon enough, it became clear what was happening as a loud yell echoed out from behind the illusory beast and an all too familiar figure appeared not too far behind the illusory beast filled with killing intent.


    The cultivator from earlier¡­


    Seeing this person, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he began moving away from the path of the escaping illusory beast.


    Even if his strength was nowparable to someone in the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm ording to the system, he also understood that there was a very clear difference between someone who had just reached the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and someone who was just a single step away from the Earth Immortal Realm.


    "Huh?"


    However, just as he was about to sessfully move out of the way and avoid a confrontation with the escaping illusory beast and the terrifying Soul Ascension Realm cultivator, the illusory beast changed direction and came straight towards him once again. Giving him no time react before it was only a few hundred meters away from, a distance that made it impossible for him to stay hidden from the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast¡­

 Chapter 1097 First Time Causing a True Spatial Collapse

    <h4>Chapter 1097 First Time Causing a True Spatial Copse</h4>


    Roar?


    Seeing Xuan Hao suddenly appearing in front of it, the illusory beast let out a confused roar as it came to a stop before it collided with him. Stopping no more than a hundred meters away from him.


    "Huh? This¡­"


    At the same time, the unknown cultivator who had been chasing after the illusory beast also came to a sudden stop as he also discovered Xuan Hao who had suddenly appeared in front of him and the illusory beast without any warning.


    Even if he was originally chasing after the illusory beast and had a perfect chance to attack it now that it hade to a stop, he also understood that doing so might open him up to being ambushed to the unfamiliar person that had just popped up in front of him.


    No matter how confident he was in his current strength inside the Soul Ascension Realm, he had no intentions of possibly putting his life on the line when there was no reason to do so. Instead, it was far more reasonable to first assess the strength of the person that had suddenly appeared in front of both him and the illusory beast before deciding on what to do.


    At the very least, he was certain that Xuan Hao was at least someone close to the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm. After all, without this level of strength, it would have been impossible for him to remain hidden from his and the illusory beast''s senses!


    "¡­"


    Not aware of the thoughts going through the head of the unknown cultivator and the illusory beast as they both stared at him in surprise, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly to himself as he wondered how to get out of his current predicament.


    Considering that neither of the two had attacked him yet, he might be able to use the opportunity to sneak away before they recovered from the shock of his sudden appearance-


    Roar!


    However, before he had the chance to sneak away, the illusory beast woke up from its surprised state as it let out a loud roar and lunged towards him. Intent on getting rid of the obstacle blocking its path and escape before the unknown cultivator behind it took the chance to attack it.


    Whoosh~!


    As the illusory beast lunged towards him filled with killing intent, Xuan Hao understood that he wouldn''t be able to sneak away from the scene and decided to use his dao domain to forcibly push back against the illusory beast-


    Bang!


    Roar!?


    Colliding with the dao domain, the illusory beast let out a surprised cry before finding itself unable to approach Xuan Hao. Making it painfully obvious that it wouldn''t be able to push past Xuan Hao without a proper fight, something that it didn''t want considering that there was still the unknown cultivator behind it, who would be more than happy to see it use up all of its remaining energy fighting Xuan Hao.


    In the end, the illusory beast continued attacking Xuan Hao''s dao domain with the hope that he wouldn''t be able to continue resisting for long and had just momentarily increased his strength to fight back. Not using too much power in the process as it was still feeling fearful of the cultivator behind it.


    Luckily for the illusory beast, the unknown cultivator had also decided to observe the situation for now and try to first determine Xuan Hao''s strength before doing anything that might put him in danger. Giving the illusory beast ample time to attack Xuan Hao''s dao domain-


    Bang-bang-bang!


    Unfortunately for the illusory beast, it did not take long for it to discover that Xuan Hao had not momentarily increased his strength to resist it. Instead, he was indeed strong enough to resist it with his own strength, a worst-case scenario for the illusory beast who was now left with no idea how to escape from its current situation.


    Not only was a powerful cultivator watching it from behind, but its path forward had now also been blocked by a powerful opponent¡­


    What in the world does this illusory beast want!?


    At the same time that the illusory beast felt a sense of helplessness over its current situation, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he thought this to himself while looking at the illusory beast relentlessly attacking his dao domain.


    Not understanding why, the illusory beast had decided to continue attacking his dao domain with only the bare minimum strength of someone in the Sixth Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm instead of just escaping in another direction.


    After all, the left and right side of the illusory beast were wide open, and it should be able to escape in those directions and didn''t have to try and make it straight through him.


    Unless the illusory beast already thinks that it won''t be able to escape by going around me and thinks it might cause the cultivator behind it to act. Resulting it having to deal with both my dao domain and that person at the same time¡­


    Realizing this, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he looked towards the unknown cultivator a few thousand meters behind the illusory beast.


    Up until this point, the unknown cultivator had yet to make a move and was just observing the situation from afar, likely trying to assess his strength and determine whether or not he would be able to kill him and the illusory beast.


    How annoying¡­


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao understood that he couldn''t continue the stalemate with the illusory beast for too long nor could he fight back against the illusory beast, as both would end up revealing that his current strength was at mostparable to the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Far below the strength of the unknown cultivator-


    Whoosh~


    For this reason, Xuan Hao decided to take the opportunity to test out the true spatial copse ability that he had recently acquired after his physique had improved. Instantly causing a small space the size of an apple in front of the illusory beast to start copsing.


    Roar?


    Seeing the space in front of it starting to copse, the illusory beast momentarily stopped its attack as it looked at the small copsing space the size of an apple that had appeared in front of it filled with confusion. Not understanding what Xuan Hao was nning to do.


    Rumble~ n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    However, this confusion soon turned into fear as the small copsing space rapidly expanded-


    ROOOOAR?!


    And before the illusory beast could react, it felt a terrifying force taking hold of its body before it found itself being dragged into the expanding void that now covered almost everything in its sight.


    Roa-


    Not a secondter, the entirety of the illusory beast was swallowed up by the copsing space. Erasing it from existence before it could muster a defense. Not that it would have made that much of a difference considering that it had no way to resist the spatial copse with its Dao of Illusions.


    RUUUMBLE-!


    Following the illusory beast being swallowed, the spatial copse continued to expand for a few seconds longer before thews of the world seemed to kick into action and forcibly suppress it from expanding any further. Forcing it to shrink down to its original size of a small apple where it ended up in a state simr to the copsed space he had seen back in the mystic realm, a small scar on the world that wouldn''t heal for a long time without any outside interference.


    "¡­"


    Seeing the sheer power of the true spatial copse, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    Although he had been the one to trigger the true spatial copse just now, he had also clearly felt that he had no control over the copse after he had first started it.


    If not for the fact that the rules of the world had forcibly suppressed the spatial copse from growing anyrger, it might have ended up swallowing him as well, something he had not really thought about when he had first decided to test out the true spatial copse on the illusory beast.


    Not only that, but the energy consumed by triggering the true spatial copse had almostpletely dried up his dantian. Only leaving behind ten or so percent of his qi. Let alone fighting in his current state, even escaping would be a rather difficult thing if he had to escape for more than a few hours!


    At the very least, from looking at the unknown cultivator''s terrified expression, he felt that this shouldn''t be a problem. Maybe he could even use the opportunity to obtain some more information about the Valley of Illusory Beasts from him.


    On a side note, he would have to be extremely careful when using the true spatial copse in the future. Not only because it used up almost of his qi, but also because it might end up killing him¡­

 Chapter 1098 Chu Li

    <h4>Chapter 1098 Chu Li</h4>


    "This is-?!"


    Having just wanted to observe the situation from afar to see how strong Xuan Hao was and if he would be any threat to him, the unknown cultivator could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he witnessed the space around the illusory beast copse. Erasing the illusory beast from existence in the process.


    Although part of the reason why the illusory beast had been killed off so easily was due to it being caught off guard by the attack, the unknown cultivator also understood that the power of the copsing space had far exceeded hisprehension. Reaching a point where it had even left a scar on the world itself. Showing just how powerful it was.


    Is this person perhaps an Earth Immortal¡­?


    Recalling that only someone in the Earth Immortal Realm would have the power to damage the fabrics of space to such a degree, the unknown cultivator could not help looking towards Xuan Hao with a somewhat fearful expression on his face. Understanding that even though his strength was close to the Earth Immortal Realm, there was no way for him topete against a true Earth Immortal Realm cultivator.


    Coupled with the fact that he could not sense Xuan Hao''s true strength due to the existence of his dao domain making it difficult to grasp while also giving him a somewhat mysterious and unfathomable presence, the unknown cultivator became convinced that Xuan Hao was a senior in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    "¡­"


    Because of this, the unknown cultivator didn''t know what to do as he decided to remain silent while nervously looking towards Xuan Hao. Not daring to do anything that might end up offending Xuan Hao.


    Whoosh~


    Seeing the reaction of the unknown cultivator realizing that his n had worked, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a silent breath of relief before he made his way over with a calm expression on his face. Not daring to show any signs of exhaustion after using the true spatial copse ability, as it might end up making the unknown cultivator suspicious.


    "Greetings senior, this junior''s name is Chu Li and I serve under the East Sea General. Is there anything I can help with¡­?" Feeling even more nervous than before as Xuan Hao arrived in front of him, the unknown cultivator didn''t hesitate for a second before introducing himself as someone serving under the East Sea General. Hoping that his identity of being under one of the Blue Sea Empire''s four generals would be able to ensure his safety.


    Unfortunately for Chu Li, who thought that his identity might help keep him safe, Xuan Hao had no idea who the East Sea General was and showed no reaction upon hearing about him.


    Inevitably, this caused Chu Li to grow even more uneasy as he began wondering if the senior in front of him might be one of the terrifying experts who had surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm and stood at the pinnacle of power in the Blue Sea Empire.


    "No need to be so nervous, I just wanted to ask you what you know about this ce." Seeing the increasingly fearful expression on the face of Chu Li, Xuan Hao decided to jump in before things went out of control.


    Although it was good for Chu Li to fear him, it would not be good he ended up bing fearful to the point where he might end up doing something stupid in an attempt to get out of his current situation alive.


    After all, his current strength was nowhere near a level where he would be able to suppress someone like Chu Li who was only a single step away from the Earth Immortal Realm. On the other hand, it might end up exposing that he was not a senior and cause Chu Li to attack him, something he wanted to avoid at all costs considering his current state was far from optimal after having used the true spatial copse earlier.


    "Information about the Valley of Illusory Beasts¡­? Sure! I have been here for the past five years, I''m sure I will be of assistance to senior!" Hearing what Xuan Hao said, Chu Li sprung back to life as he happily said this with a proud expression on his face.


    Considering that Xuan Hao had just asked him for information, it was obvious that he shouldn''t have any ill intentions towards him. After all, considering their difference in strength, he would have been able to easily kill him if he wanted to.


    "So far, I have been able to explore the outer part of the valley and some of the deeper parts of the¡­"


    With this in mind, Chu Li didn''t hold back as he told Xuan Hao everything; he had managed to learn about the Valley of Illusory Beasts during the five years he had spent inside the valley. In the process, also telling Xuan Hao about the different dangerous locations that would be best to avoid due to the possible presence of Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts in those areas.


    In the end, by the time he had finished talking and hurriedly took his leave after a quick farewell, Xuan Hao had managed to learn a lot more about the Valley of Illusory Beast and why the ce had been abandoned by the Blue Sea Empire as a ce that was open to anyone who found it or bought information about it from the intelligence department.


    The reason why the Blue Sea Empire had decided to abandon the Valley of Illusory Beasts was that one of the seniors from the Blue Sea Empire had explored the ce and discovered that there was an existence surpassing the Earth Immortal Realm within the deepest parts of the valley. Not only that, but that senior had, ording to Chu Li, discovered more than one such existence.


    Not only that, but these powerful existences deeper inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts seemed to wander out towards the outer edges of the valley from time to time. Making it far too dangerous to use for training the Blue Sea Empire''s younger generation without getting rid of these powerful creatures.


    Considering the fact that the Dao of Illusions was already rather rare to begin with, the Blue Sea Empire couldn''t be bothered to waste so many resources and time on clearing out the ce. Resulting in it being abandoned by them.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao had wondered why someone like Chu Li had decided toe to the Valley of Illusory Beasts even knowing about this danger and return, he had told him that he had found a way to tell when the powerful existences deep within the valley were about to emerge. The method in question was to observe the illusory beasts that normally roamed around the outer edges of the valley.


    ording to Chu Li, when these weaker illusory beasts in the Domain Lord Realm and earlier stages of the Soul Ascension Realm began hiding away, it meant that the terrifying existences deep inside the valley were about to emerge.


    Unfortunately, he had no idea how long it would take for them to emerge. Only having experienced the weaker illusory beasts hiding away two times during his five years in the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    The way he knew it would be safe to return to the Valley of Illusory Beasts being when he could see the weaker illusory beasts roaming around the valley after poking his head out through the wooden gate.


    As for seeing any of the terrifying existences normally hidden deep inside the valley¡­ He didn''t have the opportunity¡­


    "There is really something wrong with this Chu Li¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about what Chu Li had told him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that there was something wrong with Chu Li. After all, he had stayed inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts for such a long period of time. Even knowing the danger of the ce and that was not mentioning his unique method of making sure that the terrifying existences from deep inside the valley had left¡­


    Well¡­ I guess it should also be because the valley is an opportunity for him to break through to the Earth Immortal Realm¡­


    Shaking his head as he remembered the fact that Chu Li was only a single step away from the Earth Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao felt like he understood why he was willing to take such a huge risk to increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions.


    Not only would reaching the Earth Immortal Realm improve one''s lifespan by leaps and bounds, but one would also be able to finish the Immortal Soul Tribtion.


    After all, when reaching the Soul Ascension Realm and officially starting the Immortal Soul Tribtion, one would have a total of five thousand years to prepare between each tribtion, when the time came, the tribtion would descend no matter what. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Because of this, Soul Ascension Realm Experts who were about to run out of time and felt like they were far from capable of transcending the next tribtion would get increasingly anxious for ways to increase their strength. Especially so for Soul Ascension Realm cultivators in theter stages of the realm¡­

 Chapter 1099 Back to the Ephemeral Forest

    <h4>Chapter 1099 Back to the Ephemeral Forest</h4>


    As he found out just how dangerous the Valley of Illusory Beasts was, Xuan Hao was also left with a new problem¡­ And that was whether or not he should continue staying inside the valley to continue improving his Dao of Illusions.


    Even if Chu Li had told him about the signs that would show up before the emergence of the powerful creatures from deeper inside the valley, he had no idea how urate this information was. Not to mention, he had no clue how long he would have to escape from the valley when the weaker illusory beasts began to hide away.


    If he happened to be deeper inside the valley and was locked in a fight with a powerful illusory beast when the powerful creatures deeper inside the valley began to emerge, he might end up being too slow to leave the valley in time¡­ And that was not counting the fact that there always was a chance that the powerful creatures from deep inside the valley might possess the ability to leave the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    "Haaa¡­ Staying might end up bing dangerous, but leaving will make breaking through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm take far longer¡­" Letting out a sigh as he muttered this to himself while gazing into the depths of the valley where his divine sense could not reach, Xuan Hao felt himself hesitating.


    Although the smartest thing would be to leave the valley and not risk running into an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast, he also understood that leaving the valley would make it close to impossible for him to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm within the next five years.


    At that point in time, he might be forced to find a way to deal with the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple while still being in the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, something he wanted to avoid if possible. Not only because he had no way to deal with someone at the Earth Immortal Realm with his current strength, but also because such a powerful cultivator would be more than strong enough to destroy every part of the Star Shattering Sect outside of the area guarded by the chaotic qi formation.


    Even if the Star Shattering Sect would be able survive and he could take his time breaking through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm inside the chaotic qi formation, the loss of the sect''s entire territory outside the Shattered Star Peaks and the branch sects that had been built up over the past few years across the sect''s expanding territory would take a long time to recover¡­ And that was not to mention the mental blow many of the sect''s elders and disciples would experience from something like that happening. Especially when considering that most of the sect''s disciples and elders had their rtives stay in the ever-expanding city at the base of the Ninth Star peak, a ce that was outside the chaotic qi formation¡­


    Thinking about all of this, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head.


    "Staying or not, I will have to face an Earth Immortal Realm Expert at some point while still in the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm anyway. At the very least inside the valley, I can still escape and don''t have to worry about my sect being destroyed in the process." As he said this to himself, Xuan Hao decided to continue hunting down illusory beasts inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    Dangerous as it might be, he felt confident in being able to escape from any of the Earth Immortal Realm creatures that might emerge from the deeper parts of the valley in the future due to his spatial movement technique, as long as he didn''t end up wandering too far into the valley where the space became far too solid for him to manipte with his current strength and understanding of the Dao of Space.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any time after havinge to this decision, Xuan Hao left the ce and headed towards a different part of the valley to recover the qi he had used earlier before he would even think of starting to search for search for a Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast to help improve hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions.


    Only after he had fully recovered would he dare to try and target another illusory beast.


    Of course, he also had to do his best to not use the true spatial copse ability, if possible, as using it didn''t leave a body behind. Meaning that he would not be able to make use of it to increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions. Essentially making the death of the illusory beast meaningless.


    ¡­


    "I wonder who that senior was, the power from that attack earlier was definitely in the Earth Immortal Realm. Maybe even beyond that¡­"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was focused on finding somewhere safe where he could recover from using the true spatial copse, Chu Li was left wondering to himself about Xuan Hao''s identity as he continued searching for another Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast to hunt down.


    "Ah! Come to think of it, the senior should also havee because of the illusory beasts'' special ability to enhance one''sprehension of the Dao of Illusions and with that in mind, senior''s dao should also be the Dao of Illusions!"


    Realizing this, Chu Li could not helping to a stop as a look of regret appeared on his face.


    "To think I wasted a chance to ask for pointers from a senior in the Dao of Illusions!" Eximing this in a loud voice filled with endless regret, Chu Li could not helping to a stop as he looked back in the direction he had juste from.


    Part of him wanted to turn around and see if he could catch up with the senior again and ask him for guidance in the Dao of Illusions, while another part of him understood how rude it would be of him to do something like that. Understanding that it might even result in the senior bing hostile to him.


    Although the illusory beasts were able to help him with his breakthrough to the Earth Immortal Realm, it was nowhere near as useful as getting the guidance of a senior who had already gone through the final tribtion he was about to undergo.


    Even if each tribtion would vary from individual to individual and the dao was the same, the experience and guidance would still be invaluable. Far more precious than anything else he might obtain inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    As for asking a senior from the Blue Sea Empire¡­ That was impossible!


    Not because the Blue Sea Empirecked Earth Immortal Realm Experts or that he was unable toe in contact with them, but because the Blue Sea Empire didn''t have a single Earth Immortal Realm Expert whoprehended the Dao of Illusions.


    To this day, Chu Li was the strongest expert in the Dao of Illusions in the entire Blue Sea Empire. Having no seniors that he could ask for help whenever he encountered a problem in hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions.


    As he remained in a state of struggle without moving for close to half an hour, Chu Li finally let out a small groan before turning around. "Ah! I will go! I can''t give up such an opportunity, even if it means I end up identally offending the senior!"


    Whoosh~!


    Wasting no time after he came to a decision, Chu Li used all of his strength to rush in the direction he hade from earlier. Silently praying that Xuan Hao hadn''t left the ce or at least was somewhere nearby¡­


    "Noooo! He''s gone!"


    Unfortunately for Chu Li, he soon came to realize that the senior had long since left without leaving a single trace behind-


    "No, I can''t give up like this! If I can''t find the senior anywhere around here, I will just have to search for him. At least considering that he wanted to know more about the Valley of Illusory Beasts, he should still be somewhere inside the valley¡­"


    However, Chu Li was not one to be easily discouraged as he soon calmed down and began the process of searching through the Valley of Illusory Beasts for any sign of Xuan Hao. Hoping that the senior was still somewhere inside the valley. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    ¡­


    "This ce should be perfect to recover without having to worry about any illusory beasts appearing."


    At the same time Chu Li had begun the process ofbing through the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Xuan Hao had made his way back to the wooden gates and returned to the Ephemeral Forest. Having concluded that it would be far safer for him to stay inside the Ephemeral Forest while recovering-


    Squeak!?


    Squeak?


    While at the same time also letting the rabbit demon beast and squirrel out to train like they had done during his secluded cultivation to break through the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions.

 Chapter 1100 Hunting Illusory Beasts

    <h4>Chapter 1100 Hunting Illusory Beasts</h4>


    After Xuan Hao began focusing on recovering and let out the rabbit demon beast and the squirrel, it did not take long before the rabbit demon beast tookmand of the situation and began the process of training the rabbit once again. Taking full advantage of the beneficial environment in the Ephemeral Forest to help increase the strength of the squirrel, while at the same time not forgetting to make sure that the squirrel didn''t ck off-


    Squeak!


    Because of this, the squirrel ended up in a half-dead state as it was trained in a way that could only be described as tortuous for the next week. Even though its strength grew rapidly because of this, it wanted nothing more than to go back to training inside the small space of the pocket again. Not only because it was far more rxing, but also because it would have some time to rest in between training sessions, something that it didn''t have during the week inside the Ephemeral Forest.


    The main reason why the rabbit demon beast went so hard on training the squirrel to the point of it almost fainting from exhaustion inside the Ephemeral Forest was not because it hated or had anything against the squirrel. Instead, it was because it had long since realized just how beneficial the Ephemeral Forest was for the squirrel and wanted to take full advantage of its time there before having to return to Xuan Hao''s pocket again.


    "Hm?"


    Waking up to this scene, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of pity while looking at the half-dead squirrel being forced to continue training by the ve driver of a trainer in the form of a small cute looking rabbit.


    Even if he didn''t have any chance to interact with the squirrel, he still felt a little bad knowing that the reason why it was in its current state was because the rabbit demon beast wanted to make use of the short time that it had inside the Ephemeral Forest.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao slowly got up before calling out to the two demon beasts. "You two, stop for a moment."


    Squeak?


    Squeak!?


    As a result, he was soon met with the confused expression of the rabbit demon beast and the terrified expression of the squirrel who had no idea why Xuan Hao had suddenly called out to them.


    "From now on, you two can continue staying here while I return to the Valley of Illusory Beasts. Before leaving this ce, I wille back to pick you up again."


    SQUEAK!?


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said, the squirrel let out a loud scream filled with terror before rushing towards him with an almost begging expression on its face.


    No matter what, it couldn''t continue staying inside the Ephemeral Forest or the rabbit demon beasts training might really end up killing it!


    As these thoughts passed through its head, it seemingly forgot the fact that Xuan Hao was far scarier than the rabbit demon beast as it looked up at him with tears in its eyes.


    Squeak!


    Bang!


    However, before he had the chance to say anything, the rabbit demon beast arrived beside the squirrel and knocked it out. Not intending to sit back and watch it badmouth its training in front of its master. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Squeak~


    Dragging away the unconscious body of the squirrel, the rabbit demon beast let out a small squeak of reassurance to him before disappearing inside the Ephemeral Forest.


    In the end, Xuan Hao didn''t have the chance to say anything before the rabbit demon beast and squirrel had disappeared and could only give onest stare in the direction that the two had disappeared in before turning around and making his way back through the wooden gate connected to the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    ¡­


    Returning back to the Valley of Illusory Beasts after having fully recovered the massive amount of qi he had used for the true spatial copse; Xuan Hao didn''t immediately begin to search for Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts to kill. Instead, he used the first few days after returning to the Valley of Illusory Beasts on finding out where he could go inside the valley before the spatial restrictions prevented him from using his Drifting Cloud Steps.


    Making sure that he knew just where he could go and still have all of his escape abilities avable in case a powerful creature in the Earth Immortal Realm appeared.


    Only after having made sure of this, did Xuan Hao begin to search for a suitable Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast to target¡­ And before long, he managed to sessfully find a Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast inside the area where he could still use his Drifting Cloud Steps. Officially marking the start of actively hunting down the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts, something that was only possible due to the fact that their abilities had significantly weakened after he had broken through to the Small Ses Realm in the Dao of Illusions.


    The only real problem was the fact that he still had to avoid the Chu Li and not end up in a fight with an illusory beast anywhere near where he was so as to avoid revealing the fact that he was not a senior and instead someone who was actually weaker than him.


    At the very least, this was not too hard to aplish given that his divine sense covered arger area than that of a normal Peak Soul Ascension Realm cultivator due to his stronger soul. Giving him more than enough time to leave if he spotted Chu Li.


    Other than that, given he was more than strong enough to fight the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts after his Dao of Illusions had reached the Small Sess Realm, this resulted in his somewhat stagnant progress in the Dao of Illusions once again rapidly improving at pace simr to when he had first entered the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    Like this, Xuan Hao ended up spending the next few months solely focused on hunting down the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts to improve hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions, while at the same time doing his best to avoid encountering Chu Li again.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was dedicating all of his time towards trying to improve his Dao of Illusions to the Large Sess Realm, the rabbit demon beast was making the squirrel go through hell back in the Ephemeral Forest.


    Although it had decreased the intensity of the training to some extent after Xuan Hao had left and allowed them to continue staying inside the Ephemeral Forest, it was at most enough to give the squirrel a few hours of rest every so often¡­


    Even then, the benefits of the spartan like training of the squirrel began to show itself a month after Xuan Hao had left for the Valley of Illusory Beasts, as the squirrel sessfully managed to reach the Fourth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Going from the First Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm to the Fourth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm in just a little over a month!


    Even whenpared to the geniuses of the Star Shattering Sect or outside the Star Shattering Sect for that matter, the squirrel''s talent far surpassed most of them. Showing just how much potential it had, while at the same showcasing how effective the rabbit demon beast was when it came to training other demon beasts.


    If Xuan Hao had witnessed all of this, he would undoubtedly have attributed it to the rabbit demon beast''s special bloodline. Even though it hadn''t fully awakened, it definitely did seem to have some effect on the rabbit demon beast, while at the same time also having an effect on the squirrel.


    The main effect on the squirrel being the fact that it naturally began to follow the rabbit demon beast. Not in the same way it had done when the rabbit demon beast had first picked it up and forcibly taken it in, but instead in the sense that it felt subservient to the rabbit demon beast.


    On the other hand, it also began to feel the benefits of the training more prominentlypared to going from the Qi Condensation Realm to the Foundation Establishment realm, as the rabbit demon beast had now begun to teach it all sorts of different ways for it to utilize its qi, both inbat and outside ofbat.


    It might be a bit odd that this was what was needed for the squirrel to understand that its strength had improved and that it was different from before it had ended up wandering into the Sea of Mist a few months earlier, but that was ultimately what ended up making it realize it.


    Much like Xuan Hao, the squirrel had also begun a process of rapid improvement and was showing no signs of stopping as it got closer and closer to the Core Formation Realm with each passing month¡­

 Chapter 1101 Problems and Solutions

    <h4>Chapter 1101 Problems and Solutions</h4>


    As time passed inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts and Xuan Hao''sprehension of the Dao of Illusions increased with each passing day, the situation back in the Star Shattering Sect also began to change as the first independent sects began to arrive at the different kingdoms surrounding the Star Shattering Sect. Soon beginning the process of taking over these kingdoms ording to their earlier agreement with the Star Shattering Sect before beginning the process of merging these territories together with the Star Shattering Sect.


    In the process of this, Elder Song also made sure to dispatch arge number of Nascent Soul Realm Experts to facilitate this process, most of these Nascent Soul Realm Experts being from the different subordinate powers under the Star Shattering Sect. Among which, the most prominent one was the Ascendant Frost Hall, who dispatched three elders in the Nascent Soul Realm to help out.


    Solidifying the fact that the Ascendant Frost Hall was by far the strongest subordinate power under the Star Shattering Sect. Not only because of their high number of Nascent Soul Realm Expertspared to most other forces below the Star Shattering Sect, but due to the fact that their sect master had managed to break through to the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm after a fortunate encounter and the support of the Star Shattering Sect''s resources.


    At this point in time, outside of some elders from the Star Shattering Sect like the grand elder of the half spirit race, the sect master of the Ascendant Frost Hall was the one with the highest hopes of reaching the Domain Lord Realm in the near future.


    The only person who would be able to threaten the Ascendant Frost Hall''s position as the number one subordinate power under the Star Shattering Sect would be Wan Linyun, the Domain Lord Realm Expert who had been taken in as a guest elder after during the Star Shattering Sect''s expansion into his kingdom¡­ And that was only if he decided to try and build up his family, something that didn''t look like it was going to happen considering he had willingly be a guest elder and spent all of his time in the Star Shattering Sect.


    Outside of the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect through the addition of the different independent sects from the core region of the Sky Empire seeking refuge with them, the number of rogue cultivators and refugees from the kingdoms closer to the core region passing through the borders of the Star Shattering Sect also increased.


    The difference between these people and the ones from the independent sects being the fact that none of them entered the Star Shattering Sect for protection but had instead been pushed further away from the core region of the Sky Empire as the surrounding empires began to cause chaos all across the Sky Empire.


    Although unintentional, the sudden influx of refugees and rogue cultivators looking for somewhere safe to settle down during the ongoing chaos in the Sky Empire inevitably ended up causing unrest across the border territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    However, before things could get out of hand, Elder Song took action to calm things down without needing to stoop down to things that wouldn''t solve the root cause of the problem, like blocking their entry, expelling, or outright killing them. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Taking advantage of therge number of rogue cultivators who were mostly between the Foundation Establishment Realm and the Core Formation Realm, Elder Song recruited arge number of them and had them use their superior strength to help build out new cities to house therge number of refugees within a short span of a few months.


    In the end, settling down the situation in the border region before it could grow out of control and potentially affect the core part of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    At the same, the Star Shattering Sect also managed to get arge number of ordinary people who could help build up some of the different infrastructure projects that Elder Song and the rest of the management elders of the sect had thought about implementing butcked the necessary manpower to aplish at the moment.


    As for food¡­ That was no problem at all considering the fact that a single cultivator in the Core Formation Realm skilled in a farming rted spiritual technique would be able to create food enough to feed millions of people with a few hours of work.


    In a sense, therge number of refugees turned out to be a blessing in disguise for the Star Shattering Sect as it helped filling out the current need for ordinary mortal manpower, while also covering the need for Foundation Establishment and Core Formation Realm manpower that the Star Shattering Sect needed to continue expanding at its current speed.


    ¡­


    Three months after the refugees settled down and began working on different infrastructure projects to better connect the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, the Star Shattering Sect encountered its first real challenge since the chaos in the Sky Empire began, as a Domain Lord Realm Expert from one of the surrounding empires had ended up finding his way inside the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    If he had just been passing through the ce on his way to the core region of the Sky Empire, everything would have been fine, and the Star Shattering Sect could just ignore him and continue keeping their neutral position in the current conflict without getting involved in the chaotic situation.


    However, this Domain Lord Realm Expert did not have this intention as he headed directly towards the core of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory where the Shattered Star Peaks and the main sect was located. Having obviouslye with a purpose in mind.


    Learning about this the moment the Domain Lord Realm Expert had passed through the borders of the star Shattering Sect and asked one of the elders present at an outpost for directions to the Shattered Star Peaks, Elder Song decided to preemptively leave the sect together with Feng Chen to meet up with this Domain Lord Realm Expert before he had a chance to reach the Shattered Star Peaks. Doing so would not only prevent this Domain Lord Realm Expert from finding out just how powerful the Star Shattering Sect was but would also give him an illusion of subservience that might end up helping the Star Shattering Sect in staying out of the current war that was happening in the core region of the Sky Empire without offending one of the empires behind this war.


    Even if doing something like this might damage to reputation and image of the Star Shattering Sect in the eyes of some people, both Elder Song and Feng Chen agreed that this was worth it if they could stay out of the war between therge powers of the Sky Empire and the surrounding empires.


    ¡­


    Upon meeting the Domain Lord Realm Expert as he was making his way towards the Shattered Star Peaks, both Elder Song and Feng Chen could not help cursing inside themselves as they saw the arrogant grin stered all over his face as he observed both of them.


    "So, you are the sect master of the Star Shattering Sect?" Ignoring Elder Song, the Domain Lord Realm Expert focused all his attention on Feng Chen as he examined him from head to toe before sneering disdainfully at him. "I heard the Star Shattering Sect had someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, but from the looks of it, that was just a rumor. Tsch, as expected of the Sky Empire''s border region. Mistaking someone in the Domain Lord Realm for someone in the Soul Ascension Realm." Shaking his head as he said this to himself the next moment, the Domain Lord Realm Expert belonging to one of the invading empires didn''t bother saying anything more before turning around and leaving.


    From start to finish, Elder Song and Feng Chen didn''t even get to say a single word before the Domain Lord Realm Expert had turned around and left. ""¡­""


    Left in a state of speechlessness due to the weird interaction that had just taken ce, they had no idea whether to feel offended at the tant disregard or feel happy over the fact that they had managed to avoid getting involved in the war between the Sky Empire and surrounding empires.


    "Haaa¡­ I think we should just go back for now, let''s just pretend this never happened¡­" Not knowing what else to say as an audible sigh escaped his lips, Feng Chen decided to pretend like the Domain Lord Realm Expert had never appeared in the first ce.


    "Indeed¡­ Let''s do that¡­" Nodding his head in approval to Feng Chen''s suggestion, Elder Song also felt like pretending the meeting just now had never happened would be for the best. Especially when considering the fact that they still had no idea what power this unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert was from.


    Whoosh~!


    Like this, Elder Song and Feng Chen soon left the spot and made their way back to the Star Shattering Sect in a quiet manner. Pretending like the Domain Lord Realm Expert they had met just now never appeared.

 Chapter 1102 Sect Recruitment! New Disciples!

    <h4>Chapter 1102 Sect Recruitment! New Disciples!</h4>


    Returning back to the Star Shattering Sect following the weird encounter with the Domain Lord Realm Expert belonging to an unknown empire, Feng Chen and Elder Song decided to bolster the borders in case more powerful experts began appearing following the appearance of the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    No matter how uninterested in the Star Shattering Sect the Domain Lord Realm Expert had looked, they didn''t dare to let down their guard in case one of the empires attacking the Sky Empire had set their sights on the Star Shattering Sect. Even if the Star Shattering Sect now had someone in the Soul Ascension Realm and the matter had already begun to spread outside the borders of the Star Shattering Sect over the past few months, it had be obvious from their interaction with the unknown Domain Lord Realm Expert that the people from the invading empires would not easily believe that there was a Soul Ascension Realm Expert in the Star Shattering Sect, a sect located at the border of the Sky Empire.


    Not to mention, the invading empires had nock of Soul Ascension Realm Experts and would be more than strong enough to dispatch a few of these experts to deal with the star Shattering Sect in case they ended up viewing them as a possible threat!


    The main problem was the fact that Feng Chen and Elder Song had no idea how strong Xuan Hao was and how he wouldpare to other Soul Ascension Realm Expert, but¡­ Considering that he should only have broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm recently, he should be far from strong enough to deal with any of those invading empires.


    Other than that, there was also the fact that Xuan Hao wasn''t at the sect of at the moment. Meaning that they had no way to resist if someone at the Soul Ascension Realm ended up appearing at the moment, something that ended up motivating Feng Chen to continue cultivating and try to reach the Soul Ascension Realm, so the sect didn''t have to only rely on Xuan Hao to fend off any possible enemies in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    As a result of this, Elder Song ended up bing the one in charge of the Star Shattering Sect as Feng Chen decided to retreat into seclusion in an attempt to break through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    At the very least he wasn''t totally alone in managing the Star Shattering Sect this time around, as he had both the management elders that he had taught and Shu Yao to help ensure things went smoothly without him burning out in the process.


    Because of this, Elder Song had more than enough energy to move forward with his n to host another recruitment event for new disciples. nning to take advantage of the Star Shattering Sect''s recently integrating the different major kingdom to get a new batch of talented disciples to join the sect. ¡­


    "So, this is where the Star Shattering Sect is located¡­"


    Standing in front of the now sprawling city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak, a young boy could not help looking up towards the towering mountains of the Shattered Star Peaks filled with admiration.


    "Hey, can you stop blocking the path for the rest of us!?"


    "Yeah, some of us still have to sign up in time before the next recruitment period begins!"


    Unintentionally, he ended up blocking the path for therge number of simrly young people who had been standing behind him waiting for a chance to enter the bustling city and sign up for the uing recruitment of new disciples for the Star Shattering Sect that was going to take ce in less than a week.


    "Sorry¡­"


    Smiling a bit awkwardly as he heard the increasinglyrgemotion that had begun growing behind him, the young boy didn''t dare stand around for a second longer as he rushed inside the city. Not daring to continue blocking the path inside the rtively small side gate that had been specially allocated to the young peopleing to try their luck at joining the main sect of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although the gate was far smaller than one of the main gates used by most people, it was far faster to go through than the main gates. Especially considering the city was constantly expanding, causing more and more people to rush towards the city.


    To be honest, it wouldn''t be surprising if the main gates of the city ended up being moved to expand the city even more, something that had already happened more than three times over the past year ording to what the young boy had heard during his journey to the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Not only that, but he had also heard that the Star Shattering Sect had apparently begun to build some kind ofrge buildings at the base of the Ninth Star Peak where the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak and into the Star Shattering Sect was located. In process of this, severalrge shops were forcibly moved, even the Explorer Union had apparently been moved away due to this construction project.


    I wonder what thoserge buildings are for¡­ Perhaps ces for the disciples of the sect to sell their things, or maybe something rted to the recruitment tests¡­


    Thinking about this to himself as he made his way through the bustling streets, the young boy soon arrived at therge buildings in question. Although, different from his imagination, most of the buildings that should still have been under construction had already been built and looked like they were already in use. "Internal Management Department of Transportation Infrastructure, External Management Department of Export and Import of Spiritual Herbs, Internal Management Department of¡­"


    ncing over the different signs above the entrance to some of the finished buildings, the young boy could not help feeling his head hurt at the long names disyed. Even if he didn''t fully understand what the buildings were for, he was at least certain that they shouldn''t have anything to do with the recruitment tests.


    "Ah! There it is!"


    Spotting what he had been looking for the next moment, the young boy wasted no time as he rushed over to a small building located right next to the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak. Above the entrance to the building, therge words [Recruitment Sign Up] were written in bold letters. Making it easy for anyone passing by to spot them.


    If not for that, therge number of young people gathered outside the building would be more than enough to guess that it was the right ce for signing up for the recruitment tests.


    "Now¡­ To get registered¡­"


    Finding his way through therge number of young people both younger and older than him, the young boy soon managed to reach the small building where he sessfully managed to register for the Star Shattering Sect''s recruitment test after waiting around in line for another few hours. Getting an identification token for the test and a location outside the city where he was supposed to be when the test started.


    Although he had no idea why he would be going somewhere just outside the city when he had never seen the slightest sign of there being anything rted to the recruitment tests, the young boy didn''t question it and just decided to head back without getting involved with the other young people. Knowing that there was a possibility of ending up in an elimination duel against any friends he might end up making there.


    In his opinion, it was better for him to wait until the end of the recruitment tests when he had be a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect before creating any friendships.


    With his strength having already reached the Later Stages of the Qi Condensation Realm and his young age, he felt more than confident in being able to enter the Star Shattering Sect!


    ¡­


    Much like the young boy who hade to the Shattered Star Peaks to be a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect, there was nock of people confident in being able to pass through the assessments and other tests that the elders of the Star Shattering Sect might throw at them.


    Unfortunately for them, the sheer number of people who had gathered to try and join the Star Shattering Sect was far above what it had been in the past. The number of outsiders present also ended up causing a rather significant strain on avable hotels, inns, and other simr establishments in the city, to the point where Elder Song was forced to dedicate some of the sect''s resources towards temporarily building new ces for these young people to stay.


    In total, the number of young people present in the city for the chance to be a disciple of the Star Shattering Sect ended up exceeding two hundred thousand by the time the day of the assessment came¡­ And by the time the assessment came to an end, only two thousand of them would be disciples of the sect- A number that had already been raised from the original one thousand nned new disciples by Elder Song due to the sheer amount of young people who had shown up¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 1103 One Year

    <h4>Chapter 1103 One Year</h4>


    "Everything is going well so far, the only problem is the fact that the city is far too small to amodate such arge influx of people."


    Watching therge number of young people walking around the city talking among each other with excited expressions on their faces, Elder Song could not help letting out a sigh of regret as he nced over towards the overcrowded inns and hotels. Even with him ordering arge protein of the sect''s elders and disciples to go out and build up some temporary ces for these young people to stay in while waiting for the first tests to begin, there was still arge number of them who had nowhere to stay and were forced to camp outside the city on their own.


    All of this was an oversight on his part, as he had at most expected around a hundred thousand to show up. Nowhere near the two hundred thousand currently present in the city. Not to mention that the number of young people entering the city was still increasing, to the extent that it wouldn''t be surprising if there ended up being a quarter million young people by the time the tests officially began.


    Because of this, Elder Song had even gone as far as recalling some of the more experienced elders currently not in the main sect to ensure that the assessments of therge number of young people went smoothly, while also being ready to take some of the less talented people to popte the different branch sects.


    In the end, Elder Song was prepared to recruit a total of 2000 people for the main sect, while another ten thousand would have the opportunity to join one of the branch sects. This way, the Star Shattering Sect should avoid losing too many talented young people, who just happened to not cross the mark and be ranked within the top two thousand.


    "Now that I think about it, today marks a year since Xuan Hao left the sect, I wonder when he will return again and how much stronger he will have grown¡­" Suddenly remembering Xuan Hao as he gazed down at therge number of young people excited at the possibility of joining the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song could not help saying this out loud.


    Although it had already been a year since Xuan Hao left and his disciples had started to get worried about their master, Elder Song didn''t feel too worried about anything happening to Xuan Hao. After all, he was already someone in the Soul Ascension Realm and was more than strong enough to keep himself safe. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Instead of that, he was looking forward to what kind of surprise he might bring back with him. Part of him hoped that it would be something that could help improve the strength of the entire sect, like the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms that he had brought back in the past.


    Even though only a simplified version of the codex had been made avable to most of the sect''s elders, the change it had brought to the Star Shattering Sect had still been astronomical, causing the strength of all the disciples to increase, while also increasing the number and strength of the Nascent Soul Realm Elders in the sect.


    "Haaa¡­ Shouldn''t hope for too much, he already brought back the Domain Lord Realm version of that codex, so the sect should be fine until Peak Domain Lord Realm Experts start appearing¡­" Shaking his head as he dispelled his somewhat greedy thoughts, Elder Song returned to observing the flow of young people in the city below while contemting how to best conduct the uing tests and trials.


    ¡­


    At the same time that Elder Song was busy preparing for the recruitment of new disciples, Xuan Hao opened his eyes inside a small hidden cave inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts as his gazended on the body of a dead illusory beast in the process of dispersing on the ground beside him-


    Whoosh~


    Disappearing the next second. Leaving no traces other than the small motes of light containing thest bit of power that had drifted off the body of the illusory beast before it had disappeared.


    "How curious¡­" Whispering this to himself as he observed the small motes of light from the now gone illusory beasts slowly drifting away before simrly disappearing, Xuan Hao slowly began stretching his body before standing up after over two weeks immersed in the Dao of Illusions.


    The past two weeks allowed his Dao of Illusions the chance to take another step forward towards the Large Sess Realm, but at the same time also worsening the effects of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts.


    If he wanted to reach the Large Sess Realm of the Dao of Illusions, he had a feeling that he would eventually be forced to first take down an illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm, something that he didn''t think was anywhere near possible with his current strength.


    After all, even if the Dao of Illusions provided him with an advantage when it came to fighting against the illusory beasts, it was far from enough to allow him to fight against an illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm, let alone kill one! "Hm¡­ I might try and search for more powerful illusory beasts for now and see if they make any difference. If they really don''t work, I will have to either find a way to kill an illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm or find another way to increase myprehension of the Dao of Illusions to the Large Sess Realm." Muttering this to himself as he turned to look at the few illusory beasts in the Domain Lord Realm that had surrounded him after feeling the presence of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast disappear, Xuan Hao casually waved his hand and used his dao domain to send them flying before they had a chance to attack him.


    Roooaaaar-!


    As the small group of Domain Lord Realm illusory beasts were knocked flying, it did not take long before a loud roar echoed out from the distance before Xuan Hao felt several Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts rapidly approaching his location.


    "Looks like its time for me to leave before I end up getting swarmed¡­" Narrowing both his eyes as he remembered how Chu Li had been surrounded in the past after his battle with a Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time before using his Drifting Cloud Steps to teleport away.


    ¡­


    Whoosh~


    "Huh? Senior! I have been searching all over for you!"


    As he appeared out of thin air far away from the ce where he had been absorbing the insights of the dead illusory beast after five minutes, Xuan Hao was just about to take another step forward in the direction of ce with a powerful Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast when a certain someone appeared in front of him¡­


    "Chu Li¡­ Is there a problem?" Knowing that it wouldn''t be too good to just up and run away the moment he encountered him, Xuan Hao decided to turn around and face Chu Li with a questioning expression on his face.


    "Ah¡­ Actually¡­ This junior has a somewhat selfish request and was wondering if senior would be able to share some of his insights into the Dao of Illusions. If senior is willing, this junior will never forget the favor and will make sure to return it in the future!" Hesitating for a short moment when faced with the questioning look, Chu Li ultimately built up enough courage to ask him about the thing he had wanted to ask him since theirst conversation. Understanding that he had nothing to really give a senior in the Earth Immortal realm outside of a promise to return the favor in the future.


    "¡­"


    Different from the hesitation of Chu Li who was filled with anticipation at the answer from the person he perceived as a senior in the Dao of Illusions, the senior in question was left feeling like he had been caught between a rock and a hard ce.


    Although he could refuse Chu Li''s request with the excuse that he had other things to attend to, he also understood that doing this might result in the other party growing suspicious of him. After all, handing out a few pointers normally didn''t take more than a few minutes, so most seniors would be more than happy to spend a few minutes guiding a junior. Especially if the junior was someone talented on the brink of reaching the Earth Immortal Realm¡­


    "Sure, show me what you got, and I will give you a few pointers."


    For this reason, Xuan Hao reluctantly agreed with Chu Li''s request. Praying to himself that his powerful talent had allowed hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions to surpass Chu Li enough that he could at least give him a few suggestions on where to improve. Even if these suggestions might not help Chu Li a lot with his Dao of Illusions, they would still be helpful and could thus keep up the fa?ade of him being a senior¡­

 Chapter 1104 Teaching a... Senior?

    <h4>Chapter 1104 Teaching a... Senior?</h4>


    "Thank you, I will make sure to use all my strength!" shing a smile filled with joy after hearing Xuan Hao agree to his request, Chu Li wasted no time before starting to gather his power to show off hisprehension and mastery of the Dao of Illusions.


    "¡­"


    Feeling the terrifying power that Chu Li was gathering, Xuan Hao narrowed both his eyes as a hint of surprise shed through them.


    Even though Chu Li was still someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, the strength he was disying far exceeded that of someone in the Soul Ascension Realm and instead gave a feeling simr to the two Earth Immortal Realm cultivators he had seen fighting to the death almost a year ago.


    No¡­ It''s simr, but there is clearly somethingckingpared to those two Earth Immortal Realm cultivators. If I had to say anything to describe it, it feels simr to the difference between someone in the Half Step Domain Lord Realm and the Domain Lord Realm.


    Someone in the Half Step Domain Lord Realm might have a pseudo domain and have far exceeded the strength of anyone else in the Nascent Soul Realm without a pseudo domain, but they are ultimately still inferior to someone in the Domain Lord Realm¡­ But if that''s the case, what is someone in the Half Step Earth Immortal Realmckingpared to someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­?


    Shaking his head as he thought about this to himself, Xuan Hao focused his full attention on Chu Li. Even if he wanted to know more about the Earth Immortal Realm and was curious about what it was Chu Li was missingpared to the Earth Immortal Realm Experts he had seen, he first had to ensure that his status as a senior remained intact.


    Not aware of the thoughts going through Xuan Hao''s head as he was looking at him with a stern expression on his face, Chu Li just thought the senior was analyzing his every move to get a better understanding of how far he had progressed and what things he might be able to improve on.


    "Senior, I will begin now."


    As Chu Li said this, he narrowed both his eyes before he took a step forward and cupped one of his hands, causing a surge of ethereal energy belonging to the Dao of Illusions to spring forth all around him, manifesting into all sorts of mystical creatures, ancient warriors, and other things before gathering in his hand where it merged together into a luminous sphere of light. Rumble~!


    Only a short instant after the sphere had gathered together in the palm of Chu Li''s hand, did it start to shake uncontrobly as if it would copse at any moment.


    However, before it had a chance to do this, Chu Li decisively thrust his palm forward, sending the sphere hurtling towards a group of Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts who happened to be passing by-


    Roar?


    RUUUMBLE-!


    Only turning around in time to see the sphere appearing directly in front of them, the illusory beasts had no time to react as the sphere hit, causing reality itself to fracture as the terrifying illusory power contained inside the sphere rippled outward, destroying everything in its path in the process. Including the group of unlucky illusory beasts.


    "¡­"


    Observing the terrifying power of the small sphere as the different countless illusory creatures inside of it had merged into some kind ofrge-scale illusory construct that destroyed everything in its path, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    Although the attack was not directed directly at him, he still felt like he would die if faced with the attack head on. Making him certain that the level of the sphere should have already transcended the Soul Ascension realm and reached the earth Immortal Realm!


    Not only that, but the dao contained in the attack doesn''t just contain the Dao of Illusions, but also contain the Dao of Space. Although¡­ The Dao of Space in the attack just now is extremely rudimentary and doesn''t even reach the Elementary Realm¡­


    Trying his best to analyze the attack, Xuan Hao also realized that the attack didn''t just contain the Dao of Illusions but also contained the Dao of Space.


    The Dao of Illusions was used for the attack itself, while the Dao of Space was used topress and contain the power for long enough to reach its target. In the end, the reason why the sphere had grown unstable earlier was because Chu Li''sprehension of the Dao of Space was insufficient topress and contain such arge amount ofrge amount of illusory power.


    If he wanted to improve on the attack in the future, he would have to increase his understanding of the Dao of Space, or the attack might end up blowing up in his face at some point in the future. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Hm? His understanding of the Dao of Illusions is clearly far above my own, but won''t I be able to guide him in the Dao of Space with ease?


    Suddenly realizing this as he finished analyzing the attack just now, Xuan Hao turned to look at Chu Li who had already sat down on the ground to recover therge amount of qi he had just used. "Senior¡­? Did you already finish analyzing my attack?!" Feeling Xuan Hao''s gaze, Chu Li opened both his eyes as he turned to look up at Xuan Hao filled with shock. Thinking that Xuan Hao''s gaze meant that he had already finished analyzing his move just now and was ready to give him guidance on how to improve.


    "As expected of senior! Really worthy of admiration!" Not even giving Xuan Hao time to answer, Chu Li seemingly went off on his own as he began praising him happily the next second.


    This f¡­ Hah¡­ Need to calm down¡­ "S-sure¡­" Trying his best to not curse at Chu Li, Xuan Hao could only reluctantly nod his head in agreement. Fearing that doing anything else might end up with him having to face the terrifying illusory sphere of light.


    In any case, he had already decided to use his understanding of the Dao of Space to improve on the attack instead of trying to use his clearly inferior Dao of Illusions to try and help him. Even if this might not be what Chu Li had originally been hoping for, it wasn''t too weird considering that a more profound Dao of Space would indeed improve the power by several times. If taken far enough, it might even be possible to merge the power from the Dao of illusions together with a more powerful Dao of Space to create an even more terrifying attack¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t bother dying the inevitable as he began pointing out the different mistakes he had spotted when analyzing the attack. Pointing to hundreds of different ways that Chu Li could improve hispression and containment of the illusory power while at the same time throwing in some of his ideas about the possibility of merging the two together into a single attack instead of the dao of space only being used to temporarily store the illusory power.


    Of course, knowing that Chu Li might not understand some of the things he said with his rudimentary understanding of the Dao of Space, he also decided to personally show it without using his Dao of Illusions. Ensuring that he didn''t end up revealing his far lowerprehension of the Dao of Illusions in the process¡­


    "¡­And that will be all, I still have something to do, so I will take my leave for now." After over an hour ended up passing with him teaching Chu Li about the Dao of Space, Xuan Hao didn''t dare stay around after finishing his lecture-


    Swish-!


    Wasting no time in using his Drifting Cloud Steps to disappear before Chu Li had the chance to ask him more questions- or even more dangerous, ask him about the Dao of Illusions!


    "Senior¡­!?" Only realizing Xuan Hao was leaving when he had already disappeared into thin air, Chu Li looked around himself filled with surprise for a short moment before calming down again.


    "To think senior would leave so fast after he finished teaching me, but¡­ To think senior would not point out my mistakes in the Dao of Illusions but instead my utilization of the Dao of Space. Hah¡­ I did indeed disregard the Dao of Space in my pursuit of the Dao of Illusions.


    Even if I just implement a small bit of what senior taught me, I might be able to double- no triple the strength!" Muttering this to himself as both his eyes started shining, Chu Li could not help feeling a new sense of respect towards Xuan Hao.


    "Not just my attack, but maybe he was also hinting towards my current stagnant progress in improving my strength. Maybe what I need to do is not just focus on the Dao of Illusions, but instead try andprehend a new dao to supplement it. If that is the case, the Dao of Space does indeed seem fitting¡­"


    Feeling like he saw a new path appearing in front of him, Chu Li felt all kinds of different feelings surging up inside of him. However, before things went out of control, he quickly calmed himself down and found a ce nearby to sit down and go over everything slowly.


    After all, the things he had learnt from Xuan Hao would take some time to fully digest before he was prepared to take the next step¡­

 Chapter 1105 Terrifying Encounter, Confusing Encounter

    <h4>Chapter 1105 Terrifying Encounter, Confusing Encounter</h4>


    Whoosh~


    "This should be far enough..." Appearing inside a small secluded forest located at the edge of the valley, Xuan Hao looked back in the direction he hade from with a worried expression on his face. Even if he felt that his earlier performance should have convinced Chu Li, he didn''t n to stay around for long enough to find out.


    To make sure that he didn''t end up running into Chu Li the moment he stepped out of the small, secluded forest and resumed hunting down Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts, Xuan Hao decided to spend the next week quietly meditating on the Dao of Illusions on his own without leaving the small forest.


    Hisprehension speed of the Dao of Illusions might have slowed down due to this, but at least he would be sure that he didn''t end up getting caught in a troublesome situation. Not to mention, he also decided to use some of the time to go over the attack Chu Li had used to demonstrate hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions.


    Although Chu Li should not have reached the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions, he had gone further than him and should only be a single step away from reaching the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions. If he could grasp anything from his attack back then, it would undoubtedly end up saving him a lot of time in the future.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao hid away in a corner of the Valley of Illusory Beasts, back in the Sea of Mist, the old man who had remained stuck in the same position for a year without moving, opened both his eyes as he stared towards the entrance to the Sea of Mist, he had passed through a year ago.


    "It seems like those people still haven''t given up and are still lingering around the entrance. If I try to leave, they will undoubtedly notice me the moment I appear¡­" Muttering this to himself as he used his divine sense to connect to some of the formations he hadid down outside the Sea of Mist, the old man shook his head helplessly as he looked around the empty Sea of Mist.


    Even though an entire year had passed, nothing had changed inside the Sea of Mist, and everything remained exactly the same as it had been when he had first entered the Sea of Mist. The only thing different was the fact that the squirrel, who had identally wandered into the Sea of Mist, was nowhere to be seen.


    However, ncing towards the two wooden gates hidden deeper inside the mist, it was not difficult to guess that the squirrel had managed to reach one of the two wooden gates during the past year. If it hadn''t managed to do this, he should have already spotted its remains if it hadn''t been able to step into the path of cultivation and be a demon beast.


    Thinking about the two wooden gates that should be connected to some other part of the special independent space that he now found himself inside of, the old man could not help feeling a hint of curiosity about what might be lurking on the other side of the two wooden gates. Given his knowledge about these kinds of independent spaces, it might be an ancient spiritual herb garden filled to the brim with ancient spiritual herbs that could help him recover from his current state, or it might be a deadly hell scape filled with all kinds of terrifying demons wanting nothing more than to kill him¡­ And considering his current state, he could not risk going to such a ce before he at least managed to recover his strength to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Given the fact that his current strength had just barely managed to recover back up to a levelparable to the Domain Lord Realm, he didn''t dare think about entering the two wooden gates any time soon.


    "But¡­ I should have recovered enough to move around a bit¡­" Almost whispering this to himself as he felt a need to move around after spending over a year in the same position, the old man slowly got up after stretching his rigid body. Soon beginning to aimlessly wander around the Sea of Mist to stretch out his legs after such a long time sitting in the lotus position on the ground.


    For once in his life, the once powerful Earth Immortal Realm Expert, felt like an ordinary old man out on a normal walk as he wandered around the empty Sea of Mist¡­


    "Huh?"


    After a little over two hours passed peacefully like this and the old man was preparing to get back to recovering and sit down for another year, he found himself standing directly in front of one of the two wooden gates. Having unconsciously moved towards the closest of the two wooden gates during his small walk around the Sea of Mist. Well¡­ A single peek never hurt anyone before. Not to mention, I should be able to retreat safely in case something really does end up happening¡­


    Convincing himself that it would be fine to just take a little peak on the other side of the wooden gate in front of him, the old man slowly leaned forward as he stuck his head through the wooden gate. Having already tried and failed to prate it with his divine sense earlier.


    However, the sight on the other side of the wooden gate was nothing like what he expected to see, as he found himself face to face with a small, cute looking rabbit demon beast-


    "Soul Ascension Realm¡­!?"


    Even more shocking was the fact that he discovered that the small, cute looking rabbit demon beast had actually reached the Soul Ascension Realm. Having far exceeded anything he could deal with in his current state.


    Squeak?


    Noticing the old man at the same time that the old man noticed it, the rabbit demon beast tilted its head in confusion at the aged face that had suddenly popped out from the wooden gate a few meters away from where it was training the squirrel.


    Whoosh-!


    Reacting fast, the old man took advantage of this confusion to rapidly pull his head back out from the wooden gate. Leaving the rabbit demon beast in an even more confused state as it wondered if what it had just witnessed had been a mirage created by the Ephemeral Forest.


    If not for the fact that it didn''t dare to leave the Ephemeral Forest in case its master returned and found out it was missing, it would have followed after the weird floating head to investigate whether or not it had just been tricked by a mirage created by the powerful presence of the Dao of Mirages in the Ephemeral Forest.


    Squeak¡­?


    Not having seen the weird floating head that appeared in the wooden gate just now, the squirrel let out a confused squeaking sound upon seeing the weird state of the rabbit demon beast. Feeling curious about what had caused its strict and almost sadistic teacher to give it a rare break during a highly intensive physical training session-


    Squeak!


    However, this did notst for long, as the rabbit demon beast sprung back into action the moment it heard the curious squeaking from the squirrel. Giving it no time to rest as it increased the intensity of the training even further.


    Although this terrifying training was beneficial to it, the squirrel could not help letting out a painful sound as it began regretting the fact that it didn''t just remain quiet and use the precious time when the rabbit demon beast was distracted to get some rest¡­


    "How terrifying!"


    At the same time that the rabbit demon beast returned to training the squirrel, the old man who had appeared as a floating head to the rabbit demon beast was looking towards the wooden gate filled with fear.


    "Even a small and cute rabbit that would at most be in the Qi Condensation Realm managed to reach the Soul Ascension Realm. If I''m not wrong, I should have been rather lucky to not have ended up face to face with an Earth Immortal Realm demon beast earlier.


    Indeed, it''s far too dangerous for me to explore the other side of the wooden gates in my current state. Even recovering my strength back to the Soul Ascension Realm is far from enough to explore those ces¡­" Muttering this to himself as he let his imagination run wild about what other things might be hidden on the other side of the wooden gate, the old man made his way back to the spot he had been spending all his time over the past year. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "For now, I should focus on recovering my strength before doing anything else¡­" Closing his eyes as he said this to himself, the old man didn''t bother continue his walk around the Sea of Mist and instead sat back down on the ground before continuing to cultivate like nothing had happened.

 Chapter 1106 Late Stage of the Small Success Realm

    <h4>Chapter 1106 Late Stage of the Small Sess Realm</h4>


    Unaware of the fact that someone else other than Chu Li and himself had managed to find his way into the special space where the Sea of Mist, Ephemeral Forest and the Valley of Illusory Beasts was located, Xuan Hao continued staying inside the small, secluded forest without moving around for another few days.


    Only after a little over a week had passed since his encounter with Chu Li, did he start to make his way out of the small forest in search of more Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beats to kill. Making sure to properly scan his surroundings with his divine sense before using his Drifting Cloud Steps. Ensuring that he didn''t identally end up appearing directly in front of Chu Li again.


    Although he had been sessful in convincing him this time around, there was no saying if he would be able to continue keeping up the act when he began asking more detailed questions about the Dao of Illusions or the Earth Immortal Realm.


    After all, when everything was said and done, he didn''t really have any clue about the Earth Immortal Realm outside of the fact that it was the realm that came after the Soul Ascension Realm. If Chu Li began asking him for help in breaking through to the Earth Immortal Realm and how to best face thest tribtion of the Immortal Soul Tribtion, his act would almost certainly be exposed the moment he disyed hisck of information regarding the Earth Immortal Realm and experience when it came to the Immortal Soul Tribtion.


    "Well¡­ I do have information on the Immortal Soul Tribtion from the elder of the Mirage Sect, so I should be able to offer some advice on how to best face thest tribtion of the Immortal Soul Tribtion." Muttering this to himself as he remembered the information that the elder from the Mirage Sect had transferred to him about the Immortal Soul Tribtion before his passing, Xuan Hao could not help cheering up a bit.


    Even if he ended up encountering Chu Li again, he should at least be able to use this knowledge to avoid the topic of the Earth Immortal Realm and his far weaker Dao of Illusions. Although, this might also bacsh and result in Chu Li asking more questions¡­


    Haaa¡­ No matter what, it''s best to just avoid running into him again¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao became extra cautious when moving around the Valley of Illusory Beasts to hunt down illusory best to improve his Dao of Illusions. Making sure that Chu Li was nowhere close to the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast he was targeting before taking action to kill it.


    As a result, the speed at which he was progressing over the next few months did end up taking a hit.


    But¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even though his speed slowed down, the help provided by Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts still ended up losing their effect¡­ And three months after his encounter with Chu Li, illusory beasts in the Soul Ascension Realm no longer provided any help when it came to improving his Dao of Illusions.


    If he wanted to continue his rapid progress in the Dao of Illusions, he would either have to kill an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast or get the guidance of a senior in the Dao of Illusions who had already broken through to the Large Sess Realm, neither of which were realistic considering that he was far too weak to contend against an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast and the only senior in the Dao of Illusions he had encountered had only reached the Peak of the Small Sess Realm.


    The worst part was that he had not even managed to reach the Peak of the Small Sess Realm and had only managed to reach the Late Stage of the Small Sess Realm, still quite a distance from being able to think about breaking through to the Large Sess Realm any time soon.


    Maybe killing a single Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast wouldn''t even be enough to break through and he would need to kill two of them, something that was even less realistic than killing a single one through some kind of incredibly fortunate opportunity.


    As for breaking through to the Large Sess Realm on his own¡­ Xuan Hao had a feeling that it would at least take five years with his current sensitivity towards the Dao of Illusions and that was only if he stayed inside the Ephemeral Forest to cultivate. If he didn''t have the ability to stay inside the Ephemeral Forest, he might be able to break through the Large Sess Realm with the Dao of Space faster than the Dao of Illusions, something that would at least take 10 years to aplish. Far toote for him to break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm before the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple appeared to cause trouble back in the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    Maybe I can try to take advantage of the emergence of the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts to try and find one weak enough to try my luck at. Even if I''m not strong enough to kill it, I might be able to increase my understanding of the Dao of Illusions by fighting one¡­


    Feeling himself growing a bit desperate as he realized that he might not break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm before the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple appeared, Xuan Hao could not help thinking about some more dangerous ways to increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions.


    Although his current strength might be far from strong enough to fight against someone in the Earth Immortal Realm, hisprehension of the Dao of Space and profound movement technique should be able to allow him to escape from someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Even if the soul attacks of an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast were far more powerful than a Peak Soul Ascension Realm one, Xuan Hao felt confident in the strength of his soul being able to resist for a short period of time.

 Chapter 1107 Chu Li On the Path Towards Comprehending the Dao of Space, Xuan Hao’s identity?

    <h4>Chapter 1107 Chu Li On the Path Towards Comprehending the Dao of Space, Xuan Hao''s identity?</h4>


    Having decided to stay inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts and try to see if he could continue improving hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions by observing the illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm using the Dao of Illusions while fighting, Xuan Hao decided to wait for them to leave the deeper parts of the valley where they should be staying at the moment.


    The main reason for this being that he wouldn''t be able to use the Dao of Space nor his movement technique if he went to the ce inside the valley where the earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts should be located. After all, the spatial structure of the ce made it impossible to do so without him at least reaching the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space- at which point he would already have fulfilled the requirement for breaking through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and wouldn''t need to find an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast to fight¡­


    Following this, Xuan Hao began toprehend the Dao of Illusions on his own as he waited for the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts to emerge ording to what Chu Li had told him back when he had encountered him for the first time.


    Although he had no idea how long he would have to wait before they emerged, he could at least deduce from what Chu Li had told him that the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts seemed to emerge once every two or so years. Meaning that he should at most be waiting around for a year considering he had already spent over a year inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts without encountering the emergence of the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts.


    ¡­


    At the same time that Xuan Hao began to focus onprehending the Dao of Illusions on his own while waiting for the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts to emerge, Chu Li opened both his eyes with an overjoyed expression on his face.


    Even though his strength had not improved since Xuan Hao had left, Chu Li had taken everything he had told him to heart and had begun trying toprehend the Dao of Space instead of focusing only on the Dao of Illusions. Soon realizing that the path given by Xuan Hao was indeed viable- no, it wasn''t just viable, it was superior to his current path of only focusing onprehending the Dao of Illusions! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    If he managed to sessfully merge his Dao of Illusions together with the Dao of Space, Chu Li had a feeling that he would be able to easily pass through the final tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm with little difficulty and smoothly reach the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Not only that, but he should also be stronger than normal Earth Immortal Realm Experts after breaking through afterbining his Dao of Illusions with the Dao of Space!


    "I really have to thank senior if I meet him again!" Feeling an endless sense of gratitude towards Xuan Hao for the guidance he had provided, Chu Li vowed to repay him in the future after he broke through to the Earth Immortal Realm and became strong enough to help someone like that.


    Although¡­ If I want to improve my understanding of the Dao of Space like senior told me to, I have to either find a stable spatial anomaly or try to enter one of the Blue Sea Empire''s training grounds¡­ Haaa¡­ No matter which of the two it is, it won''t be ea- Ah! That''s right! Can''t I make use of the spatial anomaly senior created back when he killed the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast I was chasing after!?


    Lost in his own thoughts as he thought about how to best improve his understanding of the Dao of space, Chu Li suddenly remembered the spatial anomaly that had been created by Xuan Hao when he used the true spatial copse ability to instantly kill the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast during their first meeting.


    Back then, he had been too taken aback and awestruck by the disy of power and mysterious presence around the senior, that he didn''t pay any attention to the small void left behind by the attack. Only now that he needed a spatial anomaly that would makeprehending the Dao of Space easier did he remember the small void that had been left behind by Xuan Hao back then.


    Wait¡­ Did he perhaps already predict that this was going to happen and intentionally leave behind the spatial anomaly for me toprehend!?


    Suddenly realizing that the attack from Xuan Hao back then had been far too powerful to use on a Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast when he should have been able to just kill it without the need for such a terrifying and over the top attack, Chu Li could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    Indeed, the senior was far more terrifying than he could have imagined. Maybe he was not in the Earth Immortal Realm and was instead one of those terrifying existences above the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Considering the fact that the Valley of Illusory Beasts was filled with Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts in the deeper parts and there should be some kind of big secret hidden at the deepest part of the valley ording to what he knew about the ce, it wouldn''t be too weird for an expert above the Earth Immortal Realm to appear and investigate the matter personally.


    The only thing he found weird was the fact that he had never heard of or seen anything of Xuan Hao in the information he had avable to him as part of the Blue Sea Empire''s armed forces, while also directly serving under one of the four generals.


    In the end, he could only conclude that this was because Xuan Hao shouldn''t be from any of the major powers on the Ewaria Continent and should instead be a wandering cultivator who journeyed across the continent while cultivating and improving his own strength in the process¡­

 Chapter 1108 Emergence of Earth Immortal Realm Illusory Beasts...

    <h4>Chapter 1108 Emergence of Earth Immortal Realm Illusory Beasts...</h4>


    Following Chu Li finding his way back to the spatial anomaly that had been created by Xuan Hao during their first meeting, he wasted no time before setting up a simple formation to hide away from any of the weaker illusory beasts wandering around the area. After which he beganprehending the Dao of Space, a different dao from the one he had been focused on his entire life.


    Going against themon knowledge on cultivation that dictated that one should only focus on a single dao when cultivating, lest one ends up wasting to much time on other Daos and ends up unable to progress as a result. Showing just how much trust he put into the advice that Xuan Hao had given him.


    Of course, Xuan Hao had no idea that it wasmon knowledge across the continent for one to only practice a single dao. After all, his sect had never had someone in the Domain Lord Realm before him, nor had any of the information he obtained through the system ever mentioned anything aboutprehending a single dao at a time.


    Even the little information about the Domain Lord Realm that he gained from Shu Yao or others were quickly overturned as he got his hands on the exnation of the Domain Lord Realm equal to the Codex of the First Four Mortal Realm.


    In the end, this information had also caused Shu Yao and the rest of the Domain Lord Realm Experts in the Star Shattering Sect to unconsciously change the way the viewed the Domain Lord Realm and how to progress in it, to the point where Shu Yao had even begun trying toprehend a new dao to try and strengthen her flower domain¡­


    Not aware of any of this, Chu Li just thought Xuan Hao''s suggestion for him to cultivate the Dao of Space was because his vision far exceed that of any of the Earth Immortal Realm Experts who had taught him so far and had managed to deduce what would be best for him.


    Unknowingly, Xuan Hao''s strength had already exceeded that of the Earth Immortal Realm Experts he had encountered during his time working in one of the four main armies of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Whoosh~


    With this in mind, chu Li fully dedicated himself towards trying toprehend the Dao of Space to merge it together with his Dao of illusions ording to the advice Xuan Hao had given him.


    ¡­


    As both Xuan Hao and Chu Li stopped hunting the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts, it did not take long before peace returned to the Valley of Illusory Beasts in their absence, some of the weaker Sixth Stage Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts even jumping at the opportunity to take over the territory of the now dead Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts.


    ROOOOAR-!


    However, this peaceful scene did notst for long as a loud roar filled with killing intent echoed out from the depths of the valley. Scaring the weaker illusory beasts into hiding. Only leaving behind the stronger illusory beast in the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm or above, who were all bowing their heads fearfully in the direction of the deeper part of the valley where the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts were supposed to reside¡­


    Rustle~


    At the same time that the roar echoed out and the weaker illusory beasts began hiding away while the stronger ones began prostrating in the direction that the roar hade from, Chu Li opened both his eyes in surprise before realizing what was happening.


    "It''s time already?" Muttering this to himself as he looked down towards the spatial anomaly with a reluctant expression on his face, Chu Li understood that he couldn''t afford to waste any time- n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Swish-!


    And without even bothering to pack away the formation, he jumped into the air and rushed towards the location of the wooden gates.


    No matter how confident he was in his own strength, he understood that he wouldn''t stand a chance fighting against an illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm. Even if hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions strengthened his soul and made it stronger than a normal Soul Ascension Realm Expert, it would at most allow him tost for a few seconds longer.


    "Hm? Is that senior?"


    About to reach the wooden gates that served as the passageway out of the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Chu Li could not helping to a stop as he spotted Xuan Hao emerging from a small forest close to the wooden gates.


    "Senior!" Feeling overjoyed upon spotting the senior who had helped point him in the right direction, Chu Li didn''t continue escaping towards the wooden gates and instead headed over to meet up with Xuan Hao.


    After all, in his mind, Xuan Hao was already someone who had surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm and would have no problems dealing with a few illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­


    "Chu Li? Are you about to leave?" Seeing Chu Li rushing over towards him, Xuan Hao didn''t leave and instead calmly faced the excited Chu Li. Having already expected this oue when he decided to reveal himself.


    If he really nned to avoid him, he would have left before Chu Li even had the chance to notice him. Unfortunately, he was forced to reveal himself as he understood that Chu Li was going to leave the Valley of Illusory Beasts with the emergence of the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts and might end up running into the rabbit demon beasts and its newly recruited subordinate in the process.


    "Yes, the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts are about to show up and I''m nowhere near strong enough to deal with them, so I n to hide away in the Ephemeral Forest for the next few months until things calm down again."


    Nodding his head upon hearing Xuan Hao''s question without any hesitation, Chu Li didn''t notice the slight frown appearing on Xuan Hao''s face after hearing what he said.

 Chapter 1109 Illusory Dragon and...

    <h4>Chapter 1109 Illusory Dragon and...</h4>


    "I see¡­ A few demon beasts of mine are currently cultivating in the Ephemeral Forest at the moment. If it isn''t too difficult, could I ask you to watch over them while you are there?"


    Hearing that Chu Li was indeed nning to go to the Ephemeral Forest, Xuan Hao decided to ask him to watch over the rabbit demon beast and the squirrel during his time there. Not so much to watch over them, but more so for him to not kill them the moment he noticed the two demon beasts.


    After all, there wasn''t really anything dangerous in the Ephemeral Forest that they needed protection from¡­


    "Huh? Senior''s demon beasts? Ah! Of course!"


    Not knowing what was going through Xuan Hao''s head at the moment, Chu Li just happily agreed to the request of watching over the demon beasts before the two parted ways after Xuan Hao gave a brief description of the rabbit demon beast and the squirrel.


    During the entire process, Chu Li didn''t question why a powerful senior who had surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm had decided to bring two demon beasts below the Earth Immortal Realm with him to such a dangerous ce, but in the end, he just guessed that it was because the senior was a wandering cultivator and happened to pick up a few demon beasts that he wanted to train and the Ephemeral Forest proved the best ce to do this.


    Although¡­ He had no idea why the senior had decided to choose a squirrel and a rabbit demon beast instead of arger demon beast that could serve as a mount.


    Maybe the senior just had some other purpose for them?


    ¡­


    Following Chu Li leaving the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Xuan Hao continued waiting above the small forest he had hidden inside of for the past month. Waiting for the first Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast to appear inside the range of his divine sense. Not daring to move too far away from the wooden gates in case the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts turned out to be too strong to even fight against for a short time with his current strength.


    Although there would be the risk of Chu Li poking his head out through the wooden gate connected to the Ephemeral Forest, it was a risk he was willing to take considering that the alternative might result in him dying¡­


    Rooooaaaar-!


    Not even five minutes after Chu Li had left, a roar far more powerful than any of the illusory beasts he had faced so far echoed out from the depths of the valley before a terrifying presence appeared at the edge of his divine sense.


    "Earth Immortal Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he felt a hint of nervousness at the thought of having to face off against someone in the Earth Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao prepared himself mentally to run away in case he had overestimated his own strength and wasn''t able to fight an illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    WHOOSH-! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As Xuan Hao finished preparing himself, a terrifying wind swept through the uneven terrain of the valley and directly wiped out the small forest below him in the process before arge illusory dragon appeared at the edge of his vision-


    Whoosh-!


    And before he even had time to react, the illusory dragon had effortlessly cut through the air and appeared in front of him filled with killing intent as arge pair of ws headed directly for him-


    BANG!


    Only blocking the ws in time because his dao domain had already spread out to surround him. If not, the ws might have been able to reach him before he could even use the Drifting Cloud Steps to run away. Making Xuan Hao painfully aware of how slow his reaction time was in the face of someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Although the fights he had seen so far of Earth Immortal Realm cultivators didn''t seem so much different in terms of speedpared to a fight between Soul Ascension Realm Experts, it had now be obvious that it was just that he couldn''t fully see what was happening in a fight between Earth Immortal Realm Experts, something he might have discovered if he had more time to watch Earth Immortal Realm Experts fighting or just had a chance to observe the fight from a closer distance without dying¡­


    Roar?


    Not expecting Xuan Hao to block its attack, the illusory dragon retracted its ws. Unsure of how someone below the Earth Immortal Realm had managed block its attack.


    Giving Xuan Hao some much needed time to recover from the impact of the attack while also assessing how to fight against the illusory dragon in front of him.


    Given just how fast the illusory dragon was, it was no longer doable for him to try and rely on his Drifting Cloud Steps to avoid its attack, as even though he could teleport to avoid it, he might not be able to use the Drifting Cloud Steps in time to avoid the attacks.


    Do I really have to run away?


    Feeling a sense of reluctance as he realized that he was still far too weak to face off against an illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if it was best to just escape from the Valley of Illusory Beasts while he still had time.


    Even if it was disappointing that he would not be able to have his Dao of Illusions reach the Large Sess Realm, he would at least be able to stay alive and think of another way to have one of his Daos reach the Large Sess Realm before the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Tem-


    RUMBLE-!


    About to turn around and escape from the Valley of Illusory Beasts after concluding that he was still too weak to fight against an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast, a loud rumbling echoed out from the depths of the valley before the entire valley began violently shaking.


    "Huh!? The wooden gates are¡­ Disappearing!?"


    However, the main thing Xuan Hao had his attention focused on was the fact that the wooden gates in the distance became illusory and looked like they were about to disappear at any moment¡­

 Chapter 1110 Trapped!

    <h4>Chapter 1110 Trapped!</h4>


    "H-how am I supposed to leave without the wooden gates!? Didn''t Chu Li say that the only change would be Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts emerging from the depths of the valley- Unless¡­ Things are different inside the valleypared to when he was looking at it through the wooden gate. Maybe he didn''t see the situation inside the valley, but instead just saw an illusion when looking through the wooden gate¡­?"


    Feeling a profound sense of fear washing over him as he saw the state of the two wooden gates, Xuan Hao felt that his decision to remain inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts without first ensuring that he would be able to leave, had been a mistake.


    Not only would he be forced to stay inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts while Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts wandered around the ce, but he would also be forced to find a way to deal with the illusory dragon currently in the process of trying to figure out how someone who should only have been in the Soul Ascension Realm had been able to defend against its attack.


    Roar-!


    Although, it looked like he had run out of time, as the illusory dragon decided to continue its attack after not being able to figure out how he had been able to defend against its ws-


    Bang-bang-bang!


    Soon enough, the sound of the illusory dragon''s ws shing with Xuan Hao''s dao domain could be heard across the periphery of the valley. The battle itself causing the ground beneath to shake with the impact, as any illusory beast still around ran away in fear.


    Crack~


    However, even though Xuan Hao''s dao domain had the ability to resist the w attack of the illusory dragon for a short time, it soon started to show cracks under the pressure. Even worse¡­ The illusory dragon should be extremely skilled in the Dao of Illusions, but so far, it had only ever used its ws to attack him¡­


    I don''t know whether to feel happy or offended at the fact that the illusory dragon doesn''t treat me as an equal opponent...


    Thinking about this to himself as the cracks covering the outer edges of his dao domain began expanding in size with each w strike from the illusory dragon, Xuan Hao shook his head before using the Drifting Cloud Steps to escape. Understanding very well that he would only end up dying if he continued to stay and fight the illusory dragon.


    Not to mention, given that the illusory dragon didn''t use any of its abilities rted to the Dao of Illusions, he didn''t really gain a lot from fighting it.


    In the end, the only way he managed to improve his Dao of Illusions during the fight was by observing the illusory dragon itself. Although helpful, it was far from enough for him to willing risk his life.


    Whoosh~


    Roar?


    Feeling its ws sweeping through the air without hitting anything, the illusory dragon was once again left in a confused state as it looked around itself wondering where Xuan Hao had disappeared to-


    Roar-!


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, the distance covered by the Drifting Cloud Steps was not enough to leave the range of the illusory beast''s sense, as it soon came rushing directly towards him the moment he reappeared.


    "Looks like its going to hard to shake this one off¡­" Staring at the illusory dragon that was almost directly on top of him the moment he reappeared, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit helpless as he took another step forward and disappeared again-


    Roar!?


    Frustrating the illusory dragon in the process, as it looked around itself for a short instant before spotting Xuan Hao appearing again-


    Whoosh-!


    Rushing straight towards him without wasting a single second- Only to barely miss him in the end¡­


    As this chase continued for the next five minutes with both of them keeping the same distance between each other, the illusory dragon began growing increasingly frustrated with being unable to catch Xuan Hao, whom it perceived to be someone far weaker than itself.


    In a sense, it looked to Xuan Hao like the illusory beast''s pride had been hurt¡­


    ROOOOOOAR-!


    Unable to take this constant chase back and forth any longer, the illusory beast let out a roar filled with both killing intent and anger, as all sorts of illusions began manifesting around the illusory dragon before flying towards Xuan Hao at a speed far exceeding that of the illusory dragon-


    "Huh!?"


    As a result, Xuan Hao didn''t even have time to use the Drifting Cloud Steps before the illusions created by the illusory dragon engulfed him. Soon forming a deadly attack that ignored his physical body and headed straight for his soul. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Swish-!


    However, the moment the illusory attack entered his dantian where his soul was located, it was cut apart by his nascent sword soul without him even having the time to react.


    "So¡­ The nascent sword soul is useful for defending against soul-based attacks¡­" Muttering this to himself as he witnessed how the nascent sword soul easily destroyed the illusory soul attack, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised.


    After all, he had never really used his nascent sword soul and didn''t have a full grasp of its abilities outside of the fact that it could be used to strengthen his soul and be used for directly attacking the soul of an opponent.


    Hm? If the nascent sword soul is useful for dealing with the soul attacks of the illusory dragon, is it perhaps also effective in dealing against soul-based opponent like illusory beasts¡­?


    Suddenly feeling like he had realized something important; Xuan Hao dragged his nascent sword soul out of his dantian before turning around to face the approaching illusory dragon. nning to test out his idea instead of immediately using the Drifting Cloud Steps to run away.


    Roar!


    Seeing Xuan Hao not running away, the illusory dragon just thought its attack had been sessful in wounding him and didn''t think too much about it as its ws once again descended towards Xuan Hao...

 Chapter 1111 Side Effects of Using the Nascent Sword Soul

    <h4>Chapter 1111 Side Effects of Using the Nascent Sword Soul</h4>


    Seeing therge ws once again descending towards him, Xuan Hao grabbed the hilt of his nascent sword soul and shed up towards the iing ws-


    Swish-!


    And without any suspense or terrifying sh, the nascent sword soul smoothly cut through the ws of the illusory dragon before continuing forward with a seemingly unstoppable momentum. Almost like the ws had never even existed in the first ce.


    Roar!?


    Caught off guard by the terrifying nascent sword soul that had just cut through its ws with seemingly no effort, the illusory dragon acted in instinct as it felt a threat to its life-


    Swoosh-!


    Dodging the nascent sword soul before rapidly retreating far away from Xuan Hao where it began to examine him in far more detailpared to the first time when it had discovered that he had been cable of defending against its w attacks.


    After all, when everything was said and done, there was a stark difference between being able to survive an attack that takes zero effort to preform on the side of an Earh Immortal Realm Expert and someone having the ability to threaten the life of someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    The first could be considered a genius in the Soul Ascension Realm who would eventually reach the Earth Immortal Realm in the future, while the other was someone who already had the ability to kill someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­


    As the illusory dragon once again entered a state of deep thought as it focused all its energy towards trying to figure out how someone who should only be in the Soul Ascension Realm had managed to aplish something like that, the person in question didn''t want to stay around for a second longer as he directly used the Drifting Cloud Steps to run away again.


    The only difference this time around was that the illusory dragon didn''t chase after him. Having seemingly concluded that it would be too dangerous to continue chasing him. Above all, it wasn''t the only Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast around, while at the same time being nowhere near the strongest.


    Even if it let Xuan Hao escape, it understood that he wouldn''t be escaping for too long before he ran into another Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast¡­ And considering that he didn''t really have anything of value to it in him, it didn''t want to possibly risk its life fighting with him for no reason.


    Indeed,pared to the ordinary illusory beasts between the Domain Lord Realm and the Soul Ascension Realm, the illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm had finally gained some semnce of sentience- Although, the level of sentience was still limited.


    ¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Haaa¡­ Looks like ¡­ Haaa¡­ It''s not chasing after me¡­" Copsing in a small forest clearing after escaping for three hours straight, Xuan Hao only muttered this to himself before beginning to recover the energy that had been sapped from his soul after utilizing the nascent sword soul in battle against the illusory dragon.


    Although it didn''t look like it consumed a lot of energy due to him just taking the nascent sword soul out from his dantian before swinging it towards the ws of the illusory dragon, the main consumption of energy stemmed from the fact that the nascent sword soul was directly linked to his soul¡­ And from the experience just now, he realized that it would forcibly drain the strength of his soul when used.


    Even though this might not have too much of an effect if he was facing someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, the same could not be said when his nascent sword soul had to face off against an illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm. The power required was more than enough to render him exhausted to the point of fainting, something that would almost certainly spell the end for him with the illusory dragon around.


    In the future, it would be best to limit the usage of the nascent sword soul to fighting people around his own strength or those below him. Not only because using it at a stronger opponent would potentially cause him to faint, but also because the drain on his soul might end up permanently scaring his soul.


    The only reason why he had been able to escape unscratched from the sh with the illusory dragon was because his nascent sword soul only hit and cut through the ws!


    If he had ended up identally cutting into the body of the illusory dragon, he might have all the power inside his soul sucked up by the nascent sword soul before he could even cut halfway through it¡­


    If he had ended up using the nascent sword soul on a more powerful opponent in the future without knowing about the drawbacks, it was easy to imagine the surprise on his opponent''s face when he ended up just falling dead on the ground after using it.


    How terrifying¡­ Nascent sword soul¡­ A double-edged sword in the truest sense of the word. If I''m not careful, I might end up killing myself when using it¡­


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he thought about this while recovering, Xuan Hao could not help feeling grateful that he had managed to escape without any permanent damage to his soul¡­


    As a day came and went like this, Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes after recovering from the battle with the illusory dragon at the Earth Immortal Realm before turning to look in the direction of the two wooden gates that had turned illusory during his battle with the illusory dragon.


    Although he had no idea what had happened to them, he had clearly sensed that his divine sense couldn''t approach them, being blocked by some kind of strange power that made it impossible to get any closer to them.


    It was also because of this strange power that he hadn''t decided to try and escape through the illusory wooden gates. Having instinctively understood that the power wouldn''t just stop his divine sense but would also prevent him from approaching the wooden gates.


    Maybe I can examine them in more detail now that I don''t have to worry about the illusory dragon, it should have left by now¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao wasted no time in jumping into the air and flying towards the location of the wooden gates. Intending to examine the illusory gates up close to hopefully find out if he could still leave the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    Even if he couldn''t leave, he at the very least wanted to figure out if there was some kind of limit until the wooden gates returned to normal or if his current situation wasn''t something that had happened before and that he would be trapped inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts for an unknown period of time.


    If that really ended up happening, he would need to find a way to break through the illusory wooden gates, something that would undoubtedly require a power far beyond what he had at the moment. Maybe another option existed, which was increasing hisprehension of the Dao of Space and mastering the long distance teleportation technique.


    If he mastered the long distance teleportation technique, he wouldn''t have to worry about getting stuck so easily in the future, as he would be able to easily leave any trap or space that didn''t have a proper spatial seal on top of it.


    "But¡­ Mastering the long distance teleportation technique to such a realm will undoubtedly take far longer that reaching the Large Ses in the Dao of Space or the Dao of Illusions for that matter¡­ And that is not mentioning the fact that the Star Shattering Sect won''t be able to survive for such a long time without me.


    Even if the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple doesn''t show up for some reason, the current chaotic situation in Frozen Wastnds might end up resulting in a demon just as powerful emerging in the Sky Empire¡­" Muttering this to himself as he flew towards the illusory wooden gates, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he realized just how bad things might get for the Star Shattering Sect without him present.


    Even if the current Star Shattering Sect could be considered powerful in the Sky Empire, that was only considering that he was still around. Not to mention whenpared to the powers above the Sky Empire, like the Blue Sea Empire.


    In the grand scheme of things, the Star Shattering Sect was still weak and had no real power on the Ewaria Continent¡­ And there were still other continents outside of the Ewaria Continent, some of which might be far more powerful than the Ewaria Continent.


    No use thinking about all of this, the Star Shattering Sect still has time to grow, with time, it will be a top power on Ewaria and with my help, even beyond the borders of the Ewaria Continent...

 Chapter 1112 Illusion and the Pitiful Rabbit Demon Beast

    <h4>Chapter 1112 Illusion and the Pitiful Rabbit Demon Beast</h4>


    Arriving at the illusory wooden gates after travelling through the valley for a little over a day, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of relief washing over him. Even though he didn''t end up encountering any Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts during his journey back to the illusory wooden gates, he never let down his guard and was always watching out for any of them appearing inside the area covered by his divine sense. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Avoiding them was not an option, as his encounter with the illusory dragon had clearly shown him that it could sense his presence before he had sensed it.


    In the end, this meant that area covered by an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast exceeded his own divine sense or in more simple terms, it meant that he would always be found first and could only react to them attacking him when they entered the range of his divine sense.


    The only thing he could do to try and reduce the risk of being attacked was lower the strength of his presence from what normally felt like someone in the Soul Ascension Realm to the illusory beasts to that of an ordinary Domain Lord Realm Expert. Any lower than this would just end up drawing more attention due to the fact that even the weakest illusory beast had reached the Domain Lord Realm, something weaker than that would not be able to stay alive inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    Well¡­ Even if I was spotted by an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast, it might have just ignored me because of my weak strength-


    Thump~


    "Ah?!"


    Lost in his own thoughts as he was approaching the illusory wooden gates, Xuan Hao suddenly found himself colliding headfirst with a seemingly unmovable invisible wall. Even if it didn''t injurie him, the surprise of suddenly crashing into a wall while flying was not a good experience and reminded him of the time he had been trapped in the formation back at the Main Star Peak.


    "This is¡­ the barrier that stopped my divine sense?" Almost instantly realizing that the thing in front of him should be the barrier that had stopped his divine sense before he could examine the illusory wooden gates, Xuan Hao could not help himself from poking it out of curiosity as he began trying to examine it in more detail through thebination of his dao domain and divine sense.


    Bang!


    Unfortunately, even with this and being up close, he couldn''t examine the invisible barrier with his divine sense or dao domain. Instead, it just crashed into the invisible barrier before being forcibly dispersed by the invisible barrier.


    "This-!?"


    Although it might not be so surprising for the barrier to disperse his divine sense upon contact, it was different for his dao domain. After all, for it to have the ability to do this, meant the power of the barrier itself likely exceeded the strength of the illusory dragon he had encountered a day earlier.


    Then again. If the barrier wasn''t strong enough, the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts who had managed to gain some semnce of intelligence and weren''t just mindless beasts might have already left the valley of Illusory Beasts.


    But even if that was the case, why didn''t they try to escape by weaking the barrier over time. After all, no matter how strong it was, it would be worn down over time if constantly attacked by arge number of Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast¡­ Unless¡­ Something was forcing the illusory beasts to return to the deeper parts of the valley. Not giving them the needed time to try and break out of the valley.


    Of course, these were only some thoughts he got after seeing the wooden gates being blocked off with the emergence of the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts. Reality might be different. Especially considering that he hadn''t seen a single Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast anywhere near the wooden gates, outside of the illusory dragon and the illusory dragon didn''t stay around after he had run away.


    "What in the¡­ It''s not a barrier¡­?"


    Continuing to examine the invisible barrier blocking his path to the two illusory wooden gates, Xuan Hao soon discovered that when his dao domain hit the invisible barrier, it didn''t disperse like he had first thought. Instead, he realized after careful observation that there was some kind of powerful illusion in ce that made it seem like the dao domain dispersed.


    The reason why he didn''t pick up on the illusion the first time around was not because he didn''t see it, but because the illusion had spread through his dao domain and ended up affecting him as a result. Making him think that his dao domain had really dispersed, thus causing him to retract his dao domain in fear that it would also affect the rest of his dao domain.


    However, even with this, it wouldn''t be enough for him to have fallen for the illusion. The real reason why it had fooled him was because he indeed couldn''t sense what was on the other side of the invisible barrier that now turned out to be the border of some kind of illusion.


    Not to mention, the illusion had indeed blocked his path forward- Or did it?


    "Don''t tell me I wasn''t blocked by the illusion but just affected by it without noticing¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked at the two illusory wooden gates no more than a few hundred meters away from where he was, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    If not for the fact that the illusions in ce around the two wooden gates weren''t intended to kill and merely had the effect of blocking anyone from leaving, he would have been killed without even knowing how¡­


    Looking at it in a positive light. The creator of the illusion should have already reached the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions and possibly even beyond that. If I study such aplex illusion, I won''t have to worry about my progress in the Dao of Illusions slowing down. Maybe it will be a chance for me to reach the Large Sess Realm!


    Narrowing his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao felt excited at the prospect of reaching the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions. Outside of the fact that he had to worry about encountering another illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm and the fact that he might be trapped inside the valley of Illusory Beasts, things didn''t seem that bad.


    If he really was trapped, he could use the time to break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and try to find a way out after that. At least he wouldn''t have to worry about the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts after breaking through the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Whoosh~


    Havinge to a decision on what to do, Xuan Hao found a spot on the grass covered ground not too far away from the two wooden doors before starting toprehend the Dao of Illusions through observation of the illusion blocking his path out of the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    Swish~!


    Using his dao domain to cause a movement in the illusion every now and then so he could personally experience it while also observing how it worked from afar.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao immersed himself inprehending the Dao of Illusions in front of the two illusory wooden gates, at the other side of one of the wooden gates, a fierce confrontation was taking ce between the rabbit demon beast and Chu Li¡­


    "Hey little fellow, how are you doing, your master asked me to look after you two, so why don''t youe over here and y with me as well? Don''t worry, I will make sure to include your little friend as well, we can all have fun together while waiting for things to be safe back in the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    No need to feel shy, I used to take care of the cute little demon beasts of the nobledies from the capital back when I was younger!"


    SQUEAK!


    Well¡­ It might have been a fierce confrontation in the eyes of the rabbit demon beast, but in the eyes of Chu Li, the little rabbit demon beast was just feeling shy after having met a stranger. Nothing out of the ordinary and he knew just how to deal with it-


    Whoosh!


    Squeak!?


    Dashing forward and picking up the small rabbit demon beast before it had any time to react with his superior speed before starting to gently pat its fluffy head with a smile on his face.


    "It''s fine, there, there little one."


    Squ¡­


    "Hm? Do you want to say something little one?"


    SQUEEAAAAAAK!


    Not knowing how to deal with this kind of humiliation that was being administered to its royal body, the rabbit demon beast could only let out a pitiful scream of agony as it prayed for its master to return as fast as possible...

 Chapter 1113 Two Years, Dao of Illusions, Large Success Realm

    <h4>Chapter 1113 Two Years, Dao of Illusions, Large Sess Realm</h4>


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect time passed without care for night or day, while their master was busy trying toprehend the Large Sess Realm of the Dao of Illusions and break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Mui and Bai Ning were rxing in front of the small pce on arge outdoor couch as they watched Chu Yang and Qing Yi sparing with each other in the training ground attached to the side of the pce.


    On the side Zhi Ruo was preparing a pot of tea on a small table with a look of concentration stered all over her face, not missing a beat as she carefully mixed different herbs into a unique self-created blend.


    Rustle~


    Lazily rolling around on the couch, Mui came to a stop just before rolling over the edge of the couch as her attention remained focused on her two seniors fighting each other.


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Just the energy from their shes was more than enough to make a shiver run down her spine as she felt a hint of longing. If not for the fact that she was in no state to do so at the moment, she would have wanted to join them and have her two seniors teach. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Unfortunately,pared to the two of them, she and Bai Ning had no energy to spare for training at the moment.


    Not so much because they werezy or anything like that, but because they had juste back from the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces after spending the past two days forging without a single ounce of rest. Although it might have been fine in normal circumstances, both of them wanted to try and surpass their past creations and had thus ended up using up all of their qi in the forging process.


    Because of this, no matter how much Mui wanted to join her two seniors, she had no energy to do so and could only roll around on the couch with a reluctant expression on her face as she observed the two sparing with each other.


    "I wonder when master will return, I really want to show him how much stronger I have be and the powerful artifact I just finished creating¡­" Pulling out arge blob of metal that seemed to be the fusion created by the g of hundreds of different metals, Mui let out sigh as she voiced her thoughts.


    "No need to worry, it''s already been two years since master left and he should be returning soon, who knows, he might already be on his way back as we speak." Encouraging Mui who seemed to have entered a somewhat depressed state after thinking about their master who had already been gone for over two years, Bai Ning smiled gently while saying this.


    Even if he had no idea how urate this would be, he felt that their master should be returning to the sect soon. Not so much because he had been informed by the Elder Song or anyone else about this, but because the situation in the Sky Empire was about to reach a critical state as the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the different empires and the Soul Ascension Realm Experts hiding away in the capital city had started shing with each other seriously.


    Given the current state of things, it was only a matter of time before Soul Ascension Realm Experts belonging to these different powers ended up appearing inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect to cause chaos, something that they had been able to avoid so far due to their location being at the border between the Sky Empire and the Frozen Wastnds.


    Not only that, but Yi Min had also fended off arge number of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts who would normally havee to the Star Shattering Sect''s territory from the core region of the Sky Empire. After all, her kingdom was essentially ced directly at the border between the core region of the Sky Empire and the border region of the Sky Empire.


    Although, with the passing of time, most of the kingdoms located between the Star Shattering Sect and the Iron Sky Kingdom had already been integrated into the Star Shattering Sect due to the arrival of the independent sects.


    "Really!?" Not aware of the thoughts going through her senior brother''s head as he answered her, Mui just looked up at him with an exited yet questioning look on her face. Not fully believing the words of her senior brother. After all, it had already been years since their master left and this senior brother in front of her had said simr things in the past when she had asked about when their master would return.


    "Yes, I''m sure it won''t be more than a few months before master returns given the current situation in the sect. If you want to have him return earlier, you could try and go to the sect master and ask him to contact master through one of those long-distancemunication talismans."


    Nodding his head as he said this with a confident smile, Bai Ning also decided to throw in some of the information about Feng Chen having a way to directly contact their master along the way.


    "Yay!" Showing an overjoyed expression on her face as she heard the first part, Mui soon began pouting as she heard the second part of what he said. "Uncle Feng has a way to contact master!? Why didn''t he tell me about this when I visited him together with Song Jia in the past!?"


    Swish-!


    Having seemingly found a new source of energy after hearing that Feng Chen had a way to contact their master, Mui jumped up from the couch before rushing out of the courtyard in front of the pce before heading in the direction of where Feng Chen''s pce was located.


    "How energetic¡­ Hehe, this is what you get for lowering the resources allocated to the cksmithing Hall. Even if it''s to facilitate the rapid expansion of the sect, you didn''t need to take from the cksmithing Hall and could just have taken it from those beast tamers instead¡­!" Muttering this to himself as both his eyes narrowed while looking at his junior sister''s disappearing figure, Bai Ning felt a sense of satisfaction after knowing about the headache she was going to cause before he leaned back down in the couch and began dozing off.


    Bang! Bang! Boom!


    Unaware of the trouble that their junior sister was about to cause, Chu Yang and Qing Yi continued fighting with each other as they fought each other using the moves they had managed toprehend not too long ago, both of them seeking to learn what they might be able to improve through this spar.


    Although they weren''t excited to the same level as Mui when it came to showing off how much they had improved over the past two years, they were still looking forward to it and wanted to ensure that their master wouldn''t think they cked off in his absence.


    At the same time, they were also curious about what their master had been up to over the past two years and wanted to find out about it as soon as possible. After all, for something to take their master such a long time to aplish, it had to be something amazing.


    Maybe their master had even managed to sessfully increase his strength even further during this period of time!


    No matter what it was, both of them were looking forward to finding out what had happened to their master. None of them felt worried that something bad might have happened to him, as they were fully confident in their master''s strength.


    ¡­


    Back in the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Xuan Hao quietly looked at the illusion blocking his only path out of the Valley of Illusory Beasts with a frown on his face.


    "It should already have been a year, yet the illusion shows no sign of lifting after such a long period of time¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked at the illusion that had now be far clearer to him, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh to himself.


    After a year of sitting in front of the illusionprehending the Dao of Illusions, he had not only managed to break through to Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions and finish thest needed preparations for breaking through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm by merging all of his Daos smoothly together with his dao domain, but he had alsoe to realize just how terrifying the creator of the illusion was.


    Even after he had reached the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions, he stood no chance of doing anything to the illusion in front of him. At most he would be capable of resisting it for a short time and approach the illusory wooden gates by another 10 or so meters before being forced to retreat. Far from enough to reach the wooden gates and leave the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    In the end, the only choice he had left now was to try and break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm inside the Valley of illusory Beasts, something that he wanted to avoid if possible due to the fact that an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast interfering with him during his breakthrough might end up permanently damaging his foundation, or worse, kill him!

 Chapter 1114 Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm

    <h4>Chapter 1114 Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm</h4>


    Having finished all the necessary preparations for breaking through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit nervous at the thought that he might get interrupted by an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast during his breakthrough.


    Although he wouldn''t have to go through any kind of tribtion as he was still in the Dao Domain Lord Realm and had yet to begin the process of breaking through to the Earth Immortal Realm, the breakthrough would still cause a disturbancerge enough to attract any nearby Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that there might already be some Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts lurking nearby, just outside the range of his divine sense.


    Shaking his head as he threw these worries to the back of his mind for now, Xuan Hao decided to check on his status onest time to make sure that everything was in order.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword (Small Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess), Dao of Space (Small Sess), Dao of Illusions (Large Sess Realm)


    Sword Intent: Nascent Sword Soul Realm


    Talent: ????


    Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened)


    Physique: ??? (79% Awakened)


    Realm: Intermediate Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to Peak Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm)


    Professions: Alchemist (Artisan), Formation Master (Expert), cksmithing (Expert) n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Sect: Star Shattering Sect


    Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect


    Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui


    Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Peak Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm)


    Looking through his status, other than the fact that his physique getting closer to awakening and the fact that everything seemed to be ready for his breakthrough to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it also looked like the rabbit demon beast had managed to break through to the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm over the past year.


    Whether this was due to the environment in the Ephemeral Forest being suitable for its cultivation or if it was due to the help of Chu Li, it was a good thing that the strength of the rabbit demon beast had managed to increase over this past year. At least he could be certain that Chu Li was taking good care of his rabbit demon beast and the squirrel.


    If I have the chance, I should find an opportunity to repay him for looking after the two after I get out of the Valley of Illusory Beasts. After all, he ended up looking after them far longer than the few months he might have been expecting to look after them. Not only that, but the rabbit demon beast also managed to break through to the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Feeling thankful that Chu Li seemed to have been looking out for his rabbit demon beast so much over the past year, Xuan Hao decided to repay him after he got out of the Valley of Illusory Beasts. At least given that his Dao of Illusions had managed to break through to the Large Sess Realm, it wouldn''t be that hard for him to guide him in the future.


    Not only that, but he also nned to breakthrough to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm now. Meaning that his strength would have reached a levelparable to the Earth Immortal Realm by the time he met him again. At which point he would indeed be a senior and didn''t need to try and fool him.


    Whoosh~


    As he finished his train of thought regarding what to do after leaving the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Xuan Hao closed both of his eyes as he focused his full attention on breaking through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if he wanted to find a ce to hide away inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts, there wasn''t really anywhere for him to hide given the disturbance caused by his breakthrough would inevitably spread out no matter where he hid.


    In the end, he had concluded that it was better to just stay beside the terrifying illusion that engulfed the two illusory wooden gates. Maybe the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts would ignore the disturbance. Thinking it was just something rted to the illusion, causing them to hesitate for some time before they decided toe over and investigate in person.


    Even if they hesitated for only a few seconds, it might be the deciding factor for him to finish his breakthrough and escape to somewhere safe where he could hide and stabilize his cultivation base.


    As Xuan Hao''s aura continued to grow in strength over the next few hours, it suddenly came to a stop as it reached the pinnacle of the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Crackle~ Crackle~


    The air began to violently crackle with energy as Xuan Hao was at the precipice of breaking through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. The light from the sun hanging in the sky above the valley illuminating the terrifying qi gathering towards him from all directions.


    Rumble~!


    Soon enough an energy storm spanning a little over a thousand meters in all directions had formed with him at the center.


    Inside the storm, Xuan Hao remained in a state of deep meditation as the massive amount of qi began surging into his body. Pushing his strength beyond the Dao Domain Lord Realm and officially beginning the process of breaking through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    At the same time, inside his body, the massive amount of qi surged towards his dantian in an unstoppable manner. Not giving Xuan Hao the chance to focus on anything other than his breakthrough, as doing so might cause him to lose control over the massive amount of qi flowing into his body, something that could end up with him blowing up as a result.


    Although he might survive if he abandoned his body in time and fled with his soul, he didn''t really want to try something like that if he could avoid it¡­


    Whoosh-!


    As the qi began to fill up his dantian, it did not take long before it had no more space inside of it¡­ And with this in mind, the only path the qi could take was to forcibly expand the size of his dantian, while at the same time beingpressed at an unimaginable speed.


    RUMBLE-!


    In the process of this, everything inside of his dantian was forcibly destroyed by the qi as it was reduced to its pure energy state and merged together with the sea of qi. The only thing floating around inside of his dantian that managed to avoid this fate was his soul located at the core of the dantian and the nascent sword soul that had hidden away inside his soul.


    Other than that, his dao domain was also going through a change as Xuan Hao clearly felt its size and strength growing far beyond what it had been before.


    Boom!


    At the same time, a fundamental change also seemed to take ce with his soul, as a thinyer formed by the different Daos that he hadprehended so far formed around it in the shape of a closed lotus flower.


    Because the Dao of Illusions was the only Dao that he had managed to reach the Large Sess Realm in, the closed lotus flower shell around his soul seemed to be in an illusory state, while the powerful Dao of Space caused it to flicker in and out of existence.


    The effect from the rest of the Daos he hadprehended was more subtle, as the Dao of Ice and fire caused the temperature around the closed lotus flower to fluctuate between freezing cold and burning hot, while the Dao of Corruption and the Dao of the Sword changed the appearance of the closed lotus to some degree.


    To facilitate the creation of the closed lotus flower, all the qi that had gathered inside his dantian was sucked up by it, causing his body to absorb the qi more actively and in return causing the energy storm outside his body to grow in size as more qi rushed inside his body.


    As the closed lotus flower finished absorbing all the energy it could, a radiant glow enveloped Xuan Hao''s figure, while a transcendent power far beyond that of the Soul Ascension Realm emanated from his body.


    BOOOOOM-!


    In the pivotal moment after the closed lotus flower had been fully constructed around his soul, Xuan Hao felt the barrier between the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm shatter like ss.


    After a long time stuck in the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he had finally managed to break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm!

 Chapter 1115 A Waste of Resources

    <h4>Chapter 1115 A Waste of Resources</h4>


    Swish-!


    Having finished his breakthrough to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao didn''t waste a second before using all of his strength to jump off the ground and use the Drifting Cloud Steps to teleport away from the two illusory wooden gates.


    Roar!


    Almost the instant that he disappeared, arge illusory beast in the shape of massive bear appeared above where he had been before it violently smashed into the ground. Creating a crater a few thousand meters in size where itnded. The only thing that survived being the area covered by the terrifying illusion.


    Even if the illusory beast had reached the Earth Immortal Realm, it didn''t even cause a single ripple to appear on the surface of the illusion-


    Whoosh-!


    On the other hand, it seemed like the violent attack of the illusory beast had caused some kind of defensive response from the illusion as it suddenly expanded in size and swallowed up the illusory beast before it could retreat, causing the massive illusory beast to disappear without any sign of resistance.


    In the short time it had taken for the illusory beast tond on the ground in front of the terrifying illusion where Xuan Hao had been cultivating to it being swallowed by the illusion, less than a single second had psed¡­ And in that short period of time, a powerful Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast had essentially been dealt with by the illusions without any way to resist.


    So¡­ This is why the illusory beasts don''t dare to try and break the illusion¡­


    Having watched all of this from afar as the bear shaped illusory beast was still inside the range of his divine sense when it had been swallowed up by the illusion, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he remembered how he had tried to enter the illusion in the past to test if he could reach the two illusory wooden gates guarded by the terrifying illusion.


    Only after seeing the fate of the bear shaped illusory beast did, he understand why the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts didn''t dare trying to breakthrough the illusion forcefully and leave the Valley of Illusory Beast.


    Even though they had reached the Earth Immortal Realm, they had no way to resist in the face of the terrifying illusion¡­


    "Maybe I should try and find another way to leave the valley¡­" Muttering this to himself as he remained in the air looking back towards the ce where the bear illusory beast had been just a few seconds earlier, Xuan Hao shook his head before turning around to leave for a safe ce where he could stabilize his cultivation base without having to worry about being randomly attack by Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts.


    At the very least, after he broke through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, the area covered by his divine sense expanded as the strength of his soul increased and should exceed the size of the different Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts roaming around the valley.


    For now, checking his progress and just how much his strength increased after he broke through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm would have to wait until he finished stabilizing his cultivation base.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao sessfully managed to break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Chu Li was looking towards the wooden gate connected to the Valley of Illusory Beasts with both curiosity and fear in his eyes.


    "The presence of Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts is still present whenever I poke my head inside. Not only that, but the terrifying aura just now should have been the result of an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast fighting someone not too far away from the wooden gate¡­" Muttering this to himself, Chi Lu could not help wondering if the senior had something to do with the terrifying aura of battle that he felt when he poked his head through the gate just now.


    Although he had never seen the illusory beasts fighting with each other before and felt that it should be rted to the senior, he could never to too certain when it came to the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts. After all,pared to the other illusory beasts, the ones in the Earth Immortal Realm were far smarter. Meaning that they might also be hostile to other illusory beasts. "But¡­ If it''s not rted to the senior, it might have something to do with why things inside the valley haven''t calmed down after an entire year." Narrowing both his eyes as he continued to observe the wooden gate in front of him, Chu Li felt a increasing curiosity about what had happened inside the Valley of Illusory beasts during the past year.


    No matter what had ended up happening, it had caused the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts to continue staying in the outer part of the valley instead of returning back to the deeper part of the valley after a short period of time like they had done in the past.


    Squeak¡­


    Interrupting his train of thought at this moment, the rabbit demon beast appeared not too far away from the Chu Li as it stared towards the wooden gate connected to the Valley of Illusory Beasts with a sense of longing.


    "Hm? What is it little fellow? Are you perhaps missing your master?"


    Seeing the rabbit demon beast, Chu Li guessed what might be on its mind as he said this before reaching down to pick it up-


    SQUEAK!


    However, before Chu Li had a chance to grab hold of it, the rabbit demon beast managed to turn around and escape into the Ephemeral Forest behind them. Making full use of its increased speed after reaching the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm to dodge the fast hands of Chu Li.


    "Huh, quite a shy one. Oh well, I should also get back to training, I feel like I''m about to reach a breakthrough in myprehension of the Dao of Space." Shaking his head with a small smile on his lips as he said this, Chu Li turned around and made his way back into the Ephemeral Forest where both the squirrel and rabbit demon beast spent most of their time training.


    Not much different from them, he had also used the past year training or to be more urate,prehending the Dao of Space.


    The reason for this was simple, as he personally began to see the benefits that the Dao of Space had on his strength andprehension of the Dao of Illusions.


    Just byprehending the Dao of Space, he opened several new pathways to understand the Dao of Illusions. Giving him a brand-new way toprehend the Dao of Illusions that he had never thought possible before. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    In the end, this had resulted in his admiration and respect for Xuan Hao growing exponentially over the past year, to the degree where he now saw him as a figure on par with the old ancestors of the Blue Sea Empire. Existences he had never seen before and had only heard about in legends as people far surpassing the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Because of this, Chu Li also made sure to spend any spare time he had on helping Xuan Hao''s demon beasts, as it was the only way he could repay Xuan Hao for his guidance.


    As a result of this, the rabbit demon beast never ran out of spirit stones during the past half year, while its cultivation also managed to break through to the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm with the help of some special spiritual herbs suitable for nurturing demon beasts from Chu Li.


    In the end, the reason why the rabbit demon beast tolerated Chu Li''s clingy behavior from time to time was because of these precious spiritual herbs¡­


    On the other hand, the squirrel that had only been in the Foundation Establishment Realm when Xuan Hao left experienced the biggest change over the past year. Going from the Foundation Establishment Realm all the way to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Under normal circumstances, it would have been impossible to improve so quickly, but the countless precious spiritual herbs provided by Chu Li and the favorable environment had allowed the squirrel to improve at a speed that surpassed even the most talented of human geniuses.


    In a sense, it was understandable when considering that most of the precious spiritual herbs eaten by the squirrel were at the Transcendent Grade with one of them even having reached the Immortal Grade, the grade of spiritual herbs above the Transcendent Grade and normally something reserved for those in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    All of this was what allowed the squirrel to reach the Nascent Soul Realm in a short year. Thinking about it for more than a few seconds, it was truly a waste to use so many precious spiritual herbs to help a single demon beast reach the Nascent Soul Realm, but¡­ Chu Li couldn''t think of any other way to repay Xuan Hao other help take care of his demon beasts¡­

 Chapter 1116 Dao Lotus

    <h4>Chapter 1116 Dao Lotus?</h4>


    Using the next half month to stabilize his cultivation base at the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao ended up discovering that there were far more Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts roaming around the outer region close the wooden gates than he had first expected.


    Just over the past half month, he had managed to spot more than a dozen different Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts passing by inside the range of his divine sense. The number alone was more than enough to make him fearful of what might be hidden inside the deeper parts of the valley that had managed to restrain so many illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    The more time passed, the more he came to understand just how scary the Valley of Illusory Beasts was. At the same time, he also began to understand why a power with experts above the Earth Immortal Realm had decided to give up on trying to take control of it.


    The reason why they didn''t keep the ce and just sent in the younger geniuses of the Blue Sea Empire while the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts were restrained in the deeper parts of the valley, was likely because they already had some kind of idea about the path potentially being blocked without showing any signs of opening after a long time, like what he was experiencing at the moment.


    Even if the chance of the young geniuses not making it out in time was small, there was always a chance, a risk that the experts from the Blue Sea Empire had deemed in time was small, there was always a chance, a risk that the experts from the Blue Sea Empire had deemed necessary considering the fact that the Blue Sea Empire should control a lot of precious location simr to the Valley of Illusory Beasts that would be far safer than the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    After all, there was also the possibility of the thing restricting the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts failing before any signs appeared, something that would result in the unfortunate death of the geniuses who found themselves inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    But¡­ If that is the case, why did someone like Chu Li not know about this? Considering the fact that he is part of the Blue Sea Empire and someone close to reaching the Earth Immortal Realm, he should have been informed about something important like that¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he observed a group of three Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts in the shape of differentrge bird demon beasts, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself.


    The more he thought about the weird state of the Valley of Illusory Beasts and how it had been abandoned by the Blue Sea Empire, the more he felt confused over the appearance of Chu Li inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    All things considered, someone like Chu Li should have never entered the Valley of Illusory Beasts under normal circumstance, let alone without first learning about all the dangers involved in entering the Valley of Illusory Beasts- n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Unless¡­ Someone deliberately leaked the information about the ce to him without including all the information about the ce and its dangers¡­" Narrowing both his eyes as a frown made its way to his face, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that the situation inside the Blue Sea Empire was also troublesome in its own way.


    Different from the united and powerful empire he had imagined when first entering the Blue Sea Empire and ran into the border guard and other people from the Blue Sea Empire, it looked like the situation inside the Blue Sea Empire was far moreplicated.


    Not only that, but from the fact that the imperial family of the Blue Sea Empire hadplete control over the empire and there weren''t any other powers like a powerful religion, sect or noble family influencing it, the fighting and different factions should be within the imperial family itself. But¡­


    No matter how much he tried to think about it, he would ultimately not be able to make a lot of urate guesses considering how little he had interacted with the Blue Sea Empire so far. Only ever really having seen a single city and a single branch of their government in said city. "Haaa¡­ How troublesome¡­ If we have to interact with the Blue Sea Empire when sect starts to border their territory in the future, I have to make sure Elder Song knows about this and avoids identally aligning with one of these factions¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while making sure to remind himself to inform Elder Song about this at some point after returning to the sect, Xuan Hao decided to not think too much about the current political situation of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Well, I should check the situation inside my dantian now that my cultivation stabilized¡­


    Whoosh~


    Deciding to focus his attention on his cultivation and how the situation inside his dantian had changed since he broke through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao soon saw the situation inside his dantian.


    Floating in the middle of his dantian, the closed lotus flower that had now be part of his soul was gently nurturing his soul inside. Even without doing anything, Xuan Hao could clearly feel his strength increasing.


    Not only that, but he discovered that the lotus flower was divided into 6 distinctyers, each representing one of the six Daos he hadprehended, with the most prominent being the Dao of Illusions closely followed by the Dao of Space.


    The reason he had not realized this back when he had broken through was simply due to the fact that theyers of the lotus flower had still been in the process of developing and had been all mixed together. Only after stabilizing his cultivation base did everything settle into ce.


    Outside of the closed lotus flower floating at the center of his dantian, the qi inside his dantian had also undergone a significant change, as it was forcefully condensed into a far more powerful state than before.


    Even if the overall quantity of qi present didn''t change much, the strength had increased several times over.


    However, out of everything that happened following his breakthrough, the most surprising one was the effect all of this had on his nascent sword soul. Allowing its strength to rapidly improve alongside his soul, while at the same time unexpectedly deepening his understanding of the Dao of the Sword in the process.


    Although it didn''t directly allow him to break through to the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of the sword, it brought him infinitely close to the realm. With all of these changes, Xuan Hao couldn''t help pulling up his status to see just what had changed and if he could get any clue on how he wouldpare against someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword (Small Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess), Dao of Space (Small Sess), Dao of Illusions (Large Sess Realm) Dao Lotus: 6yers


    Sword Intent: Peak Nascent Sword Soul Realm


    Talent: ???? Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened) Physique: ??? (99% Awakened)


    Realm: Late Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to the Earth Immortal Realm, Third Layer Lotus) Professions: Alchemist (Artisan), Formation Master (Expert), cksmithing (Expert) Sect: Star Shattering Sect Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Peak Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm)


    Dao Lotus? 6 Layers? Third Layer Lotus?


    Looking through his status, outside of his Nascent Sword Soul Realm changing to the Peak Nascent Sword Soul Realm and the clear improvement in his physique that had allowed it to reach a staggering ny-nine percent. Only a single step away from fully awakening, Xuan Hao was much more focused on the new information that had appeared in his status.


    Dao Lotus andyers of a lotus¡­ From what little information he had avable, it was clear that these things were rted to the Earth Immortal Realm, the only problem was that he had no idea about any of it.


    For now, the most important thing he managed to pick up on from his status was the fact that he was indeedparable to someone in the Earth Immortal Realm, someone with a thirdyer lotus¡­ Whatever that meant¡­


    "Oh well¡­ At least I should have the strengthparable to someone in the Earth Immortal Realm now, as for the details, I should be able to ask Chu Li about it after finding a way to leave this ce¡­" Shaking his head as he said this, Xuan Hao turned his attention away from his rather impressive status and focused his attention on the important matter at hand that had yet to be properly addressed- Finding a way out of the Valley of Illusory Beasts¡­

 Chapter 1117 Strange Pillar

    <h4>Chapter 1117 Strange Pir</h4>


    Deciding to start searching for another way out of the Valley of Illusory Beasts that didn''t involve the two illusory wooden gates, Xuan Hao ended up finding him moving deeper and deeper in the valley with each passing day without finding anything that might point him towards an alternative path out of the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    Instead, the only thing he managed to find so far was therge number of Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts roaming around the ce. If not for the fact that there were simply far too many of them around and even a slight mistake would expose him to at least three or more Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts, he would have long since tried to find an Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast to test out his new strength.


    Whoosh~


    Crossing over the seemingly invisible barrier separating the area where the illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm normally roamed and the ce where the Peak Soul Ascension Realm and weaker illusory beasts could be found after close to a week of searching for the way out, Xuan Hao was happily surprised to discover than the power of his Dao of Space had only been blocked for a short time before bing avable again.


    Different from his expectations of it being impossible for him to utilize the Dao of Space in the deeper parts of the valley due to the progressively harder to manipte space the deeper one went; it turned out that he was wrong. Instead of it bing increasingly harder to manipte the Dao of Space, there was instead some kind of barrier separating the two parts of the valley.


    The barrier in question was not really a barrier in the sense of one created by a formation but was instead arge swath ofnd stretching across the Valley of Illusory beasts. Separating the weaker and stronger illusory beasts from each other. Although he thought it might have been artificially created by some powerful expert in the Dao of Space at first, he quickly ended up throwing this thought away after personally examining the strange state of the space around and inside the swath ofnd.


    Thend covered was simply far toorge, while the power that stabilized the space and made it impossible to manipte seemed to be rted to the strange space that the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Ephemeral Forest, and Sea of Mist was located inside of.


    If something like that had been made by an expert in the Dao of Space, the existence would be far beyond anything he had encountered so far, likely even surpassing the old experts of the Blue Sea Empire standing above the Earth Immortal Realm.


    "Huh? What is that¡­"


    Searching around the ce where the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts should have been confined, it did not take long before Xuan Hao discovered something that made him pause with a look of surprise stered all over his face.


    "A pir¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he stared up at what could only be described as arge pir, Xuan Hao was rendered speechless as he had no idea what such an object would be doing inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    The only thing he could think of was that it should somehow be rted to the illusion that was now blocking his path out of the Valley of Illusory Beasts or the thing that was responsible for restraining the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts.


    But¡­ No matter what its use is, it''s clear that it used up all of the energy stored inside of it and is in the process of absorbing the qi around itself to recover¡­


    Spotting the small crystal-like object floating above the pir absorbing qi from the air around the pir at a speed that almost caused an energy storm simr to when he had broken through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao did not take long to realize the current state of the pir.


    Whoosh~!


    Deciding to investigate more closely with his divine sense, Xuan Hao soon discovered that there were countless ancient formation symbols floating around inside the crystal-like object floating above the pir.


    The formation symbols all absorbed the abundant qi that entered the crystal-like object before they began growing brighter and bright when-


    Whish~


    One of the ancient formation symbols seemed to have been filled with qi as it seeped out of the crystal-like object and fell down onto the pir below before merging together with it. In the process of this, the crystal-like object also seemed to shrink ever-so slightly.


    The pir didn''t show any clear change that was observable to him, but Xuan Hao still felt like something had changed after the ancient formation symbol merged together with it, it was just that he couldn''t tell just what this was.


    "Hm¡­ If the pir is rted to the restriction of the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts, does it perhaps mean that when it has finished recharging, the path leading back out of the Valley of Illusory Beasts will be opened?" Muttering this to himself as he focused his attention on the crystal-like object floating above the pir, Xuan Hao could not help silently frowning to himself.


    If his guess was correct and the pir was indeed connected to the restriction of the illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm, he might have to wait until the pir finished recharging before he could leave the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    Although it might not sound too bad at first, he guessed that for the pir to fully recover, it had to absorb all of the ancient formation symbols floating in the crystal-like object above it¡­ And from his quick observation of the speed at which the ancient formation symbols were charged up and released back into the pir, this process would at least take thirty years at the current speed.


    Even if the qi absorption speed was far above anything Xuan Hao had seen before his breakthrough to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it was also obvious that restraining so many illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm was not an easy thing to aplish. After all, restraining and killing were twopletely different concepts.


    But¡­ For what reason would someone go through the trouble of constructing something like this just for the sole purpose of restraining the illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm? Is there perhaps some other use for the illusory beasts that I don''t know about?


    Gazing up at the pir with an increasingly curious expression on his face, Xuan Hao wondered if the illusory beasts had some other magical effect other than increasing one''sprehension of the Dao of Illusions after they managed to reach the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Wait, no, it''s not time for this! I have to find another way to leave this ce. If I really stay in here for the next thirty years waiting to see if the path out will open, the Star Shattering Sect and my disciples might have already perished.


    Feeling like his train of thought was starting to drift away from his main objective of finding a way to leave the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Xuan Hao got into the air before continuing his search across the valley for anything that might be able to help aplish his goal. Leaving behind the strange pir to continue absorbing qi on its own.


    ¡­


    As days passed and turned into weeks, Xuan Hao continued searching through the valley with no sess.


    Outside of therge pir he had encountered back when he had first crossed into the deeper part of the valley where the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts normally resided, Xuan Hao did not encounter anything. Not even a single Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast ran through the area covered by his divine sense. Making him believe that all of them should have already left the ce to go to the outer part of the valley.


    This realization made Xuan Hao wonder just what these Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts were up to. After all, they weren''t as dumb as the illusory beasts who normally wandered the outer part of the valley.


    Given they had at least some level of intelligence, they should be trying to find a way to leave the Valley of Illusory Beasts while the pir was not there to restrain them and given that the two wooden gates had been blocked off-


    "They should be trying to find some other way to leave the valley¡­" Finishing his own train of thought as he was flying through arge empty field, Xuan Hao could not help could not help freezing on the spot- n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Why didn''t I think about that before!


    Swish-!


    And without wasting a single second, he turned around and headed straight towards the outer part of the valley where the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts should be searching for an escape path in.

 Chapter 1118 Following the Illusory Beasts~

    <h4>Chapter 1118 Following the Illusory Beasts~</h4>


    Roar-!


    Arriving back at the outer part of the Valley of illusory Beasts again, it did not take more than a few minutes before he ran into an illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm. Completely different from the emptyndscape without a single sign of life that he had encountered in the deeper part of the valley where these powerful illusory beasts had been restrained a year earlier.


    Whoosh-!


    Not wasting any time after spotting the illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao rushed forward before starting to follow after it. Hoping to find out just what the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts were up to and if they really did have a n for leaving the valley.


    However, as the illusory beast got closer to the ce where the terrifying illusion guarding the two illusory gates was located, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit confused. After all, as far as he knew, there wasn''t anyrge gathering of Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts near the two wooden gates when he had left the ce a few weeks earlier.


    If there really had been some illusory beasts working on something nearby, he would have sensed it after breaking through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and had the strength of his divine sense increase far beyond that of the illusory beasts.


    Unless its somewhere in the same direction as the two wooden gates, but not exactly at the location of the two wooden gates¡­


    Lost in his own thoughts as he wondered just where the illusory beast in front of him was heading, Xuan Hao soon noticed that several other illusory beasts had appeared at the edges of his divine sense heading in the same direction as the illusory beast in front of him. Rooar


    Roar


    Roooar


    As the three illusory beasts noticed each other, they beganmunicating in their ownnguage before closing the distance between each other to form a small group of three as they continued flying in the same direction. Confirming his earlier suspicion that the illusory beasts were indeed working together.


    Not only that, but he also realized that the illusory beasts were smart enough tomunicate with each other, a level of intelligence that he hadn''t expected after his encounter with the illusory dragon. Maybe it was just that the illusory dragon wasn''t the smartest among the illusory beasts and just so happened to give him an overall worse impression of how smart the illusory beasts were.


    Looks like I will have to reevaluate the intelligence of the illusory beasts. For now, I should keep a constant distance from them in case they discover me, and I have to escape. After all, there is a chance that some of the illusory beasts have the ability to seal space and prevent me from using the Dao of Space to escape¡­


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this while keeping his attention focused on the three illusory beasts in front of him, Xuan Hao deliberately slowed down his speed to create some distance between himself and the group of illusory beasts.


    Just in case they had somehow managed to find out about his existence and were nning an ambush together with the other illusory beasts. Considering that their intelligence was above what he had expected, he decided not to take any chances.


    Though his strength had reached a levelparable to someone in the Earth Immortal Realm, he highly doubted that he would be strong enough to fight back against a group of Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts. Even more so when there was a chance of them having some kind of weird ability that might allow them to seal space.


    Whoosh-!


    Worried about potentially walking into a trap, Xuan ended up deciding to not just follow a single illusory beast and instead swapped to follow another one whenever the chance presented itself and the new illusory beast appeared to be heading in the same direction as the other illusory beasts.


    This way, even though his speed had decreasedpared to if he had just continued following the single group of illusory beasts, he had at least made sure that he didn''t end up walking into a trap-


    Roooar-!


    Just at this moment, a terrifying roar echoed out in the distance as an all too familiar figure came into view at the edge of his divine sense.


    "The illusory dragon¡­"


    Recognizing the figure of the illusory dragon he had fought with during the time that the two wooden gates were sealed off, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he observed the illusory dragon rapidly overtaking the illusory beast he was following behind before passing the area with the two wooden gates. Continuing to head in the direction that should under normal circumstances lead out of the valley.


    Of course, given that the valley itself was located in a special space together with the Ephemeral Forest and the Sea of Mist, the direction where the illusory dragon was heading was blocked by the walls created by the differentws of the special space they were inside of at the moment.


    Although it was possible to pass through the walls of the special space and go directly to one of the other two spaces that it was connected with without using the wooden gates connecting the three spaces, the strength required to do this was highly dependent on the strength of the space itself¡­ And considering just how many illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm were present inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts, it was easy to imagine just how tough the walls of the space were.


    To breakthrough through force, power above the Earth Immortal Realm would likely be required.


    Of course, Xuan Hao also knew about another method to pass through the walls of special space, but that involved a higher level ofprehension in the Dao of Space and mastery over the long-distance teleportation technique, something he was still far off at the moment.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao could not help growing curious about what the illusory beasts were up to.


    Considering the fact that none of them had surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm, as they would have been able to forcefully leave the Valley of Illusory Beasts if that was the case, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if the illusory beasts had managed to find another way to escape from the Valley of Illusory Beasts that didn''t involve the Dao of Space.


    Even if it was hard to imagine, it did seem possible considering just how many illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm he had encountered so far. The number of unique Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts he had seen so far already surpassing twenty, a number of Earth Immortal Realm Expert that would make even a powerful empire like the Blue Sea Empire pause.


    Swish-!


    Ditching the rather slow illusory beast he had been following after for the past five minutes, Xuan Hao couldn''t stop himself from chasing after the illusory dragon that had already disappeared in the distance. Making sure to hide his presence from any of the nearby illusory beasts in the process, while also making sure to keep a certain distance from them at the same time.


    No matter how confident he was in his own skills when it came to hiding his own presence, the illusory beasts he was trying to hide from had still reached the Earth Immortal Realm and were equipped with a soul far more powerful than ordinary Earth Immortal Realm cultivators due to their special race being centered around a dao rted to the soul.


    Roar? n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even with all of this in mind, some of the illusory beasts he passed by while chasing after the illusory dragon still managed to pick up on his presence to some extent.


    Roar¡­


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, these illusory beasts just looked around themselves in confusion for a short moment before continuing forward like nothing had happened after realizing that there wasn''t anyone around. ming the odd presence, they had felt on the illusory dragon who had rushed ahead of them and caused quite a bit of havoc along the way due to the terrifying winds generated by the wings whenever they pped to move the illusory dragon forward at a speed none of the other Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts could keep up with.


    ¡­


    Rooooar!


    Chasing after the illusory dragon for what felt like hours before it finally came to a stop at the edge of the special space where the Valley of Illusory Beasts was located, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on the spot as he saw what the illusory beasts had been working on for their escape from the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    The only words Xuan Hao could find to describe it was "insane", as he almost instantly realized how the illusory beast nned to ovee the natural barrier that was the walls of the special space that the Valley of Illusory Beasts was inside of.

 Chapter 1119 Path out of the Valley

    <h4>Chapter 1119 Path out of the Valley</h4>


    Huddled together, therge number of illusory beasts seemed to have undergone some kind of metamorphosis as they seemed to momentarily merge together for short periods of time tounch attacks towards the barrier. From time to time, some of the illusory beasts would be too exhausted to merge together and would separate from the mass and leave to recover while another illusory beast took its ce to keep up the attack on the barrier.


    "¡­"


    To describe it in more simple terms, all of the illusory beasts became a singlerge illusory beast for a short period of time and used this giant form to attack the barrier. Repeating this process over what should be at least a year at this point in time, the barrier that kept them from leaving the valley had weakened to the degree that it looked like it was about to break at any moment.


    Because of this, it looked like the exhausted illusory beasts didn''t wander too far away to recover and had instead gathered together not too far away.


    At the same time, the illusory beasts who had left to recover had made their way back in preparation for the barrier breaking. After all, even if they managed to break through the barrier, it worked on the same principles as the normal structure of a world barrier and would end up recovering shortly after being broken.


    Of course, the short period that the barrier was broken would be more than enough for all of these illusory beasts to escape from the valley and make their way into the outside world, or more specifically, the Blue Sea Empire.


    Wait¡­ If all of these Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts escape, won''t the Blue Sea Empire be in for a rather troublesome situation considering that they seem to attack anyone other than illusory beasts upon spotting them?


    Suddenly realizing this as he looked at therge number of illusory beasts working together to break the barrier, Xuan Hao could not help silently mourning for the inevitable destruction that the illusory beasts were going to cause in the Blue Sea Empire.


    However, even if he knew about this, there was not really anything he could do about it with his current strength. Just the number of illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm had already exceeded a hundred and that was not even mentioning the fact that their power should have surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm afterbining together to attack the barrier.


    Outside of the fact that he was too weak to fight against therge number of illusory beasts, he didn''t really have a reason to help out the Blue Sea Empire in the first ce. On the other hand, the chaos the illusory beasts were going to cause in the Blue Sea Empire might end up being beneficial for the Star Shattering Sect in the future.


    Other than all of this, he would very much like for the illusory beast to break the barrier and create a path out of the valley, as he didn''t really want to be stuck inside the valley until the weird pir in the deeper part of the valley recovered enough to restrain the illusory beasts¡­


    BOOOOOOOOOOOM-!


    Just at this moment, the illusory beasts managed tond a perfect hit of the already weakened barrier. Blowing it wide open. Rumble-!


    Following the barrier being blown open, a path leading out of the Valley of Illusory Beasts and directly into the Blue Sea Empire was carved by the remnant power of the massive illusory beast that the illusory beasts hadbined into. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Roar!


    Roar~!


    Rooooar-!


    Seeing the path to freedom appearing, the illusory beasts all let out overjoyed roars as they all rushed forward. None of them wasted any time as they used all of their strength to escape before the barrier recovered and closed again.


    R-roar-!


    Even the weakened illusory beasts who had just used all of their energy rushed forward as they burned up part of their soul to momentarily recover their strength to escape from the valley.


    Whoosh-!


    Seeing the path to the outside world already starting to shrink as the barrier recovered at a speed visible to the naked eye, Xuan Hao didn''t dare stand around and watch, as he also rushed forward into the path that had been created by the illusory beasts.


    Given the chaotic nature of the tunnel, he could not use the Dao of Space inside the tunnel and was forced to fly normally.


    Roar?


    Roar!?


    Even though a few of the illusory beasts managed to spot him because of this, they were far too busy trying to escape themselves to care about him. In front of possibly being able to escape from the Valley of Illusory Beasts nothing else mattered¡­


    RUMBLE-!


    Not even halfway through the tunnel, a loud rumbling sound echoed out at the back of the tunnel as the barrier of the valley repaired itself- CRACK!


    What followed was a loud cracking sound as the tunnel began copsing in on itself, starting from where it had been connected to the Valley of Illusory Beasts before working its way up towards where the tunnel was connected to the Blue Sea Empire.


    Roar!?


    Roa-


    All of this happened in less than a second, as a few of the slowest illusory beasts had no time to react before being swallowed up by the copsing tunnel, their fate unknown.


    Whoosh-!


    Not saying anything as he saw the chaotic tunnel around him growing increasingly unstable as the copse grew closer to where he was, Xuan Hao wasted no time and used all of his strength to rush towards the end of the tunnel connected to the Blue Sea Empire. No longer caring about hiding himself from the rest of the illusory beasts.


    If they ended up ganging up on him after leaving the tunnel, he would have to deal it at that time. For now, the most important thing was escaping from the chaotic tunnel and returning to the Blue Sea Empire before getting swallowed up like the increasing number of illusory beasts behind him had experienced.


    Even if he couldn''t see what happened to the illusory beasts being swallowed up by the copsing chaotic tunnel, given the chaotic spatial storm that seemed to form in the ce where the tunnel copsed, it was hard to imagine that they had somehow managed to survive. After all, a spatial storm was something terrifying, capable of tearing everything apart, something he had only ever witnessed when travelling to the ancient battlefield where the ancient golem and Dao of Corruption Heart were located. Given his current understanding of the Dao of Space, he suspected that a spatial storm was essential what would happen if a true spatial copse was done on a muchrger scale.


    Roar!?


    At the same time Xuan Hao rushed ahead of the illusory beasts and revealed himself, somewhere not too far behind him, the illusory dragon let out a surprised roar before its expression filled with killing intent. Even if a year had passed, it still remembered how Xuan Hao had cut off its ws¡­ And even if the rest of the illusory beasts had no time to think about Xuan Hao''s presence due to the copsing spatial tunnel, the illusory dragon was not the same as it rushed towards Xuan Hao.


    In the eyes of the illusory dragon, Xuan Hao was still someone in the Soul Ascension Realm and shouldn''t be able to block it given the chaotic space in the tunnel. Even if he had a powerful attack, it felt it would be able to dodge it now that it was prepared.


    "Huh?"


    Sensing the illusory dragon rushing towards him from behind, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as a hint of confusion shed through them.


    Even if he was confident in fighting the illusory dragon now that he had broken through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he understood very well that even a single second wasted on fighting inside the copsing tunnel might end up costing him his life.


    Does it perhaps want to drag me down with it or something? But it should be more than strong enough to escape from the tunnel if it put all of its power into escaping¡­


    Not able to understand the actions of the illusory dragon now only a few hundred meters away from him, Xuan Hao was forced to stop and respond to it.


    Rumble-!


    Knowing that even a single second could end up costing him his life, Xuan Hao didn''t hold back in the slightest as he utilized all of his power tounch a single devasting sword attack towards the illusory dragon before turning around and continuing to rush up towards the end of the tunnel.


    Roar?


    BOOOM-!


    Suddenly faced with the terrifying sword attack, the illusory dragon could only let out a confused roar before it was forced to use all of its strength to block the attack.


    ROOOAR-!


    Booom!


    Struggling for a short time, the illusory dragon managed to forcefully resist the attack-


    RUMBLE-!


    However, before it had time to celebrate, the chaotic tunnel around it copsed and the spatial storm created by the copse instantly swallowed the triumphant illusory dragon¡­

 Chapter 1120 Panicking Soul Ascension Realm Experts

    <h4>Chapter 1120 Panicking Soul Ascension Realm Experts</h4>


    "To think we haven''t been able to find that old man even after searching the entire mountain range for over two years¡­ No matter how good at hiding he is, he shouldn''t have been able to hide from us in his state. Even if he found somewhere special to hide away, we should have found some traces of him by now!"


    "Indeed, I''m starting to worry that he might end up recovering before we find him. Even if he can''t recover his full strength, an Earth Immortal is still and Earth Immortal. At that point in time, all we can do is wait for death¡­"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was observing the illusory beasts trying to break through the barrier and escape from the Valley of Illusory Beasts, two of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had been chasing after the old man in the Earth Immortal Realm were casually chatting with each other not too far away from the entrance to the Sea of Mist.


    Given that two years had already passed without them finding any traces of the old man, a part of them had already started to give up hope and were secretly preparing to run away before the old man managed to recover part of his strength in the Earth Immortal Realm and decided to take revenge on them.


    Even if they still felt fearful of future retaliation from the old man in the Earth Immortal Realm after they left, they also understood that there would be no way for the old man to continue staying in the Blue Sea Empire after having killed one of their Earth Immortals.


    Although the experts of the Blue Sea Empire had yet to appear inside the mountain range that they had chased the old man into, information had recently leaked among the group of Soul Ascension Realm Experts that the Earth Immortal Realm Experts of the Blue Sea Empire were at the scene of the battle and had begun their search for the old man daring enough to kill one of their empire''s Earth Immortal Realm Experts.


    With all of this in mind, the Soul Ascension Realm Experts searching through the mountain range where the old man in the Earth Immortal Realm had hidden away understood that they only had a short time left to find him before the Earth Immortals of the Blue Sea Empire appeared.


    Even if some of them had already given up and were prepared to escape before this happened or the old man managed to somehow recover his cultivation realm ande out to deal with them, the majority of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts were still fully dedicated to continuing the search.


    After all, in their eyes, this was a once in a lifetime opportunity to obtain the wealth of two Earth Immortal Realm Experts, though it might not be able to guarantee them reaching the Earth Immortal Realm, it would undoubtedly increase their chances.


    Rumble-!


    Just as the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts chatting with each other were about to find somewhere else to search for the old man in the Earth Immortal Realm, the ground beneath them started violently shaking.


    "Huh? What is-"


    BOOOOOOM-!


    Before the two had the chance toprehend what was happening, arge hole suddenly opened beneath them. Creating a powerful shockwave that ended up knocking both into one of the nearby mountains in the process.


    "Huh¡­?"


    "What in the¡­"


    Witnessing the unfortunate fate of the two Soul Ascension Realm Experts who were knocked into the mountain by the terrifying shockwave that swept out following the hole in the ground appearing, the remaining Soul Ascension Realm Experts began fearfully observing the hole that had suddenly appeared.


    "What is that?"


    "I don''t know, but what about those two, did they die¡­?"


    Not knowing how to respond to the possible death of their two peers, they remained frozen on the spot as they began discussing the situation between each other through their divine sense. The speed of the conversation far surpassed anything archivable by a mortal as they came to a decision to investigate the hole in the ground a few seconds after it had first appeared.


    Fearful as they might be of the danger involved, they also understood that the hole might be the entrance to some sort of powerful secret realm¡­ And given that the Soul Ascension Realm Experts still present were still searching for the old man in the Earth Immortal Realm, it was obvious that their greed was stronger than normal when it came to opportunities for them to improve their chances at reaching the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    With this in mind, most of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts soon arrived at the edge of the hole before looking down into it-


    Roooar!


    Roar!


    Rooooaaaaar-! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    And what met them was a sight they would never forget, as close to a hundred illusory beasts entered their view, all of them carrying an aura above the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Not to mention whether they would be able to get any benefits from entering the hole, none of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts thought about the old man in the Earth Immortal Realm hidden somewhere nearby. Only a single thought was left in their heads after sensing the terrifying strength of the illusory beasts heading up towards them¡­


    Escape!


    ¡­


    Almost out!


    While the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Blue Sea Empire realized how dangerous their current situation was and began scrambling in all directions while using all ofmunication talismans or other special tools to contact the more powerful people behind them or just directly contacting the Blue Sea Empire to request for help, Xuan Hao had almost reached the other side of the tunnel.


    The only thing preventing him from continuing to pass the illusory beasts in front of him being that he wanted to eliminate any chance of being rted to therge number of powerful illusory beasts that were about to enter the Blue Sea Empie.


    Outside of that, Xuan Hao also realized that the demon beasts flying beside him had begun to grow rxed with the exit getting closer and closer to them.


    Although this might not have mattered a lot in a normal situation, his current situation was far from normal and because of that, it was even more nerve wrecking to feel many illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm suddenly start paying more attention to him. After reaching the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao had a feeling that these illusory beasts would start to attack him.


    At least I should be able to use my Dao of Space to escape the moment I get out of this ce¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao ignored the illusory beasts around himself as he put all his power into preparing himself for the time, he made it out of the chaotic tunnel.


    It''s here!


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, he didn''t have more than a few seconds to prepare himself, as he emerged from the tunnel together with close to a dozen illusory beasts surrounding him on all sides. All of them having reached the Earth Immortal Realm-


    Rooar-!


    Roar!


    And all of them fully intent on attacking him now that they had sessfully managed to escape from the Valley of Illusory Beasts. Not a single of them cared about celebrating their escape as they all simultaneously lunged towards Xuan Hao who now found himself being attacked by close to a dozen Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts.


    Rumble-!


    No matter how much stronger he had be after reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao understood very well that he stood no chance of fighting back against so many illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm. Forcing him to use all his power to execute the Drifting Cloud Steps to get out of his current situation, while silently praying that none of the illusory beasts attacking had some kind of weird ability that would lock down the space and prevent him from teleporting away and forcing him to face them head on-


    Whoosh~


    Boooom-!


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, it seemed like none of the illusory beasts had this kind of ability, as he disappeared from the spot before the attacks of the illusory beastsnded. Appearing a few thousand meters away with a relieved expression stered all over his face.


    "Given the disturbance that all of these illusory beasts caused with their appearance, the true experts of the Blue Sea Empire above the Earth Immortal Realm might show up soon¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced towards therge number of Soul Ascension Realm Experts escaping not too far away from the location of the hole, it was not hard to guess that these people should have already informed the Blue Sea Empire about the appearance of therge number of Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts.


    I should get out of here before the experts from the Blue Sea Empire begins to show up, but before that, I have to pick up the rabbit demon beast and squirrel¡­

 Chapter 1121 Reunion with Rabbit Demon Beast

    <h4>Chapter 1121 Reunion with Rabbit Demon Beast</h4>


    Wasting no time lingering around after having escaped from the illusory beasts, Xuan Hao made use of the momentary confusion of the illusory beasts to slip back into the cave where the entrance to the Sea of Mist was located before rushing straight into the Sea of Mist. Not even noticing the formation that was hiding the presence of the entrance.


    Hm? Someone is here?


    Only realizing something was wrong after entering the Sea of Mist, Xuan Hao could not help ncing towards the old man looking like a shriveled-up corpse sitting not too far away from the entrance to the Sea of Mist.


    Someone simr to Chu Li? Whatever it is, I don''t have time to waste¡­


    Swish-!


    Not carrying too much about the appearance of the old man due to his current state looking like he would copse if a gentle breeze passed through the Sea of Mist, Xuan Hao rushed past the old man and made his way through the wooden gate connecting the Sea of Mist and the Ephemeral Forest. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Huh!?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao disappeared, the old man opened both of his eyes in surprise as he looked in the direction Xuan Hao had disappeared in.


    "My formations were broken¡­ An, that person just now, his strength should be above mine¡­" Muttering this to himself as he understood he would no longer be able to hide himself with his formations being broken, the old man forced himself to stand up as he began preparing himself for another daring escape.


    Although his strength had not yet recovered, he had at least managed to recover a small part of it over the past two years. Enough to possibly make another escape from the Soul Ascension Realm Experts who were bound toe rushing into the Sea of Mist at any moment.


    At least, that was what the old man thought as he prepared himself to use all of the strength, he had managed to recover to escape once again-


    "Where are they¡­?"


    However, even after a few minutes passed, no one appeared, and he was left nervously staring at the wooden gate connecting the Sea of Mist to the small cave in the Blue Sea Empire. Only able to wonder what had happened to the Soul Ascension Realm Experts that had been chasing after him.


    After all, given that he had stayed in the Blue Sea Empire for quite some time, he understood very well that there was no chance of them just giving up after two short years. For them to not appear, something should have happened to them that forced them away.


    But¡­ What could cause all of those Soul Ascension Realm Experts to run away? The Earth Immortal from earlier?


    Thinking this to himself, the old man could not help frowning, as he turned to look towards the wooden gate Xuan Hao had disappeared into a few minutes earlier. Not knowing whether it was safe to leave the Sea of Mist and find somewhere more secluded to recover or if there were still some of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts roaming around the area outside the Sea of Mist, waiting for him to appear.


    ¡­


    Unaware of the worry and fear his appearance had caused the old man trying his best to recover his strength back in the Sea of Mist, Xuan Hao passed through the wooden gate leading to the Ephemeral Forest and soon found himself in front of the all too familiar forest constantly flickering in and out of existence.


    "I wonder how much the squirrel managed to progress over the past year. Given its rapid progress under the rabbit demon beast, it might be close to reaching the Peak of the Core Formation Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the forest, Xuan Hao wasted no time in spreading out his divine sense to find the two demon beasts and Chu Li. Desiring nothing more than to leave as fast as possible and avoid potentially shing with the Earth Immortals or more powerful experts from the Blue Sea Empire, who should be showing up to deal with therge number of illusory beasts that had appeared inside their borders.


    Whoosh~


    As his divine sense entered the Ephemeral Forest, Xuan Hao soon spotted the rabbit demon beast, squirrel, and Chu Li at the other end of the forest where another set of wooden gates connecting to the Sea of Mist and Valley of Illusory Beasts were located.


    "So, there are more wooden gates inside the Ephemeral Forest¡­" Not having expected there to be more wooden gates inside the Ephemeral Forest as he had always thought there was only one pair of wooden gates in each of the three different spaces, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit curious about the reason behind this and if the wooden gates they connected to were different.


    Swish~!


    However, he didn''t bother thinking about this for too long before jumping into the air in the direction of the three. Understanding very well that he had to leave the ce as fast as possible to avoid the experts from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Not only that, but a part of him also worried that the illusory beasts escape from the Valley of Illusory Beasts might end up waking up whatever terrifying creature had caused the Blue Sea Empire to give up on controlling the Valley of Illusory Beasts back when it had been discovered.


    ¡­


    Squeak~


    At the same time Xuan Hao entered the Ephemeral Forest and began making his way through the Ephemeral Forest, the rabbit demon beast let out a satisfied squeaking sound as it looked at the squirrel in front of it. Even if it had been fed with all kinds of precious spiritual herbs during thest year, the rabbit demon beast felt happy that it finally had a subordinate at the Nascent Soul Realm.


    After returning to the Star Shattering Sect, the rabbit demon beast would be able to start implementing its own ns of recruiting more talented demon beasts and have the squirrel train them. Allowing it to start the process of building up its own power inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Looks like someone is quite excited, I wonder if it''s because you want a few more spiritual herbs from me?"


    Unfortunately, the rabbit demon beast''s happy dreams of the future were shattered, as the voice of a certain person echoed out behind it.


    Squeak!


    Turning around to see Chu Li happily smiling at it, the rabbit demon beast could not help feeling a shiver run down its spine as it remembered how it had spent thest year being tortured by the man. No matter how many spiritual herbs he had given and the fact that it had managed to break through to the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, the rabbit demon beast had no intention of getting along with him after the humiliation had caused it to experience during thest year.


    Not only did it damage the rabbit demon beast mentally, but it also affected its image in the eyes of the squirrel, as there was no way the squirrel would ever look at it filled with awe after seeing it being treated like a stuffed animal by Chu Li¡­


    "Hm?"


    Just at this moment, Chu Li froze on the spot a few centimeters away from the rabbit demon beast before turning to look into the depths of the Ephemeral Forest- or to be more specific, a person who emerged from the depths of the Ephemeral Forest.


    "This is¡­ Senior!?"


    Recognizing the person who had emerged from the depths of the Ephemeral Forest, Chu Li could not help tilting his head in confusion. Not understanding where Xuan Hao hade from, as the two wooden gates connecting the Ephemeral Forest and the Valley of Illusory Beasts were just a few hundred meters behind him.


    "Senior!"


    However, this confusion onlysted for a short instance before it was ovee by the sheer happiness of seeing Xuan Hao again.


    Given that it had already been a year since theirst encounter and the fact that the Valley of Illusory Beasts still showed no signs of calming down from what he could sense when peeking through the wooden gate, Chu Li did start to worry about whether or not something had ended up happening to Xuan Hao, but now that he had appeared, all of these worries disappeared.


    SQUEAK-!


    Swish-!


    Reacting to the sudden shift in Chu Li, the rabbit demon beast also spotted Xuan Hao and wasted no time in rushing towards at a speedparable to someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Rm. Possibly even surpassing that of the average Peak Soul Ascension Realm Expert-


    "Huh?"


    And before Xuan Hao had time to say anything to the rabbit demon beast, it crawled up his robe and entered his sleeve where the small pocket space was located. Not even bothering to care about its subordinate, who had been left behind and was still training without knowing that its master had already run away.

 Chapter 1122 Old Man in the Sea of Mist

    <h4>Chapter 1122 Old Man in the Sea of Mist</h4>


    Deciding not to bother the rabbit demon beast after it disappeared inside his robe, Xuan Hao instead turned his attention towards the squirrel demon beast that had not yet discovered him and was still busy training.


    Squeak? Only after feeling his gaze did, ite to a stop and looked over with a surprised expression stered all over its little face as it suddenly seemed to remember him. Not a secondter, the squirrel seemed to understand what had happened to the rabbit demon beast as it nervously began approaching Xuan Hao. Not knowing what to do, as it was far too fearful of him to dare trying to climb up his robe.


    Swish~


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao casually waved his hand as the squirrel demon beast was sucked into his sleeve. Not intending to just stand around and wait for the rabbit demon beast to calm down ande out to pick up the squirrel demon beast.


    "Senior¡­"


    Seeing the two demon beasts disappearing, Chu Li could not help nervously calling out to Xuan Hao. Hoping that the senior was satisfied with the help he had provided to the two demon beasts over the past year.


    "No need to worry, I see that you helped out those two quite a bit over the past year and I''m thankful for that." Understanding what was going through Chu Li''s head from the nervous expression and expectant look in his eyes, Xuan Hao decided to reassure him before turning towards the wooden gate leading back to the Sea of Mist.


    Even if he wanted to chat for a bit longer with Chu Li and possibly find out more about the Blue Sea Empire now that his strength had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm and he didn''t have to worry about being exposed as someone who wasn''t a senior, he also understood that he would have to leave the ce before the experts from the Blue Sea Empire arrived at the scene.


    Although he would be more than capable of escaping from an ordinary Earth Immortal Realm Expert, he didn''t blindly believe that this would be the case when encountering some of the more senior Earth Immortal Realm Experts. Especially if these people happened to be skilled in the Dao of Space.


    If he really did encounter someone skilled in the Dao of Space, that person would be able to seal space and prevent him from teleporting away, something Xuan Hao wanted to avoid if possible!


    And that is not mentioning the fact that an expert above the Earth Immortal Realm was very likely to show up due to the sheer number of illusory beasts that had managed to escape from the Valley of Illusory Beasts- no, it was more urate to say that the Blue Sea Empire would have no way to deal with the illusory beasts unless an expert above the Earth Immortal Realm took action to calm down the situation before it grew out of hand.


    "Senior? Is something wrong? Did something perhaps happen to the Valley of Illusory Beasts?" Seeing Xuan Hao already about to leave, while also picking up the fact that he didn''te out from the wooden of the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Chu Li quickly jumped forward and asked this.


    Over the past year, he had been wondering what had happened inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts given that it was the first time it took this long for the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts to disappear and retreat back into the depths of the valley.


    Now seeing how Xuan Hao was about to leave through the wooden gate leading to the Sea of Mist, Chu Li realized that something had happened, something that caused the senior in front of him to no longer want to continue exploring the Valley of Illusory Beasts!


    "Hm? Oh¡­ You probably don''t want to enter the Valley of Illusory Beasts again and¡­ Most of the illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm found a way to escape from the Valley of Illusory Beasts and are currently just outside the entrance of the Sea of Mist. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Given how chaotic the situation is and the fact that around a hundred Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts are about to run rampant inside the Blue Sea Empire, I nned to leave this ce before the more powerful experts of the Blue Sea Empire show up. Hm¡­ Now that I think about it, it would be a good idea for you to leave as well."


    "Wha¡­"


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said, Chu Li momentarily froze on the spot as he had no idea how toprehend what he had just heard.


    The Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts that I left the valley for, escaped and are now outside the entrance to the Sea of Mist? The experts of the Blue Sea Empire might show up!? Given senior''s strength, he should mean that those old ancestors above the Earth Immortal Realm are going to show up! If I get caught anywhere close to the ce where someone like that is fighting, I will probably be killed without even knowing how I died¡­


    Realizing the seriousness of his current situation and just how much danger he was in, Chu Li felt a shiver run down his spine.


    If not for senior''s information just now, I might have ended up dying without even knowing what happened¡­


    "Senior! Wait for me!"


    Thinking this to himself, Chu Li suddenly jumped up as he chased after Xuan Hao who had just stepped through the wooden gate leading back to the Sea of Mist.


    ¡­


    "Hm?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao stepped through the wooden gate and arrived back at the Sea of Mist, the old man who was still in the process of recovering opened his eyes again as he stared towards him with a cautious expression on his face.


    That person is back again¡­ What in the world did he want inside that wooden gate? Was there perhaps some kind of treasure in there or did hee back out to kill me?


    Even if Xuan Hao hadn''t done anything to him yet, he still didn''t dare to let down his guard when faced with someone who might be stronger than him when he was in his peak state.


    "Senior! Wait for me!"


    However, just as the old man was prepared to get up and escape, a voice echoed out from the wooden gate connected to the Ephemeral Forest as Chu Li came barreling out of the wooden gate.


    "Chu Li? Is there something you want?"


    Chu Li! Isn''t that the young prodigy from the Four Sea Armies?! What is someone like that doing here¡­ And senior¡­ Is that person perhaps one of the four sea generals!?


    Listening to the short question from Xuan Hao, the old man''s mind began to spin as a shiver ran down his spine. Instantly realizing who Chu Li was and starting to guess the identity of Xuan Hao.


    No matter what, for Chu Li to call Xuan Hao a senior, it meant that he wasn''t just an ordinary Earth Immortal Realm Expert, but someone above that. Possibly even one of the four sea generals. Terrifying beings who stood infinitely close to the realm above the Earth Immortal Realm!


    Considering the fact that he had just killed an Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Blue Sea Empire not too long ago, the old man could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he did his best to make himself disappear. Silently praying that the terrifying being that Chu Li referred to as senior didn''t notice him.


    Even if he did, he hoped that the news of what he did hadn''t managed to spread to the higher ups of the Blue Sea Empire and would only be known among some of the weaker Earth Immortals of the Blue Sea Empire.


    "Huh? Who is that over there?"


    However, before he even had the chance to rx, Chu Li noticed him and called out with a curious expression on his face. Clearly wondering who he was. Having clearly felt the Earth Immortal Realm aura around him.


    I''m doomed!


    Hearing what Chu Li said and feeling the gaze of both him and Xuan Hao turning towards him, the old man could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine. Understanding very well that the next few seconds would determine whether he would live or die.


    "Hehe, don''t mind me, I''m just recovering from an injury I sustained in a battle with a demon beast not too long ago."


    Now that he had already been spotted and was called out by Chu Li, he could only try his best to remain calm before going over to meet the two. Silently praying that none of them knew anything about him killing an Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Blue Sea Empire, as that would undeniably result in the senior standing beside Chu Li killing him on the spot!

 Chapter 1123 Leaving the Sea of Mist

    <h4>Chapter 1123 Leaving the Sea of Mist</h4>


    Hearing the nervouslyughter followed by the old man, who had been quietly cultivating inside the Sea of Mist, bowing his head while exining his situation, Xuan Hao could not help examining the old man more closely. Soon realizing that the old man was none other than the Earth Immortal Realm Experts who had managed to kill the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Blue Sea Empire before being besieged by arge number of Peak Soul Ascension Realm Experts on all sides.


    To think he managed to escape in that kind of situation and even managed to begin the process of recovery after using so many forbidden techniques to forcibly increase his own strength¡­


    Feeling a sense of admiration towards the old man as he thought about this while observing his condition through his divine sense, Xuan Hao didn''t pay any more attention to the old man as he began making his way towards the wooden gate leading out of the Sea of Mist and back into the blue Sea Empire. Ignoring the earlier words of Chu Li in the process, as he had no intention of taking this person with him.


    The reason for this was not just the fact that he was a part of the Blue Sea Empire, but also because he clearly had some enemies that wanted to secretly kill him off by sending him to a dangerous ce like the Valley of Illusory Beasts¡­ And considering the fact that he was still far from being able to meddle in the affairs of a giant power like the Blue Sea Empire, he decided that the best option would be to leave before he ended up getting caught in some kind of internal struggle taking ce inside the Blue Sea Empire.


    Swish-!


    Given the difference in strength between himself and Chu Li now that he had broken through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Chu Li didn''t even have time to react before he disappeared through the wooden gate and appeared back in the small cave that the wooden gate was located inside of-


    Whoosh~


    And with another step, he directly used the Dao of Space to teleport away from the cave before any of the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts wandering around outside had the time to notice him. Not giving Chu Li any chance to catch up with him and possibly dying him until the powerful experts of the Blue Sea Empire appeared.


    Even if he didn''t have any hostile rtionship with the Blue Sea Empire and there was a good chance that he would still be able to leave if this happened, he wasn''t one to take the chance. Especially after he witnessed how the group of Peak Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the blue Sea Empire had treated the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Blue Sea Empire¡­


    "Wha- Senior!?"


    At the same time inside the Sea of Mist, Chu Li could not help eximing to himself with a look of surprise stered all over his face as he witnessed Xuan Hao leaving without responding to him.


    Although he wanted to believe that it was because he hadn''t heard him earlier, he understood that there was no chance of something like that being the case considering the senior''s cultivation base. The most likely reason was that the senior didn''t want to bother with him any longer and had decided to leave or had something importante up.


    In the eyes of Chu Li, he felt that thest option was more likely as the senior didn''t really seem like someone who would just ignore him and leave all of a sudden. After all, he had already put up with him for a few hours when he taught him about the Dao of Space and pointed him on the path to the Earth Immortal Realm.


    "Senior¡­"


    Even if this was the case, Chu Li could not help feeling a hint of sadness after Xuan Hao left. Not only because he might not encounter the senior in the future given the fact that he should be a wandering cultivator that just happened to be passing through the Blue Sea Empire, but also because he now had to find a way to survive therge number of Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts lurking outside the Sea of Mist.


    Confident as he might be in escaping from a single Earth Immortal Realm illusory beast that had just broken through to the realm with his current strength, there was no way he would be able to escape from therge number currently outside the entrance of the Sea of Mist.


    "But¡­ With such arge number of Illusory Beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm, the four armies are bound to make a move to calm down the situation. Even those old ancestors won''t be able to sit still with such arge number of powerful illusory beasts running around inside the empire¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about therge number of illusory beasts just outside the Sea of Mist, Chu Li felt himself starting to rx again.


    Even without the help of Xuan Hao, he should be able to just wait around for his seniors to start moving out and deal with the situation. After all, even if it would be hard to deal with so many illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm, it was not impossible with the Blue Sea Empire''s strength. Especially so if some of the ancestors above the Earth Immortal Realm appeared to take charge of the situation¡­


    WHAT!? Therge number of Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts? Four armies? Old ancestors? What in the world happened outside the Sea of Mist?!


    At the same time Chu Li was feeling himself rx after realizing he could just continue waiting around inside the Sea of Mist for his seniors to show up and clean up the mess, the old man sitting not too far away listening to what he said could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine upon hearing what Chu Li said.


    Although the seniors and powerful experts from the Blue Sea Empire would help Chu Li get out of the current situation safely, the same could not be said for the old man, as he was currently wanted by the Blue Sea Empire for killing one of their Earth Immortal Realm Experts.


    Given that over two years had already passed since then, his remnant aura had undoubtedly been recorded by the Blue Sea Empire''s special artifacts and would be able to pick up on his presence the moment he got anywhere close to one of them.


    The only positive thing about this was that these kinds of artifacts were rather hard to make and could only be found inside some of therger cities of the Blue Sea Empire and along the border. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Of course, there were always exceptions to this and one of these exceptions just so happened to be the four armies, who were one of the few forces in the Blue Sea Empire that had these artifacts. The main reason for this being that it would normally be the people from the four armies who tracked down anyone wanted inside the Blue Sea Empire.


    I¡­ I have to get out of here before those people show up!


    With this in mind, the old man who had just barely managed to recover a small part of his strength after two grueling years trying to mitigate and repair the damage that the different forbidden techniques and pills used had done to his body and soul, began making his way towards the wooden gate leading out of the Sea of Mist.


    The danger posed by therge number of illusory beasts roaming around outside that Chu Li had mentioned was the least of his concern, as continuing to stay inside the Sea of Mist would undoubtedly get him killed when the people from the four armies appeared.


    "You! Where are you going? It''s dangerous outside there-"


    "I understand, there are illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm running rampant. Although my current state isn''t too good, I''m still someone in the Earth Immortal Realm, you don''t have to worry about me." Rumble~


    As Chu Li spotted him and called out to him, the old man calmly responded as he used some the precious power, he had recovered to disy his Earth Immortal Realm aura and suppress Chu Li. Understanding that if he didn''t do this, there was a chance that Chu Li might grow suspicious of him or try to restrain him.


    "I-I see, I didn''t expect you to be a senior. Forgive me my rudeness."


    Indeed, after feeling the might belonging to an Earth Immortal Realm Expert bearing down on him, Chu Li slightly bowed his head before retreating with a hint of fear in his eyes. Not having expected that the old man was actually someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    "Then, I will take my leave."


    Swish-!


    Not intending to stay around for a second longer, as he felt the little power gathered over the past two years rapidly draining while he used his aura to suppress Chu Li, the old man wasted no time as he left the Sea of Mist.

 Chapter 1124 The Four Armies of the Blue Sea Empire, East Sea Army

    <h4>Chapter 1124 The Four Armies of the Blue Sea Empire, East Sea Army</h4>


    "This¡­ Is far more dangerous than I expected¡­" Passing through the wooden gate, the old man could not help freezing on the spot as he felt the terrifying presence of close to a dozen Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts appearing all around him. Even if he had just heard about it from Chu Li, seeing it in person and hearing about it were twopletely different things. Rooar-! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Roar!


    The slim hope that Chu Li had been exaggerating when describing the scene outside the Sea of Mist evaporating with the terrifying roars of the illusory beasts happily celebrating their escape from the Valley of Illusory Beasts not too far away.


    No, I have to get out of this ce before they discover me!


    Realizing that he couldn''t waste any time lingering around the entrance to the Sea of Mist, the old man used all the strength he had managed to gather over the past two years to utilize his movement technique to its limits-


    Swish-!


    Turning into a thin shadow that rapidly flew out of the cave before heading in the direction of the border of the Blue Sea Empire. Dodging any illusory beasts in his path along the way, as he did his best to not get too close to any of the more excited illusory beasts celebrating their escape from the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    Not so much because these illusory beasts were much stronger than the rest of the illusory beasts, but because they were unconsciously using their strength to destroy the environment around themselves.


    Along the way, the old man also managed to spot some of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had chased him down in the past and forced him to hide away inside the Sea of Mist while he recovered from his battle with the Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Although he really wanted to kill these people and take revenge for them forcing him into his current situation of now having to escape from a ce surrounded by arge number of Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts, he also understood that he didn''t have any strength to spare on these Soul Ascension Realm Experts, as even a single attack might end up draining the little strength he had left.


    On the positive side, the Soul Ascension Realm Experts in question didn''t have it easy either, as they were all trying their best to escape from therge number of Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts that had appeared all of a sudden.


    As things would have it, they had nowhere near the speed needed to escape nor the strength to make the illusory beasts hesitate on whether or not to attack them- Roar-!


    Boom!


    Because of this, all of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts that the old man saw along the way were fighting on the brink of death using all of their precious items to fend off the illusory beasts.


    "Ahhh! My spiritual artifact! I used 500 years to craft it!"


    "Gone¡­ My family heirloom passed down for the past thirty generations. Gone just like that¡­"


    "Damnable beasts! You will all die when the- Ahhh-!"


    Unfortunately, even with all of these precious items, they could at most hold back the illusory beasts for a short period of time before the items in question were destroyed by the illusory beasts, who wasted no time in killing a few of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    Ironically, the battles between the illusory beasts and Soul Ascension Realm Experts resulted in the old man safely passing through arge number of illusory beasts that would normally be blocking his path. In the end allowing him to safely escape from the illusory beasts without doing anything other than using his movement technique.


    ¡­


    Whoosh~


    At the same time the old man in the Earth Immortal Realm was trying to drag his injured body to safety before the people from the Blue Sea Empire appeared, Xuan Hao appeared above a small mountain range far away from therge mountain range where the illusory beasts were currently running rampant.


    This should be far enough away from the-


    "Huh?"


    About to take another step forward and begin his journey back towards the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on the spot as his divine sense picked up arge object rapidly flying towards him at a speed that made the illusory dragon look slow inparison. Looking closer, he discovered that the flying object was some kind of massive flying ship several thousand meters long.


    "Earth Immortal Realm¡­ And so many of them¡­" However, the thing that caused Xuan Hao to stop was not the impressive size of the ship, but the fact that he felt close to a dozen people in the Earth Immortal Realm on the ship. Not only that, but one of these people''s strength was far above anything he had ever felt before. Making him wonder if the other party was one of the Blue Sea Empire''s ancestors that had surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm.


    If it really turned out to be the case, the other party would definitely have a way to forcibly restrain him and prevent him from using the Dao of Space to run away¡­


    Looks like I will have to wait and see what they want from. At least, considering the fact that I haven''t done anything, I should be fine- Unless my connection to the Explorer Union ends up causing problems¡­


    Once again feeling regretful over the fact that he had tried to hide his true identity by using the identity he had created in the Explorer Union to find the spiritual herb needed to awaken Qing Yi''s divine physique, Xuan Hao could only remind himself to never do something like that again in the future as he silently waited for the massive flying ship.


    Rumble~!


    As the flying ship came to a stop a short distance away from him, Xuan Hao felt a bit nervous as he watched around five Earth Immortal Realm Experts covered in armor from head to toe jump out of the ship beforeing to a stop a few hundred meters away from him. Taking the lead, the strongest among the five Earth Immortals walked closer while the rest remained stationary.


    Looks like they aren''t here to cause trouble¡­


    Seeing how only one of the five approached him while also picking up the polite expression on the face of the Earth Immortal approaching him, Xuan Hao felt himself rxing.


    "Fellow Daoist, might I ask if there is anything I can help you with?"


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao returned a polite smile as he asked this. Curious about why the group in front of him had stopped him.


    "Yes, we recently received information that arge number of unknown beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm appeared not too far away from here in the Fae Mountain Range and wanted to know if you had any information about this given you came from that direction." Nodding his head in confirmation as he said this, the man in the lead turned his attention towards Xuan Hao. Eager to hear whether or not he had any information.


    Came from that direction¡­ Looks like there is someone skilled in the Dao of Space on the ship...


    Narrowing both of his eyes slightly after hearing what the man said, Xuan Hao could not help feeling grateful that he decided to stay and wait instead of trying to leave. After all, for the other party to pick up the direction he hade from, the other party shouldn''t be too far behind him in terms ofprehension and might even be superior to him in the Dao of Space.


    "No problem, I did manage to learn a bit about the current situation¡­"


    Knowing that he might not be able to escape in case he fell out with the people on the flying ship, Xuan Hao decided to inform them about the current situation on what he found out was called the Fae Mountain Range. Making sure to modify it a bit so it seemed like a passerby who had nothing to do with therge number of illusory beasts and just happened to pass by and witness theming out of the ground.


    In any case, the information wasn''t really anything special considering that arge number of Soul Ascension Realm Experts had witnessed this scene as well and some of them were bound to have informed their friends and the Blue Sea Empire about this before trying to escape.


    "Hm¡­ I see, this situation is far more troublesome than expected, I really have no idea how those people expect the East Sea Army to deal with such a thing on its own¡­ Anyway, thank you for the information. Unfortunately, we will have to leave, but you can always feel free to stop by the East Sea Army in the future for a chat."


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Not giving Xuan Hao any time to react after saying this, the man and the rest of the Earth Immortal Realm Experts returned to the flying ship before the ship in question flew off in the direction of the Fae Mountain Range where the illusory beasts were located.

 Chapter 1125 The Small Abandoned Temple

    <h4>Chapter 1125 The Small Abandoned Temple</h4>


    I wonder what that person meant with only the East Sea Army being dispatched to deal with the illusory beasts alone is true¡­


    Watching as the flying ship disappeared as fast as it had appeared, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about what the man from the East Sea Army had said before he left with the rest. After all, even if the people on the flying ship were powerful and there were around a dozen Earth Immortal Realm Experts present, it was far from enough to deal with the close to hundred Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts.


    Could it perhaps be that Chu Li isn''t the only person being targeted by someone in the East Sea Army, but instead that the entire army has been targeted by someone and they are currently trying to use the illusory beasts as a way to suppress and possible kill them? Feeling his thoughts wander as he remembered how Chu Li had likely been targeted by someone who wanted to kill him by sending him to the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Xuan Hao realized that it wasn''t just Chu Li being targeted, but also the East Sea Army itself.


    "The situation in the Blue Sea Empire is far more dangerous than I first thought, it was a good idea to not recklessly get myself involved with Chu Li and the East Sea Army¡­" Muttering this to himself as he continued looking in the direction that the flying ship had disappeared in, Xuan Hao could not help feeling relived that he didn''t stay behind and get himself involved with Chu Li.


    Even if he did have a good impression of him given his help in exining the Valley of Illusory Beasts and how respectful he was to him, it was far from enough to make him risk his life to get involved in whatever mess the East Sea Army found itself in at the moment.


    Swish-!


    Just about to leave again, Xuan Hao once again stopped himself as he turned to look at the figure that had suddenly appeared at the edge of his divine sense. The main reason why this person caught his attention was that the strength of the person who appeared was above the Soul Ascension Realm and had reached the Earth Immortal Realm. Although, upon closer inspection, it was clear that the person in question was in a bad state.


    "Isn''t that the old man from the Sea of Mist? I guess he decided to escape after learning about the situation from Chu Li. Although, I wonder why the people from the East Sea Army didn''t stop him¡­ Hm¡­ Maybe they didn''t bring that special artifact with them¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he watched the old man struggle with all his might to continue using his movement technique while getting closer to him, Xuan Hao felt curious about what ns the old man had.


    Not so much because he cared about the old man, as they essentially didn''t have anything to do with each other, but because he was curious about how he nned to leave the Blue Sea Empire in his current state. After all, not to mention crossing the border that was guarded by a lot of powerful cultivators who would at least be in the Later to Peak Stages of the Soul Ascension Realm, he likely wouldn''t even be able to reach the border in his current state.


    The reason why he was certain that the old man didn''t just n to find somewhere new to hide away and recover was because more people from the Blue Sea Empire were bound to show up to search for any illusory beasts after the people from the East Sea Army inevitably failed to deal with them.


    At that point in time, it wouldn''t be possible for the old man to find a new ce to hide and recover his strength inside the Blue Sea Empire, as the entire ce would be teeming with Earth Immortals and possibly stronger cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Whoosh~


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to hide himself from the old man before he had a chance to find him. Not something difficult to aplish considering how bad the old man''s state was at the moment.


    As for it taking him a few days or weeks longer to return to the Star Shattering Sect¡­ Xuan Hao didn''t really care too much about that, as he still felt like he had a few years left before the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple appeared.


    Outside of that, if something really did end up happening back in the Star Shattering Sect, Feng Chen would always be able to contact him through themunication talisman he had left with him before leaving the sect.


    All things considered, he had more than enough time to spare on finding out what the old man was up to.


    Maybe, if he was lucky enough, he might find another path into the Blue Sea Empire that didn''t involve crossing the borders of the empire, something that might be useful in the future when the Star Shattering Sect began looking to expand beyond the borders of the Sky Empire.


    ¡­


    Almost copsing on the ground after using his movement technique for the past few minutes to escape from the ce filled to the brim with illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm, the old man in the Earth Immortal Realm came to a stop in front of the small mountain range that Xuan Hao had talked with the people from the East Sea Army only a short time earlier.


    Of course, the old man had no idea about something like that happening, as he just thought it was a normal mountain range.


    "This should be far enough. Even if those illusory beasts chase after me, I doubt they wille before the people from the Blue Sea Empire shows up to deal with them¡­" Almost whispering this to himself as he looked back in the direction he hade from with a hint a relief on his aged face, the old man used his divine sense to scan the small mountain range before finding a small abandoned temple on the side of one of the mountains.


    Whoosh~


    Wasting no time, he used what little strength he had left to fly down to the small temple before finding a small seating ce to sit down and stabilize his condition. Even if he didn''t use all of the power, he had managed to gather over the past two years, using it in his current state inevitably caused someplications that he had to deal with as fast as possible to prevent future problems.


    The small, abandoned temple was not out of the ordinary and looked like an ordinary temple that had been abandoned for a few hundred years, with parts of it starting to crumble without any repairs or maintenance.


    Given the age of the Ewaria Continent and the fact that many old wandering cultivators chose to find somewhere secluded to build a small ce for themselves to reside after giving up hope of breaking through and extending their lifespan. ces like the small temple weren''t out of the ordinary and ces like it could be found all around the ce.


    Because of this, Xuan Hao who was observing the old man now silently cultivating inside the temple didn''t really pay any attention to the temple after arriving at the small mountain range-


    "This should be enough for now¡­"


    however, this changed when the old man suddenly opened his eyes after having dealt with the most pressing injuries that had appeared after he used his movement technique to escape and began making his way into the deeper parts of the temple that were still in a somewhat fine state since the temple had been abandoned.


    "This should be the ce¡­"


    It was inside this part of the temple that Xuan Hao witnessed the old man methodically pulling out a small metal box that had been buried under the rubble from part of the ceiling that had been copsed before retrieving two dusty talismans that looked like they were about to fall apart at any moment.


    "Hm¡­ If I''m not wrong, they should be ced around here¡­" Muttering something to himself as he looked over the dust covered interior of the temple, the old man soon arrived in front of a small inconspicuous stone before cing the two dusty talismans on top of it-


    Rumble~! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Instantly causing the inconspicuous stone to absorb the two dusty talismans before a power emerged from the small stone and began to slowly draw in qi from the surroundings to draw arge formation on the floor of the temple.


    "This is-!?"


    Seeing the formation slowly appearing on the floor of the temple, Xuan Hao could not help sucking in a breath of cold air.


    Although the speed at which the formation was being created was slow and would at least take a few weeks before beingpleted, it was undoubtedly a teleportation formation!

 Chapter 1126 East Sea Army vs Illusory Beasts, First Clash

    <h4>Chapter 1126 East Sea Army vs Illusory Beasts, First sh</h4>


    Why is there a teleportation formation here? Is this perhaps something that the old man set up before engaging in the life and death battle with the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Blue Sea Empire, or is it perhaps something that was set up by someone else in the past and the old man just happened to learn about it?


    Watching as the teleportation formation was slowly being drawn on the floor of the abandoned temple, Xuan Hao could not help wondering where the formation hade from.


    If it did indeede from the old man, it should have been set up years in advance, while if it had been set up by someone else, it left up the question of who would set up this kind of formation in the middle of nowhere for no discernible reason.


    In the end, the only reason he could think of someone other than the old man setting up the formation, would be if there was some kind of organization inside the Blue Sea Empire that sold these kind of hidden teleportation formations to the different people who had ended up being wanted by the Blue Sea Empire and were desperate for a way out that didn''t involve them getting killed by the border guards of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Considering the fact that the people wanted by the Blue Sea Empire would likely pay far more than the formation itself was worth, it would be quite a profitable business. Of course, there was always the danger of being discovered by the Blue Sea Empire by doing it but given how many treasures and spirit stones one could earn, Xuan Hao didn''t doubt that there would be quite a few people interested in doing something like that. Even at the risk of being hunted down by the Blue Sea Empire.


    The worst-case scenario would be that the Blue Sea Empire became enraged enough to send a powerful expert proficient in the Dao of Space. After all, with someone like that, it would be impossible to escape with the use of teleportation formations, as someone skilled in the Dao of Space could simply track down the location and follow¡­


    Rumble~


    As the formation continued to take shape over the next few hours, parts of the abandoned temple began to crumble. Revealingrge intricate formation symbols hidden behind the crumbling walls of the temple. Slowly, the formation began bing more and moreplicated. Reaching the point where even Xuan Hao felt a sense of amazement at the profound understanding of the Dao of Space that the creator of the formation had imbued into the formation.


    Even with his currentprehension of the Dao of Space, observing the teleportation formation taking shape would help deepen his understanding of the Dao of Space, while at the same time also helping his formation knowledge improve for the first time in a long time.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t bother keeping an eye on the old man and instead focused his full attention on the formation. Not really believing that the old man nned to leave the abandoned temple after having activated the teleportation formation.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao began studying the teleportation formation as it took form inside the old, abandoned temple, the flying ship carrying the people from the East Sea Army arrived at the Fae Mountain Range where the close to a hundred illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm were currently running rampant.


    Standing at the bow flying ship, the Earth Immortal Realm Expert that had asked Xuan Hao for information just a short time earlier could not help widening his eyes in disbelief as he stared out at the close to twenty illusory beasts celebrating in the air not too far away. Even from a distance, it was obvious that all of them were in the Earth Immortal Realm. Not only that, but a few of them had even exceeded the level of ordinary Earth Immortal Realm Experts and reached the realm he himself was in.


    "To think the situation would be this bad¡­" Unconsciously muttering this to himself as his gaze remained locked on the four or so illusory beasts whose strength wasparable to his own, the difficulty of the task assigned to them by the imperial family began to truly set in.


    Outside of the East Sea General who had reached the pinnacle of the Earth Immortal Realm, there were only 11 people in the Earth Immortal Realm on the ship, two others like him who had surpassed the realm of ordinary Earth Immortals, while the rest were considered ordinary Earth Immortals.


    Even with the help of differentbat formations that allowed them to work together and showcase power beyond their original power, taking on the twenty illusory beasts in front of them would already be the limit of what they could aplish with their current strength, let alone take on the close to hundred illusory Beasts that were said to be present.


    Even if the general made a move, I doubt that he would be able to- N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Roar!


    It was at this moment, while he was lost in his own thoughts thinking about the difficulty of the task in front of him and hisrades, that one of the illusory beasts discovered the massive flying ship approaching them-


    Roooaar-!


    ROAR!


    Rooar-!


    Almost instantly following the first illusory beast''s roar, the rest of the twenty illusory beasts turned around and began roaring threatening towards the iing flying ship. Clearly having perceived the threat posed by the people on top of the flying ship.


    "Everyone, get ready for battle!" Narrowing both his eyes after seeing therge number of illusory beasts getting ready to jump on them, he gave out a simplemand to the rest of the soldiers present on the ship.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Instantly causing all of the Earth Immortal Realm Experts except for the East Sea General to rush to the bow of the ship. Ready to face the illusory beast.


    Rumble~


    Not too long after the Earth Immortal Realm Experts arrived at the bow of the ship ready to face the illusory beasts, the weaker soldiers below the Earth Immortal Realm began activating the different offensive and defensive formations on the ship. Even if they couldn''t directly participate in the battle, they would do their best to support from the side with the help of the powerful formation etched into the flying ship!


    ROOOOAR-!


    Not too long after all the formations had been activated, the first illusory beast dashed forward to face the iing flying ship-


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Soon enough, the sound of fighting echoed out across the Fae Mountain Range as the soldiers from the East Sea Army shed with the illusory beasts for the first time-


    Roar-!


    Rooooaaar-!


    However, as time passed, more and more illusory beasts were drawn to the scene of the battle, causing the original twenty or so illusory beasts to grow to over forty with more illusory beasts rapidly rushing over after realizing that someone was daring enough to attack them.


    "This- How are there so many of them!? Not to mention illusory beastsparable to us, there is even an illusory beast at the pinnacle of the Earth Immortal Realm approaching!"


    As the number of illusory beasts attacking the soldiers of the East Sea Army continued to grow, one of the three Earth Immortals who had surpassed the realm of ordinary Earth Immortals could not help eximing in fear as he sensed the presence of an illusory beast at the pinnacle of the Earth Immortal Realm.


    "We have to retreat!"


    "Everyone, fall back to the ship!"


    Of course, he was not the only one who sensed the terrifying illusory beast at the pinnacle of the Earth Immortal Realm, as the rest of the Earth Immortals also sensed it, causing all of them to rapidly retreat back to the flying ship where they could at least enjoy the protection of the countless defensive formations etched into the ship.


    Rooar-!


    Seeing them retreating, the illusory beasts all let out triumphant roars as they began working together to attack the defensive formations on the flying ship-


    Crack-!


    Not taking long before causing a few cracks to appear on the formation. After all, even if the formation protecting the flying ship was powerful, there was no way it would be able to hold up for an extended period of time when faced with thebined attack of over forty illusory beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    ROOOOOOAR-!


    As if to make matters worse, the illusory beast at the pinnacle of the Earth Immortal Realm appeared at this moment. Inspiring fear among the soldiers on the deck of the ship, be they Earth Immortals or not, as it used its mastery over the Dao of Illusions to create a massive illusory constructrge than the flying ship itself in the shape of a w to attack.


    "Haaa¡­"


    However, just before the massive w reached the formation guarding the flying ship, a loud sigh echoed out from the depths of the ship, as a terrifying power rushed out and restrained the w before it could hit the formation.

 Chapter 1127 Unfortunate East Sea General

    <h4>Chapter 1127 Unfortunate East Sea General</h4>


    Boom-!


    As the two powers collided with each other above the flying ship, a terrifying shockwave was created that swept out through the nearby illusory beasts. Instantly forcing them back and preventing them from continuing their attacks on the flying ship.


    Even if all of them were in the Earth Immortal Realm, it was clear just how big the difference between them and someone at the pinnacle of the Earth Immortal Realm was, as even the shockwave from the sh was enough to force them back and prevent them from continuing their attack on the flying ship.


    Roar-!


    Roaaar!


    Instead, all they could do was retreat to a safe distance before surrounding the flying ship and start to roar threateningly towards the people on top of the flying ship. Ensuring that they would not be able to use this opportunity to try and escape.


    Of course, none of them dared to get any closer in case they ended up getting caught up in the fight between the human and illusory beast at the pinnacle of the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Not too long after this, the East Sea General and the powerful illusory beast began fighting each other seriously. Leaving the soldiers on the flying ship shivering in fear as the battle in question happened to take ce almost directly above the flying ship.


    Even with the countless formations protecting the ship, it still took the 11 Earth Immortal Realm cultivators on top of the ship everything they had to ensure those formations didn''t end up breaking when faced with the terrifying residual power from when the two pinnacle level Earth Immortals shing with each other almost right above them.


    Roar!


    It was at this moment, the illusory beast at the pinnacle of the Earth Immortal Realm exploded with a terrifying aura before it began to forcibly push the East Sea General back towards the ground. Showing just how powerful it was at it gained the upper hand in the battle-


    Crack!


    At the same time, the increased pressure from the battle getting closer to the flying ship became too much for the formations on the ship to endure, as they began cracking apart visibly under the terrifying might of the illusory beast.


    Roooar-!


    Rooaaaar! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Roar!


    Seeing this, the illusory beasts who had already retreated and were currently surrounding the flying ship from all sides began to happily cheer on as they watched the fearful and strained expression that appeared on the faces of the different soldiers on top of the flying ship.


    "To think the general can''t win¡­ Just what kind of beasts are these illusory beasts?"


    Filled with both doubt and disbelief, one of the soldiers in the Domain Lord Realm could not help muttering this to himself as he stared up at the peerless general in his heart being suppressed by the illusory beast.


    "Who knows!? Even if the general is stronger, he won''t be able to fight with all his strength as long as we are around!" Overhearing what he said, another Domain Lord Realm guard was unwilling to ept the premise that the general couldn''t win against an equal opponent as he said this.


    "Indeed¡­ Maybe the general is worried about implicating us and is holding back?"


    "Yeah, the general is kind and wouldn''t do anything that could end up killing us!"


    "Haha, indeed, the general is too kind. Even in this kind of situation, he thinks about us before himself!"


    Not to be beaten, the rest of the soldiers jumped in on the conversation as they all began praising the general.


    No matter whether or not the East Sea General was really being suppressed by the illusory beast, it had already turned into a fact among the soldiers on the flying ship. Even the Earth Immortal Realm Experts observing the battle taking ce above while also doing their best to try and stop the defensive formations breaking felt that this was the case.


    Among everyone present, only a small guard in the Nascent Soul Realm had noticed the small bit of blood that had begun trailing down the side of the general''s mouth. "¡­"


    However, given how energetic and spirited everyone became after they concluded that the general was just holding back so as to not implement them, he decided to not say anything about it. Understanding that his fellow soldiers wouldn''t take well to the news. Especially considering that their current situation was less than optimal with the defensive formations growing weaker with each passing second.


    "Ah! That all makes sense, but¡­ If that is the case, we need to find a way out of here as fast as possible, before more illusory beasts appear and before the general ends up in an even worse situation due to our presence!"


    With all of this in mind, the small Nascent Soul Realm soldier decided to speak up and suggest for them to try and find a way to escape from the battle so as to help out the general and give him a chance to unleash his full strength.


    Of course, his true motive behind saying this was simply to survive the current dangerous situation. Compared to the rest of the soldiers present who had almost all grown up inside the East Sea Army and had lived together for a long time, he had only just recently joined the East Sea Army through the rmendation of a friend¡­


    "Huh? Escape!? How can we leave the general to fend for- Wait it might be a good idea¡­" "Hm¡­ Indeed¡­ If we can leave, the general should be able to fight without having to worry about us."


    "Only by leaving will the general be able to show these beasts his might!"


    Following the suggestion of the Nascent Soul Realm soldier, the rest of the soldiers on the ship began discussing among each other-


    "Neer, great idea! Everyone, prepare yourselves, we are going to forcibly break through the encirclement!" In the end, one of the leading Earth Immortals caught wind of the situation and agreed that it would be their best course of action.


    Even if the general couldn''t beat the illusory beast before another simrly powerful illusory beast appeared, he would at least have a better chance to escape if they weren''t around. After all, so far, only forty or so of the close to one hundred illusory beasts had appeared!


    Rumble-!


    Not even a second following themand of the leading Earth Immortal Realm Expert, the flying ship sprung into action and charged towards the weakest point in the encirclement that was only guarded by a little over five of the illusory beasts-


    BOOM-!


    Roar!?


    Roar!


    Managing to forcibly break through with the help of the flying ship''s offensive formations before any of the nearby illusory beasts had the chance to rush over.


    Whoosh-!


    Having escaped from the encirclement, the formations covering the flying ship disappeared as it was covered in countless small formation symbols-


    Swish-!


    And in the next second, it turned into a stream of light that disappeared into the distance, having activated some kind of escape formation engraved into the flying ship for escaping just this kind of dangerous situation.


    The reason for not using this escape formation before breaking out of the encirclement being rather simple, as they would have to disable all of the other formations to use it. Not really something they would be able to do inside the encirclement with the constant barrage of residual power from the battle taking ce above them.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the flying ship carrying the soldiers of the East Sea Army disappeared into the distance, the East Sea General grimaced as he blocked the illusory construct of the illusory beast in front of him. Different from what most of his subordinates were thinking, what the Nascent Soul Realm soldier had thought was indeed urate, his situation wasn''t that good.


    However, the reason for this was not that the illusory beast was stronger than him, but because the illusory beast happened to be perfectly suited for countering him and his particr fighting style that focused on the strength of his physical body that had grown to a levelparable if not superior to a demon beast in the same realm as him.


    Specializing in the Dao of Illusions and a soul-based lifeform? Just how bad is my luck¡­


    To be more specific, his physical attacks did less damage to the illusory beast because it was a soul-based lifeform that didn''t really have a physical body in the same way a normal human or demon beast did, while at the same time also specializing in soul based attacks- And with one of his main weaknesses being his soul that was weaker than other Earth Immortals around his realm, the illusory beast could truly be considered the worst kind of opponent for him¡­


    As he thought about this to himself, the East Sea General silentlymented over his bad luck. For the first time in a long time, he wanted to run away from a fight-


    ROOOOAR-!


    However, before he could do this, another roar equal in strength to the illusory beast he was currently facing echoed out in the distance...

 Chapter 1128 Escaping from the Fae Mountain Range and Chu Li’s Decision

    <h4>Chapter 1128 Escaping from the Fae Mountain Range and Chu Li''s Decision</h4>


    "Another illusory beast at the Pinnacle of the Earth Immortal Realm¡­" Feeling the terrifying aura the apanied the roar, the East Sea General could not help narrowing his eyes as he muttered this to himself.


    Given that he was already struggling when it came to dealing with a single illusory beast at the Pinnacle of the Earth Immortal Realm, it was obvious that he had no way to face off against two of them at once. On the other hand, if the two teamed up to attack him, they might be able to seal his path of escape and kill him through their terrifying soul attacks.


    I have to get out of here¡­


    With this in mind, the East Sea General didn''t think twice before turning around to escape in the same direction that the flying ship had escaped in. Not caring about the task that had been handed down to him by the imperial family.


    Even if his enemies would make use of this chance to try and weaken him and his East Sea Army, it was still far better than dying. Not to mention, the strength of the illusory beasts had far exceeded the estimations given by the imperial family when they gave him the task.


    In their estimation of the illusory beasts that they had made based on the information sent in by the different Soul Ascension Realm Experts who found themselves inside the Fae Mountain Range when the illusory beasts had emerged from the ground, the strongest among them would only be a bit above that of an ordinary Earth Immortal Realm cultivator given the fact that these Soul Ascension Realm Experts managed to stay alive, some even escaping the Fae Mountain Range by the time the East Sea Army arrived at the Fae Mountain Range. Far from being at the Pinnacle of the Earth Immortal realm¡­


    From this alone, it was obvious that the stronger illusory beasts had either decided not to attack the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators or that the imperial family had lied to the East Sea General about the strength of the illusory beasts.


    No matter what it was, the East Sea General understood that there was nothing to do about it in his current situation other than trying to negate some of the punishment that the imperial family would try and push on to him and his army.


    "I hope that kid is okay¡­"


    As he transformed into a ray of light and disappeared before the two powerful illusory beasts could catch up to him, the East Sea General could not help ncing towards the deeper parts of the Fae Mountain Range where the entrance to the Sea of Mist was located.


    Given his status and the fact that Chu Li was one of the most talented people in his army, he had of course learnt about his departure for the Sea of Mist and the Valley of Illusory Beasts that it was connected to.


    Unfortunately, he didn''t stop him in time and just when he was about to set off to pick him up before he encountered a dangerous situation, the illusory beasts somehow managed to free themselves from the Valley of Illusory Beasts and appeared in the Fae Mountain Range.


    In the end, there was nothing he could do other than pray for his safety as he flew in the direction of the flying ship to meet up with his subordinates and inform the imperial family about the situation and learn about the next n of action now that he and his army had failed in suppressing the illusory beasts.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the East Sea General retreated together with his army after being faced with the two powerful illusory beasts at the Pinnacle of the Earth Immortal Realm, Chu Li was helplessly staring towards the wooden gate in the distance.


    "I wonder when the general and the rest will show up to deal with the illusory beasts¡­" Muttering this to himself as he remembered what Xuan Hao had said about the illusory beasts running rampant outside the Sea of Mist, Chu Li could not help wondering if his seniors from the East Sea Army would show up and help him get out of the Sea of Mist without being attack by the powerful illusory beasts outside.


    After all, even if he hadn''t informed them about where he was going when he left to try and break through to the Earth Immortal Realm, he understood that it wouldn''t be difficult for them to find out where he was going¡­ And knowing the general it wouldn''t be surprising if he already knew about him going to the Valley of Illusory Beasts to seek an opportunity to increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions and breakthrough to the Large Sess Realm.


    The reason for this was rather simple, as the number of ces inside the Blue Sea Empire that would allow someone toprehend the Dao of Illusions was extremely limited, let alone ces that would be helpful for someone like him who had already reached the Peak of the Small Sess Realm and was close to reaching the Large Sess Realm.


    Outside of the Valley of Illusory Beasts, the only other location he knew about was a special location tightly guarded by the imperial family where their younger generation went toprehend the dao, a ce they would never allow anyone other than direct descendants of the imperial family to enter.


    Hm? Now that I think about it, with all of those illusory beasts gone, won''t I be able to freely explore the Valley of Illusory Beasts without having to worry about being attacked by them?


    Suddenly realizing this as he was thinking about when he would be saved by his seniors, Chu Li''s eyes started shining as he turned towards the wooden gate connected to the Valley of Illusory Beasts in the distance.


    Although the Valley of Illusory Beasts might be dangerous to enter given that the situation inside was difficult to understand after so many illusory beasts had escaped, he felt like it might also be an opportunity for him.


    After all, outside of the illusory beasts that would be able to help increase hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions after he killed them, he had also heard a few rumors about spiritual herbs growing in the deeper parts of the valley where the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts would normally live.


    The spiritual herbs were said to at least have reached the Transcendent Grade and were said to have the ability to increase one''sprehension of the Dao of Illusions after being consumed. Working in a simr way to the mysterious power that left the body of the illusory beasts after they were killed and could be absorbed to increase one''sprehension of the Dao of Illusions.


    If it was under normal circumstances, he would never think of trying to explore the deeper parts of the valley where these spiritual herbs were rumored to grow, but now that the Earth Immortal Realm illusory beasts had managed to escape from the valley and were running rampant in the Fae Mountain Range outside the Sea of Mist, he felt temped to try and enter the Valley of Illusory Beasts to get his hands on the spiritual herbs¡­


    As time passed and minutes turned into hours and hours into days, Chu Li understood that he wouldn''t be saved any time soon, as it seemed like the illusory beasts were far stronger than he had first expected. To the point where even the Blue Sea Empire had a hard time dealing with them.


    During this time, he had tried to poke his head outside the Sea of Mist for a few seconds to check if the illusory beasts were still around and just so happened to witness arge bird demon beast in the Earth Immortal Realm unlucky enough to pass through the Fae Mountain Range being torn apart by a group of illusory beasts.


    This scene alone was more than enough to make him obediently stay inside the Sea of Mist without daring to poke his head outside again in case he was discovered by one of the illusory beasts.


    But¡­


    At the same time, he also began growing more interested in reentering the Valley of Illusory Beasts to try and get his hands on the spiritual herbs he had heard about.


    Even if the method to reach the Earth Immortal Realm given to him by Xuan Hao was useful, increasing hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions was not a bad thing as it would only make him stronger. In the end, he still intended to use Xuan Hao''s method to break through to the Earth Immortal Realm because he felt that it would make him stronger in the long term and give him a better foundation.


    At least, if his Dao of Illusions reached the Large Sess Realm, he would be able to break through in case no help arrived, and he had to escape on his own!


    With all of this in mind, after over two weeks of no oneing to save him, Chu Li finally came to a decision, as he made his way through the wooden gate connected to the Valley of Illusory Beasts-


    "Huh!?"


    Instantly finding himself trapped inside the valley without any way to return¡­N?v(el)B\\jnn

 Chapter 1129 Half Bloom~

    <h4>Chapter 1129 Half Bloom~</h4>


    As the East Sea Army retreated from the Fae Mountain Range after finding out that they were far too weak to deal with the Illusory Beasts, Xuan Hao was silently observing the teleportation formation that was slowly forming beneath the old man in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Given that his understanding in formations was extremely elementary whenpared to the person who had set up the teleportation formation, the simple act of observing the formation forming allowed his understanding of formations to increase by leaps and bounds. Directly allowing him to break through to the Artisan Realm and make steps towards reaching the Master Realm in a short week.


    Of course, stepping into the Master Realm by only observing the formation of the teleportation formation below was unrealistic. Even then, it did allow him to get some insights into the realms beyond the Master Realm when it came to formations.


    Hisprehension of the Dao of Space through the teleportation formation- didn''t really result in any real benefits, as he realized that theprehension of the person who had set up the formation actually had an inferior understanding in the Dao of Spacepared to himself.


    The only reason why he thought otherwise when first seeing the formation was due to the formation enhancing the power of space contained inside of it. Making it seem far moreplicated than it actually was at first nce.


    Even then, the creator of the teleportation formation had still managed to make use of this level ofprehension of the Dao of Space to create a teleportation formation that covered a distance far beyond what should be possible with the creator''sprehension of the Dao of Space. Showing just how terrifying his understanding of formations was.


    If I''m not wrong, he the creator of the teleportation formation should have alreadyprehended the Dao of Formations and managed to integrate it with the Dao of Space to some extent¡­


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this while observing the teleportation formation, Xuan Hao could not help wondering how strong the creator of the formation was.


    Given the fact that he should haveprehended the Dao of Formation, he should have at least reached the realm of a Grandmaster when it came to formations, while his ability to integrate the two Daos together hinted that his strength wasn''t just at the Domain Lord Realm.


    Together with the fact that the Dao of Space wasn''t really the easiest dao toprehend, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the strength of the person who created the teleportation formation should have at least reached the Earth Immortal Realm- And not someone ordinary in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Rumble~! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As two entire weeks passed by since the teleportation formation had started forming, a loud rumbling sound suddenly echoed out from beneath the abandoned temple. Following which the qi in the air around the mountain that the temple was one top up was rapidly swallowed up by the teleportation formation.


    "It''s finally finished activating."


    Having spent this entire time waiting inside the temple while slowly recovering what little he could over the past two weeks, the old man slowly got up while saying this. Turning his full attention towards the now glowing formation symbols covering the entirety of the abandoned temple.


    Whoosh~!


    Not too long after the old man got up, the teleportation formation sprung into action and created a terrifying spatial force that directly engulfed the old man before sending him shuttling through space in the direction of the Blue Sea Empire''s borders- or to be more specific, the borders of the Blue Sea Empire that happened to be connected to the Sky Empire and another few weaker empires.


    "Well¡­ This should save me some timepared to flying there myself¡­" Muttering this to himself as he observed the passage left behind by the activation of the teleportation formation, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time before he used his own power to enter the passage left behind by the teleportation formation.


    Not intending to stand around and wait for it to crumble and disappear along with the abandoned temple, that had already crumbled together with the teleportation formation''s activation a few seconds earlier.


    Although it would require him to use his own strength to travel over such arge distance, his current strength was more than enough to aplish something like this. Especially when considering that the passage itself had already been created and he just had to follow it while ensuring that he didn''t end up getting swept up in some kind of spatial anomaly along the way.


    In the end, both Xuan Hao and the old man disappeared from the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire with any signs of them leaving being destroyed together with the copse of the small, abandoned temple.


    The only sign of what had happened being the small spatial anomaly left behind by the spatial tunnel being created, something that would soon cease to exist, as thews of the world patched up the hole like it had never been there in the first ce over the next few seconds.


    Riiip~!


    Not too long after this, the space next to the abandoned temple tore apart as a person covered in a long ck robe making their appearance hard to guess, appeared above the now destroyed temple.


    "Another one of these teleportation formations... Just who is it that keeps setting them up? Even after such a long time, that person still somehow manages to elude us¡­" As the person above the temple muttered this to themself, a terrifying power suddenly descended on what was left of the temple. Instantly destroying it without leaving any traces of its existence behind.


    "Hm? Now that I think about it, there was a situation with a few of those illusory beasts from the valley where that terrifying creature is sealed managed to escape. If I''m not wrong, that rebellious brat from the East Sea Army went to try and deal with it but ended up failing after encountering two illusory beasts in the Half Bloom Stage.


    Hehe, from what I know about that guy. Although his strength is above that of an ordinary Earth Immortal in the Half Bloom Stage, he is rather weak when faced with soul-based attacks. Even if there was only a single illusory beast at the Half Bloom Stage, I doubt it would have made any difference¡­"


    Chuckling to themself while saying this, the person hidden beneath the ck robe turned around and left in the direction of the Fae Mountain Range. Clearly intending to check up on the situation with the illusory beasts.


    After all, if the illusory beasts ended up leaving the Fae Mountain Range and began to split up, the situation would get somewhat out of hand. Not only because it was hard to catch an illusory beast in the Earth Immortal Realm, but because the illusory beasts could hide far better than normal demon beasts with the help of the Dao of Illusions.


    If they realized they were being chased, it would be difficult for anyone below the Earth Immortal Realm to find them. Not to mention, even those in the Earth Immortal Realm would have a hard time finding them if they decided to hide in ces filled with demon beasts.


    ¡­


    Whoosh~!


    At the same time that the unidentifiable person left the abandoned temple after havingpletely erased it from existence, the old man in the Earth Immortal Realm suddenly appeared out of thin air inside arge swamp-


    "Ah!?"


    Ssh!


    And without any time to stop himself, he ended up falling straight into the muddy swamp water.


    Damnable injuries¡­. If not for the fact that my reaction speed was also hurt, I would never have been forced to endure something like this. The only saving grace is that no one is around to-"


    Whoosh~


    Just as the old man was whispering something to himself, the space behind him split open before Xuan Hao stepped out through the crack. Given the fact that the spatial passage wasn''t something he could control and the fact that the old man would undoubtedly notice him when he appeared so close to him. Even if he was injured. Xuan Hao decided to just reveal himself without bothering to hide.


    Ssh~


    "Huh!?" Of course, his sudden appearance caught the old man off guard, as he instantly jumped up from the muddy water without cleaning himself up.


    "Who are you!?"


    Seeing that Xuan Hao wasn''t wearing anything resembling someone from Blue Sea Empire''s military, he calmed down a bit, but was still on edge as he asked this.


    After all, he had just silently appeared behind him without notice and seemed to havee through the same way he had made it to the swamp somewhere outside the Blue Sea Empire. Meaning he had been watching him for some time and found a way to follow him through the passage left by the teleportation formation¡­

 Chapter 1130 The Realm above the Earth Immortal Realm...

    <h4>Chapter 1130 The Realm above the Earth Immortal Realm...</h4>


    "Don''t worry, I just happened to pass by the temple while you were activating the teleportation formation and saw it as a great opportunity to save some time by following the spatial passage left behind by the formation. After all, travelling to the border of the Blue Sea Empire normally would take at least a few weeks under normal circumstances."


    Seeing the cautious expression stered all over the old man''s face, Xuan Hao reassured him that he didn''t mean him any harm.


    Of course, even with him doing his best to reassure the old man, the old man still remained cautious. Even if Xuan Hao said he didn''t mean any harm, the old man had no way to make sure this was the case. Especially considering that he had been chased down by arge number of Soul Ascension Realm Experts just a short a few weeks earlier and part of him worried that Xuan Hao was one of these Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had managed to sneak inside the temple without him noticing. Resulting in both of them being teleported outside the Blue Sea Empire in a ce where it would be far easier to monopolize the two interspatial rings filled with the wealth of two Earth Immortal Realm Experts that he had on him at the moment.


    Whoosh~! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Knowing the thoughts that might be going through the head of the old man, Xuan Hao decided to use his strength to surpass the old man. Not to attack him, but just to show him that he was more than strong enough to kill him if he so wished, while at the same time also showing that he had no reason to lie and try to make him lower his guard against him.


    "Earth Immortal Realm¡­" Feeling the pressureing from Xuan Hao, the eyes of the old man momentarily flickered as his tensed state rxed. Understanding that Xuan Hao wasn''t one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had been chasing after him for the past two years.


    Given the strength disyed by Xuan Hao, he understood that he would have no way to resist in his current state if Xuan Hao really wanted to kill him and seize his wealth.


    Of course, if he wanted to do that, he would already have done it. Showing that Xuan Hao did indeed not have any ill intentions and should be true to what he said about passing by the spatial passage and deciding to make use of it to save some time in leaving the Blue Sea Empire.


    Wait a second¡­ If what he said is true, doesn''t that mean he managed to travel through the spatial passage without the help of the formation?! This person is actually someone whoprehended the Dao of Space!


    Suddenly realizing this, the old man could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    The Dao of Space was well known as one of the most difficult Daos toprehend, only surpassed in difficulty by some of the more legendary Daos, like the Dao of Karma or the Dao of Time.


    Even in arge empire like the Blue Sea Empire, the number of people whoprehended the Dao of Space could be counted on one hand. Most of them being among the old ancestors who had surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm or other powerful cultivators who had settled down inside the Blue Sea Empire due to certain special locations inside the empire being helpful to their cultivation.


    For someone toprehend the Dao of Space, that person was undoubtedly a senior in the Earth Immortal Realm or an existence above the Earth Immortal Realm!


    With this in mind, the old man felt even more rxed than before. Understanding very well that there was no reason for someone like that to covet the wealth of someone like himself.


    If he really wanted it, there was a muchrger chance that he would have just asked him about it directly instead of killing him. After all, even at his best, he was at most a bit stronger than other Earth Immortals. Far from enough to make himparable to those stronger Earth Immortals who could easily fight a dozen of ordinary Earth Immortals¡­


    Whoosh~


    "I see that you understand that I mean you no ill will now." Removing his pressure on the old man after seeing he archived the effect he wanted, Xuan Hao smiled slightly at the shocked expression on the old man''s face.


    If not for the fact that he had reached the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he might not have been able to convince the old man so easily. At least his strength would still look like it was in the Soul Ascension Realm. Potentially making the old man think he was one of the people who had been chasing after him for the past two years¡­


    "I''m sorry for the earlier rudeness, it''s just that my current situation is not that good, and I don''t want to take any risks."


    "I understand, I would be the same in your state. For now, the most important thing for you should be finding somewhere to recover if I''m not wrong?"


    "Indeed, I will need to find somewhere safe to recover for the next five to ten years or longer without being interrupted. Given that I''m a wandering cultivator, it will be a bit difficult if the people who put me in this state decided to start searching for me¡­" Smiling a bit wryly as he said this, the old man didn''t bother hiding the fact that he was being chased by someone and even hinted at the fact that he was not attached to any power. Obviously trying to see if Xuan Hao was willing to help him.


    After all, it wasn''t that difficult to find out who was chasing after him considering that he had just escaped from the Blue Sea Empire. Especially when there weren''t any smaller forces with power inside the Blue Sea Empire like there were in the Sky Empire.


    Of course, with how obvious the old man was, Xuan Hao also realized what he was asking for. Given the fact that the old man was someone in the Earth Immortal and had information on the Earth Immortal Realm and would also be able to help teach the disciples and elders of the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao was more than happy to take him in and make him a part of the Star Shattering Sect.


    The only problem was that taking him in might cause problems for the Star Shattering Sect if the Blue Sea Empire expanded their search for him outside the borders of the Blue Sea Empire and into the surrounding smaller empires like the Sky Empire.


    If he was found at that time, the Star Shattering Sect would have to face off against a power that was equal to if not stronger than the Heavenly Dragon Temple in another few years. Although he and the Star Shattering Sect would be stronger at that point in time, he doubted it would be strong enough to face off against those two terrifying powers at once. Not to mention, he expected to deal with the Earth Immortal from the Heavenly Dragon Temple without the rest of the temple finding out about, as he doubted that person would divulge the ce, he wanted to explore in the Shattered Star Peaks.


    "¡­"


    Thinking about the benefits and dangers that was involved as he looked over at the nervous old man, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself as he couldn''te up with a solution. Even if it was beneficial to take in the old man, it was undoubtedly also a great risk to the Star Shattering Sect that had been able to develop rtively peacefully over the years.


    "Senior, if I myself isn''t enough, I also have information on the Celestial Immortal Realm that I''m willing to hand over to you to ensure my own safety." Seeing how hesitant Xuan Hao was, but also seeing that he dared to contemte going against the Blue Sea Empire, the old man took a deep breath before stepping forward and saying this with a solemn expression on his face.


    "Celestial Immortal Realm?" Not knowing what the old man was talking about, Xuan Hao could not help tilting his head in confusion as he asked this.


    "Yes! The Celestial Immortal Realm! I''m sure you are aware of the danger involved in the blooming process of the lotus flower when breaking through from the Earth Immortal Realm to the Celestial Immortal Realm, the information I want to share is about the tribtion that one will encounter during the blooming process and some ancient information on the realm. Although thest part is undiscernible to me due to it being mostly written in anguage, I haven''t been able to understand."


    Nodding his head as he said this, the old man thought Xuan Hao was interested in agreeing as he took out an ancient looking book and handed it over to him without saying anything more. Understanding that he would not be able to keep the ancient book himself after he told Xuan Hao about it. Gambling on him not just taking the book and leaving.

 Chapter 1131 Learning about the Earth Immortal Realm

    <h4>Chapter 1131 Learning about the Earth Immortal Realm</h4>


    Hearing what the old man said and seeing the ancient looking book that he handed him; Xuan Hao could not help freezing for a short moment before starting to look through it to determine whether or not the old man told him the truth.


    This...


    Reading through the ancient book, it did not take long before a shocked expression made its way onto his face.


    What the old man said was indeed true, the ancient book did contain information on the Celestial Immortal Realm and had part of it written in an unknownnguage that reminded Xuan Hao of some of the other ancient texts he had encountered from the past.


    However, the thing that caught his interest was neither of these two but was instead a detailed exnation of the Earth Immortal Realm that was written at the start of the book. The exnation was detailed and finally gave him an opportunity to understand the mysterious Earth Immortal Realm that had seemed to elude him over the past few years.


    From what was written in the ancient book, Xuan Hao realized that after someone managed to ovee the Immortal Soul Tribtion and break through to the Earth Immortal Realm, the soul of the cultivator would undergo a fundamental change. The change would cause the soul itself to transform into the shape of a closed lotus, with the Dao that the cultivator hadprehended forming a protectiveyer around the soul. The lotus became known as a Dao Lotus because of this connection to the daoprehended by the cultivator.


    Depending on the cultivatorsprehension of the dao, moreyers could be formed around the lotus flower, with the Small Sess Realm being able to form a singleyer and the Large Sess Realm able to form 3yers, there was also the Perfection Realm beyond that, but reaching this level ofprehension in a Dao before reaching the Earth Immortal Realm was rare even during the ancient time that the book was written in.


    Other than that, it was also noted that reaching the Large Sess Realm was a core requirement for breaking through to the Earth Immortal Realm, as without at least forming threeyers around the lotus flower, the soul might end up being too weak to handle the power of the Earth Immortal Realm, thus causing it to copse, killing the cultivator.


    For this reason, most Earth Immortal Realm cultivators would enter secluded cultivation after breaking through to the Earth Immortal Realm. Onlying out after they had sessfully managed to form threeyers around their soul.


    Although, it was not out of question for someone to sessfully reach the Earth Immortal Realm withoutprehending a Dao to the Large Sess Realm, though exceptions like this was rare ording to the ancient book and could only happen with the help of a special physique that could offset the burden ced on the body by the power of the Earth Immortal Realm.


    So¡­ How did I manage to give birth to a Dao Lotus without breaking through to the Earth Immortal Realm?


    As he finished going over the introduction to the Earth Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao could not help wondering about the Dao Lotus inside his dantian. ording to the ancient book, it would only form after reaching the Earth Immortal Realm. Not only that, but ording to the system, although his Dao Lotus had sixyers, his strength was onlyparable to an Earth Immortal who had just broken through and finished stabilizing their strength.


    Maybe the Dao Lotus created through the Dao Domain Lord Realm is different from the one created by breaking through to the Earth Immortal Realm?


    Thinking about this to himself, Xuan Hao could only shake his head before turning his attention back towards the ancient book. Hoping that it might be able to help clear up some of his doubts. Although, given that the ancient book didn''t mention anything about the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he highly doubted this to happen.


    At least he hoped to find out how to add moreyers to the Dao Lotus, as his Dao of Illusions had already reached the Large Sess Realm and could be used to make another twoyers. Hopefully increasing his strength in the process¡­


    Continuing to read through the ancient book, it did not take long before Xuan Hao found the method to create moreyers around his Dao Lotus. In a sense, it was a rather simple process and just required him to spend some time condensing theyer around his Dao Lotus, the real difficulty in creating moreyers didn''te from actually creating them, but fromprehending the dao.


    To create moreyers around the Dao Lotus, one would either have to break through to the Perfection Realm in the Dao used to reach the Earth Immortal Realm or find a way toprehend a brand new dao, both of which were difficult tasks that could take hundreds if not thousands of years to aplish.


    Of course, with the Earth Immortal Realm having the word immortal in the realm, the lifespan of someone in the Earth Immortal Realm far exceeded that of anyone below the Earth Immortal Realm. Although not truly immortal, someone in the Earth Immortal Realm added fifty thousand years to their lifespan after breaking through, with the stronger ones being able to live for over a hundred thousand years.


    However, the main difference when it came to lifespan that Xuan Hao learnt about in the ancient book was the fact that some Earth Immortal Realm Experts would be able to forcibly seal themselves and slow down the speed at which their lifespan ran out.


    Even if doing this would prevent them from continuing toprehend the dao and increase their strength, essentially giving up on reaching the Celestial Immortal Realm, it did allow them to continue guarding their families for a far longer period of time than they would normally have been able to do.


    Reading about this, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if a powerful Empire like the Blue Sea Empire had a method to seal away their powerful seniors when their cultivation was about to run out.


    Although the methods to seal away someone was incredibly rare even in the ancient time and cost a lot of resources to maintain, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that a powerful empire like the Blue Sea Empire that had stood strong for a long time might have been able to get their hands on this kind of technique.


    In the end, learning about the existence of a method to seal away powerful ancestors when they were about to pass away so they could continue protecting the power they were from made him feel far more careful about offending powers like the Blue Sea Empire.


    Who knew, given the age of the Blue Sea Empire, they might have some old founding ancestor from the ancient past who had surpassed the Celestial Immortal Realm sealed away somewhere inside their ancestral pces¡­


    Haaa¡­ I don''t need to worry about this for now, I''m not enemies with the Blue Sea Empire and I doubt the Heavenly Dragon Temple will find out about the Star Shattering Sect before my strength reaches a levelparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this to himself, Xuan Hao focused his attention back on the ancient book and finally reached the part that described the division in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    From forming the first threeyers to the eighthyer around the Dao Lotus, one would be known as an ordinary Earth Immortal Realm Expert, the mostmon Earth Immortal.


    After forming the ninthyer around the Dao Lotus, one would be able to be considered someone strong in the Earth Immortal Realm and could be considered an expert across the entire continent.


    After forming eighteenyers around the Dao Lotus, one would reach the stage known as Half Bloom, where the Dao Lotus already began showing signs of blooming. At this stage, one could begin to attempt breaking through to the Celestial Immortal Realm. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    However, this was not the end, there was another stage above the Half Bloom Stage, known as the Radiant Bloom Stage!


    Upon reaching the Radiant Bloom Stage, one would naturally break through to the celestial Immortal Realm, causing a unique natural phenomenon in the process.


    Of course, the difficulty of reaching the Radiant Bloom Stage was terrifying. Requiring one to form 36yers around the Dao Lotus, a feat that was considered close to impossible even in the ancient past.


    Those sessful in reaching the Radiant Bloom Stage would all have a smooth journey through the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    "¡­"


    Reading through all of this, Xuan Hao could not help turning his attention back towards the Dao Lotus that had formed inside his dantian, was the purpose of the Dao Domain Lord Realm perhaps in preparation for reaching the Radiant Bloom Stage after breaking through to the Earth Immortal Realm. Directly breakthrough to the Celestial Immortal Realm in one step?

 Chapter 1132 Past Memories

    <h4>Chapter 1132 Past Memories</h4>


    If the Dao Domain Lord Realm is really in preparation for reaching the Radiant Bloom Stage. Doesn''t that mean I will have to grow theyers around my Dao Lotus Flower to 36 before I can breakthrough to the Earth Immortal Realm?


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help wanting to find the old elder from the Mirage Sect to get more information about the Dao Domain Lord Realm from him. Unfortunately, the old man had already perished together with the copse of the trial ground. If he wanted to find out more about the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he would have to return to the mystic realm and find more of the celestial trials left behind by the Mirage Sect. Only in these celestial trials did he feel like he had a chance at finding out more about the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Maybe he might even be lucky enough to encounter another elder from the Mirage Sect and get information directly from him.


    Outside of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he also wanted to try and find out more about the Three Immortals Bloodline. After all, the elder from the Mirage Sect had clearly noticed it and trusted him more because of it.


    Although he still to this day had no clue about what the Three Immortals Bloodline was, he knew that it should be rted to his past, the only problem was that the only thing he remembered from before reaching the Flying Sword Sect was the fact that he had been fleeing from something terrifying beyond his imagination.


    Even after his strength had reached the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and should have full control over his own memories from birth to now, he still couldn''t recall anything more than fleeing from something terrifying for years before he ended up at the Flying Sword Sect.


    At first, he had thought it was just because it had traumatized him enough that the memories had been forcibly suppressed, but upon reaching the Domain Lord Realm, he began thinking that his memories had been sealed away by someone. After all, a suppressed memory due to a childhood trauma was not something that should exist inside someone who had reached the Domain Lord Realm, it would have be an internal demon that would be impossible for him to not detect when he broke through.


    Following the information about the Three Immortals Bloodlineing to light, he felt that the memory being sealed was more likely.


    The only problem with this line of thought was¡­ Who sealed his memories? Given his current strength beingparable to someone in the Earth Immortal Realm and his soul being far stronger than that of a normal Earth Immortal Realm Expert, it made no sense for him to not even be able to feel any seal ced inside his soul.


    Even if the other party was in the Celestial Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao felt that it would be impossible for him to not notice¡­ And¡­ From this line of thought came another idea, the idea that part of his soul storing the memories of his childhood and escape had been destroyed when he had transmigrated, and the two different souls had merged together.


    During the short merging process of the two different souls, although a new stronger soul emerged in the end, did end up damaging the memories of his time on earth to some extent.


    With that in mind, it wouldn''t be weird for the same thing to have happened with his memories of his childhood before the Flying Sword Sect-


    "S-senior¡­"


    Just at this moment as Xuan Hao felt his thoughts wandering towards his past before the Flying Sword Sect, the old man who had been standing patiently waiting in front of him while he read through the ancient book for the past hour could not help calling out to him. Feeling worried that staying at the same spot just outside the borders of the Blue Sea Empire might end up causing them problems if one of the border guards carrying the special artifact used to identify outsiders and people wanted by the empire happened to pass by close enough for it to pick up his aura.


    Hm?


    Being rudely awoken from his thoughts as he was in the process of trying to figure out his past, Xuan Hao could not help frowning slightly as he turned to look towards the old man in front of him.


    "I think we should leave this ce for now. Although it''s outside the borders of the Blue Sea Empire, it''s still rtively close to the border and if a border guard happens to pass by¡­"


    Hearing what the old man said, Xuan Hao realized that they were indeed rather close to the border of the Blue Sea Empire, close enough that he could sense a border crossing at the edge of his divine sense. "I understand, let''s move a bit farther away from the border. After I finish reading through the ancient book, I will give my answer to your request."


    "Thank yo-"


    Whoosh~!


    Before the old man could even thank him, Xuan Hao used his domain to grab him before flying in the opposite direction of the Blue Sea Empire''s border.


    Even though he had no idea about where he was at the moment and only knew that it should be close the Sky Empire, he understood that no matter where he had ended up, it would almost certainly be safer than staying close to the borders of the Blue Sea Empire.


    As for finding his way back to the Sky Empire, that could always wait until after he finished reading through the ancient book and decided on whether or not to take in the old man.


    After all, even though he had indeed helped him out a lot when it came to understanding the Earth Immortal Realm with the ancient book, he also felt more on edge against the Blue Sea Empire after learning about the existence of a method to slow down one''s death by forcibly being sealed away.


    If the Blue Sea Empire wasn''t around or he had a way to guarantee that they wouldn''t show up in the Sky Empire in the next 50 or so years, he wouldn''t have hesitated to take in the old man. Unfortunately, that was not the case and he had to chose between losing an Earth Immortal Realm Expert and potentially bing enemies with the Blue Sea Empire before he had the strength to fight them¡­


    At least I should look through the rest of the ancient book beforeing to a decision on what to do.


    Thinking this to himself as he arrived at a deste mountain range after travelling for over half an hour, Xuan Hao put down the old man before focusing his attention back to the ancient book. Skipping past the part about the Earth Immortal Realm that he had already finished and instead turning his attention towards the part about the Celestial Immortal Realm that the old man had been hopeful would be what made him agree to take him in.


    "Huh?"


    However, after starting to read through the first part that was about breaking through from the Earth Immortal Realm to the Celestial Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself as he noticed a very clear disimer at the top of the page.


    [This method is only suitable for those following the ??? path and is unsuitable for those who didn''t break through the Soul Ascension Realm.]


    Although the disimer on the top was written in ancientnguage, he could somewhat decipher what it said and although it didn''t specifically mention the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it felt like it was referring to the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    After all, he didn''t know about any other path that skipped over the Soul Ascension Realm, but that could just be because he still hadn''t learnt much about other cultivation paths.


    For example, the path used by the followers of different gods could also be included in this disimer, as they didn''t follow the same path as cultivators did.


    From what he knew, their power was derived from the divine power granted by their god. For this reason, they didn''t have to go through a tribtion and would just have to gather enough faith for their god and be rewarded with more strength.


    Of course, there was a major drawback to something like this and that was one couldn''t really improve on their own and had to rely on the power of the god behind them to improve. Meaning they would never be able to surpass the god above them and might forever be stuck upon reaching a certain realm.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he decided to skip past the part on breaking through to the Celestial Immortal Realm that the old man hopped would help convince him to take him in¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 1133 New Guest Elder

    <h4>Chapter 1133 New Guest Elder</h4>


    Continuing to read through the next part of the ancient book that should be about the different realms in the Celestial Realm, Xuan Hao was surprised to discover that he couldn''t understand what was written beyond the part about reaching the Celestial Immortal Realm. Even more confusing, the reason he couldn''t understand it was not that it was written in the ancientnguage that he was still in the process of deciphering, but instead because some kind of mysterious power seemed to blur the text. Making it impossible to read.


    Did someone ce a restriction on the Celestial Immortal Realm part of the ancient book?


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he focused thebined might of both his divine sense and dao domain on the ancient book in an attempt to see through what he perceived to be some kind of restriction, Xuan Hao soon met some kind of resistance-


    Whoosh~!


    However, upon being met with resistance, he suddenly felt a shiver run down his spine as a sense of primordial fear welled up inside him. Not even when facing the terrifying creature sealed beneath the ruins of the Raging me Sect did, he feel this level of fear!


    "What is this thing¡­" Unconsciously muttering this to himself with a fearful expression on his face as he drew back his divine sense and dao domain from the restriction he encountered, Xuan Hao wasted no time in throwing the ancient book into an empty interspatial ring before turning to look at the old man standing a few meters away from him.


    Although he understood that there was no way that the old man had anything to do with the terrifying restriction on the ancient book and the overwhelming sense of terror he had experienced, he could not help looking towards him for answers.


    Silently hoping that he would at least know about the terrifying restriction ced on thest few pages of the ancient book pertaining to the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    "Is something wrong with the ancient book?" Unfortunately, the old man had no idea about what had just happened and could only tilt his head in confusion in response to the sudden inquisitive re from Xuan Hao.


    "No¡­ It''s nothing, I just finished reading through it¡­" Understanding from the old man''s gaze that he had no about the danger hidden away inside the restriction on the ancient book, Xuan Hao decided to brush the matter aside for now.


    "¡­"


    Hearing what he said, the old man froze on the spot before his expression became extremely nervous while looking towards him with a hint of anticipation shing through his old eyes.


    Ah! I almost forgot because of the ancient book; I still need to decide on what to do with this old man¡­


    Meeting the expectant eyes of the old man, Xuan Hao instantly realized what he was thinking about as he threw the matter of the ancient book to the back of his mind for now. Even if he wanted to continue investigating the ancient book, he also understood his own limits and decided not to needlessly risk his life for a chance to learn about the different realms in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    In the first ce, he was still in the Dao Domain Lord Realm and was far from being anywhere near breaking through to the Celestial Immortal Realm. Investigating the Celestial Immortal Realm could always wait until he was stronger.


    With all of this in mind, Xuan Hao began to methodically go over the negatives and positives of epting the old man in the Earth Immortal Realm. Not wanting to mess up and identally end up causing the Star Shattering Sect to face off against a terrifying power like the Blue Sea Empire¡­


    First of all, the addition of an Earth Immortal Realm Expert would undoubtedly speed up the progress at which the strength of the disciples and elders improved. Possibly even giving birth to the first Soul Ascension Realm Expert of the Star Shattering Sect in the near future.


    Secondly, with a powerful Earth Immortal Realm Expert holding down the fort, he would be able to leave the sect and travel around without constantly thinking about someone potentially appearing and destroying the Star Shattering Sect during his absence.


    The main negative to all of this was the fact that the Earth Immortal Realm Expert came with quite a bit of baggage. Even if the terrifying chaotic qi formation guarding the Shattered Star Peaks where the main sect was located, he didn''t feel certain that it would be able to conceal the presence of the old man from the special artifacts used by them.


    After all, there was a high chance that these special artifacts had been crafted by one of the powerful ancestors of the Blue Sea Empire and were far more effective than any tracking talisman he had encountered in his life so far.


    The thought of sending the old man to a branch sect to recover and just cut off the branch sect if anything ended up happening did ur to him, but it didn''tst for long as he thought about it for a few seconds.


    Given the temperament of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Blue Sea Empire that he had encountered so far, he had a feeling that they might try and use it as an excuse to either destroy his sect to get their hands on the resources stored inside of it or just try and rob him as the strongest expert in any sect were bound to have a most of the sect''s important resources on them or close by so they could keep an eye on them.


    ¡­


    As the sun slowly started dipping below the horizon without Xuan Hao giving any response to the old man''s request, the person in question could not help growing a bit impatient as he looked up at Xuan Hao still trying to figure out whether the benefits of adding the old man to the sect would outweigh the negatives.


    What is this person hesitating so much for¡­ Although he thought this to himself while watching Xuan Hao thinking about whether or not to help him out having received the ancient book, the old man never forgot to remain respectful to Xuan Hao.


    No matter what the oue became, he would have no way to change it in his current injured state. Instead, he hoped that Xuan Hao would at least refuse him faster so he could get a chance to escape farther away from the Blue Sea Empire before they began starting to search the different empires bordering their empire.


    Even if doing something like this might seem like an overreaction and waste of resources from the side of the Blue Sea Empire, especially when considering that they still had to deal with the close to hundred illusory beasts in the Fae Mountain Range, the old man also understood that the Blue Sea Empire would not let go of someone who killed one of their top experts-


    "Old man, what is your name?"


    "Hm!? Ah, you can just call me Pei Yang or just Old Pei." Startled by Xuan Hao''s voice, the old man called Pei Yang froze for a short moment before giving his name.


    "Pei Yang¡­ I see¡­ From this day forward, you will be a guest elder of the Star Shattering Sect. During the next few years, I will ensure you have somewhere safe to recover. In return, I hope you will help teach the disciples and elders of my sect at least once every month. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Of course, considering your current state, I don''t expect you to start teaching immediately and you will have half a year without needing to show up and teach anyone."


    "This- Thank you!" Listening to what Xuan Hao said with a somewhat shocked expression on his face, Pei Yang didn''t expect Xuan Hao to actually ept him and provide him somewhere safe to recover.


    Although he had assessed Xuan Hao to not be someone bad after their short exchange earlier in the day and handed over the ancient book for him to read through, deep down, he had not really expected him to agree with his request.


    After all, when everything was said and done, it was a massive risk to take someone like him in, as it would essentially be the same as going against the Blue Sea Empire... And to do something like that, one needed a certain level of strength and confidence.


    "Let''s get going, we should get out of here before anyone from the Blue Sea Empire shows up." Not waiting for Pei Yang to recover from the shock of his request being epted and officially bing a guest elder of a sect he had never heard about before; Xuan Hao directly used his dao domain to pick up the old man before flying in the direction of the Sky Empire.


    Whoosh~


    Unseen to the old man, Xuan Hao casually put away amunication talisman that he had retried earlier without Pei Yang noticing¡­

 Chapter 1134 At the same time...

    <h4>Chapter 1134 At the same time...</h4>


    At the same time Xuan Hao began making his way back to the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song and Feng Chen were both looking at each other with shock. In front of them, amunication talisman could be seen on the table. "To think Xuan Hao would actually be able to convince an expert above the Soul Ascension Realm to join the sect¡­" Muttering this as he picked up themunication talisman and put it away, Feng Chen still had a shocked expression on his face. Not able to believe what Xuan Hao had somehow managed to convince such a powerful expert to join the Star Shattering Sect during his time outside the sect.


    "Indeed, even if we do end up potentially bing enemies with this Blue Sea Empire that he mentioned, it should take a long time before they even think about searching through a small empire like the Sky Empire. Giving us more than enough time to grow stronger and have more people reach the Soul Ascension Realm. Potentially also giving birth to a few Earth Immortal Realm Experts of our own¡­" Nodding his head as he said this, Elder Song also felt happy over the fact that the Star Shattering Sect would be gaining an Expert in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Even if the other party would remain hidden while he recovered from his injuries, he would still be teaching the disciples and elders at least once a month ording to what Xuan Hao had told them. Providing an opportunity for the elders and disciples to rapidly improve with the guidance of a senior in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Even if the other party would remain hidden while he recovered from his injuries, he would still be teaching the disciples and elders at least once a month ording to what Xuan Hao had told them. Providing an opportunity for the elders and disciples to rapidly improve with the guidance of a senior in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    After all, even if Xuan Hao had the ability to help out the disciples and elders of the sect when it came to the Domain Lord Realm, he didn''t really have any ability to help them beyond the Domain Lord Realm, as he himself could still be considered to be in the Domain Lord Realm to some degree.


    Not only that, but there was also the fact that he didn''t spend a lot of his time teaching the rest of the sect''s disciples and elders. Instead, using most of his time on his own disciples or trying to deepen his understanding of the different Daos that he hadprehended.


    It was also with this in mind that Xuan Hao had ended up contacting Feng Chen and Elder Song about the matter and get their opinion on whether or not they should take in Pei Yang.


    During this conversation, he also informed them both that his own strength had surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm and reached the Earth Immortal Realm, while also making sure they understood just how strong the Blue Sea Empire was.


    In the end, even with all of this, the two of them had decided that it would be fine to take in Pei Yang. Not so much because they were confident in the Star Shattering Sect bing powerful enough to face off against the Blue Sea Empire in a few years, but because the location of the Star Shattering Sect was far away from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even if they thought Pei Yang might try to hide somewhere to recover, they would undoubtedly think it would be somewhere in the core region of the continent where the qi between heaven and earth was denser and recovery would take a shorter time.


    ording to Elder Song, there was a higher chance that the Blue Sea Empire would believe Pei Yang to have hidden away somewhere in the core of the continent where the Blue Sea Empire''s enemies were located, than find somewhere at the edges of the continent where the qi between heaven and earth was less dense to recover. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Other than all of this, there was also the Frozen Wastnd right next to the Star Shattering Sect, a ce that seemed to be more and more dangerous with each passing day.


    Although the Frozen Wastnd didn''t seem to contain any demonic cultivators above the Soul Ascension Realm on the surface, it had to be known that the Frozen Wastnd was the main location on the continent for demonic cultivators to gather.


    Even if there wasn''t any information avable to Elder Song and Feng Chen about the presence of demonic cultivators in the Earth Immortal Realm, it was not hard to believe that demonic cultivators that powerful existed in the depths of the Frozen Wastnd.


    After all, there had to be something in the Frozen Wastnd that made the different powerful forces in the core of the continent, like the Blue Sea Empire hesitant about entering the Frozen Wastnd to get rid of the demonic cultivators.


    "Haaa¡­ I hope everything ends up going well¡­" Whispering this to himself as he nced over at Elder Song who seemed lost in his own thoughts, likely trying to think of ways to best take advantage of Pei Yang who would be joining the sect soon, Feng Chen got up and left the room to inform the rest of the sect''s important elders about Pei Yang.


    Considering that he was the sect master he needed to do at least this much. Not to mention, he felt excited when thinking about the fact that Xuan Hao had reached the Earth Immortal Realm. Officially allowing the Star Shattering Sect to far surpass the Sky Empire and other surrounding empires who only had Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    At the same time, it also made himment at how weak the Star Shattering Sect was. Even if the strength of the sect had improved a lot over the years, most of the elders were still in the Nascent Soul Realm, while most of the disciples were between the Foundation Establishment Realm and the Core Formation Realm. Far from beingparable to the Sky Empire or surrounding kingdoms in terms of Domain Lord Realm Experts and above.


    In the back of his mind, Feng Chen hoped that the addition of Pei Yang would finally help the Star Shattering Sect ovee this disadvantage faster. After all,pared to Xuan Hao who mostly taught his own disciples or the younger generation of the sect, Pei Yang would also be teaching the elders of the sect.


    Together with the codex on the earlier cultivation realms that Xuan Hao had given to the sect in the past, Pei Yang''s arrival in the Star Shattering Sect would be the catalyst for many of the sect''s Nascent Soul Realm Elders to break through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    ¡­


    Shortly after the conversation between Feng Chen, Elder Song and Xuan Hao finished, Feng Chen informed the rest of the sect''s important elders about what had happened-


    "Master ising back!?"


    And as a result of this, Mui, who happened to be ying with the blue deer together with Song Jia at Shu Yao''s ce happened to overhear the conversation between Feng Chen and Shu Yao.


    "Indeed, your master said he would be heading back to the sect together with Pei Yang and shouldn''t take more than a month before he is back. Although he did mention that he had ended up in an unknown empire bordering the Blue Sea Empire. So, it could take a bit longer depending on how far away from the Sky Empire this empire is." Not having tried to conceal anything from Mui or Song Jia given their identities being far above that of a normal disciple, Feng Chen nodded his head in response to Mui''s question.


    "Haha! Master is finallying back! Now I can show him just how much I improved over the past few years!" Laughing happily with an overjoyed expression on her face, Mui didn''t waste any time as she turned around and rushed back in the direction of Xuan Hao''s pce. Not intending to waste time ying around, as she instead began thinking about preparing for her master''s return.


    As a result of this, her drive for cultivation that had decreased a bit over the years with her master''s absence, was reignited. Part of her even began thinking about trying to improve her own strength even further and possibly surpass her worst senior brother, Bai Ning, before her master returned.


    After all,pared to her, although Bai Ning''s strength did increase a lotpared to two years ago, he had focused far more of his attention towards improving his cksmithing skills.


    In the end, this resulted in Mui beginning to get close to surpassing this senior brother of hers.


    However, due to him mainly caring about his cksmithing and not so much how his cultivationpared to his fellow disciples, Bai Ning continued focusing most of his attention on cksmithing. Having recently managed to improve his cultivation technique, the Unformed Mantra, to a level where it helped improve his cultivation more through cksmithing than normal cultivation.


    "She sure left fast¡­" Muttering this to himself as the they all watched Mui leave, Feng Chen just shook his head and continued talking with Shu Yao, while Song Jia resumed ying with the blue deer not too far away.

 Chapter 1135 Neutral Territory

    <h4>Chapter 1135 Neutral Territory</h4>


    Not aware of the excitement that the news of him returning to the sect had caused for his youngest disciple, Xuan Hao had already begun his journey back towards the Star Shattering Sect together with Pei Yang.


    Because of the fact that he had no idea where he was and what empire he had ended up inside of after having followed Pei Yang out of the Blue Sea Empire and the person in question also not having any clue about where they were other than the fact that it was somewhere outside the Blue Sea Empire.


    Feeling quite confused over the fact that an old Earth Immortal Realm Expert like Pei Yang, who should be familiar with the core region of the continent, didn''t know about where they were, Xuan Hao could only nce at him weirdly.


    "Ahm! The reason I don''t know about this ce is because I spent most of my time in another part of the core region! Just so you know, the core region of the continent is farrger than any other part of the continent and can almost be considered a world on its own!


    Outside of those who have lived for hundreds of thousands of years, I doubt there are many Earth Immortal Realm Experts familiar with most of the core region. Even I, who have spent a good amount of time roaming the core region, still fall short and only have knowledge about a quarter or so of the core region¡­"


    Giving a somewhat awkward cough as he said this, Pei Yang could not help feeling a bit embarrassed when faced with Xuan Hao''s weird nce¡­


    "I see¡­" Not saying anything more than this as he didn''t really have any clue about how big the core region of the continent- or the continent itself for that matter was, Xuan Hao began to use his divine sense to try and search their surroundings for any living being who might be able to help them find out where they were at the moment.


    "¡­"


    Feel a bit ashamed of the clear sense of disappointment that had been present in Xuan Hao''s words, Pei Yang followed what Xuan Hao was doing and also began to use his divine sense to search the surroundings for anything that might help point out where they were located.


    Soon enough, the first part of the journey back to the Star Shattering Sect ended up with them using their divine sense to try and find out where they were and what direction the Sky Empire was in.


    Luckily as things would have it, they happened to encounter a ratherrge city that was controlled by a Soul Ascension Realm Expert, who was more than happy to provide them with the information they wanted after a quick convincing.


    In the end, they found out that they were currently inside a neutral territory located between the Blue Sea Empire and an equally powerful empire. The neutral territory waspromised of hundreds of small andrge city states, each controlled by different powerful experts ranging from the Soul Ascension Realm all the way up to the Earth Immortal Realm.


    For them to reach the Sky Empire, they had to cross through several of these city states and a few smaller empires around the same size as the Sky Empire.


    Although the journey should take around a month given that travelling through the use of the Dao of Space was a little harder when carrying Pei Yang, there wasn''t any real danger along the way from what they could tell.


    The main reason for this was that most of the powerful city states with Earth Immortal Realm Experts were located towards the center of the neutral territory where the Soul Ascension Realm city lord had told them different precious spiritual herbs and other things could be found in abundance.


    During the entire journey back to the Sky Empire, the strongest power that they would have to pass through was a kingdom far smaller than the Sky Empire that happened to share a border with one of the empires currently in the process of invading the Sky Empire.


    From the information that the Soul Ascension Realm city lord had told them, the ancestor of the small kingdom was in the Earth Immortal Realm. The only reason why a kingdom with such a powerful ancestor didn''t decide to expand and be a powerful empire was due to the fact that the ancestor of the kingdom didn''t care about expanding the kingdom and instead preferred to quietly cultivate on his own.


    As a result of this, the second strongest person in the kingdom had only just barely managed to reach the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm with there being no other Soul Ascension Realm Experts present in the kingdom.


    "Well, it looks like we should be able to reach the Star Shattering Sect without any issues."


    "Indeed¡­"


    Having learnt everything, they could about their surroundings from the Soul Ascension Realm city lord, Xuan Hao soon picked up Pei Yang with his dao domain, as both of them began making their way in the direction of the Sky Empire.


    Considering the fact that there wouldn''t be any real danger involved in the journey back, outside of the small kingdom with the Earth Immortal Realm ancestor, Xuan Hao decided to focus on increasing his speed at the cost of bing more visible to the different cultivators they flew by.


    Although not visible to most Soul Ascension Realm Experts, it had at least be possible for those below the Earth Immortal Realm to notice them from afar.


    ¡­


    "Hah¡­ Those two finally left¡­"


    As Xuan Hao used his dao domain to leave the city, the city lord who had been intimidated into answering all of their questions over the past few hours let out a sigh of relief while looking in the direction that they had disappeared in.


    "But¡­ To think two Earth Immortal Realm Experts appeared in this remote ce, they should havee from the Blue Sea Empire- Hm!? Don''t tell me¡­ Is the Blue Sea Empire perhaps about to start another war with the Wei Empire!?" Suddenly realizing the possible implication behind the sudden appearance of two Earth Immortal Realm Experts from the Blue Sea Empire, the city lord could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he recalled thest war between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    In the past, when the tworge empires had been at war, therge neutral territory connecting the tworge empires had been part of the two empires and a ce where they bordered each other.


    Back then, the war got so devastating that it was widely rumored existences above the Earth Immortal Realm joined in on the battle, causing what had once been a prosperous part of the two massive empires to turn into a hellscape that then ended up bing neutral territory due to interference of some other forces in the core region who didn''t want to see the two empires fighting with each other.


    Although all of this had happened tens of thousands of years ago at this point in time, some of the scars left behind by the experts above the Earth Immortal Realm could still be seen at the central part of the neutral territory where these experts had shed with each other in the past.


    It was because he knew about this past, that the city lord began panicking after seeing Xuan Hao and Pei Yang who hade from the Blue Sea Empire.


    But¡­ In the end, this was not enough to make him feel so fearful, the main thing that made him believe that the two empires might be shing again in the soon to be future was the fact that another group consisting of two Earth Immortal Realm Experts from the Wei Empire had appeared in the neutral territory a few weeks earlier.


    Even worse, the questions they had asked was almost the exact same as what Xuan Hao and Pei Yang had asked him.


    The main difference was that after getting the information they wanted, the two Earth Immortals from the Wei Empire had started to visit all of the powerful city states in the neutral territory. Openly examining the strength of these city states on the premise of asking a few questions.


    If the two Earth Immortal Realm Experts, who hade from the Blue Sea Empire, did the same, it was almost certain that both the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire were preparing to take over the neutral territory. Nothing short of a cmity for the different city states who had been able to enjoy their independence and ability to get their hands on some of the different resources that would normally be under the control ofrger powers like it had been in the past¡­


    No! I can''t just sit around doing nothing! I have to prepare myself for the worst!


    With all of this in mind, the Soul Ascension Realm city lord quickly contacted his friends before starting to pack up his things in preparation for running away¡­


    036947095cac4dd165298d821c624e9dd02b4ec372a5cfd1544705d6daa1de0921d82a85c8683f573250cbd0f02603aad4814ee4a2565331bda18f4a4d91f

 Chapter 1136 Ancestor of a Small Kingdom

    <h4>Chapter 1136 Ancestor of a Small Kingdom</h4>


    As panic began to set in across the neutral territory after the Soul Ascension Realm city lord informed his friends and they in turn spread the news to their friends, Xuan Hao and Pei Yang travelled for a few weeks before arriving at the border to the small kingdom with the Earth Immortal Realm ancestor.


    Although they could go around the kingdom and avoid possibly offending the ancestor of the small kingdom, doing so would add another few months to their journey, as they would be forced to pass through some dangerous regions that could even pose a threat to someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    With this in mind, it was far more preferable to go through the small kingdom where they only had a small chance of running into the Earth Immortal Realm ancestor. Not to mention, even if they ended up running into the Earth Immortal Realm ancestor, they had no prior rtionship with him and didn''t have any reason to fight even if they ran into each other.


    Even if the ancestor in the Earth Immortal Realm wanted to fight with them, they both doubted that he would do so inside his own kingdom. After all, the damage caused by a fight between two Earth Immortal Realm cultivators would be more than enough to level the small space that the kingdom upied.


    Whoosh~! Because of all that, Xuan Hao didn''t stop at the border of the small kingdom and continued into the kingdom. Moving in the direction of the Sky Empire.


    If everything went well, it shouldn''t take more than an hour to pass through the small kingdom and reach one of the empires bordering the Sky Empire. At that point in time, they would only be a few days away from reaching the Star Shattering Sect and there wouldn''t really be anything for them to worry about outside of some forbidden regions along the way.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao and Pei Yang crossed over the border of the small kingdom, a man looking no more than thirty years old opened his eyes inside the kingdom''s ancestral temple before turning to look in direction where Xuan Hao and Pei Yang were, a hint of surprise shing through his eyes.


    "Two people in the Earth Immortal Realm, one gravely wounded unable to utilize his strength while the other- Huh? That''s weird¡­ I sense the presence of his Dao Lotus, but it feels different. Maybe he is a practitioner of an ancient art? As far as I know, only those people proficient in ancient arts would have such a strange Dao Lotus¡­" Muttering this to himself as he focused his full attention on Xuan Hao, ignoring Pei Yang, the man slowly got up.


    "Considering the fact that he might havee into possession of an ancient art, he should have stumbled upon one of those sects. Maybe I should try and capture him and see if I can- The Dao of Space?!"


    Just as the man was considering whether or not to capture Xuan Hao to try and interrogate him in an attempt to learn about the ce behind the strangeness of his Dao Lotus, he suddenly noticed Xuan Hao using the Dao of Space while travelling through the kingdom. Not just that, but he quickly realized that hisprehension of the Dao of Space had at least reached the Large Sess Realm.


    "How troublesome, capturing someone proficient in the Dao of Space without adequate preparations is close to impossible. Even if I''m stronger, I won''t be able to stop him from escaping if he wants. Even then, I can''t give up the chance to learn about those sects, they might hold the opportunity I need to reach the Celestial Immortal Realm!" Giving up on capturing Xuan Hao, the man instead decided to try a more peaceful method¡­


    Riiiip~! With this in mind, the man instantly tore apart the space in front of himself as he stepped forward. Instantly disappearing from the empty hall. Disying his own mastery over the Dao of Space in the process.


    ¡­


    "Hm?" Almost instantly noticing someone approaching due to hisprehension of the Dao of Space, Xuan Hao came to a stop as he looked towards the direction where he had felt the disturbance while Pei Yang could only look on with a confused expression on his face.


    Although everyone would gain the ability to manipte space to some extent upon reaching a high enough cultivation realm, it was nothing whenpared to someone who hadprehended the Dao of Space.


    It was also because of this, that catching someone in the Dao of Space without proper preparations or far superior strength was close to impossible, something that also seemed to be the case for the Earth Immortal Realm from what Xuan Hao had learnt about the realm so far.


    "Is something-"


    Riiiip~! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Just as Pei Yang was about to ask about what caused them to stop all of a sudden, the space a few hundred meters in front of them was torn open to reveal a small passage that soon copsed as a young man around thirty stepped through it.


    "The Earth Immortal Realm ancestor¡­"


    Even without the man saying anything, it did not take a genius to figure out that the man standing in front of them was the ancestor of the small kingdom that they had hoped to avoid if possible. On the other hand, the more pressing matter was the fact that the strength disyed by the man was in no way inferior to the general of the East Sea Army. An Earth Immortal in the Half Bloom Stage that has mastered the Dao of Space¡­!


    Thinking this to himself as he looked at the man who had appeared in front of them, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he prepared himself to run away the moment the other party showed any signs of hostility.


    Even if the man shouldn''t have reached the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space, his strength being at the Half Bloom Stage still meant that he might have other ways to stop him from escaping.


    More important than all of this, the information that the city lord had provided them with only said that the ancestor was around the earlier stages of the Earth Immortal Realm. Nowhere near the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm like the person currently standing in front of them.


    The only reason why he and Pei Yang didn''t mistake the man for one of the Blue Sea Empire''s experts that hade chasing after Pei Yang was due to the fact that the man in front of them was wearing a long luxurious robe with the small kingdoms symbol engraved into it.


    If not for that, Xuan Hao wouldn''t even have bothered waiting for the other party to speak and would have directly turned around and escaped back in the direction of the neutral territories. Hoping to use the ce to shake off the Blue Sea Empire without them learning about the fact that he was from the Sky Empire nor how he was connected to the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Might I ask what reason this senior is here? We just happened to pass through this kingdom on our way to find a ce for my friend here to recover." Cautiously asking this after thinking things through, Xuan Hao narrowed both of his eyes as he didn''t dare to let the man in front of him out of sight for even a second.


    Considering the fact that they hadn''t done anything to the kingdom and did indeed just happen to pass through on their way to the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao felt that the ancestor of the small kingdom shouldn''t make things too difficult for them and would at most ask for a little something from them.


    "Don''t worry, I''m not here with ill intentions, I just noticed both of you passing through my kingdom without permission and came here. Given that I don''t get out much, I was hoping to get some information about a ce I have been searching for from seasoned wanderers like both of you. Don''t worry, if you don''t know about the ce I''m searching for, I won''t make things difficult for you."


    "Information? I wonder what ce senior is talking about. If you could give me a description of the ce, I might be able to help you." Hearing that he only wanted information from them, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief as he said this.


    Although he might not know a lot about the core region of the continent, Pei Yang was a seasoned wanderer and knew about a lot of different ces.


    "Great, the ce I''m searching for is a mystic realm that was once controlled by an ancient sect called the Mirage Sect, I wonder if any of you know about it?"


    "¡­"


    Never mind¡­ It would be much better if he just asked them for a few spiritual herbs and spirit stones!

 Chapter 1137 Abruptly Leaving

    <h4>Chapter 1137 Abruptly Leaving</h4>


    "Hm? Have you perhaps heard about the mystic realm?" Noticing the slight change in Xuan Hao''s expression after he mentioned the mystic realm and the Mirage Sect, the man could not help feeling a sense of excitement welling up inside as he asked this.


    Even if he believed Xuan Hao might know about the ce that he had been searching for, he didn''t really expect him to know about it. After all, the mystic realm had eluded him for countless years and was the main reason why he was willing to remain inside the small kingdom that had helped him grow in his earlier years instead of heading for the core region of the continent where there were more opportunities for him to grow.


    Of course, the main reason why he was willing to stay and search for the mystic realm was because he had once obtained a bundle of ancient records that originated from the mystic realm during his youth. The ancient records not only contained information on the mystic realm, but also a profound cultivation method that allowed him to reach the Earth Immortal Realm. Surpassing the Domain Lord Realm Expert who had been the strongest in his family before him, while at the same time also allowing the small kingdom to gain independence from any of the surrounding empires.


    ¡­


    Unaware of the thoughts going through the head of the man in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself after hearing the question. Unaware of the thoughts going through the head of the man in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself after hearing the question. He did indeed know about the mystic realm under the Mirage Sect and had been there before, but¡­ He didn''t want to share the location to the mystic realm, as he already intended to integrate it into the Star Shattering Sect in the future. Either having it be a training ground for the younger disciple or the future main location of the sect after he became strong enough to control the mystic realm like the Mirage Sect had done in the past.


    Even if all of this was far off in the future, he didn''t want to give away any of the opportunities that might be present in the mystic realm to outsiders not part of the Star Shattering Sect. Not to mention, if information of the mystic realm leaked to therger powers on the continent, like the Blue Sea Empire and the Heavenly Dragon Temple, it would undoubtedly cause arge number of people to show up and try to cease control of the mystic realm.


    With all of this in mind, Xuan Hao had no ns of divulging the location of the mystic realm to the man in front of them, as the risk posed to the Star Shattering Sect would be far too big. Especially when considering that most of the openings to the mystic realm were located inside branch sects or right next to them. For example, the entrance to the mystic realm located at the Flying Sword Sect was close enough to the Shattered Star Peaks, that a battle between Peak Domain Lord Realm Experts would end up affecting the city beneath the Ninth Star Peak and in turn the main sect¡­ And that was not considering the fact that some of the powerful experts trying to enter the mystic realm might grow interested in the Shattered Star Peaks and try to force their way through the chaotic qi formation.


    All of this was not even mentioning what kind of reaction these powerful experts might have after realizing that the path into the mystic realm was blocked by a formation preventing anyone above the Nascent Soul Realm from entering.


    Just thinking about it was enough to give Xuan Hao a headache, as he could already imagine how the Star Shattering Sect''s territory might end up being erased from the continent when the more powerful experts attempted to break the formation¡­


    However, even if he wanted to pretend, he didn''t know anything about the mystic realm, he understood that the man in front of him had already noticed his reaction when the mystic realm was mentioned and wouldn''t allow him to try and brush the matter aside.


    "I did indeed learn a bit about the mystic realm you mentioned¡­" For this reason, Xuan Hao decided to nod his head in response to the man''s question before saying this.


    "Great! Do you have any idea where the mystic realm is located? From what I managed to gather with my own research, it should be located somewhere close to this kingdom of mine. Although, even after using my divine sense to thoroughly search the surrounding empires, I never managed to find any sign of an entrance to the mystic realm¡­"


    Showing an even more excited expression after hearing Xuan Hao''s confirmation, the ancestor of the small kingdom almost looked like he was about to jump over, and grab hold of him to shake out the information.


    Whoosh~


    Of course, Xuan Hao didn''t intend to let the man get any closer, as he decided to move backwards to keep the distance between them.


    Even if their conversation so far had been rather peaceful and the ancestor of the small kingdom didn''t show any signs of hostility, he didn''t intend to take any chances with someone in the Half Bloom Stage of the Earth Immortal Realm.


    If the distance between them became too small, the other party might be able to force him into defending himself before he could use the Dao of Space to escape¡­


    "Ah¡­ Sorry, I just got a little excited after hearing your answer¡­" Smiling a bit awkwardly as he noticed Xuan Hao rapidly retreat a little over a thousand meters after he barely took half a step forward in his excitement earlier, the ancestor of the small kingdom could only apologize in an attempt to appease Xuan Hao before he ended up running away.


    No matter what, the ancestor of the small kingdom had no intention of allowing something like this to happen after finally getting some clues about the mystic realm that he had been searching for over the past thousands of years.


    "No problem, as for your question about the location of the mystic realm, I''m not really clear about the exact location as I haven''t personally explored it before and only happened to read about it in some ancient scrolls from the ruins of an ancient sect. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    From what I learnt, the entrance to the mystic realm should be located somewhere inside the Frozen Wastnd where the demonic cultivators reside. Although I have no idea about the uracy of the location, as I never dared to venture too far into the Frozen Wastnd. Especially now that the overall situation inside the Frozen Wastnd has be more chaotic over the past few years."


    Knowing that there was no way that he could easily convince the ancestor in front of him by just giving a random location nearby, Xuan Hao decided to try and make the Frozen Wastnd the location of the entrance to the mystic realm. Hoping that it would be dangerous enough for the ancestor of the small kingdom to give up on trying to find the entrance to the mystic realm and in case he did try to find it, he would not easily suspect him and might end up believing that the entrance to the mystic realm is located deeper inside the Frozen Wastnd where the more dangerous demonic cultivators reside.


    "The Frozen Wastnd¡­ Indeed, why did I never think of that ce!? No wonder I haven''t been able to discover the entrance to the mystic realm, the deeper parts of that ce is deadly even to those in the Celestial Immortal Realm and I never even thought about searching it for this reason, but¡­ If the entrance to the mystic realm is really located there, I have to take a look and see if I can find it!" Mumbling this to himself as his expression changed between one filled with excitement and one filled with understanding, the ancestor of the small kingdom didn''t bother saying anything to the two of them as he directly turned around and disappeared in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Obviously, what Xuan Hao had told him was more than enough to convince him that the location of the entrance was indeed somewhere in the Frozen Wastnd. Another thing to add to the im of the entrance to mystic realm being there was the fact that the old ancestor had already spent thousands of years searching through the surroundings for any sign of an entrance to the mystic realm without finding anything.


    The only ce nearby he hadn''t searched was the Frozen Wastnd and when Xuan Hao mentioned it to him, he didn''t doubt his words in the slightest, as he felt that it made sense for the entrance to be in the only location he hadn''t searched through yet.


    "Let''s get going¡­"


    Not knowing what else to say following the disappearance of the old ancestor of the small kingdom, Xuan Hao could only smile wryly before picking Pei Yang up with his domain to continue their journey back to the Star Shattering Sect.

 Chapter 1138 Pseudo Saint Realm Formation Master...?

    <h4>Chapter 1138 Pseudo Saint Realm Formation Master...?</h4>


    Leaving the borders of the small kingdom of the terrifying ancestor at the Half Bloom Stage, Xuan Hao, and Pei Yang both let out a sigh of relief as they found themselves inside one of the empires bordering the Sky Empire.


    Although the empire in question was farrger than the small kingdom, the strongest people in the empire had only reached the Soul Ascension Realm and were still far away from the Earth Immortal Realm. Far from being able to pose a threat to Xuan Hao. The only thing they had to worry about during thest bit of their journey back was some of the dangerous ces that were rumored to be filled with all sorts of dangers that might threaten the life of someone in the Earth Immortal Realm. However, considering that they had already learnt about these locations from the conversation with the Soul Ascension Realm city lord from the neutral region, it wasn''t too difficult to avoid them. At most it would add a few more days to their journey.


    Whoosh~


    With all of this in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t linger around the outskirts of the empire for long before they resumed their journey. Dragging Pei Yang along with him, while Pei Yang closed his eyes and focused his attention on his recovery. Hoping that he would at least be able to recover enough to hold his own as a senior when faced with the people from the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, it would be rather embarrassing for him if he didn''t even have the ability to fly on his own when he reached the Star Shattering Sect and had to have Xuan Hao help him get around.


    ¡­


    "Finally, back¡­" Seeing the Shattered Star Peaks appearing in the distance after travelling for a few weeks, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself as he looked forward to seeing how much his disciples had improved during his time away.


    So far, he only managed to learn about Mui breaking through to the Core Formation Realm, outside of that, he didn''t really have any idea how much Chu Yang, Qing Yi and Bai Ning had improved, but¡­ Considering how hardworking they were most of the time, they should have improved by a lotpared to two years ago.


    The only one worrying him to some extent was Bai Ning, who would spend most of his time focused on improving his cksmithing if the opportunity presented itself. Neglecting his cultivation in the process. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Maybe Mui managed to surpass him over the past two years¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling to himself at the image of the now fifteen-year-old Mui defeating Bai Ning with a triumphant smile stered all over her face. "Is the mountain range over there where your sect is located?"


    Just at this moment, Pei Yang who had been floating in the air beside him could not help curiously asking as he observed the Shattered Star Peaks in the distance. Considering that he would be spending most of his time inside the Star Shattering Sect while recovering over the next few years, it was understandable for him to be curious about the ce.


    "Yes, the main sect of the Star Shattering Sect is located on the Seventh Star Peak- Ah! And before I forget it, the Second Star Peak and Main Star Peak is off limits, the two peaks have already been sealed off by the guardian formation of the sect." Nodding his head as he said this, Xuan Hao didn''t forget to remind him that the Second Star Peak and the Main Star Peak was off limits.


    Even if Pei Yang would be part of the sect in the future, he didn''t fully trust him and had no intention of telling him about the things on the Main Star Peak and the Second Star Peak.


    Just the divine energy in the rocks on the Second Star Peak would be enough to cause a bloody battle among the different religions who would want to seize it and convert it into their gods divine power, while the things on the Main Star Peak would attract both the different religions and powerful cultivators at the same time.


    No matter how much he trusted Pei Yang or the rest of the Star Shattering Sect for that matter, he had no ns of divulging anything about the things on the Second and Main Star Peak. At least, with his identity as the strongest person in the Star Shattering Sect, he had more than enough power to prevent anyone from going to the Second and Main Star Peak.


    The only one who had some idea about the things on those two peaks was the blue deer, who hadn''t developed the ability to properlymunicate yet¡­


    "I understand, I will make sure to keep out of those two mountains." Not feeling that it was odd for the Star Shattering Sect to have some forbidden locations as most powers would have ces like that where the most precious treasures, cultivation techniques and important cultivation locations were located, Pei Yang just nodded his head in understanding. Not feeling that curious about the two tallest mountains, something that was bound to change after he found out that only Xuan Hao ever visited the two mountains.


    "Good, let''s get going then. First, we will visit the city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak for you to get a better idea about how we interact with the different forces under us. After this, the person in charge of managing the internal situation of the sect wille to guide you to your future abode before showing you around the sect.


    Although, if you want to begin recovering your strength immediately, you can always wait before getting shown around untilter. The only requirement is that you will do at least one lecture a month for the younger generation or the elders.


    Of course, if you want to hold more than a single lecture a month, you are more than wee to do so, as I think the elders and disciples will happily attend." Smiling as he gave Pei Yang a brief description of what was going to happen and what he would be doing in the future, Xuan Hao used his dao domain tond on the ground a few hundred meters away from the entrance to the city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak. Not bothering to think about how much the city needed some kind of name.


    "Hehe, of course." Nodding his head in response, Pei Yang soon made his way inside the city together with Xuan Hao.


    ¡­


    So, this is the city that the Star Shattering Sect uses tomunicate with their vassals and the outside world. Although it''s rather small, it should still be in the process of expanding. From what Xuan Hao said, the Star Shattering Sect only moved to the Shattered Star Peaks a few years ago and is still in the process of settling in.


    Walking through the city at the base of the Ninth Star Peak, Pei Yang could not help thinking this to himself as he observed the bustling city walking alongside Xuan Hao.


    Although the city could be considered impressive in the Sky Empire, in the eyes of a senior like Pei Yang who had explored the core region of the continent for a long time, it was just a small city.


    The strength of the disciples and elders walking around was even less worth mentioning, as they were at most between the Foundation Establishment Realm and the Nascent Soul Realm.


    All things considered, the only thing that caught Pei Yang''s interest inside the city was the fact that most people living in the city were rted to the Star Shattering Sect in some way. Most of the mortals walking on the street being the close family members of the disciples of the sect, something he hadn''t expected considering most other sects he had encountered practiced a more traditional doctrine that involved cutting off the mortal world after stepping on to the path of cultivation.


    Compared to those sects, Pei Yang apricated the Star Shattering Sect''s way of doing things far more. Even if the family members of the disciples were still mortals and would inevitably pass away with the passage of time, the Star Shattering Sect at least helped provide for them and gave the disciples a chance to send off their parents.


    "Hm? This is-!?"


    Lost in his own thoughts as he followed Xuan Hao along the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak, Pei Yang suddenly froze on the spot as he felt a terrifying aura enveloping his entire body. Even if it was only for a brief moment, he clearly felt a power beyond the Earth Immortal Realm locking on to him!


    "Don''t worry, we just passed through the guardian formation."


    Guardian formation!? Does the Star Shattering Sect perhaps have a formation master in the Late Stage of the Pseudo Saint Realm!?


    Filled with amazement at the terrifying guardian formation, Pei Yang didn''t even notice the change in qi between heaven and earth as he just followed behind Xuan Hao with a look of disbelief stered all over his face.


    859bd4ce4defa30b05958813448b12fe1ce9936d0ce456b719d22260142f40748484113f0191401091f4fdb93b285c75bb741e30be632b1aed5ad1b01a3eba4cf297fe00072e0d3742f09fe27d18a

 Chapter 1139 Shocked Pei Yang

    <h4>Chapter 1139 Shocked Pei Yang</h4>


    Huh? This is-!?


    Only after crossing the spiritual herb fields on top of the Ninth Star Peak did Pei Yang calm down enough to notice the qi between heaven and earth.


    "To think the qi in here is so dense¡­ Even when I visited the capital city of the Blue Sea Empire in the past, it was nowhere near as dense as this. Maybe only the ce where those Celestial Immortals cultivate canpare to this¡­" Unconsciously muttering this to himself with a sense of awe present on his face, Pei Yang became even more certain than before that the Star Shattering Sect had a Pseudo Saint Realm Formation Master.


    In his eyes, this was the only thing that could describe the terrifying guardian formation and the qi gathering formation that should be covering the Shattered Star Peaks.


    The only problem was that he had no clue how the Star Shattering Sect had managed to get their hands on a Pseudo Saint Realm Formation Master. After all, the ones who could reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in their profession were highly sought after by the different powers in the core region, there would be no reason for them to settle down in a sect like the Star Shattering Sect that was located in outer edges of the continent right next to the Frozen Wastnds.


    Not to mention, the formation master who had set up the formations of the Star Shattering Sect was not just a Pseudo Saint Realm Formation Master, but one that had reached the Late Stage of the Pseudo Saint Realm!


    In the eyes of the cultivation world, an existence like that was rarer than that of a Celestial Immortal and only a few existed across the entire continent. Most of them having been absorbed by therger powers at the core of the continent while a few entric ones wandered the continent searching for an opportunity to breakthrough to the Saint Realm, a realm that nobody had managed to reach since ancient times.


    "Huh!?"


    However, his shock didn''t end there, as he soon spotted a few of the elders from the half spirit race on their way to the spiritual herb fields.


    Considering the fact that the current continent was dominated by humans, Pei Yang had never seen any intelligent races outside of the human race and some of the stronger demon beasts he had encountered during his travels across the continent.


    For this reason, he could only freeze on the spot with a face of disbelief as he watched the elders from the half spirit race walk past them. Not knowing how to react upon suddenly encountering someone from a race, he had only heard vague tales about in tales describing the past.


    Not to mention, the differentrge powers on the continent had clearly issued an order that any of these races were to be killed on the spot if found, as they posed an existential threat to the humans on the continent.


    "They''re from the half spirit race, they are part of the Star Shattering Sect, you don''t have to worry about them, they are harmless and not too differentpared to humans. Outside of the fact that their size is a bit smaller." Noticing the different emotions shing past Pei Yang''s face, Xuan Hao decided to reassure him that the people from the half spirit race were harmless and didn''t mean any harm.


    "I see¡­ Sorry for my behavior, I just haven''t seen anyone from these races before and only heard about them through some ancient tales and the differentrge powers who want to kill them. Although¡­ I never really understood why those powers want to kill them so much, as they don''t seem to be anywhere near strong enough to pose a threat to the continent¡­"


    "That''s understandable, the half spirit race is a race born from the union of a spirit and human, so they can be considered to be human to some extent. As for the opinion of the differentrge powers who want to kill races like the half spirit race, I don''t know¡­ Maybe they are afraid that the human race will lose their spot on the top of the continent¡­" Shaking his head as he said this, Xuan Hao could not help wondering why the differentrge powers were intent on killing off the different races like the half spirit race.


    In the end, the only thing he could think of was the ancient war that had taken ce in the past. Perhaps back then these races had allied with the ice phoenix and thus ended up beingbeled as enemies by the powers who had managed to survive that war.


    "Born from the union of a spirit and a human¡­ How in the world would something like that happen? Isn''t it stated that spirits don''t have a physical body¡­?" At the same time Xuan Hao was lost in thought wondering about why the different races from the past had beenbeled as enemies of the human race by therger powers at the core of the continent, Pei Yang was left wondering about somethingpletely different.


    ¡­


    Making their way to the Seventh Star Peak while both thinking about twopletely different things, Xuan Hao, and Pei Yang directly towards Elder Song''s courtyard.


    "Xuan Hao! And this must be... Senior Pei?"


    Having already been contacted by Xuan Hao the moment the two arrived at the Seventh Star Peak, Elder Song was already waiting for them on the path leading up to the entrance of his courtyard.


    Even without him saying more than a few words, it was still obvious how excited he was to see Pei Yang. The reason for this being that there was no one more excited about a new powerful elder than him, who was already looking forward to seeing how much the disciples would improve with the guidance of a powerful Earth Immortal. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Elder Song, I will be leaving him in your care."


    Whoosh~!


    Leaving with these few words, Xuan Hao made his way back towards his pce where his disciples were probably eagerly waiting for his return.


    "Greetings, Elder Song, I heard a lot about you from Xuan Hao along the way."


    "Haha, how humble of you to call this old man elder even though I''m barely at the Nascent Soul Realm. Follow me and I will show you where you will be living from now on." Chuckling happily upon hearing Pei Yang refer to him as an elder, Elder Song wasted no time as he began leading Pei Yang in the direction of his future home in the Star Shattering Sect.


    "¡­"


    During the entire process, Pei Yang had no idea how to respond to the enthusiastic Elder Song, as he found himself being dragged away from the entrance to the courtyard by him.


    The reason why he had called him Elder Song was not because he was trying to be humble and respectful towards him, but because he had never heard Xuan Hao refer to him as anything other than Elder Song. In the end, it caused him to just use it like a normal name. In the end, it resulted in Elder Song thinking that he was being humble and respectful.


    All things considered, he didn''t try and correct himself after seeing how happy Elder Song was. Even though he had never met Elder Song before, from what Xuan Hao had told him, he could not help feeling a sense of admiration towards the happy old man leading him towards his future home in the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not so much because of his strength, but because of how he had been able to climb to his current position in the sect while only being in the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm. Even reaching a point where he overshadowed the sect master to some extent.


    I hope I will be able to recover safely without anyone from the Blue Sea Empire appearing. At least I don''t want to bring trouble to the sect of my benefactor¡­


    With these thoughts in mind, Pei Yang soon found himself exploring his new home together with Elder Song before being dragged away by him a few minutester to explore the different facilities of the sect.


    From the Combat Hall to the Grand Mission Pavilion and the Grand Library, Pei Yang found himself bing more and more shocked with every ce he visited in the Star Shattering Sect. Reaching the point where he began wondering if the Star Shattering Sect was really just a new sect that had been recently established or some ancient sect that had decided to reveal itself to the world.


    The only thing that kept him from believing thest part was the fact that the strongest people in the Star Shattering Sect outside of Xuan Hao had only reached the Domain Lord Realm. If not for this, he would have almost certainly believed that the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient sect that had just recently surfaced.

 Chapter 1140 Reunion, Emergency Quest

    <h4>Chapter 1140 Reunion, Emergency Quest</h4>


    Leaving Pei Yang in the care of Elder Song, Xuan Hao made his way back to his pce for the first time in over two years. Feeling excited at finding out just how much his disciples had managed to improve during this time. Having deliberately not used his divine sense to check their cultivation beforehand.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao could not help showing a surprised expression upon seeing Mui at training in the small training ground attached to the pce.


    "Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm¡­"


    Although he had already learnt about her reaching the Core Formation Realm through the system, he had never expected her to reach the Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm in such a short period of time. Even whenpared to Chu Yang and Qing Yi back then, she was far faster than them. Managing to reach the Sixth Stage in a single year after breaking through to the Core Formation Realm.


    Not only that, but her current age was only around 15. Making her the youngest Core Formation Realm Expert in the Star Shattering Sect, even looking to outdo him in bing the youngest person in the Star Shattering Sect to reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Considering the fact that he had been 21 when he broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm and she was already close to entering theter stages of the Core Formation Realm at the age of 15, it was almost inevitable that she would break this record¡­


    "Hm? Howe her appearance didn''t change?" Outside of the fact that Mui had managed to increase her strength all the way to the Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm during his two years away from the sect, Xuan Hao also noticed that her appearance hadn''t changed in the slightest during the time he had been gone.


    From head to toe, Mui still looked like a kid between the ages of 10 and 12, something that should have been impossible considering 2 years had passed since he had seen her, and she was still at the age of growing rapidly.


    "Master!"


    As Xuan Hao was lost in thought wondering why Mui had the same appearance as when he had left the sect, the person in question seemed to discover him out of the corner of her eye. Wasting no time as she stopped what she was doing before rushing towards him at a speed easilyparable to that of a Peak Core Formation Realm Expert.


    Thump~!


    Not a secondter, Mui crashed headfirst into him before turning to look up at him with an excited smile stered all over her small face. "Master, I broke through the Core Formation Realm. Even senior brother Bai Ning isn''t a match for me! Not only that, but my cksmithing skills also improved a lot, look at this, and this, I made this one specifically for you master and¡­"


    As Mui began talking about everything, she had gone through over the past two years and how much she had improved, she also began taking out all sorts of weirdly shaped chunks of melted metal. Even going as far as to present the shiniest among the metal chunks to him with a proud expression on her face.


    "Thank you¡­ It''s great to see how much you improved, Mui, you have done great over the past two years." Deciding not to think about how much of the sect''s spiritual metal had been wasted on his little disciple''s creations, Xuan Hao decided to gently pat her small head while praising her wholeheartedly.


    "Hehe~"


    Smiling happily as she enjoyed the feeling of being patted on the head by her master, Mui felt that all the effort she had put into improving her strength over the years was worth it.


    "Huh? Master is back!?" However, just as Mui was blissfully enjoying the head pats of her master, the sound of her senior sister echoed out from the entrance to the pce, causing the head pats to stop.


    Senior sister!


    Turning to the person who had caused her master to cease the head pats, Mui could not help frowning as both of her eyes narrowed dangerously. Momentarily causing Qing Yi to freeze up on the stop as she felt a chill run down her spine. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Huh? What was that just now¡­" However, before Qing Yi had a chance to pinpoint where the scary feeling came from, Mui returned to her usual self.


    "¡­"


    Having seen a new side to his youngest disciple, Xuan Hao decided not to say anything and instead used the opportunity to examine his first disciple''s progress over the past two years.


    Hm¡­ Peak of the Fifth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, she should be able to breakthrough to the Sixth Stage in a few weeks. Not just that, but her soul also seems to be a lot stronger than a normal Peak Fifth Stage Nascent Soul Realm cultivator. Did she manage to breakthrough to the Artisan Realm!?


    Narrowing both of his eyes upon noticing how strong her soul was, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if she had managed to break through to the Artisan Realm in alchemy. Considering that she had already been close to the peak of the Expert Realm, it was indeed possible she had broken through over the past two years¡­


    "Qing Yi, did you manage to break through to the Artisan Realm?" Not wanting to just guess on his own, Xuan Hao decided to ask the still confused Qing Yi who had yet to fully recover from his youngest disciple''s earlier stare.


    "Huh? Master- Ah! Yes, I managed to experience a sudden enlightenment a few days earlier and used the opportunity to break through to the Artisan Realm. Hehe, I''m officially an Artisan Realm Alchemist now!" Recovering quickly following her master''s question, Qing Yi answered honestly, while feeling surprised at how her master had managed to realize that she had be an Artisan Realm Alchemist.


    After all, different from breaking through a cultivation realm, it should be impossible to tell what realm someone was in when it came to their profession.


    However, her master had somehow been able to notice it. Making her admiration for her master soar to a new height. Especially considering that she hadn''t told anyone about reaching the Artisan Realm yet.


    "That''s great, you can now be considered one of the sect''s top alchemists. Not only that, but I also see that you haven''t cked off in terms of cultivation over the past two years." Not knowing about the thoughts going through his disciple''s head, Xuan Hao praised her the same way he did Mui, excluding the head pats.


    At the same time, deep inside, Xuan Hao realized that he soon wouldn''t be able to ignore improving his professions any longer.


    Other than Bai Ning whose cksmithing realm was the same as his, Qing Yi had also managed to catch up with him.


    Wait¡­ Bai Ning''s cksmithing realm was alreadyparable to mine two years ago¡­ Did he perhaps surpass me during these two years and break through to be an Artisan Realm cksmith-


    Whoosh~!


    Not even a second after he thought about Bai Ning having possibly surpassed him, a new quest popped up in front of him.


    [Emergency Quest: Don''t let the disciple surpass the master!]


    [Description: During your absence from the sect, one of your disciples did the impossible and surpassed the master before he grew up. No matter what, it''s uneptable for the master to be inferior to the disciple and incapable of providing guidance. Ensure that you are capable of providing guidance to your disciple. Don''t let him lose faith in his master and begin to doubt your strength!]


    [Objective: Reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in cksmithing]


    [Timer: 3 Months]


    [Penalty: Cultivation base will be sealed for 5 years]


    What in the world is this¡­ Pseudo Saint Rm!? I just learnt about the existence of the Pseudo Saint Realm, how in the world am I supposed to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in cksmithing in three months'' time!? And my cultivation base will be sealed for 5 years if I fail, does the system suddenly want to kill me!?


    Not knowing what to say after seeing the emergency quest issued by the system, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down when he saw the penalty for failing toplete the quest. From the time he had gotten the system, this was the first time he had seen a penalty being issued instead of a reward. Showing just how seriously the system took the matter of Bai Ning surpassing him in terms of cksmithing.


    This is unreasonable, I should at-


    [Reminder: It''s rmended that the host does not allow disciples to surpass you in any aspect. Please keep in mind that failure to do so will result in emergency quests.]


    "¡­"


    Not even giving him a chance toin, a new window from the system appeared in front of him.

 Chapter 1141 Pseudo Domain!?

    <h4>Chapter 1141 Pseudo Domain!?</h4>


    "Master? Is something wrong?"


    "Huh? Ah, it''s nothing, I was just thinking about how much you two managed to improve over the past two years." Hearing Qing Yi suddenly calling out to him with a worried expression on her face, Xuan Hao quickly reassured her as turned his attention away from the emergency quest and back towards his disciples.


    Even though he only had three months to somehow reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in cksmithing, he at least wanted to check up on his disciples before starting to worry about it.


    At least Qing Yi and Mui didn''t realize anything had happened as both of them just smiled happily after being praised before Xuan Hao checked their cultivation more in depth by examining their dantian and guided them on where they werecking and could improve before trying to further increase their strength. Boom-!


    In the end, Qing Yi managed to sessfully cross the small gap between the Fifth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Officially breaking through to the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm with his help and reaching the final minor realm before what could be considered the Late Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    ""Master!""


    At the same time Qing Yi returned to her room to stabilize her cultivation base after having broken through to the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, Chu Yang and Bai Ning arrived at the entrance to the pce after having learnt about his return to the sect from a few of the elders who had seen him together with Pei Yang earlier in the day.


    Huh? This is¡­


    Upon seeing the two walking over, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a profound sense of shock.


    Even from a distance it was clear that Chu Yang had already managed to enter theter stages of the Nascent Soul Realm over the past two years. Having sessfully managed to break through to the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Surpassing many of the sect''s elders in the process.


    However, the most shocking thing was not how much Chu Yang''s strength had increased over the past two years, but the fact that Bai Ning standing beside him had already managed to form a pseudo domain!


    Although it was only a pseudo domain and felt different from any domain he had encountered so far, it was still a domain, what''s more, the domain itself clearly felt different from any domain he had encountered so far. The normal feeling of power that woulde along with a domain was not present and instead, a sensation simr to standing in the middle of a forge engulfed him as he used his divine sense to examine the domain.


    This is¡­ a pseudo domain for the Dao of cksmithing!?


    Thinking this to himself as he continued examining Bai Ning''s pseudo domain, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more shocked than before.


    How strong was Bai Ning? He had barely reached the Fifth Stage of the Core Formation Realm, being one minor realm behind Mui, but¡­ He had somehow managed to establish a pseudo domain with such a weak cultivation realm.


    Even when he himself had established a pseudo domain, he had been in the Nascent Soul Realm. After all, the pressure on the soul and body from carrying a pseudo domain was not something a Core Formation Realm cultivator should be able to endure, but Bai Ning had somehow managed to do it. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Wait¡­ The power of the pseudo domain is clearly different from my sword domain back then and far weaker than any pseudo domain I have seen¡­ Is there perhaps a difference between normal domains and those rted to the different professions?


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this to himself, Bai Ning and Chu Yang walked over and greeted him before Xuan Hao woke back up from his thoughts and praised them like he had done to Qing Yi and Mui. Spending the next few hours helping both of them like he had done with Mui and Qing Yi.


    During this time, he made sure to ask Bai Ning about his pseudo domain and managed to find out that his little disciple had not just reached the Artisan Realm in cksmithing but was only a step away from breaking through to the Master Realm. The only thing he needed to do was evolve his pseudo domain into a true domain.


    Of course, because he had already learnt from some of the Domain Lord Realm Experts in the sect about the dangers of establishing a true domain and also learnt about how odd it was for him to establish a pseudo domain with his current cultivation realm. In the end, he decided to ask his master for guidance on how to go about it, as he believed that his master had already managed toprehend the Dao of cksmithing and would know what he should do.


    "Ehm¡­ For now, you should stabilize the pseudo domain and build a proper foundation for establishing a true domain. After three months, I will help you with thest preparations needed before you can ascend to the Master Realm and be a Master cksmith."


    Not knowing anything about the Dao of cksmithing nor how it was different from a normal domain, Xuan Hao could onlye up with some excuses as he decided to postpone the matter until after the emergency quest. After all, when he reached the Pseudo Saint Realm in cksmithing, he should be more than capable of helping Bai Ning breakthrough to the Master Realm.


    "Thank you master! I will make sure I''m prepared!"


    Whoosh-!


    Having no idea about the thoughts going through his master''s head, Bai Ning smiled happily before turning around to rush back in the direction of the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces that he hade from. Feeling excited at the prospect of being able to reach the Master Realm in cksmithing and bing the first Master cksmith in the sect.


    After all, so far, the Star Shattering Sect didn''t have a single cksmith in the Master Realm, of course, excluding his master¡­


    "Master¡­" Seeing Bai Ning running away, leaving only him and Xuan Hao behind, Chu Yang could not help looking excitedly at his master with a clear battle intent present in his eyes.


    "Let''s go to the Combat Hall."


    Even without him saying anything, it was easy to guess that Chu Yang wanted to fight him and test out his new strength, likely due to the fact that the number of elders who could train with him at this point in time was close to nonexistent and the ones who could were too busy with keeping the sect running most of the time.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Not a secondter, the master and disciple both left in the direction of the Combat Hall.


    ¡­


    "That brat really did improve quite a bit; his current strength is already enough to be considered invincible in the Nascent Soul Realm. Now all he needs to do is establish a domain and breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    After spending an entire day inside the Combat Hall together with Chu Yang, giving him a chance to use all of hisbat techniques and helping him improve in the process, Xuan Hao could not help sighing with amazement as he watched Chu Yang in deep meditation digesting what he had learnt.


    "Now¡­ It''s time for me to find out a way for me to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in cksmithing within the next three months¡­" Turning his attention away from Chu Yang and leaving him alone to meditate, Xuan Hao frowned slightly as he made his way out of Chu Yang''s room and into a small garden located in between the training ground and the pce.


    So far, from what he knew about the realms of professions, the only way to reach the Master Realm and improve beyond it was toprehend the dao of the profession.


    If this was not possible it would be impossible to reach the Master Realm, let alone reach the Pseudo Saint Realm.


    Given his current realm in cksmithing only being at the Master Realm, he really had no idea how he would cross over the Master Realm and then the Grandmaster Realm after that before reaching the Pseudo Saint Realm in three months.


    Even if he had the help of the system, he doubted that he would be able toprehend the Dao of cksmithing to whatever level was needed for him to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm.


    "Maybe I should go and ask Pei Yang, considering his experience, he might have a better idea about the Pseudo Saint Realm and how to reach it¡­" Muttering this to himself as he felt the difficulty of the task in front of him, Xuan Hao didn''t stand around the small garden for long, as he soon jumped into the air and made his way to where Pei Yang was staying.

 Chapter 1142 Hidden Requirment...?

    <h4>Chapter 1142 Hidden Requirment...?</h4>


    Leaving his pce after thinking things through, Xuan Hao soon arrived in front of a rtively small courtyard located next to the Qi Spring Lake at the center of the Seventh Star Peak. Enjoying the rich spiritual qi that had transformed into a thin mist surrounding theke.


    Although the spiritual qi between heaven and earth was already far above the outside world inside the Shattered Star Peaks due to the chaotic qi formation transforming the chaotic qi into spiritual qi and transferring the spiritual qi into the formation where the Shattered Star Peaks were located, the environment around the Qi Spring Lake was even better due to the qi springs located inside the Qi Spring Lake constantly spewing out spiritual water filled to the brim with pure qi.


    In a sense, there wasn''t a better location for someone like Pei Yang to recover. Even a powerful force like the Blue Sea Empire might find it difficult to replicate the environment around the Qi Spring Lake without having to waste arge quantity of their resources in the process.


    ¡­


    Fully absorbed in absorbing the endless qi present around the Qi Spring Lake to repair the damage he had caused when forcibly using several forbidden pills and techniques to forcibly increase his strength, Pei Yang felt overjoyed at his choice to join the Star Shattering Sect back when he had encountered Xuan Hao.


    At this point in time, a part of him already felt attached to the Star Shattering Sect. Understanding very well how beneficial it would be to cultivate next to Qi Spring Lake.


    After all, even if he didn''t need to absorb that much qi and mainly needed toprehend the dao to increase his strength at the Earth Immortal Realm, the dense qi present around the Qi Spring Lake made the dao easier to sense andprehend. Allowing him to progress faster in the Earth Immortal Realmpared to the outside world.


    The only thing that would make hisprehension increase faster would be if he managed to enter a ce where the dao he hadprehended was concentrated, a ce simr to the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Sea of Mist, or the Ephemeral Forest.


    Of course, ces like that were hard toe by and came with all sorts of dangers involved. Especially given that most of the safe ces had already been seized by the more powerful forces like the Blue Sea Empire.


    With all of this in mind, staying in the Star Shattering Sect was indeed a great option, as the ce was safe and also allowed him to progress through the Earth Immortal Realm more easily.


    Whoosh~


    It was also for this reason that Pei Yang didn''t notice Xuan Hao when hended on the ground a few meters away from him. Remaining fully absorbed in recovering his injuries with the help of the thin mist of qi that drifted off from the Qi Spring Lake before entering his courtyard.


    "Pei Yang-" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Ah!? Senior Xuan!?"


    Suddenly jumping up upon hearing someone behind him, Pei Yang turned around to see Xuan Hao standing behind him with a surprised expression stered all over his face. Not having expected Xuan Hao to suddenly appear only a day after he had settled down. After all, there was still some time before he would hold his first lecture and he couldn''t think of any reason why Xuan Hao would find him at this point in time.


    "No need to look so worried, I only came because I wanted to ask you about something¡­" Smiling a bit upon seeing the shocked expression on Pei Yang''s face, Xuan Hao could not help feeling amused at the reaction from Pei Yang.


    "Ask about something? What is it?" Calming himself down and returning to an appearance befitting of someone in the Earth Immortal Realm, Pei Yang curiously asked. Wondering what Xuan Hao wanted to know from him.


    "Nothing much, I just wanted to ask about the different professions and what you know about them. More specifically if you know anything about the Pseudo Saint Realm¡­"


    "Professions? And¡­ The Pseudo Saint Realm? Hm¡­ I do know a bit, as I''m a Grandmaster Realm Alchemist. Although my knowledge on the Pseudo Saint Realm is rather limited due to information about the realm being restricted by thoserge powers¡­" Frowning slightly as he said this, Pei Yang could not help shaking his head as he mentioned the information on the Pseudo Saint Realm being restricted.


    Even without him saying anything more, it was clear that he didn''t appreciate the information on the realm being restricted by thoserger powers. After all, it would be the same as forcing any aspiring alchemist, cksmith, or other skilled cultivator in the Grandmaster Realm to join one of theserge powers if they wanted to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm.


    "That doesn''t matter, anything you know is fine." Not caring too much about the information being restricted, Xuan Hao just wanted to know more about the different realms so he could start improving his cksmithing as fast as possible. Even ignoring the fact that Pei Yang turned out to be a Grandmaster Alchemist.


    "Fine¡­ I guess you should know the basic about the earlier stages so let''s start from the Master Rm. In the Master Realm you need to gain a basic understanding of the dao of the profession you follow. In my case it was the Dao of Alchemy. The understanding of the dao does not have to reach the Elementary Realm, but at least has to be enough for you to establish a domain¡­


    The main difference between a domain established through something like the Dao of Alchemy and a normal domain that might have been established through the Dao of Fire, is the fact that the domain established by the Dao of Alchemy can''t be used for fighting and is far weaker than a normal domain. The only use of the domain in the Master Realm is to help you create pills or whatever your profession is rted to.


    You can think of it as a sort of unique domain unrted to the domain established while breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm¡­ And because of this, the domain can also be used before the Domain Lord Realm. Although, it''s rare for someone toprehend one before reaching the Domain Lord Realm. Next, the Grandmaster Rm¡­"


    Listening to Pei Yang as he began talking about the Master, Grandmaster and Pseudo Saint Realm, Xuan Hao could not help feeling pessimistic about his ability to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in three short months.


    First of all, even though the Master Realm wasn''t that hard to reach given his current cultivation realm andprehension ability, the Grandmaster Realm would require him toprehend the Dao of cksmithing to the Elementary Realm¡­ And although he didn''t know a lot about how to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm, Pei Yang told him that he and some of his friends not rted to any of therge powers had spected that one would have to reach the Small Sess Realm and fulfill some kind of requirement that therge powers had hidden from them.


    The condition in question was not anything that Pei Yang knew anything about, and he and his friends could only specte. For instant, one of the reasons he had ended up falling out with the Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire was rted to the fact that he had tried to gain ess to this information and the Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire had blocked him from gaining this information. Baring him from finding out how he could breakthrough to the Pseudo Saint Realm.


    Of course, this was not the only reason he had ended up fighting to the death with the man. From what Xuan Hao observed, it was clear that the enmity between Pei Yang and the Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire also involved another story.


    Even though he felt interested, Xuan Hao decided not to ask and instead focused his attention on learning as much as he could from Pei Yang before taking his leave to start his journey to be a Pseudo Saint Realm cksmith. Feeling some pity that Pei Yang was not a Grandmaster Realm cksmith, as he would have been able to help him out if that was the case.


    At the very least, he managed to get the location of one of his friends who was a Grandmaster cksmith. The only problem was that the person lived quite far away from the Star Shattering Sect and would take at least two weeks to reach travelling on his own.


    But¡­ Considering that he had no other clue as to how to rapidly reach the Pseudo Saint Realm, he could only tell Feng Chen about him leaving again before disappearing towards the location of Pei Yang''s friend.


    At least this time around, he would at most be gone for a few weeks and be back before his disciples even noticed he was gone¡­

 Chapter 1143 Meeting Yi Min after Two Years

    <h4>Chapter 1143 Meeting Yi Min after Two Years</h4>


    Leaving the Star Shattering Sect only a few days after he had returned to the sect, Xuan Hao decided to first stop by Yi Min before he made his way towards the location of Pei Yang''s Grandmaster cksmith friend. The reason for this was that he wanted to see if he could get any help from her and at least improve his cksmithing realm beyond the Expert Realm before meeting the Grandmaster cksmith.


    After all, even if Yi Min wasn''t anywhere near the Grandmaster Realm, she had still reached the Master Realm and would be able to provide him with some help when it came to reaching the Artisan and Master Realm.


    Other than that, he also had to thank her for ensuring that none of the chaos from the war between the forces of the Sky Empire and invading empires ended up affecting the Star Shattering Sect over the past two years.


    If not for the fact that she had blocked the way for any Soul Ascension Realm Expert passing by who wanted their empire to take over the border region where the Star Shattering Sect was located, the Star Shattering Sect would not have been able to expand and develop to the same extend that it had been able to over the past two years.


    Because of her help and the rtionship between her and Xuan Hao, the territory of the Star Shattering Sect ended up bordering her Iron Sky Kingdom¡­ And of course, due to the help Yi Min had provided to the Star Shattering Sect during the past two years, Feng Chen, and the rest of the elders of the Star Shattering Sect didn''t try to think of ways to take over the Iron Sky Kingdom and instead began doing their best convincing Yi Min to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although Feng Chen and the rest hadn''t managed to sessfully convince her yet, the rtionship between the Star Shattering Sect and the Iron Sky Kingdom had already be inseparable due to most of the spiritual metals in the Iron Sky Kingdom being bought up by the Star Shattering Sect instead of the Sky Empire who would have bought them in the past before the war between them and the surrounding empires had begun¡­


    "It''s been quite some time; I wonder how much Yi Min improved over the past two years¡­" Muttering this to himself as he arrived at the edge of the Iron Sky kingdom''s capital city, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious as to whether or not Yi Min had been able to increase her strength after she broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Considering the fact that it would normally take dozens- if not hundreds of years to break through a single minor realm in the Soul Ascension Realm, he wasn''t expecting her to have improved by a lot in the few years he hadn''t seen her. Even then, he still felt like she wasn''t one to be underestimated.


    "Huh!?"


    Even with all of this in mind, he was still taken aback when his divine sense swept over the capital city and found her quietly chewing on some treats in the main pce at the center of the city.


    Not because she wasying around doing nothing, but because he sensed that her cultivation realm had actually managed to reach the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm in the two short years, he hadn''t seen her.


    Meaning that she had broken through one minor realm a year since he had left to try and break through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm!


    "Who?!" Not hiding his divine sense from her as he also intended to inform her about his presence, the rxed Yi Min abruptly jumped up with serious expression on her face and a half-eaten cookie still in her mouth. "Huh? Xuan Hao?" Only after using her own divine sense and noticing Xuan Hao did she rx again.


    Chomp~!


    Whoosh-!


    Not a secondter, Yi Min ate thest bit of the cookie before leaving the pce. Soonnding in front of Xuan Hao with a curious expression on her face. Wondering why Xuan Hao hade to her kingdom all of a sudden. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Inevitably, her thoughts ended up drifting towards the elders of the Star Shattering Sect who had shown up over the past few months to talk to her and her kingdom joining the Star Shattering Sect.


    "It''s been a while, Yi Min; I see that you have helped my sect quite a bit over the past two years and came to thank you on their behalf. Outside of that, I also want to ask for your help with something."


    "What is it¡­?" Feeling like she already knew what Xuan Hao was going to ask her about, Yi Min narrowed her eyes ever so slightly as she looked at Xuan Hao.


    "Ah, it''s nothing big, I just wondered if you could help teach me cksmithing for a week or two."


    "B-cksmithing? Teach? You¡­ You want me to teach you cksmithing?"


    "Yes, I heard you are a cksmith in the Master Rm and hoped you would be able to lend me a bit of your time if possible."


    "This¡­" Not at all expecting Xuan Hao to ask her to teach him cksmithing all of a sudden, Yi Min could not help freezing on the stop for a short moment after hearing him confirm that he indeed wanted her to teach him cksmithing. Unable to guess why Xuan Hao wanted to learn cksmithing all of a sudden.


    "Are you perhaps busy at the moment?"


    "No, no, I''m not, I would be more than happy to teach you for a few weeks!" Realizing that she had frozen up long enough for Xuan Hao to start worrying, Yi Min quickly shook her head and agreed.


    Let alone teaching him cksmithing for a few weeks, she would even be willing to have her kingdom join the Star Shattering Sect in a heartbeat if he was the one asking. After all, she still felt like she hadn''t repaid him for saving her when she had been besieged by the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts¡­


    "That''s great."


    Whoosh~


    Waaa!? Why is he leaving just like that? Isn''t he supposed to ask me about my kingdom joining the Star Shattering Sect!?


    Watching Xuan Hao turn around and make his way inside the capital city after hearing her agree, Yi Min could not help starting to panic internally. The main reason why she hadn''t joined the Star Shattering Sect yet was due to the fact that Xuan Hao was nowhere to be found over the past two years and she wanted her kingdom to join the sect through him instead of some random elder.


    However, the person in question had just turned around and left without asking her. Leaving her confused as to whether or not she should bring up the matter herself.


    No, he said that he wanted me to teach him for a week or two. During this time, I doubt that he will not bring up the matter of my kingdom joining the Star Shattering Sect over the next two weeks!


    Thinking this to herself as she watched Xuan Hao disappear in the direction of her pce, Yi Min soon followed after him before both of them made their way towards the massive forge located directly beneath the main pce at the center of the capital.


    The forge in question was the ce where Yi Min practiced her cksmithing, while also being the ce where a group of skilled cksmiths working under her processed the more precious spiritual metals in preparation for her to use.


    Of course, given that she agreed to teach Xuan Hao over the next few weeks, she purposely made these cksmiths leave after both of them arrived at the forge. Not intending to have anyone around to disturb her while she was taking care of Xuan Hao and soon enough, Yi Min began to teach Xuan Hao cksmithing. Not holding anything back as she did her best to teach him with all of her strength.


    Following this, two weeks quickly came and went.


    Over these two weeks, Yi Min was shocked to discover Xuan Hao who had only been at the Expert Realm at the start, somehow managed to reach the Pinnacle of the Artisan Realm. Even with her own talent in the Dao of cksmithing being far above the norm, she understood that it was nowhere near the same level as Xuan Hao.


    Of course, she had no way to know that the main reason for Xuan Hao''s fast progress was due to his strong soul making it far easier for him toprehend what she taught him. Allowing him to begin sensing the existence of the Dao of cksmithing over the short two weeks they had spent together. Making him only a single step away from reaching the Master Realm by the end of the second week.

 Chapter 1144 Travel Companions

    <h4>Chapter 1144 Travel Companions</h4>


    "Well, it''s about time for me to leave. Thank you for your help over the past two weeks, I will make sure that Elder Song sends over enough spirit stones to cover the cost of the spiritual metal I used during our time together."


    Admiring an artifact at the Peak of the Soul Realm that he had just made, Xuan Hao informed Yi Min standing beside him about leaving as he put away the artifact. Thinking about giving it to one of his disciples after he returned to the sect.


    "Huh? You are leaving already!?" Not having expected Xuan Hao to suddenly dere he was leaving all of a sudden, Yi Min could not help panicking as she said this out loud without thinking before looking towards him filled with disbelief written all over her face.


    The reason for this was rather simple, as he had still not asked her about joining the Star Shattering Sect during the past two weeks they had spent together! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Yes? Is something wrong?"


    "No, no, it''s nothing¡­ I was just wondering where you are going now. After all, it doesn''t look like you are going back to the Star Shattering Sect from what I can tell." Feeling Xuan Hao suddenly turning his attention towards her with a confused expression on his face after her surprised exmation in response to him leaving, Yi Min quickly shook her head before trying to steer the conversation in another direction.


    "Indeed, I''m nning to visit a Grandmaster cksmith who happens to be friends with one of my sect''s elders and see if I can improve my cksmithing even further." Luckily for Yi Min, Xuan Hao didn''t think much of it and happily exined that he was going to find a Grandmaster cksmith to learn more about cksmithing.


    Given that Yi Min could already be considered a part of the Star Shattering Sect in his eyes, he didn''t bother hiding this from her.


    "A Grandmaster Realm cksmith!?"


    Hearing that Xuan Hao was actually going to meet a cksmith in the Grandmaster Realm, Yi Min could not help eximing even more loudly than before as she stared at him with disbelief. Not having expected Xuan Hao to actually know a cksmith in the Grandmaster Realm.


    Even more surprising, he was nning to meet this cksmith and learn from him!


    Thinking about this, Yi Min could not help feeling a bit jealous.


    Given that she had been stuck in the Master Realm for quite a long time, she really wanted the opportunity to meet a Grandmaster Realm cksmith and learn from them. Unfortunately, it was already rare for there to be a Master Realm cksmith like herself in a small empire like the Sky Empire, let alone someone who had managed to reach the Grandmaster Realm.


    If not for the fact that her strength was too weak before she broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm, she might already have left the Sky Empire for the core region of the empire in search of opportunities to further her understanding of not only cksmithing, but also formations.


    "Do you perhaps want toe as well?" Not knowing anything about the thoughts going through Yi Min''s head, Xuan Hao could not help asking this after seeing the expression on her face.


    Although he had originally nned to just visit the friend of Pei Yang by himself, he didn''t mind taking Yi Min along if she wanted toe. After all, she was already a Master cksmith and would undoubtedly benefit from meeting a Grandmaster cksmith¡­ And considering the fact that he already treated her as part of the Star Shattering Sect, he didn''t think too much about it.


    Hearing what he said, Yi Min could not help freezing for a short moment as she pointed at herself in disbelief. "Join? Me?"


    "Yes? Do you perhaps have something important to attend to?"


    "No! Not at all, I''m¡­ I''m just worried about the safety of my kingdom during my absence, you should know that a few Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the different empires show up from time to time and I have to scare them off." Shaking her head as she said this, Yi Min could not help letting out a reluctant sigh.


    Indeed, even if she wanted to go and Xuan Hao said she could join, she also understood that the Iron Sky Kingdom would be helpless in the face of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert without her around. Not to mention, the Star Shattering Sect at the other side of her borders would also get affected as a result of this¡­


    "Hm¡­ If that''s what your worried about, we can let this little one guard your kingdom while we are gone-"


    Swish~


    Thinking about what Yi Min said for a short moment, Xuan Hao soon reached into his sleeve and pulled out the rabbit demon beast and the squirrel. Squeak!? Not having expected to suddenly be pulled out of what it now considered to be its home, the rabbit demon beast could not help letting out a surprised noise while the squirrel next to it remained silent. Fearing that it would end up identally offending Xuan Hao.


    "This is- Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm!?" A rabbit pulled out his sleeve is actually stronger than me!?


    Seeing the rabbit demon beast, Yi Min was just about to question Xuan Hao about why and how he had suddenly pulled a rabbit out of his sleeve when she realized that the rabbit demon beast was actually at the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Indeed, this little one should be more than strong enough to keep your kingdom safe during your absence, even if can''t use your formation." Nodding his head like there was nothing wrong with the fact that he had just pulled out a demon beast that had reached the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm from his sleeve, Xuan Hao began to instruct the rabbit demon beast about its task. Giving it a small interspatial ring filled with spirit stones to use while guarding the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Squeak!


    Feeling overjoyed that it was suddenly handed such arge number of spirit stones for simply watching the Iron Sky Kingdom and ensuring that nobody destroyed it for a short time, the rabbit demon beast didn''t hesitate to grab the small interspatial ring before leaving together with the squirrel to find somewhere for them to enjoy the- cultivate and watch over the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "Okay, now that the problem has been settled, we should be leaving- Ah! Almost forgot, make sure to inform your subordinates about the rabbit demon beast and the squirrel."


    "Sure¡­"


    As things developed far too fast for her to fullyprehend, Yi Min almost mindlessly nodded her head in response before informing her most trusted subordinate about the situation through her divine sense.


    "Done?"


    "Yes-"


    Whoosh~


    "Huh¡­?"


    Before she could even answer properly, she found herself being carried by Xuan Hao as he used his mastery over the Dao of Space to teleport both of them out of the underground forge that they had spent the past two weeks inside of.


    "I will be carrying you, as you are far too slow on your own. The location of the Grandmaster cksmith is not anywhere inside the Sky Empire and will take at least a few months to reach with your speed."


    "This¡­ Okay¡­"


    Not knowing how to respond, Yi Min paused for a short second before deciding to nod her head in agreement. Indeed, she didn''t want to spend longer than necessary travelling. Especially when she knew they were going to meet a Grandmaster cksmith.


    After all, who knew if the Grandmaster cksmith would still be at the location after they arrived? The worst possible thing would be if her only chance to meet a Grandmaster cksmith disappeared because she happened to miss him or her by being a few days slower.


    Swish-!


    Not wasting any time after getting Yi Min''s agreement, Xuan Hao directly used the Drifting Cloud Steps and disappeared from the Iron Sky Kingdom together with Yi Min.


    The main difference between now and the time he had carried Pei Yang back to the Star Shattering Sect, was the fact that he wasn''t using his domain to carry Yi Min. The reason for this was rather simple, as he had realized that the burden caused by his movement technique being far smaller when carrying someone like that instead of using his domain.


    Although it wouldn''t make much of a difference over smaller distances that took a day or two to travel, the same could not be said for longer distances that took a week or longer.


    In the end, Xuan Hao had calcted that it would at least take two weeks for them to reach the location that Pei Yang had given him before he left the sect. Resulting in Xuan Hao picking the travelling method most suitable for him to waste as little time as possible to reach the Grandmaster cksmith¡­

 Chapter 1145 Unfortunate Demonic Cultivators

    <h4>Chapter 1145 Unfortunate Demonic Cultivators</h4>


    Squeak!


    Following Xuan Hao leaving the Iron Sky Kingdom together with Yi Min, the rabbit demon beast happily waltzed inside the main pce and made itself at home inside arge empty guest room before starting to eat a few of the spirit stones from the interspatial ring Xuan Hao had given it before closing its eyes to focus on absorbing the pure qi inside the spirit stones.


    Rustle~


    Not too long after the rabbit demon beast had settled down like this, the squirrel cautiously appeared at the entrance to the guest room.


    Squeak¡­


    Scanning over the mostly empty guest room before spotting the rabbit demon beast, the squirrel let out a somewhat nervous squeaking sound before finding a ce inside the guest room to settle down and cultivate on its own. Not daring to approach the rabbit demon beast and ask it for some of the spirit stones.


    Considering the training it had gone through since meeting the rabbit demon beast, it had learnt that it was wise to never ask it for any of its spirit stones and instead focus its attention on cultivating by itself. Even if it was slower to cultivate without the assistance of spirit stones, it felt happy as long as it could cultivate without being beaten up by the rabbit demon beast¡­


    At this point in time, although the squirrel had grown far strongerpared to before it had identally stumbled inside the Sea of Mist and could in a sense be considered a powerful demon beast in a kingdom like the Iron Sky Kingdom, it had no clue about this and still thought of itself as weak, a side effect of it only having interacted with beings far more powerful than itself after starting its cultivation journey.


    Whoosh~


    As the squirrel and rabbit demon beast settled down and both focused on cultivating inside the main pce, the muscr man at the Domain Lord Realm and most trusted subordinate of Yi Min could not help escaping from the main pce after personally having escorted the rabbit demon beast into the main pce just a short time earlier.


    Although he had been informed about the rabbit demon beast being a powerful demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm, he had not believed it at first after seeing the cute looking rabbit the size of his hand and identally used his divine sense to scan the rabbit demon beast. Resulting in the rabbit demon beast using its terrifying divine sense to shatter part of his divine sense as punishment.


    Even though it didn''t permanently damage him, he would at least need a few weeks to recover.


    If not for the fact that the rabbit demon beast was supposed to guard the Iron Sky Kingdom during his master''s absence, he didn''t doubt that it would have outright killed him earlier!


    I have to ensure that the main pce is isted until master returns with the senior¡­ Thinking this to himself as he escaped from the main pce with a terrified expression on his face, the muscr Domain Lord Realm Expert quickly began making arraignments for the staff in charge of maintaining the main pce to leave.


    Given that Yi Min had informed him about not saying anything about her absence unless necessary, he decided to use the excuse of her going into seclusion to try and improve her cksmithing as an excuse.


    Considering the fact that she had spent two weeks locked up in the forge and the fact that Yi Min would normally close off the main pce to anyone when she was about to undergo an important breakthrough or trying to further her understanding in cksmithing of formations, there wasn''t anyone who doubted this.


    As a result of this, it didn''t take long before the rabbit demon beast and the squirrel were the only living beings left inside the main pce¡­ And to the relief of the muscr Domain Lord, they didn''t look like they had any ns of leaving the main pce to explore the Iron Sky Kingdom during their stay. Soon causing the somewhat chaotic situation caused by the staff and guards being moved out of the main pce to return to normal again. None of them having the slightest idea that Yi Min had already left the kingdom and the current protect had turned into a small cute looking rabbit.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the rabbit demon beast and squirrel got used to their new home for the next few months, Xuan Hao and Yi Min crossed the border of the Sky Empire in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd.


    ording to the information Pei Yang had given him, the Grandmaster Realm cksmith was not located anywhere in the core region of the continent where he had expected him to be. Instead, he was located at a small kingdom at the very edge of the continent, one of the few ces where the continent met the endless ocean that had managed to establish a kingdom ording to Pei Yang. Apparently, the coast next to the endless ocean was not that great to live next to as countless thunderstorms and waves would sweep dozens if not hundreds of kilometers ind every few years. Destroying anything in their path.


    The only way a kingdom could survive under such circumstances would be if a Domain Lord Realm Expert or stronger established a formation to protect the kingdom¡­ And given the fact that the qi was already close to nonexistent, it was incredibly rare for any kingdom to exist in such an environment. After all, if given the chance, no Domain Lord Realm Expert would willingly stay at the edges of continent.


    All of this is not mentioning the fact that a powerful demon beast from the ocean might appear at any given moment and destroy the said kingdom, with most of these demon beasts at least having reached the Domain Lord Realm, some even reaching the Earth Immortal Realm.


    With all of this in mind, the only people who would settle down and establish and kingdom under such circumstances would be people hiding away from therger powers in the core region.


    Even though Pei Yang hadn''t explicitly said that his cksmith friend was one such person, it was easy to guess after finding out that he was located in a kingdom at the edge of the continent.


    The only thing that puzzled Xuan Hao was what this friend of Pei Yang had done for him to hide away at the edge of the continent. Considering what Pei Yang had gone through, he had a feeling that it might also be rted to the fact that he wanted to breakthrough to the Pseudo Saint Realm but had been stopped by the different major powers before being able to aplish his goal.


    In the end, this ended up making Xuan Hao even more curious about the thing needed to break through to the Pseudo Saint Realm. After all, he still had to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in less than three months'' time and also needed to find out what it was that the major powers were hiding regarding the breakthrough to the Pseudo Saint Realm.


    "Hm? Demonic cultivators?"


    Lost in his own thoughts while travelling through the Frozen Wastnd together with Yi Min, Xuan Hao could not help frowning upon noticing arge number of demonic cultivators gathered a short distance away from the temporary barrier he had created between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Frozen Wastnd in the past.


    "Indeed, there are at least three in the True Demon Realm. From the looks of it, they are preparing to invade the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­" Hearing what Xuan Hao muttered to himself, Yi Min curiously scanned the group of demonic cultivators in the distance with her divine sense before she said this with a worried expression on her face.


    Three demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm would be more than enough to make even her feel a shiver run down her spine. After all,pared to normal cultivators in the Soul Ascension Realm, demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm were known to be stronger when it came tobat.


    In a sense, only in the True Demon Realm could a demonic cultivator be considered to have abandoned their past and turned into a full-fledged demon intent on doing anything to increase its power.


    As an example, Yi Min could clearly see one of the female demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm happily draining the life energy out of a dozen unfortunate demonic cultivators in the First and Second Demonic Transformation Realm¡­


    "Invade the Azure Sky Kingdom? Guess I will have to deal with them and strengthen the barrier I created back then¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced towards the gathering of demonic cultivators in the distance, Xuan Hao frowned visibly before abruptlying to a stop.


    "Xuan Hao¡­?"


    Feeling like something big was about to happen, Yi Min could not help turning to Xuan Hao as she nervously uttered his name. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "It''s nothing, I just n to pay the little gathering over there a visit before we continue our journey¡­"

 Chapter 1146 New Barrier

    <h4>Chapter 1146 New Barrier</h4>


    "Pay the little gathering a- Ah!" Realizing what Xuan Hao was saying, Yi Min froze for a short moment before looking towards the gathering of demonic cultivators with a sense of pity in her eyes.


    Although the three True Demon Realm demonic cultivators were far too strong for her to deal with, she understood that they were no match for Xuan Hao. After all, she had already seen him easily deal with three Soul Ascension Realm cultivators in the past. Not to mention, if she could improve her strength all the way to the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm over the past two years, Xuan Hao would undoubtedly also be able to increase his strength.


    Whoosh~


    As she thought about this, she suddenly felt the space around them twisting before both of them were in the air above the group of demonic cultivators. Even when directly above the three powerful demonic cultivators who should have easily noticed someone appearing above them, none of the demonic cultivators had noticed her or Xuan Hao floating in the air a few hundred meters above them.


    Rumble~!


    Before she even had the time to think about what Xuan Hao was nning to do, she suddenly saw a giant sword made of ice manifesting in the air above the group of demonic cultivators. Even when it was not pointed at her, she could still not stop a shiver from running down her spine when seeing this sword.


    Although she had no idea how strong it was, she was certain that she would not be able to defend against the sword¡­


    "Wh-what is that!?" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "A Sword¡­?"


    "Did someone from the core region perhaps show up?!"


    Given that Xuan Hao didn''t make any effort in trying to hide the giant ice sword now hovering in the air above the group of demonic cultivators, it did not take long before all of them fearfully turned to look up at the ice sword that had seemingly appeared out of thin air above them. All of them trying to figure out where the ice sword had appeared from and if they had ended up encountering a powerful expert from the core region of the continent.


    After all, as the situation in the Frozen Wastnd grew more chaotic and the number of demonic cultivators escaping from the Frozen Wastnds increased with each year, experts from the core region of the continent had already begun to appear around the borders of the Frozen Wastnd to ensure that the demonic cultivators didn''t end up expanding what could be considered the territory of demonic cultivators while escaping from the Frozen Wastnds.


    As all of the weaker demonic cultivators thought about possibly having run into a powerful cultivator from the core region, they could not help looking towards the three True Demon Realm cultivators. Considering the difference in strength, the only ones that had the strength to face the experts from the core region of the continent were these three¡­ Unfortunately, the three True Demon Realm Experts were in no state to help the rest of the demonic cultivators as they also looked up at the ice sword hanging in the sky above them filled with fear.


    "This power- A Demon Lord!? Impossible! why would such an existencee to this remote part of the Frozen Wastnd!?"


    "Not a Demon Lord, it''s an Earth Immortal¡­"


    "Does that change anything?!"


    As the three True Demon Realm demonic cultivators nervously exchanged a few nces with each other, they realized that there was no way for them to escape from their current situation. Even if they were at the peak of the True Demon Realm, there was no way for them to escape from the sword hovering in the air above them.


    In a sense, the only reason why they had managed to stay alive so far was because the master of the sword had yet to make a move.


    """¡­"""


    As the situation persisted like this for a little over half a minute without the sword above them moving, the demonic cultivators could not help growing suspicious.


    Is the master of the sword perhaps intending to spare us?


    The moment this thought appeared among the demonic cultivators, it soon spread like wildfire before a few of the demonic cultivators became brave enough to take the chance to try and escape in the opposite direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom-


    Whoosh~


    However, before they had a chance to take more than a few steps, the giant ice sword hovering in the air above them emitted an almost indistinguishable hum before it descended towards them. Giving them no time to react before the de stabbed into the ground.


    RUMBLE-!


    As the giant ice sword more than a thousand meters in length plunged into the frozen ground, a strange resonance urred between the natural yin qi present in the Frozen Wastnd and the sword. Triggering a cataclysmic release of frigid energy that instantly killed all the demonic cultivators expect the three in the True Demon Realm, who barely managed to survive by forcibly burning the lifespan.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Following the cataclysmic event that seemed to engulf the entire Frozen Wastnd in the eyes of the three barely alive demonic cultivators, they watched in horror as an ethereal glow emanated from the sword stabbed into the frozen ground.


    Even if they had managed to survive the first part of the attack just now, they had a feeling that the sword itself was not aimed at them, but something different¡­ And as the air around the sword began to crystallize, this feeling only ended up growing more intense.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Those three actually managed to survive¡­? Indeed, the vitality of demonic cultivators is far above that of normal cultivators¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced down at the three barely alive demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes for a brief moment before focusing his attention back on the ice sword now embedded in the frozen ground.


    The reason why he hadn''t directly used the ice sword to kill the demonic cultivators was because the sword''s primary focus was not to kill the demonic cultivators, it was to create a new barrier between the Frozen Wastnd and the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Now that his strength had increased, he not only wanted the barrier to cover the border between the Azure Sky Kingdom and the Frozen Wastnd, but also wanted it to protect the kingdoms located beside the Azure Sky Kingdom. After all, quite a few of these kingdoms had already be part of the Star Shattering Sect and already needed quite a bit of help to deal with the constant influx of demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds.


    RUUUMBBLEEE-!


    In response to Xuan Hao''s will, the sword shone with an even more terrifying might as it became the focal point for the frigid yin qi of the Frozen Wastnd to gather towards, transforming the immediate vicinity into a chaotic tempest that would freeze anyone below the Earth Immortal Realm to death in an instant, a fate that soon caught up with the three demonic cultivators unfortunate enough to be close to the center of this tempest.


    Even if demonic cultivators cultivated yin qi and had a far higher resistance than normal, they had no ability to resist the terrifying frigid yin qi that gathered around the ice sword in their current state¡­


    "Aaaah-!"


    Letting out a painful scream one after the other, the three demonic cultivators perished in quick session. However, the frozen storm didn''t subside following their death and instead only increased in intensity as it continued to grow in size under the constant influx of frigid yin qi from the Frozen Wastnd.


    "This should be enough¡­"


    Feeling that the frozen storm had already grown to a size and power that was close to reaching a level impossible for him to control, Xuan Hao stopped the ice sword below from gathering more frigid qi and using all of his strength, he forcibly pulled the ice sword acting as the center of the storm out of the ground before throwing it in the direction of the Azure Sky Kingdom-


    Bang!


    Crack-!


    As the swordnded a few thousand meters away from the Azure Sky Kingdom, creating a massive crater where itnded, Xuan Hao moved fast and created a dozen simr swords before sending them off in the direction of the other kingdoms from the Sky Empire bordering the Frozen Wastnd-


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Before the frozen storm had time to spread into the Azure Sky Kingdom, the other swordsnded and connected together with the ice sword that the frozen storm was centered around.


    Rumble~!


    Not a secondter, the frozen storm stopped encroaching on the Azure Sky Kingdom and instead began to spread out and connect up with the other ice sword, weaving together to create a formidable barrier separating the different kingdoms from the Frozen Wastnd.


    Although the size and power of the storm was reduced significantly due to this, it would still be close to impossible for any True Demon Realm demonic cultivator to cross it without dying.


    In the end, Xuan Hao had sessfully managed to aplish what he wanted, creating a barrier between the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and the Frozen Wastnd.

 Chapter 1147 Crossing the Frozen Wasteland

    <h4>Chapter 1147 Crossing the Frozen Wastnd</h4>


    "This..."


    Seeing therge frozen storm forming a barrier between the Frozen Wastnd and the Sky Empire, Yi Min could not help swallowing unconsciously as she felt a shiver run down her spine.


    Although she knew Xuan Hao was stronger than the demonic cultivators, she didn''t expect the demonic cultivators to die so easily. Not to mention, when looking at the frozen storm now blocking the path from the Frozen Wastnd to the Sky Empire, she understood that Xuan Hao had most likely surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm. At least that was the only way she could exin what she had just witnessed.


    "Let''s get going before more demonic cultivators show up." Not aware of how shocked Yi Min was following his creation of the barrier between the Sky Empire and the Frozen Wastnd, Xuan Hao didn''t say anything more before leaving the scene together with the still shocked Yi Min.


    Even though it had looked easy for him to create the frozen storm now separating the Sky Empire from the Frozen Wastnd, the qi required to aplish something like that had almost ended up draining his dantianpletely. After all, the barrier was not a formation and couldn''t absorb the qi from the air around it to strengthen and keep itself running, it only had the initial qi Xuan Hao had used to create the ice swords controlling the frigid qi gathered from the Frozen Wastnd. The moment the qi in the ice sword ran dry, the frozen storm would disperse by itself, and the frigid yin qi would return to the Frozen Wastnd.


    In the end, it wasn''t a permanent solution to the problem of demonic cultivators entering the territory of the Star Shattering Sect from the Frozen Wastnd, but it would at least ensure that no demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm or below entered the Star Shattering Sect''s territory during his absence¡­


    "Huh? This is¡­" As Xuan Hao and Yi Min left following the death of the demonic cultivators and made their way along the edge of the Frozen Wastnd, Xuan Hao could not help frowning when he suddenly felt a powerful divine sense sweeping over both him and Yi Min from deeper inside the Frozen Wastnd.


    Though it only swept over them for a brief moment before disappearing again, it was obvious from the strength of the divine sense that the other party had at least reached the Earth Immortal Realm¡­ And given that he had just used up most of his qi to create the frozen storm, Xuan Hao had no ns of getting involved with a powerful demonic cultivator-


    Whoosh-!


    For this reason, before the other party could show up or do anything, he decided to preemptively use most of his remaining strength to execute the Drifting Cloud Steps. Using his mastery of the Dao of Space to rapidly teleport across the small patch of the Frozen Wastnd they had to cross over to reach the edges of the continent where the Grandmaster Realm cksmith was located.


    Rumble~


    Not a second after Xuan Hao had disappeared together with Yi Min, a handsome man looking like he was in his mid-twenties appeared at the spot where he had been standing with a frown on his face, a pair of devil horns visible on the top of his head.


    "Hmph! The Dao of Space¡­ Did those people discover anything or is this just a coincidence¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he looked in the direction that Xuan Hao had disappeared in together with Yi Min, the man let out a reluctant sigh before turning around to head back into the core of the Frozen Wastnd again. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "No matter whether it''s someone sent by one of those people, they shouldn''t be certain for them to send someone to investigate the situation. If they truly had an idea, they would have already shown up personally instead of sending someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­" Shaking his head as he said this, the handsome man tore apart the space in front of him before walking through it.


    Different from Xuan Hao who had manipted space to teleport, he used a far cruder method of using his strength to tear apart space directly to teleport.


    Although it was useful and demonstrated that one''s strength had at least reached the Soul Ascension Realm, it was far inferior to someone who hadprehended the Dao of Space. Not only due to the consumption involved in tearing space, but also due to the lowered uracy in teleporting somewhere.


    If not for the fact that the handsome young man didn''t master the Dao of Space, he would undoubtedly have tried to catch up with the escaping Xuan Hao and tried to get answer out of him.


    Unfortunately, he couldn''t do this and could only give up. Allowing Xuan Hao to escape.


    ¡­


    "Haaa¡­ That was close¡­" Using the next few hours to rush out of the Frozen Wastnd, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief after realizing that the owner of the powerful divine sense didn''t chase after them. Although he had no idea how strong the other party was and only knew that it should at least be in the Earth Immortal Realm, he also understood that there was a chance that the owner of the divine sense had surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm and reached the demonic cultivators equivalent of the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    "Did something happen¡­?"


    Being far too weak to notice the powerful divine sense earlier, Yi Min could not help showing a somewhat confused expression on her face as she asked this. Not understanding why Xuan Hao had suddenly gone quiet before increasing his speed far beyond anything she had ever seen before.


    "A powerful divine sense swept over us from the core of the Frozen Wastnd. Although the divine sense didn''t seem to be looking for us, I didn''t want to take any chances and decided to escape before the other party could think about catching us." Seeing Yi Min''s confused expression, Xuan Hao didn''t hide anything as he exined his reason for their earlier escape from the Frozen Wastnd.


    "I see¡­ How powerful was the demonic cultivator?" Hearing what Xuan Hao said, Yi Min nodded her head in understanding before asking this. Feeling curious about how powerful a demonic cultivator who could scare him away was.


    "I don''t know, but it should at least be in theter stages of the Earth Immortal Realm, possibly even above that!"


    "Above the Earth Immortal Realm!? This¡­ I never expected for there to be demonic cultivators that powerful inside the Frozen Wastnd."


    "Well, the Frozen Wastnd should have something to rely on for it to stay strong over so many years¡­"


    As Xuan Hao said this, both him and Yi Min looked at each other. Only now realizing that the Frozen Wastnd was far more dangerous than it seemed at the surface. Especially Xuan Hao, who hadn''t really treated the Frozen Wastnd too seriously before. Mainly due to the knowledge he had obtained through the sky Empire earlier on that stated that the strongest demonic cultivators at the core of the Frozen Wastnd were in the True Demon Realm.


    From the looks of things, he should pay more attention to the Frozen Wastnd in the future.


    Even if the demonic cultivators didn''t end up invading his sect, he needed to at least have an idea about how strong the ce filled to the brim with demonic cultivators bordering his sect''s territory was in case they ended up falling out with them in the future.


    At least, given the fact that none of the major powers like the Blue Sea Empire had decided to go in and kill off the demonic cultivators yet, he could assume that the Frozen Wastnd was at least as strong as these major powers. Meaning that they would at least have a handful of experts in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Thinking about it, not only did he have to deal with the Heavenly Dragon Temple and the Blue Sea Empire in the future, but from the looks of it, he would also have to deal with the Frozen Wastnd if the Star Shattering Sect wanted to continue to expand in the future.


    Not to mention, there was no saying how the different major powers in the core of the continent would react to the rise of a new power that would end up cutting into their share of the cultivation resources on the continent.


    Outside all of this, there was also the different religious organization that would be less than happy at the rise of a sect that wouldn''t allow them to harvest the faith of the kingdoms and powers under them.


    "¡­"


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly to himself. From the bottom of his heart, he had a feeling that he understood why he had to raise a few disciples. If he had to deal with everything by himself, he would undoubtedly end up dying of exhaustion¡­

 Chapter 1148 The Blue Shore Kingdom

    <h4>Chapter 1148 The Blue Shore Kingdom</h4>


    Having crossed the Frozen Wastnd, the rest of the journey to the edge of the continent where the kingdom of the Grandmaster Realm cksmith was located went without any problems.


    Along the way, both Xuan Hao and Yi Min took in the deste environment beyond the Frozen Wastnd, as they were both left shocked by just how little qi was present on the other side, as it reached a point where even someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm could be considered the strongest person around, something unimaginable under normal circumstances.


    It was also during the little under two weeks of travel after crossing the Frozen Wastnd that both of them realized that even with theck of qi between heaven and earth, the number of people living on the edges of the continent where the qi was close to nonexistent was by no means small. Even whenparing to a kingdom like the Azure Sky Kingdom, there were quite a few kingdoms close to it in size.


    Of course,pared to the Azure Sky Kingdom, these kingdoms were far weaker and at most had a few Peak Foundation Establishment Realm Experts at the helm, while in rare cases they would have an old ancestor who had barely broken through to the Core Formation Realm.


    Out of everything they witnessed during their journey, they didn''t encounter a single person who had managed to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm. On the contrary, the strongest person that they had encountered hadn''t even reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and was instead an old man at the Seventh Stage of the Core Formation Realm, who had been hailed as a legendary immortal god by the kingdom he resided in and the surrounding kingdom due his age exceeding 500 years.


    The main reason why he could live beyond the normal lifespan of a Core Formation Realm Expert was not because he had invented some kind of longevity method to increase his lifespan, but instead due to being lucky enough to find an interspatial ring of a powerful alchemist containing a dozen or so life extension pills that had increased his lifespan by a little over 500 hundred years.


    Although there was only one pill left by the point Xuan Hao and Yi Min passed through his kingdom, both of them could not helpmenting over the wasted pills as they witnessed him swallowing thest one.


    After all, life extension pills were incredibly difficult to create, even for someone in the Grandmaster Realm, let alone life extension pills that allowed one to increase one''s lifespan by a few hundred years.


    Unfortunately, even after taking a quick detour to check on the interspatial ring of the Seventh Stage Core Formation Realm Expert with the life extension pills, there wasn''t any recipe for the life extension pills and only a few pills that would help with increasing one''s cultivation in the Core Formation Realm and a special pill for helping one breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm were left. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Given that the Star Shattering Sect didn''tck those kinds of pills and the fact that Yi Min didn''t care about pills like that either, they ended up leaving them to the Core Formation Realm Expert who had managed to extend his lifespan by over five hundred years.


    Maybe with the help of the pills, he could be the first person native to the edges of the continent who managed to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    At least Xuan Hao and Yi Min didn''t n to take away his opportunity after realizing that there was nothing rted to the life extension pills left, causing them to leave before the Core Formation Realm Expert even realized that his interspatial ring had disappeared.


    Like this, both Xuan Hao and Yi Min arrived at the border of a small kingdom called the Blue Shore Kingdom, the kingdom where the Grandmaster Realm cksmith was located and also one of the only kingdoms on the continent that bordered the ocean.


    The kingdom itself was not that big and only covered a small area that included the capital city and a dozen or so smaller cities that produced most of the food in the kingdom.


    Even then, the Blue Shore Kingdom could be considered the most famous kingdom at the edges of the continent. Not only because it had existed for far longer than any other kingdom, but also because the qi between heaven and earth inside the small kingdom far exceeded that of the rest of the deste area.


    As a result of this, the number of cultivators present in the Blue Shore Kingdom was also far higher and also a ce where immortal gods resided ording to the locals. Of course, the so-called immortal gods were not like the Core Formation Realm Expert who had managed to get his hands on a few life extension pills, but were instead Nascent Soul Realm cultivators whose lifespan almost seemed endless in the eyes of the cultivators in the deste area. After all, a Core Formation Realm Expert could at most live around 300 years under normal circumstances, while someone in the Nascent Soul Realm could easily live for 2000 years or longer.


    However, Xuan Hao and Yi Min wasn''t really here for the so-called immortal gods of the Blue Shore Kingdom and was instead there for the Grandmaster Realm cksmith who should be the person behind the existence of the Blue Shore Kingdom.


    Although the locals didn''t seem to know a lot about his existence from what Xuan Hao and Yi Min picked up along the way, they did hear a few legends about a mystical immortal that had descended in the past and established the Blue Shore Kingdom.


    The only problem was that the Blue Shore Kingdom had been around for close to ten thousand years at this point in time. Resulting in the legends of what should have happened in the past being nothing more than an abstract fairy tale of mortals trying their best to describe the powers of a cultivator who should have at least reached the Earth Immortal Realm.


    "Hm? This is¡­" "The qi¡­


    Unexpectedly, after stepping inside the territory of the Blue Shore Kingdom, Xuan Hao and Yi Min were both surprised at the concentration of qi inside the kingdom. Not only was it superior to the normal environment found in the core region of the continent, but it could even be considered simr to the environment created inside some of the smaller cities in the Blue Sea Empire that had a qi gathering formation covering them.


    Even if this would not normally be shocking considering that the Grandmaster Realm cksmith should have at least reached the Earth Immortal Realm, it had to be known that to increase the concentration of qi in one area, one had to draw it from somewhere.


    In the cities of the Blue Sea Empire, the qi was drawn from the rich environment around them, while in the Star Shattering Sect, it was drawn from the chaotic qi above.


    On the other hand, the qi in the Blue Shore empire was not drawn from the environment, let alone the chaotic qi that was far more difficult to refine.


    "Where did the qi from this cee from?" Muttering this to herself as Xuan Hao put her down after they reached the Blue Shore Kingdom, Yi Min could not help curiously examining the formation covering the Blue Shore Kingdom.


    After all,pared to Xuan Hao who was still in the Artisan Realm in terms of formations, Yi Min had already reached the Master Realm and had a far better understanding than him when it came to formations.


    Whoosh~


    It was also because of this, that Yi Min was the first to use her divine sense to probe into the formation. Attempting to find out where the qi inside the Blue Shore Kingdom hade from-


    Rumble-!


    However, the moment Yi Min used her divine sense to probe the formation covering the Blue Shore Kingdom, a change took ce as a terrifying divine sense descended on both of them, causing Yi Min to quickly retract her divine sense while moving closer to Xuan Hao for protection.


    Of course,pared to Yi Min who could only tell that the owner of the divine sense was far stronger than her, Xuan Hao could clearly tell that the owner of the divine sense was in the Earth Immortal Realm. Around the same level as Pei Yang before he was injured.


    This must be the Grandmaster Realm cksmith Pei Yang mentioned¡­


    Whoosh~


    Realizing the identity of the person behind the divine sense, Xuan Hao wasted no time in taking out a small token that Pei Yang had handed him before he had left.


    "This¡­ Pei Yang''s friends?"


    Not a secondter, an old voice echoed out in both Xuan Hao and Yi Min''s ears as an old man flew over from the capital of the Blue Shore Kingdom and appeared in front of them with a bewildered expression on his face.

 Chapter 1149 Gong Cheng

    <h4>Chapter 1149 Gong Cheng</h4>


    "Yes, you should be Gong Cheng¡­?" Hearing the old man calling out to them along with him instantly mentioning Pei Yang, Xuan Hao guessed that the old man in front of them was indeed the Grandmaster Realm cksmith that Pei Yang had mentioned. "Indeed, I''m Gong Cheng¡­ Are you two perhaps here to hide away?" Nodding his head, Gong Cheng slightly tilted his head with a puzzled expression on his face as he asked this. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Hide away¡­?" Showing a simrly confused expression on his face after hearing Gong Cheng''s question before a look of understanding reced it.


    Considering the fact that the Blue Shore Kingdom was located at the edge of the continent, and it was a well-known fact that people escaping from the different major powers would flee to ces like this, it wasn''t odd for Gong Cheng to think that they hade to the Blue Shore Kingdom for a simr reason. After all, there wasn''t really any other reason why someone at their cultivation realm would bother heading to the edges of the continent where powerful demon beast emerged from the ocean every now and then to cause chaos.


    "No, we came to seek guidance from you in cksmithing!" For this reason, Xuan Hao quickly shook his head and stated his and Yi Min''s intentions for showing up.


    "Hm? You came all the way here to seek guidance from me? What about Pei Yang? Is he still alive?"


    "No, we came to seek guidance from you in cksmithing!" For this reason, Xuan Hao quickly shook his head and stated his and Yi Min''s intentions for showing up.


    "Hm? You came all the way here to seek guidance from me? What about Pei Yang? Is he still alive?"


    "Still alive¡­? What do you mean?" "Huh? I thought you- Never mind, it''s good that fellow is still alive. Honestly, I thought he would be dead after I heard about him entering the Blue Sea Empire." Shaking his head while saying this, Gong Cheng only now seemed to realize that they hadn''te to hide away from one of the major powers in the core region.


    "So¡­ Can you still teach us senior¡­?" Seeing this, Yi Min stepped forward and asked a bit nervously. Obviously not used to referring to someone else as a senior with how she had spent most of her cultivation journey figuring out things on her own without the help of anyone senior teaching her.


    Of course, this was not because she didn''t want the assistance of someone stronger than herself, but instead because getting the guidance of a senior normally required her to join arger power or pay some kind of price¡­ And before she knew it, she had already managed to figure out the thing she wanted to learn about on her own and be one of the strongest people in the Sky Empire. No longer needing the assistance of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts of the Sky Empire due to finding her own path.


    Now faced with someone far beyond her current realm in both cultivation and cksmithing, Yi Min could not stop herself from growing a bit nervous.


    "¡­"


    Standing beside her, Xuan Hao could not help silently rolling his eyes.


    Where was this kind of nervousness when she faced him? Just in terms of strength, he should be stronger than Gong Cheng¡­ Perhaps it''s because she is already used to his presence?


    Thinking about this to himself as he watched Gong Cheng put on a thoughtful expression after hearing what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what the old man had done to be chased out of the core region.


    After all, given that he was a Grandmaster Realm cksmith and had reached the Earth Immortal Realm, there shouldn''t be any reason for thoserger powers to chase him away. On the other hand, they should be trying to recruit him to strengthen themselves.


    Hm¡­ Maybe it''s the same reason why Pei Yang ended up falling out with the Blue Sea Empire, the method to break through to the Pseudo Saint Realm. Although, I have a feeling that there is a bit more to Pei Yang''s case than just that¡­


    "I will teach you both on behalf of Pei Yang, but it won''t be for longer than two months, I still have other things to do, and my lifespan is already close to running out at this point in time."


    At the same time Xuan Hao was lost in his own thoughts thinking about Pei Yang and what might have caused the battle he had seen back when he first met him, Gong Cheng finally seemed to have thought things through as he agreed to teach them for a period of two months.


    However, outside of the fact that he agreed to teach them, he also ended up revealing the fact that his lifespan was about to run out, a fact that caused both Xuan Hao and Yi Min to freeze for a short moment.


    "Your lifespan is running out?! If I can ask¡­ How old are you?" Not surprisingly, Yi Min could not help asking this question. Mainly because she had learnt about the Earth Immortal Realm from Xuan Hao during their journey to the Blue Shore Kingdom¡­ And from it, she knew that someone in the Earth Immortal Realm could live up to a hundred thousand years, some even longer than that.


    "Hehe, don''t worry, I''m not as old as you think I am. Although Earth Immortal Realm cultivators can live for a hundred thousand years, that is only under optimal circumstances. In most cases, Earth Immortal Realm cultivators will rue all sorts of hidden injuries over time that affects their vitality. In the end, most will live to around seventy thousand years, a few thousand longer if they are lucky. Ah, I''m a little over sixty-nine thousand years old and should only have a little over a thousand left from what I can tell."


    ""¡­""


    Hearing that Gong Cheng was actually close to seventy thousand years old, Xuan Hao and Yi Min could not help feeling surprised. Especially when he mentioned that he only had a little over a thousand years left to live.


    After all, both Xuan Hao and Yi Min were below the age of one thousand!


    For a thousand years to be considered a short time was shocking to say the least and made both of them understand that crossing through the Earth Immortal Realm in the future would take far longer than any realm before that. Indeed, deserving of having the word immortal in the name of the realm¡­


    "Ehm¡­ Let''s go to the capital for now, I will help both of you find somewhere to settle down first before we begin the lessons tomorrow¡­ And although it might not look like it, myprehension of the Dao of cksmithing is far superior to that of Grandmaster Realm cksmith. Not to brag, but myprehension is already half a step into the realm of perfection.


    If not for the fact that something other thanprehension of the Dao of cksmithing is required when breaking through to the Pseudo Saint Realm, I would long since have be a Pseudo Saint Realm cksmith.


    Who knows, If I manage to reach the realm of perfection before passing away, I might end up directly breaking through to the Saint Realm¡­" Shaking his head with a somewhat depressed expression on his face, Gong Cheng turned to look in the direction of the core region with a look of longing.


    Even if he had hidden away at the edges of the continent and built a small kingdom for himself to live in, it was obvious that he still wanted to continue pursuing the Dao of cksmith.


    Unfortunately, he had been chased out of the core region and could only hide away at the edges of the continent where there wasn''t any precious spiritual metal around for him to practice his cksmithing.


    Of course, there was the option of entering the ocean in search of spiritual metal deposits, but the danger involved in this was far from something someone in the Earth Immortal Realm could do safely.


    Not to mention identally stumbling on a powerful demon beast in the Celestial Immortal Realm, who knew what kind of terrifying creatures were hidden beneath the waves?


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Deciding not to say anything when faced with the somewhat depressed state of Gong Cheng, Xuan Hao and Yi Min just ended up silently following the old man back to the capital city of the Blue Shore Kingdom, where they were quickly given a ce to stay for the next two months before Gong Chen disappeared inside thergest pce at the core of the capital city.


    During the entire ordeal, Xuan Hao was rather surprised that the old man didn''t ask for anything in return for teaching both of them but guessed that there wasn''t really much he could offer to him that would be useful, outside of something precious like life extension pills or elixirs that could help him live longer.


    After all, he doubted any artifacts he could produce would be useful to a Grandmaster Realm cksmith, while the spiritual metal he did have on him was below the Transcendent Grade and wouldn''t be useful to a Grandmaster Realm cksmith¡­

 Chapter 1150 Requirment For the Saint Realm

    <h4>Chapter 1150 Requirment For the Saint Realm</h4>


    Spending the rest of the day getting familiar with the pce Gong Cheng had given them to stay in during their stay, Xuan Hao and Yi Min also took the chance to explore the capital of the Blue Shore Kingdom. During which both of them discovered that there were far more powerful cultivators present than they had first expected. Having been hidden away by a formation that covered the capital city and the area a few thousand meters around it.


    Not to mention Domain Lord Realm Experts and Soul Ascension Realm Experts, there were around three other Earth Immortal Realm Experts outside Gong Cheng present in the capital of the Blue Shore Kingdom. Making it rather obvious that Gong Cheng wasn''t the only person who had chosen to hide away from the different major powers at the edge of the continent.


    Even though it wasn''t easy to gauge the strength of the three Earth Immortal Realm Experts as they seemed to be trying their best to hide themselves inside a few of the smaller pces located around the one Gong Cheng had disappeared inside of, Xuan Hao still managed to gauge their strength to some extent¡­ And although they were not as strong as Gong Cheng, they were still a bit stronger than someone who had just broken through to the Earth Immortal Realm.


    On the other hand, Yi Min focused her attention on the different Soul Ascension Realm Experts inside the capital city. After all, she herself was in the Soul Ascension Realm at the moment and felt shocked at suddenly encountering so many Soul Ascension Realm Experts in such a remote location where the qi between heaven and earth was far from enough to allow someone to reach the Soul Ascension Realm.


    In the end, both Xuan Hao and Yi Min found out that all of the people in the Domain Lord Rm and above were people who had fled from the core region of the continent after falling out with one of the major powers or some of the vassals attached to these major powers.


    By talking to some of the Domain Lord and Soul Ascension Realm Experts, they also managed to learn that the Blue Shore Kingdom had existed for far longer than they had first thought. Having existed for over a hundred thousand years before Gong Cheng took control of the kingdom and the ancient formations that protected it a little over ten thousand years ago.


    Thinking about it, this also made more sense, as the formations ensuring the dense qi inside the kingdom seemed far moreplicated the more Xuan Hao and Yi Min tried to analyze it.


    ording to Yi Min who was already at the Master Realm in terms of formations, the formation that gathered the qi and guarded the capital city of the kingdom should be above the Grandmaster Realm. Meaning that it should at least be in the Pseudo Saint Realm. Maybe even the Saint Realm. Far beyond what someone like Gong Cheng, who wasn''t even a formation master, could create.


    Even if there happened to be a formation master at the Grandmaster Realm among the cultivators hiding in the Blue Shore Kingdom, it was unlikely that one of them was behind the formations.


    Because of all this, Xuan Hao, and Yi Min both ended up bing even more interested in the qi gathering formation covering the Blue Shore Kingdom and where the dense qi hade from. In the end, this led to them finding out that the qi gathering formation not only covered the Blue Shore Kingdom, but actually stretched over ten thousand meters out into the ocean. Resulting in both of them guessing that the qi inside the kingdom came from somewhere in the depths of the ocean that the qi gathering formation covered.


    Of course, given the dangers that might be lurking beneath the surface, neither of them intended to go in and try to find out about the source of the qi for now.


    Even though it was only a little over ten thousand meters off the shore of the continent, the little information both of them had learnt about the demon beasts lurking in the ocean stopped them.


    Not to mention, the ocean itself was also special and made it hard for one''s divine sense to prate too far below the surface, as an example, Yi Min could go a little over a hundred meters below the surface with her divine sense, while Xuan Hao could go close to two thousand meters down.


    Although Xuan Hao could see the bottom of the ocean with his divine sense for the first few thousand meters off the shore, the ocean floor suddenly dropped off a cliff and went straight down beyond what he could see with his divine sense after reaching the eight-thousand-meter mark.


    Looking at the steep drop and the seemingly endless ocean beyond it, Xuan Hao guessed that the ocean truly began at that point¡­ And it would be far less safepared to the rtively shallow part of the ocean close to the continent. After all, in the shallow part of the ocean, he could at least see everything swimming around, something that became impossible beyond the eighth-thousand-meter mark with his current strength.


    ¡­


    Following Xuan Hao and Yi Min spending a day getting familiar with the Blue Shore Kingdom and some of the more powerful cultivators who resided there, it was soon time for them to meet up with Gong Cheng again-


    "Haha, I see that both of you have already managed to settle down, I hope both of you are prepared for the next two months."


    And as predicted, Gong Cheng appeared in front of them the moment the sun rose, and the first few rays of light hit the ground.


    "Yes! Please guide me well senior!"


    Answering the question with excitement, Yi Min respectfully bowed her head as a sign of respect.


    Following her learning about the fact that Gong Cheng was close to reaching the realm of perfection in the Dao of cksmithing, she understood that the next two months might be a chance for her to reach the Grandmaster Realm in cksmithing.


    After all, the main requirement to reach the Grandmaster Realm was to take the first step inprehending the Dao of cksmithing, thus reaching the Elementary Realm in the Dao of cksmithing.


    Of course, with Gong Cheng''sprehension of the Dao of cksmithing, he should have long since surpassed the Grandmaster Realm, but the method to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm was still unknown to anyone outside of the major powers, thus leaving him stuck at the Grandmaster Realm. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The reason why he had mentioned reaching the Saint Realm before the Pseudo Saint Realm during their first meeting, was due to the fact that there was a rumor among different professions on the continent that one would be able to reach the Saint Realm without breaking through to the Pseudo Saint Realm if one managed toprehend the dao of one''s profession to the realm of perfection¡­ And given that he was close to reaching the realm of perfection and had still not managed to find out how to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm, it was obvious he would think about reaching the Saint Realm and skip over the Pseudo Saint Realm.


    In fact, Xuan Hao and Yi Min had learnt that there were many others like Gong Cheng spread around the continent who refused to work for the different major powers and thus ended up stuck in the Grandmaster Realm trying to purse the realm of perfection and be a saint without the need for the major powers support.


    Naturally, with so many trying to reach the Saint Realm, there had been someone in the past who had ended up seeding. Lending some validity to the rumor, but that person ended up being killed by a Celestial Immortal Realm Expert from one of the major powers shortly after news of this spread out.


    As a result, to this day, there wasn''t a single known Saint Realm Expert on the continent. Although, there might be some hiding inside the core territory of the different major powers or at the edges of the continent. Afraid to end up dead in case the major powers found out about their existence¡­


    "Thank you for taking your time to teach both of us."


    Following Yi Min''s example, Xuan Hao also decided to bow his head as a sign of respect to the old man. After all, he was his senior when it came to the Dao of cksmithing and his age was enough for him to have existed far longer than most powers on the continent, outside of the different major powers. The knowledge he should have gathered during such a long period of time was priceless and something Xuan Hao had already begun thinking about possibly using to help out the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, if Pei Yang could be recruited, couldn''t the old man in front of him be recruited as well¡­?

 Chapter 1151 Unspoken Concerns of the Blue Shore Earth Immortals

    <h4>Chapter 1151 Unspoken Concerns of the Blue Shore Earth Immortals</h4>


    Unaware of the thoughts going through Xuan Hao''s head as he observed him, Gong Cheng didn''t think too much about what both of them said as he made his way towards arge forge located at the edge of the capital city next to a natural heat source, while Xuan Hao and Yi Min quietly followed after him.


    Even if there weren''t any good spiritual metals around at the edge of the continent where the Blue Shore Kingdom was located, looking around as they made their way inside the rtivelyrge forge, it became obvious that Gong Cheng still practiced his cksmithing on an almost daily basis from therge number of artifacts and spiritual metal covering every inch of the space.


    Although most of the artifacts present were at most in the Spirit Rank and would normally only be useful for someone in the Core Formation Realm, it was obvious that the strength of the artifacts forged by Gong Cheng far exceeded the limitations of their rank. Showing just how profound Gong Cheng''s understanding of the Dao of cksmithing was, while also allowing both of them to understand that Gong Cheng was still fully intend on trying to break through to the Saint Realm even if his lifespan was about to run out.


    Thinking about it for a bit as they looked at each other, Xuan Hao and Yi Min realized that the reason why he only wanted to teach them for a period of two months should be because he didn''t want to waste any time on anything other than improving his cksmithing.


    In a sense, the reason why he had agreed to teach them in the first ce, should be because of his past rtionship with Pei Yang and the fact that he understood that it was Pei Yang asking him for a favor when it came to teaching both of them.


    If not for the fact that they hade under Pei Yang''s rmendation, it was doubtful whether or not he would agree to teach them.


    After all, even if Xuan Hao was strong and felt confident in his own strength, giving him a certain level of leverage, he wasn''t much stronger than Gong Cheng. Not to mention, there were another three Earth Immortal Realm cultivators in the capital city of the Blue Shore Kingdom outside of Gong Cheng himself.


    Even if he had wanted to try and force Gong Cheng''s hand with his strength, he doubted he would be able to seed with his current strength. After all, there was also the mysterious ancient formation protecting the Blue Shore Kingdom that he had to think about. Although wasn''t clear about the strength of this formation, he had feeling that it should at least have reached the Earth Immortal Realm if not beyond that¡­


    "Hm?"


    As they continued making their way towards the core area of the forge where the little spiritual metal of the Blue Shore Kingdom and the furnace itself was located, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed a particr artifact leaning on the side of a worn-down anvil.


    Although the sword didn''t look that special at first nce, the strength contained inside of it was far beyond the quality of the metal that made it up.


    The sword itself was only at the Spirit Rank, but the power contained inside of it was more than strong enough to threaten someone in the Domain Lord Realm and even seemed to be close to reaching a level that could threaten someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Putting it at the same level as Peak Mystic Rank Artifact!


    "This sword is¡­" Not able to contain his curiosity after seeing such a weird sword that had managed to skip two ranks, Xuan Hao could not help curiously turning towards Gong Cheng with a questioning look on his face.


    "Oh? You noticed that sword? Hehe, it''s indeed a little specialpared to the rest, but it''s only useful for someone in the Domain Lord Realm and below¡­ To be honest, I tried to turn it into a Transcendent Rank Sword back when I forged it but ended up falling short by a bit. The sword is nothing more than a failure that can at most be considered Half a step into the Transcendent Rank. Not quite at the Transcendent Rank, but also a bit stronger than a normal Mystic Rank artifact." Shaking his head as he said this, Gong Cheng thought about something for a moment before walking over to the sword before grabbing hold of it before throwing it over to Xuan Hao.


    "You can have it if you want. Although it is a failure in my eyes, the engravings I made in it is still useful forprehending the Dao of cksmithing. At least it should make it a bit easier to reach the Elementary Realm in the Dao of cksmithing." Saying this, Gong Cheng turned around and continued making his way inside the forge under the shocked eyes of Xuan Hao and Yi Min.


    Something that could help assist someone reach the Elementary Realm in the Dao of cksmithing could be considered a priceless treasure, yet¡­ Gong Cheng had casually handed it over to Xuan Hao without a single care.


    ""¡­""


    In the end, Xuan Hao and Yi Min decided not to say anything as they just silently followed Gong Cheng deeper inside the forge, Xuan Hao not forgetting to ce the sword away inside one of his interspatial rings. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even if it might not be useful to him for long as he nned to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm over the next two months, it would undoubtedly be useful for the cksmiths back in the sect and might even help the Star Shattering Sect reach a new height in terms of cksmithing.


    After all, the sword was something that could beprehended and researched by multiple people at a time and didn''t require anyone teaching the ones trying toprehend the Dao of cksmithing inside of it.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao and Yi Min were being escorted through the forge by Gong Cheng, the three Earth Immortal Realm cultivators who were staying in the capital of the Blue Shore Kingdom had gathered together to talk.


    "I wonder who the two people Gong Cheng recently weed are¡­"


    "Hm¡­ From what I can tell, it doesn''t look like they are nning to settle down and only here for a temporary period of time, they will likely leave again after getting what they came from."


    "Indeed, but I''m quite interested in the man, he should also be in the Earth Immortal Realm like us. Although the feeling he gives me is quite strange. Almost threatening."


    The object of their conversation just so happened to be Xuan Hao and Yi Min who had just arrived at the Blue Shore Kingdom, then again, considering the fact that both Xuan Hao and Yi Min were rtively strong, it made sense for them toe together and try to figure out why they had suddenly appeared and seemed to already know Gong Cheng.


    After all, even if Yi Min wasn''t strong enough for them to care, Xuan Hao wasn''t like that¡­ And as the third among them had just said, he gave off a feeling that was more powerful than a normal Earth Immortal Realm cultivator. Forcing them to take the situation a bit more serious than the arrival of any normal Earth Immortal Realm Expert.


    "Indeed, the guy is quite strange, I really hope it isn''t something troublesome¡­" Shaking his head as he said this while the rest of the group had momentarily gone quiet, the first among the three who also happened to be the one behind their gathering, looked out in the direction of the forge where Xuan Hao, Yi Min and Gong Cheng were at the moment.


    Even without saying anything, it was obvious to the other two that he was feeling nervous about what Xuan Hao and Yi Min might want from Gong Cheng. After all, given the remote location of the Blue Shore Kingdom and the fact that they were all enemies of the different major powers, there was only a few things people would go through the trouble to find someone like Gong Cheng¡­ And it was preciously because of this that all of them were so nervous at the moment.


    "Let''s just observe the situation for now, as long as they don''t end up involving the Blue Shore Kingdom in anything troublesome like thest time around, we shouldn''t actively try and antagonize them."


    As a few more minutes passed without anyone leaving the forge, one of the three Earth Immortals shook her head before getting up to leave.


    Whoosh~


    "Haaa¡­"


    Following the first one leaving, the other two only nced towards the forge for a short moment before one of them let out a sigh before simrly turning around to leave. "¡­"


    In the end, thest of the Earth Immortals continued to stay for a few more minutes before following the other two to leave. Hoping that nothing troublesome or dangerous woulde out of Xuan Hao and Yi Min''s visit.

 Chapter 1152 Initiation into the Dao of Blacksmithing

    <h4>Chapter 1152 Initiation into the Dao of cksmithing</h4>


    Unaware of the conversation that had taken ce between the three Earth Immortals of the Blue Shore Kingdom following them entering the forge together with Gong Cheng, Xuan Hao and Yi Min arrived at the core of the forge where a giant furnace farrger than any furnace either of them had seen before. Even from a quick nce, it was obvious that the furnace was not a normal furnace, but instead a spiritual artifact that had at least reached the Transcendent Rank. Indeed, worthy of being the furnace used by a Grandmaster Realm cksmith who was only a step away from forcibly breaking through to the Saint Realm.


    "Given that the spiritual metal avable is not of that great quality around this ce and I already used up most of the higher quality spiritual metal I could get my hand on, I will use most of the time over the next two months teaching you. If you want to try and attempt forging yourself, you are more than free to do so and can even use my furnace if you want. The only thing is that I can only provide spiritual metal at Spirit Rank¡­" Showing a slightly embarrassed expression on his face as he said this, Gong Cheng allowed Xuan Hao and Yi Min to take in what he said as he nced towards the piles of spiritual metals located around the corepartment of the forge.


    Although there was quite a bit of spiritual metal present, it was mostly Earth Rank spiritual metal, with a small part of it having reached the Spirit Rank. In a corner of the corepartment of the forge, a single piece Mystic Rank spiritual metal could be seen leaning up the side of an anvil made out of far higher quality spiritual metal.


    Given his identity as a Grandmaster Realm cksmith, it was quite embarrassing that the spiritual metal in his forge was so low quality. Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do about it when living so far away from the core region of the continent where the spiritual qi was abundant and capable of nurturingrge quantities of spiritual metal.


    ""¡­""


    Silently looking around the forge as they heard what Gong Cheng said, both Xuan Hao and Yi Min could not help feeling bad for him after seeing just how bad his current situation was. "Senior, I brought a bit of spiritual metal with me for practicing. If you don''t mind, you can have some¡­"


    "Me as well, I have a bit of spiritual metal as well!"


    Not able to endure the sad sight of Gong Cheng who was looking around at the spiritual metal in his forge with a depressed expression on his face, Xuan Hao, and Yi Min both decided to take out some spiritual metal before handing it over to him. Among the spiritual metal Xuan Hao and Yi Min handed over, Xuan Hao decided to include a piece of spiritual metal in the Transcendent Rank that he had belonged to one of the three demonic cultivators he had killed when they passed through the Frozen Wastnd.


    "This is¡­ Thank you! Haha, I will make sure both of youprehend the Dao of cksmithing over the next two months!" Seeing therge amount of Mystic Rank spiritual metal and the piece of Transcendent Rank spiritual metal, Gong Cheng froze for a short moment before loudly eximing in a joyful tone.


    Whoosh~


    At the same time, he didn''t miss a beat as he put away the spiritual metal in his interspatial ring for safe keeping.


    Although it wasn''t befitting of his current status as the senior, he also understood that the amount of spiritual metal was far too good to refuse. Not to mention the Mystic Rank spiritual metal, with the help of the Transcendent Rank spiritual metal that Xuan Hao gave him, he would be able to forge an artifact befitting of his skill. Possibly even helping him further increase his understanding of the Dao of cksmithing in the process.


    No matter how unfitting it was, there was no way Gong Cheng would give up a chance to increase his understanding of the Dao of cksmithing.


    On the other hand, after being given therge amount of spiritual metal by the two, Gong Cheng decided to teach both of them with all of his might over the next two months. Intending to help both of themprehended the Elementary Realm of the Dao of cksmithing before the two-month period was up!


    "Thank you in advance senior."


    "Thank you¡­"


    Seeing this scene, Xuan Hao and Yi Min decided not to say anything and just went with the flow. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Hehe, no need to thank me yet. For now, how about we get started with the basics of the Dao of cksmithing? After that, both of you can try and use my furnace to get more familiar with the dao through more practical means." Smiling happily as he heard what Xuan Hao and Yi Min said, Gong Cheng pretended like nothing had happened. "Now then, let''s get started¡­" And before Xuan Hao or Yi Min had a chance to respond, he officially began teaching both of them about the Dao of cksmithing.


    Keeping it simple as he slowly starting to talk about more and more profound things, Gong Cheng observed Xuan Hao and Yi Min silently listening to him while siting down on two cushions that both of them had brought out the moment he had started to preach the Dao of cksmithing.


    As a few hours passed by like this, Gong Chen realized that both Xuan Hao and Yi Min''s were able to easilyprehend everything he said. Leaving him dumbfounded as to how high their affinity for the Dao of cksmithing was. Especially Yi Min, who had only reached the Soul Ascension Realm and had a far weaker soul than someone like Xuan Hao.


    Of course, he had no idea that Xuan Hao had only reached the Artisan Realm in cksmithing and thought that he was also a Master Realm cksmith like Yi Min, who had specificallye to him for a chance to breakthrough to the Grandmaster Realm.


    If he knew that Xuan Hao was just an Artisan Realm cksmith yet was able toprehend the Dao of cksmithing with such ease without even reaching the Master Realm, it was unknown what he would think.


    Even if the powerful soul of an Earth Immortal was able to make it far easier toprehend the dao, there was still limitations. After all, someone in the Master Realm was already close to reaching the Elementary Realm in the Dao of cksmithing, while someone in the Artisan Realm hadn''t even taken the first step inprehending the Dao of cksmithing.


    For Xuan Hao to be capable ofprehending the Dao of cksmithing at this stage essentially meant he would be able to directly skip past the Master Realm and reach the Grandmaster Realm byprehending the Dao of cksmithing, the unique domain that would normally appear at the Master Realm would show up on its own after his breakthrough to the Grandmaster Realm¡­


    Hm¡­ If they can still keep up and stay rxed? What if I increase the difficulty a bit more¡­


    Unaware of this, Gong Cheng decided to start increasing the difficulty of what he taught the two. Curious about how much the two couldprehend and if they could grasp the opportunity to directlyprehend the Dao of cksmithing and reach the Elementary Realm through the first session.


    In the end, because of this, the first session that Gong Cheng had only intended tost for a few hours and serve as an introduction to the Dao of cksmithing ended upsting far longer than expected as he continued trying to test Xuan Hao and Yi Min to see how much they couldprehend from him.


    For the first time in a long time, he also experienced the joy of teaching a talented student who could soak up everything he taught them.


    More importantly than all of that, he also felt the barrier to the Perfection Realm starting to show signs of loosening as he continued teaching Xuan Hao and Yi Min. In the end, he unknowingly slipped into a enter a state of enlightenment a week after he had begun preaching the Dao of cksmithing to Xuan Hao and Yi Min. However, this enlightenment didn''t stop him from preaching the Dao of cksmithing. Instead, the difficultly of what he preached increased rapidly. Reaching a point where Xuan Hao and Yi Min could barely understand what he was saying.


    But even with this, both of them still benefitted immensely from what little they understood, causing Yi Min to reach the Grandmaster Realm by the second week, while Xuan Hao entered the Grandmaster Realm a bitter. Sessfully breaking through by the third week.


    Both of them officially reaching the Elementary Realm in the Dao of cksmithing through the single lecture. At the same time, it was also at this point that they noticed that something was odd about Gong Cheng¡­

 Chapter 1153 Saint Realm

    <h4>Chapter 1153 Saint Realm</h4>


    Not stopping because they managed to reach the Grandmaster Realm, both Xuan Hao and Yi Min continued to attentively listen to Gong Cheng. Even if they had already figured out that something was off, it didn''t change the fact that listening to Gong Cheng preaching the Dao of cksmithing was immensely helpful to both of them. Even after they had broken through to the Elementary Realm in the Dao of cksmithing, this didn''t change in the slightest and both of them were still progressing rapidly.


    Rumble~!


    However, a month after Gong Cheng had started preaching the Dao of cksmithing to them, a low rumbling sound could be heard throughout the interior of the forge before it started spreading outward to cover the entire Blue Shore Kingdom and beyond it.


    "Huh!?"


    "This is¡­"


    Not able to keep themselves focused onprehending the Dao of cksmithing with such arge disturbance taking ce, Xuan Hao, and Yi Min both opened their eyes and stared at Gong Cheng who was now surrounded in a faintyer of light with a shocked expression.


    The reason for the shock was not the faintyer of light now covering Gong Chen nor the rumbling sound that had already begun to quiet down, but the fact that the aura around Gong Cheng was far stronger than before, to the point where even Yi Min who was still in the Soul Ascension Realm could sense the drastic change.


    This strength¡­ He is at leastparable to that general from the Blue Sea Empire!


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he examined the new strength of Gong Cheng, Xuan Hao could not help feeling shocked. Gong Cheng had clearly been a bit weaker than him just a moment ago, but now his strength had suddenly increased to the Half Bloom Stage, the peak of the Earth Immortal Realm if one didn''t count the Radiant Bloom Stage.


    "Hm?"


    However, as he continued examining Gong Cheng who was still in the process of undergoing some kind of transformation beneath the faintyer of light enveloping his body, he soon realized that even though his strength had reached a levelparable to the Half Bloom Stage, his actual cultivation had not changed.


    The change in strength didn''te from his cultivation realm suddenly increasing, but seemed toe from somewhere different¡­


    Whoosh~


    Lost in his own thoughts as he tried to figure out what had happened to Gong Cheng, the person in question suddenly opened both of his eyes with a bright smile covering his aging face. Dispelling the faint light around his body in the process.


    "Hahahaha! I finally seeded! I broke through the Saint Realm! Hahaha! I can''t wait to see the faces of those old fools when they learn about this! Hahaha!" Not even giving Xuan Hao or Yi Min a chance to ask him about what happened, Gong Cheng beganughing joyfully as he inadvertently ended up telling them what had happened just now-


    "Saint Realm!?"


    "Amazing¡­"


    As a result, Xuan Hao and Yi Min could not help eximing loudly as they looked towards the old man filled with both surprise and awe.


    The Saint Realm.


    Even though both of them knew little about the Saint Realm, they at least understood how important a Saint Realm Expert was- An existence that even the major powers on the continent couldn''t ignore and would kill if they couldn''t get them to join them¡­ At least, that was what they guessed from how the major powers had acted when it came to the secret of reaching the Pseudo Saint Realm and the death of any Saint Realm Expert that had appeared on the continent not aligned with any of these major powers in the past.


    "Haaa¡­"


    Taking a deep breath as he calmed himself down after experiencing his newfound power and the countless ideas rting to the Dao of cksmithing rushing through his mind, Gong Cheng turned to look at Xuan Hao and Yi Min with a grateful expression on his face.


    Although neither of them had done anything and had just listened to him preach the Dao of cksmithing, it was this simple thing that had allowed him to pass through the final hurdle and officially enter the Perfection Realm in the Dao of cksmithing. Allowing him to step into the Saint Realm without the need to pass through the Pseudo Saint Realm.


    Without them, he would have undoubtedly ended up trying to forcibly reach the Perfection Realm on his own until the day his lifespan ran out without reaching the Saint Realm.


    "Thank you for listening to this old man over the past month¡­"


    For this reason, Gong Cheng could not help himself from bowing gracefully to the two of them. Feeling genuinely thankful that Xuan Hao and Yi Min had stayed and listened to him for the past month without moving. After all, even the slightest interruption during enlightenment might result in him failing to grasp the tiny bit he needed to reach the Perfection Realm.


    "N-no need senior, both of us benefitted immensely from your lecture!" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Yes, there is no need to worry, we both managed to breakthrough to the Grandmaster Realm during enlightenment."


    "Grandmaster Realm!?" Hearing what Yi Min and Xuan Hao said, Gong Cheng showed a shocked expression as he examined both of them and discovered that they had indeed managed toprehend the Dao of cksmithing. Stepping into the Elementary Realm in the Dao of cksmithing. "Guess I wasn''t the only one benefiting from my enlightenment earlier¡­"


    "Indeed, so there is no need for senior to bow his head to the two of us, we already received a lot of benefits from listening to senior and experiencing his breakthrough to the Saint Realm." Nodding her head with a somewhat anxious expression on her face, Yi Min tried her best to stop Gong Cheng from bowing towards them.


    Even if Xuan Hao was unaffected by it, she was still a little Soul Ascension Realm Expert and couldn''t withstand the pressure of having such a powerful expert bow his head to her. "Hehe, seem like I made you a little nervous. My bad." Chuckling lightly as he saw Yi Min''s reaction, Gong Cheng didn''t continue bowing his head as he stood back up. Allowing the nervous Yi Min to calm down.


    "Senior Gong Cheng, if I might take the opportunity to ask, what is the difference between the Grandmaster Realm and the Saint Realm? And I wonder if you managed to learn anything about the Pseudo Saint Realm after reaching the Saint Realm¡­" Jumping in at this moment, Xuan Hao decided to ask the question that had been on his mind ever since he realized that Gong Cheng had broken through to the Saint Realm.


    Not only because he was curious about the Saint Realm and why Gong Cheng''s strength had suddenly increased, but also because he wanted to know if he had any idea how reach the Pseudo saint Realm. After all, he only had a month left until the time for the emergency quest was up!


    If he didn''t manage to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in this time, his cultivation base would end up sealed for the next five years!


    At that point in time, not to mention dealing with the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple, he might not even be able to make it back to the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    "Oh? I just recently broke through to the Saint Realm and don''t really have a good grasp about the realm. All I know is that after breaking through I managed to gain a new power that allows me to fight with someone at the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm. More importantly, I feel that this power can grow beyond the Earth Immortal Realm if I continue to progress in Saint Realm. Other than that, I also feel that my lifespan increased significantly. At least by another ten thousand years.


    As for the Pseudo Saint Realm¡­ From what I can tell, it isn''t as special as I thought it would be. To be honest, with my current strength, I can help the two of you reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in a less than a week."


    ""Really!?""


    Hearing what Gong Cheng said, both Xuan Hao and Yi Min could not help eximing in surprise at the same time as they looked over at Gong Cheng filled with disbelief.


    After all, the Pseudo Saint Realm was a secret that the major powers had done their best to hide, yet Gong Cheng had told them that he could help both of them reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in less than a week. How could they not be shocked when they heard this?


    "Hehe, calm down. The Pseudo Saint Realm isn''t that special, but at the same time, it is. In a sense, one can only reach the Pseudo Saint Realm with the help of a past Saint Realm Expert."


    ""?""


    Hearing what Gong Cheng said, Xuan Hao and Yi Min just ended up bing more confused than before¡­


    wah~ First chapter of the month ^^

 Chapter 1154 Three Earth Immortals Shock

    <h4>Chapter 1154 Three Earth Immortals Shock</h4>


    "Ehm¡­ What I mean is, to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm, one requires the inheritance of a Saint Realm Expert. After receiving the inheritance of a Saint Realm Expert, one will officially be considered to have reached the Pseudo Realm.


    In essence, the Pseudo Saint Realm isn''t a real realm so to speak, but instead a transitional realm that should have been made to make the process of reaching the Saint Realm easier for future generations. After all, the difference between someone in the Grandmaster Realm and the Saint Realm is like the difference between heaven and earth. Even someone like me, who spent the good part of sixty thousand years fully dedicated to the Dao of cksmithing barely managed to reach the Saint Realm due to a stroke of good luck.


    If I''m not wrong, the reason why those major powers are so against spreading this information is likely due to the fact that they want to hold a monopoly over Saint Realm Experts. After all, outside of being taught by a Saint Realm Expert directly, one can also obtain the inheritance of a Saint Realm Expert by finding the resting ce of past Saint Realm Experts. Most of which happen to be located inside these major powers.


    Thinking about it, they might also be fearful that the news of the method to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm spreading might cause all of those stuck in the Grandmaster Realm to rush into their territory and start causing chaos¡­" Shaking his head as he finished exining the Pseudo Saint Realm and the likely reason why those major powers decided to keep the way to reach the realm hidden, Gong Cheng turned to look towards Xuan Hao and Yi Min standing opposite of him. Patiently waiting for both of them to take in what he had just said.


    "Can you really help us reach the Pseudo Realm in such a short time¡­?" Absorbing the new information first, Xuan Hao could not help cautiously asking this with a hint of anticipation in his eyes.


    If Gong Cheng could really help them reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in such a short time, he would be able toplete the emergency and prevent the worst-case scenario of having to search for a way to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in under a month on his own, something he wanted to avoid at all costs if possible. Especially after learning that the only way to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm was to find the inheritance of a past Saint Realm Expert or have a living Saint Realm Expert''s help.


    After all, the ce where most Saint Realm Experts could be found would be in the core region of the continent¡­ And Xuan Hao doubted he had enough time to reach the core region of the continent and find the inheritance of a Saint Realm Expert with the little time he had left.


    "Haha, indeed!" Smiling with a somewhat proud expression on his face as he said this, Gong Cheng reassured Xuan Hao that he could, causing Xuan Hao to breathe a sigh of relief.


    "Senior! Let''s get started! I want to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm!" Before the two had a chance to continue their conversation, Yi Min finally recovered from the shock of learning about the Pseudo Saint Realm, as she jumped up and said this with stars in her eyes. Clearly excited about the fact that she could reach the Pseudo Saint Realm and have a clear path towards the Saint Realm in the future.


    "Sure, let''s start immediately. After this I still need to enter secluded cultivation for a while toprehend and understand my new strength." Nodding his head with a smile in response to Yi Min, Gong Cheng didn''t waste any time as he began to impart his knowledge on the Saint Realm to the two of them. Officially beginning the process of imparting his inheritance to the two of them.


    Soon enough, both Xuan Hao and Yi Min went quiet as they silently listened to Gong Cheng, while the sky outside began changing with the passage of time. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    ¡­


    As Gong Cheng managed to breakthrough to the Saint Realm, the three Earth Immortal Realm Experts who had just met up to discuss the appearance of Xuan Hao and Yi Min a month earlier, gathered at a small hill not too far away from the forge with shocked expressions stered all over their faces, a hint of fear barely visible.


    "What on earth was that just now!? That aura was in no way inferior to those generals and powerful figures from the major kingdoms!"


    "I don''t know¡­ Perhaps it was the Earth Immortal Realm Expert who came just a month ago. Maybe he was hiding his strength back then and happened to reveal it just now?"


    Wasting no time, two of the Earth Immortals began to specte and guess about what had happened just now, while the third began visibly frowning while looking towards the forge where the terrifying aura had erupted from just a second earlier.


    "Big brother, what do you think?"


    "Yeah, you are the most sensitive to these kinds of things, did the aura just now belong to the Earth Immortal Realm Expert who appeared a month ago?"


    Not able toe up with a proper conclusion of where the powerful aura hade from, the two quickly turned towards the silent Earth Immortal Realm Expert who was still looking towards the forge with an increasingly troubled expression on his face.


    "This¡­ I don''t think the aura just now belonged to the Earth Immortal from a month ago. Instead, I think it should be Gong Cheng. Although I have no idea how that old man managed to be so strong all of a sudden, it should be him." Saying this with a bit of hesitation, the Earth Immortal referred to as big brother could not help smiling a bit wryly as he kept his attention focused on the forge. Almost looking like he was about to rush inside the forge to confirm whether or not Gong Cheng was the one who had broken through.


    Of course, he kept himself from doing this, as he understood how disrespectful it would be to forcibly rush inside Gong Cheng''s forge when he could be in the process of consolidating his foundation after the rapid improvement in strength. Especially considering that doing so might result in Gong Cheng losing concentration at a critical moment and resulting in a qi deviation.


    "Gong Cheng is the one behind that terrifying aura just now!? Well¡­ That is better than it belonging to that unknown Earth Immortal Realm Expert¡­"


    "Indeed, it''s good if that''s the case. At least in the future, we will be able to enjoy the protection of a powerful Earth Immortal in the Half Bloom Stage. At that point in time, the major kingdoms won''t be able to do anything to us unless they sent one of their Celestial Immortals¡­ And given how far away the Blue Shore Kingdom is, I doubt any of their Celestial Immortals would be willing to travel all the way out here."


    "Don''t forget, there is also the Frozen Wastnd separating us from those major powers. Even if the powerful demonic cultivators lurking in there ignore someone like us passing through, the same won''t be the case if those Celestial Immortals try to pass through the Frozen Wastnd. In the future, we should be safe even if the major powers want to deal with us!"


    As the three Earth Immortals all collectively let out a sigh of relief after concluding that the terrifying aura just now hade from Gong Cheng, they settled down on the small hill and began waiting for Gong Cheng to emerge from the forge.


    Considering that all of them were familiar with just how long it normally took to consolidate one''s cultivation base after such a major breakthrough in strength, they didn''t find it odd that Gong Cheng didn''t emerge after a few days, and everything remained peaceful on the outside.


    Well¡­ Not everything was peaceful during these few days, as arge number of smaller kingdoms located outside the Blue Shore Kingdom had begun to grow restless following the terrifying aura and loud rumbling from Gong Cheng''s breakthrough to the Saint Realm.


    As a result of this, the different peak experts of these kingdoms ended up concluding that an immortal treasure had appeared, causing almost all of the Core Formation Realm Experts and Foundation Establishment Realm Experts to rush towards the Blue Shore Kingdom. Momentarily resulting in the borders of the Blue Shore Kingdom being filled with all sorts of people looking for the immortal treasure.


    Of course, with there being Nascent Soul Realm Experts and above in the Blue Shore Kingdom, these experts from the smaller kingdoms couldn''t do much, but the initialck of people guarding the borders of the Blue Shore Kingdom still ended up resulting in some of the people getting inside. Soon causing rumors of the rich spiritual qi inside the Blue Shore Kingdom to spread across the barren edge of the continent¡­

 Chapter 1155 Emergency Quest, Embarrassment and a newfound Dilemma

    <h4>Chapter 1155 Emergency Quest, Embarrassment and a newfound Dilemma</h4>


    Inside the forge, Xuan Hao and Yi Min had no idea what was happening outside as both of them remained fully focused on absorbing the inheritance of Gong Cheng. After all, both of them understood that they might not have such an opportunity again in the future.


    For this reason, neither of them noticed when Gong Cheng finished bestowing his inheritance after a week had passed, as they were both far too absorbed in the new information about the Dao of cksmithing that came along with the inheritance. Like this, two weeks passed by with Xuan Hao and Yi Min digesting the information in the inheritance.


    Although it didn''t help their understanding of the Dao of cksmithing reach a new realm, it still helped both of them establish a clear path towards the realm of perfection in the Dao of cksmithing. Different from someone like Gong Cheng who had to explore on his own.


    In a sense, the inheritance wouldn''t help someone reach the Perfection Realm in the Dao of cksmithing, but it would cut down the time required to reach the realm.


    Of course, if one''sprehension of the Dao of cksmithing wasn''t good enough, even if the time needed to reach the perfection realm was cut down by a lot, one would still be unable to reach the perfection realm.


    For example, there was no small number of cksmiths, Alchemists and other experts in their own respective fields who remained stuck at the Pseudo Saint Realm even after they decided to join one of the different major powers for a chance to reach the Saint Realm¡­


    "Hm?" Opening both of his eyes at this moment, Xuan Hao could not help looking at the ce where Gong Cheng should have been standing with a surprised expression on his face. "He''s gone? Wait- How much time passed since he left¡­?"


    Realizing that he had actually been in a state ofprehension for an extended period of time while digesting therge amount of information in the inheritance, Xuan Hao quickly pulled up the emergency quest to see if he had failed it.


    Part of him already realized that the week mentioned by Gong Cheng was not how long it would take for them to digest the inheritance and reach the Pseudo Saint Realm, but instead how long it would take him to bestow the inheritance on them.


    [Emergency Quest: Don''t let the disciple surpass the master! (Complete)] [Description: During your absence from the sect, one of your disciples did the impossible and surpassed the master before he grew up. No matter what, it''s uneptable for the master to be inferior to the disciple and incapable of providing guidance. Ensure that you are capable of providing guidance to your disciple. Don''t let him lose faith in his master and begin to doubt your strength!] [Objective: Reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in cksmithing] [Timer: 1 week] [Penalty: Cultivation base will be sealed for 5 years] "Haaa¡­."


    Seeing that he had indeedpleted the emergency quest and there was still a week left, Xuan Hao could not help breathing out a sigh of relief.


    If he had ended up failing the quest and had his cultivation base sealed while in the process of digesting the inheritance, he really had no idea how he would react¡­


    Luckily my soul is stronger than an ordinary Earth Immortal, making it far easier and faster to absorb information.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while looking towards Yi Min who was still fully absorbed in digesting the information contained in the inheritance, Xuan Hao decided to close his eyes and sort out the new information while waiting for Yi Min to finish digesting the inheritance.


    Even if it would at least take her a few months considering the difference in strength between them, Xuan Hao was not worried about anything happening to the Star Shattering Sect. After all, he had already made sure that there wouldn''t be any threat from the Frozen Wastnd in his absence, while the threat of the Earth Immortal from the Heavenly Dragon Temple should still be a few years away from showing up¡­


    As time continued to pass with Xuan Hao going through the information in the inheritance while Yi Min was still in the process of absorbing the inheritance, Xuan Hao discovered that outside of just containing a path for guiding them to reach the Saint Realm, the inheritance also contained a lot of blueprints of different artifacts that Gong Cheng should have created in the past.


    Even if the requirement to forge some of these artifacts were far beyond what he could create with his currentprehension of the Dao of cksmithing, there was also arge number of blueprints that was within his current realm¡­ And more important than this, there was an evenrger number of blueprints suitable for those below the Grandmaster Rm.


    Although these blueprints wouldn''t be useful when it came to increasing his own understanding of the Dao of cksmithing in the future, it would undoubtedly be useful to Bai Ning and the rest of the cksmiths in the sect- Maybe it would even help some of the older cksmiths who had remained stuck at the Expert Realm or Artisan Realm progress!


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao decided to focus his attention on writing down the different lower-level blueprints instead of trying toprehend some of the more difficult to understand information contained in the inheritance¡­


    Like this, a month slowly passed. Making it the fourth month since he had left the sect in search of an opportunity to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in cksmithing.


    Rustle~


    It was at this exact moment that Yi Min slowly began showing signs of movement before her eyes slowly opened after close to two months.


    "Looks like you finally finished absorbing the inheritance."


    "Huh?" Hearing Xuan Hao suddenly call out to her, Yi Min tilted her head in confusion before turning towards him and nodding her head in response. Clearly not fully recovered from having absorbed the inheritance of Gong Cheng.


    After all,pared to Xuan Hao who had reached the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and had a soul far stronger than a normal Earth Immortal, Yi Min was still in the Soul Ascension Realm and had a far weaker soul than him.


    Even though she could also amodate the inheritance of a Saint Realm Expert, her soul had beenpletely stuffed with information and she needed some time to sort it out, thus resulting in her slow reaction speed and the somewhat dumb look that was stered all over her face as she looked at him.


    If not for the fact that he had used his divine sense to check the condition of her soul and confirmed that there hadn''t been any damage to her soul, Xuan Hao might have thought that her soul had suffered some damage after seeing the way she acted¡­


    "Ah!"


    As a few minutes passed like this, with Yi Min mindlessly staring at him as her soul recovered from therge influx of information, Yi Min suddenly let out a small scream as she looked away with an embarrassed look on her face.


    "Finally, back to normal I see, I guess the inheritance of a Saint Realm Expert is a bit hard to absorb for anyone below the Earth Immortal Realm." Chuckling slightly to himself as he said this after seeing the embarrassed reaction of Yi Min, Xuan Hao was about to continue teasing Yi Min when he noticed her staring directly at him with a strange glint in her eyes.


    For some reason, he had a feeling that it would be best for him to not tease her anymore¡­


    "Where did senior go?" Seeing that Xuan Hao decided to remain quiet, a small triumphant smile made its way to Yi Min''s lips as she asked about Gong Cheng. Not intending to respond to what Xuan Hao said.


    "If I''m not wrong, Gong Cheng should have finished the process of bestowing the inheritance a week after he started and left us alone to absorb it afterwards. From what I know, it''s been around two months since then."


    "I see¡­ Senior should be in the process of understanding his new strength somewhere inside the Blue Shore Kingdom." Muttering this to herself with a thoughtful expression on her face after hearing what Xuan Hao said, Yi Min soon turned to look up at him. "So¡­ Are we going to return to the Star Shattering Sect or wait for senior to understand and consolidate his new strength? Given how much his strength improved and the fact that he would likely also want to try out his new power as a Saint Realm cksmith, I doubt he wille out for another year or two." N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "This¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after hearing what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao suddenly realized that his n of recruiting Gong Cheng to join the Star Shattering Sect would have to wait.


    Of course, there was also the fact that Gong Cheng was now far stronger than before. Meaning that it would be harder to recruit him into the Star Shattering Sect in the short term¡­

 Chapter 1156 Departure from the Blue Shore Kingdom

    <h4>Chapter 1156 Departure from the Blue Shore Kingdom</h4>


    Concluding that it would take far too long for them to stay and wait for Gong Cheng to emerge from his secluded cultivation, Xuan Hao and Yi Min didn''t stay in the Blue Shore Kingdom for long, as they left shortly after Yi Min had managed to recover from absorbing the inheritance.


    During the process of them leaving, they didn''t see any of the other Earth Immortals of the Blue Shore Kingdom and guessed that they should be upied with guarding Gong Cheng after he entered secluded cultivation to consolidate and familiarize himself with his new power.


    In the end, the only people from the Blue Shore Kingdom that they saw while leaving was the Nascent Soul Realm and Domain Lord Realm Experts busy trying to keep arge number of cultivators below the Nascent Soul Realm from entering the Blue Shore Kingdom at the borders of the kingdom.


    Although, they weren''t always sessful due to restraining themselves and not using deadly force when dealing with the weaker cultivators. Resulting in some of the weaker cultivators managing to cross the border and enter the Blue Shore Kingdom.


    Of course, the majority of the cultivators from outside the Blue Shore Kingdom trying to enter were stopped at the border without even being able to enter. Blocked by the powerful domains of some of the Domain Lords at the border or sent flying into the distance by a Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    As for the ones who managed to sessfully enter the Blue Shore Kingdom¡­ They didn''t stay for long, as a group of Nascent Soul Realm Experts roaming the area close to the border would soon find them and kick them out of the Blue Shore Kingdom.


    However, even with all of this happening and the fact that they would at most be able to stay inside the Blue Shore Kingdom for a few days, the weaker cultivators from outside the Blue Shore Kingdom kept trying to enter.


    The reason for this was rather simple, as Xuan Hao and Yi Min both noticed some of them breaking through to higher realms while leaving the Blue Shore Kingdom. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Due to deste state of the environment outside the Blue Shore Kingdom, just a day or two inside the Blue Shore Kingdom where the qi between heaven and earth was abundant, would give them a chance to breakthrough their limits and increase their cultivation realm in a short period of time. An opportunity that none of the Core Formation Realm Experts already stagnant in their realm could give up on, as they finally seemed to see a chance to surpass the Core Formation Realm. Especially so after meeting the powerful cultivators from the Blue Shore Kingdom who had already surpassed the Core Formation Realm.


    "How odd¡­"


    As Xuan Hao cast onest nce towards the Blue Shore Kingdom and the struggle taking ce at the borders of the kingdom, he could not help muttering this to himself as he watched a few old Core Formation Realm cultivators being sent flying into the distance by a Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Blue Shore Kingdom.


    The main he found odd about the situation was the fact that the cultivators from the Blue Shore Kingdom didn''t kill the people trying to rush into their kingdom and merely threw them out, then again, considering the situation of the area around the Blue Shore Kingdom, it could be that they pitied these people and thus allowed them a chance to enter the Blue Shore Kingdom without killing them.


    Of course, this situation would notst forever and the Blue Shore Kingdom would undoubtedly start enforcing its borders again in the future, but¡­ At least for now, it looked like the people at the edge of the continent had a chance to possibly ovee the limits of the deste qi by entering the Blue Shore Kingdom.


    Maybe it might even give birth to the first Nascent Soul Realm Expert that could then start helping create a rudimentary qi gathering formation to start enhancing the overall strength of the deste edge of the continent.


    Naturally, this would be far off in the future and was not something that would happen in a few years¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about the possible future of the deste edge of the continent, Xuan Hao soon turned away from the Blue Shore Kingdom before once again picking up Yi Min-


    "Hiii!?


    Who ended up letting out a rather surprised yelp before realizing what was happening, causing no small amount of embarrassment as she did her best to pretend nothing happened while staring at the ground now rapidly passing by below them, while they began making their way back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    ¡­


    "They left¡­?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao and YI Min made their way out the forge and left the Blue Shore Kingdom, one of the three Earth Immortal Realm cultivators who had been put in charge of watching over them in case they tried something while Gong Cheng was not around, let out a sigh of relief as he watched the two disappear.


    Even if he and the other two Earth Immortals felt confident that Xuan Hao and Yi Min wouldn''t do something considering how well Gong Cheng took care of them, they still worried about them possibly being spies sent by one of the major powers hunting them down and took measures to ensure that nothing could happen.


    After all, even if Gong Cheng trusted the two and everything seemed fine on the surface, it would always be better to make sure that nothing ended up happening. Especially considering that the feeling Xuan Hao gave the three of them was rather strange.


    Although he seemed like he was in the Earth Immortal Realm, it also felt like he wasn''t in the Earth Immortal Realm, a strange feeling that caused the three of them to guess that Xuan Hao wasn''t revealing his true cultivation realm and had instead been hiding it since he arrived at the Blue Shore Kingdom¡­ And for him to be capable of hiding his cultivation base from them meant that he would at least be someone inter stages of the Earth Immortal Realm. Possibly even the Half Bloom Stage! This was also the reason why some of the three guessed that the Half Bloom cultivation base they had felt a few months earlier was Xuan Hao instead of Gong Cheng.


    However, in the end, everything ended up turning out well and Gong Cheng even reached the Half Bloom Stage. Making the Blue Shore Kingdom safe even if the people from the different major powers learnt about their existence.


    At the same time, it also somewhat confirmed that Xuan Hao and Yi Min shouldn''t be spies belonging to the different major powers. After all, if they were spies from these major powers, there was no way they would allow Gong Cheng to breakthrough, but at the same time, it might also be because they were too weak to interfere and decided against it¡­


    "As long as they leave, it''s good¡­ Too many strangers are never a good thing¡­" Muttering this to himself as he kept his attention focused on the direction Xuan Hao and Yi Min had left until their auras disappeared, the Earth Immortal Realm cultivator got up and left in the direction of the main pce where Gong Cheng and the other two Earth Immortals were currently located.


    Although Gong Cheng hadn''t told them anything about what had happened inside the forge and how he had managed to suddenly increase his cultivation base by so much. Instead, directly returning to his pce before shutting off all contact with the outside world, the three Earth Immortals of the Blue Shore Kingdom didn''t feel offended by this and instead felt like it was an expected oue.


    After all, in their eyes, Gong Cheng had just gone from the early stages of the Earth Immortal Realm to the Half Bloom Stage in a single step. For him to rush into secluded cultivation for an extended period of time without having time to talk to them was understandable.


    The only thing they found weird was the fact that he had decided to stay in the forge for a week after he broke through instead of going directly into secluded cultivation to stabilize his cultivation base and familiarize himself with his new strength, but none of them dared to ask about this for now.


    Instead of this, they all gave up on their own cultivation and focused their full attention on guarding Gong Cheng while he was in secluded cultivation, as they understood that this was his weakest point in time and any interruption might end up causing permanent damage, something they wanted to avoid at all costs!


    None of them were willing to give up the protection provided by a Half Bloom Stage Earth Immortal, as it would essentially guarantee their safety in the future when faced with the people from the major powers.


    Of course, excluding the Celestial Immortals, but they didn''t think experts like that would bother toe all the way to the deste edge of the continent to try and deal with them. Especially considering they had the Frozen Wastnd blocking the way¡­


    Wah~ Blue Shore Kingdom mini act done for now~

 Chapter 1157 Gathering Storm at the Iron Sky Border

    <h4>Chapter 1157 Gathering Storm at the Iron Sky Border</h4>


    -At the same time Xuan Hao and Yi Min were making their way back towards the Star Shattering Sect after a rather sessfully journey to the Blue Shore Kingdom, arge number of cultivators had started gathering at the borders of the Iron Sky Kingdom. All of them covered in armor from head to toe with an identical symbol covering the chest part of the armor.


    Even if they remained quiet without saying anything, it was obvious that they had note with good intentions in mind. Especially so considering that a few of the cultivators in the back had begun preparing a rather well-known formation specialized in breaking other formations.


    "S-someone! Inform the capital!"


    "Y-yes!"


    Of course, seeing this happening, the border guards located in the different towers around the Iron Sky Kingdom wasted no time in sending word back to the capital city. Understanding very well that they had no way to deal with therge number of cultivators that had gathered outside the border.


    The main reason for this was that outside of being rather intimidating, therge number of cultivators outside the border were by no means weak, with most of the normal soldiers having reached the Core Formation Realm, while there was nock of Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    Looking more closely, a few Domain Lord Realm Experts could even be spotted among the cultivators. Far from what a few border guards who had at most reached the Nascent Soul Realm could deal with.


    In the end, information about the impending attack soon reached the capital city and ended up in the hands of the muscr Domain Lord Realm Expert that Yi Min had left in charge of the kingdom during her absence.


    "This is¡­ Did one of those empires finally decide to try and invade us?" Muttering this to himself as he went over the information, the muscr Domain Lord did not take long to realize that therge number of cultivators outside the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom should belong to one of the empires in the process of invading the Sky Empire.


    Although he and Yi Min had already expected this to happen at some point in time considering that the Iron Sky Kingdom was sitting on one of the biggest- if not the biggest spiritual metal mine in the Sky Empire, they had not expected it to happen so fast.


    After all, the empires invading the Sky Empire had yet to sessfully enter the true core of the Sky Empire where the capital and their most precious spirit stone mines and other resources were located.


    Even if they wanted to deal with the Iron Sky Kingdom and seize the spiritual stone mine there, they should not want to recklessly fall out with Yi Min after she managed to reach the Soul Ascension Realm, as that would only end up making it harder for them to destroy the Sky Empire if she ended up joining the side of the different Soul Ascension Realm Experts now in control of the Sky Empire''s capital. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "My master is still not back¡­" Muttering this to himself as he tried to pierce together why one of the empires would suddenly decide to attack the Iron Sky Kingdom, the muscr Domain Lord suddenly realized that his master was still not back. Should¡­ Should I go to the rabbit for help¡­?


    Thinking this to himself as he unconsciously looked towards the main pce that had been off limits to anyone other than him for the past few months, the muscr Domain Lord towering more than two meters above the ground could not help shivering as he remembered hisst encounter with a certain cute looking rabbit.


    The encounter in question happened a little over a month ago when he discovered that he had forgotten an important document in the main pce. Back then, he had not thought much about it and had made his way back into the main pce to recover the document. Unaware of the fact that he would end up running into the rabbit demon beast and the squirrel roaming around the hallways of the pce¡­


    "Haaa¡­"


    Taking a deep breath to forcibly calm himself down, the muscr man hesitated for a short moment before making his way towards the main pce. Silently praying that the rabbit demon beast wouldn''t do anything to him this time around.


    "Squeak!"


    Unfortunately, the moment he stepped inside the main pce, he was met with the rabbit demon beast who had already sensed himing.


    "S-senior, s-someone has a-appeared at the border a-and it looks like they are a-about to attack, I- we hope that s-senior can take action and d-deal with them!" Doing his absolute best to fight off the fear that was welling up inside of him upon seeing the familiar look in the eyes of the rabbit demon beast and the squirrel following behind it, the muscr man did his best to ask for help. Ignoring the part of him that wanted nothing more than to turn around and run away from the rabbit demon beast.


    "Squeak?"


    Unaware of the thoughts passing through the head of the terrified giant of a man, the rabbit demon beast cutely tilted its head after hearing what he said before using its divine sense to personally investigate the situation at the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom-


    "Squeak!"


    And sure enough, it soon discovered therge number of cultivators gathered outside the border, but more important than that, there was at least three people in the Soul Ascension Realm present, with one of them even reaching the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Only a single minor realm below itself!


    Given the strength of the attackers, it was indeed understandable that the chew toy in front of it had decided to seek it out for help.


    "Squeak¡­ Squeak, squeak~!"


    Knowing that it would have to deal with the group of people by itself, the rabbit demon beast turned around and informed the squirrel about the situation without a single hint of worry before jumping out of a nearby window in the direction of the border where therge number of cultivators had gathered.


    Even if there was three Soul Ascension Realm Expert, one of them only a single minor realm below it, the rabbit demon beast didn''t feel the slightest bit worried about losing the battle.


    The reason for this was simple, as the rabbit demon beast didn''t view those stronger than itself as an equal, let alone someone whose cultivation realm was below it!


    ¡­


    "So, this is the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­ I heard quite a bit about the formation in ce and I must say, it''s far stronger than I expected. Even without the support of a Soul Ascension Realm Expert, it would still be more than strong enough to defend against someone in the Soul Ascension Realm¡­"


    Standing at the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom behind therge number of cultivators prepared to rush into the Iron Sky Kingdom the moment the formation was destroyed, a middle-aged man frowned to himself as he gazed over at the formation that covered the entire Iron Sky Kingdom. Although the formation had not yet activated and was still in a dormant state, it would undoubtedly activate by itself the moment it sensed them getting too close. "Are you sure that Yi Min left?" Turning away from the formation towards an old man standing a few meters behind him, the middle-aged man narrowed both of his eyes.


    "Yes, yes! I''m sure she left! Sealing off the main pce should just be an excuse from that old servant of hers, hehe, I hope the lord will reward this little one ording to the agreement after the fall of the Iron Sky Kingdom." Nodding his head excitedly as he said this, the old man moved a bit closer after mentioning the reward while a greedy expression made its way to his face.


    "Sure, as long as what you said is urate, I will provide what we agreed on." Showing a disgusted expression after seeing the greedy expression on the old man''s face, the middle-aged man didn''t bother looking at him after hearing what he said.


    As long as Yi Min wasn''t in the Iron Sky Kingdom, it would only be a matter of time for them to destroy the guardian formation of the kingdom with three Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    Yi Min returning and bing their enemies after finding out what happened didn''t really matter in the eyes of the middle-aged man. After all, he had long since set his sight on the spiritual metal mines of the Iron Sky Kingdom and nned to take control of the kingdom at some point in time.


    The reason why he decided to do it now of all times was simply because he was informed that Yi Min was currently not in the Iron Sky Kingdom, and he was more than happy to take the opportunity and destroy her priced formation while she was gone and not have to deal with it while she was in control of it.


    "Everyone! Attack!"


    Not a secondter, therge number of cultivators outside the Iron Sky Kingdom began their attack¡­

 Chapter 1158 Cotton Ball Chaos at the Border

    <h4>Chapter 1158 Cotton Ball Chaos at the Border</h4>


    "Squeak?" Arriving on top of one of the towers acting as part of the formation guarding the Iron Sky Kingdom just as the cultivators outside began showing signs of attacking, the rabbit demon beast could not help tilting its head in confusion while looking down at them. Not understanding why these humans had suddenly decided to attack the Iron Sky Kingdom all of a sudden. Especially considering that most of the humans were only in the Core Formation Realm with a few of them being in the Nascent Soul and Domain Lord Realm.


    "Attack!"


    Hearing a loud roar from the back of the charging humans just at this moment, the rabbit demon beast could not help narrowing its eyes as it spotted a middle-aged man standing in the back with a confident expression on his face whilemanding the weaker humans to attack the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Of course, the thing that caught the rabbit demon beat''s attention was not the fact that the middle-aged man was signaling for the weaker humans to attack, but because he was one of three Soul Ascension Realm Experts that it had spotted earlier when it had used its divine sense to check out the situation at the border for itself.


    Even if the human was weak in the eyes of the rabbit demon beast, it still understood that he was far too strong for the chew toy or any of the other humans in the Iron Sky Kingdom to deal with.


    "Squeak!"


    Swish-!


    For this reason, the rabbit demon beast didn''t waste any time after seeing the middle-aged man and directly jumped towards. Intending to end things as fast as possible so it could get back to enjoying spirit stones back in thergefy beds of the main pce. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Huh?"


    As a result, the middle-aged man in the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm had no time to react before two very soft looking rabbit feet appeared directly in front of him-


    Smack!


    Crack-!


    Soon making direct contact with his face. Sending him straight into the ground, creating a crater thousands of meters across.


    "Wha-!?"


    "General!" "Boss!"


    Seeing theirmander being smacked into the ground, the cultivators charging forward froze on the spot before anxiously calling out to him. Not understanding what had just happened.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    However, before they had time to find out where theirmander had gone, the loud sound of fighting echoed out beneath them before the ground below their feet started cracking apart. Revealing arge underground cavern beneath them where theirmander was engaged in a battle with what looked like a small cotton ball- Or to be more urate, theirmander was currently in the process of being beaten up by the small fluffy looking cotton ball.


    ""General!"" Seeing this situation, the two remaining Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had only gone through a single tribtion finally reacted as they jumped into the underground cavern to help their general.


    "Squeak!"


    Unfortunately for them, the rabbit demon beast didn''t feel the slightest bit afraid when it noticed the two joining the fight. Instead, it decided to use all of its strength to deal with them. Soon disying a speed beyond what it had used to outrun a group of Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts in the past.


    "This¡­ What realm is this demon beast- "


    Bang!


    Seeing the terrifying speed of the rabbit demon beast, the general had no time to finish his sentence before the familiar feeling of the rabbit demon beast''s feet on his face interrupted him, while at the same time sending him flying into one of his two subordinates rushing over to help.


    "Ugh!"


    Being directly hit by his general''s body, the subordinate in question had no time to react as he was knocked into the wall of the cavern before finding himself fighting off the powerful qi from the rabbit demon beast that had been contained in the earlier attack.


    Although he wasn''t the one being targeted by the attack, his general had tried to reflect most of the qi when he had been hit by the rabbit demon beast, thus resulting in most of the qi from the attack ending up on him.


    A truly unfortunate oue, as he had no way to fight against the terrifying qi of the rabbit demon beast and could only try his best to resist it and wait for the qi to naturally disperse.


    Whoosh-!


    At the same time, the rabbit demon beast wasted no time in rushing towards the second Soul Ascension Realm Expert who had rushed into the cavern to try and help out the general.


    "Wha-"


    BANG!


    Giving him no time to react, as it used all of its strength to smash headfirst into the man. Sending him into the ceiling of the underground cavern, causingrge cracks to spread in all directions before the entire ceiling.


    Rumble~!


    By the time that the general and the other Soul Ascension Realm Expert managed to recover, the underground cavern had already started copsing in on itself, while the Soul Ascension Realm Expert who had been unlucky enough to face the full power of the rabbit demon beast had already died. His lifeless body slowly fell down from the cave ceiling before being buried beneath the rocks and dirt from the copsing cave.


    "Ah!? The ground is disappearing!?"


    "What is happening!?"


    "Help! I can''t die like this!"


    "No! Help me!"


    At the same time aboveground, therge number of cultivators who had essentially frozen on the spot in reaction to the disappearance of theirmander and the subsequent cracks in the ground revealing themander in question engulfed in battle with what could only be described as a cotton ball, were rudely awoken by the ground beneath them suddenly disappearing.


    Even though the weakest among them had reached the Core Formation Realm, they couldn''t survive falling from any height and the height of the cavern just so happened to be within the parameters that would end up killing most Core Formation Realm Experts¡­


    Swish-!


    Not paying any attention to the fearful screams of the cultivators above, the rabbit demon beast turned around and dashed towards the two remaining Soul Ascension Realm Experts. Not intending to give them a chance to realize how bad their current situation was and give them a chance to escape.


    Although the rabbit demon beast was confident in being able to chase them down, it was also understood that this would take a long time. Especially considering that one of the two humans left happened to have reached the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Catching him would at least take another minute or two!


    BOOOOOOM-!


    As a result, a terrifying explosion soon echoed out inside the already crumbling cavern as the rabbit demon beast decided to use all of its strength to attack the middle-aged man and his subordinate. Taking full advantage of its terrifying speed to reach both of them before they had the time to put up a proper defense. Killing them without giving them a chance to try and run away.


    "Squeak~!"


    Confirming that all of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts were dead, the rabbit demon beast didn''t bother with the rest of the cultivators now trying their best not to fall into the cavern that had opened up beneath them-


    Whoosh~!


    Leaving the ce before any of them had the time to realize that theirmander and the two most powerful experts outside of him had perished to the rabbit demon beast¡­


    "This! Th-themander!"


    "No- How is this possible!?"


    By the time they discovered the dead bodies of theirmander and the other two Soul Ascension Realm Experts, the rabbit demon beast had already returned to the main pce in the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom to enjoy its spirit stones in peace.


    In the end, the losses that the empire behind this group of cultivators experienced were enormous.


    Not to mention the fact that they ended up losing three Soul Ascension Realm Experts, one of them even having reached the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, they also ended up losing close to ten thousand Core Formation Realm Experts.


    Although Core Formation Realm Experts weren''t normally worth that much, the number that ended up dying still caused a significant loss. After all, it wasn''t free to nurture a Core Formation Realm Expert. Not to mention, the Core Formation Realm Experts present for the invasion of the Iron Sky Kingdom were all part of the empire''s talented younger generation and had potential to go far beyond the Core Formation.


    Of course, outside of therge number of Core Formation Realm Experts who ended up dying during the battle between the rabbit demon beast and the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts, there was also another unfortunate victim, who just happened to be the old man that had informed the middle-aged man about the fact that Yi Min wasn''t in the Iron Sky Kingdom at the moment¡­

 Chapter 1159 Return through the Frozen Wasteland

    <h4>Chapter 1159 Return through the Frozen Wastnd</h4>


    Not long after the rabbit demon beast returned to the main pce and resumed itszy lifestyle centered around eating spirit stones, the muscr domain lord and the rest of the Iron Sky Kingdom learnt about what had happened at the border. Of course, the information that came back was just about how the invading forces had been decimated and sent running. Not anything about who was behind the entire thing, causing everyone except the muscr domain to think that Yi Min was one behind the death of the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the invading forces. Resulting in all of them feeling a profound sense of fear whenever they looked towards the main pce at the center of the capital.


    At the same time, news about the sudden disappearance of a certain prominent family''s old ancestor also spread began spreading through the capital, but that news didn''t end up causing any waves as everyone was far more focused on the fact that Yi Min had the strength to kill three Soul Ascension Realm Expert.


    In the end, the situation in the capital continued to be restless for the next few weeks. However, none of this affected the rabbit demon beast as it happily continued eating the spirit stones that its master had given it on top of one of therge fluffy beds in the main pce while the squirrel was sitting on the ground next to the bed. Fully focused on increasing its strength. Only peeking up towards the rabbit demon beast every now and then with a hungry expression on its face. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even if it understood that there was no way that the rabbit demon beast would hand over any of the spirit stones, it didn''t stop the squirrel from dreaming about the day where it could get its own interspatial ring filled with spirit stones-


    Swoosh~


    And it was with this in mind that the squirrel managed to seamlessly break through another minor realm in the Nascent Soul Realm. Getting it one step closer to the Domain Lord Ream and its dream of owning an interspatial ring filled to the brim with spirit stones.


    "Squeak?"


    Noticing the squirrel''s breakthrough, the rabbit demon beast lifted its head in surprise. Not having expected the squirrel to break through a minor realm in such a short period of time.


    "Squeak¡­"


    Thinking about something for a few minutes as it gazed down at the now happy squirrel below it, the rabbit demon beast hesitated for a good minute before taking out a spirit stone before throwing it to the squirrel that let out an overjoyed squealing sound in response.


    Even if it didn''t want to hand over its spirit stones to the squirrel, it understood that it should reward its little follower.


    Chomp~ Chomp~


    Lost in its own thoughts while looking down at the squirrel happily eating the spirit stone, the rabbit demon beast could not help feeling a tinge of regret before it turned its attention back towards eating spirit stones on its own. Trying its best to pretend like the squirrel wasn''t there and it couldn''t hear it chewing through the spirit stone.


    ¡­


    "Back here again¡­" Muttering this to himself as they once again found themselves in front of the Frozen Wastnd, Xuan Hao could not help hesitating as he remembered the terrifying divine sense that had swept over them thest time, they had passed through the Frozen Wastnd to reach the Blue Shore Kingdom.


    Even without meeting the other party, it was clear that he or she should have reached the Celestial Immortal Realm or whatever was the demonic cultivators equivalent to the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Of course, with this in mind, Xuan Hao wasn''t too thrilled about having to pass through the Frozen Wastnd again, as he and Yi Min would inevitably run the risk of attracting the attention of the powerful expert that had spotted them thest time around. The only difference being the fact that the other party now had some clue as to his mastery of the Dao of Space. Meaning there was a chance that certain restrictions had been put in ce along the path they had travelled on to reach the deste edge of the continent.


    "Is something wrong?"


    "No, it''s nothing¡­" Hearing Yi Min calling out to them after they had remained in front of the border separating the Frozen Wastnd and the deste edge of the continent for a few minutes without moving, Xuan Hao shook his head before nervously proceeding to enter the Frozen Wastnd together with Yi Min.


    No matter how much he wanted to avoid the Frozen Wastnds, he also understood that the only way for them to reach the Star Shattering Sect was by passing through the Frozen Wastnd.


    Well¡­ There were other methods to reach the Star Shattering Sect, but the time it would take, even with his mastery over the Dao of Space, would be far too long. After all, to avoid the Frozen Wastnd, they had to go around it and pass through countless small and big empires on their way back to the Star Shattering Sect... And that is not mentioning the potential dangers that woulde along with exploring a brand-new region that neither he nor Yi Min had any knowledge on.


    Not to mention, they might still end up running into a Celestial Immortal by trying to avoid the Frozen Wastnd, as some of the kingdoms and empires they had to pass through could did have Celestial Immortal Realm Experts watching over them.


    At least by going through the Frozen Wastnd, the number of powerful demonic cultivators that they might end up encountering would be far lower¡­


    Swoosh~!


    Not intending to spend longer than necessary inside the Frozen Wastnd after they had once again stepped inside of it, Xuan Hao decided to use all of his strength from the start to twist the space around him and rapidly teleport across the Frozen Wastnd together with Yi Min. Not caring the slightest bit about the massive amount of qi that was drained with each step he took.


    Even if he would end up exhausted by the end and had to spend a few days focused on recovering instead of increasing his cultivating, Xuan Hao felt that it would be worth it if he and Yi Min could get out of the Frozen Wastnd safely¡­.


    Luckily for both of them, their journey back through the Frozen Wastnd went by without any major problems.


    The most troublesome thing they ended up encountering was a group of demonic cultivators heading towards the core region of the Frozen Wastnd. Among these demonic cultivators was one that had reached the Demon Lord Realm, the demonic cultivators equivalent to the Earth Immortal Realm.


    However, although he did notice Xuan Hao and Yi Min, he only made sure that they didn''t attack him and the rest of the demonic cultivators before resuming his journey towards the core of the Frozen Wastnd.


    ording to what little information that they managed to overhear from conversations between the rest of the demonic cultivators who hadn''t noticed them while passing through, they managed to learn that a group of powerful demonic cultivators had called for all of the demonic cultivators in the Demon Lord Realm to gather together with their subordinates.


    Like any normal cultivator, learning about this, both Xuan Hao and Yi Min became rather anxious after learning about this. After all, the Star Shattering Sect and the Iron Sky Kingdom were located close to the borders of the Frozen Wastnds. No matter what reason the demonic cultivators had for suddenly gathering together like this, both of them understood that it wouldn''t be anything good.


    On the positive side, it might be because of this sudden gathering of demonic cultivators in the core of the Frozen Wastnd that they were able to smoothly pass through the Frozen Wastnd without encountering any problems¡­


    "Finally, back¡­"


    "Indeed, I didn''t expect the journey to take such a long time, but at least both of us managed to gain quite a bit on this journey."


    "Yes¡­ I really can''t thank you enough for this opportunity. Not only did I reach the Grandmaster Realm, but I even had the chance to obtain the inheritance of a newly promoted Saint Realm cksmith because of y-"


    "No need to worry about it, we should head back to your kingdom for now and see how things are going. After all, even if I trust the little rabbit in protecting your kingdom, I doubt it will be kind to your pce¡­" Interrupting Yi Min before she had a chance to finish her sentence, Xuan Hao suddenly had a somewhat foreboding feeling as he remembered the rabbit demon beast currently in charge of protecting the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "This¡­ Sure¡­" Narrowing both her eyes for a brief moment after being interrupted, Yi Min let out a quiet sigh as she nodded her head in agreement.


    Even if she wanted to find a way to thank Xuan Hao for the opportunity to reach the Half Saint Realm, she was indeed a bit worried about her kingdom after being reminded that the sole protecter of her kingdom at the moment was a small cute looking rabbit¡­

 Chapter 1160 Expansion Plans

    <h4>Chapter 1160 Expansion ns</h4>


    "Hm¡­ Given Yi Min not being willing to join the Star Shattering Sect for now, I think its about time to look for other direction to expand the Star Shattering Sect¡­"


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song frowned to himself as he muttered this while staring down at a report about the recent expansion of one of the independent sects. More specifically, it was the independent sect that had taken over a kingdom close to the Iron Sky Kingdom and the report stated that this independent sect had just recently expanded its territory all the way up to the Iron Sky Kingdom and couldn''t expand any more without going into the territory of the Iron Sky Kingdom or expanding outside the boundaries of the outer region of the Sky Empire that they were currently in.


    If the Star Shattering Sect wanted to continue expanding, it had only three choices. The first being to expand in the direction of the Iron Sky Kingdom, something Elder Song had already begun trying to do by convincing Yi Min to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    Second, the Star Shattering Sect could try to expand in the direction of the Frozen Wastnds. Although¡­ Considering the fact that there were likely demonic cultivatorsparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm, it was unlikely that this would happen in the near future. Especially considering that the cultivation environment of the Frozen Wastnd was unsuitable for most normal cultivators and would only really be useful for thoseprehending a dao rted to ice or demonic cultivators.


    Finally, the third option that had already been considered by Elder Song was to expand in the direction of the rest of the Sky Empire''s outer regions instead of trying to expand into the core region of the Sky Empire. The only problem with doing this was that most of these outer regions had already ended up falling under the control of the invading empires with only a few of them still managing to not be attacked due the resources present in those regions being far too spares for the invading empires to care or them bordering certain dangerous regions.


    An example of a territory bordering a dangerous region would be the Star Shattering Sect, as it and the regions bordering it had been left alone by the invading empires due to most of the Domain Lord Realm Experts stationed in these regions not participating in the war and were instead focused on preventing demonic cultivators from invading the Sky Empire.


    Of course, there was no way for them to know about the fact that Xuan Hao had already sealed off the path for demonic cultivators trying to enter the Sky Empire, while at the same time, the Domain Lord Realm Experts stationed along the Frozen Wastnd had no intention of this news spreading out. After all, if the invading empires learnt about the Frozen Wastnd no longer being a threat, they would undoubtedlye to kill them.


    "The Sky Empire has a total of eight outer regions, one of the two bordering us also borders the Frozen Wastnd and has been left alone, while the other only partially borders the Frozen Wastnd and has mostly fallen under the control of the Onyx Empire after the invasion began¡­" Muttering this to himself as he went over the situation of the two outer regions of the Sky Empire that bordered the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song made a choice as he quickly picked up a piece of paper and began writing up the order that would be send to the elders he had put in charge of expanding the sect''s territory.


    The next target for expansion had been decided, it would be the outer region that had a simrlyrge border with the Frozen Wastnd as the Star Shattering Sect had and had as a result been left alone by the different invading empires.


    Although the region was far worse in terms of the resources present, Elder Song felt that it was still too early for the Star Shattering Sect to start making enemies with a powerful empire like the Onyx Empire. Not only that, but he also saw the benefit in expanding into the outer region that had be increasingly chaotic following the invasion of the Sky Empire.


    Compared to expanding into a region controlled by the Onyx Empire, it would be far easier to control a chaotic region that didn''t have any major power behind it and was just a gathering of countless smaller forces fighting for resources and a safe ce.


    ording to what Elder Song had learnt from investigating the two regions bordering the Star Shattering Sect, the Domain Lord Realm Experts in charge of guarding the border with the Frozen Wastnd in the region did not participate in this battle for resources, as they were far more worried about potentially catching the attention of the invading empires by doing something like this.


    Instead, they had decided to gather together in a city close to the Frozen Wastnd to feel safer in case someone from any of the invading empires ended up appearing¡­


    Rustle~


    Finishing the order that included detailed ns on how to begin expanding into the outer region in question in a few hours, Elder Song looked through it onest time before standing up and making his way out of the room in the direction of Feng Chen''s courtyard.


    Even though he had been given the power to send out orders like that by himself, he still preferred to get such arge and influential order approved by Feng Chen before sending it out. After all, it would affect the number of elders present in the sect to teach the younger disciples, suppress stronger demon beasts and powerful cultivators causing trouble inside the territory of the sect over the next few years.


    "Elder Song? Is something the matte?"


    Sensing Elder Song entering his courtyard through his divine sense, Feng Chen came out almost the same instance he stepped through the entrance to the courtyard. The main reason for him rushing out this being that Elder Song wouldn''te find him unless there was something important.


    "Feng Chen, it''s like this¡­"


    Seeing Feng Chen, Elder Song didn''t waste any time as he handed over the order he had just finished writing up before starting to exin it to Feng Chen. Also including his reason as to why he had decided on the different ns on how to expand written down in the order itself.


    "This¡­ You don''t have to worry about it, I think the sect will be alright even if a few elders end up leaving. After all, during the past few years, a few of the older disciples already managed to promote to elders and took over some of the burden ced on the older elders."


    "Burden?! Hmph! If they work more than two days in a row, that will be a miracle!"


    "Elder Song¡­ They also need time to cultivate-"


    "I understand, I will proceed ording to the n I wrote down and use some of the older elders so the younger ones can get more opportunities to teach the younger ones. At least this way they will have a proper way to contribute to the sect and won''t set a bad example for the new elders!"


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as Elder Song interrupted him before he had time to finish talking, Feng Chen could not help smiling wryly as he watched Elder Song stomp off in the direction of the tea pavilion, a rather famous location for the older elders of the sect to hang out and chat with each other.


    For obvious reasons, he could not help feeling a hint of pity towards the older elders currently gathered at the tea pavilion happily chatting with each other. ¡­


    At the same time, heading directly for the Iron Sky Kingdom after they had made their way through the Frozen Wastnd, it did not take long before Xuan Hao and Yi Min found themselves at the borders between the Iron Sky Kingdom and one of the independent sect''s now under the Star Shattering Sect''s protection. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    From the looks of things, during the few months that both of them had been gone, the Star Shattering Sect had managed to close the distance between them and the iron Sky Kingdom. Officially taking control over a section of the Sky Empire''s outer region where Yi Min had been the most powerful person around in the past.


    "This is-"


    "Where did that giant hole in the grounde from¡­?"


    However, the thing that caught their attention was not this, but instead a giant hole in the ground half the size of the Iron Sky Kingdom that had appeared on the opposite side of the kingdom where its borders met the core region of the Sky Empire.


    ""¡­""


    Looking at each other after their initial shock had subsided, both of them could not help wondering where such arge hole had appeared from during the few months they had been in the Blue Shore Kingdom¡­

 Chapter 1161 Back in the Iron Sky Kingdom

    <h4>Chapter 1161 Back in the Iron Sky Kingdom</h4>


    Although the hole in question was not located directly in front of them and was on the opposite side of the Iron Sky Kingdom where the core region of the Sky Empire began, it was not hard to spot when their divine sense swept over the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "Did an underground cave copse?"


    As her divine sense swept over the enormous hole in the ground that had ended up forming a natural barrier between her kingdom and the core region of the Sky Empire, Yi Min could not help wondering out loud about what had happened.


    Even though arge number of Core Formation Realm Experts had ended up dying when falling into the copsed cavern, Yi Min didn''t see any of them through her divine sense due to focusing most of her attention on the formation towers located close to the hole. Making sure that none of them had been damaged or grown unstable when the ground had copsed.


    Xuan Hao on the other hand, didn''t pay much attention to the formation towers and soon managed to spot the countless dead bodies inside the hole that covered an area close to half the size of the Iron Sky Kingdom. Hm? This is¡­ Observing the dead bodies more closely, it did not take long for him to realize that even the weakest among them had reached the Core Formation Realm, while the strongest was someone in the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Of course, after seeing the dead bodies of three Soul Ascension Realm, it didn''t take much to guess what had ended up happening¡­ "Yi Min, it looks like someone tried to invade your kingdom while we were gone."


    "Huh?! Wait- Ah!"


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said while she was still in the process of examining the formation towers closest to the abnormallyrge hole for any damage, Yi Min''s expression soon changed into one of shock as she used her divine sense to check out the situation inside the hole herself.


    "I never expected someone to attack during the short time I was gone¡­ And with three Soul Ascension Realm Experts no less¡­" Saying this as she stared in the direction of the hole, Yi Min slowly turned back to Xuan Hao. "Not to mention, I didn''t expect the rabbit demon beast you brought to be strong enough to kill off three Soul Ascension Realm Experts!"


    Hearing this, Xuan Hao could only smile awkwardly, he had not expected the rabbit demon beast to be strong enough to kill three Soul Ascension Realm Experts either. Not to mention, one of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts had reached the Third Tribtion, being only a single minor realm below the rabbit demon beast.


    I think I should reevaluate the strength of the rabbit demon beast, it was after all strong enough to escape the pursuit of a group of Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast back when I first encountered it. Maybe it''s powerful in more than just speed.


    Thinking this to himself as he turned his attention towards the main pce of the Iron Sky Kingdom where he had sensed the presence of the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao decided to pay more attention to the rabbit demon beast in the future. Intending to try and figure out what was so special about its bloodline¡­


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting too much time hovering in the air around the borders of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao and Yi Min soon made their way towards the capital after Yi Min finished checking the formation towers at the border of the core region of the Sky Empire with her divine sense.


    ¡­


    "Squeak~" A few minutes before Xuan Hao and Yi Min arrived at the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom, the rabbit demon beastzily rolled around on top of the bed inside one of therge bedrooms of the main pce. Devouring a few spirit stones as it enjoyed the peaceful time without having to do anything other than eat spirit stones to increase its cultivation. Ignoring the squirrel quietly sitting on the floor next to the bed fully absorbed in increasing its strength. Only opening its eyes every now and then to longingly gaze at the spirit stones being devoured by the rabbit demon beast.


    After it experienced the joy of eating a spirit stone together with the slight increase in strength it experienced after refining the pure qi contained inside the spirit stone, the squirrel only ended up wanting the spirit stones even more than before. Especially when considering that the spirit stones currently in the hands of the rabbit demon beast were of far higher quality than the ones it had been given back when it had first been taken in as a subordinate.


    By the standards used by human cultivators that it had listened to through its divine sense when it had taken a break from cultivation following the rabbit demon beast handing over a spirit stone, the squirrel guessed that the spirit stones possessed by the rabbit demon beast should what the humans referred to as high-grade spirit stones. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although, after learning about how rare these kind of spirit stones were from some of these humans, it could not help wondering how the rabbit demon beast''s master had managed to get his hands on so many high-grade spirit stones.


    Then again, thinking about how powerful the master of the rabbit demon beast was, it didn''t think too much about it and just thought that the humans of the Iron Sky Kingdom were too weak and thus didn''t have ess to things like high-grade spirit stones easily.


    "Squeak?!"


    Feeling a terrifying divine sense sweeping over it without any intention of staying hidden at this moment, the squirrel could not help feeling a shiver run down its spine before it turned to look at the rabbit demon beast to know if it was the one behind the terrifying divine sense and if there was another invader trying to invade the Iron Sky Kingdom-


    "SQUEAK!"


    However, different from the expression it had expected to see when it turned around to face the rabbit demon beast, the rabbit demon beast instead let out a joyful squeaking sound before cing the spirit stones on the bed into its interspatial ring that was coiled around one of its legs like a bracelet and jumping off the bed.


    Whoosh~!


    Before the squirrel even had time toprehend what was happening, the rabbit demon beast had already disappeared from the bedroom in the direction of the massive entrance to the main pce.


    "Squeak- Squeak! Squeak, squeak!?"


    What is- Wait! Don''t tell me, is the master back!?


    Suddenly realizing what might have happened after thinking about things for a few seconds, the squirrel jumped off the ground before rushing in the direction that the rabbit demon beast had disappeared in. Not daring to waste a single second after realizing that the terrifying divine sense just now might have belonged to the master of its master.


    ¡­


    Hm? Seems like both of them improved quite a bit over the past few months. Especially that squirrel¡­ Hm¡­ With its inherent aptitude for the Dao of Illusions, it shouldn''t be too hard for it to breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm in the future¡­


    Observing the situation in the main pce where the rabbit demon beast and the squirrel were currently staying while he and Yi Min approached the capital city at a leisurely pace, Xuan Hao could not help opening his eyes in surprise after noticing the significant increase in strength of the two demon beasts over the past few months.


    The squirrel had managed to improve its cultivation by one minor realm, bringing it one step closer to the Domain Lord Realm, while the rabbit demon beast was close to reaching the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Although the cultivation of the rabbit demon beast had not changedpared to the past, it''s strength had undergone a qualitive change as it had fully adapted to the strength of the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Thinking about it, the main reason for this sudden adaption and increase in strength should have been the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts who allowed the rabbit demon beast to fully utilize its strength for the first time since it had broken through to the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Unknowingly, these Soul Ascension Realm Experts had ended up bing steppingstones for the rabbit demon beast''s rise¡­


    "We are here!"


    Unaware of Xuan Hao''s thoughts, Yi Min smiled happily upon seeing the familiar walls of her capital city appearing in the distance. After four months, both of them had finally returned to the capital of the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­ And although it wasn''t that long for someone at their cultivation realm to be out travelling, it was still the longest time Yi Min had left her territory in the past hundreds of years. Outside of the time she happened to spend a few months recovering in the Star Shattering Sect¡­

 Chapter 1162 Joining the Star Shattering Sect

    <h4>Chapter 1162 Joining the Star Shattering Sect</h4>


    Spotting the rabbit demon beast standing at the entrance to the main pce waiting for him with a stern expression stered all over its face, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling silently to himself as hended on the top of the stairs leading up to the entrance of the main pce.


    If not for the fact that he had seen how the rabbit demon beast had beenzing around on one of the beds in the main pce, he might have thought that the rabbit demon beast had been working hard for the past few months to ensure that not even a random fly entered the Iron Sky Kingdom without permission, but considering that it had ended up dealing with three Soul Ascension Realm Experts, Xuan Hao decided not to call it out on its bluff as it jumped forward the moment it spotted him and Yi Min.


    "Squeak¡­"


    "Yes, you did well."


    "Squeak~!"


    Hearing Xuan Hao''s praise, the rabbit demon beast happily jumped around him with a cute and expectant expression on its face; one didn''t have to think for long to understand that the rabbit demon beast was waiting to be rewarded for doing a good job.


    "You already have enough spirit stones." Not intending to give the rabbit demon beast any more spirit stones as he very well understood that it should have more than enough left in the interspatial ring that he had handed it before leaving the Iron Sky Kingdom together with Yi Min, Xuan Hao didn''t bother ying into the rabbit demon beast''s little y


    Whoosh~!


    "Squeaaaaakk-"


    Using his qi to sweep up the rabbit demon beast and the squirrel before sending them both into his sleeve. Returning them to their little home inside the pocket space hidden in the sleeve before they had any time to react to what was happening.


    Considering the rabbit demon beast''s speed, Xuan Hao had a feeling that it would be rather annoying to catch if it ended up throwing a tantrum after not getting any spirit stones. Not that he expected it to do something like that with its pride, but one could never be too sure.


    "Huh¡­?"


    Seeing Xuan Hao casually sweep away the two demon beasts, one of which she had intended to thank for saving her kingdom during her absence, Yi Min opened her mouth with a shocked expression on her face. Not having expected him to just put away the two demon beasts before she even had a chance to say anything.


    Seeing Yi Min suddenly stand up to interrupt him as he was on his way out, Xuan Hao could not help tilting his head in confusion. Was there perhaps something that he missed during their earlier discussion?


    "Ah¡­"


    Feeling Xuan Hao''s confused gaze, Yi Min could not help awkwardly squirming her body. Even though she had prepared herself to ask him about joining the Star Shattering Sect, when faced with the gaze filled with confusion, she could not help freezing on the spot¡­


    "I-I just wanted to ask about the future rtionship between my kingdom and the Star Shattering Sect. After all, given the current state of things, I don''t think our current cooperative rtionship is going tost for much longer given the speed at which your sect is growing, and I fear that it might end up negatively impacting my kingdom." Swallowing her nervousness as she said this after a few seconds passed, Yi Min did her best to not directly say that she wanted her kingdom to join the Star Shattering Sect and instead tried her best to subtly guide Xuan Hao towards asking her about it as she had originally wanted.


    "Hm? Indeed, there might be elders who would want to expand into your kingdom in the future¡­ To solve this problem, I think it would be best to talk with Elder Song, he is far more knowledgeable in this kind of thingpared to myself. More importantly, he has a better understanding of the elders and their overall attitude towards your kingdom." Nodding his head as he said this, Xuan Hao didn''t notice the small frown that appeared on Yi Min''s face when she heard him mentioning Elder Song.


    "That is not what I wanted you to say¡­"


    "Did you say something?" "No, it''s nothing¡­"


    Feeling a hint of frustration as she saw the oblivious expression on Xuan Hao''s face, Yi Min could not help wondering if she should bring up the matter of joining the Star Shattering Sect-


    "Ah, now that I think about it" However, just as she was about to give up and open her mouth to ask him about joining the Star Shattering Sect herself, Xuan Hao suddenly seemed to remember something. "Why don''t you just join the Star Shattering Sect? That way, you won''t have to worry about any elders in the future who might want to try and expand into your kingdom, and I can help you keep full control of your kingdom after joining."


    "¡­"


    This #!$@! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not able to stop herself from cursing him inside her head after hearing his suggestion just as she opened her mouth about to speak, Yi Min could not help ring at him with a bit of resentment over how she had tried her best to make him ask her about this again and again, just for him to ask when she had resigned herself to asking about joining the Star Shattering Sect herself.


    "Hm? Is there something wrong with my suggestion?"


    "No¡­ I think it would be a great idea, I will go and inform my subordinates about it and get in touch with Elder Song!" Pouting angrily as she said this, Yi Min stomped out of the room. Leaving behind a confused Xuan Hao, who had no idea what had just transpired¡­

 Chapter 1163 Development of the Spiritual Herb Field on the Ninth Star Peak

    Standing behind for a few minutes not understanding what had happened to Yi Min, Xuan Hao soon shook his head before leaving the Iron Sky Kingdom. Concluding that something might havee up for Yi Min to act like that all of a sudden. Taking only a few minutes to cross the distance between the Star Shattering Sect and the Iron Sky Kingdom with his current speed, Xuan Hao arrived back in the Star Shattering Sect.


    "If something she is unable to deal with did end up happening, she should contact me or Elder Song for assistance. At least, considering that she and her kingdom will now be part of the Star Shattering Sect, it''s also our responsibility to ensure that nothing happens." Muttering this to himself as he nced back in the direction of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what it might be that caused Yi Min to stomp off like that. In the end, he guessed that she would be contacting him or Elder Song if it was something that she couldn''t deal with by herself.


    At the very least, considering that he didn''t sense any powerful cultivators near the Iron Sky Kingdom before leaving, he guessed that the thing that caused her reaction to be some kind of internal problem.


    Considering the fact that the people from the Onyx Empire seemed to know that she had left the Iron Sky Kingdom and decided to attack during her absence, it was not hard to see where this internal problem causing her to be angry stemmed from¡­.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao made his way through the entrance to the Star Shattering Sect located in the city that had been growing below the Ninth Star Peak.


    The city in question was recently named during the few months he had been gone for the Blue Shore Kingdom together with Yi Min. Officially taking on the name Falling Star City to keep in line with the star-based naming of the sect and the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Other than that, Xuan Hao also managed to learn that differentws had been set in ce around the matter of the disciple''s who brought their families to stay in the Falling Star City during his walk along the path leading to the Ninth Star Peak.


    Even though it was a rather short journey, and it would be difficult to learn much from just walking without using his divine sense to try and figure out what had happened, the disciples walking along the path to the Ninth star Peak were rather loud as they discussed this matter between each other.


    "How can this be?! Why would the elders decide on something like that?! Won''t I have to send my family back now!?"


    "Hehe, your family should be more than capable of living considering your elders are in the Core Formation Realm."


    "You! Leaving the Falling Star City is already bad enough, why does your family get to stay!?"


    "Hehe, because my family isn''t a cultivation family, I only have my mother, father and sister, all whom are still mortals. Not like your family that numbers in the hundreds!"


    "Hmph! Just because I have a slightlyrger family!"


    Listening to two such disciples as they made their way past him in the direction of the Falling Star City, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling to himself.


    Essentially, thews put in ce by Elder Song and the rest of the sect''s elders over the few months that he had been gone dictated that the disciples bringing their families to the Falling Star City couldn''t bring more than a few people consisting of their closest family members.


    Not only that, but there were also restrictions on how strong these family members were allowed to be. Allowing only those at the Qi Condensation Realm and below.


    After all, the idea behind allowing the disciples to bring their families to the Star Shattering Sect was mainly aimed at the formerly mortal disciples who had families in the mortal world and wanted to take care of them. Not the different cultivation families who took advantage of the opportunity to bring their entire lineage into the Falling Star City and settle down with the assistance of the Star Shattering Sect.


    In the end, this had resulted in arge part of the Falling Star City being overtaken by these massive families over the past few years, who had taken full advantage of the Star Shattering Sect giving them a ce to live for free.


    Not wanting the Falling Star City to turn into a ce controlled by these massive cultivation families, Elder Song and a few other elders had jumped in and changed thews to fit their original intent, thus resulting in the current heated discussion between the disciples who came from mortal backgrounds and those from cultivation families.


    Of course, the newws set in ce didn''t mean that these cultivation families had no way to enter and settle down inside the Falling Star City, it just meant that they would have to pay for everything themselves, something that most couldn''t afford considering that thend sold in the Falling Star City was controlled by the Star Shattering Sect and was expensive to say the least. From some of the conversation he heard on his walk up the Ninth Star Peak, most of thend sold off by the Star Shattering Sect ended up being bought by different trading firms who wanted to set up shop close to the Star Shattering Sect or different powers who at least had a Nascent Soul Realm Expert holding down the fort.


    "Hm?"


    Reaching the summit of the Ninth Star Peak where thergest spiritual herb field of the Star Shattering Sect was located, Xuan Hao could not helping to a stop with a hint of surprise in his eyes, as he focused his attention on the spiritual herbs being taken care off next to the path going over the Ninth Star Peak.


    Although he knew that the herb field had developed well due to the dense qi present in the air inside the chaotic qi formation, the quality of the spiritual herbs being grown on the Ninth Star Peak was still far beyond what he had expected. Most of them at least reached the Earth Grade, while a few in the Mystic Grade could be seen further away from the path.


    Using his divine sense to get a better picture of the overall situation of the spiritual herb field, he even managed to spot a Mystic Grade Spiritual Herb in the process of evolving to the Transcendent Grade, a quality of spiritual herb he hadn''t heard about being cultivated inside spiritual fields before and would normally only be found out in the wild.


    Of course, he didn''t think it was impossible to grow Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herbs for powerful empires like the Blue Sea Empire and just thought that he hadn''te in contact with such high-quality spiritual herb fields.


    For the spiritual herb field on the Ninth Star Peak to reach this level within a period of a few short years was surprising. Even when considering the dense qi present in the air for the spiritual herbs to absorb, there would also be the need for someone skilled in taking care of spiritual herbs¡­ And looking around the spiritual herb field on the Ninth Star Peak, it became obvious that the elders taking care of the spiritual herbs all understood what they were doing and the disciples present helping take care of the spiritual herbs were being taught by these elders.


    Looks like there is already a n in ce for nurturing skilled spiritual herb farmers¡­


    Thinking about this as he observed the elders and disciples on the Ninth Star Peak, Xuan Hao could not help feeling happy that the sect was progressing in more ways than just the strength of its disciples and elders.


    After all, spiritual herb farmers weren''t a particrly popr upation considering that it required a lot of time and effort, while not being as rewarding as a profession that would help improve the strength of one''s soul upon reaching a certain realm. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Then again, the act of caring for spiritual herbs and increasing one''s understanding of the nts might allow one toprehend a dao rted to nature in the future, it was just that it would require a long time.


    Maybe for this reason, the disciples taking care of the spiritual herb fields weren''t the most outstanding of the Star Shattering Sect, but even if their talent was on the lower end, it was obvious that they were passionate when it came to taking care of the spiritual herbs. Understanding just how important the spiritual herbs that they were helping grow were for the Star Shattering Sect.


    Shaking his head as he thought about it, Xuan Hao retracted his divine sense and continued making his way along the path through the spiritual herb fields. Feeling curious whether or not there were other things in the Star Shattering Sect that he had missed like the spiritual herb field.

 Chapter 1164 Storage Woes

    <h4>Chapter 1164 Storage Woes</h4>


    Continuing to walk along the path going through the spiritual herb fields on the summit of the Ninth Star Peak, Xuan Hao soon made his way down to the base of the Ninth Star Peak inside the chaotic qi formation.


    At the same time, it was also here that the storage buildings used for storing the spiritual herb seeds that had yet to be nted on the Ninth Star Peak and the already harvested spiritual herbs.


    For this reason alone, the number of people present at the base of the Ninth Star Peak had significantly increasedpared tost time he walked through the ce, as arge number of alchemist could be seen trying to get their hands on some of the more recently harvested spiritual herbs that had a fresher and higher qualitypared to those that had been in storage for a longer period of time.


    "Hm? Qing Yi?"


    Among therge number of alchemist present surrounding a particr storage building that seemed to have just recently been filled, Xuan Hao managed to spot his first disciple eagerly rummaging through arge number of spiritual herbs that had beenid out for the alchemist to buy with the contribution points they had managed to earn from the Grand Mission Pavilion.


    Of course, considering that Qing Yi shouldn''t have been one to leave the sect to hunt down demon beasts or bandits causing trouble in the territory of the sect, he guessed that most of her contribution points had been earned through her alchemy. Concocting different pills and potions for the disciples and elders of the sect.


    After all, even if she was his personal disciple, there wasn''t any monthly stipend of contribution points that she would receive from the sect. Although¡­ She could always sell off the cultivation resources she got from the sect for contribution points, but that was unlikely as it would hamper her own cultivation.


    Thinking about this as he watched how Qing Yi essentially bought up close to a quarter of the spiritual herbsid out, Xuan Hao decided to walk over after seeing that she was done finding the spiritual herbs she was looking for and was about to leave.


    "M-master!?"


    Seeing her master suddenly appearing in front of her, Qing Yi could not help letting out a slightly surprised voice as she quickly stopped herself before she ended up attracting the attention of the nearby disciples. Understanding that they would both get surrounded the moment these disciples realized that he was there.


    "Don''t worry about it, I already used my domain to iste the area around us. Not to mention, none of them can see me at the moment." Noticing the worried expression on Qing Yi''s face as she looked around at the surrounding disciples to see if any of them had noticed her calling out to him just now, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling to himself as he said this.


    "I-I see¡­ "


    Hearing that he had already isted the area around them with his domain, Qing Yi let out a sigh of relief as she calmed down. No longer worried that they might end up being swarmed by the surrounding disciples who would want nothing more than an opportunity to receive the guidance of someone like her master.


    After all, Xuan Hao was the strongest expert in the Star Shattering Sect and his guidance when it came to cultivation could be considered unparalleled in the eyes of the disciples. Even with Pei Yang in the Earth Immortal Realm starting to teach these younger disciples, they still felt that Xuan Hao was superior, as he had been the one to invite Pei Yang and convince him to join the sect.


    This soon became a fact in the eyes of the disciples when the chances to listen to Xuan Hao''s lectures became far more difficult toe by. The normal once every three months he had done in the past disappearing over the past few years as he was busy in the Blue Sea Empire and the Blue Shore Kingdom¡­


    "Master, I haven''t seen you for the past few months after you returned from the Blue Sea Empire. Did something urgent perhaps happen?" Taking a few seconds topose herself, Qing Yi could not help asking this as she curiously looked over at her master. Wondering what had happened over the past few months, as he had seemingly disappeared into thin air just a few days after he had returned to the sect.


    "This¡­" Hearing what Qing Yi said and seeing her confused expression while asking this, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly. Not knowing what to say in this situation. After all, it was not like he could tell her that he suddenly got an emergency quest from the system that forced him to focus all of his attention on finding a way to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in cksmithing¡­


    Ah! There is that¡­


    "Indeed, something dide up at our border with the Frozen Wastnd, requiring me to take immediate action to create a barrier to prevent any demonic cultivators from entering the sect''s territory in the near future.


    Outside of that, there was also a crisis at the Iron Sky Kingdom that they couldn''t deal with, so I also ended up paying them a visit. At the same finalizing talks about the Iron Sky Kingdom bing part of the Star Shattering Sect." Suddenly remembering the barrier he had created at the border of the Frozen Wastnd and the recent happenings in the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao nodded seriously as he said this with a slight frown on his face to make it a bit more believable that this was the reason he had been gone for the past few months without informing any of them.


    "Huh? S-something like that happened!? And the Iron Sky Kingdom decided to officially join the sect¡­? I heard Elder Song had been having quite a bit of trouble with thattely, as expected of master!"


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, Qing Yi didn''t suspect that there was anything wrong with what her master said, as she already had some idea about the current situation with the Iron Sky Kingdom and understood how difficult it had been for Elder Song to convince Yi Min to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    The matter about the Frozen Wastnd wasn''t something that was hard to believe either, as news of the surge in demonic cultivators surging into every kingdom and empire unlucky enough to border the Frozen Wastnd was already quite well known across the sect. Even causing some of the disciples and elders to worry about potentially having to deal with a potentialrge influx of demonic cultivators.


    In a sense, it was also because of this fear of demonic cultivators starting to cause chaos in the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, that a lot of these elders and disciples had taken on missions to kill demonic cultivators from the Grand Mission Pavilion whenever they appeared.


    "Hehe, no need to praise me like that. For now, you should store away those spiritual herbs. After all, even though you can keep them like this for the short term, the quality of the spiritual herbs will decrease if not stored properly for an extended period of time."


    "Yes! I understand master!" Nodding her head, Qing Yi took out the few containers for spiritual herbs that she had in her interspatial ring before filling them to the brim with the different spiritual herbs she had bought before they had a chance to stay out long enough to start losing some of their efficiency and freshness.


    "Ah! I don''t have enough¡­" It was only after stuffing half of the spiritual herbs she had bought away in containers that was then stored in her interspatial ring, that she realized that she had bought far more spiritual herbs than she had space for.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao could not help looking up at the clouds above with a hint of disbelief shing through his eyes.


    Who decided to go buy spiritual herbs without making sure they had enough space to carry the spiritual herbs that they bought? n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Thinking this as he watched a rabbit shaped cloud floating above him, Xuan Hao didn''t bother making a bit deal about it as he just took out some of the spiritual herb containers that he had been generously gifted by the demonic cultivators that he had dealt with during his and Yi Min''s journey to the Blue Shore Kingdom.


    Whoosh~!


    "Ah! Thank you master!"


    Grabbing the spiritual herb containers that her master handed her, Qing Yi smiled brightly as she began stuffing thest remaining spiritual herbs into them before cing them into her interspatial ring. During the entire ordeal, Xuan Hao just watched silently as his disciple borderline abused the spiritual herbs by stuffing them into containers that would under normal circumstances only contain a single spiritual herb. Not twenty like Qing Yi had been stuffing into them¡­

 Chapter 1165 Acting Coy

    <h4>Chapter 1165 Acting Coy</h4>


    Ignoring his disciples mishandling of the spiritual herbs, Xuan Hao soon continued his journey back towards the Seventh Star Peak. The only differencepared to before being that Qing Yi was now following him as she eagerly asked about his help when it came to improving her alchemy.


    Considering that both of them had reached the Artisan Realm at this point in time, he didn''t try to do something beyond his abilities and instead decided to just use some of the vast knowledge he had obtained through the system to expand her field of view regarding the different potions, pills and spiritual herbs that existed out there.


    Although it was not nearly as useful as if he had been in the Master Realm and had the ability to teach her how to progress in the Artisan Realm, the expansion of knowledge regarding alchemy still helped improve her understanding of alchemy to a degree that wasrge enough for Qing Yi to full believe that her master''s understanding of alchemy was still far beyond her own.


    At the same time, the fact that he was now having a hard time teaching Qing Yi when it came to alchemy, reminded him of the emergency quest he just had to go through because Bai Ning had ended up surpassing him.


    No matter what, he didn''t want to get another emergency quest from the system again in the future. After all, he had no idea if he would be lucky enough to stumble upon a cksmith that happened to break through to the Saint Realm just when he was around. Not to mention, he had no idea if the system would only want him to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm the next time around.


    No matter what, he didn''t want to get another emergency quest from the system again in the future. After all, he had no idea if he would be lucky enough to stumble upon a cksmith that happened to break through to the Saint Realm just when he was around. Not to mention, he had no idea if the system would only want him to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm the next time around.


    After all, thest emergency quest had appeared when Bai Ning had reached the Artisan Realm and had begun taking steps towards the Master Realm. If the next emergency quest appeared due to Qing Yi reaching the Master Realm in alchemy, he might very well end up facing an emergency quest that required him to be a Saint Realm Alchemist within three months, something he wanted to avoid at all costs if possible¡­


    "Master is it really true that something like the wobbly pill will turn one''s bones into a wobbly, gel-like substance, making movement difficult and uncoordinated. Serving no practical purpose other than being a rather unsettling experience, exists? Who would make something like that? Isn''t it just a waste of spiritual herbs?" As they were about to reach the entrance of the pce, Qing Yi could not help curiously asking about one of the pills that her master had taught her about during their rather long journey back to the Seventh Star Peak. Feeling a sense of wonder as to whether or not the wobbly pill described by her master really existed. Not able to convince herself that an alchemist would waste their time developing something like that... And all of this not even mentioning the fact that the wobbly pill was of the Soul Grade and required quite a few spiritual herbs to create.


    "Indeed¡­ It''s a waste of spiritual herbs, but the wobbly pill does exist. Although, I doubt there would be anyone willing to create such a pill outside of someone trying to find new ways of torture someone." Nodding his head in agreement with what Qing Yi said, Xuan Hao also felt that the existence of the wobbly pill was a waste of resources.


    Even then, ording to the information about the pill that he got from the system, the wobbly pill did indeed exist somewhere out there.


    Thinking about it, the unlucky alchemist who happened to obtain the recipe for the wobbly pill might even be unlucky enough to misunderstand its effect and think that it''s some kind of bone tempering pill that can help enhance the strength of one''s body¡­


    "Alchemist really are¡­ Unique¡­" Muttering this after hearing what her master said, Qing Yi felt like her view of the alchemy profession had been overturned with the existence of a single pill. Not only that, but she also realized that the other pill that her master had mentioned on their way back to the pce should also be real.


    As this realization set in, Qing Yi realized that her way of handling alchemy might have been wrong, alchemy was not just about the creation of pills and elixirs that assisted someone in their cultivation.


    "Master, I seem to have gained some inspiration after our conversation-


    "I understand, you can leave." "Thank you!" Knowing that Qing Yi seemed to have gained some kind of enlightenment in the Dao of Alchemy after being exposed to the different weird pills and elixirs of the system, Xuan Hao sent her off. Understanding that even a single second wasted might end up ruining his little disciple''s chance.


    "Hm? Qing Yi? Wha are-"


    Whoosh-!


    Stepping out of the pce just at this moment, Bai Ning barely managed to dodge Qing Yi as she dashed inside the pce in the direction of her room without saying anything, her full attention being focused on the spark of enlightenment she had experienced just now. Not daring to think of anything else in fear that it might end up disrupting what she had gained from the moment of enlightenment she had just experienced.


    Thump~


    In the end Bai Ning was unlucky and could be considered to be at the wrong ce at the wrong time, as the wind dragged along by Qing Yi''s fast speed hit him directly in the stomach. Knocking him to the ground in one fell swoop.


    It didn''t matter how strong he was in the Core Formation Realm; Qing Yi was still someone in the Nascent Soul Realm. Even the wind created by her rushing past him was enough to knock him over and take the wind out of his lungs.


    "Haaa¡­ What was that for¡­?" Getting up a few seconds after Qing Yi disappeared into the pce, Bai Ning could not help silently cursing his senior sister for her rude behavior.


    "Huh?"


    However, it was also at this moment that he realized that his senior sister did note alone. No, someone came along with her and from the looks of things, the person was-


    "Master!?"


    Realizing that the person who had been standing beside his senior sister this time around was none other than his master, someone he had been searching for over the past month, as he already reached the requirement set up by Xuan Hao for him to teach him about how to reach the Master Realm in cksmithing.


    "Indeed, it''s me. Don''t me your senior sister too much for earlier, she just happened to experience enlightenment for the first time and should be rather excited about using this opportunity to increase her own understanding of the Dao of Alchemy. Maybe she might even be able to increase her cultivation,"


    "This¡­ To think that senior sister managed to experience the feeling of enlightenment after talking with master about alchemy!" Hearing that his senior sister had actually managed to experience the legendary enlightenment that he had only ever heard about in legends or from the elders of the sect, Bai Ning could not help himself from looking forward to learning more about cksmithing from his master.


    After all, at this point in time he had already waited for a month longer than what he and his master had first agreed on, so he eager to get started as fast as possible so he could be gin starting to break through to the Master Realm and be the first Master cksmith of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course, excluding the recently joined Yi Min, who had managed to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm. Far exceeding the Master Realm that she had been in only a few months earlier.


    "M-master~ Can-"


    "Let''s move to the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces before starting, I will guide you into reaching the Master Realm there¡­ And don''t try to do that again!" Hearing Bai Ning suddenly call out to him in a coy tone of voice,pletely unbefitting of him, Xuan Hao immediately interrupted him before he had a chance to say anything more before warning him to not do that again. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Yes!"


    Understanding that his master would be teaching him cksmithing like he wanted, Bai Ning just happily nodded his head before following after his master as both of them began making their way towards the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces.


    During the entire journey there, Xuan Hao made sure to keep both of them out of sight of any of the disciples moving past them, while at the same time answering any of the questions that Bai Ning had regarding cksmithing.


    Now that he was officially someone in the Pseudo Saint Realm, he was more than qualified to teach someone like Bai Ning, who had not even reached the Master Realm yet.


    At least for now, he didn''t have to worry about his disciple overtaking him when it came to cksmithing¡­

 Chapter 1166 Teaching Bai Ning, Old Injury

    <h4>Chapter 1166 Teaching Bai Ning, Old Injury</h4>


    Arriving at the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces shortly after leaving the pce together with Bai Ning, Xuan Hao didn''t hold back as he began teaching Bai Ning about the Master Realm just as he had promised him before leaving for the Blue Shore Kingdom. Helping him take the first step towardsprehending the Dao of cksmithing.


    At the same time, he also ended up demonstrating for him by crafting a few artifacts with the help of hisprehension of the Dao of cksmithing.


    Although the artifacts crafted were nowhere near the level that would normally be done by someone in the Grandmaster Realm, let alone the Pseudo Saint Realm, they were more than enough to disy the level for someone in the Master Realm.


    Of course, the main reason for thisck of skill when it came to crafting was because Xuan Hao hadprehended the Dao of cksmithing but had never really used it in practice before.


    Even then, this issue was just temporary and could be fixed with a few months of practice if he really wanted to start crafting higher level artifacts.


    Then again, Xuan Hao didn''t really n to start crafting artifacts any time soon and mostly just wanted to increase hisprehension of the Dao of cksmithing to the point where he could still teach Bai Ning. Only if it required him to be able to craft higher level artifacts would he spend the time required to get his crafting skills on par with hisprehension.


    Part of him was also hoping that he would gain a reward from the system simr to what he had gotten with his alchemy skills, as that gave him not only the knowledge, but also the skill of someone in that realm. Allowing him to concoct pills, potions and elixirs befitting someone in the Artisan Realm¡­


    "Thank you for your guidance master!"


    Unaware of this, Bai Ning was smiling from ear to ear as he felt even more awed at his master''s understanding of cksmithingpared to the past. After all, in his eyes, he clearly felt that his master should be far above the Master Realm for him to be capable of so effortlessly guiding him into how to reach the Master Realm. Making him feel confident in surpassing the Master Realm in the future, his master guiding him whenever any doubts came up.


    "No problem, if there is anything else in the future, you can always find me, as I don''t have any ns of leaving the sect over the next few years." Seeing the overjoyed expression on Bai Ning''s face as he looked like he couldn''t wait to try and take the final step and enter the Master Realm, Xuan Hao smiled happily as he decided to leave him to take the final step on his own.


    Rustle~


    Nodding his head eagerly upon hearing what his master said, Bai Ning didn''t waste any time as he turned around to find a few spiritual metals lying around in his forge before getting prepared to solidify what he had learnt through using it in crafting. Hoping that this would allow him to take the step needed to create the cksmithing domain that his master had mentioned and enter the Master Realm. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Whoosh~


    Knowing that there wasn''t anything else for him to help Bai Ning with for now, Xuan Hao turned and left the forge while Bai Ning did this. Intending to keep an eye on him with his divine sense to ensure that he would be able to safely reach the Master Realm and not end up trying to do something beyond his own capabilities.


    After all, even if the pressure put on the soul by a cksmithing domain was weaker than a normal domain, Bai Ning was only in the Core Formation Realm at the moment and Xuan Hao didn''t know if he would be able to handle it yet.


    If he really couldn''t handle a cksmithing domain yet, he could intervene before his disciple had time to fully form the domain and interrupt the process before it ended up permanently damaging his soul- or in worst case, killing him.


    Even if this would end up being a blow to Bai Ning''s confidence, he could only me himself for not focusing enough on his cultivation. After all, he had made sure to remind him about the fact that a cksmithing domain would put a certain pressure on his soul that he might be unable to endure because of his low cultivation realm.


    "Haaa¡­ I hope everything works out¡­" Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided to head over to the Combat Hall to check up on his second disciple, who, from what he could gather about him from the different disciples and elders, pretty much lived in the Combat Hall at this point in time.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao went to catch up with Chu Yang, Elder Song was looking down at themunication talisman on the table in front of him with a surprised look in his eyes.


    Just a few seconds earlier, he had been informed by one of the elders who was currently in the Iron Sky Kingdom to continue the conversation regarding the Iron Sky Kingdom joining the Star Shattering Sect, that the Iron Sky Kingdom had agreed to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not only that, but he had also learnt that the reason for this sudden agreement was a conversation that had taken ce between Yi Min, the ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom and Xuan Hao, someone he had no idea was in the iron Sky Kingdom, let alone carrying out a negotiation on behalf of the sect to convince the Iron Sky Kingdom to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    "To think Xuan Hao would convince the Iron Sky Kingdom to join the sect, but now that the Iron Sky Kingdom is a part of the Star Shattering Sect, I can think about future expansion into the core region of the Sky Empire. Although¡­ Considering that the war between the Sky Empire and the surrounding empires is still taking ce, it would still be best to continue the earlier expansion n and avoid getting involved with any of the empires for now¡­" Muttering this to himself as he went over the possible expansion ns that could be implemented now that the Star Shattering Sect had a border with the core region of the Sky Empire, Elder Song ultimately ended up deciding to still go with the expansion into the nearby outer region.


    Even if the Star Shattering Sect was more than strong enough to expand into the core region of the Sky Empire without suffering too much at the hands of the different empires now that the sect had multiple Soul Ascension Realm Experts and even an Earth Immortal Realm Expert brought in by Xuan Hao, he also understood that the size of the Star Shattering Sect was far fromrge enough to manage such arge territory. Especially the core region of the Sky Empire where the demon beasts and cultivators were stronger.


    After all, he didn''t just want the Star Shattering Sect to only control small parts of the area like the Sky Empire was doing, but instead wanted to control the entire area and build it up to be the future core of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory, something that would require thousands- if not tens of thousands of Domain Lord Realm Experts¡­


    Given the current strength of the Star Shattering Sect, this was of course still something far off in the future, but Elder Song felt that it would happen at some point in the future given how fast the Star Shattering Sect was growing.


    For example, although the number of Domain Lord Realm Experts in the Star Shattering Sect at the moment could be counted on a single hand, it would only be a matter of time before the number of Domain Lord Ream Experts exploded due to the rich cultivation environment in the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Even now, the number of Nascent Soul Realm Experts in the Star Shattering Sect had already grown far beyond what it had been in the past and almost every week, a new elder who had been stuck at the Core Formation Realm would breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Thinking about this as he continued to look down at themunication talisman on his table, Elder Song could not help silently sighing to himself. Even if he had been promoted to the position of Vice Sect Master after breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm, he had a feeling that he would have to reach the Domain Lord Realm in the future if he wanted to continue staying in his current position, something that he had no idea if he could do.


    The main reason for this was that he became increasingly aware of the damage that his soul had suffered during the time he had used the demonic method to help Song Jia as his strength increased. Even if it didn''t affect him much at the moment, he understood that it woulde back to bite him again after he reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm and started thinking about trying to break through to the Domain Lord Realm¡­

 Chapter 1167 Troubled Mui, Failing Again and Again

    <h4>Chapter 1167 Troubled Mui, Failing Again and Again</h4>


    Spending the next few hours at the Combat Hall together with Chu Yang, Xuan Hao was not the slightest bit surprised when he realized that Chu Yang''s strength had already reached a levelparable to someone at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm with his Eighth Stage Nascent Soul Realm cultivation base. Even reaching a point where his strength was approaching the level of someone who had already managed to sessfully establish a pseudo domain and was in the process of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Of course, outside of the increase in strength he had during the past four months, Xuan Hao also realized that Chu Yang had managed to take significant steps towardsprehending the Dao of the Spear over the past few hours.


    ording to what he could see, if everything continued at its current trajectory, Chu Yang should be able to establish a pseudo spear domain in a year or less and take the first step towards reaching the Domain Lord Realm.


    Meaning that he would soon have his first Domain Lord Realm disciple, something that made Xuan Hao feel more motivated than ever before during his time with Chu Yang inside the Combat Hall. Making sure to teach him everything that he felt would be helpful for him in the process ofprehending the Dao of the Spear.


    After all, even if he hadn''t personallyprehended the Dao of the Spear and couldn''t guide him in the dao itself, he could still impart his knowledge on the process ofprehending a dao and help him in that regard. Although less useful than someone actually knowledgeable in the Dao of the Spear, it wasn''t any worse due to the help of the Domain Lord Chapter of the Mortal Codex that he had obtained in the past.


    Even if the information in the codex stored in the sect also contained the Domain Lord Realm Chapter after he handed it over to Elder Song, the chapter was not easy for someone in the Domain Lord Realm or below to understand because of theplex nature of the codex itself.


    The best use of the Mortal Codex that recorded the information on the different cultivation realms and how to best progress through them, was by having someone at a higher cultivation realm learn and teach it to those of weaker strength.


    This was also one of the main reasons why the speed at which the disciples grew in strength had far exceeded that of the elders. Only recently after more elders broke through the Nascent Soul Realm and taught the Core Formation Realm Chapter of the Mortal Codex to the elders who had yet to reach the Nascent Soul Realm, did the sect end up experiencing its current rapid grow in strength and constant emergence of new Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    In the future, when more Domain Lord Realm Experts emerge in the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he nced towards Chu Yang, who was sitting on top of arge boulder not too far away from where he was standing, Xuan Hao could not help looking forward to the time when the Nascent Soul Realm Chapter of the Mortal Codex was allowed to show off its true strength.


    As for the Domain Lord Realm Chapter he had been using to help Chu Yang enter his current state of enlightenment following a few hours of training¡­ That was still far off in the future¡­


    "I should leave him alone for now and make sure no one identally enters the training room while he is in a state of enlightenment¡­" Knowing that he wouldn''t be able to help Chu Yang any more for the time being, Xuan Hao turned around and silently left the training room that he and Chu Yang had been using for the past few hours before using his divine sense to find hisst remaining and youngest disciple. Not forgetting to inform the elder in charge of the Combat Hall about not allowing anyone to enter the training room Chu Yang was inside of before leaving the Combat Hall to find Mui. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    ¡­


    "Hm¡­ I wonder if this is correct? No¡­ Maybe like this?"


    At the same time, the disciple in question was curiously looking down at a few random formation symbols inscribed on a few small stones while randomly shuffling them around. The formation symbol stones weren''t anything special but was one of the main ways that the elders practicing the art of formations taught the youngest disciples of the sect about some of the most basic concepts of formations.


    The formation symbol stones were essentially a practice tool that would create a small formation if they were lined up correctly, something that the current Mui was struggling to do as she kept shuffling the formation symbol stones around to no avail.


    "Maybe the stones are defect?" Muttering this to herself as she continued to stare down at the formation symbol stones, Mui was about to pick up the formation symbol stones and go ask the elder in charge of them to get her a new pair.


    Whoosh~


    However, before she had the chance to take the formation symbol stones over to the elder and ask for a new pair, the elder in question arrived beside her with a slightly helpless expression on his face as he picked up the formation symbol stones and lined them up correctly to form the small formation. Demonstrating that there was nothing wrong with the symbols inscribed on the stones.


    "Junior, you havee here every day for the past month without being able to clear the entry level designed for those younger disciples around 10 years old, I don''t think you are fated to walk the path of formations. How about you try something different?"


    As Mui showed a look of disbelief on her face after witnessing this, the elder could not help letting out a sigh as he said this. Not because he didn''t want Mui to try and be a formation master, but because he really didn''t believe she had any talent for it after failing for a straight month without any progress.


    Not to mention, as he said, the test with the formation symbol stones was designed for the younger disciples who had just entered the sect as a way to spark their interest in formations. In essence, it wasn''t a test and could almost be considered a toy for the younger disciples, yet Mui had somehow managed to fail when it came to using this toy for a straight month¡­


    "This¡­! I can still do it, just hand me another one!" Hearing what the elder said, Mui looked shocked for a short moment before a determined expression appeared on her face as she asked for another set of formation symbol stones from the elder.


    After all, this was not the first time the elder in front of her had told her these words and tried to make her give up onpleting the small formation that could be created with the formation symbol stones.


    "¡­ Haaa¡­ Here¡­" Knowing that there was no way to convince Mui as he had already tried to do so before, the elder decided to just hand over a new set of formation symbol stones. All things considered, the formation symbol stones weren''t really worth that much and the reason he kept reminding her was just because he didn''t want to see a young disciple like her continue wasting her time on something she clearly had no talent for.


    "Thank you!" Unaware of the troubled thoughts of the elder as he handed over a new set of formation symbol stones to her, Mui excitedly took them before starting to shuffle them around like she had done before. Showing no signs of being affected by her recent failure.


    "¡­" Seeing this, the elder just shook his head before turning around and returning to his post of watching over the rest of the young disciples'' present doing the same thing Mui was, the main difference being that these disciples managed to seed inpleting the small formation after a few minutes of ying around with the formation symbol stones while Mui continued to struggle. "Hm? What is she doing here?"


    Arriving just a few seconds earlier, Xuan Hao was left confused seeing this scene ying out. Not understanding what had just happened and why Mui had seemingly be obsessed with formations over the past month. Especially when her talent for formation was at a level that he had never seen before¡­ And that was not in the positive sense¡­


    Maybe something is troubling her and that''s why she came here to try and figure it out on her own? Only able to think this as he watched her continue to fail again and again, Xuan Hao decided to walk over and ask her. Hoping that she would at least tell him considering the fact that he was her master¡­

 Chapter 1168 Guiding Mui

    <h4>Chapter 1168 Guiding Mui</h4>


    "Mui-"


    "Ah!? M-master!?"


    Jumping up in surprise after hearing him, Mui spun around before looking at him with a shocked expression on her face, obviously not expecting her master to suddenly appear behind her out of the blue. Especially considering that it had already been a few months since she hadst seen him, and she had been too focused on trying to figure out how to use the formation symbol stones in her hands to notice him approaching.


    "So, I see that you have grown quite interested in formations during the time I was gone¡­"


    "Ah! Yes! I have been trying my best to learn formations over the past month. Even if its harder than I expected, I''m sure I can learn it with enough time!" nking out for a short moment after the sudden appearance of her master, Mui quickly recovered before answering his question with a determined expression stered all over her face.


    Clear to anyone, she had no intention of giving up on learning formations any time soon. Even if she had ended up making no progress over the past month and her skills in formations were worse than the youngest disciples of the sect who had visited the Formation Hall for a little over ten minutes.


    "That''s¡­ why did you suddenly decide to learn the art of formations?" Not knowing what else to say after seeing the determined look on her face while mentioning the fact that she nned to continue trying to learn the art of formations, Xuan Hao ended up asking her the question that had been on his mind since he heard that she had been trying to learn about formations with no progress over the past month.


    "Huh?" Tilting her head in confusion before starting to think about what her master asked with a thoughtful expression on her face, Mui''s face soon lit up as she seemed to have thought of an answer. "Master, the reason I started learning about formations is because I heard Senior Brother Bai say that the strength of an artifact can be increased by inscribing formation symbols on to them, so¡­ I wanted to learn more about formations and make my artifacts stronger!"


    "¡­"


    Seeing not the slightest bit of hesitation on her face as she said this, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing Bai Ning for leading his junior sister astray.


    Even if using formations could indeed enhance the strength of an artifact, it was only specialized formations unique to cksmiths that didn''t have much to do with the art of formations and the few times where a formation could indeed be used to enhance the power of an artifact, it involvedrger artifacts that could normally not be moved around.


    An example of such an artifact would be the Combat Hall that most of the disciples of the sect used when training theirbat techniques, while another example would be therge formation towers that surrounded the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Although the formation towers were just part of a muchrger formation, the towers themselves were each unique artifacts that were covered in countless smaller formations.


    "Mui¡­ The formations used for artifacts are a little different¡­"


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to exin the existence of the special formations used by cksmiths to enhance the strength of their artifacts, while also making sure that she understood that the formations created by formation masters was only something used in the construction ofrger artifacts that involved the need for people from more than one profession and took a long time. Not something she should be trying to create on her own. At least not before she became stronger.


    All of this was not even mentioning the fact that she had only ever created some weird blobs of random spiritual metals when it came to cksmithing. Not really skilled enough for Xuan Hao to entrust her with the astronomical number of resources required to create an artifact like the Combat Hall¡­ And even if he did, Elder Song woulde out to skin him alive before he had the chance to do so. No matter the difference in strength between the two of them¡­


    "Hm¡­ So, I need to learn these specialized formations to enhance the strength of my artifacts¡­"


    As Mui listened to her master exin the concept of the specialized formations used to enhance the strength of artifacts, she had a look of understanding on her face before she put away the formation symbol stones on her own ord for the first time in a month. Now understanding that she didn''t need to learn the formations that she had tried so hard to understand during this time.


    "Thank you master! I will make sure to make you a splendid artifact as a gift when I master those cksmithing formation thingies!" Smiling brightly as she said this, Xuan Hao didn''t even have a chance to respond before Mui dashed off in the direction of the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces to practice the cksmithing formations.


    In the end, Bai Ning would most likely end up being the one who had to exin things to her when doubts inevitably popped up during her practice. But, considering that Bai Ning was the one who had ended up mentioning this to her in the first ce, it was only right that he acted as a proper senior brother and helped guide his junior sister.


    In any case, if he didn''t want to teach her or became too annoyed by his little junior sister, he could always send her over to him¡­ n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help looking forward to how Mui''s journey into cksmithing this time around ended up ying out.


    Would she finally create a normal artifact, or would she create another abomination? Xuan Hao couldn''t wait to find out.


    Not feeling too worried about her neglecting her own cultivation, as she always set aside time for it and had demonstrated thatpared to someone like Bai Ning, her cultivation speed didn''t slow down in the slightest even when she became obsessed with learning something new like formations.


    Even reaching the point where her cultivation base had managed to breakthrough to the Seventh Stage of the Core Formation Realm during the four months, he had been gone from the sect. Officially stepping into the Late Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    At the same time, Bai Ning''s cultivation base was still at the Fifth Stage of the Core Formation Realm. Only having taken a few steps forward to reach the peak of the realm.


    Whoosh~!


    Having finished checking up on all of his disciples, Xuan Hao continued to go around the sect to check up on the few elders he knew, while also seeing how much stronger the average disciples of the sect had grown.


    Among the different people that Xuan Hao knew among the elders, Peng Yun, Wan Qiu, and Chi Hu were the three who had changed the most since he hadst seen them.


    Wan Qiu was an old elder that had been one of the people in charge of the Alchemy branch of the Flying Sword Sect and had in turn also ended up as one of the people in charge of the Star Shattering Sect''s alchemy branch.


    Of course, the thing she did that caught Xuan Hao''s attention, was the fact that she had not only managed to reach the Nascent Soul Realm, but her alchemy realm had managed to reach the Master Realm!


    The reason for this rapid growth was not just due to the new environment and abundant spiritual herbs for practice, but mainly because she managed to somehow have Pei Yang teach her... And with the help of a Grandmaster Realm Alchemist, it was obvious to see how she had managed to reach the Master Realm in such a short period of time.


    On the other hand, Peng Yun, the treasure hunter that had ended up bing an elder of the Flying Sword Sect and in turn an elder of the Star Shattering Sect, also managed to improve both his alchemy and strength. Reaching the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Although¡­ The direction for his alchemy was a bit weird. Developing even more weird potions that seemed to resemble those from the system¡­


    Lastly, Chi Hu, the first person he had brought back to the sect and made an elder after their encounter in the secret realm all the way back when he had still been in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not only had he managed to fully integrate in the Star Shattering Sect at this point in time, even taking in a few personal disciples of his own, but his strength had also grown to the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Although he wasn''t among the strongest elders of the sect, he could already be considered to be among the stronger ones with hopes of reaching the Domain Lord Realm in the near future.

 Chapter 1169 Talented Disciples, New Elders, Requirments to Becoming a Core Disciple

    <h4>Chapter 1169 Talented Disciples, New Elders, Requirments to Bing a Core Disciple</h4>


    Outside of the different elders who had managed to improve their strength sinceing to the Shattered Star Peaks, there were also quite a few disciples who managed to stand out over the past few years that weren''t among Xuan Hao''s four disciples.


    Among these disciples, the most well-known was a young man called Lu Wen who joined the sect at the same time as Qing Yi and ended up bing the disciple of Wang Hu, one of the two twin brothers originally part of the few Nascent Soul Realm Experts back in the Flying Sword Sect.


    Back then, although his strength had been superior to most other disciples in the Flying Sword Sect, it was only after moving to the Shattered Star Peaks that his talent truly began to shine. Allowing him to reach the Peak of the Core Formation Realm in a rtively short period of time, cementing him as one of the strongest disciples in the sect and also one of the few who were seen as having the potential to be among the Star Shattering Sect''s first batch of Nascent Soul Realm disciples.


    However, his cultivation was not the thing that made him the most well-known disciple in the sect. Instead, it was the fact that he always had a group of senior and junior sisters following him around, drawing the ire of quite a few jealous male disciples.


    Of course, this was not the only reason, as there was another reason he was known among the disciples of the sect and that was the fact that he always happened to find himself in locations he shouldn''t be in, the most frequented location being the baths of the female disciples. Earning him the title of awless pervert in the eyes of arge number of the female disciples.


    In the end, when looking through the information on this Lu Wen, Xuan Hao found out that he had been caught by thew enforcement of the sect more than a hundred times over the past few years due to trespassing into random bathhouses used by the female disciples.


    The only reason why he hadn''t been severely punished being due to the fact that he had always identally fallen or stumbled into these bathhouses while either being chased by someone or because he waste for a lecture and tried to take a shortcut to save some time.


    Someone should put a stop to this little menace¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this after looking through thew enforcement elders reports on Lu Wen, Xuan Hao felt that it might be a good idea for Wang Hu to teach this naughty disciple a lesson before he ended up causing even more trouble.


    After all, from what he could see, twenty percent of thew enforcement elders time was used on resolving cases involving this Lu Wen¡­


    Not thinking too much about this little troublemaker after sending a quick message to Wang Hu about it through hismunication talisman, Xuan Hao began looking at the other disciples who had managed to stand out since the establishment of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Outside of the troublemaker Lu Wen, there was also the beloved granddaughter of Elder Song, Song Jia, who had managed to reach the Core Formation Realm. Although she wasn''t well-known in the sect due to spending most of her time cultivating or ying together with Mui and Qing Yi, she was still among the most talented disciples of the sect.


    At the same time, two of the girls following around Lu Wen, Yi Xuan and Wang Shufen were also among the outstanding disciples of the sect, both being in the Core Formation Realm, while Yi Xuan even had a status above that of Lu Wen due to the fact that she was the personal disciple of Zu Fei, a Core Elder in the Domain Lord Realm.


    On the more unknown side, that Xuan Hao had never heard about before, was a brother and sister pair who had recently joined the sect. Although they were still in the Qi Condensation Realm and were both Outer Sect Disciples, their talent made them stand out among their peers, causing quite a few of the elders in the sect to start eyeing them as potential personal disciples.


    There were of course many more talented disciples outside of these few, they just weren''t enough to catch his attention.


    At least, after a quick look through the disciples of the sect, Xuan Hao managed to determine that the average strength of the disciples had reached the Foundation Establishment Realm, with more than a hundred of them managing to reach the Core Formation Realm. Not including some of the older disciples who were already close to a hundred years old, who ended up reaching the Peak of the Core Formation Realm before choosing to be outer sect elders.


    Of course, even though they became outer sect elders, it didn''t mean that they intended to give up on bing stronger, it was just that they chose a different path. After all, they would be able to take on more difficult missions unavable to disciples and earn more resources by bing elders, while at the same time also being granted a certain level of authority in the sect that they didn''t have while being disciples.


    The only unfortunate thing so far, was the fact that there weren''t any core disciples outside of Chu Yang and Qing Yi, as the requirement to be a core disciple had been changed to reaching the Nascent Soul Realm below the age of 50.


    Although this requirement might have been impossible in the past, this was no longer the case, as there were quite a few disciples who showed enough hope of reaching the Nascent Soul Realm before the age of 50. The most well-known being the troublemaker Lu Wen who had already reached the Peak of the Core Formation.


    In a sense, it was also because of this change that many of the older disciples had decided to change into outer sect elders after reaching the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and work their way towards bing a normal sect elder by reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, as they had long exceeded the age requirement for bing a Core Disciples.


    Rumble~! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Just as Xuan Hao was lost in how own thoughts while thinking about the current state of the sect''s disciples and newer elders, a loud rumbling sound echoed throughout the entire sect before being followed by a terrifying aura that appeared from a corner of the Shattered Star Peaks before covering the entire Seventh Star Peak.


    "Wha-what is that?!"


    "Is someone attacking the sect!? Who dares!?"


    "No¡­ This is-"


    Not a secondter, loud exmation echoed out from all over the sect. Interrupting the peaceful daily life of the elders and disciples who were left in a state of confusion and fear after feeling the terrifying aura spreading out to cover the entire Seventh Star Peak.


    "Someone is breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he instantly realized what was happening, Xuan Hao could not help smiling happily as his divine sense soon spread out and forcibly isted the terrifying aura before it had a chance to cause any damage.


    Looking more closely at the person behind the terrifying aura and the one currently in the process of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao was a bit surprised, as the person in question was none other than the grand elder of the half spirit race.


    Although the old man had already been close to reaching the Domain Lord Realm and it would only be a matter of time before he broke through to the Domain Lord Realm, he didn''t expect him to break through so quickly and thought it would at least take him another few years before it would happen.


    Observing the situation more closely with his divine sense, he soon found a small and familiar looking crystal next to the old man and instantly understood how he had been able to shorten the time needed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    "A source crystal¡­ Never expected the old man to be lucky enough to find one¡­" Shaking his head as he said this, Xuan Hao decided to keep an eye on the old man and make sure his domain didn''t end up causing too much damage to the Shattered Star Peaks during his breakthrough, while at the same time informing Feng Chen and the rest about the situation so they could calm down some of the restless disciples and elders who thought the sect was under attack.


    At the very least, the grand elder of the half spirit race was a bit more thoughtful with where he broke through and decided to do it in a somewhat isted location in a corner of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Even if he was not around, the damage caused by his domain being out of control at the start shouldn''t do too much damage to the sect. Different from a certain someone who decided to break through to the Domain Lord Realm on the Seventh Star Peak¡­

 Chapter 1170 Tempest Domain

    <h4>Chapter 1170 Tempest Domain</h4>


    Keeping an eye on the grand elder of the half spirit race as his pseudo domain evolved into a true domain and began the process of merging together with his soul, Xuan Hao ended up spending the rest of the day watching over him together with the rest of the elders in the sect. Excited at the birth of a new Domain Lord Realm Expert, as it would once again increase the strength of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course,pared to everyone else, the ones most affected by the grand elder of the half spirit race reaching the Domain Lord Realm were the members of the half spirit race who had joined the Star Shattering Sect. After all, with the birth of a Domain Lord Realm Expert among them, their status in the Star Shattering Sect would be more stable in the future.


    Even if they hadn''t experienced any form of suppression or restrictions after joining the Star Shattering Sect, they also understood the fact that things would not be like this if they decided to venture outside the Star Shattering Sect in the future. If they wanted to continue staying strong even when venturing outside the Shattered Star Peaks, they would at least need the strength to back it up¡­ And the grand elder reaching the Domain Lord Realm could be considered the first step in this direction.


    "Looks like everything''s settled¡­" Not paying too much attention to the excited members of the half spirit races and other elders of the sect, Xuan Hao just smiled slightly after the grand elder of the half spirit race finished his breakthrough without encountering any problems before focusing attention on some of the people who had shown up to witness the breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Outside of the few Domain Lord Realm Experts and the more powerful Nascent Sou Realm elders close to the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm of the sect, Xuan Hao noticed both Chu Yang and Qing Yi had also appeared at some point in time. Fully absorbed in observing the grand elder of the half spirit race as he began the process of stabilizing his domain and taking control over it after his breakthrough.


    I see¡­ Both of them should be trying to learn as much as possible now that they themselves are about to reach the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he saw the two eagerly approaching Feng Chen and Shu Yao to ask them about the situation to get a better insight as to what had happened from them, Xuan Hao could not help feeling his lips twitching in annoyance.


    No matter how much help Feng Chen and Shu Yao could provide them with-


    Feeling his thoughts going off in a rather unusual direction, Xuan Hao quickly shook his head and turned his attention back towards the grand elder of the half spirit race before using his divine sense to find out what kind of domain he had formed and what dao it was rted to.


    Dao of Wind? No¡­ It should just be rted to the Dao of Wind to some extent... Noticing the weak presence of the Dao of Wind in the newly established domain, Xuan Hao first thought that it was a wind domain, but quickly changed his mind after sensing the presence of several different Daos in the domain.


    Hm¡­ The Dao of Wind is by far the clearest, but there is also a trace of the Dao of Water, Lightning and¡­ Chaos!? What kind of domain did this old manprehend!? Feeling the presence of four distinct Daos in the domain, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes with a hint of shock shing through them. During the process of the breakthrough, he hadn''t paid too much attention to the domain as it expanded and grew in power and just felt like it should be something rted to the Dao of Wind and the Dao of Water, with a tiny bit of lightning mixed in.


    Even if he had expected the domain of the old man to be mixed and not a pure domain like the sword domain he had established back when he broke through to the Domain Lord Realm in the past, he had never expected to sense the existence of more than three different Daos in the domain. Especially the Dao of Chaos.


    Faint as it might be, the Dao of Chaos was still a Dao that was among the most difficult toprehend. Even though the old grand elder of the half spirit race hadn''t trulyprehended the Dao of Chaos, the faint presence of the Dao of Chaos in his domain symbolized that he had a very real chance toprehend the Dao of Chaos in the future.


    Rumble~!


    As Xuan Hao was lost in his own thoughts trying to figure out just what kind of domain the grand elder of the half spirit race had managed toprehend, a loud rumbling sound echoed out around the old man as his domain covered the area a few hundred meters around him. Giving Xuan Hao and the rest of the people present a perfect chance to analyze the domain-


    Ah! A Tempest Domain?


    And it was only a few seconds after this that Xuan Hao managed to figure out what kind of domain the old man from the half spirit race had managed to construct.


    A Tempest Domain.


    Although it wasn''t something unheard of, it was by far one of the rarest domains from the information he had managed to gather on different domains so far. ording to some of the limited information he had on the Blue Sea Empire, one of their Celestial Immortal Ancestors was rumored to have a Tempest Domain.


    Of course, this information wasn''t that reliable and came from some rumors that Yi Min had stumbled on when she had searched for information about powerful people in the Blue Sea Empire during her more adventurous days.


    Even then, it spoke to the power associated with the domain!


    The only thing that was a bit concerning was the fact that the domain involved four different Daos and would be harder to advancepared to a normal domain- Not to mention the fact that most people would only choose the path ofprehending a single dao upon reaching the Soul Ascension Realm and continue doing so until they broke through to the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Hm? Maybe the old man is more suited for the Dao Domain Lord Realmpared to following the path of the Soul Ascension Realm. Even if he isn''t able to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, just reaching the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm should be sufficient for him to reach the Earth Immortal Realm¡­


    Suddenly realizing that the first person with the potential to enter the Dao Domain Lord Realm outside of himself was not one of his own disciples, but instead the old man from the half spirit race, Xuan Hao had no idea how to react as he could only throw this matter to the back of his mind.


    For now, even if the old man had the potential to enter the Dao Domain Lord Realm and Xuan Hao wouldn''t really mind teaching him, he would first have to reach the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm before any of this¡­ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Whoosh~


    Having found out what he wanted and with the tempest domain no longer needing him to restrain it, Xuan Hao didn''t bother to continue staying and observe how the old man from the half spirit race slowly managed to take control of his own domain as it was in the process of merging together with his soul.


    The only people who could gain something from watching something like this were his two disciples and the group of elders in the Nascent Soul Realm who had gathered from all over the sect at this point in time.


    Of course, to ensure the safety of these elders in case something went wrong, and the domain ended up going out of control again for some reason, Shu Yao, Feng Chen, and Zu Fei all decided to remain as well.


    Although, the reason why three Domain Lord Realm Experts were needed to restrain the domain of a newly advanced Domain Lord Realm Expert was a mystery that only the three knew the answer to¡­ Maybe they had also heard rumors about the power of the tempest domain and thus ended up deciding that it was for the best that more of them were around in case something that one Domain Lord Realm Expert couldn''t deal with appeared- Or it could be apletely different reason that was unrted to the safety of the elders eagerly watching the old man from the half spirit race in the process of merging together with his domain.


    No matter what it was, it was certain that the elders present would be safe no matter what ended up happening¡­

 Chapter 1171 Mysterious Arrival

    <h4>Chapter 1171 Mysterious Arrival</h4>


    Returning back to his pce after checking up on the situation in the sect and how things had progressed over the years, Xuan Hao settled down inside his cultivation room before beginning the process of condensing moreyers around the dao lotus inside his dantian.


    Even though he had no idea about the exact path he would have to take to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he guessed that it should involve adding moreyers to his dao lotus, simr to what Earth Immortal Realm cultivators did to advance in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Of course, there was always a chance that he needed to do something different to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, but at least for now, he didn''t worry too much about it. Even if he needed to do something other than addingyers to his dao lotus to break through to the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he would first have to reach the Peak of the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, something that was still far away considering that it wasn''t that long since he had broken through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao dedicated most of his attention towards condensing moreyers around the dao lotus seed floating in the middle of his dantian. Making sure to also dedicate some of his time towardsprehending the Dao of Alchemy. Not wanting to end up getting another emergency quest from the system in the future.


    At the same time, also keeping part of his divine sense active around the Shattered Star Peaks in case his disciples came to find him, or the Earth Immortal from the Heavenly Dragon Temple appeared to cause trouble.


    All things considered, Xuan Hao finally had the opportunity to stay in the sect and cultivate in peace without having to worry about anything other than the Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple who might show up. Even then, with his current strength and the help of the chaotic qi formation guarding the sect, he didn''t feel too worried about the person from the Heavenly Dragon Temple causing any problems outside of damaging the Falling Star City at the base of the Ninth Star Peak.


    ¡­


    Around the same time that the grand elder of the half spirit race was stabilizing his domain after breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm, two figures appeared at the edge of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory covered from head to toe in dark clothes that made it hard to discern their true appearance. "The lord should be arriving in another year; we have to make sure that nothing goes wrong or both of us won''t be able to return to temple alive!"


    "Hmph, I already understand that! On the more worrying side of things, we still haven''t been able to figure out how strong that Star Shattering Sect is. From what little information we managed to gather about it, it seems to have undergone a period of rapid growth over the past dozen or so years due to the presence of a powerful elder known as Xuan Hao and another one known as Elder Song.


    Although that Elder Song isn''t that strong and only around the Nascent Soul Realm, he is by far the most important driving force in the development of this Star Shattering Sect, while that Xuan Hao provides safety for the sect to develop¡­ And that is not mentioning the fact that quite a few Domain Lord Realm Experts have begun to appear in the secttely¡­"


    "Indeed, but our main problem is not to deal with these people. Instead, it''s the fact that we can''t enter the Shattered Star Peaks and investigate the thing the lord wanted us to find out about due to the presence of the formation guarding the ce."


    "True¡­ That formation seems far too powerful for it to have been set up by someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Makes me wonder if it might have reached a level strong enough to block someone in the Earth Immortal Realm."


    "If it really is that strong, it might prove troublesome for the lord to break it in a short period of time. Possibly giving those people, a chance to find out what is happening and sent over their own people-"


    Whoosh-!


    Interrupting their conversation, a violent wind swept past them as a third figurended a few meters away from them.


    ""Senior!""


    Seeing this person, the two wasted no time bowing down with a clear sense of awe present in their eyes.


    From a nce, it was obvious that the person arriving had a far higher status than them.


    "Hm? I see that both of you have been doing quite well during thest few years, I hope you have something important to say considering that both of you went through the trouble of contacting me a year before the lord''s arrival¡­" Narrowing both his eyes as he said this, the newly arrived third figure intently released part of his cultivation base to pressure the two of them and show his displeasure. At the same time revealing the fact that he was at the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Only a single step away from the Earth Immortal Realm.


    "This¡­ S-senior, w-we have an important reason to call you...!"


    "Y-yes, it''s something rted to the lord!"


    Feeling the terrifying pressure of someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, the two figures who had just been chatting leisurely with each other began stumbling over their words as they answered the third figure looking down at both of them with a displeased look.


    "I see, what is it? I also have to make sure that those border guards of the Blue Sea Empire don''t notice anything during the lord''s arrival. After all, our Heavenly Dragon Temple isn''t exactly on friendly terms with them." Frowning as he said this, the pressure he exuded increased ever so slightly. Forcing the two figures standing before him to kneel down on the ground to avoid having their legs broken under the terrifying pressure.


    "T-the reason why we called you¡­ Senior¡­ Is because of the Star Shattering Sect, you should have learnt about it from some of the information we sent you over the years¡­"


    "Indeed, I learnt a bit about them, but they should just be a small sect with the support of a single Soul Ascension Realm Expert who just recently broke through¡­ Is there a reason to inform me about such an insignificant power?"


    "A-actually¡­ The strength of the Star Shattering Sect is still unknown. The reason why we called senior was because we want to borrow senior''s strength to test out the formation that guards the Shattered Star Peak, as we suspect that it might be strong enough to stop someone in the Earth Immortal Realm¡­" Stopping after they finished saying everything they wanted to say, the two weaker figures nervously looked over towards their senior. Knowing very well that there was a chance that he would not take their words seriously and might even punish them.


    After all, what they had just said was essentially that a brand-new sect that had just recently emerged in a border empire that barely had any Soul Ascension Realm Experts present somehow managed to gain control of a formation strong enough to block someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    No matter how confident they felt in their own investigations of the Star Shattering Sect and the formation guarding the Shattered Star Peaks over the past few years, they understood that this wouldn''t matter if their senior didn''t believe them.


    "Earth Immortal Realm formation¡­? Are you serious? In a god forsaken ce like this?"


    Indeed, like both of them had expected, their senior looked down at both of them filled with doubt as he asked this.


    "Yes! We made sure to check it over the past few years and we are certain!" "Haaa¡­ Listen to yourself¡­ How would a small sect possibly gain such a powerful formation in the first ce?"


    "Senior, we think it might be rted to those ruins. Maybe the Star Shattering Sect managed to gain ess to part of the ruins ahead of time and obtained the formation through it. No matter what, we still request senior to check the formation before the lord shows up and ensure that the formation won''t pose a problem."


    "This¡­ Fine, I will go and test that little formation." n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Seeing that the two juniors of his didn''t show any sign of budging even after he gave them several times to back out, the senior shook his head as he reluctantly agreed to test the formation and ensure it wouldn''t cause any problems to the lord when he appeared.


    Even if he didn''t believe the two of them, he at least had to make sure himself considering how adamant the two were¡­ And if the two of them were wrong, he would make sure that they were punished ordingly for wasting his time¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Like this, the three figures soon jumped into the air before heading towards the Star Shattering Sect.

 Chapter 1172 Strong or Weak Formation? Unnecessary Worry!

    <h4>Chapter 1172 Strong or Weak Formation? Unnecessary Worry!</h4>


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, everyone was still upied with the grand elder of the half spirit race breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm. Even causing the normal scheduled lectures taking ces to halt for the day as the different Nascent Soul Realm elders gathered together to watch the breakthrough in hopes of getting a better understanding of the process of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm. All of them wanting to increase their own chances of reaching the Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    After all, even though no one had failed to break through to the Domin Lord Realm in the Star Shattering Sect yet. All of these elders understood that there was a very real danger of failing to breakthrough. Especially so after learning more about the Sky Empire over the past few years and how different people in the Sky Empire had failed during their breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even though they did not know a lot about how people failed in their breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, they understood one thing and that was the fact that most of the people failing to reach the Domain Lord Realm was due to ack of knowledge regarding the process of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    For this reason, these elders were adamant to use any opportunity they got to increase their knowledge of the breakthrough from the Nascent Soul Realm to the Domain Lord Realm.


    In a sense, this attitude also spoke to the general trend in the Star Shattering Sect, as all of these elders believed that they would reach the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm in the future and have a chance to reach the Domain Lord Realm themselves.


    It was also due to this and the fact that these elders just wanted to increase their own chances of surviving a future breakthrough that Elder Song decided to ignore the fact that most of these elders had abandoned their lectures and other responsibilities toe and observe the grand elder of the half spirit race breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Of course, he didn''t n to ignore it forever¡­ And if these elders intended to neglect their duties to just loiter around after the matter was over, he wouldn''t mind sending them off to assist in the future expansion projects that he had in mind¡­


    Rumble~!


    It was at this moment, when everyone had their attention focused on the grand elder of the half spirit race, that a loud rumbling sound suddenly echoed out from the direction of the Ninth Star Peak followed by a terrifying aura sweeping over them. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "What is happening!? Is someone else breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm on the Ninth Star Peak!?"


    "Maybe it''s that Elder Shen? If I''m not wrong, I also saw her leaving earlier in the direction of the Ninth Star Peak."


    "Indeed, from what I know, that Elder Shen should also be quite close to the Domain Lord Realm and might really have managed to gain some insight just now and used the opportunity to break through to the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    Given what they had just experienced, none of the elders panicked. Instead, they began guessing that someone else had managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm. The most discussed individual being Shen Xuefeng who had just recently managed to reach the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "This is¡­ Someone is trying to force their way into the sect!?"


    "Indeed, the strength of the other party should be above the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    "Where did someone like thise from all of a sudden¡­?"


    However, different from the elders in the Nascent Soul Realm, Feng Chen, Shu Yao, Zu Fei, and the rest of the people in the Domain Lord Realm or above in the Star Shattering Sect instantly realized that the new aura that appeared in the direction of the Ninth Star Peak didn''t belong to someone who was in the process of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Instead, it was rather obvious to them that the terrifying aura emerged following someone above the Domain Lord Realm violently shing with the formation protecting the Shattered Star Peaks!


    ¡­


    "Huh? Who?"


    Being forcefully awoken from his cultivation session by a certain someone smashing headfirst into the chaotic qi formation, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as his divine sense swept out and soon engulfed the person responsible for triggering the chaotic qi formation.


    Although he couldn''t recognize the person and had no idea why he hade to attack the Star Shattering Sect, the same could not be said for the two people standing a bit further away from him with nervous expressions on their faces after seeing that the chaotic qi formation remained intact.


    "Those two¡­ They are the people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple. Meaning that¡­ The person attacking the formation should also be from the Heavenly Dragon Temple¡­" Muttering this to himself as his attention was focused on the unknow person at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm that was attacking the chaotic qi formation, Xuan Hao tried his best to figure out why someone from the Heavenly Dragon Temple would suddenly appear to attack the Star Shattering Sect all of a sudden.


    After all, he had made sure to not kill the two people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple who were keeping an eye on the Shattered Star Peaks to prevent them from the master behind them from showing up before he had a chance to gain the strength needed to face someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    From the current strength disyed by the Star Shattering Sect, there should be no reason for them to call over a senior of theirs to attack the Star Shattering Sect-


    "Ah¡­ Is it the formation? Now that I think about it, they did try to enter quite a few times over the years¡­"


    Realizing that the formation might be the reason for the sudden arrival of this senior from the Heavenly Dragon Temple, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit wryly to himself.


    Indeed, he had made sure not to raise any suspicion on the side of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, but he ended up forgetting about the fact that the chaotic qi formation was far beyond what a sect like the Star Shattering Sect should be able to create.


    Given that the Star Shattering Sect only recently gained a Soul Ascension Realm Expert in the eyes of the outside world, it was understandable that the two people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple would grow suspicious about them posing a formation capable of easily dealing with them.


    In the end, this suspicious should be what caused the current situation of them pulling over one of their seniors¡­


    Understanding this, Xuan Hao was a little lost on what to do next.


    If he killed the three, the master behind them would inevitably grow cautious with the death of a Peak Soul Ascension Realm Expert and might draw in the rest of the Heavenly Dragon Temple as a result. Not something Xuan Hao could deal with at the moment, as the Heavenly Dragon Temple was a powerparable to the Blue Sea Empire with Celestial Immortals present.


    Ignoring the other party was not an option either, as it might also result in their master bing cautious about the true strength of the Star Shattering Sect. In the worst case also resulting in him asking for assistance from one of his seniors¡­


    No matter what he did, Xuan Hao felt like he would end up with a far more troublesome situation in the near future.


    "Hm¡­ Maybe I can try to weaken the formation a bit and make it seem like its weaker than it actually is?"


    Out of idea on how to deceive the three people currently hovering in the air outside the Ninth Star Peak, Xuan Hao decided to try and weaken the chaotic qi formation a bit to make it seem like it was about to break. Hoping that this would satiate the curiosity of the three and make them leave without him having to kill them and bring more trouble to his future self.


    ¡­


    BOOOM-!


    "Haha! Looks like this formation is finally showing signs of weakening!"


    "Indeed! Senior is amazing!"


    "Yeah, I wish I was as strong as senior!"


    At the same time Xuan Hao began weakening the chaotic qi formation to make it seem like it was about to break, the three people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple joyfully eximed as they thought the formation had indeed begun to weaken.


    Whoosh~!


    Continuing to attack for a few more minutes until the chaotic qi formation looked like it was just about to break, the senior from the Heavenly Dragon Temple suddenly stopped and retracted his attacks.


    "This should be enough. Although the formation is far more powerful than an ordinary formation in the Soul Ascension Realm, it''s still within the boundaries of the Soul Ascension Realm. Nothing for the lord to worry about. On the other hand, we might as well let it continue to stay in ce and prevent raising any unnecessary suspicion by destroying it."


    "Indeed, senior is wise!"


    "Yes, like this, they will just think something went wrong with the formation and that''s it. After all, there is no way for them to have noticed us in such a short period of time with senior helping us stay hidden!"


    As the group of three finished their test of the chaotic qi formation and their assessment of the situation, they didn''t bother continuing to stay around the Star Shattering Sect, as they left just as fast as they had appeared. Not thinking that everything they said and did was inside the area covered by Xuan Hao''s divine sense.

 Chapter 1173 Strengthening the Formation?

    <h4>Chapter 1173 Strengthening the Formation?</h4>


    "So they did indeede to test out the strength of the formation¡­" Having heard everything that the three of them said as the senior among them attacked the chaotic qi formation, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief as he watched them disappearing into the distance. Feeling relieved that he had acted in time to control the chaotic qi formation and make it seem like it was weakening on the outside. Allowing the three to rest easy that the Star Shattering Sect wouldn''t be difficult for their lord to deal with.


    If he hadn''t acted in time or had decided to kill off the three people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple, he might have been able to enjoy peace for the next few years, but he would inevitably end up dealing with a far more troublesome situation after that. Especially considering how important the ruins located on the Fifth Star Peak seemed to be to this lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    After all, even now, it was rather obvious that this lord didn''t want information about the ruins to leak out to the rest of the Heavenly Dragon Temple and wanted to monopolize it for himself.


    If not for that, it was doubtful whether or not the more powerful experts from the Heavenly Dragon Temple would have shown up to im the ruins on the Fifth Star Peak before they emerged. Giving him and the Star Shattering Sect no chance to reach a level capable of resisting them.


    At least, with only a single lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple aware of the ruins on the Fifth Star Peak and doing his best to not leak out information of its existence to the rest of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, the Star Shattering Sect stood a chance of growing stronger before having to face the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    Not to mention, it was almost certain that the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple would hide his own traces when he left for the Fifth Star Peak when the ruins were about to emerge. Meaning that, even if he ended up dying together with his subordinates, it would take some time for the Heavenly Dragon Temple to figure out where he had gone¡­ And that was not to mention the fact that they seemed to be at odds with the Blue Sea Empire. Making it harder for them to investigate the situation in the empires located close to the borders of the Blue Sea Empire without the Blue Sea Empire finding out.


    In the best-case scenario, the Heavenly Dragon Temple searching for their lord who had mysteriously disappeared in an area close to the Blue Sea Empire would trigger a war between the Blue Sea Empire and the Heavenly Dragon Temple. Making it far more difficult for the Heavenly Dragon Temple to find the Star Shattering Sect and realize that the Star Shattering Sect had something to do with their missing lord.


    "Of course, all of this is only the best-case scenario¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about the future trouble that woulde when the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple arrived.


    At the very least, from some of the conversation between the three from the Heavenly Dragon Temple as they left, he managed to pick up that their lord would arrive in another year. One year¡­ I wonder how much stronger I can be during this period of time¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao retracted his divine sense and allowed the chaotic qi formation to return to normal before focusing his attention back on cultivating anotheryer for his dao lotus.


    At the same time, also making sure to inform Feng Chen and Elder Song that they didn''t have to worry about what had just happened. Making a simple excuse saying that it was just him strengthening the chaotic qi formation in preparation for expanding it in the future.


    After all, even to this day, the chaotic qi formation still didn''t cover the entire Shattered Star Peaks, the Third Star Peak was still being used by those outside cultivators at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm seeking to reach the Nascent Soul Realm at the end of their life, while other parts of the Shattered Star Peaks were still covered in chaotic qi that made it difficult to traverse.


    Of course,pared to the past, most of the Shattered Star Peaks were already inside the chaotic qi formation and could be considered to be part of the Star Shattering Sect.


    However, in the future, Xuan Hao wanted the chaotic qi formation to cover the entire Shattered Star Peaks and the area around the Shattered Star Peaks. Including the Falling Star City.


    At that point in time, the formation could be divided into differentyers with different levels of ess, with the Shattered Star Peaks being the hardest to enter, while entering the Falling Star City at the base of the Ninth Star Peak would be rtively easy for any wandering cultivator.


    As for the Third Star Peak¡­ Xuan Hao had no intention of changing it, as it served as a good way for the Star Shattering Sect to find new Nascent Soul Realm Experts, while also making the wandering cultivators who learnt about the Third Star Peak look more positively at the Star Shattering Sect. After all, it was rare for a powerful force to give an opportunity like the Third Star Peak to outsiders without expecting anything in return. Even if the Third Star Peak was only useful for those at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm trying to reach the Nascent Soul Realm, this didn''t change.


    On the other hand, the existence of the Third Star Peak had allowed the Star Shattering Sect to gain a total of three new Nascent Soul Realm Experts over the years. Although the three Nascent Soul Realm Experts weren''t much to the current Star Shattering Sect, it still helped increase the strength of the sec. Especially considering that the Star Shattering Sect hadn''t used any of their own resources to nurture these three Nascent Soul Realm Experts. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    ¡­


    "Strengthening the chaotic qi formation¡­ So that was what caused the terrifying aura just now? No wonder it felt so much stronger than the Domain Lord Realm if it was Xuan Hao¡­" Hearing about what had happened from Xuan Hao, Feng Chen could not help letting out a sigh of relief as he said this loud enough for Zu Fei and Shu Yao cautiously standing beside him to hear.


    "Grand Elder Xuan? I see¡­"


    "So, it was Xuan Hao¡­"


    Hearing that it was just Xuan Hao strengthening the chaotic qi formation, both Shu Yao and Zu Fei let out a sigh of relief as they looked over in the direction that the terrifying aura had emerged with a hint of fear present in their eyes.


    Although they now knew that the origin behind the terrifying aura had been Xuan Hao, it didn''t make them any less fearful of it. Having reached the Domain Lord Realm, both of them had thought they were already strong, but now that they had felt the terrifying aura from Xuan Hao strengthening the chaotic qi formation, they both felt like they were still far too weak.


    Unknowingly, the attack of the senior from the Heavenly Dragon Temple ended up igniting the cultivation spirit of Zu Fei and Shu Yao. Making both of them want nothing more than to return to their own cultivation room and try to strive for the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this, Feng Chen wasn''t much different, as he also wanted to go back to cultivating his sword domain and strive to reach the Soul Ascension Realm.


    However different from the two of them, he didn''t just want to do this because he wanted to grow stronger, but because he understood that he would have to reach the Soul Ascension Realm in the future if he wanted to keep his position as the sect master.


    After all, the strength of the Star Shattering Sect was constantly increasing and if he couldn''t keep up, he knew that he would inevitably be reced by someone from the younger generation.


    Speaking of the younger generation, the disciples whom he felt would be the most likely to rece him was one of Xuan Hao''s disciples. After all, two of them had already reached the Nascent Soul Realm and were getting close to reaching the Domain Lord Realm.


    Xuan Hao surpassing him in strength was one thing, but how could he possibly sit around doing nothing as his two disciples were about to surpass him!?


    If that really happened, where would his face as someone from the older generation go? Even more so considering that the two disciples in question were still under 50 years old¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Havinge to a somewhat tactic understanding after they realized what the cause of the terrifying aura just now was, Feng Chen, Zu Fei and Shu Yao looked at each other for a short moment before making their way back towards the Seventh Star Peak.

 Chapter 1174 Speed Up Expansion Plans

    <h4>Chapter 1174 Speed Up Expansion ns</h4>


    Following the people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple leaving and Elder Song spending the next few hours calming down the excited elders trying to search for the second person who had supposedly broken through to the Domain Lord Realm, the situation in the Star Shattering Sect calmed down and returned to normal.


    The only change being the fact that the grand elder of the half spirit race was now in the Domain Lord Realm and a rumor about Grand Elder Xuan nning to expand the size of the guardian formation spreading around the sect.


    Of course, none of this had much impact on the current development of the Star Shattering Sect, as Elder Song soon began the process of sending elders out to expand the influence of the Star Shattering Sect in the neighboring outer region of the Sky Empire. Intending to take control of it before the war between the Sky Empire and different invading empires came to an end.


    Knowing very well that the moment the war came to an end, the Sky Empire was likely to no longer exist, causing the different invading empires to start setting their sights on the different territories outside the core of the Sky Empire.


    Even if the Star Shattering Sect had managed to avoid the war so far due to the fact that it was located right next to the Frozen Wastnd, it had only been able to do so because the different empires were far more focused on taking out the severely weakened Sky Empire. All of them intending to take out what they perceived as apetitor, while leaving a smaller force like the Star Shattering Sect that they didn''t perceive as a threat forter.


    "Haaa¡­ I wonder how long those noble families and ns can hold out¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about the current situation of the Sky Empire while sorting through a few documents regarding the recent development of a few smaller branch sects that would soon be established in the neighboring outer region, Elder Song could not help wondering if there was enough time for him to carry out his ns.


    The main reason for this thought was due to the fact that the Soul Ascension Realm Experts left in the capital city of the Sky Empire had recently begun showing signs of running away before the imperial capital was fully surrounded by the forces of the invading empires.


    Of course, the fact that the imperial capital had yet to be fully surrounded was also because the invading empires wanted these Soul Ascension Realm Experts to leave. After all, none of them wanted to engage in a life and death battle with them and possibly lose one of their own Soul Ascension Realm Experts if it could be avoided. Especially considering that none of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the imperial capital of the Sky Empire were part of the imperial family.


    Even if they ended up running away, none of the invading empires felt like they would go through the trouble of enacting revenge on them in the future. On the other hand, some of the invading empires even wanted to directly take in these Soul Ascension Realm Experts and offer them arge portion of the conquered territory in return.


    With all of this in mind and the chances of the Sky Empire surviving through the crisis bing increasingly low, the only Soul Ascension Realm Experts capable of keeping the current situation somewhat under control was the three Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the three major religions. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not only were they the strongest among all of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the imperial capital, but they also had no intention of giving up on the Sky Empire. The main reason for this being that they understood that doing so would result in their religions being expelled by the other religions that had taken root in the different invading empires, something that none of them could tolerate. Instead of this, it was better for them to try and hold on to the influence they still had in the Sky Empire and hope for reinforcement from their more powerful churches in the core region of the continent to show up.


    Shaking his head as he thought about all of this, Elder Song only hoped that the Sky Empire would be able to hold on long enough for him to finish the process of taking control of the neighboring outer region of the Sky Empire. Feeling confident that they would be able to hold on to this much territory without the invading empires attacking them.


    After all, the current Star Shattering Sect had more than one Soul Ascension Realm Expert now that Yi Min had decided to join. Even if she still intended to continue developing her kingdom independently from the Star Shattering Sect as a whole, she would still stand with the Star Shattering Sect in the face of external enemies.


    Although the invading empires would be more than strong enough to deal with two Soul Ascension Realm Experts, Elder Song felt that they should not want to fall out with them over two outer regions of the Sky Empire when the most precious resources were located in the core region of the Sky Empire¡­ And that is not mentioning the fact that the Star Shattering Sect also has someone in the Earth Immortal Realm present.


    Even if the Earth Immortal Realm Expert in question is unable to move outside the sect from what he had heard from Xuan Hao and Feng Chen, it would still be more than enough to intimidate any of the invading empires and prevent them from having any thoughts.


    Of course, all of this was not considering the fact that Xuan Hao was most likely also in the Earth Immortal Realm. Even though information about this had not been confirmed by the person in question yet, it was rather obvious to Elder Song, Feng Chen, and the rest of the higher ups of the sect that he should have reached the Earth Immortal Realm.


    After all, without having reached the Earth Immortal Realm, how could he bring back a powerful Earth Immortal Realm Expert like Pei Yang and have him willingly join the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if the other party was in an injured state and owed a debt of gratitude to Xuan Hao for saving him, it would be unlikely for him to have joined the Star Shattering Sect without Xuan Hao being an expert in the Earth Immortal Realm. At most he might have offered to watch over the sect for a period of time. Not go as far as using a day every month for teaching the disciples and elders of the sect. Especially when he had not even fully recovered from his injuries.


    "No matter how things end up panning out with the Sky Empire, I have a feeling that the Star Shattering Sect will be fine as long as Xuan Hao is around." Muttering this as he let out a sigh while turning to gaze out of the nearby window, a determined smile briefly appeared on his old yet spirited face. "Well¡­ Considering that the Star Shattering Sect will be fine with Xuan Hao around, why don''t I speed up the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect a bit? Maybe also starting the expansion into the outer region partly under the control of the Onyx Empire!"


    Turning his attention back on the documents in front of him with a slight smile, Elder Song pulled up several documents located rather far away before focusing his full attention on them.


    "Hehe, with the recent emergence of a new Domain Lord Realm Expert and arge number of new elders taking over the roles of some older elders, I think we should have enough people to send out a few more people. Not to mention, I can also have Zu Fei join them for safety in case some of the Domain Lords from the Onyx Empire show up to cause trouble!" Mumbling this to himself as he kept his head in the documents he had just pulled over from a corner of the desk, the fate of countless elders along with the unfortunate Zu Fei was sealed.


    The person who caused Elder Song to elerate his expansion ns for the Star Shattering Sect, cultivating peacefully without knowing what kind of trouble he had ended up causing arge number of the older elders who had been lucky enough to avoid being sent to the neighboring outer region by Elder Song only a few weeks earlier.


    In the end, when the matter was announced, the older elders were shocked and speechless. Not expecting Elder Song to suddenlye out with a new expansion n a short time after the first had been announced.


    ¡­


    "You¡­ You want me to go!?"


    Not at all having expected to also be sent out along with the older elders, Zu Fei could only freeze on the spot not knowing what to say after Elder Song personally came to inform her about the matter¡­

 Chapter 1175 One Year (Part 1)

    <h4>Chapter 1175 One Year (Part 1)</h4>


    As Zu Fei ended up leaving the sect together with arge number of the older elders in the Nascent Soul Realm following Elder Song''s ns for expansion into the border region of the Sky Empire partly controlled by the Onyx Empire, the situation in the Star Shattering Sect became hectic for a few weeks as the younger elders settled into the roles that had been left behind by the older elders.


    At the very least, Elder Song had made sure that there was still quite a few Nascent Soul Realm Elders around in the sect to continue teaching some of the older disciples who had already reached the Core Formation Realm or were about to enter the Core Formation Realm, while at the same time ensuring that the younger elders ended up in roles that they could handle and didn''t end up somewhere that they were unqualified for.


    Making full use of this peaceful time, Xuan Hao used the next half year to condense two moreyers around his dao lotus, bringing it up to a total of eightyers.


    During this time, he also got a more in-depth understanding of the requirements for condensing ayer around his dao lotus. Learning that the minimum requirement for condensing ayer was toprehend a dao to the Small Sess Realm, while reaching the Large Sess Realm would allow him to condense another two.


    Comprehending a dao to the Elementary Realm wasn''t enough to condense ayer like he had first expected. Meaning that if he wanted to condense any moreyers and improve his strength, he would have to eitherprehend a new dao or improve his other Daos, like the Dao of cksmithing, to the Small Sess Realm or beyond.


    This realization made Xuan Hao painfully aware of why it was normal for people to try and break through to the Celestial Immortal Realm after reaching the Half Bloom Stage that symbolized someone having condensed at least 18yers around their dao lotus. For someone to condense 18yers around their dao lotus, they needed toprehend at least three Daos to the Realm of Perfection orprehend 15 Daos to the Small Sess Realm and one to the Large Sess Realm.


    In the eyes of most Earth Immortal Realm cultivators, this was already a task that was impossible for most to aplish. By the time that most reached the Half Bloom Stage, they would focus all of their time and energy towards trying to break through to the Celestial Immortal Realm. No matter how confident they were in themselves, there wasn''t anyone who would be dumb enough to try and reach the Radiant Bloom Stage that at most existed in legends across the Ewaria Continent at this point in time. After all, even the youngest Half Bloom Stage cultivator had lived for thousands of years, with most of them being tens of thousands of years old. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    If he didn''t want to end up with another emergency quest, he had a feeling that it would be best for him toprehend the Dao of Alchemy to the Elementa- No, the Small Sess Realm. At the same time, he could also raise his Dao of cksmithing to the Small Sess Realm and ensure that he could continue to stay ahead of his two disciples. On another note, it would also allow him to condense another twoyers on his dao lotus, further increasing his strength.


    But¡­ That lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple should be showing up in another half year, I wonder if I can raise my Dao of cksmith and Alchemy to the Small Sess Realm before he appears? Not to mention, considering the twoyers around my dao lotus will also take a few months¡­


    Smiling a bit wryly to himself as he thought about this, Xuan Hao realized that he would most likely not be able to raise the two Daos to the Small Sess Realm and condense two moreyers before the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple appeared.


    "Even then¡­ I should be able to raise the Dao of cksmithing to the Small Sess Realm and condense one moreyer around my dao lotus¡­" Havinge up with a n of action for what he would use the remaining half year before the arrival of the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple on, Xuan Hao once again closed his eyes as he focused his full attention onprehending the Dao of cksmithing.


    During this period of time, the only time he would leave his cultivation room would be to check up on his disciples once every month or when they personally came to seek his help in cultivation, while also resuming his past lecture once every three months.


    Even if the rewards given by the system forpleting the three-month lecture weren''t useful to him, it was still useful to the sect and his disciples. Especially the spiritual metal that was given through the repeatable system quest, as he found out that it would always be rare and exotic spiritual metal that originated from the ancient era and was hard to find in the current time.


    However, the person who enjoyed these rare and exotic spiritual metals the most was Bai Ning, who began frolicking around like a child whenever he brought out any of the spiritual metal that he had managed to get through the repeatable system quest.


    Even if the quality of the spiritual metal wasn''t that high, the fact that it was exotic and most of it didn''t exist in the current time was more than enough to make up for it.


    In the end, this resulted in quite a few unique artifacts created by Bai Ning starting to spread through the Star Shattering Sect. Even if the impact of these artifacts didn''t create much of a stir, their uniqueness still managed to captivate arge number of cksmithing disciples and elders. Ultimately increasing Bai Ning''s prestige among the cksmiths of the sect during this period of time, while also making his presence more known throughout the sect as a whole.

 Chapter 1176 One Year (Part 2)

    <h4>Chapter 1176 One Year (Part 2)</h4>


    Not only did Bai Ning reputation spread through the sect during this half year, but Mui''s name also spread among the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect. Although, the reason why she became known was not do to her creating some amazing artifact like Bai Ning did, but instead because of the rather unique artifacts that she had ended up creating after learning about the special formation symbols used by cksmiths to strengthen their artifact.


    Given how much she had ended up practicing after learning about the special formation symbols, she ended up creating hundreds of these unique artifacts during thest half year¡­ And with nowhere to put all of them after the forge she used had almost been filled to the brim, she had decided to give them away to the different disciples she met during her walk from the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces to the pce of her master.


    In the end, it was this giving away of artifacts that had ended up causing her to gain a reputation among the disciples of the sect. Not only because of the unique appearance of these artifacts, but also because most of them were capable of blocking the attacks of someone in the Core Formation Realm with rtive ease.


    Even though this might have been due to the quality of the spiritual metal used in the creation of these artifacts, it was still more than enough to make some of the younger disciples admire this strange senior who looked no more than thirteen going around giving out these unique artifacts for free.


    At the same time, Qing Yi finally managed to break through to the Master Realm and the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm six months after the grand elder of the half spirit race had broken through to the Domain Lord Realm. However, because she didn''t announce it and only Xuan Hao knew about it, her break through to the Master Realm went unnoticed by the disciples and elders of the sect as she remained fully absorbed in trying out new potion and pill recipes after her breakthrough.


    On the other hand, the same could not be said for Chu Yang, who broke through to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm inside the Combat Hall a short two months after Qing Yi''s breakthrough to the Master Realm.


    The breakthrough was seen by countless junior and senior disciples along with the elders in charge of the Combat Hall. Resulting in his name resounding through the entire sect. Praised unanimously as the strongest disciple of the sect.


    In the end, a short time after Chu Yang''s breakthrough, Elder Song saw an opportunity and grabbed hold of Feng Chen before disappearing with him.


    Only a few hourster did the rest of the secte to know that a new position known as Prime Disciple had been established and Chu Yang had been promoted to this new position, it was only after learning what this new position entailed that some of the elders understood why Elder Song had abducted Feng Chen a few hours earlier.


    In essence, the Prime disciple represented the strongest disciple in the sect at the moment and could be reced by anyone if they could beat the current prime disciple.


    Of course, when Chu Yang was promoted to an elder at some point in the future, a new Prime Disciple would be chosen to rece him.


    The reason why Elder Song had been excited to establish a position like this after he saw Chu Yang breaking through to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, was because he also saw the fighting spirit of the different disciples who watched the breakthrough igniting. Driving them towards improving their own strength and cultivation.


    In the end, Elder Song wanted to try and use the Prime Disciple position to stimte the fighting spirit of these younger disciples.


    Even if there was no chance of them bing a Prime Disciple due to the fact that Chu Yang was already close to the Domain Lord Realm and had strength almostparable to someone in the Domain Lord Realm, it didn''t change the fact that these younger disciples would work harder when they had a goal to work towards and try their best to surpass!


    Following the establishment of the Prime Disciple position, the atmosphere in the Star Shattering Sect changed from its usual calm and serene appearance into one filled with disciples all working hard to improve their strength.


    The increased fighting spirit of these young disciples ended up causing the Combat Hall and Grand Mission Pavilion to be filled to the brim for the next four months, as the disciples who qualified to take on missions outside the sect all rushed to get out and find an opportunity to enhance their strength, while the weaker ones ended up staying back in the sect to practice in the Combat Hall.


    Of course, it was not just the weaker disciples staying in the Combat Hall, as some of the stronger disciple also stayed behind to practice theirbat techniques, Chu Yang being one of these stronger disciple, as he returned to the Combat Hall shortly after having stabilized his cultivation base and a short conversation with his master about how he should go about establishing a pseudo domain in preparation for reaching the Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    ¡­


    "Finally managed to condense the ninthyer¡­ And with only a little over a week left before the one-year time imit mentioned by those people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple is up¡­" Opening his eyes again after spending a half year fully immersed in the Dao of cksmithing, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself as a sense of nervousness washed over him.


    Although he had managed to reach the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of cksmithing and finished condensing the ninthyer around his dao lotus before the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple arrived, he still felt nervous when thinking about the fact that he would have to face the unknow Earth Immortal Realm Expert from the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    After all, even if he knew that the other party was in the Earth Immortal Realm, he had no idea how strong this lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple was. In the worst-case scenario, he might be someone in the Half Bloom Stage that he had no way to fight back against with his current strength.


    Of course, if the other party was really that strong, he would be forced to hide away inside the chaotic qi formation and begin the Immortal Soul Tribtion.


    Even if it would give up his chance at reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he should at least be able to gain enough strength to fight back against the Heavenly Dragon Temple after oveing the Immortal Soul Tribtion.


    Other than that, I might also have a chance if my physique awakens¡­


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help ncing over his status.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword ((Peak) Small Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess), Dao of Space (Small Sess), Dao of Illusions (Large Sess Realm), Dao of cksmithing (Small Sess) Dao Lotus: 9yers (one for each daoprehended.)


    Sword Intent: Peak Nascent Sword Soul Realm


    Talent: ???? Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened) Physique: ??? (99% Awakened) Realm: Late Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to Earth Immortal Realm, Fourth Layer Lotus) Professions: Alchemist (Master), Formation Master (Peak Artisan), cksmithing (Pseudo Saint) Sect: Star Shattering Sect Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Peak Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm) Ever since his physique had reached the 99% mark, it had not moved an inch. Making it obvious that he needed to do something to awaken his physique, or he was still too weak to awaken it.


    At the same time, his strength that had beenparable to an Earth Immortal with a Third Layer Dao Lotus had also increased to a Fourth Layer Dao Lotus. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although it seemed like his strength wasn''tparable to a true Earth Immortal with a Ninth Layer Dao Lotus, he should at least be stronger than someone who had just broken through to the Earth Immortal Realm at this point in time.


    Even though he had no idea how strong the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple was, he had a feeling that he should be stronger than an Earth Immortal with a Fourth Layer Dao Lotus¡­


    "Even if the other party isn''t a Half Bloom Stage Earth Immortal, it will still be difficult for me to win. Maybe I should check up on Pei Yang and see if he has recovered enough to lend me a hand¡­" Muttering this to himself as he finished going over his current situation, Xuan Hao stood up and left his cultivation room in the direction of Pei Yang''s courtyard.

 Chapter 1177 Heavenly Dragon Temple Outpost Location

    <h4>Chapter 1177 Heavenly Dragon Temple Outpost Location</h4>


    After visiting Pei Yang to see if he could help with lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, Xuan Hao was relieved to discover that Pei yang was more than willing to lend a hand in return for the help he had shown him by allowing him to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although Pei Yang had not yet managed to recover his strength, he was still a skilled alchemist and had been in the Earth Immortal Realm for a long time. Allowing him to recover his strength back to a levelparable to someone who had just managed to break through to the Earth Immortal Realm. Even if he wasn''t that strong in battle considering that he was still in an injured state, he would at least be able to provide some support in case he needed it.


    At the same time, Xuan Hao also tried to inquire about the Heavenly Dragon Temple through Pei Yang. Hoping that someone as experienced as him would at least have some information on the Heavenly Dragon Temple. After all, so far, the only thing he had managed to figure out about the Heavenly Dragon Temple was the fact that they weren''t on friendly terms with the Blue Sea Empire and were one of the major powers in the core region of the continent.


    Luckily, Pei Yang did have some information about the Heavenly Dragon Temple and through their conversation, Xuan Hao managed to figure out that the title of lord in the Heavenly Dragon Temple was something that was rewarded to those who managed to condense fiveyers around their dao lotus.


    Of course, this didn''t mean that the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple who wasing to the Star Shattering Sect had only this strength. Instead, it just meant that this was the lowest level of strength that his opponent might have!


    Then again, everything wasn''t hopeless, as Pei Yang also told him that the strongest lord would at most have eightyers around his or her dao lotus. Beyond that, the other party would no longer be a lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple and would instead be an elder figure that could be considered powerful even within the Earth Immortal Realm. Meaning that at most, he would have to face an Earth Immortal with ana Eight Layered Dao Lotus.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao felt far more confident in his chances of dealing with the other party. At the very least, he no longer worried about the possibility of the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple being someone in the Half Bloom Stage. Allowing him to rx a bit as he began preparing for the inevitable battle that would take ce in another few weeks.


    No matter how confident he was in his chances now that he had some idea about his opponent''s strength, he also understood that his own strength had only reached a levelparable to someone with a fiveyered dao lotus.


    If he wanted to kill the other party and prevent any news of his death from reaching the Heavenly Dragon Temple, he had to prepare a trap for the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple in a ce with as few people as possible. But for this, he would have to find a way to intercept the other party before he could reach the territory of the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Not wasting any time after realizing this, Xuan Hao soon rushed out of the sect without anyone noticing him leaving. Heading in the same direction, the three people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple had gone a year earlier.


    Intending to first find them and try to figure out where the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple woulde from before setting out a trap in an isted location that he would cross over to reach the Shattered Star Peaks.


    ¡­


    "I wonder how long it will take before the lord arrives¡­"


    A few hours after Xuan Hao left the Star Shattering Sect, at the edge of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory, one of the three people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple currently present in the Sky Empire, quietly muttered this to himself as he looked into the distance.


    "Don''t think too much about it, the lord should show up in another few weeks. Until then, we should keep an eye out for anything that might disrupt the lord''s n." Standing not too far away, another of the three people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple opened his mouth to say this after hearing what his friend said.


    "True, the senior already left to keep an eye on the Blue Sea Empire and make sure that none of the border guards notices the lord''s arrival, but¡­ Given how most of the border guards are busy looking for someone wanted by the Blue Sea Empire at the moment, ording to what senior said, they shouldn''t pose any problems for the lord.


    "Don''t think too much about it, the lord should show up in another few weeks. Until then, we should keep an eye out for anything that might disrupt the lord''s n." Standing not too far away, another of the three people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple opened his mouth to say this after hearing what his friend said.


    Even if some trouble ends up appearing during the next few weeks, I highly doubt it will be enough to cause us any trouble. After all, the Sky Empire is just a border empire outside the core of the continent. No matter what kind of problems ur in a ce like this, they won''t be too hard to deal with given our strength."


    "Hm¡­ I understand what you mean. Should we go check up on the outpost and ensure that the teleportation formation is working properly? Even though it will take a bit of time to reach the outpost, we can also check the path of his lord along the way and make sure there isn''t anything troublesome along the path."


    "You- You obviously just want to go back to the outpost and see if you can get something from those poor disciples left in charge of the outpost!"


    "Hehe~ You caught me~ So¡­ What do you say? It''s not like anything will happen and we still have a few weeks left before the lord shows up."


    "Hmph! Fine, let''s get going." Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    As the conversation between the two people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple came to an end, both of them jumped into the air before leaving in the opposite direction of the Star Shattering Sect. Unaware of the fact that someone had silently arrived not too far away from them just a short time earlier. Silently observing both of them as they flew away.


    Whoosh~


    Only a short timeter, did the person silently follow after the two people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple, who were stillpletely unaware of the fact that they were being followed.


    Soon, a few days flew by as the two people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple left the borders of the Sky Empire and crossed through two other empires around the same size as the Sky Empire. Only after arriving at the edge of the second empire did the two finallye to a stop as they look around themselves cautiously before one of them took out a small token that unlocked a secret passage leading down into an underground space the size of a small city.


    Swish~


    Wasting no time after the secret passage appeared, the two rapidly entered before the passage disappeared.


    "Hm¡­ Looks like the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple is going toe using the teleportation formation inside that outpost¡­"


    Appearing a few thousand meters away from the ce where the secret entrance to what he guessed was the outpost mentioned by the two people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple had appeared, Xuan Hao frowned slightly as he muttered this to himself.


    Although the distance between the Star Shattering Sect and the ce where the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple would appear from was rather long, the number of locations suitable for him tounch an ambush could be counted on a single hand. Not to mention, he had also discovered that some of the border guards from the Blue Sea Empire had started appearing inside the two different empires he had traveled through. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even though they had only appeared close to the ces where these empires bordered the territory of the Blue Sea Empire, it was still unsettling knowing that the border guards of the Blue Sea Empire might notice him if he started fighting with the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    The only positive thing was that the strength of the border guards had only reached the Soul Ascension Realm and there was not a single one among them that had reached the Earth Immortal Realm. Meaning that he should be able to fight with the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple without them noticing as long as they didn''t go too far into the empire, he chose to ambush the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple inside of.


    If they really ended up noticing him, he could only hope that the matter didn''t attract the attention of the Earth Immortals of the Blue Sea Empire, who should be busy dealing with the illusory beasts running rampant in their empire.

 Chapter 1178 Ambush (Part 1)

    <h4>Chapter 1178 Ambush (Part 1)</h4>


    In the following weeks leading up to the arrival of the lord from the Heavenly Dragon temple, Xuan Hao found a rtively deserted location in the middle of the empire that the outpost was located in before beginning to prepare a trap, while also asking both Yi Min and Pei Yang toe and help. Making sure that Pei Yang picked up Yi Min beforeing, as it would take her at least a few weeks to reach his current location on her own.


    Although Yi Min wouldn''t be of much help when it came to fighting the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, she was the strongest formation master that he knew about and only person who would be able to guide him and Pei Yang in setting up a killing formation strong enough to have any effect against someone in the Earth Immortal Realm. Only after the killing formation had been set up did Yi Min retreat to a safe distance, while Xuan Hao and Pei Yang both finished setting up a few more traps on their own before hiding themselves. Waiting for the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple to appear.


    ¡­


    "Finally managed to escape, I never expected those old fools to notice something and have someone follow me. Given I left that fellow behind in the Light Mist Poison Swamp, I should have a few years without any interruptions. More than enough time."


    Back at the outpost of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, a solemn looking middle-aged man walked out of the teleportation formation as he muttered this to himself with frown on his face.


    "This humble one greets the lord!"


    Standing only a short distance away from the teleportation formation, the senior among the three people from the Heavenly Dragon Temple in charge of ensuring nothing went wrong, instantly recognized the middle-aged man as respectfully greeted him before lowering his head-


    """We greet the lord!"""


    Something that instantly caused the rest of the people present in the outpost to simrly lower their head before respectfully greeting the middle-aged man, while a few of the younger people in charge of the outpost sneakily peeked towards him out of the corner of their eyes filled with awe.


    Given that most of the people who were in charge of managing the outpost were only around the Nascent Soul Realm with the leader of the outpost having reached theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm, none of them had expected that they would actually have the chance to encounter a revered existence like a lord in a remote empire far away from the core of the continent.


    "Hui, is everything ording to n?" Not at all caring about the people respectfully bowing to him, the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple simply turned to look towards the strongest of the three who had been left in charge of ensuring that nothing went wrong before his arrival.


    "Yes! Everything has been going smoothly and there are no movements from the Blue Sea Empire, as they are currently busy looking for someone who killed one of their Earth Immortals. The only thing worth mentioning is that the sect currently upying the Shattered Star Peaks has a formation strong enough to block someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm for a few minutes.


    After personally investigating the Star Shattering Sect and finding no one capable of producing such a formation among them, it led me to believe that the formation had been obtained from the ruins on the Fifth Star Peak. Considering the lord''s wish to keep things as hidden as possible, I decided to not destroy the sect on the Shattered Star Peaks to avoid raising any attention before the arrival of the lord."


    As he finished relying on everything of importance, the strongest person outside of the lord, Hui, nervously lowered his head a bit further as he waited for a response. Knowing very well that if there was anything wrong with his report, he might end up losing his head.


    "So, the Blue Sea Empire is busy and has no time to keep an eye on the surrounding small empires¡­ Hehe, this is great! As for that sect you mentioned¡­ Don''t worry about them, it was good to leave them intact, as destroying them might lead to the Blue Sea Empire noticing something." Chuckling to himself as he said this, the lord slowly turned around to look back at the teleportation formation that had been set up in the middle of the outpost-


    Bang!


    "Ah!? The formation-"


    Crack~


    And before any of the people present had the time to react, he released part of his strength to directly destroy the teleportation formation. Only the panicked voice of the Domain Lord Realm Expert in charge of the outpost could be heard as the teleportation formation was reduced to dust.


    "You three, let''s get going." Once again ignoring the reactions of the people around him, the lord nonchntly called out to Hui and the other two people he had left in charge of handling things before his arrival.


    Whoosh~


    Not wasting any time waiting for their response, he directly grabbed the three of them and dragged them out of the outpost before jumping into the sky in the direction of the Sky Empire where the Shattered Star Peaks were located.


    During the entire process, he never mentioned the sect that had established itself on the Shattered Star Peaks over thest few years. Clearly showing how little, he cared about a weak sect outside the core region.


    Even if he had some idea about the fact that the Star Shattering Sect being a sect with a Soul Ascension Realm Expert presiding over it and a formation that should havee from the ruins at the Ninth Star Peak, he didn''t care in the slightest. On the other hand, the information that a weak sect like the Star Shattering Sect had managed to enter the ruins ande out with a powerful formation only excited him.


    After all, for the Star Shattering Sect to be capable of getting their hands on such a powerful formation inside the ruins on the Fifth Star Peak not only meant that the ruins had already opened, but also that the ruins were far safer than he had first expected.


    ¡­


    In the depths of arge desert stretching on for thousands upon thousands of miles with close to no demon beasts living inside of it and not a single human cultivator anywhere near it, Xuan Hao and Pei Yang nced over at each as they noticed a terrifying presence entering the borders of the dessert before it reached the core of the desert over the next few seconds.


    Rumble~!


    It was at this moment that Xuan Hao and Pei Yang chose to activate the formation, causing the entire desert to tremble violently as a web of formation symbols covered the entire desert before a terrifying power rose up from the desert to form an endless number of sand spears that rushed towards the surprised lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple and the three people, he was carrying with him-


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Exploding violently on impact with a scorching power more than strong enough to reduce a Soul Ascension Realm Expert to ashes.


    Although the formation that had been drawn up under the help of Yi Min was far from strong enough to pose any real threat to the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, it was still using the scorching qi in the desert and the desert itself as a core. Allowing its power to reach a level beyond what was normally possible for a Master Realm Formation to archive.


    "Who!?" Instantly realizing that he had been ambushed as he watched the countless sand spears raining down on him, the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple used his power to forcibly resist the spears as they exploded all around him while keeping his three subordinates safe.


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not bothering to answer the question posed by the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, Xuan Hao and Pei Yang both made their move as they rushed out from the ce they had been hiding before starting to attack the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple together with the killing formation that was already doing a good job forcing him to divide his attention on three different attackers at once.


    BOOOM!


    RUUUUUUUUMBLE-!


    As the three began to sh in earnest and the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple stopped talking and focused his full attention on the fight. Knowing that even a slightpse in his attention might end up costing him his life, the three subordinates that he had been carrying with him were all let go to fend for themselves-


    "Ahh!"


    "No-"


    "Lord! Don''t do-"


    In the end, the three managed tost for less than a second as the sand spear of the killing formation violently tore them apart before they even had the time to react¡­

 Chapter 1179 Ambush (Part 2)

    <h4>Chapter 1179 Ambush (Part 2)</h4>


    Even after letting go of the three subordinates that he had been protecting, it was still difficult for the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple to protect himself against the attack of the formation, Xuan Hao, and Pei Yang at the same time. Even though he was stronger, he was still locked in a situation where he was essentially being attacked from three sides at the same time, all of which had Earth Immortal Realm level power.


    Because of this, it did not take long before he was forced to use all of his energy to defend himself from the constant onught. Unable to mount a serious counterattack against Xuan Hao or Pei Yang.


    Of course, if he knew that Pei Yang was currently in an injured state and wouldn''t be able to properly defend himself and could only attack with the help of the formation and several pills he had swallowed before the start of the battle, the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple might have not ended up in the current situation of only being able to passively defend himself. Unfortunately for him, he had no idea about this and just thought of Pei Yang as a normal Earth Immortal Realm Expert without any problems so to speak.


    As for the reason why, he didn''t sense anything off about Pei Yang, it also had to do with some of the pills that specifically masked the weakness in his aura.


    At the end of the day, Pei Yang was still a Grandmaster Realm Alchemist and had countless ways to mask his own weakness and boost his own strength to give the illusion that there was nothing wrong with him. Although it wouldn''t work for an extended period of time, it was more than enough that it couldst for a few minutes and give them a chance to either kill or severely injure the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    Boom!


    Unable to free himself after being forced into a defensive position, the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple could only continue blocking the endless barrage of attacks raining down on him from Xuan Hao, Pei Yang, and the sand spear killing formation.


    Just who is it!?


    In this stalemate that had emerged, he could not help looking towards Xuan Hao and Pei Yang before trying to figure out who they were, where they came from and how they had managed to find out about him going through the desert of a small empire at the outskirts of the continent.


    Did one of those elders discover my ns and send these two to ambush me? Or did Hui fail to notice someone from the Blue Sea Empire spying on him leading up to my arrival?


    Frowning as he thought about this to himself whileparing Xuan Hao and Pei Yang to any of the Earth Immortals from the Heavenly Dragon Temple and the Blue Sea Empire that he knew about, the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple ultimately couldn''t recall seeing any of them before.


    The main reason why he couldn''t recognize Xuan Hao was rather obvious, while the reason he had no idea about Pei Yang was due to the fact that he was a wandering cultivator before joining the Star Shattering Sect and hadn''t done anything notable other than killing an Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire¡­ And even the fact that he was the person who had killed the Earth Immortal did not yet have time to spread outside the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even if it did end up spreading outside the Blue Sea Empire in the future, it was doubtful whether a lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple would pay any attention to someone in the earlier stages of the Earth Immortal Realm who happened to win a life and death battle with another Earth Immortal in the earlier stages of the realm. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The only thing that might be of interest to someone like that would be the fact that the dead Earth Immortal belonged to the Blue Sea Empire, one of the Heavenly Dragon Temple''s enemies in the core region of the continent.


    Whoosh~


    Unaware of the thoughts going through the head of the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple, Xuan Hao decided to momentarily step back after seeing that the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple had been restrained and unable to move away from his current location before pouring all of his strength into his divine void eyes-


    Rumble~


    Not intending to give the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple a chance to fight back, both of Xuan Hao''s eyes shone eerily under the burning hot desert sun as he used his divine void eyes to forcibly increase the speed and strength of the spatial copse, something had learnt to do after his strength had increased.


    In a sense, it was not that he couldn''t do this before, just that his strength was insufficient to do it. Even now, increasing the speed and strength of the spatial copse would drain what little strength he had left after causing the spatial copse¡­


    "Aaaaah!" Feeling the change in the speed and power that the space was copsing; the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple could only let out a painful scream from within the copsing space as he used all of his power to fight back against it to no avail-


    BOOOM-!


    However, just as it seemed like he was going to be crushed and torn apart by the spatial copse, he managed to forcibly break through his own limits and gain a momentary enlightenment allowing him to condense the ninthyer around his dao lotus. Officially breaking through to the realm of what was considered the Late Stage of the Earth Immortal Realm.


    ""¡­""


    Not having expected something like this to happen, Xuan Hao and Pei Yang momentarily froze in surprise.


    "Aaaaaah! I will never die like this!"


    BOOOOOOOOM-!


    Feeling the speed and power of the spatial copse momentarily weakening due to the slightpse in attention from Xuan Hao, the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple used all of his strength and artifacts to forcibly rush out of the area covered by the spatial copse before tearing apart another spatial talisman and escaping before Xuan Hao and Pei Yang had a chance to stop him.


    "Just you wait old man! We might both be from the same ce, but I will have my revenge in the future!" Screaming these few words as he disappeared, Xuan Hao and Pei Yang could not help looking at each other surprised over what had just happened.


    "This is¡­ Unexpected¡­" Muttering this to himself Xuan Hao could not help frowning. Not expecting the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple to somehow gain enlightenment in a life and death moment before condensing anotheryer around his dao lotus and using this new strength and hispse in attention to break out of the area covered by the true spatial copse with the protection of his artifacts and escape.


    "Don''t worry too much about it, in his current state, I doubt he will be able to recover in a short time. Even if he manages to recover, he seems to have a misunderstanding thinking we were sent by one of his enemies from the Heavenly Dragon Temple. Even if he returns to the Heavenly Dragon Temple, we should be fine." Noticing Xuan Hao''s worry, Pei Yang walked over as he said this in a reassuring tone.


    Even if the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple had escaped, he should not be thinking about the ruins of the Shattered Star Peaks any longer and should instead be worried about recovering and getting revenge on the "old man" who was behind the ambush.


    "Indeed¡­" Nodding his head in agreement after hearing what Pei Yang said, Xuan Hao rxed a bit.


    Although the enemy had managed to escape alive, the situation should be fine in the short term. Maybe it might even be better this way, as the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple didn''t end up dying but instead left the ce thinking that someone else from the Heavenly Dragon Temple had arranged an ambush on him.


    Even if he ended up finding out that this was not the case in the future, it would be hundreds of years from now¡­ And at that point in time, the Star Shattering Sect should be more than strong enough to contend with a powerful force like the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    Understanding this after thinking about the situation for a bit, Xuan Hao could only shake his head hoping that the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple would not cause any more problems for the Shattered Star Peaks. "Haaa¡­ Let''s go back for now¡­"

 Chapter 1180 Doubts

    Riiip~! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Thump!


    At the same time Xuan Hao began to make his way back to the Star Shattering Sect together with Pei Yang and Yu Min after failing to kill the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple, the person in question came tumbling out of a spatial passage far away from the empire that he had been ambushed in. Covered from head to toe in bloody wounds that made it obvious just how bad his current state was. "Haaa... I finally managed to escape!"


    Even in this kind of condition, he didn''t show the slightest sign of displeasure, as he instead let out a relieved sigh. No matter how bad his current situation was, he was alive.


    "But¡­ If that old man is really behind the ambush, I can''t return to the Heavenly Dragon Temple as he might take advantage of my weakness to get rid of me. Especially now that I managed to condense a ninthyer around my dao lotus. Obtaining the minimum qualification to be an elder myself¡­" Muttering this to himself as he went over his current situation, the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple could not help frowning to himself.


    Although he had indeed managed to escape alive, he understood that he wouldn''t be able to return to the Heavenly Dragon Temple in his current state. Not only because the main culprit behind his ambush was there, but also because his other enemies might jump at the opportunity to deal with him in his current weakened state.


    "Looks like my only option is to keep a low profile for a few years until I recover¡­ Hmph! After I recover, I will make sure to take revenge on that old man!" Narrowing both of his eyes as he came to a decision, the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple stood up before dragging his injured body away from the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    Even though he had managed to reach the territory of the Heavenly Dragon Temple with the help of the teleportation talisman that he had shattered and used to escape, he had only arrived at the edge of the Heavenly Dragon Temple''s territory and hadn''t managed to alert any of the elders patrolling the borders of the Heavenly Dragon Temple''s territory.


    For now, he decided to hide away in a neutral region not controlled by any major power and consolidate his cultivation base before recovering from the injuries he had received during the ambush.


    "Give me 100- no, 50 years and I will return to have my revenge!" Looking back in the direction where the Heavenly Dragon Temple was located, the lord of the Heavenly Dragon Temple smiled confidently as he said this before officially leaving the territory of the Heavenly Dragon Temple in search of a ce where he could peacefully recover his strength and consolidate his cultivation base. Unaware of the fact that the elders from the Heavenly Dragon Temple had nothing to do with the ambush he had just barely survived through.


    In the end, it would only be when he returned to the Heavenly Dragon Temple in the future, that he would be aware of how wrong his thoughts were. Unfortunately, for now, he had no way to know that the elder he was dead set on killing at the moment was innocent.


    ¡­


    Returning back to the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao could not help feeling an unknown sense of unease after parting ways with Pei Yang and Yi Min.


    The reason for this had nothing to do with the fact that the lord from the Heavenly Dragon Temple had escaped but was instead due to the presence of the outpost that he hade through.


    Although there wasn''t anything special about it whenpared to the other outpost from the Heavenly Dragon Temple that he had encountered inside the Blue Sea Empire, it caused him to recall the weird observers he had discovered secretly keeping an eye on the Flying Sword Sect all the way back when he had just finished crafting his first interspatial ring and taken on the interspatial ring quest that had yet toe to an end.


    Back then, he didn''t investigate too much about these secret observers as they left shortly after he had discovered them, but upon closer thought, he realized how weird it was for a group of people who by all ounts should be strong enough to destroy the Flying Sword Sect back then to secretly observe it from a distance without doing anything.


    Although he managed to figure out that they seemed to be looking for the founder of the Flying Sword Sect and had been doing so for at least 800 years and also seemed to be afraid of being noticed by the Sky Empire, it made little sense to him just where these people hade from. After all, if they were enemies of the Sky Empire, they should have appeared during the past few years when the Sky Empire entered a state of decline and was attacked from all sides.


    The other reason why they might be afraid of the Sky Empire was a bit more nerve-wracking, as it could be because of the fact that the Sky Empire was to some extent aligned with the Blue Sea Empire and might inform them about their presence if they were found, but¡­ For that to be the case meant that the power that had been secretly keeping an eye on the Flying Sword Sect for at least the past 800 years had to be a power on par with the Blue Sea Empire!


    "Just who is the founder of the Flying Sword Sect¡­?" Not able to stop himself from muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the background of the founder was more mysterious than he had first expected. Possibly even belonging to a powerful force at the core region on the continent before having left for some unknown reason to establish the Flying Sword Sect in a rather remote empire like the Sky Empire¡­


    "Haaa¡­ Even if I want to know more about the founder, I have no clues to follow¡­" Shaking his head as he realized this, Xuan Hao understood that he couldn''t do anything to try and find out more about the founder of the Flying Sword Sect on his own.


    The best thing he could do was look out for anyone who seemed to be looking for the founder of the Flying Sword Sect. Although it was doubtful that the people, he had encountered back then would return to take a look at the Flying Sword Sect from what he had heard on the day that they had left, as it seemed like the power behind them had given up on continuing their search for the founder of the Flying Sword Sect.


    Maybe when they found out about the establishment of the Star Shattering Sect and its rapid increase in strength would they send someone new to investigate the situation, but before that, Xuan Hao was rather helpless when it came to finding out more about the founder of the Flying Sword Sect and the people who seemed to be searching for him.


    The only real clue he had about the founder of the Flying Sword Sect at this point in time was that he seemed to be rted to the different seals he had encountered in the areas close to the Flying Sword Sect.


    Maybe if he tried to investigate those seals again now that his strength had increased, he might be able to find some clues as to what kind of being had been sealed and possibly also how the founder of the Flying Sword Sect was rted to these seals.


    Although it would be hard to find the seal that was located in the Frozen Wastnd due to it constantly shifting its position and the current unstable situation with powerful demonic cultivators all over the ce, it shouldn''t be a problem to take a look at the seal that was located below the ruins of the Raging me Sect¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he directly left the Star Shattering Sect and made his way towards the ruins of the Raging me Sect.


    Whoosh~


    Considering the fact that his current strength had reached a realm far beyond what it had been thest time he had visited the ce, all it took was a single step before he arrived in front of the entrance to the underground area where the seal was located-


    "Hm?" However, upon arriving at the entrance leading down into the ce where the seal of the unknown being was located, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that he wasn''t the only one nning to make a trip to the seal.


    Who is that¡­?


    Not too far away from the entrance, a hunched back old man solemnly nced down into the dark abyss where the seal was located. Not only was he someone Xuan Hao was unfamiliar with, but his strength had also reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although this strength was not worth mentioning to someone like him, it was considered extraordinary in the Sky Empire and the surrounding empires. Meaning that if he was from one of these empires, he should have been well known enough for Xuan Hao to have heard about him before when he investigated the different experts present among the invading empires.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to not reveal himself immediately and instead decided to quietly observe the situation.

 Chapter 1181 Back at the Seal, Strange Old Man

    <h4>Chapter 1181 Back at the Seal, Strange Old Man</h4>


    Not aware of the fact that Xuan Hao had arrived a few hundred meters above him and was currently watching his every move, the old man crotched down at the edge of the abyss leading deep underground where the seal was located.


    "This should be the ce¡­ I hope the seal is still in ce¡­" Muttering this to himself as a hint of hesitation shed through his eyes, the old man slowly took a step forward before descending into the dark abyss. The fear on his face made it rather obvious that he had some idea about the terrifying existence sealed below.


    Whoosh~


    Not one to fall behind, Xuan Hao also descended into the abyss following after the old man. Now feeling more curious than ever about the identity of the old man, as he very clearly seemed to already know about the existence of the seal below the Raging me Sect.


    Not a secondter, Xuan Hao and the old man found themselves floating above the dark miasma that the unknown being was hidden inside of. At a nce, it was clear that the being had not yet managed to break free from the seal and was still stuck.


    However, after Xuan Hao ced his attention on the hidden divine formation symbols covering every inch of the underground space, it became clear that the seal had been significantly weakenedpared to thest time he had been there. Not only that, but a section of the divine formation symbols seemed to have been fully destroyed. Allowing part of the miasma from below to surge up and cover arge part of the underground space that had been essible in the past next to the tform suspended above the dark miasma.


    "Looks like it''s still intact¡­" Breathing out a sigh of relief after seeing that the dark miasma was still restrained to some extent, the old man didn''t notice the part of the seal that had already been broken as he directly flew over andnded on the stone tform suspended above the dark miasma. Not wasting a single second, as he took out several obscure artifacts that he began to meticulously set up along the still intact parts of the stone tform.


    Observing this situation, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more curious about the identity of the old man. After all, not only did he seem familiar with the seal located below the Raging me Sect, but he now also seemed to be preparing to do something with the stone tform suspended above the dark miasma.


    Even though he had no idea what the old man was nning to do, from what he had been saying to himself so far, Xuan Hao felt certain that he shouldn''t be trying to release the seal. On the other hand, he felt like it might be possible that the old man was trying to use the strange and obscure artifacts that he had brought along with him to strengthen the seal, something Xuan Hao would be more than happy to see happen considering the fact that the Star Shattering Sect would be the first to suffer in case the being sealed below managed to break the seal and escape.


    Rumble~


    Shortly after the old man finished setting up all the strange artifacts around the stone tform, a faint light emerged from inside the already broken stone tform before it expanded and covered the ces where parts of the tform had been broken off. Forming a whole tform that allowed the old man to walk out on the strangely solid light and ce another few strange artifacts on top of it.


    In the end, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that the old man seemed to have established some kind of connection to the divine formation symbols gathered around the ceiling of the underground space after thest of the artifacts had been ced on the solid light that made up the missing parts of the stone tform.


    "Hm? Part of the seal actually broke!?"


    It was also at the moment that this connection was established that the old man noticed that part of the divine formation symbols had been broken.


    "How is this possible?!" Eximing loudly with a shocked expression stered all over his face, the old man stared down in the dark miasma below the stone tform as the fear in his eyes became present once again. "Although that being might have recovered part of its strength over the years and the seal weakened after such a long time, it shouldn''t have been able to destroy part of the formation- Unless¡­ No, impossible, the seal shouldn''t have been discovered by any of those people!


    Even if someone happened to stumble upon this ce, they wouldn''t have any ability to interfere with the seal to this degree unless they reach the Breaking Da- Celestial Immortal Realm." Mumbling this to himself as he began to frantically search around the stone tform for something, the old man no longer seemed to care about the artifacts he had set up earlier. Instead focusing his full attention on trying to find something.


    Celestial Immortal Realm? This old man is indeed not someone simple¡­ And what was the breaking thing he was about to say before correcting himself to the Celestial Immortal Realm? Is it perhaps another title for the Celestial Immortal Rm?


    Listening to the old man''s mumblings as he frantically searched the stone tform, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both of his eyes with even more interest than before.


    If he had first just wanted to figure out how the old man was rted to the seal below the ruins of the Raging me Sect, he now also wanted to figure out what the old man stopped himself from saying in rtion to the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    After all, at the moment, he had no clue about the realm that came after the Earth Immortal Realm outside of the fact that it was called the Celestial Immortal Realm. In the future, he had a feeling he would have to know more about the Celestial Immortal Realm if he wanted to break through to the realm above the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    "Ah! Found it!" Just at this moment, the old man seemed to have found what he was looking for, as he wasted no time cutting his arm before letting the blood drip down on a rtively ordinary spot on the stone tform-


    RUMBLE-!


    However, the moment the old man''s blood hit the stone tform, the entire underground space began violently trembling as the divine formation symbol that had remained hidden so far revealed themselves and began shinning with a power far more terrifying than anything Xuan Hao had ever felt before.


    Compared to the past when he had witnessed the activation of these divine formation symbols, he now felt like a terrifying holy being was directly present above him. Forcefully pressing down on the dark miasma below to keep it in check.


    ROOOOOOOOAR-!


    BANG-!


    Of course, following the activation of the seal, the being sealed below stirred in anger as it rushed up from the depths and violently crashed into the seal.


    "Just how strong is the being sealed below the Raging me Sect¡­"


    It was only when he sensed the being crashing into the seal and powerful holy being that seemed to be forcefully pressing down on it from above that Xuan Hao realized just how powerful the sealed being was.


    Not to mention the Earth Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the being sealed below the Raging me Sect had surpassed the Celestial Immortal Realm. After all, the thing sealed in front of him was not the entire body of that being, but instead just a fragment¡­


    "Hmph! Do you think you can cause trouble just because I''m doing some maintenance? Think again!"


    Not one to sit back and watch as the being sealed below violently crashed into the seal in an attempt to destroy it, the old man at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm waved his hand and caused the different artifacts ced around the stone tform to light.


    Whoosh~


    Not a secondter the artifacts all turned into a form of liquid energy that seeped into the stone tform, causing it to expand and cover the entire underground space where the dark miasma was located. Forcing Xuan Hao to momentarily escape up the entrance to avoid being hit by the expanding stone tform.


    RUMBLE-!


    Finished expanding, the stone tform descended towards the dark miasma where the terrifying being was sealed-


    BOOOOOOOOOOM-!


    ROOOAR-!


    Smashing directly into it with a terrifying power that Xuan Hao could tell far surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm. Forcing the being back down into the abyss below.


    "Hmph, should have a few minutes to work in peace now."


    Seeing that the being in the dark miasma was forced back, the old man wasted no time as he returned to what he was doing before, this time around without the being below trying to break the seal.


    "¡­" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Having watched all of this from the side, Xuan Hao could not help unconsciously swallowing as he had a feeling that it was best not to underestimate the old man. Even though he was only at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, it seemed like he had some terrifying things up his sleeve¡­


    Last chapter this month :3

 Chapter 1182 New Main Quest, Four Ancient Dao Seals

    <h4>Chapter 1182 New Main Quest, Four Ancient Dao Seals</h4>


    Continuing to keep an eye on the situation on the stone tform after the being in the dark miasma had been suppressed, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that the old man had begun to repair the part of the seal that had shattered.


    Given the difference in strength between the old man and the seal itself, it should have been impossible for him to repair the seal. However, he seemed to have the help of yet another strange artifact that allowed him to borrow a power far beyond what he could wield at his current cultivation realm. Allowing him to freely manipte and in turn repair the damaged part of the seal.


    Even then, it was obvious that the old man had a rather extensive understanding of the Dao of Formations. Far superior to anyone he had ever seen before. If not, it would have been impossible for him to repair the damaged seal.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to try and see if he could learn anything from observing the old man working on the terrifyingly powerful seal.


    "Almost there¡­"


    Unaware of Xuan Hao observing his work on the seal, the old man didn''t pay attention to anything other than the dark miasma below him and the part of the seal that he was currently doing his best to repair in the limited time he had managed to buy for himself. Understanding very well that it would be impossible to touch, let alone repair the part of the seal that had been destroyed if the being in the dark miasma was attacking the seal. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although it would be impossible for the being to do anything to him, it was more than capable of preventing anyone from repairing the part of the seal that had already been destroyed, it was also because of this that the old man had decided to use his strongest move at the start and forcibly suppress the being in the dark miasma. Hoping that he would be able to buy enough time to finish repairing the destroyed section of the seal.


    ROOOOAR-!


    Unfortunately for the old man, he didn''t have time to finish recreating the destroyed part of the seal before an all too familiar roar echoed out beneath him.


    "So fast! Did the other seals perhaps also weaken!?" Eximing in a somewhat surprised voice as he saw the being in the dark miasma reemerge only a short time after he had forced it down, the old man was forced to stop after only repairing half of the section that had been destroyed.


    Boom-!


    Not a second after he retracted from the damaged section of the seal, did the being hidden below violent crash into the newly created divine formation symbols-


    Rumble-!


    However, having already been connected to the rest of the seal, the newly created divine formation symbols lit up in response to the attack of the shadowy being. Shinning with far more powerpared to the rest of the divine formation symbols before working in tandem with the rest of the seal to force back the being in the miasma with slightly more powerpared to before. Showing that the overall strength of the seal had improved following the work done by the old man.


    Although the strength didn''t increase by a lot, it still showed that the old man did indeed have the ability to repair the seal.


    "Looks like I won''t be able to continue the maintenance of the seal any longer, but at least I managed to deduce that this shouldn''t be the only seal that has weakened more than expected¡­" Muttering this to himself as he frowned while looking down at the being in the dark miasma below violently smashing into the seal that was shinning brightly as it kept the being in ce, the old man suddenly turned to nce back towards the entrance to the underground space where Xuan Hao was currently watching the ongoing situation.


    Of course, given the difference in their strength and the fact that Xuan Hao had actively hidden himself, the old man didn''t notice him and was instead just lost in his own thoughts as he thought about something.


    "Maybe I should check up on the other seals? I still have a bit more divine blood left¡­"


    Whoosh~


    As the old man seemed toe to a decision, he jumped off the stone tform and made his way towards the entrance of the underground space where Xuan Hao was hiding. Ignoring the rampaging being in the dark miasma below, understanding that it was still far too weak to do anything about the seal in the short term. Especially now that he had managed to slightly increase the strength of the seal¡­


    Other seals? Divine blood?


    At the same time, Xuan Hao was left even more confused as he heard the old man mention the existence of something called divine blood and more seals. Although he had encountered one other seal inside the Frozen Wastnd, the words of the old man clearly implied that there were more than just two seals around. Not just that, but the divine blood that he mentioned seemed to be vital for repairing the seal-


    [Main Quest: Investigate the Four Ancient Dao Seals]


    Just as he was thinking about what the old man had said, the familiar sound of the system echoed out in his ears as a new quest appeared in front of him.


    "You finally show some signs of life?" Muttering this to himself as he left out a sigh at the rather non-existent presence of the system over the past few years, Xuan Hao ultimately began reading through the new quest, curious about the fact that a main quest that didn''t involve his disciples had appeared.


    [Main Quest: Investigate the Four Ancient Dao Seals]


    [Description: You have chanced upon an ancient seal in the ruins of the Raging me Sect where you discovered an old man of unknow origin working hard to repair the already breaking seal. Upon closer inspection, you realize that it is only part of a much stronger being that is sealed beneath the ruins of the Raging me sect. Understanding this, you decide to follow the old man to find out more about the being sealed so close to your sect.]


    [Investigate the Four Ancient Dao Seals: 2/4]


    [Reward: Increase Comprehension of the Dao of Formations and Dao of Light]


    "Huh?"


    Reading through the new quest, Xuan Hao could not help tilting his head slightly in confusion. Not due to fact that he had seemingly already managed toplete half of the quest with his earlier visit to the seal in the Frozen Wastnd, but instead due to the fact that that the system hinted at the fact that the other seals were also located somewhere close to the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not only that, but the reward from the system would also be able to directly increase his strength depending on what kind ofprehension it was talking about.


    Ah! I can''t let that old man leave without me!


    Suddenly remembering thest part in the description of the quest, Xuan Hao brushed the system panel aside before rushing back out of the underground space. Intending to catch up to the old man before he had a chance to run away.


    After all, at the current moment, the only way for him to find the remaining two seals mentioned by the system was for him to follow the old man as he seemed intent on using thest bit of divine blood, he had on him to try and strengthen these seals.


    If he had to search for the two remaining seals on his own, he had no idea how long it would take. After all, he had not managed to find them yet¡­ And even a seal that seemed to be randomly teleporting around the Frozen Wastnd was considered to be located close to the Star Shattering Sect. For all he knew, the other two seals might be located somewhere inside the Blue Sea Empire and still be considered close to the Star Shattering Sect in the eyes of the system.


    Whoosh-!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao wasted no time as he rushed back out of the underground space before catching up with the old man who was seemingly flying in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Don''t tell me¡­ Is he perhaps nning to visit the seal in the Frozen Wastnd first? But¡­ He is far too weak to cross the formation I created-


    Just as Xuan Hao was wondering how the old man would cross the formation, he had created to separate the Star Shattering Sect''s territory from the Frozen Wastnd, the old man came to a stop hovering above the familiar Burning Mountain Range while focusing his attention towards a rather familiar location to Xuan hao before diving down towards without a second thought.


    "This is¡­"


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao hesitated for a short moment with a look of shock on his face before following after the old man¡­

 Chapter 1183 The Third Seal

    The reason why Xuan Hao was shocked when he saw where the old man was heading was not due to the fact that he had found some kind of hidden passage that led to some kind of underground space simr to the one located beneath the ruins of the Raging me Sect, but instead because the old man went to a rather familiar ce.


    To be more specific, he descended headfirst into the strange dark red whirlpool hidden away inside a ravine of the Burning Mountain Range. Using yet another strange artifact to protect himself from the mes and powerful spatial distortion around the dark red whirlpool. After all, even though he was at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, he was still far too weak to deal with something capable of shattering space.


    Whoosh~


    Hesitating for a short moment after the old man disappeared inside the dark red whirlpool, Xuan Hao soon chased after him. Using all of his strength to block the terrifying mes, while at the same time using his limitedprehension of the Dao of Space to negate the spatial anomaly caused by the dark red whirlpool as he plunged into it.


    Rumble~


    Even then, his current strength was only barely enough for him to forcibly halt the terrifying power of the dark red whirlpool for a few seconds-


    15:36


    Swish-!


    Just enough time to slip inside the space hidden on the other side of the dark red whirlpool before he was crushed by the terrifying power contained inside of it. Soon finding himself hovering above a piece ofnd the size of arge city hovering in the middle of an empty dark expanse.


    "Haaa¡­ That was far too close¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked back in the direction of the dark red whirlpool that now seemed to have turned into the sun of the dark expanse that he found himself inside of, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine. The size of the dark red whirlpool had grown to a size that far eclipsed the one in the Burning Mountain Range, taking up close to half of the dark expanse.


    Although he had managed to safely pass through the dark red whirlpool just now, he understood very well that the only reason he had managed to pass through it safely was because he had managed toprehend the Dao of Space and the Dao of Fire. Giving him a certain degree of resistance against the powers rted to these Daos.


    If not for that, he doubted that he would have been able to make it through the dark red whirlpool with his current strength at the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm!


    "Looks like this seal is still working normally without any problems, but¡­ If there isn''t a problem with this seal, is it perhaps one of the other seals? And is the damage more extensive than the one located beneath those sect ruins?"


    Not aware of the fact that Xuan Hao had been scared silly passing through the dark red whirlpool that now seemed to have grown farrgerpared to before as it took up almost half of the dark expanse, the old man just tilted his head in contemtion as a frown appeared on his aged face.


    "No, if that was the case, that being should have already escape¡­ Maybe one of the seals were found by those people!?" Having seemingly concluded something after looking around the seemingly empty piece ofnd for a few seconds, the old man didn''t waste any time as he rushed back up and made his way back out of the empty expanse where only the dark red whirlpool and the empty piece ofnd were present.


    "That was fast¡­" Noticing the old man leaving already, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself as he watched the old man dash past him without noticing before charging back into the dark red whirlpool.


    "Hm?"


    However, just as he was about to turn around and leave the empty expanse to follow after the old man, he noticed something moving in the distance. More specifically, it seemed like part of the dark expanse hade alive as an eye the size of the empty ind appeared to stare directly at him.


    "This¡­ Don''t tell me the seal is-"


    Roooar-!


    Rumble~!


    Hearing a loud roar followed by the massive eye rapidly approaching him from the distance, Xuan Hao didn''t think twice before turning around and using all of his strength to rush back into the dark red whirlpool. Only now understanding why the old man had spent such a short time inside the dark expanse and left shortly after confirming that there wasn''t anything wrong with the seal.


    The seal was none other than the dark red whirlpool, while the city sized ind floating in the middle of the dark expanse should be part of the seal in some way he couldn''tprehend.


    As for the dark expanse itself... That was where the being sealed inside the dark red whirlpool resided!


    Whoosh-!


    Wasting no time as he realized this and felt the shadow of death approaching him from behind, Xuan Hao soon plunged into the dark red whirlpool. Not carrying the slightest bit about sustaining any injuries from forcing himself out through the dark red whirlpool at a speed far surpassing his earlier cautious and slower approach. Understanding that staying for even a single second longer inside the dark expanse might end up resulting in the being sealed there catching up to him.


    Even though he had reached the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and could hold his own against someone in the Earth Immortal Realm at his current realm, he didn''t have any delusions of being capable of fighting back against the being sealed inside the dark red whirlpool.


    Weakened or not, he was almost certain that the being sealed there had surpassed the Celestial Immortal Realm!


    BOOOOM-!


    Not even a second after he had managed to escape from the dark red whirlpool while sustaining a few injuries in the process, Xuan Hao felt a shiver run down his spine as the dark red whirlpool behind suddenly exploded with a terrifying power as it seemed to be fighting back against something-


    FWOOOOSH-!


    Forcing the mes of the whirlpool to spread out and incinerate everything inside the ravine before rapidly spreading out to cover the surrounding mountains located around the ravine. Killing any cultivator or demon beast unfortunate enough to find themselves within the range of the mes.


    Of course, Xuan Hao didn''t dare to slow down as he continued escaping from the dark red whirlpool. Soon catching up to the old man who didn''t seem to show the slightest reaction at what was happening behind him as he continued moving towards an unknown location that Xuan Hao silently prayed wasn''t the seal in the Frozen Wastnd.


    After all, the seal located in the Frozen Wastnd was by far the hardest one to find¡­ And more importantly than that, the demonic cultivators in the Frozen Wastnd were far too unpredictable at the moment. The most memorable case of this being the powerful demonic cultivator that he and Yi Min had barely managed to avoid while passing through the Frozen Wastnd on their way to the Blue Shore Kingdom. If he entered the Frozen Wastnd again, Xuan Hao was afraid that he would end up encountering one of these powerful demonic cultivators again¡­


    [Investigate the Four Ancient Dao Seals: 3/4] Deciding to not think too much about possibly having to go to the Frozen Wastnd again, Xuan Hao focused his attention on the quest that had now updated after his short visit to the dark expanse inside the dark red whirlpool.


    "At least the investigation mentioned by the system doesn''t mean I actually have to investigate the seals themselves; I just have to confirm their location and see them for myself¡­" Muttering this to himself as he went over his recent experience with the dark red whirlpool, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief.


    At the very least, he didn''t have to examine the seals and learn more about them for the system to consider him having investigated them.


    If he really did have to do something like that, he highly doubted that it would be possible to investigate the seal of the dark red whirlpool with his current strength. After all, he would only be able to stay for a short moment before the being sealed in there appeared. Not to mention, he had no way to tell if that being was waiting on the other side of the dark red whirlpool if he tried to enter the dark expanse on the other side again.


    "Hm? Looks like he isn''t going to the Frozen Wastnd¡­" Noticing the old man suddenly changing his direction towards somewhere that wasn''t the Frozen Wastnd, Xuan Hao''s train of thought was momentarily interrupted as he simrly turned to follow him.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 1184 Back in the Blue Sea Empire, Weakened East Sea Army

    <h4>Chapter 1184 Back in the Blue Sea Empire, Weakened East Sea Army</h4>


    Feeling a sense of relief after realizing that the old man wasn''t moving towards the Frozen Wastnd any longer, Xuan Hao''s relief soon disappeared after he realized that the old man was instead moving in the direction of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Although he didn''t have any problems between himself and the Blue Sea Empire at the moment, he could not help feeling a bit uneasy knowing that the Blue Sea Empire was currently searching for Pei Yang. Even though he should be safe, he felt that there would always be a chance that one of the Blue Sea Empire''s special artifacts for recognizing people''s aura had managed to somehow notice him and Pei Yang together before he had left.


    No matter how little the chance of something like this happening was, he still felt that there was a possibility this happened. Even if the more sensible part of his mind told him that this was impossible, as the Blue Sea Empire''s experts would long since have descended on the Sky Empire if they really figured out that he was rted to Pei Yang.


    Whoosh~


    It was with this sense of unease that he once again arrived at the border of the Blue Sea Empire following behind the old man. Soon finding himself at a small border city where he followed the Blue Sea Empire''s standard procedures for entering their empire without any problems without being noticed by the old man who did the exact same thing not too far away from him.


    It was with this sense of unease that he once again arrived at the border of the Blue Sea Empire following behind the old man. Soon finding himself at a small border city where he followed the Blue Sea Empire''s standard procedures for entering their empire without any problems without being noticed by the old man who did the exact same thing not too far away from him.


    Of course, given their close proximity, he also managed to overhear the identity that the old man gave the border guards, a wandering cultivator, something that was undoubtedly not true considering the countless artifacts and other things far beyond the means of someone in the Domain Lord Realm that he had on him¡­ And that was not even mentioning the fact that he seemed to be out doing maintenance on the seals on someone else''s order.


    In the end, after everything at the border city was finished, Xuan Hao soon found himself silently following the old man through the Blue Sea Empire once again. Not having encountered a single problem so far, showing that his earlier fear over being noticed as someone rted to Pei Yang was not anything to be worried about. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was slowly following after the old man in search of thest seal he needed to find toplete the quest from the system, the situation inside the Blue Sea Empire was bing increasingly unstable due to therge number of illusory beasts that had been running rampant since hisst visit to the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even after the failure of the East Sea Army and some of the other armies of the Blue Sea Empire showing up to suppress the illusory beasts, they hadn''t managed to act in time and ended up giving the illusory beasts the chance to spread out across the Blue Sea Empire. Making them far harder to findpared to when they had all been gathered in one location.


    In the end, an ancestor in the Celestial Immortal Realm was forced to show up and help suppress the situation before it spiraled out of control and an illusory beast in the Celestial Immortal Realm appeared.


    However, when this powerful ancestor appeared to suppress the illusory beasts, they once again gathered together into a single entity and forced back the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Although this didn''te without cost for the illusory beasts, it still caused the situation to be far more dangerous than the Blue Sea Empire had initially expected. Forcing them to take things a bit more slowly when it came to cleaning up the illusory beasts. In the end deciding to clean them up one by one instead of trying to deal with all of them at once to avoid possibly losing one of their Celestial Immortal Realm ancestors in the process.


    Of course, the current unstable situation of the Blue Sea Empire was due to this, as the illusory beasts ended up being able to cause chaos while the Earth Immortal Realm Experts of the Blue Sea Empire chased them down and killed them off one by one.


    Even though doing things like this did damage the inner and outer regions of the Blue Sea Empire to some extent and they ended up losing quite a few of their smaller and less protected cities, it was ultimately far better than them potentially losing a Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor. Especially considering that the core region of the Blue Sea Empire remainedpletely untouched. Not harming the core resources of the Blue Sea Empire. Only damaging some of the less important areas that they didn''t care too much about-


    Ptsh-!


    And it was in this kind of chaotic situation that the General of the East Sea Army and his army was used as the main force for taking out these isted illusory beasts that strayed too far away from the rest of the illusory beasts to merge together with them.


    "Another one down, this makes a total of sixty-four for our East Sea Army¡­" Standing at the front of his flying ship as he muttered this to himself while gazing at the illusory beast crashed into the ground a few hundred meters away from where his ship was hovering, the general in question let out an exhausted sigh as he turned to look over his soldiers.


    Given that his army had been used as the main force for an extended period of time without a single chance to rest, the East Sea Army had weakened quite a bit during thest year, as a fair share of powerful soldiers had ended up dying during the countless battles with illusory beasts, two of the Earth Immortals of the East Sea Army had even ended up dying.


    "General¡­ It''s clear that those people don''t want our East Sea Army to continue existing. Even if there was a fear of the illusory beasts merging together to resist the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor in the past, over half of the illusory beasts have already been killed by us¡­" Just at this moment, one of the Earth Immortals from the East Sea Army walked up as he said this in a solemn tone.


    "General, don''t you think it''s time to-"


    "Haaa¡­ I understand what you mean, we don''t have the support of an ancestor, so it will be hard for us to do anything about the current situation without the backing of someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm. Maybe it''s really time to do as they wish and disband¡­" """¡­"""


    Following the general''s words, a depressed atmosphere engulfed the deck of the flying ship as all of the soldiers looked towards their two superiors with conflicted expressions. All of them, understanding the implications of the conversation between the two.


    "General¡­" "No need, what you say is right, we can''t continue like this, I will sort out a few things ande up with a final decision on the matter soon. For now, move the ship to the towards the closest city and inform the ancestor about our recent sessful kill."


    Whoosh~


    Not bothering to stay on the bridge of the ship for even a single second longer after he finished saying this, the general disappeared back inside the ship before his subordinate had a chance to say anything. Leaving the fellow in stunned state as he could only shake his head before taking out a specialmunication talisman to carry out the order he had received. Understanding that this might be thest time he would see his general in action.


    ¡­


    Following after the old man as he continued making his way deeper inside the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao could not help growing a bit worried as he wondered if thest seal might be located somewhere in the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Luckily, after two days of travelling without stopping, the old man finally slowed down and descended towards a small city located along the massive river that connected the Blue Sea Empire to the Sky Empire and the endless ocean.


    Is thest seal perhaps located inside the river¡­?


    Not able to stop this thought from appearing as he watched the old man, Xuan Hao could not help remembering the massive demon beast that he had encountered during his first trip to the Blue Sea Empire.


    Although he had managed to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and could now understand that the serpent from back then should have been a demon beastparable to an Earth Immortal with a nineyered dao lotus, he didn''t feel any less worried about what kind of terrifying demon beasts might be hiding inside theke.


    Whoosh~


    However, he didn''t intend to give up on the following the old man because of something like this. Especially considering that the old man who was only at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm showed no sign of worrying about theke and what might be hidden beneath the surface.

 Chapter 1185 Entrance to the Fourth Seal

    <h4>Chapter 1185 Entrance to the Fourth Seal</h4>


    Entering the small city that only had the presence of a single expert in the Soul Ascension Realm watching over it, Xuan Hao soon found himself silently following the old man as he slipped into the river unnoticed by the Soul Ascension Realm Expert in the city. Not taking long before both of them arrived at the rather deste riverbed that only had a few small fish passing by every now and then.


    The only thing standing out from the rather boring environment of the riverbed was a broken stone pir that stood out like a sore thumb¡­ And looking closer at the broken stone pir, Xuan Hao discovered that it was the top of some kind ofrge structure that had been buried beneath the loose soil of the riverbed.


    Even without having to see the old man enter the buried structure, it was rather obvious that the seal thatst seal he was searching for was somewhere inside therge structure or at the very least connected to it in some way-


    "Hm? What is this thing doing here?"


    Bang!


    For this reason, it was quite shocking to suddenly see the old man causally knocking the stone pir aside before continuing forward without giving the now fully broken stone pir and therge structure that had been partly revealed by the earlier attack a second nce.


    "¡­"


    Deciding that it might be for the best to note to his own conclusions regarding the location of thest seal, Xuan Hao looked away from the massive structure that had been buried in the loose soil of the riverbed and instead decided to silently continue following the old man. Not intending to stray away from the old man in case he ended up identally losing him in the river.


    After all, even though his divine sense could easily cover a massive area, the water in the river was dangerous and using his divine sense without a care might end up with him identally awakening one of the powerful demon beasts that were sleeping in the river. Not only endangering himself, but also the old man who was the only person he knew about with knowledge about the location of thest seal he needed toplete the quest from the system¡­


    "Ah! Here it is."


    It was only a few minutes after walking around on the riverbed that the old man suddenly came to a stop on an empty spot that was no different from the rest of the riverbed before he began taking out a strange artifact that looked like an oversized apple made out of metal.


    What in the-


    Whoosh~


    Not even having time to understand who came up with such a strange looking artifact, the apple artifact flew out and merged together with the sand and gravel covered riverbed before a hole began to open up beneath the old man-


    Rumble!


    Directly causing the water to rush into the opening. Swish-!


    Wasting no time after seeing the old man disappearing into the hole that had opened up in the riverbed, Xuan Hao followed after him without thinking twice about the danger that might be on the other side of the hole. Having seemingly forgotten hisst encounter inside the seal in at the Burning Mountain Range.


    ¡­


    Back in the small city located next to the river, a flying ship appeared to hover above the small city beforending a short distance away from the gate leading into the city, causing the Soul Ascension Realm Expert in charge of the city to rush out.


    "This- East Sea Army!"


    However, only a second after he rushed out did, he realize the identity of the people behind the flying ship, as he quickly backed down and put on a respectful expression while waiting for the people on the flying ship to appear.


    Although the East Sea Army was by far the weakest among the four armies of the Blue Sea Empire and was constantly suppressed by the other three armies, it was still an official army of the Blue Sea Empire and could not be disrespected by a small city lord in the Soul Ascension Realm!


    "To think that there''s only such a small city nearby¡­"


    "Nothing much we can do about it, therger city that is located a little upstream got destroyed by a group of illusory beasts not too long ago and hasn''t been rebuilt yet and is currently under the South Sea Army''s control."


    "Indeed¡­ It would be best for us to avoid the South Sea Army, if possible, I really don''t want to encounter any of their people again. Especially after ourst encounter¡­"


    "Hehe, indeed, those cowards will definitely try and use their position and backer to annoy us."


    As the first few people disembarked from the massive flying ship, the city lord could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he listened to the conversations taking ce between the soldiers.


    Even though he had some knowledge about the bad rtionship between the East Sea Army and the other three armies, he also understood that ordinary soldiers wouldn''t dare to talk like the people who had just disembarked the flying ship!


    Wait- The strength of these people- Even the weakest among them is in the Domain Lord Realm!? Don''t tell me- Is this perhaps the main army of the East Sea Army!?


    Suddenly realizing that he wasn''t dealing with an ordinary army ship, the Soul Ascension Realm city lord felt a shiver run down his spine as he felt the very clear pressure of someone in the Earth Immortal Realm pressing down on him.


    "Are you the city lord of this city?"


    "Y-yes!" Hearing a voice suddenly calling out to him following the terrifying pressure of an Earth Immortal Realm Expert bearing down on him, the city lord kept his head lowered as he nervously answered. Understanding that the person asking him was most likely the Earth Immortal Realm Expert that was casually suppressing him.


    "Sort out a ce for us to stay at. At the same time, find any abnormalities in the surroundings over the past few months and bring them to me."


    "Yes! I will be back shortly with the information, as for a ce to stay¡­ You can use the mansion in the middle of the city where I stay during your time here!" Nodding his head without daring to say anything else, the Soul Ascension Realm city lord directly offered his own abode as a way to please the Earth Immortal Realm Expert before he rapidly turned around and escaped back inside the city to find the information that had been requested.


    Inside, the Soul Ascension Realm city lord was just hoping that things would blow over quickly and the East Sea Army would leave without causing any problems for him. After all, with his current strength, he had no way to resist a terrifying entity like the East Sea Army.


    Swoosh-!


    "¡­"


    Watching as the city lord disappeared back inside the city at a speed that made one think he was escaping from some kind of terrifying demon beast, the general of the east sea army could not help smiling a bit wryly as he shook his head.


    As weak as the East Sea Army might be back in the capital city, it still held quite a significant level of influence outside the core of the Blue Sea Empire, something that was brilliantly demonstrated by the city lord who had already disappeared inside the city.


    "At least we won''t have to worry about anything while we stay here." Muttering this to himself as he looked at the dust kicked up by the city lord as he had run away, the general turned back tomand his subordinates to move into the city-


    Rumble-!


    However, just at this moment, a violent tremor hit the small city, causing everything to start shaking as a few smaller buildings copsed.


    "What is happening!?"


    "An earthquake!?" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "No, I think someone might be fighting nearby!"


    "Don''t tell me- Another illusory beast!?"


    As the weaker soldiers began panicking at the prospect of having to face another illusory beast in their current state, the general and the other Earth Immortal Realm Experts of the Blue Sea Army instantly realized that the origin of the tremor didn''te from an illusory beast.


    Instead, they all noticed that it came from the river next to the city¡­ And knowing just how dangerous the river was as it was a hotspot for demon beasts from the endless ocean to hibernate in, they all prepared themselves in case one of these demon beasts had woken up. After all, the weakest of these demon beasts hibernating had reached the Earth Immortal Realm, while the stronger ones were rumored to have surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm and reached the Celestial Immortal Realm!


    """¡­"""


    However, as time passed without any demon beasts appearing, the general and the rest calmed down before deciding to go over and investigate the situation on the river¡­

 Chapter 1186 Divine Blood, Seal Operating at Full Power

    At the same time that the people from the East Sea Army were moving to investigate what had happened at the river, Xuan Hao arrived in arge underground space simr to the one he had encountered below the ruins of the Raging me Sect. The only differencepared to the seal located beneath the ruins of the Raging me Sect being that the seal beneath the river looked like it had already started breaking apart, while the dark miasma below continuously pushed against the seal to speed up the process.


    "This¡­"


    Seeing this scene, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    Even though he wasn''t too experienced when it came to formations, he could still tell that the seal in front of him wouldn''t be able to hold on for long under the constant attack of the dark miasma below.


    "To think the damage was this severe¡­" Simr to Xuan Hao, the old man also froze on the spot filled with horror after he saw the state of the seal. "Even with the help of the divine blood, I won''t be able to fully repair it and will at most be able to stabilize it for a few more years. Maybe I will be able to get more help in dealing with strengthen the seals after returning, but it might be toote by then."


    Frowning visibly as he went over the current situation by himself, the old man ultimately let out a reluctant sigh before starting the process of repairing some damaged parts of the seal and strengthening other parts with the help of an evenrger assortment of strange artifacts than he had used while repairing the seal below the ruins of the Raging me sect.


    ROOOOAR-!


    Of course, as the old man began the process of repairing the seal, the all too familiar roar of the being sealed inside the seal echoed out from the depths of the abyss that was covered by the dark miasma as a terrifying aura swept over the old man and Xuan Hao who had hidden a short distance away from the old man.


    The aura is actually so much more powerfulpared to the one beneath the Raging me Sect. Maybe even stronger than the one inside the dark red whirlpool seal!


    Feeling this terrifying aura, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he thought about this. Not just because of how strong the aura was, but also because the aura was almostparable to the one, he had felt inside the dark red whirlpool where he had been on the other side of the seal for a short time.


    The implication behind this was rather unsettling, as it meant that the being sealed beneath the river was only a single step away from escaping the seal.


    "Hmph! Don''t think you can take advantage of me to escape while I''m working on the seal!"


    Whoosh~


    Having seemingly seen through the intentions of the shadowy being that had emerged at the edge of the seal at some point in time, the old man didn''t hesitate for a second as he pulled out a circr artifact and threw it towards the shadowy being that seemed to be trying to escape through some of the gaps that had formed in the already badly damaged seal after the old man had begun to work on repairing it.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Roar!? Having sensed something terrifying from the circr artifact that seamlessly passed through the seal without being stopped, the shadowy being turned around and tried to escape back down into the dark abyss that it hade from-


    Crack-Bang!


    However, it was far too slow to react, as the circr artifact suddenly broke apart. Revealing a small golden drop of blood inside.


    R-roar!?


    Seeing the small golden drop of blood that had emerged from the artifact, the shadowy being that had remained fearless so far suddenly began to shake in fear before freezing in ce, unable to move as the golden drop of blood flew towards it.


    Watching this scene y out from afar, Xuan Hao couldn''t help frowning to himself as he focused all of his attention on the small drop of blood.


    What is that? Is it perhaps the divine blood mentioned by the old man? But why does it give me such a strange sense of familiarity¡­?


    Not able to understand the strange feeling he felt after the appearance of the golden drop of blood and wanting nothing more than to investigate it further, Xuan Hao could only reluctantly watch as the golden drop of blood entered the body of the being hidden in the dark miasma-


    FWOOSH-!


    R-r-roar!?


    Not a second after the golden drop of blood entered the body of the being in the dark miasma, did the seal suddenly light up with a terrifying light that far surpassed anything he had ever seen from the seal beneath the ruins of the Raging me Sect.


    "Hehe, with the help of the divine blood, the seal should be able to operate at its full power for a few minutes no matter how damaged as long as the core is intact." Chuckling to himself as he saw the seal essentiallye back to life again, the old man smiled proudly after hearing the panicked and fearful roaring from the dark miasma.


    At the same time, he didn''t waste a second as he used this precious opportunity to repair as much of the seal as possible. Understanding that the divine blood wouldn''t be able to keep the seal operating at full power forever.


    RUMBLE-!


    With a resplendent burst of light following the seal recovering its past full power for a moment, countless golden tendrils unfurled from each of the divine formation symbols covering every inch of the underground space, all of them unfurling into a massive golden that covered the dark miasma before converging on the helpless being inside the dark miasma.


    Roar!


    However, even using all of its strength to try and fight back against the luminous energies converging on it from all sides through the golden tendrils that now covered its entire body, the being in the seal was helpless to struggle against the overwhelming tide of light that washed over it. Only able to twist and turn in agony as the powerful luminous energy belonging to the Dao of Light seared through its entire body, while it was forced deeper int the dark abyss that it had emerged from.


    The power of the seal even forced back the dark miasma that had overtaken the underground space. Giving Xuan Hao and the old man a chance to see the true appearance of the underground space. Allowing both of them to understand that the underground space wasn''t just a random underground space where the seal happened to be set up by chance, but instead a massive underground hall that had long since been destroyed with the passage of time.


    The only thing that remained intact from the once massive hall that should have made up the underground space where the seal was located being the broken tiles and pirs inside the seal that the dark miasma had hidden before. Considering that none of these ruins had appeared outside of the seal, the reason why they had managed to survive for so long inside the seal itself, should be due to the fact that the being sealed inside the seal didn''t seem to care about destroying thisst bit of what remained of the hall it had been sealed together with it.


    At the same time, it also made Xuan Hao realize that the size of the seal shouldn''t have covered the samerge area that it covered at the moment.


    "¡­"


    Looking at the light from the seal forcibly suppressing the shadowy being deep into a space located below the ruined hall that he found himself inside of at the moment, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that the true size of the seal in its peak was nothing more than a small ball of light norger than his head that was located in a small room beneath the ruined hall itself.


    The reason why the seal had been changed to cover the now ruined hall was due to the simple fact that it had been weakened over the long years and should have used some kind of iprehensible method to forcibly sustain itself by expanding in size, either to absorb more spiritual qi from the surrounding environment or somepletely different thing he had no way to understand at the moment.


    In the end, the being hidden in the dark miasma had ended up being fully sealed after the appearance of the divine blood. Not able to put up the slightest bit of resistance in the process.


    Although it would onlyst for a few minutes ording to the old man, Xuan Hao didn''t think too much about it as he focused his full attention on the seal operating at full power. Intending to learn as much from it as he could in the short time it was active.

 Chapter 1187 You- You are from the Mirage Sect!?

    <h4>Chapter 1187 You- You are from the Mirage Sect!?</h4>


    Given the sheer difference between him and the person that created the ancient seal, even watching it operate at full power for a few short minutes would bring immense benefits to his understanding of the Dao of Formations and the Dao of Light. Especially considering that he was lucky enough to watch the process of the seal suppressing the being now locked away in the small sphere of light below the ruined hall.


    Althoughprehending the Dao of Formations or the Dao of Light to the Elementary Realm within the short time that the seal was operating at its full power, it still allowed him to have a smoother path when it came toprehending these two Daos in the future.


    As an example, he managed to breakthrough the barrier separating the Artisan Realm and the Master Realm. Officially bing a Master Realm Formation Master in the short span of a few minutes.


    Rumble~!


    Of course, the single drop of divine blood couldn''t keep the being suppressed with the seal forever, as it was soon exhausted. Resulting in the small light sphere rapidly being pushed back up through the hole in the middle of the ruined hall connecting the hall and the small room that the seal should have been confined to originally.


    "Damnit! The divine blood only managed to hold on for a little over four minutes! ording to the elders, it should have been able to suppress it for at least five!" At the same time Xuan Hao was focused on the seal that had begun to expand outwards as the dark miasma pushed back against the once again weakened seal, the old man in the process of repairing in the seal cursed out loudly as he simrly noticed the seal weakening.


    Roooar-!


    Knowing that the divine blood had disappeared, the being hidden in the dark miasma also reemerged before roaring angrily towards the old man who had thrown the divine blood towards it. No longer showing any signs of its earlier fear when it had first seen the old man take out the divine blood.


    BANG!


    Only a minuteter, the dark miasma returned back to its original position as the old man was forced to retreat to avoid giving the being in the seal a chance to take advantage of him working on the seal to escape.


    In the end, even though the seal hadn''t been repaired fully in the short time that the old man could work on it, it had at least returned to a state simr to the seal located beneath the ruins of the Raging me Sect. Not good, but at least it wouldn''t break in a year or two without outside interference.


    "Looks like I won''t be able to fix all of the damage in such a short period of time. If only the divine blood had managed to hold on for a few more minutes I would have been able to secure this seal for the next hundred years. More than enough time for me to go back and get the help of an elder¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked at the dark miasma pushing against the seal, the old man could not help shaking his head regretfully as he picked up some of the still intact artifacts that had originally been prepared for repairing the seal.


    "Hm¡­ I already checked on three of the seals so far. Maybe I should also check on the one in the Frozen Wastnd, but¡­ That seal is far stronger than the rest and is also using a spatial formation to constantly switch positions. Even if I find it, the Frozen Wastnd is home to several demonic cultivators in the Demon King Realm. If I get caught by any of them, I will be dead before I can use any of my artifacts to escape!


    In the end, it should be best to just head back for now and see if I can get one of the elders toe and repair the seals before they break¡­" As the old man continued talking to himself after returning all of the unused artifacts to his interspatial ring, Xuan Hao watched in amazement as the old man took out a small disc shaped artifact.


    Even though the artifact had not been activated yet, the spatial fluctuationsing from it made it rather clear that it was an artifact crafted by someone whoseprehension of the Dao of Space had far exceeded his own.


    Wait! Is this perhaps a teleportation artifact that allows someone who didn''tprehend the Dao of Space to teleport!? If that is the case- "Ah!"


    Whoosh-! n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Suddenly realizing that the old man was about to use what he presumed to be some kind of teleportation artifact to leave the ce, Xuan Hao didn''t think twice as he rushed in front of the old man before he had a chance to run away.


    He had far too many questions to ask this old man, there was no way he would just allow him to run away before answering any of his doubts! Like what was the Breaking- something realm he mentioned? What was the divine blood? What about the Four Ancient Seals? What kind of being was sealed inside of them!?


    "Huh?!"


    Seeing someone suddenly appearing in front of him when he was about to leave, the old man momentarily froze on the spot without knowing what to do. Knowing very well that someone capable of appearing directly in front of him was far stronger than him.


    "Sorry for the surprise, I don''t mean any harm." Knowing that his sudden appearance would be quite a shock, Xuan Hao did his best to defuse the situation before the old man ended up doing something stupid.


    "You- Who are you!? What do you want?" Calming down a bit after realizing Xuan Hao didn''t seem intent on attacking him, the old man could not help narrowing his eyes as he said this while closely inspecting Xuan Hao.


    "Hm? This robe¡­ Mirage Sect?! Are you someone from the Mirage Sect!? How!? Didn''t the Mirage Sect get- Ah¡­ never mind that, what is someone from the Mirage Sect doing here? Didn''t everyone except the few religious branches evacuate this continent?" Recognizing the robe that he was wearing after a short look, the cautious expression on the old man''s face changed into one of shock as he asked this.


    "I''m not from the Mirage Sect, I got this robe from a senior before he passed away inside a mystic realm under the Mirage Sect. Although, all that is left in that ce now is ruins¡­" Knowing very well that it would be hard for him to fool the old man and pose as someone from the Mirage Sect to try and get the answers he wanted from the old man, Xuan Hao decided to answer truthfully that he wasn''t someone from the Mirage Sect.


    "Not from the Mirage Sect? I see¡­ For you to havee here should be because you learnt about the Ancient Dao Seals from that senior and came to take a look¡­" Nodding his head with a look of understanding after hearing that Xuan Hao wasn''t from the Mirage Sect, the old man seemed toe to his own conclusion on how he had managed to find his way to the seal. Not suspecting that he had been silently following after him for the past few days.


    After all, he had several different artifacts on him that would spot anyone the moment they got within a certain range of him. Giving him a heads up in case there was someone secretly following him so he could ensure that the way inside the seal didn''t end up leaking out.


    Of course, the artifact that had been doing this happened to be malfunctioning at the moment due to it being damaged before he went to the seal located beneath the ruins of the Raging me Sect.


    Even if he knew about this, he would not suspect that Xuan Hao had been secretly following after him. The main reason for this being that he understood what it meant for Xuan Hao to be wearing a robe from the Mirage Sect.


    Such a robe, even if he had stolen it from some ruins of the Mirage Sect, would not be wearable without the prior permission of the past owner. If worn without this special permission, the robe would trigger several different formations inside the robe and cause it to self-destruct with enough power to kill someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm!


    Of course, there was no way Xuan Hao had any idea about this, as he would have thought twice about wearing the robe of the elder from the Mirage Sect if he knew about the fact that it had an inbuilt function to blow up with more than enough power to instantaneously kill him!


    Then again, the protection it provided whenpared to other robes was far better than anything the current Star Shattering Sect could create- No, maybe better than anything that could be created at the current Ewaria Continent!

 Chapter 1188 Gods

    <h4>Chapter 1188 Gods</h4>


    After learning that Xuan Hao was rted to the Mirage Sect, the old man seemed to fully rx his guard as he turned his attention back towards the being in the dark miasma struggling to break the seal that had once again returned to its weakened state.


    "Haaa¡­ For you toe all the way out here to check up on the seals, the person from the Mirage Sect should have trusted you quite a bit, but even if you want to help strengthen these seals, it''s useless without the proper equipment." Shaking his head as he said, the old man turned to look directly at Xuan Hao. "I can see that you have quite a few questions you want answered, you can feel more than free to ask. Although I''m in a rush to return and inform my elders about the current situation, I don''t think staying here for a few more minutes to answer some questions will have much of an effect." "This- Thank you!" Not having expected that the old man had managed to guess his intentions for stopping him, Xuan Hao could only freeze up for a short second before thanking him.


    "No need for that, just keep things short and I will be more than happy to answer before leaving."


    "Okay¡­ First of all, is there no way to strengthen or repair the seal outside of getting the help of your elders?" Thinking about the first question to ask for a bit, Xuan Hao ultimately decided to first ask about the seal and if there was any to repair outside of getting the help of the elders from the force that the old man was part of.


    After all, the seal being broken would undoubtedly end up affecting the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Another way to repair the seal outside of getting my elders help¡­? Hehe, well, there is a way¡­"


    "Really!?"


    "Yes, you can get an existence above the Celestial Immortal Realm to take action, but¡­ Considering the current state of this continent, I doubt there is such an existence present here at the moment¡­"


    "Any other way¡­?" Hearing that the other way mentioned by the old man was to get an existence above the Celestial Immortal Realm to act, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he felt like he got an idea about the strength of the elders mentioned by the old man.


    "Hm¡­ I don''t think it''s likely, but maybe a Saint Realm Formation Master would also be able to repair the seal without the need for someone above the Celestial Immortal Realm. Although, the formation master would have to be familiar with the inner workings of the seal and have an in-depth understanding of the Dao of Light. At least reaching the Large Sess Realm.


    Even though it might be possible to find a Saint Realm Formation Master, I doubt it will be possible to find a Saint Realm Formation Master with a deep understanding of the Dao of Light in a ce like this." "This¡­" Hearing that he would need a Saint Realm Formation Master who was also skilled in the Dao of Light, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly. Indeed, like the old man said, finding someone like that on the Ewaria Continent would be impossible.


    Not to mention, the different Saint Realm Formation Masters on the continent should be concentrated in those few major powers. Making it even more impossible for him to find a Formation Master at the Saint Realm. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    As for bing a Saint Realm Formation Master himself and mastering the Dao of Light to the Large Sess Realm¡­ Xuan Hao doubted he would be able to aplish something like this before the seal in front of him ended up being broken¡­


    "How¡­ How strong will the being sealed be after it breaks out of the seal¡­?" Knowing that it would be close to impossible for him to repair the seal before it broke, Xuan Hao could not help asking about the strength of the being sealed inside the seal. Hoping that he would at least have a chance of beating it before it managed to break the other three seals.


    "Don''t bother thinking about that, even if one of my elders shows up, they won''t be able to do anything if the seal breaks. Although that being has been severely weakened and its only a single part of its body sealed here, its strength is stillparable to that of a Minor God, an existence that can be considered strong even in the ancient world."


    "Minor God? Ancient world?"


    "Hm? Oh¡­ I forgot, the ancient world refers to the world before the cmity where the ancient divine realm was split into four continents and countless smaller inds that were then scattered across the endless ocean.


    Minor God on the other hand refers to the lowest realm among the gods. Even though it''s the lowest realm among the gods, it''s still a god. For example, the different religions on this continent are mostlyprised of faiths belonging to different Minor Gods who were pushed away from the other continents by more powerful gods."


    "Wait! Does that mean there are Minor Gods on this continent!?" Hearing about the existence of powerful entities like Minor Gods and remembering the fact that he had offended quite a few of these religions in the past, Xuan Hao could not help asking this with a slightly fearful expression on his face.


    Although he already had some idea about the fact that the past world had been destroyed and reduced to smaller continents scattered across the endless ocean, he had no clue about the Minor Gods mentioned by the old man. "Haha, you don''t need to worry about them. Most gods, no matter how strong they are, spent most of their time in their faith realm in the void outside the boundaries of the world. The only way for you to see one of them is if you affect their religion enough to impede the process of faith collection, something that is close to impossible unless your strength be enough to topple the different major powers on this continent." Laughing to himself after seeing Xuan Hao''s fearful expression, the old man quickly reassured Xuan Hao that he had nothing to worry about.


    Even though the existence of gods were a terrifying concept, they wouldn''t care about their believers unless it began to seriously affect the faith they collected for an extended period of time.


    "So¡­ I have nothing to worry about even if I happened to fall out with some of their believers?" "Indeed, nothing to worry about. Even if you ended up affecting their faith collection process, it would take hundreds of years before they would notice or care about it. After all, most gods have lived for hundreds of thousands of years, some even dating back to the time before the cmity."


    "That''s¡­ Relieving¡­"


    Not knowing how to feel about the sudden knowledge that the gods behind the different religions he had encountered actually existed and were powerful ancient existences that surpassed the strength of a Celestial Immortal, Xuan Hao decided that it would be best to not fight these religions in the future if possible.


    "Now that you got your answer, do you have any other questions? Ah! Before that, if you want to know about the Mirage Sect and the being in the seal, I can''t answer, as I don''t really know much about it myself. The only reason I noticed your robe was due to it being in some of my family''s ancient records that mentioned the Mirage Sect being one of our allies, outside of that, I don''t really know much about the Mirage Sect."


    Listening to the old man as he said this, Xuan Hao could not help frowning.


    Out of all the things he wanted to ask the old man about, the Mirage Sect and the being in the seal was on the top of the list.


    He wanted to know more about the Mirage Sect to find more of the Celestial Trails, while also wanting to find out if there was a way to repay the old senior from the Mirage Sect who had helped him. The reason for knowing more about the being in the seal was rather obvious, as he would inevitably have to face it given the current state of the seals that kept it locked away, constantly weakening with each passing second.


    Hm¡­ If I can''t learn anything about the Mirage Sect and more information on the being in the seal is impossible¡­ I guess I can only ask about where he is from and the breaking- something cultivation realm that he mentioned earlier. Maybe he knows something about the Dao Domain Lord Realm and is capable of helping me. After all, he does have seniors in his family above the Celestial Immortal Realm, with such strength, his family should know about the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Thinking this to himself, the frown on his face disappeared as his eyes lit up in anticipation.

 Chapter 1189 Books on Formations, Bragging Old Man

    <h4>Chapter 1189 Books on Formations, Bragging Old Man</h4>


    Knowing that this was a hard toe by opportunity, Xuan Hao calmed himself down as he sorted through the many questions, he wanted to ask the old man. From wanting to know more about the Dao Domain Lord Realm and different things about the ancient world that had puzzled him to more simple things rted to asking him whether or not he had any books on him rted to the Dao of Formations or other profession that he could get.


    Although it was rather unlikely for the old man to be carrying around books rted to different professions given that he should havee to the Ewaria Continent for the sole purpose of dealing with the seals, Xuan Hao still felt hopeful that he would at least be carrying a few random ones with him that he could have.


    After all, the information contained inside a book from a powerful family like the one the old man belonged to would undoubtedly be precious and should be able to help not only him improve but also the rest of the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Do you happen to have any books on formations, alchemy or any other profession on you that you don''t need¡­?" With this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to first ask about the books. Even if it was unlikely, he felt hopeful that the old man would at least have one rted to formations on him.


    "Books rted to professions? Indeed, something like that should be quite useful considering the Saint Realm is the highest realm on this continent¡­" Frowning as he said this in response, the old man seemed deep in thought for a moment before pulling out a single worn down book from his interspatial ring. "Unfortunately, I only have a book rted to formations on me at the moment. Although it won''t be that useful without firstprehending the Dao of Formations, it does contain some information on the seal and should also be useful if you happen to find a qualified formation master to fix the seal before it breaks."


    Whoosh~ n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Thank you, this is better than nothing!" As he grabbed the book sent over by the old man, Xuan Hao beamed with joy as he thanked him before putting away the book in his interspatial ring.


    Originally, he had not expected the old man to have any books on him. For there to be even one and for it to be rted to the seal was quite a good thing. After all, a book on formations that included the seal in front of him was bound to contain knowledge far beyond just the Sait Realm.


    Even if the information in the book was not something he could understand given that he had not even managed toprehend the Dao of Formations to the Elementary Realm yet, he believed that he should be able to reach this level soon. Maybe the reward from the system quest that was waiting to be imed would even allow him to directly reach the Elementary Realm in the Dao of Formations.


    "Other than that, I also wanted to ask you about the different cultivation realms. Seeing as you shouldn''t be from the Ewaria Continent, I believe you should be far more knowledgeable than me¡­" Ensuring that he wouldn''t end up losing the book, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the old man as he asked this.


    "Cultivation realms? I do indeed know a bit¡­" Showing a slightly surprised expression on his face after hearing Xuan Hao''s question, the old man soon nodded his head in understanding. "Is there perhaps anything the specific you are thinking about?" "Yes, I wonder if you have heard about the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­" Hearing what the old man said, Xuan Hao decided to take the chance and ask about the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Sharing his knowledge of the realm for the first time since his encounter with the elder from the Mirage Sect.


    "Dao Domain Lord Realm!? Don''t tell¡­ Are you perhaps in the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­?" Eximing loudly as his entire face turned into one filled with disbelief, the old man could no longer remain calm as he asked this.


    Not having expected such a reaction from the old man, Xuan Hao could not help hesitating whether or not to answer him truthfully given the shocked reaction. Even without the old man saying anything about the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it was obvious that the realm was far more significant than he had first expected-


    However, he also had a feeling that the old man would give him more information if he was in the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Whoosh~!


    "Yes, I''m currently in the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Although only the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm." In the end, Xuan Hao decided to not show off the fact that he was someone in the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and instead just released an aura simr to the one he had back when he had been in the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Nothing too difficult considering he could just release his domain using only a few of his weaker Daos to archive the effect of showcasing a dao domain of an Initial Stage Dao Domain Lord.


    Even though he didn''t feel like the old man would be an enemy in the future, he also had a feeling that reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm on the Ewaria Continent in the current state of the continent was a little too much.


    After all, the old man would definitely tell his elders about him after he retuned to his family, him being in the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm might be attributed to the fact that he had managed to encounter an elder from the Mirage Sect. On the other hand, reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm that was hard to reach even in the ancient world might draw unwanted attention from these elders.


    It didn''t matter if this would be good or bad for him, he simply didn''t dare to take a gamble considering that the strength of these elders had likely surpassed the Celestial Immortal Realm¡­


    "Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm! Indeed, worthy of someone acknowledged by an ancient sect like the Mirage Sect. Even back home, the number of people in my family who managed to reach the Dao Domain Lord Realm barely exceeds five, with only a single one having reached the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the past hundred thousand years!" Nodding his head in acknowledgment as he said this with a look of praise on his face, the old man also leaked a bit information about his family and the fact that they currently had over five people in the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    At the same time, Xuan Hao also felt a sense of surprise after hearing that they had only managed to produce a single person in the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the past hundred thousand years.


    Indeed¡­ The Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm is hard to reach under normal circumstances¡­ Good thing I didn''t tell him about my true strength or those elders from his family would undoubtedly have tried to drag me back with them the moment they show up¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he saw the excited and proud expression on the old man''s face while mentioning the Late Stage Dao Domain Lord Realm Expert from his family, Xuan Hao felt even more relieved that he didn''t reveal his current cultivation realm to the old man.


    "Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm!? How amazing, I hope I can reach it in the future¡­"


    Of course, on the surface, Xuan Hao didn''t say any of this, as he showed an amazed look on his face after hearing the old man mention the Late Stage Dao Domain Lord Realm Expert from his family.


    "Hehe, indeed! Although, reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm is far too hard in the current day and age. Even in the ancient world, reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm could be considered the mark of a top genius, let alone now that the situation and resources avable have worsened significantly¡­!" Smiling even more proudly as he said this, the old man seemed to have fully transformed as he bragged about the amazing Late Stage Dao Domain Lord Realm Expert from his family.


    "Amazing! I wonder if you could tell me more about the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Especially considering that I don''t really have much of an idea on how to progress beyond the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm at the moment." Knowing that it would be better to not say anything about the bragging of the old man, Xuan Hao decided to try and steer the conversation towards the Dao Domain Lord Realm itself. Hoping that the old man would tell him more about the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and more importantly, the Peak of the Dao Domian Lord Realm¡­

 Chapter 1190 Dao Seed, Breaking Dawn, Profound Immortal

    <h4>Chapter 1190 Dao Seed, Breaking Dawn, Profound Immortal</h4>


    "About the Dao Domain Lord Realm? Hm... Although I do know a bit, I don''t think it will be of that much use considering how hard it is to go beyond the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself, the old man came to a stop when he noticed Xuan Hao looking towards him filled with anticipation. "Well, even if it''s hard, I don''t think it will hurt you to know about it. Just remember it was me who taught you if you manage to somehow reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future!"


    "Of course, I will make sure to remember senior if I manage to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future!"


    "Senior¡­ Hehe¡­ Ehm! Well then, I will start with the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    How easy¡­ Seeing how easy it was to convince the old man with a tiny bit of praise, Xuan Hao could not help rolling his eyes as he began listening to the old man exin the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Considering that he was already in the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, there wasn''t much new information to be gained. The only real thing of substance that the old man said regarding the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm was that the birth of the Dao Lotus before going through the tribtion was indeed a special characteristic of the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Apparently, if he decided to go through the tribtion in the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm like the person from the old man''s family had done in the past, his dao lotus would go through some kind of special transformation that would allow him to enter a state of enlightenment.


    In the past, this state of enlightenment caused by the transformation of the dao lotus had ording to the old man allowed the Late Stage Dao Domain Lord Realm Expert from his family to directlyprehend a dao from the Large Sess Realm to the Perfection Realm and at the same time help some of his other Daos go from the Elementary Realm to the Small Sess Realm.


    "¡­And after my senior managed to finish hisprehension, he ended up with a 30yered Dao Seed and chose to use the chance to breakthrough to the Breaking Dawn Realm in one go!"


    Dao Seed? Breaking Dawn Realm?


    Hearing the old man mention something he had never heard before; Xuan Hao could not help tilting his head in confusion as his brain worked overtime trying to figure out what the two realms mentioned by the old man were about.


    "Ah! I almost forgot, you shouldn''t have heard anything about the Dao Seed Realm or the Breaking Dawn Realm before." Noticing the confusion stered all over Xuan Hao''s face as he finished talking about how amazing his senior was, the old man could not help smiling a but awkwardly as he said this. "Ehm¡­ Guess I will have to exin the realms properly for you to understand how amazing my senior is! First of all, the Dao Seed Realm is just what you call the Earth Immortal Realm. The only difference is the name and the fact that you call the seed in your dantian a dao lotus. In reality it isn''t really a lotus and can only be considered a seed at the moment, thus the name dao seed was born and the name was named as such due to the realm being about nurturing the seed..." Knowing what he had to do for Xuan Hao to understand just how amazing his senior was, the old man narrowed both of his eyes before he began exining the two unknown realms to Xuan Hao. Starting with the Dao Seed Realm that was rtively easy for Xuan Hao to understand.


    In the end, the Dao Seed Realm was the exact same as the Earth Immortal Realm, the only difference being the name and the fact that the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm was far higher than the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm.


    In essence, the Dao Seed Realm was split into four minor realms, Early, Middle, Late and Peak Stage.


    Each of the minor realms being symbolized by 8, 18, 24 and 30yers respectively and a transformation taking ce to the dao seed in the Middle, Late and Peak Stage of the realm.


    The Half Bloom Stage that took ce at the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm was the transformation that the Dao Seed went through upon reaching the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm and not a final transformation that symbolized that one was ready to reach the Celestial Immortal Realm like was currently known across the Ewaria Continent.


    In truth, there was still two more transformations left ording to the old man, the first at 24yers where theyers around the dao seed began to integrate into the dao seed itself instead of just staying around it and the transformation at 30yers where theyers around the dao seed fully integrated into the dao seed.


    Above the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm, there was still one transformation left that the dao seed could go through, but that was not something the old man had any knowledge of. The only thing he knew about it was that only those in the Dao Domain Lord Rm could go beyond the 30yers symbolizing the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm.


    So, he doesn''t know about the Radiant Bloom Stage¡­


    Feeling a bit surprised that the old man didn''t know anything about the Radiant Bloom Stage, Xuan Hao felt a bit worried about whether or not the old man had any information about the Peak Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    After all, ording to his own research of the realm so far, the Radiant Bloom Stage was rted to surpassing the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    "¡­ And that is all for the Dao Seed Realm. Back then, my senior managed to directly reach the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm before he chose to directly breakthrough to the Breaking Dawn Realm above the Dao Seed Realm.


    Given my current cultivation realm only being in the Domain Lord Realm, I don''t really know a lot about the realms above the Dao Seed Realm, but I do know that the realm above the Dao Seed Realm is known as the Profound Immortal Realm, the Breaking Dawn Realm is considered the first minor realm of this realm. Symbolizing the birth of the Dao Lotus in the dantian." Shaking his head as he said this with a hint of awe on his face after mentioning the Profound Immortal Realm, the old man finished his exnation.


    "Hm? Profound Immortal Realm? Isn''t the realm above the Dao Seed Realm called the Celestial Immortal Realm? Is it perhaps another name for the Celestial Immortal Realm?" At the same time, Xuan Hao could not help showing a confused expression on his face after hearing the name of the realm above the Dao Seed Realm being called the Profound Immortal Realm. After all, he had never heard about the Profound Immortal Realm before.


    "Ha?! Oh god¡­ I almost forgot that, no, the Profound Immortal Realm and the Celestial Immortal Realm are different. The Celestial Immortal Realm can be considered an inferior realm for those who couldn''t integrate the daoyers around their dao seed into the dao seed. Even a Peak Celestial Immortal is at mostparable to someone in the Middle Stage of the Profound Immortal Realm, while their future hope of advancement is pretty much cut off without the support of certain ancient cultivation techniques that has long since been lost during the cmity.


    In the future, make sure you don''t try to breakthrough before you reach the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm or your future progress won''t have any hope of going beyond the Celestial Immortal Realm!" Showing a somewhat offended expression on his face as he said this, the old man made sure Xuan Hao understood the difference between the Profound Immortal Realm and the Celestial Immortal Realm, while also reminding him to not breakthrough before reaching the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm.


    "I see¡­" Feeling a hint of pity on behalf of the Celestial Immortals of the Ewaria Continent, Xuan Hao nodded his head in understanding. Even if the old man didn''t say anything, he didn''t n to try and breakthrough before he reached the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    In the end, Xuan Hao and the old man''s conversation about the different cultivation realms and the Dao Domain Lord Realm soon came to an end, with Xuan Hao discovering that the old man had no idea about the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, let alone how to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    From the looks of it, he would have to explore on his own if he wanted to surpass the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future¡­ n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    damn information heavy chapter, but at least need to get the information on future and current cultivation realms out at some point. ___

 Chapter 1191 Fallen Immortal Archipelago and Other Continents

    <h4>Chapter 1191 Fallen Immortal Archipgo and Other Continents</h4>


    Having his question so far answered and also finding out about the realm above the Earth Immortal- Or Dao Seed Realm as it was originally called, Xuan Hao could not help feeling thankful that the old man answered all of his questions without hesitation and to the best of his ability.


    Although the old man clearly didn''t know anything about some of the things, he asked about due to his rather low cultivation realm, he still did his best to answer his questions and even handed him a book on formations.


    Considering that both of them had never met each other before, Xuan Hao guessed that the reason why the old man treated him so kindly was because he was rted to the Mirage Sect.


    I guess the only question I have left to ask is about his family and where he is from¡­


    Narrowing both his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided to first ask about the easiest of the two questions.


    "Senior, if you don''t mind me asking¡­ Where are you from? Are you perhaps from one of the other continents that were created during the cmity of the ancient world?"


    "Hm? Oh, no, I''m not from any of the four continents." "Huh? Not one of the four continents? Are there perhaps more continents outside of the four?" Hearing what the old man said, Xuan Hao could not help tilting his head in confusion. Not having expected that the old man was actually not from one of the four continents.


    "Not that I know of, but it wouldn''t surprise me if there were more than the four. After all, the size of the ancient world back then was simply unimaginable. Thinking about it, the ce I''m from is called the Fallen Immortal Archipgo, it was rumored that it was once a continent rivalling the size of the Ewaria Continent before it was shattered and reduced to countless smaller inds that now make up the Fallen Immortal Archipgo.


    Apparently, the name of the archipgo stems from the fact that the shattering of the continent happened with the fall of a powerful immortal, but that is only rumors, so far, I haven''t seen any traces of such a powerful being. Of course, it could always be that I''m just too weak to sense anything, hehe¡­" Scratching his chin as he said this while giving a rather awkwardugh towards the end, the old man turned to look down at the dark miasma still pushing up against the ancient seal no more than a few meters away from where he was standing.


    "¡­"


    Seeing the old man''s awkward expression and the painful look in his eyes when mentioning his own strength, Xuan Hao understood that the old man was remembering something from his past.


    Indeed, although the Domain Lord Realm might be impressive on the Ewaria Continent, there was no way it would be considered impressive in the family that the old man came from. Especially considering that the old man wasn''t young and was already half a step into the grave. Even looking at it optimistically, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the old man wouldn''t live for more than a few hundred years if he didn''t manage to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Maybe that is why he was the one toe here and check up on the seals? After all, reaching the Ewaria Continent from the Fallen Immortal Archipgo is bound to take a long time and there is no way the powerful experts from his family would make the long journey without any reason. Not to mention, the endless ocean is filled with dangers¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao felt a sense of pity towards the old man who had undoubtedly been through countless life and death situation to reach the Ewaria Continent.


    Hm? But where in the endless ocean is this Fallen Immortal Archipgo located?


    "If you don''t mind me asking, where is the Fallen Immortal Archipgo located in the endless ocean?" Suddenly realizing that he still didn''t have any idea where this archipgo was located in the endless ocean, Xuan Hao decided to ask the old man. Not just because he wanted to find out, but also to get the old man out of the state of depression that he was slowly sinking into.


    "Where in the endless ocean¡­ Eh¡­ Sorry, but I don''t really know the exact location given that I mostly relied on an artifact given by my elders to find the Ewaria Continent, but¡­ From what little I know; it should be located somewhere between the Ewaria Continent and the Demon Beast Continent. Although it should be closer to the Demon Beast Continent." Thinking about the answer for a short time before answering, the old man still looked a bit uncertain. Clearly, he didn''t really have any real idea of where the actual location of the Fallen Immortal Archipgo was in the endless.


    Then again, considering the sheer size of the endless sea and the fact that the old man was only someone in the Domain Lord Realm, it was a given that he didn''t know the exact location of the Fallen Immortal Archipgo. After all, from what Xuan Hao guessed, he should have journeyed across the endless ocean for dozens of years before reaching the Ewaria Continent. Knowing where he was in such a situation without an artifact guiding him would be unrealistic for someone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even then, Xuan Hao didn''t feel the slightest bit let down by the answer given by the old man, as he managed to learn the name of one of the other three continents.


    Demon Beast Continent¡­ Just from the name alone, it was obvious that the continent was ruled by powerful demon beasts. Different from the Ewaria Continent where the ones in charge were the humans.


    Although, thinking about the fact that ces like the Burning Mountain Range were still controlled by demon beasts with no humans daring to try and take control of it, it was obvious that even on the Ewaria Continent, the demon beast also had a certain level of power. "Demon Beast Continent¡­ Senior, do you perhaps also know about the other two continents?" Knowing an opportunity when he saw one, Xuan Hao decided to try and ask about the other two continents. Hoping to gain some useful information for when he would inevitably end up going beyond the Ewaria Continent.


    "The other two? Ehm¡­ Sorry to say, I didn''t really learn a lot about them due to them being so far away from the Fallen Immortal Archipgo and the elders not really talking about them. The only real thing I know about those two continents is that one of them is home to those gods and their followers, while the other continent is a bit different. ording to what one of my elders told me during my youth, unlike the other three continents that were created by parts of the ancient world that broke apart in the past, that continent is farrger than all the othersbined and is the only part of the ancient world that managed to survive the cmity back then." Shaking his head as he said this, the old man let out a regretful sigh at the little information he knew about the other two continents.


    "No, no! This is more than enough!" Seeing this, Xuan Hao could not help trying to cheer up the old man.


    "Really?"


    "Yes! It''s more than enough for me, not to mention, I don''t n to leave this continent any time soon!" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Indeed, Xuan Hao did feel that the information provided by the old man was enough. Even though he did want to find out more about the other three continents, he at least managed to learn something about all of them through the old man.


    "That''s great! If you want to know more, you can ask one of my elders when they show up to deal with the seal¡­ Or what is left at it¡­" Smiling happily after hearing what Xuan Hao said, the old man took out a small token inscribed with an intricate pattern of a one leaf flower. "This is an identity token used by my family, you will know when my elders arrive through it and they will know you are a friend after seeing it, although¡­ The robe your wearing should be more than enough¡­"


    "Thank you¡­" Not expecting to suddenly get a token from the old man- Not only that, but one that would allow him to find out when the elders from his family appeared, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say other than thank the old man for the kindness he had shown him.


    "Hehe, no need to thank me, a past ally of my family is rare toe by and you are the first I have heard about and-" Shaking his head as he said this the old man suddenly froze as he turned to look towards the entrance to the underground space.


    Rumble-!


    Just at that moment, a faint rumbling sound echoed out from the entrance that the old man was looking towards¡­

 Chapter 1192 Disturbance, Seal Relocation

    <h4>Chapter 1192 Disturbance, Seal Relocation</h4>


    "This- Someone managed to find the entrance to the seal?! But how is that possible? I made sure there wasn''t anyone powerful around when I entered the seal, the strongest person was only at the Soul Ascension Realm- Ah!" Suddenly realizing something as he looked towards the direction that the rumbling sound hade from, the old man turned to look back at Xuan Hao. "Junior¡­ How did you happen to enter the seal¡­?"


    "Huh? There was arge hole in the ground where the entrance was located, and I just happened to enter it and found myself here. Honestly, I thought it would be more difficult to reach the seal¡­" Not saying anything about the fact that he had been following a few seconds behind him, Xuan Hao decided to just tell him how he had entered the underground space without telling him when.


    As for the whether or not the entrance had fully closed up behind him... He had no idea. The only thing he knew for certain was that the opening of the entrance had caused quite a disturbance to the surface of the river. More than enough to rm the people in the town next to the river. Even though, it was doubtful that they would investigate the situation at the river unless there was someone at Earth Immortal Realm present.


    All things considered; the reputation of the river was quite well known across the Blue Sea Empire. Making it unlikely that someone in the Soul Ascension Realm would dare enter, let alone investigate the river unless absolutely necessary. After all, there was no telling if the disturbance was caused by a powerful demon beast waking up from a long slumber¡­


    "Didn''t close up properly¡­ Damn it! I knew this ce had been in a bad state, but I didn''t expect for the entrance of this ce to have suffered as well! What to do¡­ The person trying to break through the entrance should at least have reached the Earth Immortal Realm, even if I escape, the location of the seal will be revealed, and those people will undoubtedly end up finding out about it!" Starting to full blown panic as he muttered this to himself while looking towards the direction of the entrance where the rumbling sound grew louder and louder with each passing second, the old man began looking through his interspatial ring for anything that could help with the current situation.


    "Is there anything I can help with?" Seeing the panicked old man, Xuan Hao decided to offer his assistance.


    Although he didn''t understand who the old man was referring to when he talked about someone who seemed to be searching for the seals, it wasn''t that hard to guess considering that the old man had referred to the being in the seal as a god of some kind. Meaning that the people searching for the seal should be the followers of this being in the seal.


    Even though he had no idea how strong these followers were, it was obvious that the old man didn''t think they would have any problem dealing with the seal. Not to mention, just a single part of the sealed being had the strength of a Minor God, when fully recovered, the being should be an existence above the Minor Gods mentioned by the old man!


    Not just that, but from the fact that he thinks they will discover information about the seal the moment it''s discovered, these followers should already have spread across the entire continent. Lurking in the shadows searching for any information about their god¡­


    Frowning to himself as he thought about this, Xuan Hao went through the different major organization that he had heard about on the Ewaria Continent, but none of them seemed to be followers of the sealed being.


    "Help? Unfortunately, there isn''t anything we can do about it with our strength¡­" Lifting his head from his interspatial ring to answer his question while Xuan Hao thought about the possible followers of the being in the seal, the old man shook his head before once again burrowing his head in his interspatial ring to look for anything to help them out of their current situation. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Considering the fact that the old man believed Xuan Hao to be someone in the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it was understanding that he didn''t ask for his help. After all, what would someone in the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm do against someone in the Earth Immortal Realm. At most he would be able to hold on a little longer than a Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert like himself¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that the goal was not to fight the other party, but to prevent them from finding the underground space where the seal was located.


    "¡­"


    Understanding this, Xuan Hao could only remain quiet as the old man continued looking through his interspatial ring for an artifact that might be useful for dealing with the current situation¡­


    "Ah! I got it! Haha, looks like things aren''t over just yet!"


    After close to a minute like this, the old man finally seemed to have found what he had been looking for as he pulled out arge disc simr to the teleportation disc he had been about to use earlier. Only many timesrger than the other disc.


    "This is¡­" Feeling the terrifying spatial fluctuations around the disc shaped artifact taken out by the old man, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine. Even though he could only feel a fraction of the spatialws contained inside the artifact, it was clear that they were far superior to that of the smaller disc.


    "Hehe, this is a seal relocation disc! One of my ancestors gave it to me in case one of the seals was found and had to be relocated. The only problem with this thing is that I can''t activate it on my own due to my insufficient cultivation realm, but with your help, we should be able to activate it." Smiling happily as he said this, the old man waved for Xuan Hao toe over and help him activate the disc shaped artifact.


    "Can''t activate it on your own? Why did your ancestor give it to you if you can''t activate it on your own?" Not feeling worried about the old man doing anything to him given the difference in their strength allowing him to instantaneously kill him if he did anything suspicious and the fact that he hadn''t done anything to make him think he would do something like that, Xuan Hao curiously made his way over to him while asking this. Feeling rather curious as to why his ancestor had given him an artifact that he was too weak to activate.


    "Well¡­ I didn''t lie when I said that it was ast resort, as I would have to use a forbidden technique to forcibly elevate my strength to the Dao Seed Realm for a short time to use it, a forbidden technique that would end up killing me shortly after activating the seal relocation disc¡­" Smiling a bit wryly as he said this, the old man ced both his hands on the disc and began infusing his qi into it. "Everything is ready, you just have to infuse your qi into the disc, and it will do the rest of the work on its own." Whoosh~


    Nodding his head in response to the old man, Xuan Hao ced his hand on the disc and began to infuse his qi into the disc- "Huh?"


    However, upon cing his hand on the disc, Xuan Hao could not help opening both his eyes wide as he felt the terrifying spatial fluctuation rapidly expand and integrate into the entire underground space-


    Rumble~!


    And before he even had the chance to figure out what was happening, a terrifying force enveloped the entire underground space before disappearing the next moment.


    If not for the fact that he hadprehended the Dao of Space and could feel that he had just been teleported an unimaginable distance by the terrifying spatial power, he would have believed that nothing had happened, and he was still in the same underground space below the river in the Blue Sea Empire.


    "Hm? That was easier than expected¡­"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was left in a state of shock following the terrifying disy of spatial maniption, the old man frowned to himself as he looked at the disc in his hand that had begun shattering following its activation. Not understanding why, he had only barely started to infuse his qi before the disc had activated.


    "Maybe the ancestor was just telling me about having to use a forbidden technique to scare me into not carelessly using the seal relocation disc¡­"


    In the end, he had no idea about the fact that the qi infused by Xuan Hao in that short period of time was already more than enough to satisfy the condition of activation and could only me his ancestor for being overly worried about him identally wasting the seal relocation disc¡­

 Chapter 1193 Parting

    "Haaa... At least everything ended up working well." Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while looking down towards the dark miasma still struggling against the seal below, the old man let out a sigh of relief after seeing that the seal hadn''t been damaged by the sudden change in location.


    The only thing that seemed to have changedpared to before was the fact that the entrance to the underground space that had been present before had disappeared. Instead, being reced by a small tunnel barelyrge enough for one person to fit through.


    Given that the seal relocation disc had a predetermined location that it had locked on to when used, there wasn''t any problems with the new location of the seal, as it had already been prepared for the seal in case it was moved there.


    Thinking about this, the old man began to take out the smaller disc shaped artifact in preparation for leaving the ce and making his way back to the Fallen Immortal Archipgo and inform his elders about what had happened.


    "Looks like it''s time for me to leave¡­" Turning around as he said this the old man wasted no time as he began the process of infusing his qi into the artifact to activate.


    "Leaving!?" Seeing this, Xuan Hao who still had some question he wanted to ask the old man could not help showing a shocked expression on his face as he said this.


    Although he knew that the old man would be leaving after the seal had been relocated, he never expected him to act that fast and begin the process of infusing his qi into the disc shaped artifact before he had a chance to ask him any more questions.


    "Indeed, I really wanted to stay longer, but any more dy and I might be forced to stay on the Ewaria Continent for an extended period of time to wait out some of the more terrifying storms my elders predicted to reach the patch of ocean between the Ewaria Continent and the Fallen Immortal Archipgo¡­" Seeing Xuan Hao''s shocked expression, the old man could not help shaking his head as he said this.


    If not for the fact that he had already been dyed by Xuan Hao''s earlier question and the movement of the seal adding another few days to his journey, he really wanted to stay and chat a bit longer with him.


    "Storms strong enough to endanger someone in the Domain Lord Realm? I guess the endless ocean is far more dangerous than I first expected¡­" "Indeed, some of those storms can even threaten the life of those in the Profound Immortal Realm. Although storms like that are rare close to any of the four continents and normally also involve the presence of powerful demon beasts beneath the surface¡­


    Back during my time crossing the endless ocean, I also encountered a powerful storm. Although far from enough to threaten someone at the Profound Immortal Realm, I was close to losing my life several times. Only barely managing to cling to life with the help of the spiritual boat the elders gave me for this journey. If not for that boat, I would have never made it to the Ewaria Continent¡­" Nodding his head with a fearful expression as he said this, the old man seemed to have remembered his struggle in the endless ocean.


    Even though he only mentioned one of the storms he had ended up encountering, Xuan Hao was sure that the old man had gone through countless life and death situation while crossing the endless ocean on his own. Especially considering that he was only in the Domain Lord Realm. In the future when crossing the endless ocean, Xuan Hao noted down that he would have to watch out for any storms and try to avoid them if possible.


    "Ah! Before I forget, the new location of the seal shouldn''t be too far away from the past location and should still be somewhere inside the borders of the Blue Sea Empire. The main reason for this is that the distance between the four seals can''t be too big or they will start to grow unstable." Suddenly remembering something as he was about to pour thest bit of qi into the disc shaped artifact to activate, the old man said this before turning to point towards the narrow tunnel nearby. "Following the tunnel over there should lead you back outside."


    Rumble~!


    Not even giving Xuan Hao a chance to respond, a terrifying spatial force spread out from the small disc shaped artifact before engulfing the old man.


    "I hope we will have a chance to meet again in the future and I will make sure my elders know about you when they-"


    Whoosh-!


    Before the old man could finish what, he wanted to say, he disappeared from the underground space together with the disc shaped artifact. Leaving Xuan Hao on his own in the underground space-


    Bang!


    Well¡­ Almost alone, the being in the dark miasma was still doing it''s best to push against the seal in an attempt to further weaken it. "How unfortunate, I really wanted to find out what family or power that old man belonged to. Even if I don''t have any clue about the Fallen Immortal Archipgo, I might be able to find out more about them if I return to search through the mystic realm of the Mirage Sect in the future¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked at the ce where the old man had been just a second earlier, Xuan Hao could only shake his head in regret over not being able to find out what power the old man belonged to.


    However, all things considered, he didn''t care too much about it, as he should find out about when the elders from his family appeared to fix the seals in a few years. Although he had no idea how friendly these elders would be when they appeared, he was at least certain that they were allies of the Mirage Sect in the past and still seemed to value this past alliance.


    Outside of that, he had also been given the token by the old man that would allow him to know when the elders from his family appeared on the Ewaria Continent. At least giving him some time to prepare before he had to face them¡­


    Whoosh~


    Deciding not to waste any more time in the underground space now that the old man had left, Xuan Hao soon left the underground space through the narrow tunnel. Soon finding himself inside arge mountain range stretching far beyond what he could see.


    "Huh? Isn''t this the Burning Mountain Range!?" Discovering where he was after only looking around for a few seconds, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat shocked expression on his face.


    Although part of the Burning Mountain Range did indeed run through Blue Sea Empire, it didn''t connect the Blue Sea Empire and the Sky Empire. Instead, the part of the Burning Mountain Range that he was currently inside of should be connected to the Blue Sea Empire through one of the neighboring empires of the Sky Empire currently in the process of attacking the Sky Empire. To be more specific, the empire in question was none other than the Onyx Empire!n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    However, the thing Xuan Hao focused the most on regarding his new location was that he could see the primeval jungle that the primeval jungle Chun Hua had to cross through to reach the central region of the continent in the past was right next to where he was at the Burning Mountain Range.


    Although the sheer size of the primeval jungle meant that it connected to several massive empires in the core region of the continent.


    "Maybe I should take the chance to search for Chun Hua now that the situation with the Heavenly Dragon Temple has been dealt with for the foreseeable future¡­" Narrowing both his eyes as he looked towards the primeval jungle barely visible on the other side of the Burning Mountain Range, Xuan Hao could not help remembering the potential disciple he had encountered back when he had first wandered through the ancient teleportation formation back at the Eighth Star Peak.


    Given his current strength and the fact that he had imnted part of his power inside her soul back then, he could vaguely feel her presence somewhere in the distance. Although he couldn''t tell if she was still inside the primeval jungle or had managed to make through the jungle, he should be able to track her down following the vague presence of his own power inside her soul, as it would only be easier to sense the closer, he got to her.


    Let''s do that then, but first, I should check out the rewards from the systems¡­


    Havinge to a decision, Xuan Hao first decided to redeem the rewards from the system and increase his own strength before leaving in search of his future fifth disciple¡­

 Chapter 1194 Enlightenment Space, Ancient Cultivation Technique

    Chapter 1194 Enlightenment Space, Ancient Cultivation Technique


    [Main Quest: Investigate the Four Ancient Dao Seals (Complete)] [Description: You have chanced upon an ancient seal in the ruins of the Raging me Sect where you discovered an old man of unknow origin working hard to repair the already breaking seal. Upon closer inspection, you realize that it is only part of a much stronger being that is sealed beneath the ruins of the Raging me sect. Understanding this, you decide to follow the old man to find out more about the being sealed so close to your sect.] [Investigate the Four Ancient Dao Seals: 4/4] [Reward: Increase Comprehension of the Dao of Formations and Dao of Light]


    [Redeem Reward: Y/N]


    Yes! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    As the system panel showing thepleted quest appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao directly redeemed the reward, curious about how the system would increase hisprehension of the Dao of Formations and the Dao of Light.


    Would it be a direct increase like the one he had experienced in the past during the time that the system helped increase his cultivation realm or would it ce him inside a special system space like had happened in the past when he received aprehension rted reward from the system.


    Whoosh-!


    Not even a second after he finished his thoughts, Xuan Hao promptly disappeared from his original location. Soon finding himself inside of the familiar system space forprehending the dao. "Hm? Sunflowers?" The only differencepared to the past being that there wasn''t any barrier around to protect him. Instead found himself in the middle of an endless field of sunflowers with the sun shining down on him from above. At the very least,pared to when the system had helped himprehend the dao in the past, the Dao present in the sunflower field was far gentlerpared to the past. Of course, it could also just be that his strength had increased enough for him to survive without the help of the barrier protecting him. Although he doubted that when he remembered the Dao of Corruption eroding everything in sight. Even if he reached the Profound Immortal Realm, he doubted he would be able to walk freely in the corrupted space where the Dao of Corruption reigned supreme.


    With this in mind, the only reason he could walk around in the dao space of the system should be because the system was protecting him in some way or the area, he was at was a lower level dao spacepared to the ones he had been to in the past.


    Although this might mean that it would take longer toprehend the dao in such a space, it would at least be safer and allow him to feel the presence of the dao in the ce more clearly.


    Whoosh~


    As he thought about this, Xuan Hao sat down amidst the field of sunflowers before trying to grasp the dao power present in the air all around. Even though he had already guessed that the space he was in should be rted to the Dao of Light given the environment, he still had to make sure¡­


    "Huh?" However, after investigating the situation with his divine sense, he could not help opening both of his eyes in shock. "The sunflower field is actually a formation!? Not only that, but it incorporates both the Dao of Formation and the Dao of Light!"


    Indeed, the entire field of sunflowers was one giant formation that perfectly incorporated the Dao of Light. Not only that, but the Dao of Light and the Dao of Formations even showed signs of having merged together into some kind of unknown dao through the formation.


    "So, this ce is not just toprehend the Dao of Light, but also the Dao of Formations? How amazing¡­ but¡­ Is there perhaps not a time limit likest time? More importantly, how will I leave this ce if there isn''t a time limit?" Muttering this to himself as he looked around the field of sunflowers that seemed to transform into an endless sea of yellow in the distance, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit worried when he realized that he had no idea how to leave the system space.


    Even if heprehended the Dao of Light and the Dao of Formations to a level simr to what was disyed through the sunflower field formation, it would be useless if he ended up unable to leave the system space¡­


    [Enlightenment Space will remain open until the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Formations and Dao of Light is archived.] [Enlightenment Space will be adjusted ordingly whenprehension of one of the two Daos reaches the Small Sess Realm.] [Time inside the Enlightenment Space has been adjusted.]


    [Current Time Ratio: 1:200]


    [Warning: If no significant progress in the Dao of Light and Dao of Formations is detected, the Enlightenment Space will be closed.]


    Just at this moment, the several messages from the system popped up in front of him. Informing him about his current situation, while at the same time allowing him to breathe a sigh of relief. Although it didn''t seem like the system nned to give him a chance to take advantage of the flow of time inside the Enlightenment Space being slowed down to focus on his other Daos and rapidly increase his strength nor give him a chance to only focus on one of the two Daos of the Enlightenment Space, Xuan Hao didn''t feel sad.


    Even though the system didn''t directly increase hisprehension of the two Daos, it would essentially be the same considering that only a few days would pass outside while heprehended the Dao of Light and the Dao of Formations to the Small Sess Realm¡­


    "I guess I should get started. After all, I have no idea what the significant progress mentioned by the system entails¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao didn''t dare ck off as he sat back down on the soft grass hidden beneath the field of sunflowers before closing his eyes toprehend the two distinct Daos present all around him.


    ¡­


    Bang!


    RUMBLE-!


    At the same time Xuan Hao began the process ofprehending the Dao of Light and the Dao of Formations, the entrance to the underground space that had housed the seal just a short time ago was forcefully broken apart as arge amount of water rushed in to fill the space.


    Whoosh-!


    Following therge amount of water rushing into the space from above, the figure of the person behind the destruction of the entrance to the seal arrived above the ancient ruins that had been left behind.


    If Xuan Hao had been there, he would immediately have recognized this person as the General of the East Sea Army that he had happened to encounter during hisst trip to the blue Sea Empire.


    "Huh? Nothing¡­?" Floating above the ruins that had now been covered in water, the general could not help frowning to himself as he discovered nothing of interest in the underground space.


    Even though the ancient ruins had been made from high quality spiritual stones mixed with different spiritual metals, they had long since lost their former luster and were no different than ordinary rocks due to the constant corrosion of the dark miasma that had covered them for a long time.


    "Was I wrong? Isn''t there something more to this ce? The hidden entrance alone should mean something is hidden here¡­ Or has it perhaps already been taken? After all, if the entrance opens periodically every few dozen or hundreds of years like it should have today, it should have been discovered by others long ago¡­" Muttering this to himself as he arrived at the lowest point of the underground space where the being in the dark miasma had originally been restrained when the seal had been at its full strength, the general frowned unhappily.


    Having discovered the earlier disturbance at the river, he rushed over and discovered the hidden entrance just a short time after it closed. Thinking it might hold a treasure or be a hidden tomb of a past expert, he had originally been excited to enter the ce.


    However, reality was often cruel and after entering the ce, he found nothing of value. Only a few ancient ruins that couldn''t be used for anything.


    "Hm?"


    With this in mind, the general was just about to leave disheartened when he discovered a book in the corner of the room located at the bottom of the hole in the middle of the underground space.


    "This is¡­ A cultivation technique?"


    Picking up the book and examining it up close, the general could not help feeling a bit surprised as he realized that it was a cultivation technique. Although he had no idea about the quality of the cultivation technique, he was certain that it shouldn''t be a low quality one considering that it was inside an ancient ruin. Even if it wasn''t useful to him, an ancient cultivation technique would definitely be highly valuable and could be sold.


    Whoosh~!


    Thinking about this, the general felt a renewed sense of happiness as he put the cultivation technique into his interspatial ring before turning around to leave the underground space before it filled up with water.

 Chapter 1195 Pets, Disciples and Status

    Chapter 1195 Pets, Disciples and Status


    Whoosh~


    "Finally out¡­ The Dao of Light and the Dao of Formations was far harder toprehend than I expected¡­"


    Appearing back in the mountain range after a little over two weeks had passed outside the Enlightenment Space, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself as he remembered the little over seven and a half years that he had spent inside the Enlightenment Space of the System.


    Although the ce was optimal forprehending the Dao of Space and the Dao of Light, it was inferior to the other Enlightenment Spaces he had gone through in the past. Other than that, the main thing that made him spent such a long time inside the Enlightenment Space was the Dao of Formations.


    Out of all the time he had spent in there, at least 80% of the time was spent on him trying toprehend the Dao of Formations!


    Even then, I did at least manage to reach the Grandmaster Realm¡­ n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Shaking his head as he thought about this to himself, Xuan Hao could onlyment that his talent for the Dao of Formations was nowhere near the Dao of cksmithing that he had managed to promote to the Small Sess Realm in a far short period of time.


    Then again, it could also be because he had the help of a Saint Realm cksmith guiding him in the Dao of cksmithing. Making it far easier toprehend than if he had to do it on his own like he had to in the Enlightenment Space¡­


    "I wonder how much my status changed now that Iprehended to new Daos..." Deciding to not think too much about his slowprehension in regard to the Dao of Formations, Xuan Hao instead decided to focus his attention on his status after a long time to see if there were any changes now that he had managed toprehend two new Daos to the Small Sess Realm.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword ((Peak) Small Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess), Dao of Space (Small Sess), Dao of Illusions (Large Sess Realm), Dao of cksmithing (Small Sess), Dao of Light (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Formations (Small Sess Realm) Dao Lotus: 9yers (Possibleyers 11) Sword Intent: Peak Nascent Sword Soul Realm


    Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened) Physique: ??? (99% Awakened)


    Realm: Late Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to Dao Seed Realm, Sixth Layer Dao Seed) Professions: Alchemist (Master), Formation Master (Grandmaster), cksmithing (Pseudo Saint) Sect: Star Shattering Sect Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Peak Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm)


    Looking through his status for any changes, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit disappointed. Although hisparable to realm had changed from the Earth Immortal Realm to the Dao Seed Realm, there wasn''t anything unexpected in his status.


    His physique was still stuck at the 99% mark showing no signs of changing and his Sword Intent remained unchanged, while his pets had not improved since thest time he viewed his status.


    "Hm? This is¡­"


    However, just as he was about to close his status and leave the Burning Mountain Range to begin his search for his potential fifth disciple in the primeval jungle, he noticed a new small plus symbol located next to his disciples and pets¡­ And feeling curious, he decided to touch the symbol located next the rabbit demon beast first.


    [Royal Rabbit, Prince]


    [Realm: Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Rm]


    [Talent: 47]


    [Bloodline: Royal Emperor Rabbit (In the process of awakening)]


    [Subordinates: Squirrel Demon Beast (Nascent Soul Realm)]


    Looking at the new screen that appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit shocked. Not because the information in the screen was anything new to him, but because he didn''t expect that he could also view the status of his pets like this¡­ And looking towards the plus symbols next to his four disciples, it was easy to guess that he should also be able to view their status through the system.


    Whoosh~


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao wasted no time as he first decided to pull up the status of his first disciple-


    Name: First Disciple, Qing Yi


    Race: Human


    Talent: 38 Potential Dao: Dao of Fire, Dao of Wind, Dao of Light, Dao of Space, Dao of Alchemy


    Physique: Bright Sun Divine Physique (Late Stage, Small Sun Realm)


    Realm: Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm


    Profession: Alchemy (Peak Artisan Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Heaven Burning Mantra


    However, after pulling up his first disciple''s status, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes slightly.


    Different from the rabbit demon beast, it also included a few more things like her cultivation mantra, race and most important of all, potential dao.


    Although there was no description of what this potential dao was, it did not take a genius to understand that it was the Daos most suited for Qing Yi toprehend.


    The Dao of Fire was expected given the fact that she had a physique rted to the Dao of Fire, but the Dao of Wind, the Dao of Light and the Dao of Space waspletely unexpected.


    "So¡­ With the help of this I will be able to tell what dao is best suited for my disciples to learn?" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling excited as he realized that this would allow his disciples to have a far easier time reaching the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    After all, one of the main roadblocks for someone to reach the Dao Domain Lord Realm was the fact that it would be difficult toprehend more than one dao in the Domain Lord Realm.


    If by mistake, one ended up spending years trying toprehend a dao without progress, it was essentially wasting precious time that could be used trying to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm. Even if others knew about the existence of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it was unlikely for them to try and reach it due to the hurdle of finding another dao that waspatible andprehend the dao.


    Not to mention, one still had to merge the newlyprehended dao into the domain to create a dao domain, something that came with its own risks not any lower than the tribtion of breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm¡­


    However, with the help of the system, he could now tell what Daos were more suited for his disciples. Making it far easier for them to reach the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future!


    Whoosh~


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao quickly put away Qing Yi''s status and pulled up Chu Yang''s status-


    Name: Second Disciple, Chu Yang


    Race: Human


    Talent: 57 Dao: Dao of the Spear (Pseudo Domain)


    Potential Dao: Dao of Earth, Dao of Blood, Dao of ughter, Dao of Death


    Physique: No Special Physique


    Rmended Physique: Six Paths of ughter Divine Physique (Can be refined)


    Realm: Half Step Domain Lord Realm


    Cultivation Mantra: Soul Spear Divine Mantra


    "Huh?"


    However, once again, he was taken aback by what he saw. Not so much because there was now a rmended physique present below the physique part of the status, but because of the potential Daos of his second disciple.


    The Dao of Earth was expected by him to some extent considering that the Soul Spear Divine Mantra didter develop into spear moves relying on the Dao of Earth, but the rest of the Daos rmended for his disciples was a bit much.


    Okay¡­ I know he likes fighting a lot, but the Dao of ughter? Isn''t that a bit too much¡­? Not to mention that Dao of Blood and the Dao of Death!


    Not knowing what to say as he continued to intentionally stare at the potential Daos part of the status, Xuan Hao decided topletely ignore the rmended physique for his disciple.


    If he really ended up refining the Six Paths of ughter Divine Physique mentioned by the system, he feared that this disciple of his would really end up bing some kind of death god in the future.


    Although¡­ Since he had beaten up most of the Nascent Soul Realm elders of the sect, he was already considered to be like this in the eyes of some of the elders who had been dragged away to the Combat Hall for training by him regrly.


    As for him reaching the Half Step Domain Lord Realm and establishing a pseudo domain through hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear in the short time he had been gone, Xuan Hao didn''t find it odd considering that he should have gained quite a bit during their training together before he had left the sect to deal with the Earth Immortal from the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    After all, before leaving, Chu Yang could already be considered to only be a single step away from establishing his pseudo domain¡­

 Chapter 1196 Not Human? And the Dao of...

    Chapter 1196 Not Human? And the Dao of...


    Deciding not to think too much about the future path of his second disciple, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the status of his third disciple, Bai Ning. Although he already had some idea what path he would be following, he was still curious to see if there was something unexpected.


    Name: Third Disciple, Bai Ning


    Race: Human, Heavenly Sky Serpent


    Talent: 34 Dao: Dao of cksmithing (Pseudo Domain)


    Potential Dao: Dao of Metal, Dao of Fire, Dao of Formations, Dao of Wind


    Bloodline: Heavenly Sky Serpent (Dormant)


    Realm: Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Profession: cksmithing (Master Realm)


    Cultivation Mantra: Unformed Mantra


    "Huh¡­?"


    Once again, looking through the status of another of his disciples, Xuan Hao could not help freezing at the spot with a look of disbelief stered all over his face. Not because of the fact that Bai Ning had managed to reach the Master Realm in cksmithing nor the fact that he had an affinity for the Dao of Formations and the Dao of Wind, but instead the fact that he just found that his third disciple wasn''t entirely human¡­


    Looking through his status one more time just to make sure everything was correct, and he didn''t end up imagining things.


    "So¡­ My third disciple isn''t only talented in the Dao of cksmithing, but also the Dao of Formations. Not only that, but he also has some kind of bloodline dormant in his body¡­ And from the fact that his race isn''t entirely human, it should have been inherited from one of his predecessors." Not knowing what to say as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao couldn''t help feeling curious about Bai Ning''s family from before he became an orphan.


    Even though everything seemed normal on the surface with how many orphans were left behind everywhere in the world, either due to the parents being too poor to care of the children or some powerful cultivators that happened to be fighting nearby and identally leveled a nearby mortal vige or two, Xuan Hao had a feeling there was more to the story of Bai Ning with the recent realization.


    Not to mention, a family that had a bloodline powerful enough to enter the eyes of the system should by no means be weak and had to have a certain level of strength.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao could not help thinking up all kinds of scenarios that might have led to Bai Ning ending up as an orphan. From his family encountering a powerful enemy that they had no way of escaping or fighting back against to being thrown out of the main family by a jealous concubine of his father who wanted her child to take his ce.


    No matter what it was, Xuan Hao felt curious about Bai Ning''s background. After all, a heavenly sky serpent was definitely a demon beast of some kind. Meaning for the family bloodline to exist, certain things would have to have taken ce that would be close to impossible without the demon beast in question at least reaching a strong enough cultivation realm to transform into a human.


    If it didn''t reach a strong enough cultivation realm¡­ Bai Ning''s family would be far more¡­ Unique¡­ Compared to what he first thought¡­


    "Haaa¡­ Let''s not think about that for now¡­" Deciding to purge his mind of anything regarding how Bai Ning''s bloodline might havee about, Xuan Hao closed his third disciple''s status before pulling up the status of his fourth andtest disciple.


    Name: Fourth Disciple, Mui


    Race: Human


    Talent: 78 Potential Dao: Dao of Water, Dao of Darkness, Dao of Ice, Dao of Space, Dao of Chaos


    Physique: Deste Ancient Moon Physique (Dormant)


    Realm: Eighth Stage of the Core Formation Realm


    Profession: cksmithing (Abysmal), Formation Master (Abysmal)


    Cultivation Mantra: Myriad Water Art


    Looking through the status of his fourth disciple, Xuan Hao could only shake his head helplessly. Although he was surprised at the fact that she had a still dormant physique and seemed to have an aptitude for some unexpected Daos, he didn''t really find it too shocking considering he had been given some of the artifacts she had created.


    If anything, the Dao of space and the Dao of Darkness were the only two he found surprising so to speak. After all, she already showed signs of being skilled in the Dao of Water through the cultivation mantra she was using to cultivate, while the Dao of Ice was to some extent rted to the Dao of Water. The Dao of Chaos on the other hand had reminded him of some of the interesting things she had created through cksmithing.


    Her physique on the other hand was understandable given how high her talent was, it would be more surprising if she didn''t have some kind of special physique.


    "But¡­ What is the abysmal rank mentioned by the-"


    [Abysmal: A rank only archived by those with an inherent aptitude for the Dao of Chaos. The person who reaches this rank can create abysmal quality artifacts, potions, formations and so on. Abysmal quality things are not bound by normal system of categorization. An abysmal quality artifact may be too weak to kill a fly or may hold the power to sink continents.]


    "¡­"


    Looking through the new screen that appeared in front of him as if to answer his question, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say and could only remain silent. Only now figuring out why the things created by his youngest disciple were so weird and hard to understand from the perspective of a normal cksmith.


    After all, no matter who it was, no cksmith would be capable of creating some of the g metal balls that Mui created. Even if they had the exact same things to work with!


    "Haaa¡­ Looks like I will have to pay more attention to what she ends up creating in the future¡­" Letting out a slightly exhausted sigh as he could already foresee a scene of Mui creating something that ended up blowing up half the sect in the future, Xuan Hao closed her status as he turned to look back towards the primeval jungle in the distance.


    Although it had taken him a few days longer to finish absorbing the reward from the system and he had yet to condense newyers around his dao lotu- dao seed in his dantian, he had no intention of returning to the sect before he picked up this potential fifth disciple.


    Whoosh~!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he jumped into the air and headed towards the direction of the mark, he had left inside Chun Hua''s soul before she left to return to her family.


    Even though a part of him felt a bit worried about the trouble that her family was in and the fact that he would likely have to help her deal with it before she would agree to be his disciple, Xuan Hao felt rather confident that things would work out.


    The confidence came from the simple fact that his current strength was more than enough for him to go wherever he wanted on the continent without being in any sort of danger.


    Of course, excluding some dangerous areas controlled by demon beasts and demonic cultivators, and the core regions of the different major powers of the Ewaria Continent.


    Outside of that, he could pretty much go anywhere he wanted on the Ewaria Continent with his current strength. Possibly also the core region of the different major powers as long as he kept a low profile and avoided their Celestial Immortals.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao began his journey through the primeval jungle in search of his fifth disciple, back in the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song was happily expanding the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Given that the war was about to reach its climax and the different empires had begun preparing for a final battle with the Soul Ascension Realm Experts still protecting the core region of the Sky Empire where the capital was located, Elder Song had even begun to expand into the region that was under the control of the Onyx Empire without any pushback.


    The main reason for this being that the Onyx Empire didn''t want to fight with the Star Shattering Sect at this point in time. After all, it was rather powerful considering that they had two Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the eyes of the outside world.


    Even if an empire like the Onyx Empire felt like they could deal with them, they had no intention of falling out with them given the current state of the war. Especially considering that they had just recently lost three of their own Soul Ascension Realm Experts and one of their elite armies.


    Although they still had no clue what had happened to them, one of the soldiers had managed to send back a message before his death. Stating that they were attacked by a powerful demon beast. Outside of that, the Onyx Empire had no idea what happened to them¡­

 Chapter 1197 Expanding Star Shattering Sect

    Chapter 1197 Expanding Star Shattering Sect


    Expanding the Star Shattering Sect during the war was far easier than Elder Song and the rest of the elders had expected, as they pretty much encountered no resistance from the local forces who were more than willing to go under a powerful sect that had the backing of two experts in the Soul Ascension Realm. Even though the same could not be said for the territory under the control of the Onyx, given that the Onyx Empire didn''t want to fall out with the Star Shattering Sect, the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect in that ce didn''t encounter that much more resistancepared to the other region that the Star Shattering Sect was expanding into.


    Outside of that, with the different independent sects beginning the process of integrating more with the Star Shattering Sect during this period of time. The main way that this took ce was through the elders of the different sect joining the Star Shattering Sect elders in the process of expanding the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, while the younger disciples who couldn''t participate in this began to interact with the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect.


    The main way that this happened was through the disciples of the independent sects and the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect taking on missions from the Star Shattering Sect''s Grand Mission Pavilion together.


    In the end, because of the stream of disciples from the independent sects that entered the Star Shattering Sect over the past few weeks, Elder Song and Feng Chen even ended up implementing ns to construct a new Mission Pavilion outside the Star Shattering Sect in the Falling Star City for the disciple of the different independent sects to use.


    Not only lowering the number of people in the Star Shattering Sect''s mission pavilion, but at the same time also giving the disciples of the different independent sects a chance to take on missions without having to go through one of the disciples from the Star Shattering Sect.


    During all of this, Elder Song also made sure to enlist the help of Elder Dust Fairy who was in charge of the servant quarters and the information gathering of the sect. Having her establish awork across the territory of the Star Shattering Sect where the different mortal towns and different powers under the Star Shattering Sect could directly make a request for help if a problem like a demon beast or a demonic cultivator appeared.


    In the end, even though she had only been working on thework for barely a week at this point in time, the number of request flooding into the mission pavilion through it was more than enough to keep the increasinglyrge number of disciples flocking to the mission pavilion busy for a long time.


    At the same time, it was only after the initial parts of thiswork had been established that Elder Song and the rest of the elders in charge of the Star Shattering Sect realized just how dangerous it was for ordinary people without any cultivation to roam around on their own.


    Just the number of requests to deal with rampaging demon beasts exceeded 5000 in less than a day after the initial part of thework had been set up by Elder Dust Fairy¡­ And the area covered by this only epassed the former Heavenly Sky Kingdom and a small part of the Azure Sky Kingdom¡­


    Although most of the demon beasts reported only had the strength of the Qi Condensation Realm, it was nothing short of a disaster in the eyes of normal mortals without any cultivation.


    Even though the territory of the Star Shattering Sect was far saferpared to the past when it had been under the control of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom or other kingdoms, it was still rather dangerous for ordinary mortals without any cultivation.


    Of course, with the establishment of the informationwork that could be used by the different mortal towns and other weaker powers who couldn''t fully fend for themselves in the face of Foundation Establishment or Core Formation Realm demon beasts under the Star Shattering Sect, would be safer in the future with time.


    ¡­


    "Hm? This Star Shattering Sect has been acting quite boldtely¡­" "Indeed¡­ At this rate, it won''t take long before they reach some of our spirit stone mines¡­"


    "Hmph! Not just that, but the Flood Stream Spirit Garden will also soon be at the edge of this Star Shattering Sect!"


    At the same time that the Star Shattering Sect was in a process of rapid expansion, some of the experts dispatched by the Onyx Empire to keep control of some of the most important resources in the region of the Sky Empire that had fallen partially under their control, could not help getting a bit nervous as the Star Shattering Sect''s territory grew closer to them.


    Although the Onyx Empire had ordered them to not attack the Star Shattering Sect, if possible, they understood very well that such an option might not be viable in the near future, as the Star Shattering Sect began looking to take control of some of the more important resources that the Onyx Empire valued in the rather deste region.


    Even if the strongest expert dispatched by the Star Shattering Sect to lead the expansion had only reached the Earlier Stages of the Domain Lord Realm, they didn''t dare underestimate the Star Shattering Sect. After all, it was still a powerful sect with two Soul Ascension Realm Experts overseeing it, a power that the Onyx Empire would do its best to not recklessly offend for no reason in normal times, let alone now that it was embroiled in a war with the Sky Empire and surrounding empires for the resources in the core region of the Sky Empire.


    With this in mind, the five or so Domain Lord Realm Experts present in the partially controlled region of the Sky Empire decided to ignore the Star Shattering Sect''s expansion into the region.


    The main reason for this was not just because of the orders from above to not recklessly engage the Star Shattering Sect, but also because the Star Shattering Sect also seemed to avoid the areas under the control of the Onyx Empire as they expanded into the region.


    In the end, because of this, a weird stability and coexistence emerged between the people from the Star Shattering Sect and the people from the Onyx Empire, neither of them wanting to needlessly fight the other party.


    Given that the Onyx Empire didn''t have any energy to spare when it came to dealing with the Star Shattering Sect at the moment and the fact that they managed to keep the different critical resources in the region under their control, the Onyx Empire was more than happy with such an oue.


    At least¡­ Until they finished off the Sky Empire and divided the resources in the core region of the Sky Empire between themselves and the other invading empires, they would exist peacefully with the different branch sects of the Star Shattering Sect that had begun to pop around them.


    As for after the war ended¡­ There was no way the Onyx Empire would allow such a powerful sect to emerge at its borders after it had just finished dealing with its long-standing enemy, that would simply be asking for trouble in the future when the Star Shattering Sect ended up growing stronger and stabilized its position as a forceparable to the empires around it!


    ¡­


    Outside just the Onyx Empire finding itself on edge regarding the newly emerged Star Shattering Sect, the other empires located farther away from the Star Shattering Sect were also starting to pay attention to this newly emerged power that had appeared at the border of the Sky Empire right next to the Onyx Empire. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The only difference between them and the Onyx Empire being that they weren''t so much afraid of a possible war with the Star Shattering Sect. Instead, they were far more interested in the possibility of using the Star Shattering Sect to weaken the Onyx Empire further.


    After all, the information about the sudden loss of three Soul Ascension Realm Experts on the side of the Onyx Empire had already spread far and wide. Making them appear far weaker than in the past, while at the same time also making some of the empires in the process of invading the Sky Empire think about taking the chance while the Onyx Empire was down to attack them as well.


    Even though this might have been difficult to do considering that the Onyx Empire was still strong with their imperial family intact, things might change if the Star Shattering Sect could cause enough damage to the Onyx Empire and make them lose another two or three Soul Ascension Realm Experts.


    Because of this, quite a few envoys belonging to different empires had begun to set off in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect.


    All with the simple goal of sparking a fight between the Star Shattering Sect and the Onyx Empire¡­

 Chapter 1198 At the Gates of the Falling Star City

    Chapter 1198 At the Gates of the Falling Star City


    Following the situation outside the borders of the Star Shattering Sect growing more chaotic as the weeks went by, the first group of envoys belonging to the different empires interested in seeing the Star Shattering Sect and the Onyx Empire fight, arrived at the gates leading into the Falling Star City that towered dozens of meters into the sky.


    "So, this is the Falling Star City under the Star Shattering Sect? Quite impressive considering that the ce was established over the past ten years."


    "Indeed, it''s almostparable to the capital city. The quantity of resources needed to aplish something like this is¡­ No, more important than that, how did such an unknown sect manage to get enough resources to pull off something like this? Just the spiritual metal used in the gate alone will take at least a few years to produce¡­"


    "Maybe they waited around for a long time saving up resources¡­ Or¡­ They might have discovered something amazing inside the Shattered Star Peaks. After all, the ces are rumored to be the location of the ruins of a fallen ancient sect...!" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    As the group of envoys from the different empires began chatting with each other in front of the gates leading inside the Falling Star City, all of them could not help feeling a sense of amazement at the sheer scale of the Falling Star City.


    Although it had only been a short time since the Falling Star City had been established and it couldn''t yetpare to the capital cities of their empires, it was obvious that it would only be a matter of time considering the constant expansion that they could see the city going through not to far from therge gate into the city.


    However, more important than all of this, the group of envoys were curious about where the Star Shattering Sect had gotten their hands on the resources to take on such arge construction project. After all, their capital cities had been built up over thousands of years, while the Star Shattering Sect''s Falling Star City had only been around for ten or so years at this point in time.


    In the end, it was because of this that the group of envoys began eyeing the towering peaks of the Shattered Star Peaks in the distance greedily. Almost all of them concluding that the Star Shattering Sect should have found some kind of treasure left behind by the sect that existed on the Shattered Star Peaks in the past ording to legends.


    Of course, there was no way for them to know about the fact that most of the resources to develop the Falling Star City didn''te from the Shattered Star Peaks, but instead the massive spiritual metal mine located beneath the former capital city of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    Now that the mine had been operating for a few years, it was already churning out arge quantity of spiritual metal used in the construction of the Falling Star City. Only dwarfed by the Iron Sky Kingdom when it came to production of spiritual metal.


    Not just that, but most of the stones used in the creation of the Falling Star City also came from the spiritual stone mine in the Azure Sky Kingdom. Mainly due to the fact that the stones had grown stronger than normal stones from being in close contact with the spiritual metal of the mine. Making them the perfect building material in the construction of the houses and other buildings of the city.


    Out of everything used in the creation of the Falling Star City, the hardest thing to procure was not the spiritual metal and stones, but instead the spiritual wood.


    Spiritual wood had to be nurtured for a long time and even the lowest quality spiritual trees used in the production of spiritual wood would at least take 10 years inside the qi rich Shattered Star Peaks, while taking close to double the time outside of it.


    Even though the Star Shattering Sect had already begun the process of establishing locations dedicated to the production of spiritual wood, they had yet to mature. Meaning that the sect still didn''t have a steady supply of spiritual wood.


    In the end, this had resulted in most of the spiritual wood being bought through the different merchant organizations and most importantly, the Explorer Union.


    Although it was far more expensive to do thispared to growing the spiritual wood themselves, Elder Song had decided that it would be worth it considering that the current Star Shattering Sect didn''tck any resources to trade. Especially when it came to their ample supply of the spiritual metal that had only increased after the Iron Sky Kingdom officially became part of the Star Shattering Sect.


    In a sense, it was not wrong to say that the currentrgest producer of spiritual metal in the Sky Empire was the Star Shattering Sect!


    "Hmph! What''s so impressive about them using all of their resources in the construction of a city? In my eyes, this is simply a waste of resources that would be far better spent creating more artifacts or pills to increase the strength of their sect!"


    "Yeah, they are simply wasting their resources! Just look at the spiritual metal used on this gate; it would be far better spent creating more artifacts for their elders!"


    "Hehe, indeed, I don''t think the Star Shattering Sect should share a bit with us if they have enough to spent on a useless gate¡­!"


    "Yeah!"


    "You are correct!"


    "I agree!"


    As part of the envoys present admired the sheer size of the Falling Star City and how much it had managed to grow in such a short period of time, another part of the envoys could not helpining over how wasteful it was for the Star Shattering Sect to use so much spiritual metal on a single gate.


    Even though they understood deep down that it should be because the gate was part of arger city protection formation that guarded the Falling Star City from attacks, it still didn''t stop them fromining about it. Wanting nothing more than to take down that massive gate made out of spiritual metal and drag it away with them.


    "¡­"


    Arriving just in time to hear this, Shen Xuefeng, who had been asked to go over and meet these envoys could not help frowning as both of her eyes narrowed ever so slightly. Although she and the rest of the elders already had an idea what these envoys wanted when they heard about them entering the territory of the sect, she had never expected them to openly talk about wanting to tear down their gate.


    Even if these empires didn''t view the Star Shattering Sect as too much of a threat considering that it only had two Soul Ascension Realm Experts from what they knew, it was far too much for this group of envoys to openly talk about wanting to tear down the gate to their city. Especially considering that the strongest among this group of envoys had only reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Wee to the Star Shattering Sect, all of you can follow me and I will show you where to stay as the person in charge of external affairs will meet you one by er." Because of the bad first impression, Shen Xuefeng wore a cold expression on her face as she addressed the group of greedy envoys before turning around to make her way back inside the Falling Star City without waiting for any of them-


    "Huh?"


    "Wha- How rude!"


    "Hmph! Indeed a-"


    Ignoring the shocked andining voices that echoed out behind her as she began making her way towards the location that had been agreed upon for the meeting location with the different envoys and also where they would be staying.


    Of course, considering that the Star Shattering Sect had no rtionship with these empires and didn''t have any intention of pursuing one in the future, the meeting location was inside the Falling Star City and wasn''t inside the Shattered Star Peaks. Not intending to give these envoys any idea of informing their lords about the plentiful spiritual energy and have them try and seize the ce for themselves.


    As for being rude to this group of envoys, giving them no face so to speak of? Shen Xuefeng understood very well that none of these envoys could do anything as long as they were granted a proper meeting with her sect.


    In the end, they were merely a group of unimportant Nascent Soul Realm Experts in the eyes of the different empires behind them. Even if Shen Xuefeng was rude to them, they would at most sent aint and wouldn''t ever fall out with a sect that had the backing of two Soul Ascension Realm Experts over something as trivial as having their envoys disrespected by an elder from the Star Shattering Sect¡­

 Chapter 1199 Enraged Lion and Overexcited Rabbit

    Chapter 1199 Enraged Lion and Overexcited Rabbit


    Following Shen Xuefeng leaving them behind, the envoys soon came to understand that she wasn''t intending to wait for them as she slowly began disappearing among the busy streets of the Falling Star City-


    "Ah!? She''s really leaving?!"


    "Wha- I can''t go back without meeting the Star Shattering Sect or my lord will punish me!"


    "Same here! I will be leaving first!"


    Prompting the still angry envoys to quiet down and chase after her before she disappearedpletely.


    Even though they felt like their empire was far stronger than a newly emerged power like the Star Shattering Sect, they also understood that they were far too weak to cause any trouble without any of their seniors around. After all, a sect with more than one Soul Ascension Realm Expert present in it was bound to have at least a few people in the Domain Lord Realm guarding the Falling Star City.


    Not even a few secondster, the group of envoys rushed inside the Falling Star City following after Shen Xuefeng. Making sure to not get too close to avoid bing even more angry than they already were, something that Shen Xuefeng was more than happy to see happen as she made her way towards the part of the city that the sect had closed off for the envoys of the different empires to stay.


    ¡­


    "Hm¡­ Looks like the group of envoys arrived, Shen Xuefeng should have escorted them to the nned location, and they should be eagerly waiting to meet."


    At the same time Shen Xuefeng led the group of envoys through the Falling Star City towards the part of the city that had been isted for the envoys of the different empires, Feng Chen stood on the side of the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak as he gazed down towards the group of envoys nervously following behind her.


    "Although¡­ It looks like not all of them came with the intention of having a conversation¡­" Narrowing both his eyes as he said this, Feng Chen turned his attention away from the group of envoys towards an equallyrge group sneaking through the Falling Star City in the direction of the Ninth Star Peak.


    Just from a nce, it was obvious that this group hade with the intention of sneaking inside the Shattered Star Peaks... And their strength alone was far above that of any of the envoys following behind Shen Xuefeng, with most of them having at least reached the Late Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, while a few had even reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    On the outside, the different empires seemed to have only sent over a group of envoys to create a rtionship between themselves and the Star Shattering Sect, while they had in truth worked together to create a group of cultivators to infiltrate the Shattered Star Peaks to find out more about the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although this was expected to some extent, Feng Chen didn''t expect that the different empires would even go as far as sending Domain Lord Realm Experts to try and find out more about the Star Shattering Sect. After all, the Star Shattering Sect was still a sect with Soul Ascension Realm Experts in it. If the group of people trying to infiltrate the sect was discovered, they would be as good as dead, and they would never try to use their identity to escape.


    The reason for this was rather simple, as the current Star Shattering Sect was not a power that the different empires wanted to use against the Onyx Empire. If the Star Shattering Sect found out about them trying to infiltrate their sect, wouldn''t this n vaporize?


    On the other hand, it might cause the Star Shattering Sect to be cautious and push them to align with the Onyx Empire for safety. Essentially allowing the Onyx Empire to almost fully recover the damage that they had suffered from losing three Soul Ascension Realm Experts not too long ago.


    "How interesting¡­"


    Narrowing both of his eyes even further as he thought about this, Feng Chen took out amunication talisman and contacted some of the elders back in the sect about the situation. Intending to use this group of intruders to train some of the stronger elders of the sect who hadn''t had a chance to fight seriously in a long time. Especially the grand elder of spirit race, who had just recently broken through to the Domain Lord Realm. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As for safety? He had been granted partial control over the chaotic qi formation guarding the Shattered Star Peaks by Xuan Hao. If anything ended up happening, he could always use the formation to kill off the group of intruders if needed.


    "Hm¡­ Given Zu Fei is currently out of the sect leading the expansion into the adjacent region, there are only two Domain Lord Realm Experts present in the sect outside of myself. Guess I should leave one for both Shu Yao and the grand elder of the half spirit race and the rest¡­ I will let Xuan Hao''s lion deal with them¡­" Muttering this to himself as he went over the situation, Feng Chen picked up a differentmunication talisman before informing the winged lion about the situation and promising a lot of spirit stones in return for its help.


    SQUEAK!


    "Huh?"


    However, after informing the winged lion through themunication talisman, the only answer he got back was a weirdly excited squeaking sound.


    Is there something wrong with the winged lion? No¡­ It''s a demon beast close to the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ Maybe it''s just excited at the prospect of getting more spirit stones and made a weird noise¡­?


    Deciding not to think too much about it, Feng Chen began preparing to allow the group of people inside the Star Shattering Sect and having the formation split them up and give the elders of the sect a chance to practice against powerful opponents.


    Considering that there was a total of five Domain Lord Realm Experts on the other side and around twenty or so Nascent Soul Realm experts, he nned to have all of them separated from each other, while three of the Domain Lord Realm Experts would be staying together for the winged lion to deal with.


    The reason for him to not split up the Domain Lord Realm Experts that the winged lion demon beast would deal with was rather simple, as all of them were only in the First Stage of the Domain Lord realm and stood absolutely no chance against a powerful demon beast at the pinnacle of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if they did their best to work together, it would be a miracle if they managed to survive for more than a few seconds against such a powerful demon beast.


    "But¡­ What is the winged lion doing? Why isn''t it moving? Is it perhaps toozy to move and wants me to use the formation to move it¡­? Haaa¡­ Whatever, it doesn''t matter¡­" Shaking his head as he said this, Feng Chen directly used the chaotic qi formation to drag the still sleeping winged lion demon beast away from its rxing sleeping location before cing it t on the ground.


    ROAR!?


    Shocked by this sudden development, the winged lion demon beast could not help jolting awake as it began looking around itself in surprise and anger. Wondering who had dared to wake it up.


    "So, this is the Shattered Star Peaks? What rich qi- Huh? What is that over there?"


    "Demon beast!?"


    "A strong one at that¡­ Let''s kill it fast before the people from the Star Shattering Sect notice us!"


    Just at this moment, three different voices echoed out not too far away followed by a dense killing intent hitting it.


    Who is this!? They definitely aren''t people from my master''s sect¡­ Hmph! How dare they show their killing intent in front of me!


    Rumble-!


    Narrowing both of its eyes as killing intent began to fill them after it realized the group of people that had appeared all of a sudden weren''t from the Star Shattering Sect and showed a very clear intent to kill, the winged lion decided to not hold back in the slightest as the aura of a Peak Domain Lord Realm Demon Beast violently erupted.


    """Huh!?"""


    Not even having a chance to react, the three First Stage Domain Lord Realm Experts were soon engulfed by the terrifying power of the winged lion, as a massive w covering the heavens appeared above them-


    BOOOOOM-!


    Not standing the slightest chance against the terrifying might of an enraged demon beast at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, the three First Stage Domain Lord Realm Experts were directly squashed by the w. Dying in a single attack.


    ¡­


    SQUEAK!!!!


    "What in the- why are you suddenly acting like this? And isn''t that themunication talisman I left for the winged lion? How did you get that!?"


    At the same time this was happening, inside the primeval jungle, Xuan Hao was having a hard time calming down a certain rabbit demon beast that had suddenly doing its best to rush back towards the Star Shattering Sect to no avail¡­

 Chapter 1200 Scheming~

    Chapter 1200 Scheming~


    Only managing to calm down the rabbit demon beast and ce it back inside his sleeve again after handing over a small mountain of spirit stones, Xuan Hao could not help looking suspiciously at themunication talisman that he had secretly seized from it in the process.


    This is definitely themunication talisman I gave to the winged lion so it could be contacted by Feng Chen or others when there was a problem that they couldn''t deal with on their own and needed the help of the winged lion! For the rabbit demon beast to be so excited¡­ Did someone say something about spirit stones through themunication talisman?


    Thinking about this as he looked at themunication talisman for a short moment before disabling it, Xuan Hao ced it inside one of his interspatial rings before continuing in the direction of Chun Hua.


    The reason for disabling it was just to ensure that the person who had contacted the winged lion earlier would know that themunication talisman wasn''t working and would send a new one when they discovered it. Saving him the trouble of having to inform the other party about the winged lion''smunication talisman being stolen by the rabbit demon beast.


    At the very least, considering that there was now also someone in the Earth Immortal Realm at the Shattered Star Peaks, he didn''t worry too much about anything happening during his absence. After all, even if Pei Yang hadn''t fully recovered his strength, he was still someone in the Earth Immortal Realm. Far more powerful than anyone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    The only exception to this being some heaven defying cultivators whoseprehension of the dao far exceeded their realm and those who had managed to step into the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Of course, it was more likely to encounter someone in the Dao Domain Lord Realmpared to those kinds of heaven defying cultivators, as those people would have already reached the requirement to breaking through to the Dao Seed Realm but had for some reason decided to hold back and not break through immediately.


    No matter what, Xuan Hao didn''t worry too much about the Star Shattering Sect as he continued moving deeper into the primeval jungle.


    ¡­


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, Feng Chen could only smile wryly at the scene of the winged lion demon beast killing the three Domain Lord Realm Experts before it made its way back to its sleeping spot and closed its eyes to sleep like nothing had happened.


    Even though the rest of the elders from the Star Shattering Sect were dealing with the situation with rtive ease, none of them came close to the difference in strength disyed by the winged lion demon beast. The only person who came close being Chu Yang, who had rushed over after hearing about the situation.


    In the end, he was currently locked in a fight with five other Nascent Soul Realm Experts, three of them having reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, while another two of them were in the Half Step Domain Lord Realm with a pseudo domain.


    Although he should have been in disadvantageous position against the five, Chu Yang somehow came up on top and even looked like he was suppressing the group of five.


    "In another few minutes, those five will be overwhelmed by that child''s aggressive attacks¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Feng Chen scanned over the rest of the battles taking ce inside the different spaces he had isted from the rest of the Shattered Star Peaks with the help of the chaotic qi formation¡­ And after making sure that none of his elders were in any danger, he turned around and made his way towards the ce where the different envoys were waiting.


    To make sure nothing happened while he wasn''t paying attention, he made sure to inform Pei Yang about the situation and had him keep an eye on the situation with his powerful divine sense.


    Even though it was unlikely for something to happen given that he had made sure to assess the strength of the people from the different empires and assigned elders to fight them ordingly, one could never be too sure about what kind of trump cards they had on them¡­


    Not too long after the battle began, thest few of the intruders belonging to the different empires died without knowing what had gone wrong or what had happened to suddenly separate them.


    At the same time, the different envoys began meeting with Feng Chen one by one. All of them tried to convince Feng Chen in different ways about how it would be good for the Star Shattering Sect to attack the Onyx Empire and how they would make sure to support them if they chose tounch a battle against the Onyx Empire and their forces in the part of the Sky Empire under their control.


    In the end, Feng Chen didn''t directly agree to attack the Onyx Empire, but at the same time, he didn''t disagree either. Giving the envoys hope that the Star Shattering Sect would be willing tounch an attack on the Onyx Empire inside the Sky Empire if they were given enough support.


    With this in mind, the envoys soon left the Falling Star City just as fast as they had arrived, happy expressions stered all over their faces as they left. Happy and convinced that there was a chance for the Star Shattering Sect to start fighting with the Onyx Empire.


    After all, for them, they had not expected there to be a chance to convince the Star Shattering Sect to fight with the Onyx Empire so quickly. Having at least expected that it would take a few years of back-and-forth negotiations to happen.


    At the same time, all of them were unaware of the fact that their empires had lost a ratherrge number of promising Nascent Soul Realm Experts and even a few Domain Lord Realm Experts during their short stay in the Falling Star City¡­


    Even if it wouldn''t affect their empires in the slightest, it would still make them cautious about cooperating with the Star Shattering Sect.


    Unfortunately for them, Feng Chen had already thought things through before he made the move to have those people killed off. Making sure that none of them could contact the outside world the moment they entered the Shattered Star Peaks with the help of the chaotic qi formation.


    At this point in time, it was highly likely that those empires still thought things were going ording to n and their people had already begun to infiltrate the Star Shattering Sect at the Shattered Star Peaks.


    "It should be time for the envoy of the Onyx Empire to show up¡­" Narrowing both his eyes as he muttered this to himself, Feng Chen looked towards the edge of the Falling Star City where a powerful aura belonging to someone in the Domain Lord Realm had suddenly appeared.


    Considering that the different empires had already sent over their envoys to try and convince the Star Shattering Sect to fight with the Onyx Empire, it would be weird if the Onyx Empire didn''t send over someone of their own¡­ And considering that the different empires might try and kill this person before he could reach the Star Shattering Sect, it was only reasonable that he was far stronger than the envoys sent over by the other empires. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "At least the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Maybe even the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­ The Onyx Empire really didn''t want to end up losing their envoy midway. Really makes one wonder how they n to try and convince us to not attack them¡­" Whispering this to himself while observing the powerful envoy from the Onyx Empirending a short distance away from the gate to the Falling Star City before being guided inside by Shen Xuefeng, Feng Chen narrowed both of his eyes slightly before shaking his head.


    Whoosh~!


    Not a secondter, one of the elders who had participated in the earlier fight arrived next to him.


    "Sect master, themunication talismans and other things belonging to those intruders are here. Senior Pei Yang sealed the interspatial rings so the location part of it won''t work unless they are taken out." Handing over a small handful of interspatial rings as he said this, the elder soon turned around and left in the direction of the Shattered Star Peaks. Intending to digest what he had gained from the earlier battle.


    "A tracking formation is actually hidden inside this thing¡­ If not for the help of the formation, I wouldn''t have been able to discover it¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the interspatial rings, a yful smile unbefitting of someone his age and status inevitably made its way onto his face. "Hehe, want us to fight each other so badly? Why don''t all of you fight with each other first¡­?"

 Chapter 1201 Rampaging Demon Beast

    Chapter 1201 Rampaging Demon Beast


    Not long after the envoys from the different empires left the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, the powerful envoy that had been sent over by the Onyx Empire left the Falling Star City with a happy expression on his face. Having seemingly had an unexpected and happy oue from talking with Feng Chen.


    Unbeknownst to the fact that he was being secretly followed on his way back by a certain winged lion with someone on top of it as he began taking out hismunication talisman to inform his superiors about what had happened while flying back in the direction of the Onyx Empire.


    Even though there was a chance for the different empires to attack him on his way to the Star Shattering Sect. Forcing him to constantly be on the lookout on his way there, they had no reason to attack him now that he had already met up with the Star Shattering Sect. Not to mention, he was still someone at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Only someone at the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm or above would be able to threaten him¡­ and even in such a situation, he could always run away if the opponent was too strong.


    The only people who had a chance of killing him would be someone in the Soul Ascension Realm and he doubted those empires would send out someone like that to kill him. Especially now that he had already managed to meet with the Star Shattering Sect.


    If they wanted to send someone like that to deal with him, they would have done so before he could reach the Star Shattering Sect, there was absolutely no reason for them to wait until he had already met with them-


    Swish-!


    Roooar-!


    "Huh?"


    Bang!


    Thus, resulting in him being caughtpletely off guard when a powerful demon beast at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm suddenly appeared in front of him filled with killing intent. Not able to react in time as he wasunched flying into a nearby mountain.


    "Where did this demon beast pop up from!?" Cursing silently to himself as he jumped out of the crater that had been formed on the side of the mountain, the envoy from the Onyx Empire didn''t think twice before turning around and rushing in the direction of the Onyx Empire with far greater speedpared to before.


    Although he had no idea where such a powerful demon beast had popped up from, he had no intention to stay and find out. After all, the short interaction just now had made it more than clear to him that the demon beast was far stronger than him. Staying behind to fight back would only be killing himself for no reason.


    ROAR-!


    Unfortunately, the demon beast didn''t seem intent on allowing him to leave as it pped itsrge wings before chasing after him. "This- Why is it targeting me!? Did it perhaps just emerge from the Burning Mountain Range and found me to be the most delicious thing it saw after a long nap or something!?" Not able to stop himself from cursing as he said this, the envoy from the Onyx Empire could not help feeling that the heavens were punishing him with that kind of bad luck.


    After all, even though there were countless powerful demon beasts living inside the Burning Mountain Range. Especially the parts of the mountain range that ran through the Blue Sea Empire and otherrge empires at the core of the continent, it was extremely rare for demon beasts above the Nascent Soul Realm to leave the Burning Mountain Range.


    Though the reason for this was unknown, it wasmonly agreed upon that Domain Lord Realm demon beasts and above only ever wandered out of the Burning Mountain Range in extremely rare circumstance. Rare to the point that it had only ever happened twice inside the borders of the Sky Empire since the day it had been established¡­


    ROAR-!


    BANG-!


    Only able to think about how bad his luck was as he continued escaping back towards the Onyx Empire whilemunicating to one of his seniors at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm about his situation and begging for help, the envoy once again felt the powerful attack of the demon beastnding on him before he was sent flying into a nearby forest. Creating a rather spacious opening in said forest in the process.


    "DAMNABLE BEAST! JUST WAIT UNTILL MY SENIOR ARRIVES!" Screaming loudly as he dug himself out of the dirt, the envoy wasted no time before he jumped into the air and continued to run away.


    Roar-!


    Bang!


    "Damn you-"


    BANG!"


    "I-" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Bang!"


    In the end, the chase continued for close to an hour as the envoy from the Onyx empire was beaten to the point where even his parents wouldn''t recognize him. Unable to recover due to the severe injuries he had received. Focusing all of his remaining strength on escaping in the direction of the Onyx Empire while silently praying that his senior would show up even though hope was slowly dwindling as his situation continued to worsen¡­


    Rumble~!


    "DEMON BEAST! HOW DARE YOU DO THIS!"


    However, just as he was about to give up, he heard the voice of his senior in the distance, as he felt someone arriving in front of him before he heard the sound of the terrifying demon beast fighting behind him.


    ROAR-!


    In the end, the battle ended after a few minutes as the demon beast was sessfully repelled.


    "Junior brother, are you okay?"


    "Y-yes¡­ Although I don''t have much energy left, I should be able to recover after a few years of closed-door meditation."


    Hearing the voice of his senior next to him, the envoy used up thest bit of his strength to say this before the exhaustion from the earlier escape caught up with him-


    "Hm? Junior brother!?"


    Causing his senior to step forward and grab him before he ended up falling out of the sky.


    "That was close¡­ But his state is indeed bad. If I arrived a secondter, I might have ended up losing a junior brother! Outside of that¡­ What''s up with all these interspatial rings?" Muttering this to himself as he began to examine the state of his junior brother, the senior in the Peak of the Domain Lord Rm could not help noticing that there were quite a few more interspatial rings on his junior brethren''s hands than normal.


    Is it perhaps from the people sent by those people?


    Thinking this to himself, the senior could not help curiously taking the interspatial rings from his unconscious junior brother before inspecting them-


    "Indeed, although they tried to erase their tracks, the interspatial rings definitely belong to the more covert assassin and infiltration groups of those people!"


    And soon concluded that the interspatial rings did indeed belong to the people from the different empires targeting the Onyx Empire.


    I should give this to master when I get back and have him take care of it, I will also make sure to send some resources for recovery to junior brother in return for the interspatial rings¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, the senior from the Onyx Empire put away the interspatial rings in one of his pockets and grabbed his junior brother firmly before rushing back towards the Onyx Empire. Not caring the slightest bit about where the powerful demon beast went after having escaped. After all, this was not the Onyx Empire, and he had no intention of wasting time hunting down a demon beast that he very well understood was by no means weaker than himself.


    Whoosh~


    At the same time that the two people from the Onyx Empire disappeared in the distance, Pei Yang appeared on top of the winged lion demon beast as he looked in the direction that the two had left.


    "Looks like everything worked out ording to the little sect master, with me removing the seal on the tracking formations, those empires should have seen them leave the Falling Star City. Although a bit faster than normal, it didn''t exceed the speed of a Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert before the fight ensued, I guess that envoy was not in a hurry to get back¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Pei Yang soon turned and made his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect together with the winged lion demon beast.


    Roar~!


    Remembering the reward it had been promised in return for the battle and chase just now, the winged lion demon beast roared happily as it rapidly flew back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although it had no idea why it had been asked to not kill the human earlier and why the terrifying human standing above it had to go with it and only acted once to secretly slip some interspatial rings on to the half dead human''s hands while he didn''t notice, the winged lion demon beast was just happy knowing about the mountain of spirit stones and roasted spiritual beast meat waiting for it back at the Star Shattering Sect...

 Chapter 1202 Empty Plain

    Following the envoy from the Onyx Empire and his senior returning to the territory of the Onyx Empire, the surrounding empires soon realized that something had happened to their people. Not inside the Star Shattering Sect like they had expected, but instead on their way back from the Star Shattering Sect.


    Given the information from the tracking formation inside the interspatial rings that their people had been using, it was obvious that they had been attacked shortly after they had left the Star Shattering Sect and had their things taken away.


    Although they had no idea if any of their people had managed to survive, the different empires felt that this was highly unlikely considering that the people behind the attack seemed to be the Onyx Empire¡­ And as if to solidify this reasoning, they also learnt that one of the Peak Domain Lord Realm Experts from the Onyx Empire had left his original position at the border between the Onyx Empire and the Sky Empire during this period of time.


    "This damnable Onyx Empire, I swear I will make them pay in the future!"


    "How low of them to utilize such a powerful expert just to deal with those few people!" "Hmph! Just they wait, after the Sky Empire is destroyed and divided, the Onyx Empire will be next!"


    In the end, the different emperors, and high-ranking people behind the coborative effort to investigate the Star Shattering Sect could only curse at the Onyx Empire for their shameless behavior of sending two powerful Domain Lord Realm Experts to deal with a few people in the Nascent Soul Realm and five in the First Stage of the Domain Lord Rm.


    However, the main reason why they were so mad was not because of the death of these people, but instead because the dead people in question hadn''t managed to send back any of the information that they had managed to gather of the Star Shattering Sect. Leaving them with the choice of sending another group and risk the nearby Onyx Empire once again intercepting them, or ¡äleaving the Star Shattering Sect alone for now and investigating them at ater time when they didn''t have to worry about the Onyx Empire killing their people.


    In the end, the positive news sent back by their envoys ended up persuading them to not send another group, as it became clear from their envoys that the Star Shattering Sect would be more than willing to cooperate with them if they were willing to pay the price.


    In the eyes of these empires, a power that could be bought was far easier to deal withpared to one that didn''t want to involve itself in outside affairs. At the same time, some of the empires close to the territory of the Star Shattering Sect also felt like they might have a chance at integrating the Star Shattering Sect into their empires.


    Because of this, the situation around the Star Shattering Sect quickly calmed down again, as the different empires focused their attention back on figuring out how to deal with the remaining Soul Ascension Realm Experts huddled together in the capital of the Sky Empire.


    The only difference being that the Onyx Empire had been excluded from joining in on the conversation between the invading empires now that they were also being viewed as a possible target for them to expand into in the near future. Leaving the Onyx Empire with no choice but to retreat from the area surrounding the capital of the Sky Empire and begin the process of preparing itself for a possible attack by the other empires.


    ¡­


    As the situation in the core of the Sky Empire became more dangerous and the different invading empires were began the process of sealing off the ce in anticipation ofunching a finally deadly attack to deal with the Soul Ascension Realm Experts in the capital city without the chance of any of them escaping and returning to get revengeter, Xuan Hao was moving deeper and deeper into the primeval forest.


    Considering that the primeval forest itself covered an area several times that of the Blue Sea Empire or any other empire on the continent for that matter, there was nock of powerful demon beasts. Even forcing him to slow down on several asions as powerful demon beast at the Dao Seed Realm were engaged in deadly battles over territory.


    If there had been one saving grace during his journey so far, it was the fact that he hadn''t been unlucky enough to run into a Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast.


    Although demon beasts at the Celestial Immortal Realm were undoubtedly far more umon than human cultivators at the Celestial Immortal Realm on the human dominated Ewaria Continent, the primeval forest was definitely one of the rare ces where one could run into one.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao constantly kept his eye out for anything that might point towards a Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast being in the area, causing him to take the long way around certain locations that felt like they were dangerous. Not intending to take any unneeded risks.


    At the same time, as he continued travelling through the primeval forest, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what Chun Hua had gone through over the years since he hadst seen her.


    Given that she was only in the Nascent Soul Realm back then, he wondered about how she had managed to safely travel through the primeval forest without losing her life.


    "Maybe it has something to do with the fact that she isn''t human¡­" Muttering this to himself as he remembered the special abilities she had to hide herself from him back during their first encounter. If she could blend in with the natural environment of the primeval jungle, it might not be impossible for her to avoid those powerful demon beasts in the Dao Seed Realm that he had encountered so far.


    Of course, there is always a chance that those demon beasts simply aren''t interested given her weak strength, thus allowing her to safely pass through their territory without being attacked by them.


    "Hm? Why does the jungle seem to be thinning out? I should still be far away from the border of the nearest empire¡­" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Suddenly noticing that the dense jungle all around him began to thin out all of a sudden, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both his eyes as he felt something was wrong.


    Whoosh~


    Not feeling anything dangerous ahead, Xuan Hao decided to continue forward until he suddenly found himself outside the dense jungle with arge open in as far as he could see. In the distance arge city standing alone on the in was barely visible.


    "What is this ce¡­?" Not able to stop himself from saying this as he looked towards the city in the distance with a weird expression on his face, Xuan Hao could not help feeling uneasy as his divine sense rapidly spread out all around him together with his dao domain.


    ording to what little he knew about the primeval jungle; it was a dense jungle covering an area several times thergest empire on the continent and there shouldn''t be any areas of the jungle like the in in front of him.


    Not to mention, he could clearly feel the presence of humans in the city up ahead.


    Although the strongest among the humans he could sense had barely reached the Domain Lord Realm, he didn''t dare to let his guard down given the strange circumstances of the in in the middle of the dense jungle.


    In the end, he remained stationary like this without moving for a good thirty minutes as his divine sense and dao domainbed through everything around him. Looking for any sign of danger on the vast yet empty in in front of him, while at the same time also listening in on the conversation between the cultivators in the city to learn more about what kind of ce the in was.


    "So¡­ This in was left behind from a past battle¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he went over the information, he had learnt from listening to the conversation between the different cultivators in the city and on the in, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat amazed expression on his face.


    ording to the information he had managed to learn, the in was once the site of a battle between two powerful demon beasts in the Celestial Immortal Realm and two human cultivators of equal strength.


    The battle had drawn on for over a dozen years and in the end arge part of the primeval jungle had been destroyed andter reced by the empty in that now spread out before him¡­ Andter down the line, humans arrived at therge in and set up different city states.


    The reason why no empire or kingdom could be established being that the frequent appearance of powerful demon beasts prevented anyone from leaving the heavily fortified cities scattered around the in¡­

 Chapter 1203 Demon Beast Blood

    Chapter 1203 Demon Beast Blood


    Finding out about the history of the empty in and how it had been established, Xuan Hao retracted his divine sense and dao domain as he felt himself rxing his nerves. From the information that he had gathered about the different city states, the strongest people on the empty in had only reached the Soul Ascension Realm, while most of the city states scattered across the in were governed by powerful Domain Lord Realm Experts ranging between the Middle and Later Stages of the realm.


    For this reason, whenever an especially powerful demon beast happened to pass through the empty in, the people hidden away inside the different cities would either escape somewhere else or hide away underground and pray that the demon beast didn''t notice them.


    Of course, situations like that were rare and only happened once every few hundred years, as demon beasts strong enough to force everyone on the empty in to run away and hide underground had at least reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm and possibly even the Dao Seed Realm. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Large as the empty in was, it was still rather small inparison to the entire primeval jungle. Not to mention, it was located close to the edge of the primeval jungle where the more powerful demon beasts rarely ventured.


    Whoosh~!


    With all of this in mind, Xuan Hao continued moving in the direction of the mark he had left behind in Chun Hua''s soul. Not intending to waste any time investigating therge empty in, as he had already found out why so many cultivators decided to risk their life to settle down in such a dangerous ce, the blood left behind by the powerful Celestial Immortal Realm demon beasts that had fought the equally powerful human cultivators in the past.


    The blood was so powerful that it could help someone ovee the tribtion and step into the Soul Ascension Realm and was even rumored to be capable of helping those in the Soul Ascension Realm progress through the Soul Ascension Realm smoothly. Allowing them to directly step into the Dao Seed Realm if they had enough blood.


    Even though Xuan Hao doubted that the blood of the two demon beasts in the Celestial Immortal Realm would be as useful as described in the rumors he overheard about it, the rumors should be true to some extent.


    If not, there wouldn''t be so many people gathered at the empty in devoid of resources outside of the rtively higher spiritual qi concentrationpared to an empire like the Sky Empire.


    The main reason that he wasn''t really interested in the blood of the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beasts that had the magical effect of helping someone step in the Soul Ascension Realm and progress all the way to the Dao Seed Realm was rather simple, as there would be a very obvious drawback from consuming the blood of spiritual beast.


    The drawback in question being the remnant will of the demon beast still left in the blood and the changes that consuming the blood would have on one''s body.


    Of just the few Domain Lord Realm cultivators that he had seen so far, there were quite a few of them that had the very obvious characteristics belonging to a demon beast somewhere on their bodies. Even though they did their best to hide it, it was easy for Xuan Hao to notice with his powerful divine sense.


    Not to mention, those people had clearly only consumed a very small among of the blood. Making Xuan Hao guess that the Soul Ascension Realm Experts on the in wouldn''t look much different from a demon beast.


    "I wonder if Chun Hua had to pass through this ce as well¡­ And more importantly, if she happened to consume some of the blood to increase her strength¡­" Muttering this to himself as he spotted a group of Domain Lord Realm Experts fighting to the death over a small drop of blood floating a few feet off the ground, Xuan Hao could not help waving his hand as he used his dao domain to grab the drop of blood and take it away before the Domain Lord Realm Experts had a chance to notice.


    "Huh? Where did the divine blood go!?"


    "Wha-!? Did you take it!?"


    "No, it wasn''t me!"


    "He''s lying for sure! I saw him sneakily put it in his interspatial ring earlier!"


    "Ha!? What are you talking about!? You were clearly the one who¡­"


    As the Domain Lord Realm Experts noticed that the drop of blood disappeared, they not only didn''t stop fighting, but instead began fighting with far more energypared to before as they looked like a bunch of wild animals who had seen fresh prey after starving for weeks without anything to eat.


    If not for the fact that Xuan Hao could clearly tell that the group of cultivators were normal cultivators without anything special to them outside of a few scales and horns at random on their bodies, he would have thought he had encountered a bunch of demonic cultivators- No, the group of Domain Lord Realm cultivators below were far more violent than any demonic cultivator he had encountered¡­


    Is this perhaps another side effect of consuming the blood of the two Celestial Immortal Realm demon beasts?


    Thinking this to himself as he examined the drop of blood, Xuan Hao could only shake his head helplessly after realizing that he couldn''t see through the drop of blood. The only thing he could see was the abundant and powerful vitality contained inside the drop of blood.


    Although meaningless to someone like himself, it would undoubtedly be of great help to anyone below the Dao Seed Realm. Especially if they practiced a body refining method that could make use of the powerful vitality to strengthen their bodies with the help of the powerful vitality.


    Whoosh~


    Deciding to not think too much about the mystery behind the blood for now, he threw it into his interspatial ring before continuing in the direction of Chun Hua''s soul mark.


    Given that he had already gotten close to the edge of the primeval jungle, he could tell that Chun Hua had managed to safely make it out of the primeval jungle and wasn''t too far away from his current location.


    Continuing at his current speed, Xuan Hao felt like it shouldn''t take more than a week for him to reach Chun Hua, as long as he wasn''t unlucky enough to run into a few Dao Seed Realm demon beasts fighting with each other along the way.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was making his way through the empty in inside the primeval jungle, picking up any of the mysterious demon beast blood that he found along the way, Chun Hua, the person he was trying to find, stepped into arge city that made even the capital city of the Sky Empire seem small inparison.


    "I''m finally back¡­" Muttering this to herself as she nced around at the bustling city streets that appeared in front of her, Chun Hua quickly lowered her head and covered her face with therge cloak she was wearing.


    Though happy to have returned safely after years of travelling through the deadly primeval jungle, she also understood that she would be targeted by the enemies of her family the moment she was noticed by them. Only by safely making her way back to the part of the massive city that fell under the control of her family could she be considered to be safe to some degree.


    Although she felt confident in the mark Xuan Hao had left on her after seeing it in action, she also understood that there were people far stronger than the Soul Ascension Realm present inside the city and some of those people were also the ones targeting her family. No matter what, she didn''t want those people to realize that she had returned.


    Whoosh~


    With all of this in mind, Chun Hua didn''t waste a second as she began heading straight towards the part of the massive city that fell under her family''s management.


    The only problem with this being the fact that it would take her over a day to reach the ce with her current strength in the Nascent Soul Realm. Even though this was also due to her not daring to use her full strength to rush there in fear of drawing attention to herself, it still spoke to the sheer size of the city that it would take such a long time for a Nascent Soul Realm Expert to reach a ce inside the city.


    In terms of size alone, the city could rival the part of the old Heavenly Sky Kingdom that fell under the Star Shattering Sect''s control!


    Undoubtedly, the strength of the empire behind such a massive city could easily be imagined to not be any weaker than the Blue Sea Empire that dominated the region where the Star Shattering Sect was located¡­

 Chapter 1204 Calm Before the Storm

    Chapter 1204 Calm Before the Storm


    Knowing how dangerous it would be if anyone familiar with her noticed her before she could get to safety, Chun Hua continued walking through the city at a rtively slow speed, while also stopping by different shops along the way to avoid raising any suspicion and just appear like any normal wandering Nascent Soul Realm cultivator.


    Considering that it was the core region of the continent, filled to the brim with powerful cultivators, it wasn''t odd for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm to be walking along the streets of the massive city by themselves. Not to mention Nascent Soul Realm Experts, there were quite a few Domain Lord Realm cultivators walking around the streets with the weaker cultivators instead of flying, something that could only be seen inside a powerful city governed by powerful cultivators above the Soul Ascension Realm.


    The only people who would dare to fly through the air in such a city would be people with a significant status or those at the same level as the powerful existences above the Soul Ascension Realm.


    In the end, while slowly moving towards the part of the city under the control of her family, Chun Hua encountered more than a dozen Domain Lord Realm cultivators.


    Luckily, none of them were from the different powers against her family. Allowing her to reach the territory under her family''s control after three days of slowly making her way through the massive city. Finally giving her a chance to let out a sigh of relief before she took out a specialmunication talisman to contact her family and make them aware of the fact that she was back.


    The reason she didn''t dare to do it before entering the territory under her family was rather simple, as she feared that some of the forces working against her family might pick up on it and catch her before the people from her family had a chance to arrive.


    Even if there was still a chance of something like that happening inside her family''s territory, it was rather low considering that the entire ce was covered in a formation under the control of her family.


    If someone really dared trying to kidnap her, the formation would make it hard for them to leave before her family members arrived to help.


    "I hope nothing happened during the time I was gone¡­" Muttering this to herself as she finished sending the message regarding her arrival, she put away the specialmunication talisman before rushing towards the direction of her family home with all her strength. No longer intending to try and keep a low profile now that she had arrived inside the part of the city under the control of her family.


    Even though her family was going to be caught up in a dangerous situation ording to what she managed to learn before the disaster thatnded her all the way in the Sky Empire, Chun Hua also understood that the people behind the disaster might have decided to elerate their ns after what had happened.


    Back then, her parents had managed to uncover a plot against her Chun Family.


    In the end, before they had time to inform the rest of the family, a disaster befell her and her parents while they were on their way back to the core territory of her Chun Family after discovering the plot while out investigating the sudden disappearance of a branch family under the Chun Family.


    It was during this disaster that came in the form of arge number of assassins descending upon her and her parents that she had fallen into arge ravine. Landing on an ancient teleportation formation, it had directly activated. Sending her far away before she could react. Ultimately leading to her finding herself in the primeval jungle andter the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although she had no idea what had ended up happening to her parents during the time she had been gone, she knew deep down that it was unlikely for them to have escaped alive.


    After all, her parents were only around the First few stages of the Domain Lord Realm, while the people attacking them had all reached the Middle and Late Stages of the Domain Lord Realm. Not to mention, there had been more than five people present at that time. Making it even more unlikely for her parents to have safely survived the attack back then.


    Shaking her head as she thought about this, Chun Hua focused all of her attention on getting back to the family home as fast as possible and informing her grandfather about the situation, while secretly hoping that her parents had somehow managed to survive the attack like she had done.


    ¡­


    Not long after Chun Hua returned back to her family, the Chun Family began to secretly mobilize their power in preparation for something, though unnoticed by most of the powers inside the city, some people still noticed, causing a wave of unease to spread among the higher echelons of the city who were unaware of why the Chun Family had suddenly begun to act like that.


    "In the end, they still ended up discovering something¡­"


    "It doesn''t matter, we have already gone down this path and there is no way for us to turn around now. At least with all of us working together, we should be able to take out the Chun Family!"


    "Indeed, even if they have an idea of what is happening, it''s unlikely that they know much outside of the fact that someone is targeting them. If they really knew, they might have decided to run away instead of just preparing for a battle."


    "True, looks like we should be fine to proceed ording to the original n with a few alterations added to ensure nothing goes wrong¡­" As for those who were aware of what the Chun Family''s movement symbolized, they could only gather together and n around the fact that the Chun Family seemed to have some idea that they had been targeted.


    After all, no matter how confident these people were, they all understood that they couldn''t underestimate an old family like the Chun Family that had already existed for thousands of years and had a solid foundation that included an ancestor in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Even if the ancestor in question had been injured during a journey to the primeval jungle a few hundred years ago and was said to be close to dying. Giving them the confidence to plot against the Chun Family, they also understood that it wouldn''t be easy for them to deal with someone in the Earth Immortal Realm. No matter how injured the other party might be!


    ¡­


    At the time that Xuan Hao finally managed to make it through therge empty in controlled by the countless smaller city states all aiming for the blood left behind by the powerful Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast in the past and once again found himself inside the primeval jungle again, the situation inside the massive city started to affect the weaker cultivators who just happened to be visiting the city for trade or as a ce to rest safely.


    No matter who, every single person had realized that something was brewing below the surface. Ready to erupt at any moment. Only, they had no idea what this was and didn''t dare try to investigate it, as the only people capable of causing such unrest would be the powerful families and ns in control of the city with powerful ancestors in the Earth Immortal Realm backing them.


    "I think it would be better to avoid this ce for a few years¡­"


    "True¡­ Now that I think about it, my family did need a little vacation as well."


    "Mine as well!"


    In the end, as the unrest in the city affected the weaker cultivators, some of the smaller families, ns and merchants decided it would be better to leave the city for a few years and wait until things calmed down. Even if doing so would end up harming their benefits and the resources they had ess to during these few years, the weaker cultivators of the central region all understood that it was better to lose out on a few benefits if they could avoid getting swept up in the struggle between the different forces vying for control over the central region.


    By the time Xuan Hao reached the edge of the primeval jungle, countless people had already packed up their things and begun heading away from the massive city in an attempt to avoid getting caught up in the storm that was brewing beneath the surface. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    In the end, some of these people also decided to hide away inside the primeval jungle. Resulting in Xuan Hao meeting them before he had reached the city. Giving him a chance to learn more about the situation of the empire that his future fifth disciple was a part of, while also learning about the current situation of the city that he could clearly feel that she was inside of through the soul mark he had left on her.

 Chapter 1205 Here to Pick up a Disciple

    Chapter 1205 Here to Pick up a Disciple


    From listening to the different groups of people fleeing to the outskirts of the primeval jungle where only weaker monsters resided, he realized that the Chun Family that Chun Hua had referred to was far more powerful than he had first expected. Not only was it one of the ruling families in a massive citymonly known as the frontier city that acted as the bastion between the Astorion Empire and the demon beasts of the primeval jungle, but it also had an old ancestor at the Dao Seed Realm.


    Although the Chun Family couldn''t be considered the strongest among the four families in charge of the frontier city, it was by no means weak and had an extensivework that covered arge part of the Astorion Empire. cing them firmly as one of the strong factions in an empire that was just below a hegemon like the Blue Sea Empire.


    The fact that Chun Hua actually came from such a powerful background was a bit shocking but considering the fact that she had managed to reach the Nascent Soul Realm at such a young age, it was not too surprising.


    Out of everything, the main thing that shocked Xuan Hao was that arge force like the Chun Family would be encountering a cmity capable of wiping it out ording to what Chun Hua had shared with him before she rushed back to warn her family.


    Though it didn''t seem like this cmity had arrived considering that the Chun Family was still around, the situation in the frontier city made it clear that the cmity of the Chun Family was about to arrive even after Chun Hua''s warning and the Chun Family preparing themselves.


    "So¡­ Is it those three other ruling families who want to take down the Chun Family or someone different?" Narrowing both his eyes as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao descended from the sky andnded on the ground at the perimeter of the primeval jungle.


    No matter who was behind the uing cmity of the Chun Family, Xuan Hao had a feeling that things were not as simple as the three other ruling families just vying for more control. After all, they all came from the same empire and the death of the Chun Family would not benefit them much and would only result in the ruling imperial family dispatching someone new to take over what was left behind by the Chun Family.


    Not to mention, them killing the Chun Family might result in the imperial family losing trust in them and think they are spies out to weaken the Astorion Empire.


    Whoosh~


    Knowing that he would not find out more on the current situation by just dawdling around on his own, Xuan Hao began making his way towards the frontier city with a cultivation base that looked simr to someone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    By far, one of the more hidden benefits of being in the Dao Domain Lord Realm was the fact that he could easily disguise his cultivation realm as that of someone in the Domain Lord Realm. Making it impossible for even those in the Dao Seed Realm to notice anything unless he used his Dao Domain.


    And with this, he managed to smoothly enter the frontier city without attracting any attention from the four ruling families.


    Even though he didn''t fear any of them given his current strength being more than enough to kill weaker Dao Seed Realm cultivators, he didn''t n to waste time dealing with any of them considering that his main reason foring here was to pick up a new disciple.


    If possible, Xuan Hao just wanted to walk into the Chun Family, pick up Chun Hua and then leave.


    Even if it was unlikely to happen considering Chun Hua''s clear attachment to her family that wouldn''t stop him from trying¡­


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao soon found himself at the entrance leading up to the Chun Family Estate located at the southern side of the frontier city.


    Given the current storm that seemed to be brewing beneath the surface of the city, the entire estate had arge number of guards patrolling around the clock. Not leaving a single inch around the estate unguarded¡­ And that was not to mention therge number of Domain Lord Realm Experts and a few Soul Ascension Realm Experts keeping an eye on things from the shadows.


    All things considered, the current Chun Family would be able to react and respond with their full force the second something happened in their territory. Even at this point, Xuan Hao clearly felt a few of the Domain Lords hidden away focusing their attention on him and making sure that they were ready to respond the moment he did something.


    Talk about being on edge¡­


    Smiling a bit wryly as he thought this to himself while going over the different measures that the Chun Family had put in ce to defend themselves against a possible attack, Xuan Hao shook his head as he began making his way towards the Chun Family Estate. Almost immediately catching the attention of both the normal guards and those in the shadows-


    "Greetings senior."


    And not even a second after he began making his way towards the Chun Family Estate, one of the normal guards around the Later Stages of the Core Formation Realm approached him with a tense expression on his face. Clearly indicating how nervous he was.


    "Greetings." Feeling a bit bad for the guard, Xuan Hao decided to politely respond in an attempt to show that he meant no harm.


    "Senior, this is the Chun Estate, and the ce is currently under lockdown. If you don''t have any business here, I will have to ask you to leave!" Seeing that Xuan Hao didn''t seem to have any bad intentions, the guard calmed down quite a bit as he said this. Making sure to emphasize on thest part of the sentence so Xuan Hao understood that he should leave. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Oh, I do indeed have some business with the Chun Family." However, instead of leaving like the guard had expected him to do, Xuan Hao just smiled slightly as he said this-


    "Huh? Y-you do¡­?"


    Catching the guardpletely off guard.


    "If you do have business with my Chun Family, please be understanding that now isn''t the right time for such things." Feeling that the guard wouldn''t be able to handle the situation on his own anymore, one of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had been observing the situation revealed himself andnded beside the guard as he said with a stern tone.


    "Oh? What if I insist?"


    Rolling his eyes upon hearing what Xuan Hao said and seeing the somewhat teasing look in his eyes, the Domain Lord Realm cultivator from the Chun Family understood that Xuan Hao wasn''t someone easy to deal with.


    Outside of that, he also had a feeling that someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm wouldn''t recklessly throw away their life by offending the Chun Family for no reason. Meaning that whatever business he had with the Chun Family should be something important. Possibly rted to his breakthrough to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "At least state what business you have with my Chu Family, a person like yourself who is only a step away from the Soul Ascension Realm shouldn''t be nning to kill yourself by needlessly offending my Chun Family." Knowing this, the Domain Lord Realm decided to ask Xuan Hao what he hade for.


    At least, if possible, he wanted to avoid having to fight with someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, as he understood very well that someone at that realm could cause quite a bit of damage even if the seniors of the Chun Family interfered.


    Though the difference between the Domain Lord Realm and the Soul Ascension Realm wasrge, the self-destruction of a Peak Domain Lord Realm cultivator still had enough strength to threaten someone in the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ And considering that he knew nothing about Xuan Hao, he felt it would be best to solve things peacefully if possible.


    "No need to look at me like, I''m just here to meet someone."


    "Huh? Just here to meet someone?" Not having expected that Xuan Hao was just here to meet someone, the Domain Lord Realm cultivator from the Chun Family could not help tilting his head in confusion. Not understanding why Xuan Hao hade at such a dangerous time just to meet someone.


    "Yes, the person is going to be my fifth disciple!"


    "Ha? Disciple? You¡­ You are her to take in a disciple!?"


    "Indeed, I have travelled quite far to reach this ce and nned to head back immediately after picking up the little one." Nodding his head without a single bit of hesitation, Xuan Hao responded like it was the most natural thing in the world.


    He had indeed juste to pick up a disciple¡­ Was there anything wrong with that?


    Xuan Hao just here to pick up a disciple~ Nothing out the ordinary~

 Chapter 1206 Entering the Chun Family Estate

    Chapter 1206 Entering the Chun Family Estate


    "..." N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Not knowing how to respond to Xuan Hao after hearing what he said, the Domain Lord Realm cultivator from the Chun Family momentarily froze on the spot with a speechless expression on his face.


    Out of everything he had expected Xuan Hao to say, he had never expected him to be here to pick up a disciple. Even without the current dangerous situation of the Chun Family, when would someone who was just in the Domain Lord Realm have the qualifications to take someone from the Chun Family as their disciple?


    If it had been one of the branch families that were significantly weaker, it might have been possible, but the main family had more than a dozen people in the Soul Ascension Realm and hundreds in the Domain Lord Realm. Not to mention the old ancestor above the Soul Ascension Realm!


    In such a situation, where would a person in the Domain Lord Realm be qualified to take in a disciple from the Chun Family? Even if it was someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm that had a high possibility of reaching the Soul Ascension Realm in the future, it was still far from enough considering that the Chun Family had Soul Ascension Realm Experts of their own.


    Outside of all of this, there was also the fact that none of the people present knew anything about Xuan Hao¡­ And given the current state of things, they had no way to ensure that he wasn''t someone belonging to the powers secretly moving against the Chun Family.


    For this reason, the Domain Lord Realm cultivator from the Chun Family didn''t recover from his shock before Xuan Hao had already begun making his way towards the Chun Family Estate-


    "Ah! Wait a second!"


    Almost jumping off the ground as he rushed in front of Xuan Hao to stop him.


    "Hm? Is something wrong?" Showing an expression that looked like he didn''t understand why the Domain Lord Realm cultivator from the Chun Family had stopped him, Xuan Hao silentlyughed to himself as he watched the speechless expression on the face of the person in question.


    Although he understood that he wouldn''t be able to enter the Chun Family like this and find Chun Hua given the current state of things in the frontier city without forcing his way inside, he never nned to do so in the first ce and had already informed Chun Hua about his arrival through the mark he had left on her soul.


    In the end, what he was doing at the moment was simply just to poke a little fun at the guards of the Chun Family while waiting for Chun Hua to show up.


    After all, even though they didn''t have much of a rtionship to speak of, he did save her through the mark left in her soul once already. Of course, there was also the fact that the mark in her soul gave himplete control over her life and death, but that was not something she knew anything about, so it was not worth mentioning. Instead, it would be a far better option for him to start figuring out how to get Chun Hua to ept him as her master, as saving her life once might not be enough to convince her¡­ Maybe helping out her family in their current predicament was the only way in the short term¡­


    "This- You- Ahhh!"


    As Xuan Hao was contemting his current rtionship with Chun Hua and how to go about having her ept him and be his disciple, the Domain Lord Realm cultivator from the Chun Family looked increasingly frustrated as he had no idea how to respond.


    If Xuan Hao was weaker, he might have been able to intimidate the other party into leaving, but with his current strength being at the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he was far from strong enough to intimidate a senior at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm into leaving and in the end, he could only turn towards one of his seniors at the Soul Ascension Realm for help. Hoping that the senior could get him out of dealing with Xuan Hao.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this situation, the senior in question could not help rolling his eyes in disbelief. Not expecting his junior to look for help when dealing with another Domain Lord Realm Expert.


    Even if the other party had reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, both of them were still in the Domain Lord Realm and his junior also had the backing of the Chun Family. Giving him more than enough power to send Xuan Hao away, but in the end, he had been left unable to even say anything in front of Xuan Hao after a few short sentences. Leaving the Soul Ascension Realm senior quite disappointed in his junior.


    Whoosh~


    Even then, he still had to help out his junior and prevent the unfamiliar Domain Lord Realm cultivator from entering the Chun Family Estate. No matter what business Xuan Hao had, be it taking a disciple like he had said or something different, it would have to wait until the Chun Family crossed over the current dangerous situation, they found themselves in.


    "Hm?"


    Seeing someone in the Soul Ascension Realm stepping forward, Xuan Hao also understood that he wouldn''t be able to y around with the Domain Lord Realm cultivator any longer or he might really end up in a fight with the people from the Chun Family, something he wanted to avoid. Not just because it would look bad to fight his future fifth disciple''s family, but also because it would end up revealing his strength to the group of people, he could clearly sense not too far away keeping an eye on the Chun Family.


    Though these people were only around the Nascent Soul Realm and only a few had reached the Domain Lord Realm, they undoubtedly belonged to the remaining three ruling families and other powers in the frontier city. Possibly even the force that was preparing to attack the Chun Family.


    Considering that the other party should at least have reached the Dao Seed Realm to scheme against a powerful family like the Chun Family, Xuan Hao felt that it would be best for his strength to remain hidden if he had to interfere in the future to save his future fifth disciple''s family¡­


    "Good to see that you understand, you cane back in the future for your business when the situation calms down." Not knowing anything about what was going through Xuan Hao''s head at the moment, the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator from the Chun Family just thought Xuan Hao''s pause was him about to turn around and leave after seeing him.


    With a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator showing up, this was the least he could do to show respect. At least, it was enough in the eyes of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator from the Chun Family.


    Unexpectedly and outside of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator''s expectations, Xuan Hao didn''t leave and instead just happily smiled at him without moving. "I''m not leaving, I just spotted the person I was looking for." "Ha!? You-"


    "Senior!"


    However, before he had a chance to say anything, the voice of a young girl echoed out behind him, causing the old Soul Ascension Realm cultivator to turn around with a shocked expression on his face. This youngdy was none other than Chun Hua, the person Xuan Hao had decided would be his fifth disciple. "This senior is with me; it should be fine for him to enter the estate with my guidance¡­ No?"


    "Youngdy!? You know this- Haaa¡­ I understand, just make sure to keep an eye on him and inform us immediately if anything happens." Knowing that he had no authority to speak against the young girl who had juste out from the estate, the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator just said this before leaving.


    "Senior¡­ I didn''t expect you to show up here all of a sudden. Considering the current state of things, it won''t be good for us to speak out here. Let''s head inside for now. My grandfather is also quite curious about you¡­"


    "Oh? So that''s where that probing divine sense is from, sure, let''s head inside first." Having archived his goal of meeting Chun Hua, Xuan Hao smiled gently as he followed her inside the Chun Family Estate under the shocked eyes of the Domain Lord Realm cultivator who had been yed with him for the past few minutes.


    At the same time, the divine sense that had been mentioned by Xuan Hao trembled slightly in shock. Clearly, the owner of the divine sense had not expected that he would be discovered by someone he perceived to be a junior in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Considering that the other party was in the Dao Seed Realm and had his divine sense seen through by someone in the Domain Lord Realm, it was an understandable reaction¡­

 Chapter 1207 Doting Grandfather

    Chapter 1207 Doting Grandfather


    Following Chun Hua into the estate under the eyes of more than a dozen people secretly observing him from the shadows, Xuan Hao soon arrived at the central part of the estate where the divine sense trying to probe him earlier hade from. Making it rather easy to guess that Chun Hua had led him directly to the ce where the ancestor of the Chun Family resided.


    At the same time, the dozen or so people observing him from the shadows all left after he stepped into the central part of the estate. None of them daring to barge into the central part of the estate without the approval of the ancestor, while they also understood that Chun Hua wouldn''t be in any danger with the ancestor watching over her.


    Although the same could be said for rest of the estate, they didn''t want the ancestor to move unless necessary. After all, the different Soul Ascension Realm cultivators of the Chun Family all knew about the injurie that they ancestor had received and understood that it would be best for him to not move if possible.


    In a sense, it was also because they knew about the injurie of their ancestor that the entire Chun Family was on edge after learning that someone was targeting the Chun Family in its current weakened state.


    Of course, the feelings of the different Chun Family elders didn''t matter to Xuan Hao, as he arrived in front of a small pavilion that had been set up at the core of the estate. "Hm?"


    Feeling the clear change in the qi in the air around the pavilion, Xuan Hao also discovered that there was a qi gathering formation centered around the pavilion, though not anywhere near the level of the chaotic qi formation that covered most of the Shattered Star Peaks, it was still impressive, nheless. Undoubtedly helping speed up the cultivation of the old ancestor of the Chun Family.


    Outside of that, he still felt the now rather familiar divine sense that should belong to the old ancestor of the Chun Family and Chun Hua grandfather clearly keeping an eye on him. The main differencepared to when he had been outside the Chun Family Estate was the fact that the divine sense wasn''t probing him any longer and instead felt like a sword ready to strike at any moment, a clear indication that the old ancestor no longer thought of him as someone in the Domain Lord Realm but instead treated him like a peer.


    Even if it was a little extreme to do something like that just because he had managed to notice his divine sense, the current situation of the Chun Family made it impossible for the old ancestor to let down his guard.


    "Senior, my grandfather is waiting inside. Although he is a bit stronger than the other elders of my family, he is really kind, I already told him about how we met and how the mark you gave me saved my life." n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Not aware of any of this, Chun Hua praised her grandfather with a slight smile making its way to her face before she walked forward and opened therge wooden door leading into the pavilion.


    Even if you told your dear grandfather that I''m not from the Astorion Empire and instead somewhere far away that isn''t a part of the central region, he doesn''t seem to fully trust your words¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself while feeling the terrifying divine sense belonging to someone in the Dao Seed Realm surrounding the two of them, Xuan Hao followed Chun Hua into the pavilion to meet this powerful grandfather of his future fifth disciple-


    Swish~!


    However, he only managed to take a single step inside the pavilion before an old man appeared in front of him with a suspicious expression on his face.


    "So, you are the person who saved my granddaughter? Might I ask for what reason you havee to the Chun Family? You should have learnt about the current situation of this ce on your way here. Not to mention, the Sky Empire is located extremely far away from the Astorion Empire, and one would either have to cross through the Blue Sea Empire and either go through four smaller empires and countless dangerous regions or pass through the more dangerous primeval jungle!"


    "G-grandfather!"


    "Not now little Hua. Ehm¡­ As far as I know, the connection between you and my granddaughter is nowhere near strong enough for you to do something like this. Especially considering that there isn''t nearly enough to gain from helping my Chun Family to make youe all the way to the Astorion Empire from the Sky Empire. Don''t tell me¡­ Are you-"


    "No! I''m here because I noticed how talented Chun Hua was and wanted to take her in as a disciple!" Feeling like the old man''s train of thought might be a little too imaginative, Xuan Hao didn''t give him a chance to finish his sentence as he directly interrupted him and stated his reason for traveling all the way from the Sky Empire to the Astorion Empire.


    Not only that, but also because he could feel a very clear killing intent from the old man that clearly signaled that a wrong answer would result in him being attacked.


    "Huh?"


    "Me? A disciple¡­?"


    In the end, the answer caught both the grandfather and granddaughter off guard, as neither of them had expected his reason for travelling all the way to the Astorion Empire to be because he wanted to take Chun Hua in as a disciple.


    Chun Hua thought his reason might be rted to something he had sensed through the mark he had left behind inside of her, while the old man''s imagination was a little too imaginative.


    "Yes, I wanted to take you in as a disciple when we first met but given your family circumstances and the fact that I was busy at the moment, I could only dy it forter and leave you with something to defend yourself in case you encountered anything dangerous on your journey back through the primeval jungle." Nodding his head as he said this, Xuan Hao decided that it would be best not to tell her that he was far too weak back then to help out with her family problem, something that only became clearer after he realized that her grandfather was someone in the Dao Seed Realm.


    If he had tried to take her in as a disciple back then, she would likely have asked him to help her family in return, something that would have been impossible¡­


    "Really!? You came all the way here to take me in as a disciple!?


    "Yes!"


    "This¡­ My family still needs my help and I-"


    "What if I help out your family?" Knowing that Chun Hua was about to refuse him, Xuan Hao quickly stopped her by offering to help deal with her family''s current situation.


    Considering that the other party had not dared to directly attack the Chun Family, it was clear that the other party shouldn''t be that much stronger than the Chun Family. Meaning that it shouldn''t be that difficult for him to help out. "This¡­ The enemy of my family should be above the Soul Ascension Realm! Are you sure you can help out against someone that strong? Even my grandfather said he wasn''t confident!"


    "Hehe, you don''t have to worry about that, I''m more than strong enough to help out. Not to mention, my Star Shattering Sect is far stronger than the different powers in this city!" Deciding to embellish the strength of the Star Shattering Sect a bit as he reassured her, Xuan Hao also made sure to make the Star Shattering Sect attractive in the eyes of the old ancestor of the Chun Family.


    After all, he didn''t just need to convince Chun Hua about joining the Star Shattering Sect, but also had to convince the old man to take away his granddaughter, something he had a feeling would be far harder than convincing Chun Hua to be his disciple.


    "Star Shattering Sect¡­?" Frowning to himself as he heard what Xuan Hao said, Chun Hua''s grandfather narrowed both his eyes as he seemed deep in thought. "Ha¡­ I have never heard about the Star Shattering Sect before but considering that your strength is a mystery to me even now, I have a feeling that your sect shouldn''t be weak by any means. Especially considering the brief description of the ce given by little Hua after she returned."


    "Indeed! The qi in that ce is far richer than grandfather''s old pavilion! Far better for cultivation!" Nodding her head upon hearing what her grandfather said, Chun Hua could not help showing a look of awe upon remembering the dense and rich qi present on the Shattered Star Peaks.


    "Ahm! Y-you don''t have to say it like that. Don''t you know how many precious resources your grandfather spent to create this pavilion!?"


    "Is it wrong?"


    "This..." Not knowing how to answer as he recalled the description of the ce and seeing his adorable little granddaughter looking up at him with a confused expression on her face, the old man could only swallow his words¡­

 Chapter 1208 Calamity of the Chun Family

    Chapter 1208 Cmity of the Chun Family


    "Ahm¡­ So, what do you say? Want to be my disciple?" Watching the grandfather and granddaughter duo conversing with each other, Xuan Hao decides to interrupt the two before focusing his full attention on Chun Hua.


    "Huh!?" Not having expected Xuan Hao to ask her again all of a sudden, Chun Hua froze for a short moment as she turned to look up at her grandfather with a confused expression on her face. "If you can really help my family and your Star Shattering Sect is as strong as you im, I wouldn''t have anything against my granddaughter bing your disciple. Maybe she would be able to progress further than she could under my guidance¡­" Knowing what his granddaughter was asking without her saying anything, the old man frowned ufortably as he said this while ncing towards Xuan Hao out of the corner of his eye.


    Although he knew nothing about Xuan Hao, he could at least confirm through his granddaughter that he did note from anywhere in the Astorion Empire and wasn''t rted to the cmity that his family was about to go through.


    Not to mention, from what his granddaughter had told him about her brief infiltration of the Star Shattering Sect, he could tell that there was some authenticity to his words about the Star Shattering Sect being stronger than the different ruling families of the frontier city¡­ And there was also the fact that Xuan Hao was someone he couldn''t see through even with his strong cultivation base. If the other party did have bad intentions towards his Chun Family, he understood that there was no reason for him to go about things in such a roundabout way. Especially given that his current injured state wasn''t that hard to find out about through the other three ruling families who had long since sold off this information.


    In such a situation, he would at most be capable of contending against the three other old people behind the three other ruling families, as he was a few minor realms above them in terms of strength.


    Contending with apletely unknown opponent stronger than himself¡­ That would be difficult even if he wasn''t injured, let alone now that he had been injured and was in a weakened state.


    "Grandfather¡­" Not aware of the inner thoughts of her grandfather, Chun Hua felt a sense of relief after hearing him giving his go ahead. Understanding that her family had close to no chance of surviving through the cmity without help¡­ And with this in mind, Chun Hua turned to look at Xuan Hao with a serious expression on her face. Having finallye to a decision. "Senior, I''m willing to be your disciple!" "Great! Now¡­ What is the cmity that is about to destroy the Chun Family?" Smiling happily after Chun Hua officially agreed to be his disciple, Xuan Hao wasted no time asking about the cmity that involved the destruction of the Chun Family. After all, if he wanted to keep this fifth disciple, he would have to first resolve this matter.


    Only after her family situation had been sorted out would she be able to take her back to the Star Shattering Sect and introduce her to her senior brothers and sisters.


    "This¡­" Hearing Xuan Hao wanted to know about the cmity of the Chun Family, Chun Hua nervously looked over at her grandfather again, who in turn nodded at her as a sign for her to continue.


    "Ha¡­ Okay¡­ It''s like this¡­" Only after getting a nod from the old man, did she calm down before starting to exin the current situation of the Chun Family and the cmity that was looming above it¡­


    Listening to Chun Hua as she talked about what her parents had discovered before she had been separated during an ambush on her way back to the main family, Xuan Hao was surprised to learn that the cmity that would bring about the destruction of the Chun Family didn''te from any of the other ruling families, but instead from arge noble family located at the capital of the Astorion Empire.


    Apparently, ording to Chun Hua, thisrge noble family had recently been able to give birth to a third Earth Immortal. cing them far above a family like the Chun Family in terms of strength.


    In the end, the Chun Family and a noble family from the capital city wouldn''t normally have anything to do with each other, but it just so happened that Chun Hua''s grandfather got injured in the primeval jungle fighting with a powerful demon beast, thus forcing him to enter seclusion to recover from his injuries.


    It was during this time that the noble family managed to learn about this through one of the other ruling families that had sold the information to them. Resulting in therge noble family starting to covet the position as one of the four people in charge of the frontier city. The reason for this being that the frontier city was an extremely important city in the Astorion Empire.


    Outside of the capital city, it could be considered the city with thergest number of resources flowing through it. Making the four ruling families far wealthier than most powers with an ancestor in the Dao Seed Realm.


    But¡­ Even if they knew about the injuries of Chun Hua''s grandfather, they couldn''t take direct action, as it would invite the wrath of the imperial family.


    In the end, this resulted in them moving in secret. Coborating with one of the other ruling families to destroy the branches of the Chun Family and seal them off from the outside world.


    By the point that Chun Hua''s parents learnt about the situation from capturing one of the people sent off to destroy one of the branches of the Chun Family, there was not much time left to send a message through to the imperial family and inform them about the situation¡­ And by the time Chun Hua returned to inform her grandfather, it was already toote. The noble family had managed to sessfully seal off the frontier city and prevent any information from leaking out.


    Informing the three other ruling families of the frontier city didn''t work either, as one of them was working together with the noble family, while the rest had been offered enough resources by the noble family to remain neutral and not interfere.


    As for how the noble family nned to take over the Chun Family''s position in the frontier city and install their newly promoted Earth Immortal Realm Expert¡­ That was not something Chun Hua''s parents had not managed to find out about.


    However, considering that the noble family had already begun to move against the Chun Family, it would not be surprising that they already had a n set in ce for ensuring that their newly promoted Earth Immortal would be the person taking over after the Chun Family was gone. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    In the end, the destruction of the Chun Family would be exined as a result of arge number of demon beasts suddenly emerging from the primeval jungle¡­


    "So¡­ In the end, they want to push all the me on the demon beasts¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he listened to Chun Hua finishing her exnation, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes.


    No matter how convincing the noble family was, there was no way that the imperial family would simply believe that the Chun Family had been destroyed by a random flock of demon beasts that had emerged from the primeval jungle. Especially considering that said demon beast wave only happened to destroy the Chun Family and nothing else¡­


    "I know what you are thinking, but it isn''t that simple, I think they are nning to cause a demon beast wave by intentionally provoking some of the powerful demon beasts in the primeval jungle. Taking the chance to deal with me and my family during the chaos." Seeing the doubtful expression on Xuan Hao''s face, Chun Hua''s grandfather decided to borate a bit on what Chun Hua said at the end.


    "Intentionally causing a demon beast wave¡­ Indeed, if the demon beasts really do show up, it gives their story substance. Not to mention, if the other three ruling families cooperate with them, there is little chance of the imperial family doubting them. After all, the demon beast wave is real, and the Chun Family won''t be the only one affected." Nodding his head as he heard what Chun Hua''s grandfather said, Xuan Hao felt that the current situation of the Chun Family was indeed dangerous.


    Not to mention the noble family with three people at the Dao Seed Realm or the fact that one of the three ruling families with a Dao Seed Realm Experts was secretly cooperating with them, just the uing demon beast wave alone would be enough to endanger the Chun Family whose Dao Seed Realm Expert was currently in an injured sate!

 Chapter 1209 Demon Beast Stampede

    Chapter 1209 Demon Beast Stampede


    At the same time Xuan Hao was learning about the dangerous situation that the Chun Family found itself in, somewhere far away from the frontier city of the Astorion Empire inside the primeval jungle, a group of people covered from head to toe in dark robes silentlynded at the edge of a steep ravine. Ignoring the group of demon beasts only a few meters away from where theynded.


    Roaar-!


    Ro-


    Bang!


    Before the demon beasts had a chance to do much more than roar at them, one of the people casually extended his hand and directly crushed one of the demon beasts, who in turn froze on the spot for a short moment before turning around and escaping in the opposite direction of the group of strange humans that had suddenly appeared in their territory.


    Although something like this wouldn''t have been enough to scare them off under normal circumstances, as most of the demon beasts in the group were rather weak, it just so happened that the demon beast being crushed in a single move was none other than the leader of the group of demon beast.


    Not bothering with the demon beasts after they ran away, the person who had crushed the demon beast just a few seconds earlier walked up to the edge of the ravine and looked over it down towards the bottom of the ravine that seemed to be covered in a nket of moss.


    "That thing is indeed in hibernation here¡­" Whispering this to himself as he saw the nket of moss at the bottom of the ravine, the person slowly took a few steps back before signaling for the others to get ready.


    Rustle~


    Not a secondter, the group of people all took out a bunch of small rocks with dozens of talismans attracted to them.


    "Looks like we just have to wait for the signal now¡­" Seeing that everyone was ready, the person who had gone over the edge and confirmed the situation in the ravine earlier, took out amunication talisman as he proceeded to wait with the rest.


    Inevitably, a sense of nervousness pervaded among the group, as all of them understood how dangerous their current task was¡­


    "Now!"


    However, before they had a chance to second guess what they were about to do, the voice of the person holding themunication talisman woke them up-


    Whoosh~ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Whoosh~


    Whoosh~


    Causing all of them to throw the small rocks covered in talismans towards the ravine before jumping into the air and escaping in the opposite direction of the ravine, some even directly choosing to use a blood burning technique to forcibly increase their own speed above that of the others.


    BOOOOOM-!


    The reason for this soon became known to the fearful demon beast observing the group from a distance, as a loud explosion echoed out from inside the ravine, causing the ravine itself to start copsing in on itself-


    ROOOOOOOOOAR-!


    However, before the ravine had a chance to fully copse a terrifying and almost prehistoric roar echoed out from inside it. Leaving all of the demon beasts close enough to hear it shivering, as an almost primordial fear emerged from the depths of their souls.


    Although the demon beasts had no idea what the roar just now belonged to, they inherently understood that they would stand no chance of survival if faced with the owner of the roar.


    RUMBLE-!


    And it was at this moment it happened-


    CRACK-!


    The rocks tumbling down from the sides of the ravine about to bury it were forcibly broken apart as a massive snake over a dozen kilometers in length emerged from the ravine.


    Covered in thick scales with a simr texture to stones with moss growing on top of them that made it almost impossible to detect under normal circumstances and a pair of horns growing on top of its head, the snake demon beast turned its massive head in the direction that the group of humans had disappeared in-


    ROOOAR-!


    WHOOOOSH-!


    And letting out an almost draconic roar, it unfurled a pair ofrge wings attached to the side of its body before soaring into the sky in the direction that the group of humans had escaped in. Showing that it wasn''t just an ordinary snake, but instead one in the process of transforming into a dragon, but¡­ More important than all of that, its strength had clearly reached the Dao Seed Realm!


    ¡­


    ROOOOOAAAAR-!


    ROOOOOAR-!


    MEOOW-!


    At the same time that the massive snake demon beast took off chasing after the group of humans, simr situation was ying out across the outer part of the primeval jungle located close to the Astorion Empire, as over a dozen powerful demon beasts ranging between theter stages of the Soul Ascension Realm and the earlier stages of the Dao Seed Realm all began rushing in the direction of the frontier city filled with killing intent-


    Roooar!


    Rooar-!


    Roar!


    In turn, the sudden reaction of the powerful demon beasts all rushing in the same direction caused the weaker demon beasts watching the things from below got riled up¡­ And with the help of some special incense and poison that had been spread beforehand, they all began following behind the more powerful demon beasts with an even greater killing intent¡­


    "D-Demon beast stampede!"


    "Why is there a demon beast stampede now of all times!? Didn''t the recent examination of the primeval jungle state that there was no need to worry about another stampede for the next dozen or so years!?"


    "What does it matter!? We need to get out of here and enter the frontier city before it''s toote!"


    In the end, the first people to discover thisrge number of demon beasts suddenly rushing in the direction of the frontier city was none other than the weaker cultivation ns and families that had left the frontier city not too long ago to escape from the brewing storm inside the city.


    Unfortunately, most of the people hiding around the outskirts of the primeval jungle were on the weaker side-


    "Ahhh! Why did this happen now of all times!?"


    "Nooo-!"


    "Grandfather! Don''t leave us- Ahhhh!"


    Resulting in most of them being unable to escape from the iing horde of demon beasts, while the few strong enough to do so were forced to leave behind their families as they fled in the direction of the frontier city before they too ended up being torn apart by therge number of demon beasts.


    ¡­


    "Hm? This is¡­"


    Back at the frontier city, Xuan Hao frowned visibly while turning to look in the direction of the primeval jungle. Given the strength of the demon beasts and the fact that they had no intention of hiding themselves while chasing after the group of humans daring enough to disturb their slumber, Xuan Hao noticed them the moment they entered the area covered by his divine sense.


    "Is something wr- Ah!?" Being weakerpared to Xuan Hao, Chun Hua''s grandfather could not help asking him filled with confusion before a serious expression appeared on his face. Having also sensed therge number of powerful demon beasts rushing directly towards the frontier city that they were located inside.


    "What is it?" Not capable of sensing the powerful demon beasts rushing towards the frontier city, Chun Hua could only tilt her head in confusion before asking this. Not understanding what had caused her grandfather and recently acquired master to suddenly be so serious all of a sudden.


    "It looks like the noble family targeting your family has already made their move. Attracting quite arge number of powerful demon beasts in this direction. Hm? Not just that, but it also looks like they used something to attract the weaker demon beasts to the city¡­" Exining the situation to his newest disciple, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes further after discovering that arge number of weaker demon beasts were also rushing towards the frontier city.


    "Huh!? T-they really caused a demon beast stampede!?" "Yes¡­ And from the looks of things, the people they sent out to cause trouble are about to reach the frontier city¡­" Nodding his head in response to Chun Hua''s shocked expression, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he focused his attention on the close to one hundred people covered from head to toe in dark clothes that made it hard to discern their identity.


    This group of people were undoubtedly the people behind the demon beast stampede, something that was rather clear from the dozen or so powerful demon beasts who were all chasing after them filled to the brim with killing intent.


    Not only that, but every single one of these people had at least reached the Domain Lord Realm with a little over a dozen of them having reached the Soul Ascension Realm. Even for arge noble family in an empire like the Astorion Empire, they were a force that epassed at least a third of their powerful cultivators below the Dao Seed Realm!


    Now¡­ Wouldn''t it be unfortunate if something happened to them before they had a chance to hide away inside the frontier city¡­?

 Chapter 1210 No Path Forward

    "About to reach the city¡­" Muttering this to himself after hearing what Xuan Hao said, Chun Hua''s grandfather narrowed both his eyes. Even though he had also noticed the powerful demon beasts rushing towards the frontier city because of the fact that none of them bothered hiding themselves, the people behind the demon beast stampede were not the same. Maybe only after they got within a few thousand meters of the frontier city would he be able to notice them, a point in time that would make it far toote for him to do anything about them entering the city.


    Not to mention, he also had to think about the noble family behind these people, as they would undoubtedly have one of their three Earth Immortals hiding away somewhere inside the frontier city to ensure their safety.


    If he really decided to leave his family and rush to intercept those people, he might end up walking into an ambush by the noble family and the ruling family that had decided to cooperate with them!


    For this reason, the old man could not help feeling a bit regretful, but¡­ After remembering Xuan Hao who had agreed to help his family just a short time ago, he suddenly regained his energy before turning towards him filled with anticipation.


    "¡­"


    Rolling his eyes upon seeing the expectant look stered all over the old man''s face, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say in response.


    "So¡­ Can you¡­" "I understand what you are thinking, I was also nning to deal with them before they could reach the city." Knowing what the old man was trying to say, Xuan Hao didn''t stay inside the pavilion for long before leaving in the direction of the primeval jungle while ensuring that he remained hidden in the process. Intending to deal with the people from the noble family without having to face off against the Dao Seed Realm cultivator that should be hiding somewhere inside the frontier city at this point in time.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao silently slipped out of the Chun Family Estate without being detected by any of the people keeping an eye on the estate for the different major powers in the city nor the different Soul Ascension Realm cultivators from the Chun Family curious about what had happened to him after he entered the central part of the estate where the ancestor resided, the group of people who had provoked the Dao Seed Realm snake demon beast sessfully reached the edge of the primeval jungle.


    "Looks like everything worked ording to the n, the only unfortunate loss was a few people in the earlier stages of the Domain Lord Realm." Slowing down a bit to not overexert himself beyond his limits, one of the people could not help saying this as he nced down at therge number of weaker cultivators being ughtered by arge number of weaker demon beasts below.


    "Indeed, nothing out of the ordinary considering the strength of the demon beasts we had to attract¡­" Nodding his head as he responded to the first person, another of the people simr slowed down after seeing the frontier city in the distance. No longer feeling the need to continue burning his lifespan to increase his speed beyond his limits.


    Given that he could see the frontier city up ahead and the fact that they had managed to create quite a bit of distance between themselves and the terrifying demon beast that they had provoked, his current speed was more than enough to reach the city before the demon beast could catch up to them.


    "Yeah, I honestly thought we were going to die when I felt that terrifying aura earlier!" Arriving with a far more exhausted expression on his facepared to the other two, a figure looking about to copse at any moment nodded his head fearfully as he said this.


    Compared to the others in the group, his strength was only around the middle stages of the Domain Lord Realm. Forcing him to burn close to half of his remaining lifespan for a chance to keep up with the rest.


    "Hehe, at least you managed to make it out alive! Now that we are so close to the city, the ancestor should be able to notice us soon and help in case we can''t reach the city on our own." Poking a bit of fun at hisrade, one of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators in the group chuckled slightly as he said this.


    Of course, it was all just a bit of fun to turn their attention away from the terrifying will that was bearing down on them from the snake demon beast that they had forcefully woken up from its peaceful slumber.


    Even though the demon beast wasn''t in range to attack them, it had still managed to lock on to all of them. Ensuring that the people daring enough to disturb its sleep wouldn''t be able to run away¡­


    Not too dissimr from this group, more people covered from head to toe in clothes that made it hard to discern their identities soon appeared all around the edge of the primeval jungle before starting to converge towards the frontier city in the distance. Each group being chased by a powerful demon beast that had at least reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Whoosh~


    How convenient, all of them gathered up into a single group¡­


    Arriving outside the primeval jungle only a short distance away from this group of powerful cultivators, Xuan Hao couldn''t help smiling to himself as he thought this while looking at the people from the noble family gathering together as they moved in the direction of the frontier city in a singlerge group.


    At first, he had thought he would have to chase down each of the small group and try to kill them off before they could reach the frontier city or the Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the noble family could intercept him, but now it seemed like he worried over nothing¡­ n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Hm¡­ But if I make a move to kill them, I will essentially announce my presence to the noble family. Making them more cautious when ites to dealing with the Chun Family. Possibly even deciding to retreat and find another way to deal with the Chun Family¡­


    Narrowing both his eyes as he thought this to himself while looking towards therge group made up of Soul Ascension Realm and Domain Lord Realm cultivators rapidly approaching his current location, Xuan Hao suddenly felt his gaze wandering towards arge demon beast not too far behind them, arge snake demon beast with a pair of wings that seemed to have just recently broken through to the Dao Seed Realm.


    Although the demon beast was by no means strong enough to pose a threat to him, it was more than enough to deal with the group of cultivators from the noble family.


    If they happened to run into a wall of some kind. Unable to continue towards the frontier city, he wouldn''t have to do anything and would be able to watch on the sideline as the group of cultivators from the noble family were taken care of by the winged snake demon beast. Maybe even giving him a perfect opportunity to ambush the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the noble family that woulde out of the frontier city to try and save the group of Soul Ascension Realm and Domain Lord Realm cultivators¡­


    Swish-!


    Havinge up with a decent n in his own opinion, Xuan Hao spread out his dao domain before using it to form an imprable wall in front of the group of escaping cultivators from the noble family-


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Not even a second after Xuan Hao used his dao domain to block the path of the noble family cultivators, did the first few people violently crash into the invisible wall that had been formed by his dao domain.


    "Ahhh!? What is this!?"


    "Wah!?"


    "Wall- No, a formation!?"


    Not able to understand what had suddenly blocked their path, all of the noble family cultivators began panicking. Even a single second wasted would give the terrifying demon beasts behind them time to catch up.


    "Don''t waste time! Attack it with all your strength unless you want to be eaten alive by those demon beasts!" Knowing this, one of the more powerful Soul Ascension Realm cultivators took the lead as he yelled this while using all of his strength to attack the invisible wall that had appeared in front of them-


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    And soon enough, countless spells and mystical techniques rained down towards Xuan Hao''s dao domain¡­


    "This¡­ Impossible!"


    "Not even a single scratch¡­"


    "Go around! We can''t destroy it!"


    Unfortunately for the noble family cultivators, the difference between the Soul Ascension Realm and a Late Stage Dao Domain Lord was simply not something that could be changed that easily¡­

 Chapter 1211 Catching Up

    Chapter 1211 Catching Up


    Roooar-!


    Just as the noble family cultivators were about to try and go around the invisible wall that had suddenly blocked their path towards the frontier city, a loud roar echoed out not too far behind them as the winged snake demon beast became visible above the tall trees of the primeval jungle. The little time they might have left without having to worry about the powerful demon beasts they had provoked not too long ago being reduced to a few seconds, as the smarter ones among the noble family cultivators wasted no time in trying to contact the ancestor hidden inside the frontier city to ensure their safety-


    Rumble~!


    Not even a secondter, a powerful aura belonging to someone in the Dao Seed Realm erupted from the frontier city as an old woman soon rushed out in the direction of the noble family cultivators.


    Even without knowing anything about the other party, Xuan Hao was sure that she wasn''t one of the Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the three other ruling families and was instead the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the noble family hidden inside the frontier city-


    Whoosh~!


    And with this in mind, Xuan Hao decided to retract his dao domain before the other party had a chance to notice him, while at the same time preparing himself to attack the moment he saw an opportunity.


    After all, as long as he could kill one of the Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the noble family, they would no longer be capable of taking up control of the Chun Family''s position in the frontier city and would instead be forced to retreat and stabilize their position in the capital city.


    Even though doing something like this would undoubtedly draw the attention of the Astorion Empire and its more powerful cultivators. Possibly preventing him from easily entering the Astorion Empire in the future, he didn''t n to stay in the empire after ensuring the safety of the Chun Family.


    If they wanted to try and chase him down, they would not only have to pass through several dangerous locations like the primeval jungle and the Blue Sea Empire. Not to mention, they didn''t have any idea about his identity in the first ce. Making killing the Dao Seed Realm cultivator a rtively safe endeavor as long as he could leave the Astorion Empire before their more powerful cultivators showed up.


    "Ah? The invisible wall disappeared! Everyone, we can go back the original way!" Discovering that the dao domain blocking their path earlier had disappeared, one of the weaker cultivators at the Late Stage of the Domain Lord Realm who had yet to try and go around the invisible wall, yelled out loudly before rushing towards the frontier city with all his might.


    "Huh? It disappeared¡­?"


    "Haha! The ancestor is alsoing! I''m saved!"


    "This¡­ What if it suddenly appears again? Isn''t it safer to continue around it?"


    "Indeed, better safe than sorry, my strength is also more than enough to escape before that demon beast catches up to me¡­"


    Hearing the loud yell and seeing that he safely managed to pass through where the invisible wall had disappeared, the rest of the noble family cultivators were split on what to do, some continued to go around, while the rest tried their luck directly through the ce where the invisible wall had been a short moment ago.


    In the end, the majority of those taking the chance and hoping the invisible wall wouldn''t appear again were the weaker cultivators who didn''t stand a chance going around the invisible wall, while the ones who continued around it to be on the safer side were the more powerful cultivators.


    Given that all of them could already see their ancestor rushing out of the frontier city to save them, they felt confident in being able to escape, while their ancestor kept the winged snake demon beast at bay to buy them some more time.


    After all, the rest of the powerful demon beasts that they had provoked were rtively slower than the winged snake demon beast. Giving them some time before their ancestor would be forced to retreat back towards the frontier city to ensure her own safety.


    Hm¡­ Looks like I have to do something, or they will be able to escape before that demon beast has a chance to catch up to them. Making it more difficult to look for an opportunity to ambush that old woman¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he watched the noble family cultivators escaping towards the frontier city once again, Xuan Hao could not help frowning. Although he had managed to slow them down by a few seconds without being noticed by the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the noble family, it was not enough for the winged snake demon beast to catch up and start killing off the noble family cultivators.


    With this in mind, he needed to slow them down by a bit more so he could force a fight between the old woman in the Dao Seed Realm and the winged snake demon beast. Only then would he have a perfect opportunity tounch a sneak attack on the old woman¡­


    The Dao of Ice¡­ No, it will be noticed the moment I use it, same with the Dao of Formations. If myprehension of the Dao of Space was higher and I had a technique for shifting space, it might have been possible to use that. Hm¡­ That leaves the Dao of Illusions¡­


    Going over the different Daos he hadprehended, and techniques associated with them, Xuan Hao ultimately ended up at the Dao of Illusions.


    Although he didn''t have time to learn any technique rted to the Dao of Illusions, just the fact that he had managed to reach the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Illusions would be more than enough to trap a few Soul Ascension Realm and Domain Lord Realm cultivators in an illusion for a few seconds. Giving the winged snake demon beast more than enough time to catch up with them before they had a chance to reach their ancestor.


    At the same time, the use of the Dao of Illusion would also be hard to detect. Making it difficult for the old woman in the Dao Seed Realm to realize that something had happened. Even if she did notice something, she would most likely not think it had something to do with the winged snake demon beast using its powerfulprehension over the Dao of Wind to forcibly slow down the cultivators. Not something too difficult to do considering that the winged snake demon beast had reached the Dao Seed Realm.


    The only problem with this was the fact that the winged snake demon beast was currently using all of its strength to increase its speed. Not having used any of it to try and slow down the noble family cultivators at such a long distance. Not that the old woman from the noble family would have any idea about this¡­ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Whoosh~!


    Havinge to a decision, Xuan Hao didn''t waste a single second as his dao domain spread out and engulfed the noble family cultivators without any of them noticing-


    WHOOOOOOSH-!


    And before any of them had time to react, a powerful wind suddenly swept over them and forcibly pushed them back in the direction of the winged snake demon beast. Giving the illusion that the winged snake demon beast had used its powerful mastery over the Dao of Wind to conjure up a powerful storm forcibly preventing them from continuing forward towards the frontier city.


    "Ah!? Where did this powerful winde from!?"


    "I-I can''t continue forward?!"


    "The wind is slowing me down to only five percent my normal speed!?"


    "Huh!? I-I''m being dragged back towards the winged snake demon beast by the wind!?"


    Realizing the danger of the situation, the group of cultivators began desperately using every secret trump card at their disposal to escape from the terrifying wind. However, after discovering that they still couldn''t escape, they could only turn towards their approaching ancestor filled with hope-


    ROOOOAR-!


    Unfortunately, before their ancestor appeared at the scene to save them, the winged snake demon beast finally managed to catch up to the group of noble family cultivators.


    "Ancestor! Save-"


    Crunch-!


    Fully announcing its arrival by angrily chomping down on one of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators that had dared wake it up not too long ago-


    "Ahhh!"


    "Nooo-!"


    "Don''t! Help-"


    However, this was far from the end, as the winged snake demon beast began to rush towards the other cultivators behind its rude awakening. Killing any of the noble family cultivator''s unfortunate enough to be in its path. Marking the beginning of the end for the group of noble family cultivators, as the first Soul Ascension Realm cultivators soon met his end under the powerful fangs of the winged snake demon beast!


    Roaaar-!


    ROOAR!


    Roar!


    At the same time, not too far away, the remaining demon beasts who had beencking a bit behindpared to the winged snake demon beast began appearing one by one¡­

 Chapter 1212 Creating a Perfect Opportunity

    Chapter 1212 Creating a Perfect Opportunity


    Seeing the winged snake demon beast running rampant as it killed off the different people who had forcefully woken it up from its slumber, the leader of the group in question fearfully did his best to rush in the direction of his ancestor. Hoping that his superior cultivation at the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm would give him enough speed to escape before the winged snake demon beast finished up the rest of hispanions.


    Whoosh-!


    Unfortunately, the powerful wind forcing him back seemed to indicate that the winged snake demon beast also thought of this, as he soon found himself being forcibly dragged back in the direction of the winged snake demon beast.


    "Nooo-!"


    Realizing that he wouldn''t be able to reach his ancestor in time, he could only scream out helplessly as the winged snake demon beast finished up thest of hispanions before turning its attention towards him.


    Although this did result in the powerful winds affecting the rest of the cultivators around him, he didn''t feel the slightest bit happy knowing that their possible escape of the other noble family cultivators woulde at the cost of his life. Especially so when some of the people who now stood a chance at escaping were the weaker Domain Lord Realm cultivators.


    If I can''t escape, I might as well use everything at my disposal¡­


    Not wanting to go down without a fight, while at the same time believing that he might have a chance to dy the winged snake demon beast for long enough to have his ancestor catch up an save him, the helpless noble family cultivator decided to use everything in his interspatial ring to fight back against what seemed like an inevitable death-


    Swish-!


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    And not a secondter, countless talismans, artifacts and other powerful trump cards that had been saved up over a lifetime flew out towards the rapidly approaching winged snake demon beast before erupting with a power far beyond that of a cultivator in the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Reaching a level close to that of someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm in terms of power.


    Even when the first Soul Ascension Realm cultivator had fallen to the winged snake demon beast, the level of their trump cards had never reached this level before. Showing that the cultivator in the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm wasn''t someone ordinary but had a certain degree of power inside the noble family!


    ROOOAR-! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Unfortunately, the difference between someone in the Soul Ascension Realm and the Dao Seed Realm was not that easy to cross and the powerful trump cards only ended up further enraging the winged snake demon beast without doing any real damage-


    "No! Don''t-"


    Crunch~


    And before the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator had a chance to do anything more, the winged snake demon beast opened its mouth wide and chomped down on him. Instantly killing him in body and soul with a simple yet effective attack.


    Will it leave?


    Not able to stop this thought from emerging as they watched thest person of the group that had been tasked with attracting the winged snake demon beast to the frontier city, the few noble family cultivators who were unfortunate enough to find themselves right next to the winged snake demon beast could not help thinking this to themselves as they remained frozen on the spot. Not daring to move a single muscle out of fear that they might attract the attention of the terrifying demon beast.


    Roar~


    Not caring the slightest bit about the noble family cultivators around it, the winged snake demon beast let out a satisfied roar after having sessfully hunted down the troublemakers daring enough to disturb its slumber before it turned around about to leave-


    Roar?


    But just as the noble family cultivators around it were about to let out a sigh of relief, the winged snake demon beast tensed up as it seemed to have discovered the ancestor at the Dao Seed Realm currently rushing directly towards it filled with killing intent. By ident, it also noticed the dozen or so noble family cultivators all around it.


    Given that they were only around the Domain Lord Realm, the winged snake demon beast simply didn''t care enough to pay any attention to them earlier¡­


    "Oh no, it noticed us!"


    "Ancestor¡­ Why do you have to do this to us?"


    "If just the ancestor hadn''t shown up¡­"


    Knowing what was about to happen as they felt the winged snake demon beast''s gaze focus on them, the dozen or so noble family cultivators could not help silently cursing at their ancestor before all of them turned and escaped in different directions with all their power. No longer caring about trying to remain hidden from the winged snake demon beast.


    Rooar-!


    However, if the difference between the Soul Ascension Realm and the Dao Seed Realm was already massive, the gap between the Domain Lord Realm and the Dao Seed Realm was simply unimaginable-


    WHOOOOOOSH-!


    "Ahh-!"


    "Noo-!"


    "Damnable ancestor!"


    And before any of them had a chance to escape more than a few thousand meters, a terrifying wind swept over them and tore them apart. Instantly killing all of them without any resistance. The Dao of Windprehended by the winged snake demon beast was on full disy for all to see. Confirming the earlier thoughts of the noble family cultivators that the winged snake demon beast was indeed the one behind the terrifying wind that suddenly prevented their escape.


    "Dao of Wind¡­ And such a terrifying level as well¡­" Not aware of what had happened earlier, the ancestor from the noble family could not help frowning to herself as she witnessed the winged snake demon beast using the Dao of Wind to kill the dozen or so Domain Lord Realm cultivators.


    Although the winged snake demon beast''s strength was far below her, she clearly sensed that itsprehension of the Dao of Wind was superior to that of a normal demon beast that should have just recently broken through. Maybe it would even be able to fight equally against her with the help of its powerfulprehension of the Dao of Wind!


    "Hmph! No use thinking about that, all I have to do is hold it off for a bit so they can escape back to the frontier city." Shaking her head as she muttered this to herself, the old ancestor of the noble family sped up and soon appeared directly in front of the winged snake demon beast before it could kill any more of her people-


    BOOOOOM-!


    ROOOOAR-!


    Not a secondter, a terrifying battle began, as the ancestor from the noble family and the winged snake demon beast began shing violently with each other. Killing off a few of the noble family cultivators too slow to escape, while the rest used all of their strength to rush towards the frontier city. None of them intending to waste the opportunity that their ancestor had given them.


    Even more so because they all understood that their ancestor wouldn''t be able to hold on for long, as she would also be forced to retreat when the rest of the demon beast caught up!


    ¡­


    Looks like she didn''t notice me and thinks everything was done by that demon beast, I guess I''m quite lucky that it''sprehension of the Dao of Wind is so high, or she would have inevitably felt more suspicious about it being able to slow down everyone so far away.


    Watching everything y out from shadows, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a sigh of relief as he kept his attention focused on the ancestor from the noble family violently shing with the winged snake demon beast midair.


    Although he had managed to sessfully fool her and make her fight the winged snake demon beast, he also understood that it would be impossible for him to kill someone in the Dao Seed Realm in a single attack without the other party being injured.


    Of course, this didn''t mean that he had no way to deal with the ancestor from the noble family¡­


    Hm¡­ The time for me to strike should be when those cultivators from the noble family are just about to reach the frontier city, as the rest of the Dao Seed Realm demon beast will arrive at that point. Forcing the ancestor from the noble family to retreat while enduring their attacks, a perfect moment to strike. Not to mention, I don''t have to kill her by myself and can also rely on the help of the demon beasts chasing her.


    Smiling confidently to himself as he thought of this, Xuan Hao leaned back on a cloud next to him as he watched the ancestor of the noble family valiantly fight against the winged snake demon beast. Waiting for the rest of the Dao Seed Realm demon beast to catch up.


    Waiting for the opportunity he had created for himself to show up¡­

 Chapter 1213 Trapped Among Demon Beasts...

    Chapter 1213 Trapped Among Demon Beasts...


    How troublesome, the rest of those demon beasts will catch up before those children reach the frontier city. Even though the losses so far have been bad, they are still manageable, something that won''t be the case if I retreat before they have time to reach the perimeter of the frontier¡­


    Focusing all her attention on the demon beasts in front of her, the ancestor of the noble family didn''t realize that she was about to walk into a trap. Not even thinking that something like that would be possible in the first ce considering that they were within the borders of the Astorion Empire.


    Not to mention the fact that she had reached the Dao Seed Realm. Making it close to impossible for someone to ambush her, there was also the fact that she had the frontier city behind her with at least three other Dao Seed Realm cultivators ready to interfere in case she was ambushed by someone¡­ And given how short the distance was, she didn''t think it would be possible for someone to kill her in the short time it would take the Dao Seed Realm cultivators in the frontier city to show up and assist her.


    The only people who even had the ability to do something like that in the first ce would be legendary existences at the Celestial Immortal Realm, which in turn wouldn''t need toy in ambush to kill her in the first ce.


    It was because of this underlying thought that she had dared to leave the frontier city and confront the Dao Seed Realm demon beast on her own. Even going as far as thinking about holding off the rest of the Dao Seed Realm demon beasts for a short time while her people safely escaped into the frontier city.


    In her mind, if things ended up bing dangerous, she could always retreat back into the frontier city that was no more than a few seconds away for someone with her strength.


    As for resisting the seven total of seven Dao Seed Realm demon beast in the demon beast horde that she and her family had created, that wasn''t anything to worry about, as the guardian formationid down to protect the frontier city was set up by one of the Celestial Immortals of the imperial family skilled in the Dao of Formations.


    From what she knew, not to mention the demon beasts in front of her, the formation guarding the frontier city was said to have been specially designed to resist a Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast for long enough that a Celestial Immortal from the capital had the time to show up and protect the frontier city.


    Of course, the Celestial Immortal of the Astorion Empire wouldn''t be alerted unless a Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast was detected by the formation. If not, she and her family would have never dared to create an artificial demon beast wave to hide their n of killing the ancestor of the Chun Family¡­


    ROAR-!


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Like this, the fight continued even as the second Dao Seed Realm demon beast appeared and joined the fight. Followed by the third, four¡­ Until all seven Dao Seed Realm demon beasts had joined in.


    It''s time to retreat¡­


    Only barely able to hold on for a single round when faced with the seven Dao Seed Realm demon beast, the old ancestor of the noble family knew her own limits as she began retreating back towards the frontier city before she ended up being injured by the powerful demon beasts-


    Swish-!


    However, it was at this moment Xuan Hao who had been biding his time emerged from the shadows. Using the Dao of Space to instantly cross the distance, while using the Dao of the Sword inbination with the Dao of Illusions to attack. Creating countless illusory attacks in front of the old woman. Making it impossible for her to sense which one of them was the real one within a short period of time, let alone in the time it would take for Xuan Hao''s attack to reach her!


    "Huh?" Not having expected to be ambushed just when she was retreating back towards the frontier city with seven powerful demon beasts right behind her, the old ancestor of the noble family could only let out a somewhat stupid sound before she realized the gravity of her current situation-


    Whoosh-!


    BOOM-!


    And just before Xuan Hao''s attack couldnd, she pulled out a defensive talisman that instantly transformed into a transparent shield blocking Xuan Hao''s attack before shattering. Sessfully blocking Xuan Hao''s attack.


    However, Xuan Hao never expected to kill the ancestor of the noble family with a single attack in the first ce. Instead, what he wanted to do was not kill her, but instead stop her retreat and push her back into the seven Dao Seed Realm demon beasts behind her-


    Roaaar-!


    Roar!


    Meoow-!


    And just like he had expected, three of the demon beasts instantly jumped on the opportunity and took advantage of the old woman having just defend against Xuan Hao to attack her before she had a chance to recover from the shock of someone ambushing her.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Soon enough resulting in the old woman being fully surrounded by the demon beasts without any path out, her previous escape route being cut off. Forcing her to use some of her most precious lifesaving treasures that she had spent her entire life gathering to hold on against the seven demon beasts, while also desperately using hermunication talisman to request help from not only her family, but also the four ruling families of the frontier city in a desperate attempt to survive her now deadly situation.


    Rumble-!


    Not a secondter, four powerful auras emerged from the frontier city before rushing in the direction of the battle, three of them belonging to the ruling families while thest one belonged to another of the noble family''s Dao Seed Realm cultivators.


    Among the ruling families, only the Chun Family''s old ancestor, Chun Hua''s grandfather, didn''t show up for obvious reasons¡­


    "Hm¡­ They reacted a bit faster than expected, but it doesn''t matter, as long as I can keep them at bay for a few minutes, she will die under the continues attack of those seven demon beasts¡­" Not having bothered to hide himself again now that his presence had been revealed, Xuan Hao calmly and confidently faced the four approaching Dao Seed Realm cultivators.


    Given his current strength, he was more than confident when it came to holding off the four Dao Seed Realm cultivators by himself. Especially considering that the strongest among them only had the strength of a fifthyer dao seed.


    Rumble-!


    For the first time in a long time, Xuan Hao fully unleashed his strength at the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Allowing his Dao Domain to rapidly spread out and envelop the approaching Dao Seed Realm cultivators-


    "Huh?"


    "Wha-!?"


    "What is this!?"


    In turn, the four Dao Seed Realm cultivators each showed different degrees of surprise on their face as they suddenly felt the Dao Domain enveloping them. Although they had no idea what it was, they instinctively understood that it wasn''t something good¡­


    FWHOOOOSH-!


    And as if to answer their doubts, Xuan Hao directly turned the dao domain into a purgatory that burned everything inside of it. Using the Dao Domain to amplify the strength of his Dao of Fire, a use of the Dao Domain that he had only just recently discovered was possible.


    "Dao of Fire! Where is this person from and why is he targeting my great aunt!?" Forced to defend against the powerful mes created by Xuan Hao, the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the noble family could not help looking towards Xuan Hao in dismay. Not understanding where such a powerful cultivator hade from and how his family had managed to offend someone like that.


    "Get yourself together! We have to work together if we want to save that old woman!" Seeing the state of the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the noble family, one of the three other Dao Seed Realm cultivators kindly reminded him that now was not the time for trying to figure out their opponent''s identity.


    "This¡­ I understand¡­" Realizing that his wandering thoughts had cost a few precious seconds, the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the noble family quickly calmed down as he began working together with the other three Dao Seed Realm cultivators to push through the terrifying mes towards the location where the old woman was struggling to stay alive in the face of the seven demon beasts trying their best to kill her.


    ¡­


    RUMBLE-!


    At the same time, back in the frontier city, the guardian formation also sensed the threat of the dao domain and activated on its own to protect the frontier city. Instantly causing a massive barrier to form around the frontier city. Protecting it from Xuan Hao''s dao domain that had essentially turned everything inside of it into a purgatory of fire.


    "This¡­" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Wow¡­"


    Seeing this scene, both Chun Hua and her grandfather were left speechless. None of them having expected something like this to happen¡­

 Chapter 1214 Holding Back Four Dao Seed Realm Cultivators

    Chapter 1214 Holding Back Four Dao Seed Realm Cultivators


    Knowing that they couldn''t waste any time given the current desperate situation of the old ancestor from the noble family, the four Dao Seed Realm cultivators worked together to fight back against the terrifying mes conjured through Xuan Hao''s dao domain. Although Xuan Hao had used his full strength to amplify the strength of the mes, his current strength was still a bit off singlehandedly fighting four Dao Seed Realm cultivators at the same time.


    Then again, his goal was not to fight the four, he just intended to dy them for long enough that the seven Dao Seed Realm demon beasts could finish off the ancestor of the noble family-


    Roooar-!


    Boom!


    And looking back towards the old ancestor of the noble family struggling to keep arge boar demon beast from swallowing her alive, Xuan Hao wagered that she might not even be able to hold on for another minute, something that the four Dao Seed Realm cultivators also seemed to have noticed as they began taking out different artifacts to speed up their progress through the purgatory created by his dao domain.


    Continuing at their new speed bolstered by the support of the different artifacts and treasures that they had taken out to push back against his mes, they should be able to reach the old woman from the noble family in time.


    Unfortunately for them, Xuan Hao didn''t intend to just stand around relying on his dao domain to do all the work, as he took a step forward using the Dao of Space to teleport himself in front of the group of four. Blocking their path forward, while at the same time leaving all of them stunned at the disy of his short distance teleportation-


    "You! To orchestrate such a sinister plot against my family, you deserve to die!"


    Well¡­ Everyone except one person, the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the noble family, whounched himself toward Xuan Hao filled with killing intent the moment he appeared.


    Boom! Boom!


    Not even getting the chance to say anything to try and dy the group of four, Xuan Hao was forced to draw his sword to fight back against the relentless barrage of strikesunched by the noble family cultivator now wielding arge saber more than two meters in length.


    Even with hisprehension of the Dao of the Sword having reached the Peak of the Small Sess Realm, Xuan Hao could not help finding himself in a desperate situation when faced with the saber of the noble family cultivator.


    The reason for this being rather obvious, as the Saber Dao of the noble family cultivator had surpassed hisprehension of the Dao of the Sword.


    Not just that, but his saber intent was also far stronger than his sword intent. Having undergone a qualitive transformation that his sword intent had not yet gone through. Clearly having surpassed the saber intent''s equivalent of the Nascent Sword Soul Realm.


    In the end, Xuan Hao was forced to rely on his dao domain to fight back. In turn resulting in the purgatory that trapped the other three Dao Seed Realm cultivators disappearing, as Xuan Hao concentrated his full strength on suppressing the noble family cultivator-


    BANG-!


    CRACK-!


    Almost instantly resulting in the noble family cultivator being violently knocked into the ground before Xuan Hao fully suppressed him to the point that he could only passively defend himself. Showing the clear difference in strength between the two of them.


    Even then, it wasn''t enough to kill the cultivator from the noble family. Instead, it created a perfect opportunity for the other three Dao Seed Realm cultivators to rush towards the old woman fighting for her life surrounded by the seven powerful demon beasts-


    "Hmph! As if I''d allow that!"


    Swish-!


    However, before the three had a chance to rush forward, Xuan Hao took a step forward and with the help of the drifting cloud steps, arrived directly in front of the three. Wasting no time as he began fighting with the three while also preventing them from getting any closer to where the demon beasts were fighting.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    The battle between Xuan Hao and the three Dao Seed Realm cultivators soon caused a devasting change to the environment around the frontier city. Leaving nothing behind other than the scars inflicted whenever an attack missed and subsequently created a newndmark in the process.


    Roar?


    Starting to take notice as the battle between Xuan Hao and the three Dao Seed Realm cultivators was far too hard to ignore, the demon beasts surrounding the old woman from the noble family could not help turning to look over at the humans that seemed to have started fighting with each other for some reason-


    Roar!


    And noticing that the battle didn''t affect them, the demon beasts soon turned their attention back towards the old woman from the noble family. Not just because they wanted to kill her for daring to try and stop them, but more so because eating a Dao Seed Realm cultivator was incredibly beneficial to them as demon beasts.


    No matter which of them ended up eating her, the power contained in the body of a Dao Seed Realm cultivator would be more than enough to help them promote a minor realm!


    R-roar!


    Roooar¡­


    R-r-r-roar¡­!


    At the same time that the stronger demon beasts were busy dealing with the old woman from the noble family and Xuan Hao was busy fighting the Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the three ruling families, the weaker demon beasts who had formed into arge horde numbering in the millions, were left shivering in fear as none of them dared to take a single step forward in the direction of the frontier city. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even though they were under some kind of special concoction that made them more aggressivepared to normal, they had seemingly woken up from the trance that they had been put into when faced with the devastating battle between Xuan Hao and the three Dao Seed Realm cultivators.


    The main reason for this being that the battle of Xuan Hao didn''t just take ce in the sky where they couldn''t really see much, but instead turned everything around the frontier city into a wastnd that caused any demon beast unfortunate enough to venture into it to meet a rather quick end.


    "C-can we get inside¡­?"


    "Please! Open the formation! I don''t want to die!" "What is even happening!?"


    Not too different from the demon beasts who were left fearfully observing the battle from afar, the group of noble family cultivators who had managed to survive by hugging the protective formation of the frontier city could not help crying to themselves as they watched the countless terrifying attacks flying all around the ce.


    Although they had managed to reach the frontier city, the guardian formation of the city had activated before they had a chance to run inside. Luckily, the formation didn''t just protect the inside of the city, but also a small section outside the barrier itself. Resulting in their current situation of the noble family cultivators hugging the protective formation while praying for a way out of their current deadly situation.


    """¡­"""


    Watching the group of desperate noble family cultivators from the other side, a few of the stronger cultivators inside the city who hade to watch the battle had no idea how to react when they saw these people desperately clinging to the barrier of the guardian formation. Especially considering that they clearly sensed that this group of people were no weaker than them.


    Rumble!


    Whoosh-!


    At the same time all of this was happening, the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the noble family, who had been firmly knocked into the ground by Xuan Hao a few seconds earlier, emerged covered in blood before he jumped over to join the battle between Xuan Hao and the three Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the ruling families.


    The saber in his hand now covered in a blood red aura as he attacked Xuan Hao with far more ferocitypared to before.


    Boom-! Boom! Boom!


    Facing the onught of four Dao Seed Realm cultivators at once, Xuan Hao could still clearly sense that something had changed in the noble family cultivator.


    However, considering his current situation, he didn''t have any time or energy to spare investigating this change and instead focused his full attention on stopping the four from getting any closer to the ce where the seven demon beasts and the old ancestor of the noble family were fighting.


    Although he was being pushed back under thebined might of the four Dao Seed Realm cultivators, it was nowhere near fast enough for them to reach the old woman before one of the demon beasts managed to break through the seemingly endless wave of lifesaving treasures and talismans that she was carrying in her interspatial ring.


    At the very least, Xuan Hao hoped this was the case. After all, her lifesaving treasures had to run out at some point¡­ Right¡­?

 Chapter 1215 Death of the Old Woman From the Noble Family...

    Chapter 1215 Death of the Old Woman From the Noble Family...


    Damn all of this! Why hasn''t that guy shown up yet!? He and those people should have noticed what happened the moment I was knocked into these damnable demon beasts!


    Unaware of what was happening outside due to the massive demon beasts blocking her sight, while at the same time not giving her any energy to spare on trying to figure out what was happening outside with her divine sense, the old woman from the noble family could not help silently cursing the four people currently fighting against Xuan Hao not too far away.


    If things continue like this, I might really end up dying¡­


    However, even though she cursed at the ipetence of the four who hadn''t been able to save her from the demon beasts yet, she also felt a profound sense of fear welling up inside her, as the lifesaving treasures and talismans saved up over a lifetime began to run dry.


    At this point, she had already exhausted most of her talismans and was only left with a few protective artifacts that would at most allow her to hold on for another half minute against the powerful attacks of the seven powerful demon beasts.


    Though this should be more than enough time for someone toe help her, she felt her hope of being saved dwindling with each passing second, as a realization dawned on her¡­ And that was the fact that the unknown cultivator who had ambushed her andnded her in her current life and death situation had somehow managed to prevent the four froming to her rescue.


    With this in mind, the only way she could she herself surviving her current deadly situation would be to hold on for long enough that one of the four could break through and reach her, or for some powerful cultivator to appear and intimidate the group of demon beasts into running away, both of which were looking increasingly unlikely with each passing second. In the end, she was left with no other choice than to try and think of another way, something that was easy said than done with seven demon beasts doing their best to try and swallow her whole¡­


    Rumble-!


    However, before she had a chance to think up of another way to escape her current situation without relying on the help of someone else, a loud rumbling sound echoed out from the primeval jungle not too far away as a massive demon beast the size of a small mountain appeared in the distance. Each step caused the ground to shake as it made its way in the direction of the frontier city without a single care in the world.


    From a single nce, it looked like the massive demon beast was just out on a casual stroll and happened to be heading in the direction of the frontier city by ident. Not paying any attention to the old woman from the noble family or the rest of the human and demon beast cultivators in its path.


    Feeling the abysmal aura surrounding the mountain sized demon beast that seemed to swallow her whole, the old woman from the noble family could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine. "C-Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast!" Barely saying this to herself as she froze on the spot together with the seven demon beasts that had been trying to kill her just seconds ago, the old woman from the noble family felt like her situation had somehow be even more dangerouspared to before.


    Not to mention escaping while the demon beasts weren''t attacking her, she couldn''t even move her body as she felt the terrifying aura of the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast bearing down on her-


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Forcing her and the seven demon beasts to lose control of their bodies as they fell from the sky and crashed into the ground below.


    Although resisting the might of a Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast was possible for someone in the Dao Seed Realm, the old woman from the noble family and the seven demon beasts could not even be considered to have reached the early stage of the Dao Seed Realm that was categorized as someone who had at least eightyers around their dao seed.


    "Huh?"


    "C-Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast!? Why did such a powerful demon beast show up!?"


    "This is bad¡­. We have to get inside the formation before it notices us!"


    Not too far away, the four Dao Seed Realm cultivators fighting Xuan Hao also noticed the sudden appearance of the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast. Only, they were a bit luckier, as the terrifying might of the demon beast had not reached them yet. Giving them an opportunity to escape back towards the frontier city for safety.


    What about saving the old woman from the noble family? None of them thought about this, as all of them rushed back towards the frontier city for safety. Even the noble family cultivator who was covered in a blood red aura while attacking Xuan Hao in a crazy manner seemed to wake up with the appearance of the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast.


    "¡­" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    In the end, Xuan Hao was left floating alone in the air between the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast and the frontier city of the Astorion Empire.


    Out of everything he had thought might happen, this was not how he thought things woulde to an end.


    Whoosh-!


    Feeling the terrifying might of the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast washing over him the next second, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he was forced to use all his strength to keep himself from plummeting to the ground like the old woman from the noble family and the seven demon beasts that had been attacking her.


    Although his strength was the strongest, he was still far from beingparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm. Even more so considering that he had a feeling that the mountain sized demon beast approaching the frontier city was strong even for someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Of course, he didn''t have any way to confirm this as he had never really encountered someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm before and could only guess from what little information he had on the realm.


    RUMBLE-!


    Not a second after he thought about this, a loud rumbling sound echoed out from the frontier city behind him, as the formation seemed to have detected the approaching Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast. Instantly causing the formation to undergo a terrifying transformation as countless ancient symbols flew across the surface of the barrier guarding the frontier city. Soon erupting with an aura that made Xuan Hao feel a shiver run down his spine.


    If before, the formation could be considered like a sleeping dragon that had just casually dealt with his dao domain without exerting any real strength as it happened to pass by, the dragon had now woken up. Ready for battle at any moment.


    Rumble~


    Simr to Xuan Hao who instantly noticed the change in the guardian formation of the frontier city, the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast in the distance also noticed the formation as a hint of interest shed past its colossal eyes. Not caring about anyone in its path as it began to move in the direction of the frontier city to satiate its interest-


    "Nooo-!"


    "ROooar-!"


    THUMP-!


    CRACK-!


    Along the way, the old woman from the noble family and the demon beasts who had plummeted to the ground were directly crushed beneath the massive foot of the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast while fearfully crying out together in a weird sense ofradery that had appeared at thest moment before death.


    "This¡­"


    Seeing this scene, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he watched the mountain sized demon beast getting closer-


    Whoosh-!


    And without a second thought, he turned around and escaped before he ended up being in the way of the terrifying demon beast and ending up like the old woman from the noble family. Only stopping after reaching a safe distance where he could observe the situation from afar.


    Unfortunately, he wasn''t like the four Dao Seed Realm cultivators he had fought and had no way to enter the frontier city after the formation had been activated, but¡­ Given that his fifth disciple was still inside the frontier city, he didn''t n to leave even if staying would be dangerous. Especially considering that he had no idea if the formation had the ability to hold back the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast.


    In his mind, he was already getting ready to use the Drifting Cloud Steps to teleport into the frontier city the moment the formation broke and take his fifth disciple and her grandfather away before they were crushed under the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast. The rest of the Chun Family simply wasn''t something he could save with his current strength; his priority was the safety of his fifth disciple and her grandfather¡­

 Chapter 1216 It... Its just standing there... Menacingly!

    Chapter 1216 It... It''s just standing there... Menacingly!


    Roar?


    Arriving in front of the frontier city, the mountain sized demon beast didn''t immediately attack, but instead curiously inspected the guardian formation. Not showing any hint of killing intent during the process. Making it seem like the earlier death of the old ancestor from the noble family had just been an ident.


    "This¡­ What is it nning to do?"


    "I-I heard demon beasts in the Celestial Immortal Realm are far more intelligent than normal demon beasts¡­ Maybe¡­ Maybe it''s trying to think of a way to undo the formation¡­"


    "Impossible! ording to the ancestor who created the formation, it''s impossible for a Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast to solve the formation without trying to break it!"


    As the mountain sized demon beast stared down at the seemingly small city inparison to its massive size, the three Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the different ruling families were fearfully looking up at it as they wondered what it might be nning.


    After all, even though they had confidence in the guardian formation of the frontier city, they could not stop the primal fear that inevitably emerged when confronted with a demon beast an entire major realm above them.


    Although this kind of fear wasn''t hard to suppress given their mental states as Dao Seed Realm cultivators being far above that of a junior who encountered a Foundation Establishment Realm demon beast for the first time while still in the Qi Condensation Realm, it was still present as they could only wait for the Celestial Immortal from the capital city of the Astorion Empire to show up.


    "¡­"


    Not too far away from the group of three, the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the noble family, who had just witnessed the person he had been trying to save being crushed beneath the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast, stared down at the ground without saying a word. Unable to cope with the reality that his family had just lost one of its pirs, something that would inevitably force them to stop their nned expansion.


    Instead, it might even force them to give up parts of their territory, as the newly promoted Dao Seed Realm cultivator was far weaker than the old woman and his influence and friends were nowhere near the same level as the old woman who had been able to establish herself over thousands of years.


    Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do about it other than continue shamefully staring at the ground beneath his feet. Knowing that the reason for her death was due to the ambush of the unfamiliar Dao Seed Realm cultivator and the unexpected appearance of a demon beast in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    No matter how much he and his family had prepared, there was no way they could have ounted for something like that happening. Especially considering that his family didn''t have any enemies in the Dao Seed Realm outside of other noble families as far as they were aware. None of which would dare to attack them inside the Astorion Empire.


    "Everything¡­ Everything went wrong¡­" Muttering this to himself with a gloomy expression, the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the noble family soon left in the direction of the people from his family in preparation for what was about to happen.


    At the very least, the people who had been stuck outside the formation had managed to take advantage of the fact that they returned and briefly opened the formation. Giving them a chance to escape their fate of hugging the formation while praying for no stray attack to fly in their direction.


    ¡­


    "A Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast¡­ I never expected for something like that to show up all of a sudden¡­" Back in the Chun Family, Chun Hua''s ancestor could not help frowning to himself as he gazed in the direction of the mountain sized demon beast outside the guardian formation of the city. Out of everything he had expected to happen after he witnessed the fight between the four Dao Seed Realm cultivators and his granddaughter''s new master, he never thought a demon beast at the Celestial Immortal Realm would appear. Not only that, but it also ended up finishing off the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the noble family.


    If the demon beast was sessfully dealt with before it could destroy the guardian formation of the frontier city, the threat that had been threatening the destruction of his Chun Family would be gone.


    Even though the noble family might still be harboring thoughts about him and his family, they wouldn''t be able to do much now that they had lost one of their Dao Seed Realm cultivators. Especially considering that the Dao Seed Realm Expert that died was the oldest and most influential among the three Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the noble family. Meaning that they would be too busy trying to retain friendships and stabilize their situation in the foreseeable future.


    "I really hope the Celestial Immortal from the capital shows up soon¡­" Muttering this as he continued looking in the direction of the mountain sized demon beast menacingly standing in front of the guardian formation of the city, Chun Hua''s grandfather could only pray that the Celestial Immortal from the Astorion Empire would show up soon.


    "¡­"


    Standing beside her grandfather, Chun Hua didn''t say anything as she was simrly looking in the direction of the mountain sized demon beast with a look of fear. Different from her grandfather who had been able to witness the battle between the Dao Seed Realm cultivators and Xuan Hao, while also seeing how all of them left before the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast attacked them, Chen Hua had no idea what had happened and could only fear the worst might have happened as she looked up towards the demon beast in the distance.


    Even with her limited knowledge of the cultivation realms above the Soul Ascension Realm, she could tell that the mountain sized demon beast was in apletely different realmpared to the cultivators threatening the destruction of her family.


    ¡­


    At the same time that everyone hiding inside the frontier city were shivering in fear in the face of the colossal demon beast that had nted itself outside the main entrance of the city, a middle-aged man hidden in a secret underground pce beneath the capital city of the Astorion Empire opened his eyes with a shocked expression on his. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "The guardian formation of the frontier city located next to the primeval jungle detected a Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast!? How is this possible? Didn''t we enter a non-aggression agreement with them a few years ago!?" Starting to frown visibly as he said this to himself while looking off in the direction of the primeval jungle, the man nced towards two figures not too far away who had been woken up just like him.


    Together with him, the three of them were none other than the Celestial Immortals of the Astorion Empire who had just learnt about the situation at the frontier city through the guardian formation.


    "This is going to be troublesome¡­ Who is going to go?" Calming down the fastest among the three, a woman looking no more than twenty years old spoke up to break the gloomy mood that had begun to engulf the underground pce.


    "I can''t go, I''m too busy preparing for my uing seclusion to try and grasp the Dao of Rainwater. Now, if you two will excuse me, I will get going first!"


    Whoosh~!


    Before the middle-aged man or the young woman had a chance to say anything, the third person among the three of them, an old man looking like he was half a step into the grave, stood up and left. Only leaving behind a few words with his divine sense as he disappeared from the underground pce.


    "This old man¡­ Always running away at the first sign of trouble¡­"


    "Indeed, he is far too unreliable for an ancestor¡­. Back to the topic at hand, the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast, we can''t dy this matter for too long or we might have to rebuild the frontier city."


    Having already expected this to some extent, both the young woman and middle-aged man just shook their head before returning to the topic at hand. Who among them was going to go to the frontier city and deal with the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast?


    "How about you go this time around?"


    "No, no, how about you? You haven''t gone out for thest 100 years, I think it would be good for you and also serve as a chance to see the empire and how it has developed over the years."


    "Then what about you? You have been locked up in this ce for thest 500 years! Not to¡­"


    AS the two began discussing the matter in-depth through their divine sense to shorten the time it would take, a conclusion was soon reached as the middle-aged man ended up being the one who would go to deal with Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast at the frontier city.


    Rumble~!


    Knowing that it was best not to dy any longer, he didn''t waste any time as he directly used his movement technique to rush in the direction of the frontier city. Leaving behind the young woman who happily smirked at the sight. Clearly happy that she didn''t have to be the one to go out and deal with the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast.


    The main reason for this being that dealing with a Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast was far from simple and could possibly take months- if not years to resolve. Not including the obvious danger of having to face a demon beast in the Celestial Immortal Realm¡­


    10/10 chapter title, can''t convince me otherwise.

 Chapter 1217 Praise the Ancestor! Praise the Founder!

    Chapter 1217 Praise the Ancestor! Praise the Founder!


    Back at the frontier city, Xuan Hao was feeling a bit confused as he watched the colossal demon beast just harmlessly standing in front of the guardian formation of the frontier city without doing anything.


    Although it was a bit disappointing considering that he had been looking forward to finally seeing how strong someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm was, he also felt a bit relived knowing that his disciple and her family wouldn''t be in any danger. After all, he doubted that the Astorion Empire didn''t have any safety measures in ce in case a Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast happened to wander out from the primeval jungle and into their territory.


    Whoosh~!


    Not long after he thought about this, a powerful divine sense swept through the surroundings before locking on to the mountain sized demon beast, as a man appeared in the sky above the frontier city the next second. Showing no signs of fear in the face of the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast.


    That should be a Celestial Immortal from the Astorion Empire¡­


    Narrowing both his eyes as he focused his full attention on the man that had appeared above the frontier city, Xuan Hao could not help feeling himself getting a bit excited to see the fight between two Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators.


    After all, outside of just giving him a chance to see the current difference in strength between himself and someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, it would also give him a chance toprehend the different Daos that they hadprehended. Possibly giving him a chance to increase his own understanding or gain a foothold inprehending a brand new dao he had yet to understand.


    Roar?


    Noticing the appearance of the Celestial Immortal from the Astorion Empire, the demon beast that had been casually observing the guardian formation of the frontier city turned to look up at the man. Not showing any sign of hostility in the process. Instead, just curiously examining the neer.


    "Hm? Not one those five¡­ A new demon beast that recently broke through to the Celestial Immortal Realm? No¡­ This strength is definitely not the earlier stages of the Celestial Immortal Realm." Seeing the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast in person, the middle-aged man from the Astorion Empire could not help frowning as he said this himself while examining the mountain sized demon beast in towering above a few low hanging clouds.


    Though its size was massive, the demon beast was not a mountain so to speak but was instead a kind of colossal dragon turtle with a small forest growing on top of itsrge shell.


    Even from a simple scan with his divine sense just now, it was rather obvious that the demon beast hadn''t just reached the early stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm but was beyond that. Possibly even having reached the Late Stage of the Celestial Immortal Real!


    Thinking about this to himself as he kept his attention focused on the colossal dragon turtle silently observing him, the middle-aged man could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    His own strength had only reached the Peak of the Early Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm and was far from enough to fight the dragon turtle.


    Though there might only be a difference of a single minor realm between the two of them, as someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, he understood very well how massive the difference of a small minor realm was upon reaching the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    The reason why the Astorion Empire had managed to establish itself and keep its current position as one of the peak powers on the continent was precisely because the Astorion Empire had a Celestial Immortal at the Intermediate Stage. Allowing it to stand above normal powers with Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators protecting them.


    Unfortunately, that old man will be hard to contact now that he has run away¡­ If only he had been the one to go instead of me¡­


    Sighing internally as he thought this to himself, the Celestial Immortal from the Astorion Empire didn''t waste any time as he contacted the other two about the current situation through an emergency talisman. Hoping that the two would be able to show up and lend him a hand in dealing with the powerful demon beast-


    "Rooar-! Wait!"


    However, just as he took out the emergency talisman and contacted the other two about the current urgent situation, another roar echoed out from the primeval jungle partial hidden behind the massive frame of the dragon turtle. Followed by a broken voice speaking in themonnguage used by the entire Ewaria Continent before a human figure more than three meters tall covered in a thickyer of hair appeared beside the dragon turtle demon beast.


    "Huh? Old Iron Fist?! What are you doing here? Have you alsoe to cause trouble for my Astorion Empire!?" Recognizing the other party as none other than one of the five Celestial Immortal Realm demon beasts living close to the primeval jungle''s border with the Astorion Empire- Or to be more precise, the human form of one of the demon beasts.


    For demon beasts, after they broke through to the Celestial Immortal Realm. Not only would their intelligence reach a level no less than that of a human in the Celestial Immortal Realm, but they would also gain the ability to take on a human form¡­ Though from the demon beast now floating in the air beside the colossal dragon turtle demon beast, it was obvious that this transformation was nowhere near perfect and could at most be considered an iplete transformation.


    Even then, it was a ratherrge shock to Xuan Hao observing the situation from afar, as he had never witnessed a demon beast capable of conversing normally like a human before. At most he could generally tell what his contracted demon beasts were trying to tell him through the contract he had established with them¡­ And though intelligent, it wasn''t anywhere near the level of the floating hairy ball called Old Iron Fist.


    "Trouble? I''m just here to pick up this fellow before your Astorion Empire ends up doing something stupid." Rolling his eye upon hearing what the middle-aged man from the Astorion Empire said, the massive and buff looking hair ball turned to say something to the dragon turtle demon beast in anguage that could only be described as a few random roars.


    Rooar~!


    However, the dragon turtle demon beast seemed to understand these few random roars, as it soon turned around and began to leave in the direction of the primeval jungle without doing anything to attack the guardian formation that it had been curiously observing for the past few minutes. Giving the cultivators hidden away inside the frontier city a chance to breath out a sigh of relief as they felt like they had just escaped from certain death.


    "Haha! We are saved!"


    "An Expert of our empire appeared! That is the only way that massive turtle demon beast would have run away without a fight! Haha! The Astorion Empire is indeed powerful. Even dealing with the terrifying demon beasts of the primeval jungle with ease!"


    "Hehe, what do all of you know! I''m sure that it wasn''t just someone from the capital, it might have been the founder who came to confront the demon beast. After all, without the strength of the founder, how could such a powerful demon beast retreat without a fight?"


    "Indeed! That makes sense."


    "Yeah, it has to be the founder!"


    Outside of Xuan Hao and the other five Dao Seed Realm cultivators present in the frontier city at the moment, none of them had any idea about the appearance of a second Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast and just thought that the retreat of the dragon turtle demon beast was because the powerful founder had appeared and intimidated the demon beast into running away.


    "Thank you for your grace, Great Founder!"


    """Thank you! Great Founder!"""


    In the end, therge number of people hidden away inside the frontier city all came together and knelt down respectfully in the direction of the sky above the frontier city where they presumed the old founder to be standing at this moment. Quietly watching over all of them as the powerful demon beast retreated with its tail between its legs.


    "¡­" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    At the same time, in the sky above the frontier city, the middle-aged man could not help feeling his face starting to turn dark as he listened to the countless praises from the crowd below. Praising thezy old man who had run away at the first sign of trouble as some kind of saint that had saved all of them from certain death.


    "HAHHAHAHAHAHAHA! How did thatzy old fossil end up getting praised like this all of a sudden when he isn''t even here!? You humans really are unique! Hahaha! I can''t stopughing!"


    Not too far away, the demon beast in its iplete human form could not stop itself as it beganughing loudly with a smile stered all over its face after seeing the predicament of the middle-aged man. Almost reaching the point where it had to stop itself from falling backwards and identally crash into the ground below.

 Chapter 1218 Demon Beast Family?

    Not long after the demon beast stoppedughing at the Celestial Immortal from the Astorion turned and began to leave in the same direction as the dragon turtle demon beast. Considering that he had onlye to pick up the dragon turtle demon beast before it started causing damage and potentially invited the wrath of the surrounding human experts, the barely human demon beast had no intention of fighting with the Celestial Immortal cultivator floating above the frontier city. Even more so after he noticed the clear killing intent in the other party''s eyes after heughed at him.


    "Running away?" Seeing this, the man from the Astorion Empire frowned on the outside, while secretly feeling happy that the demon beasts had decided to leave without a fight. After all, he had no confidence in facing two Celestial Immortal Realm demon beasts alone.


    Even though he had already called for help from the other two, he had no idea when they would arrive with the fastest speed being a few minutes.


    "Hmph! Don''t think I can''t tell what you are thinking, human! I will make sure toe back again in the future when our agreement runs out. At that point, I hope you won''t run away!" Frowning visibly as he said this, the demon beast seemed to have sensed something as it had sped off in the direction of the primeval jungle just after finishing its sentence.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Not a secondter, two new figures appeared above the frontier city.


    These two figures belonged to none other than the remaining two Celestial Immortals of the Astorion Empire, who had rushed over the moment they had received the news of there being more than one Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast present. Even the old man who would normally avoid trouble had appeared.


    "They left already¡­? Haaa¡­ What a waste of time, I will be leaving¡­"


    Whoosh~!


    However, before the two others even had time to say anything to him, he jumped back into the sky and disappeared. Having already determined that the situation had been resolved after noticing the two demon beasts returning to the primeval jungle.


    ""¡­""


    Seeing this, both the middle-aged man and young woman couldn''t help looking in the direction that the old man had left in with disbelief. Although the demon beasts were indeed leaving and making their way back to the primeval jungle, shouldn''t he at least stay around for a period of time to ensure that there wasn''t some kind of trap in ce waiting for them to lower their guard and give the other party the opportunity to kill?


    With such thoughts in mind, the two could only sigh restlessly as they began to study the matter that had just taken ce in more detail, both of them wondering where a massive demon beast like the dragon turtle had suddenly popped up from.


    Considering that they visited the primeval jungle at least once every hundred or so years to check out the situation of the demon beasts there, they wanted to find out where the new and powerful dragon turtle demon beast hade from and what its intentions for showing up at the frontier city was.


    However, after more than half an hour passed like this, neither of them could figure out where the dragon turtle demon beast hade from and could only conclude that it might havee from the somewhere deeper inside the primeval jungle that was off limits to humans.


    "Ah! Now that I think about it¡­" Having thought about something all of a sudden, the young woman turned to look at the man next to her with an uncertain expression on her face. "It might be from one of those demon beast families in that ce. Although they willingly surrendered back then and sealed themselves off across the remote regions of the core region, I doubt they n to sit still forever and allow us humans to continue enjoying the most abundantnd of the core region." "Hm? Those families of demon beasts?" Frowning as he heard what the young woman, the man seemed to show a doubtful expression on his face as he seemed to demand for her to exin.


    "Indeed, an unknown Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast isn''t that difficult to exin, but this dragon turtle demon beast should at least have reached the Middle Stages of the Celestial Immortal Realm. Possibly even beyond that!


    The only ce that it could remain hidden with such a level of strength for long enough to reach such strength would be the territory under those demon beast families. Don''t forget, arge portion of those families reside in the depth of the primeval jungle!" Nodding her head as she said this, the young woman seemed to have convinced herself as she turned to look back in the direction of the capital city. "This might be the prelude to another war with the demon beasts. Even if its not the case, I propose we use our power as one of the forces in charge of keeping an eye on the primeval jungle to call a meeting."


    "Another war with the demon beast!? You are moving far too fast, we should first contact the others in charge of keeping an eye on the primeval jungle before doing anything, you should know the importance of calling a meeting. If you don''t have anything serious and waster people''s time, the Astorion Empire might be erased!" Hearing what the young woman said, the middle-aged man who had remained rtively calm so far could not help loudly eximing this as he looked at the young woman like he was looking at a crazy person.


    "This¡­ Fine, we will ask the others first¡­" Knowing that she might indeed have jumped to a bit extreme conclusion after spotting the massive unknown demon beast that had appeared out of seemingly thin air, the young woman could only awkwardly nod her head with embarrassment before the two of them deactivated the guardian formation of the frontier city and made their way back towards the capital to see if they could find out more about the situation of the primeval jungle and if there had been any abnormalities recently.


    Although an unknown demon beast at the Middle Stages of the Celestial Immortal Realm was close to impossible, it had happened a few times in the past with demon beasting from the endless ocean¡­ And the primeval jungle was to some extent connected to the endless ocean through the Blue Sea Empire.


    Making it possible for a demon beast from the endless ocean to cross through the Blue Sea Empire undetected before entering the primeval jungle and making its way to the primeval jungle''s border with the Astorion Empire. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As for the death of the old woman from the noble family and what had happened in the frontier city before their arrival? Neither of them knew anything about this outside of the fact that they could sense that a Dao Seed Realm cultivator had fallen outside the frontier city a short time before their arrival¡­ And given therge number of dead demon beasts around, they just presumed that the Dao Seed Realm cultivator had died protecting the capital before ultimately being killed by the dragon turtle demon beast.


    Even though they felt this was a pity considering that the battle scars left behind on the scene showed that the other party had fought bravely against several powerful demon beasts at once, they couldn''t do much to punish the dragon turtle demon beast and could only feel a bit of justice at the fact that the other party had managed to drag down seven Dao Seed Realm demon beasts with her.


    Outside of the brave soul that had perished, they also sensed the presence of Xuan Hao and the four others, but due to the fact that most of the battle scenes had been messed up by the dragon turtle demon beast before their arrival, they just thought that they had been helping the now dead old woman from the noble family in her fight.


    Three Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the Frontier City, two from a noble family that had happened to pass by and a wandering Dao Seed realm cultivator¡­


    In the eyes of the two Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators, a massive fight of epic proportions had taken ce between humans and demon beasts before their arrival¡­ And from how only a single human Dao Seed Realm cultivator had ended up dead, while seven demon beasts had perished, it was obvious that the human cultivators had ended up winning even with one less person.


    In a sense, this made the two Celestial Immortals feel a bit proud as they had already thought of rewarding the Dao Seed Realm cultivators for their bravery after they returned. Blissfully unaware of what had actually happened before their arrival and how the old woman from the noble family had ended up dying together with the seven demon beasts.


    Then again, there was a chance of them never finding out about this, as the noble family currently in need of all the help they could get, and the three ruling families with nothing to lose by staying silent might decide not to share what had happened in fear of missing out on these possible future rewards given by these Celestial Immortals¡­

 Chapter 1219 Demon Beast War...

    Chapter 1219 Demon Beast War...


    Demon beast family? Another war with the demon beasts?


    Listening in to the conversation between the two Celestial Immortals from the Astorion Empire, Xuan Hao could not help frowning as he looked in the direction that both of them had left in.


    Not only did they introduce a new thing he had never heard about before like demon beast families, but they also mentioned a possible war between the humans and demon beasts on the Ewaria Continent. Although the chance of this really being the case was low, Xuan Hao could not help worrying as he thought about what little he knew of thest such war between humans and demon beasts that had taken ce in the past.


    ording to historical records that had been gathered from the different powers that ended up integrating into the Star Shattering Sect over the past few years, thest war between the humans and demon beasts had taken ce tens of thousands of years ago back around the founding of the Sky Empire. Back then, countless empires outside the central region had ended up perishing as a result of the demon beast running rampant everywhere as they shed with the powerful cultivators of the humans on the continent. At the same time, it was also due to this turmoil that many new empires like the Sky Empire had been able to establish themselves in the outer part of the continent.


    In the end, from the information he knew about that period of time, the only ces that had been stable were the edges of the continent that neither the humans nor demon beasts were interested in and the core areas of powerful empires like the Blue Sea Empire.


    Smaller empires with less than a handful of Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators like the Astorion Empire weren''t that stable during this period of time¡­ And those unlucky enough to be located next to the ces that the powerful demon beasts inhabited even ended up falling. Marking a rare asion in history where no small number of Celestial Immortals ended up dying.


    Of course, all of this was ultimately dealt with when the pinnacle experts of the human race united and worked together to suppress the demon beasts. Forcing them into their current state of being limited to areas like the primeval jungle¡­ And even then, humans would still enter the primeval jungle for resources or to hunt down demon beasts every now and then.


    With that in mind, it was obvious that the powerful experts among the demon beasts would restart the fight of the past at some point in time. After all, they wouldn''t want to continue the current state of things and slowly get killed off by the humans.


    Even Xuan Hao felt that something like this was obvious, it was just that he didn''t expect this war to happen any time soon.


    After all, with all things considered, the demon beasts in the Dao Seed Realm and above could easily live twice if not longer than the human cultivators of equivalent realm. If they nned to resume the war again, it made sense for them to wait until the more powerful cultivators from back then passed away.


    Starting the war now meant that the powerful human cultivators from back then would still be around and more than strong enough to fight back. Meaning that the demon beast would encounter the same defeat that they had experienced in the past. Probably even more severe than back then given the powerful human cultivators wouldn''t allow their descendants to be left with a powerful enemy after they passed away.


    "Unless¡­ They have something to rely on. Giving them confidence in being able to win this time around¡­" Muttering this to himself as he turned to look over at the primeval jungle not too far away, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head.


    No matter what would happen in regard to the demon beasts and humans of the core region, it was not something he could interfere with at the moment. Even if his strength reached a levelparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm, he doubted there would be much he would be able to do in war of such scale.


    Only reaching the Profound Immortal Realm mentioned by the old man from the Fallen Immortal Archipgo would he stand a chance at influencing a war of such a scale.


    For now, the most important thing would be to continue strengthening the Star Shattering Sect and his disciples.


    Even if he wouldn''t be able to interfere in arge war like that, he at least nned to ensure the safety of the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Now that I think about it, I should have Elder Song focus on expanding towards the border region of the continent instead of the core region, that way, the Star Shattering Sect would be far less impacted if a war did end up breaking out in the near future. Not to mention, it should be far easier to do and would also avoid drawing attention from the more powerful empires like the Blue Sea Empire¡­" Shaking his head as he said this, Xuan Hao nced towards the primeval jungle onest time before he concealed himself as an ordinary Domain Lord and entered the frontier city without any of the Dao Seed Realm cultivators noticing him.


    Considering that the danger for the Chun Family had passed, he intended to take his disciple back with him to the Star Shattering Sect before any of the Dao Seed Realm cultivators could cause any more trouble.


    At the same time, he did also think about having Chun Hua''s grandfather and family join the Star Shattering Sect or at least move to the territory under the Star Shattering Sect, but quickly gave up on the thought.


    After all, the Chun Familypromised of thousands of people and taking all of them through the primeval jungle all the way back to the Star Shattering Sect wasn''t doable with his current strength. Even if he had the help of Chun Hua''s grandfather, he doubted it would make much of a difference considering that both of them would at most be able to protect a handful of people if they ended up running into a Dao Seed Realm demon beast inside the primeval jungle.


    Not to mention, he highly doubted that Chun Hua''s grandfather would give up the current position held by the Chun Family to go to the Star Shattering Sect that he essentially knew nothing about outside of what Xuan Hao and his granddaughter had told him about it.


    Having his granddaughter go there to learn and improve her cultivation was one thing, moving the entire Chun Family was apletely different matter that involved the life and death of the family. Not a decision that could be taken lightly.


    Even though there was still the threat of the noble family inside the Astorion Empire, Chun Hua''s grandfather was only worried about something like this due to his injury. After he recovered, there wouldn''t be much that the noble family could do to him. Especially considering that they had lost their most senior Dao Seed Realm Expert. Forcing them toy low for the foreseeable future as they stabilized things back home.


    ¡­


    "The seniors left¡­ I never expected all three of them to show up at once. Haaa¡­ Looks like the situation turned out far more serious than I imagined¡­" Mumbling this to himself as he looked up towards the ce where the three Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators from the Astorion Empire had been standing just a few seconds earlier, Chun Hua''s grandfather could not help feeling a sense of relief washing over him. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although he had believed that the situation would be under control after the first senior in the Celestial Immortal Realm appeared, he had never imagined that an additional demon beast in the Celestial Immortal Realm would appear. Not only that, but the mountain sized demon beast seemed to be stronger than the senior from the Astorion Empire.


    Only after the mountain sized demon beasts began leaving after a short conversation between the senior from the Astorion Empire and the new demon beast, did he breathe a sigh of relief.


    However, this did notst long, as the appearance of the two other Celestial Immortal Realm seniors of the Astorion Empire made him tense once again.


    Luckily, the two didn''t stay for long and quickly left the scene. Unfortunately, he did manage to hear what two of these seniors talked about. Making him reconsider whether or not to move his family away from the primeval jungle.


    Even if the benefits of staying were rather high and made the Chun Family far more wealthypared to other powers that only had the support of a single Dao Seed Realm cultivator, the danger of staying next to the primeval jungle when a possible war with the demon beasts was on the horizon would definitely make him think about leaving before things erupted.


    "At least my granddaughter won''t be anywhere near this ce¡­" Muttering this to himself as he turned to nce at his oblivious granddaughter just staring out in the direction of the primeval jungle with a look of awe on her face, Chun Hua''s grandfather could not help feeling that it wasn''t such a bad thing to send his daughter to a sect located outside the core region of the continent. At least, it would be far safer if a war really did end up erupting between the humans and demon beasts in the near future.

 Chapter 1220 Fighting to Hold On

    Chapter 1220 Fighting to Hold On


    Returning to the Chun Family, Xuan Hao ended up spending the next few days helping Chun Hua''s grandfather recovering before he left together with Chun Hua in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect.


    However, given the presence of the Celestial Immortal Realm demon beasts that had emerged from the primeval jungle not too long ago, he didn''t dare to rush into the primeval jungle and instead travelled along the edges of the primeval jungle for a few days before being sure that he wouldn''t run into them while passing through the primeval jungle together with Chun Hua.


    Even though he felt confident in escaping with the help of the Dao of Space, he also didn''t want to run the risk considering that one of the demon beasts had clearly surpassed the Earlier Stages of the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao began his journey back to the Star Shattering Sect together with Chun Hua, the war between the few Soul Ascension Realm Experts gathered together in the capital city of the Sky Empire and the invading empires who wanted to take a chunk of the Sky Empire for themselves, had officially begun.


    The battle itself caused everyone below the Soul Ascension Realm to shake in fear, as more than a dozen people in the Soul Ascension Realm shed with each other in the air above and around the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    Among which, the most impressive battle taking ce being the one between the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the three religions of the Sky Empire. Even the weakest among them had reached the Peak of the Second Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm, while the strongest had shockingly managed to reach the Third Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Of course, the reason why they could reach such a terrifying level of power all of a sudden was because they had managed to gain the assistance of the higher ups from the core region of the continent, each being bestowed a divine technique that allowed them to increase their strength far beyond what it was normally.


    Even then, the three were faced with thebined might of around a dozen different empires, each of which had at least sent out three of their Soul Ascension Realm Experts to fight for territory in the Sky Empire¡­ And although they might be able to hold off two or three of these Soul Ascension Realm cultivators on their own, there was no way the few other Soul Ascension Realm Experts on their side would be able to do this.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    As a result of this, the three of them ended up facing five Soul Ascension Realm Experts on their own, while the more powerful Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the invading Empires decided to remain on the sidelines for now.


    Not because they couldn''t join in and kill them, but because they had to have some strength in reserve in case any of the other empires decided to target them.


    "We just need to hold out a little longer¡­" Muttering this to himself as he struggled to hold on against five First Stage Soul Ascension Realm Experts, the Soul Ascension Realm Expert from the Order of the Sky God felt some hope in his current difficult situation.


    The reason for this was that he and the cardinals from Cult of the Scarlet Moon and the Followers of the Fire God, had managed to sessfully persuade their seniors from their religion located in core region of the continent to send help. The only requirement being that they managed to keep the capital city of the Sky Empire under their control without allowing any of the invading empires to im it.


    Although none of them had any idea why they had to hold the capital city to receive help from their seniors, they didn''t dare to question them or ask why they had to do something meaningless like risking their life to keep control of the capital city during the few months it would take their seniors to reach the Sky Empire.


    If not for this, there was no way that the three of them would have dared to stay behind and fight it out with the invading empires after seeing the sheer number of Soul Ascension Realm Experts that had gathered to surround the capital city.


    Boom!


    As he was lost in thought thinking about this, the cardinal suddenly felt a cold de stabbing right through his chest before a terrifying energy began wreaking havoc inside his body-


    "Hmph!"


    Whoosh-!


    Knowing that he had to deal with the situation fast, the cardinal wasted no time in forcibly suppressing the violent energy inside his body while at the same time pushing the sword out of his body before focusing his full attention back on the five Soul Ascension Realm Experts attacking him.


    Although he was stronger than the other two cardinal and had managed to reach the Third Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm after using the divine technique that had been bestowed upon him by his seniors, he couldn''t let his thoughts wander in his current dangerous situation.


    Like he had just experienced, a singlepse in attention could result in his enemy finding an opening to attack.


    Not to mention, he could still feel the gaze of a powerful cultivator at the Fourth Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm among the more powerful Soul Ascension Realm Experts who had decided to wait on the sidelines.


    Hmph! You are going to regret not killing us when the exalted one appears!


    Smiling disdainfully without anyone noticing as he saw this scene, the cardinal stopped attempting to fight back and instead focused his full strength on defending. Intending to preserve as much strength as possible while waiting for his seniors to show up.


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Simr to him, the other two Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the remaining two religions also stopped trying to fight back before focusing their full strength on defending themselves and preventing the attacking Soul Ascension Realm Experts from inflicting any serious injuries on them.


    Considering that both of them were an entire minor realm below the cardinal from the Order of the Sky God, they had a far harder time doing this¡­


    "Hm¡­ Those three focused all their strength on defending themselves. Showing no intentions of trying to win the battle¡­"


    "Indeed, they might be nning something. Although, I doubt they can do much in their current situation."


    "Yeah, those two at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm should be able to hold on for three to four days in their current state, while thest one should be able tost five days before they are forced to escape. If they give up on escaping, they might all have a chance to hold on for a week if none of us interfere."


    "A week¡­ Do any of you have the patience to wait that long? I doubt they willst more than three days before someone start to lose their patience!" Observing the chance in the three cardinals from a distance, the more powerful Soul Asension Realm Experts began discussing the current situation of the three among each other. Ultimatelying to the consensus that the three of them should be able to hold on for at least three days if they wanted to attempt escaping and a week if they gave up any hope of trying to rush out of the encirclement.


    So far, none of the Soul Ascension Realm Experts observing the fight taking ce had any idea about the fact that the three were trying to do their best to stall for time.


    After all, given their knowledge on the different religions that spread throughout the empires and kingdoms outside the core region of the continent, they understood that destroying them wouldn''t result in any response from therger part of the religion located in the core region. Instead, it was more likely for a new branch of the religion that had lost its ce to randomly appear inside a new empire without caring about what had ended up happening to thest branch. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even in the rare circumstance that the powerful experts from the core region did appear, it would only be due to some kind of extraordinary event rted to the birth of a precious spiritual herb or treasure that also attracted other powers from the core region.


    At least since thest war between the humans and the demon beasts, the different religions from the core region of the continent had never interfered in what happened in the outer region.


    For this reason, these Soul Ascension realm Experts had never thought about the aloof religions that normally never interfered in the outer region of the continent, would have suddenly decided to start interfering in the situation. Especially because they knew that the three religions of the Sky Empire had their branches in the outer region destroyed more than once, as they had originally not only operated inside the Sky Empire, but also in two empires outside of the Sky Empire itself...

 Chapter 1221 Fall of the Sky Empire (Part 1)

    Chapter 1221 Fall of the Sky Empire (Part 1)


    As the battle at the capital of the Sky Empire ragged on with the powerful Soul Ascension Realm cardinals from the three religions focusing all of their strength into defending themselves, the remaining Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the Sky Empire were quickly pushed to the brink of death by the Soul Ascension Realm Experts from the invading empires.


    Although they were also in the Soul Ascension Realm, the strongest among them had only reached the Peak of the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Making it impossible for them to hold on against therge number of Soul Ascension Realm Experts like the cardinals of the three religions could. Especially considering that they didn''t have any special divine technique to enhance their strength.


    Boom!


    "Nooo-!"


    And it was in this kind of dangerous situation that the first Soul Ascension Realm Expert from the Sky Empire, the old ancestor of the Earth Dragon n, one ofrgest powers in the Sky Empire, ended up being struck down and killed under thebined attacks of three cultivators at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    I-I have to escape! I can''t die here!


    Seeing this as he himself was being suppressed by two people at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, the old ancestor of the Hollow Thunder Family who had just recently managed to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm could not help feeling any will to continue staying to fight for his family''s survival disappearing.


    Although the three cardinals had informed him and the rest of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators that they had managed to get support from their higher ups and that they would just have to hold on until they appeared, he understood that he might not be able to hold on for much longer with his current strength.


    Even if it meant that he would have to give up on his family still located in the capital city below, he didn''t want to die just after he had broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm. Finally achieving his dream of bing a true powerhouse in the world. Respected even in a ce like the core region of the continent.


    I can always rebuild my family again in the future. Not to mention, now that I''m in the Soul Ascension Realm, I might be able to do so in the core region and try to see if I can reach a higher realm in the future¡­


    Whoosh-! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Havinge to a decision as he felt it bing increasingly hard to defend against the two people relentlessly attacking him, the ancestor of the Hollow Thunder Family didn''t think twice as he turned around and escaped from the capital. Directly choosing to burn part of his own lifespan to increase his speed far beyond the limits of someone in the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Sto-"


    Boom!


    Jumping out to stop him as he reached the encirclement formed by the more powerful cultivators, a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator at the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension didn''t even have time to finish his sentence as the ancestor of the Hollow Thunder Family took out a talisman and threw at him. Exploding in a brilliant disy thunder that pushed him back, while giving the ancestor of the Hollow Thunder Family a chance to escape the enrichment.


    "Huh? This¡­" Recovering the next second, the cultivator at the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm could only look of into the direction that the old ancestor of the Hollow Thunder Family had disappeared in. Already having left the range of his divine sense by the time he recovered from the thunder talisman.


    "Don''t bother about him, he is too cowardly to think about revenge." About to give chase to prevent possible future trouble from emerging, the Soul Ascension Realm expert was stopped by an even more senior figure at the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "But¡­ That talisman earlier-"


    "It''s the hollow thunder talisman, an ancient talisman that has been the inheritance of the Hollow Thunder Family in the Sky Empire for generations. If I''m not wrong, the person in question should be the ancestor from the hollow thunder family who just recently overcame the first tribtion and broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm. Given his talent and the fact that he only broke through close to the end of his lifespan, I doubt he will be able to survive the second tribtion.


    Not to mention the hollow thunder talisman that was the inheritance of his family was used just now to stop you. Meaning that it will be hard for him to rebuild his family in future¡­ And that is without ounting for the fact that he used a technique to burn his lifespan during his escape¡­" Patiently exining the reason why he didn''t worry about future trouble from the ancestor of the Hollow Thunder family, the senior slowly turned his attention back to the fight between the three cardinals and the group of weaker Soul Ascension Realm cultivators.


    Compared to those three, the rest of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators still left in the Sky Empire was simply not worth mentioning in his eyes.


    Outside of that, there was also the fact that the imperial family of the Sky Empire was still around and hidden somewhere inside the Sky Empire.


    Although the old ancestor of the imperial family had been injured, he was still someone at the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm with a terrifying mastery over formations.


    One of the reasons why he and the rest of the more powerful Soul Ascension Realm cultivators didn''t join in on the fight that was taking ce between the three cardinals and the weaker Soul Ascension Realm cultivators was because they worried that the old ancestor of the imperial family had left behind some kind of hidden killing formation in the capital city.


    Though the chance of something like this was low, the chance still existed, and the different powerful Soul Ascension Realm cultivators didn''t want to end up in a situation where they had to rely on the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators from the other empire for help.


    After all, if they ended up trapped inside a killing formation left behind by the ancestor of the imperial family of the Sky Empire, it was more likely that the others would take the chance to kill them and set their sight on their empire next.


    It was in this kind of situation that three days passed, the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators still left on the side of the Sky Empire either dying or using some kind of secret trump card to escape from the encirclement like the ancestor of the Hollow Thunder Family had done.


    In the end, the only people left around the capital of the Sky Empire were the three cardinals from the three religions and the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators fighting them.


    Of course, there were also therge number of people living in the capital of the Sky Empire hiding away inside the capital city, but these people were far too weak to influence the oue of the battle and were thus ignored by the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators above.


    In the eyes of everyone at the scene, the only threat was the three cardinals and the possibly hidden killing formation hidden around the capital city.


    After these two were dealt with, it would be rather simple to take care of the remaining people inside the capital city of the Sky Empire, be it killing them to prevent any possible future problems or recruiting the more talented ones to increase their own strength.


    ¡­


    Observing the battle taking ce above the capital city of the Sky Empire with the help of a special artifact from a hidden ce far away from the capital itself, a handsome middle-aged sighed sadly to himself upon seeing the three cardinals about to lose.


    If the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators fighting above the capital city and those watching the battle from afar were to see him, they would instantly recognize him as none other than the Great Emperor of the Sky Empire, a powerful cultivator at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    However, different from his normal heroic and awe-inspiring appearance, his current appearance was filled with sadness as he understood what was about to happen.


    "Those three won''t be able to hold on for much longer. Looks like the war is about to reach a conclusion¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, he prepared himself for what was about toe. Understanding very well that when the three cardinals fell, the Sky Empire would have officiallye to an end as those invading empires would begin dividing up the territory of the Sky Empire among themselves. Ending the legacy of Sky Empire that had stood for over ten thousand years, while at the same time destroying the hope he had of rebuilding his empire in the foreseeable future.

 Chapter 1222 Fall of the Sky Empire (Part 2)

    Chapter 1222 Fall of the Sky Empire (Part 2)


    "Indeed, they won''t be able to hold on for that much longer and will soon be forced to escape if they still want to keep their life." Appearing behind the emperor of the Sky Empire, an old man that seemed to be having a difficult time standing up straight quietly said this as he simrly looked at the battle taking ce above the sky of the capital city.


    "Ancestor! You shouldn''t be moving around like this in your current state!" Seeing the old man, the emperor of the Sky Empire instantly panicked as he rushed over to support the old man. At the same time giving away the fact that the frail looking old man was none other than the old ancestor of the Sky Empire''s imperial family, a powerful cultivator at the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Different from his past awe-inspiring image deserving of a powerful ancestor at the Soul Ascension Realm, his current state looked no different than a mortal in his twilight years.


    "Hmph! You little brat, you don''t need to worry about me, I''m just here to see how the empire I founded is going to end." Pushing away the emperor, the old ancestor of the imperial family walked up to the artifact showing the fight taking ce between the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators from the invading empires and the three cardinals from the three major religions.


    "Hehe, those three archived their dream of taking control of my empire after so long, but none of them have the strength to intimidate those outsiders! Haha, it really feels great to see them being beaten to death by those outsiders!" Laughing happily to himself as he saw the desperate situation of the three cardinals, the old ancestor of the imperial family could not help feeling happy knowing that his empire wouldn''t end up in the hands of those three.


    "But if those three lose, the territory of our Sky Empire will be divided up by the invading empires. If we want to rebuild the Sky Empire in the future, it will be far harder than-"


    "Don''t worry about it, we managed to escape with the majority of the family and didn''t lose much of our strength. After I recover my strength again, it won''t be hard for our family to establish a new empire. Even if we start out with a smaller territorypared to the past, we can always expand when we have enough strength." Interrupting the emperor of a soon to be fallen empire, the old ancestor reassured him that there wasn''t anything to worry about.


    Indeed, even thought the imperial family of the Sky Empire had lost all of their territory and were forced to hide away while their ancestor recovered, they didn''t lose any of their Soul Ascension Realm cultivators¡­ And with the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators of the imperial family still around, the imperial family of the Sky Empire had a chance to rise again in the future.


    "I understand¡­" Knowing that his ancestor spoke the truth, the emperor reluctantly nodded his head.


    Although what his ancestor said was indeed the truth, he also understood that it would take thousands of years for the Sky Empire to be rebuilt from scratch. Possibly even longer considering that they would also have to deal with the pressure of the surrounding empire who didn''t want to see the rebirth of the Sky Empire.


    Maybe we should start in the outer parts of the continent where there is lesspetition before working our back towards the core region¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he began to silently n how to reestablish the Sky Empire after the recovery of his ancestor, the emperor of the Sky Empire turned his attention back towards the image of the fight above the capital city projected by the artifact. Curious about whether or not the three cardinals had the ability to escape from the encirclement that had formed around the capital city.


    After all,pared to the weaker Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who didn''t pose much of a threat to the invading empires, the three cardinals were different.


    Not only were they more powerful, but they also might establish a new branch of their religion in the future and target their empire.


    Though this did not happen often, as most of the people who failed to protect the branch they were in charge of and escaped by themselves were dealt by the higher ups of the religion and never appeared again, none of the invading empires wanted to take the chance. nning to eliminate them and prevent future problems.


    However, contrary to what the emperor from the Sky Empire and the other experts observing the struggle of the three cardinals thought would happen, the three cardinals didn''t escape after the three-day mark and instead continued staying above the capital city of the Sky Empire. Using all of their strength in holding back therge number of First Tribtion Realm Soul Ascension Realm cultivators attacking them.


    Of course, this didn''te without problems, as all three of them began to grow weaker. Having a harder time facing off against the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who attacked them only to be interrupted when one of them ran out of energy and was reced by another Soul Ascension Realm cultivator waiting on the side.


    Holding off against this kind of attack for three days straight was the limit for the two cardinals who had managed to reach the Peak of the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm with their divine technique if they still wanted to stand a chance of escaping the capital city. Meaning that they had essentially given up their path of escape to continue trying to hold on for a few days longer.


    At the same time, though the third cardinal was stronger and could dy escaping for a few more days, it became obvious that he had no intention of doing so in the eye of the observing Soul Ascension Realm cultivators after seeing the actions of the two weaker cardinals.


    "What are they nning? Do they perhaps want to fight to the death defending their branch?"


    "Fight to the death? Hmph! I doubt it, they should be nning something¡­"


    "nning something? What could they be nning?"


    "Yeah, there isn''t much those three can do with all of us here."


    As the stronger Soul Ascension Realm cultivators realized that the three cardinals had no intention of running away and instead seemed to be dragging things out, they couldn''t help hesitating on what to do.


    Part of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators thought that they might be secretly nning something and decided to y it safe and observe the situation first, while another part of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators just thought the three wanted to fight to the death defending their branch. After all, it wasn''t umon for something like that to happen when it came to religions. At the same time, it was also during moments like this that they would be the most dangerous.


    In the end, both sides of the observing Soul Ascension Realm cultivators were unwilling to interfere with the fight between the three cardinals and the weaker Soul Ascension Realm cultivators, some of the fearing that they might walk into a trap, while the other part feared dealing with a crazy zealot on the brink of death.


    The destruction of the Sky Empire that seemed to be just around the corner inevitably ended up dragging on for another two days before the two weaker cardinals who had managed to reach the Peak of the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm couldn''t hold on any longer and were unable to fully defend themselves against the continues barrage of attacks-


    "Aaaah-!"


    Ultimately resulting in the cardinal belonging to the Cult of the Scarlet Moon being cut down. Instantly increasing the pressure on the other two, as the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators joined the other two groups in dealing with the remaining two cardinals.


    "Ah! Damn it all!"


    FWOOOOSH-!


    Knowing very well that he had no way to hold on for any longer after seeing three of the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who had just killed the cardinal from the Cult of the Scarlet Moon, the cardinal, who was a Follower of the Fire God, cursed loudly before his entire body transformed into a giant me that directly swallowed the five nearby Soul Ascension Realm cultivators-


    "Get back! He''s go- Ahhh!"


    "Nooo!"


    "Don''t- Ahh-!"


    Giving the five no chance to react as all of them were engulfed by the me. Killing them before they had a chance to resist. Instantly causing the remaining Soul Ascension Realm cultivators present to freeze on the spot as they looked in the direction where the cardinal who was a Follower of the Fire God had once been.


    In a single instant, he had used some kind of self-destruction technique to incinerate the body and souls of five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators. Killing them before they had a chance to fight back, while at the same time killing himself in the process!n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 1223 Fall of the Sky Empire (Part 3)

    Chapter 1223 Fall of the Sky Empire (Part 3)


    As everyone froze on the spot following the sudden death of the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators and the cardinal who was a follower of the Fire God, the cardinal from the Order of the Sky God breathed a sigh of relief as he used the time to recover some of his strength while keeping an eye on the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who had been attacking him just a short time ago.


    Given what had just happened, the stronger Soul Ascension Realm cultivators observing everything from afar felt even less inclined to join in on the fight taking ce, while those who had just ended up losing their Soul Ascension Realm cultivators decided to pull back their remaining Soul Ascension Realm cultivators and not interfere in his battle. Fearing that he would do something simr to the cardinal belonging to the faith of the Fire God had just done.


    In the end, the original dozen or so Soul Ascension Realm cultivators he would have to face on his own following the fall of the other two cardinals and the escape or fall of the other Soul Ascension Realm cultivators from the Sky Empire, was reduced down to seven people.


    Although this was still not something he could handle with his current strength, he would at least be capable of holding on for a few more days if none of the observing Soul Ascension Realm cultivators interfered, something that was unlikely to happen after the death of the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators.


    The senior should show up within this period of time. If not¡­ I won''t be able to make it and might have to join that fellow¡­


    Thinking this to himself as the battle that had momentarilye to a stop resumed again, the cardinal belonging to the Order of the Sky God could not help hoping that his senior would show up soon¡­


    "He actually chose to kill himself and take down five with him¡­ Looks like I underestimated the resolve of those three to defend their branch. Even when faced with death, they still stay and defend to the end, a pity that they will die like this¡­"


    At the same time that the cardinal following the Fire God incinerated himself and the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators fighting him, the old ancestor of the Sky Empire watching the fight from afar could not help muttering this to himself as he let out a sigh of regret.


    If not for the fact that the three cardinals had always been trying to vie for control over his empire since its establishment, he would have been overjoyed to have such people join his empire.


    "Indeed, a pity¡­ But at least they can inflict quite a bit of damage before dying. Making it a bit easier for us to reestablish ourselves in the future by targeting the territory of the empire who lost Soul Ascension Realm cultivators to them!"


    Not showing the same pity as the old ancestor who had been around for longer and had established some weird sense of friendship with the different cardinals who had been around since the start of the Sky Empire, the emperor standing beside him just nodded his head in response while listening out the clear benefits of the three cardinalsst ditch effort to defend their branch in the Sky Empire.


    Losing a single Soul Ascension Realm cultivator, even if it was only one at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, was a major loss to the invading empires and would weaken them until a new Soul Ascension Realm cultivator was produced, something that could take anywhere from a few hundred to a few thousand years.


    For one of the invading empires who ended up losing two of their Soul Ascension Realm cultivators just now, they would enter a period of time where would be weakened enough that they might not be able to hold on to all their territory. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    If they ended up losing another Soul Ascension Realm cultivator, they might even end up reaching the same point as the Onyx Empire, that was now looking like it would be a second Sky Empire after the different invading empires finished digesting their gains from conquering the Sky Empire.


    "¡­"


    Deciding not to respond to the emperor who was already busy thinking about how to restore the Sky Empire before it had even fallen, the old ancestor just turned his attention back to the battle taking ce above the capital city.


    Even though the cardinal from the Order of the Sky God was stronger than the other two and had managed to reach the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, he wouldn''t be able to hold on for more than a few days faced with the continuous barrage of attacks from seven Soul Ascension Realm cultivators at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension realm¡­ And the only reason he could evenst that long in the first ce was due to the fact that the attacking Soul Ascension Realm cultivators didn''t go all out like they had done in the past.


    Instead, they now acted far more cautiously than before. All of them fearful that the cardinal would suddenly sacrifice himself in an attempt to drag them down with him.


    ¡­


    "The Sky Empire is about toe to an end¡­" Whispering this to himself as he looked in the direction of the core region where the capital city of the Sky Empire was located, Feng Chen could not help feeling like a terrifying pressure was pressing down on him from above. Having just learnt about the invading empires attack on the capital city of the Sky Empire where thest remaining power of the Sky Empire was gathered.


    The reason for not finding out any sooner being that the different invading empires had essentially cut off any way for the people inside the capital city of the Sky Empire tomunicate with the outside world.


    Doing this not just to prevent the people inside the capital from trying to ask for help, but more importantly to prevent attracting people wanting to take advantage of the situation. More specifically the wandering Soul Ascension Realm cultivators and the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators that might be bordering one of the invading empires but being too far away to join in on the fight for territory in the Sky Empire.


    The first of which would want to try and take advantage of the chaos to rob the treasures left behind in the capital city, while thest wanted to prevent the empire that happened to border them getting stronger.


    Although it had been five days since the attack had begun and things were still not over, Feng Chen understood very well that the future days of the Star Shattering Sect would be difficult with the different invading empires possibly starting to pay more attention to the Star Shattering Sect after they were done with the Sky Empire.


    Even with the support of Xuan Hao and Pei Yang who had reached the Earth Immortal Realm, the overall strength of the Star Shattering Sect was still too weak. Especially in terms of cultivators in the Domain Lord Realm and Soul Ascension Realm.


    Not to mention, Xuan Hao had once again disappeared, while Pei Yang wouldn''t move unless the Star Shattering Sect was threatened, as he was still busy recovering his strength and had to worry about the possibility of being recognized by the people from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Realistically, the Star Shattering Sect was helpless in the face of the invading empire without the help of Xuan Hao and Pei Yang.


    "Maybe it''s better to stop expanding the territory of the sect after the two outer regions of the Sky Empire is under our control andy low for a few years to consolidate the new territory and increase the overall strength of the sect before continuing to expand." Muttering this to himself as he thought about the situation, Feng Chen felt that this made sense and went straight towards Elder Song''s courtyard to discuss the situation with him.


    Considering that Elder Song was the smartest person he knew and the fact that he seemed to be far more knowledge than him, the sect master, when it came to the development of the sect, Feng Chen wasn''t surprised to learn that Elder Song had already thought about this.


    Not just that, but after a short conversation, he even managed to learn that he had already arranged the future development of the sect after the two outer regions of the Sky Empire entered their control.


    As for how to deal with the outer region that was now partly under the control of them and the Onyx Empire? It was rather simple¡­ Just wait for the situation in the Sky Empire to resolve itself and wait for the Onyx Empire to retract its forces to solidify its defense against the empires wanting to take advantage of its current weakened state.


    ording to Elder Song, as long as the Star Shattering Sect yed it neutral during the uing conflict and didn''t continue to expand, it should be able to avoid entering the future war between the Onyx Empire and the different empires.


    After all, the current territory of the Star Shattering Sect wasn''t that valuable outside of a few ces like the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­ And even if one of the empires wanted to take on the Star Shattering Sect and try to seize the spiritual metal mine below the Iron Sky Kingdom, they now had two Soul Ascension Realm cultivators in the eyes of the outside world. Not a force that could be recklessly offended.

 Chapter 1224 Fall of the Sky Empire (Part 4)

    Chapter 1224 Fall of the Sky Empire (Part 4)


    As the fifth day passed and the sun rose on the sixth day since the attack on the capital city of the Sky Empire, thest remaining cardinal from the Order of the Sky God could not help panicking as he became unable to fully defend against his opponents.


    When is that senior going to show up!? If he doesn''t appear soon, I will really end up joining those two on their journey to theherworld!


    Although his opponents were taking things slower to avoid being caught off guard by a possiblest-ditch effort to take them down with him, the cardinal understood full well that he was running out of time¡­ And more importantly than this, the observing Soul Ascension Realm cultivators had started to grow restless after the news of the attack on the capital started spreading outside.


    Though they didn''t explicitly say anything, it was obvious that they wanted to end things before more people could show up andplicate the situation¡­


    "Oh? Looks like things aren''t over yet, the Sky Empire is far more tenacious than I expected."


    It was just at this moment that a loud voice resounded through the surroundings followed by an unfamiliar figure appearing at the edge of the edge of the encirclement formed by the different invading empires around the capital city.


    "The third ancestor of the Yan Empire!? Why is someone like that here!?"


    "The Yan Empire¡­ To think someone from that ce appeared so fast¡­"


    "This is bad, we have to deal with that cardinal before more people appear!"


    Seeing the person who had appeared, the stronger Soul Ascension realm cultivators surrounding the capital city all began panicking before focusing their attention on the cardinal struggling to hold on above the capital city.


    The main differencepared to before being that there was a very clear killing intent present in their eyes this time around.


    Though the third ancestor of the Yan Empire wasn''t among the strongest present, he was still someone at the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, but¡­ More importantly than that, his appearance signaled that they were running out of time and had to finish things up before more people could show up and try to take the spoils of war that they had already finished dividing up among themselves.


    Whoosh-!


    With this in mind, one of the stronger people at the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm decided to jump out andunch an attack towards the already exhausted cardinal-


    "Wha-"


    BOOOOOM-!


    In the end, the cardinal was caughtpletely off guard by the sudden attack and ended up beingunched directly into the ground a few hundred meters away from the capital city. Instantly creating a massive crater that destroyed part of capital city.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Seeing an opportunity to hit someone when they were down, the rest of the Soul Ascension realm cultivators didn''t waste any time as they allunched attacks of their own towards the cardinal from the Order of the Sky God.


    The earlier fear of ast-ditch strugglepletely disappeared with the realization that dragging things on for any longer might end up resulting in them losing the spoils of war they had worked so hard for. This was especially so for the different empires who had ended up losing Soul Ascension Realm cultivators and wanted to use the resources stored in the capital city of the Sky Empire to nurture a new batch of powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivators who might rece their lost Soul Ascension Realm cultivators in the future.


    Senior¡­ Where are you¡­


    Feeling the countless spells, mystical techniques, powerful sword arts and other kinds of powerful attacks tearing apart his body and soul, the cardinal from the Order of the Sky God could only helplessly wonder where the senior dispatched by the higher ups was at the moment and why he hadn''t appeared to save him at thest moment like he had expected to happen.


    In the end, only regret was left as his body and soul werepletely destroyed under the barrage of powerful attacks from the group of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators desperate to end things before other people could show up and start harboring thoughts about taking away the treasures, they had been working hard to get their hands on.


    Even if the imperial family of the Sky Empire had already left, the treasures stored inside the capital city of the Sky Empire was nothing to scoff at, as it included not only the wealth of three major branches of religions from the core region of the continent, but also contained the wealth of the different noble families controllingrge parts of the Sky Empire. All of this wealth umted over thousands of years. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "He''s dead¡­"


    "Finally!Let''s divide things ording to our earlier agreement."


    "Sure¡­ And let''s keep things civil and finish up before more people show up¡­"


    Following the death of the cardinal from the Order of the Sky God, the different Soul Ascension Realm cultivators from the invading empires all let out a breath of relief as they descended upon the now defenseless capital city to take anything of value and to erase the people of the different noble families and other major powers that had been in control of the Sky Empire in the past.


    Though it was a bit ruthless to massacre the people left behind in the capital city, it was necessary to erase future problems.


    Even if the escaping Soul Ascension Realm cultivators did pose more of a risk at the moment, they had all suffered permanent damage during their escape and wouldn''t be able to advance any further in the future and might not even live for much longer. Different from the people left behind in the capital city who might in the future grow up to be a renowned expert with the ability to seek revenge on them.


    Considering this, the capital city soon turned into a bloody hellscape as the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators swept through it and eliminated anyone belonging to the major powers of the Sky Empire, the three religions or the different noble families.


    The only people who managed to escape alive being the wandering cultivators who huddled together inside the Explorer Union and a few weaker cultivators at the Qi Condensation Realm who just happened to be normal civilians without any attachment to the Sky Empire outside of it being the ce they lived. People who wouldn''t care much about the fall of the Sky Empire outside of worrying about whether or not they would be able to continue living peacefully under the new empire who took over the territory of the Sky Empire.


    "Why don''t we kill those people in the Explorer Union?" Finding it quite odd that they left the wandering cultivators and people hiding in the Explorer Union alone, a weaker Domain Lord Realm cultivator could not help asking this as he turned towards a senior standing beside him. "I''m sure they have a lot of good stuff stored away considering how much they-"


    "Don''t! Do not touch that ce unless you have a death wish!" However, before he had a chance to carry out his desire to rob the Explorer Union, his senior violently yanked him back and scolded him.


    "Wh-why not? Aren''t they simr to those religions?" Confused over the sudden rough treatment from his senior, the junior Domain Lord Realm cultivator could not help asking. Not understanding why, they robbed the three religions while leaving the Explorer Union untouched.


    "Haaa¡­ The power behind those religions might not respond if they lose a branch, but the Explorer Union is different! Thest time an ancestor from arge empire dared to destroy one of the Explorer Union''s major branches in the capital of an empire around the same size as the Sky Empire that they had just destroyed. In the end, the empire that the ancestor belonged to ended up disappearing overnight! From rumors back then, someone above the Soul Ascension Realm belonging to the Explorer Union made a move to destroy that empire¡­"


    "This¡­!" Hearing the exnation given by his senior, the young Domain Lord realm cultivator could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he looked towards the branch of the Explorer Union not too far away filled with fear.


    "As long as you remember to not offend the Explorer Union in the future, everything is fine. Although they are everywhere on the continent, they remain neutral in any situation, be it struggles betweenrge empires or the scrambles for power among noble families. Only if a branch breaks this neutrality does the Explorer Union not care if you destroy one of their branches¡­" Taking the chance to lecture his junior, the senior made sure to impart his junior about the importance of not offending the Explorer Union and the rare situation where it would be fine to attack them.


    Conversations like this were not rare among the Domain Lord Realm cultivators tasked with cleaning up the capital city. Marking the end of the Sky Empire, as thest bastion of the Sky Empire officially fell to the invading empires.

 Chapter 1225 Three Troublemakers

    Chapter 1225 Three Troublemakers


    Following the fall of the Sky Empire, the situation around the capital city remained chaotic for the next few days as the different invading empires swept through the ce and devoured everything of value, while an increasing number of lone Soul Ascension Realm cultivators arrived and tried their best to get their hands on some of the treasures hidden around the capital city.


    Although attempts like this were unsessful most of the time due to the invading empires working together to stop anyone else from taking what they had deemed to be theirs, a few lucky Soul Ascension Realm cultivators still managed to snatch away a few treasures every now and then.


    Unfortunately for these Soul Ascension Realm cultivators, the most precious treasures and artifacts were still stored inside the capital itself. Meaning that the invading empires were still able to monopolize most of the resources left behind by the major powers of the Sky Empire.


    However, this did not discourage these Soul Ascension Realm cultivators, as some of the smarter ones among them decided to leave the capital city and start searching for the hiddenirs of these major powers hidden across the territory of the Sky Empire.


    Though it was harder for them to find these kinds of secret locations that had been set up to store treasures and artifacts to rebuild these major powers in case they encountered a disaster like the today, these Soul Ascension Realm cultivators still managed to see some sess after a few weeks of scouring through the Sky Empire. Taking full advantage of the fact that the different invading empires were currently busy cleaning up the situation in the capital city and had no time to prevent them from doing what they wanted inside the now destroyed Sky Empire.


    In the end, the only ces that these Soul Ascension Realm cultivators didn''t search through were the areas outside the core territory of the Sky Empire. Not just because the outer regions of the Sky Empire had nothing useful in it, but also because the outer regions still had fallen under the control of the different invading empires¡­ And the only outer regions not under the control of these invading empires had fallen under the Star Shattering Sect''s control.


    Even if they weren''t aware of the Star Shattering Sect before their arrival, they at least managed to learn that it was a sect with more than one Soul Ascension Realm cultivator watching over. More than enough to make them avoid the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and instead focus their search for hidden treasure vaults towards the core territory of the Sky Empire.


    At the end of the day, this resulted in the territory of the Star Shattering Sect remaining peaceful as the Sky Empire that had stood tall for over ten thousand years copsed.


    It was during this period of chaos as everyone were scouring through the core territory of the copsed Sky Empire for treasures, that three figures silently appeared in the sky above the capital city without any of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators from the invading empires noticing them.


    "Hmph! To think none of those three managed to hold on¡­ How useless!"


    Seeing the chaotic situation below and the dried blood coveringrge parts of the capital city, one of the three figures could not help frowning as he said this.


    "Indeed, they should have found a way to hold on for a few days."


    "Yeah¡­ Now we ended up wasting our timeing here. Not only that, but we even had to pay that old man from the Explorer Union to teleport us closer to this ce!"


    Nodding their heads in agreement with what the first person said, the other two also weighed in on the situation.


    During their short conversation, it became obvious that the three were none other than the people that the three cardinals had been waiting for during theirst struggle above the capital city.


    "Given that those three are already dead and our religions don''t have any way to interfere in a situation regarding a border empire that has already copsed, we should head back¡­ But¡­ I really don''t like seeing these ants wantonly desecrating the sacred ground of my lord¡­" As the three people belonging to different religions were about to leave after learning that they had been toote, one of the three suddenly said this as he lifted his hand in the direction of the sacred ground belonging to the Order of the Sky God inside the capital city-


    RUMBLEEE-!


    And before the people currently in the process of robbing the ce for anything of value had a chance to react, a massive hand covering the entire sacred ground appeared in the sky before descending towards the sacred ground-


    BOOOOOM-!


    ttening the entire sacred ground while killing everyone inside of it. Including a handful of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators.


    "Huh¡­?"


    "Wha-!? What is happening!?"


    "The sacred ground of the Order of the Sky God disappeared¡­?"


    The cultivators who witnessed this scene, be it Soul Ascension Realm cultivators or ordinary Qi Condensation Realm cultivators who were still trying to cope with the recent fall of the Sky Empire, all of them felt an unknown sense of fear stemming from the depths of their souls as they saw the enormous hand descending from the sky. Akin to a mortal looking up at a god.


    "Hehe, you really decided to move! You people from the Order of the Sky God are always so reckless¡­ What if those old fellowse after you for acting out of hand in a border empire? Don''t forget, this ce falls under the management of the Blue Sea Empire!"


    "Hmph! This ce is no longer a border empire, but merely a chaotic region without anyone in charge of it. Did you forget that the little Sky Empire was destroyed? Even if the people from the Blue Sea Empire wants to cause trouble, there is nothing they can do about it!"


    "This¡­ Hm¡­ Indeed! That works! Hehe, guess a little punishment towards those ants should be fine¡­"


    RUUUMMBLLE-!


    BOOOOOM-!


    Not even a second after he finished saying this, two new hands simr to thest one appeared in the sky above the two remaining sacred grounds before descending and ttening the two other sacred grounds. Killing everyone inside, be it weaker Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators or powerful Soul Ascension Realm cultivators.


    In a single instant, the number of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators under the invading empires had been reduced by more than fifteen. Instantly causing everyone inside the capital city to panic as the different invading empires still left with Soul Ascension Realm cultivators wasted no time in retreating from the capital before rushing back towards their own territory. None of them dared to stay inside the capital city for a second longer, as the losses they had incurred from the three massive hands that had descended from the sky were enough to leave their empires unable to do anything for the next few thousand years.


    In a more unfortunate situation where the strongest ancestor of a certain empire had appeared to rob one of the sacred grounds personally for his empire, the empire in question was left in a state worse than the Onyx Empire that had already retreated all of its forces back into its borders in preparation for a possible attack from these invading empires. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Considering everything that had happened and how much these invading empires had lost in a matter of a few seconds; it was unlikely that any of them had the energy to spare when it came to invading the Onyx Empire.


    Instead, it was more likely that they would give up the territory that they had conquered in the Sky Empire and focus all of their strength on defending themselves from possible attacks from their neighbors. After all, there was no small number of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators not belonging to the invading empires observing the situation taking ce in the capital city. Meaning it would be impossible to prevent information about what had happened from spreading.


    "Hehe, looks like things are going to be quite chaotic in this ce over the next few years." Observing the escaping Soul Ascension Realm cultivators belonging to the invading empires and knowing how bad their future days would get after information of what had happened spread, the person among the three who struck out first to tten the sacred ground under the Order of the Sky God, could not helpughing happily to himself-


    Rumble~


    However, before he could finishughing at the situation of the invading empires, a terrifying divine sense spread swept over the three of them.


    "Oh?" Feeling the terrifying divine sense, the person from the Order of the Sky God could not help briefly narrowing his eyes. "Looks like we were detected by one of the border guards from the Blue Sea Empire. Let''s leave before things get troublesome!"


    "Good idea!"


    "Just what I wanted to say, I really don''t want to wait for one of their ancestors to show up an punish us¡­"


    Hearing what he said, the other two didn''t hesitate, as all three of them soon disappeared from the scene before the owner of the terrifying divine sense had a chance to rush over and stop them.t

 Chapter 1226 End of the Sky Empire

    Chapter 1226 End of the Sky Empire


    A few minutes after the destruction of the three sacred grounds inside the capital city of the Sky Empire, a man standing close to two meters tall covered from head to toe in armor appeared in the sky above the capital city.


    "They ran away rather quickly¡­" Narrowing both his eyes as he said this while looking in the direction that the three had disappeared in, the man didn''t waste any time as he pulled out a strange looking artifact that absorbed some of the qi still lingering in the air from the earlier attacks that had ttened the three sacred grounds.


    "Hm¡­ This qi is¡­ Damnable! It''s indeed those religions! Looks like I will have to inform the ancestors¡­!" As the artifact finished absorbing the qi and identified it, the man who had remained locked on the artifact after it had absorbed the qi could not help cursing out loudly as he pulled out amunication talisman to contact his ancestors about the situation.


    The matter was not something he could deal with. Even if only a single border empire had been affected so far, the border empire was within the jurisdiction of the Blue Sea Empire. Any interference by another major power from the core region of the continent would therefore be handled with utmost care. Especially considering that there was a clear agreement for the different major powers in the core region to not interfere too much with the border empires.


    In normal circumstances, anyone above the Soul Ascension Realm was not allowed to recklessly fight inside a border empire.


    Not only did the three religions vite this agreement, but they also did so inside a border empire located right next to the Blue Sea Empire¡­ And with the number of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators that had ended up dying, it would inevitably cause chaos in the border empires bordering the Blue Sea Empire.


    No matter how much the Blue Sea Empire might want to ignore it, it was a clear sign of disregard towards them and might even be them trying to incite chaos in the outer parts of the Blue Sea Empire!


    Whoosh~


    Putting away themunication talisman after informing the ancestors of the Blue Sea Empire about the situation, the armored man made his way back towards the Blue Sea Empire. Ignoring the panicking weaker cultivators who had been left behind in the now destroyed capital city of the Sky Empire.


    Although he himself was of a simr strength to the three escapees, he had arrived far too slow and had no way to catch up to them. Not to mention with his strength, he wouldn''t be able to stop them from running away even if he caught up to them.


    "Hmph! Just you three wait! The ancestors won''t let you escape so smoothly!" Smirking to himself as he crossed the short distance between the Blue Sea Empire and the capital of the now fallen Sky Empire, the armored man from the Blue Sea Empire could not help looking forward to the three troublemakers getting caught.


    The reason for his confidence being that in the short conversation he had with his ancestors about the situation, he was also informed that one of them had decided to make a move to catch the three before they could run away back to their religions sacred ground.


    No matter how fast the three escaped, the territories of their religions was located far away from the Sky Empire, there was no way for them to outrun someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm. Even if the other party was located all the way back in the capital of the Blue Sea Empire, the speed of someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm was far beyond what someone in the Dao Seed Realm could ever achieve.


    Unfortunately, the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire was bound to fail, as the three had long since prepared for just such a scenario. Having already paid a powerful cultivator proficient in the Dao of Space from the Explorer Union to help them not only get to the Sky Empire, but also to leave the ce.


    Although they still had to travel for a few minutes to meet up with that person, it wasn''t long enough for the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire to catch up to them and they managed to safely escape from the Sky Empire without being caught. Leaving the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire with no other choice than to turn around and make his way back to the Blue Sea Empire.


    Given that the three had managed to escape, the only way that the Blue Sea Empire had left to punish the three religions behind them was to bring up the fact that they had broken the agreement to the rest of the major powers in the core region.


    However, the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire understood very well that doing something like this wouldn''t aplish much. Especially considering that only a few Soul Ascension Realm cultivators not part of the Blue Sea Empire had ended up being killed.


    At most, the Blue Sea Empire would be able to extract a few resources from those three religions, while punishing the three behind the matter would be impossible now that they had managed to run away.


    ¡­


    Not too long after the matter in the capital city of the now fallen Sky Empire had concluded, news about what had happened began to spread through the Sky Empire before spreading to the surrounding empires and beyond.


    Given that there were arge number of cultivators keeping an eye on the capital city of the Sky Empire from a distance and the movements of the different invading empires, it did not take long before someone managed to put together who among the invading empires had died and who had managed to run away unscratched.


    Because of this, it did not take long before the news of a certain empire losing their strongest ancestor at the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm spread out. Resulting in the empires bordering this empire wasting no time inunching a full-scale attack on said empire after confirming the news.


    In the end, all of the invading empires were met with somewhat simr situations, as they were all forced to retreat and ensure the safety of their borders. None of them were able to continue keeping their people in the now fallen Sky Empire.


    As a result of this, the Sky Empire that had been teeming with a dozen or so different empires was suddenly left empty outside of the different treasure hunters who hade to scour through the fallen empire for hidden treasures and artifacts that might be hidden in the now unguarded vast kingdoms and cities that had been left without a protecter after the fall of the Sky Empire.


    Within the time of a single week, the vast territory of the Sky Empire that spanned thousands of smaller kingdoms was turned into a chaotd where battles between cultivators fighting for artifacts or other precious cultivation resources happened everywhere.


    Even the outer regions of the Sky Empire that had far less resourcespared to the core region of the Sky Empire was not spared, as the stronger kingdoms that had been pushed out of the core region began to settle down in the outer regions to escape from the chaos in the core region of the Sky Empire. Inevitably pushing out or destroying the smaller and weaker kingdoms in the region as a result.


    Not just that, but the religions belonging to the different invading empires didn''t waste any time in spreading their influence in the absence of the three major religions that had once dominated the vast territory of the Sky Empire.


    Among these religions, the one with the most influence and spreading the fastest was none other than church of the gue God that had disappeared from view for a time following the invasion of the different empires bordering the Sky Empire. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Taking advantage of the fact that they already had a lot of their people secretly nted in the different smaller kingdoms, the church of the gue god ended up bing the strongest religion in the chaotd that had once been the Sky Empire.


    Of course, not everything inside the territory of what had once been considered the Sky Empire was chaotic with battles taking ce everywhere, as the Star Shattering Sect managed to peacefully continue developing.


    The main reason for this was not just because of the existence of two Soul Ascension Realm cultivators intimidating outsiders from causing any trouble in the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, but more so due to the fact that the Iron Sky Kingdom ended up bing a barrier for anyone wanting to enter the Star Shattering Sect''s territory from the core region of the Sky Empire to pass through first.


    Because of this, it soon became known that Yi Min was someone at the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, thus further intimidating anyone who might have thoughts about causing trouble inside the Star Shattering Sect''s territory¡­

 Chapter 1227 Peace Amidst Chaos

    Chapter 1227 Peace Amidst Chaos


    As the Star Shattering Sect continued to develop without any problems over the next few months, the two outer regions bordering sect that Elder Song had already begun the process of officially integrating into the sect ended up being sessfully absorbed during the few months following the fall of the Sky Empire.


    Not just because the Onyx Empire that had been contending with them for control in one of the two outer regions of the now fallen Sky Empire had decided to retract their forces in preparation for a possible attack from the invading empires, something that was unlikely to happen given what had happened in the capital city not too long ago, but also because the chaotic situation gave the Star Shattering Sect a perfect opportunity to sweep in and take control of things before any other forces had a chance to enter the two outer regions.


    If not for the fact that the current Star Shattering Sect was too weak to continue expanding without running into problems rting to the clearck of cultivators in the Domain Lord Realm and above, Elder Song and Feng Chen would have both wanted to continue taking advantage of the situation to expand the territory of the sect.


    However, in the end, both of them ended up deciding that it would be better to stabilize the power of the sect for a few years and nurture the disciples and elders of the sect. Intending to at least nurture a dozen Domain Lord Realm Elders before thinking about expanding the sect again.


    Although this might be a bit difficult to aplish, it shouldn''t be too hard considering that the current Star Shattering Sect had more than a dozen elders stuck at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm that should be able to break through to the Domain Lord Realm with enough time. Especially so considering that Pei Yang was personally teaching these elders once a month.


    If they couldn''t reach the Domain Lord Realm in the next few years with the guidance of a powerful Earth Immortal like Pei Yang, they might as well give up on ever reaching the Domain Lord Realm in the future!


    The actions of the Star Shattering Sect didn''t escape the eyes of the different smaller powers and religions trying to gain some semnce of power inside the now chaotd that had been formed in the absence of the Sky Empire, but they couldn''t really do anything to the Star Shattering Sect considering that they had Soul Ascension Realm cultivators backing them.


    Outside of that, there was also the fact that the Star Shattering Sect didn''t continue expanding and instead stayed outside the core region of the fallen Sky Empire where the most precious resources were located. Resulting in the different powers trying to expand into the chaotd with Soul Ascension Realm cultivators backing them deciding that it was simply not worth it to make enemies with the Star Shattering Sect.


    The only ones showing signs of attacking the Star Shattering Sect was the Onyx Empire that had ended up losing the little territory they had managed to take from the Sky Empire during the invasion, but considering that they were still not certain of how things would y out now that they had lost so many of their powerful cultivators and one of their elite armies, they didn''t want to end up losing any more by starting a fight with the Star Shattering Sect.


    At the end of the day, the Star Shattering Sect was not affected by what happened around it, outside of a few more troublemakers appearing inside its territory that the elders and disciples would have to deal with every now and then. Also giving the different independent sects under the Star Shattering Sect a rare chance to help out in dealing with the more powerful troublemakers that the Star Shattering Sect had a hard time dealing with as their number of Domain Lord Realm cultivators was still rather small.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the Star Shattering Sect had finished taking control of the two surrounding regions and began the process of stabilizing the territory and focusing on developing the strength of the sect, Xuan Hao and Chun Hua had already managed to pass through most of the primeval jungle and was about to reach the part of the burning mountain range connecting the primeval jungle to the Blue Sea Empire.


    During the journey so far, Xuan Hao had decided to take things a bit slower to learn more about his newest disciple, while also ensuring that they didn''t end up running into any problems along the way. The main reason for this being that he could still clearly remember how terrifying the two Celestial Immortal Realm demon beasts that had appeared at the frontier city were.


    Even though part of him felt confident that he would be able to escape together with Chun Hua with the help of the Dao of Space, another part of him felt uncertain when he remembered the massive dragon turtle demon beast.


    If he ended up encountering a simr demon beast to the dragon turtle demon beast, he had a feeling that he wouldn''t be able to escape even if he used the Dao of Space.


    For this reason alone, Xuan Hao was more than willing to spend a bit longer travelling through the primeval jungle.


    As for why he didn''t try to reach the ancient teleportation formation that Chun Hua had originally passed through to reach the Astorion Empire where her family was located¡­ That was due to the fact that she didn''t have a clear idea about where it was located other than the fact that it was located somewhere towards the core of the primeval jungle.


    Given the current state of things, Xuan Hao didn''t have any ns of going anywhere near the core part of the primeval jungle where he might end up running into the terrifying dragon turtle demon beast again. Even if it might have saved them a lot of time, it was simply not worth the risk it posed.


    Not to mention, he learnt quite a bit about his newest disciple over the past few months.


    For example, he learnt about how she had grown up in the Chun Family and about her parents who were currently missing. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Yes, her parents who had been about to be assassinated in thest moment she had seen them were missing. Not dead.


    The reason for the missing state of her parents being because Chun Hua firmly believed that they were still alive and had managed to escape in a simr way that she had been able to escape back then, they just simply hadn''t returned to the Chun Family because the ancient teleportation formation they had gone through teleported them to a location a farrger distance away from the Astorion Empirepared to her.


    Although, learning about this from Chun Hua, Xuan Hao had a feeling that she was just coping with the fact that her parents had passed away, though, he didn''t say any of this out loud, as there was still a chance that her parents had managed to survive just like her¡­ And considering the distance of an ancient teleportation formation might even extend beyond the Ewaria Continent.


    If that was really the case, they would indeed be unable to return to the Astorion Empire with their strength only at the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Is this the Burning Mountain Range?" Just at this moment, Chun Hua who was floating in the air beside Xuan Hao through the help of his domain curiously called out as she pointed at therge mountain range appearing in the distance.


    "Yes, beyond that is the Blue Sea Empire and then the Sky Empire where the Star Shattering Sect is located." Nodding his head in response to Chun Hua''s question, Xuan Hao also decided to take the chance to introduce her to the Blue Sea Empire that was located on the other side of the Burning Mountain Range.


    After all, even though she was from the central part of the continent that the Blue Sea Empire existed inside of, she was unfamiliar with the different major powers on the continent¡­ And given that the Star Shattering Sect was bound to interact with the Blue Sea Empire more in the future, he felt that it would be a good idea for Chun Hua to learn about the Blue Sea Empire beforehand.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao felt that it would also be a good idea to teach his other disciples about the Blue Sea Empire in the future when he returned to the sect.


    Not just his disciples, he had a feeling that it would be a good idea for the Star Shattering Sect as a whole to learn more about the Blue Sea Empire before the sect grew to a point where it had to interact with the Blue Sea Empire. At that point in time, he at least wanted the elders and disciples of the sect to have some knowledge about the Blue Sea Empire¡­

 Chapter 1228 Travelling Together, Exhausted Yi Min

    Chapter 1228 Travelling Together, Exhausted Yi Min


    Arriving at the Burning Mountain Range only a short time after finishing a simple introduction of the Blue Sea Empire to the eagerly listening Chun Hua who had already begun to look forward to seeing the Blue Sea Empire in person, Xuan Hao decided to add a few days more to their journey back to the Star Shattering Sect. Intending to take Chun Hua to visit one of the cities of the Blue Sea Empire on their way back, as there wouldn''t be a chance for her to visit the Blue Sea Empire in the foreseeable future after she entered the Star Shattering Sect.


    The reason for this was not only because it was far too dangerous for her to travel around a powerful empire like the Blue Sea Empire, but also because the distance between the Star Shattering Sect and the Blue Sea Empire would take months to cover for someone in the Domain Lord Realm, let alone someone who was still in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Before he could feel confident in having her or any of his other disciples travelling around an empire like the Blue Sea Empire, they would at least have to reach a strengthparable to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Any lower than that and they might run into problems even in the weakest outer region of the Blue Sea Empire, let alone the inner and core region.


    Not thinking too much about this as the two of them officially stepped inside the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao and Chun Hua first registered at the closest outpost located a short distance away from the Burning Mountain Range before they began to slowly make their way through the Blue Sea Empire in the direction of the Sky Empire.


    Even at this point in time, Xuan Hao had no idea that the Sky Empire that had been locked in a rather precarious situation when he had left, had been destroyed. Leaving the territory of the Sky Empire in a chaotic state due to the massive losses that the different invading empires had sustained to the three mysterious experts from the Order of the Sky God, Followers of the Fire God, and Cult of the Scarlet Moon.


    Although, even if he knew about what had ended up happening during his absence, he wouldn''t care that much about it considering that it didn''t negatively affect the Star Shattering Sect.


    On the other hand, instead of negatively affecting the Star Shattering Sect, the current chaotic situation in the territory of the now fallen Sky Empire ended up giving the Star Shattering Sect a chance to smoothly take control of the two outer regions of the now fallen empire that it had already been in the process of taking control over.


    The Onyx Empire that had been troubling the sect in one of the two outer regions had also run away earlier in preparation for a possible invasion after the Sky Empire had been dealt with, something that didn''t end up happening after the massive losses sustained by the different invading empires in the capital city of the Sky Empire.


    Even after the Onyx Empire learnt about what had happened in the capital city, they decided to remain vignt and didn''t try to take over the part of the outer region that had now been taken over by the Star Shattering Sect. Not wanting to fall out with the Star Shattering Sect over the little bit of resources that could be found in the outer region of the Sky Empire. Instead, they began turning their attention towards the core region of the Sky Empire that had been left alone by the surrounding empires after what happened in the capital city.


    Though still weakened and having to watch out for some of their neighbors who were too far away to join in on the invasion of the Sky Empire, the Onyx Empire had already begun to secretly mobilize some of their experts in secret to try and take control of a few important resources that had been left almostpletely defenseless in the core region of the Sky Empire.


    Not just the Onyx Empire, some of the more distant empires had begun to take simr actions. Trying to control a few important resources like spirit stone mines and natural herb fields, while ignoring therger part of the fallen empire. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    In just the short time that it took Xuan Hao and Chun Hua to travel from the Blue Sea Empire''s border with the Burning Mountain Range to the border with the Sky Empire, these distant empires had already begun to fight for the different resources openly and secretly. In turn causing the already chaotic state of the core region of the Sky Empire to be even more chaotic than before asrge numbers of powerful cultivators ranging between the Domain Lord Realm and the Soul Ascension Realm swarmed towards the region from outside.


    Even the peaceful territory of the Star Shattering Sect that had managed to continue developing without any problems following the fall of the Sky Empire had been affected to some extent, as there was no small number of people starting to eye the vast spiritual metal deposits located beneath the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Of course, with Yi Min''s strength at the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and the massive formation covering the entire kingdom assisting her, none of these people had been sessful.


    However, instead of intimidating these people into giving up, it had instead caused them to start working together to try and break through Yi Min and her formation, causing Yi Min no small amount of stress as she now had to deal with an almost daily attack from different Soul Ascension Realm cultivators that she had never seen or heard of before.


    Even worse was the fact that she didn''t have the strength to kill any of them before they could escape. Only having been sessful in killing one person at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm who had attacked her without knowing about her strength.


    ...


    "Haha, your formation is already starting to show signs of breaking! In another few weeks, you won''t be able to rely on your formation to fight us!"


    "Hmph!"


    BOOOM-!


    Whoosh~!


    Knocking another group of relentless attackers flying into the distance, Yi Min could not help frowning to herself as she thought about what one of the three people in the group of attacks had said before she sent them all flying.


    Indeed, the formation can''t keep up the constant drain from fighting almost every day without any time for me to repair it¡­


    Frowning even more deeply as she realized what the person had said was correct and her formation indeed wouldn''t be able to hold on for much longer when faced with the constant battles, Yi Min understood that she had to find a way to deal with the constant onught of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators.


    After all, it was clear that none of them gave a damn about the Star Shattering Sect. Not because she or the Star Shattering Sect was weak, but more so because the different Soul Ascension Realm cultivators attacking her all came from empires located far away from the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if she or the Star Shattering Sect wanted to take revenge in the future, they would have to pass through several other empires along the way to do so. Not to mention, she had never heard about most of the people that had attacked her so far. Making it even harder to determine which empires and powers were behind the attacks on her Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "I have to ask for help, or I will end up being exhausted to death by constantly having to fight with those damnable people¡­" Muttering this to herself as she thought about her current hopeless situation, Yi Min understood that she would only be able to escape from her current situation if she had a way to intimidate the different attacking Soul Ascension Realm cultivators into never daring attack her kingdom again.


    Whoosh~


    With this in mind, amunication talisman appeared in her hand before a somewhat hesitant expression shed through her eyes.


    "Considering that I''m now part of the Star Shattering Sect, it shouldn''t be too much for me to ask for help¡­ And considering my current situation¡­ The only person with enough strength to intimidate these people should be Xuan Hao¡­" Whispering this to herself as she stared intently at themunication talisman, Yi Min stopped hesitating as she decided to contact Xuan Hao.


    Understanding that, Xuan Hao someone above the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, should be able to help out.


    Out of everyone she knew, he was the only person who had the strength to intimidate the group of annoyingpeople who had been harassing her and trying to exhaust her to death over the past few weeks in their attempt to take control of the vast spiritual metal deposits located beneath her kingdm.

 Chapter 1229 Bonding Between Master and Disciple, Rapid Improvement of Chun Hua

    Chapter 1229 Bonding Between Master and Disciple, Rapid Improvement of Chun Hua


    "Hm? Someone is actually daring enough to attack the Iron Sky Kingdom?" Learning about the troublesome situation that Yi Min found herself in, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat surprised expression on his face.


    Although he had already arrived back at the Sky Empire together with Chun Hua and had managed to learn about what had happened during the time he had been gone, it was still surprising that someone would be daring enough to attack the Iron Sky Kingdom. After all, Yi Min was still a powerful cultivator at the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Not someone that could be easily killed.


    "Yes, I have been holding out for a few weeks with the help of my formation, but I doubt I will be able to hold on for more than a week or two if the attacks continue¡­" Hearing the surprised exmation of Xuan Hao, Yi Min quickly responded through themunication talisman.


    "Able to hold on for a week or so¡­" Muttering this to himself after hearing what Yi Min said, Xuan Hao unconsciously nced over towards Chun Hua who was fully focused on observing a fight between two cultivators in the Domain Lord Realm not too far away.


    The two Domain Lord Realm cultivators were both unfamiliar to him and should be from one of the powers who were in the process of trying to take control of the now ownerless resources that could be found across the former territory of the Sky Empire. Looking a bit closer, it looked like the two were fighting for a spirit stone mine located only a short distance away from where the fight was taking ce.


    The reason why he hade to a stop and was allowing Chun Hua to watch this fight was because he had been using it as an opportunity to teach her about the Domain Lord Realm through observing the two fighting Domain Lords using their domains to fight each other.


    Hm¡­ Given that she can hold on for a week or two on her own, it shouldn''t be a problem to take our time returning to the sect. In the worst-case scenario, I can always rush back if something unexpected happens¡­


    Narrowing both his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards themunication talisman-


    "Don''t worry, I will be there in a few days. If you can''t hold on, contact me again and I will rush over."


    Informing Yi Min about when he would be there and the fact that she could always contact him again if something ended up happening and her life ended up being in danger.


    With his current mastery over the Dao of Space and his strength at the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it would at most take a few minutes to rush back if he used all of his strength.


    "Hold on for a few days? Sure, I will be waiting for you to show up and scare off those annoying people." Not feeling anything wrong with what Xuan Hao said as she knew that he wasn''t currently at the Star Shattering Sect, Yi Min let out a sigh of relief as she said this. Feeling more than confident in being able to hold out on her own for a few days.


    "Master! What is that!"


    Unaware of the conversation that had taken ce between her master and Yi Min, Chun Hua who had already adapted to her new identity as a disciple, eagerly called out as she pointed towards somewhere on the ground not too far away from where the two Domain Lord Realm cultivators were fighting.


    "Hm?" Putting hismunication talisman away after finishing his conversation with Yi Min, Xuan Hao nced down at the oddity that Chun Hua had pointed out, a small rock that would have looked normal if not for the fact that there were two powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivators fighting a few hundred meters away. Destroying everything in their surroundings except the small rock that seemed to look out of ce. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Using his divine sense to investigate the rock more closely, Xuan Hao discovered that the small rock wasn''t a rock, but was instead a third Domain Lord Realm cultivator that had hidden himself with the help of his domain without being noticed by the other two Domain Lord Realm cultivators only a few hundred meters away.


    Given the sense of a Domain Lord Realm cultivator and just how hard it was to sneak up on someone in the Domain Lord Realm, it was easy to see how impressive this Domain Lord Realm cultivator was and how great his control over his domain was. Even whenpared to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, this level of control was terrifying.


    Even more amazing than all of this was the fact that Chun Hua had somehow managed to notice something odd about the small rock while the two Domain Lord Realm cultivators no more than a few hundred meters away from the rock hadn''t noticed anything.


    Indeed, a good disciple!


    "That is another Domain Lord Realm cultivator, he is using his domain to hide himself from the other two. The way he is hiding is by using his domain to¡­" Not showing any of his happiness over the fact that she had been able to notice the hidden Domain Lord Realm cultivator, Xuan Hao nodded his head as he began to exin how the third Domain Lord Realm cultivator had managed to use his domain to hide from the other two Domain Lord Realm cultivators.


    Though the other party might have an impressive control whenpared to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, to Xuan Hao who had reached a levelparable to the Dao Seed Realm, it was rather easy to see through his methods and exin them to Chun Hua.


    "Wow¡­"


    As a result, Chun Hua was left in a state of amazement as she attentively listened to her master''s exnation. Allowing her to deepen her insights into the Domain Lord Realm, while at the same time also giving her a more in-depth understanding of domain control.


    Unknown to the three Domain Lord Realm cultivators below who were all aiming for control over the nearby spirit stone mine, they had ended up bing perfect subjects for Xuan Hao to teach Chun Hua about the Domain Lord Realm. Serving as a good way for the master and disciple to bond and grow closer.


    In the end, by the time that the third Domain Lord Realm cultivator finally decided to make his move and emerged from his hiding spot to kill the two exhausted Domain Lord Realm cultivators, Xuan Hao had already finished teaching Chun Hua. Having left to continue back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course, given the chaotic state of the core region of the fallen Sky Empire, he and Chun Hua ended up encountering more than just that one battle between Domain Lord Realm cultivators¡­ And with how beneficial it was to Chun Hua; Xuan Hao took the time to teach her something new about the Domain Lord Realm whenever they encountered such a situation.


    During this time, Chun Hua''s cultivation that had broken through to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and she also began taking steps towards establishing a pseudo domain of her own. Improving at a rapid pace as she began looking like she might be the first of his disciples to reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although the journey back to the sect was extended far beyond the few days, he had originally thought it would take, Xuan Hao didn''t want to interrupt the rapid progress of his disciple and had to find another way to help Yi Min deal with her current situation without going on his own-


    Squeak-!?


    And in the end, he decided to send out the rabbit demon beast to help out Yi Min after promising it arge number of spirit stones after it helped out Yi Min.


    Despite the fact that the rabbit demon beast was only at the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, its speed surpassed even that of someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm and it''s strength alone was more than enough to deal with someone at the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Given that the people attacking Yi Min weren''t much stronger than the First and Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao felt more than confident in leaving the situation to the rabbit demon beast. After all, there was no way those weaker Soul Ascension Realm cultivators would have any way to escape from a terrifying demon beast like the rabbit demon beast.


    Of course, to make sure Yi Min didn''t identally attack the rabbit demon beast, he also made sure to inform her about it beforehand. Even though she had already seen it before, it was better to be on the safe side and avoid the rabbit demon beast getting injured by friendly fire¡­

 Chapter 1230 A Fluffy Savior~

    Chapter 1230 A Fluffy Savior~


    The rabbit demon beast ising to save me¡­?


    Learning that Xuan Hao wouldn''t be the one toe and help her, but instead the cute looking rabbit demon beast that she had only encountered for a short time in the past, Yi Min couldn''t help feeling an unknown sense of regret welling up inside of her.


    At the same time, she also began to be curious about how strong the rabbit demon beast was for Xuan Hao to feel confident that it would be able to deal with the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who had been harassing her over the past few weeks. After all, even if it had reached the Soul Ascension Realm, it would be difficult for it to deal with those people unless it had reached the Later Stages of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    I wonder how he managed to encounter such a strong demon beast and even managed to tame it¡­ n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Realizing that the rabbit demon beast might have reached the Fourth or Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, Yi Min couldn''t help feeling curious as to how Xuan Hao had managed to encounter such a powerful demon beast and somehow also managed to tame it in the process. After all, taming a demon beast was far harder than killing it, even if his strength was aboe it¡­


    "It''s here¡­" Suddenly sensing the presence of the demon beast in question entering her kingdom a few dayster, Yi Min quickly retracted her formation and allowed it to enter.


    Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­!


    At the same time, she also managed to sense the strength of the rabbit demon beast¡­ And although she had already expected it to have at least reached the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, she was still shocked by the fact that Xuan Hao had somehow managed to tame such a powerful demon beast.


    Even when the rabbit demon beast appeared in front of her, she remained in a shocked state.


    Squeak?


    "Ah! My bad, I was just lost in thought for a moment. Ehm, I take it that your master already informed you about the situation?"Only after the rabbit demon beast made a sound to catch her attention did she recover before focusing her attention back on the matter at hand.


    Squeak!


    Feeling a bit weird when faced with the understanding look of the rabbit demon beast that seemed to perfectly understand everything she said, Yi Min could not help remembering an ancient text about demon beasts that she had read in the past about the fact that some demon beasts intelligence would increase along with their cultivation realm. Making them indistinguishable from humans outside of their appearance upon reaching a certain realm.


    Looking at the rabbit demon beast in front of her, it seemed like it had reached this realm and was no different from a human when it came to its intelligence. Making her wonder if this had something to do with how it ended up being tamed by Xuan Hao.


    Maybe it wasn''t so much him taming the rabbit demon beast, but more so him recruiting the rabbit demon beast?


    "Ahm, you won''t have to wait too long, as those people shoulde knocking in another few hours. For now, you can wait in one of my pavilions and enjoy a few spirit stones while waiting for them to show up." Feeling like her thoughts were a bout to start wandering again, Yi Min quickly stopped herself as she said this while pointing towards a nearby pavilion that she had prepared beforehand.


    Although she had no idea how a demon beast would normally spend its time, she knew about the fact that seemingly all demon beasts enjoyed eating spirit stones-


    SQUEAK!


    And looking at the excited rabbit demon beast rushing towards the pavilion she had prepared after hearing what she said, Yi Min was certain that this fact held true.


    "Now¡­ All I have to do is wait for those people to appear again¡­" Muttering this to herself as she once again turned her attention towards the border of her kingdom that had been under constant attack over the past few weeks, Yi Min began looking forward to being attacked.


    Not just because she would finally get a chance to strike back at those people, but also because she would get a chance to see the rabbit demon beast in action. Feeling curious about the true strength of the demon beast that Xuan Hao had told her would be more than enough to deal with the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who had been attacking her.


    ¡­


    Squeak?


    Arriving at the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom where Yi Min was located only a few seconds after passing through the formation guarding the kingdom, the rabbit demon beast tilted its head in confusion as it soon ended up face to face with the shocked Yi Min. Not understanding why, the human was staring at it with such a silly expression.


    Only for to jump up surprised before starting to talk about the enemies it would have to face and¡­ It didn''t really care about any of it outside of the spirit stones it would get from helping the human in front of it-


    ".... you can wait in one of my pavilions and enjoy a few spirit stones while waiting for them to show up."


    SQUEAK!


    Or at least that was what the rabbit demon beast thought until Yi Min suddenly presented a pavilion for it to wait inside of filled to the brim with spirit stones!


    Although the spirit stones were of a lower quality than the ones given by Xuan Hao, it still felt overjoyed at therge amount of spirit stones.


    From a random person that it didn''t really care about, Yi Min had suddenly be the second most important person outside of Xuan Hao. No matter what, the rabbit demon beast decided that it would make sure to properly deal with the pests daring to touch its spirit stone dispenser- Ehm, precious friend of its master!


    Of course, Yi Min, the person in question, waspletely unaware of the fact that her position had transformed to this degree in the heart of the little rabbit demon beast after giving it a few spirit stones. Instead, she was far busier makingst-minute preparations for what she expected to be a final battle between her and the group of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who had been attacking her over the past few weeks.


    ¡­


    At the same time Yi Min was preparing for battle and the rabbit demon beast was indulging in therge amount of spirit stones present inside the pavilion, the group of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who had been attacking Yi Min had gathered together not too far away from the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "I wonder how long that woman will be able to hold out. At least with our continuous attack, it shouldn''t be for more than a week at most."


    "What about the Star Shattering Sect behind her? Isn''t it said that they have another Soul Ascension Realm cultivator?"


    "Hmph! What do you know? I looked into it and it''s just someone who recently broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm. Nothing for us to worry about! To be honest, I''m quite surprised that someone at the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm would choose to join such a sect."


    "Indeed¡­ Let''s get ready to attack again today, everyone should have recovered, and we don''t want to give that woman enough time to repair her formation! Who knows, we might even be able to sessfully break the formation this time around¡­"


    As the group finished talking among each other about their next attack, they didn''t waste any time as they rushed towards the Iron Sky Kingdom a short distance away.


    Looking at the group in full, there were five people at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and one at the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Although none of them had stated their identity to the others, it was obvious that every single one of them came from an empire that was looking for an opportunity to take advantage of the chaos in the now fallen Sky Empire to extract some of the precious cultivation resources for themselves. In their case, they had decided to target spiritual metal deposits located below the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    None of them feared a possible retaliation by Yi Min or the Star Shattering Sect behind her, as their empires were more than strong enough to deal with two Soul Ascension Realm cultivators. Especially considering that Yi Min and the Star Shattering Sect had no idea about their identity and who to seek revenge on in the future even if they wanted to!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    It was with this confident mindset that the group of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators once again arrived at the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    "Haha! We are here again! Just give up and- Huh?"


    Squeak?


    However, different from the past where Yi Min would be ready to face them the moment they appeared, they instead found themselves face to face with a rather cute looking rabbit¡­

 Chapter 1231 Suppressing Everyone! Might of the Rabbit Demon Beast!

    Chapter 1231 Suppressing Everyone! Might of the Rabbit Demon Beast!


    "Huh? A demon beast? What is a demon beast doing here?" Seeing the rabbit blocking their path, one of the six Soul Ascension Realm cultivators could not help showing a somewhat confused expression on his face as he said this. Not understanding where a demon beast had suddenly popped up from without him or the others noticing it.


    "Don''t think too much about it, it should havee from the other side of the formation. After all, we can''t see through it and that woman doesn''t block travel for ordinary demon beasts and humans¡­ And looking at this little thing, I doubt she would care about it passing through the formation."


    "Haha, indeed, this thing should at most be a normal rabbit that somehow managed to absorb a bit of spiritual qi by ident. Resulting in it bing a demon beast, it''s strength should at most be somewhere around the Earlier Stages of the Qi Condensation Realm."


    "True, I doubt a little thing like this would survive for long if it hadn''t been lucky enough to grow up in a ce like this where strong demon beast are rare and the cultivators won''t bother with weak demon beasts like this."


    Also noticing the rabbit demon beast after hearing what the first person said, the others could not help joking with each other as they looked at the small cute looking rabbit demon beast that had suddenly appeared in front of them. None of them felt any danger, as they mistook not sensing the rabbit demon beast''s strength for it being too weak.


    Squeak¡­!


    Feeling the clear disdain from the group of humans along with hearing what they said, the rabbit demon beast who had already prepared itself to deal with the group of humans decided that not a single one of them would be leaving alive!


    "Hm? Look! The little one looks angry."


    "Haha, perhaps it understood what you said earlier."


    Not understanding how dangerous their current situation was, the group of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators just continued tough and joke among each other as they kept most of their attention on the guardian formation protecting the Iron Sky Kingdom. All of them wondering why Yi Min hadn''t shown up yet, as she would always be there to fight them the moment they appeared to try and break her formation.


    "Hehe, I think she might have been more exhausted than we first thought, let''s take this time to break this damnable formation!"


    Whoosh~


    Deciding to not waste any more time standing around waiting to see what had happened to Yi Min, one of the Soul Ascension realm cultivators at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm decided to make the first move as he gathered his strength to attack the formation. Ignoring the rabbit demon beast located directly in front of the formation. Not caring that he would end up killing the little demon beast in the process.


    Swish-!


    However, before he had the chance to reach the formation, the harmless looking rabbit demon beast jumped forward at a speed far surpassing theprehension of the six Soul Ascension Realm cultivators and arrived directly in front of the person who had decided to step forward and attack the guardian formation of the Iron Sky Kingdom first


    "Wha-!?"


    BANG!


    And before he had any time to react, he suddenly felt a terrifying force mming into his body as he found himself being thrown back with a power far beyond what his body could take-


    BOOOOOM-!


    Resulting in his body being directly blown apart by the terrifying force. Leaving only his soul to float around with a confused and fearful expression on its face. Not understanding what had happened and how his physical body had suddenly been destroyed without him having any time to react, let alone see who had attacked him.


    "What in the- The rabbit demon beast!?" Being the strongest among the six of them, the cultivator at the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm had managed to catch a glimpse of what had happened. Not that it was any less shocking, as the rabbit demon beast he had regarded as harmless just a few seconds earlier had suddenly transformed into a terrifying demon beast with the power to easily kill someone at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even with his current strength at the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, he couldn''t help feeling a shiver run down his spine. Understanding very well that he would stand little chance against such a terrifying demon beast.


    Even the simple act of escaping wouldn''t be easy to aplish considering the terrifying speed that the rabbit demon beast had just disyed.


    Not too different from him, the other four Soul Ascension Realm cultivators also felt a sense of dread as they realized what had just happened. Not wasting a single second before gathering together in preparation to resist the rabbit demon beast together.


    SQUEAK-!


    Letting out a proud squeaking sound after seeing how the remaining five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators began huddling together in fear, the rabbit demon beast could not help feeling satisfied with its quick action of killing the cultivator who hade barreling towards it without a single hint of cation.


    Although it did have the strength to kill someone at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, it normally wouldn''t be that easy. The only reason why it had been able to aplish what it had was due to the simple fact that the other party hadpletely let down his guard and had remained focused on the possible appearance of Yi Min. Not paying any attention to the rabbit demon beast directly in front of it.


    Then again, the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator couldn''t be med for hisck of cation, as he would have never expected a harmless little rabbit demon beast to be so powerful, let alone happen to be directly in front of the guardian formation of the Iron Sky Kingdom when they had decided to attack¡­


    Whoosh~


    Deciding to take the chance to further intimidate the rest of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators while at the same time finishing off the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator that had been reduced to nothing more than a heavily injured soul, the rabbit demon beast casually used its strength to grab hold of the soul before it had a chance to run away. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Huh?" Still in a bit of daze after what had just happened, the soul was rtively slow to react-


    "Nooo-! DON''T!"


    Thump~!


    And by the time it wanted to struggle free of the rabbit demon beast''s grasp and escape, it was already toote, as it found itself being crushed beneath the fluffy paws of the rabbit demon beast.


    Marking the official end of a proud Soul Ascension Realm cultivator, who would have properly never have expected he would end up being crushed to death by a cute rabbit foot.


    """¡­"""


    Watching all of this ying out, the remaining five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators all felt a shiver run down their spine.


    Never in their life had they imagined such a cute looking rabbit could be so terrifying!


    If they managed to escape alive from their current situation, all of them silently swore that they would never dare to underestimate an opponent no matter how weak or harmless they seemed on the surface.


    Of course, that was only if they managed to get out alive-


    Whoosh-!


    For now, they first had to deal with the rabbit demon beast who charged towards them shortly after crushing the soul of theirrade.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Not long after, an earth-shattering battle began just outside the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom, as the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators worked together to fight back against the rabbit demon beast who was singlehandedly suppressing all five of them. Using its terrifying speed to aplish this.


    ¡­


    "Looks like it will be fine without my help¡­"


    Not too far away from the border of the Iron Sky Kingdom on the other side of the guardian formation, Yi Min who had watched the entire thing unfold, could not help muttering this to herself as she watched how the rabbit demon beast singlehandedly suppressed the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators.


    Although she had expected for the rabbit demon beast to strong considering that Xuan Hao had ite over and help her in his ce, she had never expected for the rabbit demon beast to be that strong!


    Not to mention the strength disyed by the rabbit demon beast, just the speed alone made it difficult for her to keep up with it with her strength in the Third Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, she could easily imagine how hard it was for those five who were even weaker than her¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Continuing to observe the fight for another few minutes, Yi Min finally decided to join in and help the rabbit demon beast finish off the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators.


    Though the rabbit demon beast could finish things on its own, it would take longer and might result in one or more of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators managing to escape. After all, she had no idea what kind of trump cards these people might be hiding and waiting for a perfect opportunity to use¡­

 Chapter 1232 Fate of the Five Soul Ascension Realm Cultivators

    Following Yi Min showing up to join the rabbit demon beast in fighting the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators, it didn''t take long before the five were driven into a corner. Forced to rely on some of the trump cards that they had gathered just for this kind of life and death situation.


    Unfortunately, even with them using everything they had to fight back and find a way to escape from their current situation, they had no way of escaping for the rabbit demon beast whose speed was already close to rivaling someone in the Dao Seed Realm¡­ And as they slowly realized that there would be no way for them to escape from their current situation, they began to grow more unrestrained in the way they fought.


    In turn, this ended up forcing Yi Min to retreat back to the safety of her formation. Understanding that the battle had entered the most dangerous state as the group of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators had started to give up on escaping. Knowing that it would be impossible to escape from the rabbit demon beast.


    At this point in time, it wouldn''t be surprising if one of them ended up doing something crazy like blowing themselves up in an attempt to take her or the rabbit demon beast down with them.


    Even if she was stronger than them, a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator blowing themselves up would still seriously injure her and even had the chance of killing her. Especially the one at the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Given that there was only a minor realm between them, there was a very real chance that he could kill her if he decided to blow himself up with some kind of forbidden technique.


    Squeak!


    Different from Yi Min, the rabbit demon beast wasn''t the slightest bit concerned about this development and instead squeaked happily after seeing that the group of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators had begun to lower their guard and focus almost entirely on the offensive. Feeling overjoyed thinking about therge amount of spirit stones that it would soon be eating.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    As a result, the fight became even more chaotic than before, as the rabbit demon beast used its terrifying speed to weave in between the countless spells and techniques unleashed by the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators while taking advantage of theck of defense from the five to attack.


    "Ahhhh-!"


    In the end, the first among the five Soul Ascension Realm cultivators soon ended up dying under the consistent attacks of the rabbit demon beast. Not even getting the chances to self-destruct due to the rabbit demon beast killing him before he had a chance to do so.


    "What do we do!?"


    "I-I Don''t know¡­ Did any of you contact the people behind you for help!?"


    "I did! But¡­ I doubt they will show up in time. Not to mention, I doubt they will try and avenge me after my death. After all, this ce is too far away¡­"


    As the remaining four began panicking following another person dying, they realized that their time was time was running.


    However, even if they knew about this, there was nothing they could do about it, as the rabbit demon beast was simply too strong for them to fight back and too fast for them to escape.


    Even those among them who wanted to use a forbidden technique to self-destruct and take the rabbit demon beast down with them were faced with the reality that the rabbit demon beast could also use its terrifying speed to escape the moment they tried to self-destruct.


    As for targeting Yi Min¡­ That was even more difficult, as she had focused all her strength on barricading herself inside the guardian formation guarding the Iron Sky Kingdom. Making it so that they would first have to destroy the formation before they would stand a chance at killing her. Not to mention, she had begun to control the formation away from the border itself. Meaning that even if they self-destructed close to the formation, it would only end up destroying the formation and wouldn''t harm her.


    The only way that they would stand a chance at reaching Yi Min would be if two or more of them cooperated, but¡­ They were all strangers before they had targeted the Iron Sky Kingdom for the spiritual metal deposits below it. Making it impossible for them to suddenly engage in that kind of cooperation.


    Whoosh-!


    With all of this in mind, one of the four Soul Ascension Realm cultivators decided to try and escape on his own. Taking the opportunity to slip away while the other three shed with the rabbit demon beast-


    Boom!


    "Ahh-!"


    "HOW DARE YOU!?"


    "NOooo-!"


    Resulting in the remaining four being fully exposed to the rabbit demon beast on one side. Instantly causing two of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators to die without any chance to fight back.


    "Hmph! They think I want to continue wasting my energy here and wait to die!?" Frowning disdainfully as he heard the screams of pain and curses echoing out behind him, the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator who took the chance to escape during the sh wasted no time in taking out a small spiritual boat the size of his hand before throwing it out, causing it to rapidly expand until it fit exactly one person-


    RUMBLE-!


    Wasting no time, the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator jumped on top of the spiritual boat before injecting his qi into it, causing a terrifying aura to spread out from the spiritual boat before the space around it twisted violently for a short instant before the boat and cultivator on top of it disappeared.


    Squeak!?


    Seeing how one of its opponents had seemingly disappeared into thin air after jumping on top of the spiritual boat, the rabbit demon beast couldn''t help letting out a somewhat confused sound. Not understanding how its opponent had managed to escape.


    "What in the- A-a Celestial Spirit Boat!? How¡­ How did he get something like that!?" Different from the rabbit demon beast who had no idea what the spiritual boat was nor what had just happened, thest remaining Soul Ascension Realm cultivator could not help eximing in surprise upon seeing spiritual boat and how it disappeared into thin air.


    Squeak?


    Hearing that thest remaining human seemed to know something about what had just happened, the rabbit demon beast could not help curiously tilting its head as it looked towards him with a curious expression.


    "Huh? Ah! I-I know about how that person escaped and what that boat was!" Sensing the gaze of the rabbit demon beast changing from one filled with killing intent to one filled with curiosity, thest remaining Soul Ascension Realm cultivator who was also the only one at the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm seemed to have seen a path to survival. "Lord Rabbit! If you can spare this little one, I will be more than happy to share everything I know!"


    Transforming from a powerful Soul Ascension Realm cultivator fighting with everything he had without any fear of death into a bootlicker of the highest caliber in an instant, the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator lowered his head as he waited for the rabbit demon beast''s response. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Given his more than thousand-year lifespan, he was an experienced person and knew when to retreat and when to advance. Understanding very well that this was the only chance he had of getting out of his current situation alive. Especially considering that the injuries he received just now had pretty much rendered him unable to continue fighting.


    Bowing his head to a demon beast? So what! None of this meant anything if he could get out of his current situation alive!


    Squeak?


    Seeing thest remaining human Soul Ascension Realm cultivator suddenly falling to the ground as he lowered his head while also telling it that he had the answers to what it wanted to know, the rabbit demon beast felt a sense of happiness welling up inside of it.


    Lord Rabbit¡­ It really liked the sound of that¡­


    Squeak!


    Havinge to a decision, the rabbit demon beast signaled for the human Soul Ascension Realm cultivator to continue.


    Its master had never said to kill the people attacking the Iron Sky Kingdom and had just told it to help out Yi Min. Considering that there wasn''t any threat left, it wouldn''t be a problem to leave this person alive¡­


    "Thank you, Lord Rabbit! Thank you!"


    Feeling a sense of happiness washing over him upon seeing the rabbit demon beast nod its head for him to continue, thest remaining Soul Ascension Realm cultivator began happily exining what kind of spiritual boat the person who had escaped had used just now.


    Unfortunately, he wasn''t aware that the rabbit demon beast''s curiosity only grew the more he talked¡­ And given how respectfully he addressed it; the rabbit demon beast suddenly had another thought¡­


    Wouldn''t this human make a good subordinate¡­?

 Chapter 1233 New Subordinate of the Rabbit Demon Beast, Unfortunate Escape

    Chapter 1233 New Subordinate of the Rabbit Demon Beast, Unfortunate Escape


    After the idea appeared in its head, the rabbit demon beast couldn''t let it go and kept feeling that it would be a great idea to take this human in as its second subordinate. Especially considering how respectfully he was and how well he followed what it said. Not just that, but his strength was also at the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Far stronger than its first subordinate, the squirrel demon beast, who was still in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Whoosh-!


    Having made up its mind, the rabbit demon beast didn''t waste any time as it directly established a subordinate contract with the human before he had any time to fight back-


    "Huh?"


    And by the time he realized what had just happened, he had already be the subordinate of the rabbit demon beast. Not having any way to leave now that an official subordinate contract had been established.


    After all, a subordinate contract wasn''t much different from a blood contract that could be established between humans and demon beasts where the person establishing the contract would have control over the other party''s life and death. Only being rendered useless if the strength between the one establishing the contract and the one bound by it was too big.


    Of course, given that the rabbit demon beast was stronger than the human by two minor realms, there were no such problems. Resulting in him being unable to break the subordinate contract¡­.


    Squeak!


    Seeing the speechless expression on the face of the human cultivator after he realized what had happened, the rabbit demon beast thought he was so overjoyed by bing its subordinate that he couldn''t say anything. Resulting in the rabbit demon beast happily bouncing over beforending on top of its newest subordinate''s head before giving a simplemand for him to go back to the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom where the spirit stones given by Yi Min were located.


    "Y-yes! Lord Rabbit¡­!" Now able to understand to some extend what the rabbit demon beast said after the subordinate contract had been formed, the human cultivator could only cry on the inside as he followed themand and made his way inside the Iron Sky Kingdom before heading in the direction of the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom without being stopped by the formation that had blocked him and the others in the past.


    "¡­"


    Watching all of this y out from the side, Yi Min had no idea what to say when she saw the almost crying face of thest remaining Soul Ascension Realm cultivator as he obediently carried out the rabbit demon beast''smand.


    Out of everything she had thought might happen when the rabbit demon beast took action to help her, thest thing she expected was for the rabbit demon beast to take in one of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who had been attacking her relentlessly for the past few weeks.


    Maybe he can be considered lucky. After all, that rabbit is far from ordinary and might end up surpassing the Soul Ascension Realm in the future¡­


    Thinking this to herself as she watched the two disappearing in the direction of her capital city, Yi Min silently decided that it would be best to not offend the rabbit demon beast in the future.


    ¡­


    Unaware of the fact that his pet had ended up taking a human as a subordinate, Xuan Hao continued to travel through the chaotic region that had once been the Sky Empire together with Chun Hua. During which she ended up creating a pseudo domain of her own rted to the Dao of Nature. Taking her one step closer to the Domain Lord Realm.


    At the same time, he also decided to take the chance to check out her status now that she had be his official disciple. Feeling curious just what race she was from and if the system could figure it out, while also wanting to know what Daos would be best suited for her toprehend in the future. Intending to make full use of the system to point his disciple in the right direction.


    Name: Fifth Disciple, Chun Hua Race: Nature Spirit, Tree Spirit Talent: 67 Dao: Dao of Nature (Pseudo Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Wood, Dao of Life, Dao of Water Physique: Spirit Physique Realm: Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm Profession: Alchemy (Apprentice Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Heart of the Forest In the end, Xuan Hao was not the slightest bit disappointed by the results, as he not only found out that this fifth disciple of his wasn''t a human at all. Instead, she was a nature spirit mixed with a tree spirit. A full-fledged spirit, different from the Half Spirit Race that had been taken in by the Star Shattering Sect who were half human.


    Thinking about the half spirit race that had now been fully incorporated into the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious as to how they would react upon realizing that Chun Hua was a true member of the spirit race that they had originally descended from.


    At the same time, he also began growing more curious about the identity of Chun Hua''s parents.


    Given that Chun Hua was a full-fledged member of the spirit race, could it be that her parents were both members of the spirit race as well? But¡­ If that was the case, howe the rest of the Chun Family didn''t show any signs of having the bloodline of the spirit race running through them like the members of the half spirit race? Could it be that they had found Chun Hua when she was still young and decided to take her in and raise her? Or maybe the bloodline of the spirit race was just too thin for him to sense and had only awakened in Chun Hua¡­


    As his thoughts started to wander thinking about the possible background of his newest disciple''s parents, Xuan Hao continued to make his way through the chaotic region of the Sky Empire together with Chun Hua. Getting closer to the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and the Iron Sky Kingdom while Chun Hua''sprehension of the Dao of Nature continued to rapidly improve under his guidance and observing the battles between different Domain Lord Realm cultivators-


    Rumble-!


    "Finally, out! I thought I would be trapped in that space for the rest of my life!"


    However, it was when they were only a few days away from the Iron Sky Kingdom, that the space in front of them was suddenly torn apart as a person emerged on top of a spiritual boat a few meters away from them while talking to himself.


    "Haaa¡­ I really can''t use this spiritual boat properly with my current strength. Maybe it will only be possible after I be an Earth Immortal and- Ah!" As the person on top of the spiritual boat finally seemed to discover the two people floating in front of him, he momentarily froze on the spot. Not knowing what to do.


    "Ehm¡­ Hello?" Not knowing what to say either and seeing that her master hadn''t said anything yet, Chun Hua decided to try andmunicate with the stranger who had suddenly popped up in front of them.


    "Hm? Peak Nascent Soul Realm? And this person should be¡­ Domain Lord Realm?" Recovering after hearing Chun Hua call out to him, the stranger narrowed both his eyes as he began to examine both of them. Only letting out a sigh of relief after discovering that the two of them were of no threat to him.


    Even if he was in an injured state at the moment due to his fight not too long ago with a certain rabbit, he was still more than strong enough to deal with someone in the Nascent Soul Ream and Domain Lord Realm.


    "Well, count yourselves unlucky for running into me, I can''t have you leak out information of my whereabouts." Muttering this to himself as he decided to silence the two to prevent the rabbit demon beast from learning about his whereabouts now that he had already used his final trump card and was thus unable to continue escaping in the short term, the stranger began to gather strength to kill the two-


    RUMBLE-!


    "Ah!? What is-"


    Unfortunately for him, before he had a chance to do anything, Xuan Hao directly activated his divine void eyes to partially copse the space around him. Swallowing him up before he could do anything. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Given Xuan Hao''s current strength, although a true spatial copse was still difficult to aplish, it was no longer hard for him to create a partial spatial copse. More than enough for dealing with someone in the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm without having to do much.


    "Master¡­ This?"


    "Don''t worry about it, just someone who wanted to take advantage of our perceived weaker strength to kill us. Nothing out of the ordinary in a chaotic ce like this. For now, let''s continue on our way."


    "Okay¡­"

 Chapter 1234 New Junior Sister!

    Chapter 1234 New Junior Sister!


    Returning to the Star Shattering Sect''s territory without any more interruptions, Xuan Hao first decided to stop by the Iron Sky Kingdom on the way to the sect. Intending to pick up the rabbit demon beast he had help Yi Min deal with her situation.


    "Huh?"


    However, before he arrived at the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom, he noticed a certain Soul Ascension Realm cultivator dutifully standing beside the rabbit demon beast while feeding it a few spirit stones every now and then.


    What in the- Did it tame one of the people attacking the Iron Sky Kingdom!?


    Not knowing what was happening, Xuan Hao could only guess that his little demon beast had somehow managed to tame one of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators that had been attacking the Iron Sky Kingdom. Even then, the thought of his pet taking a human subordinate felt a little weird and made him wonder if he should do something about it and prevent the rabbit demon beast from trying to recruit any more humans.


    After all, carrying the rabbit demon beast and the squirrel demon beast around in his sleeve was fine, but carrying a group of humans around in a simr fashion felt a bit weird¡­


    But¡­ That person is in the Soul Ascension Realm and will definitely be useful to the Star Shattering Sect¡­.


    Feeling conflicted and not knowing what to do about the rabbit demon beast''s newest subordinate, Xuan Hao decided to ignore the situation for now and return to the sect together with Chun Hua first while leaving the rabbit demon beast to do its own thing in the Iron Sky Kingdom for now.


    Whenever it grew bored or wanted the spirit stones, he had promised it in return for protecting the Iron Sky Kingdom, it would inevitably return, and he could find a solution to this problem at that time.


    "Time for you to return to your lord."


    Whoosh-!


    With that in mind, he gently waved his sleeve, causing the squirrel demon beast to fly out in the direction of pavilion that the rabbit demon beast was currently inside of. Indulging in the spirit stones that Yi Min had provided it with after the end of the battle. Not intending to look after one of the rabbit demon beast''s subordinates while it wasn''t even around.


    Squeeaaaaak~!


    Suddenly being sent flying through the air at a terrifying speed, the squirrel demon beast inevitably let out a fearful scream as it directly broke the sound barrier. Alerting everyone below about its presence-


    BANG!


    Unfortunately, it was toote for anyone to stop it, as it directly crashed into the pavilion where the rabbit demon beast was happily indulging in spirit stones while being served by its newest subordinate-


    Squeak!?


    Causing the rabbit demon beast in question to let out a surprised squeak. Only calming down again after realizing that the intruder was none other than its first subordinate. Not taking long after that to realize that the person behind the appearance was most likely its master¡­ And given that its master had not appeared, it guessed that its master had agreed to it staying in the Iron Sky Kingdom to enjoy the spirit stones given by Yi Min.


    Squeak~!


    Feeling grateful for this, the rabbit demon beast let out a thankful squeaking sound while looking up in the direction that the squirrel demon beast hade flying in from.


    "¡­"


    Well, I guess it''s better this way¡­


    Seeing the grateful expression of the rabbit demon beast through his divine sense and sensing its thoughts, Xuan Hao could only smile wryly as he thought this to himself before turning around to make his way back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    Given that the matter with the rabbit demon beast had been settled for now and he didn''t have to worry about the newest human subordinate for now, Xuan Hao didn''t intend to dwell on the matter any longer. Instead deciding to focus on properly introducing his newest disciple to the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, even if she had learnt a bit about the Star Shattering Sect in the past when she had tried to sneak into the sect, she didn''t know much outside of a few things that could be considered standard for most sects.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao arrived in the Iron Sky Kingdom together with Chun Hua and threw the squirrel demon beast to the rabbit demon beast, he also decided to inform his disciples about his return and the fact that they would have a new junior sister in the future.


    "Master is returning! And with a new disciple! Hehe! I will no longer be the youngest! I wonder if it''s a junior brother or sister¡­." Among Xuan Hao''s disciples, the most excited among them was none other than Mui, who felt excited at the prospect of no longer being the youngest disciple and having someone who would look up to her as a big sister.


    "From what master said, it seems to be a junior sister." Seeing the excited expression on Mui''s face as their master informed them about the new disciple, Qing Yi happily informed her junior sister about the part she had missed out on due to her excitement upon hearing that she would get a junior and her master would be returning to the sect.


    "I''m curious about how strong she is¡­ Maybe she will be able to be my training partner in the future!" Standing not too far away from the two, Chu Yang muttered this to himself while looking forward to finding out how strong this junior sister was.


    After all, from the way their master took disciples, it didn''t seem like he cared too much about their age or cultivation realm when taking them in. Not like some elders who preferred taking in someone before they started cultivating or had grown up inside the sect.


    It was due to this fact that Chu Yang felt hopeful that the newest disciple of their master might be someone strong enough to fight with him and serve as a proper training partner. After all, the elders of the sect were no longer sufficient for him to properly train and only the ones at the Domain Lord Realm gave him a chance to go all out after he established his pseudo domain.


    "Another junior sister¡­" Not too far away from the three, Bai Ning, who had just returned from the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces, could not help frowning to himself as he recalled his time together with Mui and the countless spiritual metals, she had ended up destroying.


    If the new junior sister ended up being anything like Mui¡­ He dared not think about it! The supply of spiritual metal in the Star Shattering Sect had already been severely damaged due to Mui, another one would strain it to the point where his and the rest of the cksmiths in the sect would get affected and have the spiritual metal avable to them for forging reduced!


    Whoosh-!


    Thinking about this, Bai Ning directly turned around and rushed back towards the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces. Intending to warn the elders of the cksmithing Hall to prepare in case the new disciple of his master turned out simr to Mui and wanted to try her hand at cksmithing.


    "Huh? Senior brother Bai? Where is he going?"


    "No clue, he properly had something important to attend to, likely something rted to one of his artifacts." N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "I see¡­"


    Not paying too much attention to Bai Ning, as they had already gotten used to him running off whenever something came up regarding artifacts he was in the process of creating or when someone from the cksmithing Hall had found a type of spiritual metal he had been looking for, Qing Yi, Mui and Chu Yang didn''t think too much about him leaving as they continued chatting about their new junior sister.


    All of them felt curious about her and how she had ended up as a disciple of their master. After all, their master had been gone for quite some time and none of them had any idea where he had gone outside of the fact that it had been somewhere outside the Sky Empire ording to what little information Feng Chen had told them when they had asked him about it in the past.


    In the end, the three of them soon finished their conversation and went on to do their own thing while waiting for their master and new junior sister to show up. After all, ording to what their master had told him, he would be back in a few days. Intending to show their new junior sister around the territory of the Star Shattering Sect first before returning to the sect.


    Not that surprising considering that there wouldn''t be much of a chance for her to leave the sect in the short term after arriving at the Shattered Star Peaks. Not so much because their master restricted their ess to the outside world, but more so because there wasn''t anywhere elseparable to the cultivation environment in the Shattered Star Peaks.

 Chapter 1235 Back in the Sect, Introductions to the Fifth Disciple

    Chapter 1235 Back in the Sect, Introductions to the Fifth Disciple


    Spending the next few days travelling through the territory of the Star Shattering Sect together with Chun Hua, Xuan Hao also took the chance to see how well the different independent sects that had decided to join the Star Shattering Sect had been developing. After all, most of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory was managed by the people from these independent sects, as it would have normally been impossible for the current Star Shattering Sect to manage such arge area with only a handful of Domain Lord Realm cultivators of their own.


    Luckily, nothing much had changed regarding these independent sects over the years outside of the fact that they had been growing closer to the Star Shattering Sect due to the continued efforts of Elder Song, who had arranged no small number of events and tournaments for the disciples of the different sects to participate in together.


    Given enough time and if the Star Shattering Sect continued growing at its current pace, it would only be a matter of time before these independent sects were fully integrated and became a part of the Star Shattering Sect. Especially considering that he had witnessed quite arge number of disciples from the independent sects and the Star Shattering Sect travelling together toplete missions from the Grand Mission Pavilion or one of the branches of the Grand Mission Pavilion that had begun to appear across the territory of the Star Shattering Sect during his absence.


    In the end, by the time he and Chun Hua arrived at the Falling Star City at the base of the Ninth Star Peak, Chun Hua had grown more familiar with the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and the different independent sect that existed inside of it. Making her rather surprised over just how much stronger the Star Shattering Sect seemed to have grown since herst time there.


    At the same time, she also began to seriously consider some of the information that she had heard among the different disciples of the independent sects about the Star Shattering Sect possibly being an ancient hidden sect that had decided to reveal itself to the world. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Only able to exin the growth of the Star Shattering Sect in this way, considering it unlikely that the Star Shattering Sect was really formed by the merger of two small sects who only had people in the Nascent Soul Realm at the time that they merged together into the Star Shattering Sect!


    Of course, Xuan hao was aware of these thoughts and also knew about the different independent sect''s view of the Star Shattering Sect.


    However, given that it wasn''t detrimental to the Star Shattering Sect and instead benefited it by making the different independent sects follow the Star Shattering Sect without question, Xuan Hao decided not to correct this misunderstanding. Especially when considering that Elder Song and Feng Chen hadn''t decided to do so either.


    Not to mention, with his current strength and the presence of Pei Yang in the sect, it would be hard to convince them that they weren''t a powerful hidden sect. Even more so considering that observing the different independent sects with his divine sense during his and Chun Hua''s journey through the territory of the sect''s territory revealed that some of the elders from the different independent sects had already joined in on some of the lectures in the Star Shattering Sect held by Pei Yang.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao entered the Falling Star City together with Chun Hua before both of them began heading towards the Ninth Star Peak where the official entrance of the sect was located. Making sure to answer any question Chun Hua had along the way, while also making sure she got a basic introduction to his other disciples. In turn, causing her to grow a bit restless at the realization that she wasn''t the only disciple and would also have a bunch of senior brothers and sisters in the future.


    ¡­


    Not too unexpected, Chu Yang, Qing Yi, Bai Ning, and Mui managed to discover his return to the sect almost the moment that he and Chun Hua reached the top of the Ninth Star Peak. Soon resulting in his disciples showing up to greet him and Chun Hua-


    Whoosh~!


    Well almost everyone, as Mui threw herself forward in what seemed to be a flying hug of sorts, causing him to stagger backwards at the sudden impact to not have Mui hurt herself by crashing into him. After all, with his current strength, if he didn''t intentionally move, it would have been the same as Mui throwing herself headfirst into an unmovable wall, something that would have injured her even with her strength in the Core Formation Realm¡­


    "Master! Is this my new junior sister?" Not noticing any of this, Mui just happily hugged him as a show of affection before turning her attention towards her new junior sister. Filled with curiosity about this new junior sister of hers, while at the same time looking forward to no longer being the smallest.


    "Howe she''s sorge¡­?"


    However, different from the little girl she had expected to see, she was met by the towering figure of Chun Hua who was almost the same height as Chu Yang.


    When she had first heard that she would be getting a new junior sister, this was not what she had imagined! This junior sister wasrger than her in all aspects!


    "¡­"


    Noticing the very obvious re from Mui focused on a very obvious location on Chun Hua, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit wryly as he quickly stopped this little troublemaker before Chun Hua noticed the stare of the little one who seemed to be rather jealous of a certain part of her newest junior sister.


    At the same time all of this was taking ce, Chu Yang narrowed his eyes ever so slightly after carefully sensing the strength of this new junior sister of his.


    In terms of cultivation realm, she was no worse than him and he could even sense that she had also established a pseudo domain and seemed to have progressed further than him!


    "Chun Hua¡­" Muttering this to himself as he realized that this new junior sister of his was a perfect training partner and would be able to help him with his practice far better than Qing Yi could in the future, Chu Yang could not help himself as he began approaching her with a smile on his face.


    "What happened to you? Where did Chu Yang go!?" However, this sudden change in temperament didn''t escape Qing Yi''s eyes, as she couldn''t help saying this after seeing hime over.


    "What do you mean? I''m just happy to meet our new junior sister."


    "Hm? Are you sure that''s it? Not because you noticed this new junior sister of ours is already at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm and wanted her to join you in the Combat Hall?"


    "This¡­"


    Having his intentions seen through in an instant by Qing Yi who had grown rather familiar with them over the past few years due to her being the main person that would train with him in the Combat Hall, Chu Yang could not help freezing on the spot.


    "Hehe, looks like this new senior brother of mine is rather fond of fighting. Sure, I will join you in the¡­ Combat Hall after I get settled in." Chuckling to herself as she said this after seeing the short back and forth between Qing Yi and Chu Yang, Chun Hua happily agreed to join Chu Yang in the Combat Hall for a battle.


    Not just because she was curious about how strong the other disciples of her master were, but also because she wanted to use the opportunity to learn more about Chu Yang and in the future, hopefully also the other disciples. Intending to do her best to try and fit in now that she had be Xuan Hao''s disciple.


    "You said it! I will make sure you keep your promise in a few days!"


    Hearing that Chun Hua agreed to join him for a battle in the Combat Hall, Chu Yang smiled happily as he wasted no time in rushing back in the direction of the Combat Hall to make sure that there was a proper space allocated for their battle in a few days.


    "He sure ran off fast¡­ Oh well, let''s continue our conversation from earlier¡­" Shaking her head as she said this while looking in the direction that Chu Yang had disappeared in, Qing Yi quickly resumed her earlier conversation with Chun Hua while Xuan Hao was busy taking care of Mui and Bai Ning only did a simple introduction before rushing back to the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces in preparation for this new disciple being anywhere simr to Mui.


    Even if the chance was low after he learnt a bit about her through the introduction, he didn''t dare take any chances when it came to his cksmithing and the rest of the cksmiths of the sect! No matter what, they had to be prepared for another Mui!

 Chapter 1236 Mysterious Stone Slab, Path to Rapidly Increasing the Strength of the Sect

    Chapter 1236 Mysterious Stone b, Path to Rapidly Increasing the Strength of the Sect


    Seeing how his Chun Hua managed to fit in with his other disciples without any problems, Xuan Hao decided to leave the introduction of the sect to Qing Yi and Mui, while he went to catch up with Feng Chen and Elder Song and find out what had happened during his absence from the sect. Feeling curious about how much stronger the sect had grown and what their thoughts were on the future development of the sect now that the two bordering regions had fallen to the sect and were in the process of being integrated.


    Although, considering that he hadn''t heard anything about the sect elders or the elders from the different independent sects being moved around in preparation for any further expansion, he guessed that they should have alsoe to the same conclusion as him and decided to focus on increasing the strength of the sect before thinking about expanding any further.


    And after meeting up with the two of them, he discovered that this was indeed the case. Leaving him with nothing much to do in regard to the development of the sect. Given that the two of them already had a solid n in ce for how to best develop the disciples and the elders of the sect. Already striving towards having at least three more people break through to the Domain Lord Realm over the next three years with the help of Pei Yang''s monthly lectures.


    Pei Yang¡­?


    Hearing about Pei Yang in their n for the development of the Star Shattering Sect over the next few years, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised before quickly calming down after thinking about it for a few seconds.


    Indeed, Pei Yang might have been aplete stranger to the Star Shattering Sect, but he was still a genuine Earth Immortal Realm cultivator¡­ And together with the monthly lectures he did ording to the agreement he had struck with him back in the Blue Sea Empire, it wasn''t surprising that Pei Yang had rapidly grown to be one of the most respected figures in the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, for the elders of the Star Shattering Sect, they had barely seen someone in the Soul Ascension Realm before, let alone someone above the Soul Ascension Realm. Not to mention, the guidance provided by Pei Yang was genuinely helpful and allowed arge chunk of the Star Shattering Sect''s Nascent Soul Realm cultivators to rapidly improve.


    During the few months he had been away from the sect, Pei Yang had even begun to teach some of the elders from the different independent sects who came to visit the Star Shattering Sect every now and then, thus resulting in his name now also being known among the upper echelons of the different independent sects under the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course, Elder Song and Feng Chen already knew a bit about the circumstances behind Pei Yang''s presence in the sect from both Xuan Hao and the person himself, so they made sure that the information about him that spread outside the Star Shattering Sect was limited and wouldn''t alert the nearby Blue Sea Empire. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    In the end, Xuan Hao left Feng Chen and Elder Song to do their own thing as they seemed to have everything under control and didn''t need his help in managing the sect.


    Not that he would really want to spend his time doing that either, as it was quite obvious that the time Feng Chen and Elder Song used on managing the sect cut into the time that they could spend on cultivation.


    Although Elder Song didn''t seem to care that much about this, Feng Chen clearly wasn''t the same, as he couldn''t wait for the next development n of the sect to beunched so he could focus his full attention on cultivating.


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself while he arrived back at his pce, Xuan Hao could not help feeling like he began to understand why the ancestors of different major powers always retreated to the back while leaving the younger generation to manage most of the things by themselves. Only ever showing up in case their power was threatened or something important that couldn''t be ignored took ce.


    "Hm? Going along this train of thought¡­ Am I perhaps already considered an ancestor figure in the Star Shattering Sect!?" Suddenly freezing on the spot as he voiced his inner thoughts out loud, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say, as his current behavior did indeed seem to align with the different ancestor figures he had encountered so far. Only ever showing up in the Star Shattering Sect when something important that would affect the entire sect happened, while on normal times leaving everything else for others to take care of.


    No¡­ I definitely do more than that! I¡­ When did I hold a lecture for the disciples of the sect, was it half year ago? Maybe a year¡­?


    Realizing that he indeed seemed to perfectly fit in with the ancestor type of figure, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit wryly to himself.


    It was not so much that he was against being considered an ancestor of the Star Shattering Sect, it was just that it felt a bit weird considering that he wasn''t even fifty years old while most of the sect''s elders were pushing two hundred.


    "Ah! I almost forgot! Now that myprehension of the Dao of Illusions improved, I wonder if I''ll be able use the stone tablet, I picked up back in the mystic realm."


    Remembering the stone tablet that he had picked up back in the mystic realm as he thought about what he had done to help improve the secttely, Xuan Hao wasted no time in pulling it out from his interspatial ring to see if he could do something about its illusory state now that hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions had broken through to the Large Sess Realm.


    If he could really solve the problem of the stone tablets illusory state, it could serve as a defining treasure for the Star Shattering Sect and would be helpful for both the disciples and elders of the sect when it came to reaching the Domain Lord realm.


    After all, the stone tablet was covered in Dao Carvings from ancient cultivators who had deliberately left behind the marks of their respective dao to make it easier for the younger generation toprehend them. Even after reaching the Domain Lord Realm, it would still be useful and serve as a clear path to the Dao Seed Realm.


    Of course, in terms of being of the younger generation, it seemed like everyone in Star Shattering Sect was considered to be a part of the younger generation. Everyone except Pei Yang who had just barely graduated from being considered as someone from the younger generation.


    Although, considering that he hadn''t even reached the threshold of the Early Stage of the Dao Seed Realm yet, he might still be able to benefit from the stone dao carvings on the stone tablet.


    Bang!


    As the illusory stone tabletnded in front of him, Xuan Hao wasted no time in starting to try and look for a way to undo the illusory state that it was trapped in at the moment. Not bothering to drag it back into his room as he remained at the entrance to the pce while deducting the illusion that covered up the stone b¡­ And after a few hours of observing the illusory stone b for a way to undo the illusion, he finally found a way.


    Rumble~!


    "Hm?"


    However, the moment he began to tug at the illusion to undo it, he discovered that the size of the stone b suddenly increased by more than half a meter-


    Rumble~


    And by stopping what he was doing, it shrunk back down to its original size again.


    "How interesting¡­" Muttering this to himself as he began to experiment with the stone b, Xuan Hao discovered that outside of just growing in size as he got closer to undoing the illusory state of the stone b, it also became impossible for him to carry, as the dao carvings left behind on the stone b seemed to make it impossible to carry without being injured, while cing it inside an interspatial ring became even more impossible.


    Looks like I have to undo the illusory state in a location where it can stay in the foreseeable future without causing any problems and also giving the disciples and elders a chance to peacefully study the dao carvings¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he allowed the illusion covering it to recover and shrink the stone b back down to a more manageable size, Xuan Hao didn''t have to think for long beforeing up with a few potential locations to ce the stone b.


    In the end, only two locations seemed to fit the criteria of being ces where it wouldn''t cause any problems and the disciples and elders wouldn''t be disturbed whileprehending the dao carvings, one being the Grand Library where the cultivation techniques of the sect was stored, while the other was somewhere along the shore of the Qi Spring Lake where the qi was the most abundant.

 Chapter 1237 Dao Enlightenment Monument

    Chapter 1237 Dao Enlightenment Monument


    Contemting over which location among the two to choose, Xuan Hao ultimately decided to settle with the Grand Library where the sect''s cultivation techniques and other scrolls and books were stored. Mainly due to the fact that the Qi Spring Lake was located at the core of the sect and normal disciples wouldn''t be able to easily ess the ce without help from an elder.


    At least, by cing it in the Grand Library, it would be far easier for the disciples to ess it together with the elders of the sect.


    "As for requirements to ess it¡­ Contribution points can be used. This would also give another incentive for the disciples and elders to take on missions and help dealing with the different problems across the now rather vast territory of the sect." Muttering this to himself as he had already begun to envision the future use of the stone b, Xuan Hao wasted no time as he made his way towards the Grand Library.


    Whoosh~!


    Arriving at the Grand Library of the sect, Xuan Hao decided to directly expand the first floor of the library that most of the sect''s disciples used by adding another wing to the library before cing the stone tablet inside of it. Making sure to use some of the spiritual wood and stones he had picked up over time to do this. Ensuring that the new wing of the library was strong and sturdy enough to stop the dao aura of the stone b from leaking outside when the illusion on it was undone.


    "Everything should be done now. After the illusion is removed, I will contact someone from the mission pavilion and have them set up a formation on this ce to ensure that the disciples and elders can pay their contributions points to enter this ce." Focusing his attention on the stone b ced in the middle of the new library wing as he said this, Xuan Hao began the process of slowly undoing the illusion covering the stone b.


    Rumble~!


    BANG!


    "Huh!?"


    However, just as he reached the end and was about to fully undo the illusion, the illusion disappeared on its own, causing the stone b to suddenly grow rapidly and out of control. Directly crashing into the ceiling above before reaching a height that would put it only a few meters away from the ceiling of the second floor of the library.


    Looks like I will have to raise the ceiling up to the second floor¡­


    Only able to smile wryly as he thought this to himself after seeing how the precious spiritual wood used in the construction of the library wing had been smashed into pieces, Xuan Hao could only take out what little spiritual wood he had left on him and raise the height of the new library wing to match that of the ceiling of the second floor.


    In the end, the heigh from the ground to the ceiling of the new library wing ended up being around 25 meters, as the normal ceiling height of each floor of the grand library was around a dozen meters with some space in between for both support and different formations to be ced in.


    "Now I just need to contact one of the elders from the mission pavilion and have them set up a formation that will deduct the contribution points of the elders and disciples who want to enter this ce andprehend the¡­ Stone b? Hm¡­ it definitely needs a different name, but what? Dao stone room? Enlightenment room? No¡­ Dao Enlightenment Monument? Yeah, that sounds nice. Dao Enlightenment Monument, a ce for disciples and elders to go toprehend the dao of ancient cultivators." Nodding to himself as everything fell into ce, Xuan Hao took out hismunication talisman and contacted the current elder in charge of the mission pavilion toe over and set up a formation and price structure for disciples and elders who wanted toprehend the dao carvings on Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    Not intending to set the prices on such things himself, as he felt that someone like the elder in charge of mission pavilion would be far more suited to do such a thing. After all, being the one in charge of the mission pavilion also meant that one oversaw the distribution of contribution points inside the sect.


    Such a person would have a far better idea than him about how many contribution points would be suitable to charge the disciples and elders¡­


    "Grand Elder!"


    Not even half a minuteter, the person in charge of the mission pavilion arrived at the grand library.


    "Hm? Aren''t you the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race?" However, after seeing who the person in charge of the mission pavilion was, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised. Not having expected that the current person in charge of the mission pavilion to be the Grand Elder of the Half Spirit Race.


    "Ah! Yes, I happened to be put in charge of the mission pavilion by Elder Song after I broke through to the Domain Lord Realm. Hehe, I was quite fortunate, as I didn''t think I would be able to get such an important position directly after reaching the Domain Lord Realm- Ah! And senior, you can just call me Wei Chin instead of using my title from back before I joined the Star Shattering Sect together with my people."


    "I see¡­ Then, Wei Chin, I called you here to set up a formation to manage the disciples entering this ce toprehend the dao carvings on the stone behind me, I take it that you should be able toe up with a price to enter this ce after taking a look yourself."


    "Yes, yes! Of course!" Nodding his head eagerly, Wei Chin finally noticed the massive stone monument behind Xuan Hao and was instantly spellbound upon seeing the countless dao carving belonging to all sorts of Daos that he had never seen before. Even finding a few corresponding to the Tempest Dao he had startedprehending upon breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "This¡­" Not knowing what to say as he instantly understood the importance of this stone monument, Wei Chin could not help nervously turning to look back up at Xuan Hao. Wondering if it would really be okay to ce something like that inside the library of the sect instead of locking it away in a secure vault.


    "Impressive, right? It''s called the Dao Enlightenment Monument, I''m sure both the disciples and elders will improve rapidly after getting a chance toprehend the dao carving left on it. Seeing as you understand the importance of this matter, I will leave the rest to you and wait for the good news of this ce to spread out from the elders and disciples."


    Unaware of the thoughts going through Wei Chin''s head, Xuan Hao just thought he was amazed by the Dao Enlightenment Monument and happily praised it before turning around to leave after confirming that the rest could be left for Wei Chin to handle.


    "This¡­"


    Seeing Xuan Hao leave, Wei Chin froze for a short moment as he slowly turned to look back at the more than twenty-meter-tall Dao Enlightenment Monument covered in dao carvings left behind by ancient cultivators to assist the younger generation in their journey toprehend the dao.


    "Looks like I have quite an important task at hand¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Wei Chin narrowed both his eyes as he pulled out hismunication talisman and began to prepare for setting up the Dao Enlightenment Monument and making it essible to the disciples and elders of the sect as fast as possible.


    ¡­


    As Xuan Hao finished setting up the Dao Enlightenment Monument and left the rest to Wei Chin, information about what had happened and the new wing that had been added to the library soon spread across the sect, causing both elders and disciples to rush over in anticipation of what the new wing of the library was going to be used for.


    "Huh? A new wing appeared in the Grand Library? Did it perhaps undergo an expansion because of the recent influx of cultivation techniques from the new territory under the sect?"


    "No, I was here yesterday when the ce was built and witnessed arge stone monument suddenly breaking through the ceiling of the ce. Forcing the elder building the ce to increase the height to cover it up."


    "Really? What is it for then? Storing arge stone?"


    "I don''t know¡­ The ce was closed off by the elders from the mission pavilion shortly after and you can''t approach the ce without one of them showing up to chase you away. If I''m not wrong, it should be something we will be able to use contribution points on in the future and-"


    "Haha! You guys are all uninformed!"


    ""Huh?!""


    "Who is this?"


    "Hmph! I''m an inner sect disciple! But more importantly! I happened to overhear one of the elders from the mission pavilion mention that the ce was created by Grand Elder Xuan!"


    ""Really!?""


    "Yes! I''m sure it will be something amazing!"


    In the end, news about the fact that Xuan Hao was the one behind it also began to spread among the disciples, causing even more people to show up in anticipation of what was hidden in the new wing of the library, while at the same time putting more pressure on Wei Chin to finish preparing the ce for use and allow the first batch of disciples and elders inside.

 Chapter 1238 The Dao Enlightenment Monument Opens, New Domain Lord!

    Chapter 1238 The Dao Enlightenment Monument Opens, New Domain Lord!


    "So many people¡­" As the number of disciples and elders gathered around the library in anticipation of what the new wing of the library would be used for, Wei Chin emerged from the library with a somewhat shocked look on his face. Not having expected a crowd to gather during the short time he had taken to set up the Dao Enlightenment Monument together with a few elders from the mission pavilion.


    I wonder if this is because news of Grand Elder Xuan being behind it leaked out¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Wei Chin could not help marveling over just how much pull Xuan Hao had in the sect even though he hadn''t made any appearances over the past few years outside of a few lectures.


    Then again, he was still considered the strongest person in the sect, something that had been acknowledged by Pei Yang during one of his lectures in the past. Making it well known inside the sect that Xuan Hao should have also surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm.


    With such strength, it was only a given that anything he did would attract the attention of the sect''s disciples and elders. Especially when it also happened to involve the mission pavilion¡­


    "Everyone!"


    Seeing that a few of the elders had already noticed him and were looking towards him filled with anticipation, Wei Chin decided to speak up. Instantly causing therge gathering of disciples and elders to quiet down as they turned to look towards him with a simr look of anticipation. All of them wanted to know about the new wing of the library and what it was going to be used for.


    "As all of you might already know, the addition of the new wing of the library was added by Grand Elder Xuan yesterday and the mission pavilion was tasked with setting up the ce for use through contribution points. The new wing of the library is called the Dao Enlightenment Monument, it contains a stone monument covered in dao carvings left behind by ancient cultivators for the younger generation toprehend.


    ording to what Grand Elder Xuan told me about it, the Dao Enlightenment Monument is useful to anyone below the Dao Seed Realm. Although, I don''t have a clue what that realm is, I''m certain that it should be somewhere above the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Due to most of the people here properly wanting to enter the Dao Enlightenment Monument, a limit on the people entering will be in ce over the next few weeks and will be lifted afterwards, as I doubt any of you will have that many contribution points left by that time."


    Finishing the introduction of the Dao Enlightenment Monument, Wei Chin didn''t bother waiting around to wait for the disciples and elders to react, as he directly turned around and made his way inside the library to be the first person to enter use the Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    Given that the Dao Enlightenment Monument was still useful to someone like himself, he of course intended to take full advantage of it to improve his strength.


    "This¡­ Did¡­ Did Elder Wei just leave to enter the wing of the library where the Dao Enlightenment Monument is located¡­?"


    "Yes¡­ I think he said it would be useful to anyone below this¡­ Ehm¡­ Dao Seed Realm? Although I don''t have any clue about the realm either, he did say it was above the Soul Ascension Realm. Meaning that the Dao Enlightenment Monument should also be useful to those in the Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    "Wait¡­ Isn''t this a perfect opportunity for us still stuck at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm¡­?"


    "This¡­"


    "Indeed, it might be the opportunity we have been waiting for!"


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Before any of the disciples standing around outside the library had a chance to react, the elders at the Later Stages and the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm who had also been standing around wasted no time as they rushed towards the Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    Not caring the slightest bit about therge quantity of contribution points required for them to enter for even a single day, as they all rushed inside. Not intending to give up the opportunity to reach the Domain Lord Realm that had finally appeared in front of them.


    Even though it was significantly cheaper for a disciplepared to an elder when it came toprehending the dao carvings left behind on the Dao Enlightenment Monument, the spots on the first day of the Dao Enlightenment Monument being unveiled were fully upied by the elders of the sect¡­


    "Nooo-! I don''t have enough contribution points to stay any longer!?" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Just a little more¡­ And I would have been able to establish a pseudo domain of my own and take the first step towards the Domain Lord Realm!"


    "Ah! I should have taken on more missions from the mission pavilion!"


    However, when the second day rolled around, a good chunk of the elders who hadn''t participated much in helping the sect through taking on missions were forced to leave the wing with the Dao Enlightenment Monument inside of it. Giving the first few disciples of the sect a chance to enter the wing andprehend the Dao Enlightenment Monument, while the few elders who had been forced to leave rushed towards the mission pavilion to take on missions from the sect to gain enough contribution points to return to the Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    Soon enough, news about the Dao Enlightenment Monument spread across the entire sect. Instantly igniting a rush among both elders and disciples to umte more contribution points so they would have a chance toprehend the dao carvings on the Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    Even Feng Chen and the other Domain Lord Realm cultivators of the Star Shattering Sect paid a visit to the Dao Enlightenment Monument after learning that it would also be useful for those in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Of course, Xuan Hao''s disciples were no different, as they also decided to visit the Dao Enlightenment Monument for a chance toprehend the dao carvings left by the ancient cultivators.


    Because of this, both Chun Hua and Chu Yang managed to rapidly improve their pseudo domains and grew infinitely close to forming a true domain and stepping into the Domain Lord Realm. Only needing a single opportunity to take the final step to reach the Domain Lord Realm, something that not only caught the attention of Xuan Hao who was looking forward to having one of his disciples break through to the Domain Lord Realm, but also happened to catch the attention of the different elders of the sect.


    After all, even though they didn''t know much about Chun Hua, they all understood just how young Chu Yang was and felt a sense of urgency to break through themselves so as to not be overtaken by the younger generation.


    In the end, five days after the Dao Enlightenment Monument was opened to the disciples and elders of the sect, one of the elders who had been stuck at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm managed to sessfully break through to the Domain Lord Realm. Marking the first person to reach the Domain Lord Realm since the establishment of the Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    This person was none other than Shen Xuefeng, the young elder who had once been an elder of the Spring Flower Sect before the merger between the Spring Flower Sect and the Flying Sword Sect into the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although she hadn''t been drawing much attention over the past few years and had been focusing her attention on cultivating, she was still a rather well-known figure in the Star Shattering Sect due to her small stature and the giant hammer more than twice her height that she used for fighting. Even resulting in her bing rather known even outside the Star Shattering Sect due to her participation in the sect''s expansion into the two bordering regions not too long ago.


    During her breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, her domain had also be known across the sect, as it directly ttened the area a few hundred meters around her when she had broken through.


    The dao that she had ended upprehending was a rather unique one, the Dao of Gravity, that she could not only use to suppress her opponents and increase her own speed but could also use to adjust the weight of her beloved weapon. Resulting in the already massive hammer that she had been using before being reced by an evenrger hammer that was difficult for any other Domain Lord to wield due to its terrifying weight.


    The hammer in question was created by none other than Yi Min, who could be considered the strongest cksmith in the Star Shattering Sect at the moment. Even more so after she had been lucky enough to gain the inheritance of a Saint Realm cksmith together with Xuan Hao.

 Chapter 1239 Dao Seed Realm? Clearing Pei Yangs Confusion

    Chapter 1239 Dao Seed Realm? Clearing Pei Yang''s Confusion


    Following Shen Xuefeng breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm, it did not take long before the rest of the sect''s elders began to make significant progress towards the Domain Lord Realm¡­ And although none of them managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm in the week after Shen Xuefeng''s breakthrough, a few of them had managed to take another step forward and established a pseudo domain. Meaning that it would only be a matter of time before they broke through.


    In the end, among the people who had already broken through to the Domain Lord Realm, Feng Chen managed to directly break through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm after spending a single day in front of the Dao Enlightenment Monument, while Shu Yao also managed to breakthrough to the Second Stage of the Domain.


    The rest of the sect''s Domain Lord Realm each made significant progress towards the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Only needing more time to breakthrough and follow in the footsteps of Feng Chen and Shu Yao.


    Of course, with such a rapid speed of improvement, Pei Yang who had spent most of his time recovering in a courtyard not too far away from the core of the sect, also grew interested in the Dao Enlightenment Monument and decided to pay it a visit.


    Although he had also heard about the Dao Seed Realm that Xuan Hao had mentioned to Wei Chin when he tasked him with setting up the ce, he didn''t think too much about it and just guessed that it should be a different name for the Earth Immortal Realm. After all, the enclosed lotus that formed in the dantian after reaching the Earth Immortal Realm could be considered a seed that had to be nurtured into blooming inside the dantian.


    However, after personally visiting the Dao Enlightenment Monument, he was shocked to discover that the dao carvings left on the monument were also useful for his cultivation. Although nowhere near as useful as it was to those elders in the Nascent Soul Realm trying to reach the Domain Lord Realm, they were still useful to him.


    Meaning¡­ That he hadn''t reached the Dao Seed Realm that Xuan Hao had mentioned. Making him start to second guess his earlier thoughts of the realm being the same as the Earth Immortal Realm.


    I will have to ask him about this¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he left the Dao Enlightenment Monument after spending an entire week spell bound by a dao carving that corresponded with the dao he hadprehended back when he broke through to the Earth Immortal Realm, Pei Yang didn''t waste any time as he headed directly towards Xuan Hao''s ce. Fully intend on finding out more about the Dao Seed Realm.


    "Hm? Pei Yang is here to see me?"


    Given the fact that he intended to visit Xuan Hao, it did not take long before the person in question found out about it after a quick message sent through his divine sense. Resulting in Xuan Hao postponing a training session that he nned to have with his newest disciple in a few minutes.


    The reason behind Xuan Hao decision to do this was rather simple. This was the first time Pei Yang had asked for a meeting with him ever since he became a part of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Dying Chun Hua''s training session by an hour or two for something like this wouldn''t hurt. Not to mention, Chun Hua might even be happy to get another hour or two longer to focus on her cultivation.


    As for why this would be the case¡­ That had to do with the rivalry that had bloomed between her and Chu Yang during the short time she had been living in the Star Shattering Sect.


    At the moment, both of them were fully focused on seeing who among them would be able to break through to the Domain Lord Realm first. Resulting in both of them focusing all of their time on cultivating, while ignoring everything else.


    Even he, the master, had a hard time trying to set aside time for teaching the two of them, as both of them already had a clear path towards the Domain Lord Realm and didn''t need his help on this matter. Already being as prepared as they could be for the breakthrough¡­


    "Pei Yang, what do I owe the pleasure?" For this reason, Xuan Hao happily greeted Pei Yang as he appeared at the entrance to his home before motioning for him to follow him inside where Zhi Ruo was already in the process of preparing a few simple snacks and tea for them.


    "Xuan Hao¡­ Or do prefer Grand Elder Xuan?"


    "Ah¡­ Xuan Hao is just fine."


    "Then, Xuan Hao, I have something I wanted to ask you about, so I ended up rudely inviting myself."


    "Hehe, it''s no problem at all, you can ask away and I will do my best to help resolve your doubts." Hearing that Pei Yang hade to him to ask about something, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what he wanted to ask him about as the two of them ended up in one of therger rooms for receiving guests where Zhi Ruo had already finished preparing a few simple snacks and tea for them.


    "Ah, it''s nothing serious, I just wanted to ask about the Dao Seed Realm that I heard you mention to Wei Chin back when you set up the Dao Enlightenment Monument." Seeing the somewhat serious expression on Xuan Hao''s face, Pei Yang decided to directly ask his question before some kind of misunderstanding was created.


    "The Dao Seed Realm? I see¡­ Guess its only a given that you would want to know about it after I ended up mentioning it to Wei Chin¡­" Hearing what Pei Yang said, Xuan Hao silently let out a breath of relief at the fact that it wasn''t anything serious as he sat down took a sip of the tea that Zhi Ruo had prepared for them.


    "Hm¡­ How much do you know about the Earth Immortal Realm and the Celestial Immortal Realm thates after it?" Not knowing where to start his exnation of the Dao Seed Realm to someone who had only ever known about the Earth Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao decided to first ask what Pei Yang knew about the Earth Immortal Realm and the Celestial Realm to both gauge where to start his exnation and at the same time see if he could learn more about the Celestial Immortal Realm from Pei Yang.


    "How much do I know? Hm¡­ For the Earth Immortal Realm, I know that it''s divided into¡­" Hearing what Xuan Hao said, Pei Yang thought about the question for a few seconds before starting to exin the Earth Immortal Realm in detail.


    Although the information was far more expansive and in-depth than what Xuan Hao knew about the realm, it was nothing new.


    "¡­ When ites to the Celestial Immortal Realm¡­"


    Only upon reaching the Celestial Immortal Realm did he start to pay more attention. Unfortunately, Pei Yang''s knowledge on the Celestial Immortal Realm was worse than his own. Not really providing any new insights into the realm itself.


    "¡­ That is all I know about the Earth Immortal Realm and the Celestial Immortal Realm; I wonder if there is anything I''m wrong about?" As he finished exining his understanding of the two realms, Pei Yang felt even more so than before that there was something special about the Dao Seed Realm, as it didn''t seem to fit into the Earth Immortal Realm or the Celestial Immortal Realm that he knew about.


    After all, he could tell from how useful the Dao Enlightenment Monument was to him that it wouldn''t be useful after his strength reached theter stages of the Earth Immortal Realm. Meaning that the Dao Seed Realm should be located somewhere inside the Earth Immortal Realm.


    "No, there isn''t anything wrong with it so to speak, it''s just that your understanding of the Earth Immortal Realm is limited. Well¡­ Not really the Earth Immortal Realm, but the Dao Seed Realm as it was called in the past." n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "The past! Is the Dao Seed Realm perhaps the name of the Earth Immortal Realm during the ancient era!?"


    "Indeed! Not just that, but the Dao Seed Realm is far more profound and also has a far higher upper limitpared to the Earth Immortal Realm of today. Not to mention, the realm after the Dao Seed Realm is different than the one after breaking through at the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm¡­" Seeing that he had Pei Yang''s full attention, Xuan Hao didn''t intend to hide anything regarding the Dao Seed Realm from Pei Yang as he began to exin both the Dao Seed Realm and the Profound Immortal Realm that came after it in detail.


    After all, Pei Yang was now a part of the Star Shattering Sect, and it would be bad for the sect if he reached what he thought was the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm and decided to break through to the Celestial Immortal Realm instead of trying to reach the Profound Immortal Realm.

 Chapter 1240 Rapid Growth, First Domain Lord Realm Disciple

    Chapter 1240 Rapid Growth, First Domain Lord Realm Disciple


    Learning about the Dao Seed Realm and the Profound Immortal Realm that came after, Pei Yang was left stunned for a long time before ultimately excusing himself to go back to his own courtyard where he could digest the information.


    "Looks like he will be visiting the Dao Enlightenment Monument a lot in the future¡­" Seeing how Pei Yang rushed off, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling to himself as he could already foresee Pei Yang spending most of his time at the Dao Enlightenment Monument after he fully recovered and could once again focus his full attention on his cultivation.


    At the same time, he also decided to write a simple description of the Dao Seed Realm and the Profound Immortal Realm before sending it off to Elder Song for storage in the Grand Library where the Dao Enlightenment Monument was located.


    Of course, he made sure that Elder Song would store this information on the higher floors of the library that the disciples couldn''t easily ess, as he didn''t n for them to ess this sort of information before they had even reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    Maybe in the future when the Dao Seed Realm and possibly the Profound Immortal Realm be more widely known, things could change, but for now, he felt it was for the best that information about the Dao Seed Realm didn''t spread out from the sect.


    After all, a simple name of the realm was one thing, an in-depth understanding of the realm was apletely different thing and might end up attracting a lot of unnecessary attention from the powers at the core of the continent. Especially considering that he was almost certain that these empires andrge religions had some information on the Dao Seed Realm with their long heritage.


    As he finished up this and drank thest bit of tea left, Xuan Hao signaled for Zhi Ruo standing nearby to clean the ce up before heading towards the room that had been dedicated to Chun Hua after she had settled down in the sect. Intending to teach her ording to what he had nned to do before Pei Yang''s sudden visit.


    Not because he wanted to dy her breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, but because he wanted to teach her as much as possible about the Domain Lord Realm to ensure she could begin smoothly progressing towards the Dao Domain Lord Realm after her breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm. Even if it ended up dying her breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, it would at least save her more time in the long run.


    All things considered; he did the same thing for Chu Yang. Not to make things fair in their littlepetition to see who would first reach the Domain Lord Realm, but because he wanted both of them to reach the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    Not just them, if possible, he wanted all of his disciples to reach the Dao Domain Lord Realm instead of having to go through the Soul Ascension Realm. Especially so after he had broken through to thete Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and personally experienced his strength growing to the Dao Seed Realm without having to first pass through the Immortal Soul Tribtion.


    Even if he would still have to go through it at some point in the future, he felt that his current strength was more than enough for him to easily breeze through the seven tribtions of the Immortal Soul Tribtion.


    ¡­


    Not long after Elder Song received the scroll containing the description of the Dao Seed Realm and the Profound Immortal Realm, he informed the rest of the sect''s upper echelons about it before cing the scroll at the top floor of the Grand Library. Knowing very well that it would be bad for the sect if the information contained inside the scroll leaked out.


    The reason why he even informed the different upper echelons of the sect who were mostly around the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm or at the Domain Lord Realm, was due to the fact that the information contained inside the scroll also contained some of his own insights into cultivation. Even if it was difficult to understand, it would still be useful for those below to read.


    Of course, this was apletely unintentional result on Xuan Hao''s side, as he hadn''t really thought much about it as he wrote down the simple description of the two realms. Ending up also sharing quite a few of his insights on the realms below as a result of trying to simplify the description of the two realms.


    In the end, coupled with the Dao Enlightenment Monument that had also been established by Xuan Hao, the higher-level cultivators of the Star Shattering Sect entered a period of explosive growth as those already in the Domain Lord Realm continued to grow stronger, while those still in the Nascent Soul Realm began to establish pseudo domains of their own and take the first steps towards the Domain Lord Realm.


    By the time that the Dao Enlightenment Monument had been around for a little over three months, the different Peak Nascent Soul Realm cultivators of the sect that had been stuck at the realm for a long time began to start breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm one by one.


    Among the people breaking through was both Chun Hua and Chu Yang, who surprisingly began to break through to the Domain Lord Realm at almost the exact same time, with Chu Yang only falling a few seconds behind Chun Hua who ended up beginning her breakthrough first.


    Due to this, Xuan Hao was forced to stop his own cultivation as he used his strength to lock down his pce and prevent his two disciples break through from causing any serious damage, as both of them had begun the process of breaking through in the training ground right next to the pce.


    Neither of them showed the slightest bit of worry about the damage they might cause, as they focused all of their attention on breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm. Even nowpeting as to who among them managed to finish their breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm first.


    "What a bunch of troublesome disciples¡­" Shaking his head as she said this while watching the two from the side, Xuan Hao couldn''t hide the smile that had appeared at his lips after he realized that the two were breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    On the inside, he was overjoyed that the two were breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm, as it not only meant that his disciples would have grown up enough to take on more responsibilities in the sect in the form of an elder position, but also because he would be able to see some signs of life from the system that didn''t include the repeatable quest for holding a lecture every now and then.


    BOOOOM-!


    "Hahaha! I won! I broke through first!"


    Just at this moment, the happyughter of his fifth disciple echoed out across the devasted training ground, as the person in questionnded on the ground with a victorious grin on her face. Not bothering to try and restrain her domain as her master was already making sure that it didn''t spread out and cause any damage.


    BOOOOOM!


    Not even ten seconds after Chun Hua had finished her breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, Chu Yang simrly finished his breakthrough as hended on the ground not too far away from her with a frown stered all over his face.


    "Hmph! You only won this time around! There won''t be a next time!" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Hehe, sure~"


    "You only won by a few seconds, I''m sure that-"


    "Both of you, stabilize your cultivation base." Interrupting the two before they could start anything, Xuan Hao reminded them about the fact that they had just broken through and needed to stabilize their cultivation realms.


    ""Yes, master!""


    Hearing their master''s words, both Chu Yang and Chun Hua quieted down before sitting down on the ground and beginning the process of stabilizing their cultivation base. Knowing very well that the words of their master were correct.


    If they didn''t stabilize their cultivation base, they might end up injuring their foundation- or worse, regressing!


    "Hm, good to see both of you are listening, I will keep this ce sealed off for the next three days, so both of you should take this opportunity to fully stabilize your cultivation base in this time and fully step into the ranks of Domain Lords.


    After this, I think Elder Song will be more than happy to have a chat with both of you about what you can do to help the sect. After all, with your strength, both of you are more than qualified to take on elder positions."


    Saying this, Xuan Hao didn''t stay around the training ground for long and left after sealing the ce up to prevent the chaotic domains of his two disciples from wreaking havoc outside. Heading back towards his own cultivation room to check out the system message he had ignored when the two had broken through earlier.

 Chapter 1241 Hidden Main Quest, Source Crystal and...

    Chapter 1241 Hidden Main Quest, Source Crystal and...


    [Hidden Main Quest: Have one disciple reach the Domain Lord Realm plete)]


    Reaching his cultivation room, Xuan Hao could not help looking at the system panel that had appeared the moment Chun Hua had broken through from the Nascent Soul Realm and officially stepped in the Domain Lord Realm a few seconds ahead of her senior brother¡­ And without wasting any time, he fully expanded it to see what he would get this time around. Hoping inside that it would be thest percentage point needed to awaken his physique.


    [Hidden Main Quest: Have one disciple reach the Domain Lord Realm plete)]


    [Description: Have one of your disciples break through the Domain Lord Realm below the age of 50.]


    [Reward: Information on how to fully awaken the Ster Dao Body.]


    [Bonus Reward Requirements: Have a disciple sessfully reach the Domain Lord Realm within one year of taking them in as a disciple, the disciple must be below the age of 30. plete)]


    [Bonus Reward: Source Crystal]


    However, after seeing the rewards from the system after having one of his disciples break through to the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao was just about to curse out loudly upon noticing that the reward was only information about his physique and how to awaken it and the official name of the physique itself, when he suddenly realized that he had somehow managed to alsoplete the bonus reward requirement for the hidden quest.


    Although the reward itself was nowhere near the level of the bonus reward, he could have gotten from the hidden quest of having four disciples reach the Core Formation Realm, a source crystal was still something precious that would increase hisprehension after consumption.


    Not to mention, this was only the reward for having one disciple reach the Domain Lord Realm, not four¡­


    "A source crystal¡­ I haven''t seen something like that since I took in Bai Ning." Muttering this to himself as he remembered the battle he had with the guardian snake of the source crystal back then, Xuan Hao could not help wondering how big the source crystal given by the system would be.


    Depending on howrge it was, it might even be helpful in increasing hisprehension realm of one of his Daos to Large Sess Realm. After all, back then, he had used the source crystal the size of a grain of rice to break through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Whoosh~


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t hesitate in the slightest as he first redeemed the bonus reward, causing a small crystal no bigger than his fingertip to appear in front of him.


    "This¡­ So big!"


    Seeing the source crystal that was many timesrger than the source crystal he had consumed back then; Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of excitement building up inside of him as he remembered the wonderful feeling he had felt overwhelming every part of his body after swallowing the source crystal.


    If he could experience a simr situation now that his cultivation had risen. Not to mention advancing to the Large Sess Realm, he had a feeling that he might even be able to reach the Perfection Realm in one of his Daos.


    No, not just one of his Daos, he might be able to directly reach the realm above the Perfection Realm!


    All he needed to do was consume the source crystal¡­ And he would be able to experience the magical feeling from back then! Yes, all he needed to do was swallow the source crystal and he would be able to surpass the Perfection Realm!


    Maybe even directly breaking through to the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and then the Profound Immortal Realm in a single step. Even his physique would awaken after such a massive improvement and-


    Thump~


    Huh? This¡­!?


    Suddenly hearing the sound of the source crystalnding on the floor, Xuan Hao blinked both his eyes in surprise-


    Whoosh-!


    And before he had a chance to fall into the strange trance like state he had just managed to awaken from again, he used his domain to pick up the source crystal and seal it away before cing it inside an interspatial ring.


    "What in the world¡­ Are source crystal perhaps dangerous after growing to a certain size?!" Only after all of this did Xuan Hao calm down and look at the interspatial ring with the source crystal sealed inside of it with a hint of fear.


    After it had appeared, he didn''t even have a chance to fight back as he was trapped in some kind of strange trance that made him want nothing more than to consume the source crystal. Only waking up due to the source crystal falling to the ground where it made a sound that allowed him to momentarily awaken and seal it away before the same strange power that had lulled him into a trance had a chance to affect him again.


    No matter what it was, he had a feeling that it would be best to avoid consuming the source crystal for now. At least, he needed to try and get a better understanding of source crystals before recklessly consuming the one now sealed away in one of his interspatial rings, something he hadn''t done in the past due to not encountering any more source crystals after the first one back when he had just met Bai Ning and decided to take him in as his third disciple.


    I will have to ask Elder Song if the sect has any information on source crystals¡­


    Shaking his head as he already thought about going to Elder Song for help in finding out more about the source crystals, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the hidden quest. Focusing his attention on the main reward that he hadn''t yet redeemed-


    Ster Dao Body¡­ I wonder what requirements there is to awaken it¡­


    And without a second thought, he redeemed the reward. Fully prepared for an influx of information on how to awaken the Ster Dao Body.


    "¡­"


    However, instead of the influx of information about the Ster Dao Body he had expected to happen, nothing happened, and he just remained frozen on the spot watching the system panel for the hidden main quest disappear in front of him without anything happening.


    Don''t tell me¡­ Is it simr to the short awakening method stating requirements to awaken the physique that Qing Yi had for her physique¡­


    Feeling like he already had his answer after no book or scroll about the Ster Dao Body rting to the divine physique had appeared nor had he received any influx of information on it, Xuan Hao decided to slowly pull up his status for the first time in quite some time.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword ((Peak) Small Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess), Dao of Space (Small Sess), Dao of Illusions (Large Sess Realm), Dao of cksmithing (Small Sess), Dao of Light (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Formations (Small Sess Realm) Dao Lotus: 11yers


    Sword Intent: Peak Nascent Sword Soul Realm


    Talent: ???? Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened) Physique: Ster Dao Body (99% Awakened)


    Ster Dao Body Awakening Requirements: Dao of Space Perfection Realm, Dao of Time Elementary Realm, Profound Immortal Realm (Land Creation)


    Realm: Late Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to the Early Stage of the Dao Seed Realm) Professions: Alchemist (Master), Formation Master (Grandmaster), cksmithing (Pseudo Saint) Sect: Star Shattering Sect Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui, Chun Hua


    Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Peak Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm)


    Looking through his status and finding the awakening requirements, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing to himself.


    Not to mention reaching the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space, he had no idea how to even beginprehending the Dao of Time, let alone the requirement for his cultivation to be in the Profound Immortal Realm.


    As for thend creation part in the Profound Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao guessed that it should be one of the minor realms of the Profound Immortal Realm¡­ And for once, he really hoped that it was the first minor realm of the Profound Immortal Realm and not thest one symbolizing the peak of the Profound Immortal Realm. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    If that was really the case, it would be quite some time before he could awaken his divine physique, but at the very least he could pat himself on the back and feel a bit happy at his increase in strength after he had finished integrating the Dao of Formations and the Dao of Light into his dao seed over his journey back to the sect together with Chun Hua.


    At the same time, he also felt like he had found the reason why his physique had remained stuck at 99% for so long.


    It was not that he couldn''t awaken his physique, it was just that he was far too weak to do so at the moment.


    Then again, he could not help remembering the bonus reward from having four disciples reach the Core Formation Realm.


    If he got that reward, would he have directly broken through to the Profound Immortal Realm or would the system find some way around the requirements for awakening the Ster Dao Body¡­?


    Unfortunately, no matter what he thought, there was no way he would find out as he had already failed that quest¡­

 Chapter 1242 Rabbit Demon Beasts Effect on a Kingdom...

    Chapter 1242 Rabbit Demon Beast''s Effect on a Kingdom...


    Knowing that he wouldn''t be able to do anything about his special physique any time soon and the source crystal was too dangerous to consume at the moment, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit weird. Although the information on how to awaken the Ster Dao Body was useful, and the source crystal would be a great help in archiving this, he didn''t really get anything he could use at the moment and would have to wait until he grew stronger before he could make use of any of it.


    "Oh well, for now, I should just continue focusing on nurturing my disciples and have the rest of them reach the Nascent Soul Realm for another reward." Muttering this to himself as he decided to focus on nurturing his disciple for more rewards now that he didn''t have any ns of leaving the sect in the foreseeable future, Xuan Hao closed both his eyes as his divine sense swept out and covered the training ground where Chun Hua and Chu Yang were busy trying to stabilize their cultivation base.


    ? Second Disciple, Chu Yang?


    Race: Human Talent: 57 Dao: Dao of the Spear (Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Earth, Dao of Blood, Dao of ughter, Dao of Death Physique: No Special Physique Rmended Physique: Six Paths of ughter Divine Physique (Can be refined) Realm: First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Cultivation Mantra: Soul Spear Divine Mantra ? Fifth Disciple, Chun Hua?


    Race: Nature Spirit, Tree Spirit Talent: 67 Dao: Dao of Nature (Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Wood, Dao of Life, Dao of Water Physique: Spirit Physique Realm: First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Profession: Alchemy (Peak Apprentice Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Heart of the Forest Deciding to look over their status now that they had both broken through to the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao noticed that outside of the pseudo dao part of their dao changing to domain, nothing had changed outside of Chun Hua somehow managing to reach the Peak of the Apprentice Realm for alchemy, a change he guessed had happened because her insight into the Dao of Nature had deepened. Giving her far deeper insight into spiritual herbspared to normal.


    Thinking about, maybe she didn''t even practice or try to be an alchemist but had automatically managed to reach the Apprentice Realm as her insight into the Dao of Nature had deepened. Maybe in the future, her alchemy realm would unknowingly end up increasing as her insight into the Dao of Nature deepened.


    "Now that I think about it, outside of increasing the strength of my disciples, there is also that limited time quest. Given how long it''s been, it should only be a few months before it''spleted..." Recalling the quest that was better left unnamed as he looked through the status of his disciples, Xuan Hao could not help ncing towards a certain number that he had done his best to ignore over the years.


    [6358/1000]


    Though he did still throw out a few interspatial rings every now and then, he no longer bothered to use his time on refining new interspatial rings and only used those he had picked up from cultivators he had killed or during his travels outside the sect.


    Even then, the sheer number of interspatial rings he had thrown away had ended up attracting a lot of talented young people to the Star Shattering Sect from all across the Sky Empire and even the Blue Sea Empire. The test created by the system inside the interspatial ring proved to be convincing enough for the lucky few who managed to find one of the interspatial rings that they would take on the long journey to reach the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course, not a single one of the people who had happened to pick up one of the interspatial rings he had throw out during his travels through the Blue Sea Empire had managed to reach the Star Shattering Sect yet and only those within the territory of the Sky Empire had managed to reach the sect so far.


    As for the reason why, he knew about this¡­ That was because the system would remind him every time someone happened to chance upon one of the interspatial rings and trigger the test stored inside. Giving him a chance to observe the test and see if the people inside were fit as personal disciples.


    Unfortunately, he had yet to find a single potential disciple this way, though, on the bright side, the Star Shattering Sect did attract quite arge number of talented young people this way. Even managing to attract two young wandering cultivators at the Nascent Soul Realm, who had happened to pass through the territory of Sky Empire to escape a recent flood of demonic cultivators that had overwhelmed one of the bordering kingdoms of the Onyx Empire.


    With this in mind, even though he hadn''t managed to pick up a disciple with the help of the interspatial rings he had thrown out during his travels outside the sect, it had still ended up attracting a steady flow of talented young people to join the sect. Ensuring that the younger generation of the sect remained strong.


    ¡­


    Squeak!?


    At the same time Xuan Hao was pondering over the recent breakthrough of his two disciples and his longest quest to date, a certain rabbit demon beast was letting out a surprised squeak as it suddenly discovered that the spirit stones that had once covered every part of the pavilion it resided in had disappeared.


    Not too far away, the human cultivator who had been taken in as the rabbit demon beast''s second subordinate rushed over with a worried expression on his face as he kneeled down. "Lord Rabbit! Is there anything I can help with?"


    SQUEAK! Squeak, squeak, squeak!


    Seeing the respectful expression of its subordinate and hearing what he said, the rabbit demon beast didn''t hold back in the slightest as it directly asked about the suddenck of spirit stones¡­ And although the human cultivator had a hard time properly understanding the squeaking sounds of the rabbit demon beast, he still managed to catch the general gist of it with the help of the contract that had been established between them.


    "¡­"


    However, even if he knew about what his lord wasining about, there was nothing he could do about it, as Yi Min had long since cut off the flow of spirit stones after discovering that the rabbit demon beast showed no signs of leaving and consumed a tremendous amount of spirit stones every day.


    The spirit stones that the rabbit demon beast had been consuming for thest two months didn''te from the Iron Sky Kingdom, but had insteade from his personal savings¡­ And at this point in time, the rabbit demon beast had already consumed all of his spirit stones.


    Leaving him with no choice but to face the anger of his lord!


    "My lord¡­ It-it''s like this¡­" Building up what little courage he had when facing the rabbit demon beast that essentially controlled his life, the random human subordinate did his best to exin that the Iron Sky Kingdom had stopped sending spirit stones and that they had no spirit stones left.


    SQUEEEAAAK-!


    Hearing this, the rabbit demon beast let out a loud squeak that left everyone in the capital city of the Iron Sky Kingdom shivering in fear. However, this was the extend of what the rabbit demon beast did, as it full well understood that it couldn''t go to Yi Min and try to get more spirit stones from her. Understanding very well that doing so would definitely anger its master. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    In the worst-case scenario, its master might directly lock it up for years without giving it a single spirit stone! A fate worse than death!


    Squeak¡­Squeak!


    However, as it thought about its master, the rabbit demon beast suddenly remembered the reward that its master had promised it for helping Yi Min-


    Whoosh~!


    And so, without wasting a single second, the rabbit demon beast grabbed the squirrel that had been fully focused on cultivation not too far away before making its way back towards the Star Shattering Sect with its new human subordinate following close behind with a curious expression on his face. Feeling more curious than ever about the Star Shattering Sect that he had heard a lot about during the past few months.


    ¡­


    At the same time, inside the main pce of the Iron Sky Kingdom, Yi Min let out a sigh of relief as she watched the rabbit demon beast leave through her divine sense.


    "That greedy little rabbit finally left¡­ I thought it was going to try and eat through all my spirit stones¡­" Muttering this to herself, Yi Min silently decided to never try and offer the rabbit demon beast spirit stones when it passed by, as the sheer number of spirit stones it ate on a daily basis had been enough to seriously affect the supply of spirit stones in the Iron Sky Kingdom.

 Chapter 1243 Following a Certain Subordinate...

    Chapter 1243 Following a Certain Subordinate...


    As the rabbit demon beast made its way back to the Star Shattering Sect together with its two subordinates, it soon found itself being distracted by a recently unearthed spirit stone deposit near the old territory of the Cloud Sky Kingdom located a short distance away from the Star Shattering Sect itself¡­ And upon sensing therge amount of spirit stone present in the spirit stone deposit, it wasted no time in descending and taking control of it before anyone else happened upon it and imed it for themselves.


    Squeak!?


    However, the excitement of finding arge quantity of spirt stones didn''tst for long, as it quickly discovered that it would first have to mine the spirit stones and clean them properly before they could be eaten, something that it had never encountered before and left in a rather distraught state.


    So many spirit stones, yet it couldn''t eat any of them¡­


    "Lord rabbit? Is there anything wrong?


    Hearing its trusted human subordinate suddenly calling out to it from the side in a worried tone, the rabbit demon beast suddenly sprung back to life again as a new idea n appeared inside its little head.


    Indeed, even if it couldn''t personally mine out and clean the spirit stones, couldn''t its subordinates do this for it?!


    Squeak¡­ Squeak!


    With this in mind, the rabbit demon beast didn''t waste a second before instructing its two subordinates to do just that, as it found a good ce toze around while its two subordinates went to work mining spirit stones for it.


    ""¡­""


    Faced with the unreasonable request of their master, the human and squirrel demon beast could only awkwardly look at each other before both of them descended into a small fracture that led into part of the spirit stone deposit to carry out their master''s demand.


    Even if both of them were far stronger than the normal Qi Condensation Realm or normal mortals who would do such tedious work, they had no way to keep up with the consumption of their master¡­


    Squeak? Squeak!


    In the end, only after the two of them toiled for a week straight inside the small mine they had ended up creating, did their master finally realize that the spirit stones mined by the two of them were nowhere near enough and pulled them out of the mine to return to the Star Shattering Sect like they had originally been doing before stumbling upon the recently unearthed spirit stone deposit.


    ¡­


    "This is the Falling Star City!?


    As the group of three arrived at the entrance to the Falling Star City, the human cultivator who had be fully subservient to the rabbit demon beast could not help eximing in shock after seeing the magnificent Falling Star City that had now grown beyond the base of the Ninth Star Peak and had started to grow towards the base of the other mountains.


    In size alone, although the city was nowhere near a capital city of an empire like the Sky Empire or the surrounding empire, it was still farrger than the capital city of mostrge kingdoms¡­ And more importantly than that, it was obvious to anyone that the city was still in the process of rapidly expanding, as countless construction projects could be seen around the edges of the city.


    For the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator now following the rabbit demon beast, this was quite a shocking sight, as the Falling Star City he had learnt about while looking through the information of the Star Shattering Sect was nowhere thisrge. Not to mention, he could feel the presence of arge number of Nascent Soul Realm cultivators and even a few Domain Lord Realm cultivators inside the city itself!


    If there are so many powerful cultivators inside the city acting as the sect''s connecting to the outside world, how many are there inside the sect itself¡­


    As he thought about this to himself, the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator who had once thought nothing of the Star Shattering Sect could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he unconsciously turned to look at his master casually swaggering into the Falling Star City under the respectful gazes of the two Nascent Soul Realm Elders who were in charge of guarding the main entrance to the city.


    Squeak?


    However, his master soon turned around to look towards him with a slightly annoyed expression. Making him realize that he had just been standing in front of the entrance while spacing out.


    "Ah! I''ming!"


    Knowing that he had trouble his master, he didn''t waste any time as he rushed into the Falling Star City under the surprised gazes of the two elders guarding the entrance. Soon finding himself directly behind his master together with the squirrel demon beast once again, as the three of them made their way through the city in a short time before arriving at the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak and into the Star Shattering Sect itself.


    "Ah, if it isn''t the little rabbit of Elder Xuan."


    Just as at this moment, as his master was about to walk up the path, a surprised voice echoed out from behind, as figure wearing the official robe belonging to an elder of the Star Shattering Sect and with a cultivation realm at the Half Step Domain Lord Realm, only a single step away from reaching the Domain Lord Realm, appeared behind them.


    Squeak?


    Hearing someone calling out to it, the rabbit demon beast turned around in confusion before both of its eyes started shining with excitement after seeing the person who had appeared-


    Whoosh~!


    Wasting no time as it excitedly dashed over towards this person.


    "Hehe, quite excited to see me." Seeing this the elder smiled happily as he took out a bag of spirit stones and handed it over to the rabbit demon beast with a smile on his face. "Hm? You are¡­?" Only after all of this did the elder notice the person standing together with the squirrel demon beast where the rabbit demon beast had once been.


    "Greetings elder, I''m a subordinate of lord rabbit!"


    "Huh? A¡­ A subordinate of lord- Wait¡­ Subordinate of the rabbit demon beast!?"


    "Yes, I''m one of the lord''s subordinates!" Not knowing how to feel as he saw the expression of absolute disbelief on the face of the elder, the once proud Soul Ascension Realm cultivator could only bite his tongue and answer with a prideful expression. Not daring to do anything else out of fear that his lord would end up punishing him.


    "I see¡­ I''m the current elder in charge of the Hall of Beast Tamers, well then, if you will excuse me, I¡­ I have something to do. Please do take care of your lord¡­" Hearing this, the elder who identified himself as the elder in charge of the Hall of Beast Tamers turned around and bolted up the path into the sect.


    Although the beast tamers of the Star Shattering Sect could be considered rather unique among other beast tamers in their care of demon beast, it was still a bit too far to be a subordinate of demon beast for these fanatics.


    "¡­"


    Knowing how weird it was, the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator could not help looking at his master busy enjoying the spirit stones handed over by the elder from the Hall of Beast Tamers while silently crying on the inside.


    It was not that he wanted to be a subordinate of the rabbit demon beast in the first ce, it was just that this had been forced upon him in a life and death situation. If he didn''t end up bing the subordinate of the rabbit demon beast, it was likely that he would have ended up joining the rest of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who had attacked the Iron Sky Kingdom. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even though his current situation was humiliating, and his future was full of unknowns, at the very least, he could continue keeping his life in this way¡­ And who knew, he might even be able to free himself from his current situation considering that the master of the rabbit demon beast that had been mentioned just now should be the Soul Ascension Realm Expert from the Star Shattering Sect.


    If he ended up meeting that person, he felt that he should have a chance to escape his fate as a subordinate of a demon beast and possibly even get the status of an elder of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if doing so meant that he would have to swear a dao oath and stake his life on it, it was far better than his current fate of being reduced to a subordinate of a rabbit demon beast that could end his life with a single thought.


    At the very least, being and elder of the Star Shattering Sect meant that he would be able to retain some of the pride he had lost after bing a first-ss bootlicker under the rabbit demon beast.

 Chapter 1244 Perfect Disguise and Urgent Need for Cultivation Rooms

    Chapter 1244 Perfect Disguise and Urgent Need for Cultivation Rooms


    At the same time that the rabbit demon beast stepped inside the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao who had been cultivating back in his cultivation room while waiting for his two disciples to finish stabilizing their cultivation base, opened both of his eyes as a slight smile appeared at the corner of his lips.


    So, it finally returned? Hehe, I guess Yi Min gave up on trying to keep up with its consumption of spirit stones and it finally remembered the spirit stones I promised it back then. Although, it did take a bit longer than I expected it to. Hm¡­ Maybe it''s due to the new subordinate it took in using his own spirit stones?


    Curiously examining the human following closely behind the rabbit demon beast as he thought about this, Xuan Hao still felt surprised that the rabbit demon beast had somehow managed to take in a human as a subordinate.


    Even then, he didn''t n to say anything about it, as it seemed like the rabbit demon beast got along rather well with this human subordinate¡­ And from the awe stered all over his face and the constant praise flowing out of his mouth when talking to the rabbit demon beast, it became clear to him that the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator was born to be a subordinate of the rabbit demon beast.


    In spite of the fact that he had wanted to stop the rabbit demon beast from taking in human subordinates when he had first discovered that it had taken one in through a subordinate contract, he changed his mind after seeing just how the rtionship between the two of them yed out.


    After all, a subordinate contract didn''t cause someone to change the way one acted and only meant that the master in the contract had a certain level of control over the other party''s life and death.


    If the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator wasn''t sincere in the way he addressed the rabbit demon beast and acted around it, Xuan Hao was certain that he would have been able to see through it. Possibly resulting in him stopping the rabbit demon beast from continuing to keep this human subordinate, as it might negatively reflect on the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Hm¡­ Looks like I won''t have to interfere and can trust the rabbit''s judgement when taking in subordinates in the future. Even if these subordinates turn out to be human." Muttering this to himself as he turned his attention away from the rabbit demon beast and focused his attention back on cultivating while keeping an eye out for Chun Hua and Chu Yang, Xuan Hao had unknowingly been fooled by the wless acting skills of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator subordinate of the rabbit demon beast.


    In the end, the wless acting abilities had ended up unknowingly dooming him to not being able to use Xuan Hao as a way to escape from his fate as a subordinate of the rabbit demon beast.


    Not just him, but the future subordinates of the rabbit demon beast would also end up being affected by this, as Xuan Hao had decided to fully trust the rabbit demon beast when it came to choosing its own subordinates¡­


    "This is the Star Shattering Sect!? Such rich spiritual qi!"


    Unaware of all of this, the subordinate in question was making his way up the Ninth Star Peak with an amazed expression on his face as he marveled at the terrifying density of spiritual qi inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    From the Star Shattering Sect being stronger than he had first expected and possibly a power that could rival that of the empire he hade from, the image of the Star Shattering Sect instantly grew to that of a power from the core region of the continent that had decided to hide away and settle down outside the core region itself.


    The reason for a powerful force doing such a thing was still unknown, but he had his own guess about it. Believing it to have something to do with some kind of power struggle or something simr that forced them out of the core region of the continent and into the border region.


    At the same time, this "realization" made him feel less troubled by his new identity as a subordinate of a rabbit demon beast. Unknowingly causing his disguise as a faithful subordinate to be even better.


    ¡­


    As the rabbit demon beast made its return to the sect and Xuan Hao was busy looking over his two disciples, somewhere in the sect, arge number of elders had gathered together to discuss an important matter pertaining a problem that had been affecting the Star Shattering Sect over thest few months.


    "I never imagined that this would be a problem facing the sect, but we have to do something about it before it''s toote!"


    "Indeed, it wasn''t something I expected either, but with the recent establishment of the Dao Enlightenment Monument by Grand Elder Xuan, it has be difficult to constantly repair what is destroyed."


    "Yes, we can''t keep repairing everything that gets broken whenever someone breaks through to the Domain Lord Realm! Elder Song, you have to help, we can''t keep this up or the budget allocated for the cultivation of the disciples from next year onwards will be affected!"


    "Yes, not just that, but¡­"


    As the group of elders voiced out their troubles one by one, everyone slowly focused their attention on Elder Song who was sitting at the center of the group. All of them understood that if someone was capable of finding a solution to this unique problem, it would be him.


    "Hm¡­ The destruction caused by the elders breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm is indeed rather substantial, but we can''t just chase them out of the sect to breakthrough in a worse environment¡­" Muttering this to himself as he felt the gazes of the surrounding elders focusing on him, Elder Song could not help frowning to himself as he thought about countless possible solutions.


    Sending the elders about to reach the Domain Lord Realm out of the sect was possible, but wasn''t a good idea, as they wouldn''t have the rich spiritual qi of the Shattered Star Peaks to assist them in their breakthrough. Making the possibility of failure far higher.


    Getting someone to watch over them and restrain their domain wasn''t really possible either, as only Xuan Hao or Pei Yang was capable of doing this without any problems, Feng Chen only able to do this to a certain extent. Not to mention, this was not a permanent solution and would require one of the three to constantly be ready for when someone broke through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Permanent solution¡­ Wait! Maybe we can imitate those lotus shaped tforms on top of the Third Star Peak. Although it isn''t their intended purpose, they do absorb the impact of the cloud tribtion and prevents it from spreading out to affect others if someone breaks through to the Nascent Soul Realm on top of one of them. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    If we can imitate this for the Domain Lord Realm and create a tform or cultivation room of some sort to absorb the impact of the breakthrough, we won''t have to worry about the damage caused by those breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm in the future. At the same time, it will also give a ce for those breaking through to the Nascent Soul realm to break through in peace instead of having to go down the mountain and find somewhere isted to undergo the cloud tribtion.


    Thinking this to himself with all of the elders looking at him filled with anticipation, Elder Song felt that his idea of creating a cultivation room or tform of some sort to absorb the impact of the breakthrough seemed feasible- No, it seemed like a good solution to the current problem.


    The only thing that might put a damper on this solution was the fact that the formation masters of the Star Shattering Sect weren''t knowledgeable or powerful enough to create such cultivation rooms or tforms "Ah! Yi Min! We can ask her toe and help out with the formations!"


    "Huh!? Elder Song? Do you have a solution to the problem?!"


    "Yeah! Don''t leave us hanging!"


    Eximing his thoughts out loud unintentionally, the rest of the elders who had been waiting for his answer curiously asked-


    "Ah, it''s like this¡­ I nned to create special cultivation rooms or tforms where¡­"


    And without wasting a single second, Elder Song began to exin his ns and how he intended to invite Yi Min to help out with the formations of these new cultivation rooms and tforms intended for those wanting to either breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm or Domain Lord Realm.


    "That''s great! I will get people ready for construction immediately!"


    "And I will get the formation master ready to take care of the lessplicated formations so as to not trouble Yi Min too much."


    "I will¡­"


    Only a few minutester, everyone in the room sprang into action. Fully intend on creating the cultivation rooms as fast as possible, as it would reduce the damage caused to the sect more the faster they were constructed.

 Chapter 1245 Cultivation Platforms

    Chapter 1245 Cultivation tforms


    Soon after Elder Song and the elders of the sect came to a decision, the entire sect swung into motion to construct the cultivation rooms for those trying to breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm or Domain Lord Realm as fast as possible, while Elder Song personally went to the Iron Sky Kingdom to ask for Yi Min''s help in the construction of the formations that would ensure the cultivation rooms wouldn''t be destroyed whenever someone broke through to the Domain Lord Realm inside of them.


    Although the sect''s formation masters had grown a lot stronger over the past few years, they were still nowhere near strong enough to create a formation capable of contain the outburst of power from when someone broke through to the Domain Lord Realm. Not to mention, the expansion of the domain was a crucial part of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm, so it couldn''t be fully restrained and had to be managed properly.


    In the end, arge area around the base of the Seventh Star Peak was dedicated to creating a ce where those at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm could break through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    On second thought, it wasn''t really a cultivation room so to speak and was more so arge tform simr to the ones at the Third Star Peak. All designed around the sole purpose of ensuring that the uncontrolled domain of those who had just broken through to the Domain Lord Realm didn''t spill out and cause damage to the sect.


    The size of the tform itself was also designed around the purpose of allowing up to 10 people to break through to the Domain Lord Realm at the same time without anyone affecting each other. While at the same time also having a few smaller tforms around the Domain Lord Realm tform for those in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Altogether, the construction of what had at first just seemed like a small cultivation room ended up bing one of thergest projects taken on by the elders of the Star Shattering Sect since the establishment of the sect.


    The main reason for this being that the requirements for a formation that needed to be capable of restraining the out-of-control domain of someone who had just broken through to the Domain Lord Realm was impossible to do at a smaller scale ording to Yi Min.


    Well¡­ Not entirely impossible, just that Yi Min was far from skilled enough to create a formation at the scale of a normal cultivation room with the ability to restrain the domain of someone breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm without negatively impacting the breakthrough itself.


    Of course, it wasn''t entirely a bad thing that the Domain Lord realm tform ended up being so massive, as it became a thing that the disciples could look forward to stepping onto in the future, while also giving the formation masters of the sect a ce where they could gather to study the formations left behind by Yi Min.


    All things considered, the Domain Lord Realm tform, though taking more than a month to construct even with all of the sect''s resources focused on it, ended up bing useful to more than just those trying to break through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Booom-!


    And it didn''t take long before some of the elders at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, who had helped in creating the tform, became the first to use it to breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm-


    Rumble-!


    Soon causing the countless formations created by Yi Min with the assistance of the sect''s formation masters, to activate and restrain the new domains and prevent them from spreading outside the Domain Lord Realm tform, while also not damaging the domains in question and instead redirecting them to expand towards an empty part of the tform.


    In total, during the short demonstration of the Domain Lord Realm tform, it perfectly allowed a total of four elders to break through to the Domain Lord Realm without affecting their breakthrough nor causing any damage outside of the Domain Lord Realm tform that had long since been strengthened to the point that someone at the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm had no way of damaging it.


    "It works¡­"


    "Yeah¡­ Even though it was designed for more people to breakthrough at once, it still made me a bit nervous when seeing four breaking through at the same time."


    "Same, though its doubtful that there wille a time when 10 people will need to use it at the same time¡­"


    Seeing the formation in action, the elders who had nervously gathered around to watch the four people test the Domain Lord Realm tform, all eximed happily as the sense of nervousness that had covered them only a few seconds earlier dissipated.


    "Looks like its working well, Elder Song, if there is nothing else, I will be taking my leave."


    "Of course, you have a kingdom to attend to and I have already taken a month of your time for this. If there is anything you need help with, make sure to contact me and the Star Shattering Sect will help you."


    Standing a bit further away from the group of elders, Elder Song and Yi Min both exchanged a few short words after seeing that everything was working before Yi Min turned around and left.


    Having already stayed at the Star Shattering Sect for the past month, she had essentially left her kingdom without any real preparations for such a long trip out and had to get back as fast as possible to prevent any problems from urring. Especially so now that the core region of the fallen Sky Empire was in constant turmoil and there was almost always someone who came knocking at her border to cause trouble.


    At the very least, after the rabbit demon beast dealt with the group of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators¡­ And took one of them in as a pet? Servant? Subordinate? Ehm¡­ She didn''t really know what the unfortunate Soul Ascension Realm cultivator had ended up as, but after that situation, the number of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators showing up to cause trouble for her had been reduced to zero.


    Even then, the sheer number of Core Formation Realm, Nascent Soul Realm and Domain Lord Realm cultivators trying to spread the chaos of the core region to her kingdom had only increased.


    If not for the fact that the guardian formation of her kingdom consumed an ungodly number of spirit stones to keep active, she would have just directly used it to prevent anyone from entering her kingdom from the chaotic core region of the fallen Sky Empire.


    Whoosh


    ~!


    With this in mind, Yi Min didn''t waste a single second as she rushed back to her kingdom. Fully prepared to deal with therge number of troublemakers who would have taken advantage of her absence to sneak inside her kingdom to try and cause problems. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not only Yi Min had this kind of problem, but the rest of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory had also begun to get affected by the chaos, as the number of cultivators entering the Star Shattering Sect''s territory through its bordering regions had begun increasing.


    At first, Feng Chen, who had been in charge of most of the sect''s internal and external matters while Elder Song had been busy with the construction of the Domain Lord Realm tform, had thought that this was due to some kind of scheme from the Onyx Empire or other powers who might want to weaken the power of the Satar Shattering Sect.


    However, after an investigation into the situation by Elder Dust Fairy, it was discovered that therge influx of cultivators didn''te due to some kind of plot, but instead came because the Onyx Empire and other empires bordering the Frozen Wastnd had begun to struggle against the continuous flow of increasingly strong demonic cultivators.


    The situation had gotten bad enough that the Onyx Empire and other empires had ended up losing dozens of kingdoms bordering the Frozen Wastnd, causing the people who managed to escape to flee in all directions, one of which happened to be in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect.


    As for why the Star Shattering Sect hadn''t been affected yet¡­ That was due to the barrier Xuan Hao had created to prevent any demonic cultivators from invading the territory of what had once been the Sky Empire.


    Of course, powerful demonic cultivators would still be capable of forcefully passing through the barrier but considering that someone had went through the trouble of creating such a massive and terrifying barrier, the demonic cultivators got the hint and decided it would be better to not offend the power behind it and instead ended up flooding into the empires at the edges of the barrier.


    In the end, this had caused the number of demonic cultivators in the Onyx Empire and other empires close to the former territory of the Sky Empire to be invaded by a farrger number of demonic cultivators¡­

 Chapter 1246 Influx of Troublemakers, Future Plans

    Chapter 1246 Influx of Troublemakers, Future ns


    As Yi Min returned to deal with the troublemakers on her side, it didn''t take long before the Star Shattering Sect began to issue missions through the mission pavilion to deal with therge number of new cultivators that had entered the sect''s territory.


    To encourage the elders and disciples to take on these missions, Wei Chin took full advantage of the recent introduction of the Dao Enlightenment Monument and added it on to the different rewards offered for the more difficult missions. Allowing the disciples and elders of the sect another way to gain ess to the Dao Enlightenment Monument that didn''t involve them using their contribution points.


    And¡­ Given the current state of the sect with almost all of the elders at the Peak or Late Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm looking for anything that would give them enough contribution points to ess the Dao Enlightenment Monument, it didn''t take long before arge number of them rushed out of the sect in the direction of the recently added territory where thergest number of new cultivators were located.


    Outside of the Star Shattering Sect, the different independent sects under them also learnt about the recent chaos caused by therge number of cultivators escaping from the destruction caused demonic cultivators invading their former home. Soon resulting in them joining the elders of the Star Shattering Sect in dealing with those who tried to take advantage of the situation to rob others, with some of the bolder ones daring to seize thend of the different minor powers under the Star Shattering Sect and proim themselves the new lord of thend.


    Of course, these troublemakers had no idea about the Star Shattering Sect, as its name hadn''t yet spread to the smaller kingdoms of the Onyx Empire, and they just believed that they were inside the already fallen Sky Empire that had long since turned into a chaotic battle for resources.


    In the end, they would soon end up finding out about the Star Shattering Sect firsthand¡­ And along with the fact that none of the people entering the Star Shattering Sect''s territory this way had reached the Domain Lord Realm, it became a rather one-sided ordeal, as the elders of the Star Shattering Sect and the independent sects swept through them over the next month. Ensuring that those escaping to the Star Shattering Sect understood that the territory was under arger power, and they couldn''t do as they pleased.


    In turn, this caused those escaping from the demonic cultivators to calm down quite a bit as they began to familiarize themselves with thend, they had believed to be a ce in a state of chaos and disarray. Not taking long before they learnt about the existence of the Star Shattering Sect, a power supported by powerful cultivators at the Soul Ascension Realm. Instantly causing any thoughts of carving out a small space for themselves in thisnd to disappear, as they were very well aware of just what a cultivator in the Soul Ascension Realm represented.


    On the other hand, they all began trying to find ways to either join the Star Shattering Sect or get permission to establish a domain of their own under the Star Shattering Sect.


    Luckily for them, the current Star Shattering Sect was in urgent need of people to manage the new territory that they had just recently taken control of¡­ And it just so happened that most of the people who could escape from the chaos caused by the demonic cultivators were at least in the Foundation Establishment Realm. Making them more than strong enough for the Star Shattering Sect to let them control some of the still unimed parts of the two former border regions of the Sky Empire.


    Even then, these people didn''t end up bing part of the Star Shattering Sect and were only taken in as subordinate powers operating under the Star Shattering Sect.


    If they wanted to join the Star Shattering Sect, they still had to wait for the next recruitment by the sect. After all, the current Star Shattering Sect had nock of Nascent Soul realm cultivators, let alone Core Formation and Foundation Establishment Realm cultivators.


    At this point in time, the only way to join the Star Shattering Sect without having to wait for the next round of disciple recruitment would to be for someone to have reached the Domain Lord Realm, as the Star Shattering Sect was still in need of Domain Lord Realm cultivators.


    However, the different independent sects weren''t that stringent in their requirements and took advantage of the situation to absorb arge number of Nascent Soul Realm cultivators and talented Core Formation Realm cultivators. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    From a chaotic situation that had begun to spread towards the core of the sect''s territory and threatened to reduce it to a state not much different from the rest of the Sky Empire''s territory, everything had been dealt with in a little over a month and had even ended up benefiting the Star Shattering Sect after it took action to deal with the situation.


    ¡­


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song had once again gathered together with the elders of the sect, this time also including Feng Chen, Zu Fei, and Shu Yao.


    "I take it that you gathered all of us here because of something rted to the influx of cultivators from the Onyx Empire and other empires bordering our new territory?"


    Sitting on the main seat, Feng Chen was the first to speak up as he nced down towards Elder Song, who had called for the meeting in the first ce, with a curious expression on his face. Not understanding what was so urgent about the situation, as most of the cultivators that had entered the Star Shattering Sect''s territory had already been dealt with. Most of them being absorbed by the different independent sects.


    08:44


    "Haaa¡­ Indeed, it is rted to this!" Nodding his head as he said this, Elder Song didn''t wait for a response as he visibly frowned. "But I hope everyone here hasn''t forgotten the reason why those people came to our territory in the first ce!"


    "Demonic cultivators¡­"


    "Indeed, I fear that with the number of new cultivators showing up from those empires decreasing by the day and the state they show up in bing worse and worse, it won''t be long before the ones showing up are demonic cultivators! Before this happens, I hope we can properly prepare ourselves."


    "Indeed, what you say is right. If we can prepare ourselves properly, this might also turn out to be a good opportunity for the younger disciples to train like we did in the past." Nodding his head after hearing what Elder Song said, Feng Chen could not help budding in as he remembered how they had taken advantage of the demonic cultivatorsst time around to train their younger disciples.


    Although the number of younger disciples trained this way was limited, the cultivation progress of those younger disciples who had gone through fighting demonic cultivators far exceeded that of their peers.


    If they could establish a better framework and have more disciples get some life and death experience this way, the results might be even better. Especially so if they could take advantage of the demonic cultivators showing up over time like the escaping cultivators had done¡­


    "Hehe, sect master, it looks like you are learning quite well!" Hearing the suggestion given by Feng Chen, Elder Song could not help chuckling as he said this with a happy expression on his face. Looking like a proud elder whose disciple finally managed to learn something he had been trying to teach him for years.


    "Hmph! Do you think I can''t do anything on my own and just leave everything to you all the time?" Seeing this, Feng Chen could not help frowning with a slightly unhappy expression on his face as he said this.


    """¡­"""


    "Huh? Why are all of you silent now!? E-even you Zu Fei!?"


    Unfortunately for Feng Chen, the rest of the elders could only awkwardly avoid his eyes as everyone in sect was well aware of the fact that Elder Song was the true master of the sect who kept everything running. Even Zu Fei who always did her best to be on his side could only lower her head like she didn''t hear him call out her name.


    "Ahm¡­ Let''s move on, we still need to figure out how to properly deal with this situation, this is why I gathered all of you here in the first ce." Giving a light cough to break the awkward silence that had descended upon the meeting, Elder Song quickly jumped in and steered the conversation back towards the matter at hand.


    Once again demonstrating his ability to take control of the situation as the conversation resumed and proceeded smoothly over the next few hours, as the future n for nurturing the younger generation of the sect through the use of the demonic cultivators who would be unfortunate enough to step into the Star Shattering Sect''s territory concluded without any more interruptions.

 Chapter 1247 The Seven Tribulations of the Immortal Soul Tribulation

    Chapter 1247 The Seven Tribtions of the Immortal Soul Tribtion


    As months went by with the number of cultivatorsing from the surrounding empires decreasing with each passing day, the Star Shattering Sect began to prepare for the first demonic cultivators to arrive, while at the same time assigning a few different elders at the Domain Lord Realm to keep an eye on the borders of the sect''s territory to prevent any powerful demonic cultivators sneaking inside.


    Among these elders, the most prominent was none other than Chu Yang who had just recently broken through to the Domain Lord Realm and had begun to take on more responsibilities in the sect.


    Of course, considering that he didn''t want to waste any of his precious cultivation time, Elder Song ended up having a rather hard time having him do anything rted to teaching the younger disciples of the sect. Especially so considering that Chu Yang was still incredibly young and some of the older disciples of the sect were older than him by more than twenty years.


    In the end, guarding the borders of the sect against demonic cultivators was the only thing that Chu Yang felt wouldn''t waste any of his precious cultivation time, as by doing this, he would have an opportunity to face off against powerful demonic cultivators.


    Even if the time spent outside the sect would end up affecting his cultivation speed, facing powerful demonic cultivators would more than make up for it, as it would help him in hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear.


    Not to mention, he had also recently learnt about the Dao Domain Lord Realm from his master after he broke through to the Domain Lord Realm and felt eager to try andprehend some of the Daos that his master had mentioned were suitable for him. Especially the Dao of Blood, as he had already gained some initial insights into it after trying to understand the Devil Immortal Jade that had been floating around inside his dantian without doing anything other than help increase his cultivation speed.


    Knowing the thoughts of his disciple as well, Xuan Hao had also been more than happy to let him leave the sect to help out with the uing crisis that was going to face the sect.


    Not at all having anything to do with the fact that Chu Yang hade to try and drag him away for a practice battle ever since his cultivation base had stabilized. Evening to a tactic understanding with Chun Hua to aplish this goal, as both of them worked together to get him to join them in the Combat Hall for the past few months.


    Outside of that, Chun Hua, still new to the sect, hadn''t taken on any real responsibilities after she broke through to the Domain Lord Realm and still spent most of her time cultivating by herself inside her master''s pce. Only asionally leaving to train with Chu Yang or to y together with Mui, whom she had grown rather close to over the past few months.


    During one of these times out ying with Mui, the little girl had managed to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm. Bringing the total number of disciples under Xuan Hao in the Nascent Soul Realm or above to four. Allowing him toplete the requirement for another hidden main quest.


    [Hidden Main Quest: Have four disciples reach the Nascent Soul Realm plete)]


    [Description: Have four of your disciples break through the Nascent Soul Realm below the age of 50.]


    [Reward: Expansion to Codex of the First Four Mortal Realms, Soul Ascension Realm.]


    In the end, the reward from this quest wasn''t anything that could help him directly, but instead an expansion to the codex of the first four mortal realms that he had already upgraded to the Domain Lord Realm in the past.


    Although it wasn''t that useful to him, as it didn''t contain any information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it was a clear path from the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and all the way up to the Dao Seed Realm, something that the current Star Shattering Sect would benefit tremendously from considering that the elders of the sect had begun to break through to the Domain Lord Realm and the next step would be for them to go through the tribtion and reach the Soul Ascension Realm.


    After all, even though the Dao Domain Lord Realm seemed like a stronger pathpared to going through the Soul Ascension Realm, it was far from suitable for anyone and most of the elders and disciples of the sect would be following the path of undergoing the seven tribtions of the Immortal Soul Tribtion one by one.


    Even then, the codex''s Soul Ascension Realm chapter also contained information on the seven tribtions that made up the Immortal Soul Tribtion, something that was useful for him.


    The first tribtion, the tribtion of fire, where one will have to endure the fires of heaven, as it descends to remove impurities that have been umted in the body over the years. The older one is and the more pills and elixirs one has used to increase their cultivation, the more terrifying this tribtion will be. The fires of heaven can take different forms depending on the cultivator, from lightning to a river of water descending from above.


    The second tribtion, the tribtion of earthen lightning, lighting will descend from the sky to strengthen the body. This tribtion can be easy or hard, depending on how strong the body already is. For example, most demon beast won''t have any problems with this tribtion, while humans tend to struggle with their weaker body.


    The third tribtion, the illusory heart tribtion, an illusion will descend and trap the cultivator. The tribtion is easier for those with a strong will, while it kills anyone failing to escape the illusion in time.


    The fourth, fifth and sixth tribtion, the three soul tribtions, the soul needs to undergo a transformation to reach a higher realm, therefore it will go through three soul tribtions manifesting in the form of heavenly lightning descending from above, that will help strengthening the soul or destroying.


    The Seventh Tribtion, dao seed formation, the final tribtion where one will have to endure the onught of heavenly lighting while forming the dao seed around the soul to both strengthen it beyond the mortal realm and protect it.


    Although the formation of the dao seed around the soul can be considered to have broken through the mortal realm and reached a higher realm, the dao seed itself is still a seed and isn''t considered a true immortal soul and can at most be considered a pseudo immortal soul. Only when the dao seed finishes growing and blooms, can a true immortal soul be born.


    Outside of that, there was a small part at the end of the description regarding the Immortal Soul Tribtion that did mention the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­ And in it, outside of what he already knew about it descending in its entirety, it also stated that the strength of the Immortal Soul Tribtion for those who reach the Dao Domain Lord Realm would increase in difficulty depending on when they decided to break through.


    After learning about this, Xuan Hao felt that the reward from the system wasn''t that bad, as it at least helped him understand that he wouldn''t be able to just breeze through the Immortal Soul Tribtion like he had first thought he would have been able to do considering how much stronger he was whenpared to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Not just that, but the information on the tribtion would also help him prepare for it properly so he wouldn''t be taken by surprise when faced with something like the third tribtion that descended in the form of an illusion.


    All things considered; Xuan Hao decided to hand over the Soul Ascension Realm chapter for Elder Song to handle like he had done in the past. Making sure that the part on the Dao Domain Lord Realm wasn''t included for now.


    If the Star Shattering Sect really did have someone outside of his disciples reach the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he would always be able to teach them about this and prevent any information of the Dao Domain Lord Realm from leaking to the outside world before he fully understood the situation of the different major powers and whether or not they would try and attack the Star Shattering Sect after learning about them having information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­ n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Hm? Now that I think about it, it should be about time for that quest to bepleted¡­" Opening his eyes inside his cultivation room as he thought about the hidden main quest, Xuan Hao could not help ncing down on a certain quest that would soon bepleted.


    [Time left: ~2 months]


    Only around 2 months left before I can stop having to look at that quest ever again!

 Chapter 1248 Progress of the Disciples

    Chapter 1248 Progress of the Disciples


    As he saw that there was still only two months left before the interspatial ring quest would be considered to have finished, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit excited as he began looking forward to what kind of reward he would get from the system when the quest finally came to an end after so long.


    Although he didn''t expect it to be something that would allow him to directly reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he at least hoped that it would be something that he could use to increase hisprehension of the different Daos he hadprehended so far, like another source crystal or an opportunity to enter the system''sprehension space once again.


    No matter what it ended up being, he at least felt it should be something useful to him considering how much effort it had taken him to gather so many interspatial rings over the years. Especially considering that he had crafted most of the interspatial rings by himself.


    "Hm? Qing Yi is here?" Just as he was lost in his own thoughts, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed Qing Yi returning before making her way directly towards his cultivation room beforeing to a stop in front of it with an excited expression stered all over her face.


    "You cane in." Feeling curious as to what had made her so excited, Xuan Hao called for her toe in-


    Bang!


    And not even a secondter, the door to his cultivation room was thrown open as Qing Yi rushed inside without a single sign of respect for her master. Instead, she excitedly pulled out a potion from her interspatial ring before approaching her master.


    "Master! This, here, here!" Not even waiting for him to respond she happily presented the potion with an even more excited expression on her face.


    "This is¡­" Seeing the potion presented by his first disciple, Xuan Hao didn''t scold his disciple outright and instead decided to examine the potion that had caused her to be so excited that she had rushed into his room.


    "A Mystic Grade Potion! I just made it!" Not waiting for him to examine the potion, Qing Yi proudly told him what it was, as she looked up at him filled with excitement. Proud of the fact that she managed to create a Mystic Grade Potion.


    "So, you finally managed to create your first mystic grade potion, good job, now you can be considered a true Master Alchemist." Hearing what Qing Yi said and confirming what she said, Xuan Hao could not help praising her as a smile inevitably made its way onto his face.


    Although Qing Yi had broken through to the Master Realm in her alchemy months ago, she hadn''t had the chance to concoct a mystic grade potion or pill yet. After all, the ingredients required to make a mystic grade potion were hard toe by. Even more so considering that Qing Yi had just recently broken through to the Master Realm and would inevitably waste a lot of precious spiritual herbs in the process of creating her first mystic grade potion.


    "Yes! I''m finally a master alchemist! Hehe~!" Smiling happily upon hearing her master''s words, Qing Yi nodded her head with even more excitement. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Master alchemist¡­ I wonder how much the status of my disciples has changed over the past few months.


    Seeing the excited Qing Yi in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help thinking this to himself as he ended up spending the next hour together with Qing Yi discussing her recent insights after finally concocting a mystic grade potion.


    Only after she had left, did Xuan Hao decide to turn his attention towards the status of his disciples, deciding to first start out with none other than Qing Yi herself.


    ? First Disciple, Qing Yi ? Race: Human Talent: 38 Dao: Dao of Fire (Pseudo Domain), Dao of Alchemy (Pseudo Domain.


    Potential Dao: Dao of Fire, Dao of Wind, Dao of Light, Dao of Space, Dao of Alchemy Physique: Bright Sun Divine Physique (Late Stage, Small Sun Realm) Realm: Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm Profession: Alchemy (Master Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Heaven Burning Mantra Although her strength hadn''t increased as much as he hoped and she still hadn''t managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm, she had at least managed to reach the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm during the past few months. Even managing toprehend the Dao of Fire enough to establish a pseudo domain during her intensive focus on her alchemy.


    Of course, together with her already established Dao of Alchemy pseudo domain after she had broken through to the Master Realm, she stood in the unique circumstance of havingprehended two pseudo domains while only in the Nascent Soul Realm, something that even he hadn''t aplished back when he was at the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Hm¡­ Given that she alreadyprehended and established two pseudo domains, I wonder if it''s a sign that she will have an easier time stepping into the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future¡­


    Narrowing both his eyes as he thought this to himself while looking at Qing Yi happily leaving the pce and making her way to the alchemy hall to show off as well, Xuan Hao could not help looking forward to when Qing Yi broke through to the Domain Lord Realm, as he wondered if she would directly establish two domains, or if only one of her pseudo domains would evolve along with her breakthrough.


    ? Second Disciple, Chu Yang ? Race: Human Talent: 57 Dao: Dao of the Spear (Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Earth, Dao of Blood, Dao of ughter, Dao of Death Physique: No Special Physique Rmended Physique: Six Paths of ughter Divine Physique (Can be refined) Realm: First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Cultivation Mantra: Soul Spear Divine Mantra ? Fifth Disciple, Chun Hua ? Race: Nature Spirit, Tree Spirit Talent: 67 Dao: Dao of Nature (Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Wood, Dao of Life, Dao of Water Physique: Spirit Physique Realm: First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Profession: Alchemy (Peak Apprentice Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Heart of the Forest Turning his attention towards Chu Yang and Chun Hua next, Xuan Hao didn''t find anything out of the ordinary that had changed in their status during the past few months, outside of the fact that both of them had reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    ? Third Disciple, Bai Ning ? Race: Human, Heavenly Sky Serpent Talent: 34 Dao: Dao of cksmithing (Pseudo Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Metal, Dao of Fire, Dao of Formations, Dao of Wind Bloodline: Heavenly Sky Serpent (Dormant) Realm: Ninth Stage of the Core Formation Realm Profession: cksmithing (Master Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Unformed Mantra As he nced over Bai Ning''s status next, Xuan Hao could not help silently letting out a sigh to himself upon seeing that he had only managed to reach the Ninth Stage of the Core Formation Realm. Although he knew the reason why his cultivation realm had only increased by so little was due to him spending longer and longer on his cksmithing, he decided not to stop him from pursuing the Dao of cksmithing.


    After all, he had learnt a bit about the Saint Realm from his visit to the Blue Shore Kingdom together with Yi Min and knew that breaking through the Saint Realm would allow one''s strength to undergo a qualitative transformation that put one on par with someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Although it would take some time before Bai Ning would reach such a realm in the Dao of cksmithing, Xuan Hao had a feeling that this cksmithing obsessed disciple of his wouldn''t disappoint in this regard.


    Who knew, he might even end up bing the first among his disciples to reach a strength levelparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    "Now¡­ Mui¡­" Muttering this to himself as he remembered the little girl whose growth seemed to have stagnated for some reason that was most likely rted to her physique, Xuan Hao could not help feeling his head hurt as a long list of trouble that the girl had been up to over the past few months appeared in his head.


    Although her size didn''t increase over the past few months, the trouble she caused did¡­


    ? Fourth Disciple, Mui ? Race: Human Talent: 78 Potential Dao: Dao of Water, Dao of Darkness, Dao of Ice, Dao of Space, Dao of Chaos Physique: Deste Ancient Moon Physique (Dormant) Realm: Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm Profession: cksmithing (Abysmal), Formation Master (Abysmal) Cultivation Mantra: Myriad Water Art No idea how she had managed to do it, but her cultivation realm had somehow managed to skyrocket all the way to the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm after she broke through to the realm. Directly skipping over the first and second stage of the realm.


    Even whenpared to himself, the talent of this youngest disciple of his seemed to be a bit too terrifying¡­

 Chapter 1249 Muis First Formation... Slime Pit?

    Chapter 1249 Mui''s First Formation... Slime Pit?


    Not to mention the talent of his youngest disciple that had far surpassed his expectations, she had also managed to create her first formation deserving of the abysmal rank during the past few months¡­ And although it wasn''t attached to one of the blobs of g metal that she created through cksmithing, it still ended up bing rather well known among the formation masters and younger disciples of the sect.


    All for the simple reason that her formation happened to have been created by her time at a training ground frequented by the younger disciples of the sect and caused the training ground in question to change into a space filled to the brim with some kind of slimy substance that seemed to have been created by the formation from absorbing the surrounding qi in the air.


    Although this hadn''t ended up causing any real damage to the younger disciples who had happened to be training at the training ground at the time, it was still a rather memorable experience for them to suddenly find themselves covered in slime. Even more so when some of the more curious ones among them realized that eating the strange slime increased their cultivation speed.


    In the end, the incident had caused quite an uproar among the formation masters of the sect, as they had rushed over to investigate the strange formation and slime. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    However, they could not recreate the formation and after an elder looked into the matter, the training ground was ultimately closed off and the slime was gathered on a regr basis for consumption. Not just because it was found out that eating it increased the cultivation speed of those below the Core Formation Realm, but also because it tasted like strawberry pudding.


    And when made to look like pudding, it didn''t look any different, thus resulting in the rather unique new dessert that was thoroughly enjoyed by the younger disciples of the sect for its taste and effect on their cultivation speed¡­


    Remembering the time when he had first learnt about this, he himself had also gone to check out the formation that had been created by Mui.


    However, even with his strength, he couldn''t figure out how it worked or see through it.


    "Indeed, things created at the abysmal rank are unpredictable. At least she ended up creating something that ended up benefiting the younger disciples of the sect. Even if I do feel a bit bad for those disciples left in charge of gathering the slime created by the formation¡­" Muttering this to himself as he shook his head, Xuan Hao''s divine sense drifted over towards the rtively normal training ground close to the outer sect disciple abodes that had now turned into one of the more important locations of the sect.


    At the moment, a dozen or so unlucky disciples could be seen working inside the former training ground. Doing their best to gather up arge amount of slime that wouldter be turned into desserts for the rest of the younger disciples to enjoy, while they themselves struggled to move around inside the red colored slime.


    Rumble~


    Not too far away from where these disciples were doing their best to gather the red slime, Xuan Hao also noticed that a group of elders were hard at work digging into the hard to damage ground of the Seventh Star Peak.


    From the few conversations taking ce between them, he realized that they wanted to create a pit for the slime to gather inside, so they didn''t have to worry about it overflowing into the nearby disciple abodes.


    "A slime pit? I never thought the Star Shattering Sect would one day be getting a slime pit¡­" Not knowing what to say after learning about what the group of elders were up to, Xuan Hao decided to not pay any more attention to the creation of his younger disciple. Instead, he decided to use his divine sense to see what she was up to at the moment¡­


    "AHAHAH! IT''S PERFECT!"


    Standing in middle of a forge that looked like it had exploded with g metal spraying out everywhere and covering every part of the room in still hot metal, Muiughed happily as both her hands held onto arge spherical object that seemed to be a giant metal marble created from countless different metals being fused together under a terrifying pressure from all sides.


    "With this, I''m sure to senior brother Bai will be impressed." Narrowing both her eyes into slits with a smile still present on her face, Mui calmed herself down before putting the spherical object away-


    Whoosh~!


    Wasting no time as she dashed off in the direction of Bai Ning''s forge to show off hertest creation to her senior brother, who would almost undoubtedly end up having a heart attack after seeing her creation.


    After all, from a simple nce through his divine sense at the different g metals covering the room, Xuan Hao recognized at least three different mystic grade spiritual metals.


    No idea how she had managed to even get her hand on such precious spiritual metal in the first ce as it was tightly regted by the cksmithing elders who wanted to either trade it with Yi Min for an opportunity to learn directly from her or use it to try and find a breakthrough point to the Master Realm.


    No matter what, Bai Ning definitely wouldn''t react well after realizing this. Especially considering he had been short on mystic grade spiritual metal since having broken through to the Master Realm, as spiritual metal of that quality was hard toe by and the amount produced by the current Star Shattering Sect was far from enough for him to use mystic grade spiritual metal in every single artifact, he made¡­


    Bang!


    And just as Xuan Hao was thinking about what kind of reaction Bai Ning might have, Mui arrived at his forge and barged inside with a happy smile stered all over her face. Looking eager to show off her newest creation to her senior brother.


    "Huh? Junior sister? What are you- Hm? Wha¡­ What is that¡­?" Seeing his junior sister barge in, Bai Ning instantly had a bad feeling as his eyes was drawn to the weird spherical object that she pulled out from her interspatial ring.


    "This is my new artifact! Look, look!" Not noticing the strange look of her senior brother, Mui proudly showed off her newest creation. Looking for praise from her senior brother now that she had finally managed to create an artifact that wasn''t rough around the edges like her past artifacts. Showing just how much she had improved over the past few months.


    "New artifact¡­ No¡­ Don''t tell me¡­ The missing mystic grade spiritual metal that I prepared for-"


    "Hehe, if you are talking about the shiny metals that you left behind when leaving earlier, I made sure to add them! Look! It''s all shiny now, like small stars dancing across the surface! Hehe~" Hearing her senior brother mention mystic grade spiritual metals, Mui''s eyes instantly started shining as she said this before he could finish what he was about to say. Guessing that the mystic grade spiritual metal, he should be talking about was the shiny metals that made her artifact so pretty.


    "Shiny? Small stars¡­?"


    Hearing the words of his little junior sister, Bai Ning could not help taking a closer look at the spherical object that she was proudly holding up to him.


    Indeed, there were several small lights dancing across the surface of the mostly ck metal ball¡­ And after examining them, Bai Ning realized that there were three distinct colors of light, each representing three different spiritual metals¡­


    "Mui¡­"


    "Hehe, I know, it''s awesome! Ah! I have to show it off to master as well!"


    Whoosh-!


    Before Bai Ning even had a chance to say anything or even think of stopping this junior sister of his, Mui had already rushed out of the forge in direction of her master''s pce to show off the artifact that she had created, something that she did every time she created something she thought was good.


    "I¡­ I really need to find a way to deal with this junior sister of mine¡­" Seeing this, Bai Ning could only slump down on the ground with an exhausted expression on his face.


    Although he had managed to hide away most of the precious spiritual metals from this junior sister of his with the help of the other elders of the cksmithing Hall, he had the unfortunate fortune of having her snoop around his forge in search of pretty looking metals every now and then.


    Normally, it wouldn''t cause him to lose anything that precious, but this time around, he had truly ended up losing out to his little junior sister. Only having left for a few minutes to get everything in order for forging back then, and she had ended up grabbing the most precious spiritual metal in his forge¡­

 Chapter 1250 Visit From Mui

    Chapter 1250 Visit From Mui


    Seeing how Mui had left her senior brother in a devasted state as she was making her way towards him, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly as he quietly sent a message to Elder Song and had him allocate a bit more mystic grade spiritual metal to Bai Ning. Making sure that he would at least get the three pieces of mystic grade spiritual metal that he had prepared before Mui swept through his forge and took them with her during the short time, he had left them alone.


    "Maaaster!"


    Not even a few seconds after he sent the message to Elder Song, Mui came rushing into his pce as she called out to him with an excited expression on her face. Obviously having arrived to show off the artifact that she had created with her senior brother''s precious spiritual metals.


    "Come in¡­" Knowing there was no stopping this girl, Xuan Hao just shook his head as he allowed her toe in and show off, also feeling a bit curious about what kind of artifact she had ended up creating with the three different mystic grade spiritual metals that she by all means shouldn''t have been able to use with her current level of skill in cksmithing, then again¡­ Her abysmal realm didn''t follow the ordinary path of progress.


    "Master, look! This is¡­"


    As she rushed inside following the door to his cultivation room opening, Mui didn''t waste a second as she began to happily show off the strange spherical artifact that she had created. Making sure that he knew just how awesome it was.


    The only problem with the artifact was that it didn''t really have any real use, outside of the fact that it was hard to the point that it would be hard for anyone below the Soul Ascension Realm to leave as much as a scratch on it.


    However, even if this was the case, Xuan Hao still made sure to praise Mui to continue working hard. After all, the formation she had created in the training ground for the younger disciples, had be an important resource for the sect when it came to nurturing the younger disciples below the Core Formation Realm.


    Even if she ended up wasting a few of the sect''s resources every now and then on seemingly useless things like the incredibly durable spherical artifact she had created this time around, it was still worth it if she could create something simr to the red slime creation formation again.


    For this reason alone, Elder Song didn''t try to interfere with Mui after learning about the loss of the three different mystic grade spiritual metals from him, his view on the situation being simr to his own.


    In the end, after Mui finished showing off her artifact to him, Xuan Hao took the opportunity to teach her. Spending the next few hours together with her while teaching her about the Nascent Soul Realm and at the same time getting a better understanding of his disciple''s progress so far. Making sure that there wasn''t anything wrong with her foundation due to how fast she had progressed through the Nascent Soul Realm¡­


    "Bye, bye, master!"


    Watching a Mui left his cultivation room with a happy smile still present on her face, Xuan Hao simrly smiled at her as he waved to her as she dashed off in the direction of the qi springke at the center of the sect.


    If he didn''t guess wrong, she should be heading there to show off her artifact to Zu Fei- Or anyone who happened to run into her along the way.


    "I should get back to cultivating..." Muttering this to himself as he turned his attention away from Mui, Xuan Hao couldn''t help feeling a hint of anticipation as he began to look forward to the reward he would get when the interspatial ring quest finished in another two months¡­ And considering that time passed by the fastest while fully focused onprehending the dao, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any more time as he sat back down and closed his eyes to focus onprehending the Dao of Space.


    Considering that he needed toprehend the Dao of Space to the Perfection Realm before he could awaken his physique, he had already decided to focus his full attention on trying toprehend the Dao of Space.


    Even though his cultivation realm was still nowhere near the required cultivation realm, he could at least try toplete the other requirements. Not to mention, increasing hisprehension of the Dao of Space would also allow him to create moreyers around his dao seed and thus progress his cultivation realm at the same time.


    Although inevitably slower than if he justprehended arge number of Daos to the Small Sess Realm,prehending the Dao of Space would be more beneficial in the long run, as he would have toprehend it at some point in time if he wanted to awaken his physique.


    As for the Dao of Time¡­ He had tried toprehend it during the past few months but had been unsessful.


    ording to what little he had managed to learn about the Dao of Time from asking Pei Yang, the Dao of Time was considered one of the hardest Daos toprehend.


    Without any special opportunity, it would be close to impossible to even reach the Elementary Realm in the Dao, as anyone who managed toprehend even a small fraction of the Dao of Time could already be considered to have some control over their own time.


    One of the only people in known records to haveprehended the Dao of Time, although not known for his strength, had managed to live for over three hundred thousand years while only being at the earlier stages of the Dao Seed Realm before disappearing from the face of the continent. Rumored to have gone into seclusion a little over a hundred thousand years ago and still thought to be alive and in the process ofprehending the Dao of Time. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    And this person was just one of the people who hadprehended the Dao of Time in recent times. Following the same path, anyone whoprehended the Dao of Time seemed to have a lifespan unimaginable to anyone at the same realm, while at the same time also having an incredibly slow cultivation speed for some unknown reason. Staying in the same realm for hundreds of thousands of years without any progress.


    But then again, it could also just be that thoseprehending the Dao of Time decided to hide their own cultivation base. After all, none of the people who hadprehended the Dao of Time ording to Pei Yang, had ended up dying. Instead, they just disappeared from the world after a period of time. Leaving no traces of where they had gone behind¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao focused his attention onprehending the Dao of Space.


    Although he was really curious about the Dao of Time and the people who had managed to sessfullyprehend it, he also understood that it wasn''t something he could learn about at the moment.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Is this where all those people escaped to?" At the same time Xuan Hao once again began to dwell into the mysterious of the Dao of Space, a demonic figure standing a little over two meters tall appeared close to the edge of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory as he muttered this to himself while staring in the direction of one of the Nascent Soul Realm elders of the sect who had been put in charge of helping guard the borders of the sect.


    "Nascent Soul Realm¡­ And around theter stages of the realm as well. Not to mention, there are a few other Nascent Soul Realm cultivators nearby, together with a Domain Lord Realm Expert a bit further away. Looks like this should be the territory of some local power." Continuing to examine the situation while also turning to look in the direction where of the Star Shattering Sect''s elders who had just recently broken through to the Domain Lord Realm was staying, the demonic figures showed a serious expression on his face upon the mention of a local power.


    In his eyes, a local power wasn''t something like a small kingdom or sect, but instead a power at the level of the Onyx Empire or Sky Empire before its fall, a force with the backing of someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Only a power of this level would have the power to dispatch someone in the Domain Lord Realm to guard their border!


    "Not to mention it being a local power, it might also be rted to the strange barrier that blocked off the Frozen Wastnd from this ce. Hm¡­ Looks like I will have to check out the situation myself." Narrowing both his eyes as he said this, the demonic figure turned into a ck mist that quickly flew into the territory of the Star Shattering Sect without being noticed by the Domain Lord Realm Elder in charge of guarding the border from any demonic cultivators who might try and do just that.

 Chapter 1251 Cautious Demonic Cultivator

    Chapter 1251 Cautious Demonic Cultivator


    Not aware that someone had secretly snuck past one of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators who was in charge of guarding the borders of the Star Shattering Sect from any demonic cultivators who might try and do just that during the uing weeks and months, the Star Shattering Sect as a whole continued to prepare for making use of the demonic cultivators to train their younger disciples.


    All the while, the person in question slowly arrived at the edge of the vast open field that surrounded the Shattered Star Peaks on all sides. Staring off in the direction of the Falling Star City that could barely be made out surrounding the base of the Ninth Star peak from where he was standing.


    "So, this is where the local power of this ce is located? How weird, I thought it would be close to the core region and not so close to the Frozen Wastnd¡­" Muttering this to himself, the demonic figure didn''t directly approach the Falling Star City, but instead began to examine his surroundings once again for any powerful cultivators.


    Acting far more prudent whenpared to most demonic cultivators, as he clearly didn''t want to end up identally attacking someone who was far stronger than himself, something that was unimaginable under normal circumstances considering that he was by no means weak among demonic cultivators. Having already reached the Peak of the True Demon Realm, the equivalent to the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    By all ounts, he could be considered invincible wherever he went outside the core region of the continent, but he still acted so cautiously, a result of having lived at the edge of death even after he had reached the True Demon Realm. The core of the Frozen Wastnd being far from a safe ce, even though it had been considered taboo for those in the True Demon Realm to fight with each other by those in charge of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Existences that had caused this demonic cultivator to still keep his current cautious approach to anything he did, lest he ends up identally offending an entityparable to those terrifying demons above him¡­


    "Hm? A demonic cultivator? And one in the True Demon Realm at that¡­ What is this little fellow doing here?"


    Unfortunately for the demonic cultivator who thought he had perfectly managed to hide himself as he began the tedious process of trying to figure out how strong the cultivators of the Star Shattering Sect was, Pei Yang just so happened to have taken a rare break to leave the sect and look around the Falling Star City when the divine sense of this demonic cultivator happened to enter the range of his own divine sense. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although he didn''t deliberately spread out his divine sense nor try to search for the other party, the difference in strength made it impossible for the True Demon Realm cultivator to hide from him.


    "Should I inform Xuan Hao about it? Nah, he should be busy cultivating at the moment, and I shouldn''t interrupt him over such a little thing." Shaking his head as he chuckled a bit to himself while his divine sense spread out and engulfed the demonic cultivator without him even noticing that he had already been found, Pei Yang took a step forward before arriving directly in front of the demonic cultivator.


    "Wha-"


    Ptsh-!


    Not even giving the other party a chance to react, as he directly killed him. Knowing very well that dragging things out might result in something unexpected happening, like the demonic cultivator taking out a powerful talisman or something different that could sway the battle in his favor or help him escape.


    Whoosh~!


    With the other party dead, Pei Yang didn''t leave immediately, as he grabbed the interspatial ring of the demonic cultivator before starting to curiously look through to see if there was anything of interest inside of it.


    "Ah¡­ A teleportation talisman. Indeed, a good idea that I killed this fellow immediately instead of giving him a chance to use it. Outside of that¡­ Let''s see¡­ Demonic cultivation technique, spirit stones, infant blood pills!? Better burn those¡­ Hm¡­ More spirit stones, a novel called two tips meet? Interesting taste¡­ And- Hm?"


    Looking through the interspatial ring of the demonic cultivator and the many demonic things in his possession, along with spirit stones and other things more normal that should have been seized from cultivators he had killed not too long ago, Pei Yang could not help frowning when he noticed a certain small piece of paper.


    On it, there were clear instructions for invading the outer regions of the Onyx Empire and other surrounding empires bordering the Frozen Wastnd.


    Although the information in question wasn''t that hard to understand, the implication behind it made a shiver run down Pei Yang''s spine, as he understood that the flood of demonic cultivators that hade swarming into the empires around the Frozen Wastnds wasn''t an ident, but instead something that had been caused by someone on purpose.


    Not just that, but from the fact that it seemed like the demonic cultivator at the Peak of the True Demon Realm had beenmanded to help out in case stronger cultivators tried to interfere with the weaker demonic cultivators causing havoc, he could tell that the demonic cultivators behind this was above the True Demon Realm. Having at least reached the Demon Lord Realm that wasparable to the Dao Seed Realm.


    No, not just the Demon Lord Realm, as the chaos caused by the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnd had spread far beyond the Onyx Empire and few other empires mentioned on the paper.


    For someone to have the ability tomand so many demonic cultivators, it could only be a demonic cultivator that had managed to reach the Demon King Realm, a realm that he himself had only ever heard about in rumors during his travels across the central region of the continent, an existence among demonic cultivators who stood at the same level as those in the Celestial Immortal Realm!


    "Looks like the situation regarding the Frozen Wastnd might be far more troublesome than a simple chaotic situation in the core of the Frozen Wastnd forcing the weaker demonic cultivators to flee in all directions to keep themselves save¡­" Muttering this to himself as he realized this, Pei Yang could not help frowning as he turned to look back in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect.


    "I should inform Xuan Hao about the situation and see if we cane up with a way to avoid getting dragged into whatever n those demonic cultivators are cooking up¡­"


    Whoosh~!


    Not wasting any time after this, Pei Yang rushed back towards the Star Shattering Sect to discuss the situation with Xuan Hao. Leaving no traces of the demonic cultivator who had not even managed to say a word before he died.


    ¡­


    Not long after Pei Yang visited Xuan Hao met up, they both ended uping to the simple agreement that they would do nothing. Not just because they wanted to avoid drawing any unnecessary attention towards the Star Shattering Sect, but also because the situation regarding the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnd simply wasn''t anything they could interfere with.


    The Frozen Wastnd covered an area that was farrger than a hundred Sky Empire''s put together and bordered hundreds of different empires, big and small.


    Instead of them trying to find out what the ns of these demonic cultivators was, and try to prevent the Star Shattering Sect from getting dragged into it, it would be better for them to just wait and see while ensuring the safety of the Star Shattering Sect from any of the demonic cultivators that might end up heading their way without them revealing their strength.


    This way, they would at least be able to keep the Star Shattering Sect out of the attention of the more powerful demonic cultivators for some time.


    Although not a permanent solution, the time they bought this way would at least give the Star Shattering Sect time to grow, while at the same time also giving thoserger empires bordering the Frozen Wastnd time to test out the waters.


    After all, among the empires who bordered the Frozen Wastnd, a few of them did have the backing of someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    For empires like this, it would only be a matter of time before they lost their patience with the flood of demonic cultivators and decided to take action to prevent their empires from sustaining any unnecessary damage- Or that was at least what Pei Yang felt would happen.


    For now, they could only try and make best use of the situation and use the constant stream of demonic cultivators that would soon arrive, as a training opportunity for the disciples of the sect.


    In case of stronger demonic cultivators appeared, the elders of the sect would be in charge of dealing with them and ensuring that nothing happened to the disciples.

 Chapter 1252 Two Months, border situation

    Chapter 1252 Two Months, border situation


    Following Xuan Hao and Pei Yang''s decision to try and stay out of whatever the powerful demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds were up to, it did not take long before the first few demonic cultivators arrived at the borders of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    However,pared to the demonic cultivator at the Peak of the True Demon Realm who had managed to sneak past the Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had been put in charge of keeping an eye on the borders of the sect, the demonic cultivators who appeared this time around were nowhere near this level. Most of them being Lesser Demonsparable to the Foundation Establishment Realm and Higher Demonsparable to the Core Formation Realm, with a few demonic cultivators at the First Demonic Transformation,parable to the Nascent Soul Realm, hidden among them.


    Although this would be a force that any kingdom around the Star Shattering Sect would find difficult to deal with, for the current Star Shattering Sect these demonic cultivators were not worth mentioning, as it didn''t take long before a group of disciples and elders were dispatched to deal with them.


    Soon enough resulting in the first sh between the demonic cultivators and the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect, something that only became moremon as the number of demonic cultivators reaching the borders of the Star Shattering Sect increased. In turn it also caused more disciples to get a chance at going to the border to fight demonic cultivators. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Soon enough resulting in the first sh between the demonic cultivators and the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect, something that only became moremon as the number of demonic cultivators reaching the borders of the Star Shattering Sect increased. In turn it also caused more disciples to get a chance at going to the border to fight demonic cultivators.


    As for the demonic cultivators who were at the First Demonic Transformation Realm, most of them were dealt with by the elders of the sect, while a few of them managed to sense the danger ahead of time and escaped back in the direction they came from to find a weaker kingdom to invade.


    Not many of them dared to try and find a strong demonic cultivator to help out. After all, doing so would also put their own life in danger, as the stronger demonic cultivator could just kill them and absorb their cultivation.


    Only those who were part of a demonic sect that wouldn''t result in them being directly killed by the stronger demonic cultivator did go back and inform their seniors of the situation¡­ And as a result of this, a few demonic cultivators at the Third Demonic Transformation Realm,parable to the Domain Lord Realm, ended up appearing a month after the first demonic cultivator had appeared.


    Luckily for the elders of the Star Shattering Sect who were in charge of guarding the border, these demonic cultivators weren''t too strong and were only within the earlier stages of the Domain Lord Realm in terms of strength.


    Not to mention, upon learning of these demonic cultivators, Chu Yang wasted no time in rushing over to fight them before any of the other elders had a chance to. Resulting in him bing a rather well-known person among the younger disciples who witnessed him fighting the demonic cultivators, his reputation even spreading all the way back to the Star Shattering Sect where no small number of elders felt a shiver run down their spine as they all remembered the training session they had been forced to participate in before he had reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    At the very least, those who had yet to reach the Domain Lord Realm among these elders all felt a sense of relief knowing that they would never have to go through that kind of nightmare again, while the few who had been overjoyed over having just broken through to the Domain Lord Realm all felt a sense of dread as they realized they were still strong enough to be training partners in Chu Yang''s eyes.


    Unaware of all of this, Chu Yang continued his rampage through the stronger demonic cultivators. Not intending to let go of the opportunity he had been waiting for to rapidly increase hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear through battle.


    In the process, he also ended up causing a momentary pause at the demonic cultivators trying to enter the Star Shattering Sect in the ces where he fought the powerful demonic cultivators. All of them having been scared away by the battle.


    Unknowingly, he also started toprehend the Dao of ughter through his constant battles with the demonic cultivators. Although nowhere near hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear, he managed to take the first step towardsprehending the Dao of ughter.


    Slowly, another month passed like this, as the stronger demonic cultivators at the Third Demonic Transformation Realm trying to enter the Star Shattering Sect''s territory lowered with the increased number of deaths at Chu Yang''s hands, while the weaker demonic cultivators who had been scared away by the constant battle between Chu Yang and the powerful demonic cultivators once again began trying to enter the territory of the Star Shattering Sect. Allowing the disciples of the sect to once again fight with the demonic cultivators, as the number of weaker demonic cultivators trying to enter the Star Shattering Sect''s territory continued to grow.


    Not long after, the elders of the Star Shattering Sect were overwhelmed by therge number of weaker demonic cultivators and couldn''t guard every inch of the Star Shattering Sect''s borders. Ultimately resulting in some of the demonic cultivators getting through and causing chaos inside the border newly conquered border regions of the Star Shattering Sect that had only recently been integrated and also brimmed with arge number of new cultivation families that had fled from the demonic cultivators and settled down in one of the two border regions.


    Although, it wasn''t that bad of a thing, as it gave these cultivation families a chance to show off their usefulness to the Star Shattering Sect by hunting down these demonic cultivators. In the end causing the damage of these demonic cultivators to be minimal.


    ¡­


    "Finally¡­!"


    At the same time, back in the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao could not help shedding an imaginary tear as he looked at the interspatial ring quest that had been marked asplete after what felt like forever. Even if the reward wasn''t anything useful, at this point in time, he just felt happy that the quest was finally over!


    Whoosh~


    "Huh? Master!?"


    "Where is master going? Weren''t we supposed to train together today?"


    Not aware of the internal thoughts of their master who just heard the heavenly sound of a certain quest beingpleted, Mui and Bai Ning, who had been prepared to be personally taught by their master, were left in a confused state as the person in question suddenly disappeared in front of them before teaching them anything.


    "Ah! I get it! Master should want us toprehend the movement technique he just disyed! Hehe, if I learn it, I will be able to easily outrun those elders trying to catch me whenever I visit the cksmithing hall for crafting materials." Seeminglyprehending what their master "intended" to teach them, both of Mui''s eyes shone brightly as she said this with an excited expression on her face.


    "This¡­"


    On the other hand, Bai Ning, who was standing right next to her, could not help panicking when he heard what his junior sister said.


    Not just because it involved the spiritual metal of the sect that was stored away in the cksmithing Hall, but because he found out that his junior sister had already found out about one of the locations where the spiritual metal of the sect was stored and had apparently already been chased away by the cksmithing elders once.


    No! I can''t allow her to learn such a powerful movement technique, or the spiritual metal stored in the cksmithing Hall will be at risk!


    Thinking this to himself, Bai Ning slowly turned towards his junior sister, who was looking in the direction that their master had disappeared with an excited expression on her face.


    "Junior sister, what do you say I teach you a bit of cksmithing now that master has left? The movement technique can always wait for the future."


    "Hm? Senior brother¡­ Teaching me cksmithing!? Waaah! Yeess! Let''s goooo!" Hearing what Bai Ning said, Mui happily eximed as she nodded her head filled with excitement. Making it clear to anyone watching just how excited she was about learning cksmithing from her senior brother, who was considered the most skilled cksmith in the current Star Shattering Sect.


    "Let''s go to my forge for now¡­"


    "Yay!"


    Knowing that his supply of spiritual metal was going to take a serious hit by taking his junior sister with him to his forge, he also understood that this would be better in the long term for all of the sect''s cksmiths.


    The longer he could stop his little junior sister from practicing a powerful movement technique like the one their master had shown them, the longer he could keep the spiritual metal stored at the cksmithing Hall safe- Or at the very least keep it safe long enough for one of the cksmithing elders to break through to the Domain Lord Realm.

 Chapter 1253 The End of the Limited Time Quest...!

    Chapter 1253 The End of the Limited Time Quest...!


    Arriving back at his cultivation room unaware of the fear he had unintentionally caused Bai Ning by suddenly leaving, Xuan Hao calmed himself down before pulling up the interspatial ring quest.


    [Limited Time Quest: You have found a brilliant way to recruit new potential disciples! Scatter 1000 interspatial rings around the world. The system will add a specific test to the ring that will test the potential future disciples. Interspatial Rings will only be counted towards the quest if they are scattered a certain distance away from each other. Timer will begin upon reaching the Domain Lord Realm!] [6358/1000 (Complete)] [Reward will vary depending on the amount of sessfully scattered interspatial rings during the time limit]


    [Reward for 1000 interspatial Rings: Sword Intent Promotion, Increase the level of Sword Intent]


    [Reward for 2500 interspatial Rings: Alchemy Realm Promotion, Increase Alchemy to Grandmaster Realm and increaseprehension of Dao of Alchemy to the Small Sess Realm]


    [Reward for 5000 interspatial Rings: Time Stone (Used inprehension of the Dao of Time)]


    Looking over the rewards from the interspatial ring quest, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of excitement building up inside of him.


    Indeed, waiting for such a long period of time turned out to be worth it!


    Not to mention the time stone and the increase in his alchemy realm, just the sword intent alone would have been more than enough to make him happy, as it would directly increase his strength. Especially considering that his sword intent had remained stuck at the nascent sword soul realm for a long period of time without developing into a full-fledged sword soul.


    He was happy enough with the reward shown by the system, that he decided to overlook the fact that 1358 of the interspatial rings he had scattered didn''t have any effect on the reward itself.


    Whoosh~


    Knowing it would properly take some time before he left his cultivation room as he had to absorb the rewards from the system, Xuan Hao took out hismunication talisman before informing Feng Chen and a few other elders about him going into secluded cultivation for the next few weeks. Including his disciples, who seemed to be busy doing their own thing at the moment.


    Even Bai Ning and Mui whom he had been about to teach just a moment ago had begun to practice cksmithing with each other. Disying a harmonious rtionship between a senior and a junior learning from each other.


    [Redeem Reward, Sword Intent Promotion: Y/N]


    Yes!


    And so, with further ado, Xuan Hao redeemed the first the three rewards, the sword intent promotion-


    Rumble~


    Instantly causing the nascent sword soul inside his dantian to start growing and changing at a speed visible to the naked eye, as different insights rted to the Dao of the Sword began to appear in his head. Forcibly raising hisprehension of the Dao of the Sword from the Peak of the Small Sess Realm to the Large Sess Realm over a period of a few hours.


    Rumble-!


    After which a fundamental change seemed to take ce as the sword soul, that had already grown by more than twicepared to its old size, manifested itself into a more solid shape that floated around inside his dantian.


    The clearest differencepared to before, was that he could instinctively feel that he could manifest his sword soul outside his body to fight others.


    Although the drain on his soul would be enormous, it would allow him to unleash far more power than normal through his sword techniques¡­ And at the same time, he also felt he could now merge his sword soul together with a physical sword, like the silver sword he had been given by Yi Min, to lessen this burden on his soul.


    Though the power would be reduced from a direct manifestation of his sword soul, it would at least allow him to use it for a longer period of time instead of the single powerful attack he could unleash with it at his current level.


    "With this, my strength should beparable to someone at the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm or someone at the Half Bloom Stage of the Earth Immortal Realm." Muttering this to himself as he felt the strength of the sword soul inside his dantian, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the second reward.


    [Redeem Reward, Alchemy Realm Promotion: Y/N]


    Yes!


    And not wasting any time, he directly redeemed the second reward. Soon causing arge amount of information rted to the Dao of Alchemy to flood into his mind. Containing not only insights into the Dao of Alchemy, but also countless different potion recipes simr to the other unique potion recipes the system had given him in the past.


    Among them, there wasn''t a single ordinary potion recipe. Meaning that if he wanted any normal potion recipes, he would once again have to find them by himself. At leastpared to the past, the current Star Shattering Sect did have a few Mystic and Transcendent Realm potion and pill recipes stored in the Grand Library of the sect. Most of theming from the different independent sects they had taken under their wing.


    Rumble~!


    As he thought about the unique potion recipes from the system, Xuan Hao once again felt himself enveloped by a strange power as hisprehension of the Dao of Alchemy reached the Elementary Realm before directly breaking through to the Small Sess Realm over the next few hours.


    All in all, it took him a total of a little over 14 hours to fully absorb the alchemy information from the second reward of the system¡­ And although it didn''t increase his strength as much as having his nascent sword soul break through to the sword soul realm and at the same time his Dao of the Sword reach the Large Sess Realm, it did still bring him a step closer to the 36yers that he needed to form around the dao seed in his dantian to reach the Radiant Bloom Stage that he believed would allow him to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    In total, after spending the next week forming three newyers around his dao seed, Xuan Hao now had a total of 14yers around his dao seed.


    As for thest reward given by the system, the time stone that could be used toprehend the Dao of Time, he didn''t try and use it, as he found out that it was something that could only be used once. Allowing the user toe into contact with the Dao of Time for short period of time.


    Although this would make it far easier for him toprehend the Dao of Time, he also understood that it would have a far better effect if he waited until he at least managed to gain some insights into the Dao of Time first. Instead of going into itpletely blind and possibly losing out on the chance toprehend the Dao of Time.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while putting the time stone in question away in his interspatial ring, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards his status, curious about the changes that should have taken ce now that his strength had increased.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword (Large Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess), Dao of Space (Small Sess), Dao of Illusions (Large Sess Realm), Dao of cksmithing (Small Sess), Dao of Light (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Formations (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Alchemy (Small Sess) Dao Lotus: 14yers n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Sword Intent: Sword Soul Realm Talent: ???? Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened) Physique: Ster Dao Body (99% Awakened) (Can evolve into Great Expanse Dao Body) Ster Dao Body Awakening Requirements: Dao of Space Perfection Realm, Dao of Time Elementary Realm, Profound Immortal Realm (Land Creation) Realm: Late Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm) Professions: Alchemist (Grandmaster), Formation Master (Grandmaster), cksmithing (Pseudo Saint) Sect: Star Shattering Sect Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui, Chun Hua Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (First Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm) However, outside of the changes that he had expected to see when looking through his status, he also noticed that thezy winged lion had somehow managed to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm during the short time he had entered secluded cultivation.


    Whoosh~!


    And with a quick sweep of his divine sense through the sect, he realized that the winged lion was nowhere to be seen. Meaning that it had most likely managed to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm outside of the sect.


    The only problem was¡­ Why had the winged lion left the sect in the first ce?


    Knowing how it acted normally, it wouldn''t leave the sect unless Feng Chen, Elder Song or some of the other elders requested for its help¡­

 Chapter 1254 Winged Lion Demon Beasts Breakthrough and a Familiar Demonic Cultivator

    Chapter 1254 Winged Lion Demon Beast''s Breakthrough and a Familiar Demonic Cultivator


    After asking around the sect for a bit, he discovered that the winged lion demon beast had also gone to the border to help face off against the demonic cultivators, as a few powerful ones too difficult for Chu Yang to deal with had shown up during the time he had been in secluded cultivation.


    In turn, this sudden pressure from fighting against the demonic cultivators had allowed the winged lion demon beast that had already been at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm to smoothly break through to the Soul Ascension Realm without any problems.


    The sudden growth in strength not only gave the winged lion demon beast a renewed sense of confidence when it came topeting against a certain rabbit demon beast that had taken its spot as the number one demon beast in the Star Shattering Sect, but also caused it to focus more seriously on its cultivation instead of justzing around inside the sect like it had done before.


    Although the hope of it surpassing the rabbit demon beast was close to nonexistent considering that the rabbit demon beast was far more talented and also had a special bloodline helping further enhance its talent for cultivation, Xuan Hao was still happy to see that the winged lion demon beast had started to work hard for the sect.


    Although the hope of it surpassing the rabbit demon beast was close to nonexistent considering that the rabbit demon beast was far more talented and also had a special bloodline helping further enhance its talent for cultivation, Xuan Hao was still happy to see that the winged lion demon beast had started to work hard for the sect.


    At the same time, as he looked into information on the current situation of the winged lion demon beast, he also found out about the current situation of the sect''s borders.


    Learning that although the situation could be considered under control at the current moment, with the number of deaths among the elders and disciples being limited, he also learnt that things were different before the winged lion demon beast had gone to the border.


    Apparently, a demonic cultivator at the Pinnacle of the Third Demonic Transformation Realm had appeared just a short time after he had entered secluded cultivation and caused close to a thousand deaths among the disciples and elders participating in dealing with the demonic cultivators.


    Although only around a hundred of these were from the Star Shattering Sect with the rest of them being from the different independent sects, it was still a significant loss that ended up causing Feng Chen to ask for the winged lion demon beast''s help as Chu Yang and the rest of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators prevented this demonic cultivator from causing any more damage.


    In the end, the winged lion demon beast rushed over and engaged in a massive battle with the demonic cultivator that dragged on for two days and nights before the demonic cultivator chose to escape with his tail between his legs.


    It was precisely this battle that had allowed the winged lion demon beast to push past it limits and undergo the first tribtion and reach the Soul Ascension Realm in less than a day.


    However, the most shocking thing was not the fact that the winged lion demon beast had managed to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm. After all, it had been stuck at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm for a long time and only needed a small push to break through.


    Instead, it was the fact that the demonic cultivator returned only a day after the winged lion demon beast''s breakthrough. Having also managed to break through himself, reaching the True Demon Realm.


    After a bit more investigation in the form of paying Elder Song a visit, Xuan Hao learnt that the powerful demonic cultivators that the winged lion demon beast fought off on an almost daily basis since it broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm weren''t different demonic cultivators, but instead the same one that had just broken through to the True Demon Realm!


    Not just that, but he also learnt about the identity of the demonic cultivator, Su Wuhan, the former ruler of the Azure Sky Kingdom that was now part of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory, a person that he hadn''t heard about in a long time since his sudden disappearance following the fall of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "I never expected that guy to have be a demonic cultivator. Not to mention, one at the True Demon Realm¡­ After all, he should have only been around the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm during his time as the ruler of the Azure Sky Kingdom" Shaking his head as he quietly muttered this to himself while making his way back from Elder Song''s courtyard, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of understanding towards those choosing to follow the demonic path.


    Going from someone who was merely the king of a small kingdom under the massive Sky Empire to a powerful demonic cultivator at the True Demon Realm,parable to the pinnacle experts of a power like the Sky Empire, it was obvious why so many people decided to willingly be demonic cultivators.


    After all, though the life of a demonic cultivator was fraught with dangers around every corner and was even more precarious than an ordinary wandering cultivator. Living each day on the edge of a knife where one wrong step would result in death by having all of their cultivation absorb by another demonic cultivator or being hunted down by powerful cultivators seeking to kill them the moment they left the Frozen Wastnd, there was a clear benefitpared to following the orthodox path.


    No requirement for talent.


    No need to spend years stuck at a bottleneck not knowing when an opportunity to breakthrough would appear.


    All one needed was to follow the demonic path and devour the essence of other living beings to increase one''s own strength until one reached the True Demon Realm and transformed into a true demon.


    After that, it was also simple to grow, as one just had to continue devouring the cultivation of others.


    The Dao requirement for reaching higher realms? Simple! Just continue ughtering others and you will naturallyprehend the Dao of ughter! Devour others and you willprehend the rted Dao and so on¡­ The demonic path was truly simple and straightforward. Nothingplicated about it.


    At least, that was from what Xuan Hao knew about the demonic cultivation at the moment. Maybe it would be different for higher realms.


    After all, if it was really that simple to progress by going down the demonic path, the demonic cultivators wouldn''t have been suppressed to the Frozen Wastnd and other simr wastnds. Unable to leave without facing the fierce suppression of the different major powers at the core of the continent.


    "Hm¡­ Maybe the thing limiting demonic cultivators is rted to their mental state? Perhaps the further they progress, the more their mental state deteriorate until they lose control and be no different from mindless demonic beasts attacking everything in sight¡­" Muttering this to himself as he arrived back at his cultivation room, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that this made sense.


    Not to mention it wasn''t without any proof, as it was a well-known fact that demonic cultivators tended to go insane if they couldn''t improve their strength fast enough and were overwhelmed by their own inner demons.


    Of course, this wasn''t something unique to demonic cultivators and could also happen to normal cultivators who experienced qi divination and either gave birth to inner demons or already had some residing inside them that simrly overwhelmed them and transformed them into mindless demons.


    Though,pared to demonic cultivators, this kind of thing was rather rare and didn''t happen often. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even a sect the size of the Star Shattering Sect with hundreds of thousands of cultivators residing in and around the sect, didn''t have more than one or two such incidents a year¡­ And most of these incidents could be solved without killing the affect party by forcibly suppressing the inner demon with overwhelming strength.


    Although the cultivation of the other party would essentially be destroyed by doing something like this, at least they would be alive and had another chance at bing cultivators in the future if they could ovee their inner demons.


    In the worst-case scenario where an inner demon became a mental demon, there would be no choice but to kill the other party before it had a chance to grow, something that was understood by both normal cultivators and demonic cultivators alike, as a mental demon was seen as a disaster by both.


    Quite ironic considering that demonic cultivators behaved in the same manner as a mental demon in most circumstances.


    But then again, the demonic cultivators could still talk among each other and establish their own sects and powers in the Frozen Wastnd. Engaging in some form of trade and teaching younger demonic cultivators.


    Even if the ultimate end goal of most of these sects and powers in the Frozen Wastnd was to rear arge number of decently strong demonic cultivators for the powerful demonic cultivators in charge to devour and increase their own strength without having to risk their life hunting down other demonic cultivators on their own¡­

 Chapter 1255 Su Wuhans... Senior?

    Chapter 1255 Su Wuhan''s... Senior?


    At the same time that Xuan Hao arrived back in his cultivation room while thinking about demonic cultivators, Su Wuhan, the demonic cultivator that had been fighting the winged lion demon beast every day since its breakthrough to the Soul Ascension Realm and his own break through to the True Demon Realm, silently arrived at the border of the Star Shattering Sect with an unbearable killing intent in his eyes as he stared towards a group of the Star Shattering Sect''s disciple hunting down demonic cultivators not too far away.


    Rooooar-!


    However, before he could attack this group of disciples who were only watched over by a single elder in the Nascent Soul Realm, a loud roar followed by the emergence of a massive, winged lion demon beast stopped him.


    "Damnable beast! It''s here already!?" Seeing this demon beast that had already arrived in front of him before he could kill the group of disciples and elder from the Star Shattering Sect, Su Wuhan could not help silently cursing at the winged lion demon beast as he was soon engaged in a deadly battle that forced all the surrounding cultivators and demonic cultivators to run away.


    In the end, the battlested for a little over two hours before Su Wuhan was forced to take his leave, as the winged lion demon beast''s strength had slightly surpassed his own after it had broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm. Meaning that an extended battle might seriously injure him and possible give it a chance to kill him.


    Even then, it didn''t stop Su Wuhan from trying to enter the territory of the Star Shattering Sect on a daily basis.


    Not because there was something special about the Star Shattering Sect''s territory, but because more powerful demonic cultivators had already monopolized the areas where the Frozen Wastnd was connected to the Onyx Empire or other nearby empires.


    "Damn it all! If not for those powerful ones forcing everyone out from the central part of the Frozen Wastnd, I would have been able to stabilize my cultivation properly without taking any risk after I broke through to the True Demon Realm!" Muttering this to himself filled with anger and fear, Su Wuhannded on an abandoned mountain a short distance away from the Star Shattering Sect''s border before he began to recover from his recent battle with the winged lion demon beast.


    Although he felt angry at the winged lion demon beast that was constantly blocking his path and preventing him from crossing the Star Shattering Sect''s territory, he felt even more anger towards the powerful demonic cultivators who were behind his current desperate situation.


    If not for them, he wouldn''t have to risk his life like this and continue causing chaos by pushing forward recklessly with the rest of the demonic cultivators just after breaking through to the True Demon Realm.


    However, even if he wanted to just leave and not get involved in the schemes of those powerful demonic cultivators, he didn''t really have a choice, as going against them would result in death.


    Not just because he would be hunted down by them, but also because one of these powerful demonic cultivators had shown up a few hours after his breakthrough to the True Demon Realm and had directly ced a seal on him and told him to continue pushing forward with the rest of the weaker demonic cultivators.


    "If just I had a way to undo that restriction¡­" Whispering this to himself with a helpless and fearful expression on his face as he felt around his neck where a barely visible cor made up of small indiscernible symbols was located, Su Wuhan could not help feeling like his life was no longer in his own hands.


    Instead, he had already be a pawn for those powerful demonic cultivators. The only way for him to escape his current predicament being if his strength managed to break through to the Demon Lord Realm above the True Demon Realm, but¡­ The chances of that happening before he ended up dead were close to nonexistent.


    After all, during his time as a demonic cultivator, he had learnt a lot about the different major powers in the central part of the continent and understood that it was only a matter of time before they dispatched their powerful experts to suppress the demonic cultivators.


    Although this seemed to be the goal of those powerful demonic cultivators given their actions so far, he had no idea why they wanted to do something like this and to be honest, he didn''t care that much about it. The only thing he cared about was the fact that he would almost definitely die when those powerful experts came to suppress the demonic cultivators!


    "The ones I will have to deal with should be from the Blue Sea Empire¡­ I wonder how much time I have left before they show- Hm!?" As he was lost in his own thoughts trying to figure out how to escape from his current situation of being used as a pawn by others, Su Wuhan suddenly jumped into the air with a cautious expression on his face as he noticed someone approaching him.


    Not just that, but the person approaching him was also a demonic cultivator¡­ And someone who had simrly reached the True Demon Realm like himself!


    "Who is it!?"


    Following his question, a shadowy figure emerged a short distance away from him before changing into a tall demonic figure standing more than five meters tall.


    "Hehe, no need to worry little king, I''m not here to harm you." n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Hearing the eerie voice that came from the demonic figure, Su Wuhan could not help showing a shocked expression on his face.


    Not because of the eerie voice, but because of the fact that the owner of the voice seemed to know about his past identity as the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom, something that he hadn''t told anyone about since he had be a demonic cultivator.


    And¡­ Considering the fact that the Azure Sky Kingdom had only been a small kingdom back before its fall due to his absence and the emergence of the Star Shattering Sect, it was even more surprising that someone at the True Demon Realm knew about this.


    "No need to look at me like that. Don''t you remember the demonic cultivation technique you found back then? Do you really think it was a coincidence that you, a little king at the Nascent Soul Realm, was able to find such a demonic cultivation technique and reach the True Demon Realm in such a short period of time?"


    "You¡­ T-the immortal devil scripture I found back then was-"


    "Indeed, it was left behind by an elder from my sect who happened to see that you had a fitting physique for practicing it. Of course, deciding to follow the demonic path was your own choice, heheh~"


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say after hearing what the demonic figure said, Su Wuhan was left in a state of disbelief as he remembered how he had first found the immortal devil scripture that led him on to the demonic path.


    Back then, he had stumbled on what seemed like an abandoned cave dwelling with a barely functioning concealment formation a few years after he broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Having thought himself lucky, he had rushed inside and searched through the ce. Ultimately finding the devil immortal scripture, a legendary demonic cultivation mantra that showed him a clear path far beyond the Nascent Soul Realm and an interspatial ring with fetal blood pills refined from the blood of over a thousand newborns that would be able to help elevate his strength all the way to the Third Demonic Transformation Realm.


    Of course, knowing the danger of bing a demonic cultivator back then, he didn''t get tempted and instead stored the pills and technique away.


    Only after hundreds of years and remaining stuck on the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm without any sign of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm, did he begin to feel tempted by the demonic path and started studying the immortal devil scripture.


    Only stepping on to the demonic path after barely escaping from Archbishop Soft Breeze back when he had shed with the church of the gue god.


    Wait, is my master from back then perhaps-


    "Hehe, seems like you already figured it out, the mysterious master you followed back during your time as the little king of the Azure Sky Kingdom was none other than an elder of my sect. Of course, he only intended to point you in the right direction and didn''t interfere too much after you finally decided to enter the demonic path."


    "But the ns from back then and-"


    "Nothing more than a way to keep you distracted and have youe in contact with the demonic path."


    "This¡­ Why are you here¡­?" Feeling like his life back during his time as the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom was nothing more than a lie that had been arranged by his master to carry out his so-called n that now turned out to be nothing more than a ploy to get him more familiar with the demonic path, Su Wuhan could not help slumping down with a look of disbelief on his face as he asked this.

 Chapter 1256 Alerting the Winged Lion Demon Beast, Calling for Master!

    Chapter 1256 Alerting the Winged Lion Demon Beast, Calling for Master!


    "Hm? I''m here to pick you up now that you have broken through to the True Demon Realm, isn''t that much obvious?"


    "But¡­ I had a restriction ced on me by one of the senior demonic cultivators from the core of the Frozen Wastnd. If I really do end up leaving, I will likely end up dying¡­" Hearing that the other party wanted to take him away, Su Wuhan could not help frowning visibly as he said this.


    Not to mention the fact that he had no idea what would happen if he ended up following the other party, he still had the seal left behind on him by a demonic cultivator in the Demon Lord Realm, a terrifying entity above the True Demon Realm.


    Even if he wanted to follow the other party, there was no way to do so with the threat of Demon Lording to hunt him down or worse, triggering the restriction left behind in him to kill him.


    No matter how mysterious the person in front of him was and how it seemed like the other party had been secretly following his every move ever since he had been in the Nascent Soul Realm, he could still clearly feel that he was only in the True Demon Realm. Nowhere near strong enough to face off against someone in the Demon Lord Realm, let alone help him get rid of the restriction that had been left behind in his body!


    "Hehe, you don''t have to worry about that, we have alreadye to an agreement with that demonic cultivator, as long as you are willing to follow me back to the sect, I will ensure that you won''t h have to worry about the restriction." Having already predicted this question, the demonic figure just chuckled lightly as he said this. Showing that the power behind him was strong enough to negotiate with someone in the Demon Lord Realm.


    Though he hadn''t been a demonic cultivator for long, Song Wuhan understood that demonic cultivators only responded to strength and someone in the Demon Lord Realm would never bother with anyone weaker than themselves.


    Just like how the other party had appeared in front of him shortly after his breakthrough to the True Demon Realm, forced a restriction on to him andmanded him to continue his attack and left without bothering to listen to anything he said.


    Meaning that the power behind the person in front of him at least had someone in the Demon Lord Realm backing them up!


    To agree or not¡­


    As he realized this, Su Wuhan began to hesitate. Understanding that although he might be able to escape from his current restriction by following the other party and avoid being killed when the powers at the core of the continent sent out their people to suppress the demonic cultivators like himself, he might end up in a far worse situationpared to before.


    After all, he had no idea why this strange power had targeted him for so long and even gone through so much trouble to nurture¡­ And considering that it was a demonic force, he doubted it was for any kind intentions like simply wanting to take in a talented disciple.


    Instead, he felt that it was more likely for it to be because someone powerful from this demonic sect found he had some kind of special bloodline or divine physique suited for demonic cultivation and wanted to nurture him to take it for themselves at ater point in time.


    Reaching the True Demon Realm might be the time that he had reached the level needed for something like this before he grew out of control¡­


    "You don''t need to make a choice immediately; you can contact me through this talisman when you thought things through- Ah! Just before I leave, I happened to hear that the Blue Sea Empire ns to suppress the demonic cultivators in this ce in around a year. So, I rmending to a decision before that time, hehe~"


    Whoosh~!


    Knowing that it wouldn''t be that simple to get Su Wuhan to follow him, while also understanding that he couldn''t force the other party given that both of them had reached the True Demon Realm, the demonic figure just chuckled to himself as he threw out amunication talisman before turning around to leave before Su Wuhan had a chance to respond.


    "This¡­"


    Grabbing themunication talisman with a hint of hesitation on his face while looking in the direction that the demonic cultivator left, Su Wuhan could not help feeling surprised.


    After all, he doubted that the other party had no way to force him to follow. After all, if he truly gained the agreement of the Demon Lord who left behind the restriction, he should be able to threaten him with using the restriction against him and force him to follow that way.


    The fact that he didn''t do that did not make Su Wuhan feel grateful to the other party for being gracious and giving him time to think things through, but instead made him suspicious about whether or not the other party had truly gained the agreement of the Demon Lord who had left behind the restriction in his body.


    In the end, he didn''t know what to believe and could only sit down and continue his recovery in preparation for facing off against the winged lion demon beast in the future. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    At least for now, he didn''t n on following the strange demonic cultivator back to his sect where the person he had perceived as his master back during his time as the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom should be from.


    RUUUUUMBLE-!


    However, as he was lost in his own thoughts thinking about his future prospects, a terrifying divine sense suddenly swept across him and the other demonic cultivator who was still in the process of leaving, causing both of them to freeze on the spot.


    ¡­


    Roar? Roar!


    Not too long ago, while Su Wuhan and the demonic cultivator were having a conversation with each other only a short distance away from the Star Shattering Sect''s territory, the winged lion demon beast could not help showing a slightly panicked expression on its face as it felt the presence of the two True Demon Realm demonic cultivators.


    Even though it was confident in its own strength after it had reached the Soul Ascension Realm, it also understood that it stood no chance when faced with two True Demons at the same time. Especially considering that one of them seemed to be far stronger than the one it had been facing so far.


    Roar!


    And so, with this in mind, while the two powerful demonic cultivators were having a conversation with each other, the winged lion demon beast contacted its master for help. Not nning to wait around to find out what these two demonic cultivators were up to.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Two demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm appeared on the border?"


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao, who had been going over his recent gains from the interspatial ring quest, suddenly looked in the direction of the sect borders that the winged lion demon beast had been defending, his gaze prating through space itself as he saw the scene of the two demonic cultivators chatting with each other not too far away from the border while one of the smiled at the other, seemingly havinge to a cooperative agreement of some sort.


    "This is bad... Although that little one is now at the Soul Ascension Realm, it''s far from strong enough to deal with two demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm at the same time!"


    Not able to hear the conversation between the two demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao didn''t have to be a genius to figure out that the two of them seemed to havee to an agreement on how to deal with his little lion.


    Whoosh-!


    So, with this in mind, Xuan Hao took a step forward a used hisprehension of the Dao of Space to cross the distance that would normally take someone in the Nascent Soul Realm weeks to cover in a single step.


    Roar?!


    Arriving directly in front of the surprised winged lion demon beast, who hadn''t expected his master toe personally.


    "Hehe, no need to look so surprised, you are still considered my pet, I at least still have to make sure that others don''t start bullying you!"


    R-roar~!


    Hearing his master''s words, the winged lion demon beast let out a happy roar. Once again feeling like it had chosen the right master to follow back then!


    Shaking his head as he saw the happy expression that seemed filled with energy on the little lion''s face, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he violently spread out his divine sense in the direction of the two demonic cultivators-


    RUUUUUUUMBLE-!


    Not showing any intention of hiding his divine sense, as he nned to kill both of them!

 Chapter 1257 Where Did I Go Wrong?

    Chapter 1257 Where Did I Go Wrong?


    Feeling this terrifying divine sense, both Su Wuhan and the demonic cultivator he had been conversing with only a short time ago began to shiver in fear. Freezing at the spot as they looked in the direction of the terrifying divine sense where they could see Xuan Hao''s figure standing in the air with the winged lion demon beast floating next to him.


    "Impossible! How is there an Earth Immortal is here already!? Shouldn''t the Blue Sea Empire at least take another half year before the meeting between them, and the rest of the major power conclude!?" Seeing this, the demonic cultivator who had been full of confidence when talking to Su Wuhan only seconds earlier, could not help yelling in disbelief. Not understanding how someone in the Earth Immortal Realm had suddenly appeared outside the core region of the continent.


    If not for the fact that he had been told beforehand that no Earth Immortals would appear during this trip to the forefront of the battlefield between the demonic cultivators and the surrounding empires bordering the Frozen Wastnd, he would have never dared to take on the task from his sect to talk with Su Wuhan.


    Even if it was something directly ordered by an elder of his sect, he would have never gone out if there was a chance of him running into someone in the Earth Immortal Realm, as he understood just how low his chance of survival was in case something like that happened.


    At the very least, even if he went against the orders of an elder, he would be able to keep his life given his high cultivation and the fact that he had the backing of an elder from the sect who could at least help chose someone other than him for the task.


    I have to escape!


    Knowing that every second that passed would lower his chances of survival, the demonic cultivator who was the furthest away from the borders of the Star Shattering Sect wasted no time as he took out a teleportation talisman and shattered it. Instantly causing the spatial forces around him to start twisting violently before swallowing him up.


    Although it was of a rather low quality considering that the elder behind him wasn''t willing to waste any of his more precious treasure for escaping, it was still more than strong enough to help him escape from someone in the Earth Immortal Realm as long as it activated-


    "No, you don''t!"


    However, before the demonic cultivator could let out a sigh of relief after he sessfully entered the spatial passage, a terrifying force suddenly seemed to grab hold of the spatial passage and forcefully pull it-


    Rumble-!


    BOOOOOOM-!


    And before the demonic cultivator had the time to understand what was happening, the spatial passage broke under the terrifying force before the terrifying force descended upon him.


    "Half¡­ Half Bloom Stage¡­ Proficient in¡­ Dao of Space!"


    Only able to barely mutter these words to himself as he was crushed by the terrifying force, the demonic cultivator''s eyes were filled with terror as he died without any chance to resist.


    The only sign left behind by what took ce in the spatial passage being a ratherrge crack on the spatial fabrics of the world that were healing at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    After another week or two, it wouldpletely disappear. Leaving behind no trace of the demonic cultivator that had tragically died without any chance to fight back. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    However, the crack caused by Xuan Hao using his power to forcibly grab and rip apart the spatial passage had still allowed the winged lion demon beast and Su Wuhan to see the tragic death of the demonic cultivator.


    Making one swear to never anger his master, while the other began shivering even more.


    Knowing that he was going to face a simr fate very soon.


    "S-senior, I-I actually didn''t want to be a demonic cultivator¡­"


    And with that in mind, he decided to try his best to convince Xuan Hao not to kill.


    Whoosh~!


    "Oh? Really? Did you just happen to identally practice demonic techniques and just happened to show up here to attack my sect against your will?" Appearing directly in front of Su Wuhan, Xuan Hao could not help rolling his eyes as he said this. Not believing a single bit of what Su Wuhan said, as he understood very well that someone didn''t just identally end up reaching the True Demon Realm.


    Maybe if Su Wuhan was only at the First Demonic Transformation Realm, it would have been believable considering he had been at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm before, but reaching the True Demon Realm in a period of a few short years? Only by devouring and ughtering countless people could something like that be aplished.


    To be honest, even Xuan Hao was a bit taken aback by just how fast Su Wuhan''s cultivation had managed to increase. Especially considering that he hadn''t heard or seen anything special or outstanding about him when he had been the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    "This¡­ I-I just happened to find a blood pill that rapidly increased my cultivation realm and¡­ And the reason for attacking you sect is due to orders from stronger demonic cultivators who ced a restriction on me that will kill me if I don''t do so!"


    "Oh? Under orders from someone?" Hearing what Su Wuhan said, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes "Do tell me about it and I might spare you." Not intending to let go of an opportunity to learn more about what the powerful demonic cultivators were nning.


    Whoosh~


    Outside of that he also used his divine sense to confirm that there was indeed some kind of restriction created by someone with at least Dao Seed Realm level strength ced on Su Wuhan.


    "Ehm¡­ This¡­" Feeling the divine sense that seemed to peer through his entire being, Su Wuhan could not help feeling grateful for the restriction that had been left by the powerful Demon Lord, while at the same time hesitating on what to say in response to Xuan Hao''s question.


    Although he did indeed manage to learn a bit about the ns of the stronger demonic cultivators considering he had been someone close at the Third Demonic Transformation Realm before the flood of demonic cultivators took ce, he didn''t have any real information on the ns of those powerful demonic cultivators.


    The only real information he had should already be known among the different major powers. If not, it would have been impossible for a little guy like him to learn about it.


    "Stop hesitating or I will just kill you, out with it."


    "Ye-yes! From what information I managed to gather about the current situation so far, the different Demon Lords of the Frozen Wastnd seems to be working at the behest of the Frozen Wastnd Demon King that awakened recently.


    Not just that, but I also learnt that the other Demon Kings have made simr moves recently. Working in tandem with the Frozen Wastnd Demon King to push the weaker demonic cultivators out and into the kingdoms and empires bordering their territories¡­"


    Finished describing what little he knew about the current situation; Su Wuhan could not help nervously ncing up at Xuan Hao standing directly in front of him. Hoping that the Earth Immortal in front of him hadn''t learnt about the information yet.


    Demon King¡­ An entityparable to a Celestial Immortal¡­ So, the recent surge in demonic cultivators is due to abined effort by different Demon Kings that recently awakened?


    Luckily for Su Wuhan, Xuan Hao had no idea about this as someone not aligned with any of the major powers at the core of the continent. Only aware of the fact that the Demon King Realm symbolized the demonic cultivators equivalent to the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Should I use this guy? Maybe I can have him discreetly gather more information about the situation for me so I can make sure that the Star Shattering Sect is prepared. At the same time, I would also be able to have him warn the sect in case another powerful demonic cultivator appears¡­


    Unfortunately for Su Wuhan, Xuan Hao had no intentions of letting him go and instead began thinking about ways to use him. Not just for information gathering, but also an early warning system against powerful demonic cultivators heading towards the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    "Huh? Wha-what are you-"


    Whoosh-!


    And so, before Su Wuhan had a chance to fight back, Xuan Hao grabbed his head and forcibly destroyed the restriction that had been left inside of him before creating his own by using his recent mastery over the Dao of Formations together with a small wisp of his soul that could erupt with powerparable to the Dao Seed Realm in case Su Wuhan tried something.


    "Hehe, from now on, you will serve as the Star Shattering Sect''s eyes among the demonic cultivators~"


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as he had turned from one person''s puppet to another''s, Su Wuhan could only nkly stare into the distance as he helplessly nodded his head. Not knowing where he had gone wrong in life to end up in his current situation.


    But then again, at least he was still alive¡­

 Chapter 1258 Revisiting the Barrier Between the Star Shattering Sect and the Frozen Wasteland (1)

    Chapter 1258 Revisiting the Barrier Between the Star Shattering Sect and the Frozen Wastnd (1)


    Instructing Su Wuhan to continue his attack on the Star Shattering Sect to avoid drawing the attention of the stronger demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao made sure that he wouldn''t end up harming any disciples or elders of the sect and would only be fighting with the winged lion demon beast every now and then.


    In case some of the disciples or elders of the sect were in a dangerous situation, he also made sure that he would be there to secretly lend them a hand against the demonic cultivators. Ensuring that the disciples and elders would be able to train and grow in their battles against the demonic cultivators without too much risk.


    Although this was only one of the two ces where the Star Shattering Sect was under attack by demonic cultivators, the other border wasn''t attacked by any demonic cultivator above the First Demonic Transformation Realm. Meaning that the Domain Lord Realm elders didn''t even have to do anything, as the Nascent Soul Realm elders of the sect took care of them.


    The main reason for this difference in strength of the demonic cultivators whenpared to the border Xuan Hao currently found himself on, was the fact that the Onyx Empire had a far harder timepared to most other empires when facing the demonic cultivator, both because they had lost arge number of their powerful cultivators to the rabbit demon beast and that the number of powerful demonic cultivators trying to enter their empire was far higher than any of the other empires close to them.


    In the end, it could be said that the Onyx Empire was just unlucky to find itself being the focus of the demonic cultivators in the region without being able to do anything about it other than fight back, while waiting for the nearby Blue Sea Empire to send out their experts to suppress the demonic cultivators.


    Thinking about it, Xuan Hao felt that the Onyx Empire was indeed rather unlucky.


    After all, he had also contributed to the bad situation that the Onyx Empire found itself in, with the demonic cultivators that would normally have entered the Sky Empire being funneled towards the Onyx Empire due to the barrier he had created to prevent weaker demonic cultivators from entering the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    At least, it didn''t seem like the Onyx Empire had found out about the barrier he had created in the Frozen Wastnd, or else he had a feeling that one of their ancestors would rush over to destroy to relieve some of the pressure that their empire was under.


    As for offending the Star Shattering Sect in the process of doing something like that? Xuan Hao highly doubted that they would care considering that the barrier had already caused them to lose over a dozen smaller kingdoms bordering the Frozen Wastnd that might have survived if they had a little more time to respond.


    Hm¡­ Just to be on the safe side, I should check up on the barrier and strengthen it now that my strength has increased, and myprehension of the Dao of Formations broke through to the Small Sess Realm.


    Thinking this to himself as he turned to look in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd where the end of the barrier, he had created back then entered his field of view, Xuan Hao gave the winged lion demon beast a few orders to ensure that it didn''t end up killing their sect''s new demonic cultivator puppet before leaving.


    Whoosh-!


    Taking only a short moment to arrive with his current strength, as the barrier he had created back then appeared in front of him in all its glory.


    Although now that his strength had increased along with hisprehension of the Dao of Formations, it seemed rather clumsy and weak.


    As long as someone had the time to spare, they would essentially be able to slowly weaken the formation itself by forcing it to defend against external attacks. The main issue being that the formation that made up the barrier didn''t have any true core and was solely made up from his own power.


    If someone at the True Demon Realm really did appear and try to destroy this makeshift barrier of his, he had a feeling that it wouldn''t take that much effort to destroy, let alone if a demonic cultivator at the Demon Lord Realm appeared.


    Of course, he already knew this when he had created the barrier between the Frozen Wastnd and the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not to mention, the barrier couldn''t really be considered a formation, as it was just a few swords thrown out with his power imbued into them. Creating a blizzard that was powerful enough to kill anyone below the True Demon Realm and had the ability to defend itself in case of external attacks. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    At the end of the day, he hadn''t intended for it tost more than a few years before he nned to revisit it and think of another solution to the demonic cultivator problem¡­ And that time seemed to be now, as he discovered almost immediately after arriving at the barrier, that it was already on the brink of copse from having to deal with an increased number of demonic cultivators trying to force their way through it.


    More importantly than that, he could also sense that there were a few demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm slowly working away at weakening the swords that made up the barrier itself.


    Though none of them dared to approach the swords in question, their continued effort did have result, as it would at most take them another half year to fully break the barrier and allow the demonic cultivators to start flooding into the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if Xuan Hao would ultimately be alerted by the barrier breaking and he was more than strong enough to deal with these few True Demon Realm demonic cultivators, it would still end up causing quite a bit of damage to the Star Shattering Sect¡­

 Chapter 1259 Revisiting the Barrier Between the Star Shattering Sect and the Frozen Wasteland (2)

    Chapter 1259 Revisiting the Barrier Between the Star Shattering Sect and the Frozen Wastnd (2)


    Not intending to just watch as these demonic cultivators worked away at the barrier keeping the Star Shattering safe from the constant flood of demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao took a step forward and appeared directly above the central part of the barrier where two of the stronger True Demon Realm experts were slowly trying to weaken one of the swords that made up the barrier by constantly attacking it from a safe distance.


    "This barrier should at most be able tost for another half year before it breaks."


    "Indeed, though I do feel a bit worried about angering the person who created this barrier."


    "No need, the great Demon Lord who gave us this task already said that none of the Earth Immortals from the central region would be leaving for the next year. Even if the person who created this barrier wants toe after we destroy it, we should have more than enough time to safely retreat.


    Not to mention, if we didn''t take on this task, we would be sent to one of the frontlines and have to face the inevitable retaliation from the nearby Blue Sea Empire in a year." N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "True¡­ At least we are allowed to retreat after we finish destroying this barrier. Far better than those people forced to the frontline¡­"


    Unaware of the fact that Xuan Hao had arrived above the giant sword that they were in the process of slowly destroying, the two True Demon Realm demonic cultivators casually chatted with each other without any worry on their faces.


    Although the giant sword gave off a terrifying aura far beyond that of the Soul Ascension Realm, they had already grown used to it and understood that the sword didn''t have any ability to harm them as long as they kept a certain distance from it.


    Hm¡­ Seems like these demonic cultivators aren''t trying to destroy the barrier just because they want to, but because of the instructions of a Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator¡­


    Narrowing both his eyes as he listened to their conversation, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself as he wondered why the Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator didn''t just outright destroy the barrier and instead instructed these weaker True Demon Realm demonic cultivator to do so.


    After all, with the strength of a Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator beingparable to someone at the Dao Seed Realm, it wouldn''t take them more than a few hours to break the barrier and allow the weaker demonic cultivators to cross over and attack what was now the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    In the end, the only reason he could think of was that the Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator didn''t dare to do so out of fear that it would provoke the creator of the barrier. Instead deciding to use these weaker True Demon Realm demonic cultivators to first test the waters.


    So¡­ If I kill these demonic cultivators, the Demon Lord behind them will likely find out¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he nced over the two True Demon Realm demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao didn''t immediately kill them and instead began to use his divine sense to search the surroundings for any traces of the Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator that should be observing the situation from afar.


    Ah! There you are!


    Not taking too long to spot an old man deep in meditation on top of a small mountain a short distance away from the barrier where the True Demon Realm demonic cultivators were working hard to weaken it.


    Although nothing stood out about him and even Xuan Hao couldn''t sense the old man''s cultivation base, the fact that he couldn''t sense the old man''s cultivation base was more than enough to confirm his identity, as there would be no way an ordinary old man would be silently meditating on a mountain in the Frozen Wastnds.


    The other thing that gave it away was the fact that this old man was far toorge. Standing more than three meters tall with massive muscles that made him look a bitical.


    "Hm? Someone is watching me!" Of course, as Xuan Hao''s divine sense swept over him, the old man also opened his eyes with a look of surprise. Not expecting someone to find him when he had done so well in restraining his own aura. "It should be the Earth Immortal who noticed something happening to his formation!"


    Whoosh~!


    Not having to guess the identity behind the divine sense, the old man jumped into the air and began to search the surroundings before spotting Xuan Hao who had already taken the initiative to show himself.


    "You should be the one who created this formation! Don''t you know that creating such things inside the Frozen Wastnd is against the agreement between us demonic cultivators and your central powers!?"


    Nope, no idea¡­


    "Hmph! You should know that such a vition means that you no longer-"


    "I''m not from one of the central powers. Not to mention, aren''t you demonic cultivators already invading every empire and kingdom surrounding the Frozen Wastnd? Do you expect me to care about a non-aggression pact that I''m not even a part of in this kind of situation?" Seeing that the old demonic cultivator seemed intent on continuing to talk, Xuan Hao decided to interrupt him before things got out of control.


    "It''s good that you- Huh? Not from one of the central powers¡­?" Finding himself stun locked by this, the old demonic cultivator seemed to freeze on the spot. Not knowing how to answer.


    Indeed, like Xuan Hao had said, they had indeed vited the non-aggression pact by attacking the surrounding empires and kingdoms¡­ And if he truly wasn''t a part of the central powers, he had no reason to even follow the non-aggression agreement in the first ce¡­


    Swish-!


    Taking advantage of the demonic cultivator who was still in a state of confusion, Xuan Hao decided to make the first move by using his recently acquired sword soul to attack inbination with his Dao of the Sword.

 Chapter 1260 Revisiting the Barrier Between the Star Shattering Sect and the Frozen Wasteland (3)

    Chapter 1260 Revisiting the Barrier Between the Star Shattering Sect and the Frozen Wastnd (3)


    As the sword attack left the silver sword and swept towards him, the old demonic cultivator instantly recovered from his confused state, as his body morphed into a more than ten-meter-tall demonic figure that boldly stepped forward to fight against the sword attack-


    Roar-!


    BOOM!


    And along with an almost bestial roar, the sword light and demonic cultivator collided in the air above the small mountain. Instantly causing a terrifying shockwave to spread out from the source of the impact. Leveling the mountain below, while at the same time alerting the nearby True Demon Realm demonic cultivators to what was happening behind them.


    Whoosh-!


    Bang!


    As for the demonic cultivator who had boldly stepped forward to block the attack, he was sent flying into the ground where the small mountain had once stood. Creating a crater almost twice the size in the process.


    "This¡­ You''re a Half Bloom Stage Earth Immortal!?" Shrugging off the nearby rubble and loose stones that had buried his body, the old demonic cultivator could not help narrowing both his eyes dangerously as he said this while looking up towards Xuan Hao floating in the air like nothing had happened, a hint of fear barely visible in the depth of his eyes.


    After all, the difference between someone in the Half Bloom Stage of the Earth Immortal Realm and someone in the earlier stages of the Earth Immortal Realm was massive¡­ And he himself was only someoneparable to someone in the earlier stages of the Earth Immortal Realm. Having only recently managed to break through to be a Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    In a sense, the reason why he had taken the initiative to try and destroy the barrier that blocked off the weaker demonic cultivators from entering the territory of the Star Shattering Sect was because he wanted to earn some merits and be seen as useful for the overall n of the Grand Demon King.


    However, having encountered a terrifying Earth Immortal Realm cultivator like Xuan Hao who was only a single step below the Celestial Immortal Realm and could only be faced by the strongest Demon Lords, he didn''t even wait for him to answer as a pair of wings sprouted on his back before he jumped out of the crater and rushed deeper into the Frozen Wastnd.


    Given his many years as a demonic cultivator living life on the edge of death every day until finally reaching the Demon Lord Realm, he understood very well that a cowardly escape was far better than dying.


    "The strength is decent and definitely allows me to possess the strength to fight someone in the Middel Stage of the Dao Seed Realm."


    Having had the opportunity to test off the strength of his sword soul while it was imbued into his sword, Xuan Hao was more than satisfied with its strength, as he looked in the direction of the old demonic cultivator who had already started to disappear from his field of view.


    "He sure ran fast¡­ Though, he doesn''t expect it to be that easy to run away. Does he?" Chuckling to himself as he said this, Xuan Hao took a step forward as the space in front of him briefly twisted before he seemed to teleport almost half the distance that the old demonic cultivator had traveled in a single step. Showing just how terrifying the Dao of Space was when it came to chasing someone and also demonstrating why it was impossible to catch someone proficient in the Dao of Space without certain special precautions or overwhelming strength¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Like this, Xuan Hao arrived in front of the escaping demonic cultivator in only a few steps-


    Swish-!


    Wasting no time as his sword swung down towards him with the same power as before. Only now seeming a bit more refined, as Xuan Hao had never fought with anyone since his sword intent had broken through to the Sword Soul Realm, thus resulting in him taking the opportunity to refine his sword soul and Dao of the Sword in battle.


    The reason for this was also because he had managed to see just how much Chu Yang''sprehension of the Dao of the Spear had managed to improve through battle over the past few months. Making him want to try and see if he could also emte this through using the sword in battle against a decently strong opponent like the demonic cultivator in front of him.


    "Wha- Dao of Space!?"


    BAAAAANG-!


    Taken aback by Xuan Hao appearing in front of him all of a sudden, the demonic cultivator could only yell out in surprise as he was forced to defend himself against the sword attack. Once again, forcing him into the frozen tundra below.


    Whoosh-!


    Emerging a short timeter, the old demonic cultivator wasn''t the slightest bit happy, as his face seemed to be filled with regret after realizing that Xuan Hao hadprehended the Dao of Space. Knowing that his chances of surviving in the face of such a person were low.


    Rooooaar-!


    However, this didn''t mean that he intended to just give up on fighting. Instead, he intended to go all out and try to draw the attention of the more powerful demonic cultivators who he knew would be monitoring the situation of the Frozen Wastnds borders.


    If he could draw the attention of one of those powerful demonic cultivators. Although killing the cultivator in front of him wasn''t that high, he would at least be able to safely escape from his current situation!


    Boom-boom-boom!


    With this in mind, the old demonic cultivator and Xuan Hao soon began shing in the air above the Frozen Wastnd.


    The devasting power of the shes killing any unfortunate demon beast or demonic cultivator that happened to pass by nearby, as Xuan Hao''s sword became more and more refined with each attack. Taking full advantage of the opportunity given to him by the demonic cultivator to refine his sword through battle instead of trying to kill the demonic cultivator.


    After all, killing the demonic cultivator didn''t have that much use when it came to increasing his own strength.

 Chapter 1261 Arrival of a Second Demonic Cultivator

    Chapter 1261 Arrival of a Second Demonic Cultivator


    Fully set on using the demonic cultivator for as long as possible to refine his sword soul andprehend the Dao of the Sword throughbat, Xuan Hao didn''t use anything other than his sword to fight. Giving the demonic cultivator the opportunity to fight back to some extent.


    Although the difference in strength between both of them was still quite obvious and the demonic cultivator wouldn''t be able to hold on forever, it at least gave the demonic cultivator enough hope to continue fighting back with all of strength.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    In the end, the battle dragged on for the next two hours, as Xuan Hao and the old demonic cultivator continued shing with each other without a clear winner in sight.


    The main reason behind it being that the terrifying physical body of a demonic cultivator was far more resilientpared to a normal cultivator. Allowing the old demonic cultivator to continue fighting with his full strength even though his entire body had been covered inrge wounds that would long since have killed and ordinary cultivator at the Dao Seed Realm.


    This should be far enough¡­ Now I just have to wait for that senior to show up.


    At the same time, unknown to Xuan Hao who was focused on refining his sword soul, the old demonic cultivator had slowly dragged their battle in the direction of a ce that he knew would be sensed by one of the more powerful demonic cultivators guarding the outer regions of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Rumble~!


    And almost in response to the thoughts of the old demonic cultivator, a loud rumbling sound echoed out from afar only a short timeter, as a terrifying divine sense far stronger than his own descended upon the ce where he and Xuan Hao were fighting with each other.


    Making even Xuan Hao, who was fully focused on refining his sword soul look up with a hint of surprise on his face. Clearly not having expected such a strong demonic cultivator to appear only a few hours into his fight with the old demonic cultivator.


    Not just because of the fact that demonic cultivators at that level of strength shouldn''t be easy toe by, but also because they were still in the outer parts of the Frozen Wastnd where such powerful demonic cultivators normally wouldn''t be around.


    Even encountering the old demonic cultivator at the Demon Lord Realm was surprising. Not to mention another even stronger demonic cultivator around the same location.


    I guess it''s because of the recent ns of these demonic cultivators that more of them are around the outskirts of the Frozen Wastnd now¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he locked on to the demonic cultivator rushing towards the ce where he and the old demonic cultivator were fighting, Xuan Hao decided to not drag out his fight with the old demonic cultivator any longer now that a much better whetstone had presented itself-


    Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!


    And without showing any mercy, he directly used the Dao of the Sword inbination with the Dao of Illusions and the Dao of Space to instantly send out hundreds of powerful sword attacks that appeared all around the old demonic cultivator in a split second.


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Not even giving the old demonic cultivator any time to react, as he was forced to defend against the hundreds of swords that descended the next second. Unable to tell which of them were real and which of them were just illusions created by Xuan Hao to deliberately confuse him and make him waste his strength attacking nothing but air-


    Ptsh-! Ptsh-! Ptsh-!


    However, this did notst for long, as the first few sword attacks soon broke through his defense and pierced into his body before the sword intentying dormant inside of them exploded and began destroying his body from the inside, something Xuan Hao had deliberately not done during their past exchange, as it would undoubtedly have killed him by now given their difference in strength.


    Unfortunately for the old demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao no longer needed to use him as a whetstone to improve his Dao of the Sword and sword soul any longer. Meaning that Xuan Hao had no intention of going easy on him.


    "Wha- How?"


    In the end, the old demonic cultivator could only let out a few confused words as he looked towards Xuan Hao filled with disbelief. Not understanding why his opponent had held back against him for so long and only killed him when his savior was about to show up.


    Is it perhaps because he has some sort of grudge against demonic cultivators and decided to deliberately give me hope before shattering it at thest moment?


    As he thought about this while the sword intent tore through his body from the inside arrived at his dantian, the demonic cultivator closed his eyes painfully as the sword intent finally reached his soul and tore it apart. Killing him just as the stronger demonic cultivator appeared at the horizon. Giving the old demonic cultivator onest glimpse of his would-be savior before he departed from the world of the living.


    In the darkness that had descended upon the Frozen Wastnd over the past two hours, a figure cloaked in an eerie robe that seemed to have been woven from human skin, flew silently towards them at a neither fast nor slow pace. Obviously not caring the slightest bit about the death of the old demonic cultivator.


    "Hm? A demonic cultivatorparable to the Middel Stage of the Dao Seed Realm¡­" Seeing this demonic figure at the same time as the old demonic cultivator who had just passed away, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as a slight smile made its way to his lips. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Indeed, this demonic cultivator was a far better whetstonepared to the one that he had just killed. Especially considering that he would not just be able to use his Dao of the Sword and sword soul but would be able to use his full strength without having to worry about identally killing the other party.

 Chapter 1262 Spirit Devouring Wanderer, Xuan Gui

    Chapter 1262 Spirit Devouring Wanderer, Xuan Gui


    Hm? This person isn''t one of the Blue Sea Empire''s Eight Immortals nor one of their four Sea Generals¡­ Is it perhaps someone who was nurtured in secret by them or someone from another empire?


    At the same time Xuan Hao was observing him, the demonic cultivator slowly approaching was also observing him while trying his best to guess his identity to no avail. Only able to guess that he should be from one of therger powers he wasn''t familiar with or someone who had been secretly nurtured by the Blue Sea Empire.


    After all, someone who had strength at the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm wasn''t an unknown figure and would normally be widely known. Only in case of being from one of the far-off major powers not bordering the Frozen Wastnd or a secretly nurtured genius would it make sense to be unknown, but¡­ Such situations were extremely rare.


    I guess those major powers are hiding far more than they let on¡­


    In the end, the demonic cultivator could only shake her head in awe of the hidden strength concealed by the different major powers as she came to a stop a few hundred meters away from where Xuan Hao was standing with the interspatial ring of the now dead old demonic cultivator.


    "Might I ask who this is? I don''t seem to be familiar with this fellow cultivator¡­ Ah! You just call me Xuan Gui, though I''m better known as the spirit devouring wanderer outside the Frozen wastnd." Not carrying the slightest hint of ill intentions, the demonic cultivator happily introduced herself.


    However, after hearing the name, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine. Not so much due to fear, but more so because the name, spirit devouring wanderer, was quite well-known across the Blue Sea Empire. Even reaching the point where he happened upon it quite a few times during his time in the Blue Sea Empire, both through story telling of cultivators he happened to overhear or a few historical records he had read through to pass time.


    From what he knew, the spirit devouring wanderer had once been a well-known wandering cultivator at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm before she had be a demonic cultivator.


    However, this all changed when a young master from the Blue Sea Empire''s imperial family took a fancy to her and wanted to take her in as a concubine, something that a wandering at the Domain Lord Realm without any backing had no way to refuse. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    In the end, she was dragged all the way to the imperial capital of the Blue Sea Empire against her will¡­ And it was during this time in the imperial capital, in the days leading up to her marriage, that she had chanced upon a demonic technique.


    With no other way out of her current situation and unwilling to be someone''s concubine, she practiced the demonic technique and secretly became a demonic cultivator while hiding this fact from everyone around her and the powerful cultivators present in the imperial capital¡­ And pretending she agreed to the marriage, she managed to change the location for the marriage to somewhere outside the imperial capital, where she ambushed her to be husband at the Earth Immortal Realm and managed to devour his spirit and breakthrough to the Demon Lord Realm in a single step.


    Not just stopping at that, she soon went on a rampage and ughtered countless Soul Ascension Realm Experts and three Earth Immortal Realm cultivators. Devouring all of their essence and using it to further increase her own strength to a level close to the Peak of the Demon Lord Realm.


    Instantly going from a Peak Domain Lord Realm Expert without any real influence or power, to a feared demonic cultivator who stood at the pinnacle of the continent. Only below those Celestial Immortals and Demon King powerhouses who rarely showed themselves.


    Hm¡­ If I don''t remember wrongly, the information about what happened back then also did include the emergence of a Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire after she broke through to the Demon Lord Realm and killed three more Earth Immortals. Although, information of what happened after that is lost or deliberately hidden¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he looked towards Xuan Gui who was floating in the air in front of him without any hostility, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of admiration towards her.


    Not just because of the reason she had ended up bing a demonic cultivator, but also because he hadn''t heard about her ughtering wantonly like most other demonic cultivators who had reached a simr realm to her.


    "A pleasure to meet you, I''m Xuan Hao, an elder from the Star Shattering Sect. Not rted to the Blue Sea Empire."


    And because of this respect he felt towards her, Xuan Hao decided to introduce himself instead of just attacking her like he had first nned to do. Making sure to state that he was in no way rted to the Blue Sea Empire, as he had a feeling that it wouldn''t be a good idea to do so.


    "Xuan Hao? Star Shattering Sect? Never heard of you or your sect before, but I guess it has been quite some time since Ist left the Frozen Wastnds¡­" Nodding her head with a slight smile on her face as she said this, Xuan Gui took a few steps back as she got into abat position. "Well, you should haveprehended the Dao of Space from what I''ve seen so far and the fact that you aren''t leaving even though you have the ability to do so without me being able to do anything about it should be because you are looking for a fight. No?"


    "Indeed, I just happened to have had a few improvements in my strengthtely and wanted to find someone to test it on." Smiling a bit as he said this while looking towards Xuan Gui, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any more words as he attacked the next second. Not holding back like he had done against the weaker old demonic cultivator.


    BOOOOM-!


    Soon causing the ground beneath the two of them to get blown apart as they collided with each other midair for the first time.

 Chapter 1263 New Friend~

    Chapter 1263 New Friend~


    Following the first exchange, the two continued to sh with each other above the barren frozen wastnd, Xuan Hao taking the opportunity to test his strength, while Xuan Gui skillfully responded to each of his attacks. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Through this, it became obvious to Xuan Hao that even though his strength wasparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm like Xuan Gui, he was still inexperienced when it came to fighting someone at that level. Resulting in him falling into a rather disadvantages state after some time.


    Although not to the degree where he was losing, it was still enough for Xuan Gui to take the lead in the battle.


    Then again, this wouldn''tst for long, as his experience and understanding of his own strength continued to grow as the battle dragged on. Not to mention, if he really ended up being pushed into a corner, he could always use the Dao of Space to escape or use the true spatial copse to either kill or severely injure her.


    For now, he was more than satisfied with the current state of things, as it was useful for him in understanding his own strength and how to properly use it. Especially considering the fact that Xuan Gui didn''t seem to have any hostile intentions towards him during their exchange so far.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    In the end, the battle between the two continued well into the next day, as Xuan Hao finally reached a state where he could fully utilize his strength. Allowing him to regain the upper hand in the battle, while at the same time forcing Xuan Gui into using everything at her disposal to fight back against him.


    Showing him that she had indeed been holding back against him when they had first shed with each other.


    The reason why she had decided to do so was still a mystery, but Xuan Hao had a feeling that it should be for a simr reason as to why he didn''t use any of his stronger killing moves when he had been suppressed by her, she also wanted to take the opportunity to refine her own strength throughbat¡­ And meeting someone simr to her, who didn''t show any killing intent towards her even though she was a demonic cultivator, she should have been more than happy to go along with the flow of things and take the opportunity to refine her strength.


    Of course, this was just his thoughts on the situation, and he couldn''t be certain if this was really the case, or she had some other reason for not actively trying to kill him during their fight.


    Even then, Xuan Hao still decided to go along with his thoughts on the current situation and restrained his own strength a bit while fighting with her to both continue refining his own strength, while also giving her a chance to refine her strength as well.


    After all, though she was a demonic cultivator, she could be considered a peaceful person contrary to what her rather menacing title might indicate. Especially when the reason for this title was the massacre, she caused back in the Blue Sea Empire and had nothing to do with her actions after she escaped to the Frozen Wastnds.


    Well¡­ That wasn''t entirely true, as she had visited the Blue Sea Empire every now and then over the years to attack the imperial family of the Blue Sea Empire. Never involving any outsiders in her obvious grudge against the imperial family of the Blue Sea Empire¡­


    "Enough! I don''t think there is any reason for us to continue this battle any longer. Not to mention, it might draw the attention of a Demon King or Celestial Immortal if our battle continues to expand in scale." As their battle dragged on for another day with no winner in sight, Xuan Gui suddenly came to a stop as she loudly dered the end of the battle.


    "Understandable, wouldn''t want to draw the attention of someone like that." Nodding his head in response as he also came to a stop, Xuan Hao could not help curiously turning to look at Xuan Gui who looked like she was about to leave. "Although, I''m quite curious as to why you decided to fight me. After all, it''s clear that you don''t have any intention of killing me."


    "Hm¡­ I don''t have any specific reason, but if I had to mention one, it would be the fact that you are not from the Blue Sea Empire. Given my past history with them, I know that they won''t tolerate a new power like the Star Shattering Sect you are from to emerge within their territory.


    So, with that in mind, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Even if you want to avoid fighting with the Blue Sea Empire, they will still try to destroy your sect the moment it grows too strong. Especially considering that you are already close to the Celestial Immortal Realm." Thinking about what to say for a short moment before saying this, Xuan Gui smiled happily at him. Possibly already seeing how he and his sect would sh with the Blue Sea Empire in the future and cause damage to them.


    "This¡­ I guess we can be considered friends¡­"


    "Hehe~ Indeed! We are friends in the future when fighting the Blue Sea Empire!"


    Not knowing what to say after seeing herplete change in attitude when talking about attacking the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao could only smile wryly to himself.


    Although she didn''t hide her attempt to try and turn him into an enemy of the Blue Sea Empire, she wasn''t wrong that his sect would inevitably fall out with the Blue Sea Empire.


    However, the reason was a bit different from what she said, as the Star Shattering Sect could already be considered enemies with the Blue Sea Empire due to the fact that Pei Yang had been absorbed into the sect.


    No need for the sect to growrge enough to pose a threat to the Blue Sea Empire before it decided to attack them, just the existence of Pei Yang being part of the sect getting revealed would be enough to draw the ire of the Blue Sea Empire¡­


    "Now that I think about it¡­ You should be the current person in charge of this part of Frozen Wastnd. Right?"


    "Hm? Yes, I am the person who was put in charge of ensuring the stability of this region."


    "And we can be considered friends in our struggle against the Blue Sea Empire¡­"


    "Y-yes¡­?" Not knowing where Xuan Hao was going with his line of questioning, Xuan Gui, who was about to leave, couldn''t help tilting her head in confusion as she looked at him.


    "Great, then it wouldn''t be difficult for you to make sure that no demonic cultivators at theter stages of the True Demon Realm or above gets anywhere near the territory of my sect. Ah! You shouldn''t stop the weaker ones from going, as its still useful for the training of the younger members of my sect."


    "Huh? You¡­"


    "Ohhh¡­ I see that you are more than happy with this idea. After all, with my sect growing stronger and not having to deal with any problems from the side of the Frozen Wastnd, it would surely be a big headache for the Blue Sea Empire in the future."


    "That¡­ Indeed is true, but it would be difficult for me to interfere with the ns of-"


    "So, you can do it! That''s great! Don''t worry too much, the territory of my Star Shattering Sect is minisculepared to the Frozen Wastnd. Even if no strong demonic cultivators are ced there, it shouldn''t interfere with therger ns of the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnd."


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as Xuan Hao continued talking, Xuan Gui could not help feeling convinced by what he said. After all, therger ns wouldn''t be affected by a small sect like the Star Shattering Sect and their territory not being overwhelmed.


    Even more so when she thought about how the recent invasion by the weaker demonic cultivators below the True Demon Realm wasn''t really a true invasion, but just the first step in arge n against the core powers in the central part of the continent.


    "Fine¡­ I will do it! Take thismunication talisman and I will contact you in case someone I can''t stop shows up." Shaking her head in defeat as she said this, Xuan Gui threw out amunication talisman to Xuan Hao before turning around to leave.


    "Hehe~ Great! See you in the future, Xuan Gui." Putting away themunication talisman, Xuan Hao smiled happily as he simrly turned around and took his leave.


    Not only did he manage to refine his strength and get a clear understanding of how strong he was, but he also managed to gain a rather powerful friend that helped prevent any too strong demonic cultivators from attacking the Star Shattering Sect during the current assault by the demonic cultivators on any territory surrounding their territory.

 Chapter 1264 Expanding the Intelligence Network of the Star Shattering Sect

    Chapter 1264 Expanding the Intelligence Network of the Star Shattering Sect


    Heading back to the Star Shattering Sect after he had managed to secure a new friend for the Star Shattering Sect, while at the same time resolving the problem of having to worry about powerful demonic cultivators invading the territory of the Star Shattering Sect in the near future, Xuan Hao began pondering about whether to change the task he had assigned Su Wuhan to.


    However, after thinking things through and realizing that the sect still needed a warning system against those weaker demonic cultivators he decided against it.


    Not to mention, with Su Wuhan around to give off the image of the Star Shattering Sect already being attacked by someone in the True Demon Realm, it would make it less likely for more demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm to show up and cause trouble.


    The only real problem he still had to solve regarding Su Wuhan, was the fact that he would most likely end up being killed when the experts from the Blue Sea Empire showed up. So, before that, he either had to find a way to hide him while the experts from the Blue Sea Empire flew by or just give up on him and have the experts from the Blue Sea Empire kill him.


    Although this would be considered a loss for the sect, as someone in the True Demon Realm under their control was still someone incredibly useful, it couldn''t be considered anything that would affect the sect, as Su Wuhan had ultimately just be part of the sect intelligencework a few days earlier and had yet to be introduced to Elder Dust Fairy who was in charge of the sect''s intelligence gathering and management.


    Guess I will cross that hill when the timees. If it inconvenient to keep him, I will just let the Blue Sea Empire deal with him¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao didn''t bother thinking about Su Wuhan''s fate any longer, as he arrived back at the Star Shattering Sect''s borders. Not wasting any time as he checked up on both Su Wuhan and the winged lion demon beast before he made his way back to the sect.


    After his battle with Xuan Gui, he had increased hisprehension of the Dao of the Sword by quite a bit and intended to spend the next few weeks consolidating his gains from the battle.


    Whoosh~


    As Xuan Hao was making his way back to the sect, Su Wuhan happened to catch a glimpse of him before he disappeared, causing a flurry ofplicated emotions to appear on his face, who had now essentially be a tool for the Star Shattering Sect to watch out for any iing powerful demonic cultivators.


    Although he wanted toin about his current situation, there wasn''t much he could say when he remembered his situation beforehand, where he had been a puppet for the powerful demonic cultivators in continuing their attacks against the powers surrounding the Frozen Wastnd until the experts from the Blue Sea Empire appeared to kill him. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Not just that, but his only choice to escape from such a sad fate was to join an unknown demonic sect that seemed to have been secretly guiding him into bing a demonic cultivator before he became the king of the Azure Sky Kingdom.


    All things considered, he doubted his fate would be much better following such a demonic sect, as they had most likely nurtured him and helped his cultivation because some powerful demonic cultivator''s lifespan was about to reach and end and he or she needed a new body or something along that line.


    Looking at things positively, at least the Star Shattering Sect wasn''t a demonic sect, and he wouldn''t have to worry about someone trying to possess his body. On the negative side of things, the Star Shattering Sect wasn''t a demonic sect, making it close to impossible for a demonic cultivator like himself to join.


    In the end, he could only silently pray that the Star Shattering Sect wouldn''t just throw him to the experts from the Blue Sea Empire when they appeared to clean up the situation in a year.


    Unfortunately for him, he had no idea that Xuan Hao hadn''t thought about this and had instead just kicked the issue down the line. Not intending to waste any time trying to figure out how to hide a demonic cultivator from the Blue Sea Empire. Especially so considering that he would also need to make sure that Pei Yang was properly hidden when those experts from the Blue Sea Empire appeared.


    After all, if they found out that Pei Yang was part of the Star Shattering Sect now that the sect was still far from strong enough to face the Blue Sea Empire, there wouldn''t be any way for them to endure the attack from one of the Blue Sea Empire''s Celestial Immortal Realm ancestors.


    ¡­


    Returning to the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao decided to first pay Elder Dust Fairy a visit and inform her about the situation with Su Wuhan before handing her a seal that would allow her to control the restriction that he had left behind inside Su Wuhan. Essentially handing him over for her to deal with if she wanted to change anything regarding the situation he had arranged.


    "Handing me¡­ A True Demon Realm demonic cultivator!?"


    Of course, learning about the situation and the fact that she was now in control of someone in the True Demon Realm, a beingparable to a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator, Elder Dust Fairy could not help trembling in fear as she looked at the small seal engraved into a simple jade that directly allowed her to connect and control the restriction Xuan Hao had left behind in Su Wuhan.


    "Yes, I''m sure you will make great use of him to grow the intelligence gathering capabilities of our sect in the territory of the demonic cultivators." Not exining the situation any further, Xuan Hao essentially gave her a thumbs up in encouragement before leaving.


    "¡­"


    Leaving Elder Dust Fairy in a ratherplicated emotional state as she stared at the small jade in her hand. Not knowing how to even begin building up an intelligencework in the territory of the demonic cultivators that Xuan Hao had casually mentioned to her before leaving.


    No! He entrusted a True Demon Realm demonic cultivator to me for this! I''m sure I will be able to expand our intelligencework into the Frozen Wastnd where the demonic cultivators reside. All I have to do is make good use of this demonic cultivator given to me!


    Filled with determination as she thought this to herself, Elder Dust Fairy arranged for someone to watch over the management of the servant quarters and her other duties in the sect before she headed off in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect''s border with the Onyx Empire where the True Demon Realm demonic cultivator now under her control was located.


    Even if Xuan Hao hadn''t meant ittterly when he told her to build up the sect''s intelligence gathering capabilities in the territory of the demonic cultivators and instead simply meant to keep an eye on Su Wuhan and ensure he kept them informed in case anything big happened, Elder Dust Fairy had be determined to do just that.


    No¡­ Not just that, she wanted to truly expand the intelligence gathering capabilities of the Star Shattering Sect with the help of Su Wuhan, as she would now have the ability to also make use of him to use the demonic cultivators that would never be linked back to the Star Shattering Sect as long as Su Wuhan being under the sect''s control didn''te to light.


    Feeling increasingly inspired on her way to the border where Su Wuhan was located, Elder Dust Fairy even began using her influence in the sect to begin tracking down potential demonic cultivators hiding inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect who might be of use considering their abilities to sneak past the Domain Lord Realm cultivators guarding the borders of the sect.


    Of course, she didn''t intend for these demonic cultivators to stay in the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and instead intended to send them into the neighboring territories to gather information for the sect.


    In the end, the chaos caused be Elder Dust Fairy''s preparations caused quite a stir among the elders of the sect, as none of them had any clue what she was up to and at the same time knew that it should be something important.


    Unfortunately, none of the elders would ever find out about what she was up to outside of Elder Song and a few other important members of the sect, as the matter of getting involved with demonic cultivators wasn''t really something that was seen positively by most people on the continent.


    The only real reason why Elder Song and the rest epted it, was because they knew about the restriction Xuan Hao had ced on Su Wuhan and the fact that they were confident that Elder Dust Fairy wouldn''t make any mistakes in this matter.

 Chapter 1265 Fall of the Onyx Empire

    Chapter 1265 Fall of the Onyx Empire


    After Su Wuhan had been handed over the Elder Dust Fairy for her to handle, Xuan Hao didn''t think about him any longer as he returned to his cultivation room while pondering over how to hide Pei Yang from the cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire who would undoubtedly show up in another year.


    Although he could keep him hidden inside the Star Shattering Sect like he had done so far, he couldn''t guarantee that some of the disciple or elders outside the sect didn''t mention him in a ce where a few of the people from the Blue Sea Empire happened to be present. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Trying to limit the disciples and elders of the sect wasn''t really an option either, as they weren''t the only ones who knew about Pei Yang''s existence.


    The number of people who had learnt about Pei Yang''s existence during his lecture once a month, pretty much made it impossible to hide his existence in case someone from the Blue Sea Empire did look into the Star Shattering Sect.


    "At least the people from the Blue Sea Empire are noting because of the Star Shattering Sect, but instead to deal with the demonic cultivators. If we just keep a low profile during that time and don''t draw any attention, we should be fine¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about the situation, Xuan Hao could only hope that the people from the Blue Sea Empire wouldn''t end up bing interested in the Star Shattering Sect during their short visit to their territory.


    Considering that the situation with the demonic cultivators in the rest of the smaller empires that fell under the Blue Sea Empire, they might be lucky and have the experts from the Blue Sea Empire ignore the Star Shattering Sect and its territory in its entirety.


    After all, it is handling the situation well and hasn''t really taken any damage from the continuous stream of demonic cultivators. If anything, it had managed to take advantage of the situation to grow stronger.


    A stark difference whenpared to the situation of an empire like the Onyx Empire that had already lost a territoryrger than that of the Star Shattering Sect to the demonic cultivators.


    If anything, the Blue Sea Empire would properly feel happy that they wouldn''t have to send any of their stronger experts out to a remote ce like the Star Shattering Sect.


    Whoosh~


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao closed eyes as he began cultivating. Knowing that there wasn''t much he could do to try and prevent the stronger cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire possibly looking into the Star Shattering Sect and finding out about Pei Yang''s existence.


    On the other hand, trying to prevent the Blue Sea Empire from noticing something might end up backfiring. Drawing more attention to the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    Following Xuan Hao''s return to the sect, not much changed outside the movements caused by Elder Dust Fairy as she used the sect''s resources to start the process of expanding the sect''s intelligencework into the territory of the demonic cultivators. Even nning to use them in ces outside the Star Shattering Sect that she had failed to expand into so far.


    The most notable among these potential candidates for expansion was the Onyx Empire. Not just because it was directly bordering the Star Shattering Sect''s territory, but also because therge number of demonic cultivators causing chaos in their territory would make it easier to sneak inside and help building up an informationwork inside the Onyx Empire.


    Of course, she wasn''t expecting these demonic cultivators to survive when the people from the Blue Sea Empire arrived to clean up the ce in another year, but she at least wanted to have them create a stable base for the people under her to take over and establish a permanent presence inside the Onyx Empire.


    At the same time, she also began working together with Elder Song trying to figure out a way for her new True Demon Realm subordinate to survive when the people from the Blue Sea Empire appeared.


    After all, even though Xuan Hao didn''t care about Su Wuhan so to speak, she very much wanted him to stay alive, as he would be indispensable for the expansion of her informationwork.


    In the end, after three months trying to figure out a solution while the first few secret outposts of demonic cultivators began to pop up inside the Onyx Empire, Elder Dust Fairy finally came up with a solution.


    Have Su Wuhan pretend to die at the hands of the winged lion demon beast a short time before the people from the Blue Sea Empire show up and secretly slip away before hiding inside a secret realm.


    Although this method wasn''t perfect as it would be impossible for Su Wuhan to fake his death if anyone of simr strength was present and he would inevitably end up leaving traces behind while leaving, Elder Dust Fairy felt confident that the people from the Blue Sea Empire wouldn''t think twice after hearing about Su Wuhan''s death. At most doing a simple check to validate the information by asking around at the ce where Su Wuhan would have died to the winged lion demon beast.


    The reason for this confidence was the fact that the situation in the Onyx Empire had deteriorated greatly over the past three months, as more powerful demonic cultivators appeared. Even a terrifying demon in the Demon Lord Realm had shown up for a brief moment and ended up killing one of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators from the Onyx Empire before being before disappearing in the direction of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Though she had no idea what this powerful demonic cultivator was up to, she at least knew that this was a good thing for the Star Shattering Sect and her n, as the attention of the Blue Sea Empire along this part of the border with the Frozen Wastnd would be fully focused on the Onyx Empire that was starting to show signs of copsing¡­


    Indeed¡­ As Elder Dust Fairy had guessed, the situation in the Onyx Empire grew worse over the next few months, as over five demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm had appeared to cause havoc. Essentially forcing the remaining Soul Ascension Realm ancestors of the Onyx Empire into hiding away in their imperial capital while the rest of their empire grew increasingly chaotic with the number of demonic cultivators growing.


    By the time another six months had passed and it had been nine months since she had been handed over control of Su Wuhan, Elder Dust Fairy personally witnessed the capital city of the Onyx Empire being besieged by the five True Demon Realm demonic cultivators and countless weaker demonic cultivators through a special artifact being carried by one of the demonic cultivators that was part of her intelligencework.


    Not to mention holding on for another three months until the experts of the Blue Sea Empire were said to show up ording to Xuan Hao, Elder Dust Fairy doubted that the three remaining Soul Ascension Realm cultivators inside the capital city would be able to hold on for more than a few days¡­ And that was only due to the fact that they had the protection of the capital''s defensive formation.


    If not for the help of the formation, they might not even havested a single day due to the fact that the True Demon Realm demonic cultivators attacking them were all above them in strength, one of them even having reached theter stages of the True Demon Realm


    "Will the Onyx Empire really fall just like that?" Muttering this to herself as she kept watching the increasingly bad situation that the three Soul Ascension Realm cultivators found themselves in, Elder Dust Fairy could not help wondering if she was about to witness the downfall of an empire.


    Not just Elder Dust Fairy, countless people were paying attention to the situation in the Onyx Empire. All of them understanding that if the Blue Sea Empire didn''t step in, it would mark the end of the Onyx Empire and the subsequent flood of demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnd would turn the once majestic empire into a paradise for demonic cultivators, as there were still a lot of kingdoms left inside the Onyx Empire''s borders that could be devoured by these demonic cultivators¡­


    BOOOOOM-!


    And three days after the attack on the imperial capital of the Onyx Empire began, the guardian formation that had stood strong for countless years, fell under the continuous attack of the five powerful demonic cultivators-


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Forcing the three Soul Ascension Realm cultivators hidden inside to fly out and fight back.


    However, given the difference in strength, it didn''t take long before one of them died and the other two fled in the direction of the Blue Sea Empire. Officially marking the end of the Onyx Empire as the five demonic cultivators descended upon the defenseless capital city to devour the people inside¡­

 Chapter 1266 Third Domain Lord Realm Disciple

    Chapter 1266 Third Domain Lord Realm Disciple


    "How terrifying..." Muttering this to herself as she observed the fall of the Onyx Empire''s capital city, Elder Dust Fairy quickly made the demonic cultivator carrying the observation artifact leave the ce before he caught the attention of those terrifying True Demon Realm demonic cultivators who didn''t seem to care whether it was a normal cultivator or a demonic one as they massacred everyone inside the city and around it.


    Soon after, she stopped observing the situation taking ce in the Onyx Empire and instead took out amunication talisman to inform the different demonic cultivators, who now worked under her through the help of Su Wuhan, who made it seem like she was also a demonic cultivator, about the situation and have them prepare for leaving the different outpost that they had established over the past few months inside the Onyx Empire under the guise of escaping before the people from the Blue Sea Empire appeared.


    In truth, her intention wasn''t to save these demonic cultivators, but was instead to hand over these outposts to the people under her from the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, the chance of these demonic cultivators escaping from the Onyx Empire in less than three months'' time was close to none.


    Not to mention, the experts from the Blue Sea Empire would probably not just kill off the demonic cultivators in the Onyx Empire but would likely also enter the Frozen Wastnd to push back the demonic cultivators.


    "Ah! Now that I think about it, I will also have to find a secret realm to hide Su Wuhan inside. The only problem is that most of the secret realms in the surroundings are all known and likely to get searched." Remembering the fact that she also had to start thinking about where to hide Su Wuhan, Elder Dust Fairy could not help frowning as she turned to look back in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect that was at least a few days travel from her current location.


    "Maybe that old fellow knows about some secret realm I can use to hide Su Wuhan... Looks like I will have to make a trip back to the sect."


    Shaking her head as she said this, Elder Dust Fairy didn''t waste any time as she quickly finished up thest few preparations for having the demonic cultivators under her hand over the intelligencework that had been built up inside the Onyx Empire to a few mortals that had been "bewitched" by her and would take care of things until the experts from the Blue Sea Empire left before she began making her way back to the Star Shattering Sect.


    ¡­


    As Elder Dust Fairy made her way back to the sect, Xuan Hao was busy helping Qing Yi make herst few preparations for breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although she could have broken through to the Domain Lord Realm over six months earlier, she had pushed it back as she was fully absorbed in alchemy after she broke through to the Master Realm. Even neglecting her cultivation to the point where he was starting to worry whether or not Mui would end up breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm before her.


    Even if her cultivation speed had slowed down significantly since she reached the Nascent Soul Realm, it would still not take more than a few years before she managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm with her current speed. Making the act of surpassing Qing Yi and reaching the Domain Lord Realm before her a possibility if Qing Yi decided to focus solely on alchemy for the next few years.


    Maybe knowing this and not wanting to be surpassed by her new junior sister who still hadn''t managed to figure how to grow any taller, Qing Yi had decided to breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm.


    In the end, to ensure her safe breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, she had even sought the guidance of not only her master, but also other Domain Lord Realm cultivators from the sect who had recently broken through. Learning from their situations when breaking through to prepare herself¡­


    Boom!


    And after another few days of preparations, Qing Yi managed to breakthrough to the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm without any problems.


    FWOOOOSH-!


    However, as she finished her breakthrough, a terrifying me suddenly envelopted her and the surroundings as her strength seemed to climb rapidly-


    Boom! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Boom!


    And in a few short seconds, her cultivation directly broke through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, causing the chaotic state of her domain to grow even more violent as it forced him to step in and ensure that it didn''t affect the old elder who was simrly in the process of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although the formation in ce should have been able to handle it on its own, he didn''t want to take any risks considering that it didn''t take much for him to control the situation with his current strength and prevent Qing Yi''s chaotic domain from affecting the poor elder who had chosen a bad time to try and reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    Rumble~


    As the situation calmed down following his interference, Xuan Hao began to observe the situation of Qing Yi who was still engulfed in fire.


    Is it perhaps something rted to her divine physique?


    Seeing that nothing was wrong with Qing Yi outside of the fact that she seemed to have grown stronger, Xuan Hao guessed that the current situation most likely had to do with her Bright Sun Divine Physique breaking through to a new realm.


    With that in mind, he turned to use the system to view her status...


    ? First Disciple, Qing Yi ? Race: Human Talent: 45


    Dao: Dao of Fire (Domain), Dao of Alchemy (Pseudo Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Fire, Dao of Wind, Dao of Light, Dao of Space, Dao of Alchemy Physique: Bright Sun Divine Physique (Peak Stage, Small Sun Realm) Realm: Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Profession: Alchemy (Master Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Heaven Burning Mantra


    And indeed, like he had expected, her divine physique had broken through from thete stage of the Small Sun Realm to the Peak Stage. Not just increasing her cultivation realm, but also increasing her talent by an entire seven points. Making him wonder just how much her talent would increase after her divine physique broke through again.


    Wait¡­ Now that Qing Yi has broken through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, doesn''t that mean she is now my strongest disciple again? Hehe, I''m looking forward to seeing how Chu Yang reacts when he realizes this.


    Chuckling to himself as he thought about the reaction Chu Yang would have when he realized that Qing Yi had surpassed him, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time in taking out hismunication talisman to inform all his disciples about Qing Yi''s breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm. Making sure to include the fact that she had broken through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in fashion not much different from how Mui had broken through to the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm directly after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Hm¡­ But I wonder if her rapid breakthrough will have some kind of effect on her domain¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he finished informing his other disciples about Qing Yi''s breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes slightly as he used his divine sense to examine her domain more in depth than he had done before.


    Unfortunately, it didn''t take long before he realized that he could not find anything out of the ordinary in her domain.


    Well¡­ It was not that there wasn''t anything out of the ordinary about her domain, but more so the fact that it was still in a far too chaotic state.


    The only thing he could conclude for now was the fact that there wasn''t anything big that had changed about her domain and if there was something, it wouldn''t be that big or make that much of a difference or he would have noticed it even though her domain was in a chaotic state.


    Whoosh~


    As he retracted his divine sense following this realization, Xuan Hao silently sat down to watch over her while she stabilized her domain.


    Considering that her breakthrough was so unique, he didn''t dare to ck off and enter cultivation while keeping an eye on her with only a small part of his consciousness. Instead focusing his full attention on her as she continued to stabilize her domain.


    Only really looking elsewhere when his other disciples began showing up to see their senior sister who had managed to directly break through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in a single step. Bing the strongest among all of his disciples without anyone close to contending with her.

 Chapter 1267 Arrival of all Four- Three Disciples

    Chapter 1267 Arrival of all Four- Three Disciples


    Being the first to arrive at the scene, Chun Hua looked over towards the part of the Domain Lord Realm Ascension tform that was engulfed in a sea of fire with a look of disbelief on her face. "She really broke through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­ And here I thought I was going to be the strongest after breaking through to the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm."


    Although she had received her master''s message about Qing Yi breaking through to the Third Stage of Domain Lord Realm earlier, she thought it was just a way for her master to get her toe over and congratte her senior sister on breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm. Never did it dawn on her that Qing Yi had actually managed to break through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in a single step.


    Even if Mui had broken through to the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, there was a major difference between the Nascent Soul Realm and the Domain Lord Realm. Not to mention, she had heard about others breaking through directly after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm back in the Astorion Empire


    The person in question was the crown prince of the Astorion Empire, though she didn''t learn much of the world outside the Chun Family due to her special race and the problems that would arise if others found out, she still knew about this person.


    But even the talented crown prince from the Astorion Empire hadn''t broken through directly after reaching the Domain Lord Realm.


    "She really broke through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm- Huh!? C-Chun Hua, y-you broke through to the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!?"


    Lost in her own thoughts trying to recall the little information she had on the crown prince of the Astorion Empire, Chun Hua was suddenly startled awake by the loud sound of Chu Yang who had arrived beside her and discovered that she had broken through to the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm ahead of him.


    "Indeed, I just happened to break through a few days ago." Smiling triumphantly as she said this, Chun Hua soon showed a puzzled expression. "But¡­ Howe you are here? Weren''t you at the border fighting demonic cultivators?"


    "Tch, to think you broke through before me¡­ And I just returned to the sect a few hours ago. Most of the demonic cultivators attacking the border at the moment are below the Domain Lord Realm and don''t pose any real challenge."


    "Oh? What about Elder Song?"


    "Ah, I was put in charge of the Combat Hall. Hehe, Elder Song wanted me to make sure that therge number of elders breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm as ofte gets used to their strength."


    "¡­"


    Silently offering a prayer for the elders who were currently over the moon after breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm, Chun Hua turned her attention back towards Qing Yi who was sitting in the middle of the sea of fire the engulf arge part of the Domain Lord Realm Ascension tform.


    "Looking at things now with Senior Sister Ying breaking through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, you can be considered the third strongest."


    "Huh¡­ This¡­" Not knowing how to answer Chun Hua''s sudden not so hidden attempt at poking fun at him, Chu Yang could only smile awkwardly as he looked between her and Qing Yi.


    Indeed, like she had said, he was indeed the third strongest, still being at the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even if the reason for this was the fact that he had been focused onprehending the Dao of the Spear and had decided to wait until he got back to the sect where the cultivation environment was better before breaking through to the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, it was indeed true that he was the third strongest for now¡­


    "Waaaaah-! I''m here!"


    Just at this moment, Mui came flying down the mountain at a terrifying speed that shouldn''t have been possible for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm. Well¡­ It shouldn''t be possible for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm to fly in the first ce.


    "W-watch out, I can''t sto-"


    BAAANG-!


    And before Chun Hua or Chu Yang had any time toprehend how their junior sister had managed to fly, she crashed directly into Chu Yang at a speed that even someone in the Domain Lord Realm like himself couldn''t react to.


    "You¡­ How do you produce so much power in the Fifth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm?" Forced to the ground by his little junior sister who came flying out of nowhere, Chu Yang could not help asking this with a look of shock on his face.


    After all, he was someone in the Domain Lord Realm, yet he had been forced to the ground by someone only in the Fifth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    In terms of strength alone, the attack of this junior sister of his had reached the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, even bordering the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Hm? How? Hmmm¡­ I heard about senior sister breaking through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and was excited to see it for myself, so I jumped off the mountain and whoooosh! Flew down here reeaaaally fast by pushing myself forward!"


    Tilting her head in confusion as she said this while making different movements in an attempt to describe how she had flown through the air; Mui didn''t seem to understand why Chu Yang was so surprised.


    "This¡­ Never mind¡­"


    Knowing that he wouldn''t get anywhere trying to use logic with this little junior sister, Chu Yang decided to give up. Not nning to end up like Bai Ning, who had a rather traumatizing experience trying to figure out how one of the strange metal balls crafted by Mui could somehow transform normal water into normal wine by being ced in the water.


    "Woooooow! Senior sister is in the middle of those mes! How amazing!" Not hearing his words, Mui had already turned her attention towards Qing Yi with an amazed look on her face. Full of admiration for her senior sister who was standing in the middle of a massive sea of fire without being harmed.


    ¡­


    Looks like everyone except Bai Ning is here.


    Using his divine sense to look towards his three disciples, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself as he watched them interacting with each other while also keeping an eye on Qing Yi who was busy stabilizing her fire domain after breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    As the three settled down over the next few minutes, Xuan Hao decided to extend his divine sense to cover the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces where he was almost certain that he could find Bai Ning in the process of crafting some kind of artifact.


    Bang~ Bang~ Bang~


    And indeed, he soon spotted him inside of his forge hammering away at what looked like a greatsword more than twice his own height. Even though it wasn''t done yet, it still gave off a terrifying aura that would intimidate even a Peak Nascent Soul Realm cultivator.


    Without a doubt, the greatsword that Bai Ning was in the process of forging was a Mystic Grade Artifact, a weapon that could only be wielded by those in the Domain Lord Realm or above.


    Considering the current state of the Star Shattering Sect with a rapidly growing number of Domain Lord Realm cultivators and the fact that the only Yi Min had the ability to forge Mystic Grade Artifacts before Bai Ning broke through to the Master Realm, there was quite ack of Mystic Grade Artifacts and weapons.


    With this in mind, another one entering the Star Shattering Sect would be weed with open arms. Especially by Elder Song, who was in charge of managing these kinds of things and couldn''t wait for more artifacts and weapons like that to enter his hands.


    Hm¡­ It looks like he didn''t receive my message because he was busy¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought this, Xuan Hao retracted his divine sense. Knowing that Bai Ning wouldn''t be showing up before he finished the artifact that he was in the process of crafting.


    At the same time, he understood why Bai Ning had ended up bing the most favored among his disciples over the past few months as he had begun to produce Mystic Grade Weapons and Artifacts for the sect.


    On the contrary, although Mui did help out the sect a lot with the different weird things, she created every now and then, she also caused quite a bit of trouble for both the elders and disciples because of the things she created, as not all of them were as useful as the slim pit that helped the younger disciples cultivation.

 Chapter 1268 Another Stange Creation of Mui

    Chapter 1268 Another Stange Creation of Mui


    As a few minutes passed with Chun Hua and Chu Yang began chatting with each other over Qing Yi''s breakthrough, it didn''t take long before Mui, who was just standing at the side staring into the sea of mes, grew bored and decided to sit down on the ground to start tinkering with a few formation stones used for practicing by the younger disciples of the sect who had barely stepped into the Apprentice Realm.


    Of course, even though it wasn''t anything dangerous and was a rather normal pass time for the younger disciples of the sect and a few older disciples who just wanted to take a break from cultivation by ying around with a few simple formations, Chun Hua, and Chu Yang both understood that these innocent formation stones were far from harmless in the hands of their little junior sister.


    Although the chance of something happening that would cause problems for Qing Yi while their master was around, neither of them dared to let down their guard around the strange things created by Mui, both having personally had an experience with some of the things created by this youngest disciple. Making them fully aware that it had nothing to do with cultivation realm with her and the things she ended up creating.


    "¡­"


    Even Xuan Hao who had been fully focused on Qing Yi at this point in time, could not help turning to look over at Mui as she tinkered away with the small and harmless looking formation stone that wouldn''t even be capable of hurting a normal mortal without any cultivation.


    Though not having been on the receiving end of some of the more troublesome things created by this little disciple of his, he had heard about her antics, while at the same time also being presented with some of the things she created when she felt especially proud of them and wanted to show off in front of him.


    At one point even showing up with some kind of artifact capable of drawing in the qi in a hundred-mile radius beforeunching an attackparable to someone in the Early Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if the artifact in question had been destroyed after it was used, it still left a deep impression on him over just how dangerous some of the things created by her could be.


    Indeed, like the system had mentioned when describing the abysmal rank that Mui had reached, the things she created so far ranged between having the ability to kill an unprepared Dao Seed Realm cultivator to a pit of edible slime that could help the cultivation of the younger disciples.


    He only hoped that by the point that she ended up creating something capable of sinking continents, he would be strong enough to deal with the situation before she really did destroy a continent by ident¡­


    Why do I feel like the biggest threat to my life isn''t the Blue Sea Empire, the mysterious sealed god, the weird feather situation rted to the past or my background and how I ended up on this continent in the first ce, but instead this little disciple of mine¡­ Don''t tell¡­ Is she perhaps a hiddenst boss or something along that line?


    Not able to stop himself from smiling awkwardly to himself as he thought about this while looking in the direction of Mui who was innocently ying with the formation with arge smile on her face. Not a single care in the world as she was fully focused on etching a rather wed fire rted formation into the formation stone. Possibly feeling inspired by the majestic sea of fire that had manifested around Qing Yi following her breakthrough.


    Oh well¡­ If something does happen I-


    FWOOOSH-!


    About to encourage himself that he was more than strong enough to deal with things in case Mui ended up creating something troublesome, Xuan Hao was stopped before he could finish his train of thought, as the formation stone in Mui''s hand suddenly erupted with a terrifying me before flying directly towards Qing Yi at a speed no slower than someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    No, you don''t!


    Whoosh-!


    Wasting no time after seeing this, Xuan Hao directly twisted the space around himself to instantly move in front of the formation stone that had long since turned into nothing more than a ball of pure fire. Intending to stop it before it could reach Qing Yi.


    After all, even though the fire wasn''t of any threat to him, it still carried a strengthparable to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm and wasn''t something Qing Yi could deal with. Especially in her current state of having her full attention focused on stabilizing her cultivation base.


    Whoosh~ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Not reacting to Xuan Hao now blocking its path, the ball of fire continued flying towards Qing Yi behind him-


    Fwoosh~


    "Huh?"


    And under the suppression from his dao domain and with him standing directly in front of it, the ball of fire simply phased straight through him. Completely unaffected by any of his attempts to try and stop it, as it seemed to exist on apletely different ne of existence. Rendering him unable to do anything but watch as the ball of fire mmed into Qing Yi.


    FWOOOOOOOOSH-!


    However, instead of the me phasing through her or blowing up in her face, the ball of fire instead seemed to merge together with her fire domain. Rapidly helping stabilize it before being absorbed into her body like some kind of heavenly tonic-


    BOOM-!


    Allowing Qing Yi, who had just stabilized her cultivation realm with the help of the ball of fire, to breakthrough another minor realm. Reaching the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    """¡­"""


    Not just Xuan Hao. Even Chun Hua and Chu Yang watching everything ying out from the side were left speechless when they saw this.


    None of them expecting the strange ball of fire that seemed to have been casually crafted by Mui allowing Qing Yi to rapidly stabilize her cultivation realm before breaking through to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm the next instant.


    "Hehe, it worked! This way, it should be easier for senior sister to stabilize her cultivation base!"


    Out of everyone present, the only one who seemed to not be the slightest bit surprised at this oue was Mui, who happily celebrated as she noticed that her senior sister''s domain had ended up bing more stablepared to before after she broke through to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Ma-Master, can I ask junior sister Mui toe with me when I breakthrough in the future?"


    "Me too!I also want Mui around when breaking through!"


    Being the first to interrupt the silence that had descended on the ce outside of Mui who was grinning happily from ear to ear, Chun Hua, and Chu Yang both turned towards their master with a look of anticipation stered all across their faces.


    Even without them saying anything more, it was obvious that both of them wanted to get their little junior sister''s help when breaking through in the future¡­


    "Oh? It seems like both of you forgot that Mui doesn''t always craft something useful like this¡­ What would both of you do if she created a simr ball of fire for both of you and it ended up blowing up in your face instead of helping your cultivation grow?" Rolling his eyes at the request from the two, Xuan Hao couldn''t help reminding them of the fact that their little junior sister didn''t have a good track record.


    On the contrary, most of the things she created had a negative effect on the people unfortunate enough to encounter them in the wild


    Hearing what their master said, both Chun Hua and Mui froze on the spot before smiling wryly to each other for a short moment.


    "This¡­ I forgot about that¡­"


    "Yeah¡­ It might be more dangerous to bring her along when breaking through. Especially consider that even master was unable to stop the strange me created by her"


    Nodding their head after thinking over the situation for a few seconds longer, both of them realized that it would indeed be far riskier to bring Mui along whenever they wanted to break through to a new realm.


    "Hm~? Master, Chun Hua, Chu Yang¡­ And Mui? What are all of you doing here?"


    Just at this moment, the sound of Qing Yi''s voice drifted over from afar as the fire domain that had covered up arge portion of the Domain Lord Realm ascension tform disappeared.


    Leaving behind the small Qing Yi, who was already standing up looking towards them with a confused expression on her face. Clearly having no clue why everyone had decided to gather together to wait for her to finish her breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm and stabilize her cultivation base.


    Part of her seemed to believe that she had been busy stabilizing her cultivation for days- If not weeks. Unaware of what had happened to her only a few seconds earlier.

 Chapter 1269 Why is Everyone Gathered Here?

    Chapter 1269 Why is Everyone Gathered Here?


    "Let me exin¡­" Seeing the confusion on Qing Yi''s face along with the disbelief on Chu Yang and Chun Hua''s faces, Xuan Hao decided to step forward to exin what had happened while observing the drastic change in Qing Yi''s expression when she heard that she had broken through to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm with the help of some kind of strange ball of fire that had been made by Mui.


    "This¡­ Thank you for the helping me breaking through to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and stabilizing my cultivation base, I really don''t know what else to say¡­" Calming down quickly after listening to Xuan Hao exin what had happened, Qing Yi rushed over and thanked Mui for her help.


    "Hehe, no need to thank me, I just didn''t want to wait for weeks until senior sister stabilized her cultivation base." Smiling proudly, Mui looked like she had nned out everything from the start as she said this.


    ""¡­""


    Watching Qing Yi and Mui talking happily with each other, Chu Yang and Chun Hua could not help silently thinking about what would have happened if the ball of fire hadn''t been perfectly absorbed by Qing Yi, but instead blew up instead.


    In a sense, both of them didn''t dare think about asking their junior sister for help when they broke through in the future after remembering what their master said.


    What happened today with Qing Yi could be considered a coincidence that was best for them to not try and recreate or they might end up dying without even knowing how. After all, the things created by this little junior were strong enough to avoid their master, let alone them¡­


    Following the small get together between his disciples to celebrate Qing Yi''s breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao also decided to spend the next few days teaching and guiding all of them together.


    Allowing the four of them to get an opportunity to train together without it being rted to Chu Yang dragging someone off to the Combat Hall¡­ And to make things fairer when they did a few practice battles, Xuan Hao made sure to lower their cultivation realms down to the Nascent Soul Realm so Mui could also participate.


    Surprisingly, even though Mui should have stood no chance against the three as their insight andbat experience was far superior to her, she still somehow managed toe out victorious in any battle she participated in due to the countless strange metal balls that she had stored away inside of her interspatial ring.


    From a metal ball that could create countless balls of ice that seemed to increase in strength along with the strength of the user to a metal ball that could grow without a limit and used to smash into opponents as long as there was enough qi, Mui''s fighting style was unpredictable and hard to counter.


    Even when all three of them tried to team up on her with their Nascent Soul Realm cultivation base, none of them were able to win against her and only after Xuan Hao put a ban on her using her metal balls, did she return to the level of an ordinary Nascent Soul Realm cultivator


    After all, his goal with them having a few practice battles was for them to practice some of the techniques he taught them together. Not for Mui to single-handedly beat up the others with her strange creations.


    In the end, all four of them were fine with this and continued practicing together even after Xuan Hao finished teaching them what he had nned to teach them.


    Of course, Xuan Hao was overjoyed to see this as it meant his disciples got along well with each other. Although, he did feel that it was a bit of pity that Bai Ning wasn''t around, so he decided to pay a visit to the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces to check up on him and see if he could get him to join the rest of his disciples after he finished crafting the Mystic Grade Greatsword he had seen him working on while watching over Qing Yi during her breakthrough.


    Cling~ Cling~ Cling~


    In the end, as he arrived in front of Bai Ning''s forge, he was surprised to see that outside of the rhythmic sound of a hammer hitting metal echoing out from inside of the forge, there was also arge number of people gathered around the forge with looks of anticipation on their faces as they looked towards the interior of the forge where Bai Ning was located.


    Not just that, but most of these people were Domain Lord Realm elders of the sect who had broken through to the Domain Lord Realm after he installed the Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    What are all of these people doing here?


    Wondering what all of these elders had gathered together for in front of his disciple''s forge, Xuan Hao suddenly sensed someone new arriving as he turned around with a look of shock on his face.


    Also sensing the person who appeared, all of the elders looking towards Bai Ning''s forge filled with anticipation turned around with shock in their eyes.


    """Sect master!?"""


    Indeed, the person who had appeared was none other than Feng Chen, who had been using most of his time trying to improve his cultivation over the past few months. Not wanting to be left behind and surpassed by therge number of elders who had broken through to the Domain Lord Realm following the instation of the Dao Enlightenment Monument by Xuan Hao.


    In the end, he had managed to break through to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm a few months ago and looking at him now, Xuan Hao could see that he had already managed to reach the peak of the realm and was only a single step away from breaking through to the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Out of everyone in the sect, who had managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm before the Dao Enlightenment Monument''s introduction, he was the one who had benefited the most from the looks of it.


    "What are all of you doing here!?"


    Showing a clear look of confusion on his face upon seeing so many elders standing around the forge of a disciple, Feng Chen couldn''t help freezing on the spot as he asked the group of elders.


    "Sect master, we are here because we heard news of Grand Elder Xuan''s disciple being in the process of crafting a Mystic Grade Sword and all of us wanted toe and take a look before it gets taken away by Elder Song." n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Yes, we are just here to take a look!"


    "Hehe, not just that, some of us also want to see if we can take the opportunity to ask if he is willing to make a weapon for us. After all, the weapons that fall into Elder Song''s hand require a lot of-"


    Bang!


    Before the third could finish his sentence, two nearby elders worked together to silence him.


    "Don''t listen to this guy, he was not thinking straight!"


    "Yeah, he was just a bit confused!"


    "Indeed, I also heard he has been drinking quite a bit of spiritual wine beforeing here, the kind crafted by that Peng Yun fellow."


    Narrowing both his eyes after hearing the words by these elders, Feng Chen didn''t have to listen to the entire story from the now silent elder to know what these elders were up to.


    They wanted to try and get Mystic Grade Weapons directly from Bai Ning instead of going through Elder Song to get their hands on them. Hoping that they would be able to get them cheaper this way, as the contribution points required to get a single Mystic Grade Weapon was not something any of them could afford without years of hard work.


    This was normal considering how rare Mystic Grade Artifacts and Weapons were in the first ce and the resources required to craft them.


    Even in a massive empire like the Blue Sea Empire, it was hard for anyone below the Late Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to afford something like a Mystic Grade Weapon, let alone someone in the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "Oh¡­Are all of you really that free? Hm¡­ Seems like I will have to ask Elder Song to assign all of you to help out the sect in the future. Maybe sending you to help stabilizing the newer territory of the sect or helping with the border situation?"


    "S-Sect Master, let''s not jump to conclusions, I-I''m really busy right now and just happened to pass by, I will get going!"


    "Me too, my disciples are still waiting for me¡­"


    "¡­ I have lecture to attend to¡­"


    "¡­ My husband is going intobor!"


    "Huh? I''m what?"


    "Let''s go!"


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Not wasting any time after hearing what Feng Chen said, all of the elders scattered like the wind. Disappearing from the area in front of the forge like they had never been there in the first ce.

 Chapter 1270 Chat with Feng Chen

    Chapter 1270 Chat with Feng Chen


    "They sure are fast to run away¡­" Muttering this to himself as he watched thest few of the elders disappearing from the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces, Feng Chen turned his attention towards the forge where Bai Ning was hard at work putting the finishing touches on the Mystic Grade Greatsword.


    To be honest, he hade for a simr reason as these elders and intended to ask Bai Ning for help with forging a sword¡­


    Of course,pared to the rest of the elders, he had more of a reasonable excuse to do this, as he was still the sect master and needed to put on a strong front for the sect when faced with outside forces.


    Yes! He needed a Mystic Grade Sword to show off for the sect and ensure that the different independent sects under them and any external forces trying to cause trouble knew that the Star Shattering Sect wasn''t weak in any way and had more than just Xuan Hao and Pei Yang to rely on!


    "Feng Chen, didn''t expect to see you here."


    "Xuan Hao!?"


    Just as Feng Chen was lost in his own thoughts, Xuan Hao decided tond right next time, causing no small amount of shock as Feng Chen hadn''t expected him to show up. Especially considering that he had learnt beforehand that he was busy taking care of his first disciple who was in the process of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    In a sense, it was also because of this that he felt shameless enough to approach one of his disciples for a favor. Feeling that it would be a bit embarrassing to ask Xuan Hao to get his help in convincing his disciple to help him. Instead nning to do so secretly without Xuan Hao finding out about it¡­ And considering that Xuan Hao would normally be in secluded cultivation most of the time with only going out when teaching his disciples every now and then, it wouldn''t be that hard to do without him learning about him asking his disciple for help.


    "I''m just here to ensure these elders don''t cause any trouble. By the way, what are you doing here? Weren''t you busy with little Qing Yi?"


    With that in mind, Feng Chen decided to throw the matter of asking for a Mystic Grade Sword from Bai Ning to the back of his mind for now and instead decided to ask into the reason for Xuan Hao''s appearance when he should have been busy helping Qing Yi in her breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Ah, she already finished her breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm. Now standing firmly in the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm."


    "I see, I see, so she already broke through to the Fourth Stage of the Doma- WAIT A SECOND!" Nodding his head at first in understanding after hearing that Qing Yi had broken through, Feng Chen''s understanding soon turned into shock as he realized what Xuan Hao said. "Did you say Forth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!? Did she really reach the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm."


    "Yes, she managed to break through directly to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, though it was mostly assisted by one of the strange things made by Mui, she still managed to reach the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm after her breakthrough."


    "This¡­"


    Hearing Xuan Hao confirm that Qing Yi had indeed broken through to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Feng Chen could not help freezing on the spot as the disbelief on his face only became more pronounced than before.


    Although he knew that the day when he would be surpassed by Xuan Hao''s disciples woulde soon now that they had started to break through to the Domain Lord Realm, he had never expected one of them to have already reached the same cultivation realm as himself.


    Though he was only a step away from the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and could be considered at the Peak of the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he was still at the same realm as one of Xuan Hao''s disciples.


    Monsters¡­ All of them¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he remembered just how young Xuan Hao''s disciples werepared to himself, Feng Chen could only smile awkwardly. Knowing that it was only a matter of time before the rest of them surpassed him in terms of strength.


    Maybe I should start thinking about stepping down as the sect master and focus all of my efforts on cultivation. Hm¡­ It seems that''s what most ancestors from other powers do when they be strong enough. Relegate the management of the sect to the younger generation¡­


    Narrowing both his eyes as his thoughts started to wander, Feng Chen began to seriously consider stepping down from the position of sect master and hand over the mantle to the younger generation while he himself nned to focus all of his efforts on cultivation.


    However, after thinking about it for a few seconds longer, he realized that he didn''t really do that much as the sect master and most of the management aspects of the sect were taken care of by Elder Song and the elders under him. Essentially giving him all the time in the world to focus on cultivation.


    "Haaa¡­ I really feel like I''m starting to fall behind the younger generation. Not just your disciples, but also the rest of the sect''s disciples have made great progress over the past few years. Especially a young girl called Yi Xuan, a personal disciple of Zu Fei who managed to reach the Nascent Soul Realm not that long ago.


    Outside of that, there was also the personal disciple of Wang Hu called Lu Wen who also broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm. Although, it seems like he is quite a troublemaker. Often getting in trouble with the female disciples and elders of the sect. Now that I think about it, I even heard about him hitting on a Domain Lord Realm female cultivator when out adventuring. Only barely escaping with his life due to some fortunate circumstances."


    As Xuan Hao listened to Feng Chen talking, he couldn''t help narrowing his eyes slightly when he heard the name Lu Wen. Not so much because he knew a lot about him, but because he had heard from Mui that he was one of the people who had helped her cause quite a lot of trouble in the past.


    Indeed, a troublemaker who was even daring enough to work together with his disciple, the most infamous troublemaker in the sect.


    But¡­ Back to Feng Chen, it seems like he is rather troubled by the fact that he is being surpassed by my disciples so fast. Maybe I should try and lend him a hand? N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Thinking this to himself as he looked at Feng Chen who was clearly affected by the knowledge that Qing Yi had already managed to reach the same realm as him, Xuan Hao thought about what he could do to help Feng Chen¡­ And in the end, the most obvious answer was to help guide him in the Dao of the Sword.


    After all, his own understanding of the Dao of the Sword had already reached the Large Sess Realm, while Feng Chen was still in the Domain Lord Rm and had yet to even touch upon the Elementary Realm in the Dao of the Sword.


    With that in mind, it shouldn''t be that hard for him to help guide Feng Chen into the Dao of the Sword and help him progress through the Domain Lord Realm far easier andy the groundwork for him toprehend the Dao of the Sword in the future. Hopefully making his ascension through the Soul Ascension Realm to the Dao Seed Realm far simpler.


    The reason he didn''t think about helping him reach the Dao Domain Lord Realm was simply due to the fact that Feng Chen wasn''t the slightest bit interested nor did it seem like he had any affinity for any other Dao than the Dao of the Sword.


    Not to mention, reaching the Profound Immortal Realm in the future didn''t require one to first reach the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it just meant one had to wait until reaching the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm before breaking through, as breaking through below the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm would result in one reaching the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    "Feng Chen, it''s been some time since west had a chat together¡­ Why don''t you join me at the eastke pavilion for a cup of tea to discuss the sword. After all, we bothprehended the Dao of the Sword and are sure to havee to some different understanding. Only throughparison can one pick out ws and perfect the dao."


    "This¡­! Of course, let''s go!"


    Understanding what Xuan Hao wanted to do, Feng Chen could not help shing a grateful smile as he immediately epted before the two of them left the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces together.


    As for Bai Ning, Xuan Hao decided to wait until he finished the Mystic Grade Greatsword. Intending to help out Feng Chen while waiting.

 Chapter 1271 Stopping Oneself From Improving

    Chapter 1271 Stopping Oneself From Improving


    Sitting down with Feng Chen to chat talk the Dao of the Sword, Xuan Hao was surprised to discover that it didn''t just turn into a one-sided ordeal of him talking while Feng Chen listened. Instead, he also managed to improve his understanding of the Dao of the Sword by listening to Feng Chen, as there was still a difference in the way they both understood the Dao of the Sword.


    Even then, Feng Chen was still by far the one who ended up benefiting the most out of the two of them¡­ And unsurprisingly, he even managed to breakthrough the bottleneck he had been stuck on. Sessfully reaching the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    In the end, after spending close to a week chatting with Feng Chen about the Dao of the Sword, Xuan Hao finally sensed that Bai Ning had finished the Mystic Grade Greatsword he had been crafting.


    Unsurprisingly, Elder Song also seemed to have learnt about it shortly after him and had already arrived at the forge to take away the sword for storage in the sect''s treasury, while in return handing all kinds of rare and precious spiritual metals to Bai Ning.


    By the time Elder Song left, Bai Ning had already rushed back into his forge with the precious spiritual metals. Eager to use them to forge another artifact at the Mystic Grade and see if he could make one better than the greatsword he had just made.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao could not help silently letting out a sigh as he stood up from the small table that he had been sitting at together with Feng Chen.


    "Is something wrong?"


    "No, it just looks like that disciple of mine finished up the weapon he was crafting. If I don''t get going, I won''t be able to catch him before he locks himself away in the forge again." Hearing Feng Chen''s question, Xuan Hao only helplessly shook his head as he said this.


    Outside of chatting about the Dao of the Sword with Feng Chen, he had also talked about his ns to catch up with Bai Ning after he finished crafting the greatsword he was in the process of crafting. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Venting a bit of his frustration over the fact that this disciple of his was always in the process of crafting something when he was looking for him.


    Of course, he could always interrupt him, but that had a chance of ruining the thing he was in the process of making. Not to mention, he didn''t really have anything urgent to discuss with him.


    "Haha, I understand, I hope we can chat again like this in the future!" Laughing slightly with a look of understanding on his face, Feng Chen signaled that everything was fine as he also got up from his seat.


    "Sure, let''s chat again in the future. Bye then."


    Whoosh~!


    Nodding his head in response, Xuan Hao did a quick farewell before turning around to leave. Intending to catch that little disciple of his before he had a chance to lock his forge and start the process of crafting another artifact.


    ¡­


    "Xuan Hao? Haven''t seen you in quite some time."


    Arriving in front of Bai Ning''s forge a few minutes after leaving Feng Chen, Xuan Hao happened to run into Elder Song who finished up everything with his disciple and happened to be inspecting the greatsword outside of his forge.


    "Elder Song, it has indeed been quite some time since west saw each other, but it looks like you have been doing quite well for yourself." Inspecting Elder Song as he said this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised that the old man had actually managed to step into the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Although this could be considered rather normal with the resources and the Dao Enlightenment Monuments assistance, it had to be known that the soul injury that he had received back when he tried treating Song Jia on his own still hadn''t been fully healed and should have made it close to impossible for him to reach the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm in such a short period of time.


    But upon closer inspection, he quickly discovered the reason, Elder Song''s soul had been nourished by some of the precious spiritual herbs and other things that the sect had managed to gather over the past few years and although not fully recovered, it wasn''t far from it.


    In at most another few years, his soul would have fully recovered, and he should be able to reach the Domain Lord Realm like so many elders had done ahead of him.


    "Indeed, I have been doing well, but more importantly than that, are you perhaps here for Bai Ning? If you are, I would rmend not wasting too much time talking to this old man, as he seemed quite eager to try the new spiritual metals I gave him earlier."


    Interrupting his thoughts, Elder Song chuckled to himself as he said this while pointing towards the forge behind him. Even though he didn''t say anything about his reason for showing up, it was quite obvious to Elder Song.


    "This¡­ Thank you, I will get going before he ends up starting on something new¡­" Whoosh~


    Hearing what Elder Song said, Xuan Hao nodded his head thankfully before turning around to enter the forge where Bai Ning was busy looking through the different spiritual metals that Elder Song had given him.


    "Ahm¡­"


    "Hm? Who is-Master!?"


    Giving a low sound to catch his attention, Bai Ning quickly turned around with a slightly annoyed expression that quickly changed into one of shock after realizing that it was his master.


    "Indeed, I''m here, I take it that you didn''t check yourmunication talisman yet?"


    "Huh? Oh¡­"


    Hearing what his master said, Bai Ning could not help showing a somewhat awkward expression on his face as he put down the spiritual metals, he had been happily ying around with just seconds earlier before he picked up hismunication talisman.


    Indeed, he had been a bit too excited that he forgot about everything since seeing the new spiritual metals that Elder Song had brought. Making him forget the fact that hismunication talisman seemed to have gone off a few days earlier when he was in the midst of crafting the Mystic Grade Greatsword.


    "Ah! Senior Sister Qing broke through to the Domain Lord Realm- No, the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!?"


    "Not entirely urate, she managed to breakthrough to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm shortly after that, though it was after I sent that message.


    Bai Ning, I know you enjoy forging, but you should also take some time off every now and then to interact with the others. Not to mention, you are the only one who is still in the Core Formation Realm at this point¡­ And don''t try to make any excuses, I know that you have been dragging on your breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm because you don''t want to be stuck consolidating your cultivation base for an extended period of time."


    "This¡­"


    Hearing what his master''s scolding, Bai Ning could not help freezing at the spot as he felt a shiver run down his spine.


    Indeed, he had remained stuck at the Peak of the Core Formation for close to a year at this point in time and just like his master had said, he deliberately stopped himself from improving any further. Not wanting to spend weeks and possibly months stabilizing his cultivation base.


    Time he wouldn''t be able to focus on cksmithing¡­


    "M-Master, I-"


    "No excuses, I didn''t juste here to say hello, but also to help guide you into reaching the Nascent Soul Realm."


    "Huh? M-master, y-y-you aren''t nning to¡­"


    "Yes, now, we are going to the ascension tforms located at the base of the mountain and I will personally guide your breakthrough and ensure that everything goes well."


    "M-master-"


    "Hehe, you don''t have a choice in this matter!"


    Whooosh~!


    "Maaaasssteerr!"


    Not giving Bai Ning any chance to escape, Xuan Hao directly picked him up with his domain and carried him down the mountain to one of the smaller ascension tforms used by those trying to breakthrough from the Core Formation Realm to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Although he hadn''t originally nned to do something like this when visiting Bai Ning, it was only after seeing him personally that he realized what this little disciple of his was up to.


    Forcibly suppressing his cultivation and stopping himself from breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm in order to avoid having to spend time consolidating his cultivation base.


    No matter what, he couldn''t allow something like that, as it would not only slow down Bai Ning''s progress but could also end up harming him if he forcibly stopped his own breakthrough for a long time.


    For this reason, he could only step in as the master and ensure his disciple broke through smoothly. Even if he was a bit unwilling¡­

 Chapter 1272 Bai Nings Breakthrough

    Chapter 1272 Bai Ning''s Breakthrough


    As Xuan Hao arrived at the ascension tform for those trying to breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm together with Bai Ning, he didn''t give him any chance to escape, as he directly sealed off the area. Kindly reminding this little disciple of his that he would be able to leave after he broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Of course, as a reward for breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm, he also promised him that he would teach him in the Dao of cksmithing after his breakthrough. Making sure to demonstrate a bit of the knowledge he had gained afterprehending the Dao of cksmithing to the Small Sess Realm to encourage him.


    And unsurprisingly, Bai Ning didn''t waste much time after this, as he directly began the process of breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm in a simple yet smooth manner. Easily passing through the cloud tribtion without any real problems before starting the process of consolidating his cultivation base.


    All of this took ce in less than a few minutes, as Bai Ning could be considered the fastest example, he had ever seen of someone breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ And that was not mentioning the fact that he could clearly feel his cultivation base consolidating at a terrifying speed that in no waygged behind his rapid breakthrough.


    More importantly, there weren''t any mistakes or hidden problems left behind from the rapid breakthrough and consolidation of his cultivation base. Instead, it only left Xuan Hao surprised over this little disciple of his and made him wonder why he hadn''t just broken through earlier if he could do so in such a short period of time.


    Rumble~! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    However, just as Bai Ning was about to finish consolidating his cultivation base at the First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, the qi that he had umted while he was suppressing his breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm, exploded forth with a terrifying might. Instantly propelling his stabilizing cultivation base forward towards the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Boom! Boom!


    Soon enough resulting in Bai Ning directly breaking through the Second Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm before quickly reaching the peak of the realm where he just barely managed to cross over to the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm with his umted qi.


    In the end, this resulted in his stable cultivation base growing far more chaotic, as he was forced to dedicate far longer than before to stabilize his cultivation base. Even with his speed surpassing that of ordinary Nascent Soul Realm cultivators when it came to stabilizing their cultivation base following a breakthrough, it would still at least take him a few days before his cultivation stabilized after his breakthrough to the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    In the end, this resulted in his stable cultivation base growing far more chaotic, as he was forced to dedicate far longer than before to stabilize his cultivation base. Even with his speed surpassing that of ordinary Nascent Soul Realm cultivators when it came to stabilizing their cultivation base following a breakthrough, it would still at least take him a few days before his cultivation stabilized after his breakthrough to the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not just that, but themotion caused by the breakthrough also attracted the attention of the nearby disciples and elders, who came over to take a look at who was breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    After all, even though he sealed off the area to prevent Bai Ning from leaving without breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm, he didn''t stop anyone else from seeing what was happening on the ascension tform where he was breaking through.


    "Look, isn''t the person breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm Bai Ning!?"


    "Indeed, I never imaged he would break through to the Nascent Soul Realm considering how much time he spends locked up in his forge and how little he spends on cultivation¡­"


    "Hehe, true! I guess he isn''t just talented when ites to cksmithing if he can breakthrough to the Nascent Soul Realm while spending most of his time focused on cksmithing."


    Listening to the conversations of these disciples, Xuan Hao couldn''t help smiling wryly as he realized that the group of disciples and elders who happened to be walking past was none other than a group of cksmithing disciples and elders who recognized Bai Ning at a nce.


    Not that unexpected considering that Bai Ning was quite well known among the elder and disciples who practiced cksmithing. Especially the younger disciples who had begun to look up to him like a senior and sought his help whenever there was something that they didn''t understand and needed help with.


    In a sense, the only thing Bai Ning spend his time on outside of cksmithing was teaching these younger cksmithing disciples and chatting with the elders of the cksmithing Hall.


    The reason for this wasn''t that hard for him to guess after his recent talk with Feng Chen, as Bai Ning should have realized that talking about cksmithing with others was also useful when it came to improving his own understand of the Dao of cksmithing.


    If not for something like that, Xuan Hao highly doubted that he would spend any time with these younger disciples who were far below him when it came to cksmithing, but then again, it could also just be him wanting to promote cksmithing among the younger generation of the sect. Hoping that someone as skilled as himself would show up and be helpful for his ownprehension of the Dao of cksmithing in the future.


    In the end, Xuan Hao decided to just stay on the side and watch over Bai Ning as he stabilized his cultivation base without being noticed, while allowing the different disciples and elders of the cksmithing Hall to gather around and admire his disciple.


    Not just because he wanted to show off his disciple, but also because it was a great opportunity for him to learn more about Bai Ning through the conversations of these disciples and elders. After all, he couldn''t keep an eye on what he had been up to all the time. Not to mention the times he hadn''t even been in the sect.


    ¡­


    As Xuan Hao was silently listening to the different disciples and elders from the cksmithing Hall talking about Bai Ning and the different things he had been up to over the past few years, Qing Yi had been dragged off to the Combat Hall by Chu Yang the moment she had fully stabilized her cultivation base and was about to return to studying the Dao of Alchemy.


    "Why am I not surprised that you would drag me here the moment you got the chance¡­" Muttering this to herself as she let out a sigh while looking towards Chu Yang who was floating in the air above a volcanic terrain inside one of the Combat Hall''s practice rooms with a spear in hand, Qing Yi took a step forward and entered the practice room.Knowing that there was no way for her to escape from this junior brother of hers.


    Well¡­ Not so much that she couldn''t escape from him, but more so that she would have to endure his endless pestering if she didn''t agree to fight with him, something she had managed to avoid following the arrival of Chun Hua who took up the mantle of being Chu Yang''s main sparring partner.


    "Hehe, it''s your own fault for breaking through to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in a single step. To be honest, I also want to try and fight you if there is an opportunity¡­" Chuckling slightly as she entered following behind Qing Yi, Chen Hua poked Qing Yi''s chin with a yful expression on her face.


    Not surprising at all, Chun Hua seemed to have been negatively influenced by Chu Yang during their regr sparring sessions, also growing to enjoy sparring with others more than ordinary.


    Following in his footsteps, Chun Hua had also challenged a few of the elders of the sect and was currently nning to work together with Chu Yang in toughening up the group of elders who had recently broken through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    At least, that was what Qing Yi had managed to overhear from the two of them as she got used to her new strength and had the two of them following her around at all times in anticipation of her being ready for a fight.


    Haaa¡­ One Chu Yang was already difficult enough to deal with¡­ In the future, I have to make sure not to surpass these two in strength or they will definitely keep pestering me instead of each other¡­


    Shaking her head as she thought about this to herself while looking between Chu Yang and Chun Hua who were both eager to try and fight her following her breakthrough to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, Qing Yi took a step forward and arrived in the air a dozen meters away from Chu Yang.


    But¡­ Flying by myself sure does feel amazing¡­!


    With these thoughts passing through her head as she stood ready to confront Chu Yang, Qing Yi soon decided to make the first move as her fire domain exploded around her and spread out. Engulfing both Chu Yang and Chun Hua. Intending to fight both of them at the same time.


    Feeling confident in being able to do so considering her divine physique''s breakthrough and the fact that she had reached the Middel Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.

 Chapter 1273 Close Friends

    Chapter 1273 Close Friends


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    As Qing Yi engaged in battle with both Chu Yang and Chun Hua at the same time, it didn''t take long before she was forced to go on the defensive. Having clearly underestimated the strength of these two who spent all of their time fighting with each other. Especially Chu Yang, who somehow managed to disy more strength than Chun Hua who had reached the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    However, she was soon forced to give up trying to fight both of them at the same time and instead resumed a one versus one battle with Chu Yang while leaving Chun Hua on the side forter. Finally giving her the opportunity to properly fight back.


    Even then, Chu Yang was far from a simple opponent, as even with the disparity in their cultivation realms, he still managed to use his superiorbat knowledge and abilities to hold on against her. Only ended up fully suppressed when she used the mes of her domain together with her divine physique to forcibly restrain.


    Of course, considering it wasn''t a real life and death battle, she decided against doing that, as there wouldn''t be much for either of them to gain from her doing something like that. Not to mention, the fight between the two of them was also useful for her, as it gave her a chance to better familiarize herself with her strength after she had reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    After all, there was only so much one could learn from sitting around pondering about things by oneself. Learning from firsthand experience was far more useful.


    "My turn!"


    Following the battle between her and Chu Yanging to an end over the next few hours, Chun Hua, who had been sitting on the side waiting, didn''t waste a single second as she jumped forward.


    "¡­"


    Much to the displeasure of Qing Yi who didn''t get any time to rest before she was faced with the attacks of Chun Hua¡­ And to make things worse, Chun Hua switched their fighting environment to some kind of prehistorical forest with trees towering more than a thousand meters into the sky. Giving her a clear advantage as she was impossible to sense even through the use of a domain.


    All of it resulting in a different kind of battle where Qing Yi was mostly on the defensive while trying to predict where Chun Hua would attack from.


    As for burning down the towering ancient trees¡­ She had tried doing so but found out that burning them down was close to impossible and took her more than five minutes to burn down a single one of the towering trees.


    In the end, the battle with Chun Hua dragged on for far longer than the one with Chu Yang and neither of them ended up being victories. Instead choosing to end the battle after it had gone on for a day.


    And¡­ With the end of the battle, Qing Yi didn''t waste a single second as she rushed back to her room to study alchemy before Chu Yang could drag her into another sparring battle. Understanding very well how the mind of this junior brother of hers worked.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the practice battles between the three came to an end with Qing Yi escaping back to her room, Xuan Hao watched with anticipation as Bai Ning managed to sessfully stabilize his cultivation base at the Third Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Congrattions on your breakthrough Senior Bai!"


    """Congrattions!"""


    Not only him, but it seemed like the group of cksmithing elders and disciples gathered outside also noticed that his disciple had finished stabilizing his cultivation base as they all happily congratted him.


    "Hm? So many people are gathered¡­ Thank you everyone, there is no need for all of you to stand around like this." Opening his eyes to therge number of people all staring at him, Bai Ning could not help frowning slightly as muttered the first part barely loud enough for Xuan Hao to hear before thanking the group.


    "No worries Senior Bai, we just wanted to congratte you on your breakthrough." n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "I also wanted to know when you will hold another lecture for the new disciples of the cksmith Hall."


    "Me too! I want to know about that as well."


    "Same! But I also want to know if elders can join in as well?"''


    Not showing the slightest bit of shame as they said this, the group of disciples and elders soon showed their true motives, as all of them had been waiting around to ask him about the next lecture he was going to do on cksmithing.


    After all, given him being the only Master cksmith inside the Star Shattering Sect outside of Yi Min, everyone from the cksmithing hall, be it elders or disciples, would gain a lot whenever he held a lecture or taught them in passing.


    "This¡­"


    Hearing what these elders and disciples said, Bai Ning could not help freezing on the spot before turning to look towards his master for help.


    However, when he needed him the most, his master seemed to have disappeared into thin air like he had never been there in the first ce.


    "You can teach these eager disciples and elders a bit. After that, I will teach you in the Dao of cksmithing as promised."


    Just as he was about to refuse the group of elders and disciples to go and search for his master who had promised to teach him the Dao of cksmithing after he broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm, he was shocked to suddenly hear his master''s voice in his ears.


    Not just that, but his master actually wanted him to teach these elders and disciples before he would teach him!


    Master is taking advantage of me to teach the disciples and elders of the sect¡­ But¡­ Howe this feel so familiar to Elder Song asking me to teach them in return for spiritual metal¡­?


    Thinking this to himself as he tried to locate his master to no avail, Bai Ning could only reluctantly agree with the group of disciples and elders from the cksmithing Hall.


    Although he felt a bit unwilling to go along with what his master said, he ultimately didn''t n to give up the opportunity of learning the Dao of cksmithing from his master. After all, his master was far superior to him when it came to cksmithing in his head¡­ And even if he did end up wasting a few days on things not rted to cksmithing, his master''s teachings would more than make up for it.


    Thinking about it, there was even a chance that he would catch a glimpse of the Grandmaster Realm above the Master Realm with his master''s help.


    "Everyone, let''s go to the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces, I will be talking about cksmithing outside my forge for everyone willing toe and listen!"


    With this in mind, Bai Ning didn''t waste any time as he rushed back towards his forge to finish teaching the elders and disciples of the cksmithing Hall as fast as possible so he could seek out his master to hold up the promise of teaching him the Dao of cksmithing.


    At the same time, in the back of his head, he felt a bit worried that his master might end up finding something different for him to do like he had done just now. Even then, that would be for the future, and he had no ns of worrying about it at the moment¡­


    Unknown to Bai Ning at the moment, Xuan Hao was indeed thinking about making him do something after he finished teaching the group of elders and disciples from the cksmithing Hall.


    "It''s good that he gets to interact a bit more with the disciples and elders of the sect this way. Although, I should probably also get him to interact with Chun Hua and the others a bit. After all, Chun Hua has already been around for close to a year, but the interactions between the two of them can be counted on a single hand.


    Hm¡­ Thinking about, the only one he is close to so to speak is Mui, but that is mostly because the little keeps breaking into his forge to steal his spiritual metals for her strange metal ball creations¡­"


    The only difference was that it was just having him interact with his fellow disciples and get to know them more.


    Of course, excluding Mui, whom he had managed to get to know quite well since she had be his master''s fourth disciple, as she wasn''t one to easily back down from her close to weekly raids of his forge.


    Whether he liked this close bond that had formed between the two of them was an entirely different matter that only Bai Ning himself knew about. Although, his joyful cries whenever some of his precious spiritual metals went missing spoke of their close friendship.

 Chapter 1274 Mui Getting Caught! End of the Blacksmithing Elders Despair?

    Chapter 1274 Mui Getting Caught! End of the cksmithing Elders Despair?


    Following Bai Ning beginning to teach the different disciples and elders about cksmithing, while his master was secretly nning on having him take on another task, Mui arrived at the edge of the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces with arge number of spiritual metal ores in hand.


    "Stop! You can''t take that!"


    "Great Mui, please, it took me two weeks to gather¡­!"


    Behind her, two elders with tear-stricken faces appeared as they called out to her while trying to reach her.


    "Hmph! You two stopped me at the spiritual metal storage yesterday, I''m just taking a few random rocks I found on the road. No need for you to chase me like this!" Frowning as she said this while looking back towards the two elders with a not so innocent expression, Mui turned around and ran away from the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces before the two elders could catch up to her.


    Although all three of them were in the Nascent Soul Realm and the two tear-stricken elders cultivation realm exceeded that of Mui, in terms of speed alone, Mui was far superior to them. Leaving them no chance to catch her as she disappeared into the crowd of excited disciples who were gathering towards the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces to listen to Bai Ning''s lecture.


    "Found it on side of the road¡­? That red spirit crystal metal was clearly stored away inside my forge and even locked up in a box that was sealed by a formation¡­"


    "Random rocks¡­ The Water Stream Spiritual Metal that took me two entire weeks of hard work to find roaming outside, is just a bunch of random rocks¡­"


    Seeing Mui disappearing, the two elders broke down with devasted expressions on their faces as neither of them had any time to pay attention to the lecture that Bai Ning was holding, both of them feeling hateful towards the elder who had assigned them to guard the cksmithing Hall''s spiritual metal storage.


    Originally, both of them had thought this was an easy job considering that the Star Shattering Sect was under the constant protection of the chaotic qi formation that enveloped the Shattered Star Peaks. Preventing any outsiders from entering the sect, but¡­ Things turned out different with the appearance of Mui¡­


    Although she hadn''t managed to enter the spiritual metal storage, she had held quite a grudge against the two blocking her path and decided to pay their forge a visit while they were busy guarding the spiritual metal storage.


    If not for the fact that one of the protective formations that was ced on their forges had alerted them to someone breaking in, they would have never discovered a certain someone tantly taking away some of their spiritual metal.


    Picking up on the road? They clearly witnessed a daylight robbery when they saw her walking out of one of their forges with their spiritual metal in hand!


    It was only at this moment that the two of them realized the reason why no one else had taken up such a well-paying and simple job.


    As for going after Mui through thew enforcement of the sect? both of them understood very well that this was an unrealistic endeavor.


    Not just because Mui was the disciple of Grand Elder Xuan, the strongest existence in the sect, but also because Elder Song specifically protected her due to the fact that the things she ended up creating with her often stolen goods turned out to be extremely useful to the sect. Far exceeding the value of the stolen things she took for her creations.


    "Ah! Now that I think about it, I think one of the elders working as the guards for the spiritual metal storage before us mentioned something about possiblepensation for damages during our time as guards and that we should seek out Elder Song¡­" Just as the two of them were wallowing in their own despair over the precious spiritual, one of the two seemed to suddenly remember something as he said this.


    "Compensation? I guess they experienced something simr¡­ Haaa¡­ I guess we should try and go pay a visit Elder Song."


    "Yeah... Even if it will take some time, we should at least get a few contribution points for free this way¡­"


    As the two elders conversed among each other, it didn''t take long before the two of them swallowed their sadness and got up before deciding to follow the advice of the past guards of the spiritual metal storage¡­


    Not too far away, seeing that she wasn''t being followed any longer, Mui happily smiled to herself as she looked at the two kinds of spiritual metal, she had sto- borrowed from her kind seniors.


    "With this shiny blue one shiny red rock, I should be able to create a masterpiece! Hehe~ I wonder how master will react¡­ I hope he will like it!" Smiling from ear to ear as she said this, Mui had already begun to imagine the artifact the artifact she was going to create. Looking forward to presenting her master with yet another splendid divine artifact created by her.


    "Mui¡­"


    "Huh!? Who!? Grandpa Song!?"


    However, before she could set off to start creating the artifact she had started imagining, a somewhat exhausted old voice echoed out behind her, as she soon came face to face with Elder Song.


    "Did you steal from the cksmiths again?"


    "Ah- N-n-n-no, o-o-of course I didn''t!" Hearing the baseless usation beingunched towards her, Mui looked to the side to show her innocence while her voice began stuttering in confidence.


    "Mui¡­ You can just request what you want through me, you don''t need to break into people''s forges to steal them all the time, you know, it gets quite difficult for this old man to deal with the constant stream of eldersing toin about their spiritual metal mysteriously going missing¡­" Not showing any belief in her wless response, Elder Song just rolled his eyes as he said this.


    Today, he hade to seek out Mui to deal with this situation once and for all and happened to chance upon her after a sessful heist of yet another pair of unfortunate elders who would soone knocking at his door forpensation.


    "Butst time I came to you for a request, you didn''t give me what I asked for¡­" Hearing what Elder Song said, Mui could not help showing a somewhat unwilling expression as she said this.


    "You requested three tons of Amber Crystal Spiritual Metal, throughout the entire sect, there is only a little over a hundred kilograms of Amber Crystal Spiritual Metal and most of it is in use by the cksmiths of the sect. Not to mention, what would you even do with that much spiritual metal?"


    "¡­"


    Not knowing how to answer the question posed by Elder Song, Mui could only remain silent.


    She couldn''t possibly tell him that she intended to use the Soul Grade Spiritual Metal to decorate her room back at her master''s pce because she really liked the amber glow given off by the Amber Crystal Spiritual Metal.


    Therge amount of three tons was what she had calcted it would take for her to cover her room in the Amber Crystal Spiritual Metal and change her furniture to also use it¡­ n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Wait¡­ You were nning on using it on something other than an artifact¡­?"


    "Th-that doesn''t matter! What''s important is that you didn''t agree to my request back then!"


    Whoosh~


    Feeling like he was about to get a headache thinking about what she could possibly use such arge amount of spiritual metal for, Elder Song slowly took out amunication talisman from his interspatial ring.


    "Mui, I really didn''t want to do this, but we can''t have you harassing the elders of the cksmithing hall all the time¡­ So¡­ From today onwards, I will inform your master to keep an eye on you and make sure you don''t cause any more trouble for those elders of the cksmithing hall.


    "Huh? Noooo!"


    Hearing what Elder Song said and seeing him take out themunication talisman from his interspatial ring, Mui finally realized that the situation was far more serious than she had imagined as she understood that Elder Song was serious in punishing for her constant harassment of the elders from the cksmithing Hall.


    Well¡­ It wasn''t really a punishment, but more so Elder Song informing her master to keep an eye on her and stop her from causing problems for the elders of the cksmithing Hall.


    Although it wouldn''t seriously affect her so to speak, it would definitely make her lose one of her precious resources gathering spots, as she didn''t dare to do the same thing as before knowing that her master might be watching her.


    Not just because she essentially stole from the elders of the sect, but because it was embarrassing to know her master seeing her do something like that to the elders of the sect.


    The only person in the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces she could continue stea- borrowing from with her master watching was her senior brother, Bai Ning!

 Chapter 1275 Hidden Strength?

    Chapter 1275 Hidden Strength?


    Learning about the recent adventures of his youngest disciple, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly to himself as he put away hismunication talisman.


    Although he knew that she had been rather active inside the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces to gather materials for the different artifacts she had been presenting to him and showing off in the sect, he had never thought that she would be specifically targeting the elders of the sect in charge of guarding the spiritual metal of the cksmithing Hall.


    Even though she hadn''t really caused any real damage so to speak and only ended up making Elder Song work a bit longer than normal to deal with the eldersing to him forpensation, it wasn''t that good for his reputation inside the sect to have this little menace running around stealing other people''s things without any proper punishment.


    Not to mention, Elder Song was already overworked, so anything that could lessen his burden a bit and allow him to focus more of his time on cultivating was a good thing. Although Xuan Hao doubted that he would spend this extra time to cultivate. Instead, he felt it was more likely that he would be using the time on some kind of new project rted to the strengthening of the sect.


    Hm¡­ Now that I think about it, it should be time for recruiting new disciples soon, I wonder if there will be anyone among them with a high talent. Outside of that, there should be quite a few talented ones entering the sect due to the interspatial rings I scattered all over the ce, though they aren''t enough to be taken in as personal disciples, they should at least be able to help improve the level of the new disciples.


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help looking forward to the next disciple selection of the sect. Not just due to the possibility of a new personal disciple, but also due to the fact that the overall strength of the disciples should be increasing by another level.


    After all, so far, outside a few exceptions like Lu Wen and a few other disciples. Most of the sect''s disciples were far below his own disciples in terms of strength.


    Even if they also grew a lot after the Star Shattering Sect was established, they were still far below the disciples and younger generation of therger powers on the continent.


    Just take Chu Li that he had encountered during his time in the Blue Sea Empire as an example, he should be part of the younger generation of the Blue Sea Empire but had already reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm!


    Compared to him, even his own disciples seemed a bitcking at the moment as the strongest among them were still in the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Indeed¡­ I can''t underestimate the strength of these major powers¡­ Who knows how many talented youths like Chu Li exist in arge empire like the Blue Sea Empire? Although he should be older than Chu Yang and the rest by at least a hundred or so years, it''s still an amazing cultivation speed." Muttering this to himself as he remembered Chu Li from the East Sea Army of the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head as he thought about the different major powers on the continent.


    Only now realizing that the strength of these major powers was still aplete mystery to him.


    He might have learnt that these major powers were supported by several ancestors in the Celestial Immortal Realm. Allowing them to control the central part of the continent where the spiritual qi and cultivation resources were the most abundant.


    But was that truly the case? Did they really have no idea about the Dao Seed Realm and the Profound Immortal Realm beyond that? Could they have hidden the existence of even more powerful ancestors in the Profound Immortal Realm?


    As he felt his mind drifting while pondering over the true extent of power hidden inside the different major powers, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    Considering how long some of the different major powers had been around, it wouldn''t be odd for them to have had people who managed to reach the Profound Immortal Realm.


    On the other hand, it would be strange that none of them had ever tried to go beyond the Celestial Immortal Realm in their long history. Especially considering that they should have found knowledge about the realms above through the countless ancient ruins, mystic realms and secret realms from the ancient era that was scattered across the continent.


    Not to mention, there were also the different religious empires that should have knowledge about the past, who might have traded information with the different major powers on the continent throughout their long history. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    All things considered; Xuan Hao found it difficult to believe that the strongest existence behind these major powers was someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm like they imed to the rest of the world.


    In a sense, simr to the Star Shattering Sect that outwardly had only imed to have someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, but in actual fact actually had someone in the Dao Seed Realm guarding the sect.


    Then again, there was a major difference between someone in the Dao Seed Realm and the Profound Immortal Realm.


    For the different major powers to have someone in the Profound Immortal Realm, they should also have had a brilliant genius in the Dao Seed Realm that far surpassed anyone else during his time.


    Hm¡­ A genius far beyond his peers in terms of strength while in the Dao Seed Realm, I should properly start investigating the different major powers looking for information about someone like that throughout the history of these major powers.


    Narrowing both his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao took out hismunication talisman and contacted Elder Dust Fairy.


    Although her informationwork wasn''t that extensive outside the boundaries of the Star Shattering Sect, he didn''t really need the information in the short term as the Star Shattering Sect was still far from confronting any of the major powers on the continent and was still in the process of secretly growing stronger while avoiding detection from the nearby Blue Sea Empire.


    At the same time, he also thought that this would be a good task to encourage Elder Dust Fairy to work hard on expanding her informationwork into the nearby blue Sea Empire in the future.


    Even though it would be a difficult task to aplish considering the different safety measures of the Blue Sea Empire that directly dealt with unknown people entering their territory, Xuan Hao felt confident that she would be able to find some way around the problem. Especially considering how she had managed to expand and establish the informationwork inside the Onyx Empire during the turmoil caused by the demonic cultivators.


    Maybe, she would be able to make use of simr methods in the future if the demonic cultivators began attacking the Blue Sea Empire, but¡­ Demonic cultivators attacking the Blue Sea Empire head on would also mean aplete shift in the battle between the demonic cultivators and normal cultivators. Possibly involving existences above the Dao Seed Realm!


    "Hm? Now that I think about it, it should be about time for the Blue Sea Empire to send out people to deal with the surge in demonic cultivators. Although toote to save the Onyx Empire, they should drive the demonic cultivators back to the Frozen Wastnds¡­


    Maybe this is a chance for the Star Shattering Sect to expand into the chaotic Onyx Empire? Given the recent breakthroughs of the elders, we should have enough people to expand a bit." Saying this as he once again turned his attention towards hismunication talisman, Xuan Hao silently apologized to Elder Song in his head before contacting the old man.


    Having just believed that he had escaped from arge amount of work by setting his naughty little disciple in order, he was about to get a lot more work¡­


    Of course, the old man could always delegate some of this work to his subordinates, but doing so would "lower the quality of the work" in his own words.


    Although the new management elders had helped lower Elder Song''s workload by quite a bit, they still hadn''t reached a level that made Elder Song confident in having them take on some of the more important tasks of the sect that involved expansion and resources management.


    Well¡­ Almost everyone, there was one who excelled among the management elders helping Elder Song, a young man from the Half spirit Race who seemed to have been specially nurtured by Elder Song.


    Regarding that young man, he should be the one whom Elder Song wanted to promote as a possible sessor in the future, though it was doubtful whether Elder Song would ever retire¡­

 Chapter 1276 Information on the Immortal Dreamer

    Chapter 1276 Information on the Immortal Dreamer


    As she received the task of finding out more about geniuses in the Dao Seed Realm among the different major powers on the continent from Xuan Hao, Elder Dust Fairy remained speechless for a long period of time before she set out to try and find the information that had been requested from Xuan Hao.


    Even though she understood that her current informationwork was far from strong or wide enough to gather information on the different major powers on the continent, she still decided to see if she could find something with her current limited capabilities. After all, she didn''t try to find anything damaging to the different major powers and was just seeking information on powerful Dao Seed Realm cultivators or Earth Immortal Realm cultivators so to speak.


    Surprisingly, this approach did allow her to gather some information on some figures that fit into the category, with the most surprising among these figures being someone she and the rest of the people of the Star Shattering Sect had heard about before. The Immortal Dreamer, who had awoken the Immortal Dream Physique and surpassed what they now understood to be the Domain Lord Realm.


    Apparently, this figure had not disappeared, but had apparently been recruited to join the Blue Sea Empire due to his overwhelming and unique talent. In the end, he had refused this and ended up being chased down by the Blue Sea Empire for unknown reasons.


    More information about what happened afterwards was close to impossible to find in her current scope of operation, but Elder Dust Fairy still managed to figure out that the chasested for hundreds of years and had allowed the Immortal Dreamer to break through to the Dao Seed Realm before bing a figure that no Dao Seed Realm cultivator could fight.


    What happened after that, she couldn''t find out, but guessed that the Immortal Dreamer might have ended up drawing the attention of one of the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestors of the Blue Sea Empire.


    In the end, after reporting this information to Xuan Hao, Elder Dust Fairy didn''t waste any time as she sped up the integration of the informationwork in the Onyx Empire. Hoping to spread her informationwork into the Blue Sea Empire as fast as possible so she could get some idea about what ended up happening to the Immortal Dreamer, as she herself had be quite curious about this person.


    Even more so after hearing a few rumors regarding that personprehending the mysterious Dao of Time. After all, the Dao of Time and what happened to those whoprehended it was a mystery she had long since learnt about since her informationwork spread out into the chaotd of what had once been the Sky Empire and the now demonic territory of the quickly falling Onyx Empire.


    Outside of the Immortal Dreamer that had fully managed to grab Elder Dust Fairy''s attention, there were also a few others who fit the criteria set by Xuan Hao, but none of them seemed to reach the level that would put them at the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm with the possibility of reaching the Profound Immortal Realm. Only the Immortal Dreamer had seemed to fit those criteria so far.


    Even then, Xuan Hao was still surprised that Elder Dust Fairy had managed to find so many people that had surpassed the level of what was considered the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm on the Ewaria Continent. Making him feel more certain that there should be someone inside these different major powers that had managed to reach the Profound Immortal Realm during their many years of existence.


    "I really need to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced over his current strength as shown by the system, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that he needed to improve his strength.


    After all, he currently had 14yers around his Dao Seed. Although it could be considered strong and put him at the same level as someone in the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm or the Half Bloom Stage of the Earth Immortal Realm, he was still far from the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm that he guessed required him to reach the Radiant Bloom Stage that required 36yers around his Dao Seed.


    Let alone facing the potential Profound Immortal Realm cultivators that might be hidden inside these major powers, he was still far too weak to face the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators that served as the strongest power on the surface of these major powers.


    Not to mention, all of the major powers had more than just one person at the Celestial Immortal Realm, with a weaker major power like the Astorion Empire where Chun Hua''s family was located having three Celestial Immortal Realm ancestors as one of the weakest major powers in the core of the continent.


    "Maybe I should go back to the mystic realm of the Mirage Sect to try and see if I can find out more about the Dao Domain Lord Realm now that I''m stronger. At the same time, I could also take that Su Wuhan with me and help Elder Dust Fairy hide him from the experts of the Blue Sea Empire¡­" Narrowing both his eyes as he said this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help ncing in the direction of the Flying Sword Sect where one of the entrances to the Mystic Realm of the ancient Mirage Sect was located.


    Now that he had the robe of the elder and had been recognized as the owner of the robe, he could freely enter the mystic realm without having to worry about the barrier that prevented anyone above the Nascent Soul Realm from entering the Mystic Realm.


    At the same time, he could also lend Elder Dust Fairy a hand in hiding away Su Wuhan, whom she had repeatedly asked him for help in hiding since learning about the Blue Sea Empireing to sweep through the area to deal with any demonic cultivators inside what they perceived to be their border territory for preventing the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnd from directly bordering the Blue Sea Empire itself. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Although he didn''t really care too much about Su Wuhan after he had given him to Elder Dust Fairy, he didn''t mind lending her a hand in helping keep Su Wuhan save after all the hard work she had done for the sect. Especially so with her recent exploits of somehow managing to find some of the information he wanted when he thought it would be impossible for her to do so in such a short period of time.


    "But¡­ I also promised Elder Song to look after Mui and teach her how to behave¡­" Remembering what he had promised Elder Song just as he was about to leave to pick up Su Wuhan and head for the mystic realm of the Mirage Sect, Xuan Hao came to stop.


    Whoosh~


    Soon enough, his divine sense spread across the sect to find Mui. Soon finding the little girl in the process of building something that he couldn''t describe with words, a somewhat downcast expression on her face as she still seemed affected by what Elder Song had told her earlier about not stealing.


    Listening to what she was saying muttering to herself while creating the hard to describe object or artifact, Xuan Hao managed to pierce together that it seemed to be something for the cksmiths of the cksmithing Hall. Apparently, an apology gift of sorts for the spiritual metal she had borrowed from them over the past few months for her unique creations and artifacts.


    "Guess I should take her with me after she finishes that¡­ Thing¡­"Not knowing what else to call the thing that Mui was in the process of creating, Xuan Hao decided that he was going to take the little girl with him to the mystic realm after she finished the thing she was in the process of creating.


    Luckily, there was still some time left before the day that the cultivators from the Blue Sea empire would show up to sweep through the empires and kingdoms bordering the Frozen Wastnd. Giving him some time to wait for Mui to finish her apology gift for the cksmith residing in the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces before leaving with her.


    At this point in time, he was just hoping that whatever apology gift this little girl ended up creating wouldn''t end up bringing more harm than good, something that was hard to guarantee with her record.


    At the very least, he would be watching over her during the next few days. More than ready to jump in and salvage the situation in case something really ended up going wrong with the strange thing she was in the process of creating for the cksmiths.


    Hopefully, if it did go wrong, the power of the thing wouldn''t exceed the Dao Seed Realm¡­

 Chapter 1277 Magical Furnace

    Chapter 1277 Magical Furnace


    Continuing to work on the thing that she wanted to use to try and apologize to the cksmithing elders that she had stolen spiritual metal from over the past few months, Mui disappeared from the surface of the sect. Making many of the disciples and elders wonder where she had gone.


    However, Mui didn''t care about any of this as she continued her work on what slowly shaped out to be some kind ofrge furnace mainly made up from the red and blue colored spiritual metal, she had taken from the two cksmithing elders who had blocked her path into the spiritual metal storage of the cksmithing Hall.


    "Finished!" After close to two weeks going by with Mui using all of the spiritual metal she had on her, the furnace was officially finished, as she didn''t waste any time in dragging the massive object into the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces where she ced it directly in the middle of the ce before leaving after informing the confused elder in charge of the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces.


    In the end, he could only call a group of fellow cksmithing elders to examine the strange furnaces that had been brought over by Mui. After all, as someone from the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces, he was well aware of the possible danger hidden in the things created by Mui.


    Although the strange furnaces didn''t seem dangerous at first nce and hadn''t done anything as of yet, one could never be too sure when it came to something made by Mui.


    "My Water Stream Spiritual Metal!"


    "Ah!? The Red Spirit Crystal Metal!?"


    Arriving along with the rest of the elders who had shown up to inspect this creation that had been left behind by Mui, the two cksmithing elders who had recently lost their spiritual metal to Mui instantly realized that the mainponents of the furnace in front of them was none other than their former spiritual metal. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Hm? Now that you say it, isn''t that my Amber Dust Metal in there as well."


    "My Hard Scale Iron is also in there!"


    "Ah! I also see my¡­"


    Following the first two cksmithing elders recognizing their own spiritual metal inside the furnace that Mui had left behind in the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces, it didn''t take long before the rest of the cksmithing elders present realized that the spiritual metal Mui had taken from them was also present inside therge furnace.


    "Is this perhaps what she had been gathering spiritual metal for¡­?"


    "Who knows, but we should at least test it out and see if it''s dangerous."


    Not long after this realization, the cksmithing elders became less cautiouspared to before, as the first few among them began expressing their desire for testing out the furnace. Even petitioning to be the first among the group to test it out and ensure its safety-


    Fwooosh-!


    Soon enough resulting in the first among the cksmithing elders stepping out to test out the furnace brought in by Mui, as the spiritual mes of the cksmithing elder soon entered the furnaces and heated it up.


    Rumble~


    However, different from what would happen under normal circumstances, the spiritual me didn''t just enter the furnace, but was instead enhanced by the furnace as it passed through it. Allowing it to reach a far higher temperature, while at the same time making it easier to control and adjust as needed inside the furnace.


    At the same time, it also seemed like the furnace was partially guiding him in how to improve his control and forging after the spiritual metal was ced inside of it and he began crafting a rtively simple Mortal Grade Artifact for testing purposes.


    "This¡­!"


    Realizing just how useful the furnace was in improving his cksmithing skills and me control, the cksmithing elder testing out the furnace could not help showing a somewhat shocked expression on his face. Instantly realizing just how magical the furnace in front of him was.


    Not to mention allowing a higher sess chance in refining higher grade artifacts, the furnace also seemed to be subtly guiding him in the Dao of cksmithing as he continued using it to craft an artifact. Suggesting possible improvements.


    "Huh? Is something wrong with the furnace?" Seeing the surprised expression on the testing cksmithing elder''s face, the rest of the cksmithing elders who had been paying attention to him from the side could not help asking. Clearly worried that the furnace might blow up or cause something strange to happen.


    "No! Not at all! Instead¡­" Shaking his head vigorously, the cksmithing elder didn''t waste any time as he directly told the rest of the cksmithing elders about the magical use of the furnace. Soon causing all of these cksmithing elders to grow excited as they all rushed up to try the furnace for themselves. Wanting to see if it would be able to help them step into the Master Realm and be Master cksmiths.


    After all, the fact that only Bai Ning, a disciple, had managed to reach the Master Realm so far, was a rather embarrassing thing for these elders.


    Now that a chance for them to break through to the Master Realm had presented itself, all of them grew excited and wanted to try it out for themselves.


    The bad reputation that Mui had managed to garner for herself among these cksmithing elders over the past few months was instantly swept away when faced with the magical furnace. Especially considering that most of these elders noticed some of the spiritual metal Mui had taken from them inside this furnace.


    In the end, these cksmithing elders concluded that Mui had gathered the spiritual metal from them with the simple purpose of creating the furnace in front of them to help their cksmithing skills improve.


    None of them cared about what had happened in the past when faced with such a magical furnace that could allow their cksmith skills to improve and guide them intoprehending the Dao of cksmithing. After all, the main reason they had gathered precious and rare spiritual metal in the first ce, was to try and forge something that would allow them toprehend the Dao of cksmithing and break into the Master Realm.


    Now that these rare and precious spiritual metals had been used for something that could help them achieve their original goal, they all felt thankful to Mui. Even feeling bad about how badly they had treated her in the past without knowing about just what she had been secretly doing for them.


    "I really misjudged that little girl!"


    "Me too, I will go to Elder Songter and give back thepensation I got from him and ask him to deliver it to that little girl!"


    "Yeah! This furnace is more than enough to help us in reaching the Master Realm. Giving that little girl the extra spiritual metal we got from Elder Song is a good idea! Who knows she might create another furnace like this for us in the future!"


    "True! I will go over immediately and thank her with my Spirit River Crystals!"


    As the cksmithing elders all felt emotional over the furnace that Mui had created for them even though they had chased her away whenever they saw her trying to take any spiritual metal from the cksmithing Hall or somewhere else, it didn''t take long for them toe to consensus of sending over the spiritual metal that they had received as apensation from Elder Song.


    Not just with the hope that she would create something useful for the cksmithing Hall again in the future, but also to repay her for the hard work she had put into the massive furnace now ced at the center of the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces. All of them believing that she should have taken months to create the furnaces in front of them.


    ¡­


    "Well¡­ This worked out well, I guess?" Not knowing what to say upon seeing the emotional cksmithing elders praising his naughty little disciple who had essentially just thrown together whatever spiritual metal she had on her to create the furnaces praised to the high heavens by them, Xuan Hao could only shake his head helplessly as he decided not to interfere.


    As long as the cksmithing elders were happy, he wouldn''t be one to jump in and badmouth his own disciple. Especially when they were going to give her enough spiritual metal to keep her preupied for the next few months.


    "After they give their thanks, I should get going to the mystic realm of the Mirage Sect or it might be toote for that Su Wuhan to escape notice before the people from the Blue Sea Empire show up." Muttering this to himself as he nced in the direction of his youngest disciple who was about to get swarmed by the happy cksmithing elders, Xuan Hao stood up before disappearing in the direction of the border where the winged lion demon beast and Su Wuhan were located.


    Intending to pick up Su Wuhan while Mui was thanked by these elders.

 Chapter 1278 Leaving for the Mystic Realm

    Chapter 1278 Leaving for the Mystic Realm


    Setting off for the borders of the sect to pick up Su Wuhan, Xuan Hao didn''t waste much time as he directly used the Dao of Space to appear in front of the other party before grabbing him and returning to the sect before the person in question had time to react to what was happening.


    "Wha-!? W-where is this!?"


    By the time Su Wuhan came to again and began to observe his surroundings, he realized that he was in apletely different ce with all of his cultivation being sealed without him even noticing.


    Soon resulting in Su Wuhan cautiously taking in his new surroundings. Soon resulting in him spotting Xuan Hao sitting on the ground not too far away. Already focused onprehending the Dao of Space as he was waiting for the cksmithing elders and Mui to finish things up on their side before moving to the mystic realm of the Mirage Sect.


    This¡­ That person from back then¡­


    Recognizing Xuan Hao as the terrifying existence who had essentially forced him to be an unwilling servant of Elder Dust Fairy, Su Wuhan felt himself rxing ever so slightly. Understanding that the other party shouldn''t have taken him away to kill him, as he had done quite well in helping Elder Dust Fairy over the past few months and was still in the process ofpleting several tasks on her behalf.


    If not for that, he would have been far more panicked at this point in time. Especially considering that a part of him had begun to worry about the Star Shattering Sect behind the person in front of him killing him off to ensure that the Star Shattering Sect wouldn''t end up getting targeted for housing demonic cultivators by the Blue Sea Empire when they swept through the ce in another few months.


    Whoosh~


    Standing there awkwardly for another few minutes, Su Wuhan was about to say something to try and figure out why he had suddenly been taken away to a strange room and had his cultivation base sealed, when Xuan Hao who had been sitting silently in front of him suddenly disappeared. Leaving him all alone to stare nkly around the empty room without knowing what to do.


    Even if a part of him wanted to leave the room and explore where he was, his cultivation base had been sealed and he feared that leaving the room without allowance could result in the terrifying figure who had brought him to the room in the first ce killing him.


    Whoosh~


    Luckily for Su Wuhan, he didn''t have to wait for more than half an hour before Xuan Hao returned with a certain little girl in tow¡­ And without exining anything to him, Xuan Hao once again grabbed Su Wuhan before leaving the Star Shattering Sect.


    The only difference from the first time around was the fact that he now also carried a little girl along with him as they headed towards a ce that Su Wuhan would be forced to call home for the foreseeable future.


    ¡­


    Arriving at the entrance to the mystic realm of the Mirage Sect together with Mui and Su Wuhan, Xuan Hao used the power inside the robe he had gotten from the elder of the Mirage Sect back during his first visit to mystic realm and created a passage through the protective formation for them to pass through. Avoiding the maximum cultivation limit ced on the formation guarding the entrance of the mystic realm all together.


    "This is¡­ A mystic Realm?" Only now realizing what kind of ce they had entered, Su Wuhan who had remained quiet so far, could not help showing a surprised expression on his face as he looked around the underground space, they now found themselves inside.


    Whoosh-!


    However, before he could get a chance to marvel over the fact that he had managed to enter a mystic realm, Xuan Hao used his dao domain to seal him away in a corner next to the entrance of the mystic realm. Making full use of his not so recentlyprehended Dao of Formations to do this.


    Although he had taken Su Wuhan to the mystic realm for the purpose of him hiding away while the people from the Blue Sea Empire swept through the ce. Killing any demonic cultivators they spotted along the way. There was no way he would allow him to just roam around inside the mystic realm on his own. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Not to mention the fact that there should be things inside the mystic realm that could allow him to rapidly improve his strength and possibly break free from the seal he had ced on him, there were also several things that could kill him if he carelessly wandered around the ce.


    Even with his current strength in the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, beingparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, he didn''t feel confident in his own safety inside the mystic realm of the Mirage Sect, let alone someone who had only just recently broken through to the True Demon Realm¡­


    "Master, are we going to leave that person here?" Not aware of who Su Wuhan was and only seeing him being pushed to a corner of the underground space by her master, Mui could not help innocently looking up at her master as she tilted her head cutely to the side with a curious expression on her face.


    "This¡­ He is going to keep an eye on the entrance to the mystic realm while we go inside and explore the ce."


    "I see! So, he''s like one of those gate guards watching the gates of the Falling Star City."


    "¡­"


    Deciding that it would properly be best for him to remain silent, Su Wuhan helplessly nodded his head when faced with the questioning look of the little girl.


    Yep, it had nothing to do with the rather intense stare that the person standing beside this little girl was giving him, yep, absolutely nothing to do with that.


    "Let''s get going, we don''t need to waste our time around the entrance, the outside of this underground space is far more exciting. Not to mention, there is also all kinds of rare metals and other things for you to collect."


    "Huh!? Really!?"


    "Yes."


    "Yay!"


    Ignoring the overjoyed Mui as his attention remained fully focused on Xuan Hao, Su Wuhan nervously watched as the two disappeared in the direction of what he assumed to be a way out of the underground space he now found himself inside of after being forced into the mystic realm.


    Only able to let out a sigh of relief after the two of them had fully disappeared from his limited divine sense that only barely covered a few hundred meters around himself in his current state.


    Even then, he didn''tin about his condition that was no different from a trapped animal unable to do anything but observe his surroundings.


    After all, it didn''t take a genius to understand that the reason why he had been dragged along and ced inside the mystic realm by Xuan Hao was due to the fact that the cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire would soon be sweeping through the kingdoms and empires close to the Frozen Wastnd.


    In a sense, he felt happy knowing that the Star Shattering Sect at least valued him enough to find a ce to hide him away and keep him alive instead of just discarding him when the people from the Blue Sea Empire appeared.


    Although he understood that his current position in the Star Shattering Sect still wasn''t really anything more than a useful demonic cultivator, he at least felt like he saw some hope in turning his own situation around if he continued working hard for that Elder Dust Fairy who was watching over him and putting him to work.


    At least, whenpared to what awaited him back in the Frozen Wastnd or the demonic sect that had been behind him bing a demonic cultivator in the first ce, Su Wuhan felt that it was far better for him to stay inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    Outside of that, there was also the option of trying to run away after the seal ced on his soul disappeared or he found some way to remove it, but he had a feeling that doing something like that would result in the demonic sect that had been secretly nurturing himing after him.


    Thinking about his current situation as he had nothing better to do while being stuck inside the vast empty underground space of the mystic realm, Su Wuhan realized that staying with the Star Shattering Sect might be his only way of staying alive, as the Star Shattering Sect itself should be what kept the demonic sect that had been secretly nurturing him from going after him for the past few months.


    After all, they should have noticed that the person they had sent to get him had been killed.


    The only reason they hadn''t sought him out after that, should be because they felt cautious about the Star Shattering Sect that was the most likely suspect in the disappearance of their True Demon Realm cultivator.

 Chapter 1279 Snake Turtle Demon Beast vs Mui

    Chapter 1279 Snake Turtle Demon Beast vs Mui


    Leaving behind Su Wuhan to stay in a corner of the underground space next to the entrance of the mystic realm, Xuan Hao carried Mui along with him as he made his way out of the underground space an on to what could be considered the surface of the mystic realm where he had encountered the entrance to the celestial trial that ultimately allowed him to meet with the now dead elder of the Mirage Sect.


    "Master! What is that over there!?" As Xuan Hao was reminiscing about the short meeting he had with the elder from the Mirage Sect before his unfortunate passing, Mui excitedly called out next to him as she pointed towards therge forest that spread out before them- Or to be more urate, therge strange looking demon beast that happened to have made its way out of the forest just as the two of them emerged from the underground space connected to the passage leading to the Flying Sword Sect.


    "Hm¡­ It should be a turtle demon beast mixed with some kind of snake demon beast? I really can''t tell what kind of demon beast this is¡­" Trying to identify this strange looking demon beast that had the body of a snake with a turtle shell and a turtle head with a snake tongue sticking out of its mouth, Xuan Hao could only give up, as he had never seen a demon beast like that before.


    "Even master doesn''t know what kind of demon beast it is! It must be really impressive¡­" Hearing her master''s words, Mui could not help looking towards the strange demon beast filled with a sense of admiration.


    Although she had no clue how strong the demon beast was as it was still too far away for her to sense with her divine sense, Mui felt certain that a demon beast even her master couldn''t recognize was sure to be some kind of impressive and rare demon beast.


    Well¡­ It''s not really that strong¡­


    Not knowing what to say in response to his little disciple''s heartfelt admiration, Xuan Hao could only shake his head as he looked towards the turtle snake demon beast that was only around the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Ah, Mui, do you want to try and fight the snake turtle demon beast?" Suddenly getting an idea as he examined the snake turtle demon beast staring at them threateningly from afar, Xuan Hao turned to ask Mui as he wanted to try and use this strange demon beast to train her.


    Though the difference in strength between the two of them was three minor realms, with Mui''s strange metal balls, she should be more than strong enough to face the strange snake turtle demon beast.


    "Really!? Is it not too strong for me¡­?"


    "No, it''s only in the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm."


    "Eighth Stage of the¡­ Nascent Soul Realm? Hm¡­ I guess it must be a juvenile snake turtle demon beast¡­" Muttering thest bit to herself, Mui ultimately took out a few of the metal balls that she was always carrying around with her inside of her interspatial ring before charging towards the snake turtle demon beast in the distance.


    ROAR!


    In response, the snake turtle demon beast let out a ferocious roar before charging out to meet the rapidly approaching Mui filled with killing intent. Not showing the slightest bit of care towards Xuan Hao who was standing not too far away.


    The main reason for this nonexistent care being that Xuan Hao had deliberately concealed his own strength and revealed a cultivation base around the Core Formation Realm. Although this kind of deliberate concealment would only work at those below the Domain Lord Realm, it was more than enough to fool this demon beast and allow it to fully focus on its fight with Mui instead of running away.


    If it had been in the Domain Lord Realm, he would either have to show off a cultivation base at the Domain Lord Realm or fully hide himself if he didn''t want to reveal his Dao Domain Lord Realm cultivation base¡­


    Bang!


    "Ah!?"


    shing with the snake turtle demon beast the next moment, Mui was instantly pushed back as her strength at the Fifth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm proved too weak to face the snake turtle demon beast head on. Forcing her to use one of the metal balls now floating around her to smash into the snake turtle demon beast-


    BANG!


    Roar?!


    Hit by one of Mui''s metal balls, the snake turtle demon beast was instantly knocked flying in a state of confusion, as it couldn''tprehend how such a small and unassuming metal ball carried enough force to directly overwhelm its defense in an instant before knocking flying.


    Whoosh-!


    However, before it had time to recover from the shock of being knocked flying, another metal ball came flying towards it at a terrifying speed.


    FWOOOOSH-!


    Not just that, but the metal ball had somehow managed to transform into a giant fireball that carried a powerparable to the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. Making the poor snake turtle demon beast feel a shiver run down its spine as it did everything in its power to try and block the massive ball of fire-


    BOOOM-!


    Unfortunately, even when using all of its strength and hiding inside of therge shell on its back, the snake turtle demon beast was unable to fully negate the power of the fireball as it exploded upon contact and caused severalrge cracks to spread across the turtle shell.


    "So tough!" Seeing that the turtle shell had managed to endure her attack, Mui showed a somewhat surprised look on her face before her eyes started shining. "I will have to work hard if I want to break that shell!" And along with those words, Mui directly threw out three different metal balls in the direction of the snake turtle demon beast after pouring arge amount of her spiritual qi into them.


    Rumble-!


    Roar¡­?


    As a result, the snake turtle demon beast just managed to poke its head out of its shell before it came saw three metal balls hurling towards it, one having transformed into some kind of giant metal ball, another into an icy spike ball, while a third created a mist of corrosive poisonous mist that melted anything it passed through along the way.


    Roar!


    Realizing the deadly situation, it found itself in, the snake turtle demon beast quickly hid inside of its shell again, as it prepared itself for an even more terrifying attack. Not daring to try and escape, as it knew doing so would mean having to face those terrifying attacks without the protection of its shell.


    Boom-!


    Not a secondter, the three metal ballsnded on the shell of the snake turtle demon beast. Marking the start of what would be a rather painful experience¡­


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    "This is a rather one-sided fight¡­" Muttering this to himself as he watched the battle between Mui and the snake turtle demon beast from afar, Xuan Hao could not help wryly smiling to himself.


    To call it a fight wasn''t fair, as it was just Mui using the different metal balls under her control to subject the poor snake turtle demon beast to all kinds of torturous attacks¡­ And to make things worse, when its suffering was about to end, Mui ended up identally using a metal ball that healed part of the snake turtle demon beast''s injuries. Extending the time of the one-sided beating¡­.


    Well¡­ At least it seems like Mui is having fun. Not to mention, her control over those strange metal balls has been growing more skilled during the battle. Resulting in her now being able tobine the strange powers of several metal balls to create even more terrifying attacks.


    Thinking this to himself as he watched Mui skillfully use fire-based and wind-based metal balls to create arge inferno that engulfed the barely intact turtle shell of the snake turtle demon beast, Xuan Hao smiled happily to himself over the progress of his disciple. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    As long as it was useful to her bing stronger, Xuan Hao was more than happy letting Mui continue fighting the snake turtle demon beast. Especially considering that Mui didn''t have muchbat experience.


    In a sense, Mui''s first visit to the mystic realm was way differentpared to how Chu Yang and Qing Yi had first experienced the mystic realm. Having grown familiar with the forest by having to run for their life most of the time inside of it or try and hide from powerful demon beast roaming around inside of the forest.


    Hm? Now that I think about it, a demon beast in the Nascent Soul Realm should be hard to find at the outer edges of the forest, I wonder if something happened since thest time I was here with those two or its just one of the demon beasts that chased after those two back then¡­


    Narrowing both his eyes as he suddenly realized how odd it was for a Nascent Soul Realm demon beast to be at the edge of the forest, Xuan Hao closed his eyes as he momentarily focused his full attention on extending his divine sense out into the forest.

 Chapter 1280 Can A Nascent Soul Realm Cultivator Fly?

    Chapter 1280 Can A Nascent Soul Realm Cultivator Fly?


    As his divine sense spread out into the forest, Xuan Hao didn''t take long to notice that there were more than just a few demon beasts in the Nascent Soul Realm gathered around the outer parts of the forest. Not just that, but he even noticed a few stronger demon beasts in the Domain Lord Realm among them.


    The weaker demon beasts in the forest in the Core Formation Realm and below were also present, but they had long since hidden themselves. Most of them had gone below ground into small dens or tunnels where they could hide from the divine sense of the demon beast up above with the help of theyer of earth between them and the surface.


    Of course, this kind of hiding method would only work against those demon beasts in the Nascent Soul Realm whose divine sense weren''t that strong and couldn''t prate far into the ground. Faced with the Domain Lord Realm demon beasts, they were still clearly visible.


    Even then, the Domain Lord Realm demon beast had no interest in hunting down these weaker demon beasts and would much rather prefer to go after the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts.


    But¡­ Why had all of these powerful demon beasts who were nowhere near the edge of the forest now present at the edge of the forest¡­? n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Thinking about this as his divine sense continued to spread further into the mystic realm, Xuan Hao could not help wondering about this question.


    At the current moment, his main guess as to what had happened was rather simple, a powerful demon beast above the Domain Lord Realm had appeared inside the forest during the time he had been gone from the mystic realm. Scaring the weaker demon beast away.


    Considering that he had indeed sensed a few demon beasts in the Soul Ascension Realm and possibly even the Dao Seed Realm in the deeper regions of the mystic realm during hisst visit, it wasn''t that unrealistic for one of these powerful demon beasts to have wandered out from the inner regions of the mystic realm and into the forest he currently found himself at the edge of.


    Narrowing both his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao pushed his divine sense to its limits. Soon covering the entirety of the forest. Stretching his divine sense to its absolute limit as it now covered an area close to four times the size of the old Heavenly Sky Kingdom.


    Even with his cultivation base in the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, covering such arge area was exhausting. Especially considering that everything inside his divine sense had to be processed by his soul. Putting enormous pressure on his soul to see everything inside the scope of his divine sense.


    Even then, Xuan Hao soon discovered what he was looking for at the other edge of the massive forest.


    The thing in question being the cause for therge number of powerful demon beasts that had appeared at the edge of the forest, a Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast.


    Although it was not in the Dao Seed Realm, it was more than powerful enough to have scared the different Nascent Soul Realm and Domain Lord Realm demon beasts present at the edge of the forest into escaping as far away as possible.


    Even more so when considering that this demon beast at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm seemed to be in the process of breaking through to the Dao Seed Realm. Resulting in the aura surrounding this demon beast being no weaker than that of a demon beast that had already broken through to the Dao Seed Realm.


    "Hm¡­ I guess it shouldn''t havee here because of themotion caused by me and those two leaving the mystic realm back then, but instead because it wanted to find somewhere safe to break through to the Dao Seed Realm." Muttering this to himself as he retracted most of his divine sense and focused his attention on the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast, Xuan Hao didn''t take long toprehend why this powerful demon beast had appeared at the edge of the mystic realm where only Core Formation Realm demon beast and a few Nascent Soul Realm appeared under normal circumstances.


    BOOOM!


    ROAR-!


    Just at this moment, a loud explosion followed by an equally loud roar echoed out not too far away from him, as Mui finally managed to break through the turtle shell of the snake turtle demon beast.


    Roar!


    Now at the mercy of Mui, without any chance to properly defend itself against the terrifying power of her metal balls, it didn''t take long before the snake turtle demon beast was crushed beneath one of the metal balls. Putting an end to its miserable fate of being tortured by Mui without the ability to fight back.


    "Hehe! It''s my win!" Showing a triumphant smile as she proimed this while looking down at the dead snake turtle demon beast, Mui put away her metal balls before jumping over to her master with an expression looking for praise.


    "You did well, but you have to remember that the main reason for your victory this time around was because of your metal balls. Next time around, you should try and fight without using them. Only this way can you enhance yourbat and movement techniques." Knowing what Mui wanted, Xuan Hao smiled slightly as he praised the little girl, while also reminding her to also practice herbat and movement techniques instead of just relying on her special artifacts.


    After all, without a strong enough movement technique it would be easy for her to get caught off guard by the enemy, while being stronger in fighting without the help of artifacts was always a good thing if one found themselves without any way to use these artifacts or they grew too weak to use in the future.


    Even though Xuan Hao doubted that this would be much of a problem for Mui, as it seemed like her artifacts became stronger the stronger, she was, it was also good for her to try and fight without the help of the artifacts, as it could put more pressure on her and help her cultivation grow faster.


    "I understand master!" Nodding her head happily at the praise, Mui wasn''t the slightest bit affected by what her master said. After all, she had already tried fighting without the help of her artifacts against Chu Yang and Chun Hua, something that had indeed helped her cultivation andbat sense grow.


    Although her master hadn''t said it, she understood what he meant by her not using her artifacts to fight.


    "Good, let''s go and find another demon beast for you to fight. This time around, don''t use any of your artifacts and just use thebat techniques you have learnt." Smiling happily upon seeing the look of understanding on Mui''s face, Xuan Hao picked her up with his domain before flying in the direction of another Nascent Soul Realm demon beast not too far away from their current location.


    Even though he had also entered the mystic realm to improve his own strength and try to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he first intended to spend some time training Mui with the help of the different Nascent Soul Realm demon beast present at the edge of the forest before doing so.


    Intending to first get her strong enough that she should be able to explore the outer parts of the mystic realm on her own before leaving to continue exploring the inner parts of the mystic realm.


    The reason he wanted to go to the inner parts of the mystic realm that he had felt too weak to explore before being that he wanted to see if he could find more remnants of the Mirage Sect. Possibly more of the Celestial Trials, as they had proven to be incredibly useful when it came to increasing his strength in the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Not to mention, the Mirage Sect clearly had information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm and searching through the remnants of this once glorious ancient sect might prove useful in finding out more about the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Maybe he might end up running into another elder from the Mirage Sect that had somehow managed to keep himself alive through some mysterious methods like the one who had given him the robe he was currently wearing.


    Thinking about this as he carried Mui through the forest before arriving in front of a rather surprised Nascent Soul Realm demon beast, Xuan Hao concealed his own presence before throwing his little disciple towards the surprised Nascent Soul Realm demon beast who couldn''tprehend how someone had suddenly appeared in the air above it.


    "Maaaasttteeer!" Finding herself suddenly plummeting towards the ground, Mui could not help screaming out for her master in surprise. Not having expected her master to suddenly drop her directly above a demon beast.


    "¡­"


    Oh¡­ Forgot that she couldn''t fly on her own¡­

 Chapter 1281 Training Mui

    Chapter 1281 Training Mui


    Following a rather awkwardnding by Mui who had suddenly been dropped from the sky by her master, it didn''t take long for her to start fighting with the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast that had been too shocked by the strange situation to attack before Mui was already on the ground.


    Being only a single minor realm above Mui, the demon beast should have been losing out considering how an even stronger demon beast had been easily toyed around with by Mui-


    Bang!


    "Wah!?"


    However, given the fact that the one-sided fight earlier had been entirely due to her artifacts, Mui instead ended up losing out when faced with the demon beast an entire minor realm above her. Showing that she wasn''t that skilled when it came to fighting without her artifacts.


    On the other hand, if not for her strong foundation surpassing that of normal Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, she would have long since ended up dead when faced with the demon beast a minor realm above her.


    After all, Mui''s currentbat experience was close to non-existent. Only ever having fought a few battles with her senior brother and sister.


    The only thing that she seemed to excel at was her ability to escape from enemy attacks, an ability she should have learnt while being chased down by the elders of the cksmithing hall in the past.


    Even though this escape ability wasn''t a specific movement technique so to speak, it was still rather efficient and might even evolve into a unique movement technique with enough time.


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    As the fight between Mui and the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast dragged on for the next few hours, Mui who had originally been rather inexperienced when fighting against a demon beast for the first time without the help of her artifacts, had grown to the point of now being able to fight back against the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast.


    Although she was still losing out and was pushed into a corner, she now disyed strength fitting for someone at her cultivation realm.


    Not just that, but her talent for cultivation began to shine at this moment, as she still continued improving even at this point in time.


    With enough time, she would grow beyond the level of an ordinary Fifth Stage Nascent Soul Realm cultivator and would enter the ranks of geniuses capable of fighting those above them.


    Rooar-!


    Unfortunately, her strength had already been weakened to the point where she couldn''t continue fighting back against the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast. Meaning that she didn''t have the time for her to continue improving with the pressure brought by the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast''s constant stream of attacks.


    "Looks like we will have to find another demon beast for her to train with after a quick rest¡­" Muttering this as he observed the fight from above and how Mui''s situation be worse with each passing second, Xuan Hao casually waved his hand as arge icicle materialized above the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast-


    Ptsh-!


    And before the demon beast had any chance to react, the icicle fell directly on top of its head. Instantly killing it before it could mount the slightest bit of resistance.


    "Ah! Master, I could have killed it myself!" Stumbling back in surprise before realizing what had happened, Mui pouted angrily as she stared up towards her master. Feeling like her master had underestimated her and thought she needed help.


    "Sure, you could~ now let''s go and find something to eat. After all, this ce is filled to the brim with all kinds of delicious spiritual fruits." Rolling his eyes as he said this, Xuan Hao decided to turn the conversation towards something different.


    "Spiritual fruits!? Really!?"


    And like expected, Mui took the bait and instantly forgot about how he had killed the demon beast, as her full attention focused on the spiritual fruits he had mentioned.


    "Yes, here are a few I picked up while you were busy fighting with the demon beasts earlier."


    Chuckling to himself after seeing the shift from his little disciple, Xuan Hao casually took out a few spiritual fruits from his interspatial ring before throwing them towards Mui, who happily caught them before chomping down on the first spiritual fruit with an overjoyed expression.


    The demon beast from earlierpletely disappeared from her mind as she indulged in the spirit fruits thrown out by her master.


    "Ah~ That was good~ Hm? Ah! The demon beast! Master, we have to find another demon beast!" Only after finishing thest spiritual fruit did Mui seem to remember the demon beast, as she called out for her master to find a new demon beast for her to fight.


    "Sure, let''s get going then, there are lots of demon beasts for you to fight inside the forest." Inspecting Mui with his divine sense and making sure that the spiritual fruits had done their job of helping her recover from her earlier battle, Xuan Hao once again set off together with Mui. Heading in the direction of the closest demon beast that would be unfortunate enough to end up as Mui''s training partner.


    Reaching the third demon beast, Xuan Hao continued to watch over Mui as she fought below. Using his divine sense to help guide her every now and then as she continued to rapidly improve.


    Soon enough, a few weeks flew by like this, as Xuan Hao watched over Mui while she fought the different Nascent Soul Realm demon beast to improve her own strength and increase herbat experience. Feeding her spiritual fruits after each battle to help her recover her strength.


    At the same time, he also made sure to step in and guide her whenever she needed help in one of her movement- orbat techniques. Ensuring that she could progress without any bottleneck halting her progress. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    In the end, Mui managed to improve to a point where she could fight demon beasts two minor realms ahead of her without losing out, while she could kill demon beasts a minor realm ahead of herself after a long-drawn-out battle.


    Demon beasts who were the same realm as her and below was no match for her, as she could kill them with rtive ease.


    All of this was without her using her artifacts, as if she was using them, no demon beast in the Nascent Soul Realm was a match for her. Even a demon beast in the Domain Lord Realm would end up finding it hard to deal with those strange metal balls, as they seemed to remain unaffected by the normal suppressive power of a domain.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao felt confident in leaving Mui to explore and train around the outer edges of the mystic realm on her own.


    Of course, before leaving her to explore by herself, he made sure to hand her several talismans that contained the power of a single attack of his, while also leaving behind some of his power inside of her soul to protect her in case that wasn''t enough. Also serving as a way to alert him in case she encountered something dangerous and needed his help.


    Outside of that, as he left Mui on her own, he also decided to clean up the forest and the surrounding areas. Killing any demon beasts in the Domain Lord Realm or above to prevent them from causing trouble for Mui while he wasn''t around.


    In the end, this also included the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast that had gone to the edge of the mystic realm to safely break through to the Dao Seed Realm.


    Unfortunately for this demon beast, it might have been safer for it to have stayed in the inner parts of the mystic realm to break through than going to the edges of the mystic realm where it was unfortunate enough to run into Xuan Hao.


    Not that there was much it could do, as Xuan Hao killed it before it even had the time to register what was happening before, he neatly ced its corpse inside an interspatial ring for storage.


    Although the corpse of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast wasn''t worth much to him, it was still filled with countless useful materials that could be used by the cksmiths of the sect and the Beast Tamers of the sect who would happily take the meat for feeding the demon beasts of the sect.


    In a sense, the corpses of powerful demon beasts could be used instead of spirit stones when it came to feeding the demon beasts of the sect, something that had grown moremon as the Star Shattering Sect grew in strength and had more ess to ces where they could procure stronger demon beasts for feeding their own demon beasts.


    Among these ces, the most obvious one was the Grand Mission Pavilion that regrly issued missions for demon beast corpses in exchange for contribution points. Turning it into the biggest contributor of demon beast meat for the sect''s demon beasts.

 Chapter 1282 Leaving Mui on Her Own

    Chapter 1282 Leaving Mui on Her Own


    Having left Mui to continue exploring the forest close to the entrance of the mystic realm on her own, Mui didn''t waste any time as she happily made her way through the forest in search of more Nascent Soul Realm demon beast to hunt down and spiritual fruits for her to eat. Having grown fond of this kind of lifestyle of fighting and eating delicious spiritual fruits after the few weeks she had spent training with her master inside the mystic realm.


    At the very least, for the foreseeable future, Xuan Hao wouldn''t have to worry about Mui using her time on something other than training.


    The only thing he had to worry about after leaving Mui on her own to explore the forest at the edge of the mystic realm was when she finished exploring the forest and began moving deeper into the mystic realm.


    Even if he had informed her about the dangers involved in going too far into the mystic realm where the more powerful demon beasts at the Domain Lord Realm and above resided, he had a feeling that this wouldn''t stop her for long, as her curiosity would ultimately end up winning with enough time


    To stop this from happening, he would have to return before she could finish up the demon beasts inside the forest four times the size of the old Heavenly Sky Kingdom¡­ And although this seemedrge and there were countless demon beasts present inside this forest, Xuan Hao guessed that he would at most have half a year to a year before Mui finished up the demon beasts inside the forest.


    The main reason for this fast clearance being the fact that some of the metal balls she carried along with her could be used for flying at a speedparable to someone in the Domain Lord Realm if she focused her full strength on it.


    With that in mind, the normallyrge size of the forest to someone in the Nascent Soul Realm became something that could easily be traversed in a short period of time.


    Luckily, outside of just the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast that had been left alive before leaving Mui on her own, Xuan Hao had also made sure that there were a few demon beasts in the Half Step Domain Lord Realm that the current Mui couldn''t defeat even with the help of her strange artifacts. Making sure that she wouldn''t be able to steamroll over all of the demon beasts left in the forest and start making her way into the more dangerous inner parts of the mystic realm.


    Of course, even though Mui wouldn''t be able to kill these demon beasts half a step into the Domain Lord Realm, she should be more than capable of escaping from them and keeping herself safe without triggering or using any of the safety measures he had left for her.


    The only w in this n was that the Half Step Domain Lord Realm demon beast might break through to the Domain Lord Realm, posing a real deadly threat to Mui, while other stronger demon beasts could also show up during his absence.


    All things considered, Xuan Hao had done his best in making a good training environment for Mui before leaving and left a few safety measures for her to use in case something ended up going wrong.


    "I really do hope nothing ends up happening¡­" Muttering this to himself as Mui left the coverage of his divine sense, Xuan Hao turned his full attention towards the inner region of the mystic realm. Showing a somewhat cautious expression as he nced across the different powerful demon beast ahead.


    Although not a single one of them had reached the Dao Seed Realm, they were still far stronger on average than back when he had first entered the mystic realm with most of them having reached the Nascent Soul Realm with no small number of Domain Lord Realm demon beasts hidden among them.


    Even the asional Soul Ascension Realm demon beast wasn''t that hard to spot. Essentially confirming that the strength of the demon beasts in the outer parts of the mystic realm had indeed increased.


    The only problem was the reason for this sudden increase in strength among the demon beasts.


    First, it could be what he suspected when he first noticed the increased number of Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts inside the forest that Mui was now exploring on her own, a powerful demon beast had emerged in the inner parts of the mystic realm and had caused the weaker demon beasts to escape into the outer parts of the mystic realm.


    Though this could exin the movement of the demon beasts, it was also a rather worrying thing considering that a Dao Seed Realm demon beast shouldn''t be able to create such arge disturbance. Possibly pointing at the birth of a Celestial Immortal Realm demon beast.


    However, he had already seen what had happened to the cloud demon beast when it revealed its strength at the Dao Seed Realm and was discovered by the guardian formation.


    If not for the fact that he had been lucky enough to escape from the st range of the guardian formation by jumping into one of the celestial trials, he doubted that he would have been able to make it out alive.


    With that in mind, it led him to a second idea of what might have happened¡­ And that conclusion was that a demon beast inside the inner parts of the mystic realm had somehow managed to trigger the guardian formation of the mystic realm into attacking.


    This could either have happened because the demon beast was already in the Dao Seed Realm and identally revealed its aura or perhaps because a new demon beast had broken through to the Dao Seed Realm and ended up triggering the guardian formation in this way.


    Of course, there was also the possibility that one of the demon beasts already in the Dao Seed Realm that had somehow managed to hide from the guardian formation of the mystic realm in a simr way as the cloud demon beast had done, decided to try and break through to the Celestial Immortal Realm. Triggering a possibly even stronger response from the guardian formation.


    If one of these three things had happened, it would make sense why all of the demon beasts that normally resided deeper inside of the mystic realm had decided to venture out and showed no signs of returning from where they hade.


    As for a demon beast sessfully breaking through to the Celestial Immortal Realm or perhaps even the Profound Immortal Realm¡­ Xuan Hao didn''t think that this was possible, as he could clearly still feel that the guardian formation of the mystic realm was intact and full of energy.


    The only reason why it hadn''t descended to kill him with his cultivation reaching a levelparable to someone in the Dao Seed Realm was because he had the robe of the Mirage Sect Elder on.


    If not for that, Xuan Hao had a feeling that he wouldn''t be able to hide his true strength from the formation after entering the mystic realm without seriously restraining his own strength like the cloud demon beast back then. Ultimately ending up in a simr way as the cloud demon beast had after it had revealed its strength at the Dao Seed Realm.


    At the very least, he didn''t feel any real danger inside of the mystic realm knowing that the strongest opponent he would encounter would be in the Soul Ascension Realm, with those above being reduced to ashes by the guardian formation the moment they revealed their strength.


    The only real threat he could think of left inside the mystic realm would be the celestial trials, ancient formations like the one that had trapped him inside the misty mountains for a period of time and remnant of the terrifying power that had attacked the mystic realm and the Mirage Sect in the past.


    Although he hadn''t encountered a lot from the battle that should have taken ce inside the mystic realm in the past, he had a feeling that he would soon end up encountering more scars from the terrifying battle that should have taken ce back then as he continued moving deeper inside the mystic realm.


    At the same time, he also looked forward to encountering more of the celestial trials, as they had been useful in both increasing his strength and triggering a rare quest from the system. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    In a sense, his main reason for going to the mystic realm was to try and find more of the celestial trials that had been left behind by the Mirage Sect for training the younger generation. Especially so because he was still considered part of the younger generation in the eyes of a terrifying ancient sect like the Mirage Sect and could gain a lot from the celestial trials outside of just increasing his strength.

 Chapter 1283 Exploring the First and Second Celestial Trial Again

    Chapter 1283 Exploring the First and Second Celestial Trial Again


    Continuing deeper inside the mystic realm, it didn''t take long before he reached the mist covered mountains where he had first encountered the celestial trials of the Mirage Sect.


    The only differencepared to back when he had been inside of the mist covered mountains being the fact that the entire ce had been blown up as a result of the guardian formation activating to kill the cloud demon beast. Leaving behind only remnants of what had once been there. Leaving only the gates of the three celestial trials standing. Unaffected by the terrifying attack of the guardian formation.


    Deciding to make a stop and investigate the celestial trial gates more closely now that his strength andprehension had increasedpared to thest time he had seen them, Xuan Hao began to sense the power inside of them to no avail.


    Outside of the terrifying spatialws that helped hisprehension of the Dao of Space to some extent, he didn''t manage to gain much from observing the celestial gates, as the concepts that made them up were far beyond anything he could touch with his current understanding of the different Daos involved in the construction of the celestial trial gates.


    Even the little bit rted to the Dao of Space that he could understand only ended up making him more confused, as it suggested that the celestial trial gate was essential connected to countless different spatial passages that all led to different trial spaces... And from what little he knew about the celestial trial; he could only guess that the celestial trial gate would somehow observe his cultivation base and judge on which of these trial spaces to send him to. Resulting in him being sent to the one fitting for his current cultivation base.


    Wait¡­ Does that perhaps mean that I can enter the trial again and challenge a higher difficulty of the trial I alreadypleted?


    Thinking this to himself as he finished learning what little he could from theplicatedws of space of the celestial gate in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes.


    Although he felt tempted to enter the celestial trial in front of him, he also remembered that the trial standing in front of him should be the first celestial trial he had entered back then.


    Meaning that if he had to face the trial again, he would end up face to face with Aria, the guardian of the first trial, again.


    Well¡­ She shouldn''t be that difficult to deal with considering that her main ability involved illusions now that my ownprehension of the Dao of Illusion already reached the Large Sess Realm.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao didn''t hesitate as he stepped forward and entered the gate of the first celestial trial. Feeling curious about what would happen if he entered the same celestial trial twice-


    Whoosh~


    And without much suspense, he soon found himself being shuttled through a spatial channel.


    "Hm? This¡­ Isn''t a trial?"


    However, unexpectedly, he didn''t find himself inside another trial, but instead found himself inside a small space upied by a singlerge building that had long since been destroyed beyond recognition.


    Even then, from the remnants in front of this building and the few familiar-looking golems that had long since ceased to function, he became certain that this should be another exchange hall like the one he had encountered inside the third celestial trial.


    The main difference between the two being that this one obviously hadn''t managed to hold out as well as the one inside the third celestial trial, as it had been more thoroughly destroyed. Leaving little hope for him to find another living Mirage Sect Elder inside.


    Whoosh~


    Of course, Xuan Hao didn''t let this discourage him, as he cautiously began to approach the remnants of what had once been an exchange hall simr to the one in the third celestial trial. Hoping that even if there weren''t anyone still alive inside, some of the secret techniques and other things had survived.


    Unfortunately, as he floated a few centimeters above the ground through the ruins, Xuan Hao was disappointed to discover that none of the techniques of precious materials that should once have been stored inside had managed to survive.


    Even when he reached the ce where the elder of the Mirage Sect should have been, he only found an empty void where the fabric of space had been directly torn apart and had yet to recover from due to the presence of a terrifying power that still lingered around the ce.


    Making the usage of divine sense inside the ruined exchange hall an incredibly dangerous endeavor, as it might result in himing into contact with the terrifying power still lingering around the ce.


    In the end, Xuan Hao ended up spending the good part of two days searching through the remnant of the exchange hall to no avail. Finding nothing but decaying texts or jades that crumbled the moment he touched them, or his divine sense came into contact with them. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Luckily, leaving the space of the exchange hall wasn''t difficult, as the spatial channel that had brought him there was still present close to the entrance of the ruined exchange hall. Allowing him to simply step through it to find himself back outside the gate of the first celestial trial.


    Even more surprising, he found out that entering the gate of the first celestial trial would just end up bringing him back into the space where the ruined exchange hall was located. Making it clear that he could only take on the celestial trial once. Afterwards, he would be redirected to the exchange hall no matter how many times he entered the gate.


    "I should try and see if it''s the same for the two other celestial trials¡­" ncing in the direction of the second celestial trial as he said this, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he flew over and entered the celestial gate of the second celestial trial without any hesitation.


    Soon enough, finding himself inside another small space upied by a single building that was simrly destroyed like the one inside the first celestial trial.


    Another exchange hall.


    The only differencepared to the first being that the second one looked far more intactpared to the first.


    "But¡­ If both of these exchange halls are located inside their own small space, what happened to the third exchange hall for it to have ended up inside one of the trial spaces?" Narrowing both his eyes as he turned to look back in the direction of the spatial channel he had just passed through, Xuan Hao could not help remembering the exchange hall of the third celestial trial that had essentially been buried in the sand of one of the trial spaces.


    If it was just a single exchange hall that was located inside such a small space with only itself present, he could guess that each exchange hall was different, but a second one in a simr situation as the first¡­ He could only guess that something had gone wrong and caused the third exchange hall to somehow end up inside one of the trail spaces.


    Perhaps, it wasn''t something going wrong, but the elder of the Mirage Sect who had deliberately tried to hide inside one of the trial spaces. Considering that he was the only elder in charge of an exchange hall that had managed to survive for so long, it isn''t that unlikely¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this to himself, Xuan Hao soon refocused his attention back on the exchange hall in front of him.


    Given that the exchange hall seemed to be in a far better situation than the first and even the third exchange hall, he felt confident that he should at least be able to find something of value inside of it.


    Hopefully something rted to the Dao Domain Lord Realm or something that could help with hisprehension of the Dao of Space or the other Daos he hadprehended.


    Of course, he wouldn''t be sad finding something rted to the history of the Mirage Sect or ancient records regarding what might have happened to the mystic realm of the Mirage Sect, as anything that could survive from the Ancient Mirage Sect would be useful to him. Especially if it helped his understanding of the ancientnguage improve.


    "Hm?! There is actually something!?"


    Even then, Xuan Hao was still taken aback and shocked when he actually ended up discovering something that had managed to survive the destruction of the exchange hall.


    A small and inconspicuous looking scroll that didn''t seem that important having survived due to a special kind of record keeping formation on it having survived the attack back then still functioning even after countless years had passed by absorbing the tiny bits of spiritual qi present inside the destroyed exchange hall.


    No matter how little importance this little scroll might have, Xuan Hao was overjoyed seeing a still surviving scroll.

 Chapter 1284 Dawn Immortal, Sea Immortal, Earth Immortal

    Chapter 1284 Dawn Immortal, Sea Immortal, Earth Immortal


    Carefully cing the still intact scroll into his interspatial ring, Xuan Hao began to search through the destroyed exchange hall with far more motivationpared to before. Soon turning the ce upside down for any other scroll or books that might have managed to survive the long passage of time since the exchange hall had been destroyed.


    Unfortunately, he didn''t manage to find anything other than crumbling scrolls and shattered jades. Nothing of value outside of the single scroll had managed to survive inside the exchange hall. Even then, Xuan Hao was still filled with excitement, as he had gone in expecting to find nothing.


    "Time to see what is written in the scroll¡­" Leaving the second exchange hall and finding a secluded ce inside the crater that had been left behind following the destruction of the mist covered mountains at the hands of the guardian formation, Xuan Hao excitedly pulled out the small scroll before carefully undoing the preservation formation that had allowed it to survive for such a long period of time.


    Hoping that the scroll wasn''t written in the ancientnguage, but instead one he could understand that resembled the currentnguage of the Ewaria Continent.


    Whoosh~!


    Unfortunately, the moment he undid the preservation formation that had kept the scroll intact and tried to use his divine sense to read through it without touching the scroll and possibly destroying it, part of the scroll directly disintegrated. Leaving behind only a small part of the original scroll.


    On the positive side, the part that had managed to survive being taken out of the preservation formation was not written in the ancientnguage that he had yet to fullyprehend but was instead written in a more modernnguage not much different from the one currently being used on the Ewaria Continent. Allowing him to understand what was written inside the scroll, while at the same time giving him a better understanding of how the ancientnguage ultimately ended up evolving into the current modernnguage used on the Ewaria Continent. Increasing his understanding of the ancientnguage and getting him closer to understanding it.


    As for what was written inside the scroll, it wasn''t anything like a secret technique or something simr to it but was instead a kind of record describing ancient events that had taken ce inside the mystic realm. More specifically around the exchange hall and inside the second celestial trial and different people of importance that had taken part in the trial.


    Although this information wasn''t really that important, it still contained a lot of information that was useful. For example, it contained information on certain geniuses of the ancient Mirage Sect that had visited the celestial trial or the exchange hall in the past.


    Not just that, but it also contained a brief description of these geniuses, their realm and what Daos they had managed toprehend¡­ And there was nock of geniuses in the Profound Immortal Realm. Allowing him to get a better understanding of the different realms in the Profound Immortal Realm.


    At the very least, it seemed like the part of the scroll that had been destroyed was the part containing information on the weaker and less talented cultivators who had been to the exchange hall in the past, while unfortunate as even the weakest one among them was above the Dao Domain Lord Realm and had at least reached the Pinnacle of the Dao Seed Realm and was already in the process of reaching the Profound Immortal Realm, he could at least increase his understanding of the Profound Immortal Realm.


    Of course, it could also just be that the information on those in the Dao Domain Lord Realm was kept on another scroll that had already been destroyed¡­


    First of all, the first realm and Early Stage of the Profound Immortal Realm was called the Breaking Dawn Realm. The start of the Profound Immortal Realm. The people in this realm were either referred to as Breaking Dawn Immortals, Dawn Immortals or just Profound Immortals.


    Geniuses who had reached this realm were rare, but not umon, with the age of these geniuses ranging between the ages of 200 to 500 years.


    Next up were those who had reached the Middle Stage of the Profound Immortal Realm, the Sea Formation Realm. The people in this realm being reffered to as Sea Immortals or just Profound Immortals. Although far rarerpared to those in the Early Stage of the Profound Immortal Realm, there were still a small handful of them noted down in what was left of the scroll.


    Different from the first group though, their ages ranged between 300 to 800 years.


    Last, there was a single person standing proudly at the top of the scroll and noted down as a holy son of the Mirage Sect.


    At the age of 353, this person had managed to reach the Land Creation Realm, the Late Stage of the Profound Immortal Realm. Referred to as an Earth Immortal in the description. Making Xuan Hao understand that the title of an Earth Immortal had a different meaning when referring to someone in the time of the Mirage Sect. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    The Earth Immortal Realm wasn''t referring to someone in the Dao Seed Realm like he had first thought back when the elder of the Mirage Sect had encouraged him to ovee the tribtion and be an Earth Immortal Realm in the future, but instead seemed to refer to the Late Stage of the Profound Immortal Realm.


    However, as he realized this, Xuan Hao also realized that the tribtion that the elder of the Mirage Sect had referred to might not be the Immortal Soul Tribtion he had first thought he might be referring to, but instead apletely different tribtion that one would have to undergo in the Profound Immortal Realm¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao focused his attention back on the scroll floating in front of him as he read through the far more detailed description of the holy son.


    The Daosprehended by the holy son wasn''t anywhere near as many as he expected, as there was only four different Daos, the Dao of Yang, the Dao of Space, the Dao of Fire and Dao of Wind.


    However, each of these Daos had reached the Realm of Perfection, with the Dao of Fire even reaching a brand-new realm ofprehension that he wasn''t aware of, the Origin Realm.


    Although he doubted that it meant that this holy son figure had managed toprehend the entirety of the Dao of Fire, he was certain that this realm ofprehension was far beyond his current understanding.


    At the same time, he also noticed that the holy son shouldn''t have been able to reach the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm with the four Daos he hadprehended. Not just that, but it was the same for most of the geniuses that had managed to reach the Middle and Early Stage of the Profound Immortal Realm. None of them hadprehended enough Daos to create enoughyers around their dao seed¡­


    However, there was onemon thing¡­ And that was every single one of them had at leastprehended one Dao to the Realm of Perfection with two other supporting Daos reaching the Large Sess Realm.


    "Perhaps this is another path to the Profound Immortal Realm? Considering how many different Daos one would have toprehend under normal circumstances to reach the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm, I guess it makes sense that there are other ways to reach the Profound Immortal Realm.


    If not, it would be hard for anyone not in the Dao Domain Lord Realm to reach the Profound Immortal Realm considering how difficult it might be for others to startprehending different Daos. Even then, reaching the Perfection Realm in a Dao and the Large Sess Realm in two other Daos is still difficult to aplish.


    As for theyers around the Dao Seed¡­ Maybe the Perfection Realm allows the creation of far moreyers than I first guessed¡­"


    Shaking his head as he said this to himself, Xuan Hao realized that there was still much that remained unknown about the Dao Seed Realm. For now, he had at least managed to figure out a bit more about the Profound Immortal Realm and another possible path to reaching the realm that the ancient geniuses of the Mirage Sect seemed to take.


    Unfortunately, these wasn''t any information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm inside the scroll, as it specifically noted down that the holy son at the Late Stage of the Profound Immortal Realm was a genius that had managed to reach that level without going through the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    "Looks like I can only try and look through the third celestial gate and see if there is anything to find there¡­" Muttering this to himself as he sealed the scroll before cing it inside his interspatial ring, Xuan Hao turned around and made his way out of the second celestial trials exchange hall and made his way in the direction of the celestial gate leading to third celestial trial.

 Chapter 1285 Back at the Third Celestial Gate

    Chapter 1285 Back at the Third Celestial Gate


    Reaching the third gate leading to the third celestial trial where he had encountered the elder from the Mirage Sect, Xuan Hao didn''t directly enter the celestial gate. Instead stopping to observe it from a few meters away with a somewhat surprised expression on his face.


    Different from the other two celestial gates that werepletely stable even though they had been attacked, the third celestial gate had some unstable elements to it.


    Although it was far too small for him to have noticed when he had first passed through the third celestial gate. Now that his strength had increased, he could sense that the damage done to the third celestial gate during the battle that had happened in the past was far more severe than the other two celestial gates.


    Not just that, but it was clear that most of this damage had affected the spatial structure of the celestial gate.


    It was only by sheer luck that his strength hadn''t been at level that would take him through one of these damaged spatial passages, or he might very well have ended up dead before he even had the chance to reach the third celestial trial and meet the elder from the Mirage Sect¡­


    The reason why he remained stationary in front of the third celestial gate was that he had no idea if the spatial passage leading to the location of the exchange hall inside the third celestial gate was among the spatial passages that had been damaged.


    Something that wasn''t hard to imagine considering that the exchange hall shouldn''t originally have been inside the trial space he ended up inside of, but instead inside a space simr to the ones of first and second celestial trials.


    So¡­ Should I give up on trying to enter the third celestial gate?


    Thinking this to himself as he stared at the celestial gate in front of him with a hint of hesitation on his face, Xuan Hao tried to use his divine sense to try and investigate the spatial passages on the other side of the gate.


    However, even if the celestial gate didn''t seem to stop him from trying to investigate the spatial passages connected to it, his current understanding of the Dao of Space was far too shallow.


    In the end, the only thing he ended up learning, was that although a lot of the spatial passages had been damaged to some extent, it didn''t mean that they would end up killing him, as the passages themselves were still in ce.


    Given his currentprehension of the Dao of Space, he should be more than capable of ensuring that he didn''t end up falling out of any of these damaged parts along the way.


    The only real danger was the spatial passages that had been fully torn apart at one point and were slowly being chipped away at by spatial storms at an incredibly slow pace due to the durability of these spatial passages.


    In total, less than a single percent of the spatial passages had ended up in such a situation, but from the power he could sense through them, he understood that his current strength was far from enough to survive the spatial storms on the other side of these spatial passages.


    No matter how low the chance of encountering one of these spatial channels might be, Xuan Hao had no ns of taking an unnecessary risk that might cost him his life just to try and figure out how the exchange hall might have ended up inside one of the trial spaces. Especially considering that he could alwayse back in the future after hisprehension of the Dao of Space increased and investigate the situation when he didn''t need to risk his life.


    At least that was what Xuan Hao nned to do after he investigated the different spatial passages connected to the celestial gate¡­


    Rumble~


    Unfortunately, he didn''t realize that forcibly using his divine sense to investigate the inner workings of the celestial gate had ended up triggering a security mechanism inside the celestial gate, causing a terrifying to lock on to him before dragging him inside the third celestial gate. Not giving him any chance to resist as he soon found himself travelling through one of the spatial passages.


    Although the celestial gate didn''t stop his divine sense earlier, it shouldn''t have been because it allowed him to investigate it, but more so that the celestial gate''s inner workings had been damaged to the point that its response had been dyed and only acted a few seconds after he had used his divine sense.


    On the bright side, the spatial passage in question hadn''t sustained any damage and allowed him to safely move through it without having to fear being pushed into a spatial storm and ripped apart¡­


    Bang!


    Being thrown to the ground the next second, Xuan Hao was once again reminded that it wasn''t the time to be happy about his circumstances, as he jumped up to take in his new surroundings.


    A grand hallparable to the size of a single exchange hall- Or that was at least what it should have been, as what Xuan Hao saw was just a pile of spiritual rocks and other metals that had long since broken down.


    All located on a simr piece of floatingnd as the exchange hall, with the only difference from the exchange halls being that the battle that had taken ce at the grand hall had clearly been far more damaging, with space itself having been torn apart. Leaving mile long holes in the ruins that had an even more terrifying aura lingering around itpared to the one he encountered in the first celestial trail''s exchange hall.


    However, out of all of this, the main thing Xuan Hao focused his attention on was a familiar looking golem that slowly dragged its barely functioning body towards him amidst the ruins.


    "A preservation golem?"


    Indeed, this golem was none other than one of the preservation golems he had seen for the first time inside the exchange hall of the third celestial trial.


    From what he knew about these golems, they served the simple purpose of ensuring that the celestial trial kept functioning, while also preventing any trial participants from moving somewhere they shouldn''t, an example being the preservation golem he had met stopping him from entering the exchange hall and triggering the protective formation there.


    "Does it perhaps have any idea why I ended up here?" Muttering this to himself as he watched the preservation golem slowly getting closer to him, Xuan Hao began to cautiously approach it while making sure to keep as wide a distance as possible to any of the ces where space had been directly torn apart by some kind of terrifying power.


    Soon enough, finding himself standing in front of the preservation golem that stopped moving after seeing that he was directly in front of it. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Greetings tier three trial participant, you have been found in breach of the rules regarding interference of celestial gate spatial passages. Normal punishment, 500 years solitude cultivation in the trial space, Empty Peak. Punishment invalid. Reason, tier three trial participant has been granted temporary elder status. The case has been forwarded to Grand Elder Li Meng.


    Grand Elder Li Meng will oversee the case and meet out proper punishment, as automatic punishment cannot be met out against a temporary elder. Tier three trial participant. Please proceed forward and await judgement from Grand Elder Li Meng."


    Not wasting any time as it began speaking in a simr fashion as the first preservation golem he had encountered, Xuan Hao quietly listened as it soon finished talking and did its best to point towards somewhere behind it.


    Likely the ce where the Grand Elder Li Meng that it had just mentioned should have been located under normal circumstances before this ce had been destroyed.


    In the end, the ce that the preservation golem was pointing had no Grand Elder Li Meng. Instead, the entire space of the ce where it pointed had been violently torn apart, as a horrifying aura permeated the ce.


    Even looking directly towards it for a split second caused a terrifying pain to erupt in the depth of his soul.


    Just looking at the remnants of what should have undoubtedly been the starting location of a battle between terrifying existences beyond the Profound Immortal Realm caused him to recoil in pain, as part of the remnant will almost ended up damaging his soul just now.


    If he really proceeded forward like the preservation golem told him to do, he feared that he wouldn''t be judged by some Grand Elder Li Meng but would instead end up being torn apart by what remained from the ancient battle that should have started inside the ruined grand hall that he now found himself inside of.


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao focused his attention back on the preservation golem again, curious and fearful about what might happen if he didn''t follow along with what it said, as he knew that it might be capable of triggering some formation that would force him to cooperate¡­

 Chapter 1286 Muis Battle

    Chapter 1286 Mui''s Battle


    "No response detected from tier three trail participant. Please proceed forward. Grand Elder Li Meng will- No response from Grand Elder Li Meng detected. Grand Elder Li Meng is currently busy. You are allowed to leave as the vitionmitted doesn''t reach the level required for forceful detainment of an elder.


    Be aware, Grand Elder Li Meng will be informed of your vition when he returns and will meet out proper punishment then. Escaping the Mirage Sect before Grand Elder Li Meng carries out punishment might result in Grand Elder Li Meng issuing a warrant on behalf of the Mirage Sect to the surrounding sects."


    Nervously waiting in front of the preservation golem, Xuan Hao could not help silently breathing a sigh of relief as he heard what it said. Even if it was threatening him, he didn''t really care about this, as the Li Meng that it was referring to had most likely already been killed in the attack that destroyed the hall.


    The only thing he did care about was whether or not this preservation golem was in control of some kind of formation that might force him into the terrifying void that had been formed where the Grand Elder Li Meng mentioned by the preservation golem should have been.


    "Okay, I will make sure toe back the moment Grand Elder Li Meng returns and calls for me."


    Even then, he still made sure to nod his head politely in response to the preservation golem. Not intending to find out if it had some way of forcing him to stay in case, he showed any signs of wanting to run away.


    "Acknowledged, you may leave. Remember, do not cause any more vitions or you will be treated in ordance with the sectws regarding repeat offenders. Elder status will not protect you much in that case, as thew enforcement elders will be the ones responsible for dealing with you." Nodding its head mechanically without any emotion, the preservation golem plopped down on the ground motionlessly.


    Not because it had broken down after delivering the message, but instead because it had finished doing its job and entered some kind of low maintenance mode that allowed it to preserve its energy while also slowing down the inevitable decay that had started taking ce after it had suffered a significant amount of damage at some point in the past.


    "I will be taking my leave¡­"


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao didn''t n to wait around any longer inside of the destroyed hall that had once been the seat of power for a Grand Elder of the Mirage Sect, as he directly made a beeline for the spatial passage that had taken him there.


    Any ns to search through the ce for possible treasures or scrolls that might have been left behind had disappeared the moment he happened to look in the direction of where the Grand Elder of the Mirage Sect should have been.


    Just looking in the wrong direction had almost cost him his life, there was no way he would dare to search through such a ce!


    Not to mention, he had a rather easy way to go there in the future, as it seemed like he would just have to cause some kind of vition to be dragged there by the third celestial gate.


    Of course, doing so in the future might not result in a simr reaction, as the preservation golem did mention something about thew enforcement elders being the ones to take care of him if he did something simr in the future. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    At the very least, if he got stronger and increased hisprehension of the Dao of Space, it shouldn''t be that difficult to get back by tracking the different spatial passages connected to the third celestial gate. Not difficult, if he didn''t think about how high hisprehension of the Dao of Space needed to be to do something like this.


    Looks like I probably won''te back here before reaching the Profound Immortal Realm¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao took thest step forward and entered the spatial passage that had originally taken him to the destroyed hall-


    Whoosh~


    Disappearing from the destroyed hall the next second before once again finding himself shuttling through the intact spatial passage back towards the third celestial gate that he had entered through.


    ¡­


    At the same time her master was in the process of leaving the destroyed grand hall, Mui was busy fighting with two demon beasts at the Nascent Soul Realm, one of them at the Fifth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, while the second one had reached the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    And from the fact that she kept being pushed back by the two monsters that had formed an alliance against her, it was obvious that she wasn''t used to fighting more than a single demon beast at the same time.


    Not that Mui let this discourage her, as she took the opportunity to grow more familiar with fighting more than a single opponent at the same time. Growing more confident with each passing minute and starting to push back against the two demon beasts that had overwhelmed her at the start.


    Of course, this didn''t mean that she was anywhere close to winning the battle against the two demon beasts. On the other hand, her starting to push back ended up causing the two demon beasts to fight with even more power and ferocity than before.


    Soon enough resulting in Mui being suppressed by the two demon beasts again. The main difference being that they now went all out in trying to kill her after learning how fast she had seemingly adapted to their strength and begun to fight back against them.


    Although demon beasts without enough intelligence tomunicate through their divine sense, they were still more than smart enough to understand that it would be best for them to kill Mui as fast as possible. Knowing that if she continued to slowly increase her strength during their fight, it would be them who ended up dead.


    "How did they suddenly get so much stronger!?" Not understanding how the demon beasts suddenly ended up getting stronger all of a sudden, Mui who hadn''t experienced something like that before, as all the demon beasts that had faced her in the past had gone all out from the start when facing her one on one, began to panic.


    "Wait! Don''t tell me¡­ARE THEY HIDING THEIR REAL STRENGTH!? No! I can''t afford to hold back if they turn out to secretly be at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm!" In the end, due to her inexperience with such things, Mui couldn''t understand that the demon beasts had just held back a little bit of their strength and wasn''t hiding their true cultivation realm.


    Whoosh~!


    As a result of this, to be on the safe side, Mui didn''t hesitate to take out her metal balls. Not intending to hold back any of her strength in the face of the two demon beasts that had been hiding Peak Nascent Soul Realm Strength and could attack her with all of their strength at any moment.


    R-Roar?


    Roar¡­?


    In the end, the two demon beasts could only retreat a few meters with confused expressions on their faces after seeing the metal balls that suddenly flew out of Mui''s interspatial ring before floating in the air in front of her menacingly.


    Well¡­ As menacing as a floating metal ball could look¡­


    "Hm? They retreated- Ah! They are preparing to unleash their full strength for a single powerful attack! Simr to when master attacks and kills his opponent in a single powerful attack! Hmph! I won''t let you!"


    However, in the eyes of Mui, who had been observing their every move, the slight retreat from the demon beasts and confused expressions ended up looking like they stepped back and were looking at her filled with contempt for her lower cultivation realm as they prepared to unleash their "full strength" to attack her.


    Rumble~!


    And so, before the two demon beasts had much time to react, the metal balls around Mui sprung into action, as all kinds of terrifying attacks descended towards the two still confused demon beasts that had no clue what was happening or how Mui had suddenly gotten so powerful-


    Whoosh-!


    BOOOM!


    As the powerful attacksnded the next second, Mui kept her full attention on the two demon beasts. Prepared to continue her attack in case they managed to block her attack.


    Roar!?


    Roar¡­


    "Tch! Just as I expected! You were indeed hiding your strength!"


    Indeed, just like Mui had suspected and under the surprised eyes of the two demon beasts, arge earthen wall had appeared in front of them just before impact. Blocking the damage from Mui''s artifacts and saving the two demon beasts in the process, something that both of the demon beasts knew wasn''t their work.


    As for where this earthen wall had trulye from¡­ The culprit was one of the metal balls Mui had thrown towards the two demon beasts that had ended up malfunctioning andnded on the ground where it ended up creating the earthen wall protecting the two demon beasts¡­

 Chapter 1287 Muis Escape

    Chapter 1287 Mui''s Escape


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Following the demon beast "revealing" its real strength, Mui used all of her strength to try and kill it to no avail as it continued using powerful earthen walls to block her attacks. Resulting in not a single one of her attacksnding no matter how much strength she put into them, as the earthen wall seemed to grow stronger the stronger her attacks were.


    Don''t tell me¡­ This demon beast is already half a step into the Domain Lord Realm and has established a pseudo domain of earth!? Is this perhaps why I can''t get any of my attacks through?


    Narrowing both her eyes for the first time as a frown appeared on her face as she thought this while looking at the earthen walls that had once again blocked her attack, Mui felt that she might have severely underestimated her opponent.


    Having thought that it was at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, while it had actually taken another step forward and entered the Half Step Domain Lord Realm!


    "No, I can''t go on like this or I will run out of strength if I keep this up. Giving it the perfect chance to counterattack¡­ I-I have to retreat for now!" Muttering this to herself as she gazed towards the demon beast hidden behind the earthen wall, Mui turned around and escaped in the opposite direction of the demon beast. Knowing very well that she stood no chance of contending against a Half Step Domain Lord Realm demon beast with her current strength.


    Although she would still have the ability to kill it if she decided to use some of the talismans left behind by her master, she had no intention of doing so, as she was far more interested in returning in the future to get her revenge after she got stronger.


    Yes, Mui felt that she was only just slightly behind the Half Step Domain Lord Realm demon beast in terms of strength and felt confident that she would be able to kill it as long as she gained a bit more experience with fighting and broke through to the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not to mention, she also knew that the pseudo dao of the demon beast should be the Dao of Earth. Meaning that she could prepare for dealing with her in her next battle with the demon beast.


    Just you wait! I will definitely get my revenge after I be stronger!


    Whoosh~!


    With a determined mindset and a clear goal in mind, Mui disappeared from the opening that had been created by their battle. Leaving behind a rather confused demon beast that could only stare in the direction she had disappeared with a look that was both fearful of the power she had disyed, while also being confused over what had just taken ce.


    In the end, the demon beast could only think that Mui had deliberately kept it alive.


    As for the reason¡­ The demon beast didn''t think it was for anything good given the clear killing intent she had disyed before leaving.


    Roar¡­


    And so, knowing the danger of staying around the forest any longer with someone like that around, the demon beast made the decisive decision to venture deeper into the mystic realm to try and escape from Mui before she returned again.


    Although it had deliberately made its way towards the edge of the mystic realm to escape danger and the many powerful demon beasts that had now begun roaming around its former home, the demon beast had a feeling that it would still be safer than staying in the forest at the edge of the mystic realm where Mui was running rampant. Especially given that she seemed to be deliberately targeting it.


    ¡­


    Thump~


    At the same time that Mui finished up her battle with the scared demon beast now in the process of running away, Xuan Hao silentlynded on the ground in front of the third celestial gate with a somewhat surprised expression on his face. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "I''m back at the third celestial gate? I for sure thought I would end up somewhere different after going through that spatial passage. Especially considering how long it took to get back¡­" Muttering this to himself as he recalled how long his return journey had takenpared to going the other way, Xuan Hao could not help voicing his thoughts out loud.


    From the third celestial gate to the destroyed hall, it had taken him a few seconds to get there, but one the way back, it had taken him several minutes. Making him believe that he would end up somewhere different.


    Maybe its because the spatial passage I took back was different from the one I used to reach the destroyed hall, but even then, the difference shouldn''t be that big¡­


    Shaking his head as he realized that his current understanding of the Dao of Space was still far too low to understand the workings of the different spatial passages contained inside the third celestial gate, Xuan Hao decided to not think about it for now as he instead focused his attention back on the third celestial gate.


    Of course, this time around, he didn''t dare to use his divine sense to investigate the inner workings of the celestial gate, as he had no ns of being dragged back to the dangerous ce that he had just managed to leave.


    Instead, he was thinking about whether or not to enter the celestial gate and try to enter the space of the third celestial gates exchange hall. Even if he knew about the danger involved in doing this, he had managed to analyze some of the differences between the different spatial passages that he had seen inside the third celestial gate during his extended travel time back.


    For example, the mostmon spatial passages that were by far the weakest should be the ones connecting to the different trial grounds inside the celestial gate, while the stronger ones should be connected to more important locations, like the exchange hall.


    More importantly, none of these stronger spatial passages had been damaged. Meaning that it should be safe for him to enter the third celestial trial and travel to the ce where the exchange hall of the third celestial trial should have originally been located before it had ended up inside one of the trial grounds.


    Of course, he could always be wrong in his spections and that was why he hadn''t yet stepped forward to enter the third celestial gate, but instead just stood in front of it as he continued to go over what he had managed to see before he got dragged away into the destroyed hall.


    Like this, a few days flew by as Xuan Hao was fully focused on trying toprehend what little he could from the countless spatial passages he had seen inside the third celestial gate.


    In the end, Xuan Hao closed his eyes for a brief moment to calm himself down before taking a step forward into the third celestial gate. Having concluded that it should be safe for him to enter after going over the different spatial passages he had seen, and which ones might lead to the space where the third celestial trials exchange hall was located.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling the familiar spatial forces warp around him as he stepped through the third celestial gate, Xuan Hao nervously felt his surroundings as he was sucked into one of the countless spatial channels. Only feeling relieved after sessfully making his way through the spatial passage andnding on the ground of the space where the third exchange hall was located.


    "Huh? This¡­ Is the third celestial trial''s exchange hall¡­?"


    However, as he got a chance to observe his surroundings, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that the piece ofnd he was standing on was the only thing left inside the space where the third exchange hall should have been.


    No, that wasn''t entirely true, as there were still a few remnants and corners of the third exchange hall that had broken off and were now aimlessly floating around inside the space with a few bits ofnd still intact beneath them.


    But outside of this, the space where the third exchange hall should have been located waspletely empty.


    Although he had already expected this to some degree considering that he had already seen the third exchange hall inside the third celestial trial space he had gone to when first entering the third celestial trial, he was still shocked when seeing therge empty space where the third exchange hall should have been.


    After all, it wasn''t entirely empty, as the space had been forcefully torn open to move the third exchange hall¡­ And given the bits of familiar aura still lingering in the void, Xuan Hao was certain that it should have been done by the elder of the Mirage Sect that he had encountered.


    Not just that, but it should have been done before the attack had truly begun, as there was no aura outside the elder from the Mirage Sect present.

 Chapter 1288 Tower of Secrets

    Chapter 1288 Tower of Secrets


    I should check out the little bit still left of the third exchange hall in this ce and see if I can find something useful¡­


    ncing in the direction of the few parts of the third exchange hall that had been floating through the empty void in front of him, Xuan Hao jumped up and flew towards the closest piece ofnd still floating in the void.


    Considering that there wasn''t any aura present outside of the one that should have belonged to the elder of the Mirage Sect, he didn''t feel any fear doing this, as the presence of the robe that had been handed to him by the elder in question also carried some hints of that aura. Allowing him to fearlessly move through the void without any worries.


    Not just that, but he could also feel that the remnants still left lingering in the void moved to protect him.


    "Looks like I won''t have to worry about anything dangerous happening¡­" Chuckling as he felt this, Xuan Hao soonnded at thend that had been closest to the spatial passage he hade through.


    Although it had been severely damaged and the building still left standing on it had essentially been torn in half, Xuan Hao didn''t let that discourage him as he flew inside the building. Not wasting any time as he searched through the entire ce.


    Unfortunately, even though it didn''t seem like the space of the third exchange hall had been targeted during the attack back then due to the absence of the third exchange hall itself, it looked like everything that had been left behind was damaged to some extent during the movement of the third exchange hall.


    Though there might not have been a lot of damage and the scrolls, or other precious materials would have been able to survive for a long time without any disturbance floating motionlessly in the void, the preservation formations that would have ensured they remained intact far beyond their normal shelf time had been destroyed when the third exchange hall had been forcefully moved.


    In the end, the scroll and books crumbled with time and the few precious materials that had been left behind simrly eroded due to theck of spiritual qi in the air inside the empty space. The qi gathering formations that would normally have filled this space long since having perished during the battle that should have taken ce back then.


    "I hope at least some of the smaller preservation formations managed to survive. At least considering that this ce wasn''t attacked, it should be more likely to find something herepared to the other ces." Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while looking towards the dozen or so other pieces ofnd still left floating in the void, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he flew over to search through them.


    Hoping that his thoughts about the ce would be urate and he would have the chance to find a storage room for scrolls or precious materials that had managed to survive the movement of the third exchange hall.


    Not anythingrge, just a small room would do.


    Be it precious materials or scroll recording ancient techniques or records of the past, a small intact room would be able to allow the strength of the Star Shattering Sect to rapidly increase¡­


    Thump~


    Thinking this to himself as hended at the second and by far thergest piece of still intactnd floating inside the space that had once housed the third exchange hall, Xuan Hao stepped forward and entered the ratherrge tower like structure on the floatingnd.


    From past explorations of the other two exchange halls, he knew that this tower should have originally been connected to the exchange hall through a long path outside the exchange hall itself.


    However, every other exchange hall he had visited so far, this tower had beenpletely obliterated. Leaving nothing behind but a pile of rubble and a few traces of what had once been.


    Because of this, the tower was also the thing that Xuan Hao looked the most forward to exploring, as it seemed to be a fully intact building without any sign of damage. Meaning that the preservation formation inside it might still be intact!


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he made his way over the entrance of the tower-


    Whoosh-!


    However, before he even had a chance to enter the tower, a familiar looking preservation golem appeared in front of the door leading into the tower.


    Not just that butpared to the other preservation golems that he had encountered so far, the one standing in front of the tower waspletely intact without any damage. Confirming his guess that the tower had managed to remain fully intact due to not being directly attached to the exchange hall itself.


    Normally this would not have mattered if the exchange hall had been attacked, but given that the exchange hall wasn''t attack, the tower had managed to survive and even seemed to still function like it should have done in the past before the fall of the Mirage Sect.


    Lost in his own thoughts as he kept looking at the preservation golem in front of him, the preservation golem suddenly stepped forward. "Tier three trial participant, would you like to enter the Exchange Hall, Tower of Secrets?"


    "Huh? Tower of Secrets?" Taken aback, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself as he stared at the preservation golem filled with confusion at the sudden question.


    "New trial participant detected; would you like an exnation of the Tower of Secrets?"


    "Yes." Hearing the words of the preservation golem, Xuan Hao quickly calmed down as he nodded his head. Remembering that the main purpose of the preservation golems was just to act as guides and help the trial participants of the celestial trials¡­ And the preservation golem in front of him should be one such preservation golem in charge of the ce called the Tower of Secrets.


    "Acknowledged, the Tower of Secrets is one of the main exchange locations for the Exchange Hall. Inside the Tower of Secrets, you can exchange celestial coins granted through thepletion of the celestial trials for different movement andbat techniques stored inside the Tower of Secrets."


    "I see¡­ But how do I get these celestial coins? I don''t remember getting anything like that afterpleting a celestial trial¡­" Frowning slightly as he said this, Xuan Hao could not help thinking that he might have ended up leaving behind the so-called celestial coins mentioned by the preservation golem by ident because he didn''t know what it was. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Celestial Coins are awarded for anyonepleting the celestial trials. Would you like to view your current progress and celestial coins trial participant?"


    "Yes."


    Swish-!


    Already familiar with the how the examination of the preservation golems was done due to his first experience encountering one of them, Xuan Hao wasn''t as shocked when it easily passed through his dao domain and directly appeared in front of him this time around.


    Instead, it only made him more amazed over the strength of these preservation golems, while also making him certain that it would be best not to do anything that caused them to attack him.


    "Initial examination will begin now, please do stand still during this process as movement might cause inuracies in the examination." Hearing the familiar instructions, Xuan Hao remained still as he waited for the examination to finish.


    "Examination has beenpleted; would you like me to list your current progress?"


    "Yes."


    "Confirmation of trial participant granted; I will now list your current progress in the Celestial Trials¡­" Not wasting a single second after hearing Xuan Hao''s response, the golem began speaking again.


    "¡­ Cultivation realm of trial participant, Late Stage Dao Domain Lord, number of trialspleted, 3, requirement to enter Tower of Secrets at the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, 3, faction, no information avable. Trial participant has been granted temporary elder status and can freely ess any exchange hall without normal limitations. Total avable celestial coins, 7. No more information can be gathered on the trial participant.


    It is rmended that the trial participant buys knowledge regarding the Dao Domain Lord Realm if the elders of the trial participant haven''t informed the trial participant. Information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm can be found at the second floor of the Tower of Secrets."


    "Huh? Information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm!?" Hearing what the preservation golem said, Xuan Hao could not help eximing out loud with a shocked expression on his face. Never having expected the preservation golem to directly mention information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm, something he really needed at the moment given hisck of knowledge on how to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    After all, a guess was still just a guess and couldn''tpare to real knowledge from someone who had managed to reach the realm!

 Chapter 1289 Too Expensive...

    Chapter 1289 Too Expensive...


    "Yes, there is information on the Dao Domain Lord inside the Tower of Secrets, as long as you have the required celestial coins, you can obtain the knowledge." Responding to his rather loud exmation, the preservation golem didn''t move in the slightest as it said this. Making Xuan Hao even more excited, as he understood that he would finally be able to get information of the Dao Domain Lord Realm that wasn''t just a few fragments here and there or information gained through advancing through the Dao Domain Lord Realm by himself.


    Not only would it be useful for reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and going beyond that in the future, but it would also be useful for improving his current strength in the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, as it would give him a clear path to follow.


    "Can I enter the tower now?"


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao could not help excitedly turning to the preservation golem as he asked this. Wanting nothing more than to enter the tower as fast as possible so he could get his hands on the knowledge about the Dao Domain Lord Realm that was stored inside ording to what the preservation golem had said.


    Whoosh~


    Turning back towards the tower after hearing what Xuan Hao said, the preservation golem suddenly raised one of its hands, causing the formation that was guarding the entrance to open.


    "You have met the requirements and can enter the Tower of Secrets whenever you want. Mandatory warning, forcefully trying to take away any of the things inside the Tower of Secrets without paying, will result in the killing formation inside activating.


    Do be aware, elder status does not protect you from the killing formation, as it is designed to kill anyone attempting to steal from the tower."


    "¡­"


    Hearing what the preservation golem said just as he was about to rush inside the Tower of Secrets, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine.


    Although he had already reached the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and could be considered to beparable to someone at the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, he understood that he would stand no chance against the formations left behind by the Mirage Sect. Especially so considering that the tower in front of him had managed to remain fully intact. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    After all, given that the tower was still intact meant that the killing formations protecting the tower itself should also be intact. Not having weakened much since the battle that should have taken ce in the past.


    Just the fact that the geniuses of that time had reached the Profound Immortal Realm was more than enough to stop him from having any thoughts of stealing anything from the tower, as it at least meat that the strength of the killing formations inside the tower had reached the Profound Immortal Realm in terms of power. Not something he was anywhere close to being able to deal with in his current cultivation realm.


    Even then, it shouldn''t be a problem as long as I use the celestial coins to buy the information from the tower¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao made his way inside the Tower of Secrets and was soon met by a beautifully decorated room filled with rows upon rows of shelves filled to the brim with scrolls.


    "So many scrolls¡­ And the space in here is farrger than outside, is there perhaps some kind of space expansion formation in ce?" Muttering this to himself as he nced around the ce, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious as he walked over to one of the shelves and picked up one of the scrolls.


    [Sword Sovereign Domination, Volume 1, Low Heaven Rank. Entire Sword Sovereign Domination, Saint Rank]


    [Price: 5 Celestial Coins]


    "Low Heaven Rank? Saint Rank?" Seeing a few unfamiliar terms written on top of the scroll, Xuan Hao ignored the price as he turned to look back at the preservation golem that had been silently following behind him since he stepped inside the Tower of Secrets.


    "Do you want an exnation of the technique ranks?" Picking up what he wanted immediately with a simple straightforward question, Xuan Hao quicky nodded his head. Wondering if the division of qi techniques and other techniques was any different in the ancient timespared to the current time.


    "Acknowledged,bat techniques and the names of their ranks can change depending on where you are from, but they are still universally ssified into three realms. ording to the name that the Mirage Sect follows, these three realms are Mortal, Earth and Heaven.


    Mortal signifies the first four mortal realms, Qi Condensation, Foundation Establishment, Core Formation and Nascent Soul Realm. Low Mortal Rank signifying Qi Condensation Realmbat techniques, while Peak Mortal Rank signify Nascent Soul Realmbat techniques.


    Earth signifies the first steps toprehending the dao and transcending the mortal realm, the Domain Lord Realm, Soul Ascension Realm and Dao Seed Realm. Low and Mid Earth Rank being the Domain Lord Realm and the Soul Ascension Realm respectively, while the Dao Seed Realm is the High and Peak Earth Rank.


    Heaven signifies transcending the mortal realm, the Celestial Immortal Realm and the Profound Immortal Realm. Low Heaven Rank being the Celestial Immortal Realm, Mid Heaven Rank being the Sea Formation Stage of the Profound Immortal Realm, while the High Heaven Rank is for the those at the Land Creation Realm. Peak Heaven Rankbat techniques being reserved for those at the peak of the Profound Immortal Realm."


    This¡­ Was far more detailed than I expected it to be¡­ Not having expected such a long and detailed description from the preservation golem, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly to himself as he thought about the description of the different ranks given by the preservation golem.


    Indeed, whenpared to the ranking system ofbat techniques that was being used at the moment on the Ewaria Continent, he liked this ancient ranking system far more and had already decided to go ahead and implement it in the sect after he returned.


    Not just to make things a bit easier to understand for his disciples, but also to make it easier for himself, as he had a feeling that he would interact far more with this ancient systempared to the one currently in use throughout the Ewaria Continent in the future.


    But, outside of that, there was something he was curious about and that was-


    "Are there any ranks above the Heaven Rank?"


    "Yes, the Saint Rank is the rank forbat techniques above the Heaven Rank, but there are no suchbat techniques present in the Tower of Secrets. The information avable to me does not extend to things that aren''t present in the Tower of Secrets, so I can unfortunately not give an exnation on the Saint Rank outside of its name." Saying this in a somewhat depressed tone, the preservation golem suddenly looked a bit pitiful after acknowledging that it didn''t have any information on the Saint Rank that was beyond the Heaven Rank.


    "It''s fine, can you help me find the information of the Dao Domain Lord Realm inside the tower?"


    "Yes, the information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm is located on the second floor of the Tower of Secrets. Normally, ess to the second floor is only granted after bing a tier two trial participant, but given the temporary elder status, there are no restrictions on which floors you can enter."


    "That''s great, lead the way." Feeling relieved after hearing what the preservation golem said, Xuan Hao soon found himself following it up the spiral staircase at the center of the tower leading up towards the second floor of the tower.


    However, this relief vanished a few secondster when he nced at the different scrolls along the way.


    [Price: 12 Celestial Coins]


    [Price: 10 Celestial Coins]


    [Price: 8 Celestial Coins]


    [Price: 15¡­]


    Not a single one of them was cheap enough for him to buy with his current celestial coins. Making him feel increasingly nervous about the price of the Dao Domain Lord Realm information that he had wanted to buy from the Tower of Secrets just a few seconds earlier.


    Even more so because he clearly noticed that the price of the scrolls around him kept rising as he followed the preservation golem deeper inside the second floor of the Tower of Secrets¡­


    "Trial participant, the information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm is here."


    [The Precarious Journey, a look into the Dao Domain Lord Realm]


    [Price: 8 Celestial Coins]


    And indeed, just like he had feared, the price of the information he wanted to buy just so happened to be a single celestial coin over what he had on him. Making him not know whether to cry orugh over the fact that he had found the information he wanted but couldn''t ess it.

 Chapter 1290 Ten Celestial Trials

    Chapter 1290 Ten Celestial Trials


    Of course, it had to be too expensive for me to buy outright... And given the formations that should be guarding this ce, trying to forcefully take it isn''t an option.


    Smiling wryly as he thought this to himself while looking at the thin scroll ced on the shelf in front of him, Xuan Hao did his best to suppress the desire to just try and forcefully take the scroll. Knowing very well that the formations inside the Tower of Secrets would end up killing if he did so.


    "Is there any way to earn celestial coins outside of partaking in the celestial trials?" With that in mind, Xuan Hao could only turn around and ask this. Hoping that there was some other way for him to earn thatst celestial coin required for him to get his hands on the scroll containing the information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    "Yes, outside of the main method of obtaining celestial coins, they can also be obtained through trading with other trial participants for things other than celestial coins andbat matches with other trial participants putting some of their celestial coins on the line.


    Outside of that, a more difficult way to earn celestial coins is also avable. Involving the submission of at least Earth Rankbat techniques that haven''t been registered inside the Tower of Secrets before. Slight changes to abat technique does not serve as a valid submission."


    "Submission ofbat techniques? Can I perhaps submit some of thebat techniques from the sect and try to see if I can get thest remaining celestial coin through this!?" Feeling both his eyes starting to shine as he said this after hearing what the preservation golem said in response to his question, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of renewed hope that he wouldn''t have to leave behind the scroll containing information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    "Submission of newbat techniques require the validation of an elder before they can be ced inside the Tower of Secrets, would you like me to contact an elder forbat technique evaluation? Be warned, contacting an elder without proper reason will result in a deduction of 5 celestial coins."


    "No¡­ No need for that¡­"


    However, before he could start getting excited about submitting the different high level techniques that the Star Shattering Sect had managed to get their hands on since their rapid expansion and some of the techniques he had obtained himself, the preservation golem destroyed his hopes.


    Contacting an elder from the Mirage Sect toe and evaluate hisbat techniques now that the Mirage Sect itself had been destroyed was nothing more than a pipe dream. Not something that would happen no matter how much he wished for it.


    Instead, there was a higher chance that he would end up losing 5 celestial coins by trying to contact one of the elders from the Mirage Sect¡­


    Haaa¡­ Looks like the only way for me to earn enough celestial coins to get my hands on the scroll with information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm is to find another celestial trial andplete it.


    The only problem with this is the fact that I haven''t found any other celestial gates so far. Not to mention, there is a high likelihood that the other celestial gates won''t be in good condition. Meaning just entering them will pose a risk¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he looked down at the scroll that was just barely above what he could afford, Xuan Hao soon turned back to face the preservation golem that had remained silent since his refusal to contact one of the elders. "Do you have any idea how to find any of the celestial gates?" Not thinking twice as he asked this, as he intended to try the only method left for him to get more celestial coins, challenging another celestial trial.


    "Yes, you can track down celestial trials with the help of a celestialpass, as you have yet to im a celestialpass, you can get one for free."


    Whoosh~


    Taking out a small goldenpass with a small crystal dial inside, the preservation golem directly handed it over. "Do be aware, losing or destroying the celestialpass will mean you have to pay for the second one. The price of a celestialpass is 25 celestial coins."


    "Thank you¡­" Not knowing what else to say in response, Xuan Hao just looked down at thepass in his hand with a surprised look on his face. Not having expected the preservation golem to suddenly hand over something that would help him track down the location of other celestial trials.


    [Main Quest: The Ten Celestial Trials]


    [Description: Having gained the celestialpass, you can now track down the remaining celestial trials inside the mystic realm. Complete all the celestial trials.]


    [Celestial Trials Completed: 3/10]


    [Reward: Increaseprehension of the Dao of Space, ???]


    However, the most surprising thing was that a new main quest appeared the moment he took the celestialpass from the preservation golem.


    Not to mention the single celestial trial that he nned toplete so he could get his hands on the information regarding the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it seemed like the main quest wanted him to clear all the celestial trials present inside the mystic realm.


    But¡­ A total of ten trials¡­


    Frowning as he thought of having to go through seven more celestial trials, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit uneasy.


    Not so much because he was fearful of the celestial trials themselves, but more so because he was afraid of encountering a situation where the spatial passage leading to the trial had been destroyed and would end up resulting in him being thrown into a spatial storm the moment, he tried to go through it.


    Although the chance of this happening when passing through the third celestial gate wasn''t high, it was still there¡­ And he had no idea if any of the remaining seven celestial gates were in a worse state than the third celestial gate¡­


    "No¡­ I don''t need to worry so much about all of this for now, there isn''t a time limit to the quest. For now, I should just start off with trying to find a stable celestial gate and get thest celestial coin I need for the scroll with information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    After that, I can use the information in the scroll to increase my strength and try to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm before trying to go through any of the unstable or damaged celestial gates." Calming down as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao nced back down at the celestialpass in his hand.


    If he had enough time, it shouldn''t be that difficult for him toplete the main quest given by the system.


    The only worry he had outside of the unstable spatial passages being the fact that he had no idea what the remaining seven celestial trials entailed. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Considering that they were also designed for those trial participants in the Profound Immortal Realm, he understood that even if he felt confident after going through three of them, he couldn''t let his guard down.


    Even more so considering that the difficulty of the celestial trials would likely increase now that his strength had broken through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    "Well¡­ It''s no use staying inside this ce any longer. After all, there isn''t much I can get with my meagre 7 celestial coins¡­" ncing down at the scroll with information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm onest time as he said this, Xuan Hao turned around and made his way back in the direction he hade from.


    Now that he had managed to get his hand on a celestialpass that could help him find the other celestial trials present inside the mystic realm, he didn''t intend to waste any time lingering around inside the Tower of Secrets staring at the scroll he couldn''t get his hands on.


    Instead of that, his time would be far better spent returning to the mystic realm and start searching for one of the seven remaining celestial trials as fast as possible-


    "Trial participant has left the Tower of Secrets without purchasing anything, one celestial coin has been deducted as entrance fee."


    "¡­"


    Deciding to not say anything after hearing the emotionless voice of the preservation golem behind the moment he stepped out of the Tower of Secrets, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing to himself as he wondered what had happened to his temporary elder status of being able to enter anywhere inside the exchange hall.


    Obviously, even though it seemed like he could enter everywhere from what he had experienced so far, he still needs to pay some kind of mandatory fee for not buying anything after entering the Tower of Secrets¡­

 Chapter 1291 Strange Mountain

    Chapter 1291 Strange Mountain


    Leaving through the spatial passage after going through the remaining ruins floating around inside the almost empty space, Xuan Hao nced back in the direction of the Tower of Secrets onest time. Promising himself that he would return the moment he got the one- two celestial coins required to buy the scroll that had the information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    At the very least, from the celestial coins he had been given so far, it seemed that he got at least two celestial coins forpleting a celestial trial with one of them giving him 3 celestial coins.


    Of course, there was always a chance thatpleting a celestial trial only rewarded a single celestial coin, while anything more than that would be rewarded whenever someone preformed beyond the expected level required toplete the trial.


    If that was the case, he would have to try and do his best toplete whatever trial he ended up inside of without holding back.


    Not that it mattered that much which of these two guesses were correct regarding the number of celestial coins rewarded frompleting a celestial trial, as he intended to do his best atpleting the celestial trials anyway. After all, the celestial trials were far too dangerous for him to not use all of his strength. Especially now that his strength had increased to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and the difficulty of the trial should have increasedpared to the past when he had gone through the celestial trial at the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Whoosh~


    Safelying out on the other side of the spatial passage, Xuan Hao didn''t wait around as he looked down at the celestialpass and left the ce in the direction that it was pointing. Intending onpleting the closest celestial trial as fast as possible so he could return to the space of the third exchange hall and exchange for the scroll containing information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Luckily for him, he didn''t have to head deeper inside the mystic realm where he didn''t have any idea of the situation, but instead somewhere towards the outer parts of the mystic realm ording to the celestialpass.


    Even if it could still be hidden in a ce simr to the first three celestial gates he had found, he didn''t feel like he would end up encountering anything too dangerous in the outer parts of the mystic realm.


    At the very least, he didn''t think he would end up running into something that would pose a threat to him outside of the trial inside of the celestial gate itself.


    After all, if any demon beast above the Soul Ascension Realm appeared, the guardian formation of the mystic realm would activate to kill it. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although¡­ Remembering thest time the guardian formation had activated to kill the cloud demon beast, he had a feeling that the most dangerous thing would be finding himself too close to a Dao Seed Realm demon beast when the guardian formation activated, as he was certain that the power behind its attack was more than strong enough to kill someone in the Profound Immortal Realm, let alone someone who had yet to reach the Profound Immortal Realm like himself¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao silently decided that he would teleport as far away as possible the moment he spotted a Dao Seed Realm demon beast. nning to avoid any chance of him getting caught up in the aftermath of the guardian formation activating.


    Ching~


    However, just at this moment, Xuan Hao heard a quiet sound echoing out from the celestialpass, as he discovered that thepass turned around and pointed at a small mountain just behind him. Signaling that he had already arrived at the location of the fourth celestial gate.


    "Hm? I''m already here?"


    Not having expected the fourth celestial gate to be so close, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat surprised expression on his face as he looked over at the small, secluded mountain that the dial of thepass was now pointing towards.


    The mountain in question was small and secluded. Looking like nothing out the ordinary if one didn''t consider that the attack from the guardian formation had essentially vaporized thendscape around the small mountain. Leaving it standing out amidst the charredndscape.


    Even if it could normally be ignored, it was rather hard to do so when it was the only thing that had been left standing in the wake of the destruction brought by the guardian formations attack to kill the cloud demon beast.


    The reason why he hadn''t discovered it was simply because he had been teleporting forward following the celestialpass and didn''t pay much attention to his surroundings before the celestialpass had reminded him that he had reached the location of the fourth celestial gate.


    And now that he saw the weird, secluded mountain in the middle of the scorchednd created by the attack of the guardian formation understood that there was more to it than what met the eye.


    I guess the mountain is protected by some kind of formation that allowed it to survive the attack from the guardian formation. Not just that, but a quite strong formation considering that it managed to survive the residual power of that terrifying attack.


    Narrowing both his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao used his divine sense spread to spread out and envelope the small mountain in an attempt to try and find the location of the fourth celestial gate¡­ And to his surprise, he soon discovered the fourth celestial gate inside a cave just big enough to fit it close to the peak of the mountain.


    The formation he had expected to block his divine sense or create some kind of illusion to confuse it, didn''t happen. Instead, he had managed to smoothly find the fourth celestial gate without any problems.


    This is far too easy¡­


    Still, feeling cautious about how the small mountain had managed to survive while everything around it had perished, Xuan Hao didn''t immediately descend to investigate the situation of the fourth celestial gate.


    Instead, he decided to carefully approach while using his divine sense and dao domain inbination to carefully investigate the base of the mountain without making his way off the scorched ground.


    Hm? This is¡­


    And just like he had expected, as he used thebined power of his divine sense and his dao domain to investigate the area around the mountain, he managed to discover a faintyer of qi that seemed to envelope the entire mountain.


    Thin to the point that he hadn''t even noticed it when his divine sense first swept through the mountain in search of the fourth celestial gate.


    However, even if he could sense this faintyer of qi that enveloped the small mountain, he still couldn''t figure out what kind of purpose it had, as the thinyer of qi essentially had no power. Not much different from normal.


    The only thing that seemed to give away that this thinyer of qi wasn''t normal was the fact that some kind of strange ancient looking symbols seemed to form through the thinyer of qi every now and then.


    Although he didn''t know any of these symbols and had never seen them before, hisprehension of the Dao of Formation allowed him to at least understand that these symbols were rted to some kind of formation.


    Not just that but given that he couldn''t understand these symbols even when he hadprehended the Dao of Formations, it was obvious that the formation formed by the thinyer of qi was far moreplicated than what first met the eye.


    Whoosh~


    Thud!


    Casually throwing out a small ice spear formed by his Dao of Ice to test out the formation, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing both his eyes, as he watched the entire mountain shimmer briefly before allowing the ice spear to pass straight through it and pierce into the scorched ground a few thousand meters away.


    "So¡­ This was how it managed to avoid being affected by the attack from the guardian formations¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked at the small mountain, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit relived that the formation protecting the small mountain didn''t seem to be an offensive one, but instead a more unique defensive formation.


    At least he didn''t feel that worried about the formation, as he should be able to freely test it out and try toprehend it without facing the risk of being attacked by it.


    After understanding the formation and whether or not it would try and imprison him the moment he entered it, he would be able to figure out how to best reach the fourth celestial gate without anything to worry about.


    Even if it might take a few days of trial and error, Xuan Hao didn''t mind it that much, as he had more than enough time at hand and the scroll with information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm wasn''t going anywhere.

 Chapter 1292 First Sign of Chaos, Blue Sea Empires Forces Appear

    Chapter 1292 First Sign of Chaos, Blue Sea Empire''s Forces Appear


    Finding a ce next to the small mountain with the thinyer of qi protecting it, Xuan Hao sat down and began the process of slowly analyzing the mysterious formation protecting the small mountain. Intending to find out if it would cause him any harm by entering the formation or if it was just designed to protect the mountain itself from being harmed.


    At least from what he had seen so far, he guessed that there shouldn''t be any problems with entering the formation, but just to be sure he wanted to make sure that this was the case. Not to mention, it wasn''t like he didn''t gain anything from studying the formation, as it helped him increase hisprehension of the Dao of Formations. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    At the same time, it also gave him insight into the ancient formations used in the past during the time that the Mirage Sect was around. Giving him an easier time when encountered simr formations in the future, as he would have some knowledge about the different formation symbols, they used and what purpose they served.


    For example, if he had prior knowledge of the ancient formation symbols that were just barely visible on the surface of the thinyer of qi covering the small mountain range, he would have been able to figure out the purpose of the formation without having to spend a few days studying it.


    "If I continue encountering formations like this whenever I encounter a celestial gate in the future, I might end up reaching the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Formations before doing so in the Dao of Space¡­" Chuckling to himself as he muttered this while looking at the thinyer of qi that formed some kind ofplicated formation that he couldn''t see through, Xuan Hao closed both of his eyes as his divine sense and dao domain both spread out began probing the thinyer of qi from all directions.


    Although the ancient formation hidden in the thinyer of qi was hard to notice and impossible to sense without at least havingprehended the Dao of Formations to the Small Sess Realm, it wasn''t that difficult to analyze after finding it.


    In the end, all Xuan Hao needed was time and he should be able to fully understand the principles behind the mysterious formation.


    Of course, his goal wasn''t to fully understand the formation, but instead just to figure out if it was safe for him to enter the formation.


    After all, to fully understand such aplicated formation, it would take him over a dozen years with his currentprehension of the Dao of Formations¡­ And Xuan Hao had no ns of staying around for so long inside the mystic realm to analyze a single ancient formation.


    Maybe in the future when he ran out of things to do, he coulde back to the mystic realm and try to understand the different ancient formations scattered around inside the mystic realm, but for now, he was fully set on reaching the fourth celestial gate on the small mountain and get the remaining two celestial coins he needed for the scroll with information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao sat down and began to analyze the mysterious formation covering the small mountain, the situation back in the Star Shattering Sect had begun to rapidly change.


    The reason for this was that the first group of cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire arrived in the devasted Onyx Empire. Engaging in a devasting fight with the True Demon Realm demon cultivators that had caused the destruction of the Onyx Empire.


    The battle itself didn''t just affect the Onyx Empire, but also started affecting the neighboring powers that happened to border the Onyx Empire, as the terrifying battle between the Soul Ascension realm cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire and True Demon Realm demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnd pushed out any of the weaker demonic cultivators into the surrounding territories.


    In the end, Feng Chen and Shu Yao were both forced to go to the Star Shattering Sect''s border with the Onyx Empire to defend against therge influx of demonic cultivators, while arge number of elders and disciples followed them. Leaving the Star Shattering Sect mostly empty outside of a few essential elders and the weaker disciple who weren''t strong enough to participate in the battle with the demonic cultivators.


    As for the winged lion demon beast that had been guarding the border, it still remained in ce as it focused on consolidating its strength after the countless battles it had with Su Wuhan. Only nning to act in case a demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm appeared.


    Surprisingly, although the Star Shattering Sect ended up mobilizing most of their strength and the strength of the independent sects to deal with the influx of demonic cultivators, they couldn''t stop all of them from getting through.


    At the end of the day, there were simply far too many demonic cultivators and there was no way to fully defend the massive border that they shared with the Onyx Empire. Especially so when most of the Domain Lord Realm Experts ended up busy dealing with the stronger demonic cultivators and didn''t have time to kill off the weaker demonic cultivators.


    Even though the weaker elders and disciples of the Star Shattering Sect and independent sects did their best trying to kill as many as possible, it didn''t take long before the few demonic cultivators that managed to make it through started causing chaos inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    It was at this moment that the different smaller forces that had escaped to the Star Shattering Sect from the Onyx Empire when the demonic cultivators overwhelmed the Onyx Empire''s border with the Frozen Wastnd, finally had a chance to shine, as they worked in tandem with Elder Dust Fairy and the extensive informationwork she hadid down inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect to track down and kill these demonic cultivators.


    All things considered, the damage that the Star Shattering Sect ended up suffering because of the demonic cultivators was rtively minimal, as most of them were taken care of before they could end up bing a big problem.


    Of course, this didn''t mean that there wasn''t any demonic cultivator that ended up causing serious damage to the Star Shattering Sect, as some of them ended up taking advantage of the rtively weak powers that existed under the protection of the Star Shattering Sect to rapidly devour arge number of weaker cultivators to rapidly increase their own strength.


    An example of such a situation that caused Chu Yang to leave to the sect, was when a demonic cultivator managed to find a weak aristocrat family that had fled from the Onyx Empire where the strongest person was only around the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    In the end, the demonic cultivator devoured the entire aristocratic family. Reaching a realmparable to someone in the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm before Elder Dust Fairy had learnt about him.


    However, by the time Chu Yang arrived to kill the demonic cultivator before it could cause any more damage, it had already destroyed close to a dozen small forces around the aristocratic family.


    But more important than that, it had ended up destroying one of the Star Shattering Sect''s recently established branches in the region. Killing all the elders and disciples that had been staying at the branch.


    Although there weren''t more than four elders and a little more than a few hundred disciples in the branch due to its recent construction, it was still devasting news for the sect, as it could be considered the first time that the Star Shattering Sect had experienced such arge number of deaths in such a short period of time.


    Even at the border between the sect and the Onyx Empire where demonic cultivators kept appearing in endless numbers, the number of elders and disciples dying were minimal due to the protection of the more powerful cultivators at the Domain Lord Realm preventing any powerful demonic cultivator from running amok among the weaker elders and disciples, something that didn''t happen outside the border.


    Outside of the devasting loss of a branch, the different independent sects under the Star Shattering Sect also suffered their fair share of disasters, as they ended up losing more than the Star Shattering Sect. Mainly due to the fact that Elder Dust Fairy had focused the full power of the informationwork towards ensuring the safety of the Star Shattering Sect and its branches after the loss of one branch.


    In the end, resulting in the information around the territory of the different independent sects being a bit slower and less urate than usual, as most of the talented people under Elder Dust Fairy relocated to ces close to the different branches of the sect.

 Chapter 1293 Fall of a Dao Seed Realm Cultivator...

    Chapter 1293 Fall of a Dao Seed Realm Cultivator...


    Outside of the chaos that was taking ce inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, the rest of the powers surrounding the Onyx Empire managed to deal with the situation without a lot of problems. The only power that experienced a worse situation than the Star Shattering Sect being the empire that bordered both the Onyx Empire and the Frozen Wastnd.


    In the end, this empire was forced to deal with an influx of demonic cultivators from two different directions at the same time.


    If not for the timely arrival of cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire, it wouldn''t have been out of the question for this empire to end up in a simr state as the Onyx Empire.


    At the same time, the first existence in the Dao Seed Realm also appeared a few days after the fall of the Star Shattering Sect branch.


    Following this, it didn''t take long before the demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm to get killed, as the demonic cultivators still left inside of the Onyx Empire began fleeing back in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd.


    As a result, the number of demonic cultivators trying to enter the Star Shattering Sect''s territory began to significantly decrease, as most of the powerful demonic cultivators who learnt about the appearance of the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the Blue Sea Empire all began to flee back in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd.


    In turn, the weaker demonic cultivators became rather easy to deal with as the Domain Lord Realm cultivators of the sect were freed up to help deal with the weaker demonic cultivators trying to rush into the sect''s territory.


    By the time that the first few people from the Blue Sea Empire appeared to lend a hand in dealing with the demonic cultivators, the situation was already under control. Resulting in them leaving to help out in ces where they were more needed.


    Of course, this didn''t mean that the Star Shattering Sect waspletely out of danger, as the people from the Blue Sea Empire would undoubtedly return to survey the situation after the demonic cultivators were fought back.


    Not just to ensure that the demonic cultivators had been dealt with, but likely also to get an idea about the current strength of the different forces that were in a sense under their protection.


    When that time came, it would be the time for the Star Shattering Sect to endure the scrutiny of the Blue Sea Empire. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Although it might only be someone in the Soul Ascension Realming to do this, it was still something that was of upmost importance.


    First of all, Pei Yang''s existence had to remain hidden as he was still a wanted figure in the eyes of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Secondly, the Shattered Star Peaks couldn''t be fully exposed to the people from the Blue Sea Empire, as the ce would undoubtedly end up being coveted by the Blue Sea Empire. After all, the dense qi of the ce and spiritual herb garden on the Ninth Star Peak was more than enough to make even a Dao Seed Realm cultivator greedy.


    At the very least, when it came to this kind of thing, Feng Chen had already managed toe up with a way to fool the people from the Blue Sea Empire by utilizing the chaotic qi formation to limit the spiritual qi present on the Shattered Star Peaks in case someone from the Blue Sea Empire wanted to see the sect. Also using the chaotic qi formation to hide anything that the Blue Sea Empire shouldn''t see.


    Of course, this would only work if the other party was in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    If the other party was in the Dao Seed Realm, it could still work, but it would depend on the strength of the Dao Seed Realm cultivator and how suspicious he was of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Someone above the Dao Seed Realm wanting to check out the Shattered Star Peaks would make it impossible for him to hide anything with the help of the chaotic qi formation.


    Well¡­ He should be able to hide things, but it would just be instantly picked up by the other party¡­


    However, just as Feng Chen returned back to the sect and began to prepare for having to endure the scrutiny of someone from the Blue Sea Empire who might show up at any moment after the demonic cultivators were pushed back to the Frozen Wastnd. News came that the Dao Seed- Earth Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire had been unsessful in pushing back the demonic cultivators to the Frozen Wastnd.


    Not just that, but he had been ambushed by a group of powerful demonic cultivators in the Demon Lord Realm. Equivalent in strength to someone in the Dao Seed Realm.


    As a result of this unexpected ambush, the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the Blue Sea Empire had ended up dying at the outer regions of the Onyx Empire close to the borders of the Frozen Wastnd.


    In turn, the demonic cultivators that had been escaping back towards the Frozen Wastnd had regained their spirits and once again began swarming back into the Onyx Empire and out towards the surrounding powers bordering the Onyx Empire.


    Although these demonic cultivators had not yet reached the borders of the Star Shattering Sect and resumed their earlier attack, Feng Chen didn''t dare waste a single second as he left the sect and rushed back towards the borders to help out with holding back the demonic cultivators. Understanding that there was little chance of the Blue Sea Empire showing up to survey the territory of the Star Shattering Sect now that they had lost someone at the Dao Seed Realm.


    Instead, it looked like the battle with the demonic cultivators was about to take a turn, as demonic cultivators at the Demon Lord Realm were now involved.


    Even if he had no idea about the situation outside of the few smaller empires located around the Star Shattering, Feng Chen had a feeling that this was only the prelude to what was about toe.


    At the very least, he felt somewhat reassured knowing that Pei Yang was there to help protect the sect in case a demonic cultivator at the Demon Lord Realm appeared. Bringing some semnce of safety to the chaotic time.


    Of course, Feng Chen waspletely unaware that the Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators wouldn''t be targeting the Star Shattering Sect''s territory in the first ce and would instead be actively trying to avoid it due to Xuan Hao''s friendship with Xuan Gui, who didn''t go back on her word and specifically ensured that there wouldn''t be any Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators attacking the Star Shattering Sect.


    ¡­


    At the same time that Feng Chen hurried back to the border between his sect and the Onyx Empire, the ancestors of the Blue Sea Empire had gathered together at the core of the Blue Sea Empire''s capital city to discuss the current state of things.


    "In just a few hours, we ended up losing more than three earth immortals dispatched to suppress the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnd and force them back. No matter how you look at this, it''s obvious that those demonic cultivators are nning on attacking us for real this time around!"


    "Indeed, outside of us, the others also faced simr losses. Even those monks in the west who normally don''t interfere also ended up losing one of their senior monks close to archiving enlightenment."


    "A monk close to archiving enlightenment¡­ So, someone close to reaching the Celestial Immortal Realm? Looks like they suffered quite a bit¡­"


    As the ancestors discussed, it was quickly revealed that outside of the Dao Seed Realm cultivator that ended up falling in the Onyx Empire, another two Dao Seed Realm cultivators had also ended up dying. Putting the total loss of Dao Seed Realm cultivators at three.


    Although not enough to cause any real damage to a massive power like the Blue Sea Empire, it was still something that could be felt and caught the ire of these ancestors above the Dao Seed Realm.


    "Those damnable demonic cultivators! I will go and teach them a lesson, or they might think that they can get away with tantly killing our people!"


    In the end, one of the ancestors didn''t wait for the rest to finish discussing as he stood up before leaving in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd filled with killing intent.


    "This¡­ Is it okay for him to leave like this? We still don''t know what those demonic cultivators are nning."


    Seeing this, one of the ancestors could not help voicing his concern, as it was rather obvious that the demonic cultivators were plotting something that didn''t just involve the few Demon Lords that had shown up so far. Especially considering that the attacks were happening across all demonic cultivator-controlled areas. Not just the Frozen Wastnd.


    "Don''t bother, one of the people who died was his grandson."


    "This¡­ Hah¡­ I understand¡­"

 Chapter 1294 Wiping Out the Demonic Cultivators

    Chapter 1294 Wiping Out the Demonic Cultivators


    Following the Celestial Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire moving out to deal with the demonic cultivators, it didn''t take long before the demonic cultivators that had returned to invade the Onyx Empire suddenly found themselves being reduced to nothing more than a bloody mist as the Celestial Immortal arrived and used his terrifying strength to kill all of them before continuing in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd filled with killing intent.


    Among the few demonic cultivators that had managed to escape alive from the terrifying and all-epassing power of the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor by being at the edge of the Onyx Empire and on their way to invade some of the different powers bordering the Onyx Empire, there were a few in the Demonic Transformation Realm who had managed to sense the terrifying power that had suddenly descended a short distance behind them.


    "Celestial Immortal! A Celestial Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire is here!"


    "W-we have to leave!"


    "But where do we go? That Celestial Immortal should be moving towards the Frozen Wastnd¡­"


    As the Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivators came to a stop on their way towards one of the empires bordering the Onyx Empire, they all understood that they had to leave as fast as possible and find somewhere to hide before the Celestial Immortal ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire appeared again and killed them off.


    As the Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivators came to a stop on their way towards one of the empires bordering the Onyx Empire, they all understood that they had to leave as fast as possible and find somewhere to hide before the Celestial Immortal ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire appeared again and killed them off.


    At the very least, they felt lucky that they were so meaningless to that existence that they had beenpletely ignored just because they were a few hundred meters outside the range of the ce where his domain had descended.


    "Maybe we can hide inside a secret realm. Although those ces are bound to be searched through, we might be able to avoid detection by finding an uninhabited secret realm to hide inside of."


    "Good idea."


    "Yeah, let''s go with that. After the danger passes, we can start growing our strength secretly while avoiding any attention from the surrounding powers."


    Coming to a decision on how to escape from their current dangerous situation unscratched, the group of Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivators formed an alliance with each other as they rushed forward in the search of a secret realm that they could hide inside of.


    Luckily, the border of the empire that they were nning on entering was rtively weak. Allowing them to overwhelm the border guards by working together before entering the empire in search of a secret realm to hide inside of.


    Not much different from this group of Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivators, the rest of the powerful demonic cultivators that had managed to survive the arrival of the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire, came up with simr solutions and began searching everywhere for secret realms to hide inside until the danger outside passed.


    Of course, their sess varied widely depending on the strength of the empire or power that they decided to try and hide away inside of, as most empires, including the Star Shattering Sect, managed to sessfully fend off against the demonic cultivators trying to enter their territory to hide away.


    Even then, there were still a lot of demonic cultivators that were sessful in escaping and finding somewhere to hide away while the danger outside passed. Only nning to reemerge when they were certain the people from the Blue Sea Empire were gone.


    ¡­


    Noticing the strange and sudden disappearance of the demonic cultivators a few hourster when only a few weaker demonic cultivators appeared at the Star Shattering Sect''s borders, Elder Dust Fairy wasted no time as she set out to figure out what had happened through the people that she had managed to ce in the Onyx Empire.


    "Huh? All of the demonic cultivators suddenly died?" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    In the end, she quickly learnt that all of the demonic cultivators inside the Onyx empire had suddenly died. Only showing a sudden expression filled with terror before being reduced to a bloody mist without any chance to fight back.


    Even if Elder Dust Fairy didn''t know what or who was behind the sudden death of the demonic cultivators, she guessed that the other party should be someone above the Dao Seed Realm from the fact that they had managed to kill all of the demonic cultivators inside the Onyx Empire in no more than a few minutes.


    "Did the Celestial Immortals from the Blue Sea Empire finally make a move?" Muttering this to herself, Elder Dust Fairy shook her head before taking off to inform Feng Chen and Elder Song about what had happened in the Onyx Empire. Understanding that the battle with the demonic cultivators in the Frozen Wastnd was about to reach a realmpletely out of their league.


    In such a situation, she understood that the best course of action would be for them to retreat back to the Shattered Star Peak where they at least had the protection of the terrifying chaotic qi formation in case something ended up happening.


    After all, the strongest people in the Star Shattering Sect at the moment was Pei Yang who was around the earlier stages of the Dao Seed Realm and Xuan Hao who should also be somewhere around the middle stages of the Dao Seed Realm from what she could guess from how Pei Yang had clearly referred to him as being the stronger one between the two.


    Both were far from strong enough to contend with a peak existence at the Celestial Immortal Realm-


    BOOOM-!


    Just as she was lost in her own thoughts making her way back towards the sect, a terrifying explosion suddenly rang out in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd before a terrifying shockwave leveled the territory of the Onyx Empire that she could barely see in the distance. Killing anything in its path.


    "The Celestial Immortal started fighting¡­"


    Even without seeing where the shockwave hade from, she was clear of one thing, the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire should have started fighting.


    However, there was one thing that confused her about the shockwave¡­ And that was the fact that it seemed to have been stopped by something before it had a chance to reach the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Is it the barrier that Senior Xuan set up to stop demonic cultivators?


    Remembering the fact that she had heard Elder Song talking about Grand Elder Xuan Hao setting up a barrier to stop demonic cultivators from barging into the territory of the Star Shattering Sect from the Frozen Wastnd, Elder Dust Fairy could not help narrowing her eyes with a look of disbelief as she stared off in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Although the power of the shockwave just now should only contain a fraction of the strength of the Celestial Immortal Realm, it was still far beyond anything she had ever seen or felt before.


    For the barrier set up by Grand Elder Xuan Hao to stop it, she guessed that she might have underestimated the strength of this Grand Elder.


    Perhaps, he was already close to reaching the Celestial Immortal Realm or the Profound Immortal Realm that she had only recently learnt about.


    "I hope that is the case¡­" Shaking her head as she said this while looking off in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd, Elder Dust Fairy didn''t waste any more time as she continued to rush back in the direction of the Shattered Star peaks.


    ¡­


    Whoosh~


    A few hours earlier, upon arriving in the air above the destroyed capital city of the Onyx Empire, the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire frowned in disgust as he looked down at the demonic cultivators who were in the process of consuming the bodies of several fallen cultivators below.


    "Hmph, to think so many demonic cultivators left the Frozen Wastnd to cause chaos and destroy one of those small empires. Let''s just kill all of those insects to start off with." Not saying anything more than this, the ancestor gently lifted his right arm, as a terrifying light suddenly appeared in the palm of his hand before splitting up into countless small streams of light that shot off in all directions-


    "AH!?"


    "Wha-!?"


    "Noooo-!"


    Soon spreading throughout the entire Onyx Empire. Killing any demonic cultivator that they came in contact with along the way. Reducing them to nothing more than a bloody mist before continuing onward to their next target before any of the cultivators still struggling to stay alive in the demonic cultivator infested Onyx Empire had the time to see what had happened.


    In no more than a few minutes, the streams of light returned to the palm of the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor before dispersing into thin air like they had never existed in the first ce.


    "Now, time to deal with those Demon Lord Realm insects." Not showing the slightest hint of exhaustion after having essentially wiped out every single demonic cultivator in the Onyx Empire within a few short minutes, the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire wasted no time as he began making his way towards the Frozen Wastnd.

 Chapter 1295 Trapped

    Chapter 1295 Trapped


    Reaching the Frozen Wastnd filled still brimming with killing intent after having cleaned up the demonic cultivators running rampant in the Onyx Empire, the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire slowed down as he began to use his divine sense to check his surroundings for the Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators.


    "There you are¡­"


    Not taking long before he spotted the three Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators further inside the Frozen Wastnd.


    Whoosh~!


    However, instead of directly flying deeper inside the Frozen Wastnd to kill them, he decided to gather his strength together into a powerful attack beforeunching it towards the three Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators in the distance. Intending to kill them off from afar without having to wander too far into the Frozen Wastnd.


    After all, even though he was filled with killing intent and wanted nothing more than to kill those three demonic cultivators, he wasn''t dumb enough to just wander deeper into the Frozen Wastnd where an ambush not much different from the one that his grandson had died to might be waiting for him.


    Understanding very well why the Frozen Wastnd had managed to remain a haven for demonic cultivators without being destroyed by the Blue Sea Empire and other powerful empires that surrounded it.


    The most obvious reason being the powerful demonic cultivators at the Demon King Realmparable to someone like himself at the Celestial Immortal Realm¡­


    BOOOM-!


    Watching with his divine sense as his attacknded only a few seconds after he had thrown it out, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire could not help narrowing his eyes as he noticed a bright red demonic barrier engulfing the three demonic cultivators to protect them just before his attacknded.


    Although this did result in the barrier shattering a few secondster, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire didn''t feel the slightest bit happy nor did he try to throw out another attack. Knowing that doing so would most likely just result in another simr barrier appearing to protect the three demonic cultivators who were now shivering in fear while looking in his direction.


    With that in mind, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire instead focused his attention on an empty spot just beside the three shivering demonic cultivators as his eyes narrowed even more than before.


    Even if it had only been for a brief moment, his divine sense had long since enveloped the three Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators and the area around him. Allowing him to notice the slight change in that empty space.


    Whoosh~


    And like he had expected, a figure covered in blood red robe emerged from the empty spot beside the three Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators. Shocking the three terrified demonic cultivators even more as they had seemingly no idea about this person having been there in the first ce.


    "Blood Lotus Demon King!? W-we greet his excellency!"


    ""¡­""


    However, it didn''t take long before one of the three recognized the person that had emerged as none other than one of the demon kings in control of the Frozen Wastnd, causing him to bow his head, something that was soon followed by the other two demonic cultivators.


    Though not the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnd who could be considered the ruler of the Frozen Wastnd, a demon king was still a demon king, an existence far beyond small demon lords like themselves.


    "To think a demon king would be showing up. Looks like he intended to use those three as bait to ambush me¡­"


    Shaking his head with a look of disdain on his face as he said this while looking towards the demon king that had emerged, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire didn''t show the slightest hint of fear as he directly took out a small talisman and shattered it before waiting to see what the demon king nned to do now that his ambush had failed. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    The talisman he had just shattered was a safety precaution that would instantly inform the rest of the ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire that he had encountered someone at the Celestial Immortal Realm or a demonic cultivator in the Demon King Realm.


    In another few minutes, two more ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire would be showing up to ensure that nothing went wrong. After all, someone in the Dao Seed Realm dying was fine and didn''t harm the foundation of the Blue Sea Empire, but someone at the Celestial Immortal Realm was apletely different matter.


    Even if the Blue Sea Empire could be considered among the strongest on the Ewaria Continent and could endure the loss of one or two Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators without their foundation being affected much, it didn''t mean that they nned on doing so.


    If possible, they would still do everything in their power to ensure that none of the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestors ended up dying.


    "¡­"


    Knowing that the ambush n had failed, the Blood Lotus Demon King remained silent as he kept his attention focused on the Blue Sea Empire Ancestor in the distance. Completely ignoring the existence of the three demon lords who had no idea whether to stay or run away.


    In the end, a stalemate emerged between the two sides, one waiting for reinforcements, while the other hadn''t made any clear indication of what he wanted to do after his ambush had failed.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    "Wow, it really is a demon king, I didn''t expect one of them to emerge. Are they perhaps tired of being trapped in this cold ce and want to start a full-blown war? Didn''t they learn from thest time around?"


    "Perhaps¡­ They have been awfully quiet for the past few thousand years¡­"


    As a few minutes flew by, two more ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire soon appeared beside the first, as they bothmented casually while looking over in the direction of the demonic cultivator that remainedpletely silent since he had appeared.


    "Now that you two are here, should we try and kill this demonic cultivator? Even if more demon kings end up showing up, with three of us here, we should be able to escape without any problem."


    "Hm¡­ Although it is a bit risky to go deeper inside the Frozen Wastnd, it shouldn''t be much of a problem considering we are three."


    "Indeed! Even if we can''t kill that demon king, we should at least be able to kill those three Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators!"


    Not wasting much time chatting with each other, the three ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire soon came to an agreement, as they all used their movement techniques to close the distance between themselves and the demon king referred to as Blood Lotus by the three Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators-


    RUUUUMBLE-!


    BOOM!


    Following which a terrifying power containing thebined might of three Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators descended before exploding with a might far beyond something a single demon king should be able to safely deal with.


    Whoosh~!


    However, contrary to the scene of the demon king getting sent flying that the three ancestors had expected to see, they were instead met with the sight of arge blood red barrier that perfectly absorbed the attack without the slightest bit of damage. Completely different from what had happened only minutes earlier when the first ancestor hadunched a long-distance attack towards the three Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators.


    Rumble~


    And to make matters worse, the ground and air around them began to tremble ever so slightly as everything around them was soon reced by an endless sea of blood and blood red sky.


    "This¡­ Looks like we walked into a formation."


    "You don''t say¡­"


    "No need to worry you two, we are still three against one. No matter how much effort this guy put into this formation, it''s impossible for him to trap us here for long, let alone kill us!"


    "I know¡­ It''s just annoying to break these trapping formations¡­"


    "True¡­"


    However, instead of panicking at the fact that they were trapped inside a formation, the three ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire only let out somewhat annoyed exmations before all three of them erupted with their full strength. Beginning the process of forcibly breaking out of the formation through strength alone.


    Although this would take longer than solving the formation, none of the three were skilled in the Dao of Formations, so they could only go with the most rudimentary way of breaking the formation through strength.


    "Looks like this should keep them trapped for a few hours¡­" Seeing that the three had been trapped and wouldn''t be able to escape in the next few hours, the demon king that had remained silent so far finally spoke up as he turned towards the three Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators. "You three, I have something for you to do before they break free or more ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire shows up..."

 Chapter 1296 Guarding the Border and a "Small" Mountain

    Chapter 1296 Guarding the Border and a "Small" Mountain


    As the three ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire remained trapped inside the formation, the three Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators quickly flew off in the direction of the Onyx Empire before splitting up and disappearing in different directions. Intent on carrying out the task that had been given to them by the demon king, as they understood only death would await them if they refused to do so.


    Crack-!


    BANG!


    And like this a few hours quickly flew by without much happening before the three ancestors of the Blue Sea Empire finally managed to break through the formation that had trapped them, as all three of them used their full strength to attack the Blood Lotus Demon King that had been patiently waiting for them-


    BOOOM-!


    Soon resulting in the devasting shockwave that Elder Dust Fairy had seen, as the four began to fight with each other. Destroying anything in their path.


    Unfortunately for the ancestors of the Blue Sea Empire, they couldn''t kill the demon king in front of them, while the Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators that they had originally nned to kill had long since disappeared.


    In the end, as the battle dragged on and several powerful auras appeared from the deeper parts of the Frozen Wastnd, the three could only reluctantly turn around and leave the Frozen Wastnd without aplishing anything other than killing a bunch of weaker demonic cultivators that could easily be reced.


    "Hmph! Don''t think you will get another chance to leave this wastnd again in the future!"


    Feeling unsatisfied with this kind of situation, the ancestor that had originally gone to kill the demonic cultivators behind the death of his grandson decided to not fully leave the ce, as he directly ced himself at the border between the Onyx Empire and the Frozen Wastnd. Intending to stay behind and kill any demonic cultivator that appeared to calm down his killing intent.


    Of course, considering that this wasn''t inside the Frozen Wastnd itself, the other two ancestors didn''t say anything and just quietly left to inform the other ancestors about what had happened so they could figure out what the demonic cultivators were nning.


    More importantly, they also had to figure out how the situation was like with the other empires around them and if they had taken any losses among their Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators. After all, it was clear that the demonic cultivators were nning something big.


    Following the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire settling down inside the Onyx Empire, it didn''t take long before the Star Shattering Sect and surround small empires found out about what had happened, as the number of demonic cultivators trying to invade their territory sharply decreased with the appearance of the Blue Sea Empire Ancestor.


    For some empires that only bordered the Onyx Empire and not the Frozen Wastnd itself, the assault of the demonic cultivators came to full end, while others like the Star Shattering Sect still had to deal with the attack of demonic cultivatorsing from other parts of their territory.


    Even then, the stress on the Star Shattering Sect itself was reduced to a manageable level, as demonic cultivators stoppeding from the direction of the Onyx Empire and now only came from the opposite direction of the Onyx Empire where the demonic cultivators seemed to be far weaker¡­ And over a short period of time, it became a popr ce for the disciples and elders to go for training inbat against the demonic cultivators.


    After a few weeks, the Situation in the Star Shattering Sect''s territory stabilized and reconstruction of the branch sect that had been destroyed officially began.


    The only thing that worried Feng Chen, Elder Song and the rest of the higher ups of the sect was the presence of the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire, who remained at the Onyx Empire''s borders with the Frozen Wastnd. Killing any demonic cultivator daring enough to try and cross over.


    Although he hadn''t really done anything to the Star Shattering Sect, it was still a worrying thing when such a powerful cultivator had decided to settle down next to you. Especially considering that the strength of this cultivator was more than enough to destroy the Star Shattering Sect.


    However, the most worrying thing was that he would have a reason to do so if he noticed the existence of Pei Yang or became greedy after seeing the abundant spiritual qi present inside the chaotic qi formation of the Shattered Star Peaks where the main sect of the Star Shattering Sect was located.


    Not that there was much the Star Shattering Sect could do other than pray that the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire didn''t decide to leave the Onyx Empire and check out the surrounding powers.


    ¡­


    At the same time back in the mystic realm, Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes after having remained seated in front of the small mountain with the fourth celestial gate on top of it for the past few weeks.


    Having been fully focused onprehending the formation that protected the small mountain, he had ended up losing track of time in the process.


    In the process of doing so, he had not only managed to deepen his understanding of the formation but had also managed to increase his understanding of the Dao of Formations.


    Although not to the point where he broke through to the Large Sess Realm, he was at least one step closer to reaching the Large Sess Realm and should be able to reach it if he decided to spend another few months in front of the ancient formation guarding the small mountain.


    A terrifyingprehension speed, but ultimately not what he nned on using his time on at the moment, as his goal for now was toplete a celestial trial and get his hands on the scroll containing information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    After having done that, he could always return toprehend the ancient formation for a few months and reach the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Formations.


    The main reason for his confidence in being able to return andprehend the formation in the future came from the fact that the ancient formation guarding the small mountain wasn''t hostile in any way nor would it be trapping him upon entering it.


    Instead, he had managed to learn that the sole purpose of the formation was to protect the small mountain from any attacks that might damage it¡­ And only if he tried to damage the small mountain would the ancient formation guarding it activate and possibly trap him in the process.


    As long as he didn''t do any of this and just peacefully entered the formation and made his way to the fourth celestial gate, everything would be fine. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    The only problem was that the ancient guardian formation seemed to view even the slightest movement of spiritual qi as damaging the natural environment of the small mountain. Essentially meaning that he would be forced to seal his cultivation base before entering the range of the formation.


    Even though doing this wouldn''t affect the strange of his physical body and he would still be able to almost instantaneously undo the seal if he encountered any dangerous situation inside, it also meant that he would be limited to walking normally up the small mountain without using any strength above what a normal mortal could do.


    Though it might not be that much of a problem to climb up the mountain in this kind of manner, the small mountain was only small in terms of cultivators. For a normal mortal, the small mountain was already like a giant piercing through the sky. Standing over ten thousand meters tall.


    Even if there was a path to follow, it would still take a few days to reach the summit where the fourth celestial gate was located¡­


    "Haaa¡­ Nothing to do about it if I want to reach the fourth celestial gate without having to try and force my way through the formation." Muttering this to himself as he looked up at the now towering mountain and the summit that now loomed far above him, Xuan Hao spent the next few minutes sealing off his own cultivation base.


    Making sure that no spiritual qi leaked out from his body before he stepped on to the long path leading up the mountain towards summit where the cave with the fourth celestial gate inside of it was located.


    At the very least, although the formation seemed to react to his dao domain. Preventing him from flying up, it didn''t react to his divine sense. Allowing him to fully explore the mountain and continueprehending the ancient formation as he slowly made his way towards the summit.


    In the process, he noticed that hisprehension speed of the Dao of Formation did increase by a bit after entering the formation, but it had nothing to do with the mountain, but more so the fact that he could now personally feel the formation with his own body.

 Chapter 1297 Undamaged Celestial Gate

    Chapter 1297 Undamaged Celestial Gate


    Continuing to slowly make his way up the mountain, Xuan Hao didn''t pay much attention to his surroundings as he focused onprehending the Dao of Formations.


    Soon enough, a few days flew by peacefully as he followed the already established path up the mountain and all the way to the summit where the cave containing the fourth celestial gate was located.


    "So, this is the fourth celestial gate¡­" Finding himself wandering inside the cave beforeing to a stop in front of the fourth celestial gate, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself as he looked up at the majestic celestial gate.


    Although he had already seen it through his divine sense earlier, the feeling of being directly in front of the celestial gate was different, as he could feel the majestic and terrifying presence of the gate bearing down on him.


    Not just that, but he could also clearly sense that the celestial gate in front of him was different from the other three celestial gates he had encountered so far.


    Different in the sense that the other three celestial gates had been damaged, while the one in front of him didn''t seem to have suffered any damage from the attack that had taken ce in the past, something he didn''t expect considering the fact that the battle back then seemed to have been rather one sided.


    But then again, it could also just be that what he had seen so far was just the result of a first strike advantage catching the Mirage Sect and their elders off guard.


    Different in the sense that the other three celestial gates had been damaged, while the one in front of him didn''t seem to have suffered any damage from the attack that had taken ce in the past, something he didn''t expect considering the fact that the battle back then seemed to have been rather one sided.


    But then again, it could also just be that what he had seen so far was just the result of a first strike advantage catching the Mirage Sect and their elders off guard.


    From then onwards the advantage of having the first strike would decrease and it would be harder to kill the elders from the Mirage Sect. Giving them an opportunity to fight back and save some of the celestial gates before they could be damaged.


    Even if he had no idea why they would do something like this, he still felt appreciative of the Mirage Sect for doing so, as it would be much safer for him to undergo the celestial trial with an undamaged celestial gatepared to a damaged one where he ran the risk of ending up inside a spatial storm.


    "Hm? Considering that the celestial gate is intact and doesn''t have any sign of damage. Perhaps the elder of the Mirage Sect in charge of this celestial gate might have survived¡­" Suddenly realizing that there was a very real chance that he might encounter someone from the Mirage Sect by entering the celestial gate, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit nervous as he stopped himself just before entering the celestial gate.


    Although his interactions with the Mirage Sect so far had been positive and there shouldn''t be any danger if he encountered someone from the Mirage Sect, he couldn''t help feeling uneasy at the prospect of encountering another elder from the Mirage Sect.


    After all, from what he had managed to learn so far, an elder from the Mirage Sect should at least be someone at the Peak of the Profound Immortal Realm and possibly even beyond that. Meaning that he would stand no chance to resist if the other party turned out to be hostile.


    Following these thoughts, the more rational part of his brain also jumped in and reassured him that it would be impossible to encounter an elder from the Mirage Sect unless he or she was in a simr state as the elder he had already encountered.


    Considering how long it had been, if an elder or someone different from the Mirage Sect had managed to survive the battle back then by hiding inside of the fourth celestial gate in front of him, they should have long since left the ce, either to seek revenge or rebuild the Mirage Sect.


    Thinking about it, they might have already tried to rebuild the Mirage Sect inside of the mystic realm once, as that might have been the reason why the guardian formation of the mystic realm had somehow managed to still remain operational after a devastating attack on the mystic realm in the past.


    However, for unknown reasons, they had given up on rebuilding the Mirage Sect inside the mystic realm and had left the ce.


    Not just that, but outside of the guardian formation that should have been repaired by the remnants of the Mirage Sect that had survived the attack back then, it didn''t seem like they had done much with the celestial gates, as everything inside of them remainedpletely untouched from back when they had been attacked.


    Unless¡­ The celestial gates had some kind of safety measure built into them that directly closed the celestial gate and prevented anyone from entering. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Considering that he had only seen the gate in an open state where all the spatial passages were connected, it seemed insane to forcibly seal the countless spatial channels connected to a single celestial gate, but considering the power of the celestial gates themselves far surpassing his current understanding, he couldn''t count it out¡­


    No matter what happened, there was no way for him to figure it out by standing motionlessly in front of the fourth celestial gate-


    Whoosh~


    So, without wasting any more time with his own thoughts, Xuan Hao threw aside his hesitation and stepped inside the fourth celestial gate.


    In the end, even if there were some risks to entering the fourth celestial gate, he would ultimately still have to go through the celestial trial to obtain the celestial coins needed for him to get his hands on the scroll containing information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao began making his way up the mountain a few days earlier, Mui, who had been running rampant inside the forest close to the edge of the mystic realm stood triumphantly in front of arge demon beast at the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Waaahahaha! Finally got you!" Laughing happily as she looked down at the demon beast that had already been knocked to a state where it couldn''t fight back any longer, Mui decisively manipted one of her artifacts to deliver the killing blow-


    Bang!


    Ending the life of the powerful demon beast that could be considered one of the strongest demon beasts still left inside the forest.


    "Hehe, now I should have killed off most of the demon beast in the Nascent Soul Realm. If I want to continue training, I will have to leave the forest and go deeper inside the mystic realm!" Saying this to herself as both her eyes started shining, her eyes soon started dimming again as she remembered what her master had told her about the dangers present in the deeper parts of the mystic realm.


    Although she felt confident in her current strength now that she had grown ustomed to fighting demon beasts and was far more skilled in using her artifacts, she had no real way to face a Domain Lord Realm demon beast outside of using the things that her master had left behind for her.


    Even then, with her cultivation already being close to breaking through to the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and her current strength making her confident in facing Half-Step Domain Lord Realm demon beasts if she encountered another once again, Mui didn''t feel fearful of moving deeper inside the mystic realm.


    All things considered, she had to move deeper into the mystic realm if she wanted to continue on with her training and increasing her own strength, as the demon beasts still left in the forest were far too weak for her to train with.


    Most of them only being in the Core Formation Realm or the Foundation Establishment Realm, with any in the Nascent Soul Realm already having been killed off by her during the past few weeks.


    "Let''s do it! Maybe I will even be able to find that Half Step Domain Lord Realm demon beast from back then and get my revenge now that I''m stronger!"


    In the end, Mui ultimately decided to leave the forest and head deeper inside the mystic realm.


    For traveling, she decided to use one of her artifacts for flying, as normal travel through the forest would at least take her a few weeks to reach the other side of it.


    Normally, it would have taken her far longer to clear the forest of any Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts, but it was precisely because of this Xuan Hao had felt at ease leaving Mui there while he himself went deeper into the mystic realm by himself.


    Never would he have expected that she had somehow managed to turn her artifacts into flying artifacts.


    Not just that, but the spiritual qi consumption that should have been massive for something like that, had somehow been negated by her, as she had used different spiritual metals she found over the past few weeks to improve on the artifact in question and turn it into a real flying artifact, something Xuan Hao hadn''t thought about when he had left her alone in the forest to train by herself¡­

 Chapter 1298 Fourth Celestial Trial, Mushroom Forest

    Chapter1298 Fourth Celestial Trial, Mushroom Forest


    Unaware of the fact that Mui had already finished off all the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts in the forest that he had left her in, Xuan Hao focused his full attention on the spatial passage that he had been sucked inside of after entering the fourth celestial gate.


    Although the fourth celestial gate looked like it had beenpletely undamaged from the outside and there shouldn''t be anything wrong with the spatial passages connected to it, Xuan Hao still remained cautious in case he ended up being thrown into a spatial storm.


    After all, even with his current strength at the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he was nowhere near strong enough to resist against the spatial storms he had seen when observing the different spatial passages connected to the third celestial gate.


    At most, he would be able to try and make use of hisprehension of the Dao of Space to force himself out of the spatial passage before he ended up inside a spatial storm.


    Even if this might end up being dangerous, he still felt like it would be better than him getting stuck inside a spatial storm where he would have no way to escape with his current strength.


    Dispersing the spatial storm or trying to escape from it with hisprehension of the Dao of Space was also impossible, as he doubted that he would be able to do something like that unless his Dao of Space broke through to the Perfection Realm.


    Luckily, there wasn''t anything wrong with the spatial passage and he soon found himself safely on the other side of the spatial passage.


    Plop~!


    However, what appeared on the other side of the spatial passage was nothing like what he had expected to see when he entered the fourth celestial gate, as a forest made up of giant mushrooms spread out in all directions around him as far as he could see.


    Not just that, but the ce he hadnded after leaving the spatial passage was one of these giant mushrooms that stood dozens of meters tall with a cap that had a diameter of over a hundred meters.


    From first impressions, the trial contained inside the fourth celestial trial was by far the most unique one and made him wonder just what kind of challenge he had to ovee toplete the fourth celestial trial.


    Fight some kind of mushroom monster? Protect the giant mushrooms from an external threat? Or perhaps somethingpletely different¡­ n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    No matter what kind of challenge awaited him, Xuan Hao didn''t dare let his guard down, as he understood from past experience that the difficulty of the trial was adjusted ording to his cultivation realm¡­ And considering that he was now in the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it should be far more dangerouspared to the past.


    Of course, there was also the fact that he wasn''t even at the Peak of the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm yet and could only be considered around the middle stages of the realm. Making the current celestial trial far more dangerouspared to the past three celestial trials.


    "For now, I should try and find the scroll of trials so I can figure out what this celestial trial is about¡­"


    No longer having the help of his system to at least give him some hints about the trial he was going through, Xuan Hao quickly decided to try and seek out the scroll of trials he had encountered during his past three celestial trials. Understanding that he should be able to find out what he needed to do if he found the scroll of trials of the fourth celestial trial.


    The only problem with this was the fact that he had no idea where this scroll of trials might be located, as everything around him looked the same with giant mushrooms in all directions.


    Even when he used his divine sense to try and find out more about the mushroom forest, he only found out that the range of his divine sense had been severely limited¡­ And that there was nothing within the range of his limited divine sense that helped him figure out what direction to go in.


    The only thing he found with the help of his divine sense was a few mushroom-shaped monsters that roamed around at the ground below.


    However, given that most of these monsters were barely in the Nascent Soul Realm with only a few in the Domain Lord Realm and none above the Domain Lord Realm, he decided to ignore them, as they were far too weak to do anything to him and didn''t seem much different from the wild demon beasts normally found insiderge forests outside of them being mushrooms.


    "Guess I will have to try and head in a random direction and hope for the best¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked down at a few mushroom monsters fighting with each other right below the giant mushroom that he was standing on top of, Xuan Hao stepped off the edge of mushroom and flew in a random direction-


    "Ah?!"


    Or at least, that was what he wanted to do, but he instead found himself plummeting to the ground below without any way to stop himself-


    BANG!


    And unfortunately for one of the two mushroom monsters fighting, hended directly on top of it.


    Killing it in a single hit, as he had been trying to use the full strength of his dao domain to stop himself from falling. Resulting in the unfortunate Domain Lord Realm mushroom monster being crushed by the full force of his dao domain¡­


    Squuueeee~!?


    Taken aback by the sudden death of its opponent, the second mushroom monster let out a surprised sound before turning around and escaping before it ended up in a simr state.


    "There is a restriction that prevents flight¡­ And one that is strong enough to restrict even my dao domain¡­ Is it perhaps rted to the challenge of this celestial trial?" Not paying any attention to the terrified mushroom monster or the one that had been crushed beneath him, Xuan Hao was instead preupied with the fact that he had been unable to fly.


    It had to be known that outside of the range of his divine sense being limited and being unable to fly, his strength hadn''t been restricted in the slightest. Making him guess that it should be rted to the challenge of the fourth celestial trial in some way.


    After all, during the past three celestial trials, he hadn''t encountered such a situation before. Making it clear that there was a good chance that the restrictions were rted to the challenge of the fourth celestial trial.


    Not able to figure out anything from just standing around, Xuan Hao ultimately just shook his head regretfully before continuing to move in the direction he had first wanted to fly in.


    Without the scroll of trials or some kind of powerful demon beast that served as a challenge to ovee, he could only search through the mushroom forest by himself.


    Although his speed wasn''t that affected as he could still use hisprehension of the Dao of Space to execute the Drifting Cloud Steps and teleport himself forward, it was still annoying finding himself falling back towards the ground whenever he used the Drifting Cloud Steps to teleport himself a few thousand meters every step.


    At least, as long as he continued using the Drifting Cloud Steps, he could teleport forward before he had any time to fall from the sky. Essentially archiving a simr result as if he was flying through the air normally.


    The only problem with this kind of movement technique being that it was far more draining to execute than normal, as the formation that suppressed his divine sense and flight ability also seemed to be actively trying to stabilize the space inside the celestial trial.


    Even then, it didn''t take him long before he found the first thing that stood out inside the mushroom forest, a mushroom farrger than any other mushroom stretching more than a thousand meters into the sky with a cap that seemed to cast an eternal night on the mushroom forest below it.


    Rumble~


    However, the most unique thing about this massive mushroom was the fact that it seemed to be alive. Moving ever so slightly at a speed that would make it hard to discern that it was even moving if not for the loud sounds that it created every so often.


    As for the strength of this giant mushroom, Xuan Hao honestly had no clue, as he couldn''t really tell how strong it was through his divine sense.


    Of course, knowing that he was inside a celestial trial and the giant mushroom very much looked like a possible challenge he would have to ovee, Xuan Hao decided to be on the safe side and not recklessly approach the giant moving mushroom.

 Chapter 1299 Immortal Mushroom

    Chapter 1299 Immortal Mushroom


    Deciding to slowly approach the giant mushroom and find out whether or not it was a monster he would have to defeat toplete the fourth celestial trial, Xuan Hao did his best to hide his own presence before starting to move closer. Making sure to not identally get noticed by any of the mushroom monsters along the way by moving on the mushroom caps above.


    Although this would make him a bit easier to spot considering that he was rather easy to differentiate from the normal color of the mushroom caps, it wasn''t that much easier considering that he was using his dao domain to hide himself.


    Unless the senses of the giant mushroom turned towards him and focused on the ce he was standing, he doubted that it would be able to notice him as long as it wasn''t hadn''t reached the Profound Immortal Realm, something he deemed impossible considering that this was still a challenge for someone in the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    The main reason for this being that the massive difference between someone in the Profound Immortal Realm and Dao Seed Realm would turn the celestial trial into an impossible toplete challenge if there was any monster or demon beasts in the Profound Immortal Realm around.


    Just their powerful divine sense alone would mean that they would spot him far before he even noticed them and in turn kill him without even giving him the time to react¡­ And considering that this had not happened yet, he could at least conclude that the giant mushroom should be below the Profound Immortal Realm.


    Thump~


    Landing on a mushroom right next to the giant mushroom that still seemedpletely oblivious to the fact that he was there, Xuan Hao carefully began to inspect the giant moving mushroom. Not taking long to conclude that the strength of the giant mushroom wasn''t anywhere near his own strength. Only barely beingparable to someone that had just broken through to the Dao Seed Realm.


    Whoosh-!


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t bother hiding himself as his divine sense swept out and covered the giant mushroom. Scanning every inch of it for anything helpful in him learning more about the mushroom forest.


    Rumble~


    As a result of this, the giant mushroom that had been moving around 10 meters a minute, came to an abrupt stop before a strange energy began rising up from the surrounding mushrooms before gathering towards the giant mushroom. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Hm? This energy¡­" Seeing the strange energy gathering towards therge mushroom the moment the strange energy appeared, Xuan Hao could not help narrowing his eyes as he focused his divine sense on trying to figure out what the giant mushroom was up to.


    Hm¡­ The strange energy from the surrounding mushrooms seems to be strengthening it at a rather terrifying rate, but¡­ To reach a levelparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, it would still at least need to continue absorbing the strange energy without interruptions for ten or so hours¡­


    Shaking his head as he realized that it would at least take another ten hours for the giant mushroom to strengthen to a level where it would threaten him, Xuan Hao didn''t pay more attention to it and instead took a step forward and arrived on top of the mushroom monster to kill it before it had a chance to be a threat-


    "Huh?"


    However, just as he was about to deliver a killing blow, he realized that there was a small stone te located on top of a primitive altar at the center of the giant mushroom monster''s cap¡­ And given that he couldn''t sense it with his divine sense, Xuan Hao already had some idea what that stone b was the moment he noticed it-


    "The Scroll of Trials!"


    Swish~


    And so, casting aside the thought of killing the mushroom monster for now, Xuan Hao dashed forward and arrived in front of the stone b with an excited expression on his face.


    [Scroll of Trials Fragment, Part 3 of 4]


    However, the happiness soon disappeared when he read through the few words written on top of the stone b.


    The scroll of trials is actually split into four parts¡­


    Not knowing what to say as he just looked down at the stone b in disappointment, Xuan Hao still continued to read through what was written on the stone b. Soon finding the coordinates of the other three parts of the scroll of trials on it and a simple description of how tobine the four stone bs to form the scroll of trials.


    Outside of that, there was also a simple warning written on the bottom of the stone b about the giant mushroom that he was currently standing on top of.


    Immortal below the Profound Immortal Realm.


    A few simple words, but terrifying nheless, as it essentially meant he would have no way to kill the giant mushroom with his current strength ording to what was written on the stone b.


    Of course, Xuan Hao didn''t n on just leaving in search of the other stone bs after reading that it was impossible for him to kill the giant mushroom, as he intended to first put it to the test and see how urate it was-


    Whoosh-!


    So, not holding anything back, Xuan Hao distanced himself from the giant mushroom before using his strongest move currently avable on the giant mushroom. Empty Void, the ability inherent to his Divine Void Eyes that had been awakened through his Ster Dao Body.


    Rumble-!


    Soon enough, the air around the giant mushroom began to distort before being torn apart as space itself began copsing in towards the giant mushroom within a fraction of a second, causing everything inside the section of the mushroom forest affected by the spatial copse to disintegrate.


    Smaller mushroom monsters, tree sized mushrooms and rocks on the ground. Everything was torn apart and absorbed into the growing void that soon swallowed the giant mushroom busy absorbing the strange energy to increase its strength.


    RUMBLE-!


    However, just as the giant mushroom was enveloped by the True Spatial Copse created by Xuan Hao, the formation that kept the space of the celestial trial intact kicked into action, as it forcibly reversed the spatial copse and repaired the space that had been destroyed at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    "This¡­"


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao could not help opening his eyes wide with a look of shock stered all over his face.


    Destroying space through True Spatial Copse was different from the partial spatial copse that didn''t fully destroy the space. The difference being that the destruction caused by True Spatial Copse was a real copse of space, something that would take tens of thousands of years for a world to normally recover from at the scale that he had just used it, while a partial spatial copse didn''t fully copse space.


    Repairing the damage he had caused with True Spatial Copse would be difficult to aplish even if hisprehension of the Dao of Space managed to reach the Large Sess Realm. Recovering it at a speed visible to the naked eye was something he doubted would be possible even if he reached the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space!


    After all,pared to copsing space, repairing it was far more difficult to aplish.


    Even with his current understanding of the Dao of Space having reached the Peak of the Small Sess Realm about to reach the Large Sess Realm, it was almost impossible for him to repair a partially copsed spacerger than a few meters wide.


    Repair space that had been through a true spatial copse? That wasn''t something he could do with his current understanding of the Dao of Space no matter how small the area in question might be¡­


    For this reason, Xuan Hao was rendered speechless as he just looked on as the space in front of him was repaired by the formation that governed the celestial trial he was currently inside of.


    Not just because he wanted to use the opportunity to try andprehend the Dao of Space through watching how space was reconstructed by the celestial trial formation, but also because he wanted to see if the giant mushroom had managed to survive the terrifying attack.


    Rumble~


    Unfortunately, as the space was reconstructed again and he no longer had the chance to observe the delicate workings of the formation as it reconstructed the space of the trial space, Xuan Hao was met with the sight of thepletely undamaged giant mushroom.


    Outside of its strange energy absorption being briefly interrupted by the attack. Nothing had happened to it and it was still peacefully growing stronger without retaliating against him.


    It was also at this moment that Xuan Hao realized the real danger of the trial, the giant mushroom.


    Before it reached a level of strengthparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm or beyond that, he had toplete the challenge of the fourth celestial trial!

 Chapter 1300 More than one...

    Chapter 1300 More than one...


    "But¡­ That was far more exhausting than I expected¡­" Muttering this to himself as he cast onest nce towards the immortal mushroom before leaving in the direction of the next fragment of the scroll of trials, Xuan Hao felt the clear sense of exhaustion that had appeared after the attack just now.


    Although he had only used a single attack, it had by far been the strongest attack he had ever used since breaking through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Having drained quite a bit of his strength.


    Thankfully, he didn''t really have anyone to fight afterwards, as the immortal mushroom remained in the same ce, while the rest of the mushroom monsters in the mushroom forest had at most reached the Domain Lord Realm. Not really posing much of a threat to him.


    Not to mention, he moved through the use of his Drifting Cloud Steps and was far above the ground where these mushroom monsters roamed. Meaning that he wouldn''t really be affected by the exhaustion caused by the use of the True Spatial Copse on top of the immortal mushroom.


    At the very least, he should be able to fully recover his strength before the immortal mushroom reached a levelparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm where it would start to pose a threat to him.


    Even though, he was a bit worried about the fact that he couldn''t do any damage to the immortal mushroom, as it essentially meant that he would have no real way of fighting it when it came looking for him in the future.


    The only thing he could do at that point in time, would be to avoid it and trypleting the challenge of the fourth celestial trial as fast as possible and leave the mushroom forest before it grew to a level beyond the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm¡­


    Thinking about different ways that he could avoid the immortal mushroom when it came looking for him after it grew stronger, Xuan Hao soon arrived at the location of the second fragment of the scroll of trials.


    "This¡­"


    However, what he saw upon reaching the location of the fragment was not what he expected, as there was yet another immortal mushroom already in the process of growing stronger in front of him, while the fragment in question was simrly located on top of it.


    Whoosh~!


    Knowing that it wouldn''t be a good idea to waste time, Xuan Hao quickly descended towards the second immortal mushroom and grabbed the second fragment without any problems.


    The immortal mushroom was still busy growing stronger and didn''t have time to pay attention to him.


    Of course, this didn''t mean that Xuan Hao was any happier, as he understood that there should be two more immortal mushrooms at the location of the two remaining fragments.


    Although they had not proven to be a problem as of now, he had already taken around two hours to reach the location of the closest fragment and reaching the other two that were even further away could take anywhere between four to five hours to reach each of them.


    In the end, he was very likely to end up facing an immortal mushroom that had already reached a levelparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm by the point he got to the fourth fragment!


    Depending on how long it will take me to get the fourth fragment, I might end up facing thebined attack of four immortal mushrooms at the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm before I even find out about the challenge of this celestial trial¡­


    Frowning to himself as he thought this, Xuan Hao could only prepare himself for the worst, as he understood that he wouldn''t be able to defeat the immortal mushrooms and could only try his best toplete the challenge of the celestial trial as fast as possible.


    After all, the longer he stayed inside the mushroom forest, the more dangerous it would be for him.


    Even though he might stand a chance faced with four Middle Stage Dao Seed Realm immortal mushrooms with the help of his Dao of Space, there was no way for him to face the four if they managed to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, let alone beyond that.


    ¡­


    At the same time that her master was busy inside the fourth celestial trial, Mui came to a stop in front of a brand-new forest filled with demon beasts before she slowly descended from the air andnded somewhere out of the way to recover therge amount of qi it had taken her to fly for an extended period of time, while at the same time taking the chance to try and assess the strength of the demon beasts living inside the forest.


    After all, even though she had no idea if there were demon beasts above the Nascent Soul Realm present inside the forest, Mui still remembered that her master had told her about the dangers of moving deeper inside the mystic realm and made sure to not recklessly charge forward.


    Thump~!


    As a result of this, Mui didn''t attack the moment she noticed a Nascent Soul Realm demon beast a few thousand meters away from her, but instead decided to quietly observe it and see if any stronger demon beasts appeared.


    At the same time, she could also get a general outline of where powerful demon beasts lived from what ces the Nascent Soul Realm demon beast avoided.


    Although it would be impossible to tell if these stronger demon beasts were just in the Later Stages of the Nascent Soul Realm or if they had gone beyond that and broken through to the Domain Lord Realm, it would at the very least give her an idea of what ces she should be careful around and not randomly charge into.


    In the end, Mui ended up spending most of her day inside the new forest following behind different demon beasts in the Nascent Soul Realm and the Later Stages of the Core Formation Realm. Giving her a good idea of what ces there might be stronger demon beasts present.


    On a positive note, she did manage to deduce that the demon beasts living around the edge of the new forest weren''t in the Domain Lord Realm.


    The reason for this being rather simple, she hadn''t been attacked.


    If there really was a demon beast in the Domain Lord Realm lurking around the outer edges of the new forest, it should have already noticed her and attacked her. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    After all, the divine sense of a Domain Lord Realm demon beast was far beyond that of someone in the Nascent Soul Realm. Meaning it would be able to notice her far before she had a chance to notice it.


    Of course, there was also a chance that the Domain Lord Realm demon beast was busy sleeping or just didn''t pay attention to its surroundings. Meaning that it didn''t have a chance to notice her, but that was rather unlikely considering that doing something like that inside the mystic realm that swarmed with other simrly strong and stronger demon beasts would be a death sentence.


    No matter which of the two it was, Mui was at least safe for now and didn''t get attacked by any powerful demon beasts since her arrival at the new forest brimming with demon beasts for her to fight against and use to increase her own strength.


    So, with that in mind, Mui found a secluded ce at the edge of the forest before starting the process of breaking through to the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Considering that she had long since reached the Peak of the Fifth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, it was only a matter of time before she would break through naturally. So, Mui decided to put aside her training for a bit and focus on breaking through to the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not just because she would be able to challenge stronger demon beasts, but also because it would make her safer in case, she ended up encountering a Domain Lord Realm demon beast in the future. Possibly even giving her a chance to escape from a Domain Lord Realm demon beast if she managed to make use of her artifacts.


    Booom-!


    Like this, a few hours flew by before Mui managed to sessfully break through to the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm without any problems¡­ And having a solid foundation, there wasn''t much trouble during the breakthrough, as everything went smoothly. Allowing her to rapidly consolidate her cultivation base in a short period of time-


    Rooar!?


    Rooar!


    Of course, she did have to find somewhere else to do this, as her breakthrough to the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm did end up drawing the attention of the surrounding demon beasts¡­

 Chapter 1301 The Final Fragment...

    Chapter 1301 The Final Fragment...


    Unaware of the fact that Mui had already managed to break through to the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm only a few weeks since he had left her to train by herself, Xuan Hao had managed to pick up the third fragment of the scroll of trials and was currently making his way towards the location of the final fragment.


    On the way, he already started to seriously consider how to deal with the immortal mushroom when he ended up facing itter.


    After all, he was still around three or so hours away from reaching it, while the immortal mushrooms he had encountered so far should be less than two hours away from reaching a realmparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Meaning that it looked like he wouldn''t be able to avoid a fight with the immortal mushroom guarding the final fragment of the scroll of trials.


    Of course, there was also the chance that the immortal mushrooms wouldn''t start attacking him after they reached a level of strengthparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Instead continuing to increase their strength without doing anything to stop him from getting the scroll of trials andpleting the challenge of the celestial trial.


    But the chance of that happening wasn''t really something he wanted to gamble on¡­


    Whoosh~


    So, with that in mind, a few hours quickly flew by before Xuan Hao found himselfnding on top of arge mushroom a little over a dozen kilometers away from the fourth and final immortal mushroom that seemed to not notice him as it kept absorbing the strange energy from the surrounding mushroom forest to continue increasing its strength.


    If not for the fact that he could clearly feel the aura of the immortal mushroom in front of him had already broken through to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, he would have already rushed forward to take the final fragment needed for the scroll of trails.


    But now that the immortal mushroom in front of him had already reached the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, he couldn''t do something that dangerous, as he would risk being ambushed by the immortal mushroom if he was not careful enough¡­ And considering that he couldn''t really kill the immortal mushroom, it would just start a battle that would only end after he ran out of energy and died.


    No matter what, he wanted to avoid a situation like that.


    At least before he ended up locked in a fight with one of the immortal mushrooms, he wanted to get his hand on the final fragment so he could figure out how toplete the challenge of the celestial trail and get out of the mushroom forest as fast as possible.


    However, to do so, he would have to teleport to the center of the immortal mushroom''s cap where the final stone b was located, something that would put him directly inside the immortal mushroom''s range for a short period of time.


    The main problem with this was that he still had absolutely no idea what kind of abilities the immortal mushrooms had nor what kind of dao they would use when fighting. Meaning he had no idea if they had the ability to lock up space and prevent him from teleporting away.


    Well¡­ It wasn''t entirely true, as he had sensed the Dao of Life when he tried killing one of the immortal mushrooms.


    In that sense, the Dao of Life should be what kept them alive and made immortal below the Profound Immortal Realm ording to what little was written on the stone bs.


    Making him guess that the immortal mushrooms should also haveprehended some kind of dao rted to the soul to prevent them from being killed by soul-based attacks. At least giving him some clue as to what kind of attacks the immortal mushrooms might engage in.


    Outside of that there was also-


    "Ah¡­! I''m wasting time¡­ No matter how hard I think about it, it won''t make much of a difference. On the other hand, the longer I hesitate, the stronger the immortal mushroom will grow!" Shaking his head as he stopped himself from continuing down the rabbit hole of figuring out any more ways to deal with immortal mushroom in front of him, Xuan Hao narrowed both his eyes as he took a step forward-


    Whoosh-!


    Disappearing and appearing rapidly as he closed the distance between himself and the immortal mushroom with the help of the drifting cloud steps. Soon arriving directly at the center of the immortal mushroom''s cap in less than a second. Not giving the immortal mushroom any time to react as he snatched the fragment of the scroll of trials away without any problems.


    RUUUMBLE-!


    However, just as he was about to take a step forward and leave the ce, a loud rumbling sound echoed out from below him before the space all around him was sealed off by a strange power. Followed by the immortal mushroom below him releasing countless spores the size of a normal human head that began surging towards him with a terrifying speed.


    Even having no clue what these spores did, Xuan Hao still inherently understood that it would be bad for him to get hit by them-


    Swish-!


    So, with that in mind, he executed the drifting cloud steps to the best of his abilities without the assistance of the Dao of Space to rapidly charge down from the cap of the immortal mushroom, while at the same time using his dao domain to destroy any spores that got too close.


    However, the number of spores flying towards him continued to grow from ten thousand to a hundred thousand, from ten million to a hundred million and before long there were billions of them flying at him.


    Even using his dao domain with all of his strength, he couldn''t stop the spores from slowly getting closer with each passing second, as they brute forced their way through his dao domain, something he had never expected to happen considering that the spores were rtively easy to destroy with his dao domain.


    Unfortunately, easy didn''t mean that it didn''t require any effort, as his soul was already getting exhausted from him using his divine sense to keep an eye on billions of spores at the same time and ensure that none of them got through.


    Even for the powerful soul of someone like himself at the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Keeping his attention focused on so many different things at the same time was simply impossible, as one of the countless spores soon managed to get through his dao domain and reach him. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Boom!


    And before he had time to do anything about it, it exploded into a cloud of brown mist that quickly engulfed him and began trying to forcibly enter his body.


    Luckily, his physical body was in no way weak and could even be considered to be far above that of normal cultivators due to his still unweakened physique strengthening it to the point where it was no less powerful than a demon beast at the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm.


    If not for that, the brown mist might have been able to get into his body and even if it didn''t do much damage, it would cause him to lose focus for a short moment. Giving the billions of simr spores outside a chance to breakthrough his dao domain and reach him.


    Even then, Xuan Hao wasn''t unharmed, a part of his skin had been corroded by the brown mist before it had dispersed. Showing just how dangerous these spores were.


    "I have to get out of here as fast as possible¡­" Muttering this to himself as he now found himself trapped on top of the immortal mushroom, unable to continue moving forward due to the constant onught of spores, Xuan Hao inevitably turned to look down at the soft flesh like outer skin of the mushroom cap below him-


    Swish-!


    Ptsh!


    And without a second thought, he directly used his Dao of Ice and Dao of the Sword together to cut a hole big enough for him to fit through, as he soon found himself falling.


    Not being able to kill the immortal mushroom didn''t mean that he wouldn''t be able to cut through it¡­ And it just so happened that the only way he saw out of his current situation was to cut through the immortal mushroom cap and hopefully make use of gravity to reach the ground below and escape before the spores could catch him.


    Whoosh~! Whoosh~! Whoosh~!


    "Huh? This-!?"


    However, as he was nning his escape after falling through the cap of the immortal mushroom that was close to five hundred meters thick, Xuan Hao suddenly felt a strange tickling sensation as countless tentacle like stems sprouted from the side of the hole he had created, some trying to repair the damage, while others flew towards him in an attempt to grab hold of him.

 Chapter 1302 The Goal of the Celestial Trial

    Chapter 1302 The Goal of the Celestial Trial


    Cutting through the tentacles that moved towards him in an attempt to stop him from escaping, Xuan Hao could not help silently cursing to himself as he watched the path, he had cut through the cap of the mushroom being closed up beneath him at a speed visible to the naked eye-


    Swish-!


    In the end, he could only gather his strength once again andunch a new attack downwards to widen the hole that had already shrunk to the point where he could no longer fit through. Making sure to make it farrger than before so the mushroom wouldn''t be able to recover in time.


    Rumble~!


    However, as he was only a few dozen meters away from leaving the inside of the mushroom cap, the entire immortal mushroom began trembling before the recovery speed of the hole increased by several times. Almost directly colliding with him if he hadn''t used his dao domain to forcibly hold back the living walls all around him, while also making sure that the hole beneath him wasn''t closed up either.


    RUMBLE-!


    Even then, the immortal mushroom only seemed to increase the power, as Xuan Hao clearly sensed the Dao of Life all around him forcibly bearing down on his dao domain from all sides.


    Whoosh-!


    Luckily, he didn''t have to endure this for long, as he soon managed to sessfully reach the other side of the mushroom cap. Allowing him to freely plummet towards the ground below without any spores around to attack him¡­


    Not that it wouldst for long, as the immortal mushroom started producing even more spores shortly after he managed tond on the ground. Not to mention, the spores that had already been produced had already be visible as they washed over the side of the immortal mushroom''s cap like a waterfall of spores attempting to block him from escaping from underneath the immortal mushroom-


    Bang!


    Bang!


    Bang!


    Not just that, but hundreds of massive tendrils shot up from the ground all around the immortal mushroom before simrly attacking him in an attempt to prevent him from escaping.


    All things considered, even though he had managed to escape from the spores for now, his situation wasn''t that much better and would probably only grow worse if he counted to stay around and try to fight with the immortal mushroom. Especially considering that the strange energy that strengthened the immortal mushroom was still gathering towards it and strengthening during the fight. Meaning that it would only continue growing stronger.


    So, with that in mind, Xuan Hao decided to use all of his strength on rushing out from underneath the immortal mushroom before it had time to trap him. Hopefully to somewhere where the space wasn''t sealed off and he could use the Drifting Cloud Steps to its full potential.


    With the speed of a spatial based movement technique, it would be impossible for the immortal mushroom to catch up with him unless its strength far surpassed his and reached a realm like the Profound Immortal Realm.


    Rumble~!


    Of course, the immortal mushroom wasn''t just going to allow him to escape, as the newly produced spores and tendrils from below all surged towards him like a tide- n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Luckily, as the number of spores hadn''t managed to growrge enough and the fact that the tendrils only carried the strength of someone who had barely broken through to the Dao Seed Realm, he managed to forcibly charge forward even under attack of the immortal mushroom.


    Soon enough arriving at the area where the spores from the mushroom cap above were trying to cut him off before they had a time to do so. Allowing him to slip past them without any problems while continuing to rush in the opposite direction of the immortal mushroom to try and get out of the range of its space sealing ability.


    Whoosh-!


    Something that didn''t take long, as he soon disappeared with the drifting cloud steps once again showing its terrifying speed.


    Rumble-!


    Of course, the immortal mushroom didn''t give up its chase just because of this, as it forcibly lifted itself off the ground with a countless tendrils forming a writhing mass of tendrils below the stem of the immortal mushroom that carried it in the direction Xuan Hao had escaped in.


    Although it would be a truly horrifying and at the same time terrifying sight for anyone unfortunate enough to witness the immortal mushrooms movement, its speed was by no means something to fear, as it was barelyparable to someone in the Dao Seed Realm and would even be overtaken by Soul Ascension Realm cultivators skilled in movement techniques or flying demon beast in the soul Ascension Realm.


    Even if it wanted to catch up with Xuan Hao, it was simply far too slow to even catch the hem of his clothes as he almost instantly disappeared out of sight after he regained his ability to use the Dao of Space together with his movement technique.


    However, as Xuan Hao decided to slow down to see if the immortal mushroom was even capable of moving, he was shocked to discover that the speed of the immortal mushroom seemed to be steadily increasing as it rolled through the mushroom forest and integrated any mushroom or mushroom monster into the writhing mass of tentacles below it.


    "This mushroom can not only increase its strength with time but can even grow its speed in this kind of way!?" Not knowing what to say as he saw the immortal mushroom and how it seemed to be steadily increasing its speed as it rolled through the mushroom forest towards him, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any more time as he executed the drifting cloud steps and disappeared once again.


    Although it would take a long time before the immortal mushroom would reach a speed where it could threaten him, he now knew that it would be possible. Not to mention, it didn''t need to catch him, but only needed to trap him with the space sealing ability that would undoubtedly grow to cover arger area as its strength continued to increase.


    For now, he needed to figure out the challenge of the celestial trial andplete it as fast as possible!


    Whoosh~


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao took out the four stone bs afternding on a mushroom far away from the immortal mushroom chasing after him, causing the four stone bs to fly out of his hands and merge together with a bright light. Forming a familiar looking scroll in front of him.


    "Finally, I should be able to find out what I need to do to leave this ce!" Narrowing both of his eyes as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao grabbed the scroll of trials. Wasting no time as he looked over the words on top of the scroll.


    [Scroll of Trials, Trail of the Immortal Mushrooms]


    A title that made it clear that the mushrooms he had encountered were rted to the challenge in some way. However, as he continued reading through the scroll of trials, Xuan Hao could no help silently cursing to himself.


    The goal of the celestial trial was not rted to the immortal mushrooms like Xuan Hao had thought after reading the first few words on the scroll but was instead just about going through a gate that was located directly beneath the mushroom that one ended up on after entering the trial.


    ording to the scroll of trials, this information would be given to the trail participants before entering the trial by one of the people in charge of the celestial trial.


    As for the existence of the scroll of trails and the stone bs, they served the purpose of allowing trail participants to adjust the difficulty of the trial.


    The more stone bs collected, the more difficult the trial would be, while collecting the scroll of trial could be considered the highest difficulty and would therefore give out the biggest reward forpleting the celestial trial.


    At the same time, he also managed to learn that the other immortal mushroom should not be moving towards him, but instead the location of the gate leading out of the celestial trial the moment he collected the final stone b.


    "I hate this trial¡­" Knowing that he couldn''t waste any time or he would risk having to deal with the immortal mushrooms guarding the way out of the celestial trial, Xuan Hao could only mutter this to himself before he once again used the drifting cloud steps to rush back in the direction of the mushroom he had ended up on top of when he had first passed through the celestial gate and entered the trial.


    Unfortunately, considering the distance between him and that ce having widened quite a bit, he would need at least 10 hours to reach it, 8 if he used all of his strength. More than enough time for the closest immortal mushroom to reach the gate¡­

 Chapter 1303 Sealed Gate

    Chapter 1303 Sealed Gate


    Using the drifting cloud steps to the limit as he made his way back towards the giant mushroom he had firstnded on when arriving at the mushroom forest, Xuan Hao did happen to run into one of the other immortal mushrooms along the way that was simrly making its way in the direction of the gate leading out of the celestial trial.


    Luckily for him, the immortal mushroom had not grown fast enough to catch up with him. Allowing him to easily move past it while avoiding the area where space was sealed around it.


    However, the encounter did allow him to confirm that the immortal mushrooms were bing stronger with time as they rolled through the mushroom forest, with the one he just encountered already reaching a speedparable to someone in the Early Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Far above the first one of them he had seen moving that only had a speed around the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm to the absolute slowest among those in the Dao Seed Realm.


    If he was unlucky enough to encounter another immortal mushroom close to the gate out of the celestial trial, he might not be able to move past it that easily.


    But¡­ Considering he knew the general location of all four of the immortal mushrooms, he knew that this shouldn''t happen unless one of them decided to try and run for him instead of the gate that they were supposed to move towards ording to what was written in the scroll of trials.


    Unfortunately, given that the speed of the immortal mushrooms seemed to be growing far faster than he had first expected, he might end up having to deal with two immortal mushrooms when he reached the gate leading out of the celestial trial.


    With that in mind, he wouldn''t be that sad if he ended up encountering a third immortal mushroom along the way, as it would at least mean that he would only have to deal with a single immortal mushroom when he ended up reaching the gate out of the celestial trial¡­


    Whoosh~


    Arriving back at the location where he had first entered the mushroom forest after a little over 8 hours of travel without encountering another one of the immortal mushrooms, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on the spot as he stared off into the distance where the gate leading out of the celestial trial was located.


    At that location, two giant mushrooms had taken root, as countless small tendrils wiggled around arge gate in a pit that had been forcibly dug up by them.


    Even without knowing anything about what the gate out of the mushroom forest looked like, it was obvious that it should be the one that was now fully covered by the tendrils and roots of the immortal mushrooms that had shot up from underground. Making escaping through the gate without a fight impossible, as he would first have to cut through the barrier that had been created around the gate.


    "I guess it had to be like this¡­" Sighing to himself as he looked at the two immortal mushrooms towering above the gate out of the mushroom forest, Xuan Hao felt a hint of nervousness as he understood that the situation would only continue to get worse the longer, he dyed.


    Not only would the immortal mushrooms continue to get stronger with each passing second, but there was also a chance that the two remaining immortal mushrooms would show up and join them in blocking his way out of the mushroom forest.


    Whoosh-!


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao decided to take his chance and try to forcibly break through the barrier created by the two immortal mushrooms before they got too strong for him to deal with.


    Sneaking up on them wouldn''t work as the space around them was sealed and made it impossible for him to approach without being noticed due to his speed slowing down significantly without the ability to use the Dao of Space.


    Not that it would mean that much considering that the roots and tendrils blocking the gate were still there. Making it impossible to just slip past them without first cutting through them.


    Of course, there was one thing he would have been able to avoid if he could teleport right next to the roots blocking the gate¡­ And that was the attack he would be facing from the two immortal mushrooms before reaching the sealed off gate.


    Rumble-!


    Something that came in the form of both the immortal mushrooms shaking violently, as countless spores emerged from them before beginning to float towards him with a terrifying momentum. Far surpassing the numbers of the single immortal mushroom that he had to deal with.


    In numbers alone, the spores in the air easily numbered in the tens of billions, while the ground around the immortal mushrooms was torn open as countless roots and tendrils sprung up from the ground and turned thendscape into a living forest of mushroom roots and tendrils.


    Even if he had ben somewhat aware of what he was going to face, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he saw thebined power of the two immortal mushrooms who were still only around the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm in terms of strength.


    If they really managed to reach a realmparable to the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm before he had the chance to escape from the mushroom forest, he had a feeling that he wouldn''t be able to escape given just how terrifying these immortal mushrooms were. Especially considering that he didn''t have the ability to harm them in the slightest and could only do his best to fend off against their attacks while trying to reach the gate out of the mushroom forest. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Swish-!


    With this in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t hesitate as he coated the silver sword given to him by Yi Min in his sword intent before starting to cut away at the first few of the roots and tendrils that came for him.


    Not wasting any time as he continued moving through the temporary tendril and root forest that had been created. Heading straight towards the gate without any hesitation. Knowing that any time wasted would only result in the immortal mushrooms bing stronger and more difficult to break through.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    It was just at this moment that the first few spores descended towards him from above with a speed and power that seemed to have surpassed the first few spores he had dealt with-


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Luckily, the spores had not yet managed to gather together inrge enough numbers that it would result in him being forced to a stop, as he could still use his dao domain to force his way through them.


    Although¡­ Doing this was far more exhaustingpared to dealing with them while standing still, he couldn''t afford to stand still, as it would only result in him being overwhelmed by thebined might of the two immortal mushrooms who could produce more than enough spores to overwhelm him in a short period of time.


    As a result from this, even though it exhausted arge portion of his strength, Xuan Hao managed to sessfully reach the gate that had been blocked off by the two immortal mushrooms before they had the chance to force him to a standstill.


    A chance that Xuan Hao didn''t intend to waste, as he gathered most of his remaining strength together and executed a single sword strike towards the roots and tendrils sealing up the gate out of the mushroom forest. Using his sword intent to fully unleash the power of the sword soul realm. Merging his sword soul together with the sword for the first time in actualbat-


    Swish~


    As a result, a terrifying sword sh swept towards the tendrils and roots blocking the gate leading out of the mushroom forest-


    BOOOOOOM-!


    Soon enough colliding with them and causing a terrifying shockwave to spread through the surroundingndscape, as the terrifying power of the sword sh and the power of the two immortal mushrooms collided violently with each other.


    Unexpectedly, the roots and tendrils created by the two immortal mushrooms were far more powerful than the ones that had sprung up from thew ground to attack him as he got closer to the gate-


    Crack~


    Bang!


    But even then, they didn''t manage to hold on for more than a few seconds under the terrifying sword sh that essentially contained all of Xuan Hao''s remaining strength, a gamble to try and forcibly break through the two immortal mushrooms before they had the chance to grow too strong for him to even resist.


    Whoosh-!


    In the end, the gamble worked out, as Xuan Hao took the opportunity while the roots and tendrils around the gate had been destroyed to slip through the gate before the two immortal mushrooms had a chance to seal it up again.


    After all, he had no strength left to continue his fight against the immortal mushrooms¡­

 Chapter 1304 Sudden Wealth

    Chapter 1304 Sudden Wealth


    Passing through the gate leading out of the mushroom forest, Xuan Hao found himself on top of arge open tform floating in the clouds with only an endless sea of clouds appearing as far as the eye could see.


    The only thing on the tform was the gate that he had passed through, and a dozen or so other gates lined up along the side of the tform, with a familiar looking preservation golem standing motionlessly at the center of the tform.


    Even without having to ask the golem, he guessed that this should be a space created for those whopleted the celestial trial, with the other gates around the tform being connected to different trials of higher or lower difficulty than the one he had gone through.


    In the past, the tform should have been a ce for the different trail participants to gather and chat with each other after having gone through the celestial trial, but now that there was only him around, it seemed rather deste with no one else around.


    So, with that in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he made his way up to the preservation golem that was motionlessly standing at the center of the tform. Not just to figure out what kind of reward he had gained frompleting the celestial trial, but also as a way for him to hopefully find a way out of the celestial trial.


    "Trail participant, you have sessfullypleted the celestial trial of the immortal mushrooms at the highest difficulty, would you like to receive your reward?"


    Walking up to the preservation golem that had been standing motionlessly at the center of the tform, Xuan Hao was slightly taken aback when the golem suddenly turned around and asked him this before he even had the chance to say anything to it.


    However, after realizing that nothing more happened, he calmly nodded his head in agreement. Feeling curious what kind of reward, he would get after identally challenging the highest difficulty of the celestial trial andpleting it.


    Hopefully, he would at least get the two celestial coins he needed to buy the Dao Domain Lord Realm scroll back at the Tower of Secrets. If not, he really wouldn''t have any idea how to react, as he would need to find another celestial trial to go through.


    "Confirmed agreement from trial participant, reward will be issued ordingly. Checking treasure vault¡­ Error! Unable to connect with treasure vault. Contact elder for assistance, please stand by¡­!"


    "¡­"


    Listening to the preservation golem as it seemed unable to check some kind of treasure vault for a reward and how it had begun trying to contact an elder, something that would undoubtedly end in failure, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit nervous, as he had a feeling that he might actually end up having to go find another celestial trial if the preservation golem in front of him ended up malfunctioning because there wasn''t any elders present.


    No¡­ He might not even be able to leave the tform floating in the clouds, as he had no idea how to get out of the ce. Entering the gates randomly wasn''t an option either, as he might identally end up walking into a celestial trial that had been created for someone in the Profound Immortal Realm.


    In such a trial, the random mushroom monsters walking around on the ground below might have reached the Dao Seed Realm, with some of them even having the chance of being in the Later Stages of the Dao Seed Realm!


    No matter what, he couldn''t do something that reckless and could only sit down nervously as he patiently waited for the preservation golem that seemed to be trying to connect with an elder of the Mirage Sect to figure out how to solve the current problem¡­


    "Error. Unable to connect. Error. Elder not present. Failed to contact within designated time limit, switching to alternate reward structure. Trail participant, would you like to switch to alternate reward structure or wait for an elder to show up?"


    As a few hours flew by without much happening, Xuan Hao was suddenly awoken by the words of the preservation golem-


    "Yes!"


    Not wasting any time as he answered the preservation golem. Knowing that it would be impossible for any elder to show up to fix the situation. On the other hand, it might even result in him getting stuck inside of the celestial trial.


    "Confirmation epted; alternate reward structure has been chosen. Converting rewards from celestial trialpletion into celestial coins. Total celestial coins granted following conversion, 32."


    Listening closely to the preservation golem, Xuan Hao could not help feeling both of his eyes starting to shine as he heard the words celestial coins. Even more so when he heard therge number of celestial coins he had been granted, a total of 32 celestial coins!


    Together with the celestial coins he already had, he would now have a total of 38 celestial coins!


    Not only was this more than enough for him to get his hands on the scroll that contained the information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm that he had originally set out to get, but he could also try and look through the Tower of Secrets and see if he could find any suitablebat techniques.


    At least, given the current windfall of celestial coins he had managed to get his hands on, he should be able to get some heaven rankbat techniques.


    And, given that even the lowest level heaven rankbat technique was for the Celestial Immortal Realm or the Profound Immortal Realm, he would also be able to gain some more insight into the realm through thesebat techniques.


    Of course, outside ofbat techniques, he could also try and buy more information on the different cultivation realms. Although, he didn''t really know if it would be better to do that or to just buy abat technique and try to gain a better insight into the cultivation realm that way.


    After all, abat technique would not only allow him to gain a deeper understanding of the cultivation realm that it was created for but would also allow him a chance to understand the dao being used with thebat technique.


    For one, he wanted to increase hisprehension for the Dao of Space, so he would definitely take the opportunity to try and find abat technique rted to the Dao of Space so he could deepen his understanding of the dao and also gain a better understanding of how to properly use it inbat.


    At the same time, he also had a feeling that he had to look for a new movement technique after what he had gone through in the mushroom forest.


    Even though the drifting cloud steps was an amazing technique that allowed him to easily traverserge distances, it was severelycking when it came to fighting in ces where space had either been sealed or had be too chaotic that it would possibly backfire to use.


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao nned to also look for a new movement technique not rted to the Dao of Space after he got back to the Tower of Secrets. Maybe a movement technique that could make use of the Dao of Light that he hadprehended not too long ago. After all, light was also well known for its speed. Only outmatched by the Dao of Space that could essentially bend space itself to surpass the speed of light.


    "Now¡­ How do I get out of here?" Already feeling excited about what to do with his newfound wealth, Xuan Hao could not help looking around the tform for a possible way out that might have appeared after he had been given his reward.


    "Trail participant, would you like to leave the reward space?"


    However, instead of finding a way out of the ce that was called the reward space, he was instead asked if he wanted to leave by the preservation golem.


    "Yes?" And not knowing how else to answer, Xuan Hao curiously observed the preservation golem as it created a screen in the air in front of him. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Exchange Hall, Treasure Vault, Disciple Quarters, Visitor Quarters, Arena¡­ These should be the different facilities that exist inside the celestial gate¡­


    Looking through the list, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a hint of curiosity. However, as he tried clicking on the exchange hall, he realized that it didn''t work.


    Not just the exchange Hall, he couldn''t travel to any of the locations listed, as a simple, unavable prompt popped the moment he tried to do so.


    "So much for exploring the celestial gate facilities¡­" Muttering this to himself with a hint of unwillingness, Xuan Hao could only reluctantly move his hand towards the exit at the bottom of the floating screen before pressing it-


    Whoosh-!


    And not a secondter, a strange power enveloped his entire body before he found himself back outside the fourth celestial gate.

 Chapter 1305 True Value of the Tower of Secrets

    Chapter 1305 True Value of the Tower of Secrets


    Thump~


    Landing in front of the fourth celestial gate, Xuan Hao was just about to panic about the fact that he hadn''t sealed up his cultivation base and might cause the formation in ce around the small mountain where the fourth celestial gate was located, when he realized that nothing was happening.


    Upon closer inspection, it seemed like the cave where the fourth celestial gate was located had been fully isted from the formation that protected the mountain outside.


    Considering that others who simrly left the celestial gate in past should have encountered a simr situation, it made sense that the formation wouldn''t activate the moment he left the fourth celestial gate.


    If that had really ended up happening, he would have no idea whether or not tough or cry if he ended up being sealed away by the ancient formation for who knew how long.


    "Luckily that is not the case¡­ Although I still have to spend a few days getting down the mountain again, the time won''t be wasted as I can still use the time toprehend the Dao of Formations. Not to mention, a few days won''t make much of a difference now that I have the celestial coins that I need." Chuckling to himself as he said this while looking towards the entrance of the cave, Xuan Hao briefly closed his eyes as he sealed up his cultivation base before leaving the cave to make his way down the mountain a short timeter.


    Given that he had managed to get more than thirty celestial coins from the celestial trial this time around, Xuan Hao couldn''tpletely focus onprehending the Dao of Formations on his way down the mountain, as part of him also began to ponder over the few differentbat techniques he had casually looked over on his way to the scroll with information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Although the bits and pieces of information he had managed to gather on thesebat techniques weren''t a lot, all of them were at least heaven rankbat techniques and would be worth a lot to him at his current cultivation realm.


    Not just to him, but also his disciples and the rest of the Star Shattering Sect. After all, thebat techniques inside the tower of secrets could be considered a facility not much different from the Star Shattering Sect''s library where the sect''sbat techniques and cultivation techniques were stored.


    In a sense, outside of being part of the exchange hall, the tower of secret could be considered an ancient library that stored the techniques and cultivation information of the Mirage Sect, a treasure trove for any weaker sect that might stumble upon it, as it would be helpful for establishing a solid foundation of knowledge for the Profound Immortal Realm and possibly even beyond that.


    Of course, Xuan Hao also understood that it was unrealistic for him to take away the tower of secrets with his current bnce of celestial coins, let alone take it away forcefully.


    However, it didn''t stop him from dreaming about the day when he could do this, as he was already fully intent on seizing the tower of secrets for his sect, disciples and his own growth. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    On the other hand, outside of this, his newest quest had also progressed after he passed the fourth celestial trial.


    [Celestial Trials Completed: 4/10] Even then, he would still need toplete another 6 celestial trials before he wouldplete it, a thing for the future. Especially considering that each of the celestial trials would involve a certain risk to his life, something that had be clear after his visit to the mushroom forest.


    At least for now, he felt fine justpleting one celestial trial and making his way back to the tower of secrets to exchange his celestial coins for something useful before checking up on Mui to see how she was doing after having been left alone for such a long period of time.


    Even if none of the safety measures he had left for her had been triggered during this time and her status through the system only showed that she had managed to break through to the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, he still felt a bit worried about how she was doing on her own inside a monster infested forest. Especially considering that he was almost certain that she would be starting to wander outside the borders of the forest he had ced her inside of at some point in time.


    Though she was now at the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and had the help of her unique metal balls for battle, he understood very well that she would start struggling when faced with a demon beast in the Half Step Domain Lord Realm with a pseudo domain.


    A domain, even if it was just a pseudo domain, was hard to ovee as someone in the Nascent Soul Realm and was the main difference between someone in the Domain Lord Realm and someone in the Nascent Soul Realm. Oveing it was not a simple matter¡­


    ¡­


    At the same time that her master emerged from the fourth celestial trial and had begun to think about how she might be doing and worrying that she had left the ce where he had left her to train on her own, Mui had already begun to explore the new forest that she found herself in after she had stabilized her cultivation base at the Sixth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Wawawa, what is this cute thing!? Howe it''s in here?!"


    Currently finding herself face to face with a cute looking demon beast at the Second Stage of the Core Formation that she couldn''t stop herself from picking up to hug due to its overwhelming cuteness that seemed to be a result of it being a mutated rabbit demon beast with pink colored fur and bright green eyes.


    "¡­"


    Of course, given the difference in strength between the two of them, the rabbit demon beast didn''t dare to utter a single word as it was picked up by Mui and hugged. Only able to think about how to remain motionless and avoid provoking the terrifying monster that had suddenly appeared to pick it up.


    Boom!


    "Hm? What''s that?"


    Luckily, the pink colored rabbit demon beast didn''t have to wait for long, as it was soon put down on the ground and allowed to run away following a sudden battle that seemed to break out not too far away from where the two of them were. Drawing Mui''s attention away from it.


    "A battle between two demon beasts¡­ And quite powerful ones at that! If I''m not wrong, they should at least be at the Half Step Domain Lord Realm. Maybe even having reached the Domain Lord Realm!" Muttering this to herself as both of her eyes started shining while looking in the direction of the battle that had suddenly erupted between two powerful demon beasts, Mui no longer paid the slightest bit attention to the cute looking and unique rabbit demon beast, as she instead ced her full attention on the battle not too far away from her.


    Although she was still far too weak to participate in such a battle personally, it didn''t mean that she couldn''t observe it from a distance¡­ And considering that she always had her flying metal ball to escape with in case the demon beasts decided to try and attack her, Mui didn''t feel afraid. Wasting no time as she began moving closer to the ce where the two powerful demon beasts were shing with each other.


    Roar!


    ROoooar!


    Rooar!


    Simr to her, other powerful demon beasts ranging from the earlier stages of the Nascent Soul Realm to a few that had managed to reach the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. Only one step away from forming a pseudo domain of their own. All began moving closer to the ce where the two powerful demon beasts were shing with her.


    Of course, different from her goal of observing the fight between the two powerful demon beasts, the main goal of the demon beasts who were trying to get closer the ce where the battle was happen was doing so because they wanted to try and get their hand on the body of the losing one among the two powerful demon beasts- Or at least a part of it.


    After all, consuming the flesh and body of a powerful demon beast was immensely beneficial to demon beasts. Especially if the consumed demon beast was far stronger.


    For this reason alone, there were also quite arge number of daring weaker demon beasts who were sneakily starting to move closer to the ce where the battle was happening. Trying their best to avoid detection or getting too close to the battle out of fear of getting caught up in the battle.


    Only a few of the braver demon beasts who saw no other path for reaching the Nascent Soul Realm decided to do so.

 Chapter 1306 Center of Attention

    Chapter 1306 Center of Attention


    Following the sound of battle together with a few of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts that had alsoe to see what was happening, Mui arrived at the edge of arge clearing in the forest where two massive demon beasts could be seen fighting with each other.


    One being a massive turtle the size of a small mountain, while the other was a giant tiger only slightly smaller in size.


    Just from their size alone, Mui was sure that these two demon beasts shouldn''t be in the Half Step Domain Lord Realm but were instead true Domain Lord Realm demon beasts. After all, only powerful demon beasts like that would be able to grow to such massive sizes.


    At least for now, she hadn''t encountered or heard about any demon beast that could grow to the size of a small mountain before it reached the Domain Lord Realm. If there really was such a demon beast out there, it would pretty much be impossible to kill below the Domain Lord Realm due to its massive size.


    "Guess I shouldn''t get involved in the fight, as it would only result in having to use one of master''s talismans¡­" Muttering this to herself as she confirmed the strength of the two demon beasts and satisfied her curiosity, Mui began to retreat back to avoid getting drawn into the battle between the two Domain Lord Realm demon beasts.


    Although a part of her did want to test her current strength against a demon beast in the Domain Lord Realm, she also understood that her current strength was still far away from contending against a demon beast like that. Even with the help of her metal balls, she wouldn''t be able to do much when faced with the domain of these Domain Lord Realm demon beasts.


    Especially considering that the demon beasts currently fighting it out in the clearing didn''t seem like demon beasts who had just broken through to the Domain Lord Realm, but instead looked more like seasoned Domain Lord Realm demon beasts that had already progressed a fair bit into the Domain Lord Realm.


    With her limited exposure to Domain Lord Realm cultivators beyond the first three stages of the realm, Mui could only guess that the two demon beasts fighting with each other should be above the earlier stages of the Domain Lord Realm.


    A bad target for a possible first attempt at fighting someone in the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    Roar?


    Roar!


    Roar-!


    However, as she was about to leave the edge of the clearing with the two powerful demon beasts fighting each other, she realized that arge number of demon beasts ranging from the Core Formation Realm to the Nascent Soul Realm had blocked her way.


    Moving along the ground was not an option if she wanted to leave, but¡­ If she decided to try and fly up to a safe distance before going over the wall of demon beasts that had formed behind her during the brief time, she had taken to watch the battle between the two Domain Lord Realm demon beast, there was a chance that these two demon beasts would notice her.


    Whoosh~!


    But considering that staying around wasn''t really an option with the wall of demon beasts behind her slowly moving closer with each passing second, as they seemed intent on not just watching the battle, but also attacking her, Mui made the decision to still use her flying metal ball to ascend high enough into the air to safely fly over the demon beasts who had been blocking her path.


    "So¡­ So many demon beasts¡­!"


    And¡­ In the process of doing this, she also got a chance to see just how many demon beasts had gathered not just behind her, but all around the clearing where the two Domain Lord Realm demon beasts were fighting with each other.


    Just in numbers alone, she could easily count more than a hundred Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts, with close to a thousand in the Core Formation Realm. More importantly, she also noticed three demon beasts that should either be at the Half Step Domain Lord Realm or already have reached the Domain Lord Realm. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    In the few short minutes since the battle between the two Domain Lord Realm demon beasts had begun, a terrifying number of demon beasts had managed to gather to watch the fight y out. Making Mui painfully aware of just how many powerful demon beasts were lurking around inside the new forest that she had entered.


    However, as she noticed them, the demon beasts who had remained focused on the fight also noticed her high in the air, causing Mui to feel a shiver run down her spine as the divine sense of countless demon beasts locked on to her. Including the terrifying divine sense of the demon beasts above the Nascent Soul Realm.


    In the end, themotion caused by so many different divine senses sweeping through the battlefield also caused the two demon beasts fighting in the middle of the clearing to stop, as they both turned their attention towards the focus of the hundreds of different divine senses.


    Roar?


    Roar¡­?


    Soon staring directly at Mui floating close to the edge of the clearing by using one hand to hold on to a fist sized metal ball that floated in the air through some mysterious force with confused expressions on their faces. Not knowing how to react to the rather funny image of a young girl gently swaying back and forth while holding on to a small metal ball that seemed to defy gravity as it remained motionless in the air without any rhyme or reason.


    Even with their Domain Lord Realm cultivation base and intelligence in no way inferior to that of a human, they simply couldn''tprehend what they were seeing. Especially considering that this was also their first encounter with a human.


    This is bad¡­


    Feeling that she had suddenly be the center of attention for the thousands of demon beasts all around the clearing, Mui could not help feeling a bit afraid for the first time since she had started training on her own.


    Even before she could start flying away from the clearing, her attempt to ascend into the air and fly over the demon beasts blocking her path without drawing any attention from the rest of the demon beasts, had already failed.


    Not just failed, but she had somehow managed to draw the attention of every single demon beast present, while also causing the two fighting demon beasts to pause their battle to see what was happening.


    I¡­ I have to get out of here!


    Swish-!


    Realizing that some of the demon beasts had already started moving below her during her panic and seemed to be about to leap into the air to attack her, Mui didn''t waste any time as she directly poured arge portion of her qi into the metal ball she was holding on to, causing it to fly away at a speed no less than that of a Domain Lord Realm cultivator. Dragging her along, as she used her remaining strength to hold on while steering the metal ball in the direction of the safe forest, she had already cleared out for any powerful demon beasts.


    ROOOAR-!


    Rooar!


    Roar!


    However, upon seeing that she was running away, the demon beasts below and around the clearing didn''t go back to what they had been doing before, but instead began roaring out loudly before chasing after her.


    The reason for this was not because they just didn''t like humans like her but was more so because the metal ball that had been injected with arge portion of her qi looked no different from a massive spirit stone to these demon beasts.


    And not just any old spirit stone, but one of such high quality that none of the demon beasts below could control themselves as they charged after her. Inherently understanding that if they could eat this "spirit stone", they would be able increase their cultivation realm and strength.


    Be it the Core Formation Realm demon beasts or the Domain Lord Realm demon beasts, all of them felt tempted by this "spirit stone".


    Rumble~!


    Thus, resulting in a demon beast stampede that hadn''t been seen inside the mystic realm since thest time Xuan Hao''s disciples visited the ce. Growing stronger with time, as more demon beasts noticed the floating "Spirit stone".


    In the end, even though Mui had the assistance of her strange metal ball, it wasn''t long before the Domain Lord Realm demon beast that could simrly fly like she did, began to catch up to her. Forcing her to take out one of her master''s talismans in preparation for having to face off against the Domain Lord Realm demon beasts.


    After all, no matter how strong she might have be over the past few weeks, it was far from enough to face off against these Domain Lord Realm demon beasts.

 Chapter 1307 Two Paths

    Chapter 1307 Two Paths


    Unaware of what kind of trouble his disciple had ended up causing only shortly after she had wandered out of the forest that he had deemed to be safe for her to train inside of by herself, Xuan Hao arrived back at the third celestial gate. Soon finding himself back in front of the tower of secrets that he had been forced to leave behind earlier due to insufficient celestial coins.


    Now that he had managed to get his hands on 38 celestial coins, he could not only get his hands on the information rted to the Dao Domain Lord Realm but would also be able to get a few powerful heaven rankbat techniques. One of which he had already decided would be a movement technique that didn''t involve the Dao of Space, as he needed a proper movement technique that could also be used while space was sealed.


    Outside of that, he didn''t have any clue about what kind of otherbat techniques he could get, but getting the ones rted to the Dao of Space seemed like a good idea, as he didn''t really have any ways to fight with the Dao of Space outside of the spatial copse that drained most of his strength whenever he used it.


    "Hello, Trial Participant, would you like to enter the tower of secrets?"


    Going over what kind ofbat techniques he should choose inside the tower of secrets; Xuan Hao was momentarily taken aback by the preservation golem standing in front of the tower of secrets suddenly speak up.


    However, he quickly calmed down and nodded his head in agreement, causing the preservation golem to move to the side as it opened up the door to the tower before signaling for him to go in first.


    "Thank you¡­" Only able to smile a bit wryly at the formal gesture from the preservation golem, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he stepped inside the tower of secrets before directly making his way up towards the floor that the scroll with information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm was located.


    No matter what kind ofbat technique he ended up finding in the end, he would first have to get his hands on the information about the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Not only for himself, but also for the future Dao Domain Lords that might develop in the Star Shattering Sect.


    [The Precarious Journey, a look into the Dao Domain Lord Realm]


    [Price: 8 Celestial Coins]


    Finding himself back on the second floor in front of the scroll that he had been looking for, Xuan Hao was about to reach down and grab the scroll when he suddenly remembered the words of preservation golem when he had first arrived at the tower of secrets regarding the killing formations guarding the tower of secrets.


    How¡­ Was he supposed to pay with his celestial coins¡­?


    "To buy any scroll or book within the tower of secrets, you just need to state your intention to do so. If your celestial coins are insufficient, you will be reminded to ce the scroll or book back in its original location."


    Seemingly sensing the confusion on Xuan Hao''s face as he had already turned around about to ask it, the preservation golem answered before he even had a chance to do so.


    "I¡­ I want to buy this!" Feeling a bit taken aback that the preservation golem had managed to guess what he was about to say, Xuan Hao calmed down before picking up the scroll with information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm and stating his intention to buy it.


    "Order epted; total remaining bnce is 30 celestial coins. You can safely store the scroll forter reading or use a reading corner to look through it." In response, the preservation golem''s eyes shone for a brief moment before saying this. Returning to its normal emotionless state the next second as it pointed at a small chair and table located close to the walls of the second floor of the tower.


    "Guess I will look through it first before finding something to use the rest of my celestial coins on." Already feeling overwhelmed with curiosity regarding theter stages of the Dao Domain Lord Realm that was still unexplored territory, Xuan Hao followed the preservation golems rmendation and went to sit down at the reading table located at the edge.


    "A look into the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­ I''m already starting to feel a bit excited¡­" Muttering this to himself as he ced the scroll down on the table in front of him, Xuan Hao cautiously unfurled it with an excited and nervous expression on his face.


    Excited because he might soon figure out how to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, while he felt nervous that the scroll was written in anguage far too ancient for him to understand, a risk he had considered, but had decided to take considering the importance of the information.


    "Not written in ancientnguage!" Only after seeing the first few lines in anguage that he could understand, did he breathe a sigh of relief.


    Although thenguage used to write the scroll wasn''t the same as the one currently in use on the Ewaria Continent, it wasn''t that different and was easy to read through with his already rather extensive research into the ancientnguage that had been used in the ancient past.


    So, with nothing to stop him, Xuan Hao happily began to read through the scroll¡­


    Reading through the scroll, Xuan Hao realized that the Dao Domain Lord Realm was far from as simple as he had first suspected.


    First of all, reaching the Dao Domain Lord Realm wasn''t just about merging two different domains together in the Domain Lord Realm and reaching the Dao Domain Lord Realm this way. Instead, there were other ways to reach the Dao Domain Lord Realm that involvedprehending a single dao, the most used one ording to the scroll beingprehending a single dao to the Small Sess Realm in the Domain Lord Realm and using a special method to evolve it into a Dao Domain.


    However, due to the difficulty ofprehending a dao to the Small Sess Realm in the Domain Lord Realm, it was obvious that only the most brilliant geniuses decided to try and follow the path of establishing a dao domain.


    Not just that, but the method of essentially smashing to domains together and forcibly creating a dao domain this way, was considered an outdated and suicidal method of reaching the Dao Domain Lord Realm, as the chance of death doing so was high.


    Outside of that, the method of reaching the Middle and Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm wasn''t much different from what he knew, with the only difference being that there now was a different method for those choosing to focus on a single dao instead of multiple Daos like he had done.


    Following that path, one had toprehend the chosen dao to the Large Sess Realm to reach the Middle Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and the Perfection Realm to reach the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    In turn, to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm following the path of a single dao, one would have to reach the Origin Realm in said dao. After which one would be able to directly break through to the Profound Immortal Realm.


    Thinking about it, Xuan Hao realized that the holy son he had read about in the Land Creation Realm should be a genius who had broken through to the Profound Immortal Realm after he reached the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm byprehending the Dao of Fire to the Origin Realm.


    However, this method of reaching the Peak of the dao domain lord realm was ultimately not suitable for him, as he had chosen the method of merging different Daos together into his dao domain and strengthen it this way.


    Although this method wasn''t in any way inferior ording to the information recorded in the scroll, it was far more troublesome, as one would have toprehend multiple Daos instead of just focusing on a single dao.


    Not that Xuan Hao could do anything about it, as he could already be considered set on the path, he had unknowingly chosen to go through the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao nced down towards the section rted to the path of merging different Daos into his dao domain and how to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm with this method and in turn reach the Profound Immortal Realm.


    "This¡­ How is this even possible!?"


    However, as he nced over the requirements for reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he could not help silently cursing to himself as he began regretting the fact that he had even decided to go through the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the first ce¡­

 Chapter 1308 Dao Domain Lord Realm Scroll

    Chapter 1308 Dao Domain Lord Realm Scroll


    Different from the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm following the path of a single dao, the one he followed that required theprehension of multiple Daos was far more difficult. Requiring him toprehend three different Daos to the Realm of Perfection and six to the Large Sess Realm.


    With a dao in the Realm of Perfection creating sixyers around his dao lotus and one in the Large Sess Realm creating threeyers, he would end up with a perfect 36yers around his dao lotus by the end. Archiving the realm of Radiant Bloom.


    However, he had alreadyprehended 10 Different Daos at this point in time and would essentially go beyond the 36yers around the dao lotus if he tried to break through to the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in this manner¡­


    Fortunately, he was not leftpletely without hope, as the scroll did note down that something like that had happened in the past.


    Unfortunately, the way to solve this problem was not what he liked, as it was essentially a pat on the shoulder from the creator of the scroll telling him to pray that his dao lotus could hold on and didn''t end up blowing up under the stress of the additionalyers.


    In this way, he also found out that the limit of 36yers wasn''t really a limit of the maximum number ofyers that could be constructed around the dao lotus, but was essentially the limit deemed to be within the rtive safe zone, as going beyond it would force the cultivator to squeeze the dao lotus to prevent it from blooming, something that came with the wonderful risk of the dao lotus being squeezed by theyers and in turn rupturing under the stress, causing an explosion that carried with it the force to even kill a Profound Immortal standing a few thousand meters away.


    "Pray to not blow up in the future¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked down at the scroll in front of him, Xuan Hao realized that it would be quite dangerous for him to continue creating any moreyers around his dao lotus with Daos that he didn''t intend to focus on raising to at least the Large Sess Realm in the future.


    At the very least, he found out about this before he ended upprehending another five or so Daos and used them to create even moreyers around his dao lotus thinking it would be a shortcut to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm that he thought was waiting for him after he created 36yers around his dao lotus.


    "Haaa¡­ Can''t undo what is already done¡­" Shaking his head as he decided to no longer think about it for now, Xuan Hao focused his attention back towards the bottom part of the scroll that was about the different benefits of going through the Dao Domain Lord Realm instead of going through the traditional route of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    First of all, the Early or Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm didn''t bring any benefits and one would end up being forced to go through the entire Immortal Soul Tribtion. Resulting in most people breaking through in the Early Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm perishing under the Immortal Soul Tribtion.


    Next up, the Intermediate or Middle Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm did bring benefits in the form of being able to create 36yers around the dao lotus in the Dao Seed Realm instead of the normal 30. Allowing them to create a stronger foundation and have a better chance of reaching the Profound Immortal Realm in the future.


    Following this was the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, the realm that he was currently at and also starting to consider whether or not he might need to give up on trying to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm if things got too dangerous.


    At the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, one could be considered a genius ording to the scroll and the benefits one would receive from breaking through in this realm were also far betterpared to those of previous two realms.


    Not only allowing the creation of 36yers around the dao lotus, but also giving one an opportunity to undergo an enlightenment directly supported by the world itself.


    Although Xuan Hao had no idea what this, enlightenment support by the world, was about, he still remembered the old man he had met from the Fallen Immortal Archipgo had told him that a genius from his n had been able to directly break through to the Profound Immortal Realm due to this enlightenment. Making Xuan Hao certain that it wasn''t anything to scoff at.


    Finally, there were the benefits from reaching the Peak Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, his now more distant than ever goal.


    Reaching this realm, even in the ancient past, would make one a widely known genius on the level of the inheritors carefully raised by the different pinnacle forces.


    The benefits of reaching did change much from the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, as it in a sense only had involved the same enlightenment as before.


    However, different from the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm where one could use this enlightenment to break through to the Profound Immortal Realm, someone at the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm would naturally reach the Profound Immortal Realm upon reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Allowing them to use this enlightenment in a different manner.


    ording to the person who wrote the scroll, the mostmon way for the cultivator to use the enlightenment being to directly breeze through the Breaking Dawn Realm of the Profound Immortal Realm and reach the Sea Formation Realm in a single step.


    But the most important thing was that the enlightenment guided by the world allowed one to establish a perfect foundation after reaching the Profound Immortal Realm. Allowing smooth progress through the Profound Immortal Realm and essentially guaranteeing that the person would be able to reach the Peak of the Profound Immortal Realm if they didn''t die beforehand.


    "This¡­"


    Finished reading through the scroll, Xuan Hao had no idea how to react, as he could only stare at the scroll nkly for a moment. Wondering whether or not he should try to directly break through to the Profound Immortal Realm and give up trying to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, but these thoughts were quickly banished after realizing that he wasn''t really in a hurry to reach the Profound Immortal Realm and could take his time trying toprehend the required Daos, he was, after all, still rather young.


    Even if he had no idea what the benefits of a perfect foundation were, he was certain that it would be something good considering that it was directly mentioned. Not just that but breaking through at the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm would also allow him to skip past the Breaking Dawn Realm and allow him to directly reach the Sea Formation Realm.


    And, considering that one of the requirements for awakening his Ster Dao Body was to reach the Land Creation Realm that was above the Sea Formation Realm in the Profound Immortal Realm, he would be more than happy if he could skip past a minor realm in the Profound Immortal Realm. Especially considering that he had no idea how long it would take for him to break through after he reached the Profound Immortal Realm in the future.


    At the very least, considering his current speed and how much it had slowed down after he had reached the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he had a feeling that he would most likely be spending a long time trying to break through the further he went.


    Even reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm at his current speed ofprehension without any outside assistance would at least take him a few hundred years. Making him realize that his future breakthrough time might end up being measured in the hundreds- if not thousands of years¡­


    "Haaa¡­ That''s something for the future. For now, I should focus on trying to find somebat technique to use myst 30 celestial coins on¡­" shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao had only nowe to the painful realization that this was indeed an immortal world and what he was practicing was indeed immortal cultivation.


    The long time for breaking through that had managed to elude him so far finally seemed to have crept up on him as his cultivation realm rapidly improved. Soon enough, he would really end up as some ancient fossil that had lived for thousands of years, a fate that seemed inevitable for any cultivator who cultivated to a high enough realm¡­


    __n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om

 Chapter 1309 Looking for new Combat Techniques

    Chapter 1309 Looking for new Combat Techniques


    Putting aside the matter of how long it would take him to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future, Xuan Hao put away the scroll with information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm. cing it inside his interspatial ring so he could hand it over to the sect for storage in the future.


    After all, the scroll would still be useful for the Star Shattering Sect in the future when they began seeing Dao Domain Lord Realm cultivators appearing.


    Although it was a bit too early to think about it now that the strongest elders of the sect had only reached the Domain Lord Realm and was still far away from the Dao Domain Lord Realm that could only be reached after they were at least at the peak of the Domain Lord Realm, it didn''t hurt to have the information avable.


    At the very least, they wouldn''t end up making a simr mistake as the one he had made when breaking through to the Dao Domain Lord Realm and would be able to make a choice on what path they wanted to follow after they reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Be it following one of the two paths of the Dao Domain Lord Realm or just going along the easier path of breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm and progressing normally through the Dao Seed Realm andter aim for the Profound Immortal Realm or Celestial Immortal Realm.


    No matter what the rest of the sect''s elders and disciples ended up choosing when it was time, Xuan Hao wanted to at least give them the information on the different paths that they could choose between so they could find the one that was best suitable for them to follow.


    After all, it was not everyone who would be able to enter the Dao Domain Lord Realm and, in the future, it would not be everyone who would be able to reach the Profound Immortal Realm even if they knew about it.


    Even in the ancient past, it was clear that there were still people who chose the Celestial Immortal Realm. Meaning that although those at the Celestial Immortal Realm were weaker than those in the Profound Immortal Realm, it should still be a viable path.


    Not to mention, a Celestial Immortal was already a very strong existence with a long lifespan, and it was not everyone who would be able to reach such a high cultivation realm.


    Even if there were some problems with the Celestial Immortal Realm and its future prospects, it wasn''t something for him to worry about for now considering that the strongest member of the Star Shattering Sect, Pei Yang, was still only at the Early Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Still far away from even thinking about breaking through to the Celestial Immortal Realm, let alone going beyond it...


    "For now, I should just try and find a fewbat techniques. Thinking about the future of those in the Celestial Immortal Realm is far too off in the future for now." Muttering this to himself as he shook his head and threw the matter of the future of those who broke through to the Celestial Immortal Realm and their future prospects to the back of his mind, Xuan Hao turned to look up at the preservation golem that had been silently standing beside him as he read through the scroll on the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    "Can you help me find any movement technique not rted to the Dao of Space? Preferably below the price of 20 celestial coins."


    "Yes, the movement technique section on the second floor of the tower falls within your requirements. Follow me and I will guide you there." Nodding its head after it heard what Xuan Hao said, the preservation golem began to move towards another part of the second floor of the tower of secrets.


    Not one to fall behind, Xuan Hao got up from his chair and began following after the preservation golem as it made its way deeper into the second floor of the tower of secrets. Soon arriving at a smaller section where the preservation golem came to a stop and motioned for him to take a look around.


    Compared to before he had spent his 8 celestial coins on the Dao Domain Lord Realm scroll, it seemed far more respectful in its mannerism for some reason¡­


    "Dancing Steps of the Wind Spirit, 8 celestial coins¡­ Nine Steps of the Netherworld God, 15 celestial coins¡­ Dragons Grace, 4 celestial coins¡­ So many different movement techniques¡­" Not bothering to think too much about it, Xuan Hao instead began to look through the introductions of the few nearby scrolls and books.


    Not taking long to find a few that stood out from the rest of the movement techniques.


    First up was the Nine Steps of the Netherworld God, a movement technique that mixed the Dao of Darkness and the Dao of Illusions together to create a ghostly movement technique that made it hard for others to discern the true location of the user when moving. Althoughcking in speed, it was an extremely potentbat-oriented movement technique that would be useful even after the Profound Immortal Realm if one continuedprehending the rted Daos.


    Second was the Seven Godly Steps, a movement technique that didn''t involve any specific dao and relied on the physical strength of the body. Although not the showiest among the movement techniques, it was still impressive and would allow an easy way to improve one''s speed without the need toprehend a new dao.


    Of course, the minimum requirement on the strength of the physical body was still not something that was easy to achieve under normal circumstances and Xuan Hao only managed to barely fulfill the requirement ording to the brief introduction.


    If he wanted to continue practicing the Seven Godly Steps in the future, he would most likely also have to pick up a corresponding body cultivation technique to ensure that the strength of his body became strong enough to practice the higher levels of the Seven Godly Steps.


    Third was the movement technique that he thought looked the most promising among them called Light Comet, a far more advanced movement techniquepared to the Seven Godly Steps, it allowed the user to turn into a ball of light as they moved at terrifyingly fast speed. Considered the fastest movement technique below anything rted to the Dao of Space, as it involved the Dao of Light.


    Although it was also the most expensive of the three movement techniques, costing an entire 20 celestial coins, it could also be considered the one with the most potential and best fitting for his current situation considering that he had alreadyprehended the Dao of Light.


    In the end, Xuan Hao hesitated for a bit before deciding to look around atbat techniques rted to the Dao of Space beforeing to a decision whether or not to use 20 celestial coins on a single movement technique.


    After all, he didn''t want to end up in a situation where he was left with only 10 celestial coins and the Dao of Space rtedbat technique that he wanted just so happened to cost 11 celestial coins.


    As a result, Xuan Hao left the movement technique section of the second floor and made his way towards the ce wherebat techniques rted to the Dao of Space were stored under the guidance of the preservation golem.


    "Spatial sh¡­ Spatial Seal¡­ Void Sword Art, First Volume¡­ Hm? Spatial Shift and Partial Spatial Copse? Didn''t expect to find a few familiar techniques here¡­"


    Looking through thebat techniques rted to the Dao of Space, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat surprised look on his face after discovering a few familiarbat techniques.


    Then again, it wasn''t that surprising considering the spatial copse and spatial shift should be corner stone techniques for thoseprehending the Dao of Space. After all, they weren''t thatplicated and would inevitably be leant when one''sprehension reached a high enough realm.


    For this reason, their price wasn''t that high either. Only costing 4 celestial coins each.


    The first volume of the Void Sword Art on the other hand cost a total of 8 celestial coins. Making one wonder just how expensive the entire sword art was.


    The Spatial Seal and the simpler Spatial sh on the other hand didn''t cost too much either, standing at around 6 celestial coins each.


    However, Xuan Hao didn''t stop after just 5bat techniques, as he continued to look through the different space rtedbat techniques. Trying to see if he could find something that would be fitting for his current fighting style.


    Unfortunately, there weren''t that manybat techniques rted to the Dao of Space that were also rted to the Dao of the Sword.


    In the end, outside of the Void Sword Art, he only managed to find a total 12 sword arts on the second floor that were rted to the Dao of Space. Most of them exceeding the price of 10 celestial coins that he wanted them to be at or below.

 Chapter 1310 Two New Techniques and the Saint Realm

    Chapter 1310 Two New Techniques and the Saint Realm


    Continuing to look around the tower of secrets and checking out all kinds of differentbat techniques to make sure that he chose the correct ones in the end, Xuan Hao also decided to make his way up to the third floor of the tower of secrets.


    [Divine Transformation, High Heaven Rank]


    [Price: 50 Celestial Coins]


    [Void Steps, Peak Heaven Rank]


    [Price: 150 Celestial Coins]


    [God Body Refinement, High Heaven Rank]


    [Price: 75 Celestial Coins]


    However, after seeing the price of thebat techniques up on the third floor of the tower of secret, Xuan Hao quickly gave up on trying to find a suitable technique up there, as even the cheapestbat technique on the third floor of the tower cost at least 50 celestial coins. Not something he could afford with his current 30 celestial coins.


    In the end, after looking around the tower for a little over half a day and going through countlessbat techniques, Xuan Hao first ended up choosing the Void Sword Art at the price of 8 celestial coins because it was a suitable technique and not too expensive, while he could at the same time buy the second volume of the technique that he had already seen up on the third floor of the tower in the future.


    Although he guessed it would take some time before he got enough celestial coins to afford the next part of the Void Sword Arts, it was still a Mid Heaven Rankbat technique and would be usable up to the Sea Formation Realm. More than enough time for him to get the required celestial coins he needed to get the second volume of the sword art.


    Although he guessed it would take some time before he got enough celestial coins to afford the next part of the Void Sword Arts, it was still a Mid Heaven Rankbat technique and would be usable up to the Sea Formation Realm. More than enough time for him to get the required celestial coins he needed to get the second volume of the sword art. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Next up, Xuan Hao had originally wanted to get his hands on a physical refinement technique to strengthen his physical body, but he inevitably ended up giving up on this endeavor, as he found out that it would not bring too many benefits considering that his physique was still in an unweakened state.


    Meaning that before he managed to awaken his physique, it wouldn''t be that beneficial to find a body refinement technique, as it would be more beneficial for him to just focus on awakening his physic first.


    Because of this, Xuan Hao was left with a total of 22 celestial coins for a movement technique. Leaving him with the choice to get a higher-level movement technique or get anotherbat technique while getting a slightly lower-level movement technique.


    Considering that he didn''t really feel like he needed anotherbat technique after getting the Void Sword Art, Xuan Hao had at first wanted to get the Light Comet movement technique, as it would give him a fast movement technique that wouldn''t be restricted by spatial seals and relied on a dao that he had alreadyprehended.


    Even though the Light Comet movement technique was mostly focused on speed and going in a straight line and wasn''t that suitable forbat, Xuan Hao didn''t mind it too much, but this changed as he reached the section where movement techniques rted to the Dao of Illusions were located¡­


    [Illusory Light Steps, Mid Heaven Rank]


    [Requirements: Dao of Illusions, Dao of Light]


    [Price: 20 Celestial Coins]


    It was here that he found a different movement technique that also involved the Dao of Light.


    However, different from the Light Comet movement technique that only focused on speed, the Illusory Light Steps was slower, but at the same time also useful forbat.


    Even if it also required theprehension of the Dao of Illusions to practice it, it wasn''t that big of a problem to the current Xuan Hao, who had alreadyprehended the Dao of Illusions to the Large Sess Realm.


    Because of this, Xuan Hao ultimately ended up choosing the Illusory Light Steps as his new movement technique.


    After all, even if it was slower than the Light Comet movement technique that focused solely on speed, it was still a movement technique that incorporated the Dao of Light. Making it far faster than most other movement techniques.


    So, in the end, Xuan Hao ended up using up a total of 28 celestial coins on the two techniques. Leaving him with only 2 celestial coins that couldn''t even be used for buying the worstbat technique present inside the tower of secrets.


    "Hm? Now that I think about it, given that I could buy information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm, is there perhaps other kinds of information in here that I can buy? Like information on the Profound Immortal Realm or the Celestial Immortal Realm?" cing the two techniques he had just bought inside his interspatial ring for readingter, Xuan Hao could not help asking this as he nced towards the preservation golem standing a few meters behind him.


    Making it more than clear that he hoped that the preservation golem could answer his question.


    "Yes, you can buy all sorts of information rted to cultivation in the tower of secrets. Including information on the Profound Immortal Realm and the Celestial Immortal Realm. Do you want to browse the cultivation information library located on the first floor, second floor or third floor?" Answering as expected, the preservation golem directly asked where he wanted to look for information.


    "Hm? Cultivation Information library?" However, instead of answering, Xuan Hao could not help asking about the cultivation information library mentioned by the preservation golem. Feeling that he had just learnt something new about the tower of secrets that he hadn''t encountered so far during his past few hours looking through the tower.


    "The cultivation information library is the location where cultivation insights of different cultivators are stored and can be bought. The cultivation insights can be useful for those stuck at a bottleneck. General information of the major cultivation realms can also be bought there, with the only exception being special cultivation realms like the Dao Domain Lord Realm, the Saint Realm or simr unusual cultivation paths. Information on unusual cultivation paths can be found in the normal section of the tower of secrets."


    Listening to the preservation golems exnation of the cultivation information library, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat surprised look on his face. Understanding just how important the cultivation insights of past seniors might prove for anyone who was stuck at a bottleneck and wanted to find a way to ovee it.


    At the same time, he also felt curious about the Saint Realm mentioned by the preservation golem, as he guessed it should be the same Saint Realm as the one that Gong Cheng had broken through to back when he had taught him and Yi Min about cksmithing.


    Even if he had found it amazing that he had a strength simr to someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm after breaking through to the Saint Realm with his cksmithing, he never expected it to be a unique cultivation path.


    Considering that Bai Ning was also talented in the Dao of cksmithing and might also end up following this path in the future, Xuan Hao decided to try and check it out to ensure that the Saint Realm was really what he thought it was.


    After all, if it was really a unique cultivation path that focused on theprehension of a profession path like cksmithing, it might be good for him to learn about it so he could help Bai Ning step onto this path in the future, as he felt it might be more suitable for himpared to entering the Dao Domain Lord Realm like he had first wanted him and the rest of his disciples to do.


    Whoosh~!


    In the end, after asking the preservation golem to guide down to the first floor where the introduction of the Saint Realm was located, Xuan Hao wasted no time as he picked up the small book and outright bought it with hisst two celestial coins.


    "Saint Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked at the small book in his hand, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he found a ce to sit down and read through it.


    And¡­ As he had expected, the Saint Realm was exactly what he thought it was, as Gong Cheng had indeed broken through to the Saint Realm described in the book.


    Although there wasn''t that much information on the Saint Realm in the introductory book he had bought, Xuan Hao still learnt about the names of the four minor realms of the Saint Realm.


    Third Heaven of the Saint Realm.


    Second Heaven of the Saint Realm.


    First Heaven of the Saint Realm.


    And finally, the Great Saint Realm


    Gong Cheng from back then should have broken through to the Third Heaven of the Saint Realm. Giving him strengthparable to someone at the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm.


    ording to the book, if he reached the Second Heaven of the Saint Realm, he would get strengthparable to someone at the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm.


    And reaching the First Heaven of the Saint Realm would allow him to reach a levelparable to someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm or Breaking Dawn Realm.


    The final Great Saint Realm was a realm that would allow one to have strength no weaker than someone in the Sea Formation Realm of the Profound Immortal Realm or the Later Stages of the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Unfortunately, even though the book contained a bit of information about the saint realm and the four minor realms, it didn''t provide any clues about how to reach the different realms outside of what he already knew. Indeed, proving that it was just an introduction to the Saint Realm¡­

 Chapter 1311 Peak of the Profound Immortal Realm

    Chapter 1311 Peak of the Profound Immortal Realm


    Finished reading through the book on the Saint Realm, Xuan Hao ced it inside his interspatial ring with the rest of the things he had bought inside the tower of secrets so he could ce it in the sect''s library when he left the mystic realm in the future.


    "And¡­ That was thest of my celestial coins¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked down at his interspatial ring, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit depressed when remembering all the powerful techniques located at the third floor of the tower.


    If he wanted to have a chance of getting one of those techniques in the future, he would have to clear at least another three celestial trials¡­ And that was only if they ended up giving as many celestial coins as the fourth celestial trail had given him, something Xuan Hao understood would be impossible unless he ended up entering a simrly life-threatening situation as the one, he had experienced during the fourth celestial trial.


    At least for now, it looked like he wouldn''t get an opportunity to browse the tower of secrets after he left.


    So, with that in mind, Xuan Hao decided to take the opportunity to check out the cultivation information library that the preservation golem had mentioned before leaving. Feeling curious about the insights that were stored inside.


    After all, even though he hadn''t really encountered any bottleneck so to speak and the problem of how to advance to the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm had also been solved, the insights of past seniors would always be helpful in the process of improving his ownprehension.


    Of course, he currently did not have any celestial coins left and couldn''t get any of the insights written by the past seniors of the Mirage Sect¡­


    Arriving inside a rtively small hall that seemed to not fit in with the overall circr structure of the tower, Xuan Hao could not help opening his eyes wide as he realized that he had just walked into a small separate space that had been carved out inside the already expanded space of the tower of secrets.


    The insight into the Dao of Space required to do something like this was far beyond anything he had encountered so far and made Xuan Hao seriously wonder how high hisprehension of the Dao of Space would need to be to do something simr, let alone add these effects to a formation


    In the end, Xuan Hao didn''t even pay attention to the countless simple scrolls that were lined up along the walls of the small hall, as he instead just focused his full attention on how the Dao of Space was being applied to open the small independent space that the hall was located inside of.


    The only unfortunate thing was the fact that the formation covering the tower of secrets made it impossible to release his divine sense to do an in-depth examination of the space inside the small hall.


    Not because it stopped his divine sense from being released, but more so because the formation had used some kind protective measure that prevented him from investigating how the Dao of Space was being applied. Only allowing him to feel it in person.


    Then again, it was something understandable, considering that he would be able to circumvent the formation if he could understand how the space inside the tower of secrets was constructed.


    Doing so by either unraveling the formation by messing with the space itself or stealing from the tower of secrets.


    Is what he wanted to say, but his current strength was far too weak to aplish either of those things, as he would be far too slow to do this before the formation in ce either killed him or destroyed the books and scrolls inside the tower to prevent anything from being stolen. Not to mention, he wasn''t sure whether or not there were other ways that the tower of secrets ensured that nothing was stolen, and nothing happened to the tower.


    However, considering that the unraveling of the formation by messing with the space it was constructed in should be a rather easy w to think of Xuan Hao guessed that there should be measures in ce to prevent something like that from happening. Especially considering that anyone entering the tower of secrets who hadprehended the Dao of Space to the Small Sess Realm would be able to understand the space inside of it with enough time and think of ways to unravel or destroy it.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided to find a ce to sit down andprehend the Dao of space inside the small hall, stillpletely ignoring the countless scrolls lined up at the side of the small hall.


    Partly because he had his full attention focused onprehending the Dao of Space after finding out that doing so would be beneficial to deepening his understanding, but also because he had managed to catch a glimpse of the prices of the different scrolls lined up alongside the walls of the small hall-


    [Insight into the Star Creation Realm, by the Red Star Immortal]


    [Price: 750 Celestial Coins]


    [Insight into the Land Creation Realm, by the Scarlet Lover, Yi Lin]


    [Price: 300 Celestial Coins]


    [Insight into the¡­]


    And to say it scared him was an understatement, as even the expensive techniques located on the third floor of the tower seemed cheap inparison.


    A silver underling was the fact that he managed to learn about the name of the fourth and final minor realm of the Profound Immortal Realm, the Star Creation Realm.


    Although he still had absolutely no clue what the realm was about, he at least had something to go on for now¡­ And if heard anything about something rted to the Star Creation Realm in the future, he would know that it was about the Peak of the Profound Immortal Realm.


    Going back toprehending the Dao of Space after this, Xuan Hao fully immersed himself in the experience of feeling the space around his body.


    Considering that the safety measures he left with Mui were connected to his soul to some extent, he wasn''t worried about not knowing if she ended up in danger without him knowing. Allowing him to peacefullyprehend the Dao of Space without any worries.


    Like this, time flew and soon a week had passed since he had stepped foot inside the small hall filled with the cultivation insights of different seniors from the Mirage Sect before he once again opened his eyes.


    Of course, the reason why he opened his eyes again wasn''t because he wanted to-


    "Time limit of one week has been reached. If the trial participant decides to stay any longer without buying another technique, one celestial coin will be deducted for another week. Failure to pay will result in immediate expulsion from the tower of secrets."


    "Huh?" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "No celestial coins were detected in the bnce of the trial participant. Proceeding with forceful expulsion of the trial participant."


    Whoosh-!


    Instead, it was because the preservation golem that had been silently standing beside him for thest week without doing anything suddenly kicked him out of the tower of secrets before he even had the time to get up from where he was sitting.


    In simple terms, he barely opened his eyes before a ck void swallowed him whole and spit him out a few meters away from the entrance to the tower of secrets¡­


    "Talk about rude¡­" Dusting off his robe as he got up on his feet, Xuan Hao could not help feeling wronged as he looked over at the preservation golem that had already appeared in front of the entrance to the tower of secrets.


    Although he was unwilling to give up on the opportunity to continueprehending the space inside the tower of secrets, he also understood that it would be impossible for him to do so without any celestial coins at hand.


    At the very least, during the week he had managed to spend inside the cultivation information library where the insight of past seniors was stored, hisprehension of the Dao of Space had already started reaching the limits of the Small Sess Realm. Starting to show signs of him breaking through to the Large Sess Realm.


    As long as he spent a bit of time solidifying what he had managed to learn over the past week, he should be able to reach the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space. Bringing him a step closer to the now distant goal that was the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, while at the same time also getting him closer to fulfilling one of the requirements for awakening his physique.


    "Guess, I should go and check up on Mui first¡­ "


    However, before that, Xuan Hao decided to first go and check up on Mui and see how she was faring by herself inside the mystic realm.

 Chapter 1312 Ancient Ruins

    Chapter 1312 Ancient Ruins


    A week before Xuan Hao was thrown out of the tower of secrets, Mui was still escaping from therge group of demon beasts that had now been chasing after her for a rather long time. Making her start considering using one of her master''s talismans to scare them off.


    Roar!


    ROooar!


    This only became more pressing as the Domain Lord Realm demon beasts chasing after her slowly began closing the already short distance between them.


    Having experienced the domain of her senior brother and sister, she understood that it would be difficult for her to amount much of a resistance if she ended up getting caught in one of the Domain Lord Realm demon beast''s domains.


    Not to mention escaping at that point in time, she feared that she wouldn''t even be able to properly use the talismans that her master had left for her!


    "Is that a ruin? Master did mention that this ce once had a powerful sect controlling it..." However, before she had the chance to throw out one of the talismans, she noticed a massiveplex of ruins appearing in the distance. "Ah!? My divine sense is getting blocked by them!" Not just that, but she also realized that the ruins seemed to be blocking her divine sense. Making it impossible for her to investigate it without personally going down into the ruins.


    "Hm? Maybe¡­ Maybe I can use those ruins to hide? After all, if my divine sense is blocked, so should the demon beasts and their domain as well!" Realizing that she might be able to use this to her advantage, Mui didn''t seem to know about the obvious difference between a domain and divine sense, as she wasted no time diving down from above and into the ruins below.


    Roar?


    Roar¡­


    Roar!


    Seeing this, the group of demon beasts following her were first confused, then surprised and finally overjoyed, as they finally seemed to see a chance to catch Mui. None of them disyed the slightest bit of care or consideration towards the strange ruins below.


    For all these demon beasts knew, it was just a random set of ruins, something they had grown up seeing all the time inside the mystic realm.


    From their personal experience, there was nothing to be afraid of inside of these ruins outside of those in the deeper parts of the mystic realm.


    And although the one in front of them was a bit strange when it came to blocking divine sense, it was nothing unusual for the ruins found in the mystic realm to have these kinds of strange traits that were otherwisepletely harmless.


    If anything, the weirdest thing about the situation was the fact that none of these demon beasts had ever seen this massiveplex of ruins before, something they should have noticed given its location in the outer part of the mystic realm.


    Roar! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Rooaaar!


    However, none of the demon beasts cared about this as they all dived down towards Mui filled with greed, all of them wanting nothing more than to devour the strange metal ball that looked like a giant spirit stone of unparalleled purity in their eyes.


    Swish~


    For this reason, none of the demon beasts noticed a faint barrier forming around the massiveplex of ruins the moment they made their way inside. Instead, they remained focused on trying to find Mui, as the stronger demon beasts also discovered that they couldn''t use the power of their domains inside the massiveplex of ruins.


    Because of this, Mui had sessfully managed to hide away after entering the ruins. Finding a small corner to hide away inside of as she waited for the demon beasts to grow tired and leave.


    Rumble~!


    However, before Mui or the demon beasts had a chance to do anything, the entireplex filed with ruins began trembling ever so slightly, as the barrier surrounding the ce became fully visible to Mui and the demon beasts-


    RUMBLE-!


    Roar¡­?


    Roar?!


    "Wha-!?


    And before either of them could do anything, they found that the sea of trees outside the barrier surrounding theplex of ruins had suddenly disappeared, being reced by even more ruins that stretched as far as Mui could see.


    Obviously, she and the demon beasts had been teleported somewhere by some kind of ancient formation that had been beneath the ruins¡­ And the ce where they all ended up inside of was an evenrger ruin.


    Possibly an ancient city that had once belonged to the ancient sect that ruled over the mystic realm they were inside of in the ancient past.


    But more importantly than that¡­


    ROOOOOAR-!


    The demon beast they heard roaring in the distance following their arrival was clearly stronger than the Domain Lord Realm!


    ¡­


    Back to the present and in front of the tower of secrets.


    Given that Xuan Hao had decided to go see Mui and how she was doing on her own, he didn''t waste any time, as he directly made his way out of the exchange hall space where the tower of secrets was located before starting to make his way in the direction of the border region of the mystic realm where he had originally left Mui when he went to the deeper parts of the mystic realm by himself.


    "Hm? She¡­ Isn''t here¡­?"


    However, as he arrived above the forest, he had left her in to hunt demon beasts on her own, he was surprised to discover that she was nowhere to be seen.


    Together with the fact that all the demon beasts in the Nascent Soul Realm had already been killed, it didn''t take long for him to realize that she had already left the forest and gone deeper inside the mystic realm.


    Although this was a bit worrying considering therge number of Domain Lord Realm demon beasts that could be found just a tiny bit deeper inside the mystic realm, though, she might have used some of the talismans he left for her, Xuan Hao didn''t worry too much about her.


    The main reason for this being that the mark he had left on her as ast line of defense hadn''t been triggered so far. Meaning that she hadn''t encountered a life-threatening situation she couldn''t deal with.


    Outside of that, there was also the fact that he could easily track her down by simply focusing on the mark he had left behind on her. Making it rather simple for him to find out where she was as long as he focused some of his attention towards trying to find her.


    Of course, it wasn''t entirely fool proof, as he didn''t doubt there would be some kind of crazy sealing formations inside the mystic realm constructed by the Mirage Sect that could fully iste Mui from the outside world and prevent him from tracking her down.


    However, if that really did end up happening, he would still be able to notice the connection between himself and the mark disappearing, something that hadn''t happened.


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao closed his eyes for a brief moment as he sensed the direction and general location of the mark-


    "Huh? Wha-what is she doing there- No¡­ More importantly, how did she even get there!?"


    However, when he did that, he realized that her current location was somewhere deep inside the mystic realm. Far deeper than he himself had ever ventured inside the mystic realm.


    Given the speed of Mui, this should have been impossible, as the deepest part of the mystic realm Xuan Hao had gone so far was the fourth celestial trial, a ce that would at least take him a few days to reach from his current location at the edge of the mystic realm.


    For Mui to have gone even deeper inside the mystic realm than that in such a short period of time, she would need the speed of someone at the Later Stages of the Dao Seed Realm, something Xuan Hao doubted she would be able to archive even with the help of her strange creations.


    Making him guess that she had identally wandered into some kind of teleportation formation connected to somewhere deeper inside the mystic realm.


    "Haaa¡­ This is turning out far more troublesome than I expected it to¡­" Muttering this to himself as he stared off in the direction, he could feel his soul mark in, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as his divine sense rapidly began expanding in all directions around him.


    Considering that Mui should have walked through a teleportation formation of some kind to suddenly end up so deep inside the mystic realm, Xuan Hao intended to use his divine sense to find the location of the teleportation formation and reach the deeper part of the mystic realm that Mui now found herself inside of as quickly as possible.


    After all, if he wanted to reach such a far-off location without the help of a teleportation formation, it would still end up taking him at least a week, a time that he couldn''t help Mui in case she ended up in a dangerous situation¡­

 Chapter 1313 Hiding Among The Ruins

    Chapter 1313 Hiding Among The Ruins


    As her master was wandering around the edge of the mystic realm looking for the teleportation formation, he believed she had identally walked into, Mui was hiding away inside the ruins of a small house that had half its roof missing.


    Since she found herself in therge ancient city and heard the loud bestial roar in the distance, she had managed to somehow establish a friendly rtionship with the demon beasts that hade along with her to the ancient city, as they were simr hiding away from the owner.


    Roar¡­


    At this point, it had already been a week since she had arrived in the massive ancient city and she had long since be familiar with the different demon beasts, who, like her, were trying to find a way out of the ancient city.


    It was because of this, that Mui didn''t end up jumping forward to kill the demon beast that suddenly popped in through the broken door frame of the small house, but instead just tactically nodded her head in the direction of the demon beasts before going back to vigntly keeping an eye on therge street outside the small house.


    If it was the past, she would have tried to kill the demon beast, as it was only around the Fourth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. However, she knew that engaging in a fight would inevitably end up drawing the attention of the terrifying demon beast she had heard back when she first appeared in the massive ancient city.


    Although she didn''t get a chance to see the demon beast back then, she still felt the fluctuations of its fight with one of the Domain Lord Realm demon beasts that had been chasing after her¡­ And to say it was terrifying would be an understatement.


    In terms of strength alone, she was certain that whatever demon beast was lurking in the ancient city should be above the Domain Lord Realm.


    Because of this, even though she had been locked in a fight with a group of Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts back then, she had ended uping to an alliance with them after they learnt about the terrifying demon beasts lurking inside the ancient city. Especially when they had all sensed that it was moving in their direction due to the fluctuations created by their battle.


    Luckily, though not all the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts from back then managed to get away safely like her, those that did get away informed the rest of the demon beasts about their truce. Resulting in Mui not having to fight any of the demon beasts she encountered along the way, saving her from possibly attracting the attention of the terrifying demon beast lurking in the ancient city.


    "Hopefully I will be able to get out of this ce soon¡­" Muttering this to herself as she kept her gaze focused on therge street outside through a small crack in the wall, Mui could not help feeling optimistic, as the size of the ruins around her had been decreasing in size over the past few days. Possibly indicating that she was getting closer to the edge of the city.


    The only problem was that the terrifying demon beast roaming the ancient city had also moved in the same direction as her, something she had be certain of, as she sensed it whenever it found and killed one of the demon beasts that had been chasing her only a week earlier.


    It was also for this reason that she was currently keeping her attention focused on therge street outside the small house, as she had sensed the terrifying demon beast killing another one of the demon beasts in the direction not too long.


    Roar¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Knowing about the dangerous situation they were in as well, the demon beast that had just sought refuge inside the small house together with her also made its way over to her, as it simrly looked out the small crack in the wall.


    Of course, given that Mui was upying most of the avable space, it had to squeeze under her to get a good look out of the crack. Not something Mui minded, as the demon beast in question was a rather fluffy wolf demon beast.


    On the other hand, it instead provided a rather good pillow to lean on as she stared out the small crack without moving a single muscle, something she had been doing for the past two hours before the arrival of the fluffy wolf demon beast.


    Whoosh~


    After spending a few minutes rxing on top of the fluffy wolf demon beast and almost feeling like she was about to fall asleep after not having had any time to rx or sleep off her exhaustion for the past week, Mui suddenly felt a gentle breeze drifting through therge street outside. Bringing with it a heavy fog that soon made it impossible for Mui or the wolf demon beast to see anything outside the small house, considering that their divine sense was rendered useless inside the ancient city.


    Thump~


    However, this didn''t stop them from hearing the distinct sound of somethingrge moving along the street in the direction that they had been looking.


    Thump~ Thump~


    Not just that, but whatever it was, it was clearly getting closer to them¡­ And given that there was only one thing Mui, and the wolf demon beast could think of that would make such thumping sound when moving, they both quietly retreated away from the crack in the wall before both of leaned up against the half-destroyed wall of the small house that was the only thing standing between them and the street outside.


    Of course, with the situation possibly being life threatening, Mui had already taken out one of the talismans that her master had given to her for self-protection in case the thing outside ended up discovering them, something that both Mui and the wolf demon beast hoped wouldn''t happen.


    Thump~!


    Unfortunately, fate wasn''t on their side, as the two of them felt therge creature, demon beast or whatever it was, hade to a stop just outside the small house that they happened to be hiding inside of at the moment. Making Mui tighten her grip around her master''s talisman even further, as she had already begun mobilizing her qi to activate the talisman.


    Thump~


    However, before she had a chance to throw out the talisman, the creature outside turned around and continued its journey along the street like nothing had happened. Only leaving behind the loud thumping sounds as it slowly moved away from them.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say as she still gripped the talisman in her hand. Ready to activate it. Mui could only look helplessly towards the wolf demon beast hiding together with her before she pulled back her qi and prevented it from actually activating the talisman.


    It should have clearly noticed us at that time¡­ Why did it leave?


    Not able to understand how they had just managed to get out of that situation without any problems, Mui could not help feeling like something was wrong, as she put away her master''s talisman before slowly moving up to the crack in the wall to peek through it in the direction that the strange creature had been moving in.


    nning to try and see if she could catch a glimpse of it before it disappeared into the fog that seemed to be following it.


    "Huh¡­?"


    However, when she really did look out of the small crack in the wall and managed to catch a glimpse of the creature, Mui was shocked to discover that it wasn''t a demon beast that had been hunting them down one by one.


    Instead, it was some kind of mechanical looking wolf that she could describe as a far more sophisticated golem than the ones she had seen moving around back in the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, the golems in the Star Shattering Sect were rather rudimentary and only carried out rather basic tasks such as carrying out some menial tasks. Far from beingparable to the mechanical wolf shaped golem that wandered around the ancient city with strength that possibly surpassed the Domain Lord Realm.


    Of course, the Star Shattering Sect wasn''t entirely to me for the fact that it didn''t have any strong golems around, as the profession of golem or puppet creation was a rather rare one across the Ewaria Continent.


    Even at this point in time, the Star Shattering Sect had only managed to recruit two people skilled in the art of golem creation.


    One in the Nascent Soul Realm, while the other was in the Earlier Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, a master and disciple pair that had ended up joining the Star Shattering Sect and currently stood for the maintenance and production of all golems found in the Star Shattering Sect.


    Far from being close to having the ability to create a golem like the one she was looking at¡­

 Chapter 1314 Reaching the Edge of the Ancient City

    Chapter 1314 Reaching the Edge of the Ancient City


    Thump~ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Remaining in the spot as she observed the giant wolf golem disappear into the fog, Mui dared not move a single muscle as she didn''t want to identally alert the golem to her presence.


    No matter if it had noticed her and the wolf demon beast beside her or not, she didn''t want to test if that was the case. After all, if it hadn''t decided to ignore them and had just missed them, it would end up with her being forced to use one of the talismans left behind by her master to get out of her current situation.


    Of course, after seeing the golem, she also began thinking about a clear problem that she hadn''t really thought about before¡­ What if there were more wolf golems roaming around the ancient ruins than just the one, she had encountered?


    Remembering the earlier battles that had taken ce back when she had first arrived in the ancient city together with the demon beasts, Mui realized that there should have been more than one battle taking ce at the same time back then, it was just that she had been too busy trying to hide that she didn''t notice it back then.


    Only now that she personally encountered the wolf golem, did she think back on what had happened in the past and realized that it wasn''t just a single demon beast that they were trying to escape from. Instead, it was an unknown number of golems that roamed the ancient city.


    As for why battles as ofte had only been in the direction she had been moving in¡­ That should be because the demon beasts heading in any other direction than the same one as her had already perished.


    The reason for that should be rather simple, as those demon beasts would have been moving deeper into the ancient city instead of moving towards the way out of the city.


    With that in mind, the golems they encountered might be stronger and more numerouspared to the ones located at the outer edges of the ancient city ruins, but-


    Hm?


    About to continue her train of thought regarding the golems that should be roaming around the ancient city ruins, Mui was suddenly forced out of her thoughts as she felt something gently poking her feet.


    Turning to see what was poking her, Mui was surprised to see that it was the fluffy wolf demon beast that was still lyingpletely still on the ground beside her without moving, as it used a tiny bit of strength to poke one of her feet.


    Clearly, it wanted to know if it was safe to start moving again and if the creature outside had disappeared. After all, it had clearly seen how Mui had been daring enough to move up and look out of the crack again. Meaning she would know if it was safe for them to start moving again, or if the creature was still around outside.


    Seeing the nervousness and anticipation on the face of the fluffy wolf demon beast, Mui signaled that it was fine for it to start moving again as she nced out of the small crack where the fog had already started to disperse following the disappearance of the giant wolf golem.


    Rustle~


    Not wasting a second after seeing Mui signal that it was fine to start moving again, the fluffy wolf wasted no time as it rushed up to the crack in the wall of the small house to look out and confirm the situation for itself¡­ And only when it made sure that the fog outside was gone and there wasn''t any scary creature waiting for them around the corner, did it rx and start celebrating that it had managed to survive an encounter with the strange creature roaming the ancient city.


    Of course, different from Mui, who had already concluded that it wasn''t some strange creature, but instead a golem and that there was more than one of them roaming the ancient city, the wolf demon beast had no idea about this and thought it was only a single powerful demon beast roaming around the ancient city.


    For this reason, having survived an encounter and knowing what direction the other party was moving in, the wolf demon beast was confident it would be able to survive by going in the opposite direction.


    How unfortunate¡­


    Seeing through the rather simple thoughts of the fluffy wolf demon beast as it got up and got ready to leave the small house, Mui felt a bit regretful letting it go after having personally experienced just how fluffy and soft its fur was.


    Roar~


    However, there was nothing much she could do as it gave a quick goodbye and started moving back in the direction that the giant wolf golem hade from, deeper into the ancient city ruins.


    After all, it was still a wild demon beast that had just formed a cooperative rtionship with her due to the fact that fighting would only end up leading to them dying.


    Although it was smarter than a normal animal due to its cultivation having reached the Nascent Soul Realm, it wasn''t that much smarter. Not having been brought up by specialized beast tamers and having spent its entire life without encountering any humans or other sentient life forms.


    In a sense, demon beasts confined to the mystic realm could be considered dumber than the ones outside of the mystic realm due to their limited contact with cultivators and the fact that most of them spent all of their life in a simr looking forest without much change from life to death.


    The only difference would be when the demon beasts broke through to the Domain Lord Realm, as demon beasts at this realm would always develop a certain level of intelligence. Even more so for those who broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Guess I should also get going before another golems shows up¡­"


    Watching as the fluffy wolf demon beast disappeared along the paved streets of the ancient city, Mui regretfully shook her head as she continued moving towards the direction that she thought to be the edge of the city.


    Even if part of her wanted to keep the fluffy wolf demon beast by force, she was not strong enough to take it down without being noticed and would inevitably end up catching the attention of any nearby golems.


    Whoosh~


    So, with that in mind, Mui continued her journey towards what she believed to be the outer edges of the massive ancient city. Making sure to not move too fast, as that might result in her running into the different ancient golems roaming around the ancient city.


    After all, now that she had be certain that there was more than just a single golem present roaming around the ancient city, she didn''t dare to be as brazen as before, where she had essentially used all of her strength to rush forward whenever she sensed a battle taking ce somewhere in the ancient city.


    In hindsight, she had been rather lucky that she avoided identally running into an ancient golem back then.


    At the very least, now that she was smarter, she would be able to prevent something like that from happening, as she steadily moved through the ancient city.


    Another thing that greatly helped her was the fact that she also found out about the fog that surrounded the giant wolf golem. Allowing her to understand that if there was fog around, a golem was nearby. The thicker the fog was, the closer it was.


    Using this to her advantage, Mui soon found herself reaching the very edge of the ancient city after three days of travel with the lush forests outside of the ancient citying into view in the distance.


    Of course, even though this was something to be happy about, Mui wasn''t the slightest bit overjoyed upon seeing this. Instead, she was terrified.


    The reason for this was simple, as she could see a thick fog covering everything a few dozen kilometers around the walls of the city. Making it clear that there should be some kind of golems all around the walls of the city. Making it impossible for her to pass through and leave the city without encountering any.


    Not just that but given how thick the fog was around the city walls, Mui had a feeling that the golems there should be stronger than the ones that she had encountered so far.


    Considering how they should have been ced there in the past to defend the ancient city that had now turned into a massive ruin beyond anything she had encountered before, Mui understood that it wouldn''t be as simple to leave ancient city as she had first thought.


    "¡­"


    In the end, she could not help ncing down at a few of the talismans that her master had left for her. Knowing that they might be the only way for her to get out of her current situation.

 Chapter 1315 Going Back

    Chapter 1315 Going Back


    Back at the edge of the mystic realm where Xuan Hao had been looking for the teleportation formation that his disciple should have wandered into during his absence, Xuan Hao finally concluded that the teleportation formation he was looking for had either been destroyed or disappeared along with his disciple. Forcing him to give up on his n to use the teleportation formation to quickly cross the distance between the outer edge of the mystic realm and where his disciple had ended up.


    Because of this, Xuan Hao wasted no time as he rushed in the direction that he could faintly sense the presence of the mark he had left on Mui before having left her to train by herself.


    At the very least, because the mark in question was connected directly to his soul, it didn''t matter how far away it was or what kind of formation Mui might be trapped inside of, as he would still be able to easily sense her location.


    The only problem was that he had clearly sensed that Mui had somehow been moving further away from him and deeper into the mystic realm over the past few days.


    Considering that he had explicitly told her just how dangerous the deeper regions of the mystic realm was and that she should try her best to avoid going too deep into the mystic realm, he understood that she had either been forced to move deeper because something was chasing after her, or she had her direction confused and ended up identally moving deeper into the mystic realm.


    No matter what it was, Xuan Hao understood that Mui''s current situation was an extremely dangerous one.


    After all, as she moved deeper into the mystic realm, she would encounter more and more powerful demon beast at the Domain Lord Realm and above.


    Although he had given her quite a few talismans to protect herself and kill off any powerful demon beast that might try and attack her, he also understood that the sheer number of powerful demon beasts would be able to easily overwhelm her even if she had the help of talismans.


    After all, the number of talismans was limited, while the number of powerful demon beasts in the deeper regions of the mystic realm were countless.


    For now, he could only hope that she wasn''t carelessly using the talismans he had left for her and was instead doing her best to preserve them and avoid any powerful demon beast she encountered if possible.


    "From my current speed, I would need at least two weeks to reach her current location. Possibly longer depending on the dangers along the way¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the depth of the mystic realm that easily covered an area no less than a massive empire like the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit worried as he set off in the direction of Mui.


    Although he had a bad feeling about how long it would take him to reach Mui and the fact that he had essentially wasted around three days or precious time searching for a teleportation formation that didn''t exist, he also understood that Mui''s situation shouldn''t be too bad considering that the final defenses he had left for her were still intact after at least three days in the deeper regions of the mystic realm.


    If she had ended up in a demon beast infested forest filled to the brim with powerful demon beasts in the Domain Lord Realm and above, herst line of defense that had been left behind by him to trigger by themselves when she encountered a deadly threat, would have long since triggered.


    After all, the speed of a Peak Domain Lord Realm or Soul Ascension Realm demon beast would be far too fast for Mui to even have the chance to trigger any of the talismans he had left behind for her to defend herself.


    Essentially, her only form of protection against powerful demon beasts like that was thest line of defense that would trigger by themselves when she was in danger.


    Of course, even though this was reassuring knowing that none of those defenses had ended up triggering, he was still worried about how many talismans she had left after an entire three days inside the deeper regions of the mystic realm.


    The main reason was that she would still have to survive for at least another two weeks with the talismans she had¡­ And considering that she might not know this, she could identally end up wasting all of her talismans in the first few days and end up dead before he had a chance to reach her!


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao was worrying about Mui wasting all of her protection talismans, the person in question was wandering around the outer edges of the ancient city ruins. Looking towards the fog-covered walls of the city filled with helplessness.


    No way out¡­ Why can''t there be just a tiny gap for me to squeeze through! Do I really have to use the talismans left by master to force my way through¡­?


    Thinking this to herself as she looked down at the talisman firmly grasped between her fingers, Mui had not yet decided to even use a single of the talismans that her master was worrying about her running out of.


    Of course, the main reason for this was that she had quickly realized that to force her way through the golems defending the walls of the ancient city ruins, she would not just have to use a single talisman, but would have to use a lot, if not all of them.


    After all, she wouldn''t just have to use a single talisman to break through the wall of golems blocking her way out of the ancient city but would also have to deal with the golems that came to attack her after she blew open a path.


    And¡­ Considering the sheer number of golems lined up on the ancient walls from what she could guess by the dense fog, Mui feared that she would go through all of her talismans before she managed to escape from the ancient city and deal with the countless golems that woulde rushing towards her.


    Not just that, but when she had been wandering alongside the walls of the ancient city ruins to look for any gap, she might be able to squeeze through, she had seen more than once how powerful demon beast at the Domain Lord Rm had appeared in the forests outside the ancient city walls.


    Even more terrifying, she had also witnessed how one of these Domain Lord Realm demon beasts had moved too close to the ancient city walls, causing the dense fog to surge outwards before engulfing the Domain Lord Realm demon beast.


    In the end, all she heard were a few pitiful roars before the fog retreated back towards the ancient city walls. Revealing the mangled body of the Domain Lord Realm demon beast that had been killed off without any chance to fight back.


    No matter what, witnessing such a situation only made her more terrified of the demon beasts hiding in the dense fog around the ancient city walls.


    At the same time, she also confirmed for certain that there was indeed something hidden inside the dense fog, something she had started to doubt after witnessing the sheer scale of the ancient city walls.


    "Should I try and go back into the ancient city ruins and see if there is another way out deeper inside the city?" Muttering this to herself as she continued wandering around the outer edge of the city without finding a single gap in the dense fog covered walls, Mui ultimately thought about returning to the deeper parts of the ancient city to search for a way out.


    All things considered; she still remembered the way she first got into the city by the help of an ancient teleportation formation.


    With that in mind, she thought that she might be able to find another ancient teleportation formation and use it to get out of the ancient city ruins in the same way that she had first entered the ancient city ruins. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Roooar-!


    Hearing yet another roar from the direction of the fog covered walls at this moment, followed by witnessing a massive demon beast the size of a small mountain getting swallowed by the dense fog. Only to turn into a corpse a few secondster, Mui came to a decision before making her way back into the ancient city ruins.


    Although the ancient city walls were a way she could escape, she didn''t dare risk wasting all of the talismans that her master had left for her on something that might not even work and would possibly put her in an even more dangerous situation.


    Instead, she wanted to try and head deeper into the ancient city ruins and see if she would be lucky enough to find another ancient teleportation formation that she would be able to use to escape from the ancient city ruins.

 Chapter 1316 Ancient Golems Gathering

    Chapter 1316 Ancient Golems Gathering


    Havinge to the decision to go back in the same direction she had essentiallye from and make her way back into the deeper regions of the ancient city despite the danger involved in doing so, Mui made sure to keep an eye on her surroundings. Keeping an eye out for any fog that might be approaching her, as she understood that fog appearing was a bad thing and a sign that the golems wandering the ancient ruins were getting closer.


    Outside of just watching out for the ancient golems that wandered around the ancient city, she also kept an eye out for any of the demon beasts that had managed to stay alive up to this point in time.


    The reason for doing this was not because of some kind of practical reason, but more so because she found it enjoyable to spend time with the different demon beasts wandering around the ancient city simrly looking for a way out of the ce like she was.


    Of course, simr to how she had discovered the existence of the golems wandering through the ancient city ruins, the demon beasts that still remained alive at this point in time also seemed to have noticed their existence, or, at the very least realized the danger of the fog that surrounded the ancient golems.


    No matter what, Mui still ran into quite a few demon beasts on her way back through the ancient city. Making her wonder just how many demon beasts hade with her to the ancient city in the first ce.


    At the very least, she was certain that there should at least have been a thousand or so at them chasing her back then and a majority of them had followed after her into the ancient ruinplex thattter teleported her and the demon beasts chasing after her to the ancient city that the ancient ruinplex was only a small part of.


    Lost in her own thoughts as she continued moving deeper into the ancient city while avoiding any ancient golems that came too close, Mui soon found herself back at the ancientplex of ruins that had originally taken her and the demon beasts following after her to the ancient city that she now found herself stuck inside of.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling a light breeze at that moment followed by a thin fog covering her that slowly began growing denser, Mui didn''t waste any time looking at the ancientplex of ruins as she quickly moved into the closest ruin she could find before making herself as small as possible.


    Having already encountered simr situations several times on her way back into the deeper parts of the ancient city, Mui was fully aware of how to deal with a situation where the fog rapidly grew denser around her. Knowing that, trying to escape in such a situation would only result in the golem currently rushing in her direction immediately noticing her.


    As for how she learnt about it¡­ She had a rather dumb demon beast she encountered along the way to thank for that.


    At the very least, its sacrifice had allowed her to escape several dangerous situations that should have normally forced her into a situation where she would have to use one of the talismans that her master had left for her.


    Thump~!


    Not even a few seconds after she had hidden away inside the ruins of the ancient ruinplex, the sound of somethingrge moving just outside the ruin she was now hidden inside of echoed out. Followed by Mui seeing what looked like a golem in the shape of a giant turtle appearing outside the ruin she was hidden inside of through a small crack next to the ce she was hiding.


    Although it didn''t look like the golem noticed her through the small crack, Mui still couldn''t help silently cursing to herself as she had not intended toy right next to a crack that could potentially expose her to the golem outside.


    Thump!


    Not caring about her thoughts, the turtle golem didn''t waste much time after it appeared in Mui''s view, as it continued moving deeper into theplex of ruins without stopping close to where she was hiding like the wolf golem had done in the past.


    However, even though the turtle golem soon made its way past her without spotting her, Mui didn''t feel the slightest bit safe, as a second golem soon appeared behind the turtle golem. Simrly moving into theplex of ruins.


    Rustle~


    Feeling the presence of even more golems appearing behind the second golem, Mui could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine as she did her best to try and move away from the crack in the wall.


    After all, even if the first two golems didn''t seem to have noticed her, she could never be certain about whether or not any of the other golems following behind them would discover her.


    As for why so many golems had suddenly appeared inside the ancient ruinplex just when she happened to pass through it¡­ Mui didn''t have the time to think about this, as she was far too busy praying that the golems wouldn''t notice her¡­


    Thump~ Thump~ Thump~


    Managing to move away from the crack in the wall she had been leaning up against and making her body as small as possible, Mui remainedpletely silent for the next half hour, as she just listened to the golems moving past her outside of the ruin she was hiding in. Hoping that none of them would notice her, while at the same time keeping one of her master''s talismans ready just in case.


    ROOOOAR!


    As the final golem moved past her and no more golems seemed to show up after another half hour flew by, Mui was about to emerge from her hiding spot, when a loud bestial roar suddenly echoed out from the direction that therge number of golems had disappeared in.


    Even if it was only for a short moment, Mui was certain that the roar should belong to the same demon beast she had heard when she had first found herself in the ancient city ruins together with the demon beasts that had been chasing her.


    Having first thought that this demon beast had been the only one chasing after her inside the ancient ruins, Mui had paid attention to the fact that she had often sensed this demon beast locked in battle with what she believed to be the demon beasts that had chased her and simrly ended up inside the ancient city. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    However, now that she knew about the existence of the ancient golems that roamed throughout the ancient city, she guessed that the powerful demon beast shouldn''t have been fighting other demon beasts but should have instead been fighting off the ancient golems roaming the ancient city.


    Not just that but given therge number of golems she had just witnessed going in the direction that the roar hade from, it didn''t take long for Mui to realize that therge number of golems were gathering together to deal with the powerful demon beast.


    Ignoring the terrifying battle that she could feel breaking out not too far away from her current location, Mui suddenly realized that she had a great opportunity to go deeper into the ancient city now that it seemed like most of the golems that normally wandered around the part of the ancient city that she was currently inside of had all moved together to deal with the powerful demon beast.


    Although she had no idea if the powerful demon beast could win or how long it mightst, Mui didn''t waste any time after realizing just how precious her current opportunity was, as she jumped out of her hiding spot before making her way deeper into the ancient city. Hoping to use the opportunity to find another ancient teleportation formation, one that would take her out of the ancient city and move her to somewhere safer.


    "Hm?"


    Just as she made her way out of the ancient ruinplex and began to move deeper into the ancient city like she had nned on doing, Mui froze for a brief moment as she suddenly spotted a familiar figure appearing among the ruins not too far away from her.


    Fluffy wolf!


    Feeling somewhat surprised upon seeing the fluffy wolf she had thought to be dead after seeing it go back into the deeper parts of the ancient city ruins, Mui froze for a short moment before noticing that outside of the fluffy wolf, there was also a dozen or so other demon beasts slowly emerging before starting to simrly move deeper into the ancient city.


    RUMBLE-!


    About to continue deeper inside the ancient city again after seeing the demon beasts with simr ideas doing the same, Mui was somewhat shaken as the ground beneath her feet began violently trembling all of a sudden-


    BANG!


    Followed by one of the golems, she had only seen through small cracks while remaining hidden. Landing directly in front of her.

 Chapter 1317 Palace Complex at the Center of the Ancient City

    Chapter 1317 Pce Complex at the Center of the Ancient City


    Seeing the golem thatnded right in front of her, Mui froze on the spot together with the demon beasts not too far away from where she was standing. Everyone present was taken aback by the golem that hadnded in front of Mui. Especially considering that the golem that hadnded in front of Mui showed no sign of moving and upon closer inspection had clearly broken apart on impact with the ground.


    Roar¡­


    Feeling a bit uneasy with the appearance of the golem, one of the demon beasts that had frozen as it was about to leave, let out a low roar to remind everyone that this was no time for them to dawdle around wasting their time.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    And so, along with the reminder from the demon beast, Mui and the rest of the demon beasts who had momentarily frozen on the spot following the appearance of one of the golems, all came back to their senses before they all began moving deeper into the ancient city ruins.


    However, maybe because everyone had the same goal in mind or at least wanted to escape in the same direction, Mui found herself grouping up with the dozen or so demon beasts as they moved deeper into the ancient city together.


    Of course, this also included the fluffy wolf demon beast that had simrly been nning to move deeper into the ancient city.


    Although¡­ There was one major difference between the fluffy wolf demon beast whenpared to the rest of the demon beast and that was the fact that the fluffy wolf demon beast was the only demon beast below the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Compared to the fluffy wolf demon beast, the rest of the still alive demon beasts were clearly among the strongest that had entered the ancient city back then, while at the same time also looking far smarterpared to the rest of the demon beasts she had encountered so far. Even being close to reaching a level of intelligence no less than that of a human cultivator.


    In this sense, the fluffy wolf demon beast clearly stood out, as it should have long since died under normal circumstances. Especially so considering that it was clearly not the brightest one around and just seemed to be running in the opposite direction of where it perceived danger to present.


    At least that was what Mui managed to understand about it from the little interaction she enjoyed with it so far. Different from the other demon beasts who clearly seemed to have a goal in mind as they moved deeper into the ancient city.


    Rumble~!


    As the sound of the battle between the ancient golems and the powerful demon beast grew fainter the farther away, they got form ancient ruinplex, Mui and the demon beasts soon reached the edge of a massive pceplex that went on for far further than they could see.


    Not just that, but Mui and the demon beasts also noticed that there were still ancient golems present around the pceplex.


    Though not as numerous as the golems guarding the outer walls of the ancient city, their numbers still formed an almost perfect barrier around the pceplex. Meaning that the few openings that were present into the pceplex was still covered in a light fog¡­


    "How in the world are we supposed to pass through this ce without being discovered¡­" Muttering this to herself as she stared towards the barrier of fog that had formed around the pceplex, Mui could not help feeling a sense of helplessness at her current situation. Understanding that she might not be able to get out of the ancient city on her own.


    No¡­ Not to mention on her own, she doubted that she would be able to escape from the ancient city even with the help of the talismans that her master had left for her. After all, using those talismans would undoubtedly serve as a beacon for any nearby golems to rush towards, causing her to end up in an even worse situation than before if she couldn''t find a teleportation formation shortly after using a talisman.


    In the end, Mui concluded that the only way that she would be able to escape from her current situation without any danger, would be if her master appeared to save her, something that she found unrealistic considering that she was currently out training on her own without her master.


    Not to mention, given that she had no idea where she had been teleported or how far away from the edge of the mystic realm the ancient city was, Mui feared that it might be too far away for her master to reach in time.


    Of course, outside of the negative thoughts about her potentially life-threatening situation, there was also a part of her that believed that her master had long since predicted her current circumstances and had already prepared in case she really did end up in a life and death situation.


    Roar¡­!


    As Mui was hesitating on whether or not to approach the pceplex that might or might not contain a teleportation formation out of the ancient city, one of the demon beasts that had simrlye to a stop beside her stood up before it bravely began approaching the barrier made of fog.


    Fluffy wolf!


    Seeing the demon beast that had decided to stand up and be the first one to try and breach the fog that surrounded the pceplex, Mui couldn''t help widening both of her eyes in disbelief as she watched the weakest among the demon beasts, the fluffy wolf demon beast, approach the fog.


    However, the reason for her surprise was not so much because of the brave actions of the fluffy wolf demon beast but was more so because it was carelessly moving directly towards one of the locations where the fog was the densest.


    Even whenpared to the entire fog barrier visible around the pceplex, the ce that the fluffy wolf demon beast was moving towards was the densest.


    Did it¡­ Did it perhaps not realize the danger associated with areas where the fog is dense? But¡­ If that is the case, how did it manage to survive for so long?


    Feeling both confused and worried as she watched the fluffy wolf demon beast disappear inside the dense fog, Mui kept her full attention focused on the fog for any movements. Knowing that the moment the fog started to move would mean that the fluffy wolf demon beast had been noticed by the ancient golem inside the fog¡­


    However, unexpectedly, nothing happened for the next few minutes, as she kept her full attention on the fog for any signs of movements that might indicate that the fluffy wolf demon beast had been discovered.


    "Wha¡­ How is this possible!?"


    In the end, Mui was left speechless as she soon saw the fluffy wolf demon beast emerge unharmed on the other side of the dense fog, as it soon began moving deeper into the pceplex without any signs of having been injured, let alone attacked inside the dense fog.


    Roar!


    Witnessing this scene as well, one of the stronger demon beasts at the Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm let out a low roar before it decided to follow in the steps of the fluffy wolf demon beast and try to make its way through the dense part of the fog that the fluffy wolf demon beast had managed to safely pass through without any problems.


    Clearly thinking that there might be something wrong with the area that the fluffy wolf demon beast had managed to pass through without any problems.


    Rooar!?


    Crack-!


    Unfortunately, the panicked and terrified roar that soon echoed out from inside the fog. Followed by the sound of something being cracked in half, proved that the dense fog covered area wasn''t safe at all. Making both Mui and the remaining demon beasts wonder how the fluffy wolf demon beast had managed to safely pass through the ce.


    Was it luck? Or was it something different? Perhaps the fluffy wolf demon beast had even managed to find a way to make the ancient golems ignore it¡­!


    No matter what it was, Mui and the rest of the demon beasts all understood that they wouldn''t be able to repeat what the fluffy wolf demon beast had done.


    If they wanted to pass through the fog-covered barrier separating the pceplex from the rest of the ancient city, they would have to do it by sneaking their way past the ancient golems guarding the ce, a task that would be difficult to aplish. Even if they didn''t go anywhere near the areas where the fog was dense and only kept to the areas where the fog was thin and easy to see through.


    Rustle~


    As the demon beasts around her all began to move forward one by one, Mui didn''t sit around on her own, as she followed them and chose a moderately safe location to start making her way through the fog¡­


    N?v(el)B\\jnn

 Chapter 1318 Through the Fog

    Chapter 1318 Through the Fog


    Following the demon beasts that had simrly begun to move towards different areas where the fog was thin and seeminglycking any golems to defend the ce, Mui soon arrived in front of the thin fog together with two other demon beasts that had chosen the same location as her to try and breakthrough the fog and reach the pceplex on the other side.


    Considering that it would only be beneficial to have demon beasts around in case they were noticed by a golem while moving through the thin fog, Mui didn''t mind their presence in the slightest, as she waited for one of the demon beasts to enter the fog before following it inside.


    As for how the demon beasts were useful¡­


    That was of course as a distraction in case they were discovered by one of the ancient golems!


    Although¡­ There was also a chance that she would turn into bait, but Mui didn''t really think too much about this, as she had already nned to throw out one of the two demon beasts following her through the fog in front of any golem that might be targeting her.


    No matter how much she valued the alliance that she had managed to establish with the demon beasts due to the danger present inside the ancient city, there was no way she would die to uphold this kind of alliance. After all, she had not forgotten the fact that these demon beasts had been chasing after her to kill her beforehand.


    In a sense, she did me part of her current situation on these demon beasts, as she would have never entered the massiveplex of ruins that hadter teleported them inside the ancient city ruins if they had not been chasing after her¡­


    Keeping her thoughts of potentially using the two demon beasts moving alongside her through the thin fog as bait, Mui slowly made her way through the fog, while doing her best to ignore whenever one of the other demon beasts trying to move through the fog ended up being noticed by one of the ancient golems.


    In the end, even though Mui felt fearful of the danger involved in moving through the fog, she soon managed to sessfully make it to the other side of the thin fog together with the two demon beasts that had been going alongside her.


    Looking around for any of the other demon beasts that had simrly attempted to pass through the thin fog in other locations, Mui first discovered the fluffy wolf demon beasts that seemed to have been waiting for all of them to get through the fog, while another eight demon beasts had just passed through the thin fog.


    In total, together with the two demon beasts that had followed her and the fluffy wolf demon beast. Only 11 demon beasts managed to safely pass through the fog. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although not clear about the exact number of demon beasts that had been around before, as she hadn''t really bothered to count them, Mui was sure that at least half of the demon beasts that tried to move through the thin fog had ended up dying.


    Roar¡­


    Noticing this situation as well, one of the two demon beasts that had been following her through the thin fog, could not help letting out a somewhat sad roaring sound at the realization that half of the demon beasts left had ended up dying.


    Not different from this demon beast, the rest of the demon beasts all let out simr sad sounds as they took note of the current situation. All feeling depressed at the loss of so many demon beasts. Although the reasons for this sadness varied, as some of them undoubtedly felt sad over the fact that there were less demon beasts around to provide a distraction in case, they encountered an ancient golem inside the pceplex and had to escape.


    "Looks like it will take some time for everyone to recover before we start moving into the pceplex¡­" Muttering this to herself as she saw how the different demon beasts hade to some kind of consensus without her to have a small break after the scary experience of moving through the fog, Mui decided to take the opportunity to look at the pces that towered above her not too far away.


    From majestic pces that still retained some of their former glory, to pces that had long since decayed to the point where nothing more than a stone foundation was left standing, Mui was amazed at the different pces that stretched on as far as she could see.


    In the past, the pceplex should have been the location where powerful cultivators from the ancient city had resided and possibly also the core of the ancient city itself. Maybe even serving as the core of the entire mystic realm, as that would exin the teleportation formation in the ruins she had hidden away inside of before ending up inside the ancient city.


    After all, if the ancient city was the core of the mystic realm, it would make sense that there were countless teleportation formations inside of it that led directly to the ancient city. Allowing the people living in the ancient city to easily traverse the mystic realm without having to fly long distances whenever they moved around the mystic realm.


    Although part of her did want to leave behind the demon beasts and move into the pceplex on her own, she also understood that doing so would be a far more dangerous endeavorpared to moving together with the demon beasts.


    So, with that in mind, Mui kept her focus on trying to observe the ancient pces from afar and see if she might be able to pick up where a teleportation formation could be located.


    After all, if the ancient city was the core of the mystic realm and teleportation formations connected to the rest of the mystic realm could indeed be found inside the pceplex, it would only make sense for them to be in some kind of central location that would be easily essible.


    As for recognizing the teleportation formation as a teleportation formation when she actually found it and not just moving past it¡­ That was something Mui hadn''t thought about yet¡­


    At least for now, her idea was to just move through any ce she suspected of containing a teleportation formation and hope it activated like the one that ended up sending her and the demon beasts that had been chasing after her to the ancient city.


    Anything beyond that would mean she might identally end up moving through a teleportation formation without even knowing that it was there in the first ce. After all, all things considered, she wasn''t that skilled in formations, let alone capable of recognizing an ancient teleportation formation put down by an ancient cultivator far above any formation master present in the Star Shattering Sect.


    Roar~!


    Rooar!


    As she was lost in her own thoughts on how to find a teleportation formation inside the pceplex, Mui was awoken by the sound of the demon beasts roaring confidently to each other as they seemed to have ended their break and were ready to enter the pceplex.


    Finally!


    Seeing this, Mui smiled happily as she followed after the demon beasts and began making her way into the pceplex together with them.


    However, unexpectedly, the one leading the group of demon beasts was not the most powerful among them or Mui, but instead the fluffy wolf demon beasts.


    The reason for this was not that hard to guess for Mui, as it was obvious that these demon beasts felt that there was something special about the luck of this weakest demon beast, thus deciding to leave it in charge of moving through the pceplex.


    Considering that she herself had also been amazed by the luck of the fluffy wolf demon beasts when it came to staying alive, Mui felt fine having the fluffy wolf demon beast lead them through the pceplex. Feeling that the rest of the demon beasts were wise to leave the lucky fluffy wolf demon beast in charge of things-


    RUMBLE-!


    However, this situation changed quickly, as it didn''t take more than a few minutes of travel along the ancient paths of the pceplex before the fluffy wolf demon beast led all of them face to face with an ancient golem.


    Roar!?


    Roar¡­!


    "Wasn''t it supposed to be lucky?!" Muttering this to herself, as she, simr to the surrounding demon beasts, let out surprised cries, Mui stared up at the massive ancient golem that had appeared in front of them.


    Of course, if it was a normal golem, she, along with the rest of the demon beasts would have long since noticed it, but¡­ The golem in front of them just so happened to be a special one. Completely different from the rest of the golems roaming the ancient city.


    Special in the sense that there wasn''t any fog around it to hide it and alert anyone who got close about its presence¡­

 Chapter 1319 Becoming a Beast Tamer

    Chapter 1319 Bing a Beast Tamer


    Remaining frozen in the face of the ancient golem that had suddenly appeared in front of them, it wasn''t long before Mui and the demon beasts realized that the ancient golem wasn''t moving and instead seemed to have long since ceased moving, as a few nts could even be seen growing around its feet upon closer inspection.


    Rumble~


    However, just as Mui and the rest of the demon beasts were about to start rxing again upon discovering that the ancient golem wasn''t moving, they were once again taken aback, as the ancient golem suddenly started moving. Turning its giant head to face them.


    Roar¡­!


    Not able to take this sudden fear followed by relief that onlysted a short instant before once again being reced by fear, one of the demon beasts decided to turn around and escape. Not nning to be the first to get killed off by the ancient golem-


    Whoosh-!


    PTSH!


    Unfortunately, things didn''t work like the escaping demon beast had expected, as the ancient golem ignored the rest of the demon beasts and Mui. Instead, shotting out some kind of strange looking metal arrow that directly pierced through the escaping demon beast. Killing it in an instant, as there seemed to be some kind of terrifying poison inside the metal arrow that directly killed the demon beast the moment it was hit.


    Thump~


    Hearing the sound of the escaping demon beast''s bodynding on the ground dead, Mui and the demon beasts decided wisely against repeating what the now dead demon beast had done, as they all remained frozen on the spot in front of the ancient golem.


    Although none of them knew why, it was clear that the ancient golem didn''t seem to target them unless they tried to escape from it, but¡­ If they wanted to continue searching for a teleportation formation out of the ancient city, they would have to find a way past the ancient golem that was now motionlessly looking down at them without moving after having killed off the scaping demon beast.


    Do I have to use one of master''s talismans¡­?


    Thinking this to herself as she looked up at the ancient golem before looking around at the surrounding demon beasts that remainedpletely frozen in fear following the death of the escaping demon beast, Mui silently pulled out one of her master''s talismans.


    Still, not knowing if the ancient golem would leave after watching them for a few minutes, Mui decided to silently wait for a bit before using the talisman used by her master. After all, she didn''t want to end up wasting it. Especially considering that using a talisman would undoubtedly draw the attention of any nearby golems to her current location¡­


    Unfortunately, even after half an hour of staring directly at the ancient golem that motionlessly stared down at them, Mui and the demon beasts weren''t any closer to getting out of their current situation.


    Instead, their situation had grown worse, as they became distinctly aware of the fact that other golems also roamed around the pceplex, as a thin fog had already covered them. Signaling that one of these roaming golems was nearby.


    Of course, different from the golem in front of them that only seemed to attack if they tried running away, Mui and the demon beasts all understood that the roaming golems moving around the pceplex would attack them the moment they were spotted.


    For this reason, a few of the demon beasts had already started fearfully shaking as the fog around them slowly grew denser with each passing second.


    Not just that, but a few of the demon beasts even seemed to be prepared to try and make a run for it and hope for the best.


    All things considered; it seemed like none of the demon beasts had any way for them to get out of the current situation safely. Meaning that the only option left for her would be to use one of her master''s talismans against the ancient golem.


    Whoosh~!


    With that in mind, Mui didn''t hesitate any longer as she poured her qi into the talismans before throwing it out in the direction of the motionless golem, causing the talisman to shine brightly. Followed by a terrifying presence belonging to that of someone in the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm manifesting around it. Drawing the attention of both the demon beasts and the ancient golem.


    Rumble-!


    Not even a second after the terrifying presence manifested itself, a terrifying sword manifested itself at the location that the talisman had been, before shing down in the direction of motionless ancient golem with a terrifying might far beyond anything the demon beasts or Mui for that matter, had ever seen before-


    BOOOOOM-!


    And the next second, the terrifying sword sh reached its target. Instantaneously destroying the ancient golem upon contact before the remnants of the attack continued into the distance. Soon creating a scar that cut straight through the entire pceplex as far as they could see. Having destroyed anything in its path.


    Of course, unknown to Mui or the demon beasts, the only reason this had been possible was due to the fact that the pces in the way had decayed to a point where even a simple Nascent Soul Realm cultivator would be capable of easily destroying them, let alone an attack carrying the full might of a Late Stage Dao Domain Lord Realm cultivator no less powerful than someone in the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm!


    "This¡­ We have to get out of here!" Recovering only a few seconds after the aftershocks from the attack had dissipated, Mui didn''t waste any time as she quickly began escaping from the scene. Knowing that staying any longer could result in her getting caught by any ancient golemsing over to investigate the situation.


    Rooar!


    Roar¡­!


    Roar~!


    Seeing how Mui was leaving, the remaining demon beasts simrly understood the situation as they followed after her. Turning her into the de facto leader of the group of demon beasts.


    The reason for this was not just because the fluffy wolf demon beast had caused them to run into a rather dangerous situation that had cost the life of one of the demon beasts, but also because of the might that Mui had just disyed.


    Although these demon beasts had no understanding of talismans, they still understood that the terrifying attack just now had been Mui''s doing¡­ And that was all they needed to understand to make her the new leader of the group.


    None of them cared about the fact that she was not a demon beast after the terrifying strength she had just disyed.


    On the other hand, it almost seemed like Mui had managed to sessfully tame this group of demon beasts after using her master''s strength just now. Unintentionally aplishing her goal of taming the fluffy wolf demon beast without realizing that she had done so, as she was far more focused on getting away from the site of the attack and avoiding any ancient golemsing to investigate the situation.


    Rumble~! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    At least, from the sound of moving golems in the distance and the fog around them growing thinner, it seemed like she had managed to seed in this goal. Giving her confidence to start looking for teleportation formations once again.


    Of course, now that she had managed to be the leader of the demon beasts, it became far easier to do this, as the demon beasts had essentially begun to follow her everymand when it came to looking for signs of any teleportation formation.


    In the end, like this, a week soon passed inside the pceplex as Mui searched through the entire ce with the help of the demon beasts for any sign of teleportation formations.


    During this week, not only had Mui managed to fully secure the fluffy wolf demon beast as pet, but she had also managed to tame the rest of the demon beasts sessfully. Giving her a total of 10 demon beasts that were all covered in soft and fluffy fur.


    At the same time, using her newfound prowess as a beast tamer, Mui managed to establish a general perimeter to keep an eye out for any approaching golems or spotting any motionless golems ahead of time. Allowing her and the demon beasts to safely move through the pceplex while searching for a teleportation formation.


    Because of all this, Mui and the demon beasts finally managed to find a teleportation formation eight days after they entered the pceplex.


    The only problem being that the teleportation formation didn''t work.


    Luckily, the problem was quickly figured out to just be ack of qi after one of the demon beasts identally pushed a spirit stone onto the formation and caused it to start working for a short time before running out of qi.


    Unfortunately, the qi required to keep the teleportation formation up and running long enough to send them out of the ancient city was not something the spirit stones currently in Mui''s interspatial ring could cover. Meaning that they would have to search through the surrounding decaying pces for more spirit stones so they could activate the teleportation formation.


    Something that wasn''t too difficult to aplish and would only take them a bit of time. Not something Mui or the demon beasts minded considering that there was finally a path out of the ancient city in sight.


    All they had to do was hope that no ancient golem ended up deciding to go through the ancient teleportation formation and end up destroying it in the process before they could escape.

 Chapter 1320 Jumping into the Spatial Passage

    Chapter 1320 Jumping into the Spatial Passage


    Spending the next few days searching for spiritual stones among the decaying pces, Mui and the demon beasts soon managed to gather the required spirit stones for activating the teleportation formation without running into any problems along the way.


    Well¡­ Not entirely without any problems, as there was one incident with an ancient golem walking straight through the ce where the teleportation formation was located.


    Luckily, the ancient golem didn''t end up causing any damage to the formation and passed through without causing any problems. Allowing Mui and the demon beasts who had been watching the situation unfold from the side to let out a sigh of relief.


    After all, if the teleportation formation ended up destroyed, they would have to spend an unknown amount of time searching for a second intact teleportation formation.


    Under normal circumstances, this might not have been that much of a problem, but¡­ The terrifying battle between the ancient golems and the demon beasts that should have reached the Soul Ascension realm had already entered the pceplex and was moving in their direction.


    If they ended up wasting too much time and the formation was destroyed as the battle reached it, they might end up being forced to not only have to avoid the ancient golems roaming the ancient pceplex, but also the terrifying battle that was sweeping through the pceplex and could be heading towards them at any moment.


    For this reason alone, Mui wanted to activate the teleportation formation as fast as possible and leave the ancient city before any of those things had a chance to impact her or her newly tamed army of fluffy demon beasts.


    Rumble~!


    As a result, after cing the spiritual stone that had been gathered in the decaying pce ruins for thest few days inside the ancient teleportation formation, Mui watched nervously as the formation symbols slowly lit up.


    Hoping that therge number of spiritual stones gathered would be enough to activate the formation and allow them to leave the ancient city ruins, she stepped back together with the demon beasts and waited for it to fully activate. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Of course, to ensure that the spirit stones were ced in a correct location for the formation to continue absorbing, she made sure to keep an eye on them and move them in case they were ced in ce that the formation couldn''t absorb them.


    Whoosh-!


    In the end, a few hours in this manner, as Mui and the demon beasts watched the ancient teleportation formatione to life before a massive gate was constructed at the center of the formation. Establishing a stable spatial passage connected to somewhere outside the ancient city.


    It really was a teleportation formation!


    Seeing the spatial passage appear, Mui could not help breathing out a sigh of relief.


    After all, though she was confident that the formation was a teleportation formation given its somewhat central position, she wasn''t a hundred percent certain about this.


    Only after seeing the spatial passage herself, did she finally manage to confirm that it was indeed a teleportation formation.


    So, with that in mind, Mui made sure that there were enough spiritual stones around for the teleportation formation to remain active for at least another few hours in its current state before she rushed towards it together with the demon beasts.


    After all, she was not sure if the teleportation formation running out of spiritual qi before they passed through it would end up causing any problems.


    As for the matter of attracting any ancient golems with the activation of the teleportation formation¡­ Mui didn''t bother thinking about this, as there was no way around it.


    All they could do was hope that whatever ancient golem ended up showing up didn''t just outright destroy the ancient teleportation formation.


    Whoosh-!


    And it was with these worrying thoughts about what might end up happening to the teleportation formation, that Mui entered the spatial passage together with the demon beasts.


    Silently praying that the location they ended up in after passing through the teleportation formation wasn''t anywhere more dangerous than the ancient city.


    ROOOOAR-!


    In the end, thest thing she ended up hearing before being swallowed by the spatial powers of the teleportation formation was the excited roar of the terrifying demon beast that had been fighting with the ancient golems not too far away from her and the demon beasts.


    It wants to use the teleportation formation to escape the ancient city!


    Realizing what the terrifying demon beast wanted to do as she felt herself being shuttled through space at a terrifying speed, Mui knew that she would have to destroy the ancient teleportation formation after she got to the other side¡­ And do so as fast as possible!


    After all, if the terrifying demon beast managed to sessfully reach the other side of the teleportation formation like them, they would not have any way to resist against the terrifying demon beast if it decided to try and kill them.


    Even if Mui still had talismans left by her master that could deal with it, she had no ns of using any of them unless absolutely necessary. Especially in an unknown location, where using such a thing might end up drawing the attention of even more powerful demon beasts or ancient golems.


    Whoosh~!


    "Everyone! destroy the formation! Quick!"


    So, after a few minutes of travel through the spatial passage, Mui didn''t hesitate tomand the group of demon beasts to attack and destroy the teleportation formation before even looking around to take in her new surroundings.


    Only really using her divine sense to ensure that there weren''t any powerful demon beasts or golems around them at the other side of the teleportation formation.


    Rooar!


    Roar!


    Growl~!


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Hearing Mui''smand, the demon beasts hesitated for a short moment before following hermand to destroy the formation. Not holding back, as the already fragile ancient teleportation formation soon crumbled under theirbined strength. Not able to hold on for more than a few seconds.


    bit slow on release, another chapter will be released at some pointter today.

 Chapter 1321 Spatial Distortion

    Chapter 1321 Spatial Distortion


    Roooar-!


    Hearing a loud roar echoing out from the spatial passage just as it copsed in front of them following the destruction of the teleportation formation, Mui and the demon beasts all felt a shiver run down their spine. Understanding that the roar just now should havee from the terrifying demon beast that had been travelling through the spatial passage.


    If they didn''t destroy the teleportation formation and cut off the spatial passage in time, they might really have ended up being forced to find a way to deal with the terrifying demon beast¡­


    "Good thing we reacted fast and destroyed the formation before it could get through. Although, I do wonder where it ended up following the copse of the spatial passage. Hopefully, its somewhere far away from here¡­" Muttering this to herself with a look of relief on her face as she stared at the now destroyed teleportation formation, Mui turned around to examine her new surroundings.


    Although there were still ruins around, the ruins were far from the same scale as the ancient city. Instead, only covering a small area that could be traversed in a few minutes by Mui and the demon beasts.


    However, the most exciting thing about the new location was not the size of the ruins, but instead the small harmless demon beasts that could be seen wandering around the edge of the ruins.


    Among them, the strongest had only reached the Core Formation Realm, while most of them were between the Middle and Later Stages of the Foundation Establishment¡­ And more importantly than that, none of them showed any signs of fear. Meaning that the location they had ended up in shouldn''t be somewhere dangerous with powerful demon beasts around.


    Instead, it was likely that their current location was somewhere at the edge of the mystic realm where the demon beasts were the weakest, a safe location that Mui felt more than confident in surviving in on her own!


    Rooar?


    Roar¡­


    Hearing a few of the demon beasts behind her suddenly calling out to her, Mui turned around and was shocked to discover that they had obediently gathered together and were now looking up at her filled with respect.


    I really did end up taming them¡­¡§


    Shaking her head as she thought about this while looking over the demon beasts, Mui soon turned to leave the ruins. "Everyone! Let''s go!" Calling out to the demon beasts, as they all left together to explore their new surroundings.


    ¡­


    "Hm?"


    At the same time Mui passed through the teleportation formation inside the ancient city ruins, Xuan Hao who had been travelling for over a week in her direction suddenly froze on the spot as a frown appeared on his face.


    "Why did the location of her mark suddenly shift by so much? Did she perhaps enter another teleportation formation?" Muttering this to himself as he clearly sensed the mark left on Mui moving around the mystic realm at a terrifying speed following what he could only guess to be some kind of spatial channel, Xuan Hao ignored the fact that she passed through directly above him at one point in time.


    Not because he didn''t want to reach out and try to grab her, but because the speed she moved at was simply too fast for him to even react. Not to mention, the spatialws involved in the spatial passage she used was far above his current understanding of the Dao of Space.


    The only thing he could do was continue following her as she seemed to move wildly around the mystic realm before finallying to a stop somewhere at the edge of the mystic realm. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Although not the exact location where they had entered the mystic realm, it was at least somewhere outside the dangerous section of the mystic realm.


    Rumblle~


    "Hm? Where did those violent spatial distortionse from- Ah, the spatial passage is copsing. Perhaps it only had energy for Mui to move through it once before copsing." Suddenly feeling the space a few hundred meters above where he was floating starting to distort violently all of a sudden, Xuan Hao briefly narrowed his eyes before figuring out what was happening.


    Though the spatial passage his disciple passed through was created by someone with a far better understanding of the Dao of Spacepared to him, it looked like the spatial passage couldn''t be sustained without any energy or powerful cultivator to keep up.


    Of course, this was a great opportunity for Xuan Hao, as it allowed him to take a peek at the inner workings of the spatial passage while it was copsing. Although it wouldn''tst long, it would still be helpfulprehending the Dao of Space. Especially so when he was only a single step away from reaching the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space.


    Just a little glimpse of a higher realm ofprehension might allow him to break through this barrier and-


    "Huh? What is that-"


    Roooar!?


    However, before he had a chance to take this rare opportunity toprehend the Dao of Space, arge body suddenly came tumbling out through the spatial passage together with severalrge ancient looking golems.


    All heading directly towards him, who just happened to be standing a few hundred meters below the spatial distortion caused by the copse of the spatial passage-


    Whoosh-!


    Even then, given his current strength far surpassing the golems andrge demon beast that came out of the spatial distortion, Xuan Hao easily side stepped them before getting hit, as he turned his attention back towards the spatial distortion caused by the copsing spatial passage.


    "Gone¡­"


    However, when he looked back up in the direction of the spatial distortion, it had already disappeared. Indicating that the spatial passage had fully copsed in the short time it had taken him to avoid the falling demon beast and golems.


    "¡­"


    Narrowing both his eyes dangerously after having lost this precious opportunity toprehend the Dao of Space, Xuan Hao slowly turned to look down towards therge demon beasts and golems that hadnded on the ground below.

 Chapter 1322 Suffering Su Wuhan

    Chapter 1322 Suffering Su Wuhan


    Roaar!


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Not having noticed Xuan Hao as it was forced out of the spatial passage when it copsed, the demon beast was busy fighting off the ancient golems that attacked it the moment theynded on the ground a few seconds behind it.


    The battle that had started back at the ancient city and had alreadysted for over a week seemed to show no end, as the demon beast and ancient golems soony waste to their surroundings as they battle between the two parties became more and more intense with each passing second. Showing no care for possibly attracting any powerful demon beasts that might get attracted by thergemotion.


    Although, with the demon beast''s strength having reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, there wasn''t really anyone outside of the ancient golems that could match it in the entire mystic realm.


    An exception to this being if there was a demon beast that somehow managed to fool the guardian formation of the mystic realm or resided in a ce that wasn''t under the constant monitoring of the guardian formation. Allowing it to reach the Dao Seed Realm without being reduced to dust by the terrifying power of the guardian formation.


    Of course, another exception would be the person currently looking down at the fight taking ce below filled with killing intent after his opportunity toprehend the Dao of Space and possibly break through to the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space had been ruined.


    "This little demon beast is still ignoring me, but¡­ What are those¡­ Golems? That its fighting." Frowning to himself as he looked at the demon beast below, barely restraining himself from just outright killing it, Xuan Hao began to curiously examine the ancient golems that it was fighting.


    Having only seen the preservation golems so far inside the mystic realm, it was a rather new experience to see a new kind of golem. Not to mention, the golems in question were shaped like all sorts of different demon beasts as they fought in a manner no different from normal demon beasts.


    The only difference between them and real demon beasts being the fact that they didn''t show any signs of tiring dude to an inbuilt small scale qi gathering formation that allowed them to absorb qi from the air far faster than a normal demon beast.


    Unfortunately, there wasn''t really anything that special about these golems outside of the small-scale qi gathering formation inside of them and the fact that they acted and fought like demon beasts.


    Even though the golem itself was probably a marvel of the art of golem creation, he didn''t really have any understanding when it came to that Dao and couldn''t understand how amazing these golems capable of fighting a demon beast at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm were.


    Then again, it might also just be because he had witnessed the terror of the preservation golems in charge of guarding certain critical areas of the celestial gates, those golems were terrifying to a degree that he still had no idea about their true strength.


    From what little he had witnessed from the ones he had encountered so far; he could guess that their strength should at least be in the Profound Immortal Realm. Far beyond these small demon beast golems capable of working together to fight someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Comparing the two, Xuan Hao suddenly lost interest in them and instead just ended up bing far more curious about the true strength of the preservation golems. Feeling that it might be a good idea for him to try and ask one of them the next time he visited the tower of secret or found one somewhere inside the mystic realm.


    At least with his current status in the mystic realm being official in the eyes of these preservation golems, he didn''t really feel any fear when facing them.


    Well¡­ Almost, as he still felt a hint of fear when remembering what had happened after he decided to try and use his divine sense to forcibly look into the inner workings of a celestial gates¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao turned his attention back towards the battle that was taking ce below-


    Whoosh~ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    And with a single wave of his hand, the demon beast that had been fighting bravely against the ancient golems, suddenly froze on the spot as a look of absolute horror appeared in its eyes before being extinguished the next second as it remained frozen in ce together with ancient golems that had simrly frozen on the spot without moving.


    Given the sheer difference in strength between Xuan Hao and the demon beast and golems below, all he needed was to casually release his Dao of Ice to freeze them to death. Not needing to do much more against an opponent that hadn''t even broken through to the Dao Seed Realm.


    Although fighting above one''s own realm could be considered a normal thing for geniuses in lower cultivation realm, as the realm of a cultivator increased. So did the gap between realms.


    The strength difference between someone in the Soul Ascension Realm and someone in the Dao Seed Realm was an insurmountable mountain to anyone outside of the most terrifying geniuses¡­ And the Profound Immortal Realm even beyond that.


    After reaching a high enough realm, Xuan Hao could already imagine that a difference by even a single minor realm would be like the current difference between two major realms. An insurmountable gap even for the most brilliant of geniuses¡­


    "Now¡­ To find that little girl before she ends up disappearing again¡­" Having killed off both the demon beast and the golems, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any more time around the ce where the spatial passage had copsed, as he began moving towards the new location where Mui had ended up after having gone through the now copsed spatial passage.


    Given how long they had already spent inside the mystic realm, Xuan Hao felt that it was about time for them to return to the sect again.


    Not just that, but the Blue Sea Empire should have also finished looking through the Star Shattering Sect''s territory for demonic cultivators at this point in time. Allowing him to take Su Wuhan back out and hand him back over to Elder Dust Fairy.


    Hm? Now that I think about it¡­ Has that fellow just been stuck next to the entrance of the mystic realm for over a month¡­?


    Remembering Su Wuhan all of a sudden as he flew back in the direction of Mui, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly to himself as he silently apologized to the unfortunate demonic cultivator.


    Although it shouldn''t be that difficult to spend a month in istion as a cultivator that had managed to go as far as he had, it would still be boring if one couldn''t cultivate during this time.


    In a sense, the only thing that Su Wuhan would have been able to do for the past month was stare aimlessly at the lifeless rocks all around him. Maybe able to look through the entrance of the mystic realm to see a few clouds pass by in the sky outside the mystic realm.


    Deciding not to think too deeply about Su Wuhan, Xuan Hao just decided to think of it as punishment for¡­ Ehm¡­ Something he would definitely think about by the time he got back to the old demonic cultivator and took him back out of the mystic realm and handed him over to Elder Dust Fairy again.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao remembered the existence of a certain demonic cultivator, the demonic cultivator in question was busy cursing him to his hearts content, as he remained stuck in the spot Xuan Hao had sealed him without being able to move a single muscle due to the seal.


    Aaaaaahhhh! HOW MUCH LONGER DO I HAVE TO WAIT LIKE THIS!? What kind of punishment is it to seal me like this? Unable to cultivate and unable to move! That damn scratch on my back has been guing me for the past two weeks without any way for me to deal with it! Damnable Elder Xuan, I curse you and your nine generations! No, I curse your 17 generations!


    Even worse, he had discovered two weeks ago that he really needed to scratch his back and found himself unable to do so¡­


    Unknown to Xuan Hao, he had created a new kind of torture that even seemed capable of breaking a terrifying demonic cultivator, something that he would never find out about, as the demonic cultivator in question would never reveal anything about his current desperate situation after Xuan Hao returned to undo the seal. Especially the fact that he found himself willing to do anything just to have someone get rid of the itching sensation at his back by scratching it¡­

 Chapter 1323 Reunited with Mui

    Chapter 1323 Reunited with Mui


    Going back in almost the same way he had gone while trying to reach Mui, Xuan Hao managed to safely reach the border of the mystic realm without encountering any problems along the way outside a few demon beasts that overestimated themselves and tried to attack him.


    But more importantly than all of that, Mui was still in the border region of the Mystic Realm and didn''t move a lot from her initial position during the week it took him to return to the border region of the mystic realm.


    To be honest, there was a part of him that feared that she would suddenly end up falling into some kind of teleportation formation just as he was about to reach her. So, for this reason, he didn''t waste any time after reaching the border region. Heading directly for the ce where he had sensed Mui wandering around in. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Hm?"


    However, as his divine sense reached the location where his disciple was currently staying, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat shocked expression on his face as he also saw the group of demon beasts that were obediently following behind her.


    If it had just been a group of weak demon beasts in the Core Formation Realm or below, he wouldn''t really have cared that much about it, as it should have been easy for her to use her strength to forcibly tame these kind of demon beasts. Especially considering that their cultivation was still low and their intelligence had yet to develop that much beyond a wild animal.


    But¡­ The demon beasts that he saw obediently following after his disciple had all reached the Nascent Soul Realm and were above her in terms of cultivation realm.


    Not just that, but he even noticed that one of the demon beasts was already on the verge of breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm. Even if Mui used all of her strength and her strange metal balls, he doubted that she would be able to easily win against such a demon beast and might even end up being on the losing end.


    For her to tame such a demon beast along with the rest of the Nascent Soul Realm demon beasts¡­ It looked like his fifth disciple had quite a talent for taming demon beasts. Probably far beyond whatever talent for those people in charge of the sect''s demon beasts had.


    After all, the beast taming of those beast tamers was mostly reliant on the vast number of resources beneficial to demon beasts that the sect possessed. Not something like what Mui had done, where she had tamed the demon beasts without the need for such resources.


    Of course, the beast tamers of the sect weren''t entirely useless, as Elder Song had been putting in certain restrictions and so on, but they were still consuming a lot of resources, something that there wasn''t anything to do about given that the demon beasts were truly useful for the sect. Especially when it came to transport ofrge quantities of resources that couldn''t be stored and moved in interspatial rings.


    But¡­ Now that he saw how Mui had managed to tame this group of demon beasts, Xuan Hao had already begun to think about how bright the future for the sect would be if they managed to decrease the resources required to keep arge number of demon beasts around.


    Although he didn''t normally concern himself with the operation of the sect, he still understood that freeing up arge number of resources that would originally go to the demon beasts, would be helpful to the growth of the sect, as there would be more to use on disciples and elders.


    The main problem in all of this¡­ Was the fact that the skilled beast tamer in question was Mui¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about how troublesome it would be to get Mui, who was still a child in every sense of the word, involved with the inner workings and management of a part of the sect, Xuan Hao decided to leave it up to Elder Song after he returned to the sect.


    For now, he himself nned to first catch her before she could disappear again and at the same time figure out what she had been up to since he had left her to train on her own. Feeling curious about where she had ended up inside the mystic realm and what she had experienced.


    ¡­


    "Master!" Arriving in front of Mui only a few seconds after having examined her condition, Xuan Hao was greeted happily by the girl, while the demon beasts all looked towards him filled with both confusion and fear.


    Confused because they had no idea who he was and fearful because they clearly knew that only those at the Domain Lord Realm would be capable of flying.


    "Mui, it''s been a while, I see that your strength improved a lot over the past month. Not just that, but it also seems like you''ve taken in a few demon beasts during this time¡­ Want to tell me what you''ve been through?" Smiling happily when met with the overjoyed expression of Mui, Xuan Hao made sure to praise her as he also decided to ask about what she had been up to. Feeling curious about just where she had ended up and how she ended up taming the group of demon beasts.


    "Yes, Master! First of all, I was¡­" Nodding her head upon hearing what her master said, Mui didn''t waste any time before starting to talk about what had happened to her over the past month. Ignoring the fearful demon beasts that had huddled up behind her in the process.


    Of course, this didn''tst for long, as the demon beasts soon understood that Xuan Hao meant them no harm, as they all calmed down and found somewhere toy down and rx while Mui continued talking about the adventures she had been through.


    From the first rather boring weeks she had spent inside the forest only focused on hunting down demon beasts to improve her strength and grow more familiar with fighting to her being chased by arge number of demon beasts into an ancient ruin that ended up teleporting her and the demon beasts chasing after her into an ancient city, Mui told her master about everything she had gone through. Making sure that she mentioned how she hadn''t used any of the talismans he had left for her outside of a single one.


    An ancient city in the depths of the mystic realm¡­ Is it perhaps rted to the people from the Mirage Sect who managed to survive the attack on the mystic realm or from before the attack¡­?


    Listening to what Mui told him about the ancient city ruins, Xuan Hao could not help bing curious about the ancient city ruins. Part of him also wondered if it was from the Mirage Sect or the people left behind following the attack on the mystic realm.


    If it was the former, there was a good chance that more of the city had survived and left behind clues about the past and possible treasures or other stuff that could be useful for himself and the Star Shattering Sect!


    At least, given that there still seemed to be a fully active defensive barrier formed by ancient golems around the ancient city andrge parts of the city was still standing. Even having spirit stones present that could be easily found and hadn''t been consumed by any passing demon beast or ancient golem, Xuan Hao felt confident that it should be younger in terms of age as whenpared to the rest of the ruins in the mystic realm.


    Of course, the most obvious giveaway that the ancient city ruins were not from before the attack had taken ce was the fact that there was no sign of a battle having taken ce inside the ancient city. Instead, it looked more like the ce had just been abandoned ording to Mui.


    Not just that, but it had been abandoned before the people who lived inside the ancient city had time to even take spirit stones and other personal belongings with them ording to Mui. Leaving behind several decaying artifacts or other personal belongings inside the pces or houses she had entered during her time in the ancient city ruins.


    As for why she didn''t bring any of the artifacts or other things she found back with her, it was apparently because the artifacts and other things she had encountered was not really in a usable state and was no different from scrap metal. Making it a waste of space to carry them along with her. Especially considering that the space inside her interspatial ring wasn''t that big.


    And¡­ There was also the fact that she feared taking these artifacts might result in some kind of formation she couldn''t see being activated, thus attracting the ancient golems she had been doing her best to hide from¡­

 Chapter 1324 Task of the Three Demonic Cultivators

    Chapter 1324 Task of the Three Demonic Cultivators


    Listening to Mui as she finished talking about what she had been through inside the ancient city, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about the ce. Even then, it was just a bit of curiosity due to the ce possibly being rted to people from the Mirage Sect that had managed to survive the attack on the mystic realm.


    In terms of importance, the ancient city was far below the celestial gates.


    Not just because of the clear help that the celestial gates provided when it came to improving his strength, but also because he had no idea whether or not his current status in the eyes of the ancient formations and preservation golems of the Mirage Sect would transfer to the formations or other kind of protective measures that might be hidden inside the ancient city.


    So far, the only real clue he had about it was the ancient golems that had fallen out of the copsing spatial passage together with the demon beasts they had been chasing after¡­ And those ancient golems didn''t seem to recognize him nor his current status in the eyes of what was left behind by the Mirage Sect. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even though he only interacted with a few of the ancient golems mentioned by Mui so far, Xuan Hao had a feeling that the rest of the ancient golems and formations in the ancient city ruins wouldn''t be much different.


    Of course, the only way for him to find out about it would be to make a trip to the ancient city himself, but¡­ Considering that he had already spent a long time inside the mystic realm and Mui looked more than ready to leave the ce, Xuan Hao didn''t intend to stay any longer. Especially because it would at least take him another two weeks to reach the ancient city. Not ounting for the time, he would be exploring the ce and the time it would take to reach the exit of mystic realm after he was done¡­


    So, with that in mind, Xuan Hao decided to leave the matter of the ancient city ruins for another time, as he picked up Mui and her demon beasts with his domain before making his way back in the direction of the path out of the mystic realm.


    Not forgetting to pick up a certain demonic cultivator that had been aimlessly staring at a few rocks on the ground when he reached him.


    To say he was happy would be an understatement, as Su Wuhan almost jumped up in joy after seeing them show up. Clearly happy that he would finally be able to escape from the prison that he had been ced in and go back to serving Elder Dust Fairy and help her expand the Star Shattering Sect''s intelligencework.


    No matter how humiliating it might be to follow someone only at the Nascent Soul Realm with his current strength at the True Demon Realm that stood on par with someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Anything was better than being stuck in the same ce without being able to cultivate for over a month, a tortures experience considering that he couldn''t even absorb qi from the air to avoid hunger. Although not deadly, it was still a painful experience.


    ¡­


    Going back to a little over a month earlier when Xuan Hao had just entered the mystic realm with Mui and the three Celestial Immortal Realm ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire had just found themselves trapped inside the formation set up by the Blood Lotus Demon King. The three Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators that had been given an important task toplete by the Blood Lotus Demon King all split up in the direction of three different empires bordering the Frozen Wastnd.


    Among these empires, one of them was the devasted Onyx Empire that only existed in name at this point in time, while the other two empires bordered the Onyx Empire.


    One of these empires was located on the opposite side of the Onyx Empirepared to the Star Shattering Sect, while the second was none other than the chaotic mess of what had once been the Sky Empire.


    "Wasn''t there supposed to be an empire here? Did his excellency perhaps make a mistake when he sent me here? How am I supposed to set up a formation like the one wants in a location like this?" Arriving in the chaotic mess that was the remnants of the once great Sky Empire, the demonic cultivator could not help showing a confused expression on his face as he muttered this to himself.


    The formation that he had been tasked with secretly drawing up by the Blood Lotus Demon King was one that required arge number of sacrifices inside of it for it to function, but finding such arge gathering of people in one location in the chaotic mess that had been left behind following the fall of the Blue Sea Empire was impossible.


    At least, when it came to the Onyx Empire, the Blue Sea Empire would be actively helping rebuild the nation and ensure that it became a stable barrier against the Frozen Wastnd in the future.


    The only thing the demonic cultivator sent to that ce had to worry about was getting discovered by the people from the Blue Sea Empire who would be overseeing the reconstruction of the Onyx Empire as he drew up the formation, but at least they had all been given a special talisman by the Blood Lotus Demon King that would allow them to hide themselves even from those Celestial Immortals for a period of three months.


    Although not that long considering the construction of the formation would take longer than that, it would at least allow them to safely make it through the most dangerous period where the powerful cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire would be the most numerous.


    "How troublesome¡­ Looks like I will just have to construct it in the ce of the old capital city of the empire here and wait for the Blue Sea Empire to reconstruct the ce as well¡­" In the end, the demonic cultivator decided not to think too much about it as he turned to move in the direction of the capital city of the now destroyed Sky Empire that had been given to him before leaving.


    Although the situation of the Sky Empire had not been mentioned by the Blood Lotus Demon King and this particr demonic cultivator had no idea about the local powers of the ce, he just thought that the Sky Empire had gone through a simr situation as the Onyx Empire and would soon be rebuilt by the Blue Sea empire as well.


    In the end, his job was simply to follow themands of the Blood Lotus Demon King any down the formation that he had been tasked withying down.


    Asking questions was only something that would end up getting him killed faster. Especially when talking about a terrifying demonic cultivator that had managed to reach the Demon King Realm.


    Whoosh~!


    Because of this, the demonic cultivator soon beganying down an extremelyplicated formation below the ruins of the destroyed capital city of the Sky Empire. Not bothering with the few people still left living among the ruins of the destroyed city.


    Not much different from him, the other two demonic cultivators at the Demon Lord Realm had simrly begun toy down their formations.


    The main difference between them and the one currently in the ruined capital of the Sky Empire being the case that they had to spend most of their time hiding from the cultivators residing in the cities they were cing the formations below. Understanding that the moment they were noticed, it would be a death sentence for them.


    After all, they had also managed to learn about the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire that had decided to stay on the border between the Onyx Empire and the Frozen Wastnd to kill any demonic cultivator trying to pass through the border.


    The moment any of them were noticed, this Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor would undoubtedly be rushing over to kill them. Especially considering that this ancestor''s original goal foring to the Frozen Wastnd was to kill them.


    ¡­


    "Looks like everything is going ording to n, that old fellow really did stay behind to guard the border. Hehe, quite an emotional fellow. Now those three just have to set up those formations and I can proceed with the final step. Only, those three can''t be discovered no matter what, or those old fellows will definitely sense something suspicious¡­"


    At the same time that the three demonic cultivators began to busy themselves with setting up the formations that had been assigned to them, the Blood Lotus Demon King who had just finished his battle with the three ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire could not help chuckling to himself, as he looked off in the direction of the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire that had remained behind before turning to leave the ce. Not wanting to arouse any suspicion from the Celestial Immortal Realm ancestor.

 Chapter 1325 Dropping Off Su Wuhan

    Chapter 1325 Dropping Off Su Wuhan


    Leaving the mystic realm together with Mui and Su Wuhan, Xuan Hao first made sure to contact Feng Chen and make sure that there wasn''t anyone from the Blue Sea Empire around. Not nning to identally return to the sect with a demonic cultivator when someone from the Blue Sea Empire might still be in the process of searching through the territory of the sect for any sign of demonic cultivators.


    Although the chance of this still being the case over a month after the situation with the demonic cultivators in the Frozen Wastnd had started to calm down, he didn''t intend to take any unnecessary risks. Especially when it was rted to the possibility of being attacked by the powerful Blue Sea Empire.


    However, after finishing his conversation with Feng Chen about the situation, Xuan Hao was shocked to hear that a battle had broken out between the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire and the Demon Kings of the Frozen Wastnd. Resulting in one of the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors of the Blue Sea Empire deciding to remain behind in the Onyx Empire to ward off any demonic cultivators.


    In the end, this had resulted in the demonic cultivators originallying from the side of the Onyx Empire and attacking the territory of the sect to stop showing up. Instead, the number of demonic cultivators appearing on the other side of the sect''s territory had increased. Resulting in most of the sect''s disciples and elders moving towards that border instead.


    After all, with a Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire guarding the other border for them, there was no need for them to have so many people guard the ce. Even the winged lion demon beast had moved away and was now stationed at the new border.


    Even though¡­ The reason for the winged lion demon beast wasn''t so much to deal with possible True Demon Realm demonic cultivators but was more so because it had been left quite terrified by one of the Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire that had almost ended up identally killing it whening to search for demonic cultivators a few weeks earlier.


    Even if it hadn''t really ended up suffering any injuries as an elder had managed to jump in to exin the situation in time, it had still been terrified by the terrifying pressure of a Dao Seed Realm cultivator that had been about to crush it to death.


    All things considered, outside of that one incident, there hadn''t really been any problems with the people from the Blue Sea Empire who flew through the sect''s territory and killed off any demonic cultivators they encountered.


    The original worry of them getting curious about and trying to enter the Shattered Star Peaks where the main sect was located had beenpletely unfounded, as the people from the Blue Sea Empire didn''t care the slightest bit about them.


    On the other hand, it could even be said that they looked down on the sect.


    Not that Xuan Hao or the elders of the sect wouldin about this, as it did allow them to escape the scrutiny of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Now¡­ If the Blue Sea Empire learnt about the existence of someone in the Dao Seed Realm inside the Star Shattering Sect, things might be a bit different, as such an existence would normally not appear outside the central part of the continent and the different major powers there.


    If they did, they would almost certainly be a well-known lone cultivator.


    Someone in the Dao Seed Realm without any reputation would only arouse suspicion from a power like the Blue Sea Empire and considering the recent surge in demonic cultivators, they would almost certainly investigate the Star Shattering Sect thoroughly if they learnt about there being Dao Seed Realm cultivators inside the sect. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    As for different rumors about there being such people in the sect already, the Blue Sea Empire''s cultivators simply didn''t believe something like that.


    Not just because of how unlikely it was, but because it was normal for people outside the central part of the continent to spread such rumors about differentrge powers in their vicinity. Especially if it was a recently emerged power like the Star Shattering Sect that had only recently risen to power. Rumors about it being supported by a powerful cultivator above the Soul Ascension Realm were bound to spread.


    All things considered; the Star Shattering Sect managed to escape the scrutiny of the Blue Sea Empire without any problems. The only troublesome thing in Xuan Hao''s eyes was the fact that there was now a Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire right next to them.


    Given that he had no idea just how wide an area the divine sense of a Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator could cover when actively searching for something, Xuan Hao didn''t immediately go back to the sect, but instead rapidly moved in the opposite direction to the Onyx Empire before cing a confused Su Wuhan down and having him contact Elder Dust Fairy on his own.


    The reason for doing this was rather simple, as he didn''t want the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire to notice the sect''s connection with a demonic cultivator if he just so happened to be using his divine sense to personally search for demonic cultivators one day and found him together with people from the Star Shattering Sect.


    Outside of that, there was also the fact that he had been useful to the Star Shattering Sect when it came to expanding the sect''s informationwork outside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    With that in mind, he wanted to avoid this demonic cultivator getting killed if possible. Having him work in the empire on the opposite side of the sect''s territory would ce him in far less danger of something like that happening, as there were still a lot of demonic cultivators trying to enter that empire.


    Of course, after having made this decision to move Su Wuhan away to from where he normally worked, Xuan Hao also made sure to inform Elder Dust Fairy about it. Making sure that she understood the reason why he had done so.


    Luckily, ording to Elder Dust Fairy, it wouldn''t really have any effect on the expansion speed of the sect''s informationwork, as the groundwork for the informationwork inside the Onyx Empire''s territory had already beenid down and there was no need for Su Wuhan to do anything more with it.


    On the other hand, it was far more beneficial for him to enter the other empire bordering the Star Shattering Sect that was still troubled dealing with therge influx of demonic cultivators.


    During the conversation, Xuan Hao even managed to learn that the reason why the Blue Sea Empire had not yet gotten to dealing with the demonic cultivators in the empire neighboring the Star Shattering Sect was because it was in a far less important location and the demonic cultivators invading the ce were too weak and could be blocked by the cultivators from the empire itself.


    Of course, a sweep of the empire had still taken ce at the same time as the Star Shattering Sect''s territory had been swept over by powerful cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire. Resulting in a few days without any demonic cultivators causing trouble.


    Unfortunately for this empire, the demonic cultivators returned shortly after the powerful cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire left. Once again pushing them into a seemingly endless war with the demonic cultivators surging out from the Frozen Wastnd.


    In the end, one of the powerful cultivators from this empire had been bold enough to try and ask the cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire about whether or not they would be returning again in the future to help ording to Elder Dust Fairy. Resulting in this powerful cultivator being told that they would be sweeping through the empires bordering the Frozen Wastnd once every three months. Meaning that there was only a little under two months left before the cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire would return.


    And¡­ From the fact that word of that conversation spread far enough that Elder Dust Fairy, who had only barely begun setting up the frameworks of an informationwork in that empire, had managed to learn about it, it was clear that this empire didn''t n on hiding this information.


    With that in mind, it was more trustworthy.


    After all, the small empire in question wouldn''t dare spread false information about the Blue Sea Empire unless they nned to end up like the demonic cultivators that fell into the hands of the powerful cultivators of the Blue Sea Empire.


    All things considered and with Su Wuhan left behind for Elder Dust Fairy to take care of, Xuan Hao returned to the sect together with Mui after spending close to two months in the mystic realm.

 Chapter 1326 Back in the Sect Again

    Chapter 1326 Back in the Sect Again


    Returning back to the Star Shattering Sect together with Mui, Xuan Hao barelynded on the ground before the little girl ran off to somewhere. Likely intent on showing off how much she had improved during her time in the mystic realm and sharing her adventures with the rest of his disciples.


    Xuan Hao didn''t really mind this, as he instead made his way to find Feng Chen and caught up on the details of the current state of the sect and what had happened during the time he had spent in the Mystic Realm. After all, there was only so much he could be told about the situation through his brief conversations beforehand. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    During this, he also learnt about the fact that outside of just flying through the territory of the Star Shattering Sect in search of demonic cultivators, it also seemed that some of the cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire had been searching for something.


    Although, given that these cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire hadn''t really barged into the Star Shattering Sect or caused any problems with this search that seemed to be mostly focused on the remote areas of the sect''s territory, Feng Chen didn''t feel that it was that important.


    After all, if it didn''t involve the Star Shattering Sect, there was no reason for him to try and risk investigating the powerful cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire, as the chance of doing that ran the risk of offending the Blue Sea Empire, something that he and the rest of the sect''s elders wanted to avoid.


    On the other hand, unlike Feng Chen and the rest of the elders that didn''t seem too worried about the Blue Sea Empire''s cultivators searching through the remote areas under the sect''s control, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit uneasy.


    Not so much because he believed that the cultivators of the Blue Sea Empire were nning to attack the Star Shattering Sect or something along that line, as they would have done so long ago if they intended to do it, but instead because he guessed that these powerful cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire might be looking for Pei Yang.


    Though it was highly unlikely, there was still a chance that some traces had been left behind during their escape allowing the Blue Sea Empire to guess the general direction that they had left the Blue Sea Empire in back then.


    At the very least, it could be seen that they shouldn''t be suspecting the Star Shattering Sect or any power for that matter, for hiding Pei Yang. Instead having turned to look through the remote and isted regions that would make good hiding locations.


    Of course, it was far more likely that they weren''t searching for Pei Yang and had instead just been trying to track down a demonic cultivator that had somehow managed to hide away around the territory of the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    Even then, Xuan Hao decided to be on the safe side and informed Pei Yang about his worries after finishing his conversation about the sect''s current state with Feng Chen.


    After which, Xuan Hao didn''t have much to do and decided to spend his time catching up on a few of the things that he had put on the sideline so far. Among these, the one that came to mind first was to find the former elder from the me Sky Kingdom that he had originally nned to visit in the past but had always found himself busy with other things before he could do so.


    One of the reasons for this was that he had managed to learn that she was not only knowledgeable on the ancientnguage that he was still in the process of trying to learn about, but also the fact that she had once been a follower of the Lord Kubera whose alchemy notes he had encountered in the past and suspected to be at least someone at the Master Realm with a cultivation base in the Domain Lord Realm or above.


    Of course, with his current strength, someone in the Domain Lord Realm¡­ And even someone in the Master Realm in Alchemy wasn''t that impressive. Instead, the main thing that intrigued him about this Lord Kubera was the fact that he had seemingly vanished into thin air after having established a single sessful city with no traces of him outside of that city and the notebook he had left behind.


    The only clue he had to finding out what happened to this mysterious alchemist was the former elder of the me Sky Kingdom, Sheng Mei.


    Whoosh~!


    So, with that as the first objective on his to do list, Xuan Hao used his vast divine sense tob through the entire sect before finding Sheng Mei busy reading through arge stack of books inside the sect''s library.


    Looking closer, he discovered that all of these books were all historical records. More precisely, they all seemed to be around the same period of time.


    But outside of that, he couldn''t really gleam anything specific from the books that she was reading through, as they all seemed to be from the perspective of weaker cultivators or even mortals. Not really giving him a good idea about what she was looking for if she was looking for something in that period of time.


    "Guess I should wait a bit for her to finish. Now¡­ What to do while waiting? Perhaps spend some time trying to understand those damnable notes from that sky watcher guy¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he silently moved to the library and found a spot to sit down and read not too far away from where Sheng Mei was currently sitting, Xuan Hao took out a now all too familiar book.


    The Sky Watcher''s forgotten notes rting to celestial bodies.


    A book he had grown to fear over time, as itsplexity far surpassed anything he had encountered before.


    Be it in an ancientnguage or one that he fully understood, Xuan Hao had a feeling that it wouldn''t make much of a difference in trying to understand what was written in the notes contained in the book. Even after they had been sorted out by the system.


    At first, he didn''t understand why this was the case, but as his strength continued to grow and as his understanding of different Daos continued to deepen with his increase in strength, he slowly began to understand why.


    To understand the content in the notespiled inside of the book, he would need a corresponding realm ofprehension¡­ And with his current understanding, there he could only slowly try and understand what was written in the notes. The only negative part about this was the fact that he had only managed to under three words so far¡­


    Of course, that was not to say that reading through the notes and trying to understand them was without merit, as reading through it did allow him to understand what kind of Daos were rted to the notes. Even helping him to some extent withprehending these Daos if he focused on the specific part of the notes rted to them.


    In the end, so far, he had managed to notice a total of three different Daos from the notes, the Dao of Space, the Dao of Fire and the Dao of Light. All three of them Daos that he himself had alreadyprehended. Making him wonder if the reason he couldn''t find other Daos might be because he first needed toprehend them to feel their presence in the notes.


    Of course, although he would have loved to try and do something like that in the past byprehending new Daos that were rted to the three that he had already knew were present in the notes, he didn''t dare to do so now that he had understood how dangerous it would be for him if he wanted to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    So, with that in mind, Xuan Hao began to read through the ancient notes, something he had already gotten used to whenever he had time to spare and didn''t want to use it on cultivating and wanted a more rx way to still continue increasing hisprehension of the Dao of Space that he was currently focusing all of his attention on-


    "Those damn notes even if sorted like this, they are far beyond my capabilities to understand¡­"


    Not that it stopped from asionally cursing in annoyance when faced with the sheerplexity of the notes that seemed to look no different from a normal book on the surface.


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, he didn''t have to wait around for too long, as Sheng Mei soon got up and began making her way out of the library. Giving him a perfect chance to approach her and have a conversation with her about the ancientnguage and Lord Kubera.


    As for why he didn''t just directly approach her on the spot with his identity as a Grand Elder¡­ That was because he didn''t want to reveal his identity to her and instead just wanted to talk to her in a more normal manner.


    After all, as time went by and his identity as a senior figure became more cemented, it became more difficult for him to speak normally with newer elders who hadn''t been around before the establishment of the Star Shattering Sect without them getting rather nervous. Not that he would me them considering the difference in strength¡­


    Maybe I will finally be able to write a chapter on sect expansion this time around....

 Chapter 1327 Pre-Collapse and Post-Collapse Ancient Language

    Chapter 1327 Pre-Copse and Post-Copse Ancient Language


    "Hm? Is there anything I can help with?" Seeing Xuan Hao walking up to her and not recognizing him due to the fact that he had already hidden his strength and changed his appearance. Looking no different from a normal elder in the Nascent Soul Realm, Sheng Mei only felt a bit confused upon seeing the unknown elder in front of her.


    Considering the fact that the Star Shattering Sect had been expanding quite a bit and added a lot of new elders over the past few years, it wasn''t that umon for the Nascent Soul Realm Elders of the sect to not know each other. Especially for a newer elder like Sheng Mei, who often just kept to herself and didn''t interact much with the rest of the elders of the sect.


    "Hello, Elder Sheng, I just happened to hear that you were knowledgeable on the ancientnguage and wanted to know if you had time to talk about it, as I myself am quite interested in learning about the ancientnguage and I''m sure both of us would benefit." Knowing this, Xuan Hao directlyid out his cards and invited her for a conversation around the ancientnguage.


    "Huh? You are interested in the ancientnguage as well!? How rare¡­ Of course, I would love to have conversation with you¡­"


    "Ah, you can just call Elder Stone Deer."


    "Elder Stone Deer? Hehe, what a unique title. Okay then, let''s just sit over here, there aren''t any disciples around to disturb in this part of the library anyway. After all, most of those young ones spent most of their time in thebat technique section searching for powerfulbat arts." Nodding her head in response to Xuan Hao''s newest attempt ating up with a new identity for himself, Elder Sheng Mei didn''t seem to mind the rather unique name he hade up with as she signaled for him to sit down together with her.


    Although the Daoist title of Stone Deer was a rather unique one, it wasn''t among the most outrageous ones that could be found in the Star Shattering Sect and could even be considered quite tame. Especially whenpared to a certain elder who had taken on the Daoist title of all devouring demon hand.


    Given the fact that this elder was a pacifist by nature and didn''t do anything other than dedicate himself to teaching the disciples of the sect, it was a wonder how he hade up with a Daoist title like this that would normally be reserved for demonic cultivators.


    Though, there was a chance that this title didn''te about through this elder''s own ideas, but instead due to his teaching methods and what the disciples ended up calling him as a result. In the many Daoist titles were created like this and wasn''t in the control of the one with the title most of the time.


    So, although Sheng Mei might be a bit curious about how the unknown elder in front of her had ended up with the title of Stone Deer, she decided not to ask about it as she sat down together with him.


    More than anything else, she felt curious about his expertise in the ancientnguage that she herself had spent a good part of her life researching. After all, there weren''t that many people who tried to understand the ancientnguage.


    The reason for this was rather simple, as it was extremely difficult to understand and took a long time to even partly understand. Time that other cultivators felt would be better spent on more productive things like increasing their cultivation realm or furthering themselves in a specific profession¡­


    "Well then, should we get started? I''m curious how far your understanding of the ancientnguage goes. After all there is quite a difference between just understanding a few words and being capable of actually reading through the ancientnguage itself and¡­" As Xuan Hao followed behind Sheng Mei and sat down across from her, Sheng Mei didn''t waste any time as she began passionately talking about the ancientnguage.


    Soon enough, Xuan Hao was dragged into the conversation and both of them began sharing the different things they had learnt about the ancientnguage and how far both of them had gone when it came to understanding it and its history.


    As time passed, Sheng Mei only became more passionate, as she came to understand that the Elder Stone Deer in front of her was far more knowledgeable on the ancientnguage than she had first expected.


    Although not on the same level as her who had spent most of her life researching and trying to understand the ancientnguage, he wasn''t that far off from her and only seemed to have veered off in some strange directions along the way due to ack of a proper teacher or path to follow when trying to understand the ancientnguage.


    In turn, as she realized this, Sheng Mei became certain that the person in front of her was incredibly passionate about the ancientnguage. After all, to reach his current level of understanding of the ancientnguage in the Nascent Soul Realm, he would have had to have spent a long time researching it.


    After all, different from her, who had Lord Kubera to teach her in the earlier stages and point her in the right direction, Elder Stone Deer in front of her didn''t have this kind of help and would have had to go through everything blindly on his own.


    Knowing this, Sheng Mei decided to also share some of the things she had learnt from Lord Kubera in the past about the ancientnguage.


    Among the things she had learnt, by far, one of the most important was the fact that the ancientnguage could be split into two parts. Pre-copse ancientnguage and post-copse ancientnguage.


    One before the disaster that had broken the ancient world and one that had emerged after the copse of the ancient world.


    Though both of them shared simrities, they were in a sense differentnguage, with the post-copse ancientnguage being far easier to understand as their currentnguage had evolved from it, while the pre-copse ancientnguage was far harder to understand as it was, in simple terms, older.


    Hearing about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit surprised, not just because of the new knowledge on the ancientnguage that he had received, but also because she had mentioned Lord Kubera on her own during the conversation without him needing to try and find a way to bring it up.


    "Lord Kubera, who is that? Is he the one that taught you about the ancientnguage? If he is, I would love to meet him in person." n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Of course, Xuan Hao didn''t intend to show that his main goal had been to find out more about this mysterious Lord Kubera, as he just casually brought it up out a curiosity born from wanting to learn more about the ancientnguage.


    "Haaa¡­ Unfortunately, that won''t be possible¡­ Thest time I saw Lord Kubera was when I had just been promoted to Elder of the me Sky Kingdom. The only thing I know about the Lord''s whereabouts is the fact that he seemed to be heading towards the central part of the continent.


    Even though I did want to follow him back then, I was far too weak to do so, as he said that I would at least have to reach the Profound Immortal Realm if I wanted to follow. Although, now that I learnt that this realm is somethingparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm, I believe that it might indeed have been good for me to not go if it was that dangerous¡­" Shaking her head as she said this, Sheng Mei looked down at the few papers on ancientnguages still on the table in front of her with a somewhat sad expression on her face.


    "Now that I think about it, I didn''t really know a lot about Lord Kubera and what he was doing. After all, he seemed far too strong to be lingering around a small kingdom like the me Sky Kingdom¡­" Muttering this to herself, Sheng Mei abruptly stood up. "Well, I have been taking quite a bit of your time and I still have something to do before it gets toote, so I will take my leave first."


    Whoosh-!


    And so, with Xuan Hao just kindly waving her off after connecting to hermunication talisman so they could keep in contact in the future, Sheng Mei left the library. Leaving Xuan Hao behind at the small, isted table with a thoughtful expression on his face.


    From what he had managed to learn about Lord Kubera through the conversation, he had to first and foremost reevaluate the strength of this mysterious cultivator who now very well could be someone at the Profound Immortal Realm instead of just someone in the Domain Lord Realm¡­

 Chapter 1328 Chu Yang Leaves

    Chapter 1328 Chu Yang Leaves


    After his short conversation with Sheng Mei about the ancientnguage and her former lord, Xuan Hao was about to go over and see his disciples when he encountered a rather strange situation on his way back to the Combat Hall where his disciples had gathered.


    SQUEAK!


    "I-I''m sorry Lord Rabbit, I will make sure to bring go and bring you more spirit stones as fast as possible!"


    The scene in question being his rabbit demon beast seemingly bossing around a human in the Soul Ascension Realm in front of a crowd of younger disciples who were curiously observing the human Soul Ascension Realm cultivator speed off to find spirit stones.


    "This should be the human subordinate that it brought back¡­" Muttering this to himself without having any clue what to say, Xuan Hao decided to just ignore the situation and pretend he wasn''t there. Even actively deciding to use his dao domain to conceal himself as he continued moving towards the Combat Hall.


    Although it was a bit weird for a demon beast to have a human subordinate, it seemed like both parties involved were at least in agreement like they had been the first time he saw them. Meaning there was no reason for him to interfere in the affairs of the rabbit demon beast.


    And so, without the rabbit demon beast knowing about his return to the sect, Xuan Hao made his way towards the Combat Hall where Mui was busy showing off how much her strength had managed to improve during her time adventuring in the mystic realm. Earning her a rather jealous look from Chu Yang, who also wanted to enter a dangerous ce like the mystic realm to improve his strength.


    Unfortunately for him, he also understood that his master was unlikely to return to the mystic realm so fast considering that he had just gone there with Mui less than a day ago.


    Even then, it didn''t stop him from staring in an almost begging manner towards his master when he joined them for their training session in the Combat Hall. Making it rather clear to everyone around that he also wanted to go out on adventure to improve his strength like Mui had done.


    If not for the fact that he didn''t feel safe sending Chu Yang inside the mystic realm on his own after knowing about the possibility of a demon beast in the Dao Seed Realm or above being present in there, Xuan Hao would have been more than happy to let him go and train inside the mystic realm.


    To make things worse for Chu Yang who clearly wanted to go out on an adventure, it wasn''t really safe for him to leave the sect either, as there was still the problem with the demonic cultivators that posed a certain risk. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    But¡­ After thinking things over and having to endure the begging look from his oldest disciple for the next two days, Xuan Hao finally gave in and decided to let him leave the sect''s territory to go out to improve himself.


    Of course, there were a few conditions that came along with the agreement, like staying away from the Frozen Wastnd or powerful major powers like the Blue Sea Empire, but outside of that, he pretty much had free reign to do what he wanted.


    In the end, Chu Yang ended up staying in the sect for another two weeks. Spending this time being taught by his master about the core region of the continent and what ces he should avoid before he left with a few life saving talismans that had been refined by his master for self-defense.


    The talismans in question were the same he had left the rest of his disciples in the past and weren''t really thatplicated to make. Only requiring Xuan Hao to use his mastery over formations to create a special kind of formation that could contain his power.


    The only problem with this method being that it took quite a long time to prepare even a single talisman like this and they didn''tst for long, as their power slowly decreased over time with the power inside them leaking out as time passed.


    At most, these kinds of talismans would be able tost for half a year to a year before the strength started to fall below the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and began a stage of rapid decline.


    Out of everything, the only method he really had that couldst for a long time, was the soul mark he left behind on his disciples as ast line of defense.


    But¡­ For obvious reasons, he couldn''t really go around leaving his soul mark on everyone in the sect, as even a single soul mark affected his soul to a certain degree. Although the ones he had left on his disciples were far from enough to cause any adverse effects on his soul, he was not nning to try and test out the limits of the soul mark, as it would risk damaging his soul¡­


    Following Chu Yang leaving the Star Shattering Sect. Nothing much changed, as the sect continued its normal operation of expanding its informationwork, fighting back demonic cultivators, building up and strengthening branch sects, recruiting new disciples and continuing to integrate the different new powers that hade from the Onyx Empire not too long ago.


    Like this, two months had peacefully passed since Chu Yang left the Star Shattering Sect to explore on his own.


    ¡­


    "Hehe, it''s finallypleted! I hope the demon king will be pleased with it! What about you two, did you finish up the formations ordered by the demon king?"


    At this time, inside the recently rebuilt capital city of the Onyx Empire, an old man covered in a ck rode hidden inside a small alleyway happily said this into a smallmunication talisman with a proud expression on his face.


    Looking closer, this was none other than one of the demonic cultivators that had been sent out by the Blood Lotus Demon King when the demon king had been busy holding off the three ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire.


    "Of course, I finished mine a little over a week ago."


    "Hmph! Both of you are so slow! I finished mine over a month ago!"


    Not long after the old demonic cultivator finished talking two simrly proud voices echoed out from themunication talisman. However, one of them clearly stood out a bit, while also seeming a bit haughtier and more arrogant.


    "One month ago!? What about powerful cultivators? Wasn''t there anyone from the Blue Sea Kingdom around!?"


    "Yeah! How did youplete the formation in only two months!?"


    In response, the two other demonic cultivators could not help almost yelling back with shocked expressions stered all over their faces. Not understanding how this fellow had managed to set up the formation so much faster than them. After all, the formation they set up was the same and there shouldn''t be this much of a difference between their speed in setting them up under normal circumstances.


    "Hehe, you two don''t know, the ce I was to set up the formation is rather dested, and I only had to hide away from the Blue Sea Empire''s people three times over the past three months!"


    "Tch! How Lucky, I could barely continue work on the formation for more than a few hours before being forced to hide away. Scared me to death whenever I felt those people from the Blue Sea Empire flying past above.


    If not for the safety measures left behind by the demon king to help hide my presence, I fear that I would have long since been found and killed by those people!"


    "Now, now, let''s get back to the matter at hand. Now that the three formations have been set up, we should contact the demon king and wait for his signal to activate the formations."


    ""¡­""


    Hearing the words of the third demonic cultivator jumping in, the other two quickly quieted down. Understanding that the moment they decided to activate the formation they had spent the past three months working on, their locations would be revealed to the people from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even though they might be able to carry out the n of the demon king without any problems, as the hardest part had already beenpleted, they all understood that there was little chance of them escaping alive after activating the formations. Especially the demonic cultivator currently in the Onyx Empire''s newly built capital city.


    The moment the formation there activated, the Celestial Immortal still inside the Onyx Empire would likely rush over to kill him. Leaving no chance of escaping.


    Only the other two stood a small chance of escaping depending on what would happen after the activation of the formations.


    "Haaa¡­ It''s our fault for being too weak¡­" Sighing to himself as he muttered this to no one in particr, the demonic cultivator located in the ruined capital of the destroyed Sky Empire decided to be the one to deliver the news, as he picked up a specialmunication talisman and sent his qi into it with a somewhat reluctant expression on his face¡­

 Chapter 1329 Ambush (1)

    Chapter 1329 Ambush (1)


    "Good... Looks like everything is going ording to n. Hehe, I would like to see how that old man from the Blue Sea Empire escapes this time around!"


    In some unknown location inside the Frozen Wastnd, the Blood Lotus Demon King was happily smiling to himself as he received the message from the demonic cultivator currently at the location of the former Sky Empire''s capital city and the location of one of the three demonic formations.


    Whoosh~!


    At this time, two different figures appeared beside the Blood Lotus Demon King, each carrying a terrifying presence no less powerful than the blood Lotus Demon King himself.


    "Are you sure that this will work? Killing someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm isn''t that simple! Those three formations of yours will at most be able to buy us a few minutes of time before the other ancestors of the Blue Sea Empire can join in!"


    "Indeed, even with three of us here, it''s impossible to take down that ancestor at the Celestial Immortal Realm in such a short period of time. After all, he is bound to have countless lifesaving treasures and artifacts on him.


    Not to mention killing him, I feel that doing this will only expose our ns to escte this battle to the Celestial Immortal Realm."


    Following their arrival, it didn''t take long before both of them expressed their worries to the Blood Lotus Demon King about the assault they were about to engage in against one of the Blue Sea Empire''s ancestors. Clearly not feeling confident that they would have the ability to kill him in the short time that the three formations would be able to buy them.


    "Hmph! Both of you are worrying over nothing! The goal of those three formations is not to block the people from the Blue Sea Empire, but instead tounch an ambush on the ancestors at the borders of our Frozen Wastnd."


    "This¡­ Are you sure those three formations will have the ability to do anything to that ancestor? After all, it is at most fueled by the blood and soul of a few insects?"


    "Yes, this is a task personally given to us by the Great Demon King, the formations themselves also contain part of his blood and will thus be further enhanced in strength. All we have to do is provide a proper distraction, so he won''t notice those formations activating behind him before its toote."


    "A task from the Great Demon King¡­ I understand!"


    "If it''s themand of the Great Demon King, I will help out as well. After all, I don''t n on being turned into a blood pellet by that ruthless fellow¡­"


    Hearing that the task was one that had been personally issued by the Great Demon King himself, the current ruler of the Frozen Wastnd, the two Demon Kings who had been hesitating beforehand quickly agreed. Showing just how fearsome the reputation of the Great Demon King was to these other demon kings.


    "Good, we will be moving out immediately! Although the formations haven''t been spotted yet, we can''t take any risks. After all, they can only stay concealed for so long."


    Whoosh~


    Seeing this, the Blood Lotus Demon King smiled menacingly in the direction of the Onyx Empire as he said this before disappearing.


    ""¡­""


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Looking at each other for a short moment following the disappearance of the Blood Lotus Demon King, the other two Demon Kings didn''t waste too much time, as they soon followed after him in the direction of the Onyx Empire where one of the Blue Sea Empire''s ancestors in the Celestial Immortal Realm was currently staying.


    Both of them understood that after today, the war between the demonic cultivators and the rest of the cultivators not set on the demonic path would escte to the point of no return and herald the beginning of another war for superiority.


    If the demonic cultivators won, demonic cultivation would be the norm and reign supreme on the Ewaria Continent and if demonic cultivators lost, they would be faced with a far worse suppression than thest time they had engaged in such a massive battle with the rest of the cultivators on the Ewaria Continent.


    Although it was impossible to erase demonic cultivation given how there would always be people willing to do everything in their power to increase their own strength, it would definitely end up far worse than it was at the moment where they at least had some ces on the continent that fell under the control of the demonic cultivators.


    As for the stronger demonic cultivators who participated in the battle, they would almost definitely end up being hunted down and killed by the powerful cultivators of the powers located in the core of the continent.


    ¡­


    Hm? Why do I suddenly feel so uneasy all of a sudden? Could it be that the demonic cultivators are nning tounch another attack on the Onyx Empire? But with me here, would they dare to do something like that?


    As the three demonic cultivators in the Demon King Realm made their way towards the Onyx Empire, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire, who had decided to remain at the border of the Onyx Empire to kill off any demonic cultivator trying to cross in a way to honor the death of his family member, suddenly felt a shiver run down his spine. Forcing him out of his current meditative state, as his terrifying divine sense swept out in the direction of the Frozen Wastnd. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Hm?! Three Demon Kings!?"


    Just as he did this, he almost instantly noticed the three Demon King Realm demonic cultivators rushing directly towards him.


    Not good, could they be nning to force their way through and try to sneak into the Blue Sea Empire!?


    Seeing this, the ancestor didn''t even think that they were targeting him, as he thought that they were just nning to try and rush past him to enter the interior of the Blue Sea Empire and cause damage from the inside.


    I have to inform the rest about the situation and have them guard the borders!


    With this in mind, the ancestor quickly took out hismunication talisman before contacting the rest of the ancestors about the situation. Wanting them to quickly get to the borders and prevent the demonic cultivators from sneaking inside-


    RUUUMBLE-!


    However, just as he finished doing this, he suddenly felt thebined power of the three Demon Kings locking on to him.


    "Hehe, you should be paying attention to us old man!"


    "This¡­ YOU WANT TO TARGET ME!? HMPH!"


    Feeling the terrifying power locking on to him, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire wasn''t the slightest bit terrified. Instead, he felt more offended than anything else, as he understood full well that there would be no reason for them to target him unless they thought they could kill.


    Essentially meaning that they viewed him as an easy target that could be finished off in the short time it would take for the rest of the ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire to show up and lend a hand.


    "You need more than this if you three want to kill me!"


    Showing a fearless demeanor worthy of someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, the old ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire faced the attack of the three Demon Kings head on-


    BOOOM-!


    And the next second, the terrifying attack reached its target, causing everything within a hundred kilometers of the Blue Sea Empire Ancestor to get vaporized. Killing any cultivator or mortal unfortunate enough to get caught within the powerful attack.


    The only ones capable of surviving were a few Dao Seed Realm cultivators who had been lucky enough to have been informed of the attack by the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire. Barely giving them enough time to use a teleportation talisman or another kind of lifesaving treasure to get out of the way in time.


    Of course, there were also some unfortunate ones that had been too slow to react and had been caught in the attack. Dying almost instantaneously without any way to resist the remnant power of a sh between three Demon Kings and a Celestial Immortal.


    In the end, by the time that the dust settled. Nothing was left alive around the four powerful cultivators-


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    However, the quiet moment didn''tst for long, as the four soon began violently fighting with each other in the air above the Onyx Empire. Sending shockwaves through the entire empire, some of which managed to cross all the way to the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although the power had significantly weakened at this point in time and could be stopped by someone in the Domain Lord Realm, it still ended up destroying over a dozen cultivation families and even cut through a recently constructed branch of the Star Shattering Sect. Killing a dozen elders and over a hundred disciples before they had a chance to react.

 Chapter 1330 Ambush (2)

    Chapter 1330 Ambush (2)


    "Hm?"


    Noticing the terrifying battle that was taking ce in the Onyx Empire almost immediately due to the sheer scale of the battle and that it had even spread into the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao could not help freezing on the spot with a clear frown on his face.


    "Master? Is something wrong?"


    Standing next to him, Bai Ning who had been in the process of forging an artifact under his guidance could not help looking up with confusion after suddenly seeing that his master had stopped talking.


    "Someone is fighting close to the territory of our sect, and it seems like their battle has already caused quite a bit of damage to our territory¡­" Not hiding anything Xuan Hao nodded his head as he told Bai Ning what was happening.


    Although he hadn''t confirmed any damage to the sect''s territory, he was certain that there was some. After all, the remnant power of the battle had managed to reach all the way to the Shattered Star Peaks. The territory closest to the Onyx Empire was bound to have suffered quite a bit of damage.


    The only positive thing was that the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire who should be one of the people involved in the fight had taken the initiative to move the fight deeper in the Frozen wastnd to avoid any more damage to what could essentially be considered territory under the Blue Sea Empire.


    "Someone fighting close to our territory?! And it even caused damage to the degree that master noticed it¡­ Master¡­ how strong are the people fighting?"


    Hearing what his master said, Bai Ning could not help muttering this to himself before trying to ask more into the situation. Curious about the strength of someone capable of causing his master to act so seriously. Even cing the halfplete artifact on the side as he asked.


    "Celestial Immortal Realm. If I''m not wrong, it should be the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire who is currently at the Onyx Empire who is battling someone of simr strength." Narrowing both his eyes as he said this, Xuan Hao kept looking in the direction of the battle. Clearly not understanding what the demonic cultivators were nning, as he understood full well that there would be no way for them to win. Even if they had a numbers advantage.


    After all, all things considered, this could still be considered part of the Blue Sea Empire, and it would at most take a few minutes before the rest of the ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire appeared to lend a hand. Far from enough time to take down this Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor.


    Not to mention taking him down, Xuan Hao didn''t even think that the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire currently caught in a fight would need to use any of his hidden cards, as there was simply far too little time for those demonic cultivators to pose any real threat to him-


    Rumble~!


    At least that was what he thought when he suddenly felt a terrifying tremor spreading through the ground beneath him following three terrifying demonic auras appearing in three different locations behind the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire.


    One came from the direction of the fallen Sky Empire, another from the Onyx Empire and thest came from the direction on the other side of the Onyx Empire.


    Among these, there was a distinct difference in strength between the one in fallen Sky Empire and the other two, as the one in the fallen Sky Empire was clearly far weaker than the other two. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even then, far weaker was still far above anything Xuan Hao felt confident in taking head on, as the strength of these terrifying auras had all clearly surpassed the Dao Seed Realm.


    An ambush?


    Thinking this to himself as he felt the three terrifying demonic auras, Xuan Hao instantly understood the intentions behind the three demonic cultivators.


    RUMBLE-!


    And it was at this moment that the terrifying tremor intensified significantlypared to before. Reaching the point where everyone on the Shattered Star Peaks could sense it. Even alerting the oblivious mortals who were just going about their day without any idea of the terrifying battle taking ce just outside the Onyx Empire at this point in time.


    WHOOOOSH-!


    In the next second, a terrifying beam of light cut through the sky in the direction of the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire, changing the color of the sky into a bright red wherever it passed, causing mortals and cultivators alike to think that some kind of heavenly cmity was about to descend.


    Only those at the Domain Lord Realm and above could sense that this wasn''t some kind of heavenly cmity, but instead a powerful attackunched by a cultivator far beyond themselves, while the few cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire all understood who the target of the attack was and the fact that it hade from a formation of some kind-


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    As a result of this, before the attack had evennded on the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire, the Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire had already rushed out in the direction that the attack hade from. Knowing that although they couldn''t help their ancestor, they would at least be able to destroy the formation and stop any more attacks from beingunched.


    In turn, this was also what the demonic cultivators setting up these formations had feared, as they didn''t dare to waste any time and ran away the moment, they had finished their job of activating the formation. Unfortunately, the one in the Onyx Empire didn''t even have the time to step outside the recently built capital of the Onyx Empire before being surrounded and attacked by four different Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire who had just recently escaped from the attack by the three demon kings.


    I knew it would turn out like this¡­


    In the end, the demonic cultivator couldn''t do anything as he was surrounded by them. Unable to escape from thebined attack of four Dao Seed Realm cultivators.


    ¡­


    At the same time back at the battlefield between the Blue Sea Empire Ancestor and the three Demon King Realm demonic cultivators, the two tremors that should have been noticed earlier was not discovered by the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire due to the battle making it difficult to distinguish if the tremor hade as a result of the battle or something different.


    "Hm? That is-!?"


    In the end, the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire only discovered that he had walked into a trap when three distinct beams of red light appeared within the range of his divine sense heading directly towards him at a terrifying speed. Each of them carrying a power above that of his own.


    "The Frozen Wastnd Demon King!? Does he intend tounch another war!?" Screaming this out loud in disbelief as he identified the owner of the terrifying power, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire understood that he stood little chance of escaping from his current situation.


    The three demonic cultivators in front blocked his path forward, while the three powerful attacks from behind each blocked a potential escape path. Ultimately forcing him to at least take on one of the red beams, something he understood would be a death sentence considering the strength of the Frozen Wastnd Demon King.


    Hm!? One of the red beams seems to be a bit weaker than the rest¡­!


    However, just as he was about to give up hope and try something radical like blowing himself up to take down one of the demon kings down with him, he suddenly noticed that the power of one of the three red beams of light rapidly approaching him was significantly weaker than the other two.


    Although it was not by that much, it was still enough for him to give up his radicalst ditch attack idea and instead try and see if he could make it out alive-


    Whoosh-!


    So, before the three demonic cultivators noticed that one of the three beams were weaker than the other two, he gave up his attack on the three demonic cultivators and directly took out arge shield, a hidden trump card of his that was made for deflecting and blocking powerful attacks, before charging towards the weakest of the three beams of light.


    BOOOM-!


    Not a secondter, he collided directly with the weakened beam of red light, causing the shield to shine brightly as it operated some kind of mysteriousws to forcibly deflect the red beam of light away from the ancestor and into the distance. Significantly weakening the stress put on the shield itself, as it only had to deal with little over half of the red beams original power after it deflected the rest into the distance¡­

 Chapter 1331 Ambush (3)

    Chapter 1331 Ambush (3)


    I wonder if the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire can get out of his current predicament and- Huh?


    Having focused his full attention on the battle that was currently taking ce between the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire and the three Demon King Realm demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao suddenly froze on the stop as he suddenly sensed one of the three terrifying beams that had been heading towards the battle changing directions.


    Even worse, he could clearly sense that its current direction would cause it to pierce straight through the Seventh Star Peak where the main sect was located and the Ninth Star Peak where most of the sect''s spiritual herbs were being grown.


    Whoosh-!


    Knowing that he couldn''t allow something like that to happen, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he moved out of his disciple''s forge before directing the full strength of the Chaotic Qi Formation to defend against the terrifying attack-


    BOOOOOOM-!


    And this was just barely in the nick of time, as the attacknded almost the same moment that he finished mobilizing all of the Chaotic Qi Formations strength towards defending the single location that the red beam attack would strike.


    Rumble-!


    As the two terrifying forces shed with each other, one belonging to the demonic formation and the other the Chaotic Qi Formation, the entire Shattered Star Peaks began to violently shake as the entire sky above the sect turned bright red.


    "Wha-what is happening!? Are we under attack!?"


    "What is that?"


    "Is this the guardian formation¡­ How awesome!"


    As a result of this, the disciples and elders present in the sect all came out to observe what was happening with varying degrees of fear and awe at the terrifying disy of power caused by the sh between the Chaotic Qi Formation and the deflected part of demonic formations attack.


    Fwissssh~


    However, after no more than a few seconds, the attack came to an end, as the Chaotic Qi Formation slowly retreated from view and returned to its normal operational state. Refining the chaotic qi above to increase the qi density inside the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Looking at it from the outside, the Chaotic Qi Formation didn''t suffer the slightest bit of damage from the attack just now. Making the disciples and elders inside the sect confident that the threat outside the sect had passed.


    Only Feng Chen and some of the other higher ups of the sect had some inkling that the attack just now should be rted to the terrifying battle taking ce in the Onyx Empire at the moment. Resulting in almost all of them contacting Xuan Hao for confirmation.


    The reason for this being that out of everyone present, he was the only one who had the ability to fully mobilize the Chaotic Qi Formation to such a degree.


    After all, even though someone like Feng Chen also had the ability to control the Chaotic Qi Formation to some extent, he was still too weak to fully utilize it with his current strength. Not to mention, some areas like the First- and Second-Star Peak had already been personally closed off by Xuan Hao through the Chaotic Qi Formation.


    In the end, Xuan Hao didn''t hide anything from these worried elders and informed them about what had happened, causing no small amount of worry from them, as they found out just how powerful someone above the Dao Seed Realm was.


    Even being an entire empire away from the battle itself, they were still in the line of fire and might end up dead at any moment without enough strength.


    At least in this regard, the elders were all amazed by the strength disyed by the Chaotic Qi Formation, as it had proven itself capable of resisting the attacks of someone above the Dao Seed Realm without any major problems.


    "Hm? The situation is changing again¡­" Not caring too much about the amazement of the elders of the sect after he had briefly exined what had happened, Xuan Hao was instead focused on the situation of the battle between the three Demon King Realm demonic cultivators and the Celestial Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire. Noticing almost immediately that the battle seemed to have taken some kind of drastic turn during his brief period of utilizing the Chaotic Qi Formation to defend the Star Shattering Sect.


    The change in question was not that one of them had significantly weakened, but instead that the four hade to a standstill without doing anything and seemed to be locked in a standstill.


    What could have happened?


    Thinking this to himself as he carefully sensed the situation in the distance, Xuan Hao could not help what had ended up happening for such a drastic change to take ce and cause the four to enter a standstill just after being engaged in such a deadly battle with each other.


    Perhaps a powerful hidden trump card of some kind¡­?


    The only thing Xuan Hao could think of that might have caused this was that the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire had taken out some kind of powerful hidden card to threaten the three Demon King Realm demonic cultivators into stopping their attack.


    ¡­


    A short time earlier at the Frozen Wastnd where the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire had managed to sessfully deflect part of the attack and block the rest with his shield shaped artifact, the three Demon King Realm demonic cultivators all looked on in disbelief. Not having expected for the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire to have an artifact capable of helping him defend against the attack from the formation.


    After all, this didn''t just contain the power obtained by sacrificing arge number of mortals and cultivators, but also part of the Frozen Wastnd Demon King''s own power. Not something that a normal Celestial Immortal or Demon King would be capable of defending against.


    Of course, the only reason why the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire had been able to defend against the attack was because it had been weakenedpared to the other two, but none of the three demon kings present had noticed this and just thought he had managed to defend against the attack because of powerful strength of the shield shaped artifact.


    "Hm?"


    "That is¡­!?"


    "¡­"


    However, just as the three Demon King Realm demonic cultivators were thinking about what steps to take next and the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire was cautiously observing them, all four of them suddenly sensed the sh between the Chaotic Qi Formation and the part of the attack that had been deflected by the shield shaped artifact.


    "Is¡­ Someone else hiding nearby?"


    "Doesn''t seem like someone from the Blue Sea Empire¡­ Perhaps someone wanting to take advantage of the situation¡­?"


    Only able to feel the sh that took ce in the distance, the four of them could ultimately not discern that it was a sh between a formation and the attack. Instead thinking that it was a sh between another powerful cultivator that was hiding nearby and observing their battle from afar.


    "Not good, we might end up getting encircled if there are more people around!"


    Realizing the immediate danger of the current situation after he was certain that it was not a demonic cultivator, one of the three Demon King Realm cultivators rapidly turned around and fled back into the deeper regions of the Frozen Wastnd as he said this.


    ""¡­""


    Seeing this, the two remaining Demon King Realm demonic cultivators briefly looked at each other before deciding to follow after the escaping demonic cultivator.


    Although they understood that the chances of them being encircled and attack by arge group of cultivators, they also understood that their original goal of ambushing and killing the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire had already failed.


    With that in mind, there was no reason for them to continue staying around. Instead, it would be better for them to get out of the way before the rest of the ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire rushed over to attack them.


    After all, even if they would still be capable of escaping, none of them felt like getting beaten up in the process of doing so¡­


    "They are leaving¡­"


    Watching all of this, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire could not help silently breathing out a sigh of relief as the three Demon King Realm demonic cultivators disappeared into the depths of the Frozen Wastnd before he ultimately turned to gently bow in the direction that the powerful beam attack had been blocked at.


    Understanding that the person who blocked the attack should have been more capable of moving out of the way and remain hidden.


    The only reason why the other party revealed themselves would be to intimidate the demonic cultivators, something that was needed for him considering that it wasn''t without cost for him to block and deflect part of the demonic formations attack.


    If the demonic cultivators had stayed, they might very well have been able to kill him before any of the Blue Sea Empire''s ancestors could show up¡­n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om

 Chapter 1332 Ambush (4)

    Chapter 1332 Ambush (4)


    Feeling himself starting to calm down as he watched the demonic cultivators disappearing into the depths of the Frozen Wastnds, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire turned his attention towards the direction of where the unknown powerful cultivator had deliberately shown himself just a short time earlier.


    However, when using his divine sense to look over in that direction, he didn''t find anyone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, but instead just felt his divine sense colliding with the guardian formation of a local sect.


    Not wanting to identally destroy the local sect''s guardian formation with his powerful divine sense, he decided to retract it. Knowing that the mysterious Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator who had lend him a hand earlier in scaring off the demonic cultivator should have already left ce. Likely not wanting to get any more involved in the situation.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Just at this moment, three powerful auras suddenly appeared in the distance before almost instantly crossing over and arriving directly in front of the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire. Soon revealing themselves to be three Celestial Immortals from the Blue Sea Empire who had rushed over the moment they learnt about what had happened.


    "Where are the demonic cultivators? Did they leave already?"


    Out of the three, one of them couldn''t help asking in a somewhat confused tone as he had and the other two had been expecting to find their friend besieged by three Demon King Realm demonic cultivators when they arrived. Not him standing around aimlessly staring into the distance.


    If not for the fact that they could clearly see and sense the destructive battle that had taken ce only a short time earlier, they would have doubted whether or not the ancestor standing in front of them had really encounter an attack from a group of demonic cultivators in the Demon King Realm.


    "Yes¡­ They left not too long ago someone else arrived before you three and helped scare them off before they had a chance to kill me..."


    "Kill you!? Was it really that serious? How could they possibly push you to such a desperate state in such a short period of time. Unless¡­"


    "Indeed, the Frozen Wastnd Demon King was involved. If not for one of the sneak attacks being weaker than the rest and the sudden arrival of an unknown Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator who prevented any further attacks, I doubt I would have been able to safely escape with my life today¡­" Nodding his head with a solemn expression on his face, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire who had just been ambushed told the rest about his thoughts on what had happened.


    In the process of doing so, also mentioning the unknown Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator who had shown themselves to intimidate the group of Demon King Realm demonic cultivators into retreating.


    "An unknown Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator. Haaa¡­ Under normal circumstances, I would find it worrying, but considering that person saved your life, I take it that they don''t have anything against our Blue Sea Empire¡­" Showing a somewhat worried expression before ultimately shaking his head, one of the Blue Sea Empire''s Celestial Immortals ultimately decided to not pursue the unknown Celestial Immortal.


    "Indeed, if they did, it would have been a perfect opportunity to kill me!" Nodding his head in agreement, the ancestor who had barely avoided death spoke up for the unknown Celestial Immortal. Knowing even more intimately how bad his situation was and how he would have ended up without that unknown Celestial Immortal''s appearance.


    In the end, the rest of the Celestial Immortals from the Blue Sea Empire were convinced about the good will of this unknown Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator. At the very least, they could be certain that this Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator didn''t have any ill intentions towards the Blue Sea Empire given their actions to save one of their Celestial Immortals.


    "Let''s get you back to the capital for now so you can recover. In the meantime, we will have two people remain at the border for now and oversee the situation here in your ce."


    With that in mind, one of the three Celestial Immortals that had shown up as reinforcement took a step forward to say this before helping the severely injured Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor back in the direction of the Blue Sea Empire where he would be able to recover from his injuries.


    "Well, while those two get back and brief the rest on the situation, we should assess the damage done to the surroundings after the battle. Especially the Onyx Empire which seems to have been turned into a wastnd after this battle¡­"


    Staring off in the direction of the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor that they hade to assist as he left together with the weakest among the three of them, one of the two remaining Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators quickly assessed the current situation and informed the second one about their immediate goals.


    "Understood, you take care of the Onyx Empire, and I will check out the other two empires and see how they are faring." Nodding his head in agreement, the second Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor didn''tin and just flew off shortly after this.


    For now, the most important thing to these Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors was to check the damage that had been caused by the battle and at the same time assess whether or not it had all been a cover up for something different.


    After all, at this point in time, all of them had already realized that the earlier attack by the Blood Lotus Demon King had been a distraction leading up to the attack that took ce today.


    Although it was unlikely for this attack to have been a distraction as well, none of the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors nned to take the risk. Especially because the attack this time around involved the Frozen Wastnd Demon King, an existence that stood far above the realm of ordinary Celestial Immortals and even caused arge empire like the Blue Sea Empire to act cautiously.


    ¡­


    Hm? The demonic cultivators are leaving¡­ Could it be that their attack failed, and the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire was stronger than they expected?


    Having carefully kept his attention focused on the battle that had taken ce just outside the borders of the Onyx Empire, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself as he sensed the three demonic cultivators suddenly leaving after they had frozen on the spot for a few seconds without doing anything.


    Whoosh~!


    However, only a short time after the demonic cultivators left, Xuan Hao felt a terrifying divine sense descending on the Star Shattering Sect before quickly leaving again after encountering the Chaotic Qi Formation.


    That is¡­ Did the Celestial Immortal sense me defending against the attack earlier and decided to investigate¡­?


    Although he didn''t try to forcibly pierce through the formation and take a peek inside, that is only the case for now, I doubt he will ignore a formation capable of defending against a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator¡­


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this while carefully preparing himself for a possible response from the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit nervous.


    Even though his strength had increased by quite a bit over the past few years, he was still far away from beingparable to someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    At the moment, the only thing he had that allowed him some confidence in facing off against a Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator was the Chaotic Qi Formation that he had at least managed to confirm had the ability to defend against someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Of course, defending against someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm still meant that he would be able to do much against someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm outside the range of the Chaotic Qi Formation.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Even worse, he soon felt three equally powerful divine senses sweeping over the chaotic qi formation before retreating without interfering with the formation.


    Sensing the situation at the border of the Onyx Empire to the best of his ability without using his divine sense, Xuan Hao could feel that three more Celestial Immortals had appeared.


    The only reason he could sense them clearly without using his divine sense was because that none of these Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators bothered hiding their presence¡­ And from the earlier rapid escape of the demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao guessed that these demonic cultivators should have noticed them from afar and thus decided to escape before they showed up and joined the battle.


    Although, the time between the arrival of the three Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators and the demonic cultivators leaving was at least a few minutes. Making Xuan Hao believe that it might not have been the demonic cultivators themselves who sensed these Celestial Immortalsing, but instead one of their spies inside the Blue Sea Empire who had in turn informed them about the approach of the three Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators.


    That or the divine sense and senses of those above the Dao Seed Realm far exceed his imagination, stretching far beyond the range of a few smaller empires¡­

 Chapter 1333 Failed Ambush

    Chapter 1333 Failed Ambush


    Continuing to keep an eye on the situation at the border of the Onyx Empire, Xuan Hao didn''t dare to rx himself before he felt two of the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators leaving to likely check out what kind of damage the demonic cultivators had done. Only then did he know that the sect wasn''t being targeted by the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Although he had no idea why they had decided to ignore the Chaotic Qi Formation, it was at least safe to assume that they didn''t intend to take any action against the Star Shattering Sect for now, as they would undoubtedly have done so when the four of them had been gathered together instead of waiting.


    Outside of that, there was also a chance that they hadn''t discovered that it was the chaotic qi formation that blocked the attack back then. Not something too unrealistic considering that only one of the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor had been around when it had happened, and he was busy dealing with the three Demon King Realm demonic cultivators attacking him.


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao looked at the directions that he had felt the two remaining Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire moving before they had retracted their presence and made it impossible for him to continue following them. Feeling even more certain that they shouldn''t cause any problems for the Star Shattering Sect.


    At least for now, it looked like the Star Shattering Sect had managed to avoid the scrutiny of the Blue Sea Empire, but Xuan Hao had a feeling that this wouldn''tst for long, as it seemed like the sect should have already entered the view of the Blue Sea Empire after what had happened today.


    For now, I should inform Feng Chen and the rest about the situation so they can make adequate preparations in case they encounter someone from the Blue Sea Empire¡­


    Narrowing both his eyes as he thought about this to himself, Xuan Hao didn''t continue his earlier training with Bai Ning, but instead decided to directly go to Feng Chen and have a chat with him about the rather dangerous situation that the Star Shattering Sect might find itself in not too far into the future.


    At the same time, he also decided to try and have Elder Dust Fairy try and use the growing informationwork of the sect to try and look into the situation of the Blue Sea Empire''s Ancestors and what had happened at the border of the Onyx Empire.


    After all, even though he could sense their presence and the fight that had taken ce, he couldn''t really personally see what was happening nor how things had ended up after the battle had ended.


    Even if it might be a bit dangerous to look into the Blue Sea Empire and anything about their ancestors with the current strength of the sect''s informationwork, it wouldn''t be too difficult to do as other powers close to the Onyx Empire should have simr thoughts of wanting to figure out what had happened.


    Knowing this as well, the Blue Sea Empire might even take the initiative to release information about the situation themselves.


    Even though information released by the Blue Sea Empire wouldn''t be entirely trustworthy, it would at least give some information on the situation. Possibly even containing the Blue Sea Empire''s next n of action following the attack by the three powerful demonic cultivators.


    All things considered, they shouldn''t care too much about their ns leaking out to the few empires surrounding the Onyx Empire, as pretty much everything in the vicinity was under the Blue Sea Empire''s sphere of influence and didn''t really pose any threat to them.


    "I wonder what happened¡­" Standing a short distance away and watching as his master left, Bai Ning could not help muttering this to himself as he looked up in the direction where the chaotic qi formation had been used to block the terrifying attack that had essentially turned the sky above blood red.


    Although everything had only taken a few short minutes to y out, Bai Ning and the rest of the Star Shattering Sect all understood how dangerous of a situation they all had been in not too long ago.


    At the same time, everyone in the Star Shattering Sect also understood that the main reason that they had been able to avoid this danger was due to the chaotic qi formation that guarded the Shattered Star Peaks where the sect was located.


    ¡­


    Following news of the battle that had taken ce at the border of the Onyx Empire and the fact that close to half of the empire had been turned into a wastnd began to spread, it didn''t take long before news about other simr attacks at other locations around the Frozen Wastnd spread in a simr fashion.


    Although not much information could be gained about these other attacks that had taken ce, one thing was certain, it had been far worse than the battle that took ce at the border of the Onyx Empire.


    As a result of this, the battle against the demonic cultivators that seemed to have reached a stalemate increased in intensity in these locations.


    On the other hand, the parts of the Frozen Wastnd that fell under the control of the Blue Sea Empire were among the only ces that seemed to retain the same intensity without any further increase in tension


    Some people believed that this was due to the Blue Sea Empire being far stronger than other major empires and powers in the core region of the continent, while others, like Xuan Hao, believed that it was because the attack on the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire had ended up failing.


    No matter what it was, it could be considered good news for the Star Shattering Sect and the different powers within the scope of the Blue Sea Empire''s influence, as it meant that they didn''t have to worry about the demonic cultivators getting any harder to deal with.


    Of course, it didn''t mean that the demonic cultivators were easy to deal with. Not in the slightest bit.


    The only power that managed to easily deal with the demonic cultivators was the Star Shattering Sect that had the barrier created by Xuan Hao to help out blocking any demonic cultivator trying to enter through the sect''s direct border with the Frozen Wastnd, while another side was blocked by the Blue Sea Empire who had by now fully taken control of thend that had once been the Onyx Empire. Having transformed it into a temporary base of operation for the Blue Sea Empire in region.


    In the end, this meant that the Star Shattering Sect essentially only had to worry about demonic cultivatorsing into the sect through one location. Allowing them to continue exploiting the demonic cultivators that reached this border by having them serve as perfect training material for the sect''s disciples and elders.


    Like this, another few months peacefully went by for the Star Shattering Sect, as more and more of the elders broke through to the Domain Lord Realm. Stabilizing the Star Shattering Sect''s position as a powerful forceparable to the old Sky Empire in the eyes of the surroundings kingdoms and empires.


    In turn, this resulted in arge influx of spies who wanted to find out more about the Star Shattering Sect and how strong they really were and possibly also get their hands on the sect''s inheritance at the same time.


    Although nothing had ended up being leaked yet, as Elder Dust Fairy proved to be incredibly skilled in weeding out spies before they had a chance to enter the Shattered Star Peaks, it was ultimately only a matter of time before someone managed to get through the or someone inside the Star Shattering Sect was tempted to leak information.


    With all of that in mind, Elder Song and the rest of the elders in charge of the sect''s internal management had to start seriously considering the matter of the sect''s information or inheritance being leaked to the outside world.


    At the moment, the Star Shattering Sect was using the tried-and-true method of having both disciples and elders swear a simple dao oath of not bringing any harm to sect or leak its information and cultivation techniques outside the sect.


    Even though this method was extremely useful, it wasn''t perfect.


    Over the long years that such dao oaths had existed, countless methods had been found to circumvent them. From simple techniques that involved someone getting drunk and blurting out sect secrets without any intention to do so or real knowledge about what they were doing to more advanced techniques that involved soul searching techniques.


    So, with that in mind, Elder Song and the rest of the sect''s internal management elders began looking for other ways to ensure that the information meant to stay inside the sect didn''t leak outside the sect.N?v(el)B\\jnn

 Chapter 1334 First Steps into the Chaotic Region of the Destroyed Sky Empire

    Chapter 1334 First Steps into the Chaotic Region of the Destroyed Sky Empire


    Exploring new methods to limit the damage that could be caused by a potential future traitor of the sect, Elder Song and the rest of the sect''s internal management elders also began looking towards new ways to help the sect grow that didn''t involve expanding into the nearby empires.


    The main reason for this was not that the Star Shattering Sect was too weak to do so, but instead because of the Blue Sea Empire''s increased presence in the area keeping any local power in check and preventing them from causing any unnecessary trouble that could potentially give the demonic cultivators an opportunity tounch another attack and move closer to the Blue Sea Empire itself.


    After all, even though the demonic cultivators hadn''t continued to increase the ferocity at which they attacked the smaller empires serving as the border between the Blue Sea Empire and the Frozen Wastnd, it didn''t mean that things would continue like this. Especially so when considering that almost every other border with the Frozen Wastnd had been getting more and more dangerous, with battle between Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators and Demon King Realm demonic cultivators bing a regr sight.


    Although these battles hadn''t caused any Celestial Immortal or Demon King to fall, the initial attack from the Frozen Wastnd had ended up resulting in two Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators falling¡­ And if not for Xuan Hao''s earlier interference, it would most likely have been three!


    With all of this in mind, the areas that the Star Shattering Sect could continue expanding were not that many. Only the chaotic region that had been left following the fall of the Sky Empire could be considered a suitable location, as the people from the Blue Sea Empire roaming that area didn''t seem to care that much about the territory as the Sky Empire had already been destroyed.


    Outside of that, there was also the possibility of expanding the sect''s influence into the outer edges of the continent where resources were sparse and hard toe by. Potentially setting up a few smaller branch sects for the purpose of trying to find talented people that could be moved into one of therger branch sects or the main sect if they were talented enough.


    At the same time, Elder Dust Fairy could also start expanding the sect''s informationwork into the outer edges of the continent.


    Although the information that could be gained around the outer edges of the continent wouldn''t be that useful, it would at least help alert the sect in case a powerful demon beast appeared from the endless ocean that surrounded the continent or a powerful cultivator fleeing from one of the major powers in the core of the continent appeared and could be recruited in a simr fashion as Pei Yang had been recruited.


    Of course, there was one major problem when it came to expanding the Star Shattering Sect into the outer edges of the continent at the moment¡­ And that was the fact that they would first have to go through the Frozen Wastnd before they could reach the outer edges of the continent, something that was easier said than done with the current state of the Frozen Wastnd.


    For now, expanding into the outer edges of the continent would have to wait, as the only person capable of safely traversing through the Frozen Wastnd at the moment was Xuan Hao¡­ And even he wasn''t entirely sure that he would be able to keep moving between the two ces for long before he would end up catching the attention of the Demon King Realm demonic cultivators who should have noticed him thest time, he had passed through the Frozen Wastnd together with Yi Min.


    Going around the Frozen Wastnd wasn''t really an option either, as that would involve having to pass through countless smaller empires and go through the borders of at least three powers at the same level as the Blue Sea Empire, who were currently engaging in battles with powerful demonic cultivators in the Demon King Realm from time to time.


    Outside of this, there was a third option for the Star Shattering Sect to establish a presence in the outer edges of the continent and that was for the sect to construct a teleportation formation linking the two ces together.


    The only problem with this idea was the fact that there wasn''t anyone in the Star Shattering Sect skilled enough in the Dao of Formations and the Dao of Space to create a teleportation formation.


    The one who was closest to aplishing something like this was Xuan Hao, who had managed to reach the realm of Small Sess in both the Dao of Space and the Dao of Formations.


    Unfortunately for Elder Song and the management elders who wanted to convince Xuan Hao to learn how to construct a teleportation formation after learning about this, the sect didn''t really have any books on teleportation formations.


    Maybe the book of formations that Xuan Hao had acquired from the old man from the Fallen Immortal Archipgo had teleportation formations inside of it, but after a quick look through the book, Xuan Hao still found it tooplicated to understand in a short period of time. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    With that in mind, if Xuan Hao wanted to try and create a teleportation formation, he would have to create one from scratch by trying to use the one in the Half Spirit Race''s old vige as a guide¡­ And considering that Xuan Hao was far more interested in increasing his own strength so he would have a chance in case a Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire decided to show up, he decided to ignore Elder Song and the rest of the management elders. Instead continuing to focus onprehending the Dao of Space.


    Although this was a bit discouraging for Elder Song and the rest, they didn''t give up looking for ways to continue strengthening the Star Shattering Sect and merely put the matter of expanding into the outer edges of the continent on hold for now.


    In the end, after close to two weeks of deliberation on which direction the sect would expand in, Elder Song and the rest ultimately decided to focus on strengthening the already established branch sects inside the sect''s territory, while slowly beginning to look for resource rich areas inside the former Sky Empire that were close to the Iron Sky Kingdom where Yi Min was.


    Working together with Yi Min and the people under her, it didn''t take long before Elder Song and the rest of the sect''s management elders set up a small outpost in an area close to the Iron Sky Kingdom where another empire at the same size as the Sky Empire was mining arge spirit stone mine¡­ And before this empire even had a chance to respond, Yi Min and a group of elders from sect moved in to seize the mine. Marking the Star Shattering Sect''s first move into the chaotic region of the former Sky Empire.


    Unfortunately for the empire that had ended up losing the spirit stone mine, they were originally far away from the chaotic region of the Sky Empire and weren''t really in a situation to send a force over to retake the spirit stone mine after it had fallen, as they themselves were busy dealing with the invasion of demonic cultivators.


    The only reason why they had managed to keep the spirit stone mine under their control was due to the fact that many other empires that had taken advantage of the fall of the Sky Empire to seize its resources were simrly busy dealing with demonic cultivators invading their territories.


    In a sense, the only people who had been left defending the spirit stone mine were a few Domain Lord Realm cultivators in charge of keeping any smaller powers or rouge cultivators from causing trouble.


    When they were faced with a powerful Soul Ascension Realm cultivator like Yi Min, they simply stood no chance and were easily taken care of.


    Of course, as the Star Shattering Sect wasn''t really in a position to dispatch Soul Ascension Realm cultivators to guard the newly seized spirit stone mine and only a few Domain Lord Realm cultivators were left defending the ce, Elder Song made sure that Yi Min would be ready to act in case someone came to try and retake the spirit stone mine in the future.


    Considering that she also got a part of the spirit stones that were mined, and it wasn''t that far away from the Iron Sky Kingdom, Yi Min ended up happily agreeing to this arrangement.


    Following this, Elder Song and the rest of the management elders slowly began turning their focus to other simr resource rich area close to the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­ And over the next few months, the Star Shattering Sect ended up establishing another five outposts in the chaotic region of the former Sky Empire. Vastly improving the number resources avable to the disciples and elders of the sect. Further increasing the speed at which the strength of the sect increased.

 Chapter 1335 Dao of Space, Large Success Realm

    Chapter 1335 Dao of Space, Large Sess Realm


    As time continued to pass and the Star Shattering Sect kept increasing the number of outposts inside the chaotic region of the former Sky Empire to control as many resources as possible with their current limited number of Domain Lord Realm cultivators, half a year passed since Xuan Hao had returned to the sect after his time in the mystic realm together with Mui.


    It was at this moment that Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes inside his cultivation room with a happy expression on his face.


    Finally, I managed to break through to the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space!


    Thinking this to himself as he continued smiling to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling overjoyed, as he had finally managed to break through to the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Although he had expected to easily reach the Large Sess Realm after he had managed to reach the Peak of the Small Sess Realm back inside the mystic realm, he was met with the harsh reality after he began trying to breakthrough after returned to the sect. In the end, it took him a half year to cross the barrier and officially step into the Late Stage of the Dao of Space.


    Even then, Xuan Hao wasn''t too mad about it, as he clearly felt the terrifying control of space he had managed to gain after breaking through to the Large Sess Realm.


    At this point in time, his speed when using the drifting cloud steps had more than doubled with him reaching the Large Sess realm in the Dao of Space.


    Not just that, but his usage of any technique rted to the Dao of Space had be far easier, while at the same time making the techniques in question stronger.


    Even though he was still quite far away from reaching the Perfection Realm, he had at least taken one step closer to his goal. All he needed was time, something that he would have in abundance as long as the current stalemate between the Blue Sea Empire and the demonic cultivators continued and it didn''t end up in a simr situation as the neighboring major powers where battles between Demon Kings and Celestial Immortals had bemonce.


    At least in that regard, throughmunicating with Xuan Gui over the past few months, he had managed to learn that the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnd intend to focus their efforts on attacking other major powers instead of the Blue Sea Empire after the failure to kill one of their Celestial Immortals.


    ording to her, the Star Shattering Sect and surrounding kingdoms and smaller empires didn''t have much to worry about in regard to the situation escting to the level where Demon King Realm demonic cultivators would get involved.


    Of course, given her understandable hatred towards the Blue Sea Empire, she wasn''t too eager about the attack towards the Blue Sea Empire ending up as a failure, thus she did share with him that she was nning to personally act when the situation calmed down a bit and the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors left.


    The reason for informing him about something like this was rather simple, as she hoped he would be able to lend a hand when the time came and help her in getting to the Blue Sea Empire.


    As for what she nned on doing after reaching the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao decided not to ask, as it didn''t really matter much to him outside of knowing that whatever she nned on doing would end up causing chaos inside the Blue Sea Empire and potentially weaken them.


    Given that he had spent some time looking into her past from what little bit of information he coulde by with the help of Elder Dust Fairy, he had confirmed that she was different from other demonic cultivators he had encountered and didn''t seem to have done any kind of senseless ughter nor was she anything like what the Blue Sea Empire''s general information portrayed her.


    With all of that in mind, Xuan Hao didn''t feel anything against lending her a hand in getting into the Blue Sea Empire in the future. If his judgement turned out to be wrong about her and she started senselessly ughtering people inside the Blue Sea Empire, he could only me himself.


    Now that I think about it, I will have to start trying to figure out how to help her get inside the Blue Sea Empire. After all, with their increased attention to their borders due to the surge in demonic cultivators, it will be far harder than normal to sneak inside. Especially considering that there could be Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators secretly guarding the ce.


    Frowning slightly as he thought about this to himself, Xuan Hao could only shake his head slightly at the thought of trying to get into the Blue Sea Empire while they were fully mobilized and trying their best to prevent any demonic cultivator from entering their empire.


    Ah! Maybe I can try using the long-distance teleportation to get us inside? Although it will be discovered, it should give Xuan Gui enough time to find somewhere to hide before the people from the Blue Sea Empire show up. Not to mention, I should also be able to get out without any problems as long as there isn''t someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm who at leastprehended the Dao of Space to the Large Sess Realm¡­


    Remembering the long distance teleportation that he had mostly set off on learning to focus his attention onprehending the Dao of Space or other Daos instead, Xuan Hao had a feeling that it might be time for him to learn.


    Even though it would end up taking time away fromprehending the Dao of Space or other Daos, it would help in getting Xuan Gui safely into the Blue Sea Empire where she would be able to cause chaos for the Blue Sea Empire.


    In turn, it would give the Star Shattering Sect more time to grow and would likely also pull any powerful cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire away. Giving the sect a chance to possibly expand into the adjacent empires that had been left alone due to the presence of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Of course, there would still be people from the Blue Sea Empire around, but things should work out as long as the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect was done slowly without them noticing as their main focus would be on the Frozen Wastnd.


    In case the sect''s actions were discovered, it would be rtively easy to me it on a fight for resources between smaller powers. Although, this kind of excuse couldn''t be used forever¡­


    Seems like the future ns for the sect expansion is set, all I have to do now is lean the long distance teleportation technique and wait for the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire to leave.


    Learning the long distance teleportation technique shouldn''t take more than a month or two, but for the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors to leave¡­ It will at least take a few years¡­


    Turning to look off in the direction of the Onyx Empire where the two Ancestors of the Blue Sea Empire spent most of their time, Xuan Hao couldn''t help letting out a sigh as he thought about how long it would take before those two felt the border was safe enough for them to leave.


    Even if it was understandable considering what had just happened not long ago and what was happening at the borders of the other major powers close to the Frozen Wastnd, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit impatient when he thought about this.


    Although it was a good thing for him that he would have a few years where he could focus his full attention onprehending the dao and continue growing stronger without any interruptions, he was ultimately not fully adjusted to spending long periods of time solely focused onprehending the dao and partly wanted to leave the sect and go back to the mystic realm to continue exploring the ce and search for the remaining celestial gates.


    In the end, he even began feeling a bit jealous of Chu Yang, who had still not returned to the sect after close to half a year exploring the world on his own.


    The only thing he knew about his location from the soul mark he had left on him for safety was the fact that he should be somewhere inside therge neutral territory between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire.


    Considering that demonic cultivators were still far away from that ce and there weren''t any major powers governing the ce, it could be considered a great location to train for Chu Yang, though he did worry a bit about his disciple''s strength, as there was nock of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators in that region. Even encountering someone in the Dao Seed Realm wasn''t out of the question!


    But¡­ Considering he had been doing fine so far, Xuan Hao decided not to do anything, as he instead closed his eyes and began the process of learning the long distance teleportation technique.

 Chapter 1336 Chu Yang, Edge of the Core Region

    Chapter 1336 Chu Yang, Edge of the Core Region


    At the same time that Xuan Hao got started on learning the long distance teleportation technique, Chu Yang arrived at the edge of the core region after closer to half a year spent travelling through the chaotic territory of the former Sky Empire.


    Although this journey hadn''t really put him in any real danger due to the people at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm or above either being focused on either holding down an important location filled with cultivation resources or had already left the chaotic territory to assist their own empires in dealing with the recent influx of demonic cultivators, Chu Yang still managed to fight a few Domain Lord Realm cultivators along the way. Allowing him to grow more familiar with his strength in the Domain Lord Realm, while also understanding his own limitations.


    The limitations in question being the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, as the two people in the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm that he had encountered so far had been far too strong for him to fight against. Having forced him to retreat after fighting them as long as possible to hone his own strength through fighting.


    At least, that was his limitations back when he had run into those Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivators, but since then, he had broken through to the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Giving him more confidence in being able to face off against someone who could be considered at the Peak of the Middle Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Though¡­ Fighting them equally for a longer period of time should be the limit. Killing someone at the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm was not something he believed he would have the strength to do before he managed to break through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Luckily, the fights he had during his journey were extremely helpful to his cultivation and he felt himself getting closer to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm as his insights into the Dao of the Spear deepened.


    At the same time, as he began killing off a few of the weaker Domain Lord Realm cultivators that he encountered on his journey through the chaotic territory of the former Sky Empire, the Devil Immortal Jade that had remained dormant inside his dantian without showing any signs of movement as it assisted him in his cultivation, began to show signs of life, as it directly absorbed some of the blood of the Domain Lord Ream cultivators he killed.


    At first, he thought that this was some kind of demonic technique and wanted to contact his master for help, but after observing the jade inside his dantian while it absorbed the blood, he discovered that it didn''t actually absorb the blood, but instead gathered it together andpressed it into a small drop of blood that floated around the devil immortal jade.


    But most importantly, observing this drop of blood, Chu Yang discovered that he could actuallyprehend the Dao of blood from it.


    Unfortunately, soon after this discovery, the drop of blood seemingly evaporated into thin air.


    It was at that moment Chu Yang realized another use for the devil immortal jade that wasn''t increasing his cultivation speed, it helped himprehend the Dao of Blood.


    As for the Dao of Blood being more of a demonic dao, Chu Yang didn''t really care about this, as it didn''t take him long to realize that the Dao of Blood was well suited for his Dao of the Spear. Allowing him to enhance the strength of his spear in battle even though he had just barely started the process ofprehending the Dao of Blood.


    Of course, the realization that killing Domain Lord Realm cultivator would allow him to more easilyprehend the Dao of Blood gave Chu Yang a far more intimate understanding of why demonic cultivators did what they did. Especially given that he learnt how to control the blood absorption ability after a few days of it activating.


    Though it only increased hisprehension into the Dao of blood, Chu Yang couldn''t lie to himself that he did indeed feel tempted to go out and hunt down a few Domain Lord Realm cultivators to rapidly increase hisprehension of the Dao of Blood with the help of the devil immortal jade.


    But after sitting down to calm himself for a few days, he managed to free himself from the dangerous thoughts that could very well end up with him bing a demonic cultivator, something that was far more dangerous nowpared to the past¡­


    Although the blood absorption method of the devil immortal jade wasn''t a demonic one from what he had managed to observe, it could very well turn into one if he started abusing it against any random Domain Lord Realm cultivator he ran into.


    So, with that in mind, Chu Yang decided to just go on like he had been nning on originally nned before learning about the blood absorption ability of the devil immortal jade. Only using the blood absorption on the Domain Lord Realm cultivators, he ran into normally and ended up killing in the process. Stopping himself from seeking out Domain Lord Realm cultivators for the purpose of absorbing their blood¡­


    "I never expected it to take so long to reach the core region even after reaching the Domain Lord Realm. Almost taking me half a year¡­ And that is not mentioning the fact that my speed is far above that of a normal Domain Lord Realm cultivator." Muttering this to himself as he thought about what he had gone through during the past half year and the blood absorption ability of the devil immortal jade, Chu Yang looked towards the direction of a massive city in the distance.


    From what he had managed to learn from talking to other Domain Lord Realm cultivators and a few knowledgeable Nascent Soul Realm cultivators along his journey through the chaotic region of the former Sky Empire, the massive city could be considered a small city that was part of a neutral power that existed in the neutral region between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire.


    Knowing a bit about this neutral region from his master and some of the cultivators he had encountered along the way, Chu Yang guessed that the power behind the massive city in the distance should at least be someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    But this wasn''t the most important thing about the city. Instead, it was the fact that it contained a safe path into the core region!


    After all, even though he could be considered to have reached the core region of the continent at the moment, he was in fact still at the edge of the core region and couldn''t really be considered to have entered the core region yet.


    To do that, he would first have to pass through a dangerous mountain range that separated the border of the former Sky Empire from the neutral territory between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire¡­ And the only way to safely do that with his current strength was to find a way to safely pass through the mountain range without disturbing any of the Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts rumored to be inhabiting the mountain range, a way that could be obtained inside the city in distance.


    As for trying to move through the Blue Sea Empire to reach the neutral territory? He didn''t have a death wish!


    Although the Blue Sea Empire wouldn''t bother stopping someone in the Domain Lord Realm like himself from entering their empire, his safety was none of their concern and most of the Blue Sea Empire''s border region was filled with all sorts of dangers far surpassing those that could be found in the mountain range he was nning to pass through.


    In a sense, this could also be considered a deliberate barrier created by the Blue Sea Empire to prevent any weak cultivators from entering the territory without putting in too much effort. Allowing nature to take its course, as they focused on any stronger cultivators trying to enter their territory.


    "For now, I should first enter the city and learn about the situation before starting to ask around about the path through the mountain range¡­" Muttering this to himself as he threw the thoughts of the Blue Sea Empire to the back of his mind, Chu Yang didn''t waste any more time staring off in the direction of the massive city in the distance, as he jumped into the air and flew in the direction of the massive city.


    Given what he had learnt about the neutral territory between two of the major powers of the core region and the different opportunities that could be found there, he wanted to go through the mountain range as fast as possible. Feeling eager to find out how fast his strength would grow after he truly stepped foot in the core region of the continent.

 Chapter 1337 Eccentric Merchant

    Chapter 1337 entric Merchant


    Moving towards the massive city in the distance with the goal of finding a way to safely traverse the mountain range and enter therge neutral territory between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire, Chu Yang didn''t dare to be careless, as hended on the ground and travelled on foot instead of flying like he had been doing so far.


    The reason being that he didn''t want to stand out when entering the city, as he understood from past Domain Lord Realm cultivators he had encountered, that someone at his age reaching the Domain Lord Realm was something unheard of to them and might not just draw the attention of the powerful figures inside the border city, but also had the chance of drawing the attention of the more powerful Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire who were still constantly monitoring the situation inside the neutral territory.


    Although attention might be a good thing in some circumstances, Chu Yang understood full well that it wouldn''t be a good thing for him to draw attention from massive powers like the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire.


    After all, even if they might try and approach him with good intentions, nning to recruit him into their empire, there was also a chance they would try and kill him if they suspected he might have already allied or was nning to ally with their opponent.


    With that in mind, Chu Yang intended to try and hide his cultivation realm, but considering that it would be difficult to do so in front of someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, he had alsoe up with another disguise¡­ And that was to fake his own age. Making himself look a bit older than he actually was, as he looked far too young for someone in the Domain Lord Realm at the moment.


    Not that those who reached the Domain Lord Realm couldn''t make themselves look younger, but it was just difficult to make oneself look below a certain age, something that only became harder the older one got.


    In turn, this was also the main reason why most cultivators at the Domain Lord Realm or above looked to be at least in their thirties or older.


    Only a few cultivators obsessed with their appearance or prominent alchemists who had the ability to refine beauty pills would normally look younger than thirty. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Of course, the exception to this was that the cultivator was a genius who had managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm at a young age. Allowing the cultivator in question to retain a youthful appearance for a longer period of time.


    "But¡­ Even if I try to disguise my appearance, it will at most avoid my age being noticed when someone casually sweeps over me with their divine sense. If someone focuses their attention, it won''t take long to pick up the ws in the disguise¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked at his new appearance through a simple water mirror, he had casual created in front of himself, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit nervous as he saw the middle-aged man that appeared in the water mirror.


    Outside of not identally offending any powerful cultivators who might be residing inside the city, Chu Yang also wanted to go on foot so he would avoid getting inspected by the divine sense of those in the Domain Lord Realm and above inside the city. Understanding that if something like that happened, his little disguise would almost instantly get seen through.


    So, with a somewhat nervous expression on his face, Chu Yang dispelled the water mirror in front of him before starting to make his way towards the city in the distance.


    Before long, he soon found himself walking on arge road leading directly up to the city. During which he encountered quite a few other cultivators who were simrly making their way towards the city, though, all of them were either in the Nascent Soul Realm or below. Most of them being in the Core Formation Realm or the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Those in the Domain Lord Realm and above clearly didn''t bother walking on the ground and would instead just fly directly into the city itself¡­


    During the trip to the city that would now take half a day toplete on foot, Chu Yang ended up running into a rather entric merchant who happily allowed him to join the caravan he was part of before he began eagerly talking about himself before noticing how Chu Yang had close to no knowledge about the city they were heading towards.


    "Your first time visiting the Demon Mountain City?" With that in mind, it didn''t take long for the chatty merchant to ask him about it.


    "Yes." Nodding his head in response, Chu Yang didn''t intend to pretend he had been to the city before. Especially considering that the chatty merchant seemed to know a lot about the city that was called the Demon Mountain City ording to what the merchant had told him, and Chu Yang wanted to learn more about the city before entering it if possible."


    "Hehe, there are countless Nascent Soul Realm cultivators and nock of Domain Lord Realm cultivators. Even those mythical figures at the Soul Ascension Realm sometimes appear! I''m sure you will be surprised when we get there! Smiling knowingly as he said this, the merchant paused for a second. "But I have to warn you, those powerful cultivators are not easy to get along with, better to stay away from the central part of the city if you ask me. Outside of that, you also have to¡­"


    And not secondter, Chu Yang suddenly found himself being lectured by the merchant about the dangers of interacting with powerful cultivators and what to do in case he ended up finding himself faced with one.


    All things considered, the merchant was only at the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm and he himself only appeared at the Core Formation Realm. So, it was understandable that the merchant cautioned him about interacting with those in the Nascent Soul Realm and above, as they were indeed extremely dangerous for someone in the Core Formation Realm.


    With that in mind, Chu Yang made sure to carefully nod his head every now and then while listening to the merchant talking about how to avoid running into problems with powerful cultivators.


    During which, Chu Yang couldn''t help feeling that the merchant was far smarter than he let on, as his advice for avoiding trouble seemed to not only fit with those in the Soul Ascension Realm but seemed to be universally good advice for avoiding attention and trouble when entering a new and unknown ce.


    If not for the fact that the merchant was only in the Foundation Establishment Realm, Chu Yang would have seriously doubted his cultivation realm, as the advice he gave was far beyond what someone in the Foundation Establishment should been able to give. Especially considering that some of the advice seemed to pertain to in depth knowledge on how people in different cultivation realms normally looked at their surroundings.


    In the end, he could only put it down to the fact that the merchant had been to the city a lot and encountered all sorts of cultivators and learnt from them and thus developed this kind of in-depth knowledge on how toy low and avoid drawing unwanted attention to himself.


    Maybe I should inform the sect about this merchant and have them try to recruit him¡­ After all, someone like this should be extremely useful to Elder Dust Fairy and the informationwork she is trying to build¡­


    With these thoughts appearing in his head while listening to the merchant, Chu Yang secretly pulled out hismunication talisman before sending a message back to the sect. informing them of the merchant and his potential talent when it came to secretly infiltrating new areas.


    No matter how low his cultivation realm was at the moment, it wasn''t really that much of a problem, as the current Star Shattering Sect had more than enough resources to help him reach the Core Formation Realm without any problems. Increasing his lifespan by a few hundred years. Giving him a chance to continue helping the sect for a longer time, while also giving the sect time to grow strong and potentially also get the ability to more easily produce Nascent Soul Realm cultivators.


    Maybe even getting the ability to help someone forcibly reach the Nascent Soul Realm through different techniques and methods that involved the burning of the body''s potential. Methods useful to those about to die of old age and without any other way to breakthrough. Giving those without talent to reach the Nascent Soul Realm under normal circumstances, a rare opportunity to ovee their natural limitations and possibly even show a strong enoughprehension for them to reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although, such techniques were normally only found inside therger powers of the continent and was out of the scope of the current Star Shattering Sect¡­

 Chapter 1338 Expensive Entry Fee

    Chapter 1338 Expensive Entry Fee


    Arriving at the entrance to the city together with the merchant, Chu Yang was slightly taken aback by the strength of the guards and those trying to enter the city on foot. The guards all having reached the Nascent Soul Realm, while even the weakest one among those trying to make their way inside the city was at the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm or above.


    Even though he knew that this city served as an entry point to the neutral territory between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire for not only the former Sky Empire, but also a few surrounding empires, Chu Yang was still taken aback by therge number of cultivators present.


    In a sense, the city wasparable to the capital city of a small empire like the Sky Empire¡­ Or that was at least what he had heard from the merchant he had been chatting with for the past few hours, he couldn''t be too certain about it, as he himself had never been to the capital city of the Sky Empire and had no way to do so now that the Sky Empire and its capital city had fallen.


    The only way for him to see the capital city of a small empire would be for him to journey to another small empire bordering the Sky Empire. Not something he nned on doing, as it would at least add a year or longer to his journey to reach the neutral territory on the other side of the mountain range visible behind the massive city walls towering up in front of him as he waited in line together with his merchant friend.


    Of course, during the time he had spent together with his new merchant friend he had also asked about other things than just the size of the Demon Mountain City.


    For one, he found it curious that someone only at the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm would make the dangerous journey to the Demon Mountain City. Especially given how dangerous the city was for someone with such a low cultivation realm ording to the merchant himself.


    The response he got was that while it was dangerous to trade inside the Demon Mountain City with his current cultivation realm only being at the Foundation Establishment Realm, it was well worth it, as stronger cultivators tended to have more spirit stones one handpared to weaker cultivators. Even recounting an event where a powerful cultivator had passed by his stall and happened to take an interest in one of the things he was selling at the time before paying close to a hundred times the normal value of the item.


    As for how he got to the city with his low cultivation realm? That wasn''t really thatplicated, as he lived in a small town located no more than half a month away from Demon Mountain City.


    In the past, the town had been part of a smaller kingdom that had been under the Sky Empire and was part of one of the many trade routes that the Sky Empire had built up over its long history to facilitate trade with the Demon Mountain City.


    Even though the Sky Empire had already fallen and be part of history, some of the trade routes that they had painstakingly set up by killing and removing any obstacles along the way, were still operational and could be used by weaker cultivators like the merchant who was only in the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Although things would not continue like this, as demon beasts would inevitably return and cut off those trade routes for weaker cultivators, it at least served as a lifeline for many of the weaker towns and cities that had been left behind following the fall of the Sky Empire. Allowing them to continue functioning through trade with the Demon Mountain City.


    Outside of that, Chu Yang had also asked him about the safe path through the mountain range, but even the knowledgeable entric merchant didn''t seem to know much about the safe path through the mountain range. Only mentioning that he had heard information on it could be bought directly from the city lord''s mansion at the center of the city.


    But¡­ With his cultivation realm only at the Foundation Establishment Realm, he simply didn''t have the qualifications to get his hand on information like that even if he did have enough spirit stones on hand.


    At the same time, the entric merchant also made sure to properly warn him about the dangers of the mountain range and how even people in the Soul Ascension Realm had ended up perishing inside it.


    Though Chu Yang didn''t directly state his intentions for asking about information on the safe path through the mountain range, it didn''t take a genius to guess why he would ask such a thing.


    Given that the Demon Mountain City was so close to the core region and could be considered a gateway to the core region for the surrounding smaller empires, it was obvious that information about the rich resources and far denser spiritual qi had spread among those who often visited the city.


    For this reason, there was nock of people wanting to enter the core region even with its obvious dangers. Hoping they would be able to take advantage of the richer resources to either break through a bottleneck that they wouldn''t normally stand a chance at breaking through or try their luck at joining one of the powerful forces in the neutral region.


    The reason why most people thought about joining the powers in the neutral region instead of the muchrger and more powerful Blue Sea Empire and Wei Empire was that it was far harder to join those two forces and more dangerous to reach them.


    After all, even though it would be easier to reach these two powerful empires after reaching the neutral territory between the two empires, it didn''t change the fact that the neutral territory was just a border between these two massive empires¡­ And anyone trying to enter their empire through the neutral territory would undoubtedly face a lot of scrutiny. Especially if they were trying to join either of the two empires¡­


    "Next!"


    Just at this moment, one of the guards standing at the gate leading into the city called out to Chu Yang and the merchant, calling them over for a simple inspection that everyone entering the city had to go through to prevent known bandits or demonic cultivators from sneaking inside the city.


    Not too surprisingly, the inspection had be far more stringent following the surge in demonic cultivators from the depths of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Of course, given that he wasn''t a demonic cultivator, and the other party was only in the Nascent Soul Realm, Chu Yang felt confident that nothing would go wrong with his disguise, as he began approaching the guard that called out to them together with the merchant.


    "Ah, I forgot to tell you, the price for entering the city is ten spirit stones." As they were about to reach the guard, the entric merchant suddenly pulled out ten spirit stones from his pocket as he said this.


    "Ten spirit stones? Just to enter¡­?" Hearing what the merchant said, Chu Yang paused for a second as a look of disbelief appeared on his face. Thinking he had misheard the merchant.


    "Yep, ten entire spirit stones! Those people know just how valuable it is for us weaker cultivators to enter the city and sell our things, so they decided to take their cut of it by robbing us with such high prices for entering the city.


    Haaa¡­ Because of that, this little entry fee only applies to those below the Domain Lord Realm, as those in the Domain Lord Realm and above can freely enter the city without paying anything. After all, with their strength, there is no need to try and sell things for the little bit merchants like myself can earn."


    Nodding his head as he said this, the entric merchant handed over his spirit stones to the guard with a painful expression on his face before entering the city after a quick inspection.


    "Spirit stones!"


    "¡­" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Hearing the guard''smanding tone as he got to him, Chu Yang could not help smiling wryly as he pretended to take out a few spirit stones from his pocket before handing them over to the guard who just nced over him a few times before allowing him to enter without causing any problems for him.


    Although it was expensive for someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm to pay 10 entire spirit stones to enter a city, it was nothing to someone like Chu Yang who had reached the Domain Lord Rm.


    If anything, he just felt cheated out of his spirit stones after having learnt that he would have normally been able to freely enter the city without paying anything if he had not hidden his cultivation realm.

 Chapter 1339 Unusual Number of Nascent Soul Realm Cultivators

    Chapter 1339 Unusual Number of Nascent Soul Realm Cultivators


    Shaking his head as he threw the regret of losing a mere ten spirit stones to the back of his mind, Chu Yang followed the entric merchant inside the city. nning to take a look around the city first before he began looking for information on how to safely pass through the mountain range, both to learn more about the ce and to keep an eye on the entric merchant whom he felt would be useful to the sect in the future. Intending to wait until he was informed by Elder Dust Fairy about whether or not he would be recruited by the sect, something that would take a bit of time, as the currentmunication talisman he had used wasn''t powerful enough to reach all the way back to the Star Shattering Sect and first had to go through a few of sect''s recently established outpost for information transfer.


    After all, long distancemunication talismans were expensive. Even more so those that could be refused¡­ And Chu Yang unfortunately only had a few one-time usemunication talismans on him for emergency situations and he found no need to use one of them at the moment, as he wasn''t really in a hurry, and it would at most take a few hours before he would get a response. Time he could use to learn more about the Mountain Demon City and at the same time also learn more about the entric merchant who might end up bing a member of the sect''s informationwork in the future¡­


    "Hm? Something wrong?"


    As Chu Yang followed beside the entric merchant while lost in his own thoughts, the merchant suddenly came to an abrupt stop, causing Chu Yang to turn and ask him what was wrong with a somewhat confused expression on his face. Not seeing anything around that might have caused the merchant to stop so abruptly. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Indeed, something is wrong, there are far more powerful cultivators in the Nascent Soul Realm around than normal. Meaning that something should have happened to attract these Nascent Soul Realm cultivators¡­ And from my knowledge, the only thing that can attract so many Nascent Soul Realm cultivators is the uncovering of a secret realm left behind by a powerful cultivator or an ancient ruin."


    "But¡­ How is this a problem? It''s not like they will cause any trouble in the city, as long as we don''t get involved with the secret realm, we should be fine."


    "Hehe, you wish, these cultivators are ruthless! The moment the secret realm or ancient ruin is uncovered, they will need someone to scout the way forward for them so they can avoid running into deadly traps and formations."


    "And weaker cultivators serve as the perfect scouts for them, as they have no real way to resist themand of these stronger cultivators¡­ I see what you mean with it being a dangerous time for us to have entered the city." Nodding his head as he understood what the entric merchant meant with it being a dangerous time for them to enter the city, Chu Yang wasn''t too nervous about it, as he was more than confident in keeping himself safe with his current strength.


    At most, he would just be forced to show off the strength of someone in the Nascent Soul Realm and he should be able to avoid getting taken advantage of.


    The problem was the entric merchant was not like him and was only at the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm. If someone at the Nascent Soul Realm wanted to use him to scout the way forward through a secret realm or an ancient ruin, he would have no way to fight back.


    Relying on the guards of the Demon Mountain City to help out wasn''t really much of an option either, as they were likely also interested in exploring the secret realm or ancient ruins and wanted to make use of weaker cultivators to scout the way forward for them as well.


    Of course, there was also the chance that the reason for so many powerful cultivators to have gathered inside the city was because of the emergence of a powerful spiritual herb or something simr to it, but considering how confident the entric merchant looked, Chu Yang decided to believe in his words.


    After all,pared to him, he seemed far more experienced with this kind of thing.


    If he said that it was a secret realm or an ancient ruin, it was most likely true. After all, the merchant had no real reason to lie to him about something like this.


    So, with that in mind, Chu Yang and the merchant both continued to slowly make their way through the busy streets of the city, the merchant unwilling to leave before selling his wares, while Chu Yang didn''t really feel a need to leave the city.


    In the end, Chu Yang followed the entric merchant to a secluded corner of a rtively busy street where he watched him set up a simple cloth with different trinkets that he would be selling on top of it before he sat down and began trying to entice passing cultivators into buying these trinkets that were essentially just decorations with a few simple formation carved into them to make them shine or do other unique but useless things that appealed to some cultivators looking for things to decorate their cultivation rooms or homes with.


    Shockingly, Chu Yang saw how these simple and easy to make trinkets were sold for several dozens of spirit stones. Making him question the mental capacity of the different cultivators buying them.


    However, after asking the merchant about it, he found out that most of the cultivators inside the city were wandering cultivators and weren''t too familiar with smaller scale formations and were normally only aware of thoserger formations that were easier to find. Resulting in most of these cultivators paying a bit extra just to check out these smaller formations due to their uniqueness.


    More importantly, at the end of the day, a dozen spirit stones weren''t that much to someone in the Nascent Soul Realm and would be more than worth it if they could satisfy their curiosity regarding these unique smaller formations. Allowing the entric merchant to carve out a small but solid market inside the Mountain Demon City where countless wandering cultivators passed through on a daily basis with nock of those in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Funnily enough, due to the increased number of Nascent Soul Realm cultivators present inside the city at the moment, the entric merchant managed to sell off all of his trinkets in a rtively short time of a few hours.


    During this time, Chu Yang didn''t just sit still and watch the merchant going to work, but instead went around the different stalls trying to ask into the situation that had caused so many Nascent Soul Realm cultivators to show up.


    Luckily, even though most of the merchants didn''t know much about the situation and ended up giving a response not that different from the entric merchant, there were still a few who had managed to find out more about the situation from conversations they had overheard when more powerful cultivators visited their stalls.


    In the end, Chu Yang found out that the reason why so many Nascent Soul Realm cultivators had gathered together at the Demon Mountain City was because arge ancient ruin had recently been uncovered by someone from the Explorer Union.


    As a result of this, the Explorer Union had sent out a request for anyone at the Nascent Soul Realm or above to help in exploring the ancient ruin.


    Although there wasn''t any payment attached to the request, everyone understood that the Explorer Union wasn''t interested in the treasures inside the ancient ruins and instead just wanted to fully explore the ce. Meaning that any treasure they found inside the ancient ruins would be theirs.


    Because of this, a lot of Nascent Soul Realm cultivators had happily rushed to the Demon Mountain City in preparation for exploring the ancient ruins.


    Of course, a contributing factor to so many Nascent Soul Realm cultivators showing up was also because of the Explorer Union''s reputation throughout the continent.


    If not for their ster reputation and having no bad record in regard to taking advantage of wandering cultivators, so many wandering cultivators in the Nascent Soul Realm would have never shown up in the first ce.


    Asking a bit further about the situation after finding out about this, Chu Yang also managed to find out that the day for setting out to explore the ancient ruins would be in the middle of the day when the sun was at its highest point.


    Looking up at the sky, it would only be a few hours until that time came¡­ And looking at the decreasing number of people moving around in the streets, it became clear that the Nascent Soul Realm wandering cultivators should have already started to pick up scouts for theing exploration of the ancient ruins¡­

 Chapter 1340 Hiding Spot

    Chapter 1340 Hiding Spot


    Knowing that he and the entric merchant were likely to also get swept up in the exploration of the ancient ruins if they didn''t leave the city, Chu Yang turned to look back at the entric merchant. Only to turn around and see that he had already finished packing up and was in the process of leaving.


    "What are you standing there for? We have to get out of here fast before those Nascent Soul Realm cultivators show up here as well!" Not caring the slightest bit about the shocked expression on Chu Yang''s face, the entric merchant stepped forward and grabbed hold of him before rapidly leaving the somewhat secluded corner of the street that he had set up his stall in.


    Not feeling any threat from the merchant, Chu Yang allowed himself to get dragged along. Curious about how the merchant nned to avoid getting forcibly recruited by the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators. After all, it would definitely be impossible for them to leave the city at this point in time, as those Nascent Soul Realm cultivators would definitely be stationed around that ce to pick up anyone trying to run away.


    Hm? We are not going to leave the city, but instead moving further into the city¡­?


    Feeling a bit surprised when he noticed that the merchant wasn''t dragging him towards the outskirts of the city for somewhere to hide, but instead deeper into the city where the more powerful cultivators would be located, Chu Yang felt even more curious about what kind of escape n the entric merchant hade up with. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    After all, given what he had managed to learn about him so far, he seemed to be prepared for most situations and had a solution to them.


    Given that he had decided to stay in the city, even though he knew about the danger that came along with it, meant that he should have a way to avoid the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators¡­


    Ssh!


    Just as Chu Yang was wondering what kind of method the entric merchant nned on using to avoid the detection of the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, he suddenly saw him jumping into arge river running straight through the city.


    "Follow me or you will have to find a way out of this ce on your own!"


    And along with those few words, he dived beneath the surface of the water. Disappearing from view.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this, Chu Yang could not help slightly raising an eyebrow.


    Although hiding in the river might be a good option when facing weaker cultivators, when confronted with the powerful divine sense of someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, it wouldn''t make much of a difference whether someone was hiding inside a building or below water.


    Ssh!


    However, curious about what the entric merchant was nning to escape the sight of the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, Chu Yang still decided to follow him into the river. Soon catching up to the entric merchant who skillfully swam through the strong current. Soon enough stopping in front of a small hatch located at the bottom of the river.


    This¡­ A concealment formation? Although rtively low quality, it should be more than enough to avoid the divine sense of someone in the Nascent Soul Realm if they don''t pay attention. Indeed, this fellow is quite prepared when ites to escaping danger¡­


    Seeing the small hatch at the bottom of the river, Chu Yang could not help showing a slightly surprised expression on his face, as he realized that the hatch actually had a concealment formation ced on top of it.


    Even if the quality of the formation was low, it still showed that the entric merchant had far more talent when it came to formations than he had first let on with his small but useless trinkets.


    Follow me!


    Not aware of Chu Yang''s thoughts, the entric merchant turned around and signaled for him to follow, as he used all of his strength to open the hatch and swim inside.


    Following closely behind, Chu Yang soon found himself inside a narrow tunnel that was still filled with water, as he watched the entric merchant quickly swim past him before closing the hatch behind him. Not wasting a second after that before he moved past him and rapidly moved through the tunnel.


    Considering that someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm couldn''t hold their breath forever, he had a limited time on his hand and clearly wanted to get out of the water as fast as possible, as they had already spent close to five minutes under the water by the time they reached the small hatch.


    Like this, close to fifteen minutes flew by with them moving through the increasingly narrow tunnel filled with water before they finally managed to reach the other side of the tunnel-


    "Haaaa!"


    Where the entric merchant almost copsed on the ground as he greedily breathed in air after having spent twenty minutes under water.Almost having reached the limit of what was possible for someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm when it came to not breathing, a truly impressive feat on its own.


    However,pared to the entric merchant who was nowying on the ground recovering from the long underwater escape through a very narrow tunnel that made it hard to move towards the end, Chu Yang stood uppletely fine without any sign of water on his body as he looked around the small dark space that he now found himself inside of.


    Outside of the fact that the small space wasn''t made by hand but should instead be some kind of natural underground cave that had been formed over a long time, Chu Yang almost instantly noticed that there was only a small tunnel connected to the space that he would only be able to move through by crawling.


    "What is this ce?"


    Unable to contain his curiosity as he finished looking around the small cave, Chu Yang could not help turning back towards the entric merchant who had somewhat recovered at this point in time as he asked him outright.


    "This¡­ Is a ce I found in the past during my time looking for safe locations to hide in case something happened in the city. The cave itself might be small, but there is a constant supply of fresh airing from the small tunnel connected to this cave, we can stay here until things calm down back in the city and then make our way back through the underwater tunnel."


    "What about the tunnel connected to this cave? Given that it provides a constant stream of fresh air, it means that it should be connected to the outside, why not follow that instead of swimming through that ce¡­?"


    "I¡­ Tried in the past, but the location it leads to is somewhere inside the city lord''s mansion at the center of the city. Although the formation guarding that ce didn''t discover me as it seemed to be in the process of undergoing maintenance or something along that line, I doubt something like that will happen if I try going through that ce again. Especially considering that there are currently a lot of wandering cultivators present in the city at the moment.


    Even if the formation needed some kind of maintenance, I doubt the city lord would choose this kind of time to shut it down and do so." Thinking for a brief moment before saying this, the entric merchant helplessly shook his head before going back to recovering his strength.


    Considering that he would once again have to fight his way back through the underwater tunnel to get back out again, he had to fully recover his strength as fast as possible if he wanted to leave alive with his current strength.


    "Leads straight to the city lord''s mansion¡­" Narrowing both of his eyes as he muttered this to himself after hearing what the entric merchant said, Chu Yang could not help feeling like there was something wrong with what the entric merchant said.


    First of all, a formation going through maintenance would still be active to some extent¡­ And the merchant would have never been able to avoid detection with his strength.


    Instead of that, it was likely that instead of the formation being under maintenance like the entric merchant suspected, Chu Yang felt that it was far more likely that the entric merchant had managed to unknowingly find a w in the formation guarding the city lord''s mansion. Essentially allowing him to freely enter the mansion without alerting the people inside.


    Of course, the merchant was far too weak and would almost definitely be spotted if he tried to actually enter the city lord mansion sneakily.


    However, if it was someone stronger, it could prove fatal to the city lord and the people in the mansion. Especially if that someone happened to be their enemies¡­


    Luckily for them, Chu Yang wasn''t their enemy nor did he feel interested in selling the information on this w in the formation, as it would also end up ruining the hiding spot of his new friend.

 Chapter 1341 Eccentric Merchant Lao

    Chapter 1341 entric Merchant Lao


    Staying silent inside the small cave that was located close to the city lord''s mansion, Chu Yang could not help taking out hismunication talisman to check on whether or not he had gotten a response from Elder Dust Fairy during the time he had spent wandering around the outskirts of the city and asking about the situation of the ce.


    Hm? She already responded?


    However, though he had turned to check hismunication talisman for a response, he hadn''t actually expected to see one. Mainly because he had contact Elder Dust Fairy not through her ownmunication talismans, but through one of the sect''s standardmunication systems in ce for disciples to contact the different elders in case something that warranted an elders help happened.


    Unknown to Chu Yang, who still thought of himself as a disciple of the sect, hismunication to the sect had long since been prioritized and would immediately go through to the elder he wanted to contact. Resulting in Elder Dust Fairy learning about the existence of the entric merchant almost the same second that the information reached the Star Shattering Sect. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    She wants to bring him back to the sect¡­


    And reading through the short message, Elder Dust Fairy made it clear that she wanted to recruit the entric merchant into the sect and make him a part of the sect''s informationwork. Even stating that she had already informed one of the sect''s Domain Lord Realm cultivators about the situation and the Domain Lord Realm cultivator in question had already left the sect to pick up the entric merchant and bring him.


    Instructing Chu Yang to leave amunication talisman and something that could be used to identify him when the Domain Lord Realm cultivator of the sect appeared.


    Isn''t this too much¡­? I just mentioned that he seems good at blending in and avoiding danger, is there a need for something like this?


    Not able to understand why Elder Dust Fairy attached so much importance to the entric merchant, even to the point where she had somehow managed to convince Elder Song to dispatch a Domain Lord Realm Elder of the sect to pick him, Chu Yang could not help turning to take a second nce at the entric merchant.


    No matter how he looked at it, he just couldn''t see what had caused Elder Dust Fairy to seemingly go all in to bring this person back to the sect. After all, his cultivation was only at the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm and while his skill in terms of avoiding danger and blending in was impressive in his eyes, they weren''t at the level that required the level of importance that Elder Dust Fairy seemed to attach to bring him back to the sect.


    Whatever, this has nothing to do with me and is Elder Dust Fairy''s decision. If she thinks it''s worth it, I won''t question it. After all, my specialty isn''t in the field of information gathering¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while still looking at the entric merchant who was fully focused on recovering his strength so he could safely make it back out the way he hade from, Chu Yang decided to formally invite him to the Star Shattering Sect after he finished recovering and also inform him that someone woulde to pick him up.


    Considering his identity as nothing more than a small merchant who spent his time tinkering away with small trinkets to be sold inside the Demon Mountain City, Chu Yang didn''t consider that the merchant would refuse.


    After all, he would be far safer as a member of the Star Shattering Sectpared to what he was doing for a living at the moment, while at the same time he would also stand a far better chance at advancing his cultivation in the future by joining the Star Shattering Sect.


    In case he had a family of some sort, they could also join him and live inside the Falling Star City located at the base of the Ninth Star Peak.


    Like this, a few hours quickly flew by with Chu Yang and the entric merchant both quietly sitting inside the small cave as one was recovering his strength and waiting for the situation outside to calm down, while the second was just waiting for the other to finish recovering his strength so he could officially extend an invitation to join the Star Shattering Sect on behalf of Elder Dust Fairy.


    "Finally recovered enough to go through that tunnel again, though the situation outside should still be a few hours before it calms down again¡­" It was just after the four-hour mark of them having reached the small cave that the entric merchant finally finished fully recovering his strength, as he opened both of his eyes while muttering this to himself.


    Although four hours had already flown by, it was clear that the entric merchant was still not ready to leave the small cave and return to the city. Fearing that the wandering cultivators at the Nascent Soul Realm were still roaming the streets of the city looking for any weaker cultivators that they could use to scout the way for them inside the ancient ruins.


    "Recovered?" Sitting only a few meters away from him, Chu Yang instantly noticed this, as he asked to confirm that he could start what would likely turn into a rather long conversation.


    "Hm? Ah! Yes, I''m fine now. Unfortunately, I''m not in the Core Formation like you, so holding my breath for such a long time is a rather difficult endeavor. Unfortunately emptying the water from the tunnel is impossible, as the river water would soon seep in and fill up the ce again within a few hours¡­" Nodding his head in response as he said this with a somewhat embarrassed expression on his face, the entric merchant turned around to face Chu Yang. Not having forgotten about the stranger that had travelled along with him into the city and one of his hiding spots across the city.


    Although he was normally not someone to easily make friends with stranger, he found himself strangely attached to Chu Yang, who seemed like a good person from his interactions with him so far.


    Not to mention, considering that he was someone in the Core Formation Realm and stronger than him, he didn''t fear him doing anything against him, as he would have long since had an opportunity to do so while they were traveling towards the Demon Mountain City.


    After all, even though the city had countless powerful cultivators in the Nascent Soul Realm and above, none of them would care about a small merchant in the Foundation Establishment Realm like himself being attacked on the road to the city.


    Only if something happened inside the city itself would these powerful cultivators take act, as it could be considered damaging to the reputation of the city if someone could just kill people inside the city without anything happening.


    "Good, I have something to talk to you about, an opportunity that I''m sure you won''t give up on¡­" Nodding his head as he heard what the entric merchant said, Chu Yang put on a far more serious expression as he officially extended an invitation towards the entric merchant. Inviting him to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although the merchant was extremely confused at first, as he had never really heard about the Star Shattering Sect from the small vige, he spent most of his life in. After asking about the sect itself and the reason why he had been invited to join the sect, the entric merchant was soon fully convinced and decided to agree on bing a part of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course, one of the main reasons why he trusted Chu Yang''s words was the fact that Chu Yang personally demonstrated his Domain Lord Realm strength to the merchant. Fully convincing him of the strength of the Star Shattering Sect that Chu Yang had told him about.


    At the same time, Chu Yang also managed to learn more about the entric merchant and who he was.


    For one, the name of the entric merchant was Lao and second, Lao was far younger than he had first thought, being only a little over a hundred years old.


    Although he was still old considering the lifespan of those in the Foundation Establishment only being 200 years, he wasn''t old enough that he wouldn''t stand a chance of reaching the Core Formation Realm on his own before his lifespan ran out. Especially considering that he was already at the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm


    And so, following the conversation between the twoing to an end, Chu Yang handed him a few different cultivation resources along with themunication talisman and other things Elder Dust Fairy had asked him to give the entric merchant Lao before he left him on his own inside the cave. Not intending to stay around and wait in there for another twelve hours like Lao was nning to do¡­

 Chapter 1342 Elder Dust Fairys Thoughts

    Chapter 1342 Elder Dust Fairy''s Thoughts


    Leaving behind the entric merchant Lao inside the small cave hideout after having sessfully recruited him to join the sect and handed over the things Elder Dust Fairy had asked him to give him so he could properly be identified by the Domain Lord Realm Elder who would be showing up to take him back to the sect, Chu Yang soon found himself at the shore of the river where the entrance to the tunnel leading into the cave hideout was located.


    Because of the rtively secluded location next to the river that the hatch was located in, he managed to easily make it out without being noticed by anyone in the process.


    Of course, one of the reasons why he wasn''t noticed was also because most of the cultivators normally on the nearby streets had long since left, either to search for weaker cultivators to use for exploring the ancient ruins or to escape from bing a scout of these stronger cultivators.


    The only few people still on the streets not too far away, were a few of the guards casually patrolling along with a few permanent residents who were living under the protection of the city itself as they were tasked with doing some menialbor to keep the city running.


    Even though their strength was only between the Qi Condensation Realm and the Foundation Establishment Realm, none of the wandering cultivators currently roaming through the city in search of usable scout for their exploration dared to target them, as that would go directly against the city lord of the Demon Mountain City, an existence at the Soul Ascension Realm. Not someone that a few wandering cultivators in the Nascent Soul Realm had the courage to offend over a few scouts for their exploration of the ancient ruins. Especially when they could just go after the other wandering cultivators who were weaker than them for something like that.


    "I should adjust my strength a bit so I won''te off as someone at the Core Formation Realm or I might get targeted by those Nascent Soul Realm cultivators as well." Muttering this to himself as he scanned the streets and saw nobody above the Core Formation Realm present outside of the few patrolling guards, Chu Yang wasted no time as he adjusted his strength from the Core Formation Realm to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Although this kind of disguise in terms of cultivation realm would almost instantly get seen through by someone in the Domain Lord Realm the moment, they used their domain to observe him or just focus their attention on him, it was still more than good enough when it came to fooling those wandering cultivators in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    So, with his outwards cultivation realm being adjusted to the Nascent Soul Realm, Chu Yang made his way deeper inside the city to official start his search for information on how to safely pass through the mountain range. Hoping that the information won''t be too hard to find for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    If it really did turn out that even someone in the Nascent Soul Realm wouldn''t be able to acquire the information, he would be forced to use his Domain Lord Realm cultivation base to try and find out about it.


    The only problem with this was that doing so would undoubtedly result in him having to interact with other Domain Lord Realm cultivators, something that had a high likelihood of backfiring, as his flimsy attempt to hide his age would easily get seen through.


    ¡­


    At the same time Chu Yang was heading further inside the Demon Mountain City to search for information on the safe passage through the mountain range, Elder Dust Fairy was looking off into the distance with a somewhat absent look on her face.


    "Elder? Is something the matter?" Just at this moment, a young girl around the age of 16 entered the office that Elder Dust Fairy was sitting in, as she directly opened her mouth to speak upon seeing how Elder Dust Fairy was looking out of the nearby window with an uncharacteristic absent look on her face.


    "Hm? Little Yue? Hehe, it''s nothing for you, my dear disciple, to worry about, I was just thinking about the person that Grand Elder Xuan''s disciple informed me on not too long ago and was a little lost in thought." n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "The merchant? Hm¡­ From the way Senior Brother Chu Yang described the merchant, he didn''t seem too impressed and just informed us because he thought this merchant might be of some use to us, though, I fail to understand why elder would take it serious enough to ask Elder Song to send Elder Xuefeng to bring him back.


    In my eyes, it would be fine to just have that merchant try and make his way to the sect on his own, though the distance is long, and he won''t be able to make it with his weak cultivation realm, he should at least struggle for a few years to show that his dedication to joining the sect!" Tilting her head in confusion as she said this, the girl referred to as little Yue by Elder Dust Fairy simply couldn''t understand why her master was so interested in some random merchant.


    "And that is why I''m the master and you''re the disciple, did you forget who the person informing us about this little merchant is?"


    "Of course not! How wouldn''t I know about senior brother Chu Yang, a disciple of Grand Elder Xuan and also a terrifying cultivator at the Domain Lord Realm! Among all the disciples of the sect, who doesn''t know about senior brother Chu Yang? Especially those who visit the Combat Hall!" Saying this with an excited expression on her face as she talked about Chu Yang, little Yue soon turned to her master with a confused expression on her face. "But master, what does any of this have to do with this little merchant?"


    "Everything! Chu Yang is well known for not being easy to earn praise from, something that a lot of the sect''s elders personally experienced when he went around challenging every one of them back when he was still in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    For this merchant to earn his praise even though he is just a little merchant at the Foundation Establishment Realm without any significant background¡­ It can only mean that this merchant is truly impressive even without any help. Meaning that his talents for the art of information gathering might be far more terrifying than even your master if properly nurtured!"


    "This¡­ I never thought about it like this. My apologies master!" hearing what her master said, little Yue realized that she had indeed never heard about Chu Yang praising anyone before outside of a few of his fellow personal disciples who were simrly terrifying in their own way.


    "It''s good that you understand. In return, when that merchant gets to sect, I will put you in charge of him for the first two weeks of his stay at the sect. Perhaps this will help learn what it is about him that is so special that he even earned the praise of Chu Yang." Nodding her head as she said this, Elder Dust Fairy signaled for her little disciple to leave.


    Soon enough leaving her by herself inside her office as she once again continued to stare out the window where a small group of disciples could be seen practicing under the guidance of an elder in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The disciples and the elder were all part of her attempt to nurture a new generation of information gathering experts for the sect. After all, even though she had no n to step down from her position as the head of the sect''s information gatheringwork any time soon, she nned to at least have a suitable sessor when that time came.


    Little Yue, one of the disciples she had taken a few years earlier following her bing the person in charge of both the servant quarters and the sect''s informationwork, was one of the people that she had started nurturing for the express purpose of bing a sessor in case something happened to her or she decided to step down when she became older.


    Of course, with the news of the entric merchant and hearing how even someone as stingy with praise as Chu Yang had praised him in his ability to blend in and adapt to his surroundings, Elder Dust Fairy had a feeling that this little merchant would prove to be a good disciple for her to nurture. Maybe even putting some pressure on little Yue to improve more, as she had started cking quite a bit since she already stood far above the rest of the disciples, she had taken in.


    "Hehe, a good challenge indeed, I hope this little merchant won''t disappoint me." Chuckling to herself as she thought about the future, Elder Dust Fairy soon focused her attention back on the work waiting for her on the desk.

 Chapter 1343 Gathering In Front of the Explorer Union Branch

    Chapter 1343 Gathering In Front of the Explorer Union Branch


    Moving further into the city following the slight adjustment to his cultivation base, it didn''t take long before Chu Yang found out where the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators that had been hunting down weaker cultivators that could be used as scouts had gone, as all of them seemed to be gathered together in front of arge building that he quickly identified as the Explorer Union Branch of the Demon Mountain City.


    Indeed, even though it had been a few hours since he and Lao had hidden away, these Nascent Soul Realm wandering cultivators hadn''t left for the ancient ruins discovered by the Explorer Union yet¡­ And looking at therge number of weaker cultivators who had simrly gathered in front of the Explorer Union, Chu Yang guessed that it shouldn''t be too long before they left.


    At least, with his current cultivation disying a pressure akin to someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, he didn''t get more than a few nces from those Nascent Soul Realm cultivators before they focused their attention back on what seemed to be discussing the ancient ruins they were about to enter.


    Continuing to move past the group of wandering Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, Chu Yang couldn''t help slowing down his pace as he listened in on what these Nascent Soul Realm cultivators were talking about.


    "I really hope everything works out as expected¡­"


    "Yeah, even if those people from the Explorer Union said that the ruins aren''t too dangerous for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, I have a feeling they aren''t talking about people like us still in the Earlier Stages of the Nascent Soul Realm, but instead those in the Later Stages!"


    "So what? Do you perhaps want to give up an opportunity like this? The ancient ruins are bound to have all sorts of treasures hidden inside and with the city lord himself leading the way, I doubt there will be too much danger for us."


    "Indeed, we will just have to try and stay behind the city lord and his people while picking up the things they aren''t interested in¡­ And considering the weakest among the ones from the city lord''s mansion joining this expedition is at the Domain Lord Realm, we should be able to get a lot of treasures with rtive ease!"


    Although the conversations between the different wandering cultivators at the Nascent Soul Realm left much to be desired, Chu Yang wasn''t too disappointed by the information he had managed to learn, as it seemed like the city lord of the Demon Mountain City would be leaving the city together with the wandering cultivators and people from the Explorer Union.


    In such a situation, the Demon Mountain City would be far safer for him to move around inside of, as the main danger inside the Demon Mountain City was the city lord''s mansion.


    The reason for this was that outside of the city lord himself who was a powerful cultivator at the Soul Ascension Realm, there was rumored to be another Soul Ascension Realm cultivator hidden inside the city lord mansion¡­ And that was not mentioning the dozen or so Domain Lord Realm cultivators serving under the city lord.


    All things considered; it made sense why even an empire like the Sky Empire would prefer a friendly rtionship with such a powerful force. Especially when considering that the Demon Mountain City just existed as a branch of arger power inside the neutral territory between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire.


    Guess the smartest option would be to wait until those wandering cultivators and the city lord leaves the city before I start trying to ask around about the safe passage through the mountain range. After all, the less powerful cultivators around, the better-


    "Hey, you!"


    However, just as Chu Yang was lost in his own thoughts and was about to leave the area where the wandering cultivators in the Nascent Soul Realm had gathered, someone called out to him, causing Chu Yang to turn around with a confused expression on his face.


    "I don''t recognize you¡­ Oh well, the city lord order for all wandering cultivators at the Nascent Soul Realm to gather in front of the Explorer Union and prepare to head out for the ancient ruins in a short while, I rmend not leaving this ce or you risk offending the city lord!"


    "This¡­" Not knowing what to say as he turned around and heard what the one calling out to him just now said, Chu Yang wanted to cry, as he suddenly realized that if the wandering cultivators in the Nascent Soul Realm were looking for someone to scout the way ahead for them, so would the city lord at the Soul Ascension Realm.


    The main difference being the strength of the scouts who were now all at the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ And given that all of these people were wandering cultivators without any real background, there was nothing they could do other than listen to the orders of the city lord and follow hismand.


    At the very least, things weren''t too bad for them, and they would still benefit from exploring the ancient ruins without too much risk with a powerful Soul Ascension Realm cultivator around.


    The only problem was that Chu Yang was not really interested in exploring the ancient ruins. Even more so because it would require him to interact with the city lord at the Soul Ascension Realm along with his subordinates at the Domain Lord Realm.


    No matter how good his little disguise was at fooling someone weaker than himself, he doubted that it would work against someone at the Domain Lord Realm, let alone someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    However, if he left the ce before the city lord arrived, he might end up offending the city lord like one of the wandering cultivators was kind enough to remind him about, something that would still end up with him catching the attention of the city lord.


    Maybe I should just use one of the defensive measures that master left for me to intimidate the city lord into showing me the safe passage through the mountain range before leaving the city.


    Narrowing both of his eyes slightly as he thought about this, Chu Yang felt like a good n.


    The main problem was the fact that he would definitely end up getting exposed if he did something like that and would cause future problems for himself down the line.


    The only way to avoid any future problems would be to borrow his master''s strength to wipe out the Demon Mountain City and erase any traces of himself, but¡­ Considering that he didn''t want to kill so many innocent people, Chu Yang chose against this option.


    Even if he was willing to carry it out and kill off the entire city after getting the information he wanted, it was likely that the destruction of the city would draw the attention of the nearby Blue Sea Empire due to their increased attention on the area because of therge number of demonic cultivators surging into what could be considered territory under their protection. Resulting in them likely suspecting that the destruction of the city was done by a demonic cultivator, that they would then try and chase down before any more damage was caused.


    Of course, outside all of this, there was also the fact that his master''s defensive measure might not even attack to destroy the city in the first ce¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Chu Yang ultimately decided to¡­ Not stay, as he quickly left the area around the explorer union branch under the pitying look of the wandering cultivator that had stepped up to warn him only seconds earlier.


    Staying might have been a good option under normal circumstances, but Chu Yang didn''t want to run the risk if he could avoid it.


    Even if this ended up resulting in him offending the city lord, he didn''t care too much about it as the city lord would be too busy to care about a little Nascent Soul Realm cultivator at the moment. Giving him more than enough time to find out about the safe passage through the mountain range and leave the Demon Mountain City before the city lord and the rest of the wandering cultivators returned to the city.


    However, just to be on the safe side, Chu Yang decided to find a small inn a bit further away from the center of the city to wait until the city lord and wandering cultivators left. Lowing his cultivation all the way down to the Qi Condensation Realm as he tried blending in with the locals by finding a secluded spot to order something to eat as he sat down and looked out a nearby window pointed in the direction the explorer union branch.


    Rumble~! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Like this, a little over half an hour flew by before Chu Yang saw a small group of people arriving in the air above the explorer union branch before they descended for a short time and soon left again together with therge number of wandering cultivators at the Nascent Soul Realm and below.

 Chapter 1344 Progress of the Disciples

    Chapter 1344 Progress of the Disciples


    Watching as the wandering cultivators left together with the people he presumed to be from the city lord''s mansion, Chu Yang silently felt a weight lift off his shoulders as he didn''t have to worry about being caught by the people from the city lord''s mansion any longer.


    After all, even though he had been confident when leaving the explorer union branch, he didn''t truly want to deal with someone at the Soul Ascension Realm like the city lord if it could be avoided. Especially considering that the only method he had to deal with someone like that was the talismans that his master had left with him in case he encountered a situation that he couldn''t deal with on his own.


    Given that he would soon be entering the core region of the continent where Soul Ascension Realm cultivators and even those above the Soul Ascension Realm weremon, he really didn''t want to waste his limited number of talismans when he didn''t have to, as he had no idea how many of them, he would need after he found a way to pass through the mountain range.


    In the end, because of this, Chu Yang decided to wait inside the small inn for another half hour before he finally left the inn to go around and ask about a method to safely pass through the mountain range. Hoping that doing this wouldn''t end up with him having to confront someone in the Domain Lord Realm or above.


    After all, even though the city lord had already left the city, it was still rumored that there was someone else in the Soul Ascension Realm inside the city lord mansion. Not to mention, it wasn''t odd for there to be some hidden soul ascension realm cultivators passing through the city, as it could still be considered an entrance point into the core region of the continent.


    ¡­


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, following Xuefeng leaving the sect to pick up the entric merchant Lao, it didn''t take long for information about this merchant and the fact that Chu Yang was the one who rmended him began to spread among the elders who had personally experienced Chu Yang''s might when he had been dragging different Nascent Soul Realm elders to the Combat Hall for practice¡­


    "I heard he is someone only in the Foundation Establishment Rm but has the strength to fight with those in the Core Formation Realm!"


    "He, your news is outdated, I heard he can not just fight someone in the Core Formation Realm, but instead fight someone at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm with his Foundation Establishment Realm cultivation base!"


    "I also heard that he wields a massive two-handed awe more than five meters tall when fighting and that is what first caught Chu Yang''s attention when passing by."


    "From what I heard, it wasn''t the massive axe that caught his attention, but instead his massive figure standing almost three meters tall. Surpassing even demon beasts at the same real in terms of physical strength!"


    "Hehe, all of you are¡­"


    Of course, the conversations taking ce between the different elders of the sect who had all once been beaten up by Chu Yang didn''t really focus on the fact that the merchant he had personally rmended to join the sect under Elder Dust Fairy in charge of the sect''s information gathering. Instead, they all focused on the fact that it was someone who had managed to catch the attention of Chu Yang¡­ And in their heads, the only person who could do something like that would be someone with impressive martial prowess.


    "Hm? Chu Yang found someone and recruited them a behalf of the sect? Maybe I should take a look and see how talented that person is when he shows up." Even Xuan Hao who had been focused on his cultivation couldn''t help muttering this to himself after hearing about what the elders of the sect were chatting about.


    Wondering if the person chosen by his second disciple was talented enough to potential bing his next disciple.


    Even if he was a bit olderpared to the rest of the disciples he had taken in, Xuan Hao didn''t particrly care about it, as there wasn''t really any requirement on the age of disciples.


    Not to mention, in the future, he would undoubtedly encounter older people with enough talent to be taken in as a disciple.


    The only real problem that came with taking older cultivators on as disciples was that they were almost definitely already taken.


    Considering the talent that he deemed minimum for taking someone in as a disciple, it would almost be certain that they would have already revealed part of this talent after they got the chance to cultivate.


    The only potential way for him to take on an older disciple was to find someone old and talented who hadn''t embarked on the path of cultivation yet or to snatch the disciples from others, both of these methods were difficult to aplish in their own way, as the new disciple would have to acknowledge him as master wholeheartedly for the system to consider the person one of his disciples.


    If not, they would not really be a disciple. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Thinking about his disciples, Xuan Hao decided to take the opportunity to use the system to check out how much they had improved over the past few months since his return from the mystic realm.


    ? First Disciple, Qing Yi ? Race: Human Talent: 45 Dao: Dao of Fire (Domain), Dao of Alchemy (Pseudo Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Fire, Dao of Wind, Dao of Light, Dao of Space, Dao of Alchemy Physique: Bright Sun Divine Physique (Peak Stage, Small Sun Realm) Realm: Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Profession: Alchemy (Master Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Heaven Burning Mantra First of all, Qing Yi, she hadn''t made much progresspared tost time he had checked on her. Not too surprising considering that she had been using most of her time deepening her understanding of the Dao of Alchemy after reaching the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    ? Second Disciple, Chu Yang ? Race: Human Talent: 57 Dao: Dao of the Spear (Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Earth, Dao of Blood, Dao of ughter, Dao of Death Physique: No Special Physique Rmended Physique: Six Paths of ughter Divine Physique (Can be refined) Realm: Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Cultivation Mantra: Soul Spear Divine Mantra Chu Yang on the other hand had clearly improved in terms of strength, as he had managed to breakthrough to the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm during his journey outside the sect. Showing that it was a good idea for him to leave the sect and journey on his own and refine his Dao of the Spear in this way.


    ? Third Disciple, Bai Ning ? Race: Human, Heavenly Sky Serpent Talent: 34 Dao: Dao of cksmithing (Pseudo Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Metal, Dao of Fire, Dao of Formations, Dao of Wind Bloodline: Heavenly Sky Serpent (Dormant) Realm: Seventh Stage Nascent Soul Realm Profession: cksmithing (Master Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Unformed Mantra On the other hand, Bai Ning was clearly going through a period of explosive growth, as he had somehow managed to reach the Late Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm in a rtively short period of time following his breakthrough to the Master Realm in cksmithing.


    ? Fourth Disciple, Mui ? Race: Human Talent: 78 Potential Dao: Dao of Water, Dao of Darkness, Dao of Ice, Dao of Space, Dao of Chaos Physique: Deste Ancient Moon Physique (Dormant) Realm: Eighth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm Profession: cksmithing (Abysmal), Formation Master (Abysmal) Cultivation Mantra: Myriad Water Art


    Next up was Mui, who had slowed down her cultivation speed significantly since returning to the sect. Although, the reason for her slow down in cultivation speed didn''t have much to do with her talent, but more so had to do with the fact that she had been trying really hard to learn the art of talisman making.


    Unfortunately for Mui, the art of talisman making was incredibly difficult and also required some understanding of the Dao of Formations. Making her attempts to learn how to create her own talismans unsessful so far, though that might have more to do with the fact that the Star Shattering Sect not really having anyone especially skilled in the art of talismans and the only ones with some mastery over talismans was Xuan Hao who had mostly learned about it through reading the records and texts stored in the sect''s library.


    ? Fifth Disciple, Chun Hua ? Race: Nature Spirit, Tree Spirit Talent: 67 Dao: Dao of Nature (Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Wood, Dao of Life, Dao of Water Physique: Spirit Physique Realm: Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Profession: Alchemy (Expert Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Heart of the Forest Last was Chun Hua. Although her cultivation had not increased, it was because she had been learning alchemy from Qing Yi¡­ And looking at how she had already managed to reach the Expert Realm, it seemed like she was also talented in the Dao of Alchemy.


    All things considered, all of his disciples were growing well and those below the Domain Lord Realm were getting close to reaching the Domain Lord Realm.

 Chapter 1345 Different Techniques

    Chapter 1345 Different Techniques


    Given the growth speed of his disciples, it wouldn''t be long before he once again saw the system appear again, as it should show up again when Bai Ning or Mui broke through to the Domain Lord Realm, as he would then have four disciples at the Domain Lord Realm.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help looking forward to what he might get when he had four disciples reach the Domain Lord Realm, as even though the system had begun to appear less and less with his increase in strength, it was still extremely useful when it came to helping increase his strength. Especially so when it came to deepening his understanding of different professions, as it was the main reason why he even began the process of learning different professions like alchemy in the first ce.


    For one, he still had the source crystal and the time stone around that he had gotten from the system thest time around¡­ And although both of these things were a bit powerful for him to use at his current realm, it wouldn''t be long before he had a chance to use them. Mainly the source crystal, as he wanted to use it to increase the realm of his Dao of Space from the Large Sess Realm to the Perfection Realm when he reached the bottleneck at the Peak of the Large Sess Realm of the Dao of Space in the future.


    Of course, before that, he would have to continue strengthening his soul enough so that he wouldn''t end up dying the moment he used the source crystal. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    The only way he had to do that at the moment was to either increase his cultivation realm and give up on trying to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm or to continue deepening his understanding of more Daos, as doing so did bring certain benefits and helped further strengthen his soul.


    Among all the Daos he hadprehended so far, some had a better effect on the soulpared to others and the one with the best effect in terms of strengthening his soul was the Dao of Illusions followed by the Dao of Alchemy, Dao of Formations and Dao of cksmithing respectively.


    Before taking the source crystal, he nned to try and see if he could break through to the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Illusions and have all three profession rted Daos reach the Large Sess Realm.


    Although difficult, it would be something he had to do at some point, as he still needed toprehend three different Daos to the Perfection Realm and six to therge Sess Realm if he wanted to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Something he was still far off from aplishing at the moment, as only his Dao of Illusions, Dao of Space and Dao of the Sword had reached the Large Sess Realm so far¡­ And when he promoted those three to the Perfection Realm in the future, he would need another six Daos to reach the Large Sess Realm to take their ce¡­


    "Haaa¡­ Truly difficult to aplish, I wonder just how long it will take for me to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain LordRealm¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself while thinking about how far away he still was from reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could not help ncing over his status.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Small Sess), Dao of the Sword (Large Sess), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess), Dao of Space (Large Sess), Dao of Illusions (Large Sess Realm), Dao of cksmithing (Small Sess), Dao of Light (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Formations (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Alchemy (Small Sess) Dao Lotus: 14yers, (Possibleyers 16) Sword Intent: Sword Soul Realm Talent: ???? Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened) Physique: Ster Dao Body (99% Awakened)


    Realm: Late Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm) Professions: Alchemist (Grandmaster), Formation Master (Grandmaster), cksmithing (Pseudo Saint) Sect: Star Shattering Sect Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui, Chun Hua Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm) Cultivation Mantra: The Untold Swords Mantra Looking through his status that hadn''t changed that much outside of the slight increase in strength following his Dao of Space breaking through to the Large Sess Realm, Xuan Hao was about to turn his attention towards the different Daos he hadprehended to figure which ones among them to focus onprehending up to the Large Sess Realm in the future outside of the three he had already chosen, when he suddenly noticed something new below his status-


    [Techniques]


    A new section called techniques that could be expanded¡­ And so, feeling curious, Xuan Hao decided to try and expand this new section that had appeared in his status.


    [Personal Techniques]: Descend of the Ice God''s Sword (High Earth Rank)


    [Movement Techniques]: Illusory Light Steps (Mid Heaven Rank), Drifting Cloud Steps (Iplete, Peak Heaven Rank)


    [Sword Techniques]: Rain Sword (Peak Mortal Rank), Heaven Splitting Sword Art (Iplete, Mid Heaven Rank), Void Sword Art (Iplete, Low Heaven Rank), Untold Sword Mantra (Iplete, Unknown)


    Looking through the new section that had appeared, Xuan Hao realized that it noted down the different techniques he had learnt so far along with the ones he had created. Although, looking through the list of techniques only numbering a handful, it seemed like there was some kind of requirement, as far from all of the techniques he had learnt so far had made it into the technique section.


    Even then, Xuan Hao was more than happy seeing the new section that had appeared, as it allowed him to gain some insight into the level of past techniques he had learnt. For one, his self-created technique had reached the level of High Earth Rank, a Dao Seed Realm technique, while the Drifting Cloud Steps that he didn''t have too much knowledge about turned out to be far more amazing than he had first expected.


    However, even more amazing than the Drifting CloudSteps was the untold sword mantra that still managed to elude him to this day. Even the system didn''t know what rank this technique was. Although he had a feeling that this was due to the fact that he just hadn''t learnt about the techniques above the Heaven Rank outside a brief mention that they were beyond the scope of the Profound Immortal Realm.


    Outside of that, there was also the heaven splitting sword art that he had partly neglected as he focused his full attention onprehending the Dao of Space and how to use it inbat, it turned out to be a terrifying technique at the Mid heaven Rank. Not to mention, it was still iplete, meaning that it might be far more terrifying than just a simple Mid Heaven Rank sword art.


    Then there was the first volume of the Void Sword Arts.


    During the time he had spentprehending the Dao of Space in attempt to breakthrough to the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space, he had also started learning the Void Sword Arts. Although he did manage to have some sess in it, it was not a lot given he mostly focused on the aspects rted to the Dao of Space in the technique.


    "But¡­ I wonder why no other techniques are noted down? The long-distance teleportation technique that I recently managed to learn should definitely suffice in terms of quality whenpared to a technique like the Rain Sword¡­" Muttering this to himself as he shook his head while looking over the few techniques that had been listed, Xuan Hao could only give up trying to figure out how the system worked as he shifted his attention towardsprehending the Dao of Illusions instead of the Dao of Space.


    At this moment, the only thing on his mind outside of his disciples was the matter rted to Xuan Gui.


    Although he had no idea when she would need his help in getting into the Blue Sea Empire, he had already managed to learn the long-distance teleportation technique in a rtively short span of time since reaching the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space and was now fully capable and confident in helping her enter the Blue Sea Empire and escaping without any trouble.


    With his current mastery over the Dao of Space, even someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm would find it close to impossible to catch him. Especially considering that he had managed to learn the long-distance teleportation technique.


    The only real weakness he had was his sect, that couldn''t escape like him, though, if the Blue Sea Empire did start causing problems, he at least had some confidence in being able to retaliate against them to some extent. Even if he couldn''t target locations guarded by their Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors¡­

 Chapter 1346 Buying Information

    Chapter 1346 Buying Information


    As Xuan Hao once again focused his attention onprehending the Dao of Illusions, back in the Mountain Demon City, Chu Yang walked through a small narrow alleyway located at the edge of the city before turning to enter a small storage room where a few people in the Core Formation Realm could be seen casually chatting with each other. Not at all looking like they had been affected by the recent hunt for scouts by the wandering cultivators in the Nascent Soul Realm even though their cultivation realm would have made them prime targets.


    "Hm? Is there anything we can help with?"


    Just at that moment, one of the Core Formation Realm cultivators seemed to have noticed Chu Yang entering the small storage room as he turned around and asked casually. Not at all showing any sign of respect or fear even though Chu Yang was currently showing a strengthparable to someone in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "I heard that it''s possible to buy information on not only the Demon Mountain City but also the neutral territory on the other side of the mountain range, so I came here in hope of buying information." Not showing any change in expression even though the behavior of this Core Formation Realm cultivator could be considered rather rude, Chu Yang stated his purpose.


    "Oh? You want to buy information? Buy you should know that-"


    Thump-!


    Hearing what Chu Yang said, the Core Formation Realm cultivator was just about to say something when he suddenly got interrupted by Chu Yang, who ced arge bag filled to the brim with spirit stones in front of him.


    "This¡­ Follow me, I will lead you inside and have a representative help you out!"


    Seeing therge amount of spirit stones far above what a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator could take out, the Core Formation Realm cultivator instantly understood that the person in front of him was not to be taken lightly, as he adapted a far more polite tone before signaling Chu Yang to follow him as he opened a hidden door that was located at the other end of the small storage room.


    "¡­"


    Not saying anything in response, Chu Yang just nced around the ce for a brief moment before nodding his head and following after the Core Formation Realm cultivator through the hidden door into a muchrger room where he could sense a few people at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm and even someone in the Domain Lord Realm hidden somewhere in the room.


    However, given that these people seemed to ignore him, Chu Yang didn''t care about them as he continued following behind the Core Formation Realm cultivator before arriving in a new room where there was nothing more than a small table and a few chairs that the Core Formation Realm cultivator signaled for him to sit at before turning around to leave the next second.


    In the end, Chu Yang was left alone inside the room sitting by himself as he stared nkly in the direction where he had sensed the Domain Lord Realm cultivator earlier.


    Slowly, recalling how he had ended up inside this small room after having asked around the city until finally finding out that there was a special organization specializing in selling information inside the city that not even the city lord dared to mess with.


    Although it did take some time to find the ce where he could buy this information given the fact that it wasn''t prominently located at the center of the city like the Explorer Union and the City Lord Mansion.


    Even then, it didn''t take too long to find¡­ And given that he had managed to acquire quite a substantial amount of wealth during his journey to the Demon Mountain City fighting all kinds of Domain Lord Realm cultivators along the way, Chu Yang wasn''t worried that he would be unable to buy the information he wanted.


    Creak~!


    "Hehe, sorry for making the esteemed guest wait, my name is Wang Ling, I''m the person in charge of handling most trades in the branch. So, what kind of information does the esteemed guest want to buy?"


    Straight to the point without wasting any time, the middle-aged man who appeared from another door on the other side of the small room, introduced himself before asking what he wanted to know.


    "I want to know about the safe passage through the mountain range." Feeling things were rather simple with someone so straight forward, Chu Yang decided not to waste any time either as he directly asked for the safe passage through the mountain range.


    "The safe passage through the mountain range¡­ Hm¡­ Quite a difficult one as the city lord mansion monopolizes information on that path and the path itself constantly changes every few years¡­"


    "Changes every few years¡­" Frowning as he heard what the middle-aged man Wang Ling said, Chu Yang felt like he finally understood why information about the safe passage through the mountain range had not leaked over the years.


    After all, if the passage was constantly shifting, it wouldn''t matter that much if information of the path ended up leaking to the outside world, though it did make him curious about how the city lord mansion managed to find out about the new passage through the mountain range after it changed. Especially so given brute force would not be an option given the fact that powerful demon beasts in the Soul Ascension Realm resided inside the mountain range. Making it dangerous to traverse even for someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Hehe, I said it was difficult, not impossible. If you can pay, I will be more than happy to give you information on the current safe passage through the mountain range." Smiling as he said this, the middle-aged man slowly sat down in front of Chu Yang with a bright smile on his face.


    "So¡­ How much would it cost for me to buy this information?"


    Knowing that he was most likely going to lose most of his spirit stones after seeing the smile on the face of the middle-aged man in front of him, Chu Yang could only let out a sigh internally as he prepared himself for what was about toe.


    No matter the price listed by the information broker in front of him, he had to get his hand on the safe passage through the mountain range if he wanted to continue his journey into the neutral territory between the two major empires.


    "Don''t worry, the people of the Shadow Lotus Sect have always been fair to their customers, we won''t charge you an unreasonable price for the information. Only what the information is worth¡­ And when ites to precious information like the safe passage through the dangerous mountain range, it will of course be simrly expensive!" Chuckling to himself with a slight smile as he said this, Wang Ling took out a pen and paper before writing something down on the paper and handing it over to Chu Yang.


    "Hm? This is-"


    [Shadow Lotus Sect, Information Payment]


    [Subject: Secret Safe Passage]


    [Information Level: Soul Ascension Realm]


    [Price: 5 Top Grade Spirit Stones or 500 High Grade Spirit Stones.]


    Looking over the paper, Chu Yang had no idea how to react as he just stared at the price located at the bottom of the paper with a speechless expression on his face.


    500 high grade spirit stones were an astronomical sum even to someone at the Domain Lord Realm, as for the alternative payment of top grade spirit stones¡­ Chu Yang didn''t even consider it, as he didn''t have that many top grade spirit stones on him. Even the 500 high grade spirit stones were close to everything he had on him at the moment after having gone through several Domain Lord Realm cultivators on his journey so far.


    "So? Do you want to buy the information, or would you like to look at some different information?" Seemingly not noticing the shocked expression on Chu Yang''s face, Wang Ling just casually smiled as he asked this with a kind expression on his face. Not at all looking like he was about to rob Chu Yang of all his spirit stones. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "I will buy it¡­"


    Thump!


    Knowing that he had no other way to get his hands on this information, Chu Yang could only reluctantly take out the spirit stones before handing them over to Wang Ling, who in turn smiled even more brightly than before as he took the spirit stones and stored them away inside his own interspatial ring.


    "Great! The information you want is on this jade slip and should be urate for at least the next two months. If you don''t have any more information you want to buy, I will be taking my leave."


    Whoosh-!


    Almost the second after handing over the jade slip with the information on the safe passage, did Wang Ling stand up before disappearing from the room like he had never been there before. Leaving Chu Yang to pick up the jade slip before checking the information stored inside and simrly turning to leave the same way he hade after ensuring that the information shouldn''t have been faked.

 Chapter 1347 Struggles of a Small Power

    Chapter 1347 Struggles of a Small Power


    Finding himself leaving the Demon Mountain City only a short time after getting his hands on the information, Chu Yang didn''t waste any time as he ventured inside the mountain range following the path recorded inside the jade slip.


    Although he didn''t think the people from the Shadow Lotus Sect would be wrong in the fact that their information should stillst for another few months before it became useless, he also understood that crossing the mountain range was far from a simple matter even with the help of the jade slip to guide him through a rtively safe passage.


    Even with that, it would still take him at least a month to cross the mountain range safely. Meaning he did have to leave immediately if he wanted to have some time to spare while crossing the mountain range before the information, he had just used most of his spirit stones on became invalid.


    The only real worry he had with leaving the Demon Mountain City at this moment was that he would end up running into the people from the city lord mansion who had also entered the mountain range in search of the ancient ruins that had been found by the explorer union.


    Hopefully, wherever that ruin was located, it would be somewhere far away from the safe passage through the mountain range, as he really didn''t want to get involved with the powerful people from the Demon Mountain City if it could be helped. Especially considering that he had managed to establish a somewhat unfriendly rtionship after dodging the recruitment by the city lord¡­


    As Chu Yang slowly began his journey through the mountain range and Xuan Hao being busy doing his own thing back in the sect, there wasn''t much outside the ordinary taking ce inside the Star Shattering Sect, as the demonic cultivators weren''t much of a challenge and had essentially just turned into great practice tools for the sect''s elders and disciples.


    So, with that, things inside the Star Shattering Sect continued developing normally, as the number of disciples inside the main sect slowly began growing¡­ And together with the strength of the disciples increasing, so did the strength of these disciples.


    One major change that did take ce but wasn''t that noticeable was the fact that the strength of Outer Sect Elders that had normally been at least at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm had ended up being changed to the Nascent Soul Realm. Meaning that the weakest elder in the Star Shattering Sect had now at least reached the Nascent Soul Realm and any disciple who wanted to be an elder in the future would at least have to reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Even the assistant elders who would normally be able to scoot by with their far weaker strengthpared to even the Outer Sect Elders had been changed to at least be in the Nascent Soul Realm in the future.


    Though¡­ Because of their importance in the sect''s daily running, those among them still in the Core Formation Realm had been allowed to keep their position even though their strength was below the new minimum requirement.


    At least in the future, there would be no elders below the Nascent Soul Realm even among the sect''s assistant elders.


    In turn, because of this, there had also been some changes to the cultivation realm of other levels of the sect. For one, the strength of Inner Sect Disciples had been increased and now needed one to at least reach the Core Formation Realm. Meaning those in the Qi Condensation Realm and the Foundation Establishment Realm would always be Outer Sect Disciples.


    At the same time, the strength of normal Sect Elders had been Increased to the Later Stages of the Nascent Soul Realm, while the rank of Core Elders had been changed to the Domain Lord Realm.


    The Status of Grand Elder on the other hand wasn''t changed much and was now just reserved for the peak of the Sect''s power that didn''t include the Sect Master. Meaning that the only Grand Elders at the moment still remained Xuan Hao and Shu Yao, who had just broken through to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm not long ago.


    Outside of all these changes that had taken ce without being that noticeable to the disciples and elders of the sect due to how much they had all grown over the past few years, there hadn''t really been any changes in the Star Shattering Sect.


    ¡­


    "To think someone from the Ice Cave Abode woulde to our town to recruit disciple, I really hope we can get chosen!"


    "Indeed¡­ If we get chosen, we can embark on the immortal path and live for hundreds if not thousands of years in the future!"


    "Brothers, I pray that all of us have an affinity and can embark on this path together!"


    At the same time that everything was smoothly developing for the Star Shattering Sect without any problems along the way, inside a small town located at the edge of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory that had managed to avoid any of the dangers rted to demonic cultivators because of the Star Shattering Sect''s almost airtight defense along their borders, a group of youths were excitedly chatting with each other as they walked towards the center of the town.


    At this moment, the Ice Cave Abode, a small force that existed under the Star Shattering Sect''s sphere of influence had arrived at the small town and had asked the town lord to gather all the young people for examination.


    Although everyone and even the town lord himself was overjoyed and excited about this, even sending out his own children to join the examination in hopes that they could join the Ice Cave Abode, it wasn''t the same for the two envoys from the Ice Cave Abode who were currently looking at the increasinglyrge number of young people gathered in front of them filled with excitement. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Haaa¡­ So many young people, but among them, there are only a dozen or so that has stepped into the Qi Condensation Realm and only two that has reached the Third Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, with not a single one at the Fourth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm¡­"


    "Indeed, the talent in this town is far below expectations. Only those two at the Third Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm have some potential."


    Shaking their heads as they both expressed their disappointment to each other while looking out over the young people who had gathered together in front of them, the two envoys from the Ice Cave Abode could not help wondering if they had done something wrong as they remembered the other towns they had visited so far during their annual recruitment of disciples.


    So far, out of a total of twenty-three different small towns and viges, they had only ended up finding a little over a dozen young people suitable for joining the Ice Cave Abode, something that was extremely bad considering that they would normally have recruited at least fifty new disciples under normal circumstances.


    However, they both understood why this was, as not too long ago, a new branch of the Star Shattering Sect had popped up in the vicinity of their Ice Cave Abode.


    Although the branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect didn''t suppress them or take away the resources that they were in control of, it did end up attracting all the talented young people in the surroundings. Essentially leaving behind nothing for them, as anyone with just a little talent would always choose to join a massive force like the Star Shattering Sect over a small power like the Ice Cave Abode.


    Even if it was just a branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect, it was well known that even a branch sect would at least have someone at the Later Stages of the Nascent Soul Realm presiding over it, some even having powerful cultivators at the Domain Lord Realm.


    Not just that but joining a branch sect of the Star Shattering Sec also gave one the chance to join the main sect in the future, something that no talented young person wouldn''t want to do. Especially since they could also join the main sect as elders in future if they failed to do so during their time as disciples.


    To be honest, even the two envoys of the Ice Cave Abode at the Foundation Establishment felt tempted when they thought about joining a massive power like the Star Shattering Sect, but there was nothing they could do to do so, as they were already far above the age to be a disciple and far too weak to try and be an elder of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not just them, but even the leader of the Ice Cave Abode at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm was too weak to be an elder of the Star Shattering Sect¡­

 Chapter 1348 A Peaceful Journey

    Chapter 1348 A Peaceful Journey


    As the two Foundation Establishment envoys from the Ice Cave Abode were lost in their own thoughts while the young people from the town gathered together in the square at the center of the city for a simple test, the small group of young people who had been chatting about joining the Ice Cave Abode arrived at the square just when one of the envoys stepped forward and announced that some simple tests would be conducted to test the aptitude of the young people and determine whether or not they were fit for cultivation.


    At least in that regard, the group of young people who had ended up arrivingst was a step above the rest, as all three of them had already reached the First Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, being among the few in the town that had managed to sessfully step onto the path of cultivation.


    Although the First Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm might not be that strong in the grand scheme of things, it was still considered strong inside the small town where the strongest person had only reached the Seventh Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm and was still far away from the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    "Hm? A few more potential disciples." Seeing these three show up and how the three of them had all reached the Qi Condensation Realm, one of the envoys who had been sitting a bit in the back as hispanion began examining and testing the young people of the town could not help slightly nodding his head upon spotting the three.


    Not just because they had already managed to reach the Qi Condensation Realm, but because they were also among the youngest of the people present. Looking like they were between the ages of 10 and 12. Making their low cultivationpared to the rest look far more desirable for the envoys of the Ice Cave Abode whenpared to the rest who were mostly between 16 to 18 years old.


    Even the ones that had managed to reach the Third Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm didn''t attract as much attention as these three young people, as the young people should be more than capable of surpassing them at their age in the future after entering the Ice Cave Abode.


    More importantly than that, they were clearly too talented and should have been missed by the Star Shattering Sect in the past when they had swept through the ce to fill up the nearby branch sect that had been established not long ago.


    For this reason, the envoy who had been mostly sitting back without doing much so far, stepped forward. "I will go and examine those three, if nothing is wrong, I will immediately return with them while you take care of the situation here."


    "I understand, make sure you head straight for the Ice Cave abode and don''t get distracted along the way." Hearing what hispanion said, the second envoy, still busy, nodded his head in agreement while also warning him to not get distracted on his way back to the Ice Cave Abode.


    The reason for this was rather simple, as they had already heard tales about how some other nearby powers with simr strength to the Ice Cave Abode had lost their newly recruited disciples to the Star Shattering Sect on their way back.


    In the words of those powers, the Star Shattering Sect had not considered these young disciples part of them, as they had not yet been integrated, thus, they decided to offer these young talented disciples a chance to join a branch of the Star Shattering Sect, something that these young people almost never refused considering the dominant reputation of the Star Shattering Sect as the sole ruler of the territory they lived in.


    There was nothing they could do against this, as the Star Shattering Sect was far too strong for them to fight back against, and the Star Shattering Sect did always leave the final choice up to these recently recruited disciples and didn''t interfere in case they ended up refusing the olive branch that had been extended towards them by the Star Shattering Sect. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    On the other hand, there were a few times where the elders offering this request had even lent a hand and helped them get back safely after being refused.


    It was also because of these small things and the seemingly uncaring attitude of the Star Shattering Sect towards theing and goings of small powers like them, that they all realized that in the eyes of the Star Shattering Sect, it didn''t really mean much to recruit these young people and was just something that was done in a passing.


    With that in mind, it had be the norm for these different powers to rush any young talented peoplethey found back to their sect or family as fast as possible before they ended up being found by the people from the Star Shattering Sect who were active in the area due to its rtively close proximity to the border where demonic cultivators were still trying to enter through.


    Because of this, after confirming that there was nothing wrong with the three young talented people from the small town and hearing that they were willing to join the Ice Cave Abode, one of the two Foundation Establishment envoy grabbed the three of them and rushed out of the small town without even giving them a chance to say goodbye to their parents.


    All of that could wait until after they had joined the Ice Cave Abode officially. For now, the most important thing in the eyes of the envoy was to get back to the Ice Cave Abode as fast as possible. Resulting in him running with all of his strength while carrying three rather confused-looking children along with him, a ratherical sight for any of the mortals who happened to catch a glimpse as he sped by them.


    "Hm? What is that¡­?"


    However, after travelling like this for a little over an hour and as he was getting closer to the location of the Ice Cave Abode, the envoy suddenly noticed something appearing in the distance.


    Looking closer, he realized that it was two cultivators locked in battle with each other, both being stronger than him, but not to the point where it was impossible for him to follow the battle between the two. Meaning that they should be somewhere around the Peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm or Earlier Stages of the Core Formation Realm.


    "Wooow! Is that a battle between cultivators!?"


    "So awesome¡­!"


    "When will I get that strong?"


    Noticing the cultivators fighting as they got closer to the two who happened to block the path that the envoy had intended on taking to the Ice Cave Abode, the three children who were being carried couldn''t help opening their eyes filled with amazement as theymented on the battle. Filled with admiration towards the two powerful cultivators who were fighting at a speed that they couldn''t perceive properly with their current strength at the First Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Of course, even though they couldn''t clearly see the two cultivators fighting, they could still see the damage caused by their battle, as small craters were left in the ground and trees were directly uprooted wherever the two passed.


    This was the first time these children had ever seen something like this before and it steeled their resolve towards cultivating and bing that strong themselves!


    Seeing the reaction of the three, the envoy could not help smiling to himself as he saw their resolve to grow stronger after witnessing the battle between two powerful cultivators. Feeling that these three indeed did have great potential and should be able to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm in the future. Possible even the Later Stage of the Foundation Establishment Rm.


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Time to move around before we end up getting dragged into the battle¡­


    As the sound of the two cultivators became clearer and they got closer, the envoy decided to start going around them to avoid being dragged into the battle. Not something difficult given that he and the children weren''t targets for these two cultivators.


    Not to mention, there was no reason for them to involve them in their fight.


    After all, even though he was only at the earlier stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm, he should still be able to put a certain level of pressure on one of the two people fighting if he ended up being targeted by one of them.


    "Quick! Get back!"


    "Huh?"


    However, as he thought about how unlikely it was for him to get involved in the battle, one of the two quickly called out to him, causing the envoy to look properly at this cultivator-


    That robe¡­ Star Shattering Sect Disciple!? Oh no! This is not a normal battle between cultivators, but a battle with a demonic cultivator!


    "Hehe, I was about to lose, but some new blood was freshly delivered? Don''t mind if I do¡­!"


    Unfortunately, it was toote for him to retreat, as the second cultivator, who turned out to be a demonic cultivator, suddenly turned to rush towards him filled with killing intent.

 Chapter 1349 A Shocking Turn of Events

    Chapter 1349 A Shocking Turn of Events


    "Hmph! Don''t think you can just ignore me!"


    Following the demonic cultivator charging towards the envoy of the Ice Cave Abode and the three young potential disciples he was carrying along with him, the disciple from the Star Shattering Sect, who had been fighting with the demonic cultivator, instantly strung into action. Charging forward to block the path of the demonic cultivator just before he could reach the envoy and three young children.


    Bang!


    Along with the two once again colliding with each other, a small shockwave was created. Forcing the already terrified envoy from the Ice Cave Abode to retreat and try to look for another way around the two battling almost directly in front of him at this point in time.


    Even more so considering that the small shockwave just now had allowed him to perceive the strength of the two people fighting. Allowing him to understand that the one from the Star Shattering Sect should be around the First or Second Stage of the Core Formation Realm, while the strength of the demonic cultivator was somewhere slightly above that.


    In a sense, the disciple from the Star Shattering Sect was fighting above his realm and was currently winning against the demonic cultivator.


    The only problem with this was that the disciple from the Star Shattering Sect couldn''tpletely overpower the demonic cultivator. Giving the demonic cultivator a chance to slowly get closer and closer to him and the three children he was carrying even though he had been using his full strength to retreat.


    Seeing this as well and knowing that he himself would be in for a rather troublesome situation if the demonic cultivator managed to catch and devour the envoy from the Ice Cave Abode and the few children he was carrying along with him, the disciple from the Star Shattering Sect didn''t hold back as he used everything at his disposal to try and keep the demonic cultivator in one ce and stop him from getting closer to them.


    Unfortunately, even though he had the upper hand in fighting the demonic cultivator head on, he wasn''t a match for the demonic cultivator when it came to speed. Only barely keeping up with the demonic cultivator through the help of a special artifact that allowed him to temporarily boost his speed just enough to catch up with the demonic cultivator every few seconds.


    "Hehe, as I said, this fresh blood and cultivation is mine!"


    Because of this, it didn''t take long before the demonic cultivator was standing in front of the envoy from the Ice Cave Abode. Grinning happily as he finally managed to catch up with him and the disciple from the Star Shattering Sect still a few seconds behind him-


    BOOOOM-!


    However, just as he was about to move to devour the envoy of the Ice Cave Abode before the disciple of the Star Shattering Sect could reach him, a terrifying explosion could be heard somewhere higher up in the sky before a towering demonic figure more than a dozen meters tall came plummeting towards the ground a few thousand meters away-


    RUUUMBLE~!


    As the massive demonic figure crashed into the ground under the horrified gaze of both the demonic cultivator and the envoy from the Ice Cave Abode, a terrifying earthquake soon hit both of them, causing them to lose their footing and fall to the ground.


    Momentarily giving the disciple of the Star Shattering Sect, the opportunity to close the distance and once again engage in battle with the shocked demonic cultivator, while the envoy from the Ice Cave Abode remained frozen on the spot while staring towards the towering demonic cultivator that nowid motionless on the ground a few thousand meters away from them.


    Is that perhaps a demonic cultivator at the Third Demonic Transformation Realm? Able to fully turn into a demonic being and having the strengthparable to someone in the Domain Lord Realm¡­?


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he realized just how powerful the demonic being in the distance was, the envoy of the Ice Cave Abode could barely gather enough courage to move out of the way of the battle between the demonic cultivator and the disciple of the Star Shattering Sect, as he kept his gaze focused on the massive demonic figure-


    Rumble~!


    And just at that moment, the massive demonic cultivator that had crashed into the ground and remained motionless so far, started rising from the ground, causing both the disciple from the Star Shattering Sect and the demonic cultivator he was fighting to stop, as they simrly turned their attention towards the terrifying demonic cultivator in the distance.


    At this moment, be it the demonic cultivator, the envoy of the Ice Cave Abode, the three children or the disciple from the Star Shattering Sect. All of them understood that they would be dead the moment the demonic cultivator noticed them.


    The only one who did decide to do something was the disciple from the Star Shattering Sect, who had taken out amunication talisman to inform his seniors about the situation, but it could be some time before someone strong enough to deal with a demonic cultivator at the Third Demonic Transformation Realm could show up.


    For now, their only hope was that the one behind the demonic cultivator being knocked into the ground was still around and in a better state than the demonic cultivator.


    At least, everyone except the demonic cultivator standing next to them hoped this, as he would die either way.


    His only hope for now was to use the opportunity to try and sneak away while everyone was distracted-


    Whoosh-!


    So that was exactly what he did, as he soon sped off into the distance when the disciple from the Star Shattering Sect had his full attention focused on the terrifying demonic cultivator slowly standing back up-


    Swish-!


    Ptsh!


    However, before he took more than a few steps, a small red colored light suddenly descended from above and directly cut him in half without giving him any chance to react or fight back.


    At this moment, two figures descended from the sky. Hovering above the demonic cultivator that had just gotten back up, both carrying a terrifying presence no less than that of the demonic cultivator. Making it clear that these two people were both in the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Elder Hu, Elder Lan!" Recognizing the two figures who had just descended, the disciple from the Star Shattering Sect called out in an overjoyed voice.


    "Hm? Would you look at that, I didn''t expect for there to be a disciple and a few others around when I knocked this fellow over here. Haha, at least there are two of us around. Brother, can you help those people get out of here safely before they get caught up in the battle?"


    Having already noticed the disciple from his sect earlier and also the envoy from the Ice Cave Abode and the three children he was still carrying with him, one of the two people, who turned out to be none other than Wan Hu, one of the original elders of the Star Shattering Sect who had managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm, called out to his brother to help them get to safety.


    "Fine, just make sure to not finish things before Ie back!" Nodding his head, Wang Lan, who had simrly managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm made sure to remind his brother to not kill off the demonic cultivator too fast, as he really wanted to take the opportunity to refine hisbat techniques. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    In a sense, it was for this reason that they had found a rtively remote area to knock this demonic cultivator towards. Creating a ce where they would be able to refine theirbat techniques in realbat against a demonic cultivator.


    Although doing so was dangerous considering that the strength of the demonic cultivator was no weaker than theirs, it was far more beneficial than training inside the Combat Hall and would help them more easily pick up ws in theirbat techniques.


    Whoosh-!


    Not a secondter, the group of five soon found themselves being lifted into the air before being carried off into the distance by Wang Lan.


    "Wha-!?"


    "W-we are flying?!"


    "Wooow! Flying!"


    And while the envoy from the Ice Cave Abode was keeping quiet out of fear of identally offending this senior from the Star Shattering Sect, the three children didn''t have any of this fear, as they all just mored excitedly over the fact that they were flying.


    Luckily, as the envoy of the Ice Cave Abode nced towards the Wang Lan, he discovered that he didn''t seem to care about this. Allowing him to breathe a sigh of relief before he took the opportunity to look back in the direction where the towering demonic cultivator and the elder from the Star Shattering Sect were confronting each other.


    Hoping to witness the fight, even for a short time, as he understood that he was unlikely to get the chance to do so again in the future.

 Chapter 1350 Joining the Star Shattering Sect...?

    Chapter 1350 Joining the Star Shattering Sect...?


    BOOOOM-!


    However, as he tried to look back and see the battle between the terrifying demonic cultivator and the elder from the Star Shattering Sect, all he saw was a blinding light followed by a terrifying shockwave that devastated the surroundings. Turning the formerly lush and verdant terrain into a wastnd where no animal or monster that had formerly inhabited the area were left alive.


    Only at this point did the envoy from the Ice Cave Abode realize how terrifying someone in the Domain Lord Realm was, as their battle essentially shaped the surroundingndscape. Destroying or killing anything and anyone caught up in the battle.


    In a sense, be it a normal mortal or a powerful Nascent Soul Realm cultivator. Faced with the terrifying power of a Domain Lord Realm cultivator, they were no different and would both die when faced with that kind of terrifying power.


    Not just that, but the envoy of the Ice Cave Abode also realized that there were still realms beyond the Domain Lord Realm and the Star Shattering Sect seemed to have cultivators who had surpassed the Domain Lord Realm and stepped into a realm far beyond anything he could imagine with his current limited strength.


    In his eyes, a Domain Lord Realm cultivator was already capable of shaping thendscape around them, someone above the Domain Lord Realm was no different than an all-powerful god!


    The Star Shattering Sect¡­ Indeed, if I had the opportunity to join such a powerful sect, I would definitely also take the chance¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he recalled theints of his seniors when they talked about how they had lost disciples to the Star Shattering Sect, the envoy of the Ice Cave Abode felt that theirints were unfound, as it was understandable for anyone to want to join such a powerful sect.


    Even he, who had already joined the Ice Cave Abode, would join the Star Shattering Sect at the drop of a hat if he got the chance without the slightest bit of regret.


    At least¡­ From the information spread around by the Star Shattering Sect, it seems like they consider all the different powers inside their territory to be unofficial subordinate powers. Allowing them to exist and grow as long as they don''t interfere with the sect itself.


    Only when a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator emerges do they get a visit from the Star Shattering Sect and gets the opportunity to be an official subordinate power to the Star Shattering Sect, though¡­ I did hear that they are also allowed to continue staying neutral without anything happening. The Cui Family not to far away from the Ice Cave Abode is one such neutral power¡­


    As his thoughts continued wandering regarding the Star Shattering Sect, the envoy from the Ice Cave Abode could not help feeling more and more amazed by the Star Shattering Sect the more he thought about it and realized just how magnanimous they were towards the different powers that existed inside their territory.


    Not only did they provide protection from outside powers like they were doing at the moment with the demonic cultivators, but they also allowed the different powers inside their territory to develop on their own without much interference. Even allowing them to remain independent after they became powerful if they wanted to.


    Of course, he didn''t know about the entire situation when it came to the different goings of those powerful forces with Nascent Soul Realm cultivators in them, but at least he understood that their ability to develop wasn''t hindered by the Star Shattering Sect like most of them were in the past when they had been under different kingdoms or otherrge powers who didn''t want to see them grow stronger and threaten their position.


    An example of this being the Cui Family, that had managed to grow a lot since the rise of the Star Shattering Sect. Growing from a force with only a single Nascent Soul Realm ancestor, into a local hegemon with more than three Nascent Soul Realm cultivators presiding over it.


    Now that I think about it, the Star Shattering Sect did allow any of the powers existing inside their territory to send a representative to their main city, Falling Star City, located below their main sect¡­ And the Ice Cave Abode hasn''t sent any representative as of yet due to the distance of the ce and the fact that it isn''t viewed as a requirement for powers who don''t have someone in the Nascent Soul Realm cultivator.


    If that''s the case¡­ Can''t I volunteer to go on behalf of the Ice Cave Abode¡­?


    As his thoughts continued turning, the envoy of the Ice Cave Abode had already forgotten his original task of taking the three children now freely being carried by the domain of Wang Lan. Instead beginning to think of ways to potentially get closer to the Star Shattering Sect with the ultimate goal of joining it.


    After he saw the power disyed by Wang Hu in his battle with the terrifying demonic cultivator, he wanted to hug this thick thigh as quickly as possible before it was toote¡­ And his opportunity mighte if he ventured to the Falling Star City, the Star Shattering Sect''s main link with the outside world and also the city that had turned into the main trading hub of the Star Shattering Sect''s now massive territory¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Unaware of the chaotic thoughts of the envoy from the Ice Cave Abode who was thinking about how to best hug his thigh, Wang Lan came to a stop and ced all of them on the ground. Waking the envoy up from his momentary stupor.


    "This should be far enough away for you five to avoid any effects from the battle, but I do rmend for you to continue moving away, as you never know how things might turn out."


    "Thank you for the help, Elder Lan."


    """Thank you, senior."""


    Following the disciple of the Star Shattering Sect who was the first to thank the elder, the envoy followed along in thanking him together with the three young potential disciples. Not daring to show the slightest bit of disrespect, as he almost fell forward from bowing so deeply.


    "Haha, no need, it was no trouble at all- Ah! Disciple, it will be a bit difficult for you to get back to the border in the near future with us blocking the path. So, you should head to the newly established branch sect not too far away from here until the battle concludes. It will also be a good opportunity for you to try and teach what you learnt to the young disciples there."


    "Thank you for the guidance elder, this disciple understands!"


    "Great, then I will get going or I might not even get a chance to join in on the fun, haha!"


    As the Wang Lan left a few words for them and the disciple of his sect, he soon ascended back into the sky before rapidly flying back in the direction he hade from. Moving at a speed several times faster than when he had been carrying them.


    "Well then, this is it for our short time together, young ones, I hope your cultivation will proceed smoothly in the future and for the senior of these young ones, I hope you can guide them well. If you ever get the chance, I encourage you to take them with you to the branch sect in this area. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Although you are a bit old, you are still in the Foundation Establishment Realm and should still be within the range for bing a disciple. Even if not the main sect, a recently established branch sect like the one in this area mightck manpower and consider epting you as disciple. Well then, I will be taking my leave."


    "This¡­! T-Thank you for your guidance, I will make sure to remember it!" Hearing what the disciple from the Star Shattering Sect said, the envoy of the Ice Cave Abode froze for a second before turning in the direction that the disciple left before loudly thanking him while bowing his head until his figure was no longer visible.


    "S-Senior? What are we going to do now?"


    As he got up and stopped bowing, one of the young potential disciples could not help stepping forward in a somewhat uneasy manner as he asked this. Obviously, he and the rest of them wanted to join the Star Shattering Sect after what they had just witnessed but were scared to say so out loud. Not wanting to offend.


    "Of course, we are going to the branch sect of the Star Shattering Sect! No need to think about joining the small Ice Cave Abode!"


    However, the envoy had already be fully set on joining the Star Shattering Sect at this point in time, so he didn''t waste a second as he answered the hesitating child. Earning the cheers from all three of the children, as he wasted no time in setting off in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect''s branch sect.


    Now that he had the opportunity to potentially join the Star Shattering Sect, he didn''t n to waste it.


    As for what to do about the Ice Cave Abode¡­ They would likely consider him dead after news about the battle between the terrifying demonic cultivator and elders of the Star Shattering Sect spread and the fact that he had been going that way when the battle had broken off.


    If he didn''t go back to the Ice Cave Abode, they wouldn''t have any clue that he had defected and decided to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    As for the disciple who had essentially napped this Foundation Establishment cultivator¡­ He didn''t know any better and just thought that the Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator was a wandering cultivator travelling with his few disciples, thus deciding to extent this lone cultivator an olive branch to all four after seeing that the three younger ones were rather talented.

 Chapter 1351 Plans For New Alchemy Hall

    Chapter 1351 ns For New Alchemy Hall


    As the disciple, who had ended up identally convincing the envoy from the Ice Cave Abode to betray his sect and instead join the Star Shattering Sect, arrived at the newly established branch sect not too far away from where the battle between the two Wang brothers and the demonic cultivator were fighting, he first contacted one of the elders in charge of the branch about the situation before also making sure to inform him about the wandering cultivator in the Foundation Establishment Realm and his disciples who would soon be showing up to join the sect.


    Given his current status as an Inner Sect Disciple of the main sect with potential to reach the Domain Lord Realm in the future, the elders at the branch sect easily epted his request without making things difficult.


    After all, another Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator joining the branch didn''t really matter with the current size of the Star Shattering Sect. Even if the resources allocated to this Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator after he joined the sect as a disciple ended up being wasted, it wouldn''t really matter.


    At least, because the branch sect was stillying down the groundwork for establishing the sect in the area, having a local familiar with the surrounding powers around might prove useful, as he could lend a hand when it came to understanding the current situation of the ce.


    In the end, there were no problems at all, as the inner sect disciple wasted no time after he chatted with the elder. Heading directly towards the central part of the branch sect where he quickly got in contact with some of his friends back at the border.


    Given that he couldn''t return for a few days because of the battle taking ce, he intended to inform them so they wouldn''t end up worrying about him, as he had kind of disappeared all of sudden when they had been fighting demonic cultivators together because he had spotted a demonic cultivator managing to sneak past them and chased after the demonic cultivator before it could start causing any chaos inside the sect''s territory.


    Even if the demonic cultivator was only in the Higher Demon Realm,parable to someone in the Core Formation Realm, he understood full well just how much damage a demonic cultivator could cause if they had the opportunity to grow by devouring the different smaller powers inside the sect''s territory.


    Although it wasn''t often something that happened, the demonic cultivators that had managed to enter the sect''s territory and had an opportunity to grow for even a few days, had ended up causing enormous damage to the parts of the sect''s territory they had passed through. Only the Star Shattering Sect''s branches and some powerful forces in those areas surviving as the demonic cultivators deliberately avoided them.


    "Now that I think about it, I hope the battle went well. After all, they should have had a rather rough time against those demonic cultivators with me suddenly disappearing¡­" Muttering this to himself as he remembered the state of his friends when he had left to chase after the demonic cultivator, the disciple couldn''t help awkwardly smiling to himself for a brief moment before contacting them. Hoping that they had managed to resolve the situation on their own without any problems or need for their elders to interfere to lend a hand.


    ¡­


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, Wan Qiu, one of the original elders in charge of the Flying Sword Sect alchemy hall back in the day, could not help showing a somewhat emotional expression on her face as she looked at therge alchemy hall in front of her with countless disciples and elders constantly moving in and out of the massive building.


    "Looks like it''s finally time to upgrade this ce¡­" Muttering this to herself, she understood that it was time to upgrade the ce, as it had be rather cramped with the recent growth of the Star Shattering Sect and the fact that there was a constant stream of both elders and disciples visiting the alchemy pavilion either to request something from the alchemists there or because they themselves were alchemists.


    Of course, upgrading the alchemy pavilion wasn''t a simple matter to carry out, as it required the approval of either the Vice Sect Master, Elder Song or the Sect Master himself¡­


    "Indeed, the ce is getting rather cramped nowadays." Not too far behind her, another elder from the alchemy hall stepped forward and nodded his head in agreement.


    "Luckily, we have senior Pei Yang assisting us this time around, so it shouldn''t be difficult for us to get approval for building a muchrger location for the alchemy hall. Potentially moving it to somewhere outside the Seventh Star Peak on one of the other nearby Star Peaks to ensure that there will be enough space for when we will inevitably have to expand in the future." Letting out a sigh of relief as she said this, Wan Qiu could not help feeling thankful towards Pei Yang.


    The main reason for it being that he had stepped up and said that outside of providing monthly lectures for the disciples and elders of the sect, he would also be assisting the sect''s alchemy hall.


    It was also at that moment that Wan Qiu and the rest of the sect''s alchemist had realized that outside of being a powerful cultivator, Pei Yang was also an incredibly skilled alchemist who had already managed to reach the Grandmaster Realm.


    With someone like that around, it was only a matter of time before the alchemy hall underwent a round of explosive growth. Not to mention, the number of disciples wanting to be alchemist had also significantly increased following the revtion that Pei Yang was an alchemist and would be assisting the sect''s alchemy hall in the future.


    "Now then, should we get going? We still have to inform Elder Song before we take any action towards expanding the alchemy hall, as for a potential location outside the Seventh Star Peak¡­ We could look towards the Ninth Star Peak.


    Although the peak of the mountain has been turned into a spiritual herb field, we could use some of the space to set up buildings for the alchemy hall. At the same time, we could also build around the base of the mountain, as only the peak itself is being used for growing spiritual herbs."


    At this moment, a third elder from the alchemy hall who had been standing a bit behind the two stepped forward and spoke out about his ideas regarding the future location of the alchemy hall while also eagerly trying to get them to go and inform Elder Song about the situation.


    "Oh? Peng Yun? I didn''t even notice you there¡­ Did you perhaps finally break through to the Ninth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm?" Noticing the figure as none other than the former treasure hunter who had ended up being recruited by Xuan Hao in the past, Wan Qiu could not help calling out in a slightly surprised tone. Not having expected him to sneak up on them so easily.


    "Yes, I managed to break through a few days ago while I was studying a new potion." n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Woow~~ Amazing! Only a single step away from the Domain Lord Realm now! If not for the fact that you were so focused on your weird potions all the time, you might have already broken through at this point in time."


    "¡­"


    Hearing the somewhat teasing voice of Wan Qiu as she said this, Peng Yun decided to remain silent as he looked towards the third person present.


    "Ah! Let''s get going immediately so we can build up the new alchemy hall as fast as possible¡­ And if we do end up moving it away from the Seventh Star Peak to the Ninth Star Peak, we will have to do some surveys of the area around the Ninth Star Peak and figure out where to ce the new alchemy hall, Peng Yun, as you suggested this, can you go check out the Ninth Star Peak for potential locations to start building around?"


    Understanding what that gaze meant, the third elder immediately answered the call, as he naturally asked if Peng Yun would leave to check out the Ninth Star Peak without it sounding odd.


    "Yes, I will get going."


    And in response, Peng Yun immediately agreed before setting off in the direction of the Ninth Star Peak-


    "Oh, I will go with you, there is only need for one person when ites to talking with Elder Song, while checking out the future location of the alchemy hall would be better done with more people to ensure the location is right."


    However, before Peng Yun could leave, Wan Qiu quickly called out before following after him. Leaving the third elder behind on his own a few secondster as the two of them both disappeared in the direction of the Ninth Star Peak.


    "Well¡­ I did try to help¡­" Muttering this to himself as he gazed off in the direction of the Ninth Star Peak, the elder shook his head before heading in the direction of Elder Song''s courtyard to inform him about the situation of the alchemy hall and the nned expansion. Hoping things could get started as fast as possible.


    After all, it would take a long time to build up a new alchemy hall, as countless formations and other things needed to be created inside the new ce, both for defense and protection of certain areas, but also for helping in alchemy and training of new alchemy disciples.

 Chapter 1352 Expansions and Paperwork caused by Expansion

    Chapter 1352 Expansions and Paperwork caused by Expansion


    As the elders of the alchemy hall got busy with their preparation for changing the location of the alchemy pavilion, while at the same time also making it bigger so it could fit the increasinglyrge number of disciples joining the alchemy hall, the sect''s formation masters had run into a simr problem, as they had also been looking towards somewhere to expand to and establish themselves either on the Seventh Star Peak or somewhere else within the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Of course, because of the difference in size between the Alchemy Hall and the Formation Hall that the formation masters of the sect used and the fact that there were far less disciples interested in the art of formationspared to those interested in alchemy, the expansion ideas of these elders weren''t at the level of taking over an entire peak for themselves like the elders of the alchemy hall were nning to do.


    Not to mention, there was little chance they would be able to aplish something like this, as they didn''t have the backing of Pei Yang to help convince Elder Song that it would be beneficial to dedicate an entire mountain peak to them. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    After all, even though only the Ninth Star Peak and Seventh Star Peak were being used by the sect at the moment, it didn''t mean that Elder Song and the rest of the sect had no ns for the remaining mountain peaks. Only that the sect was still too small to begin investing in expanding into these areas of the Shattered Star Peaks when there was no need to do so.


    Out of all the different profession halls of the Star Shattering Sect, the only one that didn''t have any problems with the increasing number of disciples was the cksmithing hall, whose Sea of a Thousand Furnaces already covered a good portion of the Seventh Star Peak.


    Even if the number of disciples continued to grow at its current rate, the cksmithing hall would easily be able to continue on like normal without needing to expand. Making the elders from the rest of the profession halls of the sect feel regretful that they didn''t decide on constructing such a massive location for their profession when the sect had just been moved to the Seventh Star Peak.


    But then again¡­ There was no way any other sect could take up the same space as the cksmithing hall on the Seventh Star Peak, as it would have made it difficult to fit in the disciple abodes if that was the case.


    Also¡­ It was only for now that the cksmithing hall could continue running normally without having to think about expanding. In the future, when the number of disciples grewrger and the sect needed more abodes for disciples, the cksmithing hall might end up being forced to move from the Seventh Star Peak to make space, as the Seventh Star Peak was the best location inside the Shattered Star Peaks to cultivate due to the presence of the qi springke in the middle of the mountain peak¡­


    At the same time that the different profession rted halls of the sect, except the cksmithing hall, were busying themselves with future expansions, the remaining elders of the sect who weren''t part of any of these different profession halls were going about their day like normal without noticing therge movements that had started taking ce inside the sect, as those profession halls began preparing to move or expand.


    Even though ces like the alchemy hall and cksmithing hall was a popr ce for the disciples and elders of the sect and some of them even joined these ces to be official alchemist, cksmith and so on, therge majority of the sect''s disciple still didn''t learn a profession and instead focused their full attention on cultivating.


    Most of them not seeing any real use of using their precious time on learning these different professions, as they would only start proving useful in theter stages and wouldn''t provide much benefit before that.


    Instead, it would be far easier for them to take on a sect mission and use their contribution points to buy what they needed from the sect.


    The reason why most of the elders didn''t take up a profession was simr, as they didn''t want to waste their time on a profession when they could instead use their time toplete sect mission for contribution points that they could then use to visit the Dao Enlightenment Monument, something that was far more beneficial to their cultivationpared to learning a profession.


    Only if they ended up stuck at a bottleneck in the future and couldn''t advance any further would these elders not originally interested in things like alchemy and cksmithing decide to pick up a profession to use the soul enhancing effect that came with continuing to improve a profession to a certain degree to try and break through their bottleneck.


    Then again, people like that weren''t really destined to go far in the Dao of Alchemy, cksmithing, Formations and so on, as they didn''t truly intend on pursuing the path.


    In the end, those from the Star Shattering Sect that did end up joining the different profession halls of the sect while still being disciples who were far from reaching such a bottleneck, could be considered to be truly interested and had potential inprehending the Dao of the chosen profession and advance further.


    ¡­


    As the different elders rted to the different profession halls began to make their way to Elder Song one by one, it didn''t take long for Elder Song to realize the seriousness of the situation, as he understood that the expansion of these few different profession halls was going to be critical for the future growth of the sect.


    Every single one of them provided something invaluable to the sect and aided in its rapid growth, the alchemy hall providing pills and elixirs to assist the cultivation of the sect disciples, while also providing safety when outside the sect, the cksmithing hall providing artifacts, while the formation hall helped in construction of certain artifacts and was the main part of the sect responsible for the establishment of new branch sects.


    After all, for a branch sect to be sessfully established, it had to have a guardian formation that could help defend it in case it was attacked¡­ And at the moment, most of the Star Shattering Sect''s branch sects were equipped with powerful guardian formations capable of fending off most people in the Nascent Soul Realm, with a few of the more important branch sects having formations capable of resisting Domain Lord Realm cultivators for a period of time.


    Though it didn''t seem that impressive, it was still a testament to the increased strength of the Star Shattering Sect''s foundation, as formation masters were originally hard toe by and the Star Shattering Sect had spent arge number of resources nurturing the current formation master of the sect to their current level.


    "The alchemy hall wants to expand and so does the Formation Hall¡­ Haaa¡­ I guess it won''t be long before the reste running over to ask about expanding. Although,pared to the rest, the alchemy hall''s suggestion of moving to the Ninth Star Peak is a little out of the ordinary, but can be aplished given that only the peak of the mountain is being used at the moment." Muttering this to himself with a somewhat exhausted expression on his face, Elder Song nced down at therge stack of papers that had slowly begun to pile up in front of him.


    Even though the majority of the work regarding the expansion of the different profession halls wasn''t something he would have to do, a lot of paperwork ultimately still had to go through him first for approval.


    "I finally reached the Nascent Soul Realm when I thought I never would in the past, but all I was met with was more paperwork¡­ Is this perhaps a fate that I won''t be able to escape no matter how strong I grow? No¡­ I have to properly nurture a sessor to take care of this for me in the future, the management elders and those few disciples I have been nurturing so far with this goal in mind is far from enough! I have to expand the internal management departments of the sect! Recruit more internal elders for management!


    But¡­ Before that, I should be able to take the opportunity while the alchemy sect is moving to merge them together with the spiritual herb caretakers. Not only will this lessen the overall work I will have to go through when the alchemy hall expands, but it will also allow the two sides to get closer."


    Shaking his head as he talked to himself while looking down at the paperwork in front of him, Elder Song soon showed a determined expression before he went to work. Diving headfirst into therge stack of paper.

 Chapter 1353 Changing Structure

    Chapter 1353 Changing Structure


    Following Elder Song getting to work on the situation rted to the formation hall and alchemy hall, it didn''t take long before the two were granted approval to begin expanding their headquarters, with the formation hall expanding on the Seventh Star Peak, while the alchemy hall began relocating to the Ninth Star Peak.


    At the same time, the elders and disciples who were in charge of taking care of the spiritual herbs on the Ninth Star Peak were also granted a ce to stay, as a small pavilion was established for them on top of the Ninth Star Peak. Giving them a more official position in the sect outside of just being a job that would be assigned to anyone willing through the grand mission pavilion, something that the few elders and disciples in love with taking care of spiritual herbs appreciated a lot, as I would also mean that they would be getting more support from the sect in the future.


    Not only did this make them feel more appreciated, but it also gave them an opportunity to try and experiment with different growing methods for spiritual herbs and allowed them to deepen their understanding of spiritual herbs.


    Although they weren''t alchemist, the few who had decided to permanently settle down and take care of the spiritual herbs on the Ninth Star Peak, had knowledge on the spiritual herbs growing on the Ninth Star Peak far exceeding that of any alchemist in the sect.


    Along with the extra resources they got their hands on following the official establishment of a pavilion specially for them, it wouldn''t take long before the quality of the spiritual herbs growing on the Ninth Star Peak increased, together with new and more difficult to grow spiritual herbs beginning to appear as these spiritual herb caretakers became more proficient in taking care of higher quality spiritual herbs.


    In the end, as the alchemy hall moved to the Ninth Star Peak and began to establish themselves there, the spiritual herb caretakers were merged together with them and became somewhat simr to a branch of therger alchemy hall. Allowing disciples and elders another path outside of just alchemy.


    Not just that but given the fact that a spiritual herb caretaker would be especially close to spiritual herbs for extended periods of time and take care of them, it also nurtured an affinity towards the Daos rted to nature. Making it easier for those spiritual herb caretakers toprehend Daos like the Dao of Life, Dao of Nature, Dao of nts.


    Outside of the two profession halls starting their expansion and the change for spiritual herb caretakers of the sect, Elder Song also took action to address the problem rted to theck of management elders to help handle the internal affairs of the sect.


    First of all, the term of assistant elder, internal management elder or management elder that was used to describe essentially the same thing, an elder in charge of the internal management of the sect, was removed and reced with the simple deacon title.


    Secondly, the strength requirement to be a deacon was removed, with the only requirement being that one would have to at least have been an elder in the past or someone who had been in the sect for at least 200 years.


    The requirement of 200 years wasn''t really that high considering that the lifespan of those in the Foundation Establishment Realm was around 200 years, with those in the Core Formation Realm reaching 300 to 400 years. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    This way, it would give the people who exhausted their potential an opportunity to have a ce in the sect, while making sure that it was only those who had been with the sect for an extended period of time and had been properly integrated who could take on the role of deacon.


    Given the requirement for joining the Star Shattering Sect in the first ce, Elder Song didn''t doubt that most of the disciple should have the ability to reach the Core Formation Realm and thus have a chance to be deacons of the sect in the future if they couldn''t reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Of course, this was only for now. In the future when the sect became stronger, the requirements to be a deacon of the sect would get higher and more difficult, but at least for now, the current arrangements were suitable and should provide arge number of new deacons to help alleviate the workload off the few dozen elders currently keeping the entire Star Shattering Sect running.


    At the same time, Elder Song also began considering what to do about the elder positions of the sect, as even though there hadn''t been any real problems so far, the distinctions between the different elders also needed to be made clear.


    The normal sect elder and outer sect elder positions were fine and there wasn''t really a need to change much about them or limit the number of people who could archive these ranks, as it was something that most of the sect disciples were currently aiming for.


    The problem came with the Core Elder position and the Grand Elder position.


    At the moment, there wasn''t a clear distinction between the two positions, as the requirements for the two ranks were essentially the same. Reach the Domain Lord Realm. The only clear distinction between the two being the fact that the Grand Elder Position could somewhat be considered a legacy position that had been given to two of the most senior people in the sect, thus not really causing any real problems for now, as both Xuan Hao and Shu Yao were well respected by the elders of the sect and none of them really had any problem with them being in this legacy position that existed above them and was on the same level as the sect master in some respects.


    But¡­ For the future, there needed to be some changes to this position, as Elder Song had personally seen how other sect''s or powers viewed the position of a grand elder as being someone from the older generation who still lend a hand in the management on the sect. Generally viewed as stronger if not the same level as the sect master.


    Although this was the case for Xuan Hao who was far stronger than the sect master ording to what he understood, Shu Yao wasn''t and could be considered quite a bit weakerpared to Feng Chen, who had recently undergone a period of rapid growth. Especially considering that Feng Chen was a sword cultivator and could generally be considered stronger than his peers inbat.


    "Should I remove Shu Yao down to Core Elder or make a new position?" Muttering this to himself as he frowned while mulling over this problem, Elder Song could ultimately not decide on what to do, as he got up from his seat and began heading towards the sect master''s pavilion.


    Intending to find Feng Chen and ask him for help. Hoping that his old friend would be able to have a better idea of how to handle this situation than he himself did.


    After all, this would have to go through him anyways, as changing the Grand Elder and Core Elder positions of the sect was of utmost importance as it rted to the distribution of power among the top experts of the sect, something that could affect the current core elders who were still not fully used to their new positions and still acted in the same way as when they had been normal elders¡­


    "Why not put a limit on the number of Core Elders and Grand Elders and have them be determined by strength? This way we can keep the Core Elder and Grand Elder position as the pinnacle of the sect''s power, while also giving those elders something to strive towards. Holding apetition for the positions every few years or something along that line.


    As for those who want to retire and not continue meddling in the internal affairs of the sect and just focus on cultivation, we can establish an ancestor position like most other powers do and allow to retreat and focus solely on their cultivation or whatever they want to do.


    Of course, the requirements for the ancestor position shouldn''t be low and should be kept far above that of normal elders of the sect¡­ And given that most of the sect elders are still young in terms of their strength, I think we should establish something for them to strive towards. Let''s set the requirements for the ancestor position to the Dao Seed Realm.


    At the same time, the number of Core Elders should be a hundred, with Grand Elders being ten. This way, it won''t interfere with any of the newly promoted core elders, while also giving those yet to reach the Domain Lord Rm time to try and catch up to secure a core elder position. In the future, the requirements to be a core elder and grand elder will grow naturally together with the strength of the sect."


    "This¡­"


    Listening to Feng Chen''s suggestion on how to deal with the situation, Elder Song froze for a second with a speechless expression on his face before it was overtaken by one filled with joy.


    Feng Chen¡­ He seemed to have be far more skilled at managing the sect!

 Chapter 1354 Something to Strive Towards and a New Duo

    Chapter 1354 Something to Strive Towards and a New Duo


    After finishing his conversation with Feng Chen about the future structure of the sect''s core elder, grand elder and ancestor position, Elder Song didn''t waste any time as he directly began to take action to implement the new elder structure of the sect.


    Considering that the current Star Shattering Sect only had around 23 people with the core elder position at this moment in time, there wasn''t really any change among the current elders who had already been promoted to core elders during the recent rapid period of growth that the sect had experienced following the introduction of the Dao Enlightenment Monument, but those who had yet to reach the Domain Lord Realm among the normal sect elders all began striving towards reaching the Domain Lord Realm and bing a core elder.


    In turn, this caused the elders of the sect to take on even more missions and help with the growth of the sect, while at the same time also causing those who had already managed to be core elders to strive towards bing grand elders.


    Of course, instead of just directly promoting eight of them up to the position of grand elder to fill in the remaining positions for grand elders, Elder Song had made sure to give them a year to prepare before assigning the remaining grand elders. Intending to allow them to fight for the position when the time came so only the strongest among them would be able to ascend to the rank of grand elder.


    At the same time, this did also give some of the normal sect elders who were just about to reach the Domain Lord Rm a chance to try and vie for the rank of grand elder if they sessfully managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm and stabilize their cultivation base in this period of time.


    After all, everything considered, most of the Star Shattering Sect''s elders were still only around the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm at this point in time. Meaning that there would be some grand elders in the First Stage Domain Lord Realm during the first time that the rank of grand elder was being assigned.


    Of course, with the way that things had been set up, this would only be for the first time, as the grand elders would only continue to grow stronger as the sect also got stronger over time. Especially considering that there would definitely be a lot of core elders who wanted to try their hand on ascending to the grand elder position the next time a fight for the position woulde. Almost certainly targeting those weaker grand elders who might have been able to reach the position the first time around due to there not being that many core elders around during their time.


    Thinking about this, Elder Song could not help smiling to himself as he was already looking forward to it.


    For the elders of the sect to have something to work towards like this was good and the constant threat of possible being surpassed by the newer elders would make both the core elders and grand elders strive for improving themselves and not dare ck off like they had done in the past.


    In case they grew exhausted of this lifestyle in their older years and just wanted to rx and do something different, the deacon position for weaker elders and the ancestor position for the stronger ones were already put in ce.


    Although, the ancestor position was certainly far more tempting to these elderspared to the deacon position, as an ancestor was of a far higher status and would still be able to enjoy a lot of resources from the sect.


    The only real requirement for an ancestor was to teach the younger elders and disciples every now and then and of course also lend a hand when the sect needed a more powerful cultivator to act.


    But these requirements weren''t that different from other sects, kingdoms, ns or powers with a simr structure and the ancestor would almost always enjoy the freedom to do whatever they wanted as long as it didn''t interfere with the overall interests of the power they belonged to.


    For this reason alone, the ancestor position became the long-term goal of countless elders after learning about it, while the immediate goal became to either reach the core elder position or the grand elder position.


    No matter the position of the elder, everyone in the sect had something to strive towards, something that the Star Shattering Sect had beencking for some time.


    The only thing that seemed to becking for the Star Shattering Sect at the moment when came to the elders, was resources.


    Even though the Star Shattering Sect had managed to secure an ample number of resources for those below the Domain Lord Realm, when it came for those in the Domain Lord Realm, the Star Shattering Sect was severelycking in resources or things for their elders, as the alchemy hall and cksmithing hall had not yet managed to fully catch up to the growth of the sect''s elders.


    The number of Master Realm cksmiths was still fine at the moment, as Bai Ning was inside the sect to fill the gap, while there was also the support of Yi Min in the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­ And with their support and teaching of cksmiths it still looked like more people would soon join them in reaching the Master Realm. Allowing the cksmithing hall of the sect to at least look like it should be able to keep up with the growth of the sect if things continued like this with the help of Yi Min.


    The main problem was the alchemy hall, that essentially only had Qing Yi in the Master Realm working to make elixirs and potions for the sect''s Domain Lord Realm cultivators.


    Luckily, before Elder Song had the time to try and address this situation, three of the older alchemist elders who had been stuck at the Peak of the Artisan Realm managed to breakthrough to the master Realm under the guidance of Pei Yang. Solving the problem for him before he had the time to try and do anything about it.


    Everything ended up working out on its own and without him having to do anything for once. Making Elder Song feel a bit helpless for once, as he had no idea what to say when the sect actually managed to work its problems without his help.


    However, he still felt happy about this development, as he decided to take a rare day off to focus on looking after his little granddaughter, Song Jia, who had managed to develop well over the past few years. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not just had his granddaughter grown up in terms of her height over the past few years, but her strength had also increased from the earlier stages of the Core Formation Realm to the Peak of the Core Formation Realm. cing her as one of the strongest disciples of the sect.


    Although, her circumstances were rather uniquepared to most of the other disciples at this realm, as she still didn''t have a teacher, but instead bounced around between the different elders who were good friends with Elder Song. Learning from them in the process.


    Of course, among these people, the location she frequented the most was Xuan Hao''s ce, as she was already good friends with all of his disciples and had managed to grow rather close to them over the years.


    One worrying thing in Xuan Hao''s eyes as he observed his disciples ying or hanging out with her every now and then was that she seemed to have an especially strong friendship with Mui and had ended up being dragged into the weird things she was up to every now and then.


    Even if Mui had mostly stopped stealing things from different elders and disciples of the sect to make her strange contraptions at this point in time, it didn''t mean that she had stopped making them¡­ And while some of them were extremely useful to the sect and the development of the sect. Most of them ended up causing a rather chaotic situation wherever they appeared.


    Worse¡­ After the friendship between Mui and Song Jia blossomed, he noticed that Song Jia special ability to find spiritual herbs also extended to different things like rare spiritual wood or metal. Essentially allowing her to find several precious metals and other things together with Mui, who then used them to create all kinds of strange creations.


    Soon enough, much to Elder Song''s dismay, the two soon ended up bing an infamous duo among the disciples and elders of the sect, who at one point or another would end up encountering some strange thing that had been created by the two young girls.


    Unfortunately, Elder Song didn''t have the heart to separate his little granddaughter from her best friend, as they weren''t really causing any serious problems for the sect and were in some sense benefiting it in the long term with the few useful creations that ended up appearing every now and then among the things created by Mui.

 Chapter 1355 Returning to the Second Star Peak

    Chapter 1355 Returning to the Second Star Peak


    As Elder Song was busy with the implementation of the deacon position and changes to the existing core elder and grand elder position, Xuan Hao slowly opened his eyes with a frown on his face as he clearly sensed the changes in the Dao of Illusions that he had been trying toprehend to the Perfection Realm.


    Although it hadn''t been that long since he broke through to the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space and he had only recently begun toprehend the Dao of Illusions. Trying to further hisprehension of the dao and strive towards the Perfection Realm, he hade to realize that it was far harder than he had expected to progress in the Dao of Illusions.


    Even with his far higherprehensionpared to other people, he almost felt stuck without making any significant progress after spending months trying toprehend it, something he wasn''t used to and also something that made him stop what he was doing. Understanding that he would have to do something if he wanted to speed up hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions.


    The only problem was that the only location he knew where he could do something like that was located in the Blue Sea Empire. After all, even though the Dao Enlightenment Monument was useful in helping those in the Domain Lord Realm and below inprehending the Dao, it wasn''t really useful when it came toprehending the Dao of Illusions at its current level.


    So, instead of continuing without making any progress inprehending the Dao of Illusions, Xuan Hao had decided to stop what he was doing and was now thinking about whether or not to first try andprehend some of the other Daos he nned onprehending to the Large Sess Realm before trying toprehend one of his Daos to the Perfection Realm.


    Even though this would make his soul a bit stronger and make it easier for him toprehend something like the Dao of Illusions to the realm of Perfection easier, it would ultimately still take a long time without any outside assistance.


    "Outside assistance¡­ Something that can help meprehend the Dao faster- Ah! The Second Star Peak!"


    As he was thinking about what to do and how he could increase hisprehension speed of the different Daos he had managed toprehend so far, Xuan Hao suddenly remembered the Second Star Peak that was covered in divine rocks filled with ice blue divine energy. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even if it was somewhat dangerous, he still clearly remembered how absorbing that divine energy through the me imprint had allowed him toprehend the Dao of Ice¡­ And even if he still had no real understanding about the me imprint and the different phoenix feathers, he had found that were promptly absorbed by the me imprint, he felt a bit more confident that he should be able to endure absorbing the blue divine energy now that his strength had increased.


    At least, for now, it was the only thing Xuan Hao could think of that would be able to help increase hisprehension speed without needing him to leave the sect and go to somewhere far away like the Blue Sea Empire.


    In any case, he would be heading to the Blue Sea Empire when he took Xuan Gui there in the future to cause chaos.


    When that time came, he could always set aside some time to check out on the secret realm that allowed him toprehend the Dao of Illusions to the Large Sess Realm and also see if those illusory beasts were still around.


    Given his current strength and hisprehension of the Dao of Space, he didn''t really feel that fearful of getting caught by the Celestial Immortals of the Blue Sea Empire nor being trapped inside the secret realm again. Especially considering that he had managed to learn the long-distance teleportation over the past few months and would be more than capable of escaping from the illusory beast''s secret realm even if he was trapped inside it again.


    Of course, that was on the premise that the ce hadn''t been destroyed already by the Blue Sea Empire, who would have responded to escape of the illusory beasts.


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao shook his head before standing up and stretching his limbs for the first time in a little over a week of having remained in the same position trying toprehend the Dao of Illusions without much sess.


    "Guess I will go and pay a visit to the Second Star Peak and- Hm?"


    About to leave and head towards the Second Star Peak to try and see if he could use the divine stones filled with blue divine energy there toprehend the Dao of Ice, Xuan Hao suddenly came to a stop as he noticed that someone had contacted him a few days earlier.


    Unfortunately, he had been far too focused on hisprehension of the Dao of Illusions to notice it and only now saw it.


    "Elder Song? Hm? Changes to the Grand Elder and Core Elder position? Ancestor position- Ah! Don''t tell¡­ He wants me to take on the ancestor position!? I''m not that old!"


    Reading through the message that Elder Song had sent him, Xuan Hao was at first nodding his head in approval when he read through the changes to the Grand Elder and Core Elder positions, as he could see just how useful and good for the sect these changes were.


    However, when he reached the part about the new ancestor position and saw the Dao Seed Realm requirement, he instantly thought Elder Song was trying to hint at him to take on the ancestor position. After all, in the eyes of Elder Song and the rest of the sect''s elders, his current realm was the Dao Seed Realm, simr to Pei Yang.


    Only after he read a bit more into why the requirement was the Dao Seed Realm did he realize that this wasn''t directly targeted at him.


    Although his age was close to 50 at this point in time and he could personally feel himself growing older, he didn''t feel old enough to be called an ancestor. Especially considering his appearance hadn''t changed and he still looked to be in histe twenties to early thirties.


    "Ancestor¡­ Maybe in another fifty- no hundred years, I might consider it¡­" Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself, Xuan Hao put away hismunication talisman as he made his way out of his room towards the Second Star Peak.


    Although there was put a limit of 10 on the Grand Elder position, it wouldn''t really affect him, as there wasn''t really anyone in the sect who would be able to threaten his position as a core elder.


    The only reason why he thought that he might have to take on the ancestor position at some point in the future was because he understood that the elders in the sect wouldn''t be happy if he continued to use his overwhelming strength to keep one of these limited positions indefinitely, as that would essentially make it like there was only 9 Grand Elder positions instead of 10.


    Of course, he also thought about another solution to the problem, which was to use his influence and strength in the Star Shattering Sect to have Elder Song and Feng Chen make a special position for him that didn''t end up with him being referred to an ancestor that was generally reserved for those ancient fossils of major powers who had been around for tens of thousands of years.


    In the end, Xuan Hao didn''t really care too much about it, as it was only a title in the sect so to speak. No matter what title he had, it wouldn''t really change his status in the sect, as he would still be the strongest existence in the sect.


    So, as he already managed to throw the recent changes to the sect''s new hierarchal structure to the back of his mind, Xuan Hao arrived back at the Second Star Peak for the first time in years. Having not returned to investigate the divine stones filled with blue divine energy since thest time he had been scared off by the terrifying power contained inside the divine energy.


    Even though his strength had increased several times since then, the power inside the divine stones was still far beyond anything he had encountered so far and even now, he was still uncertain whether or not it was a correct choice for him to try and absorb more of the strange blue divine energy to further his understanding of the Dao of ice.


    No matter how useful it would be for hisprehension of the Dao of Ice, it still didn''t change the fact that it was something dangerous that came with certain risk. Even more so after his understanding of the terrifying power of gods and how strong they were had deepened, as even the weakest god should stand above the Profound Immortal Realm.

 Chapter 1356 Large Success, Dao of Ice

    Chapter 1356 Large Sess, Dao of Ice


    Landing at the Peak of the Second Star Peak that seemed to be without any changes from thest time he had been there with countless smaller andrger rocks filled with the blue divine energy still motionlessly covering the mountain peak, Xuan Hao could not help breaking a sigh of relief for some unknown reason.


    Even though he didn''t really expect something to have changed since hisst visit to the Second Star Peak, he was still happy when he personally saw that there hadn''t been any changes since he hadst been there and absorbed some of the blue divine energy from one of the smaller rocks.


    If something really did up changing without him being around and with the chaotic qi formation already having locked down the area to prevent anyone else from reaching the Second Star Peak, he would have to move forward far more carefully.


    On a positive note, he at least managed to confirm that absorbing the blue divine energy inside one the rocksst time around didn''t seem to affect the rest of the rocks with divine energy inside them.


    However, there was a change taking ce, though not one rted to the Second Star Peak, but instead Xuan Hao himself, as he clearly felt the me imprint between his brows revealing itself without him personally intending to do so.


    Not just that, but he could also clearly feel that the me imprint seemed to be trying to reach out towards the nearby rocks filled with blue divine energy. Clearly trying to absorb the blue divine energy inside of them.


    Of course, given that he still wasn''t fully aware of just what the me imprint was and whether or not it would pose any danger to him in the long run, Xuan Hao decided to start slow. Picking up a smaller rock on the ground before slowly allowing the me imprint between his eyebrows to absorb it. At the same time allowing hisprehension of the Dao of Ice to rapidly increase, as he felt the profound Dao of Ice inside the blue divine energy flowing through his body before entering the mysterious space contained inside the me imprint.


    The main differencepared to the past when the small me, that had now turned into a me imprint, had absorbed the blue divine energy, was the fact that his body could now endure the blue divine energy flowing through it without any major problems.


    Although the strength of the blue divine energy was still far too strong for him to try and personally absorb with his current strength, it did bring some benefits outside of increasedprehension of the Dao of Ice, as Xuan Hao clearly felt both the size and strength of the meridians throughout his body growing as the blue divine energy flowed through them. Strengthening his already strong foundation even further.


    Unfortunately, after a little over three hours on top of the Second Star Peak slowly absorbing the blue divine energy inside a few of the smaller stones scattered around on the mountain peak, Xuan Hao felt that the capacity of the mysterious space inside the me imprint seemed to have reached its limits. Unable to absorb any more of the blue divine energy.


    Unfortunately, after a little over three hours on top of the Second Star Peak slowly absorbing the blue divine energy inside a few of the smaller stones scattered around on the mountain peak, Xuan Hao felt that the capacity of the mysterious space inside the me imprint seemed to have reached its limits. Unable to absorb any more of the blue divine energy.


    Even then, this did not seem to slow down hisprehension of the Dao of Ice, as the lingering power of the blue divine energy was still present throughout his body. Allowing him to continueprehending the Dao of Ice without any problem. Slowly allowing him to get closer and closer to the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Ice.


    Considering that the Dao of Ice was one of the first Daos he hadprehended back when he was still in the earlier stages of the Domain Lord Realm, it was also one of the Daos he had the longest time toprehend.


    Thus, as two months flew by on top of the Second Star Peak without any interruptions, Xuan Hao managed to break through to the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Ice.


    Regrettably, after breaking through to the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Ice, thest bits of power left behind in his body by the blue divine energy disappeared. Making him open both of his eyes as he scanned the unchanged destendscape of the Second Star Peak that had seen no changes during his two month long secluded cultivation.


    Turning his attention towards the mysterious space hidden away inside the me imprint, he noticed that it was still filled to the brim. Not able to allow him to try and absorb more of the blue divine energy.


    Even though he had originally wanted to be a bit more cautious about the me imprint absorbing the blue divine energy, he couldn''t bring himself to stop after he noticed how much it help with hisprehension of the Dao of Ice.


    "I really have to be more cautious the next time around. Maybe find out more about the me imprint and whether or not it will pose any threat by continuing to absorb the blue divine energy¡­" Muttering this to himself as he shook his head, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit conflicted as he unconsciously touched the area where the me imprint was located.


    Although he was cautious about the danger that it might pose to him at some point in the future, it was also a fact that it had saved him on several asions in the past.


    Because of this, Xuan Hao silently ended up deciding to continue trying to absorb the blue divine energy on the Second Star Peak with the me imprint when it had finished absorbing what had been absorbed this time around.


    Not only because it would be useful for hisprehension of the Dao of Ice, but also because he was genuinely curious about what kind of changes would take ce in the me imprint if he continued to have it absorb the blue divine energy. Especially considering the phoenix feathers it had absorbed and the fact that there was an even smaller phoenix inside it.


    Would continuing to absorb the blue divine energy perhaps cause the small phoenix inside the small me between his brows to grow? Maybe the mysterious space inside the small me was specially created to nurture this small phoenix?


    But¡­ If that was the case¡­ What was he? An egg?


    Shaking his head with a slightly wry smile on his face as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided not to think too much about the meaning behind the small me imprint or the even smaller phoenix inside the me imprint for now.


    Though, he did take note of the fact that it seemed like the small phoenix had grown in size after the absorption of blue divine energy this time around. Even if it was only at a scale that could be measured with his divine sense, it had indeed grown¡­


    "


    Haaa¡­ For now, I should get back to the sect and see what has happened during the time I was gone. Hopefully the new elder changes encouraged the elders in their cultivation.


    Shaking his head as he decided not to think about the small me imprint any longer, Xuan Hao began making his way back towards the sect while wondering just how many elders had managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm over the past two months following the encouragement in the form of the core elder position being limited to a hundred people.


    Whoosh~!


    Without even waiting until he was back home, Xuan Hao spread out his divine sense and covered the Shattered Star Peaks. Searching for any new Domain Lord Realm cultivator he hadn''t felt before. Knowing that anyone who had managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm over the past two months should still be consolidating their cultivation base inside the sect at this point in time.


    "1¡­ 2¡­ 5¡­ 7 people!? There is actually seven who managed to breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm over the past two months!?" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    However, the discovery that seven people had actually managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm in this rtively short period of time was still shocking. Especially considering that he also noticed that there were several elders of the sect currently at thest steps of preparing to break through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    In another month, it wouldn''t be shocking for the number of Domain Lord Realm cultivators in the Star Shattering Sect to grow by another five to ten people!


    Indeed¡­ In terms of encouraging the elders of the sect, it seemed like the new arrangement for the core elder and grand elder positions had worked perfectly, as it seemed to have sparked these elderspetitive spirit.


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao also decided to check out on Feng Chen and the rest of the sect''s elders who had already managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm to check out how they had been doing and whether or not they were still stuck at the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.

 Chapter 1357 Condensing the 18th Layer around the Dao Seed

    Chapter 1357 Condensing the 18th Layer around the Dao Seed


    Using his divine sense to check out the situation of the rest of the sect elders in the Domain Lord Realm inside the sect, Xuan Hao noticed that most of them seemed to have made significant progress over the past few months, with quite a few of them managing to reach the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm during this period of time, one of these elders being Zu Fei, who had somehow managed to reach the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Surpassing most of the elders in the sect.


    Of course, the main reason why these elders could progress so fast even after they broke through to the Domain Lord Realm, far surpassing that of those Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had once been under the Sky Empire, was because the elders of the Star Shattering Sect had not only the guidance from the cultivation records and Dao Enlightenment Monument from Xuan Hao, but also the lectures from Pei Yang.


    All things considered, it would be stranger if they didn''t improve at their current speed, as they had so much that helped them seed.


    The real challenge would be when they started reaching the Soul Ascension Realm, as even if Xuan Hao had found out about what the different tribtions of the Immortal Soul Tribtion entailed and given that information to the sect, it would only allow the elders of the sect to prepare more for the tribtion when it came.


    At the end of the day, oveing the Immortal Soul Tribtion was not something that would be easy to aplish even with the help of the Star Shattering Sect behind them and Xuan Hao, along with Pei Yang, already understood that not all elders of the Star Shattering Sect would be capable of passing through the Immortal Soul Tribtion.


    Even in a massive empire like the Blue Sea Empire, those of the royal family there still ended up dying in the Soul Ascension Realm while trying to pass through the Immortal Soul Tribtion¡­ And it was without a doubt that this massive empire already understood the Immortal Soul Tribtion and would have done everything in their power to prepare their younger generation for the tribtion, but still ended up unable to ensure a safe passage through the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao understood that there was nothing he could do about it.


    Cultivation wasn''t that easy and there would always be challenges to ovee and the Immortal Soul Tribtion was one of them.


    Although the sect would be able to prepare them for it, they would ultimately have to ovee it by themselves.


    Well¡­ There wasn''t really much he could personally help the elders of the sect with when it came time for them to prepare for oveing the Immortal Soul Tribtion, as he himself had still not ovee the Immortal Soul Tribtion and didn''t really have any experience that he could share with them about the tribtion.


    The only one in the sect who had sessfully managed to pass through the Immortal Soul Tribtion at the moment was Pei Yang and he was already teaching the elders of the sect. So¡­ There wasn''t really much for him to worry about doing in this regard when all things were considered.


    The most important thing for him to aplish if he wanted to help the Star Shattering Sect was to continue increasing his strength and strive to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm as fast as possible.


    After all, even though the Star Shattering Sect had managed to avoid getting involved in the struggle between the major powers in the core region of the continent and the demonic cultivators so far, he understood that this wouldn''t be the case for long.


    No matter how much his new friend wanted to hold back the demonic cultivators from attacking the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, it would only be a matter of time before a more powerful demonic cultivator took notice and decided to attack.


    In a sense, the only reason why the Star Shattering Sect had managed to avoid most of the conflict so far was because of the ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire shing with the powerful demonic cultivators, causing the attack towards the Blue Sea Empire to be postponed, as the demonic cultivators focused their attention elsewhere. Only allowing a few weaker demonic cultivators to continue attacking the small kingdoms and empires bordering the Frozen Wastnd, whom Xuan Gui could still control with her strength at the Peak of the Demon Lord Realm.


    Of course, it was also important that the current Star Shattering Sect wasn''t that big in the grand scheme of things and not attacking could be exined away due to the wall Xuan Hao had created between the Star Shattering Sect''s territory and the Frozen Wastnd.


    Not to mention, the demonic cultivators were in a sense still attacking the Star Shattering Sect, it was just through another border that was between them and another bordering kingdom to the Frozen Wastnd.


    If a simrly powerful or more powerful demonic cultivator had been present, things might have been different, but at least for now, Xuan Gui could be considered the one in control of the situation ording to what she had been informing him about every now and then.


    In case a more powerful demonic cultivator really did show up and wanted to take charge of the situation, both of them had alreadye to an agreement that she would inform him about it, as the two of them had already started cooperating together and she understood her only way into the Blue Sea Empire would be if he helped her.


    After all, even though Xuan Gui was a demonic cultivator, it was not like she cared about what happened to the demonic cultivators. Especially considering that the attack on the surrounding empires and kingdoms around the Frozen Wastnd was something that had been forced on to her and most of the demonic cultivators below the Demon King Realm.


    In her eyes, she would much rather spend her time quietly cultivating and slowly umte her strength until she broke through to the Demon King Realm before taking revenge on the Blue Sea Empire for what they had done to her¡­


    Whoosh~


    Arriving back inside his cultivation room as he waved his hand and closed the door behind him while his thoughts wandered, Xuan Hao slowly sat back down before closing his eyes to resume his cultivation.


    However, he wasn''t nning on continuing toprehend the dao this time around. Instead, he was nning to condense two newyers around the dao seed inside his dantian now that his Dao of Ice had managed to break through to the Large Sess Realm.


    Considering that he had condensed thest twoyers with the help of the Dao of Space after it reached the Large Sess Realm, the total number ofyers around the dao seed inside his dantian would reach 18 after he finished condensing another two.


    18yers around the dao seed symbolized reaching the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm and the dao seed would transform into the half blooming state.


    Although he had no idea if this would actually happen given that he wasn''t in the Dao Seed Realm so to speak, he still nned to take care just in case, as it wasn''t apletely painless experience to breakthrough to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm.


    Even if there was no danger of death like the Immortal Soul Tribtion, there was still a certain risk of failure that would in turn injure his soul to a certain extent, something that would then force him to stop hisprehension to recover the injurie his soul sustained.


    Though the higher realms of the Dao Seed Realm seemed unknown to most of the people on the Ewaria Continent, the Half bloom Stage was still rather well known and so was the damage caused to the soul by failing to break through to this stage, something Xuan Hao had long since managed to learn about from not only records bought or gathered by the Star Shattering Sect, but also personally from Pei Yang, who was far more knowledgeable than himself on the Dao Seed Realm or Earth Immortal Realm as it was known throughout the continent. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    So, with that in mind, Xuan Hao slowly condensed the 17thyer around the dao seed inside his dantian before slowly starting to condense the 18thyer. Making sure to keep an eye out for any sudden changes or abnormalities along the way¡­ And just like that, Xuan Hao managed to sessfully condense the 18thyer around his dao seed without anything happening, or that was at least what he thought as he finished condensing the 18thyer around his dao seed-


    Whoosh~


    "Wha-!?"


    As not even a few seconds after he started to rx his guard, a change began to take ce inside his dantian.

 Chapter 1358 Increase in Strength

    Chapter 1358 Increase in Strength


    As the 18yers around his dao seed had finished stabilizing and Xuan Hao was starting to rx, theyers suddenly seemed to expand, as the dao seed inside his dantian began growing in size before it began showing signs of sprouting into a dao lotus at any moment. Having more than doubled in sizepared to before.


    However, the thing that shocked Xuan Hao about this change was not the fact that the dao seed had formally entered the state of half blooming. Symbolizing that he had reached a levelparable to someone at the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, but instead the fact that he could clearly feel the power of his soul being elevated to a level far beyond what it had been before.


    Taking a few seconds to calm down from the sudden change that had taken ce inside his dantian, Xuan Hao quickly realized why the strength of his soul had suddenly undergone a major change following the growth of the dao seed.


    The dao seed was a part of his soul at this point in time and as the dao seed became stronger, so would his soul. Increasing not only the strength of his soul, but more importantly also strengthening hisprehension in the process. Making it easier for him toprehend the more difficult Daos like the Dao of Illusions and the Dao of Space that he found too difficult to progress in beforehand.


    As he realized this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling like he had gained a deeper understanding of the Dao Seed Realm, while at the same time increasing his confidence in reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    After all, even if his current increasedprehension after his soul had been strengthened wasn''t enough, he should still be able to reach the next stage of the Dao Seed Realm and strengthen his soul again without having to worry about having toprehend one of his Daos to the Perfection Realm.


    And¡­ Given how much he felt hisprehension had increased he felt confident in doing so within the span of a few years.


    Part of him even felt confident that he might be able to promote the Dao of Ice to the Perfection Realm if he could make use of the blue divine energy contained inside the rocks on the Second Star Peak.


    The only problem with this was that the me imprint between his brows had already been filled to the brim and would take some time to digest the already absorbed divine energy before he could try and go back to the Second Star Peak again.


    Even then, it should at most take a few years from what Xuan Hao could sense from the mysterious space hidden inside the me imprint. During which he could focus on some of the other Daos he had been nning to promote to the Large Sess Realm.


    Among these Daos, the ones that ended up drawing the most attention being the Dao of cksmithing and the Dao of Alchemy, as he really wanted to avoid getting surpassed by his disciples again and wanted to stay ahead of them before the system ended uping after him for being surpassed by his disciples again.


    Outside of that, Xuan Hao also felt like increasing hisprehension of these two Daos would give him a good opportunity to spend some time with Qing Yi, Bai Ning and Chun Hua, who had taken an interest to alchemy over the past few months and was currently studying it under the guidance of Qing Yi.


    As for his two remaining disciples¡­ Chu Yang was currently out on an adventure and wouldn''t be returning to the sect for the foreseeable future, while Mui was busy ying together with her new best friend.


    Speaking of Mui and her new best friend, Song Jia, Xuan Hao did hear about what they were up to and wanted to help out Elder Song in case Mui ended up being a bad influence on his granddaughter, but he was told that it was fine and told that it was fine given that the two weren''t really causing any harm.


    On the other hand, it seemed like the beneficial things created by Mui increased in thepanionship of Song Jia, as the two had somehow managed to create some kind of strange artifact that had ended up merging together with Elder Song''s soul. Solving the inherent problem that had been left behind by the demonic techniques he had used in the past.


    It was also because of this that Elder Song wasn''t that hard on the two of them and didn''t want to separate them, as they had helped him ovee the one thing that would have stopped him from breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm in the future after reaching the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not just Elder Song, but it seemed like several of the elders of the sect were helped out by the two troublemakers, as they created an almost imprable defense line for them whenever they ended up causing any kind of trouble inside the sect.


    Hearing about this, Xuan Hao had no idea what to say, as he wondered if this was something that had been done intentionally by his little disciple or if it was just a coincidence.


    No matter what it was, Xuan Hao decided that it would probably be for the best that he didn''t interfere with what this little disciple of his was up to. Especially because he learnt that three of the seven elders who had managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm during his seclusion on the Second Star Peak was because of the help that this little disciple had seemingly unintentionally given them.


    Unknowingly, during his short two-month long seclusion, his youngest disciple had somehow grown into a powerhouse inside the sect with several Domain Lord Realm elders supporting her from behind. Truly not something he had expected to happen when he had left for the Second Star Peak.


    However, given that it had helped increase the strength of the sect and there wasn''t any harm done outside of one time where Mui and Song Jia had created some kind of slime pit that caused people falling into it to get drunk if their cultivation was below the Domain Lord realm, Xuan Hao took the same stance as Elder Song and decided to support the two troublemakers.


    "Haaa¡­ I wonder what will happen when she ends up reaching the Domain Lord Realm in the future¡­" Muttering this as he shook his head, Xuan Hao closed his eyes as he began focusing his attention onprehending the Dao of Alchemy.


    Although the Dao of Alchemy was bestprehended through practice, simr to the Dao of cksmithing, Xuan Hao intended to first test out how strong hisprehension had be after his recent increase in strength¡­ And the result was rather shocking, as he felt hisprehension speed of the Dao of Alchemy having almost doubled whenpared to before.


    Guess I should also check out my status to see if my strength managed to surpass the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm¡­


    Narrowing both his eyes as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao also clearly felt that his strength had increased by a lot following the transformation of his dao seed, thus causing him to turn his attention towards his status¡­


    Name: Xuan Hao n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Dao Domain: Dao of Space (Large Sess), Dao of Ice (Large Sess), Dao of the Sword (Large Sess), Dao of Illusions (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess), Dao of Fire (Small Sess), Dao of cksmithing (Small Sess), Dao of Light (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Formations (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Alchemy (Small Sess)


    Dao Lotus: 18yers


    Sword Intent: Sword Soul Realm Talent: ???? Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened) Physique: Ster Dao Body (99% Awakened) (Can evolve into Great Expanse Dao Body) Ster Dao Body Awakening Requirements: Dao of Space Perfection Realm, Dao of Time Elementary Realm, Profound Immortal Realm (Land Creation) Realm: Late Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm) Professions: Alchemist (Grandmaster), Formation Master (Grandmaster), cksmithing (Pseudo Saint) Sect: Star Shattering Sect Status: Grand Elder of the Star Shattering Sect Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui, Chun Hua Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (First Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm) Cultivation: The Untold Swords Mantra [Personal Techniques]: Descend of the Ice God''s Sword (High Earth Rank) [Movement Techniques]: Illusory Light Steps (Mid Heaven Rank), Drifting Cloud Steps (Iplete, Peak Heaven Rank) [Sword Techniques]: Rain Sword (Peak Mortal Rank), Heaven Splitting Sword Art (Iplete, Mid Heaven Rank), Void Sword Art (Iplete, Low Heaven Rank), Untold Sword Mantra (Iplete, Unknown) Looking through his status, he had indeed managed to reach the strengthparable to the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Making him feel a bit more confident in case the sect ended up being targeted by the Blue Sea Empire or demonic cultivators in the future.


    After all, the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm was beyond the limits of the Earth Immortal Realm widely known throughout the Ewaria Continent and only someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm would be capable of threatening him at this point in time.


    Not to mention, using the Dao of Space to his advantage, he might even be able to contend with someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm at this point in time. Possibly ensuring that the Star Shattering Sect wouldn''t be seen as an easy target by any of the major powers on the continent.

 Chapter 1359 Trying to Use Long-Distance Teleportation

    Chapter 1359 Trying to Use Long-Distance Teleportation


    Thinking about how he might have the strength to contend with someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao quickly shook his head as he remembered the encounter between the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire and the Demon King Realm demonic cultivators from the Frozen Wastnd. Especially when recalling the terrifying attack that had collided with the chaotic qi formation.


    Although his strength had improvedpared to before, he still felt helpless when it came to facing such a powerful attack without the assistance of the chaotic qi formation.


    The main differencepared to before being that he now felt confident in at least being able to keep himself alive if he got hit by such a powerful attack. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Contending with someone capable ofunching such powerful attacks was simply wishful thinking on his part, as he understood that he was still far away from fighting equally against someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Of course, there was clearly also differences between those in the Celestial Immortal Realm and the Demon King Realm, as the people he had sensed fighting outside the Onyx Empire that was barely standing at this point in time, were obviously far weaker than the one who had been behind the terrifying attack that had ended up being blocked by the chaotic qi formation.


    Faced with them, Xuan Hao at least felt some confidence in being able to fight back against them without having to immediately turn to using his Dao of Space to escape.


    But then again, this was all just his own thoughts, and he would never truly know how well he would fare against someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm without first facing someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Unfortunately, he didn''t really know anyone in the Celestial Immortal Realm that he could ask for help in this regard.


    His strongest friend being Pei Yang, who was still quite far off breaking through to the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    The only person outside of Pei Yang he could think about as a potential opponent to test out his new strength was Gong Cheng from the Blue Shore Kingdom who had managed to break through to the Saint Realm.


    Although, after his recent revtions on the Saint Realm and how it was divided up, he understood that Gong Cheng should have only reached the Third heaven of the Saint Realm that would make his strengthparable to someone at the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm.


    Even if this still made him one of the strongest people below the Celestial immortal Realm on the Ewaria Continent, it was still far from the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    For Gong Cheng to reach a levelparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm, he would first need to reach the First Heaven of the Saint Realm, something that he doubted the old man had managed to reach in such a short period of time.


    But¡­


    Thinking about Gong Cheng, Xuan Hao could not help wondering how he might be faring with the recent actions of the Frozen Wastnd and the demonic cultivators.


    Even though he doubted that the demonic cultivators would bother turning towards the resource deprived wastnd that was the outer edges of the continent, it wasn''t out of the question for a few of the weaker demonic cultivators to turn their attention towards that ce when they became desperate enough¡­ And if they ended up causing enough chaos to warrant Gong Cheng or his people to interfere, it might result in the Blue Shore Kingdom getting noticed and targeted by more powerful demonic cultivators.


    No matter how strong Gong Cheng had be after he broke through to the Saint Realm, Xuan Hao doubted that he had managed to grow strong enough to resist thebined might of a group of Demon King Realm demonic cultivators.


    If not for the fact that he felt that it would be difficult for him to move more than a few people with his long-distance teleportation and feared that he might be noticed by the more powerful demonic cultivators lurking in the depths of the Frozen Wastnd, he might have already gone to the Blue Shore Kingdom to try and convince him to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    For now, the best he could do was establish a line ofmunication between the Blue Shore Kingdom and the Star Shattering Sect in case something ended up happening.


    More specifically, Xuan Hao just wanted some kind of excuse to test out the limitations of his long-distance teleportation before he would have to help Xuan Gui get into the Blue Sea Empire.


    After all, it would be rather awkward if he stepped up to help and ended up miscalcting how far he could go, causing them to end up alerting the Blue Sea Empire and possible one of the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors who should be on high alert around the borders of the empire at the moment.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this worst-case scenario, Xuan Hao stood back up after the situation inside his dantian had calmed down before closing both of his eyes to focus.


    Different from normal short distance teleportation that was generally used in movement techniques like the drifting cloud steps, long-distance teleportation was not something that could be used in an instant and took time to use, as he would have to carefully lock on to the spatial coordinates of the location where he wanted to go, while at the same time calcting a route that wouldn''t end up with him identally running into some kind of spatial anomaly.


    Finally, he had to create a stable spatial passage to the location he wanted to go to, something that would be a far more exhausting endeavorpared to using two already connected teleportation formations to travel through a spatial passage that had already been created and stabilized during the creation of the teleportation formation.


    Doing all of this, even with hisprehension reaching the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space and his strengthparable to the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, took over five minutes.


    Though not a long time all things considered, it was far too long to be viable inbat¡­ And there was also the fact that it was easy to interrupt the process, as apletely stable spatial environment was required for the long-distance teleportation.


    "At the very least, I hope it gets me past the Frozen Wastnd¡­" Muttering this to himself as everything had been finished, Xuan Hao took a step forward and disappeared from his room. Trying to use long-distance teleportation for the first time in an attempt to jump over the Frozen Wastnd and see if he could avoid detection.


    Even if he did fear detection by the stronger existences in the depths of the Frozen Wastnd, he didn''t feel like a single passage through the Frozen Wastnd would be enough to draw their attention. Especially considering the war they were currently waging with the empires and kingdoms bordering the Frozen Wastnd and the fact that the endpoint of the spatial passage wasn''t anywhere inside the Frozen Wastnd itself.


    In the end, Xuan Hao carefully felt the space around him twisting while trying to sense if anyone noticed him during the short time he would be inside the space of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Luckily, he didn''t notice anything out of the ordinary during the little over a second, he spent crossing the Frozen Wastnd to reach the outer edge of the continent.


    Well, he did sense something¡­ And that was the unimaginable exhaustion that came from using the long-distance teleportation. Forcing him to forcibly stop before he could reach the Blue Shore Kingdom.


    But¡­ Stopping before reaching the intended location wasn''t that simple of an affair, as Xuan Hao''s only real solution was to manipte the space around him to break apart. In turn forcing him out of the spatial passage he had created in the process.


    As a result of this, Xuan Hao suddenly found himself falling from the sky in an unknown location at the outer edges of the continent-


    Bang-!


    Unable to stop himself just after leaving the spatial passage, as he directly crashed into a nearby mountain range before he could regain control-


    RUUUMBLE-!


    Causing the mountain, he ended up hitting to crumble from the impact. Killing any animal or human who might have been unfortunate enough to have been at the mountain when he crashed into it¡­


    "Good thing I decided to test out the long-distance teleportation before actually using it to try and help Xuan Gui¡­" Inside the rubble of the mountain that had essentially copse on top of him, Xuan Hao quietly muttered this to himself with a sense of relief on his face. Completely unaffected by the situation outside of the dust that now covered his body.


    The mountain copsing on top of him unable to elicit even the smallest hint of worry from him, as he pondered about what had just happened when he had been using the long-distance teleportation and what had gone wrong.

 Chapter 1360 Not at the Third Heaven of the Saint Realm...?

    Chapter 1360 Not at the Third Heaven of the Saint Realm...?


    Everything was fine when using the long-distance teleportation and there weren''t really any problems with the technique itself. The main problem was that it was far more draining than he had first expected it to be, as even just crossing the Frozen Wastnd had already drained close to one third of the qi inside his dantian.


    Although he should still be able to reach the Blue Shore Kingdom like he had originally nned to do with the qi still left inside his dantian, he had no intention of doing so, as it would put him in a rather dangerous situation in case something happened, or he was attacked after reaching the Blue Shore Kingdom. After all, he had no idea what kind of state the kingdom was in and whether or not he might run into some kind of powerful demonic cultivator the moment he arrived.


    With that in mind, he decided to forcibly stop the teleportation technique before he could reach his target location. Sparing himself from using thest two thirds of qi inside his dantian on traversing thest remaining part of the way to the Blue Shore Kingdom. Instead opting to travel the rest of the way normally now that he had managed to sessfully cross the most dangerous part of the journey to the Blue Shore Kingdom with the help of the long-distance teleportation technique.


    Even if it was nowhere as fast as the long-distance teleportation technique that had essentially taken him no more than a few seconds to cross the Frozen Wastnd that had taken him weeks to cross in the past when he had gone together with Yi Min, it would not take more than a day or two to reach the Blue Shore Kingdom with his current mastery of the drifting cloud steps.


    Rumble~


    Having concluded that the main reason for the failure this time around had nothing to do with the long-distance teleportation technique but was instead because of the massive energy it requires to activate, Xuan Hao moved aside the rubble of the mountain that had copsed on top of him before ascending into the sky and moving in the direction of the Blue Shore Kingdom.


    Unaware that the mountain he had smashed into and copsed happened to be the divine mountain of a small kingdom controlled by a group of monks.


    "T-The divine mountain has copsed!"


    "Look! Someone ascended into the sky from the copsed mountain!"


    "I-Immortal! One of the monks who went in seclusion on the divine mountain ascended and became an immortal!"


    And it just so happened that this group of monks were unfortunate enough to be in seclusion on the divine mountain when Xuan Hao crashed into it¡­


    Not that Xuan Hao would have any idea about any of this, as he had long since left the area by the time that the mortals of the small kingdom began calling out in shock and awe, while the different nobles and other powerful people in the kingdom wore worried expressions on their faces. Wondering what to do now that their powerful backers had suddenly ascended.


    ¡­


    Standing at the border of the Blue Shore Kingdom only a little over a day after he had sessfully crossed over the Frozen Wastnd, Xuan Hao effortlessly passed through the formation surrounding the Blue Shore Kingdom. Feeling the clear change in the spiritual qi present the moment he passed through the formation before he began making his way towards the forge where he knew he could find Gong Cheng.


    Ching~ Ching~ Ching~


    Not that unexpectedly, Gong Cheng was working away at something inside of the forge at the moment, something he should have gotten himself rather busy with after he managed to break through to the Saint Realm and officially be a Saint Realm cksmith.


    "Hm? This¡­!"


    However, as he prepared himself to settle down and wait for Gong Cheng to finish what he was in the process of crafting, Xuan Hao suddenly found himself frozen on the spot as he narrowed both of his eyes slightly while looking in the direction of the forge.


    "This strength is definitely not in the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm¡­ Could it be¡­ Gong Cheng is above the Third Heaven of the Saint Realm¡­?" Muttering this to himself with slightly narrowed eyes as he felt the terrifying presence inside the forge, Xuan Hao realized that he might have underestimated the strength of Gong Cheng.


    Not to mention the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Even his own strength that was nowparable to the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm felt inferior to the power of the person inside the forge at the moment.


    Even then¡­ After carefully feeling the power for a few minutes, he realized that although strong, it wasn''t yetparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire or the Demon King Realm demonic cultivators that he had witnessed fighting in the past.


    With that in mind, he guessed that Gong Cheng should have reached the Second Heaven of the Saint Realm and was currentlyparable to someone at the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm.


    Peak of the Dao Seed Realm¡­ Different from the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm that was only the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm was infinitely close to the Celestial Immortal and Profound Immortal Realm.


    Even standing at a realmparable to the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, Xuan Hao clearly felt the fundamental difference between him and Gong Cheng, as Gong Cheng seemed to have already touched upon a higher realm, while he was essentially still limited to the Dao Seed Realm. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Of course, in a battle, he would still win against Gong Cheng even if he had strengthparable to the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm, as his Dao of Space and the other Daos he hadprehended were far more suitable for battle than the Dao of cksmithing that Gong Cheng hadprehended.


    The only ce where he might be at a disadvantage would be in terms of artifacts, as he had still not yet managed to get his hands on a suitable sword or another kind of artifact that he could use for fighting. After all, the sect didn''t have any cksmiths strong enough to create a suitable weapon, while he himself was also nowhere near the required realm in cksmithing to do so.


    And that is not even mentioning the precious spiritual metals and other resources that would be required to craft a suitable weapon¡­


    To be honest, Xuan Hao had given up on finding a suitable weapon to use for now, as he did the same as most other cultivators did when they couldn''t find someone to craft a suitable weapon and fought without one.


    Of course, though it did make his strength a bit weaker than if he had a proper weapon, it didn''t really affect it by that much as he could still use his sword intent and Dao of ice or his sword soul to create a suitable sword when fighting, while the rest of his Daos didn''t really require a weapon¡­


    "Huh? Xuan Hao? What brings you here?"


    Hearing someone calling out to him just at that moment, Xuan Hao turned around and found himself gazing into the surprised eyes of Gong Cheng who had just emerged from the forge. Clearly having sensed his presence when he arrived earlier.


    "I''m just here to say hello." Chuckling to himself as he saw the increasingly confused expression on Gong Cheng''s face as he said this, Xuan Hao soon put on a bit more serious expression. "But outside of that, I wanted to check up on you because¡­" Exining to him what had happened and the attack from the demonic cultivators.


    "Demonic cultivators attacking the core region so brazenly¡­ Looks like the situation is about to get far worse in the next few years if things continue developing like this. If I''m not wrong, the demonic cultivators should either be nning to fight another war for supremacy over the core region of the continent or trying to at least carve out a space of their own inside the core region.


    No matter which of the two it is, you and your sect can be considered quite lucky to have avoided any real danger so far, as for worrying about me¡­ There is no need to do so. Even if the demonic cultivators learn about my presence, they won''t bother to send someone at the Demon King Realm all the way out to kill me for no specific reason.


    For now, I definitely rmend for you to ensure the safety of your sect either by trying to stand as a neutral force and avoid the demonic cultivators or find somewhere to hide. Although, both options will be rather difficult to aplish without someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm presiding over your sect"


    Shaking his head as he finished speaking his thoughts on the situation, Gong Cheng gave his own judgement on the situation of the Star Shattering Sect. Clearly trying to lend a hand in how to best go about the current situation.


    Even though¡­ The rmendation essentially boiled down to hide away and hope for the best¡­

 Chapter 1361 Presure to Become Stronger

    Chapter 1361 Presure to Be Stronger


    Not nning to move the Star Shattering Sect to somewhere like the border regions of the continent where the Blue Shore Kingdom was located, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly in response to what Gong Cheng said. For now, it looked like the best option for him to ensure the continued safety of the Star Shattering Sect would be to reach a realm where he could contend against those Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators and Demon King Realm cultivators as fast as possible.


    Of course, even with this strength, he understood that he wouldn''t truly be safe.


    The main thing that came from having strengthparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm would be to make others understand that it wouldn''t be easy to take down the Star Shattering Sect without incurring any losses¡­ And given that the demonic cultivators and those cultivators from the core region of the continent wouldn''t want to identally push someone with Celestial Immortal Realm strength to the other side of the conflict, it should be able to allow the Star Shattering Sect to remain as a neutral force without being attacked by either party.


    At least before the battle became more chaotic and the demonic cultivators managed to push their way into the core region where the different major powers were located, the Star Shattering Sect should be able to continue staying as a neutral party without being attacked.


    However, given the current state of the battle between the two sides, Xuan Hao guessed that it would probably take a long time before this happened, as the different major powers in the core region had no intention of allowing the demonic cultivators to reach their territory. Doing their absolute best to limit the scope of the conflict to the small empires and kingdoms between themselves and the different demonic cultivator strongholds like the Frozen Wastnd.


    In a sense, this was the original goal of these smaller empires and kingdoms, serving as a barrier for the demonic cultivators to reach the core region of the continent, it was just that they only now realized this, as they found themselves being forced forward as shields for these major powers with no way to resist.


    Luckily, in this regard, the Star Shattering Sect and the surrounding kingdom and empires, outside of the Onyx Empire, was rather lucky, as the demonic cultivators hadn''t decided on an all-out attack towards the Blue Sea Empire after the failed assassination attempt on one of the Blue Sea Empire''s Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors.


    Not that this wouldst forever, as Xuan Hao had already been informed by Xuan Gui that the decrease in powerful demonic cultivators attacking the Blue Sea Empire was only because most of the higher-level demonic cultivators were tied up elsewhere at the moment.


    In at most ten or so years, they would likely beginunching a more powerful attack towards the Blue Sea Empire.


    At least with his friend on the side of the demonic cultivators, he didn''t have to worry about an unexpected attack from the demonic cultivators without any warning, as she herself had also told him that she would ask him to help her get inside the Blue Sea Empire before that attack took ce. Knowing it would be far more difficult for her to enter the Blue Sea Empire when the official attack wasunched by the more powerful cultivators.


    Of course, given that her little infiltration n of the Blue Sea Empire was beneficial to the powerful demonic cultivators behind these attacks, they didn''t really care much about this and instead encouraged her to cause as much damage as possible inside the Blue Sea Empire. Even hoping to use it as an opportunity tounch a surprise attack and gain a lot of territory while the Blue Sea Empire''s experts were busy trying to chase her down.


    Given that his sect was inside the territory of the Blue Sea Empire that bordered the Frozen Wastnd, Xuan Hao had originally been worried about this, but was soon reassured by Xuan Gui that the ce that these demonic cultivators nned on attacking was another empire located on the other side of the Onyx Empire. Meaning that the Star Shattering Sect wouldn''t get affected by this attack if what she said ended up being urate.


    I really need to improve my strength to the level of a Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator. At least, with that level of strength and the chaotic qi formation, I should be able to stand out and keep my sect out of the conflict like Gong Cheng said¡­


    Feeling the increased pressure on his shoulders as he realized just how dangerous of a situation that the Star Shattering Sect was in; Xuan Hao could not help ncing over at Gong Cheng who was patiently waiting beside him as he thought over what he had said.


    Different from him, who had to worry about the demonic cultivators beginning a war with the cultivators from the core region of the continent, Gong Cheng had nothing to worry about at the edge of the continent. Knowing that the demonic cultivators wouldn''t bother with this wastnd where people could barely reach the Foundation Establishment Realm and even fewer the Core Formation Realm.


    In a sense, because of the scarce resources, the edge of the continent where the Blue Shore Kingdom was located could be considered the safest ce on the entire continent at the moment, as there was no need to worry about demonic cultivators or the powerful core region cultivators who were now much more abundant in the territories bordering the Frozen Wastnd.


    If not for the fact that he couldn''t move the Shattered Star Peak, he would have undoubtedly moved it over next to the Blue Shore Kingdom so both of them could enjoy the safety of being in a resource scarce region.


    Of course, this would force the Star Shattering Sect to give up a lot of their resources and would inevitably slow down the development of the sect, but with the chaotic qi formation around, there would be an abundance of spiritual qi no matter where it ced. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Haaa¡­ Looks like the rtively peaceful state of the sect is only temporary without someoneparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm present¡­"


    "Haha, indeed, only with someone at the Celestial Immortal Realm present can you truly establish yourself on this continent. Just look at me, I''m still stuck in this ce even after reaching the Saint Realm and bing a Saint Realm cksmith. All because my strength is still not at the Celestial Immortal Realm!"


    Hearing Gong Cheng''s response to what he unconsciously said after thinking about the current state of the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao could not help ncing over at the old man as he realized what he said.


    Indeed¡­ even though Gong Cheng had reached the Second Heaven of the Saint Realm and was essentiallyparable to someone at the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm, he was still forced to keep hiding at the edge of the continent out of fear that those powerful Celestial Immortal Realm ancestors would show up and try to either kill him or get him to join them.


    Thinking about this and how Gong Cheng was unwilling to join any of these major powers, Xuan Hao decided that it would probably be best for him to not mention his original intentions of wanting to recruit the old man to join his sect for now. Especially considering the rather dangerous situation that his sect was currently in due to the demonic cultivators.


    Maybe in the future when the situation was safer and he had managed to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and gain strengthparable to the Celestial Immortal or Profound Immortal Realm, but for now, he should instead try and improve his friendship with this old man so recruitment would be easier in the future¡­


    "By the way, I never got a chance to probably thank you for the help you gave me and Yi Min when teaching us about the Dao of cksmithing. So, I brought a few different spiritual metals along with me this time, as I doubt you have much all the way out here-"


    "Spiritual metal!?"


    Almost the second he finished speaking, Xuan Hao felt his hands being griped as the old man who had remained rtively aloof so far had rushed over and was staring directly into his eyes.


    "Y-yeah, here¡­" Not knowing what to say when met with this level of enthusiasm, Xuan Hao could only awkwardly take a few steps back before handing over a small interspatial ring filled with all kinds of spiritual metal that he had prepared the moment he decided to head to the Blue Shore Kingdom while testing out his long-distance teleportation.


    "This-! So much spiritual metal! Hehe, with this, I should be able to progress even further and might even reach the levelparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm!"


    Filled with joy as he looked through the spiritual metal stored inside the interspatial ring, Gong Cheng didn''t waste any time after seeing the spiritual metal inside of it, as he turned around and rushed back into the forge the next second-


    "¡­"


    Leaving Xuan Hao behind to stare helplessly in the direction he had disappeared in.

 Chapter 1362 Another Distraction

    Chapter 1362 Another Distraction


    Having a feeling that he wouldn''t be seeing Gong Cheng anytime soon after he disappeared into his forge, Xuan Hao decided to not stay around in the Blue Shore Kingdom any longer than necessary. Not wanting to stay away from the sect for too long with the current chaotic situation that might result in the sect running into problems that couldn''t be handled by the Domain Lord Realm Elders of the sect.


    Not to mention, his original goal with going to the Blue Shore Kingdom was to test out his long-distance teleportation technique, while getting to meet Gong Cheng could be considered a bonus.


    Testing out his strength against Gong Cheng might have been helpful but given that he doubted that the old man would be leaving his forge any time soon because of therge quantity of spiritual metal he had just gotten his hand on, Xuan Hao decided against it.


    On the other, maybe he should have asked him for a spar before handing over the spiritual metal¡­


    No matter, it wasn''t that important, as Gong Cheng wasn''t reallybat focused in the first ce with his Dao of cksmithing and would likely not be able to give him a chance to test the limits of his strength after his recent breakthrough.


    So, with that in mind, Xuan Hao sent a short goodbye message to Gong Cheng through his divine sense before turning around and leaving in the direction he hade from. Not directly activating the long-distance teleportation technique, as he didn''t have any reason to waste his qi before he reached the Frozen Wastnd.


    After all, there was nothing in the outer edges of the continent that proved a threat to him at the moment, outside of the demon beasts who might be heading ind through the river connected to the Blue Sea Empire, but such demon beasts were rare and preferred to stay hidden to avoid detection.


    But¡­ To make sure that he didn''t end up getting targeted by any of these potentially deadly demon beasts from the endless ocean, Xuan Hao decided to keep a distance from the river connected to the ocean.


    In the end, because of this, the path back to the edge of the Frozen Wastnd where he nned on using his long-distance teleportation formation to get back to the sect took a few hours longer, but at least, he didn''t end up running into any problems along the way-


    "Huh?"


    At least, that was until he began preparing to use the long-distance teleportation technique, when he suddenly noticed arge number of demonic cultivators appearing in the distance and rapidly getting closer to where he was.


    The only positive thing was that the strongest among these demonic cultivators was onlyparable to the earlier stages of the Soul Ascension Realm, while the negative was that they would reach his position before he could activate his long-distance teleportation technique¡­ And given that it required his full concentration to use, he wouldn''t be able to keep himself hidden.


    Should I just kill them?


    As this thought emerged, Xuan Hao casually raised his hand as sword intent began gathering into a sword in front of him, but ultimately, he hesitated as the demonic cultivators got closer.


    Not because he had any intention of sparing them, but instead because it became clear that they didn''t just happen to be around the edges of the Frozen Wastnd patrolling, but instead seemed to be heading towards the outer regions of the continent, something rather confusion considering that there wasn''t really anything of value there.


    Even if they ughtered the people for their blood and qi, it would at most be useful to someone in the Higher Demon Realm or maybe someone who had undergone the first demonic transformation, there was nothing useful to a True Demon Realm demonic cultivator.


    "There has to be a reason why these demonic cultivators are here¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao narrowed his eyes slightly as he silently used the Dao of Illusions to hide himself before he got in range of the demonic cultivators.


    Curious about what these demonic cultivators were nning to do and what reason they might have toe to such a dested ce that was even worse than their Frozen Wastnd for cultivation¡­


    "Ugh, why do we have toe to this god forsaken ce? Can''t we just send a few of those lesser demons and higher demons to get the job done? Even if there are a few cultivators present, they are at most in the Core Formation Realm. Nothing that would need us to personallye to this ce!"


    "I understand your unwillingness to go, but this is orders from Demon Lord Shadow Spirit, we have to ensure everything goes smoothly. Not to mention, this is better than being thrown to the frontlines where we have to face those cultivators from the core region."


    "Well¡­ You do make a point¡­"


    Listening to the two leading demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm as they got closer, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more interested in what they were up to, as it now also seemed to involve a Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator.


    At the same time, he also felt a bit more cautious about the entire situation, as a Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator wasparable to the Dao Seed Realm.


    The only reassuring thing was that the demonic cultivators flying past below him werepletely oblivious to his presence, as they continued moving deeper inside the outer regions without stopping.


    Guess I will have to wait with going back to the sect for now¡­


    Smiling a bit wryly to himself at this thought, Xuan Hao understood that his curiosity had gotten the best of him once again, but ultimately, there was nothing to lose from following the demonic cultivators and finding out what reason they had to go to the outer regionspletely devoid of resources¡­


    Whoosh~


    And so, Xuan Hao silently trailed behind the group of demonic cultivators as they made their way into the outer regions.


    In the process, Xuan Hao made sure to listen in on what the demonic cultivators were talking about and soon found out that they were going to pick up some kind of spiritual metal that had been mined by a small kingdom under their control.


    As for the specifics about this spiritual metal, these demonic cultivators didn''t know much outside of the fact that it seemed to have some kind of spatial property.


    Even then, it was more than enough to catch Xuan Hao by surprise when he learnt about it, as he understood full well just how valuable spiritual metal with a spatial property was.


    Not only because it was one of the coreponents required to craft an interspatial ring, but also because it was an important thing in the construction of spatial formations. Mostmonly teleportation formations, something that the Star Shattering Sect needed.


    The main problem so far in the construction of teleportation formations being the obviousck of formations masters who were proficient in the Dao of Space, but also theck of spiritual metal with a spatial property. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    If he could get his hand on this spiritual metal that the demonic cultivators were talking about, he should be able to construct a few teleportation formations for the sect in a few important locations.


    After all, in the current Star Shattering Sect, he was the only one who had the necessaryprehension of the Dao of Space to aplish something like this, but¡­ At least the few teleportation formations heid down should also be able to serve as something that the formation masters of the sect could go and learn from by watching them in action.


    Of course, before all of that, he would first have to figure out how to construct a teleportation formation but given his currentprehension of the Dao of Space reaching the Large Sess Realm and hisprehension of the Dao of Formations reaching the Small Sess Realm, Xuan Hao didn''t feel like this would prove much of a problem for him.


    The only problem he could foresee would be the demonic cultivators that he was following, as he had no idea what kind of defensive measures the Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator behind them might have put in ce to ensure nothing happened to the spiritual metal being mined.


    After all, spiritual metal with a spatial property was extremely precious and far more valuable than normal spiritual metal, something that could be seen from the fact that the Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator had two True Demon Realm demonic cultivators acting as escorts for the precious spiritual metal¡­ And when he finally reached the small kingdom in question, his thoughts were proven correct, as he was forced toe to a stop when faced with a formation more than strong enough to block someone in the Dao Seed Realm.


    Such a powerful formation¡­ I''m starting to doubt that the strongest person behind this entire operation is someone in the Demon Lord Realm!


    Narrowing both his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao realized that the spiritual metal present was likely far more valuable than he first thought¡­

 Chapter 1363 Remnant Soul...? And Space Node Stones

    Chapter 1363 Remnant Soul...? And Space Node Stones


    Knowing about the value of the spiritual metal that should be present on the other side of the formation, Xuan Hao had no intention of giving up on it. Even if it met potentially falling out with a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator. After all, given that he had not been attacked yet, he was certain that the potential Demon King Realm demonic cultivator behind the formation in front of him shouldn''t be present.


    With that in mind, as long as he could break the formation fast enough, steal the spiritual metal and escape with his long-distance teleportation, he should be able to avoid any confrontation with the demonic cultivator behind the formation¡­ And in case there was a teleportation formation present inside the formation; he nned on destroying that to prevent anyone from rushing over.


    Not that it was likely for there to be a teleportation formation given that there was a group of demonic cultivators transporting the spiritual metal on foot, but one never knew if there was an emergency one or not hidden inside the small kingdom...


    The biggest problem with his n was the fact that he couldn''t defend against the other party in case they hadprehended the Dao of Space to the Large Sess Realm and had learnt some kind of long-distance teleportation, but the chance of that was low. Especially given that demonic cultivators weren''t that well-known forprehending any Daos that didn''t involve things like death and ughter.


    Having essentially decided that he would be trying to get his hands on the spiritual metal that was on the other side of the formation, Xuan Hao didn''t just immediately try to break the formation, but instead decided to try and examine it and figure out how to break it.


    After all, even though hisprehension of the Dao of Formations wasn''t that high, the one who had created the formation sealing off the small kingdom wasn''t much better than him in terms ofprehension.


    With enough time, he felt confident in figuring out how to break the formation in a short period of time.


    At the same time, he also intended to wait around for the group of demonic cultivators who had already entered the small kingdom to get the spiritual metal.


    nning to intercept them after they left the safety of the formation and investigate the spiritual metal that they would bring out with them, both to confirm the validity of what they had talked about, but also to find out about the quality of the spiritual metal.


    If the quality was too low and not much better than what the Star Shattering Sect could already produce, he didn''t n on offending a potential Demon King Realm demonic cultivator over it, as he had no idea what kind of methods such a person might have when it came to potentially tracking him down¡­


    Ah? Looks like they are out again!


    Just at this moment, Xuan Hao noticed the group of demonic cultivators he had been following emerge from the formation before making their way back towards the Frozen Wastnd with a fewrge spatial bags now in hand. Obviously for carrying much more than could be ced inside a simple interspatial ring.


    So, without any of the demonic cultivators noticing him, Xuan Hao silently followed behind them as they moved further and further away from the small kingdom.


    Intending to make a move on them when they got far enough away from the small kingdom that he was certain someone in the Demon Lord Realm wouldn''t be able to sense him when he took down the group of demonic cultivators.


    In the end, because of the demonic culitvators rtively slow pace of travelpared to someone at the Demon Lord Realm, it took a little over an hour before they were finally far enough away that Xuan Hao felt confident in attacking them without being discovered-


    Swish-!


    And so, before any of the demonic cultivators below could react, he made a move. Sending down a stream of sword intent to kill all of them before they had any time to fight back or inform other demonic cultivators about being attacked-


    BOOOOM-!


    However, it was just as the two strongest True Demon Realm demonic cultivators died, that a terrifying aura suddenly erupted from a small jade carried by one of the weaker demonic cultivators in charge of carrying one of the spatial bags. Blocking his sword intent and saving that one demonic cultivator, while the rest of them almost instantaneously died due to the sheer difference in power.


    "W-what!? W-we are under attack¡­? Everyone¡­ Is dead¡­?"


    Seeing this shocking sight of hispanions suddenly being reduced to nothing more than a blood mist in less than a fraction of a second, their bodies and souls annihted before they even had a chance to react, the surviving demonic cultivator could only silently whisper to himself in disbelief. Not believing what he had just witnessed, as Xuan Hao''s sword intent continued grinding away at the terrifying power that had erupted from the small jade to protect this weak demonic cultivator who should have just recently undergone his second demonic transformation.


    Is it some kind of protective talisman? No¡­ It shouldn''t¡­ Perhaps a remnant soul sealed away inside the jade awakening due to the danger and erupting with power to protect the little demonic cultivator?


    As he continued grinding away at the power that had erupted to protect the little demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao''s frown could not stop deepening, as he felt increasingly annoyed at what he guessed to be some kind of remnant soul protecting this young demonic cultivator.


    Even when he used his full strength to try and break the barrier that had formed to protect this little demonic cultivator, he could only slowly grind away at the barrier, something that would ultimately give the little demonic cultivator more than enough time to contact others about his situation. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    I can''t allow that to happen!


    RUMBLE-!


    Knowing that he couldn''t allow the demonic cultivator to contact others, Xuan Hao stopped using his sword intent and instead decided to directly copse the space around the small demonic cultivator. Directly initiating a true spatial copse, something that would indeed be a little overkill for killing a Second Demonic Transformation Realm demonic cultivator under normal circumstances.


    "Noooo-!"


    As the spatial copse started, there was no way to stop it, as Xuan Hao soon heard a painful roar filled with unwillingnessing from inside the small jade. Likely belonging to the remnant soul housed inside the jade, as the little demonic cultivator''s figure was soon swallowed up by the spatial copse. Disappearing along with a small part of the continent.


    "Hm¡­ Unfortunate to lose some of the spiritual metal, but this should at least have stopped any outwardsmunication from taking ce. Now, I just have to check the spiritual metal and figure out whether or not its worth to make a move before someone notices the spatial anomaly or the demonic cultivators fail to return to the Frozen Wastnd¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked at the empty ck space in front of him that even the world itself seemed to have some difficulties closing in the short term, Xuan Hao soon picked up one of the spatial bags that had fallen on the ground before checking the contents of the bag.


    "This is?! Space Node Stones?! Such a high quality as well¡­"


    However, when he checked the content of the bag, he could not help showing a somewhat shocked expression on his face.


    The main reason being that the spiritual metal with spatial properties inside the bag was far better than he had expected.


    To be more urate, it was a kind of spiritual metal called Space Node Stones, that was perfect in the construction of teleportation formations.


    In other words, just the kind of spiritual metal that his sect needed at the moment. Meaning, he almost instantaneously decided on robbing the demonic cultivators and take as much of the spiritual metal as possible. Even if it meant offending a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator as a result.


    Swish-!


    So, with that in mind, Xuan Hao quickly made his way back to the small kingdom guarded by the powerful formation before starting to try and find a weak spot in the location before attacking. Intending to use the time it would take the demonic cultivators to reach the Frozen Wastnd to do this.


    At the same time, also preparing himself for what to do in case there was a Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator guarding the mine on the other side of the formation, as even if he was stronger than the other party, he didn''t n on fighting and only wanted to seize as many of the Space Node Stones as possible before running away before a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator could show up.


    As for his escape path¡­ he nned on using his drifting cloud steps to get escape from the potential Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator before using his long-distance teleportation to move across the Frozen Wastnd before escaping into the Blue Sea Empire where he wouldy low for a bit to make any potential demonic cultivator capable of tracking his escape path think he was someone from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Just a precaution that might also end up working out, as it could create quite a bit of trouble for the Blue Sea Empire to have a Demon King Realm demonic cultivatore knocking at their door for revenge. Maybe it might even help Xuan Gui a bit in her revenge plot¡­

 Chapter 1364 Importance of Space Node Stones

    Chapter 1364 Importance of Space Node Stones


    Arriving back in front of the formation, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he began the process of trying to figure out a way to easily break through the formation as fast as possible, while at the same time also checking to see if he could figure out the situation inside the formation. Hoping that the one behind the entire thing would be confident in the strength of the formation and thus wouldn''t have dispatched a Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator to watch over the small kingdom where the mining for Space Node Stones was taking ce.


    Of course, given the value of the spiritual stones, Xuan Hao felt this was unlikely, even if the power of those in the outer regions and at the edges of the continent barely reached the Core Formation Realm in most cases, there would still be other dangers in forms of demon beasts from the endless ocean or cultivators like Gong Cheng, who were looking for a ce to hide andy low.


    Any of these two could spell trouble for the demonic cultivators mining for the space stone nodes, as the first could destroy their mining operation, while thetter might result in news of the space node stones spreading to the rest of the continent.


    Obviously, neither was something that the demonic cultivator behind all of this wanted to happen, as it would not only draw attention from major powers like the Blue Sea Empire but would also end up drawing the attention of other demonic cultivators who would likely be more than happy to lend their fellow demonic cultivator a hand in securing the space node stones.


    Unfortunately, even if the other party wanted to monopolize the space node stones at that point in time, it would impossible. Even with the strength of someone in the Demon King Realm.


    But more importantly than that, the main reason why it was difficult to monopolize was that the extraction and mining of space node stones took a long time and couldn''t bepleted in a short period of time. Requiring years or decades to mine even a small part of the overall mine.


    In a sense, the reason for the secrecy of the small kingdom where the space node stones had been found was also because of this, as without personally encountering one of the rare few times that the space node stones were transported out of the small kingdom, he would have no idea what it was that was being mined there and would likely not have decided to take the risk of breaking in at the risk of offending a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator.


    After all, even though spiritual metal with spatial properties were rare, it wasn''t that rare that someone would offend a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator over it.


    Only Xuan Hao, whose sect wascking a lot of spiritual metal like that was willing to take such a risk, as the Star Shattering Sect really needed to start establishing teleportation formations across the sect''s territory to ensure that the sect could continue to grow without any major issues.


    After all, teleportation formations would allow the sect to far more easily move around the sect territory and also have a far easier time transporting different resources around.


    Although it was a bit of a stretch at the moment, it would be ideal if teleportation formations could be created within the different resource rich locations of the fallen Sky Empire that the sect had recently taken over.


    Of course, the longer distance between teleportation formations, the more resources and the more difficult they would be to construct¡­ And although the Star Shattering Sect''s territory was rather small whenpared to arge empire like the Blue Sea Empire, it had already grown to be close to a third the size of the now fallen Sky Empire.


    The main difference between the two being that the Star Shattering Sect had almost full control over this territorypared to the Sky Empire that didn''t fully control most of its territory due to different powerful demon beasts or other things.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao continued trying toprehend the formation in front of him, as minutes soon turned to hours, as his understanding of the formation guarding the space node stone mine slowly deepened.


    First of all, he discovered that the formation was far weaker than he had first thought.


    Even with strengthparable to the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, it should be rtively simple to break the formation itself with enough time.


    Given his current strength was far above that, the weaknesses he had managed to pinpoint in the formation would essentially allow him to almost instantly destroy the entire formation. Rending itpletely useless.


    Secondly, he did manage to peer through the formation to some extent after his understanding of it increased and he found weak spots that his divine sense could slip through undetected.


    Unfortunately, when he investigated the situation on the other side of the formation, he discovered that there was not just one, but two demonic cultivators in the Demon Lord Realm present inside the small kingdom guarding the space node stone mine.


    Even if these two Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators could be considered on the weaker side and wouldn''t pose that much of a threat to him given his current strength, it would still take him some time to kill them, time that he didn''t have considering that he expected a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator to rush over the moment he broke the formation.


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao had instead focused his attention on where the space node stones were being stored before being transported. Intending to take as much as possible with him before escaping before the two Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators had a chance to block him.


    Luckily, the space node stones were not being stored inside an interspatial ring or space bag but were instead stored out in the open just next to the mine itself where it was being processed into smaller and more manageable sizes that could be cared with ease inside interspatial rings or bags.


    From the looks of the situation inside, the space node stones were only prepared outside the mine before being picked upter when a group like the one he had killed not long ago appeared to transport it out.


    Because of this, the amount of processed space node stones present outside the mine was close to nothing.


    The majority of it was inrge unprocessed chunks that would be difficult to transport not only due to their size, but also due to their spatial nature making it more difficult to stone inside interspatial rings and bags.


    Of course, Xuan Hao wasn''t too concerned about this, as with his currentprehension of the Dao of Space, he could forcibly contain the spatial anomalies caused by the space node stones for a period of time before storing them inside some of the interspatial rings he was carrying.


    The main problem being that even though he had further enhanced and strengthened them after hisprehension of the Dao of Space increased and their current size surpassed that of the few space bags he had stolen not long ago, he wouldn''t be able to carry all of the unprocessed space node stones out with him.


    At most, he would be able to take half of it, but considering that there was close to ten times the amount of space node stones than what he had managed to get his hands on already, Xuan Hao felt that it would be enough for a simplework of teleportation formations across the current territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course, in the future, a mine like the one in front of him would be required, but for now, the sect didn''t have the strength to size such a mine.


    The best-case scenario would be that one was discovered inside the sect''s territory, and they could secretly mine it like the demonic cultivators were doing at the moment. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Oh well¡­ No matter what, it looks like I will still be breaking into this ce¡­


    Smiling to himself as he thought about this, Xuan Hao soon narrowed his eyes as he focused his attention on the two Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators inside the formation-


    BOOOOM-!


    And the next second, a terrifying explosion echoed out across the destednd, as the formation was pierced in several critical locations at the same time by his sword intent. Instantly destroying the formation.


    Ruumble-!


    Not a secondter, the two Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators rushed out, but¡­ It was already toote at this point in time, as Xuan Hao had directly used his drifting cloud steps to teleport himself in front of the unprocessed space node stones before taking as much as he could carry and before reusing his drifting cloud steps to disappear.


    Not giving the demonic cultivatorsthe chance to realize what was happening before he was gone.

 Chapter 1365 Escape Path

    Chapter 1365 Escape Path


    "Wha-!? Did¡­ Did someone just break the formation and steal the unprocessed space node stones?" Not able to believe what had just happened, as everything happened far too fast for him to react, one of the two Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators stationed to guard the small kingdom and space node stones being mined there, could not help saying this out loud with a shocked expression on his face.


    Clearly, from the moment Xuan Hao had appeared to when he had arrived at the mine and then escaped again, he hadn''t even managed to get up from his position before everything was over. Leaving him in a rather confused state about what had just happened.


    After all, with his strength in the Demon Lord Realm, there were not many people who could easily sneak past him and escape before he even had the time to respond.


    The only people who had this kind of ability would be the Demon King or Celestial Immortal Realm Experts¡­ And the thought of such a terrifying existence breaking into the small kingdom he was in charge of guarding was more than enough to send a shiver down his spine. Especially considering that he understood very well how important the space node stones being mined were.


    Terrifying¡­ If I''m not wrong, that person should not even be a demonic cultivator, but instead one of those Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators from the core region!


    Feeling even more terrified as his thoughts continued wandering, the demonic cultivator didn''t even bother chasing after Xuan Hao. Instead, just turning towards hispanion. Only to find out that hispanion was simrly looking at him with a shocked expression on his face.


    Obviously, it was not just him who had been shocked and terrified by what had just happened¡­


    "Let''s inform the Demon King about this¡­"


    "Yes¡­ If we don''t, he mighte looking to kill uster when he realizes such arge amount of space node stones are suddenly missing. Not to mention, the formation breaking should have already alerted him to the situation."


    As the two demonic cultivators came to a decision on what to do, one of them nervously picked up amunication talisman before contacting their lord about the situation and what had happened.


    Both of them making absolutely sure to state that the intruder''s strength had surpassed the Demon Lord Realm. Understanding that only if their opponent''s strength was far more powerful than theirs would they have a chance to survive when their lord arrived to personally inspect the situation¡­


    Because of this, Xuan Hao was left escaping on his own without anyone chasing after him, something that he only ended up finding out about after he reached the edge of the Frozen Wastnd and began preparing for the long-distance teleportation.


    Not that this ended up changing any of his ns, as he still intended to first go to the Blue Sea Empire beforeying low for a few days or weeks before returning to the Star Shattering Sect.


    No matter what, he didn''t want a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator to focus his attention on the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, even if the chaotic qi formation could defend against the demonic cultivators, there was no way to defend that outside of the Shattered Star Peaks against a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator, N?v(el)B\\jnn


    In the end, by the time that the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator appeared at the scene to personally investigate the situation in an attempt to find out who was behind the attack, Xuan Hao had already long since made his way into the Blue Sea Empire after using the long-distance teleportation technique far beyond what he intended to do. Leaving him almost defenseless as he popped out in front of a small vige not too far away from the firstrge city he had encountered after entering the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even if this was risky. Especially considering the fact that the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors of the Blue Sea Empire would be on edge due to the demonic cultivators failed assassination attempt of one of them, Xuan Hao felt it was worth it considering that it might save him and his sect the trouble of potentially being targeted by a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator.


    And¡­ From the fact that he couldn''t sense anyone approaching him since he had appeared, Xuan Hao was confident that he hadn''t yet been spotted. Allowing him to traverse the Blue Sea Empire rtively easily.


    However, to ensure that it would be convincing in case the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator in charge of the space node stones did have a way to track him, Xuan Hao decided to move in the general location of where he guessed the capital to be located.


    Meaning that he ended up following therge river upstream towards the ind sea he had heard about, as the capital city of the Blue Sea Empire was said to be located there.


    At the same time, he also began thinking about what to do with his information on the space node mine located on the deste edges of the continent.


    First, he wanted to try and possibly sell the information as there wasn''t much, he could do about it outside of the with his current strength, but this thought didn''tst long, as he realized the very real possibility of him being killed off as a way to try and silence information on the space node stone mine.


    On the other hand, it would be far better idea for him to keep the matter a secret for now¡­ And when the demonic cultivators began trying to attack the territory of the Star Shattering Sect in the future, he could then release the information on the space node stones. Potentially forcing the powerful demonic cultivators to back off as they would start fighting over the mine.


    Of course, outside of demonic cultivators, this would also gain attention from the other major powers around. Likely resulting in arge-scale battle at the outer edges of the continent, a battle that would buy the Star Shattering Sect some more time if needed.


    All things considered, even though he didn''t manage to get his hands on all of the space node stones that had been mined so far, Xuan Hao felt more than satisfied with what he had managed to gain.


    Whoosh~!


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao decided to find afortable ce to sit down and recover the strength he had lost during his long-distance teleportation.


    Soon realizing that outside of the general exhaustion caused by his dantian almost being fully emptied out, his body had also suffered quite a bit of damage because of the long travel through space.


    If not for the fact that his body could be considered stronger than normal, Xuan Hao didn''t doubt that he might have ended up tearing himself apart by using the long-distance teleportation technique.


    Luckily, he didn''t have the qi to continue moving forward with his long-distance teleportation technique. Resulting in him managing to leave the hastily constructed spatial passage from identally killing him in the process.


    ¡­


    "This¡­ Is this considered the safe passage through the mountain range!?"


    Ptsh-!


    At the same time Xuan Hao reached the Blue Sea Empire, Chu Yang was cutting down arge demon beast as heined loudly to himself with an exhausted expression on his face.


    It had been weeks at since he started making his way into the mountain range in hopes of using the safe passage, he had acquired to safely reach the other side of the mountain range, but he had found no sess so far and was still stuck wandering the mountain range hoping that he was moving in the correct direction.


    Not to mention, he was starting to doubt whether or not the information he had bought was even urate in the first ce, as he found himself constantly fighting against demon beasts as he ventured further inside the mountain range.


    This was not just a few weaker demon beasts in the Foundation Establishment or Core Formation Realm, but instead powerful demon beasts in the Domain Lord Realm!


    Once, he had even managed to spot a demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm that he had only barely managed to avoid by sheer luck.


    No matter how he looked at it, there was no way that this could be considered a safe passage through the mountain range.


    In his eyes, it felt more like some kind of death trap¡­


    Of course, even with these thoughts, he still continued following the safe passage, as it didn''t take long for him to realize that it was even more dangerous to veer off the passage that he had bought.


    His one encounter with a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast was after all when he had veered slightly off the safe passage.


    So, even if he felt unwilling, he continued moving along the safe passage without any end in sight¡­

 Chapter 1366 Hard time Staying on the Safe Path...

    Chapter 1366 Hard time Staying on the Safe Path...


    Continuing to move along the safe passage, it didn''t take long before Chu Yang managed to encounter another group of demon beasts that had decided toy down directly on the path itself. Blocking it and preventing him from continuing forward without first fighting them off.


    Normally, this was what he had done so far when encountering demon beasts blocking his path. However, the group of demon beasts blocking his path this time around were all in the Domain Lord Realm, with one of them even having reached the Later Stages of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if he was confident in his strength, he was clear that the group of demon beasts currently blocking his path were far too strong for him to face on his own.


    So, with that in mind, he was left with only being able to try and go around them before continuing along the safe passage. Hoping that he wouldn''t end up encountering another Soul Ascension Realm demon beast as he made his way around this group of demon beasts. Understanding that his current strength was far from enough to face off against a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast.


    Rustle~


    Like this, Chu Yang found himself rapidly moving through a few bushes as he moved around the group of demon beasts rxing on the path. Doing his best to try and remain hidden without being discovered by any of the demon beasts in the process.


    Roar?


    Unfortunately, he wasn''t able to fully hide himself while sneaking around the group of demon beasts, as one of the stronger ones among them ended up noticing him, as it turned its head to look almost directly at him with a somewhat confused expression on its face.


    Wait! It shouldn''t have discovered me yet, but just heard the sound of the bushes moving! As long as it doesn''t use its divine sense, I should still be fine¡­!


    Realizing that the demon beast hadn''t actually ended up discovering him upon seeing the somewhat confused expression, Chu Yang held his breath as he prayed for it to not use its divine sense to investigate the situation.


    Roar~


    Luckily, one of the younger and weaker demon beasts jumped up in front of the confused demon beast. Drawing its attention away, as Chu Yang took the opportunity to continue making his way around the group of demon beasts before they had a chance to notice him. Just barely avoiding detection as he found himself back on the safe passage once again. Having sessfully managed to avoid encountering the group of demon beasts.


    Rooar~!


    "¡­"


    However, his happiness of being back on the safe passage didn''tst for long, as he soon came face to face with another group of demon beasts blocking his path.


    Even worse, this group of demon beasts was stronger than thest one. Making it far more challenging to move around thempared to thest group.


    Boom!


    Unexpectedly, as he was about to start veering off the path to move around the group of demon beasts, an explosion sounded out in the distance before a powerful shockwave hit the group of demon beasts. Sending some of the weaker demon beasts blocking the path flying in his direction.


    ROOOOAR-!


    In response, the strongest demon beast let out a powerful roar before getting up and charging in the direction of the explosion filled with killing intent towards the one behind the explosion that had injured the weaker demon beasts.


    Not long after the strongest demon beast in the group made a move, the rest soon followed in charging towards the location of the explosion together with their leader, while the weaker ones retreated towards a nearby cave for safety.


    In turn also clearing the path in the process, giving Chu Yang the opportunity to continue along the path without having to worry about veering off the path trying to avoid the group of demon beasts.


    Of course, he understood that this entire thing wouldn''t be that easy, as the explosion just now and the direction that the group of demon beasts had moved in was just further along the path¡­ And from the sounds of battle, he could hear erupting a short distance away from him, he guessed that the path was likely still being blocked by the battle that should have broken out between the demon beasts and the one behind the explosion¡­


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Indeed, as he moved past the ce that had been blocked by the demon beasts not too long ago, Chu Yang ended up staring directly at arge-scale battle between different demon beasts from the mountain range and arge group of humans who seemed to be desperately fighting off the demon beasts that seemed to be swarming towards.


    Among those fighting, the one who seemed to catch his attention almost immediately was someone in the Soul Ascension Realm locked in battle with a massive ck bird demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Wait¡­ Those people look familiar- Ah! It''s those people from the Mountain Demon City! To think I would encounter them now of all times¡­


    Suddenly recognizing one of the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators who seemed busy fighting with some of the weaker demon beasts charging over filled with killing intent, Chu Yang realized that the group of humans busy fighting off therge number of demon beasts was none other than the group of cultivators from the Mountain Demon City he had seen heading into the mountain range to explore some kind of ancient ruin.


    From the looks of things, it didn''t go as nned. Making him feel grateful for the fact that he didn''t end up being forced to join them.


    Even the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator who was more than strong enough to wander into the mountain range on his own was caught up in a difficult situation faced with the ck bird demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Looks like I will either have to wait for the battle to finish or find a way to sneak around without being discovered if I want to get to the other side of the mountain range¡­


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought this to himself, Chu Yang nced in the direction of the safe passage that had essentially turned into the center of the battle between the humans and demon beasts.


    If he wanted to continue going through the mountain range, it looked like it was going to be rather dangerous.


    Instead of that, Chu Yang felt like it would be better to find somewhere to hide and see how the battle progressed.


    If there was no sign of the battle ending any time soon, he would have to find a way around them, as the safe passage wouldn''t be safe indefinitely, something he had started to realize, as it became increasingly dangerous the longer, he spent inside the mountain range.


    In the end, he decided to settle down a short distance away from the battle where he could avoid being detected by the demon beasts continuously rushing over to join the battle, while at the same time keeping an eye on the battle and seeing how it progressed. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Everyone! We have to head back into the ruins, or we will be overrun by these demon beasts! Follow me!"


    Just as he was settled in and began observing the battle wanting to try and see what he could learn from observing the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator shing with the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast, Chu Yang was shocked to suddenly hear one of the Domain Lord Realm humans yelling out before all of them began escaping.


    This wasn''t really a problem as it would clear up the path for him, the main problem was that the direction they were escaping in happened to the small hiding spot where he was hiding at the moment¡­ And considering the fact that this group of people didn''t seem to be the friendliest from his short experience with them inside the Mountain Demon City, Chu Yang didn''t think that the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator would spare a random Domain Lord Realm cultivator who popped out of nowhere.


    Whoosh-!


    So, with that in mind, Chu Yang wasted no time before turning around and escaping into the small cave that was his temporary hiding spot. Not daring to continue waiting around to see if the group of human cultivators were heading towards the cave he was inside, as he continued deeper inside without a second thought.


    "Over here!"


    Only when hearing the sound of yellinging from behind him as he continued moving deeper inside, did Chu Yang realize that the cave he had just entered was likely rted to the ruins that this group of people had gone to the Mountain Range to search for.


    However, there was nothing he could do about the potential danger of the ce, as he continued moving further inside the cave without a second thought before suddenly finding himself in a massive open space located below the mountain range itself.

 Chapter 1367 A Secret Realm?

    Chapter 1367 A Secret Realm?


    Therge open space was notpletely empty, as there was arge structure barely visible in the distance and without even knowing what that structure was, Chu Yang guessed that it should be the ruins that the group of people from the Demon Mountain City had been referring to.


    So, with that in mind, Chu Yang began making his way forward towards the ruins, as it was the only ce he could hide before the people from the Mountain Demon City arrived inside the massive underground space.


    Of course, given that the ruins were dangerous even to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, Chu Yang didn''t intend on entering the ruins and potentially expose himself to danger far greater than what he would face by confronting the group of people from the Demon Mountain City and therge number of demon beasts. Instead, he nned to just find somewhere around the edges of the ruins to hide himself while waiting for the people from the Mountain Demon City to either leave or make their way into the ruins.


    After they disappeared inside the ruins, he could then start looking around the underground space and try to find another way out of the ce without ending up in front of arge group of demon beasts.


    Given that his strength had reached the Domain Lord Realm, he didn''t think it would be too difficult for him to try and dig his way out of the underground space in case he couldn''t find another way out.


    The only problem with using his domain to dig his way out being that it would take time and would make him rather easy to spot for anyone inside the underground space. Especially if that Soul Ascension Realm cultivator was around.


    For this reason alone, he didn''t try and dig his way out to start off with as the people from the Demon Mountain City was just behind him. Instead opting for what he deemed to be the safer option of hiding around the edges of the ruins until the group of people from the Demon Mountain City left along with the demon beasts chasing after them.


    "Hm? This ruin is actually a gate to a secret realm?!"


    Arriving in front of the ruins that he had only heard the group of people from the Demon Mountain City talk about so far, Chu Yang could not help showing a somewhat surprised expression on his face when he realized that the ruins he had been intending to hide inside of was actually just a gateway to a secret realm.


    Though¡­ It did make a bit more sense why even a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator found the ce dangerous, as those capable of constructing a secret realm was normally at least at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and had the support of resources that even a normal Soul Ascension Realm cultivator would have a hard time getting their hands on.


    Of course, this was only the lowest requirement for constructing a secret realm. In most cases, the ones who had the time and resources to construct a secret realm would normally be in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Not to mention, this secret realm was located inside a mountain range that had nock of Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts.


    For someone to create a secret realm in such a location, they had to have the strength to suppress the surrounding demon beasts while creating the secret realm. Meaning that the person who constructed the secret realm had most likely surpassed the Soul Ascension Realm. Reaching the Dao Seed Realm or beyond. Making it understandable why the secret realm would be considered dangerous even for someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    But¡­ This was not the problem that Chu Yang was thinking about at the moment. Instead, it was the fact that he had nowhere to hide inside these ruins that were nothing more than a few structures centered around the gateway to the secret realm. Hiding inside these small ruins or behind the gateway into the secret realm would likely not be enough to avoid detection by any of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators, let alone the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator.


    If he wanted to avoid detection, his only option would be to enter the secret realm.


    Even though this did contain a certain risk considering that the ce was dangerous even to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, Chu Yang felt that the risk of encountering any dangers just after stepping into the secret realm should be low considering that the group of humans from the Demon Mountain City were currently heading towards the secret realm to hide from the demon beasts that were swarming them.


    Whoosh~!


    And so, with that in mind, Chu Yang didn''t hesitate any longer and stepped through the gateway into the secret realm. Soon enough finding himself on top of a massive stone tform suspended above arge jungle by three massive chains connected to three evenrger mountains.


    However, the thing that almost immediately caught his eye was not the mountains holding up the stone tform that the gateway was located on, but instead the towering turtle demon beast right below the tform.


    Even though it wasn''t doing anything and seemed to be deep in sleep, it was clear from a nce that the strength of this demon beast was not to be underestimated, as Chu Yang clearly sensed a power not much different from what he had sensed during one of his encounters with Pei Yang. Meaning that the sleep turtle demon beast below the stone tform was most likely a demon beast in the Dao Seed Rm.


    At the very least, it didn''t seem to wake up even after he arrived and showed no signs of doing so any time soon. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Considering that the group of humans from the Demon Mountain City should have already explored the secret realm, Chu Yang guessed that this powerful demon beast should be harmless.


    If not, he felt that there would have been no way for them to try and escape back into the secret realm.


    After all, no matter how many demon beasts came rushing towards them outside the secret realm, their strength was mostly between the Nascent Soul and Domain Lord Realm, with the strongest demon beast being in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Nowhere nearparable to a Dao Seed Realm demon beast that would have more than enough strength to easily kill off all of them without any effort.


    Swish-!


    Feeling like the turtle demon beast should be safe, Chu Yang didn''t linger around the stone tform with the gateway on top of it for too long, as he soon jumped onto one of the nearby chains holding up the stone tform before rushing towards the mountain it was connected to and hiding himself at the end of the chain out of sight from anyone emerging from the gateway.


    The main reason he didn''t go any further away from the gateway being that he had no idea what kind of dangers might be lurking inside of the secret realm and the fact that he could clearly feel his divine sense being somewhat suppressed after he entered the secret realm.


    Not that he intended to use it considering it might end up waking up the turtle demon beast, but with the suppressed divine sense, he felt confident that he should have managed to go out of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator''s range in case he ended using his divine sense to investigate the surroundings after entering the secret realm. Even if the chances of that happening was low considering the presence of the turtle demon beast.


    Whoosh~!


    Over the next few seconds, Chu Yang watched from afar as the humans from the Mountain Demon City slowly began arriving through the gate before finding somewhere to quietly sit down and wait while waiting for the situation outside to resolve itself.


    "Back here again¡­ And that turtle is still down there¡­"


    "Indeed, we just have to wait around here for a bit before going back again when the demon beasts leave and avoid waking that turtle up."


    "Hopefully, none of the demon beasts end up following us through the gateway and wake up that turtle¡­"


    None of them surprised by the turtle demon beast below them, as they began to casually be chatting with each other-


    BOOOM-!


    But the situation suddenly changed drastically, as the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator burst through the gateway. Followed by the gateway in question suddenly exploding. Sealing the path out of the secret realm-


    RUMMBLE-!


    However, this wasn''t the worst of it, as Chu Yang looked on in disbelief, as the chains attached to the three mountains holding up the stone tform were suddenly detached, causing the massive stone tform to plummet down towards the turtle demon beast sleeping below it.


    Even without knowing anything about the temper of this demon beast, Chu Yang was certain that the people falling down along with the stone tform were not likely to survive this ordeal¡­

 Chapter 1368 No Way Out

    Chapter 1368 No Way Out


    BAAANG!


    As the massive stone tform crashed into the turtle demon beast that was peacefully sleeping beneath it, everything suddenly seemed to go quiet, as nobody dared to move a single muscle. All remaining fully focused on the turtle demon beast now half buried beneath debris from the stone tform that shattered upon hitting its shell.


    Rumble~!


    The situation remained without any change for a few seconds, before a sudden movement from the turtle demon beast seemed to wake up everyone, as they wasted no time in trying to escape from the scene before the turtle demon beast fully woke up. Everyone understanding that the only reason they were still alive was because the turtle demon beast had not yet fully woken up and should still be in a rather confused state after suddenly being hit in the head by arge rock.


    Of course, watching all of this ying out from afar, Chu Yang didn''t intend to stay around and wait for the turtle demon beast to wake. Understanding very well how terrifying someone in the Dao Seed Realm was from the few spars he had with his master in the past.


    Even if he was far stronger than a normal Domain Lord Realm cultivator, there was no way for him to directly cross two major realms, that was simply far toorge of a leap. Especially considering that the Dao Seed Realm could be considered a major transformationpared to past major realms due to the Immortal Soul Tribtion one would have to go through to reach the realm.


    But¡­ The path out of the secret realm was destroyed just now¡­ How in the world am I supposed to leave the secret realm in such a situation!?


    Frowning visibly as he clearly remembered how the gateway had been destroyed after the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator passed through the gate, Chu Yang guessed that the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast that had been chasing after him might have destroyed the gate on the other side and thus caused the gate inside the secret realm to copse.


    Now that this path out had been destroyed, he had absolutely no idea how to leave the secret realm.


    Hm? That Soul Ascension Realm cultivator doesn''t seem that disturbed by the current situation¡­


    As he continued moving further away from the location where the gateway had copsed and the turtle demon beast was currently in the process of waking up, Chu Yang noticed the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator casual moving forward at a rtively slow speed followed by the Domain Lord Realm cultivators and a few of the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators.


    Not showing a single bit of worry about the terrifying demon beast that was currently waking up not too far behind them or the fact that the only path outside the secret realm had been destroyed-


    Unless¡­ There is more than one gateway connected to this secret realm and they know about it!


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he realized the most likely reason for those people to be so calm even in such a dangerous situation, Chu Yang could not help rxing a bit, as he slowed down a bit before turning around and following behind the group of cultivators from the Demon Mountain City as they moved deeper into the secret realm.


    From the looks of things, the turtle demon beast might not be as dangerous as he had first thought considering how these people were acting. In the end, the only ones who would end up dead were likely the ones who had panicked when the stone tform copsed and ran off in different direction¡­


    ROOOOAR-!


    It was just at that moment he heard the terrifying roar of what he suspected to be the turtle demon beast, before suddenly sensing the terrifying demon beast charging over towards him and the other cultivators. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Whoosh~


    However, just as the turtle demon beast became visible a few thousand meters away from where he was, Chu Yang watched in shock, as a chain not different from the one that had been holding up the massive stone tform before it plummeted to the ground, manifested around the turtle demon beast-


    BANG!


    And the next second, the turtle demon beast reached the limits of the chain and was forcefully pulled back by a tremendous force.


    ROAR! ROOOOOAR-!


    Even though it was unwilling, the turtle demon beast could do nothing but stare at them filled with killing intent, as the chain dragged it back towards the location of the stone tform where it had been sleeping not long ago before it had been rudely awoken.


    "Indeed, that turtle can''t leave the range of those three mountains. To think such a powerful demon beast was actually sealed in such a small space¡­"


    "True, the one behind this secret realm should be someone at the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm. Maybe even a legendary Celestial Immortal!"


    "He, a Celestial Immortal? They aren''t that easy to find, let alone a secret realm belonging to a fallen Celestial Immortal. After all, those major powers would seize the opportunity the moment such a secret realm got discovered. Leaving no chance for people like us to enter it."


    "Don''t worry about all of that. For now, let''s first focus on getting out of here alive. Even if we know about the existence of a second gateway, its extremely dangerous and we did fail to enter it thest time we tried to breakthrough!"


    Listening to the group of people from the Demon Mountain City, Chu Yang realized that the secret realm might be far more amazing than he first thought, while at the same time also getting a confirmation that this group of people did indeed have another way out of the secret realm.


    More specifically, they had found another gateway.


    Although¡­ From their conversation, he could also tell that it wouldn''t be that easy to reach this gateway and just leave the secret realm. From the looks of it, it was going to be a quite challenging endeavor¡­

 Chapter 1369 A "Larger Than Normal" Worm

    Chapter 1369 A "Larger Than Normal" Worm


    Even though it would be dangerous to follow behind the group of cultivators from the Demon Mountain City, Chu Yang didn''t feel like he had much of a choice in the matter, as he had no idea how to make it out of the unfamiliar secret realm that he now found himself trapped inside of.


    At least those people would be able to lead him towards a gate out of the secret realm, while he should at least be able to keep himself hidden from them by keeping arge enough distance between them. Not something hard to aplish considering that the strongest demon beasts inside the jungle outside of the turtle demon beast was only around the Core Formation Realm.


    Weak demon beasts like that, he was more than capable of hiding himself from. Even in this ce where his divine sense and in turn his domain had been weakened.


    And so, Chu Yang continued following the group of cultivators from the Demon Mountain City for the next few hours before they finally got to the edge of the jungle where they suddenly came to a stop while examining the massive desert that had now appeared in front of them.


    "We are back at this sted desert again¡­ Hah¡­ I really hope we won''t encounter any of those oversized worms this time around¡­"


    Hearing what one of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators said to himself as he stared into the seemingly endless desert stretching for as far as the eye could see, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit worried about this oversized worm he mentioned.


    After all, for it to cause a Domain Lord Realm cultivator to react in such a manner, Chu Yang was certain that this oversized worm wasn''t just arger than normal worm¡­ And from the fearful expressions stered all over the faces of the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators who had managed to avoid separating from the group earlier, he was almost certain that this oversized worm was some kind of Domain Lord Realm demon beast.


    The only problem was that a Domain Lord Realm demon beast shouldn''t cause such arge reaction in this group. After all, they did have someone in the Soul Ascension Realm watching over them, a Domain Lord Realm demon beast shouldn''t be able to make them that fearful.


    Unless there is something special about that oversized worm demon beast¡­


    Narrowing his eyes as he watched the group in front slowly start moving into the desert, Chu Yang didn''t immediately follow them into the desert, but instead continued watching them as they proceeded deeper into the desert-


    "Ah? AHHHH!? Worm! WOOORM!"


    And not more than a few minutes after the group had started to cautiously move through the desert, Chu Yang heard one of the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators trailing behind the rest suddenly yelling out, as the sand beneath him started vibrating, causing him to sink into the sand. Soon enough, this also affected other Nascent Soul Realm cultivators nearby, as they began simrly sinking into the sand.


    Even worse, Chu Yang watched how these Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, who would normally have more than enough strength to get themselves out of such a situation was stuck without any way to free themselves from the sand.


    The only way for them to get out was to have one of the Domain Lords fly over and pull them out.


    However, it was also at this moment that Chu Yang noticed that the Domain Lord Realm cultivators had not been flying before even though there was a very clear danger associated with walking through the desert instead of flying through it-


    Rumble-!


    But this question had to wait for now, as Chu Yang watched in awe, as the sand in a close to hundred-meter circle suddenly copsed in on itself asrge teeth suddenly appeared in the sand further down the hole that had been created in the desert.


    All of sudden, Chu Yang understood why these Nascent Soul Realm cultivators were so scared of these oversized worms.


    At the same time, he also seemed to understand why the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator didn''t take action to try and kill this massive demon beast, as it was simply far toorge, while at the same time also being protected by the desert itself. Making it impossible to kill even though its strength should only be somewhere around the Late Stages of the Domain Lord Realm.


    "Aaah!"


    "NOooo-!"


    In the end, not all of the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators could be saved in time, as three of them ended up falling into the giant mouth. Soon getting swallowed up by the massive worm before it slowly disappeared beneath the sand.


    Time that the group of cultivators used to try and make as much distance between themselves and where they knew the worm was located. Soon enough disappearing behind arge sand dune.


    "Guess it''s time for me to enter the desert if I want to continue following them¡­" Muttering this to himself as he stared at the ce where the so-called oversized worm had emerged a short time earlier, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit of fear when thinking about having to face off against such a massive demon beast.


    Even if he was stronger than others in the Domain Lord Realm, he feared that he would have no way to fight such a massive demon beast even if he reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. Maybe only when he surpassed the Domain Lord Realm would he stand a chance of fighting such an overpowered demon beast that seemed to transcend its cultivation realm in terms of strength¡­


    "Huh?" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Of course, the moment he actually stepped into the desert, Chu Yang suddenly found his domain far more restrictedpared to before, while flying had also be far more taxingpared to before, as he now found out why the Domain Lord Realm cultivators and the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator hadn''t decided to fly through the desert but had instead decided to remain on foot.


    In this kind of situation, even if I reach the Soul Ascension Realm, I doubt I will be able to fight that oversized worm¡­

 Chapter 1370 River or Inland Sea?

    Chapter 1370 River or Ind Sea?


    Catching up with the group of cultivators from the Demon Mountain City over the next few minutes, Chu Yang soon began what would end up bing a journeysting for several days through the desert. Doing his best to avoid being detected during the few times that the group in front of him was attacked by therge sandworms lurking beneath the surface of the desert.


    Luckily or maybe because he was on his own, he was never targeted by any of the sandworms and was pretty much left on his own. Making the entire journey through the desert a rather monotone and boring experience, as he had nothing to do outside of trying to figure out what kind of power was suppressing his domain.


    In the end, he did manage to find some clues by the time that a grasnd emerged in the distance and the group ahead of him rushed forward to leave the desert as fast as possible.


    Through the clues, he guessed that the entire desert should have formed some kind of natural formation that suppressed the strength of those who wandered inside of it and prevented them from flying more than a few seconds even if they had reached the Domain Lord Realm. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    All of this allowed the sandworms living inside the desert to have a perfect living environment without any challengers capable of defeating them. After all, without being able to fly properly or use one''s domain, there was no way someone in the Domain Lord Realm could even harm those massive sandworms. Even someone in the Soul Ascension Realm had a difficult time, something he had seen when the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator in charge of the group ahead of him tried taking on one of the weaker sandworms only a little over seventy meters wide.


    The battle had been a treat to watch from afar, but was rather discouraging, as it was essentially just the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator punching sand without being able to do anything to the sandworm as it slowly disappeared into the endless sea of sand.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Chu Yang decided not to think about these sandworms any longer, as he would soon be out of the desert and would most likely never encounter them again after he left the secret realm. Unless there was another desert with sandworms waiting on the other side of the grasnd.


    Whoosh~!


    Managing to avoid encounter any sandworms at thest stretch out of the desert, Chu Yang hid himself in the tall grass before resuming could in a way be called stalking of the cultivator group ahead of him. Not feeling too worried about his current situation, as it was clear that these people seemed to know what they were doing as they continued moving deeper into the secret realm with a clear path in mind.


    ¡­


    "Finally! Out of that worm infested desert!"


    "Haa¡­ You don''t say. Unfortunately, Old Jin didn''t manage to make it through, he got swallowed just when we saw the grasnd."


    "Well, at least this grasnd is far saferpared to that death trap, the strongest demon beast encountered during ourst time visiting this ce was only around the Earlier Stages of the Nascent Soul Realm."


    "Indeed, I''m not worried about this grasnd, but instead that dreadful canyon on the other side of this grasnd¡­"


    "True, though I really doubt that ce can be called a canyon. After all, what kind of canyon is over a thousand kilometers wide? It''s more like a small ind sea flowing through at that point¡­"


    "I agree, but the ruins we found at that ce called it a canyon. So, I guess it should be one, or at least was one in the past. Don''t know if the size of it becamerger since the time that so-called canyon was named as a canyon¡­"


    "I don''t care what it''s called, I just hope we can get through it safely. After all,st time we tried to make it through, we only managed to make it halfway through before the city lord spotted the gateway on the other side.


    At that point we were forced to turn back, having already lost more than two dozen Nascent Soul Realm cultivators and two Domain Lord Realm cultivators to those creatures inside the river."


    """¡­."""


    As the group of Nascent Soul Realm cultivators chatted with each other about their uing crossing of what could essentially be considered an ind sea, all of them became quiet after the mention of the creatures living inside this more than a thousand-kilometer-wide river.


    Even the Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had remained rtively calm so far could not help shivering a bit at the mention of those creatures, as they had personally been there to witness as two powerful Domain Lords no weaker than themselves had been dragged into the dark waters. Never returning to the surface again.


    In the end, it had been because a creature in the Soul Ascension Realm emerged from the water that they were forced to escape the way they hade back then.


    Not just that, but they also clearly remembered that they could feel several equally powerful creatures lurking beneath the surface staring at them during the entire process. Leaving some of these Domain Lord Realm cultivators far more terrified than the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators who hadn''t been able to sense those powerful creatures back then.


    All things considered, they understood how dangerous it would be for them to cross that river, but they simply had no choice, as this was the only path they had managed to sessfully explore and also the only one where they were certain they could find a gate out of this secret realm.


    If they tried exploring a new path, they might end up dying long before they can even find another gateway out of the secret realm¡­ And that is of course only if there is another gateway out of the secret realm in the first ce!

 Chapter 1371 Dead Spirit Canyon

    Chapter 1371 Dead Spirit Canyon


    "There it is¡­"


    As the conversation between the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators somewhat quieted down following the mentions of the creatures lurking inside the abnormallyrge river, the group of cultivators from the Demon Mountain City soon found themselves on the edge of cliff stretching endlessly into both directions with a seemingly endless body of water violently churring as it flowed in one direction. Creating several towering waves in the pitch-ck water, some towering several hundreds of meters into the sky due to the violent currents.


    "Dead Spirit Canyon¡­ I really wonder where that rive leads to¡­" Standing at the edge of the cliff together with the rest as they looked down towards the pitch-ck water, one of the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators could not help muttering this to himself as he stared off in the direction that the river was flowing in.


    In the past, when they first arrived in this ce, they did try and figure this out, but only managed to travel for a little over two days before they were blocked off by a swamp filled with a deadly mist capable of almost immediately killing someone in the Domain Lord Realm. Forcing them to turn around and try going upstream, before encountering a simr situation. Only, the deadly mist wasn''t inside a swamp this time around, but instead a mountain range.


    Worse, that mist looked almost identical to spiritual energy when it was extremely concentrated, causing some of the cultivators that had been with them to rush forward filled with excitement only to end up dead.


    At least in that aspect, the swamp made it clear that the mist was poisonous from a nce, while the mist covering the mountain range pretended to be spiritual qi. Making it far more deadly.


    Ultimately this was what ended up causing them to decide on trying to venture across the river that looked like a violent sea from where they were currently standing.


    Of course, crossing this body of water wouldn''t be that difficult under normal conditions, but simr to the desert, something restricted those in the Domain Lord Realm and the city lord at the Soul Ascension Realm from flying for more than a few seconds.


    Essentially forcing them to walk across the water. Normally not that difficult to aplish even for someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm, while the violent water was something that a Peak Core Formation Realm should be able to cross as long as he avoids therger waves in time at least that was what those Nascent Soul Realm cultivators believed, but outside of the water itself, they also had to deal with the creatures living beneath the surface.


    Those creatures were weird and grotesque to look at. Always showing up at the most unexpected time to attack.


    Even worse, it gave off the feeling of being yed with whenever they attacked, as it had never seemed like they seriously attacked them and instead just yed a little roughly with them and caused a few Nascent Soul Realm and Domain Lord Realm cultivators to die in the process¡­


    I hope it won''t end up like that again- or at least if it does, let me be one of the people who get safely to the other side¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he looked around at the two or so dozen Nascent Soul Realm cultivators and three Domain Lord Realm cultivators left alive at this point in time, the Nascent Soul Realm cultivator closed his eyes as he began focusing on recovering his strength.


    Given the difficulty of crossing the massive river that they didn''t manage to cross in the past, it was agreed that they would all recover to their most optimal state before progressing forward. Everyone understood that if they managed to cross this ridiculouslyrge river canyon, they would be able to leave the secret realm.


    Even if they had no idea about what they might end up finding at the other side of the gateway located on the other side of the dead spirit canyon, they all felt that it would be better than whatever they might encounter by lingering around for too long inside the secret realm.


    ¡­


    "This¡­ Is a canyon? Dead Spirit Canyon?"


    Listening in on the conversations between the cultivators who had begun preparing themselves to brave the violent waters, Chu Yang could not help muttering this to himself as he stared off into the distance where he could see the pitch-ck water violently churning as wave hundreds of meters tall formed at random before disappearing just as randomly.


    Even without the presence of the creature mentioned by the group of cultivators, it would be difficult for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm to cross the river. The main reason being how wide it was, as those weaker Nascent Soul Realm cultivators would run out of strength before reaching the other side. Getting swallowed up by the pitch-ck water as a result.


    A Core Formation Realm cultivator crossing such a wide and violent river like the in front of him felt a little unrealistic and seemed more like the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators trying to cope with the fact that they might not be able to cross the river with their current strength.


    No matter what it was, Chu Yang understood that the reason for these thoughts and the behavior was because these Nascent Soul Realm cultivators had no other way out of the secret realm. Only by crossing the river would they have a chance at surviving.


    Without crossing the river, they would be abandoned and have to find another way out of the secret realm by themselves. No different from a death sentence with their strength in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Oh? Looks like its time¡­


    As Chu Yang was a bit lost in his own thoughts about the canyon and unnaturallyrge river inside of it, half an hour had flown by since arriving at the edge of the river¡­ And it looked like the group of cultivators from Demon Mountain City had recovered enough and slowly descended towards the water below before using their qi to create a barrier between themselves and the water. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Allowing them to walk across the water, as they officially began their journey across the pitch-ck waters under Chu Yang''s watchful gaze hoping that he could catch a glimpse of one of the creatures mentioned by the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators earlier on.

 Chapter 1372 Crossing Deadly Waters in a Single Step

    Chapter 1372 Crossing Deadly Waters in a Single Step


    Whoosh-!


    In the end, Chu Yang didn''t have to wait for long, as a small ck fish soon jumped out of the water. Tackling one of the nascent soul realm cultivators and causing him to lose his footing and fall into the pitch-ck water-


    "Ah!?"


    Ssh~ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Before even getting the chance to cry out for help from the others, he was dragged down below the surface. Not emerging again, as the rest of the cultivators could only helplessly look at each other for a short moment before continuing forward with a far more nervous expression on their faces. Understanding that the creatures lurking beneath the surface had already noticed them and begun to target them.


    "How is that ck fish grotesque? It just looks like a slightlyrger than normal ck fish¡­"


    Watching all of this ying out from a safe distance, Chu Yang couldn''t help tilting his head in confusion as he wondered how such a simple looking ck fish was grotesque, but he soon got his answer as another ck fish jumped out of the water to knock a second Nascent Soul Realm into the pitch-ck water.


    However, as this Nascent Soul Realm cultivator had been prepared, he managed to skill fully dodge out of the, but it was at that moment that the body of the ck fish suddenly twisted before parts of its body broke open and countless small tentacles that then grabbed onto the Nascent Soul Realm cultivator emerged before dragging him into the water.


    If Xuan Hao had been present, he would have almost immediately realized that this creature was rted to the Dao of Corruption, but Chu Yang, having no idea about the Dao of Corruption, could only nod his head in agreement with the earlier descriptions of the creatures below the water being grotesque.


    Though, he did find it troublesome that he would also have to cross over the river if he wanted to leave the secret realm. After all, it was deadly to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, so it would definitely not be safe for him to recklessly cross it.


    With that in mind, Chu Yang turned his attention towards the only structure present at the cliffside, arge stone tower of sorts that was slightly leaning over the edge. Looking like it was about to plummet into the water below at any moment.


    This tower was also the ruin that had been mentioned by the group of cultivators from the Demon Mountain City and also where they had apparently found the name Dead Spirit Canyon in the past.


    Although, from their conversations, it seemed like they didn''t find anything of value inside the stone tower.


    Even then, Chu Yang wanted to take a look for himself before he intended to try and cross the thousand-kilometer-wide river.


    So, without caring about the group of cultivators trying their hardest to cross the river at the moment, Chu Yang began looking through the stone tower. Searching for anything that the people who hade before him might have overlooked. Feeling curious if he could possibly find another way to cross the dead spiritke.


    In the end, a little over a day ended up flying by, as the cultivators trying to cross the river had long since disappeared from sight.


    "Finally! Found something!"


    It was just at this moment, that Chu Yang let out an overjoyed cry, as he looked down at a small inscription barely visible inside the small reception room located at the base of the stone tower.


    Even though he was unfamiliar with formation symbols, he at least recognized the formation symbols below him as belonging to some kind of ancient teleportation formation, something that his master had taught him about before he left for his journey so he could better ensure his own safety in case he encountered something simr to what Mui had encountered inside the mystic realm.


    "An ancient teleportation formation¡­ I wonder where it''s connected to¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked down at what turned out to be an ancient teleportation formation, Chu Yang could not help ncing out across the pitch-ck river churning violently below him.


    Given the location of the ancient teleportation formation right next to such a violent river, he guessed that it might have been created to more easily move around in the past.


    So, without a second thought, he decided to inject his qi into the ancient teleportation formation to try and activate it.


    Even if it didn''t end up leading to the other side of the unnaturallyrge river, he at least guessed that it should lead him to somewhere better than where he currently was.


    Rumble~


    And so, along with a slight rumble, the ancient formation activated before Chu Yang disappeared from his original location inside the stone tower-


    Rumble-!


    Followed by which a far more violent tremor seemed to rush through the structure of the stone tower before it seemed to lose its strength.


    Ssh! Ssh! Ssh!


    Plummeting into the depths of the water below the next second, as the single activation of the ancient teleportation formation seemed to take up what little energy had remained in the ancient formations keeping the tower standing for countless years¡­


    "Huh? This is¡­ The stone tower? No, it''s different¡­"


    At the same time, Chu Yang opened both of his eyes in apletely different stone tower that was in a far better state than the previous one.


    Of course, after making sure that he was save and nothing had gone wrong, he left the tower and went out to inspect the ce he had ended up at.


    Not taking long to realize that he had ended up in some kind of small city that had long since been abandoned, but more importantly, he saw the familiar pitch ck water directly behind the stone tower¡­ And in the distance, he could even spot the barely visible figures of the group of cultivators from the Demon Mountain City who had traversed the deadly waters for the past two days at this point in time.

 Chapter 1373 Spirit Stones and Strange Black Spear

    Chapter 1373 Spirit Stones and Strange ck Spear


    Compared to when he hadst seen them heading off towards the other side of the pitch ck river, Chu Yang could clearly see that their numbers had been significantly reducedpared to before, with only 5 people in the Nascent Soul Realm alive, while only a single Domain Lord Rm was still alive together with the Soul Ascension Realm city lord who looked like he had lost one of his arms during the journey and didn''t have the strength to regrow it at the moment. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Ah¡­ Make that four Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, one of them were just grabbed by a few tentacles and dragged below the surface.


    Even if they did make it to the other side, it should at least be another twenty or so minutes given their current exhausted and slow speed.


    Before that, I should quickly look through this city and see if there is anything useful around¡­


    Swish-!


    Not wasting any more time looking at the remaining few cultivators from the Demon Mountain City as they struggled through the tall waves while also trying to defend against any unexpected attacks from the creatures lurking below the surface, Chu Yang first checked the tower to see if this one was as empty as thest one.


    "Spirit stones!? And top-grade ones as well!"


    Surprisingly, he actually found something when he reached the top of the stone tower. Top grade spirit stones, something that could be considered rare even in the core region of the continent. Useful for cultivators in the Dao Seed Realm as they could slightly help withprehension, while also being indispensable in any higher-level formations.


    Whoosh-!


    Without a second thought, Chu Yang ced the spirit stones inside his interspatial ring before continuing to look around the tower for more treasures. Unfortunately, he didn''t find any more spirit stones and soon left the stone tower to search through the rest of the abandoned city.


    Soon enough, he swept through all of the buildings except one and managed to get his hand on over a thousand top grade spirit stones. From what he knew, this was more than what the entire Star Shattering Sect had or to be more precise close to a hundred times what was currently inside the sect, as the sect didn''t really have a way to mine top grade spirit stones, as most mine capable of producing such spirit stones were located in the core region.


    The few that the sect had was obtained through luck.


    If he could bring the thousand or so top grade spirit stones back to the sect, it would definitely help in the future growth of the sect!


    Creak~


    As he thought about this, Chu Yang slowly pushed open the door to thest house in the abandoned city, filled with anticipation, as he had saved this house forst given it was located at the center of the city and was by far thergest one.


    "Huh? No¡­ No spirit stones?"


    However, as he stepped into the abandoned house, he almost immediately realized that there were no spirit stones inside, as the house was essentially just a singlerge open room. The only thing he could see was a small pedestal located at the center of the room-


    "Ah? Wait! A pedestal?! Treasure!?" Feeling like there was still hope for this house, Chu Yang focused his full attention on the pedestal, or more specifically the pitch-ck spear the seemed to be hovering a few centimeters above it.


    Even without knowing about the quality of the spear, Chu Yang was certain, this was a definitely a treasure!


    Swish-!


    And so, without a second thought, Chu Yang dashed forward and grabbed the ck spear to examine it more closely-


    Boom-!


    However, the moment he grabbed the spear, he suddenly felt a terrifying power erupting from the spear before rushing directly into his dantian before he had a chance to defend himself.


    Is this how I die?


    Feeling the terrifying power rush into his dantian, Chu Yang could not help thinking this to himself as he med himself for being too careless-


    BOOOOM-!


    And it was just at that moment the terrifying power from the ck spear reached the soul at the center of his dantian, causing it to activate the protection Xuan Hao had attached to his disciple''s soul in case of deadly threat that they couldn''t react to in time.


    RUUUUMBLE-!


    In the end, the terrifying power erupting from the spear was quickly overwhelmed before a radiant sword intent bloomed inside Chu Yang''s dantian before rushing towards the source of the power that had tried to attack Chu Yang''s soul.


    "Noooo! Not like thissss!"


    Soon enough rushing into the ck spear where a pitiful scream echoed out a secondter before the sword intent retreated back into the depths of Chu Yang''s soul. Leaving no traces of its existence behind.


    "¡­"


    That should be something left behind by master¡­


    Not knowing what to say as the battle that had broken out inside his dantian was over in an instant, Chu Yang could only thank his master before turning his attention back towards the ck spear that now felt far morefortable in his hand.


    Given that he was no longer that na?ve when it came to the cultivation world, it didn''t take him long to understand that the thing that had attacked his soul just now should have been a remnant soul of a long dead ancient cultivator hidden inside the ck spear trying to take control of his body.


    Now that the soul had been destroyed by his master from what little he could tell, the ck spear was safe to use-


    Rumble~!


    However, before he had a chance to inspect the ck spear any further, he suddenly felt a stream of pure spiritual qi flowing into his body from the ck spear, causing his cultivation still at the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to start improving at a speed visible to the naked eye.

 Chapter 1374 Chu Yang, Rapid Breakthrough

    Chapter 1374 Chu Yang, Rapid Breakthrough


    Boom!


    Not long after, Chu Yang broke through to the Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, however, it didn''t stop there, as his cultivation kept rising until he finally came to a stop after reaching the Peak of the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    If not for the fact that his cultivation was in a rather unstable state at the moment, he would have wanted to try and figure out more about where that powerful and pure spiritual qi had suddenlye from, but for now, he quickly sat down and stabilized his cultivation base enough that he could move around normally after 10 minutes.


    Even if he wanted to stay and fully consolidate his cultivation base, he understood that he couldn''t remain inside the abandoned city when the cultivators from Demon Mountain City arrived.


    So, having already found the gateway out of the secret realm as it was essentially at the center of the abandoned town and difficult to miss, Chu Yang ced the ck spear into his interspatial ring before rushing out and arriving directly in front of the gateway-


    Whoosh-!


    And without any hesitation he stepped through the gateway just as one of the few surviving Nascent Soul Realm cultivators popped his head up over the edge of the cliff before dragging his exhausted body up on the ground before falling unconscious due to the overwhelming exhaustion from the two-day long journey across the violent river.


    Not far behind him, the city lord, a Domain Lord and two other Nascent Soul Realm cultivators simrly copsed on the ground from exhaustion. All of them having been pushed to their limits over the past two days, as they constantly had to fight off strange creatures and keep themselves afloat at the same time.


    In the end, they were the only ones who had ended up surviving out of the close to three dozen people who had gone at the start.


    But that didn''t matter to any of them, they were just happy that they had managed to survive.


    As for leaving the secret realm? None of them were dumb enough to do something like that in their current exhausted and half dead state, as they expected to end up somewhere like where they had found the first entrance to the secret realm. Inside a mountain range filled to the brim with powerful demon beasts that would want nothing more than to jump on them and devour them if given the opportunity.


    ¡­


    "A small cave and hidden by a formation as well. If not for that Soul Ascension Realm cultivator who mighte through the gateway at any moment now, I would have really loved to stay in a location like this to stabilize my cultivation base."


    Coming out on the other side of the gateway connected to the secret realm, Chu Yang first felt relived that it wasn''t somewhere dangerous where he would get jumped by a group of powerful demon beasts the moment he arrived, but at the same time also felt disappointed that he couldn''t stay with a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator potentially appearing through the gateway to the secret realm at any moment.


    Knowing the danger of staying for even a few seconds longer, Chu Yang quickly made his way to the entrance of the cave before looking out to see if the environment outside was just as safe as inside the concealment formation.


    "No demon beasts stronger than the Foundation Establishment Realm around¡­ Great! This ce isn''t as dangerous as I thought it might be." Muttering this to himself after inspecting the outside environment, Chu Yang felt even more at ease before he made his way out of the concealment formation. Looking like he suddenly stepped out through solid rock in the eyes of anyone witnessing the scene of him leaving the concealment formation.


    Huh? This is still a mountain range¡­ And that path over there- Isn''t that the end of the safe passage? Did I manage to cross through the mountain range by ident?


    Inspecting his surroundings more in-depth now that he had left the small cave, Chu Yang could not help showing a somewhat shocked expression on his face when he realized that he had ended up right next to the endpoint of the safe passage through the mountain range separating the core region from the former territory of the Sky Empire.


    Seeing a small city that had been described in the information about the safe passage through the mountain range not too far away, Chu Yang confirmed that he had indeed made it to the core region of the continent.


    If not that, he could also clearly feel that the spiritual qi in the air was far denser than it had been back in the Sky Empire''s territory.


    Of course, it was still far inferior whenpared to the Shattered Star Peaks, but it wasn''t like there was anything topare the chaotic qi formation to¡­ n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "For now, find a safe ce, stabilize my cultivation base. After that explore the core region!" Muttering this to himself as he gazed off towards the small cityin the distance, Chu Yang quickly set his priorities straight before he left the ce and went to search for a safe ce to consolidate his cultivation base at the Peak of the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm without being disturbed when the Soul Ascension Realm city lord would inevitably emerge from the secret realm like he had.


    In the end, he settled for a small, secluded cave a few hundred meters away, as he made sure to try his best at hiding his presence before sealing the entrance with arge rock to prevent anyone or anything from identally stumbling into the cave before he sat down in a meditative position and focused his full attention on consolidating his cultivation base.


    Given that he had directly broken through from the Secon Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to the Peak of the Fifth Stage, it would take him at least a few weeks to fully stabilize his cultivation base.


    Of course, though he felt sad at using so much of his time just cultivating in seclusion after reaching the core region, he wasn''t too sad when thinking about the reason for it.

 Chapter 1375 Erasing a Little Renmant Soul~

    Chapter 1375 Erasing a Little Renmant Soul~


    "Hm? The protection I left behind for Chu Yang was activated?"


    Deep in meditation back inside arge city located in the Blue Sea Empire with a Peak Soul Ascension Realm cultivator watching over it, Xuan Hao suddenly opened both of his eyes in surprise as he felt thest defensive measure he had left behind inside Chu Yang''s soul suddenly being activated all of a sudden.


    Although he had noticed that he had wandered into what he guessed to be a secret realm from how he couldn''t properly pinpoint the general direction of his disciple through the connection between him and the mark he had left behind in his disciple''s soul, he hadn''t expected it to be so dangerous that it would trigger the hidden trump card of his disciple.


    At least, with the mark being activated, he could somewhat sense the situation his disciple was in¡­ And what he saw enraged him to no end, as a remnant soul that should have belonged to someone around the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm was actually trying to wipe out his disciple''s soul and take control of his body.


    Even though this little remnant soul was in an extremely weakened state, it wasn''t something his little disciple could handle with his current strength, thus causing the soul mark to be activated when his soul was in danger.


    Of course, the soul mark had already managed to repel the remnant soul on its own and it had already started retreating, but Xuan Hao had no ns of allowing it to simply run away after trying to destroy his disciple''s soul-


    Whoosh-!


    So, with a simple thought, he motioned for the soul mark to follow and destroy the remnant soul at its core.


    "Senior, please spare me! I didn''t know this was your disciple, just let me go and I will make sure to repay you, no I will serve you as an obedient dog! Don''t kill me!"


    As a terrifying sword intent bloomed inside his little disciple''s dantian before rushing towards the core of remnant soul, Xuan Hao heard a few pitiful criesing through his soul connection as the remnant soul began pleading for mercy, but Xuan Hao didn''t bother listening to any of it as he pressed forward. Rapidly destroying the remnant soul.


    "Noooo! Not like thissss!"


    And in less than a fraction of a second, the battle ended, as the remnant soul was destroyed.


    However, he found out that there was arge abundance of extremely pure qi inside the space that the remnant soul should have gathered and painstakingly refined over the long period of time he had been stuck inside the small space. Likely in preparation for rapidly increasing his own strength when he got his hands on a body in the future or gather enough qi to rebuild his own body.


    Well, no need to waste his effort, I should guide it out and let Chu Yang absorb it, it will be helpful for his cultivation.


    Nodding his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao created a small passage for the pure spiritual qi to flow through and into his disciple before he returned the soul mark back to his disciple''s soul where it once again entered a dormant state.


    Although the soul mark hadn''t really used that much of its strength during this period, him taking control of it over such a long distance still had costs and the soul mark could at most be used one more time before it had to reced.


    However, Xuan Hao didn''t worry too much about this, as it was unlikely for his disciple to run into a simr scenario to the one, he had just experienced in the future. Especially considering that he should be strong enough to fight most people in the Domain Lord Realm after he absorbed the pure spiritual qi that had been painstakingly refined by the now dead remnant soul.


    "Everything should be fine with that. Now, my own situation¡­ There is no sign of any demonic cultivator chasing after me and it''s been close to a week since I broke in and stole the space node stones.


    Either the other party doesn''t have a way to track me or doesn''t dare to enter the Blue Sea Empire. Likely thetter of the two. But¡­ How can I create even more trouble and hopefully avoid the battlefield between the Blue Sea Empire and the demonic cultivators being anywhere near the sect?" Saying this, Xuan Hao unconsciously nced out through a nearby window and happened to look straight out at arge sign.


    [Blue Sea Empire, Intelligence Department]


    A familiar sign belonging to a branch of the Blue Sea Empire''s intelligence department.


    And all of sudden, Xuan Hao realized just how he was going to cause trouble for both the demonic cultivators and the Blue Sea Empire at the same time without involving the Star Shattering Sect in any of the problems that these powerful forces might end up causing.


    Whoosh-!


    The next second, he found himself directly in front of the entrance leading inside the intelligence department where he decisively decided on using his explorer union identity, Bright Sword, an identity he didn''t have the chance to use in a long time, as most of his recent activities didn''t really require him to hide his identity in any way like what he was about to do at the moment.


    "Oh well, I hope they bite the bait. After all, I''m not going to say anything false." Chuckling to himself as he said this, Xuan Hao stepped inside the Blue Sea Empire''s intelligence department, a space node stone in hand as he directly informed the one sitting at the front to inform the one in charge of the branch that he had some important information he wanted to sell.


    Revealing an aura that was around the level of someone in the Dao Seed Realm to make it a bit more convincing and have them take him more seriously. Understanding that there was little chance they would believe him without him showing some of his strength.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 1376 Facing a Senior Bootlicker

    Chapter 1376 Facing a Senior Bootlicker


    At the top floor of the intelligence department branch, the head of the branch waszily lounging around while ying with a few artifacts while being pampered by two scantly d womanying down together with him.


    BANG!


    "Head! HEAAAAD! There is someone who wants to sell information! HE WANTS TO SEE YOU!"


    However, just as the head of the branch was enjoying this serene atmosphere andpany, a loud bang echoed out through the entire room, as he saw his subordinate rushing in screaming at the top of his lungs. Ruining the mood, while also scaring his twopanions in the process.


    "Hmph!"


    Boom!


    Deciding to teach this little subordinate a valuable lesson for his rude behavior, the branch directly revealed his strength at the Second Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm, as he used the powerful pressure created on the rude little subordinate who had interrupted his good time.


    "Head, it''s important! We have to go fast, or we might offend the senior if we are too slow!"


    However, seemingly having been infused by some kind of divine chicken blood, the little subordinate who was only in the Nascent Soul Realm continued chirping without stop. Clearly not showing any respect of care towards his superior, someone who was really in need of-


    "Wait¡­ Did you say senior¡­?"


    "Yes! An Earth Immortal Realm senior!"


    "WHY DIDN''T YOU SAY SO EARLIER! OUT MY WAY!"


    WHOOSH-!


    Hearing that there was actually a senior in the Earth Immortal Realm present, the head of the branch screamed even more loudly than his subordinate had when he first burst through the door. Throwing the two woman who had been leaning up against him to the side as he jumped up at terrifying speed unbefitting of someone in the Soul Ascension Realm before dashing out of the room towards the reception part of the building where Xuan Hao was currently waiting.


    ¡­


    "Ah, senior, I''m the manager of this humble establishment, I hope I didn''t offend you with my tardy behavior andte arrival. If there is anything I can do for you, please tell me and I will make sure I do everything in my power to aplish it!"


    "This¡­ I-I havee to sell some information that I''m sure the Blue Sea Empire would be interested in buying."


    Faced with what a senior bootlicker working in the government for the first time, Xuan Hao was slightly taken aback before quickly regaining his calm. Stating the reason why he hade to the intelligence department.


    "Selling information? Haha, I''m sure whatever information senior offers is worth a mountain of spirit stones! Please follow me and we will discuss this matter in more detail in a more private environment."


    Not lowering his stance in the slightest, the head of the branch motioned for him to follow, and Xuan Hao slowly followed him into a small private room for business.


    "So, might I ask what kind of information senior is selling? No matter what it is, I will make sure to put in a good word to higher management and ensure senior gets the best price for his information!"


    "This..." n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Thump~


    Rolling his eyes slightly at the words of the branch head, Xuan Hao directly ced the space node stone on the small table, causing the branch head to show a somewhat confused expression before it was reced by one with shock upon recognizing what the stone in front of him was.


    "A space node stone! Those are quite rare¡­ I wonder¡­ How is this rted to the information you want to sell¡­?"


    "I want to sell you the location of space node stone mine."


    "Space node stone¡­ Mine¡­?"


    "Yes."


    "This¡­ I¡­ Wait a second, I have to inform my higher ups, I can''t handle something of this scale!"


    Realizing that he was being serious, the expression of the branch head quickly changed as he rushed out of the private room. Understanding that he had no way to negotiate something that precious on behalf of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even then, he wasn''t the slightest bit mad, but instead overjoyed, as he would still be the one who started this deal and the reward, he would receive would by no means be small considering the value of a space node stone mine.


    In the end, Xuan Hao waited around inside the small private room for a few hours as he waited for someone higher up to arrive. Considering the distance from the capital he expected it to take a few hours and wasn''t bothered about sitting around inside the private room waiting.


    "Sorry for the wait, I''m here to negotiate on behalf of the Blue Sea Empire, might I ask what I can call you?"


    Just as the three-hour mark flew by, a powerful voice echoed out from the entrance to the small private room as a massive figure walked inside. Even at a nce, Xuan Hao could tell that this person was strong. At leastparable to someone at the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Meaning that following the terms of the Earth Immortal Realm, he would be considered as someone at the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm or someone at the Half Bloom Stage.


    "Just call me Bright Sword, a member of the Explorer Union."


    "Bright Sword? Explorer Union? I see, no wonder, it always you people from the Explorer Union who discover all those wonderful mining locations and other deposits, though, with the rtionship between the Blue Sea Empire and your Explorer Union, I didn''t think you woulde here to sell such valuable information¡­"


    "Don''t worry about, I normally work independently, and I''m not involved that deeply with the Explorer Union to care about their grudges and enemies."


    "A free roaming explorer? Hehe, quite rare considering your strength, but let''s get down to business, if what you say is true, I will ensure that the Blue Sea Empire pays you adequately for the information.


    Of course, if you give use an already known location or somewhere that is impossible for us to set up a stable mining operation like the core territory of the Frozen Wastnd, we won''t buy the information."


    "Understandable. Now, let''s get started¡­"

 Chapter 1377 Space Node Mine (Controlled by Demonic Cultivators)

    Chapter 1377 Space Node Mine (Controlled by Demonic Cultivators)


    As he began exining the location of the space node stone mine, Xuan Hao could see that the face of the person from the Blue Sea Empire''s intelligence department was bing brighter by the second.


    Then again, it was not that surprising considering that the location of the space node stone mine wasn''t anywhere in the core region, but instead at the remote edges of the continent where no major power was located. Meaning that the space node stone mine wasn''t inside the territory of any of the other major powers. Eliminating the biggest worry on the side of the Blue Sea Empire when it came to actually taking control of the mine.


    Of course, it didn''t mean that the space node stone mine was located in an optimal location either, as it was still far away from the Blue Sea Empire and would take a long time for anyone below the Celestial Immortal Realm or without a mastery over the Dao of Space to reach. Especially considering that the fastest way would be to go straight through the territory of the demonic cultivators, the Frozen Wastnd.


    Even then, this only made the Blue Sea Empire''s intelligence officer more convinced about the validity of what he said, as it would be far easier to name somewhere close to the Blue Sea Empire if he wanted to scam them, something that the Blue Sea Empire''s intelligence officer couldn''t rule out considering their current rtionship with the Explorer Union.


    After all, no matter what Xuan Hao told him about his rtionship with the Explorer Union, there was no way he would just trust the words of a stranger he had only met for the first time today. Even more so considering that he had never heard about this Bright Sword before. Making him guess that there was a possibility that the person in front of him might have used a fake name if he wanted to scam the Blue Sea Empire. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Ehm! Everything checks out well¡­ Now¡­ I would like to ask if you are willing to allow us to investigate the location and confirm the validity of you im?"


    For this reason, after hearing Xuan Hao exin what little he had learnt about the mine during his quick pass through the ce to steal a few space node stones, the intelligence officer nervously leaned forward as he asked this.


    If Xuan Hao agreed to allow them to survey the area and confirm there was indeed a space node stone mine where he imed it was, it would mean that the im was most likely true, while if it was false, there was a high chance that it wasn''t true.


    Even then, considering the value of a space node stone mine, they would still buy the information to ensure they didn''t end up missing something precious like that. Of course, they would be offering a far lower price in that case.


    "Yes, though, I do have to mention that the mine has already been discovered by demonic cultivators and was guarded by a demonic cultivator in the Demon Lord Realm." Nodding his head, Xuan Hao decided to also disclose the fact that the mine was guarded and had been discovered by demonic cultivators, causing the overjoyed expression on the face of the intelligence officer after hearing his agreement to transform into a frown upon hearing about the presence of demonic cultivators.


    To not give away too much about the demonic cultivators he had encountered and how strong they were nor the existence of the formation guarding the mine itself, Xuan Hao made sure to only inform him about the presence of a single demonic cultivator in the Demon Lord Realm and nothing else.


    After all, they would inevitably discover the demonic cultivators and anymore that appeared could just be because the demonic cultivator guarding the ce discovered him and informed others about his presence, causing the defenses of the mine to increase.


    Not to mention, what Xuan Hao wanted from the Blue Sea Empire was not spirit stones or artifacts, but instead for them to utilize one of their Celestial Immortals to check out the situation personally!


    His main goal was to have that Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor hopefully run into the demonic cultivator in the Demon King Realm, shing with him or her in the outer regions of the continent. Essentially trapping them there with no clear way out and more demonic cultivators at the Demon King Realm likely wanting to jump the opportunity to kill off someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    In turn, this would force the Blue Sea Empire to mobilize more of their Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors to help out their struggling ancestor.


    At the end of the day, a major fight that would weaken both the demonic cultivators and Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire would break out far away from the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if demonic cultivators wanted to use the opportunity to invade the Blue Sea Empire at this point in time, Xuan Hao doubted that there would be any above the Demon Lord Realm, as they would most likely be busy.


    Not to mention, if the Blue Sea Empire moved out with most of their Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors, it was likely that the few remaining inside the empire would lock down the entire empire to prevent any such attacks.


    Meaning the only real threat would be the demonic cultivators trying to push their territory closer to the borders of the Blue Sea Empire during this time, something Xuan Hao felt confident in being able to safeguard the Star Shattering Sect against.


    "Demonic cultivators in control of the space node stone mine¡­ Wait a second, I will contact an ancestor about the situation first!" Muttering the first part to himself, the intelligence officer quickly turned around and left the small room in hurry.


    Not unexpected considering that the matter now also involved demonic cultivators of at least the Demon Lord Realm. Investigating the mine in question would at least take someone at the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm (Middle Stage Dao Seed Realm) or someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.

 Chapter 1378 Overconfident Ancestor

    Chapter 1378 Overconfident Ancestor


    In the end, it didn''t take as long as the first time around, as only a few minutes passed before Xuan Hao felt a terrifying aura appearing on the other side of the door. Following which a tall middle-aged man dressed in a simple manner walked into the room.


    "Greetings, senior." Knowing that this person was one of the Blue Sea Empire''s ancestors the moment he had appeared, Xuan Hao quickly got up and bowed his head in a simple greeting, something that could be considered a first given that most of the people he had encountered so far stronger than him had tried to kill him the moment they appeared. Not like now, where he was actually a junior facing a stronger senior cultivator.


    "No need, you can sit down."


    However, as he heard the somewhat smug and arrogant voice from the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor, Xuan Hao felt like he might have preferred it if this person had just tried to kill him, as he understood how to deal with such a situation. Not like now. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    He wasn''t a senior bootlicker like the head of this branch of the Blue Sea Empire Intelligence Department and so, he only ended up nodding his head with a somewhat awkward smile before sitting down.


    "So, you have information about the location of a spirit node stone mine and is willing to allow us to confirm the validity of the im?"


    "Yes!"


    "Good, what do you want in return? A cultivation mantra for the Celestial Immortal Realm? Artifacts? Spiritual Herbs or Spiritual Metal? Spirit stones?"


    "Spirit stones, spiritual herbs and spiritual metal. Any of those will do, of course at least Transcendent Grade spiritual herbs and spiritual metal and only top-grade spirit stones." Hearing what the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor in front of him said, Xuan Hao didn''t hesitate as he listed out the things he had thought about wanting in return for the information beforehand.


    Even if he didn''t expect to get these things considering that he expected the Blue Sea Empire to fall into chaos soon as they would sh with the demonic cultivators in the outer regions of the continent, he at least had to sound convincing and be able to answer immediately. After all, there was no way someone went to a major power like the Blue Sea Empire to sell such valuable information without already having some demands in mind.


    Although, he did feel a bit confused about why the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor didn''t mention anything about the demonic cultivators at the mine, but that wasn''t really anything he cared about.


    "Hm¡­ Simple demand¡­ No requirements for the kind of spiritual herbs or spiritual metal you want?"


    "No."


    "I see, I don''t have that many top-grade spirit stones on me at the moment, so I will just pay you with those to make up for thecking spirit stones. Wait a moment."


    Not expecting to get paid immediately, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat confused expression on his face as he watched the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor take out a small interspatial ring before cing several different spiritual herbs and spiritual metals into the ring. Along with arge number of top-grade spirit stones.


    "Here, check if this is enough."


    "¡­"


    Feeling the interspatial ring that had been thrown over to him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more doubtful as he checked the content of the interspatial ring.


    And¡­ It was filled to the brim with spiritual herbs, metals and spirit stones.


    Considering the value of the information he had traded along with the danger of demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao felt that this was more than enough. Even a bit on the generous side.


    Even though¡­ He could not help but feel confused as to why this had been given to him now before he had even confirmed the uracy of the information he had sold him.


    "Hehe, I can see what you are thinking with that look on your face, but don''t worry, I''m confident that you don''t want to try and do something dumb like scamming me and my empire¡­. And if you do, I''m more than confident in catching you again.


    Even if you have managed toprehend the Dao of Space to the Small Sess Realm, I myself am already at the Peak of the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Space! Though, this is already well known, hehe!"


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say in response, Xuan Hao just tried his best to show a look of surprise and admiration, though¡­ Even if he did a bad job, it looked like it wouldn''t really matter with this ancestor in front of him.


    Overconfident in himself and trying his best to show off, seemingly looking for praise, Xuan Hao suddenly understood why the branch head was such a skilled bootlicker when he had this kind of superior.


    Oh well¡­ This would work good for him, as the other party had essentially revealed to him that he had only reached the Peak of the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Space and would have no real way to catch him when he leftter on.


    Not to mention, this ancestor''s overconfidence in himself had caused him to directly give away the resources he wanted in exchange for the information before he had even confirmed the uracy of the information¡­


    "Well then, I will go out and check this location myself. Of course, with my strength and profoundprehension of the Dao of Space, it will only take a short time to do something that simple!"


    Whoosh-!


    "¡­"


    Deciding to erase the existence of this ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire from his memory as he disappeared just as fast as he hade, Xuan Hao didn''t continue staying around inside the branch and quickly left. Not intending on staying in the Blue Sea Empire for more than a few days, as he knew that in another week or so, this overconfident ancestor should be able to reach the location he had given him and would end up being attacked by the demonic cultivators.

 Chapter 1379 Meeting an Old... Friend? Pupil? Senior...?

    Chapter 1379 Meeting an Old... Friend? Pupil? Senior...?


    Deciding on spending the next few days wandering around the Blue Sea Empire as he waited for the overconfident ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire to at least get into the Frozen Wastnd by the time he made his way back to the sect, Xuan Hao ended up making his way back to the location where the special location contain the Sea of Mist, Ephemeral Forest and the Valley of Illusory Beasts, was located.


    Not so much because he nned on entering the ce following what had happened thest time around, but more so because he was feeling curious about what had happened since he had left.


    Did all the illusory beasts get killed off by the Blue Sea Empire or had some of them survived?


    What about the Valley of Illusory Beasts? Was itpletely closed off following the desperate and sessful escape attempt from the illusory beasts?


    It was with these thoughts in mind that he decided to enter the special location for a quick peek, just to see how the gate leading to the Valley of Illusory Beasts was doing, as he could now see through the gate properly after his Dao of Illusions broke through to the Large Sess Realm.


    "Hm? Nothing much changed even after the destruction of the area around the gate back then?"


    However, what he witnessed on the other side of the gate was the same as when he had first entered the Valley of Illusory Beasts. Nothing had changed and he could even see a few illusory beasts moving around, he even spotted someone being hunted down by arge group of-


    Wait a second¡­ Isn''t that Chu Li? Wasn''t he supposed to get picked up by that East Sea General back then or did hee back on his ownter after the illusory beasts outside were driven away or killed?


    Recognizing the figure being chased by three illusory beast allparable to the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, as none other than the former senior he had encountered back when he had first ventured into the Valley of Illusory Beasts, Xuan Hao could not help tilting his head in confusion.


    Not understanding why, he was inside the Valley of Illusory Beasts again. After all, he should know how dangerous that ce was after the escape of the illusory beasts.


    Guess I should take the opportunity to ask and see if he is in any trouble¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought this to himself, Xuan Hao took a step forward and instantly moved through the gateway leading into the Valley of Illusory Beasts before finding himself above the chase that was taking ce between the group of illusory beasts and Chu Li.


    At the very least, considering that he was holding his own against three Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts, Chu Li''s strength had improved a lotpared to thest time he had seen him.


    Not just that, but he had seemed to follow his advice and started toprehend the Dao of Space and was in the process of trying to merge it together with his Dao of Illusions to further his understanding of the Dao of Illusions through the assistance of the Dao of Space.


    Although this couldn''t really be considered him entering the Dao Domain Lord Realm, as he was already at the Soul Ascension Realm and hadn''t really established a new domain. Still a bit away fromprehending the Dao of Space to the Elementary Realm.


    Not to mention, he was using the Dao of Space to supplement his Dao of Illusions and from what he could tell, Chu Li was on the cusp of a breakthrough at this point in time. All he needed to do was take a single step forward and he should be able to break through to the Dao Seed Realm or Earth Immortal Realm.


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao decided to not interfere in his battle, as it might very well be the battle that would allow him to break through his limits and take that step forward and-


    Bang! Bang! Bang


    Never mind, he had run out of strength and was now in the process of being pummeled by the three illusory beasts and could barely stand up straight at this point in time¡­


    Swish-!


    Knowing that it would be best for him to step in before his old friend and former senior when it came to strength ended up dead, Xuan Hao decided to use the Dao of Illusions, as three giant ghostly hands appeared above the three illusory beasts before rushing down and soundlessly crushing their souls without giving them any time to fight back.


    "Wha-!?"


    The result being three Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts disappearing and one very confused Chu Li, who had no idea about what had just happened-


    "Senior!"


    That was until he saw the familiar figure of Xuan Hao descending from the sky beforending in front of him, causing him to rush over with a happy expression stered all over his face, as he had honestly not expected to run into this senior again since they hadst parted ways a few years earlier.


    Although¡­ he did feel quite embarrassed about the situation that they met in, though, these thoughts of embarrassment were instantly erased the moment he remembered just how effortlessly his senior killed off three Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even if he understood that his senior was powerful, it was a little different when he witnessed it firsthand. Especially when it also happened to be three illusory beasts he had been struggling against for the past few hours.


    Different from other illusory beasts, he understood very well that every single one of these illusory beasts were no weaker than him. Meaning that outside of the illusory beasts, his senior could also easily kill him in a simr fashion.


    However, instead of fear, Chu Li was filled with awe at this awesome disy of power and felt even more thankful for the fact that this powerful senior had been gracious enough to teach him in the past. Even more so now that he had cultivated ording to his rmendations for the past few years and felt himself progressing after having been stuck in the past.

 Chapter 1380 Helping a... Half Disciple?

    Chapter 1380 Helping a... Half Disciple?


    "What are you still doing here? Shouldn''t you have left after what happenedst time around?"


    As he killed off the three Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts, Xuan Hao descended from the sky andnded in front of the shocked and amazed Chu Li before asking him directly about why he was still running into the Valley of Illusory Beasts.


    "This¡­" Hearing what Xuan Hao said, the happy expression on the face of Chu Li quickly became somewhat distraught as he seemed to have difficulty speaking.


    However, even without him saying anything, it was rather obvious that something had happened to him since they hadst seen each other and considering what little he knew about his background and the fact that he should be part of the Blue Sea Empire''s East Sea Army, he guessed that it had something to with the East Sea Army.


    Though¡­ Considering that he had already personally encountered the general of the East Sea Army in the past and that he should beparable to someone in the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, Xuan Hao really couldn''t imagine what couldn''t imagine what could have happened to someone like that.


    After all, someone that strong was of importance to the overall strength of the Blue Sea Empire and wouldn''t be allowed to die easily.


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao could only guess that it might not have something to do with the general in question, but instead the East Sea Army itself.


    Perhaps Chu Li got thrown out of the army? No¡­ A bit unrealistic considering that there was no way the Blue Sea Empire would give up on someone like Chu Li who was incredibly close to breaking through to the Dao Seed Realm at a rtively young age¡­


    "Senior, the reason I''m here is because there is nowhere else that will help me break through to the Earth Immortal Realm faster!" Having hesitated on what to say for a few short seconds while Xuan Hao tried to figure out what had happened on his own, Chu Li ultimately showed a confident expression as he said this. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Break through the Earth Immortal Realm the fastest? Are you in a rush to reach the Earth Immortal Realm?" Picking up the important bits about what Chu Li said, Xuan Hao could not help asking as he felt rather curious about what this little fellow who could in a sense be considered a half disciple of his was up to.


    "This¡­ Senior should know that I''m from the East Sea Army. The reason I want to break through to the Earth Immortal Realm is because the grandmander sent out an order that the weakest of the four armies be dispatched to assist in suppressing demonic cultivators at the border of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Considering how dangerous the situation is and the fact the Demon King Realm demonic cultivators have shown up, it will essentially be a death sentence for anyone who ends up being dispatched first. Even worse, with the cultivation environment of that ce, it will also be hard for those dispatched to cultivate."


    "And your East Sea Army is the weakest of the four?"


    "Yes¡­ Although the general is powerful, there are not as many Earth Immortals as in the other armies. However, if I break through to the Earth Immortal Realm, we might have a chance at no longer being the weakest and avoid being sent to the frontlines against the demonic cultivators!"


    Seeing the almost desperate expression on the face of Chu Li as he said this, Xuan Hao could somewhat understand him, as the cultivation environment outside the core region was nowhere near the same as that of a kingdom located at the border of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Not to mention, the danger involved in being dispatched to the front lines was also obvious, as Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors and Demon King Realm demonic cultivators had already shed there not long ago.


    For any cultivator below the Celestial Immortal Realm, it would be a death sentence for them to encounter a demonic cultivator in the Demon King Realm.


    But¡­ Considering the little sh that will take ce between the demonic cultivators and the Blue Sea Empire over a certain space node stone mine in the near future, Xuan Hao doubted that the Blue Sea Empire would dispatch any of their people to the borders of the Frozen Wastnd to fight back demonic cultivators.


    Instead of that, it was far more likely that they would dedicate all of their strength towards keeping their own territory safe, as arge portion of their strongest cultivators would go to fight for the space node stone mine.


    With all of that in mind, there wasn''t really anything for Chu Li to worry about, as he would almost certainly be staying inside the Blue Sea Empire even if his army ended up being the weakest of the four, as sending them out to face off demonic cultivators would just be sending them to their death at that point in time.


    No matter what kind of internal struggle the Blue Sea Empire might be going through at the moment, Xuan Hao didn''t think it would be possible for them to continue that kind of internal infighting when their continued existence was on the line.


    If not, there would have been no way for the Blue Sea Empire to have continued existing for as long as it had. Instead, it would have long since be a part of history.


    "You don''t have to worry too much about the situation and try to hasten a breakthrough to the Earth Immortal Realm. After all, a hastened breakthrough might result in you making mistakes and perishing to the final tribtion.


    The fact that you still haven''t decided to go through it is admirable, but I fear that if you continue like this, you might end up trying to pass the tribtion before you are ready for it. Not to mention, your current state of mind is far from calm enough to face thest tribtion."


    With all of that in mind, Xuan Hao decided to advise Chu Li to the best of hist ability, so he didn''t end up doing something dumb.


    After all, even though Chu Li could be considered strong for someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, he wasn''t the strongest he had encountered in the Soul Ascension Realm, and he could tell that he would not be able to pass through the final tribtion before his Dao of Illusions broke through the final barrier.


    "This¡­ I understand senior¡­" Showing a look of understanding as he heard what Xuan Hao said, Chu Li soon showed a somewhat defeated expression on his face.


    He understood what Xuan Hao said was true and that forcing a breakthrough to the Earth Immortal Realm would only harm himself and could very well cost him his life.


    But¡­ He didn''t want the East Sea Army to get dispatched to the frontlines, as that would mean that most of his friends might end up dead, while their enemies in the other three armies would gleefully watch from afar as the East Sea Army crumpled in the face of a constant onught of demonic cultivators.


    Even if it might take a few dozens or even a hundred years, the East Sea Army wouldn''t be able to continue existing forever if they had to keep fending off the demonic cultivators without any rest. Especially considering that from pastrge-scale war with demonic cultivators, the conflicts dragged on for extended periods of time without anything major happening.


    During thatst war, there had first been over a thousand years where the weaker cultivators below the Celestial Immortal Realm on both sides had shed with each other.


    Of course, this time around, Demon King Realm demonic cultivators and Celestial Immortals were active from the start, but it was doubtful if it would escte into a full-blown war at this point or quiet down and turn into a battle between weaker cultivators that would then continue for the next hundreds of years without anything major happening.


    No matter what, Chu Li didn''t want to stand at the front lines no matter which of the two oues it was, one being a slow death, while theter would be a quick death at the hands of Demon King Realm demonic cultivator.


    "You don''t have to worry so much about it. If I''m not wrong, the Blue Sea Empire won''t be sending out any of its armies in the near future."


    Seeing the obvious fear, Xuan Hao decided to hint a bit at the trouble that would follow and likely prevent the four armies from leaving the territory of the Blue Sea Empire before he turned around and left. Feeling like he had helped Chu Li enough, what he ended up doing next would be up to himself


    "What do you- Huh? Senior?!"


    In the end, Chu Li was left stunned, as Xuan Hao left before he had a chance to say anything in response.

 Chapter 1381 Elder Competition

    Chapter 1381 Elder Competition


    Leaving behind Chu Li on his own after giving him some useful advice that might end up helping him not rush into the final tribtion and killing himself in the process, Xuan Hao left the Valley of Illusory Beasts that had seemingly returned to the same state as when he had first been there before moving towards the border of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Considering that it had now been some time since the overconfident Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire had left to investigate the situation of the space node stone mine, he was nning to take his leave before anything happened. Intending to use the long-distance teleportation technique to return to the Star Shattering Sect and prepare in case the demonic cultivators ended upunching an offensive against the kingdoms bordering the Blue Sea Empire.


    At the same time, he also made sure to contact Xuan Gui and asked her to inform him of the moment something happened. Giving him time to react in case the demonic cultivators really decided to make a move on the kingdoms and smaller empires between them and the blue Sea Empire.


    Of course, this did confuse Xuan Gui, but she decided not to ask about it and just guessed that it might be because the Blue Sea Empire was preparing tounch an attack towards the demonic cultivators in the Frozen Wastnd and he wanted to safeguard his sect in case the demonic cultivators responded.


    Not something unexpected, considering that quite a few of the major powers from the core region of the continent had begun tounch offensive campaigns against the demonic cultivators who had dared to attack them after they had recovered from the initial shock of the first attack.


    Never would she have guessed that this had nothing to do with an offensive campaign from the Blue Sea Empire but was instead because one of the Blue Sea Empire''s Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors would end up being stuck on the other side of the Frozen Wastnd without any way back to the blue Sea Empire.


    If she really knew about this. Given her hatred towards the Blue Sea Empire, she wouldn''t have hesitated to inform her higher ups about the situation and possibly even join them in trying to kill this Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire before he could get any help.


    Even if this was a bit unrealistic considering how much weaker she waspared to a Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor, she would at least be able to provide some support to the Demon King Realm demonic cultivators with her Peak Demon Lord Realm cultivation base. Especially if joined together in a formation with other Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators¡­


    Unfortunately, none of this would end up happening, as Xuan Gui was instead more focused on the possible attack from the Blue Sea Empire that might end up taking ce at any moment, as she decided to y things safe and retreat deeper into the Frozen Wastnd to avoid death in case a Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor was leading the attack she suspected would take ce after hearing what Xuan Hao said.


    Xuan Hao on the other hand¡­Smoothly moved to the border of the Blue Sea Empire after a few days of casual travel through the rtively peaceful Blue Sea Empire before using his long-distance teleportation technique to return to the sect without alerting anyone about the fact that he had even left in the first ce.


    Of course, considering therge number of resources he had managed to secure this time around, Xuan Hao directly went to Elder Song before handing over close to a hundred top grade spirit stones along with dozens of Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herbs and Spiritual Metals.


    The most important space node stones that he had managed to steal from the demonic cultivators was something he kept for himself as there wasn''t really anyone outside of him inside of the sect that could use it¡­ And knowing the importance of teleportation formations for the future growth of the sect and easy movement between different important locations inside the sect''s territory, Xuan Hao returned to Eighth Star Peak where the former home of the Half Spirit Race was located.


    Not to reminisce about the past, but instead to unravel the ancient teleportation formation that he had sealed off and hidden away inside of the former home of the Half Spirit Race before they became a part of the Star Shattering Sect.


    nning to use it to try and learn how to make a teleportation formation himself.


    Of course, this kind of method was far slower than if he had something to guide him like a book on formations, but the Star Shattering Sect didn''t have a book on teleportation formations and the only one he could think about that might have those kinds of formations inside of it, the one he was gifted by the old man from the Fallen Immortal archipgo,was still far too hard for him to read.


    Even after he entered the Dao of Formations and reached the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Formations, he couldn''t read it.


    However, there was a bit of progress, giving him hope that he would be able to start reading some of the formations inside of it after his Dao of Formations managed to break through to the Large Sess Realm.


    But¡­ This was for the future and wouldn''t be of any help to him at the moment, thus resulting in his current situation where he was carefully examining the ancient teleportation formation inside the former home of the Half Spirit Race, while at the same time keeping an eye on hismunication talisman for any news from Xuan Gui in case the demonic cultivators decided on attacking.


    ¡­


    Unaware of the possible danger that the sect might soon find itself in, Elder Song was quietly looking over therge number of precious spiritual herbs and metals that Xuan Hao had brought to him for use in strengthening the sect.


    "So many precious spiritual herbs and metals¡­ I''m sure both alchemists and cksmiths alike will be overjoyed when they learn about this, though¡­ I do wonder where Xuan Hao managed to get his hands on all of these precious resources¡­ Perhaps they were obtained during hisst trip out of the sect?"


    Even if he understood Xuan Hao was powerful, he still found it surprising that he had managed to bring back so many things for the sect. Seemingly alwaysing back with arge number of things that would be useful in the development of the sect.


    "Oh well, if Xuan Hao is doing so much to help the sect grow stronger, its only right for me to work hard and ensure that the resources that he brings back are properly utilized! For these spiritual herbs and spiritual metals¡­ It might be good to hold apetition for the elders for once instead of only the disciples.


    Maybe this will also encourage some of the elders in the cksmith Hall and the Alchemy Hall to work hard¡­ Yes, it definitely will encourage them if I give them a few months to prepare- No! Not just a few months, I could split up thepetition into several rounds split up over a year or two and have them continue working hard with the promise of Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herb or Spiritual Metal as a final reward!


    But¡­ Preparation is needed for such argepetition and other rewards will also be needed. Haaa¡­ Looks like I will have to work hard for the next few weeks if I want to ensure that thepetition ends up being sessful."


    As he slowly nned out a massive tournament that would involve all the elders of the cksmithing Hall and the Alchemy Hall, Elder Song soon felt a wave of exhaustion wash over him as he realized how much work he would have to do to make something like that work.


    After all, the cksmithing hall and the alchemy hall were by far thergest profession-based halls in the entire Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if it only involved the elders, it would still be over a hundred people.


    But more importantly than that, it would serve as a way to inspire the younger generation, as Elder Song already nned for thepetition to be watched by the younger disciples of the sect. Giving them a chance to learn from their seniors or to help spark an interest in them for joining the cksmithing Hall or the Alchemy Hall in the future.


    In a sense, the main goal of thepetition in Elder Song''s eyes slowly turned towards inspiring the younger generation of the sect to strive for improving themselves with the help of the elders who would do their best to both win thepetition and show of their strength to the younger generation of the sect, something that any elder would want to do, as they wanted to be looked up to by the younger generation¡­n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om

 Chapter 1382 Confirming the Presence of the Space Node Stone Mine in person

    Chapter 1382 Confirming the Presence of the Space Node Stone Mine in person


    At the same time Xuan Hao had returned to the Star Shattering Sect and handed over arge number of resources to Elder Song, the overconfident ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire who had given him all of those resources to begin with had sessfully crossed through the Frozen Wastnd without encountering any problems along the way and was now hovering in the air a short distance away from the small kingdom that the space node stone mine was located inside of.


    "The space node stone mine mentioned by that explorer union member should be somewhere around here¡­" Muttering this to himself as he realized this, the overconfident elder adapted a slightly more cautious expression, as he began to slowly approach the small kingdom with the space node stone mine.


    Even though he had been confident in the face of Xuan Hao and talked about the demonic cultivators like they didn''t even matter, he was clearly still cautious when potentially facing off against a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator. Especially so because he understood that it would be bad for him to get caught up in a battle with a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator so far away from the Blue Sea Empire.


    Not to mention being far away from the Blue Sea Empire, there was also the fact that his path of escape would take him straight through the Frozen Wastnd where more Demon King Realm demonic cultivators might be ready to jump on him the moment he appeared.


    Of course, given that he had decided to make the journey anyway, it was obvious that he was still confident in his ability to escape in such a situation. The main reason for his confidence being hisprehension of the Dao of Space that made it difficult for anyone of simr strength to catch him if he really wanted to escape.


    "Hm? A formation? And one capable of defending against Earth Immortal Realm cultivators¡­ Looks like that person from the explorer union was correct in there being demonic cultivators around here¡­ And for them to set up such a powerful formation, they are undoubtedly in possession of a space node stone mine!"


    Spotting the now stronger formation that had been erected following Xuan Hao destroyed thest formation, the overconfident ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire showed an overjoyed expression on his face.


    Not because he was happy to see the demonic cultivators or their formation, but instead because he understood that this signified that the information on the space node stone mine being there was most likely urate.


    After all, if not for a space node stone mine, why would the demonic cultivators bother to set up such a powerful formation to guard a small kingdom on the outer edges of the continent where no resources could be found under normal circumstances?


    Swish~


    With that in mind, the overconfident ancestor didn''t bother wasting any time, as he directly appeared above the formation before casual pressing down towards the formation-


    RUUUUMBLE-!


    As a result, a giant palm made from spiritual qi manifest below him before descending towards the formation at a terrifying speed-


    BOOOM-!


    And before any of the demonic cultivators hidden away inside of the formation had any time to react, the formation effortlessly crumbled under the terrifying might of the palm. Revealing the space node stone mine that was still operating normally without showing any signs of having been stopped by Xuan Hao''s earlier visit.


    "W-w-what is that!?"


    "Demon¡­ A demon god is descending!"


    "Not again!"


    However, because of the formation suddenly being shattered, the people toiling away around the surface of the space node stone mine all turned to look up filled with both shock and fear. All of them clearly remembered a simr scene that had taken ce a few weeks earlier.


    "WHO DARES!?"


    Rumble-!


    Not a secondter, these weak mortals who were at most in the Qi Condensation Realm looked on with horror as the familiar figures of the two demon gods who had appeared back then reappeared above the space node stone mine filled with killing intent.


    Even though the killing intent was not directly directed towards them, it still caused arge number of the miners to faint on the spot, while a few unlucky ones were directly reduced to a bloody mist after being faced with a bit more of the killing intent than their weak mortal bodies could handle.


    As a result, the remaining survivors all began rushing back towards the mine with all the strength they could muster. Understanding from what had taken ce a few weeks ago, that anyone who remained above ground would end up dead when the demon gods above began to rampage.


    Boom!


    Boom!


    However, before any of the mortals had a chance to escape underground for safety, they watched in both shock and terror, as the bodies of the two terrifying demon gods suddenly exploded midair before their blood suddenly froze and reformed into two terrified looking human figures.


    "S-senior, please spare us! We are subordinates of the great river demon k- AH!"


    BOOOM-!


    Without even giving these two reformed demon gods a chance to talk, they once again exploded into a bloody mist. However, this time, they didn''t reform again and instead seemed to have died for real.


    Not just that, but as these mortals looked around themselves, they also discovered that the demons who had been watching over them and had been forcing them to work over the past few years, were dead.


    The only thing left behind in their ce being an eerie pool of blood where they had been standing. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "We¡­ We are free¡­?"


    Not knowing how to react to suddenly regaining their freedom after having spent arge portion of their lives inside the mines under the orders of those demons, the mortals all looked up towards the sky filled with disbelief before quickly falling to their knees and praising the gods above for sending retribution down and killing those demons who had been tormenting them for the past few years.


    "Let''s get out of here before those demons return!"


    "Yes! Now is our chance! I don''t want to get caught by them again and forced to spend my life mining those strange stones for them!"


    In such a situation, it didn''t take long before the first among them spoke up. Following which the rest all simr spoke of their desire to leave¡­ And within the span of a few seconds, a few entered the mines to inform the rest about the situation, while most of them began rushing back home to pack what little belongings they had and fleeing the kingdom.


    All of them understood that they couldn''t waste too much time, or they might end up getting caught and forced to the mines again.


    ¡­


    "Looks like those mortals aren''t too dumb¡­ Oh well, I managed to confirm the presence of the space node stone mine. Now¡­ How to take control of it¡­" Muttering this to himself as he gazed down at the mortal trying their best to flee the moment, they realized all the demons had been killed, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire soon focused his attention back on the important matter at hand. How to take control of the space node stone mine.


    Even though he had managed to kill off the demonic cultivators guarding the mine with rtive ease, he understood that it wouldn''t be a simple matter to take control of the mine.


    After all, even though it wasn''t inside the Frozen Wastnd, it was not too far away from the Frozen Wastnd and would be difficult to take control of given that the Blue Sea Empire was separated from the mine by the Frozen Wastnd itself¡­ And considering the current aggressive state of the Frozen Wastnd and other demonic cultivators around the continent, it would be even harder to take control of the space node stone mine, as this was a rare moment where demonic cultivators worked together.


    Even then, he didn''t intend to give up on the space node stone mine. Instead, he began nning on how to prevent the demonic cultivators from mining. Intending to drag out the matter until the war with the demonic cultivators came to an end.


    Although it would take a few hundreds and possibly even a thousand years, it wasn''t that long considering the age of a Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor like himself¡­ And if they could secure a space node stone mer when the demonic cultivators were less unified, that would be a major benefit to the Blue Sea Empire.


    So, with that in mind, the ancestor turned around about to leave-


    "Hehe, do you think it will be that simple to run away after destroying my formation?"


    However, before he had the opportunity to leave, a massive figure appeared in front of him. Blocking his escape path, while at the same time using some kind of special artifact to restrict the space around him. Preventing him from using his Dao of Space.


    "Demon King¡­ And a spatial restriction artifact¡­!"

 Chapter 1383 Planned Ambush? (1)

    Chapter 1383 nned Ambush? (1)


    Realizing the danger of the situation he found himself in upon seeing the spatial restriction artifact being activated, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire didn''t panic, as he quickly took out a small jade and crushed it before engaging in battle with the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator. Instantly causing a brilliant wave of light to wash over him, as his aura seemed to jump to a new height.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    The battle that would normally have been one between equals soon enough ended up bing a one-sided beating, as the strength of the Blue Sea Empire Ancestor was now stronger than his opponent by an entire minor realm.


    Before the Soul Ascension Realm, a single minor realm might not have mattered that much unless it was the difference between someone at the Peak of the Realm, but after one entered the Soul Ascension Realm. Even a single minor realm of difference would mean that it would be a one-sided battle in most circumstances.


    This was even more so the case when it came to the Celestial Immortal Realm, where, although not close to the Profound Immortal in terms of difference between minor realm, still allowed the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire to easily dominate his opponent without the other party having the ability to fight back.


    This was no longer a battle between equals but had instead be one between a junior and a senior¡­


    "You- You forcibly suppressed your cultivation realm to keep it hidden!? You''re not in the Early Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm, but instead the Middle Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm!?"


    As he suddenly found himself being one-sidedly beaten up, the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator could not help eximing in a somewhat shocked voice. Not having expected for the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator that he had determined to be someone simr to himself in strength was actually someone at the Middle Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Normally, such a misunderstanding would have been impossible considering that it was rtively simple for him to sense whether or not the other party was in the Early or Middle Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm before he even attacked.


    The main problem and reason why he had failed to determine the strength of his opponent this time around was not because he had failed to examine his opponent before engaging him, but instead because the other party had used some kind special jade that masked his true cultivation realm.


    Even if this demonic cultivator wasn''t the smartest amongst the demonic cultivators, he still understood the significance of something like this.


    From being the hunter, he had suddenly turned into the target, as he understood his opponent''s intentions was not just to escape but had instead be to try and kill him before other Demon King Realm demonic cultivators could show up and lend him a hand!


    Damnit! I spend so much effort preparing for that cultivator who appearedst time around to show up again. Even exchanging for a spatial restriction artifact to prevent him from escaping by using the Dao of Space, but now¡­. Now it looks like I was the one who walked into a trap! This guy definitely nned all of this from the beginning! From his appearance and fast escape using the dao of space!


    Cursing silently to himself as he tried his best to fend off the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire, the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator wholeheartedly believed that it was the person in front of him who had broken through his formation thest time around and that it was all a ruse to get him to confidently leave the Frozen Wastnd.


    If he had known about this person''s strength beforehand, he would have never dared to leave the Frozen Wastnd on his own and would have instead sought help from more and from stronger demonic cultivators than himself.


    After all, the importance of killing a Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator at the Middle Stage of the Realm far exceed the importance of killing a normal Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator. The main reason for this being that only those who managed to reach the Middle Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm were qualified to be part of the battle between the strongest.


    Those who had only just managed to reach the Celestial Immortal Realm and hadn''t made any progress after breaking through the realm simply weren''t qualified to participate in the battle where the strongest on both sides would inevitably fight it out!


    As he thought about this, the demonic cultivator also realized that the only reason such a powerful figure had decided to appear in front on him was to both secure the space node stone mine and prevent the demonic cultivators from taking advantage of it, but also to kill him! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    I have to escape!


    Knowing that he stood no chance against the other party at this point in time, the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator didn''t bother thinking about the space node stone mine any longer, as he directly turned to run while also informing the few demonic cultivators in the Demon King Realm that he was familiar with.


    Making sure to inform them not only about his location and the Middle Stage Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator currently trying to kill him, but also made sure to mention the existence of the space node stone mine. Understanding that there would be no way for him to continue monopolizing it with his own strength like he had been doing so far.


    At the same time also knowing that there would be no way to move those friends of his into action without mentioning the existence of the space node stone mine, as someone at the Middle Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm was not someone easy to face for those friends of his, as they would struggle in the same way he had without them working together to try and suppress this Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator.

 Chapter 1384 Planned Ambush! (2)

    Chapter 1384 nned Ambush! (2)


    Hm¡­ Looks like he already contacted his friends about his current predicament. Although¡­ Given the distance from the Frozen Wastnd, it will at least take them another hour or so to rush here. More than enough time to finish off this little one and take my leave.


    Seeing how the demon king took out hismunication talisman and contacted his friends for help, the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire wasn''t the slightest bit worried, as he understood he had more than enough time to kill off the demonic cultivator who had now turned his full attention towards trying to escape from him after discovering his true strength. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Rumble~!


    Unfortunately for this demonic cultivator, even if he might have an hour or so left before any new demonic cultivator appeared to assist, the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire didn''t intend on dragging things out, as he understood that there was still a very real chance that his presence would alert those stronger demonic cultivators inside the Frozen Wastnd.


    Even if he was confident in facing those weaker demon kings still at the early stage of the realm, which was also the reason he had dared to wander through the Frozen Wastnd and into the outer regions of the continent in such a dangerous period in time, he understood that he would not be able to escape if those stronger demonic cultivators appeared.


    Instead of him escaping, there was a very real chance of him being trapped and the following situation turning out like Xuan Hao had wanted it to turn out with the Celestial Immortal Ancestors of the Blue Sea Empire rushing over to assist and the battle between the top figures among demonic cultivators and the Blue Sea Empire escting beyond the point of no return.


    A situation that would almost certainly result in the Blue Sea Empire losing some of their Celestial Immortals due to the simple fact that they had to pass through the Frozen Wastnd to leave and the number of Demon King Realm demonic cultivators inside the Frozen Wastnd far exceeded that of the Celestial Immortals inside the Blue Sea Empire. At least on the surface from what both sides had shown so far.


    These two ancient forces that had existed for tens of thousands of years- Even a hundred thousand years had deep foundations that far surpassed the little power they showed on the surface.


    For example, the Middle Stage Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator currently in the process of beating the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator trying to escape senseless was one such hidden power of the Blue Sea Empire, though, notpletely hidden, as he was still well known. The hidden thing being that his strength was at the Middel Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm. Not the early stage of the realm¡­


    I''m¡­ I''m going to die¡­?


    As the battle raged on for another five minutes and the surrounding kingdoms or other unfortunate powers had long since been reduced to dust by the terrifying shockwaves produced when the two shed with each other, the demonic cultivator finally felt a sense of fear wash over him, as he realized that he might actually end up dying today.


    Considering that he was someone in the Demon King Realm and had already lived for over ten thousand years and expected to live far longer than that in the future, the sudden threat of death cutting his dreams short was unimaginably terrifying.


    Even with the war between the normal cultivator and demonic cultivators starting and different demon kings being dispatched to fight the celestial immortals on the other side, he had never really felt a real sense of fear before, as most of those battles hadn''t ever been against someone, he thought strong enough to kill him.


    "AAAaaaah!"


    As his mentality faltered for a split second while fending off the Ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire, the demonic cultivator found himself suddenly plummeting towards the ground rapidly while painful clutching his head as a ck smoke suddenly began oozing out from his falling body. Leaving behind a trail of ck smoke.


    "Complete Demonic Possession¡­"


    Seeing what happened to the demonic cultivator as he was engulfed in a ball of pitch-ck smoke, the Ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire paused for a second as a somewhat fearful expression appeared on his face before ultimately rushing down after the demonic cultivator to finish him off.


    The reason for this being that he understood that if dyed for too long, the demonic cultivator would be able toplete what he had ended up starting-


    Swish-!


    Using all of his strength to forcibly increase his speed at this moment the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire reached the demonic cultivator just when his now closed eyes began quivering ever so slightly, like they would open at any moment-


    Ptsh-!


    And without any hesitation he used all of his strength to cut through and destroy the body of the demonic cultivator before he managed to finish what he was doing. Killing him with what seemed to be a simple move, but in reality, the Ancestor had used everything he had for that simple attack. Not wanting the demonic cultivator to finish his little transformation as he understood what that would mean for him and his chances of escaping his current situation alive.


    "To think he actually ended up trying aplete demonic possession¡­ Doesn''t he know that doing so is far worse than dying?" Muttering to himself as he looked down at the dead body of the demonic cultivator who had been a powerful Demon King not long ago, the Ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire nced back in the direction of the space node stone mine before leaving the ce together with the interspatial ring of the demonic cultivator and the spatial restriction artifact.


    Just in terms of what he had managed to gain from killing this demonic cultivator in the Demon King Realm, he had more than made up for the resources that had been used to buy the information on the space node stone mine.


    Unfortunately, the Blue Sea Empire wouldn''t be able to take control of the space node stone mine at the moment due to the situation with the demonic cultivators all across the continent and the fact that they had to remain on high alert at all times and couldn''t spare dispatching enough forces to defend this space node stone mine.


    But¡­ Even if mining it at the moment was impossible, it wasn''t that hard for them to prevent the demonic cultivators from making use of the space node stone mine¡­

 Chapter 1385 Confused

    Chapter 1385 Confused


    As the situation with the space node stone was pretty much resolved for now, the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire didn''t continue lingering around the outer regions, as he immediately made his way back towards the Blue Sea Empire without wasting a second. Understanding that continuing to stay in the outer regions of the continent would only end up endangering him, as killed a single demonic cultivator in the Demon King Realm should have already ended up alerting some of the stronger demonic cultivators to his presence.


    Luckily for him, now that he was no longer restricted by the spatial artifact that the now dead demonic cultivator had used on him, he could make full use of hisprehension of the Dao of Space to rapidly leave the area before anyone arrived to stop him.


    All of this was not at all what Xuan Hao had expected to happen when he sold the information to the blue Sea Empire, as he had never expected that the person who went to check out the potential space node stone mine to actually be someone in the Middle Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm proficient in the Dao of Space.


    Not just that, but this person had even managed to kill the demonic cultivator in the Demon King Realm that he had been worried about. Completely changing things up, as the Blue Sea Empire not only didn''t lose anything from this exchange, but instead only managed to gain something.


    After all, even if a space node stone mine by itself was already something precious, it couldn''t be utilized at the moment.


    Killing a demonic cultivator at the Demon King Realm on the other hand was something that not only showed off the Blue Sea Empire''s strength, but also weakened the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnd significantly. After all, a demonic cultivator at the Demon King Realm was a significant figure inside the Frozen Wastnd.


    In the end, everything concluded without the Blue Sea Empire losing anything and only the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnd being the ones who ended up taking a significant loss from the entire ordeal.


    None of this was what Xuan Hao wanted to see happen, but he was none the wiser, as he was currently in the process of trying to understand the ancient teleportation formation on the Eighth Star Peak, while also waiting for any news regarding the Blue Sea Empire and their ancestors moving out to rescue a struggling ancestor.


    At the same time, the Star Shattering Sect had also begun to prepare for a potential massive demonic cultivator attack that was not going toe any time soon.


    Of course, it wasn''t entirely wasted effort, as the demonic cultivators would still remain a constant threat, and the Star Shattering Sect did have to make at least some preparations in case a major attack did end up taking ce.


    Not to mention, even if the demonic cultivators didn''t end up posing any threat to the Star Shattering Sect in the future, they would still have to be prepared to guard against other major powers like the Blue Sea Empire in case they ended up targeting the Star Shattering Sect, thus further justifying the sect strengthening its borders and dispatching more of their elders to guard the area.


    Also giving these elders of the sect, a good chance to familiarize themselves with the new borders of the sect in the process.


    ¡­


    "Nothing is happening¡­ Did the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire perhaps sense the danger and managed to escape before getting blocked from escaping by the demonic cultivators?"


    As a little over a week passed since he had returned back to the sect and started researching the ancient teleportation formation in an attempt to figure out how to make a teleportation formation of his own, Xuan Hao found himself standing up with a somewhat confused expression on his face. Not understanding why, he didn''t get any news about something major happening in the Blue Sea Empire nor any news from the Xuan Gui about something major happening among the demonic cultivators.


    On the surface, it seemed like nothing had happened in the past week. However, he understood that at this point in time, the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire that had gone to investigate the authenticity of the space node mine should have shed with the suspected Demon King Realm demonic cultivator that he suspected to have been in control of the space node stone mine.


    "Unless¡­ The space node stone mine wasn''t under the control of a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator, but instead a group of Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators. Although unlikely, it is possible¡­" Muttering this to himself as he came up with another reason why the nothing might have happened, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit regretful about selling the information on the space node stone to the Blue Sea Empire. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    After all, if it was really controlled by a group of Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators instead of a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator, he might have stood a chance trying to take control of the mine with his current strength.


    But then again¡­ It would still be really risky, as he didn''t really know much about the rest of the Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators who might be part of the group potentially in control of the space node stone mine.


    "Haaa¡­ Even if I wanted to take control of it, it looks like it wouldn''t be that easy to aplish. Selling the information to the Blue Sea Empire at least guarantees that I can get something out of it. Not to mention, the mine is on the other side of the Frozen Wastnd and will be difficult to make use of before the war with the demonic cultivators is over.


    By the time that the war ends, I should have be stronger and might even stand a chance of taking control of that mine!" Narrowing both his eyes as he said this to himself, Xuan Hao soon shook his head before turning his attention back towards the ancient teleportation formation in front of him.

 Chapter 1386 Excitement Building

    Chapter 1386 Excitement Building


    During the week or so he had spent trying to understand the ancient teleportation formation, he did have some sess due to his already high understanding of the Dao of space and Dao of Formations. Even if hisprehension of the Dao of Formations was not the same level as the one who had set up the ancient teleportation formation, it at least allowed him to get a general understanding of how the formation worked. Allowing him to create an experimental teleportation formation that could move him a few dozen meters with the help of the space node stones acting as core for the experimental teleportation formation. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Although far from being capable of helping the Star Shattering Sect move between the Shattered Star Peaks and the borders of the sect''s territory, it at the very least showed that he was capable of creating a teleportation formation. Making Xuan Hao feel even more invigorated to continue researching how to improve his newly created teleportation formation and make it capable of moving longer distances.


    The only unfortunate thing when it came to the experimental teleportation formation was the fact that he realized that it would be impossible to move it without destroying the space node stone he had used for its construction.


    In a sense, it made sense as the teleportation formation itself was fixed in the location it was built. Fully stabilizing the space around it using the space node stone as an anchor. Moving it was possible to some extent, but the anchor, the space node stone, would be destroyed as a result.


    Considering that he didn''t have an unlimited supply of space node stones on him, he didn''t intend on using too many of them trying to experiment by constructing new teleportation formations. Even if it was useful in speeding up his understanding of teleportation formations, it wouldn''t really matter that much if he didn''t have any space node stones left by the time he finished understanding how to construct a teleportation formation that could connect to locations farther apart than the few dozen or so meters the one he had already constructed could.


    "Haaa¡­ Still have a long way to go before that will happen¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked down at his experimental teleportation formation, Xuan Hao activated it once again and walked through it, as he began to deepen his understanding of the spatial semi-permanent spatial passage that had been created to connect the two experimental teleportation formation.


    ...


    At the same time that Xuan Hao decided to focus his attention back on the understanding how to construct teleportation formation that could help the disciples and elders of the sect move more than a few dozen meters, Elder Song began to officially announce thepetition to the elders of the sect. Almost instantly causing the excitement of the elders to soar, as they all did their best to lend Elder Song a hand, while those from the Alchemy Hall and cksmithing Hall all began preparing for thepetition.


    No matter which of these elders it was, none of them wanted to look bad in front of the younger generation of the sect, as they all wanted to show off in front of these younger disciples and make a name for them. Especially so because they had also learnt about the rich rewards for winning thepetition.


    To make things even more exciting, Pei Yang decided to join in and personally help guide the Alchemy Elders of the sect. Making the elders work even harder at improving themselves before thepetition began.


    Unfortunately for the cksmithing elders, the cksmithing Hall of the sect didn''t have anyone as skilled as Pei Yang, but that didn''t discourage them, but instead motivated them even more, some of them even feeling shameless enough to go and beg Bai Ning for help, as he was the most skilled in the Dao of cksmithing in the Star Shattering Sect if not counting Xuan Hao and Yi Min.


    Even if some of them did feel confident enough to go and ask Xuan Hao and Yi Min for help, they couldn''t find either of them even if they wanted to.


    Xuan Hao being busy with understanding the teleportation formations and not epting any request for help unless it pertained his disciples or something important happening to the sect, while Yi Min was absorbed in her own cultivation. Fearing that she would end up falling behind after seeing the rapid progress of the Star Shattering Sect''s elders.


    In turn, she had also discovered the reason for this rapid increase in strength, the Dao Enlightenment Monument inside the sect''s library and the high-quality spiritual qi inside the sect itself.


    Because of this, Yi Min, who would normally spend all of her time inside her own kingdom, had secretlye to the Star Shattering Sect to cultivate and improve her strength with the help of the Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    After all, even though the Dao Enlightenment Monument was mainly for those trying to reach and already in the Domain Lord Realm, it was still useful to those in the Soul Ascension Realm and the Dao Seed Realm.


    Of course, the help was limitedpared to those trying to or already in the Domain Lord Realm, but it was nheless still extremely useful to them and their cultivation.


    As for guarding the area around the Iron Sky Kingdom that stood as an important barrier between the Star Shattering Sect and the chaotic region of the former Sky Empire¡­ The rabbit demon beast had been promoted to guard the area together with his human subordinate.


    Not something that the rabbit demon beast had anything against, as it was given a monthly supply of spirit stones, while at the same time getting to rule an entire kingdom. Earning the respect and fear of all the people from the Iron Sky Kingdom who saw it. Making its arrogance reach a new heigh as it saw itself as the new ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom. Unwilling to give up any of its power, something Yi Min would have to deal with personally when she returned to her kingdom in the future and attempted to take back control¡­


    released through mobile as pc site is down, might be some space mistakes between paragraphs, will be fixedter when inkstone wants to work on PC again...

 Chapter 1387 Someone Not Suspicious

    Chapter 1387 Someone Not Suspicious


    "Apetition for cksmithing and Alchemy? How interesting¡­"


    Sitting down inside a small pavilion, an older woman who had just recently arrived inside the Falling Star City swallowed her cup of tea in a single gulp as she muttered this to herself while looking towards a group of elders from the Star Shattering Sect sitting a short distance away from her enjoying themselves while also chatting with each other about the uingpetition for the sect''s alchemist and cksmithing elders.


    The old woman didn''t intend on listening in on their conversation and had just happened to overhear what they were talking about due to her rather impressive cultivation base that had reached theter stages of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if she didn''t intend on listening to this group of Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, there wasn''t really any way for her to avoid what they were saying, as the group wasn''t really trying to hide what they were saying in the first ce.


    Of course, the fact that the subject of their conversation was something that interested her only made her far more interested, as she began listening in on more details regarding thispetition¡­ n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Transcendent Grade Spiritual Herbs or Metals? Guidance of a Grandmaster Realm Alchemist? Wha-what in the world!?"


    And in the end, her mild interest in the Star Shattering Sect''spetition soon turned into shock as she continued listening to the group of elders talking about the different prizes that had been announced for thepetition.


    However, out of everything, the most shocking thing she heard about was not the Transcendent Grade rewards, but instead the fact that there seemed to be a Grandmaster Realm Alchemist in the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not just that, but this Grandmaster Alchemist seemed to be personally helping out the alchemist elders of the sect in preparing for thepetition.


    Considering that she had only recently found herself in the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and was considered a wandering cultivator who had spent her entire life travelling around the continent and understood a lot of things normal Domain Lord Realm cultivator wouldn''t, she also understood just how terrifying a Grandmaster Realm Alchemist was.


    Even in the major empires controlling the core region of the continent, such an existence would often hold powerparable to those powerful existences in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    To encounter someone like that in an area that she herself had considered rather remote was a shocking thing. Especially because it seemed like this Grandmaster Realm Alchemist wasn''t the peak figure of this Star Shattering Sect from what she could tell when listening to the group of elders of the Star Shattering Sect talking about him.


    A Grandmaster Realm Alchemist is not the sect head in such a remote region¡­ Just what kind of sect is this Star Shattering Sect¡­?


    Filled with both curiosity and fear when faced with the unknown, the old wandering cultivator could not stop herself as she began asking around about the Star Shattering Sect to learn more of this mysterious sect and satisfy her curiosity.


    Luckily, the people in the Falling Star City were more than happy to talk about the Star Shattering Sect.


    Unfortunately, the information that was given didn''t help her that much and only made her more curious about the Star Shattering Sect that seemed to bepletely different from any of the other kingdoms, empires or sects in the region.


    In the end, it didn''t take long before she found herself in front of the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak and into the Star Shattering Sect.


    However, she didn''t dare to try and enter the Star Shattering Sect, as she spotted two people at the Peak of the Nascent soul Realm guarding the path chatting with someone who seemed to be at the earlier stages of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if she did manage to sneak past these people, she doubted that a powerful sect like the Star Shattering Sect didn''t have some kind of guardian formation in ce to protect the sect. Especially considering that the rumored strongest experts in the Star Shattering Sect had reached the Soul Ascension Realm.


    No matter how brave she might be, there was no way she felt confident in facing off against someone in the Soul Ascension Ream.


    She knew full well from having seen Soul Ascension Realm cultivators fighting in the past, that she was nowhere near them in terms of strength.


    On the other hand, her presence so close to the main entrance of the Star Shattering Sect might have already drawn the attention of the Soul Ascension Ream cultivator or cultivators inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    Sneaking into the sect was not an option, so, if she wanted to learn more about the Star Shattering Sect, there was only one option left-


    "Hello, I''m a wandering cultivator and I was wondering if it would be fine for me to get a chance to look around- Ah! Of course, I''m not suspicious or anything! I just wanted to see your sect because it''s by far the strongest one I encountered so far considering that most of the powerful forces on the continent are kingdoms or empires. Finding a powerful sect like the Star Shattering Sect is near impossible!"


    And that was to go right up to the two Nascent Soul Realm elders and the single Domain Lord Realm elder guarding the path into the sect and asking if she could take a look around, while doing her absolute best to not sound like someone suspicious.


    """¡­"""


    Unfortunately for her, she didn''t really seed in not sounding suspicious, as all three of them looked over at her filled with suspicion.


    "This¡­ I mean, I just wanted to see what your sect looks like, its fine if I can''t!" Feeling the suspicious gazes of the three elders of the Star Shattering Sect, the old wandering cultivator quickly did her best to defend herself. Feeling like she might get attacked if she didn''t do so¡­

 Chapter 1388 Someone Definitely Not Suspicious

    Chapter 1388 Someone Definitely Not Suspicious


    Feeling like the three elders now looked at her with even more suspension than before, the old wandering cultivator could not help cursing at herself for her bright idea of going up and asking to look around the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although this was pretty harmless on the surface, she just now remembered that the Star Shattering Sect was a bit different from the other sects that she had encountered so far.


    Even if they were easy to contact and bing a member of one of their branch sects would be simple, the main sect of the Star Shattering Sect located at the Shattered Star Peaks was shrouded in a veil of mystery and little information about it ever leaked outside.


    The only real thing she knew about the Shattered Star Peaks was from information about the ce before the Star Shattering Sect had taken over the ce, a time when the Shattered Star Peaks was hard to live in and the only really useful locations were the Ninth Star Peak where spiritual herbs grew and the Third Star Peak where people went to undergo a death cultivation to try and reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The Third Star Peak didn''t change a lot, and people still went there to undergo death cultivation when their lifespan as Core Formation Realm cultivators were about to run out. However, different from the past, the Third Star Peak now seemed better than in the past.


    Not only had the Star Shattering Sect upgraded the ce and made it easier for those going there, but those breaking through the Nascent Soul Realm would also have a chance to officially enter the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course, the status of those entering the Star Shattering Sect in this manner changed along with the growth of the Star Shattering Sect.


    She had originally intended to check out the Third Star Peak first, but ended up deciding against it, as she learnt that the entire Third Star Peak was blocked off by some kind of barrier that prevented those on the Third Star Peak from looking into the interior of the Shattered Star Peak, while also stopping anyone from wandering into the Shattered Star Peaks through the Third Star Peak.


    In the end, this was what caused her to end up in her current situation where she was being looked at rather suspiciously by the three Star Shattering Sect elders.


    "Ehm¡­ Might I ask if you know anyone in the Star Shattering Sect or just want to take a look around?"


    In the end, as the silencested for a little over ten seconds with nobody saying anything, the Domain Lord Realm Elder spoke up to break the silence, causing her to breath a sigh of relief. Not just because the silence was broken, but also because she could sense that the elder from the Star Shattering Sect wasn''t hostile towards her.


    Not just that, but from his words, she saw that she might actually have an opportunity to look around the Star Shattering Sect, something she had not expected to get given that the Star Shattering Sect didn''t seem to easily allow others inside their sect outside of those belonging to different powers that submitted to the Star Shattering sect and even then, only those more powerful among them.


    Forgetting the fact that she herself was rather powerful as someone in the Later Stages of the Domain Lord Realm. Even inside the Star Shattering Sect, she could be considered among the strongest people in the sect.


    "I don''t know anyone in the Star Shattering Sect and just want to look around!"


    So, without remembering how strong she was, the wandering cultivator excitedly responded to the Domain Lord Realm Elder, causing him to frown slightly before taking out amunication talisman to contact someone.


    Seeing this happen, the older wandering cultivator showed an excited expression on her face. Understanding that the elder should be contacting a senior in the sect about the situation.


    Doing something like that at the very least meant that the three elders of the Star Shattering Sect didn''t view her as an enemy, something positive, as it meant she wouldn''t end up attacked by the Star Shattering Sect, something she had experienced in the past when asking a simr question.


    The only difference being that the ce she was asking to enter back then was some kind of imperial pce she had grown curious about after hearing about the ce through rumors about how magical and mysterious it was-


    "Do you want to visit the Star Shattering Sect because you want to be a member of the Star Shattering or is considering bing a member of the sect?"


    Interrupting her thoughts at this moment, the Domain Lord Realm Elder suddenly stepped forward and asked her this with a somewhat serious expression on his face for the first time since she had seen him.


    "Huh? Joining the Star Shattering Sect? Mabe¡­ I guess?" Hearing what the elder said, she showed a somewhat confused expression as she said this.


    Joining the Star Shattering Sect was not something she intended to do, but if it was as good as she heard, she wouldn''t really mind joining the Star Shattering Sect, as she had been looking for a ce to settle down now that she was starting to be old.


    Not to mention, with the recent surge in demonic cultivators, it would be far safer for her to join a strong power and hide with them, as heading to the core region wasn''t really something she wanted to do. Having done so in the past and faced no small number of life and death situation in the short time she was there.


    "I see¡­ you can enter the Star Shattering Sect and look around, but it will be under the guidance of an elder. Wait a bit and someone wille to act as the guide." n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Nodding his head in response to the old wandering cultivator and what she said, the Domain Lord Realm Elder took out hismunication talisman and contacted someone before putting it away.


    Leaving the old wandering cultivator overjoyed that she had actually managed to seed in being able to enter the mysterious main sect of the Star Shattering Sect.

 Chapter 1389 Exploring the Star Shattering Sect (1)

    Chapter 1389 Exploring the Star Shattering Sect (1)


    Feeling overjoyed that she would actually get a chance to enter this mysterious sect instead of ending up being chased away like she had experienced so many times in the past whenever she attempted to get into some of the interesting locations she encountered during her travels, the older wandering cultivator smiled from ear to ear to herself before finding a ce to sit down not too far away from the three elders who continued their conversation after having finished talking with her.


    Although they did nce in her direction from time to time, she didn''t mind this and just focused on the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak where the one who would be guiding her was going toe from.


    She did try and see if she could see the Ninth Star Peak with her divine sense during all of this, but quickly realized that whenever she tried to look past where the three elders of the Star Shattering Sect were standing and chatting with each other, the path would quickly get covered in a mist that made it impossible for her divine sense to advance more than a few meters up the mountain.


    Looking up the mountain without using her divine sense, she could see further, as only the area around the peak of the mountain seemed to be covered in a thin mist.


    An illusion formation of some kind and a quite advanced one¡­ Perhaps this is part of the Star Shattering Sect''s guardian formation? How awesome!


    Narrowing both of her eyes with interest as she thought about this, she only felt more interested in the Star Shattering Sect upon being faced with the terrifying might of the chaotic qi formation that seemed to havepletely blurred her vision and made it impossible for her to see anything inside the Star Shattering Sect with her powerful divine sense.


    Even if the Star Shattering Sect did have someone at the Soul Ascension Realm, she also clearly understood that this didn''t mean that they would automatically have someone skilled in the Dao of Formations. Understanding that someone like that was incredibly rare. Especially someone capable ofying down a formation that surpassed the Domain Lord Realm. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Hello! Are you the one who wants to have a look around before considering joining the sect?"


    Just as she was lost in her own thoughts thinking about the powerful guardian formation that surrounded the Shattered Star Peaks, a cheerful voice woke her up, as she turned to look at a petite woman standing beside the three elders looking at her with a happy smile on her face.


    However, that was not important. Instead, it was the fact that she could clearly tell that this woman shouldn''t be over the age of hundred but was actually at the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm!


    Even if ced in the core region of the continent, such talent would warrant the utmost care from those major powers. For someone like that to appear in the Star Shattering Sect that should just have been a smaller power far away from the core region¡­


    Is the Star Shattering Sect perhaps one of those hidden sects I heard about in the past? But if that''s the case, it''s likely that they are far stronger than even some of the major powers in the core region of the continent!


    Knowing far more about the worldpared to a certain someone from an independent sect, the older wandering cultivator could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine as she realized that she might be about to enter a legendary hidden sect.


    Even though she did know some bits a pieces about hidden sect from her many years travelling the continent, one thing was certain¡­ And that was the fact that even the major powers at the core of the continent feared them to some extent.


    She had no idea about the reason for this but guessed that it should be because these hidden sects possessed strengthparable and possibly stronger than those major powers at the core of the continent.


    Although normally something that others might find hard to believe given the dominance of those major powers, she understood that there were a lot of things unknown and hidden throughout the continent and she had encountered no small number of weird things that couldn''t normally be exined during her time wandering the continent.


    For one, before she found herself in the territory of the Star Shattering Sect after having wandered into some kind of ancient teleportation formation by ident, she had travelled through some kind of weird cultish kingdom that revered some kind of stone construct as a god.


    Even weirder, she had personally witnessed that strange stone construct fighting and killing someone in the Earth Immortal Realm. Turning it into one of the rare moments where she had witnessed the power of someone in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Even if it was a bitck luster considering that the stone construct directly pped the Earth Immortal to death in a single move.


    Hopefully, I won''t have to go back to that weird kingdom ever again¡­ AH! I FORGOT ABOUT THE ELDER!


    Shaking her head as she reminiscence about what had happened a bit before she found herself in the Star Shattering Sect''s territory, she suddenly realized that the elder from the Star Shattering Sect had asked her a question a short and now rather long time ago¡­


    "¡­"


    And turning to look over, she noticed the petite elder looking over at her with a somewhat worried expression on her face. Clearly thinking that something might have happened to her.


    Not again¡­


    "I-I''m sorry for myck of answer earlier elder, I was just a bit lost in my own thoughts, but I do hope to enter the Star Shattering Sect for a look around." Doing her best to apologize, she made sure to also say that she reaaaally wanted to enter the Star Shattering Sect for a look around the sect.


    "This¡­ Don''t worry about it, you can follow me, and we can take a look around the sect together. By the way, my name is Shen Xuefeng, you can just call me Xuefeng if you want."


    "Thank you! My Name is Shu Yin, or Shushu, a lot of people call me Shushu, so you can call me that as well if you want to, or just Yin? No¡­ That sounds a bit weird¡­ Yin''er? No not my parents¡­ Ehm, ah¡­ Sorry¡­" Realizing that she was going a bit off into her own world as she responded to what Shen Xuefeng said, Shu Yin quickly apologized again before quietly moving over to follow behind Shen Xuefeng.


    "¡­"


    Who didn''t really know how to answer this rather entric older cultivator. Especially considering that she was someone at the Later Stages of the Domain Lord Realm and should be well into her years but acted like someone even younger than her.


    In the end, she didn''t really mind, as it would be a good thing in the end if the Star Shattering Sect could recruit such a powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivator, as the sect was stillcking in terms of Domain Lord Realm cultivators, something that was unfortunate but couldn''t be helped with the recent expansion of the sect.


    A Domain Lord Realm cultivator in theter stages of the Realm would be incredibly useful to the current Star Shattering Sect. Not just because they would be good at teaching the younger disciples of the sect, but also because they would have far more experience in the Domain Lord Realm and would be able to help the elders of the sect who just recently broke through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if Xuan Hao and Pei Yang could help these elders with getting familiar with their new strength and teach them about the Domain Lord Realm, their time was ultimately limited, and they couldn''t help out all of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators of the sect. Especially considering that the number of Domain Lord Realm cultivators had been growing with each passing month.


    More senior Domain Lord Realm Experts were needed, and this entric wandering cultivator just so happened to fit in with what the Star Shattering Sect was currentlycking.


    Even more so because it was a wandering cultivator who didn''t have any previous loyalties.


    Of course, there was a chance that this person was lying to get into the Star Shattering Sect, but Shen Xuefeng highly doubted this considering the way she was acting.


    If she really was trying to enter the Star Shattering Sect, she would have acted in a far more normal manner than what she had been doing so far. Especially considering that Shen Xuefeng wondered if this entric behavior might be enough to get Elder Song to refuse her joining the sect¡­


    At least¡­ It seemed like she wasn''t a spy in any way from what Shen Xuefeng could tell of her brief interaction with her so far¡­

 Chapter 1390 Exploring the Star Shattering Sect (2)

    Chapter 1390 Exploring the Star Shattering Sect (2)


    Wow¡­ So, this is the Ninth Star Peak that I heard about earlier?! I never imagined there to be so many spiritual herbs in a single location and all of them are high quality as well!


    Arriving at the Ninth Star Peak following behind Shen Xuefeng, the older wandering cultivator, Shu Yin, let out an amazed sound as she couldn''t stop looking at the different spiritual herb fields that covered the Ninth Star Peak.


    Even as someone at the Later Stages of the Domain Lord Realm, she felt tempted by therge number of spiritual herbs present, but of course, she understood that these spiritual herbs were grown by the Star Shattering Sect and was thus theirs.


    If she really took a few of those spiritual herbs she would end up stealing from the Star Shattering Sect. Not something she wanted to do.


    So, even if her instincts as a wandering cultivator who rarely encountered so many spiritual herbs called out for her to take away as many as possible before running away, she managed to restrain herself and obediently follow behind Shen Xuefeng as they made their way through the spiritual herb field.


    In the process, Shu Yin also managed to encounter a few of the sect''s elders and disciples who were currently in the process of building the few buildings on top of the Ninth Star Peak that would hold the elders and disciples taking care of and harvesting the sect''s spiritual herbs.


    Because of this, she also got her first glimpse of how strong the Star Shattering Sect was outside of just those few people she had encountered at the entrance to the sect¡­ And she was a bit taken aback, as the strength of the disciples far surpassed what she had expected.


    Even the elders were differentpared to what she had thought, as most of the ones she encountered seemed to be on the younger side when it came to being in the Domain Lord Realm, while those at the Nascent Soul Realm seemed to all have the potential of reaching the Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    Although she did not end up encountering anyone stronger than the earlier stages of the Domain Lord Realm, she didn''t find this odd, as she believed that it was normal for the stronger and more senior elders of the sect to be in seclusion and not wander around the sect like those she had encountered so far.


    If she wanted to encounter any of the Soul Ascension Realm or stronger elders that she believed the Star Shattering Sect to have, she would definitely have to go to the core area of the sect, something that she hoped to be able to visit, but at the same time also feared visiting, as she understood that she might end up identally pissing off one of these powerful elders.


    Outside of that, she had also heard some of the elders of the sect chatting about a title above that of elders called ancestors, though it was normal considering that any power would have ancestors that were considered the pinnacle power to some extent. Compromising of all the senior experts that had retired to focus entirely on cultivating.


    The thing she focused on when it came to those ancestors was the fact that the elders talked about the minimum requirements to bing an ancestor was to reach the Dao Seed Realm.


    Although she thought of herself as knowledgeable, having spent a majority of her life travelling around the continent, she had never heard about the Dao Seed Realm that the elders of the Star Shattering Sect casually mentioned while talking amongst each other.


    Dao Seed Realm¡­ I know about the Earth Immortal Realm, the Celestial Immortal Realm and even the legendary Profound Immortal Realm, but I have never heard anything about this Dao Seed Realm. Don''t tell me... Is it perhaps the realm above the Profound Immortal Realm!?


    How terrifying¡­ If the Star Shattering Sect has ancestors above the Profound Immortal Realm and Celestial Immortal Realm, it''s no wonder why major empires like the Blue Sea Empire would be so terrified of them! Indeed, a hidden sect is far scarier than I imagined. The strength of the disciples and younger elders I have seen so far should only be the younger generation of the sect, I still haven''t seen anyone from the senior generation!


    As she began drawing her own conclusions about the Dao Seed Realm that the different elders of the Star Shattering Sect were talking about, Shu Yin could not help feeling a shiver run down her spine. Realizing that any mistake she made while walking around the Star Shattering Sect might end up costing her, her life¡­


    At the same time, Shen Xuefeng walking in front of Shu Yin could not help ncing over at the weird wandering cultivating that she was walking through the sect.


    From the start, this fellow had acted weird¡­


    Just a few seconds ago, she had been eyeing the spiritual herbs of the sect greedily like she was about to jump forward and try to steal them, while the next second, she was following closely behind her with a fearful expression stered all over her face as she kept looking around herself and at the different elders and disciples passing by them.


    At this point in time, the different elders and disciples walking past them had even begun to look weirdly at them. Clearly thinking that something might be wrong with Shu Yin with how she was looking all over the ce.


    Is it really alright to have someone like this join the sect?


    Thinking this to herself as she let the older wandering cultivator down the Ninth Star Peak after passing through the spiritual herb fields, Shen Xuefeng was just about to say something to try and calm this wandering cultivator, when she suddenly noticed that she seemed to havepletely calmed herself at some point in time. Returning to her normal surprised and amazed expression.


    Weird, this woman is weird¡­


    Shaking her head as she thought about this, Shen Xuefeng decided to not think about it anymore, as she just decided to continue moving through the sect with Shu Yin following behind her.


    Even if that woman was somewhat of an oddball whenpared to any of the other wandering cultivators who wanted to join the Star Shattering Sect since it had grown rapidly over the past few years, it was true that her strength was at the Later Stages of the Domain Lord Rm and would be extremely useful to the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if she was a bit on the weirder side, it could be ignored as long as she would prove useful to the growth of the Star Shattering Sect. At least that was the case when it came to the way Elder Song would look at her.


    All Elder Song would care about was whether or not she would help the growth of the Star Shattering Sect or harm it by joining, as long as she helped the sect and didn''t harm it. Anything would be fine in the eyes of Elder Song.


    Of course, she would still have to pass through a few examinations and background checks, but that shouldn''t be that much of a problem for a wandering cultivator who shouldn''t have any prior loyalties to other sects, kingdoms or empires.


    As for how the Star Shattering Sect would check the identity of a wandering cultivator like Shu Yin¡­ It was rather simple, as they would do this through the Explorer Union.


    Although wandering cultivators tended to keep to themselves and not interact a lot with other forces, that was not the case for the Explorer Union, as that was their main way to earn spirit stones and get their hands on artifacts and other useful things for cultivation.


    In the end, wandering cultivators were almost always registered at the Explorer Union so they had somewhere to sell the spiritual herbs, metals or other treasures they found along their journey.


    Of course, the reason why they chose to trust the Explorer Union was also because the Explorer Union had a good reputation for being fair to all and never divulging information of what someone bought or sold through them.


    In turn, this also resulted in the Explorer Union having a rather extensive information profile on most wandering cultivator that had been around for an extended period of time.


    As long as they got approval from the wandering cultivator in question, the Explorer Union would be more than happy to share this information with them for a price. Making it extremely simple to check the past of stronger wandering cultivators.


    Of course, there were those who didn''t even interact with the Explorer Union and were harder to get information on, but they were ultimately in the minority and hard toe by.


    Luckily for Shen Xuefeng, she was not one of those people, as she had interacted with the explorer union a lot during her many years travelling across the continent.n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om

 Chapter 1391 Exploring the Star Shattering Sect (3)

    Chapter 1391 Exploring the Star Shattering Sect (3)


    Continuing deeper inside the Star Shattering Sect while following behind Shen Xuefeng, Shu Yin could not help feeling more and more amazed as she finally had the opportunity to feel the terrifying spiritual qi concentration inside the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Even those holynds in the central part of the continent shouldn''t be too far off from this ce. Cultivating in here, it''s no wonder that the Star Shattering Sect has so many young Domain Lord Realm cultivators. If I get the chance¡­ It might not be a bad idea for me to join this kind of sect¡­


    Thinking this to herself, Shu Yin felt more inclined than ever to join the Star Shattering Sect, as she understood very well just how useful the environment created inside the Shattered Star Peaks would be for cultivation.


    Even if the Star Shattering Sect didn''t have anything other than the cultivation environment to offer her, it was more than enough to someone like her at the Later Stages of the Domain Lord Realm, as the rich spiritual qi environment would also make it easier for her toprehend the dao of her domain and get closer to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Of course, she understood that the Star Shattering Sect didn''t just have the rich cultivation environment, as she soon walked past the tforms below the Seventh Star Peak used for those trying to break through to the Domain Lord Realm or the Nascent Soul Realm. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Did the Star Shattering Sect also have these kinds of tforms to assist those breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm?


    As this thought emerged, Shu Yin couldn''t keep calm as she turned around and directly asked Shen Xuefeng about the tforms at the base of the Seventh Star Peak. Unable to contain her curiosity.


    "The Nascent Soul and Domain Lord Realm tforms? Hm¡­ From what I know, they should have been created by Grand Elder Xuan and Senior Yi Min, other than helping those of the sect breakthrough the Nascent Soul Realm or Domain Lord Realm, I don''t know about any other purpose."


    "I see¡­ So, what about those breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm? Is there a simr ce to this one for those breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm?"


    "That¡­ I don''t know, I only just recently broke through to the Domain Lord Realm and haven''t really thought much about my breakthrough to the Soul Ascension Realm, as its still far off in the future¡­"


    "I understand¡­"


    Hearing Shen Xuefeng''s response, Shu Yin could not help feeling a bit disappointed that she didn''t manage to get any information of the information she wanted, but at the same time, she also felt that it wasn''t certain that the Star Shattering Sect had a simr tform for those breaking trough to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    After all, Shen Xuefeng was indeed someone who had just recently broken through to the Domain Lord Realm and it was normal that she wouldn''t be aware of things pertaining to the Soul Ascension Realm before she began approaching the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Not to mention, a tform that would be able to assist and contain the damage of someone breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm would be an important treasure even inside a ce like the Blue Sea Empire, it made sense why the Star Shattering Sect wouldn''t just show it off to anyone who happened to enter their sect.


    On the other hand, the fact that they showed off the tforms that helped their elders and disciples break through to the Nascent Soul Realm or Domain Lord Realm so openly was a show of strength on its own.


    Well¡­ Not just the tforms, the rich spiritual qi and the spiritual herbs on the Ninth Star Peak being shown so openly was also a clear show of the Star Shattering Sect''s confidence and strength in itself.


    Hearing Shen Xuefeng''s response, Shu Yin could not help feeling a bit disappointed that she didn''t manage to get any information of the information she wanted, but at the same time, she also felt that it wasn''t certain that the Star Shattering Sect had a simr tform for those breaking trough to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    I can''t wait to see the main sect on the Seventh Star Peak!


    Filled with even more anticipation as she thought about this, Shu Yin happily made her way up the path leading up to the Seventh Star Peak. Finally able to see what this sect looked like in person¡­


    "Wow¡­ "


    It was only after she fully stepped onto the Seventh Star Peak that she realized that the Star Shattering Sect was far more terrifying than she had first imagined¡­ And the reason for this, was that she just so happened to show up when Pei Yang was holding a public lecture for the Alchemy Elders of the sect. Allowing not just these alchemy elders to listen in, but also any disciple or elder interested in learning more about the Dao of Alchemy.


    Of course, the main reason for Shu Yin''s shock was not the fact that she witnessed an elder holding a lecture for a group of elders and disciples, but instead because she sensed the strength of the person holding the lecture.


    Although she was not that familiar with those in the Earth Immortal Realm, she was certain that the person holding the lecture was someone who had reached the legendary Earth Immortal Realm¡­ And not just that, but he seemed to be stronger than any of the Earth Immortals she had encountered so far during her travels across the continent.


    The only existence surpassing this elder of the Star Shattering Sect being the strange stone construct she had seen pping an Earth Immortal to death with a single wave of its hand.


    In her mind, that stone construct had already far surpassed the level of the Earth Immortal Realm and entered the legendary Celestial Immortal Realm, so there wasn''t really anyparison between it and the elder of the Star Shattering Sect in the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Even then, hearing about the strength of the Star Shattering Sect and guessing how strong they might be from what she had managed to see so far was different from personally seeing an Earth Immortal Realm cultivator in the flesh.


    No matter what, there was noparison, as it solidified the strength of the Star Shattering Sect in her mind. Especially so considering that she had heard from some of the disciples and elders of the sect while walking around that this senior figure at the Earth Immortal Realm wasn''t the strongest in the sect, but instead someone just like her, a wandering cultivator.


    The only difference between her and this person was that the way he entered the sect was because a senior figure in the Star Shattering Sect had saved him and ended up recruiting him to join the sect afterwards.


    She on the other hand had decided to try and enter the Star Shattering Sect on her own. First just to satisfy her curiosity about this mysterious sect that seemedpletely out of ce whenpared to the surrounding powers, but now feeling more than motivated to join this powerful and mysterious sect.


    Even if she didn''t know a lot about the Star Shattering Sect given the short time she had spent in the sect''s territory, she at least shared the positive look of the sect that had been created due to the Star Shattering Sect preferring to go with the more difficult route of absorbing the powers in the ces it expanded into instead of the easier one that would just see them destroying any resisting powers.


    Of course, the Star Shattering Sect wasn''t entirely harmless so to speak, as no small number of powers and kingdoms had ended up being eradicate by it during its expansion, but it was ultimately true that far fewer people ended up deadpared to the normal expansion process of powers of simr size.


    "Oh! It''s senior Pei Yang! Hey, Shu Yin, do you want to stay and listen? Senior Pei Yang is a rather powerful senior and even if it''s just about the Dao of Alchemy, I''m sure his lecture will still prove useful for someone like us in the Domain Lord Realm."


    "Huh? I-I can stay and listen to the lecture!?" Suddenly hearing Shen Xuefeng calling out to her from the side and listening to what she said, Shu Yin could not help showing a look of disbelief on her face. Not believing that she would actually have a chance to listen to the lecture of a senior in the Earth Immortal Realm after entering the Star Shattering Sect for a brief look around the sect.


    After all, the lecture of an Earth Immortal Realm cultivator was something incredibly precious and would normally never be given to any outsiders, but here Shen Xuefeng was telling her that she could just listen in on the lecture? How could Shu Yin not be shocked by something like that!


    "Of course,e, let''s find somewhere to sit!" Not seeing the shocked expression on the face of Shu Yin, Shen Xuefeng happily nodded her head after hearing what she thought of as agreement and dragged Shu Yin closer before finding somewhere to sit down and listen to Pei Yang''s lecture.

 Chapter 1392 Exploring the Star Shattering Sect (4)

    Chapter 1392 Exploring the Star Shattering Sect (4)


    Not knowing how to fight back against Shen Xuefeng and not really having anything against the chance to listen to the lecture of a powerful Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm) Senior, Shu Yin obediently followed her before finding a ce to sit down. Soon enough finding herself absorbed in the lecture, as she discovered that it wasn''t just about the Dao of Alchemy, but also seemed to incorporate different concepts of how toprehend the Dao. Proving to be useful even for those who didn''t walk the path ofprehending the Dao of Alchemy.


    No wonder so many elders in the Domain Lord Realm are present to listen to the lecture, it is not just useful to those proficient in alchemy but is also extremely useful to those in the process of increasing the strength of their domain!


    As she thought about this, Shu Yin could not help feeling amazed by the skillful teaching done by Pei Yang, as his lecture seemed to incorporate several different elements that would be useful for different cultivators of different paths.


    Outside of just being most useful to those alchemists, it was also useful to Domain Lord Realm cultivators like herself and even seemed to also carry some concepts that would be useful for those below the Domain Lord Realm to listen to.


    All things considered, Shu Yin now understood why so many of the sect''s elders had been so respectful when talking about Pei Yang, as he wasn''t just a powerful Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm) senior but was also incredible when it came to teaching.


    Not just that, but from the bits of information about him that she had picked up along the way, it seemed that he was also incredibly passionate when it came to teaching, as he held at least one lecture a month, something that was unheard of to Shu Yin, as she understood doing something like that would essentially mean giving up the opportunity to enter a deeper state of cultivation.


    In the end, this meant that this Pei Yang was passionate enough about teaching the younger generation that he would take a hit to his own cultivation speed as a result.


    Of course, the main reason for this was the agreement he had with Xuan Hao, but there was no way Shu Yin would know about this.


    Not to mention, even if his cultivation was affected to some extent by having to teach once every month, it was still far fasterpared to before he joined the Star Shattering Sect. So, he didn''t really mind it. Especially because he had seen hope of surpassing the Dao Seed Realm in the future after having stayed inside the Star Shattering Sect for a few years, something he had never dared dreaming off in the past¡­


    Focusing her attention back on the lecture taking ce, Shu Yin didn''t dare wasting this opportunity, as two hours quickly flew by with her and Shen Xuefeng carefully listening to Pei Yang''s lecture.


    During this lecture, Shu Yin also managed to learn a few things that she hadn''t learnt before, one of them being the Dao Seed Realm, as she finally found out that the Dao Seed Realm was another name for the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Only difference being that the Dao Seed Realm seemed more ancient and was far stronger than the Earth Immortal Realm she knew about, as the Half Bloom Stage at the peak of the Earth Immortal Realm only seemedparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, something she managed to learn after trying to ask into the Dao Seed Realm following the end of the lecture.


    Not just that, but she also managed to learn that reaching the Profound Immortal Realm that she had only ever heard about in rumors required one to first reach the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm, something that would normally be impossible following the current widespread knowledge of the realm.


    Knowing about the existence of the Dao Seed Realm, Shu Yin also realized why she had never seen or heard of anyone in the Profound Immortal Realm and had only found legends or ancient rumors about their existence in the past.


    Not knowing about the Dao Seed Realm, anyone who reached the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm, the Half Bloom Stage, would try and break through to the Celestial Immortal Realm, something that would inevitably cut them off the path to the Profound Immortal Realm.


    If any of the major powers in the central part of the continent knew about this¡­ They could have sealed the information to prevent anyone else from reaching the Profound Immortal Realm. Only ever giving Celestial Immortals a chance to rise up, while preventing any other Profound Immortals from emerging!


    Though she didn''t know about the difference between the Celestial Immortal Realm and the Profound Immortal Realm, it was clear to her that the Profound Immortal Realm was superior to the Celestial Immortal Realm in some way. Even if she had no idea how, she guessed that it was because of this superiority that some Profound Immortal Realm Cultivators might have the chance to suppress any Celestial Immortals that would emerge, either killing or recruiting them¡­


    "Come on, let''s take a look at the Combat Hall next!"


    "Ah? Ah! Y-Yes!"


    As she was lost in her own thoughts thinking about things far beyond her own realm of strength after learning about the existence of the Dao Seed Realm and what it actually symbolized whenpared to the Earth Immortal Realm that seemed to be something that had been artificially created to hide the existence of the Dao Seed Realm, Shu Yin was suddenly brought back to reality by the voice of Shen Xuefeng calling out to her.


    Not wanting toe off as weird or anything for being absorbed in her own world, she decided to do her best to hide her surprise, something that didn''t really end up working¡­ Before she followed Shen Xuefeng to the Combat Hall.N?v(el)B\\jnn

 Chapter 1393 Exploring the Star Shattering Sect (5)

    Chapter 1393 Exploring the Star Shattering Sect (5)


    Following Shen Xuefeng to the Combat Hall without really knowing anything about the Combat Hall and what it was, Shu Yin could not help asking about the ce as they got closer. Only to end up even more shocked than before after hearing about what the Combat Hall was and what it was used for.


    A training ground that could simte different environments and could even be used by someone in the Soul Ascension Realm. Possibly even someone stronger than that! n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Just this alone was more than enough to show that the Star Shattering Sect had someone profoundly skilled in both the Dao of Formations and the Dao of Space, as creating the independent spaces with unique environments that could be used for training certain special technique was not something one could do without a certainprehension of the Dao of Space.


    Of course, this was not to mention that it was more than just a single independent space that had been created and attached to the Combat Hall itself.


    Although the spaces themselves, even put together, were smaller than a secret realm that could be created by someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm with enough resources, it was far moreplicated than a secret realm, as it involved more than just a single space. Instead, having at least a few hundred different independent training spaces, that could be changed ording to what Shen Xuefeng told her.


    Filled with excitement at seeing such an awesome and magical thing in person, Shu Yin didn''t forget to also ask if it would be possible for her to enter the Combat Hall and check it out for herself.


    Luckily, it wasn''t that much of a problem, as most of the sect''s elders and disciples were busy with the uingpetition, causing the Combat Hall to be far more destepared to its normal fully upied state.


    In turn, Shu Yin soon found herself inside the Combat Hall together with Shen Xuefeng¡­ And taking advantage of the opportunity, she also ended up spending some time fighting with Shen Xuefeng, who was more than happy to get a chance at fighting someone at the Later Stages of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Both of them getting the opportunity to gauge out how strong each of them was¡­ And although Shu Yin won the battle to no one''s surprise, she was still pushed far more than she had expected for someone at the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    To Shu Yin, this proved the strength of the Star Shattering Sect when it came to teaching their younger generation, as it was obvious that Domain Lord Realm cultivators from the Star Shattering Sect would be stronger than someone like her who was essentially self-taught.


    At the same time, it also made Shu Yin excited about the prospect of joining the Star Shattering Sect in the future, as it was clear that they were good at training their Domain Lord Realm cultivators. Especially because she managed to learn from Shen Xuefeng during their duel that she had learnt most of what she knew regarding the Domain Lord Realm from the Star Shattering Sect and the library of the sect.


    But¡­ It seems like it won''t be that simple for someone like me to join a powerful sect like the Star Shattering Sect¡­


    Of course, together with her feeling even more excited about joining the Star Shattering Sect, she also realized that it shouldn''t be that easy for her to join such a powerful sect.


    The only reason why she felt like she still had a good opportunity to join the sect was because she had managed to enter the sect and get a tour around the sect under the guidance of someone, she presumed to be a junior elder of the sect. Meaning that they at least considered her as someone with the potential to join the sect.


    Of course, potential didn''t mean that she would definitely end up joining the sect. Instead, it was likely that she was already being observed by the senior members of the Star Shattering Sect, who would then determine whether or not she would be worthy of joining the sect.


    Swish-!


    As she thought about this, Shu Yin instantly straightened her back and stood upright. Doing her best to show off her best behavior as she followed a now rather confused Shen Xuefeng out of the Combat Hall.


    The sudden change in expression in this older wandering cultivator was really not something Shen Xuefeng could get used to, as she seemed to be constantly changing in the way she presented herself or acted.


    First filled with curiosity, then fearful and awed at the strength of the Star Shattering Sect¡­ And then her current professional demeanor.


    Shen Xuefeng began wondering what kind of expression and attitude this older wandering cultivator would end up havingter on and even started looking forward to it, as she began walking in the direction of the sect''s inner court where the courtyards and buildings belonging to the more senior members of the sect were located.


    Not just because it would be the home of this strange wandering cultivator if she ended up joining the sect, but also because Elder Song had just contacted her a short time earlier and informed her that he would like to meet with this rather strange older wandering cultivator.


    Given that he wanted to meet her, Shen Xuefeng was more than happy to bring her over. Knowing that the uing meeting with Elder Song would likely end up determining whether this older wandering cultivator called Shu Yin would join the Star Shattering Sect or if she would have to leave the sect without getting the opportunity to see some of the other important locations of the sect.


    Although weird, Shen Xuefeng did hope that she would join the sect, as there was indeed ack in stronger Domain Lord Realm cultivators in the sect and she really did benefit from their little spar earlier.

 Chapter 1394 Meeting Elder Song and Life of Shu Yin

    Chapter 1394 Meeting Elder Song and Life of Shu Yin


    Finding herself in front of Elder Song after a few minutes walking into the core of the Star Shattering Sect, Shu Yin could not help feeling a bit surprised, when she learnt that he was actually the Vice Sect Master of the sect.


    The main reason for this surprise being that the Vice Sect Master would normally be one of the strongest cultivators in the sect, but Elder Song was still in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Not to mention him being among the strongest of the Star Shattering Sect, he was still far from the few Domain Lord Realm cultivators she had run into during her time inside the Star Shattering Sect.


    "Elder Song is an important person of the sect and is also the sole person in charge of the sect''s internal management, his current position was given because of how excellent he is when ites to managing the sect. Not so much because of his strength."


    Seeing the clearly confused expression on Shu Yin''s face upon realizing that Elder Song was only in the Nascent Soul Realm, Shen Xuefeng quickly jumped in to exin, something that had be rather normal considering that most of the wandering cultivators wanting to join the sect ended up meeting with Elder Song at some point and would show a simrly confused expression.


    It wasn''t that surprising considering that higher positions like Vice Sect Master, Sect Master, Core Elders and so on were normally held by the strongest experts of the sect. Not like the Star Shattering Sect where the Vice Sect Master position had essentially turned into a sect management position that didn''t really care about the strength of the person holding down the position.


    Then again, this was mainly because of Elder Song, as the position had been left to him so he could continue doing what he did best without any problems and continue to help increase the strength of the sect like he had done so far.


    In a sense, it was also because he was incredibly good at his work and the rest of the sect elders knew about how hard he was working that nobody reallyined about him being the Vice Sect Master. Especially so because none of them dared even think about taking on the workload he allocated to the position itself.


    "I see¡­" Nodding her head in understanding after hearing what Shen Xuefeng said, Shu Yin slowly found a ce to sit down before Shen Xuefeng introduced her to Elder Song and they began discussing the matter of her joining the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if Elder Song really did want to have someone of her strength level join the sect right away, he still had to make sure that she wouldn''t end up causing any problems for the sect in the future.


    Slowly, a few hours flew by with Shen Xuefeng silently standing on the side and listening to the two of them as they talked about Shu Yin''s past and her reason for wanting to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    In the end, she and Elder Song ended up learning a lot about Shu Yin.


    Before cultivating, Shu Yin was a normal vige girl living on the eastern side of the continent that was home to severalrge Buddhist temples. From there, she had originally been fine with living a normal life, but an arranged marriage was suddenly forced upon her by some local noble son and she decided to flee her home to avoid the marriage, thus starting her journey of wandering the continent.


    The first few years, she was just a normal mortal without cultivation, that was, until she stumbled on an ancient cave dwelling of a long dead Domain Lord Realm cultivator. Finding a suitable cultivation mantra and arge number of resources. Allowing her to take her first step onto the path of cultivation.


    Of course, knowing that the treasures of a Domain Lord Realm cultivator might attract unwanted attention, she ended up spending the next two hundred and fifty years in secluded cultivation inside the cave and only dared venturing out of the cave when the resources were running out and her cultivation had reached the Peak of the Core Formation Realm.


    Next on, she officially began journeying across the continent as a wandering cultivator. Encountering all sorts of opportunities and deadly situations that ultimately helped push her to understand more about the world around her, while at the same time aiding her cultivation.


    In the end, she managed to sessfully step into the Domain Lord Realm just when her lifespan was about to reach its end. Allowing her to transcend the normal level of wandering cultivator and start moving away from the eastern part of the continent and even visit the core region of the continent.


    Of course, her strength was far from enough to wander around the core region of the continent and after witnessing a battle between two Earth Immortal Realm cultivators, she ultimately decided against entering the core region and instead spent most of her time exploring different ancient sites to further her cultivation.


    At first, she had hoped that she would be able to reach the Soul Ascension Realm by continuing to explore like this, but after she broke through to the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm at the age of 5000, she ran into a wall that she couldn''t cross no matter how hard she tried¡­ And over the next four thousand years, her cultivation barely improved. Only recently breaking through to the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although her strength was impressive and she was already close to the Soul Ascension Realm at this point in time, her slow cultivation speed after stepping into the Later Stages of the Domain Lord Realm made it clear to her that she wouldn''t be able to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm by cultivating while wandering the continent like she had done so far, as she had less than a thousand years left to live at this point in time.


    Starting to feel the desperation that all cultivators about to reach the end of their lifespan felt, she ended up wandering into some more dangerous areas in search of opportunities and found herself falling into far more deadly situations over the past hundred years than what she had experienced during the 9000 years before that.


    In the end, it was also this that had caused her to end up inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect after having ended up passing through some kind of ancient teleportation formation.


    As of now, she was 9156 years old and at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and most important of all to Elder Song, she was a wandering cultivator that didn''t get involved with any other powers during her time wandering across the continent. Outside of the explorer union that was unavable to most wandering cultivators.


    Even if her age was a bit worrying as she was already close to reaching the end up her lifespan if she couldn''t break through to the Soul Ascension Realm, Elder Song didn''t really feel that worried about it, as she still had a little under 900 years left to live.


    Helped by the resources of the Star Shattering Sect and with the guidance of someone like Pei Yang or Xuan Hao, she stood a good chance of being able to reach the Soul Ascension Realm. Especially considering the existence of the Dao Enlightenment Monument that was incredibly useful for anyone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if she didn''t get any help from Xuan Hao or Pei Yang in her cultivation, with the rich cultivation environment of the sect and the Dao Enlightenment Monument, Elder Song felt that she would still stand a good chance of reaching the Soul Ascension Realm and possibly even the Dao Seed Realm in the future.


    "Hm¡­ I will do a more in depth look into your situation and determine the uracy of what you said with the explorer union, but if there is nothing wrong, I can confidently say that you are more than wee to join the Star Shattering Sect. Of course, starting as a guest elder before officially bing an elder in the future." n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As he thought about everything, Elder Song slowly nodded his head before saying this. Agreeing to have Shu Yin join the sect, as there seemed to be nothing wrong with what she told him about her past.


    Of course, it would still have to be confirmed through the explorer union first, but he didn''t feel like there would be any problems in this regard, as Shu Yin had used the explorer union a lot ording to herself. Meaning that they should have information on her as long as they paid the price.


    So for now, Shu Yin was granted a temporary residence inside the sect until everything was sorted out and she could officially join the sect as a guest elder with the chance to be a real elder.

 Chapter 1395 Becoming Part of the Star Shattering Sect

    Chapter 1395 Bing Part of the Star Shattering Sect


    Following Shu Yin joining the Star Shattering Sect as a guest elder and a general investigation into her background through the explorer union waspleted, she soon moved into the Star Shattering Sect and wasted no time in taking advantage of the resources of the Star Shattering Sect to increase her own strength. Soon enough finding out about the Dao Enlightenment Monument as a result and finding out the importance of contribution points, that ultimately ended up with her finding herself in the Grand Mission Pavilion in search of mission toplete for contribution points.


    Shu Yin understood very well that she didn''t have any time to waste if she wanted to reach the Soul Ascension Realm before her lifespan ran out and the Dao Enlightenment Monument just so happened to provide the opportunity, she needed to make it possible to ascend to the Soul Ascension Realm before her lifespan ran out.


    In turn, she searched for the missions that were normally too dangerous or exhausting that had been avoided by other elders of the sect. Not caring about anything other than gathering as many contribution points as possible so she could enter the hall of the grand library where the Dao Enlightenment Monument was located.


    Luckily for her, outside of there being a lot of difficult missions for her to deal with, there were also some that only involved her training with and teaching some of the newer Domain Lord Realm cultivators of the sect.


    Considering that these missions had been specially arranged for her by Elder Song, the contribution points forpleting these rtively easy missions far surpassed that of most other missions. Resulting in Shu Yin taking on these missions without a second thought. Only believing that she was lucky that none of the sect''s stronger cultivators had picked up the missions before her.


    Still unclear about the true strength of the Star Shattering Sect even after having joined the sect, Shu Yin still believed that there were still a lot of powerful cultivators far stronger than her present inside the sect¡­ And although she wasn''t wrong that there were far more powerful cultivators present in the Star Shattering Sectpared to her, their numbers were far below what she believed.


    As for why these powerful cultivators were not present on the Seventh Star Peak¡­ That was because they were simply on one of the other Star Peaks, like the Second Star Peak or the Main Peak.


    Unknowingly, the closed off nature of the Second and Main Star Peak had caused Shu Yin to associate these two locations with the ancestors and stronger elders of the sect, as they did in a sense resemble the ancient forbidden grounds that she was familiar with in different major kingdoms or sects she had encountered in the past. Locations where the peak cultivators of said powers resided and that were normally closed off to the rest of the sect and the disciples.


    Shu Yin was not the only one with these thoughts, as some of the newer disciples thought of things the same way when the Main Star Peak or the Second Star Peak was mentioned, as the chaotic qi formation was still present on these two mountain peaks and seemingly stopped anyone from approaching them. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Only Feng Chen, Elder Song and a few of the other elders knew that there was nothing like that on those two mountain peaks and they had instead been closed off by Xuan Hao due to the inherent danger of the two mountain peaks.


    However, given that the mysteriousness of the two mountain peaks didn''t harm the Star Shattering Sect and instead just made it seem stronger, Feng Chen and the rest didn''t rify anything regarding the two mountain peaks, as it would also serve as an invisible pressure on anyone who might harbor thoughts of betraying the Star Shattering Sect in the future.


    Although the matter of a possible betrayal from disciples and elders of the sect hadn''t happened so far, it was always good to be prepared¡­ And if the two mountain peaks remained unknown and was even rumored to be the true core of the Star Shattering Sect where even stronger experts resided, it would make anyone thinking of attacking the Star Shattering Sect hesitate or even give up any thoughts of attacking the sect.


    If the two mountain peaks could be turned into real forbidden grounds for the sect in the future, that would be even better, but after floating this idea to Xuan Hao, they were quickly shot down.


    Although the Main Star Peak could be considered a good ce to move the Star Shattering Sect, it was ultimately still far too dangerous to move the sect there. Even more so because the independent world created on the Main Star Peak also seemed to be connected to different locations outside the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Even though he had only encountered one such situation so far, Xuan Hao didn''t dare underestimate the danger of the Main Star Peak and the possibility of more such connections and passages existing somewhere on the Main Star Peak. The ancient battlefield that had been connected to the Main Star Peak was more than enough for him to not dare think about moving the Star Shattering Sect there¡­


    "First up¡­ Teaching a group of newly ascended Domain Lord Realm Elders!"


    Oblivious to any of this, Shu Yin happily embraced her new life, as she took on her first mission since bing a part of the Star Shattering Sect. Teaching a group of Domain Lord Realm Elders who had just recently managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Not something difficult considering her cultivation realm at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, what''s more,pleting this mission would give her enough contribution points to visit the Dao Enlightenment Monument for the first time.


    So, without any ws, she intended to perfectlyplete this mission and make sure that this group of newly ascended Domain Lord Realm Elders of the Star Shattering Sect would be satisfied with her teaching and learnt a lot about the Domain Lord Realm from her.


    Although she might never have been a teacher before and had spent most of her time running around the continent exploring different ancient realms and ruins, it didn''t mean that she waspletely unaware of how to teach others.


    On the other hand, due to her long life and vast knowledge of the Domain Lord Realm stemming from her long time in the Domain Lord Realm, she would be far better than most other Domain Lord Realm cultivators when it came to teaching others about the Domain Lord Realm.


    At least it was so for the earlier and middle stages of the realm, her understanding of theter stages and peak of the realm was still blurry, as she herself was still in the Later Stages of the Domain Lord Realm and had not yet managed to reach the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even then, it wasn''t really needed in this situation, as the people she would be teaching were in the earlier stages of the Domain Lord Realm. Not the Later Stages of the Domain Lord Realm, something she was more than confident in teaching.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Another new Domain Lord Realm cultivator joined the sect? And this one¡­ Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­?"


    At the same time that Shu Yin finished taking on her first mission from the mission pavilion and began preparing herself for teaching the group of newly ascended Domain Lord Realm cultivators, Xuan Hao, who had sealed himself off on the Eighth Star Peak to research the ancient teleportation formation, opened his eyes with a somewhat surprised expression on his face after noticing this new and powerful presence inside the sect.


    Although it wasn''t that strange considering that the Star Shattering Sect had weed no small number of Domain Lord Realm cultivators following the strength of the sect in the eyes of the outside world reaching a simr level as a small empire, it was the first time that a Domain Lord Realm cultivator in the Later Stages of the realm had decided to join the sect, something that ended up drawing Xuan Hao''s attention.


    Of course, it was only drawing his attention for a brief moment before he returned his focus back to the ancient teleportation formation. Continuing to deepen his insights into the Dao of Formations, while analyzing how to improve the prototype teleportation formation that he had constructed.


    In the end, a Late Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivator, although important to the development of the Star Shattering Sect, wouldn''t be able to cause much trouble in the current Star Shattering Sect.


    Even without him around, Pei Yang should still be able to deal with them if they caused any problems.


    Maybe even Feng Chen would be able to deal with him following his recent improvement in strength and the fact that he was stronger inbatpared to an ordinary Domain Lord Realm cultivator due to him being a sword cultivator.

 Chapter 1396 Failed Plan

    Chapter 1396 Failed n


    As a few days flew by following Shu Yin joining the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao could not help stopping his continued research of the ancient teleportation formation. Not because he had run into any problems, but more so because he still hadn''t heard anything about the Blue Sea Empire mobilizing their Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors.


    Although a few days or even a week or two of dy was fine considering he didn''t know if the overconfident ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire would end up being dyed by demonic cultivators while moving through the Frozen Wastnd, it had now been around a month since he had sold the information about the space node stone mine and the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire left to investigate the mine in person.


    At this point in time, the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator who should be behind the space node stone mine should have shed with the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire, causing the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire to fall into a difficult situation that would force him to call for help.


    However, if that was the case, there should have been some kind of reaction from the Blue Sea Empire, something that hadn''t happened yet.


    Unless¡­ The space node stone mine was not under the control of a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator, but was instead under thebined control of those two Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators, but¡­ If that was the case, where would those people transporting the space node stones be going? To A third Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator inside the Frozen Wastnd?


    Frowning as he thought about this, Xuan Hao couldn''t figure out what had ended up happening to cause the situation to turn out in an unexpected way.


    In the end. Not knowing what to do about this situation as his plot to weaken the Blue Sea Empire seemed to have failed, Xuan Hao decided to contact Xuan Gui and see if she had heard anything about something major happening inside the Frozen Wastnd.


    Following which he ended up learning that something had indeed ended up happening inside the Frozen Wastnds that caused a major upheavalsting for a few days. Unfortunately, she didn''t have any clue about what had happened, as the information was sealed by one of the stronger Demon Kings in the Frozen Wastnds. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although this didn''t provide Xuan Hao with a lot of information about what had happened, he at least became certain that the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator and the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire should have shed with each other like he had first nned.


    However, from the reaction of the demonic cultivators, it seemed like things didn''t end up ying out like he had expected. Meaning that the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire had likely managed to safely escape from the demonic cultivators.


    Not just that, but from the reaction of the demonic cultivator, it seemed like they had suffered significantly to this ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire.


    From what Xuan Hao could guess, it should be the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator who owned the space node stone mine that had somehow ended up being injured by the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire before the other party had managed to run away.


    Considering that the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire had managed toprehend the Dao of Space close to the Large Sess Realm, Xuan Hao felt that he should have had a chance at escaping if he managed to injure his opponent.


    The only thing was¡­ To do something like that, he would have to be far stronger than a normal Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator. Especially considering that the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator should have been prepared for the other party using the Dao of Space, as he himself had used the Dao of Space when stealing from the space node stone mine earlier.


    "Guess that ancestor does have something to back up his confidence¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao shook his head somewhat regretfully while looking towards the Frozen Wastnd in the distance.


    Although his n to weaken the Blue Sea Empire had ended up failing, he had at least seeded in the secondary purpose of the n and that was to ensure that neither the demonic cultivators or the Blue Sea Empire would be able to mine the space node stone mine.


    Considering that both parties now knew about the existence of the mine, neither of them would allow the other to peacefully mine it.


    Even though the mine itself was closer to the Frozen Wastnd, it was ultimately still outside it and would be difficult to defend without a Demon King permanently stationed there to defend it¡­ And considering the war that was ying out at the moment between not just the Frozen Wastnd and the Blue Sea Empire, but between the core region and the demonic cultivators, neither could afford having any of their peak expert''s stationed to defend a single mine.


    In the end, the space node stone mine would likely end up falling to the backburner as the war yed out, with both parties deciding to take control of the mine after the war came to an end or one of them became too weak to continue threatening the other. Giving one of the two a chance to mine it.


    The reason why Xuan Hao wanted to see something like that happening was rather simple, as he himself didn''t want to give up on the space node stone mine either, it was simply far too important when it came to the future expansion of the Star Shattering Sect and getting a functioningwork of teleportation formations up and running.


    Not just that, but also for practice so that the sect could nurture others outside of him who couldy down teleportation formations in the future.


    The dy that would be created by the Blue Sea Empire and the Frozen Wastnd halting their mining of the space node stone mine would give him and the Star Shattering Sect a chance to grow stronger and possibly contend with them for the space node stone mine in the future.


    Considering that thest war between demonic cultivators and the cultivators from the core region hadsted for over a thousand years, it wasn''t out of the question for the Star Shattering Sect to grow to be a major power before the war ended. The main thing that could prevent something like that happening would be if the Star Shattering Sect ended up getting drawn into the war.


    Even though the sect had been drawn into the war to some extend with the constant attack of demonic cultivators along the borders of the sect, it wasn''t a real attack and was just a result of Frozen Wastnds sending out the weaker demonic cultivators to test the different powers bordering the Frozen Wastnds.


    If it was a real attack, it wouldn''t just be a few True Demon Realm and Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivators showing up but would instead be those terrifying demons at the Demon King Realm showing up!


    For this reason, Xuan Hao also treasured his rtionship with Xuan Gui, as she essentially served as an early warning system for the Star Shattering Sect in case the demonic cultivators decided to take their attack on the kingdoms around the Star Shattering Sect more serious than they had so far.


    Luckily, at the moment, the strongest demonic cultivators that the Star Shattering Sect had to deal with were demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm, equivalent to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    The winged lion demon beast had been more than enough to deal with any of them that came so far. Even managing to makerge strides forward in its cultivation, as it was now close to reaching the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    The main reason for the rapid progress being that eating the demonic cultivators proved to be a good way for it to improve, as the strong bodies of the demonic cultivators were filled with a strong vitality and powerful blood energy far surpassing normal cultivators and even equally powerful demon beasts.


    In a sense, the corpses of demonic cultivators were perfect for feeding demon beasts as long as the strong demonic qi or yin qi inside their bodies were cleaned out first, something that the beast tamers of the sect had already started experimenting with, as they needed to find something to make up for the reduced budget following Elder Song cracking down on their wasteful usage of spirit stones.


    Luckily for them, the Star Shattering Sect didn''t really have any use for the bodies of the demonic cultivators, so they were allowed to make full use of them and feed them to the demon beast after the dangerous qi inside of them was purged or cleaned.


    In a way, the beast tamers making use of the demonic cultivator bodies did also help the Star Shattering Sect in cleaning up the areas where battles with demonic cultivators had happened. Turning the beast tamers into some of the most effective battlefield cleaners ever seen in the eyes of both the elders and disciples of the sect¡­

 Chapter 1397 Negatives of Eating Dead Demonic Cultivators

    Chapter 1397 Negatives of Eating Dead Demonic Cultivators


    Shaking his head at the thought of the beast tamers that had turned into corpse collectors after realizing how useful the bodies of demonic cultivators were for nurturing demon beasts; Xuan Hao could not help wondering if he should advise Elder Song to ce a few more restrictions on these beast tamers.


    After all, even if their use of demonic cultivator''s bodies didn''t really use any of the sect''s resources and instead saved the sect quite a few spirit stones that would have normally been used to feed the demon beasts, it might end up making others think that the Star Shattering Sect was some kind of demonic sect. Making them a target for the Blue Sea Empire and the other major powers from the core region of the continent.


    At the very least, the beast tamers had to find a way to not attract any unwanted attention when they went out to clean up the battlefield¡­


    "Haaa¡­ Whenever it seems like they are about to settle down, they find another way to create problems¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about the beast tamers creating yet another problem for the sect, Xuan Hao couldn''t help letting out a somewhat helpless sigh.


    Although it wasn''t him who would have to deal with this problem, he still felt for Elder Song and Feng Chen, who would be the ones to deal with these troublesome beast tamers once again.


    Even more so because the situation of the beast tamers seemed to have just recently been resolved, as they settled down and got used to their new situation.


    However, he wasn''t really one to me them, as the bodies of the demonic cultivators did indeed bring enormous benefits to the Star Shattering Sect and wasn''t something that would be easy to give up.


    "I will just leave this matter for Elder Song and Feng Chen to deal with, both of them should already be aware of the potential problems that might emerge if information of the sect using the dead bodies of the demonic cultivators gets out- Hm?" About to focus his attention back on the ancient teleportation formation to continue what he had been doing so far, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed a change in his status.


    More specifically, a change in the status of one of his pets, the winged lion demon beast, that seemed to have just broken through to the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Guess I will go and take a look and see how thatzy little lion is doing, it has after all been quite some time since Ist saw it."


    Curious about the state of his little pet, as it wasn''t without risk to undergo the tribtion and ascend through the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao decided to take a break fromprehending the ancient teleportation formation and decided to leave the Eighth Star Peak to head for the border territory that the winged lion demon beast was currently protecting from any True Demon Realm demonic cultivators who might try and enter the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Considering that the Blue Sea Empire was still present in the Onyx Empire and showed no intention of leaving and the barrier he had created in the past and prior agreement with Xuan Gui kept any demon beasts from invading the Star Shattering Sect''s territory along two of their closest borders with the Frozen Wastnd, there was only a single border to defend for the Star Shattering Sect.


    In turn, it made it rather simple for Xuan Hao to guess where the winged lion demon beast had broken through to the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even though¡­ He did feel a bit confused as to why the winged lion demon beast had decided to breakthrough at the border instead of returning to the sect where it was far safer for it to breakthrough. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    After all, at the border, it still had to worry about potentially being attacked or ambushed by powerful demonic cultivators during or after its breakthrough.


    The only reason Xuan Hao could think of that might have caused the winged lion demon beast to breakthrough at the border instead of back in the sect, would be because the breakthrough had been unexpected and not something that the winged lion demon beast had even thought would happen.


    But for something like that to be the case, it would have had to either have consumed- Ah¡­


    Suddenly realizing what might have happened to his littlezy lion, as he thought about how eating demonic cultivators seemed extremely beneficial to demon beasts, Xuan Hao decided not to dy, as he directly used his Dao of space to twist the space around him. Using long distance teleportation to cross the distance between the Shattered Star Peaks and the borders of the sect''s territory in a few minutes. Most of the time being spent activating the long-distance teleportation technique.


    The reason for rushing over being that he feared that the little lion might have be so ovee by greed that it forgot to get rid of the demonic qi or yin qi that might be in the body that it had consumed to reach the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Rm¡­


    ROOOOAR-!


    And, like he had feared, the situation of the winged lion demon beast was far from good when he appeared, as it was currently roaring mindlessly while killing anything in sight without caring if they were demonic cultivators or not.


    Luckily, it wasn''t close to anyone from the Star Shattering Sect at the moment¡­ And on the not so lucky side of things, a few wandering cultivators and what he guessed to be members of the explorer union happened to be nearby. Dying before he had a chance to interfere with the now rampaging winged lion demon beast that seemed to have lost its mind after absorbing arge quantity of demonic qi.


    All Xuan Hao could do was light a joss stick for the unlucky group of people before stepping forward to deal with the winged lion demon beast before it ended up causing even more damage than it already had.

 Chapter 1398 Helping Heal the Little Lion~

    Chapter 1398 Helping Heal the Little Lion~


    Roar! Roar! Roooar!


    Continuing to roar angrily at no one in particr, the winged lion demon beast continued to rampage and destroy everything around it. Killing and biting into even weak demon beasts at the Qi Condensation Realm before swallowing them whole, something that was highly unusual considering just how little help devouring such weak demon beasts would provide to the winged lion demon beast.


    Then again¡­ The current winged lion demon beast wasn''t in the right state of mind, as it was ovee by therge quantity of demonic qi that it had ended up identally absorbing not long ago.


    Whoosh~


    BANG!


    Arriving in front of the winged lion demon beast in such a state, Xuan Hao didn''t bother ying nice, as he directly pped it to the ground to stop it from causing any more problems. ttening a small mountain by ident, as the winged lion demon beast stopped moving and instead looked up at the small figure that had appeared above it filled with fear.


    Although it was driven to madness by the demon qi that it had absorbed, it looked like it could still feel fear when faced with a much stronger opponent. Showing that the winged lion demon beast hadn''t gonepletely mad and could still be saved before it ended up bing no different from a demonic cultivator who lost their mind.


    Even then¡­ Xuan Hao felt like he shouldn''t help the winged lion demon beast get rid of the demonic qi coursing through its body too fast¡­ First¡­ He had to teach this little pet of his that it couldn''t just eat anything that happened to be filled with a strong vitality¡­


    BANG! Bang! Bang!


    Because of this, Xuan Hao made sure to beat up this rebellious little pet to make sure that it understood the pain that woulde if it chose to devour the dead bodies of demonic cultivators without first making sure that it was safe to do so.


    R-Roooar!?


    Soon enough, earning a rather pitiful cry from the winged demon beast, who was being beaten senseless by its master, who had chosen a rather barbaric method of forcibly helping it refine the demonic qi inside of its body through said beating.


    R-R-Roar¡­


    In the end, after close to half an hour of being beaten by its master, the winged lion demon beast returned to normal, as the demonic qi that had been coursing through its body earlier had been fully refined and used to stabilize its foundation at the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Well¡­ the demonic qi had been fully refined after twenty or so minutes, but Xuan Hao had decided to help this dumb lion with wings stabilize its foundation by showing it a bit extra love and care.


    Even if the winged lion demon beast wanted to protest against its master for using such barbaric methods, there was nothing much it could do about it, as it understood that it was indeed at fault this time around. Having recklessly devoured the body of a demonic cultivator far stronger than any demonic cultivator that it had encountered so far because it had sensed that its strength would improve by a lot after doing so¡­


    After the situation calmed down and the winged lion demon beast was given the opportunity to retreat back to the sect to recover from the love and care that its master had shown when helping it stabilize its cultivation base and refine the demonic qi that it had failed to personally refine, Xuan Hao didn''t leave immediately, but instead decided to take a look at the dead demonic cultivator that the winged lion demon beast had ended up being unable to stop itself from eating.


    ording to the winged lion demon beast, it had only nibbed off a bit of that demonic cultivator''s leg before it broke through to the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and went mad due to therge amount of demonic qi contained inside the little bit of the corpse that it had ended up eating.


    With that in mind, it was clear that this demonic cultivator was far more powerful than Xuan Hao had first expected when learning about what had happened to his little pet. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    After all, this was still the border of the Star Shattering Sect and the strength of the demonic cultivators dying here were only between the Qi Condensation and Domain Lord Realm, with a few True Demon Realm demonic cultivatorsparable to the Soul Ascension Realm dying to the winged lion demon beast every now and then.


    But¡­ From the exnation of the winged lion demon beast, it seemed like the corpse it had eaten from was not the body of a fallen True Demon Realm demonic cultivator that it had killed, but instead the body of a far stronger demonic cultivator.


    Given that only nibbling a bit at the leg of this demonic cultivator had caused the winged lion demon beast to break through to the Second Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm, it was clear that this dead demonic cultivator had been far stronger than any of the demonic cultivators that attempted to enter the Star Shattering Sect''s territory in the past.


    Demon Lord Realm at the very least. Possibly even stronger than that!


    No matter what, Xuan Hao understood that it was important for him to investigate this matter and get to the bottom of it. Especially so because such a powerful demonic cultivator had ended up dying. Leading to the question of who had killed him.


    To kill such a powerful demonic cultivator inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and to do so without leaving any traces of such a battle in the first ce, it was likely that the strength of the person who killed the demonic cultivator far exceeded the demonic cultivator. Leading to a situation where the powerful demonic cultivator had been killed without being able to fight back.


    If it was Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator, that would be understandable and expected to some extent, as a Celestial Immortal from the Blue Sea Empire might have passed through and killed him, but¡­ If the demonic cultivator was above the Demon Lord Realm¡­

 Chapter 1399 Gone...?

    Chapter 1399 Gone...?


    Arriving at the location where the winged lion demon beast had found the dead demonic cultivator that ended up causing it to lose control, Xuan Hao was surprised to discover that the massive body described by the winged lion demon beast was nowhere to be found. All he could see was the impact on the ground where the body should havended in the past along with the residual demonic qi floating around the ce.


    Although this made it difficult for him to determine the strength of the demonic cultivator who had been killed, it was not impossible, and he could at least confirm from this that the person who had killed this demonic cultivator should have returned to take the body with him or her.


    As for why the body had been left around for long enough that the winged lion demon beast could discover and take a bite out of it, Xuan Hao had no idea, but he did guess that it should be because the one who killed the demonic cultivator should have been busy and couldn''t take the dead body immediately. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Unfortunately, there was no way for him to determine whether or not this was the truth, as there were no signs left for him to follow in regard to what had happened to the massive demonic cultivator corpse that the winged lion demon beast had taken a few bites out of.


    The only thing he could do for now was find a ce to sit down before closely examining the traces that had been left behind in an attempt to determine the strength of the demonic cultivator who had died.


    Luckily, this was not that difficult for him to do, as he discovered that the power left behind by the demonic cultivator hadn''t degraded in the slightest bit. Allowing him to determine the strength of the demonic cultivator.


    The problem was¡­ The strength of the demonic cultivator who had ended up falling was definitely above the Demon Lord Realm. Reaching the Demon King Realm, something he could tell with rtive ease given his familiarity with Xuan Gui at the Peak of the Demon Lord Realm and his previous encounter with a Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire. Not to mention the fight between Celestial Immortals and Demon Kings he had witnessed at the border of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Knowing this, Xuan Hao felt uneasy for a very obvious reason, as he began wondering what in the world had happened for a dead Demon King Realm demonic cultivator to suddenly end up inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect. Especially because the war between the cultivators in the core region of the continent and the demonic cultivators didn''t seem to have escted to the extent where the Demon Kings and Celestial Immortals fought to the death like this.


    Even more troubling was the fact that the body had ended up inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect. Indicating that the battle where this demonic cultivator had ended up dying had taken ce not far away from the Star Shattering Sect, yet, he had not sensed anything.


    A Demon King Realm demonic cultivator died without me noticing anything and the one who did it was preupied by something and didn''t immediately take away the body¡­ And I didn''t notice whatever is preupying the killer of this demonic cultivator either¡­


    Lost in thought as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself as he felt that the current situation was far from normal. Difficult to understand, as he should have at least sensed something with his current strength. Even more so considering that his highprehension of the Dao of Space made him far more sensitive to any changes in the space around him. Making him better at sensing a higher level battle that would inevitably affect the stability of space than even someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    "Unless¡­ There is some kind of spatial anomaly of sorts around this ce that spit out the dead body before swallowing it up again during the short period of time between the little lion taking a bite out of it and going crazy and now¡­" Muttering this to himself as he stared towards the indent that had been created in the ground by the body of the demonic cultivator that had now vanished without a trace, Xuan Hao couldn''t think of anything other than some kind of spatial anomaly to exin what had happened.


    Even if there was a chance of an extremely powerful cultivator far beyond anything he had encountered so far taking action to kill this demonic cultivator at the Demon King Realm, he doubted that would be the case, as there would have been no reason for such an existence to leave the body behind for no reason.


    No to mention, the winged lion demon beast had clearly eaten some of it. Lowering the overall value of the body itself.


    If a powerful cultivator had indeed killed off the demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao felt that there would be little to no reason for such an existence to simply ignore the winged lion demon beast going on a rampage.


    Even if it wasn''t out of goodwill, they would at least want to get back what had essentially been stolen from them by the winged lion demon beast who carelessly ate part of the dead demonic cultivator without a second thought.


    But¡­ If it''s a spatial anomaly, what kind of spatial anomaly is it? Is it rted to an ancient secret realm or a mystic realm? Perhaps another ancient battlefield? For me to not have sensed it, it should contain principles far beyond what I understand¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he focused his eyes on the location where the dead body of the demonic cultivator should have been, Xuan Hao could not help himself feeling a bit excited at the prospect of encountering a spatial anomaly beyond his understanding.


    After all, he could tell that the anomaly was limited to a rtively small area and shouldn''t prove too dangerous, while at the same time also understanding that if there was indeed such a spatial anomaly, it contained principles of the Dao of Space far beyond his current realm of understanding.


    No matter what, if he could observe such a spatial anomaly, it would certainly prove fruitful for his ownprehension of the Dao of Space. Possibly even giving him a glimpse of the realm beyond the Large Sess Realm.


    The only problem being that he had no idea when this spatial anomaly would ur, as it could happen in a few seconds or in another thousand years.


    Although he did really want to find an opportunity to observe what he now full believed to be some kind of spatial anomaly, he also understood that he couldn''t waste his time sitting around for hundreds of years for something that he wasn''t even sure would happen.


    "To stay or not¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about the pros and cons of staying around, Xuan Hao ultimately decided to remain at the location where the dead body of the demonic cultivator had disappeared for a few weeks to watch out for the spatial anomaly.


    At the same time also standing in for the winged lion demon beast who returned to the sect to recover and consolidate its cultivation base the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    After all, the current Star Shattering Sect didn''t have a lot of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators at the moment, with rabbit demon beast currently guarding the Iron Sky Kingdom, Yi Min busy helping the cksmiths of the sect and Pei Yang assisting the sect''s alchemists for the uingpetition.


    For the first time in a long time, Xuan Hao officially took on a responsibility inside the sect that he wouldn''t normally take on. Guarding the sect''s border from any demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm, a far more peaceful experience than he had first expected when he decided to do this, as the True Demon Realm demonic cultivator didn''t take long to realize that some kind of terrifying cultivator was currently present at the border of the Star Shattering Sect.


    In turn, it also caused the number of demonic cultivators attacking the Star Shattering Sect to drastically decreasepared to before.


    Although this would have been something good in normal circumstances and for any other empire or kingdom bordering the Frozen Wastnd, it was devasting to the Star Shattering Sect, who at this point primarily relied on the demonic cultivators forbat training of the younger generation.


    As a result, it didn''t take long before Elder Song and Feng Chen heard about this and were forced to take action to ensure that a steady stream of demonic cultivators would flow towards the Star Shattering Sect. In the end causing them to contact Xuan Hao about the problem to try and convince him to leave the border of the sect as fast as possible so as to not scare off the demonic cultivators¡­

 Chapter 1400 Unknown Artifact, Scaring off Demonic Cultivators

    Chapter 1400 Unknown Artifact, Scaring off Demonic Cultivators


    "I''m¡­ Scaring off the demonic cultivators¡­?"


    Having only spent a little over a week at the border between the Star Shattering Sect and the neighboring kingdom bordering the Frozen Wastnd where demonic cultivators came from, Xuan Hao could not help staring at the person standing in front of him with a somewhat surprised look on his face as he said this.


    "Yes! Your presence and the death of two True Demon Realm demonic cultivators has caused the rest of the demonic cultivators to be scared of advancing into our territory. Lowering the number of demonic cultivators avable for practice! If you don''t leave and things continue like this, we will soon have to look for more expensive methods of nurturing the younger generation!


    Nurturing demon beasts for the disciples to fight, allowing them to venture out in the world to experience real life and death battles, ensuring the safety of all these disciples as they leave for experience... All of this is draining to the sect''s resources!


    Using the demonic cultivators that are all in one location and allowing the disciples to experience real life and deathbat, while also giving them a chance to wander around the borders of the sect for experience is far more cost efficient for the sect and drains far less resources."


    Standing in front of him was none other than Feng Chen, who had rushed over after learning about the situation through Elder Song. Wasting no time as he exined how important it was for the demonic cultivators to continue attacking the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although, as he listened to Feng Chen''s exnation, Xuan Hao had a feeling that he had been heavily influenced by Elder Song.


    However, what he said did make sense, as the sect did indeed benefit a lot from the constant and unending attack from the demonic cultivators swarming out from the Frozen Wastnds.


    Whoosh~


    Closing his eyes, Xuan Hao decided to first take a look of the current situation and determine if it was really as bad as what Feng Chen had described to him. Not fully believing that the demonic cultivators would lessen their attack only after he had been around for a little over a week. Killing only two True Demon Realm demonic cultivators.


    After all, it had to be known that the winged lion demon beast had killed far more demonic cultivators in the True Demon Realm than that over the years that it had spent guarding the borders of the sect.


    Of course, there was a longer time between the deaths of these True Demon Realm demonic cultivators and the fights should not have been as one sided as his, but still- The demonic cultivators shouldn''t have retreated so rapidly just because of this¡­


    "No demonic cultivators over here either¡­ Haaa¡­ Where have they all gone? I haven''t seen a single demonic cultivator in over three hours!"


    "Hmph! Still lucky, I haven''t encountered a demonic cultivator the entire day! I had nothing to do and could only wander around the local vige I was in charge of guarding without doing anything¡­"


    "No demonic cultivators. No contribution points. How am I supposed to buy the artifact I promised my senior sister on her birthday like this!?"


    "Gift? I can''t even afford the spiritual herbs for my cultivation¡­"


    "I''m also-"


    "¡­"


    Listening to the conversations between a few disciples who were guarding the border of the sect, Xuan Hao confirmed that there was indeed ack of demonic cultivators. Although, their disappointment in not finding any demonic cultivators was rather surprising. Making him wonder what the sect would do when this stream of demonic cultivators would stop for real.


    Whoosh~


    Of course, he didn''t just intend to check out what the sect''s disciples were up to, but also intended to take a look at what the demonic cultivators were doing and if they were really scared away by him or had been stopped by something entirely different than him.


    "Is it true? The Great True Demon Vasha died?"


    "Yes¡­ He was already close to the Demon Lord Realm, but died so fast and without sound, the other True Demons think a Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire might be residing in the area for some unknown reason and decided toy low for now." n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Really!? How do they know it isn''t just one of them passing through?"


    "One of them has a special artifact that allows him to sense danger and the danger currently at the border is no less than that of Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator!"


    "Wow¡­ So that is why¡­"


    "¡­"


    Listening in on the conversations between the demonic cultivators before finally finding something that allowed him to get a better understanding of the situation and what had caused the demonic cultivators to stop their attack, Xuan Hao could not help silently frowning to himself before trying to find this demonic cultivator with the special artifact that allowed helping in sensing danger.


    However, he was ultimately unable to find this demonic cultivator. Possibly because they had already sensed the danger and decided to hide away before he could find them.


    Haaa¡­ Looks like it is indeed me who is behind the lowered number of demonic cultivators trying to cross the borders¡­


    In the end, Xuan Hao could only smile wryly to himself and agree with what Feng Chen had said about it being him who was behind the lower number of demonic cultivators trying to enter the sect.


    What''s worse, from the looks of things, the situation wouldn''t change unless he left the border due to the mysterious artifact in the hands of one of the True Demon Realm demonic cultivators¡­


    Oh well, I have already waited around for long enough and the little lion has already recovered and stabilized its cultivation base. So, it is about time for me to head back¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while looking towards the ce where the dead body of the demonic cultivator had once beenying on the ground before mysteriously disappearing, Xuan Hao turned around and made his way back towards the sect together with Feng Chen¡­ And much to his and Elder Song''s relief, the demonic cultivators attacks on the sect''s borders soon returned to normal following Xuan Hao left the border.

 Chapter 1401 Demon Kings... Children?

    Chapter 1401 Demon King''s... Children?


    Following his brief stay at the border of the sect''s territory, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about the artifact that one of the True Demon Realm demonic cultivators had used to sense him and in turn avoid him. After all, an artifact capable of doing something like that was definitely at the peak among Transcendent Grade Artifacts. Possibly even surpassing it.


    In turn, it also made him a bit confused as to why none of the other demonic cultivators had made a move to try and seize this powerful artifact given that they clearly knew about its existence and power. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The only reason he could think of behind them not doing something like that was that there was a more powerful demonic cultivator behind the one carrying around the artifact, though, the strength of the one carrying around the artifact should also be strong.


    After all, no matter how intimidating that demonic cultivator''s backing might be, there would always be those who didn''t care about any of this.


    Unable to satiate his curiosity of this specific demonic cultivator and only feeling himself growing more curious about the demonic cultivator in question, Xuan Hao ultimately decided to try and contact Xuan Gui to see if she knew anything about this demonic cultivator¡­


    "An artifact capable of detecting danger¡­ The only artifacts I know about capable of doing something like that are the protective talisman refined by the Great Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds, though¡­ The refinement of those talismans is incredibly difficult and requires the blood and soul of at least three Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators. For a treasure like that to be outside the core, it should be one of the Demon King of the Frozen wastnd''s offspring."


    "Requires the blood and soul of three Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators!? And¡­ Offspring? The Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds has children?" Listening to what Xuan Gui told him, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat shocked expression on his face before asking about the offspring thing. Never having thought that the ruler of the Frozen Wastnds would actually have children, as it didn''t really seem to fit with what he had seen from demonic cultivators so far for them to have children and even take care of them.


    Even more so considering that this care involved refining a protective talisman with the blood and souls of three Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators!


    "It''s not what you are thinking, these children aren''t the same as what you think, they are a backup n created by the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnd. Allowing him to be reborn through these children even if his main body and soul is destroyed.


    This kind of technique is practiced among some of the stronger Demon Kings of the Frozen Wastnds, though it''s hard to cultivate given that the children in question are people selectively cultivated by the Demon Kings over a long period of time¡­ And only in the True Demon Realm can they be used for their original purpose.


    The main problem in this kind of technique is the fact that they will be able to detect the purpose behind their existence when they reach the Demon Lord Realm and given the connection established between them and the Demon King, they will naturally grow in strength without even cultivating. Leaving only a window of a few hundred years or a thousand years in the best-case scenario where they are useful.


    Out of all the Demon Kings in the Frozen Wastnd, only the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds has the ability to cultivate this technique without any problems. Keeping a constant number of bodies avable all across the Frozen Wastnds.


    As of now, the number of such children that I know about is around twenty, with three of them being in the True Demon Realm, those in the True Demon Realm all get a protective talisman, though it''s rarely used and as far as I know, is recycled to another child when the child is about to reach the Demon Lord Realm."


    "This¡­"


    Hearing the origin of the artifact or what he now understood to be a talisman of some sort, Xuan Hao could not help bing even more shocked than before as he learnt about the terrifying methods of the Demon King in control of the Frozen Wastnd.


    Even if you managed to kill his true body and destroyed his soul, he still had several backups scattered all across the Frozen Wastnds that would allow him to reemerge in the future.


    Not just that, but it was also clear that someone taking their survival so seriously would also have several other backup ns to ensure their survival. Not to mention, there would definitely also be some of those children hidden away outside the Frozen Wastnd after they broke through to the True Demon Realm and were deemed suitable.


    However, the fact that there were more than twenty of those children around was more than enough to make Xuan Hao understand that killing the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds wouldn''t be something easy even if he ended up breaking through to the Profound Immortal Realm in the future.


    At the same time, he also understood why those Celestial Immortals from the core region of the continent hadn''t destroyed the Frozen Wastnd, it was simply far too difficult.


    Not to mention, there were more forbidden grounds simr to the Frozen Wastnds where demonic cultivators gathered. Each of them is now attacking the core region of the continent from different directions.


    Although he doubted that all of them had reached the same level as the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnd in terms of their survival ability, he didn''t doubt that they should all have some kind of method or thing that had allowed them to continue staying around.


    As for a demonic cultivator above the Demon King Realm¡­ Xuan Hao and even Xuan Gui had never heard about someone like that before but given that he knew about the existence of a realm like the Profound Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao had a feeling that there should also be a demonic realm equivalent to the Later Stages of the Profound Immortal Realm¡­

 Chapter 1402 A Mission For The Rabbit Demon Beast

    Chapter 1402 A Mission For The Rabbit Demon Beast


    As he finished his conversation with Xuan Gui and managed to figure out what the artifact that had been able to notice his presence was, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit uneasy knowing that one of the bodies prepared by the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds was actually so close the Star Shattering Sect. Understanding that the presence of this demonic cultivator meant that there was the possibility that the strongest existence in the Frozen Wastnd might turn his attention towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although the chance of this was unlikely and this had a higher chance of having something to do with the dead demonic cultivator in the Demon King Realm that the winged lion demon beast had taken a bite out, he also understood that the Star Shattering Sect''s closeness to the location where the body had been located by the winged lion demon beast meant that there was a high chance of the Star Shattering Sect getting caught up in whatever had happened in that location.


    After all, the body had been inside the Star Shattering Sect. Meaning that anyone trying to investigate what had happened to that demonic cultivator would likely turn their attention towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    Normally, if the Star Shattering Sect had just been a power simr to those other kingdoms and smaller empires around it, it would have been fine, as the powerful cultivator or demonic cultivator looking into the situation would have just been able to use their divine sense to check out the situation without anyone noticing, but¡­ The Star Shattering Sect was far stronger than these surrounding powers and had the chaotic qi formation that was more than capable of preventing anyone in the Celestial Immortal Realm or Demon King Realm from seeing what was inside the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Inevitably, this would end up drawing unwanted attention to the Star Shattering Sect and possibly even make the one trying to investigate the situation think that the Star Shattering Sect was somehow involved in what had happened to that Demon King Realm demonic cultivator.


    Even though the Star Shattering Sect had grown stronger over the past few years and Xuan Hao felt confident in his current strength, he also understood that there was no way for the current Star Shattering Sect to face off against someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm or the Demon King Realm.


    At most, the sect could retreat back to the Shattered Star Peaks and hide away inside the chaotic qi formation, but that would essentially destroy all of the work that the sect had put into expanding its territory along with giving up most of the resources that the sect had managed to secure.


    For the future growth of the Star Shattering Sect, there was absolutely no way that Xuan Hao would want something like that to happen, as it would also cause the growth of his disciples to slow down and in turn also slow down his own cultivation speed.


    Not to mention, although the chaotic qi formation had proved that it had the strength to resist against someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm in the past, he had no idea if the formation would be able to endure against a continued attack from someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm or the Demon King Realm¡­ And that was not even considering that even stronger existence at the Profound Immortal Realm and the demonic cultivators equivalent to that realm might get attracted after learning about the situation.


    No¡­ I have to ensure that this doesn''t end up causing any future problems for the sect!


    In the end, by the point that Xuan Hao had returned back to the Eighth Star Peak and was about to continue studying the ancient teleportation formation, he had already resolved himself to figure out and solve the dangerous situation that the sect now unknowingly found itself in.


    The only problem was that the only one who might know about what had happened to the demonic cultivator in the Demon King Realm was rted to the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds and had a way to detect his presence before he even got close to him.


    Not just that, but he was apparently also someone powerful in the True Demon Realm. Making it difficult for the Star Shattering Sect to dispatch anyone at the Soul Ascension Realm to try and take care of the situation in his ce.


    The only ones in the sect that had reached the Soul Ascension Realm were around the earlier stages of the realm and were far from reaching the peak of the realm that this demonic cultivator should beparable to.


    Of course, there was also the fact that his goal wasn''t to kill the demonic cultivator, as that might end up drawing unwanted attention. Instead, it was to try and figure out what that demonic cultivator was up to and figure out a way to get them to leave the borders of the Star Shattering Sect as fast as possible.


    But doing so would require someone not strong enough to pose a threat to the demonic cultivator, but still strong enough to quietly monitor him and his actions¡­


    Wait¡­ Maybe the rabbit demon beast could, do it? With its size, no ordinary True Demon Realm or Soul Ascension Realm cultivator should be able to easily discover it. Not to mention, it should be fast enough to escape even if a Demon Lord shows up. If I lend it a bit of a hand in concealing its presence, it should be possible¡­


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao realized that the rabbit demon beast that had been left to help Yi Min defend her kingdom was the perfect one for the job with a bit of assistance on his side.


    The only problem was that there wouldn''t be anyone to defend the Iron Sky Kingdom while the rabbit demon beast was gone, as Yi Min was still in the Star Shattering Sect helping out the elders of the cksmithing Hall.


    Although, he could defend the kingdom and borders himself¡­


    "Haaa¡­ Looks like building out awork of teleportation formations will have to wait for a bit longer¡­" Shaking his head as he said this to himself while looking back towards the ancient teleportation formation that he had been about to sit down in front of to continue studying, Xuan Hao got up before leaving the Eighth Star Peak. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    First heading towards the Sea of a Thousand Furnaces where Yi min was currently teaching a group of elders and disciples about the Dao of cksmithing before informing her about him taking over the job of guarding the Iron Sky Kingdom before leaving for the Iron Sky Kingdom to pick up the rabbit demon beast and having it take on the little mission of spying on the demonic cultivator.


    Not bothering to exin the reason why to the confused expression on Yi Min''s face, who had no idea why he would suddenly be taking over the protection of the Iron Sky Kingdom and the resources inside the chaotic region of the former Sky Empire linked to the kingdom.


    Considering that it would be best for him to leave as soon as possible, as any time wasted could potentially lead to that demonic cultivator growing interested in the Star Shattering Sect.


    At the very least, he hoped that the demonic cultivator would not associate the strong presence at the borders of the Star Shattering Sect with the Star Shattering Sect and would instead just think of it as someone from the Blue Sea Empire who happened to pass through the area and took a week to check out the situation of demonic cultivators in the area.


    Although it was not likely for something like that to happen, it wasn''t entirely unrealistic considering that the Blue Sea Empire had at this point established a permanent presence in the Onyx Empire right next to the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    Apparently having turned the Onyx Empire into their primary stronghold at the border of the Frozen Wastnd against the influx of demonic cultivators. The reason being that it was in a rtively central position along the Blue Sea Empire''s border with the Frozen Wastnd, while at the same time already having been mostly abandoned by normal mortals due to thest few assaults on the Onyx Empire.


    Well¡­ Most of the mortals didn''t abandon the Onyx Empire so to speak but were instead just devoured or killed by the demonic cultivators when they had flooded into the empire in the past.


    No matter, it still gave the Blue Sea Empire a rtively good area to fight without killing too many mortals in the process, though, that was still for the future, as the Frozen Wastnd didn''t seem too intent on focusing their full strength on taking down the Blue Sea Empire at the moment. Instead being focused on other major empires along their borders.

 Chapter 1403 Rabbit Demon Beast Moves Out

    Chapter 1403 Rabbit Demon Beast Moves Out


    Leaving the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao soon arrived at the Iron Sky Kingdom for the first time in a long time. Finding himself rather surprised at the developments of the kingdom since it had be part of the Star Shattering Sect, as it was obvious at a nce that the formation guarding the kingdom had been upgraded after Yi Min had broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    At the current level of the formation, it wouldn''t be surprising if Yi Min would be able to hold off someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm. Probably even resisting someone at the Earlier Stages of the Dao Seed realm for a period of time. Showing that outside of her Dao of cksmithing improving by a lot since her breakthrough to the Soul Ascension Realm and visit to the Blue Shore Kingdom, her Dao of Formations had also improved by a lot.


    Just from a simple nce, Xuan Hao was certain that she should have at least managed to reach the Elementary Realm in the Dao of Formations- Maybe even the Small Sess Realm.


    But¡­ For now, he didn''t really have time to slowly investigate the formation in ce to protect the Iron Sky Kingdom and instead had to focus his attention on the rabbit demon beast that he almost immediately noticedzing around inside one of therge pces located at the core of the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital city.


    Even from a nce, it was obvious that the rabbit demon beast was enjoying its stay in the Iron Sky Kingdom quite a bit. Even using the human servant that it had recruited to serve it spirit stones and other delicacies that it had found during its stay in the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Looking at the situation outside of the pce where the rabbit demon beast had settled down, Xuan Hao could not help smiling somewhat wryly to himself, as he noticed that the people who should be Yi Min''s subordinates had all retreated far away from the pce where the rabbit demon beast was located and none of them dared to go anywhere close to it.


    The ones in charge of delivering things for the rabbit demon beast to eat were even fighting among themselves for a chance to avoid interacting with the rabbit demon beast.


    Although his first thought was that the rabbit demon beast had done something like beating up these people, thus causing them to fear it and not dare approach it, he soon found out that the reason for them not wanting to get anywhere near the rabbit demon beast was because it would force them to continue gathering spirit stones and other delicacies for it.


    This was not the normal kind where the servant would just leave the pce to request for more food and spirit stones, but was instead the rabbit demon beast deciding to take on these servants as its own people and train them ruthlessly so they could go out into the world to gather spiritual herbs or other delicious things for it to eat.


    At this point in time, there were already more than twenty such people who had been turned into the rabbit demon beast''s people. Now scouring the surroundings for spirit stones and other delicious food to bring back to the rabbit demon beast.


    Learning about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit speechless, as he wondered whether or not the rabbit demon beast really thought of itself as the de facto ruler of the Iron Sky Kingdom, but in the end, there was not much he could do about it, as those people had somehow been convinced to be followers of the rabbit demon beast. Increasing the overall strength of the rabbit demon beast and the number of people under it.


    "Guess it will be quite a shock for it to get send away to spy on some demonic cultivator¡­" Chuckling silently to himself as he turned to nce towards the direction of the rabbit demon beast, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time before barging into the newly constructed throne room that the rabbit demon beast had created for itself while it had been in the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Thump-!


    Squeak!?


    Landing on the marble floor in front of the now shocked rabbit demon beast who didn''t expect its master to suddenly show up in front of it all of a sudden, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat evil smirk as he stared at the panicked and surprised rabbit demon beast.


    "Hehe, you areing with me~!"


    Squeak? Squeeeaaaaak-!


    Whoosh-!


    And before the rabbit demon beast had any time to react, he flew forward and grabbed it before leaving the recently constructed throne room. Not giving it any chance to refuse or fight back, as he used, he drifting cloud steps at their full strength to carry the rabbit demon beast to the border of the Star Shattering Sect where the child of the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds had been located before dropping it off.


    Of course, during the journey thatsted for a few minutes, he made sure to exin its job and what it would be doing. Making sure that it understood the importance of not attacking the demonic cultivator that it was spying on.


    Not because he felt that the rabbit demon beast would in any way be weaker than the True Demon Realm demonic cultivator, but because he understood that the defensive measure put in ce on the True Demon Realm demonic cultivator by the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds would in no way be anything that the rabbit demon beast could deal with.


    Even he himself felt that it would be impossible to deal with whatever security measures that the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds had left on this child of his. Especially so considering that he doubted that the protective talisman was the only thing protecting that demonic cultivator. Believing that there should definitely be something simr to the talismans that he left with his disciples.


    Not to mention, attacking that demonic cultivator would definitely end up drawing unwanted attention to the Star Shattering Sect, something that Xuan Hao wanted to avoid at all costs and also the reason why he ced the rabbit demon beast in charge of spying on the demonic cultivator.


    So, without wasting any time, Xuan Hao turned and left shortly after leaving the rabbit demon beast at the borders of the Star Shattering Sect. Wanting the demonic cultivator to just think a powerful expert from the Blue Sea Empire happened to be passing by. Not something unusual with the current state of things and unlikely to make that demonic cultivator think anything was off.


    ¡­


    Squeak¡­?


    Being suddenly left at the border of the Star Shattering Sect with a mission to spy on a demonic cultivator that it had no idea about and where it was located nor how it looked, the rabbit demon beast could not help tilting its head with a somewhat confused expression on its face, as it began wondering what to do now.


    Although it wanted nothing more than to turn back and return to its little empire and enjoy itself like it had been doing for the past few months, it also understood that there was no way to refuse a mission given by its master. Especially so considering that its master had promised it an extremely generous reward after finishing the mission, something that the rabbit demon beast couldn''t refuse no matter how much it might want to do so and that was¡­ Top Grade Spirit Stones!


    Top Grade Spirit Stones, to demon beasts at the Soul Ascension Realm, were incredibly helpful for growing their strength¡­ And given that the rabbit demon beast had already solidified its cultivation base at the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm with all of the spirit stones and other delicious things it had eaten during its time watching over the Iron Sky Kingdom, these Top Grade Spirit Stones might be enough fort it to break through to the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm and stand at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even if the rabbit demon beast had slowly settled into a ratherzy daily life since being put in charge of guarding the Iron Sky Kingdom, its ultimate goal for doing so was still for it to continue growing its strength.


    If not for the generous reward that it had been offered in return for helping guard the Iron Sky Kingdom, there was no way it would do so no matter how it was pampered by the servants of the pce.


    Squeak!


    With that in mind, the rabbit demon beast showed a determined expression on its face before it jumped forward in the direction of the Frozen Wastnds.


    Even knowing the possible danger involved, it still wanted to do it for the rewards. Not to mention, it felt confident in escaping if something went wrong. After all, its opponent was only someone in the True Demon Realm.


    Even if it was someone in the Demon Lord Realm, the rabbit demon beast felt that it would be able to escape from them with its speed!

 Chapter 1404 A... More Difficult Mission...

    Chapter 1404 A... More Difficult Mission...


    Wasting no time after its master left, the rabbit demon beast instantly moved towards the Frozen Wastnds at a shocking speed that would even give someone in the Dao Seed Realm a hard time catching up to.


    To ensure that it remained hidden even when going at such a fast speed as it was important for it to remain hidden while investigating the demonic cultivator, the rabbit demon beast made sure to move along the ground instead of flying through the air. Making it far harder to spot for any passing demonic cultivators.


    In case, even if it ended up being spotted, most people would just think of it as a random demon beast passing through, likely underestimating its strength due to its small size.


    In a way, it was also because of this that Xuan Hao had decided to have the rabbit demon beast be the one to secretly find and investigate the demonic cultivator rted to the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds.


    All things considered; the rabbit demon beast encountered no problems as it managed to smoothly pass through arge number of demonic cultivators before entering the Frozen Wastnds undetected. Even moving past several True Demon Realm demonic cultivators who had begun returning after Xuan Hao had left the border area.


    The only problem that it encountered after it entered the Frozen Wastnds, was the fact that it had no idea how it would find the demonic cultivator that its master wanted it to investigate.


    In the end, the rabbit demon beast could only settle down and act like a normal snow rabbit demon beast that was among the mostmon demon beasts in the Frozen Wastnds, as it silently listened in to conversations between the demonic cultivators. Hoping to find out anything about this special demonic cultivator that its master wanted it to investigate.


    At least in that regard, it was rtively lucky, as the snow rabbit demon beasts were too weak to interest any of the demonic cultivators and together with the fact that most demonic cultivator seemed to just ignore them no matter how close they got, the rabbit demon beast could easily approach the demonic cultivators and listen in on their conversations without being discovered.


    However, it soon turned out that it was far more difficult to locate the demonic cultivator its master wanted it to find and investigate, as the other party seemed to be a mystery even among the True Demon Realm demonic cultivators present.


    Giving the rabbit demon beast hard time, as it had to analyze any information about this demonic cultivator and try to pinpoint the location of the demonic cultivator in question, something incredibly difficult considering that this demonic cultivator seemed to be constantly moving around.


    Even without the other party knowing about the rabbit demon beast secretly searching for it, it seemed like the other party was already doing their best to hide their movements. Making the already difficult task even harder. Forcing the rabbit demon beast to slow down what it had originally perceived to be a simple task that could be finished in a few days and take it more seriously.


    From the looks of things, the rabbit demon beast realized that the task given by its master was far more difficult than it had first thought after learning that it had to secretly investigate a demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm.


    After all, in the eye of the current rabbit demon beast, a demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm wasn''t that impressive, as it felt confident in winning against any demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm with its current strength.


    Even if the task was just an investigation, it had felt extremely confident in being able to finish everything up in a few days'' time before returning to the Iron Sky Kingdom for its reward.


    However, things had turned out to be far more difficult than it had first expected, causing it to somewhat regret not asking its master for more when it had heard about the Top Grade Spirit Stones it would be rewarded forpleting the mission.


    Indeed¡­ It wasn''t that easy for it to get its hands on Top Grade Spirit Stones.


    ¡­


    At the same time that the rabbit demon beast was starting to regret not asking its master for more spirit stones before he had left, the master in question was sitting down inside the now empty pce at the center of the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital city.


    "The rabbit demon beast should have reached the Frozen Wastnds and started trying to find that demonic cultivator at this point in time¡­"


    Looking off in the direction of the Frozen Wastnds as he muttered this to himself while praying for the rabbit demon beast''s sess in being able to find out more about the demonic cultivator and what he might be up to. Especially so considering that this was likely something that would involve the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds. The most powerful existence in the Frozen Wastnds ording to what he knew about the ce at the moment.


    Of course, though the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds was the most powerful existence he knew about inside the Frozen Wastnds, Xuan Hao didn''t honestly believe him to be the most terrifying existence in the Frozen Wastnds, as he still remembered that the location of one of the four ancient seals was still inside the Frozen Wastnds.


    If that seal was undone, it was likely that the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds would no longer be the strongest existence in the Frozen Wastnds, though, it hopefully wouldn''t turn out like that if he could find a way to strengthen the seal and ensure that the existence sealed inside wouldn''t get a chance to escape.


    "Hopefully, those people from the Fallen Immortal Archipgo can show up and solve this situation for me when the timees. All I need to do is strengthen the seals so they willst until they show up and hopefully rebuilds those seals¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about the four ancient seals that sealed some kind of terrifying ancient existence, Xuan Hao could not help feeling an unbearable burden on his shoulders.


    Understanding that if those seals were really undone, the first to suffer would likely be the Star Shattering Sect given how close it was to the four seals, with one of themtterly being below the ruins of the former Raging me Sect, a very short distance away from the Shattered Star Peaks.


    The confidence he had in those unknown people from the Fallen Immortal Archipgo being able to solve the situation of the seal and ensure that it wouldn''t break wasn''t so much because he trusted them, but more so because he understood that he stood little chance of being able to repair the ancient seals on his own in the time he had left before they broke.


    The most he felt confident in being able to do in that time would be to strengthen those ancient seals so they couldst until those people appeared.


    Of course, that was also under the prerequisite that they arrived at time. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    If they didn''t show up¡­ He would really have to try and think of some more radical solutions to the problems of the ancient seals. Especially considering that the seal he could interact with, and repair were limited to two at the moment.


    The ancient seal in the Frozen Wastnds and the ancient seal inside the whirlpool were not something he could interact with at his current realm, as the one in the Frozen Wastnds was impossible for him to find with the current war taking ce, while the one in the red whirlpool required him to directly enter the seal itself.


    Although it wasn''t really entering the seal and it should only be a small fragment of the thing sealed inside the ancient seal inside the space of the red whirlpool, it was simply far too much for him to handle at the moment.


    Even breaking through to the Profound Immortal Realm, he doubted that he would be able to face off against such an existence¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao slowly turned his attention towards a small room located at the core of the pce that the rabbit demon beast had ignored during its stay.


    The small room in question was Yi Min''s cultivation room, but more importantly, it was also the core of the formation that guarded the entire Iron Sky Kingdom!


    Knowing this and already having wanted to personally check out this formation and hopefully gain some insights into the Dao of Formations in the process, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he directly entered the room to study the formation. Hoping that he would be able to use the improvements and insight he gained to create a proper teleportation formation in the future when he got back to the sect.

 Chapter 1405 Escape Plan! News Spreads...

    Chapter 1405 Escape n! News Spreads...


    At the same time Xuan Hao began studying the formation guarding the Iron Sky Kingdom, a pale looking young man at the edge of the Frozen Wastnds could not help frowning as he looked down towards a blood red talisman currently emitting an eerie blood colored light in the palm of his hand.


    "Second level danger, someone in the Soul Ascension Realm appeared along the borders and it''s not the usual one from that demon beast, but a stronger one." Muttering this to himself as he stared down at the talisman, the young man continued frowning while an uncertain glimpse shed through his eyes.


    Is it perhaps rted to that terrifying Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator from earlier? Maybe this Soul Ascension Realm cultivator was dispatched here because they noticed the increasing number of True Demon Realm demonic cultivators gathering along the borders here?


    As the young man thought about this to himself, he could not help feeling a bit more reassured. Not so much because there was now a stronger Soul Ascension realm cultivator around to guard the border, but more so because it would mean that the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator didn''t show up for him.


    If the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator really dide for him after learning about his presence in the area, he would not have any way to escape with his current strength. Even if he had countless safety talismans and other things to keep himself safe, it would at most be able to deal with someone in the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm).


    The best he could do against someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, would be dy them for a few seconds and hope that a nearby Demon King discovered what was happening in time, though¡­ That was highly unlikely considering his special identity as one of the children nurtured by the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds.


    Although he had no idea why this was the case given that those Demon Kings would normally be extremely respectful towards his father without a hint of displeasure, he clearly knew that none of them seemed to care the slightest bit about him and his siblings.


    Even causing him to suspect that those traitorous Demon Kings were behind the disappearance of his older siblings, who suspiciously always ended up dead or missing after reaching the Demon Lord Realm or being close to reaching the Demon Lord Realm, it was clear that they didn''t want to see his father get a proper sessor. Doing their best to eliminate all of his siblings to prevent his father from gaining more control over the Frozen Wastnds when they got older and strong enough to rece those traitorous Demon Kings! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Good thing I managed to see through this before I reached the Peak of the True Demon Realm and escaped to the border of the Frozen Wastnds where those Demon Kings influence is severely weakened. Allowing me to move around without worrying about them showing up and killing me at any moment.


    Narrowing both his eyes as somewhat proud smile grazed the lips of the pale young man standing alone in the middle of a snow-covered valley close to the borders of the Star Shattering Sect, he didn''t continue lingering around in the same location for long before leaving the ce. Understanding that his opponents were far more formidable than himself and would undoubtedly track down his location with their people if he remained in the same location for too long.


    One example of this was the rumor that had recently spread among the demonic cultivators at the borders close to where he was, as he had not spread the rumors about what he had discovered through his father''s protective talisman.


    Instead, it was one of those spies from the traitorous Demon Kings, who had managed to sneak up close to him when he had been shocked by the appearance of the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator that had remained at the border without moving. Taking advantage of his shock to get close to him before escaping the next second to spread the information.


    Not just that, but when that Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator had disappeared, he had once again been caught off guard by one of those traitorous spies, causing that information to start spreading among the demonic cultivators as well. Soon enough, causing the demonic cultivators to resume their attack on the territories outside the Frozen Wastnds without a single ounce of hesitation.


    From a nce, it felt obvious to him that these powerful Demon Kings were secretly mocking him at his foolishness of thinking he could escape from their grasp, but the pale young man was not one to throw in the towel just because of something like. Instead, it only made him more certain that he would have to find a way to escape and ensure his own life so he coulde back stronger to support his father and ensure that no more of his siblings would have to die.


    Father¡­ I will definitely seed in escaping. Although I might be gone for a long time, I will make sure toe back strong enough to lend you a hand in suppressing those despicable Demon Kings!


    Filled with a sense of righteousness highly unusual for a demonic cultivator, the pale young man smiled briefly before continuing to sneakily move around the borders of the Frozen Wastnds in preparation for his grand escape from the Frozen Wastnds.


    After all, even if crossing the borders of the Frozen Wastnds was something simple and also something he had done in the past, he understood that if he moved too far away from the Frozen Wastnds, one of those Demon Kings would always appear before him and throw him right back into the Frozen Wastnds.


    Although none of them dared to directly kill him out of fear of his father''s retaliation, he also understood that this meant he wouldn''t be able to leave the Frozen Wastnds under normal circumstance, thus resulting in his current situation where he was nning to leave the Frozen Wastnd in another way that would make it impossible for those Demon Kings to chase after him.


    ¡­


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, everything was proceeding smoothly, as the sect began moving all of its focus towards the uingpetition of the sect''s cksmith Elders and Alchemist Elders.


    Even if thepetition itself was still a little under a year away from actually taking ce, it didn''t stop the disciples of the sect from bing more interested in the two professions known as cksmithing and alchemy with information about thepetition spreading throughout the sect.


    At the same time, it was not only the disciples of the Star Shattering Sect who learnt about thepetition that would take ce, but also the disciples and elders from the different independent sects, who would sometime get a chance to visit the Shattered Star Peaks for cultivation or official business.


    As a result of this, news of thepetition that would take ce soon spread outside the Star Shattering Sect and the independent sects under it, causing most of the subordinate powers inside the Star Shattering Sect''s territory to learn about the uingpetition.


    Following this, it was not just the alchemist and cksmiths of the Star Shattering Sect who were interested in thepetition, but also cksmiths and alchemists from the different powers under the Star Shattering Sect, who were interested in the uingpetition- Some even showing a clear interest in joining thepetition to the elders of the Star Shattering Sect that they encountered.


    In the end, as even wandering alchemist and cksmiths began gathering towards the Falling Star City to learn more about thispetition after rumors about the generous rewards spread, Feng Chen, Elder Song and the rest of the elders who were behind thepetition were forced to reconsider how they went about thepetition.


    Not just because it had gathered a lot of interest from the different powers inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, but also because it was clear that this was no longer just a matter of giving the elders of the sect a chance to prove themselves in front of the younger generation. No. It was now a matter of the sect''s reputation and standing in the eyes of the different powers under it.


    If handled well, this could be an opportunity to show off and exert the dominance of the Star Shattering Sect when it came to the strength of their cksmiths and alchemists.


    Although¡­ If handled badly, it could negatively affect the Star Shattering Sect and its reputation.


    Knowing this, Feng Chen, Elder Song and the rest were forced to take this matter extremely seriously, as they discussed it for days on end. Weighing the pros and cons of expanding the scale of thepetition to being something outside the sect itself.


    Ultimately, they ended up deciding that it was far too good an opportunity to give up on. Resulting in the location of thepetition being changed from the Shattered Star Peaks to the Falling Star City where anyone coulde and watch thepetition take ce.


    Not just that, but those who could join thepetition were no longer just limited to the elders of the Star Shattering Sect, but instead became open to anyone who wanted to join thepetition. The only requirement being that they were below the Grandmaster Realm to ensure any hidden experts that might be passing through didn''t end uppletely steamrolling thepetition.


    At the same time, to ensure that the Star Shattering Sect would properly stand out and show how great it was when it came to the aspects of cksmithing and alchemy, Feng Chen and Elder Song worked together to convince Pei Yang and Yi Min to respectively act as judges for the alchemy and cksmithing part of the tournament.


    Not forgetting the importance of showing off young talent that showed the bright future of the sect, the two shamelessly decided to take advantage of Xuan Hao''s absence from the sect to get both Bai Ning and Qing Yi to join thepetition as promising young elders of the sect.


    Although Qing Yi might not be at the same level as Bai Ning, she was still a genius in her own right and had surpassed most of the elders of the sect at this point in time. Serving as a great example of showing off the sect''s younger talent in the eyes of both Feng Chen and Elder Song.


    Soon enough, the news of this change to thepetition and the fact that anyone who wanted to join could join, caused arge number of people to flock to the Falling Star City in anticipation of the uingpetition.


    Even though there was still around a year before the start of thepetition, to most cultivators, a year was not a long period of time and most of the people rushing to the Falling Star City intended to spend this time taking a look around the main city of the Star Shattering Sect and the few remarkable locations, like the Third Star Peak, that was located close to the Falling Star City.


    Those not interested in that kind of thing would just enter secluded cultivation while waiting for the year to pass andpetition to begin. Nothing out of the ordinary, as most of the people showing up so early for thepetition were elders in the Nascent Soul Realm or above.

 Chapter 1406 Leaving Seclusion

    Chapter 1406 Leaving Seclusion


    As the excitement for the uingpetition had begun to spread throughout the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, causing both established powers and wandering cultivators to gather towards the Falling Star City. At the edge of the neutral territory between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire, Chu Yang cautiously poked his head out of the small cave he had hidden himself inside of to stabilize his cultivation base after directly having broken through from the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to the Peak of the Fifth Stage.


    Although he had expected it to at least take him a week to stabilize his cultivation base given just how much his strength had improved, it ultimately ended up taking longer than that. Forcing him to remain hidden inside the small cave to ensure that he wouldn''t end up encountering any problems in the future because of an unstable foundation.


    During this period of time, he had several close calls with demon beasts or cultivators who roamed the edges of the mountains. Only managing to avoid detection because their cultivation was too low to notice him without specifically looking for him.


    The only time where he had been close to being discovered was when the people, he had originally been secretly following behind inside the mysterious secret realm emerged from the cave he had firste out of after leaving the mysterious secret realm.


    Luckily, it seemed like those people were far too upied by getting as far away from the mountain range as possible to notice him, as they had run straight past him. Heading directly for the city located a short distance from his current location.


    If that Soul Ascension Realm cultivator had even paid a little bit of attention, it would have been over for him, as he had absolutely no way to hide himself from someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Of course, there was a chance that the other party would just ignore him, but considering how the people from his family had been acting when routing up people to serve as meat shields while exploring the secret realm, he doubted that the other party would do something like that. Especially considering that someone in the Domain Lord Realm would normally carry arge number of treasures on them.


    Even though the other party was someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, there was no way that anyone could say no to what were essentially free treasures given their difference in strength.


    "But that was the past¡­ Now that my strength has stabilized, it''s finally time for me to check out that city." Muttering this to himself while remembering how fearful he had felt when that Soul Ascension Realm cultivator had moved past him, Chu Yang didn''t waste much more time at the entrance of the cave before starting his journey towards the small city he had seen located close to the edge of the mountain range a few weeks earlier.


    Although he had no idea how safe that city might be considering that it was also rted to the one on the other side of the mountain range that he had a less-than-optimal experience inside of, he at least believed that he wouldn''t suddenly end up getting attacked the moment he stepped into the city.


    The only thing he had to do before entering that city was ensure that his somewhat wed disguise was fixed up, as it had been damaged and worn off during thest few weeks.


    Even if it might not be that useful, it would at least make so people would have to take a second nce at him to discover that something was wrong. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not to mention, even if they discovered that he was hiding his identity, this wasn''t something unusual inside the chaotic neutral region, as there were a lot of people who hade there escaping from something either in the Blue Sea Empire or the Wei Empire. Not wanting their identity to be revealed and their enemiesing after them.


    Of course, there was at least some requirements in strength when it came to being someone who had escaped from trouble in one of the bordering empires, but that strength requirement was generally around the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm to Earlier Stages of the Domain Lord Realm as far as he knew.


    The main reason for the strength requirements being that anyone weaker than that simply wouldn''t be able to travel to the neutral region from one of these empires. The distance was too far to traverse and dangerous.


    Only someone close to the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm would be able to safely travel in and out of an empire like the Blue Sea Empire without encountering any problems along the way¡­


    Arriving at the entrance to the small city he had spotted from afar, Chu Yang didn''t take long to realize that this ''small'' city was in no way small. Instead, it was a massive city farrger than even the Falling Star City.


    It wasn''t that he had failed to see such a massive city from afar, but instead because the city itself was mostly located below the surface with the walls of the city circling around a massive hole in the ground only visible after stepping inside the city. The hole in question being where most of the city was located, as shops and other buildings were precariously built on top ofrge wooden bridges spanning across the hole several thousand meters down.


    Not just that, but there was also arge number of buildings built into the rocky sides of the hole itself. Especially so around the area where therge wooden bridges connected to the sides of the hole.


    Put together with the countless smaller wooden bridges and hanging bridges that had been constructed to connect the different buildings and make them easily essible to those below the Domain Lord Realm, the city located inside the hole turned into a seemingly endless maze that would be difficult for even locals to navigate.


    "Even though I learnt about the existence of a city on the other side of the mountain range, I never expected it to be so massive¡­" Muttering this to himself as he leaned over the side of the massive hole that most of the city was located inside, Chu Yang could not help feeling a deep sense of shock.


    By far, this was thergest and most unique city he had encountered to date!


    Outside of that, he could also clearly sense that the strength of the people moving around inside the city itself was in no way weak. Already sensing at least, a dozen or so Domain Lord Realm cultivators and two people in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    This level of strength was more than enough to make this city stand out even in the chaotic neutral territory. Especially so considering that this should only be the surface level of this city''s strength, as he didn''t dare spread his divine sense to investigate its true strength. Having sensed those powerful cultivators only because those people didn''t bother hiding their strength in the slightest.


    Even more surprising to Chu Yang was the fact that the everyone inside the city itself was a cultivator, with most people being in the Foundation Establishment or Core Formation Realm and only children being in the Qi Condensation Realm or below.


    This is indeed the core region of the continent; cultivation is far easier here. Allowing anyone to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm with little effort¡­


    Seeing the clear difference in cultivation whenparing even the weakest people inside the city to those outside the core region of the continent, Chu Yang could not help understanding how the core region of the continent had managed to be viewed as the holynd for anyone seeking to advance their cultivation.


    No matter which power, everyone would eventually move to the core region when they became strong enough to take advantage of the abundant qi between heaven and earth along with the countless natural resources that also existed there.


    A pity¡­ Even though the ce is far better for cultivationpared to anywhere back in old Sky Empire, ites nowhere close to the Shattered Star Peaks¡­


    Even then, Chu Yang had personally spent his time cultivating in the rich environment created by the chaotic qi formation. So, in the end, the abundant qi that would normally end up swaying most cultivators to stay after entering the core region didn''t have any effect on him.


    Instead of that, Chu Yang felt far more curious about the hole that the city was located inside of. Wondering where it hade from and how it was connected to the city itself.


    That''s it! Now that I''m finally in the core region of the continent, I should use it to train and investigating the giant hole seems like a great first adventure, while also being a good chance for me to learn more about the neutral territory in the process!


    And so, Chu Yang set off to explore the giant hole and the city inside of it as his first objective after stepping into the core region.

 Chapter 1407 Deep Pit City

    Chapter 1407 Deep Pit City


    Wandering around inside the massive city filled with curiosity, Chu Yang soon found himself standing in front of a branch of the Explorer Unionrger than any branch he had seen before. Even after entering the core region of the continent, it seemed like the Explorer Union was difficult to avoid, as they seemed to be present everywhere.


    Although,pared to other branches he had seen in the past, this branch was clearly different¡­ And walking into the branch, he quickly discovered why, as the inside not only contained the standard areas for trading, missions and registering, but also had half of its interior changed into what looked like some kind of research facility that was open to the public. Allowing him to see that there were arge number of people busing themselves studying severalrge ancient stones covered in what he could only guess to be some kind of ancientnguage.


    Asking around a bit inside of the Explorer Union branch to try and find out more about this rather strange new addition to the Explorer Union, it didn''t take long before he was told that they were studying the ancientnguage that had been inscribed on the ancient stones.


    The stones themselves originated from a ruin that was located below the city itself and was also the main reason why such arge branch had been established by the Explorer Union.


    Apparently, the ancient stones with ancientnguage inscribed into them were incredibly valuable in the eyes of the Explorer Union and were bought by them for a high price. Resulting in an influx of peopleing to explore the ruins at the bottom of the hole in the past to get their hands on the ancient stones.


    In the end, this was what had caused the city to grow to its current size, while also earning it the name of Deep Pit City, a simple name that highlighted the importance of the deep hole or pit that the city itself was built inside of.


    However, when asking around about the ruins that were located below the city, Chu Yang didn''t manage to learn anything other than the fact that it was an extremely dangerous ce that had even imed the lives of several Soul Ascension Realm cultivators in the past, while at the same time preventing anyone above the Soul Ascension Realm from entering the ruins.


    In a sense, it was also because of this that the ruins were still around and the Deep Pit City still at a level that few cities in the entire neutral region could reach.


    I really want to take a look at those ruins now¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he finished learning everything, he could about the origin story of the Deep Pit City and the ruins located beneath the city, Chu Yang didn''t waste much time standing around inside the Explorer Union before leaving and heading down towards the ruins to take a look himself.


    Although the ruins were extremely dangerous and had even imed the lives of several Soul Ascension Realm cultivators in the past, the danger was limited to those entering the ruins. Standing outside the ruins and observing them without entering was safe to do.


    If not, there would have been no way for such arge city to have been established directly above the ruins without encountering any problems.


    ¡­


    "So, these are the ruins below the Deep Pit City? Less impressive than I expected¡­" Arriving at the bottom of the hole that the Deep Pit City was built inside of, Chu Yang could not help muttering this to himself in somewhat disappointed voice as he looked at the ruins that were supposedly behind the growth and continued sess of the Deep Pit City.


    The reason itself being rather simple, as the ruins were only a small gathering of around five or so ancient buildings barely standing at the bottom of the hole.


    Even though he didn''t doubt the danger or treasures inside those ruins considering that there was no reason for the few people in the Explorer Union to lie about something like that, he could not help wondering how those few ruins were behind the prosperity of the city above. Especially considering the few descriptions of the ruins he had heard described something much grander than the few lone buildings in front of him.


    "First time at the ruins? Hehe, this reaction is always the same." Just at this moment, a feminine voice suddenly called out to him from behind, causing him to spin around with a surprised look on his face. Not having sensed the other party approaching him.


    Turning around to see a middle-aged woman with a slight smile on her face, Chu Yang quickly calmed down as he also clearly sensed that the other part was only in the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Although her concealment methods were incredibly impressive, she wasn''t strong enough to pose a threat to him even if he was caught off guard.


    Not to mention, it seemed that the woman hadn''t approached him with hostile intentions, or she would have likely already taken the opportunity to ambush him instead of calling out to him.


    Then again, he couldn''t let his guard down just because of this, as there was still a chance that she didn''t make a move due to how close they were to the Deep Pit City.


    After all, even though there weren''t anyone saying not to fight inside or around the city itself, it was still clear that doing so might cause one of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators inside the city to make attack to prevent the city from being affected by a battle.


    "Who might you be?" Shaking his head as he threw these thoughts to the back of his head for now, Chu Yang instead focused his attention back on the woman who had approached him. Curious about why she had decided to approach him. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "A seasoned explorer of this ce if I do say so myself and don''t take this the wrong way, but my reason for approaching you is to give you a friendly reminder that the ruins in front of you are not the true ruins, but instead just an entrance to them. Inside all five of those buildings, there are functioning teleportation formations linked to the ancient ruins." Saying this, the woman suddenly began point towards the different buildings. "The teleportation formation in that one broke down a few hundred years ago, those two lead to the core part of the ancient ruins and are also the ones those now dead Soul Ascension Realm cultivators went through in the past, while the other two are considered safe for people like us to go through."


    Listening to the words of the woman who had suddenly approached him, Chu Yang could not help showing a look of understanding on his face, as he realized why there were so few ruins at the bottom of the hole.


    But after this realization, he couldn''t help looking back towards the woman who had helped him out. Wondering why she had decided to lend him a hand for seemingly no reason.


    After all, what she had told him was no short of being lifesaving advice considering that he might have identally ended up going through one of the more dangerous teleportation formations and found himself in a ce that even someone in the Soul Ascension Realm would find hard to survive in.


    "What is it you want¡­?" For this reason, Chu Yang decided to just be straight forward as he directly asked her. Not wanting to waste time with meaningless chatter.


    "Hehe~ Well, now that you do mention it, I did have something I wanted to ask about¡­ Using the ancient teleportation formations isn''t entirely free and requires twenty high grade spirit stones. Considering that more than one person can use the teleportation formations at the same time, I was wondering if we could take one together a split the cost. After all, twenty high grade spirit stones are a rather steep price to pay for using a single teleportation formation. Not to mention, it cost the same to go back through the teleportation formation¡­"


    "That''s it? Sure, we can go together."


    Hearing that she just wanted to save a few spirit stones on entering the ancient ruins, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit relived as he nodded his head in approval without a second thought. Agreeing to cover half the spirt stones required to activate the ancient teleportation formation.


    The reason why he decided to enter the ancient ruins now instead of just looking at them like he had first decided to do was rather simple, as he could also use this trip to ensure the safety of the teleportation formation, as he doubted that woman would enter a dangerous teleportation formation willingly.


    Not to mention, twenty high grade spirit stones were indeed a rather high price for normal Domain Lord Realm cultivators. Even if Domain Lord Realm cultivators in the core region might have more spirit stones, twenty high grade spirit stones should still be valuable.


    "Great! Let''s get going then!"


    Seeing that he agreed, the woman smiled happily as she wasted no time in rushing towards one of the two ancient teleportation formations leading to safer part of the ancient ruins. Taking out ten high grade spirt stones before cing them inside an ancient teleportation formation.


    Whoosh~


    Noticing nothing out of the ordinary and sensing nothing dangerous during the entire process, Chu Yang cautiously followed behind her before simrly taking out ten high grade spirit stones before cing them inside the teleportation formation, causing it to light up for a brief moment as a spatial power swept over both of them and teleported them away the next moment.

 Chapter 1408 Wild Beast Tamer

    Chapter 1408 Wild Beast Tamer


    As the spatial power swept over both of them and swallowed them up the next second, Chu Yang focused his full attention on keeping an eye out for any unexpected situations when he arrived at the other end of the teleportation formation.


    After all, no matter how much he might believe that the Domain Lord Realm cultivator wouldn''t attack him, there was still a chance that the two of them would run into a dangerous situation after passing through the teleportation formation. Especially considering that the ruins on the other side were considered dangerous even to someone in the Soul Ascension realm.


    Although she had told him that the location they were moving towards wasn''t the same as the one those Soul Ascension Realm cultivators had died at, it didn''t mean that they wouldn''t end up encountering a simrly dangerous situation after getting to the other side of the teleportation formation.


    No matter what, to ensure his own safety and nothing ended up happening, he had to be on guard against any kind of unexpected situation that might take ce after passing through the ancient teleportation formation-


    "Huh?"


    However, even after being prepared for all kinds of unexpected and dangerous situations that he might end up encountering on the other side, he was still leftpletely speechless after he came to and found himself on the other side.


    "Wha-!? What is this!?"


    Even the Domain Lord Realm cultivator who had been travelling along with him was taken aback and couldn''t stop herself from eximing in a somewhat surprised voice, as the two of them both stared directly towards a group of physically active mole like demon beast currently in the process of creating the next generation of mole like demon beast. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    If that was just the case, it wouldn''t have been that shocking. Instead, the main thing that caused both Chu Yang and the woman in the Domain Lord Realm to be so taken aback, was the fact that there was another cultivator present intently watching the mole demon beast with an eerie smile on his face while muttering something intangible to himself.


    "Huh!? Ah¡­" Suddenly jumping up in surprise in response to the two voices sounding out behind him, the cultivator watching the two mole-like demon beasts rapidly turned around with a somewhat panicked look like he had been caught doing something he shouldn''t have.


    "This¡­ A beast tamer!"


    Seeing the person after he turned around, the woman standing beside Chu Yang instantly seemed to recognize the other party as she called out in a both shocked and disgusted voice.


    Beast tamer? Don''t tell me¡­ This guy is trying to nurture demon beasts in the wild¡­?


    Hearing the exmation of the woman next to him along with seeing how the man seemed to be doing something with the two-demon beast mating with each other, Chu Yang quickly put two and two together, as he realized that this person in front of them was a beast tamer currently in the process of trying to nurture some new demon beasts¡­ And after a casual look over the state of the two demon beasts who continued doing what they had been doing when they first passed through the teleportation formation, it was clear that they had been affected by some kind of drug¡­


    All of a sudden, Chu Yang understood the disgusted expression on the face of the woman beside him, as it seemed like the beast tamers outside the Star Shattering Sect also seemed to have some kind of problems. Doing this kind of thing out in the open without any care for who might happen to pass by and witness it.


    Although¡­ Whenpared to the beast tamers of the Star Shattering Sect, this wild beast tamer seemed to be worse, as he even resorted to harming innocent wild demon beasts.


    Just looking at the two demon beasts who had been affected by this malicious wild beast tamer, they were only at the Earlier Stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm. Essentially harmless in the core region of the continent, yet still ended up being targeted by the malicious wild beast tamer.


    "This¡­ It''s not what it looks like! These two demon beasts have a rare bloodline, and I just wanted to try and merge it to create a powerful demon beast! I swear, I''m not someone weird!"


    ""¡­""


    "Let''s go somewhere different, the area around a thousand meters around the teleportation formation is rtively safe with only weaker demon beasts around."


    "Sure¡­"


    After a short silence and a few weird looks towards the wild demon beast tamer who tried his best to justify what he was doing to the two poor demon beasts, Chu Yang and the female cultivator came to simr conclusion as both of them moved away from the scene together, neither of them wanting to get involved with this wild demon beast tamer.


    "This¡­"


    Leaving behind the person in question to stare in the direction that the two of them left with a somewhat nervous expression on his face. Clearly, he did not want anything about what had just happened to leak to the outside world, as his reputation could easily be destroyed by something like that if others learnt about what he had done to those two weak demon beasts.


    Although he wasn''t sure that the two people just now had recognized him and might have misunderstood him as some kind of wild beast tamer conducting some sort of malicious demon beast nurturing experiment, he really didn''t want to run the risk of this actually leaking outside.


    In the first ce, he had chosen to do this little nurturing of his precisely inside the ruins because he understood that there were few people entering the ruins at this moment in time. Making it a rtively safe ce for him to conduct his little experiment of trying to merge the bloodline of those two demon beasts together.


    The entire thing would only take a few minutes to conclude, but someone had actually shown up just when everything had been about to conclude. Rendering his precious ns of hiding what he was doingpletely useless if those two people ended up spreading the information through the Deep Pit City.


    At first, it even made him want to kill the two people, as this would be the best way to ensure that the information wouldn''t leak out, but after a quick examination of the two people''s strength, he quickly realized that this would bepletely helpless endeavor given that the two people were both in the Middle Stages of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although he himself could be considered to have reached the Late Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and was rather confident in his own strength, he had ultimately only just reached the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and was still far from being capable of handling two Domain Lord Realm cultivators at the Middle Stage of the Realm.


    This was even more so the case considering that the other party didn''t have to fight him to the death and could simply just escape in case they couldn''t match him. At which point it would almost be guaranteed that he made an enemy of these two and caused them to spread the information of what they had witnessed in the Deep Pit City.


    After all, if they became his enemies, they would definitely also end up investigating his background in the Deep Pit City, something he had to try and avoid at all costs in case these two people were still unfamiliar with him!


    Whoosh~!


    "W-wait up fellow cultivators! I''m sure that both of you have some questions that I''m more than willing to answer! I-I will also give both of you a few gifts if you are willing to listen to this old man!"


    In the end, because of this and knowing that he could under no circumstances allow what had just happened to leak outside, the man quickly grabbed the two demon beasts who had finished up their little battle before chasing after Chu Yang and the female cultivator while calling out to the two of them.


    Making sure to also mention gifts so the two of them understood that he wanted to have a friendly conversation with the two of them and didn''t have any ill intentions against them.


    What does this wild beast tamer want? Is he perhaps embarrassed about being seen nursing demon beast with such a disgusting method¡­?


    Thinking this to themselves upon hearing the wild demon beast cultivator calling out to the two of them, Chu Yang and the female cultivator both looked at each other with a somewhat suspicious expression in their eyes before ultimately deciding to stop and hear out this wild beast tamer.


    After all, the other party had already mentioned gifts and none of them had anything against getting things for free just from listening to the words of this wild beast tamer. Especially if that thing involved spirit stones or precious spiritual herbs¡­

 Chapter 1409 Free Stuff~

    Chapter 1409 Free Stuff~


    "Here, these are a few spirit stones and spiritual herbs I gathered during my time inside the ruins, I hope this will be enough for the two fellow cultivators¡­ Ahm! In return, I hope the two of you could keep this entire situation of what just happened to yourself."


    "Of course, fellow cultivators have given us so many things, it''s only right that the two of us do such a small favor for you in return."


    "Haha, great, then I will get going and won''t interrupt the two of you any longer!"


    Whoosh~!


    As the wild beast tamer left without a second thought after handing out arge number of spirit stones and spiritual herbs to Chu Yang and the female cultivator, Chu Yang could not help staring down at the treasures that had been given to him with a somewhat surprised expression on his face.


    During the entire ordeal, he had just silently stood to the side doing nothing as the female cultivator and the wild beast tamer conversed with each other about them not mention anything about what they saw after they left the ruins in the future.


    Although he understood that the other party wanted the two of them to keep quiet about the scene they had witnessed after first passing through the teleportation formation, he had never expected for the female cultivator beside him to be so skilled and get so many things from that beast tamer. Especially considering that she had not just secured arge number of spirit stones and spiritual herbs for herself but had also helped him get an equal number of treasures for essentially doing nothing but stand at the sideline.


    "The person just now isn''t a beast tamer, but instead the current sessor of the Deep Pit City Lord, he didn''t want information of what just happened to spread and potentially affect his chances of inheriting the position as the city lord in the future."


    Seemingly understanding what he was thinking about even without him saying anything, the female cultivator promptly exined the identity of the wild beast tamer. Allowing Chu Yang to understand why the other party had willingly handed them so many treasures without a second thought to try and silence the two of them when it came to what they had just witnessed him doping with those two poor demon beasts.


    Of course, even though Chu Yang had a feeling that all of this wasn''t that simple, he decided to not think too hard about it as he had already been given arge number of free resources and treasures for essentially passing through a teleportation formation at the right moment.


    As for fear of the other party retaliating against the two of them after they left in the future, he wasn''t too worried, as the other party was only at the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Far too weak to threaten him.


    At the moment, he guessed that the only thing that mighte from what had happened today would be that he and the female cultivator would have someone keep an eye on the two of them during their time inside the Deep Pit City.


    Even if this would be a bit ufortable, it wasn''t really anything he cared too much about as long as the other party only intended to keep an eye on him to ensure he didn''t break the promise that had silently been established after received therge number of spirit stones and other precious gifts.


    Not really anything that would affect him considering that he had no ns of exploring the Deep Pit City any more than he already had and was instead nning on leaving the city after he had finished his trip to the ancient ruins.


    Of course, the situation could always change in the future, but at least at the moment, Chu Yang had no intentions of sticking around the Deep Pit City for an extended period of time. Instead nning to head deeper into the neutral territory where more opportunities could be found.


    After all, staying in the Deep Pit City where the main source of ie for wandering cultivators was to enter the ruins in search of ancient stones with carvings of ancient text on them, wasn''t really something he intended on using his time on. Having nock of spirit stones at the moment.


    As for any other treasures of opportunities that might be hidden inside the ancient ruins¡­ Chu Yang didn''t expect to find any with his current strength, as it was rather clear that the core regions of the ruins were dangerous even to someone in the Soul Ascension Realm and the locations he could move around in with his Domain Lord Realm strength had long since been picked clean by other Domain Lord Realm cultivators over the years.


    Not to mention, outside of Domain Lord Realm cultivators, Chu Yang was almost certain that there would have also been a few Soul Ascension Realm cultivators cleaning the Domain Lord Realm parts of the ancient ruins to make a few easy spirit stones and pick up anything that the Domain Lord Realm cultivators had ended up missing.


    In the end, the only location that might still be hiding something precious at this point in time would be the core of the ancient ruins, a ce that even Soul Ascension Realm cultivators dreaded, with no small number of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators having perished there in the past.


    A ce best avoided at the moment under all circumstances¡­


    "Are you going to continue exploring the ruins? If you are, do you want to explore them together? I''m quite familiar with the ce and know some of the better areas where treasures are rtively easy to find, and danger is low."


    Just as he was lost in his own thoughts, the words of the female cultivator echoed out beside him. Waking him up from his momentary thoughts and forcing his attention back to the current situation.


    "No need, I will just take a look around myself for a bit after leaving."


    In the end, Chu Yang decided to not take her up on her offer to explore the ruins together, both because he still didn''t entirely trust her and second because there was no way for him to know if she would lead him to some kind of dangerous location that he wouldn''t be able to escape with his current strength.


    After all, the ancient ruins had imed the lives of several Soul Ascension Realm cultivators in the past and he had no idea if that was due to some kind of powerful demon beasts lurking inside the ruins or some kind of ancient offensive formations.


    No matter what, it was best to be cautious when in unfamiliar territory. Especially so when it came to ancient ruins that were often filled to the brim with all sorts of ancient trapping formations that could kill an unsuspecting cultivator before they even had time to react.


    "Hm¡­ I see, farewell for now then and remember to be careful in case that guy ends up trying something on you!" N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Not dwelling on the situation after hearing Chu Yang''s refusal, it also seemed like the female cultivator understood the thoughts behind his answer as she soon turned around and left the ce without a second thought. Moving deeper and deeper into the ancient ruins before finally disappearing from view.


    In turn, this gave Chu Yang the opportunity to finally left out a breath of relief that he had unknowingly been holding in since the first time he met her.


    The reason for this was simple, his disguise.


    Although the disguise was done to the best of his ability, if any of those two Domain Lord Realm cultivators had ended up observing him a bit closer and used their divine sense to observe him, they would have discovered his actual appearance and in turn also noticed his extremely young age, something that was best kept hidden considering that it would definitely end up drawing unwanted attention if his real age and cultivation realm were to spread.


    Luckily, it was considered rude and foolish to recklessly use your divine sense on someone else.


    Rude because divine sense was not restricted the same way normal vision was, while being foolish because it was often seen as offensive and might cause the other party to attack you.


    Because of this, most people would normally not recklessly use their divine sense when encountering someone they were unfamiliar with, as the other party might end up being some kind of ancient monster far beyond their realm of strength.


    Though this was not as much of a thing in the outer parts of the continent where the Star Shattering Sect was located, it was especially important in the core region where cultivators in the Dao Seed Realm and above existed.


    Even more so because some of these figures would wander the world from time to time to deepen their understanding of the dao. Making them the worst kind of people to identally end up offending¡­

 Chapter 1410 Sneaking into the Star Shattering Sects Territory (1)

    Chapter 1410 Sneaking into the Star Shattering Sect''s Territory (1)


    Being left alone, Chu Yang didn''t waste much time standing around and directly began moving deeper inside the ancient ruins to have a look around the ce and see if he could find anything useful from exploring the ruins. Hoping that he could at the very least encounter a few demon beasts that would allow him to further increase hisbat experience against those Domain Lord Realm demon beasts, as the Domain Lord Realm figures he had fought most since breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm himself were other humans.


    Although the difference in strength between normal human cultivators and demon beasts wasn''t that big, there was a clear difference in how the two fought, as demon beast were far more focused on a far more brutal kind of fighting whenpared to most human cultivators.


    Of course, there was also the fact that the size and strength of demon beast''s bodies generally made them harder to killpared to humans, who in turn caried different kinds of artifacts and talismans that they used when fighting to defend and attack.


    With that in mind, Chu Yang''s main purpose for entering the ancient ruins soon became focused on trying to find some of the powerful demon beasts that should be lurking inside the ancient ruins. Changing it from trying to find any treasures or hidden artifacts, as he noticed shortly after starting his exploration of the ruins that everything had long since been picked clean by cultivators who hade before him.


    All things considered, it was not really that surprising, as even though the Deep Pit City could be considered to have only recently been established, that was whenpared to some of the older and somewhat ancient cities inside the neutral territory. In the end, it had still been around a few hundred years at this point in time.


    Meaning that other cultivators had long since had the opportunity to pick clean anything of value in the safer parts of the ancient ruins. Leaving only the more dangerous ruins that even Soul Ascension Realm cultivators feared left with possible treasures.


    ¡­


    Squeak?


    At the same time that Chu Yang began his exploration of the ancient ruins below the Deep Pit City in the neutral territories bordering the fallen Sky Empire, the rabbit demon beast that had been searching through the demonic cultivators in the Frozen Wastnds bordering the Star Shattering Sect''s territory let out a surprised squeaking sound as it noticed a particr demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm hastily moving across the expanse of white.


    Normally, this would not have been out of the ordinary and the rabbit demon beast would have ignored this person, but what had caused it to let out a surprised sound was because it clearly recognized the demonic cultivator as the exalted existence described by the other demonic cultivators that it had encountered so far. None other than the target that its master had tasked it with finding before figuring out what he was up to.


    With that in mind, taking full advantage of the fact that it waspletely blended in with the surrounding environment, the rabbit demon beast slowly began chasing the demonic cultivator from afar while keeping a distance where it could just barely hear him talking.


    "Have to get to the border¡­ Fast¡­"


    In the end, because of this, the rabbit demon beast ended up hearing him mumbling something about moving towards the border to himself¡­ And looking at the direction that he was moving in, the rabbit demon beast realized that the border he was talking about was none other than the border that the Star Shattering Sect was sharing with the Frozen Wastnds.


    Although¡­ Already having learnt of the barrier that his master had established in that area. Preventing any demonic cultivators from crossing that border, the rabbit demon beast could not help feeling a bit confused as to why the demonic cultivator was suddenly moving towards that barrier.


    After all, outside of the existence of the barrier not being well known among the different powers that bordered the Star Shattering Sect, the barrier itself was rather well known among the demonic cultivators that had tried attacking the territory of the Star Shattering Sect in the past.


    In the end, it was well known among all of the demonic cultivators that only those in the Demon Lord Realm would stand a chance trying to pass through that barrier, while anyone below that would almost certainly end up dead.


    With all of that in mind, why did this demonic cultivator still dare thinking about trying to cross over the barrier and try entering the territory of the Star Shattering Sect?


    Filled with confusion about this matter, the rabbit demon beast continued to discreetly follow behind the demonic cultivator, while at the same time sending a message to its master through amunication talisman about the entire situation.


    Although it couldn''t yet speak, it was still more than capable of sending a message through amunication talisman, as the intelligence of the rabbit demon beast had long since surpassed that of ordinary humans with its cultivation reaching the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even the matter of speaking wasn''t entirely impossible for it to learn, it was just that the rabbit demon beast didn''t want to bother using its time to learn how to speak. After all, it had not really encountered any problems not being able to use the humannguage so far and was more than capable ofmanding its subordinates.


    Even the human subordinate it had taken in was more than capable of following itsmand.


    ¡­


    "The area ahead should be the border of the newly risen sect, the Star Shattering Sect¡­ If I can pass through the barrier that was ced in that ce, I should be able to enter the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and hide there before sneaking into the Blue Sea Empire and finding a more permanent location to stay hidden.


    The only problem is that the barrier in this ce is close to impossible for someone with my strength to break through, but¡­ Going through the Onyx Empire is not an option with the Blue Sea Empire around and any other nearby kingdoms bordering the Frozen Wastnds are far too difficult to enter without being discovered¡­"


    Whispering this to himself with a somewhat uneasy expression on his face as he stood before the barrier that was standing between the Frozen Wastnds and the Star Shattering Sect''s territory, the child of the Frozen Wastnds Demon King felt a shiver run down his spine. Understanding that he was about to do something that could very well end up costing him his life.


    But¡­ For his beloved father, he was willing to take on this journey. Knowing that if he stayed behind in the Frozen Wastnd, he was likely to end up dead at the hands of those vicious Demon Kings who had killed his siblings whenever they were about to be strong enough to act as a support for their father in the Frozen Wastnds.


    Thinking about this, the young man steeled his resolve before stepping into the dreaded blizzard that had long since be known and feared by the demonic cultivators in this area. Knowing that even Peak True Demon Realm demonic cultivators like himself had ended up dying trying to pass through this blizzard that formed a natural barrier in the past. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The main reason was that he was nning on relying on the lifesaving treasures that his father had left for him to get through the current situation.


    Although he understood that this would leave him defenseless after he passed through the blizzard and entered the Star Shattering Sect''s territory, he was confident in being able to hide himself away after entering the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    The main reason for this confidenceing from the fact that there was currently an ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire inside the Onyx Empire as far as he had managed to gather over the past few months. Allowing him to feel confident that any Demon King nning to kill him would end up first having to face off against this Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor. Giving him more than enough time to move deeper into the territory of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even if the Blue Sea Empire was not that powerful whenpared to the entire Frozen Wastnds, it was by no means weak, and he felt confident it would be able to provide him a safe ce to slowly cultivate until he became strong enough to support his father in the future.


    At the same time, he also understood that him secretly entering the Blue Sea Empire would prove to be a fatal w for the Blue Sea Empire, as he would, in the future, be able tond a deadly blow to the Blue Sea Empire from the inside when his father began to officially focus on defeating this empire.

 Chapter 1411 Sneaking into the Star Shattering Sects Territory (2)

    Chapter 1411 Sneaking into the Star Shattering Sect''s Territory (2)


    Filled with expectations for his glorious future and already thinking about how proud his father would be when he found out that he had managed to escape and grow up safely to the point that he would be able to help him deal with those traitorous Demon Kings, the young man smiled foolishly for a brief moment before once again bing serious as he took out the talisman that his father had given him for protection.


    Outside of just being useful for detecting any powerful opponents and dangers that might be approaching him, the talisman could also defend against a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator for a brief period of time, something that would by his father enough time to respond in case something ended up happening to him.


    The way that his father, the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds would know when the talisman was activated would be because of his connection to the talisman.


    Under normal circumstances, there would not be anything wrong with this, but considering that he was nning to leave as discreetly as possible and not attract any unwanted attention, he had not informed his father about his ns and had discreetly moved to the border region of the Frozen Wastnds under the guise of training himself.


    Considering that the rest of his siblings were doing the same and taking advantage of the current lower cultivation of those involved in most of the battles breaking out around the borders of the Frozen Wastnds, this was not unusual in the slightest and attracted no unwanted attention as far as he knew.


    The main problem was that he understood his father''s great care for him deeply. Understanding that he had several things on him that could track him. Including the talisman in his hands.


    Because of this, he had worked for years to slowly move these tracking methods out of the clothes her wore and things he carried. Moving them on to several small stones with utmost precision to avoid them breaking.


    In the end, after over a dozen years looking into the talisman personally given to him by his father, he had managed to iste the tracking part of the talisman and sessfully moved it onto another talisman that he himself had crafted. Also ensuring that his father wouldn''t be able to discover when the talisman was activated.


    Although he felt bad about doing this behind his father, he understood that it was important to avoid any of those Demon Kings learning about what he was doing. After all, his father had personally told him in the past that nowhere in the core of the Frozen Wastnds were safe and every wall has ears. Even divine sense wasn''t a safe method ofmunication in the face of some of the more powerful Demon Kings.


    To make sure that nobody noticed anything, he had used a blood art to control a local small bird demon beast and had it swallow the things with the tracking and other things to locate him before having the small bird demon beast roam around the borders of the Frozen Wastnds for the rest of its life.


    Even though he felt like this kind of method might notst for that long, he at least hoped that it would be able to buy him some precious time. After all, he had no idea what kind of methods those Demon Kings might have secretly put in ce to monitor him¡­


    Shaking his head as all kinds of thoughts drifted through his head at this moment, the young man ultimately showed a look of determination on his face before taking a step forward into the terrifying blizzard that had formed a sort of natural barrier between the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and the Frozen Wastnd.


    WHOOOOSH-!


    At the same time, he stepped into the blizzard, he was instantly met by the terrifying howling of the wind along with countless small snowkes cutting through the wind with enough power to easily slice apart someone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    If not for the fact that he was already at the Peak of the True Demon Realm and had a body far stronger than even a demon beast at the same realm, he would have been forced back the moment he stepped foot into the blizzard.


    After all, even someone in the True Demon Realm or Soul Ascension Realm would be put in a difficult situation when faced with what could essentially be considered the attack of a dozen Domain Lord Realm cultivators at the same time.


    "This blizzard¡­ Indeed terrifying¡­" Muttering this to himself as he experienced the terrifying power of the blizzard firsthand, the young man could not help showing a slightly fearful expression on his face as the snowkes danced around him in a deadly dance that would have torn most other demonic cultivators apart. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Only after stepping into the blizzard did, he gain an understanding of why all the other demonic cultivators at the borders avoided this ce. Even more so considering that he had heard some rumors from the few True Demon Realm demonic cultivators he had encountered, that the blizzard grew more terrifying the deeper one went.


    Thinking about the power of the blizzard bing even stronger than it was at the moment, the young man could not help ncing down at the talisman flickering slightly in his hand as a sign of danger.


    The talisman was the sole reason he dared to try and pass through the blizzard. Having silently modified the talisman so he could use the power stored inside of it to create a barrier around himself and guard against the terrifying blizzard.


    As for the talisman blinking at the sign of danger nearby? The young man had long since ignored this, as he already understood that this danger came from the blizzard in front of him, something he fully understood that moment he stepped into the blizzard itself.


    Unfortunately, the danger sensing ability of the talisman would soon be rendered useless, as using the talisman in defending himself would ultimately also end up destroying the talisman in the process, something inevitable considering that his talisman making skills were still nowhere close to his father and there would inevitably be some side effects with the adjustments he made to his father''s talisman¡­


    WHOOOOSH-!


    Feeling as the blizzard around him did indeed grow stronger and more powerful as he continued moving deeper into the blizzard, the young man could not help frowning to himself, as he already felt his body starting to show signs of freezing, asrge chunks of ice was forming on his body-


    Crack~ Bang!


    Of course, he could still easily break them apart with rtively little strength at the moment, but it became more and more difficult to do this, as his speed began simrly decreasing.


    Haaa¡­ Looks like I will have to use the talisman far earlier than expected¡­ At least, I hope it will be enough for me to pass through the blizzard or at least the more dangerous part of the blizzard¡­


    Whoosh~!


    As he thought about this to himself, the young man didn''t hesitate in the slightest before activating the talisman in his hand, causing it to shine with a bright red glow before an eerie deep red barrier covered him. Blocking out the surrounding snowkes from reaching him, while at the same time allowing him to breath freely again.


    The blizzard was truly terrifying and knowing he had limited time before the energy in the barrier protecting him ran out, the young man wasted no time as he rushed forward.


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Because of this, the blood red barrier was soon crashed into countless snowkes. Making several loud banging sounds like someone was heavily attacking the barrier.


    In the end, even as the power of the snowkes reached a level no weaker than that of someone in the True Demon Realm or Soul Ascension Realm, the barrier showed no sign of breaking, but this was not the slightest bit reliving to the young man, as he understood that the energy used to keep the barrier up was starting to rapidly decrease under the endless barrage of attacks of the snowkes.


    Even more so given the current strength of the snowkes would be more than enough to almost instantly tear him apart.


    However, even with the current sense of urgency when it came to his current situation, he still found himself freezing on the spot upon noticing something hovering in the air a short distance ahead.


    "Huh? Wha-What is that!?"


    Hovering in the air amidst the violent blizzard, he could barely make up a massive sword towering far into the sky that had been pierced into the ground in front of him.


    It was only at this point in time that he realized that this blizzard wasn''t some kind of natural barrier, but instead something that had been set up by an extremely terrifying cultivator¡­ And from the strength of the blizzard, it was not hard to guess that the strength of this person should at least have reached the Celestial Immortal Realm!

 Chapter 1412 Sneaking into the Star Shattering Sects Territory (3)

    Chapter 1412 Sneaking into the Star Shattering Sect''s Territory (3)


    Rumble~!


    As the young man from the Frozen Wastnds was left frozen on the spot filled with fear after gazing up at the towering sword embedded into the frozen ground, the sword in question began moving ever so slightly, causing the ground around it to crack open-


    "I-I-I have to get out of here!"


    And as a result, finally woke up the frozen young man from his stupor, as he realized just how dangerous his current situation was.


    Although he was fully confident in the blood red shield protecting him from the blizzard outside, he had no confidence when it came to possibly defending against such a terrifying sword. Especially so considering that he had by now realized that this snowstorm wasn''t a natural phenomenon but was instead a massive formation of some kind.


    Given the fact that the sword in front of him had only now started moving, it was not hard to guess that what he had encountered so far was just a passive effect of the formation intended to ward off the weaker demonic cultivators. The true might of the formation he had unknowingly walked into shoulde from the terrifying sword in front of him!


    Whoosh-!


    With that in mind, the young man used all of his strength in the True Demon Realm, causing his harmless form to undergo an earthshaking change, as he instantly grew over five meters tall and had a single menacing horn sprouting on the left side of his head together with a pair ofrge ck colored wings


    In a split second, he had changed from a normal human to a terrifying demonic creature. Showing off his demonic cultivation realm for the first time since he had ventured into the blizzard, something he hoped to avoid if possible. Understanding that entering the territory of the Star Shattering Sect in such a form would almost certainly catch the attention of this sect.


    Even though he did not think that much of the Star Shattering Sect given the fact that it was only a sect that had risen over the past few years, he also understood that for them to establish themselves in an already contended area meant that they would at least have some strength.


    Doubtful as he was about the presence of someone in the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm) in such a sect, he also understood that there was a high chance of the sect being in close contact with the Blue Sea Empire given that their front base facing the Frozen Wastnds was located in the Ony Empire right next door.


    RUUUUMBLE-!


    Returning back to the current situation at hand, the young man, who had now turned into a five-meter-tall demon still protected by the blood red shield created through the power contained inside the talisman, suddenly felt the ground beneath him trembling with far more powerpared to before¡­ And turning to nce back in the direction of the terrifying sword that he had already dashed past, he was horrified to discover that the sword was now hovering a dozen meters above the ground.


    Even worse, it was slowly tilting slightly to point directly towards him, as he was escaping with all of his strength-


    Rumble~! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    And to make the situation worse than it already was, he heard a simr sound as the sword freeing itself from the ground a bit further away. Signaling to him that this sword behind him was not the only one hidden inside of the blizzard, but was only one of many that should make up the formation he had ended up wandering into.


    SWISH-!


    However, before he had time to worry about any of the other potentially terrifying swords that might join the one behind him, the sword in question made the first move, as it locked onto his position and tore through the air at a terrifying speed far above what a True Demon Realm demonic cultivator like himself could muster.


    BAAANG!


    Not a secondter, the terrifying sword collided with the blood red barrier protecting him, causing the barrier that had remained unmoved so far to start shaking slightly.


    Demon Lord Realm! This is definitely Demon Lord Rm strength- And not just any Demon Lord, but a Late Stage or possibly Peak Stage Demon Lord!


    Seeing the changes in the blood red barrier that managed to sessfully protect him, the demonic young man wasn''t the slightest bit relived but was instead filled with fear as he calcted the strength behind the attack just now.


    Even though the barrier guarding him hadn''t been destroyed and was still strong, the attack still ended up draining over 5% of the energy he had left!


    BAAAANG!


    And the sword didn''t show signs of stopping after the first attack, but instead continued attacking relentlessly without any signs of stopping. Instantly draining another 5% of the energy left in the protection talisman-


    Swish-!


    BAAANG!


    Not just that, but a second sword finally reached him at this moment. Crashing into the barrier with a terrifying momentum thatunched the demonic young man flying into the distance, something he was more than happy about. Taking advantage of the situation to increase the distance between himself and the two terrifying swords now hovering in the air behind him.


    What kind of formation is this!? Even a Pseudo Saint Realm Formation Master would struggle setting up something this powerful capable of continuouslyunching such terrifying attacks again and again. Not to mention, the formation is still not fully activated, as there are still countless more swords rapidly approaching- Don''t tell me¡­ Is this perhaps a legendary Saint Realm Formation? Designed to kill someone in the Demon King Realm!?


    Faced with the terrifying power of the unknown formation he had walked into; the demonic young man could not stop his thoughts from wandering as he desperately escaping in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory. Fearing that he might have identally ended up stepping foot in a legendary Saint Realm killing formation, a formation that even those Demon Kings he feared would not dare approach.

 Chapter 1413 Sneaking into the Star Shattering Sects Territory (4)

    Chapter 1413 Sneaking into the Star Shattering Sect''s Territory (4)


    As the demonic figure of the young man used all of his strength to dash through the blizzard before those terrifying swords behind him got the opportunity to further weaken the blood barrier protecting him, the small figure of the rabbit demon beast poked up from the snow. Unaffected by the surrounding blizzard, as it remained fully focused on the escaping demonic cultivator.


    Squeak?


    However, different from the young demonic cultivator desperately escaping, the rabbit demon beast had the chance to observe the situation currently taking ce inside of the blizzard¡­ And to put it in simple terms, it was far from being as terrifying as that young demonic cultivator thought it was.


    Instead, it clearly saw how all of the power of the formation was slowly concentrated towards the two terrifying swords currently cutting down at the young demonic cultivator relentlessly.


    The rest of the swords that had stirred earlier in the distance remained silent following the first movement, as the power contained inside of them flowed towards the two swords attacking.


    Far from being a formation capable of killing someone in the Demon King Realm, the blizzard formation was currently using all of its power to escape the young demonic cultivator. Soon enough getting to the point where the rabbit demon beast could clearly feel the strength of the blizzard weakening because of it.


    If the young demonic cultivator knew about this, he probably wouldn''t have been terrified like he was at the moment, but he would likely still continue to run for his life. After all, the strength of the formation was still far above what the young demonic cultivator could resist against, as he was still only someone in the True Demon Realm.


    Swish~!


    Deciding to not think too deeply about the strength of the formation that had been set up by its master, the rabbit demon beast soon jumped forward in pursuit of the young demonic cultivator. Not intending to let him out of sight and end up failing the mission that had been assigned to it by its master.


    After all, at this point in time, it had still not managed to figure out just what this demonic cultivator was up to, outside of wanting to enter the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    If not for the fact that it had already been informed by its master about the danger of the young demonic cultivator, it wouldn''t have wasted any time continuing to discreetly follow after him like this and would have instead just rushed over and beat him up before asking him in person- Hm¡­ Maybe not in person, but at least through one of its now numerous human subordinates back in the Iron Sky Kingdom¡­


    Dashing after the young demonic cultivator, the rabbit demon beast soon disappeared from view as it simrly began moving in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory on the other side of the blizzard.


    As for worrying about any damage that the young demonic cultivator might end up causing after reaching the territory of the Star Shattering Sect? The rabbit demon beast wasn''t the slightest bit worried, as it had already informed its master about the situation.


    It was likely that its master was already monitoring the situation on the other side of the blizzard. Ensuring that he could keep an eye on the young demonic cultivator the moment he stepped inside the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    Of course, given that there was still the danger of powerful talismans and other protective artifacts, the rabbit demon beast guessed that its master should be trying to keep a distance from the young demonic cultivator in case the special talisman given to him by the Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds detected him.


    Although he guessed that he would be noticed even with this, there was nothing much to do about it considering that the Frozen Wastnds was essentially located right next to the sect itself. Only separated by the former Azure Sky Kingdom that was now under the control of the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    The only hope Xuan Hao had for avoiding any detection by the other party would be if they couldn''t urately pinpoint his location and just thought the other party was in the nearby Onyx Empire. After all, it was already well known through this part of the Frozen Wastnds and the surrounding kingdoms and powers, like the Star Shattering Sect, that there was an ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire present in the Onyx Empire to guard against a potential attack aimed to push closer to the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even if there ended up being two such people, it wouldn''t be that surprising considering that thest time only one Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator was left guarding the border, he ended up being ambushed.


    ¡­. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Sitting at the peak of a small mountain while enjoying a refreshingly warm cup of tea in what should have been freezing temperatures, Xuan Hao curiously looked in the direction of the barrier he had ced at the border between the Star Shattering Sect and the Frozen Wastnds. Soon enough, focusing his powerful divine sense on a five-meter-tall demonic figure barreling through the blizzard at terrifying speed while being chased by two massive swords.


    Even from a nce, it was obvious that the demonic cultivator stood no chance when faced with the two terrifying swords that kept attacking him and could only helplessly continue to run.


    The only thing that ensured his continued survival being a blood red barrier that covered his body perfectly. Absorbing all the damage from the two massive swords constantly shing down at the young demonic cultivator.


    Of course, the blood red barrier didn''t have an infinite source of qi avable and was already starting to show signs of breaking, as countless tiny cracks had already started forming at the surface of the barrier.


    However, even with this, it still managed to hold off the continued attacks of the two massive sword that had thebined might off two cultivators in the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, a strength far beyond that of a Half Bloom Stage Earth Immortal.


    "The energy I left to keep that barrier running for years toe..."


    Simr to the blood red barrier protecting the young demonic cultivator, the two massive swords that seemed to be filled with an unending strength. Showing no signs of slowing down their offensive, was simrly running out of energy.


    Although it would be after the blood red barrier, it still made Xuan Hao rather depressed, as he understood that he would have to pay another visit to the barrier in the near future to ensure that it could keep functioning ording to its original purpose¡­


    "So¡­ That is the demonic cultivator who noticed me at the border?"Shaking his head as he threw the troubling thoughts of having to work on the barrier between the Frozen Wastnds and the Star Shattering Sect''s territory again, Xuan Hao instead decided to focus his attention on the demonic figure desperately trying to get out of the blizzard as fast as possible.


    Peak True Demon Realm, only a single step away from reaching the Demon Lord Realm.


    This was his assessment of the other party''s strength.


    As for the different artifacts and talismans he might be carrying¡­ Just from the blood red barrier that was perfectly protecting him against thebined assault of two Late Stage Dao Seed Realm swords, it was obvious that he was indeed a dangerous individual.


    Even though his cultivation realm was far lower than his own, Xuan Hao didn''t dare be the slightest bit careless dealing with this demonic cultivator.


    It was also for this reason that he had decided to move to a remote mountain peak close to the Star Shattering Sect''s territory with the Onyx Empire after hearing about the blood child of the Frozen Wastnds Demon King trying to enter the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Hopefully, he wouldn''t cause any trouble in the Star Shattering Sect''s territory with the Onyx Empire right next door. Giving Xuan Hao and the rabbit demon beast an opportunity to figure out what he was up to.


    "Huh?! My¡­ My divine was cut off?!"


    However, just as Xuan Hao was about to sit down and rx while keeping an eye on the young demonic cultivator, he abruptly stood up with a shocked expression on his face as he felt his divine sense observing the young demonic cultivator being cut off by some kind of terrifying power that had briefly erupted from the young demonic cultivator as far as he could tell.


    "Another protective talisman or treasure? And one that blocks the prying eyes of others¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced in the direction of where the young demonic cultivator was currently located, Xuan Hao could not help frowning to himself. Realizing that he had still ended up underestimating the protective measures put in ce by the Frozen Wastnds Demon King.

 Chapter 1414 Sneaking Through the Star Shattering Sects Territory (1)

    Chapter 1414 Sneaking Through the Star Shattering Sect''s Territory (1)


    "At the very least its only divine sense that is blocked,munication talismans still work, though, it looks like I will have to rely on the rabbit demon beast to get information on the development of that blood child of the Frozen Wastnds Demon King after he enters the sect territory¡­" Muttering this to himself while looking in the direction of the Frozen Wastnds, Xuan Hao ultimately shook his head before ignoring his surroundings and focusing his attention on the tea in front of him. ncing down at a small formation stone he was using to practice drawing the formation symbols required for the teleportation formation.


    Considering that he couldn''t really do much more about the situation with the young demonic cultivator without putting himself in danger, he decided to just leave the situation to the rabbit demon beast. Having it report to him in case something ended up happening.


    Of course, given that the demonic cultivator would likely not want his identity as a demonic cultivator to be exposed. Potentially causing a reaction from the nearby Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire. It was unlikely that he would cause any problems inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    At least, if that did end up happening, it shouldn''t be too much damage with the Star Shattering Sect''s main sect being out of reach for a demonic cultivator in the True Demon Realm with the protection of the chaotic qi formation.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao sat back and turned his attention away from the Frozen Wastnds, the young demonic cultivator who had been chased by the two terrifying swords managed to sessful breakthrough the edge of the blizzard located at the edge of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory with an exhausted smile stered all over his face.


    "Hahaha! I''m out!" Laughing loudly filled with happiness over having managed to sessfully escape from those two deadly swords that had stopped chasing after him the moment he left the blizzard, the five-meter-tall demonic figure of the young demonic cultivator soon shrank at a speed visible to the naked eye before once again turning into the young man from earlier. Showing no signs of being a demonic cultivator, as he knew that it would be bad news for him if anyone ended up finding out he was a demonic cultivator.


    Not just because it would present a dangerous situation where he might get chased down by the Blue Sea Empire, but also because there was a very real chance that news of him would end up reaching those treacherous demon kings.


    Although the people from the Blue Sea empire were bad, he considered those demon kings from the Frozen Wastnds far worse.


    After all, the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators from the blue Sea Empire wouldn''t show up immediately with news of a True Demon Realm cultivator, it would only be those Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm) cultivators who woulde chasing after him at first.


    The demonic cultivators finding out on the other hand would immediately result in several Demon King Realm demonic cultivatorsing to kill him.


    The best thing would be that no one ended up noticing him, as that would allow him to proceed smoothly with the next part of his journey that involved him reaching the border areas of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Entering the Blue Sea Empire itself was still for the future, something that he would do his best to not think about at the moment, as he understood full well that entering the Blue Sea Empire with the current war between them and the demonic cultivators would be close to impossible without being extremely skilled in the Dao of Space.


    "For now, I should try and assess the situation of this Star Shattering Sect before making any reckless movements. After all, I have no idea whether or not they are rted to the terrifying formations. If they are rted¡­ They might be one of those legendary ancient sects that survived from the ancient times.


    At the very least, if they are one of those ancient sects, they shouldn''t care too much about me unless I do something that ends up hurting them¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked towards the mountain range that appeared not too far away from him, the young demonic cultivator quickly analyzed his current situation before taking a step forward to slowly approach the mountain range in the distance.


    The moment he had left the blizzard, he had already noticed that there was a sect inside that mountain range but considering that it might be a subordinate sect to the Star Shattering Sect, he decided to go around it to avoid any problems. Even if the strongest person in that sect was only in the Domain Lord Realm.


    After all, if the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient sect, there was a very real chance that they were already observing his every move.


    Any mistakes he made would definitely end up alerting them. Especially so if he ended up hurting one of the subordinate sects under them.


    So, with that in mind, he decided against his first thought that was to use his blood arts to absorb the qi and blood of those cultivators to recover his strength and instead decided to slowly recover his strength without resorting to massacring anyone. Fearful of what might happen if he ended up doing that. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    All of this was a rather odd situation for a demonic cultivator. Even more so one that had only ever lived inside the Frozen Wastnds where things like killing and absorbing others were a normal urrence.


    In a sense, it was aplete break for the normal day to day life for the young demonic cultivator and was a rather difficult thing to do considering it wentpletely against what he had been doing in his life so far.


    However, he understood the importance of adapting properly to his current circumstances. Understanding that if he didn''t do that, he might very well end up dead.


    Demonic cultivators and these cultivators from the central part of the continent were different from each other.


    Although he had no idea why this was, as nobody had ever exined it to him, he understood that these people living away from the Frozen Wastnds despised him and other cultivators from the Frozen Wastnds¡­ And no matter how unwilling to change, he did so. Soon enough, causing his outside appearance to take a starkly different lookpared to before.


    Changing from a demonic looking young man, into a weak looking schr who had just departed for the imperial examinations.


    Though not satisfied with this new look of his, it was definitely far better at hiding his identity as a demonic cultivatorpared to his normal outward appearance¡­


    Squeak?


    Observing all of this from a few thousand meters away, the rabbit demon beast tilted its head in confusion for a few seconds before a look of understanding appeared on its small fluffy face.


    Even though it didn''t look too smart most of the time, it was rather smart when it came to understanding its opponents. Understanding a disguise the moment it saw one.


    Of course, it still had no idea about the purpose behind the young demonic cultivator, so it still followed behind him as he made his way into the mountain range. Informing its master about the recent developments along the way to ensure that he stayed informed about wha was happening with the demonic cultivator as he made his way into the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Luckily, things ended up going like Xuan Hao had expected, as the young demonic cultivator didn''t end up causing any problems and instead focused his attention on keeping a low profile while travelling. Not interacting with anyone along the way as he seemed set on leaving the Star Shattering Sect''s territory as fast as possible.


    As a result of this, after only two days of travel, he found himself at the borders of the old Azure Sky Kingdom and also the ce that could be considered the core territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Though¡­ It was at that moment something unexpected that not even Xuan Hao could predict ended up happening, as the young demonic cultivator ended up running into a group of elders and disciples who were heading back from the border that the demonic cultivators were attacking.


    Wasting no time after seeing the weak looking young man who seemed like an ordinary schr in the eyes of both the disciples and elders of the sect, they offered him a helping hand in getting to the city he was heading towards for examinations to try and get an official position. None of them understanding that they ended up taking a demonic cultivator at the Peak of the True Demon Realm along with them as they headed back towards the sect. nning to stop by the city mentioned by this young schr along the way.

 Chapter 1415 Sneaking Through the Star Shattering Sects Territory (2)

    Chapter 1415 Sneaking Through the Star Shattering Sect''s Territory (2)


    As the group of elders and disciples made their way deeper into the sect''s territory without encountering any problems along the way, while also giving an opportunity to more urately examine the strength of the Star Shattering Sect and potential give the demonic cultivator a chance to learn that the Star Shattering Sect was far from as dangerous as he might have first thought, the group soon enough reached the city that the young demonic cultivator had casually pointed towards earlier on while exin where he was going.


    Luckily for this group of elders and disciples, he didn''t have the time to fully examine their strength during their short time together and had instead been fully focused on observing his surroundings to ensure that he wasn''t being chased by one of the demon kings who should have been watching over him during his time around the borders of the Frozen Wastnds.


    Although he was indeed worried about the Star Shattering Sect and potentially getting noticed by them, he was still far more worried about the demonic cultivators behind him to worry about something like that at the moment.


    The main reason for this being that he just happened to overhear the group of elders and disciples of the Star Shattering Sect talking amongst each other about an unusual movement from the side of the demonic cultivators a few days earlier.


    A timing that matched up with the time that he had begun taking his first steps on setting his escape n into action¡­.


    No matter how little he believed one of those demon kings to have noticed his disappearance already, the information from the cultivators of the Star Shattering Sect did end up making him nervous enough that he didn''t even bother examining the group. Instead, just allowing them to leave without a second word, as he soon began making his way inside the rtivelyrge trading city that he had been dropped off at.


    Given that he had already established his identity as a weak wandering schr, he at the very least had to keep up appearances. Luckily for him, it just happened that there was indeed a kind of examination for new position in the city management taking ce in the city. Allowing him to escape any suspicion about him that the people from the Star Shattering Sect might have had about him.


    After all, even though part of him already suspected the Star Shattering Sect to be some kind of ancient sect and that they might already be watching over him, it wasn''t something he waspletely convinced about either. Especially so considering just how rare those ancient sects were, as even his beloved father, the legendary Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds, had only encountered one such ancient sect in the past. Showing just how rare and hard to encounter these mysterious ancient sects were under normal circumstances.


    With that in mind, the young demonic cultivator ultimately ended up going through the local city official examination with a bunch of schrs who looked not much different from himself at the moment.


    Of course, he was still someone in the True Demon Realm and could be considered far smarter than these young schrs who had barely lived for twenty or so years at this point in time. Making the entire examination rather simple for him to ace if he so wanted to, but¡­ To ensure that he could leave the city without getting any unwanted attention in the process, he made sure that he just barely failed the examination. cing just two spots from the lowest epted schr.


    Only after he had managed to sessfully leave the city by on a carriage and acting like a distraught schr who had just failed the most important exam in his life now returning home disappointed, did the young demonic cultivator slowly start continuing to make his journey deeper into the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    In the process of doing this, he also made extra sure to take the long way around the Shattered Star Peaks, as he had absolutely no intention of identally getting involved with the Star Shattering Sect. Even more so considering that he had clearly noticed someone following him silently since he had left the city where he had taken the examination for an official position.


    Although he couldn''t exactly pinpoint the location of the one following behind him, he was still sure of his feelings that someone was following him closely or at the very least keeping an eye on.


    Unfortunately, after he had used all of the energy stored inside the protective talisman given to him by his father, he had no way to pinpoint potential enemies like he had done in the past.


    At the very least, there was one positive thing to the entire situation, as it was rather clear at this point in time that the person following after him shouldn''t be rted to one of those traitorous demon kings.


    After all, if it had been one of them or one of their people, he was certain that he would have been attacked by them long ago. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Instead of that, he had feeling that it was most likely someone from the mysterious Star Shattering Sect who hade to keep an eye on him¡­ And given the fact that the other party could easily hide themselves from someone like him at the Peak of the True Demon Realm, he guessed that the other party should at least be someone in the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm).


    Not to toot his own horn, but within the True Demon Realm and Soul Ascension Realm, he had no opponents and was confident that he would have noticed the other party if it was someone in the Soul Ascension Realm or True Demon Realm.


    In the end, this caused him to feel more certain about his earlier thoughts that the Star Shattering Sect was a hidden ancient sect.


    After all, the location where the Star Shattering Sect was located along with how it had just suddenly emerged a few years ago from information he had gathered, it was far too strong to just be a newly emerged sect. Especially so when it came to having cultivators above the Soul Ascension Realm, as his father had long since taught him that cultivators like that only emerged in the core region and almost never appeared outside the core regions.


    Any such cultivators that did end up appearing would almost immediately be snatched up by the closest major power.


    The only exception being some powers who had decided to hide themselves from the world for several different reasons, one being the fact that they were a non-human species like the Half Spirit Race, fearing the potential oue if therger human race learnt about their existence, or it could be an ancient hidden sect.


    No matter which of these the Star Shattering Sect ended up turning out to be, the young demonic cultivator understood that it would be for the best not to mess with them¡­ And if they did indeed just intend to keep an eye on him as he passed through their territory, he would be more than happy with such an oue.


    His goal was after all not the Star Shattering Sect, but instead the Blue Sea Empire.


    Although the Blue Sea Empire being destroyed might affect other forces located along the edges of the Frozen Wastnds, if the Star Shattering Sect was truly a hidden ancient sect, there was a high likelihood that they would not care about the fall of the Blue Sea Empire.


    The reason why he thought so highly about hidden ancient sects was rather simple, as the hidden ancient sect that his father had encountered was not on friendly terms. In the end, a powerful elder from that hidden ancient sect had directly gone to the core of the Frozen Wastnds and fought his father before ultimately sealing him in the core of the Frozen Wastnds for over a thousand years¡­


    Just thinking about this was more than enough to make the little blood child understand that hidden ancient sects were not to be messed with under any circumstances.


    At the same time, he had also learnt that the hidden sect his father had encountered seemed to not care the slightest bit about the situation on the continent. Instead preferring toy low for some unknown reason.


    He had a feeling that his father knew something about it, but decided not to ask him, as it was clearly not something that would be good for him to know about with his strength back then.


    In the end, because of all this, he ended up wholeheartedly ignoring the Star Shattering Sect as he traveled through their territory without causing any problems along the way. Soon enough finding himself at the edges of the Iron Sky Kingdom that marked thest kingdom under the Star Shattering Sect.


    After going through the Iron Sky Kingdom, he would officially be outside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and would once again have the ability to breathe without worrying about the presence that seemed to be constantly following him and keeping an eye on everything he did.

 Chapter 1416 Sneaking Through the Star Shattering Sects Territory (3)

    Chapter 1416 Sneaking Through the Star Shattering Sect''s Territory (3)


    "Hm? He finally reached the Iron Sky Kingdom?"


    The moment that the demonic cultivator stepped inside the Iron Sky Kingdom, Xuan Hao instantly noticed him, as the formation guarding the kingdom began to operate automatically to kill off the invading demonic cultivator.


    Luckily, given that he wasn''t too far away and had already been granted the ability to control the formation by Yi Min earlier on, he managed to easily stop the formation from activating to kill the demonic cultivator. After all, he had no intention of stopping him from leaving the territory of the Star Shattering Sect. Especially so considering that it might be dangerous for him to do anything against this demonic cultivator considering his background and the kind of protective measures he might be in possession of.


    Even with his cultivation realm at the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, he had no intention of trying his luck in finding out just how strong the current demonic cultivator in control of the Frozen Wastnds was when it came to protecting the young demonic cultivator over such a long distance.


    More importantly, he had no intention of making the Star Shattering Sect a target in the eyes of the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnds.


    Instead of that, he was far more interested in what this demonic cultivator might be up to, as he had even specially assigned the rabbit demon beast to secretly follow him.


    Although it did seem like the other party had noticed the rabbit demon beast following behind him at this point in time, it didn''t really matter that much, as it was clear that he didn''t have any way of dealing with the rabbit demon beast. Not even knowing the fact that it was a demon beast and not a cultivator who was secretly following him from behind.


    Though this did make it harder for the rabbit demon beast to gather any useful information from the young demonic cultivator, it did manage to learn that the young demonic cultivator thought that the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient hidden sect. Even believing that the rabbit demon beast was someone who had been dispatched by the sect to watch over him and ensure that he didn''t cause any problems inside the sect''s territory.


    Even though it wasn''t entirely wrong, as the rabbit demon beast had been sent by the Star Shattering Sect to keep an eye on him, he was wrong about the Star Shattering Sect being a hidden ancient sect that just happened to be hiding in this small part of the Blue Sea Empire''s vast territory outside of the core region of the continent.


    Outside of that, he was also wrong about the reason why the rabbit demon beast was silently following him.


    Although¡­ Thinking about it, Xuan Hao felt like it might be a good thing to have the rabbit demon beast stop following the young demonic cultivator after he left the territory of the sect.


    Even if that might result in them not finding out what this demonic cultivator might be up to, it would at the very least cause the young demonic cultivator to confirm his thoughts about the Star Shattering Sect being an ancient hidden sect.


    This was a good thing for the current Star Shattering Sect, as if that information got back to the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnds, it should result in them being far more careful when it came to trying to invade the territory of the Star Shattering Sect in the future. Potentially even causing them to ignore the Star Shattering Sect during their attack on the Blue Sea Empire when the time came.


    The reason why he thought this might be the case, was because it was clear that the only hidden ancient sect this demonic cultivator knew about, didn''t seem to care about the struggle between the demonic cultivators and the cultivators at the core of the continent.


    Instead, that ancient sectpletely ignored the demonic cultivators as long as they didn''t enter their territory or try to attack them, something that the current Demon King of the Frozen Wastnds had learned the hard way ording to the few mutterings of that young demonic cultivator.


    In the future, if the Star Shattering Sect could portray themselves as an ancient hidden sect, it should be easy to avoid getting involved in the war between the demonic cultivators and those in the core of the continent, as he highly doubted that those empires like the Blue Sea Empire would act any different from the demonic cultivators when faced with an ancient hidden sect.


    Even if they might not believe the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient hidden sect, it was likely that they would at the very least avoid causing any trouble for them until they could confirm it, something that the demonic cultivators might end up helping with if they avoid the sect''s territory in the future.


    But¡­ For all of this to work, the young demonic cultivator had to wholeheartedly believe that the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient hidden sect.


    Unfortunately, it looked like he wouldn''t get a chance to find out about what reason that demonic cultivator had left the Frozen Wastnds for in the first ce. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao soon sends a message to the rabbit demon beast. Telling it to stop following after the young demonic cultivator the moment he left the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Making sure to inform it that it would be rewarded a few extra spirit stones if it managed to do it wlessly without the young demonic cultivator noticing anything wrong with how it left.


    Squeaaak!


    Of course, the rabbit demon beast was more than happy to do this, as it could not only finish the mission that had been given to it earlier, but also because it would be given a few extra spirit stones for essentially doing less work.


    So, with that in mind, the rabbit demon beast dutifully followed the young demonic cultivator all the way to the borders of the Iron Sky Kingdom before decisively turning around and leaving the moment his feetnded on the ground outside the borders of the Iron Sky kingdom. Wasting no time as it rushed back in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect to get its promised reward for a job well done.


    Ensuring that it made a stop at the Iron Sky Kingdom''s capital along the way to inform the few of its subordinates there to prepare themselves for its return. Making extra sure that they would have a ce ready for it to enjoy its new spirit stones when it got back to guarding the ce.


    ¡­


    "Indeed¡­ It''s as I thought, the one secretly following me disappeared the moment I stepped outside the Iron Sky Kingdom. Not just that, but the speed of that person is definitely far above that of the Soul Ascension Realm!"


    At the same time that the rabbit demon beast was rushing back towards the Star Shattering Sect with all of its strength, the young demonic cultivator looked back in the direction of the Iron Sky Kingdom with a somewhat troubled expression on his face as he said this.


    What had happened just now essentially confirmed the fact that the Star Shattering Sect should be one of those terrifying hidden ancient sects.


    Be it the fact that the one following him had reached the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm), yet had not attacked him, a demonic cultivator or the fact that this unknown sect had just mysteriously risen to prominence in a period that could barely considered a secluded retreat for a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator.


    All of this clearly pointed towards the existence of a hidden ancient sect that should have just recently emerged in the world once again.


    Although this was an extremely rare urrence, he had read and heard about things like that happening in the past and it was normally when those ancient hidden sects wanted to recruit more disciples and decided to do so through expanding their influence in the world for a few hundred years before closing off to the outside world again.


    Given the area upied by the Star Shattering Sect and the strength they had shown so far, the young demonic cultivator felt that it all matched the style of ancient hidden sects when recruiting disciples, as they would never expand too much and would try to keep things managed on a rtively small scale.


    Of course, this was also the time when these ancient hidden sects were the most dangerous, as it was far easier than normal to identally end up offending them.


    Luckily, he had learnt about this ahead of time and should be able to warn his father about it in the future to prevent any problems when it came to invading and destroying the Blue Sea Empire. After all, an ancient hidden sect could easily change the course of battle¡­

 Chapter 1417 Happy Rabbit

    Chapter 1417 Happy Rabbit


    Getting further and further away from the Iron Sky Kingdom, the young demonic cultivator stared feeling more and more rxed. Clearly sensing that the strength of the people inside the chaotic region created in the absence of the Sky Empire was nowhere near enough to threaten him¡­


    Whoosh-!


    "Ah!? What is that?!"


    "Noo-"


    So, with that in mind, the young demonic cultivator didn''t waste any time, as he quickly descended upon an outpost created by an empire for the purpose of mining a spirit stone mine. Killing all of the people inside the outpost without a second thought before using their blood and qi to rapidly recover his own strength, something he hadn''t gotten the opportunity to do inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, he had been closely observed inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and would end up potentially being killed if he dared to do anything that disturbed the peaceful atmosphere than seemed to be present inside the Star Shattering Sect\s territory.


    Of course, even though he did end up devouring quite a few cultivators, he was still not fully recovered, as the strength of the cultivators were only between the Qi Condensation Realm and the Domain Lord Realm. Far from enough to help a Peak True Demon Realm demonic cultivator like himself to recover after the near-death situation he had experienced while travelling from the Frozen Wastnds to the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Because of this, after wiping out the first outpost established by one of the many empires interested in harvesting the countless resources present in the chaotic region left behind by the fall of the Sky Empire, he wasted no time in heading towards the second to continue rapidly recovering his strength by devouring these cultivators.


    Making sure that the outpost he ended up targeting didn''t have anything to do with the Star Shattering Sect beforehand, as he understood full well that he wasn''t entirely safe from them and would likely still end up dead if he ended up attacking one of their outposts.


    In the end, because of this, countless outpost that had only recently been established in the chaotic region ended up being wiped out overnight without anyone knowing what had happened. Giving the Star Shattering Sect the opportunity to expand into these areas before anyone new could be send to the different resource gathering location. Wasting no time in making use of the increased number of Domain Lord Realm cultivators in the sect to secure these areas and prevent anyone else from taking them.


    Although there was indeed ack of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators when it came to securing these different locations in the chaotic region, the Iron Sky Kingdom located not too far away ended up bing the perfect guardian of these smaller outposts, as the rabbit demon beasts ended up bing the one in charge of ensuring the safety of these outposts in case they ended up encountering someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Soon enough, this resulted in the terror of the rabbit demon beast spreading across the chaotic region, as it took its job extremely seriously. Killing several Soul Ascension Realm cultivators in the first few weeks following the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect into the chaotic region.


    The reason for it being so active and taking on this new job without anyints was rather simple, as it found out that it would be able to keep whatever it got from killing the different Soul Ascension Realm cultivators causing trouble for the sect¡­ And the wealth of a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator was by no means small. Even surpassing that of some smaller Nascent Soul Realm Sects.


    In a sense, the rabbit demon beast even started looking forward to whenever any problems urred on the different outposts of the sect. Hoping that the one who was causing trouble would be someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Of course, even if it was only someone in the Domain Lord Realm, the rabbit demon beast still managed to get a lot of resources and spirit stones from killing them¡­ Though¡­ Not as much as it would get from killing someone in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    In the end, it became a rather happy rabbit and even began feeling unwilling to give up its current position as the guardian of the Iron Sky Kingdom when Yi Min came back. Staying at the Iron Sky Kingdom was far better than staying inside the sect, where it couldn''t easily get its hands on as many spirit stones as it could staying at the Iron Sky Kingdom.


    Not just that, but it would be difficult for it tomand so many ser- subordinates inside of the Star Shattering Sect, as most of its current subordinates did not have the qualifications to enter the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Even if it wanted to vouch for them to enter the Shattered Star Peaks, it had a feeling that even its master would step in to stop it from brining so many people inside the Star Shattering Sect''s main sect.


    After all, at this point in time, it had managed to grow its number of subordinates to well over 200. Most of them being humans that it had taken in from the Iron Sky Kingdom, while a few of them were demon beasts it had encountered during the past few weeks it had been active in the chaotic region.


    Squeak¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Thinking about all of these things as it slumped down inside the majestic pce that it had turned into its own home at this point in time, the rabbit demon beast decided to not think too hard about what it was going to do. Instead taking out one of the Top-Grade Spirit Stones that its master had rewarded it with before starting to slowly nibble away at it with an overjoyed expression on its face.


    ¡­


    "This should have solved the problem with the demonic cultivators for now, the only problem is that I have no idea what that little fellow is up to¡­"


    A few weeks earlier back when the young demonic cultivator had just left the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao was silently gazing in the direction of the Iron Sky Kingdom as he muttered this to himself with a somewhat troubled expression on his face.


    Although the situation of the Star Shattering Sect in the uing battles between the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnds and the Blue Sea Empire should have significantly improvedpared to before, he could not help feeling a bit uneasy not knowing what that young demonic cultivator was up to.


    Even though he understood that the other party''s identity as a blood child was rather unique, he also understood that this likely meant that whatever he was going to do had something to do with the Frozen Wastnds Demon King.


    The entire situation made him feel rather uneasy, but there was not much he could do at this point in time outside of hoping that his earlier attempt to fool the other party into believing that the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient hidden sect had worked.


    Of course, outside of that blood child believing it, it was also important for the Demon King behind the blood child believing it.


    Though¡­ Xuan Hao wasn''t too worried about this, as the Star Shattering Sect did indeed seem a bit too unnatural in its rapid rise and sudden appearance.


    Even if he went out of his way to tell everyone that the Star Shattering Sect wasn''t a hidden ancient sect, it was unlikely that many would believe him. Especially after they confirmed the existence of cultivators above the Soul Ascension Realm inside the sect.


    Not to mention, in case someone in the Demon King Realm or Celestial Immortal Realm ended up showing up to personally confirm the situation, there was a high chance that they would be convinced that the Star Shattering Sect was a hidden ancient sect due to the presence of the chaotic qi formation guarding the Shattered Star Peaks.


    After all, that formation was more than capable of blocking someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm or Demon King Realm from peeking inside the sect. Giving the illusion that the sect was indeed far stronger than it actually was.


    "All things considered, I guess the Star Shattering Sect should just be a hidden ancient sect- Yes! From now on, the sect is a hidden ancient sect that has existed for an untold number of years. Hidden away in the mysterious Shattered Star Peaks for tens of thousands of years before emerging to recruit a few new disciples!"


    Saying this to himself, Xuan Hao felt that it would be a believable story¡­ And so, he went to Elder Song to discuss the situation to officially spread rumors of the Star Shattering Sect being an ancient hidden sect. Hoping that it would be able to fool the different powers like the Blue Sea Empire, who might have already started to get interested in the Star Shattering Sect.

 Chapter 1418 Ancient Hidden Sect

    Chapter 1418 Ancient Hidden Sect


    Finishing the discussion with Elder Song, it was soon decided that the sect would make use of the servant quarters or so to speak, the sect''s intelligencework that had been established throughout the sect''s territory and surrounding empires and kingdoms to spread information about the Star Shattering Sect being an ancient hidden sect that had just recently emerged to recruit new disciples.


    Of course, to make the entire situation a bit more realistic and to not get found to be the ones behind the spread of the information in case the Blue Sea Empire or other forces wanted to investigate where the information hade from in the first ce, Elder Song made sure that there wouldn''t be any direct information about the Star Shattering Sect being an ancient hidden sect spreading from the sect''s people.


    Instead, most of the information spreading would be things that would normally cause someone knowledgeable about ancient hidden sects toe to their own conclusion that the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient hidden sect.


    In the end, the information that ended up spreading throughout the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and surrounding territories was just more information about the Star Shattering Sect that made it sound more mysterious and powerfulpared to before.


    Luckily, because the Star Shattering Sect was already considered a mysterious and powerful sect following the past few years since the attacks from the demonic cultivators began, the new information didn''t make anyone second guess and began to spread naturally after the first few weeks. Allowing the Star Shattering Sect to retract their people and allow the information to spread on its own. Removing any possible problems of being associated with the information that was spreading when someone from the Blue Sea Empire or other powers picked up on it.


    Because of all of this, it didn''t take long before a few attempts to probe the Star Shattering Sect came from the Blue Sea Empire in the form an Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm) cultivator, who happened to pass by the Shattered Star Peaks on several asions while trying to use his divine sense to investigate the internal situation of the mountain range to no avail.


    In the end, it soon escted to the point where a Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor ended up silently appearing to probe the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Unfortunately for that Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor, it was to no avail, as the divine sense was still easily blocked without being able to investigate the internal situation of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    However, to at least make it a bit more believable, Xuan Hao made use of the chaotic qi formation to attack the divine sense of the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor. Cutting it off the moment it came into contact with the chaotic qi formation.


    Although this didn''t directly harm the ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire, it was more than enough to cause the other party to back off, as it was clear that he had confirmed the thoughts he had about the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all of this, the situation once again calmed down. The only difference from before being that it was clear that nobody from the Blue Sea Empire dared enter the territory of the Star Shattering Sect any longer.


    Confirming the fact that they had indeed started to suspect that the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient hidden sect.


    Although it wasn''t really confirmed so to speak, as they had only ever interacted with the chaotic qi formation guarding the Shattered Star Peaks, it was clear that the Blue Sea Empire wasn''t willing to go any further in probing the Star Shattering Sect.


    The main reason for this being the demonic cultivators who were slowly increasing their attacks on the kingdoms bordering the Frozen Wastnds. Forcing them to turn their attention towards fighting off the demonic cultivators.


    In a sense, the existence of the Star Shattering Sect at the borders of the Frozen Wastnds could be considered a good thing for the Blue Sea Empire, as it did provide them with an area that even the demonic cultivators wouldn''t be able to easily invade and had to avoid.


    In the head of the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor of the Blue Sea Empire, he might even be hoping that the demonic cultivators continued throwing demonic cultivators towards the Star Shattering Sect, as it would inevitably end up drawing this ancient hidden sect into the battle against the demonic cultivators. Potentially blocking the attacks of the demonic cultivators and preventing them from getting any closer to the Blue Sea Empire than they already were.


    Unfortunately, everything wasn''t that good, as the demonic cultivators also seemed to have picked up on the information regarding the Star Shattering Sect and seemed to have significantly lessened their attacks towards the sect.


    Although normal demonic cultivators still continued trying to attack the borders of the Star Shattering Sect, it was only those below the True Demon Realm, as anyone in the True Demon Realm and above had pretty much abandoned any intentions of attacking the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    Even though this could be considered bad for the Blue Sea Empire, as it did lower the chance of the potential hidden ancient sect starting to fight seriously with the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnds, it was perfect for the Star Shattering Sect, as it still allowed them to continue using the demonic cultivators to train their disciples without any problems.


    Not just their disciples, but their elders who had recently broken through to the Domain Lord Realm could also continue fighting at the border and increase theirbat experience without any issues.


    Of course, even though most of these elders were only in the Domain Lord Realm and had long since been noticed by the Blue Sea Empire''s people, it wasn''t considered odd due to the young age of most of these elders and the fact that most of them seemed to have only recently been recruited by the Star Shattering Sect.


    In the eyes of the Blue Sea Empire, these elders of the Star Shattering Sect were not real elders, but instead just some younger disciples recently recruited who were put in charge of managing the situation outside of the sect itself. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The true elders of the sect were most likely still hidden inside the Shattered Star Peaks and would only leave the ce if something ended up happening that influenced the sect in a negative way, a normal thing for those ancient hidden sects, who didn''t care about anything happing outside of their sect''s as long as it didn''t affect them and their continued development.


    ¡­


    "A hidden ancient sect? And at the borders of the Frozen Wastnds as well¡­ How interesting, I didn''t expect one of those old relics to still be hidden inside my empire¡­"


    As the news about the Star Shattering Sect began spreading throughout the Blue Sea Empire''s higherups, it didn''t take long before the true power holders of the old empire learnt about the news, causing a certain ancient existence inside the Blue Sea Empire''s ancestral grounds to slowly open his eyes with a hint of surprise on his face.


    "But¡­ The Shattered Star Peaks¡­ If I''m not wrong, it should be the ce where that ancient sect stood in the past before being destroyed. This Star Shattering Sect, it might very well be the remnants of that ancient sect that managed to survive.


    As for them recruiting new disciples, it should be that they have managed to recover enough to start rebuilding and wants to get new disciples to properly built up their old sect. If not for those demonic cultivators, I would really love to take a look myself. Unfortunately, I don''t have the opportunity to do so at the moment."


    As the ancient figure slowly muttered this to himself while staring into the distance, he soon sank back and focused his attention back on cultivating. Seemingly unaffected by the news outside a little surprise.


    "So¡­ It''s true, it really is an ancient hidden sect!"


    However, to the people who hade to deliver this news to that ancient existence, it was nothing short of a confirmation. The Star Shattering Sect was indeed an ancient sect.


    Not just any ancient sect, but it seemed to be from one of the great sects of the past that had fallen during the ancient battle back then!


    Even if it was just a few remnants that had survived a rebuilt the sect into an ancient hidden sect, it was still something far beyond what the Blue Sea Empire couldpare to.


    After all, the minimum cultivation of elders in those ancient sects surpassed that of the Profound Immortal Realm.


    Even if only one elder had managed to survive, it was not something the Blue Sea Empire could fight against. Only their ancient ancestor had a chance to contend against someone like that, but¡­ The ancestor was old and couldn''t move around freely. Doing so might exhaust his remaining lifespan...

 Chapter 1419 Start of the Competition

    Chapter 1419 Start of the Competition


    Following the decision of the Blue Sea Empire to not do anything further regarding the Star Shattering Sect before the situation with the demonic cultivators came to an end, the Star Shattering Sect''s territory soon turned into a forbidden area that no one from the Blue Sea Empire dared to enter¡­ And although this was rather confusing to some of the weaker cultivators of the Blue Sea Empire participating in the suppression of the demonic cultivators, they dared not question it considering that it hade from those above them.


    In turn, because of this, the kingdoms and empires located close to the Star Shattering Sect also ended up bing somewhat fearful of the Star Shattering Sect.


    After all, in their eyes, it seemed like the Blue Sea Empire was deliberately trying to avoid the Star Shattering Sect. Making the mysterious background of this recently established sect even more mysterious and terrifying.


    At the same time, the reputation of the Star Shattering Sect that had somewhat stagnated at a levelparable to the old Sky Empire seemed to once again rise. Attracting countless young people to try and join the sect even from outside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect. Among them were even the children of some of the higher ranked people in the surrounding empires and kingdoms, as they now wanted to try and establish a connection between this mysterious sect and themselves.


    Not just because they wanted their younger generation to have a better path for development, but also because they wanted to avoid getting attacked when this mysterious sect ended up expanding its territory again in the future.


    After all, in the eyes of these surrounding powers, it was only a matter of time before the Star Shattering Sect finished stabilizing its territory and began expanding again. Especially so considering that was what they had done so far to grow to their current size.


    The only thing that would assure them that they wouldn''t get caught up in this and lose their territory would be if they somehow managed to establish a connection between themselves and the Star Shattering Sect.


    As for the situation with the demonic cultivators? They weren''t too worried considering that the battle had essentially entered a standstill with the demonic cultivators unable to advance any further following the reinforcements from the Blue Sea Empire showing up.


    Instead of the demonic cultivators they were far more worried about how the situation would end up ying out after the threat of the demonic cultivators disappeared and the people from the Blue Sea Empire left their territory.


    ¡­


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, time continued to pass without much happening following the decision to make the Star Shattering Sect into an ancient hidden sect in the eyes of the demonic cultivators and the people from the Blue Sea Empire. The only real change taking ce being that the excitement for the uing alchemy and cksmithingpetition reached a new high, as the Falling Star City was filled to the brim with both wandering cultivators and aspiring alchemists and cksmiths.


    Therge influx of people ended up causing the already rapid expansion of the Falling Star City to expand even faster. Even causing the old Flying Sword City to expand as well. Allowing those who couldn''t find anywhere to stay inside the Falling Star City to stay inside the Flying Sword City.


    In the process of this, the old Flying Sword Sect that had already be thergest branch of the Star Shattering Sect ended up growing evenrger, as more elders and disciples had to be moved to the sect to manage the situation in the increasinglyrge Falling Star City. Growing the number of Domain Lord Realm cultivators inside the branch to an astonishing seven people, along with several Nascent Soul Realm Elders and even more disciples.


    For the disciples who were already part of the Flying Sword Sect branch, this was the best thing that could have happened for them, as the resources allocated to the branch grew together with therge influx of people being added to it. Giving some of them an opportunity to shine and get the chance to be promoted into disciples of the main sect.


    Not just the old Flying Sword Sect, but a few of the other branches also experienced a simr growth, as there were an increasinglyrge number of people flocking towards the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    This was not only because of the uingpetition but was more so because of the recent attitude that the Blue Sea Empire had shown towards the Star Shattering Sect. Making arge portion of the wandering cultivators situated at the borders of the Frozen Wastnds feel that it would be safer for them to stay inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect until the situation with the demonic cultivators blew over.


    In the end, they only became more convinced of this after realizing that the Star Shattering Sect hadn''t been the slightest bit affected by the demonic cultivator''s invasion like the surrounding kingdoms and empires had been. Instead, they had used those demonic cultivators to train their younger generation, something that further convinced them that staying inside the Star Shattering Sect''s territory would be a safe choice.


    Like this, months flew by without any major changes as the day of the alchemy and cksmithingpetition finally arrived¡­ And with the location of thepetition having moved to a newly constructed space designed for thepetition together with the expansion of the Falling Star City, it quickly attracted arge crowd of people toe and watch thepetition.


    Not just that but given that the Star Shattering Sect had already allowed others to join thepetition, there were many aspiring cksmiths and alchemists not from the Star Shattering Sect joining thepetition after the luxurious rewards were officially announced.


    Even if an age requirement of 500 years had been put in ce, the number of people signing up ended up forcing Elder Song and the rest of the elders in charge of thepetition to extend the duration of thepetition far beyond what they had initially anticipated. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    At the same time, also forcing them to hold a few preliminarypetitions leading up to thepetition itself to eliminate arge number of those who ended up signing up to join thepetition.


    By the time that thepetition was going to start, a little over 50 elders from the sect were ready to participate, while another 150 had joined from outside.


    Of course, even with so many people joining thepetition while not being part of the Star Shattering Sect, Elder Song wasn''t the slightest bit worried about the elders of the sect not preforming well, as he had already seen the level disyed by those 150 outsiders.


    In his eyes, they would be perfect to disy the strength of the Star Shattering Sect when it came to alchemy and cksmithing¡­ And together with the age limit put in ce, it wouldn''t invoke any suspicion from the Blue Sea Empire, as 500 years old could still be considered part of the younger generation in their eyes.


    As for the talent being disyed by these elders being up to par¡­ Elder Song felt confident in them after they had been personally guided by both Pei Yang and Yi Min over the past year.


    Although they might not beparable to the genius cksmiths or alchemists of the Blue Sea Empire, he felt that they shouldn''t be too far behind.


    Not to mention, just in case, he had Bai Ning join the cksmithing part of thepetition, while having Qing Yi join the alchemist side of thepetition.


    Given their talent and age, it was impossible for the Blue Sea Empire to have any thoughts about them not being a hidden ancient sect. After all, their talent was simply something that was beyond the Blue Sea Empire''s ability to nurture, something that could only appear inside a power that existed beyond the Blue Sea Empire!


    Feeling confident as he thought about this to himself while ncing over in the direction of therge tform that thepetition was about to take ce on top of, Elder Song smiled happily to himself before running off to make a fewst second preparations for the uingpetition.


    Among the preparations was also the most important of them, which was to have Xuan Hao join thepetition and oversee as a senior from the sect.


    Given his strength, Elder Song wanted to make use of Xuan Hao to fully disy the might of the Star Shattering Sect to the Blue Sea Empire and make them fully believe in the fact that the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient hidden sect.


    Although everything so far had been going smoothly and the Blue Sea Empire seemed to wholeheartedly believe in the fact that the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient hidden sect, he also understood that only if a senior of the sect that was far beyond the normal cultivation realm of those outside the core region of the continent appeared, would they find it impossible to not associate the Star Shattering Sect with an ancient hidden sect!

 Chapter 1420 Progress Over the Past Year (1)

    Chapter 1420 Progress Over the Past Year (1)


    "Looks like it''s finally time for thatpetition to start¡­ I hope that the Blue Sea Empire won''t send out any of their Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor to observe¡­" Muttering this to himself as he was informed by Elder Song about his request to have him oversee thepetition as an elder of the Sect, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit uneasy when he thought about the fact that there might be someone at the Celestial Immortal Realm present to try and gauge the strength of the Star Shattering Sect and whether or not it was a hidden ancient sect.


    Although he felt confident in his ability to disguise his own strength with his currentprehension of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he was ultimately not familiar with the abilities of someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm and ws he was unaware of might give away the fact that his current cultivation realm was nowhere near the Celestial Immortal Realm or Profound Immortal Realm at the moment.


    At least, if it was someone below the Celestial Immortal Realm, it would be rather simple to disguise his strength as someone above the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm) because of his Late Stage Dao Domain Lord Realm cultivation base far surpassing the understanding and strength of any Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm) cultivator in the Blue Sea Empire.


    In the eyes of someone like that, his current cultivation would be no different from that of someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm. Especially so if he disyed his mastery over the Dao of Space.


    After all, the Dao of Space was well known as one of the hardest Daos toprehend and having reached the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space was more than enough to convince most that his cultivation realm had surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm).


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao slowly got up before making his way out of his cultivation room in the direction of the Falling Star City. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Over the past year, he had managed to improve hisprehension of the Dao of Formations and had sessfully managed to elevate it to the Large Sess Realm. In the process, he also came to understand the process of setting up permanent teleportation formations.


    Though he had not yet started the process of setting up these teleportation formations throughout the territory of the sect, several smaller scale teleportation formations had already been set up throughout the Shattered Star Peaks. Allowing the disciples with lower cultivation to more easily travers the Shattered Star Peaks, something more than wee to these disciples, as under normal circumstances, it would take several hours for a disciple in the Foundation Establishment Realm to travel between the Seventh Star Peak and the Falling Star City.


    Not just that, but to ensure that there wasn''t a loss in terms of spirit stones for the Star Shattering Sect when using these teleportation formations, he had linked them together with the chaotic qi formation. Allowing part of the qi refined through the formation to be used on operating the teleportation formations inside of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Although this did affect the qi entering the Shattered Star Peaks, it wasn''t much and was close to negligible. Not affecting the current state of the Shattered Star Peaks in the slightest.


    Only when Soul Ascension Realm cultivators started bing moremon in the sect would he have to consider upgrading the chaotic qi formation, as the consumption of spiritual qi for cultivation would end up surpassing what was currently flowing into the Shattered Star Peaks through the chaotic qi formation.


    Whoosh~


    Leaving his cultivation room with these thoughts in mind, Xuan Hao could not help taking a look at the status of his disciples while making his way towards the closest teleportation formation that would take him directly to the base of the Ninth Star Peak. Located just inside the boundary of the chaotic qi formation.


    ? First Disciple, Qing Yi ? Race: Human Talent: 45 Dao: Dao of Fire (Domain), Dao of Alchemy (Pseudo Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Fire, Dao of Wind, Dao of Light, Dao of Space, Dao of Alchemy Physique: Bright Sun Divine Physique (Peak Stage, Small Sun Realm) Realm: Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Profession: Alchemy (Master Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Heaven Burning Mantra First up was Qing Yi, who had managed to go from the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to the Sixth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm over the short period of a year¡­ And although her alchemy didn''t show any signs of progress beyond the master realm, Xuan Hao understood that she was only a step away from the Peak of the Master Realm. Having focused most of her time on improving her alchemy over the past year, while being guided both by him and Pei Yang.


    Next up was Chu Yang, the one who had by far shown the most improvements over the past year.


    ? Second Disciple, Chu Yang ? Race: Human Talent: 57 Dao: Dao of the Spear (Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Earth, Dao of Blood, Dao of ughter, Dao of Death Physique: No Special Physique Rmended Physique: Six Paths of ughter Divine Physique (Can be refined) Realm: Peak Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Cultivation Mantra: Soul Spear Divine Mantra Not only had he somehow managed to reach the Later Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in the short time of a year, but he was somehow also at the Peak of the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Close to entering the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Surpassing even his cultivation speed when he had been in the Domain Lord Realm.


    All of this made him wonder just what this disciple of his had been up to over the past year, as he was still somewhere in the core region of the continent adventuring on his own.


    Although part of him wanted to check up on this second disciple of his, he also understood that it would be bad for him to leave the sect at the current moment.


    Not to mention, it didn''t look like there was anything he had to worry about regarding this disciple, as he seemed to be doing just fine on his own.


    The only worrying thing was that the power he had secretly hidden inside of his body had already been triggered on several asions over the past year and looked like it barely had enough strength for a single attack left.


    Then again, this disciple of his should have learnt when to retreat and not get involved in something beyond his abilities at this point in time¡­ Well¡­ Hopefully he had¡­

 Chapter 1421 Progress over the Past Year (2)

    Chapter 1421 Progress over the Past Year (2)


    Shaking his head a bit as he thought about his second disciple and the trouble, he had gotten himself into over the past year, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the status of his third and least troublesome disciple¡­


    ? Third Disciple, Bai Ning ? Race: Human, Heavenly Sky Serpent Talent: 34 Dao: Dao of cksmithing (Pseudo Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Metal, Dao of Fire, Dao of Formations, Dao of Wind Bloodline: Heavenly Sky Serpent (Dormant) Realm: Peak Ninth Stage Nascent Soul Realm Profession: cksmithing (Peak Master Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Unformed Mantra Over the past year, his cultivation realm hadn''t improved by a lot, but he had still managed to reach the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. Although, the most impressive thing was the fact that he had managed to reach the Peak of the Master Rm in terms of cksmithing. Only a single step away from reaching the Grandmaster Realm.


    Archiving this due his own dedication towards cksmithing and the help of his master and Yi Min, who had both managed to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in terms of cksmithing.


    In a sense, his cultivation rising had nothing to do with the fact that he had allocated some time to cultivating, but was instead due to his cultivation technique, the unformed mantra, finally showing its worth, as his cultivation realm rose alongside his cksmithing. Pushing his cultivation base all the way to the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    If this continued, both Xuan Hao and Yi Min guessed that Bai Ning would most likely end up breaking through to the Domain Lord Realm the moment he managed to reach the Grandmaster Realm in cksmithing.


    Moving on to the fourth disciple and by far the most troublesome of the bunch, Mui¡­


    ? Fourth Disciple, Mui ? Race: Human Talent: 78 Dao. Dao of Water (Domain)


    Potential Dao: Dao of Darkness, Dao of Ice, Dao of Space, Dao of Chaos Physique: Deste Ancient Moon Physique (Dormant) Realm: Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Profession: cksmithing (Abysmal), Formation Master (Abysmal) Cultivation Mantra: Myriad Water Art Over the year, she had somehow managed to not only breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm. Far surpassing him in terms of speed but had also managed to reach the Second Stage of the Realm. Bringing the total number of disciples in the Domain Lord Realm up to 4, something that he had expected to trigger some kind of reward from the system.


    [Congrattion on having four disciples reach the Domain Lord Realm]


    However, instead of a reward from the system that would help increase his strength, he was instead only greeted by a congrattion notice and nothing else. Making him believe that the system might have something against him.


    Luckily, he still had the had the time stone and therge source crystal he had gained back when he finished the time limited quest that had taken forever.


    So, he wasn''t too affected by the simple congrattion message from the system- Would be a lie to say¡­


    Feeling his emotions bing slightly disturbed as he thought about the simple message and no rewards following Mui''s breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao quickly decided to turn his attention away from his fourth disciple''s status and focus his attention towards his fifth andtest disciple, Chun Hua...


    ? Fifth Disciple, Chun Hua ? Race: Nature Spirit, Tree Spirit Talent: 71 Dao: Dao of Nature (Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Wood, Dao of Life, Dao of Water, Dao of Alchemy


    Physique: Spirit Physique Realm: Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Profession: Alchemy (Peak Artisan Realm) Cultivation Mantra: Heart of the Forest Although her cultivation hadn''t improved the fastest among his disciples, she had still managed to rise from the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm over the past year.


    Though, the same could not be said when it came to herprehension of the Dao of Alchemy.


    Not only had she managed to elevate herself from the Expert Realm in alchemy all the way up to the Peak of the Artisan Realm over the past year, but she had also somehow managed to increase the number of potential Daos present in her status, something he didn''t think was possible before this.


    Not just that, but the increase in potential Daos also seemed to have increased her talent. Elevating it by an entire four points. Breaking into the seventy points mark that only Mui had managed to reach so far.


    "I wonder if there might be a chance for me to introduce more potential Daos to my other disciples and try to elevate their talent in that way¡­" Muttering this to himself as he continued looking over Chun Hua''s status, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if it would be possible for him to introduce new potential Daos for his other disciples.


    But¡­ The moment this thought appeared, it was quickly extinguished, as he understood that it was anything but simple to introduce a brand-new dao to his disciples. Especially so considering that they still hadn''t managed toprehend the Daos that they already had an inherent talent for. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    In a sense, Chun Hua''s new talent for the Dao of Alchemy was not only rted to her own interest and recent focus on learning alchemy, but also had something to do with the fact that all of her other talents seemed to be closely associated with the Dao of Alchemy in some kind of way. Allowing her a smoother path towards starting herprehension of the Dao of Alchemy.


    For now, it might be a bit too early to think about this. Maybe I can revisit this again in the future when they step into the Dao Domain Lord Realm or the Dao Seed Realm and start to explore more than just a single Dao¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he arrived in front of the newly established teleportation formation leading to the base of the Ninth Star Peak, Xuan Hao briefly closed his eyes before a look of seriousness appeared in them.


    Understanding that after stepping through the teleportation formation, he would have to do everything in his power to appear like a mysterious elder of an ancient hidden sect. An existence that should at the very least have reached the Celestial Immortal Realm or Profound Immortal Realm in the eyes of the people from the Blue Sea Empire, who would undoubtedly be keeping an eye on thepetition.

 Chapter 1422 Blacksmithing and Alchemy Competetion (1)

    Chapter 1422 cksmithing and Alchemy Competetion (1)


    Arriving at thepetition ground shortly after passing through the teleportation formation, Xuan Hao slowly took his seat among a few of the elders in charge of overseeing thepetition. Taking the most honorable position to indicate his status to anyone who might be observing, while at the same time making sure to act properly like a senior figure of an ancient sect.


    Luckily, using his divine sense to scan the area around thepetition, he quickly discovered that the strongest person around had only reached the Dao Seed Realm. No one in the Celestial Immortal Realm or above had shown up to observe thepetition and possibly gauge the strength of the Star Shattering Sect. Meaning that the worst-case scenario of having to try and potentially fool a Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea empire didn''t end up happening.


    Of course, even with this, Xuan Hao didn''t dare to rx, as he would still have to do his best to present himself as a senior figure faced with someone in the Dao Seed Realm. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    The main differencepared to if he had to fool someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm was the fact that he could easily make them believe his strength to have reached the Celestial Immortal Realm or Profound Immortal Realm by using his Dao of Space at the Large Sess Realm.


    After all, from what he had seen during his encounter with the Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire in the past, even having reached the Peak of the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Space was considered an impressive feat for someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, let alone someone with the ability toprehend the Dao of Space to the Large Sess Realm.


    As long as information of his mastery over the Dao of Space reached the ears of the higher ups of the Blue Sea Empire, they would undoubtedly believe that the elder who hade to oversee thepetition of the younger generation was someone who had at least reached the Celestial Immortal Realm, someone who would be qualified to be considered a true elder of an ancient hidden sect.


    Thinking about this to himself, a slight smile could not stop itself from making its way onto his face as he looked out over the massive tform that had already been full prepared for the uingpetition with all sorts of spiritual herbs and metals, along with furnaces and cauldrons.


    Although the sect would lose a bit from providing all of these things for thepetition considering that arge portion of the people participating were not from the sect, it was all to keep up the image of an ancient hidden sect.


    Even though, I do wonder if it was necessary to include those few transcendent grade spiritual herbs¡­


    Shaking his head as he unconsciously nced towards a few spiritual herbs hidden inside the pile of spiritual herbs that had been neat ced on top of arge table in preparation for the alchemy part of thepetition, Xuan Hao could not help feeling like it was a bit of a waste to have included transcendent grade spiritual herbs among the spiritual herbs that the participants would be able to choose from.


    However, ording to Elder Song, this was something important to keep up the image of the sect, as an ancient hidden sect wouldn''t care about these few spiritual herbs and would instead just use them to try and test the younger generation, while at the same time giving those especially talented one a way to shine.


    All things considered, after the decision to make the Star Shattering Sect appear as an ancient hidden sect, Elder Song was by far the one who had ended up working the hardest, as he had researched everything he could find about hidden ancient sects and their behaviors so the Star Shattering Sect could perfectly imitate them.


    In a sense, it was also because of this that he was here today, as ording to Elder Song, even though hidden ancient sect rarely appeared in the world, when they did start recruiting and held tournaments outside of the sect itself, there would always be a senior elder of the sect present.


    Not only to oversee the safety and fairness of thepetition itself, but more importantly also to try and scout new talent for the sect.


    After all, for hidden ancient sects who emerged, their primary goal was to scout more talent and recruit new disciples.


    Even a simple tournament would always be open to anyone who fit within certain talent and age requirements. Serving as a way for the sect to try and recruit more disciples and potential elders to join the sect.


    In other words, it was not so much apetition, as it was a recruitment test for the sect to find more talented people to join the sect, thus requiring the presence of a senior member of the sect- Or in this case, Xuan Hao, who needed to oversee the situation and find new talents for the sect.


    To make everything more believable to the people from the Blue Sea Empire or other powers who might have snuck in to observe thepetition, Elder Song also made sure that everything would progress ording to how ancient hidden sect normally conducted these kinds ofpetitions. Making sure that the sect would also recruit a few talents to join the sect during thepetition.


    Of course, at the end of the day, the Star Shattering Sect wouldn''t really lose anything by doing something like this. Instead, it would only end up gaining more talented disciples.


    The only problem with this kind of method to recruit disciples was the simple fact that the resources required were far too massive for the Star Shattering Sect to do something like this on a regr basis.


    The sheer number of spiritual herbs and spiritual metals, along with the quality of them far surpassed what the Star Shattering Sect could use on a normalpetition.


    Only because the sect had recently managed to gain a lot of new resources through expanding the territory of the sect into the chaotic region that had developed at the fall of the Sky Empire, did it manage to gather enough high-quality resources to host one suchpetition without affecting the daily consumption and flow of resources throughout the sect itself.


    With that in mind, it would be impossible to hold another suchpetition in the near future. Especially if the transcendent grade spiritual herbs hidden inside the pile spiritual herbs ended up being used, as the sect didn''t really have a reliable way to gather spiritual herbs of that grade at the moment. Most of the ones the sect had havinge from Xuan Hao''s recent information trade with the ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire.


    As for the reason why ancient hidden sects had so many resources even though they were closed off to the world and seemingly didn''t expand their influence outside the small area that the sect itself was located inside? There wasn''t really much information on the matter, though¡­ Xuan Hao guessed that these ancient hidden sects were in control of severalrge secret realm and possible even entire mystic realm. Allowing them a steady flow of resources even without them expanding their territory outside of their sect itself.


    In the future, Xuan Hao also wanted the Star Shattering Sect to create a few secret realms that could be solely used to cultivate things like spiritual herbs or be training grounds for the younger disciples, like the Mirage Sect had done with the mystic realm, but¡­ The current Star Shattering Sect was still far from being able to do something like that.


    Although it had the resources to create a secret realm, it wouldn''t be thatrge and wouldn''t really have much usepared to the resources that it would cost to create.


    Even in an empire like the Sky Empire, the secret realms created by their peak forces weren''t more than a few miles in size and only barely held the core of their training ground or the ce where their ancestor resided.


    A trulyrge secret realm required far more strength and resources to create and was simply not something that could be created by someone in the Domain Lord Realm or Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even with his strength in the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm along with hisprehension of the Dao of Space, Xuan Hao felt uncertain that he would even be capable of creating a secret realm the size of the first one he entered after crossing over to this world.


    Then again, outside of creating arge secret realm at the start, it could also grow naturally in size over time, which was how some secret realms created by weaker cultivators could end up growing far beyond the size of secret realms created by far stronger cultivators¡­

 Chapter 1423 Blacksmithing and Alchemy Competetion (2)

    Chapter 1423 cksmithing and Alchemy Competetion (2)


    Looking out over the elders of the sect who were slowly starting to show up for thepetition along with the people who had managed to qualify during the preliminarypetition Elder Song had arrange for those not part of the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao slowly focused his attention on everyone present as he began looking over the people not part of the Star Shattering Sect to see if there happened to be anyone especially talented among them that could potentially be a sixth disciple.


    Unfortunately, even though there were a few who were rather talented and would definitely qualify for the Star Shattering Sect and were worth recruiting, he didn''t find anyone near the level of his five disciples.


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao slowly turned his attention away from the newly arriving people and began noting down anyone with decent talent for Elder Song to recruit after thepetition came to an end. Not just to keep up the image that they were crafting regarding the sect, but also because those people were truly qualified to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    As for whether or not they were spies or people with malicious intentions towards the Star Shattering Sect? That would be for Elder Song to figure when he got his hands on them.


    Given the current strength of the Star Shattering Sect and how much its intelligencework had managed to grow over the past few years, it should be rather simple to figure out if anyone with bad intentions were trying to enter the sect.


    Maybe only the Blue Sea Empire would be capable of sending someone who could hide themselves and sneak inside the Star Shattering Sect, but¡­ Considering that they likely viewed the Star Shattering Sect with extreme cation at the moment, he doubted they would take such drastic actions, as being found out could result in them falling out with a potential ancient hidden sect.


    No matter how much the people of the Blue Sea Empire might doubt the status of the Star Shattering Sect, it had been far too short a period of time for them to start doing something like that to try and get more information on the Star Shattering Sect.


    Only after they had some idea about the capabilities of the Star Shattering Sect would they begin thinking about trying to infiltrate it.


    After all, doing so before they had any information on the sect, or its strength would simply be reckless and a waste of talent on their side.


    Meaning¡­ The only ones who should be thinking about trying to infiltrate the Star Shattering Sect at the moment would be the surrounding powers who didn''t really have much of an idea about what an ancient hidden sect was or what it implied.


    Of course, if they just wanted to send their younger generation to train inside the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao and Elder Song wouldn''t really mind, as it could be considered a show of goodwill for the other side to send their younger generation to train in the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not to mention, there wouldn''t be much for them to learn about the Star Shattering Sect if they were just juniors at the earlier stages of the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    The real threat came from the senior figures participating in thepetition, as most of them had at least reached the Nascent Soul Realm, with Xuan Hao even spotting a few who had managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    ¡­


    At the same time as the start of thepetition was moving closer, arge number of younger cultivators suddenly arrived at the entrance of Falling Star City. All of them having amazing looks on their faces as they gazed at the bustling scene of cultivators rushing in the direction of thepetition grounds to get a good seat for thepetition.


    "So, this is the Star Shattering Sect''s main city¡­"


    "Indeed¡­ Although not as big as some of the main cities I have seen, it''s clear that it has only been constructed for a few years, yet¡­ It somehow managed to grow to such a size!"


    "I can''t wait to see the tournament! I''m really excited to see just what is so special about this Star Shattering Sect that even causes the people from the Blue Sea Empire to avoid their territory."


    As the group of young cultivators chatted among each other, it didn''t take them long before they joined the rest of the cultivators moving towards thepetition grounds. Clearly also havinge for the purpose of watching the uingpetition.


    Although¡­ Different from the rest of the cultivators moving towards thepetition grounds filled with excitement, there was still a level of restraint among the group of youths. Signifying that they had seen such scenes before and weren''t the slightest bit intimidated by therge number of cultivators present far above their own cultivation realm.


    Whoosh~


    The reason for their confidence when facing the surrounding cultivators also soon appeared, as a group of cloaked figures silently followed behind the group. Preventing any sneaky cultivators who tried to steal or take advantage of the clearly wealthy group of young and weak cultivators between the Foundation Establishment Realm and the Core Formation Realm.


    From a nce, it was obvious that these youths were the talents from some of the stronger powers located close to the Star Shattering Sect who had decided toe out and witness thepetition that the Star Shattering Sect was arranging after they had found out about it.


    Not just that, but it was also because they were genuinely curious about this mysterious power that suddenly seemed to have appeared out of nowhere. Especially considering that even the terrifying Blue Sea Empire that none of them had even dared dream of officially bing a part of in the past had somehow decided to avoid this sect and its territory. Clearly afraid of identally provoking it.


    The powers behind these young people also wanted to know more about the Star Shattering Sect and it was for that reason that they had allowed this group of youngsters to make a trip there to take a look. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    The reason why they themselves didn''te to check out the situation of the Star Shattering Sect was rather simple¡­


    The Blue Sea Empire didn''t even dare move around inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, then how in the world could they, with their strength, dare to carelessly enter the territory of the Star Shattering Sect?


    At the very least, considering the younger generation were just out to gain some experience and thepetition was open to all who wanted to join or watch, it wouldn''t be considered overstepping their boundaries to send them into the Star Shattering Sect''s territory to take a look around in the process.


    The strength of the people guarding them had also been restricted to only be within the Domain Lord Realm, as they deemed sending someone in the Soul Ascension Realm to defend these youngsters would be no different from them just directly going to the Star Shattering Sect to investigate it.


    At the very least, with the youngsters out and about in the Star Shattering Sect''s territory and considering the current danger caused by the demonic cultivators, it was reasonable for a few Domain Lord Realm cultivators to be guarding their younger generation!


    So, with that in mind, the group of young people and secret guardians made their way towards thepetition grounds-


    "Ah! Look at that over there! Let''s go take a look there first!"


    "No, let''s check that shop first."


    "Hungry¡­ Something to eat is needed when watching apetition¡­"


    Or that would at least have been the case if the youngsters hadn''t ended up being distracted by the countless shops and food stalls that had sprung up along the streets of the city over the past year following the surge in cultivators entering the city after the announcement of thepetition.


    If not for the fact that thepetition was still some time off actually starting, the guardians silently following behind these easily distracted youngsters would definitely have gone in to hurry them up a bit. Even if it would inevitably end up exposing their intentions of observing the Star Shattering Sect.


    In the end, to ensure that they would at least be able to get somewhere to watch thepetition when the youngsters finally finished up, one of the guardians decided to move ahead of the rest and secure a spot for them to sit.


    Considering that there was nock of wandering Domain Lord Realm cultivators having shown up inside the Falling Star City at this point in time, it was a rather challenging feat to secure arge enough area in thepetitive space for everyone, but it was ultimately solved with the help of a ratherrge number of spirit stones and gifts to the elders in charge of managing thepetition itself.

 Chapter 1424 Definitely Someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm!

    Chapter 1424 Definitely Someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm!


    As the group of young cultivators arrived at thepetition ground, thepetition itself was already starting to begin, as the different participants who had qualified had arrived and were waiting for Elder Song to officially announce the start of thepetition. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Of course, outside of Elder Song behind the main focus as he began moving towards the center of the massive stone tform that thepetition would be taking ce on top of, arge portion of the people present also nced in the direction of the person seated at the highest location together with a few other elders of the Star shattering Sect.


    From just a nce, it was obvious that this person was a true senior figure in the Star Shattering Sect, who hade to observe thepetition that was going to take ce.


    The fact that he remained uninterested in the situation taking ce below him made this even more obvious, as he was the only person who was calmly meditating with his eyes closed while everyone else had their attention fully focused on thepetition.


    Most importantly, the Domain Lord Realm cultivators present could clearly feel an extremely terrifying pressure that seemed to be subconsciously emanating from this senior figure. Making them unable to look directly at him and forcing some of the weaker Domain Lord Realm cultivators to hastily retract their divine sense, as they felt their souls being directly affected by this terrifying pressure.


    Although it was only for a brief moment before the pressure disappeared, it still caused the expression on the faces of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators who hade along with the group of youngsters from the nearby powers to turn pale.


    Celestial Immortal Realm! This is definitely someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm!


    This was the single thought on their mind, as they had no other way to exin the terrifying sense of pressure they had felt seconds earlier. Especially considering that with their strength, they did have a chance to meet some of the Dao Seed Realm cultivators of the Blue Sea Empire when they hade to help deal with the demonic cultivators over the past few years.


    Even if only for a brief moment, they understood that there was some kind of fundamental difference between the senior figure of the Star Shattering Sect and those Dao Seed Realm cultivators they had encountered in the past. Only able to guess that the senior figure from the Star Shattering Sect was someone who had surpassed the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm). Meaning that he could only be someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm in their eyes.


    Not to mention, along with the fact that the Blue Sea Empire seemed cautious of the Blue Sea Empire and did their best to avoid their territory, if possible, it was rather easy to believe that the senior figure from the Star Shattering Sect was someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    After all, only someone with that level of strength had the ability to force a terrifying empire like the Blue Sea Empire to treat them with the level of caution they had.


    ¡­


    Hehe, looks like the little intimidation brought by subtly releasing my dao domain worked perfectly, those people definitely believe I''m someone at the Celestial Immortal Realm!


    At the same time that the group of Domain Lord Realm cultivators were shivering in fear following the realization that they were in the presence of a revered ''Celestial Immortal Realm'' Elder, Xuan Hao was silently smiling to himself as his divine sense picked up all of their actions following his little intimidation earlier.


    From the looks of things, everything had worked out perfectly and the group of Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had shown up with the purpose of trying to gauge the Star Shattering Sect''s strength had alle to believe that it had the presence of someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Even though this was not the Blue Sea Empire directly trying to investigate the situation and trying to gauge the sect''s true strength, the news of what had just happened would undoubtedly spread to the higher ups of the Blue Sea Empire and force them to act even more cautiously when dealing with the Star Shattering Sect in the future. Exactly what Xuan Hao and Elder Song wanted to happen.


    After all, the main goal of the Star Shattering Sect at the moment was to develop to a level where it could stand againstrge powers like the Blue Sea Empire on its own¡­ And for that, it needed time.


    Even if the current situation of the continent was rather unstable due to the demonic cultivators attacking across the entire continent at the same time, it had still not escted to a level where those pinnacle powers in the core regions of the continent fought the demonic cultivators directly.


    At the moment, they were still using various smaller kingdoms and empires as the battleground between them and the demonic cultivator. Ultimately limiting the cultivation of those involved to generally be around the Soul Ascension Realm and below, with only a few important battlegrounds with stronger cultivators appearing rather sparsely.


    For now, the Blue Sea Empire didn''t have such a battleground present in their territory and their Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators should mostly be busy observing the movements of the demonic cultivators or preparing themselves for the inevitable battle that would be taking ce in the future.


    At this kind of time, the Blue Sea Empire would definitely not allow a new power to rise inside of what it considered to be its territorial borders and would have crushed the Star Shattering Sect the moment it began growing to a level where it could threaten the empire''s influence.


    The identity of a hidden ancient sect was mainly created for this purpose, to allow the Star Shattering Sect''s true strength to remain a mystery. Allowing it to grow without having to worry about the Blue Sea Empire''s Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestors appearing to destroy it before it ended up bing a threat to their power.


    Not just the Blue Sea Empire, but Xuan Hao, Elder Song and the rest of the elders who knew about this n all understood that the rest of the powers in the central region of the continent wouldn''t allow another power to rise either, as it would ultimately also end up influencing them in the future.


    The biggest indicator that these powers would move to suppress the Blue Sea Empireing from the fact that these major powers had already banded together to conceal the existence of the Saint Realm and tried their best in killing anyone who reached the realm outside of their empires or were close to reaching the realm but not aligned with any of the major powers.


    An example of this being Gong Cheng, who had been chased to the edge of the continent by these major powers before he had managed to sessfully break through the Saint Realm and archived a level of power that was beyond what someone cultivating ording to the Earth Immortal Realm could reach.


    Though that old man was notparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm, he was definitely beyond the Earth Immortal Realm and would likely end up reaching a level of strengthparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm in the not too far future.


    At that level of strength, along with his skill as a Saint Realm cksmith, he definitely had the strength to threaten the different major powers in the core region of the continent¡­ And that was without even considering any kind of special abilities one might gain after reaching the Saint Realm in a specific profession¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help ncing towards his own status for a moment.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Large Sess Realm), Dao of the Sword (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Space (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Illusions (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Formations (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Fire (Small Sess Realm), Dao of cksmithing (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Light (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Alchemy (Small Sess Realm)


    Dao Lotus: 20


    Sword Intent: Sword Soul Realm Talent: ???? Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened) Physique: Ster Dao Body (99% Awakened)


    Realm: Late Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm) Professions: Alchemist (Grandmaster), Formation Master (Grandmaster), cksmithing (Pseudo Saint) Sect: Star Shattering Sect Status: Ancestor of the Star Shattering Sect Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui, Chun Hua Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Second Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Peak Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm) [Personal Techniques]: Descend of the Ice God''s Sword (High Earth Rank) [Movement Techniques]: Illusory Light Steps (Mid Heaven Rank), Drifting Cloud Steps (Iplete, Peak Heaven Rank) [Sword Techniques]: Rain Sword (Peak Mortal Rank), Heaven Splitting Sword Art (Iplete, Mid Heaven Rank), Void Sword Art (Iplete, Low Heaven Rank), Untold Sword Mantra (Iplete, Unknown) Although he was still not anywhere close to the Saint Realm, he had at least managed to make quite a bit of progress over the past year. Not only advancing his Dao of Formations, but also using it to form another twoyers around his dao lotus, bing stronger in the process.


    Of course, one could not forget the fact that his identity had also changed from a Grand Elder of the Sect to an Ancestor of the Sect, though, this didn''t have much to do with him and more so had to do with Elder Song, who was the one behind this change in identity of his.


    To be honest, he didn''t even notice he had changed from a grand elder to an ancestor before he happened to nce over his status and notice the change that had unknowingly taken ce without his knowledge.


    As for his demon beasts¡­ They were both progressing well over the past year, the rabbit demon beast even having taken the first step towards reaching the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Now standing at the Peak of the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    If he wasn''t wrong, Xuan Hao guessed that the rabbit demon beast would most likely be the first among his two demon beasts to break through to the Dao Seed Realm.


    Although¡­ He didn''t entirely rule out the little winged tiger, as it seemed to have some rather strange luck and might somehow manage to overtake the rabbit demon beast that was an entire three minor realms ahead of it in terms of strength.


    As long as it doesn''t end up consuming another powerful demonic cultivator by ident¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about how the winged lion demon beast had managed to reach the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao turned his attention away from the status and focused his attention back on thepetition that had just begun following a short speech from Elder Song.

 Chapter 1425 A Spy?

    Chapter 1425 A Spy?


    "... And with the rules officially established, we will begin the first part of thepetition. Go ahead and choose the materials needed among those presented. Of course, there is not enough of everything for everyone, so be fast in case there is some specific spiritual herbs or spiritual metals that you want to use."


    As Elder Song finished his introduction of thepetition and exnation of the rules, he quietly retreated to the side while watching the around two hundred people participating in thepetition rushing forward towards the tables where the different spiritual herbs and spiritual metals were located. Each of them eager to get their hands on the spiritual metal or spiritual herbs that they needed for the artifact or alchemical potion that they wanted to refine-


    "Ah! I wanted that Yellow Spring Root!"


    "Nooo-! My ck Rot Metal!"


    "Ahhh¡­ No Spirit Spring Grass left¡­ I''m doomed¡­"


    Unfortunately, not everyone managed to get the specific spiritual herbs they were aiming for and could only helplessly try and settle on something different instead. Only the few Domain Lord Realm cultivators participating managed to seize the spiritual herbs or metals that they wanted without much of a struggle, though¡­ There were a few who ended up simrly disappointed when failing to get one of the rarer spiritual herbs present in the pile that the Star Shattering Sect had made avable for thepetition.


    Most importantly of all, Elder Song clearly noticed that the transcendent grade spiritual herbs and metals that had been mixed in among the rathermon spiritual herbs had managed to survive the onught so far. None of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators or other participants have noticed them yet.


    "Hm? This looks to be an interesting color¡­ Maybe I can try using this one to enhance the beauty of my artifact?"


    However, this did notst for long, as one of the slower ones among the participants soon found one of the transcendent grade spiritual metals and casually chose it due to its rather unique colorpared to the rest of the spiritual metals present.


    "¡­"


    Seeing this, Elder Song could not help showing a somewhat painful expression on his face that he quickly hid. Doing his best to stop himself from running up and taking the transcendent grade spiritual metal way from the contestant who had just happened to pick it up. Especially so after hearing that the other party was only intending to use it due to its unique color. Not because he had realized that it was a transcendent grade spiritual metal.


    Even Xuan Hao, who had been observing thepetition with a somewhat uncaring attitude through his divine sense so far, had a simr reaction upon noticing the transcendent spiritual metal being taken away by one of the participants.


    However, whenpared to Elder Song, who had a brief change in expression, he remainedpletely calm on the outside. Only opening his eyes for a brief moment to nce in the direction of the disciple with the transcendent grade spiritual metal.


    "That is¡­ Rock Fall Rainbow Crystal Metal!? I didn''t expect something like that to appear at thispetition¡­"


    "Same, it even managed to garner the attention of that senior elder along with a surprised look from the one in charge of holding thepetition!


    "Rock Fall Rainbow Crystal Metal? Such a long name¡­ Is it really that impressive¡­?"


    "Impressive!? Kid, that''s a genuine piece of transcendent grade spiritual metal! Not just that, but also of higher quality than the normal transcendent grade spiritual metals used in crafting things for Soul Ascension Realm cultivators. Possibly even being high quality transcendent grade spiritual metal capable of crafting artifacts for those above the Soul Ascension Realm!"


    "Wha-!? Something that precious!? In this kind ofpetition?! Are they crazy!?"


    "I don''t know, they must have a reason for doing something like this¡­" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    As a few of the more experienced observers among the audience noticed the transcendent grade spiritual metal being caried by one of the contestants, it didn''t take long before word of it started spreading among all the audience members¡­


    Using transcendent grade spiritual metal of this quality in a simplepetition¡­ Indeed, it fits with the normal operations of those ancient hidden sects. Wanting to try and find a hidden gem capable of identifying the transcendent grade spiritual herbs or metals. Showing their affinity for the profession in the process.


    Hm? Is this perhaps why thepetition tform was sealed off from the rest of thepetition when the event started? Indeed¡­ Without a soundproofing barrier in ce, this kind of method would be rather useless, as those who already chose their spiritual metals and spiritual herbs would almost certainly rush back to the piles of nts and metals after realizing that they might be able to find transcendent grade metals in there.


    Even though getting their hands of transcendent grade material didn''t directly allow them to win thepetition or ce in the top 10, it would be extremely useful for all of the cksmiths and alchemists present, as using such high-quality materials gave them an opportunity to attempt something beyond their current level. Giving them a chance to possibly increase their rank as cksmith or alchemist through this opportunity.


    No matter whether they seeded in this round of thepetition or not, they would still get something out of it no matter what, a guaranteed price so to speak.


    At the same time that everyone was excitedly chatting with each other about the appearance of such high-quality spiritual metal among the resources avable to thepetitors, an average-looking person seated in one of the countless seats located around thepetition ground could not help frowning to himself as he thought about this while gazing deeply at the multicolored rock being carried by one of thepetitors.


    This person was none other than the spy that had been sent over by the Blue Sea Empire to observe today''spetition and try to gauge the strength of the Star Shattering Sect!


    Although his cultivation was only around the Later Stage of the Core Formation Realm, he had been specifically trained for missions like this one where the Blue Sea Empire wanted to avoid anyplications by sending in someone with rtively weak cultivation to avoid suspicious that woulde with anyone stronger showing up.


    To do his job properly, he even knew about things that would normally only be known to the elders of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Of course, to prevent any possible leakage of this kind of sensitive information, his soul had already been covered in countless restrictions that was impossible for even someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm to undo. Killing him the moment he even as much as thought about betraying the Blue Sea Empire.


    It was also because of this skillful infiltration and natural ability to blend in with his surroundings, that even Xuan Hao, at the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, didn''t notice anything unusual about him when he scanned the crowd of people who hade to observe thepetition earlier. At this point even believing that no one from the Blue Sea Empire had shown up to observe thepetition¡­


    Luckily for Xuan Hao, this didn''t end up causing anyplications, as the other party was simrly convinced that the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient hidden sect from what he had seen so far.


    Not so much because of Xuan Hao''s earlier disy of strength, as he had no real way to measure it with his current cultivation realm and taking out an artifact to directly try and read his strength with it, would almost certainly result in the other party noticing him.


    Instead, it was the disy of resources that the Star Shattering Sect had done so far during thepetition, as his experienced eye soon noticed another spiritual metal of the Transcendent Grade and three simr spiritual herbs hidden among the piles from where he was sitting. Not one of them being of lower quality, but instead all being of higher quality that would normally be used in artifacts or potions for those at the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm).


    Disying so many transcendent grade herbs and metals was simply not something that would be possible if the Star Shattering Sect was weak, they had to have a stable supply of these kinds of high-quality spiritual herbs and metals, something that could only be archived through monopolizing certain special locations in the core region or through well-developed secret realms.


    Both of which were unachievable by anyone other than major powers like the Blue Sea Empire and hidden ancient sects.


    I have to report this immediately and ensure that the rtionship with the Blue Sea Empire is kept neutral before we can get a better understanding of their true capabilities.


    Coming to a conclusion as he thought about this to himself, the spy from the Blue Sea Empire continued to excitedly focus on thepetition that was finally starting to get exciting below, while secretly focusing most of his attention on formting the report he was nning to submit when everything was over.

 Chapter 1426 Blacksmithing and Alchemy Competetion (3)

    Chapter 1426 cksmithing and Alchemy Competetion (3)


    Unaware of the fact that they had a chance to get their hands on transcendent grade spiritual herbs or metals during thispetition, the participants all moved towards a free cauldron or furnace after having picked up the materials they needed.


    The next part of thepetition was rather simple and set in stone, as they would just have to refine or craft something to the best of their ability before being judged by the elders of the Star Shattering Sect. Following which the most talented ones would move forward to the next stage of thepetition.


    Whoosh~


    Because of this, none of these participants batted an eye when one of the elders who had been standing on the side observing them while they picked out spiritual herbs and metals, stepped forward and removed the spiritual herbs and metals that had been ced for them to pick from-


    "Ah¡­ To think they lost the chance to get their hands on a transcendent grade spiritual herb."


    "Yeah, it was clear that there was more than one hidden inside the piles of herbs and metals, but¡­ None of them reacted to our conversation so far. Hehe, looks like the elders of the Star Shattering Sect sealed up thepetition space and prevented them from hearing us."


    "Indeed¡­ Only those talented enough would be able to recognize the presence of transcendent grade natural treasures. Truly an interesting way to find talented people. The only problem being that the cost of using this kind of method is far from something that we can aplish, one has to at least be from one of those terrifying empires from the core of the continent, like the Blue Sea Empire!"


    "True, but I also-"


    BAAAANG!


    As the next part of thepetition officially began and the participants began the process of refining their artifacts or potions, the barrier that had been put in ce to block the voices of the spectators also disappeared, causing one of the cksmiths who had been eager to get ahead of the rest to briefly lose control of his emotions. Exploding the furnace in front of him beforeunching him flying into the barrier that protected the audience members from just such an ident.


    "Ah!? What is- Damn you!"


    "How dare you blow up right next to me!? Are you deliberately trying to sabotage others!?"


    "This reckless fool¡­"


    In the end, the ones who ended up most affected by the sudden explosion were the unlucky cksmiths unfortunate enough to be located next to the one who had just exploded. Forcing them to take drastic measures to protect themselves and their furnace to prevent it from being affected by the explosion that had suddenly taken ce.


    To the dismay of these cksmiths, though they could block most of the damage and prevent their materials from being destroyed by the other party, they still ended up with damaged materials. Lowering the quality of the artifact that they could create.


    In the end, this caused the remaining participants to act far more cautiouslypared to before, as some proficient in the Dao of Formations even went as far as to set up a formation around her alchemy cauldron to defend herself against any potential explosions that might end up taking ce on the side of the alchemists.


    The most unaffected by all of this were the Domain Lord Realm cultivators that had joined thepetition, as they simply chose to use their domain to guard themselves and their furnace or cauldron.


    Although it did put a strain on them, it would not be enough to interfere with their abilities as cksmiths or alchemists. At most it would slightly increase the time needed for them toplete what they wanted to create.


    Given that this was only the first challenge of thepetition and it was essentially just designed so that the 150 outsiders who had gone through preliminaries over the past few weeks had a chance to see the abilities of the Star Shattering Sect''s elders, there wasn''t any time limit introduced in the challenge and they could take as long as they wanted toplete their artifact or potion.


    Of course, with the normal time required for refining some high quality artifacts, potions or pills taking weeks and possibly months, there had been a small time limit of a week introduced to ensure that thepetition wouldn''t end up dragging on for too long, but outside of that, the group of alchemists and cksmiths had more than enough time to create whatever they wanted to create with the materials that they had gotten their hands on.


    Like this, the first day of thepetition soon flew by with all of the alchemists and cksmiths present continuing to craft the thing they had set out to create. Most of the nning regarding what they wanted to create, had finished during the time they had used on choosing which spiritual metals or herbs to use.


    "This¡­ Is so boring!"


    As a result of this, it didn''t take long before the first few excited people who hade to watch the alchemy and cksmithingpetition merged into a singlepetition. Leaving out of boredom. Having anticipated an excitingpetition simr to that of the martial artspetitions that the Star Shattering Sect had hosted in the past.


    By the end of the second day, the only people who remained behind to watch the tournament were those who hade to try and gauge the strength of the Star Shattering Sect and the different wandering alchemists and cksmiths, who took this as an opportunity to learn from their seniors. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    For these wandering alchemists and cksmiths, it was difficult for them to find a good opportunity to learn from someone stronger than them without some kind of lucky opportunity.


    The fact that the first part of thepetition had dragged on for such a long time only made them happier, as it gave them a longer time and better chance to observe their seniors working. Learning directly from how they were moving.


    Not just that, but the fact that there were so many other cksmiths and alchemists present among the audience, with most of the normal cultivators already having been weeded out, it gave everyone watching a great opportunity to discuss their insights and share with each other what they learnt. Even better, there were some senior cksmiths and alchemists among the audience, who in turn decided to join in on the fun and help their juniors.


    All things considered; the first real challenge of thepetition was no longer for the elders of the Star Shattering Sect to show up. Instead, it had be a ce for the wandering cksmiths and alchemists to learn and improve their skills together.


    ¡­


    "How unexpected¡­ To think this kind of environment for learning was fostered after most of those weaker fellows left. How amazing, the Star Shattering Sect should also be able to use the opportunity to gauge any talents among the audience whom they might have missed under normal circumstances with this kind of environment¡­


    Ancient hidden sects¡­ Their methods are indeed terrifying. Especially so when ites to recruiting disciples!" Muttering this to himself as he observed the entire situation, the spy from the Blue Sea Empire, who had been about to leave along with the rest of the people that had grown bored, unconsciously came to a stop as he realized what was happening.


    Once again, his amazement of the Star Shattering Sect- Or more precisely, the methods of ancient hidden sects, was reaffirmed.


    Even the Blue Sea Empire was far inferior to the hidden ancient sects when it came to recruiting new talents to join them, something that allowed these sects to recruit disciples from a far smaller area and still retain their strength without any problems.


    Huh? Why is the senior looking at me- Ah! I unconsciously muttered that to myself just now!


    Just as the spy was about to continue making his way out of thepetition space, he suddenly realized that Xuan Hao was staring directly at him, causing an overwhelming sense of pressure to engulf his entire body. Preventing him from even taking a single step forward.


    Although what he had said had been brief, he had clearly mentioned something that wasn''t normal for a Core Formation Realm cultivator.


    After all, what kind of Core Formation Realm cultivator would know about ancient hidden sects? Especially so one that came from outside the core region of the continent¡­


    I¡­ I really messed up this time around¡­


    Only able to think about this to himself as he remained frozen on the spot unable to move, the spy from the Blue Sea Empire who had barely reached the Core Formation Realm, felt a sense of impending doom. Understanding far too well that there would be no survival for a small spy like him once he was discovered. Even more so considering that he was currently dealing with a terrifying hidden ancient sect.

 Chapter 1427 Scared Away~

    Chapter 1427 Scared Away~


    Hidden ancient sect... It looks like this little one is a spy from one of the nearby smaller empires. Possibly even the Blue Sea Empire!


    Hearing the words of the little Core Formation Realm cultivator pertaining to something that he shouldn''t know about with his current cultivation realm, Xuan Hao almost instantly connected him to one of the nearby smaller empires or possibly even the Blue Sea Empire itself. After all, only these kinds of powers would have some way to know about the existence of hidden ancient sects.


    Of course, when it came to the different smaller empires located outside of the core region of the continent, it would be up to luck when it came to them learning about the existence of hidden ancient sects.


    Not to mention, the existence of hidden ancient sects wasn''t purged from history like the past and the existence of the Profound Immortal Realm seemed to have been. Instead, it was just a bit more difficult to find and associate the current Star Shattering Sect with. Not something difficult to imagine a small empire with Soul Ascension Realm cultivators to be capable of doing.


    Oh well, I already expected these kinds of spies among the audience, though, it is a bit surprising that I didn''t notice this little one before he made such an obvious mistake due to being shocked by something. Thinking about it, there is a good chance that the Blue Sea Empire dispatched simr spies!


    Although, I doubt their spies will make this kind of obvious mistake. Meaning they should still be hidden among the audience, likely one of the wandering alchemists or cksmiths to make them blend in better¡­


    Thinking this to himself, Xuan Hao turned his attention away from the somewhat amateurish spy and instead focused his attention on the audience members currently discussing the crafting and brewing methods of the participants. Trying to see if he could spot the spy from the Blue Sea Empire among them.


    After observing them for a few hours through his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help letting out a somewhat frustrated sigh.


    The wandering cksmiths and alchemists among the audience seemed to perfectly fit their identity without showing any mistakes that might reveal them as a spy. All of them showing a level of mastery perfectly within the range of what would be expected from someone of their status. None of them revealed anything that would be considered impossible for wandering cksmiths and alchemists.


    Even the mistakes they made could be considered due to their gaps in knowledge stemming from them being wandering cksmiths and alchemists instead of formally raised by a powerful force. Instead having wandered the world and picked up things on their own or by having a lucky encounter with a fellow wandering alchemist or cksmith.


    The Blue Sea Empire¡­ Indeed, their spies should be top quality. Able to perfectly conceal themselves.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while feeling a sense of respect towards the Blue Sea Empire for being able to raise such a perfect spy capable of perfectly blending themselves into their surroundings, Xuan Hao decided to not pay any more attention to the wandering cksmiths and alchemists. Instead focusing his attention back on thepetition below.


    Considering that he couldn''t figure out anything after using his divine sense to carefully scrutinize the group of wandering cksmiths and alchemists for a few hours, he didn''t think he would be able to gain anything if he continued doing so. The spy had clearly mastered the ability to blend himself or herself into a crowd of people without sticking out.


    With that in mind, he was forced to take the current situation even more seriously, as he realized that there was a high likelihood that the Blue Sea Empire was currently keeping an eye on him to try and find any mistakes or something that could point towards things being different from what was outwardly being shown.


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao also made sure to inform Elder Song about the current situation to ensure that he didn''t end up lowering his guard as thepetition dragged on towards the third day.


    ¡­


    Unknown to Xuan Hao, who was now fully under the belief that there was a spy hidden among the remaining audience members, the spy in question was shaking all over in fear as he made his way out of thepetition space.


    That¡­ That look¡­ He is letting me go to serve as a warning¡­!


    Thinking this to himself as he finally stepped back into the bustling streets of the Falling Star City, the spy could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine upon realizing how close he had been to death just now.


    If not for the fact that the Star Shattering Sect clearly wanted to use him to warn the Blue Sea Empire about not sending their spies into their territory again in the future, there would have been no way for someone like him to get out alive. Especially considering that his strength was only in the Core Formation Realm.


    I¡­ I can''t send the report back in here, I have to personally go back, or I might end up getting killed by that senior for failing to heed his warning¡­


    Feeling like he was being secretly observed by a terrifying divine sense that was ready to strike him down the moment he made the slightest mistake, the spy from the Blue Sea Empire didn''t dare continue to stay inside the Blue Sea Empire and instead turned to quickly leave the city and make his way back to the Blue Sea Empire to do his report on the situation in person.


    The order in that gaze was clear and he had no intention of going against it. Especially so considering that the goal of the Blue Sea Empire was not to provoke this hidden ancient sect, but instead just to gauge their strength.


    Considering what he had seen so far, it was already clear that this was indeed a hidden ancient sect. Not just that, but it seemed even more terrifying than the rumors he had heard about hidden ancient sects.


    In the future, he would have to make sure that the Blue Sea Empire be fully aware of just how dangerous this Star Shattering Sect was and more importantly try his best to ensure that none of his brothers were sent to the territory of the sect for spying missions.


    Instead of that, he would much prefer that they were sent into the Frozen Wastnds to spy on the demonic cultivators, as that would at least give them a better chance of survivalpared to entering the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    The reason for this being that he clearly understood that the divine sense of Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator was more than enough to fully cover the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    If such an existence swept through the sect''s territory every few days to check for any enemies, it would essentially render any kind of spying operation impossible without the help of certain special artifacts capable of hiding from the divine sense of Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators.


    The Frozen Wastnds on the other hand was far easier to conduct missions inside of, as they would at most have to disguise themselves as demonic cultivators and avoid certain dangerous areas where Demon King Realm demonic cultivators were present.


    More importantly, Demon King Realm demonic cultivators didn''t really care much for those weaker than themselves and would never bother to investigate the demonic cultivators as long as they followed theirmands.


    Whoosh-!


    With all of that in mind, the spy from the Blue Sea Empire didn''t waste any time inside the Falling Star City, as he directly rushed out of the city under the confused looks of the surrounding cultivators before heading directly towards the border of the Blue Sea Empire.


    In the process of doing this, he also made sure to inform his brothers and sisters who hade together with him that they had already been noticed by the senior figure from the Star Shattering Sect and had been told to leave the territory of the sect.


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Not doubting the words of their senior and older brother, the rest of the spies realized that the Star Shattering Sect was far stronger than anticipated and quickly followed after their older brother. Heading towards the Blue Sea Empire together.


    Considering that they had already been noticed, they didn''t bother hiding themselves, causing a bit of confusion among the people inside the Falling Star City, but it was quickly forgotten again, as their group disappeared just as fast as they had appeared. Most people just thought that it was some sect that had decided to rush back home for something important.


    Outside of Xuan Hao, nobody realized that it was a group of spies that had infiltrated the Falling Star City who left just now, though¡­ Xuan Hao didn''t care too much and guessed it was just a show of goodwill towards the sect from the power behind these spies. Having them leave so openly.n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 1428 Blacksmithing and Alchemy Competetion (4)

    Chapter 1428 cksmithing and Alchemy Competetion (4)


    As thepetition proceed smoothly over the next four days, the remaining audience members, who mostly consisted of wandering alchemists and cksmiths, all benefitted greatly from the week of observing a group of seniors slowly and skillfully working.


    At the same time, as the first part of thepetition drew to an end, therge number of people who had left earlier on due to the rather boring state of thepetition for those not skilled in cksmiths or alchemy began to slowly return. Breathing life back into thepetition space that was no longer dominated by the overjoyed conversations of the wandering cksmiths and alchemists.


    The few who hade from afar to try and gauge the strength of the Star Shattering Sect and to get a better idea about their strength also returned, with a clear exception being the ones from the Blue Sea Empire, who had long since left the borders of the Star Shattering Sect following their leader being noticed by Xuan Hao.


    The only ones not part of the wandering cksmiths and alchemists who had stayed inside thepetition space and continued observing thepetition for the entire week without leaving was the group of youngsters who hade here with the hope of observing this newly emerged power that had made their parents and seniors worried.


    Of course, it was not like they wanted to remain at thepetition for such a long time. Especially considering that their cultivation realm was still a bit too low to allow them to stay up for an entire week without any rest.


    Instead¡­ The reason why they had ended up remaining with all of this in mind, was because their guardians had forced them to stay put and just find somewhere to meditate to remove the exhaustion, they inevitably encountered from staying up for such a long period of time with their current weak cultivation realm.


    "I really wanted to explore more of the Falling Star City¡­"


    "I want to eat something delicious at those restaurants we saw on the way here¡­"


    "Just¡­ Just give me a ce to sleep!"


    No matter how much these youngstersined, their guardians didn''t allow them to leave and made sure that they remained in the small part of the audience space that had been assigned to them.


    The reason for this was rather simple, as these guardians had been tasked with keeping an eye on the Star Shattering Sect and trying to gauge their strength with the youngsters acting as a shield for them to do their work.


    Meaning¡­ The youngsters had to remain in ce, or they, acting as their guardians, would have no reason to remain in thepetition space.


    No matter how much theyined, there was nothing the young ones could do about it, as they at least felt a bit of relief knowing that the first part of thepetition was about to finish up.


    At least¡­ Now that this long and rather boring part of thepetition had finished, the next part was bound to be more interesting. Not to mention, thepetition should also being to an end sooner. Giving them a much-needed chance to go out and properly explore the Falling Star City, something all of them had grown increasingly interested in doing during the week they had spent watching the cksmiths and alchemists below working.


    ¡­


    "The first part of thepetition is now officially over; I will have the senior of our sect personally examine what you made and score you ordingly. The fifty people who get the lowest score will be disqualified and won''t be able to move on to the next stage of thepetition."


    As the seven-day mark was up, Elder Song, who had remained silent at the side observing everyone during this period of time. Stood up and addressed the little over 200 participants present.


    "Wha- We can get disqualified from the first round!? Wasn''t this just a test to show off in?!"


    "No! I focused on making my artifact more pretty than useful! What a mistake!"


    "At least it''s pretty, the pill I made, though of a high grade, has a rather useless effect¡­"


    Following the announcement from Elder Song, a few of the participants who hadn''t taken the first challenge seriously all began to panic as they looked down at the somewhat weird creations that they had ended up making for fun due to misunderstanding that the first part of thepetition was only about having the elders from the Star Shattering Sect show off and not actually about anyone being eliminated.


    Luckily, the number of people who made this kind of stupid mistake was rather limited, as most of the people present didn''t dare to be careless with what they made and had thus done everything in their power to make the best artifact, pill or potion that they could make with their current strength.


    "The senior from the sect¡­ Is it perhaps that person up there?"


    "I think so¡­ He is the only one who seems to fit the description¡­ And for him to oversee thispetition, he should be someone rather skilled in the Dao of Alchemy and cksmithing."


    "Wow¡­ Someone skilled in both cksmithing and alchemy? Indeed, a senior figure¡­"


    Instead of focusing on the mistake they had made, the rest of the participants instead focused their attention on Xuan Hao, filled with curiosity.


    After all, for him to personally be inspecting what they had made, it meant that he was skilled in both the Dao of Alchemy and the Dao of cksmithing. Surpassing all of them in both of these aspects, something that was a clear testament to this senior''s strength and his ability to oversee thispetition.


    Of course, there were still some among them who were doubtful about how skilled this senior might be, as they understood just how difficult it was to study two different professions at the same time, but they didn''t voice any of these doubts out loud.


    The simple reason for this being that it would be rather easy to see if this person knew what he was doing or was simply making things up when he started evaluating what they had made.


    Because of this, the ones who were the most hopeful about the senior figure faking his knowledge of the two professions were the ones who had ended up messing up during the first challenge. Hoping that this might be a chance for them to continue onwards in thepetition. Unwilling to just give up on the rewards promised for proceeding further into thepetition.


    Rustle~


    For this reason, every single person in thepetition space, audience members and participants, all focused their attention on Xuan Hao, as he slowly rose up from his seat for the first time since thepetition had started.


    Whoosh~


    Not affected by this, Xuan Hao disyed the temperament befitting of a senior, as he slowly descended down towards the first participant. Picking up the small dagger he had crafted over the past week before examining it closely with his divine sense.


    "Imbnce between the metals used during fusion process. Added too much of the Spring Tail Spirit Metal. Not enough of the Red Breeze Metal during the final polishing. Not just that, but the heat was not well controlled when the Dark Iron Metal was added and¡­"


    Not a second after he finished examining the small dagger, Xuan Hao instantly picked up on countless mistakes that the participant in front of him had ended up making during the forging process¡­ And he didn''t hold back, as he directly stated them all out loud. Instantly causing the face of the participant to start paling visibly on the spot. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although he might not have fully believed in Xuan Hao''s skill at first, he was certain that the person in front of him was indeed a senior now that he heard what he said. Especially so because he could clearly sense that everything, he said was correct. Not just that, but his words also seemed to carry with it the intent of a senior teaching a junior.


    So, with that in mind, the participant decided to just earnestly listen to him and try his best to learn from what he said. Understanding that this might be an opportunity for him.


    "¡­ Overall, out of a hundred points, you will 57, though not of the best quality, it has shown you have room for improvement. Not to mention, it looks like you are good at picking up on your own mistakes and learning from them."


    After a little over ten minutes, Xuan Hao finished talking about the dagger before delivering a final judgement and handing it back to the participant.


    "Thank you, senior!"


    Not the slightest bit saddened by the judgement, the participant instead happily took the dagger back with an overjoyed smile on his face.


    The ten or so minutes just now had been incredibly useful to him, as it was essentially him being taught personally by Xuan Hao in that period of time. An opportunity that was hard toe by for a wandering cksmith like himself.

 Chapter 1429 Blacksmithing and Alchemy Competetion (5)

    Chapter 1429 cksmithing and Alchemy Competetion (5)


    "This..."


    "Oh no..."


    Also witnessing how Xuan Hao slowly exined the mistakes that had been made during the forging process of the dagger, the few who had harbored hope for him to not be skilled when it came to cksmithing, all simultaneously shared a look of despair. Understanding that there was no chance of them progressing to the next stage of thepetition.


    "What is this? Did you just randomly toss in a few spiritual herbs into water and turn it into a soup of some sort? Look, there are even unrefined chunks of spiritual herbs floating around inside of it¡­ Disqualified!"


    "A transcendent grade spiritual metal grinded and used as coloring for an artifact of this quality? Disqualified¡­ And pray you don''t run into any of the other cksmiths again after leaving the city¡­"


    "This pill¡­ Shouldn''t this be a healing pill? But¡­ As a poisonous pill, it gets 37 points."


    In the end, it didn''t take long before arge number of people were eliminated, while a few who thought they would get disqualified ended up just barely making it through to the next round through a stroke of good luck.


    Even then, the time it took for Xuan Hao to go through each of the participants one by one, still ended up taking around half a day. Making some among the audience rather happily listen, while arge majority of the ones who had returned in hopes of things bing interesting began to groan painfully after listening to Xuan Hao methodically going over each of the creations presented by the participants.


    Luckily, this time around, it didn''t take that long and Elder Song quickly jumped in following Xuan Hao returning to his seat. Exining the next part of thepetition that would be focused on testing the group of participants alchemy or cksmithing knowledge. Having thempete among each other on different subjects and eliminating those who fail to keep up with the rest in terms of knowledge.


    Of course, this did end up favoring those from the Star Shattering Sect, as the knowledge avable to someone from arge sect would inevitably far surpass that of a wandering cultivator.


    So, with that in mind, Elder Song made sure that the elders of the Star Shattering Sect wouldn''t end uppeting with the outsiders and instead had thempete between each other. In turn, making the onespeting feel grateful towards him and the Star Shattering Sect, as they understood that this was them making sure that they didn''t try and oppress them with their background to win thepetition. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Another¡­ Boring challenge¡­"


    "Aren''t these kinds ofpetition supposed to be more interesting¡­?"


    "Perhaps¡­ The Star Shattering Sect is trying to make this as boring as possible? You know, trying something new."


    To no one''s surprise, the second challenge didn''t make the audience members the slightest bit happy, as it didn''t take more than a few minutes for the ce to once again clear out of those not interested in alchemy or cksmithing. Once again leaving behind the group of eager wandering cksmiths and alchemists who were overjoyed at this new development, as it would get them a much-needed opportunity to learn more about all kinds of spiritual herbs and spiritual metals that they didn''t have any information on beforehand.


    Because of this, outside of the wandering cksmiths and alchemists that decided to stay behind, there were also a few wandering cultivators who understood the value of this information and remained to listen in.


    After all, even though the alchemy and cksmithing knowledge shared might not be that valuable to someone like them, the information on different spiritual herbs and metals was, as it could directly help them identifying something valuable if they happened to find a spiritual herb mentioned today that they had no idea about at the moment.


    Along with that kind of attitude and under the tight watch of Elder Song and a few other elders of the sect, thepetition proceeded smoothly without running into any problems along the way.


    Following which thepetition smoothly proceeded through third, fourth and fifth challenge of thepetition over the next week. Ending up with 10 people by the end of the second week of thepetition.


    Among the remaining 10 participants still left were both Bai Ning and Qing Yi, who had singlehandedly dominated their respective part of thepetition. Showing off the brilliance of the Star Shattering Sect in the process.


    Of course, even with them around, there were still quite a few of the wandering alchemists who had ended up showing off and had managed to exceeded expectations and beat some of the elders from the Star Shattering Sect in the process.


    In the end, outside of Qing Yi, Bai Ning and the elders of the sect, there were two wandering cultivators who had managed to make it all the way to the top ten.


    Unfortunately for both of them, they were both skilled in the art of cksmithing and ended up having to face off against Bai Ning in the final part of thepetition where two winners would be chosen, one among the cksmiths and one among the alchemists.


    By far, facing off against Bai Ning could be considered the worst possible fate for these two wandering cksmiths, as they essentially stood no chance against this single-minded person solely focused on the Dao of cksmithing.


    At least if they had ended up facing off against Qing Yi, they would have stood somewhat of a chance, as she wasn''t entirely focus onprehending the Dao of Alchemy like Bai Ning was focused on the Dao of cksmithing.


    Even then, as the five cksmithspeted with each other, the two wandering cksmiths managed to achieve the rather surprising ranking of number two and three. Surpassing the other two elders of the Star Shattering Sect left among the cksmiths in the process.


    As for the alchemy part of the finals? Qing Yi managed to win it without much suspense, as the elders of the sect participating in thepetition were still far from reaching her current level of alchemy. Possible only her master and Pei Yang had surpassed her inside the sect at this point in time.


    All things considered, this still ended up going in a way that both Xuan Hao and Elder Song had not expected, as the sect ended up forking up some rather precious rewards for the second and third ce winners of the cksmithing part of thepetition. Rewards that was originally intended to be used on nurturing their own cksmiths.


    Unfortunately, there was not much they could do about this, as the rewards for thepetition had long since been announced by the sect itself in an attempt to attract arge number of people to either watch or join thepetition.


    "Can''t waste the sect resources like this! I will definitely have to recruit those two and have them join the sect to avoid losing the precious resources of the sect to outsiders!"


    Even then, Elder Song wasn''t saddened for long, as he soon focused his attention on recruiting these two talented wandering cksmiths to join the sect. Seeing it as the best way to recover the resources that had been handed out by the sect and ensure that they stayed within the sect itself.


    Seeing this, Xuan Hao decided not to say anything.


    Instead, he focused his attention on the different people among the audience who hade to watch the finals. Trying to see if he could get lucky enough to spot the spy that might have been sent out by the Blue Sea Empire.


    But¡­ Finding no sess and once again finding himself admiring the skillful disguise methods of the Blue Sea Empire. Even though he was able to perfectly hide themselves from someone like himself, Xuan Hao soon focused his attention on a few of the more talented people among the audience members. Noting them down for Elder Song to recruit after he finished getting those two wandering cksmiths to join the sect.


    Not just to enhance the strength of the sect by adding more disciples to the now ratherrge number of disciples inside the sect, but also to give the proper impression that the Star Shattering Sect had indeed held thepetition to recruit disciples.


    In a sense, thebined aspect of thepetition that tested both cksmiths and alchemists at the same time was to attract even more people, something befitting of an ancient hidden sect when it came to their recruitment practices.


    Hopefully, after everything was said and done, Xuan Hao just sincerely hoped that the Star Shattering Sect would end up being viewed as an ancient hidden sect by the Blue Sea Empire.


    After all, this was the main reason why he had participated in thepetition in the first ce, as Elder Song would have been more than enough to take care of thepetition under normal circumstances.


    Not to mention, thepetition would almost certainly have been more exciting and different if it wasn''t for the fact that they had tailored it around how those ancient hidden sects were rumored to hold theirpetitions when trying to attract talent for a specific profession like alchemy or cksmithing.


    If not for that, Elder Song would have definitely tried his best to make thepetition a bit more entertaining for those who hade to watch thepetition instead of solely focusing on testing the participants and trying to pull out all of their talents.


    Though good for measuring the talents of those participants and even the audience members, it was not the most exciting thing to watch for those not proficient in alchemy or cksmithing¡­

 Chapter 1430 Surprise of the Alchemy and Blacksmithing Hall

    Chapter 1430 Surprise of the Alchemy and cksmithing Hall


    As thepetition concluded without any problems, the disciples and elders of the sect who had joined to watch these seniors of the sect show off their skills, did not react like how most of the participating elders had expected them to react.


    Instead of the number of disciples joining the cksmithing hall and the alchemy hall following the awesome disy of profound skill from their seniors, the number of disciples interested in alchemy and cksmithing instead seemed to see a significant decrease. Lowering the number of disciples joining the two professions, while as an unintended side effect, increasing the number of disciples deciding to join the formation hall to be a formation master and causing the remaining disciples to focus on their cultivation more seriously than they had done in the past.


    As a result of this, the already busy Combat Hall of the sect became even busier, as discussions of expanding the Combat Hall soon reached the ears of Elder Song, who was more than happy to allocate some of the sect''s resources towards the expansion of the Combat Hall. After all, the younger generation''s current drive to increase their strength was an unexpected surprise and something that would help increase the overall strength of the sect.


    Even though it was not the intended effect he had wanted from thepetition, it wasn''t bad in any way¡­ And with the lower number of disciples joining the alchemy hall and the cksmithing hall, Elder Song found a way to funnel some of the resources that would originally have gone towards expanding these two towards the expansion of the Combat Hall.


    In the end, the only ones who ended up losing out were the alchemy hall and cksmithing hall, who didn''t see the expected increase in disciples joining them and instead just saw the resources originally allocated for their expansion decreasing visibly.


    Of course, given that thepetition was nothing short of perfect in the eyes of the alchemists and cksmiths who had taken part in and watched thepetition, they couldn''t understand why this was the case.


    After all, the group of elders taking part in thepetition had all perfectly shown off their splendor and deepprehension regarding alchemy or cksmithing. Especially Bai Ning and Qing Yi, who had stood out as the youngest participants during thepetition.


    However, given that it was a fact that new disciples didn''t rush over to join them following the end of thepetition, they still understood that there might have been something that they couldn''t see that ended up going wrong in the eyes of the younger disciples for them to suddenly be so disinterested in alchemy and cksmithing. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Unable to cope with the fact that the number of disciples joining the alchemy hall or the cksmithing hall continued decreasing with each passing week until no one showed up any more, one of the elders from the alchemy hall decided to join hands with another elder from the cksmithing hall to investigate the situation and find out the reason for the younger disciples sudden extreme disinterest in learning the art of cksmithing or alchemy.


    Not that surprisingly, after asking a few of the disciples, they managed to find an answer to their question.


    However, the answer was not something they had ever expected to get, as the disciples outright told them that cksmithing and alchemy were incredibly boring and evenpleting a single artifact or pill took at least a week toplete. Time these young disciples weren''t willing to give up considering their young age and focus on increasing their cultivation realm.


    The week that the first challenge of thepetition had taken toplete had given these young disciples this kind of impression regarding cksmithing and alchemy¡­ And together with how boring the rest of thepetition was to those not already knowledgeable on alchemy and cksmithing was, it made sense that these young disciples ended up growing uninterested in learning more about alchemy and cksmithing at their young age.


    Instead, they would much rather spend their time increasing their cultivation realm and learning how to fight in the Combat Hall.


    On that note, the elders from the Formation Hall of the sect had managed to take advantage of the situation while the younger generation were uninterested in alchemy and cksmithing to promote themselves as a simple profession that you only needed to dedicate a little time a day to practicepared to cksmithing and alchemy. Allowing them to grow rapidly during the past month while the alchemy hall and cksmithing hall were still unaware of what was happening.


    "Wha- Those formation masters dare!?"


    "To think this is the reason for the decrease in interested young ones¡­ Those elders from the Formation Hall¡­ Just wait and see!"


    In the end, after learning about all of this, the two elders respectively from the alchemy hall and the cksmithing hall rushed back to inform their peers of what was happening, both of them filled with rage towards the formations masters who had seemingly taken advantage of the situation to promote themselves while helping spread rumors about the difficulty and time required to learn cksmithing and alchemy.


    All things considered, this matter was already known to Elder Song and a few of the sect''s higher ups, but it was ignored as it didn''t really harm the sect so to speak.


    Not to mention, it would also allow the formation masters inside the sect to increase, something that would be increasingly important for the sect''s continued expansion, as there would be a need for arge number of formation masters to maintain the formations of the sect''s increasinglyrge number of branch sects.


    Even with the current size of the Star Shattering Sect, it was already difficult to maintain the current number of formations spread throughout the branch sects, mines, outposts and other areas under the direct control of the sect.


    For this reason alone, Elder Song had even decided to personally intervene to some extent by guiding some of the more talented juniors towards bing formation masters. Hoping that they would be able to help dealing with the problem ofcking quality formation masters that would inevitably pop up in the future.


    The fact that the sect was now limited by its status as an ancient hidden sect when it came to expanding its current territory beyond what it was at the moment dide with some benefits, one being that it allowedthe Star Shattering Sect a chance to fully stabilize their control over their territory and the different resources outposts in the chaotic region of the fallen Sky Empire.


    At the same time giving the newly recruited disciples of the formation hall a chance to grow up.


    ¡­


    Unaware of the growing conflicts between the formation masters of the sect and the alchemists and cksmiths of the sect, Xuan Hao was quietly cultivating inside his room back on the Seventh Star Peak for the past month.


    "Looks like nobody beyond the Domain Lord Realm entered the city over the past month..."


    Opening his eyes at this moment, his eyes shone briefly, as the divine sense that had been constantly monitoring the Falling Star City for the past month quietly retracted.


    Although he felt that his previous act as a senior figure above the Dao Seed Realm was wless in every sense of the word and shouldn''t have been seen through even by someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm unless they attacked him to directly confirm his strength, he was still worried and had thus decided to quietly cultivate while also using his divine sense to monitor the situation of the Falling Star City.


    If someone above the Dao Seed Realm ended up appearing, he would know that the Blue Sea Empire had managed to pick up on something and decided to personally verify things even at the risk of offending an ancient hidden sect, something that would only happen if they doubted the Star Shattering Sect''s identity as an ancient hidden sect.


    Luckily, it seemed like nothing like that had ended up happening and his worst fears were unfounded.


    The strongest person who had shown up inside the Falling Star City over the past month had only reached the Domain Lord Realm. Far from enough to draw any attention from him, as even if they were spies from the Blue Sea Empire, they were far too weak to find out anything about the Star Shattering Sect.


    Only if they were in the Dao Seed Realm would they have a chance of noticing something off about the Star Shattering Sect and the Shattered Star Peaks, while those in the Celestial Immortal Realm would almost certainly discover something after investigating the Star Shattering Sect for a bit. Especially when it came to the overall level of the disciples and elders who normally wandered around outside the sect.


    Even if it was a hidden ancient sect, it would be odd that all the elders of the sect wandering around outside the sect were only in the Domain Lord Realm, with not a single one in the Dao Seed Realm.

 Chapter 1431 Light Hall Trade City

    Chapter 1431 Light Hall Trade City


    Shaking off all of his worries after not seeing any significant movements from the Blue Sea Empire to try and forcefully investigate the strength of the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao focused his attention back on researching the teleportation formations that he was nning to set up throughout the Shattered Star Peaks before moving on to setting up teleportation formations in some of the more important locations of the sect.


    Among these locations, the most important ones being the Iron Sky Kingdom and the border that the demonic cultivators were trying to invade the sect''s territory from.


    The border was a given, while a teleportation formation connecting the Shattered Star Peaks with the Iron Sky Kingdom would make it simple for Yi Min to move back and forth between the sect and her kingdom. Giving her an opportunity to stay and cultivate inside of the sect without needing someone like the rabbit demon beast to watch over her kingdom while she was gone.


    Although this would end up affecting the rabbit demon beast who had slowly started building its own influence inside the Iron Sky Kingdom during its time there, Xuan Hao couldn''t care less about the influence built up by the rabbit demon beast.


    Instead of that, he would be much happier if the rabbit demon beast spent its time cultivating more seriously instead of doing something useless like recruiting anyone willing to follow itsmand no matter what their cultivation realm or overall usefulness¡­


    Smiling a bit wryly to himself at the thought of the countless servants that he had seen following the rabbit demon beast through his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help wandering how Yi Min would react when she got back to her kingdom in the future and realized that all of her servants were now following the rabbit demon beast.


    No, that little rabbit should be able to solve that situation by itself. No need to involve myself. In the worst-case scenario, Yi Min will punish those servants for betraying her and siding with the rabbit.


    Throwing the matter to the back of his mind after deciding that it was something that the rabbit demon beast could deal with by itself, Xuan Hao focused his attention back on developing a blueprint for the first implementation of the teleportation formations of the sect.


    At the same time, he also dedicated part of his attention to deepening hisprehension of the Dao of Space.


    After all, he currentlyprehended 5 different Daos to the Large Sess Realm, one of them being the Dao of Space¡­ And for him to have any chance of reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future, he would have toprehend three Daos to the Perfection Realm and six to the Large Sess Realm.


    At the moment, he still needed to promote three of his Daos to the Large Sess Realm, which in turn would require him toprehend another four Daos to the Large Sess Realm.


    All things considered, he was still far off from reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, but at the very least he felt like he was making decent progress, it was just that it was the first time he would spent such a long period of time trying to break through a single realm, something that he definitely couldn''t get used to considering his previous rather rapid breakthroughs.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao began to make serious progress towards installing the first teleportation formations throughout the sect''s territory, Chu Yang, who was still journeying around the neutral territory between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire.


    Having left the Deep Pit City after spending a few weeks exploring the ancient ruins of the ce without finding much of value, Chu Yang ended up being chased out by one of the city lord''s sessors, who thought he was working together with one of the other sessors.


    Luckily, even though his cultivation realm had been far from enough to battle the other party, he still had his master''s talismans. Allowing him to just barely escape from one of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who had ended up joining the chaos that had ensued following the start of his battle with the sessor.


    In the end, it had caused him to wander through the core region without any clear goal in mind for the majority of the time that had passed. Not something heined about, as there were countless opportunities inside the core region of the continent.


    Allowing his strength to rapidly increase even without going to some of the more well-known locations he had learnt about¡­ That was until he heard about an uing auction that was going to take ce in the Light Hall Trade City.


    The auction in question was not something he could participate in with his current strength, but it did present an opportunity for him, as it also aligned with a nearby secret realm opening.


    The important part of that secret realm being that only someone below the Soul Ascension Realm could enter it. Making it the best location for him to increase his strength, as he felt confident in facing anyone in the Domain Lord Realm. Only feeling a bit more cautious towards those in the Later Stages of the Realm.


    "So¡­ This is the Light Hall Trade City¡­?" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    With all of that in mind, Chu Yang was still taken aback when he finally spotted the Light Hall Trade City in the distance, as the city itself fare surpassed any city he had seen so far. Worthy of its title as one of the main trade hubs of the neutral region.


    Of course, the main reason why it could keep this kind of title was not because of the size of the city itself, but because the city had the backing of the Light Hall, a sort of cultivation sect that operated inside the neutral territory. Having the backing of two Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm) Ancestors and dozens of Soul Ascension Realm Elders. Making them one of the few peak powers inside of the neutral territory.


    Even though he had confidence in his master''s strength and the talismans that he had left behind for him to protect him, Chu Yang had no intention of offending such a powerful power. Especially considering that the number of talismans he was left with following his escape from the Deep Pit City and a few other dangerous encounters along the way, had been reduced to no more than three. Far from enough to try and singlehandedly fight back against a terrifying entity like the Light Hall.


    Knowing this, Chu Yang decided to keep a low profile, as he went through the standard procedures for entering the Light Hall Trade City instead of flying inside like most other Domain Lord Realm cultivators decided on doing. Ensuring that he wouldn''t end up attracting any unwanted attention.


    After all, outside of the Light Hall that was hosting a once-in-a-century auction in a few days, there would also be other pinnacle powers from across the neutral territory present to participate in the auction taking ce.


    Not to mention, the younger generation of these powers would definitely also be present, as they would also be entering the secret realm that was ted to reopen shortly after the auction came to an end.


    All things considered; Chu Yang ended up finding a remote inn to hunker down in. Not taking a single step outside before the day of the secret realm opening arrived. Understanding that doing so ran the risk of him bumping into an arrogant young master and in turn starting a conflict with one of the major powers present in the city at the moment.


    Instead of that, he preferred just quietly cultivating for a few days by himself before entering the secret realm when the time came.


    As for offending any of those peak powers after they entered the secret realm? Chu Yang didn''t really care, as he was more than confident in being able to kill them off and preventing them from spreading any news outside the secret realm.


    The main problem he found when he finally stepped outside of the inn, he had cultivated for the past few days was the fact that the different major powers seemed to havee to some sort of agreement to block off the entrance to the secret realm. Preventing anyone else from entering the secret realm without some kind of pass that had been avable for purchase during the auction that had taken ce earlier.


    "¡­"


    Not knowing what to say when he realized this, Chu Yang could only stare nkly at the different people entering the secret realm filled with anticipation at the treasures and cultivation resources waiting for them inside.


    I can''t give up on this kind of opportunity that cane help improve my cultivation realm, but¡­ Forcefully entering like this¡­ Won''t I end up offending everyone present like that¡­?

 Chapter 1432 Rushing Into the Secret Realm

    Chapter 1432 Rushing Into the Secret Realm


    Staring at the gate to the secret realm that was being guarded by people from the different major factions from the neutral territory, Chu Yang could not help regretting not participating in the auction that had taken ce earlier.


    Even if it might have been dangerous, with his current wealth, he should have been able to get his hands on one of the entrance passes being sold to wandering cultivators during the auction. Especially so considering that he had even seen a few people around the First and Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm making their way into the secret realm with the help of those special passes.


    "Really bad luck¡­ But giving up on that secret realm isn''t an option either¡­" Muttering this to himself as his gaze remained focused on the entrance to the secret realm, Chu Yang didn''t want to give up on entering the secret realm even at the risk of offending most of the major factions residing in the neutral territory.


    The Reason for this was rather simple, as the secret realm wasn''t just any old secret realm but was instead one of the core locations of an ancient kingdom that was rumored to have once ruled what was now the neutral territory between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire.


    Although he didn''t know a lot about this ancient kingdom that had once existed in the neutral territory, he understood that it had ancestors above the Dao Seed Realm back when it was still around. Making it obvious just how precious the cultivation resources and artifacts inside one of their core locations could be.


    The fact that the major factions of the neutral territory seemed to value the secret realm so much also made this pretty obvious.


    Although¡­ The Fact that they even allowed others to enter the secret realm made it clear that it wasn''t a simple thing to obtain the things that had been left behind inside the secret realm, though, the main reason for that had to do with the fact that only those below the Domain Lord Realm could enter the secret realm, otherwise the secret realm would have long since been stripped of anything useful by the different major factions of the neutral territory.


    One thing that did help when it came to the secret realmsting for such a long time was the fact that this specific secret realm had only been discovered a little over 50 years ago and only opened once every ten years.


    More importantly, every ten years it opened, the cultivation realm restrictions of those entering decreased. First only Qi Condensation Realm cultivators could enter, followed by Foundation Establishment Realm, Core Formation Realm, Nascent Soul Realm and finally Domain Lord Realm cultivators could enter the secret realm this time around.


    In a sense, the reason why those major powers didn''t care much about who entered the secret realm at the moment was because the more important areas of the secret realm were not essible to someone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Only from the Soul Ascension Realm would these major powers start to take who could enter the secret realm more seriously, as it was at that point that the true wealth of the secret realm would be avable.


    But¡­ That doesn''t really have anything to do with me, I just want to enter for a chance to fight with the demon beasts inside the secret realm and to get my hands on some of the different cultivation resources unique to the secret realm and capable of helping someone in the Domain Lord Realm solidify and strengthen their domain¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Chu Yang steeled himself as he began approaching the entrance to the secret realm. Intend on entering the secret realm even if it meant he would end up offending the different major factions present in the process.


    At the very least, the people who were guarding the entrance to the secret realm were only in the Domain Lord Realm. Meaning that as long as he made a move to try and rush into the secret realm, he should be able to get inside before those guards had a chance to stop him.


    The main problem was that he had no idea whether or not there were any Soul Ascension Realm cultivators hidden around the entrance of the secret realm. Read to move the moment something happened.


    After all, with his current strength, he had no way to find someone in the Soul Ascension Realm if they wanted to hide¡­ And given the importance of the secret realm in the eyes of these different major factions, it wouldn''t be odd for them to have someone in the Soul Ascension Realm secretly keep an eye on the entrance of the secret realm.


    The main thing that gave him some confidence in still entering the secret realm was the fact that most of the people had already entered the secret realm at this point in time. Resulting in the situation around the secret realm calming down significantlypared to when it had first opened up.


    Back then, not to mention Soul Ascension Realm cultivators, Chu Yang even had a feeling that someone above the Soul Ascension Realm was present among the senior figures of the different major factions who had shown up to inspect the entrance and ensure that those in the Domain Lord Realm could enter-


    "Stop! You need to present an entrance pass to proceed into the secret realm!"


    "Huh? Ah! Sure, two seconds¡­"


    Lost in his own thoughts as he was slowly moving closer to the entrance of the secret realm, Chu Yang was suddenly stopped by one of the two Domain Lord Realm cultivators guarding the entrance, as he subconsciously responded before motioning towards his interspatial ring as if looking for something.


    Seeing this, the Domain Lord Realm cultivator who had walked forward to stop him also started rxing as he stepped back a bit. Waiting for the person in front of him to find the entrance pass that he believed he was looking for.


    Considering that it was well known who this secret realm was under the control of, he didn''t believe that Chu Yang would try anything, as doing so would essentially mean making an enemy of every major faction in the neutral territory. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    No matter how brave he might be, there was no way someone just in the Domain Lord Realm would ever dare do something like that. Especially so considering that the entrance passes to the secret realm had already been sold off for a rtively cheap price to any of the more powerful wandering cultivators who wanted to enter the secret realm in search of opportunities to further increase their strength or find ways to prepare themselves for the first tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Whoosh-!


    "Huh¡­?"


    "Ah!?"


    Because of this, he, along with the second guard who was half asleep at his post, werepletely caught off guard, as Chu Yang used his movement technique to slip past them and enter the secret realm before they had a chance to react.


    "This¡­ What? Someone¡­ Actually, forced their way inside the secret realm? Do they perhaps have some kind of death wish?"


    "No idea¡­ But we will have to inform the elders about this and make sure to catch that fellow when he leaves the secret realm in the future!"


    As the two guards recovered from the shock of Chu Yang dashing past them into the secret realm, they quickly woke up from their somewhatzy and half-asleep state before one of the two rushed off into the distance to inform the elders above them about what had happened, while the second remained at the entrance of the secret realm to guard the ce.


    Of course,pared to before, this guard was far more attentive at this point in time. Keeping an eye on any person or animal moving anywhere close to the entrance of the secret realm. Not allowing anyone of anything to get too close by making use of his domain to seal off the space and prevent anything like what had just happened from happening again.


    In turn, the people who came to enter the secret realm following Chu Yang rushing inside, were forced to wave their entrance passes from afar before they were even allowed to approach the entrance of the secret realm.


    Even when a group of elders arrived after hearing about the situation, it didn''t get any better for these wandering cultivators who had rightfully bought their entrance passes. Instead, it only got worse, as each of them were closely examined for close to an hour before they were allowed to enter the secret realm.


    Although they wanted toin, there was nothing they could do about it considering the strength of these elders had reached the Soul Ascension Realm, while they were only wandering cultivators in the Domain Lord Realm without any backing so to speak of.

 Chapter 1433 Falling First Thing After Entering the Secret Realm

    Chapter 1433 Falling First Thing After Entering the Secret Realm


    Rushing inside the secret realm the moment he got close enough, Chu Yang didn''t even have time to stabilize himself when he got to the other side of the secret realm, as he found himself stepping directly off the tform that the other side of the entrance to the secret realm was located on. Falling directly towards the ground a few thousand meters below.


    No worries, I can just use my domain and fly- Wait!? Why can''t fly?!


    Just as he was about to use his domain to try and fly to avoid smashing headfirst into the ground below, he suddenly realized that although he could still use his domain without any issues, there seemed to be some kind of restriction in ce preventing him from flying-


    BANG!


    In the end, he could do nothing, as he soon found himself crashing into the ground below. Creating a small human shaped crater in the process.


    Of course, given that his strength had reached the Domain Lord Realm, and he could still protect himself and his body with his domain, he didn''t sustain that much damage from falling over a thousand meters, but it was still quite embarrassing considering his identity as a Domain Lord Realm cultivator.


    At the very least, he was lucky that there wasn''t anyone around to see what had just happened, as they should have already moved deeper into the secret realm in search of opportunities at this point in time.


    After all, those nning to team up inside of the secret realm wouldn''t be waiting around at the entrance and would have just entered on their own. No reason to waste time standing around in the same ce inside a secret realm that was still mostly unknown to them.


    For all they knew, the danger of the secret realm could have increased along with the cultivation requirement for entering the secret realm.


    One such change that he hadn''t heard about even after trying his best to research the secret realm beforehand was the fact that you couldn''t fly inside of it, something he ended up finding out the hard way.


    Although, it was understandable that this kind of information wasn''t found out about beforehand, as the strongest person who had entered the secret realm so far was only someone in the Nascent Soul Realm¡­ And even if they might have learnt something about flying artifacts not working, it wasn''t something he had heard about before.


    No matter¡­ I managed to enter the secret realm, that is all that matters¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Chu Yang decided to not think about the flying limitations that seemed to be in ce inside of the secret realm and instead got up from the small crater he had created in the ground before looking around himself to assess his current situation.


    Even though the dangers around the entrance of the secret realm had been mentioned to only include a few Qi Condensation Realm demon beasts, one could never be too certain considering something might have changed in thest ten years since the secret realm had opened¡­ And indeed, a few dozen meters away, Chu Yang spotted a small group of demon beasts in the Foundation Establishment Realm, one of them even close to reaching the Core Formation Realm.


    Though far from being threatening to someone like himself, it clearly indicated that the strength of the demon beasts inside of the secret realm seemed to have undergone a major change over the past ten years.


    That, or the people who had spread information of the secret realm in the past had deliberately lied about the danger inside of the secret realm. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Though this might be unlucky considering no small number of wandering cultivators had managed to enter the secret realm since it had first opened up, it wasn''t entirely out of the question considering the secret realm was jointly controlled by the different major factions of the neutral territory.


    If theybined their power and controlled the information, it should be possible, but¡­ Then again, they didn''t really have much of a reason to do something like that, as the secret realm being a bit more dangerous wouldn''t be detrimental to them in the slightest bit¡­


    Whoosh~!


    Feeling like he was getting nowhere as his thoughts started to wander again, Chu Yang decided to not waste any more time staying close to the entrance of the secret realm, both because he wanted to start trying to hunt down some of the more powerful demon beasts said to inhabit some of the deeper regions of the secret realm, while at the same time wanting to avoid any potential experts that the different major factions might send into the secret realm to chase after him.


    Then again, the main reason he had waited so long to enter the secret realm outside of to avoid rushing in while a powerful cultivator was standing around, was the fact that most of the powerful cultivators in the Domain Lord Realm had already made their way inside the secret realm¡­ And those guarding the secret realm wouldn''t recklessly rush inside, as one couldn''t leave the secret realm for the next half year.


    Half a year¡­ I should be able to grow strong enough to confront someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm at that point in time. Maybe even those in the Soul Ascension Realm won''t be that far off!


    Thinking this to himself as he felt both of his eyes starting to shine at the prospect of how much stronger he could get if he managed to make full use of this opportunity that had been presented to him, Chu Yang began looking forward to having to fight it out with the different demon beasts residing in the deeper parts of the secret realm.


    After all, even though the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators who had entered the secret realm in the past had not been able to enter those deeper regions, they had been able to use different specialized artifacts to get a general idea about the strength of the demon beasts lurking in the deeper parts of the secret realm. Allowing them to understand that outside of Domain Lord Realm demon beasts, there were also several powerful demon beasts at the Soul Ascension Realm in the depths of the secret realm. Possibly even demon beasts that are beyond that!


    Filled with both excitement and a hint of caution when recalling this, Chu Yang moved deeper into the secret realm. Keeping the demon beast passing by him in mind, as he noticed their average strength slowly moving from the Foundation Establishment Realm, Core Formation Realm, Nascent Soul Realm, before finally reaching the Domain Lord Realm.


    However, even when Domain Lord Realm demon beasts started to appear among the demon beasts, Chu Yang still continued moving deeper into the secret realm.


    With his current strength, normal Domain Lord Realm demon beasts didn''t interest him in the slightest. Only when their strength reached the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm did Chu Yang begin to start fighting with the demon beast to test out their strength and his own.


    Unfortunately, he quickly realized that even demon beasts at the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm proved to be close to no challenge to him with his current strength. Especially considering that when he used the new spear, he had gotten his hands on, their thick skin and tough scales were easily pierced through without him using too much of his strength.


    Since when did demon beasts be so weak? Or¡­ Did my strength perhaps increase so muchpared to thest time I fought a powerful demon beast in the ruins of Deep Pit City¡­? No¡­ It should be because of this spear! Back then, I didn''t use the spear when hunting down demon beast because I wanted to try and improve my physical strength by fighting those demon beasts in hand-to-handbat¡­


    Thinking about the crux of the problem, Chu Yang quickly realized the reason for his seemingly massive increase in strength. The spear he had picked up back then was far more powerful than he had expected.


    Although, even with this in mind, Chu Yang didn''t let it get to his head.


    Instead, he stopped hunting the Fourth Stage, Fifth Stage or Sixth Stage Domain Lord Realm demon beasts and instead began moving even deeper into the secret realm. Intending to try and find a genuine Peak Stage Domain Lord Realm demon beast at the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to test out how his current strengthpared to such a powerful demon beast that could only be considered a single step away from reaching the Soul Ascension Realm.


    After all, his current strength was already at the Peak of the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and only such a powerful demon beast would prove of any use in increasing hisbat experience, as any weaker might not even allow him to increase hisbat experience when taking into ount the apparent strength of his new spear.

 Chapter 1434 Hidden Danger of the Grass Plains

    Chapter 1434 Hidden Danger of the Grass ins


    Travelling deeper inside the secret realm while making sure to keep an eye on the strength of the demon beasts that he moved past along the way, Chu Yang was somewhat taken aback upon noticing that the strength of the demon beasts didn''t seem to increase beyond the Sixth Stage of the Domian Lord Realm even after he had traveled for a little over two hours without stop.


    At the same time, he also noticed that the forest that he had originally been travelling through had slowly turned into arge open grass in where the only living beings were the few demon beasts he encountered every now and then while travelling.


    Outside of demon beasts, there wasn''t a single other living thing on the now seemingly endless grass ins he was travelling across.


    Although this could be because of the unique environment of the secret realm that didn''t allow anything other than demon beasts to survive inside of it, it was clear that this secret realm was not like that, as he had clearly seen arge number of normal animals while he had been travelling through the forest at the beginning.


    All things considered, there should also be normal animals present on the grass ins, as there was more than enough grass to eat and nock of water to sustain normal animals.


    However, even with all of this, there were only demon beasts present on the grass ins. Not just that, but the strength of these demon beasts had all at least reached the Domain Lord Realm. Making it rather obvious that there was something that prevented the weaker demon beasts and normal animals from living there like these demon beasts.


    Even though he had no idea what the thing preventing weaker demon beasts and normal animals from living on the grass ins, he didn''t feel too scared about it, as it was clear that demon beasts who at least reached the Domain Lord Realm could live peacefully at the grass ins without any issues.


    Considering his current strength, if a demon beast at the Earlier Stages of the Domain Lord Realm could survive on the grass ins without any problems, so could he.


    So, with that in mind, Chu Yang continued moving forward at full speed. Only paying at bit more attention than normal to his surroundings in an attempt to try and figure out what it was that made weaker demon beasts and animals unable to live on the grass ins.


    Whoosh-!


    It was just at that moment, the grass beneath his feet seemed to havee alive, as countless stalks of grass rapidly increased in length before shooting towards him at a terrifying speed-


    Swish-!


    However, having already been prepared, Chu Yang easily used his domain to directly cut off and destroy the approaching green vines shooting towards him. Stopping them before they even had the chance to approach him.


    Whoosh~


    In turn, the remaining green vines transformed from the normal grass quickly retracted and turned into normal grass again like nothing had happened. Leaving Chu Yang staring at the grass all around him with a cautious expression on his face.


    Although it wasn''t all the grass around him that had suddenly transformed and attacked him just now, it was still over ten percent of it¡­ And given the sheer size of the grass in, Chu Yang realized just how much of this dangerous grass was all around him.


    If anything, he finally understood why no normal animals or demon beasts below the Domain Lord Realm had managed to wander into the grass ins and live there. The seemingly living grass prevented this, as only with the help of his domain was, he able to fully restrain this living grass and prevent it from attacking him.


    If not for him having a domain, he would have been forced to tangle with the living grass and would have inevitably ended up running out of strength and be exhausted to death.


    The only thing that reassured him to some extent was that the strongest of the vines created by the living grass only seemed to carry the strength of someone around the early stage of the Nascent Soul Realm.


    With that level of strength, even if he had just recently broken through to the Domain Lord Realm, he would be able to keep his domain up indefinitely to defend himself against such weak attacks if he just focused on absorbing qi at the same time.


    The demon beasts living on the grass ins were likely doing the same or in some cases, they might even directly be capable of using their powerful bodies to resist the living grass and their attacks. Ignoring thempletely without even using any of their strength to fight back against them.


    Such a level of physical strength was only something possible for demon beasts, human cultivators simply couldn''tpare to demon beasts when it came to the strength of their physical bodies, the only ones who couldpare would be demonic cultivators after they reached the True Demon Realm and fully transformed their bodies or special divine physiques that allowed one a physical body far stronger than a normal human.


    Thinking about this as he continued moving deeper into the grass ins, while having to fight off the living grass with his domain every now and then, Chu Yang soon spotted something amidst the sea of green all around him.


    Approaching what appeared to only be a small dot in the distance, it quickly became clear that this small dot was farrger than he had first expected, as it soon grew into a massive mountain towering far above the empty grass ins.


    Not just that, but Chu Yang also quickly noticed therge ruins located at the base of the towering mountain¡­ And just outside of the ruins, he noticed the clear indications that a battle had taken ce there not too long ago.


    Given that he wasn''t the only Domain Lord Realm cultivator who had entered the secret realm and there should have been several old experienced seniors at the Pinnacle of the Domain Lord Realm among those who entered the secret realm ahead of him, Chu Yang understood that the battle that had taken ce in front of the ruins should havee from some of these older seniors who had entered ahead of him fighting with each other.


    After all, even though there wasn''t that much time between him entering the secret realm and them entering the secret realm, Chu Yang was still painfully aware that his current movement technique wasn''t anywhere near what he had observed other Domain Lord Realm cultivators use.


    In short bursts of speed duringbat he was still fine, but for longer distance travel, he couldn''t reallypare to other Domain Lord Realm cultivators. Especially so considering that his main way of travel had been through flight with the assistance of his domain and his speed had been further reduced due to the flight restriction inside the secret realm.


    "I really have to find some time to develop a proper movement technique that aligns with my domain¡­" muttering this to himself as he got closer to the base of the mountain where the ruins were located alongside the battle scars that had been left behind recently, Chu Yang slowed down his speed and became far more cautious about his surroundings.


    Considering that the battle had taken ce recently and he could judge that the strength of the two who had fought were above himself, he understood that there was a rather high chance that they were still around.


    Even worse, it was likely that they had noticed him before he had noticed them, thus ending their battle early before waiting to ambush him when he appeared.


    Filled with caution as he thought about this possibility, Chu Yang had already drawn his spear and was cautiously observing the ruins in front of him. His divine sense and domain actively concentrated in an area a little over a hundred meters around him.


    The moment anything entered this small hundred-meter area around him, he would notice, even if it was someone in the Soul Ascension Realm actively trying to hide from him.


    The main reason for this being that it was close to impossible for someone to avoid the detection of abined domain and divine sense below the Dao Seed Realm.


    Of course, the main w in searching in this kind of way was the fact that the area was extremely limited and if one wanted to hide, it would be easy to move out of the way.


    Although, when a Domain Lord Realm cultivator was fully focused on their surroundings like this, there was close to no way for someone below the Dao Seed Realm to ambush them without being noticed.


    Then again¡­ If a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator at the Sixth Tribtion Realm wanted to kill someone in the First Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, the Domain Lord Realm cultivator would find it difficult to react in time to respond, let alone defend¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 1435 Battle In the Ruins

    Chapter 1435 Battle In the Ruins


    Approaching the ruins fully prepared to be ambushed at any moment, Chu Yang soon came to realize that his worry was for nothing, as he managed to enter the ruins without encountering any problems along the way.


    Not just that, but even after he started exploring the ruins, he didn''t encounter any attacks. Instead, he just ended up finding more signs of battle the deeper he moved inside the ruins. Indicating that the battle that had taken ce just outside of the ruins seemed to have moved into the ruins at some point in time.


    Of course, even if he didn''t get ambushed, Chu Yang didn''t dare lower his guard, as outside of the potential ambush from Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had entered the secret realm ahead of him, he also had to worry about the potential dangers of the demon beasts or other creatures lurking inside of the secret realm.


    After all, the part of the secret realm that he currently found himself inside of was an area that had not been explored during past openings of the secret realm for obvious reasons, as it would have been impossible for someone in the Nascent Soul Realm to reach his current location.


    Even if it was rather simple for him to do, that was mostly due to his strength being at the Peak of the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    If any Nascent Soul Realm cultivator tried doing the same as what he had done, it would not only take weeks to travel the distance he had travelled in the span of a few hours, but they would also have to deal with the constant attacks of the powerful Domain Lord Realm demon beasts and seemingly endless living grass.


    All things considered, it was only possible to reach his current location in the span of time he had with a cultivation strong enough to fight off the living grass and intimidate the Domain Lord Realm demon beasts living on the grass ins from attacking him, a level of strength that would normally at least mean someone had to be at the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    In a sense, outside of the scars of battle that had been left behind all over the ce, it was this method Chu Yang used to determine that the strength of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators who hade here before him had at least reached the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Of course, he could still be wrong, as it could also just be someone like himself who was stronger than a normal Domain Lord Realm cultivator.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while moving deeper into the depths of the ruins, Chu Yang could not help slowing down ever so slightly upon realizing that the battle scars from the battle that had taken ce inside of the ruins at the base of the mountain seemed to still have a powerful power lingering around them. Showing that they had been left behind extremely recently.


    Not a few hours ago, but more like a few minutes ago. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Meaning that there was a very real possibility that the battle that had moved from the edge of the ruins at the base of the towering mountain and into the depths of the ruins might still be ongoing at this very moment¡­ And if that was really the case, he didn''t want to do anything that might give his presence away to these two powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivators who were fighting each other to the death.


    Not so much because he feared engaging in battle with, no, he would very much enjoy a battle with someone so strong. Instead, it was because he felt curious about what might have caused these two powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivators to start fighting to the death like this.


    After all, there should be a reason why these two Domain Lord Realm cultivators suddenly started fighting each other to the death.


    Whoosh~


    As he thought about this and deliberately restrained his own strength to make himself harder to notice, Chu Yang soon felt two powerful powers colliding with each other in the distance further up the mountain.


    Turning to look in the direction where he felt this collision of power, Chu Yang could barely make out two figures violently shing with each other amidst the ruins. Destroyingrge parts of the barely standing buildings in the process, as they rained down attacks on each other without any restraints. Not caring the slightest bit about what kind of demon beasts or creature might be attracted by their battle in the process.


    "Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, though¡­ The one at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm actually seems like they are winning? Interesting¡­" Narrowing both of his eyes as he muttered this to himself while looking in the direction of the battle that was taking ce in the distance, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit surprised after discovering that one of the two people fighting was actually at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    However, more surprising than that was the fact that the one winning the battle was actually the one at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, with the one at the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm seemingly being pushed back and only able to defend against the relentless attacks of the Eighth Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivator.


    Not just that, but after a closer inspection, he also discovered that the Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivator seemed to have had one of his hands cut cleanly off and was unable to recover it under the relentless attack, being forced to fight back with hisst remaining arm.


    "Indeed impressive, I would like to fight that person if possible¡­" Muttering this to himself as both his eyes shone for a brief moment, Chu Yang quickly shook his head and focused his attention back on the matter at hand.


    Before fighting that person, he first had to try and figure out what had caused the battle between the two in the first ce.


    Given that neither of the two had the energy to pay attention to their surroundings, he might get a chance to snatch the thing the two of them were fighting for before either of them had a chance to stop him.


    As forunching a sneak attack to try and take out the two of them directly¡­? Chu Yang didn''t think that this would be possible, as even if he could hide himself, he doubted that he would be able to get anywhere near the two of them, as the destruction they caused to their surroundings would reveal his presence the moment he got within a few thousand meters of them.


    At that point in time, not to mention seeding in an ambush, the two of them might decide to gang up on him and deal with this outsider before resuming their battle again.


    Although he was confident in his own strength, he was ultimately still at the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and didn''t feel fully confident in being able to fight off two Domain Lord Realm cultivatorsparable to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even more so considering that those two might not be the only ones present in the ruins, there might be others like him. Hiding while trying to assess the situation.


    Maybe they might also be trying to target the thing that caused those two powerful Domain Lords to fight to the death.


    All things considered, the best action would be for him to figure out what had caused the fight and then assess the danger of the situation before acting.


    After all, if he found what they were fighting for and just recklessly rushed in to try and take it for himself, he might end up bing the target of not only the two he could see fighting in the distance, but also those who might be lurking in the shadows looking for an opportunity to strike!


    Swish~


    With all of that in mind, Chu Yang narrowed his eyes ever so slightly as he slowly begins to proceed towards the battle in the distance. Making sure to keep an eye out for any other Domain Lord Realm cultivators along the way.


    In the end, it didn''t take him long to realize that there were indeed others like him, hiding in the shadows.


    Luckily, those people didn''t deliberately attack him and just ignored him. All of the people he encountered seemed to have the same goal in mind, none of them willing to make the first move to disturb the current delicate situation where only the two most powerful people present inside the ruins seemed to fighting each other to the death over something that he still hadn''t managed to figure out yet.

 Chapter 1436 Source Crystal...?

    Chapter 1436 Source Crystal...?


    Getting closer to the location where the battle was taking ce, Chu Yang made sure that he didn''t get too close to any of the other Domain Lord Realm cultivators that he had noticed along the way. Not wanting to end up changing the current state of things and ending up as the primary target of everyone here.


    The main reason for that was the fact that he had already encountered around seven people hiding in the dark observing the battle that was taking ce. All of them between the Seventh Stage and Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although they were clearly weaker than the two currently locked in battle with each other, their numbers more than made up for it. Even more so, considering that there was a high chance that he hadn''t found all of the people hiding in the dark observing the battle that had now moved towards the edge of the ruins and was starting to scale the side of the towering mountain.


    At the same time, therge number of Domain Lord Realm cultivators present did give him some confidence in his earlier thought that the two powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivators should be fighting for something that they had found in the ruins.


    Not just that but given that all of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators around him were still silently observing the ongoing battle, it was clear that it wasn''t that simple of a matter to take the thing they were fighting for away¡­


    Hm? This is¡­


    Finally arriving at the edge of the battle itself, Chu Yang could not help freezing with a shocked expression on his face. Finally able to see what the two powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivators were fighting each other to the death for.


    ¡­ A Source Crystal?


    Although his knowledge was rather limited when it came to certain special heavenly treasures, Chu Yang still recognized the small crystal that the two powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivators were fighting each other to the death for.


    Understanding what it was and just how useful it would be for his own cultivation; Chu Yang could not help understanding why there were so many Domain Lord Realm cultivators gathered around the ruins waiting for an opportunity to strike.


    Unfortunately, even if he wanted to get his hands on the source crystal, it was clear that it wouldn''t be a simple thing to aplish, as the crystal in question was currently at the center of the battle, caught between the domain of the two fighters who were doing their best to prevent either party from getting their hands on the source crystal and putting it into their interspatial ring. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    To get that source crystal, he would have to join the battle and try to use his domain to pull it away from those two, something easier said than done. Especially considering that there was no way the Domain Lord Realm cultivators watching everything from the dark would allow him to do something like that. Not to mention those two fighting to the death¡­


    But¡­ Chu Yang didn''t just n to give up on something as useful as a source crystal!


    Swish-!


    So, with that in mind, Chu Yang went and did what the Domain Lord Realm cultivators hiding in the dark were too scared of doing. Directly jumping out to join the fight for the source crystal under the surprised and shocked looks of not only the two fighting to the death, but also those hiding in the dark.


    "Huh!?"


    "WHO DARES!?"


    Met with the angry roar of the Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivator and the surprised look of the Eighth Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivator, Chu Yang didn''t bother exining himself, as he directly rushed forward to grab the source crystal. Using the momentary stunned and surprised state of the two powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivators to close the distance and use his spear to forcefully break their hold on the source crystal before grabbing it and cing it into his interspatial ring.


    Sess!


    Smiling happily to himself as he felt the source crystal now inside his interspatial ring, Chu Yang could not help patting himself on the back for his sessful n of rushing in and using the confusion of the entire thing to break the hold of those two powerful Domain Lords and grabbing the source crystal before they could react.


    Although this had been his n from the start when he decided to act, he had honestly not expected it to work as smoothly as it had. Having expected to at least have to fight back against those two powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivators at the final step.


    Luckily, it seemed like his sudden move wentpletely against the current state of things. Completely catching the two powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivators off guard, as they had never expected someone to be bold enough to make a move while they were still fighting and in a rtively healthy state. Especially so considering that the one doing something like that would not only be their target but would also be the target of all those who were hiding in the ruins waiting for an opportunity to strike.


    Yes, they were aware of all the people hiding around them and observing their fight, but, they had already thought of different solutions to this kind of problem in case they ended up winning.


    The only thing they hadn''t expected was for someone to suddenly make an unexpected move and go for the source crystal before they had even exhausted their strength and were still showing that they had more than enough strength to continue fighting.


    """¡­"""


    Not just the two powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivators, the rest of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators were simrly in a shocked state. None of them expected that there would actually be someone stupid enough to charge forward and make himself the primary target of everyone present.


    "Well¡­ Guess it''s time for me to take my leave¡­"


    Sensing the countless pairs of eyes that seemed to be focused on him at this moment, Chu Yang understood that it wouldn''t be good for him to continue staying around the ruins any longer-


    Whoosh-!


    And so, without any hesitation, he directly used all of his strength to run away before he ended up surrounded and attacked by the Domain Lord Realm cultivators present.


    "This- After him! Don''t let him escape!"


    Waking up from the shocked and stunned state that seemed to have affected all of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators present following the source crystal being taken away by Chu Yang, the Eighth Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivator was the first to recover, as he called out to the rest of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators. Waking all of them up from their stunned state. Soon enough causing all of them to be filled with killing intent, as they wasted no time in rushing after Chu Yang.


    Unfortunately for them, Chu Yang had managed to rush out of the circle that had been created around the battle for the source crystal by these hidden Domain Lord Realm cultivator when they recovered from their stunned state.


    However, even with this advantage in distance created between himself and the close to two dozen Domain Lord Realm cultivators chasing after him filled with killing intent and greed, Chu Yang still wasn''t safe, and the disadvantage of his bad movement technique soon began to show itself.


    Even if it wasn''t that bad among Domain Lord Realm cultivators, it was still far inferior whenpared to the Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivator and the even stronger Eighth Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivator.


    Though he had managed to create a significant distance between himself and the group of Domain Lord Rm cultivators, it would only take those two around half a minute or at most a minute to close the distance he had managed to create between himself and them, a clear show of just how bad his movement technique and speed waspared to theirs.


    Not to mention, the main reason he was even able to keep such a distance for around a minute was due to the fact that it was around that time he could keep his short-distance and closebat movement technique active without any problems.


    I really have to find a way to shake them off, or I won''t be able to keep the source crystal- Hm? Source crystal¡­ Now that I think about it, when master talked about the source crystal back then, he did mention something about a guardian of some kind born alongside the source crystal, but¡­ Where is this supposed guardian? Did those two kill it before I arrived?


    Lost in his own thoughts as he continued escaping, Chu Yang suddenly remembered what his master had told him about source crystals in the past, though¡­ He quickly realized that something rather core to the existence of said core crystal seemed to be missing for some reason¡­

 Chapter 1437 Guardian of the Source Crystal

    Chapter 1437 Guardian of the Source Crystal


    Thinking about the guardian of the source crystal that seemed to be missing for some unknown reason, Chu Yang suddenly felt like something was happening behind him, causing him to momentarily turn around to see if those chasing after him had used some kind of special movement technique to forcibly increase their speed so they could catch up with him faster.


    "Huh? That is¡­ A demon beast!?" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    However, instead of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators chasing him using some kind of secret technique to increase their speed to close the distance between them faster, he instead bore witness to a massive snake like demon beast emerging from the side of the towering mountain that the ruins were located at the base of.


    Not just that, but the strength of the demon beast that had just emerged was clearly far above the Domain Lord Realm. Having clearly stepped into the Soul Ascension Realm.


    But¡­ That was not what worried him. Instead, it was the fact that he could clearly feel the divine sense of this terrifying demon beast locking on to him as he continued moving farther away from the ruins and the towering mountains.


    Even worse, it was clear that the other Domain Lord Realm cultivators weren''t being shown the slightest bit of care by this terrifying demon beast. Instead, he was the only one who had managed to get the attention of this terrifying demon beast!


    However, the thing that shocked him the most was not the emergence of this powerful demon beast, as he had already realized that it should be the guardian beast of the source crystal he had just taken away.


    Instead, the thing that shocked him the most was the reactions of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators chasing after him, as it was clear that none of them were surprised with this development.


    On the other hand, it looked more like those chasing after him were more annoyed than anything else. Not showing the slightest bit of fear in the face of a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast, something that Chu Yang could not help finding incredibly baffling, as he full well understood that there was no one present among the Domain Lord Realm cultivators chasing after him who were capable of fighting the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast and guardian of the source crystal.


    Even working together, it would be impossible to deal with this Soul Ascension Realm demon beast, as the gap between the Soul Ascension Realm and the Domain Lord Realm wasn''t something simple to cross. Especially so considering that the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast didn''t seem to just be at the First Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, but instead seemed to have already broken through to the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Making it even more impossible for someone in the Domain Lord Realm to face off against it.


    Is there perhaps something that I''m not aware of regarding the guardian of the source crystal?


    Filled with bewilderment as he watched the terrifying snake demon beast crash through countless ruins as itnded in the ruins at the base of the mountain before it began rapidly moving towards him at a speed far surpassing that of any of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators chasing after him, Chu Yang could not help thinking that there was something that these Domain Lord Realm cultivators were aware of that he wasn''t, something that made them confident that the guardian of the source crystal wouldn''t harm them.


    But¡­ What is it¡­?


    Unaware of what to do as he watched the guardian of the source crystal close the distance between them in a matter of seconds, Chu Yang could only draw out one of his master''s lifesaving talismans in preparation for using it against the guardian of the source crystal.


    Although he was reluctant to use one of only three remaining talismans considering that he had just stepped inside the secret realm and had no idea what kind of dangers awaited him inside the secret realm and the fact that he would need at least one to save himself after leaving the secret realm, Chu Yang also understood that there was no way for him to give up something as precious as a source crystal.


    Even if it did mean he would only be left with two of his master''s talismans, he would just quietly cultivate for the next half year and wait until he could leave the secret realm.


    The source crystal was more than worth it, even if he had to give up on other opportunities inside of the secret realm.


    Of course, he didn''t entirely have to give up on the opportunities inside of the secret realm and could still try and go for the safer ces that didn''t involve anywhere near the same danger as what he was currently facing while exploring a previously unexplored part of the secret realm.


    Though the treasures and opportunities wouldn''t be able topare to what he could get from exploring the new territory of the secret realm, it was still incredibly precious whenpared to anything he could get from exploring and adventuring outside of the secret realm.


    Whoosh~!


    With that in mind, Chu Yang didn''t hesitate as he decisively threw out the talisman given by his master. Not having time to investigate the reason behind why the rest of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators weren''t afraid of the source crystal''s guardian¡­


    RUMBLE~!


    As a result, a terrifying pressure soon erupted from the seemingly ordinary piece of paper thrown out by Chu Yang, causing even the space around the paper to start twisting in ways impossible for anyone who hadn''tprehended the Dao of Space toprehend.


    "Huh?"


    "What is that¡­?"


    "This terrifying pressure is even above that of the ancestor¡­!"


    "Impossible! That is a protective talisman refined by someone above the Soul Ascension Realm!"


    Seeing the talisman thrown out and simultaneously feeling the terrifying pressure that suddenly seemed to descend upon the surroundings, the Domain Lord Realm cultivators chasing after Chu Yang all froze on the spot, while one among them seemed to have realized what the simple looking piece of paper was, causing his formerly calm expression to be one clouded with fear.


    Whoosh-!


    Wasting no time, this Domain Lord Realm cultivator, who happened to be the powerful Eighth Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivator who had been winning against the Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivator earlier, turned around and took out a strange looking artifact before turning into a stream of light and disappearing into the distance in the next second. Completely unaffected by the twisting space that made it impossible for the rest of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators to move or escape like he had done.


    Swish-!


    Not affected by the escape of the single Domain Lord Realm cultivator, the talisman paper seemed to find its target, as the terrifying pressure focused onto the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast. Giving the Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had been chasing after Chu Yang a chance to move again-


    RUMMMMBLE-!


    "N-Nooo!"


    "P-Please spare-"


    Unfortunately, even if they had regained their ability to move again, it was useless, as the talisman paper ignited the moment it had found its target. Turning into a terrifying sword that seemingly tore through space itself. Wiping out anything that stood in its path before arriving directly in front of the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast and guardian of the source crystal, who had not been able to move a single muscle ever since the talisman was activated.


    In the next second, the terrifying sword that had manifested and what could be considered a serious attack from a Late Stage Dao Domain Lord Realm cultivator hit its target. Almost instantaneously erasing the poor guardian of the source crystal from existence-


    BOOOOOM-!


    However, this was not the end, as the remaining power of the sword continued forward without anything to block it. Killing all of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators it encountered along the way before finally crashing into the towering mountain that the guardian of the source crystal had emerged from.


    Roar?! ROOOOAR!?


    In response, a terrifying roar emerged from the interior of the towering mountain followed by a terrifying aura erupting in an attempt to resist the sword-


    BANG!


    Unfortunately, it only managed to resist for a little over a second before it was simrly cut through. Allowing the sword strike to directly crash into the towering mountain-


    Crack~!


    And with thest remaining bit of power inside the sword strike, it cleanly cut the towering mountain in half, while leaving behind a terrifying scar stretching for more than a hundred thousand meters across the formerly empty grass ins.


    The terrifying energy of the attack that had taken ce still lingering. Impossible to erase with ordinary means.


    "I¡­ I just wanted to deal with the guardian of the source crystal and those Domain Lord Realm cultivators¡­"


    Seeing this destruction left behind by his master''s talisman, Chu Yang could not help muttering this to himself with a somewhat wry smile on his face. Only now realizing that it was clear that the strength inside the talismans given to him by his master seemed to differ, as this one was clearly stronger than the ones he had used in the past¡­

 Chapter 1438 Shock on All Sides

    Chapter 1438 Shock on All Sides


    "I should leave this ce before anyone attracted by the attack just now shows up¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced over the scar that had been left behind by the power contained inside his master''s talisman onest time, Chu Yang didn''t waste any more time and turned around to leave before any powerful demon beasts or other powerful Domain Lord Realm cultivators were attracted to his location by the powerful attack just now.


    Considering that most of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had been chasing after him earlier had already died together with the guardian of the source crystal, with only a few barely managing to escape in time with the help of some lifesaving measures given to them by their seniors or obtained through fortuitous encounters, Chu Yang didn''t have to worry about escaping at the moment and could afford to move at his normal speed again.


    Of course, even though he didn''t have to worry about being chased in the short term, he still had to find a way to get back to the safer part of the secret realm.


    Intending to find a secluded location where he could peacefully consume the source crystal without any problems. Understanding that doing so should help him break through the bottleneck he had encountered after reaching the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Possibly even propelling him all the way to the Peak of the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in the process.


    Then again, the main reason for him to use the source crystal was not to increase his cultivation realm, but instead for him to increase hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear.


    After all, increasing hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear was paramount to his smooth progress to the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and beyond.


    Not to mention, given that he was already aware of the realms beyond the Domain Lord Realm to some extent due to his master''s teachings and what he had encountered in the neutral territory of the core region he was currently inside of- Well¡­ Technically, he wasn''t inside of the neutral territory of the core region at the moment, but instead a secret realm connected to it, but that didn''t really matter that much at the moment.


    The important thing was that he understood how important it was to increase hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear.


    Not just the Dao of the Spear, but maybe also hisprehension of other Daos that he had somewhat thrown to the side as he focused his full attention onprehending the Dao of the Spear. Hoping to enter the Elementary Realm that his master had taught him about¡­


    Whoosh~!


    As Chu Yang the scene of the crime with the price in hand, it didn''t take long before several powerful demon beasts, each having at least reached the Soul Ascension Realm, appeared around the massive canyon that had been seemingly carved just moments ago.


    Roar¡­!


    Roar¡­


    Not a secondter, they all fearfully roared at each other as a form ofmunication. Clearly shocked by the power that still radiated from the scar left by what they could only imagine to be some kind of unimaginably powerful existence far beyond themselves¡­


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    Whoosh-!


    And given that all of them had at least reached the Soul Ascension Realm, they were in no way inferior to humans in terms of intelligence, thus they understood deeply that it wasn''t a good idea for them to stay around the terrifying scar any longer than necessary. Soon enough, scattering in all directions just as fast as they had shown up.


    The main reason for their arrival in the first ce was because they had no idea the terrifying presence they had felt when the attack was unleashed had been from someone attacking. Instead, having thought it might have been some kind of precious natural treasure that hade into existence.


    Now that they understood that this was not the case, they had no reason to stay around any longer.


    As for investigating who or where this attack hade from? They weren''t dumb enough to do something like that. Understanding full well that the strength of the one who had left behind the attack just now was far beyond them.


    On the other hand, they would prefer if the other party didn''t run into the one behind the attack, as that would almost certainly be a death sentence in their eyes.


    Although¡­


    There was one positive thing that came from everything that all of these powerful demon beasts at the Soul Ascension Realm understood¡­ And that was the sword scar that had been left behind by Xuan Hao''s sword strike.


    Even though it was just a bit of remnant power lingering around the scar itself, it contained unimaginable power and was imbued with Xuan Hao''s understanding of the Dao of the Sword and the Dao of Space.


    For these powerful Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts, it would be beneficial for them to cultivate around the sword scar, as it could help increase theirprehension of these Daos.


    Of course, given how recent the attack had been and the fact that all of these demon beasts were still fearful of running into the one who had caused the attack, they still decided to find somewhere and hide away for a few weeks or months before daring to go anywhere near the sword scar to cultivate.


    Luckily, the power lingering around the ce wasn''t something that would just disappear in a few years nor was it anything that could forcibly be moved or erased by someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, thus, these demon beasts had no fear that any of the other demon beasts would do anything that might lower the potential future benefits of cultivating next to the sword scar.


    In the eyes of these demon beasts, the sword scar was a new treasure for them that would help their cultivation improve for the next hundreds of years, if not longer. Waiting a few weeks or months before making use of the lingering power surrounding the scar to try and grasp some of Daos used during the attack was nothing! N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Wha?! What in the world is this!?"


    "What happened here¡­? I only heard something about a source crystal appearing and someone trying to snatch it away or something¡­"


    "No idea, but this kind of attack and the still lingering power¡­ It all sends a shiver down my spine imagining a demon beast capable of doing something like this lurking inside of the secret realm¡­"


    Following the disappearance of the powerful demon beasts, it didn''t take long for the different Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had entered the secret realm to start flooding towards the area in droves. Soon enough, growing to a size of over a hundred, causing even the local demon beasts who hade to investigate the situation to shrink back. Trying their best to avoid offending this massive swarm of humans.


    "Such a terrifying attack power. Directly cleaving such a towering mountain in half¡­ Is this even something someone in the Soul Ascension Realm can do¡­?"


    At the same time that the different Domain Lord Realm cultivators were all lost in disbelief looking at the devastation that had been left behind by the sword attack of Xuan Hao, one of the more knowledgeable among them could not help muttering this to himself.


    Having seen some of his seniors in the Soul Ascension Realm fight before, he clearly understood that the level of power behind what had happened in this ce was clearly above that of the Soul Ascension Realm¡­ And the sheer dread he felt looking at the sword scar made him confident that it should have definitely been done by a senior figure in the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm)!


    It was at these thoughts that this single Domain Lord Realm cultivator suddenly lost his earlier will to explore the secret realm like he had originally been wanting to do.


    Exploring the unknown secret realm filled to the brim with opportunities to increase his cultivation and a slight possibility of encountering a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast was one thing, Exploring the unknown and unexplored parts of the secret realm with the possibility of encountering a demon beast in the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm) was another thing entirely.


    After all, the area covered by thetter was far greater than that of a demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Not to mention, some demon beasts in the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm) possessed the ability to take on partial human forms. Making them close to no different outside of a few traits like scales, tails, ears or other body parts that retained some of their original form.


    If a demon beast had really reached that level, he did not fear the demon beast as much as he feared it potentially finding a way to leave the secret realm when they left in the future, something that would spell trouble for the different major powers of the neutral region, one of which he was part of!

 Chapter 1439 Comprehending the Dao of the Spear

    Chapter 1439 Comprehending the Dao of the Spear


    Having sessfully managed to leave the grass ins without encountering any problems along the way, Chu Yang could not help feeling that he had been rather lucky not running into any of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had managed to flee from the scene earlier.


    The only people he ended up encountering along the way were a few weaker Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had been attracted by the attack, believing that it might have been a powerful treasureing into existence.


    Encountering these kinds of people, Chu Yang didn''t fear them in the slightest. Not to mention, his current cultivation at the Seventh Stage of the Domain Lord Realm was strong enough to stop any of those Domain Lord Rm cultivators from attacking him.


    In the end, he had just exined the situation at the scene of the attack and told them that there weren''t any treasures there, but instead just the remnants of what he guessed to be some kind of terrifying confrontation between powerful demon beasts.


    Considering that his strength was far above theirs in most situations, the few he encountered didn''t think he was lying and decided to slow down their pace and join up with others to check out the situation after learning that there weren''t any heavenly treasures topete for, but instead just a scar left behind by a powerful demon beast.


    Of course, there were those who didn''t believe what he said, but they were in the minority, as it would be simple for them to find out the truth of the situation by going to the origin point of the terrifying presence they had sensed earlier.


    One thing that did help out with the exnation he gave was the fact that no major battle had erupted at the scene. Indicating that the heavenly treasure that might havee into existence had already been seized or was still in the process of fullying into existence.


    At the end of the day, Chu Yang didn''t care much about the reactions of the different Domain Lord Realm cultivators or what they ended up doing when they learned about what had actually taken ce there. Instead, he just wanted to safely get out of the grass ins and find somewhere he could seclude himself and consume the source crystal he had obtained to enhance hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear and hopefully also breakthrough the bottleneck to the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in the process.


    Luckily, everything ended up working out like intended and Chu Yang soon found himself inside a small underground cave that he had sealed off to the outside world with the source crystal he had managed to seize in his hand.


    "I hope this thing is as useful as master said¡­" Muttering this to himself as his attention was fully focused on the source crystal in his hand, Chu Yang didn''t hesitate any longer and directly popped the small source crystal into his mouth before swallowing it like he would do a normal pill.


    Boom-!


    Not a secondter, a magical transformation seemed to take ce, as Chu Yang directly broke through the bottleneck and entered the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    However, this was not his focus. Instead, it was to further his understanding of the Dao of the Spear, something he wholeheartedly focused all his attention on doing the moment he felt the magical transformation taking ce inside of him, seemingly making grasping the dao much simplerpared to before. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    His breakthrough so to speak could be considered a side effect, as his mind focused fully on deepening hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear in the time that this magical effect caused by the source crystal wouldst.


    Slowly, Chu Yang felt his understanding of the spear deepening with, as the time flew by.


    From being only able to discern the existence of the Dao of the Spear, to being just on the brink of reaching a new realm, Chu Yang managed to increase hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear to the point where he was just a single step away from reaching the Elementary Realm.


    Unfortunately, when he reached this step, he also felt the magical effect of the source crystaling to an end. Stopping just before he managed to take the final step and enter the Elementary Realm in the Dao of the Spear.


    However, even when he felt the effect of the source crystaling to an end, Chu Yang didn''t stop what he was doing and continued toprehend the Dao of the Spear. Intending to breakthrough to the Elementary Realm before ending his seclusion, as he understood that he would inevitably end up losing the thread still left pointing the way for him following the end of the source crystal''s effect if he stopped hisprehension.


    Meaning, he would have to try and find the breakthrough point again if he stopped hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear.


    So, with that in mind, Chu Yang focused all of his attention on continuing toprehend the Dao of the Spear even after the effect of the source crystal came to an end.


    Not caring about his surroundings nor the potential treasures and opportunities he might be losing out on as he did this. Understanding that everything would be worth it if he could breakthrough and reach the Elementary Realm in the Dao of the Spear.


    In the end, days slowly turned into weeks as he continuedprehending the Dao of the Spear. Soon enough, three months had flown by before a terrifying aura permeated the air around him. Following which Chu Yang slowly opened his eyes for the first time since swallowing the source crystal, a happy smile gracing his lips as he gazed around the pitch-ck interior of the cave.


    "Finally! I finally managed to break through to the Elementary Realm!" Laughing joyfully as he said this, Chu Yang was ovee with joy, as he clearly felt the increase in strength following the breakthrough to the Elementary Realm in the Dao of the Spear.


    Not just had he managed to break through to the Elementary Realm in the Dao of the Spear after three months of cultivation, but he also clearly felt that there were no longer any obstacles blocking him from breaking through to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    Not just the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he even felt that breaking through to the Soul Ascension Realm or beyond wouldn''t pose much of a problem to him now that he had managed to reach the Elementary Realm in the Dao of the Spear.


    Of course, he didn''t intend to break through to the Soul Ascension Realm before first returning to the sect, as he clearly remembered that his master had told him to confide with him before deciding to breakthrough to the soul Ascension Realm.


    Although he had no idea why his master had asked him to do this, he still trusted in his master and intended to return to the sect and ask him before trying to breakthrough to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    "Looks like it will be time for me to return to the sect again after I get out of this secret realm¡­" Muttering this to himself, as he went over his own progress, Chu Yang decided on ending his adventure in the core region of the continent and make his way back to the Star Shattering Sect after getting out of the secret realm.


    Of course, he fully intended on reaching the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm before returning to the sect now that he clearly felt that there wouldn''t be any more bottlenecks in the Domain Lord Realm.


    After all, the journey back to the Star Shattering Sect would be far from a simple trip back, as even with his current strength at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, it would at least take him half a year. Possibly even longer to make it back to the sect again.


    Considering that he still had around three months left inside of the secret realm, he expected it to take around a year to get back to the Star Shattering Sect again.


    In the end, his time outside of the sect would be around three years in total. By far, it was the longest time he had ever spent outside of the sect ever since he joined it.


    Although he normally wasn''t the sentimental type, he did feel himself missing his fellow disciples. Especially so his master, whom he had only ever seen in the form of the talismans he had made use of to save himself from dangerous situations.


    Thinking about it, he was quite amazed at the strength of his master''s talismans, as he had never really seen him as a skilled talisman master before his trip outside of the sect this time around. Especially so because cultivators capable of creating artifacts were incredibly rare even in the core region of the continent. Making him wonder where his master had learnt the art of talisman creation from.

 Chapter 1440 Establishment of a Simple Teleportation Network

    Chapter 1440 Establishment of a Simple Teleportation Network


    Three months earlier, before Chu Yang emerged from his seclusion and was still busyprehending the Dao of the Spear, back in the Star Shattering Sect, his master was looking down at a small formation engraved into the ground at the Eighth Star Peak, a look of happiness clearly present on his face as he looked down at the formation.


    "Finally seeded¡­ With this, I should be able toy out a simplework of teleportation formations throughout the Shattered Star Peaks. Making it far easier for those disciples and elders below the Domain Lord Realm to traverse the Shattered Star Peaks¡­" Smiling to himself as he said this while looking down at the teleportation formation on the ground in front of him, Xuan Hao took a step forward and stepped into the center of the formation before using his qi to activate it. Soon enough, he found himself teleported to a small garden attached to the side of his pce on the Seventh Star Peak. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    After a long time, he had finally managed to seed in setting up a working teleportation formation.


    Not just that, but after linking it together with the chaotic qi formation that already covered the Shattered Star Peaks, he would be able to use the abundant qi created by the formation to power the teleportation formations on the Shattered Star Peaks. Making it essentially costs nothing for the Star Shattering Sect to use the teleportation formations inside the Shattered Star Peaks.


    The main problem came with the fact that the distance he could cover with his current skill in creating teleportation formations was far from the same level as what the ancient teleportation formation he had used to draw inspiration from.


    Even then, the current size of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory was not that big whenpared to the distance that could be covered by the ancient teleportation formation in the Half Spirit Race''s old home.


    He didn''t need to cover the distance between the Star Shattering Sect and the Core Region of the Continent at the moment, covering the current territory of the Star Shattering Sect was more than enough.


    Luckily, he was at least capable of doing that much with his current understanding of the teleportation formations.


    The main limiting factor in making awork of teleportation formations to cover the entirety of the Star Shattering Sect''s current territory, was the fact that there was a limited number of space node stone avable at the moment¡­ And the fact that the spirit stones required to activate the teleportation formations not directly connected to the chaotic qi gathering formation was simply not something the current Star Shattering Sect could handle.


    Instead of that, outside of the teleportation formationwork that would beid down throughout the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao decided to onlyy down a few other teleportation formations connecting to some of the more important locations for the Star Shattering Sect and have them directly connect back to the Star Shattering Sect itself.


    Of course, to prevent any kind of situation of someone directly entering the Star Shattering Sect or sneaking inside the sect by using these teleportation formations, he decided to create a location at the base of the Ninth Star Peak to create a small hub for these teleportation formations to connect without entering the true core of the sect.


    To ess the internal teleportationwork of the sect, one would at least have to make their way up the Ninth Star Peak. Having to pass through a secondyer of the formation beforehand that Xuan Hao quickly established after confirming his ns for the teleportation formations.


    As he set out to carry all of this out over the next few days, Xuan Hao made sure to inform both Elder Song and Feng Chen about his ns. Having them lend a hand and assist in helping select different locations for the teleportation formations to be located.


    In the end, after working day and night for a little over a week, the internal teleportationwork of the Star Shattering Sect was fully established and unveiled to the rest of the disciples and elders of the sect, who were overjoyed at the convince brought by this teleportationwork and quickly began to make full use of it.


    The next part of the teleportationwork that would be connecting locations outside of the Shattered Star Peaks to the main sect took a bit longer to arrange, as the distance covered wasrger for these teleportation formations, theplexity of the teleportation formations required was also far higherpared to the ones inside the Shattered Star Peaks that at most covered a distance of a few hundred kilometers.


    Of course, Xuan Hao didn''t give up because of this and instead took the opportunity to slowly construct these far moreplicated teleportation formations and increase hisprehension of both the Dao of Space and the Dao of Formations in the process.


    The first long distance teleportation formation, connecting the Shattered Star Peaks to the active battlefield with the demonic cultivators at the borders of the sect''s territory, took around half a month toplete.


    Following the first, the second long distance teleportation formation was constructed at the Iron Sky Kingdom. Taking only a little over a week toplete¡­ And other simrly strategically important formations were soon established in an increasingly fast manner, as Xuan Hao''s skill in constructing teleportation formation increased.


    As the three-month mark from the start of the construction of teleportation formations began, it came to an end.


    Not because all the important locations of the sect had been sessfully connected back to the Shattered Star Peaks with teleportation formations, but more so because the number of space node stones avable were starting to run low¡­ And more importantly, the number of teleportation formations connected to the chaotic qi formation had reached a limit.


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao could only stop continuing to set up more teleportation formations at the moment, as adding any more to the alreadyplex structure of the chaotic qi formation would undoubtedly cause it to grow unstable and seriously impact what could be considered the most important foundation of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even then, with several major teleportation formations now active across the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and far easier transport of important resources like spiritual metals, the efficiency of the sect increased by several timespared to before, as the growth of both the disciples of the sect also simrly increased.


    Although¡­ The main reason for the increased growth of the disciples and elders of the sect was mostly due to the teleportation formation now connecting directly to the battlefield with the demonic cultivators. Allowing them to easily reach the battlefield in a few minutes instead of the weeklong trip back and forth that would normally take them whenever they returned from the battlefield to use their contribution points on something or enter seclusion toprehend something they had understood during battle and wanted to spend more time pondering on back at the sect.


    Outside of the disciples and elders who saw the most obvious benefit from having their travel time essentially reduced down from weeks to a few minutes, the disciples of the Formation Hall, that had grown explosively over the past few months, had all seemingly gathered religiously around the different teleportation formations inside of the sect to study them up close.


    The magical effect of the teleportation formation was clear to these disciples and elders studying the art of formations¡­ And because of this, they wanted nothing more than to learn how to create such magical formations themselves.


    In the end, this resulted in everyone using the teleportation formations inside of the sect always being met with the rather surprising sight of the Formation Hall Elders and Disciples every time they stepped through one of the teleportation formations.


    Although¡­ After the first few days of things being like this, the rest of the sect quickly got used to the Formation Hall and their obsession with studying the teleportation formations.


    Even though it did end up having a somewhat negative impact on the Formation Hall, as their explosive growth during the past few months ended up ending abruptly shortly after the introduction of the teleportation formations.


    Whether this was due to the image of the Formation Hall bing rather interesting due to their wholehearted obsession studying the teleportation formations or something done by the cksmithing Hall and Alchemy Hall as revenge for what had happened in the past was not something the ordinary elders and disciples of the sect were privy to.


    All things considered, the sect was progressing rapidly and outside of the normal elders and disciples of the sect, the ones who managed to make the most of the influx of resources following the introduction of the teleportation formations was none other than the cksmithing Hall- Or more specifically, Xuan Hao''s third disciple, Bai Ning, who now had full ess to all of the sect''s spiritual metal deposits.

 Chapter 1441 Grandmaster Realm Blacksmith and Problem of Slow Cultivation Speed

    Chapter 1441 Grandmaster Realm cksmith and Problem of Slow Cultivation Speed


    Together with the free ess to the sect''s spiritual mines and having the ability to enter them himself to search for precious spiritual metals, Bai Ning managed to sessfully breakthrough the barrier that had kept him stuck at the Peak of the Master Realm in cksmithing.


    At the same time, he broke through to the Grandmaster Realm of cksmithing, he also sessfully managed to establish a Domain with the Dao of cksmithing. Stepping into the Domain Lord Realm. Marking the fifth disciple of Xuan Hao''s to have reached the Domain Lord Realm. Meaning that every single one of Xuan Hao''s disciples had managed to sessfully reach the Domain Lord Rm.


    Not just was this a terrifying achievement in the eyes of the rest of the elders of the sect, but it also filled many of the sect''s younger disciples with awe at the achievement. All of them now hoping that they would be able to be a sixth disciple of Xuan Hao. After all, every single one of his disciples had managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm¡­ And even though most of the sect''s disciples were now aware of the existence of realms beyond the Domain Lord Realm, the Domain Lord Realm could still be considered the current pinnacle for most of the sect''s higherups.


    Outside of Chu Yang, who seemed to be the one closest to surpassing the Domain Lord Realm among the sect''s Domain Lord Realm Elders, there was also Feng Chen, who had managed to grow a lot over the past few months with the help of some guidance on the Dao of the Sword from Xuan Hao every now and then.


    At this point in time, even though he was still a bit behind Chu Yang in terms of cultivation realm, he had already managed to reach the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Onlycking behind by a tiny bit whenpared to Chu Yang, who seemed to have reached the peak of the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm from what Xuan Hao could see through the help of his system.


    In a sense, the talent of Feng Chen was in no way inferior whenpared to his disciples, it was only that his earlier circumstances and bad cultivation talent had been holding him back.


    On the other hand, now that the Star Shattering Sect had truly started taking off and he had a proper cultivation environment, his cultivation realm that had earlier remained rtively stagnate at the Nascent Soul Realm had begun to rapidly increase. Showing no signs of stopping any time soon.


    Knowing that he was close to reaching the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm soon and might be about to go through the first tribtion to reach the Soul Ascension Realm, Xuan Hao also made sure to inform him about the existence of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and the two paths through the Dao Domain Lord Realm he was aware of.


    Although Feng Chen might not be fitting to follow the path, he was taking through the Dao Domain Lord Realm byprehending several different Daos at once, he seemed more than suitable to follow the path that only required him to focus onprehending a single dao.


    Not to mention, he didn''t need to aim for the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm like he had done, just reaching the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm would be more than enough, as it would provide him with an upper hand upon reaching the Dao Seed Realm and create a stable foundation for him to try and reach the Profound Immortal Realm in the future.


    The Dao Domain Lord Realm, as long as one could reach the Intermediate Stage of the Realm, seemed to be worth it, even at the increased risk one might face having to pass through the entirety of the tribtion at the same time.


    If possible, Xuan Hao also wanted his disciples to at least reach the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and possibly even the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, but¡­ he also understood that doing so would be difficult, as outside of Bai Ning, the rest of his disciples didn''t seem as focused on a single dao as Feng Chen.


    Even though it would be more than possible for them to follow the same path as him andprehend several different Daos and integrate them like he had done to reach the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he had a feeling that the path would be more difficultpared to the path of following a single dao. Especially in the current state of the Star Shattering Sect where there wasn''t really much, he could do to help his disciplesprehend the different Daos that they seemed to have a proficiency for outside of pointing them in the right direction.


    "The Dao Enlightenment Monument will be useful, but I doubt it will be of much help beyond the Elementary Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help shaking his head. Silentlymenting over the fact that the sect was reallycking opportunities or special locations for the sect''s talented disciples toprehend different Daos, like the Vally of Illusory Beasts.


    At least in that regard, empires like the Blue Sea Empire far surpassed the Star Shattering Sect, as they had countless ces for specificallyprehending different Daos under their control throughout their territory. Allowing them to send their talented younger generation there to increase their strength. Further strengthening the Blue Sea Empire.


    Not to mention, there were definitely also some higher-level locations for their ancestors toprehend the Dao in depth- Or at the very least areas where it would be easier for them to feel the Dao and continuously deepen their understanding.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao once againmented to himself that the current Star Shattering Sect was trulycking behind.


    The only positive was that the Dao Enlightenment Monument was filled with countless different Daos and would be useable for the sect''s elders and disciples all the way up to the Elementary Realm and possibly even a bit beyond.


    However, after that point, they would essentially be left toprehend on their own¡­ And even though the rich spiritual qi of the Shattered Star Peaks did make it far easier to grasp the Daopared to outside, it would inevitably cause some of the sect''s elders and disciples to be forced to leave the sect in search of opportunities to increase their strength.


    All things considered, this wasn''t a problem so to speak as long as the number of disciples and elders leaving the sect to go out on adventures was limited and they didn''t disclose their identity, but¡­ The situation would be different if the Blue Sea Empire or other powers took notice.


    After all, an ancient hidden sect wouldn''t have its disciples and elders do something like that, as they had a rich inheritance with more than enough things to support the growth of the younger generation all the way to the Dao Seed Realm and beyond.


    If Elders and the disciples in the Soul Ascension Realm began running around searching for opportunities toprehend a Dao to the Small Sess Realm and break through to the Dao Seed Realm, it would inevitably end up drawing unwanted attention.


    A few would be eptable, but it would definitely be a problem in the future.


    Luckily, the current Star Shattering Sect didn''t have to worry about this kind of problem for now, as most of the sect''s elders were still only in the Domain Lord Realm, still far from reaching the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even then, Xuan Hao still decided to make a trip to Elder Song and inform him about his worries regarding this.


    Unfortunately, even the seemingly all-knowing Elder Song didn''t have a solution to this problem.


    For now, the only real solution that came to mind was to increase his strength as fast as possible and be capable of confronting the different major powers on the continent before the rest of the sect grew to that extent.


    The only problem was that his cultivation speed had seemingly reached a snail''s speed after he began trying toprehend the Dao of Space to the Realm of Perfection.


    If things continued, he had no idea how long it would take him to reach the Realm of Perfection in the Dao of Space, let alone two other Daos.


    Reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm before the sect grew to an extent that it would cause the Blue Sea Empire or others to grow suspicious seemed impossible at the current speed.


    "I need to do something different if I want to breakthrough to the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­" In the end, Xuan Hao could not help muttering this to himself as his thoughts went back towards the mystic realm where he still had an unfinished quest¡­n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 1442 Main Sect Quest

    Chapter 1442 Main Sect Quest


    Pondering over a way to rapidly increase hisprehension of not just the Dao of Space, but also the other Daos he hadprehend and reach the requirement to breakthrough to the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao could ultimately only think of going back inside the mystic realm and try toplete the quest rted to the celestial gates that he had originally decided to postpone due to it being extremely risky with his current strength.


    The source crystal he had on him could also work, but it would be a rather dangerous endeavor due to its size and the energy inside of it possibly blowing him up if he couldn''t absorb it in time, something he doubted was possible with his current cultivation realm.


    Outside of that, there was the Time Stone as well, that he could use to try andprehend the Dao of Time¡­


    But the fact that anyone who seemed to haveprehended the Dao of Time went missing in the past and the fact that he would want to try and use it together with the source crystal to increase the chance of himprehending the Dao of Time when actually using the Time Stone itself, he wanted to avoid using it for now if possible.


    Leaving all of that aside, it seemed like his only real option at the moment would be for him to go back to the mystic realm andplete the iplete quest rted to the celestial gates¡­


    [Sect Quest: Establish a Proper Alchemy Hall]


    [Alchemy Hall Disciples (Below Master Realm): 267/500]


    [Alchemy Hall Elders (Master Realm): 3/10]


    [Alchemy Hall Elders (Grandmaster Realm): 0/1]


    [Reward: Dao of Alchemy Comprehension, Alchemy Recipes, Spiritual Herbs]


    Just as he was about to prepare for setting off for the mystic realm again, a line of text suddenly popped up in front of him, as it finally seemed like the system showed some life after a long time of being in what could only be considered to be some kind ofatose state.


    [Sect Quest: Establish a Proper Formation Hall]


    [Formation Hall Disciples (Below Master Realm): 173/500]


    [Formation Hall Elders (Master Realm): 1/10]


    [Formation Hall Elders (Grandmaster Realm): 0/1] n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    [Reward: Dao of Formations Comprehension, Formation Diagrams, Formation Training Stones, Formation Construction Materials]


    Of course, it wasn''t just a single sect quest that popped up, but instead a lot of them all rted to the growth of the Star Shattering Sect''s three main profession halls that could be considered to have been fully established at this point in time.


    At the very least being more integratedpared to the few talisman masters, that the sect had worked hard to scout over the past few years, who still hadn''t managed to grow enough to establish a proper hall or something simr for themselves¡­


    [Sect Quest: Establish a Proper cksmithing Hall]


    [cksmithing Hall Disciples (Below Master Realm): 417/500]


    [cksmithing Hall Elders (Master Realm): 6/10]


    [cksmithing Hall Elders (Grandmaster Realm): 1/1]


    [Reward: Dao of cksmithing Comprehension, Artifact Blueprints, Spiritual Metal]


    Among them, the most impressive one was the cksmithing hall, that easily stood out as the strongest among the three halls.


    The main reason for the massive difference whenpared to the other two halls was the fact that the cksmithing hall simply had Bai Ning who had taken on the role as a teacher for the different elders of the cksmithing hall and had helped most of the Master Realm cksmiths of the cksmithing hall take that final step and breakthrough to the master realm.


    The alchemy hall on the other hand, did have a lot of elders on the brink of reaching the Master Realm, but were still a step behind, as Pei Yang had only recently started teaching these alchemy hall elders a little over a year ago due to thepetition that had ended a few months earlier.


    At the same time, Xuan Hao also noticed that it was only those who were part of the different halls that were counted in the sect quest itself, with people like Yi Min and Pei Yang, one in the Grand Master Realm and the other in the Pseudo Saint Realm, weren''t counted in the sect quest.


    "So¡­ They have to officially be part of the different halls to be counted as part of the sect quest¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced over the three brand new quests that seemed to have arrived just in time, Xuan Hao slowly turned his attention to a fourth quest that had simrly appeared below the three others.


    [Main Sect Quest: First Steps towards Bing a Major Power (I)]


    [Description: The sect has entered a state of rapid growth and is about to finally step onto the main stage of the Ewaria Continent. Help the sect reach the requirements to be a major power on the Ewaria Continent.]


    [Core Formation Realm Disciples: 1746/10.000]


    [Nascent Soul Realm Disciples: 11/100]


    [Domain Lord Realm Disciples: 5/10]


    [Soul Ascension Realm Elders: 0/100]


    [Dao Seed Realm Elders: 1/10]


    [Profound Immortal Realm Ancestor: 0/1]


    [Reward: World Stone (Immortal), Chaotic Qi Formation Upgrade, ???]


    [Note: Does not count host as part of the requirements]


    "How in the world am I supposed toplete this quest¡­?" Chuckling a bit wryly to himself as he looked over the content of the fourth quest that was rted to the overall strength of the sect, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit distraught.


    Not so much because of how far he was frompleting the quest in question, but because he understood that this was the level of strength that would be required for one to establish oneself as a major power on the Ewaria Continent, something that still seemed to be far off for the current Star Shattering Sect at the moment.


    Although he did discover something quite interesting looking over the current progress of the quest, as it seemed like outside of his disciples, who had all managed to reach the Domain Lord Realm at this point in time, there were actually eleven disciples who had managed to reach the Nascent Soul Realm. Showing that there were still talents inside the sect that he was unaware of.


    Whoosh~!


    Using his divine sense to check out these talented juniors who had managed to reach the Nascent Soul Realm while still being disciples, Xuan Hao quickly found out why, as almost all of these ''juniors'' were already well over a hundred years old and had simply managed to take advantage of the sect''s growth to propel themselves all the way into the Nascent Soul Realm. Having already been talented Core Formation Realm disciples seen as potential future elders before the establishment of the Star Shattering Sect.


    The only exception to this seemed to be, Yi Xuan, a personal disciple of Zu Fei and Lu Wen, a personal disciple of Wang Hu that he seemed to remember from somewhere he couldn''t really put his hand on.


    Outside of those two though, there was a rather surprising one that Xuan Hao hadn''t expected among the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators and that was none other than Fang Yu, a young disciple whom he had personally helped enter the Formation Hall in the past.


    Although, back then, she had only been in the Fourth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm¡­


    How in the world had she suddenly managed to go all the way from the Fourth Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm to the Nascent Soul Realm in such a short period of time?


    Even more so, considering that he clearly remembered having checked her talent with the system back then and finding nothing out of the ordinary about her.


    Filled with questions, Xuan Hao soon disappeared from the ce he was standing in before discreetly arriving outside a section of the formation hall where Fang Yu was currently busy studying a formation symbol that had been copied from one of the teleportation formations he had drawn up inside the sect. No different from what the rest of the formation disciples and elders of the sect were doing.


    I wonder what is so special about you that allowed you to reach the Nascent Soul Realm in such a short period of time¡­


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this, Xuan Hao directly used the system to examine Fang Yu standing not too far away.


    Name: Fang Yu


    Race: Human Talent: 16


    Comprehension: 119


    Dao: Dao of Formations (Elementary Realm) Physique: No Special Physique Realm: First Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm At first, Xuan Hao saw what he had seen in the past without any surprise- However this didn''tst for long, as he soon saw a brand-new section had appeared below the talent part¡­ And even more shockingly, he discovered that she had alreadyprehended the Dao of Formations to the Elementary Realm despite only being in the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Wait a second¡­ The sect quest¡­


    [Sect Quest: Establish a Proper Formation Hall]


    [Reward: Dao of Formations Comprehension, Formation Diagrams, Formation Training Stones, Formation Construction Materials]


    Suddenly, realizing something Xuan Hao pulled up the newly acquired sect quest before narrowing his eyes as he focused on a certain part of the quest.


    [Formation Hall Elders (Grandmaster Realm): 0/1]


    But¡­ This girl is clearly in the Grandmaster Realm havingprehended the Dao of Formations to the Elementary Realm- Ah! Elder¡­ She is not an elder! So that is why¡­


    Feeling like he understood why the sect quest still showed 0/1, Xuan Hao soon focused his attention back on the important matter at hand, a new stat had appeared for scouting talented disciples and the girl in front of him seemed to have an outrageously highprehension when it came to the Dao of Formations¡­

 Chapter 1443 Potential Sixth Disciple...?

    Chapter 1443 Potential Sixth Disciple...?


    Feeling that his other disciples might also have seen a change in their status given that something new seemed to have appeared in the form of theprehension stat, Xuan Hao didn''t waste much time before pulling up the status of his first disciple to see if there were any changes.


    ? First Disciple, Qing Yi ? Race: Human Talent: 45 Comprehension: 81 Dao: Dao of Fire (Domain), Dao of Alchemy (Pseudo Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Fire, Dao of Wind, Dao of Light, Dao of Space, Dao of Alchemy Physique: Bright Sun Divine Physique (Peak Stage, Small Sun Realm) Realm: Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Profession: Alchemy (Peak Master Realm) Looking through the status of Qing Yi, it didn''t take that long for him to spot the new stat that had simrly appeared below her talent¡­ And surprisingly enough, it seemed to far surpass her talent.


    Well¡­ Considering thatprehension was something just as important if not more important the further one went, Xuan Hao didn''t find it too surprising that his disciple was also excellent in that regard.


    Outside of that, he also noted down that it seemed like Qing Yi had managed to break through to the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm while he wasn''t looking- or more urately, while he was busy setting up the teleportation formationwork across the Star Shattering Sect.


    At the same time, it also seemed like her focus on her alchemy had paid off, as she had managed to reach the Peak of the Master Realm and seemed to only be a step away from reaching the Grandmaster Realm.


    "Guess I should put aside some time to teach her and guide her alchemy¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the status of his first disciple, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards his remaining disciples.


    Unsurprisingly, all of them were excellent in their own regard and didn''t seem to differ too much whenpared to Qing Yi¡­ At least that was what he wanted to say, but there was a certain someone who stood outpared to the rest of his disciples.


    The disciple in question was none other than his youngest disciple in terms of age and by far the most mischievous of the bunch, Mui¡­


    ? Fourth Disciple, Mui ? Race: Human Talent: 81 Comprehension: -81 Dao: Dao of Water (Domain) Potential Dao: Dao of Water, Dao of Darkness, Dao of Ice, Dao of Space, Dao of Chaos Physique: Deste Ancient Moon Physique (Dormant) Realm: Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm Profession: cksmithing (Abysmal), Formation Master (Abysmal)


    Cultivation Mantra: Myriad Water Art Not only had her talent somehow managed to break through 80, but herprehension was somehow in the negative. Making him wonder if there was some kind of visual bug with the floating screen in front of him.


    In the end, he couldn''t figure out what was wrong with this little disciple of his and could only dismiss the situation as some kind of mistake on the systems part at the moment, as it was clear that she didn''t have a negativeprehension considering the fact that she had managed to establish a water domain and start the process ofprehending the Dao of Water.


    The only real thing she could think about was the rank of her professions, which were both abysmal¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao decided not to dwell too much on the strangeness of this youngest disciple of his, as he felt like he wouldn''t get any answers no matter how hard he tried.


    Instead of that, he once again turned his attention back towards Fang Yu, still busy with the formation symbol in front of her.


    Given her terrifyingprehension ability, Xuan Hao was already tempted to take her in as his sixth disciple.


    The main reason he hadn''t just directly stepped forward to do this was the fact that he didn''t really know much about the girl outside of her clear interest in the Dao of Formations. More importantly, he didn''t have any idea if she already had a master. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although¡­ Given that the girl should have already broken through to the Grandmaster Realm and be a Grandmaster Realm Formation Master, he doubted that she had a master. Especially given the fact that information about her reaching the Grandmaster Realm should have long since spread across the sect if she had a master.


    The only reason why was the fact that this little girl had managed to be a Grandmaster Realm Formation Master was because the little one was far too focused on the Dao of Formations, to the point where she didn''t even seem to care about informing others about her apparent breakthrough to the Grandmaster Realm. Instead, remaining wholeheartedly focused on continuing to deepen her understanding of the Dao of Formations and furthering her own realm as a Formation Master in the process.


    The elders of the sect were far too chatty with each other to keep something like this hidden from each other¡­


    Shaking his head at these thoughts, Xuan Hao slowly retracted his gaze from the young girl before silently using his divine sense to inform Elder Song about the situation and have him make proper arrangements for the girl and at the same time also look into her and see if she had a master for him.


    Considering that she had already reached the Grandmaster Realm, it didn''t make sense for her to just continue like she was doing now and only receive the resources of a normal Inner Sect Disciple.


    And¡­ More importantly than that, he also had to make sure that she became a part of the Formation Hall''s Elders!


    Only if she became an elder of the Formation Hall would she count towards the sect quest. Having her remain as a normal disciple simply wouldn''t do¡­!


    Smiling to himself as he thought about this, while also noticing the clear moments from Elder Song''s side following him learning about the existence of a Grandmaster Realm Formation Master among the inner disciples of the sect, Xuan Hao didn''t continue staying around the formation hall any longer and soon left.


    nning to wait until Elder Song sorted out the situation before going further with his intent to take in the girl as a potential sixth disciple. After all, she was already part of the Star Shattering Sect, and it wasn''t like there was anyone else in the sect with the qualities to take her as a disciple in her current realm. Especially so in regard to her achievements in the Dao of Formations.

 Chapter 1444 Teaching Two Disciples Alchemy

    Chapter 1444 Teaching Two Disciples Alchemy


    As Elder Song rushed over to meet this Grandmaster Realm Formation Master that he had been unaware a few seconds ago, Xuan Hao reappeared at the Ninth Star Peak where the new main hall of the alchemy hall was still in the process of being constructed.


    Given that the elders of the alchemy hall wanted to prepare for the future and wanted the number of alchemy disciples to grow far past a few hundred, it was a massive building that was incorporated into the side of the Ninth Star Peak itself, with a portion of it sticking up above the spiritual herb field on the Ninth Star Peak, where it was incorporated into the herb fields themselves with several smaller buildings connecting to the main hall itself.


    Of course, given that it had been constructed in a manner where most of the alchemy disciples and elders could stay inside the main hall to study and practice alchemy without any problems, the different buildings connecting to the top part on the spiritual fields of the Ninth Star Peak, were mainly for the storage of spiritual herbs and ces for the spiritual herb farmers and caretakers to store their equipment or other things used to help the growth of the spiritual herbs.


    In a sense, the top part of the alchemy hall connected to the spiritual herb fields on the Ninth Star Peak had essentially been allocated to these spiritual herb caretakers and their disciples. Allowing the alchemists inside the main hall itself to smoothly and swiftly ess any spiritual herbs that they might need.


    After all, when it came to finding the spiritual herbs needed by the alchemists among the countless piles and sacks that had been sorted away for storage, the caretakers and farmers who had done said sorting could be said to be faster than even the most skilled alchemist.


    "Ah, there she is."


    Finding the one he was looking for after a quick look through the interior of the new main hall of the alchemy hall, Xuan Hao gentlynded on the ground before starting to make his way towards the grandiose entrance of the massive building that would serve as the gathering spot for the sect''s alchemists in the future. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Soon enough, finding himself in front of a rather small alchemy room located in the corner without anything around. Far from being asrge and splendid as some of the other alchemy rooms that had already been constructed for the alchemy elders.


    "Huh? Who is- Master!"


    "Master¡­!?


    Arriving at the entrance to this small alchemy room before pushing open the door, Xuan Hao was directly met with the overjoyed voice of his first disciple and the surprised voice of his fifth disciple, who were both going over some kind of alchemy recipe together.


    From a nce, it was obvious that Qing Yi was currently in the process of teaching her junior sister on the path of alchemy, something she had been doing ever since Chun Hua had first shown an interest in learning more about alchemy.


    Luckily, it seemed like Chun Hua was also quite talented when it came to alchemy and even though she hayet to break through to the Master Realm and could be considered to have encountered a bottleneck at the Peak of the Artisan Realm, it wouldn''t be long before the Star Shattering Sect gained another Master Alchemist with Qing Yi dedicating so much of her time to assisting this junior sister of hers.


    Knowing this as well, Xuan Hao could not help smiling at the two girls as he greeted them and told them to continue what they were doing before he had shown up. Earning a rather surprised look from both of them before being reced by one of understanding.


    Both of them understood that this was a subtle way for their master to assess their current progress in alchemy.


    At the same time, they also understood that their master would be there to guide them, as he had done in the past whenever he showed up and did simr things in the past.


    Of course, among the two of them, the one most excited was Chun Hua, as she was already extremely close to the Master Realm.


    Knowing that with her master''s guidance this time around, she might really be able to breakthrough the bottleneck that had been keeping her stuck at the Peak of the Artisan Realm for the past few months!


    As both of the girls understood that their master would personally be guiding them and assessing their current skill level, neither of them dared to be the slightest bit careless, as they both went all out while discussing the alchemy recipe that they had only been casually chatting about seconds earlier.


    Whoosh~!


    Not just going all out in disying their knowledge, the two of them even started demonstrating their alchemy skill under the pretext of testing the pill recipe that they had been discussing. Showing Xuan Hao a rather amusing scene of a junior sister and senior sister trying to oupete each other to show off more than the other.


    In the end, thissted for the next three hours before they finished showing off. After which Xuan Hao took the opportunity to carefully examine what they had made before giving feedback and also helping modify the pill recipe they had been discussing and making it more efficientpared to before, while at the same time also exining what changes he made and why.


    The pill recipe in question was only of the Soul Rank or for the Nascent Soul Realm.


    With his current strength as a Grandmaster Realm Alchemist, it wasn''t a problem for him to do something like this and might even be something Qing Yi herself could aplish as a Master Alchemist if she put aside a few weeks of her time.


    Not to mention, it was a good way for his disciples to learn more about the process of creating new alchemy recipes, as that was crucial for the development of an alchemist and the two of them didn''t have much experience in this regard. Mostly having relied on recipes and forms provided by him or the sect to practice without trying to create their own recipes and forms.


    Then again¡­ The main reason why he even excelled in this aspect to start off with was due to the help of the system back when it had first infused him with alchemy knowledge, as it had at the same time also allowed him to master this aspect of alchemy back then. Making it rather simple to take the first step intoprehending the Dao of Alchemy.

 Chapter 1445 A Growing Problem and a Quick Solution (1)

    Chapter 1445 A Growing Problem and a Quick Solution (1)


    After he finished guiding his two disciples in alchemy, Chun Hua quickly excused herself before running off. Heading straight back towards the direction of her own alchemy room to test out some of the new things she had learnt, while also hoping to make use of the opportunity to break through the barrier to the Master Realm and officially step into that realm and be considered among the senior figures of the sect in terms of alchemy.


    Even though the number of Master Realm Alchemist in the sect could be counted on a single hand and she could already be considered a terrifying genius in terms of alchemy. Notcking behind most of the alchemy elders of the sect, she still felt she wascking whenparing herself to someone like Qing Yi, who was obviously much younger than herself.


    The fact that she had started learning alchemy at atter date didn''t matter to her, as she wanted to at the very least stand in the same realm as Qing Yi as a Master Alchemist.


    Unfortunately for Chun Hua, even if she broke through to the Master Realm, it was likely that Qing Yi would soon break through to the Grandmaster Realm. Once again leaving her behind.


    Although¡­ Considering that it became more and more difficult to advance the further one went, it would only be a matter of time before Chun Hua broke through to the same realm that Qing Yi was on.


    Well¡­ As long as she kept her current enthusiasm regarding alchemy intact¡­


    Wait! Qing Yi is about to breakthrough to the Grandmaster Realm! Am I not at the Grandmaster Realm in terms of alchemy!? Will I have to breakthrough the Pseudo Saint Realm in alchemy before she breaks through to the Grandmaster Realm!?


    Suddenly realizing something he hadn''t realized earlier, Xuan Hao found out that he needed to improve his own alchemy so as to not get overtaken by his own disciple.


    The fact that he had reached the Pseudo Saint Realm in cksmithing had made him lower his guard and forget that he still needed to improve his alchemy to prevent any emergency quests from the system. After all, those quests gave him nothing in return and only threatened him.


    "But¡­ To improve myprehension of the Dao of Alchemy and reach the Pseudo Saint Realm, I will at least have to raise the Dao of Alchemy to the Large Sess Realm and-"


    "Master? Is something wrong?"


    Lost in his own thoughts for a moment as he muttered something to himself, Xuan Hao was suddenly caught off guard as he heard Qing Yi calling out to him from the side with a somewhat worried expression on her face.


    "Nothing is wrong, I just thought about something regarding your junior sister. After all, she might be able to break through the Master Realm and be a Master Alchemist in a few days."


    "I see¡­ Then, if you will excuse me, master, I will review what you taught me." Pondering over something for a brief moment, Qing Yi soon nodded her head as she said this before focusing her attention back on a few notes she had written down while he had taught her and Chun Hua.


    "Then I won''t bother you any more while you focus on absorbing what you can from earlier." Smiling gently as he said this, Xuan Hao didn''t spend any more time inside his first disciple''s alchemy room, as he quickly left the new main hall of the alchemy hall and headed back in the direction of the Seventh Star Peak.


    Moving at a rtively slow pace as he pondered over the matter of having to break through to the Pseudo Saint Realm in Alchemy before his first disciple managed to reach the Grandmaster Realm in Alchemy.


    Of course, he could find ways to subtly suppress or prevent her from studying alchemy by sending her out of the sect for learning experiences, but that wouldn''t be good considering that she seemed solely focused onprehending the Dao of Alchemy and reaching the Grandmaster Realm at the moment. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    The main culprit behind this sudden drive to reach the Grandmaster Realm and officially step into the Realm of a Grandmaster Alchemist came from the recent breakthrough of Bai Ning, as his strength just after reaching the Domain Lord Realm already far surpassed hers even though his cultivation realm was far weaker than hers.


    The reason for that being Bai Ning had genuinelyprehended a Dao, while she was still in the domain realm. The qualitive difference made it so that it was difficult for her to defeat Bai Ning, even though the Dao of cksmithing wasn''t really the best in terms of fighting¡­


    "Looks like I will have to rely on the system quest if I want to have hope of bing a Pseudo Saint Realm Alchemist before Qing Yi breaks through to the Grandmaster Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he went over all kinds of different scenarios that would help improve his Dao of Alchemy, Xuan Hao ultimately focused his gaze towards a recently acquired quest that seemed to prove the most useful in his hope of surpassing the Grandmaster Realm before Qing Yi broke through to the realm.


    [Sect Quest: Establish a Proper Alchemy Hall] [Alchemy Hall Disciples (Below Master Realm): 267/500] [Alchemy Hall Elders (Master Realm): 3/10] [Alchemy Hall Elders (Grandmaster Realm): 0/1] [Reward: Dao of Alchemy Comprehension, Alchemy Recipes, Spiritual Herbs] Although the quest could be said to be difficult, it wasn''t impossible.


    The Grandmaster Realm Alchemist Elder could be Pei Yang, if he personally went over and asked. Giving him the position of alchemy hall elder and officially making him part of the sect instead of the current guest elder status he had attached to him.


    At the same time, Chun Hua would soon provide one more Master Realm Alchemist, while the rest would be rtively easy to raise if he personally interfered and helped those struggling elders just a single step away from the Master Realm take the final step.


    As for the number of disciples that needed to join¡­ That was even more simple given that he could use both his own status and Pei Yang''s status in the sect to attract the required disciples to sell themselves off to the alchemist hall.

 Chapter 1446 A Growing Problem and a Quick Solution (2)

    Chapter 1446 A Growing Problem and a Quick Solution (2)


    Havinge up with a solution to the problem that he suddenly found himself facing in the form of Qing Yi getting close to reaching the same realm as him in terms of alchemy, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time, as he directly went over to meet with Pei Yang to inform him of this promotion from a guest elder to an alchemy elder of the alchemy hall. Making sure to inform him about the fact that it wasn''t a position that involved him taking on any new responsibilities like being the one to take care of the alchemy hall. Instead, informing that it was just a formality, as he understood very well that Pei Yang would much rather spend his time cultivating over nurturing and teaching the younger generation all day long.


    The fact that he was still helping teach the disciples and elders of the sect once a month was already a miracle in itself, but at least considering that he had been saved by the Star Shattering Sect and given a ce to cultivate in peace without worrying about being attacked or hunted down by the Blue Sea Empire, he didn''tin about any of this.


    In a way, teaching the younger generation once a month was a small price to pay for having a safe ce to cultivate without any worries.


    Not to mention, the Star Shattering Sect didn''t just provide him with a safe ce to cultivate, but also clear opportunities to improve his strength. The most obvious ones being the rich spiritual qi and the Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    Although the Dao Enlightenment Monument couldn''t promote any Dao to the Large Sess Realm, they still pointed the way and provided great support for anyone who had yet to reach the Large Sess Realm in a Dao.


    The main reason Xuan Hao himself didn''t use it was due to the fact that most of his time was spent onprehending the Dao of Space that had already reached the Large Sess Realm, while those Daos he still had stuck in the Small Sess Realm were already close to the Peak of the Small Sess Realm and wouldn''t really benefit much from him going to visit the Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    ¡­


    As a few days flew by following Pei Yang bing an elder of the alchemy hall, Chun Hua, who had closed herself off to strive for the Master Realm. Finally managed to break through and became a Master Alchemist- Not just that, but she also managed to directly break through from Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to the Fifth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    It was only shortly after Chun Hua''s breakthrough that several of the older alchemists who had originallye from the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect managed to break through to the Master Realm as well through the joint efforts of Xuan Hao and Pei Yang over the past few days.


    At the same time, Xuan Hao made full use of his current position inside the sect to pull arge number of disciples to join the alchemy hall.


    Of course, he didn''t do so through force, but instead just offered the first 250 to join the alchemy hall a chance to listen to a lecture that involved the Qi Condensation, Foundation Establishment and Core Formation Realm that he was going to hold in celebration of Pei Yang bing part of the alchemy hall.


    Someone who was widely rumored among the disciples of the sect to be above the Soul Ascension Realm and having reached the legendary Dao Seed Realm that only a few disciples even knew about suddenly offering a lecture on the first three cultivation realms? How could the number of disciples joining the alchemy hall not be filled up in an instant?


    [Sect Quest: Establish a Proper Alchemy Hall (Complete)] [Alchemy Hall Disciples (Below Master Realm): 768/500 (Complete)] [Alchemy Hall Elders (Master Realm): 12/10 (Complete)] [Alchemy Hall Elders (Grandmaster Realm): 1/1 (Complete)] [Reward: Dao of Alchemy Comprehension, Alchemy Recipes, Spiritual Herbs] In the end, only a few days after he had set out toplete the first of the new sect quest, he had sessfully managed toplete it.


    Of course, this was also due to the fact that the Star Shattering Sect already had a lot of alchemy elders close to reaching the Master Realm, while at the same time also having Pei Yang around to fill the gap of the required Grandmaster Realm Alchemist.


    When it came to the other two sect quests rted to the cksmithing Hall and Formation Hall respectfully, it would be far from that simple.


    At least when it came to the number of elders close to reaching the Master Realm, there was ack of Formation Masters, while those close to the Master Realm inside the cksmithing Hall had already broken through with the help of Bai Ning.


    However, this didn''t matter much at the moment, as that problem would solve itself out with time. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    For now, Xuan Hao focused his attention on the newlypleted quest and started going through the rewards.


    First of all were the spiritual herbs and a few unique heavenly treasures used for alchemy that came along with the spiritual herbs, a few of the useful things were kept inside his spiritual ring, while the rest were handed over to the sect.


    After all, with such arge number of new alchemy disciples, the sect would definitely find itselfcking spiritual herbs, something that therge number of spiritual herbs given as a reward could help out with.


    Next up was alchemy recipes, which ended up being imprinted in his mind like past information had been. Allowing him to easily memorize them and understand how to make the different new pills and potions that had appeared in his head.


    Although¡­ Following the original style of recipes given by the system¡­ Most of them couldn''t be trusted to others due to their¡­ Uniqueness¡­


    Finally, and most importantly was the Dao of Alchemy Comprehension that Xuan Hao decided to save up until he sorted out the other rewards and returned to his cultivation room to hopefully use the opportunity granted by the system to elevate his Dao of Alchemy to the level of a Pseudo Saint Realm Alchemist.

 Chapter 1447 A Growing Problem and a Quick Solution, Large Success Realm Dao of Alchemy (3)

    Chapter 1447 A Growing Problem and a Quick Solution, Large Sess Realm Dao of Alchemy (3)


    Returning to his room after everything else had been sorted out, Xuan Hao informed his disciples and Feng Chen that he would be unreachable for the foreseeable future, as he had no idea how long it would take him toprehend the Dao of alchemy this time around.


    Just in case it ended up taking a long time, he made sure to inform Feng Chen and his disciples so they wouldn''t end up worrying in case he ended up in deep mediation for the next few months.


    After all, even if the opportunity from the system might onlyst for a short time, he was fully intent on making full use of the opportunity to try andprehend the Dao of Alchemy to the Large Sess Realm and possibly even the Realm of Perfection if there was a chance, something that would undoubtedly end up with him staying in his cultivation room for an extended period of time.


    Luckily, the current Star Shattering Sect didn''t really require his personal interference at the time, as everything was developing well with the Star Shattering Sect recently gaining control over several important resources in the now chaotic region of the Fallen Sky Empire.


    On positive thing that hade from the Star Shattering Sect being viewed with cation even by the Blue Sea Empire was the fact that none of the resource location they had taken control of outside of the sect''s territory were threatened or attacked by other empires who might have been eyeing the beforehand.


    The main negative was that the Star Shattering Sect couldn''t continue expanding into the chaotic region at the moment, as it would be a bit overboard for a hidden ancient sect to suddenly make a move to control the resources of an entire empire. Especially considering that the size of the Sky Empire was several times the size of the current Star Shattering Sect when it came to the territory they controlled.


    At the very least, at the moment, the Star Shattering Sect''s resource needs could be met with rtive ease and should only start running into problems when the general realm of the elders broke through to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    For now, that was still far off in the future, but it was always a good thing to n ahead, as the future would soon enough be the present.


    The n that Xuan Hao coulde up with in that regard was to raise the high-end power of the sect to the level of a major power as described by the system, as that way, it wouldn''t matter if the Blue Sea Empire viewed the Star Shattering Sect as an ancient hidden sect or not, as it would have more than enough strength to stand on its own!


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao soon turned his attention towards the system panel that had already appeared in front of him asking if he wanted to redeem thest reward from the recentlypleted alchemy hall sect quest.


    Yes!


    Without a second thought, Xuan Hao smiled to himself as he redeemed the reward. Soon enough, causing a massive flood of information to surge forward before colliding with his soul and starting to merge with it.


    Different from the enlightenment space that he used toprehend other Daos, advancing the Dao of Alchemy this time around was a bit different, as it mainly relied on helping him understand the process creating andbining different heavenly and earthly materials to create things like pills and potions.


    As a result, theprehension of how to utilize all kinds of heavenly and earthly materials and the experience of creating countless pills and potions far above the current level he was capable of, propelled hisprehension of the Dao of Alchemy forward at a terrifying pace far surpassing any time he had spent inside the enlightenment space in the past.


    Boom!


    In less than an hour, his Dao of Alchemy directly managed to breakthrough from the Small Sess Realm to the Large Sess Realm. Although, because there wasn''t a Saint Realm Alchemist present to guide him towards reaching the Saint Realm, he wasn''t able to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm and was still in the Grandmaster Realm.


    Of course, the difference between a Grandmaster Realm Alchemist who was at the Small Sess Realm in the Dao of Alchemy and one who had reached the Large Sess Realm was like the difference between heaven and earth, as the other party could be said to have already taken the first major step towards reaching the Saint Realm.


    From what he understood about the Grandmaster Realm, both in alchemy and other professions, it could be divided up into three minor realms.


    The Junior Grandmaster Realm, someone who had justprehended a Dao like the Dao of Alchemy to the Elementary Realm and stepped into the Grandmaster Realm.


    The Senior Grandmaster Realm, someone who hadprehended it to the Small Sess Realm.


    Finally, the realm he had just broken through to, the Pinnacle Grandmaster Realm.


    Following the Pinnacle Grandmaster Realm was still the Pseudo Saint Realm, but that would normally be impossible to reach under normal circumstances, as it required one to gain the inheritance of someone in the Saint Realm.


    For example, he had only managed to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in the Dao of cksmithing because he had gained the inheritance Gong Cheng back in the Blue Shore Kingdom due to the other party feeling grateful towards him and Yi Min for helping him breakthrough to the Saint Realm.


    Without finding the inheritance of a Saint Realm Alchemist, it would be impossible for him to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in alchemy, and he would have to pave his own path towards the Realm of Perfection. Different from his Dao of cksmithing that seemed to have a rather clear path towards reaching the Saint Realm due to the inheritance from Gong Cheng.


    Of course, it didn''t mean that it would be easy for him to reach the Saint Realm and reach the Realm of Perfection in the Dao of cksmithing, it just meant that he would have an easier time and wouldn''t encounter as many bottlenecks as he would do whileprehending the Dao of Alchemy.


    Whoosh~


    Unaffected by this breakthrough, Xuan Hao continued pushing forward with the assistance of therge influx of information and memories rted to the Dao of Alchemy, as the space around him started to tremble under the terrifying presence created by the presence of the Dao of Alchemy that had gathered around him at this point of time as a result of his rapid improvement in the Dao of Alchemy.


    Even though he could already feel that it was clear that the assistance from the system wouldn''t be able to help him reach the reach the Realm of Perfection and step into the Saint Realm, he still continued to improve his Dao of Alchemy. Fully Intend on pushing it as far as possible before the assistance from the system came to an end.


    Like this, another three hours quickly flew by, as the assistance from the system came to an end.


    Even then, Xuan Hao didn''t stand up immediately and instead continued hisprehension of the Dao of Alchemy, while at the same time sorting through the massive amount of information regarding the Dao of Alchemy that had essentially been stuffed into his head by the system this time around.


    Not just because the information would be useful when it came to teaching Qing Yi, Chun Hua and any future disciples who might show an interest in the Dao of Alchemy, but also because there were several powerful techniques inside the memories that didn''t seem the slightest bit rted to alchemy and crafting pills or potions.


    Instead, this information seemed to be on how to use the Dao of Alchemy to fight, something Xuan Hao had never seen before, as most alchemists never participated inbat if possible and if they did, they would almost certainly be overwhelmed by anyone at a simr level of strength. Not much different from cksmiths or other Daos rted to professions


    Are alchemists perhaps different when they reach the Saint Realm?


    This thought was not so much because he doubted the fighting ability of alchemists below the Saint Realm, but more so because he noticed that all of the fighting methods that had been imprinted in his soul seemed to require someone to reach the Saint Realm first.


    Only a few of them could barely be executed at the Grandmaster Realm, with most of those being at the Pinnacle of the Grandmaster Realm.


    Feeling more curious than ever about the Saint Realm, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if he should pay another visit to Gong Cheng and try to get some information out of him rted to the Saint Realm, but then again, the other party didn''t seem to have much information on the Saint Realm either and had only recently broken through to the realm out of sheer luck¡­n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om

 Chapter 1448 A Growing Problem and a Quick Solution, Large Success Realm Dao of Alchemy (4)

    Chapter 1448 A Growing Problem and a Quick Solution, Large Sess Realm Dao of Alchemy (4)


    Continuing hisprehension of the Dao of Alchemy while making full use of the new information that had essentially been stuffed inside his head by the system, Xuan Hao''s understanding of the Dao of Alchemy reached a level that was above that of even his Dao of cksmithing.


    Though he had the guidance of someone in the Saint Realm when it came to cksmithing, his overall knowledge of cksmithing wascking behind by a lot whenpared to his current knowledge of alchemy. Having already reached a point where Xuan Hao had a feeling that it would be faster for him to reach the Saint Realm with alchemy, even if he didn''t have any guide towards the Saint Realm like he did when it came to cksmithing.


    In the end, as Xuan Hao remained fully focused on the Dao of Alchemy and showed no signs of stopping hisprehension of the Dao of Alchemy even after the assistance from the system hade to a stop, time inside the cultivation room quickly began to fly by rapidly, as hisprehension of the Dao of Alchemy got closer and closer to the Realm of Perfection.


    Only a little over a month since he had closed himself off to the outside world to focus onprehending the Dao of Alchemy in peace, did he finally open his eyes again.


    Not because he sensed any problems in the sect or that he had been informed by his disciples about something happening to them. Instead, it was simply because he felt his progress in the Dao of Alchemy hitting a bottleneck¡­ And this bottleneck was by far the most difficult one he had encountered so far. Not making it difficult for him to guess that he should have already reached the Peak of the Large Sess Realm and the bottleneck in question should be the one separating him from the Perfection Realm.


    Though it was just a single bottleneck blocking him from reaching the Perfection Realm, he understood full well that even with his current solid foundation in alchemy that hade from the help of the system, he would need to at least spend ten years or longer to break through that bottleneck.


    After all, it was not just about reaching the Perfection Realm but was also about him breaking through to the Saint Realm, something that had bared countless talented cultivators from advancing in the past.


    In a sense, advancing from the Grandmaster Realm could be considered far harder than advancing to the Dao Seed Realm¡­ And from the information he had managed to gather on the different major powers on the continent so far, Saint Realm Experts seemed to be even harder to find than Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators.


    Even arge empire like the Blue Sea Empire that outwardly had at least five people in the Celestial Immortal Realm, only had three people in the Saint Realm.


    Not to mention, the Blue Sea Empire could be considered lucky even with so few in the Saint Realm, as some other simr sized powers only seemed to have a single person in the Saint Realm outwardly.


    With that in mind, not to mention the Dao Seed Realm, it might even be harder to reach the Saint Realm than the Celestial Immortal Realm¡­


    Smiling a bit wryly to himself as he thought about just how difficult it was going to be for him to reach the Saint Realm in the future, Xuan Hao shook his head slightly before he decided to turn his attention towards his own status to check out the improvements he had experienced during that past month. Part of him feeling hopeful that the status would include the description of the different minor realms in the Grandmaster Realm this time around. After all, he had only recentlye upon this information while he was looking for a way to improve hisprehension of the Dao of Alchemy so as to not be left behind by his own disciple.


    At least from what he knew, the system sometimes seemed to update information when he learnt something new that wasn''t included in the system beforehand. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Hopefully, the new information on the Grandmaster Realm will be included this time around, as it should save him from having to panic and run around searching for an opportunity to reach the Pseudo Saint Realm in alchemy.


    After all, he highly doubted he would end up encountering another situation simr to the one he had experienced at the Blue Shore Kingdom¡­


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Large Sess Realm), Dao of the Sword (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Space (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Illusions (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Formations (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Alchemy (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Fire (Small Sess Realm), Dao of cksmithing (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Light (Small Sess Realm)


    Dao Lotus: 20yers (Possibleyers 22) Sword Intent: Sword Soul Realm Talent: ???? Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened) Physique: Ster Dao Body (99% Awakened)


    Realm: Late Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm) Professions: Alchemist (Pinnacle Grandmaster), Formation Master (Pinnacle Grandmaster), cksmithing (Senior Grandmaster (Pseudo Saint)) Sect: Star Shattering Sect Status: Ancestor of the Star Shattering Sect Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui, Chun Hua Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Fourth Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm) Cultivation Mantra: The Untold Swords Mantra [Personal Techniques]: Descend of the Ice God''s Sword (High Earth Rank) [Movement Techniques]: Illusory Light Steps (Mid Heaven Rank), Drifting Cloud Steps (Iplete, Peak Heaven Rank) [Sword Techniques]: Rain Sword (Peak Mortal Rank), Heaven Splitting Sword Art (Iplete, Mid Heaven Rank), Void Sword Art (Iplete, Low Heaven Rank), Untold Sword Mantra (Iplete, Unknown) Looking through his status for the first time in a rather long time, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself when he noticed that the professions had indeed been updated to the new system that he had learnt about.


    On the not so bright side of things, it looked like the level of his cksmithing had been reduced down to the Senior Grandmaster Realm. Now only disying the Pseudo Saint Realm on the side. Making him feel that the next sect quest he had to focus on would be the cksmithing one, while the formation one wasn''t that much of a worry at the moment, as none of his disciples practiced-


    Wait! If I take on that girl from the Formation Hall, won''t I have to worry about improving my formations as well in the near future!?


    Suddenly realizing that he might not just have to improve his cksmithing and alchemy in the future, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that the system was setting him up for a difficult life with no rest in the future.


    Shaking his head at these troublesome thoughts, Xuan Hao instead focused his attention on a rather interesting thing that seemed to have taken ce during the month-long secluded cultivation he had engaged in, both of his demon beast pets had broken through.


    The fearsome winged lion demon beast had managed to reach the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, while the rabbit demon beast had managed to reach the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm. Only needing to take on one more tribtion before it could break through to the Dao Seed Realm.


    Although, he was a bit puzzled over the rapid improvements in strength from his two demon beasts, as it was a well-known fact that demon beasts grew at a far slower pacepared to humans, something they made up for with their far longer lifespanspared to humans who generally lived far shorter than demon beasts of equal strength.


    Hm¡­ The rabbit demon beast''s rapid improvement might have something to do with the top-grade spirit stones I provided it with. The winged lion demon beast on the other hand¡­ I have no idea how it managed to improve its strength so fast¡­


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about the winged lion demon beast, Xuan Hao could not help remembering how it had just eaten the terrifying demonic cultivator that hadnded in front of it without a second thought or even wondering if it would be something dangerous to eat in the first ce.


    For some unknown reason, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit worried about the winged lion demon beast. Fearing that it might have ended up eating something strange again that had caused its strength to skyrocket. Allowing it to jump to minor realms in a single go.


    Whoosh-!


    Without a second thought, Xuan Hao decided to directly use his divine sense to search for the winged lion demon beast. Using his divine sense without restraint, causing it to rapidly rush outside the boundaries of the Shattered Star Peaks before moving towards the border of the Star Shattering Sect where he expected to find the winged lion demon beast.

 Chapter 1449 Blood Tendrils

    Chapter 1449 Blood Tendrils


    Not long after, Xuan Hao found the winged lion demon beast at the border of the sect engaged in battle with a powerful demonic cultivator no weaker than someone who had reached the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Rm.


    Even though its strength was clearly weaker than this demonic cultivator, it still managed to hold its own against the demonic cultivator because of its strong body that surpassed that of ordinary demon beasts at the Fourth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    If things continued as they were, it wouldn''t be surprising if the battle between the two of them dragged on for the next week, as both also had a terrifying recovery rate that helped them recover from most of the damage that they ended up suffering during the battle, while at the same time helping them rapidly recover the qi that they used during their fight.


    In a sense, Xuan Hao also felt that this demonic cultivator was rather impressive, as he managed to hold his own against the winged lion demon beast with this kind of terrifying recovery ability.


    Although¡­ He didn''t figure out why the winged lion demon beast''s strength had increased so rapidly, as there was no sign of it bing overwhelmed like it had been in the past after eating from the body of the terrifying demonic cultivator who had fallen at the edge of the sect''s territory.


    Instead of that, the winged lion demon beast''s foundation seemed to bepletely stable. Surprising considering that it had broken through two minor realms in the Soul Ascension Realm over the past month, a speed that should have been impossible for it to achieve under normal circumstances.


    "Hm? Its strength is still increasing¡­!?"


    Continuing to watch the winged lion demon beast and the demonic cultivator as they fought each other through his divine sense, Xuan Hao could not help noticing that the strength of the winged lion demon beast was still growing rapidly. Not just that, but the demonic cultivator that it was fighting was also growing in strength at the same time. Keeping up a growth speed that was no slower than the demon beast that he was fighting.


    Both of them are rapidly growing like this while fighting¡­Is it perhaps the reason behind the winged lion demon beast''s growth over the past month, but¡­ How long have these two been fighting for them to have grown to such an extent?!


    Realizing that he might be unto the reason why the winged lion demon beast was growing so rapidly, or at least having picked up a clue as to the reason behind its rapid growth, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he contacted a few of the Domain Lord Realm Elders stationed on the border of the sect to inquire about the situation.


    As a result of this, he soon ended up learning that this demonic cultivator and the winged lion demon beast had been fighting each other without any break for the past three weeks! A terrifyingly long battle that would under normal circumstances not y out unless it was in some kind of isted region where others couldn''t interfere with the battle.


    The only reason why the battle could continue was because none of the elders from the Star Shattering Sect were powerful enough to participate, while those at the side of the demonic cultivator were fearful of making a move due to neither of the two fighting to the death showing any sign of weakness over the past three weeks.


    Instead of weakness, it seemed like the two of them were only growing stronger as time continued to pass. Making the other True Demon Realm demonic cultivators even less incentivized to make a move and try to fish in troubled waters.


    At the same time, the terrifying battle between the two also intimidated any of the other True Demon Realm demonic cultivators from making a move on the Star Shattering Sect''s territory, a rather unexpected oue, as it allowed the sect to operate normally and hunt down demonic cultivators safely even with the winged lion demon beast busy fighting all of the time.


    Of course, even though the True Demon Realm demonic cultivators didn''t make a move, the disciples from the Star Shattering sect still had to avoid the death zone where the winged lion demon beast and the demonic cultivator were fighting each other. An area that even Domain Lord Realm cultivators would end up dead going in to, as even the weakest attack thrown out by the winged lion demon beast and the demonic cultivator would be more than enough to kill them.


    But¡­ What is it that is causing the two of them to improve so rapidly?


    Filled with even more confusion as he continued watching the battle between the two and seeing how both of them seemed to continue growing stronger without being able to find any reason for this rapid increase in strength from both his pet and the demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao decided to go and investigate the situation personally to see if he could find something by going there instead of just using his divine sense to watch the situation from afar.


    After all, he had encountered several situations in the past where his divine sense wasn''t capable of perceiving something that was directly in front of him.


    One such example of this being the mountain with the celestial gate on top of it inside of the mystic realm. Even standing directly in front of that mountain guarded by some kind of illusion-based formation, he wasn''t able to see it with his divine sense.


    Whoosh¡§


    Using the Dao of Space with his current cultivation realm andprehension, Xuan Hao only took a short time to reach the border where the winged lion demon beast and the demonic cultivator were fighting each other to death.


    "This-!?"


    It was only after reaching the border that Xuan Hao realized that the situation of the winged lion demon beast and the demonic cultivator was different from what he had seen through his divine sense.


    Instead of it being solely a fight between the demon beast and the demonic cultivator, Xuan Hao clearly noticed that there were countless small blood-colored tendrils, invisible to his divine sense, covering the demonic cultivator and his pet.


    Looking more closely, it was obvious that these blood-colored tendrils were attached to the two fighters and providing both of them with an ample supply of qi and at the same time also helping slowly increase their strength in the process as they kept fighting each other.


    Of course, even though these blood-colored tendrils that seemed to cover everything within a few thousand meters of where the two were fighting with each other, it was also clear that both the demonic cultivator and his pet werepletely unaware of the existence of these blood-colored tendrils.


    Even if they had noticed something unusual at this point in time, neither of them had the time to investigate what it was, as they were upied with fighting each other.


    Not to mention, what they were experiencing wasn''t negatively affecting them, but instead some kind of precious opportunity that allowed their strength to rapidly grow.


    Suspicious as they both might be, no one would willingly give up such an opportunity to rapidly increase their strength. Especially considering that there were no negative effects and both of them were smoothly improving with a stable foundation and no side effects.


    "¡­"


    Of course, given that Xuan Hao could see the countless red tendrils behind this rapid increase in strength and seemingly inexhaustible energy that the two of them possessed, he didn''t believe that the one behind the red tendrils was just nning to help improve their strength for no reason.


    Because of this, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time before starting to track the origin of the red tendrils, as even though they were still invisible to his divine sense, he could still see them without using his divine sense. Allowing him to follow the red tendrils as one of them extended beyond the thousand or so meter range of the two fighters and stretched towards somewhere deeper inside the Frozen Wastnds. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although Xuan Hao had already somewhat expected this upon seeing the strange blood-colored tendrils, he now confirmed in his mind that this should be some kind of scheme by one of the powerful demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastnds.


    Even though he had no idea what this demonic cultivator was nning to do, he was certain that it wouldn''t be anything good for the Star Shattering Sect, as it would undoubtedly end up drawing unwanted attention towards the sect if a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator decided to try causing trouble there.


    The main problem was not even the attention it would draw, but more so the problem that would follow if the Star Shattering Sect, as an ancient hidden sect, wasn''t able to handle a single Demon King Realm demonic cultivator, a situation Xuan Hao wanted to avoid taking ce if possible.

 Chapter 1450 Blood Tendrils (2)

    Chapter 1450 Blood Tendrils (2)


    Understanding the danger of the current situation, Xuan Hao didn''t dare be the slightest bit careless, as he continued to keep an eye on the winged lion demon beast as it continued to fight the demonic cultivator while continuing to grow stronger with each passing second.


    Even though it was clear to the winged lion demon beast and the demonic cultivator that there was something wrong with how they both became stronger for seemingly no reason whatsoever, it wasn''t like either of them had any intention of trying to stop this, as they both felt there were no negative effects from their rapidly growing strength.


    Instead of there being any side effects from their growing strength, the two of them instead felt that several hidden and old injuries that had been undetected in the past were healing along with their rapid increase in strength. Making their foundation even stronger than it was in the past, while also giving them a better chance at reaching a higher realm in the future.


    Able to see the blood tendrils that his pet and the demonic cultivator seemed unable to see at the moment, Xuan Hao decided to not interfere with the situation for now.


    The main reason for this being that he didn''t want to identally offend a Demon King Realm demonic cultivator and have to fight him or her in the territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if his strength had increased quite a bit over the past few months, he was in no way confident in being able to face off against a demonic cultivator in the Demon King Realm.


    Of course, another reason why he didn''t decide to make a move on the blood tendrils was because he also realized that they weren''t actually harming the winged lion demon beast or the demonic cultivator. Instead, it was genuinely helping the two of them increase their strength, something rather bewildering and confusing to Xuan Hao, as he couldn''t understand why a demonic cultivator would do something like this without gaining anything in return.


    After all, the powerful qi and blood that was used to assist the growth of his pet and the demonic cultivator was something that should have been gathered by the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator behind the blood tendrils before being refined to a degree that it would be able to be smoothly absorbed by the two without any problems along the way.


    The cost for the one behind the blood tendrils would simply be enormous and might even directly have affected their overall health and strength. Making it even more confusing to Xuan Hao as to why the owner of the blood tendrils was doing something like this.


    However, considering that he had no reason to make a move unless the other party did something to harm his pet, Xuan Hao decided to just watch the battle ying out for now. Making sure to keep an eye on the Frozen Wastnds in case the other party decided to show up or do something different.


    Boom-Boom-Boom!


    As Xuan Hao remained hidden in the dark observing without interfering, the battle between the winged lion demon beast and demonic cultivator continued without showing any signs of stopping any time soon, as both of them continued bing stronger with each passing minute.


    Soon enough, a few days flew by before both of them abruptly stopped what they were doing and retreated a few thousand meters away from each other-


    Boom! Boom!


    And in the next second, the winged lion demon beast smoothly went through the Fifth Tribtion and reached the Fifth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, while the demonic cultivator managed to reach the Peak of the True Demon Realm.


    Both of them stopped their fighting for a brief moment to break through to a higher realm, something that had already taken ce in the past judging by the reaction of the two when they had so smoothly decided not to interfere with each other while breaking through.


    In a way, it seemed like both of them had alreadye to some kind of silent agreement to take full advantage of the strange situation that they found themselves in to increase their strength as much as possible when the opportunity was there, something that made Xuan Hao smile a bit wryly as he watched the two of them soon resume their earlier battle after a few hours of stabilizing their new cultivation base.


    However, different from the two who were now locked in a slightly more devastating battlepared to before, Xuan Hao, who had been observing the process of which the two of them broke through earlier, could not help narrowing his eyes ever so slightly as he focused his attention on the blood tendrils around the demonic cultivator. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    During the time that the two of them broke through, the blood tendrils around the winged lion demon beast had been forced to retreat due to the presence of the heavenly tribtion.


    Only the blood tendrils around the demonic cultivator had stayed around as he broke through to the Peak of the True Demon Rm.


    Because of this, it allowed Xuan Hao to notice that the blood tendrils seemed to be infusing something different inside of the demonic cultivatorpared to his little pet, something that seemed to be drawing a subtle formation of sorts inside of the demonic cultivator without the other party even noticing it.


    If not for the fact that his cultivation had reached the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and hisprehension of the Dao of Formation had already reached the Large Sess Realm, it would have been impossible for him to notice the small and almost impossible to spot formation symbols that had subtly appeared on the skin of the demonic cultivator when he broke through to the Peak of the True Demon Realm.


    Even with all of that, Xuan Hao was still left in shock at just how skilled the demonic cultivator behind all of this was, as it was clear from the few formation symbols at the body of the demonic cultivator that the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator was someone incredibly skilled in the Dao of Formations.


    Although it shouldn''t have reached the level of the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Formation, it was far above his ownprehension and should only be a step away from reaching that level.


    Considering his previous encounters with demonic cultivators and how they only seemed focused onprehending different Daos rted to ughter, blood andbat, it was rather surprising to find out there was such a skilled Formation Master among the demonic cultivators.


    Demon King Realm demonic cultivator¡­ Indeed, they are differentpared to other demonic cultivators¡­


    Narrowing both of his eyes once again as he thought about this, Xuan Hao also realized that things weren''t as simple as they appeared on the surface, it was just that he was not able to see through the n of this terrifying demonic cultivator lurking behind the scenes.


    The only thing he managed to grasp from the formation symbols that had appeared on the body of the demonic cultivator now locked in battle with the winged lion demon beast was the fact that they seemed to strengthen the demonic cultivators absorption of the qi and blood provided by the blood tendrils, something that became clear as the speed at which the demonic cultivator was growing stronger began to outstrip his little pet over the next few hours.


    Even though it wouldn''t make much of a difference for now, over the next few days, it would result in the winged lion demon beast beingpletely suppressed by the demonic cultivator. Following which, the demonic cultivator should be able to break through from the True Demon Realm to the Demon Lord Realm around the same time that the winged lion demon beast reached the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Although, considering the major difference between someone in the Soul Ascension Realm and someone who had actually stepped into the Demon Lord Realm, it was obvious that the winged lion demon beast wouldn''t be able to survive after the demonic cultivator broke through, but¡­ Was that really what the demonic cultivator behind the scenes intended on doing? Strengthening the winged lion demon beast just for it to get defeated by the demonic cultivator?


    No matter how he thought about it, Xuan Hao didn''t feel like any of this made sense, if that demonic cultivator likely at the Demon King Realm behind the scenes just wanted to strengthen the demonic cultivator, there was no reason for him or her to also strength the winged lion demon beast. Doing so would just be a waste of qi and blood, there was no reason whatsoever to do something like that¡­ Unless the one behind the scenes had some other n in mind that required the winged lion demon beast to also be stronger along with the demonic cultivator.

 Chapter 1451 Blood Tendrils (3)

    Chapter 1451 Blood Tendrils (3)


    Continuing to keep an eye on the battle and watching out for any changes that took ce as the winged lion demon beast and the demonic cultivator both continued to rapidly grow stronger with each passing second, Xuan Hao ultimately decided to wait until the demonic cultivator broke through to the Demon Lord Realm before he would do anything.


    The main reason for that being that he could use the opportunity while the demonic cultivator in the Demon King Realm behind the scenes was unaware of his presence to help the winged lion demon beast rapidly increase its strength and reach the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm in a period of time that would normally be impossible without the great sacrifice from the side of the hidden Demon King Realm demonic cultivator.


    Although, given the constant presence of the blood tendrils around the winged lion demon beast supplying it with qi and blood to fuel its rapid increase in strength, he would only be able to make a move when the winged lion demon beast broke through and attracted a heavenly tribtion. Taking the opportunity while the blood tendrils hadn''t yet had time to reattach to grab the winged lion demon beast and take it to a safe location.


    After which, he would see what the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator intended to do next. After all, he would be showing off his currentprehension of the Dao of Space and ensure that the other party understood that the one he was dealing with wasn''t someone easy to catch.


    Even though he did want to find out what the other party might be nning to do with the winged lion demon beast, he subtly understood that doing so would almost certainly put the winged lion demon beast''s life at risk. Especially considering that there was close to no chance that the demonic cultivator hidden somewhere in the Frozen Wastnds had any kind intentions regarding the help he or she had provided to the winged lion demon beast.


    With all of that in mind, Xuan Hao once again calmed himself down as he silently observed the fight that continued without a clear winner. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The only differencepared to before being that the demonic cultivator was now clearly the one winning every time he shed with the winged lion demon beast.


    Like this, a few days quickly flew by, as the strength of the two continued to increase, while the area affected by their battle simrly grew in size and began affecting the small kingdom located next to the Star Shattering Sect.


    In turn, because of this, the battle also ended up drawing the attention of the Blue Sea Empire, as someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm from the Blue Sea Empire soon arrived to observe the situation.


    Of course, knowing that the battle was ultimately centered around the border of what they believed to be an ancient sect, the person from the Blue Sea Empire decided to not interfere in the battle and instead just observed the winged lion demon beast and demonic cultivator fighting each other.


    However, because he had just recently arrived and both the winged lion demon beast were close to breaking through, he believed that this should just be the Star Shattering Sect making use of a powerful demonic cultivator to train one of their demon beasts under pressure and help it break through.


    Considering the size and age of the Blue Sea Empire, they had done simr things in the past. Making it rather easy for this Peak Soul Ascension Realm cultivator to understand what was happening.


    Although, the rapid speed at which the winged lion demon beast was reaching the peak of its realm and starting to attack the barrier was astounding, though he just thought of it as the excellent training methods of the Star Shattering Sect being superior to those of the Blue Sea Empire when it came to training demon beasts. Not surprising considering an ancient sect normally had superior cultivation methodspared to empires like the Blue Sea Empire that had been around for a far shorter period of time.


    Even then, the existence of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator from the Blue Sea Empire and a few other cultivators from the Blue Sea Empire who had gathered from nearby to watch the battle did end up causing Xuan Hao, hidden in the shadows, to feel a bit troubled.


    After all, with them around, there was no way he could go with his original n of just grabbing the winged lion demon beast and using his Dao of Space to escape. Doing so would be a sign of weakness and make it look like the Star Shattering Sect was afraid of demonic cultivators, something that wentpletely against how ancient sects had acted in the past when interacting with demonic cultivators.


    But¡­ The problem was, the current Star Shattering Sect was indeed afraid of incurring the wrath of the demonic cultivators. Especially considering that it was still unknown whether or not the demonic cultivators perceived the Star Shattering Sect as an ancient sect that should be avoided at all costs if possible.


    Should I just go with the flow and go all out in keeping up the act¡­?


    Feeling increasingly troubled about what to do as he watched how the winged lion demon beast and demonic cultivator both decided to stop their battle to break through once again, Xuan Hao felt like he would have to make a very important decision that could affect the future of the entire sect.


    Even worse, as he sensed the winged lion demon beast breaking through to the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, he also sensed a new powerful figure appearing on the side of the Blue Sea Empire.


    However, different from the few Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who had gathered so far, this one was clearly here to observe the situation on behalf of the Blue Sea Empire''s higher ups. Having reached the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm or equivalent to someone who had reached the Half Bloom Stage also known as the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm.


    Fooling a few Soul Ascension Realm cultivators might be possible, but fooling someone at the Middel Stage of the Dao Seed Realm with his current strength was close to impossible. Even keeping himself hidden from the other party''s divine sense was a bit difficult and would have been impossible if he was still at the Intermediate Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    BOOOOM-!


    As the winged lion demon beast endured its heavenly tribtion and was bathed in lightning, the demonic cultivator that had already reached the Peak of the True Demon Realm was the first to break through, directly reaching the Demon Lord Realm-


    "HAHAHA! I''M FINALLY AT THE- AAAaaaah!?"


    However, just as he beganughing wildly to himself filled with happiness over finally breaking through to the Demon Lord Realm, countless formation symbols that had been barely visible during his past breakthrough, suddenly lit up like the sun, covering his entire body in an instant.


    Rumble~!


    Secondster, as the demonic cultivator already began rolling around on the ground in pain, Xuan Hao watched as the blood tendrils that had remained invisible to the rest of the world so far finally revealed themselves before surging towards the demonic cultivator on the ground¡­ And soon enough, the demonic cultivator was engulfed by blood tendrils. Forming a cocoon of blood tendrils around his body.


    This¡­ Is that demonic cultivator perhaps cultivating a second body or an avatar of some sort?


    Filled with confusion as he watched what was happening, Xuan Hao instantly guessed that the demonic cultivator behind the scenes might actually becking a body and thus decided to cultivate one for himself in this kind of way.


    If not, it might be him cultivating an avatar of some sort to help in battle in the future.


    Although, all of this didn''t exin why the winged lion demon beast had been simrly strengthened alongside the demonic cultivator.


    The only reason Xuan Hao could think of at the moment was that the winged lion demon beast might have also been strengthened alongside the demonic cultivator to let the demonic cultivator let down his guard while fighting with the winged lion demon beast.


    After all, there was no option for him to ept this increase in strength if his opponent continued to grow stronger.


    Even if he wanted to investigate it, there was no time for him to do so, as he would have to put his full attention towards fighting the winged lion demon beast, thus resulting in the current state of things where he had been overwhelmed and without the slightest bit of resistance even though he had already broken through to the Demon Lord Realm and should in fact have more than enough strength to resist the blood tendrils currently holding him in ce and engulfing himpletely inside a cocoon created by them.


    After all, the strength of the blood tendrils themselves weren''t that much and only barely reached a levelparable to the Nascent Soul realm¡­

 Chapter 1452 Blood Tendrils (4)

    1452 Blood Tendrils (4)


    "What¡­ What is that!?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao was calmly observing the situation and analyzing what was happening and the reason behind the overwhelmingly fast defeat of the Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator, the Middle Stage Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the Blue Sea Empire was left shocked at the sight of the countless blood tendrils that seemed to manifest out of thin air in his eyes.


    Although he had already noticed something unusual about the state of the demonic cultivator and the winged lion demon beast earlier, he had not been able to sense the existence of these blood tendrils numbering in the millions thatpletely covered everything within a few thousand meters of where the winged lion demon beast and the demonic cultivator were located.


    For this reason, he waspletely taken aback by their sudden appearance and could not help retreating out of instinct. Understanding that even though he could clearly sense the strength of these tendrils were far from enough to pose a threat to him, the fact that they had managed to remain hidden indicated that there were likely someone more powerful than him behind the scenes controlling these blood tendrils.


    Luckily, he quickly calmed down again as his gaze turned towards the winged lion demon beast currently breaking through to the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    This demon beast should be rted to the Star Shattering Sect, the hidden ancient sect that he had only recently learnt about existing inside the borders of what could be considered the Blue Sea Empire''s outer sphere of influence.


    Knowing this, he also understood that there was no way that this hidden ancient sect would just allow a demonic cultivator to cause trouble inside their territory.


    The reason why the battle had been allowed so far should have just been because the hidden ancient sect wanted to take advantage of the demonic cultivator to help promote the strength of their own demon beast.


    Now that the demonic cultivator had be too strong to provide any further assistance and the one behind the scenes had decided to make a move, it was clear that one of the true elders of this hidden ancient sect was likely to make a move to deal with the demonic cultivator before they started bing a problem.


    Thinking about this, the Middle Stage Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the Blue Sea Empire could not help feeling a bit of anticipation about what was going to happen next. After all, it was well known that the lowest level of elders from hidden ancient sects had surpassed the level of most ancestor level figures in major powers.


    Seeing such a figure make a move was a rare thing and something that would be extremely beneficial to someone like himself who had already reached the peak of his realm and was looking for an opportunity to break through to the Celestial Immortal Realm and join the true upper echelons of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Swish-!


    And just when he was filled with anticipation and wondering when the figure from the Star Shattering Sect would make a move, it happened, as a terrifying spatial power suddenly tore through the battlefield before erupting directly above the blood tendril cocoon with the Demon Lord Realm demonic cultivator inside of it-


    RUUUUMBLE-!


    Not a secondter, a terrifying spatial power engulfed the blood tendril cocoon, as space itself was directly torn apart, causing the blood tendril cocoon to almost instantly get erased from existence as it was swallowed up by the terrifying spatial powers. Space itself was shattered, as there was soon only an empty spot left where the blood tendrils and the demonic cultivator had once been.


    Well¡­ Not entirely so, as there was ''something'' there, a scar in the very fabric of the space that made up the world.


    Although this was not particrly unnatural, as someone in the Dao Seed Realm could archive this with rtive ease, the terrifying part was the fact that the scar that had been left behind didn''t heal like normal and still remained there even after a few seconds had gone by. Making the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the Blue Sea Empire painfully aware of the terrifying power behind the strike just now that had directly shattered space to a point where even the world found it difficult to repair.


    From a quick scan with his divine sense, it would likely take another two or three thousand years before the shattered space recovered back to normal again, before that, this shattered space would remain as a testament to what had happened here seconds earlier.


    Indeed¡­ Worthy of being an elder of a hidden ancient sect, the power of that attack just now should far surpass that of most ancestors in the Celestial Immortal Realm. Not to mention the profound understanding of space imbued in the attack. At least reaching the Large Ses Realm in the Dao of Space!


    Given that the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the Blue Sea Empire was already someone at the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm and only a single step away from reaching the Celestial Immortal Realm, he was aware of far more things than other people at his realm would be aware of, as he instantly came to his own conclusions about what had just happened.


    Ultimately, he ended uping to the conclusion that Xuan Hao wanted him toe to, as there was no way this Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the Blue Sea Empire would have known that the reason why Xuan Hao had been able to shatter space to such a degree was not his overwhelming strength, but instead the special ability of the divine void eyes¡­


    Roar¡­?


    At the same time, the winged lion demon beast who had just finished breaking through and was ready to start fighting again, was left confused, as it suddenly found itself with no opponent in sight. Instead, only being left to stare directly at the shattered space left behind by Xuan Hao''s earlier attack. Wondering inside if the demonic cultivator had run away.


    Roar! n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    In the end, after searching for the demonic cultivator for a few more minutes without finding any signs of the other party, the winged lion demon beast concluded that the demonic cultivator had been scared away by its strength after its breakthrough just now, causing the winged lion demon beast to feel even more proud and arrogant about its new strength as it began making its way back towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    Now that its strength had reached the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm, it was about time that it made the rabbit demon beast understand that it was the strongest among them!


    ¡­


    RUUUUMBLE-!


    A few minutes before the winged lion demon beast began making its way back towards the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao watched the blood tendril cocoon as it was swallowed up by the spatial copse he had caused.


    This was the n he hade up with. Launching a single powerful attack to get rid of the demonic cultivator who had broken through to the Demon Lord Realm in a single go, upholding an image befitting of an ancient hidden sect when it came to dealing with such things.


    Considering that the degree of shattering space was far beyond something that could be achieved by someone in the Dao Seed Realm or Earth Immortal Realm as it was called, it was certain that the one from the Blue Sea Empire and the demonic cultivator behind the scenes would both think that they were dealing with someone above the Dao Seed Realm. Having at least reached the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Given the effort expended by the demonic cultivator still hidden somewhere in the Frozen Wastnds, Xuan Hao hoped that the other party would be too weak to think about attacking after seeing the disy of strength just now. Especially considering the profoundprehension of the Dao of Space he had disyed.


    If the other party thought about the situation logically, they would understand that there would be no way for them to do anything to someone that strong with such a deepprehension of the Dao of Space.


    Not to mention, Xuan Hao also hoped that this demonic cultivator would help solidify the Star Shattering Sect''s identity as a hidden ancient sect in the eyes of the demonic cultivators. After all, there was only so much Xuan Gui could do when it came to helping him in spreading this information considering her strength was still in the Demon Lord Realm¡­


    Whoosh~


    As his thoughts began to wander ever so slightly, Xuan Hao briefly sensed a powerful killing intent erupt from the depths of the Frozen Wastnds for a brief moment before everything calmed down again.


    "This¡­ Indeed, someone at the Demon King Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as both of his eyes narrowed dangerously, Xuan Hao felt his entire body tense up as he focused his full attention on the Frozen Wastnd where the killing intent had erupted from.


    However, after waiting another few minutes with a tense expression on his face, he slowly began calming down again. Understanding that the other party had decided to not make a move.

 Chapter 1453 Blood Tendrils (5)

    Chapter 1453 Blood Tendrils (5)


    Continuing to keep an eye on the Frozen Wastnds even after a few minutes passed without any response from the demonic cultivator behind the scenes, Xuan Hao wanted to ensure that the situation was safe before leaving the borders of the Frozen Wastnds. Not wanting to end up in a situation where he returned to the Star Shattering Sect and the demonic cultivator who had clearly shown killing intent decided to start causing trouble.


    Even if he had no idea how to deal with the situation with his current strength, he guessed that he might at the very least be able to think of something in case the demonic cultivator appeared.


    Luckily, nothing like that ended up happening, as two hours went by in a peaceful manner with the demonic cultivator and a few of the disciples from the side of the Star Shattering Sect began to make their way into the battlefield that had been left behind by the battle between the winged lion demon beast and the demonic cultivator who had been erased from existence by Xuan Hao.


    Although there was not much left behind in the battlefield that could be useful to Xuan Hao, the same could not be said for the demonic cultivator currently beginning to cautiously make their way into the battlefield, as they wanted to get their hands on some of the blood and flesh that had been left behindduring the battle, as the qi and blood inside the flesh would be more than enough to help them leap a minor realm if they were below the True Demon Realm.


    Not to mention, arge number of blood tendrils that were filled to the brim with qi and blood, had been cut off by the earlier attack from Xuan Hao and had fallen down across the battlefield. Another source of strength for the demonic cultivators to harvest.


    For the disciples and elders of the Star Shattering Sect, the main interest for them in the now deserted battlefield of the winged lion demon beast and the demonic cultivator, was the demonic cultivators themselves.


    The reason for this being that the demonic cultivators were all busy fighting each other or trying to absorb the blood and qi left behind. Giving the disciples and elders of the Star Shattering Sect a perfect opportunity to hunt them down and gain contribution points that they could then use to buy resources to help improve their cultivation realms.


    Of course, outside of just getting their hands on resources and artifacts with the contribution points gained from hunting down demonic cultivators, the disciples also wanted to use the contribution points to join the lectures of some of the more well-known elders in the sect, as some of the stronger elders had already started to take advantage of their seniority in terms of cultivation realm to get more contribution points from the disciples by doing extra lectures.


    Unfortunately for them, the only ones who could do this among the elders of the sect were the ones who were amongst the strongest and had already reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    To date, no elder in the Nascent Soul Realm had managed to hold a lecture and earn contribution points for it¡­ And for that reason, it had quickly be a driving force for the weaker elders still in the Nascent Soul Realm to strive towards reaching the Domain Lord Realm so they could more easily earn contribution points¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Not aware of any of the thoughts of the elders and disciples of the sect as they began rushing into the former battlefield, Xuan Hao just smiled happily at the enthusiasm shown by both the elders and disciples of the sect when it came to hunting down demonic cultivators before he turned around and left.


    Now that he felt certain that the demonic cultivator behind the scenes wouldn''t make a move, he decided to leave and return to the Star Shattering Sect again. nning to check out the winged lion demon beast and see how much it had managed to improve by taking advantage of the demonic cultivator from the Frozen Wastnds.


    At the same time, he also nned to seriously check its intelligence, as it seemed topletely ignore the odd disappearance of its opponent and the strange, shattered space that had appeared where its opponent had once been.


    Even if it thought its opponent might have run away, it should at the very least have checked out the shattered space he had created before it left the scene.


    However, it had just looked around for a brief moment after breaking through to the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm before showing a somewhat arrogant and happy expression on its face as it turned around and left in the direction of the sect.


    ¡­


    Leaving the border before making his way back in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao soon arrived back at the sect only to witness the winged lion demon beast confronting the rabbit demon beast by itself with an arrogant expression on its face only to get beaten up because it still hadn''t managed to fully stabilize its cultivation base and hadn''t yet gotten used to its new strength.


    More so than that, it was also because the winged lion demon beast hadn''t really been able to adjust its fighting style ever since it had first started fighting with the demonic cultivator, as it had essentially fought in the same way as it had done when it was only in the earlier stages of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Essentially, it was wasting a lot of its strength by doing that and not taking advantage of the increased strength following each breakthrough.


    The only reason it had been able to fight the demonic cultivator was because that demonic cultivator was in a simr situation and hadn''t managed to fully adjust to his new strength, thus causing him to be unable to utilize his full strength like the winged lion demon beast.

 Chapter 1454 Uncertain Heart

    Chapter 1454 Uncertain Heart


    "¡­" n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Watching how the winged lion demon beast ended up getting beaten up by the rabbit demon beast without any ability to fight back against its overwhelming speed that had already reached a levelparable to the Early Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, Xuan Hao decided to not interfere and just look the other way.


    After all, it was the winged lion demon beast that had ended up causing trouble by seeking out the rabbit demon beast for a duel as soon as its strength had broken through to the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Eager to im its spot as the strongest among the two of them.


    Roooar!?


    Filled with disbelief as it saw its master briefly appearing before turning around and leaving after seeing its pathetic state, the winged lion demon beast steeled itself as it silently vowed to increase its strength even further so it could win against the rabbit and regain its honor.


    Unfortunately for the winged lion demon beast, the brief battle between the two of them had helped the rabbit demon beast loosen the bottleneck for the Dao Seed Realm. Allowing it to silently begin the process of progressing towards the Peak of the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. After which it would be able to directly take on the final seventh tribtion and smoothly break through to the Dao Seed Realm.


    All of this without the winged lion demon beast knowing that it was the main force behind this increase in strength.


    ¡­


    Arriving back inside his cultivation room after the short trip to the border and having mostly ignored the battle between his two pets, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he directly sat down and began focusing his attention onprehending the Dao of Space.


    For the first time in some time, he felt that his strength was far too weak, as he understood that there would have been no real way for him to fight back if the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator that had been behind the situation at the border had decided to make a move and attack.


    The only reason he had managed to get out without having to engage in a battle with that demonic cultivator being because of the special ability of his divine void eyes that allowed him to shatter space and his highprehension of the Dao of Space scaring off the demonic cultivator.


    If not for that, it was highly likely that the demonic cultivator would have decided to make a move to ensure that the qi and blood he or she had used didn''t end up benefiting others.


    Of course, even if the situation could be considered to have been dealt with for now, he also understood the inherent danger of a demonic cultivator at the Demon King Realm now having his or her attention focused on the Star Shattering Sect.


    For this reason, he made sure to contact Xuan Gui on his way back to the sect. Asking her about the presence of any Demon King Realm demonic cultivators, while also informing her about what had just happened.


    However, to his surprise, Xuan Gui had no idea about this Demon King Realm demonic cultivator being there. At least confirming that the presence of this Demon King Realm demonic cultivator wasn''t among those currentlyunching attacks throughout the border regions of the Frozen Wastnds. Meaning that he would at most have to deal with a single Demon King Realm demonic cultivator instead of having to fear a potential response from the entire Frozen Wastnds.


    After all, even though the attention and killing intent of one Demon King Realm demonic cultivator was bad, it was far better than ending up as the focus of the entire Frozen Wastnds. Having to deal with the monitoring from the blue Sea Empire was already bad enough and though there hadn''t been any problems so far, it would only be a matter of time if the scrutinizing gaze of the entire Frozen Wastnds was included.


    For now, it would be best if the Star Shattering Sect was just a suspected ancient hidden sect in the eyes of the Frozen Wastnds and nothing more, as they would most likely just choose to ignore it and focus on other locations instead¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while trying toprehend the Dao of Space, Xuan Hao could not help smiling wryly at himself as he realized that he couldn''t really focus onprehending the Dao of Space at the moment.


    The thoughts of the dangerous situation that the Star Shattering Sect found itself in and his insufficient strength to protect the sect in case something happened prevented him from having the peaceful state of mind required toprehend the dao.


    Although not the first time something like this had happened, it did end up preventing him from entering a state ofprehension before he got rid of the useless feeling of fear that had unknowingly creeped into the back of his mind.


    Using a soul calming technique was an option and one he had chosen in the past when encountering such problems, but instead of that, Xuan Hao decided on taking a different path to calming his uncertain heart. Take a walk around the sect and see how everything has developed since he had installed the teleportation formations across the Shattered Star Peaks


    The method wasn''t that special, so to speak, but it would help him calm down by getting out of the stuffy cultivation room that he had been locking himself inside of for the past few months.


    At the same time, he also felt interested in seeing how the alchemy hall had developed after he had managed to finish off the rted sect quest, as it should have grown a lot with the influx in disciples and the increased number of Master Realm Alchemists among the alchemy elders.


    Not forgetting that the increased number of alchemy disciples and the higher realm of the alchemy elders should have caused the overall number and quality of potions and pills in the sect to increase. Understandingly making it easier for the rest of the sect to get their hands on these alchemy products.

 Chapter 1455 Developments of the Alchemy Hall Disciples and Elders...

    Chapter 1455 Developments of the Alchemy Hall Disciples and Elders...


    Wandering around the sect to both rx his mind and see how the sect had developed since he had installed the teleportation formations and helped the alchemy hall grow far beyond its past size, Xuan Hao was shocked to discover that the disciples and elders from the formation hall were still gathering together around the different teleportation formations throughout the sect to study them and try to learn how to construct these formations on their own.


    Even if they couldn''t learn how to create these teleportation formations on their own, they didn''t lose anything from studying them, as the profound formation symbols that had been created by someone who hadprehended the Large Sess Realm of the Dao of Formations was still incredibly beneficial for them to research.


    In the end, the teleportation formations had ended up bing a true treasure trove for the formation elders and disciples of the sect. Recing thebat hall that had been their main focus in the past due to the countlessplicated formations that made up thebat hall itself.


    Of course, the main reason why these elders and disciples were so happy to abandon thebat hall even though it was still an incredibly useful ce for them to study their formations was also because they would have to enter thebat hall to study them closely¡­ And to do so, they would have to spend contribution points¡­


    No matter what, it was still far better to just study the equallyplex and wonderful formation symbols that made up the teleportation formations throughout the sect. Especially considering that doing so didn''t cost them any of their contribution points.


    The only thing it might cost them was their overall reputation, as they did earn a few weird looks from always crowding around the base of the different teleportation formation. Not that it bothered any of them, as most of the people from the formation hall seemed to be genuinely focused solely on the Dao of Formations and advancing their own understanding of formations.


    Among all of these disciples and elders, the one who remained the most exceptional and focused among them was of course Fang Yu, who had already managed toprehend the Dao of Formations to the Elementary Realm. Earning herself the title of a Junior Formation Grandmaster, something that had caused a stir throughout the formation hall when Elder Song finally managed to inform the rest of the disciples and elders there about the situation after he had informed him about it.


    However, different from what he had originally thought might happen after the stir caused by the revtion that Fang Yu had already managed to reach the Junior Grandmaster Realm, the situation had soon calmed down, as the rest of the formation hall soon focused their attention back on the teleportation formations throughout the Shattered Star Peaks once again.


    Although¡­ This might also have something to do with the fact that the person in question didn''t make much of a fuss about reaching the Junior Grandmaster Realm. Instead, she had just continued focusing her full attention onprehending the formation symbols that made up the teleportation formations.


    In a sense, this did cause the rest of the formation hall to grow even more reverence for the teleportation formations, as even someone in the Junior Grandmaster Realm was so obsessed withprehending the profound formation symbols used in their construction¡­


    Shaking his head a bit as he decided to not bother with the formation hall or Fang Yu for now, as they all seemed wholeheartedly absorbed in the teleportation formations he had set up throughout the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao instead decided to check up on the situation regarding the alchemy hall to see how they had developed over the past few months since he had helped them to grow to thergest profession hall inside the sect.


    However, when he paid a visit to the alchemy hall that was mostly finished at this point in time, he was surprised to discover that most of the disciples and elders who should have been present were missing¡­ And so, with a quick scan of his divine sense, he soon discovered where these alchemy elders and disciples had disappeared to-


    "Huh? This is¡­"


    However, when he finally found the elders and disciples of the alchemy hall, he could not help freezing for a few seconds with a look of disbelief on his face¡­


    "Recovery Pills! Only 5 spirit stones! High quality guaranteed!"


    "Qi Absorption Liquid, refined from high quality spiritual herbs grown on the Ninth Star Peak, extremely helpful and bound to help anyone starting out in the Qi Condensation Realm easily progress with a solid foundation. Only 49 spirit stones! Get it fast before it sells out!"


    "Extreme Yang Energy Boost, personal recipe that will help anyone ensure their linage gets passed on, 499 spirit stones. Don''t miss out, personally refined by a hidden alchemy master!"


    At the moment, the elders and disciples of the alchemy hall were busy shouting out loudly along a busy street in the Falling Star City at the base of the Ninth Star Peak. Trying their best to sell the different alchemy pills, liquids, potions and so on that they had managed to create for what could only be described as a highway robbery.


    However, upon looking at the smiles on the faces of the different wandering cultivators who bought from the sect''s disciples and elders without a singleint, Xuan Hao soon realized what was happening.


    Although the price was extremely highpared to what the Star Shattering Sect was used to internally, it wasn''t at all the case when it came to these wandering cultivators who would normally have a difficult time finding an alchemist in the first ce.


    Even though the price was expensive in his eyes and the sect disciples and elders, it was not so in the eyes of these wandering cultivators who had no idea about how much they were being ripped off in the past to be happy about such high prices¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 1456 Developments of the Alchemy Hall Disciples and Elders... (2)

    1456 Developments of the Alchemy Hall Disciples and Elders... (2)


    Looking over the alchemy disciples and elders as they sold all kinds of alchemy products to the different cultivators who hade to visit the Falling Star city, Xuan Hao decided not to interfere with them, as it was ultimately beneficial for the Star Shattering Sect and the growth of the disciples and elders to have such an easy source of spirit stones.


    Not to mention, the elders and disciples of the sect would have to help supply the sect with potions or pills before they had an opportunity to sell it outside of the sect. Meaning that the current supply in the Star Shattering Sect should be more than enough to fulfill the current needs of the sect.


    If not, there was no way Elder Song would have allowed something like selling to outsiders to happen, as the sect would have to be prioritized before anything else.


    Although¡­ With the elders and disciples of the sect selling arge number of alchemical products at what could be considered a rtively cheap price, it did help enhance the reputation of the sect among the different wandering cultivators, causing an increased number of these kinds of unaffiliated cultivators to move to the Star Shattering Sect''s territory.


    Given that they would mainly earn a living and cultivation resources through the Explorer Union or by exploring on their own, they had no problem settling down inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, as the sect itself was located right next to the Frozen Wastnds that had countless opportunities inside of it waiting to be explored.


    Even if it was an incredibly dangerous thing to do, the wandering cultivators weren''t intimidated by the demonic cultivators, as there would always be some sneaking into the Frozen Wastnds to look for precious spiritual herbs or other heavenly and earthly materials that could only be found inside the Frozen Wastnds.


    Outside of that, there were also some who took on a safer option of hunting down demonic cultivators, as Elder Song had already made sure that anyone hunting down demonic cultivators inside the Star Shattering Sect''s territory would be rewarded by the Star Shattering Sect.


    Though this wasn''t unusual, the rewards given by the Star Shattering Sect could be considered superior to that of other kingdoms or empires, something that had been done deliberately by Elder Song to ensure that the sect kept up its appearance. Even if it did end up costing the sect a bit more resources than needed.


    Luckily, there weren''t that many demonic cultivators who ended up sneaking through the border and inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect, but even then, it didn''t stop some wandering cultivators from actively searching throughout the territory of the Star Shattering Sect looking for any demonic cultivators. Making it far harder for any demonic cultivators who happened to be hiding inside the sect''s territory to remain hidden.


    At one point, it almost ended up with Su Wuhan, who had at this point be the righthand man of Elder Dust Fairy when it came to information gathering on demonic cultivators, getting discovered by a few wandering cultivators.


    In the end, Su Wuhan had been forced to remain inside the Shattered Star Peaks most of the time where he could hide away without fear of getting discovered and chased down by any wandering cultivators, while him leaving required him to take several teleportation formations that would ce him around the edge of the sect''s territory where he would be able to smoothly slip outside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect andplete the missions given to him by Elder Dust Fairy.


    Thinking about, Su Wuhan had already managed to fully adapt to life inside the Star Shattering Sect. Fully bing part of the sect over the past few months, though that would be a story for another time. For now, Xuan Hao once again focused his attention on the alchemy elders and disciples who were busy doing their best to market their pills, potions, special liquids and other things to passing cultivators.


    Although there wasn''t anything wrong with what the disciples and elders were doing and he fully understood the benefits of it when it came to the improved reputation of the sect, he also understood that there was a limit to it given the current identity of the sect.


    A few elders and disciples selling a few things for cheap would be fine and fit in with the identity of an ancient hidden sect, but¡­ If the number of alchemy sect elders and disciples doing something like that grew too much, it would inevitably end up drawing unwanted attention and questions fromrger powers like the Blue Sea Empire.


    At the very least, given that the current Star Shattering Sect was far smaller than the size of what could be considered an ancient hidden sect, even with a few hundred alchemy disciples and elders going out to sell a few things for cheap, it was at most viewed as a small fraction of the sect''s alchemy branch¡­ And given that the strength of the alchemy sect elders and disciples doing it wasn''t that high, it was just seen as a few from the younger generation likely trying to earn a few extra spirit stones on the side.


    To avoid future problems, some restrictions had to be implemented earlier rather thanter.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao nned to contact not Elder Song, but instead Pei Yang and have him set up some basic restrictions when it came to selling things outside of the sect. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Given that he was in a sense the highest ranking elder in the alchemy hall, it would be fitting to have Pei Yang do something about this situation instead of Elder Song, who was already busy with other things.


    Taking a bit of the burden away from him would give Elder Song more time to deal with other things and hopefully also give him some much needed time to rx and cultivate in peace¡­

 Chapter 1457 Future Growth

    1457 Future Growth


    Continuing to wander around the sect after informing Pei Yang and having him take care of the situation regarding the alchemy disciples and elders, Xuan Hao looked at how the rest of the sect was developing.


    After all, the Alchemy Hall, Formation Hall and cksmithing Hall were not where thergest portion of the sect''s disciples and elders resided. Instead, thergest portion of the sect''s disciples and elders were focused entirely on cultivation and improving their cultivation realm. Not focusing on any side professions like alchemy or cksmithing, as they found it a waste of timepared to focusing on increasing their cultivation realm, something that had be more so the case after the addition of the Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    The main reason being that the dao enlightenment monument provided the different elders who were still stuck at the Nascent Soul Realm with a clear path towards reaching the Domain Lord Realm, something that most of the elders couldn''t resist, as they put their full efforts into earning contribution points so they could study the dao enlightenment monument.


    Of course, outside of the elders who had be borderline obsessed with the dao enlightenment monument after realizing just how useful it would be for them when it came to reaching the Domain Lord Realm, the disciples also realized how useful it was as a few of the more talented among them started breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm and started thinking about reaching the Domain Lord Realm themselves. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although¡­ For the disciples of the sect, the thing that remained their primary focus was still hunting down demonic cultivators at the borders when they became strong enough, as this would give them an opportunity to earn contribution points that could then be used to buy cultivation resources or get personally taught by some of the sect''s Domain Lord Realm Elders. After all, most of the disciples didn''t have a master who had reached the Domain Lord Realm, with most disciples still remaining as normal outer sect disciples struggling around the Foundation Establishment Realm.


    Thinking about this, Xuan Hao could not help looking over the sect quest that pertained to the overall growth of the sect''s strength.


    [Main Sect Quest: First Steps towards Bing a Major Power (I)] [Description: The sect has entered a state of rapid growth and is about to finally step onto the main stage of the Ewaria Continent. Help the sect reach the requirements to be a major power on the Ewaria Continent.] [Core Formation Realm Disciples: 1779/10.000] [Nascent Soul Realm Disciples: 13/100] [Domain Lord Realm Disciples: 5/10] [Soul Ascension Realm Elders: 0/100] [Dao Seed Realm Elders: 1/10] [Profound Immortal Realm Ancestor: 0/1] [Reward: World Stone (Immortal), Chaotic Qi Formation Upgrade, ???] [Note: Does not count host as part of the requirements]


    Compared to the first time he had seen the quest, a few more disciples of the sect had managed to break through to the Core Formation, while two had been sessful in reaching the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Even though the increase in strength of the sect disciples was impressive considering two more had reached the Nascent Soul Realm, Xuan Hao also understood that this speed was far too slow if he wanted toplete the sect quest within the next fifty or so years. Especially so considering that the sect still didn''t even have a single Soul Ascension Realm Elder, let alone Dao Seed Realm Elders!


    The only Dao Seed Realm elder that the sect had at the moment, so to speak, was one he had managed to recruit from outside. Not one of the elders breaking through to the Dao Seed Realm.


    With that in mind, it was easy to imagine how long it would take for the sect to nurture another nine Dao Seed Realm Elders. Not to mention the fact there was still the matter of also requiring a Profound Immortal Realm Ancestor, something that Xuan Hao understood full well was impossible for the current Star Shattering Sect to aplish.


    Only after he reached the Profound Immortal Realm himself would there be an opportunity to try and either nurture the current strongest elder in the sect outside of himself, Pei Yang, to the Profound Immortal Realm, or he could try and look for a wandering cultivator simr to Pei Yang and try to recruit him to join the sect.


    The main problem with either of these two options being that both of them were incredibly difficult and would undoubtedly take a long time to aplish. Not to mention, finding a wandering Profound Immortal Realm cultivator on the Ewaria Continent that didn''t even seem to acknowledge the existence of the Profound Immortal Realm was something that might be impossible.


    Unfortunately, the system didn''t seem to acknowledge someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm and had directly asked for someone in the Profound Immortal Realm.


    Even though, the fact that it did ask for someone in the Profound Immortal Realm instead of someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm for the Star Shattering Sect to be considered a major power on the Ewaria Continent did make believe that the different major powers on the Ewaria Continent had at least one Profound Immortal Realm cultivator behind them.


    The different Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators shown on the outside should only be the surface level strength of these different major powers in the core region of the continent that had been able to survive for tens of thousands of years.


    Although¡­ Thinking about it in this way, it made him curious about the strength of the demonic cultivators, as they should have something to rely on outside of a few Demon King Realm demonic cultivators if they wanted to do anything to shake up the true foundation of these different major powers. Especially considering that he doubted that the Profound Immortal Realm cultivators behind therger major powers were only in the Early Stage of the Realm.


    Perhaps the demonic cultivators also had another branching cultivation path of stronger demonic cultivators simr to the Profound Immortal Path of cultivation?

 Chapter 1458 Future Growth (2)

    Chapter 1458 Future Growth (2)


    Thinking about the chance of the demonic cultivators having a simr branching cultivation path like the Celestial Immortal and Profound Immortal Realm, Xuan Hao soon shook his head as he felt that it would be unrealistic for there to be another more powerful branching cultivation pathpared to the demonic cultivation path that he was already familiar with. After all, demonic cultivation in itself was already a branch of normal cultivation in a sense.


    All things considered, he felt that it was more realistic that the Demon King Realm itself was far moreplicated than he first thought and perhaps gave demonic cultivators the strength to rival even those in the higher realms of the Profound Immortal Realm after reaching theter stages of the realm.


    Then again, he was far too uninformed about demonic cultivation at the moment to make any real guess as to what kind of strength someone in the Demon King Realm had, as he had limited interaction with demonic cultivators at the level.


    The only real knowledge he had managed to gain on demonic cultivatorsing from ancient and historical records and the assistance of Xuan Gui and Su Wuhan.


    Although¡­ The one who provided the most useful information was Xuan Gui, who had already spent a long time as a demonic cultivator. Nothing like Su Wuhan who had barely spent a few years as a demonic cultivator at this point in time.


    The only reason why he was even useful when it came to gathering information on demonic cultivators in the first ce was because he could make use of the informationwork that he had been helping the sect build up among demonic cultivators to gather information from countless demonic cultivators. At least ensuring that the current Star Shattering Sect had a rather extensive understanding of demonic cultivators below the True Demon Realm.


    On the other hand, the historical and ancient records that had been gathered by the sect about demonic cultivators so far didn''t seem that useful and only seemed to be about past events that involved demonic cultivators. Not really including much information on their fighting methods or details on their cultivation realms.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao at least felt that information about demonic cultivators should be able to grow with the disciples and elders of the sect almost constantly being locked in battle with demonic cultivators at the borders of the sect.


    If anything, it might result in them gaining a far more extensive record on demonic cultivators below the True Demon Realmpared to evenrger empires like the Blue Sea Empire if things continued like they were.


    After all, arge empire like the Blue Sea Empire would undoubtedly not keep that much information on demonic cultivators below a certain level outside of some basic information considering that demonic cultivators below the True Demon Realm couldn''t pose even the slightest bit of threat to an empire the size of the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even a demonic cultivator in the True Demon realm would find it difficult to cause much damage before being hunted down and killed.


    "Hm? With that in mind¡­ Is the information regarding weaker demonic cultivators insiderger empires like the Blue Sea Empire perhaps focused on the different hiding methods they use instead of theirbat techniques?" Muttering this to himself as he realized the main problem weaker demonic cultivators could cause for arger empire, Xuan Hao felt that it might be a good idea to try and trade for this kind of information in the future, as the Star Shattering Sect would also have to deal with different demonic cultivators hiding away inside of the sect''s territory, a problem that would undoubtedly grow along with the size of the sect''s territory.


    The only problem being that he would have to find a way to buy that kind of information without giving his identity away. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    At least for now, the size of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory was still small enough that he could use his divine sense to look for any demonic cultivators who might be hiding.


    Although, he did already relegate dealing with any demonic cultivators he noticed by doing this to the mission hall. Having the elders and disciples deal with them instead of doing it himself, as the sheer number of demonic cultivators that kept popping up would end up wasting a lot of time on his side.


    Not to mention, it was a good experience for the disciples to try and hunt down demonic cultivators throughout the sect''s territory, as it would allow them to learn how to track down someone, while at same time also understanding the mindset in case they ended up being the ones hunted down in the future after they left the sect''s territory to explore the world on their own.


    After all, there woulde a time the disciples would need to leave and explore the world like Chu Yang was currently doing, as it would be incredibly useful for refining their dao heart and giving them much needed life experience, something that would be difficult for them to gain just by staying inside the Shattered Star Peak and cultivating without facing any real challenges.


    Of course, for now, the number of disciples doing this kind of thing had to be extremely limited given the Star Shattering Sect''s current status. Only allowing some of the most exceptional disciples to leave the sect''s territory undetected to explore the world on their own.


    Outside of Chu Yang, who had already gone out, the other disciples leaving the sect to do this kind of training were mostly among the older ones who were stuck at the Peak of the Core Formation Realm and needed something different from just cultivating to break through the bottleneck to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    After all¡­ Even with the assistance of the sect and rich cultivation environment of the Shattered Star Peaks, it was still a challenge for most to ovee the Cloud Tribtion and reach the Nascent Soul Realm, something that could be seen from the fact that there was still only 13 disciples in the Nascent Soul Realm and close to 2000 in the Core Formation Realm.

 Chapter 1459 Dissipating Clouds

    Chapter 1459 Dissipating Clouds


    Having finished seeing how the alchemy hall had developed since he had gone in to lend a hand in its development and ending up lost thinking about demonic cultivators, Xuan Hao continued wandering around in the Shattered Star Peaks without any clear goal in mind for where he was going. Soon enough, he found himself at a small resting spot along one of the small paths that had been created throughout the Shattered Star Peaks to make travel easier for those below the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although, with the introduction of the teleportation formations connecting most of the important locations inside of the Shattered Star Peaks, the paths that had been bustling with life a few months ago had all be rather deste following the introduction of the teleportation formations.


    Of course, it didn''t mean that there weren''t any disciples or elders around using the paths that had been created throughout the Shattered Star Peaks since the Star Shattering Sect had settled down on the Seventh Star Peaks, there were still a lot of disciples and elders using the paths to get to some of the less important locations that weren''t connected with a teleportation formation.


    At the same time, there were also just those who preferred to walk on their own instead of using a teleportation formation and those who just enjoyed taking a walk through the peaceful and vibrant natural beauty that had by now grown more beautiful and spirited following the increased spiritual qi present in the air.


    To make this reality more clear, a few older elders who should have just barely managed to reach the Nascent Soul Realm before their lifespan ran out, could be seen casually ying a game of chess with each other at a small table not too far away, while a group of younger disciples still in the Qi Condensation Realm were sprawled on the ground not too far away with exhausted expressions stered all over their young faces.


    Even from a nce, it was easy to guess that the group of younger disciples still in the Qi Condensation Realm had just finished some kind of exhausting training and could barely move a single muscle at this point in time¡­ And looking at the almost resentful res they wereunching towards the two elders immersed in a game of chess, it was clear that these elders were the ones training them.


    12¡­ 17¡­ 20 disciples in total¡­ If I''m not wrong, that should be the number of disciples required to train for one of those repeatable missions given out by the Grand Mission Pavilion¡­


    Feeling a hint of curiosity as he realized that the two elders should be in the process ofpleting one of the permanent missions found at the Grand Mission Pavilion that involved the training of the sect''s younger generation, something that could only be taken on by elders of the sect, Xuan Hao turned his focus towards the two elders and twenty younger disciples who were currently the only ones besides himself at this rest spot.


    OF course, given the fact that he had not made his presence known and was still hidden, the group of disciples and elders didn''t notice his presence and were still fully immersed in their own world. Especially the two elders, who seemed far more focused on their game of chess than anything else.


    Not that he could me the two, as the group of disciples were clearly far too exhausted to do anything in their current state at the moment, outside ofying down on the ground while trying to desperately absorb the rich spiritual qi in the air all around them to recover as fast as possible. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Finally! I can move again!"


    "Haha! No more rolling around in the grass unable to sit up!"


    "Hehe, we managed to get through it. I can''t wait to get back and take a bath before going to sleep¡­"


    As the younger disciples began to recover at an extremely fast pace due to the rich environment, it didn''t take long before the previously quite disciples began chatting among each other happily following their recovery. Looking forward to getting back to their abodes to rest¡­


    "Don''t get happy too soon! Don''t forget, those two demons are still around!"


    Even then, there was one among the group that didn''t look at things as positively as the rest, as he stood up and reminded everyone that they were still not in the clear, causing the happy disciples to suddenly freeze on the spot before all of them turned to look towards the two elders still immersed in their game of chess.


    "This¡­ Maybe we can sneak away before we get discovered? It looks like both of them are too absorbed in their game to notice anything¡­"


    "Indeed, they do seem rather focused on that game¡­"


    "Maybe this could really work¡­"


    As one spoke up about a nned escape before their elders noticed that they had recovered their strength, it didn''t take long before a second and third spoke up in support. Soon enough resulting in the group starting their little escape attempt by staying out of the two elders line of sight to the best of their abilities.


    Even without knowing anything, it was clear to Xuan Hao that none of these disciples wanted to go through another training session from those two elders.


    However, Xuan Hao also understood that there was no way these little disciples could escape the divine sense of the two elders-


    "Hehe, do you little brats really think you can just sneak away when we aren''t looking? I guess you have already recovered from earlier and are ready to proceed with the next step of the training?"


    "This-!?"


    "H-How!?"


    "M-Mercy!"


    And so, before the group of disciples managed to get far, one of the two elders had already stepped out and appeared before them to block their futile escape attempt. Earning a rather surprised response from the younger disciples who had no idea how this elder had noticed them when he had clearly been looking in theplete opposite direction from the one they were escaping in.


    Watching this from the side, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling a bit to himself at the failed escape attempt as he simultaneously felt the mental burden that had been clouding his mind slowly dissipating alongside theical scene of a few braver disciples still trying to escape even after being caught.

 Chapter 1460 Dissipating Clouds (2)

    Chapter 1460 Dissipating Clouds (2)


    As the worry that had burdened his mind and caused him to leave his cultivation room dissipated along with the reluctant screams of the braver disciples who had still tried to run away after being found out by their elders, Xuan Hao could not help chuckling to himself before turning around to leave in the direction of the Seventh Star Peak. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Now that his mind had calmed down again, he could return to cultivating without any problems.


    If anything, he would have an easier timeprehending the Daopared to before. Maybe even standing a chance at trying to make use of the increased rity of mind to try and breakthrough the bottleneck between the Large Sess Realm and Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space.


    Although¡­ That was nothing more than wishful thinking on his side, as reaching the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space was far from that simple. Especially considering that the Dao of Space was a far more difficult Dao toprehendpared to any other Daos. Possibly only surpassed in difficulty by something like the Dao of Time¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao didn''t linger around for long after he had felt his mind clear up. Heading back to his cultivation room without stopping to look around at the rest of the Star Shattering Sect to see how it had been developing over the past few months.


    Of course, even if he didn''t stop by the different locations inside of the sect to see how they had developed, he still decided to take a quick look with his divine sense to see not only how the sect was developing overall, but also to see how his disciples were doing at the moment, as he had been focusing most of his attention on cultivating over the past few months. Only really spending time teaching his disciples when theye to ask him for help.


    In that regard, Bai Ning, Qing Yi and Chun Hua rarely visited him more than once a week.


    Only Mui ended up stopping by almost every day. Ensuring that he was fully aware about what the little girl was up to or nning at any given moment, as she was more than happy to share everything with him. Even if the thing she was doing or nning on doing something Elder Song definitely wouldn''t approve of¡­


    With that in mind, he first checked up on the first three disciples, who to no surprise didn''t have anything abnormal going on, as they were fully focused on their cultivation.


    Reaching Mui, who seemed to be in the process of constructing some kind of artifact with the help of Song Jia, who had essentially ended up bing her best friend at some point in time, Xuan Hao decided to look the other way as he already understood that the artifact that she was trying to create this time around wouldn''t cause any major problems for the sect and might even benefit in the long run.


    The only problem with it being that it would end up causing a ratherrge headache for Elder Song if it went ording to what Mui had told him when describing her ns for the artifact, that it would essentially turn another part of the sect into a special location.


    Turning his attention away from his four disciples still inside the sect, Xuan Hao also briefly nced over the description of his second disciple and also strongest disciple. Nothing had changed over the past few months, and he was still at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although this could be considered normal given how long it took for others to advance through the Domain Lord Realm. Given his past performance, Xuan Hao guessed that this disciple of his who had been missing for over a year at this point in time might finally be returning. Resulting in his cultivation realm not progressing as fast as it had done in the past.


    Even if this was not the case, Xuan Hao did hope that this disciple of his would return to the sect soon, as he started to miss the guy after a year. Not having expected his adventure outside of the sect to end up dragging on for so long.


    Not to mention, he still didn''t have any clue how long it would continue nor how many of his life saving measures were still left at this point in time.


    Considering his rather subpar talisman making skills that mainly relied on his skill in the Dao of Formations to forcibly seal part of his strength inside those small talismans he gave to his disciples as protection, the talismans he created and gave to his disciples were far worse than talismans created by a talisman master.


    The main difference being how long the talismans could retain their strength and still be usable.


    The ones created by a talisman master could easilyst hundreds of years, possibly even longer without losing much strength, while the ones he made with the help of the Dao of Formations would lose half of their strength in a year and bepletely useless after three to five years.


    Even though he did want to try and learn the Dao of Talismans and gain the ability to create better talismans for his disciples, he also understood that this was not something that was possible at the time.


    Not just because the current Star Shattering Sectcked talisman masters and had extremely limited knowledge in regards to talismans outside a few of the more popr ones likemunication talismans that had been spread through the Explorer Union, he also worried aboutprehending the Dao of Talismans possibly causing problems when it came to reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    After all, the more Daos heprehended, the moreyers around his dao seed and considering that he would already exceed 36 with the current number ofyers around his dao seed, adding any more was not a risk he was willing to take. Especially considering that he had already tried to just not condense theyers around his dao seed after breaking through in the Dao of Alchemy not long ago. Only to find out that theyers around his dao seed would slowly form on their own even without him doing anything.

 Chapter 1461 Dissipating Clouds (3)

    Chapter 1461 Dissipating Clouds (3)


    Thinking about the inevitably dangerous situation he would end up in when theyers around his daos seed crossed over 36 in the future, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if he should just give up on trying to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and instead just directly break through to the Profound Immortal Realm on the spot.


    However, after thinking about just how much further he would be able to progress if he sessfully managed to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and how many years of arduous cultivation it might end up saving him in the future, he quickly shook his head and threw these thoughts to the back of his mind.


    At the very least, before the Star Shattering Sect encountered a situation that he couldn''t deal with in his current realm, or he was about to die from the possible danger that came with adding on moreyers to his dao seed beyond the normal limit of 36.


    Outside of the dangerous situation that might present itself at any moment, he was at the very least still a few years away from having to worry about any dangers rted to theyers formed around his dao seed¡­


    "Hm? It seems like the cksmithing hall has been developing quite well on its own since I decided to lend a hand the alchemy hall." As he continued using his divine sense to sweep through the sect to check out on how the different parts of the sect had developed while lost in his own thoughts, it didn''t take long for him to notice the changes that had taken ce in the cksmithing hall since hisst visit to the ce. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    [Sect Quest: Establish a Proper cksmithing Hall] [cksmithing Hall Disciples (Below Master Realm): 632/500 (Complete)] [cksmithing Hall Elders (Master Realm): 8/10] [cksmithing Hall Elders (Grandmaster Realm): 1/1 (Complete)] [Reward: Dao of cksmithing Comprehension, Artifact Blueprints, Spiritual Metal] Looking over the numbers through the rted quest, it was obvious that the disciples and elders of the cksmithing hall had been inspired by the recent growth of the alchemy hall and had been rapidly expanding on their own in an attempt to catch up to the alchemy hall that had by now imed themselves as the number one profession-based hall inside the sect.


    Although the growth of the cksmithing hall was nowhere near the level of the alchemy hall given that they didn''t have anyone special like himself to help in promoting it to the younger generation, they had still managed to add a little over two hundred new disciples to their ranks.


    Showing that there were still many disciples in the sect willing to take on a profession on the side to have extra skills that might be able to help them earn contribution points without taking on any risks like having to leave for the border to fight with demonic cultivators.


    After all, even though there were elders from the sect present in the seemingly unending battle with the demonic cultivators, it was impossible for them to prevent deaths from happening on such arge battlefield.


    Outside of that, the cksmithing hall had even managed to add on another two Master Realm cksmiths, something rather surprising considering there shouldn''t have been any elders close to that realm still left inside the cksmithing hall.


    However, a quick scan of his divine sense of the two newly promoted Master Realm cksmiths, revealed that the two of them were not originally from the Star Shattering Sect, but had instead been recruited by Elder Song as guest elders not too long ago.


    Looking a bit more into the situation out of curiosity, he also discovered that the two had apparently been in the process of being epted into the sect for close to half a year before officially bing guest elders due to the simple fact that checking their identities and information took a long time considering their past identity as wandering cultivators.


    The identity of cksmithing elders apparently being given to them on the promise that they would help attract young disciples to join the cksmithing hall and teach the younger cksmithing disciples at least twice a week for the next five years¡­


    "So¡­ This is how the cksmithing hall managed to recruit so many new disciples¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the two new cksmithing elders busily running through the sect as they promoted the cksmithing hall to any young disciples they encountered along the way, Xuan Hao could not help wondering if some of the younger disciples had decided to join the cksmithing hall because of the crazy hype these two created in an attempt to convince the younger disciples about how great it would be for them to learn cksmithing.


    Even though¡­ Some of the things the two said about being able to make and repair your own artifacts without any extra costs- Ah! I''m being affected as well even though I already know cksmithing! What dreadful tactics¡­ The cksmithing hall might very well end up surpassing the alchemy hall in the near future with these two around¡­!


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this while following the two new cksmithing elders for a bit longer, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit impressed by these two.


    After they finished their work in the cksmithing hall, it might actually be a good idea to have them work on promoting the sect in the future¡­


    As these thoughts started to take root, Xuan Hao didn''t bother wasting any time, as he directly took out hismunication talismans on the spot before informing Feng Chen about the two. Handing over the situation for him to handle.


    After all, Feng Chen was the person who had decided to take charge of most of the sect''s external matters, so this situation would be best handled by him.


    Of course, the situation regarding the Blue Sea Empire was different and was not handled by Feng Chen alone, but instead all of the sects higher-ups aware of the situation, though mostly Elder Song and himself.

 Chapter 1462 Difficulties of Returning to the Sect...

    Chapter 1462 Difficulties of Returning to the Sect...


    Having finished informing Feng Chen about the situation regarding the two new elders of the cksmithing hall, he didn''t spend much time looking through the rest of the sect before making his way back to his cultivation room.


    Although the rest of the sect had also been developing well and the different profession halls were far from the only part of the sect that had grown stronger over the past few months, it wasn''t to the degree that it warranted any special attention, as it was mostly just some elders and disciples who had broken through.


    The only thing that did warrant some degree of attention being the servant quarters, that had at this point expanded to be thergest part of the Star Shattering Sect at this point in time, with there being far more members inside the servant quarterspared to the sect itself.


    Though¡­ It wasn''t really that surprising, considering that most of the sect''s daily management didn''t specifically require a cultivator to take care of it and was mostly handled by the servant quarters of the sect at this point in time.


    Of course, even though most of the members of the servant quarters weren''t able to step onto the path of immortal cultivation, living inside the Shattered Star Peaks still brought a lot of benefits, as the rich spiritual qi present would easily allow an ordinary mortal to live upwards of 150 years with a far lower chance of bing sick.


    To amodate thisrge number of servants working for the sect. A small valley close to the Seventh Star Peak inside the Shattered Star Peaks had already been transformed into a rather sizable city where most of the members of the servant quarters lived.


    As for the problem of what would happen if this city became too small to amodate the number of servants required to keep the sect operating normally? That was a problem Elder Song would have to handle when the time came, as continuing to expand it wouldn''t be an option forever given the limited space of the Shattered Star Peaks.


    The best option would of course be that the servant quarters could transform into a ce where everyone at least had a cultivation at the Qi Condensation Realm, as cultivators would be able to handle far more work than that of a normal mortal.


    The main problem with this was that the current Star Shattering Sect would have a difficult time finding so many Qi Condensation Realm cultivators who were loyal to the sect.


    After all, the current members of the sect''s servant quarters were all being trained and recruited when they were still young and had been meticulously cultivated, something that couldn''tpare to the sect recruiting people from outside the sect.


    Problems for the future~ Problems for Elder Song~


    Thinking this to himself as he thought about the potential problems regarding the future development of the servant quarters, Xuan Hao arrived inside his cultivation room before slowly sitting down and closing his eyes. Starting toprehend the Dao of Space without another thought.


    Problems like the servant quarters were ultimately not something that concerned him and was instead something that would end up being solved by Elder Song who was in charge of the sect''s internal situation.


    Better to just leave such thoughts to him instead of worrying himself about these kinds of potential internal problems of the sect. Especially considering that Elder Song was clearly far more skillful than himself when it came to dealing with these kinds of things.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao resumedprehending the Dao of Space after what could be considered a short break, Chu Yang was still hiding away inside the secret realm after having fully consumed the source crystal and managed to take full advantage of it to reach the Elementary Realm in the Dao of the Spear and Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    However, having stayed hidden away for months inside the small cave without leaving, he had not managed to make much progress in his cultivation over the months he had stayed hidden and had mostly used the time to fully stabilize his foundation in the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    The main problem was that as the time for the secret realm to close approached, he began to feel increasingly uneasy. Understanding that he would likely soon have to face the powerful cultivators from the different major powers who had control of the secret realm¡­ And considering how he had just rushed inside and knocked their guards away, he had a feeling that he would most likely end up facing at least one Soul Ascension Realm cultivator after leaving the secret realm. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    To solve this problem, he would definitely end up having to use one of the two remaining talismans from his master.


    Even then¡­ He would likely still have to flee from his life and have to hide while running while making his way back towards the sect. After all, he didn''t feel like those different major powers of the neutral region would just let him escape like that. Especially considering that news of the source crystal being in his hands would most likely also reach them.


    Though he could say he had already used it, he doubted that they would believe him considering how dangerous it was to use something like that inside the secret realm and the fact that no one would use it under normal circumstances unless facing a major bottleneck.


    The two talismans he had left¡­ Were really far too few to safely leave the neutral region if he tried to just rush straight back to the sect.


    In the end, the safest option would be for him to reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm before the secret realm closed.


    The main problem with this being that he would have to leave his hiding spot and search for an opportunity like the rest of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators currently inside the secret realm if he wanted to have any hope of that happening¡­

 Chapter 1463 Difficulties of Returning to the Sect... (2)

    Chapter 1463 Difficulties of Returning to the Sect... (2)


    Knowing the difficulties that stood before him if he wanted to try and reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm before the secret realm closed, Chu Yang could not help closing his eyes for a brief moment as he thought about how to go about his current situation.


    Even if he went out and tried to search the secret realm for opportunities to help him increase his cultivation realm to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, it was still uncertain whether or not he would be able to find such opportunities. Especially considering that most of the safe opportunities that might have been around when the secret realm had first opened should have already been seized while he had been busy stabilizing his cultivation realm at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm after consuming the source crystal.


    With that in mind, any of the opportunities that might still be avable inside the secret realm at the moment would undoubtedly also have countless dangers involved. Likely not any less dangerous than the dangers he had faced when seizing the source crystal at the ancient ruins.


    But¡­ Considering that he now only had two talismans given by his master to protect himself while he was out adventuring, he really couldn''t afford to use any of them to try and seize another opportunity like he had done with the source crystal.


    After all, he would at least need to use one after leaving the secret realm in the future, while it wouldn''t be a bad idea to keep a second one on him in case, he encountered any unexpected dangers on the rest of the journey back to the sect. Even more so considering that the mountain range he would have to pass through to get back into the territory of the now fallen Sky Empire was in no way safe for someone in the Domain Lord Realm like himself.


    At most, he could hope that he would be able to somehow get his hands on the safe passage through the mountain range by asking around inside the Deep Pit City or other cities located at the edges of the mountain range.


    "Haaa¡­ Why do I feel like getting back to the sect is going to be far more troublesome than getting here in the first ce¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about the future struggles he would have to endure when trying to get back to his sect, Chu Yang smiled wryly to himself as he slowly made his way back out in the open after months spend cultivating in seclusion.


    Though not much had changed when it came to the surroundings outside the ce, he had decided to seclude himself for the past few months, he still noticed signs of fighting not too far away.


    Looking closer, it seemed to have been a sh between two Domain Lord Realm cultivators that had ended at least a week ago given the energy still lingering in the air. Likely a fight over a treasure of some kind- Not that it mattered to Chu Yang, as he was only interested in finding out about what had taken ce inside the secret realm since he had secluded himself to reach the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    After all, thest thing he wanted to do was identally walk into a ce with a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast lurking.


    Instead of that, it would be far better for him to find someone else who had entered the secret realm and was on the weaker side so he could take advantage of them to gather some information about the different dangerous areas that should have been discovered inside the secret realm at this point in time-


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Luckily for him, he didn''t have to go out and search for long, as the sounds of fighting soon echoed out in the distance before growing closer and closer to where he was. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even better, he could clearly sense the strength of the ones currently locked in battle with each other had only just reached the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, with the strongest among the two being in theter stages of the realm and the weaker struggling party seemingly having broken through only recently.


    With his current strength, they essentially posed no threat to him and were perfect when it came to his objective of gathering information about the current situation of the secret realm.


    Whoosh~!


    Not wasting any time after these thoughts passed through his head, Chu Yang stepped forward and flew in the direction of the two battling Domain Lord Realm cultivators. Intending to capture one of the two for information.


    Soon enough arriving directly at the devasted part of argeke where the two Domain Lord Realm cultivators were battling each other.


    "Huh? This-!?"


    "L-Late Stage Domain Lord!?"


    Not long after he arrived, the two Domain Lord Realm cultivators fighting each other to the death instantly froze on the spot as they sensed the terrifying presence of Chu Yang''s Eighth Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivation base, both of them shivering at the prospect of having to face someone who could be considered among the strongest of the Domain Lord Realm who had entered the secret realm.


    "S-Senior, is there anything we can help with¡­?"


    Knowing the danger of the current situation and knowing that it would be best for them not to anger this senior figure who had suddenly shown up all of a sudden, the weaker among the two Domain Lords quickly took the incentive and stepped forward to ask in a somewhat fearful manner.


    Clearly hoping that the person in front of him wasn''t here for the same reason as the one he had been fighting to the death seconds earlier.


    "Yes, I want information on the current situation of the secret realm." Not aware of these thoughts, Chu Yang just nodded his head emotionlessly while secretly feeling happy that he might be able to resolve the situation without having to forcibly extract the information he wanted.


    Indeed¡­ Having a powerful cultivation base was convenient when it came to these kind of things¡­

 Chapter 1464 Difficulties of Returning to the Sect... (3)

    Chapter 1464 Difficulties of Returning to the Sect... (3)


    "Information on the current state of the secret realm? I understand! I know everything about the current state of the secret realm and the different dangerous locations that have been uncovered over the past few months!"


    Hearing that Chu Yang just wanted to gather information about the current state of the secret realm, the somewhat nervous and fearful expression on the Domain Lord Realm cultivator who had stepped forward brightened up as he said this.


    Given that Chu Yang only wanted information, it was clear that he didn''te with any evil intentions, as he would have likely already attacked him if that was the case.


    So¡­ With that in mind, the weaker of the two Domain Lord Realm cultivators present wasted no time as he happily informed Chu Yang about the current situation of the secret realm and some of the more dangerous locations that had been uncovered over the past few months.


    As for suspicion regarding him not being informed about the current situation of the secret realm? He wasn''t really bothered by it, as there could be countless reasons for something like that. From being busy at a single location cut off from the rest of the secret realm or being among one of those who had arrivedte to enter the secret realm at the start.


    All thing considered, the entire conversation about the state of the secret realm went smoothly¡­ And without a single ounce of hesitation, the weaker Domain Lord Realm cultivator took the opportunity while his opponent was still in a fearful state to run away. Smoothly taking advantage of the situation to escape from the ce without having to engage in another battle.


    "Wah-!? DON''T YOU DARE RUN AWAY- Ah¡­ E-exucuse me senior, I will be taking my leave¡­" Realizing what had just happened when it was already toote, the second Domain Lord Realm cultivator let out a furious shout before quickly calming down upon realizing Chu Yang was still there before taking his leave and chasing after the one who had already run away.


    "¡­"


    Watching this, Chu Yang just rolled his eyes without caring about the situation between the two weaker Domain Lord Realm cultivators. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Even if one of them had managed to get his hands on some kind of treasure inside the secret realm, he doubted that it was anything that would allow him to reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in a short period of time.


    Not to mention, the other party had helped him out a lot with the information about the secret realm and its current state along with different dangerous locations. Clearly not having held any information back when he had informed him and even informed him of several locations with precious treasures present that were currently being fought over by some of the stronger Domain Lord Realm cultivators.


    In such a situation, he really couldn''t bring himself to attack someone innocent for no reason outside of greed.


    "But¡­ None of the opportunities mentioned seem to be able to help me reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he nced off into the distance while remembering some of the opportunities that had been mentioned by the now gone Domain Lord Realm cultivator, Chu Yang couldn''t help shaking his head with a somewhat helpless look in his eyes.


    Although the opportunities that had been mentioned were indeed extremely precious and would be helpful to him. Most of them were ancient spiritual herbs or artifacts. Not really anything that would be able to help him when it came to increasing his cultivation realm.


    The only thing he could think of that might be able to help him achieve his goal of reaching the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm would be for him to head into some of the dangerous regions of the secret realm that were apparently rumored to have more things like the source crystal he had used to reach the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    The problem with this being the fact that these more dangerous locations had the presence of powerful demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm or dangers that were no less than that posed by such powerful demon beasts.


    All things considered, it would be nothing more than a pipe dream for him to seize another opportunity like the source crystal without having to use one of the two remaining talismans from his master, something that he didn''t really want to do as he still needed them for when he had to make his way back to the sect in the future.


    Even if one might be enough for him to escape from the city when he leaves the secret realm, it was almost certain that those major powers would send people to chase after him afterwards¡­ And the people chasing him would undoubtedly be in the Soul Ascension Realm. Possibly even attracting the attention of the true powers behind these major powers of the neutral region that reached the Dao Seed Realm.


    Considering his current strength, even if he reached the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he saw no chance of himself escaping from someone in the Dao Seed Realm. The only way he might be able to deal with someone like that being through the help of the talismans given to him by his master.


    So¡­ With all of that in mind, Chu Yang was left in a rather difficult situation, as he needed any bit of strength he could get when it came to returning to the sect after leaving the secret realm, but any meaningful increase in strength would almost certainly result in him having to use one of the two precious talismans he still had left from his master.


    "Hm¡­ Even if I can''t use any of the talismans, I should at least take a look at some of those dangerous regions and see if there is a chance for me to sneak in and out for a look¡­"


    However, even knowing about the danger, Chu Yang ultimately couldn''t stop himself, as he decided to first take a look at the dangerous regions that had been mentioned to him by the weaker Domain Lord Realm cultivator.


    Intending on personally assessing the danger beforeing to any conclusion on whether or not to enter any of those locations in search of opportunities.


    After all, some of those dangerous locations might not be as dangerous as mentioned, but might have been exaggerated by some Domain Lord Realm cultivators wanting to monopolize the resources inside without anypetition.

 Chapter 1465 Searching For an Opportunity

    Chapter 1465 Searching For an Opportunity


    n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Deciding to check out the closest dangerous region to his current location first to check the uracy of the information that he had received, Chu Yang didn''t waste any more time lingering around close the area where the entrance of the secret realm was located.


    After all, even though the area close to the entrance of the secret realm was by far the safest with the demon beasts and dangers there being the weakest and easiest to deal with, it was also the ce where other Domain Lord Realm cultivators would go after having sessfully or unsessfully gotten their hands on an opportunity. Using the ce to recover or hide away and use the opportunity like he had done in the past.


    Even if the chances of encountering someone like that were low given that people like that would want to keep themselves hidden, he didn''t want to risk it. Especially considering that some of the newer Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had crossed over at ater date might know about him and be searching for him at the moment.


    Though the chances of them catching him were low given his current strength at the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm making him confident in facing anyone in the Domain Lord Realm, he also had to consider that he could be surrounded and attacked by arge group of people like when he had first taken the source crystal.


    With that in mind, Chu Yang soon found himself leaving therge forest that surrounded the entrance to the secret realm. Finding himself above arge deste mountain range that stretched on for as far as he could see.


    This mountain range being one of the dangerous regions that had been mentioned by the weaker Domain Lord Realm cultivator. Located in the opposite direction of the endless grass in where he had found the lone mountain and ancient ruins with the source crystal inside of it.


    Of course, the mountain range wasn''t entirely filled with danger, as ording to the information, it only became dangerous when venturing deeper inside the mountain range, while the outer edges of the mountain range could be considered safe to explore as long as one had reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    Because of this, after reaching the mountain range, it didn''t take long before he ended up running into a group of Domain Lord Realm cultivators working together to hunt down a demon beast guarding what looked like a few spiritual herbs.


    However, given that the spiritual herbs weren''t of any use to him when it came to reaching the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm and the fact that getting involved might cause him to get attacked by the group of Domain Lord Realm cultivators, Chu Yang only gave the group a quick nce before starting to move deeper into the mountain range.


    If there really was anything that might be useful to him at his current state, he doubted that it could be found in the outer parts of the mountain range that had already been thoroughly searched by other Domain Lord Realm cultivators over the past few months.


    The main problem with looking through the mountain range was the fact that the deeper regions of the mountain range apparently contained several Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts ording to the information he had gained about the ce. The reason why the mountain range was considered a dangerous region was to be avoided by the weaker Domain Lord Rm cultivator in the first ce¡­


    Even then, Chu Yang was not entirely certain about giving up searching for opportunities in the mountain range, as he felt that it should be possible for him to try and explore the deeper regions of the mountain range by keeping himself hidden.


    As long as he avoided the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast and didn''t draw any unwanted attention to himself, it should be fine to explore the ce-


    BOOOOM-!


    ROOOOOAR-!


    However, a loud explosion followed by a terrifying roar from the deeper parts of the mountain range soon put a stop to these thoughts, as he froze on the spot with a fearful expression on his face.


    "Definitely not Soul Ascension Realm¡­!"


    Even as he whispered this to himself, he had already turned around and escaped in the opposite direction of where the roar hade from without the slightest bit of hesitation.


    The reason for this was rather simple, as even though it had only been for a brief moment, he had clearly sensed a presence beyond that of the Soul Ascension Realm following the terrifying roar just now¡­ And although he might feel daring enough to try and sneak past a few Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts, he was not brave enough to do the same when it came to Dao Seed Realm demon beast.


    After all, the strength between the two were worlds apart!


    So, with that in mind, Chu Yang soon found himself leaving the mountain range along with close to a dozen other Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had simrly been scared into escaping like him.


    As for the reason behind the sudden outburst from the demon beast deep within the mountain range? Chu Yang simply didn''t have the strength to figure out nor care about it, as a demon beast at that level was far beyond his current level.


    Instead of that, Chu Yang instead took the opportunity to get some more information on an adjacent danger zone from some of the other Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had been scared into leaving the mountain range.


    On a positive note, their scared state made it rather simple to get some information from them without causing any suspensions, as he gave some of the information, he had been given by the weaker Domain Lord Realm cultivator earlier before he left in the direction of the adjacent danger zone.


    At least,pared to the mountain range, this danger zone should be safer, as the main danger didn''te from demon beasts, but instead formations that were rather easy to spot but difficult to breakthrough ording to the information he had managed to gather about the ce¡­

 Chapter 1466 Searching For an Opportunity (2)

    Chapter 1466 Searching For an Opportunity (2)


    Arriving in front of the second danger zone, Chu Yang could not help marveling at the enormousplex of ancient ruins whose true purpose had long since been lost to the annals of time.


    Although seemingly peaceful on the surface without any powerful demon beasts running around like all the other ces he had visited inside the secret realm, he understood fully that this was a deadly location no less dangerous than the mountain range he had just fled from. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Even standing in front of the ancient ruins without entering them, he could still clearly sense the danger inside the ruins from the countless formations hidden inside.


    If anything, the ancient ruins in front of him might actually be more dangerous than the mountain range, as he found out that he had no real way to try and sense the different formations after having arrived in front of the ancient ruins himself.


    At first, he had intended on using his domain and divine sense to try and sense the different hidden formations inside the ancient ruins and move along a safe path in search of opportunities, but now that he had the opportunity to personally probe the ancient ruins with his domain and divine sense, he realized that the formations inside were hidden far deeper than he had expected.


    Just standing on the edge of the ancient ruins, he could only barely sense a few of the formations in front of him¡­ And that was mostly due to his powerful domain and divine sense that allowed him to essentially brute force his way into spotting the few formations due to his powerful soul.


    The formations further inside the ancient ruins, on the other hand, rendered himpletely helpless.


    It seemed like entering this danger zone wouldn''t be an option either, as it seemed like only those Domain Lords proficient in the Dao of Formation or having practiced a specific technique for detecting formations could explore the ancient ruins filled with formations.


    Looking at the few who actually possessed this kind of ability and were courageous enough to step inside the ancient ruins in search of opportunities, Chu Yang could not help feeling a sense of admiration. Understanding full well just how difficult it was to explore this danger zone after personally finding out how hard it was to sense the different formations inside the ce.


    Even more so when he realized that some of the formations further inside the ancient ruins seemed to be moving around. Making it even more difficult to predict the location of these hidden formations.


    Oh well¡­ At leasting here allowed me to understand that I really need to learn some kind of technique for finding formations. After all, I don''t want to identally walk into some kind of trap in the future due to not being able to notice a formation directly in front of me¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he slowly turned around and began making his way towards a third danger zone, Chu Yang noted down his need for a technique that could allow him to discover hidden formations, both to avoid danger and find possible opportunities that might be hidden behind concealment formation.


    As for the fact that he might encounter a formation the moment he left the secret realm? Chu Yang didn''t care much about this, as he had already determined that he would need to use one of the talismans given by his master when trying to leave the secret realm in the future.


    Whether a trap had beenid for him on the other side with or without a sealing formation made no difference, as his master''s talisman would be able to destroy any obstacles in his path and allow him to smoothly slip away in the chaos that would undoubtedly follow his use of a talisman.


    ¡­


    "A desert¡­ Never imagined this secret realm to be so diverse, an endless grass in, a mountain range stretching as far as the eye can see, aplex of ancient ruins without end and now a desert. Makes one wonder if this is also some kind of ancient testing ground for ancient cultivators simr to that mystic realm¡­"


    Arriving at the third danger zone, a desert that seemed to start abruptly just as the forest with the entrance of the secret realm at the center of it came to an end, Chu Yang could not help voicing his thoughts out loud.


    The secret realm was just far too weird for him to not consider it some kind of ancient training ground, as only something like that could exin the weird choice of environments that seemed to have been mashed together without any sense of reason behind it.


    By far, the thing that supported these thoughts of his the most was the ancient ruins filled with hidden formations he had just visited not long ago, as he really couldn''t see any other rhyme or reason to construct such a ce with so many hidden formations if not for the purpose of testing or training.


    Even more so when he remembered the weird architecture of the ancient ruinplex, it seemed to him like those ruins had not served any real purpose in the past before decaying into the ruins now present, but instead like they had always been ruins. Even when they had been created in the past.


    Shaking his head as he thought about these suspicious points, Chu Yang focused his attention on the desert in front of him as he recalled the little information he had managed to gather about the ce.


    Hot¡­ Unbearably hot to the point even someone in the Domain Lord Realm would be affected and filled with all kinds of powerful demon beasts. Outer edges of the desert can be considered safe to move around in for someone in the Domain Lord Realm. Beyond the 1000-kilometer mark, it bes a true death zone where even Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts might appear.


    The most prominent demon beast spotted so far being some kind of massive sandworm demon beast at the Soul Ascension Realm swallowing anything it sets its sight on. Escape immediately if discovered by it¡­

 Chapter 1467 Searching For an Opportunity (3)

    Chapter 1467 Searching For an Opportunity (3)


    Observing the desert from the outside as he recalled the information he had managed to gather on it, Chu Yang soon stepped inside the desert.


    Even if the desert itself could be considered one of the danger zones that were avoided by most of the other Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had ventured inside the secret realm, it was also simr to the mountain range in the way that the outer edges of the desert could be considered rtively safe to travel around for someone in the Domain Lord Realm.


    For this reason, there were still a few other Domain Lord Realm cultivators moving around inside the desert like him, though the major difference between them and himself was the fact that most of these Domain Lord Realm cultivators were focused on hunting down the different Domain Lord Realm demon beasts wandering around the desert.


    After all, the corpse of a Domain Lord Realm demon beast was still something rare and hard toe by under normal circumstances. Useful as not only material for crafting artifacts and concocting some higher-level pills, but also a primary ingredient for talismans, as the blood of powerful demon beasts were one of the mostmon ways to enhance the strength of talismans and allow them to hold their strength for a longer period of time. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Unknown to Chu Yang, the talismans that he had been given from his master had only managed to keep their power for more than a few days due to the powerful demon beast blood that had been used as a foundation for sealing away part of his strength inside the talisman paper.


    Of course, this was nowhere near as effective as that of a talisman master and the talismans that Chu Yang still had left on him had essentially already lost close to half of the power that they had started out with when he left the sect at this point in time.


    A real talisman should easily be able to keep its strength unchanged for a few hundred years, higher level ones keeping their strength for thousands of years and the true top tier talismans remaining unaffected in their strength even after tens of thousands of years pass.


    Ignoring the Domain Lord Realm cultivators and demon beasts that he encountered along the way, Chu Yang continued moving deeper into the desert. Intending on reaching the area of the desert where the real danger began, and most others turned around before starting to look through the ce for opportunities.


    Although he had not yet managed to get a full picture of the desert and its danger, he felt more confident in being able to search through this danger zonepared to the other two due to the simple fact that there were far more Domain Lord Realm cultivators wandering around the desertpared to the other two danger zones, something that unmistakenly meant that the desert should be safer than those two danger zones.


    Swish~!


    So, with that in mind, Chu Yang quickly moved through the desert and soon reached the area where the true danger of the desert danger zone was supposed to start-


    "There is quite a few people even inside the supposedly dangerous part of the desert¡­"


    However, when he reached the ce, he was surprised to discover that there was still a ratherrge number of Domain Lord Realm cultivators present. Not just one or two, but close to a dozen wandering around the supposedly dangerous part of the desert without any sign of unease.


    More surprisingly, these Domain Lord Realm cultivators weren''t particrly strong, with most being around the Second or Third Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even when looking at all the Domain Lord Realm cultivators who should have entered the secret realm, a substantial number of them could be said to be inside the desert if he counted those he had encountered along his journey through the desert.


    Making a rough estimate, he guessed that 10% of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators inside the secret realm should currently be inside the desert, a high number considering the fact that there were apparently far more lucrative areas to explore inside the secret realm that were also far safer.


    "The information on the desert being dangerous is most likely false¡­"


    So, with that in mind, Chu Yang could only conclude that the information that he had obtained on the desert danger zone so far was false.


    Even though it might still be a danger zone, and the Soul Ascension Realm demon beast mentioned might really exist, it was highly likely that it wouldn''t be found unless one moved far deeper into the desert.


    More importantly, the resources or opportunities that could be found inside the desert were most likely far more precious than a few easy to hunt demon beasts in the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    This is the ce! The opportunity to reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm might very well be hidden somewhere inside this desert!


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought this to himself, Chu Yang silently decided that the desert danger zone would be the ce where he was going to search for an opportunity to reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Not only because the information on the ce had turned out different than what he had expected, but more so because he could clearly sense that those who had already explored the ce were clearly trying to hide information about the ce and try to make others avoid it if possible.


    No matter how he looked at this, it was clear that the desert was likely to have far better opportunitiespared to other danger zones¡­ And more importantly, the danger involved was clearly far lower than that of trying to search through a ce like the mountain range danger zone or the ancient ruins filled with hidden formations.


    Swish~!


    Wasting no time after making up his mind, Chu Yang confidently took a step forward as he moved deeper into the desert. Ignoring the somewhat surprised looks from the weaker Domain Lord Realm cultivators who spotted him moving deeper inside the desert.

 Chapter 1468 Progress of Chun Huas Alchemy

    Chapter 1468 Progress of Chun Hua''s Alchemy


    "Good job, Chun Hua, you have almost caught up to me in alchemy by now and it won''t be surprising if you manage to surpass me in the near future!"


    At the same time Chu Yang was busy searching for an opportunity that would allow him to reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm before the secret realm closed and forced him to face the people that were undoubtedly waiting for him on the other side, back in the sect inside arge alchemy room, Qing Yi praised her junior sister with a smile on her face. Her attention focused on the small and almost transparent liquid inside a small ss bottle currently in the hands of her junior sister.


    The liquid inside the ss bottle being a Mystic Grade Potion that would be difficult for even a Master Realm Alchemist to create. Showing that Chun Hua had managed to advance beyond the earlier stages of the Master Realm and had the qualities of a seasoned Master Realm Alchemist.


    Though still far from the peak of the realm, she had taken a crucial step on her path towards the Grandmaster Realm.


    "Hehe, thank you, senior sister. it''s all thanks to your help and master''s guidance." Because of this, Chun Hua showed a shy expression on her face as she wholeheartedly said this. Knowing that it would have been impossible for her to advance so fast in her alchemy without the help of her senior sister.


    After all, outside of her master who helped her from time to time in both her cultivation and alchemy, Qing Yi had taken out time from her own cultivation and practice to help teach her alchemy. Helping her rapidly advance to her current level, something she felt extremely grateful for.


    "No need to thank me, it''s what I should do. Although¡­ Now that you have reached this stage, there is little I can do to assist your progress. In the future, we will both have to rely on asking master or Elder Pei Yang in case we have any questions rted to the Grandmaster Realm¡­"


    "Even then, senior sister is the main reason I could progress so fast in alchemy since bing master''s disciple. After all, our master mostly focused on teaching me in regard to cultivation and how to improve my cultivation realm.


    Not to mention, I will still have to rely on senior sister''s help in the future when you break through to the Grandmaster Realm and be a Junior Grandmaster Realm Alchemist."


    "This¡­" Taken aback by what Chun Hua said, Qing Yi froze for a second as she suddenly felt a bit shy herself. "S-sure, you can rely on me when the timee, but for now, let''s both focus on analyzing this potion of yours before we send it off for the sect." However, before Chun Hua had a chance to notice, she quickly turned the focus towards the potion that had just been created.


    "Yes~!" In response, Chun Hua happily ced the potion down before starting to use her divine sense to properly examine the potion and double check that nothing was wrong with it, a standard procedure before the potion could be sent off to the sect for contribution points.


    Of course, it would be checked again when it was officially handed over, but it was generally a normal thing for anyone to examine and inspect what they nned to hand over to the sect before actually handing it over.


    Not just to avoid wasting time by potentially turning in a defective product, but more so to avoid embarrassment, as the location for handing over things like artifacts and potions to the sect was in a rather busy location next to the Grand Mission Pavilion. Always having arge number of both disciples and elders present at any given time of day.


    "Everything looks fine, it should be worth more than enough contribution points for you to spend a few days observing the Dao Enlightenment Monument."


    As the two of them finished inspecting the potion and ensuring that there was nothing wrong with it, Qing Yi slightly nodded her head as she said this, while Chun Hua happily nodded her head in agreement before picking up the potion and dashing out in the direction of the Grand Mission Pavilion to exchange the potion for contribution points. nning to visit the Grand Library of the sect and observe the Dao Enlightenment Monument with the contribution points earned like Qing Yi said.


    Although the Dao Enlightenment Monument had been handed over to the sect by their master, they still had to earn contribution points for a chance to visit and observe the Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    Of course, this was not because their master didn''t allow them to go and visit the Dao Enlightenment Monument whenever they wanted. Instead, it was more so that they as disciples would feel too embarrassed to visit the Dao Enlightenment Monument without contributing anything to the sect while the rest were spending their hard-earned contribution points.


    Not to mention, they didn''t really lose anything so to speak from doing this, as the potions or pills exchanged for contribution points came from their alchemy practice anyway.


    For Bai Ning, it was the artifacts he contributed to the sect, while Chu Yang hadn''t really had much of an opportunity to visit the Dao Enlightenment Monument.


    Mui on the other hand¡­ She had no interest in the Dao Enlightenment Monument and pretty much went on doing her own thing. Only ever getting guidance from their master.


    Outside of that, there was also the fact that the elders of the sect feared that something would end up happening to the Dao Enlightenment Monument if Mui ended up visiting it. Having subtly steered her clear of it whenever possible. Resulting in the only times she visited the Dao Enlightenment Monument being when their master had personally apanied her there to see if she could gain anything from observing it after learning about how she didn''t visit it. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Something their master ended up giving up on after finding out that the Dao Enlightenment Monument didn''t seem to have any effect on Mui''sprehension¡­

 Chapter 1469 The Oldest Disciple of the Star Shattering Sect

    Chapter 1469 The Oldest Disciple of the Star Shattering Sect


    As Chun Hua was moving towards the Grand Mission Pavilion to exchange her newly created potion for contribution points and Qing Yi went back to studying alchemy to try and push herself closer to the Grandmaster Realm, the rest of the sect was simrly moving forward without any signs of stopping. Everyone felt hopeful about the future of the sect and inspired by the constant flow of information about the world that they had never imagined before. Expanding the horizons of not only the younger disciples but also the elders of the sect.


    After all, before the establishment of the Star Shattering Sect, most of the sect elders and disciples had their view limited to the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and a few of the surrounding kingdoms. Only hearing rumors or tales of the Sky Empire and powerful cultivators in the Domain Lord Realm. The Soul Ascension Realm remaining unknown to most and only ever talked about as the realm of the mythical emperor of the Sky Empire.


    However, now they were part of a sect that not only had dozens of Domain Lord Realm Elders, but even existences above the Domain Lord Realm. Even learning about cultivation realms far beyond the formerly mythical figure in charge of the Sky Empire.


    Not only the disciples, but the elders had also experienced the rapid growth of the Star Shattering Sect that had managed to grow to a state that it could easily deal with a power like the Sky Empire in a few short years.


    More importantly, all of them experienced a rapid growth in their cultivation and strength no matter their talent. Making everyone eager to cultivate and continue growing stronger. Especially so when it came to the older disciples and elders of the sect who had once been close to the end of their lifespan but had now managed to break through their long-standing bottlenecks with the help of the new rich cultivation environment of the sect and cultivation resources. Allowing them a second chance in life.


    Considering that they had already experienced being close to death from their lifespan running out, these elders and disciples were among the most passionate when it came to increasing their cultivation realm. Never wanting to experience the dread they had felt from helplessly feeling their life reaching its end with no signs of being able to break through a higher realm and life longer.


    Among these older disciples who had been stuck for a long time with his lifespan nearing its end was Chun Huang, the oldest disciples of the sect at the age of 307. Having managed to find some life extending pills in an ancient ruin in the past that had allowed him to live beyond the normal age of someone in the Core Formation Realm.


    Even then, limited by his talent, he had only managed to reach the Sixth Stage of the Core Formation Realm by the time that the Star Shattering Sect had been established. Unable to be an elder in the Flying Sword Sect and instead turning into the oldest disciple of not just the Flying Sword Sect, but the Star Shattering Sect.


    However, after the establishment of the Star Shattering Sect, Chun Huang wasn''t discouraged and still saw hope, as he continued pushing forward even after he reached the age of 300. Soon managing to break through the long-standing bottleneck that had blocked him for hundreds of years and sessfully reaching the Seventh Stage of the Core Formation Realm.


    Unfortunately, with the establishment of the Star Shattering Sect, reaching the Late Stage of the Core Formation Realm was no longer enough for him to be an elder like it had been in the past.


    Still not discouraged, he continued pushing his already decaying body forward. The sole goal in his mind was reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, as an increased position in the sect wouldn''t help him escape from the fact that his lifespan was running out. Only reaching the Nascent Soul Realm would.


    Venturing into the dangerous battlefield with demonic cultivators, taking on some of the most dangerous missions from the mission pavilion, he umted contribution points. Using them all for cultivation resources and opportunities to listen to the lectures of the seniors of the sect. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    One such lecture was from the recently recruited elder, Pei Yang, whose insightful teaching on the Core Formation Realm allowed him to sessfully reach the Eighth Stage of the Core Formation Realm. Bringing him one step closer to his goal.


    Following this, he continued pushing forward to the point that his aging body was breaking and many of his friends tried stopping him after seeing him loosing an arm on an especially dangerous mission hunting down a demon beast that had turned out stronger than expected and actually reached the Peak of the Core Formation instead of the Seventh Stage of the Core Formation Realm that it had originally been recorded as.


    Not deterred, he continued pushing forward and soon managed to break through to the Ninth Stage of the Core Formation Realm. The Peak of the Core Formation Realm. Only a single step away from the Nascent Soul Realm.


    On this day, after several years of umtion and feeling his lifespan already reaching its limits, Chun Huang climbed up one of the Nascent Soul tforms that had been constructed close to the base of the Seventh Star Peak under the close watch of some of his old friends.


    "Nascent Soul Realm¡­ Today, I will either perish to the cloud tribtion or sessfully reach the Nascent Soul Realm. Living for another 2000 years!" Muttering this to himself as he sat down in a lotus position in the middle of the tform, Chun Huang showed no signs of hesitation as he began breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm. Understanding that he would die if he failed.


    WHOOSH~!


    BOOOM-!


    Only a short timeter, as his nascent soul was born, the cloud tribtion descended- Not an ordinary bronze cloud tribtion, but a silver cloud tribtion with a small tinge of gold present inside it!


    For the next few minutes, Chun Huang was in a world of pain. Barely managing to hold on through sheer will alone. Forcing himself from losing consciousness. Understanding that doing so would mean certain death.


    And¡­ Slowly, the tribtion came to an end. Revealing the barely alive figure of Chun Huang on top of the nascent soul ascension tform.


    "Nascent Soul Realm¡­! HAHAHAHA! I really managed to break through to the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    However, all of this didn''t matter to the person in question, as all he could think about was the fact that he had managed to sessfully ovee the cloud tribtion and break through to the Nascent Soul Realm. Officially cementing himself among the higher ups of the Star Shattering Sect, while also finally gaining the qualifications to be an elder of the sect.


    But¡­ More importantly than that, he had managed to sessfully extend his life by over a thousand years now that he had reached the Nascent Soul Realm. Meaning that he would no longer have to fear the existential dread that came with knowing that your lifespan was about toe to an end, a wonderful feeling he hadn''t felt in a long time¡­


    "Chun Huang¡­ The qualifications for bing an elder has changed a bit¡­ Being in the Nascent Soul Realm is no longer enough, you need to at least reach the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to be promoted to an elder¡­"


    "WHAT!?"


    Unfortunately, when he met up with his old friends who were there to congratte him on his breakthrough after stabilizing his cultivation base, he learnt that just reaching the Nascent Soul Realm was no longer enough to be qualified for an elder of the sect. Now he needed to at least reach the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm or the Late Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm to be an elder.


    Ignoring the oddly familiar pattern with the past requirement of bing an elder of the sect, Chun Huang wasn''t discouraged by this revtion after calming down and learning why the change had taken ce. After all, he now had over a thousand years left in him. More than enough time for him to reach the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and be an elder of the sect.


    So, with that in mind, Chun Huang, still the oldest disciple of the Star Shattering Sect, set out to continue his cultivation. Aiming to reach the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm and officially be an elder of the sect like so many of his friends had already managed to seed at, as they had reached the Nascent Soul Realm before this new change was put in ce.


    Unaware of the fact that by the time he reached the Seventh Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, just being in the Nascent Soul Realm would no longer be enough to be an elder of the Star Shattering Sect¡­

 Chapter 1470 Framework of the Sect Law Enforcement Hall

    Chapter 1470 Framework of the Sect Law Enforcement Hall


    Outside of Chun Huang, who had seed in his lifelong dream of reahing the Nascent Soul realm just before his lifespan ran out, there were countless others like him in the current Star Shattering Sect that had managed to ovee long present bottlenecks and reach brand new realms after the sect moved the Shattered Star Peaks and they had a chance to enjoy the dense spiritual qi present due to the presence of the chaotic qi formation.


    Because of this, the loyalty of both the disciples and elders of the sect could be said to have far surpassed even an old long-established empire like the Blue Sea Empire.


    Though it was not that weird considering all of them had personally been able to experience the benefits of being part of the Star Shattering Sect, be they elders, disciples or even menial servants taking care of the everyday meals. Everyone had managed to benefit from the rapid growth of the Star Shattering Sect.


    On the other hand, in an empire like the Blue Sea Empire that had been established for a long period of time already, most of the benefits had already been monopolized by a few major factions. Leaving little for those below, a problem that the Star Shattering Sect would likely also face at some point in the future when its growth started slowing down and resources became harder toe by.


    Although, at the current moment, this shouldn''t be a problem before the average level of the elders reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    Though¡­ At the point that the average level of the elders reached the Domain Lord Realm, the sect might have expanded to the point that this concern would no longer be there.


    Even then, to ensure the fair distribution of resources and also make sure that internal stability remained inside the sect when that time inevitably came, Elder Song had already teamed up with Wei Chin, the elder from the half spirit race who had managed to break through to the Domain Lord Realm, to start creating the framework for aw enforcement hall that would be in charge of managing the internal stability of the sect and punish any vitors of the sectws.


    Of course, given that it was only a simple framework of this organization being established at the time, as both Elder Song nor Wei Chin understood the importance of thew enforcement hall, the members who became part of it at the time were only those who had been part of the old Flying Sword- and Spring Flower Sect''sw enforcement halls in the past.


    The main reason not only being the fact that they had been loyal to the sect for a long time, but also because they had essentially already been taking up their old job of keeping the internal situation of the sect under control beforehand. The only difference being that they were now ced together into a single organization like they had been in the past before the establishment of the Shattered Star Sect.


    As for why this hadn''t happened earlier? That was because of the current scale of the Star Shattering Sect making it impossible to operate in the same way as the oldw enforcement halls of the Flying Sword and Spring Flower Sect had.


    After all, the two sects back then only had to manage a single main sect with a dozen or so small branches back then.


    On the other hand, the current Star Shattering Sect covered an enormous area with close to a hundred branches, the size of the old Flying Sword Sect or Spring Flower Sect. Even somerge than that like the Ascendant Frost Hall.


    Not to mention, outside of theserge branches, there were countless smaller branches that had been established all across the sect''s territory to both manage surrounding powers, while at the same time acting as a way for the sect to gather talented children who couldn''t make the journey to the main sect and avoid missing them.


    More importantly was the fact that it also served as a way for the sect to exert its influence on the surrounding powers. Making sure that none of them dared to act out of turn and go against the sect and thews it had set down.


    At the same time, they also serve as important beacons for gathering information and allowing the sect to also stay up to date on anything that happens inside the territory.


    In a way, the main reason why the mission pavilion could effectively send out the disciples on missions to hunt down demonic cultivators or demon beasts causing chaos could be attributed to these smaller branches gathering information and sending it back to the sect. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    With all of that in mind, aw enforcement hall of the Star Shattering Sect would need to be capable of exercising its power across all of these smaller andrger branches in the future, a simple framework like the one that had been used in the past by the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect simply wouldn''t work on such arge scale.


    For now, the challenge that stood before Elder Song and Wei Chin when it came to building up this brand-new organization that would in the future serve as one of the pirs of the sect, was recruiting new disciples and elders.


    Although the smaller branches could wait a bit before being integrated into the first part of thew enforcement halls framework, the Shattered Star Peaks and other important locations like the spiritual metal mine in the old Azure Sky Kingdom and the Ascendant Frost Hall couldn''t be avoided and would be among the first to see the presence of this brand-new organization.


    After all, those two locations could be far be considered among the most important to the current Star Shattering Sect, one due to the spiritual metal it provided and the second due to it being the strongest subordinate force currently under the direct control of the Star Shattering Sect.


    The independent sects, though stronger, could not be considered fully integrated in the Star Shattering Sect yet and still operated in a somewhat independent state, though that would only be a matter of time, as the disciples and elders of those independent sects became more and more interwoven with the Star Shattering Sect beforepletely integrating.


    Of course, even with this, the elders and disciples of these independent sects were already considered disciples and elders of the Star Shattering Sect. At the moment being viewed as thergest branches of the sect.

 Chapter 1471 Framework of the Sect Law Enforcement Hall (2)

    Chapter 1471 Framework of the Sect Law Enforcement Hall (2)


    As Wei Chin and Elder Song began the process of establishing thew enforcement hall for the Star Shattering Sect, it didn''t take long for news about this to spread throughout the Star Shattering Sect and the different branches of the sect. In turn, it caused arge number of disciples and elders who hadn''t taken on any profession at the moment to sign up for thew enforcement hall.


    After all, different from bing an alchemist, being a member of thew enforcement hall wouldn''t require the same level of dedication and would only require one to patrol the sect and ensure internal stability and that the sect''sws were being followed. Not just that but doing so would also result in them getting contribution points in return.


    Considering that the Star Shattering Sect was extremely peaceful internally without any split factions vying for superiority or branches that seemed to be engaged inrge scale corruption and embezzlement, it could essentially be considered free contribution points that they could earn without having to go out and risk their lives hunting down demon beasts or demonic cultivators.


    Because of this, the disciples and elders willing to join thew enforcement hall ended up surpassing thebined numbers of the Alchemy, cksmithing and Formation Hall before it had even been officially established.


    Although this could be considered great news for Wei Chin, as he didn''t have to go look for people to help fill out the ranks, he also felt a bit troubled.


    Not just had the numbers of disciples and elders wanting to be part of thew enforcement hall surpassed the initial number required for the first part of thew enforcement hall that would be centered around the sect''s most important resource gathering locations and branches, but it had more than tripled the required number¡­


    It was not that he didn''t want to add all of these eager disciples and elders willing to join. Especially so considering all of them were part of the main sect and could be considered the most trustworthy in the entire Star Shattering Sect. Instead, it was because he simply couldn''t manage so many disciples and elders at the moment.


    Even the thousand disciples and dozen Nascent Soul Realm Elders he had originally decided to add to thew enforcement hall could be considered straining the old guard who hade from the Flying Sword Sect and Spring Flower Sect''s oldw enforcement halls.


    And¡­ He understood that although he might be able to manage so many disciples and elders by stretching himself and the abilities of his subordinates to their limits, he would end up in a situation simr to the one that Elder Song currently found himself in¡­


    Though survivable, Wei Chin never wanted to take on that kind of workload and thus decided to directly limit the number of disciples and elders who could be part of thew enforcement hall to the originally nned number for now.


    To make things more interesting for the disciples and elders wanting to join thew enforcement hall (and to save himself from having to do the job himself), he decided to have thempete with each other on who could contribute the most to building up the neww enforcement hall on the Seventh Star Peak and across the chosen locations throughout the sect''s territory.


    The judges being the old guard who were already considered part of thew enforcement hall, while Wei Chin himself decided to focus on the future management of thew enforcement hall or in other words. Leaving everything to others while he quietly retreated to cultivate on his own without doing any of the work himself.


    In a sense, Wei Chin, this old grand elder of the half spirit race, was truly skillful at his job, able tomand those under him to efficiently do his work for him.


    Even more so, he had managed to sessfully fool arge portion of the sect''s elders and disciples into working for him and helping him establish the initial framework of thew enforcement hall without offering a single contribution point in return.


    "Competition¡­ Hm¡­ Maybe I should establish more suchpetition in the future¡­"


    As the grand elder of the half spirit race and the future head of thew enforcement retreated into his private quarters to cultivate while thepetition for bing part of thew enforcement hall began ying out, a new idea for the future direction of thew enforcement hall spring forth inside his head as he observed the excited disciples and elders dashing off toplete the task that had been given to them without expecting a single contribution point in return¡­


    In the following days, as the information of thew enforcement hall began to spread through the Star Shattering Sect''s branches and the presence of this new organization began to pop up in several important locations, it didn''t take long before it caught the attention of the different major powers who had been monitoring the Star Shattering Sect.


    Although, after a quick look and learning about thisw enforcement hall, they quickly threw the matter to the back of their mind.


    After all, thew enforcement hall operated as the internal security of the sect and was tasked with upholding the sectws and ensure that they were being followed. Punishing any disciples or elders found in vitions of said rules andws.


    For a sect- or any power so to speak, such an organization was crucial for stability and would always be present, though the name might be different.


    Only newly emerged powers who hadn''t been around for long couldck such a fundamental pir and not for long, though, none of them considered this to be the case with the Star Shattering Sect. Not giving the newly establishedw enforcement hall a second thought as they returned to passively observing the movements of the Star Shattering Sect. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    After all, the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient hidden sect that had been around for an untold number of years, it was impossible for it to not have some kind of internal stabilizing force¡­

 Chapter 1472 Digging His Own Grave...

    Chapter 1472 Digging His Own Grave...


    As thew enforcement hall started toe into existence, it ended up drawing the attention of the different independent sects who had already be a part of the Star Shattering Sect after they moved their sects to its territory and settled there in the past.


    In turn, it caused these different independent sects to take the initiative to contact Elder Wei Chin about thew enforcement hall and help in the establishment of aw enforcement hall inside their own sects.


    Not only because this would help them close the gap between themselves and the Star Shattering Sect, but also because they understood that there was no reason for them to fear the Star Shattering Sect using thew enforcement hall as a way to undermine their power. After all, the Star Shattering Sect was already far more powerful than them and could have done so long ago if they wanted to.


    Because of this, thew enforcement hall ended up growing beyond what had first been nned with the help of these independent sects taking the opportunity to join in, though it didn''t cause any problems for Wei Chin, as the independent sects- or branch sects, took control of the situations inside the territories they were in charge of. Resulting in no extra workload so to speak.


    Instead, just serving to motivate the ones currentlypeting with each other for a chance to join thew enforcement hall to be more excited and not wanting to be outdone by these newly joinedpetitors who seemed to have joined out of nowhere.


    In an odd twist of fate, thew enforcement hall ended up saving even more sect resources, as the different independent sects andter on even other branch sects or the Star Shattering Sect began to take the initiative to constructw enforcement halls of their own. Using the resources they had on hand without requesting anything from the main sect to help with the construction.


    By the time Wei Chin went out to check on the situation, he discovered that thew enforcement hall had somehow already managed to establish itself across the territory of the sect without him doing much work outside of starting a littlepetition among the disciples and elders who wanted to join thew enforcement hall.


    Even more surprising, Wei Chin found himself being praised like the heavens above by Elder Song, who had beenpletely awed and taken aback by just how efficient he had been in establishing thew enforcement hall while using close to no resources from the sect. Especially so considering that everyone involved in establishing thew enforcement hall seemed filled with pride even though they themselves were not part of this newly established pir of the Star Shattering Sect.


    "¡­"


    In the end, Wei Chin could only silently take the praise he was given with a somewhat speechless expression on his face. Not knowing what he had done nor how he had suddenly turned into a miraculous manager in the eyes of Elder Song.


    All he knew for certain was that he would now have to manage a muchrgerw enforcement hall than he had first expected. No longer able to gradually expand the scope of thew enforcement hall and offset the workload to others like he had originally nned.


    Unfortunately, even if he wanted toin about his current situation, there was nothing he could do about it, as he had essentially ced himself in the current situation because he wanted to try avoiding a simr situation to the one Elder Song was in.


    On that note¡­ He did avoid ending up in a simr situation to Elder Song. Instead, his current situation was much worse¡­


    "Haha, Elder Wei Chin, I never knew you were a kindred spirit in this regard. Never wanting to waste sect resources and taking on the burden yourself. Truly an inspiration for the younger generation! Well then, I won''t take up any more of your precious time and will allow you to get to work on establishing thew enforcement hall throughout the territory of the sect."


    Unaware of Wei Chin''s thoughts, Elder Song, who had been standing beside him praising him, soon stood up as he said this with an overjoyed expression on his face before turning around to leave in the direction of his home at Seventh Star Peak.


    "As expected of Elder Wei¡­"


    "He is taking on the hardest task himself¡­ Truly a member of the older generation that we can look up to!"


    "Amazing¡­ If I had that kind of workload in front of me, I would have long since defected from the sect¡­"


    "Sssh! Don''t say that! This is why we are the juniors, and he is the senior!"


    At the same time Elder Song left, the disciples and elders who had been chosen to be part of thew enforcement hall all chatted among each other as they looked over towards Wei Chin filled with both respect and awe at the gargantuan task that stood before him in establishing thew enforcement hall on his own.


    Although there were currently only a little over a thousand members of thew enforcement hall, none of the disciples or elders present felt the slightest bit dispirited at the difficult task that stood in front of them. Instead, they only felt more inspired to give it their all in establishing thew enforcement hall and ensuring that every part of the sect knew about them and respected them.


    By far, the main reason for this unbreaking spirit was the newly established head of thew enforcement hall, Wei Chin, who would be taking on most of the work all by himself. Inspiring all of them to do their best as well.


    I want to go back to cultivating in seclusion again¡­ n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Unknown to them, this heroic senior who was going to take on the hardest work was crying on the inside. Regretting that he hadn''t taken a more active role in the first few days of establishing the framework of thew enforcement hall. Having blindly left it to others¡­

 Chapter 1473 Future Plans... Involving the Formation Hall!

    Chapter 1473 Future ns... Involving the Formation Hall!


    At the same time Wei Chin begrudgingly began working on thew enforcement hall under the constant surveince of the newly joined members of thew enforcement hall, Elder Song had already begun focusing on another aspect of the Star Shattering Sect. No longer feeling the need to worry or think about thew enforcement hall as it seemed the Wei Chin was fully capable of handling the situation there by himself.


    Even without him around, given that Wei Chin was simr to himself in the way he worked, Elder Song was certain that thew enforcement hall establishment would go without any problems.


    With that in mind, he was now focused on another important aspect of the sect that needed immediate attention and that was the construction of specialized cultivation environments for some of the more unique cultivators of the sect that required certain unique environments for cultivation.


    These kinds of unique environments could be anything from a ce with constant snowfall to an active volcano that allowed a closer connection to the Dao of Fire.


    Although thebat hall could help in simting some of these environments and had been doing just that already, it could not be used for day-to-day cultivation.


    However, solving this problem was difficult given the still rather limited resources of the sect when it came to creating these kinds of unique environments for cultivation.


    Not to mention, even if the resources were avable, the current Star Shattering Sectcked specialized individual capable of creating such unique cultivation environments. The only person he could realistically think of when it came to this kind of thing being Xuan Hao, but¡­ Asking him for help in this kind of situation would at most be a temporary solution to the problem and wouldn''t be a permanent one.


    For this reason, Elder Song soon found himself turning his attention towards the formation hall that had recently entered the spotlight after a younger disciple managed to break through to the Grandmaster Realm.


    When it came to creating unique cultivation environments, a skilled formation master was by far the most important. Especially so when it came to keeping said environments in an ideal state all year round.


    If the sect wanted to create unique cultivation environment useful for both the elders and disciples of the sect, it was important for the sect to have arge number of skilled formation masters. Not just to create these unique environments, but more so to repair and inspect the formations that would create these unique cultivation environments.


    After all, maintenance was important in the long run and was definitely not something he could bother Xuan Hao with doing all the time. Especially so considering that the number of unique environments that needed to be created and maintained far surpassed the few teleportation formations and the formations at thebat hall.


    Not to mention, he nned to create unique cultivation environments not just in the main sect at the Shattered Star Peaks, but also across the sects expanding number of branches. Even aiming to create some specialized branches focusing on one specific path, an example being the old Flying Sword Sect turning into a branch fully focused on the Dao of the Sword. Ensuring a ce wholeheartedly focused on nurturing sword cultivators.


    Although¡­ the example of the old Flying Sword Sect bing a branch focused entirely on the Dao of the Sword already seemed to have be a reality at this point due to the influence of Feng Chen who visited the old sect every now and then and gave lectures to the disciples and elders cultivating there. Inevitably leading them down the path of the sword as a result¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about the old Flying Sword Sect, Elder Song focused his attention back on the future development of the formation hall.


    Given how important the development of the formation hall had be in his eyes at this point in time and the fact that it wascking a bit behindpared to the cksmithing hall and the alchemy hall, Elder Song didn''t waste much time, as he directly focused a significant quantity of resources towards developing the formation hall.


    This was different from just advertising the formation hall and trying to use his own name to get disciples and elders to join, as it was a direct increase in the resources avable to those already part of the formation hall. Increasing the resources that they needed to advance as formation masters. Ushering the formation hall and its members into a period of rapid growth, as the disciples and elders who were part of the formation hall were already fully absorbed in trying toprehend the intricate formation symbols used in constructing the different teleportation formations throughout the sect.


    Among the disciples and elders of the formation hall, the one who ended up benefiting the most from this sudden increase in resources was Fang Yu, who, already being at the Grandmaster Realm and havingprehended the Dao of Formations to the Elementary Realm, took the opportunity to further her understanding of the intricate formation symbols used in the construction of the teleportation formations throughout the sect.


    Reaching the point where she gained an initial understanding of how they functioned, a terrifying achievement considering her low cultivation realm and close to nonexistentprehension of the Dao of Space.


    Of course, she was still far from fully understanding the formation symbols as it contained Xuan Hao''s understanding of the Dao of Space and Dao of Formations, which both reached the Large Sess Realm, but it was a major step that allowed herprehension of the Dao of Formations to rapidly increase.


    Seeing this growth in not just Fang Yu, but the rest of the formation hall as well, Elder Song became more certain of his decision, as he continued funneling more resources towards the formation hall. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Of course, at the same time, Fang Yu and some of the more skilled formation masters help the sect in setting up formations throughout the sect and across some of the more important branches. Making the cultivation environment better and increasing the protection of some of the branches that only had basic protective formations or none at all by establishing new protective formation capable of at least resisting someone in the Nascent Soul Realm.

 Chapter 1474 Unexpected Progress

    Chapter 1474 Unexpected Progress


    At the same time that Elder Song began to tilt the sect resources in the favor of the formation hall in an attempt to help the formation hall grow so they could help him archive his goals as fast as possible, Xuan Hao opened his eyes after having spent a few days fully focused onprehending the Dao of Space. Attempting to reach the Perfection Realm that seemed to be more difficult than reaching the heavens.


    Among the things he got used to doing when taking a small break before going back toprehending the Dao of Space was checking the progress of the different quest he had or more specifically the sect quest that he knew would be progressing on their own over time even without him doing anything.


    [Sect Quest: Establish a Proper Formation Hall] [Formation Hall Disciples (Below Master Realm): 285/500] [Formation Hall Elders (Master Realm): 3/10] [Formation Hall Elders (Grandmaster Realm): 1/1 (Complete)] [Reward: Dao of Formations Comprehension, Formation Diagrams, Formation Training Stones, Formation Construction Materials] "Hm? Why did this quest suddenly end up progressing so fast¡­?"


    And among the three remaining sect quests that he had yet toplete, the progress experienced by the formation hall stood out immediately. Having experienced a level of growth far beyond what he had expected it to have even in a year, as the disciples had almost doubled and the formation masters in the Master Rm gone from a measly one to three.


    Knowing that something major should have happened for such a growth to take ce, he didn''t waste any time before using his divine sense to gather information. Soon discovering what had happened, while at the same time figuring out what Elder Song was up to.


    Although he wanted to help Elder Song, he also understood why he hadn''te to find him to help out with the situation, as the sect couldn''t rely only on him. Especially so with how the sect was growing at the moment.


    Even if there were no ns to expand the territory outside of a few locations in the chaotic regions at the core of the fallen Sky Empire at the moment, the current size of the Star Shattering Sect and the number of branches that had been established over the past few years made it impossible for him to be the one responsible for constructing formations and other important infrastructure for the sect everywhere.


    Doing it at the main sect and maintaining the formations there along with a few other important locations was fine, but anything beyond that would start cutting into his cultivation time and the time used on his disciples.


    Because of this, he felt rather happy learning about what Elder Song was up to, as it might even result in him not having to worry about maintaining the different formations, he had constructed inside the Shattered Star Peaks on his own.


    After all, outside of the teleportation formations, chaotic qi formation and the formations at thebat hall, he had worked on a few formations here and there throughout the Shattered Star Peaks that was used not just by his own disciples, but also other disciples.


    Maintaing and repairing these formations would be far simpler than maintaining or repairing the teleportation formations or other more important formations he had set up.


    Actually¡­ Looking at the current formation hall, Fang Yu, who had already reached the Junior Grandmaster Realm in formations could be said to have the capability to repair most of those formations, while the three in the Master Realm should be able to take care of some of the simplest formations he had set up.


    With that in mind, he could already start taking advantage of the formation hall to take care of some of the things that he would usually have to do on his own.


    "Truly a forward thinker¡­" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a renewed sense of admiration for Elder Song as he once again realized just how capable this old man was when it came to aiding the development of the Star Shattering Sect.


    In a sense, he felt it was a bit of a pity that the old man''s talent for cultivation was so low. Otherwise, he would almost certainly have overtaken Feng Chen at this point in time and cemented himself as the sect master.


    Looking at his strength at the current moment, even though he had reached the Nascent Soul Realm and had set aside time to cultivate every now and then, he was only on the Fifth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm. Falling behind some of the other elders who were fully focused on cultivating and didn''t have to spend any time managing the internal situation of the sect.


    Even then, the main reason why he could even reach the Fifth Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm despite having little more than a day or two a week dedicated to cultivation was due to the fact that he often interacted with figures like himself and Pei Yang, who both guided him and personally taught him every now and again. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    That, along with the vast quantity of resources he had at his disposal due to his position as the main person in charge of the sect''s resources distribution.


    The Nascent Soul Realm is a bit weak. Especially as the average level of the rest of the elders increase and potentially even reach the Domain Lord Realm in the future. Maybe I need to dedicate some time to trying to find a way to help Elder Song reach the Domain Lord Realm in the future¡­?


    Turning to look off in the direction of Elder Song now hard at work improving the formation hall, which in turn helped himplete one of his sect quests faster, Xuan Hao could not help thinking that he should try and find a way to help Elder Song increase his cultivation realm. Not just so he could keep up with the rest of the elders, but also to reward him for all the hard work he was putting in to help the sect grow over the years.

 Chapter 1475 Helping Elder Song

    Chapter 1475 Helping Elder Song


    As he thought about finding a way to help Elder Song reach the Domain Lord Realm in the future, it didn''t take long before he thought about different special spiritual herbs that could help enhancing the strength of the soul. After all, the most important aspect of progressing through the Nascent Soul Realm was strengthening the Nascent Soul itself.


    Establishing a pseudo domain before taking on the final challenge of establishing a full-fledged domain was only something one would have to deal with at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm and wasn''t really something that Elder Song had to worry about at the moment. Especially considering that the sect had the Dao Enlightenment Monument to help out with that when the time came.


    For the current Elder Song, the most useful thing would be different spiritual herbs or pills that could help improve the strength of his soul. At the same time also helping make up for the damage that might still be lingering from the demonic technique he had used in the past to ensure the safety of his granddaughter.


    The only problem with this was that spiritual herbs, pills or potions that could strengthen the soul were incredibly rare and hard toe by.


    Even at his current cultivation realm, something that could increase the strength of his soul. No matter how little, it was incredibly precious.


    After all, as the strength of the soul increased, it would makeprehending the Dao easier.


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao felt a bit reluctant when thinking about giving up something that valuable to Elder Song instead of using it himself.


    "Haaa¡­ What am I thinking about, most soul based pills, potions or spiritual herbs useful to me is far too much for someone at the Nascent Soul Realm to handle. Not to mention, the things that can be given to Elder Song won''t really make that much of a difference and might not even be useful to me at my current realm¡­"


    Shaking his head as he muttered this to himself with a somewhat wry smile on his face, Xuan Hao quickly discarded his somewhat greedy thoughts when thinking about the prospect of getting his hand on something that could help increase the strength of his soul. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    As he said, although the things useful for increasing the strength of someone in the Nascent Soul Realm might be useful to him, it would be negligible considering his current strength at the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm where his soul strength was only a single step below someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Even if he took that kind of soul strengthening pill or potion at the Soul Rank, it was likely that he wouldn''t even notice anything happening, as it would be no different from cultivating normally.


    "Maybe I could go visit the Explorer Union and see if I could find something through them? Even if it ends up being a bit expensive to do so, it''s not like I''mcking spirit stones at the moment¡­" As he slowly focused his attention back on how to find something that could help Elder Song more smoothly reach the Domain Lord Realm, it did not take long before his attention turned towards the Explorer Union.


    Although the Explorer Union was not really that developed in the territory of the Star shattering Sect and at most had someone in the Domain Lord Realm stationed in the branch closest to the Shattered Star Peaks at the moment, it was not a lie to say that the Explorer Union had the most extensivework that prated every inch of the continent. Present almost anywhere and capable of getting almost everything one could need.


    Of course, after reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it was hard to get anything really useful from the Explorer Union, as resources that could aid him in his cultivation would almost certainly be focused on the core members of the Explorer Union.


    At the time, he hadn''t really traded with the Explorer Union since all the way back when he had gone to help out his first disciple and needed information on the special spiritual herb required to awaken her divine physique.


    Most of the trade that had happened with the Explorer Union was mostly through the sect itself and the Explorer Union. Not something he individually engaged in, but instead something that was mostly managed by Elder Song, who sold off the things that were not needed for the sect to the Explorer Union for something more useful.


    Because of this, he had some idea that the Explorer Union was more than capable of getting their hands on certain special spiritual herbs, pill or potions that could help someone in the Nascent Soul Realm increase their strength, it was only that the price of these kinds of things were far too high and it was much better for the Star Shattering Sect to focus its resources on getting other things instead.


    After all, the current Star Shattering Sect wasn''t really filled with people stuck somewhere in the Nascent Soul Realm in need of such high price things to break through said bottlenecks.


    Instead, the current elders and disciples of the Star Shattering Sect were making smooth progress through the Nascent Soul Realm, and most wouldn''t waste contribution points on something that might save them a few weeks or months when they also focused on saving up to visit the Dao Enlightenment Monument that had a far better effect on helping them reach the Domain Lord Realm in the future¡­


    Whoosh~!


    With that in mind, Xuan Hao decided to take a stroll during this small break to visit the closest branch of the Explorer Union to see if he could get his hands on something that could help increase Elder Song''s strength without having to go through too much trouble outside of spending a few spiritual stones.


    At the same time also nning to update the status of his old identity at the Explorer Union he had made in the past and adjust it to the Domain Lord Realm instead of the Nascent Soul Realm.

 Chapter 1476 Helping Elder Song (2)

    Chapter 1476 Helping Elder Song (2)


    Arriving at the closest branch of the Explorer Union to the Shattered Star Peaks that was in a rtively small town between the Flying Sword Sect and the Shattered Star Peaks, Xuan Hao was a bit surprised that the city itself had not grown anyrger considering the presence of the Explorer Union branch there being by far one of thergest he had seen so far with at least three people in the Domain Lord Realm present inside the branch.


    However, after careful consideration, he quickly realized why, as although the town was close to the Shattered Star Peaks and the Fallin Star City, there wasn''t really much of an opportunity for explorers or wandering cultivators to find something to do in the surrounding area. Trading would be far better to do in the Falling Star City, while taking on missions or hunting for demon beast or spiritual herbs would be far better to do in one of the branches closer to the Burning Mountain Range.


    In a sense, the sole reason for such arge branch existing in such a small town without any real value was due to the fact that the branch served as the main connection between the Star Shattering Sect and the Explorer Union.


    Although the ce was not often visited by wandering cultivators or explorers from the Explorer Union, it was the main location for the Star Shattering Sect to engage inrge scale trade with the Explorer Union, something that was happening more and more with the growth of the Star Shattering Sect and as resources inside the sect became more abundant.


    For this reason alone, the Explorer Union had delegated three Domain Lord Realm cultivators to guard this seemingly insignificant branch that only served the single purpose of trading with the Star Shattering Sect.


    At the same time, though the branch wasn''t frequented often, it had far better resources avablepared to any other branches of the Explorer Union outside of the core region of the continent due to the fact that it was engaging in direct trade with the Star Shattering Sect, a power that was by now viewed by all as being no weaker than the major powers in the core region of the continent.


    Because of that, the few wandering cultivators and explorers who did end up visiting this branch were mostly of higher cultivation looking for something not avable in other branches.


    Using his divine sense to scan the branch, Xuan Hao discovered that outside of the three Domain Lord Realm cultivators there to manage the branch and engage in trade with his sect, there were another four Domain Lord Realm cultivators and over a dozen Nascent Soul Realm cultivators who were all close to the Peak of the Realm.


    It was easy to guess why they were there, as the Domain Lord Realm cultivators hade seeking things for cultivation normally not avable in branches outside the core region, while the Nascent Soul Realm cultivators hade looking for an opportunity to reach the Domain Lord Realm.


    In a sense, their purpose was not that different from him, as the thing he was looking for would almost certainly be useful to all of these people as well.


    The only problem would likely be the price being too high for them.


    After all, they were wandering cultivators and didn''t have any kind of major power backing them, making them far poorer than someone from a sect or arge kingdom. Unless they had been lucky enough to stumble upon a treasure during their time as wandering cultivators, though¡­ That was unlikely, as most wandering cultivators wouldn''t have that kind of luck. Most often spend their time wandering the continent aimlessly in search of opportunities and selling off the demon beasts they hunted along the way to the Explorer Union.


    Silently descending into a secluded part of the small town without being discovered, Xuan Hao adopted his old identity of bright sword, a Nascent Soul Realm explorer. An identity that he had not used for years. Soon enough, finding himself in front of the Explorer Union branch before he quietly made his way inside and went up to change the cultivation realm he was registered as from the Nascent Soul Realm to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Considering that it had been around a dozen years since he hadst been to a branch and he had not specified his realm inside the Nascent Soul Realm back when he had first registered at the Explorer Union, there wasn''t much surprise from the clerk outside of meeting a Domain Lord Realm cultivator.


    Even then, the surprise of the clerk wasn''t that much considering that Domain Lord Realm cultivators were rather easy to find inside this specific branch. Even cultivators in the Soul Ascension Realm sometime came to trade for specific things that could normally only be found inside the core region of the continent.


    Because of this, after helping Xuan Hao change his realm in his registration at the Explorer Union from the Nascent Soul Realm to the Domain Lord Realm, she calmly handed his token back to him before asking if there was anything else she could help out with¡­ And it was at this point that she truly ended up being surprised, as Xuan Hao didn''t hold back in the slightest and directly listed out several extremely expensive pills and spiritual herbs that would aid in the cultivation of the nascent soul.


    What more, he even showed off a few top-grade spirit stones to show he had enough to buy what he was asking for. Forcing the small clerk to run off in panic as she went to get the higher ups to help out. Knowing that she didn''t have the ability to conduct a trade at this level, as she herself was only a small clerk that had just recently managed to break through to the Core Formation Realm with the help of resources provided by the Explorer Union.


    Of course, there was also a sense of excitement inside her amidst the panic she felt upon facing such arge deal. Understanding that if this kind of deal really went through, she would undoubtedly be rewarded. Giving her ess to far more resources inside the Explorer Union and perhaps also giving her a clear chance to strive for the Nascent Soul Realm herself in the future.


    As for the Domain Lord Realm¡­ There was no way she dared think about something like that at the moment. Reaching the Nascent Soul Realm would be more than enough for her considering that she would be able to live up to two thousand years if she really managed to reach the Nascent Soul Realm.


    More importantly, she would be able to keep her youthful appearance in the process. Allowing her to stay young for over a thousand years!


    Truthfully, as a small clerk of the Explorer Union who had never really left her hometown and had only been a clerk since she started cultivating, her dream wasn''t that big, and she only really wished to reach the Nascent Soul Realm to keep her youthful appearance and live longer¡­


    Thump~ Thump~ n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    As the little clerk disappeared upstairs where the three in charge of the branch were located, it didn''t take long before a staunch looking middle-aged man rushed downstairs with the little clerk in question following closely behind him.


    "Are you the one who wants to buy all those Soul Rank spiritual herbs and pills for enhancing the nascent Soul?"


    And upon reaching the desk where he was standing, the man didn''t waste any time as he directly asked this with a serious expression on his face. Making it clear that he wasn''t there to y around.


    "Yes, I''m the one, I wonder if this branch has those-"


    "Yes, we do, but you should know how expensive those kinds of soul enhancing pills and spiritual herbs are. Even if it''s only of the Soul Rank, the price is normally the same Mustic Grade and sometime even Transcendent Grade pills and spiritual herbs!"


    Nodding his head with the still serious expression before he directly interrupted him to exin the high price of the things he wanted, the manager from the Explorer Union was clearly doubtful as to whether or not he had the spirit stones to pay for something like that.


    If not for the fact that he was someone in the Domain Lord Realm, it was highly likely that he would have been even ruder than he had already been.


    Although, it was understandable considering even someone in the Soul Ascension Realm would normally not be able to buy the things he had mentioned just now.


    "Good, this should be more than enough to prove that I''m serious about this-"


    Thump-!


    Not wasting any time, as he understood only showing his wealth would convince this guy, Xuan Hao directly took out a small bag of top-grade spirit stones and ced them on the counter in front of the middle-aged man without the slightest bit of hesitation.


    "TOP GRADE SPIRIT STONES!? This¡­ I understand, I will bring the spiritual herbs and pills immediately!" Seeing the top-grade spirit stones that should be impossible to find outside the core region of the continent, the serious expression on the face of the staunch middle-aged man became even more serious as he couldn''t stop himself from eximing loudly at the sight of the spirit stones.


    Although this did end up drawing greedy stares from the surrounding explorers present inside the branch, Xuan Hao didn''t really care about it. Even if the others thought he might have stumbled upon some kind of ancient treasure or found a precious opportunity that allowed him to get his hands on so many top-grade spirit stones. Believing that they could ambush him after he left the branch and seize it for themselves, it didn''t matter to him with his current strength.


    If someone was really foolish enough to try and attack him to seize his wealth, he would be more than happy to teach them a lesson.


    Of course, with his strength still being in the Domain Lord Realm, the only ones who were seriously considering trying to ambush him were the four other Domain Lord Realm cultivators present.


    The three from the Explorer Union likely wouldn''t do anything given that doing so would damage the reputation of the Explorer Union and almost certainly result in punishment from above. Not to mention, it might also damage the trade rtionship they had established here with the Star Shattering Sect, something far more valuable than a few top-grade spirit stones.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao was able to smoothly get the things he wanted after the staunch middle-aged man returned and happily took his spirit stones.


    In the end, after beating up two of the four Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had decided to team up to try and steal from him after he left the Explorer Union, Xuan Hao maintained a rxed pace as he made his way back the Star Shattering Sect.


    Along the way using his divine sense to pinpoint Elder Song''s location, which, to no one''s surprise, was inside his study working on some kind of n regarding future expansion of the formation hall.


    Seeing how hard at work he was and how it was to help himplete one of his three remaining sect quests, Xuan Hao could not help feeling touched and became even more certain that it was right to spend a bit of his wealth on buying so many resources to help Elder Song''s cultivation.


    The main problem that stood before him when it came to giving these resources to Elder Song was the fact that he would almost certainly try and give them to the younger disciples of the sect who had reached the Nascent Soul Realm and had more potential than himself.


    The truly difficult task would be to find a way to prevent something like that from happening, something that even now seemed like an almost impossible task.


    ¡­


    "Hm? Xuan Hao? What do I owe the pleasure at this time of day?" Lifting his head from the stack of papers in front of him, Elder Song could not help feeling a bit puzzled at the sudden appearance of Xuan Hao inside his study. Not having expected this number one expert of the sect who remained elusive and hard to find on a normal day to appear in front of him in the middle of a busy workday. Especially considering that he had heard from his disciples that he was supposed to be in secluded cultivation at the time.


    "Elder Song, it''s been a while, I''m here to give you a little something that will be helpful in your cultivation."


    "Helpful in my cultivation? Are you talking about things that can enhance my nascent soul!? Don''t use something precious like that on someone old like me, it would be much better to use on the younger generation. Especially that child Fang Yu from the formation hall who recently reached the Nascent Soul Realm!"


    Hearing what Xuan Hao said and his purpose for showing up, Elder Song couldn''t keep himself calm as he directly rose from his seat to deny the interspatial ring that Xuan Hao had taken out and handed over to him.


    No matter how much these kinds of things could help him increase his cultivation realm and progress faster through the Nascent Soul Realm, Elder Song also understood that it would be far more useful in the hands of a young talent like Fang Yu, who would serve as the core of the sect when she grew up in the future.


    "Elder Song, you can''t refuse this! This time around it''s not just to help your strength increase, but more importantly, it''s to help heal up some of the injuries that have been left in your soul after using that demonic technique.


    Although hard to sense at the moment, if not dealt with soon, those hidden injuries in your soul might worsen over time and prevent you from progressing any further in the future!"


    "This¡­ I understand¡­"


    Listening to what Xuan Hao said as he stuffed the interspatial ring back into his hands again, Elder Song could not help freezing for a second before reluctantly epting the interspatial ring after hearing him mention the injuries his soul had suffered back when he had used the demonic technique to save his granddaughter.


    Even though he himself could not sense any injuries inside his soul any longer, he also understood that the demonic technique had indeed damaged his soul on a fundamental level.


    With that in mind, he trusted what Xuan Hao said, as he was far stronger than himself and should have a better idea about the current state of his soul.


    Willing as he might be to give up these kinds of treasures for the younger generation of the sect, he also understood how important he himself was to the Star Shattering Sect as a whole.


    Not to mention, he didn''t want his own path to be cut off if it was possible to avoid¡­


    Seeing Elder Song take the interspatial ring and keep it without mentioning giving the things inside to others any longer, Xuan Hao understood that he had seed in convincing the old man to use the spiritual herbs and pills inside for himself.


    Though he had lied a little bit to achieve this, the result was good and thus he chatted a bit longer with Elder Song about the development of the formation hall before he took his leave and returned to his room to continueprehending the Dao of Space after his little break.

 Chapter 1477 Special Sand

    Chapter 1477 Special Sand


    Returning to focus onprehending the Dao of Space once again, Xuan Hao didn''t n on taking any more small breaks to check the progress of the different sect quests he had at the moment. Only intending to leave in case something threatening the sect happened or his disciples were in trouble.


    After all, even though he could likelyplete the two sect quests rted to the cksmithing hall and formation hall without much trouble in a short time if he really put his focus towards it, he didn''t feel like it would make any significant difference when it came to hisprehension of the Dao of Formations and the Dao of cksmithing.


    Having alreadypleted the sect quest rted to the Dao of Alchemy, he understood that theprehension he would be given from the system wouldn''t be enough for him to close the gap between the Large Sess Realm and the Perfection Realm for either of the two Daos.


    At most he would be able to close the distant significantly and potentially get a few insights regarding the Perfection Realm of the two Daos, but breaking through to the Perfection Realm in one fell swoop with the help of theprehension from the system would be impossible with his currentprehension of the Dao of cksmithing and Formations.


    With that in mind, he found it to be much better to just focus his attention onprehending the Dao of Space for now, as the two sect quests would essentially end uppleting themselves without him wasting any of his precious cultivation time on trying toplete them faster.


    ¡­


    At the same time Xuan Hao decided to dedicate his time toprehending the Dao of Space once again, back in the secret realm far off in the neutral territory, Chu Yang was cautiously searching through the sand looking for an opportunity.


    Unfortunately, even after spending over a week inside the desert searching like the rest of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators also inside the desert, he hadn''t managed to find anything that could help him breakthrough to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    On the other hand, he had seen several other Domain Lord Realm cultivators rushing off excitedly after having found something while also doing their best to avoid confronting anyone while seemingly escaping from the desert in a hurry to use whatever opportunity that they had ended up getting their hands on. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The only reason why Chu Yang didn''t involve himself with these Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had clearly gotten their hands on something good was rather simple, as the opportunity that they had gotten their hands on wasn''t in any way unique but was a kind of special sand that could be found inside the desert that aided in cultivation at the Domain Lord Realm.


    Having found some of this special sand himself, he had long since realized that although useful for cultivation in the Domain Lord Realm, it proved of little use to him in his current cultivation realm.


    If he wanted to use that special sand to breakthrough, he would need it in a quantity that was equivalent to a handful, something unrealistic to gather considering that what was found most of the time was only a grain or two of the sand and in some special cases three or four grains.


    Even robbing everyone who had found some so far would at most put his total gathered special sand from 10 grains of sand to a little over 100, still far from making up a small handful that would be around ten thousand grains of sand.


    Of course, he could always just gather the special sand slowly, as he seemed to find some every day with his powerful divine sense scanning through the desert without any problems so far, but he didn''t have more than a few months left before the secret realm closed. Far from enough time for him to gather the required amount of the special sand to propel his strength to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    As for why he didn''t head any deeper inside the desert like he had originally been nning earlier on¡­


    Rumble~!


    The reason for that was the was the massive sandworm that was currently moving around not too far away from where he was currently standing, a terrifying pressure indicating that it had reached the Soul Ascension Realm clearly radiating off its body as it prevented anyone from getting close to it as it moved around the desert at a leisurely pace.


    Even though this sight had frightened him in the past when he first saw the sandworm that had been rumored to be an extremely terrifying demon beast that could attack at any moment, he had learnt through observation and talking with some of the other Domain Lord Realm cultivators present that the sandworm was essentially harmless as long as you kept out of its way and didn''t go any deeper inside the desert.


    As for the reason why so many Domain Lord Realm cultivators had wandered so far into the desert in the first ce. Even risking an attack from the sandworm¡­ That was because the special sand was more abundant the deeper one went into the desert, and this was by far the deepest one could go without encountering any real, life-threatening danger outside of having to watch out for the sandworm that might move closer every now and then.


    Compared to the outer edges of the desert where even finding a single grain of the special sand a week was considered lucky, here, even the weakest Domain Lord Realm cultivator could easily find five or more grains of sand a week without much difficulty.


    I will have to go deeper into the desert if I want a chance at reaching the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm before the secret realm closes¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he thought about the current situation and how it would be impossible for him to gather enough of the special sand to breakthrough to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm at his current gathering speed, Chu Yang ultimately ended uping to the simple conclusion that he would have to head deeper into the desert where the special sand was more abundant if he wanted to have a chance at reaching the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm before the secret realm closed.


    Rather than spending his time moving to the other dangerous locations and trying to figure out if they had an opportunity for him to reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm hidden inside of them, he would much rather prefer staying in the desert where he now understood such an opportunity existed through the presence of the special sand he had gathered so far.


    Not to mention, even if moving deeper into the desert seemed dangerous and might result in him having to use one of the two remaining talismans from his master, he also understood that the other dangerous locations in the secret realm were likely not any less dangerous and might even be more dangerous.


    More importantly, there was no guarantee that they contained an opportunity for him to reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lod Realm!


    Instead of that, avoiding the seemingly peaceful sandworm and gathering a bit of sand seemed like a far better path forward.

 Chapter 1478 Danger Lurking All Around

    Chapter 1478 Danger Lurking All Around


    n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    As Chu Yang steeled himself for the danger that came with moving deeper inside the desert and began moving past the invisible line that none had dared to bypass out of fear of attracting the attention of the sandworm roaming not too far away, it didn''t take long before he drew the attention of the surrounding Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had been searching through the sand like he had done a short time ago.


    "Hey¡­ is that guy nning on moving deeper inside the desert?"


    "What a fool, he should know how dangerous it is with that sandworm roaming visible from where we are standing! He is probably just unsatisfied with his gains so far and is overtaken by greed knowing that he can gather more of that special sand by moving deeper inside the desert."


    "Is that really the case? From what I can sense, he should be around the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Not like those foolish ones wandering into the deeper parts of the desert to never appear again."


    "It doesn''t matter if he is stronger, it doesn''t matter in front of a demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm!"


    "I just hope he won''t end up drawing that sandworm over here and cause trouble for the rest of us¡­"


    However, instead of just observing from a distance, the Domain Lord Realm cultivators all started chatting amongst each other, with most of themining over the fact that he might end up drawing the sandworm towards them by moving deeper into the desert.


    In the end, to make sure that they wouldn''t end up getting targeted by this sandworm in case Chu Yang drew its attention and caused it to move closer to where they were, the Domain Lord Realm cultivators all began simultaneously moving further away. None of them nning to take any extra risks by continuing to stay at the edge of what they had deemed the safe zone to search for the special sand.


    Only when they saw Chu Yang slowly sneak past the sandworm that didn''t pay the slightest bit of attention to him, did the Domain Lord Realm cultivators slowly begin making their way back to where they had been searching for the special sand beforehand. Soon enough forgetting about Chu Yang who had already disappeared deeper inside the desert.


    This was not the first time someone had ventured past the sandworm and wouldn''t be thest before the secret realm closed, but all of the ones before Chu Yang had one thing inmon. None of them had returned after moving past the sandworm.


    They had no idea what had happened to these cultivators nor did any of them think about following in their footsteps, as it was clear just how dangerous it was to move deeper into the desert from the sandworm that was blocking their path.


    Trying to move around the sandworm in front of them wasn''t much of an option either, as doing so would only end up with them wandering into another dangerous location they were unfamiliar with or running into a second sandworm in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    ¡­


    "That was¡­ Easier than I expected¡­"


    Having sessfully made his way past the sandworm that had seemingly been blocking the path in front of him a few minutes earlier, Chu Yang could not help whispering this to himself as he looked back in the direction of the sandworm that had now almostpletely disappeared beyond a few sand dunes.


    Although he had heard about how it was easy to make it past the sandworm from overhearing what other Domain Lords were talking about every now and then, he had never expected it to be that easy and was still feeling a bit doubtful about how nobody had returned after making it past the sandworm after moving deeper inside the desert.


    After all, even if he didn''t move any deeper from where he was at the moment, he had already far surpassed his gains in terms of special sand from just casually picking up what he gathered along the way. Having reached a little over 20 grains of sand at this point in time.


    With that in mind, those who hade before him could have just stayed here for a few days and possibly gathered hundreds or possibly even thousands of grains of the special sand before leaving.


    However, none of them had done this seemingly safe and easy thing that would not have them risk moving any deeper into the desert.


    Even though some might be ovee with greed and still continue deeper inside the desert at this point in time, everyone inside the secret realm had reached the Domain Lord Realm and had lived for a long time. Especially those wandering cultivators who had lived at the edge of a knife their entire life as they struggled for resources.


    For not a single one to have returned, it meant that there was more to it than met the eye and it might not be as safe as he thought to return to the perceived safe zone.


    "Guess I will have to try and retrace my steps and see if I can return or not before moving any deeper¡­" Narrowing both his eyes slightly as he muttered this to himself, Chu Yang began to slowly retrace his steps back in the direction of the sandworm that was only barely visible in the distance at this point in time. Intent on finding out what it was that kept those who hade before him from making their way back out of the desert after they moved past the sandworm.


    Rumble~!


    However, as he began retracing his steps, one the sand dunes not too far away from him suddenly began moving as he got closer. Soon enough, it revealed a massive sandworm hidden beneath the sand that looked like it was about to wake up from the slightest disturbance.


    Suddenly, Chu Yang understood why none of the cultivators who had gone before him had returned, the sand dunes all around him seemed to hide sandworms inside them!


    Not just that, but it seemed like walking over them from the direction he hade didn''t cause any reaction from them, while trying to leave the desert seemed to cause them to show signs of waking up. Leaving him no choice but to continue moving deeper inside the desert unless he wanted to risk waking up the sandworms sleeping beneath the sand dunes¡­

 Chapter 1479 A Mountain Range Appears...

    Chapter 1479 A Mountain Range Appears...


    "Guess I will not be leaving for now¡­"


    Seeing the sandworm that had revealed itself seemed to be close to waking up, Chu Yang quickly moved back to his original position to avoid disturbing it any more than he had already done. In the process unconsciously moving a bit deeper into the desert without noticing it.


    Soon enough, realizing that both the sandworm about to wake up nearby and the sandworm leisurely moving around at the border of the safe part of the desert hadpletely disappeared from view. Landing him in the middle of a desert without a clue of where he was.


    The only way he had to determine his location was through the concentration of the special sand, which luckily wasn''t that hard to find, as he soon managed to regain his sense of what direction was further inside and which one led out of the desert.


    However, knowing that leaving the way he hade would be impossible without disturbing the sandworms sleeping inside the sand dunes from his previous experience, he could only begin to slowly move deeper inside the desert while gathering the special sand along the way like originally nned. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Thinking about how he was going to leave the desert wouldeter, as he decided to focus his full attention on gathering as much of the special sand as possible for now. Intend on gathering at least ten thousand grains of sand or a handful of special sand before trying to find a way to leave the desert.


    Although¡­ In the back of his mind, he had already foreseen that he would be forced to use one of his two remaining talismans to escape from the desert in the future, as he could simply not logically think of any other way to escape from the desert with his current strength.


    After all, the sandworms hidden inside the sand dunes were at least at the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Even if not every sand dune had a sandworm hidden inside it and only one out of a thousand had a sandworm hidden inside of it, that would still be more than a hundred sandworm in the Soul Ascension Realm he would have to run past trying to leave the desert.


    Not to mention, as he continued making his way deeper inside the desert, he clearly felt an intangible pressure enveloping him. Bringing back memories of the time when he had tried to challenge Pei Yang to a fight to see how he would do against someone in the Dao Seed Realm.


    No surprise, the fight ended in an instant without him having any chance to resist, but it did allow him to be somewhat familiar with the unconscious pressure that was released by someone in the Dao Seed Realm¡­ And¡­ The slight intangible pressure he was starting to feel as he moved deeper inside the desert clearly stemmed from someone in the Dao Seed Realm!


    Is it a Dao Seed Realm sandworm or another kind of demon beast?


    Given that he could already feel the presence of the Dao Seed Realm demon beast, he understood that the other party would almost certainly have discovered him with its strength and given how it had not attacked him, he understood that it was either peaceful and minded its own business like the sandworm roaming the edges of the established safe zone or was in some kind of special situation that prevented it from taking action against him.


    Though he wanted to believe it to be peaceful like the sandworm patrolling along the edges of what could be considered the core region of the desert, Chu Yang highly doubted that this was the case given the other party''s identity as a demon beast that had most likely spent its entire life locked up inside the secret realm.


    "A sandworm¡­"


    However, upon finally finding the origin of the terrifying pressure that had grown increasingly heavy the further inside the desert he traveled, Chu Yang was shocked to discover that the demon beast in question was not only a massive sandworm that looked like a small mountain range from afar but was also pinned to the ground by severalrge chains that prevented it from moving.


    But the thing that caught his attention was not the chains themselves or the massive sandworm, but instead the several small human figures on top the body of the massive sandworm. All of whom seemed busy at work trying to break the chains nailing the massive sandworm to the ground.


    Just from a nce, it was clear that these small human figures on top of the massive sandworm were none other than the human cultivators that had entered the deeper part of the desert before him.


    Not only had they survived, but they now seemed to be actively helping therge demon beast escape from its restraints. Having already managed to break two of the twelvergest chains holding down the gargantuan sandworm.


    What are these people doing? Are they perhaps trying to die faster or something?


    Unable to understand why these cultivators would do something as reckless as trying to free massive mountain range sized sandworm that they had encountered, Chu Yang could not help freezing on the spot as he stared towards the group of humans hard at work on the third major sealing chain with a somewhat shocked expression stered all over his face.


    Wait! Is it perhaps some kind of mind control or soul control technique!? Indeed, with such a major difference in realm, it might be possible for the sandworm to employ some kind of soul control technique to force those people to free it even while being sealed.


    Don''t tell me¡­ Is it perhaps in control of the other sandworms? Only allowing people to move deeper inside the desert so it can have humans aid it in escaping from the chains, but¡­ That makes no sense, the sandworms are clearly far stronger, why does it not use them to try and break the chains?


    Lost in his own thoughts as he stared off in the direction of the massive sandworm towering far into the sky, Chu Yang could not help tightly griping the talisman from his master that he had already taken out in preparation for a possible mental attack from the sealed sandworm in the distance.

 Chapter 1480 A Precarious Situation

    Chapter 1480 A Precarious Situation


    However, as Chu Yang continued staring off in the direction of the mountain range sized sandworm sealed by the enormous chains, he soon discovered that his earlier worries seemed to be for nothing, as no mental attack or other kind of attack ended uping in his direction. Instead, the work of the human cultivators in the distance continued as they worked together on slowly chipping away at the third major chain holding down the sandworm.


    Observing the situation for a little longer, he quickly discovered why, as it seemed like the massive sandworm was currently asleep and didn''t seem to have discovered him like he had first expected upon feeling the terrifying pressure emanating from it.


    But¡­ Considering that he could only continue moving in the direction of the sandworm if he wanted to avoid waking up the other sandworms likely sleeping in the sand dunes all around him, Chu Yang didn''t feel too optimistic about his current state, as he would still end up being forced to confront the massive sandworm at some point in time.


    Even if it was asleep at the moment and had not noticed him yet, he doubted things would continue like that, as it would inevitably wake up when an unfamiliar presence got too close to it.


    If not for the sandworm waking up on its own, the humans currently working on destroying the third chain sealing it might try to attack or catch him. Possibly causing amotion that either woke up the massive sandworm or the surrounding sandworms.


    No matter what, the situation seemed rather bleak for him, and he really didn''t want to risk going any closer to the mountain range sized sandworm if possible.


    Unfortunately, going backwards wasn''t possible.


    So, with that in mind, Chu Yang found the best way to go about the situation and instead decided to try and circle around the sealed sandworm. Hoping that the fact that he was still moving a bit forward would result in the sandworms around him not waking up, while at the same time ensuring he was still far away from the sealed sandworm.


    As for why he didn''t move diagonally away from the sealed sandworm while still moving deeper into the desert¡­ That was because the reaction from the sandworms seemed centered around the sealed sandworm in the middle.


    Meaning going too far away from the sealed sandworm would still result in a reaction from the surrounding sandworms sleeping in the sandworms. Having formed a kind of around the sealed sandworm that now prevented him from leaving without waking up all the sleeping sandworms.


    Of course, the reason why he even did this in the first ce instead of directly trying to escape was because he still nned on gathering enough special sand for his breakthrough to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm before leaving the desert.


    After all, given that it was now pretty much impossible for him to leave without using one of his two remaining talismans given by his master, he intended to ensure that he got something worth it before leaving.


    At least if he reached the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm before leaving the mystic realm, he would have the confidence to escape from the different major powers waiting to catch him once he left the secret realm.


    Rustle~


    Like that, Chu Yang began to slowly circle the sealed sandworm while moving a bit closer to it every time. Making sure to carefullyb through the sand for any of the special sand along the way, while also making sure to not get discovered by the group of human cultivators.


    Luckily, it seemed like the human cultivators didn''t pay the slightest bit of attention to their surroundings and were fully upied by the third major chain sealing the massive sandworm.


    Slowly, the number of special sand grains gathered by Chu Yang started to increase while the days also began to fly by as he inched closer and closer to the sealed sandworm¡­


    "Finally¡­ Ten thousand grains of that sand¡­"


    It was on the ninth day since he started to slowly circle the sealed sandworm that he finally reached his goal of ten thousand grains of sand, just barely enough that it should be able to help him break through to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although now that he had gathered the special sand he needed, he found himself facing another problem he hadn''t expected.


    When would he use the special sand to break through to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm?


    At first, he had thought of using it after he had escaped from the desert, but only now did he realize that this might not be possible, as the sandworms might choose to chase him even after he left the desert. Forcing him to directly leave the secret realm if he wanted to avoid being swarmed by a group of Soul Ascension Realm sandworms.


    And¡­ After leaving the secret realm, he would be faced with the attack and pursuit of the different major powers waiting for him on the other side. Leaving him no time to attempt a breakthrough to the Ninth Stage of the Domain, Lord Realm, as he would need to keep moving if he wanted to avoid the detection of someone possibly in the Dao Seed Realm.


    Even if the neutral region itself was massive, it was difficult for him to hide in a single location with a Dao Seed Realm cultivator potentially chasing after him.


    So¡­ My best option would be to breakthrough to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm now and possible use what is left over from the special sand to quickly stabilize my cultivation realm before escaping¡­


    Thinking about the n that had rapidly started taking shape as he realized his current precarious situation, Chu Yang could not help smiling somewhat wryly to himself. Understanding that he was about to be in for the most dangerous and reckless escape attempt in his life¡­n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 1481 The Sleeping Sandworms Awaken~!

    Chapter 1481 The Sleeping Sandworms Awaken~!


    Moving a bit closer to the sealed sandworm and finding a sand dune that didn''t have any sandworm hidden inside of it, Chu Yang sat down on the side of the sand dune facing away from the sealed sand worm to avoid being identally discovered by the human cultivators while not paying attention before sitting down to start his break through to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Rustle~


    Soon enough, the special sand floated in front of him as a strange aura began to emerge that Chu Yang quickly absorbed into his body before directing it towards his dantian.


    This strange power emerging from the special sand was what would help him reach the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, as he had already found out through testing it himself and overhearing others that this strange power had the effect of strengthening one''s domain.


    Considering hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear had already reached the Elementary Realm, the only thing he needed to progress through the Domain Lord Realm was to strengthen his soul and domain, something that the strange power inside the special sand was perfect for. Allowing him to soon begin rapidly ascending from the Early Stage of the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm towards the middle stage¡­ Late Stage and soon reach the Peak of the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm in no more than a few hours after starting to absorb the strange power from around 1000 grains of the special sand.


    Normally, he would first spend some time stabilizing his cultivation realm before he tried to break through, but he didn''t have time for this, as his rapid improvement had already started to leak out some of his aura into the surroundings. Stirring some of the nearby sleeping sandworms. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Because of this, he directly used another 500 hundred grains of the special sand to rapidly consolidate his cultivation base at the Peak of the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm. Leaving him with around 8500 grains of special sand to attempt a breakthrough to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Rumble~!


    Not hesitating for even a second after he felt his cultivation base had stabilized, Chu Yang directly began to breakthrough to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm with the assistance of the special sand. Using his already strongprehension of the Dao of the Spear to forcibly expand his domain in this situation. Pushing his realm past the bottleneck in the short span of a few seconds by burning through a little under 7500 of the 8500 special grains of sand he had left.


    BOOOM-!


    Only a second after pushing past the bottleneck, a terrifying presence belonging to someone at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm rushed out from him with an unstoppable momentum that was impossible to prevent. Instantly alerting not just the sleeping sandworms to his presence, but also catching the attention of the group of human cultivators who had remained fully focused on attacking the third major chain sealing the massive sandworm.


    Rumble~


    Knowing that he had little time now that he had been discovered and the sandworms all around him started waking up, Chu Yang didn''t hesitate in directly consuming strange power inside the remaining thousand or so grains of special sand. Rapidly stabilizing his cultivation base at the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although far from perfect and definitely something he could improve on, it was more than enough for him at the moment as he clearly felt that his current cultivation base had been stabilized to some extent.


    Rumble!


    Just at that moment, as he was about to turn around and run away, the first sandworm sleeping inside one of the nearby sand dunes woke up. Slowly rolling over in a still drowsy state after being suddenly woken up.


    Whoosh-!


    Not intending to stay around any longer than necessary now that he hadpleted his goal, Chu Yang directly took off using his fastest movement technique to move in the direction he had determined to be leading outside the desert before he had begun his breakthrough to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    RUUUUMBLE-!


    Following him starting to run away, the sandworms sleeping beneath the sand dunes both behind and in front of him started to rapidly wake up before looking around themselves confused for a few seconds before the first among them realized what was happening and began to chase after the escaping Chu Yang followed by the rest soon realizing what was happening as they followed suit.


    Soon enough resulting in more than a dozen of the Soul Ascension realm sandworms chasing after Chu Yang as he kept running with all of his strength. Not yet having used the talisman given to him by his master, as there was no need for him to do so before he was in a life and death situation.


    And although the sandworms were at the Soul Ascension Realm, he had a good head start and was far stronger than a normal Peak Domain Lord Realm cultivator. Allowing him to keep the Soul Ascension Realm sandworms from reaching him immediately.


    In his head, he was silently praying that he would at least be able to reach the safe zone before having to use the talisman from his master, as only then would he no longer have to worry about any sandworms in front of him blocking his path.


    ROOOOOOAR-!


    However, just as he spotted the familiar sandworm leisurely roaming at the edge of the established safe zone, a loud roar echoed throughout the entire desert- no, the entire secret realm, as every Domain Lord Realm cultivator currently inside the secret realm shivered under the terrifying power that apanied the roar.


    "This is¡­ E-Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm)! An Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm) demon beast!"


    "Leave¡­ We have to leave immediately before that demon beastes here and goes on a rampage!"


    "ESCAPE!"


    Not just Xuan Hao, but every single Domain Lord Realm cultivator currently inside the secret realm began panicking as they all rushed towards the gate leading out of the secret realm. Understanding that staying inside the secret realm with such a powerful demon beast clearly angered running rampant was nothing short of taking the fastne to theherworld.

 Chapter 1482 Narrowly Escaping

    Chapter 1482 Narrowly Escaping


    Unaware of the chaos that he had caused throughout the entire secret realm with his actions of waking up the sealed sandworm that had been sleeping deep within the desert, Chu Yang didn''t care the slightest bit about the terrifying roar as he continued escaping. Knowing that it was only a matter of time before the Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts behind him managed to catch up and attack him.


    If anything, he was lucky to discover that the one sandworm he had been most worried about and the one that had been blocking his path out of the core region of the desert that was filled to the brim with Soul Ascension Realm sandworms, was currently upied with hunting down other Domain Lord Realm cultivators. Leaving him an easy path to escape without encountering any of the problems he had expected to run into.


    "Hm?"


    However, just as he happily passed the guarding sandworm that was now busy consuming a few unlucky Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had been unable to escape in time, another terrifying tremor came from the deeper region of the desert.


    The main difference this time around was that he could clearly hear the sound of some kind ofrge chain snaping followed by several other simr sounds as the terrifying presence he was now rather familiar with increased in strength before reaching a new apex that seemed even stronger than Pei Yang. Indicating that the sandworm sealed in the desert was far from an ordinary sandworm that had just reached the Early Stage of the Dao Seed Realm.


    Did¡­ Did the sandworm manage to break free from its seal and weakening the third major chain holding it down¡­? n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    As these thoughts rushed into his head upon hearing the sounds of chain breaking, Chu Yang unconsciously looked back. Only to see that the sandworms that had been chasing him a short moment ago had all retreated.


    However, this did not make him feel the slightest bit relieved, as he instantly understood what this meant-


    RUMBLE-!


    And as if on time, something massive appeared in the distance before rapidly closing the distance. Looking like a moving mountain range from afar before quickly turning into a gaping maw capable of swallowing everything, as Chu Yang soon found himself about to get swallowed whole.


    Swish-!


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine, Chu Yang didn''t hesitate, as he directly activated one of the two remaining talismans from his master, causing a terrifying sword intent to manifest in front of him before shooting towards the world devouring maw about to swallow him.


    BOOOOOOM-!


    Not even a split secondter, the sword intent fully erupted with all its might. Instantly suppressing the domineering sandworm.


    Even though the sandworm was powerful and could be consideredparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, the power contained inside the sword intent, even if it had been halved at this point in time, also contained Xuan Hao''sprehension of the Dao of the Sword and the Dao of Space merged together into the Void Sword Art, a Low Heaven Rank Sword Art, allowing it to still carry a level of power infinitely close to the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm.


    ROAR-!?


    For this reason, even though the sandworm wanted to push forward and swallow Chu Yang, it was unable to advance and was instead forced back. Suffering serious injuries as a result of the sh with the void sword art performed by the sword intent that had erupted from the talisman. Giving Chu Yang the opportunity to escape from the desert and make his way towards the gate leading out of the secret realm.


    ROOOOOAR-!


    Of course, after the sandworm recovered from the attack, it didn''t waste any time as it rushed off in the direction that Chu Yang had escaped filled with killing intent.


    The reason for this was rather simple, as the special grains of sand Chu Yang had used to increase his cultivation realm from the Eighth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm to the Ninth stage of the Domain Lord Realm was in fact not sand. Instead, it was the eggs of the sandworms.


    In other words, the reason for the high number of special grains of sand around the sealed sandworm was because it was the main nesting ground of the sandworms and also the ce that was safest for them toy their eggs.


    Unknowingly, Chu Yang had wiped out almost the entire younger generation of the sandworms. Resulting in the current killing intent of the Dao Seed Realm sandworm.


    Not that he had much time to think about any of this, as he rushed past several Domain Lord Realm cultivators before finally finding himself standing in front of the gate leading out of the secret realm.


    "It''s time¡­" Muttering this to himself with a look of determination on his face, Chu Yang was just about to step through the gate leading out of the secret realm, when he suddenly caught sight of a familiar world devouring maw that seemed to rapidly expand in size.


    Just at this moment, he thought about something he hadn''t thought about beforehand.


    Could the demon beasts inside the secret realm also go through the gate leading outside the secret realm?


    "It¡­ It can''t pass through the gate¡­ Right¡­?"


    "Don''t waste time on those useless thoughts! Stay any longer and you will get devoured!"


    "Y-YES!"


    Hearing the conversation of a pair of wandering cultivators who had been simrly frozen at the spot with simr thoughts as himself, Chu Yang woke up from his state of confusion and directly turned around and rushed through the gate leading outside the secret realm along with countless other Domain Lord Realm cultivators escaping from impending doom. Unwilling to stay behind and get devoured by the giant maw that seemed to be covering the entire world by the point Chu Yang felt his vision blur as he soon found himself on the other side of the gate. Having seed in the first part of his escape.

 Chapter 1483 Bringing a Friend Along~

    Chapter 1483 Bringing a Friend Along~


    "That person! That is the one who broke into the secret realm!"


    Just as he was catching his breath after having sessfully escaped from the secret realm and thinking he might be able to use the chaos to recover some of his strength, one of the two guards who had been guarding the entrance to the secret realm when he broke in, just so happened to walk by and notice him. Instantly attracting the attention of several powerful cultivators present. All in the Soul Ascension realm.


    Even worse, he could also sense the presence of someone far more powerful keeping an eye on the situation taking ce around the gate to the secret realm. Specifically eyeing him at the moment in case he tried something.


    Looks like I will have to use thest-


    Crack~


    About to use thest talisman from his master on the powerful cultivators present before running away, a subtle but increasingly loud cracking sound suddenly echoed out behind him, as a feeling of absolute dread washed over him upon discovering that those sounds came from countless small cracks in space around the gate to the secret realm. Especially after discovering the area covered by the cracks spreading and turning into arge spider web that looked suspiciously simr to the size of a certain sandworm, he thought he had left behind a few seconds ago.


    I have to get out of here!


    Knowing just what was about to happen, Chu Yang didn''t hesitate for a second as he threw out thest remaining talisman from his master before turning and running away with all of his strength. Not even looking back to see what happened, as the sword intent shot forth just as the massive head of the sandworm broke through the spatial barriers and crossed over from the secret realm.


    BOOOOOM-!


    In the end, this result in not just the Dao Seed Realm cultivator and Soul Ascension Realm cultivators from the major families suffering from the talisman, but the sandworm ended up suffering from the same attack for a second time.


    Filled with rage after being hit by the same attack again and being gravely injured to the point that its strength suffered a setback, the massive sandworm was about to look for Chu Yang before it spotted the Dao Seed Realm cultivator who just so happened to stand directly in front of it filled with killing intent.


    ROOOOAR-!


    Unaware that the Dao Seed Realm cultivator was not looking towards it filled with killing intent, but instead the escaping Chu Yang running away behind it, the sandworm thought the powerful cultivator was in cahoots with Chu Yang, as itunched itself towards him filled with killing intent.


    Boom-boom-boom!


    Unable to reason with a wild demon beast that seemed out for blood, the Dao Seed Realm cultivator was unable to chase after Chu Yang and was forced to battle the sandworm inside one of the most important trade hubs of the neutral region. Unable to prevent the destruction that followed, as he did his best to minimize any damage to the city while waiting for the other Dao Seed Realm cultivators of the neutral region to show up.


    Unfortunately, even if he wanted to send the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators present after Chu Yang, those Soul Ascension Realm cultivators were either dead or on the brink of death, as they had also ended up facing some of the power contained inside the talisman.


    Although the power they faced was negligible, it was still the sword art of a Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm cultivator with a profoundprehension of both the Dao of the Sword and the Dao of Space. Not something they could resist with their meager cultivation. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    In the end, chasing after Chu Yang could only wait until after the sandworm was dealt with, something that enraged the Dao Seed Realm cultivator even further as he listened to some of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had managed to escape talk about how they had seen this massive sandworm seemingly chase after Chu Yang inside the secret realm.


    The nail in the coffin being how he had wandered deeper into the desert, something that would normally be a death sentence, for no apparent reason before showing up being chased by sandworms.


    In the eyes of the Dao Seed Realm cultivator, it was clear that the massive sandworm was a scheme conducted by Chu Yang to damage the main trade city of HIS Light Hall!


    Filled with rage and wanting nothing more than to tear apart Chu Yang limb from limb, the Dao Seed Realm cultivator who turned out to be the ancestor of the Light Hall, one of the major powers in the neutral territory, used all of his strength as he attacked the sandworm. Wanting to kill it as fast as possible so he could chase after Chu Yang.


    ROOOAR-!


    Unfortunately for him, the sandworm the size of a mountain range was not an easy opponent, as even though it had been heavily injured by Xuan Hao''s two earlier talismans, it was stillparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Far above the strength of the Light Hall Ancestor.


    Not to mention, its massive body provided it with a terrifying vitality. Making it a far harder opponent to killpared to an ordinary demon beast in the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Even in its injured and weakened state, something that the ancestor from the Light Hall quickly realized, as he began losing ground.


    "Old man! We are here!"


    "Wow¡­ What a huge worm!"


    Luckily for the Light Hall Ancestor, reinforcement soon appeared. Soon enough, bringing the battle back in the favor of the now three human cultivators, who began to slowly whittle away at the massive demon beast.


    Even then, the size of the sandworm was simply toorge and even working together as three and being on the winning side, they barely managed to cause any realsting damage to the massive sandworm after a day of battling.


    At the current pace, not to mention finishing the battle in a week or two, even a year or two might not be enough to deal with terrifying vitality of the sandworm¡­

 Chapter 1484 Assassination Request...

    Chapter 1484 Assassination Request...


    Escaping back in the direction of the mountain range separating the neutral territory between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire, Chu Yang didn''t dare waste too much time resting. Spending most of his time moving, he understood that the sandworm wouldn''t be able to keep the Dao Seed Realm cultivators of the neutral territory upied forever.


    Not to mention, if enough chaos ended up being caused in the neutral territory, it might end up drawing the attention of the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire.


    After all, while a battle between a few Soul Ascension Realm cultivators might be negligible to them, a battle between Dao Seed Realm cultivators was not, as it could end up expanding and spilling over into their territory if things ended up dragging on for long enough. Especially considering that the strength of the sandworm should have already reached the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Making it difficult for the three Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the major families to deal with it in the short term.


    With that in mind, Chu Yang estimated that he would have at least two weeks to a month of time where he didn''t have to worry about being caught by the Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the major families. Following which he would have to be more careful while escaping to avoid leaving any clues behind for them to follow.


    At the very least, as his cultivation realm had increased all the way to the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm or Peak of the Domain Lord Realm, his normal flying speed had simrly increased.


    A trip from the Light Hall Trade City that would normally take around two months toplete had been reduced down to around a month and a half.


    Meaning that the dangerous period of his escape would only be around two weeks if he was lucky. Pushing his speed a bit, he might even be able to reduce it down to 10 or so days.


    Feeling himself bing more confident in escaping and making his way back to the sect, Chu Yang could not help smiling happily to himself as he rapidly moved through the air.


    If he really made it back to the sect, he would by far be the strongest disciple under his master. Not to mention, he would also begin preparing to surpass the Domain Lord Realm after he returned to the sect.


    Even though he wasn''t that knowledgeable regarding the Dao Domain Lord Realm and what his master''s ns were for him and what path he was going to take, be it the Dao Domain Lord Realm or the Soul Ascension Realm, Chu Yang still felt extremely excited thinking about how he would be improving his strength even further after he returned to the sect this time around.


    Although¡­ with how exhausting things were at the moment and how this chase was nowhere near an end, he thought that it might not be a bad idea to take a little break before he went on to trying to surpass the Domain Lord Realm.


    ¡­


    At the same time Chu Yang was making his way through the rtively serene ins of the central region, in arge hall decorated with beautiful lotus engravings as the main theme, arge number of people covering themselves making their identities hard to distinguish.


    All of them seemed focused on arge board filled with all kinds of requests simr to how the Explorer Union functioned. Only the requests on this board were only rted to assassinating someone or gathering certain information about someone or something. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "An assassination request for a Ninth Stage Domain Lord Realm cultivator who wasst seen escaping from the main trade city of the Light Hall? Given the price that is being offered for this guy, I guess he might have something to do with the current situation at that ce¡­"


    "Indeed, the price offered is more than enough for someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, let alone someone only in the Domain Lord Realm."


    "So¡­ We are taking this job?"


    "Of course! It''s essentially free money!"


    "What about you two? In?"


    "Sure, I have nothing better to do now that my job at certain trade hub ended up being ruined."


    "Hehe, I''m more than happy to join in."


    "Good, let''s head out then, you should all know how fierce thepetition is going to be with this one considering the high reward. Especially considering that it was posted by the Shadow Lotus Sect.


    "Indeed¡­ With the ck Lotus Sect''s backing behind this request, it is likely to also draw in some of those Soul Ascension Realm Assassins¡­"


    A silence fell upon the group at the mention of Soul Ascension Realm assassins. Truly fearsome people, as bing an assassin under the Shadow Lotus Sect at the Soul Ascension Realm indicated that the other party was capable of silently assassinating someone in the Soul Ascension Realm, a task that would be deemed impossible under normal circumstances considered the domain and divine sense of a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator.


    Only someone who had truly mastered the art of assassination and had strength beyond that of a Third Tribtion Soul Ascension Realm cultivator were qualified to be assassins under the Shadow Lotus Sect, one of thergest neutral forces that permeated the continent in a way not much different from the Explorer Union.


    The main difference between the two being that the Explorer Union was far stronger, though whenpared to a smaller major power in the core region, the Shadow Lotus Sect could still be said to hold its own.


    "let''s get going, maybe we will get lucky and catch the guy before someone like that shows up!"


    Not wanting to waste any time, the leader of the small group of assassins hurried the rest out of the hall, as the group soon set off towards thest location Chu Yang had been spotted. Hoping that they would get to him first before others had a chance to do so and im the lucrative reward for his head.

 Chapter 1485 Avoiding Detection. Reaching the Mountain Range at the Edge of the Core Region

    1485 Avoiding Detection. Reaching the Mountain Range at the Edge of the Core Region


    Moving peacefully without encountering any problems for the first two weeks since leaving the Light Hall trade city where the entrance to the secret realm was located, Chu Yang suddenly found himself being constantly attacked by random groups of Domain Lord Realm cultivators who all seemed really intent on killing him.


    At first, he had thought he might have just been unlucky and ended up running into a few bandits who might have seen him as an easy target.


    The second time, he once again thought he had once again run into a group of bandits wanting to rob him.


    The third time it happened, he really thought he was having some bad luck with bandit groups in the area. Part of him even thinking that they might havee to seek revenge for one of the two bandit groups he had killed earlier.


    But on the fourth time he found himself being attacked by a group of people randomly out of the blue, he finally realized that something was wrong.


    These were not just normal bandits. Instead, they seemed to havee just to kill him. In other words, assassins.


    This was not unexpected, as Chu Yang had already believed that the different major powers would put a bounty on his head and send people after him while they were busy dealing with the Dao Seed Realm sandworm running rampant in their territory.


    The main thing that took him by surprise was how easily these assassins seemed to find him.


    If they could find him that easily, it meant that when the three Dao Seed Realm cultivators were finished dealing with the sandworm, they would almost certainly have the ability to instantly locate him ande catch him before he could even fight back.


    So, with this new crisis that had emerged out of the blue, Chu Yang began trying his hardest to figure out how his location was being tracked.


    Avoiding any popted areas didn''t work, as he was already doing that.


    The birds or other animals being controlled from afar to track him didn''t seem to be the case either, as it would be a bit unrealistic to control so many animals from afar and a sneaky tamed flying demon beast secretly tailing was also out after he spent close to a day checking while being attacked every now and again.


    Having tried everything, he could think of Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit gloomy as he had absolutely no idea how he was being tracked.


    Perhaps some weird ult method that he had no idea about? Or a powerful artifact capable of tracking him from- Ah!


    Freezing on the spot as he suddenly thought of the fact that he could be tracked by a powerful artifact over a long distance in a simr way to how the Blue Sea Empire was monitoring the borders of their territory, Chu Yang felt overjoyed for a few seconds before realizing that he had no ways to stop any artifact from tracking his location from afar.


    "Maybe going underground for a bit will work? If I''m not wrong, there should be arge undergroundwork of tunnels not too far away from here, I might be able to lose the artifact that is tracking me by going underground and traveling close to the ground to make it harder to spot me in the future with any long-distance artifacts." Muttering this to himself as a n quickly took shape in his mind, Chu Yang quickly changed directions before diving down through a hole in the ground leading a massivework of underground tunnels and caves that covered an area no smaller than the current territory of the Star Shattering Sect.


    In a sense, it was a massive underground world that had local faction and entire countries all struggling for control over certain special resources that could only be found inside the underground world.


    During his time wandering through the neutral territory, this was one of the ces he had explored in the past. Giving him a general idea of theyout of the tunnels and caves that made up this underground world. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Also knowing about some locations that were best avoided due to the danger inside.


    Although this would ultimately end up slowing down his speed when it came to reaching the mountain range symbolizing the end of the core region and this neutral territory, Chu Yang quickly discovered that he was correct in that something had indeed been tracking him and that thing was no longer usable after he moved underground.


    So even after a week underground, he didn''t encounter a single assassination attempt.


    Of course, his main worry was still about whether or not his position would be locked on to again the moment he left the underground world.


    So, for the first few days after stepping out of the underground world and keeping himself close to the ground like he had nned to do beforehand, Chu Yang was in a state of extreme nervousness as he kept an eye open for assassins that might appear at any around any corner.


    However, after a week without any attacks, he finally let out a sigh of relief. Believing that his n had been sessful, he had managed to avoid detection by the assassins.


    Because of this, the next two weeks ended up bing rather uneventful, as the main source of danger that he had expected toe in the form of the Dao Seed Realm cultivators chasing after him never happened.


    Making him believe that he might have underestimated the strength of the sandworm and the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire''s willingness to get involved in the neutral territory.


    Not that he minded any of this, as it just meant he had a safe path all the way to the mountain range that separated the fallen Sky Empire from the Core Region of the continent¡­ Or at least that was what he thought until he spotted a group of four cloaked figures appearing in front of him to block his path¡­


    Mass release today - End of November


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    PurpleSpring

 Chapter 1486 Four Assassins

    Chapter 1486 Four Assassins


    "So, you are the one who managed to avoid detection of the Shadow Lotus Sect. Impressive! But! Your journey ends here!"


    Standing in front of the mountain range blocking his way forward, a rather arrogant sound man stepped forward as he said this with a tone that sounded less like an assassin and more like some kind of noble son filled with pride over having outsmarted an opponent.


    Is this perhaps some kind of distraction?


    Knowing that the group in front of him were assassins who had somehow managed to track him down even without the help of that Shadow Lotus Sect that seemed to be behind the constant attacks he had suffered before spending a week in the underground world, Chu Yang didn''t dare let his guard down. Believing that this arrogant tone and the dumb words were merely a distraction to get him to let his guard down.


    "No need for all this, let''s just kill him and get this over with, I already wasted over a month getting here¡­"


    Not able to keep up the little y that the one who had gone first was doing, a second assassin stepped forward and went directly for the attack, causing the remaining three to react and charge forward as well.


    Looks like they are finally taking this more seriously instead of trying to fool me with that dumb y¡­


    Narrowing both his eyes as he thought this to himself, Chu Yang tightly griped his spear with one hand before stabbing forward towards the first approaching assassin, a bulky man twice his size-


    Ptsh!


    And without any issue, his spear managed to cleanly pierce through the body of therge man before he quickly pulled it back out while allowing the terrifying powers contained in his attack to wreak havoc inside therge man''s body.


    Using the end the spear to block a small dagger just about to reach him before using the middle section of the spear to block another attack-


    Bang!


    And with his free hand, he grabbed the head of thest of the assassin and smashed his head into the ground before stomping on top of it with all his might, causing his head to pop like a watermelon being hit with a bat while also destroying his soul before it could escape. Killing one of the four assassins in the first exchange.


    "Wha-"


    "C-Cheong!"


    "¡­"


    Clearly taken aback by the sudden and quick death of one of theirpanions, Chu Yang took full advantage of thisck of attention to push back the two assassins he had blocked with his spear and once again stab towards the already strugglingrge man-


    Ptsh-!


    Piercing his head and killing him on the spot before he could react.


    Two down, these guys aren''t as strong as I expected them to be¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he had now finished off half of his opponents with rtive ease, Chu Yang concentrated the power of his domain on his spear before executing the second move of his Soul Spear Divine Mantra, Mountain Piercer, a technique he had refined through countless battles ever since he had first learnt the move back when he had first be a disciple of his master and had been taught the Soul Spear Divine Mantra.


    Rumble-!


    "Wai-"


    BANG!


    Not a secondter, the third assassin was easily killed off. Leaving behind the one who had tried to fool him by pretending to be some kind of arrogant noble master. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Although¡­ Looking at thest remaining assassin that seemed to have wet himself, something he thought unimaginable for someone in the Domain Lord Realm, Chu Yang had feeling that he might not have been pretending earlier¡­


    Oh well¡­


    Ptsh-!


    He is dead now. Joining the rest of his team in their futile assassination attempt.


    Even then, Chu Yang didn''t dare rx his guard, as he understood that there was a high likelihood that his current location might have been leaked.


    So, with nothing more to gain from waiting around, Chu Yang rushed into the mountain range separating the Core Region of the Continent from the fallen Sky Empire.


    Even if it might be dangerous for him to go through the mountain range without a proper map to follow like he had done the first time he made his way through the mountain range, Chu Yang didn''t feel as afraid of encountering Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts like he had been in the past.


    With his current strength at the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he felt some degree of confidence when it came to facing a First Tribtion Realm demon beast or cultivator.


    Not to mention, Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts were still rare in the mountain range and difficult to encounter under normal circumstances.


    In most cases, the demon beasts encounter while going through the mountain range would be in the Domain Lord Realm, something he was more than confident in dealing with at his current cultivation realm.


    The only real danger was the core part of the mountain range that he would have to pass through at some point.


    Although Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts were rare and hard toe by under normal circumstances, the core part of the mountain range was unique in the way that these rare and hard toe by demon beasts seemed too impossible to miss passing through the core of the mountain range unless one followed a specific path.


    This was something he had learnt not before or during his journey through the mountain range nor inside the Deep Pit City, but instead in a small town located not too far away from the Deep Pit City that he had happened to pass through after his escape from Deep Pit City.


    As for trying to find the current safe path or asking about it in Deep Pit City or surrounding cities for that matter¡­ That was not something he intended on doing with assassins still after him. Especially so now that he knew they had managed to somehow locate him.


    Mass release today - End of November


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 Chapter 1487 Breakthrough, Late Stage Dao Seed Realm Strength

    Chapter 1487 Breakthrough, Late Stage Dao Seed Realm Strength


    At the same time Chu Yang could finally be said to have made it out of immediate danger regarding the Dao Seed Realm cultivators who currently wanted him dead, Xuan Hao opened his eyes for the first time in over two months with a bright smile dancing at the edge of his lips as he looked towards the system notifications that had appeared at some point during his cultivation. Indicating that both the formation hall and the cksmithing hall had reached the standard required for the two quests to be considered to have beenpleted.


    [Sect Quest: Establish a Proper Formation Hall] [Formation Hall Disciples (Below Master Realm): 544/500 (Complete)] [Formation Hall Elders (Master Realm): 10/10 (Complete)] [Formation Hall Elders (Grandmaster Realm): 1/1 (Complete)] [Reward: Dao of Formations Comprehension, Formation Diagrams, Formation Training Stones, Formation Construction Materials] Sect Quest: Establish a Proper cksmithing Hall] [cksmithing Hall Disciples (Below Master Realm): 842/500 (Complete)] [cksmithing Hall Elders (Master Realm): 12/10 (Complete)] [cksmithing Hall Elders (Grandmaster Realm): 1/1 (Complete)] [Reward: Dao of cksmithing Comprehension, Artifact Blueprints, Spiritual Metal] Although there also seemed to be other notifications outside of the indicating thepletion of these two sect quests, Xuan Hao ignored them for now, as he decided to first ept the rewards from the two sect quests. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    First, starting with the reward from the Formation Hall sect quest that took a little over two days to fully consume. Theprehension gained not really causing any significant breakthrough outside of pushing him closer to the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Formations.


    As for the resources gained, none of them were really useful to him and were directly handed over to the formation hall.


    The resources and other things gained frompleting the cksmithing Hall sect quests were simr, though theprehension part was far more useful this time around. Allowing him to go from the Small Sess realm to the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of cksmithing.


    Not just had he reached the Large Sess Realm with another Dao, but the totalyers possible for him to create around his dao lotus was now 24, the dividing line where a new transformation would take ce and also considered the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm.


    Even if he could dy the emergence of theyers around his dao seed a bit if he wanted, he didn''t intend on doing so, as he was keen on reaching the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm in terms strength as it didpletely put his strength outside the scope of the Earth Immortal Realm.


    While he doubted that he would be able to fight someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, he should at the very least have a better chance in case he ended up facing someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Rumble~


    Because of this, Xuan Hao immersed himself in cultivation for the next week, as he consolidated two newyers around his dao seed before theyers began undertaking a drastic transformation. Instead of just staying around the Dao Seed and protecting it, theyers had started to integrate into the dao seed itself.


    After theyers reached thirty, they would be able to fully integrate into the Dao Seed and he would be considered at the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm and have the ability to break through to the Profound Immortal Realm ording to what he knew about the realm.


    Of course, there were other requirements for reaching the Profound Immortal Realm outside of just that, one being to have at least reached the Perfection Realm in one Dao and have two supporting Daos reach the Large Sess Realm.


    Although far easier than reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it was still a difficult thing to aplish, as reaching the Perfection Realm in any Dao was in no way a simple matter.


    As for how those who didn''t be Dao Domain Lord Realm cultivators managed to condenseyers around their dao seed withoutprehending so many daos, it was done throughprehending smaller support daos that supported the growth of their main dao.


    For example, the Dao of Fire has easier support Daos like the Dao of Burning or the Dao of Heat, while one could also use moreplicated and difficult toprehend Daos like the Dao of Wind as a supporting Dao.


    Of course, the stronger the supporting Dao, the stronger the main Dao and in turn the stronger the cultivator¡­


    Not worried about any of this, Chu Yang focused his attention on the new internal situation of his dantian that now seemed to be brimming with far more strengthpared to before.


    Different from the past when he just felt a small boost in strength after anotheryer was added around his dao seed, this time around, he truly felt like he had broken through to a brand-new realm.


    If he had to fight with his past self, it wouldn''t even be a challenge, as he could clearly feel that he had already taken a crucial step forward that had started some kind of transformation inside him.


    Looking at the dao seed that was now slowly merging with theyers around it, he realized what this transformation was, as theyers around his dao seed would automatically be integrating themselves with his dao seed from now on.


    More importantly, if he couldn''t add any newyers and the transformation came to an end, he would be unable to continue progressing through the Dao Seed Realm and would be forced to go down the path of the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Even if he was a Dao Domain Lord Realm cultivator, this was still the same, at least he thought it best to think so considering that it was still unknown if he could still reach the Profound Immortal Realm leveraging his Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm cultivation Base.


    At least he was certain that if he failed, he wouldn''t be able to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm...

 Chapter 1488 Old Dusty List Makes a Return

    Chapter 1488 Old Dusty List Makes a Return


    Finished examining his strength and inspecting the that took ce inside his dantian following his breakthrough, Xuan Hao soon decided to check out his status for the first time in a rather long time.


    Name: Xuan Hao


    Dao Domain: Dao Domain: Dao of Ice (Large Sess Realm), Dao of the Sword (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Space (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Illusions (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Formations (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Alchemy (Large Sess Realm), Dao of cksmithing (Large Sess Realm), Dao of Corruption (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Fire (Small Sess Realm), Dao of Light (Small Sess Realm)


    Dao Lotus: 24yers (Possibleyers 24) Sword Intent: Sword Soul Realm Talent: ????


    Bloodline: Three Immortals Bloodline (Half-Awakened) Physique: Ster Dao Body (99% Awakened)


    Realm: Late Stage Dao Domain Lord (Comparable to the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm) Professions: Alchemist (Pinnacle Grandmaster), Formation Master (Pinnacle Grandmaster), cksmithing (Senior Grandmaster (Pseudo Saint)) Sect: Star Shattering Sect Status: Ancestor of the Star Shattering Sect Disciples: Qing Yi, Chu Yang, Bai Ning, Mui, Chun Hua Pet: Lazy Winged Lion (Sixth Stage of the Soul Ascension Realm), Rabbit Demon Beast (Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm) [Personal Techniques]: Descend of the Ice God''s Sword (High Earth Rank) [Movement Techniques]: Illusory Light Steps (Mid Heaven Rank), Drifting Cloud Steps (Iplete, Peak Heaven Rank) [Sword Techniques]: Rain Sword (Peak Mortal Rank), Heaven Splitting Sword Art (Iplete, Mid Heaven Rank), Void Sword Art (Iplete, Low Heaven Rank), Untold Sword Mantra (Iplete, Unknown) Looking through his status, Xuan Hao could not help smiling to himself upon seeing that the realm part of the status had indeed changed from beingparable to the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm to beingparable to the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Confirming that his strength had indeed gone through a major change even though his cultivation realm remained at the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord realm.


    Even then, he was getting closer to the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. At this point, he only felt like he was a single step away from reaching the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space and hisprehension of the Dao of Formations wasn''tcking far behind either with the recent assistance from the system. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Meaning that he would soon have reached the Perfection Realm in two different Daos and with all the ones he had already at the Large Sess Realm, it didn''t seem like he was far off reaching the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm. At most another three to five years at the current pace if the system kept helping him like it had been doingtely.


    "Talking about the system, there was another notification that popped up not rted to any of the sect quests while I was cultivating¡­" Suddenly recalling the rouge notification that had appeared out of nowhere just when he had finished his seclusion, Xuan Hao turned his attention away from his status and focused on the rouge notification. Curious about what it was about.


    [Congrattion, Disciple Chu Yang, Killed a Top-tier young master]


    [Reward for disciple: Mysterious opportunity]


    Huh? Is this still a thing?


    Feeling a bit confused when he saw the familiar yet unfamiliar text that appeared in front of him, Xuan Hao could not help recalling a function of the system that seemed to have seemingly vanished into thin air long ago.


    Only now it seemed to have reappeared again¡­ And from the looks of it, it was because Chu Yang defeated a Top-tier young master of some kind.


    Feeling like he needed a little help in remembering, he decided to pull up the already dusty young master tier list from a corner of the system screen.


    [Young Master tiers]: [Low-tier young master]: Strength at Foundation Establishment realm, backing of at least Nascent Soul Realm. [Possible Reward for disciple]: Sudden Breakthrough during fight with the young master, finding a random artifact/herb of Spirit Grade or below on the young master, mysterious opportunity. [Mid-tier young master]: Strength at Core Formation Realm, backing of at least Domain Lord Realm. [Possible Reward for disciple]: ???(meet a mid-tier young master) [High-tier young master]: Strength at Nascent Soul Realm, backing of at least Dao SeedRealm. [Possible Reward for disciple]: ???(meet a high-tier young master) [Top-tier young master]: Strength Domain Lord Realm, backing of at least Celestial Immortal Realm [Possible Reward for disciple]: Sudden Breakthrough during fight with the young master, finding a random artifact/herb of Saint Grade or below on the young master, mysterious opportunity, ancient inheritance of Sea Formation Realm Profound Immortal or below.] [???-tier young master]: Strength Dao Seed Rm Lord Realm, backing of at least ???


    [Possible Reward for disciple]: ??? (meet a ???-tier young master)


    Looking through the list, not much seemed to have changed outside of the top tier young master now being visible, while another tier seemed to have appeared above it.


    Although, something that caught his eye immediately was the fact that the backing of the young master that his disciple seems to have defeated was in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Given the currentyout of the different major powers and the fact that his disciple had encountered this person inside the Core region between the Wei Empire and the Blue Sea Empire, the young master likely belonged to one of the ancestors from either the Wei Empire or the Blue Sea Empire.


    Even though he did feel happy with his disciple getting a mysterious opportunity as a reward, he silently hoped that this young master was not someone from the Blue Sea Empire, as that would undoubtedly end up causing trouble for the Star Shattering Sect if they figured out the young master belonging to one of their ancestors had died to someone from the Star Shattering Sect.


    No matter how much they would want to remain neutral with the Star Shattering Sect, it would still certainly result in a Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator from the Blue Sea Empireing to the Star Shattering Sect for answer, something he very much wanted to avoid if possible¡­

 Chapter 1489 Recruiting Demonic Cultivators...

    Chapter 1489 Recruiting Demonic Cultivators...


    Knowing that he might have to face a Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator because of the young master that his disciple had killed, Xuan Hao could not help thinking about what to do in case the other party ended up finding out about the identity of that young master and decided toe to the Star Shattering Sect for revenge.


    Even if the other party didn''te for revenge and just wanted to get a better idea of the situation that had taken ce, it would be troublesome for him and the current Star Shattering Sect.


    The only positive was the chaotic qi formation was more than strong enough to resist the probing attempts of someone in the Celestial Immortal.


    Maybe the fact that his strength had reached the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm would also be able to help out the situation to some extent, as he could definitely disy power above the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm.


    The main problem would be that he was still not at the level of a Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator and any serious probing would likely result in his true strength being seen through.


    With that in mind, he really felt like a fire had been lit beneath him to increase his strength as fast as possible.


    ncing through his own status and the young master tier list that seemed to have decided to make aeback after a rather long absence, Xuan Hao focused his attention on thest remaining sect quest and by far also the most important of the four he had been given a few months ago.


    Feeling curious about how much it had changed, as it did allow him to get a better look at the current overall strength of the Star Shattering Sect and also because the chaotic qi formation would really need an upgrade if it had to face off against Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators in the near future. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Even if it didn''t count the elders who had reached the Domain Lord Realm, it provided a fine outlook of the entire sect''s strength at the same time.


    [Main Sect Quest: First Steps towards Bing a Major Power (I)] [Description: The sect has entered a state of rapid growth and is about to finally step onto the main stage of the Ewaria Continent. Help the sect reach the requirements to be a major power on the Ewaria Continent.] [Core Formation Realm Disciples: 2139/10.000] [Nascent Soul Realm Disciples: 17/100] [Domain Lord Realm Disciples: 5/10] [Soul Ascension Realm Elders: 1/100] [Dao Seed Realm Elders: 1/10] [Profound Immortal Realm Ancestor: 0/1] [Reward: World Stone (Immortal), Chaotic Qi Formation Upgrade, ???] [Note: Does not count host as part of the requirements] Looking at the overall progress of the sect quest, Xuan Hao wasn''t that surprised about the growth of the sect, outside of the seemingly rapid pace that more Nascent Soul Realm disciples seemed to appear.


    There was also the Soul Ascension Realm Elder, but after thinking things through for a bit, he quickly realized that this Soul Ascension Realm Elder was none other than Yi Min, who had been officially bestowed the title of sect elder.


    This was not his doing, but instead Elder Song, who did so because he felt she needed a proper identity inside the sect given that she often came by to visit the cksmithing hall to either teach the disciples there or chat with Bai Ning, who had managed to establish a friendship with her over their shared dedication towards cksmithing.


    Thinking about it¡­ This little disciple of his seemed to have built up quite a substantial power inside the cksmithing hall, as pretty much every elder there had be his friends. Even the formation hall elders seemed to be friends with this disciple of his¡­


    If not for the fact that he knew this disciple of his was fully invested in studying the Dao of cksmithing and improving his understanding of cksmithing through the help of formations that could also be used to improve and strengthen certain artifact, he would have thought this disciple of his might have been trying to build up a faction of his own inside the sect.


    Turning his attention to the section that was about the elders of the sect, even though there had been an improvement in terms of Soul Ascension Realm Elders, it was only a single one and was still far from the one hundred required by the quest. Not to mention the 10 Dao Seed Realm Elders or one at the Profound Immortal Realm.


    The disciple part of the quest seemed rather simple and looked like it would bepleted with time even if he didn''t personally intervene, but the elder part of the quest seemed to be difficult toplete in the short term by relying on the growth of the elders already part of the sect.


    Even if Feng Chen, Zu Fei, Wang Hu and the others already at the Domain Lord Realm managed to reach the Soul Ascension Realm, there was still the problem of getting more elders in the Dao Seed Realm.


    No matter how fast those elders improved it would still take dozens, possibly hundreds of years before a Dao Seed Realm elder emerged naturally.


    With that in mind, if he wanted toplete the quest any time soon, it looked like he would have to go out and search for Dao Seed Realm cultivators not affiliated with any major powers and recruit them to join the sect. If they were in a simr situation as Pei Yang and were enemies with the Blue Sea Empire, that would be for the best.


    Even more so now that his disciple had killed a young master whose backing was very likely one of the ancestors from the Blue Sea Empire.


    In a sense, as time passed, it seemed like more and more people who were enemies with the blue Sea Empire were either joining the Star Shattering Sect or his friend.


    Be it Pei Yang who had be one of the most respected elders of the sect since joining or Gong Cheng who had fled from the core region of the continent and could be considered the enemy of all the major powers there.


    Outside of those two, there was also the demonic cultivator Xuan Gui, who seemed intent on causing even more trouble for the Blue Sea Empire. Even wanting to drag down the entire empire if she had the strength to do so.


    Speaking of Xuan Gui, he hadn''t heard much of her over the past few months, as it seemed like there was some kind of situation taking ce among the Demon Kings of the Frozen Wastnds at the current moment.


    Although the situation didn''t cause any problems for her, it had forced her to retreat andy low for a bit. Extending the time for original n of him helping her sneak inside the Blue Sea Empire.


    As he thought of her now, he could not help wondering if it was possible to recruit demonic cultivators to join the sect. Not like how Su Wuhan had ended up bing a member of the sect through bing part of the information gathering branch of the sect, but instead bing a real disciple or elder of the sect.


    The reason he thought about this was not just because he felt a bit desperate about finding the required Dao Seed Realm Elders for the sect, but also because demonic cultivators like Xuan Gui didn''t seem to be bad in the same way as most other demonic cultivators were.


    If there was a demonic cultivator like Xuan Gui, he felt that there shouldn''t be anything wrong with recruiting her to join the sect.


    The only problem was that demonic cultivators didn''t really have the best reputation on the continent, and it was not unfounded, as most demonic cultivation techniques involved ughtering and refining arge number of both cultivators and mortals.


    For the Star Shattering Sect to safely recruit demonic cultivators, it would have to figure out a way to change the demonic cultivators back from their demonic cultivation path and return them to the original cultivation path, something that seemed impossible considering the foundations of demonic cultivators were abysmalpared to normal cultivators given that most had turned to the demonic path to quickly increase their strength and forgo the normal slow cultivation speed.


    If a solution to this problem could not be found, the sect would only be able to recruit those below the Demonic Transformation Realm, when it was still possible to turn things back around. The rest would only be able to be kept hidden in a simr way to Su Wuhan and revealing them at any point could damage the reputation of the Star Shattering Sect. Especially considering that the disciples and elders of the sect had been fighting demonic cultivators at the border for a long time at this point in time.


    But¡­ The original goal behind recruiting demonic cultivators was to recruit stronger cultivators to join the sect.


    For this goal, Xuan Hao decided to take some time in studying some demonic cultivation methods to see if he could figure out a way to reverse the demonic changes that took ce between the Demonic Transformation Realm and the True Demon Realm.


    The intent behind all of this stemming from the fact that he really wanted to recruit Xuan Gui to join the sect if possible and try to find other simrly not outright evil but still powerful demonic cultivators to join the sect with her help.

 Chapter 1490 Trouble Searching for Potential Elders...

    Chapter 1490 Trouble Searching for Potential Elders...


    Pondering over how a demonic cultivator who had already gone through the demonic transformation could go back to being a cultivator in the Dao Seed Realm or below, it did not take long before he focused on the fundamental difference between demonic cultivators and normal cultivators¡­ And that was the fact that demonic cultivators more so focused on strengthening their bodies overprehending a Dao so to speak.


    Although demonic cultivators didprehend different Daos, they were mostly limited to ones rted to death and ughter. Even then, those who actuallyprehended a Dao were limited to the strongest among the demonic cultivators, with even them being limited to the Small Sess Realm in whatever Dao theyprehended.


    The only ce where this didn''t seem to be the ce would be after the demonic cultivators broke through to the Demon King Realm, as the Demon Kings he had encountered so far all seemed to have a highprehension of the Daos outside of those rted to ughter and death. Especially so when it came to demonic cultivator at the Demon King Realm that he had encountered at the Space Node Mine, who even seemed to have an artifact capable of restraining the Dao of Space on him.


    Even if it was clear that some kind of fundamental change took ce when a demonic cultivator broke through to the Demon King Realm that made them start trying toprehend the Dao more seriously over just entirely focusing on strengthening their bodies through any means possible, it was still clear that they should still be worse offpared to someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm when it came toprehending the Dao.


    "Maybe a technique that makes use of the already strong physical body?" Muttering this to himself as he dwelled into what little information he had about the demonic cultivation path, Xuan Hao ultimately ended up giving up on trying to figure out a way to change demonic cultivators back from their path and onto the path towards the Celestial Immortal and Profound Immortal Realm.


    At the moment, even if he wanted to try and do something like that, his understanding of the demonic cultivation path was simply far too shallow.


    Not to mention, his own ability to create a cultivation technique that allowed for this kind of change was nonexistent, as he had never created something like that before.


    For now, it might be better for him to just focus on increasing his own strength, when he reached the Profound Immortal Realm in the future, he could always revisit this problem.


    The only downside to that was that he wouldn''t be able to take advantage of demonic cultivators like Xuan Gui to bolster the stronger cultivators of the sect and more quicklyplete the main sect quest. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Instead of that, it looked like the only way he had avable to him when it came to progressing the main sect quest would be to go out and search for independent Soul Ascension and Dao Seed Realm cultivators and get them to join the sect.


    Although this might not be that difficult considering the current reputation of the Star Shattering Sect as an ancient hidden sect and the fact that the chaos caused by demonic cultivators across the continent caused most independent and wandering cultivators to want a ce to be safe when therger battle between the major powers at the core of the continent and the demonic cultivators began.


    In a sense, the Star Shattering Sect could be said to be a far more attractive option for most independent and wandering cultivators, as it was ultimately a neutral power in the struggle between the major powers in the core region and the demonic cultivators.


    The only problem was that the current Star Shattering Sect couldn''t start publicly epting arge number of Soul Ascension Realm and Dao Seed Realm cultivators, as that would almost certainly end up drawing unwanted attention.


    Instead, it had to be done more discreetly, simr to have Pei Yang had been epted and be an elder of the sect without the Blue Sea Empire having any idea about this and still busy searching for him inside their own borders.


    Unfortunately, in the current Star Shattering Sect, he was the only person who would have the strength to attract stronger cultivators to join the sect, as Pei Yang was currently not capable of leaving the sect without being caught by the Blue Sea Empire, while anyone else inside the sect were too weak to convince someone at the Soul Ascension Realm or Dao Seed Realm to join the sect.


    Maybe Yi Min did have the ability to convince someone in the Soul Ascension Realm to join the sect and maybe he might be able to use his two demon beasts after they broke through to the Dao Seed Realm, but in the end, the most reliable person for recruiting more people to join the sect would be himself.


    Doing so would undoubtedly be good for the sect, but at the same time, it would also end up cutting into his cultivation time. Leaving him with little time to increase his strength, as he would be busy running around the continent looking for suitable candidates to enter the sect.


    "Wait until I reach the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space. After that I will leave the sect to go and look for wandering cultivators without any prior alignment to the different major powers to join the sect." Muttering this to himself as he thought about the entire situation, Xuan Hao ended up deciding to wait until he finished breaking through to the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space first.


    Not only because it would increase his strength to apletely different levelpared to now, but more so because it would make him pretty much impossible to catch even for someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, while also giving him the ability to traverse the continent at a far greater speed.


    At the same time, it would also give him something to rely on in case the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator that Chu Yang seemed to have unknowingly offended ended uping to the sect to cause trouble.


    Talking about this disciple of his who had decided to revive a long dead part of the system, Xuan Hao could not help wondering what he was up to and what kind of mysterious opportunity he had ended up receiving as a reward for killing the younger master.


    After all, he could clearly sense that he had been moving back in the direction of the sect for the past few months only to havee to a sudden stop around the borders of the fallen Sky Empire. Making him guess that the mysterious opportunity he had received should be in that border area.


    Not just that but given that it had been able to keep him upied for close to a month at this point in time, it was clear that this opportunity was far from simple.


    Given that Chu Yang was already at the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he did feel a bit worried that this opportunity would end up forcing him to be a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator. Not that the path in itself was bad, as one could still be a Profound Immortal Realm cultivator following that traditional path, but more so because his disciple wouldn''t be able to take advantage of the benefits brought from reaching the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    At the very least, even though he hadn''t taught his disciple much about the Dao Domain Lord Realm at the moment, he had at least taught them the basics about the realm and Chu Yang should be able to enter the Dao Domain Lord Realm on his own without his guidance if needed. Only, he had no idea if that would be the same path as the one, he went down involvingprehending several different Daos or if it would be the path focusing on a singr Dao.


    Originally, he had nned to guide his disciples into choosing the path most fitting for them when they reached the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, be it the Soul Ascension Realm or one of the two paths of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    But now that might not be possible with Chu Yang depending on what kind of mysterious opportunity, he ended up obtaining-


    "Hm? Looks like he really did end up breaking through¡­"


    And just as he was thinking about Chu Yang, he noticed a change taking ce in his status disyed by the system, as his realm changed from the Domain Lord Realm to the Dao Domain Lord Realm, but more importantly than that, Xuan Hao clearly noticed a small note at the end of his realm. Indicating that he had taken a different path than his master when it came to the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    All the while ignoring the notifications that came a few secondster following his disciple''s breakthrough¡­

 Chapter 1491 A Familiar Place?

    Chapter 1491 A Familiar ce?


    n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    A few weeks earlier, when Chu Yang had been cautiously making his way through the middle section of the mountain range that was filled with Soul Ascension Realm demon beast, the ground beneath him had suddenly opened up and swallowed him before he could even react.


    The next second, he found himself in apletely different ce and the mountain range he had been travelling through for the past few days hadpletely disappeared.


    "Did I fall into some kind of secret realm?"


    Looking at his surroundings that hadpletely changed, Chu Yang''s only guess as to what was happening was that he had ended up stumbling over the entrance to a secret realm.


    If that was just it, he wouldn''t be troubled, as he would just be able to make his way out the same way he had fallen in, but as he scanned his surroundings with both his divine sense and domain, it didn''t take long for him to discover that the entrance he had supposedly entered through was nowhere to be seen.


    In short, it meant that the entrance he had stumbled through was a one-way entrance. If he wanted to get out, he would have to find another entrance to the secret realm that hopefully connected to somewhere familiar.


    "Only problem, I have no idea how dangerous this secret realm is nor where another entrance might be located¡­" Muttering this to himself as he realized just how dangerous his current situation was, Chu Yang could not help looking around at the tall trees that now surrounded him on all sides.


    Although he had not encountered any demon beasts or seen any signs of demon beasts yet, his past experience in secret realms told him that his current environment was perfect for demon beasts to live in.


    So, with that in mind, he began to cautiously move forward while looking out for any potential demon beast that might be lurking in the foliage around him. Soon enough, finding himself trekking through the forest he now found himself inside of in an unknown secret realm.


    The reason he didn''t fly being rather simple, as he didn''t want to draw any unnecessary attention to himself, bing an easy to spot target for any demon beasts that might be hidden inside the forest.


    However, as he continued slowly making his way through the forest over the next few hours without spotting a single demon beast, his worries about the forest being filled with hidden demon beasts slowly dispersed, as he used his domain to ascend into the air and slowly hover a little over ten meters above the trees.


    Taking the opportunity to inspect his new surroundings to look for anything that might help him with figuring out how to get out of the secret realm that he had ended up stumbling into by ident.


    Unfortunately, he couldn''t see anything other than an endless sea of trees stretching as far as the eye could see without any end in sight. Forcing him to continue traveling without any clear goal in mind outside of searching for something different that might help him locate a path out of the rather strange secret realm that he found himself inside of.


    At the very least, now that he was flying, he was far faster and at the same time could observe a farrger areapared to when he had been cautiously moving through the forest earlier on.


    Even then, after an entire day of travelling, he didn''t spot anything different, as the forest seemed to go on forever without any end in sight.


    This is too much! Just howrge is this forest? Could it be that I''m perhaps trapped inside some sort of illusory formation¡­?


    Feeling increasingly frustrated as the forest beneath him remained unchanging and just continued on without any end in sight, Chu Yang could not help thinking that he might have been trapped inside some kind of illusory formation.


    Given that he had learnt a lot during his time adventuring in the neutral territory, he understood that there were formations that could trap someone inside of them without the person in question having any idea of the fact that they had been trapped inside a formation in the first ce.


    The only problem with this was that a formation capable of trapping him without him having any idea about it would be of a terrifying level that would pretty much be impossible for him to break with his current strength at the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Even worse, he had already used up the talismans that had been given to him by his master. Meaning that he was essentially rendered defenseless in the face of such a trapping formation.


    Even if he knew about its existence, there was nothing he could do about it, as he couldn''t even sense the formation in the first ce.


    Am I perhaps going to remain stuck in this ce until my masteres to find me or¡­ Will I remain trapped here for the rest of my life¡­?


    Feeling his thoughts, taking a somewhat dark turn as he continued travelling through the seemingly endless forest at full speed and then one day turned into three days and then a week without any sign of change in the environment.


    "Huh? That is! SOMETHING DIFFERENT!?"


    However, just as he felt himself starting to give up hope of leaving the forest as he became certain that he had been trapped inside some kind of formation, he noticed the foresting to an end and something different appearing, causing him to excitedly rush forward. Wanting nothing more than to leave the forest after having spent over a week flying through it at this point in time.


    "Huh? This ce is¡­ Isn''t this the Dead Spirit Canyon¡­?"


    It was only when he reached the end of the forest and stood at the edge of a tall cliff looking down at the rather familiar massive river, that he realized that he wasn''t inside an unfamiliar secret realm, but instead one he had been to in the past.

 Chapter 1492 Rising Water

    Chapter 1492 Rising Water


    Even if the river below him was incredibly dangerous even for someone in the Soul Ascension Realm from what he could remember about it, Chu Yang still felt a sense of relief upon seeing it.


    "If I follow the edge of the river, I should be able to find a way out of this secret realm." n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    And the reason for this relief was because he already knew about the location of two paths out of this secret realm, one of them being in the ancient city ruins that were located right next to the edge of the Dead Spirit Canyon that the massive river flowed through.


    In the worst-case scenario, he would be on the other side of the Dead Spirit Canyon and would have to travel back the same path he had originally travelled through the secret realm to reach the Dead Spirit Canyon in the first ce. After all, the teleportation formation he had used back then to travel safely across the Dead Spirit canyon had been destroyed after he had used it.


    Even though it would undoubtedly be a dangerous endeavor, he still felt that it was far better than finding himself trapped in some unknown secret realm without any idea about how to leave.


    At the moment, the most worrying thing was the fact that he still clearly remembered how those people had clearly talked about how dangerous it had been to follow the edge of the Dead Spirit Canyon.


    From what he could see around him and the fact that he had not encountered anything that threatened his life so far, he could be certain that he was not in one of those dangerous areas that had been mentioned by them, but that didn''t mean he could let his guard down, as he would almost certainly have to pass through one of the dangerous regions mentioned by those people if he was on the side of the Dead Spirit Canyon where the tower with the now destroyed teleportation formation was located.


    Continuing to travel along the edge of the Dead Spirit Canyon with a clear goal in mind, Chu Yang ended up spending the next few days with the forest still located right beside him before the forest finally came to an end before being reced by a familiar looking grass in filled with nothing but empty space, just like how he had remembered the area next to the Dead Spirit Canyon had been in the past when he had been there.


    The main difference was that he now felt himself being restricted once again, as he could no longer fly through the air with the help of his domain.


    In a sense, it was reassuring to him that the surroundings had be more familiar, but at the same time he also understood that if the forest he had gone through earlier was indeed one of the dangerous regions that had been mentioned by that group of people in the past, it would at least be three days until he reached either the remnants of the ancient tower or the ancient city.


    So, with that in mind, Chu Yang continued moving forward with the violent river of the Dead Spirit Canyon right next to him almost spraying water on to his face as he traveled along the side of the river-


    Wait¡­ How can water reach me all the way up here? There should at least be a hundred or so meters down from the cliff edge to the water¡­


    Freezing on the spot as he finally noticed something unusual that he hadn''t been paying attention to before, Chu Yang cautiously peered over the edge of the cliff and looked down towards the violent waters below.


    Only to discover that the water that should have been far from reaching him was now only a few meters away from reaching the edge of the cliff.


    Meaning that in the months since he had been to this secret realm, the waters had risen far above their previous levels.


    Not just that, but as he focused his attention on the violent water, he realized that it was still rising and not slow in any way, as it seemed to be elerating in the speed that it was rising.


    At the current pace that the water was rising and the speed that the rise was increasing, he guessed that it would at most be another week before the violent waters ended up rising above the cliff edge and flooded the grass ins that were to his other side.


    Given the dangers of those waters and the fact that even someone in the Soul Ascension realm couldn''t safely traverse them, Chu Yang didn''t want to end up having to deal with a situation where his location was flooded with said water.


    The only positive thing was that he should be able to reach an entrance out of the secret realm if he continued forward for another three or so days. Meaning that he would have more than enough time to leave before the water ended up splining over and started flooding the grass ins.


    In the worst-case scenario that he was not on the side of the ancient city, he should still have more than enough time to make his way back in the direction of the second entrance of the secret realm before the water started affecting him.


    After all, even if it started spilling over the edge of its normal banks and flooded the grass ins next to it, he should be more than capable of avoiding it if he left in time.


    Not to mention. The desert he would have to travel through would provide a good barrier for sucking up water in case it really ended up flooding beyond the grass ins. Giving him even more time to escape in a worst-case scenario.


    All things considered, Chu Yang wasn''t too worried about the situation, as he just decided to keep an eye on the violent river in case something unexpected ended up happening.

 Chapter 1493 Ascending to the Sky

    Chapter 1493 Ascending to the Sky


    After continuing along the edge of the Dead Spirit Canyon for the next three days without anything unexpected happening along the way, Chu Yang was overjoyed to spot a familiar building appearing in the distance.


    Even from a distance, he could tell that it was the old tower that had a teleportation formation inside of it that he had used to cross over the Dead Spirit Canyon in the past- Or at the very least what remained of the tower, as it seemed like part of it had broken off and fallen into the dead Spirit Canyon at some point in time.


    Although this old tower wasn''t what he hoped to see, as the ancient city ruins with the path out of the secret realm would have been far better to encounter in his opinion, he also didn''tin too much about it as he understood that finding the old tower at the very least meant that he was now somewhere familiar and not in some unknown location like had been his fear at first. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    After all, for all he knew, he might have not even been moving in the right direction by following the edge of the Dead Spirit Canyon and could have been going in theplete opposite direction from the one that he needed to go to reach somewhere familiar.


    At the very least, now that he was here, Chu Yang decided to take the opportunity to inspect what was left of the old tower to see if there was any indication that the teleportation formation, he had used in the past might still be usable.


    And¡­ Nope¡­ The ce in the tower where the teleportation formation had once been had already partly broken off and ended up in the waters below. Rendering the teleportation formation and what little was left of itpletely unusable.


    "Looks like I will have to make my way through that desert if I want to make my way back in the direction of the other entrance¡­" Muttering this to himself as he began recalling what he could remember about the entrance to the secret realm that he had first used to enter this secret realm in the past, Chu Yang couldn''t help feeling a slight shiver run down his spine.


    The entrance itself had been on top of a stone tform that hadter ended up crashing into a Dao Seed Realm demon beast in the form of a giant turtle that had been sleeping beneath the stone tform where the gate out of the secret realm had been located.


    Even though the stone tform with the gate leading out of the secret realm had crashed into the turtle demon beast in the Dao Seed Realm, Chu Yang was confident that the gate should still be intact somewhere in the rubble that had been left behind, as a gate to a secret realm was not that simple to destroy.


    The main reason he had not thought about, using it nor had the ones who hade together with him into the secret realm back then, was because of the presence of the Dao Seed Realm demon beast guarding the area around the gate.


    In the opinions of both the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator and the weaker ones who had been part of the group that hade into the secret realm after him, it was a far better option to risk their lives trying to brave the waters of the river running through the Dead Spirit Canyon over having to face a Dao Seed Realm demon beast.


    At the very least, when passing through the Dead Spirit Canyon, they stood a chance of surviving the onught of the creatures lurking in the waters below, while facing the Dao Seed Realm demon beast, they stood no chance at all.


    The reason why he had chosen to try and go through the gate that should be left in the rubble of the stone tform that had crashed into the then sleeping turtle demon beast, was because the waters of the Dead Spirit Canyon River had be far too dangerous for him to even think about crossing them.


    Even just standing at the edge of the cliff looking out over the dark waters, he could clearly sense the presence of over a dozen Soul Ascension Realm creatures lurking below the surface close to where he was standing. Staring at him from below the surface ready to attack the moment he stepped into the turbulent waters.


    Not just that, but further out, he could also clearly sense a far more terrifying presence lurking in the waters far exceeding that of the Soul Ascension Realm creatures he could sense.


    Compared to the first time he had been to the secret realm and seen the Dead Spirit Canyon; it was clear that it had be far more dangerouspared to the past with the rising water level.


    As for where these terrifying creatures had been lurking before today? He had no idea, but he had a guess that they should have either been further upstream and only nowe downstream to where he was or that they had been in hibernation waiting for the water level to rise.


    No matter what, he had no intention of trying to cross the Dead Spirit Canyon without the help of the teleportation formation. Meaning that he would be trying his luck at finding the gate in the rubble around the ce where the Dao Seed Realm turtle demon beast lived.


    Even if his chance of making it out of the secret realm was low if he encountered the turtle demon beast without any talismans from his master, it would at the very least be better than being stuck inside the secret realm and having to deal with the waters of the Dead Spirit Canyon flooding the ce and bringing with it the terrifying creatures that lurked beneath the surface of the waters.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Chu Yang didn''t waste any more time as he began to make his way in the direction of the desert that he remembered to have passed through on his way to the Dead Spirit Canyon in the past.


    Although he was not sure about the exact location, he would have to travel to make his way back to the forest where the gate he had first used when entering the secret realm was located, it would be fine as long as he had a general direction to follow.


    Crack~!


    However, just as he began to set off, a cracking sound of earth being torn apart sounded out from behind him, as he turned around and watched as what little remained of the ancient tower broke off from the side of the Dead Spirit Canyon before starting to slowly ascend into the sky, a kind of ancient mechanism in ce to protect from the rising waters of the Dead Spirit Canyon.


    After all, if the water level rising was a normal urrence, it would definitely have been in a far worse state than it is now. Not to mention, signs of the water should have also been present on the ancient tower.


    Not just the ancient tower, but the ancient city should be the same, as it should also have ascended in a simr fashion. Turning into a small floating ind to avoid the raging waters of the Dead Spirit Canyon.


    Whoosh~!


    Not even having to think about the situation for more than a few seconds, Chu Yang directly turned around and jumped on top of the slowly ascending piece ofnd that the ancient tower was on top of before it got too high into the air.


    Hoping to not just get a betteryout of the surrounding area from up high now that he couldn''t fly up and get a better idea of where he was moving, but also because he was wondering if there were other ancient structures inside of the secret realm outside of the ancient city and tower.


    nning to see if he might be able to spot them and find another time in the future to explore them if possible.


    He didn''t really worry about how to get down, as in his current cultivation realm, he could easily negate any kind of damage he might take from falling up high. Not to mention, he would not really take any damage in most situations any way.


    At the same time, he also hoped that he might be able to use the opportunity to break through the invisible barrier that seemed to have prevented him from ascending more than a few hundred meters into the air when he had been able to fly in the past inside the secret realm.


    Whoosh~


    And¡­ Just like he had expected, he soon crossed that barrier standing on top of the small ind. Soon reaching a height of ten thousand meters before slowlying to a stop far above the rtively low hanging clouds of the secret realm. Giving him a view of the entire realm that he hadn''t seen or experienced before. Allowing him to see the entire width of the Dead Spirit Canyon, while also allowing him to spot the floating ind that seemed to have appeared on the other side of the Dead Spirit Canyon.

 Chapter 1494 Dark Waters Spread...

    Chapter 1494 Dark Waters Spread...


    Standing on top of the small floating ind that had what little was left of the ancient tower on top of it, Chu Yang was about to look around for other floating inds outside of the one belonging to the ancient city ruins on the other side of the Dead Spirit Canyon-


    Crack~


    When a cracking sound suddenly echoed out from beneath him. Alerting him to the fact that the small floating ind had begun to show signs of breaking apart.


    Though surprising, it wasn''t that unexpected considering that most of the ancient tower had already been destroyed and fallen into the Dead Spirit Canyon since hisst visit to the secret realm.


    The shocking thing came when he looked down towards the ground again and discovered that the ground that should have been beneath him had already been flooded by the dark waters of the Dead Spirit Canyon.


    Not only that, but in the short time it had taken him to ascend into the sky, the dark waters of the Dead Spirit Canyon had already spread all the way the desert that was barely visible in the distance at this point in time. Meaning that his original n of jumping down after a quick look around was no longer viable, as he would end up in the middle of the dark waters with several days of travel before, he could reach the desert.


    Not to mention, he could clearly see that the boundaries of the dark waters were still expanding. Slowly encroaching into the desert and flooding it as well.


    By the time he got to the desert, it would most likely already have been flooded. Making it even more difficult for him to try and figure out what direction to move in to reach the forest with the gate out of the secret realm, as he couldn''t see the forest from where he was at the moment and would have to pretty much blindly guess the direction if he got to the desert and it had changedpared to thest time he had made his way through it.


    Craaaack~!


    However, as he heard the sound of the small ind beneath his feet breaking apart even further, as part of the small ind directly broke off and fell into the waters below, he understood that he wouldn''t have much of a choice in another few minutes.


    How in the world did the dark water end up flooding the ce so fast in the first ce? Are the ancient ruins ascending towards the sky perhaps a trigger for this? Did they serve some kind of function in suppressing the dark waters of the Dead Spirit Canyon?


    Frowning to himself as he thought about this while looking down at the dark waters below him with a somewhat helpless expression on his face, Chu Yang decided to take what little time he had left before plummeting into the dark waters to look around for any other ancient ruins that had simrly ascended into the sky and turned into small floating inds-


    "Huh? So¡­ So many of them¡­"


    And in the end, he discovered that outside of just the two he was already familiar with, there were hundreds- If not thousands of other small inds that had popped up all along the side of Dead Spirit Canyon with a distance of a few hundred kilometers between each of them.


    The Reason he had not encountered any of them before being because the one he was on top of at the moment along with the city that stood out as unique was at the end of this line of mostly ancient towers and small buildings on the edge of the Dead Spirit Canyon.


    Outside of the ones along the edge of the Dead Spirit Canyon, he also discovered several simr rows of ancient buildings and towers in the distance¡­ And from how simr they were to the ones along the Dead Spirit Canyon, he guessed that the Dead Spirit Canyon might only be onerge river out of many.


    If he wasn''t wrong, the other rivers simr to the one in the Dead Spirit Canyon should have also overflowed. Meaning that the dark waters would most likely not just affect the area around the Dead Spirit Canyon but could probably even submerge the entire secret realm in the dark waters.


    Thinking about it. Maybe that was the reason why the gate he had first entered the secret realm through was suspended up in the air on a stone tform instead of being on the ground like the one inside the ancient city had been¡­


    Crack-!


    Lost in his own thoughts, Chu Yang was suddenly brought back to reality, as arge chunk of the ind directly broke off. Reducing its size by close to ten percent in an instant, causing him to start panicking.


    Now knowing that the dark waters might cover the entire secret realm, he also understood that the gate out of the secret realm that he had originally been aiming for would most likely be submerged and destroyed. Rendering his earlier n for when he ended up in the water useless, as he would have nowhere to escape to if the entire secret realm was submerged.


    "Hm? Is that¡­ A bridge!?"


    However, just when he was about to give up, he noticed a barely visible bridge made from almost translucentyers of light connected to the side of his small floating ind.


    Following the light bridge he had just discovered; he realized that it connected to the tower closest to his own also on the edge of the Dead Spirit Canyon.


    Thud~


    Cautiously touching the barely visible bridge with one of his feet, Chu Yang made sure that it was indeed solid and after a few more tests found himself standing directly on top of the barely visible bridge.


    Although he had no idea about the safety of this bridge, it connected to another of the towers that looked far more stable than his own¡­ And more importantly, it also had a fully intact little ind connected to it.


    Whoosh-!


    For this reason, after ensuring that he could walk on the barely visible bridge of light, he didn''t waste any time as he rushed off in the direction of the small tower ind that it was connected to. Understanding that staying any longer on his own copsing ind would be nothing more than a death sentence.


    Not to mention, he also feared staying too long might result in the bridge connecting the two floating inds disappearing, something that wouldpletely cut off this path of escape and seal him to a fate of having to find a way out by navigating the dark waters and having to inevitably dive into said ck waters in an attempt to find the gate leading out of the secret realm, something he felt was nothing short of a death sentence after feeling the countless terrifying energies that emerged from below him as the dark waters began to upy more of the secret realm.


    Thump-!


    Only when he found himself on the other side of the barely visible bridge that seemed to have been made out of light, did he feel a sense of relief washing over him as if he had just survived a life and death battle. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Even more so when he saw the bridge he had been on top of start disintegrating silently without a word before disappearing a few secondster.


    Turning and looking back in the direction of the small ind he had been standing on only a few seconds earlier, he quickly discovered why, as the small ind had already reduced in size by half and begun plummeting towards the dark waters below-


    SPLAAAASH-!


    CHOMP-!


    However, instead of the expected crash into the water that he had expected to see, a giant mouth suddenly emerged from the dark waters and swallowed the remaining bit of the tower and small ind plummeting towards the dark waters before slowly retreating back beneath the surface. Returning the dark waters to their original state like nothing had happened.


    "At least Dao Seed Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he finished watching what had just happened, Chu Yang could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine. Understanding that he would have likely ended up dead if he had decided to stay back at the floating ind and tried to traverse the dark waters in search of the gate leading out of the secret realm.


    At the very least, he is safe on top of the floating ind for now.


    More importantly, this floating ind also seemed to be connected to other floating inds, but for now, he didn''t intend to go over and see them, as the most important thing was to first explore the tower on this new floating ind.


    After all, it was in a far better state than the broken one he had been to before and could still have some treasures or other valuable things inside of it.

 Chapter 1495 Not a Secret Realm...?

    Chapter 1495 Not a Secret Realm...?


    Entering the still pristine ancient tower, Chu Yang didn''t take long to search through it.


    However, even though the ancient tower waspletely intact and didn''t seem to have suffered any damage on the outside, there was nothing left inside of the tower for him to take. Not even a single book that should have been stored on one of the several empty bookshelves lining the interior walls of the tower had managed to survive to this day.


    Not just that, but there wasn''t any teleportation formation around like there had been inside of the barely standing tower that had now disappeared beneath the dark waters below.


    From this alone, it was obvious that the tower he had first explored should have been special, as it connected directly to the ancient city on the other side of the Dead Spirit Canyon. Maybe that was also the reason why the state of that ancient tower had been far worse than the one he was currently inside of, as other people who hade before him and explored the secret realm would have prioritized exploring the more important ancient tower first.


    "But¡­ Even if this ancient tower doesn''t have any treasures left inside of it, it might not be the same for the other ancient towers¡­" Muttering this to himself as he stepped out of the pristine ancient tower and nced over towards another bridge of light connecting to another tower along the edge of the Dead Spirit Canyon, Chu Yang didn''t n on giving up on finding something valuable inside these towers.


    After all, considering that he had no way to leave the floating inds at the moment due to the dark waters flooding the entire secret realm below him, Chu Yang decided to spend his time exploring what he could while he waited for the dark waters to hopefully retreat back into their previous boundaries.


    Of course, part of him also hoped that he would be able to find another ancient city floating in the air or perhaps find a path to the one already floating on the other side of the Dead Spirit Canyon, as that would provide him with a quick way out of the secret realm that didn''t involve him having to risk his life going down into the dark waters or having to wait for an unknown period of time before the dark waters receded.


    Like this, Chu Yang soon began the process of moving from ind to ind, as he began systematically exploring the ancient towers that were connected to each other through barely visible light bridges.


    However, much like the first pristine ancient tower he searched through, the rest of the ancient towers were simrly empty without anything of value inside of them.


    The only thing of value he managed to find were a few spirit stones that had somehow managed to survive in a corner of one of the towers and a few pieces of spirit metal that had been left forgotten behind one of the bookshelves in another tower.


    Outside of this, he found nothing more than clean empty towers, like someone had deliberatelye in and cleaned up the interior of these towers before he had shown up. Making him believe that someone might have traveled along the same path he was at the moment in the past. Only, the ones who hade before him hadpletely cleaned up these ancient towers without leaving anything behind.


    What little was left behind was simply because the other party hadn''t looked around the ce properly or maybe because it was deemed worthless to waste space inside an interspatial ring whenpared to the other things that might have been present inside these ancient towers in the past.


    Luckily, this streak of bad luck and not finding anything of value soon took a turn, as Chu Yang found himself at the endpoint of the line of towers following the edge of the Dead Spirit Canyon without any other towers for him to move to next. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The reason why this was the end of his bad luck was rather simple, as this ancient tower was not only farrger than the ones that hade before, but it was also fitted with over a dozen still working teleportation formations that seemed to connect to other parts of the secret realm.


    In a sense, therge ancient tower could be considered a central hub for travel throughout the secret realm. Not just because of the teleportation formations, but also because Chu Yang noticed a very clear gate leading out of the secret realm in the middle of therge ancient tower.


    Different from the other gates leading out of the secret realm, this was clearly considered one of the more important locations, as he soon realized that there were countless still working formations in ce around the gate leading out of the secret realm. Preventing him from even getting anywhere close to the gate.


    At the very least, the different teleportation formations inside of therge ancient tower did not seem to have these kinds of formations in ce and allowed him to use them with no problems.


    Even then, finding a way out of the secret realm, but being unable to use it, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit reluctant to just leave the ce behind and thus first decided to search through therger ancient tower for a way to get through the formations blocking him from using the gate.


    As for the reason why he didn''t try to force his way through the formations with force? That was rather simple, as he had clearly sensed that the strength of the formations in ce around the gate leading out of the secret realm had clearly far surpassed anything he could handle with his current cultivation realm.


    Not to mention him being able to break those formations, he feared that if he did anything to attack them, it might trigger some kind of killing formations to take action, something that he wanted to avoid at all costs given the sheer strength he could sense from these formations far surpassed even that of the Dao Seed Realm turtle demon beast he had seen during hisst trip to this secret realm.


    In the end, after searching through therger ancient tower, he did find some intact scrolls and books.


    The only problem was that these scrolls and books were written in anguage that he couldn''t understand. Going by what he had learnt from his master andparing them to some texts shown by his master, they should have been written in the ancientnguage that came before the one currently used across the continent.


    Even if he wanted to understand what was written inside of these books, he had no way to do so, as he hadn''t really found any reason to try and study the ancientnguage in the past. Having focused his full attention on increasing his own strength.


    Whoosh~


    With that in mind, he could only ce these books and scrolls into his interspatial ring and hand them over to his master after returning to the sect. Having him trante them for him, as his master did seem to at least have some understanding of this ancientnguage.


    However, outside of these ancient texts and books that had been left behind, he also ended up finding a scroll written in thenguage that he was familiar with at the top floor of the ancient tower.


    The main problem with this scroll was the fact that it had clearly not been left behind by the once owners of the ancient tower, but instead by someone who hade before him and explored this ancient secret realm.


    Almost certainly the same who had so meticulously cleaned up the ancient towers he had passed through earlier to get here¡­


    Even then, Chu Yang didn''t decide to throw away this scroll out of spite of leaving nothing for ateer like himself, but instead decided to carefully read through.


    As a result, he discovered that the information in the scroll was actually far more useful than he had first expected.


    Not only did it inform him that this secret realm was not a secret realm, but instead a naturally urring mystic realm, but it also informed him that this mystic realm was under the Mirage Sect and his current location inside of this mystic realm was one of the outer regions of said mystic realm.


    Mirage Sect¡­ Mystic Realm¡­ Is it perhaps the same one I visited in the past with master and Qi Ying?


    Learning about this, Chu Yang almost instantly realized that the secret realm- or mystic realm that he currently found himself inside of might actually be the same one he had entered with his master and senior sister in the past. Making him realize just how massive the mystic realm was if the area he was in at the moment was only considered a small corner of therger mystic realm.

 Chapter 1496 Origin of the Dark Waters

    Chapter 1496 Origin of the Dark Waters


    Realizing that the secret realm he was currently inside was not actually a secret realm but instead a mystic realm- and one that he had likely already been to in the past, Chu Yang could not help looking through the information again to make sure he had not read anything wrong.


    Only after he calmed himself down from this sudden revtion, did he continue reading through the rest of the information. Finding that outside of a bit more information regarding the outer region of the mystic realm that he now found himself inside of, there was also information on the Dead Spirit Canyon- Or more specifically the dark waters the flowed through the Dead Spirit Canyon.


    The information in question noted down the origin of the dark waters as being a ce called the Dark Spirit Ocean, a ce teeming with terrifying creatures that had been sealed away by the Mirage Sect in the past.


    At the same time, it also exined the current state of the mystic realm with the dark waters flooding everything.


    Apparently, it only affected a single outer region of the mystic realm and had been done deliberately to release stress from the more important parts of the seal on the Dark Spirit Ocean. Allowing some weaker creatures that had been sealed to escape in the process while the core of the seal itself underwent a process of self-repair.


    Looking out of the ancient tower he was currently inside of; it didn''t take much for him to realize that the tower he was currently inside of should be at the edge of this Dark Spirit Ocean. Although barely visible, he could see some kind of formation symbols flickering across the surface of the dark waters every now and again.


    The problem was that ording to the information in the scroll, the time it took for the core part of the seal to repair itself and the outer region of the mystic realm to return to its previous state would at least take five years and in case of extensive damage to the core part of the seal could take over a hundred years.


    No matter how patient he might be, Chu Yang wasn''t nning to just sit around inside an ancient tower for the next hundred years.


    For this reason, he began searching for ways that might help him leave the mystic realm earlier.


    Unfortunately, the scroll didn''t contain any information on how to release the formation that was currently preventing him from using the gate that was right in front of him. Forcing him to turn his attention towards the dozen or so still active teleportation formations present inside of the mystic realm for a potential way out of his current situation.


    The main reason why he had not yet gone forward to test out the different teleportation formation was rather simple, as the scroll had also clearly mentioned that the teleportation formations present might only have enough strength for a single use. Potentially turning them into a one-way ticket to an unknown location.


    However, given the current state of things, he didn''t really have much of a choice if he wanted to continue searching for a way out of the mystic realm, as the only other path would be to wait for an unknown period of time for the dark waters to recede.


    Whoosh~!


    With that in mind, Chu Yang didn''t hesitate for long as he randomly chose one of the teleportation formations present before stepping through it with nervous expression on his face. Hoping that the teleportation formation wouldn''t copse the moment he reached the other side and more importantly that he wouldn''tnd in a dangerous location.


    Crack~


    Sadly, the cracking sound that came from beneath his feet the moment he found himself in a new location revealed the fact that the teleportation formation he had just gone through had run its course, as it broke apart before he had a chance to do anything about it.


    Not that he realistically could do anything about it with hisprehension of the Dao of Formations¡­


    At the very least, as he began looking around at his new surroundings, he discovered that he was now inside an ancient city that seemed farrger than the one he had encountered at the edge of the Dead Spirit Canyon.


    But more importantly than that, he didn''t sense any danger through his divine sense and the ancient city itself was also floating in the air on top of arge floating ind.


    Using his divine sense to look around the edges of the ancient city, he even noticed that there were several bridges connected to it going out towards other smaller floating inds. Making him confident that even though he had not found any gate inside the ancient city, he should have a high chance of finding one if he followed those paths leading off the ind.


    For now, he decided to first thoroughly search through the ind and look for anything of value before moving on. After all, different from the other locations he had visited since ascending to the sky, it was clear that this ancient city had far more valuable things lying around.


    One example being a pile of spiritual metal that had been haphazardly tucked away in a corner of the ancient city without anyone havinge to take it over the years.


    Even though the spiritual metal in question had clearly declined in quality over the years, he could still tell that it was valuable from the power still radiating off the metal. Not to mention, he was sure that his junior brother would be overjoyed to get his hands on this kind of ancient spiritual metal that came from the ancient past. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Thinking about it, he wondered if his junior brother might have the ability to reverse engineering the spiritual metal given how skilled he was in the art of cksmithing.


    Whoosh~


    Because of this, he didn''t hesitate to use arge portion of the storage space he had avable to store the ancient spiritual metal.


    That and he didn''t really have much else to store inside of his interspatial rings for now¡­


    As Chu Yang continued walking through the ruins of the ancient city. Picking up anything of value he found along the way, he soon found himself standing in front of arge building that had mostly been destroyed, as part of it had copsed in on itself at some point in the past.


    "This should be the center of the city where the one in the people in charge should have been staying in the past." Muttering this to himself as he looked over the ancient building that had mostly been reduced to rubble, Chu Yang could not help feeling a bit excited as he began to cautiously make his way inside of therge building at the center of the ancient.


    Given just how many valuable things he had managed to find so far during his search of the ancient city, he had realized that this was a ce that had not been explored by others before- or at the very least, those who might have explored the ce in the past had been extremely powerful and thus ignored this ancient city.


    For this reason alone, he was excited about what might still be hidden inside what should have once been the center of power of this ancient city.


    Of course, given that he was still inside the mystic realm and there could be all kinds of deadly dangers lurking around every corner, he made sure to cautiously make his way forward.


    After all, there was always a third potential reason why the ancient city had not yet been looted and that was that there might still be some kind of ancient formation guarding the city.


    If not for the city itself, at least the more important locations that were also likely to be the first to be explored by anyone entering the ancient city.


    In a sense, it was a rather odd choice on his side to go around collecting different things he deemed valuable before moving to the core of the ancient city where the most valuable things would be located.


    Although¡­ The reason for this was that he didn''t really face any kind of time restraints, as dangers that might have been present on the ground like demon beasts, were nowhere to be seen in the ancient city.


    Speaking of which¡­ What had ended up happening to the demon beast below?


    Were they swallowed up by the dark water and died? But if that was the case, how would demon beast reemerge again when the water receded in the future? Did theye from other parts of the mystic realm?


    Feeling his thoughts starting to wander as he stepped through the rubble of the ancient building searching for anything valuable, Chu Yang quickly focused his attention back on the matter at hand in case he ended up triggering any sort of hidden mechanisms or deadly formations. Ready to back off the moment he sensed anything unusual.

 Chapter 1497 Underground Room

    Chapter 1497 Underground Room


    Just from a quick nce, he couldn''t see anything of value inside of the building, but this wasn''t enough to discourage him, as he very well understood that anything valuable that might have been left behind in the past should have been hidden to some extent.


    Of course, to ensure that he didn''t identally end up triggering some kind of ancient formation that might be present inside of the ruins, he didn''t dare to use his divine sense or domain to quickly search through the ruins. Instead opting to slowly look through the ruins himself so he would have a better chance of spotting any dangerous traps before he ended up triggering them.


    The little divine sense he had used earlier when he had first stepped into this ancient city had mostly been concentrated around the streets and avoided any of the buildings inside of the city for this exact reason.


    If there happened to be a formation in ce protecting the entire city, he would have already discovered it and more importantly, he would not have any way to counter it.


    With that in mind, there was still a chance that there was a formation in ce, just that it didn''t trigger unless the ancient city itself was damaged, though the chance for that was low considering the ancient city should have ended up in its current state after having been attacked in the past¡­


    Rustle~


    Moving through the rubble, Chu Yang suddenly froze on the spot as he heard the sound of movementing from a small corner of the rubble.


    "Hm? A demon beast¡­?"


    Looking closer at where the sound of movement came from, he quickly discovered a small demon beast peeking out through the rubble before quickly darting away into another pile of rocks to hide. Clearly having been scared off by his appearance.


    Considering that the strength of the demon beast in question was only around the early stage of the Qi Condensation Rm, this kind of reaction was understandable, but its presence alone indicated to Chu Yang that the ancient city ruins were notpletely safe from demon beasts. Alerting him to the fact that there might be other, stronger demon beasts hidden among the ancient ruins that he had not yet managed to run into.


    Although¡­ Given that he had already searched through most of the city, the only location where any powerful demon beast could be hidden would be inside of the building, he currently found himself inside of.


    Even if this was reassuring to some extent, it was also worrying, as he soon finished searching through the entire building without finding anything outside of a stairwell leading down into what he could only presume to be some kind of underground section of the building or possibly even an entire underground city hidden below ground.


    There was a good chance of it being either of the two, but the more important thing was that he had clearly seen a few other demon beastsing from the stairwell while he had made his way through the rubble of the building and exploring it in its entirety.


    Meaning that the origin of the demon beasts inside of the ancient city came from the underground section of the city. Any stronger demon beasts he found would undoubtedlye from down there.


    "At least let there not be any demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm or above¡­" Muttering this to himself as he found himself standing in front of the stairwell leading down into thest unexplored section of the ancient city, Chu Yang cautiously took a step forward as he descended into the darkness below. Unaware of what dangers could be lurking down there¡­


    "Huh? This is¡­"


    However, as he arrived at the bottom of the stairwell, he could not help letting out a somewhat confused sound.


    The reason being that the underground part of the city that he had expected to be some kind ofrge underground section simr to an underground cave with demon beasts lurking in the shadows was not at all like that. Instead, all he was met with upon reaching the bottom of the stairwell was a small room decorated with finely cut stones lining the walls and a few small crystals providing the room with light for him to see.


    Not only did this confuse him as to where the demon beasts he had encountered so far hade from, but it also made him wonder what kind of secret this small room served. After all, for it to be under what he guessed to be the most important building in the ancient city, it should serve some kind of purpose in the past before the ancient city copsed.


    The only problem, he could not find any clue as to what kind of purpose the small room might have served in the past. The reason for this was rather simple, as outside of the finely decorated walls, there was nothing inside of the small room outside of the t stone floor.


    Looking around, he couldn''t even find any signs of there ever having been anything inside of the small room. Making him believe that whatever purpose this room had served in the past and the thing that should have been stored in the room in the past, had long since been taken away or decayed to the point that there were no traces left behind in the small room.


    To make the situation even more confusing than it already was, a corner of the pristine room was upied by a dozen or so demon beasts simr to the once he had spotted during his search through the ancient ruins above ground.


    The only difference he could find with these demon beasts and the others he had encountered so far was the fact that these demon beasts didn''t seem to be afraid of him as they continued moving around in the small space, they had carved out for themselves inside the small room.


    No¡­ It''s not because they aren''t afraid of me, but instead more like they can''t see me¡­


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he noticed something clearly off about the small bundle of demon beasts inside the small room, Chu Yang could not help frowning to himself as he stopped himself from taking another step forward into the small room.


    Whoosh~


    Deciding to use his divine sense to investigate before stepping inside himself, he found nothing out of the ordinary.


    However, given that he now focused on the demon beasts inside and saw that they were acting out of the ordinary, he still didn''t feel safe entering the small room. Instead, continuing to use his divine sense to find anything out of the ordinary outside of the demon beasts inside of the small room.


    In the end, he noticed that outside of the demon beasts and the fact that they now seemed to be avoiding moving around certain locations inside the small room and even feared walking through certain parts of the small, he also noticed that a small section of the pristine and intricately decorated wall had cracked.


    The crack in question was almostpletely invisible to the naked eye and would have been impossible to notice without using his divine sense to thoroughly investigate the small room.


    In the end, it was through this small crack in the wall that he noticed a barely visible formation symbol through the crack in the wall


    "A formation? And one that is inscribed into the walls of the small room. If I had recklessly entered the small room, I would likely have been trapped inside the formation¡­"


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine upon realizing that the small room was actually some kind of formation, it was not hard to imagine his fate if he had ended up entering the small room without any preparations.


    Is the situation inside the small room actually different from what I see? n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Along with the realization that the small room should in fact be some kind of ancient formation, he also realized that the situation inside of the small room should be vastly different from what he was seeing at the moment.


    At the very least, it looked like the demon beasts inside should be real, but everything outside of that shouldn''t be real. The ces the demon beasts were avoiding were most probably dangerous areas inside of the formation that he couldn''t see at the moment.


    The demon beasts he had encountered outside should have been the ones among the group of demon beasts that had managed to sessfully escape through the formation and reach the outside.


    Whoosh~!


    With that in mind, Chu Yang immediately turned around and left the underground space. Intending to catch one of these demon beasts and have them help him find the safe way to enter this small underground room without idently triggering the formation inside and killing himself the moment he stepped into the small underground room.

 Chapter 1498 Transformation of the Small Room, Not Weak, Not Small

    Chapter 1498 Transformation of the Small Room, Not Weak, Not Small


    Catching one of the demon beasts that had just emerged from its hiding spot after seeing him disappear down the stairs, Chu Yang didn''t spend more than a few second before he was back underground and standing in front of the small room again. The differencepared to before being the frightened demon beast firmly secured in one of his hands not daring to move a single muscle since having been caught.


    Thump~


    Throwing the small demon beast on the ground in front of the small room, Chu Yang eagerly watched it in anticipation of it entering the small room-


    Squeak!?


    However, as it just remained frozen without moving, he decided to give it a little more ''encouragement''.


    This¡­ Interesting¡­


    Watching as the small demon beast finally made its way into the small room by hugging one of the corners leading into the room, Chu Yang felt a sense of relief over his decision to have one of the demon beasts go ahead and help him get a better understanding of the small room before he entered it himself.


    At the same time, he also realized something he had not when watching the other demon beasts already inside of the room¡­ And that was the fact that the demon beast was moving significantly faster than when it had almost rushed into the small room by clinging to one of the walls of the small room.


    Is it perhaps some kind of time dtion? No¡­ Maybe the small room is justrger than it appears, and the slow speed is because of some kind of spatial anomaly?


    St~!


    Continuing to watch the small demon beast as he thought about this, there was a sudden change, as the small demon beast suddenly popped like a ballon for no discernable reason.


    "Huh?"


    Not knowing how to respond to the sudden death of the small demon beast that had seemed fine a second earlier, Chu Yang soon felt a sense of relief washing over him. Happy that he had not entered the small room recklessly, as he had now managed to confirm that it was indeed dangerous from what had just happened to the small demon beast.


    Of course, this didn''t mean he intended to give up on entering the small room, as he was certain a formation like that wouldn''t be in ce for no reason, it should be guarding something and whatever it was, Chu Yang was interested in it!


    Whoosh-!


    For this reason, he didn''t waste any time as he left to catch the rest of the small demon beasts that might be wandering around the ancient city ruins. Soon enough, returning to the entrance of the small room with seven small demon beasts that he began forcing into the small room one by one. Observing their progress through the small room until they either met a simr fate to the first demon beast or managed to sessfully reach the location of the other small demon beasts.


    The entire process ended up taking a little over three hours, but in the end, it gave Chu Yang the confidence to enter the small room himself.Especially so given that all of the demon beasts had entered the small room the same way by clinging to the side of the wall, while also showing him that it was possible to leave after entering the small room by one of the demon beasts trying to escape after encountering something inside of the small room.


    Feeling confident, Chu Yang slowly stepped forward while hugging the same side of the wall as the demon beasts had done earlier before crossing over the boundary separating the small room from the stairs, he had been standing on so far.


    Whoosh-!


    Almost immediately after stepping inside the small room, he found the scenery around him undergoing a transformation, as the pristine walls changed into a visible barrier and the simple stone floor turned into arge maze that made it impossible for him to see just how big the small room had be¡­ And more importantly, he also found that the restriction that had only prevented him from using his domain to fly earlier had be even stronger. Not only preventing his divine sense from extending more than a few meters around him, but also directly affecting the strength of his domain.


    At the moment he stepped inside the small room- orrge underground maze, his strength that could be considered at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm was lowered to a level where he was barely able to fight at the level of someone in the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, that too only because of hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear.


    If not for hisprehension of the Dao of the Spear, his current strength might only beparable to someone who had just broken through to the Domain Lord Realm¡­


    "This¡­ What a terrifying suppressive effect¡­" Feeling a bit taken aback by the strong suppression, Chu Yang could not help trying to leave the small room that had transformed into arge underground maze.


    Luckily, he discovered that he was indeed able to leave the same way he hade in and the suppressive effect he felt from entering the small room simrly left as he stepped out of it.


    In that sense, the small room wasn''t that bad at the moment, as it only seemed to be restricting his strength and not stopping him from leaving once, he stepped inside.


    Although¡­ From how most of the demon beasts he had pushed inside the small room ended up dying in several unexinable ways before reaching the small nest that should be located somewhere safe inside of the maze, he understood that there should be something dangerous still inside of the maze.


    Unfortunately, the demon beasts had been far too weak to endure whatever it was for even a second. Popping like small balloons whenever they encountered danger inside of the maze.


    "As long as I follow the general path they took, I should be able to get to the safe zone where the rest of the demon beasts live¡­" Muttering this to himself as he went over his current situation, Chu Yang didn''t think much about the danger that the demon beasts had encountered as he began travelling along the general same path that the demon beasts who had sessfully made it to the other demon beasts did.


    His way of judging that he went in the right direction was rather simple, as he realized that leaving a spirit stone inside of the room would still show it after he left. Allowing him to judge the general size of the underground mazepared to outside and follow the path taken by the sessful demon beasts.


    In the end, because of this, he discovered that the general size of the underground maze wasrger than he had first expected, being over a dozen kilometers wide and more than three dozen long. Making him think that the size of the maze itself might have changedpared to the demon beasts, as he really couldn''t imagine the demon beasts travelling so much in such a short time with their low cultivation base.


    At the very least, one positive was that the path he followed seemed to be correct. Even if that was just a feeling because he didn''t encounter any danger along the way so far.


    Speaking of danger, he did see a few demon beasts who seemed to be wandering the maze that he couldn''t see from the outside.


    The reason he had not decided to approach these demon beasts was rather simple, as all of the ones he had seen so far were at the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm. Far from something he could deal with in his current suppressed state.


    Like this, a few days quickly flew by as Chu Yang charted his way through the maze step by step. Leaving every now and then to ensure that he was following the correct path. Not wanting to make any mistake and encounter the demon beasts he had seen wandering the maze. Especially so because he had started to notice the strength of these demon beasts increasing from the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm to the Soul Ascension Realm as he moved deeper into the maze.


    However, there was one fortunate thing about the situation and that was the fact that these demon beasts also seemed to have been restricted. Preventing them from using their divine sense.


    "Finally¡­! I made it!"


    It was by the fifth day since he had stepped into the underground maze, that he finally managed to reach the safe zone where the demon beasts he had seen from the outside were located, causing him to smile excitedly before starting to examine the safe zone of the small demon beasts he had observed from the outside several times over the past five days-


    ROOOAR-!


    Rooar!


    ROooar!


    However, when he looked at these ''small'' demon beasts, who should have been huddling together inside a small safe zone, realized that it wasn''t the underground maze that changed when they entered it. Instead, it was them who had changed when they stepped inside the underground maze.


    The small weak demon beasts had been reced with a group of terrifying demon beasts all at the Pinnacle of the Soul Ascension Realm. Even worse, there also seemed to be some among them that had managed to reach the Dao Seed Realm hidden further inside the ''safe zone''.


    Not just that, but his sudden arrival clearly caught the attention of some of these terrifying demon beasts.


    "¡­"


    I''m so dead¡­ Aren''t I¡­?


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 Chapter 1499 Safe Escape

    Chapter 1499 Safe Escape


    Seeing one of the slightly weaker demon beasts staring directly towards him, Chu Yang could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine as he understood just how bad his current situation was. Not only didn''t he have anything to protect himself, but he was also in the middle of an extremely dangerous maze that could result in death around any corner he took.


    Outside of that, he now also realized that the small and weak demon beasts from earlier were far more dangerous than he first expected. Making him realize that whatever killed those he had pushed inside the small room beforehand should have encountered something truly terrifying for it to kill a demon beast that could very well have reached the Dao Seed Realm in an instant.


    Rooar-!


    As he was lost in his own thoughts not knowing what to do, the demon beast that had been staring towards him let out a small roar that alerted the other demon beasts before starting to leisurely approach him. Clearly not thinking he would be capable of fighting back considering the very clear difference in their strength.


    At the same time, it was also obvious from a nce that this demon beast had been one of the demon beasts he had forced into the small room earlier, as its eyes seemed to tell him that it wasn''t nning on letting him die easily.


    This¡­ I can''t escape¡­


    Feeling the gaze and understanding that he indeed didn''t have any way to escape from demon beasts who were at the Soul Ascension Realm and Dao Seed Realm, Chu Yang could only smile helplessly to himself as the demon beast slowly got closer to him.


    No! I can''t just give up like that! If there is something in here that these demon beasts fear, then I might still be able to escape!


    Feeling a sense of renewed hope light up inside of him as he remembered how most of the demon beasts, he had pushed inside the small room had ended up dead without a chance to escape, Chu Yang regained the fighting spirit that had somewhat been extinguished when facing an opponent that he stood absolutely no chance of defeating-


    Swish-!


    And so, before the demon beast approaching him had a chance to react, he made his move and dashed backwards before moving into one of the paths that the demon beasts inside their little safe zone had been avoiding.


    Of course, with the difference in strength, he would normally not have been able to do something like this, but the sheer shock of him being able to regain his bearing and escape was more than enough to buy him enough time to enter the new path through the maze-


    ROOOOAR-!


    Although¡­ By the time that the demon beast approaching him realized what had happened, it didn''t hesitate for even a second before charging after him, its rxed and domineering attitude changingpletely.


    Thump-!


    However, as it came to the entrance of the new path that Chu Yang had decided to escape down, the demon beast ultimately froze on the spot with a hesitant expression stered all over its formerly angry face.


    Clearly, Chu Yang had been correct in the path being something dangerous that even a Soul Ascension Realm demon beast didn''t dare go down.


    Even better, the rest of the demon beasts didn''t try to follow him either after realizing the path he had gone down. Instead, just cing themselves around the entrance to the path as they all gathered together to look at him like he was already a dead person.


    "Looks like this path is indeed dangerous enough for even those demon beasts in the Dao Seed Realm to not dare take a step after me¡­ Is it perhaps a demon beastparable to the Celestial Immortal Realm?" Muttering this to himself as he saw the clear fear and hesitation on the faces of the demon beasts as they all moved over to block the path he had entered through; Chu Yang could not help feeling a hint of regret over his choice to enter the path.


    Of course, the regret onlysted for a split second, as he soon shook his head and focused on inspecting his surroundings. Understanding that if he hadn''t decided to enter the path, he would have already been captured by the demon beasts.


    Even if the path itself might be more dangerous, it could also be that the danger inside the path would ignore him given just how weak he waspared to those demon beasts.


    Although¡­ Given how those demon beasts had been looking at him like an already dead person, he had a feeling that it might not matter how weak he was, as the danger would likely still show itself to him even if he was weak.


    The only good thing so far was that he had not seen anything out of the ordinary so far. The walls of the maze and the ground beneath his feet were the same with no changespared to the other paths he had walked through inside the maze.


    If there really was something dangerous hidden inside this path, it wasn''t something he could spot at the moment, though¡­ That might just be because his current strength was too weak to notice the danger that the demon beasts outside saw.


    I hope I can make it out safely¡­


    Closing his eyes for a brief moment as he thought about his master and his fellow disciples back in the sect, Chu Yang slowly started making his way through the seemingly normal path.


    Slowly, after an hour of painfully walking along the path, he finally made it to the other side.


    Surprisingly, nothing had ended up happening to him during the entire process. Making him think that he might have gotten lucky and the danger that those demon beasts feared might not have targeted him because of how weak he waspared to them.


    No use thinking about it, now I have to be alert at all times as I can''t safely leave the maze the same way I came in!


    Stopping himself before he ended up lowering his guard due to the rather safe journey through the deadly path in the eyes of the demon beasts, Chu Yang reminded himself of all the other dangerous demon beasts wandering around the maze.


    Although he had managed to safely escape for now, he still had to watch out for any other demon beasts as he continued moving through the maze on his own without any guidance.


    At this point in time, his goal was no longer to find what might be hidden inside of the small room, guarded by the formation, but instead just to get out of the maze, as it was clearly far too dangerous for him to traverse with his current cultivation realm.


    Not to mention his current cultivation realm, even if he broke through and reached the Soul Ascension Realm, he doubted that he would be able to safely traverse the maze where even Dao Seed Realm demon beasts could be found.


    Shaking his head as he felt his thoughts starting to wander, Chu Yang didn''t waste any more time staying in the same location, as he ignored the surprised looks of the demon beasts still watching him from afar before starting to follow another path that he hoped would lead him back out of the maze. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    ¡­.


    Roar?


    At the same time Chu Yang disappeared from sight down another path, one of the demon beasts who had been watching him all of this time could not help letting out a surprised roar upon seeing how he had managed to safely move through the path that they considered the most dangerous path in the entire maze.


    Feeling doubtful and thinking the danger that had prevented them from travelling down the path might have disappeared, the doubtful demon beast that had reached the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm took a step forward and entered the path.


    Roar!


    Seeing this, one of the stronger demon beasts in the Dao Seed Realm called out to the demon beast that had wandered down the same path as Chu Yang-


    RUMBLE-!


    CHOMP!


    However, it was toote, as a massive mouth suddenly emerged from the wall and swallowed the demon beast at the Peak Soul Ascension Realm before it even had the chance to fight back. Leaving nothing behind, as the giant mouth retreated back into the normal looking walls and disappeared like nothing had happened.


    Roar¡­!


    Roar¡­


    Seeing what had happened the other demon beasts who had simr doubts quickly retreated fearfully. No longer daring to get too close to the path.


    If Chu Yang had been present, he would have instantly realized that the demon beast that had just appeared was not just in the Dao Seed Realm, but it had reached the Peak of the Dao Seed Realm, a realm he had not seen anywhere before on the continent.

 Chapter 1500 A Way Out

    Chapter 1500 A Way Out


    Following the path that he hoped would get him closer to the path out of the maze, Chu Yang soon found himself barely avoiding several powerful demon beasts who were all in the Soul Ascension Realm or above.


    The only reason why he had been able to avoid the senses of such powerful demon beasts being because their divine sense and other ways to sense him had been restricted in the same way his own divine sense and domain had been restricted.


    Of course, given their stronger strength, they should have been able to sense him even if they had been restricted like he had been. The fact that they still couldn''t sense him implied that the suppression one experienced was different depending on one''s cultivation realm.


    With that in mind, Chu Yang guessed that even if his strength had reached the Soul Ascension Realm, the area covered by his divine sense inside of the maze would most likely still be around the two or so meters that his current divine sense could cover.


    More importantly than the demon beasts he barely managed to avoid due to paying proper attention to his surroundings, he also ended up realizing that the suppression that he was experiencing was slowly increasing in intensitypared to before.


    From his strength being suppressed to a level where he wasparable to the Fourth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm, he was now onlyparable to the Second Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although there was a high likelihood that this was an indication that he was moving deeper inside the maze instead of getting closer to leaving the maze, he didn''t have much of an opportunity to change his path, as by the time he discovered this, his path back had already been blocked off by a demon beast in the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Not just that, but the paths themselves seemed to shift and change around him. Meaning that even if he stood still and waited for the demon beast to leave and open up the path back, the path itself would have already disappeared when he arrived. Making it impossible for him to backtrack the same way he hade from.


    In the end, he could only continue moving forward, as standing still wasn''t an option either, as doing so would open him to possibly encountering a demon beast wandering around the maze, something he wanted to avoid at all costs given that even the weakest demon beast in the part of the maze that he was inside of had reached the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Not to mention, he had no idea if a path would suddenly open up next to him with a demon beast emerging from the new path. Continuing to move seemed like the best option avable to him.


    Like this, a day quickly flew by with Chu Yang surviving at a knifes edge as he traversed through the dangerous maze. Narrowly avoiding powerful demon beasts around every turn and slowly learning how to properly navigate through the maze without endangering himself. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Unfortunately, even though he began getting a grasp of how to navigate through the maze, he didn''t get any closer to leaving the maze no matter how hard he tried to move back to safety.


    Instead, it seemed like he only continued moving deeper and deeper into the maze, as the demon beasts wandering around the maze became increasingly powerful.


    The demon beasts in the Soul Ascension Realm that he had originally been fearful of had long since seized to exist inside the maze. Instead, he only ever saw Dao Seed Realm demon beasts wandering the maze at this point in time.


    However, this was by far the most terrifying thing as he continued moving deeper into the maze. Instead, it was the fact that he now regrly spotted demon beasts above the Dao Seed Realm.


    Even though he would love to say that they were in the Celestial Immortal Realm, he had no clue, as the terrifying presence around them seemed to have surpassed anything he had encountered so far.


    Be it the Celestial Immortal Realm, Profound Immortal Realm or even above that, it no longer held any meaning to Chu Yang, as encountering any of them would mean certain death for him at his current cultivation realm- No, not just his current cultivation realm, even if he reached the Soul Ascension Realm or Dao Seed Realm, his fate in the face of those terrifying demon beasts would likely be the same. Death.


    The only positive thing about his deadly situation was the fact that none of the demon beasts had noticed him at this point in time. Allowing him to continue moving deeper into the maze.


    Although¡­ At this point in time, he had pretty much alreadye to terms with the fact that he most likely wouldn''t make it out of the maze alive. The danger all around him was simply far too great and even his master, whom he viewed as the strongest person he had encountered in his life, didn''t seem to beparable to the countless demon beasts above the Dao Seed Realm that he had encountered so far inside of the maze.


    "Huh? That is¡­ T-t-the way out!?"


    However, just as he was letting the despair of his current helpless situation set in and prepared himself for a demon beast to pop up and instantly kill him at any moment, he froze on the spot, as he discovered a familiar looking staircase appearing at the end of the path he was walking down.


    The simple sight of this path out of the terrifying maze was more than enough to instantly reignite his hope of getting out of his current situation alive, as he wasted no time rushing forward towards the path leading out of the maze.


    Only stopping whenever a branching path appeared to ensure that there weren''t any terrifying demon beasts lurking around the corner ready to pounce on him the moment, he rushed past them.


    Luckily, there were no demon beasts present blocking his path out of the maze. Allowing him to get out of the maze without encountering any problems along the way. Soon he flopped himself onto the staircase with an exhausted expression stered all over his face. Relieved to finally be out of the maze.


    If anything, his journey through the maze had not been difficult in terms of his physical strength, but more so in terms of his mental strength, as it had been mentally exhausting to wander through the maze where every turn or path, he took could potentially end his life.


    By far, the maze had been one of the most- No, the most terrifying experience that he had ever gone through and he hoped to never have to go through something like that again, as he genuinely felt like he had absolutely no control over his own life and could only leave things up to fate and pray he didn''t get noticed by any of the terrifying demon beasts he spotted during his journey through the maze.


    But its finally over¡­ I really don''t ever want to go back there again¡­


    Closing both of his eyes for a brief moment as he remembers some of the closest encounters he had traveling through the maze, Chu Yang soon decided to sit up and look out over the small room that seemed no different from when he had first seen it. The maze itself was nowhere to be seen, as only a peaceful and pristine stone floor was visible.


    The familiar demon beasts that seemed weak and fragile viewed from the outside. Gathered together in a small corner of the floor, while a stairwell could be seen on the other side of the small room leading up towards the surface-


    Wait¡­ A stairwell¡­?


    Suddenly realizing something was off with the not just the location of the demon beasts from where he remembered they should have been inside the maze, Chu Yang finally noticed the most ring difference in the small room since he had made it out, another path leading out of the small room had appeared.


    Not just that, but it was clear to him that the path in front of him was the same one he had used when first entering the small room andter the maze. Meaning that his current location was somewhere different he couldn''t see from the stairwell he had originally used to enter the small room!


    "¡­"


    Feeling a shiver run down his spine as he realized that he was still not out, Chu Yang slowly turned around. Only to realize that the staircase that now obviously looked differentpared to the stairwell, did not lead up to the surface of the floating ind, but instead seemed to be going down.


    Looking closer. At the end of the staircase, a half open wooden door could barely be made out, as Chu Yang understood that he was still far from safe...

 Chapter 1501 Cultivation Room

    Chapter 1501 Cultivation Room


    Turning his attention away from the wooden door at the end of the staircase, Chu Yang turned around and looked back towards the path leading out of the underground space on the other side of the small room.


    Even though he was only separated from that path by a few meters, he understood that the moment he took a step forward, he would find himself back inside the maze that he had just barely managed to escape from.


    Outside of the danger associated with entering the maze again, he also worried that the maze would change around the moment he took a step back into it. After all, he had seen how the maze had changed around him while he had been moving through it not long ago and he really didn''t n on going back into the maze just after he had managed to make it out. Especially so considering that he had no guarantee that he would be able to make it out alive again.


    In a sense, the fact that he had even managed to make it out alive in the first ce could be considered nothing short of a miracle and he didn''t n to rely on fate again and pray that none of the powerful demon beasts inside the maze noticed him.


    With that in mind, he slowly turned his attention towards the wooden door that was slightly open at the bottom of the staircase he now found himself on.


    Although going forward might lead into another dangerous situation, he felt that it couldn''t be much worse than having to go through the maze again.


    As for trying to just dig himself out of the ground? He had thought about doing this, but the formation that covered the small room and had trapped him in the maze earlier was also active around the staircase he now found himself on. Protecting not just the staircase, but also the walls and ceiling above him. Preventing him from digging his way out of his current situation.


    Even then, he didn''t forget to try and dig out just in case a w that he could have taken advantage of had developed inside the ancient formation. After all, it had been a long time since the formation had been created andst repaired. Even when he had just seen the small room for the first time, he had noticed a w in the formation after carefully looking through the small room.


    Though the w in question didn''t seem to affect the formation itself, it did give him some insight into its presence. Allowing him to test out the formation before he dared to venture forth and step inside.


    If not for that one w, he might have ended up stepping into a far more dangerous ce at the beginning instead of having a more peaceful time learning about the maze for a little over a day before he found himself trapped inside the maze by what he had originally believed to have been weak demon beasts.


    Without what he had learnt about the demon beasts inside the maze and their general behavior during that one day, he would most likely not have been able to safely make his way out of the maze¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Chu Yang soon began to slowly make his way down the stairs towards the half open wooden door. Understanding that there was no other way for him to proceed unless he wanted to go through the terrifying maze again.


    Creeeak~


    Soon enough, he slowly found himself pushing open the wooden door before cautiously peeking inside the room on the other side of the door. Already prepared for a possible life and death battle-


    "Huh? This¡­"


    However, as he peeked into the room on the other side of the wooden door, he was shocked to discover that there weren''t any demon beasts or other dangers waiting for him on the other side. Instead, there was what could be described as a simple cultivation room not much different from the one he had back at the sect.


    The main difference was that the cultivation mat in the middle of the room was made of some kind of special material that seemed to be of higher quality than any of the cultivation mats he had seen back at the sect.


    Outside of that, he also soon noticed therge number of spirit stones that had been stacked up in a corner of the room.


    Even from a nce, it was obvious that all of these spirit stones were at least of top quality, with some of them even seeming to exceed that. cing them into a category of spirit stones that he was not yet aware of.


    Of course, even though the room on the other side of the wooden door seemed no different from a normal cultivation room, albeit therge number of high quality spirit stones, Chu Yang still didn''t dare let his guard down and enter the cultivation room. Understanding very well that the simple looking room might be simr to the small room that turned into a terrifying maze the moment he stepped inside of it. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Unfortunately, even though he wanted to test the room and find out how dangerous it was before stepping inside of the room himself, he had no way to do so and could only use his divine sense and eyes to scan through the room for any signs of a formation simr to the one in the small.


    In the end, he only found that the concentration of spiritual qi was far higher than normal inside of the cultivation room, even exceeding that of the Shattered Star Peaks by more than two times. Reaching the point where the spiritual qi inside the room had turned into a thin mist.


    Although this did seem to make sense considering that this should be a cultivation room used by an ancient cultivator that hade from a power stronger than the Star Shattering Sect, Chu Yang still felt uneasy about entering the room. Deciding to remain just at the entrance for another half hour to thoroughly examine every inch of the room. Leaving no ce untouched by his divine sense.


    At the end, he had concluded that there were five areas of interest inside of the cultivation room.


    The cultivation mat in the middle of the room.


    The pile of spirit stones in another corner of the room.


    A formation carved into the ground just to the side of the spirit stone, likely a path out of the cultivation room.


    A small scroll located next to the cultivation mat.


    And finally, a tiny source crystal slightlyrger than the one he had encountered inside the secret realm a few months earlier.


    All of this did point towards this just being a cultivation room without any hidden danger inside of it¡­ And even after thoroughly searching through the cultivation room, Chu Yang couldn''t find anything that would point towards it being any different.


    Thump~


    So, with that in mind and not really having any other ce to go, Chu Yang took a step forward and stepped into the cultivation room. Fully prepared to face a life and death situation.


    "¡­"


    However, in the end, nothing happened, and he just stood there looking rather ridicules from an outside perspective.


    "Really¡­ Nothing happened¡­" Muttering this to himself as he let out a sigh of relief, Chu Yang slowly began calming down while he began making his way around the cultivation room to inspect it in more detail now that he had entered it in person.


    First of all, he went directly to the spirit stones and the source crystal before cing both inside of his interspatial ring without a second thought. Securing the two in case anything happened.


    Next, he went over to inspect what he believed to be a teleportation formation leading out of the cultivation room. Soon, he found out that it was indeed a teleportation formation.


    Unfortunately, even though it seemed to be perfectly fine, it seemed like there was some kind of seal or restriction ced on the teleportation formation, preventing him from using it.


    "Weird¡­" Muttering this to himself as he tried to break the restriction to no avail, Chu Yang turned his attention towards the cultivation mat at the center of the room- Or more precisely, the scroll next to the cultivation mat.


    Hoping that it might contain some clues as to how to undo the restriction on the teleportation formation so he could get out without having to travel through the terrifying maze again.


    At the same time, he also hoped that it would contain some information about this ce and the ancient city itself. Hoping that it would help shed some light on not only some of his questions regarding the ancient city but also about a possible way out of the mystic realm that he now found himself trapped inside without any clear path out.

 Chapter 1502 No Choice

    Chapter 1502 No Choice


    Moving over to the cultivation mat in the middle of the room, Chu Yang picked up the scroll next to the mat with a hopeful expression on his face. Praying sincerely that thenguage for the scroll was the same as the one he was familiar with.


    Luckily for him, it turned out to be the same.


    Well¡­ Not exactly the same, but at least it was at a level that he could understand. Far more recently createdpared to some of the more ancient texts he had encountered during his journey through the mystic realm so far.


    "Cultivation Compendium¡­?" Muttering this to himself as he started reading through the scroll, Chu Yang could not help showing a bit of a surprised expression on his face as he realized what was written inside of the scroll he had just found.


    All the way from the Qi Condensation Realm to the Pinnacle of the Soul Ascension Realm, it was a short and detailed description of all the realms before the Dao Seed Realm.


    However, the shocking part was not so much the information about the realm he already knew about, but instead it was the fact that the descriptions inside of the scroll also contained information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm- Or more specifically, the two paths of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Among the two paths, one focused on theprehension of a single Dao, while another focused on theprehension of myriads of Daos, thus the name of the two paths. The Singr Dao Domain Lord Realm Path and the Myriad Dao Domain Lord Realm Path.


    Although he had already learnt a bit about the Dao Domain Lord Realm from his master, he had not yet learnt much about what the realm itself was about so to speak, something he expected his master would be teaching him when he returned to the sect now that he had officially reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and was looking towards either reaching the Soul Ascension Realm or the Dao Domain Lord Realm to continue increasing his own strength and cultivation realm.


    With that in mind, Chu Yang didn''t waste much time after learning that the scroll contained information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm, as he dived into the information and began reading through it with interest. Almostpletely forgetting about his current situation in the process.


    In the end, he managed to learn that although the scroll did contain information on the Dao Domain Lord Realm and the two paths of the realm itself, it wasn''t anything beyond the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    At most, it contained enough information for him to attempt a breakthrough to the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm following one of the two paths described.


    Of course, he had no intention of doing so at the moment, as he still nned to first return to the sect and consult with his master before he made any decision on what path he would follow in the future, be it one of the two paths of the Dao Domain Lord Realm of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Unfortunately, as he continued reading through the scroll and learnt more about the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he also found out that the restriction ced on the teleportation formation was one for cultivation.


    If he wanted to leave the cultivation room, he would have to first breakthrough to the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    To be honest, this was a rather surprising revtion, as it made him realize that the maze he had just barely managed to get through was actually some kind of trial that should have been designed for someone around his level of strength.


    Although¡­ After thinking things through, he guessed that the situation inside of the maze might have been a bit different in the past when it had still been actively used.


    One difference being the strength of the demon beasts might have been lower, as he couldn''t imagine anyone in the Domain Lord Realm facing off against demon beasts in the Dao Seed Realm- Or stronger for that matter.


    If anything, it was likely that the demon beasts trapped inside of the maze had remained trapped in there for an extremely long time¡­ And together with the ample supply of spiritual qi keeping them alive, had been able to cultivate all the way to their current realm.


    The ones who had managed to make it out of the maze might have found some w in the formation that they could take advantage of to escape, their weakened strength after leaving the maze might also be the result of some kind of prize, they needed to pay for forcibly leaving the maze¡­


    No matter what it was, it didn''t change his current situation much, as he still had to find a way out of the cultivation room that he now found himself trapped inside of.


    However, after spending another few minutes looking around the room, he ultimately decided to go along with the original purpose of the cultivation room and breakthrough to the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    Even if it was a bit unexpected and he didn''t really want to do it without his master''s guidance, he didn''t really have much of a choice, as he didn''t n on trying to break through the maze again or waste away inside the cultivation room hoping that his master would find him after finding out he was missing for a bit too long.


    "Singr Path or Myriad Path¡­" Muttering this to himself as he looked over the two options he had when it came to entering the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Chu Yang could not help trying to think about what path his master had chosen.


    One focused on enhancing a single Dao, while another focused on multiple Daos.


    Given that his master seemed proficient in several different Daos, it wasn''t hard for him to guess that his master should be a Dao Domain Lord following the Myriad Path.


    Although a part of him also wanted to go down this path upon realizing this, he quickly stopped himself after reading through the introduction of the two paths.


    Even though it was a bit subtle, it was clear that the myriad path was far more difficult and dangerouspared to the singr path.


    The most difficult part when it came to the singr path for the Dao Domain Lord Realm and the ce where it was by far more difficult than the myriad path ording to the information in the scroll, was the Initial Stage.


    Instead of using several domains and merging them together to form a dao domain, he would have to forge a dao domain.


    The two sounded simr but forging a dao domain was far more difficult than justprehending different Daos up to the level of forming domains and forcibly merging them together.


    First of all, he would have toprehend a dao to the Elementary Realm, something that was difficult to aplish in the Domain Lord Realm, but something he had already done at this point in time. Having reached the Elementary Realm in the Dao of the Spear. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    The next part was a material requirement for forging a dao domain, requiring a source crystal and arge quantity of spiritual qi.


    In other words, the original purpose of the source crystal and the spirit stones he had found and already ced inside of his interspatial ring.


    Last and also the most worrying in Chu Yang''s opinion, was that he needed toprehend two supporting Daos to assist his primary dao and strengthen it. Not to the level of his primary dao, not even to the level of forming a domain, but he needed to at least haveprehended two other daos to a levelparable to someone who had formed a pseudo domain.


    This should not be too difficult for him to aplish, but he felt a bit worried when he noticed that the scroll clearly mentioned that the Daos he chose when forging his dao domain would influence hisprehension of his primary dao and his future foundation and progress through the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Meaning he would have to choose somethingpatible with the Dao of the Spear if he wanted to go beyond the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the future.


    At the same time, he couldn''t choose something he waspletely unfamiliar with and hadn''t even begun trying toprehend, as that could cause him to remain stuck for an unknown period of time. Possibly hundreds of years, if the new dao he chose toprehend ended up being one he had difficultyprehending.


    "Two daos I''m familiar with, but also fit well with the Dao of the Spear¡­" Muttering this to himself as he thought about the different techniques andbat arts he had learnt over the years and the Daos associated with them, Chu Yang soon found his answer...

 Chapter 1503 Chu Yang, Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm

    Chapter 1503 Chu Yang, Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm


    "The most suitable Daos for improving the Dao of the Spear..."


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he looked down towards his spear, Chu Yang silently began going over the different Daos he already had some understanding of and had used in tandem with his Dao of the Spear.


    First of all was the Dao of Earth that could already be considered to have reached a levelparable to the Pseudo Domain level due to his frequent usage andprehension of his current mainbat techniques mountain breaker and mountain piercer.


    Already familiar with the Dao of Earth to some extent and knowing firsthand how well suited it was for the Dao of the Spear; it wasn''t really much of a question that he ended up choosing the Dao of Earth as one of the two supporting Daos for his Dao of the Spear.


    The problem mainly came when it was about choosing the second Dao, as he didn''t really have any other Dao that he had reached a level ofprehensionparable to hisprehension in the Dao of Earth. Not to mention, most of the other spear techniques he had developed on his own over the years relied on the Dao of Earth as well.


    "Maybe the Dao of Blood would work?" Muttering this to himself as he thought about the different Daos, he had encountered over the years without really gaining any meaningfulprehension in, it did not take long before his attention turned towards the Dao of Blood.


    Considering the devil immortal jade still present inside of his dantian increasing his cultivation speed and the fact that it could help increase hisprehension of the Dao of Blood, Chu Yang felt that it might not be a bad idea to use the Dao of Blood as the second Dao to enhance his Dao of the Spear and forge his Dao Domain.


    Even if the method that the devil immortal jade used to increase hisprehension of the Dao of Blood involved him needing to have it absorb the blood of cultivators he killed until it could condense a small drop of blood that he could then use to increase hisprehension of the Dao of Blood, it wasn''t a demonic technique- Maybe? He didn''t really know¡­


    Thinking about it, it did seem like a demonic technique looking from the outside but considering that the entire process didn''t require him to absorb the blood for cultivation or anything along that line and he just needed to observe the blood drop condensed to further his ownprehension of the Dao of Blood, he didn''t feel much against using the devil immortal jade.


    Especially so considering that anyone he had used it on so far were his enemies. Not to mention, there were far more dubious techniques out there.


    From what he had learnt during his time outside of the sect so far, it seemed that nobody really cared about techniques that used things like blood or other things normally associated with demonic cultivators, as long as one wasn''t a demonic cultivator themselves.


    Although it seemed rather hypocritical to not care about something that was obviously a demonic technique being used by normal cultivators but get filled with killing intent the moment a demonic cultivator used a simr technique, Chu Yang decided not to think too much about it.


    The only techniques so to speak that werepletely off limits that he knew of so far, were techniques that involved using the blood and qi of other cultivators for one''s own cultivation. Apparently, this was the main way a normal cultivator ended up bing a demonic cultivator.


    "So¡­ The Dao of Earth and the Dao of Blood it is¡­" Saying this to himself as he decided to go with the Dao of Blood as his second Dao for supporting his Spear Dao, Chu Yang didn''t really have much to prepare in terms of increasing hisprehension of the two Daos, as both of them had already reached the level required for forging a dao domain.


    With that in mind, Chu Yang didn''t waste much time standing around aftering to a decision, as he sat down on the cultivation mat in the middle of the room before starting preparations for forging his dao domain.


    By far, forging the dao domain was the most difficult in the initial stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, as he couldn''t just try to establish a new domain with his Dao of Blood or Dao of Earth and merge them into his Spear Dao.


    Instead, he would have to follow a special technique to forge another kind of dao domain that was centered around a single dao and acted to enhance that single dao. Not much different from how one advanced through the Dao Seed Realm by focusing on enhancing the strength of a single Dao.


    Whoosh~


    With a wave of his hand, the spirit stones and the source crystal he had ced into his interspatial ring earlier reappeared, as he slowly began the process of forging his dao domain by using the unique dao domain forging technique that was avable in the scroll.


    Different from the myriad path that could be reached in a rtively short time, the singr path took far longer, as the spirit stones slowly began to melt under the guidance of the ancient technique over the next week. Turning into a kind of liquid spiritual qi that then started merging together with the source crystal, a process that ended up taking another week before a slightlyrger and shiner source crystal appeared in front of Chu Yang.


    Although he had no clue what had changed about the source crystal outside of it growing a bitrger and shinier, Chu Yang knew from the information in the scroll that the current source crystal had transformed into a dao domain seed and all he needs to do at this point in time was swallow it-


    Chomp-!


    Something Chu Yang did without the slightest bit of hesitation.


    Rumble-!


    Soon enough feeling the terrifying power contained inside of the small dao domain seed, as he officially began the most important step. Forging his dao domain, a process that was far more grueling and painfulpared to the first step, as he used all of his strength to remain focused for the next two weeks, as his dao domain slowly took shape-


    BOOOM-!


    Until he finally managed to sessfully forge his dao domain. Breaking through to the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the process. His strength surging from the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm to a level that was nowparable to the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Thump!


    Unfortunately, he didn''t really have the opportunity to explore his new strength, as he directly copsed on the floor after breaking through, covered in blood from head to toe due to the terrifying energies that had been running through his body for the past two weeks as he focused his full attention on forging his dao domain ording to the ancient technique.


    Even though he had ended up being sessful, it was just barely, as even a few seconds longer and he would have ended up dead under those terrifying energies coursing through his body.


    At least I can leave this ce after I wake up¡­


    Thinking this to himself as he slowly felt his vision grow dark, Chu Yang could not help feeling a sense of relief knowing that he had seeded and would be able to leave the underground space and start searching for a way out of the mystic realm when he woke up again.


    ¡­


    "Indeed, the singr path of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­"


    Back in the Star Shattering Sect, at the same time that Chu Yang broke through to the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm following the singr path instead of the myriad path that his master was following, the master in question quietly looked over the recently changed status.


    ? Second Disciple, Chu Yang ? Race: Human Talent: 57 Comprehension: 78 Dao: Dao of the Spear (Elementary Realm)


    Potential Dao: Dao of Earth, Dao of Blood, Dao of ughter, Dao of Death Physique: No Special Physique Rmended Physique: Six Paths of ughter Divine Physique (Can be refined) Realm: Initial Dao Domain Lord Realm (Singr Path) Cultivation Mantra: Soul Spear Divine Mantra All things considered, not much had really changed outside of his realm that now indicated that he had reached the Dao Domain Lord Realm and was following the singr path.


    This was not a problem, so to say, the only reason why Xuan Hao had reacted in the way he did was because his information on the singr path of the Dao Domain Lord Realm was far moreckingpared to the myriad path that he himself had ended up following. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    For one, he didn''t have much an idea of how one even entered the singr path.


    In this regard, his second disciple could be said to have surpassed him, as he only really had some understanding of the requirements for one to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm in the singr path¡­

 Chapter 1504 Three Rewards

    Chapter 1504 Three Rewards


    Shaking his head as he realized that he needed to find out more about the singr path of the Dao Domain Lord Realm before this disciple of his managed to get back to the sect, Xuan Hao soon focused his attention on the other screen that had popped up in front of him after Chu Yang broke through to the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    [Hidden Main Quest: Have one disciple reach the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm either through the singr or myriad path]


    [Reward: Mixed Spirit Tree Saplings, General Alchemy Compendium, Talisman Emperor''s Notes on Simple Talismans]


    Looking over the hidden main quest that he hadpleted following Chu Yang''s break through to the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao''s initial excitement at getting something that would be able to further increase his strength quickly disappeared before being reced by one of confusion.


    The rewards this time around were obviously not for him. Instead, as he received the rewards and began to examine them in detail, he realized that all of them seemed to have been chosen for the purpose of increasing the strength of the sect.


    First off was the mixed spirit tree saplings.


    The mixed spirit tree saplings were essentially a little over a hundred small saplings of different spiritual trees that each produced some kind of spiritual fruit that would aid the cultivation of those who consumed it. From rtively ordinary ones suitable for those in the Qi Condensation Realm all the way up the Core Formation Realm, to more rare ones that helped increase the power of the soul, being useful to those in the Nascent Soul Realm, Domain Lord Realm and though not as useful, also the Soul Ascension Realm.


    None of this was useful for him at his current cultivation realm, but it would be incredibly useful for the sect as a whole and would provide another important resource that would further enhance the foundation of the sect, while also helping the elders and disciples increase their cultivation speed at the same time.


    As for worrying about waiting for the saplings to grow up? That wasn''t a problem, as ording to the information given to him by the system about the saplings, they would rapidly grow to maturity the moment they were nted in the ground.


    All he needed to do was find a ce to nt them, something that would be more difficult than it might seem, as he had a feeling one of his disciples might take an interest in those spiritual trees once she learns about the spiritual fruits growing on them¡­


    "A problem for Elder Song- No, let''s hand this one over to Feng Chen~" Smiling happily to himself as he decided on handing over the problem of where to nt the spiritual trees to Feng Chen, Xuan Hao went on to the second reward, the General Alchemy Compendium.


    From the name alone, he could tell that it was some kind of book with information on alchemy.


    However, when he began to look through it himself, he was shocked to discover that it was apendium of different pill and elixir recipes that aided greatly in cultivation and healing.


    Among the recipes, the one that was by far the most important was a recipe for something called a Qi Cirction Pill.


    Although the Qi Cirction Pill was not that difficult to make and not really of that high grade, it was extremely useful to the cultivation of disciples below the Nascent Soul Realm, as it helped them absorb qi faster, while at the same time also aiding in stabilizing and refining the qi once inside the dantian.


    If it was just that, the Star Shattering Sect already had some alternatives, but the thing that made the Qi Cirction Pill incredibly precious and valuable in Xuan Hao''s eyes was the material requirements for refining the pill, as it required close to nothing in terms of resources whenpared to other simr pills.


    Another bonus was the fact that the pill itself came in three different tiers, one for those Qi Condensation Realm, one for the Foundation Establishment Realm and thest for the Core Formation Realm.


    The different tiers being of different difficulty and require different resources. Allowing the lower tier of the pill to not just be mass produced rather easily, but also giving the alchemy disciples of the sect a simple recipe that they could practice and use to advance further.


    Looking through the entirety of the General Alchemy Compendium, it seemed like it was perfectly designed not just to fill the sect''s current needs in terms of low level pills and elixirs, but also perfect training material for the sect''s alchemy disciples.


    Even though the sect did have a rather established and strong alchemy hall at this point in time, it didn''t hurt to have a stronger foundation in alchemy.


    "Handing it over to Pei Yang and having him take care of it now that he is the elder in charge of the Alchemy Hall should be fine¡­" Muttering this to himself as he decided on who would be the lucky one to help disseminate the information in the General Alchemy Compendium to the alchemy disciples and elders who were interested, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the final reward.


    "Talisman Emperor''s Notes on Simple Talismans¡­" Looking down at the rtively simple and rather thin book in his hands, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit excited.


    Although the other two rewards were incredibly for increasing the strength of the sect, they were not really that useful to him.


    The Talisman Emperor''s Notes on Simple Talismans on the other hand, might be able to help him when it came to improving his understanding of talismans, as he was currently rathercking in that aspect.


    As for when it came to the rest of the sect¡­ There wasn''t really much help to be had, as the current strongest talisman master in the sect was someone from the Spring Flower Sect who had reached the Peak of the Artisan Realm.


    Even though the Spring Flower Sect did have a certain foundation when it came to talismans and had both elders and disciples dedicated to the profession, it was a rtively weak foundation that had been established by a single genius elder that had emerged in the Spring Flower Sect''s past. The limitations of this foundation were shaky at best and could at most support the growth of Artisan Realm Talisman Masters.


    The reason why the Star Shattering Sect had not managed to support the growth of the now rather scarce talisman masters in the muchrger and stronger sect was not because anyone in the sect was unwilling to do so. Instead, it was because talisman masters were far too rare and hard toe by under normal circumstances.


    So far, the only way the Star Shattering Sect has managed to increase the knowledge of talismans and help the growth of the sect''s talisman masters, was through collecting and buying scrolls and books, while also recruiting a few wandering talisman masters who had been found, rescued and then recruited by one of the elders who happened to run into them while out adventuring.


    The fact that the Spring Flower Sect even had a rather substantial number of talisman masters and a foundation in the profession could be considered out of the ordinary¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any more time as he began reading through the Talisman Emperor''s Notes on Simple Talismans and soon enough, he found himself growing more and more excited by the minute.


    Not only did the Talisman Emperor''s Notes on Simple Talismans contain what could be considered a foundation in the art of talismans, but it also contained moreplex andplicated talismans beyond the Artisan Realm.


    The so-called simple notes were clearly far higher level than he had first anticipated, but this was only a good thing, as the Master Realm talismans that were present towards the end of the book would be extremely beneficial to producing future Master Realm Talisman Masters. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    If the Peak Artisan Realm Talisman Master managed to get her hands on the Talisman Emperor''s Notes on Simple Talismans, Xuan Hao believed that she should be able to breakthrough to the Master Realm in a rtively short period of time. Giving the sect an opportunity to also firmly establish Talisman Hall simr to the Alchemy Hall, cksmithing Hall and Formation Hall in the sect.


    Outside of that, Xuan Hao also clearly felt that with the Talisman Emperor''s Notes on Simple Talismans, he would finally have an opportunity toprehend the Dao of Talismans.


    Even if he couldn''tprehend it, he should at least be able to learn from the Talisman Emperor''s Notes on Simple Talismans and be able to improve his own formations masquerading as talismans and make them lose their strength slower.


    After all, it wasn''t lost on him that the talismans currently in Chu Yang''s possession to protect his life in a life death scenario had lost almost all of their strength at this point in time¡­

 Chapter 1505 Establishing an Spiritual Fruit Tree Orchard (1)

    1505 Establishing an Spiritual Fruit Tree Orchard (1)


    Having gone through all of the rewards that had been granted to him following Chu Yang breaking through to the Dao Domain Lord Realm, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he directly set off to deliver the different rewards to the people who would best make use of them. Delivering the spiritual tree sapling to Feng Chen and the General Alchemy Compendium to Pei Yang.


    The Talisman Emperor''s Notes on Simple Talismans was first copied by him before he simrly handed it off to the elder currently in charge of the sect''s talisman development. Hoping that it would be enough to help her break through from the Artisan Realm and finally reach the Master Realm. Allowing the Star Shattering Sect to have a Master Realm Formation Master.


    Of course, as he delivered the three different rewards he had received from the system, it didn''t take long before they were put to use.


    First of all was the General Alchemy Compendium that was rather simple to use, as Pei Yang decided to just have some of the more skilled alchemy elders create copies of the different recipes inside of the book before holding a lecture on alchemy and using the opportunity to spread information on the new recipes in the process. Allowing the rest of the alchemy disciples and elders to easily learn about these new recipes avable.


    The same happened with the talismans, though on a much smaller scale given the current number of talisman disciples and elders in the sect currently only number a little over a thirty or so. Most of them being from the Spring Flower Sect.


    The nting of the spiritual tree saplings on the other hand was a far more troublesome matter, as Feng Chen had to not only find somewhere secure and hidden away to avoid any pests that might be interested in the spiritual fruits, but also had to find a group of spiritual herb farmers who could take care of the spiritual trees.


    Even though the sect had expanded a lot over the past few years, the sect had also added on a lot of different spiritual fields to support the growth of the sect. Among them, the spiritual herb field located on the Ninth Star Peak was not even thergest, just the one currently producing the highest quality of spiritual herbs for the sect. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    In fact, one of the spiritual fields that the sect had managed to take control of not long ago inside the old territory of the Sky Empire was more than ten times the size of the spiritual herb field on the Ninth Star Peak.


    Although this particr spiritual herb field didn''t produce any particrly high quality spiritual herbs and mostly produced arge amount of low quality spiritual herbs for the sect, it did require a lot of spiritual herb farmers who dedicated themselves to taking care of the spiritual herbs and ensuring their proper growth.


    Because of this, the current Star Shattering Sect was in factcking spiritual herb farmers.


    At the moment, this problem wasn''t that big of a deal, as the sect could still handle theck of specialized personal by hiring normal mortals to help out when it came to taking care of some of therger herb fields producing mostly low quality spiritual herbs, but¡­ Adding in the hundred spiritual trees that would all need special care from someone highly skilled in terms of taking care of spiritual nts when they were nted and started adapting to their new environment, the Star Shattering Sect simply didn''t have the people required.


    Of course, he could pull in some of the spiritual herb farmers on the Ninth Star Peak to care of it, but that would affect the growth of the higher quality spiritual herbs that were in their most delicate period before harvesting at the current moment.


    For this reason, Feng Chen decided to look through the sect for anyone who might be skilled when it came to taking care of nts, as someone with an affinity for the Dao of Life, Nature, Wood or anything along that line would also be able to take care of the spiritual trees with a little bit of knowledge on the growth of spiritual trees.


    In the end, this resulted in Feng Chen getting the assistance of Shu Yao and Xuan Hao''s newest disciple, Chun Hua.


    The reason for this being rather simple, as both of them were in the Domain Lord Realm and had established a domain rted to the Dao of Nature, Shu Yao having established a unique flower domain involving the Dao of Nature, Dao of Life and Dao of Flowers and Chun Hua a domain solely built on the Dao of Nature.


    Feeling that it would be simple enough to leave it to these two with Shu Yao there to take charge of the situation, Feng Chen ended up deciding to just directly hand over everything to the two of them and let them handle.


    Not forgetting to remind the two of them to choose somewhere secluded inside the Shattered Star Peaks to nt the spiritual trees. Stressing the importance of other disciples not learning about the whereabouts of the spiritual trees if possible.


    Even though the two of them were not able to understand the reason for this level of secrecy regarding the whereabouts of a few spiritual trees that would be taken care of and guarded around the clock anyway, they still decided to note down what Feng Chen said as they both left with the spiritual tree saplings and began looking for a ce to nt them in the Shattered Star Peaks.


    Soon enough, the two of them ended up on the Fourth Star Peak that was mostly barren outside of the alpine vegetation that had survived and adapted to live under the chaotic spiritual qi that had been present on the mountain in the past.


    The ce was obscure and not visited by the disciples or elders of the sect and was at the same time a perfect location to create a small orchard where the spiritual trees could grow with an ample supply of spiritual qi due to there not being a lot of disciples or elders around to absorb it, as most of them would rather stay at the Seventh Star Peak to cultivate where the spiritual qi of the entire Shattered Star Peaks had been concentrated.

 Chapter 1506 Establishing an Spiritual Fruit Tree Orchard (2)

    Chapter 1506 Establishing an Spiritual Fruit Tree Orchard (2)


    "Hehe, never thought I would get the opportunity to create an orchard like this."


    Moving around the Fourth Star Peak alone after having finished initial preparations for setting up on orchard on the Fourth Star Peak with Shu Yao, Chun Hua smiled happily to herself as she looked towards the ce where a dozen of the sapling had already been nted and in turn grown up in an instant. Turning into towering trees that were close to ten meters tall, a few reaching a height of twenty or so meters.


    Although she had already adapted to life in the Star Shattering Sect at this point in time and was spending her days either cultivating or practicing alchemy together with her senior sister Qing, she felt that something was missing¡­ And when the opportunity to take care of spiritual trees appeared, she decided to take it without a second thought after personally seeing one of the spiritual tree saplings.


    She didn''t know why, but just being close to those small saplings had made her feel a sense of bliss she had only experienced briefly while she had been running through the primeval jungle, though, it was a bit different from back then, as she had to be constantly on guard watching out for any demon beasts that might sneak up on her and kill her if she didn''t.


    "But¡­ I do wonder what reason the sect master had to keep the location of the spiritual fruit trees a secret¡­" Muttering this to herself as she arrived in front of one of the smaller trees that was only around seven meters tall, Chun Hua could not help wondering what reason the sect master had to have them keep the location of the orchard a secret from the rest of the disciples of the sect.


    Even though the Fourth Star Peak was far less traversedpared to the more important parts of the sect, it didn''t mean that there weren''t any disciples or elders who visited the ce. From time to time, some woulde there either to seek a quiet ce to rx or just to enjoy the scenery that could be enjoyed from the top of the Fourth Star Peak.


    After all, the Fourth Star Peak was the tallest mountain that could be traversed inside of the Shattered Star Peaks by most disciples and elders that would give them a view of the entire Shattered Star Peaks.


    The Third Star Peak could also be visited and was taller, but it had essentially been cut off by the formation guarding the rest of the Shattered Star Peaks that were considered the main territory of the sect. Not allowing one to see the rest of the sect.


    Not to mention, the Third Star Peak had countless peopleing to it to try and attempt breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm under the pressure of the chaotic qi. Following the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect, the number of people on the Third Star Peak had only increased, even reaching the point where Nascent Soul Realm cultivators hoping to reach the Domain Lord Realm could be seen there from time to time.


    Of course, there was still the Main Star Peak and the Second Star Peak, but those two mountains had been directly cut off and isted by her master ording to what she had heard from Shu Yao when they had been looking for a ce to nt the spiritual trees.


    "Ah? Someone else is here already- Huh?! Wha-what are those trees!?"


    "Trees? Wasn''t only thing on this mountain some random nts with a bit more spiritual qi?"


    "Who knows? Maybe the trees were nted by a senior?"


    "You guys are forgetting the important matter! Those trees are clearly spiritual trees!"


    """S-Spiritual Trees!?"""


    Just as she was lost in her own thoughts sitting down leaning up against the trunk of the spiritual tree, a few surprised voicesing from further down the mountain interrupted her train of thought, causing her to look down to see a small group of disciples in the Qi Condensation Realm looking up at the spiritual trees filled with shock.


    The shock was understandable given how rare spiritual trees were and the fact that there was more than a dozen of them gathered together in a small ce.


    "Guess I will have to deal with this situation before they spread the news to the rest of the sect¡­" Muttering this to herself as she watched the group of young disciples cautiously beginning to approach the spiritual trees, Chun Hua got up. Catching the attention of the group of disciples almost instantly.


    "You five, this is a new spiritual fruit tree orchard established by the sect, you can walk around, but no touching the fruits on the trees!"


    """Y-Yes Ma''am!"""


    Calling out to the group of young disciples who were now staring at her, it didn''t even take a second before they all answered nervously while nodding their heads obediently in response to what she said. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Seeing this, Chun Hua didn''t say anything more as she leaned back against the trunk of the spiritual tree behind her. Feeling the profound aura of life surging through it and up into the small still not mature spiritual fruits that had started taking form on the low hanging branches.


    Her current job was not just to watch these spiritual fruit trees and ensure nothing went wrong with them, but also to keep an eye on any disciples that happened toe along and stop them from doing anything that might damage the spiritual fruit trees.


    On the other hand, Shu Yao was currently out gathering the necessary resources and manpower required for constructing the mountain orchard that the rest of the spiritual fruit trees along with those already nted would be inside of.


    Of course, to ensure that any new spiritual fruit trees found could also be ced inside the orchard in the future, it would be maderge enough to amodate a little over 150 spiritual fruit trees for now, with potential to expand in the future if needed.

 Chapter 1507 Breakthrough! (1)

    Chapter 1507 Breakthrough! (1)


    "A spiritual fruit tree orchard? When did the sect have something like that?"


    "I don''t know¡­ Maybe it was only recently created? Let''s try and ask her about-"


    "No! Don''t! The senior is clearly deep in meditation! The fact that she even got up to inform us kindly after we disturbed her is already stretching our luck!"


    "This¡­ I understand, let''s just quietly leave to avoid disturbing the senior¡­"


    Listening to the five young disciples as they talked among themselves, Chun Hua could not help feeling a bit amused as she opened her eyes to see them walk among the spiritual trees filled with awe before starting to slowly and cautiously begin climbing down the mountain.


    Considering that the young disciples were only in the Qi Condensation Realm, reaching the Peak of the Fourth Star Peak could be considered quite an achievement, as it was in no way an easy journey for someone in the Qi Condensation Realm.


    If she guessed, those five had most likely spent between two and three days reaching the Fourth Star Peak from the Seventh Star Peak, as there were currently no teleportation formations connecting the Seventh Star Peak with the Fourth Star Peak.


    Another reason was that outside of the important locations used by the sect, the rest of the Shattered Star Peaks had mostly remained undeveloped and was no different from travelling through a wild mountain range with no path to follow.


    Although this couldn''t really be considered anything special for those in the Core Formation Realm, as it was rtively easy to travel around without a teleportation formation, the disciples still in the Qi Condensation Realm and Foundation Establishment Realm considered the Shattered Star Peaks rather difficult to traverse without the help of teleportation formations.


    Of course, this had resulted in no small number of younger disciples setting out on small adventures to explore around the Shattered Star Peaks. Excluding a few dangerous areas that had already been sealed off by the formation guarding the entire Shattered Star Peaks.


    "Ah! Th-the senior!"


    "What senior? Is something- Ah!?"


    "I- Let''s run!"


    Realizing that Chun Hua had opened her eyes and was directly looking at them, the group of younger disciples who had been doing their best to be quiet began to panic as they ultimately ended up deciding it was better for them to run away before she said anything, a rather amusing n considering that it would be rather simple for her to catch them if she wanted to.


    However, considering that she had no intention of capturing them, she just quietly chuckled to herself while watching them run down the mountain while stumbling over each other to escape as fast as possible. Even resulting in one of the five rolling down the mountain ahead of the rest.


    At the very least, the Fourth Star Peak was covered in a soft nket of unique alpine vegetation that lessened any damage from rolling down the mountain or that disciple rolling down the mountain would have been hurt even if she had reached the Qi Condensation Realm.


    Not that she would end uppletely unharmed from rolling down the side of a mountain¡­


    Shaking her head as she thought about this, Chun Hua closed her eyes again as she returned to waiting for Shu Yao to return so the construction of the fruit tree orchard on the Fourth Star Peak could officially begin. Unaware of the problem that the disciples she had just allowed to leave would bring upon their return to the Seventh Star Peak. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    ¡­


    Back on the Seventh Star Peak, Xuan Hao was unaware of the recent developments regarding the fruit tree orchard being constructed on the Fourth Star Peak, as he was instead far more focused on the situation taking ce inside of his dantian at the moment.


    Although the changes that had taken ce following him reaching the levelparable to the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm, it was nothingpared to what was currently happening inside of his dantian, as the spiritual qi that was calm and without change normally was currently violently surging to the point where his dantian was showing signs of cracking under the pressure.


    All of this dated back to a few minutes earlier when he had just returned toprehending the Dao of Space after having allocated others to take care of the rewards he had received from the system and ensure that they were properly utilized to increase the strength of the sect.


    However, instead of the normal cultivation session that involved him just feeling like he was slowly creeping closer and closer to the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space, this time around, he managed to unknowingly break through the barrier between the Large Sess Realm and the Perfection Realm. Allowing him to reach the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space.


    Unfortunately, the increase in strength he had expected after reaching the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space did not turn out like he had expected, as hisprehension reaching the Perfection Realm almost instantly caused three newyers to be created around the dao seed in his dantian. Forcibly draining the qi inside of his dantian to do this.


    Because of thispletely unexpected turn of events, he had no time to prepare, as his dantian and the sea of qi inside of it was instantly thrown into chaos as it was forcibly used against his will to condense three newyers around his dao seed.


    If not for the fact that the process also ended up draining close to thirty percent of the qi inside of his dantian, Xuan Hao had a feeling that his dantian might very well have ended up breaking following the unexpected chaos that he had no time to defend against.


    Even the few cracks that had started forming were difficult to get rid of and would at least take him a few months to fully heal from, though, that was only with the help of some of the more precious spiritual herbs and pills he had managed to get his hands on¡­

 Chapter 1508 Breakthrough! (2)

    Chapter 1508 Breakthrough! (2)


    "Is this perhaps what it means with unable to stop the formation of moreyers around the dao lotus?" Muttering this to himself still shocked over what had just happened, Xuan Hao began to understand why it was difficult to stop the creation of moreyers around the dao seed.


    No¡­ Not difficult, but rather impossible considering how theyers had formed the moment hisprehension reached the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space.


    Considering that it should just have been a slow formation of theyers from what he knew earlier, he guessed that this kind of forcible formation shouldbe a special feature of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and not rted to those in the Dao Seed Realm, as theiryers should just be forming slowly like he had first thought his own would after he reached the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm in strength.


    In a way, it was also a way to prevent him from trying to draw things out by not forming anyyers around his dao lotus like he had been nning to do originally to get as much time as possible toprehend the Daos he needed to reach the Peak of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    At the same time, he could also sense that it didn''t matter how manyyers he had around his dao seed before hisprehension of the Dao of Space broke through to the Perfection Realm, as the daoyers would form on their own instantly the moment, he could form more than 24yers.


    In another way, if he had decided to not form any daoyers earlier, he might have ended up in a far worse situation. Possibly even dying, as the qi required for forming even a singleyer around his dao seed was a tenth of the qi in his dantian¡­


    Closing both of his eyes as he focused on the internal situation of his body, Xuan Hao ended up spending the next three days taking care of the cracks inside of his dantian. Preventing them from growing anyrger. Effecting his strength.


    In the process, he also ended up using arge portion of the spiritual herbs good for healing that he had managed to get his hands on, together with arge number of precious elixirs and pills.


    Although the cost was terrifying and would undoubtedly have caused Elder Song to faint, Xuan Hao didn''t care much about this, as he understood the importance of his strength remaining intact in case something happened to the sect.


    Of course, even if he had managed to recover most of his strength after the three days and countless precious healing medicines for repairing his dantian, he still ended up with several smaller injuries that couldn''t be taken care of immediately and would have to slowly be healed over the next few months.


    The most important thing was that his strength was no longer affected after the three days and the only problems left were small injuries that wouldn''t really affect him unless they remained untreated for an extended period of time.


    All things considered, it was quite a scary experience over those three days, as the Star Shattering Sect was essentially left in a defenseless position without him being able to do anything in case something ended up happening to the sect.


    Luckily, there weren''t any problems during those three days outside of one of his disciples, causing a bit of a ruckus by taking some of the unripe spiritual fruits before running away.


    Not that it really mattered much considering that the spiritual fruits in question were from the lower quality spiritual fruit trees intended for those in the Qi Condensation Realm to the Core Formation Realm. Growing at a far faster speedpared to the rarer spiritual fruits that would be useful for those in the Nascent Soul Realm and all the way up to the Dao Seed Realm.


    However, different from him, it seemed like his newest disciple, who had ended up in charge of the spiritual fruit trees together with Shu Yao, didn''t agree with this and was currently chasing after the little thief, causing no smallmotion as the two of them were currently running through the Shattered Star Peaks. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    One filled with anger, while another was happily munching on one of the unripe spiritual fruits that she was carrying in her embrace. The interspatial ring that should have been on her finger likely having experienced and ident of some kind¡­


    "But¡­ The Dao of Space, it really is amazing. Now that I have reached the Perfection Realm, I should be able to almost instantly use the long distance teleportation technique. Although it will be a rather exhausting endeavor."


    Turning his attention away from the chaotic chase that seemed to be currently taking ce between two of his disciples, Xuan Hao turned his attention back on his recentprehension of the Dao of Space. Marveling at the profound insights surging through his mind following the breakthrough.


    At the moment, even if he encountered someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, he wouldn''t fear them, as it would close to impossible to prevent him from leaving if he wanted with his currentprehension of the Dao of Space.


    At the very least, when it came to those in the Early Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm that he had encountered so far, he no longer felt any fear. Instead, he had a feeling that he might even have a chance to fight them now that hisprehension of the Dao of Space had reached the Perfection Realm.


    Of course, fight and defeat were twopletely different things, but he at least felt that he wouldn''t be that helpless against someone in the Early Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm if he managed toprehend abat technique that utilized the Dao of Space, the spatial copse didn''t count, as he doubted he would be able to use it before the other party moved out of the way.

 Chapter 1509 In Search of New Elders

    Chapter 1509 In Search of New Elders


    "Maybe it''s time for me to go and look for more Soul Ascension Realm cultivators to join the sect. Maybe even find someone simr to Pei Yang."


    Finished going over the changes brought about by his breakthrough to the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space, Xuan Hao felt that he should go out and search for more wandering cultivators simr to Pei Yang to join the sect and start making progress towards gathering the required Soul Ascension Realm Elders by the main sect quest.


    Finding someone in the Dao Seed Realm would be preferable but it was unlikely considering that most Dao Seed Realm cultivators on the continent were either a part of a major power already or a member of an organization like the Explorer Union that was no weaker and possibly even stronger than some major powers.


    The fact that he had even managed to find and recruit Pei Yang could be considered exceptionally good luck.


    Convincing someone to join the sect and ensuring that they weren''t harmful to the sect was another matter entirely, but considering his current cultivation realm, he should be able to pick up on it if the other party had any hostile intentions towards the sect.


    As for when it came to his strength¡­ He was more than capable of adopting the persona of someone from an ancient hidden sect at this point in time with hisprehension of the Dao of Space reaching the Perfection Realm.


    Even more so considering that there wasn''t anyone he knew of among the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators who had managed toprehend the Dao of Space to the Perfection Realm, the strongest one only reaching the Large Sess Realm in the Dao of Space.


    Of course, he didn''t think that there wasn''t anyone who hadprehended the Dao of Space to the Perfection Realm on the continent, just that if there was someone, it should be those in the Later Stages of the Celestial Immortal Realm or the ones in the Profound Immortal Realm who remained hidden.


    The demonic cultivators on the other hand¡­ Dao of ughter or Dao of Death? Sure, but he didn''t really believe there to be anyone among them who had reached the Perfection Realm in the Dao of Space.


    Maybe it was just his ownck of understanding of the demonic cultivators, but he really couldn''t imagine that one of them had managed toprehend the Dao of Space to the Perfection Realm. Especially so considering that it seemed like they only startedprehending Daos different from ones rted to ughtering and massacring people after they reached the Demon King Realm.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, he slowly got up before leaving the Star Shattering Sect to search for potential elders that could help himplete the main sect quest faster. Only informing Elder Song and Feng Chen about his absence, as he could pretty much return to the sect from a ce as far away as the inner region of the Blue Sea Empire in no less than a few minutes with his currentprehension of the Dao of Space.


    To make sure that the two of them could reach him even if he ended up on the opposite side of the continent, he made sure to get two of the highest qualitymunication talismans sold by the Explorer Union that allowed one tomunicate with someone from anywhere on the continent.


    Of course, the price of even using such a talisman even once was by no means cheap, as it required a top grade spirit stone to send one message through it, something that the current Star Shattering Sect did not have the ability to use unless absolutely necessary considering that the current Star Shattering Sect only had a few hundred spirit stones of that quality¡­ And they were of far better use for cultivation, artifact refining, formations, alchemy or countless other things that weren''t sending a single message through amunication talisman. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    For this reason, Xuan Hao had been forced to agree with Elder Song that he wouldn''t recklessly use it and waste precious spirit stones, while they would only message him in case of an emergency.


    Whoosh~


    "Hm? Maybe I shouldn''t go to the Blue Sea Empire this time around¡­" As he was about to use the long distance teleportation to directly go to the Blue Sea Empire to start his search for wandering cultivators that could be a part of the sect, Xuan Hao realized that he didn''t really have any reason to the Blue Sea Empire that was the closest major power to the Star Shattering Sect and also the closest link the sect had to the Core Region of the Continent.


    "Maybe I should take this opportunity to explore the rest of the continent now that I have a way to ensure my safety, it would also give me a chance to look for potential elders in more locations than just the Blue Sea Empire." Nodding his head as he said this while gazing off in the rough direction of the Blue Sea Empire, Xuan Hao realized that this was a perfect opportunity for him to explore the rest of the continent and expand his horizons in the process.


    After all, at this point in time, he didn''t really know a lot about the rest of the continent and had only gathered a lot of information on a few of the major powers that existed close to the Star Shattering Sect and some more dangerous ones that might be a problem in the future like the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    Not to mention, with the current conflict between the major powers of the core region and the demonic cultivators, he might get a chance to see someone in the Profound Immortal Realm acting if he got lucky.


    Although he doubted, he had the strength to face someone in the Profound Immortal Realm, that was not his goal and he just wanted to see someone at the Profound Immortal Realm fighting so he could more closely examine their strength andpare it to his own.

 Chapter 1510 In Search of New Elders (2)

    Chapter 1510 In Search of New Elders (2)


    Deciding that he would not be going to the Blue Sea Empire like he had first been nning on doing, Xuan Hao decided to first visit a branch of the Explorer Union in the neutral territory between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire where Chu Yang had gone to train and was currently on his way back from.


    The reason he didn''t just go to one of the branches of the Explorer Union located closer to the Star Shattering Sect was because he doubted that they would have much information readily avable about the core region. Mainly because the information inside a branch of the Explorer Union was mostly tied to where it was located. Containing information of the area around the branch itself and nearby powers.


    Although he could probably get the information he wanted from the branch currently trading with the Star Shattering Sect, he had a feeling that doing so might require the one in charge of that branch contacting arger one. Drawing even more attention towards the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even worse, it was the Explorer Union, which might end up with them wanting to establish a branch inside the Falling Star City, something he wanted to avoid after having worked so hard to get rid of it to prevent any outside power from establishing a foothold inside the main city that acted as the main connection for the Star Shattering Sect to interact with the rest of the world.


    No matter how good the Explorer Union''s reputation might be, there was a reason why no major power seemed to be thrilled about allowing them to establish themselves anywhere close to the core of their power.


    Well¡­ Some weaker major powers had allowed something like that, but at least when it came to the true power yers like the Blue Sea Empire, the Explorer Union had not been allowed anywhere near the capital city back when they had still been operating inside the territory of the Blue Sea Empire.


    At this point in time, they were struggling to try and reestablish themselves inside of the Blue Sea Empire again as far as he was aware¡­


    Whoosh~!


    As he decided on the first ce to head in search of elders for the sect, Xuan Hao didn''t waste any time as he directly used the long distance teleportation for the first time since hisprehension of the Dao of Space reached the Perfection Realm. Resulting in an extremely stable spatial channel appearing in front of him as he stepped forward and disappeared from the territory of the Star Shattering Sect the next second.


    Teleportation in itself was not something instantaneous, but instead the process of creating different spatial channels, that, in a sense, shrank the distance between two locations.


    The higher one''sprehension of the Dao of Space was, the more this distance could be decreased. Allowing faster travel.


    For Xuan Hao, it changed a trip that would normally take around seven minutes down to only a little over four minutes.


    Although not a lot, he could now also use the long distance teleportation without requiring a five minute time to prepare ahead of time. Shorting the travel time by more and at the same time making using the long distance teleportation inbat a real possibility and also what he relied on to feel confident even in the face of someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    After all, in terms of speed, was there anyone who had the ability to catch up with someone capable ofparing to the terrifying speed of someone whoprehended the Dao of Space? n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om


    The only real problem Xuan Hao saw when it came to facing off against someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm or the Profound Immortal Realm was the fact that he had no idea if the other party had any way to seal off space to the extent that he couldn''t escape.


    Considering how long those in the Celestial Immortal Realm and the Profound Immortal Realm should have lived, he doubted that they wouldn''t have something to seal space and prevent an opponent from escaping.


    A very clear example of this would be the Demon King Realm demonic cultivator he had encountered after he stole the space node stones and was about to leave.


    With that in mind, even though he felt confident in the face of someone in the Early Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm now, he still intended on avoiding a confrontation with one in case he ran into them, as there was simply no reason for him to needlessly offend them just because part of him really wanted to test out his strength against someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Another factor was also the fact that he didn''t want his identity as someone from the Star Shattering Sect to leak out, as he had a feeling that some of the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators were already aware of his existence and the fact that he was someone of at least the Celestial Immortal Realm from an ancient hidden sect.


    If he ended up facing off against a Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator and ended up not being up to par, he could easily imagine the reaction from the Blue Sea empire, as they would almost certainly look into the Star Shattering Sect more closely than they had done so far. Potentially disregarding any of their previous cautious behavior and directly sending over someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm to test the waters.


    A worst-case scenario and also a reason why he intended to go to somewhere away from the Blue Sea Empire where he was far more likely to get recognized.


    As for disguising himself¡­ Although he might be confident in doing so against someone in the Dao Seed Realm, he was highly doubtful he was skilled enough to disguise himself in front of someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    The only disguise he could pull off effectively was to take advantage of the fact that he could still be considered to be in the Domain Lord Realm as someone in the Dao Domain Lord Realm and disguise himself as someone in the Domain Lord Realm¡­

 Chapter 1511 In Search of New Elders- Information! (3)

    Chapter 1511 In Search of New Elders- Information! (3)


    Whoosh~!


    Appearing at the edge of the mountain range leading into the neutral territory between the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire, Xuan Hao decided to first take a look around and see if he could figure out what had happened to Chu Yang, as he could still sense that this was the location he had disappeared around.


    Even if he wasn''t able to sense the exact location he had disappeared to, it didn''t really matter much as his divine sense soon swept through the mountain range without any obstructions.


    "Hm? An entrance to a secret realm- No, there several entrances and they all have the exact same design¡­ Do they perhaps lead to the same secret realm? If that is the case, the secret realm should be a ratherrge one. Not something that someone in the Soul Ascension Realm or even Dao Seed Realm should be able to create. Looks like Chu Yang should have found his way inside of that secret realm thanks to that so-called mysterious opportunity¡­"


    Not taking more than a few seconds before discovering close to a dozen simr looking gates all leading into a secret realm, Xuan Hao didn''t take long to conclude that his disciple should have ended up inside of that secret realm because of the mysterious opportunity from the system.


    Judging from everything, he guessed that his disciple wasn''t really in any danger and should be able to find his way out after he consumed the mysterious opportunity that had clearly been the thing behind his recent breakthrough to the Dao Domain Lord Realm. Completely unaware that his disciple was very much trapped with no way out of the mystic realm that he found himself inside of at the moment¡­


    Whoosh~


    And so, without a second thought, Xuan Hao decided to leave in search of arger branch of the Explorer Union where he should be able to get his hands on more information of the core region.


    ¡­


    Thump~


    Landing on the ground in front of arge city close to the center of the neutral territory that was controlled by one of therger neutral factions that had someone in the Dao Seed Realm behind them, Xuan Hao casually walked past the guard demanding payment for entry to the city without giving him a second nce.


    Considering he had no need to, he had of course not revealed himself as he smoothly entered the city without any troublesome situation, suddenly popping up out of the blue and soon enough, he found himself in front of the Explorer Union branch in the city.


    "This¡­ Isrger than I expected¡­"


    Just standing in front of this branch of the Explorer Union, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a sense of profound shock, as this branch seemed to take up almost a third of the entire city.


    Compared to the size of the Explorer Union branches that he had grown used to that wereposed of a single building, this was on apletely different scale, as it made him wonder whether or not that so-called neutral power was really the one in charge of the city and not the Explorer Union.


    However, after asking a few of the people who came out of the entrance to the branch with the help of a few spirit stones, he managed to learn that this could be considered a real branch of the Explorer Union where they not only did ordinary business, but also had training areas and other facilities for processing materials gathered and an extensive storage facility where most of the materials and resources gathered from nearby branches were sent.


    Not just that, but he also learnt that there was at least one person in the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm) stationed at every branch of that scale, as they were simply far too important to just have someone at the Soul Ascension Realm watch over the ce.


    In fact, the branch currently in front of him turned out to be thergest one in the entire neutral territory and was also where all the resources gathered through different branches across the neutral territory gathered.


    As a result, he learnt that there was not only one Dao Seed Realm cultivator at this branch, but instead two.


    Unknowingly he had entered up at the perfect branch for the information he wanted to gather, as a branch of this size would undoubtedly have knowledge of the situation outside of the neutral territory and nearby major powers.


    Filled with excitement upon learning about this, Xuan Hao directly made his way inside the branch before going up to an avable counter to request information on the continent with a happy expression. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "Information on the continent? You mean the Northen Region of the Continent?"


    "No, I want information on the entire continent, a map if possible."


    "This¡­ Wait a moment."


    Hearing his request, the clerk who had received him froze for a second before dashing off. Clearly this kind of information was not something she had, something that wasn''t surprising considering that she was only in the Core Formation Realm and likely didn''t encounter someone like him before.


    As he continued waiting, Xuan Hao went over the information he already knew about the continent so far.


    First of all was the fact that the continent could be split up into four major regions, the simple north, south, west and east.


    Currently, he was in the Northen Region of the Continent or more specifically what was considered the Northen Central Region of the Continent.


    Inside the Northen Central Region, there were 12 major powers, with the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire being the strongest. Battling each other for dominance over the Northen Central Region every few years, something that had only cooled down recently over the past few thousand years. Allowing the neutral territory to develop to the extent that it had given birth to Dao Seed Realm cultivators.


    Thinking about it¡­ Outside of the Northen Central Region, he didn''t really have much information on the other region outside of knowing that the Heavenly Dragon Temple was located in the Western Central Region.

 Chapter 1512 In Search of New Information, Goal Achieved ! (4)

    1512 In Search of New Information, Goal Achieved ! (4)


    Continuing to wait, it didn''t take long before the clerk returned with an older man following closely behind. From his divine sense, he could clearly sense that the old man was not just some random person, as he had actually reached the Peak of the Domain Lord Realm and seemed to be in the process of preparing to take on the first tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm. Even from a nce, it was obvious that he was one of the senior members of the branch.


    "Are you the one who wanted information on the continent?"


    "Yes." Hearing the old man suddenly calming out to him the moment he spotted him; Xuan Hao nodded his head before feeling the old man starting to examine from head to toe following his answer.


    Only after a few seconds of careful examination did he seem satisfied as he lowered his gaze slightly with a more serious expression on his face. "Follow me, we will go to a more private location to discuss."


    "¡­"


    Understanding that the old man should have just made sure of his cultivation realm just now, Xuan Hao nodded his head in response before following the old man into a more private room that was separated from the bustling crowd of people entering and leaving the building on the other side.


    From a nce around the small room, Xuan Hao could tell that there wa not only a formation in ce to silence the sound from outside and prevent any conversation inside from leaking, but also a formation designed to restrain someone. Likely in case he ended up trying to attack the person from the Explorer Union he was meeting with.


    Of course, the formation itself waspletely useless against someone at his level, but it should be useful against someone in the Earlier Stages of the Soul Ascension Realm. Making him once again marvel over the profound foundation of the Explorer Union.


    After all, this was only a single private room out of a little over twenty and all of them should be equipped with simr formations. Showing off the Explorer Unions strength when it came to formation master- or at least that they could easily hire formations master with the vast resources that they gathered from around the entire continent.


    "What kind of information do you want on the continent? Basic information or moreplex information? Do be aware that the price will change drastically depending on the kind of information you want. For example, an unexplored secret realm location that has not opened yet is far more expensive than one that has remained open for thousands of years."


    The moment the two of them were isted, the old man directly sat down as he said this without a single hint of hesitation. Having clearly switched into a professional demeanor the second the two of them were alone.


    Not that Xuan Hao minded this. In fact, he preferred this, as it would allow him to get the information he wanted and leave the Explorer Union to start his search for potential future elders of the sect.


    "Not somethingplicated, I want the information on the number of major powers in the regions outside the Northen Region and therger ones among these major powers, like the Blue Sea Empire and Wei Empire here in our Northen Region."


    "Ah, the power structure of the continent''s top yers. Understandable, the price is¡­" Nodding his head in response to Xuan Hao''s answer, the old man quickly calcted the price of the information and after Xuan Hao paid, he began exining the overall structure of the different major powers on the continent.


    First of all was the Western Region that could be said to be the region that interreacted the most with the Northern Region.


    The Western Region was around the same size as the Northern Region, but different from the Northern Region which almost onlyposed of empires and kingdoms, the Western Region waspromised of different temples.


    Among these temples, there were an astounding 23 who were at the major power level. Surpassing that of the Northern Region by more than 10.


    On the other hand, when it came to powerful temples, there was only a single oneparable to the likes of the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire¡­ And that was the Heavenly Dragon Temple.


    The reason why the Western Regions temples had not been able to encroach on the Northern Region was because the Wei Empire and the Blue Sea Empire both worked together in preventing anyone from the Western Region from expanding into the Northern Region¡­ And given the strength of the two empires, there was nothing that these temples could do to fight back.


    All things considered, Xuan Hao was quite happy to learn about this, as it made him understand that there was little chance of the Heavenly Dragon Temple taking any action against the sect in the future, as they would end up having to first pass through the massive empires of the northern region before they could do so.


    Next up, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the Eastern Region, the second region that bordered the Northen Region.


    Different from the Western Region that seemed to want to expand into the Northern Region and had shed several times with the local major powers, the Eastern Region held no adversarial rtionship with the Northern Region.


    Not because they were weaker in any way, as there were 17 major powers in the Eastern Region, four having reached a levelpared to the Blue Sea Empire and the Wei Empire. Instead, it was because the Eastern Region was over two times the size of the Northern Region and the powers there were far too busy fighting each other to care about anyone else.


    In fact, even now that the demon cultivators had started attacking, two of the major powers in the Eastern region were locked in war with each other, their Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators shing with each other at an almost daily basis ording to the information of the old man telling him this¡­


    n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om

 Chapter 1513 Th-there is still more... MORE INFORMATION! (5)

    1513 Th-there is still more... MORE INFORMATION! (5)


    Noting down the Eastern Region as a rather chaotic ce filled with both constant wars and opportunities ording to the information from the old man belonging to the Explorer Union, the information soon moved on to the Southern Region. The Largest and strongest of the different regions on the continent and also the location where the true core of the continent was located- or more specially located inside the Southern Core Region.


    At the same time, it was also the location where most of the churches on the continent had established their main churches and the bastions of their faiths.


    As a result of this, the number of major powers in the Southern Region was not just a few dozen, but was instead over a hundred, a total of 102 to be exact. More than the other three regionsbined.


    Although¡­ The major powers in that region were a bit different, as 93 of these major powers were churches that didn''t really have the same level of power as a normal major power, but they could apparently borrow strength from their gods if pushed too far and some had the power to directly destroy weaker major power through this.


    Most shocking was the fact that out of the countless churches that fought for faith in the Southern Region and across the entire continent, there were nine core faiths that held absolute power in the region, their strength unknown, but at least reaching the same level as an empire like the Blue Sea Empire.


    Not much was known about the nine core faiths, as they rarely moved and didn''t seem as obsessed with gathering faith like the rest of the churches. Instead, they remained silent and stayed inside their rtively small territories centered around the core of the continent without doing anything. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    Xuan Hao did try to ask more into these nine core faiths, but old man from the Explorer Union clearly stated that this kind of information was not something he could get his hands on with his current cultivation and if he wanted any chance of learning about the nine core faiths, he would have to go to the Southern Region where the main headquarters were located. Only there could he obtain that kind of information.


    Although he did feel disappointed at not being able to learn more about these nine core faiths that clearly seemed to be the strongest powers on the continent given their seemingly unwavering status on in the Southern Region and the fac that they were all situated around the true core of the continent.


    Of course, he had tried asking into the so-called true core of the continent but ended up with a simr answer to the one when he had asked about the nine core faiths.


    All things considered, he wasn''t disappointed in the information he had managed to gain, as he got a general understanding of the power structure of the continent now.


    For one, the best location for him to look for new elders to join the sect would undoubtedly be the war torn Eastern Region located in a constant state of warfare.


    Not only because it would be far easier to find wandering cultivators in that kind of environment, but also because heading to the Western Region with the Heavenly Dragon Temple around wasn''t that thrilling to think about. Especially given that the Western Region already had a bad rtionship with the Northern Region.


    As for heading to the Southern Region¡­ He didn''t have a death wish and had no ns of potentiallynding himself in the middle of a battle for faith between the different churches established there. Especially so because he couldn''t predict what kind of weird methods they might employ with their divine energy.


    Lost in his own thoughts as he became fully set on the next location he would be going to, Xuan Hao suddenly noticed to old man from the Explorer Union starting to get up and begin to leave the room. "Ah, before you leave, can I ask you a bit more about the Eastern Region?" To stop this, he quickly called out to him and asked a new question. nning to learn more about the region he was nning to search through for new elders.


    "Huh? Ah! Of course you can!" Hearing Xuan Hao calling out to him, the old man quickly sat back down with a smile on his face before the two of them worked out a price and Xuan Hao paid him a secondter as he quickly began talking about the Eastern Region in more detail.


    For one, Xuan Hao learnt a bit more of the four major powers; they were actually not four major powers so to speak, but all stemmed from an ancient dynasty that had once ruled the entire Eastern Region and had been a power unsurpassed in power since ancient times.


    These four major powers of the Eastern Region were in fact made up of four major families that had been connected to the imperial linage of the dynasty that had existed in the past.


    The reason for the constant war was mainly these fourrge families fighting each other to im the right of the ancient imperial family and the right to reestablish the ancient dynasty in their own name.


    In turn, this had also ended up giving birth to countless assignation and information rted organization across the Eastern Region, as the four major families used everything at their disposal to try and fight each other to the death.


    Among these many organizations that sprung forth and perished whenever they were found by one of the opposing major families, one of them managed to survive the bloodshed and break free to establish themselves as an independent power not shackled by one of the major families.


    This organization was the Shadow Lotus Sect, an information and assassination focused organization that had managed spread throughout the neutral territories and infiltrate the territories of some weaker major powers on the continent in a simr way to the Explorer Union, though far weaker and unable to properly show themselves without being hunted down by the countless enemies they had made over the years.

 Chapter 1514 No More Information... ._. (6)

    Chapter 1514 No More Information... ._. (6)


    Learning all the information he needed to learn about the Eastern Region and also getting some information on different wandering cultivators that he could find and assess as potential future elders of the sect, Xuan Hao was finally satisfied and had nothing more to gain from the Explorer Union in terms of information- or had he!? n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Yes, yes, he had, he had nothing more to ask, as any other question he still did have wasn''t something that this branch of the Explorer Union could answer¡­ And asking some of the questions in his head might end up attracting unwanted attention given that it was definitely not something someone in the Domain Lord Realm should be asking about.


    Information on the continent itself and power structure in ce was normal for someone in the Domain Lord Realm to ask about.


    Asking about the singr path of the Dao Domain Lord Realm and how to reach it when possibly only those in the Celestial Immortal Realm even knew about the existence of the Dao Domain Lord Realm? That was not normal for someone in the Domain Lord Realm to ask about¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about what kind of reaction asking about the Dao Domain Lord Realm might invoke from the old man who seemed to be the person in charge of this branch''s information gathering and selling, Xuan Hao got up from his seat before making his way out of the private room.


    Back into the bustling hall filled to the brim with peopleing and going to either sell material, buy things like pills, weapons, formations or just pick up one of the countless missions issued by the Explorer Union for a reward.


    "¡­"


    Taking a quick nce around the ce for anyone who might fit in as a potential elder, Xuan Hao didn''t even spot one person in the Soul Ascension Realm among the countless people, as he directly turned around and made his way out of the Explorer Union branch.


    Following this, he did a quick trip around therge city to see if there were any wandering cultivators in the Soul Ascension Realm around¡­ And although he did spot a few of them, they were far from anything he would befortable with recruiting to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    So, in the end, he slowly left the city before heading towards the Eastern Region of the Continent.


    Given that this would be his first time there and the fact that he had no idea if there was someone powerful guarding the borders of the Eastern Region, Xuan Hao decided to take things a bit slower as he traveled through the air at a leisure pace instead of using long distance teleportation.


    Of course, even though he was travelling slowpared to his long distance teleportation that would have taken him to the Eastern Region in a few minutes, his speed was still terrifying as he was using the opportunity to practice the Illusory Light Steps. Resulting in him reaching the border between the Eastern Region and the Northern Region in a little under a week.


    "That is it¡­?"


    However, as he floated above the border, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit disappointed as he looked down at the single small city with only a single person in the Domain Lord Realm located at the border between the two major regions.


    For some reason, he had expected to find some kind of defensive barrier, like a great wall filled with powerful formations to prevent attacks from the north, but in the end, there was nothing.


    Considering that the Eastern Region and the Northern Region had never really been at war with each other, this should have been expected, but it was still a bit disappointing nheless to find such a barren and boring border.


    Thinking about it¡­ His best chance to see such arge defensive instation would likely be at the border between the Northern Region and the Western Region.


    However, going there was a risk in itself, as there should be someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm guarding from both sides of that border¡­ And if the one guarding one side of the Northern Region happened to be someone from the Blue Sea empire, he had a feeling that he would get recognized rather fast if he attempted to cross the border.


    Rumble~!


    Lost in his own thoughts of both disappointment and curiosity towards the border to the west of the Northern Region, a loud rumbling suddenly interrupts them, as Xuan Hao almost instantly used his divine sense to ascertain the source of the rumbling sound.


    "What in the¡­"


    But, as he saw the source of the rumbling sound through his divine sense, he could not help showing a somewhat dumbfounded expression on his face.


    Watching firsthand, as a small group of Domain Lord Realm cultivators were desperately escaping in his direction with what could only be described as thousands of flying worms the size of a small house.


    Whoosh~


    Feeling incredibly intrigued and interested in this sudden and rather weird turn of events, he quickly decided to hide himself before the group of Domain Lord Realm cultivators spotted him.


    Even if not for long, he fully intended on seeing what these Domain Lord Realm cultivators were up and how in the world they had managed to offend so manyrge flying house sized worms.


    Even more so because he could sense that the strength of all these worms had at least reached the Domain Lord Realm.


    Around a thousand Domain Lord Realm demon beasts chasing after them¡­ And these escaping Domain Lord Realm cultivators were still calm in appearance and didn''t seem the slightest bit panicked as they continued to just barely escape while suffering attacks from the flying house sized worms every now and then.


    "Obviously, they have some kind of n to deal with these worms, I just wonder what it is these few Domain Lord Realm cultivators can do in the face of so many Domain Lord Realm demon beasts¡­" Muttering this to himself with even more interest in his eyes, Xuan Hao slowly began trailing after the group of Domain Lord Realm cultivators as they ran past him.

 Chapter 1515 Escape, Trap, Escape

    Chapter 1515 Escape, Trap, Escape


    Following after the group of escaping Domain Lord Realm cultivators as they crossed over into the Eastern Region, Xuan Hao soon spotted another group of Domain Lord Realm cultivators hidden in the direction that the group with the flying worms chasing after them were escaping.


    Not just that, but the hidden group of Domain Lord Realm cultivators were all anxiously staring off in the direction of the approaching group as they worked on a massive formation hidden throughout the environment stretching over a dozen kilometers around them.


    "So¡­ Those people are the bait, and they intend on using that formation to kill off the worms in a surprise attack, but¡­ This is close to a thousand Domain Lord Realm demon beasts. Even with a formation in ce for an ambush and a little over 30 Domain Lord Realm cultivators on their side, they shouldn''t be able to kill off so many Domain Lord Realm demon beasts¡­" Muttering this to himself as he grasped what was happening, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit confused, as he really couldn''t see how these few Domain Lord Realm cultivators nned on taking down so many Domain Lord Realm demon beasts.


    Given his currentprehension of the Dao of Formations, he could easily grasp the true strength of the formation they had set up and though impressive, it was far from enough to deal with so many Domain Lord Realm demon beasts. At most they would be able to deal with a hundred or so with the element of surprise on their side.


    A thousand Domain Lord Realm demon beasts¡­ Even someone at the Pinnacle of the Soul Ascension Realm would have to tread carefully faced with such an overwhelming number, let alone these few Domain Lord Realm cultivators.


    For this reason alone, Xuan Hao could not help feeling even more interested in what was going to happen, as the confidence in these Domain Lord Realm cultivators was clear for all to see. Making him wonder just what it was that they were relying on, as there was no way what he had seen from them so far would be enough to deal with the horde of Domain Lord Realm demon beasts.


    "NOOOW-!


    And as Xuan Hao watched the escaping Domain Lord Realm cultivators reach the formation before one of them called out to those hidden in the dark, the formation that had remained hidden so far sprang into action. Sealing off the surroundings before countless des materialized and swept down towards the unsuspecting Domain Lord Realm demon beasts.


    Ptsh-!


    Ptsh-!


    Ptsh-!


    Taken by surprise, more than a dozen demon beasts fell without any chance to fight back-


    ROOOOAR-!


    Roar!


    Roooaaaar-!


    However, this surprise attack did notst for long, as a secondter, the remaining demon beasts realized what was happening as they joined forces and attacked the formation together.


    BOOOOOOOM-!


    CRAAAACK-!


    Faced with thebined attack of a little under a thousand demon beasts in the Domain Lord Realm, the formation stood no chance of holding them for long, as it directly broke apart under the terrifying might that would even leave someone at the Pinnacle of the Soul Ascension Realm shivering in fear.


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    Whoosh~!


    However, the group of Domain Lord Realm cultivators didn''t seem to care about this, as they had used the moment while the demon beasts were busy attacking the formation to sweep down and collect the bodies of the demon beasts that had ended up dying before taking off and joining the rest to escape again.


    The differencepared to the first time around where they were filled with confidence was that they were now in a state of both excitement and nervousness, as they escaped as fast as possible in a nned and organized manner. All moving towards a single location, while the demon beasts behind them soon picked up on what was happening and resumed their chase.


    "Their goal was the bodies of the demon beasts? Hm¡­ Indeed, Domain Lord Realm demon beast bodies are valuable materials for both artifact refining, alchemy, formations and many other things, but can they really escape after enraging the demon beasts to this extend?"


    Realizing that the goal of these Domain Lord Realm cultivators was to kill off some of the demon beasts for their valuable bodies before escaping, Xuan Hao felt a bit doubtful on how they would be escaping from their current situation.


    After all, while they had managed to get their hands on the bodies of a little over a dozen Domain Lord Realm demon beasts, the distance between them and the demon beasts had shrunk to the point where some of the slower Domain Lord Realm cultivators were forced to fend off their attacks every now and then. Slowing them down and resulting in them being attacked by more demon beasts as they continued to escape.


    Even the fastest among the Domain Lord Realm cultivators seemed to be about to get dragged into a life and death battle during his escape, as the strongest among the flying worm demon beasts had set their eyes on him and ignored some of the other weaker Domain Lord Realm cultivators present to target him and prevent him from escaping while the others were taken care of by the weaker Domain Lord Realm demon beasts.


    "Hm? A city?"


    However, as it looked like the group of escaping Domain Lord Realm cultivators were about to getpletely overwhelmed, one of them even having both of his legs bitten off by one of the demon beasts as he continued to desperately escape, Xuan Hao spotted a city appearing in the distance at the edge of his divine sense.


    Not just any city, but one that had the presence of multiple Dao Seed Realm cultivators.


    "¡­"


    Looking back down at the escaping Domain Lord Realm cultivators after spotting the city in the distance, Xuan Hao instantly understood the goal of these Domain Lord Realm cultivators, they were nning to seek refuge inside the city and rely on the powerful cultivators there to avoid dying to the horde of demon beasts chasing after them.


    Although this was risky to do, it was also something that might end up helping them earn a lot of cultivation resources in a rather short period of time.


    Not to mention, considering that the demon beasts chasing them were only in the Domain Lord Realm, it wouldn''t really pose any threat to the city and might not even be enough for the Dao Seed Realm cultivators guarding the city to act given that the city had more than enough Soul Ascension Realm cultivators present to handle the horde of Domain Lod Realm demon beasts.


    Of course, given how valuable the bodies of demon beasts were and the fact that there wasn''t really any real risk posed to the city itself, those Soul Ascension Realm cultivators and other Domain Lord Realm cultivators might feel more grateful than anything else for them showing up with so many Domain Lord Realm demon beasts chasing after them, as it would give them a way to earn a lot of spirit stones or other resources without too much danger involved¡­


    "Looks like those Dao Seed Realm cultivators noticed them."


    As the group of escaping Domain Lords got closer to the city in the distance, Xuan Hao soon felt the divine sense of the Dao Seed Realm cultivators inside of the city sweeping over him and the rest of the Domain Lord Realm cultivators and demon beasts.


    Of course, to ensure he didn''t cause any problems, he had disguised himself as a random Domain Lord Realm cultivator who just so happened to see what was happening and was currently observing the situation from afar without giving away his position.


    After all, though his strength was far greater than those people, he wasn''t fully confident in being able to fully conceal himself.


    So, with that in mind, he decided to just pretend to be a random Domain Lord Realm cultivator and avoid attracting any unwanted attention.


    Not that it was that unrealistic considering that there were indeed a few other Domain Lord Realm cultivators who had been attracted by themotion and were currently watching the situation ying out from a safe distance without revealing themselves, there was even one who had reached the Soul Ascension Realm hidden above the group of demon beasts. Ready to strike at any moment to get his hands on the precious bodies of the demon beasts- or the treasures of the escaping Domain Lord Realm cultivators.


    Rumble~!


    However, this situation would notst for long, as the city with the Dao Seed Realm cultivators inside of it soon appeared in the distance¡­ And along with that, countless Domain Lord Realm and Soul Ascension Realm cultivators began swarming out of the city before rushing towards the horde of approaching demon beasts. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Clearly, the Dao Seed Realm cultivators in the city had informed those below them about the situation, causing them to rush out for the opportunity to earn some easy spirit stones from the approaching demon beasts¡­

 Chapter 1516 Independent City State

    Chapter 1516 Independent City State


    Watching as the group of escaping Domain Lord Realm cultivators managed to seek refuge behind some of the more eager Soul Ascension Realm cultivators who had rushed ahead of everyone else to get their hands on as many of the demon beasts as possible, Xuan Hao turned his attention away from them and instead focused his attention on the battle that started breaking out between the demon beasts and cultivators from the city.


    The group of Domain Lord Realm cultivators had managed to sessfully pull off their little scheme. Only getting a bit injured in the process, while managing to kill off over a dozen Domain Lord Realm demon beasts, one of them even having reached the Later Stage of the Domain Lord Realm.


    All things considered; the group should be able to recover in a rtively short period of time given that none of them ended up dead. Only the one who had ended up losing both of his legs might take a bit longer to recover.


    At the same time, as the demon beasts shed with the increasing number of human cultivators of both the Soul Ascension Realm and Domain Lord Realm pouring out of the city, they began to realize how bad the situation was turning out as more and more of them began to fall.


    ROooar-!?


    Rooar¡­!


    Rooar¡­


    Filled with both fear and surprise over this sudden turn of events, therge flying worm demon beasts started panicking, as more than a hundred of them died in a rtively short period of time, causing the remaining ones to quickly dive towards the ground below-


    Bang! Bang! Bang!


    Where they soon enough smashed into the ground before quickly disappearing out of sight. Leaving the cultivators who arrived toote filled with disappointment, as it was clear that there was no way to chase after this kind of demon beast proficient in digging underground. Even most of the people in the Soul Ascension Realm didn''t stand a chance of chasing after them.


    The only ones who continued chasing the flying worms as they dug into the ground to escape were some of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators proficient in the Dao of Earth. Allowing them to dig after and follow the worms as they escaped underground.


    Even then, the total number of demon beasts they would be able to catch after they made it underground would not be more than a few dozen, as they dispersed and made it impossible to continue chasing after them for more than a few minutes.


    In the end, by the time everything had finished, the people who had gathered all began to happily make their way back towards the city in the distance.


    The only people not showing any happiness being the ones who had been unable to rush out in time and kill off one of the demon beasts. Missing the opportunity to get their hands on some rather easy spirit stones, as they wouldn''t really have to worry about too much danger with so many Soul Ascension Realm cultivators around.


    As Xuan Hao watched all of this unfolding, he didn''t continue hiding on the side, as he instead mixed in together with the Domain Lord Realm cultivators heading back towards the city. Intending to take the opportunity to learn more about the Eastern Region inside of the city- Or more urately learn where he could potentially find wandering cultivators at the Soul Ascension Realm that he might have a chance to recruit for the sect.


    The ones he had seen earlier fighting the demon beasts were an option, but he had a feeling that they might not be wandering cultivators but were likely already affiliated with one of the Dao Seed Realm cultivators inside of the city or at least the power that this city existed under.


    Thinking about it, there should be a major power from the Eastern Region bordering the Northern Region, though he had not yet managed to find out about this major power, as it seemed to not really view the Northern Region border with much importance due to the fact that the two regions had been neutral with each other for thousands of years with neither party interfering with each other.


    Another reason for this could also be the fact that this major power should currently be caught up in a fight with another major power of the Eastern Region and simply not have the resources to establish a presence there outside of a single city.


    However, as Xuan Hao made his way inside of the city and began asking around, he realized that the city was not under any of the major powers of the Eastern Region. Instead, it was a neutral city state that did not align with any of the major powers, being controlled by threerge ns that each had someone in the Dao Seed Realm watching over them.


    Although this was not what he had been expecting, it wasn''t that surprising, as someone in the Dao Seed Realm would have more than enough to establish their own independent force inside the core region of the continent.


    Of course, this would only be the case if they were located in some of the more remote areas that were ignored by therger major powers¡­ And from the looks of it, the border area between the Central Northern Region and the Central Eastern Region could be considered one such location. Allowing the three ns to band together an establish a force of their own by relying on the abundant trade ships moving between the two central regions.


    Outside of just relying on the trade between the two central regions to establish themselves, there was also something different they relied on to grow their strength and that was the abundant demon beasts that could be found around the city.


    The flying worm demon beasts from earlier were one of these kinds of demon beasts that were abundant and often hunted down by the people from the three ns due to their bodies being perfect material for alchemists refining a kind of soul enhancing pill that was useful for cultivators below the Dao Seed Realm.


    Learning about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling curious about why the Dao Seed Realm cultivators of the three ns hadn''t just acted themselves to kill off all the worm demon beasts, as they should have more than enough strength to do so.


    But¡­ After thinking things through, he quickly realized why, as those three Dao Seed Realm cultivators should be thinking about the long term sustainability of their ns and killing all of the worm demon beasts would cut off a future lifeline for their ns. Even if it might give them a lot of spirit stones and resources in the short term¡­ N?v(el)B\\jnn


    "Not bad¡­ It might be a good idea to investigate the three ns and see if there is a chance to recruit them into the sect¡­" Muttering this to himself as both his eyes shone for a brief moment, Xuan Hao slowly began making his way towards one of the three ns in control of the city, the Xue n.


    Although he had been feeling a bit down knowing that all the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators in the city were already under one of the three ns with Dao Seed Realm cultivators supporting them, his thoughts soon changed as he realized that he would be able to easily recruit all of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators to join the sect if he managed to sessfully recruit the Dao Seed Realm cultivators in control of these ns to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    The reason why he first decided on going to the Xue n out of the three ns instead of the other two, being because he had managed to learn that among the three ns, the Xue n was the weakest among them, with their old ancestor already one step in the grave and his lifespan close to running out.


    Of course, given his cultivation at the Dao Seed Realm, close to running out still meant that he had a little over five hundred years left in him.


    However, five hundred years was far from enough for the Xue n to nurture another Dao Seed Realm cultivator. Meaning that they would likely soon lose their position, as there was little chance the other two ns would allow them to remain one of the leaders of the city without a Dao Seed Realm cultivator backing them up.


    Knowing this, the Xue n should also be preparing to leave the city before their ancestor passed away, as they should know that there was little chance that the other two ns would just allow them to leave safely if their ancestor had already passed away.


    Although¡­ This was just Xuan Hao''s thought about the current situation of the Xue n.


    For all he knew, the three ns might be great friends with each other with there being no power struggles present among them, though¡­ Considering how the cultivation world worked, he highly doubted this to be the case no matter how peaceful the situation seemed on the outside¡­

 Chapter 1517 Independent City State (2)

    Chapter 1517 Independent City State (2)


    Making his way through the bustling city that was now filled with people either happily preparing to sell off the demon beasts they had managed to kill or distraught that they had not been fast enough to kill off one of the demon beasts in time, Xuan Hao soon arrived at the Xue Family Estate located at the center of the city.


    Looking from a distance at the massive estate that seemed to cover close to a tenth of the entire city, Xuan Hao could not help ncing over in the direction of the two other major ns and their estates located right next to the Xue n''s estate.


    Although the three estates seemed simr in size, it was clear for anyone to see that the Xue n had upied the core part of the city. Almost like they were establishing themselves as being above the two other ns, something rather ironic considering their current circumstances ofcking a powerful enough cultivator to take over when the old ancestor who had established the Xue n in the past passed away.


    In a sense, it could be considered a good thing for Xuan Hao, as the other two ns would almost certainly be unwilling to allow the Xue n to keep their current position at the core of the city after their ancestor passed away. Giving him a potential opportunity to take advantage of the current situation to potentially recruit a second Dao Seed realm cultivator to the sect along with arge number of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators.


    Of course, before any of this, he first had to make sure about the current state of things so as not to end up making any mistake.


    To be this, he first wanted to just use his divine sense to try and understand the overall situation but given that the three ns all had Dao Seed Realm cultivators watching over them, he didn''t dare to carelessly use his divine sense inside of their estates. Fearing that they might end up discovering him and potentially make his path to recruiting any of them significantly harder.


    Even if he was confident in being able to keep himself hidden, there was no reason to take any unnecessary risks. Instead, it was far simpler for him to just find a few cultivators from the three ns and probe them for information regarding the rtionship between the three ns.


    Although the higherups might want to keep any internal struggles or problems hidden from outsiders, it would inevitably leak down through the younger generation and manifest itself in the form ofpetition between the younger people of the three ns.


    Not thatpetition between the younger generation was unnatural in any way. In fact, it was rather normal. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    But¡­


    The intensity of thepetition varied, and it could be used to understand the undercurrents and potential struggles between the three ns.


    At the same time, it would also give him an insight into whether or not there was any significant gap in resources between the three ns, as lower overall strength among the younger generation from one n would suggest ack of resourcespared to the other ns. Indicating that the ns might have already fallen out with each other to some extent and begun to split the resources earned through the city unevenly.


    With this in mind, he didn''t waste any time, as he quickly investigated the situation of the younger generation of the three ns. Not taking long to find out that there was indeed a clear hostility between the Xue n''s younger generation and that of the other two ns.


    The only real difference from what he had been expecting to see was the fact that the younger generation of the other two ns didn''t seem to be any stronger than those from the Xue n. On the other hand, it seemed like the younger generation of the Xue n was stronger. Indicating that the Xue n itself should still have ess to simr- if not more resources than the other two ns.


    Is it perhaps because the ancestor of the Xue n is the strongest among the Dao Seed Realm cultivators? The other two don''t dare to do anything even when the other party is close to death. Intending to wait to avoid a possible fight?


    Thinking about this to himself as he looked over in the direction of the Xue n Estate in the distance, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit more interested in the strength of the Xue n Ancestor.


    After all, from what he had managed to learn so far about the Xue n, it was clear that their ancestor was someone far stronger than a normal Dao Seed Realm cultivator. Possibly even someone who had reached the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm or in other words, the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm.


    Unfortunately, he had not tried to discern the strength of the Dao Seed Realm cultivators when their divine sense had swept over him earlier on. Having focused his full attention on keeping his strength hidden in case the people inside of the city had been someone from a major power that could possibly contact someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Though confident in being able to evade someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm with his currentprehension of the Dao of Space, he didn''t n on revealing himself without any reason. Especially so considering that he was still extremely close to the Northern Central Region and had no idea if there was anyone from the Blue Sea Empire or other major powers from the Northern Central Region hidden inside of the city.


    No¡­ Considering how this was essentially the first city one would encounter going from the Northern Central Region to the Eastern Central Region and there was a constant flow of people, it would be impossible for there to not be anyone from any of the major power of the Northern Central Region present inside of the city¡­


    Smiling a bit wryly as he thought about this, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit helpless. If he wanted to avoid the possibility of his identity as someone from the Star Shattering Sect being discovered, it would be best for him to at least wait until he left the borders of the Eastern Central Region before he did anything that might attract attention.


    The main problem was that if he wanted to convince the Xue n, he would have to disy some level of strength, but doing so would almost certainly end up attracting the attention of the two other ns, which in turn might cause a situation that could draw even more attention.


    Continuing to think about the current situation and how troublesome it might be to recruit the Xue n to be part of the Star Shattering Set, Xuan Hao could not help feeling that it might not be worth the effort. After all, he was still not even sure if he wanted to recruit the Xue n to join the Star Shattering Sect, as he had not really managed to examine more than the younger generation of the n.


    Speaking of the younger generation of the Xue n, Xuan Hao didn''t feel too optimistic about them, as they were acting in the typical arrogant manner one would associate with a n that had been on the top of the pyramid for a long time.


    Thinking about the future of such a n, Xuan Hao could already imagine what would happen to them when their sole backing disappeared¡­


    The only thing that kept him somewhat optimistic about the Xue n was the fact that their older generation at the very least seemedpetent considering that they had managed to still keep control of the majority of resources in the city, while also training their younger generation to the point where they stood above the younger generation of the two other ns.


    If the older generation had also beencking, he would have long since given up any hope of any thoughts regarding recruiting the Xue n.


    For this reason, Xuan Hao soon found himself standing back in front of the entrance leading into the Xue n Estate. nning to enter the estate to find their ancestor and decide after meeting the other party and potentially getting a better understanding of the Xue n in the process.


    "Get out of the way! How dare you block this young master!"


    However, just as he was about to step forward and enter the Xue n Estate, an arrogant voice called out from behind him, as a handsome looking young man arrogantly swaggered in his direction with arge number of servants and guards following closely behind him.


    The words in question weren''t directed towards him so to speak. Instead, just being directed towards the crowd of people moving around on the street outside the Xue n Estate, who all fearfully moved aside upon hearing the young master of the Xue n.


    But¡­


    Even then¡­


    Xuan Hao instantly decided against visiting the Xue n. Instead, he decided that it might be a good idea to check out the other two ns before making any rash decisions on who to visit first, as he had a feeling he would only be able to meet with one of the three Dao Seed Realm cultivators before being noticed by the other two.

 Chapter 1518 Unfortunate Young Master from the Xue Clan

    Chapter 1518 Unfortunate Young Master from the Xue n


    Watching as the young master of the Xue n got closer, Xuan Hao casually waved his hand, causing a tiny spatial distortion to appear in front of the young master. Lasting for a period of time that was impossible for any of the people present to notice-


    "Ah?!"


    Thump!


    Resulting in the young master from the Xue n suddenly finding himself in an intimate moment with the stone pavement without knowing how someone with his cultivation realm could even trip and fall in the first ce.


    """¡­""" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Outside of him, the guards, servants and people who had been fearfully moving to the side a second earlier reacted with simr disbelief. None of them understood what had just happened and how it was even possible.


    After all, the young master was a genius that had already managed to reach the Nascent Soul Realm at a young age.


    With such a cultivation, it should not have been possible for him to tip like that. Not to mention, he still had arge number of both servants and guards following behind him. All of whom should have been able to jump in and save their master from his current situation.


    Unfortunately, even if some of the servants and guards had seen what wasing before it happened, they didn''t really seem to have the best impression of this young master either, as they chose to ignore.


    Of course, there is also the fact that they feared that they might end up being punished instead of rewarded if they had gone in to save their master from tipping and falling.


    All of them having served this young master for a long time understood very well what kind of temperament he had and how he might react to being saved by his servants from tripping and falling¡­


    "Hahahaha! I never expected to see the Xue n''s young master like this! Hahaha!"


    "Indeed, brother Xue, do you need a hand getting up or do you prefer being left alone in your intimate moment? Hahaha!"


    "YOU! YOU TWO-!"


    As the young master of the Xue n remained motionless on the ground without getting up immediately due to the sheer disbelief of what had just happened to him, two voices calling out from the crowd of people that had started to form seemed to almost instantly revitalize him.


    "Haha, what are you angry about? It''s not our fault that you tripped over yourself."


    "Hehe, indeed, we had nothing to do with it! Even if we had, what can you do about it? Are you going to attack us? Careful you don''t trip again on your way over here."


    "BOTH OF YOU WILL DIE!"


    As the two taunting voices continued, the young master of the Xue n flew forward filled with killing intent-


    Thump!


    Bang!


    Only to end up tripping for a second time. Only this time around, he smashed far harder into the groundpared to before, as the stones pavement cracked apart.


    Even with the strength of someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, the young master of the Xue n was simply ovee with both anger and humiliation at this point in time, as he slowly raised his head from the ground. Only to see the two who hadughed at him earlierughing even harder than before while pointing towards.


    At the same time, he also noticed his servants and guards looking away, while the people from the city who had gathered to see what was happening were all looking towards him, filled with not just shock, but alsoughter, as they did their best to stop themselves fromughing. Knowing very well that they were not like the other young masterughing and they would end up dead if they did so.


    Ptsh-!


    Unable to deal with this kind of situation that he had never found himself in before, the young master of the Xue family ultimately coughed up arge amount of blood on the spot out of humiliation before fainting in front of the shocked guards and servants, who were still paralyzed. Not understanding how any of this was happening.


    Not to mention tripping twice in a row and making intimate contact with pavement, but to even throw up blood out of humiliation and faint on the spot. No one present had expected anything like that to happen to someone who had reached the Nascent Soul Realm.


    "Young master! Quick! Get him inside!" Only recovering and realizing what had just happened when the young master of the Xue n hit the ground for the third time in a row, this time covered in blood, one of the guards quickly called out in a somewhat panicked tone, as the rest of the people from the Xue n rapidly rushed forward and carried their young master inside the estate before their master ended up suffering even more than he already had-


    Whoosh~


    "Huh?"


    However, as the group were just about to disappear inside the estate, the guard carrying the young master suddenly tripped. Falling rapidly towards the ground.


    However, given that he was someone in the Domain Lord Realm, he quickly managed to correct himself and stop before he ended up falling and humiliating himself like his young master had done-


    Swish~ Bang!


    Unfortunately, in the process of preventing himself from falling to the ground, he ended up letting go of the young master he was carrying, as he ended up smashing into the pavement for a fourth time.


    Covering the stone pavement in even more blood, as the rest of the guards and servants quickly rushed over and dragged their master inside the estate before finally disappearing from view.


    Leaving the crowd outside to look in awe, as they had no idea how to respond to what had just happened, as it seemed like the heavens themselves were out to punish the young master of the Xue n. Completely unaware of the fact that the reason for the unfortunate fate of the young master was because he happened to be a bit too arrogant in front of the wrong person.


    After all, with his strength in the Nascent Soul Realm, there was no way he would end up tripping so many times in a row. Even a single time was unnatural, let alone two followed by a third with the Domain Lord Realm cultivator that had been carrying him.


    As for the thing about throwing up blood out of humiliation and shame? That was just him adding a little bit of force to his chest bypressing the space around it a bit.


    Without someone in the Dao Seed Realm directly using their divine sense to observe the situation, no one would realize what had actually ended up happening to the young master of the Xue n. Instead, the clumsy young master tripping and falling before fainting from anger and humiliation would be all the people present would remember.


    Nobody worried too much about the safety of the young master, as no one believed that he would end up dying from coughing up a bit of blood as someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, but then again¡­ The young master of the Xue n had really surprised everyone today. Maybe he would end up surprising everyone again by being the first Nascent Soul Realm cultivator to die from humiliation?


    This should be enough to teach that arrogant child a lesson¡­ Now, those twoughing at him earlier should be from the Qin and Zhang n, the remaining two ns in control of this city.


    Narrowing both of his eyes as he thought about this, while his attention turned away from the Xue n Estate and instead focused on the two young masters stillughing together after what they had just witnessed, Xuan Hao began to examine both of them on the spot.


    Different from the arrogant young master of the Xue n, it was clear that these two young masters were of far better character.


    The fact that both of them seemed to be close together like a pair of brothers indicated that the rtionship between the two other ns, the Qing and Zhang n, should be rather friendly.


    Although¡­ The friendly rtionship between the two ns might just be because their elders were currently working together to prepare for the time when the Ancestor of the Xue n passed away and they would have a chance to split the city between the two of them, the rtionship between the younger generation of these two ns at least seemed to be genuine.


    "Maybe I should try and see if I can recruit both the Qing and Zhang n at the same time¡­? Even if the Xue n is stronger, strength doesn''t really matter when ites to the main sect quest, two weaker Dao Seed Realm cultivators are better than one strong Dao Seed Realm cultivator¡­" muttering this to himself as he looked towards the two young masters of the Qing and Zhang n, Xuan Hao''s eyes shone for a brief moment as he officially decided to switch his recruitment target from the Xue n towards the Zhang and Qing n

 Chapter 1519 Zhang Clan

    Chapter 1519 Zhang n


    Deciding that he was going to try and recruit the Qing and Zhang n instead of the Xue n, Xuan Hao left therge street in front of the entrance to the Xue n estate just in time to witness a Soul Ascension Realm Elder from the Xue n emerge to disperse the crowd of people that had gathered following themotion caused by the n''s young master.


    Of course, this was not the only reason for this elder''s appearance, as he had also shown up to try and figure out if what had happened to their young master was the doing of someone from the Qing or Zhang n. After all, it was difficult to believe that someone in the Nascent Soul Realm would simply trip and fall to the ground several times in a row.


    Unfortunately, no matter how hard he looked for any culprits, he was bound to end up with nothing, as there was no way someone in the Soul Ascension Realm could notice the subtle spatial fluctuations. Even someone in the Dao Seed Realm would find it close to impossible to notice unless they hadprehended the Dao of Space¡­ And that would only be the case for the next few seconds, as any traces would soon disappear when the space stabilized again.


    In the end, the elder from the Xue n could only let go of his suspicions as he returned to the Xue n Estate. Concluding that the young master had really ended up tripping by himself without any outside interference.


    After all, that was something far more believable than someone having deliberately done so while also managing to avoid leaving any traces behind for him to detect.


    Even if it had been someone in the Dao Seed Realm, he should have been able to detect possible traces. Meaning that it would have had to have been someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm taking action to trip their young master, but¡­ That was something far less believablepared to the young master just tripping on his own a few times in a row.


    After all, if their young master really offended someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, it was far more likely that he would end up dead instead of just tripping and falling considering that someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm wouldn''t care much about the Xue n or the ancestor.


    In turn, as the young master recovered from what happened, he ended up secluding himself inside his room without daring to take a single step outside until he reached the Domain Lord Realm where he would be able to use his domain to fly and avoid any possibility of tripping ever again¡­


    Unaware of any of this and the trauma he ended up causing for the young master of the Xue n, Xuan Hao arrived in front of the entrance of the Zhang n. Having decided on first visiting this n due to the fact that the younger generation of the Zhang n seemed far calmer and more refinedpared to the other two ns.


    Unaware of any of this and the trauma he ended up causing for the young master of the Xue n, Xuan Hao arrived in front of the entrance of the Zhang n. Having decided on first visiting this n due to the fact that the younger generation of the Zhang n seemed far calmer and more refinedpared to the other two ns.


    Another reason was that although the Qing n was weaker, it wasn''t that much different from the Xue n upon further investigation. Making him feel that the Zhang n might end up being the only n that would end up suitable for recruitment inside of the city.


    Not that any of this really affected him so to speak, as even a single n joining the Star Shattering Sect would be a tremendous boon to the Star Shattering Sect given that even the weakest of the three ns, the Zhang n, had at least seven people in the Soul Ascension Realm together with their Dao Seed Realm ancestor.


    Walking up towards the entrance to the Zhang n''s estate, it didn''t take long before the two people guarding the entrance noticed him walking over.


    "Stop! This is the Zhang n Territory!"


    Unsurprisingly, one of the two called out to him before stepping forward to meet him before he got too close to the estate. Showing that the guards were well trained and understanding him getting too close to the entrance might present an opportunity for him to force his way inside if he had bad intentions.


    At the same time, the guard calling out also alerted the Soul Ascension Realm Elder who was secretly guarding the entrance to the estate. Ensuring that even if Xuan Hao managed to rush past the two of them, there would still be someone present to stop him before he managed to enter the estate.


    Of course, all of these precautions were useless against Xuan Hao considering his current strength that wasparable to the Late Stage of the Dao Seed Realm. Not to mention hisprehension of the Dao of Space that would enable him to easily bypass the formation guarding the Zhang n.


    However, given that his intentions for showing up were not hostile and he was nning on recruiting the Zhang n to join the Star Shattering Sect, he calmly walked up and met the approaching guard with a slight smile on his face. Indicating that he did note with hostile intentions. n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "Sir, this is the Zhang n''s Estate, may I ask what reason you have foring here?" Seeing that Xuan Hao didn''t seem to have any hostile intentions and calmly came forward to meet him, the guard calmed down a bit before asking this. Understanding that he might have some reason foring to the estate.


    "I havee with a proposal for the Zhang n and want to meet with your ancestor" Still smiling with a kind expression on his face, Xuan Hao directly stated his intentions for a conversation with the ancestor of the Zhang n-


    "The one hidden over there should be more than happy to go and inform your ancestor about this little request of mine."


    However, before the guard could say anything, he directly pointed out the elder in the Soul Ascension Realm hidden not too far away. Showing that his cultivation was far greater than the Domain Lord Realm cultivation base he showed outwardly.


    "This-!"


    Realizing that the person in front of him was not someone that he could deal with, the guard nervously turned around to nce in the direction of his senior. Hoping for guidance.


    However, what the guard didn''t know was that in the brief moment Xuan Hao had nced over towards the hidden elder; he had deliberately leaked a bit of his strength, causing the elder of the Zhang n to shiver all over. Understanding that this person was not someone he could deal with.


    "Wait here, I will inform the ancestor of the situation first and let him decide."


    For this reason, the guard could only watch in shock as the elder he had learnt to rely on disappeared. Leaving him alone with Xuan Hao, a terrifying being who was above him in strength.


    The only thing that allowed him to stay somewhat calm in this kind of situation was the fact that Xuan Hao didn''t seem to have any hostile intentions towards the Zhang n and the fact that the ancestor was still around.


    Even if Xuan Hao was someone powerful in the Soul Ascension Realm, he believed that the ancestor should be more than strong enough to handle him, as he was one of the few who had a chance to personally watch their ancestor fighting in the past.


    In turn, seeing the fearful guard barely keeping himself together as he tried his best to present himself as someone calm without the slightest bit of worry, Xuan Hao could not help silently chuckling to himself as he looked off in the direction that the Soul Ascension Realm elder had disappeared in. Feeling curious about the ancestor of the Zhang n and how he would react to his little meeting request.


    At first, he had nned to just directly use his Dao of Space to enter the Zhang n Estate and meet the ancestor of the Zhang n while also demonstrating his strength in the process, but upon second thought, he felt that it would be better to request a meeting.


    The main reason being that going through the first path that would undoubtedly demonstrate his strength, he would also end up revealing his presence to the other two Dao Seed Realm cultivators in the city.


    Given that he wanted to try and also recruit the Qing n if possible after the Zhang n, he decided on taking things slower and just requested a meeting.


    Of course, to ensure that he didn''t end up being ignored, he revealed a bit of strength to the people guarding the entrance. Ensuring that the ancestor of the Zhang n would end up learning about his presence¡­


    "Senior, please follow me, the ancestor will meet you."


    And only a few minutester, the elder who had hurried off to inform the ancestor returned with a respectful expression on his face while signaling for him to follow.

 Chapter 1520 Zhang Clan Ancestor

    Chapter 1520 Zhang n Ancestor


    A short time before the Soul Ascension Realm Elder returned to Xuan Hao to take him inside of the Zhang n Estate, the elder had arrived inside the deepest part of the Zhang n Estate to meet the elder and inform him about what had taken ce outside.


    "Someone unknown that even made you feel fear appeared and is asking for a meeting with me?"


    "Yes, I don''t know who this and have no idea about which power they might be from. At least from what I know about the different major powers close to our n, he doesn''t seem to look like any of their powerful people.


    Of course, there is still a chance that he is someone who hasn''t shown himself before or possibly used some kind of disguise technique that I''m unable to see through¡­"


    "I understand¡­ Go back and guide him here, I will personally meet this person and find out what he wants."


    "Yes!"


    Whoosh~!


    Following the rtively short conversation that onlysted a few minutesing to an end, the old ancestor of the Zhang n could not help showing a thoughtful expression on his old face as he watched the elder disappear in the same direction, he hade from to get the stranger who had shown up to request a meeting with him out of the blue.


    Although he had spent most of his life taking care of the Zhang n and helped it develop to its current state, it didn''t mean that he had no enemies throughout the Eastern Central Region. On the contrary, he had quite a few enemies, though that was nothing out of the ordinary for someone who grew up in the chaotic Eastern Central Region that was filled withbat all year round.


    In a way, the reason why he had decided on establishing a n and reign over a city in a somewhat deserted part of the Eastern Central Region even though his cultivation would allow him to take control of a far more prosperous area, was because the somewhat deserted location of the city was a rare peaceful part of the Eastern Central Region.


    Of course, one of the main reasons why the city had managed to remain peaceful for such a long time was because the ancestors of the Xue and Qing n had worked together with him when they first established the city as a ce for them to settle down and retire without having to worry about the constant fighting of the Eastern Central Region.


    Unfortunately, this peaceful environment that hadsted for thousands of years would soon be torn apart, as the Ancestor of the Xue n was about to reach the end of his lifespan.


    Although he wanted to continue this peace after the death of this old friend, he understood that the ancestor of the Qing n didn''t see things the same way he did and would undoubtedly try to cease the opportunity to take control of all the resources inside of the city.


    Given that the other party was stronger than him, this would likely also mean that his Zhang n would be targeted and end up either destroyed or forced to run away from the city, neither of which were an oue he wanted to see happen.


    "All three of us are already close to the end of our life, yet one has given up and is preparing for death, while another is intent on doing everything in his power to reach the Celestial Immortal Realm before his lifespan runs out¡­" Muttering this to himself as he gazed off into the distance with a sad expression on his face, the old ancestor of the Zhang n seemed to have aged another dozen years as he closed both his eyes and waited for the stranger to show up.


    ¡­


    This is the ancestor of the Zhang n¡­?


    Arriving inside the ancestral hall at the core of the Zhang n Estate where the ancestor of the n meditated, Xuan Hao could not help showing a somewhat surprised expression on his face upon seeing the ancestor of the Zhang n himself.


    Pale white sickly skin that looked like that of an elderly gentleman that could pass away from a slight breeze and an overall emaciated appearance that made Xuan Hao wonder whether or not the other party had passed away during the short time it had taken the elder in the Soul Ascension Realm to guide him inside. If not for the fact that he could clearly feel the terrifying power belonging to someone in the Dao Seed Realm from the old man, he would have really thought he might be dead¡­


    "Ancestor, this is the person who requested a meeting."


    Unaware of Xuan Hao''s thoughts, the elder in the Soul Ascension Realm respectfully called out to the old ancestor before taking a step back to leave the ancestral hall after having finished his task. Not daring to stay behind for too long as he was still the person in charge of watching the entrance of the Zhang n Estate.


    Not to mention, with the ancestor around, he didn''t believe that Xuan Hao could cause any kind of problem for the n. Believing that no matter how strong Xuan Hao might be, the ancestor would still be able to deal with him.


    At the same time that the elder in the Soul Ascension Realm disappeared, the old ancestor of the Zhang n slowly opened his eyes with a calm expression on his face.


    However, as the ancestor began to examine him, he could clearly see that the calm expression changed into one of confusion.


    The reason for this was rather simple, as it was impossible for the ancestor to determine his true cultivation base and strength.


    From the outside, he looked like he was just someone in the Domain Lord Realm, but as the he wasn''t deliberately hiding his strength at the moment, the ancestor of the Zhang n also noticed the unique presence of someone in the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm¡­ And given that there was essentially no knowledge left of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he had no idea how to determine his cultivation.


    Even with this, he could still tell that Xuan Hao was far stronger than him.


    Not just the difference between someone in the Earlier Stage of the Earth Immortal Realm and someone at the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm, but far stronger. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    Celestial Immortal¡­ Is he perhaps someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm?!


    For this reason, the ancestor of the Zhang n could only conclude that the person in front of him was someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    But¡­ the realization that the person standing in front of him was someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm only made him more confused, as he had absolutely no idea why someone like that woulde to him and seek a meeting.


    Even if he was someone in the Dao Seed Realm and a rather senior Dao Seed Realm cultivator at that, it was far from enough to earn this level of attention from someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm. Especially so considering that this was the Eastern Central Region constantly engulfed in wars that even Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators couldn''t avoid being dragged into.


    To be honest, he wouldn''t have been surprised if the other party had simply forced his way inside of his estate¡­


    "Senior¡­ I wonder what this junior can help with? As far as I know, my Zhang n shouldn''t have anything worth your esteemed self''s attention¡­"


    Because of this reason, the old ancestor of the Zhang n slightly lowered his head with a respectful expression on his face before saying this.


    Given that this senior had been kind enough to show him this level of respect, there was no way he intended to ruin things and possibly anger this senior figure in the Celestial Immortal Realm. Helping him out with whatever he hade to ask for in such a kind manner was obvious!


    "¡­"


    This sudden respectful behavior and being called senior by someone who is obviously far older than him by tens of thousands of years, caught Xuan Hao off guard, as he had not expected this kind of reaction after being left alone with the old ancestor of the Zhang n.


    Although it was clear from a nce that the other party should have mistaken him for someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, it was still a bewildering sight to see someone in the Dao Seed Realm act in such a subservient manner.


    However, what Xuan Hao didn''t know was that the Eastern Central Region was far more brutal than any of the other three regions, with the constant warfare killing off most before they ever got close to the end of their lifespan. Even those in the Celestial Immortal Realm were not exempt from this, as the Eastern Central Region was the only region where one could hear about a Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator dying before the attack of the demonic cultivators.


    For someone to have lived to the age of the old ancestor of the Zhang n in such a ce, it was obvious that he understood when to retreat and when to advance¡­

 Chapter 1521 Simple Recruitment~

    Chapter 1521 Simple Recruitment~


    "No need to bow like this, I''m not here for what you might think." Seeing the still lowered head of the ancestor of the Zhang n, Xuan Hao quickly stepped forward and had him lift his head. Not wanting to leave a bad impression on someone who could potentially be part of the sect in the future.


    "Not here for what I might think¡­?" Hearing what Xuan Hao said, the ancestor from the Zhang n could not help raising his head again with a still rather confused expression on his face.


    After he found out about Xuan Hao''s strength far surpassing his own to the point where he believed him to be someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, his first thought was that either something precious had appeared in the vicinity of the city and he wanted help finding it or he wanted to find someone and wanted to make use of his n to search.


    Outside of that, he couldn''t really think of any other reason someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm would show up.


    Well¡­ There was the reason that he might be here for revenge or something along that line, but if that was the case, he highly doubted that the other party would have bothered being polite with him. After all, he was only someone in the Earth Immortal Realm (Dao Seed Realm), while the person in front of him was very likely a Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator.


    However, now that Xuan Hao directly told him that it wasn''t the reason he was thinking about, he was forced to rethink the reason why he might be here- N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Did the senior take an interest in one of the juniors and want to take them as a disciple? No¡­ The younger generation shouldn''t be talented enough to catch the interest of someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, but then what is it? M-maybe he took an interest in that kind of way...?


    And in the end, he ended up going in a rather strange direction that would almost certainly end up ruining any positive thoughts Xuan Hao had about the Zhang n at the moment¡­


    "The reason I''m here is because I''m interested in the Zhao n itself. More precisely, I want to recruit the Zhao n." Feeling the somewhat weird gaze that the old ancestor was starting to give him, Xuan Hao could not help interrupting whatever strange thought might be going through the old man''s head at the moment. At the same time also informing him about his intentions for showing up. Not nning on wasting any time on small talk.


    "Recruit the Zhao n? Wh-what do you mean¡­?" Showing a bit of a fearful expression after hearing what he said, the old man from the Zhao n was obviously thinking that he was talking about taking over the territory of the Zhao n and subjugating it in the process. The standard way of ''recruiting'' people in the Eastern Central Region.


    "What do I mean¡­? I''m interested in your Zhao n and want to have your entire n join my sect. Of course, before that, I wanted to ask you as the ancestor of the Zhao n about this and see if it''s possible. Ah, I already got a good look of your n a few seconds ago when I looked through the estate with my divine sense. Hope you don''t mind."


    "Huh? Join¡­ Sect? Possible? Already looked through the estate¡­?"


    "Yes, I already have a good understanding of your n- Ah! Almost forgot, you still don''t know anything about me or the sect I''m trying to get you to join¡­


    Allow me to formally introduce myself, I''m Xuan Hao, an ancestor of the Star Shattering Sect. The Star Shattering Sect is not a sect from the Eastern Central Region, but a sect in the Northern Central Region, or, in fact, just the Northen Region."


    "Star Shattering Sect¡­ I think I heard about it somewhere before- AH! The ancient hidden sect that emerged recently!" Hearing what Xuan Hao said and realizing where he was from, the old ancestor of the Zhang n could not help eximing loudly in surprise. Not having expected that the person standing before him to actually be someone from an ancient hidden sect.


    Even more surprising was the fact that this person had directly asked him and his n if they were willing to join said hidden sect.


    If not for the fact that Xuan Hao''s current cultivation was above his own, he would have thought it might have been someone who wanted to try and fool him or lure him into some kind of trap.


    However, even with this, he still couldn''t understand why an ancient hidden sect would want to recruit his n.


    After all, he knew very well that in front of an ancient hidden sect, his n was nothing.


    Not to mention an ancient hidden sect, even in front of a normal major power, his n wasn''t really considered that powerful and the only thing that might catch the attention of a major power when it came to his n was himself.


    But¡­ If Xuan Hao was just interested in him, he wouldn''t have mentioned recruiting his entire n.


    No matter how he thought about it, the ancestor of the Zhang n simply couldn''t understand why an ancient hidden sect would want to recruit his n.


    However, given the status of an ancient hidden sect and the fact that he himself wanted to ensure the safety of his n in the future after he passed away, he was more than willing to join the Star Shattering Sect. Especially given that the danger posed by the demonic cultivators was slowly creeping closer to the part of the Eastern Central Region where his n was based.


    Because of this, it did not end up taking much convincing for Xuan Hao to get the Zhao n Ancestor to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    Of course, given the distance between the Star Shattering Sect and the Zhang n, it was not realistic to move the entire Zhang n to the Star Shattering Sect for now. Especially considering that the Zhang n would have to prepare if they wanted to take the foundation, they had established over the past thousands of years along with them- or at the very least what could be taken along with them


    For this reason, Xuan Hao and the Zhang n Ancestor decided that the Zhang n would just slowly move towards the Star Shattering Sect for now. The main focus being on the younger generation of the Zhang n, as they would be the ones benefiting the most from being a part of an ancient hidden sect in the eyes of the old ancestor.


    The process would take a few years toplete, but it would allow the Zhang n toplete the move safely, while also taking their foundation along with them.


    At the same time, it would also allow the Zhang n Ancestor to confirm Xuan Hao''s words and ensure that there was nothing wrong with anything he said in this time spent moving the Zhang n.


    As for the reason why a ''small n'' like the Zhang n would be recruited to be part of the Star Shattering Sect? Xuan Hao simply told him that the sect needed some people to manage things outside of the sect now that they had started to expand their influence and revealed themselves to the rest of the continent.


    Although this wasn''t considered normal for an ancient hidden sect, it wasn''t too weird for an ancient hidden sect to randomly absorb a power to help them manage the situation outside of their sect for them.


    For this reason, the Zhang n Ancestor was easily convinced and wholeheartedly believed that the Star Shattering Sect was an ancient hidden sect.


    Of course, during the entire process, Xuan Hao never mentioned anything about the Star Shattering Sect being an ancient hidden sect and instead just allowed the old man to make up things on his own.


    At the end of the day, Xuan Hao managed to aplish what he wanted and after acknowledging the Zhang n as a part of the Star Shattering Sect, he immediately saw a change in main sect quest.


    [Main Sect Quest: First Steps towards Bing a Major Power (I)] [Description: The sect has entered a state of rapid growth and is about to finally step onto the main stage of the Ewaria Continent. Help the sect reach the requirements to be a major power on the Ewaria Continent.] [Core Formation Realm Disciples: 3239/10.000] [Nascent Soul Realm Disciples: 21/100] [Domain Lord Realm Disciples: 5/10] [Soul Ascension Realm Elders: 8/100] [Dao Seed Realm Elders: 2/10] [Profound Immortal Realm Ancestor: 0/1] [Reward: World Stone (Immortal), Chaotic Qi Formation Upgrade, ???] [Note: Does not count host as part of the requirements] Not only did the number of Core Formation Realm and Nascent Soul Realm Disciples increase. Showing just how strong the foundation of Zhang n was in the process, but the number of Soul Ascension Realm Elders also increased.


    From the looks of it, the Soul Ascension Realm Elders of the Zhang n were already considered elders when they became a part of the sect, thus counting towards the progress of the main sect quest.


    The Dao Seed Realm Elder increasing was simply because he directly gave the old ancestor the title of an elder when he agreed to join the sect.


    Now, with the Zhang n already part of the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao turned his attention towards the Qing n not too far away. Hoping that he could recruit them to be a part of the sect as well¡­

 Chapter 1522 Simple Recruitment~ (2)

    Chapter 1522 Simple Recruitment~ (2)


    As he had managed to sessfully recruit the Zhang n to join the Star Shattering Sect and had already nned on how to integrate them into the sect, Xuan Hao was suddenly hit by the realization that it might not be the best idea for him to have arge and rtively strong faction like the Zhang n join the Star Shattering Sect.


    Not only did it create the possibility for factions and power struggles to start appearing inside of the sect, but it might also result in the current image of the Star Shattering Sect as an ancient hidden sect disappearing when they saw the strength of the current sect elders.


    In short, having the Zhang n join the Star Shattering Sect could be considered selling the future of the sect toplete his main sect quest a little faster.


    With that in mind, he had already voiced that the Zhang n would be handling things outside of the sect and the only ones from the Zhang n that would truly enter the main sect would be their younger generation, which could be considered eptable, as they would have no way to properly assess the strength of the Star Shattering Sect with their low cultivation base.


    On the other hand, because of their low cultivation base, it might end up with them believing that the Star Shattering Sect was far stronger than it actually was, as the current younger generation of the Star Shattering Sect was nothing to scoff at, with nock of Core Formation Realm and Nascent Soul Realm disciples. Even having his own disciples at the Domain Lord Realm there to give the image of a much more powerful sect.


    Of course, there was also the excellent cultivation environment on the Shattered Star Peaks and the information on cultivation that should far surpass the Zhang n itself, as it seemed like knowledge of the Dao Seed Realm, Dao Domain Lord Realm and Profound Immortal Realm wasn''t something that was normally avable across the continent.


    In another way, the sect could also make use of its information on the Dao Seed Realm and Profound Immortal Realm to keep the elders of the Zhang n from growing suspicious in the future as they were not allowed entry into the main sect.


    As long as the Star Shattering Sect could provide cultivation resources and help them with insights into higher cultivation realms, it should not be a problem for the Zhang n Ancestor and the elders of his n to remain outside of the main sect and help manage the territory of the sect for a few years until the elders in the sect became strong enough to the point where them entering the main sect wouldn''t make any difference.


    But¡­ Dealing with the Zhang n and ensuring that it wouldn''t end up causing any future problems for the Star Shattering Sect was one thing. Adding the Qing n to the mix would be apletely different matter altogether¡­


    Thinking about it, Xuan Hao realized that the current Star Shattering Sect would not be able to take anotherrge power like the Qing n under its wing. In a sense, even taking on the Zhang n was a bit too much and would be stretching the current Star Shattering Sect to its limits.


    Not so much because the sect wascking the resources to provide for the Zhang n, but more so because there was ack of higher level cultivators among the elders of the Star Shattering Sect. Resulting in a limited number of people who could interact with the elders of the Zhang n without giving away the fact that the current Star Shattering Sect was far weaker than what they might be thinking.


    Because of this, Xuan Hao could only reluctantly give up on adding the Qing n to the Star Shattering Sect as well.


    From the looks of things, he would most likely have to focus on recruiting wandering cultivators in the future, as the problems they might end up causing for the sect would be far more manageablepared to absorbing an entire n.


    "With that in mind, I should take a look and see if there is any wandering cultivators in the Soul Ascension Realm currently inside of the city before I take my leave." Muttering this to himself as he reluctantly nced in the direction of the Qing n, Xuan Hao closed his eyes for a brief moment as his divine sense spread out around him and began to thoroughly search through the entire city.


    Of course, given that he didn''t bother trying to hide his divine sense, it was almost immediately discovered by the two other Dao Seed Realm cultivators in the city.


    Unfortunately for them, the moment they made contact with his divine sense to try and figure out who it was that was daring enough to directly sweep through the entire city and essentiallyy bare any secrets they might have hidden inside of their estates, they were met with the reality of trying to resist a divine sense that was in no way weaker than someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm-


    "Aaah!? C-Celestial Immortal Rm!?"


    "Nooo¡­!" n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    And soon enough the despairing screams of the ancestor of both the Qing and Xue n''s painful and surprised voices echoed throughout the city, as their divine sense was directly crushed the moment they tried to resist his divine sense.


    The only lucky thing for them was that the damage to their divine sense wouldn''t be permanent and could be recovered in a few years.


    If Xuan Hao had been someone different, he might have just directly killed them for daring to try and fight him. Especially so considering that the strength of his divine sense was rather obvious if those two hadn''t acted so recklessly when trying to block it from invading their estates¡­


    Then again, all of this could have been avoided, but Xuan Hao was also full intend on showing his strength to the Zhang n Ancestor before he left so he wouldn''t try anything funny. At the same time also subtly confirming whatever thoughts he might have had about him being someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    After all, on the current continent, the only ones capable of easily suppressing and injuring someone in the Dao Seed Realm like he had just done was someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm¡­


    Ignoring the chaos that started to sweep through the city as what had just happened started to set in, Xuan Hao went over the information he had managed to gather from using his divine sense to directly scan the entire city just now.


    First of all, both the Xue and Qing n were far stronger than he had first expected, as they not only had close to double the number of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators that the Zhang n had, but their Dao Seed Realm cultivators were also stronger than the Zhang n Ancestor, both of them having reached the Peak of the Earth Immortal Realm, the Half Bloom Stage or what could be considered the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm.


    In no way were they weak, but at the same time, Xuan Hao also understood that neither of the two could be absorbed by the current Star Shattering Sect, as they were too strong for the sect to fully absorb and manage.


    Even the Zhang n is too much, but it could be managed by only absorbing the younger generation and training them for now, while the elders of the Zhang n would be put in charge of the sect''s external territory. Avoiding them bing aware of the current strength of the sect''s elders.


    Shaking his head as he thought about this, Xuan Hao instead focused his attention on the rest of the cultivators currently present in the city, not part of any of the three ns.


    First of all, the Explorer Union branch in the city did have Soul Ascension Realm cultivators present guarding it, but the wandering cultivators throughout the city were at most in the Domain Lord Realm, with the strongest among them being someone at the Ninth Stage of the Domain Lord Realm that looked like he was about to prepare for his first tribtion.


    Going after someone close to reaching the Soul Ascension Realm could be considered an option, but after inspecting that cultivator more closely and finding out that he had some rather troublesome hobbies, Xuan Hao quickly gave up on recruiting him to join the sect.


    From the looks of things, outside of the Zhang n, there wasn''t really anyone else that was qualified for him to step forward and recruit them to join the sect-


    Whoosh~!


    So, with everything sorted regarding the Zhang n and their slow migration to the territory of the Star Shattering Sect over the next few years, Xuan Hao left the city and began moving deeper into the Eastern Central Region. Intending to go to some of the more popted parts of the regions where wandering cultivators tended to gather in search of opportunities or precious cultivation resources.

 Chapter 1523 Dragon Tooth Mountain

    Chapter 1523 Dragon Tooth Mountain


    Leaving the city at the border between the Eastern Central Region and the Northern Central Region, it didn''t take long before he ended up encountering more and more settlements upied by different small ns and families. All of them, far smaller than the one close to the border, with the average cultivation base of the ones in charge ranging between the Earlier Stages of the Domain Lord Realm to the Later Stages of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    Not one of them being guarded by someone in the Dao Seed Realm, let alone a wandering cultivator in the Dao Seed Realm being present. If anything, it was difficult to even encounter a single wandering cultivator at the Domain Lord Realm not affiliated inside these smaller cities and settlements. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    All of this without even mentioning the fact that the state of these smaller powers being far more chaoticpared to the city ruled by the Zhang, Qing and Xue n.


    Although he had heard about the Eastern Central Region being a chaotic ce filled with constant wars, it was only now that he realized just how urate this kind of description was. Especially so considering that he had ended up suffering a few attacks himself whenever he went to take a look around some of the small cities or other settlements he encountered along the way.


    All things considered, he didn''t really mind this kind of chaotic environment, as it did allow him to more easily recruit elders for the sect by taking advantage of the chaotic situation throughout the Eastern Central Region. Providing a safe ce to cultivate through bing an elder of his sect.


    The main problem he encountered so far when it came to recruiting new elders being that the ones he had encountered so far were too weak to even be considered potential elders, though¡­ That should be something that would be solved after he reached one of the more popted parts of the Eastern Central Region where stronger cultivators congregated around areas where it was easier to get their hands on cultivation resources.


    Among the dozen or so locations like that throughout the Eastern Central Region that he had specifically learnt about during his journey and in the short time he had decided to learn more about the Eastern Central Region before entering it himself, the one he was currently heading towards was a ce called the Dragon Tooth Mountain.


    From what he had managed to learn about the ce, it was a popr ce for wandering cultivators at the Soul Ascension Realm and above to gather.


    The reason being that a rare kind of cultivation resource that could help in refining the physical body called crimson eudimite, or just simply referred to as dragon blood crystals, could be found on the Dragon Tooth Mountain.


    For this reason, most of the people going to the ce were those who specialized in cultivating their bodies. Not that there wasn''t anyone other than those specializing in refining their bodies, just that those were the most numerous among those visiting the ce.


    Of course, with that in mind, it was obvious that the Dragon Tooth Mountain was an extremely dangerous ce, as if it wasn''t, it would have long since been under the control of one of the major powers in the Eastern Central Region.


    The danger of the ce not being limited to the Dao Seed Realm, as there have even been a few cases of Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators disappearing on the Dragon Tooth Mountain.


    Not that any of this would have anything to do with him, as his goal for going to the Dragon Tooth Mountain wasn''t the dragon blood crystals, but instead to try and recruit some of the wandering cultivators gathered around the edge of the mountain.


    Although the dragon blood crystals did interest him, he wasn''t nning on going out of his way to search for them, as they were notoriously difficult to find even for someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm and relied more on luck than anything else, as they were essentially invisible to divine sense¡­


    Continuing to travel through the Eastern Central Region in the direction of the Dragon Tooth Mountain without the use of long distance teleportation so as to avoid identally revealing his presence to any of the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators in the region who might haveprehended the Dao of Space if he happened to pass by too closely, Xuan Hao took the opportunity to observe what he encountered along the way.


    Making sure to keep his eye out for any wandering cultivators who could be recruited to join the sect¡­ And surprisingly, he did end up encountering a Soul Ascension Realm cultivator who fit his criteria for being recruited to join the sect on the third day since he left the Zhang n.


    Even though the person in question was only someone who had recently broken through to the Soul Ascension Realm and was far weaker than his two pets currently at the Pinnacle of the Soul Ascension Realm and close to reaching the Dao Seed Realm, he still counted towards the main sect questpletion, a way that he surpassed his two pets.


    Speaking of his two pets, he had tried to promote them to elders of the sect in an attempt toplete the main sect quest faster, but quickly realized that this was not an option, as it seemed like the system didn''t see them as elders.


    The reason was uncertain, but he had a feeling it had to do with the fact that the rest of the sect didn''t really regard his two pets as elders. Understandable considering that they couldn''t reallymunicate with anyone other than him at the moment. Making them elders a bit difficult.


    Instead of elders, those two were more like guardian beasts with how the winged lion demon beast was helping guard the borders of the sect and ensuring that no powerful demonic cultivator caused problems for the elders and disciples of the sect.


    The rabbit demon beast¡­ It¡­ It was less memorable and might seem more like a guardian leech in some instances, but it did help the sect out when it came to guarding the part of the sect facing the former territory of the Sky Empire. Although far less visible to the rest of the sectpared to the actions of the winged lion demon beast that fought at the border in front of the sect elders and disciples every now and again.


    Back to the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator he happened to run into¡­


    After a bit of convincing, he managed to sessfully recruit the other party to join the Star Shattering Sect before sending him off in the general direction of the sect with some information to give the sect elders upon arriving that would then inform Elder Song about the situation, as he would know how to deal with this new elder. Especially so as he had already discussed this before he left the sect, so as to not cause any panic when arge number of new people appeared to join the sect all of a sudden.


    Speaking of which¡­ He had only discussed the matter of recruiting wandering cultivators with Elder Song and had not really talked about something like recruiting an entire n at once¡­


    "I will apologize to Elder Song when I get back¡­" Muttering this to himself as he could already imagine Elder Song''s reaction when he learnt about the fact that he had recruited an entire n in one go, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit guilty over how thoughtlessly he had ended up recruiting the Zhang n without thinking things through.


    However, he couldn''t be med too much, as the prospect of adding another Dao Seed Realm cultivator to the sect was simply far too tempting for him.


    At least Xuan Hao convinced himself that this was the case as he continued getting closer and closer to the Dragon Tooth Mountain.


    Soon enough, while lost in his own thoughts about what might happen when he returns to the sect and the future development of the sect, he crossed over the border of one of the 17 major powers of the Eastern Central Region, the Crimson Dragon Empire.


    Not too surprisingly from the name of this empire, it was also the major power that the Crimson Dragon Tooth Mountain was located inside of.


    After all, even if the different major powers of the Eastern Central Region couldn''t take full control of the ce, there was no way that it wouldn''t fall inside the territorial borders of one of these major powers. The Crimson Dragon Empire being the major power that had ended up with it.


    Of course, this didn''t mean that the Crimson Dragon Empire was one of the four strongest of the major powers in the Eastern Central Region, but it could still be considered among the stronger major powers of the Eastern Central Region. Ranking in the top three behind the four strongest major powers.


    Merry Christmas~

 Chapter 1524 Dragon Tooth Mountain City

    Chapter 1524 Dragon Tooth Mountain City


    Flying over the border of the Crimson Dragon Empire, it didn''t take long before Xuan Hao realized that he had entered apletely different part of the Eastern Central Regionpared to before.


    The small settlements and cities ruled by different smaller powers disappeared. Instead being reced byrger cities and towns that were very clearly under the control of a single power instead of multiple smaller ones.


    Not just that, but Xuan Hao also noticed that the strength of the cultivators present suddenly increased by a lot, with Soul Ascension Realm cultivators bing far moremon and Dao Seed Realm cultivators being rtively easy to spot inside some of therger cities.


    Unfortunately for Xuan Hao, most of these cultivators were all part of the Crimson Dragon Empire and we''re not someone he would be able to join the Star Shattering Sect.


    Even if he could convince some of them with his current strength, he soubted that they would be loyal to the sect and would be more willing to believe that they just agreed to join the sect to act as possible spies for the Crimson Dragon Empire.


    For this reason, even though there were a lot more Soul Ascension Realm cultivators appearing, he didn''t end up recruiting anyone new to join the sect during the week it ended up taking him to go from the border of the Crimson Dragon Empire to the Dragon Tooth Mountain.


    If anything, he almost ended up in a rather troublesome situation, as one of the Dao Seed Realm cultivators from the Crimson Dragon Empire almost ended up attacking him when he first crossed over the border of the Empire without first going through normal procedures of first making his presence known to the border guards


    Luckily, he managed to convince the other party that he was just a wandering cultivator unfamiliar with the Crimson Dragon Empire and had been unaware that he had crossed the borders of the Empire.


    In a sense, this was correct¡­ And together with his cultivation only being in the Domain Lord Realm in the eyes of the Dao Seed Realm cultivator, he wasn''t really viewed as someone who could potentially be a threat to the Crimson Dragon Empire. Allowing him to escape from the situation with a warning and by giving a few of his spirit stones.


    Even if he could have escaped the situation without doing any of this, he had clearly already been noticed by the Crimson Dragon Empire and didn''t want to create any more trouble for himself if he could get out of said trouble by parting with a few spirit stones.


    Shaking his head a bit as he thought about his encounter with the Dao Seed Realm cultivator from the Crimson Dragon Empire, Xuan Hao made sure to keep himself within the designated safe paths while travelling through the Crimson Dragon Empire. Not wanting to identally end up having to deal with another person from the Crimson Dragon Empire if possible.


    At the same time it was also to avoid walking into a dangerous ce unknowingly, as there was nock of locations that could pose a danger to someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm no matter which of the four Central Regions one found themselves inside of. Much less locations deadly to those in the Dao Seed Realm or below.


    The Dragon Tooth Mountain was one such location, but it was far from the only one present in the Crimson Dragon Empire.


    The main differencepared to other dangerous locations being that there was a clear opportunity in the form of the dragon blood crystals, while opportunities in other dangerous locations were far harder toe by and find.


    In a sense, the dozen or so dangerous locations simr to the Dragon Tooth Mountain throughout the Eastern Central Region were simr in the way that they all had obvious and rtively easy to get opportunities or cultivation resourcespared to other dangerous locations¡­


    Arriving at the massive city located at the edge of the Dragon Tooth Mountain around a week since first steeping inside the Crimson Dragon Empire, Xuan Hao was left in awe at the sheet size of the city, as it surpassed anything he had seen so far that was not in the form of ancient ruins.


    From a nce, a terrifying formation that should have beenid down by a formation master in the Saint Realm could be seen, while he could barely feel an even more terrifying presence in the depths of the city. Just barely revealing itself to intimidate anyone who might be bold enough to think about having any thoughts about the city or the Dragon Tooth Mountain behind it.


    "Celestial Immortal Realm¡­"


    Already familiar with the strength of the presence in the depths of the massive city, Xuan Hao understood that this terrifying presence belonged to someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Not just someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, but from the spatial fluctuations throughout the city and in the area around it preventing anyone from teleporting or use the Dao of Space to move around, it was clear that the other party was someone proficient in the Dao of Space. Having at least reached the Large Sess Realm.


    But¡­ For someone like this, who was clearly not an ordinary Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator to be stationed at the Dragon Tooth Mountain, made Xuan Hao start to seourisly reassess the importance of the Dragon Tooth Mountain. At the same time also bing far more curious about the dragon blood crystals, as it might have other uses than just the helping the refinement of the physical body.


    Pushing his slowly growing curiosity regarding the dragon blood crystals down, Xuan Hao began to approach the city. Soon enough spotting a long line of people waiting to enter the city.


    Given that there was a powerful Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator proficient in the Dao of Space and a formation created by someone with a higherprehension than him in the Dao of Formations, Xuan Hao decided to obediently line up to enter the city this time around. Not daring to try his luck and sneak into the city.


    All things considered, the guards, whose strength ranged between the Domain Lord Realm and the Soul Ascension Realm, were not enough to deter him and if it had just been the guards, he would have definitely tried to sneak inside the city.


    The main reason for this was not just to avoid the long line of people, but more so to avoid paying the outrageous entrance fee.


    The sheer wealth required to enter the city was something that even he, as a Late Stage Dao Domain Lord Realm cultivator, felt unwilling to part with.


    The Domain Lord Realm and Soul Ascension Realm cultivators even more so, as Xuan Hao even witnessed a few of them almost break into tears as they handed over the exorbitant amount of spirit stones required to enter the city.


    As for the few Nascent Soul Realm cultivators he spotted? They were either part of the Crimson Dragon Empire and didn''t have to pay the entrance fee or they were wealthy young masters anddies who didn''t seem to care about the high entrance fee.


    "Haaa¡­ No other way to enter unless I want to reveal my strength at the Dao Seed Realm¡­" Muttering this to himself as he lined up together with the rest of the people waiting to enter the city, Xuan Hao could not hel seriously considering whether or not to reveal his strength at the Dao Seed Realm, as it was clear from what he had seen so far that cultivators at the Dao Seed Realm were able to enter the city without having to pay the exorbitant entrance fee.


    However, the main thing that stopped him was not so much that he wanted to hide his strength, but more so that the one Dao Seed Realm cultivator he had seen enter the city so far, had almost instantly drawn the attention of the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator guarding the city.


    Although he wasn''t in the Northern Central Region any longer and there was little chance of his true identity being figured out, there was still a very real chance that he might be recognized by the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    After all, different from weaker cultivators whose information might becking and normally wouldn''t be interested in seeking information outside the Central Region they lived in due to the price and difficulties involved in getting information that ultimately wouldn''t really affect them, Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators would try to pay attention to the entire Central Region.


    His hope so far regarding the Star Shattering Sect, was the fact that it was hard to get any information on his sect if one didn''t specifically try to learn about it.


    For the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators from Central Regions outside the Northern Central Region, it should be enough to learn about the Star Shattering Sect being an ancient hidden sect.


    At least, Xuan Hao hoped that this would be the case¡­

 Chapter 1525 Dragon Tooth Mountain City (2)

    Chapter 1525 Dragon Tooth Mountain City (2)


    Lost in his own thoughts as he slowly moved closer to the city together with the rest of the people waiting in line to enter the Dragon Tooth Mountain City, Xuan Hao noticed out of the corner of his eye that there was actually someone in the Core Formation Realm waiting in line along with him, something highly unusual considering that even Nascent Soul Realm cultivators were hard to see among the people waiting in line.


    Even more so after considering that there wasn''t really anything inside the Dragon Tooth Mountain City that would be in any way useful to someone only in the Core Formation Realm.


    From what he had managed to learn about the city during his journey through the Crimson Dragon Empire and a little small talk between the cultivators waiting in line, the Dragon Tooth City had been deliberately set up by the Crimson Dragon Empire.


    First to block any unauthorized entry into the Dragon Tooth Mountain and second as a ce to nurture their mid-level cultivators of the empire who were no longer among the younger generation and could be considered the backbone of the empire.


    A Nascent Soul Realm cultivator going would be unnatural, but not unexpected, as some younger geniuses of the empire obviously wanted to test themselves and hopefully make use of the dangers on the Dragon Tooth Mountain to breakthrough and cross over to the Domain Lord Realm.


    Someone in the Core Formation Realm going to the Dragon Tooth Mountain¡­ That was simply a death sentence! And of course, that was only so if the other party even had the means to pay the terrifyingly high entrance fee required to step inside of the Dragon Tooth Mountain City.


    However, as Xuan Hao and a few others who had caught sight of the young Core Formation Realm cultivator watched him proceed towards the entrance, they were all shocked to see the guard bowing his head before quickly calling for a superior at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm who cautiously guided the young Core Formation Realm cultivator inside of the city without dy.


    This¡­ Is he perhaps the son of one of the Celestial Immortals of the Crimson Dragon Empire? Or perhaps an imperial descendant in line for the throne?


    Not knowing what else to think upon seeing the sheer respect together with no small amount of fear hidden beneath the surface on the face of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm cultivator who appeared to guide the young Core Formation Realm cultivator inside of the city, Xuan Hao could not think of any other reason for that kind of reaction.


    Even if the other party was the son of someone in the Dao Seed Realm, he doubted that the reaction of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm cultivator would have been that exaggerated. Meaning that the young Core Formation Realm cultivator had a great identity than just a descendant of Dao Seed Realm cultivator. n/?/vel/b//jn dot c//om


    "That- Who was that young man?"


    "No idea, but the fear on old Yang''s face when he escorted him inside was rather obvious even if he tried to hide it."


    "Indeed¡­ For even someone at the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm close to reaching the Earth Immortal Realm to react like that, I fear that I, with my meager cultivation at the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm would die if I offended that young master."


    "Sure, sure, we know you broke through to the Second Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm a few days ago. No need to use every opportunity to show off in front of others."


    "Hehe, sorry, sorry, but regarding that young master, I think he should be the son of the guardian."


    "Son of the guardian!? A-are you talking about Guardian Zhang¡­?"


    "Yes, I''m talking about him, heard a bit information about his son possibly showing up at the Explorer Union and given his strength fits along with the respectful behavior of old Yang, I think it makes sense, as only someone like that would be able tomand that level of respect and fear from old Yang."


    "This¡­ Indeed¡­"


    "Nothing to say, you make sense¡­"


    "True, even in the face of a Dao Seed Realm cultivator, old Yang doesn''t flinch, let alone in the face of the son of a Dao Seed Realm cultivator¡­"


    Listening in to the discussions of the few other cultivators who had seen the same scene as him, Xuan Hao could not help nodding his head in understanding after learning about the identity of this Guardian Zhang from a few other people behind him.


    Guardian Zhang was the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator currently guarding the Dragon Tooth Mountain City.


    For the son of someone like that to show up even though his cultivation realm was only in the Core Formation Realm, it was not that odd, as the other party at least had a reason to be there.


    Not to mention, it made the fearful and respectful reaction of the Peak Soul Ascension Realm guard a bit more understandable.


    The only thing that did make him a bit confused was that the young man had seemingly lined up alongside everyone else entering the city when it was obvious that he would be able to easily skip the line and enter with his identity.


    If anything, waiting in line was nothing short of a risk to his life, as anyone who might want to assassinate him would have the perfect opportunity to do so given that the hidden guards would at most be in the Soul Ascension Realm given that the strongest person around the entrance was in the Soul Ascension Realm from what he could sense.


    Of course, assassinating the child of a Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator so close to the father in question was nothing short of giving up on escaping after the kill. Especially considering that there would be no way to teleport away from someone so proficient in the Dao of Space.


    Perhaps the son has some kind of special circumstances and is not at any risk of being assassinated¡­


    Shaking his head as he thought about this while looking off in the direction that the young master had disappeared in, he soon came face to face with the stone-faced guards at the entrance and painfully handed over the spirit stones to enter the Dragon Tooth Mountain City.


    Whoosh~!


    Stepping inside the city the next moment, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a shiver run down his spine, as he clearly felt the formation guarding the city bearing down on him for a split second as it seemed to forcibly scan him from head to toe.


    Luckily, the formation clearly couldn''t perceive the difference between the Domain Lord Realm and the Dao Domain Lord Realm as it retracked without doing anything to him other than scanning his cultivation base and ensuring that he wasn''t some Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator from an enemy nation trying to sneak inside to cause trouble for the Crimson Dragon Empire.


    Looking back at the other cultivators who came in closely behind him, he realized that he wasn''t the only one to receive this kind of special treatment from the formation, as it seemed that the formation treated everyone equally.


    The only difference he picked up on was the fact that it had clearly taken the formation far longer to scan him earlier, though due to there being no hostile reaction and using his understanding of the Dao of Formations, he concluded that this was just because the formation encountered an unexpected error that it quickly processed and fixed.


    If the formation master who had created the formation was not present, such a small error that was quickly fixed by the formation itself should gopletely unnoticed.


    Even someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm wouldn''t be able to pick up on it, as it required a certain understanding of the Dao of Formations and wasn''t the slightest bit rted to the strength of the cultivator.


    The main thing that worried him was whether the formation had some kind of inbuilt formation that would record any errors for the formation masters taking care of the formation, but¡­ Given the other party''sprehension of the Dao of Formation exceeding his own, Xuan Hao highly doubted that the other party wouldn''t ce in such a simple formation that would help make the process maintain therger formation far easier.


    With that in mind, depending on how often the formation was looked at and taken care of without any major failures or damage urring, he most likely only had a limited time left inside of the city before someone found the error and narrowed down where and who it came from, something that should be rather simple if he was still inside of the formation.


    "¡­"


    Feeling a bit annoyed at this predicament he now found himself in as he wanted to recruit people to join the sect from among the countless wandering cultivators that could be found throughout the city, Xuan Hao decided not to waste any time and directly headed towards the Explorer Union.

 Chapter 1526 Dragon Tooth Mountain City (3)

    Chapter 1526 Dragon Tooth Mountain City (3)


    Arriving at the entrance to the Explorer Union branch located in the city, Xuan Hao made his way inside without any hesitation before walking up to one of the counters to ask about information on the different Soul Ascension Realm cultivators and above present in the Dragon Tooth Mountain City and the Dragon Tooth Mountain itself.


    Considering that he wasn''t the only person who wanted to get information on the different powerful cultivators present in the city and on the mountain itself, the staff member behind the counter showed no change in expression as he was handed over a small booklet that recorded the information of most of the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators and above currently present.


    Of course, the information itself was highly inuratepared to buying detailed information on the different Soul Ascension Realm or stronger cultivators, as some of the people might not be present in the city any longer, while everyone mentioned was not thoroughly analyzed and had just been roughly estimated as either Soul Ascension Realm or Earth Immortal Realm without anything more detailed.


    Not to mention, it was clear from a nce that the booklet did not contain information on all the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators or higher inside of the city, as those belonging to the Crimson Dragon Empire were excluded and those who had not yet revealed their strength in public were amongst the most obvious cultivators not part of the booklet.


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 Chapter 1527 A Few Months Early...

    Chapter 1527 A Few Months Early...


    At the same time Xuan Hao left the Explorer Union branch to search for the three Dao Seed Realm wandering cultivators who had the potential to be elders of the Star Shattering Sect, somewhere at the edge of therge city, a slightly older woman caring with her a presence that seemed tomand respect appeared.


    From a nce alone, it was obvious that this woman was no ordinary person, something that only became more obvious from the surprised looks the guards gave her the moment they saw her approaching.


    Among the guards at the gate, one who had just recently returned from escorting a certain young master almost instantly spotted the older woman before rushing over with a clear look of surprise stered all over his face. "M-Madam Jing, I thought you wouldn''t being until the annual assessment of the guardian formation?"


    "Hm? Oh, little Yang. Haven''t seen you in some time, I just decided on checking up on the formation a bit earlier this time around as I will be too busy to take care of the old formation soon."


    "Check on it early? Busy soon!? M-m-madam, who will take care of the formation without you around!?"


    "Don''t worry, someone else will take over in my absence, though the formation will have to go a few years without being checked. Although¡­ I doubt it will make much difference considering the level of this formation. Even checking it every year feels like too much, doing it once every ten or so years would be more than enough¡­"


    As the conversation between the older woman and the guard at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm yed out for the wandering cultivators waiting in line to see, it soon became clear that the identity of the older woman was special.


    Not only was she an incredibly skilled formation master, but she was also the one currently in charge of maintaining and repairing the guardian formation of the Dragon Tooth Mountain City!


    Given that it was a rather well known fact that the guardian formation had been set up by a Saint Realm Formation Master and was even capable of resisting against someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, to even be capable of repairing and maintaining such a terrifying formation in its peak state was an achievement in and of itself, while also being a testament to the older woman''sstrength.


    To maintain and repair a Saint Realm Formation, even with proper guidelines to follow left behind by the Saint Realm Formation Master, it at least required someone in the Senior Grandmaster Realm to always keep the guardian formation in peak condition.


    However, considering the strategic importance of the Dragon Tooth Mountain City, none of the wandering cultivators waiting in line believed that this woman was just someone in the Senior Grandmaster Realm.


    Instead, they firmly believed that she should be someone at the Pinnacle Grandmaster Realm. Possibly even the disciple of the Saint Realm Formation Master who had created the formation in the first ce!


    "¡­ Well then, I will get going. After all, I n to finish this as fast as possible to avoid wasting too much time here."


    As the wandering cultivators lined up to enter the city were all eagerly listening in on the conversation between Old Yang and the mysterious Madam Jing, the two quickly finished their small talk before Madam Jing disappeared inside the city. Soon returning the area around the gate to its former state.


    After all, the appearance of a formation master who would fix any problems with the guardian formation or just overall check on its health on a yearly basis was a well-known fact.


    Although it seemed like something had happened to push this check up on the formation a few months ahead of time, it didn''t really have anything to do with them nor would it affect them in any way whether the guardian formation of the city was checked now or three monthster. At most, it would be a good distraction while waiting in line to enter the city.


    ¡­


    Entering the city, the older woman referred to as Madam Jing, moved straight to the center of the city before tantly walking inside therge estate where the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator in charge of guarding the city resided.


    Along the way, she didn''t encounter any resistance, as she smoothly entered the estate before moving through arge garden filled with all sorts of exotic spiritual herbs and trees.


    However, none of this seemed to catch her attention. Instead, she seemed fully locked in on her goal, as she soon came to a secluded area where a middle-aged man sat quietly in a meditative position. Clearly deep in meditation, either ignoring the woman or simply not noticing her presence.


    "¡­"


    The woman didn''t really seem to care about this, as she simply nced at the middle-aged man briefly before focusing her attention on therge crystal sphere floating a few meters behind him.


    From her expression, it was obvious that this crystal sphere was her goal and the reason she hade to this ce.


    "The formation core¡­ Still as beautiful as ever¡­" Muttering this to herself as she looked towards this floating sphere, the woman slowed down her speed to a small jog, as she soon found herself standing in front of the floating sphere more than twice her own height.


    With how close she was at this point; countless tiny formation symbols could be seen flowing across the surface of the sphere inplex and intangible patterns iprehensible to those who hadn''tprehended the Dao of Formations.


    At this point, even someone unfamiliar with the Dao of Formations would have realized that the sphere was the core of the Dragon Tooth Mountain City''s guardian formation.


    However, as the woman was admiring the formation core, she was also silently inspecting it with her divine sense. Checking for any problems that might have urred since herst visit less than a year ago.


    "Hm?"


    As a result, she soon noticed something different from the past, causing a small frown to form on the corner of her lips as she stared deeply into formation symbols swirling around inside of the crystal sphere.


    "How odd¡­ It seems like an error of sort happened this time around. Not just that, but one within the simplest identification formation that is automatically used on anyone entering the city to prevent unknown Dao Seed Realm cultivators or above from entering the city secretly."


    Almost whispering this to herself as she went over the error that had urred since herst visit, the woman''s frown deepened even further as she realized that things wouldn''t be going as smoothly as she had expected.


    Normally, she would juste in, check up on the formation core and see if something was wrong. If there were no changes, she didn''t have to do anything and could just leave after concluding that the formation was still in an optimal state.


    In truth, she hade here to do what was essentially a yearly check-up a bit earlier because she had never really expected the formation to encounter any problems that would need her attention.


    After all, this was a formation set up by someone in the Saint Realm, even if left unattended, it would be able to keep running for thousands of years without any significant problems.


    The reason she even came to observe the formation once a year was because of the importance of the Dragon Tooth Mountain to the Crimson Dragon Empire and the fact that it was a good opportunity for her to deepen her insights into the Dao of Formations by observing the inner workings of the formation core created by a Saint Realm Formation Master. N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Even more so, considering that the formation master who had set up the formation wasn''t an ordinary Third Heaven Saint, but instead a Second Heaven Saint.


    Third Heaven Saint, Second Heaven Saint, First Heaven Saint and finally the mythical Great Saint.


    Most cultivators who managed to reach the Saint Realm only ever managed to reach the Third Heaven Realm. Anything beyond that would be incredibly rare across the entire continent.


    Compared to Celestial Immortal Realm cultivators, Second Heaven Realm Saints were far more difficult toe across, let alone someone who had managed to reach the First Heaven Realm¡­


    For this reason alone, she was incredibly taken aback to see that an error had taken ce in the formation created by a Second Heaven Saint. Especially considering that the formation itself wasn''t that old, only being a little over a hundred years old.


    Whoosh~


    Of course, as she realized the seriousness of the situation, she instantly dropped her former rxed demeanor and became far more serious as she began to seriously inspect the error that had urred.


    Even if the formation had managed to fix the problem on its own, it was crucial that she figured out what had caused this problem to ur in the first ce, as it presented a potential weakness in the formation that the enemies of the Crimson Dragon Empire could take advantage of.

 Chapter 1528 The Source of the Problem...

    Chapter 1528 The Source of the Problem...


    "How in the world is this even possible¡­" Muttering this to herself as she began to seriously inspect the formation core in front of her, there was a hint of worry on her face.


    Although she could fix some issues that might arise with the Saint Realm Formation, she also understood that it would be impossible for her to fix it if the issue was something that had affected the core of the formation.


    If the core of the formation had really ended up being affected to some degree, it would no longer be anything she could handle, as she would have to directly contact the higher ups of the empire for help¡­ And given that she had intended on finishing things fast before leaving for an important opportunity that might help her progress further in the Dao of Formations, she felt unwilling to face a situation where she would have to contact others for help.


    After all, contacting others for help would also mean that she herself would likely get swept up in the situation and be unable to leave before the problems with the formation was figured out and fixed.


    A responsibility she wouldn''t be able to escape given that she herself had been the one to volunteer to be the one watching over the formation guarding the Dragon Tooth Mountain City.


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 Chapter 1529 Just a Normal Domain Lord Realm Wandering Cultivator... Nothing to See Here...

    Chapter 1529 Just a Normal Domain Lord Realm Wandering Cultivator... Nothing to See Here...


    Feeling the presence of a Dao Seed Realm cultivator rapidly approaching him, Xuan Hao could not help feeling a bit relieved.


    The fact that the personing over towards him was not the guardian in charge of guarding the city but instead just someone in the Dao Seed Realm clearly indicated to him that the other party should not be aware of his strength and should have only be seeking him out to try and figure out the source of the problem that had urred with the formation.


    Although this was still bad, as he would end up being closely followed and scrutinized by someone in the Dao Seed Realm, it was far better than having someone in the Celestial Immortal Realme to interrogate him.


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 Chapter 1530 Qin Hao

    Chapter 1530 Qin Hao


    Waiting for another few minutes to make sure that the other party had really left, Xuan Hao soon turned and made his way in the direction of one of the three Dao Seed Realm wandering cultivator with the potential to be and elder of the sect. Not wanting to waste any time. Understanding very well that there was little chance that the Dao Seed Realm cultivator would be staying in the same location for long.


    Even the fact that he had managed to get any information on a Dao Seed Realm cultivator''s location could be considered nothing short of a miracle given how expensive such information would be if he tried to buy it.


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 Chapter 1531 Qin Hao (2)

    Chapter 1531 Qin Hao (2)


    Silently keeping an eye on Qin Hao as he thought about different ways to convince him to join the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao ultimately decided that he would try and use his information on the Profound Immortal Realm and Dao Seed Realm along with the hidden ancient sect identity that the sect currently posed.


    Although he couldn''t guarantee that this would work, he at least felt confident that it would be more useful than iting from a normal major power. After all, an ancient hidden sect was above a major power in terms of strength on the continent as far as he was aware. Surpassed only by a few special major powers that stood out from the rest of the major powers on the continent.


    Waiting for an opportunity, he soon found himself face to face with Qin Hao, who in turn looked at him with a curious expression on his face. Not understanding why, he had suddenly walked over to his table.


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 Chapter 1532 Realization

    Chapter 1532 Realization


    Given that he had already disyed his strength and in turn made Qin Hao fully convinced of what he told him about the Star Shattering Sect, it didn''t take nearly as much to convince him to be an elder of the Star Shattering Sect as he had expected. Not just that, but after learning about the Profound Immortal Realm and the Dao Seed Realm, Qin Hao couldn''t wait to leave for the Star Shattering Sect. Wanting to learn about the Dao Seed Realm specifically as fast as possible.


    After all, as someone who had believed that he was already close to the peak of his realm. Finding out that he was in fact only in the Early Stage of the realm was a shocking revtion. Especially learning about the Profound Immortal Realm that directly seemed like a realm above that of the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    Considering that the Star Shattering Sect already had a lot of information on the Dao Seed Realm and Pei Yang could also serve as a teacher on the Dao Seed Realm with all the information he had managed to absorb regarding the realm since bing an elder of the sect, Xuan Hao didn''t intend to stop Qin Hao from going to the Star Shattering Sect immediately.


    On the contrary, he happily encouraged him to leave for the sect immediately, as another Dao Seed Realm cultivator joining the sect would be beneficial to the sect''s younger generation and the elders who were now starting to have their average cultivation base transition from the Nascent Soul Realm to the Domain Lord Realm.


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 Chapter 1533 Running Away at the First Sign of Trouble

    Chapter 1533 Running Away at the First Sign of Trouble


    Feeling a sudden shift in the presence that had remained stationary inside of the estate at the center of the city so far, Xuan Hao immediately understood that the one who hade to investigate him earlier had managed to figure out something about him not really being someone just in the Domain Lord Realm.


    Although the other party might not be fully certain about his strength, identity or reason foring to the Dragon Tooth Mountain City, it didn''t really matter as it was clear that he was someone she couldn''t handle in her own eyes, thus logically she had gone directly to the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator guarding the city with the information. Not risking her own life by confronting him on her own.


    "At least she can use her head, but¡­ It won''t change anything¡­" Narrowing both of his eyes as he sensed the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator starting to act by both locking down the space around him from a distance while also starting to activate the formation to seal him inside of the city to prevent him from escaping, Xuan Hao knew that he couldn''t waste any time-


    Swish-!


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 Chapter 1534 A Desire For Growth

    Chapter 1534 A Desire For Growth


    "He¡­ He escaped?! How is that even possible!?"


    At the same time Xuan Hao had sensed the movement of the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator from the Crimson Dragon Empire along with the activation of the guardian formation and directly left the Dragon Tooth Mountain City, Formation Master Jing could not help eximing to herself upon the realization of what had just happened. Unable to believe that the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator and the guardian formation had been unable to stop someone in time.


    "Don''t think too much about it, that person is not simple, hisprehension of the Dao of Space even exceeds mine and the movement technique he used seem to be based on the Dao of Light. Making it close to impossible for me to catch him before he leaves the area suppressed by me.


    Not to mention, though I''m able to prevent teleportation inside of Dragon Tooth Mountain City and the area around it, it is ultimately also something that prevents me from teleporting around as well. If I undid the suppression of space, that person would still have been able to escape with his superiorprehension of the Dao of Space.


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 Chapter 1535 First Arrival

    Chapter 1535 First Arrival


    Following the formation master Jing setting off from the Dragon Tooth Mountain City, Xuan Hao appeared at the gate of anotherrge city not much different from the Dragon Tooth Mountain City located in another important location of the Crimson Dragon Empire.


    The main difference from this citypared to the Dragon Tooth Mountain City being that while it was also guarded by a powerful formation and someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm, the scale of the formation guarding the city was far smaller and only covered the central part of the city where the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator guarding the city had his estate.


    Of course, outside of the Celestial Immortal Realm cultivator''s estate, the Explorer Union branch, auction houses, artifact shops and so on were also located in the core of the city that was protected by the formation.


    However, the important thing that Xuan Hao had managed to find out about this city was that most of the wandering cultivators could often be found either rxing or cultivating in the outer parts of the city outside of the formation.


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 Chapter 1536 Awed After a Beating

    Chapter 1536 Awed After a Beating


    A few minutes before the first Soul Ascension Realm cultivator that Xuan Hao had managed to recruit the sect crossed the border and officially stepped inside the Iron Sky Kingdom, the rabbit demon beast that had recently decided to return and spend some time in the small kingdom it had managed to build for itself inside of the Iron Sky Kingdom through the help of the human it had taken in, noticed the unfamiliar Soul Ascension Realm cultivator suddenly appearing.


    Given the rabbit demon beast''s past job of guarding the borders of the Iron Sky Kingdom and the fact that it had prevented no small number of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators from attacking the iron Sky Kingdom in the past, the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator ended up drawing the attention of the rabbit demon beast.


    Of course, it didn''t directly charge forward to attack the Soul Ascension Realm cultivator, as the person in question was just lingering around the borders of the Iron Sky Kingdom with a somewhat nervous and excited expression stered all over his face.


    Squeak!?


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 Chapter 1537 The Second Test

    Chapter 1537 The Second Test


    Wasting no time stepping forward to ask the two people in the Domain Lord Realm casually chatting with each other in front of the path leading up the Ninth Star Peak about entering the sect, it did not take long before the now eager Soul Ascension Realm cultivator found himself waiting at a small outdoors pavilion built a few hundred meters up the side of the mountain. Giving him a chance to personally experience the rich spiritual qi without stepping inside the sect itself, something that was nothing short of addicting considering that he knew just how useful this was for cultivation.


    Outside of that, he also took the opportunity to observe the people entering and leaving the Star Shattering Sect through a farrger teleportation formation than the one he had used to travel from the Iron Sky Kingdom to the Falling Star City.


    From a quick nce, it was obvious to him that the people entering and leaving the sect were all from the younger generation. Most of them, even those in the Domain Lord Realm being at most a few hundred years old.


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 Chapter 1538 Influx of Soul Ascension Realm Cultivators

    Chapter 1538 Influx of Soul Ascension Realm Cultivators


    As the first Soul Ascension Realm cultivator slowly started to familiarize himself with the Star Shattering Sect and the main sect located on the Seventh Star Peak, it didn''t take long for him to realize that the strongest people present on the Seventh Star Peak were only at the Earth Immortal Realm. However, this didn''t seem weird, as he also learnt about the existence of the Main Star Peak that was out of reach for the elders and disciples of the sect. Only essible by an ancestor who resided on the Seventh Star Peak as well.


    From this alone, it wasn''t difficult for him to put two and two together and conclude that the truly powerful elders of the sect were located on the Main Star Peak or the Second Star Peak that were inessible to the weaker elders and disciples of the sect. Possibly only essible for those who managed to break through to the Celestial Immortal Realm.


    In the end, this information ended up making him even more excited when it came to improving his own cultivation in the future. Especially so considering that he now seemed to be able to realistically see himself reached the Earth Immortal Realm in the future and potentially even challenge the Celestial Immortal Realm with a bit of luck.


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 Chapter 1539 Power of the Dao Domain Lord Realm

    Chapter 1539 Power of the Dao Domain Lord Realm


    Following the increase in Soul Ascension Realm cultivators in the sect, it didn''t take long before there was a rapid increase in strength among the elders who had been stuck at the Peak of the Nascent Soul Realm for a long period of time. Leveraging therge number of Soul Ascension Realm cultivators now avable in the sect to ask for guidance and help clear out their confusion before taking the final step to enter the Domain Lord Realm.


    Outside of the elders who saw a rapid increase in their strength, Feng Chen, who had spent most of his timeprehending the Dao of the Sword and honing his Sword Intent unwilling to fall behind Xuan Hao and therge number of powerful cultivators slowly starting to join the sect. Sessfully took a step forward and entered the Singr Path of the Dao Domain Lord Realm with his Dao of the Sword reaching the Elementary Realm. Showing that his talent was indeed terrifying when it came to the Dao of the Sword. Onlycking an opportunity to showcase it properly in the past.


    After this breakthrough to the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, it also allowed the wandering cultivators who had joined the sect as elders to understand the difference between the Soul Ascension Realm and the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


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 Chapter 1541 Old Founder

    Chapter 1541 Old Founder


    Starting to look through the different documents and scrolls not rted to the Dao of Sword that he had taken back with him when he had returned to the Shattered Star Peaks from the Flying Sword Sect, Feng Chen could not help showing an increasingly surprised expression on his face as he dwelled deeper and deeper into the information.


    Not only was there information far beyond what should have been possible for someone in the outer regions of the continent to gather, but there was also information on the different major powers in the core region of the continent. Not just any information, but information about their general strength, something that shouldn''t have changed in the mere thousand years since the founder of the Flying Sword Sect had been around.


    For one, ording to the information, the Blue Sea Empire that was currently the biggest threat to the future growth of the Star Shattering Sect, had at least 10 people in the Celestial Immortal Realm and three in the Profound Immortal Realm, one of the Profound Immortal Realm cultivators having reached the Land Creation Realm. Standing above even someone in the Peak of the Celestial Immortal Realm in terms of strength.


    Although he couldn''t fully trust the information and how urate it might be, it still pointed towards the terrifying foundation of the Blue Sea Empire. Making him fully understand why it was considered one of the strongest major powers in the central region of the continent.


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 Chapter 1542 Updating the Library

    Chapter 1542 Updating the Library


    As Feng Chen handed over the cultivation manuals, scrolls and other documents that he didn''t need any longer to Elder Song before he focused his entire attention onprehending the Dao of the Sword and smaller Daos like the Dao of Sharpness and the Dao of Speed that could help increase the strength of his Dao of Sword, Elder Song wasted no time in looking through them himself.


    Because of this it didn''t take long before the sect''s library added the new cultivation manuals andbat techniques that had been among the things handed over by Feng Chen.


    In turn, this ended up making the different wandering cultivators who recently joined the sect extremely excited, as most of these cultivation techniques andbat techniques were suited for those in the Soul Ascension Realm and the Dao Seed Realm. Making them believe that the Star Shattering Sect had deliberately added these techniques and manuals to the library because of them.


    After all, when they had first joined the sect, there weren''t that many cultivation manuals andbat techniques for the Soul Ascension Realm and the Dao Seed Realm, something that those who noticed just believed to be because most of the disciples and elders at the Seventh Star Peak were from the younger generation.


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 Chapter 1543 Fleeting Cloud Empire

    Chapter 1543 Fleeting Cloud Empire


    Now putting his full focus on searching for another Dao Seed Realm cultivator to join the Star Shattering Sect, Xuan Hao soon ended up faced with the reality that there simply wasn''t anywhere in the Crimson Dragon Empire where he would find someone in the Dao Seed Realm not already affiliated with another major power that would also be suitable for joining the Star Shattering Sect.


    The different locations where wandering cultivators gathered inside of the Crimson Dragon Empire were searched through by him already and those, he hadn''t managed to look through, were close to impossible to approach given that the Crimson Dragon Empire were currently on edge due to his recent visit to the Dragon Tooth Mountain City.


    So¡­ With all of that in mind, Xuan Hao ended up turning his attention towards another major power''s territory. Understanding that it would be difficult for him to continue searching for someone inside the territory of the Crimson Dragon Empire.


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 Chapter 1547 In Search of Senior Brother Chu Yang

    Chapter 1547 In Search of Senior Brother Chu Yang


    As Xuan Hao began his search though the inner region of the ancient ruins for the wandering cultivators in the Dao Seed Realm that should be in the process of exploring said ruins searching for opportunities, his two disciples, Qing Yi and Chun Hua arrived at the edge of the mountain range separating the old territory of the Sky Empire with the Northern Central Region.


    Having been able to take advantage of the teleportation formation connecting the Iron Sky Kingdom to the Shattered Star Peaks and another teleportation formation that connected the Iron Sky Kingdom to a spiritual herb field located inside the old territory of the Sky Empire, they had been able to shorten the travel time by over ny percentpared to what it had taken Chu Yang when he had travelled to the border in the past.


    Not just that, but given that the Star Shattering Sect''s influence in the old territory of the Sky Empire had been increasing over the past few months with the members of the Zhang n showing up to take over most of the Star Shattering Sect''s defense and management in the region, they were also able to get their hands on a path through the mountain range with rtive ease through the help of one of the Zhang n''s Soul Ascension Realm Elders who had be the one to take control of the spiritual herb field they had teleported to.


    In the process, the two had also tried their best to gather information on their senior brother, both trying their best to figure out what had happened to him and more importantly, where he was.


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 Chapter 1549 Chu Yangs Search For a Way Out~

    Chapter 1549 Chu Yang''s Search For a Way Out~


    Going back in time by a few weeks to when Chu Yang first emerged from the secret cultivation room where he had sessfully broken through to the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm, he wasted no time in testing out his new strength in the empty ancient ruins. Only stopping after feeling satisfied with his control over his new strength.


    Of course, what he hadn''t noticed when he had been testing his strength was the fact that he had identally ended up hitting a critical point in the structure of the formation that had been sealing off the maze he had made his way through to reach the secret cultivation room not too long ago.


    Under normal circumstances, this wouldn''t have been any cause for concern, as even if he ended up attacking a critical or weak point in the formation with all his strength, he would stand no chance of damaging it with his current strength.


    However, the critical point in the formation that he ended up identally hitting while testing out his new strength just so happened to be connected to the weakened part of the formation, he had seen inside the small room with the maze hidden inside of it.


    Essentially, the only real weak spot in the formation that had developed over countless years of slow decay without anyone showing up to help maintain the formation and ensure that the demon beasts inside of the maze couldn''t break out and cause harm to the ancient city outside.


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 Chapter 1552 Saving a Half Dead Senior Brother (3)

    Chapter 1552 Saving a Half Dead Senior Brother (3)


    With the powerful cultivator and demon beast fighting directly in front of them, Qing Yi and Chen Hua had no way to leave the mountain range like they had originally been nning to do¡­ And even worse, they could clearly hear the wandering cultivators behind them getting closer as they dug themselves out from the copsed cave that the gate to the mystic realm was now located inside of.


    Caught between a rock and a hard ce, the two had no intention of staying behind to fight with the wandering cultivators that would undoubtedly be filled with killing intent towards them after what they had done, while also not wanting to charge forward into the deadly battlefield between the powerful cultivator and demon beast in front of them.


    No matter what they did, it didn''t seem like they had any way to get out of their current situation without risking their lives. Not to mention, even if they didn''t try to sneak past the powerful cultivator and demon beast fighting with each other, the battle itself was slowly moving in their direction. Meaning that even if they decided to stay and fight the wandering cultivators to look for another path out of the mountain range, they would likely still end up getting caught up in the battle between the powerful cultivator and demon beast.


    Even worse, they might end up catching the attention of the powerful demon beast when fighting with the wandering cultivators.


    Although the two doubted that the powerful cultivator would care much about them given how weak they were, the demon beast might not think the same way and could directly target them to deal with any potential threats.


    Being targeted by such a powerful demon beast with their current strength still ranging in the middle stages of the Domain Lord Realm, there was no way for them to escape safely without help from their master.


    Unfortunately, neither of them had managed to get any protective talismans or other things along with them when they had left the sect, as their master was currently not in the sect.


    In other words, they would likely end up dead if they ended up being targeted by the powerful demon beast fighting the powerful cultivator¡­


    "You! How dare you just dump those demon beasts on us and run away, who do you think-"


    Just as Qing Yi and Chun Hua were thinking about how to make it out of their current situation, one of the wandering cultivators managed to catch up with them filled with killing intent.


    "T-t-that is-!?"


    However, before he could do anything orunch an attack, he froze on the spot as he noticed the terrifying fight taking ce not that far away from them. Understanding very well that attacking the two of them now would be nothing more than a death sentence if it ended up drawing the attention of the demon beast.


    Not to mention, outside of being fearful of drawing the attention of the two fighting with each other, it was also clear that he feared attracting any more powerful demon beasts over.


    After all, the mountain range was well known to house more than just a single powerful Soul Ascension Realm demon beast.


    Even though he wasn''t currently inside what could be considered the deepest and most dangerous part of the mountain range where Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts normally lived, he also understood that the fight in front of him would undoubtedly have drawn the attention of other Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts.


    With that in mind, starting a fight could potentially end up simrly drawing the attention of these demon beasts who should already be paying attention to the situation in the area that he now found himself inside of.


    Because of this, even though he wanted to rush forward to attack Qing Yi and Chun Hua, he still ended up holding himself back out of fear that doing so might end up attracting unwanted attention from nearby Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts.


    Outside of that, another reason he didn''t start a battle to the death also had to do with the fact that he and the rest of hispanions had already managed to get their hands on all the spirit stones they had found without suffering any casualties during their escape from the mystic realm.


    Of course, they were still filled with killing intent towards these two troublemakers, but not to the point where they would be risking their lives to exact revenge. Especially so considering that they had essentially just managed to get their hands on enough spirit stones to reignite their hopes of reaching the Soul Ascension Realm.


    In the end, even when all the wandering cultivators had gathered and discovered the injured state of Chu Yang, whom they had originally feared, they still decided to keep a distance and not engage much to Qing Yi and Chun Hua''s relive.


    For the two of them, the most important thing was to find a way out of the current dangerous situation, as even if they no longer had to worry about the wandering cultivators for now, their inaction was more than enough for them to understand that the situation that they found themselves in was likely far more dangerous than they had originally thought.


    This couldn''t be med too much on the two of them, as they were still rather inexperiencedpared to these wandering cultivators and had failed to consider their current location and the rest of the demon beasts that would have been drawn towards the battle taking ce not too far away from them.


    Although, being able to secretly listen in on the conversations between the wandering cultivators as they openly began discussing their situation and how to safely leave the mountain range, Chun Hua and Qing Yi soon enough realized the danger of their current situation.


    "Huh? Where is this? W-what happened?"


    Just as the two of them were feeling troubled over what to do and how to safely leave the mountain range, their senior brother slowly woke up with a somewhat bewildered expression on his face as he slowly took in what was happening around him.


    "Senior Brother!" "Chu Yang!"


    In response to their senior brother waking up suddenly, Qing Yi and Chun Hua was at first confused before realizing that he had most likely been stimted by the chaotic situation taking ce around him.


    Even though he had only managed to sleep for a few hours inside the cloud while they had been preparing to leave the mystic realm, thanks to Chun Hua''s help, he had at least managed to recover enough to move around a bit. Especially so now that he was outside the mystic realm, he could float with the help of his domain.


    Of course, given that he was still in an injured state and had no strength left so to speak of, he could at most keep himself floating around at a speedparable to a mortal walking around.


    Not to mention, he had in a sense forcefully awakened due to sensing the danger around him and would soon end up falling unconscious again. Even then, his awakening was something that made both Qing Yi and Chun Hua overjoyed, as this senior brother was far more experienced than the two of them when it came to handling this kind of difficult situation.


    "I see¡­ Quite the deadly situation we find ourselves in. Although, there is a rather simple way for us to get out of this situation¡­"


    And unsurprisingly, after hearing about the current state of things from Qing Yi and Chun Hua, Chu Yang didn''t take long to grasp the danger of the situation and at the same time find a way for them to get out of their current situation. @@novelbin@@


    That solution being¡­


    "Let''s just call master for help, I have amunication talisman with me that is able to reach him, he told me to use it whenever I find myself in a situation I can''t handle on my own."


    ""¡­""


    Calling their master for help, a rather unexpected solution to both Qing Yi and Chun Hua, as both of them had clearly been expecting something different from their senior brother.


    "What? I''m not some omniscient being capable of guiding us through such a deadly situation with little to no time to prepare. Instead of that, isn''t it better to just ask master for help?"


    Feeling the gazes of his two fellow disciples, Chu Yang could not help frowning as he said this to the two of them. Clearly exining that he had no idea how to get out of the current situation with relying on their master''s help.


    "Fine¡­ I will contact master for help then¡­"


    Unable to say anything in response, as they really had no idea how to get out of their current situation by themselves, Qing Yi ended up being the one to step forward and take themunication talisman from Chu Yang before the person in question gave her a somewhat triumphant smirk before fainting again. Clearly not wanting to be the person who had to contact their master and ask for help.


    Not even giving her the time to ask him why he hadn''t used thismunication talisman to ask their master for help before they had shown up to save him.

 Chapter 1553 Failed Search Through the Inner Region

    Chapter 1553 Failed Search Through the Inner Region


    A few hours before Qing Yi ended up calling her master for help and she and Chun Hua had not yet managed to find Chu Yang, their master, Xuan Hao, was still in the process of searching through the inner region of the ancient ruins. Looking for the Dao Seed Realm wandering cultivators that had apparently entered the ancient ruins in search of opportunities to further advance their cultivation.


    So far, he had managed to find two of these Dao Seed Realm cultivators during his time wandering through the ancient ruins. s, one of the two Dao Seed Realm cultivators had already been dead when he found them, while the second one was a rather unsavory type that seemed more interested in engaging in all sorts of immoral actions by himself in the depths of the ruins out of sight.


    To be honest, it had taken him everything in him to not end this person the moment he had spotted him. However, given that he wasn''t harming anyone and had even deliberately entered the depths of the ancient ruins to avoid others, Xuan Hao couldn''t bring himself to kill this fellow that seemed like a good person ording to the information he had managed to gather beforehand.


    Of course, that was outside of that unsavory behavior he had ended up witnessing.


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 Chapter 1554 Succesful Invitation

    Chapter 1554 Sesful Invitation


    Rumble-!


    ROOOAR!?


    Watching from afar as the n of the two wandering cultivators yed out perfectly over the next few minutes, Xuan Hao felt a sense of dread welling up inside of him upon witnessing the demon beast in the Middle Stage of the Dao Seed Realm getting instantaneously killed by the offensive formation without any chance to fight back.


    The power of the ancient offensive formation was not just powerful enough to make him feel a profound sense of fear but also gave of a feeling that it was unavoidable once activated, a feeling he hadn''t even felt when faced with someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm.


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 Chapter 1557 Potential Escape Path

    Chapter 1557 Potential Escape Path


    At this time, knowing that they had no way to escape, the wandering cultivators were all starting to grow be increasingly desperate as they felt the battle in front growing closer to them and the Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts observing them from behind preventing any escape from the approaching battle.


    Unlike them, they didn''t have any kind of backing and had no one to rely on for help in their current situation. Making them far more terrified of their current situationpared to Qing Yi, Chun Hua and Chu Yang, who had the knowledge of their mastering to help them to help them remain calm.


    "Howe those three are still able to remain calm in this kind of situation?"


    "I don''t know¡­ Maybe they have something to rely on?"


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 Chapter 1559 A-A-Another One!?

    Chapter 1559 A-A-Another One!?


    Knowing that it would be best for him to get his disciples- or more specifically Chu Yang, back to the sect as fast as possible, Xuan Hao didn''t take long before arriving above the mountain range separating one section of the old Sky Empire from the Northern Central Region. Directly using his connection to thest defensive measure still left with Chu Yang to home in on his location with his divine sense.


    Almost instantly discovering the current predicament that his disciples found themselves in, as they were pinned between a group of wandering cultivators and Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts on one side, while the other had a battle between a human cultivator and a demon beast both in the Sixth Tribtion of the Soul Ascension Realm closing in on their location.


    Even if they might have wanted to try and hide away underground to avoid the effects of the battle, the sheer destruction caused by two beings at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm fighting with their life on the line was not something that was easy to avoid. Especially considering the strongest among his disciples had only just broken through to the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord¡­ And that did not even mention his current half dead state where he could at most keep himself floating to move around a bit.


    If the demon beasts or the battle did end up threatening Chu Yang enough for the power he had left to protect him to activate, it might kill off the two Peak Soul Ascension Realm beings shing fighting each other, but it wouldn''t be able to kill the countless demon beasts that had swarmed to the area due to the disturbance that the fight had caused.


    Meaning that even with the two main culprits for his disciples'' current deadly situation ended up dying, they would still be left with no way out of their current situation due to the countless demon beasts that had swarmed to the area.


    If Chu Yang had his full strength, maybe, but for now, he could barely float, let alone fight fend off the Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts they would have to deal with when trying to escape from their current predicament.


    "How truly unlucky, but I guess this danger should be rted to the opportunity that Chu Yang managed to find that helped him reach the Initial Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm." Muttering this to himself as he shook his head with a somewhat wry smile, Xuan Hao took a step forward as he used the Drifting Cloud Steps to teleport to the current location of his three disciples.


    Whoosh~


    "Huh?" " Wha-!?" "Who!?"


    Catching all three of them byplete surprise, as he essentially just appeared in front of them from seemingly nowhere.


    """Master!"""


    Of course, this didn''tst for long as they quickly recognized the person that had appeared in front of them, causing all three of them to shout out excitedly at the appearance of their master. Finally feeling a sense of security after having been stuck in a deadly situation for the past few hours or in Chu Yang''s case, the past few weeks.


    "Huh? Someone appeared beside those three!"


    "Someone appeared? Did their senior perhaps show up to save them?"


    "Their senior!? Isn''t this the opportunity we have been waiting for!? Everyone! Get ready to move whenever that senior of theirs tries to leave with those, we will look for an opening to try and escape through as well when the time is right!"


    Also seeing Xuan Hao now standing beside the three troublemakers who they rightfully med for their current life and death situation, the wandering cultivators took only a few seconds before they all stood at the ready, their full attention focused on Xuan Hao as they waited for him to make a move that would give them an opportunity to escape from the mountain range. All of them understood that this might be their only chance to get out of their current situation alive.


    So eager¡­


    Noticing this as well, Xuan Hao could not help silently chuckling to himself.


    Although he had no idea about who these wandering cultivators were nor what kind of rtionship his disciples had with them, he was clear that they just wanted to get out of their current situation alive¡­ And if something serious had really taken ce between them and his disciples, they would have undoubtedly mentioned it.


    So, with that in mind, Xuan Hao decided to just ignore them as he instead focused his attention towards the two Peak Soul Ascension Realm beings fighting each other to the death no more than a few kilometers from where he was standing.


    One was a demon beast in the shape of a massive turtle the size of a small hill, while the other was a female cultivator moving with elegance and graze as she fought the farrger opponent.


    From a nce, it was clear that the turtle demon beast was on the loosing side, as it was covered in blood and had countless cracks all over its shell. Looking like it was going to break at any moment and spell the end for the turtle that relied entirely on its powerful defense to got up against the female cultivator.


    Impressive¡­ It looks like she isn''t just at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm, but about to reach the Dao seed Realm! Hm? Perhaps she wants to use this turtle to refine herself before attempting a breakthrough¡­?


    Thinking this to himself as he looked at the female cultivator who seemed almost effortless in her fight against the turtle demon beast, Xuan Hao easily saw through her actual state.


    Not to mention easily dealing with the situation, she wasn''t much better than the turtle demon beast on the inside. Having clearly used everything she had in this fight to breakthrough to the Dao Seed Realm.


    In a sense, her calm andposed outward image was also something that was carefully crafted and took up a lot of strength to maintain, something that had been the sole reason why she had been able to continue the fight with the turtle demon beast for as long as she had.


    After all, if she showed a simr state of weakness like the turtle demon beast was currently doing, the Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts surrounding the two of them would have long since jumped at the opportunity to kill the two while they were severely weakened.


    The fact that she showed no sign of exhaustion caused the Soul Ascension Realm demon beasts to hesitate on going in to face someone at the Peak of the Soul Ascension Realm.


    No matter how many of them were around, they were smart enough to understand that the first one of them to step forward would be the one to bear the brunt of the retaliatory response of the female cultivator, something that none of them wanted to do.


    Getting a general idea about the stalemate in ce, Xuan Hao could not help smiling a bit to himself with a hint of admiration towards the female cultivator still fully focused on her battle not far away from him.


    Even though her method of trying to and forcibly stimte herself before taking on the final seventh tribtion to reach the Dao Seed Realm was incredibly risky, it did carry the clear benefits of helping refine her state of mind in a rather unique manner that seemed to be rather fitting when it came to his second disciple''s style of cultivation.


    Of course, there was still the matter of how she nned on escaping after finishing her battle with turtle demon beast, but he guessed that she already had something nned before havinge.


    With all of this in mind, Xuan Hao decided against his first idea that involved killing the turtle demon beast, as doing this would interfere with the female cultivator''s breakthrough to the Dao Seed Realm, something that he didn''t want to happen as his brain was still in recruitment mode and saw her as yet another powerful elder for the sect if she managed to sessfully break through to the Dao Seed Realm.


    As for where or not she was already part of a major power? Xuan Hao didn''t concern himself with these kinds of thoughts as someone from a major power wouldn''t be engaging in this kind of desperate and dangerous attempt to increase their chances of breaking through to the Dao Seed Realm.


    Even if they did so, they would at the very least have a senior guarding them and preventing anyone from showing up to disturb the battle, something that had clearly not happened. Not to mention anyone above the Soul Ascension Realm even being present within the scope of his divine sense.


    Unless, of course, there was someone capable of hiding from his divine sense¡­ But¡­ With the strength of his divine sense, even someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm would find it difficult to hide from him. Making it even less likely that she had a senior secretly watching over her from the shadows¡­@@novelbin@@

 Chapter 1562 Buying Time

    Chapter 1562 Buying Time


    Feeling the demon beasts slowly moving closer to her, the female cultivator didn''t feel the slightest bit rxed. Understanding that only when the talisman finished fully activating would she truly be able to escape safely. At the very least, the slow approach of the demon beasts only served to reassure her that her n of pretending to not have been weakened in the slightest during her battle had worked perfectly.


    Rooar-!


    Unfortunately, as she had to remain stationary while the teleportation talisman activated, one of the demon beasts seemed to have grown suspicious of her actual condition. Starting to approach a bit faster than the rest of the demon beast to seize the dead body of the turtle demon beast faster than the other demon beasts.


    ROooaaarrR-!


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 Chapter 1564 Meeting the Ancestor From the Blue Sea Empire Again

    Chapter 1564 Meeting the Ancestor From the Blue Sea Empire Again


    "Hm? That is¡­"


    Just as he was thinking about possibly searching for more enemies of the Blue Sea Empire and recruiting them to join the sect, he suddenly sensed a terrifying presence rapidly approaching his current location at a speed far above that of someone in the Dao Seed Realm.


    Celestial Immortal Realm¡­ And familiar it feels familiar- The Celestial Immortal Realm Ancestor from the Blue Sea Empire that I ran into earlier!


    Realizing who it was that was approaching his current location almost immediately, he couldn''t react in time to turn around and escape together with his disciples and newest member of his sect before the divine sense of the other party washed over him. Making it meaningless for him to run away, as the other party clearly recognized his disciple and Zhao Ling.


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 Chapter 1567 Creating a New Path...?

    Chapter 1567 Creating a New Path...?


    Although it had seemed rather simple for him to fight Bai Shenyang, it had taken him everything he had. Especially so thest strike, he hadtterly poured in everything except a little bit of strength that was left in case he needed to flee should he end up losing thest sh with Bai Shenyang.


    Even then, it had been a valuable experience and gave him far more confidence when it came to facing someone in the Celestial Immortal Realm in the future. At least he now knew that he had the strength to fight and defeat someone in the Early Stage of the Celestial Immortal Realm if he used all his strength.


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 Chapter 1569 Catching up with Disciples

    Chapter 1569 Catching up with Disciples


    Leaving the mountain range and making his way back in the direction of the Star Shattering Sect, it didn''t take long before Xuan Hao discovered the true impact of his battle with Bai Shenyang.


    Not only had he ended up creating a new passage between the Northern Central Region and the outer regions of the northern region of the continent, but he had also destroyed no small number of cities and towns located at the edges of the mountain range.


    If there was anything positive, it would be that the people inside those cities and towns had mostly been cultivators and had been able to sense the terrifying fluctuation from the mountain range. Allowing them to escape before they ended up getting killed.


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 Chapter 1572 Minor Dao

    Chapter 1572 Minor Dao


    Given that old ancestor from the Zhang n had not yet fully moved his n into the territory of the Star Shattering Sect and was still in the process of doing so slowly. Prioritizing those from the younger generation, first along with a few elders chosen to guard these younger members during the journey, who now helped the Star Shattering Sect watch over the different spiritual fields, mines and other important locations in the chaotic region of the now fallen Sky Empire.


    For now, the only Dao Seed Realm cultivator currently present inside the Star Shattering Sect outside of Pei Yang, was Qin Hao. The Dao Seed Realm cultivator he had managed to recruit into the sect just before he had ended up from the Dragon Tooth Mountain City.


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 Chapter 1574 Going Back to the Second Star Peak

    Chapter 1574 Going Back to the Second Star Peak


    Having decided that the two Daos he would be focusing on were going to be the Dao of Ice and the Dao of the Sword, Xuan Hao didn''t return to his cultivation room after finishing his conversation with Qin Hao. Instead, he made his way up the Second Star Peak to find the rock filled with blue divine energy and hopefully make use of them once again to increase his ownprehension of the Dao of Ice.


    Hoping that he would have an easier time doing so now that his strength had broken through to the Late Stage of the Dao Domain Lord Realm.


    At the same time also hoping that he would be able to gain some more insights into the me imprint between his brows in the process.


    After all, at this point in time, the only thing he knew about the me imprint that had formed between his brow under the influence of the phoenix feathers he had managed to gather in the past, was that it contained some kind of independent space that could absorb the blue divine energy.


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 Chapter 1578 Refugees (2)

    Chapter 1578 Refugees (2)


    As the struggles between the weaker powers inside the Star Shattering Sect began to intensify with old ones trying to keep control of their territory, while newer powers tried establishing themselves, the Star Shattering Sect and therger powers under them, like the independent sects and the Iron Sky Kingdom, decided to step in and manage the situation before it grew out of control. Allocating the newer cultivation ns and families that sought to establish themselves inside the territory of the Star Shattering Sect in some of the more remote and less popted regions of the territory.


    Given that the sheer size of the Star Shattering Sect''s territory could already be considered massive, there was still more than enough emptynd left for people to settle on. The main problem with thisnd often being that it had not yet been cultivated or cleared of demon beasts. Making it a bit more challenging for the different weaker ns and families to establish themselves there.


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 Chapter 1580 Peng Yuns New Goal

    Chapter 1580 Peng Yun''s New Goal


    Forgetting his original objective of informing his friends about his breakthrough to the Domain Lord Realm, Peng Yun found himself wandering around the Star Shattering Sect with a somewhat lost expression on his face as he observed the current state of the sect. Surprised at the increased number of Domain Lord Realm cultivators that he saw wandering around the sect, but even more than the Domain Lord Realm cultivators, he was shocked at the Soul Ascension Realm cultivators that could now also be seen wandering around the sect.


    Not just one or two, but he had at least seen a dozen Soul Ascension Realm cultivators during his short time moving from his secluded courtyard to the library of the sect, something that made him more and more certain that his secluded cultivation hadsted longer than the year he had first believed it to havested. After all, it was only if that was the case that he could understand why the overall strength of the sect had suddenly experienced such an increase in strength.


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